And so it begins...
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A rather short and young woman with a faint purple skin and blonde hair tied into a ponytail approaches on foot. She wears a military uniform of some lost era, carrying an equally old looking pistol at her hip. The hat on her head must be some kind of sign of military leadership from a long time ago.
"Major Dugerechaff, reporting for duty."
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A pale skinned girl enters the room. Blue swirls cover her skin and a light breeze seems to follow her. She is festooned with a multitude of small vials.
You can call me Linka. She pulls out a notebook as she introduces herself.
Now, major, tell me all about yourself and your adventures. Spare no detail. We never know what we'll need to know.
As you sit in a vestibule at Heidmarch manor a young woman with auburn hair and a scar down the right-side of her face pokes her head through the door, "Lady Heidmarch will be with you shortly."
She starts to turn away, then stops, "Would any of you like any refreshments while you wait? I can fetch a drink, hot or cold, and cook's probably got some cakes cooling."
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It had been a typical day for Vina. When not scouring Magnimar's libraries, she had most often been seen outdoors in the nearby gardens, devouring a borrowed book while strangely speaking to a young oak tree... things got perhaps even stranger when the tree decided to uproot itself and give her a ride towards the north part of the town.
Upon entering the grounds of the Heidmarch Manor, Vina heard the general hum of a small crowd gathered to discuss. Following the growing noise, she arrived at the vestibule to see Pathfinders of all stripes and levels of skills, and the discussion appeared to circle around refreshments or cakes...
With a growing emptiness in the pit of her stomach, she waved Lakadee to lean so as to avoid defoliation by door-frame. Shrinking to small size, Vina climbed her tree friend, and from the perceived safety of her companion's foliage, dared to listen further. After she spotted three familiar ladies she had met before at the Grand Lodge, she managed to shyly ask, "Major? Linka? Sayuki? y-yes? my name is Vina. And this is Lakadee. We arrived from Absalom yesterday. Do we know why Lady Heidmarch wants us here?"
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A man enters right after Vina, wearing a formal two-piece suit and holding a battered and dirty suitcase. The young man has frazzled and disheveled hair, which contrasts starkly with his attire. With a nervous hello, he peeks into the room and says-"H-Hello there! Evening to ya! Salvius Delronge, at your service."-bowing to you.
Without noticing Vina and her companion, he says to the other three ladies-"Apologies for being so late! Sheila Heidmarch's missions are nothing to scoff at, but I got lost pursuing a strange treant-like creature. Lost it though...but I-"-he says as he notices Lakadee and screams in surprise.
"Aaaah!"-falling to the floor from the shock and being left sitting on the floorboards. With a slacked jaw he whispers-"I-It's right here!"-pointing at it and looking at everyone else, his eyes shimmering as he face just screams child-like wonder.
"Lady Heidmarch will be with you shortly."Sayuki covers her mouth with her sleeve; her eyes sparkle with something. Mischief?
”I pray that was not a joke at the Major’s expense?”
The young woman looks taken aback for a second, then she smiles, "No, no offence intended."
"So, sakay. Anyone else?"
She hovers, door half open, to see if anyone else wants refreshment. Pushing her hair back, you can see that the scar goes all the way up and disappears into her hairline.
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"So, sakay. Anyone else?"
Around this time, the steady clopping of light hooves that you'd been hearing in the background for about a minute now grows a bit too loud to be coming from the street.
This is because they are rapidly approaching the doorway to this very room.
This is because they belong to the frightful-looking man who by now is looming over the threshold.
He is tall and athletically-built, if rather lanky, with ungodly-pale skin and long, straight hair as white and diaphanous as a ghost's. His long, Tian-featured face is exotically beautiful, but also somehow off-putting. He wears simple, well-kept clothing beneath a suit of leather lamellar festooned with small but wicked-looking sidearms, and in his hand he carries what is simply one of the finest-looking quarterstaves you've ever seen.
He takes you all in with black-on-grey, cephalopod-like eyes, the gaze of which you inexplicably fear to return.
"Tea, thank you," He finally announces in a sepulchral monotone. "With butter and kumquat, if you have it."
The young woman steps back and almost closes the door, before pausing and nodding at Ekanta's request.
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”Coffee would be fine for me, thank you.” She then looks over the sylph woman, Vanaran, and Farlander. ”Back when, some long distant life time ago, I was in a war torn country and they discovered my magical aptitude by the time I was 8 years old. In that past life I lead a battalion of highly trained mage soldiers into deadly battles. The whole time, I just wanted to get out of the fighting and get a nice retirement. They had none of it though, and I had hands stained with a lot of blood.”
”When I met my end, some higher force decided I needed to do it all over again.” She scoffs. ”So here I am, in this life time, ready to try again. This time as a member of Pathfinder Society, after some friends recruited me post Absalom Assault.”
”As for my past battles, you don’t want to know. They were not easy, and many who refused to stand down had to die. Civilians were not an exception if they didn’t leave a warzone after ample warning.”
Hmmm, he’s a perceptive one.
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Interesting, we'll have to discuss this whole past lives thing later. I believe someone was trying to catch my attention.
Linka pauses and looks around
Vina, there you are. So eager to share. Now remember, this is for posterity so try to be as complete and accurate as possible. Now... is there anything special you wish to include from early childhood or shall we skip ahead?
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"Huh. Where DID the Vanaran go?.." She starts to scowl a bit. "I can't tolerate weakness in my battalion! There will be no excuses for deserters!" As she seems to be reliving a past moment randomly. After a moment, she goes back to normal. "Hm. Perhaps I need more coffee than I thought, if I am getting this tired."
