Doc nods, "Are there any local constables on the case?"
"I wouldn't know, Doc. As far as anyone knows, Jasper left a note saying he was on a hunting trip, and until I'm called in to do my duty, I'm not wasting my time looking for him. My job is to protect the forest, not save poachers." she says brusquely as you pull up to her house. No longer feeling up to talking about this, she quickly gets to setting up for the party and helping Blake pick out suitable party attire.
Though the party isn't due to start for another five hours (as Lily's parties are known to start early and run late), Blake takes his time resting up and reading the local newspaper, while Lily is busy mixing drinks, preparing food and rolling cigarettes. Pandora sticks close by as Lily goes about her business.
By 6 PM, the sun is barely visible over the mountain tops and all that's left to do is hang some decorations and light some fires outside, and that's when the first wave of guests arrives. Comprised of younger people aged 18-25, they're here to help Lily prepare for the second, larger wave of guests, but it's here that the party starts to begin as torches and bonfires are lit and kegs brought outside. Soon more guests arrive, and even Blake comes out for a few beers - the other thing that can get him to open up about his time in the army.
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Frank will join in with the younger crowd as they are his age. He starts sharing mead and shots of whisky. He will begin chatting up the ladies moving from one to another until he finds one receptive to his advances. From there he will focus on her sharing drinks and stories to keep her entertained.
Feeling old and introvert, Racine grabs a platter of snacks before finding a quiet spot to flip open a book.
Doc finds a drink and the least trafficked bonfire as his perch. From there he observes, more than participates, in the party itself.
Frank finds an easily-impressed and playful woman and keeps her entertained all night with heavily exaggerated tales of his exploits. His tales of hunting remind her of an old flame - Jasper - who she reveals, on account of her heavy drinking, is a widower who lost his wife to an unknown disease some years prior, and now lives alone on the lake. She remembers their time fondly and hopes the rumors of him being lost in the wilderness are untrue.
Lily finds Racine reading alone, "I guess parties aren't your thing, but I wanted to check on you and make sure you're doing well." she says, the care for Racine apparent in Lily's voice and demeanor. Lily peers at Racine's book, "What're you reading there? I hope it's not monster lore - you should at least take the time to relax and get away from that life for a night, even if you prefer to do so away from the party."
While hiding from the party, Doc is noticed and approached by Blake, "You know, Lily and I met at a party like this back during my first year at the university up north. I was younger back then, but she's not aged a day in my eye. But then I joined the military, spent two tours overseas and now? I'm not the same young man that I was when we met. Sometimes I think, if they didn't let me go after that injury, I might've died out there." Blake takes a swig of beer. "But I guess a man your age - and in your line of work - understands what that's like. I guess if we let that get to us, turn into the darkness, we become monsters. So I'll keep coming to Lily's parties until the day I die, because she's the light that keeps away the darkness inside of me." He takes another swig of beer, "So'd Lily tell you folks anything about my time abroad?"
With half a sigh, Racine closes the book to speak to Lily, smiling bitterly. "No, it's not monster lore. Not yet, at least. It's an essay on the new sciences and technology that are swooping through Cedrana. It looks like the scholars and the crafters are replacing dwindling magic with brass and steam and steel. And, well, I'm using a rifle where my ancestors had bows, but it still feels strange."
She pauses for a second before speaking again. "I'm sorry if it looks like I'm not enjoying your party. But I wouldn't fit in. It's nice that young people are carousing and having fun, carefree. But I never had that kind of life, I never had a real childhood, I had to grow up at a rate that would have been brutal for a human. And I'm an elf, I'm eighty years old and I've been hunting for sixty. The man who taught me to cast my first spell died five years ago, while I don't seem to have aged at all. I just can't manage to go among the youngsters and... and what? Drink? I'm abstemious. Dance? Two left feet. Flirt? Bah."
