Searching an Ancient Bedchamber

The shadowed form that looked like Den walked towards the door that Ren claimed protected by a hallucinogen. Felazo says to the others, “You guys can feel free to explore rooms you’re interested in before the shadowy copy gets there, I just want to check out the library and/or study and know he’s better than I am at making sure there aren’t traps.”

Ren leaves the group first, heading towards the second door that Alessari had unlocked. Sister Hilan looks at the three others. “Felazo, is he going to be alright?” she asks, nodding towards the shadow.

“Not in the slightest. It’s an illusion formed entirely of magic and shadow. It’s going to disappear the moment I stop maintaining the magical effect,” the wizardly captain replies.

Sister Hilan shakes her head, concerned. Perhaps at the glibness of Felazo’s remark, or at the nature of the magic at play. Alessari could not tell which. Hilan heads away, towards the first door that Den unlocked. Leaving Alessari, Denlo, and Felazo standing in the hallway.

Alessari looks back to Den. “Bedroom and or vault?” she asks him.

Den nods. “Eyes up, in case it’s the latter,” the masked killer replies.

Alessari nods right back. The pair leave their captain standing alone in the hallway. They’ll return to him if they find anything, but searching the bedroom seems productive, and the wizard is obviously focused on the place that might have books. But one can learn a lot about someone from how they keep their bedchambers. How they think of themselves, how they feel about hygiene and security. Or it’s a vault, and they can find some valuables. Either way, quite useful for figuring out this place. Because if the structure outside is any indication, this is only the tip of a very large structure. Carefully, Den pushes open the door and they walk inside. The room is dark. Denlo begins to sift through his pack, likely looking for a torch or light of any kind. Once there’s any sort of light in here, the pair of them shouldn’t have a problem seeing the room. As the Elfi’ika searches, the noble huntress twists her arm and mutters a few words. Gently muttering to the weakened nature around this place. The vines twist up her arm, this time wrapping and staying around her wrist. Then, out from the vine grows clusters of off-white caps. Four in total. Each cap then explodes in a puff of spores, which begin to glow with a bioluminescent green, washing over the area. Denlo looks up at her silently, then turns to face the rest of the room. The huntress figures he’s curious why she’s just doing this now. He doesn’t understand magic. That it takes work and focus to keep an effect, even one as minor as some small lights, functioning. Work and focus that might risk her being less effective. The clouds of glowing spores spread out around the room some, to make certain it is entirely lit. It’s not a vault. It’s a bedroom. Sparse decor. In-chamber bath basin. So they care about hygiene, but not things. The crew won’t be finding a massive vault. Not in the way some might hope. But the bed, the cabinets, are all nice. So money was no object. Rich for his time or powerful enough with magic to never have to worry about money. Or both. Touching the bed, it is worn down, but not as much as it should be. The whole building had been sealed, which accounts for most of that. The degradation itself means it isn’t magical innately. Perhaps some sort of high-quality material that people don’t use anymore? She looks over at her companion. Denlo is also looking curiously at something, this time the basin. “Won’t be a cash vault,” she says.

Den looks up at his traveling companion, his mask hiding any reaction. “Basin is untouched by time. Magical?”

Sari walks over to the basin. She hadn’t considered it. Washing basins like this one tend to be made of materials that stand better against the tides of time than the wood of a cabinet or the cloth of bedding. She touches it, running her fingers across the marble’s grain. Denlo is right. There should be a hint of wear in the defects, but they are practically nonexistent. So something is up. They’ll need to check with Felazo to confirm if it is actually magical, but it isn’t normal. “Maybe. Let’s bring it to the front.”

“Cabinets first.” Denlo counters. That is the right play. Whether or not there is anything in those cabinets, they should be checked before leaving the room. Den moves to one of the cabinets. The huntress stops by the bedding for a moment, taking one of her swords and cutting a square of the material off of it. Just in case that is important or useful. Then she heads over to the bed stand. Oil lamp, well carved stand. Lock. Kneeling down, she pulls out her picks. Prodding it, there doesn’t seem to be any traps. Makes sense there wouldn’t be. A trap here would risk activating while the owner is just waking up and not fully cognizant. She applies some tension, and begins to seek out the binding. It takes no time. The lock might as well have been absent. Perhaps it was. Perhaps it is a lock only to dissuade people from browsing. Opening up the drawer, there are two things. A small rock with some kind of animal claw sticking out from it, and a book. She opens the book to skim through it, but it is written in a language she doesn’t know. Surprising, but not overly so. Even if it were related loosely to a language she learned in her schooling, it was far too old for there to be any more than root similarities between the two. But the formatting was odd. Each page started with an extremely short, almost fragmentary line. Then the pages end arbitrarily. Like it was some kind of journal. Placing it in her bag, she looks at the rock. Looking at it, there is clearly something special about it. Something unique. She pockets it as well, to have the group examine it. Denlo’s second cabinet also seems to have a picked drawer. He dumps the necklace he found within into the tub. “Nothing else useful?” she asks.

