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Bashiel spots Zamanda approaching and quickly explains. "This- this... unholy fiend here has explained she was working for Rolth. Ruan Mirkova's already been taken from here by him. And Rolth was accompanied by a bunch of plague doctors... that's why I thought Davalus was involved. Either the doctors are accomplices in all this or someone is using their gear and outfits as cover." He grinds his teeth.
"All this wickedness, to trap the souls of these people and twist them into undeath! If those doctors are involved in this-"
Varor walks into the room happy to see that the jester is about to fall asleep. It will make carrying her back a lot easier.
Hearing Bashiel speak with anger over what she has done he decides to correct his misunderstanding of zombification to ease his worries. “Actually Bash, all the undead here are zombies. Automatons filled with necromantic energy. Their souls have already passed. Speaking of which I need to ask her something.”
He takes the still open seat across from her and pulls out the bottle he found as he considers the best approach.“Ha Jolistina,” he begins as friendly as possible, “my name’s Varor. I was wondering if you could tell me about these plague doctors. I know you must be tired that, must be the Pesh wearing off, but I have to ask. Did you get your Pesh from them? Were they the ones who gave you the magic you need to turn invisible and make these zombies? Is that why I found this bottle on the floor?”
The jester eyes Varor a bit suspiciously and then, after a moment, her mouth parts wide in an enormous yawn. "Hi, Varor. Are you friends with Pel? I'm sorry for shooting you. It was kind of funny, but, well, you seem nice. Um... What was the question? Oh yeah... I get the pesh from a guy down by the docks. It's all over town. The magic was from Rolth. He gave me a couple of wands to do the animating, and potions to turn invisible when I couldn't just hide."
Bashiel takes a deep breath, letting his thoughts be subsumed for a moment within the clamor of his ancestors' righteous wrath. He closes his eyes for a moment, internally praying to Osiris.
When he opens them again, his internal conflicts have been cleared and replaced with a singular purpose, one shared with the spirits that guided him. He was an instrument of Osiris, to quell the perversion of the natural cycles of life and death. And before him was perhaps the most brazen opposition of those cycles he'd ever seen. He holds his bardiche firmly, without any tension in his hands.
"Jolstina, your cruelty and evil, your use of the foulest of magics - those that corrupt and twist mortal bodies and souls to create undeath... you stand in opposition to Osiris and all he stands for. In his name, I grant you this chance to pursue redemption in reincarnation."
With a single deft stroke through her chest with the bardiche, Bashiel finishes the woman off.
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After another silent prayer that her next life is more peaceful, Bashiel looks up at the rest of the group. "We have a team of doctors to investigate, and Rolth to find and deal with. In all that Pel managed to get from her, the clearest truth was that the doctors led by Davalus have an ulterior motive."
"But before we move on, we should deal with the remaining undead here, and find what clues we can on where Ruan was taken."
Varor turned the bottle in his hands, which he now knew was a potion bottle, as he considered what he just heard. Rolth sounded like a man who was shaping up to be worse than his father who in his prime was a man capable of great evil himself. If Rolth is able to make such wands that means he’s a necromancer of some ability. Even if he’s just able to get his hands on them that means he has connections with people of dark power.
He closes his eyes as he considers this. Gaedren was his friend, not Rolth. he owed nothing to this man who he has never met. Sure, Gaedren was as close to family as he had since his father died, but did that extend to Rolth?
No, Varor decided. His parents lost all right to that connection over a century ago. His father has died and past on, as has Gaedren. There is no family left for him to claim. But does that mean Rolth deserves to die?
Yes. It would be an act that would be right by all measure if he struck him down in cold blood. Sarenrae would accept the act as righteous. But that is not why he became a priest. He became a priest to help people, to show them the path to salvation, not condemn them to whatever damnation they rightly deserved. Not if he can help them. Save them from the doom they deserve. He deserves.
Varor sighed as he opened his eyes, just in time to see a blade pierce through Jolstina chest. Drops of her spit and blood land on his face, carried by her cough. The week sound reaching his long ears and echoing inside his head as he saw the light leave her eyes. He watches the blade is retracted and looks up to see Bashiel standing behind the dead jester, blood running down to the blade of his bardiche to begin to drip to the floor.
He shoots to his feet. “WHY!?”
Pel nods to Bashiel as the paladin carries out the only just sentence for the jester. The Caydenite may not agree with Bashiel on all the particulars, but on the main issue, they are very much in agreement.
Which is why Pel frowns all the more when Varor speaks up.
