"So, what have you been doing? Apart from drinking?"Bojasc shrugs. "Waiting for the boss to come back."
Braddon frowns.
"You said he was missing. Missing people don't come back. They're found. Sometimes in rivers or at the bottom of cliffs. But usually by looking. Have you? Looked?"Braddon shakes his head, as if predicting the answer.
"Do you want him found? If you want him found, by someone who doesn't wish him harm, where do you think they should start looking?"
Bojasc shrugs again. "Orik turned up, didn't he? Figured if he came back, it'd be to here. Where to look, I'd guess Magnimar. Maybe Sandy Point with Orik. Vault's emptied."
After a rudimentary search of the waiting room turns up nothing suspicious, Gristav and his butterfly move on to the dining room. It has a disused air, some of the chairs along the table askew as they might have been left the last time the staff got up from them and didn't push them all the way back into place. Saul's and Larur's places at the ends of the table, however, are straight and proper; Gristav remembers that Bojasc invariably pushed Saul's chair in when he arose to follow the owner out of the room after a meal. There are no signs of recent meals on the table; it appears that any eating being done in the Goblin in recent days has been in the untidy kitchen.
---------------------------------------
Snake continues toward the residential wing, passing Phillip's door, around the jamb of which a light shines from within, and then Thuvalia's. Recalling that Bojasc said "everyone" was told to get out, that must have included the Varisian diva as well.
As he sees the door to Thuvalia's room, the tall man stops and takes a look behind him. Seeing no one, he turns and opens the door, peering in as he moves his lights within.
Phil tucks the note away... unsure if he's relieved or otherwise before taking one last turn around the room to ensure that nothing else has been disturbed before emerging back into the corridor.
As he sees the door to Thuvalia's room, the tall man stops and takes a look behind him. Seeing no one, he turns and opens the door, peering in as he moves his lights within.
The room is empty and bare, the sheets stripped off of the bed and the surfaces of the furniture bare. It looks as if Thuvalia may even have unscrewed the knobs from the drawers and taken them with her. Undoubtedly she would have taken the furniture as well, if she could have found a way to carry it.
Phil exits his room to find Snake and his magical lights peering into Thuvalia's room next door.
As a slight grin forms, You aren't getting out of here with nothing are you princess? You are a fiery one. Pulling the door to - but not closing it - he turns toward his own room and walks in, inspecting it as well.
After a rudimentary search of the waiting room turns up nothing suspicious, Gristav and his butterfly move on to the dining room. It has a disused air, some of the chairs along the table askew as they might have been left the last time the staff got up from them and didn't push them all the way back into place. Saul's and Larur's places at the ends of the table, however, are straight and proper; Gristav remembers that Bojasc invariably pushed Saul's chair in when he arose to follow the owner out of the room after a meal.
"Noko kufumaneka phantsi kwetafile, umhlobo?", Gristav asked of Bolbo, wondering if the creature could even understand what might be out of place. But it fluttered beneath the table, and that reassured him, at least of its understanding.
For his part, Gristav turned his senses again to magical spectra at first, and then to Larur's place at the table, and the carpets nearby, envying Braddon his tracker's eye. Wondering if he remembered the dwarf in the habit of returning the chair to station, Gristav wondered if he could even trust his mind, so wrought, to recall a memory, unwarped.
He'd drawn the chair out in his musings and examinations, and after Bolbo had fluttered through the space, Gris sat in the chair, at the table, in Larur's place, in stormy silence a long moment.
"Any opposed?", he growled grimly, part fae flight, faint parliamentary posture. Silence answered.
"Motion is carried."
Gristav rose, and policed the chair, and wondered some more, but, having put the matter to a vote, proceeded dutifully, to the office.
"Vault's emptied."
Braddon keeps his voice even. "Really? By who? When did you check? And what have you been doing with visitors apart from advertising Saul's gone? 'Cause it's only a matter of time before the other bosses find out this place is still and dark, if they don't already know."
"The boss. He has the key. Must have took the money with him. No 'visitors' besides people working for Saul: cleaners, costumers. Told them they weren't needed. There's no money to pay them anyway."
Snake continues down the hall to his room. Unlocking the door, he finds it unchanged from the last time he saw it; it doesn't appear to have been tampered with at all.
------------------------------
Gristav and the butterfly find nothing alarming or out of place in the dining room and return through the waiting room to examine Saul's office.
