Taking the Report
Log Info
- Title: Taking the Report
- Emitter: Telamon
- Place: Temple of Daeus
- Summary: Andelena checks into the Temple of Daeus to attend to a missive requesting her presence and discovers that Telamon is there on behalf of his father, and he's requesting information on the Colin Phileaston incident. Plying Andelena with a bit of his magical alcohol, the Sunguard's able to recount the details he needs without losing her lunch (again). She departs with some unsolicited wedding advice for Telamon and goes home to her man and her cat.
It's been a few days since the dust-up at Colin Phileaston's house, enough time for nightmares and horror to fade. Such is the life of an adventurer. But a missive was posted for Andelena, requesting her presence at the temple of Daeus to meet with a representative of the Arcanists' Society, presumably to discuss the events in that horribly distorted house. With her luck, it'll probably be some old longbeard, half-deaf, and he'll probably nod off during the story.
As Andelena enters the temple, her attention is probably drawn to an older Sunblade who is haranguing a younger, somewhat put-upon Sunguard. The paladin's voice is pretty audible, to boot.
"TREASON AND HERESY! Everywhere I look, I see rules being stretched, and laws being broken, and protocols being dragged outside and kicked to death! I've made a list: ONE, Skirren keeps using the animated wagon for crossbow practice. TWO, Waveriel and Sidirah insist on playing tanglefoot bag tag outside my office. THREE, the warning signs that Denpari put up near the sewer manholes are riddled with misplaced apostrophes. FOUR: Spargoth keeps touching his--"
"Sir Magnar!" the Sunguard interrupts, raising his hands. "I... look, maybe you need to calm down. Relax a bit."
The paladin looks confused at the idea. "That's not even a word. I'd have heard of it."
The harried looking Sunguard catches sight of Andelena, and bows. "Oh, Knight's blessings, Andelena. The representative is waiting over there. I'll... um... be working out Sir Magnar's issues."
'Over there' is a small area off the main temple floor, used for quiet counseling, with comfortable chairs and a table. A man -- a half-elven one, in fact -- is seated there, dressed in fine clothing, his platinum hair spilling over his shoulders as he inspects a book hovering in midair next to him.
The ranting and raving gets Andelena's attention, all right. The Sunguard's striding in from her shift to check in with the Temple and attend to the subject of the missive before she heads off for the night for some much needed rest and relaxation with her man and her cat, but the elderly Sunblade sounding like he's going to put the imprint of his boot into someone's backside... Well, curiosity killed the cat, they say.
Maybe don't say that to a Sunguard who just adopted a scraggly little calico kitten off the street, though.
"Knight's blessing, brother," Andelena echoes. "Thanks for the pointer, and don't bother trying to explain the concept of relaxing to Sir Magnar. Pretty sure Sir Magnar's unfamiliar with it because his mom thought he was allergic to it growing up."
The barb's delivered with a wry smile that lets both Daeusites know she meant it only in good-natured humor, not disrespect, and she walks over to the the designated area... And she stops in place when she sees the half-elf man. "Hey Telamon," she says. "Aren't you like, getting married or something soon?" The question is obviously a humorous one. The twinkle in her steel-grey eyes suggests she knows all about it, given that her fiance is one of Telamon's groomsmen.
Telamon glances up from his book, and smiles, standing up as Andelena approaches. "Yes, but weddings don't pay for themselves, and so I'm helping out the Society. It's kind of a shared investigation, really, between the Society, the Shining Chalice, and the University over what happened." He politely gestures for Andie to sit down, before returning to his chair. "Less than a week away, though. I'm trying -not- to lose my composure. Fortunately, I've plenty of friends to help prop me up."
"I read the preliminary report you gave the guild -- father got a copy -- and it sounded pretty harrowing." Smoothly, Telamon opens his haversack, withdrawing a pair of cups and a plain bottle with a rough label on it -- a crudely printed sunburst. "So I figured if I wanted to ask questions, I'd best do it in friendly surroundings, with something to ease the way."
Andelena smirks, which is an expression that's about as comfortable and easy on her face as her trademark squint and analytical frown. "Yeah, don't worry," she says as she takes the indicated seat. "Already told Bry to beat you seven ways from here to Korday if you got cold feet. He'll make sure you're upright."
She glances at the cups, but she gives the bottle with its rough label a more judgmental squint. "Something to ease the way? You giving me some kind of homemade hooch or something, Tel? Didn't know you were a brewer. Either way, boy, I probably need some, because I tend to get the fucking weird jobs--and this one was sure fucking weird."
