[WFRP] The Lord of Lost Heart (II)

[LCP]

Going down with a yelp, Reifennen was tackled into the mud. Meanwhile, Lothar had grabbed hold of the horse's reins, and it was rearing and whinnying in alarm. Breaking free, it bolted away down the village street, rainwater flicking from flying hooves.

Writhing in Pieter's grip, the doctor did his best to struggle free. "Let go!" he cried. "Let go of me!"

The rain and mud made it hard for Pieter to keep hold of his captive. Slippery as an eel, the doctor slithered free.

OOC:

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You have another +20 for attacking Reifennen because he took a Run action, so you did hit there.

As far as I'm aware, the initiative steps are fine. Lothar spent his first turn coming round the corner of the house.

[goblinpaladin]

Snarling, Lothar stepped back a half-step as the horse bolted down the street. He blinked water out of his eyes, took a moment - and then stepped forward, plunging his sword at the doctor.

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Swift attack! (the half step is just flavour)
Attack: (1d100)[58] - right leg
Damage: (1d10+5)[14]

Attack: (1d100)[24] - left arm
Damage: (1d10+5)[14]

If I also get a +20 (I don't think I do), then that is two hits. If not, oh well.

[-Sentinel-]

Part of Pieter knew he really should tell Lothar not to kill their target, but the why eluded him right now. He was heartily sick of all this. He could not leave Hohlesbruck fast enough, and would not do so until the doctor was dealt with. Still, he resisted the temptation to draw blood and simply made another attempt to pin Reifennen to the ground.

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Away from books right now, and I can't remember if a grapple can be combined with a swift attack. If not, treat the first of these two attacks as an aimed (+10) standard grapple.

WS 36: (d100)[56]
Target's Agility: (d100)[90]

WS 36: (d100)[5]
Target's Agility: (d100)[45]

[LCP]

Pieter and Lothar

Reifennen was ready for Pieter, but not for Lothar. Jumping back out of the way of Pieter's snatching hands, he practically ran into the soldier's sword himself. The tempered steel sliced open the physician's arm, making him fall back with a piteous wail.

Reeling away, the doctor pressed his right hand to the wound. In the darkness, there was little colour, and the blood that was soaking his torn sleeve was a spreading oval of blackness.

"Please!" he cried out in a strangled voice. He stumbled away, too shocked to run. "Please, please, no more!"

Behind them, the back door of the Faulebrands' house flew open, the startled figure of Ricard rushing out into the rain. The doctor stood between Pieter and Lothar, bedraggled and bloody. No witch-fire played about his hands, no thunder answered in the night. He was just an old, wounded man, begging for his life.

OOC:

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Reifennen takes a Disengage, moving perpendicularly away from the house. Ricard appears on the scene.

[Exeson]

Seeing lothar dash for the Faulerbrand's house Ithelus raises an eyebrow.

I thought they were meeting her by the mill... or at least away from the house.

Ithelus picked up his crossbow but hesitated, If the villagers saw him outside he might lose his only chance to kill the doctor. His momentary indecision passed though and he headed for the door. Pulling it open he called to Illiiya, 'What's going on?'

[BloodyAngel]

Illiiya Jaelrae

By the time she reached Ithelus, Illiiya was panting for breath. Her long hair was matted to her face by sweat and the rain, and her pale figure seemed almost ghastly in the dim light.

Flycher is one of them... She gasped out, He got the town sick... The meat...

Stumbling forward, she threw her arms around Ithelus and took a few moments to shake, shiver and catch her breath. She did not seem to be crying, just in serious need of comfort. It did not last long.

Lothar went to Pieter and the doctor... and I heard Pieter yelling. We must go help them!

[Exeson]

Ithelus swore, checking his weapons we all in place he began to move away, but caught himself. wrapping Illiiya in his embrace he hugged her tight. 'It's ok Illiiya, me and Lothar won't let anyone hurt you. Ever' His eyes hardened, 'Now it's time to go clean up this mess.'

