“Because I was complicit in the attempted assassination of the Provost and Miss Poppell.”
Ellis’ confusion is contagious enough for Mr. Dickerson to forget (momentarily) the dilemma of the tankard -- his brow hoods into a harder furrow to match. The exasperation stirred murky at the bottom of his ??? is awfully earnest for this to be some kind of labyrinthine tease.
“You care for them very deeply.”
Defensive tension has crept in behind his ears, too subdued to rig all the way down his shoulders to his wrist. This is all very straightforward.
The second, prodding reference to his feelings is unwelcome, further sparks up something self-conscious and uneasy, but trying to untangle Richard's goal takes momentary precedence over acknowledging that feeling. (Vance's voice, full of accusation: why are you wandering around like you got ducklings?)
"I don't understand the point you're trying to make."
Was it anger? Was that what Richard had been waiting to see? Ellis doesn't know that he can summon it, having burned through all of his fury in the midst of the dream.
His hand stays gentle over Thot's belly, careful as he keeps her pinned more or less steadily.
After a beat spent watching the look on Ellis’ face, Richard unplugs entirely to look away, aside, and there’s the tension hackled in at the scruff of his neck. Beneath Ellis’ fingers, the regular feather of Thot’s heartbeat has quickened into an unsteady jog. Her ears are laid flat where she’s sprawled, wide eyes aimed blank at the ceiling.
“I’m not making a point.”
He traces back at a loss, facing down the possibility that he’s somehow broached this subject entirely on his own.
Having fallen into friendship with a pair of absurdly intelligent people means Ellis isn't any stranger to the sensation of having missed some connecting idea in the course of conversation.
Is it as simple as sitting with that truth? He has carried some variation of it with him for a very long time, ever since he'd admitted that first inkling of it to Wysteria: I am devoted to you. I have been devoted to you and Tony for some time now.
But Richard—
"Do you think I'm angry with you still, for endangering them?"
It’s easy to answer quickly, still aside. Of course not.
He’d be able to tell.
Tipped well out of equilibrium by whatever minor confusion and all the unhappier for the pervasive disorder of it, Richard smooths his whiskers with a pass of his anchor hand. It’s step one of a deliberate process: coiling himself back up after slipping off the side of a log. Zeroing back in on the present.
“It was only relevant to your anger at the time.”
And to any element of surprise he might have hoped for in similar scenarios in the future.
A nod. Ellis' hand lifts, passes carefully from Thot's shoulder to hip, repeats again in a steady loop of movement. There's nothing to be said on it that they haven't already discussed in the dream.
There's no other need to clarify what Richard knows: Ellis cares for them very much. That's as true in this moment as it had been in that dream.
Nothing is said. Ellis' attention hooks on Thot for a moment, perhaps gathering himself, considering a response.
"Can I ask you something about your shard?"
As if the best way to handle the confusion and persistent observation of his feelings is to catapult towards a completely different topic.
The rabbiting of Thot’s heart has receded; when Ellis next looks down, it’s to find her cleaning between her claws with the rasping blue loop of her tongue.
“Please,” is only a little brusque, as consent to change the subject goes.
He hasn’t started on the second ale. He doesn’t seem likely to, for all that he’s kept his thumb hooked through the handle of the tankard, anchoring himself to the table.
He might have asked before, in the garden, after Richard had suffered through the construction of a chicken coop. But he hadn't known then, and the request Richard had made of him wasn't about that kind of pain.
The further they are from confusion, the more collected he seems. Tension carved in close against the bones of his face has abated, particularly around the prickle of his jaw. The lines over and between his brows have eased into more moderate consideration.
“Most often when I’m away from the Gallows. It’s typically mild.”
The knobby joint of Thot's shoulder holds Ellis' attention as he considers that answer. He runs his fingers back and forth there, watching the flustered edge of Richard's expression recede.
"I see," is not an explanation, but is it such a leap to puzzle out who and what Ellis might be thinking of?
Wysteria will say there's nothing to worry about until she's blue in the face. But Ellis' fears for her aren't Richard's to tend to either.
"Does it trouble you?"
Vague. Room for the question to mean anything: the shard, the dream, this conversation. Any of it. All of it.
He’s already there, having pitched himself the question of why do you ask and answered it on his own with little more than passing thought.
“Have you considered inquiring with her directly?”
It might be easier than trying to scry her truth through the tea leaf muddle of Richard Dickerson, who looks to have temporarily vacated his mortal shell for the purpose of suggesting it. His eyes lose focus, a little hollow once they’ve locked back on.
“I am untroubled,” he adds, but he does not elaborate and he does not drink his ale. “And Miss Poppell is well watched over.”
