From within the suite's bathroom, Redmane says, "This could be our last chance to enjoy a bath for awhile, so we'd better make the most of it!" The sounds of running water follow almost immediately after the statement. The sun is causing the curtains to glow, but the morning is quiet - perhaps the festival doesn't really get started until after breakfast.
Still one of habit, Thomas heads to the window and eases back the curtains to watch the sunrise and see who, if any, are up and about in town. "You make it sound like its a crime to be dirty!" he calls back, "Or is this just an excuse to share the tub again?"
The square is visible beyond the balcony, and plenty of booths are set up, but the people that are out are clustered into close knots - practically huddled together - and discussing something.
Redmane pokes her head through the bathroom door, and asks, "What, you don't want me sitting in your lap?"
"Hm, unusual activity for a day after a faire," Thomas muses as he eyes the gathered groups, trying to get a look at their dress and demeanor ... to make a guess at if it is a good, or bad, discussion. "Only if you don't mind where my hands go!" he calls back to Redmane moment later.
"I don't mind at all, so long as they're soapy!" the girl claims, and vanishes back into the bathroom. From the way the people outside cast an occasional furtive glance towards anyone who is walking alone, it would be reasonable to assume that people are not feeling festive - but downright suspicious.
"We may not have time for a long bath, there's something odd going on," Thomas calls back. "And you know me, I can never let anything pass me by. So ... you get one more hour of relaxing, then we'd best get back to being the 'heroes' Mirari expects of us and go stick our noses where they don't belong." So ... he lets the curtain fall back closed and heads towards the bathroom. "No rest for the weary! Funny, I don't feel weary and I don't get any rest either..."
Inside the bathroom, Redmane is leaning across the tub to turn off the water. It doesn't look like any of the scented oils or other bathing supplies have been added to it though - just hot water. "Are we going to be sneaky-nosy, or openly nosy?" she asks.
"Depends on how they react to us. I could always use a little glamour to try and get close to eavesdrop," Thomas points out as he leans over a bit to get a look. "Huh, now there is an interesting pose for you..." he says impishly.
Redmane turns her head to look over her shoulder, and wiggles her eyebrows in response. "Well, best not waste any time then," she notes. "Get in. Time to make some soup."
Thomas, always one to up a challenge, disrobes as he saunters up to the tub. As he passes Redmane, his fingertips lightly brush and trace along her back, from her rear to her neck. "I prefer carrots in my soup," he jokes as he steps over the tub rim and slides down into the water.
The girl responds to the touch by arching her back like a cat. "Carrots? Is that a redhead crack?" she then demands, before getting into the tub to sit facing Thomas - in his lap.
"At least I know you're a true redhead," Thomas quips back as he drapes his arms over Redmane's shoulders. Of course all he then does is pick up some soap and lather his hands.
Grabbing the other bar of soap, Redmane works up a lather as well, which she applies to Tom's back. "So, you didn't sleep well?" she asks.
"No, I slept fine. Why do you ask?" Thomas asks as he massages the soap into Redmane's back. "Last night was odd, though. It felt so familiar."
"You said you didn't get any rest," Redmane notes. "And.. yeah, it made me dream of old times." She rubs her cheek against Thomas' then - an old sign of affection from their previous incarnations.
"Oh, well, sleeping is not the same as resting. Even asleep my mind is active," Thomas claims, right before the momentary twitch at the contact against his cheek. "Well, you seem more comfortable now," he notes playfully. "I just hope neither of us make the same mistakes as before."
"What mistakes would those be?" the girl asks, and then pulls back to say, "If we're going to be nosy, we should probably wash off the face paint."
Thomas reaches up to actually cup Redmane's chin lightly with his hand. "For me ... running. And dwelling too much on past mistakes," he answers and for a rare time, offers a genuine smile. The same hand then lets go of Red's chin and lightly rubs the soapy lather clinging to it over the golden face paint.
Redmane blushes, and washes behind Thomas' ears before starting to gently scrub the paint from his face. "That's good to know. We're in things together this time," she agrees.
"Quite so. Like this tub, for example," Thomas jokes as he gently works the applied scales loose.
"After this, it's back to damp rags rubbed under out clothes," Redmane says with a sigh. "But hopefully the weather will be more pleasant."
"Or a nice coat of fur, if we're offered time as wolves again," Thomas jokes, "And living off the land isn't that bad. We'll be fine. We could even ask people we pass for shelter, if you want."
"Oh? Are we going to following the roads instead of the forest then?" Redmane ask, using her thumb to wipe away the false cat nose from one side of Tom's face.
"Depends on which seems more interesting," Thomas notes, "Any ruins along the way we'll explore, though. Never one to pass up a mystery, after all!" He dips his hand into the tub water, then uses it to rinse off the soap and gold paint. "I've also been thinking about paying a visit on the way back to well, home. The valley."
"You haven't been back there since we returned?" Redmane asks in surprise, before she pulls Thomas' face down practically into her lap to rinse it off.
"Yeah ... red all over," Thomas is heard to mutter. "And no, I haven't. Been avoiding it. Who knows who or what may have taken up residence?"
Redmane seems lost in thought for a moment, as she works the makeup and wax extension from Thomas' ear. "You.. You and Lyne had a falling out, didn't you?" she asks, sounding uncertain.
