faderift | A Little Down In The Mouth Pt 2

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A Little Down In The Mouth Pt 2

WHO: Adelaide LeBlanc, Christine Delacroix, Elian Abascal, Michel de Chevin
WHAT: Investigating the Red Templar Camp
WHEN: Firstfall, late
WHERE: Fallow Mire
NOTES: Swearing, swimming

The camp itself isn't terribly helpful. Everything looks to be in order, nothing terribly remarkable save for the oddly placed hook on their cauldron. Why would anyone weld a hook on the bottom of a cauldron? Poking around reveals little else aside from a rope burned branch hanging over the pond and several reeds cut cleanly.

Adelaide peers back at the lump of iron in the center of the templar camp, back to the branch, and then the pond.

"...One of us is going to have to swim and sort out what they were looking for." If there is no one else available? She supposes it must be her.

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Adelaide does, in fact, ignore the opportunity to use a rejuvination spell to ease the ache of the cold, instead focusing on wringing out her chemise. "We've people on the shore that might pull us up should anything go wrong, mages to mind the light and currents of the water. Had I more skill in heat and less in ice I might attempt to warm the pond in our immediate area."

But that was not where she was most skilled. "We will warm up, attempt to make use of the cauldron as they had, and see what they were after."

While Elian is rifling through Michel's belongings, he's listening: a worried glance up when Michel mentions a potential bad end, a determined look back down when Christine mentions magic. (Helpful magic, sure, but he doesn't want to watch.) When he's found the rope he comes closer, running the loop of it in circles through his hands to check for rot or weakness.

"Can you tell what went wrong?"

Michel gave Lady LeBlanc a nod, she was right about that, but the Chevalier had seen a lot in his young life, enough to know that if anything can go wrong it will go wrong making him slightly less optimistic. In spite of the fact that they had perfectly capable spotters on the surface and mages aiding them, the Fallow Mire had proven to be less than hospitable and any sort of surprise on the end of their spotters could put them in danger under the water.

At Elian's question Michel ran his hands through his hair before smoothing it back and answering the question, "I've speculations...one of those being that on our next dive we'll find some of friends down there. It might bring us closer to whatever they were after, but the cauldron didn't work out for them...we might get lucky. Either way we should try it."

Christine doesn't think this is a good idea at all. Mostly because Adelaide is one of the people doing it. Her lips are pressed in a firm line, but she collects her thoughts before speaking.

"What makes you think we will succeed where they failed? I think they, at least, must have known what they were looking for. We do not."

"Nothing. But whatever we are able to learn is of that much more help to the Inquisition. What we have now is insufficient." They must return to the water. But perhaps a few extra precautions would be to their benefit. "...Do you have any watertight leather bags?"

Elian's hands find the end of the rope while they're talking, with no overly-soft or unraveled portions in the middle to cause concern, and he lays it on the ground beside Michel for safekeeping. Adelaide's words have him straightening right back up, however, and moving back to their belongings.

"I brought a water bag," he says. "I can empty it."

To carry down extra air, he assumes. Otherwise someone might want to stop him before he dumps fresh water onto the ground.

Michel glanced over at Christine, not saying anything, but offering her a significant look. He wasn't going to allow anything to happen to her mentor if he could help it, upon his honor as a Chevalier. He didn't say as much out loud, but he was aware of himself and what he would do to protect those around them even from themselves. He wouldn't permit risks that were unnecessary, he was a shield, that was part of the Chevalier's duty...and he trusted Elian to be the same.

As the rope was laid beside him and Lady LeBlanc pressed on with the plan he began unwinding the rope, preparing it for what he knew would be the next stage in their plan, "if water bags are sufficient then there should be one as well...as long as we have another vessel to empty the water into...fresh water out here is..."

Well it was a muddy bog and he didn't exactly trust the integrity of the water in their immediate area, boiled or not.

Her look in return is slightly pained, and seems to suggest: "I want to believe you, but..." This is such a dangerous endeavor, and she can do nothing more than voice that she doesn't like it. The others seem fine to continue.

Closing her eyes, she draws in a deep breath and tries to focus on the task at hand, since there is no dissuading them. When it's suggested they need a substitute to hold their water, Christine can only look around helplessly for a moment. She knows of nothing else airtight. But then she looks to Adelaide.

"Could you make a vessel out of ice to hold it in? I know what you make can last a long time."

