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GM:
Returning to Ankar-Te in the bustle of shops opening and workers hurrying through the streets, Lilley climbs the stairs to her room as many of her neighbors are filing down to begin their day. She manages to shrug out of the heavy armor and sets it up at the foot of her bed. Looking at it, she remembers the sight of countless cockroaches swarming out of it. Going back down the stairs, she locates Betty to ask to borrow a scrub brush and send one of the Twice-Born servants to carry a basin of water up to her room. She spends half an hour scrubbing out the inside of the armor thoroughly. Then she looks down at the clothes she was wearing under the armor, strips them off, and rinses them out in the basin before hanging them to dry while she sleeps. Then she considers her skin that had been inside the clothing under the armor where the roaches lived and uses the rest of the water in the basin to wash herself before laying down on her narrow bed to sleep until the afternoon. Stirgen: At the appointed time, Lilley is waiting on the steps of Thrown Bones in Ankar-Te. She is unarmored and appears to be unarmed. She is dressed in what are obviously mens' work clothes, roughly-woven and ill-fitting, probably bought secondhand. The shirt and trousers appear slightly damp and rumpled, like she washed them before she slept and they didn't completely dry before she awoke.
Stirgen: She considers a moment and then shrugs uncertainly. "He works in the evenings; perhaps he simply had a less dangerous offer of employment. He is a bard," she smiles at Stirgen. "You would like him. The gambling hall would not be open so early in the morning to inquire at anyway. It is probably wise to rest first and then ask after him in the afternoon. I will hope it is only a case of his plans changing after he sent word to me."
Stirgen: "I have a room in Ankar-Te," she replies, "but no employment. The payment from the Pharasmins will keep me safe from having to take up a profession in Hospice for some time, at any rate." Her hand goes to her pouch to make sure it still jingles reassuringly and she wasn't robbed passing through the city's streets. "The man who told me about the job in the Ossuary last night was the same one who pointed me to a place to stay when I arrived in the city. He said he would be at the cathedral as well, but...." She trails off, shaking her head; Stirgen knows as well as she that he didn't meet Priestess Valanthe with them. "I owe him a great deal, and I'm worried something might have happened to him."
Stirgen: Lilley starts the meal self-consciously -- the tusks that are ideally suited for tearing meat from bone make it difficult to eat porridge or sip tea in a ladylike fashion -- and bows her head over the table to hide her efforts behind a curtain of black hair, but that neither Stirgen nor the other diners seem to find anything out of the ordinary about her presence serves to ease her anxiety. "It's good," she smiles at him. "When I'm hungry, I usually just buy a meat pie or something from a street vendor and eat it in my room. It's never warm, and in Ankar Te, I'm always afraid to ask what might be in it." She looks around at the students. "You study here? What do you learn?"
Stirgen: She lets out a breath she hadn't been conscious of holding. When she looks up at him, it is with the first real smile he has seen on her face. "I would be delighted," she says, standing up and taking his arm, "to have some breakfast."
Stirgen: "I don't mean to insult you," she apologizes huskily. "I came to Kaer Maga for much the same reason. I thought if there were anywhere in the world I could go without being feared or pitied, it would be here, where there are so many more... unusual things walking down the streets." Although she clearly appreciates his consoling words, she hesitates before taking his proffered arm. "Before you choose to trust me," she says reluctantly, "you should know.... What I said in the crypts is true. I killed someone. A woman, unarmed and defenseless. And then I ran." She watches warily for his reaction, obviously steeling herself for rejection.
Stirgen: "Do you not hate it?" she asks him intently. "To be half a monster? The moment of your conception assumed by everyone who meets you to have been an act of violence and degradation rather than of passion? But you lived among the orcs in Belkzen; I suppose there it was your human blood that was shameful." Her eyes wander away to the altar and fluted columns. "I have worn this skin all this life. I had a life before, but like Esme, I died young. Like Esme, I had a husband who would not accept my fate. He sold everything he had worked for, his house, his possessions; when that was not enough, he sold himself, indenturing himself for seven years in exchange for enough money to cheat the Lady of Graves. But she always has the last laugh. His love for me was stronger than death, stronger than poverty and servitude, but when he saw what he received in exchange for all he had sacrificed, he found he had made a bad bargain. How can I help but hate what killed his love?"
