A Conspiracy of Ravens [Everyone]

"Tonight is when Ka'Ri wants me to play her bodyguard, so if we go 'study' now that's probably the best arrangement." Sithani frowns. "Gods, it's so weird using 'study' as code for 'not having sex'."

"Wait," said Thimb, eyes widening, "that's what that means?!" she asked aghast, several conversations she had had with other green casters suddenly being thrown into a very different light. "That's why they were so disappointed that I brought so many reference books..." she mumbled to herself in quiet revelation.

Ka'Ri blushed violently and her eyes widened. But she couldn't resist the chance to second the nomination for the Chimera Farm... for reasons she was sure were very important and not because she felt she didn't get enough time to really experience Thimb's home before rushing off last night. Okay, who was she kidding, but hopefully the others would believe she didn't have ulterior motives in adding her support.

"It uh... seems like a good next meeting spot. It's off the radar but it wouldn't be suspicious for us all to show up. I uh... think we should go for it if people are interested or you know..."

Stop talking, Ka'Ri!, she shouted at herself internally before letting her blush mix with a stronger blush of embarrassment. Trying in vain to gather herself together, she turned to Sithani.

"Excellent," she stammered, still as red as a storm sunrise, "I'll uh... need to make you look proper dock muscle, so you should meet up with me at {location that is discrete enough to spend an hour dressing her up and giving her makeup and won't notice a nob showing up}, that'll give us a chance to ask some questions and see if the nightdock drug trade suddenly got an influx of new business."

Sithani looks down at her own body. "I do hope 'muscle' is being used metaphorically here."

Ka'Ri laughs, her tension having been cut partially. "Don't worry, it's an attitude not a body shape, but if you're worried about it, I have some tricks for making you look more bulked out than you are."

Sunrise hides a smile. "The ranch sounds like a fantastic meeting place. Same time tomorrow, then. Ellowyn? Are you good with all this? Up for hitting the temple of Olidammara tonight?"

Glen, in the process of slinging his bow over his shoulder, steps quietly over to Rik. He holds out his hand for Rik to clasp. "We'll find him, Father. We'll make sure he is safe and get him to you as soon as we can."

"Alright then," says Sithani, "to the Feytower then, Thimb? With two of us, Gwynnestri's overblown teenage emotions should be easier to handle."

Rik clasps Glen's hand and arm firmly, his expression a mask of concern. "I thank you, sir. Please be gentle with my family. Thorn is... he will be worried."

Ellowyn had been so caught up taking in all this new information watching all the flirting and innuendo blushing quietly enjoying being around this many people for the first time ever really that theyd quite forgotten that they hadn't answered sunrise the first time.

"Oh im sorry dearheart I'm just trying to piece this all together in my mind it feels like a particularly tricky blueprint. But we're making some brilliant progress I feel." They say a little too brightly before they remembering that they were potentially talking about a very ill kidnapped girl and a young man with 2 small children on the run from abusive well connected thugs.

Their tone more sombre they carry on.

" Yes I can do the temple tonight if you want sunrise." They nod and smile then turn to thimb.

"I want to pick up some supplies to make some small medical kits, bandages poultices and the like, something that will help with general medical needs as well as contain a small amount of gwyns medicine so that no matter who finds her we can attend to her needs. Plus it gives us the a reasonable cover to be talking to all the folk we need to speak to."

They pull out the list of medicine and snack vendor that Luther gave them and the separate bit of paper that Laerdya wrote the potion recipe on.

"Sith you mentioned you read elvish but I don't know how busy you'll be with the diary but here's the list of ingredients to make the portion Gwyn needs and I have here" they put the laerdyas list on the table open for anyone to read and wave their notebook.

"A list of all the vendors that sell the pre made versions of all her medications and accoutrements plus the rare snack vendors courtesy of Luther"

They look around suddenly realizing they'd suddenly spoken a lot more than they had all meeting and blush

"Y'all are good people, smart people, if there's anyone that can pull this off its us."

They pause thoughtfully making sure they'd addressed all questions concerns and the like. They realise sunrise had mentioned speaking to Laerdya and their expression darkens.

"Sunrise, Laerdya is...." They falter look to ka'ri and sithani unsure how best to catagorise the meeting of that morning.

As they say the next bit the resolutely keep their eyes on sunrise desperate to not upset Rik. "Honestly in my professional opinion as a cleric she's blinded by emotion for her daughter and it's led to her treating Gwyn like a porcelain figure." They casually list of the medications Laerdya had Gwyn on.

"Half of these aren't necessary for someone with gwyns condition. She calls Gwyn delicate but ka'ri can tell you someone with her condition really isn't that delicate I mean if a pirate can manage it just fine then it no big deal for someone of gwyns means. I'm afraid Laerdya won't even entertain that she might not known Gwyn as well as she thought. She's unraveling and being uncooperative she accepts no help and I don't know how else we can help her right now other than to find Gwyn."

"Oh, yeah, just a minute." Sithani takes Laerdya's notes and starts to scribble a translation.

Ka'Ri nodded gravely along. "She's got honey-urine disease. Now, I don't know if any of you have had relatives with it, but if you have medicine and respond well to your body, you can be pretty active. Like, our ship wizard Karl had-has it and is still a fiesty competitor in the rigging races."

Ka'Ri chided herself the moment of weakness in thinking of Karl in the past tense. She wasn't going to let any of them slip over and she would not mourn a single one before all hope was extinguished that they could be saved.

"And yeah, I don't know much about clingy parent-types, mine were awful for a whole other raft of reasons, but we have a crewmember, Toph, who had similar parents and it really dragged on her how much they refused to see her as anything other than incapable."

"So that's definitely something we might face if we find her. That she may have no interest in going back to a life in the tower where she's treated as something she's not by a mother who refuses to see her or accept her as an adult. But that's a bridge we can sail under when we get to it."

Her lip curled a bit recounting that one. Parents who refused to see or accept the real her was something she knew way too much about and she had already decided there was no way she was going to send Gwynn back to Laerdya against her desires, mission be damned.

She also simultaneously thrilled and despaired at Ellowyn's eloquent brilliance. There were so many awesome fancy book-learned people and she was too rough to even talk with the nobs without everything going to Wee Jas's plane.

Well, the best she could hope for was to be herself and hope it all shook out. Which was important because she really wanted to become Ellowyn's friend so they could bond over the day-to-day frustrating trans stuff cis people never seemed to understand.

[Thread Close. Everyone receives 50 XP.]