Signed, sealed, delivered.

[Cinnabar]

His pen skims across the page now, condensing this difficult account onto lines of black ink, that they migth be captured, fixed to the page like a butterfly upon a collector's pin; to be scrutinised at a later time, scrutinised and analysed and pondered upon. That done for now, he glances up to his interviewee, fixing her with keen grey gaze.

"I understand your sentiment, your suspicions, yes. But I would... tend to agree with the Order of Straka's actions, I think; where there are bodies, where men are slain, there must be an accounting. For it to be otherwise is... it invites nothing but mayhem and carnage, you see? But in the event you all had sound reason for these killings, or at least were able to convince the Council that you had sound reason, and you were not hanged." Hm. Acquitted, cleared and freed. So... the pardons are for something else. "Justice prevailed, on that occasion."

He reaches to top up Ariane's cup, and then his own, and takes a sip before nodding to her once more. "So, you were made to forget the events in the cave, and even that Dhrin had been central to them. What became of him afterwards?" A thought strikes him. "What of the ninth man? The one taken by the Straka?"

[Carnath-Emory]

"Mmm. And perhaps you are right to: this accounting, mn? So I say it this way: that we might have looked more kindly on it, we might have understood it better, if they'd come upon us before those men were dead, you see? Or before they'd begun to dump corpses upon the lawn, or others beside the lake, or that in some sense at all they had answered the threat which the Order had become. In their absence, we fought -- for the other choice was to be slaughtered."

Another pause in these proceedings, for there is wine to be had, and breath to be taken; she is finally setting her other elbow down upon the table's edge, so that its strained shoulder might rest for a little. Walking again, soon, lest the hip grow stiff and resistant again. Soon. But for now, Calomel's questions.

"It was Thadius, above all, that I was made to forget; in the week and more before the drug wore from me, I knew him only as a trusted friend. He, the caverns -- all of these things, yes. For two weeks it was this way: our friend Thadius; our relief that we yet lived, mn? And all this time, we reckoned that perhaps the worst was passed, that it was done with, and did not guess there were other eyes Dhrin wished -- "

Ah. Watch this for a moment, because it's interesting, and because it passes very quickly. Watch, because you recognise this expression, Calomel: it appears very frequently when you describe chess-pieces to the woman, when she describes that brass eyepiece. The only difference in this case is the shocking ferocity of it, and the speed with which it vanishes. Recollecting herself, she continues:

"There were. They stole her from the tavern's own lawn, that being their audacity: Aislinn, who is small, prescient, blind. They had Lamai already, who you know already, I think. There was no quarter given them, this time: we pursued them to their very lair, the caverns to which they'd first taken me, for by then I had recalled... that much."

The direction. The look of things. A furious, tumbling horror of recollection.

"We came upon Thadius there, who had already done harm to Lamai, who meant the same for poor Aislinn. That much, he was denied -- and his life as well, for like the rest that we found there, he could not well flee from us for long. He fell to my own blade, which cleaved his heart very satisfyingly."

And now we come to it; easing back in her seat, fingertips adrift upon the rim of her mug, the woman waits.

[Cinnabar]

"Aislinn... I think I have met, briefly. She is close with, ah... D'zir, yes? Coran. The Channeller." That much pieced together from a short encounter on the porch steps, and Helstone's own file on persons of note. "Lamai Carver also? Hm." Lamai who had healed this purported monster of a man as soon as Ariane had carved out his throat. Peculiar. Inconsistent. More to this story yet, it appears.

"Any idea why they might have been targeted? It would seem to me that if they sought victims, such might be more readily obtained from the town. And with less risk, indeed, given the... calibre of the tavern's clientele." And then an obvious question occurs, though it might not have such an obvious answer.

"And why eyes? It seems a theme, a thread that runs through this madness. It is madness, but there is method to it." He ticks off the points on slender fingers as he speaks. "The murdered townsfolk; the mark carved into your back; Dhrin's own scars and inkings; the girl - Delia May; and then Aislinn and Lamai, abducted for their eyes specifically." He writes these incidents down in a neat list in his book before speaking again; his tone is distracted, his words disjointed, hurried, as if thinking out loud, and his gaze flits between the list just penned and the steadily-growing list in front of Ariane.

"Maybe the eyes are taken as sacrifices for the Baie. Symbolic? Some manner of votive offering, to prove their devotion? But then, the creature itself killed several people and took their eyes, which would make a lie of that - why would the beast gather offerings to make to itself? This speaks of something else... some kind of desire, or want, or need." He looks to the woman, brow furrowed as he tries to puzzle out the links in the chain.

