driftfleet | 009 // i carry your bones in my heart

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009 // i carry your bones in my heart

Who: Dorian and YOU
Broadcast: Fleet-Wide
Action: On the Three Twins!
When: 8/11, Midnight.

[It's rare in Drift Fleet to see Dorian as The Necromancer. He plays with people, he flirts with them. Occasionally his humor is morbid. But that's just him.

But tonight is different.

The broadcast is from a darkened cargo bay of the SS Three Twins.

Dorian is wearing black robes with a pointed hood, and as the broadcast starts, he gestures with a skull-topped staff, seeming to almost do it for show. There's a whispering of something circling him, a spirit, perhaps, and candles illuminate around him as it vanishes.]

I do hope you're having a good night. I had nearly lost track of the date, what with the odd stars, but I'm quite certain that it is the beginning of the eighth month, Matrinalis. Which means, for those of you unaccustomed to Thedosian holidays, it is All Soul's Day. Or close enough. ...regardless...

[He conjures a small flicker of fire in his hand, the light casting shadows on his face, the glowing purple lines of necromantic sigils and runes seemingly etched into his hands and arms.]

It is the day we Thedosians remember our dead. As a necromancer, I daresay I am qualified to lead the celebrations, if you will.

You are welcome to come and extinguish a candle for those you've lost.

((OOC: A combination network post and mingle log! Start up an action thread if you'd like, thread with other folks, just leave a comment in the subject if your character is looking to chat with Dorian.))

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[Cole still isn't great with videos. This one has his communicator jammed between his knees while he's in the pilot's seat.]

Will you do your remembrance ceremony for Cole and his mother and sister? No one did a ceremony for them before.

I can. Would you care to join me?

[It was almost cautious.]

I can't. I promised Fenris. I don't want to hurt him.

[He looks down, looking distraught at the idea.]

I hurt him so badly. I don't want to do that ever again.

[He looks back up to Dorian, gaze pleading.]

But I can bring the Pathstone over?

[Oh Cole, what a sweet boy when he wasn't ripping underneath Dorian's walls.]

I have a better idea. Cole and his mother and sister...anyone else?

[Cole thinks for a little bit, quiet.]

Pharamond. He was a Tranquil, but he got better, but they were going to make him, Tranquil again, and he asked me to kill him, but I couldn't, but someone did, and he just wanted to live.

And Wynne. Rhys's mother.

Is that okay to ask for?

[The word "tranquil" makes Dorian's skin crawl. The horror of almost sharing a similar fate, made pliable to his father's wishes...

His face falters for a moment, and then he nods.]

I will meet you in the Pathstone's cargo hold, if you find that acceptable.

Oh! Yes! That's a good idea! I'll bring her around to the Three Twins!

[The video less cuts and more starts showing the ceiling as Cole drops it communicator to start piloting again.

Suffice to say, the video conversation is over, because Cole is talking to the Pathstone now.]

[And there is Dorian, once he has a moment, carrying a small pack with him. His hood is up, and he looks ever the model necromancer.

He set the candles on a crate in the hold, all seven of them.]

Cole?

[Cole takes the time to lock them into a drift pattern with the Three Twins before he heads down to the cargo hold.

He slips in without any hiding in the shadows and smoke, just a very human young man for once. But he lingers back. He hasn't seen Dorian in a long time, he can't remember what's okay and what's not.]

Hello, Dorian. It's singing through you today, restless, aggravated... you're upset.

[Okay, not entirely human.]

I am.

[He nods softly, there's no use to trying to fight Cole. At least they're alone.]

Not at you. I'm upset that everyone seems to be shitting themselves over the word "necromancer".

[He sits down and pats the seat next to him. Come sit down, Spirit Friend.]

It seems that every time I speak on something that matters, something that isn't simply myself being vain and playful, I get lectured for it. I don't mind debates, it's simply that...perhaps I thought that I wouldn't be a pariah here, as well, showing them only one side of myself. Foolish, I suppose, wanting to be accepted.

[Cole comes to sit next to Dorian, curling up and, after a moment, setting side his hat so he can rest his head on Dorian's shoulder.]

They're not debates. Just people informing you of how you're wrong, always wrong, don't talk back, just listen.

[Memories flutter close like cold butterflies, heavy and sluggish. His own, Dorian's, bitter disappointment on his tongue.]

Necromancy makes me a bit uncomfortable. But you're not necromancy. You're Dorian. You pull at the Fade like you would your robes, comfortable and in control.

You let me ask things, even when I hurt you, because you want me to learn. And you came here to help me remember the people who died. I know I'm not a person, but I accept you. And I think Fenris does too, doesn't he?

You're more a person than some of the men of Tevinter, Cole.

[And at Fenris's name, he can't help the soft tug of a smile at his lips.]

That he does, despite our rocky start.

