faderift | MOD PLOT ↠ The Soldiers of the Demon Charged

MOD PLOT ↠ The Soldiers of the Demon Charged

WHO: Everyone!
WHAT: Striking closer to home.
WHEN: Justinian through Solace
WHERE: The Western/Central Free Marches
NOTES: OOC post. Please use appropriate content warnings in your comment subject lines.

WEEK ONE: THE COLLAPSE OF HASMAL

Recently in Hasmal, growing outrage from native Hasmalis over the swelling number of Tevinter refugees within and outside the city has led to a series of smaller violent incidents that went largely unanswered by local authorities, leading to additional targeting of more established Tevinter communities within the city and the makeshift fortification and arming of the camps outside. In the last week or so, after a period of simmering tensions, the situation in Hasmal has boiled over into violent riots. Reports out of the city conflict about what finally caused the rapid escalation, how bad things got, and whose fault they were. But they agree that it very quickly became a dangerous situation that the city authorities utterly failed to bring under control. Fires burned in some quarters of the city and deadly clashes between factions forced uninvolved citizens to barricade themselves in their homes. Some city leaders urged calm and peace while others encouraged supporters to seize the moment and fight for the upper hand. The Grand Vizier was nowhere to be seen. Somehow, amidst the chaos, the gates were opened and in marched the Tevinter army.

The violence, and then even more Tevinter's arrival—supposedly to help restore peace to the city, though it's unclear whether that has actually happened—has caused many to flee the city, particularly the refugee community who had fled from Tevinter once already. With nothing but the Tevinter desert of the Silent Plains to the north, most either jumped ship down the Minanter or came south across the river into Tantervale territory and Wildervale, with some now arriving in Kirkwall with their tales of chaos in the western-most March.

Also, Commander Flint and Scoutmaster Yseult are missing, having gone to meet a contact coming across the Minanter from Tevinter some days ago. They ought to be returning, but neither has been in contact since. In their absence, Ambassador Rutyer and Provost Stark will be running Riftwatch, and can direct Scouting and Forces as they see fit and delegate authority for those operations as necessary.

UNKNOWNS

This is a fast-moving situation, with events clearly already running well ahead of news. With limited resources at hand, intelligence networks in the previously quiet Free Marches have been somewhat neglected by the Inquisition and Riftwatch both. Much remains unclear, subject of wild rumor and conflicting reports from the few sources in the area:

There are stories that the Grand Vizier Rekam Antoninus, ruler of Hasmal, is either complicit in the Tevinter takeover or in league with refugees to try to bring down the city's nobility. There are rumors he has fled the city, or even that he's dead by a half-dozen different hands.

There are similarly conflicting reports about other Hasmal city leaders, with some said to have been encouraging the various factions involved in the riots, trying without success to calm the situation, or using the situation to advance their own interests in one way or another. It's likely that at least a few were cooperating to some extent with Tevinter, though exact numbers and identities can't be known right now.

The size of the Tevinter force in Hasmal isn't yet clear, as the numbers reported by those who fled the city at their arrival range from "most of the Tevinter army" to "five times the size of the entire Tevinter army."

All reports at this point are coming from people who have fled Hasmal, so there's essentially no reliable information about what the situation is like inside the city since Tevinter moved in.

RIFTWATCH'S WORK

As soon as word begins trickling in, Riftwatch will begin sending parties north to investigate the situation. Anyone with a relevant skill or two might be assigned to venture out to:

AERIAL SURVEILLANCE: Use griffons for aerial surveillance of the region between Kirkwall and Hasmal, to watch for any further movement of the Tevinter army. Using sending crystals, they'll also be able to send back reports of the routes any large groups of refugees seem to be taking. And they'll be charged with assessing the roads and terrain between Kirkwall and Hasmal, identifying the routes an army could take to reach further South and what chokepoints—bridges, narrow passages, castles and fortresses with defenses that might hold—could be exploited to slow them down. (The distance from Kirkwall to Hasmal is too great for the griffons to be flying back and forth every day; aerial teams will be gone for several days at a time, and in the meantime staying on the property of a druffalo farmer in Wildervale or in wilderness camps of their own making.)

