maskormenacelogs | There's a Hole In My Soul

Entry tags:

† maxwell trevelyan | inquisitor

There's a Hole In My Soul

WHO: Dorian Pavus and whoever
WHERE: A Nonah wine bar
WHEN: Soon after he shows up
WHAT: Wandering around, drinking whatever alcohol is available
WARNINGS: None for right now other than booze being consumed

Nonah, a wine bar

There was something to be said about finding a bar that sold only wine, and remarkably good wine at that. Leagues better than the vinegar he'd been making do with at Skyhold. It wasn't a Falernian red, but then again it had been so long since he'd had one he couldn't properly remember what it tasted like anyway. He really wasn't sure what to make of this place, he'd already ruled out that it was a dream, there was nowhere that he was aware of in the Fade like this. Not to mention that he couldn't damned well feel the Fade, but he was still able to do... something that was like his magic. It wasn't, not strictly, it didn't feel the same, even if it had much the same function, which was also strange, like figuring out a different way to breathe or blink that involved none of the same muscles.

Which was why he was currently sitting outside at this lovely wine bar whose name he hadn't bothered noticing in the first place, on his third glass of wine, with the bottle on the table next to him. He dared to think he looked rather normal, since he'd taken the clothing that had been given him when he'd arrived, even if it felt strange not to be clad in leather and armor, in this too thin shirt and the too tight trousers (though they did show off his ass to tremendous advantage.) Though perhaps the six foot long mage staff wasn't helping if his goal really was to be inconspicuous. It also didn't help that he'd asked the waitress for several candles that he was now using to experiment with his "new" abilities, and no, this was definitely different, especially after he completely melted one of the candles while simply trying to light the wick. At least he'd done it outside, he thought sourly as he glared at the pile of melted wax.

[OOC: If you would like to do something else with Dorian, or spot him somewhere other than the wine bar, that's fine too! He'll be doing some wandering to try and get a feel for the place. And yes, he'll have the staff, it might make him stick out a bit, and he doesn't really need it anymore, but it's ~~a security blanket~~ his]

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Maxwell had imagined it often enough as a substitute for the Herald's Rest, and he'd glimpsed familiar faces so many times only to realize they didn't actually look anything alike, that when he first saw Dorian outside - for that first heartbeat - it didn't surprise him. But then he didn't disappear when he blinked. His face didn't shift and change the longer he stared.

The man's voice carried and he knew it. Would know it anywhere.

That's when the glass he'd been carrying to his table slipped from his fingers and crashed to the sidewalk. Blood-red wine and glass pooled at his feet. He paid neither any mind, even as the few heads at the tables turned curiously.

"Dorian?"

Dorian hadn't actually noticed Maxwell, and why should he? He was focused on what he was doing at the moment, and while Maxwell was attractive, trying to figure out how to light a candle without just melting the entire thing was also important. And more vexing, if he was being truthful.

But the sound of shattering glass was enough to get his attention, especially when someone said his name. He looked up, taking in the person before him, who looked... shocked? Hopeful perhaps, as if Dorian being here were like some dream come true. And well, Dorian was flattered, he was of course anyone's dream come true. But he didn't recognize the man in front of him at all.

"Yes?" Why did the man look so familiar? He was quite sure that he'd never seen him before in his life, but he also thought that he should know who this man was. Had he dreamed of him? No, he didn't think that was it, he was every bit as sure that he'd never seen him before as he was that he really should know who he was. He looked down at the glass "You ah, might want to see if someone can take care of that." It was on concrete at least, but most places didn't like to have broken glass on the floor.

It wasn't exactly the reaction he'd imagined all those times he'd pictured a moment like that. He'd thought there would be more-- well, more anything really. But then, given the last words they'd spoken and that Dorian had always had always had a better hand on magical weirdness, perhaps it all was neither as exciting nor as big a shock to him as it was and had been Maxwell.

"I-- I didn't know you were here, when did you--"

Then the waitress was there, a broom and dustpan in hand, and he looked away long enough to follow her and Dorian's gesture.

"Right, sorry." He stooped to help her pick up the larger shards of glass. "Just add it to my bill, I'll replace it."

Before she could even accept this offer, he was moving closer to Dorian.

"When did you arrive? I've looked--"

"I just got here a few hours ago. I thought some wine was in order." Lots of wine. At least a few bottles.

And alright, so there was a lovely and attractive man wanting to talk to him, but at the same time he was acting as though Dorian should know him. And Dorian, despite searching his memory (and he was quite sure he wouldn't forget a jawline like that) was sure that he didn't.

