faderift | 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.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Those words mean nothing to Pel.]

Tal-Vashoth? [She sits on the edge of the well and looks up at him, two feet above her.]

[Right. Forest child.]

A qunari who left the Qun. Like a Dalish who decided they didn't believe in Dalish gods and left their clan.

More like a dwarf coming to the surface. [She has encountered a few surface dwarves. Traders.] Our gods left us a long time ago. But I think I see. What makes a qunari leave the qun?

That's a better analogy.

[He shrugs a bit, however.]

It's different for different people. Sometimes the philosophy just doesn't agree with you.

Edited 2015-10-19 18:55 (UTC)

[She nods, recognizing the boundary and steering away from it.]

Why've you come to the Inquisition? I mean--what will you do here?

Edited 2015-10-19 19:16 (UTC)

I technically didn't join. I came here as a bodyguard for a noble, but he left with an Inquisition escort and stranded me here.

[He shrugs, large shoulders rolling and making the painted vitaar stretch and crack. It was getting old and flaky.]

So I'm just hanging out until I can get a new contract.

[Something gets a little colder in her. She breaks eye contact and looks at her hands, picking at the chapped parts. Should have known better than to start getting attached.]

I imagine they'd contract you here, [she says idly, without getting her hopes up.]

Careful. You're gonna get those hands infected. Put some ram fat on them.

[Since she's looking down he can't read her lips, so the last part is not replied to.]

[She looks up at him, faintly irritated and stern even as she is surprised by his concern.]

Did you hear me? [A matter of wondering if he was willfully ignoring her, or if she mumbled without hearing herself do it, rather than suspecting he is actually deaf.]

Edited 2015-10-20 00:13 (UTC)

No. [He admits, a wry smile on his lips.] I can't hear at all.

[Blink. Blink. A dubious look.]

Of course you can't. I imagined our entire conversation.

Edited 2015-10-20 00:24 (UTC)

[Spicy little thing.]

I'm reading your lips. If you look down like that, I can't.

[She stares for a bit, then glances away, not wanting to be completely savage in her manners. After a moment, she has...a problem with one corner of her mouth.]

Can you do that from across a room? Read someone's lips from far enough away that they wouldn't be suspicious?

[He catches most of that and chuckles.]

I can, as long as I can see their lips.

[A wicked grin.]

Elgar'nan. If you told that to the Inquisition, they'd pay you better than a lord.

Edited 2015-10-20 00:35 (UTC)

[He has no idea what that 'elga'-something was, but the rest is easily picked up on.]

Heh, I'm not exactly spy material.

[Taas straightens up at his full height, flexing a massive arm.]

You're perfect spy material. Get sent into a party as someone's bodyguard. Nobody would think twice about it. I'd even expect they'd underestimate you as hired muscle. But you needn't take my word for it. Tell someone here, and let the higher-ups decide. I guarantee you'll be well-paid either way.

[That...muscle-flex though. That is completely unfair of him. Stoic as she normally is, she can't stop the faint blush that comes to her cheeks.]

[Definitely adorable. He never really knew if he wanted to hug elves or toss them over his shoulder and run off.]

It's a thought. I suppose I could look into it.

If not, I'm sure they'd have other work for you, even as a soldier. Or else as a second opinion on the qunari. Cultural advisors.

[He snorts at that, amused.]

I was a soldier. Not much of a cultural expert.

You've a better perspective than someone who never lived under the qun, anyway. I'm saying there must be a number of reasons the Inquisition might like to keep you around, if you like.

I will have to think about it. It's been... some time since I didn't work alone.

I've never been in a place where I didn't have to worry about my clothes or bedding getting wet when it rained, or freezing to death in the winter. Though now I do have to worry about getting assaulted by drunk humans on the way to bed. It's a new world for all of us.

[He frowns at that. It was not a pleasing thought to imagine her accosted by anyone.]

See it as a standing invitation to you and any other elf to call me your lover if anyone creeps on you. It should shut them up real quick.

[Her face briefly brightens.]

That would. [A faint blush.] Especially if it were true.

[That's as blatant as she gets. Actually, that is uncharacteristically forward for her.]

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