faderift | open: something grabs ahold of me tightly

open: something grabs ahold of me tightly

WHO: Inquisition Forces
WHAT: Inquisition forces cross the mountains into Orlais to deal with Emprise du Lion
WHEN: Wintermarch 25 onward
WHERE: EMPRISE DU LION
NOTES: This is a mingle-style log for the Inquisition camps, local tavern, and general/open Inquisition work, etc.

This time they hike down to the west, but the trip through the mountains is no easier. The snow is heaped up about the road where wagons have pushed it aside, stomped into slippery pack beneath the feet and hooves that have gone before. Of the main track it is ankle deep at best and in places it drifts, waist-deep on a tall man and enough to bury a dwarf who hasn't come prepared with snowshoes. Everywhere the wind howls, biting cold, and the sky hangs low, a pale flat grey that makes it difficult to judge distances. Those who know winter weather call it a snow sky, and near-daily squalls prove them right.

They set up camp in Sahrnia, across the broad expanse of frozen river that has trapped the villagers here upstream. Tents pop up in rows and in the shells of tumbled-down buildings, fires blazing and thawing the ground to mud. When the supply wagons roll in they re-open the local tavern, brightly lit with flaking paint on the walls that might once have been colorful and patterned tiles on the floor that seems to swim like an optical illusion after too many glasses of the cheap red wine that fills the cellars.

Even deadlier reds hold the hills: Red Templar sightings have been frequent and it is said they are operating in several locations in the region in significant force. Some of these men and women have become hulking, crystalline beasts. Many others are in the earlier stages of corruption: red-veined and -eyed, aggressive and superhumanly strong, but still visibly human and coherent if spoken to. Red lyrium is even easier to find, jutting out of the ground or cliffsides, filling caves-- the Tower of Bone, a fortress that has stood for centuries, now threatens to split from the inside out. The area's wildlife was none too friendly before, but now the wolves and bears have begun to be corrupted by the lyrium and many will attack on sight, without provocation. (The snofleurs that bumble harmlessly around the river seem unaffected.)

Everywhere there are ruins: broken bridges, crumbling colosseums, and the great hulking mass of Suledin's Keep tucked between the distant hills. Scouts reported that Red Templars hold it as well.

RIFTER ARRIVAL - SAHRNIA - THE HILLS - TOWER CAMP - A HANDY MAP

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Interesting. There is always some difference in what one observes and what one experiences. Curiosity is as certainly a part of Leliana as grace if part of her present company, and the indulgence of coming here, of meeting she who the Dalish so admire, draws a small smile at the corners of her mouth.

"Please, do not trouble yourself." Leliana offers a nod when Galadriel looks over, before claiming a spot nearby to sit. "We are none of us at our finest at all hours. The Emprise has been devastated - it would be a strange thing to be unaffected, I think."

She remembers a time when she might have joked a little more easily, have mocked herself or told a silly story to lighten the mood and ease discomfort. Such things are reserved, now, for rare occasions, only to be seen by those who have known her a long while, if they will reveal themselves at all.

"It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance. I have heard you are greatly esteemed by the Dalish in Skyhold." Her accent plays over her words, and the slow, careful delivery of her words betrays no sarcasm or scorn, only genuine respect. "I am Leliana, though some call me Sister Nightingale. I work in a..." a moment of pause, as she considers how to explain, lest Galadriel is unfamiliar with the name. "Information gathering capacity for the Inquisition."

A generous layer of gloss, that, which neglects the mention of bloody knives and threats, of action taken where diplomacy and chivalry cannot tread. She suspects that most can suspect, even if they do not know.

"Ah," Galadriel begins with a dry sort of fondness, "how well I know this variety of conversation. Have you come to suss out what threat I may pose, or merely to sate some curiosity?"

It was, perhaps, an unkind assessment of Leliana's motivations. The Old Song was in her head and there was a palpable desperation, a hunger, that hung in the air about them. It was difficult for her to focus and, in her distraction, she was coming quite close to being overtly rude. She sighed as she turned her knife and cut a thicker swath from the belly of what would become her bow.

"Did you say Nightingale?" Galadriel asked, as she lifted the split length of young wood from her work and tossed it to the fire. She looked at Leliana, then, even as she continued to cut wood from the interior of the bow.

