faderift | MOD PLOT ↠ A THOUSAND WRONGS

WHO: Everyone!
WHAT: Assisting with the aftermath of occupation
WHEN: August through Kingsway
WHERE: Field of Ghislain
NOTES: OOC post. Please use appropriate content warnings in your comment subject lines as needed.

The Fields of Ghislain are, as the name suggests, broad open plains, more flat than not, more grass than trees. There are famous orchards around Arlesans at the southern end, but they fade into grassland and farm land, wide fields of wheat and corn separating quiet farming villages and the occasional bustling market town, the even more occasional country estate.

High summer here has always meant long hot days, dusty roads, and preparations for the harvest. Now it also means recovery from the sudden end to the area's year-and-a-half of occupation by the forces of Corypheus. On first glance, the area appears to have escaped relatively unscathed. There are a few burnt villages here and there, a few new rifts, and the scarred valley where the Battle of Ghislain took place, but there are also crops growing strong in the fields and markets open for business, people going about their lives.

On closer inspection, there's more work to be done. The immediate threats are obvious: an unusual number of rifts and the general thinning of the Veil they signal, small bands of enemies—including bands of darkspawn with red lyrium growths—still marauding through the region, isolated patches of red lyrium to be destroyed and Blight to be contained.

Most places have at least one building that's been destroyed by fire or force, some practically essential—a grain store, an infirmary, a watch tower—some invaluable in other ways—a chantry, a mayor's office, a monument to heroic ancestors. Some places showed more resistance than others, and there whole neighborhoods or even entire villages have been gutted by fire and the ruins shoved over like block towers. Some survivors fled and now return to pick through the debris, while others remained, living in shanties in the ashes waiting for a chance to rebuild. Despite the crops ripening in the fields there are signs of malnutrition in many places as well, stories of crops confiscated to feed the invading troops and only meager rations returned, worse off even than those affected by shortages elsewhere in Orlais.

And it's not just the material that the enemy has taken or destroyed. Every decent-sized village has its missing, people who were arrested and taken away in wagons or simply vanished one day out of the blue. Where there was resistance there were executions to discourage it, and while the inhabitants have already taken down and buried the displayed bodies, there are a few places where there is no one left to do so, or where magic placed remains out of reach but always in sight.

There are opportunities too: the enemy lived and worked here for 18 months. They did their best to cover their tracks when they left, but it was a hasty and unexpected withdrawal, and there is a wealth of information to collect and work through. There are houses they occupied that haven't been entirely cleaned out, papers only half-burned in an abandoned office, a storeroom in an outpost basement they forgot to empty. And there are the people who have been forced to live and work alongside them all this time to be spoken with, the names they've learned and the conversations they've overheard, the training exercises held on their village greens, all to be teased out and taken down.

One abandoned operation commands particular attention: the site that Riftwatch—then the Inquisition—observed on the eve of the Battle might be a shrine to the Old God Dumat. At the time this was a newly-discovered ruin and little could be discerned for certain, but during their occupation the Venatori have undertaken massive excavations. They've uncovered not just a shrine but a significant temple complex, much of it underground. Exploration of the lowest levels will be handled by a particular team, but there is more to see and do besides. The warren of ruins and the remains of the camp outside them must be searched for clues as to the Venatori's purpose here, and a preliminary study made of the site's contents. There are also the slaves who did the back-breaking labor of digging out the complex and now need assistance. Many are locals, who simply need a ride back to their homes. Others the Venatori brought with them from Tevinter, and they will need to be interviewed and local communities persuaded to take them in.

It is an unimaginable amount of work, but Riftwatch isn't doing it alone. The Inquisition still has a large number of noncombatants, many of whom have been sent to help with outreach and rebuilding in particular. The Exalted March, too, has plenty of volunteers that aren't exactly fit for the front lines. There is enough ground to cover for everyone, but there will be times when Riftwatch agents will be working with—or at least alongside—those from the Inquisition and the Exalted March, and orders are clear that they are to maintain good working relations and not start any trouble.

In between all of this there will be long rides by horse or cart from this village to that one over dirt tracks with cicadas buzzing in the sun, sweltering afternoons broken up by sudden, drenching thunderstorms, warm evenings playing pétanque on the green with the locals over a pint of cider. There will be as many wary as grateful, but hopefully by the end of the summer Riftwatch can tip that balance a little bit.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

He considers he question seriously. "I'd put the odds at about 20%. Unlikely, but not a possibility we can entirely rule out. And," he adds, "certainly less alarming than options like the Veil being thin in this wing of the house for no evident reason."