“He just said why, Varor. For her cruelty and evil, the only just punishment for her is death. I, for one, am not willing to entrust the carrying out of that punishment to the current Korvosan government.”
You guys certainly have a mixed up sense of ethics. I thought I was bad. But she was rotten all the way through. I get it. Let's move on.
Bashiel lets Varor reflect upon both his own statements and Pel's, but wastes no time in trying to convince him of anything. It had been clear for a while now that the elf had an excess of compassion for the vilest sorts in Korvosa, enough that he often overlooked their evil and the innocents they killed. Bashiel could understand that, respect it, but he couldn't agree. Nor did he want to argue it.
Instead, he speaks his thoughts about what to do next and puts them into action, heading westward to one of the rooms the group hadn't chased Jolistina through.
Varor’s forearms are in front of him, fingers bent as if ready to try and strangle Bashiel through his armor, but he instead throws his arms up in frustration. “Fine Bash, ignore me. We can talk about how this is a legally accountable act of murder at any time.” Varor turns his head to Zamanda. “You already said you find my work disdainful so your opinion on someone’s moral character has little value and your opinion on anyone’s ethics has none,”
He turns to Pellius full body, finger pointed, nostrils flaring as he takes in a breath to yell but lets it go before saying, “You I want to hear. What, pray tell, gives you the right to pass off other people’s judgments for your own? By what right do you have to claim just punishment on anyone?” He stares at Pellius waiting for an answer, his head still ringing.
Pel hears Zamanda suggesting to move on and sees Bashiel actually moving on. He decides that's probably for the best.
As he moves to follow Bashiel, Pel says to Varor, "I don't claim it, Varor. I follow Cayden Cailean. Though I'm sure many consider him frivolous, he knows the difference between good and evil. I'm following his example in having the courage to do what we can to right the jester's wrongs."
Pel then follows Bashiel. Seeing the paladin examine the door, the arcanist casts Detect Magic on it in case the trap is magical in nature.
He groans as his head throbs while he goes over to the dead elf and starts untying her corpse so he can repair and clean his rope. He tries not to look at the wound as he undoes the knots, his gaze turning to the remaining three in the room. “Well? I know none of you care that he just invalidated himself so you might as well go. I’d prefer it actually.”
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Ilsa, having averted her eyes when she saw what Bashiel intended, had not watched the elf die. She had heard it, though, and that was enough to make her heart ache. Darkness pressed around her mind.
"Varor, we are acting as agents of the crown. It is not murder for Bashiel to kill the elf any more than if we waited for the hangman to do it. These are desperate times, and though I applaud your empathy--that is in short supply these days--we can't just put all these vile criminals in prison. With how unstable things are, there's a good chance they all break out and our work is in vain. Come on...let's search this place," she says kindly.
She begins following after the others, searching for any clues that might be helpful to figure out their next step.
“Well that’s two people who just invalidated themselves,” he says angry and at the end of his patience, “what about you two, you want to try? Go ahead, try. I want to find reasons to write you off now!”
Searching the remainder of the first and second floors of the manor proves relatively uneventful aside from the dispatching of the remaining zombies. Upon closer examination, you see signs of what Jolistina was talking about in terms of sculpted yet faux symptoms of blood veil.
Most of the valuables that inhabit the manor have been destroyed. Paintings have been slashed. Sculptures smashed. Musical instruments destroyed.
Eventually you make your way to the cellar, in which you find a well-stocked wine rack and several large casks lining the walls. A small wooden door squats in the southeastern corner. The door is locked.
Pel casts Detect Magic again on the locked door. Given their luck so far, he fully expects to find one more set of undead left as a surprise by the jester for some unfortunate to find. At least their group is more equipped than the average Korvosans.
With the restless dead returned to death, Bashiel is left shaking his head helplessly at the senseless horror enacted upon the nobles here. When the group arrives in the cellar, he holds his weapon close and allows those more skilled at dealing with locks to handle the final door.
Zamanda attempts the lock.
Failing miserably.
Zamanda's first attempt with the lock is badly fumbled and makes quite a racket. While that is a disappointment, she hears that it seems to elicit a reaction from something on the other side of the door, like a jangling of jewelry, but heavier, and cloth against stone in a sudden, jerky fashion. As quickly as the sound is triggered, there is silence.
Bashiel and Ilsa also hear hints of something on the other side of the door, albeit not in as much detail.
The door does not radiate magic.
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Ilsa perks up as she hears the noise on the other side of the door.
It could be a trap...or more monsters. But maybe it's a survivor...
Mustering up what courage she can, she says "Hello? Is someone there? We're looking for anyone who was at this party...we're here to help..."
