Penny

Fortune & Glory: Grimdark Pulp RP

There were wizard and witches who could hurl fire from their fingertips, or call lighting down from clear sky to smite their enemies. Jocasta had never had much a knack for battle magic, it took alot of time, training and focus that always seemed better spent on running away. Sigilry, enchantments, and alchemy were where her modest talents lay, but her greatest talent was that she always thought outside the box. As she reappeared behind the line of mercenaries she was already reaching into her pouch.

“Don’t think that your tricks will save you, you think we are without wizards?” Verholt shouted, glancing towards one of the mercenaries who was already muttering and gesturing. Adjusting her aim to the handily pointed out mage she pulled a glass orb from her pouch and hurled it at the mans head. Werholdt swatted it aside with his shield instinctively. The glass exploded and greenish gas bloomed out of it like a lump of chalk hit by a hammer.

“Sorr…ry!” Jocasta concluded, reappearing by the treeline before the last syllable left her lips. The mage was shouting and retching, trying desperately to rub at his eyes. Werholdt was not much better, staggering away from the essence of skunk she had just doused them with. A pair of crossbow bolts whisked past her, close enough to pluck at her cloak. She let out an eep and vanished again, more by accident then design, appearing back behind the treeline. More crossbow bolts crashed through the trees, aimed more or less blindly, but no less lethal for that. Of Beren there was no sign, but she suspected she had sown enough confusion with her trick that he had been able to make it to the treeline on the opposite side of the road.



“Kill them! Kill them!” one of the mercenaries was shouting, which instruction did not predispose her to wait around while they pulled themselves together. More bolts whistled passed and she belatedly realized that useful as it was, a bright red sarong wasn’t exactly the best choice for blending into a snow dusted forest. She turned and ran deeper into the woods, each time she reached a tree or ticket that blocked her path she flickered through it, covering ground far faster than her pursuers could manage. The sounds of pursuit died away and she turned in what she thought was the direction of the road, instead she came across a small gulley with a partially frozen stream at the bottom. She clambered down the side and skipped across the icy rocks to the other side without incident. No road to be found and no Beren either. She must have gotten turned around at some point during her flight. She considered her options. She pulled a small brass sphere from a pouch and hung the charm around her neck. An intricate map was etched into its surface, made by a serf who had never left his masters estate in Vrettonia. Scrying attempts would invariably report the wearer as ‘by the windmill’ or ‘in the old trout pond’ somewhere far to the south. That would prevent the now skunk smelling mage from finding her, in the event he was able to work a spell and he had something of hers he could use to work it. Beren didn’t have any such protection however and it seemed reasonable that if he couldn’t find her he might try and find her companion.



“Hrmm,” she pondered, then knelt down by the side of the stream and scraped up a double handful of half frozen mud. She pulled one of the coins the Master had given them from her pouch and kneaded the mud around it into a roughly humanoid shape, then used a couple of dried berries from her pouch to fashion crude eyes before picking up a twig and making a number of small markings in the compacted mud. A clay poppet with ridiculously chiseled abs stood up and brandished a miniature axe made of a twig and a small shard of river stone. It took a couple of steps and planted itself between here and the way she had come as though ready to defend her from an army of giant sized mercenaries.

“Oh knock it off,” she scolded the miniature, then made a gesture along the river bank.

“Thata way,” she encouraged. The poppet gave her a disapproving look.



“I have a plan here Berry-en, so beat it,” she told the thing. It shrugged helplessly and then began to run along the riverbank in what she hoped was a more or less random direction. Tracking spells now thoroughly confused she looked around for landmarks and discovered she was, indeed, in a forest. This less than helpful datum established, she set off down the gully in the opposite direction to her decoy.

Fortune & Glory: Grimdark Pulp RP

“... and so when the third Thing broke up the twelve chieftains agreed to rebel against the Sorcerer King of Angerack, except for Kalavis who was secretly in league with him. Or so the legend says anyway most of that comes from an inscription found on the Stone of Tarn which isn’t corroborated in the …” Jocasta continued talking with an excited animation which hadn’t diminished in her nearly two hour long monologue. Beren nodded along, glassy eyes, making the occasional ‘uh-huh’ and ‘hmmm’ during the rare moments she appeared to stop to take a breath. The wind was picking up as the day wore on, and the clear sky of the morning was rapidly clouding. The road to Iskura lay in a shallow valley flanked on both side by modest hills. The slight difference in topography tended to channel the winds, which kept the road open for a month or so longer than would be the case if it were in the open. Even so, with winter deepening, it wouldn’t be long before the road was passable only by sleds or with snow shoes.

