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WHO: Ellana Ashara + OPEN (with closed starters for Sabriel, Sina, and Merrick)
WHAT: Ellana returns to Skyhold from Emprise to catch up with people and settle back into life here.
WHEN: Guardian 20th through the end of the month.
WHERE: Skyhold

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After Ellana fulfills her duties in Emprise du Lion, she's allowed the opportunity to return to Skyhold or stay and wait for more assignments. But after everything that's happened while she's been away -- especially to her friends -- she wants to see Skyhold in person again. The journey back is thankfully uneventful, and as she gets through the front gate, she already has a list of people to see. But over the coming days, she settles back into a routine around the place, namely: visiting the mounts in the stables and petting those who seem agreeable to it, taking supplies down to the refugees encamped down in the valley below, reading out in the sunshine, or practicing with her new lute, which is a birthday present to herself.

[ ooc: feel free to have your character know it's Ellana's birthday from a scout if they want to give her a present. it's on Guardian 22nd! ]

{ sabriel }
Ellana is looking forward to getting back to Skyhold and flopping back into the bed she shares with Sabriel. It's not that sleeping in a bed roll is tough, seeing how she's done it her whole life, but her bed is something new and wonderful, and she's actually missed it. Coming into Skyhold, she sees not much has changed after the event with the rift. She heads to her room, drops her bag, and flops back onto the bed, sinking her head into the pillow and sighing happily. She'll unpack later. For now, she'll rest until Sabriel turns up and the two can catch up.

{ sina }
Hearing about what happened to Sina made Ellana want to return home, but she couldn't abandon her duties to the Inquisition, and she was assured Sina was recovering. Still, after resting from her journey back, she goes to find Sina to see how she's doing. There's a quick stop to the gardens first, where she picks some flowers. Her eye catches the Dalish memorial in the corner and she kneels beside it for a moment, relieved that Sina's name doesn't have to be added to her clan's stone. Then she returns to her goal of finding Sina.

{ merrick }
First Sina, then Merrick. Sam had told her what had happened to him via crystal and she had burst into tears. But Merrick was strong and Ellana had known he could beat the poison in his system. She also knows that what Merrick likes doing with Ellana more than anything else is to sit and sing, so she travels down to the merchant stalls with coins jiggling together in her purse, hoping the lutes she once saw there haven't all been bought up yet. She's been saving up to buy herself a lute for her birthday, and now the time has come. Thankfully, there are several available in her price range, and she selects one, testing it out. It will suit her, and she pays, taking the lute and adjusting the strings until it sounds as near enough to Zevran's as she can get. She still doesn't know many songs, but it's a start. And she can play for Merrick. Since the lute has no strap (she'll have to find someone to make one) she carries it in hand as she searches for her friend.

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In a fluid motion she comes to kneel close to her, opening one of the pouches at her waist to reveal a pouch of ring velvet that she hands over carefully, mindful of what she has carefully tucked within.

"A few small things, they should not take up much room when space is at such a premium in Skyhold or an aravel," she eplains, her smile small and her eyes watchful. Inside the pouch there are a few feather such as Morrigan wears on her own garments, so glossy they gleam blue and green in the light, a few carved beads that caught her eye, an assortment of small stones to do with as Ellana pleases, labelled seeds for healing supplies. But most importantly a fragment of a poem, translated and written in Morrigan's own curling hand.

Her eyes move to the pouch, which she takes gently, since that is the way Morrigan is handing it to her. But her gaze lifts when Morrigan mentions an aravel. Funny; Ellana has already been giving her future some thought, and she plans to travel most of the time. By herself, she assumes, because she doesn't know who would go with her. An aravel doesn't factor into her plans, but the word reminds her that she does want to return to the clan from time to time, if they'll permit it. The Keeper allows Gavin to return, so why not her?

"Ma serannas," she says before even opening the gift, knowing she doesn't need to translate that for Morrigan as she does for other people. She carefully tips the pouch into her open palm, eyes lighting up at the carved bits of wood. The tree branches and vines are reminiscent of her vallaslin, and remind her of Mythal. Then she turns the poem right side round so she can read it.

"Oh, this is-- it's elven?" Ellana looks up with a hopeful expression. "I've never heard it before! It's beautiful." Her lips press together and tears prick the corners of her eyes, but she tries her best not to actually start crying. She reads over the words again. They sound so powerful; from a time long past. They remind her of the story Galadriel told her of the trees of light in her homeland, and how they were destroyed, and the light forever dimmed.