"What happens to the stolen eyes, do you know?" And then confusion, a blink.

"Dhrin? You slew Dhrin?" Oh, definitely more to this tale. "Then how were you able to near-slay him again in front of the Rememdium?"

[Carnath-Emory]

"They are to be wed soon," Ariane confirms that first, and there is a moment's warmth in these ravaged features; a moment's particular gladness. Her nod confirms Lamai's part in this as well, and soon there is clarification of that strange matter:

"As for Lamai, her part in this was -- osevoj', is there a word for this? To be at the heart of things, at their very center. That was her role, for she had lulled Thadius so that he would trust her, so that he would reckon her soon to be amongst their number. By the end of it, she had lost her eyes to this pretense. Her sacrifice, you see? But for Aislinn, I... cannot say.

"They stole her upon the tavern's very lawn. Did they mean to intimidate? Did they mean it for vengeance? We'd slain eight of their number, mn? But it was folly, to steal her so, and if nothing else, ser, Thadius Dhrin is no fool. What might he gain from her? Except that her eyes are so strange: like the moon in a midnight sky, the colour of them."

But it sickens, to make so cold an assessment of a friend's worth. It sickens, to describe Coran's wife in such terms as these, and the fact of it's clear in the uneven set of her lips; a pause is required here, a considerable swallow of her mug's contents.

"Ah, the eyes -- I wondered at that, all we wondered at it, for this was long before we knew that their 'god' was Baie. But they must do it in his likeness, yes? For he never left a corpse behind him that yet had its eyes, and -- " Altias, there was such blood upon your cheeks " -- neither did they. Not once. But if this is so, then what is it that they imitate? A crazed thing? Or a beast with purpose --

"But there was --

"Ah. What becomes of those eyes, I do not know. But we come back to this, yes? For there is much to tell, and the worst of it yet to come; one thing begets the next, and explains what came before it, and then ser, I will have questions for you. For I would know what you make of -- " A shake of the head. "You see things that I do not."

But oh, the matter of Dhrin lurks between them yet, and for the first time, Calomel encounters some of its strangeness. A nod answers the first of those questions, a wry smile the second, and after a time:

"I had reckoned him dead; all we had, for how does a man survive a blade to the heart, mn? He sank against me; his robes were made bright with his blood.

"Three days after our return, I encountered him by the tavern's lake."

[Cinnabar]

He writes a small comment against a couple of the names in his notes, clarifying their circumstances in neat black letters. A nod, to the matter of eyes. "We shall consider the question as a whole - once all is laid out for us to see, perhaps the grand picture will appear." The issue dismissed for the moment, put off while this matter of the man who would not die still remains unanswered.

"So you ran him through; you know your bladework, so I can trust that you knew you had struck him truly. I... hm. When he appeared to you again, by the lake, did he still bear the marks of your blow? Did he appear hampered by it? Ailing, weakened at all? Or fully hale and healthy?"

[Carnath-Emory]

"He did."

For a time, we enter an arena of ambiguities: a woman with little faith in what she cannot seize, grasp, hold, must explain situations marked by precisely that. An atheist must describe occurences that she cannot begin to understand. Really, it's no wonder that she's drained a good portion of that mug's contents already, nor that her quill has ceased entirely in its motions across the page.

"Grievously wounded, so that even had it not been my blade which struck him, even if I'd known nothing of that at all, still would I wonder that he yet breathed. He was able to stand only with my aid; to walk, but very slowly, most carefully. As if the sword had struck him false, so that he was spared nothing but an actual death."

There will be a question here: Ariane is certain of it, because three men had spoken it to her, on recitation of this tale, three infuriated men. He is watched closely for a moment, young Cinnabar, is inspected for signs of this, and then:

"I spared him," she answers, to a question that mightn't be spoken at all, that mightn't need to be. "He was a broken thing, he scarcely walked, he scarcely moved. I spared him for that there were questions yet, there was so much yet to learn, and no answers to be had save through him. It is a terrible thing; I know this. It ... cost us, what came of his surviving, and yet today I look back upon it, and I cannot regret.

"I will not.

"What comes will explain this, I think; I hope. But if you mean to condemn for this ser, well -- you say nothing that I have not heard before, mn?"

Forgive that slightly bitter edge, forgive the wry twist of the swordswoman's smile, as she lifts the mug in toast to this.

