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The heavens weep for Petros Lorrimor. A curtain of rain, dark and heavy as Lethe water, falls upon the town of Ravengro, making midday into dusk and pounding the Restlands’ earthen paths until they seethe with treacherous muck.
You stand at the southwestern entrance to the Restlands, Ravengro’s cemetery. Moss-eaten granite walls flank two rusted iron gates, now standing open like a crimson ribcage, cracked wide.
As Kendra has explained, the local burial tradition involves sending the priest on ahead, to greet the coffin at its final resting site. Apart from the mortal remains of your esteemed friend and mentor, the Professor, the only person present besides the six of you is Kendra Lorrimor, Petros’s daughter.
Dark-eyed and bedraggled, the twenty-nine-year-old orphan has met you at the Restlands, so you cannot judge if the wetness on her cheeks is bred from tears, or merely rain. She casts a doleful look at the assembly and heaves a sigh.
“Friends, I cannot thank you enough for your kindness in coming here, upon my late father’s charge. I am loathe to make you wait any longer in this deluge, but it appears I am forced to ask another favour.
“The townsfolk have shunned my father’s funeral, it appears, and I find myself lacking in pallbearers. Would you do Professor Lorrimor the final kindness of carrying his coffin to the gravesite?”
Magdalen weeps in the rain, torn between grief for the professor, and nervousness at seeing Kendra. She raises her head at her ex-lover's voice and, hesitating slightly, steps forward at the request. She waits a moment for the others to speak up; in the silence, tears on her face, she speaks softly.
"I will help."
Esdras scratches his short beard as he watches around, noticing those present for the ceremony.
Hum... nice to see a couple familiar faces... he thinks to himself while nodding to the two strangers close to him (Ivan and Wictor) and shaking Dmitry's hands. Esdras was curious to talk with Dmitry about their past mission but he'd wait for the appropriate time.
Coming closer to Kendra, Esdras grabbed her hand delicately before addressing her, "I'm truly sorry for your loss, miss Kendra. The professor was well beloved by those who had the privilege to meet him. I'd like to say that I'm at your disposition for anything that you might need..."
At Kendra's request for help with the coffin, Esdras nods without saying another word, neither to her nor to Magdalen, his small student who clearly lacked any promising strength. To avoid any embarrassment to her, he picked a position behind her in such a manner that if her strength fails, the coffin would not fall into the ground.
Esdras looks once more to the falling rain and to the muddy ground, A dark day but a fitting one, for Ustalav is clearly darker than it was before...
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As fate's right hand leads me down a path, how cruelly its left nestles the knife in my back. How Dmitry Pavlovich's thoughts scoffed at his own misfortune when he had heard of Professor Lorrimor's death.
Now, as he walks against the conspiring elements, already his mind works in a frantic, methodical process. He had needed the Professor's aid above all, finally coming around to the idea that the man's more ludicrous notions may be closer to reality than Dmitry had originally thought. Lorrimor's trail had been easy to find, easier to follow, but to have it end at a gravesite was not something he had anticipated.
The rain pummels Dmitry, its cold bite sinking down to his marrow, but he largely is able to ignore its persistence. His mind is elsewhere, his focus shifted in search of a backup plan. Perhaps there will be an associate of the Professor at his burial who might know more about his research, he thinks, hope surrounding his faculties. Surely, he is saddened by the man's unfortunate end, but the sting of grief is all too familiar to the ex-bookkeeper, and finds himself slightly numb to it presently.
His boots sink into the mud, each step towards the cemetery a cruel representation of the murkiness of his trail, his journey - how marred with muck and grime it is! He laughs aloud, a sound drowned in the whipping of wind, the percussion of rain, the chorus of thunder. Shaking his head, Dmitry wipes the accumulated layer of wetness from his forehead and sighs, stopping his walk for a moment to tap the mud off of the end of his cane. And to collect his thoughts, ever to collect his thoughts.
The wrought iron gates creak as Dmitry passes between them, a cold and ominous greeting. He moves deliberately though the yard, eying the headstones as he passes, death so casually skirting the edges of his consciousness. Spotting a small congregation, he moves towards it, suddenly feeling the weight the rain has given to his clothing. He moves in quietly, glancing at all who are gathered. His heart nearly skips a beat spying Esdras, and suddenly his mind jaunts violently to that night, all blackness and blood and screams. He shakes his head to make the vision of it dissolve away to run like watered ink.
When Esdras approaches for a greeting, Dmitry shakes his hand, unsure of what to say, but gives the acquaintance a knowing nod. His surprise wears off, as he thinks it sensible for the once-bodyguard of the Professor to be in attendance. If the warrior had any sour feelings towards Dmitry's past actions, he did not show them, and that was enough for Dmitry.
More surprising was that Wictor was there. It had been some time since Dmitry had seed his old friend, and he couldn't help but manage a smile in response. He makes a note to reconnect with the old librarian after the ceremony, especially if Wictor was close with the Professor and might be able to assist where Lorrimor no longer can.
Dmitry is visibly puzzled by Kendra's words. Shunned? This great man who was revered in life is now shunned in death? Despicable!
"Good woman, your father's work put my life onto a path that, despite is hardships, I am thankful to have been given access to. It would be the pinnacle of honor to take up and support the Professor and walk him down the end of his own path." Dmitry walks forward and takes a place by the coffin.
Standing in front of the coffin, a tear hanging from his eye, is a young man in long, dark robes. His unkempt hair is flattened by an endless stream of tiny drops, and his pale hand clutches a leather-bound book. Ivan wipes his eye with the back of his hand and opens the Fabulous Tome, its pages fluttering in the wind.
The Horrible Night, or an Adventure with Petros Lorrimor.
Ivan tears his eyes from the journal and gazes at the strangers, trying his hardest not to frown at the sight of Alec du Chevrou. He looks down at the muddy earth, the same cold earth upon which he was born and in which he will doubtlessly be buried. He kicks the ground, mud splashing around his feet, and grins.
