The Lion at Lunch

[OOC: As always, anyone - and everyone - is welcome to join.]

He strode, footsteps preternaturally - supernaturally? - silent, through the halls brushing by flickering shadows like a whisper; and strode by the kitchen, acquiring a plate of food absentmindedly, nearly unaware of such an acquisition, as though not caring for the matter that sat on the platter - uncharacteristic for one so paranoid as he.

Griffinhart moved to the long table - its oaken bench not even creaking as he sat down, as if he were made more of ephemeral air than of solid flesh and bone and blood clad in blackened, burnished metal - and sat the food on the surface, staring intently at the meal before him. Or did he? Was he looking at his meal because that was the focus of his attention, or was he looking at his meal because it was a convenient place for his eyes to fall? The soldier was a statue, an artist's rendition of a man eating, not a man eating. He sat, sculpture-like, unmoving.

How long had it been since he had eaten? Since he had slept? It was a useless thing for him to count, he knew; but the question still pressed at him, even as other, more important questions floated their way through his mind. Most men - most mortals - came dangerously close to distraction - to death - the longer they went without food and sleep. How long had it been for him? He did not remember ever being in the mess hall - how did he know to go to the kitchen to get food? How did he know where the kitchen was?

Ah, wait, no. That was all part of the plan. The building's plan. Which he had made a priority task to memorize. Of course he knew where the kitchen was. And, in theory, its purpose. Much as he knew where he was. And his purpose.

Did he?

What was the purpose of this memory, then, this memory of a moment that had never happened? What was this anomaly, then, this anomaly that sat at his heart - the heart that had been cut out-

What heart? What cutting? He had never cut out his heart, his heart lay here, in his chest, beating slowly, as it was wont to do in the moment before a murder-

Murder? He was no murderer - a killer he was called, and killing was what he had done, killed-

Who? What? He had killed many things. Darkspawn. Men. Darkspawn. Women. Darkspawn. Animals. Darkspawn. Darkspawn.

The shadow of the ghost of the memory flitted from the grasp of his mind, and disappeared into the murk of - what? What was it that clouded his mind, that clotted his memories? Why couldn't he remember whatever it was that had never happened? But there is no remembering what never happened, he rationalizes. It is not his memory that is clotted, then - not his mind that is clouded - simply, he is...

I am what?

This state of being is incongruous with him. To him? That word, incongruous - how did he know it? Did he know it? What were these things that came up in his mind, after all this time, all this time since-

Since...

Since what?

There lay a gap in his head that he could not place, much less seal. Something, somewhere, was gone. Missing. Or, at least, so he thought. Hunger and sleep loss - nightmares and Dreams alike - preyed on him, on his body and on his mind. Was this the sort of distraction that those dying of starvation and sleep deprivation came to? Stupid, pointless questions? No - for Griffinhart, it was something else. He was acutely aware of the world beyond the privacy of his own mind. A guard was yawning, shuffling his feet. Bored. For a moment, the swordsman contemplated how he would go about gutting the man, if he were ordered to - he could cross the distance in twelve long paces. A distance doable in under five seconds. Possibly three. By that time, the killing knife would be out. The guard's throat was exposed - did no one in Ferelden consider the joints of armor to be terribly exposed weakpoints? - The man would be dead in under six seconds at most.

But there were other guards, and they would be alerted by his sudden movement. A slow approach, then? Walk by - the guard was at the main entrance, after all - slash his throat, and escape? Griffinhart had well-memorized the layout of the place - but no. There had to be undocumented secret passageways he had not sounded yet. The warrior wished that there was some way for him to know them all, bu that would defeat the point of "secret," wouldn't it?

Why even bother with killing the guard? What was the point? Worse - what if the yawning guard was a distraction, meant to draw his attention from-

From what?

Footsteps. Someone approached. Someone brazen enough to not bother with masking their approach. Did they think that, by announcing their presence, he would relax his guard? No - if anything, the wire that was the man that sat at the bench that was acutely aware of the world that included the footsteps that approached the wire that was the man was pulled even more taut, even closer to the point of snapping into action, and all it needed was a simple trigger-

There sat a man, knife and fork in hand, hooded and helmeted, staring intently at his cooling food as a warm body approached.

There sat a man, knife and fork in hand, hooded and helmeted.

