Inbox - Fade Rift

[nonvenomous]

Book/crystal/correspondence/action/whatever you desire.

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fitchertime

[hassaran]

Mr. Dickerson. [ Polite, professional. ] Forgive the interruption of your current mission. When you have a moment, I need a private word about some of your past work in Tevinter.

[nonvenomous]

[ Somewhere on the coast, Mr. Dickerson pauses in the process of comparing two blankets in the shadow of a broad-brimmed felted hat.

At a distance, it’s impossible to gauge what the cause could be for any delay. ]

I happen to be alone now.

[hassaran]

[ A pause, as if she might somehow ascertain in that moment whether he really is alone or if Fitcher is liable to wander by. Or maybe she's just girding herself for this. When it's done she speaks more briskly than before. ]

Then this is not about your past work. We've good reason to believe your companion is employed by someone other than Riftwatch and is responsible for several recent incidents intended to damage Riftwatch's relations with mages. She may have contrived to have Marcus Rowntree abducted by Templars.

[nonvenomous]

Red Templars?

[ Surely not. ]

Could she have already been alerted? She rode ahead to Ostwick this morning after a sustained complaint about sleeping on the ground and the state of her lower back.

[ He turns at the hip to regard the coastal cliffs' break over the ocean behind him. ]

I thought it was unusually theatrical.

[hassaran]

No, Templars from the Exalted March were informed that Rowntree was a problem Riftwatch required their help with.

[ The question she considers for a moment. ]

It's possible. Not likely [ unless she has an accomplice with a crystal, what a happy thought ] but she may have known this was a risky play and planned accordingly.

[nonvenomous]

[ While she is considering, Mr. Dickerson turns and begins to retrace his steps back up to the cove overlook he'd taken up a station at, blanket cast light over his shoulder as he goes.

It's not a long hike. Four minutes on foot, maybe five until he asks: ]

Would you like me to pursue her?

[hassaran]

[ Great question. ]

What plan did the two of you make when she left?

[unshut]

[Fitcher is still lying in the crispy scrub of coastal grass where he'd left her a few minutes ago. She's taken the following liberties during his absence: shifting from loitering flat her back (which is stiff) on to her side where she may more easily jauntily support her cheek on her knuckles, and undoing every single one of her shirt's multitudinous buttons.

The pipe still between Fitcher's teeth saves her from saying 'Pursue me? That's funny—'

Instead, she looks at him. A cap is produced from her skirt pocket, and the pipe is rolled out of the corner of her mouth into her hand where its ember may be suffocated.]

[nonvenomous]

[ Silas looks back.

His eyes are shadowed by the wide brim of her hat, harder to read the longer he’s stood there. ]

I was to spend another night here, with an additional stop nearer the city before rejoining her in Ostwick two days from now.

[ He folds himself to sit himself down in the bed of grass he’d left from before, much of it already sprung back up crooked into disarray. ]

We've seen little worth reporting.

[hassaran]

If you can shorten that time without raising suspicion, do. But this is a warning and a request that you observe her, only. Any further action will be handled on return to the Gallows.

If she has already fled, [ the pause here after the emphasis on has might feel significant, except her tone is more like she's thinking aloud, ] track her route if you're able, but do not attempt to capture her. Better she be pursued later than risk your life trying to bring her in single-handed. We've nearly lost enough agents to this already.

[unshut]

[Something in Fitcher's face cools by degrees as Yseult continues—the impulse to raise eyebrows and smile like she has a question, maybe. The difference between a shepherding dog lying on its side in the sun and one who has an ear cocked.

Well.

The smothered pipe is tucked behind her ear. She waits.]

[nonvenomous]

I understand, [ he says. ] Given the lack of activity I don’t believe it would be suspicious for me to rejoin her sooner rather than later.

[ From beneath the shadow of Fitcher’s hat, he follows the open drape of her shirt to her belt, and from her belt to the placement of her hands, the fulcrum of her elbow. The slope of his shoulders is slack over his knees, the crystal turned over loose in his fingers. ]

I intended to call her this evening to check in. If she provides information on her whereabouts I’ll pass them along.