How curious it is, the man thinks, and how terrible. I cannot say people who have already dealt with the greatest loss find it easier to encounter it again, but this expression won't leave my face.
As he listens to Kendra speak, a sudden wave of warmth surges through Ivan's body, surprisingly uncomfortable for the chilly weather. Ivan grunts, loosening his grasp and making him nearly drop his beloved Journal, shaking his head slightly as a voice speaks within.
How unpleasant. He was quite the fascinating scholar. The elf wizard's spirit chuckles and shifts Ivan's gaze back towards his book, where he has unknowingly written several lines. You probably do not remember, but Professor Lorrimor introduced you to this poem. It would be lovely if you read it out loud for our grieving friends.
Ivan nods, slightly annoyed by Gamorak's apathy, and clears his throat.
"Upon a long bridge all people walk;
one by one, like marching soldiers.
Beneath this bridge- the darkest pit;
from which come cries of sorrow.
We all want to get as far as we can;
take it slow and careful, or fast and brash.
But be a nobleman or lowly folk;
We all eventually must fall."
Ivan's low, clear, quiet voice echoes around the cemetery, like a thunder rumbling far away. He speaks with the stability of a man who has encountered death many times before, but is shocked by it once again as if he had witnessed it for the first time in his short, meaningless life.
"When I witnessed my allies get slaughtered, Mr. Lorrimor was there for me. He helped me when I thought everything was over; when I was at the lowest of lows, he came and held me up. I believe it is only justice that I carry his coffin in one final gesture of honor. It is unthinkable that I must say goodbye to one of the greatest people to walk this land."
Alec tries not to fidget as the rain sleets off the oiled leather of his long coat. He starts to reach up to itch the scar at his neck but catches himself and instead adjusts his woolen scarf. He glances around at the motley assembly, giving a small nod of acknowledgement to the young woman--Magdelan, he thinks?--he'd assisted some weeks past. He visibly starts when Ivan Fabulanov of all people meets his eyes for a fleeting moment. Alec hurriedly looks back down at the muddy ground, tugging his hat lower to avoid the other man's gaze.
Why is he here? For that matter, why am I? His eyes are drawn to the coffin lying before them. He doesn't know why the Professor would have included him in his will, he wasn't anyone important or knowledgeable. Like Iram Alec shies away from that thought.
He glances up to meet Kendra Lorrimor's eyes, and gives her a small smile. He hope's it looks reassuring--he doesn't feel much hope right now.
"I would do so gladly, Miss Lorrimor." Stepping forward he leans down to grip the casket handle, wondering again why the man within saw fit to think of a Galtan orphan of little account.
I never truly knew you, sir, but you might be my best hope for getting my life back.
If there was one word to describe Wictor's countenance at this dreadful juncture, it would be humbled. He had several inconveniences he suffered during his journey here -more than he usually dealt with. Tears in his eyes, he is for the first time in a long while simply silent.
Many emotions flooded across his mind, swirling and tugging to several places. Seeing little Ivan up there, all grown up and authoritatively proficient in words was a warm surprise. Wictor never knew they bore a connection; the student and the late professor. Seeing Dmitry's kind face was also comforting.
Petros Lorrimor was one contemporary whose integrity was wholly unflinching, and in Wictor's youth he found that trait to be as rare and valuable as a dragon's ruby. Whilst in life Wictor never confessed it to the Professor, Wictor placed a great amount of confidence and trust in the man. Scores of seasons had passed since the vibrant time in his life when he found himself in need of the Professor's company, but in this moment Wictor found himself in that same position again: to a wanting despair.
He clutched his fur-skin cap in his wide, trembling fists. His naked crown was a rare sight amidst his unkempt tufts of surrounding hair. For sake of appearances the aging Wictor was ne'er seen without it placed atop his brow: the two were synonymous. In this moment the man was truly naked, and forgot what shame was for the mourning of his lost friend.
As the Miss makes her request, Wictor throws his worn cane to the sodden floor. He courteously gives her the grand bear-hug only a hardworking father of three could give, his face a blubbering mess.
"Of course, my dear. Anything."
He hobbles over to the coffin, laying a ham-like hand on Dmitry's back to silently greet his old friend, taking his place 'neath his beloved burden.
Kendra cinches her cloak tightly around her throat. Judging from the dark sparkle in her eyes, her mood has been buoyed, however slightly, by your declarations.
“Your largesse warms my heart, and I know the professor would have likewise cherished it. Let us proceed to the gravesite, and hope for our garments' sakes that Father Grimburrow prefers a concise eulogy.
“After the interment, I would invite you all back to my father’s – or, rather, I should say, my house, now. There, we may take shelter and repast before the reading of the professor’s will.”
As you arrange yourselves to hoist the coffin skyward, Kendra takes her place at the lead, conspicuously avoiding Magdalen’s gaze as she strides by.
From the coffin’s head to its foot -- Magdalen, Esdras, and Alec on the left, and Ivan, Dmitry, and Wictor on the right –- you move through the yawning gates and into the Restlands. A corroded iron plate affixed to one of the crumbling mausoleums nominates this path as Ancestors’ Walk. The ancient sepulchres bear some of Ravengro’s oldest family names and sigils, but most are so weatherbeaten and mossworn that only a smattering of letters remain legible. The pounding rain pours off the tombs’ arched roofs in heavy sheets.
The mud is deep, your progress tortuously slow. After fifty paces, the professor’s daughter turns north, onto a winding path whose sign declares it to be the Dreamwake.
You cannot discern their faces, nor any hint of their intent, but you suspect they are blocking your path. Kendra, in the lead, keeps walking solemnly ahead.
Dmitry feels Wictor's heavy hand on his shoulder as the wizard gains a spot behind him. He turns his head to catch the man out of the corner of his eye and gives him a nod of greeting.