There sat a man, barely a man.

There sat a weapon.

[Saarebas is still technically being introduced in another thread, but I supposed that an assumption that this passed a little later in the day would allow for her to be here. If any problem with that arises, I can always delete this post.]


Strange. Very strange. It might have been frightening, even, if she had understood the significance of the feeling.

She was alone.

Alone.

Alone for the very first time in the entirety of her life. Humans were milling about her without a care, and she was not alone in any literal sense, but without the constant, watching eye upon her, waiting as if expecting her to place a single toe over the invisible line between useful and dangerous, she felt naked, as if a mask and cloak did not currently shield her from the rest of the room. Glances were cast her way, but they were glances turned by curiosity, or wonder. These humans were not her wardens or leash-holders, and she was not their weapon.

The hall for dining was a place she had been told to go to, and so, she had gone. “Eat,” they had told her. But she was here, now, and she found herself misunderstanding her order (a shameful thing, because she should no more misunderstand an order than a sword might).

Food was . . . strange. She did not think herself ready for such a thing. With mouths stringed shut, she had only ever understood nourishment to come in the form of enriched liquids, enough to keep her and her brethren living but which provided little else in the way of satisfaction. She had forgotten what hunger was almost as soon as she'd been born. But the threads were gone now, and only the little, pin-pricked scars and reddened, healing skin lining her lips suggested that they had ever been there, and now food was something she was expected to consume as anyone else might. Watching the humans go about eating was a strange task indeed. Her Arvaarad had consumed food as they did, but they seemed to take a joy from it that she could not understand. It was a joy she had no experience with. Joy itself was a thing with which she was wholly unfamiliar, but that hardly mattered.

She found herself not wanting to eat (“want” - another strange thing; she may not have even realized that “want” was the force behind her decision), but she had been ordered to do so, and so do it she would. Food was served to her as it was served to any other man in the hall, with a few more curious looks sent her way than at any other man about her, but she took no notice. The food was in her hand, now, and she had only to eat it to finish the task she’d been sent out to do.

Sitting alone was the easiest thing she’d done since entering this large, loud room. As soon as she moved to sit anyone who might have been nearby moved away to sit elsewhere, leaving her in peace. The walked with such heavy footfalls, and she was unused to such excessive noise, but she didn’t let it distract her. One human, who felt of an extra energy such as she did, had not moved, but he was placed far enough that his presence did not bother her. She could devote herself to concentrating on this new, strange “eating” task.

[OOC: Flbrghurgh sorry about having not posted yet. I have yet another CS280 assignment (this time, a recursive Knight's Tour) due in... uh, eight hours. Also, yesterday was my CS365 midterm. I might have to spend today recuperating. So yeah.

-- Griffinhart]

[OOC: Worry not! Work! Rest! That sounds like a lot to do, indeed. I can certainly wait, when you've got much more important things to do (like collapsing in a recuperative rest afterward).]

It - whatever it was - was a stranger. He had never seen this person - he assumed person, solely based on shape - in these halls before, and his suspicions - his paranoia, as heightened as it already was - were raised, even if no others made a move towards it. Had the Commander authorized someone into these halls without telling him? He knew he was a far cry from the head of security, but still. Griffinhart liked to know whether or not he was allowed to kill people that were unknown to him. It kept mistakes from happening.

Mistakes like... what?

He shook the question from his head silently and turned to the more immediate task - observation. He had to watch this new arrival without coming off as hostile. The only way to do that, he realized, was to stop acting so peculiar - namely, to remove his helmet before attempting to eat, as his helmet had no hole large enough for a spoon and fork to enter.

But removing his helmet, especially in such a populated place like this, was infinitely risky.

But then, so was eating the food. He had not, after all, overseen its preparation (not that he knew a single damn thing about food preparation - at least, not more than hunting and cooking a kill over an open flame, which was how he had mostly survived these past however many years). For all he knew, the food - whatever it was - was poisoned and simply waiting for him to eat it, and to kill himself.

So many risks.

"Nothing ventured, nothing gained," the swordsman rationalized (after all, he had taken just as, if not more, dangerous risks in combat), and laid down fork and knife to remove his helmet.

