[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 temperature never quite tipped above freezing, as one might be able to tell from a lack of settling snow, but at least the wind is behaving. Mostly. A few clouds dot the sky in uneven intervals, casting a light blanket over the pale, faraway sun, until it proverbially kicks it off. [u]Time[/u]: Mid afternoon. One might take an early Tea now, if one were inclined. The sun stands high in the sky, though night comes early this time of the year, so do not be fooled. [u]Ambience[/u]: The snow remains thick and consistent, not having compressed at all by he higher temperatures of the risen sun. Naturally, this means that this day is colder than the day prior. At least incrementally enough to maintain the omnipresent ice and snow. Workers in and around the Rose River Vineyard are few, far between, and mostly keeping indoors. The Coach House has been given a once-over by the domestic staff in black and white, which have been assigned to handle the incidentals of the group's presence; restocking firewood as needed, getting lists together for larder and pantry storage levels; basically covering the basics. Tight lips and quick action followed their presence, even as they attempted to stay away from anything resembling eye contact. Rumors are interesting things, depending upon who's telling them. And only a foolish person might believe that there are no rumors about the Adventurers at the Rose River Vineyard. The moors are overall at a white standstill. The soft, rolling hills greatly resemble static waves of purest, cottony ice. The highs and lows equally bear the blanket of recent snows, though the lower, wetter areas (for those familiar with the land) seem to have collected a greater depth of snowfall, leading to hazardous conditions for the unwary soul who steps from the marked road. As a matter of consequence, the road isn't as burdened with the frigid, white stuff, as it lays across mostly even, mostly higher land. But even aside from that, for anyone who has been upon the Vineyard may notice that the brunt of the recent blizzard seemed to take it a little easier on the road, and on the parts of the moors not too far away from the borders of Arnaud L'Rose's lands. [center][color=darkgray][h2]*****[/h2][/color][/center] Midday in winter is never a great time to be at work. One's efforts result in blood moving around one's body with heat, which turns trodden-through snow into wet clothing. In time, this becomes uncomfortable at best, and with the promise that this is the warmest part of the day, things may become moreso. Perhaps this is why the small, remaining staff of the Rose River Tavern spent very little time out-of-doors this day, as things were not getting any warmer. Along the road just outside of Avonshire, a curious man in a straw hat gave Aric a broad, cheerful smile, and lifts each of his feet, one at a time, in an exaggerated manner. [color=darkgray][i]"G'Mornin'!"[/i][/color] he repeated with a shrug, then turned his back to the stranger and continued his walk into the Township. Not to be impolite, he waved his free hand behind him with a quick utterance of, [color=darkgray][i]"Nice day for fishin'! Huah huh!"[/i][/color] as his form advanced toward the walled Township of Avonshire. Travelers upon the road will notice a distinct lack of travelers going any further than a couple miles, from one village to the next and one farm to the next. From what one can tell, looking out among the highs and lows along the road, that's all one can see - farms and villages - for the vast majority of the north/south road between Southmoor and the Township. There [i]is[/i] an established halfway point, more or less, which would have been reachable by noon under good conditions. Unfortunately, the conditions are best described as "tolerable" instead. This point is one which Baronfjord and Victoria had seen previously, having stopped there for a quick picnic lunch on their way to the Vineyard, though is looks fairly different when draped in precipitous white. The Waypoint was hardly a waypoint in the classical sense. It wasn't quite large enough for a large mercantile or military group to set up overnight shop, but an intimate collection of wagons and travelers might do nicely. The Waypoint was spared a lot of the accumulating snowfall, thanks to the semi-encircling collection of boulders, not including a large, flat, shelf-like stone surface which may be used for all manner of things which would require a more-or-less flat surface. Or just to get a little elevation. The center features a well-used but maintained fire pit, which does not seem to have been utilized for a while now. The saving grace to this location is that the snow is only a couple to a few inches deep here. Back at the Vineyard, talk of dragons sparked a hint of wonder from young Lizbeth, who asked in quiet reverence, [color=darkgray]"Have you ever seen a dragon? In person, I mean. I've only ever seen pictures..."[/color] The search continued, with the girl assisting where she might, even if it seemed near to hopeless. Lizbeth it seemed, did not know exactly what they were looking for and she otherwise knew most of the Vineyard brick for brick, which made things frustrating. By the time the afternoon came around, she did finally come to a decision about Kathryn's request. [color=darkgray]"I don't know what I can do yet, with magic and fighting, right? But if you want, I am willing to try for you. Not... sorry, not every time, okay? I still need to know how to do this for myself. But we can try."[/color]