↠ WHAT PRIDE HAD WROUGHT | OPEN LOG

[faderifting]

WHO: Everyone (except those who remain behind to keep an eye on the Gallows)
WHAT: Just some ruins, nothing special
WHEN: Solace 17-20
WHERE: The Arbor Wilds, Southern Orlais
NOTES: OOC post! Second log post for NPC threads! Image source!

For most, the journey through the Crossroads is miserable: the world is grey and lifeless, the light twists disorientingly like the world is being viewed through a water droplet, an incessant sound is always just beyond the edge of hearing, and walking anywhere feels like walking uphill.

For elves, it's a world in bloom with a stained-glass sky. La di da.

But everyone does eventually arrive, together, at the site of a large eluvian. There are signs of recent activity; a long-dead guard previously discovered by the Riftwatch team that traveled there before has been moved, and a spear left leant against the side of the eluvian where a new elf may have more recently temporarily taken his place. There's no guard there now.

When the team passes through the eluvian and into the verdant temple grounds beyond it, the reason quickly becomes apparent. They're met not with a volley of arrows from an army of guards, but the warily trained weapons of the small handful that remain after days of repelling an invasion from beyond the temple walls. It's a fight they're losing—one they thought already lost, given their casualties and the fires now burning outside the walls—and their exhausted, bruised leader only needs a little prodding, and only seems a little suspicious, before he orders his people to stand down and accepts an offer of help.


I. REPELLING CORYPHEUS' FORCES

The Temple's Sentinels have been reduced to a handful of wary elves, most of whom don't speak Trade very well, but they manage to give enough direction to get those who will be fighting outside of the quiet Inner Sanctum to the outer gardens. The Temple's outer defenses—powerful enough magic to kill an aspiring god, if it's run into blindly—have finally fallen, but what remains of the Red Templars and Venatori mounting the assault have been slowed by the overgrown labyrinth of gardens, then the arguments and preparations needed to blast a magical hole in the floor to expose the crypts below.

They're taken off guard by the sudden, non-Sentinel reinforcements. But they're still a powerful mix of Tevinter-trained mages and amplified Templars, and—if anyone cares—the longer the fight drags on, the more damage is done to the Temple's gardens. It's not a good time to dally or pull punches. Not even when a familiar face is found among the enemy.

II. THE PETITIONER'S PATH

When the last of the Red Templars and Venatori have been killed or chased into the jungle, the Sentinels—perfectly happy to have most of these interlopers locked outside a little longer—will be quick to disappear, save one, who will direct their attempts to get through the doors again with bored, skeptical broken Trade. The most direct route back inside requires walking the Petitioner's Path, a mazelike path through the gardens, weaving around corners and through tunnels of ivy, in places obscured entirely by the overgrowth.

There's no trick to the floor tiles, here. Only a trick of the mind. Clarity, supplication, a request for justice, and then at points along the path spirits will begin to appear. Some will wear the faces of those who have wronged you—offering excuses, begging for mercy, or refusing to be sorry, and in all cases wanting to know what you think they deserve. Others will wear the faces of those who you've wronged—wanting to know your excuse, asking if you think you deserve forgiveness.

Mercy isn't required, to pass Mythal's test. Only an even hand. The same justice for one as for the other. Succeed, and the spirits will lead you to pass freely through the doors.

III. THE CRYPTS

—or fail, or refuse to participate in a heathen ritual, or see the folly in risking that sort of exposure in less than total privacy, and your option for rejoining the rest of Riftwatch is a labyrinth of a different kind. Corypheus' allies were interrupted before they blew the floor wide open, but there is an opening large enough to pass through single-file into the ancient crypts below. The path through is dark, wet, and winding; now and then one of the dead rattles and threatens to rise; and the Sentinel babysitter, apparently disgusted by the fact that anyone might refuse or fail the test and still enter the Temple, refuses to serve as a guide or provide a map.

But it could probably be worse. Somehow. There could be less historical value in the moldering ruins, for example, or fewer pieces of gold and scraps of ancient jewelry lying around for the taking.