"No, I am... I am what my life has made of me. It's not unpleasant. I like who I am, I like what I do. But my life is made of fire and steel, not whimsy and revelry. It's just who I am. And it's better, really, that the one who fights monsters is someone as hardened and broken as I am, so that they will keep having fun."
Doc is noticed and approached by Blake, "You know, Lily and I met at a party like this back during my first year at the university up north... I'm not the same young man that I was when we met... But I guess a man your age - and in your line of work - understands what that's like. I guess if we let that get to us, turn into the darkness, we become monsters... So'd Lily tell you folks anything about my time abroad?"
Doc considers Blake as well as the fire they are sharing. "Few mature people - mostly the ignorant, I think - can afford to be the same as they were in their youth. And war, in whatever form it greets you, casts a long shadow over the soul." He pokes at the fire then tosses another log on top, watching the flurry of sparks race skyward with a smile. "I try to do the right thing but sometimes monstrous enemies require questionable acts. When I'm held to account I hope, on balance, I've saved more lives than I've ended." He takes a sip of his own drink, and changes the subject. "Truth be told, Lily hasn't told me much about your service, but she may have shared more with Racine. So. feel free to fill me in. I'd love to know what you studied at the university, What your military experience was like. And if you were to go back to the university now, what would you study?"
Lily does her best to hide the pity she feels for Racine, as well as the guilt she feels for bring it up to begin with, instead putting a fake smile of sincere caring, "Well if you need anything, hun, you just let me know, and I'll make sure no one comes up here and bothers you. Take care, Racine." she says before returning to the party.
"I was studying Natural History and Botanical Conservation in the Field of Medical Restoration and Exotic Flora and Environmental Hazards, which is how I met Lilah. I hadn't planned to join the military like my father did, but...shortly after the war started, my father was killed and my younger brother joined up. I knew where my duty was. As it turned out, a few weeks into bootcamp, my brother was found medically unfit," Blake goes on, laughing at what he says of his brother, "but I still felt a duty to my father's legacy, and to what my brother was unable to do, that kept me going. Besides, they'd have just replaced me with some poor sap otherwise. My knowledge made me fit for survival in exotic environments - specifically the deserts we were fighting in." He gulps down his beer and grabs another one, "And that was the way it went for most part - I'd go on some operation or another, usually scouting or building bases - and then I'd come home for a few months before shipping out again. Then a couple months back, I was injured while out on patrol by some religious fanatics, and I realized I'd been away from home long enough, so I dropped out and came back to stay." Blake concludes, then ponders on your last question, "Maybe I'll go back to school some day, but for now I'm happy to be home with Lilah. It'd be nice to get my degree at some point."
Frank's ploy to comfort the woman works and the two continue to drink and party until after midnight, when he walks the woman home and stays the night.
The party winds down at around midnight and all the guests are gone by 2 AM, leaving just Racine, Long, Lily and Blake, bringing peace and relief. Lily lets herself pass out on the couch and Blake, tired as he is, carries her up to bed. He tells Racine and Long (if they're still awake) that they can stay in the guest room (which has two beds) and retires for the night.
A hungover Frank arrives late in the morning to find Lily energized and brewing coffee. Without even asking, she puts a mug in Frank's hand and pats him on the face, "You're welcome," she says with a smile. Once everyone except Blake (who seems intent on staying in bed) is up, Lily informs you that she's taking you to Nedwallis' Waffle Hut for breakfast, again without asking first. "It's on me," she says with her signature smile despite having been up late drinking the night before.
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"So here is a fun fact. That girl I was with last night, quite enthusiastic, but also Jasper's ex. So if those guys didn't like me from the meeting at the sporting good place, well they probably won't be a fan now."
He sips on his coffee.
"Waffles sound amazing. Give me ten minutes to shower. Things got a little dirty last night if you know what I mean."
He takes his cup of coffee with him heading in to clean up before they depart.
You arrive together at Nedwallis' Waffle Hut and Lily seats you at her favorite booth, where a scruffy looking man - either an elf or a small slender human - whose nametag reads Nedwallis hands you menus, smiles and greets you, and asks what you'd like to order. At the back of the restaurant you see Haggart sitting alone, looking worried and glum.
