Othan will bar his door and push a chest in front of it
When Xov returns to the inn, he will give a warm smile to the innkeeper. Then he will go back to his room, and barricade it with whatever is available.
But first, he must scout out around the town.
Xov looked around again. He still had not seen anything interesting, and considered turning back...
I guess I should get some rest, thought Xov as he walked back to the inn.
"Good evening...", he greeted the innkeeper calmly. "I shall be off to rest."
Xov returned to his room, carefully eyeing for traps. As soon as he got in, he barricaded the door with whatever was there, hoping that any surprise entries would be loud enough to wake him.
He silently prepared to meditate for the night.
Ebran comes down in the morning and greets the innkeeper cordially and orders a light breakfast before taking a seat and waiting for the others.
Othan arrives downstairs soon after Ebran.
"Innkeeper my friend and I need a pair of good cuts of meat."
Essar ate some of the food and went to his room, he arranged the bed so that it looked like it was occupied and he then hid himself in the closet to sleep...
Xov blinked awake. Another day, he thought. The thought of what he had seen written on the zombie's ring was still in his mind. A lot can happen today...we might even finish this quest...and we might be rid of crazy-mouth in the process. That's probably wishful thinking, though.
Xov waited calmly for Gwen to contact him.
"My lady...if it is not beyond my place to ask, who is Erandis Vol? Is anything known about her?"
Waking early, Danir begis his morning preparations for the day ahead- first doing his daily meditation in which he summons arcane energy and binding it into weaves within his body so that he can later weave this energy into material objects. He then checks his armor and weapons to insure that they are flawless and does any maintenance on them to insure that they are in top form when he needs them.
After finishing these tasks, he disassembles his jury rigged acid trap on his room door and goes downstairs for breakfast, joining Ebran and Othan there.
|
Xov blinked awake. Another day, he thought. The thought of what he had seen written on the zombie's ring was still in his mind. A lot can happen today...we might even finish this quest...and we might be rid of crazy-mouth in the process. That's probably wishful thinking, though.
Xov waited calmly for Gwen to contact him.
"My lady...if it is not beyond my place to ask, who is Erandis Vol? Is anything known about her?"
"That information is on a need to know basis, and you don't need to know all the details" she says. "But, she's the wickedest girl in the whole world."
"I understand"
Xov nodded, then paused, waiting to see if Gwen had any specific instructions.
If she does, he listens, if not, he will go down and find Othan, Ebran, and Danir.
While he eats his breakfast of roasted potatoes, eggs, and bacon, Danir makes conversation with his companions.
"So Ebran, what was it exactly that we are supposed to be getting from this Nimblefingers fellow?"
Xov entered the room and nodded at his companions.
Overhearing Danir's question, he glanced around to make sure no one was listening, then quietly answered:
"My sources say it is a tiny eldritch machine, in the form of an astrolabe...And..."
he paused for a moment, before continuing
"now seems like a good time to discuss a bit of possible strategy I've been thinking about. Since, ya know, the four of us are hear, and the other one isn't..."
Xov lowered his voice to but a whisper:
"From what we know, there are at least two opposing groups in this fortress of evil: Nimblefingers, who may be allied with the Aurum, and his undead captors, who are allied with the Emerald Claw...and I think the Blood of Vol, too. Probably, one of these two factions knows where the eldritch machine is. If it's Nimblefingers, then the undead are probably trying to force it out of him, and we should "save" him to get it. If it is the undead, then we need to keep one of them alive for interrogation, and we won't really care about Nimblefingers. The trouble is, we don't yet know who knows where the eldtritch machine is.
Also, I have a hunch that the undead know some fairly striking secret information about their own cult. I'm not sure if that is useful or not. However...
one of the undead cultists, possibly their leader, is the cousin of Essar. I think we can turn that into a bargaining chip of sorts...
So, a strategy I have in mind is that we start by fighting our way to the undead's inner sanctum, and see what information we get on the way. If we get their and still aren't sure who we need to kill and who we need to interrogate, then we split into two groups: group one goes in, tells a few lies, asks a few misleading questions, maybe try to make some deal involving either Essar's capture or his release, and figures it out. Group two waits right outside the room ready for a surprise attack. Essar should be in group two, since I'm not sure we could trust him to hold his tongue for even a minute...maybe Ebran should be in group two since he has a visible dragonmark and probably won't be trusted by either the undead or nimblefingers. The rest of group two would need to prevent Essar from entering early...with force if needed. Maybe Othan could also be in group two to help with that...
Anyways, hopefully we'll get a better sense of what's going on during the raid, and won't have to use my strategy, but as a backup plan, what do you guys think?"
"An eldritch machine? what is that? I was just told that it is an astrolabe. Which, Danir, is a device that sailors... well I guess anyone, but in my experience as a sailor, i say mostly sailors, use to keep on course at night. You use it to measure your position relative to certain stars."
"I agree that I should not be in the first group. If they see my mark, they will know what house I am likely allied with, and know that I seek the astrolabe. I don't know anything about any of that cultist stuff."
Essar woke up in the closet and carefully looked through the holes in its door to see if he had any "guests" he also listened carefully with his ears. perception check
Essar sat stalk still and tried to make sense of the speech.
"I'm not sure exactly...I think it is a kind of potent magical artifact or item. Maybe they didn't tell you what it was because they didn't trust you not to steal it for yourself if you thought it was powerful?"
Xov tilted his head in thought as he tried to recall what he knew about eldtrich machines:
"could be. They're probably trying to get me killed."
"Maybe...I would have thought house Lyrander would be too pragmatic to try to get a potentially valuable resource killed. At any rate,
So...is everyone almost ready to go?"
"Once we have finished breakfast, I am ready"
"yeah, I feel like they resent my usefulness due to my distinctly round ears."
"I am ready whenever the rest of you are..."
Essar waited patiently he remembered these men as comrades in arms not as babbling idiots.
"Okay then, I guess we're just waiting for crazy-mouth to wake up."
Essar made his way down to the inn common room and looked around for any other "friends".
perception
We have a problem, my room was visited this morning by two members of my old unit and they were babbling like idiots when they were once lethal soldiers.
"Did they see you? Did you talk to them?
No matter, we are leaving, and going to fight this cult. Everyone else is ready to go. You can come or not."
Besides, he thought, if the cultists have become anywhere near as much like idiots as crazy-mouth is, that will make tricking them a lot easier.
Attacking them now is foolish, have you done proper recon? Because if you have not that means we are likely to run into something bad, do you for example desire to battle a wraith? I can assure you the thranians didn't want to and you won't either.
Well, mused the elf, I would hope that my Lady would warn us if this were essentially a suicide mission. If not then perhaps my life is not terribly valuable anyways...
Xov giggled at Essar's words.
"Just becaues you've been slacking off and ignorant doesn't mean other people haven't been making plans and gathering information while you slept. Do you actually have a plan? Do you even know what our mission is? "
Xov gestured to his companions, and turned to leave.
Xov you make the mistake of an outsider, you fail to comprehend the history of the Blood. We have spent many years as a persecuted minority, as such my brethern build fortress's, safe houses and temples with one goal in mind: defence. Even if you breach the initial defences your true objective will already have fled, as each Blood complex has at least three ways to escape. However I can show you a way in that will bypass the outer defences, assuming that this is a proper safe house and not just a temporary shelter..
Xov burst out laughing.
"So you are in favor of attacking now, as long as we sneak in? Good, then everyone is in agreement.
By the way...you expressed an intent to create some flasks of holy water today. Have you done so?"
"Well, Essar, if you have Bless Water prepared, cast it now. If not, then let's go."