Ilithienne looks at the gate, the walls, the garden. "Perhaps an advance would be in place? If the missing servants are fairly new to this household, it cannot explain the negligence of the court itself..." she says quietly to Kallista.

Gavyn excitedly steps through the gates, looking around the estate. "Well, certainly looks a bit haunted, don't you think Tam?" He says, giving the boy a wink.
"I take it the caretaker and the gardener were among those that has disappeared?" He comments to Idra with a wry smile as he passes her, stepping inside neglected house.

Ilithienne moves a few steps forward, next to Tam. With sincere voice she says "You are safe with us, young human. I will not let anything to happen to you anyway." And after a few yards she adds "I am sure the house is not hunted. Just imagine how desparate the ghost should be to pick THAT house." She adds quietly.

“I imagine outside the house but inside the gate should provide ample protection for him.” Aruzhal remarks in regards to Tam. He slowly gazes over the whole house and grounds, taking every detail in.

Idra shrugs at Mikaela's explanation and gives a curt response.

"If he doesn't want to follow us inside, he can sit on the doorstep."

Hearing Gavyn's question, she chuckles.

"As far as I know, we didn't have a gardener to begin with. The Lady Kindernis never shuts up about wanting to master the art of gardening and, well, you can see how that's going."

She gestures vaguely to the area around the estate.

The inside of the house is far more orderly. The front door leads into a tidy little entrance hall. To your right is a row of hooks protruding from the white plaster walls. A polished (seemingly) marble flight of stairs leads up to the house's second floor. A hallway runs parallel to the right of the stairs, branching once to the left and twice to the right, and ending in what appears to be a larger room at the opposite side of the house, evidenced by light that seems to come from windows. The hall is well-lit by natural sunlight streaming in through a large latticed window directly above the front door, and small lamps hang from the ceiling of the hallway.

Idra gestures for you to hang your coats (if applicable), before continuing straight down the hall towards the room that can be seen at the end.

The room turns out to be a parlor. Being late afternoon, the sun no longer shines through its large windows, but you can tell that in the mornings, it is easily the brightest room in the house. The walls are painted white and decorated with a floral pattern. The small round table and wicker chairs are likewise painted white. In one of the two wicker armchairs at the table sits an elf woman reading a small book. She wears an elaborate pine-green velvet dress with a paler green trim. Her hair appears to stand up in the back, evoking the image of a thistle.

As you enter the parlor, she quickly sets her book down, straightens the frills on her dress, and rises from her chair, folding her hands in front of her.

"Ah! Yes," she smiles hospitably. She looks each of you up and down and determines your profession. "I am Lady Kindernis. You must have seen the advertisement in town?"

Inside Ilithienne takes the hood down revealing her silver white hair and takes the dark glasses off. Her silver eyes look with curiosity at the inside of the court. She hangs her coat on the hook and moves down the hall with grace of a dancer... or a fighter.

When the Lady Kindernis introduces herself, Ilithienne looks at her with curiosity. She is so different... she thinks looking at the lady elf and comparing her to the drow gentry she has met. But some things never change... she adds in her mind. Ilithienne looks at the others giving the closest person (most likely Kallista) a nod to speak up.

The dark eyes of young man with the brown unruly hair goes briefly wide as the drow reveals herself. A drow, intriguing. As they pass through the house, Gavyn admires it's contents, not that he has any thought of helping himself to any of them, those days are behind him, although quite possibly in front of him aswell. As they enter the parlor he tries to spot what kind of book the mistress of the house is enjoying.

Perception: 22

"Yes indeed we did, and we are all here to solve this peculiar mystery Lady Kindernis." Gavyn, says with a deep bow and a flourish. "These immensely competent investigators are the irreproachable sisters Ilithienne and Kallista, the dragonborn Aruzhal the frosty, Mikaela the not quite so frosty, and last but not least her errand boy Tam..." He continues, looking at the others in turn. "...oh, and I am Gavyn Freeflagon, here to make this investigation as entertaining as it is efficient." He finishes with another deep bow. "Now, if you would fill us in on the details we will get started right away Lady Kindernis."

