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Post by pastels on Apr 26, 2019 4:59:11 GMT
The Dock Ward was a bustling den of activity, as usual, with dock workers throwing and catching heavy barrels and crates, each one punctuated by a yell, and the warehouses were alive with brisk movement. Deeper into the district, a new commotion was rising in one of the more infamous alleys connecting Spice Street and Dock Street—Fishnet Alley, called such from the wide, tattered nets strung across at various levels, narrow tendrils reaching down to brush passersby in the face. Now, to call it infamous might be a bit much… There were certainly more dangerous locales in the Dock Ward, where the biggest threat was far from a gap-toothed drunk and his thuggish accomplishes. Despite looking like the cavernous lair of some ancient spider, this place was rather low on the list… But for an unfortunate philosopher, it offered plenty enough trouble. Belerick Radfaire tried to sit up, but his bloodied elbow skidded on the gristly stones and he slipped down with a thud. In front of him, a girl wearing plain, coarse-looking clothes stood with her feet planted apart and her hands held out in a placating gesture, the long braid on her back swishing from side to side like a cat’s tail. She was the only thing standing between him and three tall, muscular ruffians, their ruddy cheeks aflame with the telltale splotches of liquor. Oghma’s mind, how did it come to this? One minute he was walking across the damnable alleyway, minding his own business—and yeah, he knew the place was kind of risky but it was just noon, for crying out loud—when the buffoons barreled in from the opposite side. It was a tight squeeze but he managed to get past them while they were cheering about some lay or another, and then one of them spots him, calls him a thief… Ah, damn, he really had that kind of face, did he? The one that just seemed to attract fists and feet. And not in the fun way. “—talk about this!” The girl cried out and Belerick’s head snapped up. He struggled to see what was going on with one bruised eye, but it seemed that the men were trying to push their way past her. Gods, lady, give it a rest and just go. He couldn’t exactly recall when she arrived, but at one point during the beating the pain stopped and he could breathe again and she was there, pushing away the smallest of the trio. It felt horrible, dragging down decent folk who only wanted to help. They would eventually stop, anyway, and he would be long unconscious by then. Hopefully. Not his first (failed) alley brawl, this. “You’re not even sure he did that—stop it, stop it!” Her ankle hit his knee, hard, and Belerick grunted in surprise as the woman smacked onto the wall above him. The back of her legs held him in place even as she pushed herself off and tried to regain her footing, but he could see it was getting bad, fast. He swallowed, an iron tang thick in his throat, and grabbed her ankle to get her attention. The face that stared down at him was fraught with worry, brows knitted tight in frustration and lips taut in a humorless grimace. “Look, lady… I-I’ll be… fine. Go on and… go,” he made a vague shooing gesture as he let go of her foot, but the woman’s expression shifted to steel. She shook her head, slowly, and her limbs tensed when she half-turned away to face the men again. They stalked closer. Rosemary crouched, her holy pendant dangling in front of her chest, preparing to throw herself down and shield her charge. moralhazard
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Post by moralhazard on Apr 26, 2019 5:39:20 GMT
“Leave them alone,” A new figure entered the alley, the noon-day sun casting almost no shadow. She stalked closer. If Rosemary had actually been standing, she would have had nearly a half a foot in height on the woman. She wore a black tunic, well-patched, over what looked like a black t-shirt and black leggings, and cloth wrappings covered her arms from shoulders to wrist. She looked – well – small, and almost scrawny, but for something about the set of her face. The massive weapon on her back, like an enormous staff with a leather-covered sword attached to the top – longer than the woman was tall – was the other immediately incongruous thing about her.
Twelve hours earlier…
“Ramonth, I love you!” The wizard screamed. Another small flame appeared between his hands as he murmured soft incantations under his breath.
Kara’s clothing was already scorched away to almost nothing, the tattered remains of her breastband and tights preserving her modesty. She gripped her glaive, tightly, and lunged forward; the fireball missed her by inches, and skidded to a stop on the floor, leaving a burnt mark but not igniting anything. She stalked forward, another few steps, slowly and carefully.
“Xero, please!” Ramonth was crouching behind an overturned table. The half-elf peeked out, then went back to hiding. “Xero, stop this!”
“It’s too late for talking!” Xero cried. “I know you were here with – with him! How could you? I still love you – I’ll love you for all eternity.”
Kara took another step forward. Xero shifted back, a little closer to the corner. A ball of ice whirled between his hands, and he flung it out at Kara; it burst on her skin, splashing over her, and she ignored it, taking another step closer.
“Xero – it’s over between us,” Ramonth pleaded. “It’s been over for months, I – why – what – ”
“If I can’t have you, no one can!” Xero cried out. He flung his hands up to the ceiling, eyes rolling back in his head, and began to murmur.
Kara seized her chance, lunging forward, and swung the heavy wood of her glaive into his head. It connected with a solid thunk. The entire bar seemed to hold their breath – and then Xero dropped to the ground, collapsing into a puddled heap on the floor.
