Goriel and beyond, part 4

[Graybeard]

About this time, Sister Rose, Lillith and Therese returned from their reconnaissance mission. "Well, he's not in town any more," Rose said, and they described what they'd learned. Then it was their turn to listen as Argus, Drusia and Tim repeated the conversation that had gone on in their absence.

When all was said and done, Rose frowned. "I don't like this," she said. "We'd be splitting up again, under conditions even less suited for it than usual, and with powerful forces out there against us." She sighed. "Still, what else is there to do? Blaise isn't getting any closer, Eli isn't getting any weaker, and the town ... well. So who's going where?"

[Alberich]

"Well, Eli hasn't tried to contact me yet," said Tim, "And if you can't track him now, or get a fix on this magic 'Orb of Zabog' that he helped to steal - then I think there's no way to go after him until he tries to contact me. Which I have an intuition he will do.

"On Blaise - well, right now we have a rumor that the Gibazovs took him to their mine up north. We also have that conversation I told you about that he overheard. It might be relevant but I can't make head or tail of it myself - maybe we could run it past someone who knows this place, like Father Boris or Kirassia if you trust her, to tease some meaning out of it?"

* * *

A little later in the morning, Malyuta Duravsky and several well-armed men were escorting a shortish, buxom getera dressed in red and purple to the foreign section of the market. This one wore also her ruby choker - a symbol of her clan's wealth. She reveled in her role and the sway of her walk, and enjoyed the eyes on her that could look but never hope to touch. When they reached Harker's stall, Malyuta gave a tediously wordy Gorielian good-morning, full of meaningless compliments and pointless verbosity. While he did this, Dina Gibazov - for it was she - eyed the new artworks appraisingly. She gave no hint of a blush.

Once Malyuta was done, he and his bully-boys looked around the shop while she crept up to the mystery beast and, in a conspiratorial tone, explained what she was about. From an ornate armbag she slipped out her greatest treasure -- a century-old Tsuirakuan pillow-book. This one was positively quaint to Harker's eyes. Its introduction was all about enhancing the felicity of proper marital relations, and its contents mostly illustrating classic coupling positions. The facial expressions on the models were limited and stylized - typical for works of the period, and quite tame by the standards of "C. Hieronymous."

What Dina wanted was to arrange for Harker to visit the Duravsky zenana so that she herself could pose for and create a similar, Gorielian work. She was wondering how many sessions of how many hours would be needed.

[Graybeard]

Sister Rose looked at Tim with mild incredulity. What did the man think she was, a Tsuirakuan archmage? Even her "husband" wouldn't have the magical skills to divine the location of an object he'd never seen. She actually thought she'd done pretty well with that personal-essence divination; it had been a long time since Miguel had shown her that trick.

"One way or another," she said neutrally, "our time here seems to be coming to an end. We'd better make our regrets to Clan Yurkashev and try to coax Father Boris into providing us with a coach to head off to the Gibazov mine. Maybe he can tell us more about this Orb of Zabog. But as I say: who's going, and who's staying?"

[Jack Rothwell]

OOC Do we need to shuffle things forward at the mine before the other group arrives? Paging Sareth! Btw, if the group happened to be looking for more information on the Ralkin, there's a certain kobold there who might be able to fill in some of the blanks./OOC

[Alberich]

[OOC: I think it would be a mighty good idea; and besides, Sareth's posts are fun and I would like to see more of them! Should Jamie get her group past the current blobby obstacle, things up north can go pretty far pretty fast, as you'll see.]

Tim completely failed to understand Rose's incredulous look - it wasn't as if he knew what kinds of things left their "magical essences" lying around to be picked up by mages or anyone else. But he had absolutely no business of his own in this hateful city, unless someone had a suggestion or a different direction to point him in, so he intended to stay with Rose. He shifted his seat closer to her to signify that fact. Better to let others talk for the moment. In fact, he guessed her question was really aimed at Therese and Drusia, and the air should be left quiet for them to speak.

[Drusia]

He also told them about the silka and the galdy (though in reality he knew Drusia had seen and killed galdies already).

"So that's what those things are called," I reply, fileing the name away for future reference.

"Oh, also - he hinted to me that the book came from some kind of shady dealer in Getsemiel. I don't know how many secret shady book dealers there are there" - those incense-addled lollygaggers wouldn't spot a heretic sect preaching on their street corners - "but if we lose track of him completely - maybe that dealer can give us a lead later on. Rose should take the lead on that if it has to be done - she has the contacts and can do it without diplomatic incidents."

"Dipolmatic incidents aren't my problem," I say with a shrug. I imagine some... 'enhanced interogation techniques' would work faster if the vender had anything to say, but I don't want to count on that - it is just as likely that the vender was actually Eli's first contact, and has now rejoined his fellows.

About this time, Sister Rose, Lillith and Therese returned from their reconnaissance mission. "Well, he's not in town any more," Rose said, and they described what they'd learned. Then it was their turn to listen as Argus, Drusia and Tim repeated the conversation that had gone on in their absence.

While Rose informs the others about a frame job, I step over to meet the other newcommer.

"Drusia," I say by way of introduction. "Now that I've met Tim... who exactly are you?"

-- Drusia

OOC: Did Theresa explain (in front of Drusia) about the sigil in her bathroom? That would be a good conversational jumping off point for Drusia and Tim, since Tim knows how the things work and Drusia wants to learn more about how to disable them.