Performance/Persuasion: 17

Kallista opens her mouth to introduce herself, but Gavyn beats her too it and she shuts her mouth and waves.

Aruzhal removes his own cloak, his armor showing more clearly, and hangs it on the peg. He, too, gazes around the parlor. "It seems to be a well-kept house. We will get to the bottom of your disappearing servant problem. And..." His eyes shift to Gavyn, though he does not turn his head. "I carry no title. I am not... frosty."

After they've all moved inside, Mikaela takes off her cloak and hangs it on one of the hooks. In the parlor, Mikaela is a bit surprised at Gavyn's flippant introduction of everyone.  'I suppose he did get everyone's names right at least,' she thinks, waiting for Lady Kindernis to explain more. 

Lady Kindernis smiles briefly in amusement at Gavyn's spontaneous introduction of the party.

"It is a pleasure to make your acquaintances. Thank you all for coming here." She looks up and down at each of you, seemingly trying to discern your competence. She appears satisfied and is about to continue, but then notices Idra is still in the room. She frowns and makes a dainty shooing gesture with her hand, upon which Idra leaves the room. "Now. The mystery." She begins pacing in a circle around you all as she speaks.

"It all began five days ago. It was my husband and I's fifteenth anniversary, and he wanted to open a bottle of Thayan Merlot that he had saved from his military days. So, he sent our butler Rascland to retrieve it from the wine cellar. We began to suspect something was amiss when an hour had passed and he had yet to make a reappearance."

Idra returns to the room carrying a silver tray of twelve steaming hot biscuits cut in the shapes of leaves. "Refreshments, anyone? Idra, get the tea as well." Lady Kindernis asks, taking the tray from Idra and offering it out to all of you. After waiting for whoever wanted a biscuit to take one, she places the tray on the table. Idra had already vanished, presumably to retrieve the tea.

"Now where was I? Oh yes," she takes a particularly large bite out of a maple leaf-shaped biscuit and, after an awkward twenty seconds of chewing, she swallows and continues. "Rascland had been missing for an hour, so we called our housemaid Emma to go down into the wine cellar to figure out whatever happened to our butler." she takes another bite of the biscuit and chews for another uncomfortably long time. "Well, around an hour later (at least, I think it was an hour), neither of them had returned. At this point, my Olwin (dearest husband) was quite vexed, so up he got and stormed off to the cellar himself, with me in tow. Lanterns in hand, we marched down those cellar steps and found..."

She finishes her biscuit, really savoring every moment of it. She then grabs a second biscuit.

"Well actually, we didn't find anything. No butler, no housemaid, just the silver platter Rascland had been holding, lying on the floor. How careless! As my husband picked it up, we heard the most dreadful noises! There was crashing! And squeaking! And rattling! Dreadful, I say. We dropped the platter and fled for our lives. I haven't entered the cellar since. Olwin, on the other hand..."

Idra returns, a silver platter in hand, teapot and cups for six. "Oh, the tea! Thank you," she takes the platter from Idra and sets it on the table next to the biscuits, and promptly begins pouring herself a cup.

"As I was saying, Olwin... Idra, be a dear and get some sugar from the kitchen!" Idra leaves again, muttering something. Lady Kindernis resumes.

 "This morning, we had run out of cream in the kitchen. Olwin exclaimed that he was unable to cower in fear of his cellar anymore, and felt the strength of his warrior days returning. Armed with sword and spear, he charged into that cellar to retrieve the cream for our morning tea. It's been..." she looks out the window for a second, trying to guess the Sun's position in the sky. "Nine hours. No sign of him. And there you have it. Our cellar has eaten a butler, a housemaid, and a husband (in that order). Now, the only house-servant I have left is our cook." (her eyes dart in the direction that Idra went) "Worst of all, there's only so many options for meals when you can't retrieve anything from the cellar. Market day's not for another six days! Oh thank you, Idra." She sets the sugar bowl on the platter next to the tea pot.

"In short, I ask of you, please find what happened to Olwin and our servants, and bring them back if possible. If you can't do that, could you at least retrieve that Thayan Merlot from the cellar? I was curious what it tasted like."

