canada ♔ you might make it boy but by the skin of your teeth

[adamantiumed]

WHO || Logan, Grimrot, Miles, Nels, Abigail  [Closed]
WHAT || The Knights head to a secluded village to help put an end to a dangerous disease
WHERE ||Falcon's Hollow, Canada and Darkmoon Vale
WHEN || April 21st [back dated]
HOW || Actionspam. Single thread, don't worry about maintaining tagging order.

Perched at the edge of any civilized lands, the small lumber town of Falcon's Hollow has always had to rely on itself to solve its  problems.  Now the hacking coughs of the sick are heard throughout the town.  The plague has come to the Hollow, and the town is ill equipped to stop it on its own, particularly given its resistance to magic.

That's where the Knights come in, sent to assist a local herbalist in putting together enough supplies to mass produce a cure.

Comments

[lurings]

[ her hand lifts reflexively to touch her ear, disguising the motion as tucking hair back again. abigail is wary of magic, but she is pretty much solace's number one fan. she's also a pragmatic survivalist and isn't going to say no to something that will keep her alive, even if it's magic. ]

Do they not know the herbs she's using are also from the Shadow World?

[adamantiumed]

[ she shakes her head. "Those who do still don't see it as threatening. For some reason herbalism is something they feel they can wrap their heads around: magic's a bridge too far." ]

[cuivre]

It's more controllable.

[They can grow it, collect it, cultivate it. Magic seems more wild and unexplainable. It made sense in his head.]

Thank you for your help.

[lurings]

Thanks.

[ abigail nods, offering a small smile before she turns to leave, glancing over at miles. ]

If we just head into town then?

[ they should be able to find the woman, that is. after they collect the others. ]

[adamantiumed]

[ the woman laughs lightly. "Sweetie, you are in the town. It's just a few blocks across from one end to the other." ]

[lurings]

[ abigail's smile finally touches on something more genuine. ] I grew up in Minnesota, I'm used to it.

[ and she will just wave the rest of them over. HEY YOU GUYYYYYYS. ]

[zwy_il]

[Nels will stride over.]

Shouldn't be too hard to find this old crone, by the sound of it. [His Drow ears heard everything, with a 27 Listen check.]

[adamantiumed]

[ yeah he can hear the people well before they see them. following the noise, they head around the corner on foot now. creeping ivy and window boxes cover the facade of the rugged-looking two-story shop bearing the faded sign "roots and remedies". a line of twenty-some somber townsfolk - some with pale, wheezing children, others seeming to be precipitously near tears - stretches from the open door. logan takes one look at the line and frowns, moving to head for the door and skip it, unless anyone stops him. ]

[grimrot]

Oh dear. [Grimrot looks at all the sad people, but she can't think of a single reason why they shouldn't follow Logan (wis 9) especially since he's Mission Leader, and if Wynn trusts him to make the right choices, so does she. She gives tight-lipped smiles to the town-folk, trying not to let her fangs show too much, though there's nothing she can do about her blue skin.]

[theminotaur]

[ abigail tries to ignore the townspeople because they're on a Very Serious and Obviously Time Sensitive Mission® to help said townspeople, but one of the wheezing children sucks her in and she unwinds her scarf, crouching in front of the child and holding it out. ] Breathe through this, the warm air will make it hurt less.

[adamantiumed]

[ the child stares up at her wide eyed but takes the scarf and wraps it around her face. as logan puts a hand to the door, a man speaks up between coughs.

"Hey! There's a line!"

logan looks over, irritated. ]

[theminotaur]

We're not here for the medicine, we only need to speak with the woman that owns this place. [ diplomacy 14, that is probably not why she was sent along tbqh.

looking between logan and the sickly people, abigail worries her lip between her teeth. she's not a doctor by any means, but part of her wants to stay outside and examine the people to see what exactly they're up against. ]

[zwy_il]

[Nels is totally ready to see how this crowd of supersitious backwater folks will respond to an abrupt faerie fire and/or orb of darkness. Do not test him.]

Urgent and classified business, I'm afraid.