[Dorian smiles slightly and Cole mirrors it, glad to feel the surge of happiness, that Dorian has found some kind of acceptance and love to take the hardest edges off the pain.

He reaches and curls a hand on Dorian's.]

I'm happy for you. You feel happy, and it's wonderful.

It sits in my chest oddly. I'm not entirely certain I care for it.

[Because Dorian isn't allowed these things, and one day Fenris is just going to vanish and he'll be left alone again, like he always was.

But he can't help the memory of a mansion, at night, bones at their feet, and the hesitant way that Fenris said those two words- te amo- and how Dorian felt like he could have died in that moment and would have been happy to have lived long enough to hear someone say they loved him.]

[Cole keeps holding onto Dorian's hand, swaying back and forth where he sits on the ground and letting the feeling of love be there.]

I'm glad he loves you too. I think it must be a very good thing, to love someone and be loved back.

I know it's scary, but wonderful. A lot of things that are wonderful are scary as well. It's okay to be a bit scared. Fear's only bad when it stops you doing good things.

I am not certain on that, Cole.

[Because he was scared, dreadfully scared. When he cared for someone, they became a weapon that could be used against him, a knife that he took and drove into his own skin.

Love was terrifying, it was daunting and he had closed himself to the idea of it, thought that perhaps he was better off without it.

How those words had died on his lips before. Rilienus. Four simple words- "do you love me?" and he couldn't ever bring himself to say it. And he hated himself for it.

But the truth was that he had been hurt so badly by those he cared about. The world was an unkind place, and Dorian bore the scars of a boy who had once been kindness and deep love, now turned a man who could barely allow himself to consider someone a friend.

Because caring? That was the first mistake. When you cared for someone, they were able to hurt you. When you cared about a person, they could be taken from you.]

Edited 2015-08-25 08:50 (UTC)

I am. Certain. Because I don't love and I haven't been loved, but I know how it makes others feel, even you with how much it hurts and scares, but it's not the love that hurts.

It's the loss. But... sometimes it's better to have those bright times and feelings than never know them and end alone, with no memory to bring a last smile.

[Cole had died with no good memories, no love to think on, nothing that took the edge off a dark, miserable life that had a single moment of unconditional kindness to light it.

He squeezed Dorian's hand again.]

The scars make it ache, but scars soften and lessen, I promise. For both of you. Love and loving, it will massage the knots loose eventually. It won't always be like this. It will get better.

[He managed a soft smile, resting a hand over Cole's, holding his small hand between his. It was odd, Cole was like an anchor in the ocean he seemed to be drowning in.

Love, sadness, both were intertwined for Dorian. And all he truly knew of love was the ache that he would never be enough. He would never be good enough. He would never be enough for someone to simply love him and only him.

And here, Fenris had accepted him in some way, but they loved desperately, like two men finding water in a desert. They loved fiercely because they knew that time was finite. That one of them would leave, just like everyone else.

Dorian or Fenris, one would vanish and forget this had ever happened.

He glanced over to Cole, shaking his head.]

You know, I much prefer it like this, when you don't tattle to everyone else about what I'm thinking and hang it up for the rest to see, like airing my dirty laundry.

[Cole was an anchor. When emotions were messed up and muddled and confused, he could safely anchor himself into his old nature and offer unconditional empathy and compassion for someone.

He could do it with strangers. It was much easier with Dorian.

Cole gave a small smile back.]

I'm learning. Inside, outside, people, alone... You're complicated. Very complicated. It makes it hard to keep everything just inside for me.

Rhys said absence made the heart grow fonder. Maybe you're fonder of me because you haven't seen me in several months.

Perhaps.

[Dorian looked over at Cole, and he saw a boy of delicate, bird-like bones and the chill of autumn in the South.

Cole was many things. But Dorian had come to learn quite a bit, and he had changed.]

Perhaps things are different now.

[It felt like a vine reaching out to another plant on a trellis, this awkward reaching to connect with others. Dorian was never good at that- he was much better at making people hate him that love him, and he had always thought that was for the best.

But maybe it wasn't.]

I never hated you.

[One day, maybe, Cole won't answer things that haven't been said, but he's not that good at being people still. He just can't miss that spike of thought and feeling.]

I don't think I ever could. I know what hate is. I've felt it. As me, not as memories or other people. But I won't hate you. It's not in you to be or do the things that have made me hate.

...thank you, Cole. For what it's worth, you do seem to bring comfort to even my tattered and scarred heart.

[Because he did worry, sometimes. Dorian was a necromancer, Cole a spirit. The two seemed, sometimes, to be irreconcilable. Dorian used spirits, he utilized them like a tool. They were as much an object, a weapon, as knives were to Cole.]

[That small compliment makes Cole light up, smiling and almost seeming to light from within to hear that he's helping.]

I'm so glad! It's all I want to do, honest. Make things... a bit easier. Better. Hurt less.

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009 // i carry your bones in my heart

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