closed / some dreams are made for children

[justashotaway]

WHO: Laura Kint, Byerly Rutyer, Alistair, Athessa, Ilias Fabria, Matthias
WHAT: Nothing aids digestion like an extradition crisis.
WHEN: Starts on 2nd Harvestmere, goes on as needed
WHERE: From the Gallows dining hall to Maker knows where else
NOTES: Log for the They Hired a Contract Killer player plot. Because this is happening in public, it's absolutely possible for your character to have witnessed it! A network post will go up soon, so it's also possible for your character have loud opinions!

Breakfast at the Gallows is rarely quiet, even earlier in the morning. The day a woman walks in, dressed in the garb of a Nevarran messenger, is no exception; people are coming and going at all paces, the room abuzz with conversation.

"I seek Riftwatch's diplomatic leaders." Whether she's come because the Diplomacy offices were empty or skipped them in search of the biggest possible crowd to hear her message is unclear--either way, her voice rings out over the din. Somebody is used to shouting. "You harbor a criminal among you."

Within the sealed parchment she holds, the notice is a clear and forceful demand from the Nevarran government. Deliver the suspected murderess Laura Kint to a diplomat in Kirkwall immediately. She is to be remanded to Nevarra in the company of armed guards, where she will be tried for the murder of around thirty people between 9:40 and 9:43:

Hennia Benes, a baker

Els Sebesta, a cook

Affrina, a servant

Victor, a child

Alia Somogyi, a groom

Paulin Barthel, a peddler

Caspar Ursell, a wheelwright

Lorenis, a farmer

Grett Petocs, a brewer

Anthonia "The Bright," a laborer

Costinus Dalca, a tailor

Vasilla Ignac, a blacksmith

Ullentin Winther, a butcher

Serva Mertin, a cloth merchant

Steffan Farrow, a tavern owner

Cel, a laborer

Isidia Stavus, an initiate

Arturo Lengiel, a bailiff

Sister Florenia

Brother Vulpei

Wilhelm Verony, a servant

Marckel Sarkozhe, a seneschal

Lord Baltas van Metaxa

Sister Amori

Lady Dimitra Ermolt

Lord Konrad Ermolt

Lord Melchius Ermolt

Mother Tylia

Sister Gitta

Nevarran guards may or may not be waiting outside the door to capture any attempt to flee. Unfortunately, their quarry is doing no such thing; she's frozen with her porridge spoon halfway to her lips, head determinedly down. A criminal is a general thing, but a criminal wanted by the Nevarran crown...even without knowing the contents of the demand, Laura suspects. And she does not want to return to Nevarra.

And when the woman begins to read out the demands inked onto her parchment, there is no longer any doubt.

Comments

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[sulahnan]

"Wh--There's no way she's older than twenty--"

No older than twenty, but not much older than Matthias, meaning...

Meaning Athessa's brow knits together as she fixates on this as they make their way down the hall.

athessa pls

[inkindled]

"Yeah, I know," Matthias says, with a significant look at Athessa. "Not older than twenty."

Why is she being like this? His ears have gone quite red under having to make such a thing about his age. And Laura's age, of course, but now his has entered into the discussion as well. And all because Athessa has harped on it, for some reason. Hopefully Ilias isn't looking at him. Hopefully they can all get back to the matter at hand, and get to the bloody hall quickly.

[libratus]

Ilias has his mouth half open in sort of a ?????, but— well, at least he has the good graces steer his eyes away without comment, considering the state of Matthias's ears. Thankfully, he's beginning to progress from groggy squinting to walking, listening, and talking all at once.

"It matters to me." How old she was, how much she understood, if she actually did anything at all. "But you are quite right, I will see what I can find out."

"In the meantime, if you do see her," Briskly, as they close the distance to the hall, a key is loosed from its ring and offered to— Maker, whichever of them looks marginally less confused at the moment. "Then I do not know where this went, and naturally cannot admit even His Majesty's messenger into my lab without exposing the Mortalitasi's deepest secrets. Yes?"

[sulahnan]

Athessa, not by virtue of being less confused but by being closest and the first to grab the key, is the one to take it. Not so much grabbing it as taking it carefully and frowning at it, or frowning because she was already doing so.

