Veda seems a bit absent for a moment as flashbacks of her past she can't write put together come to her mind.
A very nice residence with lots of servants, an older woman in charge and she in line with other women or girls who look like her.
It all feels very familiar, but she can't put names on the faces or what and when that was.
With disdain on her face she answers Prasitis
What? Oh! Nah you're right. The fashion right now is rags stained with ghoul splatter. I still envy that clean dress. And I guess I would like to take a bath? You talk with cats?
Laura nods when she sees Prasitis returning with the third corpse. "Who were we supposed to bring these to?" she asks, effortlessly hefting the one she's carrying.
The guards at the barricade are astonished to see the corpses of the three dopplegangers, and even more so to see you still alive.
“Well, it seems as if you all have done it. Let me go get the boss real quick, he’ll let you in.”
Within a few minutes, the side door in the hallway next to the barricade noticeably unlocks, and an older man opens the door to greet you.
”So maybe you’re not dopplegangers after all, eh? Name’s Vaustin. Captain Vaustin. Welcome to the chapel. Or, what’s left of it at least.”
With this, he leads you through what appears to be some sort of makeshift gatehouse, more guards being posted in the side offices that circumvent the barricade, giving them a way to control access to the chapel beyond.
Once you make it to the end of the hallway, you notice a faint eerie whimpering at the east end of the hallway, behind the mysterious curtain sheet haphazardly draped over that part.
But the main attraction, the chapel, is revealed to be full of both people and shrines to various deities, the main two appearing to be a larger statue of Pharasma (who, judging from the numerous other symbols of her faith in the area, this chapel is dedicated to), and a much more delicate figurine of Desna.
A well dressed black haired woman, standing out oddly from the rest of the ragtag band of survivors, greets you inside the door of the chapel.
Strangely enough, each of her eyes appears to be a different color, one a deep green and the other a vibrant amber.
”Hello there, new survivors. Vaustin told me you triumphed over at least three of those beasts, which means you have earned my begrudging trust-for now. I am Winter, the de facto leader and healer for the group of survivors holed up in the chapel. I am sure you have questions for me, but first, do sit down and rest.”
She points towards a particularly comfortable looking pile of blankets strewn about the floor strategically before sitting down, inviting you to join her.
”Now, those questions. What can I help you with?”
Winter is it? My name is Veda. Veda Versade. So, seems like you have been here for quite some time? Can you tell us what exactly happened here? And what is this place?
Winter seems to study the group carefully, eyeing each of you in turn.
”I don’t seem to recall ever hearing that name, Veda. Tell ya what. I’ll answer every question you may or may not have, if you help around the chapel first. I have a lot of problems that need attending to, and not as many hands as I wish I had.”
”How does that sound?” Winter says, crossing her arms across her chest defiantly.
Aoife drags her way around, clearly half-asleep, and collapses onto the pile of blankets.
Veda seems a bit absent for a moment as flashbacks of her past she can't write put together come to her mind.
A very nice residence with lots of servants, an older woman in charge and she in line with other women or girls who look like her.
It all feels very familiar, but she can't put names on the faces or what and when that was.With disdain on her face she answers Prasitis
What? Oh! Nah you're right. The fashion right now is rags stained with ghoul splatter. I still envy that clean dress. And I guess I would like to take a bath? You talk with cats?
Prasitis blinks, obviously a bit confused. “No, only Argyria, and she’s special.”
Her hand drifts politely, but rather aimlessly, as she adds, as the group gets admitted past the barricade, “And sometimes the whispers from the world, but that’s a spell, and that’s different.”
Once they’re introduced to Winter, she smiles – well, warmly would be entirely the wrong word. Like the kiss of the season the healer’s named after, when one’s just stepped outside into fresh air from a stuffy indoors.
“Prasitis,” she introduces herself in turn, settling comfortably.
Winter seems to study the group carefully, eyeing each of you in turn.
”I don’t seem to recall ever hearing that name, Veda. Tell ya what. I’ll answer every question you may or may not have, if you help around the chapel first. I have a lot of problems that need attending to, and not as many hands as I wish I had.”
