Port Lorrel

[AdamZero]

Marcus smiled at Jamie's subtle openness. He was about to explain that if the food would go to waste if it wasn't taken by them, when the foot stool appeared. It appeared to take an interest in Jamie's leg the same way a far too friendly dog might. He blinked twice, looked at Jamie, seeing a rather unhappy face, and looked at the stool again before it moved off.

"Okay..." he mumbled.

After Lucas gave his orders to the new fellow, Marcus felt it prudent to pipe in. "Yeah, I was gonna loot the vault upstairs but someone beat me to it, totally empty of cash, notes, jewels, blah blah. Honestly the damn clerk owes me enough for dealing with that sorta karma trip. My votes for getting out of dodge, and since I'm already packed..." He headed for the door. "I'l be waiting outside."

He moved out of the building, Boris safely under his cloak, looking up he saw storm clouds, gathering almost directly over the inn. He blinked once, and leaned back in side. "Storm's a' coming. Best get your shit in gear."

[Graybeard]

Titus looked at the gathering storm, decided he still had time to drop off the Lost Veracian Mine manuscript. However, he'd better hurry, and subtlety was right out the window. He stepped past Marcus and Boris, poked his head through the door to the World Traveler, called, "Parcel for Jamie Porter," and tossed the sealed envelope onto the reception desk. Strange noises were coming from the cellar, but he didn't hang around to check them out.

That was odd -- why did everyone dive for cover, as though he'd thrown a hand grenade rather than an envelope? These people were strange, Titus thought as he jogged back to the warehouse, the first distant rumbles of thunder echoing overhead.

[Tiamat]

Jonathan looked at the envelope as though it would explode at any moment. Immediately he turned to Winston and started to say "You open it," just in time for Winston to swipe a paw across his nose. "Fuck you! Don't even think about it!" he spat. Jonathan glared at the cat, but decided not to press the issue. Then Winston said, "Besides, that's what magical knives are for, isn't it?" Jonathan thought for a moment, then said, "Judging by the way my spells keep their duration long after I try to get rid of them, using magic to create a potentially lethal knife out of air is most likely a bad idea. It might not stop at cutting the envelope open. It may, in fact, continue straight through the inn and into the rest of town. I'm sure eventually it'll kill someone outside, and I'd really rather not be in any more trouble."

Then he paused and thought a bit more. "Besides, it's not even my envelope. Let that Jamie fellow open it - far, far away from the rest of us."

[Sareth]

I gave a little sniff of disapproval. It was just an envelope with my name on it, being delivered from/by an unknown source to me, when no one should know I was there, and I was on the run. What was to be worried about?

With a shrug I bent enough to collect the envelope from where it rested against one of my sandal-clad feet. It didn't seem to weigh too terribly much. I waggled it around like I was fanning the air, letting it bend a bit and crinkle. Nothing too solid then...

I held it up to my nose.

"Paper." I sniffed again. "Just paper and ink."

Pulling a knife from my garments, I slid it into the top of the envelop, cutting open the end and pouring the paper out into one hand.

[Graybeard]

"Did Jamie get the envelope?" Elke asked Titus as the first rain began to fall outside the Eisenfaust hideout.

"I think so," he wheezed; he'd barely outrun the storm. "That's such an odd bunch that I don't know what happened after I left. You'd think I'd dropped off a hand grenade, or at least a stink bomb, the way they dove for cover. The only one that stayed standing was this strange blue-skinned woman carrying a table leg like it was a club."

"Blue-skinned? Wonder what that's all about?" Elke said. "Well, no matter, the big thing is that it got done. I'll let the folks up north know to expect company." She waved Titus into the back of the warehouse.

One down, one to go, she thought. It was time now to think about what to do to check out Marcus ...

[Sareth]

I quickly shuffled through the papers I'd poured out of the envelope, looking for any other items that might have been concealed inside the envelope. Finding nothing but the papers, I shrugged and began perusing them.

The very first line captured my attention, causing me to sit up from where my back rested against the wall as I sat atop the counter. "Lost Veracian Mine? What sort of..." I continued to read quietly, chortling at some of the information I read, until...

