faderift | We must resist

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We must resist

WHO: Morrigan; open
WHAT: Checking in on friends, checking in on the mage and rifter situation and research. Wildcard and shapeshifter lesson discussions available!
WHEN: Post-rift opening in Skyhold onwards, basically a big catch-all
WHERE: All over Skyhold
NOTES:A few so please bear with me:
1) Morrigan is seeking out rifters since what happened to Sina, there’s a starter just for them
2) For the same reasons she’s seeking out members of the mage council
3) If you’re interested in shapeshifter lessons, there’s a handy sticky post here
4) The research Morrigan is doing is based on the Hinterlands expedition here

Library - artifact research;
Since returning from the Hinterlands, she’s devoted more time to the artifact that had returned with them, or rather to the notes that had been made about the surroundings. It makes a change to reading the book on the Veilfire runs and making her own notes from what Pel had directed her to, taking her deeper into history, into Avvar culture and Ferelden legends for a change. Each time Flemeth is mentioned she makes what might be a grimace or might be a smile.

Spread across the table are copious notes taken in the Hinterlands, including sketches of the artifact, as well as a symbol drawn on the floor in the ruin, a few more of the strange statues, the piles of bones.

Another perspective would be welcome, as would a distraction in all honesty.

Gardens;
Instead of the usual peace, Skyhold's garden is a battle. Not a serious one to most but to the children playing Wardens and Darkspawn it's very much real, shrieking and lunging, hacking and slashing with swords. One little boy holds Morrigan's attention more than the others; this is a rare moment of peace, when things have been on edge lately. As it is, she's kneeling, planting the seeds she brought with her, a few she's carried around since she left the Wilds, others brought with her from Orlais and beyond. Simple, quiet work, no devious plans some might think she has, just a break from researching out in the fresh air.

And no, contrary to what some might have you believe, not a single one of the seeds will grow into something poisonous.

Seeking rifters;
She's met a rifter or two since she came to Skyhold, and talk of them has been everywhere but hunting them down to talk was never a priority until the rift had opened within the very walls. Now? Well she has theories, theories she cannot test herself but looking for them might help, and it's a different sort of magic, something new to draw her attention when not working on whatever scraps of elven lore they've uncovered thus far.

Wherever the rifters might be, she seeks them out eventually, appearing around a corner seemingly from nowhere, perhaps after a particularly intent crow or cat has watched them before disappearing. The introduction is the same each time, for she only knows one or two in passing.

"Greetings, you may call me Morrigan. I wonder, might you have the time to talk a while?"

Seeking the mage council;
That they've made a little Circle themselves here is still a notion that disquiets her, something that she keeps an eye on without joining in, unwilling to be held to whatever rules they've made but it wasn't just anyone who opened a rift in Skyhold. It was a native, a native mage and when she arrived in the first instance it was after an Abomination rampaged. It hardly helps matters that she's Dalish as well.

There are too many Templars here for her liking as it stands, unsure of what reprisals there might be. So she waits, quiet and patient, seeking Adelaide LeBlanc in particular simply because they've spoken before but it is opinions she is after, a sense of how things truly lie. She's lingered before, to watch, to listen, to judge silently and she never could abide things being caged.

wildcard;
[Or feel free to find Morrigan elsewhere!]

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Sina is rereading a scroll for the millionth time when she turns her head toward a voice, and she smiles pleasantly at the sight of the woman she's come to recognize from her presence in the garden. "Certainly," she says quietly, and with a poorly-disguised wince of pain, she props herself up to be more upright so she can converse.

Carefully Morrigan slips into the tent, settling her staff to keep it propped up open. She misses the fresh air when kept from it, to have your whole world be nothing but a tent? It would drive her mad within a matter of days.

“Does it trouble you so much still?” It’s more genuine interest than concern though given the fate of the Herald, everyone is likely holding their breath, just waiting for the next crisis, the next chance to point fingers and spit their pieties, it concerns all marked with a shard or by magic.

Though she appreciates Morrigan's concern, it seems the shard is all anyone talks about these days. And her pain. Sina gives a strained smile and looks down at it, nodding wearily. "I'd consider myself lucky to have it in my hand instead," she hoarsely confesses, a wryness overtaking her fatigue.

“A mage’s hand is still a dangerous hand, and the Herald died too.” Outside of Kieran, she’s bad at comfort and it doesn’t do anyone well to live in the land of denial. But she didn’t come here just for that though even she isn’t so terrible as to just ignore it right away. “I thought a distraction might suit, you are Dalish and I have been working with Pel Ashara as well as speaking with others from the clan on elven lore, if you are up to it, I thought we might speak of it, of any particular tales your clan tells as well as some of the research from the Hinterlands?”

