(open, kinda) it's not enough to say, it's not what's in your heart

[fightingale]

WHO: Leliana & open to friends of Detlef/Anders and those who need to talk to Leliana in the post-Anders aftermath
WHAT: Following Leliana figuring out Detlef's true identity (after he went to the Wardens but before they had a chance to approach the Advisers), Leliana is interrogating those who knew him under either identity. However, if your character has cr with Leliana and would like to speak to her just because, they're also welcome.
WHEN: mumbles vaguely, after this log - somewhat timewimey to allow for flexibility. Mostly the first half of Drakonis, with some flexibility for folks outside of Skyhold for any reason :Db
WHERE: SKYHOLD.
NOTES:
1. by no means do you have to have your character interrogated by leliana if they knew anders/detlef! we can handwave it or come up with something else!
2. information on interrogation and sign ups are here! you don't have to reply to that comment, but it would be really helpful to give me an idea of what information leliana could find connecting your character to anders/detlef, what her scouts might have observed or what gossip there is, and sort of... anything that'll help me blather my way through this. iff you feel so inclined, filling in this form would be super helpful but is not required! :Db
3. if you would like a thread that isn't an interrogation/interview but is instead your character coming to approach leliana to discuss anders fate or even anything not anders related, basically, let's do it! just chuck in a starter or pm me or something








INTERROGATIONS
There are so many parts of Skyhold, so many still under construction and renovation. Leliana has secured such a room for her interrogations. Nothing remarkable, not greatly furnished, or even fully completed. Ivy tumbles through a hole remaining in the old roof that has yet to be patched up, accompanied by stray drips, if an interrogation is taking place during the early morning. Other times, glancing up might reveal a silhouette partly blocking the light that would normally cut down through the hole, the long leg of a spider resting there, sharp black eyes staring down through the hole, or just the occasionally click and chitter of a giant spider's observations.

(Leliana owes Morrigan thanks for more than one helpful contribution during these interrogations, yes. Such is the nature of the offence - even these two have found common ground.)

When one of her interviewees are summoned, they will be escorted to this chamber, or one remarkably similar just nearby, by her scouts. Weapons must be handed over, and then they are free to wait in the stone room, occupied only by a table can chair. The wait is oftentimes an hour at least. Up for four, sometimes, if Leliana is busy with another interrogation, or business that is privy only to the master of spies.

When she does arrive, she waits before the door a long moment, before one of her scouts open it and enters behind her, setting down a chair for her to sit, and waiting just inside the door as a silent presence. Leliana does not sit right away, nor does she speak, instead waiting a long moment before speaking, just to see if her company will speak, first. What they will say, how they will act, allowing herself a moment to watch and to consider.



OOC Note - OPTIONS!
Please pick which one (or combination!) you feel your character would be most likely to respond to, would get them a bit off balance, or that you think would make for an interesting starter. We can pretend that leliana deduced this based on logic and intuition, or her scouts giving her information.

Please note!
Leliana will not be doing anything that could endanger people or cause them harm while they wait for interrogation. She will, however, allow them to be uncomfortable.
For example, if your character has a phobia of spiders, she’d ask Morrigan to not be skittering around over the hole in the roof, and would probably not go for the webbing option. However, if your character just doesn’t like spiders? Totally on the cards. Similarly, if your character has delicate health she isn’t likely to make them sit in the cold, etc.)

1. unbalanced.
One of the legs of their chair is just a bit shorter than the others, so it’s impossible for them to get comfortable or sit for any period of time, without wobbling.

2. sticky situation.
The entire table and their seat is spread with a very fine layer of spider webbing, too thin to see, but enough to just be… kind of sticky and weird oh god why is it sticky???

3. uncomfortable.
The room is either weirdly cool or weirdly warm. Not to a level that would harm health, but just enough to have them sitting there, uncomfortably.

4. fiddling.
Quill, ink, parchment + a long wait. What are they going to do?



