The search for Brother Dalton, part 2

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Re: The search for Brother Dalton, part 2

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[OOC: Whoa! There is a problem looming with things at the warp gate that is going to require some discussion, and probably retconning. It is detached from events in Geno's, however, so to move that toward its conclusion before getting back to the warp gate:]

Kitaura beamed. "Excellent," he said. "I believe we have the basis here for a working agreement." At this point the food arrived, and he excused himself for a moment to pass a magical hand over the entree, which consisted of shellfish from the waters around Lorrel. The plates and their contents glowed briefly, then the magic subsided. "A precaution," he explained. "The Lorrel area is well known for its seafood dishes, but at certain times of the year, they can acquire biological contaminants that, when eaten, cause a number of most unpleasant symptoms. I am happy to report that, according to my detection magic, these excellent dishes are all toxin-free, and we can consume them in complete safety. Now to return to the matter at hand:"

He turned to Anfisa. "Unfortunately, direct warp-gate passage from Rinkaiel, which I believe to be the most likely refueling stop, to Tsuiraku is not yet possible. We are in the process of negotiating with the government of Rinkaiel to build a new gate, but it is some months from completion. However, there is regular and frequent airship service between Rinkaiel and cities that do have gates, such as Lorrel and Isabel in this country, and Salvus in the Northern Confederacy, not terribly far from Rinkaiel as the crow or the airship flies." Anfisa's face, polished though her skills at keeping a stiff upper lip may be, left him with little doubt of what she thought of that possibility; he filed that information away for future use -- the girl was obviously on the run from the Confederacy somehow -- and continued. "Any of these facilities would honor the Nansinu passport, and the one at Isabel, in particular, has frequent gates to Tsuiraku. You should have no difficulties in using one of those gates; reservations are not required, and they are frequent enough that your ground time should be minimal."

He turned back to include both women in his field of vision. (Of course, he'd kept Desiree in view out of the corner of his eye -- Kitaura was just that way -- but may as well be polite about it.) "So am I to understand from your reactions that you find this arrangement satisfactory?" While waiting, he speared a prawn delicately from the plate and began to nibble on it; reinforcing the point that they were safe couldn't hurt, and he was hungry.

------------

OOC: Comments on the problem (as I see it) at the gate will follow shortly in another post.
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Re: The search for Brother Dalton, part 2

Post by Alberich »

Anfisa stroked the back of Desiree's hand gently under the table in a way that said It's fine with me. (Or maybe it said, I'm going to stroke you all over like this once I get you alone. Touches aren't telepathy.) In fact, Kitaura's last assurances made her feel as comfortable as she was going to feel until they actually reached Tsuiraku. She left it to Desiree to answer though.

[OOC: Note, if he was able to spot "fear of Goriel" and interpret it that well out of Anfisa's facial expressions -- given her lifelong experience of wearing the mask in a place where that's a survival instinct -- he was using empathy magic or else he's almost superhumanly good.]

[OOC2: Ready to deal with problems at the gate whenever.]
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Re: The search for Brother Dalton, part 2

Post by Graybeard »

OOC: OK, here goes.

A couple of little things first. Kitaura IS really good. He is probably the most powerful mage yet to appear in this story, including the batty Mesuinus. If there is really such a thing as a "Tsuirakuan archmage," he is one. Also a clerical fix: the Abbot in Lorrel is Romuald, not Ranulph. This error probably resulted from the message between Kiyoka and Lorrel, where Ranulph was cited as the Abbot at Kiyoka. (This was also an error, of my doing. The new abbot in Kiyoka is Father Redmond, not Ranulph, who is an old-timer still doing his duties in almost-exile around Lorenzel.)

A more substantial "little thing" is that the Farrelian cop wasn't looking for a priest to tell what was going on; he was looking for one to drag to the warp gate and aid in the process of sorting out just who or what Tim really is. I believe this is consistent with what I wrote, i.e., that the guy was told to go find a priest and bring him to the warp gate. Things would proceed quite differently if that had been what happened -- particularly since, with the interrogation room behind a magically closed and concealed door, Marvin wouldn't even be able to find Tim. Still, not a big deal, apart from a synchronization problem -- if either Marvin had already gone to the gate and done fact finding by the time the stuff below was written, or insisted on first reporting to Romuald (who is presumably a pretty busy man), the session with Romuald wouldn't be happening until long after Rose and Argus and Tamina reach the warp gate, and the stuff with Kitaura is finished. Still, we can work with this if necessary.