The room was a wreck; every table was overturned and several had been half eaten away by acid, the chandelier was mostly frozen with water dripping from the bottom onto the ground, the bar was still half on fire, and the patrons that hadn’t managed to get out were hiding in every conceivable spot. Someone started applauding, though, and Kara turned, slowly, wide-eyed, looking around the room as the applause echoed.
Six hours earlier…
Kara made her way home, slowly. There had been no rescuing her black shirt; she was glad she’d thought to take her tunic off before the fight, so at least she had something to carry. Warren had been tripping over himself with gratitude that the fight hadn’t been worse, and Kara knew that she could have left – but she’d stayed, the same as the rest, to help clean up the bar, even though it might be a while before Warren could pay her again.
Now, though, she was making her way steadily home through the Dock Ward, looking forward to nothing quite so much as the moment when her head would hit the bedroll laid out on her floor. She used her glaive as a walking stick, the burns on her side and leg still painful; her side, where she’d been hit with ice on top of the burn, was by far the worse.
There was a full-throated scream from down the street, echoing through the late night (well, early morning really) fog.
Kara took off at a run, glaive lifting off the ground and readying in both hands.
A small tabaxi kitten with a tail that ended in a stub was crouched behind a trash can, whimpering.
The screamer seemed to have been a woman, dressed in clothing much too fancy for the Dock Ward at any hour. Her companion, a man, was shielding her, with an arm between her and the tiny tabaxi.
“Get back!” He shouted at the kit. “You stay away from us, you filthy thing.”
Kara lunged forward, bringing the shaft of her glaive up in time to deflect his foot. The man let out a yell of pain.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” He spat at Kara. “This filthy, flea-bitten – creature attacked my wife!”
Kara glanced down at the sobbing kit, then back at the man and his wife. She tightened her grip on her glaive, keeping her body between the man and the tabaxi.
After a moment, eyes narrowed, the man grabbed his wife by the arm. “Come on, darling, let’s go. This place – these riff-raff – they disgust me.”
Kara watched until they’d disappeared into the mist. She turned back to the tabaxi, taking a step towards her. The kit let out a shriek, tail stiffening, and fled into the mist. Kara didn’t try to stop her, shoulders sinking slightly as the tabaxi fled.
Thirty minutes earlier…
Kara woke bleary-eyed to the rising sun of the day shining directly onto her face. She curled up against her bedroll, head throbbing. Her stomach hurt, and her leg hurt. The pain mixed witth sharp hunger, leaving her oddly light-headed and nauseous. Kara pulled herself to her feet, and stumbled down the stairs into the backyard, drawing cold water up into the sluice and running it over herself until she felt nearly human again.
If she hurried, Kara thought, she would be able to catch an afternoon guard shift at a warehouse in the Dock Ward. Her stomach grumbled, noisily. A guard shift would mean at least enough money for a meal later, a pasty if she was quick, or maybe even something more substantial.
Kara braided her hair and dressed quickly, pulling on her only slightly sooty black tunic and her last pair of good leggings. At least she had two clean shirts, so she had the luxury of choice there. She tucked her stone shields insignia into the pocket of her tunic, and arranged her too-light money purse at her waist, slung her glaive across her back, and set off, making her way through the Dock Wards.
She was nearly at the warehouse when she heard it – a female voice coming from down the alley, tight with desperation and fear. Kara never hesitated.
Back to the alley…
Kara glanced from the three men to the woman crouching on the floor of the alley, half-shielding a bloodied man moaning as he lay against the wall.
One hand rose, and the glaive swung off Kara’s back, the leather cover which made the weapon street-respectable by Waterdeep standards flicking to the ground of the alley. She crossed closer to the three men, and gestured with the point of the weapon towards the other end of the alley. “Now.” Kara said, quietly, utterly serious. “Go.”
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Post by pastels on Apr 28, 2019 6:43:01 GMT
“’S none of your business,” one of the men said, his words slurring a bit. He seemed to be the oldest of the lot, if the scraggly beard shot through with white was to be judged. “Aw, lemme handle this, Dale…” A meaty hand pulled him backwards and the tallest walked through. This one had the height and build of a seasoned dock worker, and he loomed over Kara, matching her intensity with his own menacing sneer. The tattoos on his muscles curled as he formed a fist, thick fingers ringed with calluses and scars.
“Or what?” He challenged, and his breath stank of cheap ale. “It’s three against one, missy.”
Rosemary watched the newcomer with a growing admiration, though that swiftly turned to worry when it looked like the troublemakers were now entirely focused on her. Below her hand, Belerick’s shoulder rose and fell in shallow breaths, and he stared up with wide, astonished eyes. Their worst fears were confirmed when the men lunged…!
“Oh no you don’t!” A voice cried out with surprising conviction, and a blur of pale green and yellow tackled Dale’s hip with such ferocity he slammed onto the opposite wall, giving out a garbled yell. Rosemary was there, the better part of her back and shoulder pressed against the man’s pelvis, and the tension in her legs and arms showed that she was putting a significant amount of strength into keeping him pinned there. Ha! Good luck breaking out of this one, you stinking layabout! She’s had years to prepare for this occasion. You’ve never quite encountered back pain until you’ve tried to push an ornery hog out of the pig pen, and in Eldhearth, that was just pre-breakfast! A morning warm-up!
