[ CLOSED ] The Buck Stops Here

[sulahnan]

WHO: Athessa, Bastien, Byerly, Colin, Deimos, Flint, Raas, Thranduil, Yseult
WHAT: Revenge for past trauma reveals a sinister plot
WHEN: The Month of Guardian (aka now)
WHERE: The Gallows and Hightown, Kirkwall in general
NOTES: CW: This plot deals with sexual assault, revenge, and murder. Mostly the aftermath of the assault, no graphic descriptions that I can foresee, but be cautious. Opting out and hand-waving is fine.

By and large, the beginning of the month of Guardian in Kirkwall is unremarkable. Business as usual, even with the ever increasing cost of sugar, coffee, and tea. But for the inhabitants of Lowtown, it comes with signs that their waking nightmares persist.

For the past few months of winter, Lowtown locals have been whispering about a rash of murders and disappearances among the Alienages. Deaths previously attributed to exposure to the harsh winter weather are rumored to be far more insidious; some have claimed that they noticed wounds on the bodies as they were being disposed of, but any attempts to bring this information to the City Guard have been met with indifference or empty platitudes.

Less widely noted, and harder to attach to a pattern, are the instances of working girls being hired to entertain at private functions and coming back...different. Or not at all. To the average person, it’s barely even news, but to anyone who spends time in the brothels and listens to the chatter within, it’s clear that these are not isolated incidents, nor are they without concern.

While the alleged murders in Lowtown have no clear culprit and thus are blamed on anyone from random strangers to demons and Crows, the goings-on at the brothels go hand-in-hand with mention of one name in particular: Devigny.

Comments

iii. haunted [ closed to colin, byerly, div heads ]

[sulahnan]

[ It takes some time to get from Hightown back to the Gallows, and it's only when Colin and Athessa have already barged into Byerly's office that Athessa realizes they could have messaged him via crystal. ]

BYERL--he's not here.

[ Indeed, the office is empty.

The barely touched glass of wine on the desk, however, hints that he's only stepped away for a moment. ]

Fuck.

[keenly]

Shit, [Colin swears under his breath, raising a hand to rake fingers through his hair before turning to Athessa and reaching out to embrace her. They both went through something back there, but her most of all.]

[sulahnan]

[ For once, it seems, she's not on the verge of tears. At least not yet, anyway. But her sense of urgency hasn't died down since leaving Hightown, manifesting in tapping her heel on the floor, pacing, and chewing on her cuticles.

And inside her mind is just a mantra of what do we do, what do we do, what do we do?!

So when Colin hugs her, she doesn't hug back, but leans against him instead, and immediately goes back to anxious fidgeting. ]

He should be back soon, I think. How long do we wait before we call him on the crystal?

[keenly]

[A woman is being raped, so.]

We do it now. [Colin twists his own crystal and speaks Byerly's name into it.]

[sulahnan]

We shouldn't have come back, we're already too late.

[bouchonne]

[ Byerly's voice bounces back from Colin's crystal: ]

Hoy, dear fellow. What news?

[keenly]

Please come to your office quickly and drain this glass of wine before Athessa or I do.

[sulahnan]

[ A pause in her pacing to make a face at that. ]

[bouchonne]

It's poisoned.

[keenly]

There's a woman being raped in Hightown right now and we need your help.

[sulahnan]

[ Crowding in close to Colin's crystal, not waiting for Byerly to respond: ]

If it's poisoned you won't mind if I dump it out, right? And throw all of the other bottles out the window in case they've been poisoned, too?

[bouchonne]

[ Byerly is quiet for a moment. Then, finally, tightly: ]

And you -

[ No. He cuts himself off. ]

Why are you talking to me and not the guard. You -

[keenly]

[Concurrently with Athessa:] It's Devigny.

[A beat.]

The guard's in his pocket. We know which ones.

[sulahnan]

Byerly— [ She struggles to find a word louder than we're too late, we're too late, we're too late. ] —please. We have to stop him.

For good.

[bouchonne]

[ Steps outside the door; he enters. He's pale and tense. And without greeting, without preamble - ]

Why are you here, instead of there? [ Helping her? ]

[keenly]

If we killed him, the murder of a powerful man by a mage and an elf would get the alienage purged at the very least. Otherwise, what? We might sneak in and smuggle her out, but then he'd know we were on to him and we could never save another victim of his again.

[He's shaking, he's grey, he's wondering if he's totally crazy or if he just made a cowardly decision and made it sound to himself like it was smart.]

Right?

[sulahnan]

I knew, I said we had to help her! [ She gestures like she wants to claw her own face off for how wrong they both were to leave, and starts to pace back and forth. ]

We shouldn't have come back we should've stayed and done something--

[bouchonne]

[ He clenches his jaw and draws in a breath, trying to find his calm. ]

Tell me everything you know.

[keenly]

[It's hard to recall everything, or organize it all aloud while in such a frantic state, so sometimes they have to double back to hit a point they'd missed. So when Colin ends the story in this manner, it may not be surprising:]

The carriage curtains were drawn, a footman or someone went to the back and took out a girl who was unconscious. Devigny didn't come out, I think the last time we saw him was...

[He trails off, then he looks at Athessa with wide eyes.]

...when he left, earlier.

[sulahnan]

[ She'd been interjecting, sometimes frantically, to remind Colin about this thing, or that thing, or a minor detail here and there. Tell him about the guards, Colin. No, that happened the day before, yes we were there all night.

But when the realization hits, at the same moment that Colin looks at her, Athessa's frantic energy seems to dissolve along with the willingness for her legs to keep her upright. She sinks down to sit on the floor, taking a few deep lungfuls of air. Relief is so often a weight off the body that the way it sucks out every ounce of breath from you gets glossed over. ]

We have to act fast, then.

[bouchonne]

[ Some of his sharpness fades as it becomes clear that the imminent danger is not immediate. As the story is told, he becomes more and more quiet, more and more pensive.

At the end of it, to Athessa: ]

You should not be a part of this.

[keenly]

[Colin looks between them, but his eyes ultimately fasten on Athessa. He's seen what this week has done to her, emotionally. When he went after Lutair, there was little threat of physical danger and the payoff was all but guaranteed. This is the opposite of that.]

He's...he's right. After what this week's already done to you.

[sulahnan]

Whether or not I should doesn't matter!

[ She doesn't look between them, because she knows what she'll see if she does. She sets her jaw and, after a moment, gets back to her feet. ]

I can't let him get away with doing this to anyone else. I can't.

[bouchonne]

He will not.

[ By's voice is soft and level. ]

Trust us to guarantee that he will not.

[keenly]

You haven't, [Colin says gently.] You've ensured his destruction. Try not to risk your own.