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Lianna and Matsos present their credentials to the guards at the Greensward Estate, and head up to the manor instructed to speak to a man named Norlan at the door. A carriage runs them off the gravel path at one point, and shortly thereafter comes to a halt. A man exits the gaudy rig, armed and somewhat dangerous looking, and helps a woman out following behind him. The woman is dressed extravagantly in a deep green colored ball gown. And smiles at the sight of the manor.

Looking about she sees Lianna and Matsos coming up the way and addresses her, "Who are you to get in the way of my carriage? Servants no doubt, like my Fogg here. I'll find your masters herin, and you'll pay for your insolence!"

Matsos grins for some reason.

Lianna returns his smile. "It's an interesting philosophical point. In theory, I suppose we are servants - servants of the Law, servants of our respective deities."

She turns to the lady in the emerald dress. "My lady, do go ahead. Find our respective masters - mistress, in my case - and tell them how insolent we've been. I'm sure they'll be fascinated. You might find it easier to contact them at a temple, though, rather than a party."

As she speaks, she's moving towards one of the lights that edge the path, where her tabard - and sword - are more clearly visible.

The woman can be seen, even in the dim light, to blanch somewhat. "Well, I..."

She tries to protest, not wanting to be in the wrong, but ends up simply clamping her mouth shut, haughtily throwing a fur around her shoulders as she turns away indignantly, and heads off to the manor.

Matsos' mouth is wide open in glee, as he tries to refrain from outright laughter, "I think she feared you'd draw on her for a moment. We'd better get inside where we're more visible."

At the massive door to the manor, the pair pass two guards beyond which is a man in subdued finery, just finishing an arrival announcement for the pair the proceded in before them. "The Lady Emerald and escort!"

Turning back to Lianna and Matsos, he frowns slightly trying to figure out how to address them. "I welcome two defenders of the city to the estate of the Marquis of Greensward. I hope that there's nothing amiss that would explain your visit? Not that you need invitations if you're here in some official capacity, but I don't see you on my list of attendees. If there's some matter to attend to, it's likely my duty to see that you find what you need."

His look is inquisitive, and a bit pressured.

Inside the party rages in full swing, having already been ongoing for some time.

"Semi-official," Lianna says reassuringly (she hopes). "And no, I doubt if there's anything seriously amiss. We picked up a hint that something untoward might happen here tonight, or at least that there was someone here we should take a closer look at. Sadly the hint was so vague as to be almost useless - divine revelations aren't noted for their clarity! - but we felt we should take a look, see if we can recognise anything ominous, and put a quiet halt to anything that needs stopping. Quiet being the operative word - anything tactless is too liable to get innocent bystanders hurt, or at least alarmed. It may be that just our presence will stop whatever was being planned."

Some of this seems to disturb Norlan, but, burdened with other duties, he decides to take Lianna's last statement to heart, and nods in aquiescence. He gets the names and positions of the two (his eyebrow cocking at their announced deities), and announces them to the room, "Lianna, Paladin of Lady Luck, and Matsos, Paladin of Zanar!"

The party has enough momentum that this goes mostly unnoticed by the crowd. However, as the pair descend the three steps from the portico to the floor of the great hall, they are aproached by a middle-aged woman in a very nice, very stately dress. She stands with the pair, looking at somebody in the crowd, and before she even says anything, she points to another woman who seems to be a bit tipsy and acting a bit out of control. "That's Alltia, the Lady Greensward. And my sister. What a shame."

She turns to directly address the pair, "My name is Enara, and I'm a permenant guest of the Marquis' here at the estate. It's nice to have people of such moral quality attending one of these events. They tend to be so decadent."

She pauses for a bit, and finishes a goblet of wine, casually handing it to a passing servant after she's done with it. She gets a confidential look on her face, "Why don't we take to one of the alcoves where we can talk?"

She leads the pair to one of the room's many alcoves, occupied partially by a bust of a man.

"The father of Enkar Greensward, head of this family two Marquis back," she mentions offhandedly as they gather.

She engages the two in some idle chit-chat for a bit, seeing to warm up to Lianna and Matsos. At one point she boasts, "If you need to know anything about the backgrounds of anyone here, I'm the one to ask. I have a keen sense for personalities and social obligations."

"Take my sister, over there. There are things that I could tell you about - things that would probably cause you to have to use your position to take action..." she halts as though having said too much. "But one shouldn't speak of family that way, should one?"

She seems to want to tell Lianna something rather important, and is looking for an excuse to do so.

The presence of Inufil in Lianna's mind intrudes somewhat suddenly and enigmatically, given that it's been silent for so long.

