[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 -> Brindleton's Woodworking [color=9932cc][i][b]Action:[/b][/i][/color] Investigation [color=9932cc][i][b]Bonus Action:[/b][/i][/color] [color=black]Morty[/color] [color=9932cc][i][b]Reaction:[/b][/i][/color] N/A [/cell][cell] [right][img]https://i.ibb.co/kJ2BTjD/Victoria-HF.png[/img][/right] [/cell][/row][/table][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center] Before exiting Neil & Bob's, Victoria made it a point to walk over to Marita and quietly intone that the two of them would be headed in the direction of their new associate's friend's business. [color=9932cc]"The missing fellow he spoke about last night - Brindleton? We're going to investigate there before the Dressmaker's shop opens."[/color] She took care to speak barely above that which was necessary to clearly hear from a distance close to the Cleric's ear. Sparing a wink and a shy smile in Lea's direction, Victoria departed. Morty dutifully followed behind, as only her loyal, animated stew ingredient might. Seeing as the area directly west of Neil & Bob's was the Farmers' Market, and they had toured that area of town already without seeing signs of a carpenter's full work area, it made sense that their journey would take then to a spot they hadn't been to, the northwest quarter of town. To attempt expedience, the Bard utilized the main roads; first north, then a solid left at the big fountain in the town center. It soon became apparent that their presence was gathering attention. Victoria hoped it didn't have too much to do with the display she put on the last night. Victoria was no stranger to people's whispers and stares. It was pretty much to be taken for granted, though it was interesting to note that many of the same ones who spoke about her in hushed tones, and from afar, would smile longingly at her and engage in some of the most saccharin conversation to her face. Man, woman, or indeterminate middle, it seemed to make no difference. People were duplicitous. Much of this could be shaken off, as from Victoria's experience this was the way of the world, but there was one thing she noticed above the others that morning, which gave her a small shot of adrenaline: A local talking to a guard and pointing in her direction. That stopped the horse in its tracks, so to speak. Not for the Bard herself, though. She was ever the entertainer, recognizing that this was not her cue to cease walking nor make a scene. Practiced nonchalance forced concerns of harassment by the constabulary from reaching her face and she carried on, her and Morty both. It was easier for Morty, being a mindless animation wrapped in utility cloth. Whatever luck could be had from the situation visited them, as no pursuit was apparent. The walk to the workshop was not eventful, despite her little scare. In contrast to the main streets, there was very little foot traffic here. Victoria hoped that this would be a help, as opposed to a hindrance. A lack of people usually was, to her experience, unless she was in the middle of more professional, musical pursuits. That was not the order of the hour, so, less attention was better. Victoria was genuinely surprised to see that the door stood unlocked. She spared a glance in Rickard's direction as if to ask him a question, but verbalized nothing. Entry to the location was a foregone conclusion if they were to pursue an investigation, so with a hand on her sword hilt and a song in her heart (as potentially dangerous a proposition as an archer notching an arrow), Victoria entered. Her inquisitive eyes adjusted to the differing light conditions and she peered around, taking note of the furniture and tools here. Different styles of furniture were present, one which looked a little more familiar to her than the local goods. She noted the short stairway, and the overlooking walk. Victoria noticed a great many things during her initial walkaround, most of which she kept to herself for the moment. She did bring one fact she had gleaned from the building's interior, [color=9932cc]"This place... It looks like someone tried to clean it up recently. Badly."[/color] Sure enough, there were recent sweeping marks in the work area and the floor around it, marred dust of the regular and saw varieties, and things put away put not quite with perfect placement. [color=9932cc]"This looks like a petulant child was told to clean his room, and intentionally did a poor job to end the task quickly."[/color] What this element meant, if anything at all, could not be sussed out immediately by Victoria. And Morty ...just kind of stood there.