faderift | [OPEN] FROM RIFTWATCH WITH LOVE: PART ONE

[OPEN] FROM RIFTWATCH WITH LOVE: PART ONE

WHO: Everyone and anyone
WHAT: An abomination redecorates the Gallows.
WHEN: Early August
WHERE: The Gallows
NOTES: Part One of FROM RIFTWATCH WITH LOVE. Will include some violence, some general chaos, and some light murderin'.

There is a man in a worn traveling cloak. He is dark haired, with sharp features dominated by a dark horizontal scar near his hairline, and later someone will describe him as having been soft spoken when he asked for directions.

But something in the Gallows' dining hall, with its unreliable population for the midday meal, must catch under his skin; he's found his voice again by the time he steps up onto one of the benches.

"Is this all of you?"

Someone nearby tells him to get his boots off the furniture, so the man climbs higher onto the table and is louder the second time: "Is this really all you are? A few people in a tower on an island?"

Heads are coming up. As his voice rises, he produces an envelope from his pocket.

"Do you think this is funny? Playing at being something, and telling people you can make a difference to them? You were supposed to be helping, but you're all just sitting here! Don't touch me"—to someone encouraging him to get off the fucking table—"You were meant to be helping us. You promised you would, and I told her I believed you!"

Hands are reaching for him. No, really, get off the table. You can explain what's wrong once you're down; you're with friends— The man jerks his arm free, snarling, "Don't touch me! You're nothing!" A stronger hand finds him then and begins pulling him struggling down. With a wrenched cry of, "Livia!" the man slips from the table.

A column of fire pours upward out of him like molten heat from a crack in the earth. It bursts so high that it scorches a circle on the dining hall ceiling, and burns so suddenly hot that it sends those nearest to him recoiling backward as their clothes catch. The fire licks again in random directions, in chaotic fits and starts of light and heat, and the thing that rises up again in the mage's place isn't really a man at all.

The rage abomination will ravage its way through the dining hall and prodigious Gallows kitchens, then out into the courtyard beyond leaving considerable destruction in its wake until finally brought down by Leander. In the charred aftermath, the following can be recovered from among the mage's belongings: a leather corded bracelet with a green bead woven in it (too small for anything but the smallest wrist), a functioning phylactery, and a letter from "Riftwatch" which implies a history of correspondence and familiarly refers to the recipient by name, 'Felix.' An investigation of Riftwatch's files will reveal the log of having received a message from a similar Felix, No Lastname six months earlier. The message itself is nowhere to be found among the Gallows records.

The recovered letter assures Felix that all will be well, and includes instructions to wait in the woods above the crossroads of a small Wildervale village.

'Help will be on its way. Good luck, and safe travels.'

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Jenny Lou's understatement had actually pulled a damp laugh out of Matthias. Maybe a little mania, too. Now with the appearance of Athessa, though, he starts trying to pull himself together. Manages to sit up a bit straighter, at least.

"I can do it," he says thickly, "mostly. Then the healers and medics, and all, after. I'm-- I just want to stay here. F'now."

Dimly, then, it occurs to him to look around at them.

"You're-- You're both all right?"

Hey, sometimes mania means surviving is like 0.3% easier. Either way, she gives Athessa a wave and says to Matthais, "Imma need a hair cut and like a big fucking tub of burn cream, but otherwise I'm chill." She squints down at him, "Your leg does look kinda fucked up though."

It's just not physically possible to keep the concern off of Athessa's face as she traverses around the rubble to crouch in front of Matthias.

"She's got a point," she says, and it's 100% true. His leg doesn't look good. But it isn't his leg that she holds an expectant hand out for. "Lemme see your hand."

Since returning from Orlais, with Derrica's own burns fresh in her mind at any given moment, Athessa has taken to carrying a small container of elfroot poultice with her on the off chance that someone will need it. The least she can do for Matty and Jenny Lou is ease a little pain.

"By the time I got in here it was over."

