Tomboys and Troublemakers pt 3

[MrAbdiel]

Spoiler: OOC:

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Haha, 'fight' the hunter and dwarf was a legit typo. Damn. But let's roll with it.

Bertelis looks baffled at Gimgroth for a long moment. "...Fight them? Did I say that?" He looks up at the rest of the company, whose noninterventionist gazes suggest to him that it was a fault in his speech, not the dwarf's hearing. He shakes his head slightly. "Forgive me, no. No, the hunter Le Becassin is our best chance for a knowledgable ally against the Red Knight. And the dwarf we have no quarrel with; I know resolving his quest is a matter you are pledge to. I meant only to find them."

He touches his own forehead lightly, as if he expects to feel a crack, and his brains oozing out. He glances again to Bruno.

"I am not so much better than I was when we started sparring, Bruno. And you may be the better man, over all. We have been through most of the same trials together, but you have born your suffering better. And the foes we face today are owed your wrath as much as mine - Sul Kovaar is responsible for the plaguelord's targeting of your family... The suspicion levelled upon them, and forcing you to battle your cousin back in Altdorf. Carry the blade. I will fight for what battles I can, but I must be ready to.. withdraw if the situation demands. When this is over - when we go to claim back my family's lands in Bordeleaux - I believe we will see the Dancer again. I will need it for that fight. But today... You are our sword."

[bramblefoot]

alright, so the walk is as peaceful as its gonna get in this accursed land. youd arrive at the south gate, and nobody gives you a peep, except a small waif who will walk up to sir bertelis "its time to admit the waters have grown." she will walk away, and a older man will say "better get swimming, or youll sink like a stone" other than those two weirdos, nothing

[wilphe]

Wighard looks around, taking in the crumbling buildings, the stench of, well, everything and the reek of corruption.

He's also making a rough estimate of what percentage of the population might pass for non-mutants after some attention from his knives.

It's not high


He reaches up from petting Shclapp

I highly recommend not drinking the water, but you knew that

[MrAbdiel]

Bertelis looks at the pitiable wretches who wander by with their cryptic rhymes. He frowns a little.. and distracts himself by asking Wighard a question in his expertise.

"Most of the folk of Mousillon are under one curse or another. Born without the right allotment of fingers, or one leg too short, or curved of back. Is there... Do you think, a line between deformity and mutation..? Is one simply the terrible extend of the other, or are they matters of a different kind entirely? Is one... more natural than the other?"

[LarsWester]

Gimgroth interjects quickly but quietly They're all the same to the witch hunters. He then shuffles his boot in the dirt ashamed that he spoke out of turn.

[wilphe]

Wighard grimaces

If it has got to the point where a Witch Hunter has to decide if you are a mutant or not it's already too late for you

He looks at Bertelis

In theory no one in the Empire is supposed to be condemned as a mutant without a medical examination. In practice that hardly ever happens, but I keep it in my pocket in case I ever need it.

There is a difference between abnormality and mutation, but it does depend a lot on who is doing the assessing.

In practice it might not matter because part of the horror of mutation is being shunned, alienated and the deep feeling of self-loathing and resentment of others. In that case why you are different scarcely matters, chaos will get a hold of you anyway.

I have worked in a few mutantenklaven. A lot of people there aren't mutants, but if you think you are damned already and everyone tells you you are, you end up living down to expectations

[farothel]

"Okay then," Bruno said, taking the blade and handing over his own sword so Bertelis had a weapon. It wouldn't do to walk around here without one.
"So, what way do we have to go."

[MrAbdiel]

Welcome to Unlovely Mousillon

The gate to the city of Mousillon is beautiful. It’s elven, like many of the foundations of the cities in Bretonnia; abandoned long ago and left for the despoiling of the greenskins before, as legend has it, the tribes of the Bretonni seized them back, and built their own mighty cities. The gate is tall with a peaked archway set into snugly fitting stonecraft around it. The elven artisans that made it many ages ago ought to be proud; even through centuries of strife and war, it does not seem to have been broken down.

