Homontel, and beyond

[Sareth]

"Did you feel that?" Lillith asked. "Oh, not the sudden swell of power that you might be tempted to harness. This." She gave her hand another twist, making the man cry out. "If you even try to cast a spell, I'll make you sing falseto the rest of your life. What's more? I'll make sure your... noble friends know it was a woman that did it."

She turned to Brother Miguel. "Do you think we should gag him? He may not be man enough to really miss these." She gave a twist and a squeeze.

[Graybeard]

Brother Miguel winced in spite of himself. "That's really kinda piling on, Lillith." He and Sister Rose climbed down from the wagon and flanked the priest. Very basic anti-magic tactics; even if he could summon enough mana to cast some lethal spell, there was no way he could hit them all with it unless it had an area effect -- and he'd be in the area, and showed no willingness to commit suicide. Of course, if Lillith followed through on her threat, his survival instinct might be, one might say, compromised ... "Back off a little here. The point has been made, I think."

He turned to Dugoy. "Don't worry about our apostasy contaminating your divine little criminal operation here. At this point I wouldn't enter your miserable town if the elven death-god himself was chasing me. Meanwhile, I think -- think -- I can keep this woman at bay long enough for you to tuck your tail between your legs, go home, and worry about what happens when the Cardinal Inquisitor finds out what you've been up to here. Understood?" The man nodded, teeth clenched.

"One little item before you go," Sister Rose interjected. "The mission we have been asked to undertake, which I remind you is much more in line with the Patriarch's approval than your little grifting operation is, involves finding a priest of the Millenarian denomination. I assume that the term 'Millenarian" is familiar to you?" Another nod, and the Empathy was showing that the man didn't like Millenarians either. "Very well. Then to keep your ... equipment, answer the next question truthfully. We are curious about the whereabouts of not one, but two Millenarian priests. One is a short, squat man of middle years, new to these parts, probably looking to avoid people -- which in the case of this town shows that he's no fool. The other is a tall, lean preacher who's been touring the countryside delivering inflammatory sermons. Have either of them been seen in Mazatzel recently?"

The man's grimace was replaced momentarily by puzzlement; either Lillith had relaxed the pressure on his cojones or he honestly had no idea what Rose meant. "N-no," he stammered. "We don't allow Millenarian heretics here, any more than we allow Reformed ones -- OW!"

A nod from Miguel confirmed that Dugoy was telling the truth. "Then get your worthless carcass out of the road and back to town," Rose commanded, hoping that Lillith would relax her grip so that he could comply.

[Sareth]

Lillith let her grip on the man remain just long enough to induce doubt then let go, lifting herself off of him. Turning her back to him (which frankly made her shoulder blades itch, but she figured was safe enough with five other sets of eyes watching the priest) she walked back to the wagon. She settled back into the bed of the wagon without a word, giving the fleeing man a smirk.

The smirk was only skin deep. Inside, she was a little concerned. She'd enjoyed that just a bit too much. She scooted further in the wagon, took up a good meditative pose, and began seeking to center herself a bit more solidly. This tripe was clearly getting to her.

[Graybeard]

"How'd you figure that out so quickly, from such little information?" Brother Miguel wondered. "Based on the guy's reaction and what I was picking up on the Truth, you had him spot-on." Uh, oh. From the look on Rose's face, maybe I shouldn't have asked that...

Sister Rose's pained expression only lasted a second or two, although it would return for brief intervals. "All these corrupt little towns in the boonies think they've invented their own new racket, but there is nothing new under the sun. I'd seen exactly that act before." On my honeymoon. "The person I was traveling with --" my husband -- "had seen it even earlier and pointed out the way it worked, what the priest was thinking, and all that. It's a common problem up north. There was a town called Nuromiel that made so much of its income from rolling travelers that the northern provinces eventually passed a law against it. The law doesn't seem to have made it down here, unfortunately."

"Well, law or no law, we should probably include that in the next parrot we send north," Miguel said. "The threat of the Cardinal Inquisitor was not intended to be completely idle."

