"Lasses, ye have good hearts, but I'm not hurtin' for coin. I can look after the wee ones fer a while, but I can't raise 'em. I don't have the temper for it. Don't worry, our, ah, mutual friend is right about me bein' able to take care of 'em. I have a friend that specializes in gettin' things where they need to go. I'll send word to him tonight. He'll help the munchkins find good homes." The dwarf leans back and weaves his fingers over his belly.
"Now, can ye tell me about this friend o' ours an' what became of that Good Shepherd Gaedren Lamm?" he asks, his voice dripping venom and sarcasm in equal measure as he says "good shepherd."
Zeverin looks at Calcedon with confusion, "The queen? Involved with this monster? I doubt it. I think you are grasping at straws. His lambs were raised and used as thieves and pickpockets. If one of them got some of the queen's jewelry, maybe they didn't get beaten that night."
When the man drags Lamm over and dips an end of him into the water, but doesn't finish the job 'offering' it to someone else, Zev steps up and gets it over with. "Whatever. It works for me." With that he puts a heavy foot on the dead man and just gives him a shove, so that the body rolls over into the water. "Well, that's done, let's finish up here and meet back up. I'm not concerned with the queen so much as I am with the fact that Lamm got to the fortune-teller so soon after we spoke with her. Who knows what information he got, if any, and if he's already put out a hit."
Zev looks at the old man askance, trying to scrutinize why he's talking crazy, then he remembers what the man had said of his past, "Damn it, Man! You found and fell prey to the Shiver once again haven't you? How does the head of a woman, we just met, age by weeks over the course of one evening?"
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I am not on Shiver. Rhasuel growls. Before my encounters with Lamm, I was a member of the Academae Library. I know what I'm talking about. It's been hours since we met with this woman, and in that time nearly a month of natural decay has attempted to occur on this head, but has been magically delayed.
Paulus is reluctant to give the dwarf Zellara's name. He suspects there will be no backlash from tonight's events, that no one will care about the passing of Lamm and retaliate, but he is cautious. However, the seer had thought enough of this dwarf to guide the priest and his companions to him with the children, so he had obviously earned her trust.
"Madame Zellara of Lancet Street was able to guide us to Lamm and his associates." He looks back, to make sure the door remains firmly closed, before continuing. "Lamm no longer draws breath upon this plane of existence, and his lackeys have either joined him in the Underworld, or are awaiting arrest this very moment." Here was another one who thirsted for the sweet nectar of revenge, Paulus was sure of it. Hopefully it sated whatever burning desire was in the dwarf and he could move on.
"Magically delayed?!" Calcedon reacted with wide eyes. "No one here had access to magic. We're likely to find someone else in on this plot. I don't know who that might be, but if they had a cleric or wizard helping them, we might be in deeper than we realize."
"Remember what Lamm said about my parents? They got in too deep. We'd better be prepared for what's going to happen next and try to head it off. We'd better keep our heads down for a few days and see what happens. Of course we'd need to warn the others as well."
"Wait just a minute." Nicoletta begins pacing, her thumb and forefinger rubbing the hilt of her rapier. "We have the queen's brooch, and the weeks-old severed head of the woman we spoke to just this morning." She sighs, running her free hand through her scarlet hair. "This is all a bit much, isn't it?" She shakes her head in frustration, scowling at the head. "Looks like we should go find the others. Maybe one of them will have more input, because personally, I'm just feeling all kinds of weirded out by this."
As everyone starts walking out, Cal looks down at Lamm's corpse, shrugs and kicks it into the water. He then follows all of them out, and proceeds to the Dwarf's Axe. He would have thought that someone would have liked to see the sharks eating him, but I suppose this was good enough. There was no more need for vengeance.
Was Zerella speaking to them from beyond the grave? Did she need to be put to rest? Of course, he knew exactly which piece to play at her funeral when it was time, but would she even hear it? It didn't matter. It would be good for everyone else as well. He really wished he had brought his violin, or at least pick up a decent travelling one for battles. His head spun with different models of violins until they arrived.
