OPEN: The Western Approach

[faderifting]

WHO: Everyone!
WHAT: The Western Approach is a terrible place. You should definitely go there.
WHEN: Bloomingtide 15 onward
WHERE: The Western Approach
NOTES: This is open to everyone. Characters who would not happily go to the hell desert probably have to go anyway; it's a war, not a vacation.

Once these wastes were a land of plenty. Can you believe it? The rain came north over the Gamordan Peaks, turning the plains green and verdant for three months of the year. Eight hundred years ago, that changed. During the Second Blight, darkspawn spilled out of an enormous crack in the earth, corrupting it with their foul blood... and it never recovered, even after they were driven back underground. The Grey Wardens built Adamant Fortress to stand watch over that chasm, but eventually even they abandoned it to the wind and the biting sand.

What few of us eke out a living in this Maker-forsaken place do so knowing that any number of deaths await us: darkspawn raids, dragons, bandits—not to mention starvation from the lack of water and game. If we stay, it is because we know there are treasures buried in the bones of this place, ruins from the time when Tevinter ruled, and even earlier. We pass tales around our campfires of the things we have seen shrouded in the dust storms. My favorites are the ones about relics that could restore the Western Approach once more... but I don't believe them. Truth be told, on nights when the wind is calm, I can stand on a hilltop and see for miles in the moonlight over a stark beauty of which no other Orlesian can claim to know the equal. On those nights, I hope it will never change.

—From Lands of the Abyss by Magistrate Gilles de Sancriste

---

I. THE DESERT

When Scout Harding calls somewhere the worst place in Thedas, that's probably a bad sign. Even when nothing in the Western Approach is deliberately trying to kill you, there's nothing kind or forgiving about the landscape: bare and arid, carved through by sharp-dropped canyons, dotted with abandoned mines and signs of the deaths of lost travelers. Winds sweeping through to whip stinging sand into uncovered faces, and periodic dust storms obscure visibility entirely. It's warm enough to be dangerous but not so hot, at this time of year, that heat exhaustion and dehydration can't creep up on you while you aren't paying attention.

And at any given moment, something probably is deliberately trying to kill you. The food chain in the region is top-heavy, with quillbacks, phoenixes, hyenas, and varghests roaming hungrily and as likely to attack one another as the sparse local prey population. Compared to their natural competitors, the Inquisition's forces look like easy marks. The camps the Inquisition scatters at lookout points throughout the region require constant watch, and going anywhere alone is inadvisable. Not only because of the hostile local everything, but also because it is incredibly easy to get lost. One rock formation looks much like another after hours in the sun or bathed in shifting moonlit shadows, and good luck finding many other landmarks. There are a few: chunks of pillars or arches from some ruined structure, or the occasional odd pillar that might, if someone investigates, prove to mark a trail of sorts.

Plus: the only people who seem determined to survive out here are cutthroat bandits and stray Venatori. Double-plus: a high dragon makes occasional fly-bys, scouring the ground below for anything edible, armored or not.

Some reprieve comes at night, relief from both the sun and the area's primarily diurnal predators. But that's when the darkspawn come out.

II. GRIFFON WING KEEP

Bloomingtide 16-17: Taking the Keep

Only a small force of Tevinter cultists remains in Griffon Wing Keep when the Inquisition arrives, seemingly on their way out the door already, but the sight of Inquisition banners is enough to make them stay and fight. There's no need for siege equipment, but there is call for a little bit of patience. With it, a small battalion is able to evade the mages and archers on the walls and storm the doors with few casualties. Fewer than three dozen warriors wait inside. It's a quick, brutal fight; it only takes a night.

Bloomingtide 18 Onward: Home Away From Home

Once the Keep is cleared of occupants, it's ripe for the Inquisition to… occupy… But with implicit permission, at least. Those who aren't needed for fights elsewhere may be put to work clearing out debris and small animals and the remnants left by the cultists, and within a few days the fortress is a serviceable outpost, much more hospitable than the camps out in the sand. Barracks mean even those who don't have beds at Skyhold may have one here, and it takes less than a week for an enterprising merchant to arrive with ale.

