inagutterson | ic/ooc: inbox/plot with/contact post

[ A cloak. Dear, sweet baby Andraste.

By the time that footsteps announce him, she's well clear of the door. Has in fact taken some small pains to ensure that the crates and barrels are too — best if no one cracks a skull tonight. She'd have to let him bleed out, or worse, talk to Anders.

Wren's already started in on a bottle when he arrives (cups are for chumps), uniform traded for a sweater that might be charitably described blind grandmother chic. It's clearly not her own: too short in the arms, stretched loose in the gut. She watches from her seat on the floor, calls out: ]

Four out of five.

Edited 2017-03-26 23:42 (UTC)

[It's a cloak of many ears, Melisende can be counted on to take ears equally for this cloak. If they're Dalish she tattoos the Vallaslin on them.

There are times Yngvi would take cracking his skull to getting drunk; cheaper, faster, more reliable, you know exactly how and why you ended up with blood on your face too. Bruce doesn't need a belligerent dwarf flailing his limbs at him and bringing up that Gaspard the dracolisk is respectful of the dead. (If Korrin can name a nuggalope for Asher, Bruce can name an overgrown lizard for a pretender to a throne.)

Yngvi is-- well dirty. Floors are dirty. But he bows, sweeps himself up.] M'lady receives my greatest efforts, anything else is unworthy. [There are so few people he'd open a vein for just to get a crack of a smile, only one of them is currently residing in Skyhold.] Feels very familiar all this, slinking about to meet Templars in dark corners, exchanging bottles. Wasn't usually sharing what was in it, mind.

[ Wren hasn’t curtsied in at least thirty years, and she doesn’t intend to begin again now. But a limp-wristed sweep of an arm implies its vague association. ]

I do aim for nostalgia. [ Dryly. She presses it out to him: Wine, some Antivan thing, cloying as the words that must have accompanied its donation. ] Even brought the Fereldens, for my lord's comfort of home.

[ A loose gesture to the ceiling. They’re up there. Somewhere. Lurking — alongside with the lists, the letters announcing that home's comforts rapidly draw closer. ]

I am afraid that I could not arrange the poisoned madwoman upon such short notice, but the night is young yet.

Thought it was more than just the damp - don't we have cleaners here? Repurpose the robes of free mages for rags and dusters, get them to work, show them what real living is. [Never let it be said he can't find common ground. Inquisition get him to be foreign affairs correspondent, look at this sterling work right here.] Can't have the elves doing it.

[No, really, can't have the elves doing it, he's seen enough, the smile is too tight.]

Old aunt Meredith, practically family for how she kept sending us work on both sides. Such a shame but that's what happens with old humans. Dwarves have the decency to be decent about it. Or up here we do. Orzammar they go proper weird with Darkspawn nonsense and start riding brontos about before they swandive into the lava, wicked waste of a thing for good salvage. We drinking to your loss then? Or my possibly sad ability to dream? Is it really that good? Just seems stupid.

[Tell him Wren, tell him he is a sad impoverished dwarf as he reclines on something then weeps (in fits of laughter eventually because he wasn't the one that was good at playing the sad mark in the games.)]

[ A snort. ]

We could do with a bit of lava up here. It would take care of the mold.

[ Her eyes linger on the tension in his smile. At least they’re both in a mood, however quickly the reasons diverge. Elves, then, but which ones? Something to listen for. ]

Dreaming is a crock of shit.

[ She shifts up slightly, the better to lean against a shelf and behold his woebegone, laughing form, ]

It’s just hallucinating four or five hours, [ Sure, that’s how much you're supposed to sleep. ] While abstract concepts try to possess you. Same as dodgy mushrooms.

[ But, wait a moment, she's realized — eyes narrowing — ]

— Where are your nugs?

[ Maybe they can drink to them. ]

Edited 2017-03-29 02:23 (UTC)

Say the word, I have people who can bring it up by the bucket, stout lads. Named Big Jim to a man. I miss a good roast.

[But enough about Orzammar and the doglords.]

Thought you went places. A place. Magey party central or summat? I've had fine Nevarran corpse perfume and sampled from the depths of forests through halls bones and it was sweaty. D'you get sweaty?

[This is education he's got to ask. Templars are odd sometimes.]

Cancelling appointments like I said or at Diamondback so they don't disgrace themselves in company when we find it. Stroganugg is on guard duty and recon.

Depends. How good is the dream?

[ Are there tits involved? Nice ones? As though reciting from memory: ]

As the body rests, the dreaming mind enters the Fade. Non-mages do not retain awareness of this. Events shall seem as though they are real, however strange they become.

[ The dullness of her tone falls away. ]

But you — what, black out? Is that it? It sounds odd.

[ It sounds relaxing. She shakes her head, reaches for the bottle again: ]

To Stroganugg, a finer protector I have not known.

Edited 2017-03-29 18:50 (UTC)

It's not happening though, it's a thing going on up in here [he points to his head and it's a near thing that he doesn't slosh booze all over himself in the process, what a wicked waste] with nothing to show for it. You eat a giant dinner in a dream but you'd still wake up and not have eaten a whole boar in one sitting.

[Why did that rifter disappear on him before Yngvi got to eat an entire boar for his viewing pleasure?]

Do you really remember? I don't remember a lot of things that aren't important. I lie down at some point and then I get up, the weather might be different and maybe there's daylight, maybe there's not. Stuff to be doing. Hands to kiss, babies to shout at. [You need to show dominance with babies.] Sometimes I wake up if a nug falls out the bed or I fall asleep on a project.

He's a fierce little man. I think. I don't know how to tell boy nugs and girl nugs apart, that's some Orzammar shite. [But he'll drink to one of his nugs and whatever that nug might be because it's a good nug.]

Parts of them.

[ Wren admits. ]

How the boar tasted — for instance. You would still have the experience, just no hair in your teeth.

[ Well. She might not. Dwarven beards get serious quick. ]

There was a boy in training who would always dream of being smothered to death by geese. He was terribly concerned — Is it a demon? I am going mad? He prayed over it. Wept many pious tears. Atoned.

In the end it was solved by the confiscation of his very fancy pillow.

[ Nobility. What can you do. She mulls it over; ]

But I suppose you shall find out, if you ever wake to more nugs.

[ There is the warden from Orzammar now, she almost suggests, and abruptly thinks better of suggesting. ]

Edited 2017-04-03 00:05 (UTC)

That's the best bit - cleans out bits stuck in the gaps.

[What dinner parties do you go to where you don't floss with part of the previous course?]

Did he do something to some geese? Have a pet one that he loved one and call Puddle de Honk then they had "duck" for dinner before he got carted off? That's how my family would do it I reckon. I'd do it to Gunnar.

[This comes after he's returned to a less alarming colour after inhaling an ill-timed swig due to laughter.]

Heard mutterings from up top about a nugfestation so I can just lob them at the ginger. I'll run out of names so you can be first on the list to name more.

I am not paid enough to handle your funeral costs.

[ Not that she expects the Nightingale to object to thrown nugs — rather, that tempting her with a potential inheritance of the creatures seems a good way to mark oneself dispensible. ]

I am uncertain that I might be of help, we were never allowed to name our geese. But for you, Monsieur, I shall try,

[ She deliberates, one finger held aloft: ]

Roulade. [ For the heavy-roller. ] Andouille. [ For the dumbass. ] Sabodet — [ For the blockheaded. Look, no one stuffs sausage puns like a butcher. ]

— Ah, there is no Gunnar?

[ One must honour one's blood somehow. ]

I'm not having one, leave me out for the birds. Going out Avvar style none of the Chantry pomp for me.

[Because that's what people do for unclaimed folk - burn them. Surface dwarves wouldn't get to go back below, everyone knows enough to know that bit so just. Letting you know you can just spread him out like a tasty crow buffet. Let the birdwatchers and the curious have a picnic. Make a day of it is what he's meaning.]

You had geese! [This is clearly an exciting prospect - Asher had hens, exciting because they had eggs until Yngvi learned of the care and feeding involved but geese.] Geese can kill a man, can't they? They have rows and rows of needles in their mouths. Seen them from afar.

[Wild things have the sense to steer clear of him.]

Sabodet would go well with Jambonette. I've been involved in a Roulade rumble at a pat-- poncy cake shop, why did I not think of that before? And Gunnar? He should be so lucky. Lived this long, doesn't get to be a nug for not being worth the trouble of eating during our childhood like the rest of the no-good ones.

Then the matter is settled. If a goose kills you, we shall leave the body for it. Very tidy.

