[Changeling IC] Time's Wings: Dark Omens [Archive]

Thanqol

2018-01-28, 06:49 PM

"This story is not about you," said Mercia the Flower Knight.

"I know it feels like it is. I know all the pain you're feeling seems like it should be important; how could it not be? Isn't there so much of it? But even if it's difficult for you to see beyond it you have to realize that none of this pain that you are feeling flows on to anyone else. If I torture you to death then no one will swear to avenge you. You have a son? I could do this in front of him and throw your mangled body at his feet and all he'd get is therapy. The simple fact is that your pain is minor. Your love is insignificant. The love that others feel for you is conditional. Would your husband eat his own father alive if you asked him to? No? Then you don't understand what a real romance is like."

She lit a cigarette. She'd started smoking at first because they'd fit the image of the hard-bitten private detective but they'd become a habit. She even packed her saddlebags with extras so she could take them home with her when the hunt was over. She put her lighter down on the tray of bloody dentist tools.

"I wish I knew what that was like," she said.

She'd never had that wish before. Every time her heart was ripped from her ribs and filled with the raw desire of the Kindly Ones they always added some part of themselves as well. She didn't know why - perhaps they had to. But it was always the worst part. It made everything so much more difficult.

She extinguished the cigarette in a pool of blood.

"I'm not the main character either," she said. "We're all irrelevant here. We're all the slaves to a love greater than either of us could ever imagine. We're all cursed with irrelevance because our hearts aren't big enough to stand on their own. So that's why it doesn't matter that I have to torture you, and it's also why by the time I'm done you'll be entirely broken. Neither of us have hearts big enough to think of anything but ourselves. And we can find a common understanding in that."

She kissed her prisoner. Curiosity compelled her. Maybe she did feel love? Maybe a kiss would break the spell? Maybe that moment of commonality was enough - a spark that might light a fire?

She wiped the blood from her lips. She was disappointed. She didn't know what she was supposed to feel but that wasn't it.

*

The Flower Knight walked out of the public restroom - a little stone box on the edge of the beach - wiping the blood from her hands with a thick black cloth. She looked out at the moonlight atop the waves and felt nothing. Longarms was sitting on the sand, typing furiously into his mobile phone. Mercia still remembered the look in his eyes when she'd pulled it out of the prisoner's pocket. He'd been using it non-stop ever since.

"How'd it go?" he asked.

"I think we're done," said Mercia. "She'll obey."

"Good," said Longarms, looking up but still typing. He looked pathetic, she thought. Like a junkie. Not the handsome and daring goblin prince she'd heard about in legends. There were beads of sweat on his forehead. Like he couldn't type fast enough. She wondered if she looked that pathetic as well. Was that enough of a connection for love to grow in?

"So," he was still talking. "What does she know about this monster that's supposedly going to stop us?"

"Not much," said Mercia. "The Autumn King is keeping that secret well. But I do not get the impression it is a bluff."

She pointed up at the moon. "There are too many signs."

"We'll need to deal with that, then. Oh, that's funny," said Longarms. "We've never had a turf war before. And I don't think we've ever been the good guys before either."

Mercia actually stopped and blinked. "The good guys?"

"Yeah!" said Longarms, jumping to his feet and grinning - and in that moment he was again The Grabber in all his splendour. "What else would you call two unlikely heroes acting to defend the natural order, and overthrow a regime founded on fear and human sacrifice? We're the protagonists this time around!"

Mercia was silent.

*

Pilgrim! You are being hunted.

Motorcycles adorned with lanterns and candles roar across the dirt paths of the sugar-cane fields. Here and there you catch glimpses of the Chariot of the Summer King - a Toyota Hilux pulled along by four motorcycles, the back filled with a massive bonfire. There are thirty of them or more, howling and roaring like beasts. The Summer Court is out in the fullness of its splendour and it has come for you.

You know enough to know that the King is mad, and you know enough of madness to know that is reason enough for him to pursue you. So too do you know enough of the hunt to know you could vanish if you so choose - but that is complicated by the fact that you are not alone. Aelas is with you and she is quick to tire.

Aelas! You are being hunted! The chaos and rumble of engines and pounding lights through the sugar-cane and the roaring of road warriors is not as familiar a sight to you as it is to the Pilgrim. Unlike the Pilgrim, though, you are not used to fighting monsters - these are people, at the end of the day, and though madness is a fuel it is not the spark. You can roll Wits+Socialize at a -1 to learn from their shouts what their motive is for this chase.

Edmund! You are being hunted - by bargain prices!

You are in Gustav's Gabled Gazebo of Grandeur. Despite all suspicions to the contrary, Gustav does not actually seem to be any sort of Fae creature. As far as you can tell he's a completely ordinary, checked-out elderly conman who's currently trying to scam you into some real estate. You need a place to start a restaurant, Gustav needs all of your money and all of the money you will earn in the future, a compromise can certainly be reached.

"So, listen kid, I'm getting old and while I'm struggling to make a living at all, I'm also struggling to find good places to eat out in this town," said Gustav. "Maybe these negotiations will go easier if I can taste some of your cooking and know exactly what it is I'm going to be sponsoring."

Lily and Jack! You are hunting the King of Winter!

Specifically he is locked in his room, refusing to come out, and responding to any text messages with a frowny-face emoticon. He's not in any trouble or anything - he's just too depressed to get out of bed. This is a problem because he's due to speak at a meeting of the Kings tonight and he represents the only potential voice of sanity at what is shaping up to be a pretty lunatic gathering.

So it has fallen to you, through the magic of default, to get him out of bed, get him dressed, and get him out to a meeting where he can vote not to feed the entire town to a giant bearsquid.

Right now he's pretending not to be in but you saw the light turn off when you got close so you're pretty sure he's inside. The door is locked. What do you do?

Elanorin

2018-01-29, 05:16 AM

stveje

2018-01-29, 05:21 AM

Lily and Jack! You are hunting the King of Winter!

Specifically he is locked in his room, refusing to come out, and responding to any text messages with a frowny-face emoticon. He's not in any trouble or anything - he's just too depressed to get out of bed. This is a problem because he's due to speak at a meeting of the Kings tonight and he represents the only potential voice of sanity at what is shaping up to be a pretty lunatic gathering.

So it has fallen to you, through the magic of default, to get him out of bed, get him dressed, and get him out to a meeting where he can vote not to feed the entire town to a giant bearsquid.

Right now he's pretending not to be in but you saw the light turn off when you got close so you're pretty sure he's inside. The door is locked. What do you do?

Jack can sympathize. When you wake up and it's one of those mornings, Jack too would rather just stay in bed. If you're going to be fed to a giant sea monster at high noon, you can at least spend your last few hours feeling warm, cozy, and truly sorry for yourself. Since, you know, no one else is going to.

Hopefully the King just needed someone to feel sorry for him so he can get up and do his job, then get back to bed, because otherwise Jack got out of his own warm, cozy bed for nothing, and he'd feel really, truly f'ing sorry for himself if he ended up being eaten by an oversized squid now.

He could probably pick the lock on the door in two seconds flat, but no doubt the King expects as much, and a good thief never does the expected. If he were the King, wanting to be left alone, he'd have barred the door from the inside - then picking the lock wouldn't do much good anyway - and probably trapped it to high heaven just because he could. Jack begins to look around, trying to recall the layout of the house both in and out. Maybe there's a window, or even better, a crawl space or something above the King's room. A window is pretty obvious, but not as obvious as the front door, but maybe the King hasn't considered the ceiling of his room.

Raz_Fox

2018-01-29, 11:11 AM

Amusingly enough, this is just like that one time in the wilderness and the nest of spade-headed serpents. Well, almost. The surrounding flora isn’t on fire yet.

You are quite right; if Aelas wasn’t here, and her without her noble steed, our friend Isaac would be off and away like a shot. Moving over treacherous terrain at high speed while evading others is, as fortune would have it, a pastime that he has become quite familiar with. His legs are long and his grip is sure, and moreover, he has been wandering where he will ever since he returned.

Not solely to go about marveling at the town, which seems just as much a wasteland of the soul as it did when he was other than he is now, and not simply to return to the solitude to which he has often been accustomed; rather, his long walks and evening roamings have been carried out with a firm and deliberate purpose, namely, to survey the wild and lonely places and make himself familiar with the terrain in preparation for such a time as this. If anything, he is grimly disappointed that the necessity of his work has so quickly come into focus.

But Aelas! Now therein lies the trouble: she is nimble and sure of foot, and would give even Isaac a run for his money in a hundred-meter, but she is accustomed to riding a rainbow unicorn through space, not barreling through stalks of sugar-cane with no way of knowing when or where the culmination of the race shall come. The Pilgrim has in his bones a long, terrible willingness to endure until the race is won, which- and I must beg her pardon here- she has never had the inclination or necessity to pursue.

So here I shall lay out the Pilgrim’s resolve, before circumstance is bound to drive it askew: to make his way to Aelas’s side and bear her strong upon his back, and this being done, to become a spectre of swirling smoke that he might spirit her away from the hunt. All this without a word, for he is ill accustomed to such, even now.

Anarion

2018-01-29, 12:50 PM

Aelas is indeed used to be borne across the stars. Distance to her has been the wild rush of interstellar winds, and the zipping and whipping of the starlight as dots stretched to threads of brilliant light in Butterfly's wake. She purses her lips and thinks, as she crouches with Isaac amid the sugarcane. The dense plants are a blessing, hiding even the soft rainbow sparkle that constantly suffuses her from the prying eyes of anyone more than a few feet away. Sounds carry from the chariot. Can she hear them? [2, 3, 5. edit: spending a willpower: 9, 3, 9]. They're nothing but distant, garbled shouts of rage and wild thrill as the chariot comes, but perhaps she can just make out what's going on.

Aelas is not looking at Isaac. Her head is cocked, her field of rainbow hair pools at the ground below her right shoulder, her eyes looking elsewhere, not here. She should call Butterfly, she is thinking. They could outrun anything, even a summer chariot on the wide roads of Australia. And Butterfly was probably feeling lonely too, they hadn't been apart for more than a day since the Pralinean Hurricane on Lexar-9, and, well, everybody knew you didn't ride a cosmic courser through an interstellar hurricane if you wanted all your limbs to be in the same dimension by the end of it.

Somewhere in this thought process, Aelas started to raise her fingers to her lips to whistle for Butterfly to come to them, but in the meantime, she almost certainly appeared to Isaac to be utterly helpless, crouching in the cane stalks and listening to some nonexistent sounds without moving when their pursuers were nearly upon them. So any slow shift of her hand for a whistle went unnoticed, and her own reverie was rudely interrupted when she found herself being bodily lifted.

"I-Isaac!? What are you doing?"

Thanqol

2018-01-29, 04:29 PM

"We're going to have to leave the car," said Mercia.

"The hell you say?" said Longarms.

"It's hers," she gestured vaguely back at the restroom. "And if she shows up with no car there'll be questions."

"But it's like a billion miles back. We'll be walking all night," said Longarms.

"Then we'd better get started," said Mercia, stomping down the road. "And pray someone stops for hitchhikers."

"Um, You Grace?" Lily hesitates but knocks three quick soft knocks on the bedroom door. It's like she has the gentle unobtrusive yet clearly audible knock down to a fine art. "Is there anything I can get you?" she tried, her voice as soft and clear as her knocking. She leaned in close to rest her ear to the door, her eyes turning to Jack's shoes, and then his hands.

You hear the soft murmur of sheets, and then a very artificial stillness as the King plays dead.

As you're in his house right now you can see many aspects of King Kent's life laid out around you. There is of course the laundry; strewn everywhere and not really in the habit of being washed. The clothes cycle right now seems to be Body > Floor > Body. There is the shelf full of a random collection of cassettes, vinyl records and CDs. Surprisingly it is organized, but infuriatingly it's organized by colour. There is the wardrobe filled entirely with sports and surfing trophies to the point where not one drawer can close properly. There is the kitchen with a single knife embedded almost to the handle in the door. It's been there for long enough for an enterprising spider to build a web around it.

The one part of it that demonstrates any sort of taste are the posters. Compelling minimalist designs of beaches, airplanes, and tropical environments. A lot of them have the words FLY QUANTAS prominently on them. King Kent makes his money doing advertising and his designs are actually pretty good.

Jack can sympathize. When you wake up and it's one of those mornings, Jack too would rather just stay in bed. If you're going to be fed to a giant sea monster at high noon, you can at least spend your last few hours feeling warm, cozy, and truly sorry for yourself. Since, you know, no one else is going to.

Hopefully the King just needed someone to feel sorry for him so he can get up and do his job, then get back to bed, because otherwise Jack got out of his own warm, cozy bed for nothing, and he'd feel really, truly f'ing sorry for himself if he ended up being eaten by an oversized squid now.

He could probably pick the lock on the door in two seconds flat, but no doubt the King expects as much, and a good thief never does the expected. If he were the King, wanting to be left alone, he'd have barred the door from the inside - then picking the lock wouldn't do much good anyway - and probably trapped it to high heaven just because he could. Jack begins to look around, trying to recall the layout of the house both in and out. Maybe there's a window, or even better, a crawl space or something above the King's room. A window is pretty obvious, but not as obvious as the front door, but maybe the King hasn't considered the ceiling of his room.

While it looks like the security is just a pair a drawn curtains, you are right to not count on any Changeling being that defenceless. Luckily the King's sloth has undermined his security - your investigation reveals a scribbly little signature on the wall. You know that's the Loophole to a fairly common defensive Contract. The upside is that you're fairly sure it's on it's non-lethal setting so the worst that'd happen to you trying to break in is being knocked out cold - the downside is that the magic naturally sprawls out to cover all approaches.

But coming in through the attic would still be one hell of an entrance.

[To sneak in you'll need a dex+larceny check at -3. Failure means you take 6B damage.]

Aelas is indeed used to be borne across the stars. Distance to her has been the wild rush of interstellar winds, and the zipping and whipping of the starlight as dots stretched to threads of brilliant light in Butterfly's wake. She purses her lips and thinks, as she crouches with Isaac amid the sugarcane. The dense plants are a blessing, hiding even the soft rainbow sparkle that constantly suffuses her from the prying eyes of anyone more than a few feet away. Sounds carry from the chariot. Can she hear them? [2, 3, 5. edit: spending a willpower: 9, 3, 9]. They're nothing but distant, garbled shouts of rage and wild thrill as the chariot comes, but perhaps she can just make out what's going on.

Lot of shouting, lot of very directed anger, no gunfire, extremely spread out pattern - the shape of the hunt aligns like the Moons of Mirrodin. Someone's gone missing and they decided to blame the new guys in town. They're looking to capture you and interrogate you to find out if you're responsible.

stveje

2018-01-29, 06:02 PM

While it looks like the security is just a pair a drawn curtains, you are right to not count on any Changeling being that defenceless. Luckily the King's sloth has undermined his security - your investigation reveals a scribbly little signature on the wall. You know that's the Loophole to a fairly common defensive Contract. The upside is that you're fairly sure it's on it's non-lethal setting so the worst that'd happen to you trying to break in is being knocked out cold - the downside is that the magic naturally sprawls out to cover all approaches.

But coming in through the attic would still be one hell of an entrance.

[To sneak in you'll need a dex+larceny check at -3. Failure means you take 6B damage.]

Making an entrance is a good way to get someone's attention. It's a risk, true, but so is getting eaten by squidzilla. Jack signals to Lily that he's going to try to find a way in, then slips silently like a shadow towards the attic.

Dex+Larceny-3 = 5: 8, 2, 7, 2, 7.

Raz_Fox

2018-01-30, 12:05 AM

What is the Pilgrim to say? There are many things that all intersect in his decision, most of them burning at the level of sheer instinct. Look about you: the cane fields are thick, and he knows clever tricks to become nothing but smoke upon the wind, not even leaving a trail to be followed; calling upon a radiant horse that burns like a prism would leave a trail that even a blind man could follow, cane stalks whipping upon the beast's flank, leaves like knives lashing your fair face. Look about you: the sugar cane will not serve us as a hiding place for long, and I do not trust this man whose head burns like a furnace not to set the fields alight to drive us out, doing wrong by the ones who work the land and sending you stumbling headlong away, for all that fire has no sting to someone who has passed through it and secured its blessing. We are alone, and I have carried heavier than you before when the wagons would not pass along the road, scraping my nails against the rock as I climbed, and how they pressed their faces against my back and the mane that grows there even now. Allow me to serve you in this; I will not see you harmed, though the King of Summer himself sets against me.

He swings her up onto his back, her arms at his shoulders, and leans forward like a stalking animal, ready to run on two limbs or four as needs must. (Can she feel the veins of his thick neck beneath her hands?) His toes dig into the earth, and beneath the herald his body tenses with power, thrumming through him like fire.

"Leaving."

He lunges forward, and as he does so, he unfolds just so and becomes smoke, wreathed in his own shape; he billows about the cane stalks, flowing through them without so much as a breath of wind, two blue embers burning in the thick mass that shapes itself into the false image of his head, and behind him flowing a shower of sparks like fire-crackers, blue and green and bloody orange. Dig your fingers into the wire-rough charcoal of his hair, my girl, still strangely there beneath your hands, even as the world swims in strange wisps about you, even as he nimble and sure makes his way out towards Prosperpine, hoping to break the cordon by simple virtue of being untouchable, unstoppable, and very fast.

Perhaps they will seek to use magic to catch him, or use their cars to run you down and bring you into the overwhelming presence of the king, but once Isaac bursts forth from the sugar cane the two of you will have the advantage of surprise, and more than that, you will have a road and room to call for a horse, and that will see you safely away into Prosperpine; and if he must choose between the two of you to see to safety, even if that safety is fleeting, he will choose you without a moment's hesitation, Aelas.

(Yes, you and I know that our lovely Butterfly is a car, but he does not, not yet, I think. Besides, Butterfly is picky, and they only carry one no matter their shape- and our Isaac being quite difficult to cram into anything short of a jeep, besides.)

Anarion

2018-01-30, 01:37 AM

Aelas clutches tightly, her hands in the shock of the Pilgrim's hair, her knees pressed around his neck, though not sooo tightly that they'd stop him breathing. And then the world is mist and smoke and Aelas can't stop a shriek, a mix of terror and delight all in one, though she swiftly puts a hand over her own mouth and holds on with the other. This isn't like riding Butterfly. The speed there was wild and free, beautiful and far-reaching. This, this is close, wrapping and caressing her, shrinking her whole world so that it's just her and the pilgrim. She ought to be afraid, but this is too nice.

"They're looking for someone who's missing" she breathes into his ear as they run. "I could hear them, the way they're shouting. They think we took them, but they're wrong. Maybe...if we found the person who's lost..." She trails off. Isaac is the guide for where to run, she's the one being carried.

Elanorin

2018-01-30, 02:15 PM

You hear the soft murmur of sheets, and then a very artificial stillness as the King plays dead.

As you're in his house right now you can see many aspects of King Kent's life laid out around you. There is of course the laundry; strewn everywhere and not really in the habit of being washed. The clothes cycle right now seems to be Body > Floor > Body. There is the shelf full of a random collection of cassettes, vinyl records and CDs. Surprisingly it is organized, but infuriatingly it's organized by colour. There is the wardrobe filled entirely with sports and surfing trophies to the point where not one drawer can close properly. There is the kitchen with a single knife embedded almost to the handle in the door. It's been there for long enough for an enterprising spider to build a web around it.

The one part of it that demonstrates any sort of taste are the posters. Compelling minimalist designs of beaches, airplanes, and tropical environments. A lot of them have the words FLY QUANTAS prominently on them. King Kent makes his money doing advertising and his designs are actually pretty good.

Right.

While Lily was just about to settle in for a good solid hour of gentle but persistent one-sided negotiations through a shut door she noticed Jack heading off to find some way in that wasn't the door.

Lily frowned to herself and took a moment to think. She didn't really know the King. She didn't even know why he was locking himself in refusing to see or talk to anyone. Nor did she know how he'd react to Jack breaking in to his sealed up hideaway. While she felt she knew Jack a bit better, and liked him, she really wasn't sure how tactful he was going to be here, and this worried her.

She bit her lip nervously. Jack heading off had escalated this faster than she had been prepared for. Why was everything insisting on happening so quickly since she got back? Why couldn't everyone just... slow down? She felt a pang of sympathy for the King, if she had somewhere to call home like this she'd be sorely tempted to seal herself in it too and not come out for a few days and now they were about to deny him that.

No, she really shouldn't leave this to Jack to deal with alone. She needed to get in there too. Quickly.

"It's okay. I understand," she said softly at the closed door. "You don't have to come out. I'll come to you, Your Grace," she offered as if this was doing him a favour. She wrapped her arms about herself in a little hug and drew deep breaths of air in to her lungs. The air seemed to dilute her small frame until her shape was more wisps in the air suggesting her form than an actual girl stood outside a shut room. Then she stepped forwards, passing through the wall, and the rooms around her seemed veiled in Twilight.

[Using Whispers of Morning to get in to the King's room.]

Thanqol

2018-01-30, 05:11 PM

"Do you hear that?" said Longarms. "It sounds like someone yelling?"

Mercia turned her head and for a moment the two stood still. Longarms produced a set of binoculars from his pockets and stared out into the distance.

"Looks like a fire," he said. "Should we investigate?"

"It looks like several fires," said Mercia, taking the binoculars from his hands. When she looked through them all the colours were inverted; the sky above was the creamy white of expensive paper and on the horizon boiled a sucking void. "I've seen it before. Summer."

"Oh, so jackpot then?" said Longarms, producing a fully assembled sniper rifle from the same bag he got the binoculars.

"I'm not sure," said Mercia. "The prisoner said he's still wearing the Crown. I don't know if that means the Contract of Summer is still in place. If we engage we might not be able to retreat."

"Only one way to find out!" said Longarms. Mercia put her hand on his rifle and lowered it.

"No. We need more information." Longarms gave her a dirty look. "Don't be like that," she said. "Call your pets. We don't need to risk ourselves this early in the Hunt."

Making an entrance is a good way to get someone's attention. It's a risk, true, but so is getting eaten by squidzilla. Jack signals to Lily that he's going to try to find a way in, then slips silently like a shadow towards the attic.

Dex+Larceny-3 = 5: 8, 2, 7, 2, 7.

A delicate brush to gently scrape away a load-bearing cobweb, a polite but vexing riddle to the invisible goblin who stands waiting with a club - these are the tools you wield, and with such grace that none might mark your passage.

No, she really shouldn't leave this to Jack to deal with alone. She needed to get in there too. Quickly.

"It's okay. I understand," she said softly at the closed door. "You don't have to come out. I'll come to you, Your Grace," she offered as if this was doing him a favour. She wrapped her arms about herself in a little hug and drew deep breaths of air in to her lungs. The air seemed to dilute her small frame until her shape was more wisps in the air suggesting her form than an actual girl stood outside a shut room. Then she stepped forwards, passing through the wall, and the rooms around her seemed veiled in Twilight.

[Using Whispers of Morning to get in to the King's room.]

And all at once you are both inside the room of the Winter King, King Kent Derbyshire, first of his name, king of the Andals and the First Men.

Messy but not filthy. Designed so that as much as possible can be done without leaving bed - there is a television hooked up to a Nintendo, a bottle of water and bag of snacks, and a bed laden with blankets so as to keep out the autumn chill. Underneath those blankets is curled the mighty king, burrowed in snugly as though expecting hibernation. There is a start from the blanket pile as you make your entrances - dropping through the ceiling and walking through a door are two very impressive ways in - but it rapidly peters out and the concealment in the blankets is maintained. "What?" he demands in the defeated and surly tone of a depressed teenager.

Perhaps they will seek to use magic to catch him, or use their cars to run you down and bring you into the overwhelming presence of the king, but once Isaac bursts forth from the sugar cane the two of you will have the advantage of surprise, and more than that, you will have a road and room to call for a horse, and that will see you safely away into Prosperpine; and if he must choose between the two of you to see to safety, even if that safety is fleeting, he will choose you without a moment's hesitation, Aelas.

(Yes, you and I know that our lovely Butterfly is a car, but he does not, not yet, I think. Besides, Butterfly is picky, and they only carry one no matter their shape- and our Isaac being quite difficult to cram into anything short of a jeep, besides.)

As you emerge, the net finds you - thick and weighted and quite uselessly solid. It passes through your smoke body and lands in a tangled pile woven through the cane. Not getting the message, the ogre who threw it launches himself in an impressive full-body tackle at your midsection and resultingly winds up tangled in his own net. Comical - but for his bellowing attracting the hunters, and you may not be so lucky a second time.

But you have some road to yourself, you have an opening to foil your pursuers - you have time to build a lead, summon a vehicle, or use other magic should you desire.

Anarion

2018-01-31, 11:57 AM

As you emerge, the net finds you - thick and weighted and quite uselessly solid. It passes through your smoke body and lands in a tangled pile woven through the cane. Not getting the message, the ogre who threw it launches himself in an impressive full-body tackle at your midsection and resultantly winds up tangled in his own net. Comical - but for his bellowing attracting the hunters, and you may not be so lucky a second time.

But you have some road to yourself, you have an opening to foil your pursuers - you have time to build a lead, summon a vehicle, or use other magic should you desire.

Now, Aelas puts a finger to her mouth, and her single clear whistle pierces the silence of the open road, calling to the vrooming engine, and from out of nowhere, there is Butterfly, a jet black Ferrari, the rearing stallion prominent on the vent. [spending 1 glamour]. She turns to Isaac as she climbs off his back, running a hand gently along his shoulder as she does so. "Butterfly can only carry one person. I'm guessing you want me to get in there and get moving, right Isaac? I can do that, but I'm gonna rev the engine reaaaal loud and they're all gonna chase me down the road until I find somewhere safe or I run into whoever they're looking for. But you're gonna find the person they're looking for, okay? This is all just a misunderstanding." Aelas smiles because everything is fine and she's pretty sure this is gonna be fun, even though she has to leave Isaac behind.

[If Isaac agrees, I think this would qualify as a 1 willpower joy regain under "deny helping others to maintain your joy"]

stveje

2018-01-31, 01:47 PM

Elanorin

2018-01-31, 03:02 PM

And all at once you are both inside the room of the Winter King, King Kent Derbyshire, first of his name, king of the Andals and the First Men.

Messy but not filthy. Designed so that as much as possible can be done without leaving bed - there is a television hooked up to a Nintendo, a bottle of water and bag of snacks, and a bed laden with blankets so as to keep out the autumn chill. Underneath those blankets is curled the mighty king, burrowed in snugly as though expecting hibernation. There is a start from the blanket pile as you make your entrances - dropping through the ceiling and walking through a door are two very impressive ways in - but it rapidly peters out and the concealment in the blankets is maintained. "What?" he demands in the defeated and surly tone of a depressed teenager.

"We're sorry to disturb you, Your Grace," Jack said and bowed as one does before one's king. Out of the corners of his eyes he studied his surroundings, as he always did when entering a new room. Old habit. His eyes passed over the Nintendo and made a note of it. He had to admit he was rusty on the social graces, but maybe his plan could work with Lily's aid. Lily, who had all that social nicety down to an art. Maybe he should have talked the plan over with her first, but ... well, when you were in the moment, sometimes you had to rely on an unspoken understanding. He threw her a glance, and memories came flooding back, of his time with Veronica, working as a team, supporting each other. With the memories came sadness, but also a sense that maybe he could do it. Maybe they could do it. "We thought maybe you wanted some company," he said, as if the king hadn't done his best to give the exact opposite impression. "Play a game or something." He put it out there casually, an offer for some simple distraction, not a challenge. But Jack thought he knew gamers; they couldn't help but make it a challenge, in his experience. Once they got started ...

He hoped they weren't in too much of a hurry.

Lily certainly wasn't in a hurry. She caught Jack's glance her way and while she didn't fully meet it, her eyes rose no higher than to his shoulders, she offered a tiny and brief smile instead by way of accepting the joint effort.

Game? Lily's eyes did a second scan of the room and only then noticed the thing that looked like it could be a console. In truth she was not a very experienced gamer though she'd tried it a handful of times a lifetime ago with friends whose names she barely remembered anymore. It was a good plan, she decided, the memories that came back were of friendly rivalry and laughter and surprising honesty eased by having your eyes glued to a screen rather than facing each other.

"And maybe some pizza?" Lily added joining in to Jack's plan. Perhaps she ought not to have worried about Jack's sense of tact, he was clearly quite good at this.

[Rolling to Assist Jack: Manipulation+Socialize: 3, 8, 2, 9, 1, 10, 10, 8, (10 again: 4, 10 (10 again: 5))]

Health: 7/7
Glamor 5/10
Willpower: 5/5

stveje

2018-02-01, 05:21 AM

[Rolling to Assist Jack: Manipulation+Socialize: 3, 8, 2, 9, 1, 10, 10, 8, (10 again: 4, 10 (10 again: 5))]

Manipulation+Socialize+Wyrd+Mantle+Assist = 3-1+1+3+6 = 12 : 7, 7, 9, 7, 6, 4, 4, 2, 3, 6, 3, 1

A tie? On those odds? I need to sacrifice a goat to the dice god, clearly. F'ck it, I'll spend Willpower rather than have another contest: 4, 9, 9

3 successes beats 1. I don't know yet if it costs me glamor, as we haven't seen yet whether he challenges Jack or Jack has to challenge him.

Health 7/7
Glamour 5/10
Willpower 3/4

Raz_Fox

2018-02-01, 09:58 AM

Were this some other sort of story, our friend might here slip the viewing audience a wry glance, the arched eyebrow communicating clearly that performing an investigation into a missing persons case is clearly not his forte; perhaps he would sardonically point out that if Aelas here needed something heavy lifted, he was her man. But this is not that sort of story, and the Pilgrim is well used to being given an open-ended and ill-defined task to complete. Instead, he nods, emerging bodily from the smoke, which runs in streaming rivulets into his natty button-down, there to coil lovingly against his rough skin.

He watches her leave without so much as a word, a receding mountain in the rear-view mirror. Then he waits, listening to the cracking and creaking of the sugar cane as the pursuit catches up. Somewhere, distant, there is the whine of power generators; the creak of a windmill brushed by the dying hand of the breeze; the roar of an engine injected with fuel and let loose to run. Strange sounds, wondrous strange.

Ah, and there’s the call that he’s been spotted. It’s miles back to town, over field and fence and dry-gulch, and should they catch him, they will teach him terrible new fires. Well, let them try. Isaac is the master here, and swift are his footfalls; he’ll vanish into the land his friend, and let them waste their gas in circling.

[Using Elusive Gift and spending a point of WP, rolled with the shiny Onyx Path dice app. 4 Successes, contested by Wits+Composure+Wyrd of lead pursuer. If Isaac wins, he can hide for an hour completely undetected from the pursuit, and then will trigger Light-Shy using its catch and make his way into town.]

Health 9/9
Glamour 5/10
Willpower 5/6

Thanqol

2018-02-01, 06:13 PM

"They're out in force," Longarms translates from fruitbat. "The whole lot of them. And they're coming in this direction."

"They're following us!" said Mercia in shock. "They're hunting us!"

"Sounds like," said Longarms grimly. "Looks like we're not as stealthy as we thought we were."

"Or they're more paranoid than we thought. Sh*t," said Mercia, "They'll have our scent. Do you have any spare iron?"

Longarms made a face, but he unloaded the clip from his gun - a handful of iron bullets. He crushed them in a jade mortar and pestle and cast the dust around him like sand. "Right, that should break any magic they're using to follow us," he said.

"Let's get out of here then," said Merica. "Double time."

"And maybe some pizza?" Lily added joining in to Jack's plan. Perhaps she ought not to have worried about Jack's sense of tact, he was clearly quite good at this.

[Rolling to Assist Jack: Manipulation+Socialize: 3, 8, 2, 9, 1, 10, 10, 8, (10 again: 4, 10 (10 again: 5))]

There's no response at first, and then a pale set of hands emerge from under the blankets and pick up the controller.

Challenge accepted.

as we haven't seen yet whether he challenges Jack or Jack has to challenge him.

It's easy enough to manoeuvre so Lily challenges Kent, and Kent challenges you so it does count for the loophole.

It is shocking how deep the muscle memory of Mario Kart runs. It's like riding a bike - within a matter of minutes all those old instincts congeal and you're all executing perfect drifts, expertly navigating canyons, and cursing the communist tendencies of the cursed Blue Shell (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SEfmhcD8pE)like it was only yesterday. And really, when you think about it, this is natural. Each of you have probably spent more hours playing Mario Kart than you have spent doing your math homework.

The pizza also helps. It's the most normal your lives have been in living memory.

Over the course of the game Jack is able to analyse the King's playstyle and, through it, his personality. His lazy turns, lack of propensity to take difficult shortcuts, and choice of Wario indicate that his Vice is, in fact, Sloth. That was predictable enough; his way to recover from emotional desolation is to hide out in bed, after all. More interesting is the moment when you're screaming down Rainbow Road and you hear the first words you've heard from him all evening: "This is a really beautiful course,"

Whatever else the King is, the one thing that can stir his soul out of despondency is beauty; his Virtue is Artistic.

Finally, you notice that his play has severe self-destructive tendencies. Most of the time when he loses it's because he seems to have sabotaged himself. It's comedic when he slips on his own thrown banana peel but some part of him wanted that to happen. It's a subtle but meaningful motion to one looking for it: one of his aspirations is to punish himself for his sins.

In the end, though, it's Jack who rocks across the finish line. The King puts the controller down. He's not better now, but he'll at least talk to you at this point.

Now, Aelas puts a finger to her mouth, and her single clear whistle pierces the silence of the open road, calling to the vrooming engine, and from out of nowhere, there is Butterfly, a jet black Ferrari, the rearing stallion prominent on the vent. [spending 1 glamour]. She turns to Isaac as she climbs off his back, running a hand gently along his shoulder as she does so. "Butterfly can only carry one person. I'm guessing you want me to get in there and get moving, right Isaac? I can do that, but I'm gonna rev the engine reaaaal loud and they're all gonna chase me down the road until I find somewhere safe or I run into whoever they're looking for. But you're gonna find the person they're looking for, okay? This is all just a misunderstanding." Aelas smiles because everything is fine and she's pretty sure this is gonna be fun, even though she has to leave Isaac behind.

For a moment it ceases to be Changeling and starts to be Apocalypse World. For a moment you're riding historic on the Fury Road, pursued by a mob of screaming Warboys on bikes and utes. Butterfly roars and your spine turns to jelly as you scream down the unpaved dirt road.

This is a chase scene; you start at three successes, if you hit eight successes total on extended dexterity+drive rolls you hit the freeway where the sheer speed of your car will be able to leave everyone else in the dust. The distance between you and the Summer Court is determined by the difference of successes between you and them; if they match your successes they're close enough to ram or board you.

[Summer Court roll: 7,1,10,4,10,9; nothing on the 10s. Their total: 3, your total: 3]

And close they do - in the time it takes you to pull away suddenly they are all around you. A biker made out of lightning smashes in the window next to you with a crowbar. There's a huge jolt as the King's Hilux rams directly into Butterfly's rear, knocking out both of your tail lights and your rear license plate. More are pulling up around you with chains and baseball bats and torches.

Ah, and there’s the call that he’s been spotted. It’s miles back to town, over field and fence and dry-gulch, and should they catch him, they will teach him terrible new fires. Well, let them try. Isaac is the master here, and swift are his footfalls; he’ll vanish into the land his friend, and let them waste their gas in circling.

[Using Elusive Gift and spending a point of WP, rolled with the shiny Onyx Path dice app. 4 Successes, contested by Wits+Composure+Wyrd of lead pursuer. If Isaac wins, he can hide for an hour completely undetected from the pursuit, and then will trigger Light-Shy using its catch and make his way into town.]

You are gone. Gone gone gone - these hills are yours, these fields are yours, these lands are yours. None can find you.

But you might find someone else - you're not alone in these hills. Roll wits+survival at -3; if you succeed you discover the two Huntsmen on your way and may observe them undetected.

Raz_Fox

2018-02-01, 08:30 PM

Anarion

2018-02-02, 02:27 AM

For a moment it ceases to be Changeling and starts to be Apocalypse World. For a moment you're riding historic on the Fury Road, pursued by a mob of screaming Warboys on bikes and utes. Butterfly roars and your spine turns to jelly as you scream down the unpaved dirt road.

This is a chase scene; you start at three successes, if you hit eight successes total on extended dexterity+drive rolls you hit the freeway where the sheer speed of your car will be able to leave everyone else in the dust. The distance between you and the Summer Court is determined by the difference of successes between you and them; if they match your successes they're close enough to ram or board you.

[Summer Court roll: 7,1,10,4,10,9; nothing on the 10s. Their total: 3, your total: 3]

And close they do - in the time it takes you to pull away suddenly they are all around you. A biker made out of lightning smashes in the window next to you with a crowbar. There's a huge jolt as the King's Hilux rams directly into Butterfly's rear, knocking out both of your tail lights and your rear license plate. More are pulling up around you with chains and baseball bats and torches.

"GET OFF MY CAR! OFF, OFF OFF!" Aelas is completely flipping out, and as she does so, a storm brews above her head. It looks like a star rises from her hair, slowly gathering dust and spinning, and as it does, it whirls into an inferno, spitting out blazing matter faster and faster, making the space all around the car into a corona of blazing meteors. Oddly, not a one of them strikes the car itself, Butterfly is completely immune, but everyone on the car is caught in the blaze, and is subject to the Inferno environmental tilt. Aelas does not stop screaming either, her shrieks echoing over the road. [Invoking Elemental Fury with loophole and the Fairest bonus to not harm Butterfly or Aelas herself, Inferno Tilt (-2 to all physical rolls for those affected, after 2 turns take 2B/turn due to smoke, after three take 1L/turn from fire and dex+stam or catch fire themselves. Note that the WoD rules have each chase roll as representing 10 normal turns.)]

She also floors the pedal and goes, fast as Butterfly can carry her. You can hear the engine roar, and perhaps that's actually the sound of the horse's neigh as it rears and charges. [dex+drive: 2, 9, 3, 4, 10. 3. 2 successes. Edit: forgot to count Butterfly as equipment. I think since she's got doubled speed special that she'd count as a top class car, and add 3 dice, if you disagree, knock off from the right. 4, 10, 6. 3. So 3 Successes total. ]

Glamor 4/10
Clarity: 6/6
Health: 6/6
Willpower: 6/6

stveje

2018-02-03, 03:05 PM

There's no response at first, and then a pale set of hands emerge from under the blankets and pick up the controller.

Challenge accepted.

It's easy enough to manoeuvre so Lily challenges Kent, and Kent challenges you so it does count for the loophole.

It is shocking how deep the muscle memory of Mario Kart runs. It's like riding a bike - within a matter of minutes all those old instincts congeal and you're all executing perfect drifts, expertly navigating canyons, and cursing the communist tendencies of the cursed Blue Shell (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SEfmhcD8pE)like it was only yesterday. And really, when you think about it, this is natural. Each of you have probably spent more hours playing Mario Kart than you have spent doing your math homework.

The pizza also helps. It's the most normal your lives have been in living memory.

Over the course of the game Jack is able to analyse the King's playstyle and, through it, his personality. His lazy turns, lack of propensity to take difficult shortcuts, and choice of Wario indicate that his Vice is, in fact, Sloth. That was predictable enough; his way to recover from emotional desolation is to hide out in bed, after all. More interesting is the moment when you're screaming down Rainbow Road and you hear the first words you've heard from him all evening: "This is a really beautiful course,"

Whatever else the King is, the one thing that can stir his soul out of despondency is beauty; his Virtue is Artistic.

Finally, you notice that his play has severe self-destructive tendencies. Most of the time when he loses it's because he seems to have sabotaged himself. It's comedic when he slips on his own thrown banana peel but some part of him wanted that to happen. It's a subtle but meaningful motion to one looking for it: one of his aspirations is to punish himself for his sins.

In the end, though, it's Jack who rocks across the finish line. The King puts the controller down. He's not better now, but he'll at least talk to you at this point.

Jack would like this moment to last, but what Jack wanted had never really been anyone's concern, not even Jack's own. As wonderful as the old memories and normality felt, part of Jack was busy paying close attention and making plans.

If sloth was the problem, perhaps sloth could be the solution too.

"Do you have to be physically present to cast your vote at this meeting of Kings?" he asked casually while picking up a slice of pizza.

Thanqol

2018-02-04, 04:30 PM

[Incredibly, on two dice, 1 Success.]

Have you ever entered into a room with your mind already focused on something else? You go through the routine, eyes flickering from task to task, not seeing some new object or stealthy visitor until they are pointed out to you?

That is what it is like to be in Isaac’s presence when he is being so quiet and canny that everyone’s attention passes him by. The eye slides right off, seeing nothing but a swimming of dust in the lid or a shadow blending into all the others. No footfall he makes, and nothing trembles in his wake. And it is in such a state that Isaac stumbles upon the Huntsmen.

They move as predators: this is what he thinks to himself. One wreathed in cigarette smoke, and this bothers him; he once smoked. The aroma dredges up deep, unpleasant memories, ones he flinches from. Better to think of burning. The other, somehow familiar; the connection will come to him eventually. Whatever they are, they are not human, though that is not what troubles him. His closest friend is not human, either, and he rubbed elbows with many strange things that could, in their own odd way, be trusted in the wilderness. No, it is the fact that they are predators. Predators such as he has not seen since ascending.

He studies them, unseen, unfelt, unblinking. If you do not know the hunter as well as it knows itself, you may very well regret it during the quiet hours of the night.

You follow them, away from the distant fire. They move swiftly, not speaking, jumping fences and striding across the fields with the steady motion of those who know how to pace themselves.

They reach the road. The autumn moon emerges from between the torn clouds, and a single streetlight provides a puddle of golden warmth. And for a second you catch a glimpse of metal.

The man picked this moment perfectly - a strong light source, fresh moonlight, and no easy cover. He holds an iron mirror in his palms and is using it to look around in all directions - and spiteful iron will happily stare right through your Contract. Hunters, you called them, and you were right to do so.

[Wits+Stealth at -6 to avoid detection.]

"GET OFF MY CAR! OFF, OFF OFF!" Aelas is completely flipping out, and as she does so, a storm brews above her head. It looks like a star rises from her hair, slowly gathering dust and spinning, and as it does, it whirls into an inferno, spitting out blazing matter faster and faster, making the space all around the car into a corona of blazing meteors. Oddly, not a one of them strikes the car itself, Butterfly is completely immune, but everyone on the car is caught in the blaze, and is subject to the Inferno environmental tilt. Aelas does not stop screaming either, her shrieks echoing over the road. [Invoking Elemental Fury with loophole and the Fairest bonus to not harm Butterfly or Aelas herself, Inferno Tilt (-2 to all physical rolls for those affected, after 2 turns take 2B/turn due to smoke, after three take 1L/turn from fire and dex+stam or catch fire themselves. Note that the WoD rules have each chase roll as representing 10 normal turns.)]

She also floors the pedal and goes, fast as Butterfly can carry her. You can hear the engine roar, and perhaps that's actually the sound of the horse's neigh as it rears and charges. [dex+drive: 2, 9, 3, 4, 10. 3. 2 successes. Edit: forgot to count Butterfly as equipment. I think since she's got doubled speed special that she'd count as a top class car, and add 3 dice, if you disagree, knock off from the right. 4, 10, 6. 3. So 3 Successes total. ]

[So Butterfly's equipment bonus doesn't apply here - although if you're prepared to video yourself driving down a pothole filled dirt country road in a Ferrari then I'll change my tune. In this specific environment the dirtbikes and offroad vehicles have the edge - but that's also why reaching the highway ends the chase, because none of them can keep up with your fancy car on a real road with no traffic.

Roll: 5,5,3,7,3,7 - nothing!]

Unfortunately for Aelas, she happens to have targeted the one social organization of people statistically by far the most likely to have some form of fire immunity. A couple of the Summer Court peel off from the fire vortex but the vast majority of it just lean into it.

They return fire in kind. A Molotov cocktail sails spectacularly through the air and smashes onto your windshield. Your vision, already pretty on-fire-y, goes to full scale fire in all directions. Butterfly's windscreen wipers batter ineffectually against the burning petrol, leaving smears of melted plastic.

The canefields all about are ignited by this point as well. Somewhere some insurance company is going to have a bad day.

Jack would like this moment to last, but what Jack wanted had never really been anyone's concern, not even Jack's own. As wonderful as the old memories and normality felt, part of Jack was busy paying close attention and making plans.

If sloth was the problem, perhaps sloth could be the solution too.

"Do you have to be physically present to cast your vote at this meeting of Kings?" he asked casually while picking up a slice of pizza.

"I don't know," said the King uncertainly "I mean... it's not like there's a rule that says I do..."

[Convincing him to delegate you his authority is manipulation+persuasion, with a +3 because you're leaning on his Vice]

Anarion

2018-02-04, 08:08 PM

[So Butterfly's equipment bonus doesn't apply here - although if you're prepared to video yourself driving down a pothole filled dirt country road in a Ferrari then I'll change my tune. In this specific environment the dirtbikes and offroad vehicles have the edge - but that's also why reaching the highway ends the chase, because none of them can keep up with your fancy car on a real road with no traffic.

Roll: 5,5,3,7,3,7 - nothing!]

Unfortunately for Aelas, she happens to have targeted the one social organization of people statistically by far the most likely to have some form of fire immunity. A couple of the Summer Court peel off from the fire vortex but the vast majority of it just lean into it.

They return fire in kind. A Molotov cocktail sails spectacularly through the air and smashes onto your windshield. Your vision, already pretty on-fire-y, goes to full scale fire in all directions. Butterfly's windscreen wipers batter ineffectually against the burning petrol, leaving smears of melted plastic.

The canefields all about are ignited by this point as well. Somewhere some insurance company is going to have a bad day.

[Fair enough. Dex+drive: 9, 2, 3, 2, 7. 6/8 successes.]

Butterfly zooms through the dirt road, flying over bumps and rumbling over ditches. This isn't her best pace, she's a horse that's used to running along intergalactic roads of starlight and solar wind, and the smooth open roads would at least get her closer to that. Aelas doesn't maintain her rage for more than a minute or so. it's not a natural emotion for her, and she can see out the mirrors that it's already worked on everyone that it's going to work on. She's still really upset about them hitting Butterfly, that is super uncool, but she's not so intense about it. Instead, she rolls down the window a crack and shouts out to whoever is still hanging onto the car: "Hey! Hey! Uh...guys, like, whoever you're looking for, I don't know where they are and I probably haven't met them yet. But I could help you look if you want! Wanna tell me what they look like, and if I see them, I'll let them know there's a giant convoy of flaming trucks and dune buggies looking for them, okay?"

Raz_Fox

2018-02-06, 09:27 PM

[Unsurprisingly, I did not succeed on a chance die.]

A clever man, certainly. An adaptable man, indeed. In that small circle of impassive iron, an image flashes for but a moment: a dark man, huge and stooped, heavy-horned and wearing second-hand bespoke jorts purchased from a disreputable gazebo salesman, and those eyes, two burning candle-lights, like the headlights of a distant vehicle, an unnaturally vivid blue.

The Pilgrim nods once in the mirror, and the image is so small within that it might be hard to discern but for those spiraling horns, but it is there. A nod of fair play, a nod without fear. Then he is already bounding away, low to the ground, invisible but through that small mirror. When your opponent makes a fine defensive play, adapt without anger, but move swiftly or you will be thrown aside.

Thanqol

2018-02-06, 10:00 PM

"Bingo! Who's the smartest?" said Longarms. He awkwardly levelled his rifle, haphazardly aiming while looking through the mirror. "I got him, I got him, I -"

Mercia knocked the gun out of his hands.

"What the hell!?" said Longarms.

"Idiot!" she hissed. "It's autumn! We have to give them warning before we come for them. It's the contract."

"But he's right there," whined Longarms plaintively.

"I know," Mercia snarled. She knew exactly what he was feeling - the pounding roaring in the place that used to be her heart and was now filled with a single-minded desire to hunt and bind. "Blood of Mars, I know. But we can't."

She sighed, and then bent down to touch the Pilgrim's footprints. "But we're not leaving this empty handed," she said. "We know what he looks like now. We know he can turn invisible. We know his size, shape and speed. We know the impression of his shoes. We know he's here. We have a lot to go on."

Longarms bent to take a photograph with his cell phone camera of the soft dirt. A brief flicker of light from the flash.

"Now we need to go," said Mercia. "And fast - before he calls on Summer."

The Huntsmen began to run.

[Fair enough. Dex+drive: 9, 2, 3, 2, 7. 6/8 successes.]

Butterfly zooms through the dirt road, flying over bumps and rumbling over ditches. This isn't her best pace, she's a horse that's used to running along intergalactic roads of starlight and solar wind, and the smooth open roads would at least get her closer to that. Aelas doesn't maintain her rage for more than a minute or so. it's not a natural emotion for her, and she can see out the mirrors that it's already worked on everyone that it's going to work on. She's still really upset about them hitting Butterfly, that is super uncool, but she's not so intense about it. Instead, she rolls down the window a crack and shouts out to whoever is still hanging onto the car: "Hey! Hey! Uh...guys, like, whoever you're looking for, I don't know where they are and I probably haven't met them yet. But I could help you look if you want! Wanna tell me what they look like, and if I see them, I'll let them know there's a giant convoy of flaming trucks and dune buggies looking for them, okay?"

[2,4,7,1,3,5 - nothing, still at 3, oof]

Clinging to the side of your car for dear life is a gargoyle looking girl, made out of roughly cut gothic stone with razor sharp talons and huge bat ears. "Hi there," she says with remarkable calm - wherever she's from was evidently way more intense than a mere car chase on a flaming Ferrari. "Hunting male and female. Kidnappers. Heading in this direction. Sorry don't know more!"

She smiled to show there were no hard feelings. Then she ripped off the metal covering the fuel port to the car, and started unscrewing the cap while awkwardly trying to ignite a cigarette lighter with her rear claws.

[Unsurprisingly, I did not succeed on a chance die.]

A clever man, certainly. An adaptable man, indeed. In that small circle of impassive iron, an image flashes for but a moment: a dark man, huge and stooped, heavy-horned and wearing second-hand bespoke jorts purchased from a disreputable gazebo salesman, and those eyes, two burning candle-lights, like the headlights of a distant vehicle, an unnaturally vivid blue.

The Pilgrim nods once in the mirror, and the image is so small within that it might be hard to discern but for those spiraling horns, but it is there. A nod of fair play, a nod without fear. Then he is already bounding away, low to the ground, invisible but through that small mirror. When your opponent makes a fine defensive play, adapt without anger, but move swiftly or you will be thrown aside.

They do not follow - for a moment you are sure they will, for a moment you can feel the fire roaring on your heels and the furious glare of predatory eyes burning a hole into your back - but they don't. A glance over your shoulder shows a flicker of two shadowy shapes leaping over a fence and sprinting away through the cane fields. Some alien logic or kindly mercy has saved your skin this day, and the cold wind of autumn bats at your hair and face with playful talons, like a Siberian housecat.

Your options are, again, infinite, but the obvious two are to return to the town, or to dare your already overstrained luck by continuing the hunt.

Anarion

2018-02-06, 11:25 PM

[2,4,7,1,3,5 - nothing, still at 3, oof]

Clinging to the side of your car for dear life is a gargoyle looking girl, made out of roughly cut gothic stone with razor sharp talons and huge bat ears. "Hi there," she says with remarkable calm - wherever she's from was evidently way more intense than a mere car chase on a flaming Ferrari. "Hunting male and female. Kidnappers. Heading in this direction. Sorry don't know more!"

She smiled to show there were no hard feelings. Then she ripped off the metal covering the fuel port to the car, and started unscrewing the cap while awkwardly trying to ignite a cigarette lighter with her rear claws.

"Woah, kidnappers. That's seriously uncool. If I find them, I'll, uh, like, well, probably avoid them so they don't kidnap me, but I'll try to get them to chase me towards you guys, okay? So how about you let go and...hey, hey, no! No! Bad gargoyle! Don't touch that!"

While she's still flooring the pedal, Aelas grabs a handful of soil and sprinkles it out the window behind her into the Gargoyle's eyes.
[Dream of the Earth with Loophole. 4 - 3 - 7 - 10 - 10 - 5 - 9 - 5 - 5. 10 agains: 1 - 4 : 3 successes opposed by her composure+tolerance roll or she falls into a deep sleep.]

Meanwhile, the freeway is almost in sight, it's so close. [3 - 4 - 8 - 10 - 1. 10 again 3. 8/8 successes] Aelas is ready to break away on the open road if Butterfly is still up for it.

Glamor 4/10
Clarity: 6/6
Health: 6/6
Willpower: 6/6

stveje

2018-02-07, 07:43 AM

"I don't know," said the King uncertainly "I mean... it's not like there's a rule that says I do..."

[Convincing him to delegate you his authority is manipulation+persuasion, with a +3 because you're leaning on his Vice]

"Then there's no reason you couldn't send someone in your stead," Jack said, then glanced at the screen. "I could even patch you through via your screen, if you want to watch from here. You just have to turn it off." A black screen is reflective, like a mirror, at least somewhat, and this one had already reflected Jack's face. It could work. "And if you get tired of watching, you just turn it on." It sounded very tempting. And reasonable. Or they could just set up some kind of video stream, but Jack wasn't good enough with tech for all that, and it already sounded like a lot of work. His way would be simpler, he figured.

Manipulation+Persuasion+3 = 7 : 8, 7, 2, 10, 4, 6, 4, ten again 4; 2 successes.

Thanqol

2018-02-08, 09:19 PM

"Woah, kidnappers. That's seriously uncool. If I find them, I'll, uh, like, well, probably avoid them so they don't kidnap me, but I'll try to get them to chase me towards you guys, okay? So how about you let go and...hey, hey, no! No! Bad gargoyle! Don't touch that!"

While she's still flooring the pedal, Aelas grabs a handful of soil and sprinkles it out the window behind her into the Gargoyle's eyes.
[Dream of the Earth with Loophole. 4 - 3 - 7 - 10 - 10 - 5 - 9 - 5 - 5. 10 agains: 1 - 4 : 3 successes opposed by her composure+tolerance roll or she falls into a deep sleep.]

Meanwhile, the freeway is almost in sight, it's so close. [3 - 4 - 8 - 10 - 1. 10 again 3. 8/8 successes] Aelas is ready to break away on the open road if Butterfly is still up for it.

Good news and bad news; your charm works, but this particular gargoyle is extremely used to sleeping in totally bizarre places, so she just sinks her claws into the side of the car, tucks her wings in, and goes to sleep right there, still hanging perfectly steady off the side of Butterfly as you tear down the highway.

And that's bad. Because now you're an actual kidnapper.

You can either pull over and prise the sleeping gargoyle off the side of your car, which will get you caught, or you're looking at a four dice Clarity roll, and add an extra dice to the roll from the emotional rush of being hunted yourself so recently. This is the kind of experience that can make you question the reality of your surroundings and trigger buried coping mechanisms for handling a life of madness.

"Then there's no reason you couldn't send someone in your stead," Jack said, then glanced at the screen. "I could even patch you through via your screen, if you want to watch from here. You just have to turn it off." A black screen is reflective, like a mirror, at least somewhat, and this one had already reflected Jack's face. It could work. "And if you get tired of watching, you just turn it on." It sounded very tempting. And reasonable. Or they could just set up some kind of video stream, but Jack wasn't good enough with tech for all that, and it already sounded like a lot of work. His way would be simpler, he figured.

Manipulation+Persuasion+3 = 7 : 8, 7, 2, 10, 4, 6, 4, ten again 4; 2 successes.

"... ok," said the King, turning off the screen. "You can speak for me. Thanks, Jack."

A weary thumbs up briefly showed from under the blankets.

Anarion

2018-02-09, 01:22 PM

Good news and bad news; your charm works, but this particular gargoyle is extremely used to sleeping in totally bizarre places, so she just sinks her claws into the side of the car, tucks her wings in, and goes to sleep right there, still hanging perfectly steady off the side of Butterfly as you tear down the highway.

And that's bad. Because now you're an actual kidnapper.

You can either pull over and prise the sleeping gargoyle off the side of your car, which will get you caught, or you're looking at a four dice Clarity roll, and add an extra dice to the roll from the emotional rush of being hunted yourself so recently. This is the kind of experience that can make you question the reality of your surroundings and trigger buried coping mechanisms for handling a life of madness.

Aelas doesn't think of herself as a kidnapper here. She probably can't just prod the Gargoyle off mid drive though. Still, the whole thing is giving her flashbacks. The Gargoyle is asleep, but Aelas starts talking to Butterfly in a kind of running banter.

[Clarity damage 7 - 2 - 3 - 10 - 8, 8. 3 successes.]

"Oh Butterfly, carry us to Rigel V. I want to see the rainbow falls, and the alpacacorns."
The car swerves onto the open road and zooms down the freeway.

"No, not to Jarban II, I hate Jarban II, ever since the dragon went there, it's nothing but lighting storms, and it makes my hair stand on end."
Aelas leans into the wheel and pulls into the fast lane.

"No, no, why are we going to Jarban II, I just said I hated Jarban II. Everyone is dead there, Butterfly! Why is the dragon making us go back?"
She floors the pedal, Butterfly goes as fast as she can down the fast lane, faster than any horse or car, Aelas is looking down into the wheel, heedless of the road, Butterfly will carry her wherever she'll carry her.

