faderift | Cadash Thaig and the Lights of Arlathan

Entry tags:

Cadash Thaig and the Lights of Arlathan

WHO: Sina, Velanna, Morrigan, Shale, Katniss, and Pel
WHAT: Finding an ancient elven magic and the history of a dwarven thaig.
WHEN: Forward-dated to the 17th
WHERE: Cadash Thaig
NOTES: Some violence, but only against darkspawn. Well. Darkspawn are a warning too.

The journey to the thaig provides few encounters with darkspawn, which are handily dealt with. That's the best thing to be said about it. Pel has never been in the Deep Roads before. It's actually sort of nice, she thinks. In the Deep Roads, there are usually only two directions from which you can be attacked. There's something reassuring and secure about that. It's also missing sounds of life, aside from life that wants to kill you. Fewer guessing games to be played about what caused that sound. Other than that, it's a bleak, dead place with occasional breathtaking architecture. Modern elves don't really have architecture. It's fascinating to see it, when she can.

They arrive at the thaig and it's...surprisingly green. How in the world a place that has never seen the sun can have this much green, she has no idea. There's no mistaking it for the surface, of course, but it's a comforting color to see.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Unable to see the Lights, Morrigan turns to something she is able to aid with when she is not able to offer assistance when it is needed; searching one set of ruins is much like searching another, and she has spent a long time doing this now.

With a quiet sigh, she kneels to sift through a pile of old papers, grimacing at the grime she can feel coating her fingers, staff tucked close to her side as she tries to find something not utterly destroyed by time, darkspawn, or water damage.

"If you might ensure no darkspawn, deepstalker, or spiders creep upon me," she says quietly, turning just enough to be heard, "t'would be appreciated."

Shale turns their head a bit to check the rest of the nearby ruin as Morrigan goes mucking around in the mess. They didn't exactly see the mage as a 'friend', but they had been mostly civil... and they fought together.

So watching her back? That the golem could do. Not without commenting, whoever.

"One would think the Swamp Witch would approve of the spiders."

Morrigan has resisted the temptation to teach the ravens of the rookery to alight upon Shale's shoulders, even the fearless and bold Baron Plucky.

"The Swamp Witch as you so put it does not approve of a spider sinking their fangs into her spine, Shale." One page perhaps might be salvaged this time, more letters than muck, and it feels more like paper than mulch so she sets it to one side. "Though to have eight legs and eight eyes...I might sort through this mess sooner. I had forgotten how disgusting darkspawn were."

On purpose. No one chooses to remember much of the Deep Roads if they can do otherwise when it's the miserable place that it is.

That would make a lot of dead ravens, Morrigan. Don't make Leliana sad.

Shale makes a disgruntled sound in reply, but they're definitely keeping watch despite that. Nothing seemed to move in the shadows for now, which was both good and a little bit disappointing. Punching things was a really good way to deal with their boredom, after all.

Standing around in the courtyard all the time was really grating, so any missions that would involve crushing something was looking quite attractive these days. Even in the Deep Roads.

"Will rotten papers make any difference, or is it simply fond of dirty things?"

Well she's on making out terms with Leliana. You can go far with that.

Since Shale is unable to see it, she does allow herself a smile since and a sigh because of course, this would be lost on her. She wonders how it went if Pel followed her suggestion of speaking with Shale, to have been a fly on either of those walls ; surely something must have been said to prompt Shale's presence here after all. It occurs to her now that she might have asked the golem along to the Hinterlands in the place of Beleth - watching them pummel Venatori and Red Templars would have been satisfying, and there would have been far less braying to deal with.

"You were the one to name me swamp witch," she comments more mildly than she might have ten years prior. "These rotten papers, as you so put it, could reveal to us the origins of those who called this place home once, where they went, whom they encountered. If they know anything about these lights some of our elven companions claim to see. Perhaps even long lost kin. Tis Cadash Thaig after all."

Ew ew ew ew. Please never tell them that, they only just forgave Leliana for having bird minions.

The golem turns again to watch the tunnel while listening to Morrigan. The thought of any papers here giving better insight into possible other Cadashes out there made them oddly uncomfortable. Shayle didn't have any children, they knew that much, but it would still be strange.

They were centuries apart.

"They are not my kin," they mutter crossing their arms in some form of defense. Maker forbid Morrigan of all people made them feel emotions, after all.

Did you know that once or twice she has gone in the guise of a crow to allow Leliana to brush beneath her beak?

Perhaps they might have brought a dwarf with them - surely Leliana or perhaps Josephine would have had one that might have been better at translating some of this, or at least having another set of eyes to confirm if it's dwarven, elven, or just gibberish would help Morrigan immeasurably.

