1648: Stranded in a Foreign World IC

[Metastachydium]

Qamar does indeed find much comfort in the embrace, enough so that her head begins to finally clear. I'm just… They know I'm here. What if they'll come looking? she says expectantly. Mother and Father are smarter and wiser, so much wiser than her! She is certain that they can give her an answer, a very good answer and then everything will be alright again.

[JbeJ275]

We'll head down and find the Baron Qamar, we'll talk to him before anyone does anything hastily and if they come looking we'll be able to deal with it with the support of the village. They're good people, Qamar, and know how to stick together. Not ones to tolerate things like this either.

Daruis, Sam, Qamar, Prudence if she chooses to be there.

With you having now finished your preparations you meet up in the interior hall of the Baronial House, Qamars parents are still walking slowly but make their way downstairs where the baron is waiting. Samuel has been searching the house to find the needed components for crafting while others have been seeing your wounded guests. No longer able to speak to the soldiers, they've grown impatient and distrustful at the suddenness of your shrinking vocabulary and are pressing you to come with them quickly. Prudence's parents take the baron aside for a moment and talk privately and shortly after Qamar's parents return to her side offering simple platitudes to wait while the baron decides, and the Baron speaks to the rest of you.

Samuel, the Alveas have spoken to me of their concerns. If I must send their daughter into the lair of these thugs, if there is no other way to save the lives of others I'll do so, duty bound as I am to protect the village above lesser concerns. But I'd not do lightly or without guilt, if you can I'd like you to try and convince the girl that this is for the best, and give her my re-assurance that she will be made safe while I do what I can to talk round her parents. Else, without talking to these people we can delay them, but it will do little good and their patience is running thin. It may come to blows there soon. But perhaps there are other ways if these people truly are ignorant of magic. Or we can strike at them now and buy time for proper action later. I'll decide if I must, but I'll abide by your council if speaking to them gave you an idea of what is the wisest path here.

[Toliudar]

Prudence

Prudence seems clearly alarmed by the Baron's talk of a pre-emptive strike and 'proper action'. When he finishes, she glances around the room, giving the others who clearly know this man better a chance to speak first, before raising a hand.

"Ah. My Lord? We haven't had an opportunity to be properly introduced. My name is Prudence Oksanic, and I'm a trader, affiliated with the Seven Suns Merchant Company. I was just passing through town when this all happened.

"I know you don't know me, but I'm pretty good at reading people. These Otto-men don't seem overly interested in killing us, but they're scared to death. They've never seen an elf before, and seem to think that anything that looks different than them is a devil. Suggesting that we're in a pretty far-away country, possibly on a whole other continent. Meaning we're pretty much on our own here.

From what I've seen, you've lost a lot of your farmland, and some of your folk. Now, we don't know much about these people, except that they're confident enough to call themselves part of some empire. I'm no military person, but 'empire' usually translates to 'lots of soldiers' to me. And in most circumstances, 'lots of soldiers' is bad for business."

She pauses, deeply wishing that Feathers was here to advise them.

"So I don't think we should think about this as a choice between cooperating and fighting, but between cooperating and dying, at least until we have evidence to the contrary."

[Thundercracker]

Samuel Arvandor

“I’m fairly certain we could drive them off, but if we didn’t kill them all and hide the bodies, we would only have to deal with a larger, and more hostile force in a week,” Sam said, “I want to see what this empire is about. Eventually we’re going to need to trade, so we should probably try to make nice with our new neighbors. I’ve already gathered materials to create something to allow communication, I just need some time to imbue it. We’ll go as reconnaissance, and report back to you, father.”

[Metastachydium]

Growing pale again, Qamar looks at her parents and then the baron, Prudence and Samuel in quick succession. That's not what she was told, or, more precisely, that's not the last thing she was told. She's quick to steel herself, however. If she rides along, she'll get that ugly lot off her parents' backs. The baron is a nice man, he'll find some safe spot for them and Krogg and everyone else who doesn't look like these people.
I'll go if I h-have to. she says in a small voice.

