(no subject)

[birdhousesoul]

Date & Time: Not too long after Martin's kaffeeklatsch with Delphine
Characters: Martin Septim, Anders, and Nathaniel Howe
Summary: Anders is made of tact
Warnings: None? I dunno eta: Gross stories about blood magic


Anders still isn't sure what to make of Delphine's sassy comeback to his very tactful questions. All he knows is that this woman is somehow after his mage bro. It can't be anything good she has in mind, her hatchet face suggests very strongly.

One time, a woman was following Anders all over the place, and the woman was actually a Templar (Ser Rylock, if anyone's keeping track), and she just kept on dragging him back to the Circle, and Anders just kept on escaping, until finally it all ended in tears. And blood, lots of blood. And awkwardness between the Wardens and the Chantry.

Right, so Anders has reason to be suspicious of humorless women in dogged pursuit of mages. That's setting aside his original Oghren-esque hypothesis, mind.

Whatever it is, he figures he'd better have a chat with Martin and let him know that this woman's looking for him, and also that he, Anders, has not ratted him out. Also, he's curious as to what really is going on.

He makes some more cereal squares just to sweeten Martin's disposition a bit before prying into the man's personal life. As Martin crunches into the marshmallowy, wheaty goodness of frosted-flake treats, Anders broaches a delicate subject.

"How long's the average lifespan in Tamriel?"

Comments

[noble_nate]

Nathaniel grabs a cereal square before taking the proffered seat. The mixture of ingredients that Anders said go into the dessert seems strange to him, but the things were oddly addictive.

"From my experience, the undead aren't as intelligent as Martin obviously is." It's as much a statement of fact as it is a compliment. "The only undead I've ever met that spoke was Kristoff." He looks at Martin. "Kristoff was the body that Justice inhabited before he joined with Anders," he explains.

[septim]

"You wouldn't think at all." Which is why Martin can't be an undead, since he's thinking about not thinking. Martin merely nods at Nathaniel's judgment, drawing from his own battles against necromanced corpses as part of the Mages Guild's tests. "So, Justice inhabited a corpse before he merged with Anders?" A pause, looking down in thought. "In Tamriel, spirits tend to possess corpses. It's easier, just an empty vessel. No mind to battle against." Wait, that sounds...all wrong. "Ah, forgive me. I didn't mean to insult you, Anders."

[birdhousesoul]

Anders has known for some time that Nathaniel already explained Justice to Martin, insofar as explanation is possible. Far from upset, he welcomed this; it's always been difficult to explain Justice to anyone, and harder still to broach the subject when someone's already seen Justice in control of Anders. Indeed, Nathaniel may have been the best person to explain it, as he's one of the very few people anywhere to have known Justice and Anders as separate and discrete beings.

"No offense taken," he says to Martin, and gives Nathaniel a reassuring pat on the knee under the table. "What you're saying holds true in Thedas as well, more or less. The distinction between spirits and demons is a contested one, but a spirit of virtue wouldn't want to possess a living being, no. A demon would very much wish to possess a living being, to cross the Veil into the world. A possessed mage becomes an abomination, whereas a person with no magical talent would simply be, well, possessed, that's all. Demons will take what they can get, though — living or dead. In Thedas, if you were already dead and a demon came along to possess you, since you're a mage you'd become an arcane horror." Anders has actually battled a fair few arcane horrors, but all he knows of their nature is what he recalls from his lecture notes in Circle classes.

It's cheerful talk, this, to have over a communal snack. Anders is thinking more deeply about the whole living-vs-dead-host issue now. "Justice never had to deal with Warden nightmares when he was hanging about in Kristoff's body. He never had to sleep. Lucky bastard."

[noble_nate]

Nathaniel places his hand on top of Anders', resting it there lightly as he takes a bite of his cereal bar. He still blames himself somewhat for planting in Justice's head the idea of merging with a living host, moreso since he saw a bit of the darker aspect of their merging after the Masked broke into the flat and attacked them.

"I wouldn't exactly say Justice was lucky to inhabit Kristoff's body, he hadn't even planned on doing it. I still wonder what would have happened to him once Kristoff's body rotted away completely."

[septim]

"It seems that spirits in Thedas are as complicated as Tamriel's." It's a lot to take in, more so when considering Anders' unique perspective on the matter.

Martin didn't want to think about the consequences of shattering the Amulet of Kings. But, as the days have turned into weeks, and weeks into months, he's had plenty of nights (and nightmares) to discover that his willing sacrifice brought unwanted visitors, or at least their memories, into his mind.

"Are Warden nightmares...specific?" Vague, because he isn't sure how to breach the possibility of being possessed, or haunted, by the memories and voices of twenty-one emperors. "Disembodied voices speaking, counseling? Or just...memories of the battlefield, corpses, death?"

