[WFRP] The Bloody Crown X

[LCP]

Urgrim

Elmendrin didn't look entirely surprised. "Aye, well," she said, "humans can be that way. Their heads are too high off the ground." She glanced back at her papers. "I'll speak to the lady Sforza in due course. In the meantime, it sounds like Stubbs and his friends know how to work around her?" She let the question dangle for a while before pressing on. "Whatever resources you need, Jotunsson, you know you can call on us."

[Thragka]

Urgrim

Urgrim nodded. "Aye, the Commander seems to know how to get things done." He hoped that 'due course' wouldn't come about too soon - then chastised himself. Lives were at stake.

"We appreciate your support," he continued. "I also hope to find a smith in the hold who can dip some crossbow bolts in silver - the umgi priests say the zangunaz are weak to such weapons. Could you recommend somebody?"

[LCP]

Urgrim

Scratching a message in inky klinkarhun on a scrap of parchment and sealing it with her signet ring, Elmendrin handed it to Urgrim. "Take this to Grunda at the forge," she said. "She will see to it."

Like the rest of the Dwimmulhold, the Dwimmulsons' forge was not particularly large by the standards Urgrim was used to - but it did seem to be equipped with all the tools the Dwimmulsons needed to turn out quality metalwork. Grunda appeared to be the senior smith, with thick arms and coal-black hair tied back in a tight working braid. Shooing her apprentices out from underfoot, she took the note from Urgrim and read.

"Says I'm to give you whatever you need," she said, warily. "Within reason." Urgrim wondered if that was her own addition. "What is it you want?"

Once Urgrim had explained his request, she sniffed, seeming a little disdainful of such a simple task, skill-less task. Calling her apprentices back, she set them to find the materials. Soon enough, the forge was full of the acrid smell of molten metal. Gunda peered over the younger dwarfs' shoulders as they worked, making sure they kept the points on the quarrel-heads they drew out of the crucible. Bolt by bolt, Urgrim's stockpile slowly grew.

OOC:

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This will take a fair chunk of the day - how many bolts does Urgrim want them to make?

---

Adelbert

Late in the day, Adelbert saw Hieronymus return to the Temple. He had been by his house on Summer Street, and thanked Adelbert absent-mindedly for his care of Euthymius. It seemed Elsa had already filled him in on the events of last night, though some of the minor details he had slightly garbled. Regardless, he was eager to share the story with the other priests.

"So we know your man is watching," said Balios, sounding unimpressed. "I don't see how this helps us. What good is a snare if the beast won't take the bait?" He fixed Hieronymus with a challenging look. "You called us, Hieronymus. Here we are. What are we going to do?"

"Brother Schreiber has suggested conducting rites of banishment through the Old Town," said Hieronymus, unfailingly polite. "That certainly seems a worthwhile plan to me... but we have heard nothing from the Captain's men on the matter. That was the original plan, was it not?" He looked to Adelbert for confirmation. "To have guards."

"Geheimnistag is in two days," said Liebrecht. "We have many preparations to make for the holy day. Perhaps afterwards we can make arrangements for these rites."

"Two more days of waiting," said Balios, wrinkling his nose in distaste. "I suppose Jocasta and I can stand the stink of these streets for two days. If we must."

[-Sentinel-]

Elsa's short hair was still dyed, so she just had to put on some more makeup to hide her identity again before she tried to walk a dog in the quarantine area; if Klammenberg was looking out the window of whatever house he was holed up in, she did not want him to know that she was snooping around.


OOC

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How much are a leash and collar? I'm assuming it's rather negligible compared to Elsa's wealth.

[RossN]

Elsa and Adelbert

Adelbert looked gloomy himself. 'I'm completely out of ideas Elsa, and to be honest at this point I think the only way we'll catch Klammenburg is he is overconfident enough to attack us directly - and based on our performance I'm not sure it is overconfidence.'

He nodded wearily as she left. 'I hope you have better luck with the dog.'

Adelbert

If anything Adelbert's already low spirits plunged further with this interview with the three priests. Privately he was beginning to agree with Balios, but he couldn't say so with Hieronymus here.

'We're still hoping to entrap the necromancer before we begin our rites,' Adelbert said.

[LCP]

Adelbert

Balios gave a discontented snort at the idea of more indefinite delays. Adelbert suspected the Taalite’s ostentatious distaste for every minute he had to spend within the city walls was at least partly for show - certainly with the way he smelled himself he had no grounds to be complaining about the aroma of the city streets.

