GM: I'm not exactly sure what moves needs to be rolled for Stitch's plan. Maybe Candace does an Acquire to gather all the items. Most seem like pretty reasonable items for any manor except the holy water. And then maybe it is a Give Orders (this might be better done by Zuni or Hagar) to get Agatha to set the rope. And finally a Fight move to yank the arm off (Syrina with help from Stitch and Zuni?).
"Get off her ye blasted fools!" Stitch hollers grabbing at both Syrina and Zuni. "Can't ya see the things goin' to crush her neck easy as a cow stepping on a toad."
"Everyone get back." The ratcatcher hustles the gathered crowd back toward the hall, although it is unclear if most do so to escape the grim horror of the severed arm wrapped around Agatha's neck or Stitch's own rat filled pockets. Regardless, Agatha's eyes momentarily seem to stop bulging like a bullywug's and her flesh regains some of her natural ghostly pallor.
Hearing all the commotion, Candace comes rushing back in and stops with a startled gasp as she sees her sister's predicament. Talon hisses and flutters his wings in a mix of fright and hatred for the unnatural thing upon the bed.
"Saint's Blessing! What's that? What's...oh Agatha!" She blurts starting to rush forward only to be grabbed by Stitch who eases her back toward the door.
"Do that and you'll kill her for sure miss." He says with uncharacteristic gentleness. He leans down to captured her eyes with his scruffy face. "Now see here miss, there just might be a way to get your sister outta this mess, but we need a few things. Can you help with that?"
Taking several breaths to regain herself and muster up her own courage for her sister's sake, Candace slowly nods.
"First off we need a few basic things. I got some rope from the supplies you brought by this mornin. Along with a block and tackle. Figured we'd need 'em if we had ta move some o' them stones about." He says starting to gaze around the rafters of the room. "Now this bein' a house full of women, I'm sure there's a passel of hairpins about. We'll need several dozen. Nice and sharp."
He starts to tick off a list of several more items. A pitchfork from the stables, the thickest fireplace screen you got, a hammer and a few nails, two or three pairs of thick leather work gloves. Blacksmith's gloves if possible.
He looks over at the dwindling remnants of the fire in Agatha's fireplace. "And we'll need more firewood. A lot more. And it's got to be dry. Bust up the bloody kitchen table if you have to."
Agatha's eyes go wide at the possible assault on her precious kitchen furniture. She raises her head slightly against the arms pressure. "Why, you'll do no such thing. I'll not have you *gurk*gack*"
"That'll be enough out o you." Stitch says take a couple steps back toward the door, utterly ignoring Agatha's glare.
He turns back to Candace. "Now I know that priest from the church has been comin' up here to perform the rites every week. Do you have any consecrated wine or water still about the house."
Candace frowns in thought. "I...I'm not sure. But I'll check the cabinet behind the shrine. That's where father keeps it if we've any left over."
Stitch nods. "That'll do. Now, show folk where we can round all that up." He says instead to Candace who nods and waves for any others to follow to help carry things back.
He turns back to Agatha, his hand going up to rub his stubbled chin as he thinks.
"Way I see it. That thing reacts to anyone gettin' close or her sayin' anything about it being there or them standing stones. Clearly whoever stole the hand, doesn't want her talkin." He says. "So we rig a rope from that ceiling rafter there. We stick the hairpins through the rope to create a spiked noose, like some of them collars ya see on fightin' dogs and what not. Nasty pieces of work them, but that'll keep the slippery thing from slidin' free o' the rope. Agatha seems to be free to move her arms, so she can help guide the loop into place. We splash some holy wine or water on the thing and then..." He snaps his fingers and gestures as if tugging a rope. "Up and away from her nobleness."
"The tricky part'll be getting it over into the fireplace. I figure that's where the fork'll come in handy. And a bit of muscle." He says eyeing Syrina and Zuni both. "We get the fire goin' real hot, then in it goes. We'll need to hold the iron screen in place until the thing is good and roasted. So it'll be a tad uncomfortable, but that's what the thick gloves are for."