"You would not wish to demonstrate the superiority of this form to theirs? How many you might crush beneath one arm?" Look at her, extending these many branches of friendship since her and Alistair are managing their awkward...not co-parenting since Alistair isn't being called a parent. Whatever it is he's doing. "What did you do in all that time between now and the Blight? I sought out the past, Leliana obviously kept herself busy, Alistair had the Wardens, Zevran dealings with the Crows - and you, Shale?"

Nightmares. Never tell them that, you vile woman!

A dwarf might have been a good idea, really - but Shale also read dwarven and was technically the closest thing they could get right now. That doesn't mean they were especially concerned to read anything, despite what they had learned last time they were here.

Morrigan's words makes Shale raise a brow, though. It was a damn flimsy branch of friendship, but it was something. "It is not... completely wrong. It would be interesting to show them."

Then again, they also didn't want anyone to go volunteer for the Anvil.

The mage's question takes them a little off guard. The Swamp Witch was a wily one, after all, and Shale had pretty much assumed she knew everything. "I joined with the Elder Mage."

No one said Morrigan was good at this. Alistair and her still snipe, her and Zevran are still terrible, she and Leliana are still terrible and for most others there's her reputation from some corner or another that they have to put up with since people need to work with her anyway. "Here," rising - she is not quite so young as she was, and she's spent ten years chasing after a boy so her knees sometimes start to pop and ache now - she offers some of the papers. "Do any of these mean anything? Or shall I find a new patch of filth to poke through and amuse you?"

(Look, sometimes you need to be pragmatic. It was a Blight. Golems crushed plenty more darkspawn than things that actually succumbed more quickly to swords, spells and arrows. Don't ask if she and Leliana still fight about that decision.)

Ah. Wynne. Her fate had been one she had heard from the mages - meddling one last time. "What a pair you must have made, though I had thought she would have returned to her Circle after the Blight ended. I cannot imagine Wynne had much need of anyone or anything crushed."

Well. It's the thought that counts. Maybe.

They seem to completely bypass the Wynne questions, giving nothing but a shrug in reply. It still grated them, and honestly they might prefer chatting about moldy papers than talking about her.

Shale watches as Morrigan gets up, taking a step closer as the witch offers the parchments. The golem doesn't attempt taking any of them, as that would probably render them to dust under their stone fingers - but they can make out the letters fairly well.

"The first is a page from a journal belonging to some Shaper Assistant Shalla. 'Excavations are going well.' Good for them." The dryness is amazing, really. "'I think Shaper Warrek secretly hopes that the artifacts will lead him to the lost city of Arlathan, despite Tevinter records that insist on its complete obliteration.'"

Dwarves. Shale barely remembered being one, but 'stubborn' was apparently a race-wide trait.

"Something about elf artifacts, and something named Cad'halash." Good job, Shale. Very informative.

Last time someone had brought up Wynne around Morrigan, it had ended in an argument. The argument had been brewing, true, but it had been used as if to score a point, a low blow when she had already been hurting and angry and the very name had felt like a slap. So this is...well better. About as good as it's going to get really.

With the sort of skill one learns after motherhood means juggling a baby then a child and usually at least one other thing (normally three or four) at the same time, she opens a pouch at her belt and takes notes as Shale speaks, frowning at mention of Tevinter.

"A Shaper was in search of Arlathan? Why would a Shaper care?" Morrigan lets the confusion show because Tevinters she can understand for very obvious reasons, the theft of her eluvian recently an outstanding example but dwarves? "Cad'halash? Are you familiar with it at all?"

"I do not know the whims of a dwarf that has been dead for centuries," Shale mutters with mild irritation in their voice. They glance over at the notes Morrigan takes before they actually continue reading the whole thing rather than arguing or snappily paraphrasing.

"'Even if he found the site of the city, there would be little remaining of any worth. As for the artifacts, they must have come to this area by trade. Cadash Thaig is old, built upon an ancient settlement called Cad'halash. Lots of junk can accumulate over that much time, even elven junk.'"

The golem frowns again, looking up from the paper. That name... Cad'halash? Something about it was familiar, but they had no idea what it was or who had even heard it. Shale or Shayle?

"No," they finally reply, shaking their head.

"'Elven junk'". I have spent years searching for that which has been lost entirely, forbidden, forgotten. I have gone to ruins and found wonders. The ancient elves were capable of feats we can scarcely fathom now, to find anything from that time..." Trailing off, she shakes her head in frustration that isn't directed at Shale; searching ruins is painstaking, working with the Inquisition is painstaking, working with Celene was certainly painstaking with a side of dancing on knives and frequently feeling as though she were pulling her teeth to get anything done.

