thecapitol | the maker shall be my guide; semi-open

Entry tags:

the maker shall be my guide; semi-open

Who| The Dragon Age cast; any close CR they want to bring!
What| After recent events, Cullen feels like they need to meet up and make sure everyone is on the same page. No one should fall victim to the Capitol's machinations.
Where| Training center gym.
When| To...day?
Warnings/Notes| Nothing atm, will edit this if it becomes necessary. If you are in the Dragon Age cast, just assume that Cullen left a note at your door or you heard about the meeting from another cast member. Please tag around, this is basically just a mingle log for CR purposes! Feel free to poke me on plurk

frodabaggins if you want your character here but aren't sure if they'd get an invite!

The events of the past week or so have been worrying. Clearly, this place is more restrictive than even he thought at first - the people here are obsessed with keeping their power, and some of them even seem to enjoy baiting the Tributes.

That cannot happen. At least, if Cullen has anything to say about it, the Thedosians must keep a united front and stay out of things. Which is why he leaves notes at the door of every Thedosian he knows of, with a time and place scribbled on them for a meeting. It's imperative that they at least make sure they're on the same page, especially with more new arrivals showing up.

This world is far more dangerous than even he anticipated when he first arrived.

He waits until most have arrived, his face serious, his back straight as always, ever the consummate soldier - when nearly everyone is here, he finally starts in on his little speech. He's clearly prepared for it.

"I know a lot of things have been happening recently," he begins. "Things that are probably angering to a lot of us. I know we're all feeling very powerless right now, and might be tempted to try and lash out any way we can, just to lessen that feeling." If his gaze lingers a little on certain people, well. That's his business.

"I think it's important that we not do that, though. I think we need to keep quiet, and keep our heads down, and remember what our goal is: to find a way home. There's no point putting ourselves in danger needlessly. Many of the people here are clearly cruel and enjoy baiting us. They obviously want to see us slip up, get in trouble, be punished. We have to watch what we say, at all times. Let's not give them the satisfaction."

He looks to everyone for agreement.

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The fact that Dorian came is somewhat of a miracle, considering that he is barely even in his own rooms these days. Nor does he seem to have a particular bar that he frequents - rather, he frequents all of them, and some of the less respectable institutions besides. Whores always make good friends, he's found.

If he's fallen back into old ways, it isn't without reason. The Inquisition gave him something to focus on, but Alexius was the one to do that first - now he had neither, and was under the thumb of a tyrannical government that didn't even have the slight advantage of allowing him in on the tyranny.

When in doubt: debauchery.

He isn't drunk. That isn't to say that he hasn't spent a lot of his time drunk, lately, but he isn't drunk now, and he's almost gratingly cheerful - greeting everyone with a slightly sarcastically fluid bow - even those who he technically has never met.

Cullen's words are absolutely true, of course, which makes Dorian want to sigh and roll his eyes. He hasn't been one for obeying rules for the sake of them, whatever the consequences. And beyond having a healthy desire to stay alive, and to keep his friends alive, he has almost nothing invested in this place. So he leans against one of the pillars in the training center and crosses his arms.

"I've never been particularly good at quiet, but I can think of a hundred thousand things I would rather do than 'lash out'."

Things aren't better, not by any stretch of the imagination. Not for him, not for them as a whole, but Maxwell found one small perk in the recent goings on.

It gave him something to focus on. Trying to understand what had happened, and what it meant for them now. What they could do, how they could keep each other safe.

He passed along the invitation to Thorongil, hoping the man might find a way to be present, despite what had happened. He had been a good ally in the arena, and was proving to be a fast friend. He'd earned a place in Maxwell's opinion, whatever the little screens said.

As he last the last time, Maxwell arrived early and took a place off to one side, watching the others arrive, keeping a headcount as they passed inside.

There was a small part of Mawell, a small, cowardly part that had been relieved every time he'd stopped into District 7 only to be told that 'Mr. Pavus' was out. He didn't know all the details, couldn't, but he knew enough. Knew Dorian well enough.

It pained him to see him this way. To know he was hurting.

To know there was nothing he could do. Nothing that he didn't suspect wouldn't make it worse, for either, or both, of them.