Rose shrugged. "Nuromiel aside, the wheels of justice tend to miss those operations. Real malfeasance is hard to prove, and besides, Dugoy can always argue that he is serving his community -- which, I suppose, he is, in a warped sort of way. And the current Cardinal Inquisitor may not be much more tolerant of non-Orthodox denominations than Dugoy is. We may be better off talking to someone in Lorenzel."

She turned to Lillith, who was settling into a position of meditation; although her speech continued to be addressed to Miguel, she was interested in seeing how the half elf responded to what came next. "I spent enough time on duty in the north to hear rumblings about Errants, those half elves that were deranged in some way that nobody could figure out. We know that not all half elves are that way --" Kenny, for example -- "but enough are to cause things like the Albigenish Incident. To this day I'm not sure how I feel about Errants. Places like Mazantzel remind me, though, that the Veracian Church does have Errants of its own -- doesn't it?"

[Sareth]

Lillith visibly twitched. Her eyes remained shut, and she stayed in her pose, but she visibly tensed as Sister Rose spoke. But then after a few seconds of tense silence, her shoulders slumped and she sighed. "Yes. I suppose that's true. We all have our own thorns to deal with." She opened her eyes and looked evenly towards Sister Rose. "So, where do we go from here?"

She wasn't talking about which town to head to next.

[Drannin]

Argus sighed, returning his attention to his sketchpad. "We go on, wherever that may lead us. Whatever it may entail." The others looked at him, somewhat puzzled. Screw it. I always sucked at motivational speeches. "I don't think we'll find any trace of Father Egbert around here. He's too smart to go near these towns. But, if I'm not mistaken, he seems to be heading in the same overall direction we are." Lorenzel? Argus shrugged, already more than half distracted.
"Regardless, I've just about figured out how to link up with Tsuiraku using the materials at hand. Be on the lookout for someplace elevated, alright? Preferably with some decent ambient minerals."

The others looked a little confused. As Sister Rose started to ask the obvious question (ie how?) Harker spoke up. "I can smell 'em," he said with a wink. "Don't worry, we don't need much. Should be easy to find a location." The two turned back to their task. That seemed to be their statement on the matter.

[Graybeard]

"Well, let's look for a camp site," Brother Miguel said, eyeing the sunset. "We're certainly not going into town after that encounter, and it'll be dark too soon for us to make the next town south, which looks to be a fair distance away." Fortunately, they'd crested a low ridge not long before the encounter with the corrupted priest, and it didn't take long to backtrack, get off the road, and find a suitable spot.

"I'd really been hoping for somewhere with a real bathtub," Sister Rose opined, "but we can live with one more night on the road. That's what hygiene spells are for, after all. Given the way things went at Mazantzel, I think it would be a good idea to stand double watches through the night. Sasha, would you be willing to take the first shift with me?"

A watch schedule was arranged, but everyone was still awake, and it was still light enough to see without torches, when the first traveler came along the road, a tall man astride a familiar-looking horse.

[OOC: Re-enter Cit, maybe?...]

[Drannin]

(OOC: Slight interjection here)

Meanwhile, many leagues away and well above ground level, sat the city of Tsuirakushiti. Or 'Jerktown,' as Argus would call it, never mind that he was born there. Within the city sat a building. Within the building sat an office. Within the office, paced a man.

This man was named Reyvl Dirienzal, and he was two things: a genius of divination magic, and a complete and utter jerk. A short man, he somehow managed to simultaneously be rather skinny in the body, and yet have an immense gut, the result of a very sedentary lifestyle. Many diviners took up some form of martial art if only to keep themselves fit. Professor Dirienzal sat in front of his crystal ball for hours at a time without moving a muscle (except to reach for the snack bowl), sometimes substituting ball with book. At the very least, the man tried to make himself look impressive with voluminous robes that managed to disguise his gut by making the rest of his body look as large as that one area. In other words, they were some very heavy robes.

Put simply, Dirienzal was at the top of his game, a Tsuirakuan success, and he knew it. And made sure that everyone knew it as well.

Currently, he was awaiting a message. It was an opportunity he had been waiting for. Oh, the paper he would write! The looks on his colleagues faces...!