When Dale tried to squirm out of the vice, Rosemary shoved back. He groaned. Loudly. “Don’t worry, ma’am! I’ll keep ‘im off you!”
Belerick tried to keep his healthy eye open. Was this really happening!? The burliest led the charge, intent on closing the distance with Kara and making use of his fists. He began to panic. Could she even swing that glaive in this place? It was so narrow and chock-full of nets and strings—wait! “Watch out!” The philosopher rasped out. The third one suddenly appeared at the edges of his vision, throwing forth a heavy net he must have grabbed from the hooks high above. The edges were laden with rocks and other heavy objects, with the strings doubly reinforced like slim ropes, and it was a net clearly meant for big game. She would not like to get trapped by that.
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Post by moralhazard on Apr 28, 2019 18:46:32 GMT
Three men versus one girl with a glaive. The odds didn’t seem exactly fair.
Then Rosie took out one of the men with a surprisingly impressive tackle, knocking him hard into the wall – and the odds got even worse.
The burliest of the men closed the distance to Kara. She glanced him over, up and down. His fists were large, and very impressive. With her glaive, even with the size discrepancy, Kara had nearly twice his reach. She spun the glaive once and slammed the butt up between his legs at the end of its range, coolly and without the slightest hesitation.
He made a noise in a sound range that would have sounded more natural coming from Rosie or Kara, and turned an odd shade of green usually reserved for vegetables.
Kara had been aware of the net; her finely honed sense of danger kicked in, and she dodged, hurling herself to the side. She pushed off the wall and sprung back out at the second man, neatly passing the first, who had slowly progressed to being doubled over. She kept her back against the wall, just a few feet from Belerick now, taking over the guard position that Rosie had so recently left.
Kara swung the glaive once, twice; she could have hit him with the sharp blade, but instead she walloped him twice with the butt of the weapon, once in the side with a loud crack and a second time against his head. He stumbled, looking like stars were ringing his head. The man she’d hit between the legs vomited.
Kara gripped the glaive, looking between them once more. “Attack me again, and I’ll use the blade.” She told them. She wasn’t even breathing hard; she looked no more ruffled than if she’d calmly walked down the alley.
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Post by pastels on May 3, 2019 13:14:22 GMT
The tenson was thicker than the nets covering the alley. Heavy groans and half-mumbled curses filled the narrow space.
For a moment there it really seemed that the trio--well, the duo, now--would rise to the challenge. But given Kara's unexpected showing, a glimmer of sense pierced through the remaining thug's mind and he reached for his comrade. "'Sss not worth it."
Slowly but surely, and with a lot of vitriol, the men shambled away from the small but intimidating figure who interrupted their quaint gathering. Dale, in particular, kneed Rosemary in the nape as he went--whether or not this was deliberate was up for grabs, as he shuffled from side to side, almost as cowed as the man whose family jewels Kara had so precisely demolished. It seemed Rosie's protective efforts were once again a touch too strong for one's bones and vital organs.
As the drunken lot filed out of the alley, spitting on the ground and cursing all the way, the noise gave way to a soft, furtive silence.
Rosie stared at their unlikely savior, --she had slumped down when Dale left, her back against the wall--and remembered to close her mouth. Then as if remembering her charge, the flustered cleric got up and brought her hands down along the length of her pants, patting off dust and frayed netting. With how narrow Fishnet Alley was, it barely took her a stride to rush back to Belerick's side.
Her lips moved in a silent whisper and her bare hands were suddenly aglow in a vibrant green light. Rosemary wasted no time checking for unseen wounds and broken bones; divine magic was all well and good, but she preferred to use it in tandem with a more hands-on approach, with medicinal herbs and poultices. Such was the bounty given by her Lady. After a while though, she realized that his wounds were nothing too severe, and Rosemary gave out a strained laugh. She self-consciously tucked a strand of hair behind her ear as she turned towards Kara, admiration clear in her rainwater eyes. "I sure can't imagine what would've happened if you didn't come along! Ah... Well, I prolly would've got my shins kicked to kingdom come, that's what."
"Wait, la-lady..." The wiry man suddenly coughed, causing the cleric to withdraw her hands in alarm. "Don't tell me you... joined that fight w-without even... even a single contingency plan?"
Rosemary squirmed and kept her gaze down, studying her glowing palm with a forced kind of focus. After a moment, she nodded towards Kara with a quick, embarrassed jolt. "Um. Yes? Well, she did too, right? And I don't see you complaining 'bout *that.*"
Speaking of...
"But goodness, when you did the swing...! Then the whack... Oooh! I ain't seen that kinda green since Maylen drank those discount bitters at the last harvest festival!" The cleric brightened up and once again shot another shy look at the other woman. "A-are you fine, though? It was over so quick, I wasn't sure if..."
Another good egg, like that golden boy she met on her first day in Waterdeep. Ma sure was right when she said good folk come in all shapes and sizes.