The red-head, even at first assessment, could not have been less like to Arwen. She was beautiful, yes, but she was neither as demure nor as harmless as her title implied. Galadriel could not say if she sang with great beauty--her accent was strange, but melodic enough--and while she seemed like one who thrived at dusk, it was not dusk yet.

To Galadriel, it seemed a poor label but, if nothing else, it was familiar.

"Tinuviel," Galadriel said, without prompt or context. "Unfitting, I suspect, but you are lovely enough to carry the moniker as you like. You share the title with my granddaughter."

Definitely a leader then, perhaps moreso at home than here. Leliana considers the question, as one might take a piece of sea-smoothed glass up from the shore, twisting it in her hand and letting the odd feel of it roll beneath her fingertips. "Both, and neither. I am bound to ensure the Inquisition is not compromised, but I have not marked you as a threat, and certainly not because of your ties with the Dalish. Any figurehead, official or not, that might offer them some... guidance and comfort after what they have endured is one that should be embraced, not dismissed."

Even the Nightingale holds freedom above all things. The elves deserved freedom and support and respect, as mages did. Compassion might be a weakness in herself that she cannot leave unchecked, but a belief in freedom was something she would fight for to the very death. "And I do not think there is anything 'mere' in curiosity. Rifters represent entire worlds of history and culture, of stories that are entirely unknown. To lack a curiosity for that would be to deny a great part of ourselves."

Of myself would be more accurate, but she can at least pretend she is not giving away too much.

"I doubt I compare to your granddaughter," Leliana acknowledges, something knowing in her smile. She does not speak of beauty, nor grace, nor of being elven, certainly does not dismiss herself. She speaks of being a knife in the shadows, of brutality, of always doing what must be done. She would not wish that upon anyone. She is what she is, and hopes others need never be so. "Is tinuviel the word for 'nightingale,' in your tongue?"

She was inquisitive and clever, this human; at once she defended the concept of her curiosity, if not her curiosity itself, and humbled herself without truly denouncing any one aspect. Galadriel marked her careful words as she returned her attention to the craft in hand.

"Yes and no," Galadriel replied after a pause. "Merilin they are called in Sindarin; tinuviel is...poetic, but no less for the poetry of it. There are few who would adopt the name 'Nightingale' who would use the technical name of the birds."

She paused to reverse the bough and begin carving out the opposite side. Her knife whispered against the wood and the shavings crackled as they hit the flame.

"The Dalish, though they are reluctant to agree, are kin to the Eldar. To see them, still so much themselves, is a great balm. They soothe my heart and mind more than they can know. I would give them no less than I would give those of Arda; they are dear to me."

She paused and glanced sidelong at Leliana.

"And to you, unless I have guessed poorly."

"The technicalities remove the poetry, no? I hope, at least, I was not named for wings and feathers."

Each word is carefully committed to memory. Merilin, tinuviel, Eldar, Arda. The language is quite beautiful, though she doubts it would sound so spoken from her own lips.

"I can claim no close ties," she responds, gazing into the fire, elbows resting on her thighs and her hands clasp together in thought. "But they have suffered for generations, at the hands of humanity. They have been enslaved and abused. And for what?" Her voice has dropped now, a little hoarser, harsher, just barely audible over the crack of embers and bursts of sound from the fire.

"They are innocents, punished for their very existence, and given little chance to thrive, much the same as mages. I know a good many people who have done far worse things than so many of either group, and yet they go free by virtue of being human, or not being a mage." Leliana's lip has caught into a faint snarl, even if it does not make it into her voice. "It is abhorrent. If the Maker made all things, should not all be treasured?"

She straightens, at that, and looks to Galadriel. "Forgive me." For speaking too much, for being so forward. This is not the time.

Her tirade was telling, though somewhat more reserved than the word implied, and Galadriel listened carefully as she spoke. Though she claimed no kinship to the Dalish, such vehemence was rarely born of empathy alone. Before Galadriel could contemplate her too deeply, Leliana reined herself in. She fell silent, drew herself up, and blanked the look of contempt from her features.

The fire crackled between them but there was no whisper of a knife--Galadriel had paused her work and turned her full attention to the human. Even now, with silence between them, she did not resume her work.

"Why?" Galadriel asked in a polite tone, one that was very nearly casual, and quirked a brow. "You've said nothing that begs forgiving."

