Valiard stands up from where he was leaning against a table and stretches.
"Well I am one for some sort of supper, a good scrub and then sleep. I need time to let the spell wear off." Seeing the puzzled look on the Mayor's face, he explains "Myre hit me with a spell that, as as was explained to me, sucked the life out of me. I feel like I aged twenty years in an instant."
"Speaking of unpleasantness, I don't think that we should separate. I don't trust very many people at this moment...but at least I can trust you lot...as long as we don't go wandering off it should keep the chance that someone will do something fiddly," he says waggling his fingers in a vaguely magical manner, "to one of us. Until this is over and that thing out there is buried and gone I think that I want to keep my...companions? close."
He turns to Mireza.
"The good thing that comes from all of this is that I can ask if you, Mireza, if would like to see if we can find something edible around here." Valik asks, offering an elbow and gesturing to the door.
Heggry smiles weakly at Valiard: "Very well then. Now is the time to regroup and recuperate. I too am washed. Baveksh! See that they get adjoining appartments for the night and that food be served this night and upon sunrise. Let's pray this night goes quiet."
Mireza seems startled out of her reverie by Valiard's invitation. Giving her head a little shake, she drags her eyes away from the mayor with difficulty but smiles at the apothecary's suggestion. She considers his proffered arm quizzically for a moment before her fingertips tentatively spider around his elbow. Letting him lead her away from the city officials, she leans closer once out of sight and earshot to whisper, "The mayor is not involved. He is surprised by the news of Myre ... and afraid of what your friend intends."
"I shall turn in and get the needed rest then. I expect to see you all ready and prepared to continue in the morning. Let's make sure none of you are late." Iozef then takes his leave and retires for the night.
Gregor talks with his new commander...
Seems to me that we are getting torn up by these lunatics... anything that will stop their damned magic would help but I doubt we got something on hand for that... maybe see if we got a Sawbones on hand who has some extra salves and potions... and that warrant. We have to take down these madmen and take them down hard.
Commander Feldk gives you a scroll case of elaborately carved ivory, with golden tips at each end: "Here's your warrant Vachkov. Signed by me and the mayor. Use it well! As for equipment, we have some scrolls and potions, yes. Make me a list and I'll see what I can find... You've done well today." The last words are harder to pronounce, and are still weighted down by deep feelings regarding your past and present ways...
Valiard nods at Mireza's words as they walk from the tent towards the main house, dodging minor functionaries and soldiers.
"Its nice to know that at least we are not serving the purposes of a madman. Anything we deal with from Heggry is politics...not much better in many case though."
After a few moments of walking toward the mayor's house, Valiard grins and looks towards Mireza, "You know, I have no idea where we are going."
"I guess we should ask where the mayor's kitchens are, and see if we can talk some food out of cooks. I doubt they have anything prepared for us."
Windle smiles slightly at the door through which Iozef left, then goes off to bed himself.
Valiard nods at Mireza's words as they walk from the tent towards the main house, dodging minor functionaries and soldiers.
"Its nice to know that at least we are not serving the purposes of a madman. Anything we deal with from Heggry is politics...not much better in many case though."
After a few moments of walking toward the mayor's house, Valiard grins and looks towards Mireza, "You know, I have no idea where we are going."
"I guess we should ask where the mayor's kitchens are, and see if we can talk some food out of cooks. I doubt they have anything prepared for us."
"There were plates and cups in the mayor's room. There must be leftovers somewhere." She hums lightly under her breath for a few measures, then goes on. "I wonder if I can find a safe corner for my spider to spin a web where she won't be chased out by housecleaners. She hasn't eaten since early this morning either."
The night is spent without any incident. Mireza and Valiard find food, and Mireza's spider finds a good corner to spin a web and feed.
As dawn breaks, you feel the strain of yesterday's battles in your limb, the paralysis, blows, slips, drains, the rain even, all have taken a toll that a night's sleep won't wash away so easily.
As you are all gathered for a hearty breakfast, the sun peers through the lead windows of Rag Manor, announcing dawn, at the same time that Commander Feldk barges in: "There's been some development! A patrol of Crows have found Hyve dead in his house... murdered, not butchered. Someone else got to him!"
Pox and Buggeration!, swears Grigor rising from his seat... and almost seems he's going to rush for the door but it seems his thoughts catch up with him.
What news do you have Commander and who do we need to talk to for more details?
"I've asked the area be secured. I thought you should have a look first."
"Fine, but one of us should go to the Asylum with a Crow runner or two. If that thing goes after whatever his name was, at the Asylum, then we are going to need to act quickly."
"Hold on a second...what? Someone actually killed him, rather than being eaten or torn to pieces by the beast?"
Valiard curses under his breath and punches his fist into his hand.