When Kendra leads the procession forward, Dmitry feels more intensely the weight of the situation, perhaps due to the physical weight of the deceased Professor and his coffin, and his soul aches for the man's passing in this moment. Dmitry sets aside his own selfishness to feel sympathy for Kendra and grief for the Professor's untimely end. A pang of guilt for thinking only of himself during all this strikes him, and he frowns.
Shaking off the feelings as best he can, he clears his throat, straightens his shoulders, and focuses on the task at hand. Bringing his gaze to the muddy path before the procession, he squints at a nebulous shape in the gloom beyond. After a few blinks to scatter the raindrops from his eyes, he sees the blurry shadows take vague forms.
Dmitry clears his throat again. "Kendra, I thought you said this funeral was shunned by the townsfolk? It would appear that perhaps you were mistaken, or else we are in for some manner of trouble. Behold, a gathering ahead."
Glancing up sharply at Dmitry's warning, Alec attempts to lean out and peer past Esdras without letting go of the casket. Frowning into the downpour, he brushes his coat away from the hilt of his short dueling blade.
"I see nothing but the rain. Miss Lorrimor, should we be expecting any trouble?"
Wictor doesn't see what Dmitry is talking about, but his sullen demeanor abruptly sobers for a second, betraying to none but the wary his anxious inner workings. He instinctively puts his right hand beside the back pocket near his waist to find nothing.
Drat! Of COURSE this should happen when I'm most unsettled and least prepared... EVERY TIME, Wic!
Perhaps considered sinful by many an Ustalavian, Wictor attended the funeral completely unarmed.
His donkey, his furs, his supplies and all their trappings were left at the inn, along with his daggers and his father's old crossbow.
His paranoia then surged into a righteous indignation, leaping from his silent precipice of assumed enemies.
Dare they cross Lorrimor's procession without respects... I will do what need be done.
Esdras raises his eyes from the treacherous ground after Dmitry's warning words but isn't able to discern anything clear ahead of them, probably thanks to the downpour. His eyesight is generally quite good though. Even without seeing anything, there was no reason for Esdras to doubt of Dmitry's words. "Could they not be the priest? Father Grimburrow if I'm not mistaken about his name?"
Even if Esdras made sure to voice his question without letting transpire any of his apprehension, his years walking around Ustalav and collecting haunting tales taught him to always be cautious. I hope they are none but the priest and his attendants but if not, I'll be ready for them...
Magdalen paces dully, staring at the back of Kendra's head and struggling to carry her share. The rain streams off her hood. She's so stunned that the alarmed voices of the men barely penetrate her fog.
Only the name Grimburrow cuts through the miasma of her sodden thoughts.
Magdalen stumbles, and almost loses her grip on the casket.
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Thanks to Dmitry’s keen eye and quick warning, the procession grows cautious as you approach the end of the Dreamwake.
The grey shapes resolve themselves into twelve villagers. Half of the crowd takes shelter from the rain beneath the overhanging roof of a large mausoleum carved with a faded, circular sigil composed of intertwining wolves and ravens. The other six are deliberately blocking your path. They are mostly farmers and fisherfolk, judging by their garb and by the implements they bear – some of which are being brandished like weapons.
Kendra halts and, squaring her shoulders, addresses the man in front. He is old but hale, with a wiry stature that could mark him as a former soldier.
“Gibs Hephenus,” says Kendra, “Did you spearhead this little intrusion?”
“That’s far enough,” says Hephenus, ignoring the lady’s query, “We been talking, and we don’t want Lorrimor buried in the Restlands. You can take him upriver and bury him there if you want, but he ain’t goin’ to ground here!”
You can hear in Kendra’s voice the effort she expends in keeping calm in the face of this outrage. “Father Grimburrow has approved it,” she replies, “He’s waiting for us now--”
“You don’t get it, girl,” snarls Hephenus, “We won’t have a necromancer sullying the soil of our kin.”
Other voices in the mob throw their support behind Gibs. “We know he was sneaking around here.” “And up at Harrowstone!” “He’s cursed us. Every soul in town.”
Kendra is speechless. She turns from the mob and beseeches your aid with her eyes.
Smoothing away his frown and putting on a small, apologetic smile, Alec releases the casket and steps around Esdras, murmuring an apology to the white-haired warrior for the added weight. Stepping up beside Kendra he addresses the villagers.
"Fellas, we're not looking for any kind of trouble here, we just want to put an old friend to rest. Professor Lorrimor was a well-travelled chap, wandering all across the region. Is it really so surprising that he might take strolls about the village he loved so well? Come now, the priest has given his blessing that the old man be laid to rest here, let us finish our solemn task and we can all get out of this miserable rain."
Ignorant rabble! Esdras thinks as the man talks with Kendra. Esdras doesn't consider himself a scholar or even a well learned man despite his classes when he was younger, but even so he despised those who posed themselves as know-it-all with actually knowing nothing remarkable. What he really wanted was to let the coffin down, move straight towards the bully, and knock him to the ground... This would teach this oaf a lesson.
As Alec released the handle, Esdras tried to compensate it with additional strength. Slowly, he felt his body to answer, and soon after he felt no difference in the strength he was applying. He also felt a light tingling on his skin.
Despite his opinion and desire, Esdras decided neither to vocalize his thoughts nor to act according to them. Instead, he tried to talk the man down... a technique he wasn't really fitted for. "A necromancer you say? And you want to prevent a so-called necromancer to be allowed to rest in sacred ground, where the will of Pharasma will prevent him from raising from the dead?" As he talked, Esdras pointed first to the raining skies and then to the graveyard around them, showing all the undisturbed tombs surrounding them, a couple of them completely forgotten by the living. "And you all thought it would be a good idea? The professor wasn't a necromancer! I can attest to his good behavior for I have accompanied him around every corner of Ustalav! Unless any of you would have the guts to label me a liar for my testimony... in which case we both know how to settle such claim."
