12-24-2020, 01:39 AM
Episode 25
She re-wrapped the crown and returned it to her pack. She still had her brother to look for.
Does she hear the sounds of anyone?
(Somewhat Unlikely | 7[d10]) Yes, but...
But it’s muffled and difficult to tell direction.
Human?
(50/50 | 9[d10]) Yes
In pain?
(50/50 | 8[d10]) Yes
She heard a sound, a hoarse, ragged cry, indistinct and muffled. She couldn’t tell if it came from above or below. But it sounded like a cry for help. She pulled out her bow, fitted an arrow, and dashed forward, taking the stairs up two at a time.
Delve the Depths + edge since she’s moving quickly
3 = 1[d6]+2
5 = 3[d10]+2[d10]
Wow. I got lucky. A weak hit.
I roll on the Edge column.
I rolled an 89 - Mark progress twice and Reveal a Danger
Progress is now 9/10 with the two progress.
Here’s my Reveal a Danger move.
I rolled a 29 and check the theme card
“An Ill-fated victim in danger” -- This sounds like I’m getting close.
She darted up stone stairs, first one level, then to a second level. The sounds grew louder.
Is it Seith?
(Somewhat Likely | 10[d10]) Yes, and...
Is he conscious?
(Somewhat Unlikely | 3[d10]) No
She heard another cry and a body rolled down the steps, nearly colliding into her. It was Seith. He lay sprawled on the steps, unconscious.
Is he bleeding?
(Likely | 5[d10]) Yes, but...
She knelt and found a pulse. He was alive! She felt blood on his head. A bludgeoning wound. Maybe from the fall on the stone steps?
Is there a Varou on the steps?
(Likely | 9[d10]) Yes
She didn’t have time to consider that as a humanoid shape with strong limbs leaped at her from the shadows, curved daggers slashing at the air in front of her.
A Varou!
This is a dangerous encounter. Every harm she gives counts as two progress in the combat.
Enter the Fray with Wits for being ambushed (This was because of the danger before where they’d heard Scratch’s and her shout and were waiting to attack).
8 = 6[d6]+2
2 = 1[d10]+1[d10]
A strong hit. I get +2 momentum and I have initiative. And it’s a positive match.
Handy dandy! I’ll come up with that in a bit.
The creature landed hard and stumbled, giving her time to act. She leaped back out of reach, arrow still in her bow and loosed the shaft in a fluid motion.
6 = 4[d6]+2
6 = 3[d10]+3[d10]
Wow, another strong hit! Inflict +1 harm (so I inflict 2 harm for my deadly weapon plus this additional one). AND I get another positive match! Incredible! I’ll come up with that in a bit.
The shaft rammed into its chest and it stumbled back against the wall (6/10 progress on the fight.). She rapidly loaded, sighted, and loosed again as it leaped at her again.
6 = 4[d6]+2
9 = 7[d10]+2[d10]
A weak hit. She loses initiative but gives 2 more harm for her deadly weapon (Fight progress is now 10/10. Now she just needs to regain initiative to end the fight).
Her shaft took it in the gut. It roared in fury, spittle flying as it came on, its daggers raised. She raises her bow seeking to block its strike and swinging at its head.
Clash move (roll + iron)
5 = 4[d6]+1
5 = 2[d10]+3[d10]
A strong hit! +1 momentum and +1 to my usual harm. If the fight progress wasn’t maxed out, I would give a total of 2 more harm (her bow used in this way isn’t deadly weapon)--but really he’s taken the amount of harm that I can give as you can only get 10/10 progress on a fight and there’s always a chance of losing a fight even with 10/10 progress--not likely but always possible).
So now I just need to End the Fight move and narrate it.
10 progress vs
10 = 2[d10]+8[d10]
A strong hit!
She smacked his paws--hands--in a whirring blur, and the twin daggers clattered to the ground, then she smashed his face crushing his snout with her elbow. He fell backwards onto the steps, dazed and wheezing, groaning. Before he could react, she drove her heel down into his chin, snapping the creature’s neck.