ASSIST TRAVELLERS: Intercept people fleeing Hasmal—to assist them, when necessary, but also to get as much information from them as possible to try to separate rumors from first-hand accounts or find consistencies between stories that might point toward truths. Many of these people will be refugees twice over, already having fled from Tevinter in the wake of Corypheus' takeover, so some may have relevant information about Tevinter as well. And there is always the possibility that some loyal to Tevinter and the Venatori are disguised among the refugees, so they'll need to keep an eye out for anything suspicious.

ASSIST TOWNSFOLK: Meet with the Countess of Wildervale and local leaders of smaller towns and villages. Those south of Wildervale may need to be alerted about the waves of travelers they're about to see, while those north of Wildervale will have been reached by refugees before Riftwatch and may be overwhelmed by the sudden swell of visitors and potential long-term residents. Some of those fleeing Hasmal may be settling into these villages for the long haul due to exhaustion or a lack of resources, while many others are terrified of Tevinter at their heels and want to go further south to put at least one major city between them and Hasmal. It's a valid fear, so in addition to discussing the refugee situation and how many more people the villages can viably feed and house, Riftwatch teams will need to help assess their defenses and escape routes if the invasion pushes further south, ideally without causing a panic.

Meanwhile, in Kirkwall, those who aren't suited to fieldwork or who are between trips out of the city will:

ATTEND MEETINGS: The Viscount, Kirkwall's nobility, and City Guard representatives in Viscount's Keep will be meeting for long hours to discuss whether or not Kirkwall will be able to accept refugees (and to what extent) and the city's defenses and fortifications. Riftwatch won't have any formal say in these decisions, but its representatives may be able to provide information as it becomes available and maybe sneak some opinions in there as well.

READY LOOKOUT TOWERS: Assist the city with transporting supplies to and chasing bandits out of rarely-used guard towers in the Vinmarks.

ORGANIZE RIFTWATCH'S EFFORTS: Amass, organize, and disseminate the information being relayed back from the teams in the field—for example, making sure the Riftwatch teams advising refugees on which villages and cities will be able to take them in aren't directing them all to the same place and causing it to become overwhelmed.

There are also a few specific missions that will be assigned to those with suitable skills at the end of the week. Based on the available information, teams will be sent to Hasmal and to Tantervale to accomplish the following:

HASMAL AERIAL SURVEILLANCE: The Hasmal team will travel by griffon to conduct fly-over surveillance of the city and the territory to the north and west, to try to gather information about the Tevinter forces. From griffonback, the team may occasionally spot Tevinter scouting parties or small clusters of soldiers that can be picked off or harassed, whether from the air or by landing to confront them.

HASMAL GROUND SURVEILLANCE: The griffon team will also be carrying passengers, a small team who they will have to stealthily drop into Hasmal so that they can spend two days gathering information about the situation in the city itself before they're picked up by the griffons once again.

TANTERVALE OUTREACH: The Tantervale team will try to meet with Tantervale's leadership to coordinate defense and relief efforts. They'll travel by horseback (griffons would only remind folks how weird Riftwatch is) and work through diplomatic channels and court backchannels to try to gain an audience with the Lady Chancellor and/or her ministers and persuade them of the benefits of working together.

These missions will be interrupted by the red lyrium dragon, which will first arrive over Hasmal just as the griffon riders are collecting their spy passengers for departure. The dragon will chase the griffons off before continuing on to Tantervale, where the team in the city will be forced to flee its attack and escape from the city.

WEEKS TWO & THREE: THE RUIN OF TANTERVALE

After the news of Tevinter's takeover of Hasmal, its closest neighbor, Tantervale, is calling a muster of whatever fighting-age men are left in its territory. Most of Tantervale's soldiers have previously joined the Exalted March, leaving the city-state only lightly defended. Whoever remains is ordered to arm themselves and meet outside the city within the week to protect against the threat of Tevinter incursion, or possibly even to threaten to join any supposed 'peacekeeping' force in Hasmal. The exact plan is unknown, but the citizens of Tantervale—known across Thedas for their religious zeal—appear eager to answer the call to defend their home and any fellow devotees of the Chantry from the dangerous northern heretics.

