we've been down that road before

[ulfur]

Who: Ned Stark and fam; OTA!
When: November 1st
What: reunions, meetings at the inn
Where: the road to Gazin, the inn, etc.
Warning(s): news of character/loved one death, will update as needed



Waking up alone and on a strange road; the former normal for young Eddard Stark, the latter a new experience. He frowns at the sign. Gazin, Lothalian, Caerlias. None of the names mean anything to him. He wonders if he has somehow been drugged and shipped off across the Narrow Sea by . He is not as well-versed in the cities of Essos as he is in every corner of Westeros, as a newly minted knight should be.

Grief hangs heavy upon him as he walks, the news of his father's and brother's deaths still fresh from King's Landing. This makes him Lord of Winterfell. It is a cup he'd never thought would pass to him. As the second son, second heir, he'd known he would be a knight, and lord of his own holdfast, perhaps able to marry the woman he loved...

And in the blink of an eye, it all changed. Rickard and Brandon Stark, tortured and brutally killed, and all of the North now resting on his shoulders. That duty was one he must bear, and yet, that last night with Ashara, he had dared to dream of a different future. One where he need not take this cup and all that it brought. A lifetime bowed beneath that mantle. A marriage to a woman he'd never met and who had been pledged to his brother for nearly half his life. And the knowledge that so much of his family was gone forever. Mother, father, brother. Lyanna, too, perhaps, if they could not get her back.

He'd wished for a place free from those sorrows, where he might love whomever he wished, and live a life free of that weight.

And now...he knew he had to get back. Whatever road led there. If he had to sail a ship to return, or secure a horse, or...whatever way he could find. He would take it. He could not let Benjen bear this all alone.


[OOC: starters below or snag him at the inn/around town the day of arrival]

Comments

[fangoffenharel]

Lyanna scarcely notices that her brother has company, engaged in conversation as she is with a good-looking gentleman. Aella follows his glance, amusement sparkling in her dark eyes as she watches his sister flirt for a moment, then she laughs and settles into the seat opposite of him.

She’s pretty sure no one who actually knows her would EVER call her a lady. But she appreciates that he has. It’s sweet. Gentlemanly. It’s kind of weird. (Humans don’t usually treat elves like that. She’s been lucky to meet a few who do, but the bulk have been assholes.) “I’d love to,” she replies. “But it’s just Aella. Aella Tabris.”

She takes a sip of her drink. “And since I’ve never seen you here before, you must be newly arrived.” She’s been here a while now, settled in. Even if she’s fucking heartbroken that Morrigan was gone.

[ulfur]

"Aella," Ned repeats, nodding at her and offering a welcoming smile. It is good to see a friendly face here, even a new one. "You are quite right. We have just found ourselves on the road to Gazin this afternoon. It has been a strange time, trying to figure out where we are, if this is even part of our world or not. I almost sure now that it is not, that there is some magic at work."

He glances at the woman, finishing the last of his first drink. "You can recognize a newcomer here, hmm? Do you know all the people in this land, then? Or only the ones here in town?"

[fangoffenharel]

“You’re right, it’s not part of your world. It’s not part of any of our worlds, from what I’ve figured out so far. And it’s definitely some kind of magic, too, but not like any I’ve ever seen.” Aella speaks about magic easily, like it’s something she sees every day. Which it is. Or was, until she ended up here.

She laughs, then, bright and amused as hell, before taking a sip of her drink. “Oh gods NO. Fuck no.” Not that she DOESN’T know a lot of people’s faces here. Just not everybody. “But people who have been here a while, or live here, look at their surroundings differently than people who are newly arrived.” They carry themselves differently. Act differently. It’s not a HUGE thing, but she’s seen a lot of people around. And a lot of people show up. She couldn’t help but notice.

[ulfur]

Ned listens with keen interest to her explanations. Not part of any of their worlds. "Then they have taken us from many worlds," he muses. "It is like no magic or powers of gods that I have seen, either." He speaks less easily of magic, but he does believe in higher powers, certainly, and things not of this world.

