[center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][table][row][/row][row][cell]
[h2][color=FF6C5C][i][b]Marita Bärbel[/b][/i][/color][/h2][i][b][color=FF6C5C]Human, Cleric, Level 3[/color][/b][/i]
[color=FF6C5C][i][b]HP:[/b][/i][/color] 18/18	[color=FF6C5C][i][b]Armor Class:[/b][/i][/color] 18	[color=FF6C5C][i][b]Conditions:[/b][/i][/color] N/A
[color=FF6C5C][i][b]Location:[/b][/i][/color] Avonshire (region)
[color=FF6C5C][i][b]Action:[/b][/i][/color] Investigation
[color=FF6C5C][i][b]Bonus Action:[/b][/i][/color] N/A
[color=FF6C5C][i][b]Reaction:[/b][/i][/color] N/A 
[/cell][/row][/table][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center]
Marita listened to Hugh's assessment of the situation and couldn't really believe what she was hearing. Yeah technically if Victoria hadn't moved onto the frontlines she would have been less likely to have been targeted by the hidden archers, but it was pretty obvious to her that she'd done it to cover up the hole in their positioning left by Kathryn. She couldn't understand why he'd assert that it wasn't the fighter's fault unless he was being willfully daft or contrarian just to argue against her. Either way it wouldn't be worth responding to that statement, especially since Victoria herself did a fine job of stating the obvious to him.

[color=FF6C5C]"And as I said you needn't apologize to me; nothing that happened to me was likely to change with your presence."[/color] Although her words were reassuring, her tone was anything but. It was stern as iron and sharp as flint. It was then that something Victoria said struck a chord in her. [i]They deserve a proper burial.[/i]

[color=FF6C5C]"Wait,"[/color] Marita spoke aloud to herself, but she couldn't stop the words from flowing out. [color=FF6C5C]"What exactly is a filled coffin doing in a wagon with that much wine?"[/color] Marita knelt down to the ground and pored over the coffin. 

[color=FF6C5C]"This amount of wine is something that you would expect for a commercial shipment. I can't see even a noble house purchasing so much for their own consumption or a single occasion. So why is a cadaver here along with it? Even for a major ball I doubt they would go through more than one of these casks. Who was this?"[/color] The cleric found the coffin, although dirty and a bit scuffed from its poor treatment at the hands of goblins was in good condition, as if only made weeks ago at the latest. It was clearly made not as a mass produced commodity but for this particular individual. Frustratingly there was nothing else she could find that would illuminate the owner's identity, even after she cast a Guidance spell to reveal its secrets.

[color=FF6C5C]"Why is it that the more we learn or discover about this place, the less sense it makes?"[/color] This question's lack of an answer was cut off by the return of Kathryn with a pair of oxen, presumably the beasts that were pulling this cart before it was attacked. Marita ran her fingers through her hair before she stood once more and addressed her companions.

[color=FF6C5C]"Alright, it's probably about time we decide what we're to do from here. If there's nothing else anybody has noticed for us to discover here, we should probably start making preparations to depart again. Now we can continue to Avonshire as planned, or we could try heading West to see if indeed that's where the goblins' base of operations is. This new wagon situation demands that we split up a bit, if only to have a driver on each vehicle. However, we can also choose to investigate both at the same time by having one group go West and the other North. If we do decide to do simultaneous inquisitions I'd suggest that Victoria drive the cart with the wine and cadaver since she possesses proof that the goods were attacked by goblins rather than it looking like we stole the cargo ourselves. Any thoughts?"[/color]