QUIET MOUNDS - STEF HEART

[abardacttofollow]

You find yourself in a stone room that looks like some sort of medieval dungeon. There are (thankfully), no torture instruments, but there is a man strung up here. One large manacle is around his neck, chaining him stiffly to the door. His hands are free, but each foot is manacled to the matching bottom corner of the doorframe. There is a visible lock on each of the three manacles.

It's Stefen, and there's a knife in his chest. Despite that, he's alive, apparently alert, and doesn't look to be in pain, perhaps due to the lulling, sense-dulling music that seems to be coming from nowhere at all—in fact, if you were in pain before you entered, it's gone here. His wound is bleeding, but only a little, and he smiles his usual bright smile at you.

Behind him, but in front of the closed door he's bound to, you can see three double sets of strings running vertically. Where they meet the floor, they are fastened, and then each runs across the floor to the three doors on the opposite wall, then under them.

There is nothing else in this room.

((OOC: Here's how this will work! Since we're doing individual runs, rather than me putting up individual top levels for areas, just jump the post itself, and I'll run everything for you within your one thread. If you're wanting to do a run with someone else, just stay in the same thread together.))

Comments

[abardacttofollow]

"Oh." He looks embarrassed. "Why do you think Stefen can live up to the duties of being a bard, specifically?"

[splashofbourbon]

Way I know him, he already has, so it's pretty much that I've seen the way he does it. He cares about people, more than he does himself sometimes, he'll do what's right. You can trust him in that.

[abardacttofollow]

"I suppose all that together's enough for me." He holds out the key.

[splashofbourbon]

Thank you kindly.

[takes the key!]

[abardacttofollow]

Dellar turns back to the other Bards and they start murmuring among each other.

[head back?]

[splashofbourbon]

[heading back!]

[abardacttofollow]

Welcome back! [The Heart's guard greets you]

[splashofbourbon]

Howdy there. Got a little something for you.

[present: key!]

[abardacttofollow]

Thanks! I can't quite reach my ankle, so if you can get that for me... [he wiggles one foot]

[splashofbourbon]

Sure thing, sweetheart.

[unlocks his ankle!]

[abardacttofollow]

Thanks, friend-love.

[splashofbourbon]

You're welcome.

[he nods to the remaining threads]

Anything I should know before I head off again?

[abardacttofollow]

Not really. I guess the other two areas are dubious in their own way, but you probably know enough about me for nothing to come as a surprise.

[splashofbourbon]

Fair enough. See you soon.

[heading off to the door to the left]

Composition 1

[abardacttofollow]

You find yourself in a back alley in what looks like a medieval city—or rather, some sort of stage set of it, decorated cloth hung up to cover the four walls to show city streets leading off, the back of some sort of house of ill repute . The smell of it is terrible, though, and a lot of the props around seem real as well—a cracked barrel with almost all of its contents leaked out into the flagstones under your feet, sewage running past in a small channel by one wall, garbage scraps of food around, most of it too rotten to eat. There is a huge pile of garbage in your path, and on the other side, you see the other door. The cord runs through the middle of the room and under that locked door.

At the base of the door are two huddled rag figures—an old lady, and a young boy with a lock of brilliant auburn hair hanging around his face. They are both shivering, and the boy looks to be injured or deformed, his leg at an odd angle and bandaged, wounds seeping, though someone familiar with the scam can probably tell it's all false paste wounds and his limbs carefully tied into those positions. His hungry eyes and sunken cheeks are real, though. One hand loosely clasps a moldy roll with a few bites taken out of it.

"Alms," the old lady calls in a weak, shaking voice. "Alms, please. If not for me, for my poor boy, alms!"

There is a cracked wooden bowl on the ground between them—sitting on what appears to be a weighted platform, attached to the door.

A sign on the door reads: "What is the weight of security?"

[splashofbourbon]

[well, this isn't surprising at all. McCree frowns at the scene, nodding slightly to the woman]

'Fraid I don't got much in the way of money on me now, your boy all right there?

[abardacttofollow]

"Oh, he's very sick," the old woman tells you. "We need money for medicine so badly!"

[splashofbourbon]

That so.

[McCree crouches down, taking a look at little Stef]

How you feeling, kiddo?

[abardacttofollow]

He shrinks back.

"Don't you talk to my boy!"

[splashofbourbon]

And why not? Kid can talk, can't he?

[abardacttofollow]

"What, do you want to buy him?" she scoffs. Stefen shrinks back further, alarmed.

[splashofbourbon]

[wow no, he is openly disgusted at that]

He ain't a thing to buy or sell or use, he's his own person.

[abardacttofollow]

"Get on with you! If you're not going to give us any money why're you wasting our time, huh?" She spits at your feet. "Whose belly do you think empty words fills?"

[splashofbourbon]

[he spreads his arms wide to indicate the alleyway]

Don't see no one here save you and me and your boy, ma'm.

[abardacttofollow]

"And fat lot of good you're doing us!"