Blackburn's Crossing Chapter 4: Snake Eater

Status
Not open for further replies.
Von Brekker House:

Annabelle nods in response to Arissa's assessment. "It was an interesting evening but no where near as what I heard happened at the party. There were so many people that died, and my dad ended up being glad I had decided not to attend," she says as she moves to put on a pot of tea as Arissa had requested. As she turned back to Arissa leaning on the counter she leaned on one hand. "Oh? And what particular things were on your mind? I probably have a head full of suggestions just waiting."

Annabelle smiles softly as she waits for Arissa to being.
 
Arissa absentmindedly watches Annabelle as she prepared the tea as she thought about what to say. The two of them are good friends... surely she deserves to know if she does not already, ja? Besides, it is clear that my further involvement is only increasing the rate of deterioration in Jonathan’s health... I cannot do this alone, and others deserve the chance to help as well. Annabelle seems to be an extremely resourceful girl... perhaps she can think of something I have not.

Arissa’s smile fades and she looks to Annabelle with a grave expression. “Well, I am curious what Jonathan has already told you of his condition to begin with. Has he mentioned that I am the cause of his affliction?”
 
Bernard smiled uneasily, "You all can figure out the research, I'm sure you'll find more than me. I'll deal with the investigation. Thanks for all your help." Bernard crossed the room removing the Falkovnian gauntlets and placing them on the table then turning to the suit of armor.

As he dismantled it and placed it in his pack he turned to James, "Thanks again James, I'll put it to good use." He turned to Leone, "I'll be needing the sphere back too. I promised I'd return it." He finished packing the armor into his bag, careful of the urn.
 
Léone nods, pulling the sphere out of her bag and handing it to Benard. "Good luck with that," she says, then turning to James. "Well, you gave him the armor so I guess we're done with this room for now. Should we accompany Yelcan up to the library? I can work on this anywhere." She shrugs with a smile. "Or we can go somewhere else after we drop him off, I'd never say no to some peace and quiet."
 
"Thanks." He took the orb and placed it in his pocket. He closed up his pack, swung it over his shoulder and said his good byes.

He left the manor, making his way back to the constabulary, looking for Simon.
 
Von Brekker House:

Annabelle lets Arissa take her time in thinking about what she wanted to ask, and turned back to pour some of tea and then when Arissa speaks Annabelle spills some of the tea, as she looses focus laughing a bit. "Surely he did not put that one on you. Otherwise I might have to beat him around his arena a bit more later today," says Annabelle shaking her head. "His luck with ladies has nothing to do with you Arissa, you can be sure of that."

After a moment of humor passed and Annabelle noticed Arissa wasn't laughing she tilted her head a bit pouring the second cup. "I'm afraid I may have miss understood you, would you mind being a little more specific? I know Jonathan hasn't felt well the last few days but I wasn't aware it was serious," says Annabelle taking a sip from her tea.
 
Arissa felt angry and frustrated at Jonathan for hiding his worsening condition from Annabelle. It is so cruel of him to not tell his friends of his impending fate... Does he expect them not to notice if he were to end up dead within days? After a moment of thought, Arissa relents. I likely would have done the same in his position... I have hid much from those I care for before, ja? Arissa sighs and gestures to the chair across from her. "You should have a seat, Annabelle. I had thought that you would have known, but clearly that is not the case."

Arissa waits for Annabelle to be seated before looking her straight in the eye. "Jonathan is not merely sick, he is dying. And it is my fault. About a week back, I made the foolish decision to strike a bargain with Papa Legba, the fiend who lives in the swamps. To make matters worse, I made the even more foolish decision to invite Jonathan along to... Gods, I am not even certain myself. I suppose I had felt that I needed protection, and felt that Bernard would have forbade me from dealing with the fiend. When the time had come to make a deal, Legba separated us, and Jonathan forged a pact that he himself was rendered unaware of its contents. After our failures in Tumbledown, as well as Zindan's death... I sought out Legba once more."

Arissa's voice broke briefly as she thought of that day, which she now regarded to be the worst of her life. "I was furious, ashamed, and terrified of losing more of my friends. This time, the deal I made with the fiend was to give me the power to protect the ones closest to me... Ironically enough, it was this decision that spells the end of one. Jonathan's bargain as it turns out was to provide the payment for those that I had made... Something I never would have permitted him to do if I had known. As a result, as I grow stronger, Jonathan grows steadily weaker. His smithing skills and swordplay have deteriorated to those of an amateur... and it is not going to stop there."