Sluggish, Matthias lifts his hand off of the ground and holds it toward Athessa. The pain of it still feels distant, if it's there at all. Looking at it makes it worse. Mottled black and pink and yellow, with deep cracks and burst blisters that leave behind craters, his hand is ugly enough to match his leg, but at least it was bare when it burned. None of the charred and fused cloth.

"Me too. A haircut. I'm-- Today fucking sucks," he says, echoing Jenny Lou. And then, because he's started speaking, more words follow: "It was a mage what did it. An abomination. I didn't-- want him to die. There's not a way to undo it. When you go like that. There should be," and why is he saying any of this; he tips his head back so he can look up at the sky instead. "It's not how it has to be, y'know? It shouldn't be."

"Yeah, Colin told me, ya know... That process." Jenny Lou lets her head fall back, knocking it a little on the rubble they're seated against. She's heard of people getting possessed before, but nothing like that before. "It's fucked up. That was a whole ass person."

There has to be a way to undo it, surely. Athessa's no mage, and knows next to nothing about magic, but she's heard about the Tranquil. She knows about Templars. If they can work out a way to stop magic, surely they can find a way to reverse it, too.

"Can you move your fingers?" She asks, letting her thoughts remain her own for now. The elfroot poultice is gel-like and cooling, which should offer some small relief while also preventing infection, unlikely as it is that it might become so on the way to the infirmary.

Then, to Jenny Lou: "What's your damage, kid?"

It's 100% light and friendly, despite her worry. And she's asking about injuries, not asking what her damage is.

Still looking at the sky, Matthias frowns in concentration. His fingers feel stiff, like they're inside a frozen glove. He fixates on bending them, as Athessa has asked. The amount of concentration required is a welcome distraction.

Slowly, the pinky and ring fingers curl--not flush to the palm, but close. The middle makes it about halfway, and his forefinger doesn't move at all.

Working on that, with Jenny Lou's words rattling around in his head, Matthias doesn't have the capacity to say anything else. He leaves the space for her to answer Athessa. A whole person.

"Ah, ya know, the usual." Jenny Lou's tone is light in turn. She's still above the reality of the situation, the lightheadedness from the adrenaline drain making her giddy.

"Got a little crisped up, feel like somebody scrapped out my insides with a rusty butter knife. Probably gonna scream cry later, but otherwise, I'm chill."

She watches Matty's attempts at moving his fingers, and signals that he can stop with a gentle touch. The salve will help soften his skin so it isn't like drying leather in the hot sun. She applies it delicately, careful not to apply too much pressure, and smiles at Jenny Lou's candor.

"Well, after you both get some healing," she says, and spreads the plant-gel between Matthias' fingers. "There's a warehouse down by the docks in Kirkwall where nobody'll care if you smash some shit. And I have plenty of elfroot and valerian if you need help sleeping."

It all still hurts, but perhaps that's good. There's something good about feeling. Maybe about pain as well. The thought feels complicated, so Matthias stops thinking it. Smashing and sleeping both sound good--the second more than the first, at least for the moment.

"Is it yours?" He finally lifts his head so he can look around at Athessa. Takes a moment to focus. "The warehouse?"

His eyes fix on the scar when he asks it, without meaning to. Well-healed, if still fairly fresh. Not from this. She already said she wasn't around, so she's all right. Next time, maybe not, but this time. Jenny Lou as well. This time. Insides all scraped out, put back in, is better than baked. This time.

"Honestly, I'd be down for going up to Hightown and chucking bricks at rich fuck's windows. That would be like productive at least."

Because the world is fucked up and apparently sometimes people get possessed by demons and no ones figured out how to fix it other than killing them so. Yeah. Property damage. They should do some of that.

Athessa laughs, incredulous, and looks at Matthias with a lopsided smile.

"No, of course it's not mine," What a ridiculous thing to ask. Have you met her? "I don't own anything. Do I look like someone who owns shit?" Then, to Jenny Lou, she adds: "I won't stop you but if anyone asks I told you not to do it. People'll take any excuse to distrust us."

