[ 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

[sulahnan]

"I think so," she says after a short pause, then turns to lead the way back up. Just before the final step, she gestures to Bastien and Colin to step exactly where she steps to avoid the creaky spots on the floor.

"I got in through there," The center room off a long hall, the one with double-doors. "The locked room is 'round the corner."

[keenly]

Colin glances out through a window, just to note how far it is to the ground.

"If there's a window and you can get her out of it," he whispers, "I can get her to the ground safely."

And as discreetly as possible, so the poor woman doesn't start screaming at the use of magic.

[cozen]

Bastien nods a little, but he says, "Can you make it to the window and see if she is inside first? If she is not in any immediate danger, we need to look through his papers before we risk a commotion."

[sulahnan]

She nods to Bastien's point.

"Yeah, I'll go check while you search the study for anything useful." She doesn't wait for further commentary on the subject; the study is just off the balcony she used to get inside, so she can just as easily climb out onto the adjacent window ledges from that balcony and shimmy around the corner of the building to peer into the locked room.

On her return, Athessa shakes her head. "She's there, but the window is barred. Even if it wasn't, it'd be a tight fit. I think she's still unconscious."

[keenly]

The first thing that Colin definitely saw as being 'off' is a collection of shipping manifests. He's very familiar with how they should look, and they don't. He adds them to the pile they're making.

"How far along are you on Yseult's mandatory lockpicking training?"

[cozen]

With apparent time and space to do it, Bastien isn't being stingy about what he adds to the pile, but the Qunlat he comes across gets held up on display and then held out toward Athessa. Not that she reads it, as far as he knows. It's just interesting that it's here.

"I can give it a try," he says, about the lock, and sets aside the documents to fish around in his clothing for a wrapped set of lock picks—a gift, after he lost the last set in Orlais.

[sulahnan]

At first, she doesn't know what she's looking at when Bastien holds up the foreign lettering, but recognition draws a crease between her brows. She's seen that before, somewhere.

"He'd probably notice if we took this, wouldn't he?" She's not a fast enough reader to be able to skim everything, much less retain it. But she stares at the Qunlat, trying to remember where she's seen one specific symbol before.

[keenly]

“Sure,” Colin says with a shrug. “But he’ll take longer to notice after we trash the room and take a few valuables. Sort of hard to sort out what’s missing from what’s stolen when everything’s scattered about the room.”

He picks up an expensive-looking vase and tucks it under one arm. They’re here to make this look like a burglary, aren’t they?

[cozen]

Bastien nods as he comes up with a leather roll of picks. "I think we have to take it," he says, "whether he notices or not, unless you think we have time to transcribe it before he comes back."

[sulahnan]

"No, you're right," she considers pocketing the page, but puts it on the stack with the rest of the evidence. To Colin, in conspiratorial tones: "Yseult's lockpicking stuff is mandatory?"

But before he can respond, a footstep sounds in the hall. Then another. And yeah, you know what, it's someone walking, and with Devigny gone, the staff mostly gone and the ones not gone knocked out, it can only be the footman.

Athessa doesn't say "shit" so much as breathe it as she silently hurries to slowly, gingerly, carefully nudge the door until it's only open a crack. She looks between Bastien and Colin, gesturing to the latter's pinched vase and miming using it as a club.

[keenly]

Colin's eyes go wide and for a second, he is more focused on trying to interpret Athessa's chopping motion than the footman. A second later, he is tiptoeing up to the door and peering out the crack, making an entirely different motion with his own hand. The thud when the footman collapses to the floor is rather satisfying, considering what he's been up to. He shuts the door.

"He's out," he whispers to the other two. "Whichever of you can pick a lock better go and get the girl. Leave the staging-the-burglary bits to me."