[goblinpaladin]

Lothar's sword spun in his hands, blood flicking into the rain-soaked night. "Surrender, doctor, and we will purge you with fire. Flycher's blood-soaked confession condemned you."

Shrugging, the soldier stepped toward him, sword held out. "Struggle and I will gut you like the mutant cultist of the three-eyed god you are. I've done it before."

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In combat terms, I suppose that I am just making a Move to come back into contact with him. If I only need a half-action Move, then my other half-action is an Aim.

[LCP]

Pieter & Lothar

The cane dropped to the ground. One palm bloody where he had clutched at the cut Lothar had dealt him, Reifennen raised his hands in surrender.

"What in Sigmar's name -" began Ricard. He trailed off, some detail of the scene seeming to catch his attention. His voice became tense and nervous. "What have you done with my horse?"

[-Sentinel-]

Pieter drew his shortsword and moved closer to Reifennen, blade pointed at the man's throat. When Lothar spoke, the initiate blinked at him in confusion. Flycher's blood-soaked confession? Which Flycher?

He knew how the situation must look to Talberg - two armed toughs threatening a wounded man who begged for mercy. He wondered how much of Reifennen's wailing was genuine and how much was him playing the victim.

"He tried to knock me out and steal your horse," he informed the pistolier tersely.

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"Surrender, doctor, and we will purge you with fire. Flycher's blood-soaked confession condemned you."

Way to give him an incentive to surrender.

[LCP]

Pieter

Ricard hesitated, taking in the scene. The rain-softened earth held an imprint well, and the horse's snapped bindings and galloping hoof-prints were plain for anyone to see in the lamplight from the windows.

"Balls," said Ricard, paling a little. Running into the rain, he sprinted in the direction he presumed his horse had run, calling out after the animal. "Hey! HEY!"

[Exeson]

Ithelus stalked onto the scene, crossbow raised. He drew a bead on the doctor as he advanced. Catching Pieter's explanation Ithelus's face broke into a grin. 'Well doctor, that's not really the act of an innocent man is it, assault and attempted theft?'

Sensing the tense situation Ithelus speaks to Illiiya without so much as moving his eyes off the Doctor. 'Illiiya, go get Leopald, or someone, we need the villagers here before we are forced to kill this man.'

[BloodyAngel]

Illiiya Jaelrae

Do not let him free. Illiiya said sternly, giving Ithelus's hand a squeeze before she stepped away into town.

Raising her voice as best she could, she handled finding witnesses in the sort of subtle manner only Illiiys could.

MURDER! You are all poisoned! Sick! Corrupted by foul meat from the Flycher's! Come and see for yourself!

[LCP]

The people of Hohlesbruck were afraid to come out of their homes, but Illiiya saw a few windows open, a few candles kindled. The Faulebrands' front door flew open and Aloysius Faulebrand came bowling out. He must already have heard the commotion before Illiiya's shout: he was red-faced from charging down his many stairs.

"What's going on?" he demanded. "Where's Ricard?" His eyes alighted on the doctor. "By the gods, you've attacked him again!"

Two or three villagers had emerged now into the rain, drawn by Illiiya's cry. They were little more than dark shapes in the rainy night, but Pieter thought he recognised Ellie's hair. The girl was talking agitatedly to her companions.

Out of the darkness in the direction of the bridge, another shape came running. It was Leopold, rain dripping from his long hair. He stumbled to a halt as the scene surrounding the doctor came into view. The confusion on his face was plain to see - but in this case, it was at seeing the doctor out of his cell. Where had he been all this time?

If the doctor had any snide retorts left in him, fear had driven them out. He crouched mutely in the middle of his attackers, his hand clapped to his bleeding arm.

[goblinpaladin]

"Good. Best find some place with shelter from the rain, and some wood kept dry. We have a cultist to burn." Sword still levelled at the snivelling doctor, Lothar spoke in a calm and even tone.

