#middener

[wisdomsought]

evil is evil. lesser, greater, middling, it’s all the same. from leliana

the witcher, the last wish // selectively accepting // @middener @l3urleli

   "You sound quite firm in your belief." perhaps hard won wisdom, if the sharp glint of her eye and the bare acknowledgement is anything to go by.

It was perhaps against his better judgement to proceed with the topic - truthfully, any conversations with the Nightingale made him feel uncomfortable. Solas knew she had looked into his words, about where he came from, his objectives, the reason why he had been at the conclave. He remained free and she had remained without bringing up more questions - so perhaps the answers had seemed and came to be satisfactory.

For now. Solas knew the steps of this dance too, he wondered if he could proceed with those same old steps and get away with it - until all was said and done.

   "Evil to whom?" he asks, sighing more to himself than to her words. The result is the same as his eyes arch "Evil in the Chantry claims mages are constantly besotted by demons?"

As the Enchanter had put it so eloquently each time they spoke "Evil in the way that the templars chain them? Evil as addiction that keeps men bound to an institution that shapes them into butchers?"

And so drove those same mages to reach out and twist the nature of spirits that sought to help. A continuous cycle of hurt - and perhaps evil too.

   "Evil in the way..." he hums, turning on his heels, both hands held behind his back as he walks towards the edge of the perch that the Spymaster had made a home in. Al the ravens and crows around made him jitter, or perhaps it was the coldness of the wind that pushed against this form so easily under the layers he wore.

Holding onto the book he had been carrying he hovers it over the edge, glancing back to the Nightingale with a brief hint of a smile and a brief glint of a promise "a child innocently steals a loaf from the kitchens when their mother has denied them?"

Evil as, perhaps, to leave to fade who might walk through the rotunda and feel a child's book fall atop their heads.

   "Evil is evil," he repeats the words feel wrong in his mouth though he cannot deny it - not to himself at least though that was not the role he was to play there. Evil was evil, even as one attempted to fix what had been so terribly shattered through the best of intentions.

Evil remained evil. A polite smile settles on his features as his hands come to rest to the side of his body "but one should ponder if burning down a forest to cull the population of predators is the wisest of measures."

[mercysought]

a kiss shared during a game, halwn and abel because i know abel sat outside with him in the evenings and played chess

KISSES // accepting . @middener @inquistior

   "You are good at this."

Abel's eyes from the half lit board to look at Hawln on the other side of the table. For all the time that Abel had spent thinking while looking at the pieces it felt now that the other had spent it studying him. The thought makes his ears burn first, followed by the clearing of his throat - the warmth would arrive to his cheeks too. For the moment, Abel was thankful that the light outside of Hawln's house was both too warm from the dying sun and already too little to, hopefully, be able to tell such aspects apart.

   "Thank you." he says, and eyes return to the board in front of them, his fingers move over the black pieces, the ones that he always used while he played chess back at home. It had been an almost silent rule and a quick way of identification within the chevaliers.

It was something that he had learnt far later after earning the golden plume on his helmet "Though I think good is perhaps teetering on kindness."

His back rests once more against the chair, his hands come to rest on the loose shirt that doesn't belong to him. His armour is somewhere inside, as is his weapons. From all that he is wearing, only the pants are his, the rest belonged to Halwn. Seated outdoors, Abel could believe this was a small piece of paradise, and while he would never admit it: he wished he never had to leave just as much as he wished to never have found it.

He watches Hawln now study the board, moving the pieces without much thought - only a smile on his face.

   "Do you always dismiss compliments, or is it only those that are well earned?"

Abel cannot stop a half laugh to pierce through his lips when the other speaks. It wasn't that he was trying to be dismissive, but it was simply the truth. He was not a good chess player, truthfully he had been amongst the best in the Academie, but being a good chess player meant nothing besides that: good for a couple of hours of good fun. It hardly made for anything worth getting a compliment over.

Abel shifts in his seat, his expression shifting and glancing towards Halwn with an apology in his light eyes "It is a cultural thing, I'm afraid."