"I don't wanna go back there, Butterfly! I wanna see the Alpacacorns! Why are we going this way? Why? Why? Why?"
Butterfly goes wherever she will, and wherever the road carries a car going over 160 KPH.

stveje

2018-02-10, 05:14 AM

"... ok," said the King, turning off the screen. "You can speak for me. Thanks, Jack."

A weary thumbs up briefly showed from under the blankets.

Jack bows his head, then looks at Lily, in case she has anything she wants to say or do before they leave the King to his slumber.

Raz_Fox

2018-02-10, 11:13 PM

That footprint, you and I both know, doesn't look like some giant tennis shoe ground into the mud, or the track of some Bigfoot who's just dashed back into the woods, leaving behind one perfect footprint to be ogled over and adored. It looks closer to the track of some terrible crow, scratching up the earth in its flight, or else some terrible fleet-footed lizard whose days in this world have long since passed. It is three horribly suggestive gouges in the earth. It is the spoor of a beast.

Now, as well we know, our friend the Pilgrim is no fool. He may not know precisely what a Huntsman is- that raging storm of desire, incarnated into human flesh- but he knows a predator when he sees one, and he knows that there is strength in numbers when some beast more terrible than he happens to be roaming in the wilderness. Hunts go both ways.

There is someone among the Autumn Court who will be able to tell him whether these two predators are native to the area (for all that he had not seen them in the territory before, for all that he had not been warned of them, both pointing towards a new threat or one long thought cold and buried), and will be able to help him figure out what his next step may be.

It is possible that the one that Summer seeks has been caught out by these two jackals, has bled out under iron. It is also possible that, winged, they have fallen to ground and seek shelter. He keeps his ears open and his eyes flickering as he returns towards Prosperpine, thinking to himself: if I were bleeding from iron, where would I stumble? Where would I drag myself to shelter during the heat of the day? I doubt that he will stumble across the dame stolen from Summer, suspecting rather that the two huntsmen return to finish the job they started, but I shall keep mum. Who is to say? Maybe she has broken out from her bindings and stumbles, even now, across the dry earth, leaving a trail of dried shadow behind her.

Thanqol

2018-02-11, 05:02 PM

"He's seen our faces. Should we change them?" said Longarms as the two Huntsmen slowed from their miles-eating jog. They had reached the town and were walking down the suburban streets towards the concrete and brutalist government building; puffs of breath and waves of heat rolling from their shoulders.

"Not yet," said Mercia. "That ability isn't half as useful if they know we can do it."

"Then what? Urgh, I wish the Goblin Market still sold information, this'd be so much easier," grumbled Longarms.

"We'll get in touch with Fetches and families," said Mercia. "Escapees frequently try to make contact -" her heart panged and she wished she had someone who could command her devotion so easily "- and once they do they remain in the orbit of those people. Depending on how the Fetches were constructed they can be our best allies and informants. We have their real names, we'll just go and look up their families and street addresses in city hall and then -"

"Abigail Richmond, 432 Springbank Bvd?" said Longarms, holding up his smartphone.

"- go over paper records for hours, painstakingly building up a..." Mercia stared at the little screen. "... photographs... marital status... recent life events... she's put everything on the internet."

"Everyone has," said Longarms, shrugging. "Pretty stupid if you ask me."

"Well," said Mercia. "Let's... um, let's go pay a visit."

Aelas doesn't think of herself as a kidnapper here. She probably can't just prod the Gargoyle off mid drive though. Still, the whole thing is giving her flashbacks. The Gargoyle is asleep, but Aelas starts talking to Butterfly in a kind of running banter.

[Clarity damage 7 - 2 - 3 - 10 - 8, 8. 3 successes.]

"Oh Butterfly, carry us to Rigel V. I want to see the rainbow falls, and the alpacacorns."
The car swerves onto the open road and zooms down the freeway.

"No, not to Jarban II, I hate Jarban II, ever since the dragon went there, it's nothing but lighting storms, and it makes my hair stand on end."
Aelas leans into the wheel and pulls into the fast lane.

"No, no, why are we going to Jarban II, I just said I hated Jarban II. Everyone is dead there, Butterfly! Why is the dragon making us go back?"
She floors the pedal, Butterfly goes as fast as she can down the fast lane, faster than any horse or car, Aelas is looking down into the wheel, heedless of the road, Butterfly will carry her wherever she'll carry her.

"I don't wanna go back there, Butterfly! I wanna see the Alpacacorns! Why are we going this way? Why? Why? Why?"
Butterfly goes wherever she will, and wherever the road carries a car going over 160 KPH.

There is a picturesque small town not far from Prosperpine; one of those little towns perfectly cultivated to divert passing highway traffic, the kind where the tourism board and city council have formed an unholy alliance. Picture postcards and a Hot Fuzz level of devotion to garden maintenance. It's notable for having a cute little pub with a pair of fuzzy alpacas milling around on the front lawn, near a historic plaque describing the town's alpaca wool ugg boots (available for sale at the gift shop)

Butterfly shivers nervously. These alpacas are distinctly lacking their magnificent and magical horns and pastel colours, but they are of a comparable level of softness and fuzziness. Good enough, or does Butterfly have to keep looking?

That footprint, you and I both know, doesn't look like some giant tennis shoe ground into the mud, or the track of some Bigfoot who's just dashed back into the woods, leaving behind one perfect footprint to be ogled over and adored. It looks closer to the track of some terrible crow, scratching up the earth in its flight, or else some terrible fleet-footed lizard whose days in this world have long since passed. It is three horribly suggestive gouges in the earth. It is the spoor of a beast.

Now, as well we know, our friend the Pilgrim is no fool. He may not know precisely what a Huntsman is- that raging storm of desire, incarnated into human flesh- but he knows a predator when he sees one, and he knows that there is strength in numbers when some beast more terrible than he happens to be roaming in the wilderness. Hunts go both ways.

There is someone among the Autumn Court who will be able to tell him whether these two predators are native to the area (for all that he had not seen them in the territory before, for all that he had not been warned of them, both pointing towards a new threat or one long thought cold and buried), and will be able to help him figure out what his next step may be.

It is possible that the one that Summer seeks has been caught out by these two jackals, has bled out under iron. It is also possible that, winged, they have fallen to ground and seek shelter. He keeps his ears open and his eyes flickering as he returns towards Prosperpine, thinking to himself: if I were bleeding from iron, where would I stumble? Where would I drag myself to shelter during the heat of the day? I doubt that he will stumble across the dame stolen from Summer, suspecting rather that the two huntsmen return to finish the job they started, but I shall keep mum. Who is to say? Maybe she has broken out from her bindings and stumbles, even now, across the dry earth, leaving a trail of dried shadow behind her.

There is no chance of stumbling across the prisoner's trail, unfortunately - she was released and allowed to drive home so that she might continue to spy on her kin, her reward for obeying the will of the Gentry. If you knew this things would go more easily for you.

You're in luck in another aspect; there is a meeting of the Courts this evening, and Autumn as the presiding monarchs will be there in splendour and power. Summer will be coming but their diversion will make them late to the party and, besides - for all their fury, if you stand at the right hand of the King of Autumn they will be powerless to strike at you. And, if you head in that direction you will meet Jack and Lily coming in at the same time, heavy with the weight of borrowed power.

Raz_Fox

2018-02-11, 11:02 PM

Then it is so.

One moment, the Pilgrim is not there, and our friends Jack and Lily are making their way towards the convocation, towards our town hall meeting where madness is the order of the day. Then he is there. His presence is the smell of the campfire's ashes in the morning, the shadow that has suddenly been noticed as having always been there, the low huff of his breath. I would not fault either of them for suddenly shivering; it is disconcerting indeed to know that he is suddenly there, and who knows how long he has been?

"Hunters," he says, by way of introduction. "Outside of town. Be careful." He pauses a moment, and does not further explain that he means to ask questions about the Huntsmen among the Autumn court courtiers, and that he has told them so that they can be careful, because he cares about them and would not forgive himself if they were caught by some slavering wolves-in-human-skins out in the wilderness. Not that Jack and Lily are likely to wander too far, what with Lily looking after the affairs of the Winter folk and Jack, being Jack, wanting people to talk to and be around. Still. Life is odd indeed, and people wander sometimes, and it needed to be said. So it's been said.

He thinks about reaching out and patting Jack on the shoulder.

He does not.

Indeed, if not asked, he will not accompany them inside. He will wait, and let them enter in as Winter's shining new courtiers, and come in a few minutes later, a few minutes of leaning against the wall and watching the stars come out, and seeing who comes loping along to follow.

Anarion

2018-02-12, 07:06 PM

There is a picturesque small town not far from Prosperpine; one of those little towns perfectly cultivated to divert passing highway traffic, the kind where the tourism board and city council have formed an unholy alliance. Picture postcards and a Hot Fuzz level of devotion to garden maintenance. It's notable for having a cute little pub with a pair of fuzzy alpacas milling around on the front lawn, near a historic plaque describing the town's alpaca wool ugg boots (available for sale at the gift shop)

Butterfly shivers nervously. These alpacas are distinctly lacking their magnificent and magical horns and pastel colours, but they are of a comparable level of softness and fuzziness. Good enough, or does Butterfly have to keep looking?

It's the cessation of motion that brings Aelas to her senses. The hum of the engine is almost silent, the seat no longer lifts and lowers in calm, even rocking. Slowly, she lifts her eyes, wet with tears, up from the steering wheel and slowly, she pokes her head up over the dash. It's not the windswept empty plains of Jarban II, with their craggy stones and barren hills lit by lightning. It's...a little field with alpacas!

Her first reaction is to give Butterfly's steering wheel a hug, and then she steps out with delight and gingerly steps over to one of them. It doesn't appear to be able to talk or use magic (her memory from earth is coming back to her that earth alpacas cannot do either of those things), so she carefuly reaches out a hand and pets it behind the ears, running her hand along the soft, fuzzy wool. "You're very nice, Mr. Alpaca" she says to it.

As this starts to calm her down, it comes back to her that the gargoyle is STILL attached to the car. Her sleep spell ought to have worn off by now, so, with a last pat and a glance backward to make sure that the alpacas are in fact still there (them being still there is important), she goes over to inspect the Gargoyle. "Hey! Wake up! I don't know where we are, where are we?" she shouts. Nearby people in the shop can probably hear this. She hasn't the foggiest what this might look like either. What would a normal person see instead of the gargoyle with its claws sunk into the metal door?

Glamor 4/10
Clarity: 5/6 (mild damage)
Health: 6/6
Willpower: 6/6

Elanorin

2018-02-13, 02:15 PM

Lily had, almost instinctively, began to pick up in the area immediately around her. Not because she was a neat freak (honest!) but because it was habit and it felt more comfortable when her hands were moving. She hadn't gotten far, merely returned a handful of discs to their gaping cases and stacked them neatly when,

"Then there's no reason you couldn't send someone in your stead," Jack said, then glanced at the screen. "I could even patch you through via your screen, if you want to watch from here. You just have to turn it off." A black screen is reflective, like a mirror, at least somewhat, and this one had already reflected Jack's face. It could work. "And if you get tired of watching, you just turn it on." It sounded very tempting. And reasonable. Or they could just set up some kind of video stream, but Jack wasn't good enough with tech for all that, and it already sounded like a lot of work. His way would be simpler, he figured.

She paused, then continued albeit with slower movements. She was listening closely to the reaction due from under the covers on the bed. This was it, this was why they were here.

"... ok," said the King, turning off the screen. "You can speak for me. Thanks, Jack."

A weary thumbs up briefly showed from under the blankets.

Lily's shoulders relaxed. She glanced in Jacks direction, a slight smile on her lips. Well done, Sir.

Jack bows his head, then looks at Lily, in case she has anything she wants to say or do before they leave the King to his slumber.

Lily immediately picked up on the indication that it was time to leave and stood up. She brushed off and paused for a moment before following Jack out.

"I will be back later, should you need anything, your Grace." With that said, she turned and left with Jack.

You're in luck in another aspect; there is a meeting of the Courts this evening, and Autumn as the presiding monarchs will be there in splendour and power. Summer will be coming but their diversion will make them late to the party and, besides - for all their fury, if you stand at the right hand of the King of Autumn they will be powerless to strike at you. And, if you head in that direction you will meet Jack and Lily coming in at the same time, heavy with the weight of borrowed power.

One moment, the Pilgrim is not there, and our friends Jack and Lily are making their way towards the convocation, towards our town hall meeting where madness is the order of the day. Then he is there. His presence is the smell of the campfire's ashes in the morning, the shadow that has suddenly been noticed as having always been there, the low huff of his breath. I would not fault either of them for suddenly shivering; it is disconcerting indeed to know that he is suddenly there, and who knows how long he has been?

"Hunters," he says, by way of introduction. "Outside of town. Be careful." He pauses a moment, and does not further explain that he means to ask questions about the Huntsmen among the Autumn court courtiers, and that he has told them so that they can be careful, because he cares about them and would not forgive himself if they were caught by some slavering wolves-in-human-skins out in the wilderness. Not that Jack and Lily are likely to wander too far, what with Lily looking after the affairs of the Winter folk and Jack, being Jack, wanting people to talk to and be around. Still. Life is odd indeed, and people wander sometimes, and it needed to be said. So it's been said.

He thinks about reaching out and patting Jack on the shoulder.

He does not.

Indeed, if not asked, he will not accompany them inside. He will wait, and let them enter in as Winter's shining new courtiers, and come in a few minutes later, a few minutes of leaning against the wall and watching the stars come out, and seeing who comes loping along to follow.

"...thank you," Lily manages uncertainly. It seemed a genuine warning borne from genuine concern but it took her a moment to decide to take it for such. She wanted to ask him to come inside but the lesson not to ask anything of one such has him was still too ingrained and so she went inside quietly.

She was genuinely excited about this meeting and for having resolved their little "problem" with their King. She had felt a keen affinity for the Winter Court the moment she learned of their existence and it was exhilarating to get to see not only them but the other courts all gathered like this. She straightened her hair and clothes not for the first time and ensured she stayed out of the way while securing a good view, remaining next to Jack.

Thanqol

2018-02-13, 09:54 PM

Mercia knocked on the big wooden door.

"Miss Richmond? I'm Mercy Wilde, my friend here is Dirk Uppercut, we're with the Federal Police," said Mercia. "You're not in trouble, but we'd like to have a few words if that's all right."

The Huntsmen hadn't really worked out a detailed plan for this. They both knew that Fetches were weird and unpredictable. Some didn't know what they were, others were ruthless survivalist killing machines programmed to bring down their true selves if they ever returned - and had spent years training for that exact purpose. So the Huntsmen were inclined to see how the conversation went before they committed themselves to any form of leverage.

It's the cessation of motion that brings Aelas to her senses. The hum of the engine is almost silent, the seat no longer lifts and lowers in calm, even rocking. Slowly, she lifts her eyes, wet with tears, up from the steering wheel and slowly, she pokes her head up over the dash. It's not the windswept empty plains of Jarban II, with their craggy stones and barren hills lit by lightning. It's...a little field with alpacas!

Her first reaction is to give Butterfly's steering wheel a hug, and then she steps out with delight and gingerly steps over to one of them. It doesn't appear to be able to talk or use magic (her memory from earth is coming back to her that earth alpacas cannot do either of those things), so she carefuly reaches out a hand and pets it behind the ears, running her hand along the soft, fuzzy wool. "You're very nice, Mr. Alpaca" she says to it.

As this starts to calm her down, it comes back to her that the gargoyle is STILL attached to the car. Her sleep spell ought to have worn off by now, so, with a last pat and a glance backward to make sure that the alpacas are in fact still there (them being still there is important), she goes over to inspect the Gargoyle. "Hey! Wake up! I don't know where we are, where are we?" she shouts. Nearby people in the shop can probably hear this. She hasn't the foggiest what this might look like either. What would a normal person see instead of the gargoyle with its claws sunk into the metal door?

The alpacas are all indeed very nice, and they angle around to lick any exposed hands on the off chance they contain carrots or apples or other alpaca-approved treats. They don't go anywhere either. They are very stable and teleportation-free, as alpacas go.

The Gargoyle's eyes were open when you approach her; her stillness was as uncanny as her swiftness. She pounces like a serpent, swift as nightmares.

[Grapple attempt: 8 dice (6 dice base +2 contract) vs defence 6: no successes]

Even though you evade her initial strike she continues to move, alternating between that uncanny, liquid motion and stillness so absolute it's almost like she ceased to exist. She speaks as she does both, the same cheerful tone as she used earlier, completely disconnected from her predatory motion. "We are in Newcastle. It's a nice place, I really love the flower garden by the lake," she said. "You should see it in spring!"

Then it is so.

One moment, the Pilgrim is not there, and our friends Jack and Lily are making their way towards the convocation, towards our town hall meeting where madness is the order of the day. Then he is there. His presence is the smell of the campfire's ashes in the morning, the shadow that has suddenly been noticed as having always been there, the low huff of his breath. I would not fault either of them for suddenly shivering; it is disconcerting indeed to know that he is suddenly there, and who knows how long he has been?

"Hunters," he says, by way of introduction. "Outside of town. Be careful." He pauses a moment, and does not further explain that he means to ask questions about the Huntsmen among the Autumn court courtiers, and that he has told them so that they can be careful, because he cares about them and would not forgive himself if they were caught by some slavering wolves-in-human-skins out in the wilderness. Not that Jack and Lily are likely to wander too far, what with Lily looking after the affairs of the Winter folk and Jack, being Jack, wanting people to talk to and be around. Still. Life is odd indeed, and people wander sometimes, and it needed to be said. So it's been said.

He thinks about reaching out and patting Jack on the shoulder.

He does not.

Indeed, if not asked, he will not accompany them inside. He will wait, and let them enter in as Winter's shining new courtiers, and come in a few minutes later, a few minutes of leaning against the wall and watching the stars come out, and seeing who comes loping along to follow.

"...thank you," Lily manages uncertainly. It seemed a genuine warning borne from genuine concern but it took her a moment to decide to take it for such. She wanted to ask him to come inside but the lesson not to ask anything of one such has him was still too ingrained and so she went inside quietly.

She was genuinely excited about this meeting and for having resolved their little "problem" with their King. She had felt a keen affinity for the Winter Court the moment she learned of their existence and it was exhilarating to get to see not only them but the other courts all gathered like this. She straightened her hair and clothes not for the first time and ensured she stayed out of the way while securing a good view, remaining next to Jack.

The meeting hall was a theatre, set up as though for a performance. The lights were dim and upon the stage stood the entire Autumn Court, shoulder to shoulder, a wall of identical cloaked and hooded figures. Supernatural darkness concealed their faces. Every one of them had used magic to change their Kith and appearance into the exact same uniformed look; a single unbreakable block, impossible to tell one mysteriously robed figure from the next. A fearful show of unity.

[Socialize 4] Lily, however, can see through it. It's a powerful spectacle, for sure, but they're all really just wearing the same outfit - they still have their subtle social hierarchies; some take the lead and some give way. Some are good at this and some are really not - that one just scratched his butt in a profoundly undignified way, for example, making it easy to place him as Ronald Tortureman, the ogrish enforcer of the court. You can tell who is who, who is important, and who is just there as a backup dancer.

Spring, by comparison, all look like totally ordinary people, all with totally ordinary smiles. They're all dressed in nice clothes and fancy hats, and they've all strengthened their Masks* so that it's impossible to see their warped and scarred Arcadian forms. They look like a bunch of wealthy churchgoers more than anything else; pillars of the community, every one.

[Socialize 4] And they expect the same in response. Lily's paid close enough attention to how Spring operates to know that they find it enormously bad form and very tiresome to talk to them directly about anything supernatural whatsoever. Even approaching them without strengthening one's own Mask is a faux pas. They're not stupid - they will address supernatural problems if they're politely phrased in euphemistic language - but as a whole they would very much like to be done with this whole magic and monsters thing.

[* Systems reminder: The Mask is the normal, non-fairy human shape of Changelings that ordinary humans see to prevent them freaking out at these monsters everywhere. Changelings and supernaturals see through it by default. It can be strengthened for a single point of Glamour, preventing Changelings from seeing through it without more specialized magic]

Summer is not here yet. Out driving around presumably. They'll arrive soon.

As far as Winter goes, it's a disaster. You know there are more of them out there (like Edmund) but, much like King Kent, many are too shy, depressed or antisocial to show up to meetings. There's only about four or five of them here, wearing whatever they happened to be wearing that day, scattered around the seats of the theatre and not talking to each other. They don't really think of themselves as an influential faction and, as a result, they're not. There's a lot of potential power there but someone will need to whip them into shape to make that happen.

Who do you approach, and with what purpose?

Isaac, as you wait outside, one of the Autumn courtiers approaches you, deep in their concealing robes. "Do you wish to wear the mask?" comes the voice, soft and female (and, it must be said, a little bit hackneyed as someone with a very rural accent tries to do a mysterious cult leader voice). Nonetheless it is easy to read them and easy to like them - Autumn smooths the lines of communication and makes your naturally perceptive eye even sharper.

This is Kaitlin the Fleshcrafter, the Kithshaper of the Autumn Court. Mortician's daughter, purple hair, very much into the goth thing and had a big hand in setting the fashion tone for the Autumn range. She personally doesn't mind if you don't wear the outfit but she knows the King thinks it's very important.

Anarion

2018-02-14, 02:40 AM

Raz_Fox

2018-02-14, 11:33 PM

Uniforms and masks, masks and uniforms. Some other person might feel strange donning something that hides their identity, makes them just another part of a group; the Pilgrim has no such reservations. He is used to the ritual, to the masks, to the requirement to be part of the family. He has not given the Autumn people his full allegiance, but neither has he made any rejection of them. It is understood, insofar as he knows, that he is the guardian of the ones who have returned. He is the one who watches out for them in the crisp evening, who haunts their windowsills and leaves strange raptor-tracks in the earth. And yet, he acknowledges that they have all been marked, all been chosen, by a power beyond them, which in its own way is also familiar.

Besides. He likes Katilin. She helps people be what they wish they had been. She molds like clay, reworking, soothing. She is honest, as far as he can gauge. He has not let her touch him, however, demurring quietly and shying away when the invitation had been made. He is what he is, and this monstrous form is the one that survived, the one that he earned. Whatever she did in the molding, it would never take away the scars, and it would never give him eyes again. So let him remain as he is, quick and sure-footed and true in the wild. But the Kithshaper offered, and she did not do so from mere ceremony, and so our Pilgrim is loathe to refuse her.

He nods his head, once, and then waits an awkward moment too long before saying, "Yes."

He will wear the mask, and go about the theater, and stand near the Spring people without them paling and looking awkwardly away from the thing that has entered into the theater with them. Anonymity for a moment, as long as no one observes that particular stalking gait. Jack and Lily will be easy enough to keep an eye on, but the lack of Summer will prove worrisome. The lack of Aelas and Edmund, even moreso.

stveje

2018-02-15, 07:54 AM

The meeting hall was a theatre, set up as though for a performance. The lights were dim and upon the stage stood the entire Autumn Court, shoulder to shoulder, a wall of identical cloaked and hooded figures. Supernatural darkness concealed their faces. Every one of them had used magic to change their Kith and appearance into the exact same uniformed look; a single unbreakable block, impossible to tell one mysteriously robed figure from the next. A fearful show of unity.

[Socialize 4] Lily, however, can see through it. It's a powerful spectacle, for sure, but they're all really just wearing the same outfit - they still have their subtle social hierarchies; some take the lead and some give way. Some are good at this and some are really not - that one just scratched his butt in a profoundly undignified way, for example, making it easy to place him as Ronald Tortureman, the ogrish enforcer of the court. You can tell who is who, who is important, and who is just there as a backup dancer.

Spring, by comparison, all look like totally ordinary people, all with totally ordinary smiles. They're all dressed in nice clothes and fancy hats, and they've all strengthened their Masks* so that it's impossible to see their warped and scarred Arcadian forms. They look like a bunch of wealthy churchgoers more than anything else; pillars of the community, every one.

[Socialize 4] And they expect the same in response. Lily's paid close enough attention to how Spring operates to know that they find it enormously bad form and very tiresome to talk to them directly about anything supernatural whatsoever. Even approaching them without strengthening one's own Mask is a faux pas. They're not stupid - they will address supernatural problems if they're politely phrased in euphemistic language - but as a whole they would very much like to be done with this whole magic and monsters thing.

[* Systems reminder: The Mask is the normal, non-fairy human shape of Changelings that ordinary humans see to prevent them freaking out at these monsters everywhere. Changelings and supernaturals see through it by default. It can be strengthened for a single point of Glamour, preventing Changelings from seeing through it without more specialized magic]

Summer is not here yet. Out driving around presumably. They'll arrive soon.

As far as Winter goes, it's a disaster. You know there are more of them out there (like Edmund) but, much like King Kent, many are too shy, depressed or antisocial to show up to meetings. There's only about four or five of them here, wearing whatever they happened to be wearing that day, scattered around the seats of the theatre and not talking to each other. They don't really think of themselves as an influential faction and, as a result, they're not. There's a lot of potential power there but someone will need to whip them into shape to make that happen.

Who do you approach, and with what purpose?

Finding a small mirror of some kind that Jack can enchant and carry in his coat pocket is quick and easy, providing King Kent with a window through which he can hear and see the proceedings on his screen, as long as he keeps it off. [1 Glamor for Glimpse of a Distant Mirror]

On one hand, Jack is used to the idea of blending into a crowd, of being just another face indistinguishable from the many, but all the mask-wearing on display at this gathering is uncomfortably close to his memories of Arcadia. The Autumn cultists unsettle him deeply, appropriately for their Court, but even Spring makes him uncomfortable, all of them so attached to their masks, not showing their true selves. Jack would love nothing more than to disappear into the back, to hide like the few of his Court who are here, or to not be here at all.

But he is not here for himself, for his own desires or needs. He's wearing his own mask in a way, a crown with all its weight. He's not here for Autumn nor Spring either. Autumn certainly doesn't seem to need him, and Spring doesn't want him. As for Summer ... they're not even here. He's here for the needs of Winter, so that is where he turns: who among Winter look like they need him most?

*

Glamor 4/10
Clarity: 0/7
Health: 0/7
Willpower: 3/4

Thanqol

2018-02-15, 05:05 PM

Abigail Richmond was home watching TV. The light from the screen shone out from behind the window shades. When the knocking happened, there's the sound of some rustling, feet running across the floor, and drawers opening and being slammed shut with the force of someone who has not considered that there's a need to treat furniture gently. Finally, feet pound up to the door, but it doesn't open. Instead, a blond head with hair neatly trim just above the neck peeks out from a nearby window, with the evidence of a quickly thrown on baggy gray college sweater hanging around the neck.

"Police. Woah. Um, can't I get in trouble for this? Like, on crime dramas, you're supposed to get a lawyer before you talk to the police, even if they say you're not in trouble. I mean, like, I don't mind talking or anything, I'm sure I'd be happy to help, whatever it is, but I'm not sure if my Dad would be cool with me just joining up with an investigation, y'know?"

What does a Fetch even see when it looks out the window at a pair of Huntsmen? Do they look like normal humans to it? Like Faerie things? Should Abby start panicking here?

When the heart of a Huntsman is torn out, so is their identity. They can shift any aspect of their appearance or personality from instant to instant. Height, gender, clothing - everything is malleable to the Wyld Hunters. Right now they are appearing as themselves, in human forms, dressed as police detectives; nothing strange about them.

Where their identity truly resides, though, is in their tools. The Panoply of a Huntsman is her greatest weapon and symbol of their true self and identity; and it is these aspects of their true Faerie selves that are concealed by the Mask. Mercia wears iron chain-mail, but the Mask would make it seem to innocents a perfectly ordinary article of clothing. Longarms carries a leather sack from which he seems able to produce a variety of his stored treasures on a whim; this would be no less implausible than a backpack or large shopping bag.

If Abby can see through the Mask on these things, it would imply that she can see through the Masks of the Changelings in town. Can she?

"We're not here to investigate you," said Longarms, clearing his throat. He has a fantastic voice for this kind of thing - persuasive, confident, gruff. He's a prince amongst liars, feted by goblins for his ability to spin yarns. "We're here to protect you. Miss Richmond, I'm afraid your identity has been stolen."

"Cool! I'll definitely come back and visit, this place seems really nice. Flower garden by the lake...got it. I think I remember visiting here once when I was a kid, too, but it's a bit hazy." Aelas ducks to the side. She's not doing anything offensive, just focused on dodging for now. "Um, how come you're trying to grab me, though? Can't we just be friends now? We don't have that much time to play around, and I really, honest to gosh have nothing to do with the people you're looking for. Plus, Butterfly will have to go back and rest soon, and then it will take forever to get back from here. I mean, unless you want to donate some glamour to me, cuz I don't really feel like using any more now."

"We can be friends," said the girlgoyle, still moving and pacing unblinkingly. "I really like your hair. I've never seen hair shimmer like that. What product do you use?"

She strikes out lightning fast and gets her hand around your wrist - and then all of your muscles relax into a blissful state, like you've just had an incredibly soothing massage, and you go limp as a jellyfish. She catches your head before it hits the pavement. She's moving even faster now, almost impossible to follow from motion to motion.

[1 success on the grapple roll; activating Might of the Terrible Brute to drain your strength by 1. As that moves you to Strength 0 you gain the Immobilized tilt. You can still talk and such.]

"My name is," she thought about it. Frowned a little, straining to remember. "S. Static? Static. I do need to bring you back though. Do you mind if I drive your car? Will it let me?"

He nods his head, once, and then waits an awkward moment too long before saying, "Yes."

He will wear the mask, and go about the theater, and stand near the Spring people without them paling and looking awkwardly away from the thing that has entered into the theater with them. Anonymity for a moment, as long as no one observes that particular stalking gait. Jack and Lily will be easy enough to keep an eye on, but the lack of Summer will prove worrisome. The lack of Aelas and Edmund, even moreso.

"Good evening, Mr. Johannesen!" said Mrs. Height, the Queen of Spring. Perfect and presentable and pastel - practically the picture of a polite polity. "It is so good to see you back in town; why, I heard you moved to Sydney! Are you settling back in all right? Are you doing okay for work?"

Mrs. Height actually seems to be a fair bit younger than you, but her dress and the way in which she treats you implies she's much older. You are not clear if she is actually an ancient creature kept youthful through Faerie magic, or if she's just incredibly pretentious.

Finding a small mirror of some kind that Jack can enchant and carry in his coat pocket is quick and easy, providing King Kent with a window through which he can hear and see the proceedings on his screen, as long as he keeps it off. [1 Glamor for Glimpse of a Distant Mirror]

On one hand, Jack is used to the idea of blending into a crowd, of being just another face indistinguishable from the many, but all the mask-wearing on display at this gathering is uncomfortably close to his memories of Arcadia. The Autumn cultists unsettle him deeply, appropriately for their Court, but even Spring makes him uncomfortable, all of them so attached to their masks, not showing their true selves. Jack would love nothing more than to disappear into the back, to hide like the few of his Court who are here, or to not be here at all.

But he is not here for himself, for his own desires or needs. He's wearing his own mask in a way, a crown with all its weight. He's not here for Autumn nor Spring either. Autumn certainly doesn't seem to need him, and Spring doesn't want him. As for Summer ... they're not even here. He's here for the needs of Winter, so that is where he turns: who among Winter look like they need him most?

Bailey Scott stands out to you. She's so on edge you could use her to shave. Dark and wispy - literally, her edges fade into dark violet smoke. Knuckles clenching so white that sometimes her hand turns transparent and slips through the edge of the chair she's gripping. Something has her on the brink of freaking out, more so than almost anyone else here.

You may want to make a Wits+Empathy+Mantle roll as you introduce yourself. Gently - try to avoid sudden movements.

Anarion

2018-02-16, 04:35 AM

When the heart of a Huntsman is torn out, so is their identity. They can shift any aspect of their appearance or personality from instant to instant. Height, gender, clothing - everything is malleable to the Wyld Hunters. Right now they are appearing as themselves, in human forms, dressed as police detectives; nothing strange about them.

Where their identity truly resides, though, is in their tools. The Panoply of a Huntsman is her greatest weapon and symbol of their true self and identity; and it is these aspects of their true Faerie selves that are concealed by the Mask. Mercia wears iron chain-mail, but the Mask would make it seem to innocents a perfectly ordinary article of clothing. Longarms carries a leather sack from which he seems able to produce a variety of his stored treasures on a whim; this would be no less implausible than a backpack or large shopping bag.

If Abby can see through the Mask on these things, it would imply that she can see through the Masks of the Changelings in town. Can she?

"We're not here to investigate you," said Longarms, clearing his throat. He has a fantastic voice for this kind of thing - persuasive, confident, gruff. He's a prince amongst liars, feted by goblins for his ability to spin yarns. "We're here to protect you. Miss Richmond, I'm afraid your identity has been stolen."

As Abby looks out the window and really looks at these two, with their crazy armor and weird magical bag, a quick range of emotions crosses her face. First is an "oh no" look, then briefly anger, then thinking and her forehead scrunches up, and then she settles. "Okay, I'm going to stay here. We're talking, you're out there, you stay out there, I'll stay in here. What do you want to talk about?"

"We can be friends," said the girlgoyle, still moving and pacing unblinkingly. "I really like your hair. I've never seen hair shimmer like that. What product do you use?"

She strikes out lightning fast and gets her hand around your wrist - and then all of your muscles relax into a blissful state, like you've just had an incredibly soothing massage, and you go limp as a jellyfish. She catches your head before it hits the pavement. She's moving even faster now, almost impossible to follow from motion to motion.

[1 success on the grapple roll; activating Might of the Terrible Brute to drain your strength by 1. As that moves you to Strength 0 you gain the Immobilized tilt. You can still talk and such.]

"My name is," she thought about it. Frowned a little, straining to remember. "S. Static? Static. I do need to bring you back though. Do you mind if I drive your car? Will it let me?"

[Dodge 12d10, but Static would get her full dice pool, since it's now a contested action. 4, 1, 8, 1, 8, 2, 6, 2, 8, 4, 7, 4. She needs 4 successes to manage the grapple. Also, Aelas has Strength 2, but Stamina 1.]

"Static, nice to meet you!" Aelas shakes the hand that's grappling her [roll to escape: str+brawl chance die=9. So close. Spending 1 glamour to slip the bonds.]

"Ow ow ow, that hurt!" Aelas slips away.

"Oh, and um, I mean, you could drive Butterfly, but she can only carry one person even though she looks like a car. Honestly, I don't even know how we managed this whole thing with you hanging off the side the whole time, but she definitely won't let more than one person get in, it just doesn't work. Also, she's gonna be leaving pretty soon, like I said, she needs to rest unless we feed her."

Glamor 3/10
Clarity: 5/6 (mild damage)
Health: 6/6
Willpower: 6/6

stveje

2018-02-16, 01:39 PM

Bailey Scott stands out to you. She's so on edge you could use her to shave. Dark and wispy - literally, her edges fade into dark violet smoke. Knuckles clenching so white that sometimes her hand turns transparent and slips through the edge of the chair she's gripping. Something has her on the brink of freaking out, more so than almost anyone else here.

You may want to make a Wits+Empathy+Mantle roll as you introduce yourself. Gently - try to avoid sudden movements.

Wits+Empathy+Specialty+Mantle = 9 : 9,9,6,6,2,10,1,6,7, ten again 4. 3 successes

Jack approaches slowly, making sure she notices him and his intentions long before he's anywhere near her. He's calm as a floating snowflake on a windless day, as non-threatening and friendly as a puppy looking for a warm place to rest.

Raz_Fox

2018-02-17, 12:51 AM

As always, Ms. Height immediately and unsubtly declares the way that the world should work in the space of a few breaths, surprising our poor friend with her sudden identification of him (it must have been that gait, he thinks for a moment) and her dropping of a name. He briefly considers that it might be a mistaken identity, but she is too confident, too certain; no, she has just used the name he used to have. Johannesen. Nothing like Isaac at all, then. The sound of the name is familiar, but the memories refuse to come marching obediently one by one at the summons, a mixed blessing given the circumstances. Some answer is expected.

What does he say? What can he say to someone like this, pristine and prim and most definitely not wanting to hear about how he sleeps outside and couldn't get a job even if he wanted to have one right now? Is he even meant to be making small talk while wearing the Mask of Autumn, or is this, as he is more accustomed to, the sort of uniform that demands a heightened level of decorum? He was never good at the liturgy. Better, better at the trials, the endurance, the struggle. She is still waiting for an answer, and the moment drags on, straining at the boundaries of conversational etiquette.

A decision has to be made. Not just about what to say, about who he is, the narrative he is making of his life.

"Mistaken," he says, his voice too rough to sound as he would like it to sound: apologetic about the mistaken identity, yet eager to help her catch up to speed. Instead, it likely sounds brusque. "Just Isaac. Last I heard, Johannesen died." And that's the truth, if you look at it the right way, tilt your head and look at our friend the Pilgrim, his skin a tapestry of burnt offerings, his body made vast and terrible, half monster and half athlete and all of it a pilgrim; what about him is left from the person who was judged unworthy so long ago? Is the ship of Theseus still his ship?

Suddenly self-conscious, head aflame, throat tight with embarrassment, Isaac bows his head once, a movement of the entire body- and if he was not masked it might look like a bull about to gore her against its horns- and attempts to make an escape. That's what he's good at, after all. But this is not a jungle, and it would be very rude indeed to jump onto the wall and clamber up to a better vantage point, and people like Height have a way of using their words as a lasso.

Elanorin

2018-02-17, 04:30 AM

The meeting hall was a theatre, set up as though for a performance. The lights were dim and upon the stage stood the entire Autumn Court, shoulder to shoulder, a wall of identical cloaked and hooded figures. Supernatural darkness concealed their faces. Every one of them had used magic to change their Kith and appearance into the exact same uniformed look; a single unbreakable block, impossible to tell one mysteriously robed figure from the next. A fearful show of unity.

[Socialize 4] Lily, however, can see through it. It's a powerful spectacle, for sure, but they're all really just wearing the same outfit - they still have their subtle social hierarchies; some take the lead and some give way. Some are good at this and some are really not - that one just scratched his butt in a profoundly undignified way, for example, making it easy to place him as Ronald Tortureman, the ogrish enforcer of the court. You can tell who is who, who is important, and who is just there as a backup dancer.

Spring, by comparison, all look like totally ordinary people, all with totally ordinary smiles. They're all dressed in nice clothes and fancy hats, and they've all strengthened their Masks* so that it's impossible to see their warped and scarred Arcadian forms. They look like a bunch of wealthy churchgoers more than anything else; pillars of the community, every one.

[Socialize 4] And they expect the same in response. Lily's paid close enough attention to how Spring operates to know that they find it enormously bad form and very tiresome to talk to them directly about anything supernatural whatsoever. Even approaching them without strengthening one's own Mask is a faux pas. They're not stupid - they will address supernatural problems if they're politely phrased in euphemistic language - but as a whole they would very much like to be done with this whole magic and monsters thing.

[* Systems reminder: The Mask is the normal, non-fairy human shape of Changelings that ordinary humans see to prevent them freaking out at these monsters everywhere. Changelings and supernaturals see through it by default. It can be strengthened for a single point of Glamour, preventing Changelings from seeing through it without more specialized magic]

Summer is not here yet. Out driving around presumably. They'll arrive soon.

As far as Winter goes, it's a disaster. You know there are more of them out there (like Edmund) but, much like King Kent, many are too shy, depressed or antisocial to show up to meetings. There's only about four or five of them here, wearing whatever they happened to be wearing that day, scattered around the seats of the theatre and not talking to each other. They don't really think of themselves as an influential faction and, as a result, they're not. There's a lot of potential power there but someone will need to whip them into shape to make that happen.

Who do you approach, and with what purpose?

Lily takes it all in. It feels so grand here, in this theatre, everyone gathered, yet in a much more comfortable way than an opulent immaculate palace. There was Purpose here. So much trauma, yes, but far more Possibilities. Lily had to check herself from outright smiling. She had never been here and most of these people were strangers, even if she may have known some of them Before. It was a lifetime ago and felt irrelevant now somehow as to who she may have connection with.

She tried to keep up with Jack, she wanted to ensure he had her support in his task here, but being in this place made her feel vibrant and alive in a way she had forgotten what it felt like. It was... it was... a bit like when a funfair came to town. She could almost smell the cotton candy.

She paused to watch the ceremony of Autumn, the show of Unity that they seemed uniquely dedicated to portray. It made her wonder why, did they feel threatened? Did they try to hide something?

Her eyes went to Spring and the lengths they went to to deny the magic within and around them. It was an entirely understandable reaction, she felt. She keenly understood the temptation to close all doors on what had happened and surround yourself with the mundane and the predictable. It was not how she wished to live, but she respected it nonetheless.

Lily looked around and noticed not only the seeming absence of Summer, to make a late and grand entrance perhaps, but also the scattered, uninspired and incoherent court that was Winter. Then her smile faltered. She watched each of them, noticing Jack approaching one.

The urge to fix Winter was almost overwhelming. There had to be a way to unify them. Then she remembered that they were here largely because the King of Winter refused to get out of bed and suddenly the task of unifying Winter felt almost unachievable. Even so, Lily was wholly unable to not at least try. She looked around, to spot the one among Winter who hid the most, the one furthest back, behind the pillar, nearest an exit.

Thanqol

2018-02-17, 06:15 AM

As Abby looks out the window and really looks at these two, with their crazy armor and weird magical bag, a quick range of emotions crosses her face. First is an "oh no" look, then briefly anger, then thinking and her forehead scrunches up, and then she settles. "Okay, I'm going to stay here. We're talking, you're out there, you stay out there, I'll stay in here. What do you want to talk about?"

Mercia and Longarms exchanged looks.

"Like I said, ma'am, your identity has been stolen," said Longarms, smoothly keeping the patter going. "An illegal immigrant recently made her way into Australia using your identity. We believe she may have made a copy of your passport during your recent trip to Europe. We have been informed this 'Aelas' character," he pronounced it 'Alias', "is involved with an organized crime and human trafficking ring called 'Spring Court', an organization that has murdered people for their identities in the past."

"Static, nice to meet you!" Aelas shakes the hand that's grappling her [roll to escape: str+brawl chance die=9. So close. Spending 1 glamour to slip the bonds.]

"Ow ow ow, that hurt!" Aelas slips away.

"Oh, and um, I mean, you could drive Butterfly, but she can only carry one person even though she looks like a car. Honestly, I don't even know how we managed this whole thing with you hanging off the side the whole time, but she definitely won't let more than one person get in, it just doesn't work. Also, she's gonna be leaving pretty soon, like I said, she needs to rest unless we feed her."

"O.K.," said Static. "That's fine. I'll call us an uber."

She kept moving, the same constant, predatory flow - only faster now. She moved and crackled at the edges with prismatic light - in fact, her hair's moving and shining a lot like yours right now.

"Actually, do you mind spotting me some cash?" she actually looks a bit embarrassed as she says that, even as she's striking out again to finish draining the strength from your veins. "I'll pay you back. Swear?"

[Grapple: 4,10,3,9,10,4,1,1,8 - with one success on the 10's, that's 4 successes total.]

Wits+Empathy+Specialty+Mantle = 9 : 9,9,6,6,2,10,1,6,7, ten again 4. 3 successes

Jack approaches slowly, making sure she notices him and his intentions long before he's anywhere near her. He's calm as a floating snowflake on a windless day, as non-threatening and friendly as a puppy looking for a warm place to rest.

It's the feet, tapping to an inaudible rhythm, the constant looks at the stairs leading up to the stage - she's expecting her name to be called, a spotlight to transfix her, and be called upon to dance. And that prospect both elates and horrifies her. She's verging on a flashback - you can see the scene playing out inside her head as she tries to convince herself that she's here and not there.

She's drowning in memories right now. She could use help.

"Mistaken," he says, his voice too rough to sound as he would like it to sound: apologetic about the mistaken identity, yet eager to help her catch up to speed. Instead, it likely sounds brusque. "Just Isaac. Last I heard, Johannesen died." And that's the truth, if you look at it the right way, tilt your head and look at our friend the Pilgrim, his skin a tapestry of burnt offerings, his body made vast and terrible, half monster and half athlete and all of it a pilgrim; what about him is left from the person who was judged unworthy so long ago? Is the ship of Theseus still his ship?

Suddenly self-conscious, head aflame, throat tight with embarrassment, Isaac bows his head once, a movement of the entire body- and if he was not masked it might look like a bull about to gore her against its horns- and attempts to make an escape. That's what he's good at, after all. But this is not a jungle, and it would be very rude indeed to jump onto the wall and clamber up to a better vantage point, and people like Height have a way of using their words as a lasso.

"Oh, no need for all that," said Mrs. Height, expertly outmaneuvering you with her social footwork. By taking the right step forward and a meaningful gesture, the only way you could escape from her is by physically clambering over old Mr. Rocksledge, who just so happens to be standing nearby. "I know exactly how your life has gone, Mr. Johannesen. You got straight, quit your low-down ways, and then went off to Sydney to become some sort of tax accountant. Very agreeable! Well, I happened to hear that you had left some unresolved business down that way when you came back to us. The sort of thing that could raise a lot of inconvenient questions somewhere down the line. So that's why I wanted to speak to you and welcome you personally back to Prosperpine! I have a friend who's taking a road trip down to Sydney as we speak and when she gets there she'll pick up some of your clothes and things, help you get back on your feet, isn't that just peachy of her?"

Her implication is so crystal clear you can't miss it: Mr. Johannesen is going to die. And then you are going to be Mr. Johannesen.

She paused to watch the ceremony of Autumn, the show of Unity that they seemed uniquely dedicated to portray. It made her wonder why, did they feel threatened? Did they try to hide something?

The answer to both of those questions is an incredibly strong yes.

The urge to fix Winter was almost overwhelming. There had to be a way to unify them. Then she remembered that they were here largely because the King of Winter refused to get out of bed and suddenly the task of unifying Winter felt almost unachievable. Even so, Lily was wholly unable to not at least try. She looked around, to spot the one among Winter who hid the most, the one furthest back, behind the pillar, nearest an exit.

You probably don't find the one hiding the most - there are almost certainly at least a few truly invisible people here. Of the people who are attending rather than spying, though, the most borderline present is a hugely muscled cyborg. His skin is a sickly, tough yellow and his cybernetic parts are crude and ugly - large rivets, exposed wires, rumbling petrol-fuelled engines. It looks dangerous, raw, animalistic - bestial technology. Things made to survive anything.

He doesn't give the impression of being on the sidelines because he's afraid; he gives the impression of being frustrated - he has places to be and things to do. He doesn't want to be here but it's something he has to do. He's Mr. Bigby Moon, and his nickname in the court is The Big Bad Moon.

Anarion

2018-02-18, 04:23 AM

Mercia and Longarms exchanged looks.

"Like I said, ma'am, your identity has been stolen," said Longarms, smoothly keeping the patter going. "An illegal immigrant recently made her way into Australia using your identity. We believe she may have made a copy of your passport during your recent trip to Europe. We have been informed this 'Aelas' character," he pronounced it 'Alias', "is involved with an organized crime and human trafficking ring called 'Spring Court', an organization that has murdered people for their identities in the past."

"Oookay" says Abigail, drawing out the word with her skepticism. "So, getting murdered by a crime ring sounds like the kind of thing that makes Daddy's advice of 'don't get involved' sound really appealing, y'know? So, um, what is it that you think I can help you with in all this?"

"O.K.," said Static. "That's fine. I'll call us an uber."

She kept moving, the same constant, predatory flow - only faster now. She moved and crackled at the edges with prismatic light - in fact, her hair's moving and shining a lot like yours right now.

"Actually, do you mind spotting me some cash?" she actually looks a bit embarrassed as she says that, even as she's striking out again to finish draining the strength from your veins. "I'll pay you back. Swear?"

[Grapple: 4,10,3,9,10,4,1,1,8 - with one success on the 10's, that's 4 successes total.]

[dodge: 2 - 4 - 3 - 6 - 8 - 7 - 8 - 8 - 5 - 4 - 10 - 2. 10 again is irrelevant, grapple is canceled.]

"Okay, listen, I'm going in the store now, so if you tackle me and drag me out of here, it's gonna be in front of some random guy and I'll totally scream really loud when you do it. But we can keep talking in there all you want, okay? Butterfly, you go take a rest, okay?

And sure, if we get this all sorted out, I'll pay for the ride home and you can owe me later."
Aelas briefly considers binding this to make a point that she's serious, but decides it's not really worth it and doesn't want to come across as being mean here when she's trying to make a new friend.

Having dodged, she runs past the still present alpacas and into the gift shop and right up to the cash register, where she asks for a bottle of water.

Elanorin

2018-02-19, 03:54 PM

You probably don't find the one hiding the most - there are almost certainly at least a few truly invisible people here. Of the people who are attending rather than spying, though, the most borderline present is a hugely muscled cyborg. His skin is a sickly, tough yellow and his cybernetic parts are crude and ugly - large rivets, exposed wires, rumbling petrol-fuelled engines. It looks dangerous, raw, animalistic - bestial technology. Things made to survive anything.

He doesn't give the impression of being on the sidelines because he's afraid; he gives the impression of being frustrated - he has places to be and things to do. He doesn't want to be here but it's something he has to do. He's Mr. Bigby Moon, and his nickname in the court is The Big Bad Moon.

Ummm... okay. Well. No time like the present.

Lily moves through the crowd over to the back where Mr Moon stands and politely announces her presence with a nod, small smile and soft clearing of her throat.

"Good evening," she said softly without meeting his gaze should he turn it her way, "would you like to join us over there?" she suggested with a small motion in Jack's direction.

stveje

2018-02-20, 05:10 AM

It's the feet, tapping to an inaudible rhythm, the constant looks at the stairs leading up to the stage - she's expecting her name to be called, a spotlight to transfix her, and be called upon to dance. And that prospect both elates and horrifies her. She's verging on a flashback - you can see the scene playing out inside her head as she tries to convince herself that she's here and not there.

She's drowning in memories right now. She could use help.

Jack sat down, very carefully, next to her. "Hi," he said, then followed her gaze to the stage. "Why do you think they'll call you up there?" Maybe if he just gets her thinking about the here, the now, the present, maybe if she just has someone else to talk to, that'll be a start. What do you even do or say in a situation like this? To someone going through this? Jack is no psychologist, but one thing he's always known: how to listen.

Thanqol

2018-02-20, 09:00 PM

"Oookay" says Abigail, drawing out the word with her skepticism. "So, getting murdered by a crime ring sounds like the kind of thing that makes Daddy's advice of 'don't get involved' sound really appealing, y'know? So, um, what is it that you think I can help you with in all this?"

"We don't need your help, ma'am," said Longarms, "just your co-operation," he added tautologically.

Mercia cut in smoothly. "We advise you change all your passwords, update all your documentation, and be wary of strangers. We have contacted your bank asking them to flag suspicious credit activity, and the local police department letting them know of the potential danger. If you in any way feel unsafe or notice anything out of the ordinary, please go through the normal channels. Everyone will have been briefed about your situation."

There had been times in the past when Mercia needed to run the extra mile to hand out business cards and urge people call her rather than the cops, and that had ended in a bloody ambush when that information was used against her. Far better, she reasoned nowadays, to just flip the cops as an organization and use them instead.

"Okay, listen, I'm going in the store now, so if you tackle me and drag me out of here, it's gonna be in front of some random guy and I'll totally scream really loud when you do it. But we can keep talking in there all you want, okay? Butterfly, you go take a rest, okay?

And sure, if we get this all sorted out, I'll pay for the ride home and you can owe me later."
Aelas briefly considers binding this to make a point that she's serious, but decides it's not really worth it and doesn't want to come across as being mean here when she's trying to make a new friend.

Having dodged, she runs past the still present alpacas and into the gift shop and right up to the cash register, where she asks for a bottle of water.

Static aggressively slinks into the gift shop behind you, hands firmly in her pockets, shoulders hunched, hoodie raised. She's good at this. She has slunked around convenience stores in the past.

"Oh hey there, girlys," said the guy, identified as Dylan by his friendly nametag. Young, Filipino, big smile. A bit cult-y of a smile, really, but Newcastle has that reputation. "Welcome to Newcastle, historic Newcastle. Water here is from the Artisanal basin discovered in 1948 by Richmond Riles, back from the war with an enchanted water-divining stick he'd picked up from a bazaar in Cairo, you can see it over there in the big display case. 4.95 please."

Ummm... okay. Well. No time like the present.

Lily moves through the crowd over to the back where Mr Moon stands and politely announces her presence with a nod, small smile and soft clearing of her throat.

"Good evening," she said softly without meeting his gaze should he turn it her way, "would you like to join us over there?" she suggested with a small motion in Jack's direction.

Mr. Moon leans down - he's not particularly tall but his bulk gives even that small gesture the impression of looming. "Where's the King?" he demands roughly, gears clattering. "We're getting picked apart here. He needs to be present. Show the flag. He's using you as an excuse not to be."

Jack sat down, very carefully, next to her. "Hi," he said, then followed her gaze to the stage. "Why do you think they'll call you up there?" Maybe if he just gets her thinking about the here, the now, the present, maybe if she just has someone else to talk to, that'll be a start. What do you even do or say in a situation like this? To someone going through this? Jack is no psychologist, but one thing he's always known: how to listen.

"The courts can't fight. Directly. There's a spell that stops them," she said, still focused - focusing even harder now that the words she's going over internally are coming out of her mouth. "They fight using poems and music and dances. I'm the best at dancing," she says that like it's a... a threat? A lament? A sob, even? "so when Winter wants something they'll send me."

Her knuckles twitch, and fingers clench a little tighter, leaving white indents deep into her skin.

Raz_Fox

2018-02-20, 09:38 PM

The scene is very different, here, because of that enveloping cloak and mask, that deep well of darkness from which the hoarse whisper of a fire-scorched throat flares forth in guttering spurts. There is no terrible light shining forth from that black pool, no burning candle-wicks focused with a terrible and unblinking intensity on this small, pleasant woman. Isaac cannot even rear up to his full and terrible height, a shadow looming over her, a threat of power that is worse than the falling hammerblow itself. What we have here is a scene from a comedy, the cultist confronted by the society matron, and just you forget that the matron has just talked about killing someone without blinking an eye.

On the other hand, the Pilgrim's hands aren't exactly clean, either. The crack of a spine, the wet pop of something soft giving way to a groping thumb, the feeling of something yielding before his horns. It's easy to be brutal when the violence never lasts, when the horns will call a point and everyone will assemble themselves once again into their formations.

"Leave it alone," he says, softly. The fact that this accountant is an enigma, a patch of static in the memory, does not matter. Something left behind. Something that imperfectly filled that hole. Something that was a better member of society, from the sound of it. The Pilgrim runs interference. "The dead bury the dead." Burned into his left tricep in Aramaic, that.

What else could he say? That he went marching off to... to service, to war? Something like that. Something where you come back burned and mangled and changed utterly. That Johannesen might as well have been some punk child who cried himself to sleep and got torn apart, and the Pilgrim was forced to keep marching? Maybe the metaphor of convicts sharing a cell is better. Criminals serve their time. Criminals are punished in order to rejoin society. Stupid kids die with a knife in their livers. But that doesn't match the fact that the thing called Johannesen (educated? reformed? how did he speak? how did he live? not out in the gulch, because only hardness satisfies the spine after so long, because the change of the wind and the whisper of bats wakes him before he even knows something approaches, not like that, somewhere with keys and a fridge and that's how the real world works, right?) it is nothing like him, surely. Spare peg- no, square peg, that's the idiom, square peg, round hole, can't fit without shaving off the horns and putting mittens on the claws, he drank of their fruits and ate of their meats and now he is what he has become, and none of that fits in either the soldier or the criminal metaphor, and opening his mouth to say any of the above would be inane. And only half of it would come out, anyways, jumbling itself up in the exit.

He prods her shoulder with one skeletally thin finger, wrapped inside a thick glove, invading her personal space, her decorum, her dominance. "Be good." Everything is wrapped within the words. Everything in the universe. His fear for them all, the five of them who escaped as one, five fingers on the hand, and this whole ridiculous Tide-bleached-clean court that would become filthy and scorched in the fires of salvation, all of them, please, please, just listen. His acceptance of what has happened, what he has been made, what he deserves. His hungry need to run interference for them all. His plea for her to listen, to stop. To not kill a thing that has not done a thing, save that it looks like someone who was burned away at the edge of a luminous coal. His defiant declaration of the self, that this thing is what was vomited forth from the gates of dawn and judgment and that this is what you will deal with, and it is a walking reminder that you deserve to be punished but be good, be good, walk quiet and do not throw the stone that breaks the sparrow's wing.

He realizes, belatedly, that aggressively touching someone important rarely ends well, but the part of him that deals with emergencies just shrugs internally and makes the instinctive decision to grab hold of anyone who attempts to seize him and fling them over his shoulder, the way he would if he were in a match. It is good at doing things like that, which is why he usually takes the time to consider other viewpoints.

