Midnight RPG - Chapter 12.24
Contents
Kevin
- [This scene takes place moments after Durgaz has left Kyuad, Neese, Zal'Kazzir and D'hal hidden in the sanctuary chapel of the Obsidian Spire...]
Black candles flicker near the sarcophagus that seems more pulpit than coffin. This room isnot quite as dank as the dungeonous halls that you've moved through to hide within waiting for the Orc Seer to pull the Elf and his wolf to safety. From your vantage point beneath a long dark stone and ancient wood table that sits against the wall around a corner to the left of the cathedral-like doorway you are hidden from view by a cloth draping over scraping the warm stone-worked floor.
Durgaz quickly plunked you down beneath the table to hide from the denizens within. Ducking in and out of the carved nooks along the outer dungeon walls on your way to this "safe room", you heard the echos of human voices but could make nothing out.
It took nearly three minutes that seemed like hours to climb the chute leading into the room when the automaton-like Orge sat watching for movement of the hanging bodies, once to the top perhaps another two minutes creeping behind shadows to this place. The room feels less like an underground dungeon and more like a chapel with intricate weavings of tapestry adorning the walls. The only areas open to bare wall show strange carvings of beasts and gargoyles jutting out mostly high along the tops of the walls. Pews line this room, perhaps thirty on each side of the center walk to the front pulpit. Surrounding the pulpit/coffin, hundreds of black and dark crimson candles illuminate casting dozens of long shadows throughout the gable ceiling room.
Now and then the sound of a bat flutters somewhere in the dark. The floor carpetted in some places sometimes moves with beetles, bugs, centipedes, maggots and flys underfoot. They seem to permeate the Spire, having worked their way into the recesses of the stone walls and floor which seems to periodically have small pools of the same necro-seepage from the caverns below - the bugs scurry about to avoid being stepped on. The scent of mildew and death is covered in this room by an odd sweet wax that fills your lungs with a warm haze.
Not moments after Zal'Kazzir has been deposited by Durgaz next to Kyuad beneath the table does the cathedral door creak open... Footsteps and paper shuffling can be heard before the voices of at least three denizens of the Spire walk the center aisle toward the alter...
Bill / Kyuad
Kyuad readies to grab at Zal'Kazzir in case he decides to get out from under the table to make friendly with the legates.
Kevin
- [For sake of ease, and because its no real secret, I've labeled the names of the legates present. Assume that they say enough in their conversation that you can get the gyst of their names/ranks.]
Curate Martial, Bearer of the Black Shield - Seneschal of Shadow, Harrower (female human, Urban Sarcosan)
Ahimia Gaskindin
"... beyond that point Hyuri, I fail to see your logic to the arguement. I take issue that he offers such easy alliance for anyone that would follow his cause. Might I add that I fear that his cause is not our own. Even now the Orc and Undead march to the treeline but what does he do? He toils his time with the stars, leaving before the initiates that are to become during HIS ritual on the moon. He twists in plots with the misguided contention of meaningless whelps making their way to us from the ShadowWall..., hoping they will grant we Spire-folk favor to overcome King Jahzir..."
although you are unable to see her, you can hear the temper and budding angst in the fiery heart of the woman's voice, walking backwards up the aisle barking at the others... as she is cut off.
Bill / Kyuad
Kyuad: With a tone of amazement, "That must be us... they know of the ShadowWall!"
Kevin
Harrower, Sunulael’s Handmaiden - Inquisitor (female human, Urban Sarcosan)
Hyuri Dezba-Kahon
"...'HIS' ritual is to support the..."
pulsing in defense the second woman bumps the shoulder of the first, turning her as they walk. You still cannot see their faces, only the curves that are made by the well-toned women. The first nearly a foot taller than the second.
Curate Barrack-Master, Surgeon Knife (male human, Urban Sarcosan)
Yungat Titkan
"...'HIS' ritual is the point Lady Dezba-Kahon... 'HIS' ritual should not be noted. It is because the master chooses to go his own way that..."
the man walking behind them preaches to the women. His hands sway scuttering vermin from their path with a short staff with five large black crow feathers, as he stoops to straighten a pew seat - very nearly making eye contact with you...
Ahimia Gaskindin
"Shadow have you Hyuri! Listen to Yungat... The Vile continues to step closely to the boundries watched by those such as us within the Devout."
