faderifting: (Default)
Fade Rift Mods ([personal profile] faderifting) wrote in [community profile] faderift2018-06-02 04:52 pm

MOD PLOT: NOT ALONE DO WE STAND, Part 2

WHO: Grand Tourney attendants
WHAT: Celebrations, slightly marred
WHEN: The last day of the Tourney, and after
WHERE: Wycome
NOTES: Reminder that brackets for all events are here!


I. LAST CHANCE TO PARTY

After the Grand Melee draws to a close, and the Grand Tourney with it, the grounds and adjacent taverns and inns remain crowded with visitors. There's at least one more night of celebration before everyone has to return to their lives. The most raucous of it, as well as the most bragging, originates from the Free Marches, who have taken James Norrington's presence on the winning Inquisition team as an opportunity to claim victory for themselves—the fact that the rest of the winning team was made up of Rifters and a Tevinter is something nearly everyone would prefer to overlook. For many competitors, it's the first night they've been able to indulge in honored Tourney pastimes without jeopardizing their performance in events. For many spectators, it's their last opportunity for the foreseeable future to spend time with new friends from other nations and to prove who can sing their homeland's favored drinking songs the loudest.

When it comes to the Inquisition, something has noticeably shifted. The congratulations for their victories are often sincerely delivered, accompanied by questions about the war effort and what they do. Identifiable rifters and mages may find strangers sitting down next to them, rather than giving them wide and whispering berth, and asking their names. Elves are slightly less likely to be asked to go get a broom or fetch a drink. Arguments about political philosophy don't uniformly fall to one side or the other, but they are more common than they were at the beginning of the week, with heated arguments about the future of this or that nation periodically breaking out over drinks.

Even those arguments are fairly friendly and high-spirited, though, and far outnumbered by the number of less serious conflicts that break out: drinking contests, pie-eating dares, and good old-fashioned dance-offs.

II. CONGRATION YOU DONE IT

To allow time for competitors to set their broken bones and stop bleeding, the award for the Grand Melee is given the following morning, with the Celebrant presented amid fanfare to the winning Melee team. Winners and high-ranking runners-up from other events, though less loudly vaunted, are directed to a tent to pick up their prizes.

The grounds don't immediately vacate, after that, but the mood is distinctly wound-down, while merchants pack up their stalls and revelers nurse hangovers or aching stomachs overloaded with pie. By midday, people have begun remarking on a peculiarity: the prizes meant for competitors from the Anderfels remain unclaimed, and the entire delegation seems to have left in the middle of the night, likely sour grapes over their Grand Melee loss, fiercest warriors in Thedas my ass—though some speculate instead that they've all been kidnapped, or that they fled to avoid being forced to return to their own country.

III. SHIT

The rumors don't have long to percolate before the question of what happened is answered—first by Ina Hachette, a member of the Anderfels court persuaded to defect to the Inquisition, who turns up out of breath and searching for the Inquisition's leaders, and next by a curt message delivered to Inquisition sending crystals that there's a disturbance at the Orlais-Anderfels border. A big one. Invasion-sized.

It's inevitable that the news spreads—living cheek by jowl in tents is not conducive to much secrecy—and soon rumors have run wild throughout the encampment, putting an abrupt end to the festivities as everyone scrambles to gather their forces to leave. Tevinter, on the whole, is the quickest to pack its bags. Whether they know something or are only worried people will turn on them as the finger-pointing begins is anyone's guess. But if it's the latter, they're right to worry, and nearly prevented from leaving by an Orlesian-led mob convinced that they know something. The task of keeping the peace and preventing bloodshed falls to the Inquisition as much as Wycome's local guard, as the tourney dissolves into posturing and wild accusations.

When the danger of an actual fight breaking out passes—mainly once Tevinter is gone—and the crowds thin, the Inquisition's delegation is ordered to pack up and make haste on the journey back to Kirkwall.
esquive: ([ 003 ])

[personal profile] esquive 2018-06-07 12:35 am (UTC)(link)
She needn't worry. Despite the battered appearance and the lacquer stripping notes of the wine, he seems in good enough spirits. Or maybe he's had enough sips from the bottle that it's taken some of the string out of his defeat. Either way, he's perfectly cheerful enough about tasting from the bottle. He makes an appreciative noise. That is much better; he can tell by the fact that he can barely taste it, his mouth so stung by his own cheap drink.

Marcoulf promptly recorks the green bottle and tucks it down against his boot. Maybe he just has terrible taste.

Instead he tips his head toward the sack she has with her. He raises both eyebrows. "Full of 'vint silverware?"
villieldr: (064.)

omg i thought dw ate my tag AND IT WAS THERE ALL ALONG gosh darn

[personal profile] villieldr 2018-06-07 09:31 pm (UTC)(link)
In good enough spirits, despite not drinking good enough spirits.

She's hilarious, where no one can hear it, or groan. A grin cuts across her face, and she picks up the sack, tossing it over. It's not too heavy, or particularly bulky, although if it caught someone in the nose or groin it might be cause for complaint. The distinct lack of clatter probably betrays that it is definitely not silverware, 'vint or otherwise.

No. Instead, tucked away in the coarse cloth, is a miniature halla, tall enough to reach the knee - not her knee, obviously, the knees of shorter people. He may have seen the likes of it around the carnival games, padded out with cotton, wrapped up in fennec skins, posable. It's weird and charming.

"Consolation prize."
esquive: ([ 003 ])

legit I didn't even see the other one so we're both failures

[personal profile] esquive 2018-06-13 12:46 am (UTC)(link)
He laughs. It's a low, sawing sound gone all rough from the day's beating and the acrid liquor. The cheeks of the things are soft enough to warrant some petting, it's face all pale fur and dark bead eyes. It's cute. He wraps the canvas back around it's neck, leaving the white head and stiffened antlers poking out. He props it there on a neighboring crate. There. Now there's three of them, he thinks and keeps chuckling as he fishes in his pocket for--

A strand of faintly colored hard candy, not yet revoltingly sticky despite the humid night air.

"Worth a bump in pay, I'd think." Look at the pair of them - regular champions under the Inquisition banner, really. Someone official should be thanking them.
Edited 2018-06-13 00:47 (UTC)
villieldr: (070.)

i think you mean we are both VISIONARIES

[personal profile] villieldr 2018-06-18 01:12 pm (UTC)(link)
She grins, a bright, crooked thing that is quite shortlived as she takes a swig of terrible wine.

"A bump in pay for all the bumps we take," she replies, leaning back to stretch her back a little. She isn't sure if she pleased or displeased a god, at the moment, with how she did decently, or how she didn't do better. The present state of injury could really go either way.

"We will get a letter from the Viscount any day to applaud us."
esquive: ([ 012 ])

[personal profile] esquive 2018-06-24 05:53 am (UTC)(link)
Another grinding laugh, this one punctuated by Marcoulf raising his empty hand to mimic a toast. Cheers to that. The eyebrow he quirks to go along with it must pull at the sorest parts of his face though because afterward he touches his brow and massages the swollen eye and cheek with a grimace. "The next time anyone asks for a favor," he says, prodding the tender flesh. "Remind me of this moment."

That's an exaggeration. Subjecting himself to the Grand Melee hadn't been a favor so much as an-- order? Surely there's no refusing Luwenna Coupe, even when she phrases things as requests. Never mind that he would've found some way onto the field regardless...