A pause. When Abel leans forward once more he moves to a check mate. It is said in a whisper and it would be unexpected. But Halwn hadn't really been playing to win and Abel didn't know how to play if it wasn't to win. The chevalier rises from his chair, circling around the table to tip Hawln's chin upwards. His eyes are warm and beautiful.

Able leans down and gives him a gentle, light kiss upon his lips.

   "Forgive me, Halwn." he hums against the other's lips, the hand at his chin brushes through his brown hair "Kindness does not come as easily to me as it comes to you."

[aglaecan]

gonna shamelessly ping @middener 'cause of these tags:

#in my head he looks so good but you know how it is #you spend so long in cc you think it looks amazing #but to others that is an ordinary npc or a monster

'cause that's how i felt the one (1) time i got beru's inquiz appearance just right:

[wisdomsought]

the day will come when people will learn, and get the better of you. from imad

the witcher, the last wish // accepting // @middener @r0kh

His hands hold tightly onto his writs; Rook's voice cuts through the humming in the air around them - Solas, wonders, for but a moment what the space must look for him. It came in waves that Solas could almost telegraph but never quite so, the silence that only deepened like the space that separated and collapsed the area around them and the static that pierced through each moving atom around them to reform and reshape themselves. The gnawing of teeth, the ripping of fabric, the many eyes that glare down directly towards him as he stands before Mythal's judgement chambers.

He had walked those floors, though never faced before Her from the space that he had assigned himself as they both stood now.

   "Or, perhaps, they will simply have gotten lucky." his own voice cuts through, the silence settling upon them both like dust. Solas remains unmoved, his hands are cold against his wrists and his armour grounds him to the same rock he had always found himself in the conversations that proceeded.

He gives Rook a tenuous smile.

   "I am not above admitting when I am wrong, Rook." he continues, eyes hardening "To have your expectations changed is a gift and to deny it is a disservice." and insult, not only onto others but to yourself. To not make use of the pain you inflict when you know the best course of action, when you know that any and all paths will lead to some level of pain - the responsibility lay easily before one's fingers. Its weight there, just as gravity held onto their bodies - whether they were aware of it or not.

Solas had never been able to ignore it. The way that his body weighted against the ground. The glint of pain in one's eyes. The anger and demands in their curve. His hands bloody and unwashed, kept as a reminder of that weight even after the bodies turned to dust as light as the wind "Not to mention that to discard a lesson that is hard won is foolishness."

But he understood that too, did he not? Solas tilts his head, eyes narrowing as a tightly kept inhale jolts his arms into wakefulness, tighting against his back.

   "It still does not change what must be done." those words echo around the halls; behind Rook he sees the wings of Mythal and sees the shadow she would have cast when seated upon her throne. Her judgement cannot reach him, but her blind gaze weighted on him all the same.

Solas does not look, choosing instead to narrow his eyes towards him "Or the fact that your world now faces a much larger danger than I could ever pose to it." due to your meddling - though that last part, he keeps silent, even as the grounding noise starts at his ears once more.

[mercysought]

a kiss while slow dancing évariste and émilie, he's a big believer that there should always be music by the fire in a refugee camp

KISSES // accepting . @middener @fairb4nks

She was no midwife, but she had brought a small boy into the world on that day.

It was not the first baby she had delivered, would surely not be the last, but at least this one was given back to the arms of the mother - screaming into the forest that had welcomed it. The mother would have died if the Émilie and the small group of mages that she had been leading hadn't found a small group that would eventually lead them to this large camp. She hadn't. Both of them were now resting in the calmest part, wrapped in warm wools. The comings days and years would be hard, but Émilie was glad that for once the screams that rippled because of her hands were those of life instead of a life departing.

Even if she had a distinct talent for the latter. It felt better for this world that she should keep trying to do the former.

The blood from saving the woman's life was still remained beneath her nails, regardless of how hard she had cleaned it.

The warm, terrible, mulled wine in her stomach made the day easier; it had been one of celebration though only she knew how close it had come to be a tragedy.

