Taylar grumbles sarcasm in Maldrog, "Thanks for the tip. It's not my strongest skill either."
He will take up a defensive posture adjacent to Raven Elk, using his bludgeons to block any projectile attacks. He will manipulate waylines to focus Heat on the Amiradtha.
Indomitable, Adisakti fires back, still speaking in Maldrog, yet employing some joviality in his voice, despite the imminent danger. "Oh you ungrateful, bitter defeatist! That was really for Raven Elk but it is not like I could just say it in Markidian."
Undaunted, given his injury, the elder Amiradtha joins the banter, speaking Markidian. "Strategy and multi-lingual. Are you not the worthy foes. I think I will kill the quiet one first."
With Raven Elk and Taylar in place, Adisakti mimics the enemy's tactics, so that he cannot simply stand out of reach and throw.
The man does not move close enough to be engaged by either Raven Elk or Taylar and manages to avoid Adisakti, but the combination of the mystical assaults has a profound effect. The man falters and stops running. Despite his misgivings, Taylar is currently the most competent Bender of the three.
"Ack! You can bend as well. I knew not to go toe to toe with you, especially the big Maldrog, but Benders are so rare. No more! You win. I will suck my wounds and leave here. You will face other Benders in this conflict. I am certain the one who collected the armor is one. His soldiers are afraid of him."
In response to the Amiradthan, Taylar says, "Now that you know we can bend, we cannot allow you to leave here." He will manipulate waylines to Heat the old man, using a piece of Flint to magnify the damage. If that doesn't kill the old man, he will attack without mercy until he is dead.
79
Taylar will search the tanner station thoroughly for useful items or clues. He will gingerly search the corpse for anything useful. After this is done, he will take the old man into one of the huts. He will find something flameable, like a branch or bunch of grass, manipulate waylines to set it on fire, then use his torch to burn the tanner station down. He does this to hide that they manipulated waylines to burn the old man.
NOTE: All characters in this campaign are fluent in Markidian and 50% proficient in Maldrog. The character record for Raven Elk is not up to date. It was decided in LINE chat that Maldrog made the most sensible second language, rather than Shimadow or Rheini.
"Secret!? Ha! Only the mundane know not what you are. Half the world can sense you, though so few can do what you do."
The man suddenly become much more difficult to focus upon, as if one's eyes simply want to slip away and look at something else. Taylar and Adisakti realize what the man has done, for both can do so as well; albeit, not nearly so effectively. The man may not be able to manipulate waylines but he certainly has the talent affect himself. For the path being followed by Raven Elk, he will eventually be able to do something similar but using different waylines.
The man was about 10 strides away in a stooped position. He is definitely moving, no longer stooped, but he is injured. It will take 250 tics to cover the current distance.
Knowing exactly where the man is located is not necessary since he is not among the Outliers and cannot move fast enough to escape the affective range. There is no other living thing in the vicinity of the man to wrongfully allocate the heat. Raven Elk and Adisakti are both weaker at manipulating thermal waylines and neither can affect the man. Taylar manages to again cause the enemy harm and almost suffers damage from a throwing knife but is, again, protected by his tunic.
Though pin pointing the man seems impossible, it is readily evident that he is moving back under the closest tanning shed. Raven Elk and Taylar reach the man's location at the same time, but Raven Elk has reach, giving Taylar the advantage of second opponent, who manages to hit something solid, provoking a grunt from the man.
In the process of Adisakti closing, the man had retrieved a bow and arrow, strategically placed under the canopy and fires it at Taylar, point blank, has Adisakti manages to land a near fatal blow. The inability to focus on the man ceases as his incapacitated and unconscious form lays on the ground. Taylar is significantly injured.
There is only one hut. The other three structures are covered but have open sides. The open air structures are all used in the manufacture of leather armor. One is for tanning and dying, one is for prepping material and one is for finishing. Each of these structures also has strategically placed bows arrows and balanced throwing knives. All weapons are of a fair quality.
Finishing the man and dragging him into the main hut takes two people. The dead always seem so much heavier than the living. Once inside, kindling material is plentiful, but before Taylar ignites the place, everyone stops moving for it sounds distinctly like someone or something is moving upstairs, moving quietly. IT is not a small animal.
OOC:
Each character receives 5 DP and improves in Amiradtha by 1% and Maldrog by 1%. State intentions concerning the new development. Collection of anything valuable or anything from the man's body will be handled in a later post.
