Chapter One: Signs of the Flesh

[Schala_Zeal]

As the group with Cynthia arrives at the temple of the Silver Flame, they are struck by the soaring architecture.  This is a large temple that is clearly well supported by worshipers of the faith.  The doorman nods to Ansirus and admits the group with a blessing that the flame will guide their actions and purify their hearts.

The inside of the temple is a large room with a high-ceiling.  Light pours in through stained glass windows, causing the inside to glow with light from many colors.  The clergyman present notices the group enter and looks up from his reading - the group is the only ones present in the vast hall.  "Greetings.  I am Alsorius Walles, junior member of the Soaring Hearts cathedral.  Things are quiet during the week, so you picked a good time to visit.  In a few hours there will be visitors enough, but for now feel free to look and pray as the Flame moves you."  His eyes alight upon Ansirus' tabard.  "A member of the order?  We are blessed beyond all words."  Then he sees Cynthia's unmoving form in Aiu's arms.  "Are you in some distress?"  He pauses, waiting patiently for explanations while observing the group carefully.

[Rayth Molba]

Ansirus nods to Alsorius. "Yes, we have come here for help. This girl was attacked, and we fear for her health. Could you mend her wounds?"

After speaking to the clergyman, Ansirus turns to Aiu and the man who had not yet been introduced to him. "I don't believe we have met. May I ask you your name? And, do you perhaps know anything about the attack we all participated in?"

OOC

I am assuming that I have been told Aiu's name, considering it was my idea to bring the girl in her care here. I am also assuming that Gol hasn't been introduced to us yet. So this way, he can tell us what he wants to tell about himself, and he can ask about what I found with Detect Magic. 

[Prime32]

"I am Golharath of Sarlona", the man says with a slight bow, "and I was as surprised as you."

The average citizen of Khorvaire knows next to nothing about Sarlona, the existence of the Inspired, or the fact that kalashtar are not normal humans. Oh, and they think they invented Tashalatora-style martial arts.

Bluff check to conceal knowledge of incident (1d20+3=12)

In general, the kalashtar see the struggle against the Dreaming Dark as their fight, and see little point in giving details to the "younger" races (Gol isn't that old, but his quori spirit was born before the oldest dragons).

[Rayth Molba]

"Ah, a citizen of Sarlona! I've never met one before. It is a pleasure to meet you, Golharath." Ansirus extends his hand to shake. "My name is Sir Ansirus Avengart, although you do not have to use the honorific. I am a Knight Templar of the Silver Flame.

If you don't mind me asking, what abilities do you have? I have heard that the people of Sarlona have powers the likes of which are extremely rare here in Khorvaire. I wouldn't mind telling you about myself in return. It seems we are all connected in a way, thanks to that fight. So we may as well get to know each other. I wouldn't mind sharing some information I collected about the people we fought."

Ansirus tries to sound welcoming while talking. He would prefer to have a friendly relationship with people he seems to be working with, instead of a hostile one.

Ansirus doesn't make a Sense Motive check against Golharath. He doesn't believe that anything Gol wants to hide is anything that he needs to know(at least at the moment), so there is no point in prying.

[Prime32]

Golharath shakes Ansirus's hand. "My power comes from the mind." he says, demonstrating by slowly materialising a mind blade. "I understand adherants of the Path of Light are rare in these lands. And you are a... sorcerer?"

[Rayth Molba]

Ansirus looks at the mind blade in awe; he hasn't seen anything like it before. "You are right, I haven't seen many followers of the Path of Light here." Ansirus pauses at Golharath's next question.

"And no, I am not a sorcerer, although I can see why you would think so. My power has been bestowed upon me directly from the glory of the Silver Flame itself." Ansirus demonstrates by conjuring a plume of silver fire in his hands, letting it stay for a moment, then quenching it. "The Flame has given me a portion of its power, bringing my soul closer to binding to it in death. An endless font of energy has been contained within me, and I am learning new uses for it every day."

Ansirus smiles; he doesn't get many chances to explain where his powers come from, and he feels a great amount of pride in it.

OOC

Why is it that every time I post, I feel like I'm making some kind of typo that I just can't find  . Oh well.

I figured that this is where Ansirus assumes his power comes from, although it could come from a darker source. He thinks it is a gift from the Silver Flame, and I think it would make sense if he thought that it would get him on better terms with the Flame upon death. Schala, you can change the origin to whatever you want, whichever source you think would work better for the story.

