The Crystal Cult [IC]

[JNAProductions]

The Spire. Magnificent structures, built on an ancient floating island of earth. Today finds you amidst festivities on The Spire, celebrating the eighteenth birthday of Princess Elibazeth Fleur. The food is amazing, the drinks even better, and the atmosphere is that of a grand party.

The Marble Madam finds herself near the edge of the Spire, putting the finishing touches on an entry portal for Thomas and Nathaniel, who has come out of his stony sleep to celebrate, as befitting a man of his stature.
The Brown Knight finds himself nearby. He has just been deposited by an aerial carriage, pulled by two hippogriffs, at a landing point near where Thomas and Nathaniel are to arrive. He piles out with the others, lacking as he did the funds or clout needed to secure a personal ride.

Both of you have heard of and, on occasion, met one another. Nothing much-when the Brown Knight was Green, the families they were employed by had interactions, but enough that you're familiar faces to one another.

There is a deep thrumming, like an enormous drum being pounded, and one of the people exiting the carriage stumbles a bit. "Come on," their friend says, "don't act drunk yet!"

[Plaids]

Tavaris Blackmon - The Brown Knight


Both of you have heard of and, on occasion, met one another. Nothing much-when the Brown Knight was Green, the families they were employed by had interactions, but enough that you're familiar faces to one another.

There is a deep thrumming, like an enormous drum being pounded, and one of the people exiting the carriage stumbles a bit. "Come on," their friend says, "don't act drunk yet!"

Tavaris' peers through the window of the carriage thankful to have never developer agoraphobia after all his time within the dismal city sewers. "It's good to be back where the exalted and high performers are recognized." He surmises before taking stock of himself smoothing any creases or loose hairs on his shirt.
"I will head to the most extravagant clearing to complete Elder Sanitov's errands. Then I can find a house head who wants a real Wilds Warden instead of some simpering yes man." He silently grouses, only some of his agitation to boiling to the surface.

Tavaris changes course briefly to catch the stumbling man.
Careful there your eminence. Wouldn't want to get scuffed before festivities.
He warmly jests as he puts an arm around his ribs. Tavaris' hand lightly probes looking for a hidden crest or insignia, something to tie this man to a noble house.

[NontheistCleric]

Marble on marble, red hand on white. Madam M was never much of a painter, but who needs skill when you can simply enchant pigment to move as you wish? Liquid crawls off her fingers, arranging itself into a scarlet eel, heraldic beast of the Margraves of Khendia, blazoned large across the gleaming keystone.

With that slight infusion of power, the very paint is made the lowliest of animates. Its charge is to simply sit in this shape, and then just before the magic runs out—around evening by her experienced estimate—it is spelled to turn to steam and blow away.

The illustration is not merely symbolic but the last in a series of beacons. Earlier this morning she flew to the Spire in vapour-form, marking out a trail with vanishingly small slivers of stationary cloud and circling facsimile birds. The Margrave never takes the same route twice. As one of her more permanent works, his self-flying carriage is capable of following her magic as it sustains these temporary creations.

Snapping the tinplate paint-pot in her other hand shut, M wills the column beneath her feet to shrink. It descends from the apex of the delicate three-quarter-circle arch of the noble gate, as high as twenty men are tall, and as it goes rough granite blurs into lustrous steel, the straight, simple form twisting itself into the complexity of a silvery horse upon which the transmuter sits sidesaddle.

Transmuting the pot-lid into a perfect seal and slipping it into a hidden pocket in her dress, she nods to Captain Meris, commander of the Margrave's guard of honour. There is no need to speak, as they have performed this ritual ten thousand times over. Well, actually, most of those times were with Meris's predecessors. Now she will get out of his way so he can form the men up properly for arrival.

Urging her mount off to the side, she casts her stony gaze over to the rabble arriving nearby. Is that Sir Tavaris? Hopefully he will control that lot so she doesn't need to start putting up fences around the Margrave's runway.

[JNAProductions]

The Brown Knight can feel jewelry underneath the man's outerwear, but not enough definition to say which, if any, house they are from.

The group moves onwards, not troubling Madam M or her construction. She can see Nathaniel's carriage approaching, enamoring a few bystanders to stare at it. The vehicle pulls into the archway, settling on the premade supports, and the door slides open soundlessly. Nathaniel, his hair greying and his cane in hand, steps out first. He is followed by Thomas, his hair more salt and pepper and his stride confident. "Thank you, Aunty," Nathaniel tells you with a slight tip of his hat.

Captain Meris falls into place next to Nathaniel, the rest of the honor guard assuming their positions behind the nobles, and they start the slow walk for the center of the festivities.

[NontheistCleric]

"You're welcome, Nathaniel." Madam M smiles at her nephew, happy to see him in one of his better moods—at least, for now.

Her smile to Thomas is milder, accompanied by a meaningful eyebrow-raise. She already spoke to him earlier and gave him a little pewter model of a wheelchair. It is a spell within a spell—the outer layer a seal of miniaturization, and inside a wheelchair-golem that can move as directed by a knob on one of the armrests.

It would, of course, be better if the Margrave could walk into this special occasion on his own two feet, but if those aged legs fail before the day is out, the chair will let him remain composed and upright.

She waits for the procession to pass, then takes up her place at the rear of it. As the steel horse trots sedately, her dress shifts into a shade of deep red. Its usual black does not quite suit a royal birthday.

[Plaids]

Surmising there to be no house crests concealed by the man's jacket Tavaris begins to walk towards the procession. The man no longer interesting him. The thick impressions of jewelry would interest a lowborn thief, but Tavaris would never descend to that level.

Further down the path the sight of an elderly man and his trusted attendant. They would be recognizable even without their celebratory regalia and noble crests. Nathaniel Margrave the reclusive head of the Margrave household and his Marble Lady the dynastic attendant of the Margraves. The Zuerleins had spoken tactfully to the Margraves, a strong presence within Khendia who had consensus approval amongst the nobility. The subject of the elusive expiration of Nathaniel Margrave would only be breached in hushed whispers in the absence of Margraves.

He pays particular attention to the Marble Lady magically walking through towards the procession. All while preventing the loud clatter of stone impacting stone and her stone form bending and flexing unlike any automaton the Zuerleins ever possessed. Surely, she had to be the de-facto head of house.

Averting his gaze from the Margrave cohort he turns to a hidden contained within his jacket. " I am so close to being back to where I should be. Just have finish Sanitov's errand and you can start living better than most people, if you can play your part. " He schemes with an attentive yellow canary returning a receptive gaze.

He then goes toward the center of the party to look for high ranking officials to give the Elder Dungsweeper Sanitov's letters to.