exsiliumlogs | (no subject)

Entry tags:

(no subject)

Date & Time: After this network post
Location: Super secret mage hideout, aka Unit 205
Characters: Residents of said abode (Anders

birdhousesoul, Martin Septim

septim, Nathaniel Howe

noble_nate)
Summary: Frosted Flakes marshmallow squares have been made.
Warnings: None at present, possibly angsty microchip discussion ~~or discussion of WHAT WAS UP WITH BEING ALL BLUE AND GLOWY~~

In the days following the Masked invasion of Unit 205, Anders has made himself scarce. He's been out doing things and having discussions. He won't say what, or with whom, or where, but he hasn't been taking Pounce with him, and the cat's been taking it out on the furniture and limbs of Anders' flatmates.

Tonight, he's at home, a change from the recent status quo, and he's monopolized the kitchen with some mysterious process involving foodstuffs never seen in Thedas. Martin's love of frosted flakes has not gone unnoticed (how could it?) and Anders has consulted a recipe on the back of the box, without consulting anyone else on how it can best be followed.

It's a testament to his Circle teachers' alchemy lessons that Anders doesn't burn the results: frosted flakes marshmallow squares. He's in the kitchen trying to chisel them out of the pan.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Nathaniel smiles ruefully. "A few months ago I was worried that Anders and I would never actually get to be together, other than getting together once every few months if we were lucky. Now we have all of this time together, and we're spending it apart."

He considers Martin's comment about being a priest. "Wasn't it hard? To know that you couldn't offer comfort to the people you were counseling?"

"'Always toward absent lovers love's tide stronger flows. Sextus Propertius,'" says Martin, verbatim, as if some obscure nugget of wisdom from a long-dead Imperial poet is supposed to mean anything to the Thedan. "Which means 'absence makes the heart grow fonder'. Since you saw each other so infrequently, the emotions ran stronger."

Mulling over the question, Martin decides to pull up a chair and sit, elbows off the table. "Yes. Healing the body is easier than healing the mind. I did what I could. Often, it wasn't enough." Not at all, the Oblivion Crisis proved that. Martin lowers his gaze, wistful.

Nathaniel's more dismayed about Martin's quote than he's willing to let on. If absence really does make the heart grow fonder, perhaps Anders' fondness for him will diminish now that they're together rather than strengthen.

He focuses instead on Martin's other comments, curious about the other man's past. So you preferred being a healer rather than a priest?"

Martin knows he's said the wrong thing. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't try to advise you on romance. I've never been in love, so it's not my area of expertise," he admits factually, no regret or sorrow.

"In Tamriel, priests are healers, of body and soul. My duties as a priest were both counseling and healing wounds through magic. I can't say whether I like one over the other."

Nathaniel nods thoughtfully. "From what I can tell, priests in your world are comparable to the Chantry clergy in Thedas. But they're not capable of performing magic. If they could, they wouldn't be allowed to be members of the clergy; in Thedas, mages are mages, and they can't be anything else.

"From what Anders told me of the Chantry, I'm not sure I would've been as devout in Thedas." Martin offers an awkward smile, knowledgeable that he would've lived his existence as an indentured servant in some fortress, enchanting items for the good of society, and for profit to the Circle of Magi. "Forgive me, I shouldn't speak ill of realms I know little about."

Edited 2012-03-14 00:03 (UTC)

Nathaniel can't help smiling. "You needn't keep apologizing. I love my home, but the treatment of mages there is horrible." He grimaces a little. "There was a long time when I thought the Chantry had the right of it, that mages should be locked up. It wasn't until I became a Grey Warden and met a couple mages that I realized how wrong they were."

"Mages like Anders." Getting close to someone has a way of letting you see what they see, understand the struggles they through. It's no surprise a Thedan who used to agree with mage oppression would retract that statement once he fell in love with a mage. "The way he speaks of the Chantry, I have to admire his willpower and strength to fight them."

"So do I," Nathaniel says in agreement. "When I served with him in Amaranthine, years ago, he wasn't nearly as adament about it." He grabs another one of Anders' cereal squares. "He escaped from the Circle several times, and he hated how mages were treated, but once he was free he never really tried to help his fellow mages." He smiles ruefully. "Justice used to get irritated with him for that."

He looks up at Martin. "Has Anders told you about Justice?"

Surprising, that once upon a time, Anders didn't feel as strongly about mage liberation as he does now. Or maybe not, as he had enough trouble keeping himself hidden from the Chantry. "I assume we're not speaking about justice as a moral concept." No, how Nate is speaking about 'justice' sounds as if a name, an entity. "No, he has not."

[Massive tl;dr incoming!]

Nathaniel hesitates a moment, unsure whether or not he should tell Martin about Justice; he had been fairly sure that Anders would have already said something. But if his suspicions are correct about what happened to Anders when the Masked stormed into the apartment, then Martin should know the facts.

"It's...a bit difficult to explain to someone that's not from Thedas, but I'll try. It requires a bit of an explanation of how some things are in our world; forgive me if I wind up being long-winded." He smiles wryly.

"In Thedas, when people fall asleep and dream, their minds travel to a place called the Fade. I don't know if it's a real place or not, Anders would probably be able to explain all of that better than I. What I do know is that most people can only go there when they're asleep, but mages have the ability to travel there when they're awake."