Galadriel shifted her work in her lap and rested her hands atop the stripped branch. To carve a bow now or let it rest would make no difference in the end; she decided to indulge her curiosity and focus on Leliana rather than spend half of her focus in crafting.

"Indeed, I can think of few oaths you could have given that would have better earned my regard," Galadriel added. "You are curious; surely you did not simply wish to commend me for my love of the Dalish. If you wish to know of me, ask and I shall tell you."

A quiet huff of breath, that might have been laughter, under better circumstances.
"Spymasters and leaders are not, perhaps, meant to be so open with their views. Unseemly, or worse, manipulative." She shakes her head. "I lost my temper." That is an act worthy of forgiveness, in the eyes of some.

She meant every word, passionately. These are the beliefs that define, that make all the sacrifices she has made and the scars across her conscience worth enduring, but that does not mean she should let her emotions run away with her. These few days in the Emprise have been difficult, and she must journey back to Skyhold soon. Pressing business awaits, as it always must. Letting exhaustion free her temper so was inexcusable, in either case.

But the praise - or the words that sound very much like praise, at least - draw the faintest flicker of a smile. She has Galadriel's attention, she can see that, and can only hope that the quick edge of her temper has not made that an amused curiosity, rather than something more genuine.

"There are so many questions I would ask," she admits, before looking to the stars. "When hope has abandoned me, I will see the stars and know Your Light remains. A verse I am fond of, from our Chant of Light."
Irrelevant, perhaps. "I wish to know how you have found it. How the Inquisition-- indeed, how the Chantry might appear to one with so fresh a perspective as yourself. It is a large question, though, and perhaps one that merits a chance to think before I beg answers." A moment of pause, and she cants her head slightly. "Is Galadriel the most proper way to address you? I do not wish to deprive people of those honours due to them in their homelands."

Galadriel watched as Leliana turned her face upward, as she regarded the pale, strange stars that wheeled overhead. She had not heard of the Chant of Light, nor the Chantry, but the verse she quoted with such fondness--that was not half so unfamiliar as it should have been. Galadriel drew a deep breath in silence and, with an almost stuttering pull, a second followed--the weight of the phial in her pocket suddenly seemed so much greater.

She was so struck by the moment that she nearly missed Leliana's questions. How had she found it? The Inquisition? It was polite question but the answer required considerable thought; Leliana's grace in postponing it was a kindness. Galadriel found she could spare little thought for the Inquisition, or Thedas. Indeed, she only answered Leliana's second question because the answer came so easily.

"Híril nín," Galadriel replied without pause and, as she drew herself back into the moment, she clarified. "Your desire does you credit but I have found no parallels for my...honors in these lands. My name will suffice, I assure you."

There was a moment and, perhaps it was the verse the human had quoted, or the song it reminded her of, but she decided to answer a question Leliana had not asked.

"Galadriel is a name given to me by my husband--" She paused and considered the fire between them. As far as she knew, this was a tradition the Dalish did not share with the Eldar. "More correctly, it is a translation of the name he gave me, for the language he gave it in has passed out of both favor and memory. In time I may translate it again, so that it is not lost to time, but I am too new to Thedas to do such things yet."

"That verse," she continued and looked back up at Leliana. "Would you recite it for me?"

The thought of a name given to you by the one to which you were wed was an interesting thing to consider. Her instinctive reaction was torn, part of her thinking that it was very beautiful, and that he must love her a good deal to gift her with such a name. That it must be an honour to receive such a thing, and a good deal of trust and respect must be bound into it. Another part of her is suspicious and rails against it, reminded her of Marjolaine calling her pretty thing, as if she were some trinket, and wondered if names were part of something similar to Orlais' Grand Game. The romantic side of her is more persistent, but she is long used to ignoring it. There is no need to be overly sentimental, to expose too much of the woman wrapped up in the Nightingale. There is no use to it, save for manipulation, and she does not want to manipulate when she came here seeking understanding.

Leliana simply nods. "It is a beautiful name. More melodious than most titles I can think of, in any case."

Galadriel's request, though, makes her eyebrows raise a little tone going up just a little, enough to betray her surprise. "The verse?"
Perhaps she should not have been, but it is so rare that people ask her to tell stories, and most who are willing to hear from the Chant of Light could read it more easily than they could ascend to the Rookery, only to be denied. "It is not short," Leliana starts, though her tone carries no objection. Only that lingering surprise, as she calls the verse to mind. "The Canticle of Trials is a great comfort, however. I would be glad to recite it."