III. THE STILL RUINS

Despite signs of recent activity, the lavish Tevinter palace tucked incongruously into the canyons is quiet and still, when the Inquisition discovers it—quiet, still, but not empty. The ancient ruin is brimming with demons and Tevinters in incredibly outdated fashions, all frozen in place, as they have been for hundreds of years. No one breathes or blinks, but their skin is still warm and alive to the touch.

Beyond the entryway and halls and through the courtyard, there are signs of research and experimentation, and one man stood unmoving with his hand clasped around something unseen.

Perhaps someone will discover the cause. Perhaps someone will undo the spell that's been cast over the palace. Perhaps, if someone does, someone will take the opportunity to not immediately murder all of these valuable sources of ancient information, and instead only murder most of them. In the meantime, however, it is unlikely that anyone will ever be able to get this close to a rage demon without receiving a face full of fire. Take advantage.

IV. CORACAVUS

Signs of the Venatori point upward: up the hills, up ladders and towers, and into the ancient Tevinter prison, Coracavus, that was built into the mountainside. The ruin is filled with sand now, with half-collapsed walls and anything not made of stone worn away by winds, and the Venatori are long gone, their hunt for relics from the glory days of the Imperium abandoned when an excavation attempt opened the prison to darkspawn, instead. The darkspawn have retreated as well, but there are signs of their presence. Namely the smell and the half-eaten corpses of slaves—primarily elven and dwarven—who were left behind to their fates when the Tevinters fled.

There's no sign of them now, but digging through their abandoned camps may turn up a name, if anyone would like to see that he pays.

V. ADAMANT FORTRESS

A day's determined walk from the nearest Inquisition camp, Adamant Fortress overlooks the vast chasm—dubbed the Abyssal Rift—from which darkspawn poured during the Second Blight. It stood abandoned for nearly 150 years before the Grey Wardens' recent reoccupation, and it's abandoned again now, emptied out well before the Inquisition's forces arrive. There are signs that the retreat was a hasty one: scattered belongings, opened doors, abandoned meals, and no fewer than fifty bodies left on a mass pyre that only half-burned without anyone to tend it.

The Veil has always been thin here, and it's thinner now, where demons have been pulled through from the Fade. Rifts hang over the battlements and in the corridors, and escaped shades lurk in the dark corridors, siphoning away the willpower of those who linger until they come close enough to attack. Those who visit the Fortress set up camp outside of it rather than within it, wisely.

There are clear signs of blood sacrifice, for those who look: the bodies, blood stains on the stone floors, neat lists of names systemically crossed through. Sorting through documents left behind may turn up vague notes in a mage's runic shorthand or the journal of a trepidatious new recruit (Lourde, a pickpocket, crossed through on the registers). Behind a locked door in the lowest rooms are the bodies of sixteen mages, still in their Circle robes, left lying where they fell when the Joining took them. Mages who were among the rebels in Redcliffe may recognize a face or two as belonging to the hardliners who left with the Tevinters.

Comments

[el_tybs]

"I suppose I could," he replies with a bit of a smile. Honestly the only reason he hadn't just gone and done so was because it was so hot out. Seeing as Ellana was asking though, and she had shown him her badger...

Getting up from where he was sitting he takes a few steps out to get a bit of space. For a moment Sam makes a show of stretching out, rolling his shoulders and cracking his hands. Once he feels he's stretched it out long enough he gives a sigh before a black poof of smoke envelopes him.

It takes a moment to clear, but when it does Sam is sitting where he's at, tail wagging behind him and panting slightly with his tongue hanging out. He wasn't as massive as some of the mabaris but he certainly was still pretty large, and the poof of white fur with the look of a grin on his muzzle certainly made him somewhat cute.

