faderift | Her dirty paws and furry coat

[Although he doesn't live on Sundermount itself, his place out here in the Vimmarks isn't very far from that towering mountain. Which is why he finds himself venturing there pretty often. After all, there are said to be many Grey Warden related structures and items to be found out there. So whenever Kain has no other pressing business, he goes exploring.]

[At the moment he's high up on the mountain, somewhere not too far from the shrine's location, in the midst of fighting a bunch of skeletons. The sound of his sword striking their bones is probably unmistakable as he defends himself against them. There's no end to the creepy things up here, is there?]

[Emerging from round one corner where a landslide crushed everything in its path to reshape the pass from whatever it was before, however long ago it might have been, Morrigan hears metal striking bone, the whistling rattle of wind passing through all the hollows of bodies with more magic than even sinew and gristle to hold themselves together.

Ice slows many things, her staff raised to fire out a spell before she pauses to see if she recognises the figure. Not that it matters, the undead must be dealt with time and time again as they rise.]

One wonders [she keeps her distance; spells work best this way] how many dead Sundermount has known.

[Whereas Kain has to get right up in the midst of the fray, all the better to use his reaver-skills to their fullest potential. Though he has to admit he's grateful for some help right now. A couple of undead are easy to mow down, but they have considerable strength in numbers like this.]

Far too many, it would seem- [Kain pauses to whirl around, using his favored two-handed whirlwind technique to slam his sword into as far as reach as he can. Bones clatter as they're smashed apart, although some of these undead keep going despite limbs being severed.] -apparently things are a little too crowded for them to just- stay in the ground!

[He keeps the onslaught going, hitting them hard, one after another.]

[Hand outstretched to cast again, something pushing itself from the ground clutches at her ankle forcing her to kick free of the grip then hit it the rest of the way--]

They are old. [Has she not spoken of Sundermount's history before? Hard to recall in the thick of it.] A place of war, the Veil so thin already that more death heaped upon it that the ancient elvhen need not have bothered--

[Walking bomb when it comes to the undead isn't a pleasant thing but she allows the body to rise, to come close before spinning the staff to block the limbs from attacking as she lays her hand flat upon it. The spell burns through her palm as it ever does into withered flesh before she shoves it in his direction to shamble to the nearest target, gathering her mana again but it's a potent spell. How long should it take before there's a blood explosion?

(Mind the splash damage.)]

Ah, yes... death and veil thinness... my favorite things.

[He says this with plenty of sarcasm, not entirely thrilled to end up in such a situation. But he should have seen it coming. The mountain has so many tales told about it, after all... things which he's now starting to see firsthand. Well, it could always be worse.]

[Kain keeps on with the physical attack, feeling satisfied every time he hears bones cracking from the force of his sword. He sees Morrigan casting something, and watches the one she'd targeted closely. The explosion happens all of a sudden as the infected skeleton falls, and Kain braces himself. The closest undead end up pretty well splattered, making disturbing noises as the toxic blood hits them. Kain gets hit with some as well, but this only adds to his strength. He's got Ring of Pain in effect, but also the more enemies that fall, the more power he has too. He's ready for this.]

[Feeling bolstered, Kain slams his sword downward. The shattered ground trembles below the skeletal figures, flames erupting to add to the damage.]

[So a Reaver then.

Morrigan's seen Reavers fight in the past, more of them on the opposite side to her own. Never pleasant to fight a person who revelled in it that way but he's over there doing his thing as she keeps a careful distance from him because they can be so unpredictable.

Anyone who's drunk of dragon's blood has that in them.

(To meet one here-- No, there's the fight, she can think of it after.)

Greeting the flames with bursts of lightning she sends more corpses reeling from her, stumbling away with none to replace them this time. Yet she knows that should she walk this path again they'll rise. They'll always rise. There will be no peace of the grave eternal for any who slumber here.]

Archer! [Morrigan calls while she summons her will to cast again but arrows require none of that, certainly not from the dead, withered fingers pulling taut the string of an ancient bow as the arrow takes flight.]

[Kain has always hated the undead, or more accurately, what they're forced to be. One of his worst nightmares is being trapped as a shambling, unthinking corpse, forced to fight the living, or do the bidding of someone more powerful. It's unsettling, and the sooner these are put down, the better. Though even he has to wonder just how many of them will truly be put down for good here.]

[Fire and lightning are doing their work on some of those corpses, burning and reducing them to ashes. Their numbers are going down now, which is a good sign. Kain's sword slices the head cleanly off another one, the body collapsing but still squirming until Kain cuts through it with a heavy stab. He's just pulling that sword free as Morrigan calls out. The arrow just barely misses him, soaring by overhead, only because he'd moved quickly at the shouted warning. But there's more coming after that one. Kain sets his sights on on that archer now, as that skeletal bow fires off another arrow. Heedless of getting fired at, Kain charges in. He figures if he gets hit, he'll just use that against the creature... But another undead shambles in to block his path first, striking Kain with a surprise attack. He slams his sword into the corpse, cutting through its rotting flesh.]

[After Darkspawn, most horrors are things Morrigan is immune to by now, only a sliding scale of how much she detests the smell, the sound, the difficulty to clean away the remains that might cling to her. There are worse horrors in the minds of the living than the things living. (A cage, ever a cage, to not be what she is, what she wishes to; what thing in all the world is worse than that?)

The Deep Roads, her mind whispers through the wind blowing over the mountaintop, through the gaps in the funeral piles, in the gasping of the dead risen again, you remember Hespith's rhyme same as you remember the press of the tunnels, the rankness of the thing's breath.

Another shambles - like Redcliffe, how they kept coming but not so many for there are only so many graves picked out here - and she strikes hard with the staff to send it back. Summons her mana for a stronger spell. Something to twist whatever mind or instinct or will is left to the undead as Kain moves, perhaps something to help; hand outstretched, the caustic bite of entropy beneath her skin that always seems to nip and burn at the skin, wishing to peel away the flesh same as acid does. Disorientation falls over the shamblers. They raise their weapons and-- why do their hands hold weapons? What is their purpose? Why--

They do not get out of his way. They do not strike when they should. Morrigan takes a blow across the arm when one stumbles forward, tastes the bite of cold steel still sharp beneath the rust. She grits her teeth.]

Her dirty paws and furry coat

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