Kaxatja, Brevka, Lyra'an and Anabel file into the shop, with Lilamma being taken off to the side...
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The interior of Xandurae's shop is better organized than Sharrazzar's--the walls are lined with shelves of what appear to be various types of spell components, each of them packed into clear jars and clearly labeled in a delicate hand. In the centre of the shop is a large glass orb filled with swirling smoke that gradually shifts through a spectrum of warm and soothing colours.
Ineriza Xandurae herself is flanked by a pair of bored-looking drow guards as she organizes a set of jars behind a counter on the western wall. Her hair is tied up in a long ponytail that cascades down to the small of her back, and she wears a bright white smock with violet embroidery on the sleeves that matches her skin. She glances over her shoulder and does a double-take when she sees who just walked in through her door.
"Customers?" She pauses before noticing the sashes the party wears. "...ah. Apparently, I need to have a word with the guard captain."
She turns to face the party and puts her hands on the counter in front of her. "So, what have you come here for?"
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"We have come for the debt you owe House Parastric. A sum of one hundred gold pieces. If you would be so kind as to pay up, our business will be concluded and we will be on our way," Anabel says.
Xandurae pauses before digging out a sheaf of papers and looks through them.
"...Parastric..." She wrinkles her nose as she looks the papers over. "...no, I don't believe I owe such a debt. I have no record of a representative ever purchasing from me."
Meanwhile, in a dark alley...
Ho, come on, why so serious? Have fun with me! Is that a knife or are you happy to see me? No, it must be a knife.. You dont seem man enough for the other option! Do I have to beat you first to make you use that weapon?
She tries to slap the man, as hard as she can
The tip of his knife is sticking into your belly, blood welling up from the wound. The cold fire begins to spread upward, following the knife as he carefully slides it up to just underneath your heart. Your blood starts streaming down the blade and dripping onto the cobblestones beneath you.
Anabel narrows her eyes. "I think you ought to check the records again. Otherwise, I can have my large friend over there ask you for the money, and I doubt she ask as nicely as I have." The elf indicates Brevka behind her.
Xandurae blinks at Anabel before turning back to her papers.
"...oh. THAT debt." She wrinkles her nose and snorts. "Of course, it just slipped my mind." The drow taps a piece of parchment with a well-manicured finger.
"As much as I would like to humour you, I'm afraid there's a bit of a problem. Your debt is no longer enforceable." Her lips quirk into a smug sneer.
"And why, pray tell, is that?" Anabel asks, hands on her hips.
Brevka rests her hand on Anabel's shoulder, nearly engulfing the top of her arm. "It's pretty clear, Runt. She can't give what isn't hers. Nice clean hair and a pretty smock look nicer, but they're just her lead and collar. It's too bad; our mistress understands who responds better to freedom, and who to chains.
"That's why she just wants what's owed from This One, and why she doesn't unfetter me too close to home. Her mistress though? She'll chain her in lavender and take from her all that she is, unless she finds the golden key out of her chains."
Kaxatja moves to gain a clear line to throw net at either guard or proprietor. She favors the proprietor with a small smile, and speaks in Drow.
”Think well as you answer, Mistress. We aren’t in the business of deciding the finer nuances of debts owed or expiry dates agreed upon. The House we work for sent us here to do a job. And, we fail-we die. So really, we have little to lose and 100 gold to gain. Consider that. The last folk who...tried to negotiate no longer count amongst the living.”
Your faked cries of fear/arousal seem to have stung the guard, and he takes a different tack. He puts his dagger back in its sheath and sighs in exasperation. "...I know I'm setting myself up for embarrassment by asking this, but did you even feel that go in?" He asks in a resigned voice.
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Xandurae's sneer deepens and twists into a glare. "Then I suppose I should be fortunate that I am not negotiating. House Caldrana has extended protection to me in exchange for serving them exclusively."
The cloud of smoke in the glass orb behind the party begins to churn more violently, is colours turning sharper.
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"Our mistake, we should ask your masters." Brevka turns away from Xandurae as if she has ceased to exist, greeting her guards with a level look. "One hundred, in gold, and we leave. You can take it out of her purse or her hide as you please."
The guards exchange looks before nodding. One of them turns on Xandurae and unsheathes a sharp-looking gladius from his belt. "Pay up."