[serannas]

Ellana gasps, because she isn't expecting a dog quite so fluffy and white. He's adorable, and she immediately reaches out a hand towards him.

"You look like the sweetest little thing!" she exclaims. Though 'little' is a bit of an understatement. With her sitting down, he's taller than she is.

"Can I touch your fur? Or is that weird?" She lets Felix pet her when she's a fennec, but maybe that's a couples thing. A weird couples thing where one of them occasionally turns into an animal.

[el_tybs]

At the questions Sam hops up on his feet and gives a small huff of a bark at Ellana, stepping in closer so that she doesn't have to reach that far. This is actually the first time he's transformed for someone, besides Morrigan, so seeing what it was like to be touched would be interesting.

If it was weird he wouldn't know. It didn't really seem so considering he wasn't much like the other dogs, so it made sense that Ellana would want to touch.

[serannas]

Pleased beyond words, Ellana starts at the center of his forehead and strokes her fingers back. He's so soft and she feels like she could just leap onto him like he's a big pillow.

"Oh, this is such a good form!" she says. "Though if you ever do it in front of the refugee children back at Skyhold, they'll never let you go!"

[el_tybs]

At the feel of fingers passing over his head, Sam's ears give a twitch, but other than that he just sits down as Ellana pets him. It's certainly a different feeling, pleasant really. Save for the heat and the thick fur coat, which has him starting to pant.

At the mention of the refugee children Sam gives another huff in his way of agreeing to that. The mage children were already all over him because he was tall, he really didn't need kids chasing after him because of soft fur.

[serannas]

Ellana giggles and moves to give him a scratch behind one ear.

"Good boy."

[el_tybs]

Alright, now you're really milking it, Ellana. Sam tilts his head inquisitively at the compliment, though not very far since he's also trying to lean into the ear scratch. Honestly he likes his ears being touched as a person, but as a dog it is just... more? Whatever it is, it certainly has his tail wagging a bit more.

[serannas]

Don't blame her when you chose this form, Sam. She can't stop smiling and she raises her other hand to scratch both his ears at the same time.

"If you weren't such a good friend that I enjoy talking to, I'd suggest you stay this way all the time. I'd spoil you with treats and pets."

[el_tybs]

He supposes he passes on the big and cute. Especially the cute part.

The comment has Sam snorting a bit even while tilting his head back and forth, having a hard time deciding which hand to lean into more. Probably the hardest thing about shapeshifting was not being able to talk. You couldn't spoil him with treats when he was human, Ellana? No pets. That would be kind of weird considering you're seeing someone.

[serannas]

Ellana would never take away from Christine the fun of spoiling him with treats, now would she?

Eventually, her arms grown tired of being extended to pet him, so she returns them to her lap. "I love it," she says. "Couldn't you just picture me as a bird or a fennec, just riding on your back?"

[el_tybs]

Hey, he could be spoiled by more than one cute mage. Christine didn't need to know.

Seeing as Ellana was done petting him, Sam gives a bark before backing up a bit and the familiar black smoke appears once more as he shifts back. Pushing up to sit on his knees, he grins slightly as he pats his hands free of sand.

"That wouldn't be an odd sight not would it? We could probably try it out some time. Or a honey badger riding a phoenix."

[serannas]

Christine would just spoil him twice as hard to assert dominance.

"Oo, that second one sounds terrifying. We should head into battle that way!" But now she stands up and nods at the Keep.

"Let's get you some water. Standing out here in fur can't have been fun. I know I'm not used to it yet."


[ ooc: good stopping point? ]

[el_tybs]

In that case he would certainly let Christine know.

"It would be. Probably for everyone - we'd have to watch out for our own side attacking us."

They'll have to figure that later. Right now getting some water and cooling off sounded like a good idea. "No not really. Why I'm not using that form at the moment." That said Sam follows along side Ellana towards the Keep.

[ooc: good stopping point]