Thanqol

2018-02-20, 10:47 PM

He prods her shoulder with one skeletally thin finger, wrapped inside a thick glove, invading her personal space, her decorum, her dominance. "Be good." Everything is wrapped within the words. Everything in the universe. His fear for them all, the five of them who escaped as one, five fingers on the hand, and this whole ridiculous Tide-bleached-clean court that would become filthy and scorched in the fires of salvation, all of them, please, please, just listen. His acceptance of what has happened, what he has been made, what he deserves. His hungry need to run interference for them all. His plea for her to listen, to stop. To not kill a thing that has not done a thing, save that it looks like someone who was burned away at the edge of a luminous coal. His defiant declaration of the self, that this thing is what was vomited forth from the gates of dawn and judgment and that this is what you will deal with, and it is a walking reminder that you deserve to be punished but be good, be good, walk quiet and do not throw the stone that breaks the sparrow's wing.

He realizes, belatedly, that aggressively touching someone important rarely ends well, but the part of him that deals with emergencies just shrugs internally and makes the instinctive decision to grab hold of anyone who attempts to seize him and fling them over his shoulder, the way he would if he were in a match. It is good at doing things like that, which is why he usually takes the time to consider other viewpoints.

Autumn rustles across your robes; you feel a pressure as it sits atop your head, as grand and fearsome as a cat remembering it is a tyger. The blossoms in Mrs. Height's hat wilt slightly. This is your season. It is not hers.

Two others of Autumn come to stand behind you. A wall of fabric and shadows, although you tower above them both. Fear spreads like claw marks on expensive hardwood.

She scoffs. Her pride salvages what it can from this situation. The justifications form themselves in her eyes though they never leave her lips, the words that will shield her ego from this affront: we'll try this again in Spring.

"Mr. Rocksledge!" she says, gaze falling away from you deliberately. "How lovely to see you!" Already is she pretending that this conversation never happened and that she is just here to socialize with friends. She begins to natter away as she buries the grudge. Sooner or later the spring rain will wash away the fear she concealed it under, but until then she will not cross you.

You again have free reign through the court, though the air is beginning to warm. Summer may arrive soon. Autumn is on the brink of calling the meeting to order.

stveje

2018-02-21, 04:24 AM

"The courts can't fight. Directly. There's a spell that stops them," she said, still focused - focusing even harder now that the words she's going over internally are coming out of her mouth. "They fight using poems and music and dances. I'm the best at dancing," she says that like it's a... a threat? A lament? A sob, even? "so when Winter wants something they'll send me."

Her knuckles twitch, and fingers clench a little tighter, leaving white indents deep into her skin.

Jack looks around the room, at the few Winters there, at Lily, and at the mirror he carries, and he thinks of King Kent's appreciation for the artistic. Jack is no dancer, nor is he fond of stages, though he'll suffer them if he has to, but he is good at plans and trickery and misdirection. He looks at Lily again - not much stage presence there, he thinks, but she might just have a shred of artistic sense - then back at Bailey and makes a note to himself: they aren't so different in size and figure, are they?

"I see. But you like to dance, don't you? You just don't want to be up on stage."

Elanorin

2018-02-21, 05:00 AM

Mr. Moon leans down - he's not particularly tall but his bulk gives even that small gesture the impression of looming. "Where's the King?" he demands roughly, gears clattering. "We're getting picked apart here. He needs to be present. Show the flag. He's using you as an excuse not to be."

Don'tbackawaydon'tbackawaydon'tbackaway-

"The King may not be standing here but he is with us, his vote will be cast," Lily said softly, taking a step back as casually as she was able to disguise it. Mr Moon was... well she shan't forget his Christmas card.

"Perhaps we would fare better if we stood together?" she tried again. She knew hoping for a display like that of Autumn was just out of the question, besides, she didn't really want to go to that extreme. It was not who they were. But it would be nice if they could stomach standing with each other for an evening once in a blue moon.

The ludicrous notion of running Winter Team Build events flittered through her mind and she bit her lip to keep from smiling.

Anarion

2018-02-21, 04:25 PM

"We don't need your help, ma'am," said Longarms, "just your co-operation," he added tautologically.

Mercia cut in smoothly. "We advise you change all your passwords, update all your documentation, and be wary of strangers. We have contacted your bank asking them to flag suspicious credit activity, and the local police department letting them know of the potential danger. If you in any way feel unsafe or notice anything out of the ordinary, please go through the normal channels. Everyone will have been briefed about your situation."

There had been times in the past when Mercia needed to run the extra mile to hand out business cards and urge people call her rather than the cops, and that had ended in a bloody ambush when that information was used against her. Far better, she reasoned nowadays, to just flip the cops as an organization and use them instead.

Abbey smiles in what she hopes is a friendly way, but may be a tad forced. She hopes they just think it looks forced because they're cops and nobody likes dealing with cops, as opposed to realizing that it's because they're Huntsmen and she's internally freaking out and trying to pretend everything is normal. "Sure thing. I'll go back inside and update all my passwords right away. Um...thanks for stopping by...officers."

Are they leaving? She really hopes that they're leaving now.

Static aggressively slinks into the gift shop behind you, hands firmly in her pockets, shoulders hunched, hoodie raised. She's good at this. She has slunked around convenience stores in the past.

"Oh hey there, girlys," said the guy, identified as Dylan by his friendly nametag. Young, Filipino, big smile. A bit cult-y of a smile, really, but Newcastle has that reputation. "Welcome to Newcastle, historic Newcastle. Water here is from the Artisanal basin discovered in 1948 by Richmond Riles, back from the war with an enchanted water-divining stick he'd picked up from a bazaar in Cairo, you can see it over there in the big display case. 4.95 please."

"Wow, an enchanted divining stick." Aelas' eyes widen in wonder. She hands Dylan a few coins, and stays at the desk leaning on the counter and sips at the water bottle. "Can you tell me the story of how he ended up in Cairo and realized the rod was enchanted?"

She glances at Static to make sure she's not crowding her personal space.

Raz_Fox

2018-02-21, 09:37 PM

The Pilgrim offers his reinforcements a nod. He would have done the same, but it is good to acknowledge someone who stands up for you.

So. So. Here is what the Pilgrim needs, right now. The Pilgrim needs a quiet moment and the ear of the Vizier, or the Witch, or the Archivist. The member of the Autumn Court who specializes in arcane knowledge and the study of the other side. Someone who would be able to take the information about two predators who have the knowing of iron and produce the name: Huntsman. Someone who can let the King know. Because that's what you do when you're part of a team: you keep them in the loop.

Once that's done (and whatever knowledge can be gleaned from the encounter has been traded), if that is not important enough for us to play out in full, the Pilgrim will take a moment to do a fly-by of Lily and The Big Bad Bulldozer, his intent to make sure that she's not being intimidated by Moon likely obvious to Lily with her high social acumen, and then take his place among Autumn for the meeting's start.

Thanqol

2018-02-21, 11:03 PM

Jack looks around the room, at the few Winters there, at Lily, and at the mirror he carries, and he thinks of King Kent's appreciation for the artistic. Jack is no dancer, nor is he fond of stages, though he'll suffer them if he has to, but he is good at plans and trickery and misdirection. He looks at Lily again - not much stage presence there, he thinks, but she might just have a shred of artistic sense - then back at Bailey and makes a note to himself: they aren't so different in size and figure, are they?

"I see. But you like to dance, don't you? You just don't want to be up on stage."

"Well," she bit her lip, seriously torn by the question. "... yes? It's..." she gropes her way around the words, trying to describe a past experience without re-living it. "Less the dancing I don't want. More the judging."

Don'tbackawaydon'tbackawaydon'tbackaway-

"The King may not be standing here but he is with us, his vote will be cast," Lily said softly, taking a step back as casually as she was able to disguise it. Mr Moon was... well she shan't forget his Christmas card.

"Perhaps we would fare better if we stood together?" she tried again. She knew hoping for a display like that of Autumn was just out of the question, besides, she didn't really want to go to that extreme. It was not who they were. But it would be nice if they could stomach standing with each other for an evening once in a blue moon.

The ludicrous notion of running Winter Team Build events flittered through her mind and she bit her lip to keep from smiling.

"Hmm," said Bigby, bringing up a vast paw to rub his chin in a grotesque approximation of thoughtful consideration. "And why would I do that, hmm? Do you have some manner of plan? Are you making a play? Looking to stir the pot, are you?"

His voice roils like a storm and his challenges follow without time to respond to each, but he is not deliberately threatening; curiosity and an Ogre's delight in repetition are his watchwords here, a mind like a steam engine searching for something to crush - or drag behind it.

The Pilgrim offers his reinforcements a nod. He would have done the same, but it is good to acknowledge someone who stands up for you.

So. So. Here is what the Pilgrim needs, right now. The Pilgrim needs a quiet moment and the ear of the Vizier, or the Witch, or the Archivist. The member of the Autumn Court who specializes in arcane knowledge and the study of the other side. Someone who would be able to take the information about two predators who have the knowing of iron and produce the name: Huntsman. Someone who can let the King know. Because that's what you do when you're part of a team: you keep them in the loop.

Once that's done (and whatever knowledge can be gleaned from the encounter has been traded), if that is not important enough for us to play out in full,

It is done and is just so; the quiet correspondence of whispered secret is Autumn's trade and flow. Information gifted (and it must be a gift - dare not the Goblins' Law by selling information, even if it seems like you are beyond the market walls) disseminates and is repaid with similar gifts. Names: Mercia and Longarms, by their panoply. This exchange is as natural as the breath in which it flows; there is no need to linger on it.

the Pilgrim will take a moment to do a fly-by of Lily and The Big Bad Bulldozer, his intent to make sure that she's not being intimidated by Moon likely obvious to Lily with her high social acumen, and then take his place among Autumn for the meeting's start.

Mr. Moon raises his head draws a thumb across his throat as he catches your eyes - not a threat to her, but a clear threat to you, and not one with much thought behind it. Perhaps he only felt drawn to make it because you stalk like a raptor in robes and he is used to repaying fear with fear.

On the note of your size, you are unfortunately the worst kept secret in Autumn's unified ranks - you tower above all those around you. Someone with more grace than you arranges things so you are brought to stand in the dead centre of the court, lesser figures clustering around you.

The whispering exchange comes again; in these last few seconds, the Court is asking itself if there are any opinions or desires amongst its members it must know about. This is less a promise to consider those ideas and more a way for the Court to avoid coming to any decisions that would cause any of its members to publicly object and thereby undermine Autumn's unity.

Abbey smiles in what she hopes is a friendly way, but may be a tad forced. She hopes they just think it looks forced because they're cops and nobody likes dealing with cops, as opposed to realizing that it's because they're Huntsmen and she's internally freaking out and trying to pretend everything is normal. "Sure thing. I'll go back inside and update all my passwords right away. Um...thanks for stopping by...officers."

Are they leaving? She really hopes that they're leaving now.

They are indeed leaving now, walking down the road to get in someone else's car and drive away.

"She didn't like us," said Longarms with disappointment evident in his voice.

"She's well made," said Mercia, concealing her own heartache. "Aware. But that's fine. She doesn't need to like us. We don't really give a damn about her one way or another. Meetings like that cost us nothing."

"Who's next on the list?"

"Mr. Johannesen left town," said Mercia. "See if you can find Fairchild."

"Wow, an enchanted divining stick." Aelas' eyes widen in wonder. She hands Dylan a few coins, and stays at the desk leaning on the counter and sips at the water bottle. "Can you tell me the story of how he ended up in Cairo and realized the rod was enchanted?"

She glances at Static to make sure she's not crowding her personal space.

"The Australian Imperial Force recruited from blah blah blah blah," said Dylan. "Blah blah blah Iraq campaign blah blah mission creep blah blah blah historical parallels blah blah force the straits blah blah blah Churchill blah blah blah blah..."

He'll go on for as long as you need him to about minutae of the ANZAC corps' adventures and actions across the Middle East and the feats of derring-do achieved by Newcastle residents in the first world war. If you need him to he'll produce Mr. Riles' war diary and start reading entire passages out loud. Riveting stuff.

Static is indeed slightly crowding your personal space but her eyes are glazing over a bit as Dylan gets into his full swing. If a distraction is what you were after here, you've got it. If not, well, this will go on for a full hour until closing time brings an end to it.

Elanorin

2018-02-22, 05:58 PM

"Hmm," said Bigby, bringing up a vast paw to rub his chin in a grotesque approximation of thoughtful consideration. "And why would I do that, hmm? Do you have some manner of plan? Are you making a play? Looking to stir the pot, are you?"

His voice roils like a storm and his challenges follow without time to respond to each, but he is not deliberately threatening; curiosity and an Ogre's delight in repetition are his watchwords here, a mind like a steam engine searching for something to crush - or drag behind it.

Lily watched the hand attempting to make a display of careful consideration and she humours it by waiting. Just because she was unconvinced by the offered display, did not mean the person behind it was any less menacing, and it was only on her second attempt to speak that words actually came out, her eyes still staring on that hand, "Well, yes. The pot is in dire need of stirring, is it not? It's just a different patch of floor, a few steps away, but it could be the beginning of finding out if Winter is greater than the sum of its parts."

Mr. Moon raises his head draws a thumb across his throat as he catches your eyes - not a threat to her, but a clear threat to you, and not one with much thought behind it. Perhaps he only felt drawn to make it because you stalk like a raptor in robes and he is used to repaying fear with fear.

Lily paused and glanced over her shoulder as she noticed Bigby's attention wandering. When she saw Isaac there she froze for a second, both intimidated by his attention and glad for it.

"It's your choice, of course, Mr Moon," she added, casting her eyes down. With that she gave a quick curtsy and moved to walk over to the next member of Winter lurking around on their own.

stveje

2018-02-23, 03:40 AM

"Well," she bit her lip, seriously torn by the question. "... yes? It's..." she gropes her way around the words, trying to describe a past experience without re-living it. "Less the dancing I don't want. More the judging."

"So, if it was someone else being judged ..." he trailed off, looking again towards Lily. He leans a little closer to lower his voice, and to show her something like what he had in his mind (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGCsyshUU-A) - surely someone has a phone, everyone has a phone, even changelings fresh out of the hedge, even if it might have been someone else's phone. "I can make her into a Dancer," the word was loaded with more meaning than the everyday usage, "but I can't give her the experience or the stage presence. Do you think you could make her look stunning enough on a stage to win? Make everyone look at her and say ooh and wow? All anyone has to see of you is your shadow, dancing with her." Jack knew about shadows.

Raz_Fox

2018-02-23, 06:32 PM

Ah, so not even the vaunted magics of the fairy wizards of the most arcane of all eldritch associations can make the Pilgrim seem any less than he is. There once was an ogre who could do that, I hear, until a cat tricked him into becoming a mouse. Nevertheless, he shall be the tent pole, the axis around which the wings of Autumn turn.

(The eye imagines voluminous dark robes, edged in gold, each one bearing a hood with a pointed tip. Thank goodness the tailor made them in black, not in white, or we would have quite the distressing visual up on the stage, and a burning cross to bring the meeting to order.)

Anarion

2018-02-23, 11:16 PM

They are indeed leaving now, walking down the road to get in someone else's car and drive away.

"She didn't like us," said Longarms with disappointment evident in his voice.

"She's well made," said Mercia, concealing her own heartache. "Aware. But that's fine. She doesn't need to like us. We don't really give a damn about her one way or another. Meetings like that cost us nothing."

"Who's next on the list?"

"Mr. Johannesen left town," said Mercia. "See if you can find Fairchild."

As soon as the Huntsmen are out of sight, Abigail is sending blaring parallel lives warning beacons to Aelas. She can't really send a detailed voice message, but as much of Hunters, aaaaaah, know where I live!!111! as can manage to translate via parallel lives is going to Aelas (the ones are intentional, Abby absolutely thinks in text message).

"The Australian Imperial Force recruited from blah blah blah blah," said Dylan. "Blah blah blah Iraq campaign blah blah mission creep blah blah blah historical parallels blah blah force the straits blah blah blah Churchill blah blah blah blah..."

He'll go on for as long as you need him to about minutae of the ANZAC corps' adventures and actions across the Middle East and the feats of derring-do achieved by Newcastle residents in the first world war. If you need him to he'll produce Mr. Riles' war diary and start reading entire passages out loud. Riveting stuff.

Static is indeed slightly crowding your personal space but her eyes are glazing over a bit as Dylan gets into his full swing. If a distraction is what you were after here, you've got it. If not, well, this will go on for a full hour until closing time brings an end to it.

Aelas' original plan had just been to hope that Static got bored and left first and then catch a ride back to town. But, it's during this absolutely fascinating history of Newcastle that panic bells go off in her brain and she gathers that her Fetch is flipping out. She considers diving her Abby's eyes, but she doesn't want to take leave of her own sense with Static around, so instead she looks for an opportunity to slip out unseen. She'll hail a cab if she can, she'd rather spend money than glamour right now, but if there's nothing and she needs to make this escape very quickly, she'll call Butterfly back again.

Thanqol

2018-02-25, 04:45 PM

"Ooo, this divorce is getting messy," said Longarms, scrolling rapidly through Facebook. "She's in the right, though. Obviously."

"We'll just go about the same approach as before then -"

"No!" said Longarms sharply. Mercia looked at him. He had that same unpleasantly cold sweat about him, the twitching eye of an addict who hasn't had a fix in long enough. Unstable. "Look. She's got too much on her mind to worry about cops. And her lawyer's a moron. I need to be her new lawyer. I'll get her a win. And then she'll be my friend and tell me absolutely everything out of gratitude."

"Hmm," Mercia said tersely. But maybe, maybe sacrificing something that was meaningful to her to help someone else get what they needed was what someone who was in love would do?

Lily paused and glanced over her shoulder as she noticed Bigby's attention wandering. When she saw Isaac there she froze for a second, both intimidated by his attention and glad for it.

"It's your choice, of course, Mr Moon," she added, casting her eyes down. With that she gave a quick curtsy and moved to walk over to the next member of Winter lurking around on their own.

Organizing this is eminently within your abilities; roll manipulation+socialize. If you get an exceptional success they'll even talk to each other unprompted!

"So, if it was someone else being judged ..." he trailed off, looking again towards Lily. He leans a little closer to lower his voice, and to show her something like what he had in his mind (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGCsyshUU-A) - surely someone has a phone, everyone has a phone, even changelings fresh out of the hedge, even if it might have been someone else's phone. "I can make her into a Dancer," the word was loaded with more meaning than the everyday usage, "but I can't give her the experience or the stage presence. Do you think you could make her look stunning enough on a stage to win? Make everyone look at her and say ooh and wow? All anyone has to see of you is your shadow, dancing with her." Jack knew about shadows.

She looked intrigued by the video - when you're that good at something every novel twist is a breath of inspiration. "I could do that," she said. "The break in precision opens a lot of doors... I'm April, by the way. Thank you."

Ah, so not even the vaunted magics of the fairy wizards of the most arcane of all eldritch associations can make the Pilgrim seem any less than he is. There once was an ogre who could do that, I hear, until a cat tricked him into becoming a mouse. Nevertheless, he shall be the tent pole, the axis around which the wings of Autumn turn.

(The eye imagines voluminous dark robes, edged in gold, each one bearing a hood with a pointed tip. Thank goodness the tailor made them in black, not in white, or we would have quite the distressing visual up on the stage, and a burning cross to bring the meeting to order.)

The magic of making the large small is illegal these days, as part of the peace negotiations of a strange war in the Market; this knowledge flows through the whispers to you in response to the question unspoken. As with most things of the Market, the Goblins take an extremely pre-emptive approach to dealing with potential violations, so little do they trust each other. Holding such magic can be dangerous.

And then there is the roar of engines, and the crash of glass, and Summer has arrived.

Bedraggled, thorn-stuck, angry, coated with dust they have been made to eat. Armed with chains and tire irons and stomping their way in the straightest of straight lines, knocking away chairs in their path, moving in a united and holy host - distinct as individuals but alike in the same frenzy of activity, a unity of wrath as fearsome as Spring's eerie normality and Autumn's shadowy cloaks. The secondary theme that runs through their meins is that of vines, and growth, and green and vibrant things.

They bring with them music (https://youtu.be/4r9S2yEiuME). Their ogres stomp the ground so hard the entire building quakes. A dwarf violinist prances ahead of the storm, and a shaggy moss-man blasts on an array of trumpets, and a circus-clown wears an entire one man band and her eight arms each play a different part to it. They herald a palanquin held aloft by proud warriors armoured in wood with the teeth of dragons on their necklaces.

And from this lofty perch leaps the King of Summer, landing atop the stage with such force and flame that the entire Court of Autumn shrinks back a little, clustering closer to and behind the Pilgrim. The horns howl with every step. He is a handsome man in the way that only one who has done time as a handsome prince can be. Behind his eyes glints boldness set with fury. In his hand he grasps the thyrsus, woven from sugar-cane and banksia. Across his left eye he wars a monocle of iron and glass, and though it burns and scars his otherwise perfect features and condemns him to agony, it grants him the all-sight of Odin.

And then he roars, and the sound is a hurricane. The meaning is simple: Get off the stage. I am king here.

Everyone, make a resolve+composure roll to remain unflinching, with a bonus equal to your Mantle and a penalty equal to his (-5).

As soon as the Huntsmen are out of sight, Abigail is sending blaring parallel lives warning beacons to Aelas. She can't really send a detailed voice message, but as much of Hunters, aaaaaah, know where I live!!111! as can manage to translate via parallel lives is going to Aelas (the ones are intentional, Abby absolutely thinks in text message).

Aelas' original plan had just been to hope that Static got bored and left first and then catch a ride back to town. But, it's during this absolutely fascinating history of Newcastle that panic bells go off in her brain and she gathers that her Fetch is flipping out. She considers diving her Abby's eyes, but she doesn't want to take leave of her own sense with Static around, so instead she looks for an opportunity to slip out unseen. She'll hail a cab if she can, she'd rather spend money than glamour right now, but if there's nothing and she needs to make this escape very quickly, she'll call Butterfly back again.

Getting out unseen is a wits+stealth roll, +2 for the distraction, -3 because Static is exceptionally vigilant and used to extremely long periods of boredom. There won't be a cab waiting around in a rural town like this, in a situation someone here would need a cab they'd just call their mum.

Anarion

2018-02-25, 09:30 PM

Getting out unseen is a wits+stealth roll, +2 for the distraction, -3 because Static is exceptionally vigilant and used to extremely long periods of boredom. There won't be a cab waiting around in a rural town like this, in a situation someone here would need a cab they'd just call their mum.

[Wits+stealth-1=3d10. 1, 10, 8. 9. We're good.]

Aelas sighs. She's going to wind up creating quite a stir later, she's quite certain. Can't go running around with no glamour at all, and she was feeling quite hungry. But she needed help, and as soon as she had slipped Static's watchful gaze, she whistled for Butterfly and was in the car zooming away from Newcastle as fast as she could. "Hurry, Butterfly! We need to go see Abbey right away!" Her foot is on the peddle, and the car is zooming down the freeway, as fast as it can go. She'll careen her way into the city proper, though she'll slow down a block or two away from Abbey's house. She doesn't want to cause a scene after all.

If nothing's in the way when she arrives, she'll grab her phone (because surely in a week's time everyone's got a phone) and shoot Abbey a text message. "Hey, got your note. I'm here" and then go to the house and knock on the door for her Fetch.

Glamor 2/10
Clarity: 5/6 (mild damage)
Health: 6/6
Willpower: 6/6

Raz_Fox

2018-02-25, 11:06 PM

[2 Successes because apparently the Pilgrim gives no ****s about God or man.]

This moment is awesome, in the sense that it inspires awe, in the sense that the wild verdant heat of summer has come roaring in- summer somewhere where the sea blows cool and the flowers bloom, where high summer doesn't mean baking to death in a car without air conditioning. It is glorious in the same way that an army on parade is glorious; it is terrible in the same way that an oncoming traffic accident is terrible. And left to his own devices, the Pilgrim would give way.

But, as ever, he cannot take a step back. He is standing in front of others.

So here he stands, unmoving, unmoved. A terrible stillness, not the stillness of a corpse but the stillness of a mountain ready to break into full avalanche, the stillness of a predator about to spring. Not even a groove dug into the stage. Around him, the Autumn court sways and ripples, falling into the lee. The handsome king, marred only by his own hands and his own heart, stands and awaits the obedience of the fearful, and yet the Pilgrim still stands.

Part of him expects the trumpets to sound and for the ceiling to come caving in, for freezing light to strike the stage between them and splinter the earth into bitter shards, for him to have to rush forward and seize the King of Summer by the neck and strike him against the ground again and again until he can be tossed aside for retrieval. Could it be done? Possibly. Careful of the weapon, it levels the playing field as far as reach is concerned. He will not feint, he will attempt to maim, to delay a return to the field. Keep him disoriented, unable to find an opening, break his spine as quickly as possible- but no, we are not doing this. He will not ever do that again. The games are over for him. He was found worthy.

Perhaps this will be mistaken for pride, or a sense of contempt, which is the farthest thing from the Pilgrim's mind right now. This is not intended as a show of strength, though it may yet be taken for one. It is simply a refusal to yield when called upon to act as guardian.

Let the leadership of the Court take charge. Isaac has nothing to say. He simply stands, and will not yield an inch until Autumn retreats and allows him the grace to stand down.

Health 9/9
Glamour 5/10
Willpower 5/6

Elanorin

2018-02-26, 03:36 PM

Organizing this is eminently within your abilities; roll manipulation+socialize. If you get an exceptional success they'll even talk to each other unprompted!

[Rolling Manipulation+Socialize: 4+4=9, 3, 8, 9, 9, 9, 2, 9]

Lily slowly but steadily gathered the Winter Court around herself and Jack, but it was not long before the spectacle of the arrival of Summer claimed everyone's attention. She stared at it- at them- at him, with shock, amazement, excitement and a helping of intimidation. She held out her arms a little as if to reassure the newly gathered Winter Court, and keep it from dispersing in the summer wind and undoing her work.

[Rolling Resolve+Composure+Mantle-5: 2+3+3-5: 3, 1, 10 (ten again: 9]

stveje

2018-02-27, 08:17 AM

She looked intrigued by the video - when you're that good at something every novel twist is a breath of inspiration. "I could do that," she said. "The break in precision opens a lot of doors... I'm April, by the way. Thank you."

"Jack," said Jack, satisfaction in his smile at having arranged a plan. "Now we just have to get Lily ready." And suddenly everyone were there, not only Winter gathering around him, but Summer bursting in.

And then he roars, and the sound is a hurricane. The meaning is simple: Get off the stage. I am king here.

Everyone, make a resolve+composure roll to remain unflinching, with a bonus equal to your Mantle and a penalty equal to his (-5).

Resolve+Composure+3-5 = 2 : 4, 2

Jack flinched. How could he not? He could no doubt appreciate on some level that Summer at least were what they were, no hiding behind masks or pretending, but ... well, they were what they were, and what they were was awesome and terrible to behold. Like a swarm of police bursting into the room when you've got your fingers stuck where they shouldn't be. Suddenly Jack was glad that he was surrounded by others. A crowd was a crook's best friend, somewhere to blend in, to be just another face in a hundred. Even if a hundred was more like five, here.

Thanqol

2018-02-27, 08:45 PM

"Hey Longarms," said Merica, "why did you make a contract with bats?"
"Bats are terrifying," said Longarms without hesitation.
Mercia laughed. "And your enemies should feel that fear?"
"What?"
"I was - do you not -"
"That's a good line actually," said Longarms.
"Have - have you never seen Batman?"
"That sounds terrifying," said Longarms, not a flicker of comedy on his face. Mercia stared at him, trying to figure out if he was having her on.
"Batman? Man dresses as a bat and fights crime?"
"That sounds even more terrifying," said Longarms with a shudder. "This is a movie, right? Not a real guy?"
"Uh, yes -"
"What kind of sick mind comes up with that kind of sh*t?" said Longarms. "Bats are horrifying. They're blind, swarming, vampiric, diseased rodents. Did you know that bats carry rabies?"
"I uh -"
"And their poop makes explosives?"
"Well, not really on a timeframe that's threatening -"
"They're monsters. Do you know why I wear sunglasses at night? Because if a bat spits in your eye - and that's something they do - then you can get rabies."
"I didn't know that."
"Well you should," said Longarms edgily. "But it makes sense that you don't know that. You're apparently a sicko who likes 'bat man'."
"He's actually the most popular superhero around," Mercia commented mildly.
"Man, he's a superhero? And he's popular? Hells bells! Whatever happened to wholesome comics? Like Squirrel Girl?"
"You know who Squirrel Girl is but not Batman?" said Mercia.
"I don't have time to keep up with every horrifying fad or act of moral degeneracy society collectively engages in," sniffed Longarms. "I gravitate towards the timeless classics."
"Like Squirrel Girl?"
"Are you talking sh*t about my lady Green?"
"No, no... I'm sorry I brought it up.

They continued in silence, broken only by Longarms scoffing and muttering about degenerate bat-based lunatics under his breath.

[Wits+stealth-1=3d10. 1, 10, 8. 9. We're good.]

Aelas sighs. She's going to wind up creating quite a stir later, she's quite certain. Can't go running around with no glamour at all, and she was feeling quite hungry. But she needed help, and as soon as she had slipped Static's watchful gaze, she whistled for Butterfly and was in the car zooming away from Newcastle as fast as she could. "Hurry, Butterfly! We need to go see Abbey right away!" Her foot is on the peddle, and the car is zooming down the freeway, as fast as it can go. She'll careen her way into the city proper, though she'll slow down a block or two away from Abbey's house. She doesn't want to cause a scene after all.

It occurs to you after you've left that Static has no money so she'll have to spend the next four hours walking home.

If nothing's in the way when she arrives, she'll grab her phone (because surely in a week's time everyone's got a phone) and shoot Abbey a text message. "Hey, got your note. I'm here" and then go to the house and knock on the door for her Fetch.

A bat hanging from a nearby tree turns to angle its head at this conversation. It's not the brightest bat but it can tell that there are now two people with the exact same stance and voice standing around.

Now just to come up with a Cunning Trick that'll let it exchange this information for fruit treats instead of getting fooled by the Longarms.

[Did you want me to play the Fetch in this scene? Let me know when your decision changes]

Perhaps this will be mistaken for pride, or a sense of contempt, which is the farthest thing from the Pilgrim's mind right now. This is not intended as a show of strength, though it may yet be taken for one. It is simply a refusal to yield when called upon to act as guardian.

Let the leadership of the Court take charge. Isaac has nothing to say. He simply stands, and will not yield an inch until Autumn retreats and allows him the grace to stand down.

It does not come to blows; perhaps it never would have. Meetings like these have their own laws and it is the nature of the Fae-touched to obey oaths as they obey gravity even as passion overwhelms them.

Bargains themselves are the domain of autumn, though. The way of the court is not to meet wrath with defiance; it's to accommodate on terms that seem just but they grip the blade to. The decision comes in whispers and the court steps back - not leaving the stage, but standing to the edges of it, leaving the centre to Summer.

The catch: Now the King of Summer has his prize, but he is surrounded on all sides by shadowy figures of Autumn. Rather than appearing powerful he seems isolated and weak. Perhaps an even more powerful image than the one they began with.

At this point you have tasted enough of Autumn's unique magic and the new Kith you were blessed with to gain an understanding of its power. You can hit an exceptional success on Subterfuge rolls on three rather than five, and freely you can communicate through whispers so subtle they are almost telepathy. No one may listen in on your words or even be aware that you are speaking them, and you can hear their replies in the same way. Further, for a point of glamour, you may open a whispered conversation to anyone anywhere, even across the bounds of the Hedge.

[Rolling Manipulation+Socialize: 4+4=9, 3, 8, 9, 9, 9, 2, 9]

For a moment it's a bunch of loners who happen to be lonering at each other, and then someone cracks a joke, everyone laughs, and suddenly it's a group. Conversations start happening unprompted. The ice, as thick and thematic as it is, is broken.

Lily slowly but steadily gathered the Winter Court around herself and Jack, but it was not long before the spectacle of the arrival of Summer claimed everyone's attention. She stared at it- at them- at him, with shock, amazement, excitement and a helping of intimidation. She held out her arms a little as if to reassure the newly gathered Winter Court, and keep it from dispersing in the summer wind and undoing her work.

[Rolling Resolve+Composure+Mantle-5: 2+3+3-5: 3, 1, 10 (ten again: 9]

They stand strong with you - shockingly. It was like herding cats to get them this far but cold blood does not change quickly. It feels good to be a part of; these folks have your back at this point.

Resolve+Composure+3-5 = 2 : 4, 2

Jack flinched. How could he not? He could no doubt appreciate on some level that Summer at least were what they were, no hiding behind masks or pretending, but ... well, they were what they were, and what they were was awesome and terrible to behold. Like a swarm of police bursting into the room when you've got your fingers stuck where they shouldn't be. Suddenly Jack was glad that he was surrounded by others. A crowd was a crook's best friend, somewhere to blend in, to be just another face in a hundred. Even if a hundred was more like five, here.

It feels like the King's eye fixes on you directly for a moment; he's marked your face amidst the crowd, he smells your weakness amongst everyone here and he will remember that fact.

He takes the stage. Someone tosses him a chrome microphone which he catches perfectly and starts talking into. He doesn't roar, he talks low and fast, like a motivational speaker having a really bad day. "We are infested. We are betrayed. The Wyld Hunters have come. They have traitors working for them. In defiance of Summer they fled the field and they kidnaped one of our own as they did. I propose an inquisition. I propose a witch hunt. I propose grinding down every soul here until we find who has crossed us and bring to them the seasons' justice."

Autumn's basic instinct, Pilgrim, is to agree with this. It suits their purposes and eases the transition of seasons. Perhaps this is even the King's way of gracefully ceding power. Do you concur?

Lily, Jack, how do you act to sculpt the opinion of Winter?

Raz_Fox

2018-02-28, 10:00 AM

The Pilgrim does not close his eyes. He cannot. But the lights that burn within those deep pits dim, attenuate, become nothing but the faintest hint of vivid royal blue. (This cannot be seen regardless, as he wears the Autumn black, but we are privileged to glance beneath even its magic for a moment.) He lets out a single shallow breath, and it disintegrates into vapor and mist as it leaves his lips, which are thick with scarred tissue and dry in the presence of dwindling Summer.

“Aelas.”
“Accused of kidnapping by Summer.”
“Huntsmen roaming. A bad day for traitors.”

The question hangs between them, miles apart and yet, in the darkness of Autumn’s kind shadow, close enough for the Pilgrim’s breath to tickle Aelas’s ear, hot and hoarse. What happened, Aelas? Is this another misunderstanding?

He already knows what he is going to do. It looms before him, inevitable, vast. Like a falling star. Like a chain. Like heaven.

Health 9/9
Glamour 4/10
Willpower 5/6

Anarion

2018-03-01, 03:17 AM

It occurs to you after you've left that Static has no money so she'll have to spend the next four hours walking home.

Aelas feels extremely bad about this. However, she also doesn't have a good way of finding out where Static is right now or in the next few hours. But if she runs into her again, she'll apologize a lot and offer to buy the gargoyle a very nice free meal.

A bat hanging from a nearby tree turns to angle its head at this conversation. It's not the brightest bat but it can tell that there are now two people with the exact same stance and voice standing around.

Now just to come up with a Cunning Trick that'll let it exchange this information for fruit treats instead of getting fooled by the Longarms.

[Did you want me to play the Fetch in this scene? Let me know when your decision changes]

[Yep. You should take over Abbey anytime she's on screen with Aelas.]

Ugh, Abbey was being careless. She was supposed to open the door and let Aelas in without letting any of the neighbors see! She probably thought the whole thing was a cool joke. Or maybe she didn't even think they looked the same since it seemed like she could see Aelas' glowy form from when they had talked before.

Either way, Aelas rushed inside and hugged her Fetch, long glowing hair whipping around to entangle them with the speed of the embrace. Abbey, looked entirely unharmed and still dressed in her casual sweater that didn't really fit, and nothing had seemed weird when she drove in. That panic had been pretty major. Aelas puts one hand on her hip when she releases the embrace, and looks just a little bit pouty as she looks Abbey over. If she'd had to abandon that very nice Gargoyle and drain herself dangerously low to rush here for nothing, she'd be a little peeved. Maybe she could get Abbey to kiss a really sweet boy while she was nearby and eat that up though, that would be fair.

She realizes she's probably zoning out while looking more than a little huffy and settles on "Hey, what happened? What was with the whole panic thing?" Yeah, that didn't seem weird...er than normal. Good job, Aelas, mental pat on the back.

The Pilgrim does not close his eyes. He cannot. But the lights that burn within those deep pits dim, attenuate, become nothing but the faintest hint of vivid royal blue. (This cannot be seen regardless, as he wears the Autumn black, but we are privileged to glance beneath even its magic for a moment.) He lets out a single shallow breath, and it disintegrates into vapor and mist as it leaves his lips, which are thick with scarred tissue and dry in the presence of dwindling Summer.

“Aelas.”
“Accused of kidnapping by Summer.”
“Huntsmen roaming. A bad day for traitors.”

The question hangs between them, miles apart and yet, in the darkness of Autumn’s kind shadow, close enough for the Pilgrim’s breath to tickle Aelas’s ear, hot and hoarse. What happened, Aelas? Is this another misunderstanding?

He already knows what he is going to do. It looms before him, inevitable, vast. Like a falling star. Like a chain. Like heaven.

And then while she's still standing in the living room in front of Abbey, she just starts whispering to the Pilgrim. Because hey, that's not weird or anything, right? Just whispering to somebody that only you can sense? Maybe Abbey at least has the good sense to tell there's magic going on, that would help with explaining this later, like, so much.

"Um...kinda? They jumped on Butterfly after we parted, and one of them, her name was Static, she wouldn't get off even after I put her to sleep, and we um, kinda drove all the way to Newcastle and then I...um...kinda sorta ditched her because she kept trying to paralyze me. So it's not my fault! She's fine though, totally fine, like, maybe she'll be a little tired after her walk, but definitely fine. Also, there's something else freaking out my...uh...friend that I'm looking into. Like...did you say Huntsmen?" She turns to Abbey, still with the line open (does that work, can you have a magic whisper line open?) but anyway she turns to Abbey and says "hey, was it Huntsmen, is that what happened?"

Raz_Fox

2018-03-01, 09:24 AM

“Be safe. Find Lily.” With those words, Isaac closes the connection that binds the two together over the vast distance, and raises his head. He has a responsibility.

“He looks for me,” Isaac says to Autumn. “For Aelas. The star-child. Dogs chasing a hare because it bolts. Static clung to Aelas in flight.”

Summer needs to vent its wrath. Autumn needs to display its wisdom, its knowledge of all things. Aelas needs to be protected. “She is no traitor. I offer myself up to sate Summer.”

This he leaves to the King of Autumn. Another bargain. Better than letting the hunters and witches of Autumn find Aelas on their own and turn her over to Summer.

He knows the fire as an old friend.

[I’m calling for a Protector regain here. He’s trying to put himself in danger in order to protect Aelas from the consequences of her actions.]

Elanorin

2018-03-03, 03:48 PM

For a moment it's a bunch of loners who happen to be lonering at each other, and then someone cracks a joke, everyone laughs, and suddenly it's a group. Conversations start happening unprompted. The ice, as thick and thematic as it is, is broken.

They stand strong with you - shockingly. It was like herding cats to get them this far but cold blood does not change quickly. It feels good to be a part of; these folks have your back at this point.

A surge of relief and pride rises within and for the first time in too long Lily felt a moment of Home. This was it, this is what she was here for. This is why she came back. To belong, to be safe, to not be alone. Here she belonged, here she was safe, here she was not alone. To keep this moment, to solidify this feeling and unity instantly became a keen need.

He takes the stage. Someone tosses him a chrome microphone which he catches perfectly and starts talking into. He doesn't roar, he talks low and fast, like a motivational speaker having a really bad day. "We are infested. We are betrayed. The Wyld Hunters have come. They have traitors working for them. In defiance of Summer they fled the field and they kidnaped one of our own as they did. I propose an inquisition. I propose a witch hunt. I propose grinding down every soul here until we find who has crossed us and bring to them the seasons' justice."

Autumn's basic instinct, Pilgrim, is to agree with this. It suits their purposes and eases the transition of seasons. Perhaps this is even the King's way of gracefully ceding power. Do you concur?

Lily, Jack, how do you act to sculpt the opinion of Winter?

Lily frowned, as much as she did not want to cross the Summer King, or test this new and fragile unity of her own Court, a witch hunt was not something she felt you just announce and do. A kidnapping was of course a serious concern but they knew nothing but the Summer King's opinions on it. A witch hunt could go so very wrong and if they found out that there was a misunderstanding at the root of it all it could all go horribly wrong horribly fast.

Lily frowned and reached a gentle hand to Jack's arm. "I do not think this is something His Grace would condone," she whispered softly, leaning to his shoulder. "Why doesn't each court investigate their own?"

stveje

2018-03-05, 03:01 PM

Lily frowned, as much as she did not want to cross the Summer King, or test this new and fragile unity of her own Court, a witch hunt was not something she felt you just announce and do. A kidnapping was of course a serious concern but they knew nothing but the Summer King's opinions on it. A witch hunt could go so very wrong and if they found out that there was a misunderstanding at the root of it all it could all go horribly wrong horribly fast.

Lily frowned and reached a gentle hand to Jack's arm. "I do not think this is something His Grace would condone," she whispered softly, leaning to his shoulder. "Why doesn't each court investigate their own?"

"We should at least investigate," Jack replies, in agreement. Although he's not brave enough, under the circumstances, to say it loud and clear to the room, to the King of Summer's face, no doubt it's loud enough for plenty of people outside of Winter's little circle to hear unless they're willfully not listening. "But if a traitor exists among us, can we be sure they are not in the room as we speak? Any plan we agree on must only be discussed among the most trusted, lest the traitor knows where not to be."

If there was a traitor hiding among them, who better to root them out than Winter? They who knew hiding. It would be a waste to simply hunt them down, but so typical of Summer. Better to devise a plan that would see a traitor turned tool. A subtle investigation to identify the traitor without them finding out so they could be fed false information. This he did not say, openly.

Thanqol

2018-03-05, 05:42 PM

"Alright, here we are," said Mercia, slowing to a stop.
"We really need a car," said Longarms, leaning down to catch his breath. "This is taking forever."
"There's a junkyard outside town if you know anything about jury rigging?" Longarms made a face and shook his head. "Well, I'm fairly sure that the car dealership is run by Changelings, and the town is too small for a car to go missing without being noticed."
"Can't we, like... mail order a car?" said Longarms.
"Doubt it."
"What about the Market?"
"We'd need to get something to bargain with," said Mercia.
"And a vehicle won't be cheap," sighed Longarms. "Fine. Just give me a sec'. Let me think."

They sat for a minute in the cool autumn air.

Either way, Aelas rushed inside and hugged her Fetch, long glowing hair whipping around to entangle them with the speed of the embrace. Abbey, looked entirely unharmed and still dressed in her casual sweater that didn't really fit, and nothing had seemed weird when she drove in. That panic had been pretty major. Aelas puts one hand on her hip when she releases the embrace, and looks just a little bit pouty as she looks Abbey over. If she'd had to abandon that very nice Gargoyle and drain herself dangerously low to rush here for nothing, she'd be a little peeved. Maybe she could get Abbey to kiss a really sweet boy while she was nearby and eat that up though, that would be fair.

She realizes she's probably zoning out while looking more than a little huffy and settles on "Hey, what happened? What was with the whole panic thing?" Yeah, that didn't seem weird...er than normal. Good job, Aelas, mental pat on the back.

"You'd have panicked too if Ms. Ren Faire and SWAT-with-a-sack showed up at your door!" said Abbey. "They told me you were an identity thefting crime lord murderer from Europe! We need to leave town forever."

"Um...kinda? They jumped on Butterfly after we parted, and one of them, her name was Static, she wouldn't get off even after I put her to sleep, and we um, kinda drove all the way to Newcastle and then I...um...kinda sorta ditched her because she kept trying to paralyze me. So it's not my fault! She's fine though, totally fine, like, maybe she'll be a little tired after her walk, but definitely fine. Also, there's something else freaking out my...uh...friend that I'm looking into. Like...did you say Huntsmen?" She turns to Abbey, still with the line open (does that work, can you have a magic whisper line open?) but anyway she turns to Abbey and says "hey, was it Huntsmen, is that what happened?"

"What's a huntsmen?" asked Abbey. "Do they, like, have a logo?"

“Be safe. Find Lily.” With those words, Isaac closes the connection that binds the two together over the vast distance, and raises his head. He has a responsibility.

“He looks for me,” Isaac says to Autumn. “For Aelas. The star-child. Dogs chasing a hare because it bolts. Static clung to Aelas in flight.”

Summer needs to vent its wrath. Autumn needs to display its wisdom, its knowledge of all things. Aelas needs to be protected. “She is no traitor. I offer myself up to sate Summer.”

This he leaves to the King of Autumn. Another bargain. Better than letting the hunters and witches of Autumn find Aelas on their own and turn her over to Summer.

He knows the fire as an old friend.

[I’m calling for a Protector regain here. He’s trying to put himself in danger in order to protect Aelas from the consequences of her actions.]

[Thumbs up for the regain]

Autumn confers. On the one hand, they like the fear and paranoia an inquisition would bring. Further, if the true culprit was of Spring it would undermine Autumn's greatest rival. Offering one of their own as a scapegoat would be a powerful move but it would weaken them and strengthen Summer.

The Court is inclined against your request. If you want to convince them, roll manipulation+persuasion(+Mantle of course) at -1.

Lily frowned, as much as she did not want to cross the Summer King, or test this new and fragile unity of her own Court, a witch hunt was not something she felt you just announce and do. A kidnapping was of course a serious concern but they knew nothing but the Summer King's opinions on it. A witch hunt could go so very wrong and if they found out that there was a misunderstanding at the root of it all it could all go horribly wrong horribly fast.

Lily frowned and reached a gentle hand to Jack's arm. "I do not think this is something His Grace would condone," she whispered softly, leaning to his shoulder. "Why doesn't each court investigate their own?"

"We should at least investigate," Jack replies, in agreement. Although he's not brave enough, under the circumstances, to say it loud and clear to the room, to the King of Summer's face, no doubt it's loud enough for plenty of people outside of Winter's little circle to hear unless they're willfully not listening. "But if a traitor exists among us, can we be sure they are not in the room as we speak? Any plan we agree on must only be discussed among the most trusted, lest the traitor knows where not to be."

If there was a traitor hiding among them, who better to root them out than Winter? They who knew hiding. It would be a waste to simply hunt them down, but so typical of Summer. Better to devise a plan that would see a traitor turned tool. A subtle investigation to identify the traitor without them finding out so they could be fed false information. This he did not say, openly.

The King of Summer leapt from the stage, cleared for rows of chairs, and landed in the midst of Winter. Everyone recoiled from him as he surged towards Jack, still holding the microphone to his lips.

"Ah, so you're Kent's proxy," said the King of Summer. The air vibrated as he spoke, distorted like a mirage above a hot road. "You want to work in the shadows, do you? To skulk about in the dark rather than putting feet to flame and seeing who lies first? So who would you name as the 'most trusted' in this gathering?"

Raz_Fox

2018-03-05, 07:33 PM

“I will be found and found,” the whisper carries, curling through Autumn. Summer will remember him - and more importantly, they will remember Aelas. Her steed, her laugh; the alternative is Aelas returning and being swallowed whole by the fire. And if Autumn carries out their inquisition, they will prove Summer’s accusations blameless (or so he hopes, desperately, an attempt to thread the needle between his loyalties, between his duties). A contract, a catch: Summer flares, but Autumn ultimately proves their patience, their knowledge, their strength. “Let them burn. I will stand yet.”

And yet, he resigns himself- if they fear his loss, fear the immediate loss of prestige- he will simply have to go help Aelas in person. Or die in the trying.

[And that regain immediately gets turned around to make the roll. 0 successes, unfortunately.]

Anarion

2018-03-06, 01:05 AM

"You'd have panicked too if Ms. Ren Faire and SWAT-with-a-sack showed up at your door!" said Abbey. "They told me you were an identity thefting crime lord murderer from Europe! We need to leave town forever."

"What's a huntsmen?" asked Abbey. "Do they, like, have a logo?"

"Um, maybe whoever you met? Ren and Stimpy or whatever? I dunno. In the Dragon's galaxy, there were like, hunter things, but they were always these crazy screaming cosmic entities that looked like big rainbow monsters with swirling tentacles and like, ten different mouths, and they knew to leave me alone cuz the dragon woulda gotten mad at 'em." Aelas makes a little fist to make her point, but then looks distant and wistful. "Still, I wonder if they, like, look more human when they come here, tentacle beasts probably wouldn't blend in that well...hmmm"

It's about this moment that the whole leave town thing clicks in place in her brain and she comprehends what Abbey said. "Woah, wait, what, we can't leave town, you can't leave town! This is our home. I, I need you here, living my life. I mean, you can go to college and stuff, I don't mean like you can never leave or anything, but, but, you can't just give up everything here. It's important, it's like super important. Besides, if they are Hunts-tentacle beasts, they're here for me, not you, so you don't have to worry."

Elanorin

2018-03-07, 05:32 AM

The King of Summer leapt from the stage, cleared for rows of chairs, and landed in the midst of Winter. Everyone recoiled from him as he surged towards Jack, still holding the microphone to his lips.

"Ah, so you're Kent's proxy," said the King of Summer. The air vibrated as he spoke, distorted like a mirage above a hot road. "You want to work in the shadows, do you? To skulk about in the dark rather than putting feet to flame and seeing who lies first? So who would you name as the 'most trusted' in this gathering?"

Lily froze to the spot when she realised they'd brought the full heat of the Summer King's focus down upon them. She clutched Jack's arm tighter, both to steady her resolve and to reassure him that she was still at his side. She felt more than a little responsible for Jack being face to face with the King like this and forced herself to speak,

"Our common interest, Your Grace" she said diplomatically, eyes cast down. "Each court is individual and is made up of individuals. At any given moment every one here will be holding a secret of some form or another. To appoint any one person to lead the search for the one secret you are looking for is a game of chance. But none of us are safe with a traitor in our midst, so let all Courts work together to find them."

stveje

2018-03-07, 05:00 PM

The King of Summer leapt from the stage, cleared for rows of chairs, and landed in the midst of Winter. Everyone recoiled from him as he surged towards Jack, still holding the microphone to his lips.

"Ah, so you're Kent's proxy," said the King of Summer. The air vibrated as he spoke, distorted like a mirage above a hot road. "You want to work in the shadows, do you? To skulk about in the dark rather than putting feet to flame and seeing who lies first? So who would you name as the 'most trusted' in this gathering?"

If not for Lily and the rest of Winter, Jack might have fled. Or at least been inclined to it. Thankfully, he manages to not vanish in a puff of smoke.

"Myself?" Jack says. "I am the only one I trust completely." It's true, and Jack imagines it's a universal feeling, unless you don't even trust yourself. Alas, far too many have far too many good reasons not to.

He throws a glance at Lily and nods. "But since no one but me trusts me," it's probably true, "I suggest the King or Queen of each Court, and their choice of right hand. If we can't even trust these enough to not be traitors, we're doomed anyway."

Thanqol

2018-03-07, 06:57 PM

"Oh, hello there?" said Emily Fairchild, opening the door.

"Dirk Uppercut, ma'am, attorney at law," said Longarms, getting his foot in the door and bulldozing his way inside before anyone could react. "And I must say, ma'am, you have a bee-yuteiful house you got going here. Can certainly tell where you got your sense of taste from. One hundred percent. Mercy! Take a photograph!"

He tossed a disposable camera over his shoulder which Mercia fumblingly caught, and then awkwardly tried to figure out the mechanism for while Dirk kept talking like a steam train.

"Truly lovely place, shame about the whole dispute, shame, terrible shame, imagine if you'd be losing it? I sure can't! But it seems pretty inevitable because even if you win the case a fifty percent equity stake wouldn't be enough to keep the place. Wouldn't that be a shame, Mercy?"

"Uh -" said Mercia.

"Exactly!" Longarms went on. "But that's only to say if this case goes without cause and what kind of man is this Ryan clown to pre-nup what should have been true love? And you know what really gets my grill? That he broke the compact first! Whack-chow!" Longarms produced and dropped a folder full of photographs of Ryan Banks with another girl. "See, my friend here is a gumshoe but that's just really a cover for the fact that she's a huge pervert, isn't you Mercy, ha ha!" Longarms punched Mercia in the arm. "So I just go through her porn reel and find folks who aren't banging the right folks and who might have cause for righteous irritation on the topic, and then I get them deals! So here's the case - ditch your barcode-hair shyster for a real lawyer and I'll toss in the salacious photographs and guaranteed unravelling of that haughty little pre-nup for free. Here's my card, here's a sampler photograph, here's a proposed contract , here's a red rose just for you - Mercy wanted to give it to you but she's too shy to talk to anyone not through a camera lens. Think it through and let me know what you decide. Love-erly house, by the way. Exquisite. Have a good evening, you hear?"

And Longarms walked outside with the same flawless grace as he'd entered with.

“I will be found and found,” the whisper carries, curling through Autumn. Summer will remember him - and more importantly, they will remember Aelas. Her steed, her laugh; the alternative is Aelas returning and being swallowed whole by the fire. And if Autumn carries out their inquisition, they will prove Summer’s accusations blameless (or so he hopes, desperately, an attempt to thread the needle between his loyalties, between his duties). A contract, a catch: Summer flares, but Autumn ultimately proves their patience, their knowledge, their strength. “Let them burn. I will stand yet.”

And yet, he resigns himself- if they fear his loss, fear the immediate loss of prestige- he will simply have to go help Aelas in person. Or die in the trying.

[And that regain immediately gets turned around to make the roll. 0 successes, unfortunately.]

A counter-offer: Autumn will give you your martyrdom and not take the opportunity to secure their power, establish an inquisition, and freeze out Spring's senseless blindness. But we consider these outcomes to be a favour we are extending you and not a self-interested move; accordingly, you shall owe us.

This is a good deal, comes a strange voice that you imagine must belong to the King. If you owe us, we must preserve you else we will be unable to collect our due.

Lily froze to the spot when she realised they'd brought the full heat of the Summer King's focus down upon them. She clutched Jack's arm tighter, both to steady her resolve and to reassure him that she was still at his side. She felt more than a little responsible for Jack being face to face with the King like this and forced herself to speak,

"Our common interest, Your Grace" she said diplomatically, eyes cast down. "Each court is individual and is made up of individuals. At any given moment every one here will be holding a secret of some form or another. To appoint any one person to lead the search for the one secret you are looking for is a game of chance. But none of us are safe with a traitor in our midst, so let all Courts work together to find them."

If not for Lily and the rest of Winter, Jack might have fled. Or at least been inclined to it. Thankfully, he manages to not vanish in a puff of smoke.

"Myself?" Jack says. "I am the only one I trust completely." It's true, and Jack imagines it's a universal feeling, unless you don't even trust yourself. Alas, far too many have far too many good reasons not to.

He throws a glance at Lily and nods. "But since no one but me trusts me," it's probably true, "I suggest the King or Queen of each Court, and their choice of right hand. If we can't even trust these enough to not be traitors, we're doomed anyway."

"Of course," says the King, lips twitching. "Of course you seek equality. Of course you greedy parasites lunge on the first moment of perceived weakness to attempt to seize power. You aren't interested in solutions. You only see a chance to undermine the reign of Summer. And it is still Summer! It is still my time! I am still King here -" his crown flares atop his head like a wild fire, "- and you are my vassals, and not my equals!"

"Um, maybe whoever you met? Ren and Stimpy or whatever? I dunno. In the Dragon's galaxy, there were like, hunter things, but they were always these crazy screaming cosmic entities that looked like big rainbow monsters with swirling tentacles and like, ten different mouths, and they knew to leave me alone cuz the dragon woulda gotten mad at 'em." Aelas makes a little fist to make her point, but then looks distant and wistful. "Still, I wonder if they, like, look more human when they come here, tentacle beasts probably wouldn't blend in that well...hmmm"

It's about this moment that the whole leave town thing clicks in place in her brain and she comprehends what Abbey said. "Woah, wait, what, we can't leave town, you can't leave town! This is our home. I, I need you here, living my life. I mean, you can go to college and stuff, I don't mean like you can never leave or anything, but, but, you can't just give up everything here. It's important, it's like super important. Besides, if they are Hunts-tentacle beasts, they're here for me, not you, so you don't have to worry."

"Oh my god, Aelas! If you've brought hunting tentacle monsters to town then we need to go right now. I've seen anime, I know what happens, and you're really mistaken if you think going to college is going to help us against that," at this point Abbey was pulling out suitcases and panickedly starting to pack.

Anarion

2018-03-07, 07:48 PM

"Oh my god, Aelas! If you've brought hunting tentacle monsters to town then we need to go right now. I've seen anime, I know what happens, and you're really mistaken if you think going to college is going to help us against that," at this point Abbey was pulling out suitcases and panickedly starting to pack.