WILDCARD.
For other conversations, Leliana can be found mostly in the Rookery. Almost always in the Rookery, in fact, though there may be rare occasions when she is walking the ramparts or wandering in the garden to clear her head, usually very late at night or obscenely early in the morning.
Hit me with your best shot.

Comments

[fightingale]

( In and of itself, Leliana sees no problem with such beliefs. They echo her own, of course, but it is so easy for words to be twisted to obscure, or for outright lies to be granted voice. She watches Adelaide carefully, not yet trusting, not taking a thing at value, but neither condemning. Anders, of course, did not seem the type to lie or to offer gloss to pretty his words, but what certainty was there?

Expression carefully schooled, Leliana waits a moment before asking her next question. )

What feelings of vengeance do you harbour towards the Templars and the Chantry?

[fleurdesel]

None.

[ It is not so immediate an answer as to have been given without consideration, nor does she take so long to find what she ought to say. This is something she asked herself often in the aftermath- after counting the dead, the lost, the forgotten. Lips pressed thin and eyes flicking to the melting ice of her sculpture, Adelaide continues. ]

The Chantry had little influence in the failures that led to the Spire's fall from what I understand of it; and the templars involved are either dead or scrambling to make sense of the aftermath as much as the rest of us. Vengeance- it solves nothing. Blood begets blood. Violence begets violence. What good would it do to hold such feelings against those that were not involved and cannot hope to make up for what was done?

[fightingale]

( Her instincts - such as they are, things that are flawed and that she doubts enough that she dismissed her suspicion Alistair was lying to her - let her think, at least for now, that Adelaide might not be lying. That she might, indeed, be genuine.

Blood begets blood. Violence begets violence. Some part of her, that part which she struggles with daily, hourly it seems, is peaked with those words. What is the good in violence? But Leliana has long known that what is necessary is not always right. What worries her is that necessity is Anders' chief reasoning for his actions, and that perhaps they are not so different, she and this man she despises, this mass murderer.

There is no room for her own emotions in an interrogation, and the line of thought is promptly smothered. )

And yet, it seems a startling coincidence that you endured what you did, believe as you do, and your name is connected with none other than Anders, who blew up the Kirkwall Chantry.

( Cold delivery, that. She wants to watch her reaction, each moment of it. ) I believe you call him 'Detlef.'

[fleurdesel]

Called.

[ And they have come to the heart of it. The time it took to return to Skyhold, the time away from him has done nothing to ease the sting of that particular betrayal; a gnawing ache she cannot soothe with wine nor drown out with work. Her eyes darken for a moment in bitter memory-

Apologizing for the lie like that makes it better. Coming to her for help as though she could ever make any of this right.

Her face, her voice, or her hands- she can control some but not all. A muscle flexes in her jaw even if her voice remains level. All the same- the shock and anger, the horror she'd felt when he'd revealed himself- it's muted enough to show that this? Is not so great a surprise. Perhaps she ought to have informed someone, anyone, but wanting to put the man from her mind and simply recover from this-

Selfish. She ought to have spoken sooner. ]

He did not precisely introduce himself as such...he did not introduce himself at all. I felt a fellow spirit healer and sought him out. [ She should have known better. ] I did not know who or what he was, only that it was the first I'd felt another spirit healer since the chaos at the spire.

[fightingale]

So, you knew. And you concealed it from the Inquisition.

( Disappointing. She had thought - hoped, perhaps - that it would not be the case. It did not auger well. That one of their spirit healers was Anders, and another had known the truth coils cold and heavy in her gut, like tar. )

Is that your excuse? Some feeling of kinship? ( And how far might that kinship stretch? )

[fleurdesel]

For approximately a few days, perhaps. He only recently revealed himself to me and in doing so swore he was turning himself in- and I was taking time I think I am allowed to reconcile what I had heard of the mad apostate Anders with the man I had allowed myself, however foolishly, to come to trust and care for.