Is Seith still unconscious?
(Likely | 4[d10]) No, but...
But he won’t be unconscious for long.
She moved to Seith and knelt beside him, probing for other wounds. Other than the head wound, he seemed unharmed, and for a moment his eyes actually flickered open, unfocused.
Does he recognize her?
(50/50 | 10[d10]) Yes, and...
“Eilwen,” he croaked. “Is that you? We thought you were dead.”
“Where’s Aron?”
“Up above,” he groaned and turned his head to glance up the stairs. “At least he was...But-” then his eyes flickered and closed and he lost consciousness again.
(Milestone for Aron vow progress 6/10.)
“What do you mean, was?”
But Seith lay there unresponsive.
Were there more Varou above? She couldn’t be sure.
Locate Your Objective Move
10 progress vs
6 = 3[d10]+3[d10]
Another strong hit! +1 momentum and +1 to my next move now. And another positive match!
Alright, so I essentially had 3 positive matches in a row. Something amazing should be here.
She moved up the stairs cautiously into what used to be a solarium. Above her, an azure sky with wisps of cloud, breathed gusts of wind that scattered crumbling leaves underfoot. Vines crept over the walls and around old window shards that gleamed in the sunlight. Lichen covered everything. Broken pottery littered the stone shelves. Shards of old glass and leaves crunched underfoot as she moved into the room.
In the center of the ruined solarium lay a stone box with its lid partially removed.
And there, next to the box, she saw Aron!
He lay under a dead Varou, Aron’s dagger in the beast’s eye. She pulled the beast off of him and saw that his leather armor was soaked with blood.
“Aron!” she frantically unbuckled his leather cuirass and tunic, but after checking him over, she realized most of the blood had come from the dead Varou. Blood was on the back of Aron’s head however, but the wound wasn’t serious. He must’ve lost consciousness in his fight with the wolf-like creature.
Oracle rolls I did to come up with preceding paragraphs about Aron’s state
Is he hurt?
(50/50 | 2[d10]) No
Why didn't he help with the fight? Perhaps he had been knocked out from an earlier tangle with the attack?
(Likely | 8[d10]) Yes
Is there a dead Varou?
(Likely | 7[d10]) Yes
She hauled Seith up the stairs and dragged the large man next to her brother. Stars, but he was heavy... Then she knelt and wiped the blood from Aron’s face, and waited for her twin to regain consciousness.
After some time, Aron coughed and came to... “Eilwen,” he croaked. “You’re alive.”
(Milestone for Aron vow 9/10)
Fulfill Your Vow
6 = 4[d10]+2[d10]
A strong hit!
I get 1 xp for finishing the Troublesome vow (she now has 3 unspent xp)
“Easy,” she said and helped him sit up and swallow some water from her waterskin.
“What happened?”
He explained how they too had fled into the woods. He had wanted to look for her, but recognized it was futile in the fog. So, he and Seith had spent a cold night in the woods, hiding in the bole of a huge tree. They returned to the camp the next morning, but some Varou had also returned to eat some of the horse flesh.
“The Varou followed us into the woods,” Aron said. “We lost them for some time, but they found our trail and hounded us again, until we arrived here,” he concluded. “We found this upper chamber and ambushed them on the stairs. We fought... I saw Seith fall. Is he--?”
She nodded over to their companion, where he stored. “He’ll be fine. Like you, he took a bump on his head.”
Aron leaned back. “This place,” he said. “I saw a broken throne below. Who do you think....?” he shrugged, and his voice trailed off.
“I saw the throne,” she explained. “This is Greenhome. I don’t know it’s significance, but I think it was a home of sorts for one of the last queens that sat on the throne of our people,” she lowered her voice to a whisper. “There was a device on the back side, a depiction of the circlet etched into the stone.
(Seeing this place and this throne counts as a milestone on her Queens Quest (QQ): 3/40)
“This doesn’t feel much like a palace?”
“Maybe it wasn’t,” she said. “Some kind of attack happened here, I’m sure of it. Maybe whomever the queen was, she had lived here in hiding and assassins had found her. I saw skeletons, human skeletons below. And another of those ancient cat-like skeletons.”
