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[zombie urist]

pre-bah.

[Vector]

Locked for End of Day Processing.  Please hold while your death is being connected.

[Vector]

...Do I have to repeat hitting the post button accidentally?

PFP

Tiruin addresses the Prince again because Horatio seems busy.

"Dear Prince, could you ask Horatio--I fear I have offended him--on who had announced in the first place, that there were rumors of interlopers within our midst? Or..who did it in the first place?

"I had only heard it from others and it comes across as rumor to me. Proven rumor as of now, but back then..well, vague rumor. The sort of rumor wherein the source is indistinct."

"But I've to add. What do you see in every one of us? Is it a generality that we're all here, drawn before you--to pick? Or is there something still missing that you're undecided?

"What do you look for in a person? What did you see in us, that we were invited to your banquet?"

The Prince takes you by the hand and leads you to a table in the Hall.

"Wait here a moment," he says.  You fidget a little when he leaves, wondering what is in store for you.  Then he returns with a plate full of smoked herring, flesh cooked to a delicate shade of red.

"Now," he says, spearing a piece of red herring on his fork.  "As for these rumors that are upsetting you--open your mouth, there's a good girl."

"Mrph," you say as he stuffs it full of herring.  It's delicious, but there seems to be rather a lot of it.

"I first heard of the rumors from a lady in waiting," he says, casually taking another piece of herring.  He doesn't seem to be cutting it into more manageable bites.  "I imagine that she heard it from another lady.  As for Horatio, I do not know if he heard it or not.  He said nothing. . . if all this came of the sleepspeaker, as you girls seem to have been saying, I don't think he holds court for superstition.  A little wider, please.  That's better."

"Mrphprerhperheh." 

"As for what I see in you, my dear. . . right now, you seem to be full of herring."

He cracks a grin, sighing through his nose when you "forget" to laugh.

"If I am to be a wise king, then I am in need of a wise queen."  He feeds you more herring.  "A woman willing to bear children, of course, but able also to rule by my side--or in my stead.  Someone of great discernment and strength, with a character beyond reproach.  I do not intend to say that I expect perfection, but that if we are to be Law, then the two of us must be flawlessly moral."

He sighs.  He sets the fork down.

"And if she were to love me, then that would be nice, too."

"Why did you feed me all that fish?" you ask him at long last, a little out of breath.

". . . Didn't you say you wanted some?"

[Vector]

"The girls came in just as I had finished giving one a late afternoon snack, and said they had an idea as to the nature of the culprit.  I called the guards.  They threw the little priestess into chains and dragged her outside.  We could hear the executioner sharpening his axe as we ate dinner.  Then, as the sun went down, he summoned me to the courtyard.

"I was struck, in the moment as the sun went down, by our mutual youth.  The executioner fumbled with his hood and I had to help him fasten it over his yellow hair.  He was strong enough, but he could not have passed more than twenty summers.  I wondered why someone--my elder brother, most likely--had chosen this man, and how old they had been.  Besides the two of us and the guards, the priestess looked very small.

"'Prince Sigfred,' she said, 'Won't you bring the wood chips from the other girl's room, and burn them?'

"'If we perform a pagan ritual,' I told her, 'it will be very hard to bury you.  We would be transgressing the law of Mother Death.'

"'But I am soon to die,' she said.

"Horatio fetched the brass bowl and the executioner laid her onto the stone slab face-down, with her head and shoulders hanging off the edge.  They burned the wood chips below her face so she could smell the smoke, as she ordered, and passed the blade of the axe through.

"'Your last words?'

"'Let E represent the set of myself.  Then the complement E^c is all that is not myself.  I ask my Goddess that as E collapses to the empty set its contents become a subset of E^c--oh hang it, I'm not very good at funerals.'

"'Take your time,' I said.  From the corner of my eye I could see Horatio leaving.

"She shivered.