[ Then you roast the goose, later, and the whole thing's catered. But Maker, did he almost admit to knowing patisserie? They couldn't have that.

Other pertinent questions: Where'd that wine go? How is this bottle empty already? Wren shifts up to inspect the others upon the rack. ]

I used to tell the other children that we minced my brother up for pies. [ She hadn't started that rumour, but she'd been happy enough to spread it. It scared them more than the threat of a black eye. ] How many others were there?

Do geese fly? [Don't you dare laugh, you already asked him about dreams he is a deprived dwarf boy how would he know. (He knows.)

And he's slipping. Maybe he likes you Wren or is it just the cold and the damp down here causing a chill down the spine? Been a while since he's talked to folk outside of ambling around and getting in whatever their business might happen to be at the time.] Anything around named for a spring day? Or summer breeze? How does anyone taste that? Just tastes like a mashed up whatever, you can't taste hints of flowers in it unless it's the alienage wine because they only have dandelions to brew.

[Distinguished sommelier, add that to his resume.]

You seem the sort, bet you had the arms for it back then too. Working the grinder. [Human kids are so big to dwarf kids, what right do any of you have?] More than you'd think, less than you'd hope. Don't have all those Orzammar rules to worry about popping out babies but we don't do it like everyone else. Well. Don't know how Qunari do babies. It's like with frogs. There's a lot. Then less. Then a few.

Geese have a habit of snapping up frogs.

[ She hefts a bottle. Nevarran, this one; name pronounced like the sound of severe laryngitis, and not enough gnats for a summer breeze. But it'll do. She waves it back in answer.

The concept's familiar. Everywhere, there are times when the gift of a child must be weighed against the cold arithmetic of survival. That doesn't make it pretty, or just. It doesn't make it right.

Wren knows her own part in such unkindnesses. But you do what you can, it's all that you can do. To carry on over someone else's pain is no courtesy to them. ]

I am glad you've thus far escaped their wings. It should be dreadfully boring here otherwise.

Edited 2017-04-08 03:10 (UTC)

Someone's got to get fat off the geese, sleep cosy and well-rested by the down.

[Those same people are involved and Yngvi's face is free of tattoos so he's got it better than some as he makes an attempt at the name. His Nevarran is better than his Tevene but worse than his Orlesian. It only matters what he can understand.] Van Markhams like this one, wonder if someone relegated it down here to not offend the Pentaghast Seeker.

[Not that he cares but the most frantic deflections a dwarf half-drunk can muster at the moment as he sniffs it. Disappointingly lacking in incense. One day. One day he'll slip a special brew in there.]

Going to get that in print. Signed. Counter-signed. Carried on me at all times so that people know a Templar of good standing said a good word about me.

I am charmed that you accord me good standing. [ Who wouldn't want to fit neatly into the Order of late? They've done such a fine job of fucking it all. ] Do repeat that, if you ever speak with the Lady Seeker.

[ Or better yet, don't say her name at all. She's a favour over Reed now, and a story to shock Darton if she ever need divert him — she suspects the Right Hand would be harder to distract.

As Yngvi's doing now. But she'll let it lie a moment: silence folding into the shape of something almost an agreement. There's more than one means to pluck a bird. ]

Be certain to mention my generosity and love for fellow man.

There's a Templar here that we won't allow to touch the homebrew that the holdings keeps sending up because he'd make it go sour. Not the twitchy jumpy one. Nottingham? Yeah, Nottingham, that one. [Wren you are the best of them all.

He's met Cade. He might've put a nug on Cade. That was a whole thing.] Like she'd be speaking with me, I'd get strangled in her coattails of Seekerly justice. What a sad end to a fine life.

D'you want that engraved somewhere? You'll have to do with what I can manage, can't dream big. [It all comes back around because he's a cheeky shit but he likes you. This is clearly going to be a terrible mistake for him because of his track record with these things going tits up but it's been...lonely? Or he assumes. It's not a concept he'd been familiar with but it's the only thing he can actively think of and it's nice to have a night that's not him and the nugs or Yngvi vs the tavern floor.]

[ An undignified snort. It wouldn't do to shittalk her scant comrades of Skyhold; she's going to need them on her side. But Maker, is it occasionally tempting. ]

Why not? We are in a dangerous line of work, Monsieur, [ They might drink themselves to death in this basement. There may be coattails. ] Let this fortress remember us for it.

