thranduil oropherion (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rowancrowned) wrote2015-03-22 06:02 pm
rowancrowned) wrote2015-03-22 06:02 pm
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That is... an Elf. Not just the pitiful city elves scurrying around trying to keep out from underfoot of the humans that shove past them, or the ragged, battle-worn and scarred Scoia'tael in stolen clothing, wielding stolen weapons, save for their bows. But the elf standing in the doorway looks much like the blades do - something from an ancient, forgotten time, from histories that seemed like fairy tales when he'd been young. The memory of Enid an Gleanna in the fields of what would later be Dol Blathanna surface in his mind's eye, and despite what loathing he has for her now, Thranduil holds the same kind of ancient grace to him as she had. Not something he'd expected to see again - ever. But here we are. ]
As much as I am an archer. Especially in recent days. [ Given the assumed lack of a second eye, empty, burned out socket covered by his headscarf at the moment, though the scar running down to his lips is always clear enough. ] May I?
[ If given permission, Iorveth will carefully pick up one of the blades, examining it in his hands like it's much more delicate than steel ought to be. It's expertly, beautiful crafted, and feels like he's holding eons in his hands. ] Blades like this no longer exist in my homeland, nor the master smiths that used to make them.
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No? Melted down or put in secret places for safe keeping, and then forgotten? [ one of the two, he thinks. he treats the sword with such care. thranduil, ever biased and generous as well, thinks he will call on maedhros; he has need of a blade for this one, something able to handle abuse. his clothes are too much a patchwork to suggest anything but rough living, and for that he will be in need of something that can travel and handle having an edge put on with a cheap or scavenged whetstone.
he comes to his desk with measured steps, and bends with his hair draped about his face to reach into a drawer. his back is to iorveth, his spine and all the weak points along it exposed, as well as his neck, but he makes no fuss about it and retrieves something in a sheath.]
This, too, arrived with me, [ he says. it is a wicked little thing, with a barb but a beautiful inlaid mother-of-pearl blade. this too he offers for iorveth's inspection, handle-first. ]
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Something to that effect, yes. The humans that sacked the cities saw little appeal in Aen Seidhe crafts. There maybe be one or two remaining in some lord or king's museum, perhaps, but none left to elven hands. [ Their history wasn't kept in tomes, but recorded in art, in song, in craft, given most elvens lived long enough to simply remember relevant past events. They hadn't seen the humans and their savagery coming. ] Some may still lie in old burial grounds, but none I've set eyes on. The dwarves and gnomes make fine, sturdy weapons, but nothing like what we know of from drawings, murals and stories. The techniques and designs for forging them were lost to us.
[ the twin blades at his hip are more of a slender, slightly curved design that most elves carry on the Continent, not as bulky as human or dwarven things, but nothing particularly special to them. just blades, sharp and efficient, but plain. More force of habit than anything calculated, he watches Thranduil turn his back to him, mentally counts vertebrae and the seconds it would take to sink in a knife, because it's what Iorveth does when he looks at a person, and it's clear this man is either foolishly trusting, or astonishingly confident to turn his back on a stranger that broke into his office.
The dagger Iorveth takes with the same kind of reverie and care, setting the sword back onto its display for the moment. His hands trace over the elegant lines, turning the piece over and over, like trying to memorize the details. ]
I never thought I'd see blades like this in the flesh. Are these weapons common in your realm?
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[ (to hope for him to return would be to invite, with arms wide, the pain of losing him again.)
he scoffs, and it does not sound pedestrian. 'little appeal'. what can men learn when they are only able to learn the art of smithing for a decade or four before their strength begins to fail them, and they can swing a hammer no more. all elven craft is perfection, and then beyond that, all is art. beauty in all things.
confidence. it is confidence, seeped into his marrow and well earned. whatever iorveth hides under that bandanna, the extent of that hinted puckered scar line, well. thranduil's lived with his own far longer.
this one has so much to learn, his heart aches with it.
(he really does need to stop picking up strays.)
he smiles as iorveth turns the blade over in his hand. ]
The handle was an addition of my wife, but the blade itself is carried by most of the Watch. It is as useful for skinning a kill as making that kill, and the edge will hold for several months of feral living before it needs to be sharpened.
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From their prior conversation, it seems clear the this elf isn't one to linger on unnecessarily painful memories, so he leaves it at that alone, as he had 'The Enemy'.
Their cultures had been the same in that pursuit of art, beauty, and perfection in all things, at least, in what the Aen Seidhe had been before they'd been decimated. Even now, they tend to approach their work, be it mixing herbs for tonics, archer, or smithing, with a natural striving for the pinnacle of their abilities.
when they'd been a peaceful, undisturbed people, it was easy for them to spend time on such things. now, it's just about seeing the next day, for you and your family.
Iorveth realizes he's being watched, that it isn't a normal kind of reaction for a man to find an invader in his office then offer him heirlooms to play with. For the moment, he doesn't think on it much more than that. ]
The craftsmanship is incredible - unparalleled. [ At some point, he'd taken off a glove to touch bare fingertips along the metal of the blade, trying to imagine the material it came from, how it had been forged, as if he'd be able to take the knowledge back home with him. Which, of course, is absurd, Iorveth letting out a short scoff at the thought, as he shakes his head. ] What I wouldn't give to see an Elven kingdom still in such heights of prosperity. Just to walk the streets for a day.
