Entry tags:

Simple Gifts [Closed]

WHO: Galadriel, Thranduil, Solas, Myrobalan, Merrill, Kitty, Lakshmi, Teren, Marcoulf, Jang, Obi-Wan, and Anders
WHAT: A trip to a perfectly normal Chantry in the middle of nowhere.
WHEN: Current.
WHERE: The Island of Alamar, Ferelden.
NOTES: Current warnings, to be updated: Graphic Descriptions of Gore

The Abbey on the White Cliff

Travel to the Abbey on the White Cliff is no easy matter. While it stands not far from Amaranthine, the waters between the mainland and the island shores are a wicked confluence of eddies and razor sharp rock. The rain is ever-present here and the wind moves unpredictably at the best of times. Ships of size cannot travel easily to the island of Alamar and small boats are rarely steady through the choppy water. Fortunately, as the Inquisition approaches, the world takes some pity on them and the waters seem to still and calm. The clouds linger but, at the very least, they don't open above them until they have reached the land.

The island is a grey affair, all rocks and scrub and damp. The village, an austere looking outcropping of buildings, is entirely made from the local stone and, were it not for the red clay roofing, would blend into the landscape seamlessly. Very few people have strayed into the rain to greet the Inquisition and, without the voices to echo off the stone, most sound is drowned in the lapping of waves and the heavy fall of rain. As a result of the weather and the lack of citizens, the town has the general quality of a graveyard.

The merchants who work the docks are affable enough and, after unloading their haul and securing it somewhere a bit drier, offer to take the Inquisition up to the Abbey proper. The rain slows before long and the merchants lead the Inquisition to the main roads and, let them on their way. Fortunately, the Island is not terribly large and, even walking, it will take only a few hours to arrive at the far side of it.

As the party leaves the village and the shore, the island landscape opens before them. Sloping moors give way to periodic outcroppings of rock and, against the horizon and the far end of the island, there rests a dark forest of pines. The Abbey on the White Cliff stands at the far side, at the top of the hill and overlooking the waves. The road they travel is an easy one, well worn, and the buildings come into view long before they reach them--they stand several stories tall, made of the same stone as the village. They are moss-covered and have the look of an old building that has been questionably kept--at least, from a distance.

The closer one gets to the buildings, the more obvious the additions and repairs become. Windows that have no business holding glass have had colorful windows inset to them. The doors are heavy, wooden, and new. The ironwork on the walls is polished and unworn by the rain. There are no torches lit but, once the Inquisition members have reached the doors, they open promptly.

They are greeted by a Chantry Sister with a bright smile and rosy cheeks and, without hesitation, the lot of them are welcomed into the Abbey.

OOC:

Hey guys! So I plan on aggressively GMing this one. Basically I want to run this like D&D, or as near as I can manage.

The location threads below are available for single player/two player exploration, I will be tagging you with information based on where you go or what you do, but if you want to do a bigger thread please just use the team threads at the bottom. That way if you all decide you want to check out the [INSERT LOCATION HERE] and it leads you to [DIFFERENT LOCATION] I can move you along without changing threads.

Because of your proficiencies, different characters will have advantages in different areas/while talking to different people, so groups are best. I will also be PMing your character journal periodically with any information that your character may have picked up on that nobody else would.

The NPCs are available for talking to or questioning by any number of people. Their general locations are in their thread headers so you can travel there as a crew or ask me to send them at you, if you so desire.

Feel free to do new top-levels if you guys really want, I am just here to try and make this fun.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

The hall does not call back to him as he moves forward. His wisps curl into the air ahead and cast quiet, dull light over the walls. They behave differently here, moving in bursts and gradually slowing beside him, but the sense of foreboding that had settled over him in the library is absent...mostly.
"It's so close and so far."
Ahead the path branches out, voids open in the walls, gaping in the darkness, and remain blackened as the wisps travel by and reveal the stone architecture on either side of the doorways. One, two to the right, one and then two to the left. It was a storehouse, perhaps, but now the only constant is water.
"I would give anything to be there, but I dare not cross, not for fear of what will come of it."
The whispering returns, soft and nonsensical. it seems to come from two places at once, a macabre stereo. It pours from the walls beside him, a man's voice speaking a language he does not know. The other is softer and more distant, far ahead and to the right.

At least the wisps didn't go out this time. It's a small comfort, but it's there at least.

He looks around, contemplating his options. Something quieter seems a little more promising than the voice all around, male and not quite threatening but definitely not promising.

"Thanks. That's really comforting," he mutters. Choice made, Anders starts strolling forward with a little more determination.

