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Message: <blockquote data-quote="sheelba" data-source="post: 395268" data-attributes="member: 7794">Session One Part TwoReacting quickly, the pair head further down the alley and turn right following the dark form. No one is in sight and after several twists of the alley, they admit they have lost their quarry. The buildings around them are very run down. Crumbling blocks of flats, home to dead, blank eyes of the dispossessed. They leave quickly. They approach the market from a different direction to the one they left by. Entering one of the cafes lining the square they head to the back and disappear into a private booth. Marius draws out his find. He examines the wax seals and frowns. Making a sudden pass with his hand and muttering a strange phrase, the tube begins to glow. His frown deepens.‘What do you make of this?’ Marius briefly twitches the curtains aside as Elahnor takes the tube and begins her own examination. Another man has entered the otherwise empty eatery. The waiter brings the drinks they ordered when they entered and a second is seen taking a lamp over to the stranger who appears to have taken out several scrolls and is arranging them on the table. ‘Greetings friend,’ began Marius as he strode over. ‘Ah, “the death of Patoculus",’ he continued, ‘a scholar!’The stranger looked up, smiled and sat back indicating his notes with an expansive arm gesture. ‘These? I’m just a humble teacher. I tutor Cassiodurus’ brats.’ He chuckles, ‘Well they are not really that bad. I’m Cotta. Would you like to join me?’‘I wouldn’t want to interrupt your study.’‘Oh, I never get any work done in here. I mainly come to get away from things. I never meet anyone from the house here.’‘I was wondering about that burnt ruin across the way.’ Marius said enquiringly.‘The old Paulus house.’‘Paulus.’ Marius said the name as though he was trying to remember. ‘Republican traitors weren’t they?’‘Republicans maybe but not traitors. You’ll win no friends round here talking like that.’ Came the angry retort. ‘The Paulus family was at the top pf the proscriptions the Imperials brought back with them. They never found them, so they took their anger out on the house and decreed that it not be touched.’After spending a little time convincing Cotta that he spoke from ignorance and meant no insult, he returned to Elahnor and related all he had heard. Elahnor replied by telling Marius that the tube was magically trapped and the leather had been magically toughened. Pondering their odd discovery they wandered out and found – surrounded by nervous looking townsfolk – a very large, all white wolf. Eyes widened as Elahnor threw her arms around Snowy and started to pet him. ‘Er, I think it’s this way’  said Marius, while not taking his eyes off the wolf’s big, white and very big teeth.They found the White Swan easily, it only being a block from the market. Easily found, maybe, but not the welcome they had hoped for. They entered the public bar area to find it empty but for two arguing men. It took only a moment to realise that one – a short stocky man in his late fifties – was the bar tender and the other – tall and broad, about forty – a very drunk customer. Suddenly, the drunk reached over the bar and punched the older man, who went flying. He leapt over the bar and started pummelling the fallen man where he lay. ‘Hey, stop’ shouted Marius, who was across the room in an instant, over the bar and dragging the drunk man off. Spinning from Marius’ sudden grapple,  the man brutally punched Marius on the jaw. Reeling slightly,  Marius squared up to his antagonist. Within seconds, Marius is on his back and seeing stars. But not before Elahnor jumps up on the table and begins to land some very painful kicks to the drunks head. He in turn goes down as Marius is staggering to his feet. Elahnor jumps down at him and he collapses unconscious. At this point the bar man (actually the owner), bursts back into the room accompanied by two kitchen hands brandishing cleavers. They were stopped in their tracks when they saw the assailant unconscious and while the owners (one Lucius Laberius, a Heliocrean and his wife, apparently called Jewel), thank the PC’s, Marius opens negotiations for low room prices. Elahnor tuts as she tends to his chin.[Edited again for spelling]</blockquote>

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