It is the only beautiful thing about the city so far as you can tell; perhaps the only beautiful thing you will see for a long time.

The road leading to the this southern facing gate is wide and slick with packed mud forever churned by the feet and hooves of those unlucky enough to walk it and settled again by the rains. Lining the approach to the gate is a maze of tents, shanties, shacks, hovels, huts, lean-tos, shelters, and all conceivable variety of poor quality shelter cobbled together or stolen by the hundreds of ragged paupers who live outside the walls. There exists a susurrus of ‘village’ life all around and through the shanty town, but it bleeds down to a quieter murmur as folk come to the edges of the road to watch your group wander toward the city. And what folk they are - oddly sized ears, bulging eyes, extra fingers, lumpen heads, hoist shoulders, there seems none among them who have developed completely right. They are as miserable and poor people as you might ever have seen, but they gaze upon your party with fascination and wonder, especially the dwarven and halfling members.

And then, as you near the gate, a man with one leg shorter than the other by two inches forcing him to caper and slouch in his approach hustles forward, grabbing the unsewn hem of his sackcloth vest and holding it so the cloth makes an impromptu beggar’s bowl.

“Spare coin or bread?” He asks, his voice dry and reedy. That seems to be all it takes; then a dozen more detach from their hovels and close in about your group.

“Gods favor the gen’rous, lords!”
“My son! My son is ill, very ill - he needs silver!”
“Just a coin or more ser, just a coin or more!”
“Dwarf! Dwarf, here, let me rub yer head, fer me gout!”
“Just three penny, outlanders - three penny for the blessing of Maldor, the city-god!”
“Geef? Geef? Geef ‘ere? Geef ‘ere?”

Now there’s a score of them - holding bowls, rattling bone boxes, petitioning your attention and money. One hops foot to foot in what he must hope is a pleasing dance worthy of compensation. Another wears a crude diorama hanging from his neck like a gaudy talisman - though what the clustered stick figures are meant to represent is beyond a cursory glance. You are all seasoned enough travellers that you know to keep your purses in sight in crowds like this, but you have moments before the score around you becomes two score, and three, and more. Beyond the gathering mob, the great gates of the city sit open wide enough for a few to walk abreast - but there are no guards, no knights, not even tollmeisters here, and no one to whom one might appeal for order.

Spoiler: OOC:Sacre Bleu!

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This seems like a good time to offer rolls! Consider the difficulty Challenging in all cases, though if it's too outlandish, I reserve the right to penalize after the fact. Intimidate, public speaking, some creative use of performance - something to repel, settle, or subdue this gathering crowd of beggers before they pull the buttons off your boots.

[farothel]

This country was depressing, that was all Bruno could say about it. He knew that the Empire had its share of problems and especially in locations like Sylvania things weren't good either, but something about this place made him on edge. When they were accosted by beggars, Bruno's hand went to his sword, before he relented and started to speak.
"Ladies and gentlemen," he said, "we're here to rid this land from its curse, or at least some of its curses. We're willing to pay for information, but only good information about such things as The Red Knight, The Black Knights of the Ducal Palace, the Flylord Sul Konarr and some undead lead by a vampire and ..."

He named a few other threats in this region to mask what exactly they are looking for, although a group like the Company will quickly be known to be present by their adversaries, no matter what they do.

Spoiler: OOC rolls

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I'll go with charm and as I have public speaking, I can use that skill on up to 67 people

charm: (1d100)[20] vs 66 (67 fel -10 challanging)

FP reroll if needed.
charm: (1d100)[73] vs 66 (67 fel -10 challanging)

[wilphe]

Wighard 13/13 4/5

“My son! My son is ill, very ill - he needs silver!”

Wighard's eyes pivot

I am a healer, show me.

