Cyrus blinked. He hadn't exactly expected a party of three at his door quite this late at night, but it wasn't as though they were interrupting his sleep or any such thing. No doubt Stellulam had known they wouldn't be. “A telescope? Yes, I have one." He'd had it sent over from Minrathous the first time he'd written his steward with a request. “It isn't the most powerful, but it should do well enough for your purposes."
He stepped aside, allowing his sister to enter, along with Vesryn and Astraia. For a moment, he contemplated trying to tidy the surface of his desk or something, but there was no point. He lived in chaos only he understood, at least when it came to the atelier. No point in pretending otherwise. The telescope was among other navigation and measurement instruments, on an enclosed set of shelves on the back wall. Cyrus clicked his tongue, moving an astrolabe and a sextant aside slightly so he could extract it from its spot.
The device was made of silverite, the lightweight metal serving specially well for delicate instruments that needed to be strong, though the lens was ground glass, enchanted against the near-inevitable warp and flow of time. He blew a gentle breath on it to clear off the small amount of dust that had accumulated in the delicate patterns embossed on its surface. Constellations, of course. “Here you are." He proffered it towards Stellulam.
Beside her, Astraia stood quite wide eyed, staring unblinkingly at the device Cyrus offered. She was already dressed warmly for the night, with a blanket wrapped around her shoulders into a sort of shawl, thicker hide pants tucked into fur-lined boots that looked new. Certainly a new acquisition since arriving at Skyhold.
"Easy now," Vesryn teased gently, giving Astraia a slight shake on the shoulder. "You haven't even seen the good part yet."
"You should come with us," Astraia said, as though the value of that was quite obvious. "Show me how it works. Is it magic?"
Cyrus was actually surprised by that, a flicker of it passing over his face before it faded. But of course; he'd seen Dalish navigation instruments before. They were quite different. “Not precisely. It's enchanted, to allow for greater magnification than such a small one would usually get, but it doesn't take any magic to use, just a few physical adjustments." He paused, glancing briefly at the other two, then huffed softly to himself. “I'll... show you, yes. You can hold onto it for now, if you like." He shifted the angle of his arm slightly so that Astraia could take it instead. She took it carefully, but it wasn't more than a second before she was twisting and turning her hand to examine it more closely.
Perhaps a couple of his other instruments might be likewise interesting. He'd almost reached back for the astrolabe when he paused, letting his hand drop and shaking his head. He was getting ahead of himself. They were going outside to look at the stars, not to measure them or find true north or navigate anywhere. This wasn't a lesson he was teaching someone, or a theorem he was discussing with anybody. It was just supposed to be... enjoyable. Releasing a soft breath, he grabbed a heavy linen blanket instead, draping it over one arm and gesturing for the others to precede him out.
“If I do say so, the roof of this tower is especially well-positioned, relative to the mountains. We'd be able to see a great deal of stars from there."
“I'll take your word for it." Stellulam smiled warmly, then turned to lead the group up the stairs that would put them out at the very top of the tower. “Cy used to find all the good places for me, when we were little. There are a lot of lights in Minrathous, so sometimes the stars are hard to see, but he knew what he was doing." Her tone was fond, a rare thing when either of them spoke too much of those days.
Mounting the last ladder, she shifted the bundle she was carrying to one hand, using the other to push the trapdoor up and over so they could climb through. As he'd promised, they were immediately greeted with a mostly-open vista of bright pinpoints of light, blocked only minimally by the towering mountains around them.
Estella climbed out, pulling in a soft, but audible breath, head tilted up to the sky. She turned a couple of times as if to take it all in. “This is great, Cy. How come you didn't tell me about it before now, huh?" She affected offense, but there was obviously none actually present.
“I was saving it for your birthday this year, actually." He shrugged; that was true enough. “I suppose I'm early, now, but it seemed better to share tonight, since the opportunity arose on its own." He'd only ventured out here himself since the tower was rebuilt, the trapdoor put in to match the newer ones the Inquisition had reconstructed from the original edifice, which his former dwelling had been a part of.
