howtoactfereldan | (no subject)

When Cullen comes across the body, as he hikes in from the north, he gets the message immediately: this is not a place where he can reveal himself.

In the rain, oiled hood pulled over his head, Cullen crouches by the corpse. Female. Elven, he thinks. Circle robes. No one he recognizes. Probably came to Kinloch after the Blight. Five or six arrow shafts still in her chest.

In this weather, it's hard to get anything to burn. Even with magic. The best he can do is hope a wandering demon won't decide to take possession -- undead are one thing. Arcane horrors are something else entirely.

Not for the first time, he feels the swell of frustration, followed by a wave of guilt: there's so much he doesn't know, so much he could use to protect people --

And you could have learned it. If you didn't run.

Even then, Cullen knows it's not true. Not the way things were going in Kirkwall.

He straightens and hefts his pack again. If he's to find shelter before nightfall, he's got to get a move on. There are caves, he knows, all through the country. One of them should do for the night, if it's free of spiders. He should start looking past the keep, where all the bandits are.

Threaded | Flat

He's been in Crestwood five days now. Lighting fires is still difficult, but he's getting the hang of it; electricity seems to work better than flames for some reason. (Which suits Alistair just fine: he's always had more of an affinity for electric bolts than fire.) The cave he settled into almost looks like a real shelter, with its bedroll in the corner and its torches propped up here and there. It's even deep enough to escape a little bit of the damp -- and certainly deep enough to hide most of the firelight.

He located a few flat slabs of rock and stacked them up into a makeshift table, the better to spread out his notes. He's already contacted Mahariel to warn her -- not that she's had much cause to be around other Wardens lately either. Still: if her travels take her into Orlais, she ought to be prepared.

Both for anything Clarel might do and for the beautiful, grotesque song pressing at the back of Alistair's mind.

He kneads his eyes with his palms, lets his hands fall with a sigh. It might be time to crack open his provisions and see his way toward some sleep, rather than keep staring at the piles of parchment on his "desk."