B.T.V.-- Session 03 Epilogue: The Lyorn, the Search and the Verdosau

To the Scale -- ‘>^-_<’’

I have taken a number of trophies. These trophies I, Yeervethax Basylikaan, claim and list for anointment:

• One leaded sword; coated to be harder to discern.
• One apothecary’s pestle; stone/porcelain, of low value but it will impair further grindings.
• Three hooks; taken from those loading freight on to ships.
• One whistle; silver/embossed with mounting chain, taken from a conductor.
• Two emblems; platinum/gold/silver & filigree, taken from worthy Specials.
• One scroll; magicked for teleport elsewhere, easily snared with my retarian.

I did claim other emblems. They are not listed because I used them for bait.


The scroll I claim I have placed my thoughts upon, so that you might understand I have done as the Scale would want. I will await the Scale’s thought on this.

Report of Simon Balazs to the Circle of Beldam, second



In which your humble author has the unpleasant task of reporting the circumstances of his certain doom…

Heh! This one is a Borderland Easterner. His thoughts show he knows I am his superior. At least some rare Easterners are not as dumb as they are soft.

Shortly after completing the gauntlet that had been set as a test for us by the Dragon Lord Calcitrant E’Drion, Selador and I found a hostel willing to provide accommodations to a pair of Easterners, a place known as the “Coal Fires and Red Hot Pokers Inn” within the environs of Colleridge. Suffice to say the staff was not openly hostile, and the bedding was blessedly free of vermin, meeting my rather basic requirements. Selador, who by appearance might be used to greater finery, made no mention if he was disappointed.


I had just set my head to the pillow in my room, when my new dog, who as it turned out was very much not a dog, began whimpering and scratching at the door. Intuiting what its desire was, I dragged myself from my most welcome bed, threw on some clothes, and took him outside the inn, where he performed that which is necessary in all living beings within a nearby alley. Rather than return immediately to my room to begin my slumber, I realized that an energetic puppy such as mine might not be ready to sleep, so I prayed that as short walk would be sufficient to send Bamboo, as I had named the dog, to the Land of Nod.

The creature with the Borderlander is psychic. I can hear its thoughts. I mask my scent, that it will not hear mine. I sense that the creature is not yet ‘with’ the Easterner. I can tell it does not know about the Land of Nod. If the Scale wish me to continue this stalk, I will try to learn of its location. This Nod may be where this Easterner and the other he travels with have learned the way to kill a Jenoine. They are worthy enough to stalk further if the Scale wish it.

In one alley, I saw what appeared to be a glowing red triangular light, quite small in size on a nearby wall. I walked over to it and examined it momentarily before turning about to see if I could determine if it was being projected from somewhere nearby, or if it was a manifestation in its own right. However, I saw nothing, and as the light had already disappeared and given the heaviness of my eyelids, I decided to return to the sanctity of my bedchamber.

I tested the Easterner’s ability to notice my eye. He did. Then I waited to see if he would pierce my blind. He did not. I waited for them to rest and begin to move.

I slept soundly, and in the morning collected Bamboo and walked downstairs to purchase my breakfast, if they could and would provide one. A bartender was already on duty, though the tavern itself empty of customers at that moment, so I went to a nearby table to await the delivery of my morning sustenance.


Meanwhile, a Dzur Lord dressed all in black entered the tavern, surprising because I had expected the business to mostly be patronized by Teckla and Nobles of the working-class noble houses. He went to the bar and waited upon the bartender. Selador then joined me at my table and I invited him to take his repast with me.

The Dzurlord is Ga’adium Whaxum. He is a worthy sorcerer. I have used my blind on him and his. The Borderlander is right. He should not be in the inn. His interest is clear but he is only baiting the Easterners so he acts unlike his kind.

My breakfast was delivered, and I began my enjoyment of the hearty offerings, from time to time offering snippets of meat, bits of potato and small slices of cheese to Bamboo, who preferred the solid food over the bowl of milk I had ordered for him.


At some point the Dzur lord left and this was followed not long after by the entry of a Lyorn warrior of the female persuasion. She was most attractive, though seemed uncaring of her looks. She walked over to our table and presented a card with a stylized symbol upon it, surmounted by a crown.

Confessing our ignorance of such a sigil, she explained it meant she worked for the Court of the Empress. She questioned us, but I am unsure as to the point of her interrogation. She seemed interested in we two Easterners, as well as our contribution to the death of a Jenoine the previous night. As she departed, she stated that she might come find us again.