IV. THE TEMPLE OF MYTHAL

Back within the quiet of the Inner Sanctum, Riftwatch's envoy is permitted to rest—with varying degrees of individual acceptance, depending on whether or not they successfully walked the Path to enter, and all of them watched as closely as the small handful of remaining Sentinels can manage. Their leader, Abelas, doesn't shy away from the dire facts. Not enough of them remain to protect the Temple and the Well of Sorrows. Corypheus will likely be back. Convincing him not to destroy it, and finding a viable alternative, will be a task.

In the meantime, those who have better things to do in Kirkwall can return at any time, and anyone ill-suited for a fight but well-suited to assisting in the discussion with Abelas or the efforts to clean up the damage and tend to the fallen—either out of genuine interest in preserving the Temple or in an effort to butter up its guardians a little—can safely cross through the eluvian to help.

For those who are willing to sleep on the ground in a jungle Temple for a night or two instead, while the matter of the Well is resolved, it may be possible to slip away unnoticed to explore the Temple in the dark, at least until caught and escorted back to Riftwatch's makeshift camp, or for someone who's been appropriate respectful to convince one of the Temple guardians to show them some of the murals and statues. But venturing outside of the inner temple walls will require either traversing the crypts or walking the Path to get back inside. Every single time.

Comments

yngvi ota

[filthydipper]

I. REPELLING CORYPHEUS' FORCES
Thing is, right, thing is that hopefully no one is going to make Yngvi sit down and do any sort of property damage bollocks because Yngvi is an artificer and his first instinct in situations where stealth isn't called for (and it's not, here, he's not going to roll into and impale himself on a horny Templar thanks, he's read those books it ends badly for everyone) is to just hurl something.

That something being elemental mines.

At least they're pretty? Sort of? If you go for that sort of thing? And really, if you can't appreciate fire and ice and things being shocked then who are you, honestly.

III. THE CRYPTS
"And I mean bugger that for a lark!"

Is it out the hearing of one a candidate for the collective entry to 'top five weirdest elves' and 'top five weirdest people' (it's stiff competition now than it was previous, thanks rifters)? Maybe? Maybe not? Well Yngvi doesn't care because that sounded dodgy and he likes to think that he, grown beneath Kirkwall in the capable hands of the Carta knows dodgy. Knows it same as you know when and where you don't buy meat in times of scarcity when suddenly it shows up.

Yngvi didn't come out here to do weird elf shit anyway. (He did come to see what all the fuss is about but chances are you're not tall enough or sister-adjacent enough for that). And thanks to being a dwarf though because they are in short - get it - supply he's making out well down here in the crypts.

"I mean, what's so special about woo petitioner woo," he continues and hopefully that carries over his hands busy with something that clinks. It's a dark corner but dwarves got them eyes don't they? "Try getting to see the Viscount when Kirkwall still had one, now that was something."

wildcard
Maybe Yngvi has slipped off to explore. "Explore". To enrich himself in the culture or whatever words have tripped out of his mouth if he hasn't slunk off with the grace of a teenager waiting for parental company to leave so he can safely raid the kitchen. To go line his pockets more because that's the only sort of enriching your boy is in for thanks.

Or there are birds. There are loud terrible birds and Yngvi can be quiet and still when he has to be. Perched as awkwardly as you'd imagine a dwarf would be perched in search of a bird that he has no idea how to catch or what he'd do with when caught but he just wants it.

Or is he-- surely-- no...no he is. He's guddling about in the dirt. Is he using his cup to catch lizards?

(Or it's none of those things and he's conveniently somewhere, doing something and it can be rolled with.)

thranduil - ota

[rowancrowned]

( jump in at any point or wildcard! )

The sentinel is at least given the space of a few heartbeats before Thranduil makes for the path. There is an air about him, something settled around his shoulders, down the curve of his spine, even with the armor pulling his posture into shape. He does not gawp or gaze overlong at any feature in particular, nor is his step hesitant over the broken stones. Each step is purposeful, even processional; measured and twin to the one previous, which allows him to appear to float, rather than walk.