Dmitry studies the gathered throng, his eyes sweeping over their collective faces, analyzing. He shifts his weight, digging for traction in the mud, the weight of mortality all too evident in his hands. His cane had been tucked under one arm during the trek, and he moves one hand away from the handle on the coffin to retrieve it, thinking of the blade within.
"Careful, gentlemen, ladies," Dmitry says in a low voice to his compatriots. "Half these folk look hungry for a fight...they might just take you up on your offer, Esdras."
Words are thrown about in Wictor's background as he calculates the possibilities in a worrisome rage. Amidst the conversing white noise a word breaks through several times- something that distracts his focus for a second; 'necromancer'. It had been a dynasty since he'd 'ere read or discussed those damned souls who practiced the dark trade. For no longer than a millisecond his synapses pondered why the word disrupted his attention. There was no answer as his focus began to give sway once again to fear and swarm...
Wictor sees a dozen malicious rabblers before him. He relays not his intention to any of his companions, and offers no words to those disrespecting his friend.
Were he in a better state of mind, he'd commit himself to diffusing the situation such that both parties would swiftly part ways.
But in Wictor's eyes lay a darker stare.
After sizing up the situation- the weight of the coffin, the positioning of Lorrimor's daughter, the assumed ability of the men at his side, the distance between them and the townsfolk- Wictor begins to scan frantically for any heavy stone or broken shard of headstone he might arm himself with. He hoped against hope that the dreadful lot would simply disperse, by way of some divine miracle or authoritative utterance given by a mourner...
He was so jarred, yet so fixated in this moment that his conscious self didn't notice the pangs of guilt his heart incurred when it realized that the word of authority should come from him.
What on earth is this... why can't they just leave us alone? The poor man was dead, who could he hurt now?! Magdalen peers through the rain at Gibs Hephenus, wondering what his role was in all this. It didn't seem right. She'd seen Gibs more than once and he'd always seemed so fair, so enlightened, even in these difficult times. She didn't understand what was happening. Was he being coerced? There was something about his eyes that seemed to be just a little... haunted...
While Alec’s calming and compassionate words seem to sway the more ambivalent members of the throng, Esdras’s challenge has the opposite effect upon the belligerent ones. Six villagers slink away, leaving you facing half a dozen angry men.
“Lorrimor weren’t from around here,” spits Gibs Hephenus, the ringleader, “and you sure as sin ain’t local neither. Now make off with yourselves, and take that bedeviled heretic with you!”
He punctuates his words by producing an oversized flip razor, and slicing the air in front of him. He stands too far from any of you to be a danger; however, one of his cronies (you can’t discern which one) decides to underscore his threat by lobbing a stone towards you. The sizable rock strikes one side of the professor’s coffin and knocks the remaining pallbearers off-balance.
Esdras and Wictor both keep their footing, but it is not enough; the slippery muck betrays the other coffin-bearers, and their honorable cargo canters forward and plummets to the ground. Worse still, the impact jars the lid loose, exposing the coffin's contents to the rain.
The gruesome sight that strikes your eyes as you look down will, without a doubt, remain with you until your dying hour. The late professor, your beloved mentor, lies demolished at your feet. His attire is much as you remember it, and you recognize the loose, sparse tufts of grey hair that adorn his skull...but instead of a face, the corpse bears a hideous concavity. Whatever killed Professor Lorrimor, it dealt so heinous a blow as to eradicate all his kind features at once.
Kendra's pallor turns to chalk, and her throat emits a long, low moan. Gibs and the rest are silent and still.
The rain, sweat and mud overcome Ivan's willpower and he drops the coffin. At the sight of the corpse, Ivan starts and instinctively reaches to the Holy Water in his bag, but regains his composure and turns towards the villagers with a cold expression.
"The hideousness of this deformed corpse cannot match the ugly, revolting thing that is your soul. Throwing stones at harmless people, at a man's coffin; I've seen zombies more honourable than you."
Ivan kneels down, not looking at his comrades, and places the coffin's lid back.
Though the rock comes nowhere near to striking him Alec flinches away, whirling around at the sound of impact just in time to see the casket spill its contents onto the muddy ground.
Alec stares in horror at the corpse's hideous wound. Dear gods, what in the hells could have done that to him?! His head looks as though it was staved in by a sledgehammer!
His horror and revulsion cannot be hidden, though Alec knows that worse violence lurks just out of sight, stalking the two groups like some grisly scavenger. If I can't talk some sense into these bastards there will be blood. The ringleader Hephenus is maddened, but the others may yet see sense. Please, Arqueros, let it be so.
Slowly turning back to the villagers, his fists clenched to keep them from shaking, Alec addresses them again, speaking slowly to keep the tremor from his voice.
"So you have now defiled the dead on the holy ground of Pharasma, I hope you're proud of yourselves. Would you add murder to your sins this day? We have sought only to bury our friend, and we have offered you no violence, and yet you refuse the path of peace. In Arqueros' name I beg you, go home and trouble us no more."
Dmitry falters. Fumbles. He doesn't even have time to drop the cane and return his hand to the coffin before the box falls at his feet, and the lid jarring loose seems to take a year's worth of time masquerading as a moment. He goes down to one knee with the casket, half in defeat, half in a subconscious last-ditch attempt to salvage the situation. He realizes that there is no victory before his knee even strikes the mud, and his punishment for the failure is Professor Lorrimor, all done up in the grotesqueness of his mortal end.
There are words, somewhere off beyond some distant veil. Sound is distorted by the pounding of blood in Dmitry's eardrums; even the rain now a soft child's whisper. He feels the coldness of the wet earth seep through his trousers and onto his kneecap, numbing the joint - or is the cold merely a phantom conjured by the scene before him? Alas, life is too much a blur in this instant to know for sure.
He stares into the coffin at that ruined face, and though defiled by some foul source, Dmitry can still project the face of a man onto the graven canvas. He could see the twinkling eyes of a man possessed by knowledge, infatuation with learning, enchanted by conversation. The dim flicker of a dying lamplight throwing a waltz of shadows across his features as twilight births the night, as discourse and dialogue swirl in the musty air of a library. The smile of a man who relishes the meeting of a kindred spirit. The man who was Petros Lorrimor.