Racine gulps down her coffee, black as a moonless night.
"I was reading this fascinating book about the theory of evolution. The gist of it is that non-thinking creatures can change, over the generations, in order to improve their chances of finding food and partners. This is because food and sex are the driving needs of animals, while thinking creatures have different motivators. I'm thinking I may write a paper to expand on this theory, seeing how we know an example of a supposedly thinking creature entirely driven by sex. Do you know any good ethologists, Doc?"
"I'll have one with strawberry and chocolate, another with whipped cream, and a cup of cocoa. What's up with Gloomy, over there?"
He jots down Racine's order and responds, "Oh, that's Haggart. Not sure what's got him down, or why he's here alone. I rarely see him without his hunter friends and cousin. But he ordered food, so it's not my place to pry." He waits for the others to order. Lily scoffs at Haggart's apparent sadness, "Good riddance," she mutters before ordering a large four-stack waffle supreme with a side of waffle nuggets and a cup of coffee, and recommends that Frank order the same.
Nedwallis returns with your order about ten minutes later, including your two four-stack supremes: four buttered waffles sandwiching three layers of assorted fruits and jams, and topped with three different syrups and whipped cream. "I've got this covered," Lily says with a smile as she thanks Nedwallis and hands him the requisite money - plus a generous tip. After you finish eating and are about to leave, Haggart gets up and nervously confronts Lily, "Ma'am, I know you ain't fond of Calvert, and I ain't much fonder some days neither, but he's- well he's missing, ma'am. And with him and my cousin Jasper gone too, I'm worried that maybe something happened to them - maybe something that'll come happening to me too." Lily sighs, but asks Haggart to tell her more, "Well after we ran into you folks yesterday, Calvert was itching to get out into the woods to search for Jasper. Well I asked him to wait 'til we could all head out this morning, and he agreed, but he didn't show at the meet when we was supposed to head out. I went to his house, but him and his horse was gone." You can tell that Haggart is afraid and sincere, but Lily is uncertain what to do.
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"Alright, so what did you guys find? You pissed something off. Seems like the hunters are now being hunted. If you want help here you got to come clean with us."
Frank says in a very matter of fact manner. As he sits down at the counter waiting to hear the story.
"Yo, Nedwallis can I get a refill on that coffee after all."
Nedwallis glares at Frank as he refills his coffee. Haggart is stunned by Frank's bruskness, "I- I mean we- we didn't do nothin' wrong. Or at least I didn't. Calvert might've done wrong, but my cousin Jasper always tried to keep 'im on the straight an' narrow. What in tarnations would be huntin' us, one o' them tree huggin' elves? Alls I know is, Jasper went out on some sorta solo trip and never came back, and now Calvert's gone too!" he says in his defense.
Listening to the man, Racine takes a gulp of cocoa before speaking, mildly amused. "Word of advice, kiddo. Speaking of treehuggers when there's an elf sitting at the table won't do you any favour. Now say you're sorry and I'll consider helping you out."
Haggart stutters, "S-sorry m-ma'am! I didn't mean nothing by it, I swear. P-please help me find them, ma'am."
Chuckling at the man's embarrassment, Racine addresses her partners. "How about we look into that ourselves? We can save Lily some trouble, have a trip in the wilds. I'll pack some sandwiches."
Frank senses that Haggart is telling him the truth, which he reaffirms. Lily interjects, "What, and let my guests do all the work? If you really want to do this, I'm going with you. Haggart, stay here and let my friends and I take a look." She mutters, "So we're really doing this?" and then suggests looking in the forest north of Weegrove, unless anyone has a better idea where to start.
Lily leads the party back to their vehicle and together and they ride back out into the forest. Based on the information Haggart provided, Lily goes down one of the only roads into Weegrove's outback, which only gets worse for wear the further along until it becomes almost muddy. At the end of it is a horse-drawn camper with Calvert's name and the words "Keep yelling. I'm reloading" painted onto it, its wheels buried into the mud and the horse nowhere in sight.
