faderift | open: something grabs ahold of me tightly

open: something grabs ahold of me tightly

WHO: Inquisition Forces
WHAT: Inquisition forces cross the mountains into Orlais to deal with Emprise du Lion
WHEN: Wintermarch 25 onward
WHERE: EMPRISE DU LION
NOTES: This is a mingle-style log for the Inquisition camps, local tavern, and general/open Inquisition work, etc.

This time they hike down to the west, but the trip through the mountains is no easier. The snow is heaped up about the road where wagons have pushed it aside, stomped into slippery pack beneath the feet and hooves that have gone before. Of the main track it is ankle deep at best and in places it drifts, waist-deep on a tall man and enough to bury a dwarf who hasn't come prepared with snowshoes. Everywhere the wind howls, biting cold, and the sky hangs low, a pale flat grey that makes it difficult to judge distances. Those who know winter weather call it a snow sky, and near-daily squalls prove them right.

They set up camp in Sahrnia, across the broad expanse of frozen river that has trapped the villagers here upstream. Tents pop up in rows and in the shells of tumbled-down buildings, fires blazing and thawing the ground to mud. When the supply wagons roll in they re-open the local tavern, brightly lit with flaking paint on the walls that might once have been colorful and patterned tiles on the floor that seems to swim like an optical illusion after too many glasses of the cheap red wine that fills the cellars.

Even deadlier reds hold the hills: Red Templar sightings have been frequent and it is said they are operating in several locations in the region in significant force. Some of these men and women have become hulking, crystalline beasts. Many others are in the earlier stages of corruption: red-veined and -eyed, aggressive and superhumanly strong, but still visibly human and coherent if spoken to. Red lyrium is even easier to find, jutting out of the ground or cliffsides, filling caves-- the Tower of Bone, a fortress that has stood for centuries, now threatens to split from the inside out. The area's wildlife was none too friendly before, but now the wolves and bears have begun to be corrupted by the lyrium and many will attack on sight, without provocation. (The snofleurs that bumble harmlessly around the river seem unaffected.)

Everywhere there are ruins: broken bridges, crumbling colosseums, and the great hulking mass of Suledin's Keep tucked between the distant hills. Scouts reported that Red Templars hold it as well.

RIFTER ARRIVAL - SAHRNIA - THE HILLS - TOWER CAMP - A HANDY MAP

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The pronunciation might have been a little odd, but as Leliana echoed her, Lara couldn't help but note how familiar the accent itself felt to her ears. European, almost - French? The question grew on her tongue, like an itch, but she held it back as the woman went on.

At the mention of the mark, she turned her hand and glanced down at it, green light spilling onto the map. At the word demon, her brow furrowed and her eyes returned to Leliana's.

"...They were pale, and thin - I couldn't see their faces, but they screamed..." She trailed off. "It's not quite what I would have envisioned by definition, but I suppose 'demon' fits."

"There are many different types of demons, some less monstrous in visage than others. They can disguise themselves, even trick or persuade some into serving as a vessel for them. Some even suspected that those who arrived through the Rifts." A moment, and she slightly inclines her head, expression vaguely apologetic, realising she has skipped a step in the explanation. "Rifts are the what brought you here, a tear between this world and the Fade and, as we are beginning to learn, other worlds, as well."

Her tone is gentle, though her voice itself remains steady, strong. After a moment of hesitation she reaches to her pack, just a small thing, and pull outs a pair of black leather gloves, setting the on the table.

"These might be useful to you, if you do not wish to advertise your mark." She pauses, just momentarily, leaning back in her chair. "The Inquisition has taken in a number of people who have arrived, as you have, and others who carry such shards."

"But not you?" Lara asked, one eyebrow twitching upward as Leliana pushed the gloves toward her.

It wasn't perhaps the most pressing question she could have asked, but it was the easiest in the moment. The others - demons and rifts and alternate dimensions - she needed a minute to sort out her own thoughts before she asked another's.

"You'll just - take me in? Help me?"

Even if this did turn out to be an entirely different world, Lara still suspected that there was as little for free here as there was in the one she'd come from.

A thin smile, with little humour in it. "If I thought you were a demon, this meeting would have gone very differently."
At least, she supposes, that is honest.

"There was one among our number who had the first of those marks. When she wielded it, it held a purpose. It serves us to understand why and how people are pulled here, and what effect your being so branded will have - for yourself, and for our very world."

Her voice is low and steady. "The Inquisition is fighting a war, Lara. Resources stretch thin,"

(she doesn't grimace a little, but she is tired by that persistent tug of war that rages onward, between her compassion and mercy and all that she has had to become, to embrace, to craft the future that the Divine had wished for. Justinia had been concerned with national politics, however, and this? This could effect their entire world)

"But we will not force you to take up a blade or even wield a broom, if you do not wish it. You sought knowledge, no? We have that." Ultimately, though, Leliana shrugs a little. "The choice is yours. I will not force your hand."