Her laughter, and her breezy obscenity, provoke an answering chuckle from the grey-eyed man before her. "I am that obvious, hm?" He lifts his new mug and quaffs before meeting her eyes. It is not a flirtatious look in itself - he's had to give Ashara up, but he is not looking to replace her here either - but it challenges her, at the very least. "Did you look like me, when you first came here?" Wide-eyed. Taking it all in. Questioning. Needing answers.

[fangoffenharel]

“A great many of them, it looks like. There was, for a little while, someone I knew from my world, yet she didn’t recognize me.” It had been heartbreaking, and complicated, but they’d been able to work around it. Or begin to. Then Morrigan was gone. And she was alone again.

Sorry, Ned. Aella swears like a sailor. And is unashamed of doing so. She is who she is and is unashamed in it all. “Not just you.” She smiles, meeting the challenge in his gaze. “Not so much, sadly.” She hasn’t been wide-eyed in a long time. Elves in the alienage don’t necessarily have that luxury. At least, she hadn’t. “I was more... frustrated. Still wanting answers, though.” And needing to return home. “Given what I had been doing before arriving here, strange and unusual... aren’t.”

[ulfur]

He glances at Lyanna, who has made yet another gentleman friend, miraculously, before turning back to Aella. "I am fortunate that my sister and I knew each other, it seems," he says thoughtfully. "We are Lyanna and Ned Stark." With a nod at his sister as he says her name, and a small lift of his mug at his own. 

Ned can already tell that his new friend will be full of valuable insights. She is the persistent type, he thinks, and her bluntness doesn't trouble him in the slightest. He nods and sips his ale. "I hope you have found some of those answers." Because gods knew there were plenty of questions.

He flashes her the inkling of a grin. "All right, you can't just drop a hint like that and not explain these 'strange and unusual' activities back home. Please tell me you're going to elaborate."

[fangoffenharel]

“Having a familiar face here is... very fortunate indeed.” Aella still misses Morrigan more than anything, even if she hadn’t been HER Morrigan. Morrigan is Morrigan, no matter what version of Thedas she’s from. “It’s nice to meet you Ned. I’m Aella. Tabris.” She gives a smsall lift of her own mug before taking a drink.

“Very few, much to my frustration.” And it annoys the hell out of her. She won’t stop searching, though. There’s the incident from a month ago, too. “From what I can tell, though, in speaking to some of the others who have come here, we brought ourselves here. A wish, a want to be somewhere, ANYWHERE else than where we were. Even just a moment of it. What it was that decided to answer that want and drag us here, I’ve no fucking clue yet.”

Where does she start? She’s pretty sure ‘so I joined an organization whose initiation involves drinking some blood out of a special goblet in a ritual that binds us to the very things we’re supposed to fight’ might be a bit much for a first meeting. Then again, a lot of what she’s been up to would probably count as a bit much. “There’s a LOT to choose from,” she retorts with a laugh. “I chose who was to be crowned king of Orzammar. After exposing a real-estate scam, dealing with a gang, and travelling to find a dwarven Paragon to back the Prince as King.”

[ulfur]

"Likewise." Ned is grateful to have Lyanna here, but glad too to make acquaintances who knew the world already and could help them orient themselves within the unfamiliar landscape.

Thoughtfully, he frowns. Fascinated and also a little unnerved by that answer. "Truly? I've never heard of such a thing." He wants to ask Aella what wish brought her here, but it is probably a personal question to ask someone you've just met, in a crowded tavern no less. He tucks the question away to ask later, if they have a later.

But Aella is already giving him a lot to consider. Ned raises a brow. "You lead a busy life back home. And an important one. How did you come to have the power to choose a King to crown?"

[fangoffenharel]

“It’s the one common thread with everyone I’ve spoken to about how they ended up here. It has to be it. Or it has to play a part, somehow.” There’s a lot she doesn’t know, yet, but it feels like it would be too fucking coincidental for that little tidbit to NOT be involved.