There was a knock on his door. Dirienzal spun around. "Come!" he barked in a rather reedy voice. In response, one of his servants poked his head in through the door.

"Professor, the package you were expecting from Captain Kitaura has arrived, along with an official request for assistance..."

Dirienzal clapped his hands in a rather silly show of excitement. "Excellent! I've been waiting so long! If my theories are right, then..." the servant had already left. He knew well enough that when the professor started, he could ramble on for hours even if no one was in the room with him. Actually, an audience might actually annoy him; he was the sort of professor who thought that college was great except for the students. Really, if the pay hadn't been so good...

In fact, Revyl Dirienzal trailed off after a few minutes and just looked vaguely off into the distance. A professor of divination, with access to the tomes on forbidden magic, he had an idea on what might have been in those drawers. And if he was right...

[Graybeard]

Whoever the tall horseman was, he rode silently past the camp and into town. Maybe we spared him an unpleasant encounter like ours, Brother Miguel thought. Or maybe he was just a local, coming back to town after doing who knows what during Departure. In any event, the night passed surprisingly peacefully.

-----------

Meanwhile, encounters of a different kind were happening in Tsuirakushiti.

Brother Farley was no stranger to warp gates, but he'd certainly never seen one quite like this before. They'd gated into what appeared to be a vast, open chamber with a ceiling of stars set in the blackness of a night sky -- never mind that, unless the gate process had taken a great deal longer than it was rumored to, the sun couldn't even have set yet. Must be a magical effect to impress the paying customers, Farley guessed, accurately. And he had to admit he was impressed. So, based on her open-mouthed, awed stares, was Kristi.

A thirtyish man, already balding in the way of portalmages, met them at the entrance to the gate and introduced himself as Portalmage Gozami. "Welcome to Tsuirakushiti," he said formally. "You are the first Veracian other than diplomats to gate into this city in many years. It is my duty to see to your well-being until the personnel from Sashi Mu meet you tomorrow and escort you to the, ah, test facility. I trust that will be satisfactory?"

The formalities were handled without any fuss, and Farley and Kristi soon found themselves ensconced (in separate rooms) in a comfortable but surprisingly stark inn that appeared to be part of the gate complex. Farley guessed, again correctly, that this place had been chosen for two purposes: get him (and Kristi) in an appropriately business-like mood for the next day, and keep them out of the public eye that would have followed someone as exotic as a Veracian priest everywhere at a fancier, and less tightly controlled, hotel. Well, no matter; he didn't expect to be treated like a visiting dignitary, and he did have a job to do. The portalmage gave them contact information and instructions on how to use some of the rooms' magical facilities -- surprisingly little to them that was unfamiliar, Farley thought -- then took his leave.

Wow, Farley allowed himself the luxury of thinking after the man was gone. If anybody had told me a year ago that I'd be preparing to sleep in this place, with a Tsuirakuan girlfriend in the next room, I'd have thought they were crazy. He unpacked and started his evening prayers and meditations ...

... Which were interrupted by a soft knock on the door. "Sweetheart?" came a similarly soft, and familiar, voice from beyond. He rose from his cross-legged position and answered Kristi's knock ...

... And the night in Tsuirakushiti also passed peacefully, if considerably more ... intimately ... than Farley had ever imagined possible.

[Sareth]

Even before the sun rose, Lillith was awake. She sat over to one side of their little encampment, her legs folded beneath her, and as the sun rose, she knelt, whispering softly in an ancient tongue.

She was not, in fact, praying to the sun as it appeared she was. Rather, she was praying to the mistress of the sun, the trees, and all of nature. There were spirits, and they were to be respected, and then there was that which was above the spirits, which commanded even them. Traveling with Luminositan priests and Tsuirakuan mages, she felt the need more than ever to connect with the spirits and the Mother of all.

Behind her she could hear a stirring, but she didn't let it stop her. They knew who she was. She was not going to hide it any futher. Not from them. Either they'd accept her, or they'd reject her. At least she'd no longer be in limbo.