Telcrova's eyes close automatically as her mind retreats into the mindset of battle. Calm, cool analysis, detached from the scene around her.
Her eyes reopen, and she gazes at the scene before her. Lips tightening at the sheer brutality of it. Slow steps forward until she reaches one of the bodies. Kneeling down, checking to see how long they've been dead.
The body is still warm, though it's hard to tell if that's from the sun. The blood is drying, but still sticky. They couldn't have been dead for longer than a few hours, by the sight of it.
And on each and every body is an etched symbol. Carved with blades to stand out, red against white and bloodless flesh. The symbol of the Eghris-leen. The Brotherhood of Slaughter.
Silas covered one eye with his hand, trying not to look directly at the more brutal examples of violence. This wasn't a raid; it was a massacre. He tried to form some sort of coherent message, but all that came out was "ooooooh... oh my."
OOC: How well-known is the clan symbol? It it something that anyone would recognize, or something only familiar to people who are pretty knowledgeable of the culture?
**Eldridge, still half doubled-over, leaned on Silas as he surveyed more closely the bodies. His face, bone-white, contorted in an expression of confusion.**
Eldridge - "That symbol... I've seen it before."
**He opened his ancestor's book and flipped through before stopping suddenly on a page with a sickened "a-ha."**
Eldridge - "My great-great-great-grandfather encountered this symbol once before. He calls it... the Garr symbol of slaughter? **** **** ****."
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Sing lustily and with good courage.
Be aware of singing as if you were half dead,
or half asleep:
but lift your voice with strength.
Be no more afraid of your voice now,
nor more ashamed of its being heard,
than when you sang the songs of Satan.
**Eldridge is confused by what Telcrova is implying, but... runs after anyway.**
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Sing lustily and with good courage.
Be aware of singing as if you were half dead,
or half asleep:
but lift your voice with strength.
Be no more afraid of your voice now,
nor more ashamed of its being heard,
than when you sang the songs of Satan.
"Everyone's dead as of a few hours ago. Some garr symbol of slaughter marked on them." Telcrova hops into the cart as she says it. "We've got to get back to Epicus."
Silas gasps a little, weak from the sight of the carnage and bit fatigued from sprinting after the others. He wasn't necessarily familiar with what a "Garr symbol of slaughter" would connote, and any kind of symbol of slaughter seemed rather redundant given the somewhat more... overt representations of slaughter.
Silas - "I mean... it could be someone trying to frame the Garr, someone who wanted conflict. Leave their mark there. Don't leave any witnesses to the attack. But I agree that that might be a bit far-fetched. Either way, if someone says we've seen enough, I wouldn't disagree."
Eldridge - "I don't want to be out here more than anyone else--probably a lot less than anyone else actually--but we have nothing we can act on but some ancient symbols and an inference. The only way we're going to find out more is if we keep going."
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Sing lustily and with good courage.
Be aware of singing as if you were half dead,
or half asleep:
but lift your voice with strength.
Be no more afraid of your voice now,
nor more ashamed of its being heard,
than when you sang the songs of Satan.
Silas - "That's a strong point, and I don't think I can disagree. I feel as though if we were to return now, the next step would simply be to send someone back out here to investigate more fully, the trail growing cold in the meantime. Even if the attacks are related, we still don't know much about what prompted them."
Garrett- Then we keep going, starting at the horrible display that we've been left. Maybe we can pick up a trail leading back into the mountains, find out which tribe did this and why.
Garrett's fists tightened a little as he spoke, the kind of brutality they had seen in the village was not something he was used to. None-the-less he began pacing back towards the pile of bodies, and proceeded to search the area for any trail that may lead them to the perpetrators.
"So let me get this straight. A village is butchered by a large force of garr two days after Epicus was attacked by garr, and your plan's to forgo warning the guard in favour of searching more?"
Telcrova glances at the guard. "Tell me we at least have some way of sending a message back to the commander."
The guard shakes his head. "Nothing short of me going back and letting her know. Which means you would be without transport for four days. Or longer."
Back at the bodies, the scene is gutwrenching. It is difficult to pull any clues out of it. But there are blood stains heading deeper into the mountains.