[Prime32]

(At the temple)


Golharath glances at Cynthia out of the corner of his eye. "So... what was this information you collected?"
Regardless of where his power comes from, he seems to have knowledge of the arcane. Hopefully, he can fill in the blanks left by Negavri.

I hope the group gets back together soon (Gol has some questions for those who would meet with Dirvald). In the meantime, putting your location at the start of your posts can make the thread to follow.

[Rayth Molba]

(At the temple)

"Ah, yes. The gifts the Flame has bestowed upon me include the ability to see magical auras with but a glance. The people at the scene had several magical effects on them.

The larger man had a Transmutation aura on him, that I recognized as an Alter Self spell. He also had a stronger aura of Transmutation, the likes of which I couldn't recognize, and an Abjuration aura of similar strength coming from a necklace under his clothes. He has a faint aura of Transmutation on his hands, which I saw as a pair of Gloves of Storing, and a moderate aura of Necromancy on a belt on his waist, which I failed to identify.

The thin man, who we found was a dragon, had two moderate auras of Transmutation magic, one of which was similar to one on the larger man, and the other was a Polymorph effect. He also had a moderate aura of Enchantment magic, which concerns me. It's possible that the dragon was being controlled by the larger man." Ansirus turns to Aiu and Golharath. "So, what do the two of you think we should do, once the girl has been attended to?


OOC

Ansirus isn't sure if telling Golharath the girl's auras is wise, until he finds out more about him. It is also more Aiu's choice than his own.

[Schala_Zeal]

(At the temple)

Alsorius Walles frowns as he hears of the attack on Cynthia.  "An attack on a young girl in broad daylight?  I suppose it is not unheard of, but I fear for our society in these trying times.  I'll get an attendant who will examine her.  Please follow me."  He leads the group to through a small door in the rear of the chapel, down a hall past several other doors, before entering a well appointed bedroom.  He gestures for Aiu to place Cynthia on the bed so she can be examined.  "We use this room as a guest room, but it is currently unoccupied," he explains.  He departs, returning in a minute with a nervous looking young woman with short-cropped brown hair.  "This is sister Yvette," Alsorius says as she moves to Cynthia. 

Once Cynthia's sleeves are rolled back and the beginnings of her dragonmark revealed, Alsorius looks at Ansirus sharply.  He carefully asks whether there "Is anything we should know about this?"  Yvette proceeds with her examination. 

After a few minutes, she announces that there does not seem to be anything wrong with the girl physically.  There is no sign of any wound inflicted, though she does have a slight fever.  Yvette would like a restorative spell (lesser restoration) cast upon her patient, but she would need an elder member of the clergy to do so, as it is beyond her skill.  Alsorius offers that he could perform the spell now and, if no one objects, begins a calm intonation of the deeds of Tira Miron.  There is a flash of bluish-silver light that spreads over Cynthia's body as the spell completes, fading rapidly into her skin. 

The girl lies there for a moment, then her eyes flutter open.  "Bear?  I had a weird dream - I dreamt that my father had found me and was coming to kill me.  I fled out of my house, into the mists to escape his gaze.  And then you came and carried me away, but you walked very slowly.  No one understood that we had to hurry, we had to run and to hide and to escape his gaze.  It was everywhere, looking down on the land.  I thought the mist would hide it, block it out, but it didn't.  I could see it looking at my as you carried me away, coming closer and closer.  And no one would listen to me, since I was just a little girl that no one knew.

I have not named the female Kalashtar yet, have I?  Let's call her Negavri.

[Rayth Molba]

Ansirus leans in to talk to Alsorius when he mentions the dragonmark. "I am sorry that I didn't mention it earlier. I fear that this is may be part of the reason that she was attacked. I would greatly appreciate if you did not spread the word to people that you do not absolutely have to. I would hate to draw attention to the girl."

After Cynthia has been healed and awakens, Ansirus turns to her. "I am sorry to have to ask you questions so soon after you have been healed, but do you have any idea why you were attacked? Any information you have could help."

[Schala_Zeal]

(At the temple)

Alsorius speaks to Ansirus.  "Of course, templar.  I'm sure that Yvette and I will keep your confidence on this matter."  Yvette nods and blushes, hurrying from the room.  "She dreams of being a templar, though I do not know if she has the spirit for it.  I'll be leaving you to your talk, then, since the girl is recovered."  The church member departs from the room.

