war table mission: project haven

[libratus]

WHO: Petrana, Marcus, Edgard, Silver, Athessa, Isaac, Leander
WHAT: A Summer's End festival weekend
WHEN: Kingsway
WHERE: Cubentquium, an isolated mountain village outside Perivantium
NOTES: The plan is 3 top-levels, one for each section of the plot, RP however you like and I'll chime in with any additional info as needed. Will update warnings as we go. So far: cults, hair, blood.

The Riftwatch agents meet their guides outside a run-down little Chantry in Perivantium. Donata, a wide-smiling and plain-speaking human woman of middling age, is accompanied by two gangly youths to help her corral the assembled few dozen devotees. It's not quite the kind of group they'd been prepared to blend in with — the assembled faithful certainly seem pious enough, but where most pilgrims are the sort who've enough spending money to afford the travel, threadbare clothes and near-empty rucksacks are more the norm here. A pair of siblings are just in from Trevis, is easy enough to overhear; another family from Nessum, but they're the skittish, quiet sort and seem to expect the same from everyone else.

Not among them: the man with the red scarf and sunburst pin the team was told to look for. But then, they're hardly at the rendezvous point yet.

Honored to receive you, is the greeting that goes round with a tin of simple oat cakes from their guides; Blessed are those who give, before the group sets off into the mountains.

For a stretch of space that is, as the crow flies, not so terribly far, the path to Cubentquium is a difficult and winding one. Sharp columns of stone rise pale into paler fog, echoes of their hundred cousins to the north, and between those tight walls twists a labyrinthine path that is in places more rocky crag than walkway. Soft sand gives way to sudden drops; byways that might look a little easier to trod are, on confident assurance from their guides, decidedly not. Moving forward seems to mean doubling back as often as pushing ahead, and none of them would be blamed for forgetting which direction is which — not to worry, their guides know the way.

But when the sky cracks opens above them midway into the afternoon, pissing rain turns their precarious footholds to rushing streams, and Donata calls the group to a halt in the shelter of an outcropping until the storm passes. It's a full night and morning of waiting, wet-shoed and crowded close, before they're able to travel safely again. Thankfully, the last leg of the journey seems to be a straighter shot, and as their shadows begin to get long, the group finally reaches their destination: a deep black lake rimmed in white cliffs and tall, thin trees.

Comments

i. arrival;

[libratus]

The village is bigger than you might expect, for as challenging as it is to reach. A well-worn collection of houses and vegetable patches nestles between rock and pine. A number of villagers come out to wonder at and fuss over the new arrivals. Always a blessing to see new faces, they say as they help the group toward a simple sunset meal in the center of town. First outsiders we've had up here in months.

Blessedly, the dirt paths that lead through the village are drier than the mud they'd been slogging through all day; dirt crunches instead of squelching underfoot. But not only dirt. As they're led to the lodge that's to serve as the group's accommodations for the night, there's a quiet snap under someone's boot, felt more than heard — a brass pin caked in mud, its surface pressed with a sunburst seal.

---
Donata shuffles the team toward the two rooms they'll share between them, armed with an amiable insistence that's difficult to discreetly refuse. The walls are thin, and a night watchman paces round every now and then, but there's privacy enough to sneak half the party into the other's room if anyone feels the need to regroup. No one's forbidden them to socialize. It's only that everyone else seems to know not to.

Whenever they move to return to their rooms, they'll find a tray placed neatly outside each door. Outside everyone's door, in fact. On it, a small, sharp knife. A jar. Everyone else's are filled with a few inches of something thick and dark. Blessed are those who give.

---
As each member of the party slides their feet under their sheets for the night, they may find one last gift — something slick and wet at their toes. A simple doll, the sort children make out of corn husks or long grass; these are made of carefully gathered hair, too fine to be horse, and damp at their center with something tacky brown. The dolls' round heads peak into two stubby horns, and their eyes spiral too wide.

room 1;

[wythersake]

He nearly trips over it.

A tray, a jar. A knife. Isaac tugs at his jacket another stupid moment, willing himself past sluggish shock. Footsteps creak along the hall. He shuts the door before they turn.

(Holds a finger about the edge, just a crack. Waits for the boots to pass. The watchman pauses,

Continues on.)

"Marcus," Quiet. Perilously thin. "Would you come take a look at this?"

As though he's going to trundle in and exclaim, Oh, an Imperial shaving kit. And a jar for tucking your dreams in —

[ipseite]

In the quiet, it is enough to draw more than only Marcus—and draws Petrana up short, something curled within her fist that she had also intended to bring, first, to Marcus. And the rest, but,

she sets her cloak down on the bed that will be hers, and unfolds her hand from about the broken sunburst pin that she'd picked up after turning her ankle very slightly and kneeling down to relace her boots. (The skirts of her dress are going to be a nightmare for a laundress, at some point.) “And this,” she says, coming to Isaac's side on the assumption that Marcus (and John), too, will be doing that.