A bigger problem is this:
Alberich wrote:Tim had naturally assumed that the several flavors of magic in the interrogation room had already included a truth spell. (Tim was not as subtle as some in telling one spell from another; otherwise he might've known Kitaura's mind speech to the guards and the ticket clerk for what it was, and not imagined it to be "bewitchment.") He had countered it by telling only the truth, though he didn't always go out of his way to tell it all. Of course he would fight any forceful invasions of his mind and with a great stubbornness, and especially if they tried extracting any Veracian state secrets from him - but that had not been their way. They weren't so much trying to start a war as to simply waste time while Captain Kitaura finished his business with the two young ladies.

So their questions had focused on this business of slavers in Port Lorrel, a point on which Tim was proud of his role and glad to warn others of the danger, and had little if anything to avoid. To his interrogators' disappointment, Tim had consistently denied having any other sorts of experience with captive prostitutes, no matter how many ways they'd thought to ask the questions...nothing in his experience would provide fodder for the more salacious anti-Veracian Tsuirakuan comics. The only captive girl he'd seen naked had been Desiree, and that only while rescuing her from her captors. (Well, he'd seen her that way one other time, in Veracia, when she wasn't a captive, but they hadn't come anywhere near the right questions to bring that out.) He had no evidence that Tsuiraku or Tsuirakuan nationals were involved in this human trafficking -- except for what he'd seen, and badly misinterpreted, of the disguised Kitaura and his actions. Likewise, he had no knowledge that his own people were involved, whether as buyers, sellers, facilitators, or customers. He knew that men in general were tempted to sin, so he couldn't guarantee that any group was or wasn't involved.

So when they went back through the same weary wandering interrogation, this time with the truth spell, Tim simply said it all again. Which took long enough to bring Rose the rest of the way.
This very completely misrepresents what the battlemages are about here.

Their job is very simple: secure the warp gate. As far as they are concerned, things going with slave trade at the waterfront might as well be happening on a different planet. They simply don't give a rat's ass about that. They also don't give a rat's ass about Kitaura wasting time with Desiree and Anfisa. (That is by telepathic order from Kitaura.) Their only goal in the questioning is to determine whether this guy poses a threat to the warp gate, and they would do nothing along the lines of focusing on "this business of slavers in Port Lorrel," and they would do everything possible to divert him from that subject, including increasingly powerful mental coercion if he insists -- although simply growling "that guy isn't a slaver, but you don't need to know who he is" when Tim mentioned Kitaura would be the first step.

Their starting position is that Tim may be a demented, monomaniacal loon raving about nothing of interest to Tsuiraku, but creating a public nuisance just by being loud. Or, more of a concern to them, he may be a loon, but in addition, someone trying consciously to stir up trouble at the warp gate. Or, beyond that, that he may be the front man for a larger, more organized -- more dangerous -- attempt to do the same thing. When they first saw him, they were guessing at the loon end of that spectrum, but his subsequent behavior moved their view well along the loon/conspirator axis. And the questioning would be intended to resolve that -- figure out who he is, what his role in the temple is (if they ever succeed in learning that he's not from the temple, their paranoia level will increase a couple of notches), and so on. If anything, the questioning under the Truth spell would move things back in the demented-loon direction: while it isn't anything as powerful as mind reading (that would come next, and it wouldn't be pretty...), it would at least reveal that Tim thinks he is telling the truth about Kitaura and the girls and slavers and Luminosita knows what else, never mind how deluded those "truths" may or may not be. But under no conditions would the questioners do anything to legitimize Tims' views, and they wouldn't conduct "the same weary wandering interrogation"; once they get him behind doors, they'd be ratcheting up the magical pressure to find out who he is, and doing it fast, in a way that even Tim could not possibly mistake for "weary wandering interrogation" about the missing girls or prostitutes or anything else.

Meanwhile:
Tim had been living at the temple for a week -- even when he was serving as "ambassador to the Ralkin," he had come back each night. Brother Marvin might not know who he was, but the abbot did. The right chastisement for the Three Brainless Brothers was much on the Abbot's mind right now -- he was leaning to at least one unfrocking, and Father Unferth was limbering up his smiting arm.