Stirgen: "'Forget myself?'" she scoffs. "That's what I came to Kaer Maga to do: to try to forget what I lost and make the best of what life I am left with. This," she gestures half-heartedly with her glaive, careful not to be too demonstrative and slash anyone, "just reminds me how far I am fallen." She pauses a moment and then seemingly changes the subject. "The Pharasmins: death is their answer to everything. 'You have interfered with the church; you must die.' 'You have become sick; you must die.' Could you have done as they counseled Esme? Accepted your death, embraced your fate, given up the dreams you had for your life?"
All right, fortunately, there's not a lot of choices to make at level 2 oracle. Favored class bonus in hp. (Roll above.) Orison: light 4 skill points: Diplomacy, Heal, Intimidate, Perception
Stirgen: Lilley seems a bit taken aback by Stirgen's autobiography, but it serves its purpose of keeping her distracted from their surroundings as they pass through Hospice. "I suppose I was... 'illegitimate' as well, although I never thought of it like that. My story is the reverse of yours. I was happy most of my life...," she laughs a little bitterly, "all of my life, until the very end. When I was 'born again,' I lost everything."
Upon arrival at the shrine, the scent of roses perfumes the air, and Lilley draws in a deep breath delightedly. She seems averse to the half-elf and, in fact, keeps her distance from all the other worshipers gathered when they arrive. Although she cannot avoid Stirgen's friends, she sits shyly, drawn into her armor and her eyes on the ground, when they approach; she has never heard of Iridian armor. She appears a little awed by both the warmth and the quantity of the greetings Stirgen is attracting, but before his crowd of admirers disperses enough for her to feel free to comment, the Chorus begins. Lilley listens with bowed head and closed eyes. When she looks up at the end, her cheeks are streaked with tears. "With my eyes closed and the scent of the roses, I could have been back home. There was a rosebush under our window." She glances up at the stone roof above them. "But there's no sunlight. These birds never see the sun rise, but they sing its processional anyway. How do they know it still rises outside?"
Even -- or, perhaps, especially -- at the late hour, Hospice is a glittering hotbed of activity. In any other city in Varisia, a pair of well-armored half-orcs might expect to be given a wide berth on the streets, but in Kaer Maga, they are pedestrians and putative customers like anyone else. Some of the propositions and offers shouted to both of them from upper windows and well-lit doorways make Lilley blush a deeper green. Trying to pretend she is oblivious to their surroundings, she starts a nervous conversation, although she has nearly to shout to make herself heard over the hubbub. "Mr. Harg, are you a native of Kaer Maga?"
Lilley blinks at Stirgen's proffered arm a moment before sliding a gauntleted hand around his bicep in a practiced manner. "It seems a lifetime since a gentleman has offered me his arm," she chuckles, "though I am hardly a dainty companion, clanking around in banded armor."
Valanthe nods, but appears to be slightly annoyed that the Ossuary isn't cleared. "I understand - do you intend to return to finish the work after you have rested and recruited? And what do you mean that you're reversed? Are you trying to have a laugh?" "It is true, priestess," Lilley insists. "There was a mirrored room they all went in, and then the door shut and they came out of another room across the hall, all reversed. I thought their tongues had been scrambled as well; I could not understand them...." She trails off uncertainly before returning to her main point. "Ask your clerics who are tending to the dwarf if his heart does not beat on the wrong side of his chest." Her eyes flash with indignation at parts of the tale Valanthe tells of Esme, particularly the cleric's macabre rhapsody over the young woman asking to see the slab where her body would rot away. "May I ask you something?" she queries quietly when the story is finished. "If we had brought Svilennius back alive, what would his fate have been?" As the group makes to go their separate ways, Stirgen lingers and seeks Lilley's ear "Milady Lilley, we spoke of the Lycaeum before when we were below..." emotions crossing his ugly face as the travails they faced flashed across his face "I will be returning there to rest... but would you accompany me first to the Temple of the Rose?" Lilley hesitates, her hand going subconsciously to the ring strung around her neck. "I... have long wished to see a temple devoted to Shelyn," she admits. "I always imagined them to be full of sunlight and birdsong. Where I came from, there was but one temple, and it was Erastil's. As such, it was ... practical, but not beautiful."
Lilley twitches in her chair as Esme is led away, much as she had when Stirgen gagged her below, but realizes she is in no position to object. "You knew her... and gave her no hope or counsel but to die willingly?" she asks the priestess with a touch of resentment in her voice. "Did you not know that anyone who loved her would never accept such wisdom?" At Stirgen's flat dismissal of Esme -- and the caustic tone with which he labels her for her crime -- she flinches as if struck but does not look away from Valanthe, waiting for the zombie's tale.
