Skyhold

[faderifting]

WHO: Anyone & everyone
WHAT: Open post for business as usual around Skyhold
WHEN: The first couple weeks of Harvestmere, 9:41 (aka October)
WHERE: Skyhold
NOTES: Please mark any necessary content warnings in thread subject lines. Also, make sure to check out the other log posts already made!

Far from the glamorous adventurous world-saving people signed up for, most of the hustle and bustle in Skyhold at present is cleaning. The Great Hall is a disaster, and crews are assigned to haul out the cracked and rotting planks fallen from the wide-open roof, and tear down the vines covering the walls. Ivy encrusts the main staircase outside and many of the fortress walls and is cleared in section while other groups assess or begin shoring up the stonework as it's revealed. There are scaffolding to build, materials to sort, crates to unload, tents to stitch together or set-up, and on and on and on, endless mundane chores vital to the survival of the organization.

When not hard at work, people cluster around fires across the courtyards. Many mingle freely, going about their business, running errands and messages, planning scouting missions, tallying up supplies, distributing or playing with the sending crystals that were found in a basement vault and which a group of mages have just today finished preparing for use. Once a good number have been passed around and the first Inquisition-wide transmission made messages start being broadcast; maybe you can help someone out.

The rebel mages and renegade templars mainly keep to themselves at opposite sides of the complex given the choice. Mages assist with healing and research and bicker amongst themselves about their options and their fate. Templars help train recruits in swordforms and basic combat techniques or spar with the more advanced and bicker amongst themselves about their options and their fate. Despite having all pledged themselves to the Inquisition, they still feel like separate factions and tension between them is palpable wherever they cross paths.

Like at meals, or the communal message board in the courtyard, or at the Herald's Rest. The mess hall/tavern is so new it still smells of sawdust, and its stock has been limited to one type of strong ale until today, when a shipment of West Hill brandy has finally arrived. The mood in the place is convivial in celebration of that, but there's still plenty of muttering, especially as the night drags on and the discontented get further into their cups.

Comments

[mythalenaste]

Pel is good at busywork. She spends most of these days up to her elbows in grime, a bit too petite to help with a lot of the carrying and lifting but the perfect size for scrubbing in tight spaces. Her hair is braided tightly back and out of the way, nails blunt and broken and peeling, dust and dirt streaked over freckles and all over her clothes.

You can find her here, scowling at the cracks between stones.

You can also find her darting up a flight of stairs, waving dust out of the air in front of her and declaring, "More books dowdstairs!" and coughing.

At night, she is exhausted. After washing the keep she washes herself and usually goes straight to bed.

Other nights, she takes a drop-spindle or a bit of knitting into the Herald's Rest, sets somewhere relatively still, and works on her project while the chaos happens around her. She seldom engages anyone, but can occasionally be spotted smiling privately at a joke, or a song, or a story.

[samahl]

It's one of the nights that she's knitting that he comes over to her and sits near where she is. He's grinning as he settles next to her easily, moving a chair so that he's in her space.

"Need any help, lethallan?" he asks by way of greeting. A little too informal, but he's gotten used to the idea that she's no longer the First and can be his cousin, and, more importantly, his friend.

[mythalenaste]

"Mm-mn." Even more informal. That's been one benefit of leaving the clan. She can just slump against him a bit, touching shoulders, enjoying his company. When she gets to the end of a row, she puts the project down in her lap so she can address him.

"What about you? Everything all right?"

[samahl]

"Well enough," he replies but in truth it's so much more than that. He feels better than he has in a long time, but admitting that somehow seems like it's be against the Clan.

[mythalenaste]

"Making new friends?" Really, there's no surprise at all. Cyril has a way with humans.

[samahl]

"Oh yes," Cyril replied. "What about you? Let me guess, you're too distracted by work to consider it?" He says this with a soft tease in his voice, as he can't help but be slightly admired by her dedication.

[mythalenaste]

A faint smile. "Accidents happen even to me."

[samahl]

"Oh? Now you have to share," Cyril replies, grinning a bit as he shifts to make the affection they are showing one another more comfortable.

[mythalenaste]

"Not your kind of friend, Cyril. Regular friends. For friendships where nobody sleeps with each other."

[samahl]

"What?" Cyril asked, making an obvious show of pretending to be offended. "I have plenty of those."

[mythalenaste]

"Phh," Pel huffs, settling against him more comfortably. He makes a great backrest. "The friends you're planning to sleep with but haven't yet don't count."

[samahl]

"No," Cyril replies easily. He shifts an arm around her without getting in the way of her work if she still wants to keep at it. "The women."

[mythalenaste]

"You notice women?" She's teasing. She knows he has female friends.

[liberalum]

[ He remembers: shelving as tall as Skyhold itself, elegant marble-tiled balconies and oak ladders, tall windows of crystal that seemed to amplify the golden northern sun brilliant enough to read by and all hours of the day. Research assistants ready to be of service and plush alcoves and wine by the pitcher, lion-skin rugs and fountains and of course, books in their thousands, scrolls in their hundreds, fine golden-flecked parchment and quills of peacock feathers. The Tevinter Imperium had decadent taste even when it came to their libraries.

So this place -- wooden and dusty and cramped and cold -- is a bit of a downgrade.

