Closed

[keenly]

WHO: Wysteria, Sonia, John, Colin.
WHAT: Damsels take a road trip
WHEN: Bloomingtide 1-3ish
WHERE: The Crossroads
NOTES: This post.

Dramatis Personae:

Cato
(non-mage)
The ranking infantry officer. Most seem to follow his orders.

Octavia
(mage)
The chief Venatori overseer. She has the power to override Cato's commands, and lets him know it.

Claudia
(mage)
Venatori. Specializes in glyphs, spirit magic, and entropy.

Flavius
(mage)
Tevinter infantry healer

Aurelia
Venatori mage

Marcus
(non-mage)
Tevinter infantry

Rufus
(non-mage)
Tevinter infantry

Philo
(non-mage)
Tevinter infantry, very young and patriotic, didn't expect he'd have to commit atrocities.

 

Comments

capture

[keenly]

Most of the time, the person in the back of the party doesn't have to worry too much about traps. Colin isn't even looking when he steps right into one. His connection to the Fade narrows and nearly shuts, an unsettling and familiar feeling. Thinking one of their own might have left an active glyph, he looks down at his feet and before he can say anything, a knife is at his throat.

Eight Tevinters appear, surrounding the group, weapons drawn. An arm hooks around Colin from behind, pressing the dagger closer to his throat.

"Weapons on the ground," barks the man holding him. Colin's eyes widen in fear and he holds very still. "Your mage is useless to you now."

[vorbratta]

Somehow, even knowing the dangers of being in Riftwatch, the idea of real, immediate danger always seemed a distant prospect in Sonia's mind. Now, faced with it for the first time in a very long time, she freezes immediately, heart in her throat. Ser Ellis has been doing his valiant best to teach her swordplay, but her grasp of combat is still weak. The short sword she's carrying might as well be a joke.

"Please," she says quickly, lowering her weapon carefully to the ground, and she keeps her open hands visible as she straightens back up. Her hands are shaking slightly. Racing thoughts overtake her mind -- What do they want? What are they going to do? "Wait -- there's no need to hurt him, please."

[heirring]

As the head of their little expedition group, Wysteria had just a moment ago been busying herself with the examination of a decidedly nervy looking stone footpath leading from this particular landmass filled with crumbled old columns and a series of twisting stone walls, across a great chasm of nothing in particular to an island that might be described as a verdant valley were it not so dreadfully washed out. The path presents a few problems, namely that is is narrow and the first stone has fallen away under her foot when she'd first begun to traipse across it. And while there must be a trick to keeping it in place so they might pass - a point she has been discussing out loud for at least the past minute, which may or may not have anything to do with how easily they are located by certain marauding bands of Venatori -, it is hardly one so immediate as to be obvious.

At the first sound of trouble, Wysteria seems at first put out - less frightened and more irritated as she turns from the puzzle path back to face whatever ruckus is occurring to the rear of their scouting party. But she's a sensible enough girl ([citation needed]), and the sight of a knife blade against anyone's throat has a way of sobering up any situation.

Wysteria holds up her hands, then remembers the dagger at her belt and tosses it away. Her hands promptly return to the appropriate 'I surrender' position.

forgive mE the latest arrival

[hornswoggle]

Fear sparks and recedes to some far off corner of his mind as John considers the situation at hand. He's vastly outnumbered, the only other person with some combat capability is useless to him now, and even if he cared to tip his own hand, could he kill eight people quickly enough to make a difference?

No, he cannot. The burn of Flint's censure doesn't affect that calculation. He could kill one or two, but not enough to matter. Not when he can't tell which of them are mages. (They could very likely all be mages.) He hesitates for a long moment, watching the man poised to open Colin's throat before he twitches his coat open and pulls his sword free to toss alongside Wysteria's dagger.

"I'll keep the crutch, if it's all the same to you."

He suffered the last kidnapping leaning on a borrowed stick. If he has to suffer this indignation again, he's going to keep one advantage. (And one concealed advantage, for the time being.)