OPEN LOG: Establishing a Base in Kirkwall

[faderifting]

WHO: Many People
WHAT: Cleaning up Kirkwall
WHEN: Cloudreach 1-21
WHERE: Kirkwall
NOTES: This log post is for characters who go early to Kirkwall to assist in preparing it for the rest of those assigned there. We strongly encourage IC discussion of things left to character discretion—someone should definitely do a crystal post to discuss what to do with the personal belongings left behind in the Gallows or what new form the statues should take!

Kirkwall once lived on the edge of the Tevinter Imperium and was home to nearly a million slaves. Stolen from elven lands or shipped from across the sea, all slaves fed the Imperium's unquenchable thirst for expansion. They worked in massive quarries and sweltering foundries that produced stone and steel for the Empire.

The city's complicated past is not easy to forget, history having earmarked many corners of the stone city. A ship approaching the harbor spots the city's namesake: an imposing black wall. It is visible for miles, and carved into the cliff side are a pantheon of vile guardians representing the Old Gods. Over the years, the Chantry has effaced many of these profane sentinels, but it will take many more years to erase them all.

Also carved into the cliff is a channel that permits ships into the city's interior. Flanking the channel are two massive bronze statues—the Twins of Kirkwall. The statues have a practical use. Kirkwall sits next to the narrowest point of the Waking Sea, and a massive chain net can be erected between the statues and the lighthouse, closing off the only narrow navigable lane. This stranglehold on sea traffic is jealously guarded by the ever-changing rulers of the city as the net trolls taxes, tolls, and extortions in from the sea.

—From In Pursuit of Knowledge: The Travels of a Chantry Scholar, by Brother Genitivi

---

Establishing a presence in Kirkwall is a delicate matter. First, there's Provisional Viscount Bran Cavin—a man so used to batting back friendly offers of entirely harmless occupation of the battered city-state that his first three responses to the Inquisition's leadership appeared to be slightly personalized form letters. Proving that the Inquisition is here to work and not to conquer will be a process. The first step in that process is the second reason the move is delicate: the only building the Provisional Viscount is willing to part with is the Gallows, left quarantined and unoccupied since Knight-Commander Meredith Stannard's famous crystallization into red lyrium in the courtyard. The Gallows have since overgrown with red lyrium. If anyone is going to live and work there, there's a lot of work to do.

↠ Cloudreach 1-3: The Journey There
↠ Cloudreach 3-4: Arrival
↠ Cloudreach 4-14: Haunted
↠ Cloudreach 14-21: Spring Cleaning

Comments

[tactical_alert]

He understands her concern, even if she doesn't show it. The wry look remains, if a few shades darker than before. "There's a reason I'm the one being given some of these forms to sign despite not technically being in charge of anything at all." Only so far being the left hand of Cassandra will go. Meant something in Skyhold, less so here. Here he's just another one of them until they're all sorted--just...more, being a Seeker. Just as the Templars are more than a common man, to their own, and yet? Same boat. Quite literally.

"Benedictions. Blessed are the righteous, the lights in the shadow. In their blood the Maker's will is written." He lets it hang in the air, a sort of reverence. "I don't expect you to understand the religion and the Chant, but that you've picked up on any of it is more than I could ask for. The Chantry," he continues with a tight pull of his face, not quite a grimace but very, very close, "still does not, as an institution, take to us kindly. We must work on it if we stand any chance of making progress. If they could just agree on a new Divine, that would go a long way in uniting itself so that we, in turn, can unite with the Chantry. We've a long way to go as far as Thedas is concerned. But still...progress."

[foxsays]

"You say technically now, do any of us know what our places will be when anything at all settles?" Araceli's been wondering over it herself, how much this is going to change, if this is going to be an actual chance to do something. To see change done. To get more work done than just studying and outposts and going to the next party to talk to more nobles.

Store your blessings in your holster, she thinks, her father's voice in her ear still with her and it's comforting to know she hasn't forgotten it.

"The Chant is a part of Thedas, it's something held dear to so many, woven deep within Thedas itself. There are such things where I am from." If Araceli hadn't shared such a story, she likely wouldn't have been pointed in the direction of Rivain and so they wouldn't have gone to help the people they helped. That's the power in the stories of where people came from and how they came to be. "Orlais being on the road to recovery could help somewhat, no? The Grand Cathedral is there. A new Divine could give us another obstacle to face when there are already so many before us if she does not agree with what we must do. The Inquisition was heretical when I fell through a rift, she might think the same."

[tactical_alert]

"Much is yet to be determined." About their positions, and the future, the Divine, the Chantry. He has his questions and his doubts, but he's sure that they need a Divine.

Just...one that's on their side, let a new one overthrow Justinia's orders.

"Many minds need yet be changed. I'm sure there are many in power yet who see us as heretics and a threat to stability of the region, despite the fact that there's already a threat to stability in their towns. If we can bend enough ears to sympathy..." A shrug. Maybe they can get enough sway to not be overthrown by a new Divine. Maybe even have a say in who it is.

[foxsays]

"People in the towns care about still having a roof over their head. Having enough food on the table. Parts of where I lived before it was a choice between the rent or paying for your food, I would imagine that there are places here where the choice is just as stark. People know a false promise. They want better for their children than they ever had or the chance for more. That there won't be a war or soldiers or mages and templars rampaging through the countryside, that things can be secured." She's thinking about how people from the place the war so long ago at home was lost still come to Castileos for just the hope of more, of better, she sighs softly. "Clearing out the demons whenever there are rifts could do a great deal, seeing that we are all there, that we are willing whenever there are red templars or Venatori or whatever else? That should help them to remember who did what when their rulers were busy keeping their thrones instead of of helping them."

Orlais she's looking at you and judging all of you, yes that includes you Briala along with the whole Chantry.