There’s a book in one of the pouches at her belt devoted solely to her studies in Skyhold so far, and it seems both of them have the time to spare. If anyone untoward comes a-knocking then Morrigan is more than enough to send them on their way again.

Sina's face falls, her expression becoming instantly wearier. She knows there will be repercussions, and has been lucky enough to have avoided them for now.

Her interest is piqued by Morrigan's offer, but she tilts her head, slightly confused. "Please," she hoarsely begins, "forgive my impertinence-- but what are your intentions in studying the People's history?" She likes Morrigan, and can see straightaway that she's not a typical human. Still, a human she is, and Sina is far from quick to trust their kind with ancient secrets and theories. One never knows how that information might go astray, even well-intentioned.
...even elves can't always manage it.

With a quiet sigh, she sincerely hopes this won’t turn out the same way as her ‘chat’ with Beleth Ashara, she’d been in a foul mood for too long after that, until a scout delivering a message had scurried out of her sight so fast he’d tripped over his own feet in his haste. There’s never an easy way to phrase this because so few understand, because so many have been taught poorly as well as being taught to fear.

The Chantry has much to answer for, but that is not an answer to give Sina.

“I research what once was, the things that this world has thought lost. The magic of the elves and Arlathan existed long, long ago, as does the obscure and the forgotten. Would you not have it back? I have studied the oldest lore, able to travel to places that would be beyond many.” Not only because she is human and because she has up until recently had the backing of Empress Celene herself but because she knows, she has learned, she has taught herself. “Mages and Templars have barely stopped warring with one another and now Corypheus attempts to assault the very heavens as the magisters of old did - knowing what is just as old or older still might be all that stands between victory and defeat. We cannot afford defeat in this case.”

Sina takes comfort in hearing Morrigan speak of Arlathan not as a fairy tale held onto by a desperate people, but a real place, forgotten though it may be. She watches her speak and gives a slow nod of understanding.
"Your interest is... an honor," she says, weakly despite her burgeoning enthusiasm. "I may not have... always... trusted the word of a human, but Skyhold has taught me differently." Having spoken a bit too long without taking a breath, she cups her hand over her mouth and coughs into it with a wince of pain.

Honour almost has her curling her lip. Honour means little, honour is a word people use as shield and blade and armour as required, hurling it at one another; her interests are more selfish yet

"I take it you have come from a clan were contact with humans is minimal then? Clan Ashara seem somewhat different from the norm though I have enjoyed speaking with Pel and Ellana thus far." More than she thought when nearly all of her work has always been done alone, and will likely continue that way as soon as the eluvian can reach Skyhold. "My travels have taken me to many a strange place however, places most likely forgotten that would have been left to decay and fall to dust in the end."

Sina smiles at he mention of Ellana and Pel, and nods her head weakly. "I had never met a human before I left the clan," she admits, "never even seen one in person. Clan Dahlasanor is very small, and very wary." Her smile dwindles-- each day she wonders how badly she's betraying the Keeper by so openly consorting with humans and others, but she shakes it from her mind.
"What sort of places?" she asks, resting her head back on the pillow in anticipation of more details.

“Did your clan practice isolation simply for survival, or was it in the hopes that avoidance of humans would allow for the span of your years to lengthen once again?” There are doubts about the latter, that such a feat would ever be possible since they all learned the truth about Zathrian but she can almost understand the desire to live forever. They would lose less that way. “Where did you roam? So I might know if there are places you might have ventured that I have been to.”

And so she can build up her map, eventually she’ll need to show that to Leliana.

“I have been to such places as the Arbor Wilds, south of the Dales, to the Nahashin Marshes. As a girl I grew up in the Korcari Wilds and roamed them endlessly, during the Blight we covered most of Ferelden, from Ostagar to Denerim, to Haven, to the Deep Roads.” She has been between worlds too, and that renders things rather less exotic no matter how much one end of Orlais differs to the other.

Sina tilts her head as though confused by the question. "..for survival," she answers simply, with the tiniest note of incredulity. Perhaps other clans with larger numbers and better defenses can have their loftier reasons.

"In a forest in the Free Marches," she replies, keeping it vague, just in case. "Traveling here was my first time in Ferelden."

“The clans I have encountered have been fairly large, one still large even after what had happened to it.” Werewolves. Werewolves and a Keeper with a vendetta happened to it but still Zathrian’s clan had been much larger than they had expected, likely contacting others given the amount of elves that had come when the final battle began.

“You are not of the same clan as Merrill, are you? Hers was near Sundermount, if a place could speak then the stories it could tell, the ancient things that still move without rest for there is no one to command them to stop or to be still.”

