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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Gorse grinned at the sight of Korrin, pleased as punch to see a familiar face.

"I'd be very much appreciative. Thank you kindly." stowing his lists back into his pack for safekeeping, Gorse cheerfully followed along with the other Vashoth to see where the mage tower was. Of course, she would know. "I imagine it seems like it ain't helping much because it's helping so much we can keep finding other ways for it to help, you think?"

Chronic optimist, this one was.

That makes her chuckle. Yep, he's still as she remembers him, not that it's been very long since that last time. Korrin leads the way, past the tents holding refugees and wounded. "I suppose you can look at it that way. I'm not saying it's noting, but I suppose I am getting restless. This is the longest I've been somewhere that didn't involve the typical mercenary jobs. That will change soon enough, though."

Hence one more reason why she isn't going anywhere without her staff, even in Skyhold. Haven's still too fresh in her mind and she can't relax anywhere, even in a place far more secure than that isolated town. "So how is it out there? Where did you go this time?"

"Nowhere too wild, just 'round the Hinterlands." Gorse said, opening his pack to show it filled with the standards of elfroot, spindleweed and blood lotus as well as no small amount of royal elfroot and crystal grace among other sundry herbs. He sighed, clicking his tongue a bit. "Still lotta fighting going on seems like, but others said it was mostly cleanup. Kinda glad I missed the worst of the fighting in that case."

That's...quite a lot of herbs. Korrin's eyebrows raise briefly, reminded that she ought to replenish her own at some point. Potions are something she's always running short of, thanks to stubbornly charging on even when she shouldn't.

"I'm glad you missed it too. You're not exactly a combatant, after all." A fact which is endlessly puzzling to her. "Some of those can't have grown in safe places, from what I remember. If you need some backup, just say so. I think I've fixed or moved most of what's needed it, so at this point I'm pretty much waiting for the next assignment."

"Aw, it ain't so bad. Bears are just big softies and need their space is all." Gorse said with an easy confidence. Bears, high cliffs, environmental hazards he could handle easily.

The people, that was the hard one to deal with. Desperate bandits unwilling to be reasoned with. Gorse still tried, though.

Probably good he hadn't headed out on his own, really.

"If you got the time though I'd love the company next time I get sent out. More the merrier."

That comment about bears just gets an incredulous laugh from Korrin, as she leads the way through the courtyard and up the steps past the tavern.

"Sure, though I should warn you; bears and I traditionally do not get along. I'd be glad to give them their space, but somehow they seem to think it's the whole of the Hinterlands when I'm around. And they always bring friends. I swear the Breach drove them mad, or all the demons."

Gorse hadn't been this way before so he looks around as they walk, trying to figure how to easily find it again, adding it to the mental map he's got going of Skyhold in progress.

"Well, animals are real sensitive to that kinda thing, so that's actually possible?" The druffalo on the farm always seemed to just know when anything terrible was happening. The little the blight had affected his home had been warned early thanks to all the animals panicking before any darkspawn even showed.

Korrin nods thoughtfully, not having grown up on a farm or had pets but it makes sense enough to her. "You'd know better than I. That sounds plausible enough to me. I'd feel bad for them, but...well, better them than us. If anything's acting up, just let me deal with it."

She's not going to ask Gorse to take that on, when he seems to love everything. Besides, with her magic, taking on more than one at a time is not a problem.

"Only if we can't leave 'em be," Gorse said with a wary sort of agreement. He was hoping they could just fix the underlying problem that was driving the animals to violence like they were and the wolves and bears would go back to normal. It might be a pipe dream, but what's life without hope?

If it came down to a fight though, he would absolutely let Korrin handle it. If he had to they'd probably both end up dead.

And Korrin knows that, but she won't harass him about combat training...yet. Something else is on her mind, and she looks over to him thoughtfully. "You come across plenty of items on your excursions, right? Not just healing herbs and whatnot. I have a friend who's working on a...sewing project. If you find any extra cloth, I'm sure he'd appreciate having it passed on."

"Oh, sure. People get cloaks and tunics torn all the time! Gotta be careful around the brambles but I guess when you're in a rush a hole you can patch later don't really matter much. Anythin' in particular or just anythin' I can find?" Gorse offered cheerfully. There was also the occasional fennec or ram cut down for food that was found with cloth on it... sometimes random coins too. Those were weird, but there was surely a good reason for it. ~~The reason was the PCs need loot.~~

"Anything you can find, both as cover and for stuffing. I don't know if he has enough of the latter." If nothing else, they'd be great for future projects of Krem's. She pauses at the top of the stairs after making room for Gorse in order to enjoy the view for a moment. "I never get tired of seeing all this. We really traded up, didn't we?"

Who ever thought there'd be a random fortress in the middle of nowhere?

"You can count on me!" Gorse declared about the supplies for nugs, not that he knew what they were for. Gorse loved to help, he didn't need to know what they were for only that they would help someone, and he didn't do things halfway. Krem would have enough material for a small army of flying nugs by the time he was done.

As for the view...

"This must be how birds see the world. It's incredible."

Sighing wistfully, Korrin nods. "I can't say I'll want to be here all the time -too restless for that- but this is what I'll be looking forward to every time I come back."

Well, that and the tavern. She flashes a warm smile at Gorse. "Thanks for that. It's for a good cause, you'll see." And she reluctantly moves away from the view, so that she can continue leading the way.

"I figured it must be," Gorse said easily. Well, or a personal project that would make her happy, which was also a good cause as far as he was concerned. It didn't put him out any and had the possibility to make at least one person smile. Absolutely worth it.

"So THIS SIDE is the mages, and the other one's the Templars then?" he asked as they climbed, looking across the courtyard to the other tower.

"More or less? I don't stray close to the Templars on purpose, you know. They'd take one look at me and my staff and probably start going on about abominations and Harrowings and all that rot. As though I haven't proven myself competent by now."

Maybe the war between them and the mages is technically over, but Korrin sees no reason to trust them beyond what the Inquisition requires to keep going. There won't be hostilities from her, but she's not especially optimistic that the Templars will feel the same way. Still, at least there are more folk here interested in cooperating than making a bad situation worse.

Gorse thought many of them had to be more reasonable than that - they were just a courtyard away from the mages after all, and while everything wasn't cuddles and daisies, Skyhold had yet to be overtaken in one giant brawl.

He wasn't about to try to offer that thought up, though. Korrin had lived that life for quite a while, it was more realistic to assume that she knew better even of Gorse couldn't quite stamp down his own optimist.

"Giant hole in the sky, it really brings people together." he mused aloud instead.

That makes Korrin laugh, not unkindly, and she claps a hand on his arm. "You always do see the best in everyone and every situation, don't you? Hold onto that, for the world will do its best to try and take it away from you."

She sighs, hating to see anything dent his idealism, but at some point is was going to happen. Hopefully she can at least be there to help him through it, though with the world in the state of flux that it is, who knows if that's possible. She'll try, though.

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Skyhold

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