"Okay, alright, we all just need to calm down, calm would be good. There are no hunty tentacle beasts here. It's fine. The magicy people who knocked on the door didn't do anything bad, right? It's okay. It's fine. Um...uh...how was your day today, I mean, besides the last half hour? Um...we could, like, play a board game? Oh, or tea, let's make some tea. Tea is good for calming down, right?"

stveje

2018-03-09, 03:45 PM

Thanqol

2018-03-11, 02:12 AM

"Okay, alright, we all just need to calm down, calm would be good. There are no hunty tentacle beasts here. It's fine. The magicy people who knocked on the door didn't do anything bad, right? It's okay. It's fine. Um...uh...how was your day today, I mean, besides the last half hour? Um...we could, like, play a board game? Oh, or tea, let's make some tea. Tea is good for calming down, right?"

Case in point.

"You're right, your Grace. I misspoke," Jack says and bows, quickly adjusting his strategy. "You are indeed wise to point out that fewer are better when one is dealing with traitors. I'd be happy to ... advise the King, of course. In private, so that no traitorous ears will hear your plan. They won't see you coming." He reminds himself that apparently there's a law in effect against fighting, hoping it's true, and gets up very close so he can whisper in the King's ear: "If the plan works, everyone will know it was your idea, and yours alone. And if it fails ... well, then it was my idea, of course."

I believe both of you are rolling manipulation+persuasion. Jack, you actually suffer a penalty equal to your Mantle on this roll, but you do get a +2 for playing to his paranoia; consequences of success and failure are pretty straightforwards. Aelas, while you don't think Abbey really will leave town forever-forever, if you don't convince her to chill right now she will make some sort of bad move in her panic.

Do keep in mind, though, that you do have the option to voluntarily drop any failures to dramatic failures. While that won't win you a beat because we're not using those, I will account for those come XP time.

stveje

2018-03-11, 02:59 AM

I believe both of you are rolling manipulation+persuasion. Jack, you actually suffer a penalty equal to your Mantle on this roll, but you do get a +2 for playing to his paranoia; consequences of success and failure are pretty straightforwards. Aelas, while you don't think Abbey really will leave town forever-forever, if you don't convince her to chill right now she will make some sort of bad move in her panic.

Do keep in mind, though, that you do have the option to voluntarily drop any failures to dramatic failures. While that won't win you a beat because we're not using those, I will account for those come XP time.

Manip+Persuasion-3+2 = 3 : 4, 9, 9, Jack is lucky this time

Anarion

2018-03-11, 06:20 PM

I believe both of you are rolling manipulation+persuasion. Jack, you actually suffer a penalty equal to your Mantle on this roll, but you do get a +2 for playing to his paranoia; consequences of success and failure are pretty straightforwards. Aelas, while you don't think Abbey really will leave town forever-forever, if you don't convince her to chill right now she will make some sort of bad move in her panic.

Do keep in mind, though, that you do have the option to voluntarily drop any failures to dramatic failures. While that won't win you a beat because we're not using those, I will account for those come XP time.

[Manipulation+Persuasion 7d10: 8, 7, 1, 5, 2, 6, 9. Two successes.]

Thanqol

2018-03-13, 06:17 PM

"That was definitely a thing," said Mercia.
"Longarm charm," said Longarms, chirpily walking down the street.
"Does that work?" said Mercia.
"Maybe not immediately," said Longarms. "But it's the kind of thing that people push on the next time they feel angry or frustrated. It's a card in their back pocket. Gives them an option rather than feeling helpless. Gosh, I really wish we had a car."

They kept walking.

Manip+Persuasion-3+2 = 3 : 4, 9, 9, Jack is lucky this time

The King sniffs. His eye seems crazed behind that cruel iron monocle - bloodshot and watering slightly with constant pain.

"Investigate your own Court," said the King. "And be swift with it. I will delay the day of reckoning until I have gone through my own people. After that point if the traitor is not found I will expand my search."

[Manipulation+Persuasion 7d10: 8, 7, 1, 5, 2, 6, 9. Two successes.]

Abbey bustles about in a panic for a little while but the edge of it goes out when she is forced to start making hard decisions about which shoes she can fit in her luggage. She hems and haws for a little while but eventually the creeping realization comes that it's much less effort to not leave town forever.

She sighs and buries her face in her hands. "Well, you're right. They're not after me at all. I mean, I guess, the reason I exist is so that nobody suspects that they do - and if I run away they'll just make another copy of you to do what I do now and then I'll be you and you'll also be you and -"

She takes the tea.

"I guess I'm not the one they're after. So long as I don't do anything."

Anarion

2018-03-14, 11:03 PM

Abbey bustles about in a panic for a little while but the edge of it goes out when she is forced to start making hard decisions about which shoes she can fit in her luggage. She hems and haws for a little while but eventually the creeping realization comes that it's much less effort to not leave town forever.

She sighs and buries her face in her hands. "Well, you're right. They're not after me at all. I mean, I guess, the reason I exist is so that nobody suspects that they do - and if I run away they'll just make another copy of you to do what I do now and then I'll be you and you'll also be you and -"

She takes the tea.

"I guess I'm not the one they're after. So long as I don't do anything."

Aelas sips her own tea. Unconsciously, she had grabbed the old Peter Rabbit mug that she used to use as a kid. It had always been one of her favorite little stories, and she had sympathized with Peter, who she thought had gotten rather the poor end of the deal all things considered. The lesson she had taken from it was that it was important to be fast and sneaky when exploring, so that you didn't get into trouble, and Daddy had been far more forgiving through the years than Peter's mother ever was.

She looks at the mug now, brings it level with her eyes as she sips the hot tea lightly and the light glow from her hair swirls and mixes with the steam rising to the ceiling. Abbey, who had obviously grown out of such things in a way Aelas never would, was living the right life. She knew that, knew that her old life wasn't for her, that it was good Abbey was in it. "You know, I drove all the way down to Newcastle today" she says conversationally. "Went to see some Alpacas and maybe even met a new friend. I had to leave her to walk back though, when you shouted, but gosh I should have left her some money, huh? That was silly of me, she'll probably be out all night."

She pauses, sips at the mug, glimpses over it shyly to meet Abbey's eyes (oh gosh, was Abbey taller than her now too?). "I know the Huntsmen were probably scary, but do you like all this, the, um, the people like me? Should I ever bring any of them over? I'm sure some of them are pretty friendly, I even got to ride on top of my one friend, he's kinda a big blue monster guy, but like super nice, y'know, and we got to turn into smoke together today and it was really fun."

That reminded her of Summer. She's going to have to go to that meeting that was supposed to happen after she's done here, if it's not over already. Isaac had told her to find Lily though...so maybe something had already happened. She'd have to tell them about the Huntsmen too, what they looked like. And she really, really needed to go out clubbing because she was starving in that way only Changelings can starve. There had to be some place around here where people were just letting loose, right? Maybe she'd stop there first and then find Lily when things had calmed down and explain around the same time that Static got back. She was sure the Gargoyle wouldn't lie about what happened.

She sat lost in her thoughts and waited for Abbey to answer, the light around her hair settling into a muted blue that mixed with the twilight from the windows in a soft glow.

Elanorin

2018-03-15, 05:49 AM

"Of course," says the King, lips twitching. "Of course you seek equality. Of course you greedy parasites lunge on the first moment of perceived weakness to attempt to seize power. You aren't interested in solutions. You only see a chance to undermine the reign of Summer. And it is still Summer! It is still my time! I am still King here -" his crown flares atop his head like a wild fire, "- and you are my vassals, and not my equals!"

Lily froze on the spot at the King's sudden outburst. Bloody hell that man scared her, it took all her willpower to not crumble on the spot in to a heap of apologies and then run for the horizon. There were just too many flashbacks swirling in her mind, mingling together in to a chaotic whole of a beast snarling and roaring before her, with terrifying fangs, sharp claws and blood in its fur. Was it getting unseasonably cold in here? Or was it just her?

Case in point.

"You're right, your Grace. I misspoke," Jack says and bows, quickly adjusting his strategy. "You are indeed wise to point out that fewer are better when one is dealing with traitors. I'd be happy to ... advise the King, of course. In private, so that no traitorous ears will hear your plan. They won't see you coming." He reminds himself that apparently there's a law in effect against fighting, hoping it's true, and gets up very close so he can whisper in the King's ear: "If the plan works, everyone will know it was your idea, and yours alone. And if it fails ... well, then it was my idea, of course."

Lily held on to the sound of Jack's voice. How could he sound so... not-terrified? When he moved forwards, to close in on the King there was a slight tug at the arm that Lily held, warning him not to get too close.

The King sniffs. His eye seems crazed behind that cruel iron monocle - bloodshot and watering slightly with constant pain.

"Investigate your own Court," said the King. "And be swift with it. I will delay the day of reckoning until I have gone through my own people. After that point if the traitor is not found I will expand my search."

Lily was utterly astonished at hearing the King agreeing to their suggestion. That such a man would ever agree to anything other than his own mad whimsies and ideas seemed impossible. She still managed a quick curtsy in thank you to the King before pulling on Jack's arm to step back. "Your Grace," she added by way of leave to the King, with a nod as she withdrew.

Thanqol

2018-03-16, 07:00 AM

"So, we've also got... Jack Gladwin on the list?" said Longarms.
"Hoo," said Mercia, picking a police file out of her handbag. "I've known about this one for a while."
Longarms took it and leafed through. "Good god, this thing sounds like an animal,"
"It is," said Mercia. "Dog skeleton tied together with red ribbons and sorry-for-your-loss greeting cards."
Longarms winced. "Yikes."
"Yeah," said Mercia.
"Did our Kindly Lord happen to know what that builds, or was it all just a really unhappy coincidence?"
"We can only hope for ignorance, but malice is constantly a more accurate yardstick," said Mercia.
"And you've survived it before?"
Mercia made a face and made the so-so hand gesture.
"Sounds like a good story," said Longarms.
"Well, the Mr. Sutherland never got a Fetch, and Mr. Johannesen left town, so we're pretty much at the end of the evening's duties," said Mercia. "I suppose I could take the time for a brief story."

Aelas sips her own tea. Unconsciously, she had grabbed the old Peter Rabbit mug that she used to use as a kid. It had always been one of her favorite little stories, and she had sympathized with Peter, who she thought had gotten rather the poor end of the deal all things considered. The lesson she had taken from it was that it was important to be fast and sneaky when exploring, so that you didn't get into trouble, and Daddy had been far more forgiving through the years than Peter's mother ever was.

She looks at the mug now, brings it level with her eyes as she sips the hot tea lightly and the light glow from her hair swirls and mixes with the steam rising to the ceiling. Abbey, who had obviously grown out of such things in a way Aelas never would, was living the right life. She knew that, knew that her old life wasn't for her, that it was good Abbey was in it. "You know, I drove all the way down to Newcastle today" she says conversationally. "Went to see some Alpacas and maybe even met a new friend. I had to leave her to walk back though, when you shouted, but gosh I should have left her some money, huh? That was silly of me, she'll probably be out all night."

She pauses, sips at the mug, glimpses over it shyly to meet Abbey's eyes (oh gosh, was Abbey taller than her now too?). "I know the Huntsmen were probably scary, but do you like all this, the, um, the people like me? Should I ever bring any of them over? I'm sure some of them are pretty friendly, I even got to ride on top of my one friend, he's kinda a big blue monster guy, but like super nice, y'know, and we got to turn into smoke together today and it was really fun."

"No. No, no, they are not cool or friendly people. God, I thought I was going mental," Abbey said, "seeing these nightmare people in hoods and cloaks shuffling around, and the insanity that is that road gang, and whatever the hell is going on at the car dealership," she shuddered, bit her lip.

"It's not safe. None of them are safe. None of this is right or normal but these things are everywhere and at least while I'm here I knew how to avoid them and they didn't come knocking on my door."

Lily froze on the spot at the King's sudden outburst. Bloody hell that man scared her, it took all her willpower to not crumble on the spot in to a heap of apologies and then run for the horizon. There were just too many flashbacks swirling in her mind, mingling together in to a chaotic whole of a beast snarling and roaring before her, with terrifying fangs, sharp claws and blood in its fur. Was it getting unseasonably cold in here? Or was it just her?

Lily, this sounds close enough to a flashback to Arcadia that that I'm going to ask for a Clarity check. Only two dice because it's not aimed directly at you, but any success means you take one point of temporary Clarity damage. If you fail the roll you can keep your sh*t together without having it overwhelm you.

Raz_Fox

2018-03-16, 10:04 AM

Well, here's what a moment of hesitation buys you: a friend forestalling the proverbial day of reckoning. A new string on the sword dangling over the chair. The chance to go find Aelas yourself, and hold her tight.

"When the time comes," Isaac whispers. "Until then. I keep my debts."

Because that's how survival works in the wilderness. You remember what others have done for you, and you repay in kind. You accept what they give you, and in turn, you push yourself to give more, you turn the debt into a fire burning at the center of yourself, you use it to keep moving when the wagon's sunk in mud and there's no one to push it but you yourself, huge and thick-armed, and everyone else will remember that, and they'll use it when the time comes that their own hearts are out of fuel.

Debts make the world spin. And he owes these cunning, calculating folk. They respect his need to suffer in the stead of those he protects. That is worth a debt.

stveje

2018-03-16, 02:49 PM

The King sniffs. His eye seems crazed behind that cruel iron monocle - bloodshot and watering slightly with constant pain.

"Investigate your own Court," said the King. "And be swift with it. I will delay the day of reckoning until I have gone through my own people. After that point if the traitor is not found I will expand my search."

Lily was utterly astonished at hearing the King agreeing to their suggestion. That such a man would ever agree to anything other than his own mad whimsies and ideas seemed impossible. She still managed a quick curtsy in thank you to the King before pulling on Jack's arm to step back. "Your Grace," she added by way of leave to the King, with a nod as she withdrew.

Jack bowed and stepped back with Lily's tugging. He dared not say or do any more, at least not here. There would be a time and a place, somewhere more private, for the plans to be discussed and carried out.

Anarion

2018-03-16, 03:31 PM

"No. No, no, they are not cool or friendly people. God, I thought I was going mental," Abbey said, "seeing these nightmare people in hoods and cloaks shuffling around, and the insanity that is that road gang, and whatever the hell is going on at the car dealership," she shuddered, bit her lip.

"It's not safe. None of them are safe. None of this is right or normal but these things are everywhere and at least while I'm here I knew how to avoid them and they didn't come knocking on my door."

Aelas sighs, her teacup already halfway finished. Peter glares back at her accusingly. "Well, I mean, like, you and me are cool. And I know we've got a special connection so that's not fair, but it's different if somebody makes an introduction. But sure, I can try and keep the other folks far away, best as I can." Aelas' hair bobs and sparkles as she nods to herself, and she smoothes down her shirt past her jeans nervously. That was one of those things where you could only say I'll do my best because it would be a capital B Bad Idea to make a promise about it. Her mind then caught up to the rest of what Abbey was saying.

"Wait...so what's happening at the car dealership?"

Thanqol

2018-03-18, 07:10 PM

The Flower Knight's Tale

"Did you know that I've come to enjoy the hunt? I hate all the stuff that goes along with it - the crazy emotions they stuff you full of, the whiplash when you go into the Hedge, the screaming, even the getting paid. But the actual hunt - when I don't have to think, I can just follow and watch and react - it's nice. It's fun. It's unpredictable - everyone has so many tricks up their sleeves and it's just a case of whittling them down, one after another. By the time you've cornered them you know everything about them, you've exhausted all their other options, and in those moments it... I wouldn't say it's a rush, I can't get rushes without my heart, but it's this deep, contented feeling of satisfaction.

"So I'm getting close to that phase with Antony Boderick. Little mosquito guy. He could walk down the highway in the wrong direction and dodge every oncoming car without blinking so my usual method of knock 'em with the flat of my sword wasn't going to be particularly helpful for this one. I didn't want to negotiate a whole new Contract just to slow him down enough to get my hand around so instead I started scoping out this swampy lake where they were going to build a carpark. Slippery, sticky, sucking - it was perfect. If I could draw Antony there the ground would betray him and he'd be easy prey..."

Well, here's what a moment of hesitation buys you: a friend forestalling the proverbial day of reckoning. A new string on the sword dangling over the chair. The chance to go find Aelas yourself, and hold her tight.

"When the time comes," Isaac whispers. "Until then. I keep my debts."

Because that's how survival works in the wilderness. You remember what others have done for you, and you repay in kind. You accept what they give you, and in turn, you push yourself to give more, you turn the debt into a fire burning at the center of yourself, you use it to keep moving when the wagon's sunk in mud and there's no one to push it but you yourself, huge and thick-armed, and everyone else will remember that, and they'll use it when the time comes that their own hearts are out of fuel.

Debts make the world spin. And he owes these cunning, calculating folk. They respect his need to suffer in the stead of those he protects. That is worth a debt.

Jack bowed and stepped back with Lily's tugging. He dared not say or do any more, at least not here. There would be a time and a place, somewhere more private, for the plans to be discussed and carried out.

"It seems the matter of infiltrators has been decided," came the anonymous rustle from the Autumn Court. "Each court shall investigate its own and the matter shall be raised again at the next meeting. The next item on the agenda concerns the Goblin Market."

That actually gets everyone in the rooms' attention.

"As you may know, in previous years the town of Prosperpine was lost in a game of chance with Marshal Overdibas of Overdibs Emporium. The Autumn Court of Prosperpine saw this as an opportunity to rent the town from the Goblins - which in a practical sense, means that neither the Kindly Folk nor their servants can neither own nor rent real estate within the town's borders. The Market's rules mean that every year the town goes up for auction. We will be passing around a collection plate. Please contribute whatever you think a year without neighbours from Faerie is worth to you. Any excess funds from the auction will go towards the Royal budget."

The plate goes around smoothly. All kinds of things are added to it - from huge wads of cash, to socks, to keys, to glowing knives that chatter and wurble.

Each of you, what do you place upon the plate, if anything? And particularly to the thief Jack Gladwin, do you steal anything when it passes through your hands?

Aelas sighs, her teacup already halfway finished. Peter glares back at her accusingly. "Well, I mean, like, you and me are cool. And I know we've got a special connection so that's not fair, but it's different if somebody makes an introduction. But sure, I can try and keep the other folks far away, best as I can." Aelas' hair bobs and sparkles as she nods to herself, and she smoothes down her shirt past her jeans nervously. That was one of those things where you could only say I'll do my best because it would be a capital B Bad Idea to make a promise about it. Her mind then caught up to the rest of what Abbey was saying.

"Wait...so what's happening at the car dealership?"

"It's terrible! All the flowers bloom out of season and they've got a mosque operating in the break room and the contracts are four-dimensional labyrinths with all kinds of batsh*t clauses hidden inside full stops and I'm pretty sure the owner is literally the fallen angel Lucifer," said Abbey. "And I'm ninety percent sure that all the cars have either animals or people or whatever trapped inside them, partly like a possession thing, or maybe a human smuggling thing, and Lucifer sent me a Valentines Day card and even though I threw it in the trash it keeps winding up on my shelf!"

She pointed at the cute pink card that read "I can't BEAR to be without you".

Anarion

2018-03-20, 02:24 PM

"It's terrible! All the flowers bloom out of season and they've got a mosque operating in the break room and the contracts are four-dimensional labyrinths with all kinds of batsh*t clauses hidden inside full stops and I'm pretty sure the owner is literally the fallen angel Lucifer," said Abbey. "And I'm ninety percent sure that all the cars have either animals or people or whatever trapped inside them, partly like a possession thing, or maybe a human smuggling thing, and Lucifer sent me a Valentines Day card and even though I threw it in the trash it keeps winding up on my shelf!"

She pointed at the cute pink card that read "I can't BEAR to be without you".

"Huh. That's weird. Mind if I take a look?" Aelas goes over to inspect the little pink bear card. Is it glamoured? If it's not, is there some sort of extra glamour on Abbey that ought not to be there?

Raz_Fox

2018-03-20, 06:33 PM

The Pilgrim takes one $20 out of a wad of tightly-bound bills, and sets the plate down at his (presumably still extant) feet. He reaches up, takes his (long, slender, grey) finger between his teeth and bites down. I do not need to tell you how hard he bites down. You already know.

He takes the bill and smears his blood across Mary Reibey's face. (Please do not ask the Pilgrim who Mary Reibey is. He does not know. He does not know about her famously successful shipping ventures, or her conviction for horse theft as a teenage orphan. He does not know why she was chosen to be on the back of the lobster, or why there's a ship sticking out of her shoulder.) Once it is coated, grisly, wretched, he folds it once and presses it as carefully as a child saving a leaf in a scrapbook. This folded bill is returned to the plate as a new item, value added.

Elanorin

2018-03-21, 09:03 AM

Lily, this sounds close enough to a flashback to Arcadia that that I'm going to ask for a Clarity check. Only two dice because it's not aimed directly at you, but any success means you take one point of temporary Clarity damage. If you fail the roll you can keep your sh*t together without having it overwhelm you.

[Rolling Clarity: 2, 4]

Lily empties her wallet of cash for the collection, it's not a vast amount but there are a couple of sizable notes, crisp and brand new, folded exactly in the middle. She adds a photo of her old house, a little reluctantly, as well as a small note with her name and number neatly written in flawless cursive.

stveje

2018-03-21, 09:27 AM

Each of you, what do you place upon the plate, if anything? And particularly to the thief Jack Gladwin, do you steal anything when it passes through your hands?

Not to be outdone by Lily, Jack mimics her gesture like a mirror. Not that he has anything more to give, but what he has, he dumps into the bowl without a twinge of hesitation ... he can steal more, in fact he probably stole everything he just gave in the first place, so in a way he's just giving it back.

Not that Jack is a kleptomaniac, mind you.

But yes, he does nick a thing of two, since you ask. That photo Lily put in, for one ... it mysteriously vanishes into one of his pockets. And if there's someone else who seems to be putting something in the bowl that they're really going to regret giving up, he nicks that too.

Thanqol

2018-03-21, 11:58 PM

The Flower Knight's Tale

"I'm in the middle of scoping the site out when I notice rubbish in the swamp. Kitchy love stuff, a whole lot of it - like a shop emptied its Valentines display into the lake. Hearts and bears and flowers in a sickly pink-white heap amidst the reeds. At the time I don't think too much of it as anything other than a landmark - though it did strike me as odd the way a rotten tree had formed almost an archway above it.

I put it to one side as I noticed a steep hill with a road running along it. The idea occurred to me that if a car were to be heading down that hill towards the lake, and were their brakes to be cut, and were the barrier to be removed - well, that person would be neck deep in swampy water. The process of arranging for Antony to be driving down that hill was rather a bit more involved. I made a few small bargains, arranged for the right kind of disturbance, caused an unrelated few accidents to close off alternate pathways, and soon enough he was rolling down the hill towards the silty mangroves and I was ready to make my play."

"Huh. That's weird. Mind if I take a look?" Aelas goes over to inspect the little pink bear card. Is it glamoured? If it's not, is there some sort of extra glamour on Abbey that ought not to be there?

Aelas, how could you possibly tell? Not only do you lack two dots of Intelligence to rub together you also lack any skill in Occult. You're not a Mage, you have absolutely zero way to gather information about potentially cursed greeting cards without doing the proper fairy tale thing in this situation: Taking it to a wizard.

The Pilgrim takes one $20 out of a wad of tightly-bound bills, and sets the plate down at his (presumably still extant) feet. He reaches up, takes his (long, slender, grey) finger between his teeth and bites down. I do not need to tell you how hard he bites down. You already know.

He takes the bill and smears his blood across Mary Reibey's face. (Please do not ask the Pilgrim who Mary Reibey is. He does not know. He does not know about her famously successful shipping ventures, or her conviction for horse theft as a teenage orphan. He does not know why she was chosen to be on the back of the lobster, or why there's a ship sticking out of her shoulder.) Once it is coated, grisly, wretched, he folds it once and presses it as carefully as a child saving a leaf in a scrapbook. This folded bill is returned to the plate as a new item, value added.

[Rolling Clarity: 2, 4]

Lily empties her wallet of cash for the collection, it's not a vast amount but there are a couple of sizable notes, crisp and brand new, folded exactly in the middle. She adds a photo of her old house, a little reluctantly, as well as a small note with her name and number neatly written in flawless cursive.

Not to be outdone by Lily, Jack mimics her gesture like a mirror. Not that he has anything more to give, but what he has, he dumps into the bowl without a twinge of hesitation ... he can steal more, in fact he probably stole everything he just gave in the first place, so in a way he's just giving it back.

Not that Jack is a kleptomaniac, mind you.

But yes, he does nick a thing of two, since you ask. That photo Lily put in, for one ... it mysteriously vanishes into one of his pockets. And if there's someone else who seems to be putting something in the bowl that they're really going to regret giving up, he nicks that too.

Jack, the only thing that you find yourself compelled to rescue from the plate is when April, the dancer you were speaking to, puts her solidity on the plate.

It's remarkably unflashy, dealing with conceptuals. The Market's strange logic smooths all barriers to trade, allowing people to offer memories or emotions up as currency - the thing just needs to be infused in a physical token and April is putting that part of herself into a big heavy brick on the plate. Immediately she becomes vaguer, more transparent - and while she seems relieved right now, you're fairly sure that's not the sort of thing one will regret in the long term.

Palming a brick is a little tricky but no one's looking for you specifically - so it just happens. Could put out a decent window with this.

The plate returns to the unshifting mass of Autumn, and the last one to place a screwdriver on the surface gives it to the Pilgrim as though he is expected to take it, count it, keep it safe. Some sort of veiled decision, or a test of some kind? Either way it feels light - it's heavy, but it doesn't feel quite heavy enough.

"Thank you for your contributions," rustles the voice that must be the King of Autumn. "The next order of business is the matter of human sacrifice."

The King of Summer was on his feet, and behind him was an army. A low steady drumbeat began as the temper of the army visibly rose with the King of Autumn's cool words.

"A simple vote," said the King. "Yes or no. Are the Courts open to the idea of killing in exchange for protection, in any form?"

Every eye in the hall turns to face Jack Gladwin - custom is in matters like these that the seasons vote in their cycles, and Winter shall be the first to raise its voice. You might be able to take a moment to confer if you want, but everyone waits breathlessly to see what you say.

Anarion

2018-03-22, 02:36 AM

Aelas, how could you possibly tell? Not only do you lack two dots of Intelligence to rub together you also lack any skill in Occult. You're not a Mage, you have absolutely zero way to gather information about potentially cursed greeting cards without doing the proper fairy tale thing in this situation: Taking it to a wizard.

Kenning. It's a clarity thing.

Glamor 2/10
Clarity: 5/6 (mild damage)
Health: 6/6
Willpower: 5/6

Thanqol

2018-03-22, 04:56 PM

Kenning. It's a clarity thing.

You know, in a decade of Changeling that's the first time anyone's ever used that power?

The card is supernatural. That's all you get, though - just that it is in some way magical.

Anarion

2018-03-22, 05:55 PM

The card is supernatural. That's all you get, though - just that it is in some way magical.

See, now we know we need a wizard. Actually, let me ask a general question here. How do Changelings figure out glamoured stuff? I mean, like, is there a cabal floating around that charges a fee for this? Will word get out? What's the price for this sort of thing, or is this a bespoke job at the goblin market?

"Huh. I'll, uh, look into this. Mind if I keep the card? I mean, it might end up back with you, but I'm gonna try and hold onto it and get somebody to look at it. It's definitely magic, like for sure."

Aelas walks to the kitchen with her Peter Rabbit mug and rinses it with a little water in the sink. Runs a hand wistfully along the handle before putting it in the nearby wrack to dry. "This was fun, Abs. I'm sorry you got freaked out earlier, just let me know if those guys come back. Better yet, text me a photo if you see them again, maybe I can do something about it."

Okay, let me tell you about priorities. Aelas has three, and they're competing. One: go see Lily like the Pilgrim said. That was probably at that big town hall meeting that was supposed to be happening. Two: go to a party and have fun! (also glamour) Three: go to whoever it is that might help with this card thing so she can help Abbey out. So, what are those options looking like in this one-horse town?

[Also, scene spent with Touchstone, so healing the Clarity damage.]

Glamor 2/10
Clarity: 6/6
Health: 6/6
Willpower: 5/6

Raz_Fox

2018-03-22, 08:37 PM

The Pilgrim does not have words for the tanglebrush inside of him. If you could hear them, they would sound something like this.

Human sacrifice is bad, right? The Aztecs did that. Tore people's hearts out. That's the sort of stuff the bad guys do in Indiana Jones films, and we should know better than that.
I have killed someone many times but they never were allowed to stay dead.
Would I kill someone to protect Aelas?
I don't want to answer that.
Yes, I would.
Would I kill someone innocent?
Would I kill a child to protect Aelas?
I don't want to think about that.
I don't know.
I have killed over and over and over again.
The ones that stayed dead were the animals. That we ate. So that we could keep walking. Keep going. For strength. Some of the plants, too. Do living plants count as things that can be killed?
That's not what they're talking about.
That's not what they're going to do.
What we're going to do.
I can imagine walking up to the Big Bad Moon and taking his head in my hands and twisting it until the spinal cord snaps. I can imagine it so vividly that my fingers itch. I can imagine a world in which I would do this.
I am a member of this team.
A team fights and dies together.
Would I kill a child to protect Aelas?
Please don't ask me. Please.
Say no. Stop this from happening. Stop this from being a thing I have to consider, because I don't know whose side to take.
If Winter and Summer and- Spring's going to say no, obviously- if everyone says no, I don't have to decide.
The Huntsmen are here. Already. What if they take Aelas
what if
what if I'm not there when they come for jack
for lily
how is lily going to fight them, fight predators, real predators that look like humans but they're not and I can't be there for her all the time
please stop
I don't want to think about this
Say something
Breathe
to protect them I would cast myself into the fire and let myself burn away and I can feel it under my hands and
no that's the collection plate
Breathe
Breathe
This shouldn't even be something that we're talking about.
But it is.
So I have to deal with this.
I have to decide.
I have to know what I would pick.
But I do not need to know right now.
I will leave this place, later.
I will find Zotzie, probably behind the Fairchild house digging through empty wine bottles.
We'll talk over something I fish out of the dumpster, out by the railroad tracks.
And I can think about this where the air is cold and there's just the two of us, old sinners cast out of hell.
Am I old now?
I feel older.
Maybe this is what everyone in this room feels like.
Older. Broken at the edges.
You feel like this, you could do a lot.
Don't think about it now.
Breathe.

The Pilgrim holds the collection plate, dutiful, ever able to serve when called upon. He does not speak. But that is what we have come to expect from him, so this is hardly noteworthy at all.

stveje

2018-03-25, 02:34 PM

"Thank you for your contributions," rustles the voice that must be the King of Autumn. "The next order of business is the matter of human sacrifice."

The King of Summer was on his feet, and behind him was an army. A low steady drumbeat began as the temper of the army visibly rose with the King of Autumn's cool words.

"A simple vote," said the King. "Yes or no. Are the Courts open to the idea of killing in exchange for protection, in any form?"

Every eye in the hall turns to face Jack Gladwin - custom is in matters like these that the seasons vote in their cycles, and Winter shall be the first to raise its voice. You might be able to take a moment to confer if you want, but everyone waits breathlessly to see what you say.

Jack does take a moment to look around at the gathered Winter court. Although he's not looking for a debate, he does want to gauge his court's mood on the topic.

Elanorin

2018-03-26, 02:48 PM

Jack does take a moment to look around at the gathered Winter court. Although he's not looking for a debate, he does want to gauge his court's mood on the topic.

Lily's eyes widened more than ever at the mention of human sacrifice. Her heart, that had barely had a chance to settle down, raced once more in her chest. For once she looked up and sought to find Jack's eyes with her own, she didn't hide her worry and as if her feelings on the matter were not already written plainly on her face she shook her head slightly.

Don't. Don't.

Thanqol

2018-03-26, 07:21 PM

The Flower Knight's Tale

"Into the water Antony goes. He struggles out but the water's up to his neck and I'm closing in on him. He's panicking and wading further and further into the dark waters of the lake. I keep a steady pace following him. No quickness or trickery when you're up to your neck in water. Raw strength and stamina is all that matters at that point, so I just start wading him down.

"Then he goes below the water.

"I kicked myself and doubled my speed. Was there a crocodile in this swamp? Why hadn't I accounted for that? I didn't want to lose the Master's property to some dumb reptile. I heard splashing and shouting and pushed through the reeds just in time to see Antony being dragged by the feet over the stack of cards and roses into the archway formed by the tree. Just before he's dragged through he looks me in the eyes and asks me for help.

"Then he went through. And the hunt was over. He was gone. I was free. I only stopped to pick up one of the greeting cards on my way out. It was damp and rotten but I could still make out the signature - Love, Jack."

See, now we know we need a wizard. Actually, let me ask a general question here. How do Changelings figure out glamoured stuff? I mean, like, is there a cabal floating around that charges a fee for this? Will word get out? What's the price for this sort of thing, or is this a bespoke job at the goblin market?

"Huh. I'll, uh, look into this. Mind if I keep the card? I mean, it might end up back with you, but I'm gonna try and hold onto it and get somebody to look at it. It's definitely magic, like for sure."

Aelas walks to the kitchen with her Peter Rabbit mug and rinses it with a little water in the sink. Runs a hand wistfully along the handle before putting it in the nearby wrack to dry. "This was fun, Abs. I'm sorry you got freaked out earlier, just let me know if those guys come back. Better yet, text me a photo if you see them again, maybe I can do something about it."

Okay, let me tell you about priorities. Aelas has three, and they're competing. One: go see Lily like the Pilgrim said. That was probably at that big town hall meeting that was supposed to be happening. Two: go to a party and have fun! (also glamour) Three: go to whoever it is that might help with this card thing so she can help Abbey out. So, what are those options looking like in this one-horse town?

[Also, scene spent with Touchstone, so healing the Clarity damage.]

The meeting is fairly easy to get to, Pilgrim's warnings notwithstanding. While you're fairly sure the Spring Court would react strongly to your personal life being invaded by magic - they're really strongly against that - the Queen would probably try to re-frame it into getting rid of your Fetch. Unlike the interaction Pilgrim recently had with her which was very telling rather than suggesting, she's been remarkably compassionate and patient with you on the topic. The Mantle makes it easy for her to like you, and very easy for you to like her, but she's deeply of the opinion that Fetches are all ticking time bombs.

Parties are frequent in Prosperpine - in the spring and summer. When the weather is warm and the tourists flood the town then the beach is full of holidaymakers and students on summer vacation. Right now, though, it's a few weeks into the school term and the next holiday is going to be Easter, by which point it'll be a freezing twenty one degrees Celsius. It's the worst time of year to go looking for celebrations.

Your third question is most easily answered at the Goblin Market. Changelings might know and might help but they also might not - or get tangled in with their own opinions or passions or damage. Each court has learned individuals but there's no way to know if they're professionals or frauds. The Market is your sole sane service provider.

The Pilgrim does not have words for the tanglebrush inside of him. If you could hear them, they would sound something like this.

The Pilgrim holds the collection plate, dutiful, ever able to serve when called upon. He does not speak. But that is what we have come to expect from him, so this is hardly noteworthy at all.

Though the courtiers of Autumn that you stand among appear a clustered monolith, unified and unbreakable and cooly dispassionate, here in the centre you can feel their fear flow like waves. Each of them is tracing a similar tense internal monologue to you; each of them is a bundle of nerves and tension, wondering just how far they'd go if truly pushed. The fear rolls and crests like a silent symphony, and you are a voice in that choir.

Good news and bad news, then. The bad news is that this is close enough to a vivid flashback that it's going to force a clarity roll - a base of two dice, plus another two due to the feedback loop of strong emotions for a total of four. You're only up for one point of temporary clarity damage.

Jack does take a moment to look around at the gathered Winter court. Although he's not looking for a debate, he does want to gauge his court's mood on the topic.

Lily's eyes widened more than ever at the mention of human sacrifice. Her heart, that had barely had a chance to settle down, raced once more in her chest. For once she looked up and sought to find Jack's eyes with her own, she didn't hide her worry and as if her feelings on the matter were not already written plainly on her face she shook her head slightly.

Don't. Don't.

The majority of the Winter court looks some combination of afraid or disgusted. The only real outlier is Bigby Moon who gives you a big grin with glittering teeth and a corresponding thumbs up.

You get the distinctive vibe that the motion is as much threat as opinion. He's a large man and accustomed to violence.

Raz_Fox

2018-03-28, 01:30 PM

[Two successes on that Clarity roll, so one point of temporary Clarity damage ho.]

Do you know how the Pilgrim survived? Of course you do. I have not allowed you to forget at any point, because it is painted into his very bones. Not the burning of his skin, no: he survived by subsuming himself into the role he played on behalf of those he cared about. He threw himself into the purifying flame not because he wanted to be free, but because it was what his company of the damned and the repentant required. He fought tooth and nail, bone-breaker and eye-gouger, in order to free those who the games judged worthy.

How do you think Zotzie flew to freedom, beyond the condemning eyes of the stars?

There is a common refrain, and it goes like this: I was only following orders. There is a following chord: you needed me to do this.

And none of us want a Pilgrim who thinks only in terms of those he serves and those he breaks.

Health 9/9
Glamour 4/10
Willpower 5/6
Clarity: 1t/5

Anarion

2018-03-28, 06:02 PM

No parties. At least none found easily. Vague feelings of how ridiculous this one-horse town was stirred in Aelas' memory. She'd felt that way before she left. Maybe Abbey still did, but she'd stayed and went to school here anyway. Maybe it was because Daddy made things so nice. Lucky he hadn't been home though, that would have been like, super duper hard to explain.

Aelas decided that she'd have to get her friends and all go drinking tonight and they'd just have their own fun! Yeah! Well, at any rate, that was eventually the plan. The market would come after, when she wasn't so starving, and when she found something good to trade. Like, maybe she could find the end of a rainbow, or a the last shard of an exploding sun that had made its way to earth. Or some cookies, she bet cookies would trade really well at the market, especially chocolate chip.

But right now, she needed to find those friends first. Isaac had told her to find Lily, and she figured that everyone was still all gathered together. And since they were all grouped up and doing formal stuff, it was probably pretty safe. So, when she called herself a car (Butterfly was now taking the night off unless there was a capital E Emergency), she had it take her right to the big meeting hall, got out in front and walked right in. Then she looked around for Lily and walked over to her and waved hi!

stveje

2018-03-29, 01:09 PM

The majority of the Winter court looks some combination of afraid or disgusted. The only real outlier is Bigby Moon who gives you a big grin with glittering teeth and a corresponding thumbs up.

You get the distinctive vibe that the motion is as much threat as opinion. He's a large man and accustomed to violence.

Jack tried not to let Bigby's glittering grin haunt him as he turned back to the room, and all the expectant eyes fixed upon him. What had he done to be in this situation? Maybe he should have kicked the King out of his bed and told him to get his act together, but that just wasn't Jack's style ... bossing people around like that. He sighed inwardly and took a second to close his eyes and compose himself, then he opened his eyes again and said, "Winter votes no to human sacrifice. I don't see how it serves anyone but our enemies to cull our numbers." He might have said more, but at that moment Aelas entered the room.

Thanqol

2018-03-31, 04:06 AM

"So what happened then?" asked Longarms.
"Story for another time," said Mercia, getting to her feet. "We should check out that building that just caught fire."

No parties. At least none found easily. Vague feelings of how ridiculous this one-horse town was stirred in Aelas' memory. She'd felt that way before she left. Maybe Abbey still did, but she'd stayed and went to school here anyway. Maybe it was because Daddy made things so nice. Lucky he hadn't been home though, that would have been like, super duper hard to explain.

Aelas decided that she'd have to get her friends and all go drinking tonight and they'd just have their own fun! Yeah! Well, at any rate, that was eventually the plan. The market would come after, when she wasn't so starving, and when she found something good to trade. Like, maybe she could find the end of a rainbow, or a the last shard of an exploding sun that had made its way to earth. Or some cookies, she bet cookies would trade really well at the market, especially chocolate chip.

But right now, she needed to find those friends first. Isaac had told her to find Lily, and she figured that everyone was still all gathered together. And since they were all grouped up and doing formal stuff, it was probably pretty safe. So, when she called herself a car (Butterfly was now taking the night off unless there was a capital E Emergency), she had it take her right to the big meeting hall, got out in front and walked right in. Then she looked around for Lily and walked over to her and waved hi!

For a moment there is a total hush, and then a terrified reorganization as the band of the Summer Court rustles into position behind the King. The King of Summer's face twists and rolls and boils like he is trying to chew through his own teeth. The scream builds inside him. He clenches his whole body forwards, and then with a great ripping motion he roars.

The ground heaves. Windows shatter. Great gusts of smoke erupt into the air.

The building catches fire, igniting all about on chairs and walls and carpet. The most skittish leave instantly - most of the Spring Court, but fewer than might be thought from Autumn, as they cluster closer together for protection. Music begins to howl, drums begin to beat, stomping feet begin to keep the time, and like an avalanche the King of Summer walks towards Aelas.

Anarion

2018-04-02, 12:53 AM

For a moment there is a total hush, and then a terrified reorganization as the band of the Summer Court rustles into position behind the King. The King of Summer's face twists and rolls and boils like he is trying to chew through his own teeth. The scream builds inside him. He clenches his whole body forwards, and then with a great ripping motion he roars.

The ground heaves. Windows shatter. Great gusts of smoke erupt into the air.

The building catches fire, igniting all about on chairs and walls and carpet. The most skittish leave instantly - most of the Spring Court, but fewer than might be thought from Autumn, as they cluster closer together for protection. Music begins to howl, drums begin to beat, stomping feet begin to keep the time, and like an avalanche the King of Summer walks towards Aelas.

I suppose this ought to be scary, and like, for sure there's real threat going here. But you gotta keep a couple things in mind here. First, this is either the same or a very similar power to the thing Aelas can do herself (I mean, she even just did it for freebie jeebies earlier today) so that's a bit less intimidating. Second, flying in and around cosmic storms was totes a thing as Herald of the Cosmic Dragon. You don't fly into the fireball, but she's a lot less intimidated by this than she was by, like, the fact that Static almost paralyzed her, or the big group all jumping on Butterfly earlier.

Aelas looks around for Lily, sees her with Jack and the Winter folks and starts retreating that way, at least insofar as "that way" remains not on fire. She also starts talking real fast. "Hey, so, uh, hi, Summer King, right? You look really kingly, nice crown, very pretty. There's been a teensy tinsy misunderstanding..." (vaults backwards over a chair and tumbles it down in his way) "...see, I didn't kidnap anyone, kinda. Static was the only one I sorta kidnapped, and it was cuz she got really, really stuck to my car while she was asleep, and then she tried to kidnap me so I left her to walk back from Newcastle, but she's totally fine and you could probably even find her along the road if you know the road better than I do." Aelas makes a shooing motion towards any courtiers in the way of where she's headed so they don't get caught up. "Also! there's, like, some huntsmen or something, like a chick and a guy in weiiird armor and I...uh, sorta knew where they were a while ago, but maybe that's who you're looking for? But definitely not me because I didn't kidnap anybody, except Static and that was totally an accident and everybody there is fine!"

Elanorin

2018-04-03, 03:43 PM

Lily watches it all unfold as if in slow motion. A train wreck set for destruction with nothin in its path to stop it. With a courage that came from nowhere other than the warmth of that single shared laughter of the fractured court of winter and the deep desire for order and accountability, Lily makes her way over to Aelas, flinching at the flying embers and bits of debris, stopping just in front of her as the King came barrelling towards them.

"S-so, as was agreed, each court investigates. Th-that just remains agreeing the date on wh-which the findings are to be concluded and reported, that is, our next meeting. Care t-to name it, Your Grace?" Lily took out a pen and a piece of paper, ready to note down a date, her hands shaking visibly, as was indeed most of her. She was utterly unable to look up, and fixed her eyes on the little scribble the point of the trembling pen was making, set to the paper.

Raz_Fox

2018-04-03, 06:23 PM

Let me talk for a moment about kiths. A kith, when you get down to it, to the very bone, is just a reflection of your story, written across your body. It will never leave you, and it will never let you forget- except. Except there is magic that lets you change what your story could have been.

Take the Pilgrim. His story is the journey through the wilderness, acting as the guide and the pathfinder, unmatched in speed and power- except that now, his kith asks: what would have become of Isaac had he been the watcher of the stars, the keeper of secrets and untold stories? What if his burn-pocked skin was grey, rubbery, his deep dark flame-lit sockets overlarge ovals? He is something not quite an extraterrestrial visitor and not quite a lizard, covered in esoterica that will never fade.

For this reason, we will forgive him when he attempts to leap in front of the King of Summer, his too-short nails scrabbling and failing to turn his burning, hunched form, and he goes careening into several hastily-vacated chairs. He is accustomed to a different shape and a different story.

Here he comes now, pride battered, hood still low, fire in his teeth and spreading heedlessly across his shoulders. And he is frightened. He is frightened indeed.

He is afraid of what will happen if the king takes a step more, and declares war against the Pilgrim, unmoving and resolute.

Thanqol

2018-04-03, 10:02 PM

The two huntsmen jog down the shrouded night street, making their way between the puddles of light cast by golden hued streetlamps. Their breath runs heavy and hot, and they feel as though surrounded by a shield of heat against the chill. Their saliva tastes like refined sugar as exertion sucks the moisture from their mouths and the hunger of their distant hearts echoes against their coldly reasoning minds.

Let me talk for a moment about kiths. A kith, when you get down to it, to the very bone, is just a reflection of your story, written across your body. It will never leave you, and it will never let you forget- except. Except there is magic that lets you change what your story could have been.

Take the Pilgrim. His story is the journey through the wilderness, acting as the guide and the pathfinder, unmatched in speed and power- except that now, his kith asks: what would have become of Isaac had he been the watcher of the stars, the keeper of secrets and untold stories? What if his burn-pocked skin was grey, rubbery, his deep dark flame-lit sockets overlarge ovals? He is something not quite an extraterrestrial visitor and not quite a lizard, covered in esoterica that will never fade.

For this reason, we will forgive him when he attempts to leap in front of the King of Summer, his too-short nails scrabbling and failing to turn his burning, hunched form, and he goes careening into several hastily-vacated chairs. He is accustomed to a different shape and a different story.

Here he comes now, pride battered, hood still low, fire in his teeth and spreading heedlessly across his shoulders. And he is frightened. He is frightened indeed.

He is afraid of what will happen if the king takes a step more, and declares war against the Pilgrim, unmoving and resolute.

Autumn is dragged into the fray alongside you.

They don't want to force this confrontation - they dearly wish for anything otherwise. They're terrified, doubting, unstable, every one of them. But they also know that their greatest strength is the infliction of that same uncertainty on everyone around them while revealing none of their own. So, like the trail of water carved in the air by a soaking-wet whip, Autumn is dragged in your wake. It takes a moment for that sinuous motion of robes and fabric to twist itself back into a shape, and then the desperate, fearful determination to puff itself up and stand tall in defiance. The fear has crystalized into such a shape: backing down and losing the illusion of invincibility would be far the more dangerous course than revealing weakness and disunity.

To those not in sync with the falling of the leaves, however, a quiet army of robed figures forms around Aelas, silent and tall and unflinching in the face of the inferno.

The King of Summer's eyes are alight. His fists tighten. Words splash against his face like water and sizzle away in steam. Everything about him is violence and his pained eye darts about swiftly behind its iron monocle. He does not strike - no one does. The act is impossible; the Crown forbids this of the royalty who sign on to its stories.

"This is treason," he said with uncanny stillness. "You are rebels. And I shall deal with this by way of war."

His finger strikes out like a thunderbolt, pointing at Lily. "You. Schedule the next meeting for three days. Everyone who wishes to prostate themselves before me and beg my forgiveness may do so. The traitors shall be delivered to me for punishment. After that time passes then there shall be open war between the army of Summer and all those who have dared rebellion."

Ultimatum declared, the King of Summer steps atop the crouching back of a giant and, so borne aloft, takes his entire Court with him from the hall.

Elanorin

2018-04-04, 09:42 AM

Well that was terrifying.

Date set for public humiliation en-masse and the commencement of civil war: March 28th.

Lily wiped the wet from her eyes and scribbled down a quick note on the paper, partly to follow through on the action the summoning of the pen and paper had begun and partly in case the current overdose of adrenaline in her blood wiped every last syllable of the instruction she had just been given from her memory. Her heart was beating so hard in her chest and she was still shaking, the handwriting turned out barely legible.

He didn't say where.

Lily looked up at the state of what had been such a pleasant building moments before. It was such a shame, yet somehow a perfect representation of how the meeting had gone.

Somewhere less flammable.

"You should get out of here, it's not safe," she said to Isaac and Aelas over her shoulder, not turning to face either, then went about doing exactly that herself. No comment as to what had just happened. Normally having Isaac this close would give Lily pause but there was no trace of hesitation in her now as she left him to get out of the ruined building.

She looked for Jack, she doubted he needed help but she wanted to grab him and let him know to reconvene back at the house before he disappeared.

Anarion

2018-04-04, 01:32 PM

Raz_Fox

2018-04-04, 06:00 PM

Between the hammer and the anvil indeed, this. Now that Aelas is safe- the fool, the absent-minded lamb- our friend has a moment to catch his breath and consider the depth of his troubles, the horns that he finds himself pierced upon: on the one side, the fact that he has just dragged all of Autumn to Aelas’s defense, and yet Autumn did not offer him up as a sacrifice to placate the ravening King. Unity, and yet here is one impulsive fool acting for the whole. On the other: that the King of Summer threatens war if he is not offered up traitors.

There may be no traitors to hand. And our friend, he will not frame another. So the question becomes, then: will the lot of them run? If not, then death looms like a heavy shadow in front of Isaac.

“I accept Autumn’s decision. No matter its cost,” Isaac whispers. “For them. I will pay for all.”

His bulk shifts, his head seeking another hidden in the robes: Kaitlin. His skin itches to return to its now-familiar monstrosity. Then he means to seize Aelas up and carry her out, hopefully accompanied by Lily. He has a friend to consult.

Thanqol

2018-04-04, 10:41 PM

The two Huntsmen clamber atop a rooftop like spiders. Again the gleaming sights of Longarms' rifle observes the motion of the hall and the Changelings emerging from a distance. The two are silent, counting, memorizing faces and forms.

Aelas blinks. "Hey, were you even listening?!"

He was not.

Between the hammer and the anvil indeed, this. Now that Aelas is safe- the fool, the absent-minded lamb- our friend has a moment to catch his breath and consider the depth of his troubles, the horns that he finds himself pierced upon: on the one side, the fact that he has just dragged all of Autumn to Aelas’s defense, and yet Autumn did not offer him up as a sacrifice to placate the ravening King. Unity, and yet here is one impulsive fool acting for the whole. On the other: that the King of Summer threatens war if he is not offered up traitors.

There may be no traitors to hand. And our friend, he will not frame another. So the question becomes, then: will the lot of them run? If not, then death looms like a heavy shadow in front of Isaac.

“I accept Autumn’s decision. No matter its cost,” Isaac whispers. “For them. I will pay for all.”

His bulk shifts, his head seeking another hidden in the robes: Kaitlin. His skin itches to return to its now-familiar monstrosity. Then he means to seize Aelas up and carry her out, hopefully accompanied by Lily. He has a friend to consult.

A contract with mirrors momentarily blurs the room to obscure which of the robed figures of Autumn has released from its armoured unity. Murmured whispers of support, doubt, and fear brush your mind, overlapping; a murmured conversation you evesdrop on uncertainly. They begin to drift away, locked in their internal discussion, trying to imagine the best way for them to move forwards.

The courtiers of Spring are diligently putting out the fires that have beset the hall with extinguishers and contracts that call upon sweet spring-time rain falling gently from the roof of the hall. Overall the chemical tang and cold water makes this an unattractive place to hold further discussions and those not directly engaged are making their way out to the street and parking lot.

Elanorin

2018-04-05, 06:58 PM

Aelas blinks. "Hey, were you even listening?!" She shouts at the departing summer king. Looks around. Isaac was there, but so was Lily, and Isaac had told her to go find Lily. So, she took the most obvious course of action. She walked over to Lily, took whichever arm Lily wasn't writing with in both hands and held onto her, then looked over at Isaac. "I found Lily!" she said with a smile. "What now? Can we, like, go to a party or something? Also I need to figure out this weird magic greeting card thing. And uh...how did the meeting go before, uh, that thing that just happened happened?"

Lily was more than a little surprised at feeling her arm being grabbed and her already barely legible note gained a sudden scribble all across it before she regained her writing balance to compensate for the yanking and tugging on her arm. There'd been a knee-jerk reaction of fear at the feeling of being grasped but as soon as she recognised the feeling of a normal hand, as opposed to some enormous beastly clawed paw, the feeling quickly melted to annoyance.

Actual annoyance. Irkdom. The emotion felt shining and new in her veins. She could not remember feeling just plain old narked. It felt... good.

Note done, Lily put the pen and paper away and went about undoing Aelas hold on her, pulling her arm away, bending her fingers out of their grasp, whatever it took, and then set her shoulders. There was a clear display of disapproval on her face and in her eyes even if they still refrained from rising so high as to Aelas' face.

"A party? Really, Aelas," Lily's voice was outright frosty, unlike her usual mild and amicable tone, even the air around her was unusually cold.

She breathed a deep sigh to restore civility to her tone of voice. "I would recommend you find The Queen of the Spring court and spend as much of the next three days as possible preparing your case for her to put to the King of Summer."

Anarion

2018-04-05, 11:51 PM

Lily was more than a little surprised at feeling her arm being grabbed and her already barely legible note gained a sudden scribble all across it before she regained her writing balance to compensate for the yanking and tugging on her arm. There'd been a knee-jerk reaction of fear at the feeling of being grasped but as soon as she recognised the feeling of a normal hand, as opposed to some enormous beastly clawed paw, the feeling quickly melted to annoyance.

Actual annoyance. Irkdom. The emotion felt shining and new in her veins. She could not remember feeling just plain old narked. It felt... good.

Note done, Lily put the pen and paper away and went about undoing Aelas hold on her, pulling her arm away, bending her fingers out of their grasp, whatever it took, and then set her shoulders. There was a clear display of disapproval on her face and in her eyes even if they still refrained from rising so high as to Aelas' face.

"A party? Really, Aelas," Lily's voice was outright frosty, unlike her usual mild and amicable tone, even the air around her was unusually cold.

She breathed a deep sigh to restore civility to her tone of voice. "I would recommend you find The Queen of the Spring court and spend as much of the next three days as possible preparing your case for her to put to the King of Summer."

"Yeah a party! I used a ton of glamour today, I'm starving!" Aelas frowns at the mention of spring. "Ugh, do I have to go hang out with them? They're so boooring. Spring isn't s'posed to be like that, y'know?" Aelas' frown turns petulant. "They just do nothing. What's the point of being back if you can't enjoy life?"

Elanorin

2018-04-06, 03:12 AM

"Yeah a party! I used a ton of glamour today, I'm starving!" Aelas frowns at the mention of spring. "Ugh, do I have to go hang out with them? They're so boooring. Spring isn't s'posed to be like that, y'know?" Aelas' frown turns petulant. "They just do nothing. What's the point of being back if you can't enjoy life?"

Lily closed her eyes for a tiny three-second meditation session.

"Fine," she conceded reluctantly, "go. Refuel. But seriously, Aelas," and she turned to face the technicoloured party girl and actually meet her gaze, "this is trouble. Real trouble. You need Spring on your side, or there won't be much enjoying of anything soon. First thing in the morning, you go find the Queen. I'll let her know to expect you."

Oh great, coaxing sense from a moody teenager, torn to pieces by Summer and now tea with the witch? Today really is the day that just keeps on giving.

"First. Thing."

stveje

2018-04-06, 08:20 AM

Well, that went ... better than expected?

Jack was not really paying much attention after the King of Summer left, his feet carrying him in the general direction of wherever Lily and the others were, but their mildly heated discussion simply flowed around him like water around a fish. He took the mirror out of his pocket to see if King Kent was still observing - some part of him hoped for a thumbs up in the shiny little screen, but he actually expected to find the mirror disappointingly blank despite the clear lack of any immediate disaster. He didn't know why he expected this.

He then looked around for the rest of Winter. Aside from Lily, where had they all gone?

Anarion

2018-04-06, 03:26 PM

Lily closed her eyes for a tiny three-second meditation session.

"Fine," she conceded reluctantly, "go. Refuel. But seriously, Aelas," and she turned to face the technicoloured party girl and actually meet her gaze, "this is trouble. Real trouble. You need Spring on your side, or there won't be much enjoying of anything soon. First thing in the morning, you go find the Queen. I'll let her know to expect you."

Oh great, coaxing sense from a moody teenager, torn to pieces by Summer and now tea with the witch? Today really is the day that just keeps on giving.

"First. Thing."

Aelas rolls her eyes and sighs. "Fiiine. Tea is good at least. Is there a diner around here? Can you have us meet there? If I'm getting up that early, I want eggs and bacon too. Oh, and pancakes. Can they do the ones where they draw a smiley face on them with frosting?"

Aelas turns to grab Isaac, but then remembers something and turns back to Lily. "Oh, oh! There's a gargoyle girl named Static who's coming into town sometime later. I left her to walk and she's Summer, but like, kinda reasonable, I think? I mean, she'll probably try to paralyze me and drag me off if I go talk to her because she's, um, very focused. But I bet if you go meet her, she'll be, like, reasonable, and maybe you can talk to her about stuff and get her to talk to the Summer court, y'know? I bet they'll listen to their own instead of us. Yeah."

