Chuzo reflexively takes a step back as the strange foreigner makes a gesture towards him. One of the dog growls as he sees Ludovicus appraoch his master. After a moment's hesitation, he answers, "They all laugh at me when I tell me tale." He makes no move to take the offered pouch. "They all laugh about me poor dogs, my poor boys who died from the beast. I buried them up on th' hill." He seems near tears as he remembers his fallen hounds. Then he shakes it off and says, "Good day and safe travels, sers." Before turning away and moving towards the sheep's enclosure. The growling dog takes a moment longer to look at Ludovicus, before it also turns and runs after its master.
To the grogs: "Very okay. We go Flat Rock now yes?"
When they've left the shepherd well behind, Ludovicus outlines the plan. "When at next village, Andreas and Burkshart, you be pleased go speak to people. Martin, we stay away, so they not angry and do talk. Other two leave arms with us, so they not scared. When talk, say I merchant want to catch purple sheep for purple wool. Make much monies."
((I'm going off script from Trogdor's plan slightly, with two grogs approaching people, to avoid limiting stage time.))
"Good plan, ser," says Martin with an expressionless face, "let's just try to remember it."
He looks around, getting his bearings, before asking, "Flat Rock should be that way." He points northeast. "Do you want us to swing by the hill and take a look at the dogs' grave up on the hill?"
"I think we should look at the dog's grave," Andreas says. "Might be nothing there, but as we're here, we ought to looks. Maybe those flowers grew on the graves. Could be the purple sheep like to eat those flowers. Sheep like flowers - 'cept sheep that eat meat, I suppose. Those kind of sheep might not like flowers." His thoughts trail off.
"What means grave?" After explanation, "Ah, yes, we go to our grave on hill."
The trip to the top of the hill is fairly easy, as there is a small footpath that Chuzo probably uses to lead his flock into the heathland. You quickly locate piles of stone, which must be the graves. The more ground around them seems to have been recently disturbed, as if the vegetation that grew there has been torn off.
"It looks like sheep might have grazed here," Andreas says. "I wonder if what they ate were flowers like the ones the dogs had in their mouths. That would be funny. I wonder if it was a purple sheep that grazed here."
Martin kneels beside a patch of disturbed ground before commenting, "I don't think so, Andreas. See here?" He points to the disturbed soil. "This looks like someone literally tore off a shrub or a large plant, completely pulling it out of the ground, roots and all. Usually, when a sheep is grazing, its teeth cut the grass off, cropping it pbut leaving the roots relatively undisturbed." He points to various places where the soil or the stones themselves have been disturbed. "And this happened there and there too." He shrugs, turning to Ludovicus and adding in Latin, "This not the work of sheep. Someone tore the plants off here. Fairly large ones, like shrubs. Lots of effort to do that."
"Wait," Andreas says. "When did the dogs die again? Last year? Was there enough time for large shrubs to grow? That takes time. Might the plants have been magical?" He looks to Ludovicus, nervous to ask the magus anything.
"Yes, seems not normal. Maybe we ask for bush in village?" He looks around for any hovels that might have a view of the hill, or for other shepherds that might be nearby.
Then in Latin: "Martin, are you positive that there are no remnants of the plants? If we can find any part of one, I may be able to at least figure out what it is."
Martin digs around some with his dagger, then shakes his head. Looking around, the group realizes that this hills is within sight of a few houses on the outskirts of the village, though not in a clear line of sight. There are other shrubs on the hill top. Only those around or one the piled stones have been removed, apparently.
Latin:"Martin, let us go speak to the villagers in those shacks, to ask them about the bushes. Or rather," German: "Andreas and Burkshart, please to talk with people lives there, ask for bushes and purple sheep." Latin: "Martin, we will remain a bit, to allow for some investigative spells, and then we will follow. Please alert me if someone approaches." Ludovicus sets to casting spontaneous spells to detect mystical auras, cycling through the four realms. Then he'll cast a spell to detect vis.
CS: In+Vi+Sta+A = 5+9+2+A = 16+A
Sense of Magical/Faerie/Infernal/Divine Power (Level 2): Non-fatiguing
Detect the Presence of Vis (Level 3) (R:Voice, D:Mom. T:Ind.) (Base 1, +2 Voice): Non-fatiguing
If an aura causes his casting to fail, he'll retry with a fatiguing version. If multiple fatiguing castings are required, he'll rest between each.
Burkhart leaves his weapon as instructed before and walks towards the Houses searching for a villager. When he finds one he asks him :
"Hello there, my master is searching for the purple sheep, to get his coat, have you seen it ? Also, It seems that around the place where Chuzo's dog was killed, over there, bushes have been removed, can you tell us about it ?"
The villager, a younger man using a wooden hoe to weed his small field, looks at Burkhard and sniggers. "Ye believe Chuzo's crazy tales?" The man leans on his hoe as he elaborates, "Purple sheep is just a tale that the old use whenever they lose sheep or dogs. Chuzo's dogs were probably killed by a wolf, is all."
"Yes, you know it's just a fancy story, and we know it's a fancy story," Andreas replies. "But our master is convinced it's for real. And so long as we can keep this chase going, we get a pleasant walk in the country instead of a dull day working at the shop. The minute he gives up on getting a purple sheep is the moment we go back to work. So you can see how we'd like to keep things going."
"Right now he's fixated on the dog's grave and why the shrubs around it have been dug up. I'm not sure why, but he is. If you can give us anything more to go on about that, or about the purple sheep story, then we might be able to spin this into another day away from work. We'd really appreciate it."
"So you want me to lie and spin a tale for ye? What's in it fer me?"
"I don't want you to lie," Andreas replies. "The boss might find out and then we'd be in trouble. But if you could remember any stories, or if you know anything about why the blasted shrubs are missing up there, it might keep us going for a bit."
"As for what's in it for you ... we have some small beer we could share. Or I might even be able to convince the master to part with a ha'penny* for your trouble."
-
- or whatever the equivalent here would be,
(OOC: A low-value coin would be a Schwarzpfennige, or "black penny", usually minted locally and containing mostly copper. That's opposed to a Weißpfennige, or "white penny", that has a high silver content and thus high value. See this Wikipedia article.)
"Well..." the man says when you mention hard currency, "I could be remembering som'thing or another, maybe, that could be entertaining for yer master, then." He grins, before adding, "But me memory is bad sometimes, so somethang shiny would help me remem'ber, that's fer sure."
Burkhard turns pale and whisper to Andreas " Are you mad, that's dishonest and useless, He'll tell you anything you wish to hear..."
"It's also a real chance to get information. Besides, it's not our money. If our master thinks it's worth it, he'll pay. If not, he won't." He shrugs. "I'll go check with him."
Moving back to Ludovicus he says, "he tell stories for a black penny. Do we pay him?"