Post #2628031 in The City of Chains, a roleplay on RPG

It hadn’t been too difficult for Rilien to extract himself and Estella from the party, and he knew nothing would come down on her for his involvement in Madeline’s death, considering she was already supposed to be dead, and his apprentice’s alibi was rather solid. Regardless, that part was done, and he’d sent her back to the barracks with a letter of his own to place in the same spot she’d found the feather.

The name of her shame is Madeline.

After that, it was a matter of waiting. He did not anticipate it would take long for someone else he knew to find a strange swan feather where they slept, and when they did, he would know that her game was once more afoot. Until then, he simply went about his business as he always did, putting any incidental thoughts regarding Madeline and what her existence in that cell must have implied from his mind any time they happened to enter.

It was three days before the next task began.

The bells above the door into Rilien's shop chimed to announce his visitor. The voice that followed soon after gave him their name. "Rilien?" Aurora called aloud, "I've something for you." There was a certain sternness in her voice and a slight furrow to her brow as she spoke. Whatever she had, she was clearly not pleased by it. She approached his counter and reached into her shirt for it. What she pulled out was another envelope addressed to Rilien, though this one's white wax seal was already torn. She tossed it on the counter and shook her head as she tried to find the first question she wanted to ask.

Instead, she decided on an explanation. "I found it on my bed with a feather when I returned home. On my bed, Rilien," she repeated. She went to some lengths to assure she remained anonymous in Lowtown. To come home and find that a letter penned to Rilien awaited her disconcerted her. Whoever left it knew that she knew Rilien and it worried her to think what else they might know of her. Not only that, but they were also skilled enough to bypass all of the security that Amalia helped install.

"Who is it from and why deliver it to me instead of you. And why is it talking about a... a crown?!" Aurora asked, gesturing wildly.

Rilien did not answer immediately, instead reaching into the envelope for its contents. Unsurprisingly, it was short and cryptic, doubtless a notation on the second verse of the rhyme he’d been given. The crown weighs heaviest on one never meant to wear it. He set the parchment back down and leveled his eyes at Aurora.

"The letters are from a woman named Marquise Aurelie Montblanc. She heads an organization called Le Nichoir. It’s a well-structured conglomerate of bards, one of the most reputable in Orlais. I regret to inform you that nobody’s secrets are secret from her, if she does not desire them to be, but I doubt very much you have anything to worry about. She does not do anything without a lucrative reason, and selling mage identities to Templars is beneath her. Or she believes as much, which has the same effect.” He placed the letter back in its envelope, having a distinct feeling he now understood the parameters of the second task.

"Were I you, I would be more concerned about the fact that the feather represents a contract on your life, to be carried out by one of her agents unless I manage to accomplish what she has asked of me.” He tilted his head at her, something in his expression even graver than usual.

It was a lot to digest, and left Aurora standing with her mouth agape, equal parts confused and upset. Finally resetting her jaw, the furrow in her brow deepened. "I'm concerned about it all thank you!" Her hand found her forehead and her eyes widened. Not only did they know where she slept and how to get to it, but she was also apparently marked for death by an organization of bards. Usually when someone wanted them dead, they were forward about it and it could be solved with a liberal amount of force in a specific direction.

She took a step back from the counter and began to pace the room. "Assassination? I've never had to deal with assassination before Rilien! And why me!" she said, her tone taking an indignant turn. "I'm not important enough to be assassinated! I haven't even done anything to warrant it!" She said defensively. The most frustrating thing was that she didn't see any way around it. She couldn't take on an entire organization. From the looks of things, she could hardly keep one agent out of her own home.

"What am I supposed to do Rilien? I'm not leaving another home, and they'd probably find me if I did," she said, still pacing. She knew he was tranquil, but for a moment she wished Rilien could show that he was as worried about this as she was.

Rilien reached a hand over the counter and laid it on Aurora’s shoulder. Far from tactile by nature, he knew that nevertheless it was often reassuring to others, and since he could not properly show concern, he thought the least he could do would be to offer the token of comfort. "I told you: the contract will be voided if I can complete a task for Aurelie. This is something I intend to do, quite soon considering I know now what it is.” He allowed his brows to furrow slightly. "You did not think I would simply let you die?”

"No..." Aurora said calming down, though she still looked rather nervous about the whole thing. "It's just... When I was a little girl, I was always afraid of being hunted by the Crows. This just brought back some of those old fears," she explained. She then sighed and rubbed her eyes, "Okay. Okay, what does the letter mean? Is it a riddle or... Something?" She asked. "The quicker we can do this task the sooner I can put my mind at ease... At least somewhat." The fact that someone is able to get into her house announced would likely stick with her for some time now.

The Tranquil let his hand fall, nodding slightly. "It is part of one. I am supposed to bring her what she calls ‘the gold that lies o’er the crown of the cold.’ She also says that the ‘crown weighs heaviest on one never meant to wear it.’” He paused a moment, giving her a look laden with meaning. "Who do we know that could be described as 'cold' and also wears a crown never meant for them?”

"Meredith," the answer was immediate, and the tone used implied her distaste.

"Just so.” Rilien nodded again. "My task is to steal something that belongs to Meredith, something quite specific. Doing this will involve disguising myself and gaining admittance to the Gallows.” Getting in wouldn’t really be all that difficult. Getting access to Meredith herself would be a challenge, but not impossible. The whole thing was extremely high risk, but that in and of itself was no deterrent for Rilien.

"It will be a rather humiliating loss, if that is something you are interested in assisting with.”

