faderift | OPEN: turn off the lights and I'll glow

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OPEN: turn off the lights and I'll glow

WHO: New rifters & characters in Emprise du Lion
WHAT: More people falling on ice than usual, this time with demons, templars, and bonus nighttime
WHEN: Guardian 23
WHERE: Emprise du Lion
NOTES: This month, the arrival log is open to all.

You were asleep--deeply or fitfully, for the last time or just resting your eyes for a moment-- and then you were not. And wherever you were was not, anymore, replaced by nothing but the sensation of falling, tumbling into endless, bottomless nothing. If this were still a dream, you would wake before you hit the ground. You can't die in a dream, they say. In some worlds.

But there's no waking here, just a flare of green-white light and a jarring impact onto freezing stone or ice that is twice as cold and just as hard. When your breath returns and the light's after-image fades from your eyes you will find yourself beneath a dark sky, a full moon straining to be seen through intermittent clouds, and a second moon low on the horizon. Its light reflects off snow to add an eerie ambient glow to the darkness, made stranger by the sickly green tint added by the fluttery menacing shape of the rift hanging in mid-air. Be careful getting up: you are at the edge of a cliff, what was once a waterfall now frozen solid in a massive curling sheet of icicles. The drop to the bottom is several stories, surely a deadly fall even without the huge humps and spikes of ice and snow that litter the ground where splash and spray were petrified.

You are also not as you were: in the palm of your left hand there glows a narrow splinter of light the same sickly green as whatever brought you here. It aches, a bone-deep pain that gnaws even through all the distractions. Like the fact that you're being attacked by monsters--some tall, spindly stick-things with too many eyes, some hunched and hooded with no eyes at all. Some are entirely different but perhaps more monstrous for it: men and women in heavy, gleaming armor, all of them with chunks of red crystal protruding out in a way you soon realize indicates it is actually growing out of their skin. Their eyes are a dull red, hollow and empty, and they attack with a single-minded determination.

Luckily, you are not on your own. Around you others are waking up, equally confused, with the same green lights flaring from their hands. There is stuff scattered about, like the contents of someone's life exploded through the rift with them: a picnic table and benches upended, metal camp furniture flung about, clothes and utensils, bits of wood and canvas and mattress littering the ground. Even better, you are not far from a path leading toward an Inquisition camp, and noise travels far in this terrain, echoing up canyons and off cliffsides, carried by the chill night wind. Help is on its way; just last until it arrives.

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Magic shouldn't be draining out of her like this. She'd often described it as a kind of energy, but that didn't mean the batteries could die. So why did it definitely feel as though the batteries were dying a slow and painful death and she was going to end up with a giant demon crashing down on her at any moment??

She just barely realized that she was being spoken to, and she spared the briefest glance at the woman with the staff. "Not sure," she managed. She wanted to say that she'd never had to worry about anything like this before, that it was strange, and frightening, and ask if it was possible for magic to simply die away... but for the first time in a long time, this didn't seem like the moment for questions.

"It's going to fall," she announced in a strained voice. She might usually opt to re-route it, to get it to crash against another opponent and take care of two birds with one stone, but she didn't trust herself for anything more complicated than speech. And even that didn't seem like the best of ideas. "Can you-...?"

She was going to ask if she could do something to it when it came falling, but by then Hermione no longer felt the pull of magic, as though it had simply slipped through her fingers. It left her feeling empty and scared, but mostly, it left her with the feeling that she really should roll out of the way as quickly as she could before that demon ended up crashing down on her face.

Christine reached out an arm, intent on pushing Hermione back, but it looked like she knew what to do already, which left Christine to hold out her staff and release another powerful cold spell: Cone of Cold. Then she tried to hurry back, which resulted in her tripping over her hem and falling on her rear. Again.

Graceful.

But it was worth it to see the terror frozen solid and hitting the earth with such force that it shattered on impact. She blew out a breath of relief and moved to pull herself up again.

"All right?" she asked.

Whatever she might have been expecting, it certainly hadn't been to see the creature encased in ice and then shatter like glass. Alarmed, she let out a little cry as she threw her arms up over her face; she already had one shard embedded inside her to worry about, so she didn't need to have a shard of ice join in, too.

"I-... I think so," she murmured softly as she slowly climbed to her feet. Fighting on the ice wasn't exactly prudent, given how many pratfalls they'd taken already, but there were still others further in that clearly weren't given much of a choice insofar as being in the thick of it.

"Does this happen often? How do we stop it?"

"It does now." Christine glanced quickly at Hermione, not wanting to have to tell her this. But it was the only way.

"The shard in your hand can pull the rift closed somehow. It will hurt you, but it is the only way we know." As a healer, Christine hated to see people hurt. She hated that she could do nothing to stop the shard from reacting to the rift as it did. But the demons wouldn't stop pouring through. The rifters were needed.

She blinked at her, not quite understanding what she was talking about. After a moment, she looked down at her hand, still glowing with a strange sort of green ambiance that looked all too similar to the Killing Curse. It was already hurting, but she didn't know if it was just going to end up hurting more if she did... whatever it was that was being suggested. It couldn't hurt that much more than being attacked by demons until they wore her down, though.