”How does that sound?” Winter says, crossing her arms across her chest defiantly.
“Do tell, pray. We’re still looking for Ms. Baisily, after all.” She looks around her curiously as she combs her fragmented memories for something about Winter. Nice eyes, she thinks ungrudgingly, though glad her own are a matched pair.
“Is this all of us, then? I don’t mean to press a point, but like Veda said, anything you could tell us about what happened would be helpful. Strange mists, boiling rain, fallen walls and doppelgangers roaming the halls… I’d like to think I’d notice and remember the last at least, when I was first admitted.”
Her friendly tone easily glosses over the shift from “exactly” to “anything” about what happened, and the disconcerting fact that whether she likes it or not, she can’t remember whether she should have noticed ghouls and such upon her arrival at the asylum.
In response to Aoife collapsing restlessly into a pile of blankets, Winter seems to quickly understand what has happened, as she moves over to place a hand on Aoife and attempts to soothe her.
”All the knowledge I have about what happened here and who I am won’t help you with the tasks I need help accomplishing. But know that I have no idea why the dopplegangers or the ghouls are here, or where they came from. Perhaps there is more to be seen beyond the....never mind that. Let’s talk about what you can do to help me and the other survivors, yes?”
With that, she dips a cool rag into a bowl of water and drapes it across Aoife’s forehead. Her hand picks up one of Alice’s, exposing the mysterious bite marks on her skin.
”Because as you’ve seen, sleeping outside the chapel carries dangerous consequences. You need me to trust you, don’t you?”
Argyria the special. I see. I never heard a cat speak. But i do hear the world whispering sometimes. Or...something. That's really interesting you hear that as well. I was already afraid it's only me.
Veda remarks, thinking about the little voices she hears nagging at her mind, promising power and other things in tainted ways.
She then turns to Winter.
So, child of Winter, you're telling us we can sleep safely here? Did you work a spell? And beyond the what?
”As far as I can tell, one of the statues in this chapel provides the protection from the dreams and chaos out in the rest of the asylum.” she answers, waving towards the multitude of statues and shrines lining the walls.
”The asylum provided a shrine for most of the deities that visitors and patients would or could worship, making sure everyone felt included. Pharasma watches over the entire chapel, and it is the frail Desnan statue that I believe emanates the protection against the nightmares.”
Veda just nods and focuses on the statues, looking at each of them intensely while the hint of purple in her eyes suddenly glows stronger.
Patients you say? Why would i be a patient? I don't remember being sick or something. Have you been or are you a doctor here? Come on, tell us more about yourself. Trust always grows in two ways. If you tell us that maybe we can also find out how we can help you best! Because i'm pretty sure if i'm one thing it's a survivor, among other things. Like being a winner. I somehow have that feeling.
Winter stands up from where she was checking on Aoife, and turns towards Veda.
”I’m sorry, I don’t know. You wouldn’t be the first ones to lose a piece of themselves here. If you were patients, there must be some record of why you were committed. In some office or another.”
”We’ll talk more over dinner whenever you’re ready to help my survivors here. Until then, I have things to do. If you’ll excuse me?”
Prasitis realizes what’s caught her eye even as she considers Winter’s cryptic words. Beyond the what? It’s not still hot, praise be, but it’s still raining, and if another strange storm blows up… And was that a veiled threat? Trust would be nice, but just getting along would be fine. I suppose it depends on what one means by trust.
Her lips quirk up in a bit of a grin, which becomes more certain as she admires Veda’s self-confidence. She reaches out with her hand, ready to offer a reassuring touch, but making sure to respect the other woman's personal space. After a moment, with a thought, she calls Argyria to her arm.
As the raven settles with a muffled chatter, the knight hurries after Winter. Trying not to make the movement too obvious, Prasitis weaves the thread of her previous conversation with Veda into the discussion with the healer as she catches her up.