"They were husband and wife. Apparently, when they married, she was not ... as she is now," Lilley falters, giving Esme an unsure glance, wishing she would explain herself. "They both surrendered. The husband was willing to face your justice, but Esme... thought her way was kinder...." She trails off unhappily.
"It is not a this; it is a she," Lilley growls a little dangerously, loosening Esme's gag so she can demonstrate her sentience. The Pharasmins may yet end her, but they will not treat her like the Twice-Born cattle in Ankar-Te. "How she came to be we do not know, but it was her husband responsible for stealing the blessed dead, through a door back there." She points back the way we came. "He is dead, below."
"He can no longer tell us how to find the stairs," Lilley sighs unhappily, avoiding Esme's accusing eyes, "and she undoubtedly will not. Nor will she willingly walk to her death. One of us must carry the dwarf and ...," she hesitates with an uncomfortable glance at the murdered necroalchemist, "ought we not to carry his body up to the Pharasmins as well?"
"Thank you," Lilley accepts her weapon from Kenji a bit gruffly, still feeling awkward over the earlier heated confrontation.
GM & Rajah:
The corners of her lips turn up in what isn't really a smile. "I'm exactly what I appear to be," she answers. "A monster and a murderer and a fugitive from justice. If you ask who I was, it's a far more interesting story... but it doesn't end well." She glances toward the corridor as she hears the squawking of the wizard's bird as the rest of the party begins to return. "In a dungeon, with a prisoner and a fallen comrade, in the presence of the dead, it is neither the time nor the place. Let's finish the job we agreed to. When we are out of the crypts and all this business finished, perhaps then it may be time for a tale." When the rest of the party returns to the necroalchemist's lab, Lilley ducks back down the corridor over the planks to retrieve her glaive from where she leaned it against the wall.
GM & Rajah: She chuckles bitterly, deep in her throat. "Because I ran, and because there were no witnesses. Because the only one who knew to suspect me would rather go along with stories of a mysterious beast in the night than deal with the repercussions of the truth. I know what it is to love, and I know what it means to sacrifice for it. I also know that the consequences of that sacrifice are not always ... pleasant and that many who sacrifice for love later wish they had done otherwise." She is soberly turned inward for a few moments before looking back at the zombie. "But, Esme, he did not wish to die. If he did, he could have found his end on one of our blades. But he chose not to. He threw down his weapon and surrendered. Esme, perhaps we could have smuggled you both out of here if you had convinced us the Pharasmins would kill you. He could have found work with the necromancers in Ankar-Te, continued his work without offending the Pharasmins; the dead are bought and sold there every day. You didn't give us a chance; you didn't give him a chance."
It obviously pains Lilley to look at the bound zombie-woman, but she keeps her distance and her weapon drawn. "Esme," she croons sadly, "he loved you despite what you were. Is that not rare enough to seize a chance at mercy? We would have spoken for you, for him. I would have taken you back to Ankar-Te; we could have been friends; I've been so alone...." With an effort, she blinks back tears and retains control of her emotions. "You, Rajah," she asks the other man in a gruff voice without taking her eyes off her charge, "you are a priest? What god do you serve? Not Pharasma, or you would condemn her for what she is, what was done to her, as did the wizard."
Don't you think maybe we should drag her along with us? Can't take the risk she'll slip the ropes if given half a chance. "The corridor is not long, and the room is cramped, like most in these warrens," Lilley replies. "Besides, we should not leave the dwarf here alone and defenseless." She draws her sword wearily, nodding the rest of the group toward the bedroom. "If she frees herself, I will do what is necessary."
Lilley makes an abortive move to interfere when Stirgen gags Esme but restrains herself. When he is done, she reminds the others in a flat voice, "There are two skeletons in the bedroom, her servants. No doubt they will attack without her to restraint them, and the Pharasmins would want them released from their service. I will stay this time, to watch the prisoner and the dwarf." She looks glumly at the bound zombie and the dead necroalchemist lying in a widening pool of blood. "Master wizard," she turns her attention to Kenji, "I apologize for my belligerence. I am what I said, but I do not intend for it to happen again. You have nothing to fear from me."
