[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

[littlemissfutility]

If we want the dead to stay down, then maybe we should, too.

[ The isn't the first time I-- but if she says that, she'll have to explain, and she's pretty sure that bringing up walkers will only make things worse.

(One of these days, she's going to have to figure out what to do if she dies here. Someone will have to know to stab her in the head. One of these days, she's going to have to tell someone. But God, she really doesn't want to.)

At the moment, what she'd really like to tell him is where he can shove his options, but it's as much a risk as anything she could say about the dead. He's pissed, and he's covered in armor, and even if she doesn't mean to consciously, she finds herself analyzing arguments in context of could I win if it turned into a fight? these days. She wouldn't win against Gabranth. ​]

...Fine. What're we tending?

[ She doesn't actually get up, mind, and she still sounds like she's spoiling for a fight. But fine, she's chosen. ]

[archademode]

Mind your footing. [He murmurs, the edge in his tone dissipating the moment she acquiesces, as though it’s nothing more than a force of habit. Small shards of broken glass are the worst of the nuisances to be found in the aftermath, most of them so small they pose no risk, but he’d be remiss if he did not warn her as he turns to resume his vigil.]

There is blood yet to be washed away, and I’ve no intention of leaving hallowed ground defiled.

Anything you see that does not belong, ought be removed.

[Unusual a sight as it might seem, dressed fully in thick plate, he intends to do no less.]

[littlemissfutility]

You want to wash away the blood.

[ She echoes it, standing up to follow him, like she wants to make sure she gets it. Her cowgirl boots clack against the flagstones.

(Once, she probably would have agreed without hesitation.) ]

[archademode]

Are you incapable of it?

[Those sharp-caught syllables, though his voice stays soft: nothing more than the edge of a thumbnail pressed figuratively to skin to evoke a response, for better or worse.]

[littlemissfutility]

[ And it's annoying, the same way a thumbnail threatening to dig into her wrist might be. Beth sets her jaw. ]

I'm capable of a lot. [ So there. ] I wanna know why you wanna wash it off.

[archademode]

Have you no consecrated ground in your world?

[He winds a course through tall columns, his footfalls slow and patient— stopping when he reaches an overturned basin, likely one that had held some form of alcohol for childish games. Stooping down, he draws it over, leaving it upright and beginning the process of gathering scatterings of nearby debris, collecting it in that shallow, emptied container.]

Respect appeases all with its courtesy, even those long laid to rest.

[littlemissfutility]

[ It's pretentious, as answers go. Beth is hard-pressed to disagree with the sentiment. She thinks of the funeral home, of some absent embalmer preparing walkers for their final rests. This isn't so different, but somehow it feels like it is.

Maybe because whoever lived in the funeral home wasn't being an asshole, she thinks darkly. But it's not a corpse's fault that Gabranth's being a jerk. And they actually have time to do something about them here--they can have a resting place people at home never did.

It's long enough gone when she actually replies, instead of just walking along and picking up another little patch of mess near his, that she decides she doesn't have to answer anything he actually said. (What would she say, anyway? If all you need for consecrated ground is dead people, the whole world was sacred. It's easier to count the places without corpses.) So, conversationally, though still with a tension beneath it that says I still think you're being a jerk: ]

They burn bodies here.

[archademode]

Your petulance affords you nothing.

[She’s free to do as she likes. To help— or to argue— in truth he won’t force her hand.

But that doesn’t mean he’ll silently tolerate it, either. He abides little enough already.]

Trust that there is more to life and death than just the matter of flesh and bone.

[littlemissfutility]

[ She'd meant it as conversation. Is that what you do, where you're from? Or maybe the possibility of saying something closer to her heart. We only burned people we didn't know. We buried the ones we cared about. I hate the smell of bodies burning. Eventually, maybe, even if not right away. (Definitely not right away.)

But no, he has to open his mouth again and say something mean and condescending for no goddamn reason. She glares at his metal helmet. ]

D'you talk to everybody like this?

[archademode]

[For a moment he pauses, that hauntingly-set mask lifting to consider her more fully where she stands, as if deeply inhaling the weight of some great thought.

And then, simply:]

No.

[littlemissfutility]

[ She doesn't back down, keeping her gaze steady on the intricate etching of his helmet, hands settling on her hips. ]

Then why're you doing it now?

[archademode]

[Because you are a thorn in your persistence, is the answer that comes to mind. But— perhaps he is just weary. Of a great deal in general, and of failing to be heeded when he demands it.

Instead there’s only the narrow sound of an exhale through his nose, and he returns to scraping up a few larger shards of broken pottery.]

Pay it no mind.

[For a minute there’s only silence, and the sound of spent care on careless rubbish.]

Why did you refuse to leave?

[littlemissfutility]

[ For a moment or two, it's a weird, silent standoff. He breaks first, but she doesn't really feel like she won any ground. She's gingerly picking up chunks of glass, mindful not to slice open her fingertips, when he asks his question.