"Flycher was a cultist, a mutant. He murdered his wife an' then he ground her into mince. Before he bled to death, he told me that this thing," a gesture with the tip of the bloodied sword, "had been taking the pus from your daughter, Faulebrand, and givin' it to Flycher. So that the fetid creature could make the whole village die slow, givin' 'em to the Fly Lord."

Lothar spat on the ground, but never took his eye or sword away from Reifennan. "I dunno what the knight's doin' here, but this thing is a mutant and a murderer an' I am done with him wheedlin' away from justice. Him an' his demon mates took my eye and your lives - an' I'm burnin' him right now. In the sight o' Sigmar an' Verena an' the gods of true men."

"The burnin' fire is the way it needs t' be. It's the proper way for what he's done. The very -ing least."

[LCP]

"Wait!" yelped Reifennen. "I know, I know why he's here! I'll tell you! I'll talk! Just, mm, give me time!"

The colour drained from Faulebrand's face as he heard the doctor's confession. More villagers were gathering round, watching through the dark as they huddled out of the way of the rain.

[goblinpaladin]

"No, cultist." Lothar's teeth were gritted, his tone level. "You've had days. Right now you have until someone brings wood an' fire."

[LCP]

The villagers who had emerged from their homes were talking among themselves in a low murmur. A pair of them broke off towards the Flychers' house, hurrying through the rain towards the brooding bulk of the ramshackle building.

Reifennen licked his lips, eyes flicking from side to side. Lothar's anger was forceful, but the wet, hissing night dampened the threat of the pyre. The only places out of the rain this night were indoors. Roused from their beds, the handful of villagers who had emerged were not at their most coordinated either.

"Why is he here?" demanded Leopold, his eyes on his father. "What have you done?"

Aloysius said nothing. From the direction of the darkened road, wet footsteps approached. Ricard trudged back into view without his horse, looking frightened and defeated.

"Damn thing's gone and run off," he said, in a small voice. It was only after he said it that he realised no-one was listening to him.

Reifennen coughed. At first it seemed a nervous affectation, but then he coughed again, the harsh spasms wracking his chest. Clearing his throat, he looked up at the others and spoke in a hoarse, desperate voice.

"If you let him kill me here," he said, "you will never know."

[-Sentinel-]

Pieter was shocked by Lothar's revelation about Flycher. He did not know the man well, but the idea of a village butcher accepting to help poison his own people made his skin crawl. But Lothar's anger was even scarier - it seemed cold and implacable, unlike the fiery wrath of Illiiya or Ithelus. The initiate was very glad not to be on the receiving end.

He leaned towards the soldier. "Lothar, I'd very much like to hear what he has to say about the knight."

[Exeson]

Ithelus advanced closer to the Doctor, now that a sizable crowd had gathered. 'My friend here is dead set on burning you, but whilst it's raining it might be a bit hard. So here's a suggestion, you say you can tell us then start talking now. Because I'm not sure anyone here is going to stop me taking a knife to that face of yours.' A cruel smile spread across his face, 'Plus, there are a lot of different shapes you can be in whilst still being alive for burning.'

[BloodyAngel]

Illiiya Jaelrae

Illiiya returned, out of breath and tired. For a moment she just focused on finding her wind, as the others spoke of the doctor's fate.

The doctor's home.... has the evidence of his guilt. She spoke, once she was able to do so, And something else... Who will go with me? I will show you!

She looked to Ricard, of all people. His word would go a long way towards making this accusation stick.

[goblinpaladin]

Lothar tilted his head to Illiiya without removing his eyes from the doctor. "If y'want, go with her, folks. I'll keep an eye on the doctor here. He's doing to start talking right now. When you get back, we'll figure out a way to do this."

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Stupid rain. KILL-KILL NOW

[LCP]

Lothar, Ithelus & Pieter

Ithelus advanced closer to the Doctor, now that a sizable crowd had gathered. 'My friend here is dead set on burning you, but whilst it's raining it might be a bit hard. So here's a suggestion, you say you can tell us then start talking now. Because I'm not sure anyone here is going to stop me taking a knife to that face of yours.' A cruel smile spread across his face, 'Plus, there are a lot of different shapes you can be in whilst still being alive for burning.'