Now she turns and switches to latching on to Isaac's arm. "Isaac, you're coming drinking with me. No ifs, ans, or buts! Bring your new friends too if you want. Let's go!"

Elanorin

2018-04-06, 06:31 PM

Aelas rolls her eyes and sighs. "Fiiine. Tea is good at least. Is there a diner around here? Can you have us meet there? If I'm getting up that early, I want eggs and bacon too. Oh, and pancakes. Can they do the ones where they draw a smiley face on them with frosting?"

Aelas turns to grab Isaac, but then remembers something and turns back to Lily. "Oh, oh! There's a gargoyle girl named Static who's coming into town sometime later. I left her to walk and she's Summer, but like, kinda reasonable, I think? I mean, she'll probably try to paralyze me and drag me off if I go talk to her because she's, um, very focused. But I bet if you go meet her, she'll be, like, reasonable, and maybe you can talk to her about stuff and get her to talk to the Summer court, y'know? I bet they'll listen to their own instead of us. Yeah."

Now she turns and switches to latching on to Isaac's arm. "Isaac, you're coming drinking with me. No ifs, ans, or buts! Bring your new friends too if you want. Let's go!"

"The diner at 9am," she confirmed, but really it was more a reminder aimed at Aelas than anything else.

Then suddenly another task presented itself on Lily's To Do list with both impressive speed and vagueness. Lily raised her eyebrows at being tasked so brazenly with finding this seemingly quite dangerous 'Static' and dealing with her, without so much as a please. She tried to put on her very best you-have-got-to-be-kidding face but it was not an expression she had much practice summoning. Besides, she knew she'd end up tracking down this Static anyway, so her face soon softened back to just plain lukewarm disapproval.

Until Aelas latched on to Isaac. Lily's saw the grasp on his arm and she struggled to look away. She wanted to protest but nothing came to mind. This was not unusual. Later tonight when she was paralyzed by a gargoyle and being dragged to a Summer Court slaughter, that's when she'll know what she should have said right now. That is how the real world worked.

Right now, as Aelas and Isaac sauntered off to a party leaving her to pick up the proverbial mop and bucket... the real world kind of sucked a little bit.

"Jack," Lily tried not to voice too much of her annoyance, for none of it belonged with him, "could I trouble you for some help?"

Raz_Fox

2018-04-06, 10:47 PM

Anarion

2018-04-07, 12:28 AM

"No."

The Pilgrim takes his fear and makes of it a spear; he takes Aelas's laughter and lets it shatter itself upon the wall of the word. His hands tighten around Aelas, and he swings her up under one arm, where she hangs like a miniature dog in Height's picture-perfect purse. It is difficult, surely, for a Changeling to be held when they do not want to be; he hopes that Aelas accepts his authority and does not press the issue.

"You. Me. Zotzie. Static." He says this to everyone around, which in this case is mostly the motley. Lily and Jack included.

By which he means that he and Aelas will go find the goblin bat, and then the three of them will set out to find Static before the Huntsmen can find the gargoyle. There are Huntsmen here, Aelas. If they seize upon the gargoyle out in the wild, then you will be...

You won't, will you? You will be safe. You will flit away, or drive off in your steed, and Isaac will burn. And he will accept this, if it comes to that. But he will make you do your work, set you to the task or else it's bed for you and no supper.

You can try to pick up Aelas, but that's not what happens. One minute, she's holding your arm, but when you tense, she's gone. Not even looking back for a parting word, just out the door and gone. Sorry Isaac, but her priority is joy right now, and she thinks that her going to deal with Static is a bad idea. You're on your own on that one unless you want to chase her outside and run her down.

[That's a willpower regain for not helping others to maintain her joy.]

When she gets outside, Aelas pouts to herself. "Nobody wants to have fun! This is so dumb. I'm...I'm gonna find the first cute boy I meet and give him a great big kiss and we're gonna have some fun."

Aelas heads to whatever is open at this hour of the evening, if there's an arcade, shops, even a bar, whatever this one horse town has to offer. And she'll be true to her word here. Whoever the first boy is she sees that's at least within expected range, she's gonna rush up and give him a kiss. Tell me who that is?

Glamor 2/10
Clarity: 6/6
Health: 6/6
Willpower: 6/6

stveje

2018-04-07, 01:29 AM

"Jack," Lily tried not to voice too much of her annoyance, for none of it belonged with him, "could I trouble you for some help?"

"Yes, of course," said Jack. He hadn't truly been listening to all the details of the argument, but he had enough of a sense that it was something that needed done, that it was important.

*

Glamor 4/10
Clarity: 0/7
Health: 0/7
Willpower: 3/4

Thanqol

2018-04-08, 09:59 PM

Silently, the Huntsmen mark their targets. They do not follow yet, do not expose themselves to scrutiny. It is enough to put faces to names at this moment.

You can try to pick up Aelas, but that's not what happens. One minute, she's holding your arm, but when you tense, she's gone. Not even looking back for a parting word, just out the door and gone. Sorry Isaac, but her priority is joy right now, and she thinks that her going to deal with Static is a bad idea. You're on your own on that one unless you want to chase her outside and run her down.

[That's a willpower regain for not helping others to maintain her joy.]

When she gets outside, Aelas pouts to herself. "Nobody wants to have fun! This is so dumb. I'm...I'm gonna find the first cute boy I meet and give him a great big kiss and we're gonna have some fun."

Aelas heads to whatever is open at this hour of the evening, if there's an arcade, shops, even a bar, whatever this one horse town has to offer. And she'll be true to her word here. Whoever the first boy is she sees that's at least within expected range, she's gonna rush up and give him a kiss. Tell me who that is?

Prosperpine is equipped with a beautiful tourist district, with exotic bars, hotels, and late night shopping. Everything a summer tourist needs - summer being the operative word. It's a little bit of a hike to get there because you've got to cross the bridge and head down main street, soon you get to the Rock Pool - an artificially still paddle-pond for children built in amidst a massive tide break line of barnacle-encrusted concrete. And just beyond there the world opens up to the furthest horizon with a vast and rolling beach that only ends on a distant broken cliff, a mountain half-devoured by the sea. Trails of footprints lead off into the distant horizon as lovers and joggers walk the moon-touched trail.

That said, the season's not so far gone that everyone's packed up shop yet. The place definitely gives you the impression of being way below capacity but there are still enough students and budget tourists around to keep these places running a little while longer. But coincidences being what they are, the young man you select for surprise makeouts is named Emeret Murray - a thin and handsome Indian photography student at the university who happens to be a class-mate of your Fetch. The Bard always loved his comedies of errors. There's enough confused glamour there for a harvest.

But that all said, it is nearing the midnight hour and you are not made of stone. It comes time to let the angels carry you upon a chariot of warmed feathers to the lightless realm of Dream. This does not have to be the extent of your labours if you so wish it, for you can walk the dream world with a waking mind and even cross into the dreams of others. Tell me where your ethereal feet take you, be it wrapped in your own gossamer pathways or drawn curiously to strange minds outside your own. And if you go visiting someone else's dreams changing them, too, is within your power - so what dreams do you leave them with?

Raz_Fox

2018-04-09, 12:30 AM

Dreams. We're at our most vulnerable there, when all of our careful defenses lay down their arms and we let the world rearrange itself in our heads. Certain ones linger long after, almost real, almost close enough to touch us: memories of people we have lost, anxieties that will have themselves heard whether we will or no, and things that we did not know we wanted until our dreams dangled them cruelly in front of us. You have had dreams that have been difficult to distinguish from reality, ones that you accepted as fact until daylight streamed in through the kitchen window and it struck you, suddenly, that you never actually

"You know, if you wanted, I could probably get you a good word in with Longarms. He never pays on time and he doesn't tip at all but with my brains and your impressively thewed musculature we could probably shake him down a little bit, see what he's got in his bag of goodies before he drags someone back. And, hey, if there's anyone in town- no? You sure? Positive? All right I'll put that plan down as a solid definite maybe."

If you're anything like me, you've even had dreams that quietly snuck inside your brainpan and made camp there, running a false flag operation as you groggily roust yourself up and out of bed, and it takes you until you're parking the car at work that the thought strikes you that, no, you've never actually

"Helloooooooo yeah, this one isn't Static either. I can definitely tell. It's the salt. You taste that? Salt and a slight bitter aftertaste. Hook right and we'll see if we can't get somewhere a little more tart. It's the stone having time to settle y'see. The textures start to collect and compress. She won't be as heavy on the tongue as a mountain but did Aelas tell you anything about the architectural style? A Grim And Foreboding Cathedral Gargoyle is going to have a completely different undertone than a Moonbeast Gargoyle. Stands to reason don't it? And aha, there we go, that's the spice you taste that? Right there. Cinnamon and barbecue sauce, that's one of the Summer lasses or I'm out to seed."

Most confoundingly, some dreams

"It's not your fault and you know that so stop sulking or I'll eat your hair and you know that is not an empty threat, even though I don't have the proper singed pepper and plastic to really offset the mouth feel. She made the dive when the center field was surging and didn't spike through your zone. But she's like that all the time right? Like whatsherface with the harmonica. Us old farts gotta look after the kids and all that. And hey hey hey through here right quick, shhhhhhhh. No. Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Boojum. On my count get down the white road, doesn't matter how far that removes us from the chain, I am not staying in this dream a minute longer because I like my feathers where they are thank you very much."

Fine. Be that way. Watch with us as two masked figures stalk through the labyrinth of dreams, wearing an impossible regalia and moving to the beat of an unheard drum. They bleed out their twin natures into the dreams around them, leaving behind horribly glittering stars in the night sky, and smouldering clawprints in the stone and grass and concrete and children's play area. Four blue pinpricks of light, two above the other two; two starkly-cut dragon-bone masks, terrible in their simplicity. They're going looking for Static through dreams, to have a certain garrulous goblin talk to her about her experiences that afternoon. They'll say the words that Isaac can't, and do so with a tip and a wink.

In their dreams, they still wear the regalia. In their dreams, they're still pilgrims. It's comfortable, in its own way; it is the link that connected them first of all, and it is the role they can pull about their shoulders to not appear naked and open-faced before dreamers. Let them see. Let them all see. The pilgrim is not ashamed.

As for the next few days? Isaac is fully aware he is not the planner and the diplomat; he is not Lily or Jack. He will do what he can, seeking out Static and ensuring her safety, and he will lurk about his motley-mates to ensure their safety while the Huntsmen come knocking. It would be good if the Hedge were safe enough for trawling and token-hunting, finding some gift to mollify Summer, but that's unlikely to be the case, and going on a journey and leaving his companions unguarded? Unsafe. Unwise.

He will need to pay Zotzie in some new sort of food, though. And it's almost certain that Lily and Jack will need something that he can best and most ably fetch. And not to mention keeping an eye out for some offering he can make to Autumn as a silent apology for the disastrous town meeting.

TheAmishPirate

2018-04-09, 02:00 PM

Edmund! You are being hunted - by bargain prices!

You are in Gustav's Gabled Gazebo of Grandeur. Despite all suspicions to the contrary, Gustav does not actually seem to be any sort of Fae creature. As far as you can tell he's a completely ordinary, checked-out elderly conman who's currently trying to scam you into some real estate. You need a place to start a restaurant, Gustav needs all of your money and all of the money you will earn in the future, a compromise can certainly be reached.

And that’s comforting. It’s refreshing, this honest dishonesty. I know what he’s about, he knows what I’m about, I know he knows, and he (probably) knows I know. This man has the common decency to be shamelessly open with his false intentions, and for that, I respect him.

Not enough to give him all my money though. I need that.

"So, listen kid, I'm getting old and while I'm struggling to make a living at all, I'm also struggling to find good places to eat out in this town," said Gustav. "Maybe these negotiations will go easier if I can taste some of your cooking and know exactly what it is I'm going to be sponsoring."

“That suits me. No need to chat when the food can do the talking.”

Edmund reaches into his bag, and it’s important to stress that he is in no way threatening this old shyster. He entered this establishment to negotiate in good faith - relatively speaking - and nothing more. But. He lifts a pot out of his bag, neither rushed nor relaxed. He carries it with the same intent one would a crown, before setting it upon a king’s head. There is an anticipation about his movements, suggestive of some certainty that he feels no inclination to share before its time. And to some, that may speak of danger. But rest assured; he is not threatening Mr. Gustav.

As for the contents of the pot? It’s stew. It’s a good thing everybody likes, and it’s easy to throw together a decent stew. Which makes it all the more spectacular when you have a bowl that reminds you the last four hundred have been only passable. Edmund has not the ingredients of Arcadia at his disposal, but he does have a thousand adventures worth of experience perfecting the most common campfire recipes.

Suffice to say, he can make a mean stew.

[Could I roll Crafts retroactively for preparing stew? And furthermore, if I were to perform the Gift of Warm Breath on Gustav, would he count as willing?]

Elanorin

2018-04-12, 02:27 PM

It was later before Lily finally succumbed to sleep. Aelas had left in a flurry of words and colours leaving niggling worry behind. Isaac had been his usual silent and she had not sought to change that. He seemed preoccupied by Autumn. It was with Jack she spent most of what remained of the evening. Discussing the events of the meeting, their impressions of the Courts and the Summer King's temper and outburst. How to help Aelas. How best to frame the witch trial due in a mere three days and all that needed done between now and then. By the end they had managed to voice many questions but not many answers.

Trying to facilitate Spring standing up to Aelas defence was one thing and Lily had made sure that the Queen of Spring knew to meet Aelas at the diner the next morning (at 9.30; Aelas would likely be late anyway and even if she wasn't it would do her no harm to wait on someone else for a change). One of them should probably be there but no decision had been made as to who. Mrs Height creeped Lily out enough to hesitate to volunteer. She knew she'd had to deal with it sooner rather than later. It's just.. she preferred later. Besides, it's not as if she was short on unpleasant encounters to attend to. She needed to speak to the Hellhound himself too (that's The Summer King to me and you) to see if she could temper him in any way, or at the very least get a chance to do some damage control in how the next meeting was set up.

They needed to speak to King Kent too, and while the least unpleasant of the tasks it was perhaps the most challenging. They needed him to step up now and they needed him to Lead. Hell, ideally they needed him to be formidable. But that was just never going to happen, she knew that. But she was damned if she was going to let him hide under the covers again. Too much was at stake. No, that just wasn't an option. She had to find a way to reach through to him. She just had to. Beyond the looming witch hunt he needed to find a way to play a role in the court from now on. She had laid out fleeting breadcrumbs for the Winter Court to begin to come together, but if he did not back that up then it would make solidifying that so much harder. In short, she needed to get the King on her side. On the same page. To have her back. And she had three days.

Then there was this gargoyle Static Aelas was talking about. She seemed to think Lily needed to talk to her and that she was key to calming down these kidnapping charges. If there was anything to that it made sense to try. Perhaps she should have tried to find this Static on the roadside and give her a lift. If she knew what road. If she had a car. Hell, Lily didn't even have a phone. Oh, yes, she needed to get a phone as well.

It was all swirling around in her head as she lay her head on the stiff pillow of the squeaky foldout bed in the small musty room that was King Kent's 'guest room'. She hadn't so much asked to stay as just collapsed from fatigue here on her first night and tried to return the favour by picking the place up and helping with chores. A night became two and... well... He had yet to protest so she imagined an arrangement was slowly and silently taking form between them. She imagined he didn't care, considering the amount of time he spent shut in his bedroom, and that there was a not insignificant chance that he hadn't even noticed yet, for the very same reason.

She needed to speak to Jack again in the morning, she decided, as she set the old digital alarm clock for 7am. Maybe she could convince him to go have breakfast with Aelas and Mrs Height. No amount of fried bacon and eggs would make that meeting enjoyable, besides, she rather not see the Summer King after three pots of tea.

The pillow smelled like laundry detergent and it made her smile. Was the King asleep already? She hadn't seen him, or heard him, when she came back. She hadn't checked for the tell-tale flickering light under his door. She was too tired. She really did need to talk to him. She really should... talk to... Kent...

* * *

The roar of engines came from all around and before she knew it a countdown (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wV0LcrmnwQQ) blared and she had to dash to get out of the way. A strange vehicle driven by a deeply focused green dinosaur came hurtling towards her at impossible speed. It swerved around her and managed to miss her but instead crashed spectacularly with a rock. She took cover behind a cow that seemed utterly uninterested in her, or anything else, other than the 8-bit grass. A cloud appeared and floated over to the crashed buggy, counting down before frowning and moving on. Far away, over the roar of fast-disappearing buggy engines, deeply worrying explosions could be heard, and distant gunfire, forcing her to look up and away from the crash. Overhead a clunky-looking craft (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZnDJe6F7vk) flew passed. All had seemed bright a moment ago but it was actually a murky light-polluted starless twilight. The horizon glowed ominously red in the direction of the pixelated mountains. The dinosaur lay limp and unmoving in his wrecked smoking car, his neck unnaturally bent. He was slowly fading to grey. A soft rain began to fall and the wind picked up a little, bringing a chill that cut to the bone.

Clouds shifted, lightning flashed in the distance, the sky glistened as if a pane of glass hung suspended. The faint shadowy outline of a figure could just be made out behind it. She whistled and a horse appeared by her side, she got up and it galloped through the rain. They passed towns with frowny-face citizens fanning smoke to the sky, huge wide-open and empty military bunkers, and swamps with pools of water that glowed, all the way noticing strange bloodstained white feathers suspended in odd places, seemingly with no regard for gravity or the elements. The horse stumbled, and then tumbled over entirely with a piercing whinny, throwing her hard against a large man-size wooden box half sunken to the ground. It was rotted, covered in moss and looked like it had once been blue. The ground trembled below her and the mountains in the distance exploded in to a spectacular sequence of volcanic eruptions, spewing lava and ash up in to the sky, dimming the moon.

Amongst it all the rain held a tune (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8aYY2ZesOA), which seemed to make the air heavy and time slow. So heavy she could simply climb it up to the window in the sky above. She climbed it, above an army of red-visored cybernetic men firing from below. They seemed to be heading for one of the towns and were joined by purple-bellied soldiers shooting at the clunky airship. It wobbled and swerved off dangerously in to a dark purple forest covered in black vines. The crash was completely void of sound. She reached the top just as fire even began to come down from the sky above.

Inside, behind the window, it was snowing and even colder. The snow lay untouched but for where her feet had disturbed it and the only feature of this space was a tall Victorian street lamp giving off a fading blue light.

"Your Grace," Lily said, out of breath and shaking.

stveje

2018-04-13, 03:06 AM

Turns out playing music is hard when all the strings are out of tune.

Aelas went off to party hard. Lily wanted to call a meeting, which Jack was on board with, except ... Well, there was another thing that needed doing, it couldn't wait, and yet it didn't seem like all their strings were in tune on this one, so he'd just have to play it single-stringed. He told Lily to go ahead and prepare the meeting, and he'd be with her a little later.

The idea of doing things without a partner filled him with sadness, but it was probably best if he did this alone, anyway. He hadn't yet decided if it was best to do the other steps of the plan on his own, too, or what those steps were exactly. Filling people in on his plan was risky, even though he thought he could at least trust his own.

Stealing a car was easy. Driving it was not as ingrained, but he hopefully didn't have to do any fast or creative driving, just quietly keeping it on the asphalt. Jack turned on the radio and drove off down the road out of town to look for this Static. He wouldn't be spending all night looking - he had to get back to Lily - but he needed to make at least one quick pass.

He'd pick up Static, offer her a ride back to town, try to make a good impression on her. He needed someone in Summer to speak for him, and this was a perfect opportunity, too perfect to waste without at least trying.

Jack wasn't sure about all the details yet, but if there was a traitor, he wanted to find out who, without alerting them, so that they could be fed carefully chosen information and thus used against the enemy. It would be such a waste if the traitor fled or died, or if the enemy realized they'd been compromised. But for this to work, he needed the Summer King's ear. And that likely meant sucking up to him, and to Summer in general. Not an easy task for a wintry soul like Jack, but at least the King did seem eminently willing to be sucked up to. This was what he'd likely have to do the following day. Kissing the Summer King's ... feet. Yay.

Later - but not much later - Jack abandoned the car somewhere random and hurried back to Lily, went over plans and questions until late, then went to bed, the radio still playing in his memory. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwiyV6UF1FA)

*

A landscape of pure, white snow stretched untouched for miles towards distant mountains, rising towards a twinkling black sky. A low wall of volcanic black stone, broken in places, ran among the snowy hills. Jack walked with slow steps atop the wall, head low, kicking occasional bits of stone. No wind, nor any sound but those of his quiet steps marred the silence. He stopped and looked out across the fields of virgin snow, flakes of white gently falling around him.

During the day there was always something to do, someone who needed his help. Helping made him feel like he was still needed, like the world still held a place for him. But his dreams were his own, and here no one needed anything from him. This was when he let himself just ... sink, into sadness and the empty hole left in his heart, where once his love for Veronica was. His dreams were probably boring to an outside eye, but Jack treasured these quiet, wintry moments of loss and sleep, when he could imagine himself just ... sleeping it all away.

Anarion

2018-04-13, 04:33 AM

That said, the season's not so far gone that everyone's packed up shop yet. The place definitely gives you the impression of being way below capacity but there are still enough students and budget tourists around to keep these places running a little while longer. But coincidences being what they are, the young man you select for surprise makeouts is named Emeret Murray - a thin and handsome Indian photography student at the university who happens to be a class-mate of your Fetch. The Bard always loved his comedies of errors. There's enough confused glamour there for a harvest.

Aelas holds him close and lingers on the kiss. It's nice, a feeling she hasn't remembered in a long time. His breath is warm, and her lips buzz just ever so slightly.

[Aelas doesn't intend this to be rushed, she'll linger in the moment with him and enjoy the kiss. Not sure if he's got powerful deep-seated emotions from this or not, or if these are new emotions for him, so just rolling unmodified. I am assuming this is spring court associated. rolling presence+expression for this. 9, 6, 4, 4, 10, 5, 2. So that's 3 glamour regained.]

But that all said, it is nearing the midnight hour and you are not made of stone. It comes time to let the angels carry you upon a chariot of warmed feathers to the lightless realm of Dream. This does not have to be the extent of your labours if you so wish it, for you can walk the dream world with a waking mind and even cross into the dreams of others. Tell me where your ethereal feet take you, be it wrapped in your own gossamer pathways or drawn curiously to strange minds outside your own. And if you go visiting someone else's dreams changing them, too, is within your power - so what dreams do you leave them with?

As far as plans go, Aelas has a bunch. She'll meet the queen of spring the next morning. She had promised to do that. And she does want to make up with Static, just, like, after Static had dealt with somebody else and didn't think she was under orders to capture Aelas. Gargirl was crazy. And when she's feeling good, she'll go to the goblin market and try to figure out what's going on with that letter that Abbey had and the whole car dealership thing. She wondered if she should ask the queen of spring about that too, actually. Maybe, it would depend on the conversation and how much it was all like "rah rah, kill your fetch!" (Aelas' mental image of the queen of spring is one of those chibis with really big spiky teeth glaring at her.)

For now though, Aelas wanders off from her quick tryst and finds a quiet place to curl up to sleep (where do the spring courtiers stay when they're only recently back, anyway? Does she have a room somewhere?)

***
And then, then she wanders. She's feeling enough energy and her mind is still swirling from the busy day, so she steps through the gate of ivory and out onto the dreaming roads from her own mind. She skips happily along the roads, her long hair trailing and swirling a sparkling line of radiance behind her as she looks about for dreams that might be fun.

She flits about the road gazing at the bastion's of random dreamers in proserpine. So many people dreaming of schools or jobs, the outside of the bastion looking more like some kind of prison institution with scores of students or gray-suited workers streaming in and out. Boring! Then there are the ones that look sorta fun, the beach vacations and fast cars, even a few people imagining themselves in Star Wars. But she's been out there and that's not quite it. Then she spies one brightly colored one. Probably a child's dream, guarded by turtles and little brown mushroom guys. She recognized Mario after a second, but man, they had come a long way since the N64 3D she'd played when she was a kid. There's something charming about going through that, so she runs over to the bastion (it looks like one of the big multi-tier Mario castles) only for one of the inhabitants, hammer bros, was it? The bigger turtle guy, to start throwing stuff at her! She spends some time dodging around [dex+athletics: 3, 9, 4, 8, 8, 3] and easily jumps herself off of a koopa shell with a resounding boing and jumps right on the guy's head before he can throw anymore hammers. Obligingly, the castle gate opens and she enters the bastion.

Inside the dream, everything is modern and kinda weird. The dreamer must have been playing one of the desert levels or something because there are all these adobe huts and the little mushroom guys wearing sombreros, some with black, twirly mustaches wandering around. Aelas could probably have meandered among the inhabitants for a long while, perhaps even wandered about the desert grabbing coins and running as fast as her legs could carry her with little notice from the dream. But she had greater ambitions than that. She wanted to be Mario in here. So, she went to talk to one of the inhabitants and asked him what problems they had, and he threw up his arms and screamed about how Bowser was on some sort of pyramid with the Princess. So of course she promised that she, Mario, would save her and, with her best attempt at an Italian-sounding giggle, raced off. [Manipulation+Subterfuge 1, 9, 8, 7, 9, 4. Aelas will use the extra 2 successes and 1 glamour to paradigm shift and harvest 4 glamour from the dream, narrated below. She also gains the dream intruder condition]

Aelas raced up the pyramid with delight. There were warp pipes and those skeleton guys that keep on coming back, and a bunch of switchbacks as she climbed its stepped surface. When she got to the top, she was disappointed to find that it wasn't actually Bowser, it was one of his kids, the one with the magic wand and the top hat, whatever his name was. She ran around him and saw that when his magic was hitting the blocks of the pyramid it was knocking them out of place, so eventually she started kicking the loose blocks herself. When she had hit him three times, with a deeply satisfying thunk and actual little spinny birds appearing above his head, a magical glowing star appeared in front of her! She lapped it up, filling the role with glee, and as it spun around and filled her with a warm glow, she could feel her own spirits strengthen as well. Stealing from the dream like this would make the sleeper hostile though, they could feel it when you took something for yourself. So, probably her job was to get out of here now. She looked around to try and figure out where the exit was.

Glamor 8/10
Clarity: 6/6
Health: 6/6
Willpower: 6/6

Thanqol

2018-04-15, 08:20 PM

Jack and Isaac! The common thread in both of your intentions is that you need gifts. While Autumn is not wrathful it is counting its debts, and while you owe Summer nothing it is nothing but wrath. Getting on the right side of either of these terrible forces isn't as simple as arriving with a smile and some kind words - cold analysis and paranoid fury would make an empty handed gesture fruitless. If you want to stand out then you need to find a treasure. And luckily, the Hedge is full of treasures.

The Hedge here is a strange mishmash of terraformed cultures, invasive stories spreading like rabbits over the old myths of the Djirubal people. Old growth yew and oak forests dot the landscape, deep and dense and full of Europe's lurid nightmare beasts, blending into the thick tropical rainforests of India filled with shadow puppet warriors and golden temples that walk atop spindly fingers. A thousand severed samurai heads roll across the hill like a migratory herd of kangaroos. The sun, a circle of yellow paint, hangs simply in a matte black sky streaked over white canvas. And centring it all are the docks - a vast industrial port complex far larger than its earthly counterpart, covered with brightly coloured shipping container hermit crabs, surrounded by a small collection of carnival tents in red and white. The Goblin Market is at a low ebb right now but it always has a presence.

The shoreline consists of stunning cliffs with rocks at the bottom for tragic suicides or cornered swordsmen to leap dramatically towards, and infinite beaches that open up towards an ocean like a maw. Sailing ships circle each other in the distance, white sails fleeing from the black, industrious goblins heaving endless treasure chests of gold and sugar into the ocean to lighten their loads. An underground pipe runs all the way to America and from moment to moment tall, spidery-spindly men in long black coats emerge from it hesitantly, holding their briefcases in their mouths.

Some fairy tales know what they are. This one does not even know what genre it is. Things arrive in the docks, but they are not subsumed and integrated like in America - here they grow invasive, spreading wildly and changing everything as they go.

You have come some distance in your quest already. Pilgrim, tell me what it is you seek as your gift or gifts, and Jack, tell me what trial you have already overcome in the seeking. Also, each of you will have to mark off a point of Glamour for the crossing into the Hedge.

*

Aelas and Lily! You are far from such a wondrous place (far by contrast, not by distance - you can step through to the Hedge through any door you encounter). You are sitting in the aggressively embroidered home of Mrs. Height. She has a cozy for the teapot. She has a cozy for the eggs. She has made sure that everything in her home is as cozied and warmed as it is possible to be. You get the feeling she would put you in a cozy if she could. Teacups are presented on doilies. A large wooden cabinet is full of delicate little Russian babushka dolls. They're a little creepy in that the painted faces are of martyred saints in the process of being martyred, and the Jesus hanging from the wall aggressively makes eye contact with you wherever you go.

Mrs. Height has been fussing over Aelas a lot. Offering her nice warm hand-knitted jumpers, making sure her coffee is warm enough, giving her cookies and breakfast and generally Mothering her. She's been doing this since you got here - you're staying with her until you find your feet. How do you react to this?

Lily is getting an incredibly cold shoulder but in that incredibly subtle and extremely polite way of someone far too respectable to lower themselves to the level of a direct repudiation. You have an opportunity to give as good as you get with your own subtle snubbing - roll Manipulation+socialize-4 and if you get a success you'll win Mrs. Height's grudging respect.

(You have a weird dream-memory of a skeleton man on a beach, staring at the corpse of a leviathan whale washed up on the shore)

*

Edmund, roll your Intelligence+Crafts roll to see how mean this stew is, and Gustav is entirely willing to have his cough sent away. And tell me a little bit about where you made this stew, and got the ingredients - are you staying somewhere or is it genuine campfire cooking?

Thanqol

2018-04-15, 08:35 PM

Meanwhile, the two Huntsmen stalk Jack and Isaac through the Hedge.

"Why don't we just grab 'em?" said Longarms confidently. "I want to grab 'em!"

He looked good here. Complete. Confident. Proud. Respectable like an oil geyser. None of the paleness, none of the shakes, none of the endless low-level fuming. Mercia wondered how she must look.

But she felt good too. The craving in her heart was still there, but here, even if she wasn't home she was close to home. She could pause to sniff the flowers. And she did! They sprouted up behind her, every foot-step exploding into a riot of bright colours, and every time one caught her eye she bent down and sniffed it.

It wasn't happiness. But it wasn't the cold blooded misery she felt in the human world.

"We shouldn't," said Mercia. "Both of these two have stolen Royal contracts. And those are terrible to deal with," she let out a long sigh and stretch. "Gentry contracts. I once cornered this mousy little girl who turned into a woolly mammoth and stomped me into the dirt. You don't want to be surprised by that stuff. We need to be patient until we see what they're capable of."

"I've got surprises too!" said Longarms resentfully, as though this was a personal challenge. "They don't know what I can do either. I'm sick of waiting around. I have places to be! I want to grab 'em!"

"Just... soon. All right? Wait until the story plays out a little further," said the Flower Knight, unable to muster much more of an argument than that.

Elanorin

2018-04-17, 04:05 AM

TheAmishPirate

2018-04-17, 06:05 PM

Edmund, roll your Intelligence+Crafts roll to see how mean this stew is, and Gustav is entirely willing to have his cough sent away. And tell me a little bit about where you made this stew, and got the ingredients - are you staying somewhere or is it genuine campfire cooking?

You’ll excuse me if my memory’s patchy. Days haven’t come one right after the other for a while now. I think…

Aelas. Right. Aelas has a credit card. She let me use it, so long as I took her shopping with me. I wrangled her to the supermarket, and that’s where I got my ingredients and pots and things. (Since she was good, I bought her a pack of Oreos with Pop Rocks in them, and sent her back to the Spring Court. You’re welcome.)

Aelas, you were there. Did I miss anything?

As for where, there’s housing with the Winter Court. Temporary, not too big, not too fancy, just a few spare rooms for newcomers. (That helped me decide. The other courts made their pitches, and Winter said, ‘Look. Here’s a tiny room. You can stay inside all you like. Nobody’s going to mess with your things.’ That’s just what I wanted to hear.) There’s a kitchen in the common area, and that’s where I’d planned on cooking.

But instead, I hiked out of town, made a fire, and that’s where I made this stew. I’ll get to the stove when I want to get to the stove.

[Rolling for Int + Crafts + 1 for Cooking Specialty = 5 dice: 2, 9, 6, 4, 6. 1 Success. Giving Gustav food I made myself counts for the loophole for Gift of Warm Breath.]

Raz_Fox

2018-04-19, 06:35 AM

The Pilgrim is going to find and deliver Safety. The usual sort of business: go out into the wild, dredge up supplies and paths and safe-havens, and deliver them back to good hands. (The fact that he is being observed in this by the Huntsmen is the sort of irony I will balance on the edge of a knife.) He allows himself to stretch his physicality and his limbs, his terrible bone-shattering joint-undoing limbs, to become almost a wild creature. He could have become a Beast, you know, if he had been released into the wild and forced to scavenge for survival, for nothing more than himself.

Well, that's not quite true. I think he would have died out there, naked and afraid, spiked on thorns or eaten from the tendons up by a pack of keening poetry-shrikes. That's the story he would have become, had he not been subjected to friendship and camaraderie and judgment.

Regardless. Given that gifts are currently being sought, rather than the whereabouts of a certain gargoyle, I take it on trust that she was found by Jack and there's not too much more to be said on the subject at the moment. In that case- places where the world is quiet, woodsmen's cottages, caves with boulders that must be whispered into place over the mouth, and suchlike and sundry. Dangerous, true, but this is what Isaac does- and I pity the sort of thing that would come to him to tangle, to match itself against him, unless it is clever and winning and knows how to dance out of the way.

Give me a Green Man or a will-o-the-wisp, give me a magic hillside or a change in the soil that becomes the neon blue soul of someone dragged through the Thorns one way or the other, give me thick raggedy sweaters growing out of vegetable lambs or give me a vicious uni-horned rabbit who can be tamed at great cost.

Health 9/9
Glamour 3/10
Willpower 5/6
Clarity: 1t/5

Anarion

2018-04-20, 02:40 PM

Aelas and Lily! You are far from such a wondrous place (far by contrast, not by distance - you can step through to the Hedge through any door you encounter). You are sitting in the aggressively embroidered home of Mrs. Height. She has a cozy for the teapot. She has a cozy for the eggs. She has made sure that everything in her home is as cozied and warmed as it is possible to be. You get the feeling she would put you in a cozy if she could. Teacups are presented on doilies. A large wooden cabinet is full of delicate little Russian babushka dolls. They're a little creepy in that the painted faces are of martyred saints in the process of being martyred, and the Jesus hanging from the wall aggressively makes eye contact with you wherever you go.

Mrs. Height has been fussing over Aelas a lot. Offering her nice warm hand-knitted jumpers, making sure her coffee is warm enough, giving her cookies and breakfast and generally Mothering her. She's been doing this since you got here - you're staying with her until you find your feet. How do you react to this?

Lily is getting an incredibly cold shoulder but in that incredibly subtle and extremely polite way of someone far too respectable to lower themselves to the level of a direct repudiation. You have an opportunity to give as good as you get with your own subtle snubbing - roll Manipulation+socialize-4 and if you get a success you'll win Mrs. Height's grudging respect.

(You have a weird dream-memory of a skeleton man on a beach, staring at the corpse of a leviathan whale washed up on the shore)

Aelas is having a great time! First of all, she's feeling totally refreshed. Oh sure, she didn't do much sleeping, the dream ended up mostly being her running from Bowser firing those weird bullet bill shells at her in huge numbers after she'd stolen a star from the dreamer, but she'd eventually stumbled her way out via a warp pipe and come away with her prize in the form of delicious, delicious glamour! That plus the kiss last night had her full to the brim with vim and vigor. And honestly, she rather liked all the pampering from Mrs. Height. Her father had always been doting but her mother had been quiet, and dear old dad was the sciencey, hands on type. And she'd have barely any companionship besides Butterfly back in space. Weird scintillating cosmic phenomena just weren't that talkative, y'know? After you'd gone over the weather in the gamma quadrant and politely inquired into whether they had condensed any new cosmic dust, they just didn't have anything to say.

On top of that, she's actually getting the breakfast she wanted. Secretly, she had been sure that Lily would send her somewhere nice and then they'd only be served jam and toast while everybody else was getting a hearty breakfast. But no, Mrs. Height is offering the full royal treatment, eggs, great coffee (were these beans Columbian? Her father loved Columbian coffee), and cookies to boot! So she is gobbling it all up.

"Will the meeting be attended by the Spring Court?" Lily eventually asked without looking up, feeling they needed to get to the point if she'd ever were to be able to get out of here.

[Rolling Manipulation+Socialize-4= 6, 7, 8, 10 (ten again: 2)]

Aelas rolled her eyes (she hoped it was covertly, but the reaction had come first, looking where Mrs. Height's attention was second). "Look, this is all just a big misunderstanding anyway" she adds. "I'm sure by now Static explained what happened and that I didn't kidnap whoever they think I did."

Aelas. Right. Aelas has a credit card. She let me use it, so long as I took her shopping with me. I wrangled her to the supermarket, and that’s where I got my ingredients and pots and things. (Since she was good, I bought her a pack of Oreos with Pop Rocks in them, and sent her back to the Spring Court. You’re welcome.)

Aelas, you were there. Did I miss anything?

First of all, Aelas wanted you to know that the Oreos were delicious, but also that she is not eight years old, thank you very much. Then she ate them up.

But anyway, that's about the whole of it. This place isn't known for its fine cuisine or exotic imports. But, you were pretty picky Edmund. Actually, come to think of it, that shopping trip might have been the most passion and interest that she'd seen you show in anything. You went through the market with a careful eye. You picked out different vegetables, weighed them, checked how fresh they were, selected your spaces with thought and care. Aelas wasn't really sure that you ever got engaged with things, so she was really excited about that trip, even before you dosed her up with the most sugar you could find. She'd like to go shopping with you again, and told you so at the end of it.

stveje

2018-04-21, 03:18 AM

Following Isaac was a smart choice. Jack knows all about bringing someone gifts to make them like you - it's his thing, like a dog fetches a stick for its master. His Keeper threw that stick so many times, Jack feels dizzy just thinking about it. All that running back and forth and jumping around in joyful, excited circles. Figuratively.

There was no puppy-like joy, of course. No jumping around in ecstatic circles because your Master accepted the stick. AGAIN AGAIN THROW IT AGAIN WEEEEEE! He did it because anything was better than being a dog no one wanted or needed, a stray without home or master, alone and hungry and kicked to the curb.

Summer would no doubt appreciate something bold, something grand, something probably quite bloody. Like a young tribesman who must prove himself by bringing home a dead lion or a great wooly mammoth for the clan. But Jack is no hunter, and he'd be lost and probably already dead out here if not for Isaac. Probably he'd have looked at the wrong berries wrong, and that would have been the end of this sad, misguided hunt.

Much more of this, and he'd be out of glamor too. Maybe he should have gone "hunting" for someone to cry on his shoulder instead, but he'd told himself he needed Summer's favor.

I'm sure Jack and Isaac have faced many trials out here already. Trials where Jack hides and Isaac punches, mostly. Or Jack takes a wrong step, and Isaac pulls him out of the mire. Or Jack looks the wrong way, and something angry almost bites his face off. All par for the course, of course.

Not so with the yellow dress. Jack found it hanging or growing from the gnarled branches of an old tree, and at first thought it was a giant yellow flower. Isaac wanted him to ignore it, and Jack relented, knowing that Isaac was probably right that strange dresses growing on trees were only trouble.

It wasn't long before they saw the dress again, hanging or growing from the same old tree. Trying to get close to the tree didn't work, always it seemed to move just out of reach, and always it kept following them.

Finally, sensing that the tree wanted something, and that maybe the dress was worth more than it seemed - more than the tree would ask for it, perhaps even - Jack asked the tree what it wanted for the dress.

The tree told him he could have the dress, all it asked was that he put it on and wear it. A trick, no doubt, as Isaac kindly reminded him, not that he needed the reminding. Yet Jack couldn't shake the feeling that there was more to the dress, so he agreed. At any rate, it seemed to be the only way to get rid of the pestering tree.

So Jack is wearing a beautiful yellow gown as he trudges through the wilderness. It's ill-fitting, impractical, glaring, and so not his style. Jack feels like a dog dressed up by a giggling little girl: grumpy and very much tempted to tear it off with his teeth, but that would make giggly girl sad.

Actually, he thinks he can still hear the tree giggling far behind them. But maybe his gut is right that the dress will prove worth it, somehow. At least they got rid of the tree, and back on track.

*

Glamor 3/10
Clarity: 0/7
Health: 0/7
Willpower: 3/4

Thanqol

2018-04-22, 08:06 PM

"Oooh, Market," said Longarms, like a dog who has just become aware of the presence of Treats. "You know, this whole thing will go a lot easier if I can scam some new kit."

"You go do that then," said Mercia, expressively generous. "I'm actually feeling like I want to talk to the quarry."

"You what?" said Longarms.

"The big one's made us before, and we do have to give them warning before we come after them," said Mercia.

"But what if it's still Summer and he tries to jump you? Sh*t, in the Market? What if he pays someone else to jump you?" said Longarms. "What if he pays me to jump you? I'd do it, too."

"I just... I thought it'd be nice to have a conversation," said Mercia a bit downcast.

"Urgh, I hate you like this," said Longarms.

So Jack is wearing a beautiful yellow gown as he trudges through the wilderness. It's ill-fitting, impractical, glaring, and so not his style. Jack feels like a dog dressed up by a giggling little girl: grumpy and very much tempted to tear it off with his teeth, but that would make giggly girl sad.

Actually, he thinks he can still hear the tree giggling far behind them. But maybe his gut is right that the dress will prove worth it, somehow. At least they got rid of the tree, and back on track.

Give me a Green Man or a will-o-the-wisp, give me a magic hillside or a change in the soil that becomes the neon blue soul of someone dragged through the Thorns one way or the other, give me thick raggedy sweaters growing out of vegetable lambs or give me a vicious uni-horned rabbit who can be tamed at great cost.

The will-o-the-wisp, then, is your quarry. Your gift will be vengeance.

For you see, the reason for the king's madness is an open secret. His son was lured away into the thorns to take the king's place tilling the great field of Faerie. Such was the spark that lit the pyre of madness, now the king searchers for traitors and liars through the metal burned into his perfect face. Catching the lure and offering it as a sacrificial goat will let you spare your kin, as Abraham knew.

Catching the lure without being caught by the anglerfish is an entirely different matter.

You are heading into the dishevelled ex-carnival of the Goblin Market. If you are to manage this feat you will need some sort of cage or trap or net so the burning swamp-light does not sear away your hands. Be cautioned that nets and cages and traps are tainted possessions. They are feared, and those who wield them are in high demand, and they incline themselves towards use. Best not hold them longer than you must.

Ticket stubs and brightly coloured candybug wrappers litter the ground, crunching and crackling under your feet. Circus giraffes smoke dirty tobacco and tattoo each other clumsily. A rumbling, tumbling giant of stone mournfully pleads for someone to buy his shape. Goblins sleep on bench-tops, clutching tire irons and flamethrowers and twitching in their sleep, ready to waken and lunge on anyone who'd rummage through their shops. A rolly-polly man of dough and hazelnuts reads a newspaper inscribed on brass as he sits within his oven. If a mad circus had a hangover this is what it'd be like.

Neither of you have been to the Market before and you both get the wary sense of being sized up by every otherwise bored eye here. Something you'll learn with time is that no matter how bored or dismissive a Hob seems when dealing with you is that you always, always have their full and undivided attention. This is what they live for. They want to make deals. They will sell their own nose just for the thrill of the selling it. The only checks on this rampant craving for commerce are, in no particular order: greed, fear, and stupidity. These are three goods the Market has a surplus of.

While you're here, Pilgrim, you're also to arrange to rent the town from the goblins for the year. You're carrying the Courts' combined donations in a carefully packed sack.

The Market, however, offers no clues for free. How will you go about opening negotiations?

"Will the meeting be attended by the Spring Court?" Lily eventually asked without looking up, feeling they needed to get to the point if she'd ever were to be able to get out of here.

[Rolling Manipulation+Socialize-4= 6, 7, 8, 10 (ten again: 2)]

"Oh yes, we will bow and scrape as circumstances require," said Mrs. Height. "Summer comes to power by overthrowing Spring so we have been broken once before."

And then, what seems almost an impulsively offhand comment: "You should already be planning on how to crush Autumn when the time comes. None of the seasons go quietly these days."

Aelas rolled her eyes (she hoped it was covertly, but the reaction had come first, looking where Mrs. Height's attention was second). "Look, this is all just a big misunderstanding anyway" she adds. "I'm sure by now Static explained what happened and that I didn't kidnap whoever they think I did."

"Ms. Richmond, I don't believe you understand the nature of Mr. Breton's style of legalism," said Mrs. Height. "You are assuming a logical argument will have any impact whatsoever. You are assuming that facts are relevant. You are assuming you will be tried by an impartial jury. This is not the case. The only thing of any relevance whatsoever is if the King thinks you're a traitor, or a hobgoblin, or a Huntsman or any other manner of infiltrator. And at the moment, he does."

You’ll excuse me if my memory’s patchy. Days haven’t come one right after the other for a while now. I think…

Aelas. Right. Aelas has a credit card. She let me use it, so long as I took her shopping with me. I wrangled her to the supermarket, and that’s where I got my ingredients and pots and things. (Since she was good, I bought her a pack of Oreos with Pop Rocks in them, and sent her back to the Spring Court. You’re welcome.)

Aelas, you were there. Did I miss anything?

As for where, there’s housing with the Winter Court. Temporary, not too big, not too fancy, just a few spare rooms for newcomers. (That helped me decide. The other courts made their pitches, and Winter said, ‘Look. Here’s a tiny room. You can stay inside all you like. Nobody’s going to mess with your things.’ That’s just what I wanted to hear.) There’s a kitchen in the common area, and that’s where I’d planned on cooking.

But instead, I hiked out of town, made a fire, and that’s where I made this stew. I’ll get to the stove when I want to get to the stove.

[Rolling for Int + Crafts + 1 for Cooking Specialty = 5 dice: 2, 9, 6, 4, 6. 1 Success. Giving Gustav food I made myself counts for the loophole for Gift of Warm Breath.]

"This is atrocious garbage and I'll be running a loss if I have to subsidize your business," said Gustav as he licked the plate clean. "With the sheer insane risk I'm taking on this venture I won't be able to settle for less than a 80% cut of all revenue."

Well, you got him down from 120%.

"You want something touristy, on the bay, right? It's going to be doubly desolate over winter."

Elanorin

2018-04-24, 05:16 AM

"Oh yes, we will bow and scrape as circumstances require," said Mrs. Height. "Summer comes to power by overthrowing Spring so we have been broken once before."

And then, what seems almost an impulsively offhand comment: "You should already be planning on how to crush Autumn when the time comes. None of the seasons go quietly these days."

Lily frowned a little, and caught the unspoken message, that she was planning their overthrow, or had done so already.

'Broken' felt like such a brutal term for it. Surely there was a better way...

"No season can rule forever, why try?"

Anarion

2018-04-26, 07:14 PM

"That's a good question, Lily!" Aelas takes a break from her excellent breakfast, wiping her mouth off with a napkin and brushing aside a strand of hair (it's currently neon green, darkening to blue by the time it's swept behind her face) and looking at the other two women. "This is, like, seriously dumb. The king of summer has to be overthrown by autumn, and even as the king he's just totally crazy and doesn't care about, y'know, actually solving a problem or finding the right person, just going after anyone that pisses him off. How'd it get like this?"

TheAmishPirate

2018-04-28, 01:44 PM

First of all, Aelas wanted you to know that the Oreos were delicious, but also that she is not eight years old, thank you very much. Then she ate them up.

But anyway, that's about the whole of it. This place isn't known for its fine cuisine or exotic imports. But, you were pretty picky Edmund. Actually, come to think of it, that shopping trip might have been the most passion and interest that she'd seen you show in anything. You went through the market with a careful eye. You picked out different vegetables, weighed them, checked how fresh they were, selected your spaces with thought and care. Aelas wasn't really sure that you ever got engaged with things, so she was really excited about that trip, even before you dosed her up with the most sugar you could find. She'd like to go shopping with you again, and told you so at the end of it.

Ahm. Well. The...brands, see? They’re all different now. I can’t make good food with crappy ingredients, and how am I supposed to dodge the crappy ingredients if they keep changing the labels on me? Of course I gotta take my time with it. The next trip, we’ll be in and out like that. *snaps*

"This is atrocious garbage and I'll be running a loss if I have to subsidize your business," said Gustav as he licked the plate clean. "With the sheer insane risk I'm taking on this venture I won't be able to settle for less than a 80% cut of all revenue."

Well, you got him down from 120%.

Edmund took the clean plate back. He didn’t comment. Like he said; best to let the food do the talking.

"You want something touristy, on the bay, right? It's going to be doubly desolate over winter."

“The bay? No.” He exhaled sharply, a light snort.

Again, he reached into his bag in that slow, deliberate way, and produced a folded-up tourist’s map of Prosperpine. He unfurled it across the table between them, leaned over to survey the land, and perhaps the moment was spoiled some by the lack of accurate scale, the cutesy, cartoon fonts, and the town mascots plastered over every inch of empty space.

In his defense, it was the best he could do on short notice.

He planted his finger on the coastline, amid the jumble of tourist traps clamoring for attention. Carefully, he traced back down the streets, inland, closer to the center of town, before stopping on an unmarked, unremarkable building. A grave to the failures of another man’s venture, one of many. “There.” He tapped the map knowingly. ”That’s the spot.”

stveje

2018-04-29, 04:29 AM

The will-o-the-wisp, then, is your quarry. Your gift will be vengeance.

For you see, the reason for the king's madness is an open secret. His son was lured away into the thorns to take the king's place tilling the great field of Faerie. Such was the spark that lit the pyre of madness, now the king searchers for traitors and liars through the metal burned into his perfect face. Catching the lure and offering it as a sacrificial goat will let you spare your kin, as Abraham knew.

Catching the lure without being caught by the anglerfish is an entirely different matter.

You are heading into the dishevelled ex-carnival of the Goblin Market. If you are to manage this feat you will need some sort of cage or trap or net so the burning swamp-light does not sear away your hands. Be cautioned that nets and cages and traps are tainted possessions. They are feared, and those who wield them are in high demand, and they incline themselves towards use. Best not hold them longer than you must.

Ticket stubs and brightly coloured candybug wrappers litter the ground, crunching and crackling under your feet. Circus giraffes smoke dirty tobacco and tattoo each other clumsily. A rumbling, tumbling giant of stone mournfully pleads for someone to buy his shape. Goblins sleep on bench-tops, clutching tire irons and flamethrowers and twitching in their sleep, ready to waken and lunge on anyone who'd rummage through their shops. A rolly-polly man of dough and hazelnuts reads a newspaper inscribed on brass as he sits within his oven. If a mad circus had a hangover this is what it'd be like.

Neither of you have been to the Market before and you both get the wary sense of being sized up by every otherwise bored eye here. Something you'll learn with time is that no matter how bored or dismissive a Hob seems when dealing with you is that you always, always have their full and undivided attention. This is what they live for. They want to make deals. They will sell their own nose just for the thrill of the selling it. The only checks on this rampant craving for commerce are, in no particular order: greed, fear, and stupidity. These are three goods the Market has a surplus of.

While you're here, Pilgrim, you're also to arrange to rent the town from the goblins for the year. You're carrying the Courts' combined donations in a carefully packed sack.

The Market, however, offers no clues for free. How will you go about opening negotiations?

Jack spends some time contemplating the mournful giant, or his shape at any rate. Its worth, in particular. But wouldn't that break the law against changing size? Seems like a kind of trap, if it's intentional ... the giant could be more sly than it looks, and if they want traps, sly is what they're after. It's a wild shot, but Jack nevertheless points it out to the Pilgrim, for a second opinion.

Raz_Fox

2018-04-29, 08:20 AM

As ever, allow me to draw your attention firstly to the tramp of the Pilgrim’s feet on the well-trodden mud. He picks his way over ruts and mounds, stepping around sticky-sodden slips of broadsheet tacked to the ground by residue, seemingly without any trouble at all. His terrible claws make hardly any sound, and whatever trail he leaves is lost within the ten thousand footfalls that have already been offered up to the great glitterspangle carnival, in that eternally-just-last-night revel.

There is no safety here, even if he were to upend his sack and offer it all to the best bidder. Just because the dangers and the snares taste of stale strings of bubblegum and candy-floss does not mean they aren’t real, and nothing here’s free to hand for use, should it be called for; were he to seize a stave to fend off a predator he would find a price-tag affixed to the end, and were he to bound upon some lilting pavilion out of reach of gnashing teeth, his grasping hand would alight upon the rent-cheque from the proprietor.

Were I here, I would (for all my nattering-on about loving the market, born from an overactive fancy) be paralyzed with the tyranny of choice and danger, fluttering here and there like a wisp on the wind, my heart in my throat as I attempted to navigate the mysteries of the bazaar without so much as purchasing the air I breathed. The Pilgrim is made of sterner stuff, and though fear prickles up his terrible stooped back, he soldiers on, treating the weary and twitching Market about him with nothing more or less than the respect that any new wilderness deserves. It will take time and a few new scars to master, no doubt.

The Pilgrim’s companion (the larger one, not the gourmand in their element and crooning a song of mischief in A Major from a nest of acrid hair) draws his attention to the tumblestone giant seeping tears of liquid opal from its eyes, and the Pilgrim snorts at the little thief’s proposition.

Zotzie would doubtless point out the fine print of the law, which states that you must be in the largest form available to you, and that a shape, once sold, no longer belongs to you, and so, officer, I am in the largest shape I have available to me, and that’ll hold up at Market court, and besides, if you took the giant’s shape you’d be getting bigger, anyhow. But this is the good verse and their voice is high and piping and beautiful on a morning like this, and you’re smart enough to follow that logic yourself, probably.

The Pilgrim, rather, simply states: “Shape’s the trap. Not size.” Perhaps a curse, more likely a deal gone bad here. I want to be strong, I want to be tough, I want to be impossible to be hurt again, and then a dozen years of calcification in the blink of an eye, and your skin cold and unfeeling, and your beating heart fluttering helpless against a stone spine and fluting crystal veins, and you too big and clumsy and tumbling all over yourself to go home.

Once you sell it here, you can NEVER own it ever again!!

“Number Seven.” Obligingly, Zotzie begins to pluck the Pilgrim’s mane, yanking like a skilled equestrian breaking in a wild and spirited stallion, directing our long-suffering friend towards the pavilion of the Ringmaster.

If they’re to know where to rent, that’s where it’ll be.

Thanqol

2018-04-29, 06:27 PM

The two huntsmen sidle along for now, Longarms vacillating on if he should keep his head down or announce himself loudly.

Lily frowned a little, and caught the unspoken message, that she was planning their overthrow, or had done so already.

'Broken' felt like such a brutal term for it. Surely there was a better way...

"No season can rule forever, why try?"

"That's a good question, Lily!" Aelas takes a break from her excellent breakfast, wiping her mouth off with a napkin and brushing aside a strand of hair (it's currently neon green, darkening to blue by the time it's swept behind her face) and looking at the other two women. "This is, like, seriously dumb. The king of summer has to be overthrown by autumn, and even as the king he's just totally crazy and doesn't care about, y'know, actually solving a problem or finding the right person, just going after anyone that pisses him off. How'd it get like this?"

"Mr. Breton was, for a while... admirable," said Mrs. Height. "He didn't just escape from Over There. He incited an uprising and lead an army of forty souls out with him. Most of them are now devotees of the Summer Court and would do anything for their King. But then his child was taken by the Gentry and it turned out all that mental fortitude was built on a single foundation and now here we are. Not helped by the fact that the Goblin Market told him he was betrayed."

She takes a short sip of tea.

"I suppose you might have a rather good angle to ingratiate yourself with the King, though, if you were to lean on the idea you weren't here when he was betrayed - and are therefore the only ones he can trust. Though don't get too friendly. Ms. Waystone is just as formidable as Mr. Breton, when pushed, and she's been pushed around a lot."

“The bay? No.” He exhaled sharply, a light snort.

Again, he reached into his bag in that slow, deliberate way, and produced a folded-up tourist’s map of Prosperpine. He unfurled it across the table between them, leaned over to survey the land, and perhaps the moment was spoiled some by the lack of accurate scale, the cutesy, cartoon fonts, and the town mascots plastered over every inch of empty space.

In his defense, it was the best he could do on short notice.

He planted his finger on the coastline, amid the jumble of tourist traps clamoring for attention. Carefully, he traced back down the streets, inland, closer to the center of town, before stopping on an unmarked, unremarkable building. A grave to the failures of another man’s venture, one of many. “There.” He tapped the map knowingly. ”That’s the spot.”

Gustav looks down at the building. Then he looks back up at you. The only piece of information he has right now is that you want it, but he can't for the life of him figure out why you want it.

"Edgar's Exciting Emporium? I put that fraud out of business myself. I was there the day he had to hang up the 'closed' sign on his tacky little gift shop. I don't think there's a landmark in the town sweeter than his closed shop. And you want it? You want to take away the physical trophy of my lifetime's greatest rivalry?"