Arissa is unable to meet Annabelle's gaze any longer, and stares downwards, tears flowing freely by now. "Jonathan has at best weeks remaining... possibly closer to days. Please, do not resent him for not telling you sooner. There is so little time left with him... I beg of you not to waste it on anger. If there is anyone deserving of your ire, it is I." Arissa falls silent, awaiting Annabelle's judgement.
 
Peri curls up into Kallisto, “I’m glad to have you Kallisto and Aluc.” Hugging the larger woman back a moment she tried to regain herself. “I could use your help if Lina is awake to talk, but Aluc May think she is a shiny, I know you said she Agreed to becoming awakened. I can do that soon, but my focus is spread very thin at the moment and I would not want to hurt her. I just need a little more time.”

Getting up from her seat she waved for Kallisto to come see, quietly disappearing into her mothers room.
 
Slightly confused, Kallisto followed Perian through the house, "Aluc's 'awakening' will be helpful, but it is still your ... magic that does it. When you feel ready, we can circle back to it -- but ... what do you mean Aluc may think she's a shiny?" Kallisto shared a look with Aluc as she continued, "Shinies are usually small ... and reflective. How could a -- person be like that? ... Lina is a person, right? Or have I been misunderstanding ..."
 
Von Brekker House:

Annabelle listened to Arissa as she went about telling her about Jonathan's situation and the deal with Papa Legba and how he was growing weaker, enough to die from. "I see, we grew up with the warning tales told to us about dealing with such things. I'm sad to hear that you got caught up in it as well, though Jonathan sounds like he knew what he was doing," said Annabelle seemingly a bit distance as she was processing this. Annabelle smiled a bit forcefully. "I could never hate Jonathan, it was his decision to make and he made it. I would have hoped he would have convinced you not to go but hopefully what you got at the cost was worth it. I'll have to visit Jonathan before too long, I was holding onto something for his birthday but I guess I should speed up the time table..."

Another figure entered into the room, and looked hazily over to Arissa for a moment then to Annabelle. "It hasn't even been a day yet... Don't tell me there's a riot going on," says Thomas as he sits down and Annabelle pours him some tea as well. Thomas takes a long draft of the tea finishing it off in one go and then looks between Annabelle and Arissa sensing the tension between them he sighs. "Alright lay it on me. What's going on now in this crazy town of mine."
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Blackburn Manor:

As everyone starts to diverge James nods to Leone. "Sure, come on Yelcan," says James as he leads him up to the fourth floor, and opens his private library. Showing him more over to where Leone had been studying Violette follows offering to help, and starts to hand off books to Yelcan and read some of the books herself.

James sat in the corner of the room watching the studies as he slowly started to drift off with his own book. Violette turns a book sideways looking at a picture before setting it down. "Hmmm... sounds like we'll have our work cut out for us. Do you know what we are looking for specifically? According to what I've read these things just keep coming back, that must be a very interesting Axe Kallisto has if it's going to be able to put it down permanently."
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Constabulary:

Simon finishes discussing with a few guards their patrol routes, and as they move off Simon see's Bernard coming back. "Back so soon? I'm guessing you got the items identified already, that was rather quick work," says Simon as he looks to the bag that Bernard had collected some of the items in. "Anything interesting among them?"
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Marsh House:

As Peri and Kallisto come into the room Lina seems to be examining herself in the reflection of the window as where she had been stabbed through. She frowns than looks at the two tall people entering the room. Seeing a stranger she cloaks herself and begins to fly off above their heads figuring it would be best to stay out of sight of someone so big that might crush her.
 
Last edited:
As Violette offers to help, Yelcan grabs the books she hands him based on Leone's initial suggestion, and settles in to start reading. He takes out the drawing that Kallisto made of the Great Serpent and showed it to Violette "Basically it looks like this. We know what I briefed you on earlier, but that's about it, so finding anything that we can would be a huge help." As James starts drifting off with the book he's holding, Yelcan continues to pore over the books that he's given, taking the occasional break to watch Leone work so that he didn't overexert himself. He has always enjoyed reading, it was the main reason he pursues being a scholar at home, and with his blessing from Oberon he's able to get through any book that's placed in front of him. Unfortunately, he was limited by the information in the books, and after what felt like hours of reading he finally rested back in his own chair rubbing his eyes.