"Hmmph. I can't say I'm sorry to see the bastard go. Too slippery and twisted for the law to handle, and for the rest of us to get a hold on him. I just wish I could have put my axe to his head a few times, but vengeance doesn't bring back the dead." His blue eyes grow dark, and he seems to age decades in seconds.
"What has me worried is Zellara. She's a friend of mine, true, but I haven't seen her in almost a month and a half."
A girl on the cusp of womanhood, one of the girls that works here, comes and greets you.
"You must be the other ones. Your friends are in the back I can take you to them if you like."
Paulus nods at the dwarf's wise words. His face then gets a confused look at the mention of Zellara, before smiling at Brask. "Worry not, good sir. We spoke with her just this morning, and she was in good health. We're likely to go see her after this, I'm thinking, so I will bring your regards, if you would like?"
Tis true - I'd imagine she'd be in hiding after what happened to her son." Glad to see Zellara having kind and loyal friends, she gives the dwarf a reassuring smile.
Zev just scowls as Rhasuel answers the young woman, his attentions focused on maintaining his mantras whilst in the bar.
"What he said," Nic adds, jerking her head at Rhasuel. Her thumb and forefinger still rub the hilt of her rapier, an odd, almost lost expression coming over her face.
The girl leads you to an office past several vats and stills that have different libations brewing and distilling within. Inside you find a middle aged dwarf, Brask, and the rest of your party. Strangely, it seems that Dorian has sneaked away at some point after helping get the living thugs tied up outside.
Nodding as Paulus reports to Brask, Elise adds in an afterthought "Perhaps you'd like join us Brask? I'm sure she'd like to see you after such a long time."
If Zev's nose was tickled by the smells of the tavern out front, it outright itched for all the brewing happening here in the back. Even while trying to avoid thinking about it, Zev can't help but recognize some of the odors of the ingredients used in the brewing processes. His ability to easily discern what a chemical result was just by look and smell is all part of what got him in trouble with Lamm in the first place.
Paulus glances back at the others, smiling in relief. "Glad you could join us, Zev!" He reaches forward and grabs the man's hand, slapping him on the shoulder with his free hand. He then looks to Rhasuel. "This is Brask, the fine dwarven proprietor of this tavern that will help with the disposition of the children. He and Zellara are friends. We were actually asking if he wanted to join us when we report our success to her." He looks to Elise, smiling, before looking back to the dwarf to await his answer.
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We have some hard, and undeniably confusing, news then. Everyone better have a seat. Anyone with an aversion to the macabre best leave now.
He takes a seat and waits a beat to let anoyone who want to depart do so.
We went fishing around the place and came up with something.
He pulls out Zellara's head and places it on the table. He preemptively holds up a hand to forstall any questions and gives everyone a moment. When everyone is composed again (or at least silent), he says I don't know how she died, only that it happened about a month ago. The head has been well preserved and shows about a week's worth of decay, but there are signs. How she died is not the question right now. The question we should all be asking is, how can a lady we all just met with not even 12 hours ago be this long dead?
Paulus just stares dumbly at the head for many moments, his lips pressed tightly together. Being a full-fledged priest for the last couple of years, he had seen a few dead bodies, and murmured prayers for the dead over the empty husks. This was something else...something obscene and grotesque.
Paulus thinks back to the cards left for each of them. How confused he was that this lady would know where to find him, or even who he was. Or any of the others, for that matter. He swallows his revulsion and places his hand on the forehead of the decayed head, softly praying for the departed soul.
He then turns to the others, "I think our visit to Zellara's house is still on the table, then. There must be an impostor. Possibly still a friend, since they wanted Lamm gone, but perhaps a rival of Lamm's?"
Opting to stand and lean rather than sit, Nic still glares in disgust at the severed head when Rhasuel places it on the table. Her stomach's strong, thankfully, and she manages to continue staring for a few seconds before she begins pacing again.
She thinks back to the card, The Juggler, left atop her blade that very morning. The card Zellara - if she was Zellara - had drawn from her deck at the reading that evening. The head was an exact match. The woman who'd been at the house had definitely been real. The wine had been real - she could still taste it in her mouth, as surely as she felt the tender wound in her side from the bugbear's blade. There was no chance it had all been a dream, or an imagining.