"'I am myself on the face of it and seen from behind I am still myself,' she said.  'And when I die I will still be remembered as nothing but my own self.  I am already as I shall be when dead and when dead I will still live.  And as I and all of you straddle the bridge between life and death I assert that this moment will not change me.  Even an ass could see it.  Quod Erat Sanctificatum.'

"'In the name of the Land I return you to the land,' said the axeman.

"The axe came down.  Blood sprayed across my face.  Her bald head bounced and rolled in the dust.

"I heard screams and thought I was dreaming.  I had told the girls not to watch; but a moment later Horatio stumbled out of the castle, carrying a corpse.

"'Sigfred," he said, and then he must have seen the body or the blood on my face, because he blanched and averted his eyes.  'Oh, Goddess.'

"'Which one?' I said.

"'Any.'  He set the body down.  'Look here, she's--I don't know what to say.  She fell down when the axe dropped.  The girls are beside themselves.'

"It was the girl the acolytes had followed here.

"'Is she dead?' said Horatio.  'Or is she just dreaming?'

You are zombie urist, AKA Hypatia.

You have followed your Goddess here, she the all-seeing wonder.  You aren't sure what would happen if she were hurt.  Something terrible.  Therefore, for her own good, to protect her in her every sleeping moment, you followed her to this place where bread is plentiful but unblessed.

She seems safe and is enjoying the presence of the Prince.  You pass your hand over her bread in blessing, bowing your head, and uttering your prayer:

"Let B be a loaf of bread unblessed and bring to it, O Goddess, the full generosity of your blessing you do not even know, b(B), that it may be canonically embedded into your stomach and bring you sustenance, to better act on the set of all mortal souls through the morphism of your Gentle Rationality forevermore.  Amen."

The Prince looks at you and says:

"Are you fond of Euclid, Sister?"

"Almost as much as I am of the Goddess, though if it please you sir, I cannot read and have only heard of his demonstrations as provided by wandering mathematicians.  I am especially fond of Pons Arsinorum but the theorem by Thales also has a certain charm when backed with a lyre--"

"Wait here," he says, and leaves.  You bless the Goddess's water, the bench she is sitting on, her countenance (that it may be free of spots) and her bowels (that your blessings not give her indigestion) while you wait there.

Soon enough he returns with a most marvelous book, with diagrams drawn more cleanly than you have ever seen before, and in a gentle, stumbling way he transforms the ancient letters into words you understand.  You and the Goddess sit there in sweet contemplation for hours, and at the end of the night, in your round of blessings, you include the Prince.

You are town.  You win when all threats to the Prince are gone.

You may watch over and bless one person per night to keep them from harm.

Please send in your night actions as soon as you can.  Night end is scheduled for Friday at 12:00 noon (-8GMT).

In case you didn't read the flavor: JimGroovester is also dead.

[Vector]

18 hours left to send in night actions.  Please do that ASAP so I can process night before I have to move.

[Vector]

Hey guys, I've got all your actions but there's been no time to process them (because I was moving, LOL, and today is my first day of work).  I'm hoping it'll get done tonight but you may have to wait for tomorrow, because the last guy left a serious mess and I have no groceries, etc.

Thank you so much for your patience.  You've been real troupers.

[Vector]

"The next morning was eerie and quiet.  I woke first, early, before even the dawn had finished rising.  The flowers at my bedside table had dried and wilted.  The hangings were moth-eaten and grayed.

"We had laid the sleeping goddess on a stone bier, but she was gone.  I found her in the kitchens, amid a foul stench, poking through the pantry.

"'There's nothing to eat,' she said.  It was true.  Every scrap of food had rotted.

"On my way to rouse some hunters and errandboys I stopped through the great hall and--someone had--she"

The Prince looks down at the bar before him as though he has never seen it before, smoothing it with fluttering hands.  He inhales and cannot rest his eyes on anything, not the barrels heavy with wine, not the little flower-vase Vektor keeps on a high shelf, not the barkeep himself.

