bornpariah-a

[bornpariah-a]

hi, i moved blogs

[bornpariah-a]

hi, i moved blogs

[bornpariah-a]

elisa

[bornpariah-a]

when you ask dorian how he is there’s a 53% chance he’ll start telling you about his most recent research or just go off on a tangent about magical theory or whatever the fuck bullshit academia is on his mind at that exact moment without prompting and ignoring whether or not you’re interested in what he has to say and i think that’s great

[bornpariah-a]

i’m discussing bioware’s bullshit with a friend again ( for the nth time ) and getting heated thinking abt how dorian, “the good tevinter,” is a light skinned brown man meanwhile his father is extremely dark. yes of course i know that dorian could be mixed, his mother could be light, shades vary among family, but it’s just so blatant and ridiculous and i’m eternally mad at bioware about their not at all subtle bullshit.

[bornpariah-a]

honestly the fact that dorian went from futuristic cyberpunk adjacent looking tevtiner ( APPARENTLY????? WHAT IS THIS BIOWARE IT IS JUST THE MAGIC GIVING MAJOR ADVANCES OR, ) to the medieval south... is so fucking funny. no wonder he hated it with a burning passion sdkgnskjdngkjsnh

[bornpariah-a]

love that all we got was that varric is going to be in this game ( let me kiss him or i’ll end you bioware ) and pretty scenery and i still screamed

[bornpariah-a]

inquistior​.

      “I don’t know what you mean.”  To his credit, Halwn tolerates the abuse well, barely turning his head, never shifting his eyes from Dorian even as Dorian so pointedly refuses to look up. Feigning a clever innocence, or only being indulgent. Indulgent enough to let Halwn go on looking undisturbed, and indulged, too, in being so long looked at. It would be wildly foolish, if Halwn wasn’t so pleased about it. Dorian is right, of course, but he can carry it out a while longer. Propped up against the headboard and a small nest of Orlesian feather pillows, the pain at his left arm no more than a distant flicker, the Inquisitor feels, for the first time in months, in the mood for teasing.

      Halwn bends forward at the waist and lays his hand across Dorian’s bare foot where it is curled over his leg. He runs his touch along the rise of Dorian’s instep, wraps his fingers briefly around the lean strength of his ankle. Tevinter fashions haven’t altered far in their time apart. It is easy to remember the way to slide back the underhem of the trouser leg where it falls above the ankle just an inch or two, to slip beneath it to shape the back of Dorian’s bare calf with his palm, fingers still far enough from the tender flesh behind the knee to be considered mildly polite. As he always is, Dorian is warm to the touch. Not flushed, nor feverish, but a steady, unfluctuating warmth. Ember, rather than flame—though his skin seems to heat a little further under Halwn’s slow-moving hand. That is as it always it, too, and Halwn must smother his smirk. So much for a feigned disinterest. Dorian’s knee turns open, perhaps only by instinct, rolling into the touch, and the Inquisitor’s smirk becomes a smile again. Halwn stops at that, the contentment of the touch of skin on skin so deep in him that it feels buried like a seed.  “I have understood something, that is all.”

        He’s a glutton, in truth. For a great deal of things, good wine and knowledge being chief among them, lending itself dangerously to the pursuit thereof. Yet, Dorian knows well that he is intolerably infatuated in regards to Halwn’s attentions. Months of distance had starved him, something that he had felt acutely frustrated by in the immediate days and weeks after his departure. A new form of addiction, though the moniker seems ill—fitting / almost an offense.

        ❝   The greater meaning of the universe?   ❞   he says, appearing for all the world as though he’s disengaged from the proceedings, though the rotation of his knee and the way which he presses into Halwn’s touch betrays him. The letters they had exchanged betrayed him, as well, the tireless affections and the homesick ramblings. He extends his knee, the familiar press of Halwn’s callouses against his skin, and here he can’t help but allow himself to smile.   ❝   The purpose of our perilous existence? Beyond death defying feats to save the entirety of the world, of course,   ❞   another page turns, though he’s stopped absorbing anything at all that he reads.   ❝   Cassandra’s ramblings from earlier today, perhaps? Or yet another cryptic thing which Cole has said ——— I’m still trying to understand what he said to that crone with the bird hat, did you see her? A literal bird... Orlesians wear taxidermy, yet Tevinter has tasteless fashions.   ❞

        Dorian could very well continue listing increasingly more bizarre things that Halwn could have come to understand, he does enjoy making a game out of these things, but the magelight presses against the Inquisitor’s jaw and he’s far too steeped in love.   ❝   Go on then, before I stumble upon your great understanding and ruin your moment... I am quite magnanimous, after all.   ❞

[bornpariah-a]

chanticle​.

