The answering tip of John's cup is just as practiced. But Isaac is not a Walrus man, and it doesn't matter whether or not John's minor salute is convincing.
The liquor, at least, is good. It doesn't dull the edge of the many problems kicking at the edges of John's awareness, nor does it soften the memory of a man bursting into molten flame, but it's better than nothing.
"So. That was what the Speaker warned me of."
Ilias was not the first, only the latest. And John has never witnessed that danger so closely. The impression solidifies a particular set of fears that had sprung up in the wake of Nevarra.
Isaac expects so. Expects too, that rage has seldom troubled Ilias; not where others might. Distant,
"I've seldom seen it so close," In the war, he'd had the pleasure of running. Before: "The remains of a Harrowing are more — limited."
A knight, burned and weeping. A new absence, a rumour; a sun-marked man mopping at the stain.
"But everyone knows someone." Had Cassia been the first? No, only the loudest. He shifts the cup in hand, places it down again. Drags a hand along his face. "I wish I'd better news for you."
"Maker, we'd need to watch the elders." Septuagenarian abominations, what a thought. But an inevitability for a Harrowed mage, or for an apostate — ? Even the Chantry will admit to the difference. "How long have you known other mages, John?"
Three is a small sample, and at least one of those, a likely candidate.
John spreads his hands, shoulders lifting briefly in a shrug.
"Over the years? I've known a fair number but never for more than however long a voyage took."
True. (Even though that was before being drawn into the Walrus crew, finding a place within the structure of Nascere, arriving in Kirkwall.) Set against the whole of his life, nearly three years of cursory interaction isn't very much. Less when considering the types of magic user he'd known, some so far from Circle tradition that they may as well be wholly unrelated.
"There are mages who leap to fight," He's thinking again of Voss, he's thinking she deliberates far more than some records would credit. "Who keep a poor check upon their wants, their fears. They don't last."
Had the man in the dining hall been afraid? Must have been, somewhere far below. It's seldom so simple as one demon, as two.
Isaac drinks, and prepares as he has a hundred times to fake the swallow, some little spill. Lets it curl in his mouth instead, a wide bilious flavour; stinging with remembered impact. Whiskey will never not taste like eating dirt.
Some of the humor leaves Isaac's tone, and John feels the air around them shift accordingly.
His own words, spoken quietly as he stood across from Eleanor Guthrie: It also goes away, if you let it.
"So that's the trick," John says, as if it has not been his life. The measuring of wants and desires has been a necessity to survive, but maybe that has done more to keep him alive than he'd been aware of. A low chuckle, reaching for the bottle.
"Even after your tutelage, it still seems to me that there is a..."
His hands move, cup momentarily abandoned, sketching a shape in the air. A weighing of scales.
"A price. Some costs are more immediate than others, but it seems that there is something waiting to seize a man at the wrist if he reaches just a hair further than he should."
"Of course there is." Isaac reaches to set down the cup, reaches further, to grasp one sketching hand in his. "When I was a child, on feast days I would wrap a string about some woman at market. A bracelet, for the fine lady. For her gentleman."
His own trace of fingers, about wrist.
"My sister would lift their pockets."
He sighs. Lets go.
"The stakes are higher now," Temptation shadows ability — "And you feel them grubbing about for what they might take. More pleasant to ignore. That's why you do not allow yourself to forget."
A fine bit of misdirection, John thinks, watching Isaac's fingers close over his wrist.
(Thinks of the cold, bony clutch of the dead at his ankle, the ghost of something reaching back for him beyond the Veil.)
"You make it sound—not simple. But more manageable than I had imagined."
But had Flint not said as much? The danger was in convincing himself the possibility was inevitable. John had lived much of his life carefully mitigating his own emotions, excising wants and desires before they became overwhelming.
This is not a minor change. But the approach should be much the same, if Isaac is correct.
"You manage until you can't, you live until you don't." He finishes the cup, peat coiling down his throat; settles like coke into the barrel. "It's all the same trick."
Isaac nods to the bottle, the mug: If you please,
"The question is what you're buying."
What that price is worth. John isn't the type to spend freely — might have shaken off Isaac a dozen times over, if this were only about a secret; about blackmail.
A familiar sentiment. It's guided John's life for as long as he can remember, only the stakes have been raised a fair way. It had always been easier when he was on his own.
The mug is filled, John leaning an elbow on the table as he pours. Isaac isn't necessarily asking, but John considers his answer anyway.
"The situation on Nascere has changed," John says slowly. "We've had word that our people have suffered a decisive defeat."