“Of course Argyria’s special: she’s my familiar, we’re always talking. I’m not that keen on animals in general,” she tosses over her shoulder, suggesting that in that, at least, she’s not a stereotypical elf. She meets Winter’s eye again and says lightly, quietly, and deliberately, “Ancestry isn’t everything.” I know what you are, is the unspoken hint. But it's fine. I’m a witch, and know that magic.
Aloud, she says, “I’m sorry, we didn’t mean to be standoffish. How can we help, in the meantime? I’ve only a bit of healing magic left today, and am not a trained healer otherwise, but I do have some herblore…”
Winter stares back at Prasitis, her cold eyes betraying nothing for a second before her lips curl into a wide smile.
”I like this one, she knows how to get to the business part. Yes, let’s get started on that. I have two survivors, Airwynn and Bates, are suffering from wounds I haven’t been able to fully heal yet. If you’d like to take a look at caring for them or using that remaining healing you do have, that would be much appreciated. And then there’s Loic, the poor man who suffers hallucinations when he’s not on his mediation. Calming him down and getting him to take his medicine would be nice.”
She waves towards a stack of wooden furniture haphazardly stacked together, with a small pile of crates and boxes next to it.
”And if none of that sounds agreeable, feel free to prepare firewood or dinner for tonight.”
Aoife murmurs some form of agreement to something, rapidly starting to doze off in the comfort of the room.
Laura, like a beast of burden, snuffs and moves to the furniture and boxes, purposefully pulling out her axe. She sets to work, chopping the wood with vigor and gusto. Soon, she has worked up a sweat and there are two piles of firewood, a small one of kindling and the other more substantial pieces.
After she's done with this task, she goes looking for the others, willing to assist them with her small knowledge of the chirurgeon's art. Setting bones, she thinks. Why do I know how to do that?
With a nod, Prasitis considers the best approach. If she wants to make sure her spells work, she needs to get out of her armour, so Loic first, and then the other survivors. She hopes she can talk him down with just a smile and a sympathetic ear. She’s been told she’s good at that, though by whom most recently, she’s not sure.
She wanders over to the man Winter’s indicated, taking her time so that he’s sure to see her coming and doesn’t start fretting, if he suffers from hallucinations. She settles gently beside him, and waits a bit before speaking.
“Hello, Loic. I’m new here,” she says after a moment. She’s not entirely sure how true that is, but on the scale of even her young elven lifetime, she’s certain it is. “I thought I’d see how everyone else is holding together. I’ll admit, it’s frightening, not knowing what’s happening, with the terrible storm, and worse.”
She makes sure to leave room for him to respond, before starting to try to steer the conversation in a useful sort of direction. “It’s been a trying few days, and the nights are something else. If I could get to my garden, I could probably put together something to clear my head and help me sleep… It’s difficult, as I’m sure you know.”
As Prasitis settles in beside the man and begins talking to him, she notices a young Tian woman a few feet away working on a man's wound. She is using some types of brownish-green plant salve, spreading it on and around the wound with her hand.
The woman talks very softly to the man as she works, apparently soothing him. During the last part of the treatment the young woman's hand briefly glows with a faint golden light.
As she chats with Loic, Prasitis makes sure not to concentrate so intently on the man as to make him uncomfortable, but lets her eyes wander around the chapel. She spots what looks like another healer doing the rounds, a Tian woman, by her looks.
A thought prickles in the back of the witch’s mind. Oh. She’s the person we saw just when we were admitted through the barricade. I wonder…
Whatever it was, she’s distracted by what she’s able to spot of the other woman’s treatment, and she resolves to introduce herself as soon as she can. A lot of magic here. That accounts either for our survival thus far, or for our predicament, or both. I imagine there are particular risks with enough mad wizards and witches and such all in one place. That even the wonders of magic soon send her thoughts spiralling in still more abstract directions would, if it were any more obvious, betray that Prasitis is perhaps less out of place in the asylum than she would like to think.
Laura watches the woman approach. She's quiet, like me, she thinks.
Winter watches intently as Okita works on healing Bates, the man she mentioned was injured. She obviously understands that Okita is listening to Pras talk, and wants to see how this plays out.