“Well, I suppose all we can do in the meantime is wait and see,” said Hieronymus. “I will be quartered at the castle for the next few days, I believe, until the Captain’s men believe the threat has passed. But it should be no obstacle to my coming here during the day.” He made the sign of Verena’s scales. “Have faith, brothers. The justice of the gods grinds slowly, but exceedingly fine.”

---

Elsa

Dragos’ men had kept a chest of leashes and muzzles in the same room as the cage for the hounds. Fitting up the calmest of the dogs, Elsa led it back through the river gate and into the Old Town, doing her best to keep it from snapping and slobbering at children, street cats, and once at its own reflection in a water-butt. The big mastiff weighed almost as much as she did, and she had to put all her strength against the leash whenever it decided it wanted to head in a different direction.

By the time they reached the quarantine district, the dog had become a little more manageable - perhaps because it was getting used to her, or perhaps because the city’s feral cats still seemed to shun these streets. Turning onto Tower Street in the sundial shadow of the old minaret, it looked fearful and alert, its ears twitching as it turned its head from side to side. It had stopped marking street corners and signposts some streets back.

Stopping at the same spot where they had lost Klammenberg the previous night, Elsa stood and watched the dog. Panting in the midsummer heat, it looked imploringly back at her. It looked like it would rather be anywhere but here.

Stupid mutt, said Morrslieb, flapping down to perch on Elsa’s shoulder. What are you doing with these creatures, anyway? he asked, a little jealously. They are only good for meat.

[-Sentinel-]

Stupid mutt, said Morrslieb, flapping down to perch on Elsa’s shoulder. What are you doing with these creatures, anyway? he asked, a little jealously. They are only good for meat.

Elsa's lips curled with amusement. I wouldn't know, she replied. Never eaten dog meat before. I might try it, if my furry friend proves useless.

She gently shook Morrslieb off her shoulder; she was trying to stay incognito, and most citizens of Savonne did not have ravens perch on their shoulders.

The dog's reluctance to continue was not entirely unexpected, but still somewhat frustrating, as Elsa had been hoping it would only happen in the immediate vicinity of a specific building. She had not truly managed to narrow down the source of the evil aura, and it would be pointless to try to force a dog so large to go where it did not want to go. Perhaps she should have picked a dog that could be caged and carried, like Ludo's little mongrel.

Well, at least, I can try to pin down the approximate limits of the no-go area. See if it covers the entire quarantine quarter, or just part of it.

She pulled the dog away in a new direction away from the evil presence, stroking its fur reassuringly. But soon she was heading back towards the cursed area, from a direction perpendicular to the one she had attempted at first.


OOC

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Elsa is willing to spend as many hours of the day as necessary on this endeavor. I know we're already aware of the limits of the area that was officially under quarantine, but I want to try to "shave" its edges; whittling down the area like a block of wood until we have the smallest possible zone where the dog refuses to go. It would also be useful to know if the area is made up of entire blocks as if deliberately targeting them, or roughly circle-shaped like an "area of effect".

Around sunset, Elsa will go make sure Hieronymous is headed back to the castle. She knows the old man can be damnably stubborn.

[LCP]

Elsa

The dog's disquiet seemed most pronounced on the west side of the old quarantine, particularly around the junction of Tower Street and Half Moon Alley where Astoria had been found. It even seemed to extend a little south of where Irene's cordon had been set, down towards Bridge Street and the river gate. With its ears flattened against its skull and its head held low, the big mastiff seemed to be trying to make itself look small and submissive. It only recovered some of its former energy when Elsa finally turned back towards the docks.

Locking the dog back in its pen, she went go to check on Hieronymus. True to form, the priest was dallying at his chambers in Summer Street, coaxing Euthymius into a little brass cage. Trying to suppress her impatience, Elsa escorted both priest and bird back to the castle.

---

Festag, 33rd Vorgeheim - Saga

The sun had scarcely come up on Festag before the sails of the Dancing Jenny were seen upriver. Going down to the docks to greet them, Sieghard spoke with Nat as soon as the stolid old tollkeeper had stepped down off the boat. The shipment had gone smoothly, he said, with no trace of trouble along the way.