[birdhousesoul]

"Um." Disembodied voices? "We can see things, sometimes, that have happened, none of it ever pleasant, but some of it's stuff we weren't properly there to see, if you take my meaning, so it's not memory per se. I ... don't think I've ever heard voices, no." Anders glances sideways, toward Nathaniel. "Have you ever heard voices, love?"

[noble_nate]

"Not voices, no." Nathaniel has to think carefully about what should and shouldn't be said about the Wardens. Even though there isn't really any reason to keep such secrets here, he still takes his duties seriously. There are some things that he wouldn't be willing to talk to a non-Warden about, ever; but he recognizes the trust that Martin has placed in them by opening up about his past, and he'd like to return the gesture as much as he's able.

"Wardens dream about darkspawn," he explains to Martin. "From what I've experienced and heard about from others, the things we dream about are actually happening. They're not prophetic, exactly, it's more that we're able to...tap into the creatures' minds. We can see some of the things that they see, and sometimes can determine where they're at or how strong their numbers are in certain instances. Most of the time, the images are too generic or vague to get any real use out of them."

[septim]

Martin's tapping his fingers onto one of his legs as if he were playing a piano, the nervous gesture at odds with his default demeanor, calm and controlled. His expression is neutral enough, yet the mannerism gives away his actual mood.

The tale of his death isn't a revelation as unnerving as I might be possessed. Delphine's presence would, sooner or later, reveal his past as the Avatar of Akatosh. It's a consequence he hadn't considered during the battle against Mehrunes Dagon because there wasn't time to consider anything, not even his death.

"My nightmares are...specific," he begins, ominously. "To transform into the Avatar, I shattered the Amulet of Kings, an amulet that contained the blood of Akatosh and the souls of the twenty-one emperors before me. In my dreams, I hear some of their voices, my father's...the loudest of them all."

[birdhousesoul]

A shadow crosses Anders' face. Blood magic. Mercifully, he keeps silence for now. He'll hear the story out. Nathaniel may detect a trace of tension in him, though (hypocritical as any of Anders' misgivings might be).

[noble_nate]

Nathaniel senses Anders' tension, though it takes him a moment to realize what had triggered the other man -- he doesn't have nearly as much knowledge of blood magic as Anders does.

He chooses his words carefully before speaking. "Do you think you've been possessed by your ancestors?" he asks Martin, careful to keep his voice neutral.

[septim]

"No, I don't think it's a possession." Martin isn't aware of Anders' distaste for blood magic, sensing nothing amiss as he continues. "Not in the traditional sense. Perhaps some remnants of their souls now linger in me, but I don't think I'll have to worry about my father coming for dinner."

[birdhousesoul]

"How can you be sure that what you're seeing isn't a demon disguised as your father?" The words burst forth, sounding more like an accusation than an actual question. "The dead don't just ... just stick around. How will that Delphine woman know you're not a desire demon, pretending to be the emperor she yearns to see restored?"

Anders could go on like this. Shake some sense into him, Nathaniel.

[noble_nate]

"Anders..." Nathaniel casts him a warning look. "Just because that's how things are in Thedas, doesn't mean it's like that everywhere." The concept of there being several different worlds besides his own still seems strange to him.

"Maybe the dead do stick around in some places. It could just be...pieces of his ancestors' spirits." Nathaniel thinks about the idea of his own father sticking around and he shudders a little. Rendon Howe is the last person Nathaniel would want to be visited by, even his spirit.

[septim]

Why is Anders speaking at him (certainly not with him) as if he were on trial? The dead stick around in Tamriel, either as benevolent spirits who can't pass into Aetherius, or entities summoned. And, of course, there's always the undead, either necromancer into existence, or punished with undeath for a crime committed during their lifetimes.

"There are easier ways to become the Emperor of Tamriel than pretending to be Uriel's bastard, two centuries dead," he answers, hurt tinging his words. "I never knew my father. He didn't acknowledge my existence until his last moments, and that was to saddle me with the responsibility of his empire. There isn't much else he could offer me to tempt me." Acknowledgment.

Martin stands, re-fluffing the pillow his back squished. "Forgive me, I...don't want to speak of this any longer."

[birdhousesoul]

Anders simply glowers at the table. Blood mages.

[noble_nate]

Nathaniel looks from Martin to Anders anxiously. He likes Martin a great deal, and it's obviously that these are hard things for him to talk about. And he doesn't really understand why Anders is being so surly towards his friend.

"I'm sorry," he says to Martin. "I didn't mean to bring up painful things." He won't apologize for Anders' behavior, that's not his place.

