faderift | it's been a long road

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it's been a long road

WHO: Seeker Malcolm (not Captain Malcolm, mind), PEOPLE IN SKYHOLD, Cassandra
WHAT: Yet another arrival, gee, they just keep coming don't they
WHEN: *waggles hand* Late Wintermarch-y
WHERE: Here. There. Look, over there!
NOTES: Nothing yet

Arrival
He rides in with a small caravan of people. His armour bears a symbol that, while probably familiar to everyone here by now, is not seen on many people these days in these parts. His horse's stride is calm and careful, trying to stay out of the way and taking his time looking around. Less like a bemused tourist and more like someone with an eye for finding weaknesses, exits, entrances. He'll have to do a thorough walkaround for integrity, but the area at least is very defensible and secure.

Malcolm gets direction to the stables and sets up his horse there, giving him a nice brushing off of the snow. The next place he heads is to whatever kennel this area might have, if any at all. His dog, a long-legged, apricot-coloured, no-frills poodle, is far from the hyperintelligent mabari he was accustomed to in his youth, but his faithful canine companion needs a place to stay as well. Though if he has to keep her with him, he has few qualms about that.

The Seeker seems very...well, Cassandra-esque. He is stern and steady and goes about his initial business quickly but with care. He might not stop to chat--it is, in fact, not generally in his nature to do so generally--but he might ask for locations.

Battlements
Seeker Malcolm makes an effort within the first few days to stride around all of Skyhold with a keen eye. The location is impeccable, with only one way to really fight through, but it could also make it easy for them to get pinned down. And more than that, he must check for himself the stability of the area, the integrity of the walls, and to be honest, it needs work. It all needs work, even the roads around the mountain pass. He's seen holes in walls and roofs! In the middle of Wintermarch in the mountains!

Up here, despite some foot traffic, it's also quieter than down in the bustle, especially after he's ducked about inside for many of the same reasons. It helps him collect his thoughts, especially now that he's no longer on the road as he has been. But he's taking notes as he goes.

Training Grounds
Also much like Cassandra, he can be found keeping his fighting skills sharp. He doesn't whack a dummy with a greatsword, but instead shows off agility, dodging, quick but precise strikes with a short sword. It is no less intense. His arrows, too, fly true. If it's even possible to sneak up on him, one would be unwise to do so. He's also up for sparring or can be found working out. ~~Shirtless. Sweaty.~~

Courtyard
There is also a dog. Was the dog mentioned? There's a dog that needs training and attention and training-disguised-as-play as much as any other dog, mabari included. While Malcolm could be doing any number of things in the area, whether gathering a feel of the troops and those that support the Inquisition, mentally rearranging the area for a more efficient layout, or finding a pleasant and out of the way area to care for his weaponry, his dog likes to be nearby. He throws sticks sometimes. It's very important work, you see. At times, he plays scent games, hiding an object and allowing her to find it, although she is much less a scent-based dog. She's also efficient. Patient. Calm.

Really. Honestly. She does not at all turn into an excited lovebug in the presence of someone willing to shower her with positive attention. Absolutely not.

Wildcard
Catch him in the great hall? Found him nabbing something from the kitchen? Listening to gossip in the tavern? In the rookery reading Bad News? Convenient location to pick a bone with him? Specifically want A Thing?

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Unlike other recent arrivals that had come quickly to Benevenuta's attention, the Seeker is a surprise when she finds him with his notes upon the wall - a welcome one. His work had been good, and his company not unpleasant; carrying her books down from the empty (chilly; full of holes, trees growing inside where they do not belong) room where she'd escaped to work without the hustle and bustle that sometimes is the library, she slows to a stop a little bit behind him, certain even before he turns that she's recognised the man right.

"Seeker Reed," she greets him, warmly, in that unmistakable accent. She considers expressing her pleased surprise, but honestly, at a glance, his presence makes far more sense than hers. Benevenuta has always had a strong belief in bettering the world that she loves so much, and with her own hands, but her work has always been diligently carried out from the heart of the Nevarran court; her fastened coat and furred muff are rather incongruous on a woman who previously, in the heat of her homeland, did not seem aware that clothing was ought to cover one's sternum. A Seeker come to serve under Cassandra Pentaghast makes a bit more sense than some pampered mage who'd never been further from Nevarra City than Cumberland in all her life before.

But Nevarra is not, right now, where the bulk of the work is to be done, so it is not where she could stay; a belief is nothing if it isn't worth living uncompromised. It was sharing that that she'd respected in him at the time, and why she is pleased to see him now; a good addition to the Inquisition, she thinks.

