[] Include Lolliston armsmen, perhaps even the lord himself, what you are likely to find within will go a long way to persuading Lord Luther of the need for your aid.
-[] So long as you are actually reasonably sure you are on the right trail, otherwise you will deal with this as an object lesson that not everything is as it appears, and that in itself the vector for this blight can be as overlooked as simple disdain for the people suffering under your own nose. If Lord Lolliston can't bring himself to care about the fates of the people beneath his rule, one will find many insidious influences all too happy to take advantage of that fact, sappers in a siege of mortal will.
When you return so soon to Lord Luther with news that you may have found the architect of his troubles he seems surprised, almost disbelieving, but polite enough to try to hide the fact. The same can definitely not be said for the lord's master-at-arms Ser Benjen Rivers, a whip-thin man perhaps ten years younger than his lord with what looks to be a permanent scowl etched into his features. Features that look suspiciously alike to those of his lord, you note but do not remark upon with so much as a lingering glance. Whether illegitimate brother, cousin, or some other kinship it matters little to you. The Lollistons have thankfully given you no cause to pry into their family history, unlike certain other families. You would much rather deal with disbelief than the poisonous tangles you had found in the Crownlands.
Having already learned from Yss that what awaits you within is indeed a greater daemon you turn to the small company of armsmen that are to accompany you and Ser Richard with a grim warning. "What we will likely come across this day is a creature that could rip a knight in full plate apart with its bear hands and that is but the least of the powers such fiends possess, they wield spells and curses as easily as men breathe with neither word nor gesture to give warning and other more elemental powers taint the air around them, inseparable as their shadow."
You get a few wary looks at least, not as many as you would like, but then there is a reason why the Inquisition and to some extent the Lawmen teach this lesson over several weeks. Men are used to being masters of the world they know, none more so than the ones trained, armed, and armored in dealing death.
Rather than march with fanfare down the street of the village and to the house you seek you had sent Varys ahead unseen and able to pas through stone as easily as she flies, following rumors of this 'Lady Limaes' who had taken up residence in what had once been the septon's house by what the locals simply called 'The Old Sept'. Built some two hundred years before the Conquest and lost to Balerion's flame during Maegor's ill fated realm you suspect a daemon would find the defiled ground quite to its liking. What link it might have had to the conjuror the Lannister mages claimed to have killed you cannot say for certain save that the fiend made itself known almost a moonturn after the Golden Shields had left, not that you spent too long looking. You will know the full tale soon enough once you capture the fiend.
"Did you find her?" you send to Varys as the Lolliston men begin to grow restive under Ser Richard's unimpressed gaze.
"Digging down like mole right enough," your familiar confirms. "Or maybe like a rat from the company it keeps. Stone's planted."
At that confirmation you link hands with Ser Richard as well as the rest of the company you have pledged to take with you and in a twist of sorcery you are elsewhere.
A tomb... no, merely a roughly carved underground chamber with stone alcoves carved into the walls, though holding papers and ledgers, not corpses, but the air is as stale and bitter as any cairn you have entered. Here as in the dungeons below the keep you find rats, but these are wilder, turned feral with hunger and rage. Before they can attack you kill them all with a Word of Death, neither heat nor life giving away your presence.
"She's through there, first door on the left," Varys motions to the archway leading out of the room as she settles on your shoulder.
So you advance, Ser Richard half a step in front of you from sheer reflex, the armsmen lingering behind you, bravado spent in the catacombs that smell of death, rot and stranger things.
From the back the being working at the alchemist's workbench belching noxious miasmas seems to be a woman in a pale grown, her hair silver in the legacy of the dragon lords. But as she turns to meet the spell that binds her from fleeing by sorcery she gives a smile filled with needle sharp teeth that grows and grows, splitting open her cheek to the ear, flesh warping and rotting along the way. Her eyes become pools of fetid black-green in which shines a distant ghostly light, like the last candle on the bedside of a dying man. Fingers and hands twist into oily tentacles twitching with the motions of spellcraft, yet even in this warped half-human form you know her for what she is, a meladaemon, one of the Deacons of Famine abroad and loose in the world.
To her credit the daemon does not waste its breath with grand proclamations, launching instead a curse of withering upon all who stand against her. The sorcery is easily dismissed, and with your next breath you bind her to the form of a harmless if unfortunately wiggling and betentacled turtle, trusting that Ser Benjen and his men have seen enough to cure them of their doubts.
"What in the Seven Hells...?" the Riverlander knight begins.
"Daemon, I doubt it was the only one, they tend to call in some of their kin to join in their schemes when they find themselves free to do as they will on the mortal realm," you explain shortly.
Indeed, before further divination proclaim Oakbarrel and it environs free of all the daemons 'Limeas' had called, you capture one more tentacled fiend with some skill at spellcraft and three of the least of daemon-kind. You can only hope the latter had merely been spying and carrying messages, not harvesting souls, but you know with the hosts of Abandon hope often proves in vain.