”Name’s Naysa.” the woman currently cornering Loic calls out as Pras arrives. It appears as if her every bit of focus has been used to keep Loic from running out into the asylum wildly. ”He has issues with hallucinations about his younger sister calling out to him from inside the asylum. She passed away nearly nineteen years ago.”
Loic speaks up at this time, picking himself up off of the wall he was leaning into. ”I’m coming Elizabeth! As soon as I can!” With this, he stands up fully and begins to make a motion to run out into the hall.
Prasitis is grateful that Nasya’s around to explain and to wrangle Loic when whatever visions he sees start pushing him to break out. She reaches out to try to help catch the fellow, but tries to be gentle about it even as she grabs for an arm.
“I know, I know. We’re all at our wits’ ends. But I’ve seen the storm out there, and it’s wild. I’m sure Elizabeth wouldn’t want you to go out in this, but we can go find her for you. In the meantime, you can get ready here. She’ll need you to be strong, right?” Prasitis soothes, or tries to, even as she looks for the man’s medication.
Spotting a bottle of drops, she suggests, “A hot cup of tea and a calm, brotherly ear ready for coming out of the rain…”
Pras' words are more than able to calm the older man down, and he quickly sits down onto the floor, back against the wall.
"Yeah...yeah...you're right, she wouldn't. Have any of you seen her by the way?" he says aimlessly, watching Naysa walk closer to him with his medicine.
"Well done, the lot of you." Winter nods approvingly.
She soon gathers the group around a small makeshift dinner table, crafted from what seems to be a gurney of some sort with wood planks atop it.
A simple but plentiful meal of soup and only slightly hard bread is made available for those of you who want it.
”Well, easy question first I suppose. I’m Winter Klaczka, a sister of Maiden’s Choir Cathedral in Caliphas. My associates and I were helping a Royal Accuser investigate strangeness in Thrushmoor. You currently find yourself in Briarstone Asylum, a hospice stuck on a rock in the middle of the Danver River near Thrushmoor- a convenient place to forget inconvenient people.”
As Winter finishes this sentence, a large thunderclap echoes outside the walls of the asylum, shaking the walls and windows of the chapel. Most of the residents inside seem relatively unshaken by the weather, but a handful of cries escape a few lips.
”As to what happened here, unfortunately I know just about as much as you do. I arrived here to investigate what I was sent to do, and didn’t have much time to begin before the quakes, and these monsters started showing up everywhere.”
Prasitis stifles the urge to wince at the description of inconvenient people. Despite her pretensions of aristocratic ease, it is true that she can’t remember how she got here, exactly, or precisely what happened that saw her leave home and the service of one queen to seek out another. She thinks she may be dead? But that doesn’t explain why that would make the witch-knight persona non grata.
As the fragments of memory stir, she gets a vague flash of a cathedral near the quarter she grew up in, and that makes her think, “A Pharasmin, then?”
She blinks, not having meant to speak aloud, and shrugs self-deprecatingly in apology, but unabashedly teases more questions. “How mysterious. Are you at liberty to be more open about what your investigation concerns? I do beg your pardon. I’m not quite myself, and I’m unfamiliar with the role of the Royal Accusers.”
It’s a tacit admission that Prasitis isn’t a native, however she got tangled up in Briarstone. And with that, since she’s even less clear on her own most recent history, she latches on as best she can to the first – as she imagines she might any – opportunity to reach out to someone who might be able to steer her out of the asylum and provide hints as to how to avoid convincing the locals to recommit her to a similar institution. She smiles a bit. “I don’t suppose being a bit strange is much of a recommendation to someone who might need some assistance in investigating … strangeness.”
Veda went over to Airwynn and Bates to see who was more severely wounded, then used her last healing magic of the day for them.
Then she goes to sit down eating some soup.
At the mention of inconvenient people her ears go up and her shoulders clench, as if she felt addressed.