   "My mother used to tell me..." she starts talking, and the left side of her face rests against his rough coat. She had been careful to only use her left side. Her blue eyes watched the flames dance as they swayed - there was music but this was more of comfort "She used to tell me my brain was full of bees." she smiles and her eyes remain in the flames - the right side of her face, scarred from the burns that had lead to her freedom, was bathed in that same warm light, leaving only small shadows from the scar tissues - shadows dancing on her face was nothing new "A constant buzzing, and that it surely was because of all the beautiful flowers I had for a mind."

It had been before they had realised that buzzing was very much real. Before she started to pick up upon the feelings of those around her. There had never been any beautiful prairie in her mind, though she remembered how she thought it would look like, even now.

There was never silence in the camp. Even as the nights winded down there was always some whispering, some plucked distant tune, some mild complaining. Émilie hardly managed to sleep the first few days. She knew more than she would like about too many people in this camp, despite not knowing their faces. Their names. The music helped, but sleep was still elusive beyond the lightest of veils that was disrupted by the earliest of mornings.

There were always bandages that needed washing.

   "I think I understand why you always have music." she hums, turning her head so that her chin now rests against his chest. The words come naturally, easily and she doesn't stop them "Silence is a cruel trickster. I find myself wishing for it... But when the only company is myself and the silence acts like a still river with no one else but my reflection to look back upon?..."

They keep swaying and it feels natural, easy. With the mulled wine in her stomach. Her chin length silver hair toned into a closer natural shade that it had once had by the fire. He stops swaying and so she stops too, her eyes find his easily - dark blue meet eyes that reflect only the flames and his own back: recognition, briefly, maybe.

Silence was such a dangerous thing in a place so full of life.

I am a better person when I am surrounded by those that are better than me.

His lips fall ever so easily onto hers and hers into his and she feels herself swaying again. The crackling of the fire. The music. The voices. The bees. It is all but wise noise that diminishes softly. She holds his back with her hands, holding him in place until he releases her, taking that moment too with the spent breath and red cheeks - from the kiss and from the warmth of the fire on her face and the fire that had been roaring for years in her mind. She could sink into him and find comfort - she knows that is the shape he has for these people. That of hope.

She still dreams of the prairie that a burnt forest could one day become.

   "It is a hard life, Évariste." and on her tongue, in her accent, she hears not only her voice but the accent of those whose silence was all they could do. Their blood she didn't have beneath her nails. But she carried the smallest proof of their existence on the grooves of her tongue. She knew that he would know it. That every single person in this camp would know what it was to speak with pieces from those they have lost along the way as the only means to carrying their memory.

She stops swaying, taking a step back, holding his hand with her right one, keeping her pinky and ring finger - the scarred fingers - out of the touch. She smiles, though, and that warmth reaches her light eyes easily "But the life you are providing these people is a good one."

[mercysought]

tell me how long to kneel and i'll do it. you know i will. halwn for abel of coooourse

thrust // accepting // @middener @inquistior

   "Andraste's —" Abel's ears burn and he can feel his face grow red that had nothing to do with the bright sun. Abel could hope that the light shade that the large trees provided him as he looked up to Hawln could provide some respite - he could, but doesn't. In this place, in this sea of trees where it was only Hawln's sincere eyes that looked at him - not down - but at him, seeing him, he felt no need to hide how the heat from his words worked through his neck into the hollows of his cheek.

His eyes move down to his own hands and then into the clear sky in the horizon, back to him and to his hands. Clearing his throat, Abel exhales though he feels no relief from the heat that had taken over his body "That would be so very unnecessary."

And he did seem to enjoy teasing; light prodding, or so he assumed that was the case. There was a pure honesty in Halwn's eyes as he shifted his weight on the ladder that raised him to take the fruit. Abel's left hand held the wooden ladder, the right held a basket that Hawln had handed him.

Abel had relented and left his armour behind. Having accepted his invite to stay in his home. Sleep in his bed. Abel's light eyes lift once more to the man that focused on the work at hand, focused. Abel could easily disappear into the bark of the tree and it was likely that would not break his focus from his work.

There would be questions from his fellow Chevaliers why he had lingered. They would ask the questions to which they already knew the answers to. The thought lingered briefly. And he found himself not caring.

When the chevalier looks up to Hawln, his warm eyes are on his and brows arched. Abel cannot decipher the expression only that it felt like a completion of his words. A small smile appears on his lips, and his eyes lower as his hands lift the basket with fruit, now half fille "You are ridiculous."

