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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"I generally go by Varric," he responded automatically and turned. He was used to being approached by all kinds, big and small, law-abiding and otherwise, but even he was surprised to find a teenaged Qunari staring at him. Well, to be fair, he wasn't actually staring at him. "Unless you mean Bianca?"

He clearly meant Bianca and, if the way he was staring, all wide-eyed and curious, was any indication, the kid would probably like to see her up close. Varric wasn't one to hand Bianca off to anybody, but for a curious gangly Qunari? Yeah, he'd pull her out.

"Beautiful isn't she?" Varric asked as he drew the crossbow off his back. He hadn't been doing as much adventuring since they took up in Skyhold, so he'd had plenty of time to polish and detail Bianca until she was just like new. He was fairly proud of how she gleamed in the sunlight; showing her off was clearly not a chore.

He was about to protest that 'of course he meant the weapon', but he chokes it down. Kas was far too interested in knowing more than getting in trouble right now. Apparently his decision to not be a brat was rewarded, as the dwarf pulled out the contraption to show it off.

"Bianca?" Kas moves a bit closer, marveling over the shiny metal and polished wood. It looked like a double bow, but... huge and much more advanced. He was kind of impressed that the dwarf could cart it around like that.

"Where did you get something like that? It's amazing!" Blade in the front, strange springs... thick bolts. Deadly and fast. Probably good for a dwarf, they tended to not be as fast. Shorter legs and all that. "It looks like it could take down a dragon!"

"I bet she could--with a little help. I'm not quite as flame resistant as she is, after all," Varric said, almost eagerly. The wonder in the kid's eyes was delightful. Sure, people eye'd Bianca fairly regularly, but they were usually trying to figure out how to steal it or make another. It was refreshing to run into someone who just wanted to marvel at her in all her glory.

With a grin, and a subtle shift of his hand across several small mechanical parts, he released the safety catch on the weapon. Bianca whirred and the arms expanded with a truly impressive sound of metal snapping into place. He was glad he'd taken the time to clean and oil all the springs again, they were silent as death and that just made her all the more impressive.

"Bianca is absolutely one of a kind. Won her in a card game against the Empress of Orlais," Varric lied dramatically. It was a transparent exaggeration, but he was fond of spinning absurd tales about his crossbow. The actual story was too personal and, frankly, a little depressing, so he never shared it. "Celene was so pissed she had the schematics burned just to spite me."

"Whoaa..." Kas backs off a bit when the weapon starts springing out pieces and looking even cooler. The whirr and the snap and the little sound of something locking into something else... the teen is awestruck. (And also really good at keeping his fingers away, despite his curiosity.)

You didn't touch other people's weapons unless you wanted less fingers. Things you learned early in the streets, where a good shiv was the difference between life and death. His little rusty, sharpened metal shanks were like ants compared to a war horse like that crossbow.

He swallows all the lies easily, because why not? It sounded totally possible that it was some kind of secret that only some Empress had. "Why do you call it a she?" It was just metal and wood, after all. He's heard of people naming their weapons (he just had that discussion with Krem), but not assigning them genders.

"Have you seen Bianca?" Varric asked as he motioned, with the hand not bracing the stock of the crossbow, at the gleaming crossbow.

"She's gorgeous, stunning, and sure, I could have named her Oghren or something," Varric explained. This was only half truths but, who was counting. "But that would be mean."

He did love showing off his crossbow, but even Varric wasn't about to load a bolt or wind her up for firing. Sure, it looked impressive, but he didn't need Curly or the Seeker getting on his case. Maker knew, with his luck, he'd end up spooking someone and they'd knock over some scaffolding. Everything was just holding up as it was, no need to poke at the house of cards.

"She looks like a Bianca, don't you think?" Varric asked and it was only mostly rhetorical.

He still can't quite grip the idea of gendered weapons, but Varric just manages to be so convincing about it that it starts to make sense. "Y-yeah, I guess. She is very pretty, an' girls are pretty."

Kas smiles, trying to figure out how the weapon worked but failing badly. He wasn't exactly a weaponsmith (as seen by hos own mess of blades) or an engineer, after all. It seemed like you just... shot things. Without needing to pull the bowstring or nothing.

