02 | OPEN

[shri]

FORM: Sending Crystal.
SENDER: Lakshmibai
RECIPIENT: Any one and everyone.
WHAT: Head of Community Outreach & Are you a rifter? Do you know how to weave? Want to turn a profit and help out the inquisition? Please inquire.
WHEN: Time is a flat circle.
WHERE: The Gallows
NOTES: nothing too serious

Greetings... It is Rani Lakshmibai.

[ Right, that out of the way. ]

I have two matters which I need a moment - [ Here we go. ] - I have recently been made Head of Community Outreach, for which I'm honoured. I wish to a little more to understand where I might be applied in helping others, but as yet many things still escape me as where help might be best applied to those that need it. If you have a moment to speak with me, in person, I would be much obliged. My Quarters are in the Gallows.

[ Onwards then, because who works and doesn't overwork? Not her. ] Secondly, and for rifters amongst us... I have spoken with Master Barnabas, a merchant here in Kirkwall, and I realised that whilst what many of us bring in terms of items here can be desirable and turn a good profit for it's... foreign nature. Such things are short-term investments. [ And that as far as she's concerned, is a waste. ] As such, I am looking for women or men, of moderate skill in weaving textiles and who can take direction easily, to join me in such work. You will be paid, though primarily, all extra earnings are to be funded back into the Inquisition. I intend to work things that no part of Thedas has seen before, and feel we are uniquely qualified for such an endeavour.

If such a thing is in your ability, please enquire.

[ Somewhere, her husband is following her about, tugging at her hair and laughing. ]

That is all. My regards.

Comments

[periastron]

You literally just thought I was being serious when I said Tassie was full of mutants. We're in a world where fuckin' trees can go get themselves possessed, and I have a pet koala from a dream that's chewing on a bit of steak instead of eucalyptus.

Forget the narwhal person. Me being a able to go, "hey, Rani, mate, your country's been independent for seventy years and regularly kick the shit out of England at their national sport" and that being a surprise to you instead of something you just know is fucking— it's messed up.

( And then... ) Oh— fuck.

( That is the sound of realisation. And of someone realising she maybe was just kind of a dick. And... maybe there was a better way to deliver that nugget of info. )

[shri]

[ There's just one, long, echoing piece of silence. Scratching. Full of sounds, certainly. People moving about where she is. Her mouth parted, a soft, deep inhale. That is like taking a breath from deep underwater, harsh, she remembers. A lesson so strange - to want something so much you hurt when you have it.

She doesn't need this - not today. She can't stand this, today. She has business to attend, she has a position she has been given and Herian will want her reports no doubt, sooner rather than later and she will in the morning, exercise, ride - and in her mind she sees maps, she sees the lay of shipping lines, trade documents, outlines for places that were home and far away. She sees the grim of gunpowder, dirt and blood that leave fingerprints like footsteps over the smooth paper. Hyderabad. Lucknow. Calcutta. Mumbai. Gwalior, and a little above it, Kalpi. The details no paper could bestow. The Rajput women, dancing Ghoomer. The konch blowing clear and loud of an evening as the evening prayers began. Anand stumbling proudly through his evening Puranas. The Lotus painted in her palms. The sound of elephants. The clatter of swords and shields, and she will ride and -

Out of here, come morning. She will rise up, she will dress herself and what does she care for their reports? Their wars? Herian will understand. She will ride, and she will find the place of the dreams that brought her, and fight her way back through it. She will go home, and she will have independence. She will, she will, she will.

Something numbs to the break. That first deep breath as she breaks the surface of something. A limb that snapped and she feels the gasp rattling pain in her lungs not for the first time. Of being trapped, of being caught. Of being bound up and helpless to games so much crueller than her own. Of pounding her fists so hard they bleed.

There isn't a response to any length. She does not have words for this. There are no words for it. I died for this, I keep dying for this, I - ] Thank you.

[ And the communication cuts off. ]

[periastron]

( The communication has been cut off, and Alex is holding her crystal, realised that she was, basically, a bit cunty.

And she sits, opens her mouth, closes it, opens it again. )

Yeah, no wakkas. You're welcome. Heaps good.

( Flat, as she tosses the crystal to the side. )

Fuck knuckles.