Dmitry sweeps to his feet, a regal flourish undoubtedly learned from some nobleman. His cane twists as he stands, defiant against the whipping wind, until the gleam of a blade sneers amid the haze of rain. One sweeping step brings Dmitry equal to Alec, and the coldness of his gaze shows a man both infuriated and unflinching.
"And who among you would throw such a stone as to defile the dead? You mar the honor of a man by claiming him necromancer, yet t'is your own hand that scars the sanctity of an interred corpse. A despicable irony, is it not?" Dmitry rebuffs the group with a sharp nasal exhalation, straightening his body and swiping the air with his own blade. "You twirl a razor with the finesse of a crippled barber, yet my battle-marked friend here handles a sword with the focus of a soldier." Dmitry inclines his head to Esdras.
"We have no motive to engage you in this hallowed place, but if you should be so foolish as to remain obstacles on our way to see an old friend given last rites, so foolish as to ravage the emotions of his beloved daughter by defiling his corpse in front of her eyes, then you will certainly wish it was merely a necromancer who you crossed this day."
Wictor cannot abide by this. He cracks.
As the tragedy unfolds, he exhales the loud roar of something akin to a bear.
The fire in the man's eyes were irrefutable.
"BASTAAARDS! RECREANTS! YOU KNOW NOT WHOM YOU SULLY!"
Egregiously weeping, full with violent gasping and choking, he fumbles over to pick up the rock, and chucks it at the knife man with everything in him.
Defeated, the rock scampers to the wayside. But Wictors' vehemence would not be trounced in this moment. Hollering, he runs at full bore into the fray, as much as his gimp leg would allow.
He was long past the point of anxiety. Calculation proved a farce.
Hephenus' eyes bore into Magdalen's, then double, and she blinks and shakes her head. I must be more addled than I thought. I'm seeing things. She barely even notices the villagers' physical threats in her confusion.
The weight of the casket is suddenly off-balance and she finds herself face-first in the mud, heaving for air at the sudden violence. The breath is knocked out of her with the fall.
The coffin's contents are revealed to her gasping face. Fainting Pharasma! Magdalen's bile is disturbed and her gorge is rising. She lurches back into the mud and scrabbles for purchase to get away from the gory evidence of the professor's demise. What... how did this happen? Who could have done this?
Magdalen's anger, first kindled when she'd heard of Lorrimar's death, is stoked into a fierce blaze at viewing the destruction of the face she'd revered for so long. She recovers her footing in the muck and, pulling her forgehammer from a belt loop and brandishing it wildly, charges at the nearest villager; a guttural screech flying from her senseless lips and a mindless intent to inflict hurt the only impetus behind her action.
Dmitry finds his words proven wrong as a few of his fellows rush forward in an attack on the gathered belligerents. He watches an old friend lob a stone at the group, and blinks in a stupor as a flustered young woman rise to rage as she charges forward. Now there is a book with a story hidden behind a much different cover...
Being more bark than bite himself, and well aware of it, Dmitry instead moves into a position that puts himself between Kendra and the mob. He holds up his sword cane and puts an arm out in a defensive position. "Take a step back, miss. I'll not have any more harm befall the line of Lorrimor."
He glances back at the woman, reminded of his past, of those before he had lost. He offers Kendra a weak smile, trying to force the pleasant images of his history to take form and push out the darker phantoms, but after a few moments of indecisive battle, he shakes them all loose altogether. They would only serve to cloud the task at hand, and it was damn foggy enough this day.
Magdalen draws her impromptu weapon and swings wildly at Gibs Hephenus. The old soldier flinches out of the way just in time to spare himself a broken arm. His eyes roil with rage at Magdalen's affront, yet even in his wrath, he cannot bring himself to attack the diminutive girl. Instead, he tries to wrestle the hammer away from her.
Gibs succeeds in wresting the weapon from Madgalen's hands, but he immediately loses his grip on the rain-slick handle, and the hammer tumbles into the mud at their feet. He snarls and mutters something that only Magdalen is close enough to hear.
As this occurs, the other remaining villagers surge forward. The five of them each choose different targets, striking inexpertly with pitchforks, spades, and rakes.
Fortunately, the churning mud and driving rain render their assault a fumbling farce -- although no one is in the mood to laugh.
Wictor was never the best at brawling, and historically avoided it. This precarious event proved a pernicious precedent.
Wictor lands a sluggers' punch square in the punk's face. Unfortunately, he aged like milk, and the steel of his fist was naught but rust. It still felt really therapeutic for him.
Esdras half curses as the weight of the coffin is too much for him to bear, angry that the others, perhaps too soft from years spent locked in their homes with their books, weren't able to keep the coffin from plummeting to the ground. In his attempt to avoid such grizly desecration, Esdras almost sprained his ankle. When Esdras sees what was once the face of his loved friend, he is half frozen in a mixture of fear, anger, and mostly a feeling of failure. I've always told you that my mission was to make sure you'd die sleeping in your bed, after spending a rainy day playing with your grandchildren by the fireplace... I've failed... I've utterly failed you, Petros.
Tears run along his face for the first time since he received the letter of the professor's demise. No word written on the letter gave any mention of such terrible fate, and by the look in Kendra's face, he would also bet that she was also, until this point, spared about the truth. With his hands a bit shaky, Esdras reaches for the lid of the coffin and covers the good professor once more before getting up to face those responsible for such situation.
Esdras was pretty sure these men were not those responsible for Pretos's death and ruined face but he actually didn't care. His rage was boiling inside him and he'd punish them. Esdras flexed his fingers, banishing the numbness that had took hold of him...
