[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 -> Coach House -> Back To Fields) [color=9932cc][i][b]Action:[/b][/i][/color] [i]Casting a Spell[/i] (Prestidigitation) [color=9932cc][i][b]Bonus Action:[/b][/i][/color] [color=dimgray][i]Familiar[/i][/color] stuff, [color=black][b]Morty[/b][/color] [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] Now, Victoria did say, and quite out loud, that she was open to take direction. The unspoken other half of that sentence contained the qualifier that she was speaking near exclusively to, and/or about, Cecily L'Rose. Or at least Lizbeth. She was less enthusiastic when a series of ...suggestions... came from Baronfjord. And were it not for the immediateness of the emergency, she might have even shown it. So, while she did not give a rousing and energetic affirmation of what could only tentatively be called "the plan", she [i]did[/i] move to implement it. Mostly. The run back to the Coach House saw her mind process what had happen, and what she intended to do. The day was not great for her. Emotional, for a lady who was good at controlling what feelings she exhibited. Then again, she was already very tired. Tired from the day, tired from the impromptu performance to clear her head, and damn near exhausted on behalf of helping to deal with the sudden outbreak of something virulent or another. She would much rather be in bed. Or nursing tea. Or even copying anatomy and medicine books rather than this. But she could not just leave the L'Rose family's harvest to the ravages of an early freeze. But how to help in a manner that was more efficient than a manual laborer (which was [i]not[/i] her strong point by any appreciable means) wasn't immediately forthcoming. Her spellcraft was simply unsuited to things of this nature with expectations of direct influence. But then the thought occurred that there might be something less direct she could attempt. A quick action summoned her Familiar to her, coming into existence in a flutter of black wings. They both swiftly entered the main room of the Coach House, whereupon Victoria got to work. Morty was at the same place where she left him, and her errand cart was likewise present, though still loaded down with her personal belongings and no small amount of local wine from Harvestide. There might have been less, but why drink less fine vintages when you're living in the place that makes the good stuff? Everything got piled out of her cart; chest, bottles, books, backpack, and incidentals she had for her various nefarious and non-nefarious activities and hitched Morty up to it. She scribbled a quick but legible message on a piece of note-paper and fixed it to her Raven's leg with one of her hair ribbons. It read: [color=9932cc][i]"Medician Floquet, It is your favorite practitioner of the "dark arts." I apologize for the late arrival of my Raven, doubly so for the request I make of you this evening. The cold has grown with intensity that threatens Madame L'Rose's late harvest and the illness we have been treating has waylaid many of her workers. Without more help, she might lose the crop, which isn't good for anyone expecting wages from the L'Roses this winter. People respect you and your daughter. I know it is late, but if you can convince anyone to help, I am sure that Cecily will express her gratitude. Please, if you can. More is better than less; less is better than none. One or two is still appreciated. Thank you so much for anything you can do. [b]- V.[/b]"[/i][/color] Victoria sent her Familiar off with specific instructions. The spirit was to fly to Southmoor; unusual for a raven as they were not known for being nocturnal but possessed eyesight enough to discern how to get to a familiar spot. All the same, a raven calling in the night was rare enough to draw attention, which is what she wanted. It took to the air, setting a path towards town. Morty was set, the Raven was on its way, and now Baronfjord wanted their mule and wagon. What started out as no problem whatsoever quickly became an issue as she had completely forgotten to empty and downstack the contents of the wagon from earlier - a mistake already made from earlier and one of the duties she had set to herself when they arrived - and so had to waste time doing just this. In the dark. With the mule already attached. This was amazingly suboptimal. To make matters a little comical, the coffin which was reserved for Monsieur L'Rose that the Goblins had appropriated for themselves (after consuming quite a bit of its contents in a drunken stupor) and that Cecily expressly did [i]not[/i] want back clattered out of the back awkwardly, as if Victoria was trying to inexpertly move a body in the dark. Sighing, she hauled the thing to the nearest interior wall and leaned it well enough to brace. Then she ran back to the wagon and set off for the fields, Morty in tow. The now quite tired but heavily determined Bard made her way back toward the twinkling of firelight in front of the silhouette of the Estate House and hopped down, handing the reins off to her Dragonborn companion, Baronfjord, and focused her attention to Morty, and the utility with which the poor, dead beast might provide. Victoria and Morty went to the nearest supply wagon that had arrived and allowed the workers there to put as many stacked braziers as possible into her cart, then claimed a row for herself. The work itself, in this role, wasn't bad. Or it wouldn't be if she wasn't already dead tired and freezing. Lucky for her, Victoria had a means of speeding things along. As each evenly spaced brazier was set and filled with fuel, she went back behind them and called upon her quieter magics - the classic Prestidigitation - to light them up in short seconds. Every so often, she cast the same spell upon the hidden armor underneath her slim coat or her boots. Sometimes keeping warm pockets helped with her hands. She was a musician. Tough, skilled hands, just not suited to manual labor. Some care had to be taken. It was at this moment that she realize that her violin was still strapped to her back within its case. Why she hadn't dropped it off made no sense to her whatsoever. Well, too late now. There were controlled fires to place.