“Anyway, so I don’t think that Kalavis was…” Further discussion was cut off by a weird warbling cry that echoed from the hills. Black birds burst from the forest off to their left, cawing and clawing at the air as they beat their retreat.

“What was that?” Jocasta asked, resting her hand on her shortsword. Beren was scanning the woods, though he didn’t seem to be unduly alarmed.

“Qwarath,” Beren replied tightly as he resumed his walk, eyes troubled.

“Seriously?!” Jocasta asked, her eyes brightening all but hoping up and down with excitement. Beren gave her a sidelong glance.

“The Qwararth? The troll Qwarath?” she pressed. Beren shifted uneasily, more disturbed by her enthusiasm than by the eerie roar.

“Maybe,” he temporized, “there aren’t many trolls left, on account of the fact that they maintain huge ranges. A single troll will range over a couple of hundred miles. This is kind of far south for Qwarath, but if another had moved in I’d have heard about it.”

“Is it true he is looking for some ancient artifact?” Jocasta asked. Trolls were functionally immortal and famous trolls tended to feature in the legends as boey men and heels. Qwarath was often said to be searching the lands for something, though what exactly varied from story to story. Beren gave her a guarded look as though trying to decide something.



“What?” she asked, planting fists on her hips, “spill.” Beren shrugged his shoulders.

“The Dwarves say that back during the last age Thurgrim Hamerson, the greatest dwarven rune caller of his age, snuck into Qwarath’s horde in the Mountains of Hraflir. Qwarath confronted him but Thrugrim claimed he came only to gaze upon Qwarath’s horde, so great was it rumored to be that it was his wish to see it before he died. Qwarath agreed that he would show it to Thrugim, but that once he had seen it, Qwarath would kill him. Thrugrim paused at each gem and wonderous item, praising its every minute detail. It took so long that eventually Qwarath grew tired and fell to slumber, at which point the rune caller stole a gemstone of tremendous power and fled,” Beren related. Jocasta listened in rapt attention.

“Why didn’t he kill him and take the rest of the horde?” Jocasta asked, engaged with the tale.

“Some say Thrugrim didn’t want to transgress against guest rite, some say that Qwarath had invoked the Trollish gods and lain might spells across his horde so that the very mountain would collapse on it in the event of his death,” Beren replied.

“What do you think?” Jocasta asked.

“I think that we should probably focus on not being eaten by a hungry troll,” he replied dryly.

Fortune & Glory: Grimdark Pulp RP

"Of course," Jocasta agreed, so relived to not be facing charges of murder, horse theft, public indecency, or consorting with ye olde power of darkness that she was willing to agree to just about anything.

"We are going to Iskura anyway as we have made no secret of," she continued. It wasn't a secret though she honestly couldn't remember if they had actually mentioned it to anyone. The Master nodded his head thoughtfully, apparently considering this happy circumstance and trying to decide if he could trust them.

"Well judging from the horses you rode in on..." he began.

"Allegedly rode in on," Jocasta interjected, brushing clandestinely at a horse hair that was stuck to the gray fabric of her trousers. The Master gave her a long suffering look.

"Allegedly rode in on, you are no friends of the Leo Mortis. It seems I have to take what chances fate deals me," he sighed before reaching up and lifting a piece of paper. He dipped his quill and added a quick post script before sprinkling sand and blowing softly to finish drying it.

"I've asked Marius to give you a few coins for your troubles when you get there, I've no reason to think he won't do so," he said, rolling the paper and sealing it with some wax from a candle and a press of a seal. He passed it to Beren, evidently thinking better of entrusting it to the flighty scholar.

"If I can give you two pieces of advice," he suggested and, hearing no objection, went on. "Get out of town before your date crashers get back, if I try to protect you it might be just the provocation they need to seize control of the town." Jocasta nodded. That only made sense, though she had a stop to make before they left.

"What was the second piece of advice?" Beren asked solicitously.

"Keep her nose out of trouble and for goodness sake dont let the common folk know you are poking around old ruins, one apocalypse is enough for the year."

___

The lunch rush was just beginning as they reached the Crimson Wyrven. The smell of roasting pork was strong and the tables were beginning to fill up. Beren kept looking over his shoulder, heedful of the Master's advice that it was better to be gone and soon, than to linger.

"Bonnie!" Jocasta called waving the bar maid over. The beautiful young woman trotted over, a plate of empty mugs balanced on one hand.

