Monster Party Book 4: I slither like a viper and get you by the neck...
Chapter one: If there's somethin' strange in your neighborhood...
"Another day, another ten coppers..." Reflected Nicolai Androv.
All things considered the Nova Vassan merchant was quite content with his life and had every reason to be.
He had followed the Lawgiver's tenants his entire life and he had been rewarded with inheriting his father's antique shop and continued reliable business for it. His wealth was by no means grand, but neither did he need to fall into crime and depravity to avoid starvation.
He took a moment to caress his black mustache as he examined his latest purchases. They had arrived last night near closing time so he hadn't been able to properly inspect them until now.
Four finely crafted coffins imported from the forests of Barovia, nothing too spectacular but they should last far longer and prove much studier than those made of local wood.
Not antiques in and of themselves, but his shop did all kinds of business and he was certain he'd be able to find a buyer for them sooner or later. If worse came to worse he could always have them broken apart and remade into desks, chairs, or something else, strong stout wood would always fetch a reasonable price in Nova Vassa.
As he carefully felt out each coffin by hand a strange realization came upon Nicolai, he had paid for four coffins, four coffins had been unloaded last night... so why where there five coffins inside his shop?
The door had been locked up tight and showed no signs of tampering, besides who would break into his store to leave behind a coffin? Surely there were simpler more effective ways of disposing of a dead body?
Besides, this fifth coffin... what a coffin it was!
He ran his hands along it and felt the smooth material it had been draped in making it practically a joy to the touch. He pulled back some of the stuff and saw to his surprise that the wood beneath was black as the material covering it.
Yet a couple quick wraps on its side proved that it was neither rotted nor burnt, but stern and strong.
No sane criminal (or even an insane one) would leave behind a coffin like this, it looked grand enough that even Prince Othmar could not have objected to it being his final resting place!
As that thought struck him Nicolai began to rub his hands together, the ways of the Lawgiver were not his to question, but surely this coffin must be a minor sign of his favor! Only a gem encrusted silver spear could have been a more obvious gift from on high!
If only he could find the right buyer he was certain this coffin would be worth several month's regular business!
The only problem with possibly interesting the Prince (well the only problem other than the fact that he was still several decades away from needing a coffin) in it would be the slogan embossed upon, even if it had been done in beautiful golden thread.
"Touch Not The Cat Without a Glove."
That was all well and good but the Prince would want his own family motto "Unity from us, power for us" put in its place.
Still that phrase it.. it reminded the merchant of something that he had seen somewhere, he just wasn't sure where.
He scooped up his book of records and began to search through it hoping that he could find an answer, lest curiosity distract him for who knew how long? He ended up needing to go back through several of his family's record books (keeping careful track of everything one owns and sells was a minor way of showing deference to the Lawgiver after all) till he finally found it.
So pleased was he with his discovery that he couldn't keep himself from announcing it to the otherwise vacant shop.
"Aha, here we are, 'Touch Not The Cat Without a Glove' it showed up on a moth bitten tapestry believed to date back to a time roughly around...!" Nicolai's eyes bulged in their sockets and he dropped the book.
Forget selling the coffin to the Prince as a resting place, he'd just had a fantastic antique from the Bridling period dropped into his lap!
The coffin must have some sort of magical spell on it to be this well preserved! What other explanation could there be for why a coffin should have written in Nova Vassan a slogan that hadn't actually been used in his country for over a century?
He reached for a crowbar, realizing that if he'd been able to lay a hand on the coffin, it must not have any magical protections that would flay the skin from his bones if he tried to open it.
Who knew what greater wonders might lay inside?
As he turned around, the strange coffin suddenly swung open of its own accord.
A beautiful woman dressed in a manner both shockingly foreign and shockingly masculine rose from the coffin. Her clothing amounted to little more than a simple white jacket with white shirt underneath and a black pair of pants, while a white hat rested upon her black hair that was parted by a streak of white in the middle.
The woman's outfit was a study in contradiction for the masculine way it clung to her body ended up leaving her feminine figure far more fully on display and she wore the simple outfit with grace and elegance that would have befitted a noblewoman in a resplendent scarf and blouse.
She stretched and cricked her neck slightly as she looked around the shop her ruby red eyes paying him no more attention than they did any of his wears.
"Hmm... this doesn't look like were I remember going to sleep. Still, you don't especially look like the kidnapping type." She certainly had mastered the highborn skill of having a conversation "about you" without needing to have a conversation "with you" if nothing else.