“Nothing but quite small underclothes,” the hulking man replies.

Alessari looks up at him. “Small for you or small in general?” she wonders aloud.

Denlo laughs. It’s unsettling. Especially as, with the leather masked helm on, it’s impossible to tell how genuine the laugh is. He stops laughing long enough to silently pull a pile out and toss them at the huntress. She deftly catches the pile and looks. He was being honest. They were in fact quite skimpy for anyone to be wearing. And the sizing seemed to indicate the owner was roughly on the fit side of the modern average person. She put the underwear into the basin as well. Den’s masked head tilts slightly. Curiosity. “Material,” she claims with a smirk, “Might be valuable.”

Den sighs. “Might be,” he says, though the voice sounds incredulous. Like the killer thinks the huntress has some sort of ulterior motives. She does, she wants to see how the others react to them, but it is rude for her companion to just assume she’s not telling the whole truth. She also tosses the book into the basin, though not the rock. Just in case the rock isn’t magical, but just old and valuable. She gestures across the tub. Denlo nods and sidles up on the opposite side of the marble basin. It is incredibly heavy, but together they slowly move the tub out into the hallway. No one is there.

Sister Hilan walks out from a different room than she’d entered previous, the one directly across the hall from the one they’d seen her go into. “Why are you moving that?” she asks.

Denlo looks up at her silently. “No degradation to the flaws,” Sari answers through strained breathing. “Some help?”

Realizing, the pious woman rushes over and helps them move the basin back into the entryway. With all three of the physically fit people in the crew working on the move, it was much easier. Especially since the strongest of them was the one with the fresh arms. Putting the basin down, the sister looked down into the tub. She saw the necklace, the book, and the skimpy men’s underwear. She picks up the book, opens it, closes it, and puts it back down atop the underwear. Looking over at Denlo, then back at the clothes, she curiously cocks her head. “Those seem a bit small for you, I’m afraid,” she says calmly, not a trace of sarcasm or humor in her voice. Alessari figured the sister would not be embarrassed by the skimpiness, after all, she had stripped nude in front of the huntress the first eve after they met. More curious was her kind but direct demeanor towards the Elfi’ika. Assuming he wants a change of style makes some sense, he’s clearly wearing an outfit he’s had for years and not a particularly well made one at that. But she looked at the underclothes, didn’t politely ignore them but instead provided a warning that could almost be construed as helpful.

Denlo shakes his head and heads over to the study’s door and knocks on the wall beside it. Alessari stands beside Sister Hilan and pulls out the stone. “What do you think of this?” she asks.

Hilan moves to take it from the noble scion’s hands. The Elf hands it over. Turning the stone around and looking at the strange claw within, the monastic sister asks, “Was I rude to tell Denlo of the size disparity?”

“Yes, but not overly so. He took an implication from your statement that I suspect wasn’t meant.”

“What was that implication?” she asks, as she begins to touch carefully different parts of the claw stuck within the stone.

“The underclothes would be more revealing than the average modern pair,” the noble tries to explain.

Sister Hilan looks up from the stone for a moment at Denlo, then at Alessari, then her gaze returns to the stone. “Hmm,” she mumbles to herself, before continuing the conversation. “Was he upset by the implication that he would wear them, because the material seems like it would be quite comfortable if it fit well.”

Sari shrugs. “Either that, or he felt you were saying he was unattractive. Or both.”

The pious sister smiles. “I doubt he cares about that, coming from me.” Then, handing the stone back to the huntress. “This seems to be some kind of fossilized claw bone that is enchanted to summon a skeletal beast. Briefly and occasionally.”

Alessari takes the fossil and puts it back in her bag. As she does so, Felazo, Ren, and Den return. Felazo is carrying many books with him. “Dear scion, would you mind putting these in our fancy bag for the moment?” he asks, dumping the books onto the floor. “It seems you need me to look at some stuff.”

“Fancy bag,” Ren says, realizing something, then looks at the glowing clouds around the huntress, “Dearest Sari, would you terribly mind drifting these lights over towards the walkable closet. I do wish to bring the clothing within out with us as well, for mine own clothes be a bit wretched at the moment.” He gestures towards the door he’d entered earlier.

Alessari waves her hand and the spore-clouds move to form a line of lights leading into the closet. Then she gets to work looking at a bunch of unlabeled books and putting them into the magical bag they’d found in the pirate ship. Seventeen in total. She looks over at Felazo who has swiftly pulled all of the things out of the basin and lain them carefully on the ground beside it. “What’s wrong?” she asks her captain.

“Given the magic school and the fact it’s a bathing basin, I’m guessing it makes water. And since I don’t know the command word, much less the language’s phonemes, I don’t want to risk it being too close to some modern word and the tub to fill up with those very nice sets of underwear or that immensely interesting looking journal I can’t yet read inside it,” Felazo explains, somehow being sensible.

Ren returns laden with a bunch of incredibly fancy clothing. “I felt inspired to expropriate every piece in that walk-in, because, well, looking among us, all must admit: not a one of us be far from a desperate want of a makeover.”