When Marvin's report reached Father Ranulph, he saw that confusion and rumor were spreading too rapidly, so he had the priests called into the sanctuary. There he made it plain to them all that nothing was plain, nothing was known, and that all would be told when all was known (which was to say, they would be told "that which was good for them to know," and everyone who wanted to live his life in tranquility would keep himself to this version of events). Those who did not have useful business could occupy themselves right there in the sanctuary with a prayer for clarity and justice. A great deal of useful business was found and attended to.

And while communications were far from perfect in the secretive Eisenfaust -- receiving too many messages was bad for one's cover -- a certain gardener also knew the name of Tim, and where he'd stayed in recent times. And if word got back to him of Tim's confessed anti-slaver activities, with enough digging he'd realize these were against a group who'd tried undercutting the Eisenfaust themselves, and had deserved everything they'd gotten. In fact, once he got the facts, Desiree and Anfisa would probably be quite safe in this town...as drawing further Veracian attention to some of Port Lorrel's "service industries" was not good for happy days in the garden. If someone acted contrary to Jones' wishes on this score, pruning would take place. But there was no way Desiree, Anfisa, or their recent companions would know that...
This can all happen -- indeed, it's probably a reasonable way to pour oil on troubled waters for the long term -- but unless Marvin has already been to the warp gate and been unimaginably successful at fact finding (despite the fact that all of the principals except the ticket agent have, to all appearances, simply vanished), it couldn't be happening for quite a long time yet. There are simply too many people who know too small a subset of the facts, and too many people to try to mobilize. Having this as a long-term "epilogue" to the warp gate incident is fine.

Really, at this point the most reasonable way for things to go is something like this: the questioners begin to realize that Tim really IS a monomaniacal, fixated loon rather than something dangerous, and that while he may be a Veracian priest, he has nothing to do with the temple in town. They accordingly give up on the questioning, frog-march him to the front door, propel him through same with a swift, probably magical kick to the gluteus maximus, and give him a clear "... and don't ever come back!" parting order. And there he would be found by Rose, Argus and Tamina, in whatever mental state he's in. If that is a workable denouement, then so be it.
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Re: The search for Brother Dalton, part 2

Post by Alberich »

OOC: Okay, my turn:
Graybeard wrote:Also a clerical fix: the Abbot in Lorrel is Romuald, not Ranulph.
Edited.
Graybeard wrote:A more substantial "little thing" is that the Farrelian cop wasn't looking for a priest to tell what was going on; he was looking for one to drag to the warp gate and aid in the process of sorting out just who or what Tim really is.
I gathered that - but I was assuming that Brother Marvin, a mere "brother" at this temple, would not simply go running off with the corrupt Lorrelian "police" without telling his superiors where he was going and why (or, if no superiors were handy, at least sending a Novice with the message) -- so that there would therefore be some kind of message from him making its way up to the Abbot, even as Marvin went running off to the gate. That would especially be true in a town like Port Lorrel, where a "missing" priest might be anything from kidnapped to shanghaied to sneaking off to a brothel, so I'd expect this to be SOP. And since his message, however brief, would mention both the Lorrelian police and the Tsuirakuans, I'd expect someone to convey the news to the Abbot even if Marvin didn't explicitly ask for it to be. I've now edited to make this more explicit. Good enough?

(One thing I didn't address is why the abbot wouldn't react to the news by sending someone more senior to look into it; one possibility is that by this point he knows Rose is already on the the way, and so he acts to quell rumors; another is that he expects the situation to be resolved by the time he could get another asset in play, so he leaves it to Marvin; another is that he does in fact send someone more senior, but that happens off panel. Any way's fine with me.)
Graybeard wrote:This very completely misrepresents what the battlemages are about here. Their job is very simple: secure the warp gate. As far as they are concerned, things going with slave trade at the waterfront might as well be happening on a different planet. They simply don't give a rat's ass about that. They also don't give a rat's ass about Kitaura wasting time with Desiree and Anfisa. (That is by telepathic order from Kitaura.)
This doesn't make sense to me. Kitaura knew very well that Tim was simply trying to get the girls through the warp gate and protect them 'til it happened (Tim's a lot easier to read than Anfisa, at least a moments like this he is), and that Tim was reacting to his actions, not trying to start any trouble himself. So I imagined his telepathic orders to the guards (which Tim mistook for "bewitchment") were something like, "Keep this idiot occupied for about an hour" (thus giving him time to recruit his spies without being interrupted). There was nothing substantive for them to question Tim about, so I imagined them going around and around and around about his motives for thinking the "businessman" was a slaver and his concerns about Desiree. Not because they really care, except for any fun they might have in finding out whether Tim's like the corrupt priests in anticlerical porn, but because that's how to spin out the time. And, to a lesser extent, to make sure there were no rumors going around linking the gate to the slave trade, such as might draw unwelcome attention later.

