faderift | player plot: the battle for starkhaven.

Entry tags:

player plot: the battle for starkhaven.

WHO: All
WHAT: Riftwatch and the rebel mages come to the aid of Starkhaven
WHEN: Last week of Wintermarch
WHERE: Starkhaven and outlying territories
NOTES: Open to all, with instructions/suggestions below for what your character can do, dependent on skillset and division. Violences within.

The news has been the same for seemingly endless months: the Tevinter Imperium stays encamped, entrenched, at the doorstep of Starkhaven. The Free Marches city is long besieged, strangled and dying, and its proud stone walls that keep Corypheus' forces out also entomb its own citizens as supply dwindles fast over the winter.

The Exalted March has not come. The scattered militias and militaries of the surrounding territories have not rushed to its aid. Riftwatch has done all it can with the personnel it has, sabotaging enemy movement, collecting information, supplying villages and redirecting refugees, but it seems as though all it can do for Starkhaven is stand vigil to its collapse.

That is, until some hasty conversations were had.

A trio of Riftwatch agents approached Grand Enchanter Fiona, ad hoc leader of the rebel mage forces currently under the Inquisition's banner, with a question: what would it take, for the rebel mages to lend aid to Prince Sebastian Vael?

23 Wintermarch: Stoneweale Fort

Closed: The Division Heads, Derrica, Fenris, Julius, Marcus Rowntree, Petrana de Cedoux

It rains for the entirety of the ensuing negotiations, ice wet winter striking the impassive walls of Stoneweale Fort and the tents erected within its walls. The fort stands south of Starkhaven at the edges of Tevinter's influence, and contains the entirety of Prince Sebastian's available forces and, newly, Grand Enchanter Fiona, several rain-swept griffons, and a collection of Riftwatch agents.

Not all of them take up space in the war room (for instance, the griffons don't need to be there), but those that do bear witness to a deal being struck:

Prince Sebastian speaks plainly: the situation is beyond dire. They are at the precipice of surrender, and between himself and his commanders, they've been preparing for a last-ditch effort to save as many of his subjects as he can spare. By directing his forces in a (likely suicidal) full-scale attack against the enemy, he has hope that this will distract them for long enough so that a select few of his soldiers can fell the far gate and evacuate as many citizens as they can. He welcomes any assistance the mages could offer.

Fiona, understanding the lethality of what Prince Sebastian and his men are going to attempt, first states that the rebel mages can be mustered to assist in this evacuation by destroying the wall and shepherding Starkhaven's people to safety. She also pledges to personally join the Prince and his men in their attack on the main force.

It's with gratitude that Prince Sebastian accepts her offer.

And there is little time to prepare.

23-29 Wintermarch: The Minanter River

In the coming days, Riftwatch redirects its focus towards the preparation of Starkhaven's last stand. The movement of a small army of mages from the Orlesian frontline to deep into the heart of the Free Marches is the kind of logistical effort that one would hope to have plenty of time to organise, particularly in the interest of evading the Imperium's notice for as long as possible, but time is a luxury, and there are few of those available these days.

To ensure a swift and relatively stealthy travel time, the rebel mages are broken up into still sizeable detachments – they ride on horseback, or travel on merchant vessels that have been acquisitioned for the war effort, quietly coursing down the Minanter. They camp in thatches of forest or huddle within long emptied warehouses in semi-abandoned trading settlements.

Riftwatch agents of any combat capability join them, ride with them, and stay in contact through crystals to ensure coordination.

In the sky, griffon riders are tasked with keeping close monitor of any Tevinter detachments that might push close to the small army of mages moving in from the west. The going is often lonely, long hours, solo flying with reportage over the crystal network, before gathering together in small camps to feed their mounts, themselves, and sleep in hastily erected tents that protect them from the winter-time rain.

When necessary, members of Forces and Scouting will be deployed to run interference and push back and redirect Tevene scouts or soldiers and Venatori. Sometimes, larger groups of Imperial forces threaten to intercede, in which event, Riftwatch agents may find themselves working together with rebel mages to not only prevent the enemy from interfering with their people, but killing them so as to ensure there is no reporting back of a sudden influx of mage activity.

Members of Research may find themselves based at Stoneweale Fort. After some convincing, Prince Sebastian allows his various commanders to coordinate with Riftwatch to identify locations and pressure points within Starkhaven and its defences for the purposes of sabotage in preparation for Tevinter's taking. Now is the time to plan, analyse maps, prepare explosives or enchantments, and try not to look too excited about it.

Meanwhile, those within Diplomacy, if not hovering helpfully around Stoneweale Fort, are sent to make ready for Starkhaven refugees by speaking to villages further south, negotiating for supplies and accommodations, rallying any militia that are willing to assist in their protection. It's all a little thin on the ground, but if there was ever a time to cash in some of Riftwatch's local goodwill, it's now.