Garrett yelled back to the group, confident that even without their warnings the Commander was probably increasing the defences of the city as much as she could justify given the recent attack. He tried to see if the blood stains hinted at a direction of travel, if the blood was from the attackers leaving or dragged in from another slaughter.
There's definite signs of movement. It'll take some moving up and down the trail of blood to see that it's moving away from the village. Something left here.
Eldridge - "I do not like it at all that our best path forward is a trail made out of blood."
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Sing lustily and with good courage.
Be aware of singing as if you were half dead,
or half asleep:
but lift your voice with strength.
Be no more afraid of your voice now,
nor more ashamed of its being heard,
than when you sang the songs of Satan.
My helpdesk should you need me.
Her eyes reopen, and she gazes at the scene before her. Lips tightening at the sheer brutality of it. Slow steps forward until she reaches one of the bodies. Kneeling down, checking to see how long they've been dead.
And on each and every body is an etched symbol. Carved with blades to stand out, red against white and bloodless flesh. The symbol of the Eghris-leen. The Brotherhood of Slaughter.
My helpdesk should you need me.
OOC: How well-known is the clan symbol? It it something that anyone would recognize, or something only familiar to people who are pretty knowledgeable of the culture?
My helpdesk should you need me.
**Eldridge, still half doubled-over, leaned on Silas as he surveyed more closely the bodies. His face, bone-white, contorted in an expression of confusion.**
Eldridge - "That symbol... I've seen it before."
**He opened his ancestor's book and flipped through before stopping suddenly on a page with a sickened "a-ha."**
Eldridge - "My great-great-great-grandfather encountered this symbol once before. He calls it... the Garr symbol of slaughter? **** **** ****."
Be aware of singing as if you were half dead,
or half asleep:
but lift your voice with strength.
Be no more afraid of your voice now,
nor more ashamed of its being heard,
than when you sang the songs of Satan.
She straightens. "We've got to get back. Now." Without waiting for an answer, the drow begins running back to where they'd left the cart.
They might already be too late.
Be aware of singing as if you were half dead,
or half asleep:
but lift your voice with strength.
Be no more afraid of your voice now,
nor more ashamed of its being heard,
than when you sang the songs of Satan.
"What?"
My helpdesk should you need me.
Garrett- Whoever massacred these people, they were more powerful than the gang we stopped before. And since this is recent....
"Are these aimed at Epicus? Do we know these are the same people?"
My helpdesk should you need me.
Silas - "I mean... it could be someone trying to frame the Garr, someone who wanted conflict. Leave their mark there. Don't leave any witnesses to the attack. But I agree that that might be a bit far-fetched. Either way, if someone says we've seen enough, I wouldn't disagree."
Eldridge - "I don't want to be out here more than anyone else--probably a lot less than anyone else actually--but we have nothing we can act on but some ancient symbols and an inference. The only way we're going to find out more is if we keep going."
Be aware of singing as if you were half dead,
or half asleep:
but lift your voice with strength.
Be no more afraid of your voice now,
nor more ashamed of its being heard,
than when you sang the songs of Satan.
Garrett's fists tightened a little as he spoke, the kind of brutality they had seen in the village was not something he was used to. None-the-less he began pacing back towards the pile of bodies, and proceeded to search the area for any trail that may lead them to the perpetrators.
Telcrova glances at the guard. "Tell me we at least have some way of sending a message back to the commander."
Back at the bodies, the scene is gutwrenching. It is difficult to pull any clues out of it. But there are blood stains heading deeper into the mountains.
My helpdesk should you need me.
Garrett yelled back to the group, confident that even without their warnings the Commander was probably increasing the defences of the city as much as she could justify given the recent attack. He tried to see if the blood stains hinted at a direction of travel, if the blood was from the attackers leaving or dragged in from another slaughter.
My helpdesk should you need me.
Be aware of singing as if you were half dead,
or half asleep:
but lift your voice with strength.
Be no more afraid of your voice now,
nor more ashamed of its being heard,
than when you sang the songs of Satan.
"At least it isn't ours", Silas intoned nervously, wiping cold sweat from his brow. "How much blood does a person have, anyway?"
As Garrett spoke he began following the trail further into the mountains, hopefully it wuld lead them to the answers they were looking for.