He sacrificed his blanket to the ground, laying it out so they'd all have a comfortable place to sit. There was ample room for all of them to put their backs to the crenelations in a row, if they liked, or spread a little further apart.
A little laugh escaped Astraia, and she quite nearly bumped into Stellulam while her head was tipped back, only steered off course by Vesryn's hand. "Wow..." she said, a little breathlessly. "This is... I feel like we're birds or something. There's no trees and no branches and no walls to get in the way."
"This little bird's going to have a seat." Vesryn had brought his white lion's pelt along with him, and draped it over a section of the crenelations, offering a softer surface to put their backs against. He sank down into a relaxed seated position there, a soft blanket over his legs with more than enough room for someone to fit in beside him.
"Ves told me that the elves used to live here, the place where this fortress stands," Astraia said it like it was some fanciful legend, a bedtime story rather than actual history. She descended into a crosslegged position on the blanket, tilting her head back and taking another deep breath of cold, crisp air. "It's hard to imagine my people anywhere other than the woods, sometimes."
Stellulam divested herself of the blanket she was carrying, setting it at the edge of the square Cyrus had laid out. She was also holding canisters—tea, most likely, given her fondness for it, and put those down, too, within easy reach of everyone. She settled next to Vesryn with minimal awkwardness, though he could still read a little hesitation in the way she moved, a lingering tentativeness when she shifted the blanket over her own legs.
She kept it out of every other part of her demeanor quite well; but Cyrus had known her so long it wasn't hard to see. “Tarasyl'an Te'las, I hear. The place where the sky was held back, whatever that means." She reached for one of the canisters, easing it open and relaxing back into the covered stone behind her. A gentle waft of steam condensed into the air. “It's certainly not the woods. But then I never much imagined I'd be in a castle, either. Are you finding it to your liking so far?"
"It's..." she hesitated a little. "Well. I think I like the people a lot more than the weather, if that makes sense. It's going to be a long winter, isn't it?"
Vesryn laughed softly. "That it is, Skygirl. But you're in the best of company now. It'll be warm again before you know it. And hey, maybe the cold'll grow on you."
Astraia snagged one of the canisters and took a drink. It was almost visible, the warmth that ran into her. She sighed, and slowly tipped back until she lay flat on the blanket, halfway unraveling her legs, her head resting on a pillow of her own mass of hair. She grabbed a spare blanket and threw it over her lower half. "I've... been thinking about my brother a lot. If I did the right thing in coming here. It's foolish, probably. The Keeper will be able to help him better than I could, once Shae tells him what happened. But I still can't help but think I'm being selfish."
Cyrus reverted his full attention to the conversation, at that. He didn't consider himself much of an advice-giver. He had far too many personal problems to deal with to feel comfortable helping other people work through theirs. Questions of arcane or technical matters were another story, but those only required knowledge, not what most people commonly referred to as wisdom. That, he felt he sorely lacked most of the time. But still...
“I never attempted the exact thing your brother tried to do." He leaned back against the crenelations as he said it, still standing for the moment, and crossed his arms over his chest. “But I've been... misguided like that. Done things I regret, and... leaned unfairly on the people around me when I realized what I'd done." A breath, deep and slow, left him, clouding into the air like the steam from the tea canisters. “It's not selfish for you to take some space for yourself, to find out where you fit in the world. And coming to terms with his mistakes... that's something Zethlasan has to do on his own."
Support was helpful to have, of course, and knowing that there was at least one good person in the world who could know every horrible thing about him and love him anyway had... well, he wouldn't be the same person without that knowledge. “I think he'll be glad to know that you're doing something for yourself." He glanced briefly at Stellulam, then averted his eyes. “I think he'll be more proud of you than he even knows how to express."
Estella cleared her throat softly. “Sometimes, I think a little space is a good thing. Knowing that no matter what things are like here and now, there's someone out there who will want to know all about it when it's done. And laugh about it with you. Or cry, if you have to." She smiled a little bit wryly at Astraia. “Though I hope you won't have to, for what that's worth."