It seems you know more than we do. I don't remember and earthquake. Or much else at that. I'm not even sure i know Caliphas, or Thrushmoor. Like Prasitis i would agree to help you with your endeavor. It seems our interests align, since we want to, no have to find out more about ourselves and this situation. Should the heads of those responsible for this inconvenience roll in the dirt as a result, the better.
Aoife props herself up against the wall, "Any information woul' be nice. Hells, do ye know what year it is? It'd be nice ta know how old I am. Ah have no clue about anything that happened before we woke up in there two days ago." she says with a shrug, holding her blanket tightly around her shoulders.
When Prasitis finishes with Loic the Tian woman approaches her.
"You handled him very well. You have a talent for working with patients." After the praise she adds "my name is Satomi. It is a great pleasure to meet you."
Satomi looks much like a traveler of humble means. Her clothes are basic, trousers and a tunic of hard-wearing fabric, heavily used and mended in places. Her adornments suggest perhaps an itinerant monk or mystic of some sort. Aside from a regular leather belt, Satomi wears a belt of strung wooden beads. A couple of cloth sachets hang by strings from the belt, emitting mixed herbal scents.
Three amulets are suspended from strings around her neck, a pierced golden coin, a ball of knotted grass, and a embroidered silk pouch. A second similar silk pouch is tied around her left wrist.
A short, slightly curved sword hangs from her leather belt. It is unusual looking with an ornately braided handle, small round hand-guard, and black lacquered wooden scabbard. The scabbard has three dragonflies inlaid in mother of pearl running down its length.
Her thrown-together and worn appearance does not dampen Satomi's attractiveness in the least. If anything it seems to enhance it. The particulars of Satomi's features are beautiful in their extremeness. Her long hair, held in a simple ponytail, is the blackest black. Her eyes are a layered brown, warm and luminous. Her skin is flawlessly unblemished. But for some reason that can't be exactly pinned down, Satomi's beauty is greater than the sum of these particulars. There is a brightness about her that isn't literally seen, but instead imagined by those who see her. It is almost too much for some, who can find her uncanny and slightly unnerving.
Thrushmoor? Caliphas?
Satomi has at least heard of Caliphas, but her present location is completely unknown to her.
"I'm afraid my memory is no better than any of you, excepting Miss Winter. I do know I am originally from Kalsgard in the Thanelands. I had been traveling the Varisian caravan circuits for a while, making a living as an apothecary. That is about all."
Satomi also knows she has somehow come to be plagued by onryō for some reason she is not aware of. But the haunting is a personal problem and she does not know the people around her. Sharing such a personal problem simply would not be appropriate.
She can only guess at why she might be on the island.
"If this is a hospice, perhaps I was called here to see about a patient? I don't know..."
Mh you look that type Satomi, i can imagine you were actually here to treat people, professionaly.
Veda gives Satomi an acknowledging smile.
My name is Veda by the way. I can do a little healing myself, but i somehow don't think i'm here because of that. I think it's way more likely i pissed someone off and they wanted me out of the way. Or i did go mad....
I wonder why though. Something i must have done....
She seems deep in thought, arms crossed before her chest and chin in one hand.
When Prasitis finishes with Loic the Tian woman approaches her.
"You handled him very well. You have a talent for working with patients." After the praise she adds "my name is Satomi. It is a great pleasure to meet you."
Prasitis smiles and acknowledges Satomi’s compliment, referring to the glimmer of healing she saw the Tian woman perform, “As do you, thanks. I would insist that the pleasure is mine, but that seems ungenerous.”
The persiflage comes easily to her, as someone who grew up among embassy balls and the like. That sparks across her thoughts, followed quickly by something else. Present company confirms the diplomatic aspect of the memory, as yet another follows, more unsettling. The company of other beautiful women is familiar from her knightly order, but Prasitis was one of very few non-humans there, and most of the others’ facial scarring was more severe than the faintest couple of lines that only just mark her own features.
... Or i did go mad....
I wonder why though. Something i must have done....
She seems deep in thought, arms crossed before her chest and chin in one hand.