Her head titled at the sound of a voice, startled at the quiet, barely perceptible breaking of the quiet she had formed around herself. The other men were gone, scurried off to sit at the other tables, eager to step away from her cloaked and masked form, and it seemed as if they avoided the other man just as fervently. Strange. She could feel the magical energy coming from him, but, as he took his helmet off, she could see no threats sewing his mouth shut. Did the humans here not leash their mages? But then, he did not feel quite like a mage, as she was. Different, alien. More alien than anything else she had seen in this place.

She was aware that he had been watching her, and she wondered if she should be concerned. In Seheron, if she had been seen without her Arvaarad, she would have been killed on sight. An mage who was not under watch was a threat. She was used to being watched, but now that she was alone, she did not know what it meant to be looked at. There was no shame or embarrassment in her, only confusion, and she felt naked not for the first time.

The strange man sitting down the line of table seemed to consider his food just as seriously as she considered hers. She wanted to ask him how she was supposed to go about eating it, but she had never spoken to another creature before in her life and besides, to ask would be to show her weakness. It did not seem right.

But she could not leave her order unattended to. She would have to ask, or she would risk failing the Warden Commander's 'request' (she did not understand the word 'request,' so she had assumed it to be any order, anyway). So, she steeled herself, and turned her head to look at the ice-eyed man. It occurred to her that a kabethari would not understand her if she kept her mask on, so she reached up to remove it. It was cold, without it on, and she felt exposed to the eyes of the men around her, but she would not show her hesitation. She was a thing, and so had no pride, but even the lowest of Qunari should behave as expected around barbarians.

"You know how to eat this?" She asked directly, because she understood the words, even if she had never spoken them. Her tongue felt thick and clumsy around them, and her voice surprised her own ears, for she had never heard it before. But, she realized, the kabethari did not understand the language of the Qunari. Now, she was in trouble indeed. The tongue of the barbarians was still unknown to her.

It was not a dwarven sound, nor elven, nor human - at least, not Anderfels, Orlesian, or Ferelden. But Griffinhart knew what it was, then, by process of elimination. He had only needed look at her - he presumed her, from the vaguely feminine features; but that could have been a mistake, as had happened once (to his chagrin, had he known what the word meant) in Orlais - and correlate what he saw with what he had seen previously.

Qunari.

He did not have detailed knowledge on how the qunari thought or acted; only that they had some manner of caste system (but really, what society didn't?). He recalled admiring them for some manner of efficiency, but he knew too little else about the qunari - especially the language, given that he had little experience with their native speech, and the books he had read had even less.

So instead, Griffinhart spoke back to her in his native tongue, the hard, clipped speech of the steppes of the Anderfels. "<I do not speak qunari,>" intoned the warrior, and turned to the task at hand - food.

It was some manner of meat, with a garnishing of some manner of vegetable; a root, it looked like. The food had cooled somewhat - how long had he been in thought? - and was no longer steaming, though it still smelled heavily of... food. It was then that Griffinhart understood just how starved he had been these past few days. An urban environment was not conducive to hunting one's own nourishment.

The knife came up in his right hand. He pinned the slab of cooked meat with the fork in his left. Normal inspection would require sniffing, tasting, preparing antidotes ahead of time - but he was watched, and more importantly, he was hungry. The swordsman threw caution to the wind - he cut the meat with deliberate, firm movements - he could not afford to belie his ravening desire lest it be used against him - and brought the separated, speared hunk to his mouth, brought it into his mouth, and masticated.

"Deer," he tasted. What was the word? Venison?

Griffinhart ate in his silence, watching the qunari now from his peripheral vision, calculating possible approaches, ways to kill her if she needed killing.

He did not understand. She almost frowned, but did not. The man had spoken in return, but she did not understand, either. Inconvenient. The scars at her lips pained her from the movements her mouth had made in forming the words, but she paid it little mind as she considered what she might do. Decisions had never been left to her to make - such things had always been left to the discretion of her Arvaarad. If she was to live . . . 'alone' in this strange land, then she would need to learn its language.

Instead, she did what she had always done. She watched. The man took the objects in his hands and cut the food as a Sten might cut into a foe, and she looked down her her own cutting objects. She could manage that, she knew. She picked them up as he had, and looking back at him once more to see how he was doing it, she returned to her own 'meal.' Once cut, the smaller portion of food sat on the end of the speared utensil, and she glanced back at the man once more for further 'instruction.' He seemed to be watching her, but she didn't mind that, for now.