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Post by moralhazard on May 3, 2019 23:14:58 GMT
Kara fixed her attention on the men, a deep scowl etched into her face – and held, the blade of her glaive gleaming in even the dim light streaming into the alley. She met each of their eyes in turn, even the ones of the still-shaky looking man just slowly straightening up, even the ones of the man still half-pinned to the wall by the other woman. There was no lack of intent in her; the glaive was in her hands, and she had already proven she knew well how to use it.
They broke. There was a slow mumble, and a shuffle out of the alley. Kara fixed her eyes on Dale’s back as he fled, trying to gauge whether the knee into Rosemary had been intentional or clumsiness. Tempting as it was to teach him a lesson, she held off; better not to escalate. The only thing Kara cared about more than teaching bullies a lesson was that their victims didn’t receive any further harm. She would gladly let them go in order to keep the two in the alley from harm.
How like bullies, Kara thought. They only wanted to fight when they thought the odds were on their side. All the same, Kara was grateful for it.
Kara straightened up, slowly, as the three men left, relaxing only once they were out of sight enough that she’d have time to react if they came back. With a professional eye, she looked first at the woman – who was staring at her open-mouthed but seemed fine – and then down to the man. Kara frowned. This was well outside her capacity to handle; the skinned elbow, bloody nose and black eye weren’t much to worry about, but one leg was crumpled beneath his body at an unnatural angle.
Then the open-mouthed woman was there, mouth closed now. Her hands glowed green, and she knelt next to the man and checked him with thorough competence. Kara relaxed, fractionally, although she didn’t soften her grip on her glaive; it was something in the shoulders.
Kara’s first instinct was to leave. The battle was over, the bullies gone away, and the woman kneeling in front of the man seemed like she knew what she was doing. But… something inside Kara twinged at the thought of leaving them in the alley. She couldn’t tell if the woman had the strength to carry the man out, and to walk would certainly be bad for his injured leg. Kara gritted her teeth. That meant – there was no help for it. She would have to stay, and maybe even have to talk to them.
The woman was talking to her already, Kara realized. She just shrugged slightly in response; her assessment was probably right. The men weren’t fighters – she’d known that instantly – but they were brawny, and for all her strength, she wasn’t sure how much combat training the woman had. Certainly the man with the broken leg wouldn’t have been much help. If he had magic, Kara imagined he would have already used it.
The woman was talking to her again. Kara glanced down at the glaive. Something – not quite a smile, but a little amusement – twitched in her face, and bled into her eyes. Something about the woman’s manner was almost… comforting. Kara couldn’t explain it, but she found it soothing.
“I’m fine,” Kara said, stepping away to get her glaive’s leather cover and re-sheathe it. “They didn’t touch me.”
She returned the glaive to its holster on her back, and walked back, kneeling down next to the man – carefully, so that the long weapon wouldn’t trip her up.
“Broken?” She asked, looking up at the woman, then down at the man. Once it was confirmed, Kara would reach out, confidently, and scoop the man up in her arms, standing as easily as if he’d weighed nothing. Those same hard muscles were firm and unyielding in her arms and torso, clearly active, but there was no apparent sign of strain on her face, no more than there had been during the brief encounter. He was considerably larger than her, and it had to be awkward, but – if so, Kara didn’t seem to mind.
Kara turned to the woman, waiting a moment, then filling in the silence. “Where to?”
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Post by pastels on May 6, 2019 1:06:08 GMT
“Ow, my leg!”
“Yes, it’s broken!” Rosemary cheerfully piped in, much to Belerick’s confusion. He gaped up at her. “A healer doesn’t s-say that… while smiling, lady. Not… not usually.”
To her credit, the cleric’s bright expression wavered, and everyone had a full view as her face wore surprise, embarrassment, then shyness. It was as if watching colors shift to another in gradients, with how emotive her face was. “Oh, I’m sorry. Didn’t mean anythin’ by it. On the positive side…” she brought her hands together in a soft clap, “it’s just the one! Not too bad for a scuffle, huh?”
“I… didn’t b-break it fighting with them… I kind of…” Now it was the scholar’s turn to look sheepish. He propped himself up on his good elbow and glanced around, looking for something. “That!” Belerick, with a fair degree of hesitance, pointed at a dusty bottle near a couple of unfinished, decaying steps. He wilted under Kara and Rosie’s stares. “I t-tripped… on that. Then I landed on my l-leg. I think. T-there wasn’t any time to plot… plot a logical r-retreat.”
Rosemary didn’t let up. “It could’ve been two legs! Good job on one!” She turned towards Kara and moved away when she leaned over and carried Belerick in her arms, much to the philosopher’s surprise. To his credit, he didn’t squirm too much—asides from the initial squeak, Belerick remained pretty silent in Kara’s grasp, squirming every now and then. He was… Well. He was pretty tall. And she was pretty short. He had to fold himself up or have limbs drag down like he was a shoddy carpet roll out for a spring cleaning.
Rosie, again, was gawking with her mouth open, but she reacted much faster this time. “O-oh! We have a clinic, near the sewers! Let me lead you to it…”
And so the unlikely trio left the alley and stepped back onto the busy docks. The strange sight caused no more than a few odd looks levelled their way—a woman with a rope-like braid almost skipping beside a small, muscular woman carrying a tall, thin man who was studiously cleaning the cracked pair of glasses attached to his neck. But with the day’s work still at its zenith, nobody accosted the group much as they wove through the Ward.