With Matty's hand seen to, for now at least, she glances down at his leg and winces in sympathy. It looks bad.

"Matty--"

"I dunno," Matthias says, as defensively as he can muster, "maybe. You might've."

No, of course she doesn't own a warehouse, what a stupid thing to say. A good escape from the mild sting of stupidity comes when he cranes his neck to look down at his leg. Mottled and charred, black and yellow and red, sticky with blood and melt and patched with burnt fabric. He's seen worse. Once on him, even. The sight of it still turns his stomach, but he doesn't let himself look away. He looks until he can get used to the sight. That's his leg.

"A healer can sort it," he says, staunchly. He's gray under the soot again, and he swallows hard. "Just-- not yet. I'll stay here for a bit. Neither of you have got to stay, I'll-- be all right."

Jenny Lou arches her brows at Athessa and says, "Puh-leeze, I'm not that much of an amateur. Unless the bougie fuckers got some kind of magical security system, they're not gonna catch me."

And she's been pointedly not looking at Matthias' leg, cus like... She's gonna stress vomit, but she doesn't actually want to do it right now. Instead she looks at his face and nudges him a little again with her shoulder. "If I fuck off now, I'm probably gonna do some shit that'll get me arrested," which flies in the face of what she just told Athessa, but! "I need some post traumatic event bro time, if you're cool with that."

She can't say she didn't expect any of this. Not the whole...abomination and burned friends thing--which is honestly happening far too much lately, and she can still see the burns on Derrica's skin in that godforsaken dungeon--but their reactions.

So Athessa sighs, the same way that Sister Sara has sighed about her many times, and shakes her head. And she smiles. What can she do? Not much.

Not much except sit back and get comfortable on the rubble. She's not going anywhere, not yet anyway.

Matthias feels a tightness in his chest as they both settle down. It has nothing to do with an injury, just--that it's good, that they're here. Jenny Lou's arm is pressed against his, and Athessa is just there, and they're not leaving--which of course they aren't, they're his friends--but it still feels good, to have them here.

"If you could wreck anything," he says, after a moment, "what would it be?"

Too soon, after an abomination tore through their home? Maybe. But with warehouses and bricks through windows and all being a very different sort of wrecking, they all ought to be able to separate that out. He tries flexing his fingers again, carefully starting at the little finger and working inward.

"If we didn't have to worry about getting busted?" She wants to say a Chantry. She knows where the power lies in this world and it fuckin' chafes, but even with that tight hot ball of rage in her chest, she knows better than to say somethings.

There's always a second option anyway, since some things are multidimensional: "I totally wanna go bug fuck crazy in some rich fuck's castle. Maybe Orlesian, they seem like their rich fucks would be extra snobby and I feel like they'd have those really big fancy windows and chandeliers and shit." She gestures illustratively, "I'd take a bat to the windows and chandeliers and all the fancy vases and shit. Then I'd bust up the furniture."

Athessa exaggerates her contemplation, planning to pick something ridiculous like one of the big naval ships or all of Kirkwall or whatever, but then the act drops as she realizes the thing she'd really, truly like to wreck...

...And what might actually be feasible after some light reconnaissance.

"There's an estate in Hightown," she starts, and Matthias can undoubtedly recognize that Look she has. It's been a while since they've gone anywhere with the sole purpose of doing something stupid. "Belonged to probably the fucking worst bored rich fuck I've ever met. But he's dead now. I've always wanted to absolutely destroy his wine cellar. Smash all of it."

Busting apart a chandelier sounds so satisfying that the mere suggestion works past everything else Matthias is feeling and plants a little bright spot in him. What are chandeliers held together with? Wire? But you could bring it down, easily, even if it was hanging far overhead.

Athess's started suggestion, plus the look in her eye, both have a similar effect. Everything still fucking hurts, but--

"We'd have to drink some of the wine."