Up on the Rock, the dwarfs were preparing for their festival. Colourful banners bearing the rune of Grimnir had been hoisted outside the gates of the hold, while down in the low town Dwimmulson merchants were buying up livestock for the feast. This was a day many of the human traders of Savonne had been waiting for - everyone knew the dwarfs were rich, and there was no sense butchering a prize pig before the Dwimmulsons' feast day.

At the Temple, the priests were making their own preparations. This was Geheimnistag eve, the day before one of the most sacred dates of the calendar - particularly to the Morrites. Already the atrium was packed with people come to make their offerings to the gods, and Raqiyah's initiates were sweeping and scrubbing until the ancient stones fairly gleamed. Liebrecht and Grigore were overseeing their work, while Jocasta was sitting out in the Garden of Morr in the shade of a small cypress tree, Balios having taken himself off some place less crowded. Raqiyah, as usual, was not to be seen: once again she had secluded herself in the sanctuary to commune with her god.

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The festivities in the Dwimmulhold will kick off in the evening. Let me know if you have anything to do beforehand; otherwise as soon as Thragka's ready I'll move ahead to that. If anyone's interest in going along with Urgrim then do say.

[RossN]

Adelbert

In between being run ragged with his duties at the Temple Adelbert tried to find time to meet up with Ludo to arrange soldiers for the consecrations.

'The more and the more reliable you can find the better,' he told his friend. The priest was looking harried - even under normal circumstances this would be a busy time. 'I think you have a good idea in attempting to 'cleanse' the murder locations. At least Astoria's. I'll round up Hieronymus, Jocasta and Balios and get us started.'

[LeSwordfish]

"Those who were with us in Rivermouth," Ludo said immediately. "As few of the new folks as possible, only veterans."

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"I would hope there wasn't any trouble," Sieghard told Nat. He gestured to where birds were picking at Dragos's corpse. "Not after we dealt with the smuggler threatening the boats. Good to hear everything went smoothly, though. There's still a few of his men running around. I doubt they'll try anything for fear of ending up like their boss, but no reason to get careless."

Once he had finished his business with Nat, Sieghard went to find Elsa. "We're running out of options," he said. "What do you think about just heading into the area we know he's been hiding and searching buildings? The quarantine area wasn't too big. I'd take time, but I'm out of other ideas."

[-Sentinel-]

"We're running out of options," he said. "What do you think about just heading into the area we know he's been hiding and searching buildings? Quarantine are wasn't too big. I'd take time, but I'm out of other ideas."

Elsa nodded. She had a bad feeling about the festival; if someone wanted to sow fear and chaos by murdering a public figure such as a priest, tonight would be an excellent time to do it.

She described to Sieghard how her dog had seemed especially nervous on the west side, near the site of Astoria's murder. "I know we'll be throwing subtlety out the window if we just knock on doors, but we're being out-subtled anyway. Still, if we narrow it down further, we'll be less likely to lose the element of surprise. Can we find an excuse to knock on doors? I don't know, maybe a chimneysweep offering to come over tomorrow and do some cleaning. Someone with a good memory for faces, who can tell us what the person who answered them looked like."

She put on an upper middle-class woman's idea of a working-class man's accent: "16 Tower Street was an ol' scrawny fella with white hair comin' out of his ears. 17 was a freckled blonde lass with big hips. She was carryin' a baby, still had her tit out. 18... huh... funny, I don't remember that one. Yes, there was someone, a man, but I just sorta... forgot to notice any details. Sorry 'bout that."

She resumed her normal voice. "And that's how we know where Klammenberg is."

[LCP]

Adelbert & Ludo

Hieronymus looked a little surprised to hear that Adelbert's plan was to move now, but seemed please to have an excuse to get out from under the Morrites' Geheimnistag preparations. Gathering up Jocasta from her seat under the cypress tree, they went looking for Balios. Jocasta said he had been planning to walk up the Rock, to get away from the crowds.

They headed through the North Market, then partway up the switchback path that climbed to the Dwimmulhold gates, but saw no sign of the weathered old Taalite. Taking a seat on a boulder to rest his creaking knees, Hieronymus suggested they wait and see if Balios would pass them on his way back down, but he still made no appearance. Noon passed them by, the sun beating down on the steep face of the Rock, and Adelbert and Jocasta made the rest of the ascent, leaving Hieronymus to rest. Balios was nowhere to be seen - only the Dwimmulson gate guards, who asked them brusquely if they were bringing supplies for the feast. When asked if they had seen Balios come this way, they shook their heads and shrugged.