“Thank you again for steppin’ in, stranger,” Rosemary blurted out as they rounded a corner leading away from the busier parts of the district. She brought her hand up to her pendant, and the light glinted off of it in an odd, almost dream-like quality. “I was… Well. My kind of folk ain’t supposed to hurt others until it’s really necessary. And I don’t want to! I’m not good with fightin’—not like my brother, anyway! He was one of our guards! Went on as a soldier when Sembia started their occupation.” As she went on, it became obvious that Rosemary liked to talk with her hands (and her expressions). When they weren’t held together in a chaste, almost prayer-like pose over her chest, her hands were busy gesturing to drive her points across. “Anyway, I learned how to swing a mace from ‘im, and block a couple hits with a shield, but that’s about it. Never had brawls like that in cramped alleyways. You have a bone to pick with someone, you have it out in the fields. I had to sit in on some of those fights, you know. You ain't ever felt happy about your problems as when you see two gals slingin' cow poo at each other over a man.” The cleric took a deep breath, as if realizing she was rambling.
“Where’d you learn your style, if you don’t mind me asking?”
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Post by moralhazard on May 6, 2019 1:36:32 GMT
Unlike Rosie, Kara kept her face pretty neutral. She had had a pretty good idea that Belerick’s broken leg was – well, not self-inflicted, but at least not the deliberate work of his attackers. It was hard to imagine how they could’ve hit him to do such damage, and not exactly consistent with the rest of his injuries. They were certainly responsible – Kara considered that any damage done by Belerick to himself in trying to escape them was squarely the fault of his attackers – but there was some distinction to be made between a blow struck and an injury caused.
Rosie seemed to be doing her best to comfort him. Kara doubted she’d be able to make it any better. Then again, she also wasn’t sure if she could make it much worse.
Kara nodded, relieved that Rosie did have somewhere to take Belerick. A clinic sounded promising. Broken legs needed treatment; even if Rosie had healing magic, it was best to set the leg first. Some healers had the skill to take the wound without straightening the leg, and help the body coax it back together. Not all. Some were unskilled, but others made such mistakes when rushed. Kara never wanted to see that again; there was often nothing that could be done. Even re-breaking the limb didn’t always help, not unless it was possible to make the exact same break again.
But, then – Kara doubted such mistakes happened in Waterdeep. At least, not when the healer wasn’t drunk.
Belerick’s awkward squirming seemed to bother her not at all. Kara walked evenly next to Rosie as if she wasn’t carrying a man considerably taller and slightly heavier than her. He was the only one who seemed to be aware of how much he had to scrunch his body to fit. If his waving arms passed in front of her face while he was cleaning his glasses, well, Kara didn’t falter or give any sign that he was impeding her sight in any way.
Rosie was chatting again. Kara let the cheerful flood of conversation wash over her; she did listen, curiously. Kara had never, in fact, seen two women throwing cat poo at each other over a man. She had seen plenty of women fight over men – guards had to break those fights up as much as any other – but never any that had involved poo. Kara felt an odd, sudden rush of gratitude for that. The news that Rosie's brother had been a guard registered as well; she thought perhaps she felt a faint camaraderie.
“Sundabar,” Kara said. She paused, thinking over the question and her answer, deeply and solemnly. After a moment of grave contemplation, Kara added, “from Branmin Ironfist.” Kara couldn’t discuss her training without crediting the woman who had given it to her. She didn’t particularly care to explain much more than that, but she wouldn’t – she couldn’t – miss an opportunity to do honor to her mentor. She owed Ironfist everything. If she could have, without dropping Belerick, Kara would have reached up to touch the glaive on her back. The weapon’s shaft was a comforting, familiar presence on her back, its heavy smoothness resting solidly between her shoulder blades.
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Post by pastels on May 15, 2019 14:39:05 GMT
"Sundabar? Dear me, that's far," was what Rosemary had to say when Kara answered. She spun in place and peered curiously at the well-built woman. There was no time to observe, earlier; her attention had been on covering all of Belerick from the oncoming beating. But now that they were safe, Rosie made some observations on the other woman's physical appearance. Yes, she was smaller, but you could hardly notice! What was it Adair said before? Compact. That's the word. She was compact and her arms were like... like ropes! Ropes made out of metal!
Rosemary nodded to herself as they turned yet another corner, moving down a street that looked less kept than most in the Ward. Weeds burst from between the cobblestones, and gaps along the path became more and more common the further they walked. "Well, Branmin Ironfist did a peachy job, then! You're well fit!"
She stood on her tippy-toes and brought her hands up, reaching for an invisible person. "My brother's this tall, and he's well fit, too. Like a bear but friendly, bless his heart," Rosemary cheerfully shared without any sort of prompting from either Belerick or Kara. She seemed eager enough, and the skip in her step was barely supressed. "Did I say he were a guard? Well, we Featherdalesfolk don't have none of those fancy bell-ringin' thingamajigs the folks over at Mistledale and the urban dales have, so we make do with a good ol' village force." The cleric hopped over a cracked hole on the ground and continued talking without a pause, "Not that there's any trouble, mind, 'sides from some miscreant trying to make off with a chicken. Least until Netheril and Sembia started stirring up trouble with Archendale..."