But in the end, how many they manage to attract to this makeshift defensive force hardly matters. The gathered host is powerless to stop the sudden, devastating attack of the corrupted high dragon. The huge, red-lyrium-infected beast—known to be under the command of Corypheus for some years now, but rarely seen since it perched triumphant atop the Archon's palace in Minrathous 3 years ago—emerges above Hasmal before flying the short distance east to Tantervale and laying waste to that city.

Simultaneously, confused reports are reaching Riftwatch from both Orlais and Ferelden, indicating an array of calamities: scattered across both countries, several small villages and their fields were recently set aflame, an important bridge over the Drakon River destroyed in Ferelden, a noble family and their entire staff found hanging evenly spaced from rafters in their estate not far from Halamshiral.

UNKNOWNS

Riftwatch agents present at Hasmal and Tantervale during the early stages of the dragon attack witness its beginning, but as they have to run for their lives, little is immediately known about its outcome. Given the destruction they did see, it's believed that Tantervale was a massacre, resulting in many, many deaths and much of the city destroyed by fire and corruption. A wave of people have now joined the stragglers from Hasmal fleeing south, but how many of them actually managed to escape the city of Tantervale itself as opposed to its surrounding countryside is unknown, and among those who survived, many begin to show signs of darkspawn corruption on the road.

Per the reports coming from the South, the leaders in both Ferelden and Orlais initially respond as if being invaded before realizing that the incidents were not the beginning of a larger military push. It will take some time for it to become clear that all of these events happened on the same day as the assault on Tantervale, mostly by individual actors.

RIFTWATCH'S WORK

Most of the work Riftwatch was doing in Week 1 will continue in Weeks 2 and 3, while pivoting or expanding to include dealing with the situation in Tantervale as well:

ASSIST TRAVELERS & TOWNSFOLK: The attack on Tantervale will essentially double the number of new refugees fleeing south, testing the work Riftwatch did in Week 1 and greatly increasing the strain on communities in Wildervale. Some they may be able to persuade to make do and accommodate more fellow Marchers, while others will reach the end of either their supplies or their patience or both, and Riftwatch agents will need to help calm tensions and find alternatives.

SHORE UP DEFENSES: Efforts to shore up defenses in the region will ratchet up, and Riftwatch agents will be called on to do things like help train emergency village militias, build makeshift defenses, and provide advice on what to do in case of dragon attack.

For those in Kirkwall:

ASSIST ARRIVING REFUGEES: Pressure on Kirkwall itself will increase as the first refugees arrive at the city and an even greater number look likely to do so in the near future. Kirkwall has a fairly fraught recent history with refugees from a crisis—the influx of Blight refugees from Ferelden caused a nativist backlash that went on for years. In this case, the locals will be somewhat more friendly because the refugees are their fellow Marchers, as well as slightly more frightened because this crisis isn't happening across a sea. But there will still be a fairly tepidly charitable response to the needs of incoming people, and those escaping Hasmal who are clearly of Tevinter origin will have an especially difficult time. Riftwatch's help will be needed in connecting the new arrivals with those who are willing to help them and aiding in the construction of some temporary structures and camps for those without other means of housing themselves.

PREPARE FOR THE WORST: Riftwatch will be called upon by the Viscount's office to work with the City Guard to review Kirkwall's defenses, work on emergency upgrades, help man observation posts further afield to provide early warning of any imminent attack. For the time being, a regular rotation of Riftwatch members will be sent to keep watch at some of the further towers, since their sending crystals will allow them to pass along more information more quickly than the warning fires. There will also be a lot of discussion about how to handle a dragon attack--with the expectation that Riftwatch will take a lead role in defending against any such attack.

Elsewhere, Riftwatch will send teams to:

STARKHAVEN: Believed to be the most likely next target for assault other than Kirkwall. Riftwatch will send a team to meet with current leadership to offer to provide mage support against a potential dragon attack, coordination of defensive efforts, and to learn how Starkhaven plans to handle Tantervale refugees.

OSTWICK, MARKHAM, HERCINIA, ANSBURG, & WYCOME: Too far to have been directly affected yet. Riftwatch will send representatives to court to try to meet with leaders to discuss coordinating efforts across the region for mutual defense against Tevinter, encouraging them to raise soldiers, shore up defenses, and take in refugees.