[Bonecrusher Doc]

Darius

Darius nods in agreement. "It is wise to think long term. Defeating a handful of soldiers is no use if it just brings an Army upon us. And our town is going to need access to new resources. At the same time we don't want to present ourselves as spineless weaklings, or they'll have no respect for us."

[Bonecrusher Doc]

Darius then walks over to Qamar.

"I think you're very brave. Here, put on one of these rings. I can protect you with magic when you need it."

Darius pulls out two platinum rings, puts one on his own hand, and hands another one to Qamar.

[Metastachydium]

The ghostly pallor stays on Qamar's face all throughout the exchange of words, but she manages to reward Darius's kindness with a timid smile. Thank you. she whispers before turning back towards her parents, giving them a quick hug, after which she steps forward and looks around with uncertainty written all over her face. I'm… she clears her throat. I'm ready.

[JbeJ275]

All
y
The goodbyes are tense heartfelt and often teary but eventually you assemble and head westwards. The two captain's and thier soldiers who initially captured you fall in with a slightly larger detail on the road, which is also escorting a wagon carrying a small amount of grain, and two men who are more obviously shackled and dragged along behind you. While this happens the man who was chared seems to come back to himself, and slowly the soldiers surrounding him stop shooting worried glances at him or threatening him and take him to talk to a captain out of your earshot. The route itself is rocky and uneven, occuring on small country roads. As you occasionally cres hills you can see the sea on the northern horizon. From the peak of one of these hills you can see a grand city, but are quickly ushered on and soon leave it behind.

That night you report to a set of tents laid outside a heavily damaged village, it's past nightfall when they stop to eat and longer still before they settle in for the night, with many officers going to meet with others long into the night. You are seperated from the other soldiery, watched nervously but not none approach you to interact. Qamar in particular attracts nervous whispers aplenty.

That morning you are once again called to accompany the soldiers and brought towards the gates of a large city, the walls look like once they were sturdy, but have became damaged recently with some collapses being patched over, mostly filled in underminining attempts, and some areas that seem to have collapsed just from the force of blows into them with no evidence of underminig present. You are brought into that city and taken towards an ornate building of white stone, seemingly a citadel that dominates the harbour.

Spoiler: OOC:

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Sorry for the Delay in posting these past few days, awkwardness with my final year project has been pretty distracting. And feel free to say if you want to stop on any of this stuff, or do anything in this time though obviously a close watch is being kept on you.

[Toliudar]

Prudence

Before the group heads out, Prudence finds a private moment, away from the Ottomen, to pull her bedroll out of her haversack and secure it to her saddle.

Prudence feels strange travelling without Feathers, but does her best to bear up. Along the road, she uses gestures and cajoling to learn the name of all of the folks they are travelling with, including the two men who are being dragged along behind. To the extent possible with gesture and facial expression, she tries to learn the story behind why they were prisoners. She also works to get the names of the city that they pass, and the city that they ultimately arrive in.

Whenever she's permitted to do so, she rides alongside Ahmed or Ulubathi, providing the words in common for pretty much anything she can mime or point at, and starting to memorize the Ottoman words for the same.

Evenings, around the campfire, Prudence seeks permission to set up near - but not too near - the Ottoman soldiers, where she spends a couple of hours exhausting her limited repertoire of traditional elven ballads and raunchy bar songs. Sometimes, it's useful to have an audience who doesn't understand what "My Kitty Won't Come Home" really means.

Prudence's strategy isn't too complicated. The more that the soldiers see them as they are - as people who are scared and funny and looking for a way to understand their new neighbours - the less likely they are to see them as devils.

Spoiler: OOC

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For me, this is great, Jbe. I hope all has gone well with your project!

Prudence is continuing the brutal but necessary process of ditching her understanding of the dwarven tongue in order to start to learn the language of their new neighbours. Just in case this isn't a spring break.

Lots of her day, especially the evenings, are one long series of diplomacy checks, trying to use her experience with human nature to better understand these people and what is important to them. Modifier +17.

