It's hard to deny that Byerly-the-civilian looks quite a lot better than Byerly-the-head-of-diplomacy. Less pale, less tired, less peevish. He takes the form of that cruelest of figures, the free man who stands before the prisoner.
At least he comes to Flint's office bearing a gift: a bottle that does not, for once, hold any liquor. Instead: "Garum. The proper stuff, Tevinter-made. Do you get at all nostalgic for the stuff? You can have this, if you do."
It is natural, therefore, that Flint be sat at one of the stools around the office's broad central table with a chart book laid open before him. How would anyone know he was working, otherwise?
At this interruption, his attention lifts—fleeting from Byerly to the bottle, then slowly back again. The book with its myriad markings—coastal causeways and sounding depths and dangerous breakers—is allowed to flip closed with apparent carelessness.
"What do you want?"
Byerly now being in that coveted position of underling where he may be somewhat inclined to bribery.
“Oh,” Byerly says, “manners, tact, and the common sense that the Maker gave to a flea. Or so I’m told.”
He grins a charmer’s grin. By has not lost any of his obnoxious cheek by dint of being an underling - But then, he didn’t have it before he took over diplomacy, either. If anyone can remember back that far.
But in all seriousness - “I’m looking to talk about the source of all garum. I presume there are no free hands involved in making the stuff, being as you have to pack fish in barrels and all of that.”
"That would depend on your definition of involved. It's likely there are freed liberati or poor soporati who oversee the work," he says, a hand moving to a small scrap of parchment laid on the table. He fetches up a waiting snub of graphite— "But fair enough," he says, before scratching a note down.
From the looks of it, the contents of the page would appear to be a considerable requisitions list. X casks of water, Y live goats, Z pigs to be slaughtered, salted, and crated, and so on.
"Seeing to the freeing of those hands," he says. "No one should have to pack fish until they die."
By sets the bottle down. That he has not been rebuffed is a sign that - Well, who knows? Flint's a hard man to read; no way to know whether he actually does want the stuff or not.
"The garum manufacturing center is a metaphor, of course. A synecdoche? That's the right term, isn't it? One thing standing in for something greater? In this case, the institution itself."
Flint's low hum across the scratch of graphite serves as signal that he's paying attention. Byerly and his synecdoches have one ear, at the very least. The bottle, sat there along the edge of the long chart table, apparently doesn't warrant a second glance.
"I trust you have some direction in mind, and that you're not just here to discuss the philosophy."
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no subject
It's hard to deny that Byerly-the-civilian looks quite a lot better than Byerly-the-head-of-diplomacy. Less pale, less tired, less peevish. He takes the form of that cruelest of figures, the free man who stands before the prisoner.
At least he comes to Flint's office bearing a gift: a bottle that does not, for once, hold any liquor. Instead: "Garum. The proper stuff, Tevinter-made. Do you get at all nostalgic for the stuff? You can have this, if you do."
no subject
At this interruption, his attention lifts—fleeting from Byerly to the bottle, then slowly back again. The book with its myriad markings—coastal causeways and sounding depths and dangerous breakers—is allowed to flip closed with apparent carelessness.
"What do you want?"
Byerly now being in that coveted position of underling where he may be somewhat inclined to bribery.
no subject
He grins a charmer’s grin. By has not lost any of his obnoxious cheek by dint of being an underling - But then, he didn’t have it before he took over diplomacy, either. If anyone can remember back that far.
But in all seriousness - “I’m looking to talk about the source of all garum. I presume there are no free hands involved in making the stuff, being as you have to pack fish in barrels and all of that.”
no subject
From the looks of it, the contents of the page would appear to be a considerable requisitions list. X casks of water, Y live goats, Z pigs to be slaughtered, salted, and crated, and so on.
"What about it?"
no subject
By sets the bottle down. That he has not been rebuffed is a sign that - Well, who knows? Flint's a hard man to read; no way to know whether he actually does want the stuff or not.
"The garum manufacturing center is a metaphor, of course. A synecdoche? That's the right term, isn't it? One thing standing in for something greater? In this case, the institution itself."
no subject
"I trust you have some direction in mind, and that you're not just here to discuss the philosophy."