"I knew killing Myre was a bad idea...well too late now. Hey, I wonder if this means that there was one extra person in the Sunless Grove that we don't know about?"
"Perhaps Crove decided that Hyve was too easy for the creature to kill, and chose to eliminate him rather than take the chance that he would be found and consumed. We shall have to examine the body, and see what we can determine about Hyve's arcane defenses."
Mireza smiles and hums under her breath, a child's simple tune:
"Five little Keepers, where can they be?
Two crushed in the Grove, then there were three.
Three little Keepers, what will they do?
Myre fell by the vats, then there were two.
Two little Keepers, what have they done?
One murdered in the night, now there is one."
I'll be off then to look over the body but yes, we need to have a few crows watching that asylum
Commander Feldk nods: "Very well, I'll have a squad nearby, to watch traffic at the same time as keeping an eye on the asylum. Let's go to Hyve's!"
You hit the street, just as the sun disappears behind the low hanging clouds. It seems the dry spell has ended, for the rain starts prickling down, like lead pellets on your skulls. The streets are a sharp contrast of yesterday's, for it is still quite early and the mob is sleeping. Still, as you pass patrols of Crows, weary, wet and bleary-eyed from the day and the night before, you can tell the town is wounded and about to blow soon...
You make your way from the Crown, down to the Tangle, to Elm Way, where Arlend Hyve resided in a small old church.
From what you know, Arlend Hyve had lived at the Elm Way Church for nearly 15 years, and in those years had built a reputation as a man of knowledge, a scholar of the past, who'd made his reputation cataloguing the history of Ustalav and Carrion Hill.
You step in the church, only too eager to get out of the rain. The interior of the church is cold and damp. Two man-sized statues stand to each side of the room, both draped with gray
sheets. Dozens of sagging bookshelves stand along the walls, and a stone altar has been converted into a table.
On the old altar lies Arlend, face down, a sword stuck between his shoulder blades.
Grigor carefully and methodically searches for clues.
Valiard looks at the body of Hyve for a few moments before shrugging.
"Soooo. He's dead. And I think that this is pretty definitive that the slime-thing didn't do it. I bet this is political, nobody would be so stupid as to actually leave a sword in the back of a victim, unless the wanted the sword found. I would almost wager that its the mayor's sword...or something equally byzantine."
Valiard ignores the body and wanders off to look at the doors to the church, searching for signs of a break-in.
"Hey Crow, get moving. We don't have all day to dilly-dally here, there is one more person we need to visit...and soon."
Patience!, Grigor growls.
Let me work, he says as he carefully examines not only the body but the room itself.
Examining the body himself, "Yes, Mr. Tessar, he is quite dead. And it would appear senseless as to why they would leave the sword within him. Perhaps there is more to it than meets the eye."
Mireza walks up to the corpse on the altar with interest, examining the way its loose limbs dangle over the sides and the aesthetic impression of the spatters of blood. "Not a work of artistry, no," she agrees with Valiard, "although we mustn't be too harsh; they did try to be dramatic."
When she has finished her examination, she goes to the covered statues and pulls the cloths off curiously.
The inquisitor starts by carefully examining the area around the body, looking for tracks (or helping Grigor do that).
"I met with him here not four weeks past, and I think I can remember where the local history books he used were."
Grigor searches through out the house and finally uncovers a trap door in the bedroom. He tries to open it, glaring at Valliard before he does so.
"Well, as is obvious, the blade is the main cause of death. Yet, it does appear he's been in contact with poison. Unsure of what type, but regardless, it wasn't the poison that killed him. I would gather that eventually it would have but the owner of this blade chose not to wait." He states as a matter of fact.
Turning his attention to the Inquisitor, "Let us peruse his collection then, Mr. Thetra. It's possible we may find something that could aid us in our endeavor."
Windle paces the room carefully while muttering to himself under his breath, occasionally shaking his head at something. "This is...not entirely unexpected. Although the degree of damage to the various furnishings and other items in the room is consistent with a struggle, the tracks and the pattern of damage are not. If I had to guess, I would say that the damage to the room was inflicted postmortem, and Hyve was taken by surprise and killed with minimal disturbance. Mireza, was there anything unusual about the sword?" While waiting for the witch to answer, he joins Iozef in examining the bookshelves.
Valiard wanders over and peers into the trapdoor.
"Oh. Looks like a bolt-hole. Was it unlocked?"
Windle paces the room carefully while muttering to himself under his breath, occasionally shaking his head at something. "This is...not entirely unexpected. Although the degree of damage to the various furnishings and other items in the room is consistent with a struggle, the tracks and the pattern of damage are not. If I had to guess, I would say that the damage to the room was inflicted postmortem, and Hyve was taken by surprise and killed with minimal disturbance. Mireza, was there anything unusual about the sword?" While waiting for the witch to answer, he joins Iozef in examining the bookshelves.