"I hope so too," she answered. Through all of it, her eyes never left the stars, though she clearly thought hard on every word Cyrus and Estella said. "Saraya's okay, right Ves?"
"She is." Vesryn's tone was certain, as comforting as he could make it. "And she's happy for you, too. You're a good person, and you never need to doubt that. You have good friends here that you can come to any time you need to talk. About anything. Everyone deserves to be a little selfish, every now and then. And sometimes when that person is you, it just means you're letting someone else do the helping. And that's just fine."
She smiled a little, and fell quiet for a time, watching the stars, before she finally tilted her head. "There's the raven." She pointed up at the constellation. "Where's the halla..." she tipped her head to the side just a moment, grinning at the others. "You might hear someone say it's a stallion, but they're wrong. It's a halla. Oh, gods! How did I forget?" She picked up the telescope again, having set it down on the blanket next to her. "Show me how this works, Cyrus. Do I just look through it?"
He snorted, shaking his head slightly and pulling away from the wall to drop into a crouch next to her, leaving as much polite space as he could given the nature of the exercise. “You wouldn't see much, if you tried right now. Here. Keep hold of that end." Delicately, he gripped the other between his thumb and forefinger, pulling carefully until the telescope expanded. It was an ingenious little mechanism, and the parts fit together well enough that it slid to full size smoothly, clicking into place with a soft sound.
“So now you take hold of it here as well." he pointed to the far end. “This twists. You can look through it and adjust for clarity. Everyone's eyes are a little bit different, and you'll want it in a different place depending on how far away the object is that you're focusing on. It's not just for stars, though that's of course the best use of one." He drew back to give her the opportunity to try it for herself.
It took her a moment to get it adjusted properly, but when she did, her eyes widened again, and her mouth hung openly dumbly for a few seconds before she thought to close it. "Can I, uh... can I come back here more often? I'll try not to disturb your work. I think this is the best spot I've ever laid down in, is all. And there's something so restricting about having a roof over my head sometimes."
Cyrus felt a little pull at one corner of his mouth. “You're welcome whenever you like. I've also got star charts and a few other devices, if you've an interest. Keep the telescope; I'll ask to borrow it if I need it sometime in the future." He could easily find another, and it wasn't as though he'd get nearly so much use out of one as he suspected she would.
He stepped aside, allowing his sister to enter, along with Vesryn and Astraia. For a moment, he contemplated trying to tidy the surface of his desk or something, but there was no point. He lived in chaos only he understood, at least when it came to the atelier. No point in pretending otherwise. The telescope was among other navigation and measurement instruments, on an enclosed set of shelves on the back wall. Cyrus clicked his tongue, moving an astrolabe and a sextant aside slightly so he could extract it from its spot.
The device was made of silverite, the lightweight metal serving specially well for delicate instruments that needed to be strong, though the lens was ground glass, enchanted against the near-inevitable warp and flow of time. He blew a gentle breath on it to clear off the small amount of dust that had accumulated in the delicate patterns embossed on its surface. Constellations, of course. “Here you are." He proffered it towards Stellulam.
Beside her, Astraia stood quite wide eyed, staring unblinkingly at the device Cyrus offered. She was already dressed warmly for the night, with a blanket wrapped around her shoulders into a sort of shawl, thicker hide pants tucked into fur-lined boots that looked new. Certainly a new acquisition since arriving at Skyhold.
"Easy now," Vesryn teased gently, giving Astraia a slight shake on the shoulder. "You haven't even seen the good part yet."
"You should come with us," Astraia said, as though the value of that was quite obvious. "Show me how it works. Is it magic?"
Cyrus was actually surprised by that, a flicker of it passing over his face before it faded. But of course; he'd seen Dalish navigation instruments before. They were quite different. “Not precisely. It's enchanted, to allow for greater magnification than such a small one would usually get, but it doesn't take any magic to use, just a few physical adjustments." He paused, glancing briefly at the other two, then huffed softly to himself. “I'll... show you, yes. You can hold onto it for now, if you like." He shifted the angle of his arm slightly so that Astraia could take it instead. She took it carefully, but it wasn't more than a second before she was twisting and turning her hand to examine it more closely.
