MOD PLOT ↠ BLAZING LIKE STAR-SHINE

[faderifting]

WHO: All characters signed up to participate in the Battle of Ghislain
WHAT: The Inquisition faces off against the armies of Corypheus
WHEN: Covers most of the day on 11.28 (forward-dated)
WHERE: The Fields of Ghislain, Orlais
NOTES: This is Post #1, covering the battle itself and the retreat. It contains top-levels for each of the teams and an open prompt for the retreat. The OOC post with more information/explanation is HERE. If you're not sure which team your character is on, there's a LIST. POST #2 covers the aftermath of the battle.

Scouts accurately report the enemy's movements: after a slight slow-down believed to indicate that word reached the of the Allies' sudden appearance in their path, they have elected to remain on-course, and arrive almost precisely when and where they were expected. By sunset the night before they are making camp just over the rise to the northeast, easily visible from the hill, and as night falls their fires can be seen winking along the horizon, a close-packed glow.

The mood in the camp is tense, openly jittery rather than the tightly-wound nerves of the past month, but with a sense almost of relief that after so much preparation and so many weeks of anticipation, the day has finally arrived. Some corners of the camp, particularly the greener recruits and the Antivan veterans, are raucous around their campfires, singing and drinking, playful brawls breaking out, but commanders are strict about the wine rations, and even those who choose to take the edge of this way make an early night of it. A scattered handful of men attempt to quietly slip away during the night, mostly Orlesian conscripts, but a few Inquisition agents as well. Some succeed, but others are caught and imprisoned--the Inquisition's few held to be returned to Skyhold where it can be determined if they are traitors or merely cowards, the Orlesians only as long as it takes to find a tree and an audience to watch them hang and spread the cautionary tale.

It is expected that the enemy, hoping to make up for its surprise at finding the Allies prepared for their arrival, will attempt to catch them off-guard by attacking before dawn instead of waiting, as is traditional, for first light. They are all roused from their beds to form up in the dim grey as quietly as possible, moving into formation in the wet grass, a heavy morning fog lingering on the field ahead. It's cool and raw, the air still. But the ground moves: the shudder and rumble of hooves striking earth, felt before it is heard. The Orlesians raise their pikes, the front line braces, and it begins.

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TEAMS 1 • 2 • 3 • 4 • 5 • 6 • 7 • 8 • 9 • RETREAT
Team members can break off into smaller groups within their top-level prompts—it doesn’t need to be one 13-character thread—and the retreat is an open free-for-all.

Comments

[divineshadow]

Well then.

That's worth admiring whatever the sort or sex of the person doing it.

The Priest does not spend long in that admiration--there is a battle to attend to--but leaves Teren to cover that side of the elephant. Turns to find another Venatori soldier shimmying up the ropes with knife between teeth and a gimlet gleam in his eye. He is in a position not advantageous for a strike with hand or foot.

But that does not mean the Priest is without recourse.

"You will not!" the Priest bellows in a voice and words wholly inhuman. Atavistic resonance in it digs claws in the man's spine and nerves; he loses his grip and control of his bowels, dropping to the ground with a high thin wail of terror.

[shri]

A battle is always loud, more than always loud - it is cacophonous, whether it's the shouts of Teren in pain, vicious, fought-through pain, or the dying, the triumphant. Crowding over the top of each other, between the sound of metal against metal, the scream of elephants, the blasts of magic ripping apart the air. Different from gunfire, but just close enough to that space.

But that sound. It crawls up her back like a Lycan's scream but worse. It isn't right, or real, but it is happening and she can't help but understand why that man fell away, screaming.

The elephant on the other hand, takes it as an excuse to run. Taking them off at a great pace - "Shit!" And she desperately grabs on, can't crush their own men, trying to slow the animal's pace as they take off immediately.

[doneisdone]

Teren barely has a chance to grab ahold of the elephant's harness before it takes off, and while it was all well and good to expect her to cover the other side of it, she can't get her footing long enough to stare anyone down, let alone spear them.
"WHAT WAS THAT," she snarls, clearly noticing the strange sound as well, though it's likely her question is drowned out by the chaos.

[divineshadow]

The elephant lurches into a run; the Priest lurches a staggering step with it and falls to a three-point crouch to clutch at its harness. "A mistake," comes the teeth-gritted answer to Teren's question. (A mistaken assumption: A greater beast of Rymning would not have taken fright at such an invocation.)

Another lesson learned. They will survive it or they will not. Yet the thought grates sore, that the Priest's error has put both Lakshmi and a male in fatal danger; compels life-risking action when another soldier struggles to drag himself atop the elephant's back. The Priest lunges suddenly to meet him, grappling and binding on and sending them both back over the elephant's side with only a single rope to secure them as they struggle.

This will not end well.