Whilst examining the child in question in the corner of a shack, Wighard hears Bruno loudly declaim their intentions, as well as a bunch of other false leads

So much for a low profile

No one was gonna believe we were so misinformed as to come here for the waters. Stay high, don't want you ripped apart as a holy relic

Kwolf settles himself on the wall above the gate and keeps an eye out for an ambush or ambitious urchins with slings

The child turns out to have a cough, but has not yet developed consumption. Wighard digs out a few herbs to help clear the symptoms and steps out to address the closer part of the crowd

If our business is successfully concluded I will try to spend some time among you to provide relief and succour. However right now we have things to do

Spoiler: OOC

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(1d100)[89] Heal 81 FP to 24

[MrAbdiel]

Bruno's courtly talents do not fail him here, translated though they are to speak to a lower class. He was one of them himself, once (though perhaps never so low as this); and even the act of imposing a structure on the situation has a decisive effect. This is a forest of desperation in which every human composing it is tremendously in need of anything they can beg from travellers; but as soon as it seems like the travellers want something from them, especially with matters involving such frightful titles as those announced, the flow reverses. They drain away, almost none of them willing to get involved matters of knights, and lords, and vampires, and dead-men.

Even Wighard's good natured effort to attend the ill here is stymied by the implosive dishonesty and deprivation of these people - the woman crying for help for her ill son has a tent not so far away, and a son within it indeed. He is not ill, though he is malnourished; and Kwolf damningly observes the woman trying to gesture to her son behind Wighard's back to play along. The boy doesn't get it. He is enamoured by the tame giant wolf, and has no talent for the grift. At a guess, the mother is used to begging for silver and being fobbed off with copper, and that being enough. None of this is to say that there is no illness to treat here - the mass of humanity here is so poor and ill-treated that Wighard could pitch a tent in the with them outside the walls and spend the rest of his life battling waves of Wheezing Croop and Crawling Shingles and The Scampers roiling through the camp, not to mention treating the chronic sufferings of people so routinely afflicted with asymmetry that their spines are destined to strain and give grief. When poxes do come through here, they must shred such a slum most brutally. But in the short term, in this moment, there is nothing much Wighard can do to abate such a monument of human misery.

Back at the gate, as the beggars lose hope that they will be given money and gain fear they will be roped into something dangerous, they drain back to their hovels until only one remains. At first your eyes register him as a halfling, but he is no such thing. Halflings for all their plumpness are built to purpose; they are spry and comfortable in their stature, as quick on their toes as they might lack strength in arms. This man is shorter than a halfling, perhaps three feet tall on a good day; but with the proportions of a man compressed ill fittingly. Barrel chested, big headed, short of limb; he leans on his left side on a crutch made of a 'y' branch wrapped in fraying cord. But within the creases of his face, his eyes a big, brown and clear; and he manages a nervous smile to your band, showcasing that he has retained most of his teeth.

"Well, lords, ma'amselle; if you are going into the city herself, p'rhaps I can show you on your way. I've nought to say on such grim figures as you mention..." he says, the confession seemingly containing the sentiment 'not out here, anyway'. "...But I might show you about in the dock district, and perhaps there y'll find a man who knows more. Small Gaétan, I am. There have been no tolliers at the gate for two weeks, and for the first there were more making use of it." He wheels about and begins hobbling on his crutch toward the open gate, his badly diminished stride forcing you to walk slowly if you intent to take him at his offer. "Will you be lodging lavishly, or frugally?"

[wilphe]

Wighard lets the boy pet Schlapp for a few moments, then departs.

That was quick

This place needs an Emil, not me. I can't fix poor.

He looks over Small Gaétan, surveying him for any tinge in the winds that might indicate magic or mutation

Spoiler: OOC

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(1d100)[63] Magical Sense 87

Hail and well met, perhaps.

We're probably going to get attacked where ever, so might as well be somewhere comfortable.

And where any collateral damage is limited to those who might have it coming

[MrAbdiel]

Spoiler: Magical/Medical Sense for Wighard

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The study of mutation is adjacent to a direct study of the ruinous powers, and so is frowned upon. As and Gimgroth both note moments ago, witch hunters rarely approach these matters with enough precision. Mutants themselves do not exude the tainted chaos wind except when very recently mutated, leading to a fairly well accepted order of operations - chaos magic causes mutation. Mousillon is not a riot of chaotic energy, though it is... dour. The nature of the curse of this land is blamed on all kinds of malefactors and events, but it seems to predate the men that settled it. The grail companion, Landuin, was the patron of this realm before he fell to despair and spent his latter years in morose isolation. Whatever the base curse that has corrupted this land, it predates Bretonnia as a nation. Perhaps there is an elven archivist in far Ulthuan who knows something about the city Mousillon was, before they abandoned it to the orcs.