Performing in the evening: (1d20+5)[17]

[Metastachydium]

Qamar spends these few days in something of a near-constant daze. She moves when the others move, stops when the others stop and sleeps when the others sleep. For a while, she tries to memorize the landmarks encountered so that she can find her way back if that is even possible, but soon enough, she gives up on that altogether. She was more than capable of getting lost in the small patches of forest around Citallon. Creating a mental map is a task as tiresome as it is futile. Her mind retreats into a strange state of dormancy, focusing almost entirely on a single mantra: They'll be fine. They'll be safe. She only bothers to try and learn three terms in the language of the strangers: hayır; iblis; șeytan.

The first thing that shakes her out of this curious mix of anxiety and apathy is the sight of the city with the ruined walls and the white palace. She's never seen the like of that before: Adelar had cities of its own, but she's never left Citallon her entire life. She looks around overawed, her mouth slightly open and for a few moments even the throbbing sense of impending doom is gone.

[Thundercracker]

Samuel Arvandor

Sam spends the days attempting to pick up as much of the foreigners' language as he can, listening in to Prudence wherever possible. He also takes note of the local geography, and which general direction they're moving, in case they need to find their way back on their own. The more he sees of the soldiers, the more concerned he grows. There are a lot of them, and based on the size of the city, especially the citadel, there were many, many more people here than in his small village. It was probably a good thing they didn't kill the soldiers whom they first encountered.

He left the magical crafting gear in his haversack; he'd need 8 hours a day for weeks to be able to enchant Tongues, and Prudence needed her spell now.

[JbeJ275]

Prudence

Though many of the Turks seem to keep their distance of their own regard, a few do approach and share names. There is an Erdil, a Timer, a Cirtan, a Murkal, a Sural and two Erdem's among those who approach you. One of the prisoners seems to be named Enrio and the other Petros. The story is difficult to communicate given your limited vocabulary, but both point out scars when you attempt to explain the idea to them, and given they seem strong men of a martial age it seems violence of some kind was likely. As for the cities, you here them muttering both Candia and Kuşatma as you pass it, though they're unwilling to speak to you about it, and it seems the city you know approach is known as Resmo. Aside from this the language exchange goes poorly, as the captains seem to be frequently in discussion with each other, and unwilling to let you overhear any of it.


The evening performance is met with a few smiles from the nearby troops. Though unable to put meaning to the words they enjoy the tune, and one of them begins singing over your own lyrics with something in their own language in a disorderly but good natured manner.

Qamar

While you are still the recipient of suspicious glares and unkind sounding words the degree lessons somewhat as you travel though it's still very intimidating though, and the arrival to the city only more so. While the people in the streets seem mostly confused by your nature rather than hostile, the guards on the walls and those who join them in the city remain very wary, and try to hurry you up as you attract the crowd's attention.

Samuel
You seem to be moving east and varying a little more north than south, at least assuming the sun works the same way here. The present hills and mountains in the south are a much poorer guide than the coast to the north in terms of tracking direction. As you pay more attention to the soldiers you do pick up a fair few things, while there are a great number of them they tend to seem thinner and hungrier than any of the army processions you saw accompanying your father back home, and while you had far greater concerns, the meal provided to you was also a thin stew with little substance.

All

As you approach the gate is raised and you enter into the citadel, being quickly shown to what looks like a repurposed officer's accommodations where you are briefly tended to by a group of attendants before being retrieved and moved around once more, now towards a large open room, almost like a hall, where a number of men in ornate robes and headdresses stand on the other side of a long wooden table. Behind them several men in garments similar to those you saw the captains wear, but more ornate and with a greater spread of additional decoration sit in raised chairs, one raised higher than most others. One of the guards who brought you in speaks loudly, and then the others begin speaking as well, starting with the man seated on the highest chair.

[Metastachydium]

Qamar finds the men in ornate garb both intimidating and difficult not to stare at (needless to say, quite nervously), so much so that she stumbles shortly after being herded into the hall and would fall were it not for her instinctively grabbing the arm of the person walking closest to her. She lets go immediately and mumbles a Sorry! before looking around for a safe back to hide behind.