"Uh," she says, very eloquently. "Right. Ok. Sure."

Her confusion about Matthias not being as close to her age as she thought notwithstanding, the strangeness of the entire situation is starting to raise little question marks in her mind. A weird key? Mortalitasi secrets? Why would the messenger need to go into Ilias' lab? What does one keep in a lab anyway? Did Laura kill a bunch of people?

She looks at Ilias. "This is more complicated than it seems, isn't it?"

[inkindled]

Matthias, less quick to get the key but first to put together what Ilias is getting at, thanks to the hiding and secrecy and I-have-no-idea-serah-this-isn't-the-wagon-you're-looking-for, grabs hold of Athessa's arm to stop her from walking.

"It's not that complicated," he says. And now that his ears aren't on fire, he can give Ilias what he thinks is a slow and solemn nod. The nod comes out a bit manic, like a squirrel with a pull-string, despite his efforts. He's not built for slow or solemn. "That's what she means. It's not that complicated, so we've got it, mate. Secrets. Mystery key disappearance. C'mon--" This one's to Athessa, in a whisper, with more urgency. "We're finding Laura."

And, loudly, and more cheerfully to Ilias, complete with a wave: "See you around, then!"

[libratus]

Well. That will have to do. Ilias's face looks a bit like it's just come out of a plaster mould, but there's an attempt at an approving nod all the same. He trusts the two of them to do what they can, at least.

He'll just have to do what he can, too. And figure out what is actually going on. Maybe the latter first. With a light thock of staff against doorway, he pushes into the dining hall.

[sulahnan]

"If we're finding Laura," she hisses, after Ilias has made his way through the door, "then why are we stopping out here? She's probably still in there." She emphasizes that last bit with a jerk of her thumb towards the dining hall. The key that had been in that hand is already pocketed somewhere in her seemingly pocketless attire.

[byblow]

“—and the straps on my left boot had come undone, and I was trying to keep it on my foot while we ran back and forth, so it looked like I’d injured my leg,” Alistair is saying inside the dining hall, with a tone increasingly fraying at the edges. He can talk a lot, but he’s running out of details to add to this story, given what a blur of overwhelming terror and chaos it was in reality.

The door opens. It’s the Mortalitasi. He’s briefly distracted by it, but he keeps talking.

“But that isn’t why Cousland got there first, of course.” Of course. “He got there first because he was very heroic and daring and—”

[bouchonne]

"Speaker Fabria," Byerly interrupts smoothly, getting to his feet, lifting his hand to beckon the man over. There's not even an acknowledgment of the fact that he's stepping all over Alistair's story. Instead, he just smiles at the messenger as soon as there's a moment's silence, and says, "I really must apologize for my heroic countryman. I thought he'd be better at telling stories."

(The bite is taken out of that somewhat by the fact that, when the messenger looks away, By knocks his knuckles against Alistair's shoulder in what is unmistakably a gesture of thanks, old chap.)

"Thankfully, here's a fellow quite gifted in that art. Have you two ever met before?" he asks, as though all Nevarrans were acquainted. Which they very well might be, honestly. Small country, all that.

[libratus]

"I've not had the pleasure, no, though I would guess my cousins may be more familiar faces at court? And of course my grandmother, Lady Eudoxia."

Sweet and insidiously dangerous, all of them, but for once Ilias can tolerate dropping a name or two for a worthy cause. He extends a hand amiably.

"Such an unexpected delight, to receive His Majesty's own emissary. She shall be most eager to hear word of it, I am certain. Who shall I tell her came all the way to Kirkwall to treat with us?"

[justashotaway]

The messenger's attention is surely waning from the story of the archdemon's slaying--but Ilias' presence sharpens it again. She stands to greet him, her brows rising at the mention of his relations. Lady Eudoxia's name particularly seems to stand out.

"Margria Kedves." The answer's at the ready, along with her hand, a kind of respect--deference?--in her bearing that Thedosians of other lands apparently don't rate. "I trust the situation has been described to you, Speaker. You must understand that this situation must be handled with some speed, or we risk losing the opportunity to bring justice."