Aron’s face jerked up. “A bonewalker?”
“It may have been. Whatever it was, I think it was involved in the attack here.”
They sat in silence for a while as the sun moved across the sky.
“He’s getting bigger,” Aron frowned. “That can’t be good.”
Seith groaned and awoke, blinked blearily. “Heralds! But my head hurts,” he cursed and then shifted gingerly to a sitting position, wincing from the pain. “Nights Beneath, what happened?”
She retold her story and Seith added some additional details. They rested in silence and she passed out some of the food she had stored.
“What’s in the stone box?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” Aron said. “Seith and I thought maybe there was something inside we could use that would help us fight the wolfmen, but we couldn’t get it off in time before we heard them on the stairs.
“I killed one of them,” she said.
“I’m glad you did, lass,” Seith said, rubbing the back of his head. “I would’ve been done for.”
She shuddered to think what would happen if she had been a moment later. Likely, both Seith and Aron would have died.
The two men talked quietly, resting and eating, and she moved into the middle of the upper level room and with a grunt and grinding of cement on cement, pushed aside the lid. Scratch eventually found them and hopped on top of the stone box, peering inside, sneezing at the dust.
What’s inside? I’ll use the MAG.
(Manacles, puddle of liquid, arrow, shield with a lightning bolt, an oil lamp, a jeweled hexagon pendant, scratch marks, bug, strange triangle symbol)
Inside, some dead bugs lay in balls of curled legs and shriveled dry husks. They crowded the edges on the inside floor of the box.
On the base of the cement box, she saw a smaller iron box and pulled it out. She lifted out the iron box and set it on her lap. Then she opened the latch, raising the lid. Inside, coiled on a bed of silver-blue chain, lay an ornate hexagon-shaped sapphire pendant. Each side, cut to perfection, bore smaller rectangular sapphires, edged in gold.
She exhaled, not realizing she had been holding her breath. Her heart thumped inside her. It’s beauty and craftsmanship staggered her, and it represented wealth beyond dreams. The half crown she possessed, was staggering in and of itself, but this... Tribes and settlements would war to get this. This, with the half crown, might be enough to convince people she was who she claimed, despite not having the other half. If others would go to war, how...how would her brother or Seith respond to this...temptation? Would they remain true? Or would one of them try to take it for himself? Could she trust them?
She cast them a sidelong glance. Aron and Seith weren’t paying attention to her still engaged in banter. But even so...
She shifted her body so they couldn’t see. Then with a trembling finger, she pulled out the pendant on the chain and turned it over. There on the back she saw a strange triangular rune.
She traced one of the lines with a finger with dried Varou blood on it. She frowned at the shape. The lines of the rune twisted, like some maddening visual puzzle, and her eye couldn’t quite decide which line to follow when it went to a vertix. She had seen its like before or something very similar...Could it be--?
She put the pendant back, pulled out her mother’s book of iron plates from her pack. They always felt odd--alien even--in her hands. She turned the thin metal plates over until she found the rune. There, etched onto the last sheet of metal she traced her finger across another identical triangular rune.
“A skaed rune?” she wondered and whispered to herself in a low voice that the men couldn’t hear. Scratch peered up at her with unreadable eyes, then he hopped down inside the cement box, snuffling at the corners. After a few moments, his head poked up and his nout sniffed at the set of iron plates in her hands. It hissed, it’s tongue flicking out and backed away to the corner of the box, sitting on its haunches watching her with what? Was that wariness she saw in his eyes?
What does a Skaed rune mean or do?
Daintily / Dark
Separate / Intrigues
“Skaed” was the verbal command she spoke to call the shadows, to pull them towards her out of the natural shadowed pools created by the interplay of light and objects. Whenever she had done so, she had also traced the same symbol in the air. This rune looked very similar to that on the pendant.
“I wonder...” and she traced the symbol on the pendant again. “Later,” she promised herself. When she was alone. A nervous anticipation thrilled through her.