... just in time to see Magdalen rushing forward with her hammer. He sighed in a bit of disappointment. Have you not learnt anything, girl? Am I wasting my time AND your gold in lessons that will never bear fruit in your mind? I don't see how you'll be able to survive by yourself if you rush blindly at the first opportunity... I shall talk to you after this...
Esdras watches as the man comes towards him with a rake and if he wasn't so consumed by his angry he'd have laughed at the man's disastrous attempt... Esdras had not even to move! The man made a mistake by missing him, for that chance was wasted. Esdras did not reach for the swords in his back, sending his elbow against the villager's face. "You have asked for this! Bear in your minds that when you leave your homes, your family, carrying your work tools as weapons against innocent people, you have agreed to the consequences of your acts! And THIS..." Esdras hears the sound of a teeth being cracked, "...is the beginning!"
Esdras's blow strikes his opponent square in the nose. His head jerks back, sending a thin coil of blood into the air as he exhales. Then his legs give out and he sprawls in the mud, unconscious.
Alec's eyes darted over the farmer, assessing. Well the man's no warrior, that's for sure. His stance is a mess, he's too close strike properly with that pitchfork, and he's got no breath control. The drunken washouts of Vigil are more dangerous than this lot. Alec feints left to make the man flinch, giving him a moment to check on his companions.
The white-haired one is certainly impressive, but the old man and the girl look like they might be in trouble. Hephenus looks the most dangerous, bring him down and the fight will go out of these fellows.
Slapping aside a clumsy thrust Alec produces his sap from its pocket inside the long coat. Aiming for the spot just behind the wheezing farmer's left ear his arm snaps out.
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Dmitry watches with swift eyes as the mob participants lumber forward in their disgruntled fashion, brandishing their ineffective weapons. His eyes fall to the man who approaches him with a pitchfork, obviously more learned in skewering immobile bales of hay than stabbing at a real target. Dmitry gauges his clumsy advance with relative calm, turning aside to make himself less of a target. As the farmer's tool drives forward, he easily pushes the would-be weapon aside with a twist of his sword cane.
He notices around him the other pallbearers pummeling the belligerents with fists and elbows. Dmitry has half a mind to batter the man's pitchfork to the ground and leave it at that, but upon turning sideways, Kendra Lorrimor is put neatly in his peripheral vision. The woman's distraught look over the situation, her sadness at her father spilled out at her feet, conjures up the aggressive image of a young girl, a young girl who sobs into Dmitry's inner-self, a young girl who fades away in a sudden streak of black.
His fingers tighten around the cane, knuckles paling at the tension. When his eyes refocus solely on the man before him, the pitchfork finishing its deflected arc, they are sharp and clear and bare the soul of something darker than the clerk to whom they belong. A coldness burns deep within them, a coldness that forces Dmitry's hand.
The blade of the sword can finds the man's flesh, etching a sanguinary line across his torso in a wicked grin. Dmitry's strike carries through, the edge of the weapon distributing droplets of blood amidst the rain as it frees itself from skin.
"Halt! This is sacred soil! Fight here, and the corpses of innocents will be desecrated!"
Ivan watches helplessly as the battle unfolds and rises to his feet.
"Damned be all of you, stupid townsfolk! May Pharasma banish your souls to oblivion!"
The voice comes from Ivan's mouth, but has a clear Ulfen accent. Ivan's pupils dilate and he waddles awkwardly towards Alec. His face is a mixture of horror, confusion and wrath, and his feet seem to be acting independently from his will.
"Torin cannot crush his enemies in this body, but he can aid his friends!"
Ivan makes some strange hand gestures and speaks a few mystical words, then touches Alec's shoulder. His expression is reluctant, even annoyed, but the rest of his body acts in perfect coordination, with sharp movements more fit to a fighter than to a scribe.
"Oh, I feel alive again!"
Hearing Ivan’s encouraging, if somewhat uncharacteristic, words of guidance, Alec feels emboldened, and looks about for another target. However, the brawl seems to be over nearly as soon as it’s begun.
Esdras and Alec have both subdued their foes using methods (fist and sap respectively) guaranteed to stun but not to slay. However, Dmitry’s sword cane carves a deadly channel of crimson across the chest of the farmer who, moments ago, sought his blood with a rusted sickle. Now the man stumbles back, slackjawed from the sudden wound, and slumps into the arms of Gibs Hephenus.
“May the curse of the unquiet dead befall your miserable hearts!” Yells Hephenus, pulling his ally back through the mud as his eyes roll back into his head. “Ravengro won’t soon forget this!”
The other two remaining combatants follow his lead, hoisting up their unconscious comrades and making an uncoordinated retreat. The rain swallows them up swiftly, until all that remains of the fracas is Hephenus’s distant curses and a thin line of blood on Dmitry’s cane.
Kendra Lorrimor seems to have recovered swiftly from her shock. “Do not give the old man’s threats any credit. They are cowards, as you see.” She kneels down by the coffin, which now conceals its gruesome burden once again, thanks to Ivan and Esdras. “For defending my father’s honour this last time, you have my gratitude tenfold again.”
She is silent for a moment as she rests her thin fingers on the rain-dark coffin lid. Then she stands and brushes the mud from her skirts. “Shall we continue? Or does anyone require aid?”
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Alec watches Hephanus and his wounded friend stumble into the mist, trying to suppress a sudden discomfiture. An inauspicious start to an already mournful day. Ye gods, professor, if you could see us now, brawling in the mud with the folk of Ravengro just to see you buried. Satisfied that Hephanus will not be returning immediately, he drops his sap back into its pocket and walks back to his place at the casket, boots squelching into the mud--now mixed with that farmer's blood. As he draws apace of Dmitry, he pauses.
"The man was a fool, but you damn near killed him. Do you want to see the professor's daughter run out of town for cavorting with murderers? Forgive me if I sound overly harsh, but as we are strangers here, we must be more careful." Stepping away, he gives the white-haired warrior an approving nod.
Taking hold of the casket once more, he stares contemplatively at Ivan. What are you playing at, Fabulanov. Making voices in the middle of a fight?