[septim]

"It's not your fault, Nathaniel. My past refuses to stay buried. I was a fool to think I could run away from it." A second chance to live as a modest priest, a healer. Right in his grasp, the happiest days he's had in a long time, only to be snatched away by the painful knowledge of the events his death enabled. Eternal rests sounds kinder. "I'll try to get some rest, it's been a taxing day," he informs his roommates, walking towards his room, closing his door as quietly as possible.

[birdhousesoul]

Without a word, Anders sets about cleaning up the kitchen.

[noble_nate]

Nathaniel takes another bite of his cereal square. "You were awfully harsh with Martin." No accusation in his voice, it's merely a statement.

[birdhousesoul]

"He's a mage," is Anders' reply. "Dreams are a connection to the Fade. Do I need to spell it out? And he's a blood mage. I like the man, I really do, but he's tracing these ... these nocturnal visitations back to an act of blood magic, and I'm supposed to believe this might be a friendly ghost talking to him? Ancestors dropping by to chat him up?"

[noble_nate]

"Just because Martin used something like blood magic one time, it doesn't mean he's a blood mage," Nathaniel reasons. "Have you ever seen him use blood magic? And I've talked to other people -- I think the Fade might be exclusive to Thedas. You can't paint everyone with the same brush." Especially when they're from a completely different world.

[birdhousesoul]

"There are plenty of blood mages I've never seen performing blood magic." Anders is furiously scouring at marshmallow residue burnt onto the sides of an otherwise marvelous glasslike pan. "Like, oh, the ones who killed most of — well, most of everyone at Lake Calenhad, and it took the bloody Hero of Ferelden to clean up after that mess. Never saw old Uldred doing any blood magic, no." He resorts to chipping at the marshmallow with a butter knife. "This stuff is dangerous, Nate," and he does not mean the marshmallow or the pan. "Really, really dangerous. You know when demons find it easiest to get close to you? In your dreams. Because of the Fade. And you know when demons find it easiest to take over your body? When you're doing blood magic, that's when. In dreams, your sleeping mind crosses the Veil; when you do blood magic, you're tearing the fucking Veil, in the real world, the waking world. If you want to tell me that dreaming works differently here, that there is no Fade and there's no Veil between us and spirits, first off, the metaphysics of people dreaming differently in every world may not hold as much water as we'd like to think. Even so, let's say, for the sake of argument, that yes, dreaming works differently in Martin's world, and so do spirits and demons and the dead. Never mind that magic seems to work exactly the same way, only with different names stuck on, magicka instead of mana and Restoration instead of spirit healing and so on and so forth."

(He may be rambling.)

"Never mind all that, let's say: yes! Mages are absolutely at minimal risk of demonic possession and dreams have nothing to do with it, because Tamriel is completely different, and Exsilium is different to that! Well, then, we still have to explain this: who's visiting Martin in his dreams? If the friendly ghost of his father is really hanging about and giving him advice, how did that ghost get here? Did it hitch a ride through the aether on the way to the Initiative Hold, like ... like a child hanging onto the back of a cart? And why wouldn't it have anything better to do than give Martin nightmares? Nightmares are generally not a sign of benevolent spirit visitation. Nightmares are generally bad. And I've not yet begun to touch this idea of twenty-odd ancestors having their souls all mashed together in a necklace thanks to some of that blood magic we're not finding fault with."

[noble_nate]

Nathaniel sits there calmly, listening to Anders' rant. Finally, he speaks.

"This seems a bit hypocritical, coming from someone who's possessed by a spirit," he remarks a bit sternly. He likes Martin, and isn't happy about Anders' seeming condemnation of him. "First off, you're assuming that the ghosts visiting Martin are more demonic than benevolent, and you don't know that that's true. Secondly, you want to know how the ghosts made it here? How did Justice make it here? As intelligent as you are, love, even you have to agree that there are things going on that are beyond our comprehension."

[birdhousesoul]

Anders drops the butter knife into the mercifully resilient pan.

"Justice. Is not. A demon. You know him. He's a spirit and he's part of me now. That's not possession, it's ... like having a roommate all the time." A very bossy roommate who makes you write manifestos? "He's here only because he can't be separated from me. We're one being. If you're going to compare Justice with Martin's ancestral apparitions, then that would mean Martin has joined with all his ancestors, yes? I don't have dreams where Justice appears to me and gives me advice. I can't have conversations with him, waking or sleeping. In short, Justice is not haunting me."

[noble_nate]

Nathaniel and Anders haven't talked much about Anders merging with Justice, it being a touchy subject with both of them. But Nathaniel's not willing to just brush over this.

He stands up and walks over to Anders, a hand resting on his arm. "I know Justice isn't a demon. But it's not exactly easy for me to understand the relationship you and Justice have now. I hate to say it, but you sound a lot more like Justice than Anders right now. And you're doing Martina disservice by thinking like this."