•

Laura, meanwhile, having heard the door open and conversation begin again (if distantly, thanks to the general dull roar the dining hall always seems to have), begins moving toward the far end of the table she's under. The longer she's in the hall with them, the less secure it seems. While they are distracted with discussing her, she must find someplace more permanent to hide. That will require removing herself from the hall and possibly the Gallows or Kirkwall as a whole.

(But she dearly hopes it will not come to that.)

Cautiously, she peeks over the edge of the table she'd been hiding under, looking for the messenger's line of sight. Is the door within her view? It's hard to tell without rising to her feet--thankfully, she's near-positive the woman can't see her here--but looking at the door swinging open again, she catches sight of Matthias and Athessa in the corridor beyond.

[inkindled]

"Laura is brilliant," has been the predicate of Matthias' argument since Ilias went into the hall. He's whispered it a few times to Athessa, while they're still stood in the corridor outside the room. Brilliant enough to have escaped somehow, is what he means--that, and, "If we go back in, it'll look weird," and, "We don't know that she's in there," and, of course, "She'll notice--the bloody messenger, not Laura, and that's if she's in there," which carries him back to the top of his arguments.

Other members of Riftwatch have to step around them to go into the hall for breakfast, or simply to pass by. This means that they get some looks in passing--not that it's so weird to see an argument, right, whispered or otherwise--but the stubborn way that Matthias and Athessa have planted themselves in nearly the center of the corridor means that any traffic must pass around them, like a river diverted by a stone. Matthias stops talking each time someone gets close, gives everyone a kind of manic grin--move along, nothing to see--which does very little to make them look less weird.

"Pretty sure she'd have left by now," he says to Athessa in an undertone, as the door swings open behind the latest person to enter. He cranes his neck to see into the hall before the door can close again, trying to see what's going on. The Speaker is standing over by the table now--Alistair himself is seated there as well, wow, all right, that's good--and the messenger is still in there, but that's of little surprise-- "She's magnificent, she could likely-- oh shit--"

This swear is because Matthias has just caught sight of Laura. Under a table, or like, behind a table. He grabs Athessa's arm, blindly, leaning to the side as the door continues to drift closed, trying to keep Laura in his sights. "She is still in there!"

[sulahnan]

[sulahnan]

"Brilliant, you said. No, wait, magnificent." She can't not deliver that jab before she pulls Matthias aside, out of the doorway.

"With you gawking like that it's a wonder Messenger Fancy Pants hasn't noticed, would you be a little bit cool please. What we need is a distraction."

Like a distraction that will distract the entire dining hall.

[byblow]

Insulted, punched, where does the indignity end—

No. He's relieved to be relieved, a sucker for that precise type of camaraderie demonstration, pleased to be of service. All of that. He sinks back into his chair, oatmeal held to his chest still like perhaps someone might try to take it away and give it to a Nevarran, but he doesn't get up. Just in case.

His attention does wander, though, out toward the door, just in time to catch a flash of the gawkers disappearing around the corner, and he frowns a little. In a thoughtful sort of way, you know, like: I wonder if they're going to do something stupid.

[justashotaway]

Laura's eyes meet Matthias', she thinks. The evidence is there in the way his bearing shifts, tilting as though he's trying to keep seeing her. If she can reach them, she can escape; there are rooms and rafters and battlements, the rest of Kirkwall if necessary. (She does not want to think of leaving entirely.) And with the way they'd both immediately tried to shout down the messenger, Laura thinks their interests are still allied.

(That is the thing she holds onto, Matthias and Athessa were angry with the messenger, not the message, too tightly to consider right now. It won't be safe to think about it until she is alone.)

There are too many people in the room to creep along behind the tables. Someone will see her and tell the messenger that a girl is hiding in the room--the only surprise left will be whether they did it out of a sense of justice or hope for a reward. She will have to leave in something like plain sight, like the afternoon Matthias dared her to throw a pebble at a man in the marketplace.

She moves to the sideboard, where others also are, and pretends she is interested in eating. She pretends her name is not Laura Kint, and she is not wanted for murder. And she starts pulling her cowl over up over her hair, trying to make it seem like an idle decision, not an attempt to mask herself.