"Did you remember going to sleep in a coffin in the first place?" Nicolai ventured hoping against hope that he might retain ownership of the strange antique.
"Oh that part I remember quite clearly. Still, I don't think we're in Kartakass anymore Kitten." The woman reflected to no one in particular.
"You've got that right Mirri!" Answered a young man who emerged from the coffin a few moments later.
Nicolai turned his head to the side slightly, trying to a better look at the black coffin.
It was large yes, easily larger than the four he had actually bought, still unless it possessed additional magic that made it larger on the inside, it was hard to imagine that two people could have comfortably fit inside it.
The coffin's second occupant proved even stranger upon the eyes than its first one had. He was a young man with soulful brown eyes. Still, he was not so young that his lip should have been without at least some faint traces of a mustache starting to come in.
Nicolai couldn't help but conclude that the man must be at least as foreign as the woman's method of dress due to his lack of the traditional Nova Vassan well groomed facial hair.
Leaving aside his lack of a mustache he was dressed in a riotous bright red jacket, shirt, pants, shoes, and wide brimmed hat that came close to completely covering his head. If he squinted hard Nicolai could just barely catch a glimpse of how the hair underneath that hat seemed to be equally red.
"No of course not, you are in finest antique shop of all of Kantora!" Nicolai exclaimed, instinct rising to the occasion where actual coherent understanding had long since fled.
"Kantora, you mean I'm back in... well this is just wonderful. At least I still have my coffin..." The woman muttered to herself in irritation.
Her Vassi was without trace of foreign accent but hinted at its owner being of the upper-crust. By comparison her companion's came with a Mordentish accent (if you were going to have business dealings with traders who traveled any further west than Barovia you ended having at least some exposure to that language) and was of a much more baseborn nature.
Clues began to accumulate and Nicolai now had a theory he would carefully keep to himself.
The woman came from a family of some means and had committed Viggo's Folly or something close enough to it by becoming smitten with a foreign commoner, perhaps some son of a merchant who passed through these realms.
They might have eloped in the night carrying off the coffin either to sell it or as a memento her of family's past wealth. Granted it still did nothing at all to answer the much stranger question of why they had been sleeping inside the thing.
The pair looked far too healthy (and their clothing if bizarrely designed was mostly clean and without noticeable tear) and vibrant for them to have been so lacking in funds that a coffin was the only shelter they could seek at night!
Nicolai was tempted to insist that the mysterious coffin in question was rightfully his, then decided against it.
It was hardly as if he had paid for the coffin, and perhaps it was not a gift from the Lawgiver but a test? This beautiful woman clearly thought it was her own, what right did he have to take it from her?
Then the other coffins he had just bought opened up and more figure emerged from them, two men and two women.
One of the men had long silver hair, and a single green left eye while his right was covered by an eyepatch.
He was wearing a black outfit of some vaguely martial nature with silver symbols of a mystic nature inscribed upon it.
The other man had dirty blond hair and blue eyes and was dressed in a simple brown cloak with a blue shirt on underneath.
Of the women, one of them was an elf with blue hair and blue eyes in a close cut blue dress. The other was even stranger, she had green tinted skin, yellow hair that seemed to be strangely straw-like, and was dressed in a green leotard of some sort. She must have been either foreign or cursed (or both) for Nicolai had never seen someone whose very skin seemed to call out in morning.
"Boss, I don't recall going to bed in a coffin, let alone a coffin in the middle of some guy's store..." Reflected the dirty blond haired man.
Nicolai blinked a few times, he hadn't inspected the coffins, but he was fairly certain he would have noticed if people had been inside them when they were delivered...
"I don't suppose you're going to claim you own those coffins as well?" He muttered dourly wondering if whatever strange business was going on at the moment would result in not just the black coffin but even the one's he had rightful purchased being taken from him.
The silver haired man looked back at the coffin he had just emerged from and shook his head.
"Never seen it before in my life. Given that I could say the same about you perhaps some introductions are in order? I'm Alexander Diamondclaw..." He offered.
At that point it would been most impolite for the store's owner not to respond in kind.
"Nicolai Androv. As I was explaining to your female companion, at least supposing you people already know one another, I own the finest antique shop in Kantora. Do you see anything you like?" He abruptly added as an after thought.