She sighed and trailed off, but just as well--the change in their surroundings showed that they were in the rundown parts of the Dock Ward, the ones hidden from plain view by bad infrastructure choices and lacklustre urban planning. Not that the Masked Lords would admit to that... Rosemary perked up as they entered a surprisingly lively street, full of children running around or playing with items fished from the nearesy canal. "We're almost there! Um... Please don't expect much."
Just as the group was moving past one of the frolicking kids, a couple of the smallest tykes playing tag swerved into the scholar's outstretched legs. The effect was instantaneous; Belerick shrieked and threw his elbows inward in a violent spasm, his pale face turning even more ashen. The kids continued running along, laughing, blissfully oblivious to the agony they caused.
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Post by moralhazard on May 15, 2019 16:35:47 GMT
Kara had spent much of her time in Waterdeep exploring the Dock Ward. She lived there, and went from her inn to various parts of the city, which meant moving through different sides of the ward. Habit, as much as wariness, meant she rarely took the same path twice, and she would have said she had started to know the streets well, or as well as one could ever know one of the most chaotic wards in Waterdeep.
The streets that Rosemary was taking her down were new. Kara was doing her best to listen to Rosemary while carrying Belerick, but she tried to also spare a little attention for the new street, doing her best to pay her attention to her surroundings. She nodded faintly at the compliment to Branmin Ironfist, much more comfortable accepting the compliment to her mentor than she was accepting the compliment to herself. As if to highlight that, her only response to the folksy ‘well fit’ was a faint shrug, impressive given the amount of squirming human in her arms.
Kara avoided the holes and uneven potholes, looking down to make sure of her steps before watching Rosemary again. Kara knew very little about what being a guard in a village force was like; she imagined it was very different from being a guard in Sundabar or Waterdeep, at least with the tiny corner of her attention she was able to pare off for such thoughts.
Unsurprisingly, this was a rundown corner of the Dock Ward where Kara had never been before. She traced back the route in her mind, confident she could find it again if need be. Perhaps that was her mistake; Kara wasn’t able to move out of the way of the shrieking kids in time to keep them from jostling Belerick’s leg.
Belerick spasmed, his elbows flailing, and one clipped Kara in the side. Even with how bony his elbows were, it shouldn’t have hurt; there wasn’t much force behind it. But he had managed to hit her right in the worst of her burns, the one that had frozen almost immediately after.
Kara let out a choked sort of gasping sound, and came to an abrupt stop. There was no attention left to spare for walking or listening or anything except staying on her feet, with her arms beneath Belerick. She refused to drop him, utterly refused, and it was only her iron will that let her carry that through and keep her grasp on the scholar. Her face went as ashen as his had from the pain sweeping through her, even more striking because of her normal brown color, and a shudder swept through her whole body. It was a few moments before she could even try to breathe again, and it came out raspy and harsh from the pain.
The world had nearly whited out around her; Kara closed her eyes. They were nearly there. In a few moments, she could put Belerick down; if she did so here, she would have to pick him back up, and that would be worse. She managed a deeper breath, forcing it through the pain, inhaling and exhaling again and again until she could open her eyes. The world was in color again, and Kara found that she could move, slowly, one foot in front of the other.
“Where?” Kara asked, slowly, forcing the word out as smoothly as she could (not very). If she stopped again, she wasn’t sure she could start back up.
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Post by pastels on May 25, 2019 14:27:03 GMT
Rosemary turned pale too, though obviously for a different, less flesh-rending reason. One minute she was talking, body turned away from the two, and in the next she heard a bloodcurdling scream, then a grunt. When she turned around, Belerick was unconscious and the strong lady was… Well… She wasn’t looking good. Kara had just about turned into a rock statue on the spot. Even from this far away, Rosie could see her face turn pallid and spot the faint tremor which ran through her muscles. Oh no. Oh dear. What happened!?
“A-are… are you alright? Oh, goodness, of course you’re not, what am I asking,” the young cleric gasped and began waving her hands around, hopping from one foot to another as she circled Kara, trying to spot the source of the damage. Then, she figured out that maybe staying out in the open and clucking like a mother hen was more harm than good in this situation, so she turned away and hurried forward. “It’s just… just this way!”
And right at the corner was a dilapidated wooden house, more skeleton than building, with patched sheets of fabric covering the worst of the holes. As they neared the bubbling of the nearby sewers grew louder, more insistent. The smell was tolerable. For now. It wasn’t late afternoon yet, or summer, when the heat brings out the worst odors from the long-forgotten refuse clogging up the pipes. Rosemary continued along, oblivio sake?” us to how sketchy and barebones the whole operation looked.