You're not sure that story is true. You can't remember an Exciting Emporium. He may just be trying to project some sentimental value on it to help him jack up the price in the absence of immediate information - but knowing the truth would be really useful in these negotiations.

Figure it out with a wits+subterfuge or empathy at -2.

Jack spends some time contemplating the mournful giant, or his shape at any rate. Its worth, in particular. But wouldn't that break the law against changing size? Seems like a kind of trap, if it's intentional ... the giant could be more sly than it looks, and if they want traps, sly is what they're after. It's a wild shot, but Jack nevertheless points it out to the Pilgrim, for a second opinion.

Zotzie would doubtless point out the fine print of the law, which states that you must be in the largest form available to you, and that a shape, once sold, no longer belongs to you, and so, officer, I am in the largest shape I have available to me, and that’ll hold up at Market court, and besides, if you took the giant’s shape you’d be getting bigger, anyhow. But this is the good verse and their voice is high and piping and beautiful on a morning like this, and you’re smart enough to follow that logic yourself, probably.

The Pilgrim, rather, simply states: “Shape’s the trap. Not size.” Perhaps a curse, more likely a deal gone bad here. I want to be strong, I want to be tough, I want to be impossible to be hurt again, and then a dozen years of calcification in the blink of an eye, and your skin cold and unfeeling, and your beating heart fluttering helpless against a stone spine and fluting crystal veins, and you too big and clumsy and tumbling all over yourself to go home.

Once you sell it here, you can NEVER own it ever again!!

“Number Seven.” Obligingly, Zotzie begins to pluck the Pilgrim’s mane, yanking like a skilled equestrian breaking in a wild and spirited stallion, directing our long-suffering friend towards the pavilion of the Ringmaster.

If they’re to know where to rent, that’s where it’ll be.

Ringmasters are tall - except when they're short. They're also round and jolly unless they happen to be thin and skeletal. Their voice is booming and loud - though it may be lisping and spidery. But whatever their shape and size may happen to be, they are always the exact same shape and size and sound - the hat is lengthened, the coat gets more layers and folds, and the microphone gets larger and larger to compensate for any deficiencies between the occupant and the ideal.

His tent is not guarded or even especially fancy. He is not king here, nor is he even the star attraction. He is not the lawgiver, or the smartest or most cunning merchant, or even the market's administrator. He is, however, the man who will call "Roll up!" while rolling his Rs like plum croissants, and the man who will tell you what it is you're about to see and from what corner of the world it was stolen from.

(He once was a prince here, before the Market granted its monopoly on information. People would buy tickets for his tours and expositions, and he would bellow for paying audiences, and oh, wasn't it grand?)

Starved fingers toy obsessively with a single large walnut as he observes your entrance. A sickly expression surveys you from beneath a red-and-white striped leather hat, adorned with the British flag and its thousand children. Hunger is almost a physical presence here, occupying the bulk of the tent, eating away at desk and books and everything except that one precious walnut. "Roll up," he says in shocked reflex as you enter. His voice finds its boom and forgets its rasp and he's on his feet. "Roll up!" He's pulling out chairs for you and standing upon his own. "Roll up! Roll up and welcome to the greatest and most mysterious carnival in these barren antipodes; all the treasures of the Old World and all the secrets of the New - and even a few precious hints at the Next - tempted here by the sugar-dollar to find their place amongst our humble collections. Roll up!"

Raz_Fox

2018-04-30, 04:44 AM

I don't know what you're talking about. All ringmasters are thin and skeletal. This particular ringmaster may be small, certainly, but there are no complaints from this corner about the number of ribs that might be visible when he takes off his shirt in the early morning to shower and clean his walnut off in the elephant-troughs.

The Pilgrim looks to his left, and then looks to his right, and his thumb rubs against the outside of his index finger. The hunger's a leaping, roaring thing just outside the corner of the eye, isn't it just? And we know hunger, my lad. We know tearing into the rinds of strange fruit and spitting out the thorny seeds, we know tearing at the meat and the muscle and the sinew, we know cracking the bones to suck the marrow and then pulling back from the brink, because it's not just you what needs the feeding. We know hunger as an old bully, cruel and shallow and vicious, and it's no simple thing to meet again.

Sudden, as sudden as a clap of thunder, as sudden as the wave that capsizes the boat, the Pilgrim roars. The sound's deafening in the confines of the tent (though, between you and me, there's an echo, isn't there?) and aren't those teeth terrible, teeth for tearing through hide and cracking nuts, but never for tearing off limbs because that'd be a penalty, the opposing party receives a free throw for dishonoring the holiest of games. Those blazing blues in those sunken sockets roar to life, trembling in an unseen wind, and if a dragon were to come whirling in with its teeth all in a row and its nails freshly manicured, even it might take a step back and reconsider its intentions in the tent.

When his hand lashes back against his mane, it comes away with a) one goblin-bat who has the decency to look sheepish even with a mouthful of hair they can't slurp into their mouth fast enough to hide their crime b) more hair c) blood, too red to even seem his, it should be black and sticking like tar.

Zotzie gives the Ringmaster a sheepish ain't-I-a-stinker smile as the Pilgrim folds himself down into the seat, not even chastising the bat clinging to his forearm, because he knows that temptation too, the lengthening of the teeth, the hunger for- for not just the physical, but for the conceptual, for the feast that's been folded up out of sight and up the sleeves of the goblin holding his great big walnut, for the things that haven't been seen and will be paid for whether or not they're useful. "Begging your pardon," Zotzie says, and then begins preening their wings quite self-consciously.

TheAmishPirate

2018-04-30, 10:22 PM

Gustav looks down at the building. Then he looks back up at you. The only piece of information he has right now is that you want it, but he can't for the life of him figure out why you want it.

"Edgar's Exciting Emporium? I put that fraud out of business myself. I was there the day he had to hang up the 'closed' sign on his tacky little gift shop. I don't think there's a landmark in the town sweeter than his closed shop. And you want it? You want to take away the physical trophy of my lifetime's greatest rivalry?"

You're not sure that story is true. You can't remember an Exciting Emporium. He may just be trying to project some sentimental value on it to help him jack up the price in the absence of immediate information - but knowing the truth would be really useful in these negotiations.

Figure it out with a wits+subterfuge or empathy at -2.

Mighty suspicious that Edmond should happen to pick Edgar's former establishment...

[Rolling for Wits + Subterfuge, 2 dice: 3, 10, I don't know if 10-again applies, but if it does, 9]

Anarion

2018-05-02, 05:59 PM

"Mr. Breton was, for a while... admirable," said Mrs. Height. "He didn't just escape from Over There. He incited an uprising and lead an army of forty souls out with him. Most of them are now devotees of the Summer Court and would do anything for their King. But then his child was taken by the Gentry and it turned out all that mental fortitude was built on a single foundation and now here we are. Not helped by the fact that the Goblin Market told him he was betrayed."

She takes a short sip of tea.

"I suppose you might have a rather good angle to ingratiate yourself with the King, though, if you were to lean on the idea you weren't here when he was betrayed - and are therefore the only ones he can trust. Though don't get too friendly. Ms. Waystone is just as formidable as Mr. Breton, when pushed, and she's been pushed around a lot."

"Well, yeah, okay. I mean, honestly, you think maybe he should change seasons himself? I know all the summer group follow him and all, but if he's like, really grieving that way, maybe it's extra special time for Autumn or Winter instead." Aelas finishes eating and gets up to pace. It's easier to think while she's moving, gives her words different angles to bounce off the walls.

"The question is how do we even have, y'know, a conversation around any of this? Last time, I walked in the room and he set the freaking building on fire!" She makes a bunch of wiggly motions with her arms and her hair shimmers into red hues to provide further visual illustration of the memory. "Please do not tell me we have to tie him down first because the whole point is that we're not kidnappers...intentionally." She finishes with a slight blush, but then clears her throat. "Seriously, not kidnappers."

stveje

2018-05-04, 03:53 AM

Jack jumps back when the Pilgrim roars, like what the hell just happened? Jack likes to think he sees most things coming, but that roar came out of nowhere. It takes him several seconds to figure out what happened, and to carefully edge his way back to the chair - inspecting it like he expects something small with teeth to be hiding in it, now - before sitting a bit reluctantly.

He leaves the opening words to the Pilgrim and Ringmaster, because it was the Pilgrim's choice coming here, surely he has an idea in mind.

Elanorin

2018-05-04, 05:04 AM

"Mr. Breton was, for a while... admirable," said Mrs. Height. "He didn't just escape from Over There. He incited an uprising and lead an army of forty souls out with him. Most of them are now devotees of the Summer Court and would do anything for their King. But then his child was taken by the Gentry and it turned out all that mental fortitude was built on a single foundation and now here we are. Not helped by the fact that the Goblin Market told him he was betrayed."

She takes a short sip of tea.

"I suppose you might have a rather good angle to ingratiate yourself with the King, though, if you were to lean on the idea you weren't here when he was betrayed - and are therefore the only ones he can trust. Though don't get too friendly. Ms. Waystone is just as formidable as Mr. Breton, when pushed, and she's been pushed around a lot."

Lily thought for a moment on the Queen's words and while they troubled her, there was some actual useful advice amongst the veiled threats and manipulations. Certainly regarding the King. She felt a swell of pity for him that she had not expected, perhaps she ought to give him the benefit of doubt. A child, who would have thought. The notion of that man being a parent was frightening, but if he hadn't always been like this then... maybe there was a way to undo it.

"I'll speak with him on your behalf, Aelas," Lily said. It was not so much an offer as just explaining what was going to happen regardless of anything else. "No kidnapping."

"The tea was lovely," Lily said, keen to leave, reaching for the politeness phrases to ease a swift exit.

Thanqol

2018-05-05, 02:55 AM

"Hold up," said Longarms. "Who's the one in the dress?"
"I think that's Lily?" said Mercia.
"Are you sure? I thought it'd be Aelas, with that offensively bright colour," said Longarms.
"Yeah, I don't know," said Mercia. "It didn't seem like her."
"Urgh, why is our job so confusing," said Longarms.

Zotzie gives the Ringmaster a sheepish ain't-I-a-stinker smile as the Pilgrim folds himself down into the seat, not even chastising the bat clinging to his forearm, because he knows that temptation too, the lengthening of the teeth, the hunger for- for not just the physical, but for the conceptual, for the feast that's been folded up out of sight and up the sleeves of the goblin holding his great big walnut, for the things that haven't been seen and will be paid for whether or not they're useful. "Begging your pardon," Zotzie says, and then begins preening their wings quite self-consciously.

Jack jumps back when the Pilgrim roars, like what the hell just happened? Jack likes to think he sees most things coming, but that roar came out of nowhere. It takes him several seconds to figure out what happened, and to carefully edge his way back to the chair - inspecting it like he expects something small with teeth to be hiding in it, now - before sitting a bit reluctantly.

He leaves the opening words to the Pilgrim and Ringmaster, because it was the Pilgrim's choice coming here, surely he has an idea in mind.

The Ringmaster stares from silence to silence, and then rallies as a showman and continues with the patter.

"If you're here, well, you either need something very, very specific, or you need to buy a surplus of hunger - and oh, isn't it satisfying, just the taste you just had? Or maybe - perhaps! - travellers, you require a guide! A middleman! Not someone to show you around the market, no - someone to show the market you and what you have to offer. A service. Just tell me what it is you're after and I'll provide the full suite of services that you require."

[There's a wits+empathy or subterfuge check to negotiate this without being scammed somehow, no penalty]

"Well, yeah, okay. I mean, honestly, you think maybe he should change seasons himself? I know all the summer group follow him and all, but if he's like, really grieving that way, maybe it's extra special time for Autumn or Winter instead." Aelas finishes eating and gets up to pace. It's easier to think while she's moving, gives her words different angles to bounce off the walls.

"The question is how do we even have, y'know, a conversation around any of this? Last time, I walked in the room and he set the freaking building on fire!" She makes a bunch of wiggly motions with her arms and her hair shimmers into red hues to provide further visual illustration of the memory. "Please do not tell me we have to tie him down first because the whole point is that we're not kidnappers...intentionally." She finishes with a slight blush, but then clears her throat. "Seriously, not kidnappers."

"Mm. There's also the possibility of bending the knee, kissing the ring, taking your beating and biding your time until Spring comes back to power - and when that happens, then you glut yourself so thoroughly on revenge that people remember for the rest of the year," said Mrs. Height. "That is my plan. I am, after all, at the nadir of my power."

Lily thought for a moment on the Queen's words and while they troubled her, there was some actual useful advice amongst the veiled threats and manipulations. Certainly regarding the King. She felt a swell of pity for him that she had not expected, perhaps she ought to give him the benefit of doubt. A child, who would have thought. The notion of that man being a parent was frightening, but if he hadn't always been like this then... maybe there was a way to undo it.

"I'll speak with him on your behalf, Aelas," Lily said. It was not so much an offer as just explaining what was going to happen regardless of anything else. "No kidnapping."

"The tea was lovely," Lily said, keen to leave, reaching for the politeness phrases to ease a swift exit.

"Thank you, young lady," said Mrs. Height "Have a lovely afternoon, the two of you. Make sure you take a scarf, Ms. Richmond, you'll catch a chill otherwise."

Mighty suspicious that Edmond should happen to pick Edgar's former establishment...

[Rolling for Wits + Subterfuge, 2 dice: 3, 10, I don't know if 10-again applies, but if it does, 9]

Totally scamming you. Bare faced bare bones bare knuckle scam direct to the solar plexus. Catch is that he can't pull the 'sentimental value' card on every store in town so if you shift your attention a bit and make it clear that the store doesn't have any sort of personal value to you he'll be caught.

Elanorin

2018-05-06, 03:18 AM

"Mm. There's also the possibility of bending the knee, kissing the ring, taking your beating and biding your time until Spring comes back to power - and when that happens, then you glut yourself so thoroughly on revenge that people remember for the rest of the year," said Mrs. Height. "That is my plan. I am, after all, at the nadir of my power."

"Thank you, young lady," said Mrs. Height "Have a lovely afternoon, the two of you. Make sure you take a scarf, Ms. Richmond, you'll catch a chill otherwise."

Lily stood up, feeling quite good, like she'd achieved something. A productive morning.

"Feel free to stay, Aelas."

Please do.

"I'm going to see Mr Breton right now. Where might I find him?"

Raz_Fox

2018-05-07, 01:26 AM

[That’s a beautiful, beautiful 0 successes.]

The Pilgrim sets down his heavy burden between his knees, more of a wonder-trove that sack than Father Christmas’s bounty. “To lease,” he says. Obviously, what he’s looking for is where he can go to see to the proper oaths and bids and sundry.

Just as obvious is the fact that he is not cut out to wheel and deal. Zotzie, certainly, might step in if things get burn-the-tent-down bad, but let’s face it- we’re not getting out of here unscalped.

stveje

2018-05-09, 09:08 AM

The Ringmaster stares from silence to silence, and then rallies as a showman and continues with the patter.

"If you're here, well, you either need something very, very specific, or you need to buy a surplus of hunger - and oh, isn't it satisfying, just the taste you just had? Or maybe - perhaps! - travellers, you require a guide! A middleman! Not someone to show you around the market, no - someone to show the market you and what you have to offer. A service. Just tell me what it is you're after and I'll provide the full suite of services that you require."

[There's a wits+empathy or subterfuge check to negotiate this without being scammed somehow, no penalty]

Jack looks at the Pilgrim and his terse "To lease". Very words, much inspiring. No showman he.

Jack is also aware that the sack could have been an eensy bit heavier than it is. Even if that wasn't the case, it definitely wouldn't hurt to add a little pizzazz to make their bid more attractive.

"Obviously we have the best bid," he says and gets up, seamlessly picking something from the sack and playing it between his fingers, making it vanish right before the eye like a stage magician. "And the best bid deserves," he says, circling the Ringmaster, "no demands the best show! A show to draw in the crowds and blow the competition away."

Jack knows what the Ringmaster craves, and he wants to take a firm hold of the lead in this dance.

[Wits+Subterfuge: 7, 1, 4, 6, 8, 10, 10, ten again 2, 5. Three successes.]

Anarion

2018-05-09, 10:57 AM

Lily stood up, feeling quite good, like she'd achieved something. A productive morning.

"Feel free to stay, Aelas."

Please do.

"I'm going to see Mr Breton right now. Where might I find him?"

"Oh, no, I have to get going. I'm supposed to find somebody to figure out something about a magic love letter." She takes the offered scarf though, it looks fluffy and warm. "I mean, unless you need any help. Do you need any help Lily? Or Mrs. Height too, actually, I should thank you for this awesome breakfast! Is there anything I can help out with now?"

Thanqol

2018-05-09, 10:26 PM

"Music," said Longarms.
"What?" said Mercia.
"Music," said Longarms more urgently and dived into a hay-bale for cover.

Lily stood up, feeling quite good, like she'd achieved something. A productive morning.

"Feel free to stay, Aelas."

Please do.

"I'm going to see Mr Breton right now. Where might I find him?"

"He works at the Resource Management Center," that's Australian for 'rubbish dump'. "Not especially glamorous work but I imagine he likes the furnaces."

"Oh, no, I have to get going. I'm supposed to find somebody to figure out something about a magic love letter." She takes the offered scarf though, it looks fluffy and warm. "I mean, unless you need any help. Do you need any help Lily? Or Mrs. Height too, actually, I should thank you for this awesome breakfast! Is there anything I can help out with now?"

"Oh, don't trouble yourself with me, dear," said Mrs. Height. "You just have a good day outside and don't get into any more trouble."

[That’s a beautiful, beautiful 0 successes.]

The Pilgrim sets down his heavy burden between his knees, more of a wonder-trove that sack than Father Christmas’s bounty. “To lease,” he says. Obviously, what he’s looking for is where he can go to see to the proper oaths and bids and sundry.

Just as obvious is the fact that he is not cut out to wheel and deal. Zotzie, certainly, might step in if things get burn-the-tent-down bad, but let’s face it- we’re not getting out of here unscalped.

Jack looks at the Pilgrim and his terse "To lease". Very words, much inspiring. No showman he.

Jack is also aware that the sack could have been an eensy bit heavier than it is. Even if that wasn't the case, it definitely wouldn't hurt to add a little pizzazz to make their bid more attractive.

"Obviously we have the best bid," he says and gets up, seamlessly picking something from the sack and playing it between his fingers, making it vanish right before the eye like a stage magician. "And the best bid deserves," he says, circling the Ringmaster, "no demands the best show! A show to draw in the crowds and blow the competition away."

Jack knows what the Ringmaster craves, and he wants to take a firm hold of the lead in this dance.

[Wits+Subterfuge: 7, 1, 4, 6, 8, 10, 10, ten again 2, 5. Three successes.]

"Tell me what you want, show me what you've got," said the Ringmaster, beginning to fall into a song. "If you really want your town this year then take me to the top.
The stage is dark, the stands are cold and no one's come to town..."

He clapped his hand and the tent's walls fell away, opening the room to the outside.

"Oh, it's time... oh, it's time! Oh it's time to ignite, time to churn, time to burn, time to take flight and bring the fight and show them for what we yearn! Take the stage!"

All around you, goblins are perking up and paying attention. They begin to drift towards the Ringmaster, dragging what paraphernalia of stagecraft they have along with them. Not drawn in yet, but being drawn.

Pilgrim, the makeup crew descends upon you. With eye-shadow and beard-curlers and horn-sharpeners and shoe-shiners and with new coats and teeth whitening, they seek to make you presentable, whatever that means. But they are make-up artists with an agenda, and they will render your appearance unsatisfying to you - perhaps you will be a little too pretty, or a little too brutal, or a little too simple. Describe the look that they give you and mark it as Unstriking Looks 1 - and take a -1 penalty to any social roll that would rely on those looks.

This will last a month, until the paint flakes away and the body returns to its familiar grotesquery. But this service is at least free. Fixing it may cost.

Jack, you have the attention of the market and avoid getting drawn into any backshow bargains. Make your show and make your pitch. You may also want to make a presence+expression roll.

Raz_Fox

2018-05-10, 01:06 AM

Two words: Frosted. Tips.

Here’s a debutante hitting the Market for the first time! Oh, goodness, the physique! Let’s get a button-down shirt (and corset, get him to stand up straight, no hunching over and trying to hide your size, good sir) and, oh, it needs to accessorize with those fiery baby blues, so flames, blue and red and orange, all up and down the shirt! Short sleeves, of course, so everyone can see the inked tats, those unsightly burns filled in with glittering ink, shifting and roiling and bringing attention to those ripped biceps, bro.

Gold! The metal of a champion! Drape it about his shoulders, which are shaking in delight! Diamonds(tmtmtm)! Affix them to those glittering white teeth, with plenty of paste, and see that literally glittering smile! Ah, what a bodacious hunk!

And, of course, that unruly mane’s being shorn, falling away to soot as it falls, and hoarfrost and ginger is worked thoroughly into the tips of what remains, leaving them spiked and perpetually thawing. A light perspiration trickling down the brow at all times is in, darling, in.

Get in, bro. We’re going to Flavortown tonight.

TheAmishPirate

2018-05-12, 07:14 PM

Totally scamming you. Bare faced bare bones bare knuckle scam direct to the solar plexus. Catch is that he can't pull the 'sentimental value' card on every store in town so if you shift your attention a bit and make it clear that the store doesn't have any sort of personal value to you he'll be caught.

Honest, Edmund hadn’t meant to bait him into overextending like that. He hadn’t even been making a play at all. Call it the worst sort of old habit; the one you don’t even realize you have.

For every arc before, whenever Edmund had pointed a map, spread out with company a-hunched around it, somebody would inevitably chime in with, “Why there?” Or, “Ahhh, of course.” Or one a dozen such phrases tailor-made to set him up to showcase the brilliance and right-ness of the Prince’s decision.

To get nearly conned instead? This...wow, this was new. This was a new feeling right here. He'd nearly made a mistake. An actual, real mistake with actual, real consequences that wouldn't magically go away when his back was turned.

He didn't know how he felt about that.

But of course, it wasn’t the building. It was the area, and this building was one of the better ones there. So Edmund shrugged, and moved his finger one spot over. And again, and again, and again, for as long as Gustav wanted to keep inventing sob stories to drive up the price.

(Though once it looked like Gustav was starting to flag, Edmund would point back to the original building. Just to see if he remembered.)

stveje

2018-05-15, 03:21 AM

Presence+Expression: 8

What had Jack gotten himself into this time?

Jack was a fast thinker and knew how to go with a flow, even when everyone was looking to him to do something he'd no experience or natural talent at, but he really wished someone else could take his place right now. He may have avoided any number of bad bargains, but it still felt like he'd been had.

His only hope was that he already looked perfectly ridiculous in the sun-yellow dress, and calculated ridicule could cover for many a deficiency. Hamming up that sunny look was easy. Make them think it's all part of an act, and they'll laugh, but at least they won't laugh you off the stage.

And then there's Mr. Frosted Tips. A theme springs to mind, a near-perfectly ridiculous theme of inversion. Ladies and Gentlegobs, may I present: Jack the Winter Darkling as the bright and beautiful Queen of Sunny Summer, and Isaac the Autumn Summer Ogre as the Frosty Beast of Winter!

Why, the play practically writes itself.

If only the Pilgrim actually was Summer, but Jack knows how to fake it. Surely making a big scary ogre look more Summery and Wrathy under his new frosty spikes is a cakewalk*

When Jack and Isaac step out on scene, Jack already has a whole elaborately theatrical tale worked out about Summer and Winter, Gold and Silver, and it doesn't matter that it's ridiculous, and they're ridiculous ... somehow, miraculously, the market is eating it right up.

* In case a roll is needed: Wits+Subterfuge+Specialty+Mantle (because I'm obscuring the truth), to make Isaac look like Summer under his frosty spikes: 4, 9, 3, 7, 2, 8, 3, 5, 5, 7, 1. Unless there are some crazy penalties, that's two successes.

Thanqol

2018-05-15, 09:46 PM

From their hiding place in the bushes, Mercia needs to half-strangle Longarms to stop him laughing and applauding Jack's show.

*

Lily and Aelas! You've headed out to the Mitchell Waste Management Centre. Out the front is the Trash and Treasure - stuff that you can buy for less than five dollars. Racks and racks of clothing, an embarrassing amount of sports and exercise equipment, a forest of skis, rolls of chicken wire, rickety furniture, pots, buddha statues, all kinds of stuff people buy and then never use.

Beyond that, though, is the tip itself - the big ol' landfill where all the garbage is moved around with huge bulldozers, and plumes of foul smelling smoke emerge from. This is fenced off and the gate is overseen by a heavyset guy in a bright neon yellow safety vest. The T&T is overseen by a changeling in the shape of an ancient hawk, vigilantly tracking the motion of everyone and every piece of scrap under her care. The Summer King presumably works further in, past the gate.

Firstly, tell me how you got out here - as a walk it's a few hours, and there aren't exactly bus routes going out this way. Then, how do you make your approach?

Get in, bro. We’re going to Flavortown tonight.

Why, the play practically writes itself.

If only the Pilgrim actually was Summer, but Jack knows how to fake it. Surely making a big scary ogre look more Summery and Wrathy under his new frosty spikes is a cakewalk*

When Jack and Isaac step out on scene, Jack already has a whole elaborately theatrical tale worked out about Summer and Winter, Gold and Silver, and it doesn't matter that it's ridiculous, and they're ridiculous ... somehow, miraculously, the market is eating it right up.

The goblins don't have a sophisticated sense of humour. They bark and howl and slap their knees - it turns out that making fun of the Changeling courts is exactly their jam, and before long you have the entire Market in stitches. The Ringmaster puffs and booms and he couldn't be prouder that he's just arranged for a show like this. His prestige has gone up meteorically and as a result he is very much in your debt right now.

The curtain comes down with a crash. You've paid your end of the bargain, what do you want to buy from the Ringmaster?

Honest, Edmund hadn’t meant to bait him into overextending like that. He hadn’t even been making a play at all. Call it the worst sort of old habit; the one you don’t even realize you have.

For every arc before, whenever Edmund had pointed a map, spread out with company a-hunched around it, somebody would inevitably chime in with, “Why there?” Or, “Ahhh, of course.” Or one a dozen such phrases tailor-made to set him up to showcase the brilliance and right-ness of the Prince’s decision.

To get nearly conned instead? This...wow, this was new. This was a new feeling right here. He'd nearly made a mistake. An actual, real mistake with actual, real consequences that wouldn't magically go away when his back was turned.

He didn't know how he felt about that.

But of course, it wasn’t the building. It was the area, and this building was one of the better ones there. So Edmund shrugged, and moved his finger one spot over. And again, and again, and again, for as long as Gustav wanted to keep inventing sob stories to drive up the price.

(Though once it looked like Gustav was starting to flag, Edmund would point back to the original building. Just to see if he remembered.)

"You can't have that one, that's my great nephew's house and I couldn't ask him to move..." said Gustav. Then he looks at you, makes eye contact, and with the relentless confidence of a man who has just realized he's been caught in a lie but admitting it would literally kill him. He walks it back with grace. "... and it's also Edgar's former emporium. Which I want to remain closed for sentimental reasons. But tell you what, my nephew is a scumbag and he's ruining the dilapidation of the emporium, I'll kick him out for you. What do you say?"

Elanorin

2018-05-16, 05:32 AM

Lily and Aelas! You've headed out to the Mitchell Waste Management Centre. Out the front is the Trash and Treasure - stuff that you can buy for less than five dollars. Racks and racks of clothing, an embarrassing amount of sports and exercise equipment, a forest of skis, rolls of chicken wire, rickety furniture, pots, buddha statues, all kinds of stuff people buy and then never use.

Beyond that, though, is the tip itself - the big ol' landfill where all the garbage is moved around with huge bulldozers, and plumes of foul smelling smoke emerge from. This is fenced off and the gate is overseen by a heavyset guy in a bright neon yellow safety vest. The T&T is overseen by a changeling in the shape of an ancient hawk, vigilantly tracking the motion of everyone and every piece of scrap under her care. The Summer King presumably works further in, past the gate.

Firstly, tell me how you got out here - as a walk it's a few hours, and there aren't exactly bus routes going out this way. Then, how do you make your approach?

Taxi. With Aelas in tow it may well have ended up being by stolen car. As much as Lily was hoping she would not come along on this particular visit (how she's going to keep the King from eating Aelas alive here and now is a plan that has yet to form in her mind), she have proven useful when it comes to acquiring transport. But Lily really frowns on crime and would much rather just pay a person to drive them and not lie awake worrying about potentially getting arrested.

Lily asked the driver to drop them off right at whatever poses as the main entrance of this... place. And then walks in in search of some kind of cabin-like structure that might be the site office, presumably in the vicinity of the, uhm, '$5 sales department'.

Raz_Fox

2018-05-16, 07:15 AM

Here's a thing: the Pilgrim is not a good actor. Don't get me wrong, he's been witness to dozens upon dozens of dramatic and sonorous recitations of holy writ, the words of the judged and the damned, the careful pantomime of actors stuck on a stage until the unseen director deems them worthy of redemption. He's had to let the words come out of him, even when he didn't understand the archaic and convoluted structure of the poems, even when the words tangled up like thorned vines in his throat and he knew, he knew they weren't as important as the violence that was about to occur, for all that they were hallowed sacraments offered up before an uncaring deity.

He's just, you know, not good at conveying things like emotion convincingly. Particularly when he looks like a mid-2000s pop star post-Vegas-wedding, and he's just been thrust into a story without so much as a script and a conversation about his motivations. The hoary beast of winter, wearing an X-TREME FLAMEEEEEEEE XLLLLLLL, stumbling this way and that without so much as a tail to counterbalance the shaking, precarious motion.

Do you think that stops him from throwing himself into Jack's play?

Brother, if you answered 'yes,' I don't know what thread you've been following. If there's one thing that Isaac is very, very good at (besides carrying around the capability to fly into an infernal rage around with him all the time and yet not using it to solve his problems like the world's largest hammer), it's being ride-or-die, especially if it lets him forget about his own needs and troubles for a little bit. You think the Pilgrim's going to have too much self-esteem to ham it up like an eighth-grader doing Shakespeare, standing there in his awful and invasive new wardrobe, fully aware of how his body and his appearance have been decided for him again- you think that he's not going to set all that down and give his all to Jack's satire?

The mental image I want you to sear into your thinkpan is the bit where the Beast of Winter thinks he sees one of the Huntsmen and tries to hide behind the Summery Summer Queen, and the Pilgrim shaking and chewing his black nails as Jack looks down at the Pilgrim's shadow and then looks back up at the audience and goes, is this a Huntsman? (YEAH!) I think this is a Huntsman! (YEAH IT IS!!) I'm gonna fight it!! (YEAH FIGHT THE "HUNTSMAN"!) And then starts viciously tap-dancing on the shadow while the Pilgrim yelps like a dog with its tail stepped on, and howls that the Huntsman just caught his shadow!!!

The Beast of Winter then tries to hide under a cardboard box, but gets it stuck on his horns.

And here's the thing: the Pilgrim is still a bad actor. Like, no line is delivered well at all. It's all gravel and long, awkward pauses and stumbling over his own lines, but that's exactly what the goblins want to see, you know? Because he's the big dumb Beast of Winter, and that just makes the joke funnier.

So now it's here and now, and the show's over, the curtains are drawn, and Zotzie's selling forged autographs of the actors at the side of the stage. The Pilgrim sags, his ropes of duty cut, and bends over as far as the corset will allow him, thaw trickling from his cheeks. He turns and looks at the Ringmaster, but he's really addressing Jack when he says: "I think we won the lease, didn't we?" Because if anyone's going to talk the Ringmaster into stacking the deck for them- he's no fool, he still needs to auction- but if anyone's going to wheel and deal, it's going to be Jack here.

(Or he could ask Zotzie, but

"And here, shot on location, was the Tragic Comedy of Summer and Winter! For just one- yes, one- talking fishhead, you too can..."

Never mind.)

Anarion

2018-05-18, 04:05 PM

Taxi. With Aelas in tow it may well have ended up being by stolen car. As much as Lily was hoping she would not come along on this particular visit (how she's going to keep the King from eating Aelas alive here and now is a plan that has yet to form in her mind), she have proven useful when it comes to acquiring transport. But Lily really frowns on crime and would much rather just pay a person to drive them and not lie awake worrying about potentially getting arrested.

Lily asked the driver to drop them off right at whatever poses as the main entrance of this... place. And then walks in in search of some kind of cabin-like structure that might be the site office, presumably in the vicinity of the, uhm, '$5 sales department'.

Why would Aelas use a stolen car? She has a super fast car-horse and she's chock full of glamour? I mean, granted, the two of us are the ones that actually have some spending money, so there's nothing wrong with taking a taxi and she'd go along with it. But your presumptions are quite ridiculous and if that's how Lily is staring at Aelas the whole ride, she will be quite self-righteously huffy by the time they arrive.

Anyway, this is great. Hopefully Static is here and no longer on paralyze on sight duty so that Aelas can apologize properly. Aelas will immediately seize on something in the $5 sales department and give a little friendly wave to the Hawk guy. I dunno what they've got, maybe, like, one of those little plastic cactuses that are actually toothpick holders? Do they have those in Australia? That sounds like a worthwhile use of $5 to Aelas, and she can start up a conversation with the Hawk while buying it. "So, uh, hey. How's your day going?" she asks him.

Thanqol

2018-05-22, 12:32 AM

"Okay," said Longarms, finally recovering slightly from the show. "Okay, that's why we do this thing. They're entertainers."
"They weren't that good," said Mercia, a little unsure.
"Yes they were! That was the greatest act I've ever seen in my life!" said Longarms. "And that's important to know, because entertainers are dangerous. One moment you're parading them around town in chains and the next minute they're using their last words to incite a riot and the next thing you know you're locked in Versailles and it stinks there."
"I think the bit where Jack did that appearance change is a bigger deal," said Mercia. "I think that might have been a Contract."
"This kind of short sighted thinking is what leads to Republicanism," said Longarms resentfully.

Taxi. With Aelas in tow it may well have ended up being by stolen car. As much as Lily was hoping she would not come along on this particular visit (how she's going to keep the King from eating Aelas alive here and now is a plan that has yet to form in her mind), she have proven useful when it comes to acquiring transport. But Lily really frowns on crime and would much rather just pay a person to drive them and not lie awake worrying about potentially getting arrested.

Lily asked the driver to drop them off right at whatever poses as the main entrance of this... place. And then walks in in search of some kind of cabin-like structure that might be the site office, presumably in the vicinity of the, uhm, '$5 sales department'.

Why would Aelas use a stolen car? She has a super fast car-horse and she's chock full of glamour? I mean, granted, the two of us are the ones that actually have some spending money, so there's nothing wrong with taking a taxi and she'd go along with it. But your presumptions are quite ridiculous and if that's how Lily is staring at Aelas the whole ride, she will be quite self-righteously huffy by the time they arrive.

Anyway, this is great. Hopefully Static is here and no longer on paralyze on sight duty so that Aelas can apologize properly. Aelas will immediately seize on something in the $5 sales department and give a little friendly wave to the Hawk guy. I dunno what they've got, maybe, like, one of those little plastic cactuses that are actually toothpick holders? Do they have those in Australia? That sounds like a worthwhile use of $5 to Aelas, and she can start up a conversation with the Hawk while buying it. "So, uh, hey. How's your day going?" she asks him.

The old lady is dressed in a thick handknit sweater vest, and hundreds of small strips of brightly coloured cloth are wrapped around her wings and feathers at various points. The ribbons often have strange drawings or writing in sanskrit, and similar complex imagery wraps around her beak.

Upon seeing you, she stands up, slaps you in the face, and begins rapidly and dramatically cursing you out in Russian. What do you do?

So now it's here and now, and the show's over, the curtains are drawn, and Zotzie's selling forged autographs of the actors at the side of the stage. The Pilgrim sags, his ropes of duty cut, and bends over as far as the corset will allow him, thaw trickling from his cheeks. He turns and looks at the Ringmaster, but he's really addressing Jack when he says: "I think we won the lease, didn't we?" Because if anyone's going to talk the Ringmaster into stacking the deck for them- he's no fool, he still needs to auction- but if anyone's going to wheel and deal, it's going to be Jack here.

(Or he could ask Zotzie, but

"And here, shot on location, was the Tragic Comedy of Summer and Winter! For just one- yes, one- talking fishhead, you too can..."

Never mind.)

The Ringmaster is already swollen, bloated with the satisfaction that comes with a new show - along with the oatmeal that he's shovelling into his mouth with the desperation of a starving man. His gaunt cheeks are flushed and his top hat sags and his clothes adjust so his mass remains constant even as the distribution between waistcoat and waist is rationalized. The makeup crew is descending on him, too, with white powder and black ink so that the impression of the skull will not pass from his face just because it is now covered with flesh.

The world twists somewhat. Invigorated goblins are cleaning and more briskly talking. New material entering the Market instantly revitalizes it from its stagnancy and everyone wants to trade in the new thing.

stveje

2018-05-22, 02:05 AM

He turns and looks at the Ringmaster, but he's really addressing Jack when he says: "I think we won the lease, didn't we?" Because if anyone's going to talk the Ringmaster into stacking the deck for them- he's no fool, he still needs to auction- but if anyone's going to wheel and deal, it's going to be Jack here.

The curtain comes down with a crash. You've paid your end of the bargain, what do you want to buy from the Ringmaster?

"Well, it wouldn't hurt to know the competition. Who to look out for," Jack says, looking at the Ringmaster to see if he has some juicy details of what they can expect to be up against. "But what we're really here for -" what he's really here for, anyway "- is the Summer King's child, and the Will-o'-the-wisp who took him."

Thanqol

2018-05-22, 02:20 AM

"Well, it wouldn't hurt to know the competition. Who to look out for," Jack says, looking at the Ringmaster to see if he has some juicy details of what they can expect to be up against. "But what we're really here for -" what he's really here for, anyway "- is the Summer King's child, and the Will-o'-the-wisp who took him."

"Ahh, yes," said the Ringmaster as white powder falls from his jowls. "Of Young Richard and the Wisp, is it? I offer you six potential answers - I can tell you of Richard's past, his present, or his future. Or I can tell you the Wisp's past, its present, or its future. One answer for each performer, one answer each. Six doors but you can only take two. Roll up."

stveje

2018-05-22, 02:34 AM

"Ahh, yes," said the Ringmaster as white powder falls from his jowls. "Of Young Richard and the Wisp, is it? I offer you six potential answers - I can tell you of Richard's past, his present, or his future. Or I can tell you the Wisp's past, its present, or its future. One answer for each performer, one answer each. Six doors but you can only take two. Roll up."

"The Wisp's present interests me most," Jack says. He'll wait to see what the Pilgrim asks, and what their answers are, before making any other decisions.

Anarion

2018-05-22, 07:53 PM

The old lady is dressed in a thick handknit sweater vest, and hundreds of small strips of brightly coloured cloth are wrapped around her wings and feathers at various points. The ribbons often have strange drawings or writing in sanskrit, and similar complex imagery wraps around her beak.

Upon seeing you, she stands up, slaps you in the face, and begins rapidly and dramatically cursing you out in Russian. What do you do?

I er...what? Aelas is certainly taken aback at this. Very confusing. She doesn't really want a fight though. Instead she just steps back so she's out of slap range, rubs her cheek (the nearby hair is flashing in sympathy, cycling from neon blue to a deep plum), and gives the woman a what the heck look? "Uh, do you speak English? Uh, parlo Anglesse? American?"

Elanorin

2018-05-23, 05:36 PM

"I- we-" Lily tries her best to dodge the slaps, gasping at every time she fails to and stepping back a little, "-here to see Mr Breton. Mis-ter Bre-ton. Is he here? Mister Breton?" she tried, being unable to speak any language that sounded remotely like... that.

Thanqol

2018-05-24, 08:36 AM

Longarms produces a telescope from his satchel and starts attempting to lip-read the Ringmaster. He mutters curses when it turns out to be more difficult than he expected.

"The Wisp's present interests me most," Jack says. He'll wait to see what the Pilgrim asks, and what their answers are, before making any other decisions.

"Her sin is vanity," said the Ringmaster, and the muscles of his face moved out of sync with the ink of his makeup. Like two heads were speaking using the same face. "Her sin is vanity, the curse of beauty. Cursed with beauty and wielder of beauty's curse - she blinds and binds everyone who looks at her. So she Privateers - loyal in service to the wise and kindly master who recognizes and praises her beauty in a way she can't bear to be without. The bobbing lure on the anglerfish's mouth. Snatch it, stab it, perhaps - but be wary because when you approach the bait you are also approaching the teeth. She doesn't understand, ah, but she does not understand what it is she does! She comes smiling and offering turkish delight and thinking that all the clever children will find the grinding happiness she has found! 'ware the Wisp, because in stupidity she's found kinship with her Noble Master."

I er...what? Aelas is certainly taken aback at this. Very confusing. She doesn't really want a fight though. Instead she just steps back so she's out of slap range, rubs her cheek (the nearby hair is flashing in sympathy, cycling from neon blue to a deep plum), and gives the woman a what the heck look? "Uh, do you speak English? Uh, parlo Anglesse? American?"

"She is mad at you," said Static from immediately behind you.

Right behind you, holy crap. That girl needs a bell or something.

"She is mad at many things," Static went on in that strange, unpracticed monotone of hers. "I am mad, also."

"I- we-" Lily tries her best to dodge the slaps, gasping at every time she fails to and stepping back a little, "-here to see Mr Breton. Mis-ter Bre-ton. Is he here? Mister Breton?" she tried, being unable to speak any language that sounded remotely like... that.

"You got babushka'd," said a thick, rolly-polly, dusty voice - like a hot dog run over by a four wheel drive.
"Don't take it personally," said another voice, that was like the first but more in every respect.
"Everyone gets babushka'd," said a third voice, which was like the first two but it was putting on airs.

A big heavyset garbageman stepped past you, picked up Aelas' cactus, and wrapped it up in a trashbag. It deftly wrapped the yellow draw-cord into a big bow, handed it to you, and took the five dollars. The garbageman had three faces and his head rotated on his neck like a slowly winding carousel. We shall call the faces Less, More and Fancy.

The old lady lowers her voice to an enraged muttering but she draws her thumb across her neck while making fierce eye contact. It's extremely threatening.

"You'll be able to see Mister Breton," said Less.
"You did a good thing in saying his name when you did," said More.
"Mr. Breton's name carries weight round here," said Fancy.

The garbageman walked over to a forklift and clambered on top. It was an ugly and dusty thing, trash and scrap having worked its way into any crevasse where it could have made its way. He pats the side of the panel, gesturing for the two of you to clamber up alongside him.

"Mr. Breton's going to rule until pigs fly," said Less.
"Awful inflammable town you got here," said More.
"Mr. Breton's going to rule until pigs land on his head," said Fancy.

Elanorin

2018-05-24, 09:29 AM

"You got babushka'd," said a thick, rolly-polly, dusty voice - like a hot dog run over by a four wheel drive.
"Don't take it personally," said another voice, that was like the first but more in every respect.
"Everyone gets babushka'd," said a third voice, which was like the first two but it was putting on airs.

A big heavyset garbageman stepped past you, picked up Aelas' cactus, and wrapped it up in a trashbag. It deftly wrapped the yellow draw-cord into a big bow, handed it to you, and took the five dollars. The garbageman had three faces and his head rotated on his neck like a slowly winding carousel. We shall call the faces Less, More and Fancy.

The old lady lowers her voice to an enraged muttering but she draws her thumb across her neck while making fierce eye contact. It's extremely threatening.

Lily rubbed a sore spot a little and watched the woman stand down with wary eyes. Being suddenly attacked was rarely pleasant but it made her particularly jumpy. It also made her immediately grateful to the three-headed man for appearing and intervening.

"I see," she said, trying not to leap to any emotional judgments.

"You'll be able to see Mister Breton," said Less.
"You did a good thing in saying his name when you did," said More.
"Mr. Breton's name carries weight round here," said Fancy.

The garbageman walked over to a forklift and clambered on top. It was an ugly and dusty thing, trash and scrap having worked its way into any crevasse where it could have made its way. He pats the side of the panel, gesturing for the two of you to clamber up alongside him.

Lily didn't hang around to be slapped again and quickly hopped up and tucked herself in to whatever corner was large enough to house her in the little cab of the forklift. She wasn't too fussed with comfort, she was much too used to being without.

"Thank you, sir."

"Mr. Breton's going to rule until pigs fly," said Less.
"Awful inflammable town you got here," said More.
"Mr. Breton's going to rule until pigs land on his head," said Fancy.

"Mr Breton certainly strikes me as formidable," Lily commented diplomatically. "I'm afraid I do not know the town very well myself yet, being new. I am Lily," she offered a small smile without eyecontact, "were you at the meeting last night, Mister...?"

Raz_Fox

2018-05-25, 02:04 AM

Never ask for the future. That sets it. Makes it hard and fast and bound all about your throat; ask Odin, if you don’t believe me, somewhere down in the gullet of the wolf.

“Her past.”

From the past can be made a lure for the lure, a net that cannot be slipped.

Anarion

2018-05-25, 04:17 PM

"She is mad at you," said Static from immediately behind you.

Right behind you, holy crap. That girl needs a bell or something.

"She is mad at many things," Static went on in that strange, unpracticed monotone of hers. "I am mad, also."

"Static!" Aelas turns around and gives the Gargirl a big hug, while also talking excitedly. "Oh, I'm really glad you're okay. I'm sorry about leaving you the other day. I wanted to stay and talk things out, but then I had to leave really fast because of...um...I'm not sure exactly, actually, I think it might have been Huntsmen or something, but anyway I had to leave. But I felt really, really bad about it! So, um, well first of all, the next time you need to get someone, just let me know and I'll take you lickety-split, okay? Also, I figured I'd get you a free meal since you had to waste so much time, so whenever you'd like to go out to lunch or dinner, I'll take you, okay? Please accept my apologies" Aelas gives Static imploring puppy-dog eyes. Her hair shimmers a timid light yellow.

Thanqol

2018-05-26, 08:19 AM

"Mr Breton certainly strikes me as formidable," Lily commented diplomatically. "I'm afraid I do not know the town very well myself yet, being new. I am Lily," she offered a small smile without eyecontact, "were you at the meeting last night, Mister...?"

"The name is Ross Hekate," said Less.
"Play the drums for the King," said More.
"It's one of them ironic coincidence names," said Fancy.

The forklift began to grumblingly roll out away from the relative quiet of the Trash & Treasure and towards the dump proper. This place gets some excess from Brisbane, which is a major city nearby, and it's one of the town's few year-round industries. You're heading into The Stink, where garbage bags are moved around with bulldozers, and columns of greasy smoke arise from the incinerator plant.

"Static!" Aelas turns around and gives the Gargirl a big hug, while also talking excitedly. "Oh, I'm really glad you're okay. I'm sorry about leaving you the other day. I wanted to stay and talk things out, but then I had to leave really fast because of...um...I'm not sure exactly, actually, I think it might have been Huntsmen or something, but anyway I had to leave. But I felt really, really bad about it! So, um, well first of all, the next time you need to get someone, just let me know and I'll take you lickety-split, okay? Also, I figured I'd get you a free meal since you had to waste so much time, so whenever you'd like to go out to lunch or dinner, I'll take you, okay? Please accept my apologies" Aelas gives Static imploring puppy-dog eyes. Her hair shimmers a timid light yellow.

[Roll a Presence+Persuasion, no penalty - let's see exactly how lethal those puppy dog eyes are.]

Never ask for the future. That sets it. Makes it hard and fast and bound all about your throat; ask Odin, if you don’t believe me, somewhere down in the gullet of the wolf.

“Her past.”

From the past can be made a lure for the lure, a net that cannot be slipped.

"Harriette Kush. Never a nice one," said the Ringmaster (and for what it's worth, that's a class-mate of Aelas' - they're about the same age). "Pretty and pretty mean. A little princess born in a little town. Made the world respect her through guile and money and pressure but only because it wasn't given to her on a velvet cushion. Enjoyed photography. Terrible singer. Daddy's girl with daddy's credit card. Posted Deltora Quest fanfiction on the internet under the screen ID 'seven jewels'. Replaced with sticks and spiders and spider-webs."

"You may ask a follow up question or two on these topic," said the Ringmaster expansively. "I don't know what you believe is relevant."

That in itself is information to him. It adds to his wealth by betraying your purpose.

*

"Stupid two faced goon," muttered Longarms.
"Don't stress about it," said Mercia.
"Hey, can't we just put our expenses on the tab of the Lords and Ladies?" said Longarms suddenly.
Mercia looked horrified.
"C'mon, what's the worst they can do to us?" said Longarms, putting the telescope back to his face. "Rip our hearts out?"

Elanorin

2018-05-28, 05:26 PM

"The name is Ross Hekate," said Less.
"Play the drums for the King," said More.
"It's one of them ironic coincidence names," said Fancy.

The forklift began to grumblingly roll out away from the relative quiet of the Trash & Treasure and towards the dump proper. This place gets some excess from Brisbane, which is a major city nearby, and it's one of the town's few year-round industries. You're heading into The Stink, where garbage bags are moved around with bulldozers, and columns of greasy smoke arise from the incinerator plant.

Good gracious, the smell here was becoming something else. Lily tried to be graceful about it but the odd cough escaped her and then she just had to put a handkerchief over her nose and mouth or surely her head would start spinning.

"I see," she tried. Perhaps it was the fumes, or maybe she was just simply missing some in-joke, but she was not present enough to appreciate whatever irony Fancy referred to. "Pleased to meet you, Mister Hekate. Well I shall be sure to make an appointment next time so as not to, ehm, startle your friend at the gate."

Mercy, let there not be a next time. Ever.

stveje

2018-05-29, 02:22 AM

"Her sin is vanity," said the Ringmaster, and the muscles of his face moved out of sync with the ink of his makeup. Like two heads were speaking using the same face. "Her sin is vanity, the curse of beauty. Cursed with beauty and wielder of beauty's curse - she blinds and binds everyone who looks at her. So she Privateers - loyal in service to the wise and kindly master who recognizes and praises her beauty in a way she can't bear to be without. The bobbing lure on the anglerfish's mouth. Snatch it, stab it, perhaps - but be wary because when you approach the bait you are also approaching the teeth. She doesn't understand, ah, but she does not understand what it is she does! She comes smiling and offering turkish delight and thinking that all the clever children will find the grinding happiness she has found! 'ware the Wisp, because in stupidity she's found kinship with her Noble Master."

"Harriette Kush. Never a nice one," said the Ringmaster (and for what it's worth, that's a class-mate of Aelas' - they're about the same age). "Pretty and pretty mean. A little princess born in a little town. Made the world respect her through guile and money and pressure but only because it wasn't given to her on a velvet cushion. Enjoyed photography. Terrible singer. Daddy's girl with daddy's credit card. Posted Deltora Quest fanfiction on the internet under the screen ID 'seven jewels'. Replaced with sticks and spiders and spider-webs."

"You may ask a follow up question or two on these topic," said the Ringmaster expansively. "I don't know what you believe is relevant."

That in itself is information to him. It adds to his wealth by betraying your purpose.

Jack knew a woman of Beauty once, only Veronica was different ... wasn't she? She wasn't mean and vain. He remembers her smile and her beauty, the love they shared ... but he can't feel it any more. It was taken, and now it's gone, a hollow in his heart that he cannot fill. Only the memory of it.

He asks the only question he can think to ask.

"Who does she love?" He doesn't think it's her Keeper; that sounds like the kind of replacement he's tried himself, a false love to replace the True Love that you cannot have. For him, it's never worked. He may be able to forget for a night, in their arms, but then the hole only feels that much deeper in the morning.

Anarion

2018-05-29, 04:29 PM

[Roll a Presence+Persuasion, no penalty - let's see exactly how lethal those puppy dog eyes are.]

[7d10=8, 5, 7, 4, 5, 2, 9. Two successes.] Truly, Aelas' puppy-dog eyes cannot be resisted.

Thanqol

2018-05-31, 07:28 AM

Good gracious, the smell here was becoming something else. Lily tried to be graceful about it but the odd cough escaped her and then she just had to put a handkerchief over her nose and mouth or surely her head would start spinning.

"I see," she tried. Perhaps it was the fumes, or maybe she was just simply missing some in-joke, but she was not present enough to appreciate whatever irony Fancy referred to. "Pleased to meet you, Mister Hekate. Well I shall be sure to make an appointment next time so as not to, ehm, startle your friend at the gate."

Mercy, let there not be a next time. Ever.

The area near the furnace is hot. It's a thick heat, like the air is full of boiling mud. It's soaking into the fabric of your clothes, into your hair - like the exact opposite of a proper bath.

The King of Summer, Mr. Breton, is here. He is working, and he works like a man possessed. His strong and slender and beautiful body is doing a task it is entirely unaccustomed to - instead of the perfectly aimed strike of a sword he is breaking apart trash bags with a jagged shovel and rifling through the filth with reinforced plastic gloves. The only mercy is that he is not wearing that iron monocle - the jagged red scar around his eye demonstrates that even a man of his formidable willpower can't endure pain like that for long.

Sweating, still beautiful despite the ruin all about him, he drags a trolley full of garbage down to the fires and casts it in. He stands aloft as the heat burps and roars and you can see in the fires not the crude red flames of mortal industry but the gleaming gold-white light of the Summer sun. This burning pit is deeply magical, attuned to the mortal enemy of Winter.

And when the King draws close to the pit, that crown ignites upon his head - bold and clear, tearing away all the filth that touches him. In the moments when he stands next to it he is purified - the cleanest thing here, the perfect vessel for Summer.

He turns. His eyes find yours.

[7d10=8, 5, 7, 4, 5, 2, 9. Two successes.] Truly, Aelas' puppy-dog eyes cannot be resisted.

"Fine," said Static, looking away to try and conceal her embarrassment.

The hawk babushka goes on a particularly venomous rant in Russian, shaking her fist from behind the counter.

"I admit," said Static, "I think you are very brave. To come here."

Jack knew a woman of Beauty once, only Veronica was different ... wasn't she? She wasn't mean and vain. He remembers her smile and her beauty, the love they shared ... but he can't feel it any more. It was taken, and now it's gone, a hollow in his heart that he cannot fill. Only the memory of it.

He asks the only question he can think to ask.

"Who does she love?" He doesn't think it's her Keeper; that sounds like the kind of replacement he's tried himself, a false love to replace the True Love that you cannot have. For him, it's never worked. He may be able to forget for a night, in their arms, but then the hole only feels that much deeper in the morning.

"Romantically, her heart is unclaimed," said the Ringmaster. "Practically, though, she has left three dogs behind her, and only the most broken, evil souls can fail to love a dog."

He stands up, smiles with his two faces, and begins to step back into his tent, seemingly regarding the contract as complete.

*

"I'll go in after him," said Longarms. "Cut a deal. Find out what they're after. You stay on the targets."

Elanorin

2018-06-01, 01:37 PM

The area near the furnace is hot. It's a thick heat, like the air is full of boiling mud. It's soaking into the fabric of your clothes, into your hair - like the exact opposite of a proper bath.

The King of Summer, Mr. Breton, is here. He is working, and he works like a man possessed. His strong and slender and beautiful body is doing a task it is entirely unaccustomed to - instead of the perfectly aimed strike of a sword he is breaking apart trash bags with a jagged shovel and rifling through the filth with reinforced plastic gloves. The only mercy is that he is not wearing that iron monocle - the jagged red scar around his eye demonstrates that even a man of his formidable willpower can't endure pain like that for long.

Sweating, still beautiful despite the ruin all about him, he drags a trolley full of garbage down to the fires and casts it in. He stands aloft as the heat burps and roars and you can see in the fires not the crude red flames of mortal industry but the gleaming gold-white light of the Summer sun. This burning pit is deeply magical, attuned to the mortal enemy of Winter.

And when the King draws close to the pit, that crown ignites upon his head - bold and clear, tearing away all the filth that touches him. In the moments when he stands next to it he is purified - the cleanest thing here, the perfect vessel for Summer.

He turns. His eyes find yours.

The handkerchief fell to the baking ground and as she took a step forwards she stumbled a little as the toe of her foot caught on it while the other stood on it but she barely noticed.

What are you doing meeting his gaze? Of all the eyes of all the people in the world, his are not the ones to meet.

Absolutely everything about this moment felt dangerous. Few terrified her more than the Summer King and yet here she was, the girl that bowed to everyone, unable to look away from this recognised lunatic who had a pride the size of a small moon. No, a sun. A blazing hot fiery inferno of a sun.

She was keenly aware of how her clothes suddenly clung and stuck to her, how her plume of feathery hair was rapidly losing its volume and quickly coming to hang limp and damp, clinging to her neck and shoulders uncomfortably. Drops of sweat were trickling down her face, dripping from the tip of her nose.

"H-hi." Did you seriously just say 'hi'?! Sweat dripped through her eyelashes, stinging her eyes, and the pain mercifully broke the gaze and let her return it once more to the ground and with it came a sliver of common sense.

"I-I mean, good morning. Your Grace." She made a weak curtsy and her hands were shaking so she clasped them behind her back.

Anarion

2018-06-02, 02:10 PM

"Fine," said Static, looking away to try and conceal her embarrassment.

