Ra'am considers how to get through the profession barrier. "Sure magic treasure would be a good description. I'll be honest, I haven't heard of Archmagus Lockhart. Most of my familiarity is with the Normandy Tribunal, though. Whic Archmage did he successfully challeng and what spell did he invent for the Order's benefit?" Ooh Lore roll: 1+int 3 + OoH (have 1 xp)=4 Ra'am really has no idea who he is. He may get curious.
Like the crack which breaks open the damn, the flood of information which spills out of the excited foursome bowls Ra'am over. All four of them start talking excitedly, barely pausing to breath and certainly not pausing for the others to get a turn.
During the diameter it takes for Ra'am to feel completely overwhelmed by the information spilling out of them, he picks up the following phrases:
- "...defeated The Merlin himself for his title..." (Ra'am suspects "The Merlin" must be a nom de plume)
- "...inventor of the MacGuffin Sword..." (a Mentem-based artifact created in the 11th Century to destablize a budding mundane rebellion in Provencal
- "...fought the terrible..."
- "...saved a banshee from certain..."
- "...according to Penelope Clearwaters..." (the steward at Laguna Sententia)
- "...his new book, Gadding With Ghouls is supposed..." (a book which Prospero's librarian is quite anxious to acquire)
- "...said to Marguerite..." (apparently, a Merinita in Stonehenge)
During this verbal deluge, a large collection of Tractii (and a single Summa) are exhibited to him, along with a collection of wax tablets marked, "Possible Roy-o-gram sites," along with many (rather amateur) copies of the frontispiece of the Summa, which is artfully embossed portrait of the magus himself.
The books are:
"Travel With Trolls" a Summa in Latin by Gilderoy Lockhart. Excellent illuminations.
"Break With A Banshee" by Gilderoy Lockhart, in Latin. Excellent illuminations.
"Gilderoy Lockhart's Guide to Household Pests" by Gilderoy Lockhart, in Latin. Excellent illuminations.
"Voyages With Vampires" by Gilderoy Lockhart, in Latin. Excellent illuminations.
"Year With The Yeti" by Gilderoy Lockhart, in Latin. Excellent illuminations.
(Ra'am has not heard of any of these titles before.)
The wax tablets include a variety of catalog numbers, cross-referencing their efforts to track down local Roy-o-gram sites. There are 35 possible sites, 7 of which might be Spring harvesting tasks. Of these, 4 have a triumphant little check mark next to them. Those are:
- About 30 miles east of the covenant lies a rock quarry infested with Giant Spiders. The entry says something about spring and summer.
- Davim's Rest, 15 miles northeast. Spring. Lair. 500 ants. A date next week.
- "The Spring river-cleaning." Spring, should have started last week. "Ice!" "So that's why!" is scrawled to one side.
- Phoenix Covenant, Grapevine Harvests. Spring?
Reality Edit: Davim's Rest was a name Chico made up while creating vis sources. I'd rather have fun with real-world geography, so we'll say the entry instead says La Nava de Ricomalillo.
With the wax tablets, and their catalog cross-references, you now have access to all the knowledge listed in black on the Vis Sources page of the wiki.
While the list of Vis sources had been researched by the library staff Ra'am will have taken the opportunity to review the volumes. Hopefully the last volume has details. And hopefully it is listed in chronological order. Ra'am would start in reverse order. If that's not fruitful he'll try another tack before an in depth reading. Asking Shara, "You haven't read these by any chance. Would you know anything about a contract with a dwarf king?"
Can we adjust some of these Vis sources to better suit Jewish sensibilities? I've been thinking that several of these appear to be problematic. Arya can probably speak better on this topic, though
Cygna reads the scroll, looking duly impressed. [color=red]"Hunh. Nobody mentioned that we have the finest artist in Iberia in our employ," she says without moving her attention. She is, however, still watching them out of the corners of her eyes to gauge their reaction. [color=red]"I take it that the Archmagus will be at our Tribunal next year? Will we actually get to meet him?"
[color=red]"Sharae, do you happen to have the key to these maps handy somewhere?"
Hiems is still puzzled by the librarians. Are these girls mad, possessed, or touched by Faerie? The one that seems the most normal is Sharae and her abaya makes him ill-at-ease, as if she was in a prison.
He'll let his sodales do the talking and examine the library, instead watching them and the librarians. This is strange, for, while the girls seem really deranged, they in turn seem so... Human!
Awesome!!
Watching as he is, Hiems probably notices, too.
This is quite strange. If living here for a long time, they could have become accustomed to Jaimes Gift, but not to the new magi's. What's happening here? Are they even human? There's something that doesn't fit, here. In a way, it is refreshing, but Hiems as learned not to trust in life's gifts. Maybe the only catch is their madness. Maybe it's more than that.
Relief!!!
Hiems is almost happy not to be the recipient of that. He couldn't have whistood such a barrage. Poor Ra'am, though.
OOC: At this point, I believe I need to pass the buck off to Peregrine, our Faerie Plots SG.
Daniella, practically gushes, which does unslightly things to the belly rolls pushing out from under her faux corset top. "I know! Isn't it amazing! We're all so proud of her! And let me tell you, we were all so relieved when we found out the tribunal would be accepting silver and not vis. We keep asking Senior Jaime, but he won't tell us what vis is, or how we can earn some of our own."
