Ser Nerys Ronain, Knight of Redcliffe (ronain) wrote in thedas, @ 2010-05-19 20:33:00 |
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Entry tags: | ! narrative, ! plot, & 9:45 (5) molioris, @ nerys ronain |
Who: Nerys Ronain, various NPCs
Where: Redcliffe
When: 7-19 Molioris, 9:45 Dragon.
Summary: In the weeks after the Warden-Commander's brief visit, the situation in the arling of Redcliffe worsens.
Rating: T.
7 Molioris, 9:45 Dragon That the man had made it as far as the gate to town on foot was a very short-lived miracle. From the moment she saw him stumble over the crest of the hill, she knew it would soon be over. Cafall circled around his mistress and the fallen scout, heavy paws kicking up small dust clouds as they padded over the road. He snuffled at the earth between watching their surroundings vigilantly. Nerys held the man upright as best she could so he wouldn't choke, leaning his upper body against her own as she knelt on the ground. A foul looking arrow jutted out from the gap between the spaulder and the chest of the light armor, likely tipped with poison in addition to being roughly hewn. She didn't dare to move it yet, not without the medic she had sent the guard to fetch. She could feel the heat of his blood seeping through his armor and into her own linen shirt as he shuddered against her, his chest heaving as he gasped for air. Fluid was filling up his lungs quickly. The knight brushed a hand over his hair, dampened with sweat from under a now missing helm, lost in the escape. The beads of moisture mixed with the flecks of red, streaking his white skin and darkening her own as she tried to soothe him, "Breathe, Franklin, breathe. What exactly happened?" It was hard to keep her voice gentle and patient, though, especially when the first word he had managed to cry out was 'darkspawn'. His hand came up to grip her arm, channeling his agony through his firm grasp. It would likely leave a mark, but not nearly as great an impression upon her as what he had to say. Though she could see her own reflection in his dimming eyes, his haunted stare was unfocused and looking somewhere beyond her. "Came...from no...where. Shadows...too fast..." the scout uttered through grit teeth, crimson beginning to stain the edges of his teeth. His boots scraped against the earth as another spasm of pain wracked his body. The knight's frown deepened as she realized what he was describing, "Shadows...shrieks? Is that all you saw?" Cafall let out a loud bark then, but it lacked aggression, only an alert. He trotted toward the approaching pair, local physician and guardsman, and continued to bark as if they weren't running forward with enough urgency as it was. Nerys returned her focus to the dying man. "N-no...genlocks," he coughed, "So many...c-couldn't... So sor...ry..." The viscous liquid was pooling in the back of his throat now, causing him to gag. He was no lightweight, but she managed to shift him enough that he could turn and at least attempt to spit the blood out instead of swallow it. She adjusted her arm so that she could take his hand and keep his fading attention by squeezing it in her own, "Franklin, you have to stay with me. Where's Verna? Is she still alive?" "Ser, move aside," ordered the medic firmly as he dropped himself and his leather bag down beside her. She nodded, gently laying the man down on a makeshift pillow of a crumpled blanket, though he was reluctant to release her hand even as she stood to clear herself out of the way. "V...Ver... Too...took...her," sputtered the man with his final breath, or at least that was the closest approximation of the words that anyone could get out between the final gasps and gurgles as blood spilled forth from his mouth, before his eyes rolled back to the whites. His body gave one last jerk before stilling completely. He was lucky to have died before the medic attempted to remove the arrow; yanking it from his side revealed a jagged, toothed head intended to make removal as painful as possible. The guardsman bowed his head and whispered a prayer. Nerys said nothing, only snapped her fingers to call Cafall to her side as they strode briskly back to the castle on the cliff side. "Do you think she's alive?" asked Lora quietly, from where she stood in the doorway. Nerys looked up from the shirt she had been scrubbing at for the last twenty minutes. It was hopeless. The stains were too deep. "Who, Verna?" The squire nodded, only looking at the knight sideways without turning her head, as if she didn't want to seem overly interested in the subject. But the two young women had grown up together as neighbors in the village, one going to the militia as a scout, the other to the Keep in service of the arl. It would be more surprising if she didn't care about what she'd overheard after the emergency meeting with Teagan. As discreet as anyone tried to be, the news of a darkspawn attack coming on the heels of the Warden-Commander's visit to the Keep was no small matter. The public would have to be addressed with warnings soon enough, anyway. "Yeah. I mean...is there a chance we could...?" There was hope shining in the young woman's hazel eyes, a glimmer that would have to be quickly put out. It brought her no joy to do so, but she was a determined realist. "Save her?" Nerys finished the inquiry, black brow arched. She shook her head and resumed wringing out the fabric in her hands. "I wouldn't hold my breath." Her response was met with a long silence, the only sound besides their breaths being the slow drip from the cloth to the filled basin below it. The water was now clouded with swirls of deep pink. She heard Lora shift her stance, and thought for a second that the conversation was going to end there. Instead, the girl came closer and stopped just a few feet away. Her voice lowered, a fragile mixture of sorrow and confusion, "But why would they take her, instead of just killing her right then and there? Do they...would they...eat her?" Nerys didn't answer immediately, shaking out her ruined shirt one more time. She stepped around the slighter female to drape the soaked linen on top of the trunk at the foot of her bed to dry. "I don't know. Maybe. If those beasts even eat like we do." She shrugged casually, as if she didn't have any idea of the horror stories that were spread around after the war. No one outside of the Grey Wardens and the dwarves really knew what went on in the Deep Roads that the darkspawn normally made their home. "Turn her into a ghoul's my best guess. Make her a servant, do their bidding," the knight supposed, examining the wrinkles that had formed in her palms from sitting so long in the dirty water. Her palms weren't the only parts of her body that needed a proper scrubbing. "I can't imagine... I would rather die than have