(no subject)

[clavesregni]

WHO: Caitlyn & Co.
WHEN: during Stage II of the Siege of Alem
WHERE: mostly the Wards and the Gut's Bind
WHAT: Ghosts and dead bodies and sieges, oh my!
WARNINGS: will add as needed



[Hit me up here if you'd like a starter!]

Comments

[valeas]

( Her jaw clenches.

Not for the first time, it feels they're a step too late, but Emilia catches up to Caitlyn.

The corpse reeks, but she's withstood worse. She forces herself to inch closer, her hand outstretched toward it. Though she does not make contact with it, a rose-gold hue rises around the side of the corpse like a tangle of thorny vines. )

It feels the same as the body of the first victim I was able to look over. Vataz, as well.

( Whoever, whatever, killed this creature, was involved with all the rest. )

[clavesregni]

[Caitlyn scowls down at the ground, frustrated with herself for not having come back here sooner and frustrated with the feeling of being no closer to catching this killer even after weeks of work and sleepless nights.]

What purpose would anyone have for killing it? Did it know something? Was it guarding something? Did it possess something of import?

[And how is its death connected to the murder of those men and the mysterious vanished woman?

She frowns and steps away from the creature, both to escape the scent and to look for clues, footprints, anything that might indicate that someone else came down here since last night.]

[valeas]

( Did it possess something of import?

Emilia turns that over in her head. It was difficult enough to find a pattern with the previous victims, but now a royal and a creature are dead. What do they all have in common? If she was pressed to answer... ) A life force?

It truly feels as though this body was drained of everything. Whoever is killing them, does it need to?

( To survive?

As Caitlyn steps away, Emilia turns back to the creature, mourning the answers it took with it. )

[clavesregni]

[The lakeside is discouragingly bare, but Caitlyn investigates regardless, retracing the faint remnants of the guards' footsteps, the place she and Emilia waded into and out of the lake, looking for even the slightest hint and finding nothing.]

Or those scales. It seemed protective of them.

[valeas]

Of them, or whomever they belonged to.

( The missing woman is her guess, even as she can't help considering if they are truly scales or mirror shards or something else they've yet to identify in this godsforsaken world. ) It seemed young, didn't it? The creature.

[clavesregni]

It's hard to say. [She can recognize the difference between a young deer and an older one, but a lake monster? Emilia's right though, it doesn't have the signs of aging she'd expect from an older animal.

She circles back around to its front, frowning at the smell.

The teeth don't look very worn or discolored, no missing scales that she can see. If she had to guess, it does look fairly young.]

I wonder how it came here in the first place.