Taylar will call out, "If you come down and don't fight, we will not hurt you. That old man was a bastard. He wanted a fight, and he got one."
Taylar will search the inside of the hut thoroughly for useful items or clues before burning it.
Shortly after the words are spoken, the very faint sounds of movement crosses the floor above and proceeds down the narrow stairs across the room. There is enough light from the open windows to allow for mostly unimpeded vision.
The three men are somewhat surprised to first see the bare feet and legs of a small girl, coming down the stairs. She is clutching a thin shift of wool tunic about her. She appears to be pre-adolescent, 12 cycles at most.
"I heard the sounds from outside. Is he dead?"
She walks directly to the body and pokes it with her toe. There are blood stains on her shift. Without being questioned, she conveys considerable information about her situation, including lifting the shift to show her coverage of scars.
"I am from West Cove. Men in masks came into our house and put me in a sack. They killed my parents. I have been here since the start the season (that is about 40 days). That man liked to hurt me. He did not beat me. He liked to watch me bleed. (The scars on her are intricate and seemingly patterned.) I have not yet begun adult development. The man did not touch me in that way. He was sicker. It made him laugh to cut me."
Looking around the house while the child speaks, it contains nothing of note or value. It is a simple dwelling. There is some food and water. The girl has not been starved. Other than the scars, she appears healthy.
"... I can tell that other girls were here before me. I do not know how many or for how long or what happened to them. I have no home to go back to. What do I do now?"
Adisakti mumbles to Taylar "Do not worry about my payment, the man said. I do not even know a word for such sickness."
More definitively, he adds, "I cannot see putting a burden on the Sioliri peole. We should take this child to Vittero and see if he can help her."
The child has been maltreated long enough, she does not seem much afraid of anything.
OOC:
Each character receives 5 DP. The intention is to finish interaction with the child before proceeding to tasks about the locale.
After the Outliers introduce themselves, Taylar says to her in whatever language she is speaking, "Well, we didn't kill the old man for you, but he can't hurt you anymore." He shows a few of his own scars earned in battle. "We survive. Adapt and move on. We know of a place we can take you where you will be safe again. It is called Refuge. You are not our prisoner, so you may go where you wish. Now, it is fair to warn you that we are in a strategic as well as physical struggle against a superior power. It's possible these people are the ones that attacked your home. If you go with us, we can't guarantee your safety, and it's plausible that we are going to have to kill someone on the way back. In order to cover up how the old man died, and to take this place from the enemy, I'm going to set it on fire as soon as we clear out everything valuable. Make sure to include some clothes for yourself. Take any item you want, first pick."
Having the same skin coloration, the child was initially considered to be Amiradthan like the leather worker; but once she declared that she was from West Cove, it became obvious that she is Markidian. Only Markidians reside in West Cove. She speaks in a manner that should be alien for a child, if it were not for the time of her captivity.
"None of you is Markidian. I have never seen people like you. You could not of known of my presence before entering the house. Of course you did not kill that monster for me, but I appreciate it. I should not return to West Cove. I think it would be a bad idea. I have heard tale of others girls gone missing before I was one of them. I will gladly go with you to Refuge."
Adisakti, who has been silent and standing still during the discourse, appears to have come to some revelation. "Before you set this place ablaze and likely the entire forest with it, sending up a beacon signal to the entire land of our presence, here, I may have a better idea..."
Though Taylar is quite reticent to change any course of chosen action, the logic is sound. The corpse, which is simply considered an item an no longer a person, is dismembered to be easier to carry. When the party leaves, the girl even carries some of the pieces.
The girl finds an extra wool tunic that would have belonged to the man to put over her shift, but there is nothing else useful in the house. In the out structures, three stranded bows are located along with 18 halarin tipped arrows. The man had been armed with 10 halarin balanced throwing knives. He was wearing a tooth necklace, had three different bird skull fetishes, and a claw fetish. His armor would have fit Adisakti but being a very distinctive, he decides against it. All the clothing the man was wearing, Taylar incinerates in a fire pit, outside.
The girl is also able to fit an unfinished piece of torso armor and tie some scraps around her feet to make-shift shoes. Though the sum of the leather would be of value, it absence would eventually be noted and its transport in a small canoe with four people impossible.