[Thundercracker]

Samuel Arvandor

Samuel will take the opportunity while they're being attended to to change into his courtier's outfit, since they're no longer traveling.

In the hall, it is his his arm Qamar squeezes, and he pats her hand with his.
"Don't worry, it's going to be okay," he said reassuringly, "Worst case scenario we'll fight our way out."

Once in the hall, he assumes the first man speaking loudly is some kind of introduction, so he will bow once he finishes. As the men on the opposite side of the table being speaking, he glances to Prudence.

[Bonecrusher Doc]

Darius spent most of the journey trying to learn the language, particularly the words relevant to medicine, such as the names of common herbs and parts of the body. He also watched Qamar carefully and spoke to her when possible, trying to ascertain her mental state andhelp her identify sources of strength she could draw upon during this time of trial.

Now he stands quietly in the hall, attempting to avoid drawing attention to himself, as was his custom. It's not that he's shy-- far from it. Darius has simply found that it is sometimes advantageous to be overlooked by other people as a passive part of the scenery...

[Toliudar]

Prudence

Prudence's seemingly endless supply of patter seems to dry up as the foursome are being primped and prepared for...something. Probably something big. Something that she should be ready to understand. She gestures to be shown to a private location for bodily functions, during which time she renews her magic of language mastery.

As they are brought before the ornately adorned men, Prudence stands a bit behind Samuel and Darius, hoping to augment their authority. As the Ottomen begin speaking, Prudence quietly murmurs a translation to her colleagues.

[JbeJ275]

The Initial proceedings are long onerous, full of formality and fairly uninteresting, several people are introduced with associated lists of titles, three different men give reports of the column of white light appearing in the sky and several of the enrobed men discuss this, the more hostile among them saying this represented a pillar of salt in what soon devolves into some cultural reference you have no familiarity with. This is eventually put aside though and the attention turns more critically to the four of you once again. One of the men in the more ornate sets of robes proceeds to the front of the room, bearing papers which he proceeds to read aloud to the room.

"Soon after entering the area within the changed terrain two patrols and their captains came to a building which one noted as reminiscent of the buildings of the Rus and another as reminiscent of French designs. From here one patrol encountered three people, mounted and proceeding towards the building. There they engaged in conversation, learning that these people claimed to be from the Alder empire, and naming their village as Sytalon." Speaks the bureaucrat, butchering the pronunciation of all terms from your language. "They noted that one among their number, the one called Samuel was the child of the village's ruler, and offered introductions."

"The other parol encountered the green scaled creature, and attempted charms to repel spirits while falling into panic, as it fled several pursued in an attempt to find out where it had hid. On seeing it go inside the house, and fearing it may seek to set the people in that building they had observed against them, they made an attempt to bind it with iron. One soldier then reports an irresistible urge to regard the green scaled creature as its trusted friend and ally, protesting against the course of action he had previously championed before being taken into custody. He recovered shortly after they left the vicinity of the village, suggesting any abilities they have are bound to that place. Both patrols then converged, and received food from the people there, while talking with the Aethopian appearing one. They shared details of the village, and attempted to convince the soldiers of the green one's innocence in fluent Turkish before repeating a string of Turkish words mixed with gibberish. At that point she stopped responding fluently to spoken words and the group was escorted back here. Some are saying her abilities to speak our words was also linked to that land but this has not been proven. If we can induce such an understanding once more, they will be questioned on salient details such that their nature may be judged.

[Toliudar]

Prudence

Prudence does her best to maintain a rolling translation as the blathering and speculation continues. She glances around at the three others, clearly seeking opinions as to how to respond.

[Thundercracker]

Prudence

Prudence does her best to maintain a rolling translation as the blathering and speculation continues. She glances around at the three others, clearly seeking opinions as to how to respond.

Samuel

“We need to come up with an explanation for why you can translate only some of the time,” Samuel said, “maybe you’re part part of a special order, learned a technique for unlocking your mind, but it’s tiring and dangerous to use it too often. The rest of us are not part of your order, and have to learn their language in the normal way.”