[ Her eyes snap up, her voice going hard; all this anger directed inward; of course she ought to have told someone, anyone- of course she ought to have informed the advisors immediately. ]

Have you never been betrayed in such a way? Had the very ground pulled out from under your feet? By the time I returned this had already been brought to light. My silence was not bought out of anything so sentimental as kinship. It was not bought at all.

[fightingale]

A few days?

( Unbelievable. Galling, though she keeps that out of her tone. )

By the time you returned what damage might he have wrought? If he had been set to attack Skyhold's Templars or any number of innocents here? You believed his claims that he would turn himself in. On what basis? What value was there to his word, when the risks were so great?

( Leliana's voice is very soft, cold. She has known betrayal, yes. She has known it many times over. She has been reminded of how it feels, and keenly. )

What else have you concealed?

[fleurdesel]

Have you never had someone bare their heart to you and swear a thing might be done? I hate what he did, his actions are untenable. I may hate him more than a little for lying. I hate myself for believing the lie more than that.

[ The anger banks and cools, settling into resignation.

She'd known for however long or short a time- and said nothing. That she cannot defend.

What else? This she might- or might not. And with this she damns herself. ]

I had no way of knowing whether or not he might keep it. At the time I did not care. I wanted him out of my tent, out of my sight, and out of my life...

Anders himself would not act against the Inquisition. Justice- might. If he thought it just. If he was angry enough which takes precious little in what I know of him. Anders...is an abomination. Technically. Not one like any I have seen before and this- this I have known longer. I...weighed the odds of something happening against my own ability to right it. When he yet called himself Detlef he came to me, confessed that to me- and begged for my help. I gave my word I would do what I could under the assumption that the worst of their crimes was to set a broom on fire during a lapse of control. Not... not Kirkwall.

[fightingale]

I have heard many things, Councillor, and I have heard those same promises left unfulfilled.

( Leliana is not without feeling for Adelaide. She is not without empathy, accursed empathy that makes her so very good at being a spy and a bard, at spinning tales and reading people, and claws at her each day for the things that are necessary, that she must do.

Leliana shakes her head, disbelieving. ) Anders is not enough to stop Justice, from all that I hear. The Inquisition was left at the mercy of Justice, regardless of Anders--

( Cutting herself short, Leliana shakes her head. ) It is done. But the risk the Inquisition was placed under by the willful silence of so many... ( It is sickening. It leaves her lost. Is this the apathy and dissent within their ranks? Do the people here care so little for the cause that they have joined, for Thedas, that they would see it so risked? )

What help did he ask you for? Was there some plan that he attempted to recruit your skills for?

[fleurdesel]

So long as a spirit's purpose remains fulfilled, they are less likely to act out. Aiding the Inquisition is Just. Healing the injured, the sick, that is Just. The plight of mages- there are too many grey areas there, too many nuances for an spirit to handle no matter how long it has been bound with a human's soul.

[ This is more academic- more theoretical, far less personal. It helps her unwind the tension in her shoulders and sit back; whatever comes of this? Comes of it She's made her choice however poor her reasoning. All she can and will do is abide.

It's a little freeing to think of it as out of her hands. ]

To find a cure. A way to separate them. The most common way of handling it is to enter the fade and kill the demon possessing whomever it is they possess- but this is no mere possession. Justice is not on the other side of the veil pulling strings, making a puppet of Anders. He is in the very same skin and has been for the better part of a decade. They wish to be free of one another- for Justice to return to the fade. I did not know if such a thing was possible but- if it is? If there is a way to reverse a possession like that, a way to cure abominations? Is that not worth pursuit? Less for him in particular and more what it might do for the rest of us, I kept my silence when I should not and began the research. It actually bore some fruit, a few possibilities but-

That was before I knew. His desperation for them to be parted makes more sense now, as do his fears. They...struggled. Justice thinks Anders having enough time to rest, to not run the both of them ragged is a waste of their time. That simple human connections is a waste of their effort better spent elsewhere. Justice cannot and will not understand such things- compromise is not in his nature. There are reasons Spirit Healers do not often call upon such spirits for their aide- and why more often than not even if they did? Spirits of Justice do not answer. They are ill suited to the work and humanity in general.

