player plot: who's a heretic now?

[thunderproof]

WHO: Adalia (thunderproof), Gwenaëlle (elegiaque), Iorveth (aensidhe), Kostos (exequy or exsecutus why do you and cee hate me, mj), Nari (nadasharillen), Solas (dirth)
WHAT: Temple of Falon'din
WHEN: Now
WHERE: Northern Orlais
NOTES: CW suicidal ideation, blood, general creepiness. If anything else comes up I'll edit, and if there's a CW you can think of while reading that I didn't include, lmk and I'll add it!

PLAYER PLOT: WHO'S A HERETIC NOW?

The ruins look, on the surface, much like any other Elven ruins might — crumbling stone structures overrun by plant life, chipped mosaics and tiled floors almost entirely hidden by centuries of overgrown underbrush. A quick investigation reveals nothing of note; this temple, it seems, had been picked over many times throughout the centuries, and anything of note has already been taken. The venture seems to have been pointless, at least for a few minutes.

Until someone stumbles upon a hidden stairwell, camouflaged in the underbrush and a secret to the original temple besides. It's a long journey down, lit only by magelight and the torches of the Inquisition, but as soon as the first foot steps down onto even ground, the Fade-green flickering of veilfire lights up a massive antechamber. The veil pricks at the skin, here, warping perception and sensation for those sensitive to its fluctuations, and embuing the whole room with a sense of foreboding solemnity for those who aren't. An eerie silence broken only by the sound of flowing water, and the musty scent of stale air make it clear: this place, whatever it is, hasn't been seen in centuries, if not millennia.

At the foot of the stairs is a landing butting up to a moat of dark liquid, fed by a pool set into a dais in the middle of the chamber. The pool itself burbles quietly, a waterfall spilling into it from the two cupped hands of a massive elven statue. The only way to reach the dais is to ford the river, but as soon as the party approaches, it becomes clear — the dark liquid within is not water, but blood, still fresh despite the millennia of abandonment.

On the journey to the temple, Solas told a story of Falon'Din, and the words seem more apt than they perhaps had at the time, given the weight of myth rather than truth:

It is said Falon'Din's appetite for adulation was so great, he began wars to amass more worshippers. The blood of those who wouldn't bow low filled lakes as wide as oceans.

Comments

closed to iorveth + adalia.

[elegiaque]

( gwenaëlle and iorveth share a tent. much like her presence on this mission at all, it doesn't merit discussion, but simply happens: the first night they make camp, in a most matter of fact fashion, they arrange themselves in a pair and continue to do so, each subsequent night. nothing terribly exciting is happening behind canvas, in this most unromantic scenario, but it's comforting to be near and gwenaëlle prefers it—attempts, somewhat clumsily in the bleak mood she's been carrying around with her, to express in small ways how she appreciates it.

by being near, mostly. returning the favor of her braids, and setting iorveth's to rights underneath his bandana. and unbending, a little, enough, to speak on what she hadn't spoken of at all, low-voiced, quietly furious still— )

—and he just had one. In his hand. He'd had the fucking thing made.

( this is easier to say to the back of his head than it would have been to the front of it. )

'I knew you were going to be angry so I did it behind your back and now I'm telling you I've already done it now it's too late for you to do anything about it', and if I didn't leave I was going to choke him with his own hair.

( disclaimer: there is no way she could do that.

she starts unwinding and loosening the braid she's been working on, or he's going to have a headache from how tightly she's pulled it—and then her fingers pause. she's going to guess she doesn't need to ask if iorveth heard the footsteps before she did, and instead holds the braid against his head and offers him his bandana back. )

[thunderproof]

❰ it's not that adalia isn't curious as fuck why married gwenaëlle is sharing a tent with iorveth, it's just that with gwen there are some things you ask and some things you don't and adalia is reasonably certain that this is one of the things you don't ask about. at least not when you've already pissed her off by talking about what a piece of shit her husband is.

all that to say, when she approaches the tent and hears gwen's voice, low and furious and indistinct, and sees what appears to be the silhouette of her — braiding iorveth's hair? — she doesn't say anything. she doesn't even attempt to enter the tent, conscious of how both the people inside it value their space, and that gwenaëlle in particular would probably prefer the opportunity to tell her to fuck off before she had to deal with her again. ❱

Gwenaëlle, I've come to apologize, can I come in?