As Hephanus curses him, Esdras quickly moves his hand towards the chain of charms hidden beneath his clothes and spits on the ground as if by doing so he'd be protect against such curse. He then watched the men fleeing, taking special care to remember Hephanus's face perfectly. Should I indeed found myself cursed by the unquiet dead, I might be sure to pay this fool a visit... Esdras spitted once more just to be sure. For someone who had suffered so much thanks to unknown diseases of the flesh, Esdras would fight to not be the target of those of the mind or, in this case, of the spirit.
Before turning his head back to Kendra as she was speaking, his gaze felt upon the mud stained with the blood of the farmer. Esdras was about to show his displease about Dmitry's overreacting but another man was faster. He nodded back to him as he passed. This unknown man seems to have his head working properly, differently from a couple of those whose faces are familiar to me...
"The man is correct, Dmitry. You overreacted... and you, Miss North, should know by now that when our mind is clouded by anger, our muscles react instinctively. You are not a rabid animal or a frenzied kellid so you'd be better to keep your mind clear and your instincts under check." The rain was still falling in his face and the poor professor was still waiting for his final rest so Esdras cut his lessons and knelt besides the coffin, waiting for the others to get into their own positions.
To Kendra, she simply shrugged, "I believe that I talk in the name of all of us when I say you need not to thank us, Miss Lorrimore. Our respect and esteem for the professor guided our hands and also our heavy hearths." Esdras took the time alone by the coffin to cool his head, taking advantage of the cold rain running along his spine, centering himself and telling his body that the time for action has passed... and weirdly, his body listened, relaxing his muscles.
Dmitry watches the men as the haul off their defeated comrades, his eyes studying their ringleader in particular. His upper lip quivers in want of an acerbic retort, but he stills his tongue before a word can escape. Let the man rest easily on his threats. He has already overplayed his hand.
As they retreat into the fog, Dmitry turns around to reengage the procession, just in time to catch full-face the chastisements from his fellow pallbearers. He blinks, quite surprised by their conservative reactions, and his gaze lingers for a moment on both Esdras and Alex before sloughing off to the side to the soaked grass, where he sweeps the edge of his sword cane delicately across the slick, green-grey blades. The action is delicate, aware, akin to a parent brushing a child's hair. He draws invisible lines, the tip of the weapon dancing and dodging around the natural floor, until the blades of grass and their watery armor has drunk all the remaining blood off of the whetted edge.
And then his eyes snap upwards, a look usurping the clerk's features that is equal parts amusement, confusion, and innocence.
"Self-preservation is the base of all mortal instinct," he muses, wondering if anyone here knew that the line was indeed a quote from a book penned by Petros. "If man, beast, or other would draw on me with malicious intent, I will meet in kind. Many of you appear well-learned in arts martial, judging by your worn arms, or past deeds. You might disarm or outmaneuver an enemy with confidence that you will best them with lesser means. I am not willing to take that chance, for my training lies outside the world of steel, and I will not play games when it comes to staying alive."
He cannot quite hide his surprise that the others reacted in such a way, looking so well armed for killing themselves. Truly, he had contemplated disarming the man, but that notion was quickly abandoned when he thought of his beloved Venja. No chances. He is unsure whether or not Esdras's response in particular made sense, his mind once more hearkening back to that night of screams and blood. On the one hand, Esdras had already seen what dark places Dmitry could enter, so it should have hardly been a shock. One the other, perhaps the warrior's previous knowledge was the very reason for the reaction. Dmitry puzzles over it for a moment, but shakes his head, dissolving the nascent images of a room with a screaming chair, bloody hands, and a little girl.
As ever, the image of the girl lingers a moment longer than the others.
And this is why I cannot die. Not yet.
Dmitry walks away from the two men and stands near Kendra.
"If my actions this day make life difficult for Ms. Lorrimor, I will submit my apology to her for that. But I will not apologize for cutting a man who sought my head."
The flood once before him dispersed into trickling cowards. Wictor was in one moment amazed, and in the next infuriated.
They had the gall to disrespect that lovely man so deeply, and then the hubris to not stick it out to the end. They deserved penance.
They deserve penance...
Memories of that kind brilliant mind juxtaposed with that ugly crowd's ignorant cruel talk... and then FURTHERMORE! -Their obstinate balk...
The usually jolly fellow's rustic hairs stood on end. Emotions crossed through his mind as quickly as a hive of bees gave to swarming.
Rage, disgust, grief, lethargy, remorse, mortification...
...and it all happened so quickly, both behind and in front of his eyes. There he was left kneeling in the mud, fists on the floor, clenched powerless.
If not for this cursed leg... and this repugnant weakness... Teacher, you deserved better.
Tears brimmed his eyes. He was choking again. Vulnerable.
Easing outside of himself with a tortoises' pace, he hears the back and forth between Dmitry and his once-associate.
"Clouded by anger? Did you love Petros Lorrimor? Do you know whom you kneel beside?"
Wictor's voice trembles, half in offense, half in awe.
"How could you knowingly care of that drivel and their delusions when you hold in your hands a man so precious?"
Still crouched besides the coffin, Esdras shook his head at Dmitry's answer, his face betraying a tint of condescendence. Esdras had changed too much since he last saw Dmitry by taking under his responsibility to teach others how to defende themselves and survive... in matters of combat, Esdras did not consider Dmitry and equal, so he unconsciously regarded him as a student. Esdras prepared a retort but just when he was about to rebuff Dmitry's idea, he changed his mind. This is neither the place nor the occasion for such lessons. Perhaps later, by the fire, with something to drink...
Instead, Esdras simply says, "I strongly disagree with you, Dmitry, but I'll only discuss this with you on the appropriate opportunity."