[ No small bitterness to that thought, but it goes unvoiced in the easy smile of a moment.

Yngvi is not Arnault, is not Gervais, is no Brother — this wears neither the familiarity or formality of her few friendships. There's no advantage to this; neither of them (neither of their causes) will benefit from the association.

That makes it easier. The stakes are not so high. To let down one's guard, however slight,

It does not ask so much of her.

Wren fishes at her side, hands over a heavy knife, hilt-first. do u wanna vandalize skyhold y/y ]

[They'll have great corpses, imagine the talk. The weeping at the great love affair clearly because why else would two people be alone in the dark sharing this much alcohol that they were too comfortable in the company of one another to ever leave?]

The mountains of paperwork that threaten us both, never know when someone's going to round a corner then you're buried in it, how d'you get to the Maker's bosom that way? Can't even get up and down this mountain sometimes for the bear gauntlet or people who can't set up tents without making a spider's web out of the lines. [Shoddy workmanship that is. Those are just his least preferred ways to go in Skyhold.

For the record.

So don't let him down here or at least prop him up and pose him so he looks really cool.]

Madame! Here was me thinking that sliding some of Emeric's spoons into Skyhold's cutlery was a terrible act. [Yeah let's vandalise it, obviously he's carving a tasteful nug butt.]

I swear there were not so many bears but ten years back —

[ But then her brain catches up with her ears, and her brow furrows. It’s hardly an uncommon name, and yet — ]

Emeric?

[ — And yet she is quite done trusting to coincidence, where some bloodlines are concerned. Particularly those wealthy enough to own something so frivolous as multiple spoons. ]

Asher's not here to rip his shirt off and suplex them into submission. They're feisty.

[A new challenger is needed, where is our new challenger, step forth and cut your promo.]

M'lady's father. Gwenaëlle's father. [Gwenaëlle said all hushed as if it's a secret but when does he ever say her given name, when is she not m'lady or some joking title he's perphaps bestowed upon her?] Shouldn't have drunk all the brandy I could carry out of his estate either, that was the really good shit.

Your lady.

[ Flatly. She buries her face in her hands, wheezes laughter. ]

The Lady Vauquelin — [ wheeze ] — the — Gigi.

[ Names not to be repeated outside this room, and yet, ]

You robbed Emeric Vauquelin, [ Her head lifts, to stare in faint wonderment at her fingers. Another bubble of laughter escapes. Alright. The excessive quantity of wine's starting to hit. ] The father of my lady. Maker.

[Pausing in his carving - this is going to last, it wouldn't do to half-arse a nug arse after all - he almost swallows his tongue because Gigi.]

No one ever called her that! She sprang out into the world The Lady Vauquelin as you say, sharp-tonged, sharper-witted, smarter than anyone knows what to do with. [It's not the clumsy adoration of someone that fancies her, he's known her too long. Plus he sprawled himself out with his brother in a bear pelt in her room that one time.]

I went to check up on him. Inform him of Asher's passing when they were so close. Took his brandy. His silverware. Tried to speak to m'lady in her rooms to see if she wanted anything she didn't have and to know what shade of purple the dress I was trying on was because I looked ravishing. Then he walloped me. I escaped in my chariot. [A keg. Pulled by twenty nugs. As you do.] Might've let the whole Inquisition hear the whole thing. Including the bit where he was firing at me with a crossbow and missed. Every. Single. Shot.

Don't know why his shirt was open? I think that was my fond farewell? We'll always have the estate, I don't know.

Gigi,

[ She confirms, through a feeble attempt at solemnity. It's ruined by the laughing — turned coughing — turned laughter again.

Gwen is sharp, certainly. Prickly, too. Has anyone ever known what to do with her? Wren's inclined to guess there have been successes, small things; taken together, they might show more of the girl than she wishes seen.

But they will not be. She's too skilled at separating the herd (and Maker, isn't it ever a lot of them) of would-be protectors.

Or, you know, Wren's just at the stage of drunk where she's overconfident in her assessments. Could she suplex a bear, in Hardie fashion? Certainly not. Is she presently willing to try? Questions best left unanswered. ]

His shirt was open, [ She deliberates, considers her limited knowledge of the man, ] Because he is Emeric Vauquelin. I am more shocked, Monsieur, that your gown stayed upright. Surely your bosom must have heaved with romance.

Edited 2017-04-16 18:43 (UTC)

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