"No," Sina says quickly, shaking her head. "I... don't believe I'd be here now, if I were from Clan Sabrae." It's not meant as a slight against Merrill, with whom she has reconciled; but from her understanding, the clan was wiped out.
"I've heard of Sundermount, and my Keeper told me of the things Sabrae claimed to be seeing. It was far too close to Kirkwall for us to venture there."

"I did not hear the tale from Merrill's mouth herself, and I am not so fool as to trust what is written in a book alone. History is poorly remembered enough." Merrill's description of Varric does little to make her think she is likely to get anything resembling the truth from him so best to go straight to the source. "I expect there are many clans who will give Kirkwall a wide berth now, with the Veil so thin there I t'would be unsurprising to hear of rifts opening around that place."

The Exalted Plains might well be the same way if Gaspard and Celene keep the war going on and on until trouble is actually at their very door. "Such things make it more difficult for this Inquisition to go to the places where we are more likely to find answers. Corypheus is an ancient being and with so much that Tevinter learned and plundered from the elves before their fall and after then finding the source..." She sighs, frustrated. "We might very learn more of these shards so many of you carry now."

Sina nods in agreement about Kirkwall-- it's absolutely been a region to avoid, at least since all the trouble with Clan Sabrae. That the veil is thin makes even more sense.

"There must be," she agrees, lightly touching her shard, "one opened above me while I was out gathering herbs. This shot out like an arrow. I never... went in the rift, or came out of one, like the Rifters." She's only seen two rifts, and both were like omens of death; the horrible green pit in the sky that brings pain until she passes out from it. She hopes to never see one again.

"Do you think... the shards are from Cor...yph... what was it?" she asks, becoming a little short of breath just at the memory and heightened awareness of the debris in her chest. "Does he control them?"

“I wonder if there is the ability to choose. There are few from this world to have been afflicted so, and none seem to know how the Herald came by her mark in the first place. Since her spirit has not appeared to speak to any either, I doubt we will know the truth unless we can pry it from the mouth of an enemy.” Perhaps literally given how Leliana, sorry, the Nightingale is these days. The how and the why, the strange disparate people from the rifts, the few natives - why them, how did a rift come to be by them and then give them something other than demons.

There’s a hesitation before she speaks, a thoughftul considerate pause. “I cannot say, not entirely, but doubtless he is connected in some way. If he could control them then Skyhold would not be safe; he would be able to come and open rifts as he pleased perhaps, able to flood the place with demons and win his victory. But with all the pieces that are there, I would say that he does know more than we do. This magic involves the Veil, the Fade, and such things are often connected to the Magisters. Why do you ask?” It’s a curiousity, but a pointed one.

"Do we know that he can't?" Sina asks, her voice growing more timid. The rift she opened was an accident, at least on her part-- but was there potential for someone else to have interfered? "I just..."
She purses her lips, ruminating. After all the questioning that's been happening, she doesn't know how to phrase anything anymore without arousing suspicion. "...perhaps it's happening for a reason. With the rifters, and... perhaps it's intentional." She doesn't know where this is coming from, but at this point anything is plausible. "If this person wants power, it's... a strange way to go about it, but not entirely unsound."

Instead of answering immediately, she leans out of the tent, glancing about to see who might overhear then she makes sure the flap is closed tightly. Nothing absurd about two women being entitled to their privacy yet she woud rather they not be overheard at a time like this.

There are those who would still paint Morrigan as dangerous. (They would be right, but she is firmly on their side but such assurances are seldom enough when it comes to witches.)

"Corypheus is likely to have more of a connection to the Wardens than to the shards if he is indeed one of the magisters who breached the Golden City - he is a darkspawn, after a fashion, and their connection is stronger than the shards. The shards are something other again, and I would say that given they close rifts, they have more in common with the Fade and the Veil."

She settles herself again, listening as a wolf listens for anything untoward before she continues.

"Nothing can be ruled out but given where your shard lies, I would caution you from dwelling on such thoughts. If someone were to be pulling rifters from other worlds as a way to unbalance the Inquisition then tis an odd strategy, unless giving them the power to seal rifts is something they did not forsee and cannot undo. Already there are enough here to do significant damage. Your thoughts?" She'll give Sina time to think though, careful not to give away too many Warden secrets.

(Hilarious in hindsight.)

This is the most Sina has ever learned on the shards, and she listens raptly, nodding her head along with each point Morrigan makes. When asked her thoughts, she looks aside, considering.
"...I don't know," she says quietly, "we know that they can both close and open the rifts. But why they exist at all... that confounds me. They simply erupted from the sky, seemingly-- apparently-- caused by the explosion at the Conclave." She purses her lips and shakes her head. "But I was nowhere near Haven. It makes no sense."

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We must resist

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