"I am glad to see you here. Are you recently arrived?"

Edited 2016-01-25 04:40 (UTC)

Malcolm is aware of his surroundings, not through any preternatural sense, but simply through a mix of observation, training, and a dose of what some might call paranoia. With as many people as there are within Skyhold, he does not jump at shadows and would claim to never have done, so the presence behind him he pays little attention to until the voice is heard.

He stops short in surprise, twists slowly at the waist to see her. "Lady Thevenet," he greets with his own subdued warmth, turning the rest of the way and giving a short, polite bow.

"Yes, within the past few days, in fact. I can't say that I expected to see your face gracing these halls. If I may ask: your mother's will, or your own?"

The only true surprise in that question is that Malcolm is the first person to ask it - though doubtless Mal Reynolds has his own theories.

(He is far less likely to question her on them, that said.)

Having spent so much of her life her mother's right hand - or left hand, in a rather more apt comparison - Benevenuta scarcely sees that there's a difference worth quibbling over, but her smile is easy and genuine as she says, "It is a decision that my mother supports."

Six of one, half a dozen of the other.

"She understands, as I do, that the work of the Inquisition is essential. Especially now." In the wake of the Herald's death.

The obscuring, middle ground answer. He does not take offense; it's simply the way of politics and of a more...shadowy side to politics few care to speak of. "All the better to have someone also to observe Lady Cassandra," he notes.

"Good to have at least some of Nevarra's support in these times, and especially yours. Have you been well, here? I find I am taking...issue with some of the structural damages that have yet to be adequately addressed."

"I admire all that I observe of her," on the subject of Cassandra; a not uncalculated remark, but true, for that. She's even inclined to admire Cassandra's categorical withdrawal from the halls that she herself had haunted til so recently - there, she thinks, stands a woman who knows her mind and her mission.

Such a woman is worth following, if only to see where she goes.

But her smile tilts more informal at what he goes on to say, relaxing a little. That it suits her to be acquainted with him for reasons of her deft hand in the shadows doesn't mean she doesn't genuinely like the man; if anything, that she is so in earnest is what makes her most dangerous.

"There is a great deal of work to be done on Skyhold," she agrees, rueful, with a glance toward the damage that had caught his attention before she had. "And it is bitter cold." Which she is not built for and hates to dress according to. "I keep too busy to complain."

No, she still complains. Just only to people who'll either join in (Dorian) or tease her for being the northernmost of northerners and try to force a shawl on her (Adelaide).

Ladies Cassandra and Leliana both - though Leliana has...her own skillset. Still, both Hands of the Divine running the show, they're bound to at least make progress, which is more than he can say for literally any other organisation at the moment.

"Now that I don't believe for a moment, my Lady. Even the busiest of people can still find it in them to work their mouths to complain. And I sense the state of the hold is not the only complaint around here," he prompts. The cold he can do nothing about, of course, but some of the other issues...they'll just have to see.

Her laugh is brief, easy, and genuinely rueful - even before beginning to touch on matters of great seriousness (of which there are more than a few; of course), he's right. Naturally, he's right, both that there's something to complain about and that Benevenuta shamelessly does so.

(She does most of what she does shamelessly, it's something of a calling card. What's so great about shame, anyway.)

"Well," she says, reflective, wry, "you seem to have observed for yourself the matter of how very long abandoned Skyhold was found. It has been no simple task, simply to live here."

It is quite the departure from the surroundings to which she's accustomed.

"And living here, of course, is such a...we are quite the group, aren't we?" That it's we she settles on is a message, in itself. Benevenuta is a Libertarian, a firm believer in mage freedom, but she's far from a separatist. She's committed to the ideals of the Inquisition, if not necessarily the Inquisition itself; the war is regrettable. She would like them to live long enough, all of them, to regret it, and to see it not repeated.

"That has its own challenges."

He turns to look out across Skyhold, taking in the words. Quite the group. Especially given some of what Lady Cassandra has imparted on him. Malcolm nods down along the battlements, a request that they continue their conversation on foot rather than stand there half freezing on a crumbling wall.

"That we are. That we have yet to tear ourselves apart is nothing short of a miracle." It's still an odd thing, to now include himself in we despite having so recently arrived, still an outsider in too many ways, but here he is, with the Inquisition. History repeating itself. "Rarely have I seen many qunari in one place that were not bandits and worse. Yet here we find many, outside the Qun, and sociable. Dwarves, elves, both Dalish and from alienages and all else in between, Templars, Seekers, Circle mages and apostates and those unaligned with anyone at all. We must all of us work to keep peace within our walls, or our enemies will have no one left to fight if they come looking for one."