FERELDEN & ORLAIS: By the end of Week 3 it will be clear that what happened in Orlais and Ferelden is likely a diversionary tactic, meant to compel them to keep their attention at home rather than throwing too much of their weight behind assisting the Free Marches, but a few people will be sent to investigate the sites of some attacks for any evidence of how they were coordinated and to be sure further attacks aren't impending.

(OOC Note: For attacks in Ferelden and Orlais and for small villages around Hasmal and Tantervale, you're welcome to invent the names of these places and invent details of what exactly happened without checking in with us. If your character is from one of these areas, you're also welcome to say their hometowns or places they're familiar with were affected, as long as: (1) it isn't a place big enough to be on the canon map of Thedas and (2) if someone else's character is coincidentally from the same place, you check with them first.)

WEEKS FOUR & FIVE: THE MARCH ON STARKHAVEN

The situation in the Free Marches continues to deteriorate rapidly. With Tantervale now more rubble than city, nothing substantial stands between the Tevinter force in Hasmal and either Kirkwall, home of Riftwatch, or Starkhaven, the cultural and financial heart of the Marches. An advance on one or both of those cities is believed to be the next logical step, but nobody knows for sure which it's going to be or whether it's going to come in the form of an attack by dragon or just ("just") an army.

Reports from the Riftwatch teams in and over Hasmal at the end of Week 1 spotted signs of that army readying to move, and further griffon reconnaissance during Weeks 2 and 3 confirmed that with Tantervale out of the way the army is now moving quickly. Their path is clearly pointed east toward Starkhaven. Like Tantervale, Starkhaven is lightly-defended, much of its forces—along with its ruler, Prince Sebastian Vael—in Orlais with the Exalted March.

Help from elsewhere is unlikely to arrive in time. Those Marches who might have been best positioned to support Starkhaven in its time of need find themselves with problems of their own, as coastal communities in Ostwick and Hercinia suffer a rash of brutal and unusually well-organized pirate attacks. The port towns of Torbay and Ogwell near Ostwick and Noli near Hercinia take the brunt of it, sacked and burned by marauders. There are several attacks on shipping reported as well, with prizes taken from normally safe waters where the Waking Sea meets the Amaranthine. Both city-states have increased naval patrols and are now on alert, but they're looking outwards, not inland.

UNKNOWNS

How quickly reinforcements will arrive. Agents and Inquisition contacts in Orlais report that the Exalted March is now aware, and that there are urgent debates among the commanders about how to react. Prince Sebastian Vael is thought to be planning to return imminently, but precisely how long that will take—and how many men he will bring with him—remains unknown.

RIFTWATCH'S WORK

SLOWING THE ADVANCE: Riftwatch will do its best to slow the enemy advance and buy Starkhaven time to prepare. Without the numbers to engage the host directly, teams will instead be tasked with making the journey as difficult as possible by creating obstacles along the way: think rockslides, blown bridges, washed out roads, felled trees clogging the river, sabotaged boats and wagons, and so forth. Traps or small guerrilla-style attacks may be laid at some of these points, but with strict orders not to risk it unless conditions allow Riftwatch the advantage to attack swiftly and then escape again. The goal is to harass and pick off low-hanging fruit, not get caught up in an unwinnable battle.