He does not say: the woman I love might be dead.
"After what happened on the road, I'd thought of what I might need to do in a scenario where secrecy no longer mattered as much as I wanted it to."
He does not say: I am thinking the only way forward is to use this truth to our advantage, whatever it costs.
He listens, fingers curled about the mug; head canted in thought.
“Will you go back to them?”
It seems the only question worth asking. John has never struck him as someone willing to die for a lost cause, but secrets keep, they flock together; where you have flushed one, a dozen linger.
"I'll know better what must be done once we have more than rumors to base a decision on. But I can't do very much from here."
All that sounds very logical, very strategic. John's tone is divorced from the crushing agony of potential loss, talking around the toll this may very well take on him.
"If Riftwatch is unwilling to accompany us..."
A spread of hands, a shrug. What else can be done?
Not an idle question. Flint is a quarter of its decisions; his acquaintances, John's, a mass of its people. How many of those bear any love for their leadership? How many could say what their work stands for?
Riftwatch is no cause of its own, its existence a haphazard agreement. To stand against something is to stand for little at all.
"You have a ship. You have the funds, the friends."
All might be turned north. If Riftwatch is anything, then it's possibility: The promise of future access, of continued harbor. Useful only so far as one's goal extends — useful only if that extends beyond Nascere.
(Would Isaac go north? He doesn't intend to die for anything.)
An echo of a question John has turned in his mind already today. Why not simply go? Take whatever and whoever they can and leave, let Yseult and Thranduil and Rutyer chase them across the sea if they would.
"We have business that would benefit from connections here," John says slowly, careful. "When we broke from the Inquisition, I had said then that our remaining links to both Inquisition and Chantry would be a benefit to shield us from too much scrutiny."
Though the actions John had wanted had never materialized. Riftwatch is as ponderous and slow as the Inquisition had been in some ways, and the lure of shedding the less dedicated members is undeniable.
"I still believe there is value in our southern presence. Whatever happens after Nascere, we will still need to press back against Tevinter, and beyond that..."
A gesture of John's hand, tired, sweeping over all the things that likely keep Flint awake over the ever increasing stacks of paperwork on his desk. The Qun, Tevinter, then beyond them, the Chantry, Orlais, all these forces that would take them out at the knees one way or another if they were not prepared.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
The liquor, at least, is good. It doesn't dull the edge of the many problems kicking at the edges of John's awareness, nor does it soften the memory of a man bursting into molten flame, but it's better than nothing.
"So. That was what the Speaker warned me of."
Ilias was not the first, only the latest. And John has never witnessed that danger so closely. The impression solidifies a particular set of fears that had sprung up in the wake of Nevarra.
no subject
Isaac expects so. Expects too, that rage has seldom troubled Ilias; not where others might. Distant,
"I've seldom seen it so close," In the war, he'd had the pleasure of running. Before: "The remains of a Harrowing are more — limited."
A knight, burned and weeping. A new absence, a rumour; a sun-marked man mopping at the stain.
"But everyone knows someone." Had Cassia been the first? No, only the loudest. He shifts the cup in hand, places it down again. Drags a hand along his face. "I wish I'd better news for you."
no subject
"I'm growing used to bad news."
What's one more dismal revelation to add to the tally?
"Is it inevitable?" John asks.
no subject
"Maker, we'd need to watch the elders." Septuagenarian abominations, what a thought. But an inevitability for a Harrowed mage, or for an apostate — ? Even the Chantry will admit to the difference. "How long have you known other mages, John?"
Three is a small sample, and at least one of those, a likely candidate.
no subject
"Over the years? I've known a fair number but never for more than however long a voyage took."
True. (Even though that was before being drawn into the Walrus crew, finding a place within the structure of Nascere, arriving in Kirkwall.) Set against the whole of his life, nearly three years of cursory interaction isn't very much. Less when considering the types of magic user he'd known, some so far from Circle tradition that they may as well be wholly unrelated.
no subject
Isaac tips the mug, considers its innards.
"Of them, how many struck you as a bit —" His wavering hand is for show, "— Odd?"
He looks up, expectant; he's aware.
no subject
Isaac, he's a pirate.
no subject
"I trust that your occupation attracts certain types," Not to stereotype. "I'd wager enough of them have a direct approach to anger."
Bitches get stabbed.
no subject
John may be something of an expert on how extremely direct his fellows can be.