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...the dining room ...has a disused air, some of the chairs along the table askew as they might have been left the last time the staff got up from them and didn't push them all the way back into place. Saul's and Larur's places at the ends of the table, however, are straight and proper; Gristav remembers that Bojasc invariably pushed Saul's chair in when he arose to follow the owner out of the room after a meal...
"So Saul suddenly had an appointment?" he asks, eying Bojasc. "Since you were his bodyguard, you would have been with him when he received the summons, or would have seen something. There will be some sort of evidence, either here in material form, in some magical remnant, or on the street in whispers."
"Here is what I propose Bojasc, we sit down at the table like civilized individuals, and you tell us what happened since we left, slowly, detailed, and fill in all the nooks and crannies that you can."
"I imagine that you are just as eager to find out what happened to Saul. Right now, with him disappeared, regardless of what you might say, who is going to trust you for some future contract?" Tendal asks sympathetically. "A bodyguard who loses his contract isn't to be trusted. So you will likely end up penniless in some gutter here in Riddleport. And we all are aware of how unmerciful life on the streets would be."
"What do you say? Would you like to find your charge? Discern his fate, so you can discharge your contract properly?"
We need to find out when exactly the vault was emptied. It may be important...or not.
"Maybe he was just waiting for you lot to leave so he could take the money and run," Bojasc replies stubbornly. "Ain't no profit in looking for someone, unless there's a bounty to collect." He doesn't outright refuse Tendal's suggestion, however.
Gristav opens the door to Saul's office, and the light from his lamp reveals another room that looks much as it did when last he saw it before leaving for Roderic's Cove. The desk is still covered with various boxes, chests, papers, and small objets d'art, none of which look out of place, but touching them reveals that an invisible fur of dust has started to gather on the surfaces. The cabinet where Saul stores his wines and liquors is ajar; opening it further reveals that there are only a few bottles within and those are empty, a few lying on their sides.
Leaving his room, he starts back toward the others but not before running into Phillip. Shaking his head, "Nothing. You find anything?" he asks but continues on without waiting for a response. "If the fat man is gone, how long will it be before the other bosses find out? And then what happens? I think we had better odds surviving the Cove the way this is looking."
...likely dyed with blueberries...
Gristav clears away the dust with a gesture, intent on opening each and every container, on gauging the outer thickness against the inner depth, leveraging his suspicion against Bolbo's superior senses.
He has no desire to sit in Saul's chair, but his search does include the desk's kneeway, and whatever handy hidey-holes the chair or desk's construction might offer in either.
That all done, he'll replace the dust, and move on.
Braddon continues chatting to Bojasc.
"So, Saul has the key to the vault. And you have a spare? So you could check? And tell the staff there's no pay."
Braddon nods slowly.
"And Saul sent you away... when? He woke up and said dismiss the staff? He was reading some notes while you were looming in the next room? He came out after a meeting with... someone? He was excited? Angry? Sad? Didn't take you with him, I notice."
"Ain't no spare," Bojasc growls. "Didn't need one. He left the vault wide open and empty."
"It was breakfast. He says to send everyone away, we wouldn't need them. I was coming back from telling them all to get out, and he was headed out the back door. Where we going, boss, I ask. We ain't going nowhere, he answers, got to do this alone. I argued with him, said it was my job to guard his body, but he's the boss. You stay here and wait for me to come back, he says. So that's what I've done."
"Right."
Braddon seems mollified and vaguely thoughtful.
"What was he doing the night before? He left no instructions for Sunday?"
Bojasc shrugs. "Nothing. Ordinary night. As for Sunday, if he cleared out with the money, I don't guess he was worried about it."
Saul's desk, while well-made and ornately carved, appears to hide no secret compartments, at least as far as Gristav and the butterfly can tell. One thing seems clear: wherever Saul is, he doesn't seem to have taken anything from his office, where there are several bibelots and gewgaws which appear to be of at least minor monetary or sentimental value.
Phillip rejoins those with Bojasc and adds his own thoughts "Given he's left you behind I'd imagine he's either run off with what wealth he had or he was to meet someone he didn't want you seeing. You're not the sort to speak out of turn, so it's unlikely to be any of the Riddleport mob we know... it may very well be something or someone of darker bent"
Gristav and the butterfly next turn their attentions from the owner's office to the private apartment, in cautious survey. Any luggage labored, borne-off bibelots, or gathered gewgaws, evidenced by emptyness?
"Shinjitsu no sora, sore wa mottomo usotsukidesu...", Gristav proverbs, as they begin.
