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Meanwhile in another part of the crowd on the hall floor, Fogg is waving Terrikke's rattle in front of her face taunting her. "Does Terrikie need her baby wattle to keep her occupied? Awww, that's cuuuuute." "Some bodyguard." The nearby partygoers have parted to to leave the two facing each other to see what's going on. Though Fogg is making a typical ass of himself, some of the people are finding his antics funny and laughing slightly. Those who're watching Terrikke see her hand come from the back of her belt, go to the top of her head and (by the looks of it) shove a huge white hairpin out of sight among her braids – all in one smooth leisurely movement, as of an invisible bow being drawn. The next instant, that invisible bow snaps – – And those standing closest sway as if pushed out of the way by a sudden wave as Terrikke leaps. There's a clash and a blur and a warm spray; dreamily one partygoer licks a flicker of red from his lip like a drop of salty rain; like a huge legged fish Terrikke twists and disengages. Still some onlookers giggle. Fogg shrieks, once, blood bubbling between his hands pressed to his face, and falls backwards; skull hits floor. The rattle hops and rattles along the floor chasing fine-sandaled feet before it, no one now eager to touch it. Through a screen of glistening crimson, Terrikke briefly smiles a wide mad smile of ecstasy; with what looks like far too many teeth. Quickly the rush is over. She spits and mutters, "You're welcome," in Taal, to no one visible. She steps over the writhing heap of Fogg on the floor and gently, gently picks the rattle up and puts it back in its place. It's been over so swiftly that only now house guards peel themselves off walls and start closing in. Terrikke is oblivious of the ring of spattered onlookers around her; of the path the flow of Fogg's blood has cleared behind her, revealing Tzanrol and a fine lady and the Paladin of Lady Luck, just a few paces from her. What she sees is Siburlion, staring, somewhat green. And her shoulders hunch, ever so slightly. Lianna's mother turns to her slowly, with a very controlled look on her face. Though she tries to hide it, Lianna can tell that she's very chagrinned to have been interrupted in her business with a client by her daughter. Having to admit of having a child of the age that Lianna is obviously disrupts the illusion of youth that she affects. Now she thinks about it, Lianna could have predicted this, and could have worded it better - but she doesn't care. Not just her natural talent with cosmetics, Marossa has obviously been to the salons of the reulsorns - beauty-illusionists. Lianna can't see the magic, but she knows it's there as her mother has often looked much older than tonight. "Lianna, how nice," she says through her careful mask of control. "I'd like you to meet my new friend, Eminence Tzanrol. Eminence, this is my daughter, Lianna." Lianna doesn't quite freeze. Her social training, at her mother's hands, is far too good for that. But her thoughts race behind a polite mask. "Your Eminence. How pleasant to meet you." Oh shiiit... HIM, next to my mum - what's he doing to her? What's he going to do to her? Why now? Why here? That's one hell of a coincidence - it's not a coincidence, is it? Someone's playing games with chance - the same Someone who just gave me the warning. Get her away from him! Without waiting for them two to make obesiance to each other, Marossa continues, "What so urgently brings you to the estate of the esteemed Marquis? Perhaps related to the business that we discussed the other day?" Lianna can tell that her mother is making a threat to speak of the subject of their discussion. One she won't carry out. The threat is more of a way of stating her displeasure just between her and Lianna. If she does, she's probably dead - thank the gods for subtelty and her addiction to indirection. Tzanrol, with a congenial grin, cocks his head to listen to Lianna. "Perhaps," she agrees smoothly. "But this is purely family business, and private, I'm afraid. If you'd excuse us a for a moment...?" She urges her mother just far enough away that they can converse very quietly without being overheard - not quite pulling, and not giving her the chance to get a word in first. "Get away from him. Get out of here, in fact. I just had the clearest warning I ever saw, and if you stay around here, you're dead, or worse. That's my chief suspect you're chatting up, and I don't want him sacrificing you to any demons." It's very hard to convey the urgency she feels in a quiet murmur, without giving away anything in her expression. She can only hope... "Lianna, I know that you've been quite overwhelmed by your new position, but really, it's a party," her mother chides. Then she sees how serious Lianna is, and her face darkens. "You really think something's going on, don't you?" And then there's a scream, behind her. She spins, reflexes to avoid danger kicking in, but also putting herself between her mother and the threat. A quick glance over her shoulder - "Yes! Now get out of here!" No time for more, no time even to check what the reaction is. A man on the floor, face covered in blood. A red-haired woman crouched over him, wild-eyed, with - blood on her teeth? She looked dangerous. Insane. Years of habit tell Lianna what to do next - get out of here, fade away, back off, get Mother out of here, I never saw nothing... And