Knowledge begets a hunger for more.

"Perhaps if we are lucky Darkspawn will not have despoiled everything within the Thaig then, come, I shall indulge you and find someplace new to investigate. At least you are free of birds and deepstalkers are more easily crushed underfoot."

The golem frowns a little bit, but they do not make any comments about what Morrigan says. Instead they move a bit so she can pass them and get up to the road (if you could call it that).

"I am not fond of deepstalkers, but at least they do not have feathers" There's a pointed look at her shoulders, yup. It was fairly half-hearted bickering, though. Shale didn't feel too good about this.

It felt like they should know this Cad'halash. There was so much they had lost over the centuries, even if they did remember more than they actually admitted to.

"A bird would be less easy for the darkspawn to attack," she considers, glancing to her feathers too with a thoughtful look as if truly giving weight to it, as if Shale had made a suggestion of it. But she remains as she is, wiping the worst of the grime away with a rag she pulls from one of the pouches at her waist. (An old habit from Kieran's youngest years, one she retains.)

With a backward glance to ensure there are none to hear, she lowers her voice since Shale was one of those who fought the Fifth Blight, one of the few who remembers how awful it was. That strange awkward bond of seeing terrible things together even if it might not be the same for the golem as it is for some of them. "I heard tale that Jonas came this way once, together with a Dalish elf and a Circle mage, and that damned hound of his. I am sure he found what we search for now in half the time but twice the fuss. That was always the way."

There's one of those disgusted looks again, but Shale abandons their bickering banter for a moment when Morrigan starts talking about Jonas. The golem narrows their eyes a little bit, because as much as they really didn't get along, they were connected by that Blight mess. Horrors, fighting and rhyming trees alike.

"That was always the way," they agree with a slight grunt. "What is it it always says? The Warden was a very lucky bastard." But hey, at least there are fewer deepstalkers this time than when they last saw the Thaig.

They should have burned that damned tree. There's the wilds, and magic, and nature, and then there's that, and Morrigan would rather deal with an army of sylvans than suffer one more conversation with the thing. Perhaps the Blight rotted it away. (No such luck but they don't know that yet.)

"We must hope his luck holds with whatever seems to have taken hold of the rest of his fellows," she murmurs, more grim than usual even for her but she owes him and that's a strange thing. She owes him more than the rest of them really when she still has both grimoires and her freedom, things she could have accomplished alone but didn't have to because he helped. A friend she never looked to find for all that she did sometimes very dearly wish to roast him inside his armour with lightning.

"Tis curious, that so many of us returned, that while so many might dismiss the Blight or the threat that the past returns as it has." Not the Inquisition or those in the ranks but on the whole, it's pretty much The Fifth Blight 2: Civil War Boogaloo, everything is more terrible with Orlesians.

"It is the only one missing," Shale says thoughtfully. The Qunari would probably never leave his country again, no matter how much they missed their talks, and it would not be possible to visit. Wynne was... well.

...and Oghren couldn't really be missed.

There really could be a lot less Orlesians, though. That, and nobles in general. It had been annoying enough to gather an army during the Blight, but they already had one now, and Shale was so ready to go punch a Darkspawn god thing.

"Does the Swamp Witch think we are wasting time?"

Edited 2016-07-16 22:14 (UTC)

"Oghren could be down a well for all we know, or astride a keg pulled by a fleet of greased nugs." If she has to endure Oghren again in her life, let his arrival to Skyhold be that way, if only to watch all those faces pinching as he burps and farts his way up. "There is also Loghain, though I can only imagine the faces Alistair might make should he show his face."

If indeed he'd lasted that long. An intriguing man, for all the wrong sorts of reasons to a younger Morrigan.

"In general? I was in Orlais as Celene's arcane advisor for some several years, I have witnessed the...shambles." Omnishambles, the grasping, the pettiness, the lurching from one disaster to crisis and drawing the rest in, ignoring true threats or lives all over what head will lie uneasy beneath the weight of a crown. "I believe we should focus our attentions on Corypheus, what he desires, where he moves, who he approaches. He sent his Venatori after my eluvian and Tevinter gained much from the elves of old. If he is able to tear open the very heavens, perhaps we might spend less time trotting out a shambling awkward beast for the amusement of Vivienne's pet nobles and forge onwards. Yet I am not an ambassador, or a commander, or a spymaster, or whatever title the Seeker holds beyond being the Right Hand. I doubt Corypheus is mired in the ways we are."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Cadash Thaig and the Lights of Arlathan

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject