[center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][table][row][/row][row][cell] [h2][color=darkorchid][i][b]Victoria Belmont[/b][/i][/color][/h2][i][b][color=9932cc]Half-Elf, Bard, Level 3[/color][/b][/i] [color=9932cc][i][b]HP:[/b][/i][/color] 23 / 23 [color=9932cc][i][b]Armor Class:[/b][/i][/color] 15 [color=9932cc][i][b]Conditions:[/b][/i][/color] N/A [color=9932cc][i][b]Location:[/b][/i][/color] Neil & Bob's Public House, Bar [color=9932cc][i][b]Action:[/b][/i][/color] N/A [color=9932cc][i][b]Bonus Action:[/b][/i][/color] N/A [color=9932cc][i][b]Reaction:[/b][/i][/color] N/A [/cell][cell] [right][img]https://i.ibb.co/gJmht9Q/Victoria-Post-Funeral.png[/img][/right] [/cell][/row][/table][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center] Well, Victoria [i]did say[/i] that the guy on the floor deserved worse. Part of her felt that this might have been too much. This part was quiet within her as other, less forgiving elements of her psyche narrowed her eyes and brought a dark smile to her face. It was small; it was subtle. But the mirth at the man's suffering was apparent to one watching closely. The young Half-Elf had to stop herself from swaying her hand back and forth, as if conducting an invisible orchestra playing the man's tortured screams. Victoria did not believe the assault was necessary, having already done her part to traumatize the ruffian for his transgressions against her, but was not going to protest this with any real conviction. Somewhere, in the back of her mind, Victoria gave a shade of thought to the far-flung possibility of the man slipping into the Great Hereafter from the shock to his body, and if his body might be claimed in a lawful manner (owing to her promise to the Cleric) for her own curiosities. They even had access to a very nice, richly appointed coffin This thought was shaken off quickly, however. As much of a villian as he had played this night, he very likely had a family that would want better for his earthly remains. Maybe she could even perform the ceremony... Present reality summoned Victoria's attention. This was most likely a good thing. It was Kosara, positively gushing about her evening. At first, the Bard cleared her mind and readied to take in any information that Kosara might have picked up in the course of her investigation so far this evening. V soon discovered that, instead of trying to find leads, she had gotten herself into a bit of fun. The Half-Elf kept her face neutral, carefully taking another small sip of her wine. Responding to her question, Victoria carefully explained, [color=9932cc]"Adventures, no. Not really. I interred Monsieur L'Rose in accordance with his wishes. Or, his family's."[/color] That last addition was because, not knowing the man, he had to trust what his daughter-in-law and granddaughter had told her. [color=9932cc]"It doesn't sound like I had as much fun as you did. But it was rewarding."[/color] She kept the odd feeling of being watched on her way back to town out of the conversation, at least for now. [color=9932cc]"Several bottles of local vintages were donated on behalf of the bereaved."[/color] If nothing else, they would be flush on wine for a while. The extreme openness with which Kosara initiated camaraderie with this Elf in front of them was a gamble, to Victoria's estimation. Time would see if it paid off. But speaking to wine, Victoria looked on almost expectantly as Kathryn picked up the entire rest of the decanter of the very expensive wine, waiting quietly for the imminent glug-fest which was to occur. There was a tiny amount of disappointment about the sudden switch to ale, but that was [i]probably[/i] a pragmatic decision, considering the potency difference. As the tall, powerful woman selected and motioned to her with her beverage of choice, Victoria smiled and raised her cup slightly in a silent toast before sipping once again herself. Draining a full glass was not her style. Polite imbibing in answer to a collective invitation to drink, however, was. Victoria glanced about to make sure that she still had a line of sight to Marita, just to confirm that her adventuring group was fully present. Satisfied, she directed her attention back to their new acquaintance, Rickard. She still wasn't sure what to make of him, even if they had a similar reason to be in town. Some of this was a willingness to put up money for perfect strangers. Some of it was the way he carried and described himself. She might have labelled it as youthful exuberance except that he was much older than the rest of them, thanks to his heritage. Perhaps it [i]was[/i] just exuberance. [color=9932cc]"I have a nice, warm spot to stay this evening, thank you,"[/color] she said in response to Rickard's inquiry. Looking around for the barmaid, she absently continued, [color=9932cc]"I could really go for a bowl of something warm, though..."[/color] She had neglected to find much at all to eat since that pear she purchased on the way into the Township initially. Catching Lea's eye, Victoria blushed slightly and gave her a little wave. A demure smile crossed her lips when the Human lady approached her and V addressed her with a sweet, melodic voice, [color=9932cc]"Hi... The man said it was last call for food?"[/color] She paused, nodding, eyes falling upon hers. Her smile broadened into something more warm and welcoming, voice developing into nigh hypnotic tones, [color=9932cc]"I would absolutely love anything you could bring me, this late in the evening, please."[/color] The Bard gently took Lea's hand and placed the requisite coins into it, and carefully closed it back. [color=9932cc]"Thank you [i]so[/i] much."[/color] When the cheerful barmaid left to procure the stew, last batch of the evening, Victoria let out a short, frustrated sigh. It was quickly covered over by her practiced, cultured demeanor. [color=9932cc]"I think rest should be in order soon,"[/color] she mused. It had been a day.