It is a very long walk through the hip high water before Anders reaches the doorway that houses the source of the whispering. In that time, his wisps blink out and back again multiple times jumping and circling seemingly at random. They stabilize as he reaches the doorway, but they linger outside of it. Whether they can enter or not, or whether they refuse or not, it is impossible to say.

Through the door, the room sounds very large--without the wisps he must depend on his eyes adjusting to the darkness and whatever bits of their glow follow through the doorway. Water drips in droplets from the ceiling, or do they drip upward to meet it? The strangeness of this place is multiplied here and this space feels foggy and vague, like a memory imposed upon the world.

Someone stands in the corner of the room, their outline just barely brighter than the world around them. They wear all white, a gown that is soaking wet, and stand facing the join between two walls.
"Ai! I have found you at last, or you ----me--"
They are whispering.

At least it's not a tree. It could still be a demon, though, because it's always demons or Templars or both, really. Except when it's dragons, but there's no way this is a dragon.

"Hello?" he says quietly. Probably a little too quietly, really, but he's nervous. Anders loosens his staff from his back and takes it in hand before repeating himself louder. "Hello?"

Anders's voice bounces back at him, accompanied by the sounds of water trickling in the distance. The person in the corner doesn't move as he draws his staff, not at first, but after a moment their head tilts to the side. It is not a slight gesture, it is like the lolling of a head atop a broken neck, like a marionette with one string clipped. What had seemed to be a gown is hair, long and pale and drifting in the water.

When they speak, it is a whisper without voice behind it, but it sounds loud, harsh in this place:
There are no voices here, just the rushing of water.
"A long walk for simple herbs."
This is a facade, nothing more.
There is a pause, almost contemplative, as their head rights itself.
This is a riptide, one that will pull everyone under if they are not mindful.
"Do you require assistance?"

And there's the demon. And of course he's alone. And of course his magic isn't working quite right.

"I'm more curious, actually." Maybe he can get out of this without a fight that he'd almost definitely lose. Or being prompted to take a bargain he will refuse.

"What are you doing here?" Other than tilting its head at that awful angle. Everything says wrong, as if he needed more that did.

"It's a pleasant day."
Waves crash and ebb; the water on the walls runs upward.
She moves, then, shifts back a step but it is not right, as though it were a reverse of walking rather than a step taken on its own. The stance she adopts then is natural, casual, and entirely affected--she almost seems to be leaning on a staff, but she doesn't have one. He cannot see her face, but he can hear the smile, the one she aims blithely at the wall.
There are strange eddies here. Run before you see her face or you will be snarled in one.
"I wouldn't object to company."

It's not pleasant. There is nothing to enjoy about this, but it isn't like he has much of a choice. Anger the thing and he winds up attacked, likely, and walking away would probably anger it. He just needs to keep his head and may be he walks away from this.

"Who are you? What do you call yourself?" She may have chosen a name like a few other demons he's run into, or maybe she'll simply identify her type. Slowly he steps closer, wary and attentive.

That question brings it up short. Its posture shifts, caught between the affected ease of the last stance and some mounting tension. It is still for a while until it jerks forward and collapses, entirely limp, into the water. It vanishes into the blackness, or it nearly does, behind it leaves a halo of pale hair floating on the surface.

There are no bubbles, no spent breath, rising from the water. Behind him the wisps wink out entirely and it is pitch dark for a long, long moment.
Like water. Adamant.
A gradual sloshing fills the air as it rises again from the water. The colors it wore, the white and pale shades, are faded into something darker, something richer that Anders might not be able to make out in the darkness. Fortunately, once it has risen, the wisps wink back into existence and, in place of hair, it is bandages that rest on the surface of the water.

"--what can you do--?"
Words spoken by that same man, old and faded, weeping from the walls. He is a phantom from the far past.
It's voice is quiet and rasping, wheezed through lungs like parchment. the body it wears is the woman from the Infirmary Hall. The extent of her injuries are duplicated perfectly, down to the flesh peeling from bone.
"--might know the danger I face?"
"Sorry. I get curious--"

He jerks back from it now, feeling even less comfort as it changes its form and echoes some of his words back at him.

"You are a part of this." There is no question. There really hadn't been one for a time. Mercy wouldn't avoid an area because there was too much Mercy used up. She'd avoid the lair of a very powerful demon.

"Despair's been my guess. And that's what you're trying to inspire right here, so I feel more comfortable in this guess. I can't save them all, I know that, and no. I'm not at peace with it, but you'll not make me give up hope."

The creature turns, then, pivoting and jerking as it rotates around. The woman's face was covered in the Infirmary Hall. The face of this creature is not covered--in fact, it is not present. Its head lolls forward and it shifts toward him, takes one step, then another, and halts. The head twists looking at him at an angle, the surface of it is not made of skin--it is made of water and it starts to pour out, dripping and dribbling to fill the hall.
All shall love me and--
"--despair."