"I figured as much. And if he doesn't, Skiel will, and if Skiel doesn't, my cousin Algar definitely will. To say nothing of my mother." Despite his voiced concerns, Telamon seems oddly relaxed. "It's like... diving into a deep pool. Approaching the edge, knowing you're going to hit that water regardless."
He chuckles softly, uncapping the bottle. "Sort of. I came across a book on brewing magical spirits and liquors, and I've been working on translating and experimenting with it. I figured this would be appropriate -- it's called 'Daeus's Embrace'." The bottle gurgles as he pours a measure of gold into each cup, the liquid shimmering like sunlight. "It's not going to get you completely wobble-kneed, but I suspect it'll make the answers come a little easier."
"You're only scared because you're young and this is probably the biggest thing that's happened in your life so far," Andelena says. It's said not in a patronizing tone, but in an empathetic tone. "You may think, 'Well, what the fuck, Andie, I'm a fuckin' magic user swinging my big fuckin' magic dick around and throwing fireballs all godsdamned day, I'm not afraid of shit,' but it's true. Getting married's not just a thing you can like, take back to the stall and demand a refund unless you're getting annulled after a bad night of debauchery in Selentia that involved you and some dude you just met. It's a commitment."
She takes the cup once it's filled and raises it slightly in Telamon's direction. "And all that shit is a long-winded way of saying... Cheer up bud, it's normal. To your marriage and years of happiness to follow. May they last longer than how long it takes for my new cat to get into trouble." She takes a sip and nods appreciatively of the flavor.
The Sunguard looks over the rim of her glass and... blinks. "Fuck, you weren't kidding about it being magical. I feel all... warm and fuzzy inside. Huh. Anyway, whaddya wanna know?"
Telamon raises his eyebrows, and there's something there in his face that's... not resisting the advice. Receptive, rather. "That was kind of my thought on it, to be honest," he says, with a smile. "But thank you, Andelena. I mean it. This is a big step, for both Lana and myself. Honestly, sorcery is easy compared to marriage."
He takes a sip as well, savoring it. "So, yeah, let's get to business. According to the report, Phileaston's house was a one-story building, but you stated there were stairs and a second floor?" He's pulled out a writing board and is taking notes as he listens.
"Yup, and a third floor," Andelena elaborates. "I thought it was weird, too, but it was pretty fucking clear the magic had altered the insides of that place significantly. First floor's windows showed docks from someplace else. Second floor's windows showed red hills and... mushroom shit. Third floor's windows showed the stars with this massive black hole in the middle."
She knocks back another sip of the drink named for her god's touch, and she quietly lingers in it for a moment before she adds, "I cannot stress enough how fucked up that place was, Telamon," she says. "You want a happy life with your wife, don't fucking do what that man did. Nothing could save him short of a divine miracle, and he didn't get one that day."
The half-elf nods, writing, his expression sober. "The city brought in a crew of magicians from the University to check it over after it collapsed. They... found Phileaston's remains. It wasn't pretty." He takes another drink, before leaning back a bit in his chair. "The... artifact had pretty clearly misfired -- the windows were probably looking at other places, not necessarily on Ea either."
He shudders. "No, I've no desire to try what he did. Foolish I may be, but I'm not stupid. I imagine it'll be an object lesson to other spellcasters that meddling with the ward is a bad idea."
The Sunguard nods as she contemplates things some more. "Yeah," she says, finally. "When we got to him... He was fucked up. I've seen some shit, and I don't sicken or scare too easily, but yeah. I lost my meal. So did Magpie, poor little firecracker that she is."
She sighs and throws back another drink, wiping her mouth clean with the back of her hand when she's done. "I hope he's resting easier in the Halls. That is not a good way to go. Not a good way at all. Just... fuck."
Telamon shakes his head sadly. "I don't think there's any good way to go at all, to be honest. Aside from the old saw about in your own bed, of old age, with a bellyful of good wine." He sighs. "From the report, he was probably dead or nigh on when you found him. That sort of... distortion rarely ends well."
He looks over what he's written so far, before looking up. "If it's any consolation, the ... reaction, and subsequent collapse of the distortion, also destroyed the artifact. The University was able to salvage some bits and pieces, but they're..." He pauses, looking for a good word. "Inert? Whatever power was there is gone. So there's that." He pauses. "It also states you mentioned finding the clothes of a squad of watchmen in the house."
"Again, you're younger than me," Andelena says with a small smirk. "Sure, dying's hard on the living left behind, and the peaceful ways are what a lot of people prefer, but there's also dying a painful death to save someone else. I always figured it was preferable to die young when you can still shit when you want to shit and piss when you want to piss, rather than when your body decides to do it for you, but hey, preference is a preference, and so far I've done a pretty fucking poor job of dying so far, so maybe I can look forward to being old, incontinent, and incompetent in a few decades."