[fightingale]

( That, at least, makes sense. Leliana waits, allows Adelaide to speak, before she makes her reply. )

I have seen it before.

( The ending of a possession, but it is a side note. She remembers the horrors of Redcliffe, of what an abomination could do, yet... yet Wynne had been one with a Spirit of Faith, and never had she known such a good woman, one so noble and so kind. Protective. And there were those who would call Wynne abomination without hesitation, that she knew without doubt.

In more relaxed circumstances, Leliana might allow herself to exhale slowly, to stretch, to pace so she can better think. Instead she remains rigid, watching Adelaide intently. It was remarkable that people thought Anders so human. Yes, Justice no doubt swayed him. If Nathaniel was to be given any credence at all he would have her believe it all fell to Justice, and not to Anders at all. She is not so easily convinced, not so lightly swayed. Not with this. Not with any thing, because she cannot afford to be. There is too much at stake.

It seems ironic that she is so consumed with determining the fate of the man possessed by a Spirit of Justice, and determining what damage he might have wrought. )

You pity him. And it is pitiable, all of that, but what make him so deserving of the mercy he would not grant another?

( Not quite spiteful. More quiet, curious. It could become spite so easily, but she is trying to listen, to hear. She learns more, that way. ) What were these possibilities you discovered?

[fleurdesel]

He proves everything that is feared of Spirit Healers. That we might be possessed against our better judgement. That we might taint the very spirits we call upon in doing so. That we make monsters of ourselves. I pity a man that thought he was helping a spirit he had come to know and became instead consumed by the reality. We are cautioned against it for a reason, no matter our intentions- on this side of the veil it means little. Spirits do not understand that. For them intent is will, intent is reality. Justice likely had in his eyes good intentions for whatever came of it and while I will question, always, how much of that was Anders and how much Justice- and further still how much was Vengeance- until they are parted? We've no way of knowing.

[ One cannot have existed or acted without the other- one wouldn't be twisted into something else without all that made Anders passionate and human. It is, at the core, a mess. A tangle that hadn't ever truly touched her for it was far and away. A mad apostate a few countries over that did a horrible thing- no one she would ever know.

No one she would ever trust.

Adelaide pinches the bridge of her nose against the beginnings of a migraine and weighs her options. They are precious few, here. ]

It is less for them, for all that they brought the possibility and question to me, that I did the work. I did this for those that might benefit it. An actual cure- a way to cleanse a tainted spirit? To undo what makes them demons, to free a mage? I began because I thought he was my friend. I continued and may yet continue for the greater good. What I have found- a few promising rituals. Some are absurd and there is one with a rather complex formula that's thoroughly encoded I'm still picking at but the rough shape of it has risks. Anything of this nature would. The question remains on whether or not it is worth attempting- and if anything would come of it. I'd have to stand the sight of him for it to work and at the moment? That will be a long time coming.

[fightingale]

( Leliana is silent a long while, taking all that information in, absorbing it, processing it. There is a lot, and she cannot claim to be a mage or one versed in the arcane.

After a few moments, she finally voices a question, watching Adelaide with a calm that does not betray her interest and the wonder of what the potential for such a thing coud be. )

What can the Inquisition provide to enable such a process?

[fleurdesel]

[ Without any other option available to her, she waits for Leliana to speak. Whatever judgement comes of this? She will abide. Truly she ought to have brought Anders to them when he admitted to being an abomination, brought her research to them in kind.

That it has come to this is on her shoulders. Not even Dorian's reminder that Anders was at fault will lift that weight. ]

While they do not know what the items I will require are for- I have someone procuring them discreetly. Aside from that- somewhere safe to attempt these rituals outside of Skyhold. I would not attempt them here, not after what happened to Lauren.