their filthy, rotting hands anywhere near me," Lora said with a sudden fierceness, expression hardening for a brief second before giving way to solemnity and fear. She drew her arms up around herself and shivered. "Me too," replied Nerys sympathetically. It was the most emotion she had allowed herself to show all day. 13 Molioris, 9:45 Dragon The tension in the air was so thick it could be cut with a knife. Teagan paced back and forth before the hearth in the main hall. Strands of white and gray had begun to streak through the red of his hair, the contrast between the shades increased by the halo of firelight that outlined him. From the way he ground his heels into the floor with each step, he seemed liable to wear a hole in the rug and a groove in the stone blocks. In his hand was a crumpled piece of parchment, which he repeatedly looked like he was going to toss into the flames, but did not follow through. Nerys followed his weary figure only with her eyes, head forward and shoulders back as she stood at rigid attention just a step behind the knight-captain of Redcliffe. When the silence became completely unbearable, Ser Perth cleared his throat politely. "My lord, I know she is," he paused for only a beat to consider the tense, though he did not correct himself when he continued, "your brother's wife, but if we are on the brink of assault, we will not have the men to spare." The arl stopped in his tracks and brought his free hand up to his forehead, taking his temples between his thumb and middle finger and massaging the spots gently. "I know, Ser Perth, I know..." He wished he didn't, but the captain was right. Of all the times that woman could have chosen to take off, she had to do it in the middle of the night on the brink of what all of his advisers thought was an impending invasion. As if he wasn't under enough stress making preparations for fortifying the town and the borders of the arling. He sighed in exasperation, and then growled to no one in the room, "Damn it, Isolde, why would you do something so...foolish." His wife placed a light hand on his arm, and he turned to look down at her gentle, reassuring smile, "Maybe we don't have to worry, love. I doubt she would have headed westward, through the mountains. Not with Rowan. Travel to Orlais is shorter by sea, surely she could afford passage by ship with all the money she took." The former arlessa had a reputation for rash decision making, but Kaitlyn's logic was sound enough. If anything could be certain, Isolde would go to great lengths to protect her children and it went against all ration and instinct to travel toward the oncoming horde. It really was a great fortune that they had wed, for it seemed that her words brought him some peace. "Maybe it's for the best," she added quietly, voice barely above a whisper, though it was still audible in the chamber, as it was prone to echoing. "At least they won't be here when the storm finally hits." Concern remained in the folds of Teagan's brow, but he relaxed under her touch. "Perhaps you're right. But either way, I cannot just...forget she's out there. Especially with Rowan. At the very least, I can send a messenger out to the banns, in case anyone has seen her." He gave the orders to the seneschal standing at his opposite side, who bowed his head and retreated down the hall to the office to begin writing up the notes. With that matter settled for the present, the arl turned back to his assembled knights. He took a deep breath, regaining his composure, "Now, I believe you have some plans drawn up for me?" 19 Molioris, 9:45 Dragon There was no way for this to end well. Not for a human, and hardly for a Mabari that was writhing in pain from the poisonous wound. No miraculous flowers, dripping with a honey-sweet scent, no last minute last chances. Only a kiss to the spot between his eyes, and the sharpest of daggers to pierce through his thick fur and hide and straight to the heart. It gave her no pride to take the life of the same beautiful creature she had helped birth, but it was better to have his final whimper pass quickly than to hear him whine as the disease ravaged his body and corrupted his mind. In the two weeks that had passed since the first attack on the border of their arling, this was the third hound to have perished. The first was slaughtered alongside her master, and the second sacrificed himself to ensure the escape of the scouting party. Even that was not such a great success; two of the four sent out on that patrol were killed in the ambush, and one of the survivors finally succumbed to his wounds before dawn of the next day, bringing the total of those in the militia slain by darkspawn to six. That didn't even count the orchard on the edge of the province that had been seized, most of the workers murdered in the fields, while the bodies of its freeholders were left to hang and rot on pikes that had been set up on the roadside. It was a warning. Redcliffe was not nearly as ill-prepared as they had been during the last invasion; their numbers did not suffer from a deficit of men created by a demonic bloodbath. They were well-armed, well-prepared, and well-experienced against this enemy. Even the Arl had faced them in the siege of Denerim. And yet they did not make their move, not yet. They were waiting. And what was worse, so were the darkspawn, and no one could figure out why. They could have easily pressed forward and locked them in battle for the last few days, but instead, those foul beasts held what little ground they had taken and were beginning to nest there. It felt like a trap, somehow, and not one they could walk into on their own. They had to wait for the Grey Wardens to arrive. The kennel master gently lifted the hound's head from her lap to lay it upon the bed of straw in his cage, and wiped the blade off on a dark rag as she stood. She pulled off the leather gloves, worn in case he had tried to bite, and set them aside with the cloth and the knife, before stepping outside of the makeshift quarantine. Leaning back against the wall beside the open archway, the stone felt comfortingly chilled against the nape of her neck. Nerys raised her palms up to her face and held them over her eyes, doing her damnedest to will her tears to hold back and not spill over. She was rapidly failing. "For fuck's sake, Russil, you'd better be on your way back already..." the dark-skinned woman murmured, no doubt in her mind that the knight had survived his trial and was going to be riding in at any moment with the rest of the newly made Wardens in tow. The squire meant to assist her had not yet arrived to help her take the body out for the pyre, so she took the quiet moment to inhale deeply and rub at her eyes, covering up any indication that she had given in to crying. |