she steps forward, drawing her sword. The crowd is edging away already. What? What am I doing? Oh. Immediate threat first, potential threat later - yes, but! "But" can come later. Deal with it. She has no idea what was going on here, but the one obvious threat has to be contained. The red-head. Whatever she just did, and why, she's dangerous. Unpredictable and violent is dangerous. Stop her now, stop this before things escalate any further - and then as the crowd parts, she realises that she's already too late. In those vital few seconds, the situation had changed - and she has a hostage to deal with. The woman in green she'd met at the entrance, not now offended at a trivial insult, but terrified of a very real threat. If only she'd not lost that second answering her mother - no, guilt later, deal with the situation as it is. Does the redhead mean it? Is it a bluff? It doesn't look like it.... Can't take the risk. Get her attention, but don't push her into proving anything. "That is enough". She levels Inufil, aiming its point at the woman's eyes - not a good starting position for a lethal attack, in fact, but very, very intimidating. "Attacks you might get away with, if you can prove it was justified. But if you kill, there's no way out. You'll be cut down, anyone you came here with will be questioned - and you know what that means. You don't want that. You don't want to escalate this. Let her go." She puts all the conviction she can into the words. Remember, believe it yourself, you're a paladin, *know* what you're saying is true, and she will believe it. Keep her attention. Keep her looking at me. Keep looking at that sword. And the tabard. And... She concentrates. Usually this has only happened accidentally, but she can do it under control... She, and the sword, start to glow. White light. Keep looking at me! And then the purely practical thoughts creep in. With a bit of luck someone'll creep up behind her and hit her over the head... Where's Matsos, he must have heard that scream...? He was over in the alcove, so if I turn her... She steps slowly to one side, circling, apparently manoeuvring for an angle of attack that's clear of the hostage's body, but actually trying to give Matsos, if he's on his way, the best change of getting in un-noticed. Or any of the guards, come to that. She can't look to see if anyone's doing something, has to keep eye-contact with this crazy foreigner. The old trick of pretending to see something behind them as a distraction is exactly what she doesn't want. And for an instant or two it seems to work. The foreigner glowers at Lianna, her attention captured, and mutters, "I have no wish to cut her. Even though she was plotting against my lord. I want to leave. Or speak to a shaman." Except then... Mike's Proposal Thiator clutches the rope with surprisingly dry hands as he scans the ballroom below. For a moment he doubts what he is attempting, then he recalls hearing Amadora's voice asking "An you get all these answers, all this information, are you actually going to do anything with it?" and he knows that he has to carry through with action. Fortunately they had been near the small and inobtrusive door leading into the corridor that runs all around the upper level of the ballroom. Through its many disguised windows run the ropes for hoisting and lowering the chandeliers. Also through them, as Thiator had expected, were peering several of the house's footmen, gawking at the spectacle below (or at least at the spectacle the lady's dresses granted from this angle). The footmen had helped to put everything in place and would be cleaning up and sorting out afterwards, but during the ball they had little to do, and this is their closest contact with the affair. Before the servants could flee and before the Marquis's affronted sputter could cohere into words, Thiator had surprised himself by snapping out orders. "The Marquis urgently needs an escort to White Tide Chapel. Four burly men--you, you, you, and you. If his coach is ready take it, otherwise find his sedan chair and the carriers-- but whatever you do, don't take long, carry him yourself if you have to. Get him out of here quickly, and to the chapel. Then stay with him and help him pray to all the good gods." Turning to the Marquis, he'd added more quietly but not much less firmly "That should be as safe as anywhere, I don't think the gods would let anything dangerous into the chapel, but it won't make as big a spectacle as at the larger churches. I do advise praying while you are there--it would be good to assure the gods of your dedication I think, you wouldn't want them to think you were involved!" He'd quickly dispatched the last couple of footmen: one to Green Post Alley to give Amadora an editted version of what was happening, and to ask her to find some of the Crew and to bring them along; the other to suggest to Ajik that this evening might be a good time to go and pray again at White Tide Chapel. Hard to say what would come of either message....but thinking about it was just delaying him now. Finally the crowd openned up--a man lay bloodied on the floor, someone stood over him, a third held a sword on the tableau. More importantly, in the space behind the sword weilder stood Taznrol. Thiator took one last deep breath, wiggled through the window, then pushed off, sliding down the rope as it swung, a move practiced on ship board for boarding maneouvres. The floor wasn't swaying