30 Wintermarch: Starkhaven

The wall

A horn sounds out, long and mournful. Voices and horse hooves and sword clashing and magic casting beneath the stormy sky is reduced to a dull roar as Prince Sebastian, accompanied by Grand Enchanter Fiona, leads his forces in a frontal assault against the overwhelming Imperial presence at his gates.

As a result, the far gate has been left undefended.

Slaughtering the remaining unit of Tevinter soldiers guarding it is borderline perfunctory, but there is much still to do. The majority of the rebel mages (less those volunteers who have joined Fiona in Sebastian's host), along with any mages of Riftwatch who choose to join them, gather en masse upon the stone bridge and the shallows of the river – a small army of men and women in robes or in armor, but all holding a staff to mark them for what they are. As they begin to draw from the Fade, the air takes on the scent of bitter-storm, energy crackling and prickling across exposed skin, ruffling hair and clothing in unseen winds.

Stone cracks and wood splinters under gouts of raw magic and white-hot bolts of summoned lightning, slamming in unison against walls that have remained previously unbroken all this time. Beneath them, the ground rumbles and shivers, and debris spills where cracks form and open and widen from the base of proud walls to the ramparts.

A small group within the rebel mage forces then move together in coordination, and the stone wall before them all at once comes apart. Giant broken slabs of stone and support lift into the air as if in an explosion slowed in time, drifting away from one another as magic carries it in shimmering green-tinged telekinetic influence.

The ground shakes, again, as pieces of Starkhaven's walls land safely, if heavily, on the mud-thick river on either side, leaving a yawning opening where once were sealed closed gates of oak and iron.

On the other side, where rain beats down the rising dust, gathered citizens of Starkhaven, frightened and war-worn, stare out at an army of mages.

The sky

In the sky, over the chaos, Riftwatch uses the distraction of battle to send swift-flying griffons over the walls and into the city proper to enact acts of sabotage to Starkhaven's infrastructure. Below them, civilians flood the streets, pressing in a constant stream of bodies towards the crumbled wall. Up here, the sounds of a raging battle drift clearer from the front.

Everyone in the sky knows where they are going and what they are doing, under strict orders to avoid any harm coming to civilians. Either as a passenger or on their own, members of Scouting (and some non-Scouting mages) carry with them precise instructions from Research and the means to enact them in the form of alchemical explosives and enchanted grenade-like items that will detonate in bursts of raw Fade magic (or their own magical ability). Common targets include: the defensive weaponry and ballistae posted up on the ramparts, the chains that man the major gates of the city, certain storehouses and administrative buildings indicated on maps. Likewise, there are wealthy estates to pillage and deprive Tevinter of any coin they might find there.

But soon the city will be overrun, and those on griffonback may find themselves under assault of arrows and magic as they make their escape.

The retreat

On the ground, floods of Starkhaven citizens, soon to be refugees, flow through the crumbled wall, staggering across the bridge and through the shallows of the river that surrounds the city, helped along by mages and Riftwatch alike. It is a lengthy and exhausting process as hundreds of ordinary people, wide-eyed and terrified, are herded out of the valley and onto solid ground, streaming south for where villages have been fortified and prepared to receive them.

Then, the sound of cavalry.

Racing across the rocky plain, under Imperial banner, a horde of dracolisk and their riders come galloping at a furious pace towards civilians, mages, Riftwatch alike. Their presence does not speak well for the main battle, but they arrive all the same. Reptilian screeches and hisses pierce the rumble of thunder above, and frightened cries from the refugees begin to sound out as panic grips them, turning to run in panicked stampede at the sight of Imperial soldiers upon their poison-spitting mounts.

It was enough of a likelihood that the Forces members who have been deployed to ensure the security of the evacuation are prepared to move with the rebel mages to meet them. The battle is quick, bloody, magic crackling through the air in time with clashes of shield and flying arrows. Searing poison sprays across skin and armor and flame ripples across scaly hide as a brutal skirmish ensues.

But the battle breaks when the worth of continued harassment weighed against the potential cost. By order of Itaeus Ferra, astride his own beast, the dracolisk cavalry withdraws, tiding back towards Starkhaven, now lost to the forces of Corypheus.

31 Wintermarch: Southwards and Vallomire

Men, women, children march through the cold and into the night, but blessedly, the rain eases itself to an icy misting of constant damp instead of the driving downpour from earlier that day.

It becomes clear that among the refugees, there had been those prepared for this journey. Temporary campsites, guarded by mages and Riftwatch alike, strike up so that all may take a few hours of rest. There is some food passed around, if not very much, and as the sun rises on a new day, the procession resumes, if no less wearily.