“We have a free cot here somewhere—Annbeth! Where’s my supplies, for Eldath’s sake?” The young woman, eyes wide, darted up the crumbling steps and into the interior of the building, where her soft voice pierced through the makeshift walls. Inside, the “hospice” was as dreary as could be: a smattering of cots and stools close to the entrance, lining the walls, and a desk with a variety of jars and philters at the very edge of the room. The left wall had the sigil of Ilmater carved onto the weatherworn bricks. Rosemary kept her voice quiet even as she stomped up the rickety flight of stairs, ignoring the upset looks of the patients roused from their slumber—light injuries all, really—as she searched for the aged herbalist. The men and women, all wiry and alert and armed with every strange manner of weaponry from butterfly knife to jagged shard of glass, went still and relaxed. Then they began to eye each other suspiciously.
Each of them knew better than to start a fight in this clinic, though. And it was about the only place where the gang members of the Red Snakes and their other two rival gangs could meet in relative peace.
Rosemary continued with her hushed calls. “Annbeth? Goodness! What a hot mess this place is!”
Fortunately for Kara, the nearest empty space was but five steps from the doorway, right beside a man with thick stubble and an even thicker wad of bandages over his left eye.
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Post by moralhazard on May 26, 2019 2:06:46 GMT
Belerick was unconscious in her arms now; Kara ignored the weight of him and focused on moving forward. She bent her body to her will, focusing all her strength on the steady rhythm of her breathing, in and out.
Rosemary flickered in and out of her vision; Kara didn’t bother turning her head to track her. She couldn’t spare the attention, not yet. It was a short distance to the clinic, and by the time Kara reached the steps the sharp shock of the pain had started to fade, leaving a deep ache and painful pulling sensation that was much more manageable.
Color slowly returned to Kara’s face; her movements became smooth again, not tight and jerky. Now it was only pain, nothing worse, and pain Kara was used to. She made her way up the steps and into the clinic, taking a few steps to set Belerick down on the cot, as carefully as she could.
Kara stopped back, glancing at the man with the bandages, then down at herself. The pain was still fading, but she thought she had better look at her side all the same. With a careful exhale, Kara lifted her tunic and the shirt beneath. She wore leggings beneath, but the motion revealed a too-muscular stomach, smattered with scars, and marred by a burn that started on her front and stretched back over her side. The swollen skin was shiny and red, taut, with some blistering scattered across it. It looked serious and utterly untreated, as if she had simply gone to sleep after having a fireball flung into her.
The same as before, Kara thought. She pulled her tunic and shirt back down, and settled them into place. The pain was only a dull memory of what it had been, uncomfortable and pulling when she moved, but no longer serious. Belerick hadn’t done her any further injury; it had only hurt.
Kara turned back towards the door, fully intending to leave. Rosemary had plenty of clients; Kara was sure she had her hands full already. Belerick was in safe hands now; Kara didn’t doubt that Rosemary would heal his leg, damage from the children and all.
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Post by pastels on Jul 5, 2019 13:30:28 GMT
Annbeth had gone to the market to replace a couple of glass philters shattered in yesterday’s mishap, or so she wrote with her generous, curved handwriting on the scrap of parchment tucked into her “office:” a generous word for what was merely a corner with a desk crammed into it, one leg bolstered by an uneven pebble, and the surface piled high with all manner of medicinal greenery. Here, it seemed, a touch of the wild breathed its way into Waterdeep, vines and branches twining for the sunlight peeking in from the damaged ceiling above. In any other occasion, Rosemary would have stopped to admire it, as she always did. Not today.
The cleric of Ilmater left a scant few supplies, but what they had was in a small leather bag. The rest were scattered across Annbeth’s table—herbal remedies, mostly, made from the very same reagents grown in her alcove. Rosemary scooped those up too in her other arm and dashed for the first floor, her braid swinging madly behind her like an lash unfurled mid-strike.
Her foot touched down on the last rotten step, eliciting a nasty creak, and Rosemary glanced up just in time to spot her target moving for the door. Belerick was safe and sound—broken leg notwithstanding—in a cot.
Suddenly, the man closest to Kara spoke, his voice rumbling then rising to a strange, piping squeak. “She don’t look so good, miss.” He tapped at the skin below his still-functional right eye. “Red as cooked lobster an’ blistered besides down her food shed. Saw it meself.”
“Why are you such a goddamn tattletale, Marcel?” Someone hissed from the other end of the room, and a few other voices raised in murmured support.
“Momma’s boy.”
“Fishwife.”
“Will everybody please stop calling each other names?” Rosemary interjected with a sigh, but her eyes were on Kara. Without breaking a step, the cleric made for the battered endtable closest to Belerick and placed the curatives there. Then, with a speed that was surprising to watch, she turned around—braid whipping around to nearly smack Marcel in the good eye—and ran for the back of the room… then backtracked a few steps. “You!” Oh, Eldath’s mercy, she didn’t even know the lady’s name! They never had the chance to introduce themselves, right? Right? “Can you stay put for a bit?”
Rustling, rustling, banging… A sharp noise… Some concerned stares from the patients…
And Rosemary strode back, holding what appeared to be a cheesecloth in a scuffed metal bowl in one hand and a couple of threadbare pillows in the other. Upon closer inspection, licks of cold air wafted from the strange parcel, and it seemed to be a cold compress for the philosopher’s leg. That was the main focus for a moment, with Rosie bustling back and forth to get aforementioned limb to rights before diving into healing magic.
