[OPEN] holes in the sky, pierced by the fire

[eolasemah]

WHO: Everyone who's around!
WHAT: A rift has opened in Skyhold. We have to deal with it.
WHEN: The last day of Wintermarch
WHERE: In the courtyard, between the tavern and the dungeon.
NOTES: I will be posting periodically to let you know the results of what your dudes are doing! If you need clarification or want to ask me something, PM me on this account.

It’s a dismal, rainy evening, with Skyhold at the mercy of one of the many winter storms that passes through the Frostbacks. Most of the keep’s denizens have shut themselves inside to sit by a warm fire, have a drink, even go to bed early rather than face the freezing rain and the wind.

The tavern windows are aglow with light and merriment, but in the open area just behind it comes a different kind of glow: flames bursting to life and then dissipating, as a solitary elf in an oilskin cloak practices her fire spells in the relative safety of the rain.

It’s no secret that Sina has been isolating herself as of late, though her mood has taken an even more pointed downturn in the last few days. Her movements as she works are increasingly erratic, frustrated even, as there are times when she casts a serviceable fireball, and others when barely a spark leaves her hands. As she grows angrier, her energy depletes, and she’s barely resting between casts.

Perhaps it is because of this that what happens next occurs at all. In a burst of anguish and fury, Sina wrenches her hands forward, drawing from whatever reserves she has left—and then her shard reacts.

In an explosion of neon green that knocks Sina flat on her back, a rift erupts into the gloomy sky. It crackles and hums insidiously, its strange electricity causing every shard belonging to every Rifter in the vicinity to suddenly spit and pop in recognition.
No doubt drawn to the new opening in the Fade, the dark form of a despair demon slithers from the rift, takes stock of its surroundings, and slowly begins to approach the prone form of the fool that freed it. Moments later, it is followed by several spindly green terror demons, and at last the hulking inferno that comprises a rage demon.

Comments

[eolasemah]

The new effort and the upturned shards elicit another reaction in the rift, which catches on them like a fish on a line. There is no stream coming from off to the side this time, as it seems that person has either left or been taken away, and in the meantime the Rifters are once again feeling that terrifying buildup of power.

The pressure mounts for what seems like eternity, then explodes again, knocking them all back, killing the terror, and revealing that the rift is...

........still there.

[sunshinethroughgrey]

Bethany had fallen down to her knees as the terror demon shrieked, lifting one hand to her ear as the other raised her staff -- but it was unnecessary. The man's glaive took the demon's head clear off, and Bethany pushed herself out of the mud, covering her eyes as the rift exploded ...

And pulled right back in on itself. She shook her head, before she yelled out to the others, "You don't have enough power! Four won't do it!"

The girl with the shard in her chest was going to be no use - very well then, the man that the Mabari had pulled away. She dashed over to him, and muttered a quiet, "I'm sorry -- "

-- just before she put her hand on his arm and flooded him with Healing and Rejuvenate. Then she grabbed his hand, the one with the Shard on it, and pointed it towards the Rift.

[laurenande]

Without the interference of the fallen shard-bearer--she had not known it for what it was, not until it had been removed--Galadriel could feel the edge of the rift more keenly. Edge was not the proper word, perhaps, but it was the closest concept she could conjure at the moment. Her blood thundered in her ears and behind her eyes; the edge of that creature's scream rattled across her thoughts. It would take a long while for the ringing of that shriek to fade, but the rift could not wait for the sensation to pass.

"Again!" Galadriel demanded and stretched out her marked hand to connect with the rift.

The gradual build up of the rift energy was maddening; her patience had already worn too thin, she would not tolerate another failure. Galadriel drove her staff blade into the ground and, with as much will and force as she could summon, reached out and gripped the far side of the rift. It could not evade her now, nor slip away again, but she lacked the power to hold it and draw it through as well.

"I've a hold of it," she shouted to the others, fallen and harried as they were. "Grasp it as you can and pull. It will collapse!"

[apostasia]

It isn't that the spells don't help Martel - it's just that the vicious resonating backlash of a broken spell is something that goes beyond an injury, an unavoidable consequence of the practise of sorcery that another spell layered over can do little for. He'll have a bad night and tomorrow he'll wish he was dead, but he'll be fine; for the time being, Bethany's magic returns to him the strength he'd exhausted in these efforts so far, but not the focus or lack of mind-altering pain required to do more than allow her to manipulate him to the purpose.

Still, through the roaring of his own blood in his ears, he hears enough from Galadriel to struggle with it, his fingers clenching erratically in an effort to force himself through it to do as she bids.