All Part of the Plan...

"Dammit," Vox mutters, "I should have chopped off a surgeon's hand...." He falls into his own shadow, emerges once again from Condord's, and tries to finish her off once and for all.

OOC: Throw a Shroud on Concord, use Inescapable Shadow to jump behind her, and stab. 35 vs. AC, 23 damage.

Mallus wrote:

OOC: John, roll either Healing or Arcana (for Dexter).

OOC: Oh, dear.... Well, Arcana is the best, with a +5, so! Bedamned. 25.

The member 'Rolzup' has done the following action : Dice Roller

#1 'd20' : 19

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#2 'd8' : 1

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#3 'd8' : 5

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#4 'd6' : 6

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#5 'd20' : 20

The bureaucrat and his deft, errant hand strike simultaneous blows; Vox's blade plunges deep into Concord's chest producing a turgid spray of sap as Dexter carefully places Killian Root's heart back into it's rightful place, while somehow managing to make a series of arcane gestures with it's free fingers.

Vox's vision blurs. Around him the vine-covered trellises seems to shrink, losing their imposing proportions, not withering so much as giving up their airs. Instinctively peering into the Other Side, Vox sees the silver tree snap and break as it's struck by green lightning. The dahlia growing from the pink statue's chest does whither, turning rapidly to ash. Cracks race along the statue, stone failing away to reveal the man beneath. The living, dreaming man, who immediately starts to fade as he wakens.

"Where am I?" ask Killian, on the living side. Concord screams one last inhuman scream, then vanishes into the vines.

The rows of trellises, fat with wine grapes, no longer form a maze. The League easily exits to find a ring of withered grass bundles where the encircling crowd was just a few minutes ago. The braver of the new workers are approaching, after scouting a bit to ensure the town is secure; three dark Snake Snakes natives and the Goliath. They're cautious, at first, but soon caution gives way to congratulations for freeing them from their apparently vegetative benefactors, and saving them from being turned into walking bundles of grass...

... which isn't precisely what occurred. In short order the remaining people of Vine set upon the locked and now unguarded buildings on the west end of town. In the pitch dark buildings, in each room and cellar, they find the sleeping citizenry, which can be easily roused now that their dopplegangers have died on the vine.

All are found alive. Well, except for the ones in the estate's cellar who died in the fire. Each is in remarkable good health, given that they've been sleeping in the dark for the better part of a year.

OOC: is there anything you'd like to do while still in Vine?

You depart Vine in the morning, taking a circuitous route around the village Choir, site of you're brief foray into deicide and continuing flirtation with arson. By nightfall you reach the Shifting Village.

Inquiring after the woman you rescued from the air-pirates, Miss Elizee Dare, sister to Odanais 1 and some relation to Odanais 2 that even the eldest of sages haven't quite gotten around to naming, you find she has gone. South. To the Snake States.

Though she arrived penniless, within hours she had secured an ample sum of gold doing a spot of arcane translation for the merchant Jane Approximately. By twilight she was departing with a drow caravan for a trading post below the Principality of Asp, citing the need to find a cure for her ' recent deprivation', a desire for 'voluntary travel', and, frankly, 'the inability to cope with seeing my brother-who-isn't-my-brother' just yet.

She left word with Jane to tell the Odanais-in-residence in the Port that's she'll catch the train and 'be back soon'. Unsure yourselves of the train's schedule in the wake of the airship's assault, and not fancying a long walk through the Clutch, you travel with a group of Fae nobles to the coast, a take passage on an Aster-proofed cog back to the Port.

Where more glorious adventures, and the inescapable smell of pig-shit, await.

Fín

(for now)

As he sets foot on the streets of the Port once more, Vox heaves a sigh of relief. And sports a most unVox-like smile.

"There is a chance," he says cheerfully, "That I may get a promotion for this. Not that I have any real answers, mind, but it looks as though I do! And really, that's what matters, isn't it?" Dexter, again perched upon Vox's shoulder, actually performs a somersault; a sight which sends a nearby child screaming for his mother.

His smile broadens, and is no longer vaguely disturbing.

"Give my regards to Artichoke, unless, I happen to meet him first. Would be no surprise, that.... And I'll see the lot of you again soon enough, preferably on this side."

Vox bows, crosses his hands across his chest, and topples gracefully backwards into his own shadow.

He does not emerge.