He had one scroll and two books that he kept off to the side of the chair that he gathered up again as he addressed the room. "Well, so far I have only had minimal amounts of luck here. This scroll..." Which he holds up in the air "Is a first hand account of someone who had actually studied Nagas and discovered that they can speak multiple languages, such a sylvan and common, and even a celestial language of sorts. They also have a very prevalent tapetum, which is a part of their eye that lets them see in the dark."

He puts down the scroll and holds up the next book. "This book contains some records of attacks from the cannibals that live in the swamps, and while they vary in how they attack and where they ambush travelers, the interesting piece of information I gathered from it was the dates of the attacks. They have shown a very consistent decline over the years, and there are very rare records of attacks that have occurred within the past couple years, which might be a good sign for us. Unforunately I was unable to find any connection between these people and the Serpent, so I can neither confirm nor deny Van Richten's earlier theory, and the only mention of Nagas having children was this last book. It just has vague references to snake babies, but at the time they were believed to have been babies corrupted by witches."

Yelcan places the last book down with a quiet thump. He sighs heavily and forces a smile onto his face "What about you lot? Have you found anything useful?"
 
"I left the gauntlets and potions with Leone, the identification ritual takes time. She will have them returned when she's done. This is the adaptive weapon though." He removed the small orb and stating "Subcinctus" the orb formed into the blade he'd carried to the Manor which he offered to Simon.

He continued, "I also spoke with Violette, other than an extreme hatred for the Falkovnians, she's not guilty of anything in regards to Maria's murder that I could find. It seems we've hit another dead end. Though, the blade was copied so well that they included Jonathan's Maker's Mark and fooled Jonathan and Derek. Can't be many that intimately familiar with that blade." Bernard frowned. "I don't know what's next."
 
Léone nods at James, collecting the items and beginning to follow them out of the room. When they make it to the private library she points Yelcan at the books from before. She then finds a quiet corner and lays out the items on a table, along with her spellbook to begin the identification work. Working on the gloves first, she raises an eyebrow at the enchantments that were placed on it. "Absolute loyalty to Drakov... how do you even make an enchantment like that?" When Yelcan calls out she snaps up and points to the things on the table. "They're... interesting, that's for sure. Expected of Falkovnians. I'll keep working on the other two, though they seem like standard potions to me."

With a nod at Yelcan, she looks back down and continues her identification rituals. Despite her best attempts to distract herself with this busy work, she couldn't help but be unsettled by how... strange it felt reaching into Violette's thoughts. "It felt like there was something else there... skittering? That can't be right, it's never felt like that before... Did I do something wrong?"

Unable to shake off her worries, she idly casts the spell again behind the cover of her spellbook and glances over to James, who appeared to be drifting off next to her. She catches his attention, reaching into his surface thoughts and leaning over in a whisper. "Hey, weird question. Does anything seem... off about me? I had a strange feeling back in the other room, and I want to make sure that there weren't any lingering effects from the book." She frowns slightly, unsure of what to make of it. "I should be fine, but... you know I can't really trust myself on these things."
 
Entering the room, a small hint of movement caught Kallisto's eye, finding herself focusing in towards a spot near the window -- almost appearing as though it were right in front of her, she saw a woman only about half a foot tall before she disappeared from sight.

Kallisto blinked a few times, returning her sight to normal, "... so Lina is a person. A ... very small person. Who disappears?"

Frowning slightly as she thought back to the last time she was in a room with someone who preferred to stay invisible, she glanced around the room, trying to spot any movement. "Hello ... Lina? I ... hope I did not scare you." She picked at her beaded bracer, "I ... do that to people sometimes, but I'm here to help Perian in helping you if I can." Kallisto ran a finger along Aluc's beak, "This is Aluc -- she's a friend of mine."
 
Constabulary:

"So the person using the blade was familiar enough with the weapon to copy it. Seems to lend itself to someone who knew Jonathan made such a blade that long ago," says Simon taking a look at the blade. "I'll keep this stored safe for now. I'm thinking it might be best if no one else learns of this blade, less likely it might be used for nefarious purposes. If you have any more leads let me know, I'm going to give some thought about the case see if I can't come up with a new list now that we know it was the adaptive weapon that killed Maria."
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
Marsh House:

As Kallisto ran a finger along Aluc's beak it slowly turns into whiskers and a two ears elongated out of Aluc's head. Her tail feathers became as fur, as suddenly claws latched out into Kallisto's shoulder to keep from falling. A giggle sounds from Lina as she spins coming back into view a few feet from Aluc's face and then slowly flies up to her. Aluc recoils up tall until Aluc pats her head gently and then scratched under her chin. Despite the new sensation Aluc starts to purr.