Yes, Wysteria is well-watched over. But worry is splintered beneath his skin; suppose something happens, and all Ellis can do is watch the damage as it occurs?
Ellis' fingers flex in Thot's fur. A brief flicker of amusement crosses Ellis' face. He doesn't volunteer whether or not he intends to try and ask Wysteria directly about her shard. Instead—
"I know," is a quiet answer, followed by, "You understand I care for you as well."
A divergence. Something Ellis might have left unsaid, prior to the dream, but offers now much the same as he'd nudged the tankard across the table. Something to be left alone, if Richard would prefer.
There’s no modulation in tone to lend light to his confidence. He’s aware of the effect he has on men, women, and wardens.
Thot stretches long(er) beneath flexed fingers, her toes splayed wide for her to push one paw back up for the underside of Ellis’ chin. It’s too far, but Richard glances down at the peek of her claws reaching over the table’s edge.
“We’ll be travelling together soon. I’ll check in on her.”
His opposite hand comes to meet the straining claws, pad of his finger gently tapping against sharp points.
Momentarily, Ellis thinks to reiterate the point, but to press the sentiment (I care for you as well) will tarnish it. This quiet gratitude will have to serve in place of further attempts at driving the point home.
"There should be something I can do for you, in return for all of this."
Keeping his secrets. Protecting his friends. Offering reassurance time and again.
“The nature of friendship is not transactional,” Richard says. He might have said so before; he can’t remember. Regardless, it sounds like a reminder.
“That said,” he braces with a glance down after the tankard at his hand -- nudges it aside, “you told me once that a Rifter who wanted to serve might be welcomed as a Warden.” Thot’s claws push out to curl gentle around the tip of Ellis’ tappy finger.
“I have been curious about what that would entail.”
"We don't know if the other gates will similar to what we found at that temple."
And then, quieter—
"There's no reason to think making you a Warden will make you able to close it. What's wrong with that rift is not..."
The trailing pause is filled with the memory of standing in that chamber and feeling whatever lay beyond the rift bearing down on him. He shakes his head.
"The corruption must be stripped from it, if such a thing is possible."
Thot goggles up at Ellis from the hammock of his lap expectantly, both paws reaching now that his hand has stilled, webbed toes groping along knuckle and bent bone.
“Given the dire and time-sensitive nature of the threat it represents, I believe a tiered approach controlling for multiple contingencies is both logical and necessary.”
Richard holds firm, a shade of warning to the slant of his brow. They both know there are other people he can ask.
Thot's scrabbling toes are permitted their grasping movements, but the easy encouragement remains absent.
There are other people who Richard could ask. Ellis doesn't care to test the outer limits of Vance's regard for him, though he doesn't think lowly enough of him to think he'd perform the ritual out of spite.
"And if you're wrong, and it does nothing, it's not something that can be shucked off and put away."
“I am already indentured into the service of one losing war, and we encounter darkspawn frequently enough that the additional support would not be wasted.”
He’s not sure what he expected. The degree of resistance he’s run up against seems to surprise him, skepticism creeping fine into the creases around his eyes.
The briefest flick of amusement. They both have firsthand experience as to Richard's success against darkspawn. It's the sort of thing that Ellis can find humorous because it had been a dream, because he has no expectation of repeating the event.
But the humor fades, gone so quickly it might as well never have appeared.
"You needn't spend it this way. You needn't promise yourself to a second unending fight."
One that would outlast Corypheus, go on and on for millennia yet. (A war that Ellis cannot bring himself to feed Richard to, balks at the prospect of doing so.)
"We mean to seek answers from our people, from the Wardens. Quietly, and carefully. Will you wait until I have that much, before deciding whether you wish to keep pursuing this?"
“I don’t have any other purpose here,” is the ready reply, plain and without any trace of humor to match that flicker, fleeting as it was. “Understand that I have already had a considerable amount of time to think about it.”
What a good and comfortable conversation to have over ale in the corner of an inn.
Reflecting on what he’s done, Richard lifts the second tankard to bolt half of it discreetly down after all, taking the option off the table for Ellis.
Hghh, he clears his throat and nods, chin dipped down in bristly assent. Of course he will wait.
There is nothing to say. Thot's claws prick lightly at his knuckles. The tankard makes a heavy, hollow sound upon being returned to the table. A trio of youths are arguing over the lyrics of a song a few tables away.
What Richard offers is not a reassurance, but a kind of confirmation. Months ago Ellis had said something without thinking, and now they are here, having this conversation. If he'd chosen his words with more care, then perhaps—
"Please consider, you are good for more than this," is a last appeal, less than half of what Ellis means to say. The rest doesn't resolve into any kind of easily vocalized sentiment, catches in his throat and stays there. "And I need to go."