It was entirely different, everything even stranger than the mystery she'd discovered in the mountains of Siberia, and yet, somehow, it was exactly the same. It all came down to the same thing.

A choice that really wasn't. Not for her.

Not for the woman she had become. (Not for the woman she wanted to be.)

She reached for the gloves and started to pull them on, tucking the bottom into the metal bracers of her armor to hold them out of the way.

"I'm not entirely convinced that I'm not dreaming this," she said as she tugged the fingers tight over her own, "But if this is real, I need to know what's happening. Running and hiding doesn't help anyone."

"Wise words, on both counts." How often to demons fool dreams, and try to entrap them?

She hesitates for a moment, and is glad that her general demeanour, that quiet, deceptive calm covers what it is well enough to make it seem more akin to a pause for thought. "I am sorry," Leliana starts, brow furrowed and mouth tugging into a frown. "Thedas is home to many great wonders, but your hand has been forced."

This is not how it should happen... and yet, this should not happen at all. It seems naive to think that the remarkable must be pleasant, happy. It is a line of reasoning that fits Leliana more than the roles she must play, and that cannot be. That she struggles, still, after so many years suggests a weakness in her that she cannot stand.

"I will make for Skyhold in a day or two. If you would sooner make your way there faster or slower, I can introduce you to some contacts of mine."

Lara was quiet for a moment as well, surprised... and then touched. A small warm feeling lifting in her chest.

Small, but appreciated.

"...Thank you," she replied quietly. Then, mouth twitching gently, she offered, "Though, I'm apparently going to be here a while, so maybe I'll get to see some of those as well."

A wry, dark sort of humor. Which she increasingly excelled at.

Reaching again for the map, she searched for Skyhold.

"What should I know in the meantime?"

A very slight wave of her hand, dismissive. "Do not thank me yet," Leliana advises, though not unkindly. She would rather be able to offer something more concrete than words, than platitudes.

And though she doesn't laugh, Lara's comment does spark a smile, or at least the shadow of one, That kind of 'optimism' would get her far with certain members of the Inquisition, she suspected. A number of them did have a certain way with words and inclination to the dark and dramatic - and she could hardly exclude herself from that number.

"Perhaps. Skyhold itself is wondrous, in its way," and she taps the Frostback Mountains on the map. "And as for what you should know..." Leliana trails off a moment, thinking. What is the most important?

"The war is a complex one. Stop me if any phrase is, shall we say... unfamiliar? The war is based, however, in a long history." As they so often are. "I think," she begins, pausing thoughtfully and turning the matter over, "in its simplest form, we battle two fronts: the tensions between mages and templars, and a rising dark power. That power has caused the tears in the Fade, that has brought you here."

Leliana watches Lara carefully, just for a moment, to let that sink in, before adding with a wry smile of her own: "Which part of that has left you with the most questions?"

Lara looked at her, eyebrows arching bemusedly at the question.

"Would saying 'all of it' be unhelpful?" she joked, but before Leliana could reply, she was shaking her head and chasing the thought away. "Templar is familiar... though whether we mean the same thing..."

She worked through it aloud, one piece at a time.

"Mage... as in magic, yes? Witches, or wizards, of some fashion?" Her fingers tapped against the table, her brow furrowing in thought. "I don't recognize Fade."

Edited 2016-02-04 12:55 (UTC)

That does earn a slight smile, though she holds her tongue until Lara has had a chance to process.

"Magic, yes." This was, perhaps, going to be rather complex. Where to begin? "The Fade is another plane of existence. We go there when we dream, and it is a connection to the Fade that grants mages their power. It is where we go when we die, and it is home to spirits and demons. The Fade is complicated and dangerous, but beautiful in all that, I think. It opens up the imagination, I think."

She has boiled it down to the simplest terms, yes, and perhaps that shows a little in her expression. More details can come later, when they have more time and materials to hand. "Templars, as they exist here, are the knights and the physical strength of the Chantry." A pause, because her opinion of the Templars and their interactions with mages is complex, as much as her relationship with the Chantry.

"Mages are subject to a good deal of control and descrimination. At present, the conflicts between mage, templar and Chantry are a struggle of fear and abuse of power, on both sides."

Lara listened, her brow twitching slightly, lips pursing as her mind turned over Leliana's explanations. The woman wasn't wrong - it was all very strange, but... It was also, somehow, oddly familiar.

Similar.

"Magic isn't-- hmm," she began to speak, but then stopped, humming thoughtfully. Could she honestly say it didn't exist where she was from? She had seen the Divine Source herself, held it in her hands. She had watched Jacob perform a miracle...