[] Involve Lord Lolliston in the investigation, maybe he will better learn the lesson of the dangers his people might face through his carelessness
-[] Write in
[] Leave the Interrogation to Tyene, receive a report
-[] Write in where to go next
OOC: Normally Maledaemons look like this, which is a little scary I guess, but more like a slightly mutated gnoll than an incarnation of famine, so I looked for something more fitting. The lovely lady above is originally from the Star Wars Legends expanded universe.
Full mind-break protocols are engaged, @everyone, this is a clear and present Daemonic threat on Westeros, with an unknown amount of Daemons also either participating or aware of the "operation".
Ergo, we kinda have to be extra-through on this.
[X] Involve Lord Lolliston in the investigation, maybe he will better learn the lesson of the dangers his people might face though his carelessness
-[X] Share the first of the tomes you are giving to the loyal Lords with him - the Canticle of Decay, perhaps offering some magic to have him read through it faster, in order to him have the necessary context to the creatures you captured.
-[X] Afterwards, throughly question every Daemon, using the Brain Spider and any other relevant spells-
--[X] True Names to any and all Daemons, or other Outsider, they know - they all will be summoned and captured as per regular safety protocols.
--[X] What was their purpose here - all beings involved in the plan, an account of every being they so much as interacted with (and possibly corrupted/plagued) along the way.
--[X] Who, exactly, was their master? We assume it was the Moonpale Maiden, but there are more Archdaemons than it.
--[X] Any knowledge of ploys by other Daemons, or other Outsiders they are aware of
--[X] Any stashes of equipment, resources, any treasures, or secret places of power they are aware of. (if any are known, will be added to our "to clear-out"-list for Westeros).
Am I forgetting anything? @Crake, I can leave the wording of how to break it out for the Lord up to you, but questioning still should be prioritised, imo.
Adhoc vote count started by egoo on Nov 22, 2019 at 1:00 PM, finished with 11 posts and 9 votes.
[X] Involve Lord Lolliston in the investigation, maybe he will better learn the lesson of the dangers his people might face though his carelessness
-[X] Share the first of the tomes you are giving to the loyal Lords with him - the Canticle of Decay, perhaps offering some magic to have him read through it faster, in order to him have the necessary context to the creatures you captured.
-[X] Afterwards, throughly question every Daemon, using the Brain Spider and any other relevant spells-
--[X] True Names to any and all Daemons, or other Outsider, they know - they all will be summoned and captured as per regular safety protocols.
--[X] What was their purpose here - all beings involved in the plan, an account of every being they so much as interacted with (and possibly corrupted/plagued) along the way.
--[X] Who, exactly, was their master? We assume it was the Moonpale Maiden, but there are more Archdaemons than it.
--[X] Any knowledge of ploys by other Daemons, or other Outsiders they are aware of
--[X] Any stashes of equipment, resources, any treasures, or secret places of power they are aware of. (if any are known, will be added to our "to clear-out"-list for Westeros).
I would think you would find the image not all that creepy, I mean you're far spawn, shouldn't the tentacles make her look more or less ordinary to you?
Well I guess trying to comprehend the minds of far spawn is the road to madness anyway, so I shouldn't question what you do or don't find creepy.
I would think you would find the image not all that creepy, I mean you're far spawn, shouldn't the tentacles make her look more or less ordinary to you?
Well I guess trying to comprehend the minds of far spawn is the road to madness anyway, so I shouldn't question what you do or don't find creepy.
Adhoc vote count started by DragonParadox on Nov 22, 2019 at 2:01 PM, finished with 18 posts and 11 votes.
[X] Involve Lord Lolliston in the investigation, maybe he will better learn the lesson of the dangers his people might face though his carelessness
-[X] Share the first of the tomes you are giving to the loyal Lords with him - the Canticle of Decay, perhaps offering some magic to have him read through it faster, in order to him have the necessary context to the creatures you captured.
-[X] Afterwards, throughly question every Daemon, using the Brain Spider and any other relevant spells-
--[X] True Names to any and all Daemons, or other Outsider, they know - they all will be summoned and captured as per regular safety protocols.
--[X] What was their purpose here - all beings involved in the plan, an account of every being they so much as interacted with (and possibly corrupted/plagued) along the way.
--[X] Who, exactly, was their master? We assume it was the Moonpale Maiden, but there are more Archdaemons than it.
--[X] Any knowledge of ploys by other Daemons, or other Outsiders they are aware of
--[X] Any stashes of equipment, resources, any treasures, or secret places of power they are aware of. (if any are known, will be added to our "to clear-out"-list for Westeros).
Afterwards we should ask Lord Lolliston for feedback so we can further revise our impromptu seminar on demonic incursions. We seem to keep giving them, so we might as well try to improve our teaching method.
I wonder if Lanna stays up late at night fretting about the fact that she looted our ancestral seat? And what we'll do once we finally catch up to them.
Viserys: "You get a lion pelt; you get a lion pelt, everyone gets a lion pelt".