¤Not even well concealed.¤

Lianna sees what Inufil is refering to even before the sword communicates the thought to her. Enara wants Alltia out of the way for some reason, and is gunning for her. Precisely why is not clear, but any pretensions she has of not wanting to tell Alltia's secrets are all show meant to give her plausible deniability of malice. Alltia stands in Enara's way of getting something important, and Enara is looking for allies to get her out of the way. Apparently she must be on the outs with a substantial part of the partygoing crowd, hence her warming up to the paladins.

At a guess, too, Lianna can sense that Enara would probably be willing to lie about her sister to get their help.

"Everyone knows about the...well the drugs..But it's so much worse than that," Enara still tries to look like she's reluctantly giving up this information. "I don't think I can bear to keep such secrets. If I were to confide in you, being holy warriors, that would be a right thing to do, would it not?"

She looks away, trying to affect a look of forlorn distance, her extremely aquiline looks creating a nice pose. But something catches her eye, and for the tiniest moment there is a twinkle in her eye that Lianna catches. Looking at the target, suddenly it becomes very clear. Enara is looking at the Marquis - and having him is her goal.

Lianna has seen poses before, done by experts. This isn't bad. Alltia may well be better off without the Marquis, in fact, but being targetted by her own sister like this is unpleasant.

And she wonders what else Inufil might be implying. «Barely concealed at all. Amateurish. And at her age and in her position, she's no amateur. So perhaps this is the layer we're meant to see through, and there's another beneath it?»

A shame she can't talk to Matsos like this, but you can't expect a perfect hand every deal. And the game wouldn't be much fun if you got it...

"It can be very hard, trying to be impartial about family", she says sympathetically. "Do I take it you'd prefer your sister to stop whatever it is she's doing before she's harmed by it? Or that perhaps you're concerned about the state of her soul? Either way, telling us and letting us help her can only be good for all concerned."

Yes, of course I've fallen for the bluff. Sweet innocent, and other-worldly, that's me. Tell me more... a few bits of it may even be true, and if not, the lies you choose will tell me about you, if not about her.

She resents what Enara is doing here. That's her sister, dammit! Lianna never had a sister - her mother had miscalculated once, and never again. While her affection for and care of Lianna had never failed, children had never figured in her career plans. So it had just been the two of them. No father, just a series of clients. And her mother's family, far away and mainly hostile, she had never known. To her, family is precious, and rare - you do not treat it like this!

"You're right, of course," Enara says. "It would be wrong to hide this from such as yourselves."

She braces herself as if it pains her to let this out, "I've found evidence in her wing that she's been dabbling in demonology. And I think she's partaking in unspeakable rituals. I can't even imagine what they might be about, but I do know that they involve blood. I saw it."

She turns her head seemingly near crying. "Surely there's some way we can help my sister?"

Lianna's first thought is exasperation at the woman's incompetence. If she has to tell lies about her sister, couldn't she come up with anything more believable? She'll have some badly faked evidence pre- prepared, she can't have been expecting to get this opportunity here so it'll have been around for a while. It might be fun to expose her. But can I be bothered?

And then, reluctantly, the realisation that she *might* have been telling the truth. And it's easy enough to check. If her sister has been doing anything as bad as she says, it'll be marked on her soul. All Lianna has to do is look.

She switches vision. Now the room is full of souls, glowing brightly or dimly, in various colours. Matsos, next to her, bright and clear, others less distinct. Alltia is one of the murky ones, nothing stands out - but beyond her? What was that?

Lianna still isn't used to Soul Vision, really. So seeing something utterly unlike anything she has seen before shouldn't surprise her that much. But this... a soul at the far side of the room. Cards falling in front of it. Usually you see souls as vague, fuzzy things, seeing clear, "real" objects is completely new to her. But those are Tarot cards. Big ones, if "big" makes sense here. Falling, one by one, and vanishing through the "floor". Can she remember...? the momentary panic vanishes - they're cards, of course she can! And the meaning? The Lady's telling her something. Unspecific, but urgent. Danger. Destruction. Not just death, something worse. Applying to this one person... she flips her vision back, hoping her identification was mistaken. But it wasn't.

Her expression must for once have shown her shock - Matsos is looking at her, concerned. "What is it?"

"You didn't see? No, of course not, not the Lady... look, you handle this. I've got to do something."

Enara vanishes from her mind. This is important. She makes her way across the room, with rather less attention to discretion, manners, and being unobserved than normal, reaching her target before she vanished form sight in the crowd. She was in conversation - a new client? it hardly mattered, not now.

"Mother. I've got to talk to you - now. It's urgent."