A smile is tugging at the lips of the young man with the brown unruly hair as he listens to the somewhat aloof Lady Kindernis, helping himself to a leaf-shaped steaming hot bisquit and later a cup of tea, enjoying both as he listens attentively to her recount of the mystery of last nine or so hours. "Of course we will deliver that exquisite wine bottle to you Lady Kindernis, and while we're at it we will make sure to find out what happened to your servants and your brave husband." He says, finishing up his cup of tea. "We only need to be shown to the cellar and you can continue enjoying your tea and bisquits while we make sure to earn that generous reward." He finishes, putting down his empty cup on the table again, ready to get to work.

His arms crossed and his expression firm, Aruzhal nods slowly. “We will find your husband and servants, and we will see about the wine afterward.”

The cold Dragonborn takes a slow sip of tea, blowing on it with a cloud of chilly vapor. It’s perfectly warm enough as he drinks, and a hint of a smile comes over his face. He waves away the biscuit platter, shaking his head.

When Gavyn introduced everyone to the lady, Ilithienne grinned and looked at Kallista "Irreproachable?" she asked silently with her mouth. While the Lady describes the situation, Ilithienne looks carefully at her. She tries to grab every piece of her body language. Suddenly she asks "Are the butler and the housemaid human? I presume your husband is an elf too?" She looks at her with curiosity.

Insight check: 14

Mikaela politely accepts one of the leaf shaped biscuits, handing it to Tam. "Remember your manners," she reminds him in a whisper. Continuing to listen, she takes a cup of tea when offered, slowly sipping at it herself. 

"Yes, we should get right to the cellar to investigate."  She then looks back to Lady Kindernis, "Could you tell me good lady, was there anyone else about the manor around the time of these events? Save yourself and Miss Idra of course."

Lady Kindernis answers Ilithienne's question first, after taking another bite of her biscuit.

"Yes, Rascland and Emma (bless their souls) are both human, and so is my Olwin. Actually, he's my third human husband. But that's not important. Their lives are short as it is. I don't need haunted cellars snatching them before they're done." Her answer to the question is detached. Clearly not a heavy subject from her perspective. She takes a sip of her tea. "Right. Off to the cellar then! I'll show you the way." She sets down her teacup, briskly rises from her chair, and moves between you through the door back down the hall, stopping at the first door on the left.

"It's right here. Idra! The house keys, please!" Idra reappears from the door on the opposite wall of the hallway, a ring of keys in hand. Lady Kindernis takes the keys and fishes through them for the one to the cellar. Finding it, she twists the brass key into the lock, and the door creaks open, revealing a flight of wooden steps descending into darkness. "And there you are."

Tam had finished his biscuit quickly, but had eaten it properly, without making a mess.  Mikaela sets down her teacup before leaving the parlor.  As the group heads out, she looks to the boy. "Why don't you head back to town. Let the others know I - and others - have taken the case here. I would think I will join you all soon."  She glances to Idra, "He will be able to pass out of the gate?" she inquires. 

Once the boy has been taken care of, she looks to the others. "Shall I lead the way then?"  She looks over to Lady Kindernis, "My lady, does this cellar have any lighting, or need we bring our own?"

Idra nods to Mikaela.

"I'll walk 'im back to town. I've got to pick up an order of flour from the baker's anyway."

"There's lanterns on the hooks down there, but as you can see, none are lit. Idra, before you take the child back to the town, could you light a candle for our guests?"

Mikaela gives Idra a slight nod of her head. "Walking Tam back is much appreciated. As is getting a candle for us."  She would take the candle and start heading down the stairs once she brings it.  She keeps alert to see if she picks up any signs of anything out of place.  (Perception Check: 22) 

"Wait a moment" says Ilithienne taking a quick  walk through the door deeper into the cellar. "One doesn't need any light when all life was in darkness..." she speaks with calm voice and takes a few steps down taking her hand crossbow from her hip and loading a bolt. She pulls her rapier with the right hand and she walks down the stairs.

If Ilithienne hears anything suspicious (i.e. other than rats or mice - like dragging of claws on the stone floor or a deep growling of a prehistoric beast), she will stop and let the others know. Otherwise she will stop at the bottom of the stairs and let the top party know where she is.