Cynthia looks alarmed to see Ansirus, the others around her, and the strange room.  "What has happened?  Was it not just a dream?"  Her hands fly to her throat, to where her pendant used to hang.  "My pendant!  Does anyone have it?  I have to find it..."  She calms when she notices it in Aiu's hands.  "I'd thought I lost it.  When..." she shivers, then speaks in an icy tone that seems to come not at all from a young girl, "*Tiberus* took it from me.  Luckily," she smiles and her tone brightens, back to a young girl, "you were there to rescue me."

"I was attacked because I am my father's daughter.  I... I had to see him, see if he was going to go through with killing that man.  The one with the mark.  And he did.  I had hoped he wouldn't - he may be a bastard, but I had a hope that there was some decency left in him.  But," she looks down for a moment, as if shamed, or maybe even a bit sad, "I guess there isn't.  I shouldn't be surprised - I'm his daughter, after all.  First-born, bred true."

"You asked why he attacked me?  Because I am his first-born daughter, the first offspring he has ever had.  And he hates me for it.  Over the years, he killed most of my younger siblings.  At first, no one knew what was happening - their deaths looked accidentally.  An illness, or an injury brought by misfortune or neglect.  And he would space them out, so no one got too suspicious.  He was always an expert at getting where he needed to be unnoticed, so no one thought he might be killing them.  But he told me about them, every night after he had killed.  He would tell me everything - how he had located them, watched them, planned everything and rehearsed it, and then committed the attack.  And how he would sometimes hear later that the child he had killed had perished accidentally, and they were terribly sorry. 

"Sometimes, he would rage - they would want him to sire another.  He hated that part, that they could make him serve as a stud, to father more children that he would end up killing.  But he couldn't tell them that - no one could refuse them.  Sometimes he would take his anger out on me.  And he would always tell me how he was saving me for last - that I was special, and he wanted a death that was worthy of his first born.  So I guess that would be why he attacked me.  We never could stand each other.  No one else knew that - everyone thought that things were fine.

"After a while - when I was eight, I think, in Sypheros - I was called down to the office of the mistress whose home I was in.  She seemed shaken up when I arrived, but was trying to put on a brave face.  She told me that my father had been caught doing horrible things.  Betraying his blood.  Killing my siblings.  They never told me how many, but by my count he killed around seventeen.  Maybe more, when I was younger and didn't remember it.

"I'm sorry to burden you all with this.  It's just... my father... he's a bad man.  And he needs to be stopped."

[Pan-Fried Hamster]

Aiu shook her head in confusion.  She'd been watching quietly during the previous exchanges, waiting and trying not to interject.  Now, everything was getting very confusing, very quickly.

The warforged handed over the pendant.

"Who are 'they,' Cynthia?  What do you mean about someone forcing your father to have children?"

She paused, then asked sadly,

"I thought you were an orphan.  Did you go all the way out to the Mourneland just to hide?"

[Schala_Zeal]

(At the temple)

Cynthia looks at Aiu for a moment.

"They?  They are my family - the family, as my father said.  You could never get away from them - they were always watching.  They looked after us - myself and the others at our home.  We were not all related - a family in spirit, they would say, if not in blood.  They did not care for us - we were tools, an investment to be looked after carefully.

"They would set us tasks - lessons for us to learn.  Those who were in charge were not like us.  They did not bear our marks, they could not understand us, but they would not care for that either.  They were generally tolerable to us - some nicer than others - because they wanted us to be useful to them.  Sometimes they beat us.  I remember that one of my siblings named Gordon was killed because he kept getting more and more hysterical when the matron beat him over some offense.  He was screaming and shouting, causing quite the mess.  The fires he created burned a quarter of the house we lived in before they managed to beat him senseless.  He dies from it a few days later.

"My father served the family.  When he was younger, he must have been in a home like me.  Perhaps the one I was in, but maybe not.  I know they have several.  So he serves the family.  He does what they want when he knows that they are watching.  The reach of the family is far.  When they told him to have children, as well as providing the mate he was to use, he did so though he detested it.  He hates all his children.  It's who he is, like screaming was poor Gordon.

"I was not an orphan, and I regret lying to you and the others.  Though I wonder," she looks down at the dragonsmarks on her arms, "if it might not have been better if I was an orphan.  I did not go to the Mournland to hide - my home was there, before the Mourning.  I fled my house after the Mourning, sneaking out when no one was watching."

[Schala_Zeal]

(At the cafe - Lledrith)

Lledrith watches as the group with the girl walks past him.  He hears one of them say something about a temple nearby; then they are gone and he is alone again.