     ❝ here ! ❞    𝚃𝙷𝙴 𝙶𝙸𝚁𝙻 𝙸𝚂 𝙿𝚁𝙰𝙲𝚃𝙸𝙲𝙰𝙻𝙻𝚈 𝙶𝙻𝙾𝚆𝙸𝙽𝙶 𝚆𝙸𝚃𝙷 𝙿𝚁𝙸𝙳𝙴 ,  𝙿𝙰𝙻𝙼𝚂 𝚃𝙷𝚁𝚄𝚂𝚃 𝙾𝚄𝚃 𝚃𝙾𝚆𝙰𝚁𝙳 𝙷𝙸𝙼 .    in them lay a small ,  thin bone .  a chicken bone ,  to be precise ,  plucked from scraps in the kitchen as octavia had flitted about the edges of it to see if they had any apples today .  there had been others ,  too ,  but the cook was  scary  and mama was calling her name .  so she’d just swiped the one :  smooth ,  white ,  and a little curved .  allowing him enough time to appreciate it ,  the girl places it  very  gingerly upon the arm of the large chair in this corner of the library .   ❝ for your collection , ❞    she says brightly ,  hands clasped behind her .

@bornpariah :    liked for a starter !

        There’s something ——— perpetually odd, about children. Their whimsy and the way that they absorb the world around them, react to it, are shaped by it yet, above all else, shape the world through sheer force of will. Octavia listens to a great deal, if not just about everything she hears, and he can’t help but give her an indulgent smile even as puzzlement settles over his tongue for a moment as he looks at the bone ( clearly not human, likely a humerus and from the size alone, plucked from a bird ), brows raising. He feels at once baffled and yet,   ❝   This is quite the specimen, Lady Octavia,   ❞   voice fire—warm as he sets the book he had been reading aside, instead plucking the bone from the arm of his chair and examining it from this angle and that / smile widening.   ❝   Are you certain you wish to part with it?   ❞

[bornpariah-a]

me : no fear da4: dorian’s subplot is forgiving his father ( and mother ) for everything without any nuance or focus on the trauma it all caused him me : [ bass boosted ] ONE FEAR

[bornpariah-a]

        ❝   ——— You’re giving me that look again, Halwn,   ❞   he doesn’t deign to look up from the book he’s reading, naturally. It shouldn’t be possible to be cramped in the rather large rooms they had been afforded by the Orlesians for the Exalted Council, but Dorian had certainly achieved it by the sprawl of his belongings across all surfaces, including the bed that they were crowding. Legs akimbo, knees bumping. He rolls his wrist, a casual and fluid motion / one of the magelights bumps against Halwn’s cheek harmlessly, an undulating orb of light.   ❝   That sodden, doe—eyed one you don before saying something outrageous,   ❞   he turns a page idly / the arch of his foot is pressing against Halwn’s calf.   ❝   Out with it then, before you embarrass us both,   ❞   as if such a thing were reasonably possible, at this point, and Dorian resists smiling for all that it’s a near thing. To be so helplessly lovesick and overwhelmed with affection after time apart ——— well, it was rather embarrassing, in truth.

@inquistior // you rang?

[bornpariah-a]

dorian doesn’t collect bones or anything ( rather... primitive, no? ) but mayhaps he drops hints he does around chantry sisters and nobles to see their reactions and casually alludes to forms of necromancy utilizing them ( which is true ) without clarifying that he doesn’t use them on the regular.

also maybe he does keep a small pack of bone shards when traveling.

what? you never know when they’ll come in handy.

[bornpariah-a]

it’s not that dorian enjoys making josie’s life more difficult, it’s just that he was relatively notorious among the so—called elite in tevinter and being unknown by nobility in the south, other than being the token evil tevinter necromancer, is so novel that he has to capitalize on it. who would he be if he didn’t?

also he’s an ass and enjoys offending southern sensibilities?