The part of the pin that would attach it to fabric has snapped in half, its sharpest part gone, and it's apparent how much mud was caked on it before by how much is still there, only enough scraped away with Petrana's nail to identify it for what it is.

“I am correct in saying that this is the pin we were to look for upon our contact, am I not?”

It isn't a promising beginning. It isn't great, by itself; alongside what Isaac has found outside their door—

[luaithre]

"Inside," is gently issued instruction, to both. Away from the door, even as he moves up towards it. The walls are thin, but best they not call attention, he thinks.

Not until attention is desired, anyway. Marcus, personally, has questions as he bends his knees to inspect the items gifted them, and then peering out towards where similar items lie in front of other doors. He lifts the tray and stands with it, half-tempted to begin a stride after the sound of the watchman and make some queries.

It's what Petrana says that registers as more pertinent, at least for now, and Marcus steps back into the room, closing the door with a soft kick from his travel-worn boot.

[hornswoggle]

"Promising signs," John deadpans. Having moved furthest into the room, he'd intended to sit down but remains on his feet, drawn a step closer by Isaac's question. The pin in Petrana's hand seems like a worse omen than the knife and jar. If their contact is missing—

"Do we think contributions are mandatory, or just pointedly suggested?"

The question is pitched low, directed at Isaac and the questionable jar, even as John's eyes linger on the broken pin.

[wythersake]

The night is still. You could hear a pin drop.

Isaac backs from the door, to bear space for an abundance of skirts; for John's tilting walk. Hesitation as Marcus looks toward those footfalls — hand lifted as if to catch a shoulder —

(Inside,)

Falls away as the door shuts.

"I think a pilgrim would know," To John. His chin tips to Petrana. "They said we were the first outsiders in months."

Lying, obviously. That doesn't tell them what to do of it. He'd tried to track their early passage through these hills, it didn't last. Switchbacks gave way to storm, to sudden drops — flight isn't an option.

[ipseite]

One lie, among how many? And how many to come? Petrana retreats from the door; pauses in her step and takes in the surrounds of the room, calculating distances between door, window, them. Stops, the pin still in her open palm, the furthest she can be from both openings. “I can't think it bodes so well for a voluntary offering.”

Already she thinks: what can be salvaged? but they don't know how badly, yet, it has gone awry.

(That it has—that seems not in question.)

[luaithre]

The tray is set down on the end of the bed he'd claimed, and the little knife picked up and inspected. It's been cleaned since it was last used, he thinks.

"Then we should decide how to respond," Marcus says, dropping the knife back down upon the tray with a dull clatter. "And begin making inquiries. Tonight or at first light."

Just start flipping tables until an answer is scared out. His gesture to diplomacy is to allow the diplomats to tell him what to do instead.

[hornswoggle]

"First light would be more productive," is John's vote. "But conversationally, not accusingly."

Not to deride Marcus' ability for diplomacy, of course, just as a reminder to them all. John is extremely aware of how taxing their ascent was, and how difficult it would be to speedily find their way back down.

If this is a trap, then it's a clever one. John doesn't say this aloud just yet. Instead, he adds, "It could be that our contact simply met with an accident, but I doubt it."

[wythersake]

"Accident or not," His voice pitches reedy again. "The other jars were full."

If they've been set up, the expectations of the Trevisians, the Nessum group, have still been met. Something here is proceeding as planned.

He slips past Marcus to take up the knife. Offers Petrana the hilt, a jerk of his chin. Just in case. She may be otherwise armed (for all he knows, she's stuffed a morningstar down her bodice), but between the four of them, only one would be running in skirts.

"Until we know more, no one should travel alone."

Marcus.

It isn't guilt that eventually recalls the second room. Athessa must know better than to spill her blood. Leander might do it for them. And the third man, a mystery.

"It might do to coordinate."

If they intend to. That little gold pin had been a time in Mme. Cedoux's keeping.

[ipseite]

The pin she pockets again, wrapping it within the handkerchief she'd hidden it in before and not cleaning it of its dirt—a moment of time bought, possibly, if they're caught with it and it matters. (She thinks it unlikely it doesn't matter.) The knife—

she hesitates, glances toward Marcus, but accepts it. Handles it with some visible uncertainty, unsure quite where to put it, saying,

“If it was not an accident,” she doesn't think it was an accident, “then a decision was made, and with how much information we don't know. If we tip our hands precipitously—we must have a care what fires we are reaching our hands directly into. We had better discuss it amongst us all.”

