faderift | Skyhold

Skyhold

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.

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[It was impossible to ignore the atmosphere around Skyhold. The loss of the Herald was a profound thing that could be felt by everyone, especially with the uncertain future looming close by. The Breach may be sealed, but there were still rifts everywhere, not to mention...

The guilt claws at him again, the possibility of what could have changed if he didn't keep all the other parts of him a secret. Maybe he could have helped but--no. He'd probably only bring more pain than comfort. That's all he's ever managed to accomplish with that. Being like this, not touching all those other parts--its safer that way.]

Hard not to imagine anybody not being afraid. [Of the future, of dying, of so many unknown things. Never knowing was always terrifying.] But everyone's just focusing on getting better now... after that, I suppose there will be questions.

[Like what will happen to the Inquisition, and how they will deal with the rifts. And for Bruce himself, how many more people will be injured and hurt. It would be a lie to say there wouldn't be any.]

[Questions like where will I go, what am I.

Why am I alive.]

Templars everywhere, surrounding and shouting. All dead, Maker no, take him to the Knight-Commander.

Why have I lived to see this? I shouldn't have survived.

[The words make Bruce pause. It has his entire mind pausing, because that came from absolutely nowhere, and the words themselves--

Bruce feels every part of him freezing up, the sudden fear leaping up his throat. He was probably being paranoid, there was no way it could be what he thought it was, but.]

What? [It's all he can say, staring right at the strange boy this time round. It couldn't be, there was no way, but. But that didn't help to alleviate the growing uncertainty inside of him, and how the words all too easily bring up flashes of memory he'd rather not recall.]

[He senses how everything halts, then comes screaming and jittering back, flashes and scraps of memory. So many tears, barely patched over.]

You had questions. You were afraid. You still are.

[He looks up. Wide blue eyes behind a curtain of pale blonde hair.]

Waiting for something... the right words to give you peace.

[He tilts his head. Listening for another second... but then he shakes his head.]

Too tangled and tight, locked up, bound in the blood. I — don't know what to say.

[That last statement sounds... concerned. But more like the beginning of something than a final conclusion. This will take some time.]

[With everything he's went through there are few things now that can actively spook Bruce, but this? This is most definitely one of them. The words hit too close to the things he wants to keep hidden, even as convoluted as they are. But that doesn't matter because the meaning--the meaning is all too clear to him. He can't shut his eyes and close his ears to pretend he doesn't know what the strange boy is getting at. He knows. He knows all too well.

Unconsciously Bruce takes a step back away, uncertain and unsure, his breaths quickening despite himself. There's a dull roar at the back of his mind but Bruce quickly suppresses it. A few words shouldn't scare him this much, but what if--what if.]

You-- [He starts, stops, trying to find the words as his mind struggles to keep himself steady. Control. He needs to have his control. He lathes onto that desperately inside as he struggles out his question.] --what are you?

[There's no way a mage could do any of that, not to his knowledge. And what 'that' is, not even Bruce can quite understand. Reading minds? Seeing into his past? Bruce can't be sure at all, but whatever 'that' is--its clearly not in his favor.]

[He sits back, folding his elbows over his knees, still looking up.]

I'm Cole.

[And you're dangerous. He can't tell how just yet, but he can feel the danger underneath, like a wind howling through a deep cave. He knows the man can feel it too — it's why he answers so slowly, listens to his heartbeat, breathes calm into himself.

Dangerous things are not all bad — especially when they know they are.

He looks down again after a pause. Glances sideways, to the nearest cluster of people.]

They can't hear us. Can't see. If they ever notice, their eyes slip away.

You were in a Circle. You know about spirits.

[The answer isn't really much of an answer at all, but then again pretty much everything about this raises more questions than answers.

He follows the boy's - Cole's - gaze to the people nearby, watching them going on with their own things as if they haven't noticed both of them. And that seems to be the case, what with the words that Cole says next.

Bruce slowly turns his gaze back to Cole, hands curling into fists, taking another few more deep breaths to keep himself in control. Whatever this... Cole was, at least it doesn't seem like he was going to raise any kind of alarm over what he knew (or pried from his mind; it didn't really matter now, he supposed). That was a start, if anything.]

Anyone who goes through them is taught about them. [He says, slowly and carefully. As much as his answer is true, he has also branched out quite a bit since then, due to his research and later on, with his condition.

