#twicebound

    There had been a time where the idea of questioning the Archon’s words would have been so terrifying to Calpernia, so unattainable and fantastical - surely, she had naively once thought, he was a man of reason, and if only the slaves of Tevinter could have audience with him, things could be different.

    But alas, the throne had fallen to nothing more than a glorified ass-warmer since Darinius’s time. How he would weep to see what they’d done to his Imperium! Radonis was a snake, his pride too wounded for him to do anything more than offer baseless tidbits of coy diplomacy because he’s finally realized Calpernia’s more valuable alive to him than dead.

   ❝Spoken by the man who intended to rob me of that very future in the first place.❞

Radonis nearly snorted. Nearly. A smile did pass like a ghost over his lips, and didn’t stay but on the corners of his mouth, overshadowed by his raised eyebrows, an expression that had something positively incredulous.

« Spoken by me, indeed. And meaning it, too. » With that, he turned and moved to a chair, each of his steps emphasised by the sound of his golden staff hitting the floor. He sat, his elbows on the armrests and looking at her as he had looked at many a man and woman who had, sometimes with his approval and sometimes to his displeasure, come to talk with him in a parlour during the fifteen long years of his rule. 

you needn’t involve yourself, orana. you’re quite above all this nonsense.

a good assistant always involves herself with the affairs of her lady.

Dead Girl Walking Reprise Sentence Meme || Accepting

        There was no way for Orana to deny the statement, but it was such a relief to hear it spoken from her Lady. They’d all known it, that Corypheus had some way of fanning the worst flames of their ladies’ rebellion–but they had still supported her, with hope that she would either be strong enough to overpower the Magister or clever enough to outsmart him. Orana had pinned her hopes on the latter, for surely her Lady was the smartest person Orana has ever met.

        However, that doesn’t change the fact that the Magister had made a definitive change in their Lady--And certainly not for the better. For Calpernia to freely acknowledge that she too was aware of the change was good. It had taken an utter betrayal and a near death experience for her Lady to realize but it was better late than never. They could rise from Corypheus’ ashes just as strong as they’d been previously, but better without the interference of a mad Magister’s gambit.

Oscar Wilde sentence starters | accepting

The point was that, if killing her was that hard, it could be worth trying having her on his side — or not on Corypheus’ side, at the very least. He had done it with Titus when the man was still alive, blighting the Imperium with his Old Gods zealotry, he could do it again now, under different circumstances. And he wanted her on his side, yes, but on a leash. He was not about to offer her to sit at his right hand and speak in his name (whatever other offer he may have made) and no one sat as high as the throne of Darinius (but His Most Holy Divine who, admittedly, sat on the throne of the Maker).

But this one, Radonis thought, was accustomed to leashes. Sometimes there was no more difficult thing than taming again the one who had broken free once already. It had to be a loose one, he thought. If she noticed its presence in the bargain, which he assumed she would, it had to feel as nothing more than an inconvenience.

Of course he doubted she would trust him — no sane individual would entirely trust one who had positively tried to have them dead, nor would he trust one who had joyfully worked for a deluded extremist who reached the point of claiming godhood. But politics were politics, and he himself had shaken the hand of far worse women throughout the course of his life. 

And yet this was such a painfully black and white vision of things.

He let a faint sigh out and looked away from her freckled face, lit up by the magical lights floating above the braziers, somewhat pensively. 

“Ah, there you are, Calpernia,” Dorian greeted breezily, sauntering up to the other Tevinter for all the world as though he hadn’t been the one rather missing in action for the last several weeks. Honestly, sending him to the Wastes, of all things! Cold during the day, even colder at night, sand in his smallclothes and that dreadfully persistent, well, hissing sound? Appalling! Still, the cause and the mission had been a good one. Successful, too, and nothing to be ashamed of, that.

i love her

Hears the word necromancy...