Coordinate, yes. If she preferred to discuss her discovery with more known quantities first (...and Isaac, also here), then it isn't by an inclination to abandon the other half of their party to their fates. It may be something else entirely, as she takes stock of the men with her; she does not linger over John Silver, but she is tallying mages in her head.

[luaithre]

Marcus also tracks the path of the knife, a little perplexed when it finds a home in Petrana's hand, but unprotesting for now. Listening.

"Aye," is flatly delivered, but maybe that's just how he sounds. Either way: he agrees. Both to coordination as well as not immediately marching out into the darkness.

If it weren't for Leander sitting in the other room, he might instead suggest they simply make a decision and inform the rest of it. It is, in fact, still his instinct, mage quota or not, but instead he says, "Should our answer be a missing knife?" as an aside to Isaac and Petrana.

[hornswoggle]

It's a fortunate assembly of mages. Isaac, Leander and Petrana who know exactly what he is, and Marcus, who John had intended on tipping his hand to sooner or later. He meets her gaze directly, then turns from them to sit down on the bed as Marcus poses the question.

"I don't think they'll find that convincing."

John had intended to say more, but abandons the train of thought as he becomes aware that the lump in the coverlets isn't just sloppily folded sheets. He shifts his weight further up the bed, abandoning the flow of conversation to draw back the sheets.

room 2;

[sulahnan]

Athessa stops short of tripping over the tray, looking down at it with a frown. Without moving her head, her eyes dart from door to door, clocking each of the other trays and their contents.

Of course to clock the ones behind her she does move her head, but for the most part her movements are controlled and wary, rather than her usual lackadaisical ambling.

It seems almost pointless to ask the obvious question. Edgard wouldn't know. She doesn't want to know whether or not Leander knows. So she doesn't ask, but does quietly step past the tray to open the door. And she sends a look towards Leander as if expecting that he'll have something to say on the matter.

[sarcophage]

Honoured to receive you, and Leander had contemplated the oat cake for some time while they walked, turned it over, sniffed it. Glanced at the other travellers now and then, those of Riftwatch and the outsiders, for signs of anxiety. The difficult hike, the weather, he bore it all without complaint—made a meditation of it. Quietly ate the oat cake in the rain.

The jars give him pause. With a crease of interest between his eyebrows, he stares down at their tray. Athessa may see him in the doorway, turning his head, waiting for the watchman to recede before he steps away from the frame. With great care he takes up the nearest full jar, tips it to see how its contents move against the glass, and finally lifts the lid enough to have a sniff.

When he returns, he brings their room's tray inside.

"This ought to be an interesting visit."

[muckspout]

“Seems like nice people.” Edgard says with complete sincerity. Sure, they’re a little formal, but Edgard of all people is aware that people who live in isolated places have their quirks.

He claims a bed and throws his items on it. There’s a doll there. He squints at it a little mesmerized. But then hides behind the bed holding up the doll like a puppet.

“Hello Athessa! Hello Leander!” He says in falsetto and then laughs until he snorts.

[sulahnan]

For a beat, Athessa just stares at Edgard's weird puppet show,blinking once. Ooookaaaay. She was right not to ask him.

"Leander," she says, with the nonchalance of someone asking the time. Maybe a little bit of unease, but she's working very hard to keep her cool, here. "The other jars. Was that—?"

[sarcophage]

He stares, too, likely with less obvious—puzzlement? Disdain? What is the correct response to this? That this is a grown man; that he is filthy; that this is the first thing this filthy adult man has chosen to do; that the doll looks like someone's nightmare: every element compounds the absurdity. After visible (if expressionless) consideration, he decides,

"Hello, poppet. Would you do us a favour and tell Edgard to act his age? Thank you ever so much."

He then sets the tray down on the rustic little chair next to one of the beds.

"Yes, the one I examined contained blood. I suggest we consult the rest of our company before we respond."

[muckspout]

Well, these two are no fun. Edgard lowers the doll throwing it on his bunk and arises making a face at Leander.

“Yes, Mother.” He says lightly eyes rolling. “And I wouldn’t worry about the blood, people do that sometimes to ward off insects.”

He falls down on the cot and there’s a cloud of dust that comes from the bed.

“They’re just people with their own customs.”

[sulahnan]

The more this man speaks, the stranger he becomes.

"Why would you ward off insects by placing something that attracts insects directly outside your door?" Not to mention that there's been talk of giving and their rooms have thus far been the only ones with empty jars.

And there seems to be neither an altar for offerings in this room, nor an animal for sacrifice. Just the tray, the knife, and the empty vessel.

Athessa frowns at what's to be her bed, and the small lump beneath the covers at the foot of it. She extracts the doll, carefully, as if it might start to move on its own if she handles it too roughly. Why is it wet?