here, and fortunately the crowd was pulling away from the bare blade. It is amazing how a bare blade can fix people's attention. Even Taznrol hardly seemed to have noticed his descent until he landed beside him. Then the sorceror stepped back, hands starting to weave patterns. "I have a message for you, Taznrol." Thiator intones in his best trained messenger voice, and passes over the packet from Father Mulvaney. Tzanrol automatically reaches out for the message. As the packet leaves Thiator's fingers, he announces in his loudest voice "I have another message too: You are accused of harboring a monstrous abomination and an affront to the gods. How do you answer this message?" In the brief pause that follows, Thiator really hopes that Tzanrol will not risk sorcery amongst the assembled nobles and elites of the city! [The above is all Bryan's first post.] Lianna tries to see what's going on behind the foreigner and her hostage, without showing that she's doing so, or losing eye contact. It's not easy. If she does give away her interest, will this strange woman look round, or just register it as being the old "look behind you" trick and ignore it? It's looking promising, no sign of Matsos, but the guards are closing in. Something catches her eye, up at ceiling level - one of the upper windows. What on earth....? And then the movement resolves itself into a man swinging from one of the ropes. Swinging down, directly towards her. She almost ducks, and the red-head looks round in response, seeing the acrobat flying over her head - and the approaching guards. Oh..... drat. Lianna is divided between kicking herself for her uncontrolled reaction, and wanting to applaud the sheer style of the entrance. After one dumbfounded look after the messenger-in-flight, Terrikke (maneuvering Emerald) has started edging away from the spot of danger just between the closing guards and the fiercely glowing paladin. Away from the messenger who's now proclaiming some accusation against Tzanrol and being threatened by anther paladin, no doubt in Tzanrol's thrall. Not her fight, is it? [Terrikke's response as the resolution to the contest between her and Lianna (basically that the entrance has distracted her], which hopefully fits what you both had discussed.] Matsos pushes his way through the crowd. Apparently on his way first to see what the commotion about Fogg was about, he now interposes himself between Tzanrol and Thiator. "Who are you to make such accusations of his Eminence?" inquires Matsos with a derisive look on his face. The attention of the crowd is split between the hostage situation that has developed, and Thiator's theatrics. Tzanrol follows up Matsos' comments with, "Quit with your antics, child. A man's life is at stake!" [This was my suggested interjection of Matsos, and the reply of both Zanarians.] Throwing his shoulders back and chest out in a declamatory pose, Thiator announces "I am a messenger of Teris, may he strengthen my voice and bear witness to my words! I swear by my god that I have heard with my own ears accusations that you conspire to wrench churches from the Orhanian gods, and that you have created a horrific beast as part of some plan, a beast so horrific as to have scared even those you planned with. What purposes this has been for I don't know of my own hearing, but can you deny that you would wrench Kaitaine from its ancient the worship of the Orhanian gods who have blessed us for so long, to your own cult? I know not the nature of your beast or what sacrifices you have made to create it, but I have seen many a good-wife hurry her children inside when a priest of your cult comes down the street—and I've heard them wondering whence the lost children disappeared." Thiator scans the crowd, catching eyes as best he can. He relaxes his pose, taking on a more intimate approach. "It is possible that you don't see what you do as evil, just as insects burrowing in a ships hull don't see themselves as evil, but in no way does that mean that what they do, what you do, is not destructive, and should not be stopped. Like in the story of how the gods tamed their shadows, hunger for power, hunger for knowledge, hunger for control cannot, should not, be totally eliminated, but they must be contained, controlled, and tamed. But yet I've heard it said that the beast you have hidden horrified your own partners in planning, this does not sound like hunger contained, controlled, and tamed!" He swings back towards Tzanrol, his face once again severe. His voice bellows forth, even louder than before, stabbing his words at the wizard. "These are not idle accusations, hungry one. You are a wizard of stature, not out of place amongst the greatest of Kaitaine that we see around us. Can you in truth claim to have no plans afoot? Do you not aspire to converting a church? Do you have no conjured creatures? Would you have us believe you innocent as a kitten?" [The above was Bryan's prelude to the contest.] Terrikke stops. Hunger? Monsters! The void behind Tzanrol's eyes. Frantically she seeks out one face in the glittering party crowd. Siburlion's. "Get out! Quick! He's a Not-A-Man!" [More reaction from Terikke.] Siburlion, previously ignoring what was going on with Thiator and Tzanrol, concerned only with Terrikke's situation turns to see what Terrikke is trying to indicate is a threat so vehemently. [Sib's response to Terrikke.] [What should follow is the result of Thiator's contest.] |