"How does it close it? What do I do?"

"All I know is what I've heard from others like you, since I don't know what it feels like." She was speaking quickly now, not wanting to waste time. "You'll need some of the others to assist you, I think. It should feel like you can pull it closed." And that would shut the demons away on their side of the Fade.

Those directions were vague at best, causing Hermione to frown even more deeply. "All I feel from it is pain," she replied, hating not understanding how any of this worked. "I'm going to assume that feeling virtually anything from else is a good sign that it's doing whatever it is it's supposed to do. How does that happen and how close do I have to be to it?"

"Closer than this, I fear." She knows the shards react more violently the closer a person possessing one is to a rift. "We should gather others to help too. But... I honestly do not know how it is done. People have merely said it has felt like reaching through to grab hold of the rift from the inside, and yanking it closed."

Closer than this wasn't much of a response, but Hermione hadn't really expected much else. Of course she'd need to be closer, but that wasn't exactly this woman's fault. "Then I'll do the best that I can," she promised, looking towards the rift again. "Can you get enough people to try and cover me?"

"Yes, yes of course," she replied, bobbing her head. "I can see others now who are capable fighters." Korrin, Asher, Maxwell, the Iron Bull; just to name a few. "Come down this way. The way looks clear." At least there weren't any demons swarming across the ice where Christine was pointing. As for the wraiths, they tended to move quickly, floating out of the way of melee weapons to continue shooting out their debilitating effects.

Gripping her staff tight, Christine made her way down closer to the rift. She'd never been so close to one before, and it just felt wrong. The rifters didn't feel that way to her, even with the shards in them. But as a mage who felt a connection to the Fade, this truly felt like some kind of open wound that she was powerless to heal.

Hermione had no such connection to the Fade, at least not one that she was consciously aware of. She only saw the rift as something strange and powerful, no better than the Dark Arts, meaning that it would probably serve her to know about it so long as she didn't actually have to fiddle with it for very long.

As she got closer, the tingle and ache in her hand grew stronger, and she looked down to notice the way it brightened and crackled. She didn't like that something so dangerous had somehow attached itself to her hand - she needs that hand, even if she isn't left-handed - and she looked back up at the blonde woman again, frowning. "Do I have to say an incantation or do anything in particular?"

"No, nothing is said. Can you not feel a change, though? There should be some strange feeling -- as though you can reach out and grab the rift." Christine called to the others, and those who had been around awhile knew what to do. Amidst the demon fighting, they shouted to the other rifters to pull the rift shut. Of course, they looked as confused as anything at this instruction. They'd just landed here with some foreign object embedded into them and were assaulted by demons. And they were supposed to do what now?

Then one held up their hand and a stream of green light stretched from it to the rift. They let out a cry of pain and a native nearby cut down a demon before running over and helping to hold them up.

"There, now! Do it now!" Christine shouted, pointing at what the rifter was doing.

Hermione didn't understand abstract concepts. She needed instructions, definitive and concrete, or else she was at something of a loss if she was left to improvise.

Unless, of course, it was a matter of life or death. This? This seemed like it fell under that category.

Seeing the one person hold up their hand and then be in so much pain that they'd need help supporting it didn't really do much to strengthen Hermione's confidence. But if that was what needed to be done, then fine. It wasn't as though she'd never been in excruciating pain before.

Keeping the torture of almost a year ago in her mind as a reference, she raised her left hand, bracing it with her right. Her hand felt oddly drawn to the light, which was weird, because her hand shouldn't have any feelings independent of her body, but she just tamped down on any panic that threatened to rise. Instead, she fought to keep her eyes open in the bright green light, the crackling of the rift growing painfully loud around her as other people with similar shards began working together to close it.

Christine's heart was pounding so hard that it hurt, but she kept her eyes fixed on the rift, praying that this would work. The combined effort caused a long whining sound to come from the connection between hands and rift and suddenly the light cut off between the two. The rift, however, remained in the sky, twisting and contorting. Christine let out a shaky breath.

"The rifters who have done this before said they needed to do it several times to get it to take. Can you do it?"

When the light cut off, Hermione staggered back a few steps, breathing hard; this "rift" was still in the sky, and she was about to ask for another suggestion when the blonde woman called out to her. Looking back at her, she put on something of an incredulous expression before realizing that this needed to be done one way or the other. Besides, though it was a strange sensation, closing the rift was hardly the most painful thing she'd ever done.

So she took a breath and nodded, steeling herself before turning back to the strange mark in the sky. She was far too focused on her task to notice what anyone else was doing as she brought her own hand up again, narrowing her eyes as the light grew bright once more.

"Here; allow me to help?" Christine asked, before placing her hand over Hermione's. A small pulse of magic flowed into Hermione's body, and though it couldn't erase the pain of the shard completely, it would hopefully dull some of it and rejuvenate her at the same time.