Here, at the fireside where she is not abandoning her work to do such a thing, where she is trying to foster positive relations... here she may allow it, as she would not otherwise. Leliana takes a breath, swallows to wet her throat, and glances up to the sky as she begins, slow and precise, her accent playing over each word that she has clutched close, desperately, that she has used for comfort time and time again.

"Maker, my enemies are abundant.
Many are those who rise up against me.
But my faith sustains me; I shall not fear the legion,
Should they set themselves against me.

In the long hours of the night
When hope has abandoned me,
I will see the stars and know
Your Light remains.

I have heard the sound
A song in the stillness,
The echo of Your voice,
Calling creation to wake from its slumber.

How can we know You?
In the turning of the seasons, in life and death,
In the empty space where our hearts
Hunger for a forgotten face?

You have walked beside me
Down the paths where a thousand arrows sought my flesh.
You have stood with me when all others
Have forsaken me.

I have faced armies
With You as my shield,
And though I bear scars beyond counting, nothing
Can break me except Your absence.

When I have lost all else, when my eyes fail me
And the taste of blood fills my mouth, then
In the pounding of my heart
I hear the glory of creation.

You have grieved as I have.
You, who made worlds out of nothing.
We are alike in sorrow, sculptor and clay,
Comforting each other in our art.

Do not grieve for me, Maker of All.
Though all others may forget You,
Your name is etched into my every step.
I will not forsake You, even if I forget myself.

Maker, though the darkness comes upon me,
I shall embrace the Light. I shall weather the storm.
I shall endure.
What you have created, no one can tear asunder.

Who knows me as You do?
You have been there since before my first breath.
You have seen me when no other would recognize my face.
You composed the cadence of my heart.

Through blinding mist, I climb
A sheer cliff, the summit shrouded in fog, the base
Endlessly far beneath my feet
The Maker is the rock to which I cling.

I cannot see the path.
Perhaps there is only abyss.
Trembling, I step forward,
In darkness enveloped.

Though all before me is shadow,
Yet shall the Maker be my guide.
I shall not be left to wander the drifting roads of the Beyond.
For there is no darkness in the Maker's Light
And nothing that He has wrought shall be lost.

I am not alone. Even
As I stumble on the path
With my eyes closed, yet I see
The Light is here.

Draw your last breath, my friends.
Cross the Veil and the Fade and all the stars in the sky.
Rest at the Maker's right hand,
And be Forgiven."

And it is done. Though Leliana suspects she is beyond forgiving, she who has known what she does and condemns herself with each continued pursuit. The intention may be pure, or at least the goal, but that cannot cleanse her heart nor her conscience.

The concept of prayer was largely alien to Galadriel.

While the Eldar sang many songs, and spoke often of the grace and beauty of the Valar, they did not converse with them. In dire times, when all was lost, they might invoke the Valar in their desperation, but such occasions were rare, and it was rarer still to invoke the Creator. The Valar were fickle and their favor was easily lost, but the Creator was something else altogether. To beseech him, to call upon him or speak to him directly was an act of staggering hubris.

She had not questioned if the Maker and the Creator were separate; she had no reason to doubt that they were one and the same. When she had first come to Thedas, she had been told that the Maker had turned away from the people, that he had forsaken them to the encroaching darkness. The very idea had offended her beyond measure, it was unimaginable; the Creator would not turn from what he had made. To claim to have offended him, that he might leave because of some slight? Impossible. There was no doubt in her mind that Iluvatar watched the world as it was woven, that all things held his attention as they came and went, but he was distant. Even the Valar could not conceive of his machinations, he was so far removed, so far above all things.

To think that he would walk alongside the creatures of the world, that he would tend to them as...as a father might was so strange and jarring, so utterly foreign, that it took her quite some time to process it.

The image that thought conjured was beautiful and reassuring in a way that outstripped her skill with words. The newness of the idea gave it a clarity, a simplicity, that she had not known since youth. The Canticle came easily into her heart and Canticle seared itself across her mind. Of course, it grieved her to think that Iluvatar had stood by her through all her actions, that he knew how the world had dimmed her, and that his regard would be so near. That he might forgive her, though, even if the Valar did not, was a balm on both her pride and her soul.