Perhaps a couple of his other instruments might be likewise interesting. He'd almost reached back for the astrolabe when he paused, letting his hand drop and shaking his head. He was getting ahead of himself. They were going outside to look at the stars, not to measure them or find true north or navigate anywhere. This wasn't a lesson he was teaching someone, or a theorem he was discussing with anybody. It was just supposed to be... enjoyable. Releasing a soft breath, he grabbed a heavy linen blanket instead, draping it over one arm and gesturing for the others to precede him out.
“If I do say so, the roof of this tower is especially well-positioned, relative to the mountains. We'd be able to see a great deal of stars from there."
“I'll take your word for it." Stellulam smiled warmly, then turned to lead the group up the stairs that would put them out at the very top of the tower. “Cy used to find all the good places for me, when we were little. There are a lot of lights in Minrathous, so sometimes the stars are hard to see, but he knew what he was doing." Her tone was fond, a rare thing when either of them spoke too much of those days.
Mounting the last ladder, she shifted the bundle she was carrying to one hand, using the other to push the trapdoor up and over so they could climb through. As he'd promised, they were immediately greeted with a mostly-open vista of bright pinpoints of light, blocked only minimally by the towering mountains around them.
Estella climbed out, pulling in a soft, but audible breath, head tilted up to the sky. She turned a couple of times as if to take it all in. “This is great, Cy. How come you didn't tell me about it before now, huh?" She affected offense, but there was obviously none actually present.
“I was saving it for your birthday this year, actually." He shrugged; that was true enough. “I suppose I'm early, now, but it seemed better to share tonight, since the opportunity arose on its own." He'd only ventured out here himself since the tower was rebuilt, the trapdoor put in to match the newer ones the Inquisition had reconstructed from the original edifice, which his former dwelling had been a part of.
He sacrificed his blanket to the ground, laying it out so they'd all have a comfortable place to sit. There was ample room for all of them to put their backs to the crenelations in a row, if they liked, or spread a little further apart.
A little laugh escaped Astraia, and she quite nearly bumped into Stellulam while her head was tipped back, only steered off course by Vesryn's hand. "Wow..." she said, a little breathlessly. "This is... I feel like we're birds or something. There's no trees and no branches and no walls to get in the way."
"This little bird's going to have a seat." Vesryn had brought his white lion's pelt along with him, and draped it over a section of the crenelations, offering a softer surface to put their backs against. He sank down into a relaxed seated position there, a soft blanket over his legs with more than enough room for someone to fit in beside him.
"Ves told me that the elves used to live here, the place where this fortress stands," Astraia said it like it was some fanciful legend, a bedtime story rather than actual history. She descended into a crosslegged position on the blanket, tilting her head back and taking another deep breath of cold, crisp air. "It's hard to imagine my people anywhere other than the woods, sometimes."
Stellulam divested herself of the blanket she was carrying, setting it at the edge of the square Cyrus had laid out. She was also holding canisters—tea, most likely, given her fondness for it, and put those down, too, within easy reach of everyone. She settled next to Vesryn with minimal awkwardness, though he could still read a little hesitation in the way she moved, a lingering tentativeness when she shifted the blanket over her own legs.
She kept it out of every other part of her demeanor quite well; but Cyrus had known her so long it wasn't hard to see. “Tarasyl'an Te'las, I hear. The place where the sky was held back, whatever that means." She reached for one of the canisters, easing it open and relaxing back into the covered stone behind her. A gentle waft of steam condensed into the air. “It's certainly not the woods. But then I never much imagined I'd be in a castle, either. Are you finding it to your liking so far?"
"It's..." she hesitated a little. "Well. I think I like the people a lot more than the weather, if that makes sense. It's going to be a long winter, isn't it?"
Vesryn laughed softly. "That it is, Skygirl. But you're in the best of company now. It'll be warm again before you know it. And hey, maybe the cold'll grow on you."