This might be a bad idea.
Pel's not sure how well diplomacy will work when they can't see who or what lies beyond the door. Still, it's worth a try. If nothing else, it may at least let them know if there's a living person behind the door or just another mindless zombie.
"We're not with the mad elf jester. She's dead. You don't have to hide anymore."
Zamanda keeps her focus on opening the lock while the others talk.
Bashiel lends his voice to Ilsa's. "The undead upstairs have been laid to rest as well."
A locked door down here and something moving behind it? We have to hope some of the guests managed to hide themselves...
As Zamanda works on opening the door Varor goes over the collection of wine to see if he recognizes any of that would be valuable if sold or cheap that he could take for himself.
For a moment, there is naught but silence from the other side of the door, the only sounds being your own voices and Zamanda slowly working the lock. Just as she thinks she has nearly found a way to bypass the lock, you hear the bolt drawn from the other side. A muted voice can be heard from the other side, "It's open now. But if this is a trick, I, uh... I'm armed! I can defend myself!" Even with the heavy door between you, it isn't hard to hear the exhaustion in the person's voice.
Opening the door reveals on the other side a middle-aged man with a beard and mustache. A rusty, dull paint knife is held in a shaking hand. But when he sees the assortment of people on the other side of the door -- with nary a jester among them -- his quivering hand slowly falls to his side as he sighs with relief. He has no armor and no gear beyond the paint knife. The room appears to be some sort of workshop or studio with painting supplies, a divan, a small shrine to Shelyn, and several scandalous portraits -- some of a woman and a few of what appear to be the very man in the room.
"Oh, thank Shelyn, you really aren't her. That crazy girl was running amok when I locked myself in here. How many days has it been, do you know?"
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Ilsa breathes a sigh of relief as her hunch proves correct.
"It has been several days," she responds, not entirely sure herself how many days ago the party occurred. She decides it is best not to sugar-coat things.
"I regret to tell you all your friends are dead," she says. "Can you tell us what happened? Was anyone with her?"
Ilsa's thoughts turn to Briget for some reason.
I must see this through...this evil threatens all of us...
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Pel looks at the dull paint knife for a moment before looking beyond it to the paintings. In addition to the man, it seems some art managed to avoid the jester's rampage.
When Ilsa mentions that it's been several days, the arcanist looks around at where the man's been living. How much of that time has he been without food and water?
Pel says, "Have you had food and water? Do you need some now? We can't have you dying on us now that we've found you."
If he looks dehydrated/sick/wounded, Zamanda nods at Pel's offer and also offers healing.
The middle-aged man winces when Ilsa tells him all his friends are dead. He replies, “We were greeting the Westerkiers when the elven acrobat we hired as an entertainer went crazy. I saw her open fire on one of my guests with her crossbow, laughing all the while in the most frightful, shrill way. I’ve been locked in here for days, and every time I got up the courage to sneak out, I heard that horrible laughter above. It’s good that you’ve dealt with her.
“I don’t think anyone was with her, but I came down here as soon as she started firing, so I can’t say for sure.”
Pel recognizes the woman in the portrait as Olauren Carowyn, Ausio Carowyn’s wife.
At Pel’s question, the middle-aged man glances at a barrel on one side of the room. “I’ve had a cask of water, though it’s nearly run dry. And I’ve… eaten what rats I’ve been able to catch. If you have more civilized food and drink, I would be grateful for some.”
The man doesn’t look dehydrated, sick, or wounded to Zamanda, though he does look a bit thin, likely due to his diet over the past few days.
After answering your questions, the man adds, “Thank you for saving me and please pardon my lack of manners. My name is Ausio Carowyn. Have you seen my wife? She was wearing a very distinctive pearl-studded gown and a powdered wig when I last saw her at the party.”
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Ilsa hands the man some of her rations and pours him some water.
"It's not much, but better than rats," she says wryly.
After the man inquires as to his wife, Ilsa can't think that she saw anyone with a pearl-studded gown. Still, she hadn't been paying much attention to that kind of detail...the whole place was a grotesque masquerade with a lot more to think about.
"I have not seen your wife, though I would gird yourself for the worst," she says. "We can look around...you won't want to."
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“Varisian?” Varor asks loudly without stopping his inspection of the various wines. “Your wife, is she a Varisian?”
Zamanda nods at Ilsa's offer to look for his wife, and she starts searching the area for the distinctive gown. It would be good if his wife were alive, but they should probably do a thorough check.
While Zamanda begins searching, Bashiel steps over to reassure the sole (?) survivor, placing a hand on his back. "How about we get you out of this mansion and to somewhere safe? I know the Guard would be able to host you until you manage to recover from this confinement."