"So. He lived. He was spared. He fled, as I should have expected -- or perhaps he was taken; he is not alone at the Order's head, you see. But he was right to fear those men, he was right to fear my retribution, when I discovered what -- ah." An instant's coldness flickers through her grey eyes, keen-edged and hard. "He had given me cause to murder him a second time. You require no better detail than that. What is of importance is that for a time, the Order's sacrifices had come to an end, and we were glad of it. For a time it had all fallen quiet, and we thought perhaps we were done with it. For two fine months it was this way, so that when the Governor -- Altias -- was gone from us for a time, we thought nothing of it.

"Early of October, this absence. On its fourth day, I received a letter penned by Thadius' hand, explaining it."

This wine. This quill, ready in her hand.

"Near the end of that month, a woman had come to us, fled to us from the Order. She was terrified, she was quite desperate, for Brother Prime had meant her for one of his sacrifices, mn? She bore terrible wounds: at the eye," a fingertip demonstrates upon Ariane's own bruised cheek. "At the throat, which he'd meant to open from ear to ear. He'd very nearly managed it. You recall that I spoke of two children: a boy ... and his sister."

Fawn, in small, careful letters, just below Thadius' name.

[Cinnabar]

No sign of irritation or frustration in this young man's steady gaze; rather, intrigue, a burning and fascinated curiosity, a need to know more of this strange woman's reasoning. The man was a monster, this much she had made clear; with all the wrongs that she said he had committed, against her and many others, he would have been unsurprised had she seen fit to make sure of his death when he reappeared. But... apparently not.

"Condemn, no. Question, yes. You are... full of surprises, Ariane Carnath-Emory." A quirk of a grin to that, as if appreciating a particularly vexing and finely-made puzzlebox, but then she speaks on and he listens raptly once more. Further notes flow across the page from his pen, a small nod each time she pauses or hesitates, encouragement. Then glancing up at mention of Altias' name, a question or two for clarification: "This October last? And he was still Governor, and you still his bodyguard at this time?" Get the details straight; make sure they are recorded aright. "Do you still have the letter?"

He writes a moment longer, then his pen pauses as the brother and sister are mentioned once more. Still forbidden to write of such, and honouring that wish. "Who was this Brother Prime?"

[Carnath-Emory]

Here is a blink for his troubles, here is a burst of laughter that might almost shock: the sound is distinctly out-of-place, is so very inappropriate. But no less genuine for that fact, and there's a measure of easy warmth in the grin that follows it.

"M'Ser Calomel, you are come to Myrken Wood: you must expect only to have your expectations overturned! Mm. You will do well here, I think. Or better than most, at least -- ah, but we are still two years ago, yes? October of that year. Altias Bromn was still Governor, I still served as his personal guard. I have that letter still. It ... is not for you. Some details are not -- as I say. But I give you a part of it: that the parchment was folded into the shape of a small swan: he liked such things, such ... bezdelushka; pretty things. This swan wore a little of the Governor's hair, wound about its neck."

This wine. This quill. This second sheet of paper.
Nightingale, the pen carefully writes. I know what you have done.

"This Brother Prime," she continues meantime, "was Thadius Dhrin himself, of course. So that I write his name high upon that page, mn? There is another thing in this, and I was not sure to speak it, for it is ... strange, and perhaps it is not of importance. But that is for you to decide, I think."

You take from me, I take from you.

"A short time before this letter, this difficult time, I had begun to suffer ... such strange dreams. As if they were so very alive, as if they were real, and in some sense they were. But it was not until this very year that I learned that for true: that those dreams, they were a time that I shared with another's mind, or ... ah. Mind, I suppose. Thadius'. He said much later that it is not so difficult an art, that it is not quite magicking. But no matter, mm?"

Not dead. No. Never that. I promised.

"The Governor was gone: 'abducted', this is the word they spoke. Where were we to begin? Not the caverns where they'd first hid: they held nothing. A man in service of Kerrak al'Nerun," and here the voice slightly catches, here the voice must struggle a moment, "had a part in our search, and with him the drow Jirai, for they are able trackers both: Fawn had little but gloating to give us, at the end, but they... ahh, they found him soon enough. They found both of them, Thadius and our Governor, hidden in the Snowstill Priory, a quarter-day's ride to our north.