She pocketed the pendant when the others weren’t looking, and quietly placed the empty iron box back inside the cement box.
I think this calls for a Face Danger + shadow for her deception:
8 = 5[d6]+3
9 = 3[d10]+6[d10]
Strong hit. Nice! +1 momentum (now 8/10).
They didn’t seem to notice. Aaron even joined her, moving gingerly still from his wounds. “What’s in the cement box?” he asked.
She shrugged, “Nothing apparently. Just an empty iron box.”
“Wonder what it could’ve been?” he said with a shrug. “But it’s not surprising, given the state of this place. Someone obviously turned things over.” He yawned then turned away and hobbled back his gear.
She felt strangely simultaneously guilty and pleased with her subterfuge. Yet why should she feel guilty? Queens were allowed to keep secrets from their subjects, right? Besides, it really was for the best.
She frowned at what Aron had said and looked about her at the destruction. Shattered masonry and shards of glass. This place had been attacked and ransacked, it was true. But how had the pendant escaped discovery? Or did someone place it in this box after the destruction had befallen Greenhome? And why place something so valuable here in the first place?
Another thought struck her.
Did someone believe a future heir to the throne might come here looking for clues? Had it perhaps been left. For her? How would anyone know she would be here? The implications twisted inside her, giving birth to an excited heat of possible discovery. That was followed quickly by another thought: had her mother had something to do with this?
She didn’t want to leave this place. Not yet. It represented a connection and maybe with some more exploration, it would present a solid clue to her past.
“Aron,” she said to her brother. “You and Seith need some rest. We should camp here and recuperate. It’s a defensible location.” She picked up her small bundle of belongings. “I’ll drag the Varou bodies down to the room below, and will get some wood for a sheltered fire up here. Then I’m going to do some looking around.”
Aron nodded, “Be careful.”
Seith looked grateful at the prospect of a respite.
The two men settled in to make camp in the shattered solarium. Though it would be open to the night sky, with the trees around them, there would be less wind, and it looked like it might be a clear night for once.
She set off to perform her tasks.
She re-wrapped the crown and returned it to her pack. She still had her brother to look for.
Does she hear the sounds of anyone?
(Somewhat Unlikely | 7[d10]) Yes, but...
But it’s muffled and difficult to tell direction.
Human?
(50/50 | 9[d10]) Yes
In pain?
(50/50 | 8[d10]) Yes
She heard a sound, a hoarse, ragged cry, indistinct and muffled. She couldn’t tell if it came from above or below. But it sounded like a cry for help. She pulled out her bow, fitted an arrow, and dashed forward, taking the stairs up two at a time.
Delve the Depths + edge since she’s moving quickly
3 = 1[d6]+2
5 = 3[d10]+2[d10]
Wow. I got lucky. A weak hit.
I roll on the Edge column.
I rolled an 89 - Mark progress twice and Reveal a Danger
Progress is now 9/10 with the two progress.
Here’s my Reveal a Danger move.
I rolled a 29 and check the theme card
“An Ill-fated victim in danger” -- This sounds like I’m getting close.
She darted up stone stairs, first one level, then to a second level. The sounds grew louder.
Is it Seith?
(Somewhat Likely | 10[d10]) Yes, and...
Is he conscious?
(Somewhat Unlikely | 3[d10]) No
She heard another cry and a body rolled down the steps, nearly colliding into her. It was Seith. He lay sprawled on the steps, unconscious.
Is he bleeding?
(Likely | 5[d10]) Yes, but...
She knelt and found a pulse. He was alive! She felt blood on his head. A bludgeoning wound. Maybe from the fall on the stone steps?
Is there a Varou on the steps?
(Likely | 9[d10]) Yes
She didn’t have time to consider that as a humanoid shape with strong limbs leaped at her from the shadows, curved daggers slashing at the air in front of her.
A Varou!
This is a dangerous encounter. Every harm she gives counts as two progress in the combat.
Enter the Fray with Wits for being ambushed (This was because of the danger before where they’d heard Scratch’s and her shout and were waiting to attack).