PREPARING STARKHAVEN: Preventing an attack on Starkhaven seems impossible, but Riftwatch can at least help the city prepare for it. At this point a siege is the best option, but it will mean being (or at least looking) strong enough to withstand an initial assault. Top priorities are:
- Reinforcing city defenses. These efforts were already underway by Week 2, but will become far more urgent, and leaders will be much more eager to hear from Riftwatch anything they know about the enemy forces.
- Stocking the city. This includes bringing in supplies to prepare for the siege they now hope comes, whether by wagon or boat or griffon, and Riftwatch may even be asked to help negotiate with merchants and farmers to get deals done and goods delivered faster if possible.
- Bolstering numbers. They need all the fighting manpower they can get, so Riftwatch will be helping recruit by explaining the situation, the context of the war, and encouraging anyone able to fight to help, and then transporting them from the countryside to the city walls as fast as possible. Bringing in fighting men means more mouths to feed, so Riftwatch will also be asked to help ferry vulnerable people out of the city to safety in other Marches. At first this effort will focus on the young and old with political importance, but it will be expanded (if Riftwatch pushes and also if they work fast enough to make it feasible) to include young and old of all classes.
- Helping keep the peace and avoid a panic. Between the news of the on-coming army, the rash of high-profile assassinations (see below) and the horrific fate of Tantervale, the people of Starkhaven are understandably on edge. The mood in the city is one of barely suppressed terror, and city officials are anxious to avoid any incidents that might light a spark and distract from necessary preparations. Riftwatch will be asked to assist the guard in patrolling public areas where people tend to gather and help defuse situations, from breaking up brawls and preventing theft and hoarding of supplies to chasing off an obnoxious crier who won't stop stirring up fears with his vivid tales of how he received his scar at the hands of the vicious, unstoppable Tevinters.

PROTECTING THE COUNTRYSIDE: The enemy journey through the Marches isn't as orderly as it was in Orlais. Parties of enemy soldiers and mages are veering south (occasionally north, into the strip of Marches before the Antivan border, but mostly south) across the river to attack travelers, sack villages, burn farms, and generally cause chaos. This will also involve periodic dragon attacks in the regions between Hasmal, Wildervale, and Starkhaven. These attacks are sudden and brief, hitting random locations, causing death and damage, and leaving as quickly as they arrived. Riftwatch agents traveling through the region for any purpose will need to be on guard, and teams will also be tasked to help patrol the countryside and major roads to protect against enemy attacks. Some teams may be stationed in towns and villages for days at a time, ready to respond to any reports of enemy attacks nearby and coordinate via crystal.

And in the midst of this work, there will be some additional specific missions:

STARKHAVEN ASSASSIN: An assassin is stalking the streets of Starkhaven. Four prominent citizens have been murdered in the past two weeks, including two high-ranking guard captains, a celebrated knight who won the Grand Tourney not long ago, and Lord Kennech, a frontrunner to replace Lord Greer as regent. The murders have been brazen and bloody, not identical but each marked with the sigil of a prominent family drawn in blood, the first (over Lord Kennech) being the symbol of House Harimann, now most famous for having arranged the murders of Prince Sebastian Vael's family in a coup attempt in 9:31. The other houses referenced similarly have prominent betrayals and power-grabs in their history. No one is quite sure what any of it means, but it has certainly set the city even further on edge and has suspicions between members of the ruling class nearing a high. As a neutral party, Riftwatch will be asked to help provide security for potential targets.

DRAGON TRACKING: Corypheus' dragon has rarely been sighted very far from him, and its presence in the Free Marches raises the possibility that he's somewhere nearby. A few different small teams on griffon- and horseback will attempt to track it to where it's resting between its excursions to terrorize the countryside, with the hope that Corypheus is there and this may present an opportunity to confront him directly with fewer fortifications.

FIREBOMBING THE ARMY: As the army nears Starkhaven, another griffon-based team will make one last push to slow them down. The evening before they inevitably reach the city, the team will fly over their camp with mages, Antivan Fire grenades and breakable flasks of oil, and anything else they can come up with to rain literal fire on the Tevinter camps.

WEEK SIX: FALLING ACTION

The Tevinter force finally arrives at Starkhaven. After all the work to delay the enemy and speed preparations, the city is ready to hold fast against them at least until Prince Sebastian can return from Orlais with the army and (they hope) the Exalted March in tow. The Tevinter force, clearly still hoping to take the city before those reinforcements arrive, sets up camp as if for a siege but then launches a pre-dawn attack in hope of breaching the gates. This is repelled, but periodic assault (mostly magical) on the city walls continues—thus far with little effect.

Now that the enemy has arrived at Starkhaven, there isn't much more Riftwatch can do to help directly. The force is still too large for them to take on, and while they can get away with some limited griffon stealth missions in and out of the city, the large-scale operations of previous weeks are no longer possible. Prince Sebastian and the fastest part of his forces will arrive by the end of the week, and he will then take the lead in determining how to defend Starkhaven. He'll be happy to talk to Riftwatch about what they've seen and done in the interim and will be grateful for their efforts on behalf of his city. But there's a lot for him to figure out at present, and coordinating the type of smaller-scale work Riftwatch is best suited for isn't top of his agenda at the moment. Essentially, he'll be in touch.