Did we lose anyone?

[hassaran]

No. I'm told Rowntree and Julius were injured but located in time to be healed. One Templar was accidentally killed in the process. Seeker Hart is sorting out the ruse with officials in Val Chevin. All rather a waste from most perspectives.

[unshut]

[Pipe thus managed, those hands in question are idly layed one over another on the dry earth. Leaned on her elbow with her ankles still casually hooked one over the other, she doesn't seem to give any consideration to—

The magebane and garrote in her belt pouch, or the folding knife in her belt, or the more substantial blade in her boot, or the bright red lacquered hand crossbow propped just out of reach against a flat stone, and its corresponding collection of bolts whose respective poison tipped points are delineated by colored bands painted on their shafts.

No, she isn't that impatient.]

[nonvenomous]

Yes.

[ Silas agrees, easily. And he, with this blanket.

There is the dagger at the back of his belt, the knife in his boot. Another in a pocket, perhaps, that she’d recognize the folded shape of. He’s never carried a staff, both bony hands idle of magic, loose through the knuckle while he watches her. His thoughts are elsewhere, forward. ]

Is there anything else I should know about her?

[hassaran]

She is particularly well equipped for combating mages. But that's otherwise a question I should be asking you. I understand the two of you are close.

[unshut]

[That prompts just the smallest tip of Fitcher's head—intensifying the impression of a dog with a pricked ear and a sharp eye and, somewhere, a master who might whistle for her. Her eyebrows rise by a fraction. If there's a question in the whole arrangement then maybe it's:

Is she wrong?]

[nonvenomous]

[ He flushes off guard, ears darkening red beneath the hat cover. The tilt to Fitcher’s regard is thoroughly unhelpful, his eyes bit brighter in his skull for the heat locked in dense behind his ribs.

There’s the V of her shirt pointing down at the danger of her belt in proximity for him to focus on. It takes him a moment. ]

She’s never been forthcoming with personal details.

[hassaran]

[ Yseult lets that response hang in the air for a moment. But her tone doesn't change, except to tilt into that register that indicates a conversation winding up. ]

Of course. If you think of anything that may be useful in determining her employers, or if there are any developments, please let me know.

[nonvenomous]

Of course. [ He hasn’t moved, save to steady his breath to a count of four. ] I will report in once I’ve spoken to her.

[hassaran]

Thank you. [ For a second she considers tacking on a parting warning, but it feels a bit too pat. And she doubts he's in any actual danger from Fitcher, anyway. ] Safe travels.

[unshut]

[And her face is still tipped faintly up, the line of her neck very long and her dark eyes fixed at the look of him in the shadow of the hat's brim.

There is dirt under her fingernails. Sweat prickles faintly at her hairline. It's instinctive to count the seconds it takes for Yseult to end things.]

[nonvenomous]

Thank you.

[ He ends the connection.

His expression is hard to read; the bones of his face are very still under all their mugging furrows. Perspiration prickles dark at his chops, grimy and slick in the creases of his neck. There’s the wind through the grass, the peeling calls of seabirds.

He reaches to tuck the crystal away on his belt. ]

[unshut]

[The track of his hands is chased by some quiet flick of her attention. When it circles back to his face, there's something marginally less guarded in the height of Fitcher's eyebrows and the turn of her mouth—a gambler who's done all the calculations she's able to and now finds herself with nothing left but to make a play and see what falls out.]

Should I do up my buttons?

[nonvenomous]

[ He’s a long time in answering for the nearness of him, the crystal slotted in and secured without lingering unduly at the hilt of the dagger at his back. The mood has shifted, all the space in his chest cavity logged with something that’s baking in him like mud while he weighs what else he has to lose.

That she’s asked at all is enough to stir it from setting.

The hand he has at his belt turns to unfasten it, deliberate on the order of caution. He shifts to slide over her, dragging the blanket off his shoulder between them as he goes. ]