"It has not been easy." But from her tone, she's been in the thick of that - 'keeping the peace'. Arguing and debating and working to work with - it's frustrating, piecemeal business that she would dearly like to be able to call solved and move on from, move on to the matter of what they're actually supposed to be achieving.

But they'll achieve nothing if they can't do it together. They'll die in battle when they can't trust each other; they'll die here, ripping one another apart, suspicious and paranoid and spoiling for a fight that will destroy them. No; if she wishes the work were not necessary, she doesn't wish she weren't doing it.

If you want something done right...

"But few things worth doing are. And there has been progress, progress I have been gladdened by - even in the smallest things."

"I've been told of councils for both Templars and mages. Even trying to work together. If it were anywhere else but here, I wouldn't believe it." He hardly believes it now. "There are always going to be troublemakers, but it's heartening to see the sides not ripping each other apart."

He's seen what an annulment can look like. To call it not pretty would be the understatement of the age.

"I still fear there may be some spark that could bring it tumbling down. All sides must remain vigilant, or we go nowhere before we've begun. Any balance right now is delicate at best." Pessimistic, perhaps, but also realistic. To think it's going to be easy and sunshiny would be ignorant.

Benevenuta would not call herself pessimistic, so she must call Malcolm a realist; he says nothing she hasn't thought before, conscious of what she does, who she speaks to and how, what it might mean and how it might reflect upon mages, generally. If she doesn't always like that, well -

No one forced her into her council seat.

"For now," she agrees, with a brief shake of her head. "But I don't satisfy myself with only hoping it will hold."

"I daresay there is little that does satisfy the lady short of perfection and the completion of her tasks." He means it well. "The task set before us all is one we must all dedicate time and energy and faith to. It will be no easy journey. If we fail, then we see the destruction of all of our homes." And that's the best case scenario. It's bleak, and he's pretty sure not everyone knows how terrible the challenges are right now.

"But I am reminded at times that we are all men and women that have other needs. Social ones, for instance. Push too hard for too long, and the spirit breaks, morale drops. There's a balance to strike while the Inquisition works out its next moves."

He means it well; besides that, he isn't wrong.

"I hope that means I might rely on your company in the future," she says, with a lightness that isn't naive - he has the right of her, after all, even her social pursuits tend to have an agenda, or at least be pursued with a consciousness as to how they appear. Her weekly afternoons with Nerva, chipping away at the public perception of Templars and mages as oil and water and burning fucking pitch. The scrupulous way she guards both herself and Sabriel against the appearance of unease in the Council ranks.

That one time she dropped a blanket on Alistair because his rippling masculinity might prove too much for the unworldly Dalish. (All right, that was the wine.)

"We can't afford to forget for what we fight," after a moment, a bit gentler. "I'm glad you see that." To, perhaps, remind others. In his so serious way, it might gain more traction than from other quarters more easily set aside as frivolous and shortsighted.

He's bad at following his own advice sometimes.

A lot of the time, actually.

"If you have need of my company for reasons beyond my duties," he starts delicately, finding the words, "then you may, of course, ask." They get along, there's no denying that. There is also no denying that Benevenuta has agendas within agendas, whether her own or her mother's, and it's unwise to assume even this is for mere sport and play. Part truth, part paranoia. Part understanding how the world works. There's no grudge held there. Still, they are friendly. He's just not certain how far that feeling extends.

Friendly can make allies. Friendship can be...compromising.

He's had several decades to try and figure out the balance. It will probably take several more to truly work it out.

"I admit that it's odd to finally be stopped. To stay in one place for more than a day or two. I don't want to get too comfortable, so I must remind myself that comfort, here, is allowed."

There are a number of people who would, likely, describe Benevenuta as a friend; she encourages it, coaxes it, cultivates it. The number of people she would readily and without reservation or agenda describe as her friend is - just the one, in fact. For all that she is so constantly calculating, the drive behind it is a generous heart, so there's that, at least. She doesn't often have to feign affection when it comes to her so naturally.

"I will be glad to help remind you," she says, gracious where he had been understandably, delicately precise. "If only you'd been her for First Night - a different side of Skyhold and our Inquisition you'd have seen. I danced with a Knight-Commander with a light heart."

Norrington is a good man, she thinks. Pel could do worse than him.

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it's been a long road

battlements. rolled with what we discussed on cr meme! vaguehands the details.

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