Barek begins picking his way across the rocks, doing his best to avoid slipping.
He manages to make it without too many issues and proceeds to keep watch on the other side of the scree.
Jack hops, skips, and jumps his way to the other side, like it's simply a walk in the park. He then awaits the others to make their way across.
Despite her heavy armor, Lady Applestar uses her glaive to vault the fence.
Carla slowly and methodically climbed over the piles of stone getting on the inside of the prison. It felt oppressive in here. and Lawrence squeaked as he peeked out of the satchel he was carried in and looked around whiskers twitching with a frenzy.
Balurk climbs over the wall with such unusual grace, he made it seem too easy.
Jack raises an eyebrow at Balurk's level of grace. Huh. That one is full of surprises. He grins at the thought.
Quincey sighed, as the last one he began to pick his way up through the stones and down by the others he looks around to see where they thought to go.
Rubbing his hands together, "Alright, folks, what do you say we check out the warden's house first, hm? Maybe we could find something of use in there. If scavengers haven't gotten to it already, that is."
The group makes their way across the courtyard towards what they know to be the Wardens house to their left are the front gates, to their right the front of the prison.
The Warden's house is a small brick manor house, overgrown with thick sheets of gray-green ivy. The roof sags ominously, and the front door
hangs askew.
Their gaze cannot help but be drawn to the front of the prison though. A two-story stone building looms in the center of the prison grounds. Ivy and moss cling tenaciously to the walls, while above the wooden shingles of the roof are often missing entirely, exposing the wooden rafters of the upper structure to the sky. Here and there, leering stone gargoyles perch on the eaves, once functioning as drain spouts and decorations but now seeming almost to serve a more ominous role of sentinels. Many of these stone decorations have crumbled away and lie in ruined piles on the soggy ground below. Windows in the building’s facade are narrow and blocked by grills of rusty iron bars. Stone columns support a slumping wooden balcony over the building’s wooden front doors, both of which hang askew and reveal dark glimpses of chambers within
Raising an eyebrow, "You know, maybe the Warden's house doesn't really have anything of interest inside. Scratch that idea. The place is pretty much trash. Unless one of you wants to go in there and check it out real quick. I'm game if y'all are."
Turning his attention to Harrowstone, Jack pulls out a sunrod. "Of course, the prison don't look much better. But, we gotta start somewhere. Off we go." Jack leads the way forward, heading directly toward the front doors, keeping an eye out for anything.
As Balurk keeps an eye out, he responds, “You all talk about checking Warden’s house, now we almost at Warden’s house you want to back out? We search Warden’s house; Balurk isn’t scared.”
At the mention of trash, the orc chuckles, “As Doctor once told me, one man’s trash is another man’s treamshur…uh, treesore…uh tremishingly…uh, his payday.”
Grinning, "By all means, Balurk, let's check it out. After you, my large friend." He makes a sweeping gesture with his arm. Jack will strike the sunrod if it's apparent that it's too dark to see inside. After all, he doesn't possess the darksight like his half-orc ally.
Jack, after seeing the way the roof was sloping on the wardens house moves toward the front of the prison, and mentioned it.
Balurk moved towards the Wardens house and asked Jack why he changed his mind...Then Balurk can see slightly inside the house through the doorway with the door almost ready to fall over and notices how the walls are buckling inside and leaning and knew the Wardens home was very unsafe.
jack started to tell Balurk to go ahead, when something caught his eye and he glanced back at the brickwork along the base of the prison, and noticed runes all along the base as far as he could see on either side of the doorway, and even around the doorway.
Narrowing his eyes as he notices the odd anomaly around the prison entrance, "You go ahead, Balurk. There's something odd about the prison doorway," he mutters mindlessly.
He quickly pauses a moment and looks back at the brawler, "Although, you might want to be careful in there, buddy. It looks like it's about to collapse. Your call," he says, leaving it up to him. Jack then makes his way toward the runes and bends down to inspect them.
"I wonder what the heck these are. Can any of you tell me what these runes are all about?"
Balurk looks ready to ask what made Jack changed his mind, but shrugs it off, carefully maneuvering around the unsteady walls and searching for anything of note.
Jack looks at the runes and realizes it has nothing to do with the doorway, its just a repetition of runes running around the building in a continuous manner....so the chain would not be unbroken.
Balurk see's nothing of note walking around the Wardens house...its just time has not been kind to the building.
"Nmmmm. I don't like those runes. Could they be a trap? Carfeul, Balurk, you can't beat spells with your fists." She looks to Berek and Carla, who seem to know something of the arcane.
Barek takes a look at the runes, and casts a quick spell that might help while he wracks his brain. "يكشف," he says, pulling a small clear crystal from a pouch on his belt.
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Carla enjoys the view to the prison. She doesn't mind the whispered comments, she is not completely unfamiliar with those. In a place as superstitious as Ustalav, any source of magic will be met with some sort of push back. Talking to a rat isn't usually a thing people take lightly either.
When discussing where to go within the prison, Carla decides to inspect the runes as well. She casts a spell and focuses on them.
Barek and Carla move up to the base of the prison and begin studying the runes. First they notice they are fairly recent...within the last month...the ivy and vines were cut away from the base of the foundation and a 6 inch gap was cut all around the prison. second it looks like they were placed using a black ink first then gone over in blood after.
studying them it looks like both abjuration magic and necromantic magic was involved. They find the name 'Lyvar Hawkran' embedded within the runes every 5 feet. The runes no longer radiate magic, but when they were first placed they would have. They were likely used for a seriously strong ritual. but what that was they cannot quite grasp, best is any guesses they come up with.
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After agreeing with Barek about the runes, Carla says "So, Lyvar Harkran was the warden's name. I detected the abjuration and necromancy schools of magic. That means it has to do with protection and undead. My guess is that they were trying to conjure the warden's spirit somehow or protect against it. In any case, this probably worked against us. Most necromancy magic is working against us. The good thing is that the magic seems to have faded, but the one who organized this ritual probably got what they wanted from it already."
She paces back and forth thinking.
Balurk grunts in disappointment, then gets out of the room, making sure he doesn’t bump into anything.
“Nothing,” was all he could say.
Balurk moves into the building and begins a room to room walk through. The floors ground under his weight. Dust falls from the ceiling with every step. The walls shift and creek as he walks. He sees nothing of import and the noises worry him so he leaves after a few minutes to see Carla pacing and Lawrence look at her face from the satchel. She seems to be deep in thought while Barek kneels looking at runes and pointing things out as she walks.
Quincey has been quiet.
Briar Rose stands guard looking around.
Jack stands near a staircase going up to the entry way to the prison watching Barek and Carla.