"Luminosita's radiant tits... Mithral? Pre-dwarven artifacts and mithral?" I licked my lips hungrily, muttering to myself as I read and thought. "Lessee... Probably not the southern side of the Waldhaxen Channel. Too explored, too many settlements. Rough country, but probably not rough enough to stop people from finding a mine like that. I don't care if it is the Mountains of Madness. But the North side of the cut... Only one way up... this... Witch's Step place... Still fairly raw... Yeah... You could hide a mine like that up there..."

I leaned back, a smile playing on my lips. "If I got my hands on a place like that, I could buy anyone and anything I wanted... Family be damned..."

I raised my voice loud enough to be heard. "So... Anyone ever been to the Mountains of Madness? Particularly the Northern half?"

[Graybeard]

Jamie didn't notice that a small gray token had fallen out of the envelope as it was being opened. It was about the size of a 5-raku piece, although slightly thicker, and both sides were embossed with a stylized representation of a metallic gauntlet. It rolled across the floor toward Toivo and Jonathan as Jamie continued to read.

[AdamZero]

Marcus smiled as he looked over Jamie's shoulder. How he'd gotten there was up to the imagination of everyone around him. It wasn't magick, it was just a bit of instinct. Being nothing more than a 'labor child' to his family, he'd picked up on a skill most people had long forgotten. It was an instinct that the 'mad men of the devil city' would say we carried over from our furry, little, ancestors.

How to not stand out. How to move without being noticed. How to get behind the female looking one before 'she' could notice.

He had to admit that last one was used far too much for bad reasons.

Marcus knew they weren't crazy. The Bio-Anthro-Mages. Enough time looking at people and animal skeletons, you learn to notice how similar they are.

He smiled as he read over the basics of what was being written, shinies, danger, profit. That little beast in the back of his head was contemplating all the violence that might ensue... and how it really didn't matter to Marcus which type of sperm connected to an egg which would result in the person known as Jamie, not to Marcus.

"So... Anyone ever been to the Mountains of Madness? Particularly the Northern half?"

Marcus tried to remember, the days after leaving the territories were ....sketchy... that gypsy train he traveled with may have been lying when the said they didn't mix their stash with the food.

But damn that Sashsa had an ass... wait... had he been of age then?

Meh, what happens on the trail stays on the trail.

[Viking-Sensei]

[OOC: Sorry... I really am... I tried not to do this, honestly, I did, but ever since the first time I heard it mentioned...]

"Er... yes, I know where the Mountain of Madness is at." Lucas said, hesitantly. "I wouldn't recommend going there, though."

He reached over and pulled down a shiny piece of paper from a large rack on the wall. On it was, imblazened in what someone must have thought was a "cheery" font, were the words "Mountains of Madness Amusement Park". Underneath the logo was a small happily dancing mountain cartoon wearing a shirt that labeled him as "Peaky the Mad Mountain".

"It's a horrible, horrible place owned by a family of horrible, horrible Tsuirakans (Lucas shuddered) who decided that what the hard-working and conservative people of Farrel really needed more than anything else was... a horrible, horrible amusement park. They bought the area up from the Farrellian 'government' a few years ago... it was a mine beforehand, but they'd apparently mined it to the point where the constant accidents and mysterious deaths made going further unprofitable... The whole place was rumored to be haunted, so nobody else wanted it... but if you know the family who owns it, building an amusement park on a haunted mountain makes perfect sense. I heard the psychos actually incorperated some of the rides into the abandoned mineshafts. They even have a walk-through 'museum' (that they charge for, of course) featuring real...istic dwarven ruins."

Lucas sighed.

"But... since you guys did sign up for the deluxe package, if you really... really want... it's on the way to Rinkaiel."

[Tiamat]

Seeing something shiny roll across the floor set off instincts in Winston that had nothing to do with his status as a partly magical construct. He immediately dived for the coin and landed on it with a muffled 'ting!' Jonathan, noticing the sudden departure of the familiar over his shoulder, looked over and saw him playing with it. It looked... important.

Bending down, he snatched up Winston and the coin while no one was looking and then left the inn to wait outside. At least he had never unpacked. He cast a barrier over his head to protect him from the rain (remarkably, there were no side effects, but then he hadn't tried to get rid of it yet either.), then said to Winston, "So is it just me or is this coin magical?"

"It's magical," Winston said. "Now give me back my toy!"

"Later. I want to take a look at it once we get away from whatever warps the magic around here."