While the others consoled the survivor, Kalem continued looting the bodies of the dead nobles and the manor itself. He was broke and didn’t plan to stay that way.
Ausio eagerly takes the rations and water from Ilsa with a smile and a thank you. He looks worried at Ilsa’s next words and replies, “I saw more than enough before coming down here. If you could tidy things up a bit before I go upstairs, I would appreciate it.”
The nobleman shakes his head at Varor’s question. “No. We’re both Chelish. Why do you ask?”
Varor recognizes that most of the wine in the basement is worth a fair bit altogether, but a large portion of it is contained in casks, which would be difficult to carry. However, there are a few bottles that appear to be of good vintage. If the bottles are sold, Varor guesses they would be worth about 500 gp in total.
Ausio slowly nods at Bashiel’s suggestion. “Yes. Yes, I think that might be for the best. But could you possibly clear a path first? Knowing who or what is up there is more than enough. I would rather not see it all. And I still need to find my wife...”
The nobleman trails off, his mind seeming to wander at the thought of his spouse. He glances longingly at one of the scandalous paintings in his workshop.
-----
Kalem and Zamanda continue the search of the house. Unfortunately, Jolistina and the zombies have not been kind to the manor. The nobles’ clothing and the estate’s various decorations are all in shambles. What items remain would be better sold as scrap than as what they originally were. You would likely only be making a couple coppers for every gold piece the manor’s adornments would normally be worth.
However, Kalem and Zamanda do make one grisly discovery. Among the various slain zombies, Zamanda recognizes one as matching the description Ausio gave of what his wife was wearing. One of the two female zombies in the second floor bedroom appears to have once been Olauren Carowyn.
Kalem carried the body of the survivor’s wife outside and laid it down gently. While more than a bit annoyed that there had been no profit within the place (it the elf wasn’t already dead he would have killed her for that), he saw no reason to take his ire out on the man. As it was, he was broke, injured, and his strength still felt drained. All he wanted to do was sleep. He couldn’t decide if he’d rather sleep in his hovel, or to squat in the manor full of corpses.
Looking the man in the eyes he said ”I am sorry we couldn’t have come earlier.” There wasn’t much more that he could do.
Zamanda cleans the man's wife's body and clothing up as much as she can using prestidigitation, and then accompanies Kalem outside, ready to help if the man breaks down, but not forcing anything on him.
Once Ausio has been escorted out of the manor, Bashiel moves from room to room inside doing a final sweep. In each room, he tries to see if any evidence has been left behind by Rolth, after which her intones a prayer to Osiris for final rest for the people here.
Back outside, Bashiel's face alternates between slow-burning anger for the culprits behind this massacre, and pale shock at the extent of the senseless on display.
"Let's go. I-" He glances at the manor. "-I think we're ready to report."
Ausio lets Ilsa lead him through the ruins of his manor. He’s more than happy to keep his head down till they get outside.
Upon seeing his wife’s body, the nobleman loses it entirely. He collapses onto the cobblestone ground and stares blankly at the corpse. He crawls over to her body and starts shaking it.
“Olauren dear, it’s time to wake up. We have to go see the Korvosan guard. We’ll be safe with them. Please get up. These nice people are going to take us there. Please, Olauren.”
Ausio continues in much the same vein for a couple minutes, continuing to shake and speak to his wife’s body. He’s eventually distracted by Kalem’s word, but no longer seems to be the same man you met in the cellar.
He’s slow in getting up from the ground and when he does, he says, “Can one of you carry her? I don’t want to leave Olauren here. I need her with me.”
As soon as you emerge from under the shadow of Carowyn Manor, a new sight greets you along Korvosa’s northern skyline. More than a dozen columns of smoke rise into the sky. You’re certain they weren’t there when you entered the manor.
A young messenger boy runs past you on the street, shouting as he goes, “Queen Ileosa has put Old Korvosa under quarantine due to blood veil! Gray Maidens have burned all the wooden bridges and the stone bridge has been barricaded! No one is being allowed out of the district!”
“I'll do it,” Varor says when the man asks someone to carry his wife’s corpse. “Take solace, if you can, in knowing that her fate could have been far worse where she a Varisian.”
Varor’s words may ring hollow, and even he knows it. His throat hurts, his eyelids feel heavier, and he can’t bring to care. He wants to get out of the manor and for the day to end.
When he sees the smoke and hears the shouts he lets out a sigh that sounds more like a wheeze, or a half-choked sob. An entire section of the city condemned.