Determining what happened here is easy, thanks to the muddy conditions; Calvert parked in a hurry, unhitched his horse, and rode into the woods. Once fully into the forest, however, the tracks first grow harder to follow, then disappear entirely. But it’s no dead end, thanks to the smell. Farther along in the same general direction, Pandora's bloodhound nose leads you. Dug into the dirt floor of a small clearing is what looks, at first glance, to be a fire pit. On closer inspection, you see that mixed in among the burned out embers are the remains of a human being. The body appears to have been put into the pit naked, though it’s hard to tell if it was done post-mortem. On the far side of the pit, just beyond the lip, sits a fat tree stump with a flattened top. Carved into the top is a pair of strange sigils. Atop the sigils rests a pair of human ears.
Frank doesn't recognize any religious significance to the sigils. Lily looks them over and then copies them down in a hand-held journal, "I don't think so, but maybe there's something in my books back at the house. I've studied these woods and the surrounding lore ever since my father- anyway, I'm copying them down. Might as well see if Blake recognizes them when we get back." Lily looks around wearily, while Frank's observations enforce his belief that the ears are indeed human, but nothing around seems to indicate the identity of the individual.
"Oooh, this is nasty! Look at the cut ears. One may think it was made by elves trying to send a message, the message being "don't trespass and poach on our land". And on the other hand, it could quite be a setup, I can already see the crowd, waving torches and pitchforks, scheaming against those pointy-eared barbarian dandelion eaters like yours truly! What a treat of a case, one can never be bored around you, Lily! Well, let's get to work. Wykrycie magii!"
Racine examines the surroundings with her arcane sight as well as the mundane, trying to pick up traces of magic.
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"Good point Racine. The way the talked to Lily here, it could be a move against her to force her out of the lands or worse, but that is a calculated plan I'm not sure those fools could come up with. I can't think of anything that would leave a sign like this though."
He says as he keeps guard watching making sure they are not being watched or sitting ducks for an ambush.
Lily sighs, "Frank's right: Calvert might be a poacher, and he might hate me enough to chase me out, but he's not smart enough to pull this off, and he's too smart to pit all the elves and half-elves against the human residents." Racine detects a moderate conjuration aura, but the sigils themselves are mundane wood carvings - she notes the lines are too arbitrary and simple to be used in spellcraft, and look more like linguistic characters than magical sigils. Lily closes up her journal and looks at the scene puzzled, "Something about these sigils is familiar, but I haven't seen anything like this before. I'd rather not continue hunting Calvert - assuming this isn't him - without knowing what we're up against." Lily looks back, waiting for your call.
Pandora leads the way back to your vehicle and you trek back to Lily's home, where she immediately descends into her basement and returns with a stack of dusty old tomes. Setting them on the table everyone is gathered around, she asks Frank what his thought was as she opens the first book up.
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"Not sure what the message was that whoever was trying to send, but I think we need to use what is left of the family for bait. Seems they are being made examples of for either getting involved in something they should not have and now for looking for each other. We either convince Haggart to go looking and we follow him or we use magic and disguise to appear as Haggart and look ourselves. Unless you and Racine can figure out anything from what we found there."
"Disguising magic isn't my strong suit, but I guess that we can just shoot him until he complies."
Racine grabs a tome and starts reading, immediately focused.
Racine cracks open a tome on outsider lore and Lily begins reading through a book about the far east and thinks over what Frank suggested, "Coercing Haggart shouldn't be difficult - as you saw, he's the most timid of the troupe. We still need to find something about what might be out there before we do that. I think I might know what those sigils were, and I think I saw them in-" Lily sudden stops talking and her eyes go wide and her face goes pale as she mutters, "No, g~#~~%mit." She drops the open book back on the table and runs upstairs, calling for Blake, and you can see where multiple pages were torn cleanly from the spine, as well as the same sigils you saw earlier - they translate to Father of Hunters.