[ Would it heal something in him? Satisfy the ache in him that mourns something long lost? Ancestors in his blood that cry out for justice, or just to be remembered by a world that passed them by. Maybe just to live a dream, for a small few hours. ]
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Would that I could give you that comfort. [ he leaves iorveth there, and makes instead for the small side cabinet next to the window. the bundle he brought up from the kitchens has a heel of bread in it alongside a rind of cheese and the last of the winter apples. they are poor offerings, but he dislikes the taste of salt pork and their stores will not be refreshed for a few weeks yet. food is not what he spends his privilege on, and the wine he has is his own.
speaking of which, he uncorks a bottle and pours a measure into a half-filled ceramic pitcher. better watered-down wine than weak ales. ]
Will you eat with me? [ he asks. ] Speaking over the crystals is convenient enough, but I think we could come to understand one another, and I would nurture that.
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If you wish it.
[ After all, there's wine on offer, so why not?
Eyeing the food, he takes one of the apples carefully, and eases himself into one of the chairs across from Thranduil, watching him a long moment before speaking again. ] I've been told many of the Rifter elves here come from worlds much kinder to our race than this one, and my own. I assume you're one of them.
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the apple, then, and half the loaf, which thranduil pulls apart. the cheese he makes use of the knife to cut, and that he places atop the bread, which he pushes towards iorveth. then, the cups of wine, and he takes his half of the meal and returns to his desk. ]
'Kinder'. Yes. In some ways and crueler in others, but our children did not go hungry and our labours were for ourselves, which is far superior to what is occurring here. [ his expression folds into displeasure, if only momentarily. ] It is shameful, and see what happens to the world when the Men decide they are too good for custodians. What of yours, friend?
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For a long time, Aen Seidhe, my people, called elves by those outside us, covered most of the land. We lived peacefully among the other elder races. [ for the most part, a few skirmishes and scuffles here and there, but no all out wars to speak of. they coexisted. ]
When humans landed on our shores, they brought war with them. My ancestors thought little of them, ceded some lands to their conquests and called it fair. Even allowed them into our cities in peace. [ Iorveth snorts, shaking his head at the foolishness of the thought. It was their own pride, considering themselves above and beyond their reach, underestimating the cruelty of man. He takes a long swig of his wine, before continuing on. ] They returned with armies. Were it just a matter of skill, Men would've fallen there, but it was more about numbers.
We are long-lived, but reproduce slowly. Humans expire quickly, but multiple like vermin. Soon, the bones of Aen Seidhe cities were buried under new human ones. They didn't even bother changing most of the names. [ Vizima, Novigrad, Cidaris, Cintra. All Aen Seidhe cities now ruled by humans, where nonhumans are damned to the outskirt slums, assuming they aren't thrown in dungeons or put to the noose for one absurd reason or the other. Pathetic, really. ]
The Continent looks much like Thedas now, for my people.
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thranduil follows the story easily enough. this could have easily happened in arda, but for the way the elves had always dictated the terms by which men could interact with them. and they had always been superior in their arts; men who did not ally with the dark lords found themselves in need of elven support. outbreeding, though. that was a problem everywhere. ]
I am sorry, [ he says. ] for your loss.
[ war was pointless unless it was against the great enemy. no good came of killing. finding delight in warfare indicated a weak spirit. yet thedas and iorveth's world yet squabbled against itself. thedas had corypheus, but what of iorveth's home? pointless. ]
What of mixed children? Are they possible?
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[ He gets the importance of it, and doesn't intend to separate himself more than he already is by being a Rifter, but it's long been part of their culture that Aen Seidhe are a division of a race that was once a much larger whole. ]
We have stories of our people beginning as a single race, the Aen Undod. They then split into several different clans and separated to travel the spheres, as the Rifts pull from different realms, though the technique of it was long lost even to our ancestors. [ because the Witcher has legit dimensional travel and it's weird and terrible mostly. ] The closest others to us are the Aen Elle, who inhabit a realm beyond a thin veil to ours. The very desperate of my people like to imagine they're trying to break through to rescue us, or help push back the humans.
[ Clearly, Iorveth doesn't hold the same hope, because how do any even know they're there, and even if they were, it's most likely they'd know about as much about the Aen Seidhe as the Aen Seidhe know of the Aen Elle - next to nothing, fairy tales. as for war, his people fight because otherwise they die in squalor, and Iorveth doesn't have it in him to fizzle out quietly. The sentiment of sorrow gets a brief nod, and there's nothing much more to say of it beyond that. It is what it is, and it's far too late to do anything about it. But mixed children, that's something current. ]
Mixed children, yes. We have no elf-blooded humans like Thedas. Half-elves have a mixture of traits that appear with whatever random selection of genetics they're born with. They're scorned as much as any other elf is, though, truthfully, most humans these days have some amount of elven blood in their ancestry. [ Niflgaardians especially, but it's a truth most elect to ignore. ]
My people are few and dwindling. The struggle we face now is avoiding extinction.
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Yes. The unity does mean something. [ he's worked so hard to cultivate it, to bind them together in respect to an eventual when of it being needed. he means it when he says they are all family. ]
That is interesting, [ he says, even and polite, as if it is no great concern. his face falls at the second admission; these elves have no blessed lands to return to, no námo to build them back to perfect health. ]
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[ 'elf-made' a term that implies something is shoddy or poor in quality, though most elven products are far superior to humans. the word elf also comes hand in hand with something akin to betrayal or treason in the Northern Kingdoms, which seems utterly hilarious to Iorveth, given they'd never been welcomed into those kingdoms, truly, and the humans must be idiots to think the people they've been walking over and torturing for centuries wouldn't join up with an army ready to decimate them.
all of that is a much longer story than is being asked here, though. about half-elves. ]
Some Scoia'tael units reject the half-elves as well, wary of their human blood, but I've never felt particular concern over them. They're on the path to extermination just the same as the rest of the nonhumans on the Continent. [ a beat, and he shrugs. ] There's unity in that as well. We take what we can get.
The city elves and Dalish in this realm would do well to work similarly, if they wish to get out of their respective encroaching graves.