The young woman slips away.
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Vina appears extremely shy as a sudden, but she peeks out of Lakadee's canopy enough to make eye contact with the unexpected interviewer.
"No no no... there's no need for that... I a-assure you... my.. my life has been quite uninteresting... You... appear very alert and well-informed, Linka... do you know what we have been called here for?"
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Why we're here? As a group? Not at all. Personally, I'm here to build upon my foundation of knowledge. Where the Society is sending us and why? I'm sure they'll tell us eventually. As for your life being uninteresting, you are an adventurous vanara. There aren't many of those. Many would rather hear more about you and less of Tar-Baphon. Plus, you even brought your own tree!
The server returns with a wooden tray on which a few drinks balance.
She takes Tanya a slipware mug featuring a leaping hare design. It is full of hot, strong, black coffee.
Ekanta receives a cup of tea, on a saucer. It is accompanied by a buttered scone and a small apple. The young woman smiles sheepishly, "Cook hadn't heard of a kamquat but someone said it was fruit. I hope that's okay?"
She then gives Sayuki a small glass of white wine, "Um, no sakay but it's wine, right? So..." She waves her hand around the glass.
As you are just sipping your drinks, a tall, dark-haired woman with an air of authority sweeps into the room. She is clearly the Venture Captain for Varisia, Sheila Heidmarch. She gestures for you to follow and leads you through the gardens at Heidmarch, talking as she goes, "I don't suppose many people see the connection between tax-collectors and pathfinders. That, though, is a lack of imagination."
She pauses as she opens a door into an outside meeting room, "Rural tax-collectors in places like Varisia are intrepid. They travel long distances, often carrying the kind of money that a bandit would find attractive. They visit small towns, villages and hamlets all over the region, inlcuding the most neglected and backwater."
Lady Heidmarch gestures for you all to take seats as she continues to pace around a long table, "When something strange bubbles up from a swamp, or is turned over by a plough blade, or is uncovered when a hot summer dries out a creek... The tax-collector might be the first visitor in months and the locals will have stories to tell."
She stops walking and her tone takes on a greater seriousness, "One of our associates, Elias Kyle, is a rural tax-collector here in Varisia. A few weeks ago, we lost contact and now his employer is quietly looking for adventurers to make a rural trip. It seems likely that these two events are linked."
She looks at you each in turn, "You are to be those adventurers. We don't want Kyle's connection to the Pathfinder Society to be revealed. His employers may not be thrilled. You will just show up to a meeting with the book-keeper, Jeminda Anikee, as adventurers and pursue the case from there."
Your Venture Captain perches on a high-backed wooden chair, "Any questions."
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Sayuki sips her wine as Heidmarch speaks.
”So we are to interview for the position. Wayfinders hidden or left at home, of course. My question: say that we should fail; the position goes to a favored nephew or something beyond our control. Are we to take on the job anyway, in secret? Follow in the shadows and whatnot?”
Sayuki sips her wine as Heidmarch speaks.
”So we are to interview for the position. Wayfinders hidden or left at home, of course. My question: say that we should fail; the position goes to a favored nephew or something beyond our control. Are we to take on the job anyway, in secret? Follow in the shadows and whatnot?”
She scowls, "You should endeavour to learn all you can, then seek out Kyle anyway. You'll have to find an appropriate cover in that case. He has done a lot of favours for the Society in the past few years."
Where did Elias go missing? Do we know anything about the area?
The Venture-Captain smiles, "Good questions. Make sure you ask Jeminda the same thing."
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Sayuki smiles; ”It is always good to have a backup plan,” she points out, noticing Heidmarch’s displeasure.
”After all, our very own Linka always keeps a spare writing utensil in case the first is lost... or swiped.”
Hopefully she wasn’t detected doing the latter, or it will be much less dramatic when she produces it.
Lady Heidmarch ignores the meeting request, "I made a few gentle requests about Jeminda. All I got was that she's a book-keeper to the bottom of her boots: diligent, mildly obsessive, accurate. Everyone seems to vaguely like her, or at least approve of her, but nobody claimed to be a friend."
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Tanya listens to the briefing, sipping on her coffee with a hand holding the saucer. "Hm. The name 'Kyle'. It resonates strength and a handsomeness that many would find to come from the source of a kind heart that is just and true. Does our friend Elias match that at all?"
Sheila sighs, ”I don’t want to be cruel, when I have encountered Kyle directly he has been forthright and funny, and his reports have been very helpful, but Kyle is not one to turn heads. I doubt he was ever handsome and he has several facial scars and a nose which has been broken several times. His wife must have been a woman who could see beyond the surface and prized good character.”
The Venture-Captain checks her notes, "Jeminda will be at the Drunken Dog in Ordellia in the evening tomorrow." She looks you over, "Sorry, Ordellia is a part of Magnimar, but set a little apart, over the bridge. You have all of today and most of tomorrow to make any preparations you require."
"And, as Kyle's work took him across Varisia, if you have to travel then the Society may be able to help make arrangements."
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"Perhaps we could do this kind of exchange later when Lady Heidmarch is no longer at our disposal, Linka?" adds Vina. "Lady Heimarch, I thought the bridge was broken.. I am not familiar with this Ordellia location. Could we please borrow one of your map? and do you have any recommendations on how to make the subterfuge of appearing like non-Pathfinder adventurers believable? I suspect our relative new and low position with the Society means we do not need to use secret identities yes? that would simplify things..."