8 = 6[d6]+2
2 = 1[d10]+1[d10]
A strong hit. I get +2 momentum and I have initiative. And it’s a positive match.
Handy dandy! I’ll come up with that in a bit.
The creature landed hard and stumbled, giving her time to act. She leaped back out of reach, arrow still in her bow and loosed the shaft in a fluid motion.
6 = 4[d6]+2
6 = 3[d10]+3[d10]
Wow, another strong hit! Inflict +1 harm (so I inflict 2 harm for my deadly weapon plus this additional one). AND I get another positive match! Incredible! I’ll come up with that in a bit.
The shaft rammed into its chest and it stumbled back against the wall (6/10 progress on the fight.). She rapidly loaded, sighted, and loosed again as it leaped at her again.
6 = 4[d6]+2
9 = 7[d10]+2[d10]
A weak hit. She loses initiative but gives 2 more harm for her deadly weapon (Fight progress is now 10/10. Now she just needs to regain initiative to end the fight).
Her shaft took it in the gut. It roared in fury, spittle flying as it came on, its daggers raised. She raises her bow seeking to block its strike and swinging at its head.
Clash move (roll + iron)
5 = 4[d6]+1
5 = 2[d10]+3[d10]
A strong hit! +1 momentum and +1 to my usual harm. If the fight progress wasn’t maxed out, I would give a total of 2 more harm (her bow used in this way isn’t deadly weapon)--but really he’s taken the amount of harm that I can give as you can only get 10/10 progress on a fight and there’s always a chance of losing a fight even with 10/10 progress--not likely but always possible).
So now I just need to End the Fight move and narrate it.
10 progress vs
10 = 2[d10]+8[d10]
A strong hit!
She smacked his paws--hands--in a whirring blur, and the twin daggers clattered to the ground, then she smashed his face crushing his snout with her elbow. He fell backwards onto the steps, dazed and wheezing, groaning. Before he could react, she drove her heel down into his chin, snapping the creature’s neck.
Is Seith still unconscious?
(Likely | 4[d10]) No, but...
But he won’t be unconscious for long.
She moved to Seith and knelt beside him, probing for other wounds. Other than the head wound, he seemed unharmed, and for a moment his eyes actually flickered open, unfocused.
Does he recognize her?
(50/50 | 10[d10]) Yes, and...
“Eilwen,” he croaked. “Is that you? We thought you were dead.”
“Where’s Aron?”
“Up above,” he groaned and turned his head to glance up the stairs. “At least he was...But-” then his eyes flickered and closed and he lost consciousness again.
(Milestone for Aron vow progress 6/10.)
“What do you mean, was?”
But Seith lay there unresponsive.
Were there more Varou above? She couldn’t be sure.
Locate Your Objective Move
10 progress vs
6 = 3[d10]+3[d10]
Another strong hit! +1 momentum and +1 to my next move now. And another positive match!
Alright, so I essentially had 3 positive matches in a row. Something amazing should be here.
She moved up the stairs cautiously into what used to be a solarium. Above her, an azure sky with wisps of cloud, breathed gusts of wind that scattered crumbling leaves underfoot. Vines crept over the walls and around old window shards that gleamed in the sunlight. Lichen covered everything. Broken pottery littered the stone shelves. Shards of old glass and leaves crunched underfoot as she moved into the room.
In the center of the ruined solarium lay a stone box with its lid partially removed.
And there, next to the box, she saw Aron!
He lay under a dead Varou, Aron’s dagger in the beast’s eye. She pulled the beast off of him and saw that his leather armor was soaked with blood.
“Aron!” she frantically unbuckled his leather cuirass and tunic, but after checking him over, she realized most of the blood had come from the dead Varou. Blood was on the back of Aron’s head however, but the wound wasn’t serious. He must’ve lost consciousness in his fight with the wolf-like creature.
Oracle rolls I did to come up with preceding paragraphs about Aron’s state
Is he hurt?
(50/50 | 2[d10]) No
Why didn't he help with the fight? Perhaps he had been knocked out from an earlier tangle with the attack?