Halwn laughs. And it is warm. It is nice. It is good.

[mercysought]

everyone shifts masks, every hour of every day. for maxima, from fairbanks

thrust // accepting // @middener @midd3n

   "Hm."

Daphné smiles, head tilting to the side. Perhaps yes, she didn't know many orlesians that attended important courtly events that didn't have masks. Physical or otherwise. But everyone did have masks, he was not the same man here, sharing a glass of cheap wine served in a cup that should never be used in pleasant or polite company. He was certainly not polite company, though he could dress himself up to be and she was dressed as polite company though the form that lingered beneath shifted - just like the masks that he mentioned.

   "Revolutionary, leader—" two fingers raise through the cloud of alcohol and the warm voice hoarse from the singing earlier in the night. This would be a regret in the morning when she would need to rise just as early and look presentable and yet still feel the warmth of the alcohol and the biting of the fatigue in her lids. One finger lowers, though lifts again. It could be both in one "champion of the poor, patron saint of lost causes, dead man."

Nothing in the interaction is poisonous. Not the wine or the lining of the cup, only the hand that pushes it in his direction. Green eyes find his from across the table, mirth dancing in the candle light and on the bare lips now cleaned from the red paint that she had worn through the day.

It too was a mask that he wore, was it not? One did not bear the shape of those that would consider themselves his betters if his hands had not dug through the very heartbeat of what made Orlais tick. It required an analytical eye, sure, but one needed to know where to look still. His name was starting to pick up among circles that spoke it like he was already a martyr to his cause.

Some even joked how the Emerald Graves had known many beyond than the elves that had died for their cause, and that it seemed that Orlais was to see history repeat itself.

   "I know the shape of those masks very well." though hers were far less evocative, far simpler just like the masks provided to her to clearly identify her as a servant. A mere entertainer despite the clothes and the poise. They fit her and while they shifted they did what they were meant to do: keep her protected "Is this the life you had envisioned for yourself, Fairbanks?"

[mercysought]

stasis can kill a person. imad, for orla

thrust // accepting // @middener @r0kh

   "So can a knife." she offers "Or an unlucky punch."

Once she had punched a man - she had been attempting to move him out of her way and didn't actually intend to kill him. But she did and by the end he had fallen on the floor and with the fall he had remained there. She didn't remember his face anymore, only that he was double her age. Orla could have easily have subdued him and pushed him out of her way in a way that wouldn't have ended up in his death, but she hadn't. She had moved on before his body even hit the ground.

Statis could kill a person just as easily. It was a specific sort of training that, if used the wrong way, could stop her breathing. It could atrophy muscles. It could break bones, if applied too strongly. And it was certainly something they would be sure to find as they continued down this path. It was hardly something unique to magisters, unique to people like Imad, unique to people like her. It was useful for a great many things, but great many people didn't have a light enough touch for it, the finesse to make proper use of the technique.

So it was more often than not used for a quick and painful death.

It was also a method that she had been trained to withstand. To break out of. But it was something she had not felt since the cane that now rested on that same bench that broken through the skull of the man that had held her chains.

   "It is good training." Orla watches Imad from the other side of the room that they had assigned for training. Comedic and Relief shine as she turns them in her hands. She places one first atop the bench, next to the other straightened and parallel to the wood "You look like you know what you are doing."

Bare hands it would need to be. Orla takes Imad's form in, studying him from beneath the fan of dark lashes.

Gladiator and larger than her, strength and quick reflexes - even with the lyrium brands it would be a hard fight. Face to face, if they had met in real life, she would have to heavily rely on surprise and not being seen first. Truthfully, unless he was the target, she would have found a way to avoid him completely. A fight with him would not have been worth the time. The risk.

She returns to the square, feeling the sand under her feet. Her dark eyes find his, holding the gaze and herself in the small square. She feels her feet sink into the sand, allowing her feet to make a shape on them.

   "Come." the place was light. Lighter than she would have preferred. But this was not about preference. She offers a single half smile, both hands falling to the side of her body, warming up her fingers. Those were often the first to go "You won't kill me."