inbox.

[heirring]

[action + written + crystal]

Comments

crystal, around the time of survey post

[acreage]

I think your survey's a good idea, but I doubt I can say anything you don't already know.

[ so surely he doesn't...need to...do this....

also, hi, this isn't awkward. ]

[heirring]

[Somewhere, Wysteria has only recently parted company with Erik. Of all the things she anticipates to first receive over the crystals - a thinly veiled 'None of your business,' or some hurdle of mockery perhaps? -, this hardly ranks.

So. Well. A moment's pause. And then, adopting a tone of brightest good cheer--]

Not at all. You must make a record of the thing regardless, Mister Holden. The papers will not only be for my benefit. It should be readily referenced by anyone who wishes to study the matter.

[acreage]

Well, if you say so.

[ guess he has to...... and there's a pause. ]

How are you holding up?

[heirring]

Me? Perfectly well. Poorly rested, I grant you, but fit and fair. How kind of you to ask, sir.

[Is all breezy and light, as illuminated as the afternoon sun on an especially pleasant day. Easy, like the turn of a hand. Like telling pretty pretend stories in a Venatori dungeon.]

And yourself? Much improved, I trust.

[acreage]

[ he'd spoken to the effect of, you know i'm terrible at this, and maybe something like it comes to mind now. ]

Disoriented as fuck, [ he admits, but with no weight to it. they could be talking about a normal nightmare, or a bad day. ] But nothing a good cup of coffee won't fix.

[heirring]

[Electing to ignore the more colorful parts of speech--]

Well, I'm quite pleased that is the sum of it. By the general sounds of distress and arguments and so on already occurring over the crystal, I would expect that the kitchens must have quite the pot going already.

[acreage]

You're probably right.

[ and in light of his talk with amos — ]

Do you remember the conversation with the Herald?

[heirring]

[Ah, here is more solid ground.]

In pieces. The important ones, I should hope. Why?

[acreage]

The first gate. Did you recognize where it was?

[ it seems like a fair bet, since wysteria has been here a while. ]

[heirring]

Oh, that.

[She scoffs. Really, Mister Holden, she thought you wanted to discuss something interesting.]

It is in the temple to the old god Dumat, at the bottom of a ruin in Ghislain. The rift—for I suppose that's what it is—can't be closed by the usual means and the path to get there is, to say the least, treacherous and cursed. But it would not be so difficult to return there again. All things considered. It would be interesting, I think, to bring a Warden.

[acreage]

[ she can maybe hear the scratching, over the crystals, as he scribbles down some of this information. ]

Why a Warden?

[heirring]

They have some connection to Corypheus and to darkspawn, and it is said in the Chant that the first Blight was caused by Dumat's corruption. It's possible it is all coincidence, but there would be only one way to know for certain.

—And if it is not, then perhaps Weisshaupt knows something which might lead us to the gates.

1/3

[acreage]

That's a good idea. I think it'd be worth trying. And I was thinking —

2/3

[acreage]

[ no, okay, give him a second ]

[acreage]

Wei — who?

[heirring]

Weisshaupt. It is the head of the Grey Wardens. A place in the Anderfels, which naturally poses its own challenges before we even begin to discuss the matter of having slain their king.

—Oh, [is sudden, a thought occurring to her.] But that happened in Ghislain as well. No wonder the Venatori were so fixed on that place.

[acreage]

[ it's not that he's not interested in what's occurred to her, it's just that it's dawning on him that if he doesn't interrupt, he may never get around to his point. ]

What do you think the odds are that the gate might be emitting some kind of signature? Do you think you [ general you, the nerds ] can find it and figure out a way to detect it? It'd make finding the other gates a hell of a lot easier.

[heirring]

[Happily, Wysteria is fairly amiable about the changing of gears.]

I'm not...altogether certain. Mister Stark and I [and Misters Ellis and Fitz and so on, but surely that much is implied in with those three words] have been working on measuring the level of Fade...iation... emitted by the Rifts. And while its true to some extent that there are warning signs which precipitate their opening and readings which might be taken once they are fully formed--

The theory seems sound.

[acreage]

[ fadeiation, for fuck's sake. this is the second time he's heard the word, and this time he's pretty sure that it's tony's fault. ]

We should see about getting a team down there as soon as we can.

[heirring]

[It's definitely Tony's fault.]

I trust it is of foremost concern. Oh, but the ruin is quite dangerous and the lower most levels are unpleasant. It would be prudent, I think, for any expedition to be well armed. And armored.

[acreage]

Wardens will help with that. [ at least. judging off the single warden he knows. ] Unpleasant how?

[heirring]

[Cheerfully:]

Oh, certain environmentally oppressive enchantments. Narrowing passages with bladed walls designed with to bleed anyone who might move through them. The usual gamut of horrors in a shrine to an ancient god known for its—his?—proficiency with blood magic, I should think. On the plus side, I believe any toxins that might have been present had long since faded as our injured seemed untroubled on the front of poisons.

[acreage]

So the whole place is booby-trapped. Of course it is.

[heirring]

I'm sure for practitioners of the...worship? Of Dumat... were of the opinion that it was all perfectly orderly and businesslike.

But to a modern sensibility, yes. Very much so. Many old ruins are. Mademoiselle Durfort-Lacapalette and Ambassador Fazon—Andraste guide her—and myself once fell into a room full of snakes.

[acreage]

Bladed walls, a pit full of snakes, and probably no poisons. Anything else?