RIFTWATCH'S WORK

All agents in and around Starkhaven are pulled back just ahead of the Tevinter force's arrival, along with any last group of vulnerable citizens they're able to get out. Riftwatch will continue to put more focus than it previously had on the Free Marches, with increased patrols and surveillance, and will keep an eye on the refugee situation as things develop. The enemy presence in the Marches will continue to cause trouble, with occasional parties of soldiers and mages marauding, posing new hazards closer to home than before that will periodically require Riftwatch's attention. And the situation in Starkhaven will continue to develop and may require more assistance in the future. But otherwise, it's more or less back to business as usual for now, just with a new set of issues added to the pile.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

“Vividly.” Astarion promises, tipping his chin into it as his eyes drift shut.

His sense of smell isn’t exactly as powerful as it once was. Even so, it remains much of his world, and far keener still than most creatures will ever know— better than his eyesight, having lost perfect vision in the dark. One hand lifts, he measures the wind— the direction of it, pressing cool against his fingertips. This is instinct. Not the talents of a nobleman, or an imprisoned puppet of a spawn set only to task on command.

This, like a few other trace features, is all that remains of Cazador’s bestial benison.

“Here. The wind is pushing westward, but the origin of that scent is actually to— ” he glances up, red eyes flicking towards breaks in the cloud cover, searching for the sight of a familiar celestial tail. “Mm. The south.”

It’s been an eternity since he last felt so capable within his own element. So satisfied with himself that his angled posture reads prouder for it, brimming with a strange sense of accomplishment. Not for show, and not to be shared— but his all the same.

Fenris had expected this to be the beginning of locating the camp, not a means and an end. He's left impressed with Astarion's capacity; he promises himself he won't underestimate the man again.

Fenris studies the stars a moment, reorienting himself toward a southern target. He takes off his cloak, intending for full visibility. "I will distract them," he says. "You go for the kill."

Calibration is a strange process: a month ago Astarion wouldn’t have been half as confident or competent— a month from now, he might not be any more, either.

But he’s learning at his own pace. And while war for someone else means horror and pain, for Astarion it’s proved to be nothing more than a potent, consistent means of cutting his teeth. Where else would he hunt so often? How else would he learn— so quickly— what makes for a successful leap into the fire versus an all too dangerous one.

It’s a step up from thieves and ruffians in Kirkwall, but the patterns— the lessons tucked away from it— all of it feeds back into itself, in a sense.

“Just keep them busy. We can’t let more than a straggler or two escape, if we want to make a good— erm, horrifying impression, that is.”

Fenris, mood brightened by his friend's own brightness, answers back, "I have been doing this for years. Have some faith in me."

He starts out toward the camp, a hidden glimmer of smoke and light he is able to focus on more clearly, for knowing where it is. "They do not send their best mages to war."

“And here I was hoping we’d trip over Corypheus himself. Put an end to this war early.”

The matter of faith is left exactly where it lies; Fenris knows by now exactly what Astarion thinks of him—

Well. Mm. Then again, it is Fenris. On second thought, he might be utterly blind.

Either way, they’ve other things to focus on at the moment, and Astarion lowers himself to a cautious hunch, becoming little more than a tailing shadow. A precaution. Preparation.

Fenris lets one muted little laugh drip from him, and he's gone. Speed and strength are his advantages in battle, and he uses both. His intention is to come upon the camp so quickly they do not have time to prepare, and in a flash of blue light, he succeeds.

The strength comes later, cutting into an arm that tried to cast a spell.

It is, objectively speaking— and literally speaking— a breathtaking sight. Literally, of course, because Fenris is making quick, bloody work of his adversaries in that distinctly unique way so characteristic of his alien abilities.

Strictly speaking, the man might be a match for a true vampire. Maybe even an elder one.

