[center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][center][img]https://i.ibb.co/R9YbZV3/icewine-nighttime-vineyard.jpg[/img][/center] [center][img]https://i.ibb.co/vXD6Q0t/Update-Text.png[/img][/center][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][center][hider=Meeting Spot][img]https://img.roleplayerguild.com/prod/users/0b451289-078d-490e-a922-f2acbf4125be.png[/img][/hider][/center] [center][hider=Coach House][img]https://i.ibb.co/5jfBrYW/Coach-House-Opener.jpg[/img][/hider][/center][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center] [u]Weather[/u]: If anyone wondered whether they were in the middle of a storm or not, wonder no further. What began at the end of the day as a gentle bit of weather has transformed into a gale of frozen white against a dark night. Yes, it is cold. Unseasonably so, even for winter in this area. Regardless of one's preparation beforehand or thickness of cloak, unless one is acclimated to frigid areas there is a noteworthy level of discomfort present as long as they remain out of doors. Drifts are beginning to accumulate in not insignificant ways. This is officially a storm. Maybe even a blizzard. [u]Time[/u]: It is still on the earlier half of the night, such as it is. Ordinary working folk are probably turning in, or would be on a normal night. [u]Ambience[/u]: The snowy night has turned into a howler. Getting from place to place has officially become difficult. The main thoroughfare is still visible against the rolling fields and sharper hills around as a band of arcing, flat snowfall, distinct enough to recognize easily, even if one's step must be watched against the minutiae of the road. Exterior lanterns begin to wink out. Only a couple, here and there, but some of the others have grown dimmer with a lack of steady fuel in their reservoirs. The Coach House's exterior is rather dark, though there is a small amount of light, barely a crack here and there, around shuttered windows or the mostly snug fit of the front door to the common room. Depth of snow here is minimal as compared to the area outside of the courtyard, thanks to the presence of enclosing walls. However, those walls are doing an excellent job of building up drifts along their perimeter on the outside. The cover of the well looks disturbed, as if one had recently accessed it for what was likely iced over (or especially chilled) water, below. The exterior stairs may prevent a challenge for the intoxicated, or the unwary. The interior of the Coach House invokes memories of just a couple of hours earlier. The fire in the Taproom's hearth burns with an intensity that one would describe as adequate, thanks to the ministrations of the younger lady of the estate. The light is dim within these walls but well enough to see by without much issue. Individual lamps and candles remain dark, ready to be of service in the event that more illumination is required. The scent of fresh tea dominates the room here. [center][color=darkgray][h2]*****[/h2][/color][/center] [img][/img] Cecily appeared to flash between willingness to speak and hesitation. Whether this hesitation was based upon a desire to omit or a reasonable series of pauses while struggling to speak specifically, one could not tell. [color=darkgray][i]"I am not a medician nor a Cleric, Lady Kathryn. I can tell when a body shudders and stops breathing, and what that means. A lot of good folks passed the same way that season."[/i][/color] She quickly finished her cup and reiterated, [color=darkgray][i]"I shall tend to my houseguests now. Thank you for everything. Really. All of you. Lizbeth quite idolizes you and your friends. A couple of you in particular. I know you'll do everything you can to help her. Now, if you'll excuse me, I must see to the others."[/i][/color] The Madame of the Estate retreated further into the house, having acquired a laden candle holder to assist her. Within the Coach House, Lizbeth took to her self-appointed duties rather seriously, even if she seemed to be having a bit of an existential crisis. Baronfjord's question of why she was wondering about necromancy gave her a moment of pause. She stammered a little, not getting the words comfortably out of her mouth, then seemed to switch to another train of thought altogether. [color=darkgray]"I, because, um, [i]...what happnened to Toombes[/i],"[/color] she finally blurted out. [color=darkgray]"And what happened to Morty. And why I feel okay with it."[/color] She stood very still, having said these words aloud. Lizbeth looked embarrassed, if nothing else, as if she had only ever said that that once and felt very self-conscious about it. [color=darkgray]"Mademoiselle Belmont is a really nice lady, and she's pretty and smart, and she does magic to dead things. And the... the other one, does magic to dead things and is mean and we all have been warned about those people. From the wars. Old men who came back talked about cutting off the heads and hands of their dead, so the Necromancers wouldn't make them hurt their friends in the night."[/color] Lizbeth looked around, red-faced and possibly near to tears. [color=darkgray]"And I'm not supposed to be comfortable with it, and I'm supposed to be scared, and I don't know why I'm not, and [i]that[/i] scares me. So I need to know, are Undead all bad? Can they be good, some of them? Was this a war like other wars with regular countries, and the soldiers just happened to be dead people? Are all Necromancers evil? Am I ... why doesn't this bother me more? Am I a monster, too?"[/color] As if on cue, this was about the moment, give or take, that Kosara returned with her Unseen Servant puppeting the remains of Toombes. This earned the corpse a sudden burst of speed from little Lizbeth L'Rose, unsheathing her newly acquired, sweeping-edged, shortish blade with the proficiency of a trained soldier and pointing it at the most recent newcomers. An instant later she realized what was going on and let the swordpoint lower, almost perpendicular to the floor. [color=darkgray]"Can we help him now?"[/color] While she might have blurted out too much in the conversation to hope to get an answer to her real issue, Lizbeth did hold onto one concept that Victoria had mentioned; "Ethical Neutrality," like it was interesting if uncharted territory.