"But--" Xandurae starts. "--your master said--"
"Patron Caldrana, madam, offered you protection on the condition that any outstanding minor debts you have are paid off in full by the time your service period begins. Frankly, for one hundred gold pieces we could purchase someone competent. Pay up." The guard cuts her off, his face expressing nothing but cold professionalism.
Xandurae sputters for a few moments before growling and digging out an oil-stained leather pouch. "Here." She throws it at Brevka. "I hope your mistress chokes on it."
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"Thank you!" Anabel says with a cheerful wave.
Once outside, she looks up at Brevka. "Nice job! That's two down, and one to go."
Brevka's aura of confidence ebbs once she's back outside as she mutters a quiet reply to Anabel. "Never forget; to them everyone's just gold and silver, blood and bone. This time they were willing to pay in gold, but they won't always be."
Kaxatja shrugs as the encounter ends without violence. She removes herself without paying any attention to guard or functionary.
”Lilamma dear? Time to go!” the drider calls out, heading toward Lilmma’s last known... position.
Lilamma's voice is perversely sensuous, and offer her lithe, hard and nearly naked body to the man's...blade
Anabel nods. "In time, I hope to be able to teach the drow a better way. This was a good start."
You're spun around. The knife rakes down your back. The pain floods your body, setting your limbs ablaze with heat.
Kaxatja rounds the corner in time to find the once-nervous guard viciously and repeatedly stabbing Lilamma with a dagger while pinning her against the wall.
Kaxatja, perhaps misunderstanding foreplay, or even actual play, utters a hard snarl and charges the guard, attempting to smash the guard out of the way...
: Charge; bull rush
[CMB +1 BAB, +2 Str; +2 charge]
Perhaps it's because of the narrow alley, or perhaps it's because of Kaxatja's lack of subtlety, but the guard stops stabbing Lilamma long enough to see her coming and throw himself away from her in a panic. "AAAA!"
His dagger is still sticking out of the tiefling's back.
Thank you, I needed that.
Lilamma un-stick the dagger and keeps it, before winking to the drider, casually saying
Ready to go?
Kaxatja snarls again, bent and crumpled against a wall, but still upright, hair obscuring her face. She straightens, flicks her hair back behind her shoulders and nods to Lilamma.
”Most definitely.”
Ignoring the guard she saunters out of the alley.
Johysis is waiting for the group when they all emerge from the shop's grounds. "Well, that went a lot more smoothly than I expected." She grins at the party. "Pretty bold of Ms. Xandurae to go off with Caldrana--kinda makes me wonder how Parastric'll take it."
"Eh, that can wait until later." She turns on her heel and starts to lead the crew back into the city.
"Let's head for the menagerie next and finish our tasks," Anabel suggests.
The streets leading to the borders of the Razor and Umbral Quarters are choked with multiple wagons pulled by pack lizards. Johysis lets out an exasperated sigh before leading the party through a series of side streets and alleys to reach their destination.
The sounds and smells of the city give way to the unpalatable odor of animal waste and musk as the party arrives. The Menagerie is indeed a ring of cages, each filled with strange animals from both the surface and elsewhere in the Darklands. Wagon-sized serpents with scales like stone, eight-legged felines with vicious jaws and golden fur, bipedal lizards with ridges of black spikes running down their backs, and many other strange species are contained within the cages. Standing at the far end of the circle is a building barely larger than a townhouse, its windows tinted black and a cadre of bored-looking guards on patrol.
"Shall we try the straightforward approach?" Anabel asks. Assuming there is no protest, the petite elf strides up to the guards. "We are here on behalf of House Parastric. We're to pick up a shipment of specimens from Traxivus Kinlith. If you would kindly direct us to him, we would very much appreciate it."
Brevka grunts her approval, "I like straightforward when it's possible."
Feeling keenly that she herself might easily find herself in one of these cages, Kaxatja walks just a little lower than usual. She makes a great show of bowing officiously to the guards...
Can't be much more straightforward than this
The guards look Anabel and Kaxatja over before one of them runs off into the warehouse.
He comes back a minute later. "Master Kinlith is expecting you. Follow me."
