NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="ellinor" data-source="post: 5678666" data-attributes="member: 14561">24x03Yamashiro Tamahashi was about to have the dinner of his life.  He had been saving for months to dine at The Dining Room.  All of the best fine dining establishments in Cauldron had chefs trained by the Adepts.  At The Dining Room, the chefs were the people who trained those chefs.  The Dining Room was located on the Adept House grounds, and was the only eatery in the entire city of Cauldron featuring exclusively Adept chefs and waitstaff.  It was so universally recognized as the most amazing dining experience in Cauldron, it did not even bother with a name extolling its virtues.  The Eatery of Exquisite Culinary Delights? Practically street vendors compared to The Dining Room.  The Establishment of Great Dining Pleasures?  May as well serve sand. The Dining Room had the best ingredients, the most original recipes . . .Yamashiro Tamahashi took his place at a long, low table of diners in the quiet room.  Behind him, an Adept with a towel over one arm leaned in and placed a bowl of cold, aromatic soup in front of him, in unison with the other waitstaff, in a delicate choreography of dinner service.  “Welcome, Tamahashi-san,” she said.  Her voice was kind.  Yamashiro Tamahashi took a sip of the soup. It was amazing—fresh, spicy, with a subtle sweetness.In the distance, Yamashiro Tamahashi thought he heard a noise.  As if someone were yelling something.  ”Look out for the kiln!”  “My urn!”  That couldn’t be right.  Must be Adept combat practice, he thought, and took another sip of the soup.  It was exquisite.Yamashiro Tamahashi took a deep breath, savoring the aroma of the soup once more.CRASH!  A woman burst through the rice paper screen at one end of the room.  She was completely naked, holding a towel in one hand.  She left mud and blood on the screen—she seemed covered in clay, and was bleeding down her leg, from the dagger embedded in her thigh . . . I can be forgiven for noticing her nakedness before the dagger, thought Yamashiro Tamahashi . . .The woman crashed past a table and ran, dodging pillows and chairs, running past the long table in the middle of the room, knocking down one of the waiters and crashing through the rice-paper wall at the other end of the room and out into the courtyard, leaving a massive hole in the wall . . . a plate of food clattered to the ground . . . a plate of delicious food . . .An Adept ran in, then, chasing the blonde.  She was a tiny woman with long, jet-black hair.  She leapt onto the large table, cartwheeling and flipping.  She dismounted in one graceful movement and dashed through the hole in the wall.  Not a single plate was disturbed.  Whew, thought Yamashiro Tamahashi, and leaned forward again, reaching for the morsel of marinated mushroom the waitress had placed before him.  That was crazy.But it was not the end.  A red-haired heathen woman, also sopping with clay, followed at top speed, brandishing a dagger.  The heathen, too, jumped atop the table, but her foot landed on a brazier near the corner of the table and she nearly fell.  “Gods-damned aristocrats!” she muttered in a disagreeably outlandish accent.  She charged down the middle of the table with alarming speed, plowing through glasses and plates as she continued the tirade under her breath (“. . . spoiled rich . . . waste of time . . . EHKTIANS . . . !”).  Yamashiro Tamahashi didn’t bother to make sense of her jabber.  He was too sad.  My mushroom! That . . . he stared down at the gastronomic carnage on the floor.  That was my mushroom . . . “Stop!  In the name of the Inquisition!”  It hardly surprised Yamashiro Tamahashi, then, when several Inquisitors appeared, following the chase, although it surprised him that they were heathens—three women, one focusing on an orb and another brandishing a half-formed piece of wet pottery, and the third yelling “Run!  Catch her!” A Sovereign Inquisitor followed just behind, with two more heathens—a sturdy light-haired man with a hand-crossbow and a tall dark-haired one with a sword.  “Duck!” yelled the one with the crossbow, and fired; the arrow flew over the table, narrowly missing Yamashiro Tamahashi, and out into the courtyard, where the naked woman had tripped over a topiary.  The arrow flew just past her arm and pinned her towel to a bench.  She struggled to get up and continue running . . .They all clattered out to the courtyard, leaving behind them more hole than wall. Yamashiro Tamahashi could not help but follow them with his stare.  He stood up and walked to the torn wall to get a better look at what was going on in the courtyard . . . the naked blonde appeared to be getting away . . .And suddenly, the Sovereign Inquisitor at the back of the group became HUGE, as tall as the building.  He stepped across the courtyard in one stride, and blocked the woman’s escape with his foot.  As the naked woman paused, preparing to vault his foot, the red-haired one pounced, tackling her to the ground. “Eat clay,” the redhead advised her prisoner, and shoved a handful of would-be pottery into the blonde’s face.  “You’re under arrest,” added the enormous Inquisitor.The Inquisitor with the crossbow stood back, picked a kumquat from one of the trees, and ate it.  He spotted Yamashiro Tamahashi.  “Want one?”  he asked, and threw a kumquat toward the dining room.  “My . . . mushroom . . .” was all Yamashiro Tamahashi could say.“We apologize profusely for the disruption, Tamahashi-san,” said one of the waiters. “We will have this cleared up shortly.”  ###Mena dragged Odelette, still naked, back to the entrance of the spa, being careful not to avoid the spiny topiaries along the way.  “You’ve put us through enough trouble,” Mena said.  “You have one chance to make our lives easier, and this is it.”  Mena pushed the naked woman down onto the chair in the waiting room, and threw her towel at her.  “Cover yourself up.”Mawu stepped forward, then, a small pair of silver pliers in her hand.  She stopped a few inches from Odelette.  “My . . . friend and I have some questions.”Odelette’s eyes got wide.“Tell us your plan.”“I . . . we . . . it was the man with the glasses.  He found us at the Questor Chapter House.  We were going to capture the girl and meet up at this spot in the middle of the Ketkath, called the “silent waterfall.”  It’s a couple days’ hike from Cauldron.  The man had some way of getting us from there to Pol Henna.  We’d collect the bounty and never see each other again.”“What did you know about the people you were attacking?”  Mawu asked, her voice hard and cold.“We only knew about the girl, and that one,” Odelette said, pointing at Tavi, “and that we weren’t supposed to kill him or the girl. But we watched them all for some time. We knew they’d try to protect the girl.”“And you knew they were Inquisitors.”“Well, now that you say it, I suppose we did.  But . . .”Mawu moved quickly and steadily, and with unexpected strength.  She grasped Odelette’s hand, spun her around to the ground, and held her there, with her knee between Odelette’s shoulder blades. She produced a thin silver cord from her robe and used it to tie Odelette’s thumbs together behind her back.  She picked Odelette up from the ground, and handed her off to Yudai.  “You have been very helpful,” she said, without inflection.###As sundown approached, all that was left was to apprehend Ellisen, who—if Tavek had been telling the truth—would be waiting for Tavek in the tunnels at the edge of the city.  Tavek had given up his lover’s whereabouts only under torture.  Savina disapproved.  She had seen enough fear for one day.  This man had been defeated and was leaving the city, and would never see his lover again.  His lover had been tortured.  Must this man also be tortured with the knowledge that his lover had betrayed him?They followed Tavek’s directions.  Behind a dwarven tavern near the wall was a small trapdoor.  They climbed inside, and Savina cracked a Sunrod to light.  They could see a cavern, large and irregular.  Pillars cast shadows and supported high roof beams, presumably put there to prevent the cavern from collapsing.  It was too dark to see much, but they could see footprints in the dust.  The footprints led to a pillar and stopped.  Ellisen was nowhere to be seen.As the echoes of their footfalls died, all was quiet.  Did Tavek manage to lead us astray?  Has Ellisen escaped already?  More and more, Savina was hoping that he had.Yudai called out.  “Ellisen, it is the Inquisition.  If you come out, it will be better for you.”Silence.“We have Tavek,” said Twiggy.Savina heard something near the far side of the cavern.  It was Ellisen, she thought, slipping past them, out of the city.  Perhaps he will be safe, after all.  She let the Sunrod slip through her fingers to the ground—on purpose.  The pool of light died.  Twiggy cast light and they could see again.  There was another faint shuffling sound, and Savina turned her head toward the far side of the cavern.  No one else did—she hoped they hadn’t heard.  But Mena followed her gaze, snapped a piercing look at Savina, and then sped off into the darkness.  At that, there was the twang of an arrow from Nyoko, and a muffled gulp.  Nyoko, too, ran into the darkness.  Kormick and Arden climbed into the rafters.  There were sounds of struggle.  Twiggy moved forward, and her pool of light showed Ellisen, dressed all in black, bleeding from Mena’s sword but holding Nyoko by the neck, using her as a shield.  Silence again, for a moment. Then Kormick dove down from the rafters onto them and pounded Ellisen with his warhammers.  Tavi winked out of view.  When he appeared again, he had taken Nyoko’s place in Ellisen’s grip.  Tavi stabbed backward, straight into Ellisen’s gut.  Ellisen cried out from the tangled mass of people.  Yudai teleported behind them and sliced his katana at Ellisen’s ankles, immobilizing him.  Tavi burst into flame, and Ellisen screamed.  The fight was over almost before it had started.  A victory, surely, but Savina could not be happy.###Within 24 hours of the attack on Rose, the Inquisition issued a guilty verdict against Tavek, Ellisen, and Odelette for conspiracy and attack on the Inquisition.  They were executed quietly, without fanfare and—to avoid drawing any attention to the Questors that might generate anti-Ehktian sentiment or otherwise fuel the Tide—without mention of their religious affiliation.For the mysterious man with the glasses, justice would have to wait.  Kormick knew better than to think it was over.  Trying to put an end a bounty is like trying to put the milk back into the cow.  Won’t happen.But this round was over, and the day—the day that had started two days before, before the wrestling and the gambling and the meeting with the crime boss and the dancing and the party and the fighting and the running around town—was ending.“So, Nyoko, what do you say?” he asked. “Drinking first, or sleeping?”  “We haven’t eaten since last night, Justicar,” replied Nyoko, “except for that kumquat.  So eat first.  Then drink.”  She smiled.  “Then sleep.”</blockquote>

Verification