[bornpariah-a]

@inquistior​:  ❝  i had a dream about you.  ❞

        Night has long since fallen ——— he blinks shadows from his eyes and drives murmurs of spirits / the dead / the living / the living walls from his mind. Sleep beckons and he cannot heed its call and instead stares blearily at the book open on his chest, leaned against one hand, the other woven gently into Halwn’s hair, strands slipping through his fingers / thumb brushing gently against his forehead.

        The Inquisitor’s ( theirs something wavering and fading breathes somewhere beside his heart, theirs he knows ) quarters are quiet / and warm / and dark but for the small orb of magelight hovering over his shoulder, casting warm light on the pages that he reads, only half-absorbing the theory of temporal manipulation by way of magickal foci. He’s propped himself upon far too many pillows and he’ll likely complain about his neck come morning ( he’s not as young as he used to be, certainly ) but Halwn is warm beside him and quiet frankly, he feels no desire to move at the moment.

        There’s something nauseatingly domestic about this scene, something fragile and wanting, something that his mind demands that he dare not explore but, well. His mind does so love meandering through treacherous territory and the light catches upon his sandy hair handsomely, the way the sun does, the way light reflecting off the damned snow does. In sleep Halwn looks not quite younger, but rather : quieter. Not even Halwn Trevelyan could manage the level of intensity that he portrays in his waking hours whilst unconscious, Dorian had been certain before he had first seen him sleeping, and he found himself vindicated when he discovered that he had, indeed, been correct. Handsome still, eyes closed and brows gentle and mouth slightly parted, given that he’s always handsome to nigh offensive levels.

        Here : he may look his fill. Whilst the sun is out and Halwn attends to his Inquisitorly duties and otherwise Dorian may also look his fill ( and does, mind you ) but here he can gaze without being ensnared in return. Something like ( or perhaps just ) affection takes root in his chest, as though it had not been there all along. For all of his bluster and his aborted attempts at proprietary distance, he had never dared try to prune nor raze whatever it is that began to sprout in those long ago days.

        ( he had rather assumed that it would die naturally. he’s certainly not disappointed by this result, mind you, but. )

        Halwn stirs as he brushes his fingers against his jaw. Were Dorian a different man, perhaps he would leave him to his sleep, given that the man hardly gets enough as it is, but he finds himself ravenous / lovesick / with this terrible tenderness / with this wretched wanting. Does love turn all into insatiable monsters? It must ——— Halwn has steeped Dorian in his particular brand of love ( heavy and weighting and waiting, settling over his sternum not to crush but to envelop, so steady in adoration and awareness and mortifying assuredness that it echoes and resonates and Dorian finds himself matching it, though perhaps not with weight but with attention ) and he’s turned into an absolute glutton.

        Their eyes meet and Halwn’s eyes are heavy with sleep, shaded with something that Dorian knows ( hard fought and hard won knowledge less in its reality and more in his defiance of it ) is love. He lowers the intensity of the light and sends it further away with a flick of his wrist, a compulsive act. ( compulsive and mindless and adoring. an act of : care. ) A smile plays along Halwn’s mouth and he brushes his thumb along the curve of his upper lip, a shadow of a kiss.

        ❝   I had a dream about you,   ❞   words drowsy / words quiet.

        Not the most absurd nor clandestine thing that the Inquisitor has ever said to him by far / but still Dorian feels his chest constrict in response, eyebrows raising as he can’t help but grin, teasing,   ❝   Was it a naughty dream?   ❞   he returns easily, laughing airily as Halwn has the apparent inspiration to press a kiss to his thumb, as though that were a perfectly normal thing to do.   ❝   Did the Fade deliver a lust demon to you in my form? Or did your subconscious pull free a memory for you,   ❞   Halwn reaches for him, hands warm against his waist, pulling him closer / though Dorian resists for the moment.   ❝   Hmm, not quite... it was a stunning recollection of the dance... you did enjoy that one quite a lot, if memory serves,   ❞   and, naturally, memory serves.

        Near silent and sleep-worn laughter reverberates through his body and Dorian, quite magnanimously, allows the book to be taken from his chest and tolerates, for bare moments, the cold that so rudely decides to rush in at Halwn stretches to deposit the book on the table far from Dorian’s side of the bed. When he returns he presses against him, for warmth and for the sake of it.

