The Windward Isles - Game Thread

Since I am holding a torch, I assume we can't stealth, but I can look around

Perception: 15

The flickering orange light guides Thea and Kairouani further into the depths of the hill. The tunnel continues to slope downwards, and after about 80ft narrows significantly. At about 100ft it comes to what appears to be a dead end but, peering into the gloom, Thea notices that there is an opening low to the left. A large step down, minding one's head, would take you into another narrow passageway. Crouching down and extending the torch into this tunnel, Thea can see that it also appears to end after about 10ft. But...

There is something odd about the rock face at the end. It's too smooth. Too regular. It's similarly coloured to the rock around it but just different enough to pique Thea's interest. It definitely seems out of place.

William looked at his lit up tinderbox. 'Huh... that's different.' He held the tinderbox in the same way one would hold a crystal ball, allowing its light to shine as far as possible.

'You sure you want to go exploring?' He asked when he noticed the depth of the cave. He lingered near the entrance as he was curious to see what the others were up to.

Seri takes a few steps ahead but does not fully follow Thea and Kairouani.  Instead she looks at the ground for evidence of passage other than their own.

Seri Survival plus Guidance:  13 + 2 = 15

She considers beginning the Speak with Animals ritual once more to communicate with the parrot, though she is a little puzzled about how it will work, since the Parrot already seems to be mimicking a human tongue.  Do parrots have their own language?  They must.

Kairouani moved up to the rock face to assist Thea......the little one seemed to have keener eyes than her....

Thea slides down into the opening, handing the torch to Kairouani so she can move with more agility and balance if need be. She runs her hand over the wall, feeling the grooves and divots of the...wait. There aren't any grooves or divots. its flat and smooth. Weird.

Investigation: 6

Edit: spelling errors. If the die roller rerolls (side note: its getting better at not doing that if you don't actually touch the die roll!) the original roll was a 6.

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9

The surface at the end of this short tunnel is about five feet in height, going from the floor to just below Thea's head height, and about two feet wide. With Kairouani looking on and providing light by holding the torch as usefully as she can, Thea reaches out and touches it.

It is hard to see the surface properly in the shifting orange light, especially as her own shadow seems intent on getting in the way, but as her hand traces the smooth surface she is surprised to discover that it gives under her touch. Just a light pressure from her fingertips makes the whole surface move. It feels flexible, like a stiff blanket, or sailcloth, or maybe a skin of some kind, fixed around the edges but easy enough to move in the middle. To a point. She is able to push the centre of the surface away from her by maybe an inch or two before she can feel something hard behind it. Her fingers trace the outline of something solid and regular in shape. A straight horizontal edge and at least one corner. Too regular to be natural. And if this smooth, flat, flexible barrier is organic, it is unlike anything Thea or Kairouani has ever experienced before. Both of you suddenly have an uncomfortable notion of being intruders in someone else's space. It seems almost certain that whatever this is, someone put it here, and certainly didn't expect Thea Oltineas and Kairouani to be poking around in it at any point. But who? And when? And where are they now?

Meanwhile, out near the entrance to the tunnel, Seri inspects the outer cave. You notice signs of Thea and Kairouani's passing, bits of soil and plant matter transferred from their clothes and feet to mar the smooth stone of the tunnel floor, but you cannot identify anything that may have been there prior to that. It appears to your best estimation that no living creature has ever passed this way except for the four of you.

William, anxious and a little bit uneasy of letting the others venture off on their own, put his free hand to his mouth. 'How does it look down there?' He shouted. 'Found anything?' His voice echoed against the walls of the cave.

Kairouani examined the membrane, " It is a disguise? For a door or something similar, yes?"

"I do not know. Possibly. It feels...almost, whats the word smart people use to describe something living? Ogarnic? Oglanorc? It was something like that." Thea shrugs, "Let me try to open it" She tries to push against it [strength: 15]. If she does not get it to budge, she will feel around for a lock or nob.