For now, there’s not much time to daydream over hypotheticals: they focus wholly on the blur of emblazoned blue before them, the encampment's bewildered denizens. Even so, it doesn’t take long for an outlier or two to flee once blood dusts the earth, possibly in search of help, possibly to ensure someone else somewhere knows exactly what happened to their assets.

Astarion strikes swift in the gap between their backs and the chaos of the Blue Wraith’s onslaught. Not all that different, he finds, from snaring animals in the wood— Tevene daggers aimed only for the most vital of veins, puncturing deep to ensure healing’s out of the question.

It means he’s too preoccupied initially to help Fenris outright, keeping fully to the fringe edge of the madness, but he does, in fact, have faith.

Even if he’d never said it aloud.

He's done this before, but never quite in this fashion. Generally, he hedges his bets, waits and watches. Now, he's dragged himself to the fight outright. He has to fight more carefully than before, as well as more quickly. Dodging flame in the darkness, Fenris notices they've attracted a small band of reinforcements.

"Venhedis," Fenris swears, and begins to backtrack. If they are more spread out, it will give Astarion more room to maneuver.

It isn’t the beautiful dance it could’ve been. Nor a simple, overwhelming victory.

That’s fine. So long as no one survives but them, the only thing this night will leave behind is a bloodied testament to power. Another ghost story to make even a tactician carefully rethink his own strategy.

But he isn’t used to this. Killing is one thing, coordination is another, and though he and Fenris have worked in tangent frequently over lesser quarry, there’s a difference between a street fight and— well, Tevinter.

Fenris pulls back, and Astarion instinctively dislikes it. There’s no time to speak on it, and no means to discuss it, and were anyone else retreating his own response would leap immediately to self-preservation. The antithesis of trust.

...yet here and now, he only turns more vicious as he holds his claimed territory, forgetting all vestigial trains of thought, his heartbeat— he has one now, after all— the feverish tempo that drives him through every swifter blow, every racing lunge.

The farce is done. It should be obvious now, even with Fenris drawing dire focus like a beacon in the dark, that there are two souls at work here.

Not just one ghost.

Edited 2021-07-23 22:10 (UTC)

They may be unaccustomed to working with each other, but Fenris us used to fighting in a team. He was even healed by Anders on more than one occasion, long ago. This fight brings up old memories, sandy beaches filled with thugs and Qunari, cobbled city streets sharp with gangster's knives. This is something Fenris knows he can work with.

A fire blossoms in the sky, and Fenris grabs quickly at Astarion's wrist, pulling him away just as the scent of blood hits the air. A man explodes, flesh twisting grotesquely until nothing human is left. Just a demon, screaming into the night.

"There is your blood mage," Fenris says, and charges.

“What in the Hells— "

Yanked back, he’s left standing there for a strange little beat of awestruck wonderment. That, that is the work of a blood mage? He’d expected— no, he doesn’t know what he’d expected.

But if that’s their (literally) hellish adversary, then that’s where he’s going to commit himself: snaking a path around the wretched beast, hunting for a momentary opportunity— a second of distraction between Fenris’ claws, his blade, and the creature’s own frenzied retaliation.

Astarion finds it. Just a moment. Right between blows. His daggers— both of them— are lanced right into where the demon’s rib cage vaguely used to be, if it still is anymore.

It staggers the beast long enough for Fenris to get a few good blows in. The head falls after several hacks, and the creature crumples in a sprawl of wet limbs. These creatures are especially disgusting dead.

The rest are mortal swordsmen and rogues without any magic at all. Likely they came to the army for pay and glory. The dregs of Tevinter, and that's saying something.

Now, it's just a matter of picking the them off.

A few more run by the end of things— not that they get very far.

Once done, Astarion paces throughout the bloody aftermath, devoting nearly a full minute to making sure he detects nothing else lingering at the edge of camp: no stragglers to confess the Blue Wraith is flesh and blood and bone— or that he had an accomplice in his work tonight, or that they were anything but thorough.

He meets Fenris at the heart of it all once more, making a faint, nauseated noise of disgust once he catches wind— and sight— of that viscerally collapsed creature that’d supposedly been a mage.

Apparently there’s a limit to what his stomach can handle as far as grotesquery is concerned, strangely enough.

“Eugh....”