"You're a friend of Peri's?" she asks continuing to scratch Aluc's chin.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
Blackburn Manor:

James woke up to Leone's prodding and looked over to her smiling for a moment as he proceeded her question. "I hope I wake up to you more in the future," says James as he sits up straight to try and fully wake up. "Sorry serious question isn't it. Since the room and the book I haven't noticed anything odd. Lets try something though."

"Hello Eliose," says James before pausing and then speaking again. "Hello Leone.... which of those two sounded better to you right now?"

He watched carefully searching Leone's responses wondering if he hadn't cured Leone of her affliction. There was a slight frown on his face.

(As Leone listens to the surface thoughts of James' mind it sounds like there are two people talking over once another. 'You a very cheesy to try that line.' and 'The ingredients were perfect, no way it was wrong.' Then the next two thoughts again intertwined and hard to separate. 'She's perfectly fine probably just worrying.' and 'She might be broken again. What was that book?')

Violette shrugged looking over to Yelcan. "Think you were able to pay better attention than I was. The books seemed to drone on for what seemed like forever about the places and times, and how hard the expeditions were, and what difficulties they faced," said Violette yawning as if being partly put to sleep. "Seems you're a bit of a natural at reading through the books and extracting the information you need. It sounds like this thing is going to be fairly smart so we shouldn't expect it to be like a normal hunt where we could easily set a trap. It might expect any sort of obvious trap we might lay for it. That and it might also realize how dangerous the axe is for it as well. If I were an immortal snake I'd make sure I knew exactly what type of things could actually kill me permanently."
 
Last edited:
Kallisto grimaced slightly as suddenly Aluc's weight shifted and her claws dug into her shoulder, "What--" she began as she saw Aluc's new cat form, then saw Lina floating through the air.

Hearing the purring she figured Aluc wasn't too panicked ... even though Kallisto really wasn't sure what had happened. Was ... Aluc now going to be a cat instead?

She glanced towards Perian who seemed to be watching the exchange, "I think I'm Perian's friend ... at the very least, I'd like to help if I can. She has helped me much, it's only fair I do the same."
 
Bernard shrugged, "If you're sure it should stay here. I thought it might be appropriate to return it to the Einhorns, but it is part of the investigation I suppose. Anyway, if that's all, I can go see Thomas and free up my evening." He shifts his pack and turns toward the door. "Reach out if you figure out what's next, and keep that thing safe. It'll be a real pain to find again."
 
Léone's eyes widen as she overhears the thoughts of... James? It's just James in front of her, right? She blinks a couple times before speaking again, trying to figure out what the heck was going on with her senses. "Léone is fine... that's not what I was worried about. I thought one of my spells was acting up, like I could be hallucinating about things..."

She looks him straight in the eyes, fiddling with the copper coin in her hands before grasping it and putting a finger to her lips. "After all, I thought I knew what peoples' thoughts sounded like. I'm not so sure anymore." She frowns, putting her hand down and grabbing his hand in turn. "James... are you alright? Is there something you'd like to get off your chest... privately?" She simply stares at him in disbelief, completely unsure whether or not she had gone insane again.
 
Arissa struggles to regain her composure as she listened to Annabelle’s response. She was relieved to hear that she did not seem to resent Jonathan got what he had done. She felt a strong pant of guilt. “No. Nothing would be worth the cost that was paid...” Arissa stops as Thomas entered the room and forces a smile.

Arissa briefly glanced at Annabelle before turning to Thomas. Annabelle may hate me more for this, but I have little time to waste on explanations. Thomas is one of the last hopes of discovering what had happened to his mother before... No, I cannot think like that. Someone will think of something, I am certain of it. “Hello again, Thomas. No riots, but I am afraid I do not bring good news. Jonathan’s health is growing worse by the day... but that is not what I had come to you about today. I hope to resolve the mystery of his mother’s death before it is too late to give him closure... I know that you were close with Maria when the two of you were younger. This may be an odd question, but had you ever noticed anything... strange about her?”
 
Constabulary:

"I will make sure it is kept safe, and I'll check in with you tomorrow with my thoughts," says Simon nodding to Bernard. Another guard approaches him already reporting in. "I went and checked in on Lora like you asked, and she's non responsive at least in the normal sense."

Simon nodded as if this confirmed something for him. "Alright have Reginauld check to see if she's Elf-Shot, when he has some time available. I'll talk to Sereal in the mean time," says Simon looking back to Bernard. "Busy already on the first day. You take care and let Thomas know I'm hard at work with the pile he's left me with."