Fidellia blushes prettily, and puts back on the lacey hood in a feeble attempt to hide her face.
Sharae consults the catalog, and gets the book from the appropriate armoire. Anyone making an Awareness Ease Factor 9 will notice that she's not looking at the obnoxious signage to find the correct armoire, she's counting rows and columns.
Cygna receives a large ledger entitled, Legends of Cijara. While mundane information that could be found elsewhere is listed in a straightforward fashion, magical information (vis sources, regio borders, lairs, courts, covenants, etc) requires one to solve a complex mathematical cipher spanning several pages. The margins are filled with partially completed solutions (some angrily scratched out) and unkind commentaries about Tyrion's sexual habits.
[OOC: It takes a minimum of 5 minutes and an Artes Liberales (mathematics) roll vs Ease Factor 9 to learn any single reference point. Some peculiar property of the book allows one to add Artes Liberales to Art of Memory when attempting to memorize this book (Ease Factor 12, since while it is a massive tome, less than 12 full pages worth of information is on it).]
There are 10 formulae listed for Vis Sources. Peregrine can tell us what sort of info it has about faeries.
(Hiems, and anyone else who is paying attention to the scriptorium staff, will also notice the lack of reaction to The Gift, but it does require your attention on the subject. It is not something you'll notice in passing.)
Cygna's head snaps around to look at Daniella. [color=red]"He what?!?" (being British, I'd be surprised if she even needs a roll to have heard the name "Merlin," but beyond that: Int 4 + Area Lore: England 1 + die roll of 3 = 8 [unless it's Order of Hermes Lore, in which case it's 4+0+3=7])
The covenant is required to provide 1 tun of wine to the dwarfs three days before Midsummer, in exchange for "various and sundry goods and services."
Of course Cygna has heard of Merlin. What she hasn't heard of is anyone still around who had ever met him.
(OOC: I have no idea if there is any canon information about Merlin in the RAW)
Daniella: "He earned....well, look, it's all in Travel with Trolls. The White Council needed him to deal with...well, I don't want to give away anything, but it's a very good read. I will say that he and The Merlin don't get along very well at the beginning of the book."
Viscaria: "What's a tun? Is that like a cask, only bigger?"
After much digging through the volumes, he managed to locate the amount of wine the Covenant is contractually obligated to deliver to the dwarves. He asks of anyone who is in the library, "Just how much wine do we happen to have on hand? Does anyone here work with this particular group of fae? Because before we deliver we need to determine what goods and services have been rendered to see if they upheld their contractual obligations from the previous year. This might be a prime opportunity to renegotiate more favorable terms."
[color=red]"There are about two or three dozen barrels of wine in Cersei's cellar, which are all slightly magical. That's all that we've been able to find so far."
Ra'am goes back to reading the contracts looking to see what the exact terms of the contract are. Looking for length of the contract, responsibilities of both parties. The various and sundries in goods and services is remarkably vague. The dwarf king could meet the terms of the contract with a single bag of grain.
Knowing what has been provided previously, by reviewing any notations on the previous contracts or log of items exchanged could shed light on things, too.
"Viscaria, do you know anything about what has been provided from the dwarf king, previously?"
There is also a large warehouse full of mundane wine by the docks, though it is unclear if the magi know this.
Viscaria's knowledge about the dwarves needs to be determined by Peregrine.
"Oh by the way, I've discovered that there seem to be the vis sources that need to be examined soon to see if they're ripe. I didn't discover details on the type of vis, though. There's a rock quarry with giant spiders, there's a notation about spring and summer. On the 21st, there's activity by ants in a village to the northeast called La Nava de Ricomalillo. Spring river cleaning. We should talk to some of the veteran staff to see what they know about that mentions something about ice. We might be late on it, though. Should've started last week. And then there's something about the grapevine harvests happening in the spring." Ra'am goes back to studying, not bothering to see if anyone heard him. But since he used his teacher voice, it's likely everyone did hear him. We'll call this a teaching roll for commanding the attention... Teaching (4) +Com (3) + die roll of 1=8, which should be fine. Mentioning Vis around Magi is probably like mentioning silver to a merchant.
[color=red]"I've already got a couple of ideas about the grapevine harvests, I'll get started on it as soon as I'm done here."
Ra'am's academic interest is piqued. "Oh really? I'd be fascinated to hear how it works. I mean I'm not interested in Mentem vis, per se, but in the variety of vis in general."
Since Cygna doesn't yet know what it will entail, she says she will be happy to share what she finds with you.
Afterward, though, she will clam up about it.
In a purely academic tone, Ra'am offers some unsolicited advice, "Well, I do know that she was interested in self-pleasure and astrology. Secrets of the sanctum will probably be revealed on relatively common astrological aspects, full moon, new moon, change in sign, etc and will probably require a period of self-pleasuring with any of the available implements she has available. Some secrets might be on rare aspects, such as a void moon, when the moon makes no aspect to any other planet. You might want to look at the markings on the implements, as they might be more properly attuned to specific astrological aspects for clues. If you need assistance with anything, let me know." His tone has absolutely no judgement in it, and shows only his academic interest in the matter, based on what he's observed of the sanctum to this point. When he realizes that he what he said last might be misconstrued as an offer pleasure Cygna, he says, "Of course, I meant academic assistance, the other matter is entirely your own affair," without a trace of embarrassment or a sense that he's breached decorum. He returns to the book, researching the contracts.