He gets up abruptly and grabs the carton of milk out of the fridge, pouring himself a glass before sitting back down. "There are two types of beings within the Fade: the first are demons. There's all sorts, and all of them are dangerous and malicious. There are also spirits -- personifications of ideals.

"When Anders and I served as Wardens together in Amaranthine, there was a sort of invasion of darkspawn -- hideous monsters that the Wardens are dedicated to fighting, if you didn't already know that. During one of our battles with them, a few of us were transported to the Fade against our will. We managed to make it out with the help of a spirit called Justice. Something happened, I'm still not sure what, and he was transported back to the mortal world with us, and was trapped within the dead body of a fellow Warden."

Nathaniel grimaces at that. As much as he'd grown to like Justice, serving with a sentient reanimated corpse had always seemed a little gruesome to him.

"I'll leave the details of this part to Anders to tell you, because I wasn't there. But the long and short of it was that some time later, Anders offered his body as a vessel to Justice. Since he was inhabiting a corpse at the time, there was always the possibility that the body..." another grimace from him, "would wear out. So, Justice and Anders merged with each other, and became one being."

Martin listens intently, keeping his hands folded on his lap as Nathaniel explains the nature of the Fade, its connection with mages, and Anders' possession by a spirit of justice, aptly named Justice.

There are many questions lingering in the tip of hist tongue, but he buries his curiosity in exchange for politeness. This can't be an easy tale to give, certainly not a tale that many would be privy to in Thedas—Martin has an inkling that the fact that mages can enter the Fade, thus be open to possession by its denizens, is likely a reason as to why mages are feared, and oppressed.

"I thank you for telling me this," he nods with a grateful expression. "I promise I'll keep this private. I'm more familiar with possession than most. Let's just leave it at that." Cryptic, but necessary. Explaining his own possession, and death, at the hands of Akatosh is more than he cares to share at the moment. Maybe someday, but not now.

Nathaniel raises an eyebrow, curious about Martin's last statement, but he refrains from asking about it.

"I thought you should know, just in case." He doesn't elaborate on that statement, not wanting to say anything about the events in Kirkwall and Anders' role in causing a large-scale revolt of mages. That story is definitely Anders' to tell.

"When the Masked stormed in here and attacked us, you saw Anders start glowing blue and speaking...strangely." It's a statement rather than a question; he vaguely remembers Martin walking into the room in time to see that. "I think that that might have been Justice coming out." He stresses the word "think," as he's not entirely certain that that's what happened; he'll need to ask Anders about it later.

He takes a drink of his milk. "I don't know the full implications of Anders' merging with Justice, but I do know that it changed him. And maybe not for the better. I don't know, I've never seen that happen before. And I don't know how dangerous Anders might be when he gets like that, or how much control he has over himself at those times.

"I sensed powerful magic." Primal, indomitable power, as if a rip to Aetherius itself opened. "I decided against becoming involved, I was...hesitant to be in the middle of that." Get torn asunder in the present of an unknown variable. "The voice itself wasn't human, certainly not Anders."

Perhaps this isn't the best time to bring this up. Martin, however, believes in the necessity of knowing all the intricacies of an issue before acting. "In Tamriel, as in Thedas, possessions corrupt people." A sigh, his fingers fidgeting once, then stilling. "Even if the spirit leaves the body, there's often lingering effects. Unless the mage has a particularly strong mind, we're advised against summoning spirits, or opening doors to their realms, such as Oblivion." He closes his eyes for a couple of seconds, then continues. "I wasn't always a priest. During my youth, I followed a different path. It brought knowledge of the unpleasant sides of magic, such as conjuring and..." The fragility of life. "...I'm sorry, this isn't important at the moment. What I wanted to say is that I'm not afraid of Anders and if you ever need help, divines forbid, against this Justice, I can help you."

Nathaniel nods. "It helps that you're a mage, you probably understand possessions and spirits better than most. And thank you for your offer of help." He offers Martin a sincere smile. "I'm not afraid of Justice, and I'm fairly certain he wouldn't attack me intentionally." Though there's always the possibility of getting caught in the middle. "Anders says that he and Justice are one now, not two beings in the same body. I think that, since Anders loves me, Justice wouldn't try to harm me unless I was threatening their safety.

The smile turns into a small frown. "I feel responsible for all of this, in a way. It was me who suggested to Justice that he merge with a willing host. That the relationship could be beneficial to both. I had no idea that it could..." That it could corrupt them both.

"It's the least I could do." Martin matches Nathaniel's smile, though it's anemic. "I know Anders is strong, but that doesn't mean we're not at risk." Him, more than Nathaniel. There isn't an emotional, romantic connection to Martin as there is for Nathaniel.

"You wouldn't have known. Don't blame yourself." In a world where magic is feared, these are the consequences—ignorance of its populace towards powers that should be embraced and understood, for their own good. "I doubt Anders and Justice completely understood the danger of such a relationship themselves."

"No, I don't think they would have agreed to it had they known..." Nathaniel looks thoughtful for a few moments. "Anders seems to think that their merging was a good thing, more or less. I don't know whether I should feel relieved or dismayed that he doesn't regret it."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only