“Tis but a fragment, the rest was eroded and what I could translate made little sense without the rest of it.” It’s a common complaint she has when she’s trying to piece it together when written elven is so rare anyway, bits and pieces that can change meaning so greatly depending on where they are, if they were meant literally or metaphorically. “Whether it is meant literally I cannot say but I have seen sylvans, and I have spoken with something much like one in the Brecilian forest, a great oak that spoke in rhyme.”

Bad rhymes. Terrible rhymes. So many stories are undeniably disappointing when delving into the fine details though elven lore has only disappointed her when her own limitations get in the way. Everyone has spent so long, moved so far, spread out and filled in the gaps differently that even were more clans to speak with her they would likely argue amongst themselves about the correct interpretation.

She gives Ellana time to compose herself, remembering a time when she too could be so overwhelmed by a gift, by Jonas passing over a book, a piece of jewellery, a golden mirror. “I thought that given our prior conversation that it might serve as a reminder of sorts, of who you are and where you have come from. Of what you are.”

As Morrigan speaks, Ellana gently brushes her thumb over the words like she can absorb them through her skin and send them straight into her heart for safekeeping. Only a fragment, but enough to leave her feeling blessed to have received it. Nearly all Dalish songs and poems are about sorrow and loss, if not about practical things like how to properly steer an aravel. This poem sounds sad too, but it's something new; something unknown to her before this moment.

Her gaze lifts and she nods, even as her expression shifts to amazement. "That's right; I remember the story now. I've never seen a sylvan, and I wouldn't want to cut off a branch to see what color in bleeds."

She carefully returns the beads and poem to the pouch and cinches it up tight. She never wants to lose this gift, though she will probably copy it out many times until the words are memorized. They'll truly be written on her heart then.

"It's so thoughtful of you. I don't have words to tell you how grateful I am to have another piece of my people's past." For a person who wishes her people could look forward to the future, she knows they will inevitably cling to the past. She doesn't want to erase that; they should treasure what little they've clung to. But there is a difference between cherishing the past and holding onto it, to the detriment of everything else. They're scattered, they're nomads, they endure without roofs over their heads or full pantries when hungry. And she wants more for them. But she can't drag them kicking and screaming into a new way of life. What she can do is be an explorer who can look out for pieces of their past, to comfort them.

"This will be a constant reminder. I haven't forgotten what you told me. I think of it often."

It might not ever be fully believed but a part of Morrigan will always mourn for what was lost and long for it returning, for at least knowing as much as possible and attempt to preserve and restore it before it is lost forever. Even the world between, the Crossroads, her sanctuary to raise her son in, that too is fading, collapsing. Once that is gone? Unthinkable,

"If translating elven, particularly what is written, has taught me anything tis that guessing meaning and intent will drive one to utter distraction, that much of it will always be spent trying to decide what is metaphor and what might have been possible. What the ancient elves were capable of..." She trails off, looking about them because even in Skyhold there is ancient power that lingers in the very stone itself, in the name that sounds more impressive when the whole of it is given. "They are fearsome to fight, you find yourself imprisoned within roots and branches that only fire and steel will beat back. But many forests have been fed on death, and the spirits in this one had more reason to press close against the Veil."

Now is not the time to speak of Zathrian though doutbless it is known; ten years passed between the ending of the Blight and the formation of the Inquisition, more than enough time for word to spread and for the clans to have gathered together. The story of the Fifth Blight is well known and in some circles there would be many who would find a savage joy in speaking of what an elven Keeper inflicted upon many.

"There is no need of thanks." Ellana doesn't know her as well as some, as well as those who spent a year in her company or those who know her from Orlais. This is a practical thing with a motive though she does remember the joy when Jonas would gift her with something and maybe some part of it finds it easier to gift to a stranger than to someone like Zevran when it would inevitably mean something if it were him. "Your Vallaslin is for Mythal but I have seen the Vallasdahlen in the Emerald Graves, this verse reminded me of them; for all that has been lost, there are always those to remember, and even a tree with a severed limb might grow tall and strong to stand the test of time."

It's strange how Ellana has never felt a deep connection to the forest, thought her people often made camp there and that is where they hunted for game. Their lives were tied to the forest, but to her, it was always just a place to live. A place to stay ahead of the humans for a little while. But now she feels she's been ignorant. The ancient elves loved the trees enough to write poetry about them, making them sound like treasured members of the community as opposed to a bit of shade and firewood. Her people's traditions have carried down through the generations, from Arlathan, to slavery in Tevinter, to freedom in the Dales, to their nomadic lifestyle or life stuck in an alienage. Don't the city elves plant a tree in the center of their alienage to keep the old ways alive? And the Dalish still plant a tree over each of their departed. Now she feels her eyes have been opened. When she looks at trees, she'll see more.