"Hm." Damp. Decay. Fingers part the fine strands of hair to try and peek at the core, and the smell of blood and rot only gets stronger. "Have you seen anything like this before? The children in my clan made dolls out of sticks, or antlers, but this...I've never seen this."

[sarcophage]

Keeping his voice low, "I haven't. On the other hand, nor have I experienced firsthand the customs of any of Tevinter's people, unless you count the Venatori."

Historically not the most gracious of hosts.

He's since moved on to examining the knife for its craftsmanship; presently, he returns it to the tray.

"It could very well be as Edgard says. Discomfort is a poor metric for judgement, in any case."

[muckspout]

Edgard blinks and swings his head around at Leander. Did he just agree with him?

"Did you just agree with me?" He asks as he flops around on the bed trying to get comfortable and causing even more dust clouds in his wake. "But, don't ask me why about the insect thing, I just have seen it, I didn't say it was a good idea."

He grabs his doll and it squishes when he does so. He grins at it and squishes it again. "These," he says holding up the doll. "are probably just gifts or something."

[sulahnan]

Athessa doesn't roll her eyes, exactly. It's more like a slow blink, but with the same energy as an eye roll. She sets her doll down at the foot of the bed, not wanting to replace it to its hiding spot under the covers for obvious — or maybe just obvious to her — reasons.

Luckily, other than a few bugs, there's nothing under the beds. Nothing of note on the walls, nothing she can see in the rafters, so it seems the dolls and the blood-letting tray are the only weird things in the room.

Weird people not included in that count.

[sarcophage]

Lest he seem excessively friendly, Leander accepts Edgard's follow-up question as one that requires no answer.

The bed that seems most likely to become his, that one's got a little doll-sized lump too, which he tosses back the covers to expose. Folkish superstition is his immediate impression, the doll's simple construction, its placement, in concert with the suggested offering—it's all very quaint. While Athessa busies herself with broader exploration, he turns the little figure over in his hands, runs the dried plant matter between his fingers.

"They do appear to be gifts. Tokens of safety." He replaces his where he found it, gently remakes the bed. "I wouldn't worry overmuch."

ii. ruins

[libratus]

The night passes still and silent, save for just before dawn, when the gentle clink of glass and metal marks the quiet gathering of the trays in front of each door. By the time the rest of the travelers begin to stir, there's no sign the jars of blood were ever there — and if at breakfast there are a few more eyes on the four who didn't fill a jar, well, are there really? Or are they all just a little stressed after a poor night's sleep? The only questions that come are polite ones, and not about the jars at all — in fact, any mention of blood donation will earn more awkwardness and embarrassment than explanation. All the villagers want to talk about are the newcomers in their midst. Where are they all from? Have they done many pilgrimages? How did they hear of Cubentquim? How many days do they mean to stay? Would they like to see the ruins this morning, while the weather holds?

Inquiries about the brass pin are met with neutral confusion; Donata tells them she thinks it might be one of the elder's keepsakes, probably nicked by one of the children, and offers to see the pin to its rightful owner. Indeed, most of the humble jewelry and ornament worn by the villagers is Andrastian in theme, though Chantry insignia in particular doesn't seem common. If Petrana should decline to hand the pin over just yet, Donata won't seem offended.

But they simply must see the ruins. Their hosts insist. As the village sets to preparing for that evening's festivities, a few villagers are pulled from other tasks and sent to act as guides for the new arrivals — guides who don't seem to have put much practice into their tour guide spiels, but they are friendly enough.

The ruins in question seem at first something of a misnomer. Through a patch of forest composed of dizzyingly identical columns of pine, the dirt gives way to a rise of porous rock. A warren of caves and shafts dot its exterior, some openings only wide enough for a hand to slip inside, others for a pair of shoulders at a squeeze. Those mouths large enough to walk into have been boarded over — "For safety," explain their guides, and certainly it's not difficult to imagine a child playing among them could easily get lost. Long ago, these caves were the site of a monastery — and at its precipice is what remains of its Chantry.

Only a few segments of wall are still standing. The altar remains imposing in size, but is worn by the elements such that it's now more of a bowl than a table. The floor has long since given way to porous rock beneath, and old pine needles have stained its holes a pale rust color in places. But when one reaches the top, it's clear enough why the Chantry was built here to begin with: the rise ends in a rocky promontory out over the lake, some fifty feet above its surface. The view is appropriately stunning.

If, on their return, a few elders can be seen dispersing from the little wooden village Chantry as if from a meeting, well. That's probably not anything to worry about. The sun is beginning to dip, and it's time for the festival to begin.



...And then they all had a nice dinner and went home, the end.