Truth or Dare: Side Party for Servants and Scoundrels

[faderifting]

WHO: Anyone!
WHAT: A party for people who might scare the nobility, are deathly afraid of chandeliers, or fled the soiree with cheeses hidden in their clothes and need to make a clean getaway.
WHEN: During (and after) the soiree.
WHERE: The valley beyond Skyhold.
NOTES: Drinking, revelry. People might make out or something. We're not responsible for your actions.

The soiree might be fun, if you're into that sort of thing, but that isn't what it's for. It's for impressing the powerful and opening their pockets—and, necessarily, some people aren't invited. In some cases that's personal. In others, it's just understood. When they're done helping to set up, most of the servants and workers who aren't needed to serve make themselves scarce. The usual trickle of refugees to and from the fortress slows. Some people used to sleeping in the stables may find their "beds" occupied by nobles' horses or the rooms they had been squatting in cleaned and prepared for someone else to stay in.

There's no resentment. (Or at least very little.) That's how these things go. And in the valley outside the fortress' walls, there are foot soldiers and refugees and a number of miscellaneous exiles who welcome the company with large fires, cheap but freely flowing alcohol, and whatever music can be wrung out of instruments exposed to such low temperatures. The crowd thins and dwindles as the night wears on, but even after the last person has left the Great Hall in Skyhold, there's still a sizable gathering near the river with no intention of going to sleep before sunrise.

No masks allowed.

Comments

[bunko]

"Her."

An Antivan conman (former, reinstated for the evening), speaking to a Nevarran conman (former, reinstated for the evening), among Orlesians and Fereldans, has certain advantages. A simple advantage: to speak in Antivan can be a kind of code. To speak in an undertone, in Antivan, as you step past your partner, is an even better code, and this is what Scipio does once he has caught sight of Teren.

He has mentioned her to Rafael, because of course he has. They tell each other everything. And while they have made a great show of keeping fairly separate from one another during this ball, working opposite ends of the room, targeting the same targets but approaching from different angles--all of this work has been sly, and secretive. It would take someone watching them to note their cooperation.

Unfortunately, Teren is someone watching. So Scipio ducks past Rafa, gives the clue, under his breath--and then strolls right up to Teren. Two glasses of wine. One must meet one's problems head-on, yes?

"A drink or a dance," he proposes, and holds out one of the goblets to her. He can guess which she is more likely to choose. It isn't a difficult guess. And this may or may not be a distraction, so Rafa can keep on working. All the same, Scipio smiles blithely. "You must choose one, my friend."

[doneisdone]

"Oh must I," Teren says, the words more of a droll statement than a question. She plucks one of the goblets from his hand and just holds it for now, raising a brow at the young man. "And I suppose your partner will continue working the crowd in the meantime?" She sets the second goblet on a nearby table, set up specifically for the party, and continues to hold her first one as she casually reaches out to grasp Scipio's shoulder. Her grip is vicelike as she pulls him over to stand next to her, mostly just so she can speak in a lower voice.
"Stealing from one's own brethren is frowned upon," she says, angling her head just enough so that her critical gaze can bore into him. "And if you were conscripted as a punishment for the last time, what do you think will happen when you're caught now?"

[bunko]

"Partner," he repeats, with a delighted laugh, "ah, how you-- aggg, nooo--"

The last part is thanks to the grip she puts on his shoulder, sharp enough to pinch and strong enough to bring him in closer to her. This is not what he wants. How do you distract someone when they refuse to be distracted, when they close the circle and refuse the drink and the dance, and look at you just so, like they know?

But Scipio rallies boldly, recovers from his protestations with grace and aplomb. The longer they stand here, the easier a time Rafael will have of it. "It was not for stealing, that we were conscripted," he tells Teren, helpfully. "It is a very long story. Would you like me to tell it to you? You only needed to ask. Unless your thought to bring me closer was for other reasons, yes?"

Other reasons. Audaciously, he raises his eyebrows at her. Do not come over here, Rafael. Do not do not do not.

[doneisdone]

"Another time, perhaps," Teren says pointedly, and is then, perhaps successfully, thrown off-track by his... implication. She narrows her eyes at him in a hard gaze that seems to bore into his very soul-- then removes her hand from his shoulder to cuff him upside the head, no more harshly than a lioness would a cub. "You think you're clever, don't you boy," she observes, straightening again to sip from her wine, "no wonder you were caught."

[bunko]

Scipio bears this cuffing with fairly good humor. His little hiss of breath is mostly for show. After all, he has borne many such cuffs in his life. This one at least feels almost friendly. Teren likes him, he's sure of it. This is how he can give her an irrepressible little smile in answer.

"As the saying goes, you cannot blame a man for trying." His cheer is helped by the fact that Rafael is still continuing on unobstructed. Such success might come to a swifter end than they would have liked, eventually, but for now he will hold attention here. "And I am very clever. How good of you to notice. Of course, cleverness, it recognizes cleverness, yes? This is how you spotted me."

[doneisdone]

She rolls her eyes, but doesn't let his mugging distract her. Her eyes fix back on Rafael, watching him like a hawk. "Certainly," she says idly to Scipio, "shall we go say hello to your friend? He looks lonely."

[bunko]

"No, I think he has good company," Scipio says, cheerfully, smoothly, right as he steps in front of her line of hawk-sight. Too slender to be a true obstruction, and not terribly tall, which precludes the same--but he's enough to obstruct at least some of her view. And hopefully it will be enough to catch Rafa's eye and direct him away, send him into the crowd, where he might be covered by a screen of partygoers. Look what sacrifices he makes for you, Rafa.

Thus situated and scarified, he gives Teren a brilliant smile. "Not so good as me, of course. Come, where is the harm in letting him work? We are not injust men. A little injust, maybe, but a very very very little." In demonstration of the 'little', he pinches thumb and forefinger together with barely a squeak of space between. "If we say that we will give it all back, after the night is over, will that please you?"

[doneisdone]

Unfortunately for Scipio, Teren is very tall. That doesn't mean she can look over him, necessarily, but she can easily angle her head to peer around him, sipping thoughtfully at her wine. "Give what all back?" she asks coolly, and looks back at him with an arch expression. How pleased she will be is, of course, a direct result of how intently he lies.

[bunko]

This... is a trap. It must be a trap. It is so obvious a question that it is unargaubly a trap, and Scipio's smile stays in place, just as brilliant as it was moments ago, before she'd asked, but he is thinking very hard.

Maybe it would be better if Rafa came over here now.

Ah, well. "The time that we have wasted, of course." Smooth! He shrugs, carelessly, charmingly, and casts his gaze out over the ball with a wistful sigh. "The time of these nobles, and the time of you, too. Having to follow after us and think to keep us from trouble, and from troubling all that are here only to dance away this lovely night. But we can give back these wasted moments. And we will, should it please you."

[doneisdone]

Teren doesn't break her gaze from Scipio, watching him closely as he squirms. Then when he looks over the crowd, she flits her gaze briefly over to follow his, then brings it back, studying his face.
"Time," she repeats, "and how do you propose to give that back?" Downing the last of the wine in her cup, she sets it down and begins to stroll toward Rafael, mindless of whether or not Scipio follows. If he ghosts on her, it will be all the worse for him later. She is a Senior Warden, after all.

"Hello," she greets the other half, disregarding whether or not he's currently in the process of working someone, "a word with you, Rafael is it?"