"I am sorry, but who are you? I feel like I should know you, but..." his attention turned more fully to Maxwell, forgetting the melted candle puddle on the table for the moment to focus on him more fully, trying to place why he felt familiar without looking familiar in the slightest. Had his memory been messed with along with his powers, his connection to the Fade? What precisely was going on here?

He immediately had questions, but before he could decide which one he wanted to ask first, they all fell away. Along with the color from his face, along with his heart into the pit of his stomach.

"You don't know who I am?"

Past, present, future, it made no difference here, people came from all points in their worlds. Maxwell had seen it, knew some of Poe's friends as living examples, but to have it come from Dorian....

"...I see." He blinked, twice, and tried desperately to keep his expression neutral even as a dull roar took up in his ears. "I'm sorry, it happens sometimes here, I should have guessed it might." His luck had always been a strange, twisted kind. To have Dorian - anyone, really, but especially Dorian - here after all this time, only for them to be from a time before they'd met? A bright, big cherry in the weirdness of his life. "I'm from Thedas too. What's the last thing you remember?"

The sudden paleness had Dorian a bit worried, and he stood enough to pull a chair out. "Here, sit down. No, I don't, have we met before? I'm quite sure I would have remembered you." It might not be the best of times to flirt, but Max really was quite attractive.

"What happens here?" He wasn't aware of the timeline differences that could happen in a place like this, but he hadn't talked to very many people yet. Or, not imPorts. "Oh? Well, I had assumed, Ferelden?" The accent sounded like it anyway, Maker knew he'd heard it enough recently. "Ah well... There was that ball at the Winter Palace. But that was a few months ago. We've been busy since then." Mostly moving against Corypheus, they'd been on their way to the Arbor Wilds to face him, but Dorian had no reason to believe that this man would have any idea what he was talking about if he told him. "Were you part of the Inquisition? Is that where you know me from?" He seemed like the sort that might have joined up. Maybe he was a scout of some sort? But then why would he have been so disappointed that Dorian didn't know who he was?

From the moment Dorian said "Inquisition" everything seemed to suddenly go very still and quiet. He couldn't move, couldn't even breathe, as the conversation he'd had with Miles months ago swam suddenly back to the forefront of his mind from the dark corner he'd worked so hard to push it into.

Another Inquisitor.

Not just forward or back in time, but completely different.

What did that mean? They hadn't been able to determine, he and Miles, and had only been able to leave it on the possibility that brought them the most comfort, but how could he now? Could the world he knew - the Thedas he remembered, be gone?

He groped for the chair and sank blindly into it, distantly aware of Dorian still speaking, but unable to respond until--

"Yes," he said finally, quietly. "I am-- was. I--"

He looked at Dorian, found himself unable to admit the truth. (What difference would it even make, other than to hurt him and burden Dorian?)

"I'm sorry. You wouldn't know me, but you... you're a member of the inner circle, everyone knows you."

Something wasn't right here. This wasn't lining up at all, and Dorian had not had nearly enough wine (only three glasses!) for his mental faculties to be impaired much at all.

"Yes of course..." and perhaps it had been because he'd been looking at his face so closely that he hadn't looked at the entire man yet, because it wasn't until just then that he noticed the Mark. His eyes narrowed, because it was hard to hide a glowing green mark on your hand, even if it seemed dimmer than he remembered (but everything was strange here, so why wouldn't the Mark be acting differently?)

"What is this?" He reached out, wanting to take Maxwell's hand and turn it over, actually look at what he could see beyond the pale glow. "Where did you get this?" His eyes narrowed as he looked at him, suspicious about what was going on, who this man was, and how he was now sporting a Mark that, last time Dorian had checked, should be on Mahanon Lavellan.

He started to close his hand - as if that would work - but then he looked down and slowly opened it again. He hadn't meant to lie, so much as avoid it. But caught now, he held his left out to meet Dorian's.

"I got it at the Temple of Sacred Ashes, the day Corypheus killed the Divine and opened the Breach." He looked at Dorian sadly. "I'm the Inquisitor, just not yours."

"Not mine?" He took the hand, gently prodding the Mark. It seemed to be genuine, or at least nothing that he could determine to be false just by observing. And why would he be wearing a fake Mark anyway? No one here had the slightest idea what Thedas was, so pretending to be the Inquisitor here would have so little advantage as to be pointless.

"So... you do know me. Just, not me. Another me. A different Dorian." He had studied time magic, he was aware of the theory of branching pathways in time, that things could change easily, it was after all one of the reasons poor Alexius had gotten so desperate in his own attempts to manipulate time before Dorian had left. "I take it you and... my other self are good friends?" He ventured friends because... well he wasn't going to risk a bad reaction by assuming that Maxwell might have taken him to bed. Not that he would have turned him down, Maker no. But some men could be remarkably sensitive about things like that. And Dorian didn't want to anger him by suggesting it.