He looks about at those still gathered at the edge of the room. "Thoughts?"
Stitch had spent most of the evening sulking in his single room cabin near the edge of the village. The entire incident with Charlotte had put him in a dark mood. A mood only made worse with the jug of moonshine he'd kept stashed on the shelf next to a mildewed copy of Prayers and Parables of the Ten.
Upon waking the next morning with his head pounding and stomach doing flip flops, Stitch just manages to make the meeting at the Pig & Pickle, although the smell of fried pickle just about sent him back out into the damp morning air again. It was mostly to just escape the smell, that he decided to join those seeking out that old codger Jarrod.
Sure he knew the old man existed and he wasn't afraid of him by any means. But there was no love lost between the two, not since Jerrod turned him down when Stitch asked him if he could apprentice with the woodsman and hunter. You don't have the right disposition for hunting. Can't do it out of spite or greed. Got to do it out of need and respect. The old man said. And so Stitch ended up catching rats in the village, rather than the bigger, more respectable game and threats out in the woods and moors. One of these days, he'd show the old man a bit about respect.
And so, he stood there in the crowd beneath the dripping branches of the Gloomwood shifting his feet from a patch of trampled primroses as Jerrod hollered at them all.
"We're here on village business old man." He hollers back. Going to get the saint's hand back and someone thought you might know something, although what I can't possibly imagine."
Stitch's knuckles turn white as Charlotte throws his request back in his face like so much pasture manure. Twisting his hat practically into knots, thunderclouds seethe in his eyes as he stares stoically at a particularly large knot in the wood behind the third cider barrel. Standing rigid as a post, the ratcatcher doesn't blink until his gaze shifts to follow the furious barmaid's form as it disappears into the kitchen.
He wasn't concerned about the various stares and rather weak efforts not to stare. After all everyone in the village knew the story. Knew how his engagement to Monika ended. How the long anticipated marriage of the miller's son to the eldest daughter of the most talented boyer in the region, their union blessed by saints, gods, and most importantly, family, fell into the Pits of Chaos and tore asunder friendships and village alliances that had weathered invasion, disease, storm and a hundred other challenges.
Let 'em all get a good look. A voice growls in his head. Let them soak it all in to feed the vines of gossip and rancor a bit longer. Blasted old men and their blasted grudges. To the Pits with them all!
Stitch eventually slaps his rumpled hat back upon his head and chin thrust out defiantly, daring anyone to stop him, leaves the Pig & Pickle. He still needed to find a weapon, he wasn't going against the unknown beasts of the Moors armed only with a paltry rat skinning knife.
Slopping his way across the village green, he can't help but recall that fateful time when so many things went so wrong. His boots slop and splash across the flooded green, the tops of the water sick grass swirling like hundreds of green worms in his wake.
Stitch's Tale:
He grew up with Monika and Charlotte. Their families had been close since long before he was born. Children had always played together, racing across the hills, games of hide and seek in the woods, celebrating the High Holy Days as well as the usual seasonal celebrations practiced in so many small villages across the West. It was early on that their father's had pledged their son and daughter to each other. Finally uniting the two families.
For years all seemed well. Except as the days and seasons passed and the children grew into young adults, Stitch did indeed find himself drawn more and more to one of the boyer's attractive daughters. The young miller's son found himself falling in love, his heart and soul forever held within her the confines of this one true love. Unfortunately, it was the wrong daughter.
Time passed and the blessed day was soon arriving. Monika fairly glowed with anticipation, for she was eager to start a family and she cared for Stitch, afterall they'd known each other since they were children. And although her gaze often landed on the strapping young drovers and merchant's boys who often passed through the village, she felt content enough knowing she would have hearth and home all her own come the summer solstice.
Stitch grew ever more fretful. His mind told him all would be well and that his love for Charlotte was merely infatuation or an excuse. There father's knew best. It wasn't until the night before his wedding, the night before the longest day, as he sat in prayer in the little village chapel keeping vigil over the hand of St. Ignys as every groom does, that the vision came to him.
