open: something grabs ahold of me tightly

[faderifting]

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

Comments

[maladgogo]

"Figured by the lack'a lightin' besides torches n' fires that tech wasn't much of a thing here. Gonna take a minute t' be gettin' used to, not even havin' a phone to be callin' home or somethin' with." He rubs his hand down his face, looking off toward the bar, and its patrons with faces beset by gravity and age. The longer he's here, the less inviting this entire affair looks.

He realizes she's asked a question and turns back, leaning forward on the table with his arms crossed over one-another. "So y'know the kinda shit you can smoke what mellows you out, makes you kinda sleepy, makes you wanna eat everything in sight if you ain't distracted? Think that, but potent enough to put you in a coma for a couple'a hours. Used to grow it back home, wit' m' brother's help. Had a greenhouse just for growin' that, n' all kinds'a other strains for sellin'."

[foxsays]

“We don’t have phones where I come from but we have proper lighting everywhere except the ships. I’ve written letters but I don’t know if I can even put something through a rift, the demons all seem to be something more like fine ash when they’re finally killed.” Which raises more questions but not any she cares too much about at present, she’s written the letters and she keeps the most important ones tucked in her pocket, should the opportunity strike.

“Smoking isn’t as popular where I’m from, and it’s mostly just normal tobacco, in a pipe. Life is so busy that I don’t think anyone could conceive of taking something just to be out of it for hours.” They nap through the hottest part of the afternoon if they can but it’s too hot to do much beyond swim on those days, a refresher for the rest of the evening and night. “It’d be bad for sailors if they got into such a thing, supplies are limited, worth more than their weight in gold when it comes to certain things and it’s so expensive to import something like that from the places that grow it.” That time she managed to steal some and shift it on the black market? She ate like queen and so had her whole building. “I suppose I’m so bad at being still, I can’t imagine ever wanting to knock myself out unless I’ve been hurt.”