Important. He pushes himself up a little bit, not enough that he moves his leg, but enough that he's less slumped.

"Who's drinking wine?" comes the question, heralding Derrica's arrival.

There is a scrape all down her right side, soot and burns and bruises splotched across bare skin. Her fingers find Athessa's shoulder, mark her with a light squeeze but Matthias is the clear objective here. Maybe he's been through two wars, but he is still too young to have seen what happened here.

Derrica does not think of Marcus' hands on the body of what had once been a man with pain in his voice. She leans against the rubble, lightly tweaks a lock of Matthias' hair in greeting.

"Is everyone alright?" She asks, which is more or less an invitation for her to be useful, to smooth away what she can in the moment.

Matthias perking up is great and so Jenny Lou is grinning when Derrica shows up. It's a wild, manic grin.

"We're gonna steal wine out of some rich dead fucker's wine cellar and then wreck the rest." Like it's been decided. "Cus we totally gotta take some of the wine. Like the nice shit, so we can have a rager after all the smashing."

Athessa looks up at Derrica upon her arrival, smiling with relief that someone who can actually do something is here. Her eyes linger too long on the mage's fresh burns, bruises, that scrape, and she looks down again until she can force a fresh, lopsided grin onto her face.

"If anyone asks I did initially try to talk them out of it," she laughs, absently touching her shoulder where Derrica's hand had just been. Conveniently the shoulder that still bears some bruising from Churneau.

"But then Matty asked what we'd wreck if we could, and I brought up Devigny's wine cellar--" And one thing led to another, etc.

"We'll not get sick. At least, not too sick."

Matthias doesn't even try to flinch away from Derrica the way that he might in another setting. He smiles up at her, his skin the color of rotten oats under all the soot and grit that coats him, showing through clearest in the tear tracks. The front part of his fringe has burnt off and left his face very open. His wrecked hand is cradled in his lap, and his leg is stuck out in front of him, all burnt and ugly, but now Derrica is here, and he's thinking about what comes next, the wine cellar, wrecking some prick's house--which can't be legal, surely they could get into trouble, but only if they're caught--

There's still the shadow of the abomination at the edge of it all. Fear and sadness this bile at the back of his throat. He is trying to distance himself from it, for now. Crawling back out. He holds his hand up for Derrica to see, to show her without speaking of it. Better if he doesn't speak of it right now. The poultice Athessa had spread is globbed thick between his stiff burnt fingers, the smell of elfroot doing its best to overpower the stench of burned flesh.

"Devigny," he repeats Athessa, trying to get the sound of the name right. Not easy with his Free Marcher accent. "No one can talk us out of it now, and we're all in on it together, right? Has it got chandeliers?"

The first three things Derrica wants to say are discarded. Athessa and Jenny Lou have done enough to help him brighten away from misery. He doesn't need to hear Derrica spill out the kind of soft coddling that she knows would draw out the weight of what they'd just seen. Instead, she crouches alongside him, knee knocking against his as her eyes find his face.

She knows. Derrica feels it too. Any mage who'd seen it happen must feel the same grief.

"All of the rich people here have chandeliers, so no one should begrudge you and Jenny Lou a few of them," Derrica says, instead of I'm so sorry you saw that happen. or That will never be you, I would never permit it. "And I would never try to save Devigny's wine cellars from the three of you."

A quick glance at Athessa before she cups Matthias' hand in her own, ducks her head and blows softly between her palms. There is a soft glow of light, a cool prickle of sensation where her breath meets his skin, dousing the heat of the burn and chasing the shine of the burn from Matthias' skin.

"Hell yeah." Matthias' enthusiasm feeds into Jenny Lou's, keeping her from sinking down into helpless rage at the fucking all of it. No care for the trouble they could get into, because everything's already fucked.

"Fuck that guy's chandeliers and his fancy shit. Since we don't got some prick's castle to fuck up, we should trash this dude's place."

[OPEN] FROM RIFTWATCH WITH LOVE: PART ONE

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beka said i could.

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