"I hope I can see those trees someday soon," she says, trying to picture it in her head. There would be more than just the trees there. There would be something that marked the graves of elves, otherwise why would it be called the Emerald Graves? "If those trees could speak, imagine the stories they could tell. All they've seen over the centuries."

All her life has been the Wilds, the place she returned to, and despite the dangers faced on the journey to Skyhold she enjoyed the time back in the wilderness. The peace, the solitude, making a game of it with Kieran to tell her what bird had called from what tree, what tracks they had stumbled across. There were few true ruins in their path but she had stopped at some to take him inside, to let him see with his own eyes. That's how history becomes real. Seeing it. Breathing life into it. She will give him the joy she finds in such places as best he can that he might understand why she does what she does.

"There are tales of the ruins there, from the time between Arlathan and the fall of the Dales but still, things that have been lost to time. But with the civil war in Orlais, as well as the Red Templars then travel to such a place might be beyond what the Inquisition can manage at present." A temptation, to go searching, and she alone could fly there if she so pleased, perhaps might if the Inquisition tarries too long in places such as the Fallow Mire, the Western Approach, Emprise du Lion. "Paintings too, I have ventured before the wilds became perilous with men, not beasts or lurking spirits." She has been all across Orlais though, always retrieving something to catch Celene's eye.

Blood magic would have been a far easier way to keep on her good side without the arguments but Orlesians will always tell tall tales.

If only Ellana had wings to fly, she could go searching for ruins and return without wasting much travel time. Then she wouldn't be neglecting her duties to the Inquisition. Alas, her curiosity must wait until the Inquisition deems elven ruins prudent to explore, or after Corypheus is defeated and she can travel a new path.

"I know. With everything that's been happening, we need to focus on bringing peace first. Still, it's nice to dream, and think of the future. Maybe someday, right?"

A rare thing, a greatly freeing thing and something Morrigan has enjoyed so many times in the last few years. She’s given that up for the Inquisition though only Leliana would really understand what that sacrifice is like, and even then she still can, though there’s little sense in looking when they have little idea of where to start and so few resources.

“Eventually one party will win the war and life will return to normal. If Celene wins, at the very least, Gaspard has no patience of the Game and would see it quite like Ferelden but more civilised one would imagine. To bring peace though we need resources, influence, soldiers. We might need to venture to more fertile grounds than the Fallow Mire, the Hinterlands or the Emprise.”

"All things not easy to come by. I think influence might be the hardest to gain right now." But she believes the Inquisition can do it. Especially with people like Josephine and Leliana able to influence people to their cause.

"The Hinterlands were fertile. Just... full of bears and wolves."

"Influence is a tricky thing, and the Inquisition an unwieldy beast that shall be forced to dance and parade itself for their whims." The Inquisition, for all that it has those who can play the game and those like herself who can ignore it, will be examined from each and every angle, and no matter how well it does, it shall be found wanting.

At least she laughs though, unexpected perhaps but they all made the pilgrimmage through the Hinterlands. "On my way to Skyhold I encountered many an angry bear even in the snows, tis how I met Merrill and her refugees from Kirkwall. Still, be thankful they are none of them Blighted beasts."

Parading herself in front of people isn't Ellana's idea of a good time. She knows that nobles with money and power judge everyone as beneath them, so it's not like she's the only one, but she's also a Dalish elf, and that has set her in the lowest possible place for their good opinion. And frankly, she doesn't really care. The only issue is being part of the mage council and having to present herself as worthy of the title of Councillor. The soiree will be the ultimate test.

"That is something to be thankful for. At least wild animals have a sense of preservation. Blighted animals attack until there's nothing left." Thank the Creators the wolves that once attacked her were just normal wolves.

Never allow another to hold your leash Ellana. Morrigan has slipped free of Flemeth's shackles and never again will she allow herself to be as others desire, unless she is to lead them on a merry chase. Tis up to others to prove their worth, not the other way round.

"And yet there are so often men even worse." Is she joking or not, it's difficult to tell by the way her mouth twists, and so she sighs, remembering just how the world was at the time of the Fifth Blight. "I hope the wolves with those green eyes are not a warning of what is to come however."

It is a lesson that Ellana should learn, and who better to teach it than one who has gained her independence completely?

"They could be," she admits, "But I hope not too."

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