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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Sanglorian" data-source="post: 6109596" data-attributes="member: 83822"><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>The Rhyme of the Sanguine Lords</strong></span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">From the blood of the Tarrasque,</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Antic and old,</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Sipped twelve humble butchers,</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Clever and cold.</span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">These butchers adopted,</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Though from afar,</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Superstitions of Bergolast, </span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Rich and bizarre.</span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">“Kiss the feet of beggars,”</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">The Bergo crones shrieked.</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">“When you live by the sword,</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">“You die by the meek.”</span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">If it steals from your treasure,</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">A magpie is luck;</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">If a cuckoo crows by you,</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Your wife shall not ----.</span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">You must count every penny,</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">And pebble, and grain;</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Cross not running water,</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">But court in the rain.</span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Make your home in ruins,</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">The stone and the clay.</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Read the runestones for guidance:</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Recast them each day.</span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">The Lords flaunt these rules:</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Pennies are missed;</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Runestones forgotten;</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Beggars unkissed.</span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">They build castles all new;</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Or bathe in a flood.</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">But one law goes unbroken:</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Speak nothing of blood.</span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><em>Hooks</em></span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">What genius could write a terrific poem like this?</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">What effect do these superstitutions have on the Lords’ behaviour?</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">What encourages the Lords to follow these suiperstitutions?</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Why would drinking the Tarrasque of Bergolast’s blood transmit Bergo superstitions?</span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>The Doomsday Book</strong></span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">The  Doomsday Book, kept under tight guard at Castle Tarangael, is a record  of all land and personal property - not as it is held now, but as it  will be held at the end of the world.</span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">The  book is kept in chains - allegedly the same chains that the Duke used  to bludgeon the previous Duke of Thring to death. Each of his knights -  the Chain Gang - wears a link of it around his neck, while the Duke  himself wears the key. </span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">The  Duke discovered the book when he was a squire, and what it taught him  about power and longevity has driven his burning ambition.</span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">The Duke has not read the book in years. If he had, we would find that the ledger looks very different to how it once did.</span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><em>Hooks</em></span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">Why has the book changed?</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">What did the Duke read?</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #000000"><span style="font-family: 'Arial'">If the knights wear links and the Duke a key, what do the rest of his retinue wear?</span></span></p></blockquote><p></p>

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