Hurrying back down the crag, the three priests headed back to the Temple, retracing Balios' most probable path to make sure they hadn't missed him. On Gods' Row, at the gates of the Garden of Morr, they met Ludo and his men coming the other way. Hanna, Gustaf and Ingwald were with him, along with a handful of other Thorns who had been blooded at Arrow Heap. Greeting them, Hieronymus made his apologies for Balios' absence.

"I'm afraid we can't find him anywhere," he said. "We had said this would wait until after Geheimnistag - perhaps he's taken off on some other errand. He always was an independent spirit."

[LeSwordfish]

"Another priest is missing?" Ludo asked. He didn't even really wait for a response. "Johan, run to the castle, find Sieghard, tell him a priest is missing, get him and the wizard here as soon as possible. The rest of us, we're going to start knocking on doors."

He grabbed one of the posters of Klammenberg and showed the rest of the soldiers as Johan left. "I was planning on keeping this quiet but I suppose you'll have to know now. This is who we're looking for. He's a magic-user, and he has a spell that can make you forget him. I want you in pairs. Hieronymous and Herr Schrieber will show you which way to go: for each house, knock on the door. If there's no response, come and get me. For every two or three houses you do, come back to us and we can ask you if you saw him: with the poster, that usually makes people remember."

"Keep your bows ready. If anyone runs, call for help and go after them. Got it?"

As the soldiers began to seperate, he turned to Adelbert. "We're not going to lose him again. Where did you say you thought Balios would be?"

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

Sieghard made his way to the temple as quickly as he could, bringing Roth and half a dozen halberdiers with him. "When was the last time you saw him? Earlier this morning?" he asked. If priests were starting to disappear during the day, it meant Klammenberg was growing bolder.

[RossN]

Adelbert

Adelbert let out a low groan. 'Independent spirit or no he's probably already dead. This is my fault - I should have tried to keep him out of Savonne.'

With a grim look he turned to Ludo. 'I don't know where he has gone, but Balios was going somewhere quiet. Unfortunately there a few enough places like that here... maybe somewhere on the exterior of the rock?'

[LCP]

Hieronymus put a withered hand on Adelbert's shoulder "Nil desperandum, Brother Schreiber. The sun is still up, is it not? And Father Balios is not a frail man. If he has been taken, I think there is every chance he is still alive."

"He told me he was going up the Rock," said Jocasta, firmly. "But we looked for him there. I don't think he would have gone climbing on the rockface." She shook her head and looked to Sieghard. "I saw him leaving the Temple, just after dawn. He seemed normal."

The route from the Temple to the foot of the Rock followed one long, straight street as far as the North Market square. Ranging up and down, Ludo and Sieghard's men banged on doors, holding up torn handbills with the sketched likeness of Klammenberg's face. Not everyone was at home, and of those who were, not everyone wanted to answer the door to the Captain's soldiers - but among those who did, none seemed to recognise the face on the poster. Elsa saw few traces of Ulgu along the street either - nothing outside the ordinary.

It was mid-afternoon by the time they had covered the full length of the street, coming to a halt at the edge of the North Market. It being a Festag, there were not many stalls set out, but the busy to-ing and fro-ing of the soldiers between the houses had attracted its fair share of onlookers. There were around a dozen houses where no-one had answered the door: for each of them, the Thorns dutifully reported back to Ludo as they had been instructed.

[LeSwordfish]

"Alright." Ludo said, a little punctured but still driven. "Elsa, any way of telling if he's in one of these houses?"

[LCP]

Elsa could sense nothing out of the ordinary. Then again, unless he was physically standing in front of her, there was probably little out of the ordinary to sense about Klammenberg's presence. Necromancer or not, he was (presumably) just a man.

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"None of them seem to have been magicked?" Sieghard asked Elsa. "None at all?"

"I can't imagine none of them saw him if he passed this way. He can make them forget, but if they haven't been magicked, it isn't that. Balios may have taken another road from the temple... Which would mean Klammenberg could've ambushed him anywhere..."

[LeSwordfish]

"Did you say you were trying something with the dogs?" Ludo asked Elsa. "Any luck with that?"

[-Sentinel-]

The priest's disappearance worried Elsa more than his murder would have. It suggested that their enemy's plan went beyond killing priests. Perhaps he was meant to be killed in a certain place and at a certain time; be it to cause the maximum amount of panic, or as part of some sort of ritual.

