SUBJECT: Red(cliffe) Oyster Cult
PARTICIPANTS: Laurentius, Andrasteia, & Edgard
CLASSIFICATION: Public, filed with Project Haven & Project Jeshavis
DATE FILED: Now-ish
STATUS: Completed
SUMMARY: A team is dispatched to Redcliffe to verify whether Brother Gideon was acting alone when he attached the Gallows and its residents, or if there may be trouble yet to come.

REPORT:

In having made our way to Redcliffe, we were quickly made to be useful to the residents and Chantry both—being assigned any number of tasks and errands, which made convenient the matter of our investigation and the questions which we were obligated to press. Though no one was entirely pleased to discuss the man in particular (my read was that they are somewhat ashamed and embarassed of their relation to him), we were able to uncover a connection between Brother Gideon and the Order of Fiery Promise.

—(Many thanks for the remote research assistance; these crystals really are very convenient.)

Once we had some notion of the group, a few of the outlying farmers were able to point us in a more helpful direction. I've taken the liberty of copying down a small map on the othr side of this page should anyone wish to locate the abandoned fortress again, though I see little reason to. It seems the Order (such as it is) has abandoned their hold of it. I suspect they've made for the Anderfels, given the recovery of some notes in the Ander language and the map left behind. I can't imagine they will be of continued trouble to the Inq Riftwatch, unless Brother Gideon was passing them information that might somehow be most relevant beyond the Anderfel border. Though if you've (we, I suppose) any allies to be found so far North, one might consider sending word or warning.

Say, should you require anything more.

Faithfully,
Brother N.L. Vesperus

NEXT STEPS: Go poking around the Anderfels in search of a spooky cult!

NOTES & LINKS: OOC Info | Log & Crystal Chatter

SUBJECT: Upstairs, Mostly Downstairs
PARTICIPANTS: Mobius, Loki, Mado, & Wysteria
CLASSIFICATION: Public, filed with Diplomacy and Project Jeshavis
DATE FILED: Backdated to pre-Antiva
STATUS: Complete
SUMMARY: A team was sent to Antiva to investigate Prince Giannozzo's son, Marco, who is a contenter for Queen Anora's consort, and to make contact with lower class Antivans who have been stirring up anti-Tevene sentiments. The team successfully confirms that Marco Giannozzo is not an ally of Tevinter, and were able to form a contact with Vieri Fontana, a servant with connections to anti-Tevinter agitators in Antiva.

REPORT:

Sirs,

I'm most pleased to report that our efforts amount the Giannozzo household were of great success. Every credit should be afforded to my colleagues, whose names I would list here for posterity were you not already perfectly familiar. Further, I would describe the exact nature of our deception, however have found in attempting to draft this report twice before that managing to do so in a way which is both succinct and honors the cleverness of the trickery is impossible. Given the great many pages of paperwork that you both oversee (and the fact that I must copy this twice, once for the project office and once for the division), I have opted to simply skip the results. Should you require any further enumeration on the methodology, please don't hesitate to request an in-person brief from myself or any of my collaborators.

Firstly, we have confirmed that Marco Giannozzo has no associated with the Venatori. His suspicious activity—which we ourselves witnessed in the form of one or two unexplained absences during our stay, and the discovery of a few strange notes in his personal quarters—appears to be the product of a sort of gaming ring. One of the senior members of the household staff suggested he, or rather the persona he wears while running his betting books, has been successful enough to earn the ire of the local criminal underground.

While this may prove to be of some use should we wish to wish over either the man himself or certain members of the criminal underground, I see little relevance to our concerns regarding potential Venatori allies in the region.

Secondly, we have curated a contact with Vieri Fontana who is a relatively new member of the staff, highly devout, and in my opinion a fine if imperfect theologian. Messere Mobius and myself had quite a few thoughtful discussions with the man on the subject. Forgive me for broaching the 'hows'. Rather, know that important factor is this: Fontana evidently has connections among the Antivan lower classes who have been causing all sorts of trouble and unrest in defiance of Tevinter. I imagine that he and his associaties may offer more immediate possibilities given our upcoming trip to the region, and may prove a fruitful point of contact for work which may require doing there in the future.

Best Regards,
Mme. W. d. Foncé

NEXT STEPS: Nothing pressing, but there's an in should further work in Antiva arise which may benefit from connections among the lower classes and/or if there's a need to have a Merchant Prince's son on a hook.