"There's still a bunch of valuable stuff here, assuming there's any grog left."
Braddon frowns. "He could have done a runner. But why wait till daylight? Something must have happened that night."
Gristav carries his lamp back through the dining room to the door to Saul's bedroom. It is locked.
Gristav carries his lamp back through the dining room to the door to Saul's bedroom. It is locked.
To Larur's office. No, wait. It'll have a window, yes? No, you're no cat-burglar. Wait, a bodyguard locked out is no bodyguard, Bojasc will have a key...
"Given he's left you behind I'd imagine he's either run off with what wealth he had or he was to meet someone he didn't want you seeing. You're not the sort to speak out of turn, so it's unlikely to be any of the Riddleport mob we know... it may very well be something or someone of darker bent"
Bojasc's chest swells with pride at the same time as his eyes narrow in confusion at the ... if not praise, then at least not-abuse accorded him from an unexpected ally. "That's what I'm saying. Either he took off with the money, or he's involved in something he shouldn't be and didn't want anyone to know about."
Managing to catch the bodyguard's statement as he walks up, "Which bears the question: Where does that leave us? We suppose to run this place now? 'Cause the way I see it, either of those options leaves the fat man long gone."
Managing to catch the un-past-ed undertaker's statement as he walks up, "Which opens the door to this next question: Can you open his door? What he's taken or left might tell us something. Braddon and Phillip's eyes, best for that..." Gristav didn't even slow down as he passed, lamp in hand, bound for wherever. A half-beat later, the butterfly landed on the nearest shoulder, seemed to decide it wasn't Gristav, and moved to the next, and the next, eventually fluttering off after the half-elf...
"Right. I guess we better look around and see if we can find a reason to stay. If not, I guess we loot the place and run before the other bosses burn us to the ground."
Braddon grins amiably at the others and heads towards the stairs.
"Where's Saul's private quarters?"
"Copies of all the keys should be in the dwarf's cupboard," Bojasc offers with a shrug. "More than my job's worth to barge into the boss's room without permission, but it's your funeral."
Indeed, Gristav is able to locate an extra key to Saul's bed chamber in Larur's office.
Piqued by interest, Phillip distracts the Varisi with a simple question "Just how much is your job worth Bojasc?"
Returning to the cluster with a labelled key, Gristav waits for Phillip's answer to come, before speaking.
"Bojasc, I want to clarify some things. On the scene as we met today; please blame worry, temper, me, surely. I would have injured you, not deeply... but no insult was intended. I realize that may confuse."
"On the matter of honoring the boss; I stand here, with the key. I'll still have the answer to my question: Can you open his door, do you have a key?"
"Then let Braddon and Phillip into the room. You've kept all the delay you could, in service to your boss. Now, with another key proven, go help the process, in service to the group. Tell them if anything's changed, since the last time you saw it."
Piqued by interest, Phillip distracts the Varisi with a simple question "Just how much is your job worth Bojasc?"
Bojasc is taken aback by the question. "You mean ... what I get paid?"
"I'll still have the answer to my question: Can you open his door, do you have a key?"
"No," he replies, his voice thick with annoyance.
Shrugging slightly "Simply put... yes. As far as I see it there are three options before you: One, you remain loyal to Saul and may take umbrage when Braddon here breaks down the door to his room; Two, you care not a whit either way and depart; or Three... you can be bought and put to different purpose."
"You may see it differently of course, but we will be seeing within that room... you may wish to choose to be in front, beside or away from us when we do." sharing a pointed glance to Braddon to instill a sense of preparadness for bloodshed if it proves needed.
"You can do what you want," Bojasc shrugs. "I won't stop you. I get paid to guard Saul's body, not his room. Figure I'll stick around a while longer, see if the boss comes back."
"I'll give you five minutes to find a key in Larur's cupboard," Braddon says to no one in particular.
"When I get bored I'm breaking down Saul's door."
Braddon makes his way upstairs but no one believes they have the full five minutes.
"No need to break a door; when I've a key, more or less given by a partner. Well, given, was a key to a room with a box with a key. But close enough. No need to break a door."
"Let's mend a fence, though, while we're on our way upstairs. Or, rebuild a limit, at least. Come along, Bojasc, you can witness, no intent to raid, nor harm. Only to learn, what we might, to perhaps streak to the saving of Saul."