Further introductions were made, the man in red was James Firecat, the one in brown was Cal Wright, the elf was Devi Skye, the woman with green skin was Florence Bastien and the beautiful woman in white and black was Mirri Catwarrior.
Nicolai fully expected that all of them including (make that ESPECIALLY) Mirri would not be looked kindly upon by the Lawgiver or his priests, but as a merchant he'd long ago accustomed himself to dealing with those who were destined to spend their afterlives in the Hell of Slaves.
To their credit his unexpected guests didn't take their frustration at having been hurled halfway across the Core out on any of his delicate merchandise. Even more wonderfully they'd been lucky enough not to have been separated from their collective money pouch by whatever mystic misfortune they had suffered.
Alas, none of Nicolai's stock interested them at all.
Knowing that foreigners (and these people were about as foreign as you could get) could be counted on to purchase what no normal Nova Vassan would, the merchant didn't want to loose the unique chance they represented so he decided to display one final item for them.
"I wouldn't go showing this off to my normal customers you understand. It's antique I've no doubt of that, but all the same some members of the Iron Faith might make regrettable mistakes concerning my devotion to the Lawgiver if I left it out in the open for anyone to see..." Nicolai explained as he searched for the strange curio he had decided to purchase two days ago.
It had gone for a song because of its blasphemous nature but it had been so well made that he hadn't been able to refuse the offer.
It was another coffin of sorts. An ornately carved wooden container perhaps two feet in length, designed in the shape of a cat.
Many tiny gems were studded in the coffin while the cat's face seemed to have been gilded with gold. If Nicolai was unable to find a buyer for the object before much longer he planned to start prying the gems loose.
For now it was unmarred and in almost shockingly pristine condition.
"To be perfectly honest, I have no idea exactly how old this item is. It clearly dates back to before the reign of Saint Gorkyn Beloved of the Lawgiver, but perhaps it goes even back beyond the arrival of the Old Vassi?
I can not say for sure, only that it has been quite some time since anyone has worshiped cats in Nova Vassa to the point that they would bury one in such a resplendent fashion. It can be yours for a mere, ten platinum say?" Nicolai offered as he held up the item in question for the other occupants of his shop to get a good long look at.
The price he asked was certainly twice what the gems in the coffin were worth, and he had no intentions of mentioning how he'd bought it for only fifty gold. To his delight he saw James Firecat start to search through the many pockets of his outfit, and then to his horror he felt the coffin in his hands move.
So great was his surprise that he dropped the exquisitely carved coffin and could do nothing but curse himself for a fumble fingered fool as it plummeted to the floor. It struck the ground and snapped open, a small brownish feline figure popping out.
It looked vaguely cat shaped, but more like someone had baked a cat out of clay rather than a living animal. Yet it was animate enough to open its mouth and let loose with an ominous hiss and shake itself vigorously. Flecks of dust and who knew what else fell from its body as raggedy tufts of fur emerged from gaps in the clay coating that surrounded its body.
It turned a baleful glance in Nicolai's direction and he discovered that its eye sockets were little more than withered husks. Its teeth were discolored and broken, but in such a way to only make them more fearsome.
The shopkeeper didn't think, he acted on pure reflex and kicked out at the creature trying to knock it away from him. It jumped over his leg showing shocking dexterity despite it's decrepit appearance.
Its claws flashed out and Nicolai screamed in pain as there was a sudden searing sensation from his leg. His entire body felt weak and he collapsed to the ground.
"HELP ME!" He pleaded to the other occupants of the shop, worried that this bizarre beast might prove more than capable of killing even a fully grown man.
No sooner were the words out of his mouth than a metallic flail that had been wrapped around the elf's right arm unfolded and lashed across the room. It wrapped itself about the neck off the catbeast and with a firm pull she managed to yank it away from the prone merchant.
The feline terror hissed and spluttered in anger, its claws striking out at anything within reach, but they were not sharp or strong enough to damage the flail that held it in place. Only after failing several times over did it occur to the creature to turn its ire on the one who had bound it, spinning around to hiss at the elf.
It bounded towards her, only to have its head caved in by a blow from the back of Cal Wright's weapon, some manner of firearm Nicolai believed, such things were too expensive for him to be very familiar with them.
Either way the clay coated body jerked and spluttered a few more times then went blessedly still. Nicolai breathed a sigh of relief, which came far too soon as he suddenly found the blade of a longsword being held to his throat.
Alexander Diamondclaw stood above him weapon in hand, his grip far from traditional, but perfectly capable of ending the life of a shop keeper should he so wish it.
