[center][h3]Frenzy Plant – Inquest at Belka[/h3]
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The General of Frenzy Plant nodded, his white hair rolling like wheat in the brisk mountain breeze.  [color=8F9779]”No offense taken, Mr. Gerard.  Your father is a wise man, and in any other case, his advice should be followed.  However, towns are more unpredictable, and more heavily populated with spying eyes, than an open territory.  That is why I have disagreed.”[/color]  A quick look around confirmed that most of the soldiers were ready to move out, though some of the wagons remained less than fully loaded.  Damian’s next question returned his attention to the loaned Blade.  [color=8F9779]”Iguunale?  One of Frenzy Plant’s ‘branches’ relayed the information to us.  You might not know: this guild maintains close connections with several nonmagical fighting forces across Fiore.  They are not a part of the guild proper, but we coordinate often, including choice information.  The Rune Knights and the Magic Council watch over the wizards of Fiore; the martial tree of which Frenzy Plant is a pivotal part works at other matters.  I believe that the Dust Clavigers relayed the information.  They are also the ones responsible for the quarantine, and any potential failure to maintain it.”[/color]

Having gone off a little, Sanders inclined his head abruptly in a gesture of dismissal, signaling that the time for conversation was at its end.  He hurried over the rough, yellow-grassed ground to walk at the head of the procession leading from the clifftop campsite toward Belka.  With only a few hundred meters of ground to cover, the war guild soon found itself at the gates of the wind-battered town.  Upon entrance several features of the town became immediately obvious.  An abundance of fire pits and braziers littered the place, evidence of a populace accustomed to light-obscuring clouds and chilly, biting gusts of wind.  Houses, which looked like wooden boxes crammed and stacked together, did not appear to be very large at all, and in some cases stood elevated on tree trunk columns to provide more room for farmland.  Gardens seemed ubiquitous as well, along with their equipment.  Most of all, there seemed to be no color in the place outside of the blazing fires; only dull greens, dull browns, and grays could be seen.

More interestingly, a group of townsfolk were currently passing by.  All appeared haggard beneath their ragged work clothes, but these looked especially grim.  Two of them cooperated to lug a huge pot of gray powder toward Belka’s southern end where an allotment of gravestones lay, and the other three marched along with them.  One held a little book, and another a little bell.  The portly cleric who some minutes before had gone out to greet the envoys of Frenzy Plant stood by and watched, leaning on his spiked club.  His compatriots could not be glimpsed anywhere.  From his manner, and the morose aura surrounding the southbound group, it could be inferred that these Belka denizens comprised a funeral procession--and that kiln-fired urn the sarcophagus of the immolated deceased.