Eventually, all arrive at the half-abandoned township of Vallomire, chosen for its largely empty barnhouses and warehouses on the shores of a distributary from the Minanter. It is not large enough or manned enough to permanently house so many of Starkhaven's people, but it will do for the next few days of recovery and rest.

There is food, gathered in from as many corners as was willing to part with it, and warm blankets, and, just as important, a reduced sense of impending doom amongst those that had lived under its shadow for so long.

Spirits are not high, but they are tired. Mournful, but alive. As the day lurches into the evening, as the rain finally withdraws and bonfires are lit, and mages and ordinary citizens of the Free Marches mingle in this moment of necessity, news finally trickles in from Starkhaven.

It is as feared: the city has been claimed by the Tevinter Imperium. Much of Starkhaven's military has been destroyed, giving their lives to buy this opportunity for escape. And, in murmurs that spread from campfire to campfire, two names in particular are spoken in low, reverent tones: Prince Sebastian Vael, and Grand Enchanter Fiona, have fallen.

Stories of prince and mage charging side-by-side into a wave of enemy soldiers, fighting back-to-back against overwhelming odds after all their fellows had fallen, rising again and again from the mud to continue the fight, to hold back the inevitable tide until the city was emptied. Toasts are raised and tears shed for the saviors of Starkhaven—its people, if not its stones.

Smoke rises in the north, a black mark in the sky, as the sun begins to set.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It's surprising a response enough to earn— not a laugh. Adjacent to one, a sharper exhale than the last.

"It was a large stone tower."

Marcus brings the whiskey up again, a bolder sip. "Strong walls," he adds, after. "Difficult to take down, but they fell. Fortunately," sharper, a point being made, "given Vael's plan."

"Ah, a return to business," Byerly says cheerily. "And here I was hoping for a bit of levity. But you're not much of a man for laughter, are you?"

That sharpness dulls in a look aside, turning the cup he's holding against the table in a slow circle. Silences over the occasional round of sparring on a crystal can be left up to all sorts of interpretation; there is not much more to read from him now, a few feet away, save that Marcus is thinking.

"I think you're someone who doesn't need someone else to laugh, to make light of them," finally, dredging up something straight forward and plain. "But I'm not incapable."

"I'd like to see that some day." Byerly smiles easily. "I don't suppose you'd make a joke right now, if I asked it of you."

They are sitting in a stone fort, full of men and women who are coming to terms with the knowledge that in but several days, they will step out into the snow and mud of their home city to die in it. At some point, Marcus may need to reckon with the idea that he flew the mount that delivered the Grand Enchanter of the rebel mages to the place where she would join them. Maybe, the quiet that Byerly gets in response to his proposition is one that is considering these things.

The bottom of his cup clicks as Marcus sets it back down on the table. "Do you know the one of the Orlesian, the Free Marcher and the Fereldan, who were being chased by the city guard?"

You wouldn't think, by looking at Byerly, that he knows it. His manner is easy and casual and cheerful.

"Oh," he says, "tell me. Do."

Byerly is perfectly convincing. That Marcus doubts it is entirely a matter of self-awareness.

However;

"An Orlesian, a Free Marcher, and a Fereldan, are being chased by the city guard," he says, delivery about as one can expect—quiet and gravelly and without much in the way of inflection, although Starkhaven accents supply some of its own musicality. It's been a while since he's heard so many that sound like him, in one place.

Manages to resist fishing out a cigarette. He doesn't have too many on him, and he won't waste one just because he is having a conversation with Byerly Rutyer. "The Orlesian spies a stockhouse, and all three quickly run through the open doors. There, they all climb into empty sacks and try to disguise themselves and stay still as the guardsmen enter.

"They start searching around for the three men, and a guardsman sees the sacks a little out of place. He kicks the first one, and, thinking fast, the Orlesian barks. Guardsman says, 'it's only a dog'. He kicks the next one, with the Free Marcher, who thinks fast, and meows like a cat. Guardsman says, 'it's only a cat'. The Fereldan, who'd been listening to his friends, tries to think of what else could be in a sack. When he's kicked, he shouts, 'potatoes'."

A gesture. End of joke.

Edited 2023-01-27 01:15 (UTC)

Byerly listens to that. At the end of it, his face grows intense and grim. And there's an edge to his voice when he says, "That isn't funny. You know I'm Fereldan, don't you?"

(He is, of course, fucking around.)

Marcus lifts his cup again, the corner of his mouth going up.

"Aye," he says.

He is romantically committed to a Fereldan, anyway, who by a significant measure is more intelligent than he. He gets a pass, he thinks.

And Marcus' refusal to rise to the bait - to apologize, or get defensive - has Byerly surrendering. The sternness melts away at once, replaced by an easy grin and a shrug.

"It's a good one," he says, "but a bit generic. The sort of thing where you could easily switch around who's doing what according to who you want to insult."