He nodded along, for lack of anything else to say, until Dorian asked him about the other Dorian. His Dorian.

There was a hesitation where he tried to form the words, having already been caught not immediately admitting to the Anchor, but this was even harder. It was personal. It was private.

And it was gone.

"Yes. ...And I've been alone here for - some time now. You can imagine my hope, seeing you, a familiar face at last. I'm sorry," he apologized again, honestly meaning it, for what it was worth. "For the dramatics. I should have guessed all wasn't as it might appear, apparently shifting timelines is common here."

There was something else there perhaps, but Dorian wasn't sure... and it seemed it was something private. Maxwell might know a Dorian, but that didn't mean that Dorian felt that he knew him well enough to go prying. There were other things that he could pry about without getting into something that might be a bit too personal.

"Understandable, really. I daresay I would have reacted much the same. Loneliness is a difficult thing. And how were you to know I was a different Dorian? That's not something most people have ever had to consider." And so he waved down the waitress, asking for another glass and another bottle.

"Here, I feel you might need this as much as I." Because wine might not fix every problem, but it did help you feel better about them. And poor Maxwell had dropped his, so he needed a replacement.

He recognized it (and how cruel was that, to know the man so well and yet to know nothing), that little light in Dorian's eye that said his curiosity was peaked, but he couldn't bring himself to go further.

Not yet, he told himself, as Dorian's expression relaxed and he changed the subject. Later, when he'd had time to... accept. When it might be seen as less a burden, and maybe even a humorous anecdote.

(Surely, sure a thing would be possible. Eventually.)

"Thank you," he said after a beat, nodding lightly as the new glass was offered. He glanced toward the ruddy stain on the pavement, then back and attempted a smile. "It was good wine. I'm kicking myself, I assure you."

"Truly a tragedy. We shall have to drink to it's memory." He raised his glass to Maxwell and then paused. "You know, you didn't actually tell me your name." Of course it probably hadn't occurred to the man that he should introduce himself to Dorian all over again, but well this wasn't his Dorian. So (re)introductions were in order.

He started to raise his glass, then shook his head, his expression sliding into something charmingly sheepish, minus perhaps the quietly sad edge to it.

"Right, of course." He set his glass back down and held out a hand. "Maxwell Trevelyan, formerly of Ostwick, most recently of Skyhold..." He trailed off, gesturing with his other hand in an 'et cetera' movement -- humor to keep himself from thinking too hard about anything else. "An awkwardly strange pleasure to meet you."

Edited 2018-02-06 11:35 (UTC)

The sheepishness was sweet, and yes, rather charming, and got a smile out
of Dorian as he nodded, raising his glass in a toast with a smile of his
own, draining a good half when he took a drink. "A pleasure to meet you,
Maxwell." It was strange, but this seemed like a strange place, what with
the floating cars and... everything.

"How long have you been here? Are we the only ones here from Thedas? And...
do you have the slightest idea just where here might be? I mean,
other than what they've told us, which is nothing particularly useful, of
course." Heropa, Florida, the United States of America all meant precisely
nothing to him, they might as well have been speaking a different language
for all that it told Dorian of where they were.

Edited 2018-02-06 19:28 (UTC)

Maxwell lingered over his glass, holding the mouthful for a long beat before swallowing, hoping the tart sweetness would wash away the taste of ash that had come up in the back of his throat.

It helped. A little. Enough to take Dorian's rapid-fire questions in stride (despite the small pang it gave him, the familiarity of it - of course he was asking so many questions, that always quick mind of his).

"Several months, since--" A beat, and a frown as he tried to recall what they called the month here. "September, I think they call it? The Fall, at any rate." His moved his glass as he spoke, a slow, small spin under his fingertips. "And as far as I know, yes. If there are any others, they've avoided any contact with me. As for where we are...." He looked away, glancing down the street, then back with a bemused sort of expression. "The short of it is what they say. The longer just brings up more questions."

"I'm not sure why they would avoid you, so it seems more likely we're the only two people from Thedas that this Porter device saw fit to bring over." He smirked "At least it has good taste." Not that he wouldn't be very appreciative to have some more familiar faces around, but he had been alone before, he would be just fine.

He sighed in exasperation, draining his glass and reaching for the bottle to pour another. "Yes, but I'm perfectly fine with more questions, at least then I have some idea of what sort of direction to go."