"You are still in town?" she asked, glancing around nervously for any sign of Leo Mortis interest. It seemed the news of their animosity traveled fast.

"Just about to go," Jocasta assured her, and then reached into her pouch and withdrew the bottle she had stolen from the kitchen the night before. Shiny lead foil had been wrapped around it and soddered around the neck.

"I made this for you," Jocasta said proudly. Bonnie narrowed her eyes.

"You stole it you mean," she objected in here screeching voice but peered at it in interest.

"Take a drink," Jocasta suggested. Bonnie opened her mouth to object, but then shrugged and pulled the stopper free. She took a small sip, frowned to find it contained only water and then took another drink.

"You stole our vodka and replaced it with water?" she asked. Beren's mouth dropped open. Bonnie's voice sounded as clear and lovely as a bell.

"Something like that," Jocasta said with a grin, and then turned and hurried for the door.

The Enemy Beyond: Warhammer 40,000 Inquisitor RP

I will admit that if I hadn’t been low key convinced I was going to die in the next few hours it might have been more intimidating to come face to face with a conclave worth of Inquisitors. As it was I was pleased to have taken Hadrian’s… advice is too soft a word, direction I suppose to dress more conservatively than was my wont. I had worn, at Lazurus’ suggestion, an armored body glove, one of the pair I had picked up in the few days between the affair at the manor and boarding the ship. It was the less ostentatious of the two, matte black with panels of navy blue ceramite attached at key points. I had worn a dress robe over the top of it, a conservative vaguely ecclesiastical cut that could be easily removed when the shooting started. My hair I had pulled into tight braids which were woven down my back to keep them out of the way and my head covered with a veil of lace which had been worked into scenes from the life of Saint Catherine. When you are a psyker it never hurts to appear like you might be a closet Emperor Botherer. Even so I got looks which ranged from loathing, to desire from the assembled company. Psykers are never well trusted, even in the Inquisition which houses more than any other imperial institution save the Astropathicus itself. The entire Imperium would collapse if it wasn’t for psykers, yet even here we are viewed with suspicion.





The only weapons I carried were the force staff and a las pistol, though Lazarus had assured me that he would have an extra riot gun with him when we made it to the ground. I felt very underdressed in the firearms department. The Inquisitors quibbled for a few minutes about arcane details of deployment which might as well have been tech priest babble as far as I was concerned, and then we split up and headed to separate shuttle craft, the better to spread the risk of destruction as for the tactical advantage it would provide. Remember initiates, don’t put all your Inquisitors in one basket.



I expected the decent to be somewhat similar to shuttle flights I had taken before, despite the long dagger shaped hulls and bulky gun pods of the assault shuttles. I was disabused of this immediately as I was slammed into my seat by several G’s worth of acceleration. I squealed in fright but everyone politely ignored me. The next ten minutes were a combination of crushing G force and sickening maneuver as we powered through the atmosphere and then dropped to the nap of the earth. The fleet had not detected any anti-air craft emplacements, but the surface of the planet gave off so much in the way of strange and unexplained readings, that the tatorium had no confidence that a failure to detect them ment they were absent all together. Our enemy had, afterall had a considerable amount of time and considerable resources to fortify the place. Later, much later, I learned that the Fleet Commander was as much concerned about the mysterious Necron technology as anything the heretics might bring to bear, despite Mechanicum assurances that it was dormant.



The ride was so miserable that when we finally hit the ground it was something of an anti climax. More than anything I was relieved not to have lost my breakfast of akenberry waffles over my nice new dress, stained with lubricant grease and old gun oil as it had become during the decent. I wobbled to my feet a half second before the rear ramp dropped with a clang that was all but obscured by the wind rush that blasted in, carrying with it a scouring cloud of sand and flying particulate. I pulled my hood down over my eyes in time to avoid any serious problem, and I wondered if Saint Catherine had any particular relevance to vision and forethought.

Fortune & Glory: Grimdark Pulp RP

As manor houses went it was about as underwhelming as the rest of the town. It might have been the twin of the Crimson Wyrven if that establishment had gotten a shade less neglect over the long years. The most interesting thing about it was the armed men who stood behind the walls, invariable looking tired and ill at ease. There weren’t very many of them either, not compared to their fellows out patrolling the town and certainly not compared to the Leo Mortis. Jocasta didn’t know much about fighting in the abstract, but she had a sense that this probably wasn’t the side one would want to pick if it came to blows.