The important thing is that, while the land itself has a sort of background count of dhar, it is not directly mutative. Most of these people are deformed but their deformities are predictable spoilings of human standards. You see no hooves, tentacles, or clusters of extra eyes (though there are extra fingers here and there). That said, you can assume with a fair amount of authority that mutants would fit in with these people much more easily than others accustomed to normalcy. Where there are men, there are mutants. But they need not flee into the far and wild places if they can skulk in a fallen city full of unfortunates like this...

Small Gaétan himself, you are quite sure, is no mutant, nor magic user. He is a sufferer of a deformity you read about once - Kleinwelg's malady, in which a human child is born with compressed proportions leaving them no taller than a dwarf or halfling. Such children are so rare in the world they are almost theoretical - they must certainly be thought to be mutants, or else an indictment of a mother's unwholesome appetite for non-human men. Ironically, here in this most cursed and unlovely town, Small Gaétan lived where almost anywhere more fortunate in the world, he would have died.

"Comfortable, eh...? Well... p'raps, perhaps, we can find something like comfortable, and you look right to look after y'selves if I do say. Small Gaétan will show you surely, heh..."

The little fellow's nervousness drains rapidly away as you manifest to him as honest dealers - a like a dog used to beatings needs to sniff a hand before it wags its tail. He hobbles along on his crutch and huffs and puffs as he does, apparently used to hustling along so that the folk he guides are not overly frustrated by the delay short legs force.

"I shall show you to the best lodging in town - Ezekiah rents rooms next to the Fallen Heaven. You like arts? Comedy and music, and such? There are such things, and more unsavouriness, heh...Might I ask wherefrom you hail? Sigmarland, yes?"

He probes good naturedly about your group as he leads you through the gate into the Southgate distinct - a ruination of decrepit and collapsed buildings through which yet more desperate and destitute folk scamper and perch and boggle at you as you go. These ones seem brave enough to carve out shelter in the ruins of the city - or perhaps they are the ones who are not welcome in the shanty town. Ahead is a channel that splits off the Grismerie as it runs through the city, dividing the South Gate from the Bridge and Chapel districts. The Grismerie is foul in the best of places, but here it is utterly rank, and choked with rubbish, filth and corpses; the funk of it wafts up and invades your nostrils even as you approach the rickety looking bridge that crosses it. It is build from posts lashed and secured to skeletal and sunken buildings in the channel where the ground seems to have buckled and swallowed parts of the city here.

Spoiler: OOC: Perception!

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What a fine and wonderful time for a reaction post from everyone, and then a Perception test for no reason at all! You may fell your diminuative guide about where you are from if you like, though he can hardly force you.

[LarsWester]

Gimgroth matched strides with their diminutive guide. I'm sure this Ezekial will reward you with a few coins for bringing us to his rooms. But if we survive the night without trouble come find us in the morning and I'll add a handful of silver to whatever the proprietor provides you. Since you ask Gaétan, I hail from Tilea having recently served in one of the countless mercenary bands of that land.
As the group approaches the channel Gimgroth raises an arm to cover his nose from the stench. Gah! It's worse than a Troll's crotch.

Spoiler: OCC

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Perception - (1d100)[12] vs 58 4 D.O.S.

[farothel]

"Comfortable, for certain," Bruno agrees after getting rid of most of the other beggars. He really didn't want to know what 'basic' or 'roughing it' was in this area. While they moved behind their guide, he did keep an eye out for trouble, as you could never know here. He nodded at the question, but didn't go into any detail.

Spoiler: OOC rolls

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perception: (1d100)[36] vs 69