“What’s this Marcel was talkin’ about? You’re hurt, too?” Rosemary finally said. She paused to glance at Kara, her face lit up by the vibrant green light emanating from her hands, and her eyes were pleading. “You must have been, the way it looked earlier. Pull up a chair and let me see it, I’ll help soon as I’m done with this!”
Cure Wounds: z2OmFoEE1d8+6 1d8+6
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Post by moralhazard on Jul 6, 2019 20:53:16 GMT
Kara heard the man speaking behind her. Red as a cooked lobster, he called her. Kara had never eaten a lobster; they didn’t have them in Sundabar, and although she had been told the enormous sea bugs were a delicacy here in Waterdeep, she remained deeply skeptical.
Kara didn’t stop though, not until the woman called after her. It was a step, then another before Kara realized it was her the strange woman meant, and she stopped, glancing back over her shoulder. At the request to stay put Kara shifted, rubbed the shaved part of her head with one hand, shifted again, then nodded, faintly, and held. She couldn’t be sure what the other woman wanted; it might be important.
The other woman vanished and then emerged again, and went straight to the man with the broken leg. Kara shifted slightly, waiting, then took a few hesitant steps closer. Maybe her help was still needed after all, she thought. She hadn’t meant to go before she had finished helping.
“It isn’t -“ something about the stare leveled at her made Kara feel oddly guilty, as if she were wronging the other woman by refusing.
Kara shifted, then as instructed went and got a chair and sat. Without noticeable hesitation, she stripped off her shirt and tunic, revealing a breastband over a torso just as muscular as her arms, and even more scarred. She was a mass of them, with a long recent looking scar down one side the most vivid, but various other marks plentiful as well. Even sitting her stomach was flat, hard and ridged with a six pack she didn’t seem to need to flex to have displayed.
On top of it, of course, was the red, blistered burn, rippling painfully over her skin.
“I don’t think it needs magic,” Kara would mumble when the woman came over to examine it. She couldn’t imagine asking for it or even letting it come without protest with so many in such need. “Maybe - some salve, if you have it.” She looked down at the floor, scared of meeting the taller woman’s eyes a second time.
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Post by pastels on Jul 8, 2019 16:35:56 GMT
Rosemary wished she had Sidra’s skill with people—the Exalted always handled visitors to the temple with such grace that her own efforts seemed stilted and wooden in comparison. She remembered that cloth merchant… Oooh, was he a handful! The doughy man, who had been dressed in the funniest and most confusing array of fabrics she had ever seen, pitched a fit when she told him he had to remove his shoes for the treatment. Their argument took the better part of five minutes until Sidra finally stepped in, much to Rosie’s relief, and disarmed the belligerent traveler with hushed words and a smile which crinkled the corners of her eyes. Then done. Shoes off. He even seemed a bit ashamed of himself!
Kara was no fuming merchant, but Rosie thought she could catch snippets of discomfort every now and then. Now this… Well. It certainly was something.
To say that the cleric was taken aback by the extent of the injury would be an understatement. She had just finished with the still-unconscious Belerick when the woman dragged out a stool and took off her shirt, and it felt like the wind had been punched from her chest when she saw it. She had to blink and rub her eyes with the back of her wrist to be sure it wasn’t the light playing tricks on her. The collection of scars. Just what on earth did this stranger eat in Sundabar and fight on the way here!? Rosemary was vaguely aware of some exclamations—Marcel again, probably—and she ignored them to roll up her sleeves and tend to Kara next. “Oh, goodness.” Her pale blue eyes were wide with concern, and Rosie honestly spent a moment just wringing her hands as she studied the most pressing injury: the burn. Any other person might have considered telling Kara off for letting the wound fester this far, but it was a line of thought which would have been quickly discarded once they also considered how she could easily snap them in half. Not Rosie. It didn’t even pass her mind at all—but then again, she missed a lot of things in general. Take that as you will. Breathe in, breathe out!
Her voice was steadier when the last of the air escaped her lips. “Well, on the bright side! You’re very well fit! Like ‘beat Rommel the cargo lifter at arm wrestlin’’ fit! My brother and I could learn a few things from you.” The cleric clasped her hands and leaned back, a soft smile warming her face. She strode back to the bedside table and began to search through the old bag. “May I ask where you got this…” A hand shot up and gestured down the length of her side, then resumed its digging into the bag’s depths. “Magical fire? It don’t look like it gets close to fire easy, that place.”
A pause.
“You… have a lot of scars. The one on your side seems fresh.” She finally found what she was searching for and walked back with a tiny white ceramic pot in hand. At once, a sharp, herbal odor pierced the air—a scent that, it seemed, Rosie was immune to at this point, seeing how she didn’t bat an eyelash and focused her clear gaze down on her newest patient. “Did a healer to see to that? Looks pretty deep from where I’m standin’… Ah, if you don’t mind me sayin’, that is. Um. Any other injuries in the dark or…?”
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