"Are we to be suspicious of those who take a more sedate approach to insult?"
no subject
Is a quip — and diverging from the point, so —
"There are mages who leap to fight," He's thinking again of Voss, he's thinking she deliberates far more than some records would credit. "Who keep a poor check upon their wants, their fears. They don't last."
Had the man in the dining hall been afraid? Must have been, somewhere far below. It's seldom so simple as one demon, as two.
Isaac drinks, and prepares as he has a hundred times to fake the swallow, some little spill. Lets it curl in his mouth instead, a wide bilious flavour; stinging with remembered impact. Whiskey will never not taste like eating dirt.
"You have."
no subject
His own words, spoken quietly as he stood across from Eleanor Guthrie: It also goes away, if you let it.
"So that's the trick," John says, as if it has not been his life. The measuring of wants and desires has been a necessity to survive, but maybe that has done more to keep him alive than he'd been aware of. A low chuckle, reaching for the bottle.
"Even after your tutelage, it still seems to me that there is a..."
His hands move, cup momentarily abandoned, sketching a shape in the air. A weighing of scales.
"A price. Some costs are more immediate than others, but it seems that there is something waiting to seize a man at the wrist if he reaches just a hair further than he should."
no subject
His own trace of fingers, about wrist.
"My sister would lift their pockets."
He sighs. Lets go.
"The stakes are higher now," Temptation shadows ability — "And you feel them grubbing about for what they might take. More pleasant to ignore. That's why you do not allow yourself to forget."
no subject
(Thinks of the cold, bony clutch of the dead at his ankle, the ghost of something reaching back for him beyond the Veil.)
"You make it sound—not simple. But more manageable than I had imagined."
But had Flint not said as much? The danger was in convincing himself the possibility was inevitable. John had lived much of his life carefully mitigating his own emotions, excising wants and desires before they became overwhelming.
This is not a minor change. But the approach should be much the same, if Isaac is correct.
no subject
Isaac nods to the bottle, the mug: If you please,
"The question is what you're buying."
What that price is worth. John isn't the type to spend freely — might have shaken off Isaac a dozen times over, if this were only about a secret; about blackmail.
no subject
The mug is filled, John leaning an elbow on the table as he pours. Isaac isn't necessarily asking, but John considers his answer anyway.
"The situation on Nascere has changed," John says slowly. "We've had word that our people have suffered a decisive defeat."
He does not say: the woman I love might be dead.
"After what happened on the road, I'd thought of what I might need to do in a scenario where secrecy no longer mattered as much as I wanted it to."
He does not say: I am thinking the only way forward is to use this truth to our advantage, whatever it costs.
no subject
“Will you go back to them?”
It seems the only question worth asking. John has never struck him as someone willing to die for a lost cause, but secrets keep, they flock together; where you have flushed one, a dozen linger.
no subject
What help can he provide them from here?
"I'll know better what must be done once we have more than rumors to base a decision on. But I can't do very much from here."
All that sounds very logical, very strategic. John's tone is divorced from the crushing agony of potential loss, talking around the toll this may very well take on him.
"If Riftwatch is unwilling to accompany us..."
A spread of hands, a shrug. What else can be done?
no subject
Not an idle question. Flint is a quarter of its decisions; his acquaintances, John's, a mass of its people. How many of those bear any love for their leadership? How many could say what their work stands for?
Riftwatch is no cause of its own, its existence a haphazard agreement. To stand against something is to stand for little at all.
"You have a ship. You have the funds, the friends."
All might be turned north. If Riftwatch is anything, then it's possibility: The promise of future access, of continued harbor. Useful only so far as one's goal extends — useful only if that extends beyond Nascere.
(Would Isaac go north? He doesn't intend to die for anything.)
no subject
"We have business that would benefit from connections here," John says slowly, careful. "When we broke from the Inquisition, I had said then that our remaining links to both Inquisition and Chantry would be a benefit to shield us from too much scrutiny."
Though the actions John had wanted had never materialized. Riftwatch is as ponderous and slow as the Inquisition had been in some ways, and the lure of shedding the less dedicated members is undeniable.
"I still believe there is value in our southern presence. Whatever happens after Nascere, we will still need to press back against Tevinter, and beyond that..."
A gesture of John's hand, tired, sweeping over all the things that likely keep Flint awake over the ever increasing stacks of paperwork on his desk. The Qun, Tevinter, then beyond them, the Chantry, Orlais, all these forces that would take them out at the knees one way or another if they were not prepared.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORBgNjm2K0w
"I'm not a sailing man, John," No shit. "But I hope you've an end to that horizon."