It reaches, both hands lifted up, toward Anders. As it leans in, however, there is a long and grinding shriek from the hall. It's head whips, blank face turned to the sound and then, at once, it is turned on him again. It approaches in lurching steps, passing through the water smoothly, trailing bandages behind it in its wake. It reaches for him--

And there it is. There's a slight chance it's a trick, that it's another demon claiming it's despair to trick him, but everything about this place has suggested this conclusion. Anders takes a step back, glancing around, but still sees nothing.

He really should have tried to persuade Teren to stick around so this wasn't a solo fight. But there's no choice now. Anders whirls his staff around, focusing, tossing a barrier up. His wisps were back, that was a good enough sign.

"The right to shoot lightning at fools," he says. Fire would be effective, but this demon has some influence on it. Lightning, though? As long as the ground under him... there. He thrusts part of the rock up, enough that he can stand on something that's not water, and casts.

Magic flows strangely here, but it is very powerful. Powerful enough that the floor cleaves upward as he summons the stone. It lifts him out of it but nearly crashes him into the ceiling. The water whorls and the creature reels--if it were alive it would topple backward, bent as it is. It's face is a gushing torrent of water, rising and pouring out onto the floor.

The lightning moves sluggishly, though, and twists through the air in short, jerking movements. It appears, shifts, and a branch of it appears afterward. The creature screams as it is hit and it is a human scream, the sound of someone dying--it doesn't back away, though, and lurches forward again until its hands are clawing at the rock.
"--it is the one thing that terrifies me--"
"--it should frighten you far more than it does," the voice says and all the whispers are reduced to gurgling--the babbling of a brook. The water rises sharply and it hauls itself upward toward Anders.

It should. Maker, it should really frighten him more. It moves so quickly, in its element, its nest, and he recalls all of the times he's fought demons before. He's never been alone. There's always been someone else there, sometimes multiple someones, and even then sometimes there have been fatalities. He needs to think and do this with care if he's going to make it.

Water and earth. Those work well here, but they're clearly also what this creature utilizes. Fire, not so much. Healing, not so much. Lightning, intermittently. Thinking helps with the fear, helps him not flashback to so many years ago when he'd been alone in the dark with the demons, but the thing isn't giving him a lot of time.

He swings his staff, trying to drive the bladed edge into it, and sending ice shards down it. Water hopefully will serve him as well as it serves the demon.

"I can't die here today," he says, trying to sound and feel confident. "I've someone to go back to."

"No, do not leave," it cries, its tone startlingly stable for a creature currently clawing upward. The ice hits it, slices into its shoulder, its side, and from the wounds water pours forth in torrents, bubbling black and cold from it like it is a wellspring.

"You must understand--"

It reaches for him and the blade of the staff cleaves its hand in half. It doesn't shriek but continues talking, bubbling words to the surface like there is someone drowning beneath.

"--they poured from the doors of night before me."

It reaches with the other hand and grips his robes. Its hold is solid and heavy like a lead weight. It uses his clothing as leverage and pulls up, levering itself from the water with impossible strength, and moves as closely as it can. His own reflection stares back at him in the glassy, liquid surface where its face should be.

"Will you aid me?"

Fear bubbles up in his throat, tries to spill out, and he fights it back.

"Who?" he demands. It's lies, all of it, but he's sliced the thing, zapped the thing, hit it with ice, and basically nothing is having any affect. Stalling might.. he doesn't know.

"I've made it a policy to not make deals with demons. I'm sure you understand. But if there's something else that needs to be killed here too, I've no objections to hunting them down."

It's not a bargain, not enough to open him to risk of possession, but he knows he's skirting the boundaries here. His free hand drops down so he can loosen the dagger in his belt pouch and be ready to stab.

"--drive out the shadow--" it gurgles but it wavers, something in its form twists and it screams--a torrent opens in its side and one of its hands is split apart and releases Anders's robes. The other clings fast.

"--so long as they or I remain--"

It tries to grab at his hand, releases him long enough to make a move for it, but it is off-balance now and the whole world seems to shake around it. It stumbles, lurches like a great weight is trying to drag it back into the water behind it, but its clawed hand will not relent.

"I cannot abide--"

Drive out the shadow. That's not what a demon tends to want. It's probably a trap, no, it's almost definitely a trap, but he can't see the shape of how.

"So drive them... and you out? How?" Something is taking out the demon and he feels a little more stable now, less terrified. Which is probably also a trap, but he's not going to try to drive away temporary calm. "How would one drive out the shadow?"

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Simple Gifts [Closed]

The Abbey on the White Cliff

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