It was such a rare and consuming comfort that Galadriel was able to put the old song out of her mind. For a few moments she found some serenity and it stole over her as plainly and obviously as the light of dawn spilled over the world.

"It is a lovely lay, your Canticle," Galadriel told her after a time. The words seemed insufficient but she knew none that would serve her better. To seek them out now seemed...wasteful. "The verse you spoke called to mind a song I have long treasured, and I wondered if they were alike to one another. In a way, I suppose they are, or at least they are as similar as they could be.

"In time I expect I shall come to treasure your verses as I do that song."

Her gaze had listed while she thought, drawn back to the shifting light of the fire. It burned gold and red between them; outside of the firelight the world was silver, lit by stars and cast in the cold blue of winter and night. The sky above was dotted with thick clouds, but they blocked very little as they crawled sluggishly toward the horizon. The Emprise was beautiful.

Galadriel looked back at Leliana. The soft smile that came to her face was honest.

"The song is not so long as yours, but I would sing if it you care to hear."

Her smile is slight, and some time ago she might have been sweet and earnest. Leliana is not sure she has that in her, any more, but the praise still touches her. "There was a time when the Maker saved me. I was... naive, I cannot deny, but He has been a great comfort."

A source of comfort, crisis, of self doubt and dilemma and countless other things. The Maker demands a great deal from his children, and she does not believe in so much of what the Chantry says. It is part of what has made her so curious as to how the Chantry and its teachings must appear to those from other worlds, why she has spent so long contemplating the nature of Templars, their honour and their reputation and the good they do, and the damage they have wrought. "If... please consider me at your disposal, if you would ever like to know more of it."

And then Galadriel offers her a song, and it takes Leliana a moment to actually process it.

"I would be honoured." Her tone betrays her sincerity, a quiet rasp of earnestness that she has not allowed herself for far too long, and Leliana is leaning forward a little, hands rested on her legs. "To hear a song from another world... that is a wonder I would never have dreamed of in years past."

Leliana's wonder, however well subdued, was charming; there was an eagerness in her statement, a familiar sense of interest that made her smile grow. Galadriel often saw that look on Men, but rarely was their interest so...unsullied. Leliana desired nothing but that which had been offered; she would try to claim no more than she was given. To say she was without guile was wrong, she was sharp and clever; she meant no harm, though, and had conducted herself with great awareness and care. Her outburst had spoken to the sympathy in her heart and her earnestness, now, said much more--but that was something to be considered at a later date, when the cold was not biting and the night was not quite so dark.

Galadriel let out a short laugh at Leliana's words. It was a quiet thing, amused and gentle, but dulled by the somber mood it had been forced to surface through.

"In that we are the same...save perhaps that I've spent more years without dreaming."

But solidarity was not the point of this conversation, nor was establishing friendship, not on its own. Leliana was curious about her and there was no reason to delay her song, not when Leliana had been so generous and prompt in offering her Canticle. Galadriel drew a deep breath and, as she began, a certain longing wistfulness settled over her features. Her voice was pleasant; while she was not revered for her singing, if only because her voice was sterner than the Elves were wont to hear in song, she was adept enough for the fireside.

"In western lands beneath the Sun
the flowers may rise in Spring,
the trees may bud, the waters run,
the merry finches sing.
Or there maybe 'tis cloudless night
and swaying beeches bear
the Elven-stars as jewels white
amid their branching hair."

She paused for a breath, then, at the end of the rolling, river-like verse. The pacing of the song shifted, as she began again, and her words grew heavier but, oddly, the wistfulness did not fall from her face. Despite the shift in tone, the previous melody fit seamlessly with the second half.

"Though here at journey's end I lie
in darkness buried deep,
beyond all towers strong and high,
beyond all mountains steep,
above all shadows rides the Sun
and Stars for ever dwell:
I will not say the Day is done,
nor bid the Stars farewell."

If pressed, Leliana would admit to times spent wishing she did not dream, did not walk the Fade. Dreaming calls to mind so much of the past, echoes of failures and successes and so much that cannot be changed, for all that the Fade warps and twists about her mind. Perhaps Galadriel was not being so literal, but the thought raises regardless, and Leliana simply smiles through it.