Veda’s speculation while waiting for Winter’s response lands uncomfortably close to home. An image of faceless helms identical to the one Prasitis carries slams down over the brief image of her sisters-in-arms, laughing together, despite a shadow behind their eyes, down as decisively as the helm itself would. The image fades.
"I'm sorry, but I don't know why any of you are here. You certainly wouldn't be the first to lose a piece of yourselves here. If you were patients here, perhaps there is some record in an office of why you were committed here."
Another large clap of thunder shakes the windows before she continues.
"I do not mind divulging my investigation details now, seeing the situation we find ourselves in. Haserton Lowls, the count of Versex, appears to have abandoned his duties as one of the nations rulers. Accuser Omari had reason to believe that Lowls sent me along with other associates to investigate the asylum while she went on to Thrushmoor."
"I do not know how their investigation at Thrushmoor is but as you can tell, this particular part of the contingent sent out has gone horribly awry. And now we're all stuck here, unfortunately. Perhaps there is still a way out yet."
"And the current year is 4720, dear." she affectionately replies to Aoife, a kind gaze on her face.
Veda:
Both Aoife and Veda suddenly remember somehow that Briarstone Asylum is in Versex County in Ustalav. How they remembered this knowledge is significantly more troubling than the fact that they know it at all.
Prasitis’ brow furrows in concentration as she tries to figure out a workable hypothesis as to what Winter’s suggesting, given that, as a foreign invalid, the knight’s grasp of the situation is tenuous at best.
“So we’ve now become fatally inconvenient, as opposed to merely tediously?”
“Or your delinquent Count, trying to put you off with lunatics, has blundered into his duty by accidentally reinforcing the powers of sanity in the asylum’s hour of need?”
As if from a vague mental distance, Prasitis observes her own cheerful tone, and that she seems to default to erring perhaps slightly on the side of manic airiness, as opposed to open paranoia.
Wait a moment, we are in Ustalav! Briarstone Asylum in Versex County in Ustalav! I know that!
But i don't know why i know that, it just popped into my mind somehow. And i can't really put it into place.
Veda first looks happy to remember something, but then very troubled as she grasps just how lost she really is.
Looking at the others and Winter she puts her hands on her hips, taking a firm stance.
We have to find those archives. Do you have any idea where they are? Or where? Let's go search for them, they might provide valuable insights. And then we find out what's going on here.
Stepping over she lays a hand on Prasitis shoulder.
Now i don't know about any fools, but i found it rather convenient to have you here so far. Whoever sent you here because they sought you inconvenient were fatally wrong. Don't you worry.
Ustalav, Laura thinks, and the word stirs a bit of concern, worry, within her. What is it about Ustalav that I need to remember?
She shakes her head, as if to say this is all too much for her. She nibbles at the bread and pokes at the soup with her spoon, and tries to look at least aware of the discussion, if she can't contribute to it.
She watches Satomi and Winter-- she's a bit curious about all the people she has encountered here, but as far as she can remember she has never met an aasimar or a changeling, and so she stares a bit more openly than she would normally.
Prasitis briefly stiffens at the unexpected touch on her shoulder, before relaxing again after a moment. “Thanks,” she mouths, offering a small smile over her shoulder.
Perhaps there’s hope yet, she thinks as she turns back to the wider conversation. I think I must have been too long delayed already, but…
I’m sure her majesty has hundreds of knights eager to pledge their swords to her. Half-formed and humbling visions of the court at Iadara dance over Prasitis’ brain. And in the meantime, well, it’s a bit of a mess here, and you could do worse than help these women. The Scarlet Rose would approve.
Despite the glimmer of hope, there’s also a sense of guilt that the witch can’t account for. She can only add another hope that she won’t have to expiate it with her life, but sets aside some mental energy to allow and – in some measure – prepare for the possibility.
Feeling Prasitis stiffen when she touches her and the silent thanks, Veda thinks to herself.
What's wrong with her? Poor thing seems really shaken...
Before she knows it she turns Prasitis towards her and gives her a warm and gentle hug, both arms slung around her and head on the shoulders.
