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Entry tags:
[open]
WHO: Vandren et al.
WHAT: A Tevene defector slithers into the fold.
WHEN: Presently.
WHERE: The Gallows
NOTES: A couple of loose starters, wildcard ok, brackets ok.
WHAT: A Tevene defector slithers into the fold.
WHEN: Presently.
WHERE: The Gallows
NOTES: A couple of loose starters, wildcard ok, brackets ok.
[ Q&A ]
Here sits Vandren Verminius, first and no doubt last of his name, summoned to an office, or a workroom, or some other private quarter fit for polite interrogation. He has been nothing if not accommodating of Riftwatch’s whims these past few days.
He’s unassuming in trousers and tunic, a rug of an old coat thrown over against the cold. It’s black and gold. Ornate, and threadbare.
No weapons, no armor.
Just an old man slouched in an old chair, gone distant in his struggle to reconcile that this place was once at the heart of the Imperium’s slave trade, screams ringing through the caverns below, flagstone sticky with blood enough to thin the veil. The stone halls are quiet now, between meals. Empty and still.
His seat creaks beneath him when he shifts, pricking his attention back to the present.
Sorry, he could say, or What was the question?
“No,” he guesses, instead. As blind answers go it feels like a safe bet, fifty-fifty, until he reflects more fully on his circumstance.
“Perhaps.”
[ nighttime yoga routine for better sleep ]
It’s late enough to be early when he finally makes his way out into the courtyard one dark night, his breath drifting after him. The statues he’s seen illustrated in historical tomes are long gone, sheer walls and pedestals stripped bare under the stars, to say nothing of all the damage and subsequent repairs.
The idea was to do some stretching; some meditation. Warm up and then jog a lap or two in the bitter cold.
He might yet try, depending on how long he has between finishing the cup of wine he’s just started and inevitable interruption.
Some of the people here are slow to trust, and it isn’t hard to imagine why.
[ WILDCARD ]
Dazzle and/or disorient me I'm still getting up to speed on what the world is like these days.
Q&A
The young man sitting in front of him is one he has met already: in Benedict's tent, on the front, where they conducted what was more or less a job interview in the middle of the night.
"You... aren't here of your own free will?"
His quill taps against the side of the desk as he waits, his brow quirked skeptically.
no subject
“No, no, of course I am.”
Of course he is -- nearly as reassuring to himself as he must be to Benedict.
Stripped of his hood and the darkness and the wobble of a barrier between them, he is less impressive here than he might have seemed that night. Whatever time it is, he has an air of only having woken up recently, and appears to be severely hungover.
“You misheard.”
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"Do you have an idea of what division you'd like to join?" he continues, pressing on, looking up to meet Vandren's eyes.
no subject
No chance of him reading those notes from here. He gives up the attempt nearly in its earliest stages, preoccupied with scuffing at an itch under his chin instead, blunt nails rough through the stubble.
“Forces.”
Easy. This is an easy defection quiz, a child could do it.
His eyes are exceptionally blue today, owing in large part to how bloodshot they are.
“Might it be faster for me to write the answers in myself?”
no subject
And if you stay defected from Tevinter, you too could become the perfect bureaucrat!
"Verminius," he repeats, from earlier no doubt, "you said you're from Minrathous." Tilting his head a moment, scanning through the mental rolodex, "...Laetan?"
no subject
“Mm, well,” is what he says instead, itching abandoned for him to pluck at a thread in his coat instead. Unbothered, dehydrated, unfocused, mouldering, “not anymore.”
Band on the run, and all.
no subject
"Have you got any questions for me?" Like about the organization. The flatness of his smile communicates this: please do not ask about Me.
no subject
“I don’t know that I ever got your full name.”
no subject
"Artemaeus," he says, trying his best not to cringe, "Benedict Artemaeus."
no subject
He leaves it.
“Quite the tumble.”
Dry, and too miserable to muster a leer, he is difficult to read in his bleary reassessment of this runaway noble/secretary. A muffled thump marks the flop of his wrist back to the arm of his chair.
“Did they beat you?”
no subject
"In a manner of speaking," he says coolly, "but not..."
He trails off a moment, unexpectedly, his eyes going distant. What does he have to gain from lying or being catty about this?
"...we fell out after I came South," he clarifies, finally.
no subject
“Hmm,” he hmms.
“Why was it that you came south?”
He nudges the prompt along with an eyebrow, the creases around his eyes sharp in contrast with the dull energy about him. Remind him, as if the information was shared elsewhere and he simply can’t recall.
no subject
"I was apprenticed to a magister who took us south for his research." What was the research? He doesn't fucking remember, who cares, he was high for most of it, "when we were captured by Riftwatch, I discovered he had fallen in with the Venatori."
He meets Vandren's eyes wearily; go on, get it over with.
no subject
no subject
"If nothing else, you have the advantage of having chosen to be here from the get-go." He's trying, he's trying so hard, to steer the conversation back somewhere professionally detached: "have you encountered the Venatori much?"
no subject
“Oh yes,” matter-of-fact. “They’ve burrowed through the Imperium like shipworms.”
He’s veered a thousand miles away, just for a moment, with his mouth left open as if he intends to elaborate.
“Gorging themselves. Do you smoke?”
no subject
"Turns out there was opportunity everywhere," he begins, but is caught off-guard by the question, and, after a hesitation, nods.
no subject
He mugs an exaggerated frown to further his plea, tucked down into his own shoulders.
no subject
He hands it over, lips pursed. “A welcome gift,” he explains, to himself as much as to Vandren.
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“Ah,” he clucks affectionately, grandfatherly, as he sets one of the two immediately to his lip to tuck the other swiftly away:
“You’re too kind.”
Some rustling, a flurry of sparks at a snap of his fingers, and he drags deep to stoke the cherry.
“Were there any further intake questions?”
no subject
"Don't mention it," he says dully, and leans to one side, propping his jaw on two outstretched fingers.
"Would you be willing to provide a list of your Venatori contacts?"
no subject
“Oh, yes.”
No hesitation, past the moment it takes him to replay the question for himself.
“No problem at all."
Smoke spools idle through his fingers. He should really like to find something to eat first, and maybe a nap, but this boy looks so sad already.
"Right now?"
no subject
Somehow... he doubts it.