The were escorted into the main building without fanfare, through a surprisingly neat reception area to a receiving room, where a grim faced man with a gold pin of office sat behind a desk. It was covered with neatly stacked papers, laid down with whatever heavy items were to hand, inkpots, knives, a broken plate and the like. Jocasta couldn’t imagine a place like this bred too much paperwork, but apparently she was wrong in that assumption.

“We didn’t kill anyone!” she blurted nervously at the same time that Beren began, “They started it they tried to…” The both fell silent as the man looked up from his paperwork and arched a bushy eyebrow. He wiped his hands on a handkerchief and set his quill aside folding his hands together and steepling his fingers together.

“Good to know I suppose,” he said in a half amused voice, “but that isn’t why I had you escorted here…”

Fortune & Glory: Grimdark Pulp RP

“You mean me landing in your lap? It does seem to be happening alot,” Jocasta teased before blinking her eyelashes and vanishing in another puff of smoke, only to reappear a few feet away.

“Hey I wonder if I can…” *POOF* she materialized ten feet in the air, fell a few feet and then vanished again reappearing even higher before letting out a squawk and falling into some bushes.

“Were you just trying to fly?” Beren asked as he made his way over to her to make sure she was ok. Jocasta sat up and rubbed her rump, shaking broken twigs from her hair.

“Well, it was worth a try,” she admitted. It turned out focusing on where you were going was pretty difficult when you were in freefall and hadn’t had time to properly get your bearings. The range of the thing seemed to be fairly limited, but it was still an impressive piece of enchanting. Jocasta who had manufactured her fair share of enchanted trinkets over the years wasn’t even sure she would have known where to start, though she was optimistic that she could learn from studying the thing.

“Maybe if I…” she began but Beren held up a hand for silence, freezing Jocasta mid word.

“Someone is coming,” he said urgently, his senses evidently keener than hers when it came to the ways of the outdoors.



“There is no guarantee the mean us any harm,” Jocasta replied, attempting to convince herself as much as Beren.

“No guarantee they aren’t more assassins, or orcs for that matter,” Beren countered. The sound of horses in the distance was evident to Jocasta now as well and she looked around.

“Should we, hide or something?” she suggested but Beren shook his head.

“A blind man could track us in the snow,” he told her, making a gesture to the line of foot prints that terminated in the churned up area that they currently occupied.



“Ok… so do you have a plan?” she asked. Beren looked at her and then looked at the sarong, a slow smile coming to his face.

“Matter of fact, I do.”



Beren was standing in the open when the three horsemen came into view. They wore the tabards of the Leo Mortis and their mounts steamed in the chill air from hard riding. All three wore broad rimmed conical helms and all had crossbows across the pomels of their saddles, and shields slung from their backs. The way they hefted their weapons as they caught sight of Beren dispeled Jocasta’s hopeful theory that they were simply fellow travelers.



“Stop their foreigner,” the leader said in a raspy voice, “we got some questions for you. Don’t much like folk who pick fights with our brothers.”

“I’m not picking a fight with anyone,” Beren protested, but it seemed to make little difference.

“Where is the bitch?” the second rider asked. Beren recognised him as the drunken soldier he had confronted in the tavern, and any hope of a peaceful resolution swiftly drained away. Beren made in indistinct gesture towards the treeline, where a single set of footprints dinted the snow.

“Answering nature's call,” he replied with a helpless shrug. The leader casually pointed his crossbow at Beren.

“Maybe I’ll go answer it too,” the second rider leered, swinging down from his saddle and adjusting his belt lewdly.



*POOF*



“Sounds good,” Jocata said as she appeared on the back of his vacated horse out of thin air, shivering slightly from the covering of snow that had concealed her.

“Wha…” the mercenary began. The leader began to squeeze the trigger of his weapon but the flat of Jocasta’s sword, for once unsheathed, caught his horse a ringing blow across the rump. The horse reared back in shock, dumped its startled rider and bolted off down the scrubby trail at a flat gallop. The third merc tried to wheel around, but Beren bounded to his side, grabbed him by the leg and yanked him out of the saddle, twisting to turn the fall into a throw which hurled the confused lion into his dismounted comrades, sending all three men crashing to the snow in a jangling heap of armor, shields, and chainmail. With considerably more grace than Jocasta could have managed, Beren swung up into the saddle and wheeled the horse around.

“Enjoy the walk boys,” Jocasta waved, and kicked her heels against her steed’s flank, almost spoiling the moment of bravado by half falling out of the saddle as the beast lurched back down the trail. Grasping its neck she pulled herself upright and headed back towards the main road.

