heaven, a gateway, a hope

[byblow]

WHO: Grey Wardens & You
WHAT: A daring and not at all ragtag group of Grey Wardens has walked all the way across Orlais to inform the Inquisition--just in case it hadn't already realized on its own--that everything is terrible.
WHEN: Harvestmere 22
WHERE: Skyhold
NOTES: This post has: (1) A single group "we just got here, we're freezing, who is in charge, what do you mean you haven't decided yet" starter that we'd like to keep to one chronological thread. (2) Open starters for individual Wardens set later in the day/week.

OOC Note: Regarding the first starter--threadjack away! Anyone is welcome to wander onto the scene to see what's going on and wander back out at their leisure, to fall silent for a while, etc. No tagging order. But let slower taggers get a word in edgewise!

Comments

[amygdalae]

[Sleep has always been elusive for Bruce. These days he's much better than before, but there are always nights where the dreams get too much and the memories overwhelm him. The nights where he closes his eyes and hears not the world around him but the hum of unwanted power in his veins, bound into his body - where he smells blood and death and feels it bubbling inside, already ready to burst.

Those are the nights where Bruce knows he probably won't be sleeping much at all.

The night air is chilly as always but Bruce makes do with a tattered cloak one of the refugees had given him after he had helped to treat their illness. He had been reluctant to take it but they had insisted, and Bruce was always bad at saying no. But he had to admit it helped, as he pulled it tighter around him while he took the familiar steps up to the battlements.

At the the sight of the mountains stretching around them was no less impressive as they had been in the day. Bruce stands near the walls and stares into the distance, letting his mind wander for these few moments. Seeing sights like these always had a way of making him feel... small. And that was a strange thought to dwell on, sometimes.]

[byblow]

Good evening, [ Alistair says. He's been saying it every forty-odd paces, like clockwork, to the Inquisition soldiers standing guard along the wall. Most of them don't want to be distracted, some of them only answer in grunts, but every now and then someone will comment on the sky or something and let him talk to them for a moment.

This one doesn't have to comment. Alistair stops on his own--because the man is familiar, now that he's looking, and not dressed as a guard, and Alistair probably won't singlehandedly cause Skyhold to fall to an unseen incoming force by joining him at the wall and distracting him for a moment. ]

Or I guess it's almost good morning. It's odd you can't really say good night as a greeting. We need something for these hours.

[ Perhaps hello, and welcome to being talked at for as long as you'll politely endure it. What's inside Alistair isn't liable to bursting so much as sinking and pulling him down with it into a place where he isn't himself anymore, or not only himself--

Talking helps. ]

Or we could reclaim good night. Take it back for insomniacs.

[amygdalae]

[Bruce turns around at the greeting, and it takes a moment for him to place the face to the voice. It was one of the Wardens... presumably the leader of that ragtag team of them, according to his gut feelings. He was the last person that Bruce expected to see again. Or maybe it wasn't that surprising.]

Good night sounds good enough for me. [There's a wry smile as he replies.] Of course, we could just stick with 'hello'. That works no matter what time it is.

[Tonight might not be a good night to sleep but having some form of company might be--good, he supposes, for a definition of 'good'. Bruce isn't one to just randomly talk with people but dwelling on his own thoughts wasn't going to help him either. For now, being distracted might be the best course of action.]

[byblow]

That's true. But hello doesn't comment on the quality. I like that part. [ He gestures toward the dark sky and blue-white moonlit mountains. ] It's a good night.

[ Alistair will be enough of one for randomly talking to people for the both of them. ]

For me, anyway. I spent the last week sleeping in snow caves with a bunch of restless, smelly Wardens. Maybe it's not a good night for you.

[amygdalae]

[There's a small laugh at the comment about 'restless, smelly Wardens', because he's sure that in some way, this particular Warden was probably the same at some point as well.]

It is a pretty good night tonight. [He returns, the wry smile still on his face.] But I'm sure after spending so much time with all those restless, smelly Wardens, many things here must be a blessing for you.