Also... this may be a bad week for me, posting wise. Not sure yet.

[Graybeard]

"Therese," the tall woman said simply, taking off her hat and shaking out her long, bright red hair; the disguise would be unnecessary here. "And no, I have no elven blood that I'm aware of." She shook her hair again, exposing very human-looking ears.

That was a perceptive thing to say, thought Sister Rose. Not only was the woman unusually tall, the streak of silver in her hair would get an elf wondering. Luminosita's Nethers, it had got her wondering; Kenny's sister Claire, who took more after her human ancestry than Kenny did, had a similarly "colorful" streak in her hair. It also meant that she'd picked up on Drusia's elf nature already. Therese was obviously sharp.

"Therese shares an interest in the man who is the subject of our main mission here," Rose explained to Drusia. She turned to Therese. "Drusia, in turn, is family. We weren't expecting to run into her here." A dry smile. "We've had all manner of little surprises in Goriel, I think it's fair to say."

[OOC: Between being taciturn by nature, and still being a bit unsure what to make of this bunch, Therese definitely wouldn't have said anything about those sigils in her bathroom to Rose yet. Sorry.]

[Alberich]

"Dipolmatic incidents aren't my problem."

Tim's face hardened a little and his heart hardened more. If she imagined she could just traipse into Getsemiel, or any Veracian city, burn a bunch of humans in another of her crossfires, and retreat to the safety of her "family" village because she was too damned arrogant to let the Veracian authorities handle a Veracian problem inside Veracia...vengeance would come behind. If he had to find where her family hideaway was and report it to the elves, or Lord Luminosita had to crush them out himself...vengeance would come. Easy enough - he'd tell his superiors who was responsible, and that Rose was related to her and so must know where her home was. The Inquisition could get it out of Rose. Then while the half-elves burned and screamed and died, he could say, "It's not my problem." In just that same, casual, slap-me-now superior tone.

Obviously he'd been right from the beginning - Drusia considered humans as nothings, as pawns in her "family" games, to be sacrificed the way a human stepped on insects. And she respected only superior force, which he didn't have at hand, so it was no good admonishing her. That only worked on people with consciences and morals. (For a moment he could feel a touch of pride in being friends with Eli - he, at least, had shown her she couldn't just overwhelm whatever she met.) Well, as far as Tim was concerned, one of the Faithful was worth every bit as much as one of her hidden-away relatives, and if she killed them off casually out of arrogance because it was "not her problem" - she'd learn that there were reasons why the elves treated with humans as equals instead of as slaves. And it would "not be his problem." To Hell with her!

He checked himself at that point, wondering why his thoughts were turning so violent so quickly. Did he think he needed that kind of hardness to assert himself among his companions, who'd treated him like a buffoon 'til now, and as inferior to the elf? Or were his experiments with the Silkas starting to lead him down Eli's way? Lillith didn't deserve the fate he was imagining, at the very least. Even Eli had been good to him. Desiree - her way of living was poison for humans, but she'd done some positive good, healing people and saving him and the like, and she ought to be able to go back and live in peace among her own kind. No, these were terrible thoughts. But if the elf comes into Getsemiel with her straight brutality...my countrymen won't deserve that, either.

Well, he'd chosen to give the fullest possible information, and if Veracians died because he was so open and helpful...there would be blood for it somewhere. Now, was there anything else he could tell them about Eli and his summoning creatures? Oh, yes, there was one more thing -

"Oh, about those symbols. I asked him once what would happen if you rubbed out the symbol before dismissing the demon...things. He only said it was a bad idea, not what would happen, and I'm not sure even he knew. So it might mean they go out of control and kill everyone around. Or it might mean they disappear. Or it might mean they get twice as large, summon ten of their friends, and go out of control. Not a wise thing to try."

Drusia, he feared, would take this as a mandate to do it right away - after all, it would just be mere human bystanders getting slaughtered, and what did she care for that? But he'd decided to help almost as far as he could. Save my one little secret - but that was staying secret. He did not know the point was growing moot, as Eli was learning to summon without the drawings anyway. He subsided so that others could answer Rose's question aloud, as to where they wished to go. (He had silently shown that he meant to stick with her.)

[Sareth]

[OOC]Jamie, and by that I mean me, is jiggered as to what to do at this point. The only thing the collective "We" can come up with is "kill it with fire". While burning it may be very effective it 1) depends on having enough materials on hand to actually get a large fire going atop it, and 2) would also have the effect of having a fire that does exactly what fires do inside of mines... Get very hot and very large very fast and consume all of the oxygen rapidly, which would just as effectively kill the group. I'm stumped.[/OOC]

"It seems to me that for the moment we have no way to find Eli," Lillith commented. "Unless and until he contacts Tim we have no way to send anyone to him. Unless I've missed something somewhere? If that's right I'm not sure we really have a reason to split up just yet. Maybe we can just go get Desiree and see of Blaise is really at this mine you heard about."

Lillith shivered. "I want to find Eli and see if anything can be done before he hurts anyone, or gets hurt. But I really worry about what would happen if we split up, and then only some of us encountered Blaise while the other group sat waiting to hear anything about Eli. Especially if Blaise has friends."

[Alberich]

[OOC: The flammable material is not at hand, and it's plain to see that a fire would be a Very Bad Idea, just as you say. But based on what she's done already I think a better way is not beyond Tamina's ability to dream up, or maybe inspiration will strike Jamie yet...if not, Things Will Still Happen.]