tdm 05

[thestewards]

Though all the scars are healing
you’re always biting back
You know the struggle's real
I lie down then you attack

► All TDM threads may be considered canon provided both parties agree and are accepted into the game.

► Canon threads may be redeemed for influence and reputation depending on how you solve the issue at hand or how you engage with the prompt. They also count toward AC.

► Feel free to switch up your character's Jewel from thread to thread. Get a feel for how a Birthright Jewel may limit or enhance your character's abilities.

THE WAREHOUSE JOB
Master Tinker Mari is in a tizzy. Last night, supplies from her personal warehouse in Wall Town went missing. And not just any supplies. These supplies were prototype items fashioned for a project she’s working on for Grand Master Niall.

Having left multiple messages on Draega’s far-caster network, she’s finally gotten you to help her. She asks you to investigate the warehouse and track down her missing supplies. By the way, don’t try to crack the boxes. They’re lined with lead to protect you from some of the dangerous, uh, stuff (as she says) inside.

At the warehouse, you find the lock on the back door has been picked. From the door, you can see that no windows look into the alley, so no one could have seen the culprit. Inside the warehouse, you discover a floor covered in a white powder, but none of it has been disturbed except where the door swung inward. On the floor, an area clean of powder reveals where the boxes once stood. They could not have been dragged out of the warehouse. If they had, the powder would have been disturbed. Near the back wall, hidden by shadow, you discover a little glob of silt. Someone tracked this in from the docks.

Landens and Blood worked together to steal these items, and you suspect mercenaries are responsible. Do you go to the docks to investigate, or do you turn this information over to the Guilds and let them deal with this problem on their own? No one would blame you for the latter: if landens and Blood are working together, there are certainly muters on the mercenary ship where Mari’s supplies have been taken. Dare you take matters of the law into your own hands?


WILD WILD MEN
It’s nearly dusk. Pink and blue rays from the sun pierce a haze of sand on the horizon, obscuring the sunset and painting the sky with pastels. The world seems blurry and depth becomes an illusion. You know to be wary: this is the time when the wildmen come out of the hills to the south and west of Draega.

You’re standing guard at a farm where the spring planting is just mature enough that it could be pulled in. This is a dangerous time for the farmers. They can’t defend themselves against the wildmen that raid their fields, and there aren’t enough guards from the Queen’s First Circle to protect everyone.

A scream comes from the hills. It echoes through the still, night air. Wildmen dressed in rags and furs appear on the plains before you, their sight shields dropping. None of them wear a Jewel darker than Summer-sky, but they are all wild-eyed with rage and hunger. Subdue them however you can, but be sure to protect the fields at your back.


SPRING CLEANING
After the madness of the Black Widow coven invading Draega, Lady Fayura has asked Strangers to help weave cleansing webs. Just as there are webs that ensnare and damage the mind, there are webs that heal them, too.

She invites Strangers who have left the Residence to come spend the morning in her private garden, where she teaches them how to weave cleansing webs. These are simpler webs, built like spirals that trap oppressive psychic energy and purifies the air, removing those dark feelings. As she teaches you, she explains that the landens and slums were hit the hardest by the coven’s attack and that the most psychic damage was done in the slums and the area around the Guilds.

You could, she suggests, leave your cleansing webs there, but if you do, you can expect resistance. Strangers wear Jewels, and they will be viewed with distrust and wariness in the slums especially. The Guilds, she says, insist they can take care of their own, but this kind of psychic damage requires a web to help repair it.

The Blood in River East clamor for cleansing webs. Once, there were many more Black Widows, but that caste was nearly wiped out in the Cataclysm. There are few Black Widows among the Blood in River East who can do what Fayura teaches the Strangers, and the Blood are particularly susceptible to lingering psychic malevolence. If the effects of the webs aren’t removed, the Blood will twist and become even more dangerous than they already are. At least they won’t try to chase the Strangers out of River East.

But who you help is up to you. The choice is yours, Stranger.


AIR TIME
Whether you catch the news on a Far-caster in the city or you're spinning the dial on your own device, you'll hear…

etiquette with evandra and aren
[Evandra's voice is a little bit rough and a little bit husky, the kind of voice that gives bad ideas to young men and headaches to fathers.] I admit: I'm a bit confused. Can anyone learn how to be a Black Widow?

[Aren's boyish voice is cheerful and amused.] Anyone can learn how to weave a tangled web. Indeed, Healers weave webs to make their healing more effective. Even though you can learn the Craft, that will never make you a Black Widow. You won't spontaneously manifest a snake tooth, for example!

[Evandra:] Well, that's a relief! We certainly don't need more chance encounters that leave us poisoned!

[Aren:] Quite so, Evandra! And recovering from a Black Widow's venom is a grueling process. There are few things more deadly.

