[center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][table][row][/row][row][cell] [h2][color=darkorchid][i][b]Victoria Belmont[/b][/i][/color][/h2][i][b][color=9932cc]Half-Elf, Bard, Level 5[/color][/b][/i] [color=9932cc][i][b]HP:[/b][/i][/color] 33 / 33 [color=9932cc][i][b]Armor Class:[/b][/i][/color] 16 [color=9932cc][i][b]Conditions:[/b][/i][/color] N/A [color=9932cc][i][b]Location:[/b][/i][/color] Rose River Vineyard (Fields Near Estate House) [color=9932cc][i][b]Action:[/b][/i][/color] N/A [color=9932cc][i][b]Bonus Action:[/b][/i][/color] [color=dimgray][i]Familiar[/i][/color] stuff [color=9932cc][i][b]Reaction:[/b][/i][/color] N/A [/cell][cell] [right][img]https://i.ibb.co/k55RrWV/Victoria-Alt-4-2.png[/img][/right] [/cell][/row][/table][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center] The approach to the field was not particularly long for Victoria, but it was illuminating, both literally and metaphorically. true, she had run off practically mid-sentence, but felt a bit better about it when she heard the heavier footfalls of Kathryn behind her. She was without her usual cadre of thralls, even if most of them were recent of origin. It might not have been fair to categorize her Raven as a [i]thrall[/i], persay, as the spirit-made-flesh was bound to her by ritual as opposed to manifested with Necromancy. And her [i]Phantom Steed[/i] wasn't exactly a thrall, either, so much as a ritually invoked force of semi-real shadowstuff, formed partially from her own imagination. Victoria was a Bard. She was good at [i]imagination[/i]. Morty, on the other hand, was most assuredly her thrall. The forces which animated the formerly living (and now potentially very tasty) swine were an arcane extension of herself, utterly loyal but ultimately temporary of animation. But this line of thought was alien to the scene at hand. Knowing virtually nothing about agriculture, nor the growing of wine grapes particularly, all she knew was that an alarm was ringing and fires where burning where they generally, instinctively, really shouldn't be. Moreover, through the illumination of the fires and moon above, cloud cover notwithstanding, she cold detect the arrival of the rest of the group, plus Lizbeth. Logically, if she was not maniacally trying to put the fires out, then it wasn't quite the emergency she assumed it might be. And she would have the answers, being winefolk, even if she was a bit young. So her footfalls altered in direction just enough to bring her into her presence. As Victoria ran, she summoned up the mental fortitude to call upon her newest spiritual assistant. Her raven appeared beside her in a silent spark of necrotic energy, already to wing and flying higher as seconds passed. An spoken command was sent to the creature to keep an eye out in their periphery, hopefully to let her know if anything or anyone unexpected might come upon them in the gloom outside of the firelight. When she arrived, Victoria listened to the explanation and filled in as best she could from context. They [i]wanted[/i] the fires. And Cecily wanted them to do the things that adventurers stereotypically might for the betterment of their crop. It wasn't the worst thing that she had been asked to handle. However, she has no idea how her magic, somewhat specialized as it was, would be of help here past the odd parlor trick. If nothing else, magic aside, she was an excellent lifter of morale. The power of her voice in the most mundane but talented of application could work wonders with one's resolve. Never underestimate the ability of a Bard to motivate. Beneath the fancy hat and death-oriented spellwork, Victoria was a Bard at her very core. [i]However[/i], Victoria was also tired. A full day and more of work, from sunup to nearly sundown, her emotional outburst, light hike to the watchtower and centering performance there had left very little time to rest, and from what she was hearing this was going to be an all-night affair. She would [i]really[/i] rather be someplace warm right now with a cup of something warming and lightly spiced. Victoria was not known for her prowess with manual labor, nor as her ability to pass as a workhorse. Nevertheless, she did not immediately leave the L'Roses and staff to their own devices. With a sigh, and subtle corrections to her expression to suppress any lingering exhaustion or emotion from her features, she adjusted her voice to be heard over the movement of the workers in their vicinity and stated, [color=9932cc]"I know not what special service I may provide, but I am open to direction until I can think of one."[/color]