Lilley steps back from the cowering wizard, angry at herself for threatening him. "Esme, as jy nie praat nie, sal hulle jou doodmaak! Asseblief!" she entreats the zombie, tears in her eyes. "Hou op baklei ons!" Orc: "Esme, if you don't talk, they will kill you! Please! Stop fighting us!"
Lilley growls deep in her throat and turns toward Kenji, squaring her shoulders to fill as much of the corridor as possible. "Ek is ook 'n moordenaar. As jy wil om die reg om af te sien, begin met my." Her voice changes to more pleading tone as she throws a glance at the entangled zombie over her shoulder. "Esme, asseblief! Ek wil om te verstaan. Vertel ons waarom!" Orc:
"I also am a murderer. If you desire to mete out justice, start with me!"
"Esme, please! I want to understand Tell us why!" DM: [ooc]Lilley does not intend to attack Kenji or Rajah, but she does want to block them from getting to Esme with hostile intent. She won't allow them to move through her square as an ally usually does and will ready a grapple on anyone trying to shove past her.
When you are the target of a touch attack, your AC doesn't include any armor bonus, shield bonus, or natural armor bonus. You can't use your Dexterity bonus to AC (if any) while flat-footed.
Lilley is pale and shaken at what she has just witnessed, but she deliberately slides her blade back into its scabbard, although she doesn't move her hand far from the hilt. "Jy vertel ons...." She seems to realize something is not quite right and takes a long, shuddering breath, glancing around at the rest of the party. "You tell us," she repeats, "what is going on here. Are you dead or alive, and by whose hand? And what was the work that compelled him to rob the Lady of Graves?"
"Nee! Wat het jy gedoen?!?" Lilley gasps in horror, her hand going automatically to her sword and pulling it halfway from its sheath as she stares at Esme in disbelief. Orc: "No! What have you done?!?"
Lilley looks downcast that no one is speaking up against the assumption that the necroalchemist will die for his crimes. "Of course," she answers gruffly, stepping out of the way. "You are not our prisoner."
"Tell him that you'll wait for him," she responds immediately. "That you'll be there when his time is served. I do not know how harsh is the penalty for graverobbing," she looks at the others tentatively, "but he surrendered rather than fighting to the death. Our testimony must be worth something. As for the other, perhaps the staircase your husband has been using? He says the Pharasmins don't know of it. If we led you out that way before telling them of it...?" She looks to the cleverer party members for improvements to her rudimentary plan.
Lilley gives an uncertain glance at the wizard and the priest, feeling they are more qualified to offer an expert opinion than is she. "The Pharasmins wish to reclaim this level of their catacombs so you cannot stay here," she advances tentatively, "but you could come back with me to Ankar-Te, where the Twice-Born walk the streets and your appearance wouldn't draw a second glance. Until you knew what you wanted to do next."
Moving slowly so as not to startle Esme, Lilley raises her hand to the ring around her neck and holds it out to the length of the chain so that the woman can see it, taking a step closer if she will allow it. "The Pharasmins hired us, but I have given my devotion to Shelyn since my childhood. She values love that looks beyond appearances and faithfulness that does not fail when it faces adversity. The one who is guarding your husband and our injured companion," she nods back down the hallway toward the laboratory, "he also serves Shelyn," her lips curl in a bitter smile, "although two less likely worshippers of the Eternal Rose you may be hard pressed to find."
"Hy kon haar nie laat gaan...." Lilley whispers, seemingly stricken by the sight. Then she leans her glaive against the wall and takes a step around the gnome, her hands raised and open, palms out, to show she means no harm. "We don't want to kill you," she reassures her gently. "What do you want?" Orc:
"He couldn't let her go...."
Lilley waits for the gnome to cross the pit first, as sturdy as the planks seem, still not trusting them to bear her weight along with his. She holds her glaive poised for action but hopes that, if anything is to be found in the bedroom, it will be inert like the zombies in the vats rather than lurking readily.
"You would discuss the disposal of a man's prized possessions in his very presence?" Lilley chides the wizard with an apologetic glance at the necroalchemist. "He is obviously a man of intelligence; if he were to apply his efforts through more appropriate channels, he might put these tools to use for the benefit of others. At any rate, the dismantling and transport of such delicate equipment is better done when we don't have a prisoner to guard; we can come back down for it when he is safely in custody."