There would be a catch to such a luxurious posting, though he'd hoped it had been mainly the count's absentmindedness.

"Have you seen anything, or just heard?"

"Just heard," she answers, leading the way around the corner. It's a long corridor, dark even to someone with fancy elf eyes that see better than others. What light there is casts long shadows, creating spectres where there are none, and lending every portrait on the walls with their ornate frames a foreboding countenance.

"What do we do if the Veil is thin here?"

Edited (subject line who needs em) 2020-09-01 01:29 (UTC)

It gives him pause. "If we don't see any greenish areas, or run across any rogue blood mages hiding in closets, it's probably not in any immediate danger of tearing. If the Veil is thin but intact, the worst we can probably expect is an apparition or two. An actual tear..." The silence stretches for a moment.

"If it's a rift, we get a few colleagues to come right away and close it. If it's something else, we evacuate everyone very quickly."

Very reassuring.

The mention of blood mages makes Athessa stop to turn and listen to him more attentively, rather than in passing over her shoulder, but having a general plan is enough to make moving forward again a bit more tenable.

"Okay, then," A few more steps down the hall, then she turns again, this time with a clarifying question: "If we do find blood mages hiding in closets, do you have any handy spells at the ready for that? Like Sleep or somethin'?"

He takes the question seriously: "I have a spell that can drain another mage's magical energy temporarily. It's a bit of a calculated risk, as it's quite tiring to cast, but with surprise it would probably be the best option." A beat. "If that fails, I could always set him on fire, but probably not ideal."

Hm. She purses her lips and considers the options, then nods decisively.

"Alright. How about every time we open a closet, we keep to either side so if there is someone in there, they'll have to step out in order to see us," She continues on down the hall, feeling a familiar twitch in her fingers and flexing them to ward it off. "If we have the element of surprise, I can be quick enough to knock 'em out, and we'll save fire for a last-ditch resort."

"Probably for the best," of saving the fire for true emergencies. "If we run into something that's not a blood mage, the chances are it won't harm us. Most things people call ghosts are more like... echoes than anything. Just residue from people who lived, and dreamed, here in the past."

Are ghosts real? Technically yes, but it's fine. This may be less comforting than he strictly means it to be.

A chill runs down Athessa's spine and she shudders. It was one thing when she ran that racket of a ghost tour in Kirkwall, when she knew it was all fake; it's another thing entirely to potentially encounter something real.

"But something has to be loud to echo, right?" She whispers, trying a door to their right and finding it locked. "So in order to leave a residue..."

Something big had to have happened...right?

"Usually, yes. I mean... the Fade sometimes does strange things, but seldom without any reason at all. On the bright side," he offered, "I hear that old houses make a lot of noises, and almost none of them are ghosts or blood mages, so I think the odds are in our favor."

A pause, then:

"As long as it's not a Fade-touched raccoon. I've done that once, and I am in no hurry to encounter one again."

He is absolutely not joking.

She believes him.

"I had to deal with Fade-touched druffalo the other day, I think I'd rather do that again than run into a Fade-touched raccoon in close quarters."

"Neither sounds ideal. Did the druffalo sort of pop in and out of reality? That was the principle issue, with the racoon."

Meanwhile, he spots a likely looking closet and gestures at it with a nod. Shall we?

"No, they were just on fire and...sssstam...peding..."

The end of her brief explanation trails off when she sees that nod to that closet and she, seeing how likely it is, nods to it as well.

She draws the dagger from her belt and approaches the door, hand hovering over the handle in preparation to snatch and pull. The plan is to leap back against the wall behind the door. Then: stab, or magic, or naught.

He is mostly certain that there is nothing untoward in the closet, but his staff is in his hand just in case as he takes up the position on the other side of the door. He catches her eye and nods...

... and very nearly slams to the ground the distinctly unmagical cat that bolts out of the open door before he manages to catch himself. He tugs his staff up and toward the ceiling, where a small burst of light does nothing at all before dispersing.

There's no way to sell her yelp of surprise as anything but that; not a war cry, not a shout to take an enemy off guard, nothing but a quick aah! and tense muscles with nothing to attack.

"Who the fuck— A cat?! A cat in a bloody closet?!"

She looks into the closet, to make sure it is a closet, and swings the door shut.

"Poor little guy."

MOD PLOT ↠ A THOUSAND WRONGS

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