“Better start with introductions,” Sam added.

[Toliudar]

Prudence

The merchant considers Samuel's words, and moves to address the Ottomen.

"Honoured hosts, I am Prudence Oksanic. These are Samuel, Darius and Qamar. We are working to learn your language and the customs of your land. In the meantime, I can use my special training to speak with you, but it is extremely tiring, and I will only be able to do so for a short time.

"As you have been told, we are from another land, and don't know how we got here. Our people are farmers, craftspeople. We seek only peace and friendly co-existence. If you have questions, we will do our best to answer them."

Spoiler: OOC

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Diplomacy: (1d20+17)[27]

[Metastachydium]

Samuel's confidence is contagious enough to momentarily put Qamar's mind at ease and forget about her intention to find a good hiding place. The words of the strangers, as translated by Prudence, are quick to undo that effect, however. The green elf grows nervous and pale again and she instinctively shifts behind Samuel's back, childishly hoping that the robed men can't hurt her as long as she remains unseen to them.

[Bonecrusher Doc]

Darius thinks fast. Currently these "Turkish" seem to be basing their decisions on fear and suspicion. They probably won't be convinced that a village with "green scaly creatures" is harmless and can simply be bypassed or ignored. Best to change the subject to target different emotions. Honor and shame? Too risky. He doesn't know what their honor code is and doesn't want to offend them. Maybe vanity and greed. Those are usually effective.

"Prudence, I think we should say how impressed we are with their arms and armor, their discipline and military bearing. Then I would say that our village is poor in natural resources, but that our people are skilled artisans and eager to enter into a mutually profitable trade agreement with our new neighbors."

[JbeJ275]

..."Such special training is unusual indeed and not something we have before encountered, is this something you could pass on, to our own enoys on time through sufficient training? There would be much value to have you do so. Further, our greatest questions are on the nature of your home, of the nature and powers this one." He says with a reference to Qamar. "For we have been told she induced an effect like the smoke of Hashish on a single individual, with much else about her nature acking any natural explenation and last whether your leaders in this village will see the wisdom in peacefully accepting the suzerenity of the noble Sultan Inrahim, and gain the prosperity he brings to his empire.

[Toliudar]

Prudence

Prudence smiles broadly. Actual conversation! This was promising. She summarized the man's three lines of inquiry for the others before turning to respond as best she can.

"My lord, we appreciate your interest, and look forward to sharing what we know, and learning much more about your culture, and your empire.

"I would be delighted to work in sharing my specific training with you. However, I must warn you that this education is time consuming. It may be the work of months or years to share this capability with others.

"I admit that I also find Qamar intriguing and mysterious. I am not familiar with your Hashish. Perhaps we should try it together, and draw our own conclusions about the similarities between Qamar's beauty and this hashish.

"I'm sure that the Baron will look forward to learning more about the Sultan and this land. For this matter, I will of course to defer to Master Samuel, who may have more specific questions.

"For our part, we are seeking information about this land, and the empire? Is this the capital? Do you welcome people of many backgrounds? Is there an opportunity, while we are here, to sit with someone to learn more of your people?"

Spoiler: OOC

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More diplomacy: (1d20+17)[25]

[Metastachydium]

Prompted by Prudence's translation Qamar looks up and grimaces. I… I did try to charm one, it's… It worked before and I was scared but it… But he wouldn't protect me and I'm sorry. she mumbles apologetically from behind Samuel's back.

[Thundercracker]

Prompted by Prudence's translation Qamar looks up and grimaces. I… I did try to charm one, it's… It worked before and I was scared but it… But he wouldn't protect me and I'm sorry. she mumbles apologetically from behind Samuel's back.

“All things considered it’s probably not the worst outcome; if it was me, we probably would have had bodies on our hands,” Sam
murmured.

To Prudence:
“suzerenity?” he asked, “we should ask what this entails. I suspect they mean we become a tributary protectorate of the empire, but manage our own internal affairs as we see fit. We should find out the specifics of what this means, but we are not opposed on principle.”