"Save your healing until we know what we find past the pit," Lilley advises, setting the last of the planks in place and eyeing them dubiously, wondering how much weight they will bear. "If the dwarf is in no danger at the moment, one of us might yet find ourselves in greater need. When we are back in safety, whether you or the Pharasmins heal him is of little matter, as long as he is healed."
Link to Rajah's channel. Should have given Rhen back 2 hp and made him stable. Lilley pauses, a plank suspended inches above the stone floor. "My mother was an elf," she admits finally, settling the piece in place and sliding it next to its neighbor. "I never knew her. My father named me Lilley."
Lilley can't help but overhear the well-dressed man talking about her as she moves the planks to cover the pit. "How can I speak a language I never learned?" she protests. "It is ... difficult for me to speak clearly around ... these." She raises a hand to hesitantly indicate her tusks. "When I am exercised, no doubt I am less careful with my speech, and you cannot understand me. And what is so fascinating about my name?"
Lilley retrieves the sword she dropped in the battle and wipes the decomposed flesh and alchemical goo from its blade before resheathing it. She looks a little startled at the Blue Rajah's statement, then gives a short, humorless laugh. "He's right," she tells the necroalchemist. "You never know what something like me might do when it's angry."
The man looks dejected at the lack of response. He does flit his eyes to a number of planks when Lilley mentions the pit, but tries to quickly look away.
Lilley looks uncomfortable at the necroalchemist's mention of his death. "Graverobbing is not a capital offense, is it? In a place where the undead carry palanquins and sweep floors? He surrendered rather than fighting to the death. He didn't ... commit murder." She gives a fruitless glance at the unconscious Duskwarden, the most likely candidate to be familiar with the judicial system of Kaer Maga.
Lilley comes back, shaking her head. "There's a pit in the floor. No way across." She looks back at the necroalchemist. "Where is this stairway? If we take your way up, we can let the priests know about it. The more helpful you are, the more mercy you can expect the Pharasmins to show."
Lacking the trained eye of the Duskwarden, Lilley hesitantly makes her way to a point where she can see what is in the room to the north.
Lilley flings the raven a sardonic glance. "Keep your bird from Ankar-Te, wizard," she advises Kenji. "There the necromancers operate in the open as respected businessmen. Smite them, and you will find yourself in custody." When the necroalchemist shouts for help, she tenses up, looking over her shoulder for more attackers, but relaxes when none are immediately forthcoming. "More of his creations, no doubt," she surmises. "The Pharasmins will want them restored to their rest. The dwarf," she asks, nodding to Rhen on the floor, "he will live? The priests above owe him a debt for his service; they can heal him. Have we rope or anything to secure the prisoner? Quiet yourself," she advises him, "and seek the Pharasmins' mercy. When your time is served, you ought to find fine employment in Ankar-Te, with your 'improvements' on the Twice-Born."
Lilley lowers her glaive and breathes heavily for a moment, clutching her ring, then turns her gaze to the oversized man. "How did you gain entrance to this place?" she asks. "And your ... things," her lips curls in distaste as she contemplates the dismembered orc-creature leaking alchemical fluids at her feet, "did you take them from the crypts above?"
As the shambling orc corpse steps into Lilley's view, she darts out with the tip of her glaive, hoping to rip open its undead flesh and spill its entrails.
Stirgen looks to Lilley for guidance as to whether he cedes passage or lets his axe fall...
Lilley growls as she sees the dwarf fall under the barrage of heavy undead muscle. "Waarom veg jy nie iemand om jou eie grootte?" she hisses at the monstrosity, although next to the animated corpse of this full-blooded orc enhanced by the necroalchemist's 'improvements,' even she and Stirgen look undersized. With a quick glance at her surroundings, she suddenly pulls her glaive up vertically and withdraws a few steps down the northern corridor. Wrapping her hand momentarily around the tiny ring dangling from her neck, she murmurs, "Dame van Grafte, ek is in diens van jou kerk. As ek val, oordeel my vinnig hierdie tyd." Returning her grip to her weapon and holding it again ready to strike with a grim resolve, she nods to Stirgen. "Kyk hoe jou rug." Orc:
"Why don't you pick on someone your own size? Lady of Graves, I am doing your church a favor. If I fall, judge me quickly this time. Watch your back."
Lilley, focussed on the zombies from the vats and not understanding a word the oversized man is babbling, grunts in grudging approval at the Blue Rajah's surprising success and moves behind Rhen to intercept Alexander. She somehow manages to miss the massive target with her glaive and hisses in frustration.
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