Astraia snagged one of the canisters and took a drink. It was almost visible, the warmth that ran into her. She sighed, and slowly tipped back until she lay flat on the blanket, halfway unraveling her legs, her head resting on a pillow of her own mass of hair. She grabbed a spare blanket and threw it over her lower half. "I've... been thinking about my brother a lot. If I did the right thing in coming here. It's foolish, probably. The Keeper will be able to help him better than I could, once Shae tells him what happened. But I still can't help but think I'm being selfish."
Cyrus reverted his full attention to the conversation, at that. He didn't consider himself much of an advice-giver. He had far too many personal problems to deal with to feel comfortable helping other people work through theirs. Questions of arcane or technical matters were another story, but those only required knowledge, not what most people commonly referred to as wisdom. That, he felt he sorely lacked most of the time. But still...
“I never attempted the exact thing your brother tried to do." He leaned back against the crenelations as he said it, still standing for the moment, and crossed his arms over his chest. “But I've been... misguided like that. Done things I regret, and... leaned unfairly on the people around me when I realized what I'd done." A breath, deep and slow, left him, clouding into the air like the steam from the tea canisters. “It's not selfish for you to take some space for yourself, to find out where you fit in the world. And coming to terms with his mistakes... that's something Zethlasan has to do on his own."
Support was helpful to have, of course, and knowing that there was at least one good person in the world who could know every horrible thing about him and love him anyway had... well, he wouldn't be the same person without that knowledge. “I think he'll be glad to know that you're doing something for yourself." He glanced briefly at Stellulam, then averted his eyes. “I think he'll be more proud of you than he even knows how to express."
Estella cleared her throat softly. “Sometimes, I think a little space is a good thing. Knowing that no matter what things are like here and now, there's someone out there who will want to know all about it when it's done. And laugh about it with you. Or cry, if you have to." She smiled a little bit wryly at Astraia. “Though I hope you won't have to, for what that's worth."
"I hope so too," she answered. Through all of it, her eyes never left the stars, though she clearly thought hard on every word Cyrus and Estella said. "Saraya's okay, right Ves?"
"She is." Vesryn's tone was certain, as comforting as he could make it. "And she's happy for you, too. You're a good person, and you never need to doubt that. You have good friends here that you can come to any time you need to talk. About anything. Everyone deserves to be a little selfish, every now and then. And sometimes when that person is you, it just means you're letting someone else do the helping. And that's just fine."
She smiled a little, and fell quiet for a time, watching the stars, before she finally tilted her head. "There's the raven." She pointed up at the constellation. "Where's the halla..." she tipped her head to the side just a moment, grinning at the others. "You might hear someone say it's a stallion, but they're wrong. It's a halla. Oh, gods! How did I forget?" She picked up the telescope again, having set it down on the blanket next to her. "Show me how this works, Cyrus. Do I just look through it?"
He snorted, shaking his head slightly and pulling away from the wall to drop into a crouch next to her, leaving as much polite space as he could given the nature of the exercise. “You wouldn't see much, if you tried right now. Here. Keep hold of that end." Delicately, he gripped the other between his thumb and forefinger, pulling carefully until the telescope expanded. It was an ingenious little mechanism, and the parts fit together well enough that it slid to full size smoothly, clicking into place with a soft sound.
“So now you take hold of it here as well." he pointed to the far end. “This twists. You can look through it and adjust for clarity. Everyone's eyes are a little bit different, and you'll want it in a different place depending on how far away the object is that you're focusing on. It's not just for stars, though that's of course the best use of one." He drew back to give her the opportunity to try it for herself.
It took her a moment to get it adjusted properly, but when she did, her eyes widened again, and her mouth hung openly dumbly for a few seconds before she thought to close it. "Can I, uh... can I come back here more often? I'll try not to disturb your work. I think this is the best spot I've ever laid down in, is all. And there's something so restricting about having a roof over my head sometimes."
Cyrus felt a little pull at one corner of his mouth. “You're welcome whenever you like. I've also got star charts and a few other devices, if you've an interest. Keep the telescope; I'll ask to borrow it if I need it sometime in the future." He could easily find another, and it wasn't as though he'd get nearly so much use out of one as he suspected she would.