Both spirits- for his eagerness to begin makes it easy to watch him as he goes- take the forms of elves, or something near to them, and ones with the same excess of height, the same careless length of hair, the same unmistakable fluidity to their movements. His confidence slides off him as theirs steadies.

He flinches away from the first when it appears, taller than him, black of hair and dressed in red--

"Fëanor Finwëion," Thranduil says, to the overgrown garden and to himself, and then the conversation dissolves into rapid-fire Sindarin, Thranduil still throughout; a stag perpetually trapped in the moment of the hunt's horn blowing. But the great elven figure dissipates, finally, and he dips his head.

It remains downcast even unto the second figure, who is more light than figure, the suggestion of a face here, of ghostly flowers blooming where her feet do not meet the ground, a train that mimics starlight even as the sun cuts through it. Their conversation is longer, and anyone who has heard Thranduil speak will hear his accent shift, the ths slipping, the vowels long and lyrical, as he pleads and the spirit coaxes. His fingers twitch as if to reach out for her more than once, but the action is stilled at the wrist, and when it is done and he moves through the doors and into the waiting area, it is with no pride and less triumph.

wildcard

[rowancrowned]

The sentinels are motioning them inside, if begrudgingly, and Thranduil occupies himself with doing a quick headcount of Riftwatch, very pleased when the number is what it is supposed to be, and less pleased when one of the heads is far lower to the ground than it ought to be.

He wants, very badly, to be among the first in, to see, to soak in that feeling of familiarity. It is in such short supply in Thedas, and here, he has an (aged, decayed) taste of it.

But he will not leave Yngvi behind. He will not leave anyone behind, and so he falls back, and crouches beside Yngvi, and- ah.

"Wherever will you put it, if you catch it?"

alistair

[byblow]

a. the petitioner's path
(open but one thread please! or if you care but just want to say your character saw it without interrupting that's cool too)

He'd expected Loghain. Which is what he says: "I expected Loghain."

The spirit in front of him, in the leafy nook where Alistair found himself in while trying the ritual—feeling self-conscious and distantly ridiculous, half expecting one of the Sentinels to come fetch him and tell him it was all a joke to make a bunch of shems walk around in weird figures in their garden for a while, but on the other hand he's done weirder shit so—anyway. The spirit is a fair amount smaller than Loghain. More female. More elven. Maybe familiar, too, to people who spent time at Skyhold, or to mages who kept up with their own leaders, which is what makes him look back over his shoulder to make sure no one is paying attention before he says anything else.

"I understand why you—why she did it. It's fine. No punishment." He makes a facetiously magnanimous gesture, like a king dismissing his court.

The spirit wearing Fiona's washed-out face gives him a sad smile.

"I knew," it says, insisting on the first-person charade, with her Orlesian accent. "I knew how it was turning out, with the Arl and the Chantry. I could have at least written to you."

Alistair sighs. Not touched. Mostly impatient to have this over with. Arguing with Loghain would have been more fun.

"Well, sure, she could have done that," he says. Do these spirits understand sarcasm? He's about to find out. "Clearly she deserves to die."

b. temple sleepover

The sky is very clear, the stars very bright, the weather not too warm, this far south, or too cold, this time of year. They're anticipating another attempt from Corypheus' people, sooner or later, but not right away. Sleeping on the ground surrounded by lush vegetation and the distant sounds of frogs and bugs and owls could be sort of peaceful.

Except, "Do you think they're going to murder us?" he whispers to whomever has the misfortune of having a bedroll near his. "They don't have any reason to murder us, right? Other than murdering everyone else who tries to come here."

c. wildcard

kostos averesch

[exequy]

a. the crypts

Kostos made it far enough in the elven ritual to catch a glimpse of the form the first spirit intended to take, and then he was out, shaking his head at anyone who noticed him leaving like he didn't have time for this bullshit, even though the crypts will take longer to navigate. He can, at least, navigate them without putting anyone's capital crimes on public display.

He's only made it halfway through—maybe, hard to tell, maybe he's actually lost—when he stops, ankle-deep in murky water, to frown at something glinting on the wall. The wisp he's using for light, among other things, brightens helpfully and hovers over the barely-there markings.