His hands are very gentle as he lifts Thot from his lap, meaning to deposit her back into Richard's care.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2021-05-25 02:33 am (UTC)Ellis' expression has veered further towards frown, confusion ceding ground to some quiet kind of affront.
"I don't understand why."
Richard has never baited him, but the answer strikes Ellis a little too close to the possibility of it for comfort.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-25 02:58 am (UTC)Ellis’ confusion is contagious enough for Mr. Dickerson to forget (momentarily) the dilemma of the tankard -- his brow hoods into a harder furrow to match. The exasperation stirred murky at the bottom of his ??? is awfully earnest for this to be some kind of labyrinthine tease.
“You care for them very deeply.”
Defensive tension has crept in behind his ears, too subdued to rig all the way down his shoulders to his wrist. This is all very straightforward.
https://i.ibb.co/qFbb9Dn/si8892ij-dg.png
Date: 2021-05-25 03:41 am (UTC)"I don't understand the point you're trying to make."
Was it anger? Was that what Richard had been waiting to see? Ellis doesn't know that he can summon it, having burned through all of his fury in the midst of the dream.
His hand stays gentle over Thot's belly, careful as he keeps her pinned more or less steadily.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-25 04:14 am (UTC)“I’m not making a point.”
He traces back at a loss, facing down the possibility that he’s somehow broached this subject entirely on his own.
“You asked me to explain why it was relevant.”
no subject
Date: 2021-05-25 04:26 am (UTC)Is it as simple as sitting with that truth? He has carried some variation of it with him for a very long time, ever since he'd admitted that first inkling of it to Wysteria: I am devoted to you. I have been devoted to you and Tony for some time now.
But Richard—
"Do you think I'm angry with you still, for endangering them?"
Is that the first question he should have asked?
no subject
Date: 2021-05-25 04:46 am (UTC)It’s easy to answer quickly, still aside. Of course not.
He’d be able to tell.
Tipped well out of equilibrium by whatever minor confusion and all the unhappier for the pervasive disorder of it, Richard smooths his whiskers with a pass of his anchor hand. It’s step one of a deliberate process: coiling himself back up after slipping off the side of a log. Zeroing back in on the present.
“It was only relevant to your anger at the time.”
And to any element of surprise he might have hoped for in similar scenarios in the future.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-25 05:19 am (UTC)There's no other need to clarify what Richard knows: Ellis cares for them very much. That's as true in this moment as it had been in that dream.
Nothing is said. Ellis' attention hooks on Thot for a moment, perhaps gathering himself, considering a response.
"Can I ask you something about your shard?"
As if the best way to handle the confusion and persistent observation of his feelings is to catapult towards a completely different topic.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-25 05:28 am (UTC)“Please,” is only a little brusque, as consent to change the subject goes.
He hasn’t started on the second ale. He doesn’t seem likely to, for all that he’s kept his thumb hooked through the handle of the tankard, anchoring himself to the table.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-25 05:37 am (UTC)Simple, straightforward.
He might have asked before, in the garden, after Richard had suffered through the construction of a chicken coop. But he hadn't known then, and the request Richard had made of him wasn't about that kind of pain.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-25 05:59 am (UTC)The further they are from confusion, the more collected he seems. Tension carved in close against the bones of his face has abated, particularly around the prickle of his jaw. The lines over and between his brows have eased into more moderate consideration.
“Most often when I’m away from the Gallows. It’s typically mild.”
no subject
Date: 2021-05-25 06:11 pm (UTC)"I see," is not an explanation, but is it such a leap to puzzle out who and what Ellis might be thinking of?
Wysteria will say there's nothing to worry about until she's blue in the face. But Ellis' fears for her aren't Richard's to tend to either.
"Does it trouble you?"
Vague. Room for the question to mean anything: the shard, the dream, this conversation. Any of it. All of it.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-25 07:12 pm (UTC)“Have you considered inquiring with her directly?”
It might be easier than trying to scry her truth through the tea leaf muddle of Richard Dickerson, who looks to have temporarily vacated his mortal shell for the purpose of suggesting it. His eyes lose focus, a little hollow once they’ve locked back on.
“I am untroubled,” he adds, but he does not elaborate and he does not drink his ale. “And Miss Poppell is well watched over.”
no subject
Date: 2021-05-26 03:15 am (UTC)Ellis' fingers flex in Thot's fur. A brief flicker of amusement crosses Ellis' face. He doesn't volunteer whether or not he intends to try and ask Wysteria directly about her shard. Instead—
"I know," is a quiet answer, followed by, "You understand I care for you as well."