[byblow]

[ Him, restless? Yes, obviously. He's here rather than asleep somewhere, for one thing. Smelly, though? How dare you. He's never been smelly in his life.

Fortunately, he cannot read minds. ]

Mm, food, [ he agrees. ] What a blessing. Walls I didn't make out of snow. Personal space. But that won't last if you lot keep taking in everyone who turns up at the door looking scraggly and pathetic.

[amygdalae]

[Bruce can easily agree about food and walls not made from snow, having experienced similar situations himself. When you're by yourself, constantly on the run... its hard to have much in the way of anything.

Still, at the next part there's something of a pained, sympathetic look.]

Well, we can't exactly turn them away after all the walking they must have had to do to get here. [Considering how isolated Skyhold is from almost everything else.]

[byblow]

Oh, I wasn't serious. [ Alistair doesn't sound offended by the assumption that he was; someone who doesn't know him has no way to know his heart is a bottomless pit of compassion for all things except darkspawn and Loghain Mac Tir. ] I'm as scraggly and pathetic as anyone.

[ He leans against the wall, making himself comfortable. If Bruce was hoping to be rid of him soon, too bad. ]

What do you do around here?

[amygdalae]

Aren't we all?

[Scraggly and pathetic, he means. Regardless of who they are or what they are, they're all here because they can't be alone - not in the usual sense. The Breach and now Corypehus threatened all of Thedas. No amount of running or being valiant was going to help them. The only hope they had of accomplishing anything at all was working together.

Doesn't make dealing with anything easier, though.

Bruce bites down a sigh and glances briefly at the sky again, towards the mountains in the distance. Had he trekked across here before, when he was running away? Perhaps. He had been to so many places now sometimes it all seemed to blend together.]

I do my best to help out as a surgeon. [He says eventually.] There's already enough people who need help just within these walls.

[So many hurt, injured and dying. The work never truly ends, not really.]

[byblow]

[ Alistair Approves (+5). ]

So I've noticed. [ He felt a little guilty, turning up here with more problems to be solved when many from Haven were still sporting injuries. ] Nothing like darkspawn and dragons to keep your sort popular.

i just literally imagined a cutscene just for the +5 to happen on screen

[amygdalae]

[Bruce lets out a small laugh.] I think we've all had enough popularity going on for a while.

[Especially if this popularity brings dragons and darkspawn to their doorstep. They certainly could do with less of that.]

necessary tbh

[byblow]

Give it ten years and you'll wish you could have it back.

[ Or: no, you won't. Alistair wouldn't really wish for a return of the Blight or any of its destruction, and he wishes people would stop asking him about Cousland and archdemon-battles altogether. But for the Order's sake, if not his own, he'd like it if people had slightly longer memories. Maybe fifteen years before the resentment and name-calling resumed. ]

faderift: the rp of imaginary da cutscenes

[amygdalae]

I'm not one for being famous myself, personally.

[Because in a way he already is, and Bruce would very much rather not. He very much prefers sticking below and be unknown to everyone else. And of course, everyone is kind of done with Blights and demons and all that fun stuff, especially after this.]

[byblow]

Oh, but it's wonderful. There's nothing better than that moment of regret and resentment on someone's face when they truly realize you're not what they expected.

[ That's sarcasm. For the record. ]

What was your name? I'll ask that bard to write a song about you.

[amygdalae]

[Despite himself Bruce lets out a small little snort at the words, in a way kind of understanding where the other is getting at. Even if Bruce's own brand of 'famous' is more of 'infamous'.]

I, ah--Bruce. [He gives a pause.] And you need to do that on my account.

[He's perfectly fine not needing to have anybody write songs about him.]

[byblow]

I bet more things rhyme with Bruce than with Alistair.

[ Of course he doesn't need to. He wants to. He ignores that part. ]

Spruce. Truce. Loose. You'll be immortalized in verse by the end of the week.

[amygdalae]

I'm not too sure how I'll feel about being rhymed with 'loose'.

[Because a loose man he is not. He is also not any of the other words that has just been said.]

But there's nothing about me being worth immortalized in verse. I'm perfectly fine in not being known through a bard's song.