[OPEN] FRIGHTENING FESTIVITIES

[heirring]

WHO: Everyone
WHAT: Celebrating a totally 100% legit wedding.
WHEN: Summerday
WHERE: Edlingham Hall, the Vinmark Foothills
NOTES: cw: Spectral Violence and Ghostly Gore; if you don't want to deal with the spooky ghost adventure half of the evening, feel free to say your character went back to Kirkwall early rather than staying the night.

PARTY;

A few hours' journey from Kirkwall, the great old shape of the house known as Edlingham Hall rises up from out of the Vinmark foothills. In the decades (ages?) since it's abandonment, what must have once been a very imposing stone structure built in the mountain's shadow has given way to age and the elements. What remains is unequivocally a ruin, albeit a stunningly elaborate one. It's a place of columns and alcoves, gutted passages and weather worn stairs leading to the skeletal remains of old towers and chambers, with everything turned to varying shades of brown and green and as it's been grown over or into by the surrounding landscape. There's hardly a roof remaining to be found in the whole of the place.

Luckily, this particular party doesn't require one. In what might have once been the titular hall, a series of tables and benches (borrowed from the Gallows, thank you very much) have been set up around a stretch of cracked tiles which has been more or less cleared for dancing and everything has been lit amply by a collection of merrily burning braziers.

Party-goers will be treated to a host of entertainment, included but not limited to: at least one speech (thank you, Provost Stark), a half dozen toasts, a rather impressive spread of Orlesian-styled cuisine (no doubt prepared by someone devastated to be expected to do so under such rugged conditions), quite a bit of rather good wine, music, dancing, and a few more avant garde Rifter-influenced party games including a vaguely wyvern-shaped pinata and some heinous game called Snap-Dragon.

And if none of that sounds like a good time, then there are ruins to explore, discreet alcoves to investigate, and a campground pitched in the ruin's shadow where one might retire early from the party with only a stock level of scorn.

AT THE STROKE OF MIDNIGHT;

An eerie mist begins to stream from the cracked tiles of the dance floor. Riftwatch does not count a fog mage among their midst. Was one perhaps hired? Is this a trick of some science? A peculiar feature of the weather in this region? Such murmurs begin to circulate as the mist continues to thicken, and rise, and sour to a sickly pale yellow. It clashes with the decorations. Its touch seems to wither the impossibly sumptuous meal, curdling cream fillings and souring fine meats.

And then the screaming starts.

In the stone frame of an upper window, see her: a woman, in a long pale gown, with a horrible wound around her neck. Her slippers peep over the sill. Blood begins to drip down her front as her mouth opens, and opens, and opens, until her jaw rests upon her bloody chest.

Guests seated at the table will feel some creature bumping against their legs--something big, and solid, and hot, and hairy. When they pull away in horror, they will find nothing at all beneath the table. But the growling will not stop, nor will the crunching of teeth on bone.

The twisted figure of a man rises from a pile of tumble-down stone. His limbs hang at loose and unnerving angles. One arm has been crushed and droops down too low, brushing at his warped knee. His face is a mask of pain, and his left eye bulges as if ready to burst. Pressure has thrust his circlet of gold low on his brow, cinching his balding head. He shuffles toward the party, reaching with his ruined hands for human flesh. Or perhaps a cup of wine.

A headless body comes running out from the rotting main keep. It is wearing armor but is otherwise without identity. From its stump of a neck sprays a great geyser of blood, spatting party-goers and the ground and the food and whatever else is in its way. Its graying hands are reaching, but without a head, its path is random and monstrous, trampling over anything and anyone without regard. Or it would, if it weren’t spectral.

The ghosts must be stopped. Find the source of the haunting or this marriage will be ruined.

Those not interested in tracking down the source of the haunting will soon discover that the fog which has wreathed Edlingham Hall has become quite impenetrable. Attempting to escape the grounds will result in being impossibly turned around and eventually spit any would-be escapee back into the ruin. Solving the mystery may be optional, but experiencing the haunting by the aforementioned ghosts (and any other thematically appropriately specters your heart might desire for the convenience of creeping out your characters) apparently isn't.

Comments

party;

[sparklequeen]

Glimmer is still getting used to this whole Thedas thing but having a nice, normal party to go to where people drink and eat and have a good time? That's refreshingly normal after the last few months. So she stuffs herself with the food and the wine and eventually finds herself stumbling up to the head table to offer her congratulations. Dressed in borrowed finery (mostly in blues, oddly) She makes a sort of bowing curtsy (she is not used to wearing skirts most of the time) and rises with her circlet gleaming on her forehead.