[Evandra:] Let's take a minute to discuss antivenin and how our listeners can brew their own at home.

the weather
[A soft-spoken man’s voice rumbles out of the Far-caster. He’s pleasant to listen to, with a soothing cadence to his voice.] …plenty of sun over the next few days. It's the perfect time for taking in the spring harvest. With all this sun, consider purchasing Sun Shield, a new cream produced by the Medico and Crafter Guilds to protect your skin from…

the news
[The man speaks at a brisk pace, hurried and harried as though he has too much to say and not enough time to say it.] News from the Queen's Court suggests that we'll soon know who attacked the city two weeks ago.

[Another man, nasally in tone. He doesn’t sound rushed so much as put upon.] That’s right, Garret. The Strangers have been investigating the Black Widow coven responsible for breaking a young witch and placing malicious tangled webs throughout the city.

[Garret:] A handful of suspects are being held in the Queen's Residence as deliberations take place. The Strangers…

Comments

air time.

[goldfinger]

[ Jaime, who's also been standing in front of said empty shop front (this whole world is so bizarrely advanced, mechanism-wise, from his own), lets out an amused little noise as he considers the woman who'd come up only a few minutes earlier. ]

Does it? [ He knows nothing about Black Widows, not really. Not a lot about Craft or magic in general, either. ]

Have you been attacked by a Black Widow, my lady?

[bearbane]

Nothing so exotic.

[The admission is accompanied by a faint, wry twist of her mouth, not quite a smile, but certainly nothing hostile.]

But most people aren't trained alchemists. There will be people who harm themselves with this, to say nothing of the fools who will be emboldened if they think this means safety.

[goldfinger]

The Queen's been seeing to some educating, though. [ Jaime shrugs his shoulders, and his tone is nonchalant as he says it; clearly despite his knowing this, he's not particularly aware of the finer details. ] Maybe they'll go so far as to teach this... alchemy. [ There is the slightest tone of disdain. ]

I've had a fair bit of Black Widow training, myself. I suppose if you can teach someone to make webs, you can teach the dispelling.

[bearbane]

I've always found it strange that undoing magic isn't one of the first things mages are taught. Many never learn.

[And don't care to.

She considers him, making no attempt to hide the evaluation.]

Though undoing a spell does nothing to reverse the damage already caused.

[goldfinger]

[ If Jaime's aware he's being looked at, he doesn't seem to mind it. One of the most interesting things about him might be the gold hand on his right, but other than that he seems a normal one with a longsword at his hip. ]

No? I'm not familiar with the process. [ He doesn't care to be, either, and wouldn't be half as knowledgeable about the pathetically small amount of information he has if not for the oath he swore to the queen. ]

The damage, though-- that, I'm aware of intimately. Every instance of magic I've seen has wrought nothing but destruction.

As far as I'm concerned, the world is better off without it.

[bearbane]

[The gleam of gold does catch Cassandra's eye, and though she's not unfamiliar with people wounded badly enough to compensate with some manner of prosthetic, the material he's chosen is certainly notable. Nobility, then, or perhaps a particularly ostentatious mercenary, though the lack of concern with which he carries himself sways her suspicions towards the former rather than the latter.]

No. It's like putting out a fire; the immediate problem is ended, but anything it consumed is still burnt.

[She shifts her weight, crosses her arms over her chest, restlessness motion making a lie of her matter-of-fact tone. She has never been particularly good at accepting 'this is how things are', even if a particular instance of how things are truly is immutable.]

But not all magic is destructive. And properly directed by mages who have the discipline to keep their spells from slipping their control, even destructive magic can be used to good ends.

[goldfinger]

Hmm. [ That's a pensive sound, made more so as Jaime considers the way this woman moves. Though he may know nearly nothing of Craft, she looks to be more than familiar with it.

Or, well, "magic". But the two are interchangeable at this point, aren't they? ]

Have you seen those good ends, my lady?

[bearbane]

Cassandra. Or Seeker Cassandra, if formality is called for.

[The local insistence on calling women ladies rankles, and she's no diplomat to bow to traditions she sees no use for. Far better to be known by the title she'd earned.]

And I have, though not in the few days since my arrival here. I would not trust a strange mage completely before he proved himself, but I have called several ally in the past.

[goldfinger]

I see. [ He'll take note of that. ] Then perhaps you'll be able to learn Craft better than anyone here, having seen some version of it yourself. Unless you'd rather not?

I'm jealous. [ He gives a short smile, then turns on his feet, his body facing Cassandra properly now rather than simply standing at her side. ]

You call yourself "Seeker". What is that?

[bearbane]

[She would truly rather not. But that seems too personal a truth to hand to a stranger, in a place where magic seems to be equally reviled and revered.

And so she leaves that unadressed, seizing instead on the question that's much easier to answer.]

The functional title for any fully initiated member of the Seekers of Truth. It means little enough here, but in the place I come from, we are a martial order in service to the Divine.

What should I call you?

[goldfinger]

[ Jaime translates this as "this woman was part of some faith militant", and it sours him just a bit. Fortunately, he doesn't let it show. ]

Jaime. [ He's no lord, no knight, absolutely nothing at all. ] My name's Jaime.

[ He holds his left hand out, offering a shake. ] Well met.