She closes her eyes to listen, quiet and reverent, as though she might capture each word and note, treasure them and lock them away in her memory for darker times, when she needs to remember what hope is, what blessings she can count. To have heard an elven song from another world seemed a blessing indeed, and her eyes open only when the song is done, and silence has rested on them a while.

"It is very beautiful," Leliana starts, voice rather softer than before. "It seems... I think there are notes of hope to find in it." Careful and thoughtful, playing the words over in her mind. "It is like walking in a forest of light, I think. Light and shadows cannot exist without the other, really."

Thoughtful, perhaps too much so, and she nods to Galadriel, seeming to catch herself. "I thank you."

There was some conflict couched in Leliana's thanks and Galadriel's expression, peaceful as it had become as they sang at the fireside, faltered. It was an expression she had not meant to show, it was one she guarded carefully from mortal men, and she curbed it as quickly as it had come. For a brief moment, fleeting as a lick of rising flame, a look of deep, unending pity danced across her face.

Men were proud, a trait Galadriel understood well, and she did not know Leliana's heart with any measure of certainty. She couldn't say how the woman would react to pity, for the proud often rallied against it, and there was no need for their conversation to devolve in such a way.

"You are welcome," Galadriel replied, her tone just slightly too measured. It evened out quickly enough, but the slip had occurred, if damage was done it had already happened.

The bow rested beneath her hands and the fire crackled quietly in the stillness. The prospect of silence, with nothing beyond the old song to occupy her mind, was deeply unappealing. Fortunately, another topic rested just within reach, and Galadriel grasped it without pause.

"My lands are often called the Golden Wood, for there are few Men living who bother with their proper name," Galadriel said and tried to regain her ease. "The trees that grow there are of a kind--Mallorn, they are called. They are echoes of a lost time and a distant land. They grow tall and beautiful, bearing leaves of silver and blossoms of gold; they breathe light into Middle Earth, even as the shadow encroaches.

"To walk below the mellyrn is to walk the ancient world, to linger in what was before darkness first fell." It was a dramatic description, that she would admit, but not incorrect. "If that song conjures the idea Lothlórien, even in one who cannot have seen those trees, nor their like, then I am glad. I can think of no goal I would rather achieve."

Ten years ago, Leliana understood pity better. She felt it in great measure, welling up in her with all her compassion and trust and mercy. So eager to help and so desperate to offer light and redemption to all. No one would be turned away from the Maker's light. Of course, she has experienced for herself how badly pity can be taken, how a kind hand can be slapped away or scorched sooner than accepted. In those days, she persisted and persisted. It was that persistence that lead to a good many squabbles with Alistair and teasing from Zevran, that earned Shale's grudging affection and Morrigan's utter loathing.

She sees pity and she understands it, and it makes her throat stick. Galadriel does not know her heart, nor her mind, nor her actions. Galadriel does not know how little she deserves pity, and how wasted it is on one who does what they must do, who throws themselves into necessity and forsakes the light.

Pity is not for the likes of her, and it makes her look down for a moment. Not sharp or sudden, not so reactionary as to set Galadriel ill at ease (or so she hopes). Not all things are in her control. She learned well how to control herself and to mask as a bard, and yet there are times and things that strike you so truly as to make masks slip or seem less perfect, and there is a persistent sadness in her that she dreads coming to the for if people looked too closely. She must be the Nightingale; there is no room for Leliana, here.

"They sound... I am not certain there are words that could do such a place justice," Leliana concedes, and that rawness edges her voice, quite without her permission. To hear Galadriel speak of it alone makes her wish to take up her lute again, to weave notes and words together, and that is one of the many things she no longer has time for. "It makes me think a little of the Golden City, although I do not doubt they are entirely different in both concept and reality."

A moment, a breath. "Lothlórien, that is the name of your homeland?"

She was not the first who had asked that question, nor would she be the last, and each of them who did wore away at her. It was not their fault, they could not know, but such questions had been rare in Arda; here they washed away the illusions she tried to erect, laid her bare as easily as the tide shifted sand. Every answer she gave was a reminder of how distant Thedas truly was.

Galadriel smiled, though, as she regarded Leliana across the fire. The expression was kind but distant; it was a soft smile, gentle and welcoming, but impersonal. It was an archaic smile, the sort of mask one perfected over thousands of years, and it felt as old as it was.