"Congratulations. And many happy returns on the day!" That's what you're supposed to say, right?

"This is my first party in Thedas and it almost feels like home."

[heirring]

There is a moment in which the previous congratulator (for there is always a great line of them to get within speaking distance of any bride, isn't there) moves on and Wysteria's smile is quite genuine, and then it goes very stiff as her attention turns to the unfamiliar face before her. It doesn't disappear; it merely hangs there desperately as if painted on while the young woman behind it screams internally.

'Dear Miss,' she had written an individual who is apparently so titled as to be considered some kind of queen. She has avoided all this time thinking about it or deciding exactly the nature of her feelings on the subject, and now here they are the two of them face to face and Wysteria is dismayed to find herself still undecided on how to address the person before her.

"Oh? I'm so pleased that you're feeling so welcome. I would so dearly like to hear more about the place you come from." She lapses into a pause, remembering only after a moment that she ought to say: "And thank you."

[sparklequeen]

Glimmer hesitates just briefly, unsure as to what's happening. Something is perhaps wrong--but what it is she can't quite decide. So she remembers her lessons in etiquette and politness and just smiles the warm, diplomatic smile of a princess who doesn't remember anyone's name but has to be nice anyway.

"Oh, of course. Etheria is such a beautiful planet, and Bright Moon is--well, I'm biased, obviously--but it's the most beautiful kingdom there," she says, cheerfully ignorant of the reason for poor Wysteria's awkwardness.

"I'd be happy to tell you all about it."

[heirring]

"Oh yes please. I would like that very much," Wysteria says very evenly to the tune of metaphorical muffled shrieking in the distance.

"And other than here at the party. How are you finding Thedas thus far? You must tell me which is your least and most favorite element."

Perhaps she will simply never refer to Glimmer by name or title directly to her face. That would do the job nicely, yes?

[sparklequeen]

"It's an interesting place so far. It reminds me of home in some ways. In other ways though, it feels just utterly different, you know?" Glimmer says in a polite, conversational tone as if she has no idea what's wrong. Mostly that's because she hasn't any idea what's wrong and thinks everything is just fine.

"At least there's magic here! The last place I was didn't have magic and that was just so weird. I guess Etheria is a bit more unique than I thought. But then I've only been to like, three planets so it's not a lot to compare..."

[heirring]

Hold on--

"No magic at all?"

Whatever has been slightly off about this conversation seems to have been knocked briefly loose by that. Wysteria blinks rapidly once or twice, then furrows her brow in confusion. "But Miss Ellie said that you arrived there by similar means as you did in Thedas. What did they think the rifts there were?"

[sparklequeen]

"It's weird, because if it was magic it wasn't magic like I'd ever seen? I don't know how exactly we got there--nothing like the whole 'falling out of the sky' crap like Thedas," Glimmer says thoughtfully.

"But the explanation we got was that the powers of some god or another had been used to bring us there, but I don't know the specifics. All I know is my magic didn't work there--but it works here, at least kind of? And we all had these different abilities instead. I guess that was magic, but..." She frowns.

"It didn't feel like magic."

[heirring]

The slight frown which re-establishes itself on Wysteria's face as Glimmer speaks is a very different kind than the one which has flashes, brief and panicked, across it earlier. This one is thoughtful, the sort of studied expression one might wear while examining a particularly complex problem of mathematics. Nonetheless, she is ready with an instant response:

"I find it interesting that in both cases--there as in here in Thedas--, the inciting factor for all of this inter-planar travel seems to be contingent upon the action of an individual or individuals. Perhaps they are mirrors of one another in the way we are. What sort of different abilities? Do you still have them?"

[sparklequeen]

"I don't," Glimmer shakes her head thoughtfully.

"My abilities from back home seem to have... um. Reasserted themselves? None of the things I could do in New Amsterdam still work. I was able to phase through things. Stick myself through a door, basically. Back home I could teleport--and I can do that here again, which is such a relief. If you know Ellie, she was there too." Glimmer crosses her arms, her expression still pensive.

"And there was a sort of empathy--we could share emotions and even memories by making skin contact. Sometimes we ended up in each other's dreams."