At long last, he gives up mastery of himself, buries his face in his hands and sobs.  Vektor makes a vague effort at patting his shoulder, but when he cries harder and his nose starts running, the barkeep heads for the back room instead.  Mischka is curled on the bequilted bed there, paws tucked primly beneath her bulk, snoring.  She is grumpy and tries to claw at his hands when he picks her up, but her strength isn't in it.

"Now what's this?" he says.  "Even old animals like us have duties."

Aureliusz Vektor lugs her out and offers her to the Prince, who accepts her clumsily and tries to wipe his damp face in her fur.  He is mumbling to the cat now, and Vektor can only make out two words:

"Bone" and "maggots."

You are griffinpup the Balalaika Player.

You came to the Prince's castle following a troupe of dancing girls.  They painted the floor with their pretty steps and lithe shadows, you strummed your balalaika, the audience tossed money at their feet, and the Prince came to you directly with a handful of flowers and a bag of coin.  This was unusual in your country, where it was assumed that the dancers would pay the player, but he came forward in person, squinting a little at your shawls and layered skirts.

"Magnificent," he said.  You were not sure from the tone if he was present or elsewhere, but he looked again and said: "I--We are most grateful for your performance, and the distance you have traveled."

"What are you thinking about?" you asked him, after he had been standing there for a moment too long.

"Oh. . ."  He shook his head.  "Fare thee well."

Not a day or two later he asked you to sing for him privately.  You tuned your instrument, hands trembling, and he stared down at you with a faintly forlorn expression when your pegs squeaked.  The sunlight from the window opened a panel on the floor, in which you posed your stool and began, slowly at first, to play.  It was a marvel that you made no mistakes, as you were busy watching the minute movements of his face, the betrayals of expression, waiting for the moment when his attention would wander. . . but it never did.

Not a day or two later he officially opened his search for a wife.

You are town.  You win when all threats to the Prince are gone.

During the night you may strum chords ("none"), or you may

Play a love song (no NKs go through)
Play a warrior's song (no protects or roleblocks go through)
Play a seer's song (all inspections go through)

Each song may only be played once.  You wouldn't want to wear out your audience!

For those who dislike reading flavortext: Jim Groovester is back in play.

Oh my god, you guys don't even want to know what's happened this week.  So far two people have died, I've moved in, had my first day of work, and written more than 20 pages of documents in my spare time.  So, sorry to keep you waiting.  I hope today's totally radical and awesome for everyone.

[zombie urist]

bah.

[Lenglon]

"I.. I... Um, Lady Web, I... I decided to follow you last night, and, um... I saw you go to Lady sheep's room. Why did you do that?"
Web: Why did you visit Sheep last night?

[Toaster]

Okay, six people left.  Logical player counts assume three scum to start.  With one down, that's two, which makes this MYLO.  In other words, mass claim time.

I am Toaster the Rose, and I've claimed my flavor.

As for my role, I can give people roses at night.  This resets a used N-shot at random (essentially, they are motivated because a pretty rose makes them more likely to get *looks at princess amendment* uh... a night of unbridled passion.  I cannot target the same player more than twice.

N1 I gave it to GriffionDay because I thought he was most likely to be town.
N2 I gave it to Web.  I had a fairly town read on him at that point.
N3 I did Web again, mostly because I was rapidly losing the thread of the game and played off the prior thought, which hadn't really changed.


Jim, where did you go last night?

[webadict]

"I.. I... Um, Lady Web, I... I decided to follow you last night, and, um... I saw you go to Lady sheep's room. Why did you do that?"
Web: Why did you visit Sheep last night?

Oddly enough... I didn't. I actually targeted Toaster. Somehow, I ended up hitting Sheep instead. I'm severely confused and tired right now, so you'll have to excuse me, but I honestly have no clue what happened.

[Toaster]

Still not claiming, Web?

[webadict]

Still not claiming, Web?

Is it that time again?

[Jim Groovester]

Jim, where did you go last night?

I'll tell you all about it.

After webadict claims.

[webadict]

Jim, where did you go last night?

I'll tell you all about it.

After webadict claims.

I dunno, man, with that attitude...