[adamantiumed]

[ abigail's tenuous attempts at diplomacy actually seem to at least die their growing annoyance down to quiet grumbles, and was maybe a better choice than letting logan try to scare them straight. either way, he doesn't add anymore, just yanks the door open, prompting the jingle of an attached bell. someone shuffles out past them, clutching a vial in one hand, their skin pale and clammy. inside, the smell of burnt earth and spicy incense chokes the air of the cramped mud-tracked shop. bunches of dried herbs hang from the ceiling, along with dangling pots presses, alchemical apparatuses, and glassware of more arcane purposes. pouches of rare plants, jars of colored glass, and all manner of dried, preserved, and jellied animal parts fill high shelves and tables doing double duty as displays and workspaces. in the shop's rear, a rail-thin woman with dark hair pulled back tightly and black spectacles perched on the very end of her nose busies herself between an overpacked rack of herbs, a table covered in stray powders and measuring equipment, and a pot loudly bubbling over with thick gray froth. over the din of her work and without looking up, the woman impatiently shouts:



"And what's your problem?" ]

[grimrot]

[The alchemist over here is in freaking heaven as she looks around EXCEPT I GUESS SHE LOOKED INTO A BRIGHT LIGHT AND CAN'T SEE ANYTHING (spot crit fail) so she squints her eyes shut, rubbing them a little bit. Give her a moment.]

Er.. we're here to help!

[zwy_il]

[That's right, peasants. We go where we wanna go. Cutsies.]

[cuivre]

Care for some assistance in getting these people cured?

[Because that line is hella long and someone has to do it while she keeps them as healthy as she can.]

[adamantiumed]

[

she looks back at them, actually interested, some of the irritation leaking from her features.

"You're the ones I sent for?" she asks, uncertainly. logan nods. ] You must be Laurel.

[ she brushes some hair back, and says, "You should know, this whole thing's a long shot." ]

[theminotaur]

Better than nothing. What is the illness affecting? It looks like upper respiratory, but... [ she shrugs, that's basically winter in the north. ]

[adamantiumed]

[

"It's a sickness, almost like any other, but you get the mold growing in you - blackscour. It starts eating away in your chest and belly and is damned determined to stay. Your body nearly turns itself inside out trying to hack the stuff up but all that does is cut your guts up... bad."

logan glances around the shop, frowning. ] But you've got a cure.

[ she shrugs. "My grandmother's book had a brew in it that says it's good for this kind of thing. It sounds more like hoojoo than real medicine, but she knew things about the Shadow World, and the Vale. It's composed of some Shadow roots and concentrations, most of which I have here, but three of which I don't." she moves to an open book, aged and yellow, sitting between vials on the piled up desk, jabbing a finger in there. " Elderwood moss, which I've never even heard of, but granny said the stuff grows on the 'oldest tree in the Vale'. A specially pickled root called rat's tail - again, sounds like hoojoo to me. And seven ironbloom mushrooms, stunty little things that grow only in dark places thick with metal. Well used by dwarves, I hear." ]

[theminotaur]

[ abigail listens carefully, trying to recognize any of the ingredients from her studying (knowledge: earth & life sciences 29), fidgeting slightly since she has a mushroom complex now. ]

And the brew cures it, or makes it easier for the body to expel the junk itself?

[adamantiumed]

[

"According to what my grandma wrote? It should cure it. Completely. But I guess we'll see. Assuming you can find this stuff." ]

And how are we supposed to do that?

[ "Well," she says, wiping her hands on her apron and coming around the table. "For the elderwood mold, there's gotta be an oldest tree in the Vale. Damned if I know where it is, though. The rat's tail and mushrooms are even longer shots. Way north, people say there used to live a bunch of dwarves. They're not there anymore, but I'd bet their forges are. If you can find ironblooms anywhere around here, that'd be your best bet. As for the rat's tail, who knows? Well. Actually. Ulizmila, the witch that lives deep in the Vale might. She's a crafty, mean thing that knows all sorts of strangeness. She might even have one. I don't know what she might want for it, but I doubt it'd come cheap. My grandmother traded her sight to the old crone for a few pages of what she knew, and that was years and years back, and I don't know a soul who got any nicer as they got older." ]

[cuivre]

Either way, the sooner we get this stuff, the sooner these people get cured.

[He looks at Logan.]

Think we should split up and get the 'easier' stuff, or go talk to this witch first?

[adamantiumed]

We don't know what to expect out there, so splitting up's a bad call. We'll talk to the witch.

[theminotaur]

[ abigail's nose wrinkles. this is sounding like some serious little mermaid bullshit and she is not here for it. actually this is sounding like a bunch of fairy tale crap, but the sound of coughing outside keeps her silent. ]