[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=Coach House][img]https://i.ibb.co/BVvx6LH2/Coach-House.jpg[/img][/hider][/center] [center][hider=Vineyard Estate][img]https://i.ibb.co/yRk60Zg/Vinyard-Estate-Gridded-Day-Lv4.jpg[/img][/hider][/center] [center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center] [u]Weather[/u]: The weather remains about the same from the last hour. It is cold, as it is indeed winter, but at least the sky is bright, with minimal cloud cover, allowing a distant but quite illuminating sun to herald the day. Yes, it is still freezing. But it is tolerable to those acclimated to it, so long as they take some precautions. [u]Time[/u]: Morning! And what a grand, soft morning it is. [u]Ambience[/u]: As the morning progresses, the few workers left upon the grounds of the Rose River Vineyard begin to make their rounds. Mostly custodial or domestic staff that one may see buzzing in or around the Estate House. It is still a lovely day, as snow covered winter days allow, though there does seem to be an understandable lack of cheerfulness from the locals. The Coach House is a bit less occupied at this point, which is to be expected. Today is the scheduled day for Vineyard staff to clean and resupply the dwelling, which is notable by the presence of two persons in simple black-and-white livery pulling a cart behind them, in the general direction of the Coach House. One wonders what sights and experiences may befall them when they reach their intended destination. [center][color=darkgray][h2]*****[/h2][/color][/center] A fair piece to the north of the Vineyard, upon the road leaving the Avonshire Township, a scene unfolded that might be considered strange by anyone not from the area. A fellow in a straw hat and sandals was being put to light questioning in the middle of a snowy field, concerning the events of Harvestide. This year, as the locals will attest, was eventful in many wrong ways. The Fisherman's answer came with a bright, affirming grin, [color=darkgray][i]"Mornin'! Nice day for fishing, ain't it?"[/i][/color] The town of Southmoor, no more than a short ride or a moderate walk away from the Rose River Vineyard, seemed to have been less beaten down by the snowfall. It was still heavy upon the ground, but seemed to lack quite as dramatic of an aftermath as the Vineyard itself. Be it a trick of nature or the manipulation of it, was anyone's guess. Not that it was part of the thought process of any of the locals. They went about their business in the proud, quiet manner that people of the land do, though on this occasion, a few chose to either initiate or respond to the casual salutations of the purple clad lady who looked immensely out of place, waiting by the side of the road. Back at the Vineyard, Urmdrus shrugged from atop his wagon. It wasn't a dismissive gesture, so much as it was a means of breaking off conversation with his overly expressive (comparative to himself) Tiefling acquaintance. He bore all of the signs of a fellow who wished to get on the road as soon as possible. As such, he didn't even bother to shift more than a few inches in the seat upon his wagon to finish his few words, and nudge the lumbering vehicle into motion. Urmdrus removed himself from the Vineyard as soon as he was able. Meanwhile, elsewhere on the grounds, a conversation was taking place between two Halflings. The vast majority of this conversation was quiet. Whispered, as if a great secret were being said at length, or if they merely wished to keep private things private, in the way that one might clam up a personal conversation when a serving girl steps over to collect empty ale glasses. Tarace and Barbal were not, as it turned out, particularly hungry that morning. At least, Barbal wasn't. He seemed fairly well withdrawn, as well. [color=darkgray][i]"Barbal dearest, the eggs are fine. Yes, I know. No, this wouldn't make me feel any better about it, either. Let's just count what blessings we have, yes? Yes."[/i][/color] Suffice it to say, things were not the happiest with the Mosswaters at present. After a time, Tarace did turn his attention toward the offer to drop them back at their farm. [color=darkgray][i]"Yes, perhaps that is for the best. We shall send someone for our ponies later, I think."[/i][/color] Barbal, for the most part, just looked a bit disappointed. Alive, albeit grumbling slightly, and not amazingly put together for productive conversation. Both moved woodenly to their former army issue, mule pulled "chariot" which presently awaited them, quietly eager to remove themselves from the situation for the time being. Over at the watchtower, Lizbeth listened to her mentor's personal stories, even taking some mirth from the latter of the charming, if embarrassing anecdotes of days gone by. [color=darkgray]"You didn't say that out loud? No..."[/color] Her words were probably supposed to be admonishing, but her tone was light and amused, like she were discussing this with a friend instead of a dyed-in-the-wool warrior with a respectable body count, and she were an interested little girl instead of a potentially cursed, probably not fully alive anymore novice spellcaster. [color=darkgray]"No, the Tinker's boy isn't [i]in town,[/i] really. I mean, they are in town sometimes. He's, you know, a Tinker. They travel around places away from the cities, fixing things and sharpening tools. Sometimes selling things others throw away that they can make new again. Like... do you have Tinkers in Arcanaple? Anyway, I never did go to a ball. It sounds nice, like Harvestide, but inside a big dance hall, right?"[/color] Truly, Lizbeth was a bit of a rural princess - brought up with some education and certainly with money, but lacking any experience of the upper classes or the more structured celebratory practices therein. At the very least, in that moment, Lizbeth L'Rose appeared that she felt like a person.