She followed his movements, and put the food in her mouth. That, at least, she understood, but chewing? It hurt. Her mouth had never moved this way before. Her jaw clicked, bone on bone in the unfamiliar action, and the sharp flavor was unpleasant on her tongue. She almost felt as if she was eating a poison, and thought she might spit it out of her mouth right then and there. But she didn't, because the tiny Commander had told her - she had gone over this in her mind time and time again. And so, even though this was torture, she took another bite, and wished for the liquid food she had always been given in the past.

Her stomach protested almost instantly. It lurched at the solid food, and she grimaced despite herself. She reached instinctively for the water the server had given to her. Water she understood - water did not hurt her stomach or her mouth or her jaw.

Fortunately, the Tamassran had made an appearance as he was tired from teaching all day, and wished some food. He saw that Griffinhart and... that... thing were dining across from each other. His nose tilted up in thinly veiled disgust. He took a bowl of stew and sat down near Griffinhart, observing the Saarebas nearby. "What is this...thing doing here?" He asked. He turned his head to the Saarebas. "Where is your keeper, thing?" He asked her in a stern voice. His influence as a teacher of the Qun and a priest of sorts was clear. Even after spending so much time in Fereldan, he had not lost his presence.

Griffinhart did not take kindly to the intrusion that the newly-arrived qunari presented. The man - he presumed man, as if the qunari assigned genders to one another with such terms; for all Griffinhart knew, the masculine types were assigned feminine pronouns - had sat down next to him and addressed him with some sort of... familiarity. It did not help that the warrior was still irritated from lack of sleep and from the questions that continued to bludgeon his daily, moment-by-moment conscious thought processes.

He did not, of course, let his displeasure show. Instead, he simply began thinking of ways to kill the qunari priest-teacher, if such a thing were necessary. Yes, the man had professed pacifism - and Griffinhart believed him as far as he could throw qunari. The qunari had not professed honesty, and even if he did, the warrior would not trust that easily.

"Eating," replied Griffinhart to the Tamassran's inquiry. At least, he presumed eating - he had observed her cut into her food and attempt to eat it, only to scrunch her face up in an unpleased manner and reach immediately for the water. Perhaps qunari dietary habits were not familiar with Fereldan cuisine? Griffinhart noted that the Tamassran had chosen a bowl of liquid food - did the qunari not have stomach for solid food, then? He had too little observations to make any sort of judgment. But then, the qunari woman had scarring around her lips... the most likely answer, then, was that she, specifically, was not familiar with solid food.

The qunari man that sat at Griffinhart's side spoke in his native tongue to the qunari woman that sat across from them; the swordsman said nothing and changed nothing, continuing to eat as he continued to observe what two unfamiliar - he presumed unfamiliar, as the male's initial inquiry had a tone of hostility when referring to the woman as a "thing" - qunari did at first meeting.

She had tensed as soon as she'd heard the entrance of Qunari footfalls, and when the Tamassran chose to sit down across the table from her, she froze completely, back ramrod straight, and all thoughts of eating fled her mind. She stared forward and unblinking, not at him but at a spot just to the left of his face - only true Qunari had the right to look another in the eye.

He addressed her, and she was torn. To speak to another Qunari was something she had never done. Her mouth stitching had never allowed it. She could not speak because speaking had always carried a threat - she could perform illegal magic if she spoke. Every time a mage so much as opened their mouths, they ran the risk of doing terrible, evil things. But he had commanded her speak, and though he was not her Arvaarad, and he was not the tiny Commander of the Grey Wardens, he was a Qunari of rank. Her Arvaarad had been wrong to speak down to him earlier - a Tamassran was of high status indeed.

She did not understand why, but her eyes flicked towards the white-haired human sitting next to the Tamassran before she looked back to the spot just to the left of the Tamassran. Comfort was not something she'd ever known, and she was not looking for it when she glanced at him, but he was another creature who posed a threat. More, she thought, he too felt of the magical energy which possessed her, and she wondered why the Tamassran would sit so closely to him if he was just as dangerous as she. This country was a difficult one to understand.

"He is not here," she answered finally, her tongue still clumsy, like a child only just learning to speak. That answered his question, because she did not know where her Arvaarad was. The Commander had taken her from his possession, and she had not followed him for almost an entire afternoon.