Simon seems to smile at the jibe before turning back to the Guard.
 
Yelcan rolls his eyes at Violette, slightly annoyed by the lack of information they have going into this. As she speaks, he knows she spoke the truth and rubs his temples with his eyes closed. "I know, this is going to be one serious battle, and we haven't even figured out its origin or connection to these peoples. Who knows, maybe their safety depends on the existence and protection of the snake, just like Van Richten had said, and killing this thing is a bad idea. I don't know...I just had hoped we would have been able to find out more you know? But I guess we should be grateful for what we got." Yelcan grins at Violette. "Thank you for your help Violette, at least you managed to stay awake and attempt to read." Yelcan gives James a quick wink, showing him that he means nothing by that, but the wink and the comment might have been completely unnoticed as Yelcan noticed James and Leone in deep conversation. Shrugging at his failed joke, he turns sideways in the chair and drapes his legs over the armrest while his head dangles over the other side. "Well at least we have a good idea of the actual Naga itself's strengths, unfortunately no idea of its weaknesses really. Oh, that reminds me, Mr. Blackburn, do you happen to have a map of the swamps anywhere around here?"
 
Von Brekker House:

Thomas looked at Arissa for a moment then shrugged. "I'm afraid that girl was an enigma for most of her life. There was a time when we were close, but then I left because my father wanted me to get some 'real battle' experience like he had. I don't think she ever forgave me for leaving," said Thomas sitting up straight but still looking at Arissa. "I've heard a bit about Jonathan's struggles, down the grapevine."

"I guess he made a deal with Papa Legba," says Annabelle offering a bit of context to the conversation to which Thomas grunts. "He wouldn't be the first, nor do I suspect he'll be the last."

Thomas taps his fingers onto the table in front of him. "So am I a suspect in her death then? It's about the only reason I could think of that you'd be asking me about me and Maria's past. I can tell you it was a long time ago, and I've long gotten over the fact that our lives where headed in different directions. At one point she wanted to follow me, to the war. So I did what I thought was best which was to break her heart. Felt right at the time," says Thomas as he pours himself another cup of tea. "Take that as you will."
 
Blackburn Manor:

"Generally I think most things weakness is a sharp blade put into it enough times," says Violette looking over to follow Yelcan's gaze. James nods pointing over to the far wall before looking back to Leone. Violette herself smiles at this. "It's nice to see when two people really care for each other. You have any one of that sort Yelcan?"

Violette asks the question as she gets up going over to the far wall and pulls down a map of the surrounding swamp, and frowns. "Looks like large portions are still unexplored but this at least gives an idea of a general layout," she says looking.

James looks at Leone with only a slight bit of relief at that. "You can read people's thoughts? That is quiet a unique ability though I must admit I did not study it extensively. I did however hear that a lot of people that dwelled within the power of the mind could eventually go mad if they were to read a creatures thoughts that were far to alien their own," says James his voice low. He frowns at Leone's question as to whether he is ok.

"As far as I know I'm alright," says James thinking about the question.

('Is she reading my thoughts now?' and 'Arissa can inject thoughts, while Leone can read thoughts.' As the conversation continues to getting things off his chest there is more. 'Maybe the head pieces downstairs could be modified to mimic this if Leone can read minds it should be possible.' and 'Do I really look that tired? Or is she talking about something else? Does she know something I don't? She'd tell me.')
 
Peri smiles happy to see Lina energetic again. “Lina, Kallisto is going to help us find Momma, I know you just got better but we should know all we can before Bear comes back with the book.” Her neutral face soon falling back as she sits upon her mothers bed curling her feet up to hug her knees and watch Lina play with Aluc and talk to Kallisto.

“What happened to Momma, is she in the book?”
 
Marsh House:

Lina stops petting Aluc who seems to want to insist more petting and instead starts to carefully balance on Kallisto's shoulder and rub against her face. Line floats down to one of the tables nearby. She nods solemnly. "She's in the book, Isaiah hurt me to get to your mother. He got me with a trail of bread crumbs and then held me in a cage until he wanted to use me. Then he let me close enough to contact your mother and stuck that pin through me..." says Lina shivering furiously at the memory. "He told her to get into her book so she would be safe from what he was planning, and he would help her escape afterwards, if she didn't listen he was going to make sure I died horribly. He promised to let me go if she complied so she did...."

She didn't mention that Isaiah hadn't kept his word.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Users who are viewing this thread

Total: 4 (members: 0, guests: 4)
Back
Top