"Did you say you were trying something with the dogs?" Ludo asked Elsa. "Any luck with that?"

"I wanted to know which blocks of the city, more specifically, were under an evil force," explained Elsa. "The area where the dog wouldn't go is mostly on the west side and a bit south of where the quarantine was imposed, near the spot where Astoria was... ambushed; Tower Street and Half Moon Alley."

She hesitated. "Then again, perhaps the dog merely responded to residual magic around the place of the murder. I wonder if it would react the same way near the house where Costanza died. I didn't check.

[LeSwordfish]

"Okay, well, maybe bring it here and see if it reacts." Ludo said, looking down at Stoutheart. "And I can take this one for a walk to the bottom of the hill and back."

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"We don't have time for that," Sieghard said, frustrated. "One dog is as good as another for this. If you need to see how one reacts, Stoutheart is already here."

He turned to Adelbert. "Let's assume Balios didn't take this road. Do you know anything about the man? The sort of route he'd prefer to take if he was headed to the Rock?"

[LCP]

"This is the most direct way, isn't it?" said Jocasta, a little unsure herself. "He doesn't know the city well. I don't think he'd have taken the back streets."

Hieronymus nodded. "I can't think of any simpler route," he said. "Although of course when one is headed for the Rock, one doesn't have to worry too much about getting lost."

Stoutheart, meanwhile, didn't look like a dog who had sniffed out anything out of the ordinary. Taking Ludo's sudden attention as a sign of impending treats, he sat up and begged. Cajoling him into trotting in the direction he wanted, Ludo led the little terrier off across the market square, right to the foot of the Rock. Even on a Festag, the North Market was full of smells that Stoutheart seemed to find fascinating, requiring constant course corrections to keep him on track - but Ludo saw nothing like the reaction he had seen from his hound at the site of Astoria's death.

[-Sentinel-]

"Well, that's one question answered," noted Elsa a bit impatiently, regarding Southeart's normal happy-go-lucky behavior. "And time's running low. Most people will be headed to the festivities around sunset, I'd wager. Have any of you given thought to my chimneysweep plan? Clearly people are leery of opening their doors to guards. Doubly so for people with a good reason to hide from us."

She paused, thoughtful. "We don't need an actual chimneysweep... just someone who can look the part. If anyone asks why they've never met him before, he can explain he's just moved into town with the flock of refugees and is looking for customers."

[TheSummoner]

Sieghard

"Or we could just knock and if they don't answer, start kicking in doors," Sieghard suggested, no less anxious than Elsa was. "He knows we're on to him. No reason to send a man alone and risk his disguise being seen through."

[-Sentinel-]

"I'm mostly worried about our ruckus all over the neighborhood giving him plenty of time to run or prepare," said Elsa. Not to mention that breaking down doors and inviting burglars in would not endear the Thorns to the locals. "But if you want to keep things simple and quick, I could go feel each door individually and try to detect the presence of dark magic. If a vampire or something similar spends a while under the same roof, it's sure to leave a mark or aura. And this time we've narrowed it down to a manageable number of possible buildings."

Of course, that plan rested upon the assumption that the vampire lived at (or rather, inhabited) the same place Klammenberg did.

"I should go alone. Can't have a bunch of clanging soldiers with me. Don't worry, I'll have Morslieb keep an eye out."


OOC

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I figure we need to keep things rolling, so I'll take the initiative. Elsa will wear her hair dye, makeup, and inconspicuous clothes. She will try to sense mostly the wind of Shyish, as well as dark magic, around the doorway and windows of each house in the area she established yesterday.

Magical Sense 88: (d100)[100]
Fortune: (d100)[52]

[LCP]

As Elsa took off towards the Old Town, Hieronymus and Jocasta exchanged worried glances. The militia milled about aimlessly, waiting for Sieghard's command.

"They're not even looking for him!" Jocasta said to Adelbert, her frustration with the to-ing and fro-ing clear in her voice. "Only for this Klammenberg. I'm going back to the Temple. Maybe someone else saw which way Balios went." She looked up and down the street, as if hoping her mentor might spring suddenly from the shadows. "It's got to be better than chasing ghosts."

[RossN]

Adelbert

'We better escort you there,' Adelbert said quickly to Jocasta, a sudden premonition of yet another priest vanishing in the twinkling of an eye filling his mind. He turned to Hieronymous. 'You should also go back Father - clearly it isn't safe out here and will be getting less safer by the moment.'