(Likely | 8[d10]) Yes
Is there a dead Varou?
(Likely | 7[d10]) Yes
She hauled Seith up the stairs and dragged the large man next to her brother. Stars, but he was heavy... Then she knelt and wiped the blood from Aron’s face, and waited for her twin to regain consciousness.
After some time, Aron coughed and came to... “Eilwen,” he croaked. “You’re alive.”
(Milestone for Aron vow 9/10)
Fulfill Your Vow
6 = 4[d10]+2[d10]
A strong hit!
I get 1 xp for finishing the Troublesome vow (she now has 3 unspent xp)
“Easy,” she said and helped him sit up and swallow some water from her waterskin.
“What happened?”
He explained how they too had fled into the woods. He had wanted to look for her, but recognized it was futile in the fog. So, he and Seith had spent a cold night in the woods, hiding in the bole of a huge tree. They returned to the camp the next morning, but some Varou had also returned to eat some of the horse flesh.
“The Varou followed us into the woods,” Aron said. “We lost them for some time, but they found our trail and hounded us again, until we arrived here,” he concluded. “We found this upper chamber and ambushed them on the stairs. We fought... I saw Seith fall. Is he--?”
She nodded over to their companion, where he stored. “He’ll be fine. Like you, he took a bump on his head.”
Aron leaned back. “This place,” he said. “I saw a broken throne below. Who do you think....?” he shrugged, and his voice trailed off.
“I saw the throne,” she explained. “This is Greenhome. I don’t know it’s significance, but I think it was a home of sorts for one of the last queens that sat on the throne of our people,” she lowered her voice to a whisper. “There was a device on the back side, a depiction of the circlet etched into the stone.
(Seeing this place and this throne counts as a milestone on her Queens Quest (QQ): 3/40)
“This doesn’t feel much like a palace?”
“Maybe it wasn’t,” she said. “Some kind of attack happened here, I’m sure of it. Maybe whomever the queen was, she had lived here in hiding and assassins had found her. I saw skeletons, human skeletons below. And another of those ancient cat-like skeletons.”
Aron’s face jerked up. “A bonewalker?”
“It may have been. Whatever it was, I think it was involved in the attack here.”
They sat in silence for a while as the sun moved across the sky.
“He’s getting bigger,” Aron frowned. “That can’t be good.”
Seith groaned and awoke, blinked blearily. “Heralds! But my head hurts,” he cursed and then shifted gingerly to a sitting position, wincing from the pain. “Nights Beneath, what happened?”
She retold her story and Seith added some additional details. They rested in silence and she passed out some of the food she had stored.
“What’s in the stone box?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” Aron said. “Seith and I thought maybe there was something inside we could use that would help us fight the wolfmen, but we couldn’t get it off in time before we heard them on the stairs.
“I killed one of them,” she said.
“I’m glad you did, lass,” Seith said, rubbing the back of his head. “I would’ve been done for.”
She shuddered to think what would happen if she had been a moment later. Likely, both Seith and Aron would have died.
The two men talked quietly, resting and eating, and she moved into the middle of the upper level room and with a grunt and grinding of cement on cement, pushed aside the lid. Scratch eventually found them and hopped on top of the stone box, peering inside, sneezing at the dust.
What’s inside? I’ll use the MAG.
(Manacles, puddle of liquid, arrow, shield with a lightning bolt, an oil lamp, a jeweled hexagon pendant, scratch marks, bug, strange triangle symbol)
Inside, some dead bugs lay in balls of curled legs and shriveled dry husks. They crowded the edges on the inside floor of the box.
On the base of the cement box, she saw a smaller iron box and pulled it out. She lifted out the iron box and set it on her lap. Then she opened the latch, raising the lid. Inside, coiled on a bed of silver-blue chain, lay an ornate hexagon-shaped sapphire pendant. Each side, cut to perfection, bore smaller rectangular sapphires, edged in gold.