        ❝   Perhaps in this dream you were feeding me oranges and pomegranates and mango slices,   ❞   he says against Halwn’s cheek, legs tangling.   ❝   Take that as a suggestion if you will ——— you do enjoy feeding me,   ❞   spoiling him is more like it, and while Dorian has his qualms about such things he can’t actually deny that a small ( monstrous, perhaps ) part of him enjoys it all the same. He had adored receiving gifts from his lovers, after all.

        The light dims further and he can’t resist touching Halwn’s cheek gently, heavy with love : mango—sweet on his tongue. “Not that one either, then? Shame, it sounds like a rather pleasant dream,” Dorian laughs as he’s kissed, gently / quickly / sunlight—bright.

        ❝   Very well, Halwn, I give up on guessing,   ❞   he murmurs as the light goes out and long shadows cast by the moon slant over them and he wonders, obliquely, over the monstrosity of love.   ❝   Now you must tell me what this clandestine dream of yours was about, or else I may be forced to use less savory methods to draw it out of you. Enquiring minds wish to know.   ❞

[bornpariah-a]

@chanticle​ :  ‘ love is never a weakness ’ ( from older octavia ! )

        ❝ Certainly not, ❞ he replies easily, water spilling from a tipped jug. His thumb rubs along the ring on his left fourth finger, skin-warm and well loved. It’s become a poor habit of his, really, though it has been for a while. He considers the movement absently / considers her / she looks so much like her mother. ( not entirely, not completely, but he attributes those features to livia, as well. )

        Once, it was not unlike looking into a mirror ——— but it was less of a mirror and far more of murky waters. Octavia, flitting to and fro, more bird than girl every now and then ( and, at times, less girl than target in a similar manner ) and overflowing with wonderment and wondering and, on occasion, fear. Or perhaps it’s more apt to say CONCERN. She was a girl / a child / hardly more than a babe, she had no business being involved, even if only obliquely, in the bloodshed of adults who should know better.

        Had he wanted to protect her? In a manner of speaking, he supposes, though it’s both as selfless and far less selfless than that. She had reminded him of, well, himself ——— boundless curiosity, all eyes watching, though the KEY DIFFERENCE, he supposes ( even now removed from that time in their lives ), is that the threat on her life was far more egregious and corporeal than the threats on his own, on the day to day.

        And if, seeing her curled up in his chair or on his windowsill with a book and hearing the cadence of their mother tongue on hers reminded him of his childhood in an abstract way, soaked in rose water, sticky like honey rolls, bright like iron in blood ——— that was no one’s business but his own.

        He had liked her, all the same. Watched her grow / watched her mature. In the years that she had spent in the south she had changed, and upon their return to Tevinter she had changed further. Such is the manner of GROWING UP, he supposes, and she had flourished. Fed not on venom, but on ( ... ) pomegranate juice.

        ❝ Though I would argue that love can be dangerous, whether used as a motivation or a weapon, ❞ the ring twists around his finger again / and again / and again. He rests his hand upon his knee, the movement halted. He thinks, from time to time, of his mother teaching him that love is dangerous. Of his father teaching him to hide his heart. Of them both ——— he thinks of them both often, loves them for all of the hurt that it inspires / as much as he thinks of Octavia : fondly.

        Once, it was not unlike looking into a mirror ——— but now? Now it as though he is looking upon a masterpiece, one crafted by her own hands, and he feels no small amount of pride for her. For Octavia of house Herathinos. The culmination of the best of them, truly.

        ❝ Not to mention that love makes fools of us all, ❞ a smile plays along his mouth, indulgent and mirthful and he’s grown older, unquestionably so, and perhaps wiser. ( well, certainly wiser. ) ❝ But what is it that Varric would say? Those maudlin poets and writers of the romantics ——— that love is a force more powerful than any mere mortal can truly comprehend? ❞ humor flits across his expression and he thinks of his home / and his family / and his husband / and Octavia.

        ❝ How could such a thing ever be a weakness? ❞

[bornpariah-a]

i don’t have anything short to write or reply to

[bornpariah-a]

just realized i wrote freudian slip earlier as if. freud exists in dragon age.