Standing among the ancient stones, their gray skins covered in layers of thick lichens and moss. A woman's voice. Singing wordlessly of love and harmony drifting among the stones and across the quiet moors. Stitch looks around and finds himself suddenly standing before a veiled angle. Her face and head hidden beneath flowing white silk that drape down her like flower petals closed protectively against the night. She glowed with the radiance of moonlight, silver luminescence dancing along a pair a great wings and slowly shifted back and forth in the warm night air.
The youth drops to his knees. His breath coming in shallow gasps as his heart races and blood pounds in fright and awe at the creature looming before him. The singing stops. A hand, pale, long fingered, soft as new calf skin reaches out and caresses his cheek. He feels it shift to rest upon his head, even as his entire body quivers in a mix of fear and heady desire. For the scent and smell of the creature is potent indeed. Each breath fuels a fire within his body he has never felt or experience before or ever again.
Somehow he ends up atop the central horizontal stone, the one the old priest once called the Binding Stone. There with the twin moons shining overhead, he felt the true touch and breadth of a woman for the first time. Somewhere an owl called thrice in the dark night.
"May...may I see your face?"He asks breathless and quiet as he lays back against the stone, spent. The chill of the stone finally able to quench the flames that raced through his body.
The angel, for he knows not else to call her, nods once and leans forward, still astride his body. Slowly, he lifts the vale and gasps in shock, wonder and surprise. For it was Charlotte's face, her crystal blue eyes, framed by those auburn tresses that peered back at him from beneath the shroud.
He wakes with a start. Finds himself back in the chapel, the candles surrounding the hand of St. Ignys burnt to little more than nubs. He begins to stand, believing the whole experience just an odd dream until he looks down to see moss and lichens caught in his shirt and scattered about his feet.
It was a vision and message from the saint herself. And then and there he knew, knew completely and with every fiber of his being, that he could not marry Monika. Only Charlotte would he ever marry and until he did he would not, could not, be with any other.
Being young, foolish, and filled with the righteous power of one touched by gods, magic, or simple hallucination, Stitch announces his decision and intentions upon the green that next morning after he emerged from the chapel to meet his waiting bride to be, dressed in her gown of Summer Queen gold and white and brilliant red.
Chaos ensued. Monika burst into shamed tears, and within six months ran away with a drover working one of Florian's caravans. Her father demanded justice, revenge, due compensation for the now defunct feast and celebration. His father demanded explanations which Stitch had none the miller wished to hear. The old priest cried heresy, for he knew St. Ignys would never act in such a manner as Stitch described and that such thoughts were the height of blasphemy. The families soon split. Sinking into blame and acrimony. Their alliance burnt to ash and cold, dark embers.
The gods, being what they ever are, laughed and laughed.
Stitch contemplated what they might find out there in the wilds beyond the village fields and well traveled roads. Neither the council, the sheriff, or the laggards running things in the capital saw fit to patrol or deal with much beyond the barest effort required to keep merchant losses somewhat minimal. Venture off the main roads and who knows what you'd run into. Still there's gold and silver to be had beneath those stones. Nearly every story tells of how the Old Ones were buried with all their treasures along with their favorite husbands or wives.
Thoughts of gold and silver turn to protecting his own skin as he slips the short bladed, rusting knife from its simple belt scabbard. That just isn't going to do. Could barely fight off a rabid squirrel with that thing, better yet a bandit or one of the Lurkers.
He puzzles over how to better arm himself when he spots Charlotte working to clean up the sticky mess left by Remy. He remembered her father having an old hunting bow. Used to keep it wrapped in cloth near the door of his cabin. Stitch remembered seeing it when the farmer went hunting with his father every season. After the old man passed last year from the pox that whirled through the village, Stitch never gave Charlotte's father another thought. Other than the fact he raised a fine looking daughter. Maybe....
He steps over to where the Pig & Pickle's barmaid was busy scrapping honey into a bucket.
