MOD PLOT ↠ The Darkest Realms of Dream, Part II

[faderifting]

WHO: Open
WHAT: A dreamy conclusion.
WHEN: Wintermarch 20, 9:47
WHERE: The Fade, Kirkwall
NOTES: Please use content warnings in your comment subject lines as appropriate.

THE JOURNEY

The pull to Skyhold becomes undeniable. Whatever justification is necessary to get people onto the road the dream makes real, whether that's planting an idea in their head or having a message arrive drawing them to the area or having them wake up and find themselves in an onion cart halfway up the mountain. The dream will do its best to smooth over the gaps between conflicting stories and the strangeness of everyone heading that way at once until they're all well underway.

At first, the journey seems normal (in the context of the dreamworld they're in), with the sort of mundane dangers faced by all travelers: wild animals, bad weather, brigands, and in the future where Corypheus has won, enemy patrols. But as they get nearer to the mountains, the trip grows more dangerous. More wild animals—and perhaps now they're infected with red lyrium or Fade-touched. More bad weather, perhaps almost supernaturally so. More enemy forces hunting them, ambushing them, barring the way up into the Frostbacks.

As they get into the mountains the opposition to their journey will become increasingly improbable. Hordes of beasts, entire enemy brigades that have no reason to be where they are, a necromancer coincidentally located atop an ancient cemetery hidden beneath the ice, a rift spontaneously opening to spew demons in their path, darkspawn clawing up out of the ground, a random Qun attack thousands of miles from their front, a dragon appearing out of nowhere. More and more, it will become obvious that things are not what they seem, and that something—some larger force—is trying to prevent them from reaching Skyhold.

HAVEN

No matter where people came from or when they left, they will all arrive on the road into the mountains at roughly the same time. Not precisely, but near enough that they'll begin to encounter others making the same journey. And whether they are attempting to reach Skyhold from the East or the West, they'll find themselves in the ruins of Haven first, converging with the entire group. In the world where the Inquisitor defeated Corypheus, the village is home to a monument to those who were lost when Corypheus' forces first attacked, with evidence of a steady stream of recent pilgrimages—though presently no pilgrims—to pay their respects. In the world where Corypheus dominates, a lifesize dragon has been constructed from bones, some of them human, to stand triumphant over the ruins.

Once they press past this point, taking much the same route once used to lead Haven's refugees to Skyhold, the dreams will begin to unravel. The two dreamworlds may begin to overlap and merge in confusing ways that fuel awareness that the dreams are dreams. People from one dream may step into the woods to forage and encounter people from the other dream there to do the same thing. A person who has experienced both dreams may find that they begin to bleed together, leaving them certain of one history in one moment and of another the next, and increasingly unsure about which of their conflicting sets of memories—if either—is real.* The gaps in memories will also become increasingly apparent, as will the strange coincidence of all of them heading to Skyhold at once for very different reasons.

As people gain awareness that they are in a dream, they may find that they gain more control over the dreamworld. Non-mages may find themselves capable of impossible feats, like willing a storm into being to push enemies back, or speaking to animals to learn the enemy's movements. Mages may find that the normal boundaries on magic have been stretched, and spells that might once have been beyond their power no longer are. Their newfound capabilities do have limits, though: their enemies grow in strength to match them and cannot simply be wished away, and the major threats that more and more clog their path are still too strong to be beaten by any one person alone.

The last leg of the journey up to Skyhold will be the most difficult yet, as difficult as it has ever been. The paths are even steeper and rockier than anyone remembers, in places appearing as if they've been deliberately heaved about and strewn with boulders in an attempt to narrow the way. Surely so much of the road wasn't treacherous goat paths along the edge of precipitous drops before? And if that wasn't enough, while the enemy forces have receded here there comes in their wake a blizzard of tremendous strength, clouds blotting out the sun, the way lit only by the occasional crack of lightning. Snow lashes the rocks and wind screams through the passes, ice slicking every stone, as if nature itself is trying to throw them from the mountain. While it might normally be wisest to hunker down, they will all somehow know that this is not a storm that can be waited out and the only course is to press onward through it to the top.