Byerly's easy transition from brittle insult to easy good humour is expected, observed, still mildly off-putting to behold. The hint of a smile fades, although it was always going to, probably. Something might crack if not.

"I'll leave the joke-making to you, then," Marcus says, unseriously. A so-far conservative hit of whiskey doing its part in loosening some seams.

"No, don't! I beg you." Byerly presses his hand to his heart. "The pleasures of hearing a joke are so much greater than the pleasures of telling them. I insist - please, keep doing it."

By takes another (faked) slug of whiskey, then tilts the flask towards Marcus in offer.

The look aside this time is slightly askance, but Marcus finishes the last mouthful of whiskey in his cup, and places it in range of Byerly's flask. Only when it tips to offer him a second dose, does he remember in a flicker: a street in Lowtown, the brightness of blood on knuckles, and the coma-sleep that came after in a room paid for.

Well. This is a special occasion.

He draws back his cup once done, not quick to drink again from it. "You do one." While they're here.

"Hm," Byerly replies, and tilts his head back in thought. He drums his fingers on the table briefly, then asks, "How does Corypheus' undead abomination of a dragon, that evil creature blighted in the Maker's sight, know what it's supposed to be doing in battle?"

Marcus' focus on Byerly blunts as he thinks, a looking through as he quietly, for some seconds, runs through whatever available wordplay springs to mind.

Apparently none, returning focus, a slight shake of his head. How?

“It doesn’t really know,” says Byerly blandly. “It just wings it.”

Whatever Marcus was anticipating, this likely is so much worse.

There is half a second of delay of genuinely not understanding, before Marcus takes a breath in so it can be let out again in a sigh. He lifts his cup to drink from.

Just before it reaches his lips, he tells Byerly, "That's terrible," which is not necessarily disapproval.

"Thank you." He bows from the waist, an open grin sitting on his lips.

(The irritating thing about Byerly is that he really can be charming. On the rare occasion he's not deliberately being obnoxious, he really can be likable. All the more shame he chooses to act like he does.)

He allows that joke, that camaraderie, to sit for a moment. Then he turns to a slightly more serious matter. "Do you have any great love for this city, then?"

There's nothing in Marcus' manner that suggests this is a hard pivot, no shift or change in him as Byerly asks his question. Entrenched in it all still, here at the table, jokes or no, if now a little more comfortable for whiskey in his belly and blood.

A silence, then, taking his time in the answering, before he says, "It always felt unrequited," with a glance towards the other man. Briefly searching, scouring around for traces of, what, mockery? Perhaps.

Regardless: "I escaped, once, when I was young, and tried to go home. Not very clever of me, but I knew that."

Ah. This is new information. Interesting - Though Byerly's expression, of course, remains mild.

"What happened?" he asks, like it's not obvious precisely what happened. Unrequited tells a tale.

A hand turns, a subtle gesture of: isn't it precisely obvious, what happened?

But he doesn't say that. It's the kind of thing that he hasn't thought of lately at all, the kind of thing that he must, returning to Starkhaven again some twenty-five years later. That searching, scouring focus lessens.

"I managed it," Marcus says. "And I was served a cup of tea while they alerted the Order. They were very polite and very frightened, my family, and then I was taken again. Peaceably," he adds, as if to mitigate any wrong impressions. "There was little point to it, staying."

By tops off the man's whiskey, giving a little hum of acknowledgment.

"Have you seen them again since? Your family?"

"Some."

The cup is topped off, and Marcus splays his fingers mid-pour; enough. But he draws it back nearer anyway, breathing out a breath that feels warmer than before. Feels a muscle or two relax. It is easier to say that, some, than try to muddle his way around definitional values of the word family.

It is easier to associate that word with the likes of, first, his little elven Circle-sister. Of two lovers. Of mages, who might call him kin or might not.

"We had them promise their assistance in Starkhaven before it was sieged. Refugee transport. They own boats. When did you last see Ferelden?" There is no particular break when he switches topic, no attempt at grace in this defensive maneuver.

Byerly looks over at Marcus, a tiny quirk of amusement in his lips - graceless indeed - and then blows out his breath like he's thinking.

"It hasn't been so very long," he says. "Back with that business with young Colin and the Templar." The temptation to dwell on that is strong indeed - see, Rowntree, see what I do for you and your people - but the temptation to brush past it is even stronger. He wants to take all the advantages he can get - but he also feels so squeamish about finding an advantage in that dreadful matter.

"And then our visit to Orzammar, of course, but that doesn't really count."

There's a flicker of interest for mention of young Colin and the Templar—before his time with Riftwatch, but likely heard of at the very least—but interest of a more defensive nature than curiousity. Byerly moves past it. Marcus turns his cup around against the table.

Lifts it. "No visiting with the Rutyers?" he asks, instead, before drinking again.

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