Simple Gifts [Closed]

[laurenande]

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.

Comments

[faithlikeaseed]

It's a testament to whatever's obscuring Galadriel's disappearance that Myr--ordinarily so sharp in memory, if only because he'd learned to be--isn't at all disturbed by his own lapse. People forget, now and again; he's had a great deal to worry about during the day, and so-- And so--

He clambers to his feet from kneeling, thinking it somewhat more respectful to have this conversation on even footing. "They're something, aren't they?" For all his worry, the words are warm with affection. Of course--he's biased, they're Chantryfolk, they've treated him well (more than), but even if they weren't the fulfillment of something he'd longed to see all his life--they're good people. He believes that beyond a doubt.

Which is in part why he says what he does next: "I've spoken to the Revered Mother's successor. The sisters here--they're trading their lives for their miracles."

It seems right to trust all he's uncovered to Solas first of all of them, if the elder mage's arriving when he did were a sign. The Provost trusts him--Gwenäelle had encouraged Myr to speak to him--and in all there's something in Myr's heart that has faith in those close to his friends.

[dirth]

Solas is discomforted by the fact that she is missing at all; he knows that she is capable of caring for herself, but that doesn't mean he's content with the idea of letting her be alone somewhere as treacherous and uncertain as this place has proven itself to be. There's something about it that makes him feel on edge, something that makes him uncomfortable, and he has to force himself to try and relax.

"They are." That's easy to admit, at least. The Sister he had spoken to had been doing her best to help people, but she had seemed over her head. People were dying of diseases that they could not cure and wounds that could not explained - and Solas had done what he could, but not enough. There was no saving some people, no matter what power he had.

The rest, though... Solas frowns, immediate, staring and trying not to let his frustration. Dying for miracles? Giving their lives for miracles? That has him instantly concerned, on edge, frustrated, and he moves closer.

"They are trading their lives for something, but I would not put your trust in their idea of what a miracle is. If that was the case then there would not be so many sick and dying in their infirmary." He frowns. "There is something here that is wrong and I would not trust any of it if it can be helped, Myr."

[faithlikeaseed]

Myr bristles a little internally to be told where to put his trust; it doesn't reach his expression but to darken it a little further. He knows, with his head if not his heart, that belief in the overt story of what's happening in the abbey is difficult. Would be difficult even for other Andrastians who take the stricter line that the Maker does not intervene, only listens to His Bride's recounting of the doings of Creation and weeps for the innocent dead. Miracles didn't happen--bar Andraste's ashes, and there wasn't a flake of those to be seen here.

Yet there were the facts of the situation, plain and self-stating--the near-dead had risen and the blind been given sight.

"I met a woman who had been gutted like a fish and left for dead." He doesn't give her name--is aware, dimly, it makes the story harder to verify but Sister Luca had been troubled enough already by the unbelieving. "No healer could have saved her--yet she's alive and walking about."

Not for much longer, a troubled little part of Myr remarks. Rather than push such voices away--as he's so wont to do--he listens in silence and draws no conclusion. Not yet. "There's another who was as blind as I am who was given her sight. I've no reason to believe they're lying about that--there isn't reason to lie."

Which is the dry and colorless way of stating things, the way you present the logic of an argument, and not anything to do with Brigette's weeping or Luca's awe at being pulled back from the brink of death. He knows he hasn't a way to share that, not and honor them both in the telling. Any attempt he makes--facile as he is at words and the pretty little logic-games of the Circle educated--would diminish it to mere maudlin sentiment.

And he can't do that to them.

[dirth]

Solas is aware of where Myr's beliefs lie but he thinks it a touch foolish to believe in a miracle in a place in the middle of nowhere. He doesn't know what to suggest to make his own slight bitterness a softer edge. Solas doesn't trust these miracles no more than he trusts half the things he sees in Thedas now and he knows there must be a source to them, an explanation, a reason behind their secrets. He wants to discover it, no matter what the consequences might be.

There is something. He simply needs to find it.

"There is a reason for it, I am sure. If she was saved then why not the others? Why is there a choice in who is healed and who is not?" Why is it only the most miraculous things that are cured? What about the common people, lying in their deathbeds, ignored by the people who are supposed to be caring for them? It is all well and good making big celebrations of things that were almost impossible, but why do that and not help those that are equally as desperate?

Solas shakes his head, lips pursed.

"I would like to hope they would be able to assist you, but I am wary of what the cost might be. That is all."

[faithlikeaseed]

"Why does it need to be a choice?" Myr not-quite-retorts; respect authority is graven bone-deep into a Circle mage--or most of them, at least--and it is hard for him to contradict someone he and the Inquisition both hold in so much regard. "The Revered Mothers--they burn through their lives in days. A week, maybe," and all of a sudden what he'd been able to compartmentalize and put forward as if it were a piece of historical knowledge isn't any longer. It's Luca with all her desperate courage and Alvar saying the price is hers, and the rest of the words stick in his throat.

He makes an involuntary noise that might be mistaken for a laugh, then swallows against the rest of the emotion. "Triage, messere. Even the miracles aren't without cost; they can't be done all at once. If--if the wounded are coming from across Thedas, they'd," pile up, he nearly says, checks himself from the grotesquery of it.