But Dorian has been among those dedicated in the cataloguing and storing and sorting of books, which could be unkindly dismissed as an effort to get out of rougher work, but he's been as helpful and knowledgeable as anyone. It is a well deserved break, then, that has him seated in an armchair nearest the cleanest window, feet up, fingers pinching the bridge of his nose as he gathers mental fortitude against the dust in the air and the urge to sneeze, forever, constantly.

Then there's the sound of light foot steps up the noisy staircase, and someone shouting and coughing, something about news of even more books. There is mainly a light groan from Dorian's corner.

Give him a second. ]

[mythalenaste]

[Are shems just lazy? How do they get work done? Pel hasn't sat down in hours, and she's not about to start now. She heads toward the person groaning and reaches out to take his hand and help him up.]

Come on. The sooner it's done, the sooner we can get around to our proper jobs. [She says like that's an encouraging thing.] The unfortunate thing about sitting down while you're working is that it makes it hard to get up again.

[liberalum]

[ Shems might be pretty lazy, although Dorian might object to his work ethic or any other quality of himself representing the entirety of the human race. He hardly notices her presence until she is right there and reaching out to take his hand in a gesture that's probably matter of fact, but strikes him as more familiar than the behaviour fitting her unmarked, obsequious Tevinter counterparts.

Strikes him only after the fact, anyway, as she has the element of surprise. His fingers splay in protest, but he remains seated in irreverent resistance, angling a look up at her the tiny Dalish. ]

You don't mean to imply there's more to the Inquisition than alphabetising the literary cast offs of every apple-polishing noble this side of Thedas, do you? Ridiculous.

[mythalenaste]

[A half-stifled smile, in spite of herself. She gives up his hand and folds her arms.]

You could be setting up tents or scrubbing mildew off the walls, or hauling stones a hundred feet up in the air.

[liberalum]

Oh. Those proper jobs. Silly me.

[ Please. ]

I shan't delay another moment, [ he says, without immediately moving. ] Although I feel the urge to point out that my expertise is better applied to aforementioned literary cast offs and making any discernible sense of them, than it is dusting out the cobwebs or scrubbing down the windows.

[ Placing his hands on the chair's arms, he levers himself up onto his feet to go and make good on this claim.

Dry; ]

My tutors, they never covered mildew at any point.

[mythalenaste]

And my expertise is better applied to elven lore and runes and magic, but this is the job that needs to be done.

[She starts leading him down the stairs.]

[liberalum]

[ Dorian follows, obliged, although he manages to make this into a wander as he steps light-footed down the stairs after her, as if only following direction incidentally. ]

I'd wager that most recruits fit to wash floors and erect tents don't know altogether very much about elven lore and runes. I'd wager again that elven lore and runes will come in better use to the higher functions of the Inquisition than cosmetics to our stronghold, necessary or not.

But I'll see to the books, naturally. I'm good at books, enough to consider them a part of my proper job.

[mythalenaste]

In time. I was Keeper's First with my clan, and that involved trimming old Anan's toenails as often as it involved spells or leadership. Whatever job needs doing.

Were you a...? [She stops, realizing she doesn't know the term for it.] A...historian, perhaps?

[liberalum]

[ Even if Pel had not slipped in a question after that, the first part might have, for once, rendered Dorian with no immediate quip or rebuttal. He doesn't know the first thing about the Dalish enough to keep up.

He rounds on the books she reported, hands on hips in cursory downwards study before any heavy lifting commences. ]

A great number of things, [ he says. ] I was an Enchanter of the Minrathous Circle of Magi for a time, and after that-- I suppose I was a research assistant. My speciality was and remains complex theoretical magic, but when it comes to magic, history always looms over the present.

So, almost, yes. You'll have to forgive my own woeful ignorance as to what being a Keeper's First entails, beyond pedicures. There aren't any-- Dalish, northwards.

[ He says 'Dalish' like he's only 98% sure it's the right word to use. As well as delicately picking around the circumstances of his ignorance to begin with. ]

[mythalenaste]

[A smile creeps over her face. She suddenly became more interested in this person.]

Complex magic theory? The nature of the Beyond, the Fade, things like that?

[liberalum]

One cannot engage in complex magical theory without engaging with the Fade, [ he points out, but seems to warm at her fixation, and her swanning past the veritable minefield that could instead be a Tevinter nobleman speaking to a Dalish mage. ] But special emphasis goes to the word 'theory', at least for the last few years. Studying magical effects thought impossible -- time magic, for example.

[ He ducks down, perusing the books at first to see if where's any rubbish they can leave down here rather than hauling it all upstairs. They all seem fine (unfortunately). ]

Prior to that, I taught the practical application of higher tier spellwork in combat magics. In other words, teaching novices to fight better than simply flinging about fire and exhausting themselves.

Otherwise, I dabble.

[mythalenaste]

We might be working together. [Her geek's heart skips a beat as he speaks. The words start coming on their own.] The trouble with the Dalish is we've only really kept our own history since the days of Halamshiral. Before that, our history is tangled up with Tevinter. I would hope there...could be some manner of cross-pollination, when Elvhenan was conquered. Snatches of magic lore appropriated by Tevinter, the way the words of a language sometimes are.

[And now she's talked a lot and probably sounds completely crazy.]

But...either way, whatever is found, I want to learn more about the ancient magics, Tevinter or elvhen. To bring back to the Dalish. We've lost so much.