The She-Lyorn is Ithaan Driann. The Dzurlord’s worthy. The Borderlander finds her scent seductive. His thoughts of fear toward me show he is not dumb. I might warn him that her scent demands challenge -- but not today.

A few minutes later, by the Imperial Clock, a Hawk dressed in a Captain’s uniform and his lieutenant walked into the inn. It did not occur to me at the time, but perhaps all these Lords were attracted by rumours about myself and Selador. The Captain explained that they were something called The Special Group, though alternately through the course of the day referred to by others as the Special Tasks Group or the Special Tactical Group. He tried to give the impression they were a local guard for Colleridge but given their bearing and the nature of their attire and equipment, I concluded there were perhaps a more formidable agency, perhaps of the Empire. His lieutenant was at various times referred to as Tissa or Driassa. I suspect the former is a nickname for a Tiassa and the latter perhaps her true name.

These Specials I do not know, scenting them for the first time but I know their kind. The Borderlander is right, Specials are more worthy than the Imps.

The Captain presented a printed engraved image of a ship under full sail in a choppy sea, with a motto beneath it. I took it to be somehow connected to a pressgang, and I will freely admit that I thought Selador and I were about to begin an extended maritime adventure not of our choosing. However, the Captain left the clipping with us and departed.

The Easterners did not know that the She-Lyorn had claimed the trophies of the gangers outside the inn. The Specials did not know that the Easterners did not know. I knew. I moved away in my blind. I needed to set my traps to get baits.

After Selador and I travelled to a nearby leatherworker’s near Scrappers Corner to purchase a leash for Bamboo, who had run off during our breakfast and knocked down a shelf in the kitchen, costing me two Imperial Marks out of pocket. I determined that should not happen again, thought the leash and an attachment device turned out to be ruinously expensive at the time. The owner, Colmer, refused to haggle, and seemed set on the price. I now suspect it had something to do with Bamboo’s true nature.


From there, we ambled through the neighbourhood, I determined to learn its geography before we would be called upon by our new employer to perform some task. Then, not far away, we saw two figures in blue clothing and modest armour, the man an archer and the woman presumably a swordsman, lying in the street. The woman had a large bolt, as if from an oversized crossbow, in her torso, while the man was attempting to feed her a substantial potion to revive her.

Two more Specials. These had my baits on them.

Selador here displayed previously unrevealed knowledge of magic, inquiring as to whether the bolt had a spell upon it or not. A potion, he said, would not work if a spell was still in effect, and would if it was not. The archer waved off our advice, and I suggested he teleport the woman to where she might be revived, if not revivified. He took us up on our suggestion, but only before telling us to watch a nearby door for five minutes. Presumably, that would be enough time for help he had previously summoned with a whistle to appear.

Unworthy Special. He sent the Easterners into my trap. This was not my intent. I might have warned them off but the Special had called his kind and I wanted to know if the Easterners would scent the trap.

At about that time, I also had an unusually psychic communication which I expected was coming from Finndo, but which amazingly seemed to be from Bamboo. I had been thinking about making my new pet my familiar, but either I did so in my sleep or Bamboo, pointing out he was a lyorn and not a dog, did so through some innate casting ability of his own.

This scent is bad. The witchcraft of joining thought is made by ritual. There was none. This creature is odd. I might claim it for the Scale -- but not today.

Bamboo then led me to the door we have been instructed to watch, and testing it, I found it open and walked inside. The hallway was dark, and perhaps inevitable I walked into something, that something turning out to be a heavy tripod, with a magazine of bolts identical to the one in the female guardsman, set upon a tripod. The device went off, narrowly missing myself and providing the same courtesy to Selador, who had entered behind me. The cross reset itself, meaning it was either chantried or very finely made indeed, and I turned it to a wall to avoid any unpleasant repetitions of earlier mistakes. We had the choice of doors to either side of the crossbow, and I decided to enter what turned out to be a room on the right. A table was in the middle of the room, looking out of place, and upon it was a bloody blue cape that was knotted several times. I could not determine immediately if it contained anything, so I elected to leave it alone.

He did not claim another’s trophy. He is worthy. The trophy is mine. I do not claim it in my list above because I have not returned to claim it from the house. I have plaited the cloak in our way.

Then the Captain and his lieutenant, who we had met earlier at the tavern, entered and demanded to know why we were there. I explained the dog had led me there. Oddly, rather than arresting us as he might have, he ordered us out of the room, saying we were now in his Group’s service and that we should search upstairs. Impressed into the guards, we did so, searching a low room in the eaves of the building. I found a bag with what I guessed to be 500 Marks inside, but nothing beyond that except odds and ends of clothing.