Kostos never actually learned how to summon veilfire. Someone else was always there to do it. He knows the theory, though, and he's giving it an unsuccessful try when the sound of someone else moving in the water behind him makes him abruptly stop. Not that there's anything wrong with veilfire. There's just something very wrong with being observed failing at things, depending on who's potentially doing the observing.

b. wildcard

athessa sulahnan

[sulahnan]

A. THE CRYPTS

Or you could be a Dalish-born, Kirkwall-raised elf who refuses to be faced with the face of an old wound that never healed, and who is thus triple-shunned by your own kind.

Oh, wait.

At first it seems like Athessa could have an in with the Sentinels, if only because she speaks some far-removed version of their language. Before being presented with the test she’s able to communicate enough to be treated like a stupid child, but then she chickens out of the test and the neutral condescention becomes outright disdain.

“Not much of a scenic route,” she mutters, stepping over a toppled and moss-clad column. She walks ahead of whoever is carrying the torch. No sense going light-blind when your usefulness as a scout is heightened by dark vision. “That skeleton looks just like the last skeleton we passed.”

B. WILDCARD

a. crypts

[sulahnan]

"Oh, good, it's you," Oddly enough, a comment free of sarcasm. She actually sounds relieved that he is who he is, and that she happened upon him. She slogs through the water, her expression a mirror of Kostos' usual set jaw and slightly furrowed brow.

"I've just about had it with this place. Whatcha got there?"

[dirth]

Solas should find this more frightening, he thinks; he should be aware of what the cost might be and afraid to accept it. It is not the first time he has encountered ruins - both now, as they are, and how they had been in the past when Arlathan had been at its height. He sees it now and wishes, desperately, that things were different, but he does not quite have the strength to put any of his longing and sadness into words, to voice, to say what he feels and what he means.

It is not so easy, especially with so many eyes upon him.

He waits until Thranduil is done, until the figures are barely whispering in the world, and then he approaches. He must do his own, he knows that, but he ignores the knot in his stomach and the twitching of his fingers as he lays a hand on his friend's arm.

"Are you well?"

solas | ota

[dirth]

THE PETITIONER'S PATH

The path is agony for Solas.

He knows each of the faces as they come to stand before him, recognises them all. No one else could, of course - centuries dead, mourned and lost, the faces of the People who had come to pass because of the Veil, losing their immortality and fading into history. Some are marked with the vallaslin that the Dalish tried to reclaim, others bare-faced as he is; all of them gazing into his soul and asking him why. Why?

What is the Veil? What has -- done? After he held back the sky -- The cities, the pathways -- Our empire is ruins --

Each one is touched by Solas' hand. He does not speak loud enough to be heard, not unless you come to his shoulder, but he asks forgiveness from each one. He bows his head and accepts their anger, does not seem to attempt to defend himself. He knows what wrongs he has committed and he accepts it - he accepts it because what else can he do? He knows his guilt, he knows the failures that hang heavy on his shoulder.

The last spirit is something more than all the others, brighter and beautiful. Her face is marred by something, too bright a light to be seen, but Solas knows her all the same. He steps up to her and takes her hand, tries to, and bows his head. He asks forgiveness in a voice loud enough to be heard, broken with exhaustion and sadness, and when she bows her head and disappears he continues forward, the doorway opening and allowing him to pass.

He does not walk through immediately. He sits, and closes his eyes, and breathes.

THE TEMPLE OF MYTHAL

Yearning to greet each of the Sentinels is a painful thing because Solas knows them all, recognises them in spirit if not in name and face. He knows what power the Well holds and he can feel it burn in the back of his head, his eyes longing to release tears and his heart refusing to let them bleed; he cannot give away so much. Not here and not now, not when all the emotions spiral inside of him and make him feel too much all at once.

He uses the night to explore the temple, unafraid of the scolding of the Sentinels. They will know him as one of the People in the end, he thinks, and he reaches to touch fingers against the murals of the Evanuris, breathing in deep as he gazes at each one in turn.

They had been his fellows, once. Not friends, perhaps, but as close as he could imagine himself having at the time.