"I have no intention of hurting you, but I want you to understand just how seriously I am taking this matter. So lets both be reasonable people, I am going to put this sword back in its sheath, and you are going to tell me the truth. Did you know that thing was in there?" He demanded in a very vexed voice.
"No, of course I didn't!" Nicolai gasped, amazed that sure enough Alexander did return his sword to its sheath.
"I wouldn't ever sell something that I knew was dangerous to a customer! You can ask around this entire city, people will speak for how I have always been fair and honest in my dealings!" He explained.
"Where did that thing come from, and is there anything else you know about it you haven't told us?" Alexander 'requested' from him.
"It came from the quarry in the Koshka Bluffs... if I had to guess I'd say it was supposed to be some sort of holy relic of..." Nicolai concluded the sentence in a whisper so soft that no one else in the room was able to hear it.
"Say that last part again..." Alexander prompted him.
Beads of sweat began to roll down the shopkeeper's face.
"Look... I only know this name because it is part of our history, from a very long time ago... I don't worship it, venerate it, or respect it in any way! It's just a name, and it existed and in the dark past, the days before the coming of Saint Gorkyn Beloved of the Lawgiver, it is a name that shows up with some frequency among the name of false cults.
So, at the moment, I suspect that the coffin might have been some sort of heathen fetish made to honor the 'cat goddess' Bubahkaa who is nothing but a lie, she does not exist and never existed..." He finally admitted.
"You mean Bubastis, or possibly Bastet? The difference in language can play havoc with the names of divine beings which tend to be pretty fancy to start with. Was she depicted as a female goddess with the head of a housecat? Known for being quite even tempered as far as goddesses go, has a sister called Sekhmet, a woman with the head of a lioness and tends to be a lot meaner?" Suggested James Firecat eagerly."
Nicolai looked around the room, there were on six people in it, none of them who made their homes in Nova Vassa, and one of them had a put a blade to his throat a few moments ago.
"I couldn't possibly say anything about a deity that might or might not be known as Sehkmaa, I do not know what gender that god is, I do not know who might worship him, her or it, and I do not know in what manner they might dress, or what weapons they might consider holy, I KNOW NOTHING about Sehkmaa! Nobody worships that mysterious being anymore, just as I have never heard of anyone who worships Bubahkaa!" He protested with incredible vehemence.
Alexander saw that whatever the man might or might not know, he was already starting to fear for his life.
"Well then, I think that's all we need to know. Sorry for the unpleasantness, I don't like it when I wind up being attacked by monsters before breakfast." He apologized.
Someone else wasn't in the mood to apologize though, there was a loud "AHEM!" from behind Alexander.
James Firecat stepped forward, and began to rifle through the many pockets of his outfit. Eventually he found what he was looking for, a small figure of a cat seated upright on all fours carved out of dark stone and ran a gloved finger along it comfortingly.
"I'll have you know that me and my maternal family have been Bastet worshipers of the Purrbaterian sect in good standing for generation upon generation! That's a lot like the Meowthedist branch of the faith except unlike them we know our Lady's Prayer should include the line 'forgive us our debts as we we forgive our debtors', while those those blind fools insist it should be 'forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespasses against us' can you believe there are still people thick headed enough to think that way?" All present (even Mirri, even Alexander) suddenly found themselves overcome with a great desire to sneeze, that or for some other reason decided to bury their faces in the crooks of their elbows.
"Hey this is an important distinction!" James protested.
"The phrase 'trespasses' refers to committing actions that are against one's moral code, while 'debts' has far more wide reaching consequences, it pertains to matters material and secular rather than just moral. There have been centuries worth of disagreement over this issue!" There were noises that sounded decidedly like sniggering coming from most the rooms occupants now.
"Well also there was some stuff about how while we believe that the holy texts were divinely inspired, this divine inspiration only involves the original texts which nobody bothers to, or even possibly could read any more, and while there is still the gift of Bastet's divine mercy and wisdom within the translations it can also be as flawed as anything else produced by mortal hands, while they insist that any translation is just as perfect as the original, which is silly if you ask me because how can so many different translations all be perfectly correct?
That said, I will give them something in that they believe that the act of mouse catching is pleasing to Bastet and success at is a sign she favors you. On the other hand 'we' 'believe' that mouse catching alone done without actual faith in one's heart is not looked kindly upon by Bastet.