There could be other explanations - likely were - but who was she to say that it wasn't, with how little she knew about it?

"It isn't common, where I'm from," she said finally. "Even just a year ago I would have called it impossible. Most still would. But templars - this Fade..." That's where it got interesting. "The Knights Templar were endorsed by one of our churches in the middle ages, and were considered one of the most skilled units of the Crusades - a series of holy wars. And the Fade - it sounds something like our concept of Heaven and Hell, except singular, or perhaps Purgatory...."

A world with magic so rare as that? It hardly seems possible, and the surprise is evident on her face.

"The parallels are intriguing," she agrees, after a drawn out moment of silence. The tavern has begun to feel oppressive, less a safe haven and more a place with too many listening ears in a potentially delicate gathering of information. "Would you care to walk with me? I think this is a conversation better had with a clear head than a drunken din."

She gestures that she might stand, but does not rush, does not push. "Can you tell me a little more of these holy wars?" A moment, and then, "what of elves? They are a people that have suffered much, here."

It is too much to hope, perhaps, that in some world they have endured a better fate.

Lost in thought, the movement caught her slightly off guard, but she quickly realized the wisdom in the offer. Leliana had just warned her, after all, about being careful about revealing too much about herself to just anyone.

"Yes," she nodded. "That sounds like a good idea."

Pushing back her chair she waited for Leliana to do the same.

"The Crusades isn't my area of expertise, but I'll share what I can," she promised, the honest archaeologist in her. She knew more than most, but there were men and women who could have offered Leliana intimate details that she could only speculate at. "As for elves...."

From the expression on the woman's face, Lara surmised it was an important question, and she wished she could say something different.

"There's no such thing, at least so far as I am aware. They only exist in stories; in fantasy."

Once Lara moves, so does Leliana, listening with interest as they move. "Perhaps you might enlighten me as to your expertise, at some point."
But when the revelation on elves comes... well. She catches Lara's wrist, at that, holding her steady for a moment, studying her expression, her eyes, anything for some clue, some jest. "So simple as that? 'They only exist in stories'?"

The hold only lasts a couple of moments; whatever she looked for in Lara, she cannot see it, and so Leliana releases her, before she sweeps out of the tavern. There's no such thing. "Deplorable," she murmurs, as they break out of the oppressive air of the tavern into the crisp, invigorating chill of the night air. "History has done much to erase their very identity, here," she explains when Lara is apace with her, nodding in the direction she plans to lead. "Humanity, I should say. They have been tormented and enslaved. To hear they do not exist at all, when so many echoes appear to carry across--"

But she cuts herself short, exhaling slowly. The wall must be rebuilt, piece by piece, the calm exterior that contains her ire restored. "Forgive me. It was alarming news to be met with."

Lara tensed, muscles of her arm and shoulder tightening beneath Leliana's sudden grip, but she didn't fight. She watched the woman carefully instead, studying her face in turn as Leliana searched hers.

Looking for... what, exactly, Lara couldn't say. Ill placed humor perhaps?

"It seems to be the day for it," she murmured softly. She'd been caught-off guard by the reaction, but wasn't judging Leliana for it.

She tried to imagine what it would be like, on the other side. If it were her in Leliana's place. Somehow she believed it wasn't all that much easier.

"I wish I could say we've done better where I'm from, but we simply turn on each other instead. For everything from the color of our skin to the god, or gods, we chose to believe in."

"I can believe it. We are as cruel to one another as we are to the elves." Frowning as she walks, breath leaving fog in the air, Leliana takes the thread this had handed her, and tugs a little - only a little. "So then," she starts, "you would not know the dwarves, either? Or the Qunari?"

It seems unbelievable. It is unbelievable. She has made little time to interact with many rifters, thus far, too busy in her tower with her messages and missions. "Maker's breath."

There is something almost awed in her tone, mixed in with the concern. "To step into a new world, with so much history yet unlearned, perspective untarnished. That is quite an opportunity, Lara... though I cannot say I envy you."

Torn into another world is still the reality, and a dangerous world, at that. Who knows what she might have of a life, of kin, left behind her?

"It's--" Lara took a breath, looking around at the small, snow-covered village and its strange inhabitants as they walked. "It's a lot. But I've gotten used to having to adjust."

For better or worse.

"I'm a fast learner." She offered another of those wry, slightly sad smiles. Then her head lowered as she considered the actual question. "Dwarves I've heard of, again from popular fiction, if not in practice. The - Qunari, however...You mean the-- people with the horns?"

Another small wrinkle of her brow.

"There's one story. A myth from the ancient Greeks, but they certainly don't fit what I know of it. The Minotaur was a monster."

These people - Korrin, had seemed like any other person. If bigger and with an massive set of horns. And capable of using magic.

But that was another conversation altogether.