Eventually, he stops in front of a mural of Mythal, wolf statues surrounding her completely, and he sits, staff at his side, eyes closed, silent and prepared for the evening to pass. He waits to speak with Abelas, with the other Sentinels, to share his language with people who truly know it, and expects that he will eventually be disturbed.

It will come. He is sure.

[filthydipper]

No one had told him there would be lizards, you see.

(Maybe someone had and Yngvi had missed the memo or hadn't bothered paying attention because why should he care about weird old elf bullshit that doesn't pertain to him at all?)

There are lizards, small and delightful and skittering about underfoot where they probably aren't exciting compared to the splendour of weird old elf bullshit from days gone by and weird old elves who remind Yngvi, worryingly, of some of his tutors in childhood who were only doing things because it was expected of them and not out of any real desire to do the thing they were doing. Anyway he doesn't jump when someone crouches by him because that's the sign of a guilty conscience that is and what does-- right, fine, a hundred things to be plenty guilty over but not what he's up to, almost got it--

"Dunno," he says, face half-turned but eyes firmly on the lizards who hold very still as if they won't be seen before they skitter with the tiniest pattering of feet over the ground. "Have to catch one first but I got big pockets, left the nugs and the cat back in Kirkwall for this, there's only so much I'll subject the innocent to."

b

[bouchonne]

"Why Loghain?"

By doesn't ask this question out on the Petitioner's Path. He holds it till later, when they're all tucked away on bedrolls and when leaving would be a great big pain in the arse and so he's likely to be able to have a captive audience for a little while, at least. His voice is idle, a little wry - perfectly nonthreatening.

"Why did you expect him?"

flint | ota

[katabasis]

I. repelling corypheus' forces (ota, single thread)
Somewhere in the fray: a small contigent of well ordered Red Templar foot soldiers have figured out how to use their broad shields and one of their monstrously corrupted companions to their greatest advantage. They move in a constantly oscillating line - first driving forward with their shield line, then breaking to allow the partially crystalized creature through to lay waste with great, more than half mad strokes of a sword fused to hand by burst flesh and hardened lyrium, then closing again about them to start all over again.

It's a simple trick, being used far too effectively.

"You," -- this barked from Flint, materializing out of the chaos with a sword in one hand and an axe in the other. There's a free flowing cut on his neck, the result of some absurdly lucky sidestep that had successfully kept his head on his shoulders. "With me. We're going to break that."

II. the petitioner's path (ota, single thread)
There is an old story in Tevinter. It goes like this: a long time ago, there was a beloved young student of Thalasian whose name we no longer remember. He was sent by the Archon with a handful of trusted men to scout a secret path through the Arlathan forest with strict instructions to avoid all eyes. "And should you become separated, trust that you'll meet again," said the Archon.

For two days, the scouting party travels through the forest. That night, the party is awoken by a distant voice calling out. It happens every night after, though the voice never seems to get any closer. On the sixth night in the Arlathan, a storm comes and the parry is scattered in the dark. The student finds himself alone. Terrified of being found alone, he takes to calling out for his companions. He calls out every night after, and no reply ever comes. There is no other voice in the dark.

When the scouting party returns, they report to the Archon the successful discovery of their path and the loss of his student. "Every night, we heard him calling for us, but he always seemed to be moving opposite to us."

The moral for soldiers and young children is to do as you're told and be faithful, because even the most precious name can be forgotten.

It's an absurd story, but Flint finds himself thinking of it now as he winds through the overgrown labyrinth with its dappled shadows and curving natural passages of ivy and tangled tree boughs. It's a primordial kind of relief to be wandering in similar circles and to find himself irritated instead of dreading what might lay around each corner.

Which is a pleasant thought until, with startling abruptness, the corridor cracks open into a broad uneven courtyard from which a half dozen paths extend as spokes on a wheel. At its center, some great transluscent shape comes uncoiled.

The snake raises its slab-like head. In the center of its heavy, incorporeal body twist strange fleeting forms: swords and snapped arrows and mangled humanoid shapes, the bizarre detritus of a million swallowed things.

[wythersake]

"More rot."