[JbeJ275]

We serve in the empire of the house of Osman, those who rule in the Name of the great Sultan Mehmed Han, Sovereign of The Sublime House of Osman, Sultan es Selatin, Khakhan, Commander of the faithful and Successor of the Prophet of the lord of the Universe, Custodian of the Holy Cities of Mecca, Medina and Kouds, Kayser-i Rum, Padishah of The Three Cities of Istanbul, Edirne and Bursa, and of the Cities of Châm and Cairo, of all Azerbaijan, of the Maghreb, of Barkah, of Kairouan, of Alep, of the Arab and Persian Iraq, of Basra, of El Hasa strip, of Raqqa, of Mosul, of Parthia, of Diyâr-ı Bekr, of Cilicia, of the provinces of Erzurum, of Sivas, of Adana, of Karaman, of Van, of Barbaria, of Habech, of Tunisia, of Tripoli, of Châm, of Cyprus, of Rhodes, of Crete, of the province of Morea, of Bahr-i Sefid, of Bahr-i Siyah, of Anatolia, of Rumelia, of Bagdad, of Kurdistan, of Greece, of Turkestan, of Tartary, of Circassia, of the two regions of Kabarda, of Gorjestan, of the steppe of Kipchaks, of the whole country of the Tatars, of Kefa and of all the neighbouring regions, of Bosnia, of the City and Fort of Belgrade, of the province of Sirbistan, with all the castles and cities, of all Arnaut, of all Eflak and Bogdania, as well as all the dependencies and borders, and many others countries and cities.


You can tell this particular list is one the envoy has had no shortage of practice reciting the full list at great speed.

And this is far from the capital, but an island city among the most recent to recieve our enlightened rule. No the capital is Istanbul, city of the world's desire and a far grander place than this. All our welcome under the benelovent rule of our empire, though those who have seen the wisdom of the true faith will find faster acceptance.

As for learning of our empire, and the difficulties in teaching your own arts we wish to seek arrangements with you on this. It is the wish of the govenor, that instead of sending a request to the capital for them to send learned men to investigate the pillar of light that deposited you here, it would be far more expident to send you to speak with them oncce the first ships find it safe to sail. So that you may learn of our empire while seated at it's heart, and teach in turn these arts of your own.

[Toliudar]

Prudence

Prudence does her best to convey the list of components of the empire, but eventually the mass of detail overwhelms her. She waits patiently for the functionary to finish his, um, function, then turns to her colleagues.

"They are very proud of their empire, and have listed off dozens of cities and regions that they control. I'm going to continue talking for a while, and then we should all murmur and look very impressed. Samuel, I think your assessment of Suzerainty is accurate, and is likely the best result for your people, given the mismatch with this empire. Darius, I have this really weird map that I showed you that first morning, so maybe that's a clue to getting home. These folks are interested in bringing me to Istanbul, which might be a good opportunity as well - perhaps there are mages and libraries there where we could research this strange phenomenon. If indeed this place has mages. And now it's time for all of us to look very impressed."

She pauses to nod and look properly awed, and waits for her colleagues to do the same. Turning back to the as-yet-nameless bureaucrats, Prudence smiles.

"Samuel indicates that his people are open to that kind of arrangement, and speaks with great respect and awe of the accomplishments of the Sublime Sultan, and the might of your great empire. Is there a charter or document that outlines the details of this relationship?

"As for me, I am a terrible sailor, but would be greatly honoured by the opportunity to see such a legendary city as Istanbul, and to share knowledge with such great scholars.

"You mention that this might happen once it is safe for the ships to travel. Is this a time of great storms or rough seas in the region? I am unlearned in the ways of such things."

[Metastachydium]

Qamar gulps and slips out from behind Samuel. She is not so much awed as she is scared, in no small part of the prospect of being dragged even farther from home, but pretense is among the few things she can usually handle. Her eyes widen and her mouth opens slightly as she looks up at the dignitary before she'd bow her head in a clear display of deference.

Spoiler: Check, if needed.

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Bluff to look the part: (1d20+11)[19]