Understanding cannot be forced. You can sit the same people down to teach them the same lessons but what they take from it is always going to be different because no two people have lived the same life. How many mages agree on things? [Araceli could say 'how many of clan Ashara actually call themselves clan Ashara' right now but that would be a low blow. Sina does know that Araceli cast her lot there in wanting better and more for mages, that she wants them as free as she is so she can safely toss that one out to see where it lands before she decides to let it be personal. For her.]
I can't know the hurts you and your people have suffered. But I can know what mine have. When people say make a choice: go hungry or go without a roof over your head where there aren't streets. When they shouldn't have an education. When they shouldn't be allowed to go to certain places because they're too low to belong in them. [Sometimes? Sometimes there really are things about elves in the alienage that kick her in the teeth. It's too like the building she lived in, the part of her home she lived in.] Maybe it was still holy to some people. But sometimes a thing is done to you and it's wrong. You're hurt and it's hard to see anything but the fact that it wasn't what it was before, that you aren't what you were before, that things can't go back to how they were. And you realise-- [her heart is racing and she feels a little sick, a little dizzy, swallows it down and rubs over the thumb she broke in a failed attempt but it was a lesson] that in itself, that can be okay. Maybe you can still live with that. You can come to terms with that.
[Kirkwall isn't what she's talking about, not entirely. It's what happened to her in Craintellier that she doesn't talk about because why would she hurt her loved ones with that? It's the fear of not being who she was before she came through the rift that Martel helped her make her peace with.]
It took me a long time to be at peace with my hand with someone who took me by it and helped but he knew me and I him. After I was hurt-- there are things I can't let people do to me. No matter the intention. Because I can't. Because I remember what happened to me and I could do nothing. I can't stop you from whatever you want to do, that isn't my place but just...be careful.
[Araceli personally can't stop her, that doesn't mean she won't go figure out who she can speak to if she's worried.]
i just had a lot of emotions i'm sorry
I can't know the hurts you and your people have suffered. But I can know what mine have. When people say make a choice: go hungry or go without a roof over your head where there aren't streets. When they shouldn't have an education. When they shouldn't be allowed to go to certain places because they're too low to belong in them. [Sometimes? Sometimes there really are things about elves in the alienage that kick her in the teeth. It's too like the building she lived in, the part of her home she lived in.] Maybe it was still holy to some people. But sometimes a thing is done to you and it's wrong. You're hurt and it's hard to see anything but the fact that it wasn't what it was before, that you aren't what you were before, that things can't go back to how they were. And you realise-- [her heart is racing and she feels a little sick, a little dizzy, swallows it down and rubs over the thumb she broke in a failed attempt but it was a lesson] that in itself, that can be okay. Maybe you can still live with that. You can come to terms with that.
[Kirkwall isn't what she's talking about, not entirely. It's what happened to her in Craintellier that she doesn't talk about because why would she hurt her loved ones with that? It's the fear of not being who she was before she came through the rift that Martel helped her make her peace with.]
It took me a long time to be at peace with my hand with someone who took me by it and helped but he knew me and I him. After I was hurt-- there are things I can't let people do to me. No matter the intention. Because I can't. Because I remember what happened to me and I could do nothing. I can't stop you from whatever you want to do, that isn't my place but just...be careful.
[Araceli personally can't stop her, that doesn't mean she won't go figure out who she can speak to if she's worried.]