[ Wadanohara, Brett, why do people get born from eggs that's about as insane as half "reality" she knows anymore. Er...
It's that "wish" that leaves Ellana undecided. Bindings to her didn't mean a loss of agency — except when the one to which you were bound willed otherwise. There could be bindings that had no push or pull either way, but there's still something in the concept that doesn't rest easy on her. Not Fukami's reality, whatever it may be, but those she knows from her own world.
Her hand falls away from her face. In my wanderings through the Fade, I have learned what those marks mean. They're slave markings, made by owners in favour of their preferred God. The vallaslin, blood tattoos done upon adulthood for the Dalish. They didn't bind to the same ideas or ideals thousands of years after the golden age of Arlathan had seen its end, but these days it could bind a group, or bind a prejudice. Us versus them. A mix of bindings worth choosing and those that hurt more than helped in the end. ]
And if you chose otherwise? If she were to do something you couldn't abide by, or could not find it in yourself to forgive, would you be able to walk — or swim — away?
[ Tone kept light. She's aware enough these days not to make assumptions, and she didn't spend decades fighting against slavery or bindings and have the chip on her shoulder about "freedom" that Solas did, or that Cole did for different reasons. Good friends will wish to stay with each other to protect each other. Members of a mercenary band may well feel the same toward superiors or equals. Relationships are complex, not relegated to simple understandings.
And yet she still had to ask. If you wanted to walk away, could you?
She shifts, carefully brushing more broken glass in and glad that whatever the container held hadn't been difficult to work with in the cleanup. Damp, but not sticky or corrosive. She glances up, looking for another piece to use to help scoop these glass pieces up and get them off the ground. ]
no subject
It's that "wish" that leaves Ellana undecided. Bindings to her didn't mean a loss of agency — except when the one to which you were bound willed otherwise. There could be bindings that had no push or pull either way, but there's still something in the concept that doesn't rest easy on her. Not Fukami's reality, whatever it may be, but those she knows from her own world.
Her hand falls away from her face. In my wanderings through the Fade, I have learned what those marks mean. They're slave markings, made by owners in favour of their preferred God. The vallaslin, blood tattoos done upon adulthood for the Dalish. They didn't bind to the same ideas or ideals thousands of years after the golden age of Arlathan had seen its end, but these days it could bind a group, or bind a prejudice. Us versus them. A mix of bindings worth choosing and those that hurt more than helped in the end. ]
And if you chose otherwise? If she were to do something you couldn't abide by, or could not find it in yourself to forgive, would you be able to walk — or swim — away?
[ Tone kept light. She's aware enough these days not to make assumptions, and she didn't spend decades fighting against slavery or bindings and have the chip on her shoulder about "freedom" that Solas did, or that Cole did for different reasons. Good friends will wish to stay with each other to protect each other. Members of a mercenary band may well feel the same toward superiors or equals. Relationships are complex, not relegated to simple understandings.
And yet she still had to ask. If you wanted to walk away, could you?
She shifts, carefully brushing more broken glass in and glad that whatever the container held hadn't been difficult to work with in the cleanup. Damp, but not sticky or corrosive. She glances up, looking for another piece to use to help scoop these glass pieces up and get them off the ground. ]