OOC | * Characters from one dreamworld won't meet the other version of themselves face to face. There's only one consciousness in the dream per person, in one 'body'. They may switch back and forth between dream versions, or lose one version entirely, or begin to muddle their memories and personalities together, or drop them both when they become fully aware of the fact that they're dreaming, but the two versions will never coexist as separate entities at the same moment.

SKYHOLD

They will know when they've reached their destination because just as suddenly as it began, the storm ceases. The tranquility is as abrupt as walking through a door: one moment they are in the howling heart of the blizzard, and in the next step they are beyond it. The air is cold but still, the sky clouded but calm, the path across the great bridge to the main gate clear of snow.

Skyhold would be a striking sight at any time, perched atop its peak against a backdrop of stark white mountaintops, but in these dreams, it's ethereal. The stones have a faint luminescence, like a smooth pond bathed in moonlight, that makes it stand out clearly against the night sky. No windows or braziers are lit, and the valley around it is still. The walls are unguarded and the portcullis open in an invitation they can't bring themselves to refuse.

As they approach, they'll find themselves able to call on memories from both dreamworlds at once—while the gaps in their memories of the years prior to the last month grow. And memories of the true world, one where it's Wintermarch 9:47, may begin to reemerge and solidify, no longer a future that will never arise nor a past that's been left far behind them. By the time they reach the Great Hall, yesterday may feel like as many as three different days, each memory as clear and vivid as the others.

Once inside the walls, the castle grows still more dreamlike. A great tree grows out of the far corner where the War Room ought to be, its massive trunk somehow coexisting with the walls around it, its canopy broad enough to stretch into the Great Hall. The building's form doesn't seem wholly fixed in time—one moment it will appear to be the Skyhold of the Inquisition, in another, one might instead see a glimpse of the ruin it was before the Inquisition arrived, or a bare mountain peak with only a few foundation stones laid, or even an ancient elven temple built around that great tree. There are remnants too of those who have lived and work here in ages past: a flicker of movement in the corner of an eye might be the ghostly shape of an ancient elf or a dwarf lord or a Fereldan mason, or even someone in Inquisition uniform. Attempts to interact with these apparitions will fail, as they continue on about their routines, incorporeal and unaware, vanishing again as soon as they're out of sight.

The only exception is a spirit in the Great Hall, waiting for them.

AFTERMATH

When they wake in the Gallows, it is Wintermarch 21, 9:47, and nothing in the world—outside their own heads—has fundamentally changed from when they went to sleep.

OOC | It will feel like a month has passed at most, similar to how rifters wake up from their canon updates. They will only remember that month-long span of the dream itself, not the years of history that led up to that point. Essentially, they may wake up from the dream and remember "so back when the Inquisition fell I turned assassin and killed a bunch of people," but they'll only be remembering that in the dream this fact was true; they won't remember a years-long period in which they became an assassin, the assassin skills they supposedly learned, or the act of killing those people.

As is the manner of dreams, memories may be fuzzy or disjointed, and some things may stick in the mind more clearly and vividly than others. Anyone who interacts with the Herald spirit (or witnesses others doing so) will find these memories particularly clear and strong.

Comments

[acreage]

"Hey."

Whatever he wants to tell her can wait; instead, he brings his hands to rest on her shoulders, leans down a little so he's closer to eye level.

"As far as I can tell, the point was to take your talent away from the Venatori. Now that we're all here, that doesn't matter anymore. There's no reason for anyone to try anything."

The fact that it happened, of course, matters. That this was the choice made by the resistance's leadership, carried out. That he came this close to never seeing either of them again, that they had to go through so much. But Wysteria and Tony aren't captives making weapons for the enemy anymore, so every rationale for killing them is now worthless.

He pauses, gives her shoulders a little squeeze, makes sure he has eye contact.

"And I'm not going to let anyone hurt either of you. I promise."

