open: we built this circle on rock and roll

[exequy]

WHO: Open (mostly), targeted toward people who care about mage problems but anybody's welcome.
WHAT: Looting a Circle, fighting some scavengers, and arguing about the ethics of falsifying records of abuse.
WHEN: Cloudreach
WHERE: Markham
NOTES: This is a sliver of a couple bigger schemes, including a plan to publicize mage mistreatment (which will double as an anti-Gertruda Divine-influencing plot) and a plan to hide some Circle valuables from the Chantry, but your character doesn't have to be aware of those plans to participate in this! They can just be along to help fight bandits and carry heavy stuff. ETA: In some places this log says Ostwick, rather than Markham, because I'm dumb. Ignore them.

Calling an outbreak of enchantment-related deaths and mysterious incidents in Markham convenient would be horribly insensitive to the various burn victims and vanished druffalo involved, but, you know. It is. All of the arguments about whether or not to make formal request for permission to secure the Circle's contents, when it's already their stuff, and if Ostwick says no it might mean the Inquisition won't give them leave to go—those arguments were all for nothing. Markham's response is, essentially, Please do. Hooray!

Comments

COUNCIL OF LIARS (SEMI-CLOSED)

[exequy]

It takes some planning, some significant looks, and some head gestures, but it works: when the group breaks for lunch, a certain segment winds up upstairs, alone in the Knight-Commander's office with boxes of notes and records kept by her and the First Enchanter, stretching back five years before the rebellion.

An apprentice named Patrick lost library privileges for a week because he drew genitalia in one of the books. Antona, age eight, was confined to her room for a day after she bit Anton, age fourteen, because he'd stolen her name. Ser Pace was assigned to the night watch after teaching several apprentices dirty jokes. Enchanter Richart set fire to Senior Enchanter Agnes' research notes because he believed she had stolen his ideas and was being forced to recreate them for her. Ser Bodobert was late for his post a tenth time in one month and assigned sprints across the Templar barracks.

Et cetera.

After five minutes of flipping through documents, Kostos announces, "This is bullshit."

ooc | This part of the log is closed to characters who would reasonably be trusted and included in this discussion, but basically anyone who won’t rat them out can be there. Also content warning for discussion of abuse, probably.

[wythersake]

"I know. Anton deserved it."

Isaac is no longer actually reading. Probably. Probably it's difficult to read with a book draped over your face (you try and sleep with such rousing campfire stories).

Maybe they're not actually in a Circle at all — no one's measured the curve. Maybe the leadership preferred not to record and alphabetize abuses of power. Maybe Ostwick was just fucking boring. Regardless:

"These can't come back with us."

At least not like this.

[justice_is_blond]

"Do you suppose they're code? Punishments made to appear smaller in case someone came down on the Templars here?"

That mages would be punished for little things wasn't up for doubt. He's quite glad no one caught him when he'd decorated the books in Kinloch - tigers eating Templars would certainly go over more poorly than genitalia.

"This isn't the true picture. Maybe separate books that they took with them."

He drops the stack of records he's been perusing with an annoyed grunt.

[sarcophage]

Leander's over here leafing through something he brought up from the floor below: an illustrated collection of Chant stories, simplified for children. For many Circle mages, the sight of the binding alone—the green cover embossed with a distinctive design of the sun, twining vines, and birds—is powerfully nostalgic.

"Not likely," he says, without looking up. "We all know perfectly well the worst of it was never written down. They wouldn't dare. Unless some templar happened to be diligent about updating his diary every time he got behind an apprentice, we won't find anything we can use."