Tooth and Claw, Part 8


Verika sighs, staring across the large, barren field of tree stumps at the logging camp. "What a mess..." she says quietly, shaking her head. "Those men definitely shouldn't be here. And yet... given what they face otherwise, it's hard for me to judge them too harshly." Then she glances back, looking into your eyes. "What do you think we should do?"

You are, after all, the demon who completely upended her entire idea of what was possible. Tempting her into utter debauchery, while also offering the chance to see a real change in her birthplace, one that she never could have imagined before you met. She's watching you. Hoping to understand you even better.

Eager to see what audacious strategy you will employ in response to this dilemma.

"The first thing we need is information," you reply. "Even now, I suspect we don't have the entire picture. And we won't know all our options until we do. There must be a reason why a noble girl is all the way out here, without any real support. Tonight I plan on to finding out why."

Verika nods in agreement with your approach. "What do you want me to do?"

"For now, stay here with Juri," you say. "Keep her safe. At least until I have a better feel for our hosts, and what their full intentions are."

"I won't let anything happen to her." Verika hesitates, her dark eyes searching yours. Then she exhales. "Just... be careful, Tal. If you get in trouble, give me a shout and I'll come running."

You might actually be able to do more than that. If your impression of the strange new powers you gained after the fight with the Incubus King is accurate... you suspect that you could summon Verika directly to your side now, should it come to that. But you're keeping that particular secret in reserve until it becomes necessary to use it, hidden from any malevolent goddesses that might be eavesdropping.

Instead, you simply give the curvy drow a fierce goodbye kiss and fondling, then melt back into the cover of the night. In daylight, the approach across the deforested clearing might have been too tricky for your average stealth abilities, but in the darkness your demonic skills are more than sufficient.

On your way to your true destination, you skirt by the logging camp, studying some of the men as they stand guard. They stare nervously out into the impenetrable blackness, their surroundings lit only by their feeble torches and what little of he moonlight peeks through the clouds.

Interestingly, with your perception you're able to determine that there are more guards watching the camp's perimeter for an incursion than just the obvious ones walking a patrol route with their torches. Some of the guards are pretending to occupy themselves with other tasks, while watching "holes" in the obvious defenses. Some of the guards are just outright hiding. It's an interesting bit of subtlety that you wouldn't have expected from a rabble like this. An idea from their leader, Ragath, perhaps? You make a mental note not to underestimate him, despite how little he actually has to work with.

Either way, they're not your target tonight. You wait until Ragath disappears into one of the ramshackle buildings for the night, before shapeshifting into his likeness and completing your approach toward the noble camp. Ragath was, after all, the one you've seen and heard the most of while you were spying on the negotiations. Not to mention he's the one most likely to provoke the conversations that will result in the answers you seek.

You approach the largest and most opulent tent, already mimicking the mannerisms of human leader. Then you clear your throat. "Beggin' your pardon, Lady Edith?" you say, just loud enough to be heard inside. "Was hoping we could have a few words."

There's a rustling from inside the tent. Eventually Edith's bodyguard emerges, hand on her sword, looking you up and down suspiciously. The female knight is a plain, blunt-looking woman, with short-cropped, dirty-blonde hair, and a nose that has probably been broken at least once. Fierce protectiveness of her young charge fairly radiates from her.

She's also clearly anxious. And you don't think that all—or even most—of her worry is due to your unexpected visit.

"What brings you here at this hour?" the knight demands, regarding you warily. "What do you have to say to my lady that cannot wait until the morn?"

It's obvious that these two human groups are not seeing completely eye-to-eye. So one way to get them invested in this conversation might be to hint that it's an opportunity for them to change "your" mind... while keeping it vague enough that you can use their response to fish for details.

"I... was thinking about some of the things that your Lady Edith said..." you tell the knight, putting just the right note of uncertainty in your otherwise-gruff voice. "Wanted to talk it over some more. Just... without my men around."

The knight frowns. But the rustling inside the tent only increases, and soon the young Lady Edith herself bursts out of it, now looking at least somewhat presentable. "Of course!" she blurts out. You can see sudden hope in her eyes. Hope that her efforts might work after all. "Is there any way I could convince you to back down from this hopeless confrontation with the Forest?"

