[OPEN] He's searched the surface for an exit.

[morework]

Who: Cullen Rutherford & YOU
Where: The Deep Roads
When: 5/5 to 5/9
Rating: up to R for violence
Summary: Cullen is a loyal collector of the Worst Things in Thedas series, but for over ten years the Blight has steadily eluded him. Now Wonderland is finally giving him a chance to complete his ensemble.
The Story:

5/5 - ( Closed to Anders )

The day is a nightmare long before Cullen hears the news. Shards of glass in his veins, where the lyrium ought to be. He doesn't rise from his bed before noon, before the living cards' strange appearance makes sense. Then he laboriously packs supplies, because all he knows is this: Something rose from the ground last time, something rises from it now. If the surface doesn't hold answers to their prison, then perhaps the space below will.

And he knows he can't do it alone. Couldn't, not on his better days. Not even when he's halfway out of pain's grip by the afternoon. Cullen makes a point of standing up straighter when he walks up to the fourth floor. He knows exactly which group of people he must ask, but the specifics make him question his own choice. There are others, he reminds himself, even as he stops in front of the mage's room.

Is saving room on torches really worth this? he asks again, but his hand is already a fist, and makes three sharp knocks against the door. Cullen swallows down the urge to announce himself. He'd rather see that door open once, before it gets slammed in his face again.

A) 5/7 - Tunnels

His steps sound remarkably small on the smooth floors of those massive roads, until a cave-in blocks the path ahead. With no way through the rubble he takes to a side passage, narrow tunnels dug through the rock. He barely rounds the first corner, when he hears the sound of a fighter - and sees the number of darkspawn no man ought to fight alone.

The leeway for strategy is narrow. Cullen charges ahead with a booming outcry, and lets his sword and shield clash together challengingly. "Over here!"

He sees the spawn turn his way, some more readily than others. The strategy, apparently, is this: Divert their attention, and hope that two of them will be enough to stand against the group.

B) 5/8 - Camp

Alone the campside brings neither rest nor relief, but needs must as much as they can. He risks a small fire, and tends to his wounds. Negligible, save for his arm, where an emissary's lightning seared its mark into his flesh. He slathers on some of the ointment he brought, and wraps it in what little clean cloth he has left. Good enough.

Cullen breathes a quiet sigh, and leans back against cold stone. Eyes and ears focused intently on the darkness he reaches for the rations in his pack.

C) 5/? - ???

[ Prompt me! Cullen will be down and available in the Deep Roads from 5/6 to the very end of the event, so encounter him wherever and however you like! Prose or brackets are fine, contact me if you'd like me to set up a starter for you. ]

Comments

[morework]

The last Cullen heard at Halamshiral was that the Inquisition had inherited Celene's arcane advisor, to aid in their own cause. And then Wonderland drew him in, now weeks ago, with the news barely digested. Dimly he remembers that he'd hoped to speak with Leliana about her former travel companion, first. That he'd hoped for a moment to speak to Lady Morrigan herself, and that he'd probably been so very naive as to imagine their introduction would be set by daylight, without the company of darkspawn. That they would speak somewhere in Thedas, too, he adds with an unseen frown.

The fireball crashes into the tunnel beyond, and briefly illuminates some of its adjoining tunnels, and the snarling faces within. If stand or retreat was up for debate before, then the matter is very plainly settled now.

And yet it is still an improvement over Orlais.

"Lead the way," Cullen calls out and starts to close the distance, bristling when her magic encases him, because he had his own guard perfectly well in hand- is an objection he considers raising, until a razor-sharp blade slashes at his side from the darkness, and scrapes uselessly at the barrier.

(Cullen will set some time aside to be annoyed about the timing of this later.)

With a monstrous howl the shriek arcs out for another attack. Cullen ducks halfway underneath the strike, and severs the creature's arm. It wails furiously, and lunges again. He catches its body on his shield, and slams it back against the rocky walls. A crack of bones, and it falls down limply at his feet.

Behind him the darkness comes to life with the next group of spawn, and Cullen hurriedly follows Lady Morrigan down the path.

[courtintrigue]

A fine idea this has been: descend into the darkspawn-filled depths once more, as though she was not fortunate to avoid the taint during the Blight, and spend time with templars and those foolish enough not to avoid it. She feels no less certain that this place was not created entirely to try her patience.

Turning away, she conjures a single spell wisp that hovers slightly overhead to provide a much-needed boost to her power and cast a bit more light through the dim passage, and then she begins to double back with hurried steps. She only glances over her shoulder when the anguished wail gives her pause. Cullen, she imagines, would sound far more human if he screamed in pain, but she has no actual desire to see him with a shriek's claw piercing his chest. In truth, she finds it more than a little surprising that a man traveling these tunnels alone -- one man who is not a Warden and who she imagines to have little gift for stealth -- has not already succumbed.

"Careful," she calls back toward him. "Some shrieks coat their claws with poisons made from their own blood."

And avoiding their blood is, she hopes, a warning she does not need to offer. Though she did not have a good look at him, she did not recognize the unenviable complexion of one suffering from corruption in their blood. It cannot be sheer luck.