faderift | TAKING SULEDIN KEEP

WHO: The Inquisition
WHAT: Capturing the Keep
WHEN: Guardian 23
WHERE: Emprise du Lion
NOTES: Violence, gore, etc. This log contains closed prompts for quest participants, but is open for anyone who wants their own battle- or post-battle logs. ICly it will take most everyone they have in the region to take the keep, so any character could be part of the assault and its aftermath. It's also forward-dated to the 23rd, so if your character isn't currently in Emprise, they could be by then!

By 23 Guardian, the Inquisition has pressed the Red Templars out of the hills and snow and into Suledin Keep. The assault on the keep starts before dawn and is long and deliberate; there are no trebuchets here. By the time the sky has turned a bright enough gray to pass for morning, the Inquisition has worked its way into the snowy, twisting maze of gardens in front of the fortress. Soldiers weave around the walls and the rubble and the spikes of lyrium. Archers climb up mounds of tumbled stone and into the ancient, twisting trees for better vantage points. By the time the fortress itself is breached, the sun is setting again behind the clouds, and snow is falling.

The Red Templar forces are many and though for them this is a retreat, a last stand in the region, they are well-organized. They fight with the single-minded fury of the corrupted, and indeed many of them show signs of advanced lyrium infection, eyes red, crystals jutting up out of skin, sometimes so numerous that they begin to form their own sort of armor. A few have been so completely consumed that it is difficult to tell they were ever human to begin with. The battle will be long and bloody. Courtyards and wall positions must be taken one by one and held, and more than once retaken again after a successful Templar resurgence. Any Inquisition member able to fight is likely to be pressed into service before the day is done.

As the forces press forward the snow behind them is left checkered red: lyrium, blood, Inquisition uniforms. There are bodies to identify. Wounded to tend to. Enemy soldiers beyond hope of recovery to be put out of their misery, perhaps, for those so inclined. A giant's carcass is laid out in the gardens for inspection; two more are already dead and rotting in cages and chains, with red crystals infesting their bodies. Bigger crystals have infected the castle itself, sticking up from the ground and out of walls almost as if they have been cultivated here. They must be smashed as the army advances, for any who linger near begin to feel its effects, particularly the wounded.

Threaded | Flat

The scouts who have been surveilling the Keep warned that there might be giants within, though it was unknown whether they were captive or part of the Red Templar forces. Just the chance that they could be hostile is too great a risk to take and so teams are sent to dispatch them. They stick to the outer ranges of the castle, and the team flanks the main thrust of the battle and avoids most of the fighting en route to the long courtyard running along the western side of the keep. There are a few Red Templar archers along the inner wall but they are quickly dispatched and just in time before the real danger reveals itself.

Footsteps shake snow from the branches of fallen trees and make broken chunks of castle wall rattle ominously as a giant pounds into view. At least twenty feet tall, with heavy limbs and fists that almost drag the ground it comes toward them, red lyrium crystals encrusting its back and elbows, spread across leathery grey skin like a virulent rash. It wastes no time, a mindless rage sending it swinging straight for the group with a guttural growl, attempting to swat them into the wall like flies. His reach is long and he doesn't seem bothered by the uneven footing-- the snow or the blocks of stone and fallen logs hidden beneath it, all crunching beneath massive feet.

"Choice. Spirit." corrects Imshael, standing before them dark haired with a neatly trimmed goatee, not imposing but well-dressed in shades of purple and charcoal. The central courtyard of the castle is a mess of broken stone and metal, massive sculptures, and red lyrium that nearly hums with energy, jutting up from the ground, a heaping pillar from what used to be the courtyard's central platform. Snow blows across flagstones and frozen dirt, whipped at cheeks by a cold wind. They have had to fight to get here, but the main battle is elsewhere, the lines of Inquisition soldiers and Red Templars clashing just barely in earshot. Though the battle seems distant, they have in fact come to the heart of the matter: scouts have reported that the man standing before them seems to be in charge.

"These are your friends?" he asks, directing the question to Michel de Chevin, though his attention roams across the others. A brow lifts, intrigued. "Very interesting. True to my name, I will show you that you have a choice. It doesn't always have to end in blood. We don't fight, and I will grant you power. Shower you with riches. Or maybe virgins. You pick."

There's an end in sight now: more Red Templars lying in the snow than standing, a slow dampening of the clangs of metal and rips of electricity and shouts that have been background noise for hours, and a feeling in the air that's half relief, half despair. Which way it tips probably depends on whose side you're on. Here, ahead, are Red Templars who fall clearly on the despair side, two men and one woman who keep their weapons up as they back away across the terrace as a unit.

They're not all the way gone yet. Their eyes are red but still human underneath, a mix of aggression and fear and fury when one of them strikes out with his will to slam shut the nearest Inquisition mage's access to the Fade. Another raises her sword to swing.

She should cut his throat.

He's beyond help, even ignoring the red glow of his eyes or the stark red contrast of the veins in his exposed neck. Torsos aren't meant to bend that way. The stone he's lying across, where he fell from a height, is drenched red. She can hear his lungs rattle and bubble when he breathes. Whatever he's done, however many he's helped to kill, she shouldn't want him to suffer. Clarke has a knife in one hand, staff in the other, and an hour ago she didn't hesitate to kill one of his comrades. So she should cut his throat.

But she doesn't move, not until she hears snow crunching under feet nearby, and then it's a step back instead of forward, a sharp turn to look. If there's relief on her face, it's because the question of the Templar's throat can be momentarily set aside. Lines reappear between her eyebrows a second later.

"I'm sorry," she says, in a clipped tone that isn't sorry at all, and gestures to the red-stained field with her knife hand—"about your alliance."

CLOSED ↠ Twisted Fate, Metaari, Isabela

CLOSED ↠ Michel, Dorian, Sam

CLOSED ↠ Salvatore, Pel, Cyril

closed, post-battle.