It's one Beth has to think about, mostly because-- ]

D'you mean why I wanted to stick around or why I didn't do what you told me to?

[ There's a certain wryness there, shards of glass plinking in the bottom of a bucket as she drops them in. ]

You can't just order people around, you know.

[archademode]

They are one and the same.

[If something mattered so much that she was unwilling to draw herself away under direct attentions, then surely it must answer both aspects of his own question.

Still, he pauses:]

You are mistaken, then.

[He can. He will. And he will absolutely continue to, Beth.]

[littlemissfutility]

[ Weirdly, this is getting more comfortable for her. Maybe because she's getting a better sense of how Gabranth works. Maybe because his insistence on this point doesn't have a lot of bite behind its bark. ]

You've been here a week longer than me, and you're in a completely different division. [ This isn't someone who can punch her for backtalk and get away with it. ] If you wanna boss me around, you're gonna have to take over for Byerly first.

[ Bringing Byerly up, though, is something of a tell in itself--a shield to match all that armor of his. ]

[archademode]

[Like something feral warded away, her mention of Byerly prompts a swift response— though subtle nonetheless, one single, low breath catching softly in his throat.

A fine shield, indeed.]

...you've yet to answer my question.

[littlemissfutility]

Yeah. I know.

[ She's tempted to leave it at that. (Well, that and a little hiss of surprise and pain when her index finger slips and a bit of glass cuts it. Not a big deal, but ouch.) It's not like she's going to tell him the unvarnished truth, after all--but he's chilled out a little. She could try to do the same.

Maybe. ]

I knew we were in a war...but I didn't think I was gonna have to kill things again this soon. [ Without thinking, she wraps her finger in the hem of her tunic, holding the fabric hard against it to make it stop bleeding. ] Why'd you wanna be out here alone?

[archademode]

[Another thin exhale, and he moves to reach for her hand even as she keeps it tucked against fabric, uncharacteristically tame when he asks:]

Let me see it. 

[Glass might yet be trapped in the wound, after all, small as some shards tend to be.]

[littlemissfutility]

I think it's okay.

[ But she unwraps it from her shirt anyhow, coming a step or two closer so she can hold her hand out.

(That she hasn't pointed out he's unlikely to see much--he's wearing a helmet and it's, like, two AM--is its own sort of deference. Or at least an attempt to keep from starting a new argument.) ]

[archademode]

[He doesn’t endeavor to see, perhaps for that reason alone: instead he wedges his gloved fingertips across either side of the cut, pressing until blood wells fully— and then rolls his left thumb up across the wound to wipe away any debris that would’ve been swept up within it, like petals across a lake.

Though far sharper in their nature, of course.

And then, satisfied with his work, he releases her from his hold.]

When we return, wash it.

[Another order, of course. Invoke Byerly if you like, he’ll hold his stance on this.]

And bear in mind you’ve slain nothing tonight. No guilt need rest upon your shoulders.

[littlemissfutility]

[ She holds still, letting him squeeze her the pad of her finger without wincing. And then, with a roll of her eyes-- ]

You wanna tell me to do my homework, too?

[ There's no sharpness there, at least. Being able to wash her hands without worrying what the soap will cost her is one of the small pleasures of being in Riftwatch. For now, though, she'll just have to leave the occasional dot of blood on trash she's gathering.

Her voice grows a little softer as she adds-- ]

Just because they're already dead doesn't mean I didn't stab them. That's just how it is.

[archademode]

You did not.

[It's said— mildly. Not an intrusion into her own sentiments, only a faint counter to them.] Their plane is different than this one, they would have felt no pain, no suffering.

Were such things possible, trust I would have cleared the fete of them with my blade alone, and gladly so.

If it troubles you, if you are ill at ease, then set aside all guilt and know that as one of the ceaseless dead, I pardon all your endeavors.

[littlemissfutility]

[ Is that a joke? Coming from Gabranth, it's hard to say, but from anyone else, she might laugh a little. As it is, Beth's mouth tugs up a little at the corners as she glances his way. ]

What if we don't agree? Do we cancel each other out? The ceaseless dead.

[ She's still here, after all. She hasn't ceased. And, after a moment-- ]

Don't, um, tell anyone about that, by the way. I...don't really want everyone to know.

[archademode]

We would not. My judgment is sound.

[yours is not, being the unspoken portion of that claim— though it’s toothless, and quickly segued into something else.]

Why not? There is no shame in it.

[littlemissfutility]

[ See, that definitely sounds like a joke to her. And it gets a roll of her eyes in return, but no real complaint. It's weird, how quickly he moves from pissed off to friendly again; if not for the fact that his version of 'pissed off' only seems to involve snapping at her, she'd be walking on eggshells. ]

I don't want people to look at me and see a dead girl. I got enough of that when I was alive.

[ Beth bends over to carefully pick up what looks like half a punchbowl, a big, curved piece of glass she has no intention of cutting herself on. The rim's still smooth, fortunately. ]

And since I don't walk around in a suit of armor, people aren't gonna look at me and see something else first.