"Fawn was placed into the hands of General Eriks, who once led Myrkentown's Militia; I could name very few men that I trusted more than that one. We rode to the Priory, we three: Kerrak, Jirai, myself. A small number of the Captain's men followed far behind us, for he meant to introduce his Hél upon these cultists, and I... ah, why would I restrain his hand? I did not. The Priory was set amidst wheat-fields, and as Jirai crept through the rear of it, I bade the Captain to burn."

Had her forgiveness surprised young Calomel earlier? This will likely not; the taut line of her lips, the hard, thin smile of them, for now the page is turned about for his eyes, the quill having concluded:

Death is easy. Survival is much more challenging.

[Cinnabar]

"You near-slew him; you spared him; he remained among the cultists, and took the Governor in retaliation for your... taking, your harbouring of Fawn." He nods, though frowning at the description of his sending of dreams to trouble her.

"Eriks... Jirai... Kerrak..." Names written in his notes, yet more pieces slotted into the puzzle. More leads to follow, more names to research. He looks to the words she writes out from memory - and that is not surprising, considering what impact they must have had. Copied into his own notes, though he tilts his head at the last line.

"True enough, I think. But then? The Captain burned them out? Did that not pose a risk to Bromn's life?"

[Carnath-Emory]

"Not Fawn. But this detail, it is nothing that you require. Only that it was retaliation, as you say, for a loss he'd reckoned to have suffered. As for risk..."

The quill is set aside for a time, and some irony lights her smile, as she inclines her head to the man.

"You do not know the Priory, yes? The building is heavy stone: even by the end of it all, those walls still stood, scorched -- but whole. But you see, it was retaliation that we feared: that should he realise our approach, Thadius would murder the Governor before we could reach his cell. So ... do you see, now? We meant to intimidate, to shock them, and it worked adequately: as Kerrak made flame in their fields, I found Thadius Dhrin in the chapel itself, for he awaited us. Knowing that he was lost, awaited.

"This time -- ah, you know that I did not hesitate this time, I think." This is not quite amusement, but a close cousin of it; a tilt of the wine-cup acknowledges Calomel's good sense. "But nothing came of it, for as I meant to strike the man, the Governor himself strode from his cell, so damaged that to this day, I scarce believe that he was able to move. But so he did, seizing the rapier from my hand, and driving it at Dhrin's throat -- until the head were apart from the body, and both had fallen.

"It was then that his cultists came upon us. And in such numbers, for perhaps to see their leader fallen made zealots of them for true, mn? Jirai cleared a path from within, for by then the Governor was beyond walking: he had given the last of his strength to end Thadius' life. And Kerrak and his men emptied the doorway of them, and outside Doctor D'Rael awaited. Aeryn Karolinger -- he leads Janeiro, now that Kerrak -- " Ah. You will learn of that soon, Calomel. There is wordless grief in these eyes.

"Aeryn was sent to fetch Coran, for while Helstone might describe the man as a traitor, we knew him only as a friend -- and do to this day. A friend, a healer; we counted on him to save the Governor's life, and he did not fail us. He has never," she adds, and there is some quite vehemence here, there is a particularly level gaze, "failed us.

"When we rode from there, we left behind us little but flames and corpses. When we returned some days hence, we found blackened stone and ash. It was done."

[Cinnabar]

At that he has to hold up a hand, expression... confused, almost incredulous.

"No, no, wait... You say he was struck down not once, but twice - the first time he may have survived it through some freakish chance or swift healing from his brother cultists; but the second time he was struck down so thoroughly, so unambiguously that he could be nothing other than dead... and yet, there is still the time before the Rememdium - what was that, the third time? Fourth? Dozenth? How many times has this man been killed?" He shakes his head, denying... not her story, for he trusts her well enough to tell him the truth in this matter, or the truth as she knows it. But perhaps her perceptions of what happened, perhaps suspecting some fallacious assumption that makes an inadvertent lie of it all.

"No man survives having his head cut off. No man recovers from having his head cut off. Dead is dead, it is not some wound that heals with stitches and bed rest. So." He looks to the swordswoman intently. "Either Dhrin is no man, or it was not Dhrin who was slain that time at the Priory. Perhaps some manner of illusion, some... magic, or glamour. A trick. Because for a man to lose his head and live is impossible, even for the follower of a monster such as the Baie. So having eliminated the impossible, what answers remain?"

[Carnath-Emory]

Cinnabar could not have anticipated the swordswoman's smile, for she has omitted every moment that was not central to the recitation, that was not essential. She has neglected to describe the cost of these months, the sickly thing that it is to be a woman who is not Believed. Her very real fear that this interview would echo those long-ago reactions is dispelled by this single, happy moment -- so that there is ah, such a smile, and her mug raised in toast to the man all over again, as she nods her agreement.