"I told you," coughed Reifennen, retreating from Ithelus. "I told you to lock him up!"

Leopold stepped up next to the elf. Unsheathing his smallsword, he followed Lothar's lead and held the tip out in the doctor's direction. Friendless, Reifennen looked at the faces surrounding him, the rain beating on his shoulders. His shoulders slumped.

"None of you understand," he said. His voice was a tangle of fear and bitterness, self-pity tinging his words with hatred. "You think this is about you. You think you matter. You don't understand -" - he coughed again - " - it's about him."

"There were no roadwardens. He saved me on the road. He knew the gods would bring me here, to do their work. An answerer of prayers."

---

1

Illiiya

Following the villagers back to the Flychers' house, Illiiya practically dragged them away from the sight of the butcher's body, leading the way down into the dank cellar. It was perhaps best not to kindle the same spell she had used before in front of these peasants, so instead she took the candle that still burned in the window.

The Hohlesbruckers descended the worn steps with some reluctance, the ominous scene below filling them with unease. Leading the way as firmly as she could, Illiiya did her best to ignore the sounds that only she could hear.

Behind her, there came a muffled expression of horror - or nausea - as one of the villagers discovered the sodden sack beside the grinder. Illiiya did not look round. Instead, she reached up and pulled on the hinged panel in the wall she had noticed before. The cleavers and knives jangled on their hooks as the panel swung back.

A rough alcove had been hacked into the cellar wall behind it. A crude wooden ledge had been set into the recess, and stacked in rows over its surface were little glass phials. Each one was crusted and empty; each one looked exactly like the ones in the doctor's bag.

Behind them, a grotesque symbol had been daubed on the wall in some dark, reddish-brown pigment. Three circles and three arrows, radiating outward from the central point. It was a crude thing, but to look at it made Illiiya's eyes sting and her stomach churn. The peasants with her recoiled, making the sign of the hammer...

Illiiya Only

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The moment the symbol was thrown into the light, the slithering, wriggling sounds from the dangling sausages began to grow louder. The things making them seemed agitated, like fledglings cheeping at the return of the mother bird to the nest.

Pulsing like a diseased heart, one of the wursts nearest Illiiya began to jerk and twist. Its mottled skin split, and the viscerate white flesh of a maggot bulged through the tear, ringed with tiny black hooks. A maggot the size of a snake.

[BloodyAngel]

Illiiya Jaelrae

The mark of the lord of filth... Illiiya said aloud, stepping back from the little alcove.

She took only long enough to snatch one of the vials before slamming the thing shut, eyes fixed on the disgusting creature before her to see if is ceased to move.

This leaves no doubt. She said darkly, pulling her blade. You have all seen, yes? We did not lie! The doctor and Flycher sought to poison you all with filth...

OOC:

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Illiiya will stay defensive, unless the thing attacks her. She'll also look to see if anyone save herself seems to react to the thing. Lothar didn't seem to notice them before, either...

[Exeson]

Ithelus nods, 'And your work is to spread sickness and disease right?' He looks over his shoulder at the assembled group. 'So what is your relation to this knight? and his relation to Lady Ester.'

[-Sentinel-]

Pieter gave Reifennen a hard, steady glare. "The gods' work?" he spat. "And what do you gain from this? Let me guess. You found your healing art powerless against the Foul One and decided to side with the winners, is that it? You're a fool and a coward."

[LCP]

Ithelus, Lothar & Pieter

Pieter gave Reifennen a hard, steady glare. "The gods' work?" he spat. "And what do you gain from this? Let me guess. You found your healing art powerless against the Foul One and decided to side with the winners, is that it? You're a fool and a coward."

“Pompous brat,” snarled the doctor, his hackles rising. “What gives you the right to judge me?”

Leopold pressed the blade of his sword a little closer, and the doctor deflated.