As Hermione went for round two, Christine stayed close by, alert for more demons and anyone who might be hurt. People were shouting, instructing the rifters in their task, and some rifters were shouting back, wanting to know just what was going on. But this time a few stragglers who hadn't joined in last time were compelled or ordered to assist, and between all of them, the rift stretched, pulled and finally sealed itself shut with a sharp cracking sound echoing in the air.

Hermione gasped softly, if only because she wasn't used to strangers touching her, never mind touching her and feeling magic coming straight from their hands. Wandless magic wasn't used often where she was from, so it caught her a bit off-guard.

She was definitely one of the ones who wanted to shout and ask what exactly was happening and why was she being forced to play such a crucial role in something she obviously didn't understand. But she focused on her task, eyes squeezed shut as the rift grew brighter and the pain grew stronger despite the help from the young woman at her side. Before she knew what was happening, there was a sharp sound like very loud, distinct thunder in the air, and she was staggering a bit, her hand no longer connected to some giant hole in the sky. When she opened her eyes again and saw that she wasn't the only one there who seemed confused and startled, she turned to the blonde besides her and asked, "All right, what just happened, exactly?"

The atmosphere changed as soon as the rift closed and the last vestiges of green ozone dispersed. No more demons, no more shooting pain for the rifters, and plenty of questions that the natives only had a few answers to. Christine leaned on her staff a moment, softly exhaling a breath of relief.

"The rift is a wound in the sky. It leads directly to the Fade: a place we should only be able to access in dreams or in a trance. We are not physically capable of going here." Well, the Tevinter magisters of old had proven that was not so, and now the rifters as well. Christine needed to amend that.

"Or should not be. Some unknown force pulled you from your worlds, across the Fade, and to here, through these wounds in the sky. We do not know how to get you back through the other way. Not yet, at least." That seemed something only the Maker was capable of doing, yet wasn't it said He'd abandoned them?

Hermione was trying to catch her breath, though whether it was out of exhaustion or fear, she couldn't rightfully say. She struggled to latch onto what was being told to her, because otherwise she was going to be lost and panicked and absolutely nothing would get accomplished, which was bad because she really needed to get back to bed so she could wake up for her exam the following day.

But from what she was hearing, she would have to take a make-up, and that was assuming she even managed to get back in time to qualify for such a thing. She couldn't be away from Hogwarts, not again, not when she was already behind on taking her N.E.W.T.s and joining the work force as a qualified adult witch with the proper accreditation.

"You're saying I somehow dreamed my way through a portal and have no way of getting back?" she asked, thoroughly incredulous. Feeling weary and maybe just a little delirious, she let out an almost hysterical chuckle and asked, "Well, if that's the case, why don't I just go back to sleep and see where that gets me? Maybe I'll wake up in the middle of a dragon fight in Azerbaijan!"

Christine could only imagine what Hermione was going through right now, and she knew whatever she said would be little help for a person so removed from what they knew.

"No, I am sorry if I explained poorly. The Fade is a world parallel to this one, where spirits and demons dwell. On death, our souls pass through the Fade to their final home, and at night, our consciousness travels there to dream. Mages have bodies that are open to receive the energy of the Fade. It flows into us and we use the power to fuel our spells. The Fade is many things, but to physically travel through it should be impossible. You did not dream yourself here. We do not know how you came to be here, only that you came in through the Fade. I am sorry I can provide no more answers."

If she were Harry or Ron, she would have simply reiterated, So I dreamed my way through a portal haunted by ghosts and have no way of getting back. Brilliant. Instead of sarcasm, though, she opted for answers, even if this woman claimed she couldn't grant them.

"Then who can? I'm sorry, I don't mean to be rude, but I sort of swore to my two best friends that I wouldn't get in any trouble this year, and I'd hate to have to break that promise by having been abducted through unknown magical means and plopped down in the middle of-...."

Looking around, she frowned and asked, "Sorry, but where am I?"

Christine's lips parted to say if she knew just who knew where the rifters came from, that information would have passed to her anyway, but then Hermione continued and she waited.

"Emprise du Lion, a region in the empire of Orlais. The nearest village is called Sahrnia, just up that way." At least Christine had those answers for her.

Hermione hadn't quite cottoned on to the fact that she'd traveled just a bit further than beyond the borders of Hogwarts, not until a list of names was rattled off and she realized she'd never heard of any of them. First things first, start with the big picture and then she'd focus on the region and the village.

"Orlais? I've never heard of-... is it some sort of magical community tucked away somewhere? Near France, perhaps?" If she was somewhere near Beauxbatons, at least she could try and communicate with the Headmistress there and see about getting herself home.

Christine nearly laughed, but she held it in. It wouldn't do to laugh at a poor, confused rifter.

"No, it is an empire on the continent of Thedas. I have never heard of France."

"The... continent... of Thedas." Unless geography has changed quite a bit overnight, she was fairly certain that Thedas wasn't one of the seven continents. And even if it had always existed and had simply been tucked away somewhere by magic, there was no way it could have been populated by people who'd never heard of France.

"I'm sorry, are you trying to say that I've found myself in a completely different world?"

OPEN: turn off the lights and I'll glow

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