"Ahem...hello Charlotte." Stitch says slipping his hat from his head revealing an early onset widows peak.
"What? Oh...it's you." The barmaid replies coldly. Would the odious man ever leave her alone?
Clueless as to the woman's dislike, Stitch plows forward. "Charlotte, you know I'm joining the others to recover the saint's hand. And I was wondering if you still had your father's bow stashed away somewhere and if you might be willing to loan it to me to help bring the relic back safely?"
Negotiate for a bow using CHA:2d6 + 0 ⇒ (1, 3) + 0 = 4
Stitch slips back into the main room of the Pig and Pickle just as Councilor Florian makes his announcement. He listens as he slips the empty rat trap into the big pocket on the right side of his worn and weathered long coat. What looks to be a pale white round tail tip pokes from the oddly bulging left side pocket.
"That'll be another bit." He leans over and whispers to the frowning tavern keeper.
"What?! Oh aye, well add it to my bill." The man says distracted by the flow of events happening in his little pub. He could feel it in his bones. Something was stirring, the beginnings of heroic deeds and legendary tales. And all right here at the Pig & Pickle. If all went well, folk would flock here from up and down the valley, maybe even lure travelers from every city west of the Wall.
While the tavern keeper was lost in his dreams of future pickle sales, Stitch insures he's marked down as one who wishes to keep his share of any treasures found during the foray into the Moors. Business was good right now, but if they did find the old saint's hand and the rains stopped, well then the rats might go back to eating grains in the fields and apples in the orchards. So a bit of treasure would see him just fine until the harvest was in and the granaries needed constant trapping.
Stitch leaned back in his chair, taking another sip of the latest batch of the pub's cider to wash down the last bit of cheese from his Duke's Platter. Business had been good since the constant rains were driving the entire surrounding rodent population indoors. The ratcatcher sat in his usual shadow filled corner of the place, his hat tipped low covering the long, scaly scar that marred the right portion of his face.
He'd mostly ignored the ruckus caused by Remy and his crackpot honeybee theory. Although all that honey seeping into the floor was bound to attract the attention of some industrious mouse. Best talk to Butterman about extending my contract. He thinks marking a note elsewhere in the little journal. When the girl with her bird walks, he can't quite stifle the grimace. That bird was competition, and he didn't like the golden-eyed look it gave him before turning back to where Candace stared at the gooey honeycomb oozing toward Mathilde's boot.
But his disinterest in immediate events changes when the councilors come striding in, words passing like heavy hammer blows between them. He shakes his head. Those two couldn't agree on the sky being blue if their lives depended on it. But... He pulls out a tiny, tattered journal from the saddlebags resting near his feet. Flipping through the pages filled with long lists of names and numbered scratchings, he puts a finger to one row and raises his gaze to Councilor Florian.
His chair squawks as he slides in back and shuffles his way across the common room of the Pig and Pickle. His features are barely noticeable between the floppy hat and long coat, but as he passes, the locals almost unconsciously sidle aside. Not out of fear or respect. Instead it is fairly safe to surmise the pair of limp rat tails poking from one of his bulging coat pockets is the real cause.
"Indeed, best to study the situation completely, before spending the villages hard earned money on rewards and such." He says to draw the attention of the councilors. Lady Astier just snorts and steps away, not bothering to hide her disgust at the ratcatcher. Florian sighs and turns to Stitch.
"What do you want?" He says clearly wishing the man were anywhere but standing in front of him.
"Just emptied my traps at your place. You owe me two and a half silver bits."
"Ugh...don't bother me with that now man, can't you see I'm in the middle of village business?" Is Florian's annoyed reply.
"Eeeeek!" Stitch starts to reply only to be interrupted by a screech from the kitchen maid.
*SNAP!*
The familiar sound echoes from the kitchen and brings a smile to Stitch's face.
"We'll talk about it later Councilman." He says before disappearing into the kitchen, slipping past Remy, Candace, and the large stranger leaning against the bar.
