Ultima Ratio Regum, Scene III

Lauren

"Is it about Winslow Lake?" Evan asked, giving Lauren a level look. It was hard to shake the suspicion that Evan knew more than Lauren just then, though Evan tended to look that way even when picking a book. He sighed and pulled out a pair of keys from his pocket. "The Sheffield Chapterhouse is on Kelham Island, under the steelworks. I'll drive you, and you can tell me just what you've been up to."

Lauren pursed her lips. He knew, of course--he'd been there with Lujza at the Elysium. But it was already going to be hard enough to tell Lujza only what she needed to know, and no more.

"I'll tell you some of it. And the Kogaion can tell you more, if she wants." Being so far down the totem pole made it difficult to refuse anyone... unless the request possibly conflicted with someone higher up.

Lauren started to walk towards the door, waiting impatiently if Evan didn't follow.

“Nothing that serious, don’t worry!” Underwood made various quelling motions with his hands. “Far as I can tell, your dear old dad’s coming loaded to bear – whatever up-front fights he’s gonna pick with Lake, he’s gonna pick with his boys. And Father Birch’s boys, come to that, if he can misdirect them in that direction. Even still, I figure we need an option of last resort to operate from the shadows, just in case things go screwy once the pitched battle is over.”

“That’s where I figure you can come in, if you like – and your crowd. Stay out of sight, and wait on a signal, in case the wrong people turn on each other once Lake’s taken care of – or if Lake does a runner and you have the coverage for a perimeter patrol. Best case, nobody knows you’re even there. I can funnel your dad’s battle plan to you, provided he comes up with anything more specific…but if you’ve got any ideas for how to deploy your guys or his guys, well, you know the terrain. Here’s soliciting suggestions.”

“What’d you think?”

Erin peered in the window, her proboscis curling and uncurling a bit. It was luxurious, tasteful, wealthy in ways that Erin would never be. And no one would ever be painting pictures of the little moth-girl. Still, Erin did not envy the Prince of London one bit. Erin was alive, richly, vibrantly alive. And she knew enough of responsibility to know the Prince's power weighed on her like an anchor.

The lack of any wards disturbed her, and Erin remained outside for a few minutes. Still, if she could not see anything, she would have to move forward eventually. Taking the scene at face value... if Sheridan had no magic or technology to defend herself, then it would be servants of flesh and blood to watch out for. The moth nodded, and then flew down, squeezing through the grate and scrabbled into the room. She took stock of where she was, and twitched an antennae.

The urge to steal from the study was overwhelming. The paintings could stay, but the sideboard, the crystalware... Erin's tiny stature put a damper on the impulse, for the moment. Instead she flew about the room, investigating. There didn't seem to be any place in here for storing records. She couldn't lift anything, not at the moment, but she was small enough to squeeze into places and try to get a look. For the moment, it was a safe way to gather some information. The servants might freak out over a moth in the house for cosmetic reasons, but if they assumed every stray bug was an enemy spy, they were probably crazy past the point of Sheridan taking any warnings from them to heart.

Wits+Investigation

Erin

As Erin fluttered about the room, she ran into no infra-red detectors, no pentacles still dripping with blood. Sheridan, of course, was neither up to date on the modern world nor a sorceress of skill, but she could undoubtedly have hired people that were. Certainly there were enough people in the house, but they didn't come up to the private study. If anything, the gravest danger to Erin proved to be a spiderweb she nearly blundered into while flitting beneath a table. But Sheridan was no fool, and she was had been High Sheriff once. Which meant...

Which meant that if there were records here, they would be very well hidden. For that matter, it was entirely possible that the financial records weren't here. What if Sheridan simply kept them on file with some attorney, or in a bank vault, protecting herself with layers upon layers of deniability?

It was while Erin was considering these thoughts that her fey eye noticed something. A panel in the wood of the piano that didn't quite fit. Impossible to think that this was an oversight on the part of the craftsmen -- not in such a house. But an improperly fit panel could be a removable panel.