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The interior of the warehouse is filled with strange creatures kept in cages, their musk mixing with the stinging odour of cleaning supplies to create an uncomfortable, eye-watering stench. The party is led up a flight of stairs to an office that overlooks the main floor.
Traxivus Kinlith, a pudgy male drow with greasy white-yellow hair and a plum-coloured jacket and pantaloons, slouches in a large-backed chair behind a jet-black wooden desk. He's looking through a stack of papers on his desk and crossing out certain passages in them when the party enters his office.
"Yes, what is it--ah. Parastric, I presume?"
Fearful of making her exotic existence known to the proprietor, Kaxatja will remain outside the office, keeping an eye on the interior warehouse greater...
...as well as a blue-skinned drow in drab clothing moving to several of the more vicious-looking monster cages and fiddling with their locks.
"Parastric, aye. We're here to collect the specimens. Would you be so kind as to give them to us that we might be on our way? I'm certain you're as eager for us to be gone from this place as we are."
Kaxatja opens the door to the office. She smiles.
”A blueskin drow is attempting to free your more violent specimens. Pray this is not some ruse to lay the blame on us...” she informs the plum-jacketed master.
Hells
Brevka loosened her blade in its scabbard, but didn't yet draw it.
"Parastric, aye. We're here to collect the specimens. Would you be so kind as to give them to us that we might be on our way? I'm certain you're as eager for us to be gone from this place as we are."
Kinlith sits up in his chair and looks over the papers on his desk.
"Parastric, Parastric... I know I have your invoice here somewhere--" He shuffles through the papers before finding one with yellowed and frayed edges. "--ah, yes." He picks it up and looks it over.
"Says here you've ordered a pair of skum. And payment has already been received. Well, let's get those specimens out of the way--"
”A blueskin drow is attempting to free your more violent specimens. Pray this is not some ruse to lay the blame on us...”
Kinlith's head jerks up at the sound of Kaxatja's interruption. "What?!"
There's a brief lull in the noise of the warehouse floor. Then the panicked shouting starts.
A loud *HISS* sounds over the cacophony.
Kaxatja holds her position, looking for a high vantage point.
Kaxatja climbs to perch on the roof of the office hoping for a greater vantage point.
Anabel takes a step back at the hissing noises and looks at Brevka worriedly. "Um, should we be concerned? Because I am feeling concerned," she murmurs. She casts a spell of blessing, just in case.
Brevka grabs Anabel's shoulder, helping to urge her back with a gentle pull as she rips her blade loose from its sheath. "Good instincts Runt."
Stay there, I'll scout!
Lilamma gets toward the hissing sound, her spiked chain in hands
Heyo, dangerous thing! I'm here! Can you attack me please?
One thing is sure, as you probably stand there speechless and slack jawed: you've never seen anyone scouting like Lilamma.
The girl has absolutely no common sense, but her very own style.
Kaxatja scrambles on top of the warehouse office while Lilamma fearlessly rushes outside in anticipation of the wonderful sensation of pain.
The source of the panicked yelling and hissing is a giant snake with two heads at either end of its body, its scales being half-black and half-white around either head. The beast appears to have already killed two guards--their bodies lie on opposite sides of the creature with chunks of their torso bitten away. Three more guards are jabbing at it with longspears, but they can't pierce the monster's hide!
Lilamma beams another "out of reality" smile, striking her spiked chain as if it was a sentient animal
Taki, Taki, Taki, i've found you a friend to play with! Now don't be too rough… Just kiddin". It's a two headed snake! Maybe someone cut two snakes in half, and put glue on their middle?
"That's not a skum, right? If that's the skum we're supposed to deliver and I kill it I am going to lie..."
[ooc]Are we on a map? I can't figure out which slide if so, so apologies if this doesn't make sense with the terrain/guard placement.[ooc]
Brevka's intricate scars flare with argent light as she storms forward, swinging her falchion in a short, brutal chop.
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Brevka comes running out of the office, her falchion bared and ready to sink into snake flesh. Heedless of potential injury, she races in and scores a vicious cut on the amphisbaena's black-scaled jaw!
Lilamma uses her chain to cause maximum carnage and pain on the snake's other head, spilling some blood
Lilamma gets around the side of the two-headed beast and brings Taki to bear, raking her across the amphisbaena's white head and spilling sweet blood all over the Kuthite.