"Why did the Empress have a thing like Bianca? Do Empresses fight?" Pardon him, he's just gonna take a seat near Varric with a curious grin on his face. "What card game did you play? We usually just used dice in the kith."

"Do Empresses fight?" Varric asked, the shock on his face more legitimate than dramatic. "Kid, that's basically all Empresses do."

But a far more salient point had been raised.

"I won her in a hand of Wicked Grace, the only game worth playing in Orlais," Varric told him. It was a shame there were no Orlesian up-and-up's around to hear that...and, by that same token, it was a good thing the Iron Lady was off on a mission somewhere. If she'd heard him say that, he'd never have heard the end of how wrong he was.

"I mean, dice are alright if you're hustling in Kirkwall or Starkhaven, but if you want to win anything of real value it's Wicked Grace all the way."

"I thought all human nobles did was sit around and be pretty and throw shit on their servants. Not fight with amazing weapons! That's much more awesome." Now Kas is imagining some fancy warrior queen dressed in armors and silk, wielding Bianca and killing monsters or dragons or enemy warriors.

He would probably be much more okay with that kind of Empress than the dainty noble lady type. Kas didn't know anything about the ruthlessness of the Game, after all. Empress Celene was a bloodthirsty woman, just not with her own hands.

"So Wicked Grace... that's the game with the angel, right? I've seen a few people play in bars before." Probably while cutting their purses. "Why is that game the best? Getting the right cards seem just as random as getting the dice high."

Except both of those were influenced both by skill and by cheating.

To be fair, the kid's original assessment of Orlesian nobility wasn't very far off, but The Game was dangerous enough that Varric let him hold onto that particular misconception. If he thought that "The Game is played to the death" involved actual, portable siege weaponry, he'd probably steer clear of anything to do with it. So, win/win really.

"That's the one and, honestly? It's probably because you can stack the game easier than dice," Varric explained easily and moved to unlock Bianca's arms and fold the weapon back into its safety alignment.

"It's pretty much a game all about lying and tricking your opponents into thinking they've already lost, so...basically it's Orlais, but as a card game. People bet bigger on Wicked Grace than they do on dice or Diamondback because everybody thinks they've figured out how to be better at it than the guy they're playing. With dice, unless you load them up first, it's all chance."

Varric shrugged. "Nobody wants to bet big on pure chance. Too easy to lose that way."

If the young qunari ever got himself involved in the Game somehow, he would probably be running in the other direction and hoping to not be hit by crossbows and warrior Empresses. Thankfully he's qunari and therefore extremely unlikely to even be a pawn. Definitely a win/win.

Varrics explanation of the game makes the teen curious, and he almost jumps a bit when Bianca folds back into the original form with just the slightest click. It was amazing, really.

There's a moment of awestruck staring before he zones in to the game thing again. Basically Orlais, but as a card game. Okay, he could probably imagine that. Tricks and lies and cheating sounds like any noble thing. Just more entertaining in game form.

"Oooh. Now I get why I always lose in dice..." Yup, he's been a sucker.

The teen leans back a bit, smiling. "It sounds pretty fun, though. So you tricked the Empress in the game and won Bianca. That's amazing." Man, why where all the dwarves awesome?

This kid wore his heart on his horns; his attention was on Bianca in an instant, all awe and open interest. He'd be the worst Wicked Grace player in the history of Thedas. Varric liked him already.

"Flattery? Well, I can't say I object to hearing how amazing I am," Varric said, grinning. "I am pretty amazing."

He shifted Bianca and rested her against his shoulder. Despite how small and stocky he was, and how big and generally full of overkill Bianca was, the bow seemed exactly fitted to him. It was impossible to imagine him using anything else.

"Varric Tethras." He stuck his free hand out to the qunari. "You got a name?"

Most likely the worst player ever. He'd been to scared to cheat and too easily distracted to ever see anyone else cheat. Too bad the teen doesn't have any money he could be losing. (Strip-Wicked Grace might literally be torture for a hormonal teen.)

The boy reaches to take Varric's hand, giving it a shake. Not too loose, not too firm with the callouses of someone that has climbed on way too many rooftops and Maker-knows-what. "I'm Kas. I'm from a Tal-Vashoth band in Rivain."

His accent was rather hard to pick up, however, Fereldan lilt overshadowing it a bit. "I'm here to be a scout!"

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Skyhold

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