"Depends on what you can do about our debts," you say, feeling her out with some more vague guesses. "Isn't there anything else you could say to your father on our behalf?"

Lady Edith's face falls. "I... I'm sorry," she says in a small voice. "But... I really don't think I can change his mind. Now that the lumber from this camp has dried up, it won't be long until he makes his next move. He might arrive any day with his men. And once he gets here, it really will be too late for you."

And with that one statement, so much of what you've seen already clicks into place. The local lord isn't oblivious to what's going on here. None of this is an accident. It's all according to his plan.

Oh, you doubt Lord Edrach ever outright told these men to cut down trees in this particular place. Hell, you wouldn't be surprised if he told them—in passing—that the Great Forest was off-limits. Because he knew he didn't need to give any orders himself. All he needed to do was to gather a bunch of hungry, desperate, uneducated men. Pulled from the streets. Pulled from the debtors' prisons. Men not local to this area. Men at the end of their rope.

Once he had enough of those men, he wouldn't need to get his own hands dirty. All he would need to do would be to assign them an impossible quota. A quota that could only be fulfilled by setting up an operation on the wrong side of the boundary "of their own accord", and hoping to get away with it for long enough to save themselves. The entire point of these men is to be deniable. To be disposable.

When the lord shows up—likely in a mere day or two, if Lady Edith's estimation is correct—then you expect he'll make a great show of being aghast at what these loggers have done "against his orders". You expect he'll be all too willing to sacrifice them to whatever retribution the forest-dwellers desire. After all, the lumber from all the clear-cutting they've done up to this point has already been sent down the river into Lord Edrach's hands. At this point, the loggers are nothing but loose ends.

In fact, even if the forest-dwellers didn't demand their blood, Lord Edrach would probably dispatch them himself for their "disobedience". Thus placing the blame firmly on their heads, and silencing anyone who might tell the story from a different angle.

But what he didn't count on was his daughter learning of his scheme. And while Lord Edrach himself apparently has the sheer, bull-headed arrogance to consider this plan a good idea, it seems that the girl, at least, realizes the utter folly in trying to pad their personal coffers by playing these kind of stupid games with such a powerful ally.

It's just that her novice attempts to intervene on her own, without her father's knowledge, have themselves been ill-thought-out, and mostly ineffectual so far.

Lady Edith's words do also give you one other piece of information you hadn't realized before. If a scheme like this is lucrative enough to attract the attention of a noble in this way... then it suggests that there may be a significant lumber shortage in Nelin. And if they're already having problems with deforestation of their lands, this enormous mobilization against Kovora can't be helping at all.

All this flashes through your thoughts in an instant, your enhanced mind calculating the angles with swift efficiency, before you speak up again.

"If you can't give us anything more than that, then all you're offering my men is a choice of where we want to die," you snap. "Why shouldn't we at least try to get the Forest to back down? At least that way we might have a chance to get the lumber flowing again. It could be enough appease your father."

The female knight's eyes flash angrily. "Or it could create a diplomatic incident that would seriously harm the war effort!" she interjects. "It could jeopardize the lives of thousands of soldiers!"

You snort. "So we should just let ourselves be slaughtered? To keep lining the pockets of the same nobles who decided to use us like this in the first place? Blame them if this diplomatic incident happens, not us!"

The two of you lock eyes. The knight is blazing with determination, a determination which you return in equal measure. Yet... you can also see conflict within her. The knowledge that something unjust is happening, and that there's nothing she can do about it. It's obviously weighing on her, though she's too rigid to really imagine what any alternatives might be.

Still, to be fair to her, she is assisting Lady Edith in this hare-brained scheme. You can't imagine Lord Edrach will be at all pleased with her when he learns about that. At the very least, this knight does seem willing to put her own future on the line as well. For her country? For her mistress? Or both? It's hard to say.

Either way—as interesting as it is to play the role of Ragath—you do still need to decide how you want to influence these two in this conversation. With your charisma, you're confident that you can affect their view of the situation. And the attitude you decide to foster may become useful later, depending on your overall plans together for everyone involved.

Of course, even for you just one single conversation probably won't be enough to completely ensure that they jump to enact any particular approach immediately. But it will influence their own thoughts, fears and suggestions in future negotiations. Perhaps creating future openings or opportunities that you can exploit into something more.