Thea pushes the membrane back until she feels the resistance of the solid object behind it, then keeps pushing. It doesn’t take much before she feels the resistance disappear and whatever it was behind the ‘curtain’ topples away and falls with a hollow clatter of what sounds like wood on stone. In the confines of the cave, and the absence of any other sound, the noise created by the falling… whatever it was… is like a crash of thunder directly overhead. 

Now that the object or objects behind the material have moved, it seems looser at the bottom, and where gaps appear, hints of light sneak through from the other side. 

"Kairouani, shine the light over here" Thea tries to grab the bottom of the material. If no such grip presents itself, she will take out a dagger and cut a small hole in the material, attempting to make a hold.

" I think you broke it...whatever was behind....I'm not sure cutting is....."

Now there is more slack in the material, Thea is able to grasp a handful of it at the bottom, and it becomes clear what it is. Thea has enough experience of ships and sailing to recognise it as sailcloth. She is able to lift it a few inches but it is still fixed somehow on the sides and at the top. Giving it a tug sends rocks clattering down on the other side. Those rocks must have been holding it in place, because as they fall the barrier more and more resembles a curtain. Thea is able to pull it up far enough to crouch down and peer through.

On the far side there is dim light.  It appears to be the filtered remnants of daylight that have fought to reach this point from somewhere up ahead. Both the hard, regular shape and the wooden crash are explained by the haphazard pile of crates that had, presumably, been stacked against the curtain and on top of its trailing edge to hold it in place. They are now lying on the ground, mostly blocking your view of what is beyond. The rocks that you heard a moment ago are lying alongside the crates. You assume they had been placed and wedged strategically to hold the sides of the curtain in place.

A further tug sends yet more cascading down, and Thea is finally able to stand, pull the cloth to one side (still fixed at the top), and take a proper look at this new chamber. It is as wide as the early part of the tunnel where Seri and William are still standing. About 30ft away it bends to the right, and that is where the pale remnants of daylight are coming from. That's not what holds your attention though.

This chamber is, unmistakeably, a living area. There are one or two crates, a single barrel, some rope, and some other materials neatly stacked on one side, and a sleeping pallet woven from thin, springy branches and topped with what appears to be a deer skin, lies to the other. There is definitely a scent of human in here, but it is not overpowering, and there is no waste in sight. Whoever lives here is well ordered and fastidious. There is a low chair fashioned from driftwood placed just beyond the pallet, and a leather bound book sits on the ground beside it alongside a quill pen and an ink bottle. A net hangs on a jutting piece of the cave wall above the crates, whilst two long, straight, sharpened sticks are propped nearby. On top of the barrel lies a flintlock pistol, a powder cartridge, and a single shot. Like everything else in this tableau, they have been placed neatly and carefully in their positions.

With the removal of the sailcloth you feel a breeze stir and draw through the cave from ahead of you to behind you. Seri feels it gently caress her ankles out near where you entered the cave.

William joined the others at the sound of the commotion of rocks falling. 'What happened? Did the cave-'

He stopped mid-sentence when he saw Thea seemingly stick her head through the stone wall. 'What in the world...'

Holding the glowing tinderbox high William walked up to Thea. With the tinderbox halfway through the opening beyond what William recognised as sail cloth, it illuminated more of the area they were peeking into.

'Did we just stumble into someone's living quarters?' William asked incredulously.

"I think we have. But whose?" Thea slips into the hole, coming out into the chamber. Looking around, she absently picks up and fiddles with the pistol.

 " Unexpected.....shall we wait here then...can you repair the sailcloth?"

Seri watches the others go serenely as usual, though she is unsure of what to do.

She reaches for Trondro's magic once more, closing her eyes and imaging herself conversing happily with dolphins beneath the waves.  Or with... parrots.

(Seri begins the ritual for Speak with Animals once more so she can seek out the talkative bird and question it in its own language, not Veridian).

Quote from Damian_May >>

 " Unexpected.....shall we wait here then...can you repair the sailcloth?"

 "Me? Not a chance. Besides, I'm much more interested in finding out who lives here of all places rather than fixing their weird sailcloth door." Trying to remain subtle, Thea loads and pockets the pistol [Stealth: 19]