He was getting ready to leave, though he is unsure of where he would go, when a dirty man walks around the corner.  He is a human, wearing a rough-looking coat and durable-looking clothes.  The man looks around furtively, examining the street.  He does not seem to see Lledrith at first, though no one else is around - Lledrith is on a darker side street, not quite an alley but not a street going anywhere important in the early afternoon on a weekday.  After a few seconds of study, the man starts down the street toward Lledrith.

"Excuse me, friend," the man whines as he approaches.  Lledrith figures him for a drunk, which is confirmed when the man's foul breath reaches him.  "Have you any change for a poor man down on his luck?"  As Lledrith prepares to respond, the man thrust a hand full of coins at him.  "Fair value is all I ask - change for some coins I found?"  The top coin seems to gleam in the light, and Lledrith can see the engraving of the House Cannith coat of arms.  "You're a member right?"

[Stratovarius]

Lledrith eyes the man in front of him. He's not in the best of ways with his House at the moment, but even with his lack of worldliness, he can see this for what it is. There's no real use in lying and so he responds in the affirmative, that he is indeed a member of that illustrious House.

Still, Lledrith quickly runs through the list of spells to see if there are any he might have that are useful. He could, at least, escape if it became necessary. Still, he will listen to the man before doing such an action.

[Schala_Zeal]

"Glad to hear it!  Been looking for a place to get rid of these," the man continues, pressing the coins into Lledrith's hands.  He jerks his head towards the cafe.  "I hear that place got wrecked up only ten minutes ago.  And that professor from Morgrave was involved."  He shrugged, "You know anything about this?"  When he sees Lledrith pause, he hastens on.  "I could care less.  But you should care a great deal.  Seems a reporter was eating lunch there and say you - she might put a word into the papers.  Word that might," he shrugged again, "reach the wrong ears at House Cannith.  But maybe she wouldn't put anything about you in if the house here asks her not to.  And for that, they are interested in what happened with the professor.  If you are interested in helping out your house, go to the House of the Swollen Streams - a good drinking spot maybe two miles from here.  There's directions," he said nodding to the coin and bills he had passed over.  "Good day to you, sir, and to your health," he toasts, pulling a flask from a pocket and raising it to his lips as he walks away.

Lledrith can see from the note the beggar had given him that he is to go to a bar about two miles away.  It's House Ghalladra affiliated, and he is to sit in the rear booth underneath the red window.  He'll be contacted there by a woman calling herself Sabrina.

[Stratovarius]

Sighing at the nature of the note pressed into his hands, the crafter turns and begins a trudge towards the bar. He'd give a good deal to not be noticed by House Cannith at the moment, and had rather been enjoying his freedom until getting caught in that blasted fight in the bar. Choosing between the lesser of two evils, his feet led him on and on towards the bar, where he settled into the booth, waving a coin to get another drink, a stiffer one that at his previous place of supping.

[Schala_Zeal]

(House of the Swollen Streams - Lledrith)

An attractive woman arrives shortly after Lledrith enters.  She smiles at him as she sits at his table and orders a drink of her own.

"Greetings - glad you decided to meet with me.  I heard that you were in attendance at the disruption earlier today?  I'd like to hear about it.  In particular, what the good professor Dirvald's involvement was.  In exchange for this, you will be given your freedom.  Cannith South will never bother you again."  She accepts her drink smoothly when it arrives and sits there, watching Lledrith intently.

[Stratovarius]

He sighs and shakes his head, spilling forth the tale as best he knows it. His freedom is worth a simple retelling of what went on in that tavern. It would make news soon enough.

When he is done, he looks at the woman with wide eyes, wondering whether he is free to go?

[Schala_Zeal]

Sabrina smiles at Lledrith.  "Thank you for your time - it has been most enlightening.  As far as I am concerned, you are free to go.  My house will not trouble you further," she pauses and sips her drink, "we could trouble you to perform one further service?"  At Lledrith's look of alarm, she laughs softly.  "We shall not tell the other branches of your presence if you turn us down.  It is merely that you are in a *unique* position, at the moment.  And we can reward you well - monetarily, at the very least.  Or membership - I have heard that you were a dedicated alchemist before your branch turned down your services in that regard.  Perhaps you are still skilled in that field?  Cannith South is always looking for talent, and does not request their members to step beyond their areas of expertise.  I would like to hear more about Dirvald - not from the cafe, but anything you can find out about him.  We had a business arrangement with him, but we have noticed that he was acting more and more peculiar as time went on."