@ofvaliantheart // i am so sorry bash she rambles a lot
if you asked the members of her clan to describe nuva, they'd describe her as someone bright and full of energy and life. there was so much she wanted to say and so little time, often the words would come out all at once with little sense to any of them. they might mention her stubbornness, her pride, her recklessness, her naivety, her devotion and compassion. however they might describe her the woman that nuva had been in the past month would be nigh-unrecognisable to them. her fear and wariness to the chantry people that surrounded her left her small, wide eyed and uncertain.
it was only with the passing of time that the brightness of her nature began to peak through. they called her herald. called her "your worship." viewed her as a beacon of hope for... what? closing the rift at the temple of sacred ashes? she'd failed to close the breach and yet words of her apparent "heroism" had already begun to spread through orlais and the hinterlands -- had attracted the attention of everyone from a qunari mercenary (the iron bull was scary, but interesting), an elf that didn't consider herself an elf (she liked sera's passion for the little people) and some sort of fashionable mage that thought herself better than everyone else (she did... not like vivienne). not to mention the tevinter mage, dorian, who was becoming a pretty fast friend. even cassandra had grown on her -- though intimidating beyond belief initially, it was pretty fun to tease cassandra and flirt with her, if only to get that disgusted snort that made her snicker.
she didn't dislike the commander by any measure. indeed, his role seemed to resemble that of the war-leader in dalish clans, but he also represented the bogey-man she'd been taught her entire life to fear -- a bogey-man whose presence became all that much more threatening in her teens. she kept her unease to herself, tried to break tensions with humour and smiles, but she was always aware of his presence in a room... the only solution, then, was desensitisation. if she hung around him more, if she got used to his presence then she couldn't be afraid, right? flawed logic, but an attempt is made nonetheless; so she watches him train with the recruits, listens to him during the table meetings (more than she listens to josie, anyways. the woman is nice, but nova can't understand half of what she's talking about) and in general tries to be unobtrusive while still present.
it does nothing to cut her nerves when she does initiate a conversation outside of the table meetings and her one attempt previously. her fingers pick uneasily at her wrist and she waits for him to finish speaking to the man beside him. she catches the name rylen, recalls him mentioning something or other about him being the second in command, before the man turns to leave. the commander (should she call him cullen? was that expected of her? would it be rude? was it too friendly? human titles were weird and she was confused....) seems surprised to see her, or perhaps he's simply surprised that she's actually come up to him and her courage nearly leaves when she's forcibly reminded of how much taller than her he was. mythal's tits, who allowed him to be so tall? and so big? as if his glower wasn't intimidating enough.
she forces herself to stand upright, even as her every instinct screams that she's making herself more threatening in doing so. that it was a terrible decision -- if she made herself bigger, made herself more of a threat, then that would be provoking the templars and they'd hurt her. "sorry to bother you commander i-- i know you're incredibly busy training our recruits -- the iron bull says you're doing a good job by the way -- but i..." this was stupid. why was she doing this? "i had a strange request. you... had to learn a lot of the, what do you call it? chant of light?, when you were in your training, yeah? i-- they call me the herald of andraste. and i won't tell them not to, even if-- even if those words mean nothing to me, i know how much religion helps people when they're.... when life is shit and you feel like you've got nothing, believing in something helps. if they were elves, i could just use our prayers or our beliefs to help. but i can't. and if i ask mother giselle or-- or cassandra, they might believe i'm becoming an andrastian. and i'm not. but i want to help people in the way they know how and i thought that... maybe... you could help me learn some of those words that help people be stronger. i heard leliana praying not long ago. something about in his will be blood? or something? i don't know. i'd read it on my own if i knew where to read it but i-- struggle a lot with reading and knowing my luck i'd get everything wrong and then make everything worse. plus i thought maybe it'd... well, i don't know you very well. and you don't know me very well. unless you were talking to leliana. she can find out a lot, can't she? it's terrifying, frankly. but i thought maybe it might be a good way for us to-- but only if you're not too busy. and i mean, i wouldn't be able to do it all the time. i'm in the hinterlands a lot, there are so many people being hurt by this stupid war and it's not right. this poor old man, in redcliffe, he wanted to put flowers on his wife's shrine. but he couldn't because the templars or the mages might hurt him. so i went and --- now i'm rambling. i'm sorry."
