OPEN: Like the High Tide Takes the Sand.

[keeperofmagi]

WHO: Nerva and OPEN
WHAT: After swearing an oath to Cassandra, Nerva has foresaken her title as Templar, and sworn to serve the Inquisition only.
WHEN: Over the next couple weeks so that whoever is wherever can still come bother her.
WHERE: Either Emprise, directly after her oath, or in Skyhold after they return
NOTES:The Oath, also warning for Nerva and her Opinions....

There is something uncharacteristically quiet about Nerva, these days. A solemn silence where the passion should be, a held tongue instead of the lash. After returning from Nevarra, after trudging through the snow of the Emprise, she retreated further and further into herself.

That didn't mean the passion was gone. Rather it was turned inward - almost self-flagellating in its intensity, ripping through everything she believed, and the things she thought she believed, until her soul was left at it's most raw, most pure state.

She needed a purpose. She needed a path.

And so she made one.

Any doubts she had, she did not voice. Any doubts she had, were gone, after she made her oath.

She did not have room in her heart for doubt. She did not have room in her heart for the wretchedness that had been there, for months. No. She only had room for commitment, for the cause. And if she could not fully live one, she would live the other.

If she could no longer be Templar in word and deed, then she would be no Templar at all.

She would turn herself into a sword for the Right Hand.

Over the next few weeks, her downtime was used to carefully and painstakingly remove all symbols of the Templar Order from her armour, her clothing, her weapons. Everything she had owned, had come from the templars, and she had no funds with which to simply replace them, so she worked. Mostly on her own, removed from others. She had no desire to make a big display. Her faith - her purpose - was her own, no one else's. There would be no announcement.

Just the careful and purposeful continuation of Duty.

Comments

[keeperofmagi]

The sneer does him absolutely zero favours, and she sets her work aside to draw herself up to her full height - which isn't actually all that tall, but still.

"Did you come here merely to mock me, or do you have an actual purpose?" She asked, her eyes dark and sharp, her mouth a hard, thin line.

[noleechesneeded]

"I wanted to know what happened," Simon exclaimed, trying not to look intimidated even as he shifted back half a step as Nerva pulled herself up. And it was true, that's all he'd meant when he chose to stop and ask rather than mind his own business. He'd just...gone about asking in one of the worst possible ways. "It looked like something was wrong, so I asked...!"

Simon's arms crossed defensively over his chest next, shifting his weight but avoiding backing down completely.

[keeperofmagi]

She was ready to snap at him again, when he completed his sentence. It looked like something was wrong.

He'd come over here because he had something was wrong with her?

"You have a strange way of voicing concern," She said, still bitter, because really, he had come at it in completely the wrong way. "Just because I do not wish to throw away everything I own--"

[noleechesneeded]

"Maker...clearly I'll have to work on that," he breathed, eyebrows lifting and head tilting as he glanced briefly at the ground between them. Talking was never Simon's strongest suit, but Nerva seemed to inspire him to new insulting heights. But at least they seemed to be understanding each other now, even if it was a bit late.

"But yes, you're right, it's your armor you can do...whatever you like to it," Simon added, unfolding his arms to make a gesture of surrender. "I just don't understand why..."

They were just objects, they didn't mean anything. When Simon had escaped Cumberland to find River in the north he'd been forced to leave most of his belongings behind...and as a circle mage he never was permitted to own all that much to begin with. What did they matter in the long run?

[keeperofmagi]

"Cleary." Blunt and hard and unimpressed.

"Do you think that once something has lost its original purpose, it must be discarded?" She asked, a little tightly, and it was apparent that maybe she wasn't just talking about her armour.

"It can still do the job that was meant for it. It was built specifically for me, every measurement careful and accurate." There is a pause, and a frown. "I have spent many, many hours on its care."

[noleechesneeded]

Those were all very good points. The mage's brow remained furrowed, but his frown softened into more of a thoughtful expression than a bemused one. Clearly a lot more work went into suits of templar armor than Simon was aware of. The robes he'd been given in the circle weren't quite as tailored or expensive from the sound it, but they were meant to last him years...and they were among the few things he kept, even if he rarely wore them anymore.

"...that's fair," he admitted. "I admit I still have my old robes even though there were several times it would have been easier to discard them. They could have drawn unwanted attention while I was traveling with River...it would have been wiser to toss them out and start over."

But he didn't. And neither has Nerva. Though now that Simon's forcing himself to reflect on it, he always kept them out of some feeble hope that he could someday go back. Nerva clearly had no such intentions of returning to the templars.

Rather than admitting as much out loud, the mage simply tilted his head and offered: "Maybe a blacksmith could help. Really polish the sword out completely."