this world of ours is not as it seems

[girlinthebox]

WHO: River and OPEN
WHAT: Spooky little girl wandering around Skyhold.
WHEN: Late Wintermarch.
WHERE: Various locations around Skyhold.
NOTES: n/a

River has good days, and she has bad days. At times it feels like the swing of a pendulum, whose motions she can never truly calculate.

The good days have gotten progressively better. There are points of focus, people to talk to, to connect with. The Fade remains a presence, near-engulfing even when she's awake, but there's an opportunity to see past it, or perhaps more accurately to watch it layer against the people on this side of the Veil. Cole's compassion. Nerva's protectiveness. Zevran's cleverness. She thrives in their contact, stretching out without fear of it harming either Simon or herself, and simply allowed to be. It's a novel concept. She flits about the keep, often barefoot and the edges of her dress a little dirtier than they ought to be, her dark hair streaming behind her.

It's odd to think she has friends, yet it seems so. She feels their overlap and it feels like comfort, like warmth, and she doesn't want to untangle herself just yet.

But there are bad days.

She's more like a feral cat on those days, slinking just out of sight, out of reach. Either the noise has grown too loud inside her own head, or Simon's attempts to negate the worst of it leave her sluggish and more than a little bitter. Stumbling around like a child, slowed and lethargic. Those days she's not much good for anyone, though she tries to find those warm touchstones again. She lingers in the kitchens, in the hall, in the library or tavern, trying in vain to feel the vividness of those familiar voices again, blossoming bright like colors in her mind's eye.

She's little more than a shadow then. Huddled, hair in her face, staring outward blankly and through most passersby.

There are more good days than bad, thankfully. But every time she sinks brings doubt, creeping and gnawing. If she can't prevent herself from slipping, what happens if she falls?

Or is simply it a matter of when?

Comments

[girlinthebox]

"Too many contradictions."

She appears at ease, regardless of Bruce's caution. In fact, her focus is remarkable. She's barely glanced up at him this whole time, scanning the lines quickly before making more annotations. If Bruce gets a glimpse of the pages, he can probably recognize portions of the Chant of Light.

Whatever portions she hasn't obscured or destroyed in her efforts, at least.

[amygdalae]

That... really wasn't helping Bruce understand at all. He really was trying to, mind, but there were too many gaps and even he wasn't that smart to be able to magically make up the right answers.

"What contradictions?" he asks again as he glances at the papers strewn about the place. It takes a bit before he recognizes the words that he can make out as ones coming from the Chant of Light - he was no devout Andrastian and he hadn't touched anything Chantry-related for a good while already.

He turns his gaze back to River then, still trying to figure out this new puzzle set before him. Just what was she attempting to accomplish?