Fortune & Glory: Grimdark Pulp RP

The initial burst of excitement turned to frustration as Jocasta and Beren poked around the basis of various trees. The overnight dusting of snow hadn’t done them any favors, and figuring out which tree was ‘the third tree’ and what it referenced wasn’t easy. After twenty minutes of fruitless searching Jocasta called a halt and poked around until she found a forked yew branch.

“What are you going to do with that?” Beren asked.

“Watch and learn,” Jocasta told him and then plucked two hairs from Beren’s head.

“Ow!” he complained, rubbing at his scalp. Jocasta made a dismissive gesture and produced the assassins not, carefully wrapping it around the base of the branch and tying it in place with the hairs before inscribing several sigils on the bark with the tip of her thumb.

“There,” she said proudly, holding the stick out horizontal. Before Beren could ask what the stick was for the end began to twitch slightly to the left. Jocasta turned and allowed the soft, almost imperceptible tug to guide her to the base of a gnarled ash tree close to the statue. The tip of the twig pulled down hard and touched the soft packed snow. Jocasta crouched down and began to scrape away the icy cover to reveal loosely packed dirt beneath one humped root. She crowed in excitement.

“Enjoying yourself?” Beren asked with a smile. Jocasta nodded vigorously and dug at the dirt with her hand until she struck something solid. It was a few minutes work to reveal a simple wooden box wrapped in oiled cloth. She sat it on the snow and unwrapped it, examining the box carefully for any traps, arcane or otherwise. Unable to find any but unwilling to think that meant there were none to find, she drew her shortsword and used the tip to open the box from arms length. Inside was a bundle of red silk. She exchanged glances with Beren and then reached in and tugged at the fabric. Coins clinked inside and she lifted it free, spilling a handful of gold coins into the bottom half of the box. Her hand tingled against the silk as she shifted it to reveal a sarong.

“Our assassin would have looked just darling in this,” Jocasta observed dryly, “I bet…” She vanished from existence with a pop of inrushing air, only to rematerialise on a tree branch ten feet above. She let out a squawk of shock, overbalanced and then fell into a snowbank with a thump that shook enough snow from the tree above to fall and cover the hole she had made.

“Owww,” her muffled voice came from beneath the snow, unconsciously initiating Beren’s complaint of a few minutes before.

Maverick Malediction

“Well, well you do clean up nice,” Calliope approved as she glanced over Neil’s new attire. He looked every inch the dashing Imran Kaffir who was rumored to have gained the secret of magic for mankind by stealing the food of the Djinn.



“Shame the baths are segregated,” she teased and saw Neil smirk as though he had been having the same thought.

“Quick questions, who are these Seven Princes and are they going to kill us?” Neil asked. Calliope shrugged eloquently, her jewelry jingling slightly as she did so. Shrugging wasn’t a natural gesture to women of this region, to whom absolute control of their shoulders was taught as proper posture from birth.



“I think a cartel of local wizards, probably the greatest in the city. The sultan is in charge but there has to be some sort of hierarchy among the local mages,” she reasoned. The reading she had done had not covered politics in anything like so granular a fashion.

“As for wanting to kill us, I don’t imagine so, showing us a little charity establishes a pecking order,” she explained. It was a fairly common practice. If you accepted gifts from someone, you were effectively acknowledging their superiority to you. That might be a problem if Calliope wanted to marry into the Sultanate, but given her goal was simply to use the place for a base while she hunted for the tombs on their map, it didn’t seem likely to be an issue. Further discussion of political altruism was forestalled by Rashim’s return.

“Come, come, all is prepared,” he informed them. Calliope was hungry, but was ready to beg off attending a formal banquet in favor of something more intimate. Fortunately the issue didn’t arise.

“These are your rooms,” he informed them, opening a teak paneled door to reveal a large open room flanked by rows of stone columns. A bed chamber stood at the end with hanging silks cordening it off. The central section was dominated by a large table and several comfortable looking chairs. Both sides of the central room were flanked by smaller areas, set off by waist high balustrades of intricately carved timber but not by any wall that would block a line of sight to the center. A large table stood in the central room on which brass dishware was stacked, some were covered and clearly hot, others were open to reveal candied dates, fresh fruit, confections and other things Calliope couldn’t name. A large central basket of woven leaves held a heaping of golden rice. Pitchers of wine stood at the four corners of the table, each with the head of a different animal worked in cunning bronze.

“I will leave you now,” Rashid declared, “if you should require anything, you have but to ring.” He made a gesture to a silken rope which lead to a silver bell, and then turned and slipped from the room, closing the door as he went.