She looks sober again at the mention of the clothes. "Yeah," she says. "The clothes and... trapped spirits. I don't know if that was really them or not, the spirits. Bry might have done better with the identification on 'em, because he's good at that shit."
"I admit, I might have a slightly different view on the matter. When you're young, you really do think on some level you'll live forever." Telamon shrugs. "And then people get older, and they come to two conclusions: they make peace with it, or... they try to run from it. And that second one never ever ends well." He grins suddenly. "So while we live, let us live."
He glances back down at his notes. "Yeah, funny thing about that. They found those guards. Alive and well. Buck naked, at Granaulg's poultry farm, in the..." He pauses. "'Dire chicken coop'? The last thing they said they remembered was actually prying a window open to try and get out, because the door opened on a blank wall. How the hell they got translocated outside the city is beyond me -- probably a side effect of the distortion."
Andelena looks like her pleasant buzz by Daeus's Embrace has been thoroughly ruined by the mention of the chicken coop, and she groans as she brings her free hand to her forehead. "Fuck me in the ass, the fucking chicken coop," she says in a way that suggests she doesn't, in fact, want the subject of her first utterance. "Yeah, course they'd end up there. That's where all the sad, strange little men go when they're all fucked up. I wrestled a naked man covered in bacon grease there once."
She hastily gets more of the alcohol into her system again. "I couldn't eat bacon for weeks. And I fucking love bacon, Telamon. Or I did before I had to inhale both that and the guy's musk in one fucking infernal sitting. Worst fucking combination. Can't recommend it and I hope you never have to endure that."
Then the Sunguard takes in a breath. Rant over. "Probably should investigate that coop to see if it's some sort of anchorway for weird shit. Like that's where all the fucking leylines converge and go, 'Yup, this is where the fucking bizarre-ass stuff goes. Right here on this point in time and space specifically to say 'fuck you' to Andelena of Selentia.'" Nevermind, rant's not over.
Telamon just kind of gapes at this, before calmly refilling Andie's cup and his own. "That sounds like..." He stops, and then rethinks his approach, "...the kind of story you only laugh about after a year has passed." He shakes his head. "I think we've all got tales like that. Good, bad, or strange. It'll get better with time. Even the really bad ones... can fade."
He shakes his head, taking another sip of his drink. "But yes, they were ahead of you. The head of the conjuration department is out there with a dozen grad students doing ley line and mana flow inspection to see if he can tell what caused them to be dumped out there. He thinks it's similar to a teleport mishap, but..." He hurriedly flips back through some of his notes. "Two of the guards are actually farm lads, and they both said they were thinking of 'home' when they went through the window. Maybe that was the closest it could get?"
Andelena pffts at the mention of farm lads. "Yeah, checks out," she says. "Pretty sure when the chips are down, Bry thinks of two things: his ma and pa back on the farm, and me. Or... maybe three. He won't fess up to it, but I think he's getting pretty fond of Patches."
She looks at Telamon after a moment. "Patches is our cat," she explains. "Scrawny little thing that I saw on the street near here, and she kept hanging around here. So... I told Bry about her while I was thinking about my childhood cat, and he let me scoop up the little thing and keep her in our apartment."
Then the Sunguard waves her hand. "You didn't come here to hear about my cat, though. Magic is weird shit, but that kind of makes sense to me. Your theory, that is."
Telamon grins at Andelena. "What's wrong with cats? Though we don't have one, ourselves." He looks a bit wry. "Granted, between the various fey creatures, it's crowded as it is..." He taps his fingers together, his expression pensive. "Doesn't explain where those trapped spirits came from, but as screwed up as space was in the tower, they could've... well, leaked in from elsewhere. Another damned good reason to shut it down."
He cocks his head, and smiles. "How is Dolan doing, anyways? I know he's been busy as hell, but then, I've been distracted too. Everything going all right with him? No more headaches?"
"Nothing's wrong with cats. Quite the opposite, actually--people get scared of me sometimes, and they should," Andelena says with a return grin at Telamon, "but I do have a soft spot for animals. And kids. Cats are special, though."
She looks a little more... warm at the question about Dolan. "Bry's okay," she says. "Headaches are still ongoing when he looks at magical stuff using the Knight's guidance. He's also just kind of... expecting to see werewolves and other scary shit around the corner any second. He's on edge a lot, and I worry about that sometimes."