Somehow this will all turn out well.
What am i doing? This is only to comfort her.
After a moment, Veda let's go, looking to the floor awkwardly.
Who am i joking. That felt good and i might have needed that more than she did.
You ready? Should we go explore the asylum some more and look for clues?
Satomi remains quiet through the conversation, listening to what is said. What she hears is vaguely informative, to the extent she can tell the others "I am now far to the east of anyplace I remember being before."
Knowing the year would help if she could remember how old she is, or what year it was when her last memories occurred, but she cannot.
Satomi stops eating before she finishes her food. She takes the remaining portion and stows it away, pouring the soup into a small stoppered vial and wrapping the bread in a cloth. Presumably she is saving it for later.
As the meal and conversation start to wind down, Satomi does speak up on a subject that hasn't been brought up. While it is troubling to recall so little about the past, or to know how she came to be at the asylum, She is even more troubled by very recent events.
"Excuse me if I am asking about something already common knowledge to the rest of you. But, there are many dead bodies all over the place. What has been happening here in the last few days to make this so?"
"Uh...I'm not sure I'm suggesting that you're inconvenient to me or the survivors at all. But to the people who admitted you here, you obviously were somewhat problematic for, directly or indirectly."
She shrugs, moving on quickly.
"No offense intended of course, but there must have been some reason you were all thrown here, right? I did not get much time to survey the office area, but I am sure there is some record keeping place somewhere in the asylum."
She notes Vedas' outburst, nodding along as she listens.
"Which, yes, is inside of Ustalav. Is there some history you have here that you are remembering?"
"In terms of what has been happening these past few days, there was some sort of earthquake or shake that seems to have happened at the same time as some horrible force, that I am not fully aware what is, arrived. It had a horrifying effect on some of the patients, turning them into ghouls or dopplegangers. We have been separated from the...thing behind the curtain at the end of the hall. We are not sure how to get beyond it."
Veda looks at Winter in confusion.
Inside of Ustalav. Do i have some history there? Afraid i don't know that?
You say some mysterious force arrived with an earthquake? Can you elaborate that? How do you know something arrived? And what is the thing behind the curtain?
Prasitis closes her eyes for a second as she tries to process too much all at once, from her own and Winter’s words, Satomi’s questions, and Veda’s hug, to still other fragments of memory. If she’s managed to put up with such a splintered perspective on the world for an indefinite period of time – and she has to have had, since she can’t remember how she came to the asylum, exactly – she must really have been at least somewhat mad.
She jumps gently to her feet as she begins to worry the situation is running away with her, two flashes of vision sticking a bit longer.
Her father again, somehow she’s sure many years closer to the present, an unreadable emotion on his face. ‘My gem, what did they do to you?’ Not unreadable. Sympathy. And fear.
"Uh...I'm not sure I'm suggesting that you're inconvenient to me or the survivors at all. But to the people who admitted you here, you obviously were somewhat problematic for, directly or indirectly."
She forces herself to speak more directly, swallowing yet another apology, but making sure her tone is friendly, if not light, exactly. “Oh, present company included, to be sure. At the risk of being too candid, it seems rather convenient for the count, at least, if he is corrupt, that he should send you, one of the accusers looking into his dubious affairs, to the asylum just in time for it to be … attacked is as good a word as any I suppose. Or fortune just favours the wicked. You have my sympathy, I mean, in any case.”
"It had a horrifying effect on some of the patients, turning them into ghouls or dopplegangers. We have been separated from the...thing behind the curtain at the end of the hall. We are not sure how to get beyond it."
She nods in acquiescence to Winter’s reply to Satomi, only adding, “Turned into? Could the doppelgangers, at least, have been here all along, in disguise? Otherwise…”
Prasitis shivers at the implications, before confessing, “It’s maddening, and alarming, but I can’t remember much of anything from up to a few years ago, and mostly scraps of anything before that. And then we woke up in the cellar, after such frightful dreams…”
She pulls herself together in the knightliest way she knows, glancing around the rest of the group of women. “The curtain just at the end of the hall?” She points towards the door of the chapel, her gesture taking in the hallway beyond.