A divergence. Something Ellis might have left unsaid, prior to the dream, but offers now much the same as he'd nudged the tankard across the table. Something to be left alone, if Richard would prefer.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-26 04:56 am (UTC)He does understand.
“I’m difficult to resist.”
There’s no modulation in tone to lend light to his confidence. He’s aware of the effect he has on men, women, and wardens.
Thot stretches long(er) beneath flexed fingers, her toes splayed wide for her to push one paw back up for the underside of Ellis’ chin. It’s too far, but Richard glances down at the peek of her claws reaching over the table’s edge.
“We’ll be travelling together soon. I’ll check in on her.”
no subject
Date: 2021-05-30 04:29 am (UTC)His opposite hand comes to meet the straining claws, pad of his finger gently tapping against sharp points.
Momentarily, Ellis thinks to reiterate the point, but to press the sentiment (I care for you as well) will tarnish it. This quiet gratitude will have to serve in place of further attempts at driving the point home.
"There should be something I can do for you, in return for all of this."
Keeping his secrets. Protecting his friends. Offering reassurance time and again.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-30 06:07 pm (UTC)“That said,” he braces with a glance down after the tankard at his hand -- nudges it aside, “you told me once that a Rifter who wanted to serve might be welcomed as a Warden.” Thot’s claws push out to curl gentle around the tip of Ellis’ tappy finger.
“I have been curious about what that would entail.”
no subject
Date: 2021-05-30 06:16 pm (UTC)Stops.
"Why?" Ellis asks, expression very intent on Richard's face.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-30 06:20 pm (UTC)Reason sits well in the recesses of Richard’s bony face when he is secure in whatever position. It does now. His eyes are clear.
“And presumably others like it.”
no subject
Date: 2021-05-30 06:33 pm (UTC)And then, quieter—
"There's no reason to think making you a Warden will make you able to close it. What's wrong with that rift is not..."
The trailing pause is filled with the memory of standing in that chamber and feeling whatever lay beyond the rift bearing down on him. He shakes his head.
"The corruption must be stripped from it, if such a thing is possible."
no subject
Date: 2021-05-30 06:48 pm (UTC)Thot goggles up at Ellis from the hammock of his lap expectantly, both paws reaching now that his hand has stilled, webbed toes groping along knuckle and bent bone.
“Given the dire and time-sensitive nature of the threat it represents, I believe a tiered approach controlling for multiple contingencies is both logical and necessary.”
Richard holds firm, a shade of warning to the slant of his brow. They both know there are other people he can ask.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-30 07:05 pm (UTC)And neither do they. That's the problem.
Thot's scrabbling toes are permitted their grasping movements, but the easy encouragement remains absent.
There are other people who Richard could ask. Ellis doesn't care to test the outer limits of Vance's regard for him, though he doesn't think lowly enough of him to think he'd perform the ritual out of spite.
"And if you're wrong, and it does nothing, it's not something that can be shucked off and put away."
no subject
Date: 2021-05-30 07:17 pm (UTC)He’s not sure what he expected. The degree of resistance he’s run up against seems to surprise him, skepticism creeping fine into the creases around his eyes.
“You know that our existence here is temporary.”
no subject
Date: 2021-05-30 07:32 pm (UTC)But the humor fades, gone so quickly it might as well never have appeared.
"You needn't spend it this way. You needn't promise yourself to a second unending fight."
One that would outlast Corypheus, go on and on for millennia yet. (A war that Ellis cannot bring himself to feed Richard to, balks at the prospect of doing so.)
"We mean to seek answers from our people, from the Wardens. Quietly, and carefully. Will you wait until I have that much, before deciding whether you wish to keep pursuing this?"
A bargain.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-30 07:53 pm (UTC)What a good and comfortable conversation to have over ale in the corner of an inn.
Reflecting on what he’s done, Richard lifts the second tankard to bolt half of it discreetly down after all, taking the option off the table for Ellis.
Hghh, he clears his throat and nods, chin dipped down in bristly assent. Of course he will wait.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-30 09:47 pm (UTC)What Richard offers is not a reassurance, but a kind of confirmation. Months ago Ellis had said something without thinking, and now they are here, having this conversation. If he'd chosen his words with more care, then perhaps—
"Please consider, you are good for more than this," is a last appeal, less than half of what Ellis means to say. The rest doesn't resolve into any kind of easily vocalized sentiment, catches in his throat and stays there. "And I need to go."
His hands are very gentle as he lifts Thot from his lap, meaning to deposit her back into Richard's care.
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