When she returns without Blake, Lily is visibly scared, "That book is missing the exact pages I was looking for, and no one had access to it besides me and Blake. No forced entry, nothing to indicate someone broke in. Blake bought that book for me when he was on tour - it's all about myths and legends around where he was last stationed. Those missing pages detailed the Elegrue, some sort of demon spirit worshiped by dark cults in the region Blake suffered the attack that let him come home."
Racine's research confirms that Elegrue are malevolent outsiders worshiped by eastern cults as patrons of dark power, known to possess the bodies of hunters and killers to force them to perform sacrificies. What she's gathered fits the profile of the attacks, but also hints at a weakness: iron nails or stakes driven into the host are rumored to repel the spirit.
Lily grabs her gear and puts Pandora's harness back on, "If this thing has done something to Blake, then he's out there right now and needs our help! We just need to find him."
Racine grabs the rifle. "It all fits, in an evil and twisted way. Let's track him down and exorcise him. It won't be pleasant, but it shouldn't be too harmful either."
"Then let's go!" Lily shouts hurriedly and grabs something of Blake's, leading Pandora outside the house and kneeling down to speak to her trusted bloodhound, "Okay Pandora, we're going to find daddy. Sniff this and lead us to him." Pandora takes Blake's scent and charges into the forest. You follow her some miles through until you arrive at a steep rise leading uphill through a dense patch of thicket. On the other side of the thicket, the forest itself seems to open up, depositing you into an open area with a spectacular view of not only the town below, but the lake, as well. This site has a sacrificial pit dug into its floor as well, but unlike the first site, the ritual surface isn’t a tree trunk but a wide, natural outcropping of rock. You see that the same sigils have been scratched into the rock face. About twenty feet from the stone is a dark blue tent. Next to the stone, sitting gagged and bound to a wooden chair, is Calvert.
Lily whispers that she can make out some movement inside the tent, but that it doesn't appear to have noticed your presence yet.
"Pass me a nail, Lily."
Hoping that she's far enough that Blake won't hear her, Racine whispers magical words, an Elven trick to hide in the woods. Her colors shift to mimic the forest and leaves don't crackle under her foot anymore. She moves slowly towards the tent, blending in with the surroundings.
Racine and Lily creep along to the tent without making a sound as Frank and Pandora stay behind for backup. Through the flap you see Blake, unaware of your presence as he polishes an arrowhead with a bow on his lap.
Doc vanishes from sight as well and sneaks along a few feet (he imagines) behind the elven huntresses. He stops as soon as he sees Blake.
Racine motions to Lily to turn around and block the other exit of the tent, coiling for a strike. I don't like melee combat, not one bit.
As soon as Blake's retreats are blocked, she springs into action, trying to stab the man in the thigh with the iron nail.
Racine surprises Blake and successfully drives the nail into him. She feels his otherworldly presence attempt to force the nail from his body, but defeats him in a mental battle and the nail remains. Long almost forgot, but suddenly remembers that the ritual also requires a spoken chant to destroy the outsider, which he remarkably remembers - however, it can only be performed while one or more nails are driven into the host. Lily does as asked, turning away from the scene as she guards the exit.
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Frank watches on as Racine makes the move. He hears something yell in anger that is more than just Blake.
can't hurt the body. Got to try and knock him out.
He thinks as the blade springs to life in his hands. He moves forward the blade cutting into the ground behind as he drags it. When meeting Blake he twitches his hands and with a flick and upward motion he makes a cut upward toward him, turning his hands at the last moment in attempt to not harm the body.
Doc steps in, still invisible, and begins the incantation to separate demon from man.
Stepping back, away from the scuffling men, Racine whirls her rifle out. Rather than shooting, however, she drives it down in a whip-like motion, and the barrel extends like a snake, twisting around Blake's leg and pulling.
Racine trips Blake and Frank rushes in and conks him in the head with the side of his blade, knocking him unconscious.