Open To Anyone For Anything RP Post 2

[questionablewit]

Want to tag someone? Tag someone. Put the character you want in the subject line.
Leave a starter, or leave a prompt and I'll start.
Brilliant ideas and clueless flailing all welcome.
AUs and cross-canon, drama and comedy and shipping.
Just throw stuff at me. It's all good.

Comments

dear god I pick *all of these*, forgive the rusty af voice, I default to circle mage Beth

[circlesister]

Bethany has not seen her sister for three years, not since That Night--it always has capital letters in her head, and for good reason. For so many good reasons. Keeping in touch has been almost impossible. Marian's had to stay on the move, especially given her company. And Bethany has laid low, not that anything is new there. Varric always knows where they both are, and can be trusted to send updates, to tell them both the other is all right, for some value of "all right". But Bethany hasn't sent any letters. She doesn't know what to say that wouldn't hurt.

Then Varric was taken from Kirkwall--if not exactly by force, not really peaceably either--and now he's somewhere up in the Frostbacks. It actually makes it easier for Bethany to keep in touch with him, since she's in Amaranthine. It's a good place for an apostate, the Templars gone but still an armed force of Grey Wardens around, more than willing to turn a blind eye to magic that does no harm. Her cousin is the Arlessa here, but Bethany has never seen her, though curiosity was part of why she came.

She lives quietly, helps other mages when she can, when she finds any. She practices her own skills, learns all the things she was never able to learn while being so closely guarded by...by everyone, truthfully, it wasn't just her sister. Just, mostly her sister. She works a lot with children. She goes to the Chantry every week, though her beliefs have changed since she was younger. There are a few particular sisters there who she's befriended and talks to, ones who are safe to discuss more unorthodox ideas with. No one's looking for her here. No one's even really looking for apostates, not with so much chaos going on and a great rip in the sky.

And then Varric sends word, so very secretly, that Marian will be coming through Amranthine on her way to Skyhold to meet with the Inquisitor.

So of course Bethany is waiting when her sister's ship docks. That was never in question. She has no idea if Marian is expecting her, but she's there waiting when the gangplank is lowered.

[redtailedhawke]

If anything, the lack of direct correspondence was something close to reassurance, that while chaos had begun in earnest (with no small effort on Hawke's part), Bethany was doing well enough on her own. What had alarmed Hawke was a single short message from Varric warning her that the Chantry had begun its hunt for her again with a particular zeal, followed by abrupt silence. Had they finally begun to go after the people she'd known? What if they find her sister?

Then, well. The Conclave, dramatically failing to accomplish whatever anyone had expected from it. The great bloody hole in the sky, spitting demons and distracting everyone from the real battle. Some supposed prophet-savior propped up by whatever shattered fragments of the Chantry had been left standing. An alliance with "the Mage Rebellion" ― apparently Fiona had wisely declined to clarify that the group she led was only one cell of several, allowing the rest still free to continue fighting without having to answer to someone who couldn't be trusted to get them the freedom they deserved. An "Inquisition," claiming to fight to restore order, and Varric joining the flock, citing some sense of responsibility or whatever when he had reached out again.

And, apparently, Corypheus. The name answered one question Hawke had been asking around, about why so many Warden outposts across Ferelden and the Marches had suddenly been abandoned, but it raised a hundred others, each more terrifying than the last. Reluctant as she is to leave the mages, to leave Anders, to get involved in any part of this neo-Chantry cult, and skeptical that she has anything to offer (We didn't exactly chat over tea, Varric, I stabbed him a lot and then he died, what information do you think I've got?), those questions all need to be addressed. The Wardens, the Templars, now Corypheus, it all seemed too much not to be connected somehow. She might as well see this through.

It's less that she expects to see Bethany when she reaches Amaranthine, and more that she's hoping for it, scanning the docks while the ship bobs into harbor. She could easily be busy, or not have gotten the message, or ― no, there she is.

They're not so young anymore that Hawke can get away with picking her sister up and swinging her around when she reaches her, even if the temptation to do it anyway and risk Bethany's indignant embarrassment is certainly present. But she leaves Bethany's feet on the ground when she hugs her, squeezing with the strength of her absence as if she could make up for three years apart if she held her baby sister hard enough.

"I am so glad to see you."