Lauren

Not long later, Lauren was in the passenger-side seat of Evan's oversized Volvo, while her mentor drove down the Route 560 to Sheffield. For a little while, Evan had played the car radio -- which was mostly late-night talk shows and moody instrumentals to suit the hour -- while he waited for Lauren to start explaining. In a way, it was a bit of tactics on Evan's part as well. Later, Dvorzsak may just swear Lauren to silence altogether. Right now, though, he had a chance at getting some information on what was going on, and Evan's curiosity was only a little weaker than Lauren's.


Underwood

"I think next time I'd prefer this not happen in my home." Cinder said acerbically, even as she tried to keep the convoluted plan that Othello had laid out and Underwood described in her head. She looked at Mary Mack next to Underwood, and then just quietly sighed. "I'll have my pack around, but... it's a big park, and I'm not bringing them any closer to this mess than I have to."

You need to write out your pledge with Cinder, Underwood

The moth pawed at the offending panel, swiveling her little head to get a look at it. There was no guarantee this held what she wanted, but it was certainly worth a look. She crawled around all the edges of it, examining how the piano fitted together.

Wits+Crafts

Underwood sighed. “I know. Look, this whole thing was real seat-of-the-pants, we weren’t going into it with our usual kinda pre-planning, and we were cleaning up a mess Othello started…I mean, just do exactly what you just said you were going to do, and I’m sure you’ll be great, but I’m really sorry about this. Not that we’re on a quid pro quo or anything, but seriously: call me up for an equally risky, involved favor whenever, because I owe it to you. I’m serious.”

Will work out the pledge once I get back from visiting family! (Probably tomorrow)

"I was right about Lake," Lauren said, while staring out the window. "But I still don't know what he was looking for in the library, and I think it's important. He's almost surely going to show up tomorrow night, too." She glanced back to Evan. "Did the Kogaion tell you anything before she left?"

Erin

It was assuredly a hiding place. A false panel, that with a good push at just the right spot would reveal all manner of secrets. It wasn't very thick, so whatever inside was small -- papers most likely, though other trinkets were possible. Difficult to see, certainly, if one did not happen to be a moth and thus capable of looking at very fine detail, and Erin and thus capable of understanding what one saw.

And... there. The way it tensed under-foot. Some kind of trap, perhaps, a spring set to do... what? A spring-loaded blade, most likely. If Erin had the proper tools and the proper form, she could have disabled it easily enough. It was a little trickier to do that with antennae, however.

To disarm the trap, roll an Extended Dex+Larceny = 15 successes required; Being a moth provides a -10 penalty to the roll, however (-5 for lacking opposable thumbs, -5 for lack of tools). Animate Object or similar may be used instead.

Alternatively, Erin can brave the trap, in which case open the panel (no roll required) and roll Dex+Athletics.


Lauren

"Yes." Evan said, slowing down at a stop sign before continuing onward. Evan was a painfully conscientious driver, which was normally a virtue but not when the clock was ticking. "Mostly a number of assignments to do in the meantime." Evan had been looking through books on demonology...

"Whatever Lake wanted, it was in the East Wing. In the restricted stacks..." Evan mused as he drove. "It's not just a library, really. The Philosopher described it once, for me. It's only about half books. There's a lot of things there that the Ordo has found over the years which it keeps there, as well as things that the former tenants of the Chapterhouse collected."

This was the first time Evan had ever referred to anyone having inhabited the St. Thomas Club before the Kindred arrived.


Underwood

Cinder folded her arms and regarded Underwood, her crimson hair covering the scarred half of her face -- not that even that side was as hideous as it used to be, red and marked but not quite as melted as it used to be. She'd made that change after meeting Underwood.

"J.T... did you look into the people trying to kill me?" She asked, the left corner of her lip turning up. Mary Mack stopped singing suddenly and stared off into the distance.

"Like what?" Lauren asked conversationally. If he was going to ask her for information, then she was going to do the same.

Lauren frowned. Perhaps Lake had found something he needed for a ritual... some powerful artifact. "Can things be removed from the East Wing, or do they have to stay here? And what sort of things did the former tenants have there?" And who were the former tenants... they must have had some kind of magical power if they left things behind that had to be locked away.