"As you say. Coran has set the bones in my flesh, has wiped the scars from my skin, but even he could not work such a wonder, and will tell you so if you ask him of it. What you saw, it was ... the third time, yes, and only Lamai spared him from th -- "

An interesting proposition occurs: that in fact, Lamai spared the man nothing. That in fact, he quite literally cannot be killed. That in fact --

"'It does not end here. It will never end.' This is what he said to us, before he died. So too did Fawn, long before: that he would not die, that he would not end, but we reckoned such things to be fancy, you see? The words of a madwoman, the ... the defiance of a condemned man. We did not think it likely that it might be truth, for who has heard of such a thing? But here we are."

It quietens her for a time here, for Calomel proposes such things, makes such suggestions as to still her utterly. There is this much: the restlessness of fingertips upon a quill that had been set aside, a restless toying there, but she keeps counsel with none but herself, until:

"Baie ... has survived simpler things. When he came upon me, it was to open his own throat: he closed it with a touch of his palm, but not before he had bled as if I'd gutted him. Might he survive had he cut through to the bone? Ah -- I wish I'd had the chance to test that."

[Cinnabar]

Cinnabar nods, understanding the swordswoman's sentiment though he has yet to encounter the creature, let alone suffer as she has at its hands and the hands of its followers.

"Everything ends, in time. This thing is no different. It can be ended." A firm statement of fact, to dispel the words of cultists and zealots.

"But we jump ahead. After he was beheaded, thought dead once again October two years go: what then? When next did you encounter Dhrin, or the Baie or its followers? What became of Fawn?"

[Carnath-Emory]

"What followed this, ser, was disaster. You are come upon Myrken at far kinder a time than then: if it was not drought, it was illness -- they had beaten the Governor, so grievously that his back was more bone than flesh. If it was not illness, it was dreams, for -- ah, we speak of this after, perhaps. What I mean to describe is that ser, we thought to be done with this Order. Thadius Dhrin was dead. His bladstvo Fawn was freed of the General's custody: I know not his reasoning, but the man was no fool; there must have been good cause for it. Straka's Captain meant to jail the Governor, so as to keep him from his seat: reckoning him not a victim of this Order, but an... an attraction, do you see?

"As if Myrken might be spared their hand, if he were removed."

For a time, it is a troubled gaze which wanders the tabletop between them; for a time, it is a silent creature who eyes this list of names, this replicated letter, this elegant little journal. Who touches fingertips to the rim of her mug, dabbles there a moment before sipping almost absently, and then explains the moment with:

"In late December of that year, my sister was -- ah, she suffered. Even the Rememdium's newest physician could not spare her that, although he had seen to the worst of the Governor's hurts, and others' besides. His name was Michael Renne, and it was to his door that they came in... March, of this last year.

"Do you require more precise a date? For ser, I can name the hour.

"They'd been in his care for some time, I suppose; they trusted him better than they did Straka, and knew that some ... authority must be shown what they had found. The Governor's body." And here, at last, the pale gaze lifts to meet Cinnabar's.

"I have not the words to describe its condition. If you were to, to beat a man with a great club of iron, perhaps, if you were to work at this for an hour or more, you might crush bones in that way. If like an animal, you were to tear -- ah. We need not continue with this, I think." There is some chalky pallour beneath those bruises; there is the taut-lipped tension about her jaw. The voice is as mild as when she'd begun. "Let it be simply said: that the damage was vast, that very little remained of its face at all. There were no eyes. You expected that, mn? Into its chest, they had written this:

"You should have believed."

[Cinnabar]

Aha, Renne. This perhaps sheds more light on why she might wish the man granted a pardon - not what the pardon is for, but why she might favour him so. But then a slow frown, trying to make sense of what he is told; desperately trying to correlate this with what he knows first-hand.

"They? Which they? The cultists? Someone else?" Clarity sought, though matters are only muddled further as she continues.

"The Governor. Bromn?" He considers for a time, trying to work out how it might be. "It was definitely his body? You are certain of it? Were he so brutally ruined as you say, is it not possible that there was some error in identifying him?" Because, well. Bromn lives, even now. But he need not point out that truism, say here in the man's rooms, above his bakery, sipping his wine.

"Explain." A simple request. How it could be that like Dhrin, Bromn also died and yet lived again. Does anyone in this town stay dead?