"Hmmm," Telamon's nonverbal comment may not be a word, but there's a lot there: concern, and shared experience with Dolan. "There've been some indications that the werewolves are trying to regroup. I don't think they played nice with the Dragonier wights, and vice-versa. Which... is a small blessing. As a result, they're still in a bit of disarray." His expression grows set. "But that low-life Zalgiman, now... I'll be more than happy to dispose of him if he comes crawling around again."
Tel shakes his head, looking over his notes. "Not sure what else there is to cover. If you've got anything to add regarding this incident, I'm... well, not all ears. Half-elf, so I can only get halfway there." His eyes twinkle as he grins.
Andelena snorts. "Nothing I can add, even for your halfway attempts," she said. "Really, I divulged everything I could think of. And... honestly, I'm just glad for a bit of peace, or something resembling it, anyway."
She looks at Telamon for a moment and says, "Oh. This doesn't have to do with the report, but I met your dad. Seems like a nice guy. Having met him now, I can only imagine you got more of your looks from your mom. Not a bad thing, just saying--I got more of my mother's looks and I hate the woman, but that doesn't mean your mom is."
Telamon nods. "Father mentioned he'd come forward to assist when he found out what Phileaston was up to, though sadly it was too late to stop it. He talked about an adventuring team being sent in to disable the artifact. Didn't realize you were part of it till I got to see the report later." His lips quirk. "Honestly, my resemblance to my father is mostly around the nose and jaw. I definitely look a bit more like mother, though the hair is definitely through the elven side. It crops up from time to time among certain families."
He sighs a bit. "I think father feels a little guilty over the whole mess, though it wasn't his fault. Phileaston sent him a letter claiming he'd found something that would fix 'all his problems with floor space', so of course father's reaction was 'Wait, what?!'. But before he could get down here and warn the man off, well..." He winces. "Nasty business all around."
Andelena smiles a little. "The way you talk about your parents--sounds like they love each other a lot. And that they love you, too. I'd call you a lucky son of a bitch, but one, that'd be an insult to your mom, and two, I got out of my angry 'I hate everyone that had a better childhood phase' once I got some sense knocked into me at the first Temple I was sent to."
She shrugs her shoulders. "Believe me, man--you just can't win them all. Can't save them all. That eats at a lot of people and keeps them up at night. Make sure your dad's okay. I know that's rich coming from me, since he's an elf and all--he's had lots more time to see awful shit--but, y'know. I'm a Sunguard. I care about people. That's my job."
Telamon's face softens a bit. "They do. On all counts. It was... a shock to me when I went out into the world and found out not everyone had that benefit." He sips from his cup, letting the warmth suffuse him. "All I can do is try to show others, that there are people who do care about them. And make sure that the night's safe for them."
"Father's seen some things. I think he's made some hard decisions, too, but he hates feeling like he might've been in a position to do something and it didn't work. Still... he's in town. Part of the Mythwood delegation, in fact. He'll travel back with us to Ylvaliel for the wedding, so he's not going to have a chance to stew over this."
Andelena reaches over and pats Telamon on the shoulder. "You got heart, bud, but just remember that you gotta save some of that light for yourself, y'know? Can't keep being people's light if your light's eventually snuffed out from giving too much of it away. Or, as someone else put it to me once--you shouldn't set yourself on fire to warm someone up who's gone cold."
She sets her cup down and gets up from her chair. "I won't be able to make the wedding, sadly," she says, "but I'm sure it'll be a hell of a time. Just, uh, make sure Bry doesn't come back almost eaten by the king of the slugs or whatever." Sluagh, Andie. Sluagh.
Telamon smiles slightly. "No, we're not expecting any wedding crashers. The only fey I expect to be in attendance -- aside from the pixies -- is Lana's grandfather. And he's officiating. Dolan -- Bry -- will be returned safe and sound." He pauses. "He may be a bit spoiled from the reception and feel the need to outdo us, but that's your problem and his." He grins, as he stands.
"No, I've no intention of burning myself out. I'll soon have a wife, and there'll be children in time. Sometimes, it's enough to simply light the candle and go from there."
Andelena rolls her eyes and snorts. "Well, I sure as shit don't have a fey grandfather stowed away or shoved up my ass somewhere," she says, "so I can't outdo you there. I dunno, maybe we'll have Patches be the ringbearer or something. This is assuming Bry and I are not just having a quickie wedding and running off someplace warm and sandy to fuck each other's brains out."
She shrugs and gives Telamon a grin. "Anyway, good seeing you, Telamon. Have a fun time. Drink lots of water, don't get sloppy drunk at your wedding, and don't break your pelvis on the honeymoon. Those are my three bits of unsolicited advice."
The Sunguard walks off and through the Temple. After all, there's a cat and a man waiting for her.