Fortune & Glory: Grimdark Pulp RP

Jocasta’s face grew uncharacteristically solem in the firelight as she considered the question. For long seconds she didn’t speak merely staring into the flames. Then she let out a deep sigh.

“I have something to tell you too,” she admitted.



“I am the long lost daughter illigitimate of the King of Andred and Calli Black,” she informed him, spreading her arms portentously as she announced it.

“I was born under and ill fated star and my doom stalks me, my enemies hunt me even now. Whole armies are probably out looking for me, not to mention fair haired heroes determined to save me and carry me off to their castles to…” she cut off as Beren shoved her in exasperation.

“Can you be serious for one minute?!” he demanded.

“Unclear,” Jocasta snickered.

“You could get killed just being near me!” he tried again. Jocasta shrugged nonchalantly at the prospect.



“Please, one assassin shows up and it goes to your head. Its sheer dumb luck he didn’t show up to break my kneecaps for all the money I owe the Black Lotus,” she confided. Beren started slightly.

“Wait? What?” he interjected but she continued speaking as though she hadn’t heard.

“Since I’ve met you, I’ve nearly been ripped apart by a barrow wright, bisected by booby traps, crushed by an avalanche,” she began, counting the points off on her fingers.

“Wait that was your…”



“Molested by Mercenaries, which should count twice for alliteration, and fought off an assassin with enchanted furniture,” she continued. Beren’s frown deepened at the mention of the furniture. Jocasta waved dismissively.

“You were asleep for that bit,” she added helpfully, then paused. “I’m pretty sure there was something else…”



“You were almost beheaded by undead and or eaten by orcs?” Beren suggested.

“Damn, how could I forget about the orcs!” Jocasta exclaimed, snapping her fingers.



“Overall I’d say its been a pretty banner day,” she went on.

“Not to mention I made three silver lordlings,” she concluded, flourishing the coins like a street magician about to pull a trick. She rolled the coins across her knuckles for a moment and then the three coins began to bounce into the air and clank into each other in mock combat, the stamped faces mouthing soundless insults before she snatched them out of the air and stuffed them into a pouch.



“I guess what I’m saying is that I’m not going to let the world's smelliest assassin or the Kitty Litter spoil a good thing. “

Fortune & Glory: Grimdark Pulp RP

Fortunately for Jocasta she had already lost control of the spells animating her attack chairs by the time company arrived. Her scalp was sore and she rubbed her hairline resentfully. Luckily the assassin had mostly been aiming to get her out of the way rather than making a true effort to kill her. The only real risk had been when he had thrown her, and Beren had broken her fall.



“I’m fine,” she told Beren after patting herself down to make sure that was more or less true.

“Gods Below, he is dead!” the innkeeper gasped as he reached the door. Bonnie was close behind covering a gasp. Jocasta moved over to the assassin and lifted his head by the hair, the weight of his body pulling it to an extremely unnatural angle. Everyone collectively winced.

“What?” she asked, then dropped the head so it thudded on the floor eliciting another wince from all and sundry.



“It never hurts to check,” she huffed a little defensively.



“You have killed a man! I must summon the ….” the Innkeeper trailed off. Clearly he was about to say watch, and then realized that meant the Mortus Leo would get involved. His face pantomimed an agony of indecision.



“I think,” Jocasta began, “that maybe this is just a robbery gone wrong and we can chalk it up to natural causes?”

“Natural causes?! His neck is broken!” the landlord protested.

“Well, you know, natural in his line of work,” Jocasta amended. The Innkeeper still seemed inclined to argue but Bonnie just shook her head and steered the older man out of the room, shooting a surprisingly effective ‘take care of this mess’ over her shoulder as she went.



“Well that was fun,” Jocasta put in, casting an appreciative glance at the shirtless Beren, the effect slightly marred by the bruise that was spreading from where her knee had winded him during the fall.



“Any idea why someone would want to kill you? He said he was here to kill you specifically. Like what am I? Chopped liver?” she demanded. Beren shook his head in confusion or uncertainty she wasn’t sure.



“Well he is dead so we can’t ask him,” Beren said at last.

“Or can we?” Jocasta asked in a theatrically ghoulish voice.

“What?” Beren asked, brought back to attention by the tone rather than the content of her statement.

“What?” Jocasta repeated blinking her eyes innocently as though she hadn’t just suggested necromancy.

“I guess we should probably search his pockets before we toss him out into an alley? Just incase he has an valuable information on him, or better yet any money?”