[aenseidhe]

[ gwenaelle is absolutely right to be furious, iorveth feeling his own blood boil as he listens to her account of what had happened between them. after all the talk of protecting them from this thing, he'd submit to it himself, and call that some kind of diplomatic move. thranduil, who's thus far been the one iorveth's back when everyone asked him what must happen next to keep them safe from this.

he proved to them it could be done. he showed them their most prominent defender would bend to their will. ]

Thranduil is a fucking idiot. [ Iorveth seethes between clenched teeth, hands curling into fists where his wrists rest on the tops of his knees. gwenaelle may not have been able to throttle him, but iorveth would've had a difficult time restraining himself from it. it's well he's hearing of this here, miles from Thranduil, and coming from gwenaelle. ]

He doesn't just betray you or I with this. He's let down all of the Rifters that took a step of faith to cooperate with his requests for calm. I can't imagine he's so bloody dense he doesn't see what this will do for their morale. [ Iorveth's stopped to look over his shoulder at gwen, brows knit in disbelief. he'd thought thranduil knew he wasn't king here, but perhaps he was wrong. either way, he's interrupted by the sound of adalia outside before more can be said. it's well enough - he needs time to consider this. ]

Come in. [ he calls to her, because he needs a break from what the actual fuck, thranduil. ]

[elegiaque]

The commitment to the research was the Inquisition's and his division would have to do it, but— ( she understands that even as she hates it; the commitment had been made in the previous negotiations, the fact of the new ones that adalia will soon be setting out on hinged upon it, there was no getting out from under the fact someone would have to try. therefore keeping it quiet had to be done, as far as that went, because iorveth is right too—if everyone had known it had been done already, what chaos.

but not telling her, first.

but making it his own. they couldn't have tried it on a rifted animal? they wanted to know whether it would even work on someone through a rift not a mage, after all, animals aren't mages—

not telling her. iorveth is right to worry about the rifters, but gwenaëlle can't help but look to her own future, and past the phylacteries; is this what her marriage will look like? is this what her life is going to be, having to hope that her husband will deign to inform her the direction that he's chosen for their lives after he's already done it? the phylactery is not insurmountable, but that might be, and that had been what had weighed heaviest when adalia had shouted her own demands—it's no better to respond with the same behaviour. there's no path forward from that that they can walk together, if she starts undermining him, too.

but she's always known of these elves. she will always matter less than their plans. she'd only thought not to feel it so acutely, and so soon.

she swallows the rest of what she might have said as he bids adalia join them, though considering what she imagines she must be coming to apologize for, it may not be the breather he's hoping for—she lets her hands fall from his hair, fingers curling around her comb, neither hiding the casual intimacy of the moment nor offering any new explanation for it. she is disinclined, presently, to explain herself in much of anything.

she could offer some sort of greeting, at least, but she doesn't. she looks up, steady, not expectant. )

[thunderproof]

❰ adalia enters the tent and manages, just barely, not to look between iorveth and gwenaëlle as though they've both grown an extra head. she acknowledges iorveth with a tight smile and a little wave, but her focus is on gwenaëlle, trying not to look like... like she's trying to figure out how to manage her, or like she's still angry, or like any of the things she's really feeling.

it's getting really tiring, this having to apologize all the time thing.

deep breath. keep it simple. ❱

I'm sorry. Your husband, your business.

❰ other than the fact that thranduil making the phylactery affects so many more people than just him and gwen... in the end, gwenaëlle was angry at her husband, and adalia nudged her into revealing why. she should have at least held onto her anger long enough to vent it at iorveth or solas instead, someone who could actually do something about it without betraying their spouse, rather than try to tell gwen what to do.

not all of which, perhaps, will be conveyed in four words. but she can expand if she needs to. ❱

[aenseidhe]

[ Ah. So we are continuing the theme of Thranduil being an idiot. Unfortunately, Iorveth has nothing nice to say on the topic at the moment, and he'd rather not be a poor example for Adalia.

That, and, this apology is for Gwenaelle. it isn't his to comment on, thus Iorveth keeps his mouth shut and his thoughts to himself, casting a look back over his shoulder at Gwen, making it clear he's keeping his peace for the time being. ]

[elegiaque]

( for the moment would not be a productive thing to say on any level, not least of which because it might give adalia some hope that there actually is a possibility of him ever not being, instead of just being one of those awful things that comes out of gwenaëlle's mouth sometimes when she thinks words and then says them.

so she doesn't say that. she does say, ) I'm glad someone thinks it's my business, ( because she is still angry, and half her frustration with adalia had been coloured by feeling backed into the corner of having to defend someone she still keeps lingeringly envisioning strangling with his own hair.

her business. she has no idea what the fuck she's going to do about it. that's most of why she isn't in kirkwall, where she might have to decide. she will have to decide, but she wants to go and do anything else, for a while—

a terrible reason to be here, but there have probably been worse.

eventually, )

Thank you.