Bill / Kyuad
Kyuad: Kyuad quietly interjects, "I thought so - the Devout are in a position of contention, watching his actions."
Kevin
Ahimia Gaskindin
"Some have feared that his elfin ways cloud his mind from the stars, yet he continues to rely on them as the long dead Sahi did. Not only does he tempt fate by having the slave-master bring his latest batch in such a large contingent in one massive drive, but he continues to toil with that damned eye. Truly Hyuri you can believe that it speaks as he postulates, true it has power, true it has raised these halls from obscurity but it is but a sick tool for a self-annointed would-be scientist driven mad by the things he saw beneath the Spine of the World.
Do you truly believe that it was Lord Sunulael's wish to taunt the orc traitor who can see through the eyes of the Cadaverous thing? Do you think the Shadow compels him to use the Spire as his personal fortress for conquest on which he can hang the bodies of the pathwalker's allies? Do you think the orc legions, that would have his head, are so far from the truth told them by hundreds of years of raw instinct? And do you think Master Kulos would..."
The hot-tempered legate stops the procession as they reach the center of the cathedral room.
Bill / Kyuad
Kyuad: "The orcs hate the Vile?"
Kevin
Yungat Titkan (gasping as he walks)
"...blasphemous Lady Gaskindin! Speak not of it here!"
The man looks upward into the shadow as if he fears being overheard in this unholy debate...
Hyuri Dezba-Kahon
"'tis true Ahimia... the Priest of Shadow may or may not compel Vrolk directly in the manners in which he weaves. But I follow... You follow. We follow. We follow without hesitation because we know that he will take us..."
Hyuri skirts the blocked path, moving to the right (luckily for you) through the pews some 40' from the chapel center as she continues to the pulpit along the opposite wall...
Ahimia Gaskindin
"...take us WHERE Hyuri?!! Take us to the Marches to die true death? Take us beneath the Spine to a fate worse than undeath? Take us to the grave with so many others beneath this Nail?? You speak as though you have a devotion that reaches beyond the Shadow Hyuri. You speak with a light in your eye. You speak with..."
the girls pace one another on opposite ends of the pews, Ahimia in the center with Yungat and Hyuri on the outer edge.
Hyuri Dezba-Kahon
"...I speak with my heart Harrower..."
as the other two legates stop starkly...
Ahimia Gaskindin
"What good is heart without a mind to follow it Hyuri? What good is heart when drowned in pity for an elf who forsaked his own kind to emulate ours? What good is heart for one that has never shown mercy to the Sisterhood? What good is heart for one who's only wish is to..."
rushing between the pews toward Hyuri Ahimia picks up an unholy praybook that had been left out and slips it into a small rack on the backside of the pews as she rounds the corner across the room from your vantage point.
Hyuri Dezba-Kahon
"...YOU know nothing of heart Ahimia. You wouldn't have to ask these things if you knew love..."
and the two stand opposite the chapel as you hide beneath the table, the man steps up onto the pulpit straightening some papers... adding to the small stack as he sets a signate ring into heated wax. (these are the papers you will/can get that I showed you)
- [Kyuad and Zal'Kazzir (and their familiars) are able to talk softly to one another without fear of being heard. Kyuad would also be able to look in his lorebook for anything he wants if needed, but it will be at a 50/50 failure chance just like attacking. This simulates the lack of streaming light that you can make use of while hidden under the table.]
Bill / Kyuad
Kyuad: "The 'traitor orc,' who they also referred to as 'the pathwalker,' must be Durgaz. Though from just hearing her, she could have meant 'pathwalker' in the plural, meaning all of us. Surely they know we are here already - if not for the spying then for what happened below. I did not realize that Durgaz could see through the Cadaverous Eye himself. Maybe they refer to a potential ability and not his current practice. Though from some of his 'visions' I could suspect either to be true.
"They referred to him as a pathwalker, as though that were an important distinction about Durgaz. Perhaps he and 'the Vile have this in common... it would be interesting to see if anyone else were able to use the 'Eye. We shall see, if given the opportunity. Speak not of my suspicions to Durgaz, I do not want him thinking that I expect him to use this tool of wickedness.
"I will try to fill the time waiting on the others by trying to reference the stations and ranks these legates mentioned."
OOC: Kyuad's doing a Lorebook check on legate ranks and such, looking for what Harrower, Curate, Barrack-Master, Surgeon Knife, and Seneschal of Shadow mean for the legates and their purpose within the greater church. Modifier is +11
Other questions
Thanks a lot Kevin! This is awesome!!
