War for the Crown Gameplay Part 1

Malphene looks up at Adelaide and rolls her shoulders, striding over. "Sure, guess I owe you that much at least."

"I don't feel you owe me anything, really," Adelaide answers as they step aside. They move a little further out of earshot before Adelaide speaks again. "When we first ran into your group, I noticed you looked rather upset, more than anyone else. It didn't seem like the right time or place to ask further, but now that there's at least a clear way out of here..." Adelaide pauses, waving her hand with some frustration as she tries to find the right words. "Well, I suppose 'is everything all right' is a bit of a silly question, given how chaotic the evening's been, but, did something in particular happen?"

Malphene looks down at her feet for a moment and takes a long, deep breath to steady herself, nodding. "Yeah. When the thugs attacked the crowd I saw... I saw them attack my father," she explains, hands shaking slightly. "They... they cut him in half."

"Oh." Adelaide's voice is very soft at this. "I'm so sorry. That sounds... absolutely horrifying to have happened, let alone to have witnessed."

Malphene just nods in reply, pausing for a moment. "Yeah. I'm going to have to go back in there, once I know it's safe. Need to make sure that looters don't take the family sword or his signet ring at least."

Adelaide nods, frowning. "I guess there will be a lot of that once we know it's safe, huh. I want to say please feel free to reach out when you're ready to do that, for backup, but I can't tell how feasible that will be yet...?" She crosses her arms, considering the matter. "Do you have a safe location to go to?"

Malphene nods again. "Thank you. And I do. Well, I'm taking the first carriage out of town. I have a cousin who holds some land in the countryside a couple hours from here, that should be a safe place to stay." She grimaces. "Huh, I guess... legally I'm the head of my household now. The vote did pass."

"Trauma and responsibility all at once, huh?" Adelaide comments with a weak smile. "I really am sorry, Dame Trant. I hope things calm soon, and get better from there."

"Thank you, Dame Morilla. Take care of yourself, I don't think you're out of the woods just yet," Malphene replies, then starts making her way out of the building to find a horse so she can get out of the city.

"Quite," Adelaide agrees, and returns to her own group.

Outside the Senate building, two familiar faces - Marquess Deschamps, and Lady Gloriana Morilla, wait along the side of a nearby building, heads down until they see the group, then they both look up to show their faces and wave everyone into a nearby alleyway.

Adelaide's face visibly brightens at the sight of Lady Gloriana just fine, and she hastily follows. "Aunt Gloriana, I can't begin to say how relieved I am to see you," she comments once they're ducked away.

As soon as they're out of sight, Gloriana immediately embraces Adelaide tight. "I was just thinking the same thing. You know better than to worry about me though," she replies with a smile. "Still, this is not the place. Do any of you know what happened to Martella - she works with us. We didn't tell any of you earlier because Martella was using tonight to test you all too. We have no idea what happened to her after she got out of the building, last we heard was that she was taking the servants to a safehouse. We don't know where that is either. Safehouses are kept secret so that there's no chance of their location leaking."

"She started to tell us she was at the Dignif-something, but her message was cut off before she gave us the whole name," Adelaide answers, worry returning to her face. "I can think of a dozen or so places that start with a name like that - it would take a few hours to check them all, but it's feasible."

"Give me the list, I'll have our agents check them all," Marquess Deschamps cuts in.

"Once we find the place, we'll need you all to help get her out though. Our faces are known, we need to be getting back indoors as soon as possible, but you five are relative unknowns, you should be able to move around the city without attracting attention," Lady Morilla adds. "But before that, you look like you all need some rest. And Martella's tough, she can hold out for a little while. The way I see it, if they were going to kill her, she's dead now, we can't change that by rushing in unprepared. If they aren't planning to kill her, they either want information or ransom, and that means you have enough time to rest and prepare."

"Would preparations include being able to purchase and sell magical items? I'm not sure how chaotic things are outside of the Senate building," Sarina asks. "We acquired quite a number of those, some of them less useful than others. And, speaking of which, should we return to the archives below to retrieve Dignity's Barb? I don't feel right letting that weapon languish down there."

”You found the real Dignity’s Barb?” Gloriana raises an eyebrow. ”Once all this is settled you’ll have to explain where you were. As for gearing up, if you provide a list of what you’re buying and selling I can have an agent make the purchases for you as soon as shops open in the morning while you rest. Any arcane mages among you will need that long to sleep anyways.”

Sarina nods. "In that case, we should return to Factor 12 now, and leave the least valuable items in his hands, so we can sell the others, in order to have the most funds possible to purchase magic items for ourselves."

”To sell the others?” Adelaide echoes with a raised eyebrow. ”We might want to verify with Factor 12 that doing so wouldn’t be a form of theft. It referred to the process as ‘checking out’ items, which doesn’t sound as though we’re quite at that much liberty to do as we like.”

Josie shrugs. "Isn't what we were doing the same as bartering? We gave him one thing to get another thing, and he'd only accept our offer if he thought it was of good enough value. I don't see why there would be any problems selling it."

”All I’m saying is that it’d be prudent to check,” Adelaide answers with a shrug. ”Factor 12 may not object to that interpretation, it just didn’t sound like such before. Before we go, though, where should we return to?”

”My residence at the city’s edge,” Gloriana directs. ”Adelaide, you know the way. It should be the safest place available for you to spend the night.”

Adelaide nods. ”Perfect. Shall we go?”

With that settled, a quick return to Factor 12 reveals the inevitable buzzing around its area, and it floats up to the group upon their arrival. ”Welcome back. Do you seek to return or exchange any items?”