Because otherwise I don't see how the interrogation would last five minutes. They talk to him with a truth spell on. "Who told you to come here?" "No one; it was my idea." "Were you tryiing to disrupt gate operations?" "No." "Were you trying to threaten the gate?" "No." "Do you know anybody who is?" "No." "Well, what were you trying to do?" "Protect the girls and stop them from being abducted, the way I told you already." "Is that all?" "Yep!" Ding-ding-ding, magic says he's telling the truth, interrogation over...no need to call in the "big guns" or anything else. Especially if they don't want to hear any more about his motives or his suspicions. (Such as why he thought they needed protecting from the mysterious "businessman" who turned out to be a powerful wizard.)

I mean, I can chop that dialogue pretty easily, but need to know what to replace it with. If Tim gets kicked out in 5 minutes he's frantically searching for the girls or running up to find Rose and get her help in frantically searching for the girls.
Graybeard wrote:Thieir only goal in the questioning is to determine whether this guy poses a threat to the warp gate, and they would do nothing along the lines of focusing on "this business of slavers in Port Lorrel," and they would do everything possible to divert him from that subject, including increasingly powerful mental coercion if he insists -- although simply growling "that guy isn't a slaver, but you don't need to know who he is" when Tim mentioned Kitaura would be the first step.
They're the ones asking the questions, not Tim, so they can direct the conversation - but it's going to be a mighty short conversation if it's only about whether Tim is trying to threaten the warp gate, especially if they have a truth spell up. To stop him from answering questions about "why I think he's a slaver" all they have to do is not ask him about why he was doing what he was doing. Which is why I wrote this:
Alberich wrote:He'd already accepted the fact that none of these corrupt heathen barbarians were going to do a damned thing to rescue his companions, and so he'd just have to wait for Rose and Argus before anything got done.


In other words, by the time they got him to the interrogation chamber he'd already given up trying to persuade them to go after the stranger - instead he was only answering questions.

I don't at all understand the role of this "mental coercion." And that is important because Tim is naturally outraged by any efforts to violate his mind, will fight them to the best of his ability, and will not keep quiet about them once he is released. And since the Tsuirakuans know that the priests are the "government officials" of Veracia, I find it hard to believe they'd try this "coercion" on one of them without a really good reason...which I can't see that they have. Can you clarify? Then I can edit.
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Re: The search for Brother Dalton, part 2

Post by Graybeard »

OOC: I think we should probably move on from this. However, a couple of points. Kitaura is utterly indifferent to what goes on with Tim, because he has bigger fish to fry (not all of which are obvious yet). The battlemages are not. Remember: only a few days ago, there was what appeared to be a large-scale, successful attack on one of the facilities they and their colleagues are assigned to protect. ANY off-normal behavior is therefore going to be investigated both thoroughly and suspiciously. The starting point that the battlemages would take in the interrogation would be that any suspicious, disruptive behavior could be associated with the Tower of Artifex attack in some ill-defined way. The questioning would be correspondingly methodical and focused. The "methodical" part takes time. The "focused" part precludes wandering off into things not of interest to protectors of the Tsuirakuan transportation system. The battlemages would probe the area that really interests them until it was VERY clear that Tim had nothing to do with it, and then they'd evict him with the "... and don't come back!" line and get back to their business of protecting the warp gate.

In hindsight it would probably have been best to play the interrogation out. However, this whole thing is really kind of a side show on the way to the BBEG, who has nothing to do with what is happening in Lorrel (with one non-obvious and comparatively minor exception). As for the temple, your explanation is satisfactory, and I think we can consider that too a closed book at this point. So let's move on.
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Re: The search for Brother Dalton, part 2

Post by Alberich »

A furious Brother Tim was being unceremoniously ejected from the Tsuirakuan gate complex right as Brother Marvin arrived from one direction, and Sister Rose, Argus, and Tamina arrived from another.