I edited some minor typos this morning, and again when I added to it just now. I'm unclear about this portion however: "He toils his time with the stars, leaving before the initiates that are to become during HIS ritual on the moon. He twists in plots contending on meaningless whelps making their way to us from the ShadowWall... "
Is she referring to the initiates as "the initiates-that-are-to-become" as a single long-winded term? Is his ritual on the moon or is he leaving before the 'moon (as a shortened term for the New Moon or whatever phase that they understand as her meaning), which is when the ritual takes place?
She said that his plots contend on whelps, which means "conflicting/fighting/rivaling on whelps." I don't think this is a proper use of the word. Should that be depending instead of contending? Or should it be "contending with"?
Kevin
Thanks for the typo fixing, I don't mind at all. Just make sure you are NOT editting the meaning of the phrase. If you wonder, please ask before you change it. -thanks.
- [KYUAD] Though from just hearing her, she could have meant 'pathwalker' in the plural, meaning all of us.
- [A]: ...possibly...
- [KYUAD] Kyuad's doing a Lorebook check on legate ranks and such, looking for what Harrower, Curate, Barrack-Master, Surgeon Knife, and Seneschal of Shadow mean for the legates and their purpose within the greater church. Modifier is +11
- [A]: ROLL: Kyuad (Lorebook +11) ROLLED: 8+11 = 19
Oooo... crappy roll Bill, sorry about that... Luckily I rolled a 11 on the 50/50 though. So... With this roll - Kyuad gains Common, known by at least a substantial minority of the local population., luckily some of this information is somewhat easily known...
IN FACT... Zal might know this info as well.
ROLL: Zal'Kazzir (Know: Shadow +10) ROLLED: 2+10 = 12
So what I have listed here is the information that either Kyuad or Zal'Kazzir would both have. Bill, I've continued a little bit of your Lorebook information in your Lorebook. (ADAM - do not read the Lorebook)- Harrower: Harrowers are granted a considerable amount of autonomy and expected to scour the land with merciless efficiency. The Order of Harrowers is under the leadership of the grim legate Janavar, who oversees his harrowers’ activities from his quarters in Theros Obsidia.
- Curate: A prefix title for temple legates. Curates are aids to the Prelate (Prelate is the highest-ranking temple legate).
- Barrack-Master: A prefix title for temple legates. Barrack-Masters are responsible for the cleanliness and orderliness of the temple living quarters.
- Surgeon Knife: A dominion within the "Umbral Catholicon" group. These legates are clerics who are too weak and ineffectual to carve a niche elsewhere in the order. The Umbral Catholicon are considered the lowest of the dark god’s priests, openly despised by their brethren and treated as little better than common lackeys by the orcs.
- Seneschal of Shadow: A rank within the "Soldier Legate" group. The Seneschals of Shadow are often the head of a chapter of the Fulminate Shield. Others command the bodyguards of greater legates.
- [A]: ROLL: Kyuad (Lorebook +11) ROLLED: 8+11 = 19
- [KYUAD] I'm unclear about this portion however: "He toils his time with the stars, leaving before the initiates that are to become during HIS ritual on the moon. He twists in plots contending on meaningless whelps making their way to us from the ShadowWall... "
Is she referring to the initiates as "the initiates-that-are-to-become" as a single long-winded term?- [A]: She is referring to "Initiates" that will "become" something by attending/aiding in the "ritual on the moon". Who these "Initiates" are could be: your group, the incoming slaved orcs, the three legates with the slaves, or someone else. She didn't say.
- [KYUAD] Is his ritual on the moon or is he leaving before the 'moon (as a shortened term for the New Moon or whatever phase that they understand as her meaning), which is when the ritual takes place?
- [A]: She said he left "BEFORE the ... ritual on the moon". Which PHASE of the moon or whether he's gone and already come "back" by now is unclear, she did not say.
- [KYUAD] She said that his plots contend on whelps, which means "conflicting/fighting/rivaling on whelps." I don't think this is a proper use of the word. Should that be depending instead of contending? Or should it be "contending with"?
- [A]: The word/phrase I meant to convey was more like "contention" (struggling together in opposition). I editted it above to read this way: "He twists in plots with the misguided contention of meaningless whelps making their way to us from the ShadowWall..."