Esdras sighs at Wictor's bellicose comment. It was time for himself to use his own teachings, breathing slowly not to react in a way that he'd certainly regret. His spare hand took the form of a fist, his fingers paling as the blood left them. For the first time Esdras was thankful for the rain, almost as if it was keeping him cooled, much like an amber being quenched. After a couple seconds, he opened his eyes and stare at Wictor, "You are wrong and confounded, which I hope is the result of grief and not an indication that I misjudged you as a wise man. Everything you talked served perfectly to illustrate the consequences of having your clouded by emotions... you dare to question my affection for the professor just after I was making sure not to cause his own daughter any harm, and I know, possibly more than any of you who is besides me... it is the same man that I've been beside all these years, and in fact he is still on the ground, getting soaked with rain and mud, as I await for your assistance."
Esdras looks at the coffin once more, trying to forget the professor's hideous face, trying desperately to remember him as the good person he once knew. I believe I've never failed you, Professor... and I never will. I'll give you your deserved rest, even if I have to carry you on my back all by myself...
Alec remains kneeling by the casket, carefully noting names to faces as they are bandied about. Ah, the fellow with the cane is Dmitry then. That leaves just the warrior and the old man bereaved and grieving. I daresay his composure is in tatters. He considers leaving the matter at Esdras' words, but he is a young man and his blood runs hot. He turns a steady gaze to Wictor.
"If I met with lethal intent every misguided lout to ever take a swing at me, I'd have more blood on my hands than the Whispering Tyrant. Hephanus and his cronies clearly have little influence, or they'd have drummed up more than that halfhearted rabble. Leave well enough alone, sir, we have a duty to complete."
Pulling his hat down low over his eyes, Alec drops his gaze to the casket, watching the droplets gather and run in tiny rivulets across the wood. His mind is already reaching into the future, to Lorrimor's great library where surely there must be something, some legend or scrap of knowledge about Lady Illara and those beautiful, terrifying eyes...
Sorry if I'm drawing out the scene as well Scott.
Wictor’s angry words are underscored by a distant snarl of thunder. However, before Esdras or any of the others can respond, keen-eyed Dmitry points towards Kendra. The professor’s grieving daughter has resumed her march towards the gravesite, heedless of your lingering distress. Chagrined, you scramble to reclaim the coffin and catch up with her.
You reach the plot without further incident. Father Grimburrow awaits, flanked by two identical gravediggers. It’s immediately apparent why, on rainy days like this, Ravengro’s priest prefers to wait by the gravesite: Grimburrow stands beneath a canvas tarp, propped up by four gnarled branches. The old priest's voice is a thin, throaty rasp, yet perhaps it is a blessing that the sound of the rain upon the canvas drowns out nearly half of the generic platitudes with which he eulogizes your late mentor. It begins to dawn on you that, despite having lived in Ravengro for a decade, Lorrimor must not have been well-known by his neighbours.
After the priest concludes his droning sermon, and as the sullen twins begin to scoop sodden dirt onto the coffin, Grimburrow asks Kendra if she would like to say anything in memory of her father. Kendra shakes her head, but turns to look at your group. “Perhaps some of you wish to share your fond memories of the professor?”
Wictor stewed in silence as he fumbled back to the coffin. He was so distressed. It was as if his primal instinct as a father had kicked in, and the man in the coffin were his own befouled child. Indeed, such was the weight inside of Wictor's heart.
As the trudgery approaches the grave hole, Wictor processes all which had just transpired, for the first time taking into account more objectively his actions and words. He adds to his current anguish another cutting mortification:
Petros doesn't deserve that. Rashness... What have I done? Petros, forgive me!
He gasps as the crew walks on, this one piercing, for it denoted more than just his ambient sorrows. He realized his error.
Not more than a moment after the groups' treasured burden is placed on the ground, Wictor turns to his contemporaries, hands up as if he were under arrest. His words are short and seasoned with salt.
"Gentlemen, Kendra, please pardon my misdoings earlier. I spoke out of turn, and none of you deserve to hear such words, especially at this dire hour. Please let me make recompense. I've brought many furs from my home with me on this venture. Allow me to confer some to you."
His face is naught but pleading, but hushed so as to not draw further attention away from the focal point of the ceremony.
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Wictor is perturbed by this awkward experience amidst the crucial moments he is surrounded by. However, at Kendra's opening, he steps forward, wanting to make further amends for his blunders earlier.
"Petros Lorrimor was, as you all know, one of the most studied men found among these horizons. He was one of the brightest stars I had ever met, and knew of so many nuances of so many fields. One of his lesser known masteries, at least among those who only shared acquaintance with him, was his cunning sense of humor.
On one summer day, many years ago, when all was aright, and there was once fair hair upon this head..."
Wictor goes on and tells a fond memory of the Professors' dealings with a peculiar patron who came to him that was starkly reminiscent of a pirate, and how Mr. Lorrimor had deftly diverted a hilarious calamity from befalling several persons involved inside of a student's intended shenanigan. He later revealed that the student was indeed himself. As the tale continued, Wictor's face continued to brighten, his moustache continued to bloom, and his grin continued to widen. Not in a linear fashion, but one precisely quadratic. As he told the tale, it seemed as if layers of age were peeling away from the rugged fur-man, revealing riot of a young showman.
"...and in the end, (he-hee!) the privateer turned out to not be lying about the whole ordeal! But the feathers we had prepared were nary to be seen. 'Twas as if the Professor was always two steps ahead of our foolery, but he also proved to be a master of guile before even ourselves! We found the feathers, on the night of the great Ball, in front of everyone attending. By some feat of prestidigitation, the ceremonial crown of the ball (which was given astutely to yours truly), was transfigured from its' golden form into the same yellow feathers we stuffed into that sack! To an outsider it might've been seen as a cruel jest, but to those involved we couldn't help but laugh it off. And because of it, my dance of the eve ended up becoming my bride of even this day! He was a marvelous fellow in all his ways, that dastardly man..."
He smiles warmly as he wipes a singular tear from his eye, stepping down from whatever precipice he told the story from.