"Of course." Now isn't the best time to do so, but she extends a hand to Elian, frost spreading from her fingers to form a shell of ice that could hold the water until they were finished. A funneled top, a stopper, feet that it would stand on it's own- all growing in precise curls of ice. Her eyes glow and the pitcher flares blue for a moment before her magic recedes entirely. "That should hold until the end of the day- but I do not think it shall take us quite so long."

If only for the fact that she has no intention to spend so much time in the water.

Something—fear, or distaste, or a combination of the two—flickers onto Elian's face for a moment, when Adelaide's hand reaches out toward him, but it's only a flicker, and the only other sign is the way he waits until she's finished to move any closer and take the vessel.

He empties both his own bag and Michel's into the ice. He may not drink it, after this, unless the only other option is genuine dehydration, but if it makes the others happy—

"If you find this isn't enough, we can come back with a boat and more ways to hold air," he says as he finishes, with a vague, circular hand motion in the air with one of the emptied bags to suggest a cycle of traded containers. Don't drown over this.

For Michel's part he was well aware that beggars couldn't be choosers at this point, for his part this was better that wasting water and being left with...well he did not even want to think of the body count in the bod surrounding him. Perhaps he was a touch pickier than he pretended to be, but everyone had their limits, even someone like the Chevalier...so he really couldn't begrudge Elian his own.

For now he forced himself away from the warmth of the fire so that he might stand beside Lady LeBlanc, bracing himself mentally for their next dive into the icy water, if not physically. Having already been down there once he wasn't quite so eager to find himself down there again...but if the inhabitants before them had been able to persevere then so would he.

"It would not hurt to try it once, just to see where this goes, but if it becomes too complicated...then there's no harm in finding another way," or shame either, if they did not succeed where their predecessors had not they would just have to figure out another way and keep trying. If that meant going back empty handed for a time, then that was better than dying, "ready to get back to work, my Lady, or do you need more time?

This situation has left Christine feeling rather helpless. Yes, she managed to pull together a busted up wagon for a fire, but she's standing on the shore, waiting for whatever they find and hoping they don't get caught on anything down there. Who knows? Perhaps there are corpses down there that will awaken when their resting place is disturbed.

"May the Maker watch over you both," she murmurs, feeling at a loss.

She ignores it. Such displays of fear or loathing or distaste are familiar enough for her not to take it personally- and what does it say of the world that it is something she's come to see as normal?

It does not matter. Finding answers- that matters. Between the four of them getting the rope over the tree limb, the hook tied to the end and that set into the cauldron- it's short work. Attaching reeds to the leather, watertight bags for ease of breathing below, also quickly done. To Christine Adelaide offers a reassuring nod. "I shall send up a flare if we find anything."

Maker willing, they ought. Skirts of her chemise gathered in one hand, cauldron dragging with the other, she nods for Michel to join her in the pond. With the air offered by the cauldron they ought to be able to seek out more without having to swim all the way to the surface- and perhaps manage to see what the templars were after.

Elian almost asks her to send them up at intervals anyway—a sign they're alive, not in trouble—but the aforementioned distaste stays his tongue, on top of his usual reticence and the knowledge that she would be expending limited energy mostly for the sake of his and Christine's peace of mind. He can probably trust them not to let themselves drown.

So he doesn't say anything at all, only nods at Michel in passing to wish him luck while he retreats further onto the bank to set aside the water and stoke the fire.

If the Maker could find a way to keep them dry while under the water that would be very useful indeed...a thought Michel kept to himself, of course, but a valid one nonetheless. And one he was certain he could not be alone in. Regardless he followed dutifully and gathered himself just as Lady LeBlanc gathered her skirts prepared for the chill once again.

Hopefully they would find something of significance this time around.

[ ooc: I need to bow out of this. Please skip me. Christine will just be hanging out in the background. ]

Into the chill and the air offered by the cauldron, the weight offers them some assistance in working their way down to a semi respectable depth. With air it is not quite so horrid, even if she'd rather not have to do this at all, it is what it is. With the light her wisp offers them and the bag and reed- she dove down to seek out whatever it was the Templars had been after. She takes a turn, comes up empty, and swam back up to the cauldron, offering Michel the reed. "I'll send a wisp after you."

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A Little Down In The Mouth Pt 2

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aaa sorry guys

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eep this got lost in my spam box for some reason

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