That gives Leliana pause. "I am sorry," she finally offers. I've gotten used to having to adjust seemed a term that could cover so many crimes inflicted against your person, so many terrible things one might have done to survive. Leliana knows it from each perspective, and all too well that she is hardly unique within Thedas or even the Inquisition for that.

Suffering was universal, a blight upon each world. If seems so cruel, does it not? But perhaps the Maker had a hand in all these worlds, loved all these children, and was hurt Himself when each time they inflicted pain upon one another so ruthlessly.

Better not to dwell on it, and instead, to offer information. "I know of a dwarf who is, himself, a prolific writer. I have to wonder how he might feel about his people being relegated to the realms of fiction." Knowing Varric, he might think it rather fitting.

"Yes. Their name means 'People of the Qun,' a strict and extremely structured set of beliefs. From my understanding, it dictates almost every element of their lives. Those who leave the Qun are titled 'Tal-Vashoth,' and those born outside it simple 'Vashoth.' Those of us not born to the Qun are 'bas.' Not all those who follow the Qun are Qunari, nor are all who we humans or elves or dwarves might call Qunari considered true Qunari..." A glance to Lara, and a faintly apologetic smile quirks her mouth as she carries on. "It is complex. I travelled with a Qunari, once, many years ago. He was a stern but mighty warrior, with great honour. He did not have horns, but he was the most stalwart of them I have ever met."

And, satisfied with the distance they have drawn from some of the buildings, she stops a moment. "If you do decide to join us, I hope you will indulge my curiosity regarding these myths from your world." Perhaps her enthusiasm for stories shines through, just a little. A glance of Leliana, and not the Nightingale, before her expression becomes more serious. "I cannot lie, Lara. The mark on your hand is important to us. If you and it should fall into the hands of our enemies, I cannot say what the implications could be for this world."

Edited 2016-02-08 01:13 (UTC)

I am sorry.

It caught her off guard again. More kindness, from this woman she'd only known a few moments, than she'd experienced from so many others that should have been there for her. From so many it had turned out, were working against her.

It was disarming. She wasn't certain she could trust it.

But she wanted to, God help her.

When Leliana paused, she did as well, turning to face the woman readily.

"I appreciate your honesty, and your offer. I don't expect this to be easy, but if you and this Inquisition are willing to help, than so I am."

It is sentimental, perhaps. More sentimentality than she should allow herself, certainly more than Sister Nightingale could exhibit. What they need is the mark, and yet she cannot but feel—

Rifters, and ones bearing the mark, are dragged into a circumstance not of their making, twice over. A challenge beyond what most could imagine dealing with already existed for those from Thedas who had the green shard glowing and rippling within their skin. To have that when you have been forcibly torn from your home, into circumstances that seemed complex and beyond understanding even to some of those who had walked this world their entire life? It seemed cruel. It was cruel, and for all that she brings death with her, Leliana cannot abide cruelty. Not to mages, not to rifters, not to shareholders. It was not always simple; there were reasons these people each had the potential to be feared, but even so. One person was not a reflection of the many, nor vice versa. Such assumptions… they undermined the very fabric of what made each person so precious in the Maker’s sight. And Lara's words suggested some further hurt.

Such moments, such thoughts, they allowed her to remember why her faith was so important to her. Now was not, however, a time for such contemplation.

“I am glad to hear it. The journey is not so long from here, although I am afraid it is not the most clement weather to endear the countryside to you.”

For now, she holds out the map she had shown Lara earlier. "Take this. If you see any Inquisition scouts and have need of information, ask for Sister Nightingale. They will bring you to me."

Sister, as in--?

She pushed the question away. She could ask later. Once she'd some time to digest all that she'd already learned. (It hadn't fully sunk in yet. She wasn't sure she truly believed. Hadn't even begun to think about what it would mean....)

"It wasn't the best season where I was, either," she replied wryly, reaching out to take the offered map. "It'll take more than the weather to stop me."

She held the parchment for a moment, then tucked it into the inside of her armor where it would be safer.

"Thank you, again."

Sadly, there is a good deal more than weather to be concerned about, but something tells her Lara has gathered that already. No need to crush her beyond fighting.

"I'm glad to hear it. And I can assure you that no thanks are necessary. If you decide to find me at Skyhold, then thanks due will be my own."

As she starts to turn away, Leliana frowns, and looks back to Lara. "Unless you find yourself with Inquisition forces, I would advise keeping away from groups. There are too many factions and too many agendas for a stranger to be able to memorise them all at a moment's notice."

And with that, Leliana is departing, nodding to Lara before she continues her ascent up the hillside.

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open: something grabs ahold of me tightly

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i am so sorry for the eternal tldr omg

Don't apologise! I love it. 8D

\o/ sweet victory

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