"We need to go back," she agrees, nodding at Paulus' words. "If she was there once, there's a chance she could be again. Whoever she is. Whatever she is. If it's even her. Hells, I don't know what to think," she sighs, stopping her pacing to lean against the nearest solid object.
Since he had been the one to discover the head, he wasn't shocked by seeing it again, but he was really quite shocked that Rhasuel would pull it out in an eating establishment. "I'm thinking a funeral is in order, but if we go back to check things out, I'm getting my violin. If you tell ghosts that the job is done they'll sometimes disappear, and I need to play her the song I promised."
Turning away from Rhasuel's grisly token, Paulus nods to Calcedon. "Please be swift."
Brask takes the news of his friend's death with a silent, smoldering rage burning in his heart.
"Damned bastard, not enough to take Emily, but me friend too?" he mutters as the others talk. After a few moments he turns back around, his eyes hard as flint.
"Ye said ye talked to her? Go find out what's going on, Fifty crowns to each o' ye that goes."
Mercy stares long and hard at the severed head presented.
Goddess! Subtlety was clearly forgotten by some here...
As Paulus administers his prayer the tall half orc bows her head afore covering Zelarra's head with her cloak;
"Some dignity in death..."
Taken aback at this revelation, Annabelle's jaw drops, and she rests her arms on the back of a chair to steady herself. What new spore of madness is this? Was this poor woman some spirit, or a guileful imposter?
"I'm hoping someone's not played us for fools, and taken advantage of this poor person." She mutters to non-one in particular.
As Rhasuel turns the deck over in his hands, the cards fly out as if carried by a strong wind. They dance and flutter on the unfelt wind as they circle around the center of Brask's desk. A young woman hums a lively Varisian tune and almost as suddenly as it began, the cards stop swirling and pile into a neat deck in the hand of a young Varisian woman dressed in a loose blouse and skirt with at least three scarves about her waist and another tying back her wild, curly, black hair. She doesn't seem solid though, as if she was almost, but not quite there, but that is not what is so amazing about her. No, that would be her face, which looks like Zellara's if she was twenty years younger.
"Save your coin, Brask! The only trickery here is my own." Zellara tells the dwarf before turning and smiling at the party she'd guided to Lamm.
"Hello, friends. You all look like you've seen a ghost."
Although dealing with Lamm had been a relief for him, and perhaps would end his sleepless nights, Paulus wasn't entirely comfortable with this. "Perhaps you would care to explain, Madame?" The phrase is part question, part demand.
He remains wary, producing his holy symbol but making no attempt to brandish it at this point. Spirits had been known to possess people, and this one might be looking for a vessel to use. Or it might simply try to torment them. Or it could be benign. He was determined to find out.
Startled, but determined not to show it, Annabelle stood her ground. Finally mustering her words, she spoke at last. "Be truthful - if your some avenging agent of hers, I can accept that. But I - dare I say all of us? - will have no deceit."
Adding, silently, We've had our fill of being pawns by way of Lamm...
Calcedon was nearly out of the room when he heard the commotion behind him. Seeing what it was, he inwardly kicked himself again for not bringing his violin. He knew this was going to happen as soon as he saw the head. This is how all the stories went. They'd hear her story, she'd thank them for the service and she'd vanish into the ether. She'd never hear him play like he hoped.
He involuntarily continued the song she started by humming the tune. He stayed back toward the edge of the room, knowing there would be plenty of people pressing her for answers. He knew how it was after a concert and he didn't want to bother her with too big a crowd. At least, that's the excuse he told himself. Inwardly, he was ashamed. Ashamed his town would allow for such a tragedy, ashamed that they hadn't given her head a proper burial but most of all, ashamed that he left his violin behind.
"Zellara?" Nicoletta asks in amazement. She looks at the cards, at the head covered by Mercy's cloak, at the figure sitting before the group, looking to Nic as though she could put a hand right through her. She lifts a hand, before fighting down the impulse. It didn't seem, well, polite, to go stiking your hand through someone you barely knew.