"I want to say, please, do remain. But I need to say this, too: We've each some claim to Capp, and to heir, at least to the places at the head of the table. But you've no key, I do. You've spent your days without Saul drinking through the liquor you could reach, I've had one glass of turnip wine. You had given up, We, all of us, are going to work this. Any for which it's true, working for Saul. Myself, and any others - and welcome - for Larur."
Having reached the stairs, Gristav began climbing, and was actually silent a step or three. But it didn't last.
"I don't think there's a way to say it politely, and be plain, Bojasc. I'm above you, here. If I swing at you, you take it and ask why. If you ever draw steel on me again, I will beat you unconscious, strip you, and bind you over a chestnut cart, letting the wheel's cheerful chime ring from Lubberton gate down past the Calistrian Temple, and on to the dump and the drop. Your only decorations will be your axes - one haft bound as a bit, the other stuck in for a flag - and sufficient magicked Brands to blaze along your flanks, 'I DREW STEEL AT THE GOLD GOBLIN'."
"Please do remain, in service to the Goblin. But be clear, it's service to us all. And a mostly dry one. Your fastest path to promotion above me is the recovery of Saul. I'd guess you're already more motivated, than an hour ago."
Gristav unlocked the door, stepping aside for the sensing and observing to enter. Bolbo flitted in firstmost.
Out of mere curiosity, Snake follows upstairs, and is unable to keep from rolling his eyes and shaking his head at the endless prattling from the Magus who - from what it sounds like - has apparently become Bojasc's owner. "And if you pray to him, Bojasc, he may or may not answer your prayer. That's a tough one to call. My guess would depend on whether or not you've been good," he says facetiously - yet with a straight face - having had enough of Gristav's adolescent tough talk. And figuring he ought to explain just in case, "I'm being sarcastic in case you couldn't tell, bub," he tells the bodyguard. "Like I said before, just ignore him. If you listen to everything he says, you might just fall asleep," he states plainly.
"Find Saul and Larur. Then mock those trying harder than you."
At the foot of the stairs, Bojasc growls with rage. "You can shut your fat mouth. I don't work for you. I don't even work for the Gold Goblin; your precious dwarf didn't try to order me around. I've worked for Saul for more than a year; you knew him a week! I don't work for anyone that doesn't pay me, and I wouldn't work for you if you offered a dragon's hoard. Go to the Hells!" He shows no intention of following the party upstairs to look in Saul's room.
Phillip internally chuckles imagining Gristav attempting to subdue a raging Bojasc without assistance, before realising the depth of insult that the Half-Elf is giving the man. He doesn't add words, but does look to cross eye-line with the man to give wordless reinforcement that, as always, Gristav speaks only for Gristav.
Lacking the key, Phillip allows the others to proceed before him before lingering a moment... then with a sigh... following thereafter.
Ignoring the others, Braddon sniffs curiously at the air, looks for scuff marks on the floor, then wanders in to Saul's quarters and looks around.
Saul's bedroom is a comfortably furnished apartment with a table, two plush chairs on a rug before a fireplace swept bare for the summer, a wardrobe and chest of drawers, and a bed in the far corner. The windows in the southern wall are undoubtedly those that look out over the roof, although they are obscured with curtains, as is another window to the west. The room displays neither disarray nor signs of struggle. The wardrobe and drawers, when opened, don't sport obvious empty spaces or bare hooks, which might suggest Saul had packed his belongings to take with him; rather, it appears as if the occupant of the room fully expected to return to it when he left it.
Moving on, Snake follows the ranger into Saul's room and aids in looking around. "Either he was in a hurry and didn't have time to pack or he's coming back. Hm. The fat man continues to keep us guessing." Lucky finds his way down to the floor from the tall man's shoulders and sniffs around out of his own curiosity.
Phillip is last within, and seeing that Serpe's eyes appear to be put well to task instead crosses to the window and takes a peek through... and also at the external securement and potential for clandestine access through... for... reasons...
Gristav enumerates boredly, "We need to examine the baker's baskets, as one of them seems the last time the outside world came to Saul, here. Words with the carrier?"
"A man doesn't pack a bag, if he's coming back swiftly, or not thinking of return, at all. What motivates Saul, more than the Goblin? Wasn't there a son, with a link to Ms. Scarlet? Questions at the harbor, of if Saul took ship?"
Braddon shrugs. "Maybe that's why Shorafa sent us away- so she could get her claws in Saul. Maybe Dayn knows something."
Braddon gets on the floor and peers under the bed, almost as if Daynadrian could be there.
"You may recall, the plan Dayn had was to leave town."