[OOC: Fixed those posts as best I could based on these revelations. However, in order to do Tim's forthcoming dialogue, I still need to know whether the Tsuirakuans did any "mental coercion" on Tim and what they were coercing him to do or mind probing him about - because, he will definitely be talking about that.]
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Re: The search for Brother Dalton, part 2

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[OOC:
Alberich wrote: [OOC: Fixed those posts as best I could based on these revelations. However, in order to do Tim's forthcoming dialogue, I still need to know whether the Tsuirakuans did any "mental coercion" on Tim and what they were coercing him to do or mind probing him about - because, he will definitely be talking about that.]
To some extent, I'd say "pick the answer that you can have the most fun with," but realistically, they wouldn't have used any really heavy stuff. For one thing, a combination of a Truth spell and a truth-telling compulsion, short of a Mind Probe (which Sarine implies is pretty nasty), would rapidly determine that Tim at least thinks he's telling the truth, moving his specific looniness, in the eyes of the Tsuirakuans, from "Weird and Malevolent" to "Unsuspecting, Antagonistic Dupe." While that would be enough to keep the questions coming, and to get him booted out of the gate when they end, it wouldn't justify running out the heavy-duty magic, and as you say, they'd err on the side of caution once they found out that he really was a priest. Which reminds me: they'd definitely have found that out, and in the process, would have learned that his home church is in the boonies of Veracia -- if that matters. So /OOC, a little temporizing until Kitaura, Desiree and Anfisa reach closure, at which time we can start to move on:]

It certainly didn't require magic for Sister Rose to realize that Tim was furious; indeed, someone in the vicinity of, say, Thranel who happened to be looking in the right direction would probably have seen the metaphorical thundercloud overhead. "Tim? Are you all right?" she said. "Why are you standing out here? And where are Desiree and Anfisa? Did they..." She didn't finish the sentence, as Brother Marvin joined the group.

-------------

[OOC: Assuming Browncoat has gone silent for the moment, but we need a bit of movement on stuff up north, so I'll put a few words in Mordan's mouth...]

I wish my Divination magic was better developed, Therese thought as she stared at the door.

It had some kind of Ward on it, that was clear. As best she could tell, the magic bound up in it wasn't lethal, just a deterrent of some kind that would be enough to keep casual travelers in the tunnel (never mind that there really shouldn't have been any) at bay. That, presumably, was good. On the other hand, if they were to make progress, they'd have to breach the Ward somehow.

"Any idea how to proceed from here?" she asked Mordan, but she didn't like his answer much. "HA! I can fix this..."

Before she could stop her -- impetuous -- colleague, magic glowed around the frame of the door as the rock with the frame and hinges attached simply evaporated, leaving the door unsupported. It only took a second or two for it to fall inward with a loud crash ...

... Revealing, through the haze of the still-present Ward, three figures in robes who were starting to turn toward the noise in surprise.

"Shit," Therese observed thoughtfully, and without waiting for Mordan, she started to run.
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Re: The search for Brother Dalton, part 2

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Whirling Rose's way, Tim was struck with relief that swirled together with his worry and fury. Lord be thanked they were here! "Well done, Tamina!" - and it was heartfelt.

Brother Marvin could see that this "Tim" was at least dressed like a priest and was being treated like one by Sister Rose. Interrogating him as an impostor didn't seem wise. He held his tongue for a moment at least.

"Tim? Are you all right? Why are you standing out here? And where are Desiree and Anfisa? Did they..."

He spoke rapidly. "The Tsuirakuans just threw me out. A wizard, a very powerful wizard, has made off with both of them! He performed some bewitchment on their guards, so that they seized me, and he cast another spell so that Tamina and I couldn't move. And while the guards were hassling me, he took them off." He took a breath and backtracked. While he wanted to be on the trail right now, Rose and Argus would need to understand why.

"Back up," he said. "We came to the ticket counter. The ticket girl said they couldn't travel without identification papers from their government. I asked about ships or airships. She said there was a new 'posture' so that no one may enter Tsuiraku without such papers. We were going to leave. Then this Tsuirakuan came up. Not an official, not a guard, just a sharp-dressed, shady-acting civilian. He said he could 'be of assistance,' but he wanted the girls to go through this strange, magic door he created. And then he cast an enchantment on the innocent ticket clerk. It filled her with great fear but I don't know what else it did.

