The foyer of the plantation-house bustles with newly-arrived members and obsequious servants, but no overtly-visible security guards or other mundane defenders. In any other domain, this is just what the VRS spy would've expected; the Fraternity was rightly confident in the sheer potency of its magics, and would logically favor arcane methods of self-defense, as it had at the Manoir. But in
Souragne, as Crow'd been warned on his own previous venture to the bayou-domain, flagrant displays of spell-power were discouraged by
more than mere superstition. If the FoS felt at liberty to continue protecting itself magically, even
here, such a cavalier attitude on their part would rouse disturbing implications.
Have to make a note of th--
The bard's disquieting train of thought is broken off, as a tiresomely-familiar figure steps into his path.
Moral Machivelli wrote:"Ah, Mr. Crow. If you will step this way..."
"Why, yes,
very well; thank you for asking! And yourself...?"
The knee-jerk retort to Buchvold's curt greeting (or lack thereof) comes easy, "Brother" Crow's light-toned, chiding quips rising to supplant his own, considerably-more-scathing manner of witticism. The bard puts little true effort into the reply, though: undue earnestness in sarcasm merely registers as contempt, not humor, and diving into his role
now would be counterproductive, given what's surely coming next.
Moral Machivelli wrote:Buchvold indecates an empty room to the man. As the bard enters, the illusionist shuts the door.The room appears to be a small study room, unocupied.
Falling into step behind the Borcan -- bit of a surprise, that they'd sent his
"ally" to usher him in, but perhaps neither Hazan nor Chateaufaux had been handy -- the bard follows Buchvold into the vacant study. Vacant of
visible observers, that is: Crow has no doubts that the room is monitored in some manner, its occupants' doings perhaps even
recorded in the same fashion as his own break-in at the Borcan's office had been. As, indeed, every inch of the Maison is likely being monitored.
Crow looks casually round the room as the Borcan claims a seat behind the desk --
Making yourself at home,
are you? Fair enough, if feeling in your comfort-zone
helps improve your own performance; just don't grow so fond of the role, you forget that you've your own
duplicities to hide, wizard! -- then settles into a handy armchair, shedding his case and resting it beside him on the sumptuous carpeting. He does
not lounge bonelessly in his seat, despite "Brother" Crow's relaxed habits: again, not
too far into his FoS-persona, not -- quite -- yet.
Rather, he looks quizzically and wide-eyed at the Borcan: to the casual observor, the hopeful alertness of a somewhat-inexperienced Brother, as yet unfamiliar with the increased security-measures imposed since the catastrophe at the Manoir. His left hand dips into a pocket and retrieves the remaining loquat, which he peels and takes a bite out of.
(Though outwardly idle, the bard's
gaze scrutinizes the Borcan meticulously, discerning no obvious lapses in Buchvold's pose of calm indifference ... no betrayal of covert relief, that
he'd been picked to interview Crow, rather than some other ... no telltale indications of how they'd secretly met, not long before, to
plan for this day. Indeed, the man
has been learning, which is -- for
now, at least -- to the VRS spy's own greater advantage.)
Moral Machivelli wrote:"Now, Mr. Crow. You will activate your ring, and then I have some questions for you; in the cause of security."
Raising an eyebrow both within and without -- physically because "Brother Crow'd" not been subjected to any such test at the Manoir, and is a bit surprised to be challenged, thusly, right on the very threshold; mentally because the VRS spy hadn't expected the Frat to assign just
one witness to directly administer such a test -- the bard leans forward in his seat, extending his sigil-bearing right hand towards the Borcan.
"What, already? I daresay, things really
have tightened up since the Manoir! I suppose it's justified, though; we
both saw what happens when procedures grow a tad lax...."
("Brother" Crow slips away, for the nonce, and someone older and more spiteful claims his place in the bard's thoughts: an unseen imposture-within-an-imposture, enacted solely in the mind.)
...as the standards have grown, since I
was initiated: just consider this sorry example I'm looking at,
for one! I could never quite conceive just how this pretentious know-nothing
managed to pass his initation lecture. By bribery,
most likely? He was fool enough to select On Arcane Items, and their Residue
as his topic! How a trinket-hawking dabbler content to rely on items
as a crutch ever expects to rise within our ranks, I'll never know; if I told him once,
I told him a thousand times, it's the mind
in which true power lies, not the flimsy, ancillary paraphernalia of Shadow....
(The technique was a
rare one in the Land of Mists, even rarer than the enchanted items upon which it was employed. Crow'd met
very few others, in all his travels, who had fostered such a knack: it was too unreliable for other arcanists' tastes, too lacking in tangible payoff for those of a more-roguish bent. That the Fraternity of Shadows
hadn't taken stronger measures to prevent such sidestepping of their identity-check system might well say less about their disdain for the
materialistic -- a disdain, which the late
Rodrigo Taroyan had shared, and which the bard now psychologically
emulates, in an
internalized mode of role-assumption lying far beyond persona-crafting or even bodily impersonation -- than about just how few others in his world might have the capacity to achieve what
Crow now attempts.)
Nobody had
taught him to do
this: the bard is sure of that. It isn't a skill that
can be 'taught' in the conventional sense, only intuited. Practice helps, but not decisively; he honestly isn't certain it will work
now, a fact he's tactfully withheld from the Borcan. But he mustn't trouble himself about that, just now ... mustn't,
and needn't, even let it cross his mind that
he doesn't have
every right in the world to succeed.
Of
course he'll succeed! It's
HIS ring, after all: earned fair and square by
him, ritually attuned to
him, forged for no lesser purpose than to obey
him! It
belongs to
him: to
Esteemed Brother Rodrigo Taroyan! HIM!!!
...so to the Legions
with this self-important tyro and his pretty playthings, and to the Night
with those Richemulouise incompetents' belated "security", and to the Mists
with the enchanted rubbish this smug popinjay's so enamoured of, because such gimcrackery is only worth keeping if it does WHAT IT'S TOLD WHEN IT'S TOLD, YOU UNDERSTAND THAT?
(The
words, when they come, are an afterthought. It's the bard's uncontestable
domination -- his ... rather,
Rodrigo Taroyan's ... supreme, unshakable,
righteous confidence in his own
legitimate ownership of the signet, and in the
control over its powers which such a proprietary claim entails -- that leaves the viper-circled sigil-ring
no choice but to obey the man who, momentarily, had
become its master.)
"Cogito ergo creo," the bard's voice murmurs.
And a moment later: "Satisfied, then? I suppose we
could converse in the dark, but if you insist on rehearsing that wearisome
lecture of yours to me again, as you'd done last November, I might want the
light back, so I can read under the table...."
Teeth --
grinning teeth -- crunch audibly into fruit, and the magical darkness vanishes.
"Who [u]cares[/u] what the Dark Powers are? They're [i]bastards![/i] That's all I need to know of them." -- Crow