There's something very amusing about Astarion's disgust for ugliness. Blood and viscera, the man can more than handle. Opportune murder, chaos, destruction, all seem fine. But misshapen forms? Inexcusable.

"I told you," Fenris says, "Corypheus is one of the better looking ones."

“I don’t know if there’s even a way to rank....any of this.” He mutters, the back of his hand to his mouth for the briefest of moments.

But then—

“Are you hurt, darling?”

Fenris' grin tugs at something almost cocky. "Worried?"

“Hahah— ” Dithering, songbird high, before it drops quick as a damned stone when he adds: “Quit it.”

Nuisance.

He tips his chin up high, circling closer all the same, clearly checking for injury by sight alone beneath that swath of blood.

“Your sword work was sloppy tonight, anyway. I have every right to be worried, if that’s how you handle every last blood mage and brigand hiding out in these fields, night after night.”

Fenris privately doubts Astarion knows enough about maneuvering a greatsword to tell the difference between sloppy and neat. He also knows Astarion is not speaking from anything logical within him, so there's hardly any point in arguing. A half-formed little scoff-- really more of a laugh-- escapes him, and he lets the matter go.

"I am unaccustomed to fighting at your side, in that fashion," is all he'll admit. "Surely we need more practice."

That pulls something a little lighter from Astarion, a half-chuckle of a thing— though it’s really more of a breath— and clearly milder than his fast-fading bristling.

“You could always come back with me. It’d certainly make it easier to keep an eye on you.”

He isn’t serious about that suggestion, of course; they both know where they belong right now.

Astarion means Kirkwall, and Fenris isn't quite ready to return yet. He's seen the place in chaos and war, and would like to do his best to forestall that, rather than potentially hunkering down. Yet, the idea of cutting through Venatori on the way back is... tempting.

And surely, if Kirkwall falls, Fenris will see just as many Venatori as Starkhaven.

"Yes," he says. "Alright. We will make our way back."

The look he wears...drops slightly. An expression of wanting, and knowing that it’s something he can’t take. Stupid of him to make the joke in the first place; he'd never expected Fenris to say yes.

“I’m afraid I’m not done yet. Dragon still in need of tracking and all that. And handsome as you are, I’d only pulled myself away from it all to...clear my head. Tripping over you was just a pleasant accident.” The incident across the network had been dangerously potent in its nature. That much he doesn’t need to say out loud— to Fenris, it had always been obvious.

He thins his lips into a thoughtful line, still standing but a step away from the man’s feathered shoulders.

“...you’re sure you’re not hurt?”

Fenris nods. He's not sure why Astarion made the suggestion, but Fenris has made many greater faux pas than just rescinding an invitation. This is a rare something he can handle with grace, so he does.

"Yes," Fenris says. "Are you?"

Since this is apparently something to worry over.

“A little stiff in the shoulders from overdoing it, a few shallow scrapes here and there, but that’ll be gone after a good night’s sleep. You made quite the diversion.”

It’s a compliment and a truth, but he doesn’t draw attention to it, stepping away instead to reach for an undamaged water skin nearby— stooping down to uncork it and set to washing his own hands.

“When this is over, though. All of it. I’ll be happy to let you come back with me.”

Let.

Let.

Fenris raises a brow. Is he being baited? Only one way to find out. Voice thick with sarcasm, he says, "what an honor."

“Naturally. I’ve a place of my own in Kirkwall now. You won’t have to rest your...always bare feet on dusty stone flooring after a wearying journey home.”

His eyes are bright for a flicker of a beat, gleaming with sincere mirth. Here, in the middle of a bloodbath, washing his fingertips without scalding himself. Smelling the heady scent of iron without needing it.

And in the company of a creature that isn’t wretched with the faults of mortal kin.

It’s only a longer beat there, the pads of his own damp fingers rising to wipe down his face in one last bid at decency. His clothing’s still soaked, but that’s why dark armor prevails in the heat of warfare, matters of stealth aside. He shifts to standing, fiddles with the waterskin’s cap— and then remembers it belongs to no one anymore, tossing it aside like trash.

A draw for his own attention when he adds, quietly:

“...thank you, by the way. For stepping in when you did over the crystals.”

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