Isaac corrects, in words subdued enough to pass for mild. He's made his own exit from the test at speed, but that hardly matters now —

"One a scale of one to cursed...?"

He trails off, eyeing an array of tombs ahead.

[limier]

"Took your time."

As though she hadn't, a thundering ball of nerves and forward momentum — both shed now, arrayed stone-faced in the sanctum with the rest of them. There are many things they haven't spoken of; she does not imagine they will now. Who was she? Cannot pronounce her own guesses. They all sound the same way, in the end: Important.

wildcard;

[limier]

Habits die a still death. She's wanted to spy the exits, the camp; she's lingered there longer than thought (paralysis is a habit of its own). There are only so many ways back in to the temple, and strolling along that road again requires,

Some preparation. Preparation's in her hand now, a bottle stowed half a world away, kept for precisely this sort of moment. Preparation. Fortification. It tastes like dirt, but that's Ferelden swill for you. The dirt's the point.

She's quiet against the wall; the world is not. The birds scream. The jungle rustles. Somewhere ahead, the path is singing. She's quiet — swallowing the heat of it — it takes her a while to catch the scrape of his cup over earth. Another day might hail him with a name, a smile. A hundred such days.

Long gone. A heel kicks hard against crumbled stone. Gravel rustles free. Due warning: He's not alone.

a

[doneisdone]

"That was your first mistake," comes the muttered reply-- expecting Loghain leads to disappointment more often than not, as Teren has found. But she leaves her commentary at that, side-eyeing the ghostly Fiona while Alistair talks to her.

If only it were easier to punch a ghost.

I

[doneisdone]

He doesn't have to tell her twice.

"Fuckin hate these things," Teren mutters, launching forward with Flint, both hands gripping a blade, one of which punches in and out of the nearest Red Templar chest as easily as a hot knife through butter. "Don't get it in your mouth."

Bartolomeo "Barty" Bjurnsen | OTA

[gentlecountry]

i. Forces
It's a point of pride, for Barty, that he's always been a neat and deft hand, at killing. You have to be a good killer, to be a good farmer, after all; not merely able to spill blood and life, nor to stand the sight and smell, the warmth of it. You have to be a good killer. Good at it. Good at deciding when it should happen. And what good meant, here as in most cases, was quick.

"Now, I don't suppose we can haves a civilized conversations about this, then?" The thing, once a templar, roared like a bear or the way a bear would be if it could really know what rage was, instead of only feeling it, and charged "...Well, that's a shame."

He fought like an old man walks; carefully, each movement economic, purposeful, and aforethought. It was a very dwarven way to fight, with nothing of flourishes, as square and practical as clean-cut stone, and about as forgiving. In sharp contrast to the unassuming arc of each arm as he threw were the axes themselves; a shining flash of polished steel and leather handle, flitting through the air like a kingfisher. It necessitated that he follow the path of his destruction of course; one could carry only so many throwing weapons, when they were the size of an axe, however small and tidy an axe they might be.

But that was alright: no sense in keeping them waiting, after all. And he'd a Warden's stamina and an officer's experience; Barty could keep this up, practically all day.


ii. Path
Barty was a big believer in respecting people's beliefs and trying to be kind where one could, or at least polite, and if it weren't possible to be any of those things, he could settle for simply not taking up more of their time than was strictly necessary. But there was one place and type of person for whom none of that applied: family.

Which is why it was, in the end, truly unfortunate that one of the Spirits had decided to take the form of one Larimar Bjurnsen, the brother of a Warden by the same name.

"...Why you see fit to comes round and plow up old sod like—"

"Oh sod, is it! Sod. I'll sod you, you hopped up duster!"

"That's Warden-Constable Duster to you, y'piss poor excuse of a tart!"

"Tart! At least I can bake one!"

"Hope it was worth betrayin' your own blood for half a nug farm and another thing at least I dids more for myself than go lay down for Daryl Dales, as if thats were somes kinds of catch!"

"How dare you talks about my Darry that way! I oughts to have kicked you outs sooner if I knowed you were such a nug-humping, dust-sucking, sandy-arsed..."

"You insultin' my baking now? MY BAKING, WOMAN?!"