When the Captain came upstairs to learn what we might have discovered, I turned over the money bag, intent on not being caught out as a thief or a liar. Selador, who had not followed me into the room, then relayed that he had instead gone to a window at the end of the upstairs hall, and there had found oddly two small symbolic shields of the Special Group spiked into the wall, and looking out the window had seen someone on a nearby roof.

The other Easterner – he pierces my blind. Exemplarily Worthy. I show him my eye. He does not respond. Interesting. The emblems are my baits. The Specials retrieve them. I have not decided if I will claim these again.

From a clue provided by Selador, the Captain, who never provided his name at least to me, suggested that one known as “Vasiliki” or some such name might have returned to the city against orders to do so. This one was a Vordosau, he explained, though I would only later discover what he had meant, and not to my pleasure. The Captain for some reason gave Selador and I each one of the spiked shields to carry.

The “captain” knows of me! Good. I am pleased that he finds me Worthy. He is odd. He gives my baits to the Easterners. These are emblems of the Specials and he is of that kind. It may be that he is not Worthy. I might slay him and leave his body’s belongings unclaimed – but not today.

Staying with the Captain and Driassa, we next made our way some short distance to a foundry, where weapons were made of steel, in an effort to trace the source of the bolts used as an assassin’s weapon that day.


We split up, because that always turns out well, and I found what appeared to be a specialist in bowstrings, who examined the bolt and in return for a “consulting fee” of 15 Marks allowed that it had been made by a Chreotha from within the same foundry. I located Selador but not the others, and then made my way in the direction the master of bowstrings had suggested, finding a well-muscled Chreotha smith who matched the bowstring maker’s description, in that she was female. Again, I provided a fee of 15 marks, in return for which she refused to name the one she had made the bolts for but did allow it was a Vordosau.

Some Draegerans prove that they are indeed nobles. The Chreotha is one. I paid her well and she keeps my name out of the questions. I shall revisit her another time.

I should mention, in an aside, that I had just before that found a maker of fine tools who agreed to convert the Digosa claw I had earlier purchased from the Lyxa merchant into a fine throwing weapon, within five days in return for a fee, on delivery, of 35 Marks, to which I agreed.

Heh! Digosa claw. None would dare to use a Verdosau trophy in this way.

Returning to the centre of the foundry, where I had left Selador, I discovered he was gone, but the Captain soon took his place and demanded to know where the others were. Confessing to my ignorance, we went outside to search. What happened next is a bit of a fog in my mind but resembled somewhat a farce where those concerned keep missing each other by narrow margins. I do recall the Captain rounding a corner to investigate a whistle of alarm, only to be surprised by a Jhereg, in House colours, running the other way. I attempted to trip this fugitive as he sped by, but as father had always discouraged such crude pranks, I failed in my mission, possibly due to the runner’s long legs.

Jhereg. Small lizards. Worthy hunters. Like us, they are often despised by Draegeran and Easterner. Their belongings make good trophies to claim. Sometimes dumb. Sometimes cunning. Why are they interfering in my stalking? I had warned them by leaving my marks around the district. They had their places. This was mine. The Jhereg were hunting the Easterners. I might have stayed out of it – but not today.

I then went to investigate a nearby alley that Bamboo was growling at, only to hear a harshly whispered “Get out!” Not being a fool, I did so at a hasty pace, and then took up chase after the fleeing Jhereg, who while perhaps as formidable and sinister, was at least someone I could put a face to. I had run a short distance away when abruptly, the Jhereg cried out in a death scream. Cautiously rounding the corner of a building, I saw the poor fellow dead, somehow pinned a foot above the ground.

My rh’thuesh took the Jhereg square on the flight. Four in the limbs, one in the ear. I thought it cleanest. It meant the crawling four-legs would leave the body alone a time longer. I needed to speak to the Easterners. The Specials would need distracting for this to happen. I set my spadien to lure-overthrow. That should be enough to make the Specials look away. I came out of my blind and let the Borderlander find me.

And then I saw perhaps the last sight of this life, the Vordosau, who sadly was looking straight at me.

I remain, your loyal and potentially late and lamented servant,



Simon

I did not slay the Borderlander. He might be Worthy of a hunt – but not today.

Yeervethax Basylikaan '^'_-<^>'<'_">>^

Balazs's words compiled by R. Perry

Basyllikaan's thoughts are his own