[heirring]

Her study of him is shockingly quiet, focused in the way one might expect from the study of a machine. This is how a collection of lyrium coated wires and spinning plates and enchanted metals must feel while under the points of Wysteria's fine little tools. It spins out for a moment, second hands on the kind of clock which doesn't exist in Thedas--

And then she shrugs under his hands, raising her hand to wipe her eyes once more.

"That's perfectly well then. I suspected as much - that that was the reason. And Mister Ellis will--"

The turn in her expression is immediate, sunburst bright. For a moment, it seems as if she might explode into tears again as her hand closes over Holden's forearm, grip tight. But no, the impulse fades. She blinks rapidly.

"Oh, I didn't say. Mister Ellis has turned up as well. My gods, what a strange winter we've all had."

[acreage]

"He's what?"

You would think — after coming to realize that parts of the last years aren't real, after hearing of others returning from the grave, after inexplicable coincidences, after, after, after

what's one more impossible thing?

But it's still enough to make him to pause, blinking, as he takes that news in.

"Did he come here with you?"

[heirring]

Despite the tenor of her voice, she wears her own kind of bewilderment right there in her face. The whole of this - him, and her, and Ellis, and even Tony who is so ill that there is no logical reason he should not have died on a road somewhere in Orlais - is so nonsensical that even the things which are good (and it is good; that he is here, that Ellis isn't dead in the Deep Roads somewhere--) feel seem strangely like a burden.

"He did, yes. He's with Mister Stark right now. He has been traveling with us for these past few--Since we reunited after escaping the Venatori the first time." How long has it been? All the days melt together. "Were it not for him, I doubt we'd have gotten half so far. In fact, we were bound for Orzammar. Only it seems our getaway was not as clean as we might have hoped for, for we were pursued by all manner of people which put us off the road and chased us in this direction to begin with. Without Mister Ellis I think we would have been lost forever in the foothills and never made it here to Haven at all."

That sounds right. Logical.

"But we've seen neither hide nor hare off the scouts who followed us since we first found signs of you all. I suppose it was the threat of numbers which discouraged them."

[acreage]

He breathes out.

Skyhold — which has drawn all of them here, has pulled Ellis from the dark underground, brought Wysteria and Tony here against all odds. And for what? What the hell is waiting for them up there?

"I'm glad you found him."

Or, by the sound of it, that he found them. There's been little enough to be happy about in all those years of Venatori captivity, makes strange miracles like this (the dream, the dream) all the more unbelievable.

"You should know," he says, "that Richard was part of the plan to have the two of you killed. He gave Byerly the information that made it possible."

For all that he's talking about what someone else did, there are echoes of guilt in his frame, his voice, his eyes. He was to be saved, and they were to be killed. How can he not feel guilty about it?

[heirring]

"Oh."

It sounds silly to her own ear even as she says it. Oh, like he has delivered news of poor weather which will ruin an afternoon's longstanding plans. Oh, like the inconvenience of a horse throwing a shoe while on the road.

"Well yes. I suppose someone would have had to."

There is a brief pause, a rapid calculation. All at once, she laughs. It's a surprised, slightly delirious sound. How stupid all of this is. "Then you're welcome. Mister Stark and I made an excellent distraction for your escape. Is he here? Mister Dickerson."

[acreage]

His hands, still at her shoulders, clench painfully for a moment. An excellent distraction for your escape, she says, like he wouldn't have given his life in a heartbeat if it would've spared theirs, if it would've spared them any part of this ordeal. Like he hasn't lived for weeks (has it been weeks?) thinking he lived in some measure at their expense, that there was more for them he didn't do.

Then he makes himself let go, drop his hands to his sides.

"I don't know. I haven't seen him."

[heirring]

He releases her, but Wysteria in turns reaches out with the free hand she has wrestled out from under the fur to touch his elbow. It's a strangely firm thing, braced to reassure.

"Then it can hardly be so pressing a matter that we need waste any effort on the subject. Should Mister Dickerson resurface, we may of course revisit the subject for a choice word or two. But don't let it trouble you in the interim, Mister Holden. Gods know we have enough before and behind us already."

Maker, what a grotesquely rational thing to shake free of her. It makes her laugh again, a little delirious from the absurdity of--

All of it.