The Tamassran's golden eyed gaze leveled down at the Weisshauptian Warden. "She cannot eat solid foods. She does not know how. Imagine a bird trying to fly without wings." He said to Griffinhart in a less stern tone. Perhaps it was the people he had traveled with. He seemed to be softening up. Again, he was no fighter, but he had become lax in his enforcing the Qun and this Saarebas was only a painful reminder that he had not been doing his job well.

He turned to the Saarebas, forcing himself to think as if he were in her position. He had learned just as he had taught to the Warden Commander's group. Compassion could go a long way. "I see. I will arrange for you to get some liquid food. The barbarians cannot know what it is like to be our kind, and even moreso yours." he said to her and then had a servant bring her some soup instead. "The food here is terrible, but it is something." he cracked a small smile at his own joke.

"A bird without wings is not a bird," wanted Griffinhart to retort. "If she does not know how to eat, then why does she eat regardless?" he wanted to inquire. But the warrior said nothing - it was not his place to meddle in the affairs of qunari, nor did he give a damn. What concerned him here and now was food, and perhaps sleep, and most importantly, the questions that lay on his mind-

No.

Kill darkspawn.

Find Grey Wardens.

Protect innocents.

Those were the things that mattered. Not mattered most, those were the things that mattered, and he had sworn oaths to never forget, to never give up, he had sworn his life to such duties and no paltry existential questions were going to put him off those duties.

And so Griffinhart continued to eat in silence in the presence of two qunari he knew nothing about and cared even less for.

Why did he smile? Why offer her easier food? Her eyes darted between the Tamassran and the man, and then over the Tamassran again, the only sign of her discomfort and confusion - otherwise, she remained as stony faced and rigid as ever.

Why should a Tamassran show a thing such as her a kindness? Not only had she been doing nothing of note, she had been failing at a simple task - that deserved a lash, not a comforting word. She did not even know to thank him, because gratitude was not a thing she understood. This Tamassran was a different being than her Araavad, she understood, and she understood that among Qunari, her Araavad had been less forgiving than most, but even the most meek of Qunari should not have taken a thing such as her into consideration, lest it was to correct or give discipline.

She watched with suspicious (and perhaps almost 'worried') eyes as the servant moved away, and returned some moments later with the food the Tamassran himself was eating. A liquid food, as he had said . . . she looked up from the steaming bowl to stare at the Tamassran in confusion, aware that she was looking at him directly and that she should not have, but did so anyway.

The Tamassran stared at Griffinhart for a time, seeing the young man's mouth tighten as if he wished to speak, but chose not to. The Qunari folded his arms over his chest when he felt the eyes of the Saarebas on his person. Golden eyes slid over to the thing warningly. He may be more lenient with her than he had been with others of her kind in the past, but she was taking a little too much liberty in freely gazing at his face. "Saarebas. Be mindful of where your eyes wander. And eat the soup. I do not wish you to starve, and you are not ready for solid foods yet." He said to her and waited for her to start eating. When he was satisfied, he turned his attention back to Griffinhart. "You are from Weisshaupt. Do all bas there act as you do? You would make a fine Qunari in another life."

Do all- what? Griffinhart thought briefly; obviously the term bas referred to something that he belonged to. Some group distinct from humans in general. He did not fully know its meaning, but worked within the context provided, and answered guardedly.

"The Wardens of Weisshaupt are as varied as the Wardens of Ferelden," coolly stated the warrior. It was true enough, he supposed, given the statistics. Ferelden's Wardens numbered a bare two handfuls, if that, whereas Weisshaupt had a thousand all told spread over the Anderfels. By sheer numbers alone, and the inherent individuality of humans, it was an easy enough supposition. "Though better disciplined by far." There was no hint of emotion behind the words - it was a statement of fact, as far as Griffinhart was concerned. A thousand Wardens as varied as Ferelden's and as undisciplined would have been a nightmarish situation.

He would make a fine qunari? "I know nothing about the qunari. I will take your word for it." The soldier accepted the compliment - he assumed it was a compliment, as he had yet to hear the Tamassran express distaste for his own kind (though his attitude towards the other qunari did confuse this assumption) - with level-headed passivity.