That was nothing that didn't make it sound like....

"I'd say you all know you're too smart to get mixed up in anything like that," he said quietly from his place nearby. Attempting humor, and knowing he was probably failing there as well. "But you did fall in with the Inquisition - more than once."

The part of Sebastian that was inclined to rebel, long ago, which still popped up from time to time, like some sort of annoying imaginary friend from the past, wanted to protest that Cullen was wrong, that they could, and should find ways, even small ones, to gain some control.

The sensible, more measured part of Sebastian, the reasonable moderate voice he'd found during the years in Kirkwall was stronger, though, and while he had not been here very long, he'd learned enough to know they must be very careful here.

"They have succeeded in putting us in prison." He said, inclining his head toward Cullen. "The only way to stay safe in one of them is in following the rules."

As he spoke, it occurred to him that this was eerily similar to his life at home. There had been prisons there, some fancy and some terrible, and people had been forced into them for no reason, and he had supported that for a long time, for only the reason that they were able to use magic and others weren't. Hawke, HIS Hawke, had supported it until the end as well, when suddenly, the realization had hit him all at once. It had been bad enough to lose those he considered family on that day, but to hear Meredith's demand for Annulment...

Something in him had changed with those words, and it was that something in him that had to laugh now, at the irony of their current situation. And caused him to avoid looking at anyone clearly a mage at the same time.

"Ironic, isn't this?"

"That was very different," Dorian said, still leaning back, though he tilted his head in Maxwell's direction, smirking. "For a start, that was almost entirely out of necessity and imminent world annihilation."

His tone was easy and almost flippant, but it somehow didn't quite reach his eyes. "Also, it makes one a touch more reckless when one can start a forest fire with a wave or two of his staff."

"Excuses, excuses..." Maxwell drawled softly, arms folding over chest, eyes not quite fixing on Dorian. Gaze shying away like the man were a sun, too bright to look directly at. "You wanted to be there, admit it."

His mustache twitched, trying to hide a smile. He had no problem looking directly at Maxwell - his eyes locked on the man's even as Maxwell wouldn't let them meet.

"I will only admit that the accommodations and entertainment offered at Skyhold far outstripped our current hosts'," Dorian said wryly. "But I make do."

Now there was something interesting. This new figure in their midst practically 'screamed' Thedas, but he was the first that Dorian had seen that he didn't already know. Well. That he at least wasn't supposed to already know. Unless he happened to be a new inquisitor. The accent, however, marked the Free Marshes, rather than Fereldan, and as he hadn't come up to Dorian already expecting them to be the best of friends, probably not an Inquisitor.

Simply fresh meat.

"Or find the man in prison with the largest muscles and earn his complete loyalty, but somehow I doubt that will work, here," Dorian said, completely helpfully, and not at all sarcastically (which meant very).

"I'm not sure if Irony is quite the word. Something more along the lines of 'well of course this would happen to us' and 'some things never change between worlds' and 'would you please, for the love of the Maker, leave me alone to my books already'." Or his whores. You know. Either or.

Maxwell clucked his tongue lightly as he rocking gently on his heels.

"Careful, I wouldn't be surprised if that didn't count as sedition now." He tipped his head toward Dorian, lips pulling to one side. "Implying our hosts aren't simply the best at everything and everything..."

"Ah, and here we run into an old philosophical conundrum. Because can you be the best at comfort and the best at discomfort at the same time, or is that regulated to different divisions in the government--"

"Just smile and nod," he replied, looking at the man then. A full long beat before his eyes slipped away again.

Hoping to feel - or not feel.... he wasn't even sure.

"Anything more gives me a headache... and leaves me with the damnable urge to stick my nose where it doesn't belong. Which, I'm sure would give everyone else a pain in turn."

And he couldn't have that.

"Ah, but there in lies the problem - smiling and nodding along was never my particular forte either."

When in doubt, debauchery.

It was becoming his slogan.

"I prefer to completely ignore everything with the help of a decent brand of whiskey and the rather outlandish gossip of the - ah- I can't quite say 'lower' class here, can I? Even the lowest among them in the Capitol seem to do quite well for themselves."

