Café de Nuit

The caretaker nods.

He follows Benn out of the shrine, retrieves his spade from the ground, and then leads the away down the hill to an open grave on the lower west slope.

The simple stone marker lies toppled backward.
A pitted, discolored splotch across the upper third of the limestone slab shows faint traces of an inscription, now corroded away to illegibility.

Splinters poke up from mounds of earth about the pit.

Bending close and using the magnifying glass (which Denys Sancerre presented to him as a gift, years ago), the Lamordian investigator finds the trace of a single boot print and also some scattered fragments of thick, almost opaque, green glass--all this near the defaced and overturned headstone.

Looking into the pit, Benn sees the hole has begun filling again, as loose earth slips down, but the rectangular depression at the base shows where a casket had been buried until recently.

''I didn't touch a thing. Thought it might help the gendarmes or their helpers catch the body-snatchers, leaving it like this.'' The caretaker leans on his spade and looks down into the hole.
''I'm not certain when they struck, but it was probably four or five nights ago. I informed the gendarmes as soon as I noticed. But it was only yesterday evening I told Captain Thibault's man I'd found out who was buried here--it took some looking through records, and I've still got all my other work, you understand. The man, Strange, he was somebody important?"

"He was an old compatriot of mine," Bennedict answers, "And someone who an old enemy knew of. My first thought is that this was meant to unnerve me. The alternative is...more unpleasant."

As he speaks, he looks down at the man's boots to see if they're the same size as the boot print.

"Your instincts were absolutely right, Monsieurre. I wish more people in the city knew to do the same. Have you seen anything else unusual over the last week or so? And do you have any idea from where this green glass has come?"

Adam wrote:"He was an old compatriot of mine," Bennedict answers, "And someone who an old enemy knew of. My first thought is that this was meant to unnerve me. The alternative is...more unpleasant."

As he speaks, he looks down at the man's boots to see if they're the same size as the boot print.

"Your instincts were absolutely right, Monsieurre. I wish more people in the city knew to do the same. Have you seen anything else unusual over the last week or so? And do you have any idea from where this green glass has come?"

The caretaker's boots are about the right size.

But maybe a bit bigger.

''Unusual? The Black Cloud. Seen that--but not up close. That's all anybody talks about, these days. It's blighting the city's fortune. I heard two posh ladies at a funeral yestereve, gossiping about the postponement of the annual ball. The Cloud, again. "
He shrugs.
"Don't know about the glass... Wine bottle? Something else?"

Bennedict holds the fragments of glass towards Raen. "Anyone able to identify this? I don't think we have time to run to the alchemist right now."

As the party stands in the quiet, cool graveyard examining broken glass and discussing the recent disinterment...


The afternoon sunlight fades to a premature evening glow.

The Black Cloud, plainly visible as it rises higher in the western sky, pulses like a living thing as it spews great columns of ash down into the streets and across the rooftops.

The sooty breeze carries distant screams to the graveyard.

Turning the collar of his coat up to cover his lower face, the Caretaker mumbles a prayer to Our Lady in the Mists.

Raen looks at the streams of Ash from the heart of the cloud. "Benn, we should hurry. If you can store the glass so we could examine it better once we got proper equipment. We know what happens when the ash connects. "

Klokulf, who had been tacitly observing the open grave, goes on full alert at the advent of the shrieks.

"Is that the sound of another necessary detour?" he asks.

"I think these shrieks will only intensify as time passes. The cloud turns things rabid and very dangerous. We have to do something about it."
Raen stops short of mentioning the plan and the masks to the newcomer, not sure of his motives yet.

"I can't help but think these things are related," Bennedict says, tucking the fragment of glass away. "Find Matyr, find who is behind all of this strife, and I would wager that we'll find the source of that." He gestures towards the cloud with his cane.

He thanks the gravedigger for the assistance and moves to leave, unless the others have business to attend.

Dorgio Varga, priest of the Morninglord, enters the burial ground clutching his head, nursing one of the hangovers that have become all too frequent since his family decamped. He finds his comrades at the pit and joins them there.

Kat occasionally glances at the investigator at work, but most of her attention is on their surroundings, casting her gaze over graves and paths, eyes flicking to any hint of moment, human or animal. Her only distraction from the examination of the view is her frequent checks of the newly arrived stranger.

Bennedict nods to Dorgio as he enters the graveyard, before pointing down towards the grave. "Seems an old friend of ours has had his headstone removed."

DORGIO


The open grave, churned heaps of earth, wooden splinters, and toppled headstone attest to Benn's words. Grave robbery.
But Dorgio can't make out the inscription on the fallen slab. Where a name and perhaps an epitaph would have been carved, the face of the stone appears oddly discolored and pitted with corrosion.

kintire wrote:Kat occasionally glances at the investigator at work, but most of her attention is on their surroundings, casting her gaze over graves and paths, eyes flicking to any hint of moment, human or animal. Her only distraction from the examination of the view is her frequent checks of the newly arrived stranger.

KAT

She sees a half-dozen crows perched atop a line of marble monuments upslope, near the hilltop shrine.

The birds turn their heads almost in unison, watching Kat as she looks toward them.
One caws, and then the little black-feathered gang takes flight, rising and soaring eastwards, out of the city and away from the Black Cloud.

The Cloud seems to be growing in the West...

Kat shifts.

"I hope you are right. That cloud is growing, and if it isn't stopped soon..."

She lets the phrase tail off and stares silently into the gloom, seeking out any sign of the shapeshifting thing that might be following...