"Oh, VERY busy. Been on the move for longer than I can remember." And she has farther to go. "Important enough that people try to kill me." She's amused by it now; she adores Zevran with all her heart, and couldn't have made it through her journey without him. She huffs a wry laugh, and takes a very large drink from her mug. “That is a very complicated story.” And there’s a lot she doesn’t want to talk about with a strange human. Not yet. She doesn’t know him. Doesn’t trust him. “But the short version is that I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Or the right place at the right time, now, I guess.”

It sure as hell hadn’t seemed that way at the time, but given that she’s the last of four people – three now, she amends, the familiar ache when she thinks about Alistair walking away from everything, from her, making it hard to breathe for a moment – that can fight the Archdemon and keep the world from going to shit... well, she owes Duncan a lot. And so does Thedas.

[ulfur]

It's news to Ned, who takes in this tidbit of information with careful consideration. He would have to be more careful wishing for things in the future, it seemed.

Since Aella laughs wryly at the idea of people trying to kill her, Ned gives a dry chuckle too and tips his head back to look at her. She is a cagey one, this girl with the mischievous eyes and colorful mouth and a past she is quite vague about.

"I hope you chose well," he says lightly, inclining his head just a touch. "As for here...you have spoken with many people, it seems. Have you been here long? Traveled much of this world? How far does it go?" Ned looks quite interested in this subject, and so far it has been one that Aella is very open to speak of.

[fangoffenharel]

Look, Aella’s sort of used to it by now. She’s gotten into a LOT of fights for her life since joining the Wardens. She can’t help but laugh at it, now. In part because the assassin hired to kill her is now one of her closest, most trusted friends.

“I did, I think.” She’d taken it seriously; she could have just chosen one of the two dwarves at random and gotten them on the throne and fucked off after with the support she needed. But she couldn’t. She had to make sure, as best she could, that she was choosing who was right for Orzammar. “Prince Bhelen will be a good King.” She’s tried so hard to do what was best for the people involved. Even making peace between fucking humans and elves in Brecilian Forest.

She thinks a moment. “I’ve been here... fuck, I forget how long. Maybe eight or nine months?” Honestly she’s lost track. “There’s still a great deal I haven’t explored yet. I’ve spent a lot of time in Vasari forest and the area surrounding Gazin. But I have ventured further out a little. There’s a city called Caerlias a few days ride southeast from here. And beyond Vasari in either direction there’s Lothalian and Fairwinds. North, there’s Roselake.”

One of these days she will have to pack up and venture as far south as she can. See what’s there. “I haven’t gone farther. Not yet, anyway.”

[ulfur]

She takes her role seriously, which speaks well to her character, Ned thinks. He lifts his mug. "Long live King Bhelen." He doesn't know the man, but he will trust Aella's judgment on him.

"Then you have eight or nine months on me here," Ned says, amused. "I know none of the places you have been. I saw a few of the names on the road signs. I would like to see them for myself, on a map, and in person too."

He glances at Aella, brows raised. "But first things first. My sister and I will need a place to stay. I don't believe the powers that brought us here, brought us with any money of worth in this world. Where did you stay, when you first came here?"

[fangoffenharel]

Aella grins, and lifts her mug. “Long live King Bhelen. May his rule be long and may Orzammar stand against the Blight.” She hopes the Blight will be over soon, she hopes that she can bring an end to it, but the dwarves are on the front lines more than anyone else, with the Deep Roads. Even when there isn't a Blight.

“I think I can arrange that,” she tells him, impulsively. “If you need a guide. I’m your girl.” It’d be nice to be useful again. To do something more than explore Vasari and get into trouble. Not that that might not happen while showing him around, but it wouldn’t be her only reason for roaming the forest. This time.

“I stayed here, actually.” She laughs. “Still am. Haven’t seen a reason to move elsewhere yet.” She might get a place of her own one of these days, but she likes the inn, likes the tavern. And their owner.