The hawk babushka goes on a particularly venomous rant in Russian, shaking her fist from behind the counter.

"I admit," said Static, "I think you are very brave. To come here."

"Yay, friends!" Aelas gives Static a last squeeze and lets the hug go. "I guess it is kinda brave, but I really didn't kidnap anyone and I don't want everyone in Summer to be mad at me. Also Lily needs to talk to some people, so here we are." Aelas gives a slight shrug. "How come the Russian one keeps shouting at us?"

Raz_Fox

2018-06-05, 07:22 AM

In the bad old days, it would be easy enough to do. To simply demand she arrive when the stars align and descend. To hold her fast no matter what fires consume her. (But, of course, that it was a crime to waylay the opponent. To break, to dismay, to shatter, certainly- but never to seize and bind to the wagon-wheels.) Now, there is, perhaps...

Fetters and song. That will do. The song to bring her out and set her to singing. The fetters to hold her tight. (But that no fetter can hold one of the Freed.) Some way that she can be held and brought to Summer's door, offered up as a virgin deer, and one with innocent murder in her eyes.

The Pilgrim heaves the sack over his shoulder, and stands with all the aggrieved patience of a longsuffering man who is rocking the ice-cool stylings of Flavortown. "Thank you." And already he is moving on, ready to offer up the treasures of the Freehold at the auction.

Thanqol

2018-06-06, 04:06 AM

The handkerchief fell to the baking ground and as she took a step forwards she stumbled a little as the toe of her foot caught on it while the other stood on it but she barely noticed.

What are you doing meeting his gaze? Of all the eyes of all the people in the world, his are not the ones to meet.

Absolutely everything about this moment felt dangerous. Few terrified her more than the Summer King and yet here she was, the girl that bowed to everyone, unable to look away from this recognised lunatic who had a pride the size of a small moon. No, a sun. A blazing hot fiery inferno of a sun.

She was keenly aware of how her clothes suddenly clung and stuck to her, how her plume of feathery hair was rapidly losing its volume and quickly coming to hang limp and damp, clinging to her neck and shoulders uncomfortably. Drops of sweat were trickling down her face, dripping from the tip of her nose.

"H-hi." Did you seriously just say 'hi'?! Sweat dripped through her eyelashes, stinging her eyes, and the pain mercifully broke the gaze and let her return it once more to the ground and with it came a sliver of common sense.

"I-I mean, good morning. Your Grace." She made a weak curtsy and her hands were shaking so she clasped them behind her back.

The King of Summer walked towards you. "Did you know," he said, voice low and dark, "there is no Faerie magic that can compel the truth? Maybe it's opposed to their very nature. Maybe if they had to tell the truth they'd cease to exist. So, how can I trust you? How can I trust any of you?"

It wasn't clear if he was talking to himself or not.

"Well, the way I see it, there's a simple solution that cuts through all of that. See, the Kindly Folk -" he uses that name for them, still. Even this man, as deeply possessed of rage as any soul on this earth, still fears to address them insultingly. "they know pain, they teach their servants to know pain. They can inflict every kind of suffering or deprivation imaginable, every emotional and physical agony. But." He picked up a small coin in gloved hands.

You know instinctively that's iron. And you know that it hates you.

"They don't know the pain of iron," said the King.

He held it out.

"Take this. Hold onto it. And then tell me why I should trust you."

"Yay, friends!" Aelas gives Static a last squeeze and lets the hug go. "I guess it is kinda brave, but I really didn't kidnap anyone and I don't want everyone in Summer to be mad at me. Also Lily needs to talk to some people, so here we are." Aelas gives a slight shrug. "How come the Russian one keeps shouting at us?"

"I don't know," said Static. "Nobody knows. Nobody here speaks Russian. Don't know where she is from. Or what she wants. I think she is trying to tell us something."

The gargoyle looks a bit uncomfortable saying that many words all at once. "Did you want to see the king?"

In the bad old days, it would be easy enough to do. To simply demand she arrive when the stars align and descend. To hold her fast no matter what fires consume her. (But, of course, that it was a crime to waylay the opponent. To break, to dismay, to shatter, certainly- but never to seize and bind to the wagon-wheels.) Now, there is, perhaps...

Fetters and song. That will do. The song to bring her out and set her to singing. The fetters to hold her tight. (But that no fetter can hold one of the Freed.) Some way that she can be held and brought to Summer's door, offered up as a virgin deer, and one with innocent murder in her eyes.

The Pilgrim heaves the sack over his shoulder, and stands with all the aggrieved patience of a longsuffering man who is rocking the ice-cool stylings of Flavortown. "Thank you." And already he is moving on, ready to offer up the treasures of the Freehold at the auction.

Auctioning in the goblin market was, for a time, a complicated thing.

There is no single currency in the Market, nor can there be. Not because there's a law against it, but because if every single goblin is an inveterate counterfeit and will flood the market with anything that is commonly accepted as valuable. So everything is a barter economy, but running any sort of auction when one guy is putting up half a dozen dreams about missing sailboats verses whatever crap the town of Prosperpine threw into a sack one day gets into conversion arguments.

I mean, every goblin has a sense about what things are worth, but damned if a single one of them will admit it to any of the others.

So, in the usual way these profoundly untrustworthy creatures have for creating trust: they bring in an outside contractor. In this case it's a dog - big and happy and friendly and with a wagging tail and slobbery tongue and neon green-pink highlights and police dog jacket. They stole it from the border security team down at the docks and retrained it from sniffing out cocaine and into sniffing out value. None of the goblins have yet twigged to the idea that they could rig the auction by stuffing their bags with cocaine which the dog is still trained to respond to. Hopefully they don't because then that poor doggo will be out of a job.

The other facet of this auction is that if the goblins ever combined their resources they could beat the town of Prosperpine easily. But if they could do that then they wouldn't be goblins.

So you dump the sack alongside all the other sacks and the dog is sniffing around diligently, brow creased with doggy determination. But there's a bit of a problem - the dog is confused, and his decision doesn't seem to be obvious. The crowd of goblins looks on in increasing tension.

And at this point one of those spindly american spider-businessmen with the waxed moustache and the broad oil-drilling texan accent puts his hand on your shoulder. "My friend," he says. "It's never too late to slip in one last deal. Tell you what. Ever heard of time shares? I want," he pulls out a wad of cash. "One - that's right, just one - one room in Prosperpine, for just one night. My choice, called in when I need. Deal me that and I'll slip a little doggy treat in your bag. Do we have a deal?"

*

Mercia took a seat in the crowd. She felt obvious and out of place here. This place was cruel and ugly, and she regretted that this was the side most people of the town associated with Faerie.

Elanorin

2018-06-07, 05:04 AM

The King of Summer walked towards you. "Did you know," he said, voice low and dark, "there is no Faerie magic that can compel the truth? Maybe it's opposed to their very nature. Maybe if they had to tell the truth they'd cease to exist. So, how can I trust you? How can I trust any of you?"

It wasn't clear if he was talking to himself or not.

"Well, the way I see it, there's a simple solution that cuts through all of that. See, the Kindly Folk -" he uses that name for them, still. Even this man, as deeply possessed of rage as any soul on this earth, still fears to address them insultingly. "they know pain, they teach their servants to know pain. They can inflict every kind of suffering or deprivation imaginable, every emotional and physical agony. But." He picked up a small coin in gloved hands.

You know instinctively that's iron. And you know that it hates you.

"They don't know the pain of iron," said the King.

He held it out.

"Take this. Hold onto it. And then tell me why I should trust you."

"I'm not asking you to trust me, Your Grace," Lily said simply, finding her eyes drawn back to meet his once more by a courage that felt cold and sticky in her stomach. Not the way courage ever felt before. Perhaps it was something else. "I don't see the point. I have never known trust to come on command."

"But do we have to trust each other to find use for one another? I seek your truce. For myself and my friends, including Aelas. In return I offer my service. I understand the urgent need to root out the traitor and will gladly arrange all the particulars for the meeting you called, and anything else to aid their capture, but me and my friends arrived only days ago and correct me if I am wrong, Your Grace, but the damage was long done by then, was it not?"

She could feel her heart beating fast in her chest, the hairs on her arms stood on end and the urge to run was screaming in her aching muscles.

"I-if you require me to hold iron then I will," she reached out her hand, palm up. It was visibly trembling but ready to receive the coin if he chose to tip it in to her hand. "It might convince you that I am invested. That I will go to great lengths for the safety of my friends, perhaps even that I can endure pain. But what it won't do is magically make you trust me."

Her eyes went to the coin in his hand and despite the overwhelming heat blazing over her from the furnaces her skin went cold and she swallowed hard.

Raz_Fox

2018-06-07, 06:28 AM

Our Pilgrim, he rolls his eyes. Well, he doesn't. He can't. But that's the muscle memory, and the shift in his thaw-slicked cheeks, and the flicker of the ghost candles that lie deep within his dark head. Because what he's hearing is the implicit reminder that the auction is, ultimately, up to whoever finds the best way to cheat.

Edmund would shove his hands deeper in his pockets and complain that the Courts weren't his trouble anyhow, and Lily would pay someone off in a chain of deals that led inexorably to the sack being chosen, and Aelas would ask the dog very nicely to pick her sack pretty please? But Isaac is the beast of the wild, and he's not stupid for all that he looks it right now.

He waits until the dog's sniffing the offer from the Court, and then- as if to himself, or to the goblin offering the deal, or some other- he growls. Low and deep and terrible in his throat. A primal sound, the sort that he'd use when there was some bronze-scaled serpent draped across the branches on the road, or a pack of dark beasts with white eyes, and he needed to establish exactly what and who he was.

(Between you and me, both sides of the encounter were supposed to rely upon rhetoric and declarations of virtue. You and I both know how quickly that devolves into baring teeth and quiet reminders of strength.)

It's the sort of sound that will either send the dog running into the crowd and give Jack time to steal the doggy treat from the proffering goblin, or will convince the dog to bark at its foe and, coincidentally, the sack.

[Here's my bid: Manipulation+Intimidation(+Mantle), planning to spend WP.]

Anarion

2018-06-07, 11:45 AM

"I don't know," said Static. "Nobody knows. Nobody here speaks Russian. Don't know where she is from. Or what she wants. I think she is trying to tell us something."

The gargoyle looks a bit uncomfortable saying that many words all at once. "Did you want to see the king?"

"I uh...hm, not sure?" Aelas looks around. "Where did Lily go? I was coming with her, but if the King is gonna get mad and set everything on fire when he sees me again, maybe I should wait until she's done? I want him to know he's got the wrong girl though, I didn't kidnap anyone but you by complete and total accident. Who's he looking for anyway, though? Maybe I can find them instead, so he'll know it wasn't me!"

TheAmishPirate

2018-06-07, 03:51 PM

"You can't have that one, that's my great nephew's house and I couldn't ask him to move..." said Gustav. Then he looks at you, makes eye contact, and with the relentless confidence of a man who has just realized he's been caught in a lie but admitting it would literally kill him. He walks it back with grace. "... and it's also Edgar's former emporium. Which I want to remain closed for sentimental reasons. But tell you what, my nephew is a scumbag and he's ruining the dilapidation of the emporium, I'll kick him out for you. What do you say?"

Edmund briefly considered pushing his advantage here, maybe knock a few more percent off, but he'd just had a first-hand demonstration of both the risks of overplaying one's hand, and the utter shamelessness that is Gustav. Better to play to caution, give a curt nod, and keep up the momentum.

"The bay's crowded with tourist spots, armed with deeper purses and dug-in positions. We'd get eaten alive there. But while the bay's the draw, it's not actually that central." He traced a circle with his finger around the chosen spot; it covered a decent portion of the town and - more importantly - the residential districts. "Give up the tourists who don't want to walk, gain the entire off-season. Like you said; there's no good places to eat around here. A small band of regulars could easily hold the line until the seasons turn."

Not to mention the thought of catering exclusively to large, loud, screaming crowds made his throat tighten, his nerves shaking. A nice, homey establishment. That's what he wanted.

Thanqol

2018-06-08, 04:29 AM

[Here's my bid: Manipulation+Intimidation(+Mantle), planning to spend WP.]

It's a good idea, roll at no penalty. However, since you're rolling Intimidate and not Animal Ken you won't be able to get the dog to sit down at the right spot without an Exceptional Success - otherwise you just scare it away and create an opportunity for Jack to steal the treat and plant it in the bag.

(And it is a roll to pick the pocket of a Goblin because they always expect their pockets to be picked - and in fact, will likely be in the process of reflexively picking each others pockets the moment any sort of distraction raises its head. It's a +3 for the distraction and a -6 for stealing from a crowd of shifty-eyed conmen, so Jack make the dexterity+larceny roll at -3 total)

"I-if you require me to hold iron then I will," she reached out her hand, palm up. It was visibly trembling but ready to receive the coin if he chose to tip it in to her hand. "It might convince you that I am invested. That I will go to great lengths for the safety of my friends, perhaps even that I can endure pain. But what it won't do is magically make you trust me."

Her eyes went to the coin in his hand and despite the overwhelming heat blazing over her from the furnaces her skin went cold and she swallowed hard.

Roll manipulation+persuasion at a -5 - but with +2 for not challenging his authority, so only -3 total.

"I uh...hm, not sure?" Aelas looks around. "Where did Lily go? I was coming with her, but if the King is gonna get mad and set everything on fire when he sees me again, maybe I should wait until she's done? I want him to know he's got the wrong girl though, I didn't kidnap anyone but you by complete and total accident. Who's he looking for anyway, though? Maybe I can find them instead, so he'll know it wasn't me!"

"Forklift," said Static. "We have to walk."

And walk she begins to do, taking up a scarf that looks like it was knitted by the babushka and wraps it firmly around her face and nose. I do recommend you do something similar because you're going to stink town.

"It'd be simpler if we knew who the King wanted," admits Static.

Edmund briefly considered pushing his advantage here, maybe knock a few more percent off, but he'd just had a first-hand demonstration of both the risks of overplaying one's hand, and the utter shamelessness that is Gustav. Better to play to caution, give a curt nod, and keep up the momentum.

"The bay's crowded with tourist spots, armed with deeper purses and dug-in positions. We'd get eaten alive there. But while the bay's the draw, it's not actually that central." He traced a circle with his finger around the chosen spot; it covered a decent portion of the town and - more importantly - the residential districts. "Give up the tourists who don't want to walk, gain the entire off-season. Like you said; there's no good places to eat around here. A small band of regulars could easily hold the line until the seasons turn."

Not to mention the thought of catering exclusively to large, loud, screaming crowds made his throat tighten, his nerves shaking. A nice, homey establishment. That's what he wanted.

"Shooting for mediocrity, huh kid?" said Gustav, cutting right to the chase. "You want to give up on any dreams of fame and fortune and cook meals for nobodies in the heart of nowhere all your life? Huh? You don't have any faith in me, the greatest partner in business a man could ask for? You insulting me? You saying you don't trust me to get you a swanky touristy spot and make you rich?"

stveje

2018-06-08, 05:01 AM

It's a good idea, roll at no penalty. However, since you're rolling Intimidate and not Animal Ken you won't be able to get the dog to sit down at the right spot without an Exceptional Success - otherwise you just scare it away and create an opportunity for Jack to steal the treat and plant it in the bag.

(And it is a roll to pick the pocket of a Goblin because they always expect their pockets to be picked - and in fact, will likely be in the process of reflexively picking each others pockets the moment any sort of distraction raises its head. It's a +3 for the distraction and a -6 for stealing from a crowd of shifty-eyed conmen, so Jack make the dexterity+larceny roll at -3 total)

Dex+Larceny-3 = 5 : 8, 4, 4, 7, 8

Jack knows this trick. Jack good at this trick. Jack get treat, yes? Jack good boy, yes?

Elanorin

2018-06-08, 05:50 AM

Roll manipulation+persuasion at a -5 - but with +2 for not challenging his authority, so only -3 total.

+1 for Striking Looks and Spending 1 Willpower for +3: 6, 8, 3, 10 (ten again: 3)

TheAmishPirate

2018-06-10, 05:22 PM

"Shooting for mediocrity, huh kid?" said Gustav, cutting right to the chase. "You want to give up on any dreams of fame and fortune and cook meals for nobodies in the heart of nowhere all your life? Huh? You don't have any faith in me, the greatest partner in business a man could ask for? You insulting me? You saying you don't trust me to get you a swanky touristy spot and make you rich?"

Edmund had put up with quite a bit already; slanderous remarks on his cooking, numerous attempts to fleece him out of all the money he'd ever touch in his life, countless bald-faced lies, and poor table manners. He'd endured the lot of it in stride, giving no ground to his enemy. All that is to say what came next marked a dangerously rapid change in atmosphere.

Finger still on the map, his head rose slow, ponderous, to meet the shyster's gaze. Unseen by mortal eyes, a cloak of deep scarlet billowed out behind him, as armored plate scraped against armored plate, with the first, warning rumbles of an avalanche. The full weight of his righteous authority - his by right of unlikely and un-asked for survival - bore down mercilessly upon the presumptive scoundrel. When he finally deigned to speak, to make concrete his intent and banish horrible, infinite possibility, he ought to be thanked for his mercy. "Yeah. That's what I want." He said flatly, unblinking. "Do we have a problem?"

[Edmund would like to Intimidate this punk via stare-down, with the goal of getting him to drop this line of questioning like the hottest of potatoes. Preferably also without inviting retribution via negotiations, but I'll take what the dice give me. Presence + Intimidation + Specialty (Stare Down) = 8 die, before penalties/bonuses.]

Raz_Fox

2018-06-10, 06:33 PM

It’s a low, primal, bottom-of-the-gut sound. It’s the sound of something big and dangerous shifting its bulk and you can’t see it in the dark but it’s letting you know it’s there, and pray to whatever God you put your trust in that it’s not hungry. It’s the Crocodile doing lazy laps around the pirate king’s boat, inexorable even without time sticking in its craw.

It would be prudent, Jack, to be thankful that the Pilgrim is your friend. He would be an enemy not to be crossed.

[2 Successes, no Willpower spent, and boy howdy was I scared when I saw five failures and- oh, that’s not a 0, that’s a 10, whew.]

Thanqol

2018-06-10, 07:06 PM

+1 for Striking Looks and Spending 1 Willpower for +3: 6, 8, 3, 10 (ten again: 3)

The King drops the iron fragment.

You feel it sizzle as it scorches by your hand, barely missing it.

"I don't need a mutilated servant," he said. You feel the skein of the Wyrd twist around you, binding your oath with magic. This at least, you can both trust. Or, if not trust, be satisfied that betrayal will be met with retribution - and that's as vindicating as trust.

(You phrased the oath well. It doesn't bind you to open-ended servitude, it only binds you to your service with regards to organizing meetings and uncovering traitors. But woe will betide you if you act with sloth on either of those topics.)

"So. Tell me what you know. Tell me what you will do. And tell me how you will do it quickly," said the King. "I cannot abide traitors under my roof."

Edmund had put up with quite a bit already; slanderous remarks on his cooking, numerous attempts to fleece him out of all the money he'd ever touch in his life, countless bald-faced lies, and poor table manners. He'd endured the lot of it in stride, giving no ground to his enemy. All that is to say what came next marked a dangerously rapid change in atmosphere.

Finger still on the map, his head rose slow, ponderous, to meet the shyster's gaze. Unseen by mortal eyes, a cloak of deep scarlet billowed out behind him, as armored plate scraped against armored plate, with the first, warning rumbles of an avalanche. The full weight of his righteous authority - his by right of unlikely and un-asked for survival - bore down mercilessly upon the presumptive scoundrel. When he finally deigned to speak, to make concrete his intent and banish horrible, infinite possibility, he ought to be thanked for his mercy. "Yeah. That's what I want." He said flatly, unblinking. "Do we have a problem?"

[Edmund would like to Intimidate this punk via stare-down, with the goal of getting him to drop this line of questioning like the hottest of potatoes. Preferably also without inviting retribution via negotiations, but I'll take what the dice give me. Presence + Intimidation + Specialty (Stare Down) = 8 die, before penalties/bonuses.]

Roll it at -2; despite the grandeur of his gazebos Gustav is rather generic when it comes to gladly gazing into glares.

It’s a low, primal, bottom-of-the-gut sound. It’s the sound of something big and dangerous shifting its bulk and you can’t see it in the dark but it’s letting you know it’s there, and pray to whatever God you put your trust in that it’s not hungry. It’s the Crocodile doing lazy laps around the pirate king’s boat, inexorable even without time sticking in its craw.

It would be prudent, Jack, to be thankful that the Pilgrim is your friend. He would be an enemy not to be crossed.

[2 Successes, no Willpower spent, and boy howdy was I scared when I saw five failures and- oh, that’s not a 0, that’s a 10, whew.]

Dex+Larceny-3 = 5 : 8, 4, 4, 7, 8

Jack knows this trick. Jack good at this trick. Jack get treat, yes? Jack good boy, yes?

The great wallet shuffle in the crowd happens. The hardest part for Jack isn't picking the pocket, it's evading the hand that's already picking it. Treats are acquired. Dogs are bribed. The Goblin Market gives a grumbling whisper about bringing their own scary monkeys to the next auctions and the next time you do this it will be to the face of whatever leering monsters the Market can dredge up to try and spook a small dog. Blunt mass replication without understanding of taste or subtlety is how the Market learns.

A bearded ballet dancer curtsies as she presents you with the title deed to Prosperpine. It's a rather short scroll which simply states that 'The Gentry and their creatures will find no rest nor roofing on the mortal side of the divide'. A useful thing to have.

*

"Son of a gun," whispers Mercia to herself as she spies it.

That contract right there has caused her no end of misery. Days spent slamming down coffee and standing awake at three AM waiting for someone to wake the hell up. She almost wants to put aside this entire hunt and destroy it. Her hand strays to her sword. She just might.

TheAmishPirate

2018-06-10, 07:26 PM

Roll it at -2; despite the grandeur of his gazebos Gustav is rather generic when it comes to gladly gazing into glares.

Gladly!

...wait, darn, already used that one.

[With the -2, that takes us to 6 die: 5, 10, 2, 6, 7, 8 (10-again: 6) for a total of 2 successes. Gustav has found himself a minefield and would be wise to backpedal out of it.]

Raz_Fox

2018-06-10, 11:02 PM

Finally. It’s done and sealed. The Pilgrim softens, almost imperceptibly, but I’d daresay our friend Jack would notice the way the hiply-dressed man no longer seems quite on edge, quite as driven. Which is not to say he doesn’t still wish to find some way of trapping a gift for the King of Summer- indeed, that should still be done. But no one can steal the gifts of the Freehold from under his attention now; no one can swoop in with a king’s ransom and snatch it from his gnarled hands; no calamity can cause him to miss the auction entirely.

The responsibility, the awareness of how many ways things could go wrong, and for how many people his actions were meant to benefit, how many had sacrificed to win that contract: these things were needles in the bones, pricking him to ill-temper and worry. Now the contract rests against his skin, where it cannot be easily stolen, and slowly warms to the beat of his charcoaled heart.

“Done,” he says, and then, a single nod to the assembled audience. He places one huge hand upon Jack’s shoulder and steers him from the crowd, intent on ambling through the Market until he found something that struck him like anvil and tongs, saying: here you will catch this will-o-the-wisp, here is the trick and the magic to it.

Elanorin

2018-06-12, 07:10 AM

The King drops the iron fragment.

You feel it sizzle as it scorches by your hand, barely missing it.

"I don't need a mutilated servant," he said. You feel the skein of the Wyrd twist around you, binding your oath with magic. This at least, you can both trust. Or, if not trust, be satisfied that betrayal will be met with retribution - and that's as vindicating as trust.

(You phrased the oath well. It doesn't bind you to open-ended servitude, it only binds you to your service with regards to organizing meetings and uncovering traitors. But woe will betide you if you act with sloth on either of those topics.)

"So. Tell me what you know. Tell me what you will do. And tell me how you will do it quickly," said the King. "I cannot abide traitors under my roof."

Lily flinched and pulled back her hand, rubbing it tenderly from the almost-burn. She threw a fearful glance at the coin on the ground, she truly couldn't imagine how much it would have hurt to hold it and she was utterly relieved at having made enough of an impact for the mad Summer King to think to spare her.

The oath twisted itself in to place in the air around her, in the blood within and she knew it was Fact. She hadn't stopped to consider her choice of words when she spoke, they had just come pouring out, now she took a moment to think back to what she'd agreed to and was a little relieved, it could have easily been a whole lot worse. She was bound now, yes, and that in itself was something she'd have to come to terms with, but it was not complete. She could do this. Especially as oaths are both ways. He was bound too. To hold to a truce with her and her friends. No vendettas, no mad accusations. If they truly crossed him, then it might not hold, but it was still a layer of defence they didn't have an hour ago.

"At this moment I do not know a lot, Your Grace. I am newly arrived, what I know is only rumours. That your child has been taken and that the Goblins say you have been betrayed. The more you could share with me about what exactly happened, when and where, the less time I will need to spend determining what facts are accurate and what's just idle gossip." While she imagined his account ought to be taken with at least as much salt as any other, she figured he'd see his own view of events as the Absolute Truth.

"What I intend to do is, with your leave, of course, act as your proxy and coordinator of the court investigations that you ordered last night, Your Grace. Each court is to investigate itself and then report. I will ensure not only that they comply but I will scrutinise each court's investigation and report to you as to it's integrity, thoroughness and transparency. As such any token you could bestow on me to validate my claim that I am acting on Your order would be gratefully received." She was new, and that was not always an advantage. She imagined she'd face a fair amount of resistance and disbelief. Since when did a Winter newcomer act on behalf of the Summer King?

"I will compile a list of suspects, as narrow as possible. To be able to find the exact guilty party I may need either more time or the leave to approach my friends for help. Like you said, there is no magic for retrieving the truth. I have three days, I will spend one day with each court and be finished by the meeting on the 28th. That is, unless you wish me to oversee the Summer Court as well?"

Anarion

2018-06-13, 04:32 PM

"Forklift," said Static. "We have to walk."

And walk she begins to do, taking up a scarf that looks like it was knitted by the babushka and wraps it firmly around her face and nose. I do recommend you do something similar because you're going to stink town.

"It'd be simpler if we knew who the King wanted," admits Static.

Aelas takes off her thick knitted sweater, thankful that she took it this morning, and wraps it over on itself a couple times, then folds it over her face and ties the sleeves behind her like a thick woolen scarf. Her hair, wrapped underneath it, creates a sort of glowing effect from within the folds of wool, getting lighter and darker as it shifts.

"Wait, you mean the King doesn't know who did it, or you mean he doesn't even know who was kidnapped?! Like, I'm thinking we find the missing person, and then use that to find the real culprit!"

Thanqol

2018-06-14, 12:21 AM

Gladly!

...wait, darn, already used that one.

[With the -2, that takes us to 6 die: 5, 10, 2, 6, 7, 8 (10-again: 6) for a total of 2 successes. Gustav has found himself a minefield and would be wise to backpedal out of it.]

"Rich... in spirit?" said Gustav. "I mean, that's clearly what you're going for here. A place with personality! A place where everybody knows your name! A place that would be the je ne se quois in a town where fine eating means Hungry Jack's or that one Indian place. And who doesn't like to be a big fish, am I right? Pillar of the community? And what's money compared to influence? That's what we're after here, right? What's a sword without a place to hold the sword?" Gustav seems to have talked himself into agreeing with you by way of agreeing with himself. "Anyway what's important is that we're going to make a lot of something."

Finally. It’s done and sealed. The Pilgrim softens, almost imperceptibly, but I’d daresay our friend Jack would notice the way the hiply-dressed man no longer seems quite on edge, quite as driven. Which is not to say he doesn’t still wish to find some way of trapping a gift for the King of Summer- indeed, that should still be done. But no one can steal the gifts of the Freehold from under his attention now; no one can swoop in with a king’s ransom and snatch it from his gnarled hands; no calamity can cause him to miss the auction entirely.

The responsibility, the awareness of how many ways things could go wrong, and for how many people his actions were meant to benefit, how many had sacrificed to win that contract: these things were needles in the bones, pricking him to ill-temper and worry. Now the contract rests against his skin, where it cannot be easily stolen, and slowly warms to the beat of his charcoaled heart.

“Done,” he says, and then, a single nod to the assembled audience. He places one huge hand upon Jack’s shoulder and steers him from the crowd, intent on ambling through the Market until he found something that struck him like anvil and tongs, saying: here you will catch this will-o-the-wisp, here is the trick and the magic to it.

Mercia drew her sword.

"Halt!" declares the Flower Knight, voice ringing out clearly through the rubarb and bringing the Market to a total halt.

"I am Mercia, the Knight of Flowers, bonded slave to the Lover Awaiting," she said. Revealed in her true nature, the mud and dung soaked streets below her armoured boots begins to burst with bright and exotic colours. An emerald carpet extends behind her, like the train of a wedding dress. Flowers real and impressionistic both. "I come to bargain."

After the adjust from their initial shock, the goblins respond with malice and confusion. The crowd lets out a few 'boos' from those safely ensconced in the back, but those at the front keep a wide distance.

She is not in her human form. Bright silks and twisted vines adorn her, and her eyes are vast and owl-like atop a helmet designed for no mortal scalp. A creature of Faerie itself, as bright and terrible as they have ever come.

"I want to purchase the contract you have just won at auction, Pilgrim of the Stolen Stars," she said. "And in exchange I will offer you a single token of my favour, to be used however you see fit."

Instantly the Market bursts into a commotion of frantic whispers and crazed bargaining. A token of the Hunt! Reprieve from the eternal pursuers! It is only short from a favour from the Gentry themselves in terms of sheer value.

What do you do?

Lily flinched and pulled back her hand, rubbing it tenderly from the almost-burn. She threw a fearful glance at the coin on the ground, she truly couldn't imagine how much it would have hurt to hold it and she was utterly relieved at having made enough of an impact for the mad Summer King to think to spare her.

The oath twisted itself in to place in the air around her, in the blood within and she knew it was Fact. She hadn't stopped to consider her choice of words when she spoke, they had just come pouring out, now she took a moment to think back to what she'd agreed to and was a little relieved, it could have easily been a whole lot worse. She was bound now, yes, and that in itself was something she'd have to come to terms with, but it was not complete. She could do this. Especially as oaths are both ways. He was bound too. To hold to a truce with her and her friends. No vendettas, no mad accusations. If they truly crossed him, then it might not hold, but it was still a layer of defence they didn't have an hour ago.

"At this moment I do not know a lot, Your Grace. I am newly arrived, what I know is only rumours. That your child has been taken and that the Goblins say you have been betrayed. The more you could share with me about what exactly happened, when and where, the less time I will need to spend determining what facts are accurate and what's just idle gossip." While she imagined his account ought to be taken with at least as much salt as any other, she figured he'd see his own view of events as the Absolute Truth.

"What I intend to do is, with your leave, of course, act as your proxy and coordinator of the court investigations that you ordered last night, Your Grace. Each court is to investigate itself and then report. I will ensure not only that they comply but I will scrutinise each court's investigation and report to you as to it's integrity, thoroughness and transparency. As such any token you could bestow on me to validate my claim that I am acting on Your order would be gratefully received." She was new, and that was not always an advantage. She imagined she'd face a fair amount of resistance and disbelief. Since when did a Winter newcomer act on behalf of the Summer King?

"I will compile a list of suspects, as narrow as possible. To be able to find the exact guilty party I may need either more time or the leave to approach my friends for help. Like you said, there is no magic for retrieving the truth. I have three days, I will spend one day with each court and be finished by the meeting on the 28th. That is, unless you wish me to oversee the Summer Court as well?"

"I was leading the Court on patrol," he said. "But when I came back, he wasn't there." His teeth clench. You can press him for more information if you want, but that is in a very real sense playing with fire. This is the heart of his trauma and even gentle questions are risky.

The King of Summer rummaged in his pocket, and came out with his government ID badge. It was old and washed out, and depicted the face of a wooden marionette with clockwork jaws - that thing must have been his Fetch, and this must be a trophy from its corpse.

He thrust it at you, aggressively. "Look into everyone. Trust no one."

Aelas takes off her thick knitted sweater, thankful that she took it this morning, and wraps it over on itself a couple times, then folds it over her face and ties the sleeves behind her like a thick woolen scarf. Her hair, wrapped underneath it, creates a sort of glowing effect from within the folds of wool, getting lighter and darker as it shifts.

"Wait, you mean the King doesn't know who did it, or you mean he doesn't even know who was kidnapped?! Like, I'm thinking we find the missing person, and then use that to find the real culprit!"

"Difficult," said Static. "It was his son. Taken by the Fae. Not many people ready to risk going back there."

Would you, Aelas? You came home, but what's the emotion that comes to your mind at the thought of going back?

Raz_Fox

2018-06-14, 06:46 AM

The Pilgrim looks this thing in front of him up and down, and grinds those plaster diamonds pasted on his teeth. See, Fairyland's just given him something he knows. Not that he knows her specifically, no, but he knows this scene, this beat, great and terrible and scary swanning in and making demands because they own the spotlight and the authority and the mythos, and all you've got is- well, what you've got doesn't matter, save that it shouldn't belong to you. By all rights and principalities and dominions, it belongs to them. You are nothing. You are the stain of iniquity and the stars will aid in your redemption, each one a cold cinder lighting the skin like tinder under the steel.

"Stolen Stars," he says, almost thoughtfully, but with the bling he looks half urban royalty, half court jester, anyhow. The ink in his tats spills from line to line, shimmering, glittering, spelling out: whosoever inclineth not toward zeal, perseverance, mortification of the flesh, he hath not broken free from the third spirit of bondage, a resplendent compass-mandala enveloping his elbow. His voice grates against the stones which scrape the flesh of his lips. He was not meant to be such, displayed, stood straight-backed, in colors and royal rainment; let the monster wear its weeds and shun the light.

"What else?" What else do you know about me? What else do you think you know about me? Why are you offering me this, and don't think I don't recognize you- where's the other one, lad Longarms? Behind me, lining up the shot? If not me, triggerhairs on Jack? Why do you think I will do this, do you know nothing about me, and are you trying to discover what sort of beast I am? Damned if I do, damned if I don't, you'll know where to pull and where the lines are. Do you think I am a greedy fool, do you think I will hand it over and run so far I cross sea and shore to get away from the people I damn with one bargain, do you simply want me to know I had a chance to save myself before you break out the irons and the fetters and I will die before I let you touch Jack but I think you will kill me and gladly.

I think you will kill me.

You are my death.

There's a thought! Our friend has been broken before, but the fact that he can and will die, that the next time he's pierced and left to hang bloodless on a spire - not to free the center field but because something horrible has come loping back out of the forest and he is in the way - it'll be the last one. There will be time to think about this later, to hang his head in his hands and tremble as the ash-tears fall because he doesn't know whether he's excited or terrified at the thought, but right now there's ice in his veins because his fear's sprouted wings and teeth and rides him like a horse, his heart's thumping ten-gallon beats and the details of her cheek are etched like flagellation into his memory, it's all he can do to hold his face steady and force that runaway train of an emotion forward aimed dead into her inhuman skull.

If you've any sense, Jack, run.

Anarion

2018-06-14, 12:36 PM

"Difficult," said Static. "It was his son. Taken by the Fae. Not many people ready to risk going back there."

Would you, Aelas? You came home, but what's the emotion that comes to your mind at the thought of going back?

It's complicated. I mean, really. What do you call the combination of fear and elation? The possibility of joy and the panic of being trapped and a small part of the mind suppressing things that it knows are there but has absolutely zero clue how to handle all mixing together. That's what Aelas is feeling.

"Why does he think that's a kidnapper? Why even a Changeling, and not a Huntsman or a goblin, or just some really awful luck?"
Yes, stall, Aelas, ask other questions, don't volunteer for anything. Definitely don't volunteer for anything, you're not going to give up what you just got back, definitely not.

stveje

2018-06-14, 02:08 PM

Jack shrank back from the terrible visage of the Huntress, slipping into the Pilgrim's shadow like a dog behind its master's legs.

His fear of her was soon joined by another fear at her words and the reaction of the Market. If they refused her offer - and what kind of friend would he be if he thought only of himself, and not of others? - it was like painting a target on their backs, was it not? They were holding something of tremendous value all of a sudden, and the whole market knew it - or would soon, the way word gets around. What were the chances they would be walking away without someone trying to cash in on the offer in their place?

Jack looked around, trying to get a sense of the dangers around him - not from the Huntress, for hers was a known danger right now, but from the Market around them.

[Wits+Composure? Investigation?]

Then, still looking over his shoulder, he stepped out - but not too far - from Isaac's shadow. "We didn't win it for ourselves," he says, filling himself and his voice with as much of Winter's ice as he can. "It isn't ours to bargain away."

[Does refusing her offer count as putting himself at risk to provide for someone else (the town)? Asking since that'd be a Willpower regain.]

Elanorin

2018-06-14, 05:23 PM

"I was leading the Court on patrol," he said. "But when I came back, he wasn't there." His teeth clench. You can press him for more information if you want, but that is in a very real sense playing with fire. This is the heart of his trauma and even gentle questions are risky.

The King of Summer rummaged in his pocket, and came out with his government ID badge. It was old and washed out, and depicted the face of a wooden marionette with clockwork jaws - that thing must have been his Fetch, and this must be a trophy from its corpse.

He thrust it at you, aggressively. "Look into everyone. Trust no one."

This was... unexpected. In that moment, when he spoke of the day it happened, he seemed almost... vulnerable. Human. Like all the chaotic ego had finally cracked and fallen to the ground, revealing something of the person he'd perhaps once been. Not that she'd thought he was evil through to his core, very few people are. People from the real world, that is. That's why she came here after all, to appeal to whatever shred of humanity was left in him. She just did not expect to actually find it. Worst, by far, she did not expect to feel anything if she did. But there it was, a man who lost his son and hurt so much it broke him. And she felt... bad. Sorry. Even a little ashamed for her ill opinion of him.

She had to think fast to catch the ID as he shoved it at her, unnecessarily harshly. But she didn't mind. She saw why. She held the ID in her hand and angled it a little as she looked at it, her mind filled with questions that needed answers, throwing themselves against a wall of certainty that if she pushed him now there was no predicting how he could erupt and everything they'd just agreed could blow up just like that. Oath or no. He was volatile enough to act long before he'd give himself a chance to think. No, she didn't dare to push him any further right now on this subject. She needed to come at this from a different angle.

"Would you mind if I visited your home in order to gather more information about the crime, Your Grace?"

Thanqol

2018-06-14, 10:00 PM

"Stolen Stars," he says.

"What else?"

Is he trying to haggle?

Mercia looked at the Pilgrim askew. She couldn't get a read on him. Did she want to? Was there some hidden world behind those monosyllabic responses that could fill the hole where her heart was? If she broke him on the rack what stories would come tumbling out?

"What else?" she asked, sounding the phrase out. "Well, I could offer you a kiss. Again, to use or trade as suits you."

Jack shrank back from the terrible visage of the Huntress, slipping into the Pilgrim's shadow like a dog behind its master's legs.

His fear of her was soon joined by another fear at her words and the reaction of the Market. If they refused her offer - and what kind of friend would he be if he thought only of himself, and not of others? - it was like painting a target on their backs, was it not? They were holding something of tremendous value all of a sudden, and the whole market knew it - or would soon, the way word gets around. What were the chances they would be walking away without someone trying to cash in on the offer in their place?

Jack looked around, trying to get a sense of the dangers around him - not from the Huntress, for hers was a known danger right now, but from the Market around them.

[Wits+Composure? Investigation?]

[Wits+streetwise is, I think, the proper dice pool to get a read on the scum of the Market. Went ahead and rolled for you]

So Mercia has something that any hob would give his right arm for. It's one of the most valuable currencies the Market can possess - a favour, backed by the bank of a badass huntsman. So why didn't she just drop this coin a bit earlier and win the auction rather than do this staredown thing with you?

Well, you hear it in the fearful lamentations and talon-gnawing of an overweight and molting lion. If Mercia gets her hands on that contract she isn't going to use it for a year. She's just going to destroy it. Permanently removing wealth from the ecosystem of the Market, and removing a deal that drags in a bounty from Prosperpine every year that feeds the Market's hunger. They don't like that, and they don't like her.

But they do all fear her. Not one of them is going to put themselves at risk even slightly. But they're goblins, and not one of them is going to resist the urge to pick the pocket of someone who's fallen down.

Then, still looking over his shoulder, he stepped out - but not too far - from Isaac's shadow. "We didn't win it for ourselves," he says, filling himself and his voice with as much of Winter's ice as he can. "It isn't ours to bargain away."

"Then steal it," said Mercia bluntly. "It's in your hands so it will be easy. Do it, or else I will declare a hunt against you, now."

[Does refusing her offer count as putting himself at risk to provide for someone else (the town)? Asking since that'd be a Willpower regain.]

Sure!

It's complicated. I mean, really. What do you call the combination of fear and elation? The possibility of joy and the panic of being trapped and a small part of the mind suppressing things that it knows are there but has absolutely zero clue how to handle all mixing together. That's what Aelas is feeling.

"Why does he think that's a kidnapper? Why even a Changeling, and not a Huntsman or a goblin, or just some really awful luck?"
Yes, stall, Aelas, ask other questions, don't volunteer for anything. Definitely don't volunteer for anything, you're not going to give up what you just got back, definitely not.

Static paused meaningfully at that question.

"It could be any of those things," she said. "He didn't check."

She looks like she's mulling over the next words carefully, but seems to repeatedly decide against saying something. The vibe you get is that she's a little uncomfortable even seeming to question the King behind his back. If you want to hear her full thoughts there's some sort of roll.

This was... unexpected. In that moment, when he spoke of the day it happened, he seemed almost... vulnerable. Human. Like all the chaotic ego had finally cracked and fallen to the ground, revealing something of the person he'd perhaps once been. Not that she'd thought he was evil through to his core, very few people are. People from the real world, that is. That's why she came here after all, to appeal to whatever shred of humanity was left in him. She just did not expect to actually find it. Worst, by far, she did not expect to feel anything if she did. But there it was, a man who lost his son and hurt so much it broke him. And she felt... bad. Sorry. Even a little ashamed for her ill opinion of him.

She had to think fast to catch the ID as he shoved it at her, unnecessarily harshly. But she didn't mind. She saw why. She held the ID in her hand and angled it a little as she looked at it, her mind filled with questions that needed answers, throwing themselves against a wall of certainty that if she pushed him now there was no predicting how he could erupt and everything they'd just agreed could blow up just like that. Oath or no. He was volatile enough to act long before he'd give himself a chance to think. No, she didn't dare to push him any further right now on this subject. She needed to come at this from a different angle.

"Would you mind if I visited your home in order to gather more information about the crime, Your Grace?"

"Do it," he said tersely. Conveniently, there's an address on the back of the name badge. "I haven't been back," he adds quietly.

For a moment the crown of flame upon his head dims slightly.

Then he snarls and turns around to face the furnace once more.

Raz_Fox

2018-06-14, 11:30 PM

There are ways these things are done. Out comes the contract from its hiding-hole against the Pilgrim’s skin, and isn’t it just the center of everyone’s attention all of a sudden? Leaves the Pilgrim just the mark who’s holding it. Center of attention, center of the crowd.

If he were Edmund he could do some speechifying here. Shame the Huntsman for daring to think they would be traitors, for thinking they were cowards. He is not Edmund.

He makes a real big show of replacing it, even as a flash of blue lands upon his shoulders, and Zotzie gives a polite bob of the wings to the Huntsman in her splendor.

The words come out of him, strained and rough, but still: these are words he knows, and knows well.

“Come and have a go if you think you’re hard enough.”

Where the Pilgrim stands is now a figure of smoke, strands and wisps, with licks of flame and jewels shining from within (for even here the gifts of the Market can be seen), and here and there a blue curl of plumage.

Catch if catch can, for that smoke’s already boiling through the cloud at speed, daring, challenging her to keep up, and if Jack has any sense he’ll bolt in the other direction.

Elanorin

2018-06-15, 05:23 AM

"Do it," he said tersely. Conveniently, there's an address on the back of the name badge. "I haven't been back," he adds quietly.

For a moment the crown of flame upon his head dims slightly.

Then he snarls and turns around to face the furnace once more.

Oh.

Her stomach tied a little knot on itself.

"Then... where are you staying? Just... so I know where to find you... to report," Lily asked, trying her damndest to not feel sorry for him.

Then, without knowing why, "While I'm there, is there anything you'd like me to fetch for you, Your Grace?"

stveje

2018-06-15, 01:47 PM

Jack is not the one with the contract.

Dragging him around will only slow her down.

She's not going to just kill him.

If he runs, she'll probably chase after the Pilgrim. If she gives chase at all.

If he stays, the same.

He could maybe buy Isaac a bit of time by getting in her way, or ... he could make her think he has the contract and potentially buy Isaac a LOT of time. She already knows him for a thief, and she just voiced the thought herself, making it fresh in her mind. It might just work.

Jack darts right through the smoky trail of the Pilgrim and out the other side, making a show of slipping something down his dress as he makes a run for it. He wants her to see it but think she wasn't supposed to see it (and if the Gobs think it too, all the better). He wants her to think he stole the contract and hoped she wouldn't notice.

It's a dangerous plan. Hopefully he can worm himself out of it, too. That's the next worry, but first ...

[Manipulation+Subterfuge = 6: 4, 8, 8, 3, 5, 10, ten again 1

I think I get to add Mantle because I'm obscuring the truth: 6, 5, 7

Any penalties, just subtract from the end.]

Glamor 3/10
Willpower: 4/4
Clarity: [ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ]
Health: [ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ]

TheAmishPirate

2018-06-15, 03:25 PM

"Rich... in spirit?" said Gustav. "I mean, that's clearly what you're going for here. A place with personality! A place where everybody knows your name! A place that would be the je ne se quois in a town where fine eating means Hungry Jack's or that one Indian place. And who doesn't like to be a big fish, am I right? Pillar of the community? And what's money compared to influence? That's what we're after here, right? What's a sword without a place to hold the sword?"

Edmund’s heart turned to frost. He casually reached back to scratch at his head, and anybody with two eyes could see that his strange gesture could be accomplishing any number of things, but relieving an itchy scalp was not one of them. Unless you’d seen him, bedecked in royal finery and ready for blood, you might not realize the prince was reaching for where a sword might be.

He felt something there; a desire, a longing to be in his hand if he’d only just close his fingers and will it so. But importantly, he didn’t feel the hilt. The sword was not on his back, only there in spirit. He could breathe again.

Awful strange turn of phrase that Gustav used there. Maybe...maybe that’s just the way elderly con artists talk around here? And he hadn’t a thing to worry about?

Yeah. This was gonna come back to bite him.

Gustav seems to have talked himself into agreeing with you by way of agreeing with himself. "Anyway what's important is that we're going to make a lot of something."

“Uh...yeah. Yeah, that’s exactly it.” He blinked, nodding. “See, we don’t have a problem.”

...wait, wasn’t that supposed to be Gustav’s line?

“So. When do we start?” Yes, yes, he was totally still in control of this situation, a master negotiator, definitely not scrambling to maintain his hard-won initiative.

Thanqol

2018-06-15, 07:27 PM

The words come out of him, strained and rough, but still: these are words he knows, and knows well.

“Come and have a go if you think you’re hard enough.”

Where the Pilgrim stands is now a figure of smoke, strands and wisps, with licks of flame and jewels shining from within (for even here the gifts of the Market can be seen), and here and there a blue curl of plumage.

Catch if catch can, for that smoke’s already boiling through the cloud at speed, daring, challenging her to keep up, and if Jack has any sense he’ll bolt in the other direction.

Jack darts right through the smoky trail of the Pilgrim and out the other side, making a show of slipping something down his dress as he makes a run for it. He wants her to see it but think she wasn't supposed to see it (and if the Gobs think it too, all the better). He wants her to think he stole the contract and hoped she wouldn't notice.

It's a dangerous plan. Hopefully he can worm himself out of it, too. That's the next worry, but first ...

[Manipulation+Subterfuge = 6: 4, 8, 8, 3, 5, 10, ten again 1

I think I get to add Mantle because I'm obscuring the truth: 6, 5, 7

Any penalties, just subtract from the end.]

Mercia chases neither of you. She stands where she is, firm and tall, and declares ritually: "Jack Gladwin, you have been summoned back to your home and your master. Return. Return. Return or you shall be returned. Ready yourself, bury yourself, hide under the leaves of Autumn for soon the hunt begins."

She plants her sword in the ground and waits.

She's giving you a head start. Formally required to by the protection of Autumn that is the reward for society subjugating itself to kings and courts and the madness of seasons.

She's also declaring relentlessly against you and you alone. Perhaps that's a success.

Oh.

Her stomach tied a little knot on itself.

"Then... where are you staying? Just... so I know where to find you... to report," Lily asked, trying her damndest to not feel sorry for him.

Then, without knowing why, "While I'm there, is there anything you'd like me to fetch for you, Your Grace?"

"I stay in my car. Someone here will know where to find me," said the King. "I don't need anything. Now get out."

[Empathy: success] He is totally lying about that. He for sure needs things. Nothing that will remind him of going back, but you get the impression that he doesn't have many changes of clothes or basic conveniences.

“Uh...yeah. Yeah, that’s exactly it.” He blinked, nodding. “See, we don’t have a problem.”

...wait, wasn’t that supposed to be Gustav’s line?

“So. When do we start?” Yes, yes, he was totally still in control of this situation, a master negotiator, definitely not scrambling to maintain his hard-won initiative.

"When we're finished drinking, obviously!" said Gustav, breaking out a bottle of sparkling Australian white.

Time untethers; you can now drift over the days and weeks of preparation and purchasing to the day you are ready to open your doors.

TheAmishPirate

2018-06-16, 01:30 PM

Time untethers; you can now drift over the days and weeks of preparation and purchasing to the day you are ready to open your doors.

Who's coming to take this from me?

That's the thought running through Edmund's head. That's the anxiety that keeps him from sleeping, and sets his fingers to trembling as he gets dressed for the big day. The menu? Bah. Food is food, and he can cook food. The success of opening day? The quality of his employees? Whether or not he's about to lose all his money forever? If he can get to the point in time when those become legitimate fears, then he'll be a happy man.

It had been what; days? Weeks? Weeks of going off-script. His participation in Court functions was at a bare minimum. Most of his free time was absorbed by his own dreams, by his own choice. This was the part of the show where it all fell apart. If ever there was to be a time for the script to rear its head, and pull him back kicking and screaming to the throne, it would be today. Somebody who wouldn't take 'no' for an answer, something he couldn't turn away from, and for the fifth time this morning he shut his eyes from the world and filled his head with the sound of his own breathing. And for the first time this morning, he wished he didn't have to make the trip alone.

One bus ride. One half-mile walk. One door.

Time to find out who's writing this story.

stveje

2018-06-16, 02:22 PM

Mercia chases neither of you. She stands where she is, firm and tall, and declares ritually: "Jack Gladwin, you have been summoned back to your home and your master. Return. Return. Return or you shall be returned. Ready yourself, bury yourself, hide under the leaves of Autumn for soon the hunt begins."

She plants her sword in the ground and waits.

She's giving you a head start. Formally required to by the protection of Autumn that is the reward for society subjugating itself to kings and courts and the madness of seasons.

She's also declaring relentlessly against you and you alone. Perhaps that's a success.

A head start is a gift not to be wasted. Jack has no intention of being caught, but he didn't get to be the man he is today by putting all his money on one horse. If he can create a fake contract, a forgery, perhaps it can yet be leveraged in case she catches him sooner than he'd like. Right now he needs a place to hide, a place where he can lay low and make such a forgery ... or failing that, someone to sell him a forgery.

Elanorin

2018-06-18, 03:15 PM

"I stay in my car. Someone here will know where to find me," said the King. "I don't need anything. Now get out."

[Empathy: success] He is totally lying about that. He for sure needs things. Nothing that will remind him of going back, but you get the impression that he doesn't have many changes of clothes or basic conveniences.

Lily bowed her head at the order and then did a little curtsy. "Your Grace," she said, accepting.

"I will try to acquire a phone as soon as possible, when I do I will pass you my number so you can reach me. In the meantime, I'm staying with The King of Winter, and can be found there."

With that she didn't dare to stay any longer and backed away several steps before she turned and hurried off. Was the nice three-faced man still there with the forklift? If so she'd leap back on, if not she'd try to run back, despite being drenched in sweat already.

Anarion

2018-06-18, 04:27 PM

Static paused meaningfully at that question.

"It could be any of those things," she said. "He didn't check."

She looks like she's mulling over the next words carefully, but seems to repeatedly decide against saying something. The vibe you get is that she's a little uncomfortable even seeming to question the King behind his back. If you want to hear her full thoughts there's some sort of roll.

"Is there something else?" Aelas puts a hand on Static's arm. A gentle one, opening herself to touch. "I feel like there's something you're not saying here, and maybe it's important? I really want to help, I promise."

[both manipulation+persuasion and presence+persuasion are the same dice pool, so here's that pool. 7d10=1, 10, 4, 6, 8, 1, 5 and a 1 on the 10 again. 2 successes. ]

Thanqol

2018-06-18, 05:52 PM

"Is there something else?" Aelas puts a hand on Static's arm. A gentle one, opening herself to touch. "I feel like there's something you're not saying here, and maybe it's important? I really want to help, I promise."

[both manipulation+persuasion and presence+persuasion are the same dice pool, so here's that pool. 7d10=1, 10, 4, 6, 8, 1, 5 and a 1 on the 10 again. 2 successes. ]

Static looks at you, and it's not the expression you were expecting.

"Breton is an idiot," she said, voice low and boiling with an anger that was concealed under stillness. "He is an emotional train wreck. He is narcissistic and incapable of seeing beyond his own problems. He believes the height of strategy is to get together and ride around on motorcycles. He is a garbageman by trade because he has no education to do anything greater. He is prolonging the season of Summer unnaturally because he fears the coming of Autumn, a secret that will make Autumn nightmarishly powerful when it is exposed. His only claim to rule is based on a single accomplishment in the past. He is a bad ruler. I would make a better ruler. I should rule."

Blue flames lick at the corner of her eyes as she makes eye contact with you. It's the first time she's done this. Static has always been controlled, distant, avoiding direct challenge but now that seems merely a strategy to conceal the intensity of her passions. "I accept your promise of help," she says, and so, by the Wyrd, you are bound.

Careful about what you promise.

Lily bowed her head at the order and then did a little curtsy. "Your Grace," she said, accepting.

"I will try to acquire a phone as soon as possible, when I do I will pass you my number so you can reach me. In the meantime, I'm staying with The King of Winter, and can be found there."

With that she didn't dare to stay any longer and backed away several steps before she turned and hurried off. Was the nice three-faced man still there with the forklift? If so she'd leap back on, if not she'd try to run back, despite being drenched in sweat already.

Hectae has been waiting patiently - he's too good a bloke to leave a nice lady to walk through a literal mountain of garbage by herself. Good thing too, because as soon as you're out of the furnace room the cold autumn wind hits you like a truck. Brr.

But as far as your schedule goes, despite everything happening with the King you've got a date with a Prince. Edmond's bar is due to open right now and you did pledge to go.

Who's coming to take this from me?

That's the thought running through Edmund's head. That's the anxiety that keeps him from sleeping, and sets his fingers to trembling as he gets dressed for the big day. The menu? Bah. Food is food, and he can cook food. The success of opening day? The quality of his employees? Whether or not he's about to lose all his money forever? If he can get to the point in time when those become legitimate fears, then he'll be a happy man.

It had been what; days? Weeks? Weeks of going off-script. His participation in Court functions was at a bare minimum. Most of his free time was absorbed by his own dreams, by his own choice. This was the part of the show where it all fell apart. If ever there was to be a time for the script to rear its head, and pull him back kicking and screaming to the throne, it would be today. Somebody who wouldn't take 'no' for an answer, something he couldn't turn away from, and for the fifth time this morning he shut his eyes from the world and filled his head with the sound of his own breathing. And for the first time this morning, he wished he didn't have to make the trip alone.

One bus ride. One half-mile walk. One door.

Time to find out who's writing this story.

The first person through the door is an exhausted looking mother of three, kids in tow, saying "I heard this place has a daycare,"

Maybe leaving the marketing campaign to Gustav wasn't your bestest move.

A head start is a gift not to be wasted. Jack has no intention of being caught, but he didn't get to be the man he is today by putting all his money on one horse. If he can create a fake contract, a forgery, perhaps it can yet be leveraged in case she catches him sooner than he'd like. Right now he needs a place to hide, a place where he can lay low and make such a forgery ... or failing that, someone to sell him a forgery.

When people run away in the Market, the goblins don't get out of their way. You've got three goblins running alongside you, each huffing and puffing red-faced and trying to sell you on hiding places, magical shoes that will let you jump over the moon, an Apple Watch that will tell you how many steps you need to run for before you get away, and any other way they can cram a bargain down the throat of a motivated seller. What are you offering?

*

Mercia stands quietly in the market square. After a little while she pulls a newspaper out of her bag and starts reading it.

Anarion

2018-06-18, 11:23 PM

Static looks at you, and it's not the expression you were expecting.

