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

Emprise du Lion | Camp

[equanimiti]

Solitude and silence had kept Alayre company for the last few days. Between those two and the bitter cold of Emprise du Lion, Alayre kept to himself and only seldom shared words with others. He retreated into the depths of his mind and abandoned all things else for the sake of finding clarity. Whether or not he found clarity is debatable. Yet, as Norrington had described to others, Alayre seemed to be of sound mind now.

He was idly strolling through the camp during the late hours of the day when he came across Nerva. A curious gleam settled within his gaze as he watched her tear away the Order's sigil off her clothing and everything she possesses. It's a disturbing sight to behold especially for someone so directly tied to the Order.

A moment of silence passed before Alayre dared to speak. "Why?" His voice is quiet but the dismay is there.

Re: Emprise du Lion | Camp

[keeperofmagi]

She looks up, the defensiveness already at the ready - but when she sees who's voice it is, the bristles calm and she simply goes back to her work.

"I will not be a Templar in name only. If I am to be a sword of the Inquisition, then that is what I will be. But I will not continue to be stymied by half measures."

[equanimiti]

Once Nerva finds her calm, Alayre questions her. "What exactly does that mean?" He asks quietly as he dares to come near. His gaze lingers upon the former Templar briefly before drifting towards the clothing she's working on. Anything that once symbolized her affiliation with the Order had been stripped. Nerva looks almost bare now without the Order's sigil upon her and it's a mildly disturbing sight.

Uncertain of how he feels about this sudden change, Alayre reserves his opinions for now. He's not here to talk her out of her decision. Alayre is merely observing. Nerva is free to do as she wishes. She's a woman grown after all.

"We're lost but we can find our path again."

[keeperofmagi]

"Our path, apologizing to mages for our supposed crimes, while never addressing theirs? Pretending that they don't risk all of us while they lust for their supposed freedom? While they try to make a second Tevinter in Thedas?" She turns her eyes up and there is a real fire burning there, low and dark, that she had been trying to suppress for days to no avail.

"I have found my path, Ser. I will see the Divine's will done, and I will see myself as a sword for the Right Hand, and I will see Corypheus dead. But I will not continue to play games with our lives."

[equanimiti]

The fire within her gaze is just as telling as her words. It's the same fire within Alayre that caused him to lash out. He grown weary of the politics involved with the Inquisition and it showed in his angry tirade. "We will not have another Tevinter." The man says in a harsh whisper.

"Not as long as the Order stands." A deep sigh leaves him. Alayre is obviously conflicted. As much as he desires for the Mages to be free, he isn't about to sacrifice Thedas in the process. "No one is playing games here, Nerva." He replies as he leans against something like a wall or beam to support him. Still somewhat healing from his ordeals, Alayre honestly looks haggard.

"The lives of our men and women take precedent over all things else." He trails off for a moment. "Though, I do admit it doesn't seem that way." The old Templar let's out another sigh as he strokes his chin pensively.

"I want this Corypheus dead as well but the Inquisition isn't prepared to face him." A sobering truth. "None of us are."

[keeperofmagi]

"Everyone is playing games!" She doesn't mean to snap, but the several weeks worth of frustration pull it out of her like a bull whip, and she has to bite her lip to hold it back.

"And the Order doesn't stand! There was an abomination in Skyhold and we did nothing. A rift opens up, and we do nothing. We have no reason to capitulate to the mages and yet we do, constantly, and consistently."

His weariness does nothing to soothe her anger - only enforces it, like embers lighting tinder. As if she is enraged by what she perceives as his weakness.

"We will never be prepared as long as everyone is too pre-occupied with a future that may not even exist."

[equanimiti]

Maybe Alayre is indeed weak on some level but he doesn't believe the Order is weak. Confused, yes, but not weak. "Then clearly this line of thinking we've adopted must change." He replies after a moment of tense silence.

"Instead of directing our attention to a future that may never be, we focus on the now." Alayre honestly holds himself personally responsible for the Order's hesitance to act. They've tried too hard to appease everyone that they forsook their duties as Templars. They wore the shame of others as a mantle for themselves and in turn ruined themselves.

"I will not be the one to lead the Order but I will be one to set it on the right course." It's his mistake after all. "There's many who have cause to loathe us for our past misdeeds but be damned if we'll remain idle because of them."

He takes a breath. "It wasn't my intention to lead the Order astray but after years of violence and bigotry, I thought I could bring about change."