Ordinarily, she wouldn't be too fond of the idea of sneaking into the Gallows in order to steal something from the Knight-Commander herself. However, ordinary circumstances usually didn't leave her as the target of some bardic organization. That and opportunities to humiliate Meredith didn't come along all that often. Aurora straightened and crossed her arms, looking at Rilien with a raised brow.

"Just how humiliating, exactly?"

Rilien had turned his attention to straightening his shop, but this was not to say that he missed the query. It was reasonable, he supposed; as far as Aurora knew, if she agreed she’d be walking right into the same place she’d been avoiding for nearly a decade with only him as support. Perhaps not the most confidence-instilling of situations. "I will be sneaking past her guards into her private quarters while she is sleeping and absconding with a cutting of her hair.”

It was the logical answer to the riddle. Aurelie had asked for something worn over Meredith’s crown. Either she wanted her hood, which was unlikely since it was red, or ‘crown’ in that line referred to the crown of her head, over which was, of course, hair. As it was blonde, it would constitute ‘gold,’ so he was quite confident that this was what he was being asked to do. The implications of being able to successfully do such a thing were obvious: if he could get close enough to cut her hair and leave, he could just as easily have cut her throat instead. Meredith would know this, her immediately lieutenants, if she blamed them for the security failure, would know it, and their unease would filter down the ranks, even if the Templar footsoldiers didn’t understand the reason. He didn’t know why Aurelie wished to destabilize the order even that little bit, but he was certain she had a reason.

A crooked grin spread across Aurora lips. "Yes, that would knock her down a peg," she agreed. Not only that, but it would reveal that even she was not invincible and that the control she exerted only extended so far. The smile soon faded however, as she thought more about it. While the message would be clear, Meredith would then possibly try to close any perceived gaps. She may even go so far as to come down on the mages in the Circle, thinking that perhaps they had something to do with it. She then frowned, she'd rather not make life harder for the mages in the Circle if she was at all able. However, it didn't seem like she had much of a choice, Rilien would do the task with or without her help she knew, and she would not leave him on his own while he saves her life.

"I'm worried what she might do to the mages in the Circle, but I'm not going to let you do this by yourself," she said, crossing her arms.

"Then we make sure she knows the responsible party isn’t a mage.” He could simply take a leaf out of his own former book, and that of his Bardmistress. Calling cards were quite effective in such instances, anyway.

"The first thing we will need is a disguise.”

Rilien's plan to get into the Gallows was to disguise both Aurora and himself as transfer mages. A group of such mages were already scheduled to arrive from Ostwick, so all it took was for him to draw up fake documents and procure a pair of fake phylacteries for them to slip in. However they could not simply go as themselves. They would have to disguise themselves if they did not wish to be discovered later.

Aurora was unrecognizable. Gone was her short scarlet hair, replaced by a mane of flowing brown. A little dye and a few locks of dark walnut hair and Rilien hid her most noticeable feature. Her emerald irises were also a dark brown now, owing to a potion Rilien had concocted, and the freckles dotting her face were gone under a layer of make up. The chink in the bridge of her nose from having it broken was also gone, replaced instead by a hook toward the tip from the prosthetic he had applied. He had also put her in the typical plain blue robes of the Circle. She was now completely nondescript and entirely ordinary.

Rilien himself looked no more like usual than Aurora did. His snowy hair had been darkened to black, his eye color deepened to a flat amber. The brand on his face was of course concealed, and he’d applied liberal cosmetics even under his clothes to hide his tattoos. His robes were the yellow belonging to an ordinary Enchanter, neither apprentice nor senior, as would be expected of someone of his visual age. Perhaps more than any physical alteration, however, his appearance was transformed by his body language—he walked with a pronounced slouch, wary eyes and the tendency to move several feet in a given direction when one would do, like an overly skittish, nervous fellow. The cut of his robes was too loose, leaving him to look like he was drowning in them, and much skinnier than was accurate.

He was, for the moment, one of any number of high-strung, Templar-shy mages, awkward and clearly uncomfortable, but not in the least suspicious. It was a demeanor he’d seen dozens of times in his own Circle days, and the Templars escorting them were obviously used to it as well. He stuck close to Aurora, as though they were friends, which would make it much less interesting if they were later seen in the same places on a fairly consistent basis.

They were loaded onto boats not too long after the two of them had snuck into the procession, unnoticed as extra since the number of heads matched the number of phylacteries, and the number of transfer documents. The mages didn’t think anything of it, either, as trips like this sometimes contained more than one stop, and they were all a little preoccupied with their own trepidation. Act like you belonged in a place, and people tended to assume you did. This was basic psychology, and he’d learned it well long ago.

The Gallows soon came into sight, and they were made to disembark without their belongings, which was fine because he and Aurora hadn’t brought much of anything, and nothing of importance was in what they had. Their things would be inspected, of course, but nobody bothered to pat down a mage. What need had they for other kinds of weapons when they had magic? Most would be lucky to know which end of a knife to hold anyway.

Herded into a small receiving hall, they each reviewed their documents with the Quartermaster, an older man with grey at his temples and an utterly disinterested look on his face. “Name?” He had Rilien’s forged paperwork there in front of him, of course, but this was rote procedure. It wasn’t often that anyone impermissible wanted into a Circle, after all. Getting out was usually the more desirable maneuver.

Rilien shuffled, as though nervously, and stammered his answer. "A-Arron. Of Ostwick.” Most city elves didn’t really have last names, so that didn’t get so much as a second take out of the Templar.

“Phylactery?” That was directed not at him, but at one of the Templars unloading the boats, and after a small pause wherein one of the women found the vial with his false name on it, she nodded, and the Quartermaster, still bored, waved him through.

Snippet #2628031

located in Kirkwall, a part of The City of Chains, one of the many universes on RPG.

Setting

Characters Present

Footnotes