NOTES & LINKS: OOC Info; IC Log

SUBJECT: Don't Go Breaking My South
PARTICIPANTS: Adrasteia, Edgard, Ellis, Matthias + Bastien
CLASSIFICATION: Private to Division Heads + Project Sashamiri
DATE FILED: Early Kingsway
STATUS: Complete
SUMMARY: Investigating attacks in in Fereldan and Orlais during the August siege of the Marches. Assorted odds and ends were dealt with, including but not limited to: dragons, rock slides, eluvians, and darkspawn. More below.

REPORT:

Commander, Scoutmaster, Provost, Ambassador & Enchanter Julius,

I must apologize for the length of this report. I've attempted be thorough as to our findings.

As I reported to Monsieur Bastien, Furness can be dismissed. There was no sign of activity we need be concerned with.

Matthias and Edgard both procured eluvians in Wanborne and Sarvers respectively. They are transporting them to Kirkwall to be relocated as you see fit.

Edgard reported a dragon near Cafort. We may consider sending a team to deal with this sooner rather than later. I anticipate a request will be made of us to help regardless.

A tunnel up from the Deep Roads was discovered in Courciennes by Warden Adrasteia, which allowed darkspawn to emerge and attack. She advised the villagers as to how it might be reinforced and blocked off to prevent spillover of darkspawn in the future. It should be noted, in comparison to existing maps, the pathway beneath in the Deep Roads leads from the Marshes towards the Silent Plains. She dealt with the blighted remains, as well as what had spread along the land.

Matthias received an account of someone on the cliffs in Alnwick prior to the rockslide. A camp was found, abandoned, along with several empty bottles. They had once contained lyrium. There were tracks, but not enough of a trail to pursue.

Vitroluçon is already well on the way to repair. Their people were unwilling to speak and professed to have seen nothing suspicious prior to the attack. Warden Adrasteia was able to discover a letter left behind in the area, after being advised by a local elven servant who directed her to a camp in the hills. It reads as follows:

HIS NAME IS EBURNUS

HIS FRIEND IN VAL CHEVIN HAS A GREEN HOUSE

THERE ARE OTHERS

THE DARKSPAWN FOLLOW THE WARDENS

IM SORRY FOR YOUR PEOPLE

She has provided the original letter to be filed along with this report. Please be advised, Adrasteia gave assurances to the elf who spoke with her that this would be kept quiet. Any further questions should be put to him very carefully.

Holmfirth is no more. There were few corpses, and what darkspawn had managed to be killed were infected with red lyrium. I assisted with the disposal and destruction of these things. Only three children survived, and two are too young to speak with me. The eldest was a girl of ten, who reported seeing a Warden in the area. From what she was able to communicate to me, there is reason to believe the Warden was working alongside the darkspawn, though it must also be said: she was a child who had undergone a terrible thing. I couldn't press her far enough for her recounting of events to become clear.

It must also be related, in the interest of explaining the two newest occupants of the dungeon: Warden Adrasteia and I were attacked on the road back to Kirkwall. There was a small fire started in the midst of the fight, though the structure was still standing when we left the inn come morning. We have secured the mage accordingly in the dungeon, alongside his partner. They were not forthcoming with us, save to argue over the cause of their failure.

There is much here to consider. It is my belief that we start with the eluvians, and the two captives Warden Adrasteia and I brought back with us, before pursuing the rest. I do, however, defer to your collective judgement.

— Warden Ellis

NEXT STEPS: Riftwatch is now two Venatori and two eluvian richer. Both eluvian will likely need to be placed in the field at strategic points to enhance Riftwatch's travel options, and the two Venatori will need to be interrogated by someone with reliable skill at it. Further follow up on strange darkspawn behavior obviously a must.

Less urgently, maybe someone wants to go out to Cafort to hunt a dragon or drive it away from the village.

NOTES & LINKS: ooc info | rookery post | log

SUBJECT: Cooperation with Fereldan & Orlesian Intelligence
PARTICIPANTS: Bastien
CLASSIFICATION: Private to Yseult
DATE FILED: August 9:47
STATUS: Complete
SUMMARY: Bastien went and talked to Orlais and Ferelden’s Real Spies ™ about cooperating more often. Also acquired basic intel on the men Queen Anora might plausibly marry.