You can fill a litter box with that point of view in my opinion as I think that the Mewothedists were probably right on that one, some things Bastet likes to see done just because honestly they just need to be done, which was why in my free time I've always been contemplating how best to combine the two separated branches though I'm not sure what I wold call it." By this point laughter filled the room from all directions and in the face of it James cold not maintain his righteous fury, his fully erect stance giving way to a slight crouch as he continued to stroke the statue.
"So as you could probably guess, I'm not surprised that Bastet worship isn't exactly a major religion, we're just a little, maybe a touch more than a little, prone to schism. I think my mom once told me that every layman would come to worship service with a high priestess's mask in their pack. Assuming they would come to worship service at all, since getting the congregation together for anything tended to be like herding cats." He admitted.
End Chapter
AN: To start with something very simple, in Nova Vassa "green" is a color that is associated with death and morning the way that black is in America and many other many western cultures, or white is in some eastern ones like China. So Florence's skin tone stands out even more than it would in most places.
Onto more complicated matters, Nicolai has very good reasons to feel awkward talking about Bubahkaa/Bastet, Nova Vassa is not quite a theocracy, but like many real life autocracies of one form or another the church is definitely joined at the hip (or at least at the shoulder) with the state. The Iron Faith of the Lawgiver is the only acceptable religion to practice, and while it's not on the books illegal to be an atheist, you are going to get publicly ostracized (expect the same thing to happen if you don't show up at worship services often enough also) at the very least.
You obviously can't worship another god if you don't know their name so acting as if you don't know the names of any other gods is typically a good safe bet. You especially don't want to act like you know the names of gods who aren't from foreign parts but instead were once worshiped by quite a lot of people in Nova Vassa's past, you know those religions that the Iron Faith of the Lawgiver had to stamp out to become the sole practiced faith in Nova Vassa.
Granted, things only get worse once you bring up the subject of Bastet's sister.
There was a group in Nova Vassa roughly a little more than sixty years before this story takes place who called themselves the Claws of Sehkmaa. They somehow managed to avoid getting stamped out by the Iron Faith of the Lawgiver, most likely through dint of paying some hilariously large bribes to the head of the church, who if you haven't already guessed also happens to be the Prince (acting ruler) of Nova Vassa.
They did the same things most religions talk about it being important to do, they fed the hungry, took in orphans, spread the word of their god to make converts, tried to make Nova Vassa a better place to live.
They were also a front for one of the most ambitious organized crime rings in Nova Vassan history (which is saying something given Nova Vassan history) lead by some guy you may have heard of already, his name was Malken.
So everything Nicolai "doesn't say" about Sehkmaa, that's the equivalent of "I've never heard of an organization called 'The Mafia' and if it existed, I wouldn't know any of its members, what they do, where they meet, or what their goal is, anyone who is listening please don't kill me!"
The various branches of Bastet worship that James mentions are in no way... (sound of muffled laughter) yeah even I couldn't bring myself to honestly type that. Yes I'm making fun of just how many different branches of Christianity there are, which is okay because I myself was raised Presbyterian.
The differences that James points out between that group and Methodists are accurate differences as far as I can tell, the less obvious one about mouse catching is pointing out that the the Methodist church has a "deeds not creeds" approach while the Presbyterians have something closer to the Calvinist (which is the church they (Presbyterians) broke off from) belief in a "selected elect" though we're (Presbyterians, or at least the branch of the faith I grew up in) quick to point out that the "selected elect" in question in EVERYBODY, but they were selected and are going to heaven because god loves all of us, not because any of us were able to do such good things in our lives that we actually deserved to go to heaven.
If that confuses you just think of it as the flip of another old saw I am fond of, that saying being "no finite life of sin is just cause for infinite punishment" (which is why I (warning this is me stating my own religious beliefs at this point) don't believe in a permanent hell that people get sent to but never get to leave in a million billion google etc years ) in this case the Presbyterian belief could be stated as "no life of finite good deeds is just cause for infinite rewards".
I'm sorry that this has gotten so complicated religion wise, but short of G'Henna which is an actual theocracy, I don't think there's a domain in Ravenloft where the church interacts with the state as much as it does in Nova Vassa, so you can't really write something that takes place there and be true to the setting without getting into this kind of stuff.
On a funnier note the line that of James' mother passed down to him is the church hierarchy equivalent of that saying about how in Napoleon's army, every soldier carried a marshal's baton in his knapsack.