[center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][center][img]https://i.ibb.co/WvZTwJ26/winter-vineyard.jpg[/img][/center] [center][img]https://i.ibb.co/vXD6Q0t/Update-Text.png[/img][/center][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center] [center][hider=Southmoor][img]https://i.ibb.co/QnKHXZ8/Southmoor-Poachers-Crest-Map.jpg[/img][/hider][/center] [center][hider=Healer's Home][img]https://i.ibb.co/Kjt2pXrP/Healers-Home.jpg[/img][/hider][/center] [center][hider=Coach House][img]https://i.ibb.co/BVvx6LH2/Coach-House.jpg[/img][/hider][/center] [center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center] [u]Weather[/u]: The day is bright and mostly cloudless - optimistic, even - as if the events of the last couple of days had been nothing but a bad memory. At least, after the dawn arrives fully. It is still quite cold, below freezing, judging by the untouched crispness of last night's fallen snow. [u]Time[/u]: It is the crack of dawn. Or fully realized dawn. Regardless of cracks or realizations, it is early morning. Congratulations, you survived the night. [u]Ambience[/u]: The early morning shines over the Rose River Vineyard, giving light and hope to the masses. Naturally, being as there is technically only a handful of people present, "masses" might be pushing it. But one takes hope from most any source available. The Estate House stands, a multi-story monolith against the rolling white hills, seemingly opposite of the Coach House near the property's edge. A sort of cold calmness has settled upon the land, like a great, sleeping beast, snoring gently in the winter months. Within the Coach House, things are a little chilly. Still highly preferable to the outside, but the Taproom's hearth and kitchen's cookfires are down to the merest of embers which would require maintenance and additional fuel before they can contribute meaningfully to the ambient warmth. The books remain upon the tables, though only half of the leaf of paper remains, bearing a message for but one of the adventurer's number. [center][color=darkgray][h2]*****[/h2][/color][/center] The workshop of Master Urmdrus was an interesting construction of wood and stone which greatly resembled (and actually might have been) a shed, converted into a dwelling which had evidence of a half dozen crafting professions in and around. As an addition to the usual chaos of mostly finished projects and painful implements which were probably tools of some sort, a thick wagon frame and two giant barrels rested underneath a recently constructed wooden pavilion semi-attached to the workshop. A short chimney put out a moderate amount of woodsmoke, implying that the place was in operation, but the door remained closed to anyone giving it a knock. An astute observer might notice a shuffling set of footprints headed toward the Estate House - it looks like Urmdrus was just missed. A stout voice called from the main thoroughfare, expressing in a couple of syllables the deep voice of the resident handydwarf. [color=darkgray][b]"WHOA, THERE!"[/b][/color] It was expressed to the two beasts of burden he was driving from atop one of the merchant wagons common to the Vineyard. The wagon itself was mostly empty at this time, as far as anyone might guess from a distance. This assessment might be more readily put to the test as Urmdrus began to steer the wagon in the workshop's direction. As he neared, his gruff voice turned to Kosara, intoning, [color=darkgray][b]"Have permission. Going to town. Get supplies. Reinforce Coach House. Takes time. What do you need?"[/b][/color] His delivery was halting, but his face betrayed no hint of annoyance. Back at the Coach House, Lizbeth took her training very seriously. She maintained her quite warm and vibrant color admirably, lest she be accused of taking the easy way out of her endurance and cold temperance training. Though admittedly, this curse, or whatever it was that was laid upon her, had some perks in that regard. Maybe her other, more arcane mentor was correct about her. Following the perimeter check and promise of a more intense session, the young lady nodded quietly nodded. The shorter training session was appreciated today, not because of any lapse of character on her part, but because one of their guests made a specific request about breakfast. Then he screamed bloody murder in the night. Then her mentioned something about "drinking" his first meal of the day. Lizbeth wasn't one hundred percent sure what he meant by that, but she was fully willing to have an assortment of potable goodies on standby, just in case. She even allowed for herself a dram or to of wine-and-water, just to keep herself bolstered against the cold, of course. It was at this moment that Lizbeth became aware that the note from the previous evening was missing. This could only mean (or likely mean, if we're being truthful) that Victoria had already left for the Avonshire Township. Hopefully, they would get some answers. Hopefully, she would get [i]her[/i] answer, specifically. [center][color=darkgray][h2]*****[/h2][/color][/center] Down the road a piece, in Southmoor, things were mostly quiet. Yes, there was a decent amount of snowfall on the ground, but it seemed to be a little lighter in the town than in the more open fields of the Vineyard. None of this stopped the residents of Southmoor from getting to their jobs with the same sort of rural responsibility that normally is expected of folk who live as they did - through craft, care, and resolve. Wintertime did much to blunt the sorts of labor possible, but they kept themselves busy nonetheless. One thing which didn't cease was the constant need for someone in the town to make their way to the home of their resident Healer, Annick Floquet. The area had just gotten over an outbreak of some lung affliction or another, but that did not mean that it wasn't still present. It didn't mean that other forms of sickness or injury wouldn't be visited upon the people, and medicines needed to be mixed. Reagents had to be allocated and labeled, then organized. Stores had to be replenished, and there was other work besides which would not wait for a more convenient set of circumstances. Two such persons found themselves exiting the general area of the Healer's Home, just outside of the main grouping of buildings of the tiny town of Southmoor, very early in the morning. They passed the curious figure of a purple clad Bard on majestic, spooky horseback, with a burlap-wrapped boar trailing behind, pulling a small errand cart. They paused their egress to watch this woman knock upon the door of Annick Floquet, curious as to what might happen next. When the door was finally answered, a stern look from the older lady got them both moving on with haste. [color=darkgray][b]"You brought one of them with you this time,"[/b][/color] declared Annick, glancing at Morty with either impatience or disapproval. Or both. [color=darkgray][b]"You'd better have a damned good explanation."[/b][/color] Her fists were clenched, and her eyes showed some other emotion than purely anger. Sorrow, perhaps? Disappointment?