"I tried to stop it from striking her. So he threw me five yards away with a powerful spell and did it anyway. I ran up to shield the girls. I used the Mind Speech to say we didn't know him well enough, and could he tell me his proposal like that, private but in public? He insisted he must take the girls with him alone. He threw me again with his magic, and stunned me, and I called on the girls to run. Tamina tried to save them also. But he ensorcelled the guards so that they seized me and used magic to seize Tamina. His magic is very powerful, the strongest I've ever felt.

"I pointed out to the guards what was going on, I managed to release Tamina, and I called on the guards to stop the abduction. We tried to save them again. But he threw another powerful spell that made it almost impossible for us to move.

"The girls hadn't said a word. But he was talking to them as if they'd just agreed to go off with him alone, for a...a date or something. A further bewitchment.

"I talked to the guards, told them what this wizard had just done to two of them, to their ticket clerk, how he was abducting the girls. They seized me again, let him get away with them, dragged me through the magic door - where there was an awful room with bright lights. They tried their damnable mind magic but to no effect. I told them only the truth, so they gave him plenty of time to get far away with the girls, then kicked me out the door."

He held off from commenting on the outrageousness of his treatment - first things came first.

"This is dreadful. Whoever he was, he was hanging around waiting for girls in a desperate way to get their travel papers, then making shady offers of 'help' and using his magicks to get them off alone. With no protection. You know what happened to Desiree last time we were in this town. My task was to stop it happening again but that wizard was too strong for me. I don't know how to find them but who can say what abominations they're inflicting on them now? We've got to find them and save them!"

* * *

Meantime, Anfisa, unaware of the unspeakable horrors that were supposedly being visited on her, graciously declined dessert. This Geno's was full of tasty things, but a getera had to be careful of her body, and so did Desiree's lover.

She touched the half-elf's lovely, alien ear to get her attention. "Love, we'll need a story to tell." While she had absolute faith in her beloved's judgment, Desiree was so sweet, good, and gentle that she might not be made for intrigue, and a soft reminder could do no harm.

[OOC: Lewis Carroll tells us that "fuming" and "furious" combine to "frumious." But what do "relieved," "worried sick," and "furious" combine to?]
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Re: The search for Brother Dalton, part 2

Post by Graybeard »

Something about this story wasn't making sense to Sister Rose. [OOC: Yes, I know some of what she's about to say isn't exactly a recap of what Tim said. But he isn't the only one who hears what he expects or wants to hear. /OOC:] "Let me see if I get this straight," she said. "You think there was a powerful mage in there, who charmed Desiree and Anfisa, and magically terrified a gate agent, and probably charmed a bunch of guards -- battlemages, I'd guess -- and threw you around like a piece of confetti. And then he and Anfisa and Desiree just walked off." She shook her head. "I must be missing something."

"Uh, ma'am, can we have a word in private?" Brother Marvin ventured. Rose raised an eyebrow and nodded almost imperceptibly. Then to Argus, mentally: <"See if you can get more out of him while I talk to this priest. I don't know this guy, but he seems to think there's more to it than what Tim is saying.">

[OOC: If Drannin can't respond fairly quickly, I'm going to assume that he makes sympathetic noises to TIm while Rose and Marvin have a whispered chat, but it would be better to transact this all as player/character interactions if possible -- the lesson from the "interrogation" has been learned... Of course, Tamina could knock all this into a cocked hat; go for it, JR!]
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Re: The search for Brother Dalton, part 2

Post by Alberich »

In fact, Tim thought Rose's summary was a pretty good one, both of what he'd said and what actually had happened. He had many doubts about her - but at least, Lord be thanked, she was quick on the uptake.

Rose spoke to Marvin. Tim spoke to Argus. "I think something is missing," said he. "It's as if whoever's in charge of this gate is in league with that stranger, but they want to hide that fact. Where else do you yell "stop, thief," and they seize you and let the thief go? They must know what a priest's status is to Veracia, and have instructions not to seize or abuse us lightly!

"Which makes me think there's some corruption going on here, and they're getting a share from whatever his business is. And it's a business that makes him want to take pretty girls off by themselves with no protection, and use powerful magic to do it. I'm afraid I know what business that is.

"But whether they're corrupt doesn't matter right now. What matters is finding the girls and getting them out of danger. Do you know any way of tracking such a powerful wizard? Or scrying them out directly?"
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