we're hell raising and we don't need saving

[ungovernable]

WHO: Hercules Hansen + Benevenuta Thevenet.
WHAT: Definitely not any feelings, probably.
WHEN: Between now and the Warden plot in the Western Approach, some backdated things.
WHERE: Skyhold, Emprise du Lion.
NOTES: An assortment of threads between now and then.

Comments

backdated wintersend nonsense?

[twelvelabours]

No, normally in these circumstances, Herc wouldn't fuss too much over Wintersend. It's not really his thing, anyway, the sort of holiday that bristles at memories and leaves him better suited to a distant sort of nostalgia. Given that he recently was travelling all about to try and get away from his fellow Wardens and head towards Skyhold, it's not like he's really got much spare coin handy for picking up gifts, either.

And yet, here he is, with a knife that's intended for a peace offering, no matter how counterintuitive that be. Seems like he and the Councillor got off on the wrong foot, and for all that she stole his knife, he's not actually got anything against the woman, politician or not.

He's on his way to seek her out following one of her meetings, however, when he runs into her. Not quite literally, no, though they do round the same corner at the same time, and he smiles and nods politely.

"Councillor," quietly friendly, "just the person I was looking for."

[ungovernable]

"Am I?"

Benevenuta is politely bemused, slowing to a stop when she'd been about to sail on by him as if there were nothing interesting whatsoever in passing Hercules Hansen at any time, but particularly not this one. Things to do, terribly busy, terribly important. Letters to write and pockets to coax gold out of and mages to wrangle - mages take a great deal of wrangling, she has discovered, when one is obliged to do it sitting on a Council seat and not from slightly behind them, pulling the strings. Maker knows there are days she wishes she'd set herself at Adelaide's elbow and left well enough alone. Perhaps she'd drink less.

(He is, of course, the most senior warden present now - he is also terribly busy and important. The usefulness of that, potentially, hasn't failed to occur to her.)

"What might I do for you, Warden?" So polite.

[twelvelabours]

"Not a thing, in fact. Just here for a delivery, if you've got time."

She seems the sort to enjoy being asked, rather than just being saddled with something carry around all day, especially when that something would be hard to pass off as a fancy letter opener. His eyebrows are just slightly raised, and from around the corner that he's just rounded, a quiet wuff can be heard as Max comes trotting along, mouth wet from sticking his head in an obliging water trough.

Max bounds over, but stops short of jumping up on the Councillor or Hercules, just looking up expectantly at them both. Pats? Pats good. Pats good yes.

[ungovernable]

Pats good; Benevenuta provides them, absently.


"Well," after a slight pause, "how convenient it is, then, that I have something I had intended to give you. If you wouldn't mind delivering it to my quarters?"

But by the gesture of her hand, she means - alongside her. To collect his (Max's) gift.

[twelvelabours]

His eyebrows raise, at that. "For me?"

That doesn't seem right. In fact, he's faintly perplexed, though it translates to an expression that looks more grave than confused.

"No problem at all," Herc clarifies, without feeling very clear on why he's having to agree to this.

[ungovernable]

"No," she says, sunnily.

If he thinks she is beginning to enjoy provoking that particular reaction from him -

he's observant.

With another scratch under Max's chin, she sweeps past them both to lead the way to her private quarters; a modest room, by her standards, but probably a sight better than wherever he's rolling at night. There is a small desk, with the room's one chair, and by the fireside she's dug up an ugly old rug from somewhere for her spaniel to sleep upon. It is tidy and organised - impersonal in most ways besides accommodating that spaniel.

[twelvelabours]

What?

He stares after her, for a moment, because not a thing she says makes any kind of sense. Instead he's stilled his steps, but Max is lumbering after her, and once she's a few steps ahead, Herc makes sure to catch up and keep up. Ridiculous, honestly.

"Huh. Wasn't sure this place even had rooms," he says, a bright kind of dryness. Yeah, no. He sleeps in the courtyard with a mabari for warmth and a outcrop of roof for shelter. Sometimes a bush or a tree, depending. It's real luxurious, the Warden life.

[ungovernable]

Benevenuta would consider her own living situation 'simple' - she does much for herself that elsewhere she would not - but Herc's is another thing entirely and she wrinkles her nose at his remark, as if he doesn't remember how willing her pragmatism had been on the road toward Skyhold. She plays at softer than she really is, this hard-edged thing.

"Always you are learning something," she says, so mild as to imply the dryness she doesn't infuse the words with. "Now - here it is."

...for Max. A black collar, hand-crafted, its onyx studs polished to shine.

"I had it made for him in Nevarra," with a scratch to the mabari's big head.

[twelvelabours]

"Always," he echoes, just as mild, just as not-dry. In fact, it verges on sunny, as he collects himself and remembers to keep up with the politician.

And-- oh.

A grin that starts wry, but is accompanied by a quiet chuckle as Max barks very happily, and looks at Herc in a distinctly she likes me better way. Useless mongrel.

"Very nice. Are you going to do the honours, or...?"

[ungovernable]

Astute mongrel.

"By all means," she says, properly sunny, in turn - playful, dangerous thing that she is. She crouches down by Max to strap the collar on; she'd had to guesstimate the necessary size, but it's a good fit and well-made, too. She's rather pleased with herself as she fastens it in place, giving the mabari a good scratch under his chin as she rises again, smiling up at his master.

"Now. You had something for me?"

[twelvelabours]

She may or may not be gifted with a lukewarm trail of drool down her wrist in appreciative response for her efforts, Max's tongue lolling out and Herc making a quietly appalled sound as he kneels down and holds out a handkerchief to Benuta - more like a rag really, rough and coarse, but it's clean. "Pull yourself together," he reminds Max. "Treat the Lady with some respect."

Max whines at Herc, and goes to apologetically lick Benuta's arm, before Herc sets a hand on the dog's barrel of a chest. "No."

And then her reminder comes back to him, and Herc nods, drawing a package wrapped up in simple brown paper that's pretty crumbled. With the wrapping lies a dagger, a suspiciously close match to the one she returned not so long ago. It might have been the same, if not for how very much newer it was.