crystal || open

[degenere]

FORM: sending crystal
SENDER: the Baroness Freddie Durfort-Lacapalette & Val de Foncé
RECIPIENT: everyone with a sending crystal
WHAT: some Orlesians meet talking darkspawn in a Temple of Dumat
WHEN: backdated to a few days before the invasion of Minrathous
WHERE: the Silent Plains. underground. literally.
NOTES: we still love threadjacking should the opportunity arise and we’ll be threadjacking YOU. merci beaucoup. Val is this color and Freddie is this color


Inquisition. [Val: Orlesian accent, very serious. As always, this is of dire importance.] Darkspawn. They can talk.

Now, they say nothing of consequence. Indeed, they barely say at all. And yet, they speak. They wear clothing.

Nothing of consequence! Don't mislead them, Valentine, it--he?--the darkspawn, it was repeating a verse about Silence, and this must be a temple to Dumat! Darkspawn worshipping the Old Gods makes quite a bit of sense, one must admit, but reciting prayers! Extraordinary!

Well--yes. [A little annoyed at being corrected, but not very, as it is Freddie who did the correcting.] When it is put that way, of course it all becomes consequential. Perhaps that is the wrong word to use, to discuss such a-- do we call such a thing a feat?

I could hardly guess without more information. We can't eliminate the possibility that they have always been able to speak and have simply never bothered. Or perhaps this is something Corypheus has somehow done to them. It might also--oh look, Val! These scrolls look ancient!

Oh, shit. [But a wondering shit] Tevene, yes? Ancient Tevene, for ancient scrolls. We must take care, to preserve these, carry them back to Kirkwall, for-- Oh, but the research team. We were sent to join them, but alas: to a man, they are dead. Sacrificed, by our best guess, unless they chose to cut their own throats. I hope they were not beloved by anyone of the Inquisition, as they are quite past loving now. Yet in their death, they have led us--de Foncé and Durfort-Lacapalette--to such discovery. Ancient scrolls! A temple! Darkspawn that talk. The sacrifice of these lives has not been in vain. [Well.] Though veins were cut, in the sacrificing.

Sweet Maker, do not start punning. They were fellow seekers of knowledge even if they were Tevinters, we ought to show at least a pinch of respect. [ That to Val, this to their audience: ] Alas, they are quite gone, as Val has said, but this place is marvelous--in a dreadful macabre way, of course, but what a discovery! We may even find something here of interest in combating Corypheus. It's unlikely to be coincidence after all, all this darkspawn and Dumat just now.

Of course, without evidence, we cannot say for certain. Will there be evidence? Only careful excavation and exhaustive research of this ruin will tell.

[Oh, wait--]

And before anyone should be so pedantic as to make the claim that Corypheus is a talking darkspawn, I will disprove this easily and say on the record: that does not count. A corrupted magister may talk. A true darkspawn may not. Until now. Apparently.

Just so. A talking hurlock is an entirely different proposition.

Comments

[strangel]

Do you think darkspawn pretend not to talk so they don’t need to listen to long messages about talking?

[aventuriere]

No, I don't imagine they receive many of those.

[strangel]

( A hum, thoughtful. )

Why is so surprising for darkspawn to be talking?

[degenere]

A darkspawn can only wish that he received long messages--if indeed he is capable of a wish, which I would before have said, unequivocally, that he was not.

Yet, so I would have said of the talking, before, and what do I find now.

[strangel]

Are you happy or upset by this? Not being of rightness in your thoughts.

[mousquetaire]

The ones I've dealt with in Tevinter haven't seemed intelligent, and there's plenty of them. Did you hear this only from one?

[ Is this really Corypheus? He doesn't think it's wise to jump to that conclusion. ]

[aventuriere]

Thankfully I can't claim many encounters with darkspawn, but I've certainly never heard of them speaking. It was just one, though there is some evidence here that there may have been others among the cultists using this temple. Signs of their influence, perhaps. It's difficult to say with certainty at present.

[mousquetaire]

Is it usual for them to be alone in the first place? I'm used to finding them in groups.

Assuming this isn't just a special case, we need to know more. If they can talk at all, they could talk to us.

[degenere]

The conversation was hardly an intelligent one.

[mousquetaire]

The saying of prayers is more intelligent than anything I've heard from their kin in the Deep Roads. It requires thought and feeling. That's more than I ever have them credit for, I don't know about you.

[sorcerised]

Hang on. Maybe it just wasn't fully corrupted, yet. Perhaps it could still have been saved, I mean it's not as if anyone really tries to do that.

Have you already killed it?

[aventuriere]

It was quite thoroughly corrupted, I assure you, and already mortally wounded when we came upon it, but yes it is dead.

[degenere]

And it offended you.

[sorcerised]

How can you be sure? Something about it must have been different from the others. Maybe we should be trying to capture and not kill.

[byblow]

A talking what?

[ His sweet stars above, I have never heard of such a thing in my life voice is not very convincing. ]

[aventuriere]

[aventuriere]

Alistair, if we had not had that conversation all those months ago about Wardens, and secrets, and not keeping any more of them, I might almost wonder if you didn't know about this already. But surely that could not be the case, now could it? Because we did have that conversation--in fact I recall it quite distinctly. You must be so overcome with surprise that you are simply finding it difficult to express yourself. Is that it?

here but like not here you know

[degenere]

[In the blood-spattered ancient temple, Val shifts aside some dried husks of scrolls and gets comfortable. There is nothing quite like Freddie when she is in this mode. She could be watched for hours, though her stamina often outlives that of her unfortunate target.]

[byblow]

Of course not, that would be...

[ Okay, his bad acting is boring even him. He sighs, and sounds a little suffering instead, which is easier. ]

I'm sorry, it's just that—that I know so many things you don't know. It's difficult to keep track.

[justnice]

What's the point in talking about silence?

[ a pause ]

Are you still in there with them?

[aventuriere]

Silence [ can he hear the capital letter? No? That's okay get ready for Professor Freddie ] is not about silence as in the absence of sound, but rather Silence, the epithet of Dumat, first and most powerful of the Old Gods, who was known as the Dragon of Silence. The verse he recited suggests that Dumat's 'silence' is seen as a sort of inexorable strength or steadfastness, perhaps a separation from worldly concerns: No words of desire may sway His will, no cry of valor may stand against Him, for His Silence conquers all. Of course, Dumat was also the Archdemon who rose in the First Blight, which may be why the darkspawn have chosen to worship him: as their creator in some sense, or at least their first leader.

And no, it's quite dead now.

[rathercommon]

[ Huh. ]

Did it respond to you? Did it seem to know what you were saying?

[aventuriere]

It did not respond aloud precisely, it simply repeated the same verse over and over until death took it. But I suspect, based upon the degree of glowering vehemence at certain points, that it understood us quite well. Of course Val may disagree with me; he often does.

[justice_is_blond]

I'd say they're related.

[Truly the voice of pure innocence.]

If I had to guess. We do think the magisters started the Blight, so perhaps there's a connection there.

[degenere]

And perhaps the darkspawn was educated at a college of Tevinter, and so could speak only adequately, and without any refinement.

Really, I would not protest the perhaps of a connection between these points. Perhaps there might, and perhaps it might yet be found.