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I carefully pulled Ash's booklet
🕑 Added 2023-04-20 01:49:38 +0000 UTC"How to Be Unseelie and Look Good Doing It" out of my Elfintory. It fell open in my hand and the pages spread to show a chapter detailing all the ways an elf may be dishonest without actually lying. After a few moments the pages slowly turned again, as if ruffled by a faint breeze, and stopped at a section describing the best ways to plant incriminating evidence on one's enemies (and allies) for the purpose of blackmail.
There must have been some powerful Netherhells-forged enchantment on this unassuming little codex to make it so subtly context sensitive. How diabolically convenient. Blast that damn fox! Ash must have been really determined to turn me Unseelie if he was willing to commit such costly resources toward that goal. The enchantment must also be the reason why the book kept returning to my Elfintory every time I threw it away.
As I looked at those soft, innocent-seeming pages, I felt as though the very Lord of the Netherhells was beckoning to me. Even though I tried to stay on the Seelie side, I knew that I had been walking a very fine line for much of my life. But surely ... surely this wouldn't really be Unseelie since I would be framing Didelphis for a good cause: To save the life of an innocent femme who had nothing to do with this until I put her in harms way. Plus, Didelphis, my intended victim, was a thoroughly horrible person. I wouldn't be doing anything wrong.
The pages of the book flipped in a manner that somehow seemed cheeky, stopping on a section listing the best ways to soothe a novice's conscience by rationalizing one's vile actions with cheap moral platitudes. "It's for a good cause" was at the top of the page.
I slapped the book shut and looked up at Chloe, Rebecca, Burnside, and the Ixies. They were all standing there, anxiously awaiting orders. This was no time to indulge in philosophical musings! Lives were on the line! I needed to make a decision and act on it, and deal with the consequences later. Everyone was a mix of good and bad; I just had to make sure my good outweighed the bad.
Why did I have the feeling that very sentiment had been written lower on the page of excuses and justifications?
Oh well, I had to do something. I opened my mouth to bark out an order, when suddenly -
The vixen and the mouse (bear?) burst through the shrubbery into the circle.
"Oh my Lord!" the vixen panted. "It was horrifying! Petunia and I escaped by the skin of our teeth!"
I had no idea that lowfolk dental hygiene was so bad. I made a mental note to include a unit on tooth care in my lesson plan ... assuming my coven wasn't already doomed to failure.
"Your bug servants saved us," Petunia stated grimly, "but this clearly illustrates the need to teach us defensive spells as soon as possible. We were sitting ducks out there! No offense, Chloe."
"We had no booze, Sire," the Ixie captain explained. "So we soaked the rabbits with filthy pond water instead."
"I need information!" I exclaimed. "What do you know? Are Oonagh and Didelphis still in jail? When is the trial? What about Vernier? Has any suspicion fallen on her?"
"My Lord, we do not know," Petunia explained.
"An angry mob was chasing us!" the vixen (presumably Gretchen) sobbed. "They had torches and pitchforks! They weren't kidding around!"
"They have finally begun to take us seriously," Petunia nodded. "My Lord, Oonagh and Didelphis were still in jail as of last night. By evading capture, we may have delayed the trial ... or they might just hasten the execution now, to lure us into attempting a rescue."
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Comments
>Adler: She has a point. You need spies to keep a pulse on the situation. Send a team of your sneakiest ixies into the town. You need to know when the trial is, who the judge will be, who's in the jury, anybody of interest in the case. Also, if you are to turn this situation against Didelphis, it will help to know more about the people involved and overseeing the trial. It would also help to know if the rabbits who started this have a ringleader calling the shots or if it really is just a mob. You will also need to know the moment the situation changes. You also need to know if Didelphis's hut has been searched yet. >Chloe: What if they don't bother with a trial? >Adler: If that's the case, an immediate extraction would be needed. You find it unlikely, you hope, that the town government would skip a trial and go right to an execution. You have heard the lowfolk themselves refer to this as the "civilized age". Such a thing, even for witchcraft, would be a complete breakdown of law. The magistrate would have a lot to answer for if word of such a thing ever reached a higher office. >Rebecca: What if it's a complete kangaroo court show trial? >Adler: Why is it that kangaroos have such a bad reputation in law? Uh, anyway. That's why you want to know who the judge and jury are. You're hoping to have enough time to set a plan in motion before the trial. You need to handle this in a way to keep the situation from getting worse. Speaking of which. >Adler: Order the ixies that rescued Petunia and Gretchen to go back out to the knocked out rabbits, and if they are waking up, knock them out again. It is vitally important they be soaked with booze to tarnish their reputations and make their word suspect. Otherwise their testimony could be used against the coven if they claimed they were attacked with magic. It shouldn't be hard to find booze. The lowfolk use booze to purify drinking water, there should be bottles of the stuff in every house. Find some. >Adler: Alright, you have a few ideas on how to fix this, but you need just a bit more information. Firstly: does anyone know that Didelphis was a member and, in fact, the former leader of the coven? >Petunia: Yes. She bragged about it all the time. Like, constantly. >Chloe: She threatened to turn Oonagh into a newt multiple times, once she learned how. >Adler: What? If that's the case why has something like this not already happened? >Rebecca: Nobody took her seriously. They thought she was just a crazy old lady. >Adler: This is an obvious question, but just to clarify, Is it common knowledge that Didelphis hates Oonagh? >Coven: Yes. Yes it is very common knowledge. >Adler: If it is common knowledge that she was the leader of the coven and Oonagh's sworn enemy, why is she not under any sort of suspicion or scrutiny considering she is accusing the members of the coven she started and her most hated rival? >Petunia: She was the only one who was turned into a child. >Adler: Is that all? >Coven: Um, maybe? >Adler: Something seems fishy.
Walter Reimer
The book apparates a container of the Elvish potion Hwupazz, and a can opener.