Anything portable of value is taken along with the pieces of the body back to the village after the grounds are cleaned of any combat activity. The remains are discarded into the bay to be carried out to sea and devoured by whatever denizens the ocean contains, creating a complete mystery as to the disappearance of the man.
Based on the curing process of the leather, it is speculated to be, at least, another 20 days before whoever ordered the armor would come to collect. The three men with their passenger paddle the canoe back to the Sioliri Village.
The Sioliri ask no questions but the looks on their faces are all approval that somehow these fine young men must have managed to rescue the child from some terrible ordeal.
Taylar will manipulate waylines to check if the girl has any injuries and will Mend her accordingly. He will give her one of the bows and show her how to use it.
The girls is only marginally still showing injury, despite the scarring, which mends within minutes after being attended. She is otherwise healthy and hydrated. She has lost some of the puffiness that is normally associated with a child due to laboring to carry things for her captor. During the course of travel it occurs to the Outliers that the scarring on this girls reminds them of some scarring seen on one of the Daughters of Dawn. Nothing was much thought of it at the time, since soldiers tend to earn scars, but now it seems more notable that something sinister is going on and that psychotic hermit was much more involved than he would admit.
Quite possibly expecting the same disappointment as with the previous attempts to teach people to help themselves, Taylar finds it refreshing that the girl is receptive and attentive to instruction. She does not yet have the size or strength to use the bow efficiently, but she show potential. Additionally, Adisakti gives her two of the balanced throwing knives, and teaches her some close-quarter defensive combat. He explains.
"People who want to kill you will keep their distance. Do not throw these. Use the bow. You will improve. People who want to hurt you will want to get in close, make it personal. Save the knives for those moments."
Refuge shows some improvement when the three men and the girl arrive. Many of the burnt structure have been removed and new one are going up. A construction crew has come from West Cove and one new family has taken residence. Vittero is giving direction to the carpenters. Maka is speaking with an unfamiliar clan of young Rheini, who are providing meat for the developing village. Fish traps have been placed in the river and are showing productivity. The girls is welcomed. Vittero says that her mind has been subjected to some malevolent training and that he hopes time and care may reverse it.
An entire cycle passes with nothing untoward having occurred in the kingdom, even with questions being applied to the occasionally less than wary soldier in hopes of gaining pertinent information. That cycle stretches into two, then five, with the Outliers having to take to hunting forays to prevent sheer boredom from the mundane. In that time, Refuge grows and establishes trade with the Sioliri Village, though discretely.
All is bland until one day it isn't. Raven Elk wakes in a cold sweat. He has had one of those dreams again, a dream of fire and death and a man on a horse. Both man and horse have eyes like portals to some place mortals were not meant to go. Late that evening a retinue of Cathedral soldiers with a prisoner passes through town heading back toward West Cove. Refuge lies on the only road and these six soldiers were never seen passing north, indicating that they must have passes around through the forest. These soldiers are mounted. None has ever had horses before. Raven Elk takes one look at the leader and says, "That is the man from my dream."
The leader leans from his saddle and speaks briefly with Vittero before continuing on toward West Cove, despite the late hour. Vittero gathers his friends. "That man calls himself the Sword of Justice. The other five he called the Hand of Justice. He used a lot of ceremony when he spoke; so, forget the words. That prisoner is from the Centrin Village that is north of the mines above Outpost. I did not know there even was a Centrin Village."
"I can tell you this: I have a much greater sensitivity to waylines than I ever had when we traveled together. If that man and his horse were not standing right in front of me, I would swear that they did not exist, either of them! He thinks he is beyond reproach... He wants to be circumspect... I can play that game. He talked around the subject like some soldiers are still in the Centrin Village, something about heretics. What say you to checking it out? I would also recommend that you keep no definitive souvenirs. That way this Sword has no idea who he is up against. I do not care if he comes for me, but I do not want him questioning these villagers."
"I know a little something of the Centrin people. Their belief system is similar to that of the Sioliri but less structured. I think that the Cathedral is motivated by power and greed to expand its sphere of influence. I am glad we have been discrete in our relations with the Sioliri."
OOC:
Each character needs to be aged 5 cycles (years). Each receives 10 DP and improves in Sioliri and Rheini by 10% each.
GM:
OOPS: I made a mistake in my notes and mixed the Pelimonra and Sioliri. I have back tracked to correct this. The Pelimonra are gone. Their village is now Refuge. The Sioliri is who was met across the river and sold a canoe to the Outliers.