He didn't bother to reply to the particular 'pain' of Maxwell getting into trouble. There would be absolutely no doubt that if Dorian wasn't there with him at the time, he and the rest of the Inquisition probably would very soon after.

Catalysts, was the word that rang in his mind. Some men were simply catalysts.

It was said the same edged cheer as anything else, but Maxwell still paused then, a muscle ticking gently in his cheek as he chewed over his next words. Considering, rejecting, swallowing them back.

"So I've heard." He shifted again on his feet, tapping the toe of one boot against the high-polished floor. "...You are being careful, aren't you, Dorian?"

He would ask no further questions - wanted no more details. He had no right, he knew, but he just... needed to know that much.

He offered a grin he didn't feel, and that didn't reach his eyes. "I'm not sure the word 'careful' has ever entered my vocabulary," he quipped.

"But if what you're asking is if I'm doing my utmost to keep myself from being killed with incredible prejudice, then yes. Yes, I am being very careful."

He glanced toward him again, brow tensing over his nose, recognizing that lie too well.

"...Good," he said, lamely, telling it again. "Because I'll tell you know, I'd be very upset with you otherwise, and neither of us are going to be happy if I have to find a way to develop magical talent, learn necromancy, and raise you back just to give you a piece of my mind."

"If you ever managed to figure away to summon magical talent in this place, I will be, as they say, all ears."

It slipped from his lips before he even heard the echo of it. Deja vu. Another time, another place. Another life. He didn't blink.

Maxwell did.

A flash, there and gone, leaving a quiet thought in its wake.

Maybe he should take up drinking.

"You'll be first on my list, I promise."

He finally leaned off the pillar, walking over in an extremely casually way.

"Yes, I should hope so," He quipped with a tiny sideways smirk. He'd been careful about flirting with Maxwell before, but it had been months now. Gavin wasn't coming, and Dorian didn't want him to. He didn't want Gavin to see him like this. He didn't want anyone to see him like this, really, but there wasn't exactly much of a choice.

In any other circumstance he would have been flirting with Maxwell for ages now. There was no harm in a late start.

Maxwell straightened when Dorian did, arms tightening slightly over his chest as the man approached. Another quiet voice said he knew that that look as well. That purposeful stroll.

...But he wouldn't... he couldn't be....

"...Though I suppose Adella might have an interest as well. You two will have to determine first rights too my future fabulous magical talents."

Dorian chuckled.

"Oh, I'm not so sure about that," Dorian said, sliding up alongside him and crossing his arms as if gazing out upon the masses while everyone else had broken up into individual conversations. "I think she's rather got her hands full as it is. Not that I particularly mind competition."

Maxwell looked sidelong at him. Carefully.

"No, I can't say that's a trait I've noticed in either of you."

Him or her. Him or him.

"But I wouldn't bet against her either, she is an Inquisitor too."

He raised an eyebrow. Either they were having very different conversations, or there was something that he really hadn't noticed going on. Had Maxwell and Adella-- no. That was ridiculous.

So he chuckled, instead, and assumed that Maxwell was shutting him down on the whole flirting front.

"Ah, yes, I really should know better than to bet against an Inquisitor," he said, somewhat wistfully. "She's certainly much more responsible and reliable than I am, so perhaps you're right."

The tone had shifted, Maxwell was clear on that, but he wasn't sure as to why. He couldn't believe - didn't want to believe - he'd sensed what he had.

(But he also did. A small, base part that just wanted to be wanted again. That wanted to feel something....)

Uncertain, his mouth opened, and closed again.

"...We all have our virtues," he said after a moment. "Even literal mustache-twirling Tevinter mages."

Dorian chuckled again, out of honest good humour, the smile even reaching his eyes this time and making them crinkle ever so slightly.

"I wouldn't be so sure of that," He mused, "Unless you have a very loose definition of 'Virtue'."

"I would."

It was a daring thing to say. One, perhaps, he should have, given the odd state of things just then, but it was out before it could helped.

A simple, warm, honesty.

"And before you offer to find me a dictionary, I have one. And I still would."

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the maker shall be my guide; semi-open

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Maxwell| OTA

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Sebastian OTA

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