She exhaled, not realizing she had been holding her breath. Her heart thumped inside her. It’s beauty and craftsmanship staggered her, and it represented wealth beyond dreams. The half crown she possessed, was staggering in and of itself, but this... Tribes and settlements would war to get this. This, with the half crown, might be enough to convince people she was who she claimed, despite not having the other half. If others would go to war, how...how would her brother or Seith respond to this...temptation? Would they remain true? Or would one of them try to take it for himself? Could she trust them?
She cast them a sidelong glance. Aron and Seith weren’t paying attention to her still engaged in banter. But even so...
She shifted her body so they couldn’t see. Then with a trembling finger, she pulled out the pendant on the chain and turned it over. There on the back she saw a strange triangular rune.
She traced one of the lines with a finger with dried Varou blood on it. She frowned at the shape. The lines of the rune twisted, like some maddening visual puzzle, and her eye couldn’t quite decide which line to follow when it went to a vertix. She had seen its like before or something very similar...Could it be--?
She put the pendant back, pulled out her mother’s book of iron plates from her pack. They always felt odd--alien even--in her hands. She turned the thin metal plates over until she found the rune. There, etched onto the last sheet of metal she traced her finger across another identical triangular rune.
“A skaed rune?” she wondered and whispered to herself in a low voice that the men couldn’t hear. Scratch peered up at her with unreadable eyes, then he hopped down inside the cement box, snuffling at the corners. After a few moments, his head poked up and his nout sniffed at the set of iron plates in her hands. It hissed, it’s tongue flicking out and backed away to the corner of the box, sitting on its haunches watching her with what? Was that wariness she saw in his eyes?
What does a Skaed rune mean or do?
Daintily / Dark
Separate / Intrigues
“Skaed” was the verbal command she spoke to call the shadows, to pull them towards her out of the natural shadowed pools created by the interplay of light and objects. Whenever she had done so, she had also traced the same symbol in the air. This rune looked very similar to that on the pendant.
“I wonder...” and she traced the symbol on the pendant again. “Later,” she promised herself. When she was alone. A nervous anticipation thrilled through her.
She pocketed the pendant when the others weren’t looking, and quietly placed the empty iron box back inside the cement box.
I think this calls for a Face Danger + shadow for her deception:
8 = 5[d6]+3
9 = 3[d10]+6[d10]
Strong hit. Nice! +1 momentum (now 8/10).
They didn’t seem to notice. Aaron even joined her, moving gingerly still from his wounds. “What’s in the cement box?” he asked.
She shrugged, “Nothing apparently. Just an empty iron box.”
“Wonder what it could’ve been?” he said with a shrug. “But it’s not surprising, given the state of this place. Someone obviously turned things over.” He yawned then turned away and hobbled back his gear.
She felt strangely simultaneously guilty and pleased with her subterfuge. Yet why should she feel guilty? Queens were allowed to keep secrets from their subjects, right? Besides, it really was for the best.
She frowned at what Aron had said and looked about her at the destruction. Shattered masonry and shards of glass. This place had been attacked and ransacked, it was true. But how had the pendant escaped discovery? Or did someone place it in this box after the destruction had befallen Greenhome? And why place something so valuable here in the first place?
Another thought struck her.
Did someone believe a future heir to the throne might come here looking for clues? Had it perhaps been left. For her? How would anyone know she would be here? The implications twisted inside her, giving birth to an excited heat of possible discovery. That was followed quickly by another thought: had her mother had something to do with this?
She didn’t want to leave this place. Not yet. It represented a connection and maybe with some more exploration, it would present a solid clue to her past.
“Aron,” she said to her brother. “You and Seith need some rest. We should camp here and recuperate. It’s a defensible location.” She picked up her small bundle of belongings. “I’ll drag the Varou bodies down to the room below, and will get some wood for a sheltered fire up here. Then I’m going to do some looking around.”
Aron nodded, “Be careful.”
Seith looked grateful at the prospect of a respite.
The two men settled in to make camp in the shattered solarium. Though it would be open to the night sky, with the trees around them, there would be less wind, and it looked like it might be a clear night for once.
She set off to perform her tasks.
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