“A physician is nothing without patrons. One of mine sent me to see to a wayward son, taken sick while slumming it in a seedy establishment by the Ostplatz – a place called the Lock and Key, on a street called Vermin Alley. Half tavern, half brothel. There were rumours of contagion in that neighbourhood, and the watch had issued Plague Orders for it to be cordoned off. I asked the watch captain when the, mm, quarantine would be put in place, and planned to be in and out before then.”

“My patron's son was laid up in quarters provided by the brothel-keeper. He had nothing more than a two-pfennig pox he had caught from one of the whores, but the peasants were in terror of the plague. I should have suspected then why they had, mm, kept him on the premises.”

“The brothel-keeper was a brute of a woman, but not without a certain, mm, low cunning. She had very graciously given my patron's son the best room in the establishment, with a working clock. I was not to know she had set it an hour behind.”

“Of course, I tried to explain to the guards what had happened, but they would not hear me out. They had seen me pass through, a mere couple of hours before, but they would not let me pass back. I tried to climb the barricade with my lord's son, and they pushed me back with their spears. As if I were one of the peasants. As if they didn't know who I was.” Even now, the memory made the doctor draw in a sharp breath. “They could see my client was sick. They were afraid.”

“I was trapped with the rest of them, and the brothel-keeper now saw me as her property, the same as the other poor wretches she kept. As the peasants sickened, she forced me to care for them, for no pay and little food. I, who had been physician to the lords and ladies of Altdorf. Trapped among the filth.”

He looked steadily at Pieter.

“You said you had been in a plague ward, Hagen? You lie. It would have left its mark on you.” He spoke in a hollow voice. “When the food ran out, we ate the cats and the dogs, and when they were bones, we ate the rats. Sometimes our guards would tip supplies over the barricades, and then the strongest and most devious would clamber over each other to snatch the food for themselves. Frau Gretchen was the queen of their squalid kingdom, for she had me as her pet doctor, and the plague was real enough. Soon many began to sicken and die, and their relatives would come crawling to the madame's door, begging my assistance. My, mm, compliance was compelled with threats of violence.”

“I took what measures I could to protect myself against the disease, and did my best to treat the scum with which I had been, mm, penned in.” A trio of coughs disturbed his speech. “I assured myself that my patrons would learn of my plight, that the quarantine would be overridden, that help would come. It did not. Even my noble clients feared the plague more than they valued my life.” A consuming bitterness tinged his words.

“Do you know what saved me?” he asked. “It was the plague. Every night, I prayed that it would take my captor. It was only when starvation seemed like it might take me first that I realised the power had been in my hands all along. A gift.” A macabre glee crept into Reifennen's eyes. “I experimented at first, bringing her goods from the houses of the victims with lies as to where they had been found. But she was damnably careful, and damnably resilient. It was only when I introduced a few scraps of one of the victims' skin into her drink that the sickness took hold.”

“Even then, she suspected nothing. Can you believe it? The woman who had beaten and imprisoned me, lying like a lump of spoiling meat on her filthy bed. Begging me to save her.” Reifennen's hand trembled, and he exhaled to calm himself. “When she was too weak to pursue me, I made my escape.”

“All physicians need patrons. Mine had deserted me, but another had saved me. I would have been a fool not to see it. After all, I had been- “ - another fit of coughing dissolved the middle of his sentence - “ - I had been spared. The disease had not touched me, even at the end, when the bodies lay rotting in the alley. Even when the time came for me to flee, the hand of divine providence was there, turning the watchmen's eyes aside.”

“I knew I could not stay in Altdorf, and so I left. And everywhere I went, I found the sick. They spoke to me in their delirium, telling me what my new patron required of me. I have learned more since I left the city than my colleagues at the Imperial College would dare to believe.” Again, the persistent cough. “My patients... my subjects, whispered to me, such secrets.”

“They told me a story like my own. A poor girl, deserted by those who should have protected her. A girl consumed by grief, who in her desperation prayed to any god who would hear that her fair-haired usurper would be made just as ugly as her.”

The doctor fell silent, his long confession finally exhausted. Horror written across his face, Leopold lowered his sword.