"TOO RIGHT, YOU HEARDS ME, BARTOLOMEO BJURNSEN. YOUR TARTS TASTE LIKE CHEESE!"

"THEY'RE MEANTS TO, THEY ARE CHEESE TARTS."

It goes on like that for a while. Whatever the Spirit had intended, or thought it had gotten itself into, it's now trapped in a generations-deep dwarven feud, steeped in inheritance law and personal grudges. Barty does not, for a significant time, seem at all likely to finish the petition with any success, beyond that of venting what seems to be some fairly deep-rooted issues with the shade of what is, with increasing clarity, his sister.

But eventually, something changes, or perhaps some turn of the argument reaches an invisible seed of judgement. Maybe someone wins; stranger things have happened in the throes of sibling rivalry. In any case, the spirit, satisfied, or at least browbeaten into a semblance of satisfaction, ceases to bar his way, and Barty stomps past it to find a bench, and sit down sharply.

He's not done being mad yet. But give him a minute, and it'll all be fine.

[rowancrowned]

Thranduil doesn’t feel the fingers at first, so wound up is he in what he saw. Then he does, and he turns to look, and the smile that he offers is weak and wan.

“They are only memories,” he says. “My own heart thrown back at me through a mirror.”

Melian would have never—

He shakes his head, and lays his fingers over Solas’, more to anchor himself than to offer comfort. Then they are gone, and Thranduil settles himself. The glamour holds, as it always does, and soon he will move to the next challenge.

“Are you at liberty to walk with me?” he asks. Through the door, and beyond. There is so much of this place that Thranduil wants to see, and he thinks the sentinels will allow him it, as long as he does not pry into the corners still in use or the sacred parts. “I have questions, and I would not bother Abelas with them.”

(He absolutely would, and will, given half a chance.)

[rowancrowned]

“Yngvi needed assistance,” he says, solem, coming into step with her. “Catching lizards. Elven grace and speed has many uses.”

He takes a moment to pull his waterskin out of his pack, and uncorks it to take a swallow, then offers it to Coupe. It’s clean, and sweet, and cool if not cold—he ought to ask where he might refill it, because it is half-full and this is a jungle, not a forest.

“Who appeared to you?” Thranduil asks.

[rowancrowned]

Thranduil weighs his options, and looks at the very small, jewel-toned lizards, and does not look up at the very large, jewel-toned elves. He could, he supposes, attempt to communicate with them—such is elven grace—but his talents had always lain with the birds and the deer, and the other sort of creatures who had called his land home.

His gloved hand snaps out, too fast for the eye, and then—

A lizard, gently held by the ribs between thumb and forefinger, somewhat dazed, and then squirming frantically, climbing a wall that is not there.

[limier]

"Blessed Andraste."

The tug of her mouth suggests a joke; the direction suggests it’s not too far from truth. In Orlesian:

"I expected greater resistance," From their hosts, so quick to embrace the destruction of their temple's purpose. She drinks, passes it back (a hand clapped brief to arm). "They are quick to trust we do not seek it."

Considering,

"Else confident that we are more easily turned."

[rowancrowned]

“What form did she take for you?” instantly curious, the spirits can only reflect what the viewer expects—it’s wonderful, frankly. But as she switches, he complies, and tucks the waterskin back away.

“Those who could bear it are not willing, and those who would are not able,” he says. Are the sentinels able to understand Orlesian? How old is Abelas, anyway? All these questions and more, Thranduil has not been yet able to sneak into conversation. “And I agree with him. Better it be destroyed.”

[limier]

"Vast." She chooses, "Shining."

Not the Prophet at all.

"Abelas," The taste of it strange in its syllables. Suspicion of the man stays her, where logic would endorse his plan — in destroying it, they trust the Well is as he claims, they trust this alliance of need is an alliance at all. "What becomes of him, when this is done?"

II

[doneisdone]

Standing there with him and double his height is one very tired-looking Teren von Skraedder, who prefers to stay out of the dramatics, rubbing her temple.
It's once the arguing seems to have died down somewhat that she cuts in slowly, with a hopeful "to the crypts then?"