"Breton is an idiot," she said, voice low and boiling with an anger that was concealed under stillness. "He is an emotional train wreck. He is narcissistic and incapable of seeing beyond his own problems. He believes the height of strategy is to get together and ride around on motorcycles. He is a garbageman by trade because he has no education to do anything greater. He is prolonging the season of Summer unnaturally because he fears the coming of Autumn, a secret that will make Autumn nightmarishly powerful when it is exposed. His only claim to rule is based on a single accomplishment in the past. He is a bad ruler. I would make a better ruler. I should rule."

Blue flames lick at the corner of her eyes as she makes eye contact with you. It's the first time she's done this. Static has always been controlled, distant, avoiding direct challenge but now that seems merely a strategy to conceal the intensity of her passions. "I accept your promise of help," she says, and so, by the Wyrd, you are bound.

Careful about what you promise.

"I'm glad" Aelas smiles and lets the Wyrd settle upon her. Her hair shifts a distinctive red for a moment before settling back to its rest state of a glowing blond. A committed promise to help. Yes, that was good. She thought what Breton was doing was pretty stupid even before Static had brought up how it was empowering Autumn in a scary way. And she liked Static. "Thanks for showing me this..." she gestures at the flames, at Static as a whole. "I get where you're coming from, it's not, like, my thing exactly, but I get it and I'm glad you showed me that you're feeling something, y'know? That's what we came back for, I think. Even if for me, it's more about Joy and fun and stuff, I still get how that flows into summer."

Aelas realizes she's sort of rambling and shuts up for a second, looking contemplative. "So, what now? You want me to talk to some of the others for you?"

Raz_Fox

2018-06-19, 04:48 AM

The Pilgrim is, unfortunately, already moving at high speeds back towards Prosperpine. Chalk it down to the confluence of various factors, but he hasn't cottoned on to the fact that the hunt's been declared against Jack- he's already gone, gone, gone, baby.

I leave it up to our spinner of the story as to where adventure finds him again; it could be out in the Hedge, true, but he's a slippery one and has legs that can tear up earth something fierce, so perhaps he'll end up among the Autumnal people, or stumble out of a door right in front of our lady Lily.

stveje

2018-06-19, 05:46 AM

When people run away in the Market, the goblins don't get out of their way. You've got three goblins running alongside you, each huffing and puffing red-faced and trying to sell you on hiding places, magical shoes that will let you jump over the moon, an Apple Watch that will tell you how many steps you need to run for before you get away, and any other way they can cram a bargain down the throat of a motivated seller. What are you offering?

Jack stops as if struck by lightning.

Jack Gladwin, you have been summoned back to your home and your master. Return. Return. Return or you shall be returned.

Mercia's voice rumbles in his mind like the echo of thunder.

Jack Gladwin, you have been summoned.

Jack Gladwin.

"My name," he says.

Elanorin

2018-06-20, 01:27 PM

Hectae has been waiting patiently - he's too good a bloke to leave a nice lady to walk through a literal mountain of garbage by herself. Good thing too, because as soon as you're out of the furnace room the cold autumn wind hits you like a truck. Brr.

But as far as your schedule goes, despite everything happening with the King you've got a date with a Prince. Edmond's bar is due to open right now and you did pledge to go.

Is that the time?!

Thank goodness for him indeed. Lift by forklift gratefully accepted. Lily had a lot to think about. And a lot to feel about. She felt exhausted after her meeting with the King and most of all she just wanted to go back to the house and collapse on the little foldout bed with the squeaky springs and sleep. And hide.

Isaac. Unbidden the image of the frightful monster ally summoned itself in her mind. It took her several moments to let it fade.

She had promised so much, and she had no idea how she'd deliver even half of it. But she had no choice.

She breathed a deep sigh and wiped her brow. It was actually a relief to come out to the cool air again, even if she felt somewhat self conscious and smelly now. She was in such a need of a shower. Surely being a little late was preferable to showing up like something the cat dragged in to his grand opening.

As they got back to the forecourt she made sure to thank the forklift driver warmly, ask him politely for his number in case she needed him now that she was in the service of the king, before finding Aelas.

"Aelas?" Lily called from a few steps away, far enough to be out of earshot of normal conversation. She could see she was talking to someone and it was rude to intrude so she made her approach known while they had time to conclude their discussion.

Thanqol

2018-06-20, 07:36 PM

Jack stops as if struck by lightning.

Jack Gladwin, you have been summoned back to your home and your master. Return. Return. Return or you shall be returned.

Mercia's voice rumbles in his mind like the echo of thunder.

Jack Gladwin, you have been summoned.

Jack Gladwin.

"My name," he says.

Oh Jack. The name your mother gave you?

Firstly, take a point of Aggravated Clarity Damage automatically, no roll. This is something even the Gentry would consider to be a bit f*cked up. You're a real, permanent step closer to becoming another Goblin in the Market.

Next, the consequences. You're losing your name. And it's not going to be as easy as picking up a nickname either; they'll just slide off. Just naturally they'll warp and evolve, and you'll never really be more than 'hey, you'. You're cut off from the bureaucratic mechanisms of society and everything that means.

But hey, you've got a sense for how to bargain with goblins and despite your position as a motivated seller you can command a high price for something like this. The goblin lawyers who run the paperwork (had it ready, really) make sure that all the technicalities involved in something so legalistically tricky work out in your favour. You remain party to all of your fae Contracts, can still make oaths, and are still entitled to the protection of the Seasons. They also point out that this makes some things super tricky: A Huntsman who gives you warning in Autumn has only a very limited window to find you before your namelessness morphs a bit and they need to warn you again. In Winter, if you are killed, then the Huntsman would be unable to properly mourn you without your name, which will work out especially badly for them. In Spring you cannot be hunted - a Huntsman encountered by pure coincidence, who was sent to find you, would be able to attack you opportunistically but they could not run a premediated hunt. Summer offers no protection.

They throw in the apple watch as a bonus, mark it as a Goblin Contract. Using it adds a point of Goblin Debt, but it then gives you a number of steps to run before you Get Away. You don't need to run in any particular direction and can even jog on the spot, as long as you hit whatever number it gives you it will make sure you Get Away no matter what is chasing you. So if you get cornered by a monster, you barricade yourself in a broom closet, and then you start jogging then you'll be able to get out.

It costs 1 Glamour to activate, but the Loophole lets you use it for free if you let it post the location you escaped to on the internet.

"I'm glad" Aelas smiles and lets the Wyrd settle upon her. Her hair shifts a distinctive red for a moment before settling back to its rest state of a glowing blond. A committed promise to help. Yes, that was good. She thought what Breton was doing was pretty stupid even before Static had brought up how it was empowering Autumn in a scary way. And she liked Static. "Thanks for showing me this..." she gestures at the flames, at Static as a whole. "I get where you're coming from, it's not, like, my thing exactly, but I get it and I'm glad you showed me that you're feeling something, y'know? That's what we came back for, I think. Even if for me, it's more about Joy and fun and stuff, I still get how that flows into summer."

Aelas realizes she's sort of rambling and shuts up for a second, looking contemplative. "So, what now? You want me to talk to some of the others for you?"

"Well -" said Static, but then:

The Pilgrim is, unfortunately, already moving at high speeds back towards Prosperpine. Chalk it down to the confluence of various factors, but he hasn't cottoned on to the fact that the hunt's been declared against Jack- he's already gone, gone, gone, baby.

I leave it up to our spinner of the story as to where adventure finds him again; it could be out in the Hedge, true, but he's a slippery one and has legs that can tear up earth something fierce, so perhaps he'll end up among the Autumnal people, or stumble out of a door right in front of our lady Lily.

"Aelas?" Lily called from a few steps away, far enough to be out of earshot of normal conversation. She could see she was talking to someone and it was rude to intrude so she made her approach known while they had time to conclude their discussion.

Lily steps out from behind a pile of trash bags, and then the spiciest man in flavourtown bursts out of nowhere, frosted tips gleaming in the sunlight.

You're all together again, go ahead!

*

"Hey, what happened?" said Longarms, approaching the Flower Knight, hucking a squirming bag over his shoulder and eating a meringue with his other hand.

"I declared my hunt," said Mercia.

Longarms stared at her blankly. "In the market?"

"Yes,"

Longarms let out a long, slow sigh. "I thought you were the responsible one."

Raz_Fox

2018-06-21, 02:54 AM

One of the advantages of our being an audience a step removed from the proceedings is getting to know what’s really going on, and in this instance, let me give it to you straight: the Pilgrim is embarrassed.

It’s not the top layer of his psyche, certainly. That’s his regular relief to see that Aelas and Lily are doing all right, and there’s no calamity come out of the night against them. (They might be surprised to know there’s a movement like the delicate wings of white moths inside him when he sees then. Or they might not be. They all came out of Fairyland together, after all.) And roiling around that’s the Quest: the treasure’s been claimed, but if he lies down and rests he might have it stolen by a serpent while he sleeps, or consumed by fire racing across the sand. The subtle heave of his shoulders as he breathes; he’s been flying fast, and there’s an exertion even to the pace of smoke moving hard against the wind. The way his head moves, slow and wary, like an animal that has smelled blood across the expanse of the savannah, hearing the crunch and hiss and mechanical tolling of alarms crying out, pistons at work, pistons at work, watch your fingers my lad, for you’re on Summer’s turf now (and there’s not a corner of Prosperpine that’s not seen him lately, if only in passing).

But also, it cannot be ignored that he is standing in front of Aelas and Lily, and his terrible grandeur has been quite undercut. It is one thing to be a monster; it is another thing entirely to look like one is attempting to be stylish despite one’s deformity, and doing quite badly at it. Also, there’s a goblin bat rubbing their tummy on the cold, wet expanse of his frosted tips and leering cheerfully at everyone involved.

“Top of the afternoon, ladies,” Zotzie says, bright as a button. They start to form another word, and then double-take at their surroundings. “Hell-o! I didn’t realize that door was going to take us to the buffet! Should have known, it did look a particularly enticing bush. Hold up, hold up, big guy, pass me that bag- that one, yessssss. Prime Mickey Dee’s. Their cardboard is sodding divinity on properly aged fish.”

Now there is a black trash bag of dripping McDonald’s trash draped over his black-and-orange-and-red-and-blue flame decal shirt. And Zotzie is rubbing their tiny thieving wings together with glee.

If anyone here had anything like respect for the Pilgrim, now would be a good time to reevaluate.

Almost defensively, the Pilgrim reaches in to his shirt with two crooked fingers and lets the contract peek out for a moment. “Huntsman at market,” he says. Then, almost as an afterthought, “Mercia. Knight of Flowers. Slave of Lover Awaiting.”

“She straight-up tried to jank the contract in front of everyone,” Zotzie adds, chipper as they come. “Offered the big guy a favor for it. And he said no, of course, because the more enticing the offer the more he’s gonna guilt-trip himself over it.” The bat glances down and adds, in an almost nostalgic tone, “Ain’t that so, Mountie?”

The Pilgrim relaxes noticeably. “As you say, Osprey,” he says, a call-and-response so old it’s second nature.

Anarion

2018-06-21, 11:39 AM

Well, Static was going to say something else, but now she's not, and Aelas wouldn't want to presume of course, and now some of her friends are back together, so that's a yay! regardless of what else is happening. "Pilgrim! Wow, um, what happened? Oh, and hi Lily, how did your meeting go with the king? I made up with Static and we're friends now, I know you both wanted me to do that, and I'm really sorry about not doing it earlier, but I really had to do something else, but then I did that and now I did this, and uh...did you say Huntsman? I think maybe they visited my...um...my old house earlier, especially that flower one, that's pretty specific there can't be that many people that look like that right?"

TheAmishPirate

2018-06-22, 03:49 PM

The first person through the door is an exhausted looking mother of three, kids in tow, saying "I heard this place has a daycare,"

Maybe leaving the marketing campaign to Gustav wasn't your bestest move.

Woah woah woah, hold on a second. You think Edmund's working the front door? If he'd wanted social contact, then he wouldn't have spent the last month ignoring everybody and opening a restaurant. Though to be fair, "what Edmund wants" was a highly classified subject, a word which here means, "stuffed in a nondescript envelope and jammed into the most poorly-labeled filing cabinet in his brain, to be discussed at a future date that would never come." What he did know was that he enjoyed cooking at all times, and small talk on his own terms. That meant he ran the show from the kitchen, and whoever he'd hired on as wait staff would handle the interpersonal things.

For Edmund to be involved in this situation means one of two things; either his staff hasn't arrived yet, or they took one look at the situation and went for the proverbial panic button. Both are possible, so here he is. Exactly where he didn't want to be.

“Ma’am, this is a restaurant," He said flatly, from behind the bar (because what manner of establishment would this be if there wasn't a bar?) "If you leave your kids here, I will get hauled away for child labor, and that's gonna be bad for business.”

“...best I can do for you is a cup of coffee.” His gentler tone - and more importantly, the pot of coffee he'd started - showed it to be a serious offer.

[If she's willing to stay for a cup of coffee, and willing to be a little less tired, then Edmund will loophole the heck out of Gift of Warm Breath.]

Thanqol

2018-06-24, 05:33 PM

Woah woah woah, hold on a second. You think Edmund's working the front door? If he'd wanted social contact, then he wouldn't have spent the last month ignoring everybody and opening a restaurant. Though to be fair, "what Edmund wants" was a highly classified subject, a word which here means, "stuffed in a nondescript envelope and jammed into the most poorly-labeled filing cabinet in his brain, to be discussed at a future date that would never come." What he did know was that he enjoyed cooking at all times, and small talk on his own terms. That meant he ran the show from the kitchen, and whoever he'd hired on as wait staff would handle the interpersonal things.

For Edmund to be involved in this situation means one of two things; either his staff hasn't arrived yet, or they took one look at the situation and went for the proverbial panic button. Both are possible, so here he is. Exactly where he didn't want to be.

“Ma’am, this is a restaurant," He said flatly, from behind the bar (because what manner of establishment would this be if there wasn't a bar?) "If you leave your kids here, I will get hauled away for child labor, and that's gonna be bad for business.”

“...best I can do for you is a cup of coffee.” His gentler tone - and more importantly, the pot of coffee he'd started - showed it to be a serious offer.

[If she's willing to stay for a cup of coffee, and willing to be a little less tired, then Edmund will loophole the heck out of Gift of Warm Breath.]

"But - I heard -" for a moment total frantic desperation shows in her eyes, before it all suddenly and abruptly collapses. "Yeah, in retrospect I was silly for thinking that a restaurant would have a daycare. I'll have that coffee. Thank you."

The sudden, broken transition between fear and hope and sorrow is... a powerful thing. Winter stirs in its sleep and a fine glitter of frost rolls over the bar. This lady is sad and disappointed - but she'll deal with it. Glamour rises in the air, soft and light, like steam from a frozen tree in the dawn. (You can make a Harvest roll if you want).

A few minutes later four big guys burst in through the front door. "Yo dude, I heard you had a spa and massage parlour! Where do we go for that?"

"Excuse me," a timid voice comes a moment later. "Is this the new book club?"

A dude in sunglasses with an oiled-back ponytail: "This is the new restaurant/eSports café, right?"

People keep coming in through that door, each carrying with them all their hopes and dreams. Each of them desperately wants some certain thing to come to this tiny town. And you'll have to stomp on every singe one of them.

How do you do it?

Elanorin

2018-06-24, 06:17 PM

Lily was utterly stunned to see Isaac suddenly appear. While she was beginning to grasp that such strange things were perhaps not as impossible as she once thought she couldn't entirely shake a tiny feeling of thrill-lined guilt. She had just thought of him. Seen him, clear as day in her mind, and then he'd just appeared. Like she'd called him. Like he knew. Surely not.

No matter what it was a relief. It was a relief seeing Aelas and it was a relief seeing Isaac. The walls paused their approach for a few moments and Lily smiled, albeit briefly. And, wait, what was he wearing?

"You're safe," was Lily's reply to Aelas on how her meeting had gone. It was the part that mattered. "Pleased to meet you, Static," she said and reached out a hand to the gargoyle in greeting.

Then a cloud came over her at the mention of huntsmen, and her face fell even more at the mention of Lover Awaiting. Her mouth felt dry and the walls resumed their steady pace inwards. "H-huntsman?" she managed, looking to Isaac, but mentally already packing her bags and trying to think where they might run to next. She glanced at the contract as he revealed it and frowned a little, "you have a plan?"

stveje

2018-06-25, 01:22 PM

Oh Jack. The name your mother gave you?

Firstly, take a point of Aggravated Clarity Damage automatically, no roll. This is something even the Gentry would consider to be a bit f*cked up. You're a real, permanent step closer to becoming another Goblin in the Market.

Next, the consequences. You're losing your name. And it's not going to be as easy as picking up a nickname either; they'll just slide off. Just naturally they'll warp and evolve, and you'll never really be more than 'hey, you'. You're cut off from the bureaucratic mechanisms of society and everything that means.

But hey, you've got a sense for how to bargain with goblins and despite your position as a motivated seller you can command a high price for something like this. The goblin lawyers who run the paperwork (had it ready, really) make sure that all the technicalities involved in something so legalistically tricky work out in your favour. You remain party to all of your fae Contracts, can still make oaths, and are still entitled to the protection of the Seasons. They also point out that this makes some things super tricky: A Huntsman who gives you warning in Autumn has only a very limited window to find you before your namelessness morphs a bit and they need to warn you again. In Winter, if you are killed, then the Huntsman would be unable to properly mourn you without your name, which will work out especially badly for them. In Spring you cannot be hunted - a Huntsman encountered by pure coincidence, who was sent to find you, would be able to attack you opportunistically but they could not run a premediated hunt. Summer offers no protection.

They throw in the apple watch as a bonus, mark it as a Goblin Contract. Using it adds a point of Goblin Debt, but it then gives you a number of steps to run before you Get Away. You don't need to run in any particular direction and can even jog on the spot, as long as you hit whatever number it gives you it will make sure you Get Away no matter what is chasing you. So if you get cornered by a monster, you barricade yourself in a broom closet, and then you start jogging then you'll be able to get out.

It costs 1 Glamour to activate, but the Loophole lets you use it for free if you let it post the location you escaped to on the internet.

Jack suspects his mother didn't think very long or very hard about the name she gave him, evidenced by the slightly less generic names of his two adopted sisters, Emily and Faye. Had she cared, had she blessed him with a different name, perhaps he would have become a different man. But she didn't, and Jack became what he is, a thief ... and not the first thief to leave their name, their identity, their whole life behind ... faking your death is a time-honored tradition among crooks and con artists.

Selling your name to a random goblin is not as big and dramatic as faking your own fiery death, so you can't even warm yourself on the fact that you got a show out of it. No one will write poetically about Jack's dramatic death, or if they do it won't really be about him, but his imposter self ... he briefly wonders how this deal will affect his Fetch, if at all.

Then it's done, and the [Con] Artist Formerly Known as Jack feels the cold fingers of bereavement and the loss of something essential, a connection to his human life. For all that his mother never loved him as much as she loved his sisters, and for all that he's always been a thief, and for all that he's used to giving of himself ... he feels it. And he'll grieve and mourn ... but first he'll survive.

First he'll find a place to hide.

Question: If he lets the watch post where he disappeared to on the Internet, where anyone can see, how can he Get Away? If his new location is known to - potentially - all, surely he hasn't Gotten Away?

*

Health: [ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ]
Clarity: [A][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ]
Willpower: [x][x][x][x]
Glamor: [x][x][x][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ]
Goblin debt: 0

Thanqol

2018-06-25, 05:37 PM

First he'll find a place to hide.

Question: If he lets the watch post where he disappeared to on the Internet, where anyone can see, how can he Get Away? If his new location is known to - potentially - all, surely he hasn't Gotten Away?

The Internet is a big place, Jack. Just because something goes up there doesn't mean that the whole world knows about it. It'd take someone with a pretty good grasp of Computers to be able to track you that way.

(Also Getting Away doesn't mean Safe Forever. It means they completely lose track of you and need to start their hunt up again from scratch. Having the location you escaped to would give them a starting point, which is why it's a Loophole.)

If you want to hide from Mercia the Market is a good place to do it. Make a wits+stealth roll, +2 from the market and another +5 for the difficulty recently losing your name will cause for the goblins trying to sell you out. However Mercia and Longarms are together now and the penalty for evading them is -8.

Raz_Fox

2018-06-26, 05:00 AM

Plan?

Ah.

That's right. Everyone's looking to you, Pilgrim; you're the guide through the wilderness now. And the guide never admits to being lost, or not having a plan, because then people worry. People panic. They make bad, bad decisions on the horns of terror and misguided self-determination. They stumble into the foliage and cut themselves on glass cliff-faces and fall victim to the sin of despair, for which you shall be scourged until you realize the necessity of your continued life in the sight of the Stars. You are not given permission to die; you have not fulfilled your sentence.

(She will kill you, Pilgrim.)

The plan is as follows: deliver the contract to the Freehold, thereby achieving trust and fulfilling the duty placed upon them to clear their names. Inform the Autumn folk of the identity of Mercia, Knight of Flowers, and thereby dig for knowledge, scraps and pieces of information that together make a match even, if admittedly not preferential to his side (as per usual, then). And then? The next step is to dig out the collaborator, the person or persons who flinched when offered a token from the Hunt. Not his specialty. Lily, more likely, with her quiet voice and her awake eyes. If there even was a collaborator. Maybe the Huntsmen are just circling, seeing who's weak, who's easy prey. None of the motley are allowed to be easy prey. Not Aelas. Not Jack. Not Lily. Edmund... Edmund can take care of himself, but he's got a mountain at his back anyhow.

"Autumn," he says. He inclines his head. Did they come here in a car? He could carry them both, but it'd be trouble if he needed to become smoke (even with Zotzie clambering off him and burying themself in the McDonald's bag). Maybe they could walk. He could walk, certainly.

stveje

2018-06-26, 12:00 PM

The Internet is a big place, Jack. Just because something goes up there doesn't mean that the whole world knows about it. It'd take someone with a pretty good grasp of Computers to be able to track you that way.

(Also Getting Away doesn't mean Safe Forever. It means they completely lose track of you and need to start their hunt up again from scratch. Having the location you escaped to would give them a starting point, which is why it's a Loophole.)

If you want to hide from Mercia the Market is a good place to do it. Make a wits+stealth roll, +2 from the market and another +5 for the difficulty recently losing your name will cause for the goblins trying to sell you out. However Mercia and Longarms are together now and the penalty for evading them is -8.

Right right, without a name he probably doesn't have a Facebook profile ... if he had one to begin with, anyway. And who's going to see a random post on a random forum in some dusty corner of the web. So at the very least it would take a while to pick up the trail, and by then he may be long gone. Got it.

*

That's a -1 total:

Wits+Stealth-1 = 7: 7, 2, 7, 1, 5, 9, 9, two successes.

Thanqol

2018-06-26, 07:42 PM

Right right, without a name he probably doesn't have a Facebook profile ... if he had one to begin with, anyway. And who's going to see a random post on a random forum in some dusty corner of the web. So at the very least it would take a while to pick up the trail, and by then he may be long gone. Got it.

*

That's a -1 total:

Wits+Stealth-1 = 7: 7, 2, 7, 1, 5, 9, 9, two successes.

For a moment, hidden in amidst the cardboard silhouettes of muscle men, and ensconced above the home of a dozen dainty mice princesses who respectfully keep their giggling and yoo-hoos to a minimum, you see the iron boots of the Huntsmen pass you by.

"All right, all right," said Mercia. "I get your point. It was hasty."
"The least you could have done was spook the Pilgrim a bit," said Longarms. "He might have revealed a trick or two."
"Still," said Mercia. "I wasn't expecting him to sell his name. Who does that?"
"Well, do we buy it, or what?"
"Buy - his name?"
"Yeah. I mean, it's on the Market."
"What could we do with it? He's obviously not attached to it, and his Fetch is a monster."
"Mercia," said Longarms throwing his arm around the Flower Knight's shoulders. "I would say that is the point."

And then they move on ahead, and into the commotion of the market, and you pass from each others' trails. Where do you go now?

Elanorin

2018-06-27, 03:59 AM

"Autumn," he says. He inclines his head. Did they come here in a car? He could carry them both, but it'd be trouble if he needed to become smoke (even with Zotzie clambering off him and burying themself in the McDonald's bag). Maybe they could walk. He could walk, certainly.

"Can I come with you?" Lily asked, "Though, I believe Edmund's expecting us all, perhaps we should go there first?" As much as Lily did not feel in the mood for a big grand opening party she did not want to disappoint a friend. Autumn was the next on her list though, and she was glad of the prospect of Isaac's company to go see them. She'd faced the Summer King alone and she was still wobbly on her feet from the encounter.

The back of her hand felt hot and tender where the iron had almost-touched, like a bad sunburn. She was keenly aware that her promise had included quick results. She probably didn't even have time for parties. Maybe she could just stay for a little bit.

Anarion

2018-06-27, 10:52 AM

Raz_Fox

2018-06-28, 06:50 AM

"Can I come with you?" Lily asked, "Though, I believe Edmund's expecting us all, perhaps we should go there first?"

The Pilgrim's terrible clawed feet flex like those of a bird that's about to launch itself at your face because you're too close into its comfort zone. Like a goose, but with talons that could hoe a cornfield. Not because Lily asked to come with him, no, that's good. If Lily's with him, nothing can happen to Lily. And he won't have to do the talking. Looking like... well, looking like an American.

On the other hand. Edmund's expecting us. Let's go to a secondary location while you're still holding the piece of fairy paper that ensures the safety of everyone in Prosperpine and thus responsible for its safekeeping because nothing bad has ever happened to someone who goes out of their way to relax before they're done with their job. There's hair standing up on the back of his neck, and not just because of the hair gel.

He nods, once, but also he did just flex his talons like he was about to do a cassowary kick through a windshield, so, uh, interpret that how you will, Lily.

stveje

2018-06-28, 12:29 PM

For a moment, hidden in amidst the cardboard silhouettes of muscle men, and ensconced above the home of a dozen dainty mice princesses who respectfully keep their giggling and yoo-hoos to a minimum, you see the iron boots of the Huntsmen pass you by.

"All right, all right," said Mercia. "I get your point. It was hasty."
"The least you could have done was spook the Pilgrim a bit," said Longarms. "He might have revealed a trick or two."
"Still," said Mercia. "I wasn't expecting him to sell his name. Who does that?"
"Well, do we buy it, or what?"
"Buy - his name?"
"Yeah. I mean, it's on the Market."
"What could we do with it? He's obviously not attached to it, and his Fetch is a monster."
"Mercia," said Longarms throwing his arm around the Flower Knight's shoulders. "I would say that is the point."

And then they move on ahead, and into the commotion of the market, and you pass from each others' trails. Where do you go now?

That was almost too easy ... of course it won't always be, but maybe he hadn't had to go and sell his name after all. Had he been too rash? Ah ... Hello regret, my old friend ...

Jack slips away, quietly, head and spirits low. There's nothing left for him in the Market, and hanging around is just asking for trouble from the goblins. He came here with a job to do, but right now it is far from his mind.

I think he'll just wander for the moment, following the strongest feeling of despair and sadness to its source.

Thanqol

2018-06-28, 06:02 PM

Lily paid for the cab, as I recall? We can always do that. Butterfly is still taking a break though, and she doesn't really do groups anyway (Aelas should really buy an enchantment or something for her to seat more people). Meanwhile though, Aelas glances at Lily and Isaac, then back to Static, trying to get a read. Does Static want her to stay behind and plan now? That would be helping a friend, right? Or does she want Aelas to go with Lily and Isaac and convince them to support Static's cause? Any sign here?

Static looks uncertain, then makes the gesture of handshaking followed by a brief thumb across her throat. The implication is that unless you can really trust these people to keep a secret (which she takes to require a sealed pledge, minimum), if it gets back to the King everyone is super dead.

She's happy to go with you. If nothing else, talking treason would be more pleasant in a place that isn't A) Next to a literal pile of burning garbage and B) almost within earshot of the King.

That was almost too easy ... of course it won't always be, but maybe he hadn't had to go and sell his name after all. Had he been too rash? Ah ... Hello regret, my old friend ...

Jack slips away, quietly, head and spirits low. There's nothing left for him in the Market, and hanging around is just asking for trouble from the goblins. He came here with a job to do, but right now it is far from his mind.

I think he'll just wander for the moment, following the strongest feeling of despair and sadness to its source.

Turns out despair has a new home in town. Your footfalls will carry you steadily to Edmund's bar, which is where everyone else seems to be gravitating.

TheAmishPirate

2018-06-28, 07:20 PM

"But - I heard -" for a moment total frantic desperation shows in her eyes, before it all suddenly and abruptly collapses. "Yeah, in retrospect I was silly for thinking that a restaurant would have a daycare. I'll have that coffee. Thank you."

The sudden, broken transition between fear and hope and sorrow is... a powerful thing. Winter stirs in its sleep and a fine glitter of frost rolls over the bar. This lady is sad and disappointed - but she'll deal with it. Glamour rises in the air, soft and light, like steam from a frozen tree in the dawn. (You can make a Harvest roll if you want).

Edmund will try. He'd given her the chance to breath, to deal with a rough day, this too may help take the edge off.

[Let's see...I'm not entirely sure the skill + Attribute to roll here. This feels like Empathy, for sure, but then maybe Presence? Being there for her, in this moment, and not allowing the world to get in and shatter it?]

A few minutes later four big guys burst in through the front door. "Yo dude, I heard you had a spa and massage parlour! Where do we go for that?"

"Excuse me," a timid voice comes a moment later. "Is this the new book club?"

A dude in sunglasses with an oiled-back ponytail: "This is the new restaurant/eSports café, right?"

People keep coming in through that door, each carrying with them all their hopes and dreams. Each of them desperately wants some certain thing to come to this tiny town. And you'll have to stomp on every singe one of them.

How do you do it?

Different faces, but always the same tale as the first.

They bring wants. He fills needs. He is clear - but not cruel - about the difference. Whether they accept, leave, or argue is their business; he stands ready to fulfill his.

Elanorin

2018-07-01, 06:01 PM

The Pilgrim's terrible clawed feet flex like those of a bird that's about to launch itself at your face because you're too close into its comfort zone. Like a goose, but with talons that could hoe a cornfield. Not because Lily asked to come with him, no, that's good. If Lily's with him, nothing can happen to Lily. And he won't have to do the talking. Looking like... well, looking like an American.

On the other hand. Edmund's expecting us. Let's go to a secondary location while you're still holding the piece of fairy paper that ensures the safety of everyone in Prosperpine and thus responsible for its safekeeping because nothing bad has ever happened to someone who goes out of their way to relax before they're done with their job. There's hair standing up on the back of his neck, and not just because of the hair gel.

He nods, once, but also he did just flex his talons like he was about to do a cassowary kick through a windshield, so, uh, interpret that how you will, Lily.

If there was one thing Lily had honed to a fine art it was reading subtle hints of displeasure in the body language of a beast. Her eyes shot to Isaac's talon's and stayed there, watching to see if the temptation to lash out would be given in to.

When it seemed not, she let out the small breath that she'd come to hold and glanced in Aelas' direction.

"Actually, Aelas, perhaps you and your friend could go ahead. We'll catch you up. Please offer our apologies for being late. We'll be as quick as we can." She imagined it was Aelas who would liven the party up anyway, dazzle in the spotlight and as long as she was there no one would notice a couple of missing guests.

stveje

2018-07-02, 04:52 AM

Turns out despair has a new home in town. Your footfalls will carry you steadily to Edmund's bar, which is where everyone else seems to be gravitating.

Jack the Former slips inside and finds a place to stand where he's not in the way. Seeing everyone there is a relief. "What's going on?" he asks.

Raz_Fox

2018-07-04, 07:07 AM

Elanorin

2018-07-04, 08:36 AM

The Pilgrim offers Lily a hand; it is unlikely that she will accept the implicit offer to clamber onto his back, to use him as a beast of burden, but it is offered anyway. (There’s always hesitation at first; he’s used to simply giving orders, or hauling new meat up on his shoulders so he can carry them up a knife-sharp crevasse. But this is not there and Lily was not cast down by alien stars to suffer, and he does not have the right to seize her up. Not unless he needs to.)

If she accepts- well, we have seen this already, on screen. Swift, long-legged flight hurtling down the scrubland, all swirling smoke passing down the road against the wind, smelling like strange incense and charred flesh. They will be there soon.

If Lily declines, or ignores the offer entirely, as that is easiest, that means there is no need to confront such a fraught relationship as exists between the two- well, the Pilgrim can slow down to accommodate her little legs. He will move like an elk, all long strides and sudden stillness, every movement deliberate, his senses pricked to listen for the Hunt. There will be little conversation; his thought is cast outwards, paying attention to the world around him (so drab, so soft in comparison to the fires of purgatory).

Lily took his hand without hesitation, in fact she was almost moving to reach for it before it was offered. She held his hand with one hand and clasped his arm with her second. Her head bent, she let out a breath and her shoulders eased. She hadn't realised how much she'd needed someone to hold on to. Her heart had been beating so fast, and still did, ever since she left the King, that she felt she could be knocked over by a feather. Isaac... well, Isaac felt safe, for the moment, and so she borrowed of his strength without asking.

It truth she hadn't noticed that the intention was for her to climb up on his back. The thought didn't even enter her mind, despite having seen him carry others that way. Instead she ended up walking out the garbage gate with him like they were a Victorian couple leaving the ball.

But it didn't take long before she became keenly aware of their slow progress, and Isaac's ability to move so much faster than her. She was holding him back. So she asked him to pick her up so that he could set the pace. Disappearing in smoke, albeit one so very different from her own, was familiar and comfortable. To her mind this was her little realm of half-existence and her misty weight grew fractionally heavier at finally releasing the last of the stone-heavy courage she'd been carrying against her will. She smelled smoke and charred matter and its unpleasantness didn't even register. It was in these dark mists that she whispered her confession, as if saying it here, now, like this, was not quite releasing it fully in to the real world, not fully having to face it, just releasing it in to the space between being and not-being.

She spoke of what she'd done, of the contract she had woven with the Mad King Summer, of Iron holding her to her promise, of the King's missing child and his raging paranoia, of how much the King terrified her and how she felt he was doomed to self destruction and set to take everyone down with him. She spoke of finding this traitor and how she only had three days and had no idea how to fulfil her promise or what would happen when she didn't. Like water, the words flowed easily once released. She hadn't thought as far as to what his reaction might be. Perhaps he would pretend not to have heard her. Perhaps he'd be angry, would she be able to weather that? Would he be dangerous? Could she trust him? Right now, in this comforting smoke of half-existence, she thought so.

Anarion

2018-07-04, 12:47 PM

Aelas nods to Lily and takes Static by the hand to lead her to the street corner while she calls a car with her phone. "Sure, sure, we'll head to the grand opening and catch up later."

When they pull out of earshot, she says to Static, "I think it's just smarter to be like 'hey, can we all agree to be bound by a promise to talk about something special?' instead of like, tricking people into it, but I get that this is a big deal, so I'll talk to my friends later when we know it's safe."

Then they get in the car and head to Edmund's new bar, assuming the traffic jam of people all trying to get there doesn't get them stuck and force them to get out and walk a few blocks early.

Raz_Fox

2018-07-04, 06:39 PM

The Pilgrim listens. It is an easy thing to do, if you know the trick of it: to let your body melt away, a thing of smoke and cinders as it is already, to move without thought and to leave a still pool of reflection untouched at the center of the self. This pool, then, is able to accept the outpouring of words and let them sink, slowly, to the bottom of the soul.

If he was half the linguist your humble storyteller is, he would think of Lily as an angel, in the oldest sense of the word: a messenger sent on burning feet to carry out the dictates of a wrathful god. He does not; this allusion is beyond his education.

So. A promise. An oath. Little Lily would hold to such a thing, even if magic and Iron were not behind it. That is the sort of person she is; there is a certain pride in saying that you will do a thing, and then setting yourself by that star.

When she is done, there is silence, save for the rush of wind, and the sea breaking against the shore, and the deep, steady breath of the Pilgrim as he goes, moving more by will than by the mettle of his form. Then, slow, halting, between exhalations: “Three days. To meeting. Not to victory. Traitor... perhaps. But you must serve. Not win.”

Do you understand, Lily-of-the-Valley? Three days to ascend the peak- to make everything arranged just so- to give until you can give no more- that is how our Pilgrim thinks of it, roots it in his own experience. After that, you must keep serving as best you can: but the stars will align just so in three days’ time, and they do not care about anything save your presence in the appointed place, you and yours. You have sworn to aid in the capture of the traitor and to arrange the meeting: nothing more, nothing less, and if there is no traitor within, merely a privateer laughing gaily in the woods, then all that is required is your service as arranger-of-trifles.

Perhaps serving the King in such a way will bind you to him in the eyes of the community; will tie you to his coming, inevitable fall. (All falls are inevitable, given enough time.) Perhaps not. There is a road in front of you, and it must be walked. This is the Pilgrim’s way.

Silence, for a time. Then: “Harriette Kush.” The rush of wind. “Took- no. Lured. His son. One here is false, Fetch. If you need a name.”

Thanqol

2018-07-04, 07:51 PM

"I don't see the point of this," said Mercia.
"It's simple!" said Longarms. "Step one, I get Jack's name," he held it up - it was in the form of a Hi! My name is JACK sticker. "Step two, I smear it all over the media. Step three, I use it to lure his Fetch out and start serial killer-ing. And that's how we catch him!"
"I don't - what? How does that follow?" said Mercia.
"Because guilt, dummy!" said Longarms. "It works every time. I make it look like he made a terrible, terrible mistake that he has to take responsibility for. Then he'll show up to do something about it because he won't be able to live with himself otherwise. Bing bong so simple."
"Hmm," said Mercia. "What if he doesn't?"
"Then everyone he knows will be like, hey man, why is your former name serial killer-ing everyone and they'll shame him into it," said Longarms. "Also bing bong so simple."
"But what if -"
"Bing bong! So simple!" said Longarms darkly.

*

Lily and the Pilgrim are headed to a nearby town called Ginderry. Autumn is meeting there today and when you arrive it's clear why.

In the second world war Australia engaged in that rather unconscionable technique of rounding up Japanese citizens and sending them to internment camps for the duration of the conflict. Unfortunately this moment can't be called anything other than totally consistent with a lot of historical Australian policies.

But there was something of a strange silver lining. These camps were built in remote country towns, and gardeners were amongst those sent there. So every so often in a rural Australian city you'll find a strange and beautiful traditional Japanese garden, an oasis of green amidst forests of blue. One of these is at Ginderry, planted by a community that had nothing else to do and maintained respectfully ever since because it gave the town something to it's name other than a mutant sheep skull and a meth lab.

And while the eucalypts don't change in autumn, this Japanese garden is a poem in crimson and gold. Thick and crackling leaves drift down to find their place on sand raked white and swirling. In this transplant-garden, murmurs of music drifts out.

The Autumn Court is all about and all alike, carrying whatever musical instruments they favour. The music plays in brief starts and then stops as layers of murmuring whispers overlay as they discuss choreography and showmanship. Pilgrim, you are reflexively brought into these whispers as you approach - essentially the nature of the discussion is that amongst the Court's talents they're heavy on brass, and they're trying to figure out how to make the tuba and trombone threatening.

*

At Edmond's bar, Static, former-Jack and Aelas are all present. Static looks pleased at Aelas' choice here. "I heard this place has a VR lounge," she says, actually seeming a little excited by the prospect.

Raz_Fox

2018-07-05, 12:12 AM

It takes the Pilgrim a little bit of quiet listening to come to his own conclusions vis-a-vis brass bands. Generally speaking, tubas were in short supply in the wilderness. Whining, droning flutes leading the unwary to destruction; lutes that joyously screamed out their pain; goblin vuvuzelas and rattle-boxes making an incoherent chaos of the stands; bombastic, howling horns sounded beneath the cold eyes of the stars to herald their descending judgment.

“Power is fearful,” he says, finally. “Strength is slow. Deep. These horns are strong.”

The irony of the Pilgrim suggesting subtle restraint and menace through music while dressed as loudly as a Backstreet Boys reunion concert is palpable.

Elanorin

2018-07-05, 04:04 PM

Silence, for a time. Then: “Harriette Kush.” The rush of wind. “Took- no. Lured. His son. One here is false, Fetch. If you need a name.”

This was precious information indeed. A name! And if Isaac spoke it with certainty then she already had, at the very least an accomplice by name. The relief struck like a rush to the head, for now she knew, no matter what happened, she would not have to meet The Summer King empty handed.

"Thank you," she spoke, the words warm in her throat.

Lily and the Pilgrim are headed to a nearby town called Ginderry. Autumn is meeting there today and when you arrive it's clear why.

In the second world war Australia engaged in that rather unconscionable technique of rounding up Japanese citizens and sending them to internment camps for the duration of the conflict. Unfortunately this moment can't be called anything other than totally consistent with a lot of historical Australian policies.

But there was something of a strange silver lining. These camps were built in remote country towns, and gardeners were amongst those sent there. So every so often in a rural Australian city you'll find a strange and beautiful traditional Japanese garden, an oasis of green amidst forests of blue. One of these is at Ginderry, planted by a community that had nothing else to do and maintained respectfully ever since because it gave the town something to it's name other than a mutant sheep skull and a meth lab.

And while the eucalypts don't change in autumn, this Japanese garden is a poem in crimson and gold. Thick and crackling leaves drift down to find their place on sand raked white and swirling. In this transplant-garden, murmurs of music drifts out.

The Autumn Court is all about and all alike, carrying whatever musical instruments they favour. The music plays in brief starts and then stops as layers of murmuring whispers overlay as they discuss choreography and showmanship. Pilgrim, you are reflexively brought into these whispers as you approach - essentially the nature of the discussion is that amongst the Court's talents they're heavy on brass, and they're trying to figure out how to make the tuba and trombone threatening.

It takes the Pilgrim a little bit of quiet listening to come to his own conclusions vis-a-vis brass bands. Generally speaking, tubas were in short supply in the wilderness. Whining, droning flutes leading the unwary to destruction; lutes that joyously screamed out their pain; goblin vuvuzelas and rattle-boxes making an incoherent chaos of the stands; bombastic, howling horns sounded beneath the cold eyes of the stars to herald their descending judgment.

“Power is fearful,” he says, finally. “Strength is slow. Deep. These horns are strong.”

The irony of the Pilgrim suggesting subtle restraint and menace through music while dressed as loudly as a Backstreet Boys reunion concert is palpable.

Lily had decided to like Autumn even before they arrived. Simply because she felt it would just make life too hard if she didn't. Summer was completely terrifying, despite the odd pleasant court member. Spring was unsettling and infuriatingly underhand. As much as Winter was Home it was a court in pieces, completely derelict from neglect. Autumn just had to be the grain of sanity among it all. She had decided that it was going to be, regardless of what she found when she arrived, she was going to like them.

First impressions seemed to promise her that her wish would be granted. This place felt pleasant and welcoming. It was entirely possible that the bar for qualifying for such opinions had been so drastically lowered by Spring and Summer that it was all but impossible for Autumn not to pass.

Isaac seemed distracted by the people who were playing music. This was his court, after all, perhaps he saw something in what they were doing beyond just playing music in the warm sunshine.

Lily walked a little, but did not stray far from Isaac, she was a guest here and did not want to accidentally offend so she listened to the music, enjoyed the garden and tried to not seem to be staring too much.

Finally she stepped back to Isaac's side and took his arm like before and leaned a little closer, "Ms Waystone?" she asked him quietly, while it was true that she did not want to disturb anyone her main reason for discretion was a feeling she had picked up while at Mrs Height: the leader of this court did not like to stand out. She perhaps didn't want to be known at all. The display of anonymous unity that the Autumn court seemed to be practising with such devotion supported it.

TheAmishPirate

2018-07-05, 06:54 PM

[Harvest Roll: Presence + Empathy = 4 dice, 9-again from Professional Training. 3, 4, 5, 8 = 1 success. A close thing.]

Jack the Former slips inside and finds a place to stand where he's not in the way. Seeing everyone there is a relief. "What's going on?" he asks.

“Contrary to popular opinion, I’m opening a restaurant.” Edmund answered, still hard at work behind the bar. Oh he’d tried slipping away once the rush ended, but that betrayed a crucial misunderstanding of Gustav’s capacity for preposterous falsehoods. The whole town’d be paying him a visit at this rate.

“Come on, out with it; what do you want...” His frown deepened. “Huh, I’m blanking on your name.” The chef stopped dead in his tracks. He turned his attentions from the thousand and one tasks before him, and brought them to bear on Jack the Former with all the terrible purpose of a battleship leveling a broadside. He rested both arms on the counter, and the impact reverberated through earth and bone.

“Why can’t I remember your name?” he asked, voice cold as steel.

Thanqol

2018-07-06, 08:35 AM

Longarms and Mercia made their slow way out of the Market and towards an out of the way faerie glade. It was a bit of an extra walk but it was broad daylight and they had been made by the Courts so it was worth being a little careful here.

Longarms walked with the grumpy certainty of someone bearing a good idea that had been insufficiently praised.

It takes the Pilgrim a little bit of quiet listening to come to his own conclusions vis-a-vis brass bands. Generally speaking, tubas were in short supply in the wilderness. Whining, droning flutes leading the unwary to destruction; lutes that joyously screamed out their pain; goblin vuvuzelas and rattle-boxes making an incoherent chaos of the stands; bombastic, howling horns sounded beneath the cold eyes of the stars to herald their descending judgment.

“Power is fearful,” he says, finally. “Strength is slow. Deep. These horns are strong.”

The irony of the Pilgrim suggesting subtle restraint and menace through music while dressed as loudly as a Backstreet Boys reunion concert is palpable.

There's a moment after you speak when everyone turns to look at you and sees you clearly and properly. There's a pause born of surprise - and then a ripple of surprised laughter. It's a well timed thing, because the argument was starting to become somewhat acrimonious - the minority opinion is that the Court should focus on ominous chants a la Hellfire from the Hunchback and they were increasingly unwilling to back down.

Fear, surprise and comedy are all aspects of the same coin. For the moment the tension is behind them.

Lily walked a little, but did not stray far from Isaac, she was a guest here and did not want to accidentally offend so she listened to the music, enjoyed the garden and tried to not seem to be staring too much.

Finally she stepped back to Isaac's side and took his arm like before and leaned a little closer, "Ms Waystone?" she asked him quietly, while it was true that she did not want to disturb anyone her main reason for discretion was a feeling she had picked up while at Mrs Height: the leader of this court did not like to stand out. She perhaps didn't want to be known at all. The display of anonymous unity that the Autumn court seemed to be practising with such devotion supported it.

Lily, your decision to like the Autumn Court is thrown a bit into turbulence when they all rotate their heads at the exact same moment, look directly at you, and then all laugh in unison.

It's insanely creepy.

To continue the creepiness, when one of them speaks all of the others echo their words half a second behind, giving it an unsetting reverb. It's not that they're being threatening with it, it's that it seems more like a habit that they're all into. Pilgrim, you can hear the words a moment before they come through that same whisper-magic, so if you want to join in the spooky unity thing then you're welcome to.

"Yes, I am Ms. Waystone," they all say, almost breezily. "How can I help you?"

Anarion

2018-07-06, 05:23 PM

I imagine that’s about the time that Aelas arrives with Static. “Woah, a VR lounge?” She looks around in wonder, then puts a finger to her lips in thought. “Are you sure? This is supposed to be Edmund’s place, and if he learned to have fun in, like, the last two days, it’s probably because he sold his soul on the market or something.” Aelas giggles, but it’s not obvious whether she’s kidding or not.

“Hey, Edmund, where’s the VR lounge?!” She shouts to him over the general din.

stveje

2018-07-07, 03:59 AM

Apparently everyone weren't here ... weird, he could have sworn just a second ago ... Oh, but there's Aelas, at least.

“Contrary to popular opinion, I’m opening a restaurant.” Edmund answered, still hard at work behind the bar. Oh he’d tried slipping away once the rush ended, but that betrayed a crucial misunderstanding of Gustav’s capacity for preposterous falsehoods. The whole town’d be paying him a visit at this rate.

“Come on, out with it; what do you want...” His frown deepened. “Huh, I’m blanking on your name.” The chef stopped dead in his tracks. He turned his attentions from the thousand and one tasks before him, and brought them to bear on Jack the Former with all the terrible purpose of a battleship leveling a broadside. He rested both arms on the counter, and the impact reverberated through earth and bone.

“Why can’t I remember your name?” he asked, voice cold as steel.

"A goblin gave me his watch for it," not-Jack says, trying for a hint of self-deprecating humor, but it's probably not really working. At least not-Jack himself isn't laughing much, but it still feels better to joke at it than to really dwell on it.

His mind is occupied by looking at all the people other than Edmund. Someone here must be sad and in need of him ... also, looking at Edmund is a bit intimidating under the circumstances. "Then a pair of Huntsmen bought it from the goblin. I assume. But what's in a name, really," he continues, quoting the great bard himself. Romeo and Juliet ... or Jack and Veronica? Maybe he should have just drunk poison and laid down beside her in that bog instead of bringing her roses. Maybe all this was his punishment for selfishly staying alive instead of going with her to whatever paradise awaited angels like his Veronica. Maybe that's why Hell took him instead. "You know my face."

TheAmishPirate

2018-07-08, 04:06 PM

"A goblin gave me his watch for it," not-Jack says, trying for a hint of self-deprecating humor, but it's probably not really working. At least not-Jack himself isn't laughing much, but it still feels better to joke at it than to really dwell on it.

His mind is occupied by looking at all the people other than Edmund. Someone here must be sad and in need of him ... also, looking at Edmund is a bit intimidating under the circumstances. "Then a pair of Huntsmen bought it from the goblin. I assume. But what's in a name, really," he continues, quoting the great bard himself. Romeo and Juliet ... or Jack and Veronica? Maybe he should have just drunk poison and laid down beside her in that bog instead of bringing her roses. Maybe all this was his punishment for selfishly staying alive instead of going with her to whatever paradise awaited angels like his Veronica. Maybe that's why Hell took him instead. "You know my face."

I knew it I knew it I knew it I knew it I knew it I knew it I knew it I knew it I knew it I knew it

The Hunstmen were here. On opening day. Huntsmen. Here. They were coming for him. He'd been allowed his little diversions but it was time to go. Go. Go...bac...the thoughts wouldn't come together. Before-now was a horrible blur of never-again. Not real. And if it wasn't real, then it wasn't a real place he could ever be.

Only there were Huntsmen. Huntsmen here. For him. "They know your face." He ground out. "And you brought it here."

They were coming to take him away, to continue the story...

“Hey, Edmund, where’s the VR lounge?!” She shouts to him over the general din.

...or else he would have to fight them off, save the town, and continue the story.

There was plenty he wanted to feel. Angry. Scared. Frustrated. Miserable. But he'd had a dozen lifetimes where he'd lost all choice in feeling; maybe it was too late to learn again. Right now, facing down the barrel of his most anticipated fears, he just. Felt. Tired.

He stood up from the bar, and began a slow march towards Aelas. "Nope. No VR lounge here." He shrugged. "But we do have the next best thing, today only, opening-day special for a lucky few; storytime!"

"Starting with the story of 'Why You Can't Remember This Guy's Name.'" He set himself behind not-Jack, stopping just short of physically grabbing his shoulders. (Some lines are too deep to overstep.) "Go on; start from the top."

Elanorin

2018-07-09, 10:03 AM

Lily, your decision to like the Autumn Court is thrown a bit into turbulence when they all rotate their heads at the exact same moment, look directly at you, and then all laugh in unison.

It's insanely creepy.

To continue the creepiness, when one of them speaks all of the others echo their words half a second behind, giving it an unsetting reverb. It's not that they're being threatening with it, it's that it seems more like a habit that they're all into. Pilgrim, you can hear the words a moment before they come through that same whisper-magic, so if you want to join in the spooky unity thing then you're welcome to.

"Yes, I am Ms. Waystone," they all say, almost breezily. "How can I help you?"

What the actual- no. No. No, this was fine. This is their Thing. It's okay. I can work with this.

Lily missed a beat, but only one before restoring her composure, "It's an honour, Your Grace," she said with a polite bow. This was one of those many times when a habit to avoid eye contact was a great asset. No need to awkward search for whose eyes to seek and who to speak to. "I'm Lily, I'm afraid I did not have a chance to introduce myself last night. I have been tasked with aiding and facilitating the investigations ordered last night in search of a traitor among us. Would you be so kind as to share your progress so far?"

Anarion

2018-07-09, 04:09 PM

"Starting with the story of 'Why You Can't Remember This Guy's Name.'" He set himself behind not-Jack, stopping just short of physically grabbing his shoulders. (Some lines are too deep to overstep.) "Go on; start from the top."

"See! I told you he wouldn't have a VR lounge. Edmund wouldn't know fun if it hit him, trust me, I've tried." Aelas sticks out her tongue playfully at you as her hair shimmers to a taunting red-orange, then takes in what you just said. "What are you talking about, we all know that's...uh...that guy we know...named...uh...um...OH MY GOD WHY DON'T WE KNOW YOUR NAME?????"

stveje

2018-07-10, 01:12 PM

He stood up from the bar, and began a slow march towards Aelas. "Nope. No VR lounge here." He shrugged. "But we do have the next best thing, today only, opening-day special for a lucky few; storytime!"

"Starting with the story of 'Why You Can't Remember This Guy's Name.'" He set himself behind not-Jack, stopping just short of physically grabbing his shoulders. (Some lines are too deep to overstep.) "Go on; start from the top."

"See! I told you he wouldn't have a VR lounge. Edmund wouldn't know fun if it hit him, trust me, I've tried." Aelas sticks out her tongue playfully at you as her hair shimmers to a taunting red-orange, then takes in what you just said. "What are you talking about, we all know that's...uh...that guy we know...named...uh...um...OH MY GOD WHY DON'T WE KNOW YOUR NAME?????"

"Maybe I should have gotten a t-shirt," not-Jack says and points at his chest as if showing the writing, " 'I Sold my Name to the Goblin' ". Then he indicates his back in the same way. " 'Then a Hunstman bought it, and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.' Would save me some time."

Raz_Fox

2018-07-11, 07:04 AM

Our Pilgrim, he doesn't do the talking so much. You know this. Autumn knows this, like as not. But having words echoing in your own head where your thoughts should be can do tricky things to a person, especially when they're used to grand pronouncements and lofty speech and the proper reactions to such things.

So, Lily? I doubt you'll miss the fact that the Pilgrim is breathing in time to the words. When they speak, he huffs out, the modulation of the breath such that it's almost- almost- the words that echo all around, underscored by that deep bestial bellows-pump of his smoke-scored lungs. And he places his hand upon your shoulder, gentle-like, but still possessive.

We know he means to reassure you, but it's still a nonverbal gesture, and if you think words are tricky to puzzle out sometimes, just you wait until a hand the size of a plate and the general consistency of scorched earth envelops your shoulder while a low, guttural exhalation tickles your ears, while also staring down a dozen pairs of eyes all intent on giving none of the game away.

Thanqol

2018-07-11, 10:02 PM

"Not having a car suuuuuuucks," groaned Longarms.
"I don't mind," said Mercia.
"I'm the King of the Goblins!" said Longarms. "I should have a chariot drawn by ugly pug dogs the size of horses! I hate this place!"
"That's why I grabbed at that contract," said Mercia.
"Your grabbing needs work," grumbled Longarms.

What the actual- no. No. No, this was fine. This is their Thing. It's okay. I can work with this.

Lily missed a beat, but only one before restoring her composure, "It's an honour, Your Grace," she said with a polite bow. This was one of those many times when a habit to avoid eye contact was a great asset. No need to awkward search for whose eyes to seek and who to speak to. "I'm Lily, I'm afraid I did not have a chance to introduce myself last night. I have been tasked with aiding and facilitating the investigations ordered last night in search of a traitor among us. Would you be so kind as to share your progress so far?"

"Betrayal is not the deficiency of a single soul," said Autumn, voices dark and roiling. "It is the manifestation of a broken and corrupt community, one over-ripe and festering. Harvest time comes, and come the Equinox the Gloaming Lord will accept our sacrifices and reveal to us what we must do."

Silence.

"But we are beyond reproach. The guilt lies within Summer. They cannot acknowledge it."

Our Pilgrim, he doesn't do the talking so much. You know this. Autumn knows this, like as not. But having words echoing in your own head where your thoughts should be can do tricky things to a person, especially when they're used to grand pronouncements and lofty speech and the proper reactions to such things.

So, Lily? I doubt you'll miss the fact that the Pilgrim is breathing in time to the words. When they speak, he huffs out, the modulation of the breath such that it's almost- almost- the words that echo all around, underscored by that deep bestial bellows-pump of his smoke-scored lungs. And he places his hand upon your shoulder, gentle-like, but still possessive.

We know he means to reassure you, but it's still a nonverbal gesture, and if you think words are tricky to puzzle out sometimes, just you wait until a hand the size of a plate and the general consistency of scorched earth envelops your shoulder while a low, guttural exhalation tickles your ears, while also staring down a dozen pairs of eyes all intent on giving none of the game away.

You are brought into Autumn's confidence - why should you not be? Their plan is to sacrifice the defiant King of Summer upon the Equinox that their depthless patron might drag every secret into the bloody light on their behalf. You shall keep this confidence and help them hold down his limbs while the knife is raised. This is the payment for the debt you owe them. You will know the moment.