“I’m ready, if everyone else is. Whatever’s out there might not be expecting us to prowl around ourselves of an evening,” she says, with grim determination.
"I am unsure what exactly happened, but all I do know is that a few days ago when I first started my investigation, an earthquake shook the entire building. It freed many of the more dangerous patients from their restraints, and then suddenly they were revolting."
She looks saddened at the mention of the revolt, her face turning down slightly.
"I lost several good friends during this revolt, which was only made worse by the appearance of the monsters. I do suppose the dopplegangers could've been here from the beginning, but I cannot be too sure about it."
She points out the door to the hallway, where the edge of a curtain pokes out just barely.
"That...thing. Like a huge monstrous eye on the door. Blocks our way out, and screams every time you even touch it. There has to be a way to get past it without terrifying the children, but how?"
"Hmmm." Aoife muses, and stands in front of the curtain, "Le' me try somethin'." she says, and closes her eyes in concentration.
Prasitis falls in step behind Aoife quickly, readying her shield and a sword to provide support – once again, her heftier Korvosan blade finds its way into her hand rather than her ancestral elven weapon.
An uneasy feeling skitters over the back of the witch’s neck. What Winter’s described sounds like a bizarre horror, so Prasitis feels the unhealthiness of her own curiosity. It’s not a new feeling: there’s a flash of another half-memory. Another sister-not-sister. A book she asked Siti to find, that she should never have glanced into before handing it over. The book.
The witch-knight gives her head a small shake, ready to twitch the curtain aside if Aoife disappears behind it only to need help.
"Before you head off, though, here. Take this, we found it in the chaplain's office. It will most certainly help in your travels."
As Aoife attempts to teleport beyond the curtain, she finds herself suddenly sucked directly in front of the horrendous eye.
The hallway ends just beyond the curtain, but a mass of stringy yellow fungus stretches across the stone blocks. At its heart bulges and blinks a watery eye the size of a wagon wheel. As Aoife reappears in front of the eye, it cries out in surprise as tears made of what appears to be ammonia drop from both sides of the eerie pupil.
Hearing a cry that doesn’t sound like Aoife’s voice, Prasitis pushes the curtain aside as best she can and … stops short. “What-”
She remembers her manners just in time, bearing in mind that the unusual spectacle seems to have some sort of voice. “Who are you?”
She keeps her own voice as steady as circumstances permit, and tries to will her sword-arm into not twitching threateningly. It would suit the horror-show of the asylum to tempt its inmates to lashing out in the wrong direction, or to conceal any number of things with misleading horrors. That’s not to say that Prasitis is inclined to be trusting, or that she’s not trying to see if there’s anything or a way past beyond the monstrous eye.
Laura reacts with slightly less alacrity than Prasitis, racing forward and drawing her axe. She examines the monstrosity before them, with a practical eye to fighting and defeating it. Fungus, she thinks, narrowing her eyes. Nature gone bad. She takes the curtain from her elven friend, to free her up for whatever she has in mind.
When it is decided she will be going with the group of other women to... look for records or paperwork she supposes, Satomi goes to collect the rest of her gear.
She returns wearing a light, oatmeal-colored coat long enough to reach her knees. The coat is quilted, but thin rather than thick and puffy. Numerous multicolored birds have been sewn onto alternating diamond-shaped spaces. The birds are hand-constructed of pieces of cloth of various colors, cut into the shapes of portions of the bird and sewn together to make the whole.
In her hand Satomi now carries a glaive. It is obviously well made. The blade at the end of the pole is bright and silvery, with scrolled etchings along the edges.
Satomi feels a certain disquiet after their conversation with Winter. She can only think the "eye" the woman spoke of is imagined, and that perhaps she is mentally unstable.
She doesn't hurry to the hallway until she hears the cry from that direction, and when she arrives to see the eye for herself, Satomi has no idea what to say or do.