REPORT:

Yseult,

Our contact in Ferelden is Lady Rede. She has given us a cipher to use when necessary. She is very straightforward, for a spy, and when she said she looked forward to our future cooperation I think I believed her. Of course the Fereldans know about Byerly [ whose name gets some extra large loops and a fancy flourish; Mission: Make Yseult Roll Her Eyes (Without Being So Gauche As to Draw Actual Hearts) ] and know that we know about Byerly, so they will not be getting much out of us that they would not have anyway, and I expect them to moderate their generosity with their information accordingly. But good manners, is the point!

We discussed the Queen's marriage prospects a little, and then I nosed around elsewhere. Options include:

— Duke João Khalid Bakkar of Aveiro, brother of the Queen of Rivain. Cute, charming, but young and not particularly useful for Ferelden.

— Duc Jean-Laurent Libert de Verchiel, cousin of Empress Celene. I met him once. His favorite opera is Odila & Huet, so I say definitely Venatori.

— Lord Aled Penvennan, nephew of the Teryn of Ostwick. A large human-shaped question mark!

— Marco Gonzaga, the second son of Prince Giannozzo Gonzaga in Antiva. He is the religious one, I believe—the father. No idea about the son.

— Lord Taskill Curwen, son of a Bann. He is also fairly young and it sounds as though he is interested in positioning himself as her successor, in the absence of an heir, and marrying her would just be one possible way to do that.

In Orlais we are liaising with Loys Brassard, an assistant to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, who is very old and a very much a bureaucrat. A funny one. Him I like. But he brought a bard named Sedaina with him, and I know her, and I do not like her. I have never heard of her reneging on a contract, so while the Empress is paying her, we can trust her to act on the Empress' behalf. But if acting on the Empress' behalf gives her a reason to fuck us over, she is the type to enjoy it.

As we discussed, they wanted to know where we have eluvians, and I said no. But in a friendly way, you know.


Bastien

NEXT STEPS:

• Figure out which of Anora’s potential husbands needs to die.
  
• Or figure out just one that for sure doesn’t need to die and make sure he’s the one she picks!
  
• “We got a tip from Ferelden/Orlais” or “Ferelden/Orlais needs us to do this secret spy favor” are now available (or more available, they were always somewhat available) for plot motivation.

NOTES & LINKS: Threads about Ferelden and Orlais.

[ If the team fanning out across Ferelden and Orlais doesn't periodically make some noise to let him know they're all alive, Bastien will break the silence with a laidback, ]

Ça va?

[ But they're more than welcome to talk without prompting. ]

SUBJECT: Life Ruiners
PARTICIPANTS: Petrana de Cedoux, John Silver, & Fitcher
CLASSIFICATION: Private to Riftwatch Leadership
DATE FILED: Early Bloomingtide
STATUS: Complete
SUMMARY: A team travelled to Gwaren to ruin the local harbormaster who had a history of aiding the Venatori.

REPORT:

Monsieur B,

I'm unhappy to report that our effort in Gwaren was only a partial success. In an effort to redeem ourselves, I will summarize our work in the hopes that you will understand that we weren't so much outfoxed as merely outrun.

Upon our arrival in Gwaren, Mssr Silver approached the harbormaster with a falsified opportunity to assist in smuggling a 'person of interest' from the Northern army who had agreed to return to Tevinter and act as a double agent on the South's behalf. Our hope was that Gregory would forward the information to his contact (dear Frederick) and so we might arrange to trap two hares in one snare, so to speak.

Meanwhile, the esteemed Madame de Cedoux forged a series of letters between the two colleagues to suggest that Frederick was an assassin the harbormaster had hired to be rid of his wife. Evidently the man had something of a history for conveniently disappearing (albeit rather less mortally speaking) inconvenient family members.

For my own part, I presented this evidence to Gregory's wife and persuaded her to rendezvous at a quiet location so as to confirm her husband's intentions. Naturally, our plan was to have the woman act as our 'person of interest' so as to draw out Frederick. He would attempt to assassinate her, lending credence to our tale about her husband, and we would handily capture the Venatori agent.

I am pleased to report that Gregory's wife—who is quite a lovely albeit somewhat anxious woman—is well and was most eager to stand as witness against her husband before the proper authorities in Gwaren; he has since been stripped of his position and is awaiting trial for conspiracy to murder. Unfortunately, our Northern quarry successfully slipped away into the night. I believe I may have caught him with a bolt, for I was unable to recover it, and so we may never hear of him again. But it is equally possible that I missed him entire and merely failed to find my shot.

I hope you will find it in your heart, which I know to be rather black and demanding and to which good humor is a stranger, to forgive our ambition.

Cheers,
S.F.