"--there'd be more of them than could be healed at once."

It's a little alarming how quickly and thoroughly Solas sees through him to what he'd not yet spoken of to the others; he'd kept that brilliant little piece of hope to himself as if treating it too lightly might ruin it and shatter the dream he's in. He resists the urge to round his shoulders and back down in the face of being discovered. "I've every faith they can," he says, softly.

[dirth]

"Someone must have chosen those that are to be healed and those that are not," Solas shakes his head. He does not think it would be possible for him to sit idly by and watch only some people be healed and others be ignored; he cannot stand and allow people to die when they could be saved. If there are miracles performed then it should be done for all, not a view. Solas is distrustful of this place and the people within it, for all that he appreciates the work they are doing here.

Performing miracles that are grand and remarkable and draw attention... How can he put any faith in that?

"I have seen what there is in the infirmary, Myrobalan. They do not try to understand the disease, nor do any of the people that come here seem to try to help. I did what I could, but the people here... There is too much unrest, too much sadness, too much death. I appreciate the sentiment and your hope, but I cannot appreciate it in the same way that you can."

It's as political and gentle as Solas can be about the matter, all things considered. There are times where he is far less dipolimatic about matters like this, but he doesn't have the energy for an argument, not here, not when time and distance is weighing heavily on his heart. There is still too much.

"I hope that you are able to get what you wish," he says, gentle. "But I have to make sure that Galadriel is safe, that these people are cared for, and I do not trust what is taking place here."

[faithlikeaseed]

The infirmary is a gap in Myr's understanding the abbey; he cannot go there, hasn't been able to bring himself to step beyond the lintel where the smells of blood and decay are strong enough to call back memory. Without knowing it for himself, knowing how many people lay there or what afflicted them or how it came they still waited on their miracles, he can make no strong argument here.

(But he supposes, he assumes: Triage. He hadn't been awake often then and half the time he had he'd been so sunk in misery nothing around him registered--but he yet remembers Sestina walking the rows of the wounded and dying. This one; if he's not healed now the wound-rot will take him, or, her lungs have filled; let her sleep, trading what couldn't be salvaged for what could. How did it change with miracles to-hand?)

"They do what they can do, I think," he says at length, voice still soft. "In a bad situation-- And deserve more than our distrust for that; they did send for us."

If this were something to be ashamed of, if something were happening that the Inquisition would want to put a stop to--pilgrims fleeced of their money and left to die--they wouldn't have been invited in. They wouldn't have been welcomed.

But then, Solas isn't wrong: Myr's appreciation for the abbeyfolk isn't widespread among the Inquisition team, comes from a very different place than the suspicion and for very different reasons. Persuading anyone to his point of view would be hard--and doubly so if he alienates them all through needless arguments before they're ready to change.

So. Find a place of compromise. And don't, for the Maker's sake, examine his own wishes too closely for fear it will all unravel. "They aren't in the least concerned something's close to the Veil here," he says, after a moment's consideration. "And that does worry me for them--especially with spirits in the woods that don't like magic at all."

[dirth]

"I do not distrust them for their kindness," Solas admits, voice softer, now. His worry and his concern prickles around him - his heart is with Galadriel, and without her he feels concerned, adrift. He wants nothing more than to ensure her safety, and it batters at him. It's not what he had ever anticipated for himself and, so, he feels on edge, unsure how to manage and handle the feelings. After so long being alone... This is a novelty he had not imagined nor expected, and it draws him down even now.

It certainly doesn't help that his connection to the Fade feels strange, here, and walking Dreams does not hold the same merit it might elsewhere. Nothing in this place has done much to endear Solas to it at all.

He cannot comment on the infirmary any more, at least. What Myr is saying is true enough - Solas is sure they are doing what they can or, at least, the best they can with what limited resources they might have. It simply frustrates him to see people die who might be helped when miracles are performed elsewhere in ceremonies designed to be somewhat like a spectacle. It reminds him of a time long gone.

"I do not think they understand the dangers, nor the strangeness of it," Solas shakes his head. "I do not think they are accustomed to mages, or those with any connection to the Fade, and they do not recognise what is... Wrong here." Solas' intimate knowledge to the Veil makes him even more on edge, jaw tense.

[faithlikeaseed]

I do not distrust them for their kindness.

Hearing that is enough to ease Myr's concern, soothe his bridling. He is not so blind (ha!) as to not know there are places the abbeyfolk's handling of the situation could be improved--need to be improved--but their intention and bravery surely must count for something in his estimation.

Worrying about all that has put him in a position (he realizes now, with a sinking feeling in his breast,) where his standing duty to the Inquisition might be compromised.

Well. Go forward from where you are. "I don't know it's that, messere," he ventures after a moment's recollection. "They know more than most do about these things, and what they know isn't--clouded by the fear the Chantry's instilled. They've not any prejudice against mages or magic but they also don't have--even a healthy fear for things that could harm them."

"I've not the first idea what to make of it." Other than being glad they take me as I am, he does not say, though it lurks behind his manner. The Inquisition is better than most but the Inquisition isn't Chantry. (The clinical part of him says this isn't, either: This is a regional cult. But it's what the Chantry should be and he'll fight for that.)