He stares at Cole some more, trying to understand, to know, to find answers. Just what was he, to speak of all this, to... Bruce needs answers, and he'd rather have them soon than later.]

Voices beyond the Veil, drawing dreams, shaping the sights in the Fade.

I'm like them. Except I'm different, because I'm here.

[Bruce frowns, processing the words, trying to make sense of them. Beyond the Veil... if it means what he thinks it means, then--]

You're-- [He starts slowly, not wanting to draw any immediate conclusions until he knows for sure. Bruce likes being sure of things before he speaks them aloud. Not knowing is more terrifying than exciting.] --from the Fade?

[Pause. 'From the Fade'...]

Are you a demon?

[But it didn't look anything like a usual demon--was it possessing a body, then? That made the most sense, but it didn't feel quite right. There was something missing in this puzzle.]

Demons hurt people. I don't want to be like that. I want to help.

[His hand brushes against the hand of the man — the body of the man — lying between them. It's starting to go cold. Sometimes helping means pushing back against the pain. Sometimes it means letting go. He's only just starting to see the difference, but he's been learning.]

The elvhen mage — Solas — he understands... She could have explained it, too. I found and followed her from the fortress where the Templars were hiding. I came back with the ones She saved. She was bright, glimmering, glowing through the darkness...

[When he speaks about her, his voice takes on a tone of reverence, adoration. A quiet intensity, like a person in prayer.

Then, it all sags out of him.]

But... She's not here anymore. The sky closed, and the shine scattered. The light all went away.

[Bruce can't help but take a good part of Cole's words with a fair hint of suspicion. He said he didn't want to be a demon, but that meant he wasn't exactly denying it either. So, was he a demon that wanted to... help?

That's--Bruce doesn't know what to make of that. It's so hard to believe that when his life had all been ruined by something so similar but yet vastly different at the same time. The irony, of course, is noted.

But the part about her - the Herald, he assumes from what he (whatever Cole was) - has Bruce sympathizing a little. No matter what, losing somebody who could understand you when the rest of Thedas wouldn't... that was a feeling he could relate too all very well. So despite his ever-growing uncertainty about this Cole, the fear he has of Cole talking about his secret out loud, the paranoia that everyone else will see this and know--Bruce continues to speak.]

I--I'm sorry. [He says, because its the best thing he can manage right now, with how much his mind whirls at the moment.] She... deserved better. [Her life had ended all too soon, all too quickly. In the short time where she had been known to all she had brought hope, in some form or another. And to lose that hope - he knows that feeling well too, from his own personal experiences.]

[Of course, not all hope is lost. If it were, none of them would be here. Hopelessness scatters people to the winds, makes them cut the bonds that tie them together. The feeling around Skyhold may be mournful, desperate, but it is not fully despairing. A scrap of faith still remains.]

The Inquisition is still an idea. People still want it to mean something. Something like what She wanted. I think that matters. At least, it would be good if it did.

It's — hard thinking about the future. Everything starts getting slippery.

[Bruce certainly hopes that something will still continue. The Inquisition has done good, in the time that its been around, and in times like these a group such as them will truly be beneficial. Hope is what people out there needs most, now.]

The future is always hard to think about. [Because of how uncertain it is. Bruce knows that, because he faces that everyday. Every night wondering what tomorrow will bring. Wondering how long it takes until he has to leave this place. When he will ever find a place that he can actually stay.

The last, he knows, will probably never happen.]

[Ah — and there's something. It won't make everything better — the man's troubles are too deep-set to be patched up with a few words — but it may help a little.]

So many here just want somewhere to belong. Holding out hands, huddling against the cold. They need us to reach out, too. I can brush and be forgotten, leave the warmth without the memory. But people are different. Sometimes, holding means being held.

[There's a beat, a short one, and Cole looks to one side — this time, toward the stairs that lead up to the upper courtyard.]

I should go. There's so much to do...

[Then, he's gone. It's hard to say how it happens: he doesn't wink away from sight, nor does he fade away. It's more like... something slips, and then he simply isn't there.

Bruce will find, in the following days, that his memory of the conversation is a bit slippery as well. Cloudy. As if he's recalling something from a dream. He may have to assertively remind himself that it wasn't one. But he will remember.]

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Skyhold

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