He thought for a moment, looking at Maxwell "You're not a mage, are you?" It's not really a query, it's more asking for confirmation of something he'd already expected. After all, Mahanon hadn't been a mage, and this Maxwell... doesn't feel very magey, though Dorian can't quite put his finger on why, just that he doesn't think he is. The lack of a staff is one thing, but plenty of incognito mages went without, and it wasn't as if his was doing him a damned bit of good right now.

"If we're all from - not just different points in time - but different versions of time, perhaps they would feel it would be too painful." It was an especially sad point, said quietly, almost more to himself than even to Dorian. But then he seemed to release it and he shrugged and attempted to lighten things again. "But here I've seen you first, so you're out of luck."

He started to talk another drink from his glass, but paused when Dorian looked pointedly at him. One of his eyebrows started to twitch upward-- then he shook his head.

"That obvious, hm?" He set his glass back down. "No, I'm not. I prefer archery. You don't see a bow because the Porter saw fit to give me a special one when I arrived." He reached up with his Anchor marked hand, and back over his shoulder. As he put his arm back down the spectral weapon came shimmering into view, made seemingly from the smokey wisps of Fade as the mark itself. "She likes to do that, you'll learn. Twisting abilities that already existed or creating new ones as She sees fit."

That got a querying look from Dorian, since he wasn't actually sure what sort of painful event Maxwell might be referring to that would mean that someone wouldn't want to see him. It would have to be something quite awful, or so Dorian thought. But that was most likely a question for when he'd known the man longer than an hour.

"Oh yes, what terrible luck, to run into charming, handsome men who are fine with me interrogating them. I have the absolute worst luck sometimes." The sarcasm was probably something Maxwell was familiar with too, as was the look Dorian gave him.

At least, until he was distracted by the spectral bow, which caused him to stand up, wanting to get a clearer view of it. "Fascinating..." He reached out to touch it, find the "wood" of the bow smooth under his hand, and quite solid feeling. He even thought he recognized it from one that he had seen Sera use. "Are the arrows it shoots solid, or are they made of the same stuff? How long does the bow last? Does it require you to concentrate? Can you form anything else, or just this one specific bow?" Oh, he had so many questions. He wanted to test it, see what it did, figure out why it did it. He'd nearly forgotten about what they had been talking about before. Not completely, but his mind certainly wasn't focused on it anymore.

It was familiar. So much so that he had to pointedly remind himself that he wasn't his Dorian. It would have been far too easy to let himself fall into the belief that such teasing meant anything when he knew it was just a part of who Dorian was in general.

Taking a breath, he shook his head.

"The same yes. I'd call it the Fade, but as I'm sure you've realized it doesn't truly exist here. Just this sort of--" he gestures to the gently rolling green smoke, "--facsimile. It lasts as long as I remember it should, to put it simply. The effort required to conjure it is minimal. And to put it away--"

He demonstrates, giving his wrist a small shake. The bow disappeared as easily it had come.

"It only works for me. I can't hand it to anyone else, however much I concentrate. Perhaps it's tied to the Anchor, but only the Porter really knows."

Edited 2018-02-09 23:00 (UTC)

Well, in Dorian's defense, it wasn't insincere flirting in the slightest, as Maxwell was very handsome, and charming in a sheepish sort of way, and was answering Dorian's questions without the slightest hint of annoyance. He already liked him, even if he'd barely known him for a half hour.

He shakes his head, watching as the bow dissipated. "The Fade also shouldn't do that for you if you're not a mage. Mages don't even do something like that, possibly because it's easier to simply fire the projectiles than to summon up a bow to do it for us..." He took another drink of wine. "I can't feel it in the slightest. Or... it's like trying to hear faint music from two rooms over while everyone in the room you're in is shouting. I should be able to hear it, but I can't." It's clearly very frustrating to him.

"And this!" He gestures at the large puddle of candle wax on the table. "I've been able to light a candle since I was six, suddenly finding myself lacking the fine control to make it do more than burst into a flaming puddle or, when I'm especially lucky, explode, is beyond frustrating."

He took a deep breath and another drink of wine. "My apologies, but it feels as if... I'm trying to play the harp with my fingers all wrapped together."

He stares at the wax for another moment, as if this entire debacle is its fault.

Edited 2018-02-11 18:33 (UTC)

"It isn't you," Maxwell replied with complete sincerity. "It's the Porter, Lachesis - if you'd like to be formal. She's apparently--" He paused, brow furrowing slightly as he searched for the best word. "Some sort of Goddess. Tied to the device that brought us all here. She changes powers, or gives them where they never were, or takes them away from those that already had them, as she sees fit."

He shook his head, broad shoulders rising and falling in a small shrug.

"No one seems to quite know how or why, and the last time anyone got close enough to try and ask she was not happy about it. She actually shut down and people got hurt."

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There's a Hole In My Soul

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