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

[liberalum]

Welcome to my world, [ he invites, remaining in his lean with only a glance her way, a twitch of a friendly smirk. ] We're all clever, here.

[ He returns his gaze to the little ocean of soldierly camaraderie below, hulking men and equally hulking women. There's a rift opened up near Redcliffe and so, bets are on, both as to what demons they'll find crawling out of the earth and who will kill what.

Dorian extends an index finger past his glass. ]

The little one. Two-blade wielding. I've seen her in the training grounds. If they'd have my money, I'd put it on her to make the first kill. There's always a demon skulking around the periphery that these other brutes hardly ever notice. What say you?

[ungovernable]

What say I?

( benevenuta laces her fingers around her glass as she leans companionably beside him, scrutinizing the great knot of muscle they see before them. even the little one has some size on her, she reflects, but from this distance and angle it's hard to tell if that's truly height or a trick of her shoulders. )

If not the first, then precisely the very last.

( not only, obviously. but she has the look of a woman who finishes a fight. benevenuta can get behind that. )

[liberalum]

[ Little is most certainly relative. Dorian doesn't only like Benevenuta because she makes him look tall, but it's among her many merits.

He muses; ]

Bringing up the rear. Equally important.

[ He lifts his glass to sip from, a wrinkle forming at the top of his nose at the expected coarseness. But it's fine. This is fine. ]

It's always barging right in with these ones. It's a wonder I have any time to fire off my own shots for all the barriers and dispulsions I find myself casting to keep them alive. Well, not them, [ he says, of Templars below ] but you know, sword sword, axe axe, lets try hitting the end of the world, see if that works.

[ungovernable]

But, Dorian, ( her eyes widening, her mouth a perfect o for just a moment, leaning in conspiratorial in her feigned earnestness (a good impression, but, then, of course it is)-- ) however shall we know it doesn't work if not for trying?

Have you tried hitting the end of the world with a sword? For you'll have no shortage of volunteers.

( she manages not to grimace at her drink in mirror only because she's too amused by herself. )

[liberalum]

[ If a pair of drunk mages can't find themselves entertaining, then who will. Dorian leans in indulgently during her conspirational earnestess, righting himself with an easy sway once it's done, a smile barely tickling the corners of his mouth. ]

I suppose the swords can be forgiven. They don't get possessed by demons half so regularly.

[ Dry. Very dry. As dry as this West Hill straw-tasting liquor. ]

[ungovernable]

Perhaps if the swords were taught fear and self-hatred as skillfully, their wielders would have more trouble,

( is a remark it's probably best they're too far away from the objects of their current fascination to let carry. the ambient sound of the tavern is less than it was, before the evening deepened and soured the mood of the room along with it, but still just enough to let her get away with a hint of provocation unintended for ears that will be provoked. )