Aloysius stepped forwards. The miller sounded strangled, on the verge of tears.

“Alexa did nothing to you. You lied to me,” he said, his voice shaking with anger. “You said you'd make her better.”

“You have two children, Herr Faulebrand,” said Reifennen quietly. “If young Leopold had to die tomorrow, would you strike the blow yourself?”

Aloysius blinked, taken aback.

“What?” he asked. “...No!”

“Then you understand,” said Reifennen, calm. A beatific smile, horrible to behold, stretched across his face. “I would no sooner cure your daughter than any other father would kill his child.”

There was a thud as Leopold's fist connected with that grinning face, and the doctor crumpled into the mud like a marionette with its strings suddenly cut. Whirling round, Aloysius grabbed Ithelus by the lapels of the elf's dirty coat.

“The Verloren girl,” he said, his voice full of urgency. “Find her!”

---

1

Illiiya

The peasants murmured their assent, no individual wanting to step forward and take responsibility. The man who had opened the sack said nothing, looking pale-faced and queasy.

“I always knew he were a bad 'un,” muttered one of them to the others. “Didn't I say? Didn't I say.”

Illiiya Only

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The maggot writhed and stretched, slowly wriggling its full length out of its cocoon of sausage-meat and skin. She could see it glistening in the candlelight, smell its awful stench, but none of the peasants seemed to show the slightest reaction.

Behind her, she heard the slithering split of another dangling sausage peeling open...

[goblinpaladin]

Lothar stared down the length of the blade at his captive, horror and anger paling his face. "We told you. We shouted it t'you. We screamed it at you, at all o' you. And y'wouldn' listen. Y'wanted proof. Evidence. As if this were civilisation, as if we were in Altdorf, as if the Pox-Eyed Despair didn't eat time and spit up bones."

He stepped forward and pressed the tip of the sword against the doctor's shoulder, right above those vital blood vessels. He jerked his head at Ithelus. "Go, Ith. Bring Lady Verloren. I've got this thing pinned, an' right now I feel like a kid with a fly."

"Like to pull off some wings." Lothar's grin was strained, and unpleasant.

[Exeson]

As Mr Faulerbrand grabs Ithelus's clothes he finds the elf's crossbow pressing against his gut. 'I suggest you let go of me,' He says in a very level tone, 'Or things might get ugly. Don't you presume to order me about either'

However, Ithelus did make his way with Pieter to the manor.

Once out of earshot the elf talks quietly to Pieter. 'I guess we should not reveal our true intentions yet, make up some story about the doctor asking for her. Maybe say that Leopold was ranting something strange about his sister and he attacked the doctor.'

He strokes his crossbow, 'I'm not afraid of shooting a cultist, but it might make things easier.'

[-Sentinel-]

Pieter listened to the doctor's explanation in shocked silence. The man had been so stubbornly tight-lipped, even in the presence of people who knew of his guilt, that his lengthy explanation was quite a surprise.

“The Verloren girl,” [Mr Faulebrand] said, his voice full of urgency. “Find her!”

Pieter closed his eyes and exhaled slowly.

I'm sorry Esther, he thought, I can do nothing more for you. You made your bed; now lie in it.

He had convinced himself that Esther was motivated by selfish love, not spite; that she mostly wanted Talberg back and did not know the lengths Reifennen would go to destroy her rival. Now, in the light of the doctor's rant, he decided that giving her the benefit of the doubt may have been a mistake.

"I'll come along, Ithelus," Pieter offered. "In case she tries to run."

[Ithelus] strokes his crossbow, 'I'm not afraid of shooting a cultist, but it might make things easier.'

Pieter sighed. "She's no cultist, Ith. She's a foolish lady who made some bad choices." He grimaced. "I... was hoping to prevent the ugliness of a lynching. In fact, I was thinking about giving her a chance to 'escape' us. All by herself, she's not a threat to anyone... Her only crime was silence."

He studied the Elf's expression, somehow doubting Ithelus would be willing to show mercy.