"It's a lovely stabby thing," she replies absently, her eyes running up and down the visible part of the weapon protruding from Arlend Hyve's remains. "Runes and carvings... someone being swallowed... someone must be know who carried this. And it must have cost many pounds of cloves. Why leave it behind?"
The sword is quite unique. Strange markings and runes are etched along its blade and the bronze pummel is carved showing a weirdly shaped creature swallowing a human head. "Darllen," Mireza says, taking a clear prism from a pocket of her scarf and peering through it at the runes.
Mireza takes a moment to pull the sheets on the statues. Everybody tenses for a second, but nothing happens. The statues are in a bad shape, but are representations of angels, made of pink granite.
Caught up in her examination of the intricately-engraved sword, Mireza takes hold of the handle and wiggles the blade a few inches back out of the stiffening corpse; the blood pools in the carved lines of the runes, making them easy to intepret. "'A dark light shines," she reads aloud, "'leaving a bright shadow.' And it is a magic sword, worth many, many pounds of cloves. Perhaps it's his?" she turns curiously to Windle, who seems to have known the dead man best. "Stabbed in the back with his own priceless sword? If it belonged to the killer, why not take it with him, especially as the owner ought to be readily identified?"
Grigor looks back towards the fortune teller.
Cultist artifact like as not... . He thinks for a moment. I'd have thought they'd take it with them unless its some sort of message by the cult - like those who break faith or act on their own can count on pointed justice from the mystic blades of 'thingamagig' or 'whatsitsname'.
Thrice damned crazy bastards that they are.
He snorts and then looks for a flame to light his lantern with.
As she spends more time around the body, and pulls the sword a bit from the body, she can tell from the way the blood pooled and from the bruises around the wound, that Hyve's muscles were under hyper contraction. Looking at the rest of the body, she notices the same weird effect. It seems Hyve was paralysed when he was stabbed. She can't tell if it was through a spell or a poison.
While looking over the bookshelves and quietly discussing various titles with Iozef, Windle suddenly stops and looks back at one of the books. "That's odd...I thought that Neska's history of the Palatinates was only produced in a folio edition." He pulls the volume down from the shelf. "Do you know, I don't think this is a book at all. Valiard? Grigor? That notch looks more like a latch to me; what do you think?"
"I think it's a gift," Mireza muses. "Its edge is sharper and bites more viciously against things that don't belong in this reality, things that hurt eyes and bruise minds to see; it's made to cut and carve the creature they've summoned. Someone's trying to help us. They've slain the Keeper before his beast could do so and feast on his strength, and they've left behind a valuable tool in a place we couldn't help but find it." She surveys the scene again -- the body across the altar and the magic sword protruding from its back. "You see?" she asks Valiard. "I told you they were trying to be dramatic. They didn't need such an expensive blade to kill him; a dull butter knife would have done that. He died as you almost did, Crow," she calls out conversationally. "He was frozen. Couldn't move when the blade slid in. They had leisure to set the scene. He was awake and aware until his life pooled out on the stone but couldn't squirm or call for help. I wonder if his nose itched." She leans over and stares into the dead face, as if trying to divine what its last minutes or hours were like. "I can't tell if he was magically held or if it was some kind of poison that made him stiffen, like the ghouls' filth. Remember Yarresh and the ghouls yesterday morning? You were all frozen. Did your noses itch when you couldn't scratch them?"
"Looks like his hidden office down there, don't you think?"[b] Valiard says to Grior as he peers down the trap door. He then shrugs, stands up and moves over to where Windle is poking at the bookcase.
[b]"Ah. I see what you mean. That is very nice. I don't know how any but a scholar would have seen that."
Valiard looks at the mechanism for a moment, trying to divine what it actuates.
"I don't think that I would touch that thing if I were you. It looks pretty suspicious. See how it is on the shelf? Its fishy, and stinks..."
Interesting...now how to get a chance to open it?
"Windle, Izoef. From what I saw from the trapdoor it looks like the actual office was underground. I saw the tops of bookshelving, you may want to go down there and nose around a bit." Valiard suggests helpfully.
Iozef examines the sword in an attempt to ascertain whatever information he can.
Turning his attention to Valiard, "Very well. It may prove useful." Iozef then makes his way down to the office.
Iozef recalls how the High Priest of Pharasma was called upon by the mayor of Carrion Hill, a very long while ago, to help with an invasion of abominations. In exchange for the lands on which the current pharasmin church now stands, a sword was forged. The sword was held by the Crows' Commander as he led elite soldiers below the city.
The soldiers and the sword never surfaced, but neither did the aberrations...
Iozef also notices the very special quality of the sword's steel. It was likely forged by talented smiths, at low temperatures.