npc inbox: ellethia

[groundrules]

NPC INBOX

Reach out to your (not-so-)favourite NPC here, putting their name in the comment header. Try to keep it to just quick text/audio/written exchanges or inquiries that can accept summarised answers, please!

Previous NPC inbox posts:

■ Arc I: Sa-Hareth

■ Interlude: Stairs of Sighs + Arc II: Taravast

	ENAM Well-travelled guide and botanist. Associate of the Merchant, formerly himself a tradesman. Measured of speech, honourable, sincere. Lover and protector of animals, whatever their nature. Travels with apprentices.
	HATISSE Revived witch of the Attaryl, partly responsible for the massacre of the Stairs of Sighs. Formerly a court witch of the Attaryl. Manipulative, vicious, a trained seductress. Formidably powerful. Buried with wards and injuries by her own sisters to prevent her return. Somewhat bound to Wrath.
	ASGEIRR The ghost of a scholar monk. Haunts the tattered execution cloak that the party stole from the La Rea bank in Sa-Hareth. Once a champion of equality and freedom, he faced ire for converting his followers against the regionally profitable trade of slavery. Soft-spoken but wise and just, slow to regain his strength. Will speak to those who visit his cloak in brief interludes. Favours necromancers.
	THE MERCHANT The patron saint of etiquette and the eastbound getaway expedition. Seems to largely trade information alongside wares. Appreciates spices, strategy and collaboration. Has an eerie and overly cautious manner. Committed. Defends the benefit of the many, to the detriment of the few.

OTHER CITADELS

	"HALTHAM" | ANURR The undead warlord Anurr, previously posing as gentle-mannered giant Haltham. An embodiment of Sa-Hareth's cold storms and wind, who regained his territory from contender Unhalad with the inadvertent help of the party in Arc I. Frostily rational and amenable to some negotiation.
	MACALUSO SPINA Earnest and moderate nephew of Bonaccorso Spina, now leading Doxe of Taravast. Adrift, following the betrayals of his family, Macaluso benefits from support from the witches of Bessis and seeks to rebuild the citadel he secured with the party's help.
	VANNOZZA SPINA Beautiful and fierce niece of Bonaccorso Spina, targeted by the old man for possession. Crafty, coy, strategic and cold, she now acts as adviser to her more idealistic cousin, Macaluso Spina after executing her grandfather.
	RIGARDA Lively, charismatic and gossip-prone lady of the highest echelons, formerly closely allied to Bonaccorso Spina. She carried out the dirty work of brokering weapon shipments to the Brotherhood of undead lieges, buying Taravast's protection. Alive at Anduin's largesse.
	KARSA Currently unavailable | Sorceress, young (?). Employed by the Merchant and deferential to him. Talented but fiery and frequently impatient, intolerant of fools. She will get today's job done yesterday. Struggles to sympathise with men, objections and those who cannot absorb information quickly. Enchanted the group's translation devices. Furtively left the group, bearing injury, at the end of Arc II.

Comments

[northerndragon]

They were trying to do something, before Taravast could do it.

[pulvisetumbra]

That is apparent enough.

You might remember what our brave Doxe attempted to achieve. And what stood beyond his reach.

Taravast witches traded in mere extensions of life.

[northerndragon]

They thought here that you could find a way to choose not to die.

[That’s true, isn’t it? He doesn’t bother asking. He assumes he will be told if he’s wrong.]

Something tried to take my body. Or the look of it — I’m not sure which. I could feel it in me, for a time.

[pulvisetumbra]

But it is not currently with you.

[northerndragon]

No. I pushed it out, or it was pushed out. Something else wanted in, and could not get in. But it tore at me for

I don’t know how long. They say it was only a few minutes. It felt like days. Longer. Hard to say when you’re under the water.

[pulvisetumbra]

Do you expect felicitations for surviving?

[northerndragon]

No. I wanted to know if you had any idea what those things were — why something like that would happen here. I don’t think it chose me for myself. I think it would have taken anything it could get.

[After all, he had not been the only person piecing the mirror together, only the one unlucky enough to be pulled in.]

[pulvisetumbra]

I believe you are correct in your assumptions.

[northerndragon]

That isn’t a comfort. But it makes me think the glass was shattered for a reason, and we were fools to put it back together, though it gave us little choice.

You gave me a key, and I have held it. Not the one you gave me for Wrath and Wen Qing — I gave them that the day I arrived in Taravast. The other. Is its lock somewhere in this city?

[pulvisetumbra]

The ruins of this city. Yes. One of them.

You are possessed of a key to many locks and doors. It will be of interest to see which one you open.

[northerndragon]

All right.

The box seems to want wishes. A door here wanted wishes too.

What would you do? I am not asking you what you would want me to do. I’m asking what you might do yourself, in this city, in your home, with this sort of locked box. Would you wish it all back the way it was, before any trouble began?

[pulvisetumbra]

It is the popular opinion that if a person is gifted a lock and a key, it is to tempt them into the opening. And perhaps they shall benefit from the knowledge, or perhaps it will damn them.

But they will have it, either way.

[northerndragon]

And what if they are already damned?

[He would like to say here that he is no toy, no plaything, but he knows better. He has been dead; now he is alive. He thinks his fate is, likely, to die again, to march under the Night King’s orders, but he does not mean to accept it easily. If it is a victory for the Dead, let it be a costly one.

Either way, he knows that he would not have chosen to live again. Something brought him back, whether he would or not. This business with the key… well, at least there is a little more choice in it.]

[pulvisetumbra]

Young man, you may wish to turn each stone of your philosophical exploration of this topic with another, in hopes of giving up your liability for your choice.

But you won't. This is your choice. Kindly make it.

some time after

[northerndragon]

Well, I’ve done it. The box was full of papers. They tell us enough of what happened here.

Someone who was in command resigned their post. They thought what was being done here in the tower was wrong, but their name has been blotted out. Do you know anything of them?

[pulvisetumbra]

Am I expected to be privy to every bureaucratic shift in the architecture of Ellethia?

[northerndragon]

No, but no more am I. I thought that if there was a way to know, and if they still live, it might be to the good. It would be bitter for them to have known that they were right, and to still have been able to do nothing. I understand that, but it doesn’t matter here.

You have my thanks for your aid.

[pulvisetumbra]

The fall of Ellethia was rapid, decisive, public and cruel.

I assure you, they know. The world knows. For generations, it could not look away.

[northerndragon]

I am sorry for that, too.

What I can do here may not be much, but I will do what I can. I hope the same is true of the rest of us.

[pulvisetumbra]

For your earnestness, I am not ungrateful.