"That is the name of the land that I steward, and it is where my heart lives, but it is not my homeland as you mean it," Galadriel explained. "The land I hail from, before all others, is called Aman. It is the home of all elves, a far green country in the distant west. The mellyrn have always grown there and they grow there yet...but it has been long years since I saw the trees on those shores.

"I love them best in Lórien, I think," she said. "In Aman they did not sparkle in the light of dawn, and I have a great fondness for how that golden light that dances through their leaves."

"It is strange how things dear to us change as our circumstances do." It is simplistic, she suspects, compared to how Galadriel speaks. Something in her breathes of Ages, not of scant decades. Leliana wonders if, perhaps, that is nothing more than her own inclination to fancy and the craft of tales, if she might be imposing her imagination on a woman who, while ethereal, is but flesh and bone as much as Leliana herself. "Perhaps better put... they change as we do. The eyes that look upon them once might not see them again, no matter how often we behold them."

If she were inclined to being absurd, this would be a prime opportunity to lighten the mood by speaking of nugs. She is not, so Maker be praised, Galadriel is spared.

"To hear you speak of it," the filter of light through the treetops and the way dust twirls and pirouettes, "I would think there are precious few sights to be beheld that could ever be so precious. As if it were a feeling to be captured, in that light." The fleeting memories of her mother's embrace and the scent of Andraste's Grace, of the Maker's blessing, of... of peace and contentment that she has not known since Lothering.

"Aman and Lórien both sound beautiful."

"They were," Galadriel replied and caught her error as she made it. It stole her words from her, for that brief moment, and in her silence she considered the woman alongside her, then the dark forest beyond the firelight. How their conversation had come to this, she could not say; thoughts of the creator, of watchful deities and distant lands, all of them tumbled together to the tune of the crackling flames. Lothlórien was little more than a feeling now, if a precious one. It was no different from Aman save that, Valar willing, she might see Aman again should she perish.

It was a grim thought and her smile passed with it.

"Forgive me, I dislike change and thinking overmuch about Aman all but demands I ponder the differences between what is and what was." And what would come to pass. Galadriel stared off at the woods for a few seconds longer and then let out a short sigh. Her attention returned to Leliana, fixed as it had ever been, and she leaned toward the warmth of the fire.

"But I admit, I do delight in your regard for my home. I have not been in Thedas long, but I find I miss Lórien terribly. If I can only linger in it in passing thought, then I shall when I can."

Leliana had asked her a question. It was some time ago, by her measure, and the topic seemed senseless now. It was easier than speaking of lost homelands, though, and Galadriel resigned herself to it.

"You wished to know how I found this Inquisition? I fear I have no insights that will aid you. I have known no army that behaves as this one. Your fortress is a clever thing, and easily held, unless Thedas has a great many creatures that can take to the sky."

And there it is, a bitter truth that she is sorry to see exposed. It should not surprise her - perhaps it should not even grieve her, and yet she finds that familiar feeling in her gut, a sinking feeling that yet rises, as though a void was opening up within her that would consume her as effectively as the Breach might have swallowed the world. It is familiar and, she suspects, ceaseless. Some days and some moments the reminder of it opened it up afresh, echoes of all the horrors she has seen and inflicted reaching out with vicious fingers that would pry her apart from within, sinking in and pulling - indefatigable.

To open wounds afresh in another was not something she even took pleasure in, and especially so when it was done without any kind of deliberateness.

"I understand," Leliana finally replies, a little more quietly. "Dwelling on change can be a painful thing, for want of another word. Even so... I think sometimes that change is what we must think on. What is and what was may not suffice. I would not wish for what was to be the way that it will be in the future. Not for mages, nor elves - not for any person here. What was did not work. What will be... that carries some breath of hope."

There is a tightness in her chest, stretched as a bowstring, pulled far with her own anticipation and desperation that has spanned years. "No forgiveness is necessary, I assure you."

But that she could offer some... respite, perhaps, even if it was only little and only through her own childish wonder, then that she can be glad of. Her wonder is rarely lingered in, either, though that hardly needs to be mentioned. This conversation was never intended to be about Leliana.

A slight smile, just a little wry. "I do not know that any army has behaved quite as this one. We are a little unorthodox, in some regards, but I greatly appreciate your candour. We will gather strength as we go."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

open: something grabs ahold of me tightly

you don't even understand the delighted sound i made

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Galadriel Greatly Approves.

YESSSSSS

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the tldr is coming

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