P.S. I've heard rumor of a small stage putting on comic adaptations of a selection of the Randy Dowager's works. Tre controversial, I know, but I beg you to come along with me before it's run out of town.

NEXT STEPS: Keep an ear to the ground for Frederick.

NOTES & LINKS: OOC Info | IC Log

Hello! [ Lowkey cheer, Orlesian accent. ] I'm Bastien, if we haven't met, and if we have—I took over organizing Jeshavis a few months ago. I didn't say before. Mieux vaut tard que jamais.

If you are new, Jeshavis is the project focusing on counterintelligence in the South. [ This is a normal thing for a printer to be in charge of. ] It is named after the Mother of Orlais. And I am Orlesian, and Madame d'Asgard, who has agreed to stay in the office with me and continue lending her expertise less officially—she is Orlesian. Au total, it is a lot of Orlais in a small space. But we care very much about Ferelden, too. Especially since its swamps might be our last bastion someday. We would like to keep it nice and uninvaded for as long as possible.

—you know, I am not sure anyone with this accent has ever said that.

De toute façon. I have two requests.

The first is for anyone who thinks they might be useful to come by and say hello. Even if it is only a vague suspicion that you might be a little useful, maybe, but you aren't sure how. There are spiced nuts and wine for you in the bargain.

And the second: I would love to hear everyone's best Fereldan and Orlesian accents. I am making lists of who can fake it. Native Fereldans and Orlesians—just the one that is foreign to you, s'il vous plaît. And if you are natively Fereldan and Orlesian, don't be be a show-off.

SUBJECT: Join the Navy, They Said...
PARTICIPANTS: Darras Rivain, Bastien
CLASSIFICATION: Public
DATE FILED: Cloudreach 9:46
STATUS: Complete
SUMMARY: Crack team infiltrates the ranks of the Orlesian Navy to chase down leads on who might have sabotaged the Orlesian blockade of Val Chevin.

REPORT:
[ Delivered by messenger sealed in a damp, salty bottle, purely for effect. ]

Dearest Mme d’Asgard:

Dissatisfaction in the war weary Orlesian ranks is funneled on the Foudre through a sailor named Bruleaux. He claims to have a contact in the officer ranks who is sympathetic to their troubles and involved in coordinating the fleet’s movements. Whether this is related to the blockade or some other potential difficulty for the navy is impossible for us to discover. Someone else will have to take a closer look.

For our part we are trapped in the middle of the ship, which (I have been told) is where they place incompetent gurn fucking mottle dicked bastards to minimize their opportunities to knock things overboard or tangle the ropes, but they are not called ropes on a ship, did you know that? I suspect it is also where they place their most charming sailors, so more may share in the pleasure of their company.

All attempts to give the Lieutenant an excuse to relieve us of our positions without relieving us of our lives have been stymied by the Captain’s desperation for men in general or perhaps his desperation for these two men in particular. He is reasonably handsome and improved by his uniform. By the time this reaches you I will be either dead or his devoted lover.

Either way I hope you will remember me fondly.

Yours with all affection,

Bastien
Accompanied steadfastly and skillfully by Darras Rivain who I am sure would send his love to his wife if I asked him

NEXT STEPS: Follow the trail! Uncover the traitors!

NOTES & LINKS: Rookery post.

SUBJECT: Lend Me Some Sugar
PARTICIPANTS: Athessa, Fitcher, Bastien and Coupe
CLASSIFICATION: Private for Project Jeshavis/the Division Heads
DATE FILED: Early Harvestmere
STATUS: Ongoing
SUMMARY: Riftwatch agents were tasked with traveling to the Hunterhorn Mountains and quietly investigating the whereabouts of Duke Armel de Ezoire and his supposedly dead son. They get captured-not-quote-on-purpose, discover the castle is home to a large band of mercenaries with Armel's son at their head, and are promptly framed for the murder of Duke Armel himsel before making their daring escape. Oops.

REPORT: ( A very reasonable series of events )

SUBJECT: Follow That Baron: Overture.
PARTICIPANTS: Athessa, Isaac, Leander, Mhav, Romain
CLASSIFICATION: Public
DATE FILED: Late Harvestmere
STATUS: Ongoing.
SUMMARY: Agents of Riftwatch traveled to the château of Baron Deshaies, wherein they discover he was a Venatori agent in an attempt to keep his land from being swallowed in the impending (?) war. Riftwatch agents pressure him into setting up a meeting with Venatori agents, and threaten him with mutilation... politely.

( Read more... )