"Yeah, we did. Mentioned that yesterday after the face painting," Thomas says with a nod. "It was an ugly fight. He hated that I made a deal to save his life that well, would probably cost others later," he adds with a slight shrug, "But what could I do? He was still my child, even if adopted. He didn't understand that to me ... he mattered more than anything."
After a few more rubs, Redmane says, "I think I got it all off of you now. Maybe he left you a note or something back at the valley, after you went missing."
"I visited him before I died," Thomas comments as he feels over the side of his face and behind his ear, "He didn't know it, but I did. I had to see him one more time. He had a family then; his children were ..." He then just grins and shrugs, adding, "Well, they'll never know that they got to hug their grandfather. Just some crazy old-man trader passing through."
"That was sneaky," Redmane points out, tapping Thomas' nose. "You never did that to me, did you?" she asks pointedly.
"Well .... now that would be telling," Thomas answers, "Do you really want to know?"
"Hmmm, probably not," Redmane admits, and rests her arms across Tom's shoulders. "Besides, I've got the real you now," she points out, and then kisses Thomas.
"Glormph!" goes Thomas, though he is quite thoroughly pinned in the tub. Not that he makes any real effort to escape, either. When the kiss finally ends, Thomas says, "Well, ahem, er, we should get going. I want to find out what is going on. I can't help it, I'm nosy."
"Mmmm-hmmmm," Redmane goes, pursing her lip. "Okay.. We need to get some breakfast anyway," she agrees. And then she dunks Thomas again!
This only makes Thomas pinch Redmane in a very sensitive area, then yank her under the water too! When he finally emerges, he's laughing. "You're incorrigible," he coughs, "I'm so proud!"
"Augh!" Redmane yelps as she flails a bit before settling down. "And you want to leave all this to go look for trouble!" she says, shaking her head and grinning. "Help me find the drain plug."
"That's not the drain plug," Thomas jokes, winks, then goes about his own search. This devolves into each trying to grab the other, then pretend that they just thought it was the plug for the next several minutes. Eventually, though, the tousling manages to dislodge the plug and the tub starts to drain.
Climbing out first, Redmane grabs up a towel, and then offers one to Thomas. "What do you think happened to make them call off the festival?" she asks him.
"If I had to guess? Someone stole something from a visiting noble or the like," Thomas offers as he takes the towel and then goes about drying himself off. He even shows remarkable restraint and doesn't try to pop Redmane with the towel. "Another possibility could be a fight broke out late night, or even something as simple as stuff went missing or damaged mysteriously. Without any more information, hard to say."
"So, put on our adventuring duds instead of our town clothes?" the girl asks as she dries her hair first.
"It might give away who we are, but probably. I suppose we are duty bound to get involved," Thomas says in a mock long-suffering way. His hair is still damp, but he uses this fact as a quick way to comb it back with his fingers and get it to stay. "If it is something serious, I also expect we'll run into the local ruling noble. Likely a Baron, given the town size and location."
"Think he might be a distant relative then?" Redmane asks, draping the towel across her shoulders as she leaves the bathroom.
Thomas cringes a bit. "Possibly. Unlikely that they would know, though. Not really important, either," Thomas adds as his towel is slung around his waist and he heads back into the main room. There his travel clothes remain neatly hung enar the fire, where he had left them to dry after washing them just before bed.
Redmane is already pulling her own clothes on, and has her sword-belt out as well. As she laces her boots, she says, "With our luck, it won't be anything simple."
"Of course not. That's the problem with being a legend," Thomas comments with a wry grin as he dresses, "The world now wants to give us legendary problems!"
"Right," Redmane notes, hanging her silver sword from its frog. "And we can't influence that anymore, right?"
"Not without access to the Rules," Thomas says with a nod as he straps on his own sword, then throws his pack over his shoulder. "So, we had better just live up to the stories about us. I have no worries, I'm perfect after all."
"Of course you are," Redmane says, patting Thomas' rear as she goes to collect her own pack. For now, her iron blade stays wrapped up.
"Exactly, I don't have to augment myself with iron," Thomas teases as he finally opens the door to their suite. "Come on, lets go either fix, or cause, chaos!"
The tavern area of the inn is packed, if oddly quiet. Many eyes track the pair as the come down the stairs, but turn away when noticed. Two tables are crowded with unhappy looking women, while the rest are filled with anxious men. Even the woman tending the counter looks nervous as she keeps wiping the same spot over and over again.
"I smell bacon," Redmane whispers to Thomas. "We could still get breakfast."
"I've been in happier tombs," Thomas whispers to Redmane as they come down the stairs and spot the wary crowds. "Good morning," he says cheerily to those gathered. "How is breakfast?"
The people seated look startled at the question, and then turn back to their low conversations. The woman at the counter snaps out of her daze, and says, "Come sit here, young people, afore you lose your appetites."
"Why would we lose that?" Thomas asks as he heads to the bar and sets his pack on it. He turns to look out at those gathered as he leans back against the bar.
Redmane sits down as well, and asks, "What's going on?"
"Most of the town children went missing last night," the innkeeper says with a lowered voice. "Bunch of the men went to the gypsies to see if.. well. To see. We're waiting on them now."
"The town children?" Thomas asks, his left brow arching slightly. "That seems .. peculiar. How could the children go missing from their homes without their parents being aware of them leaving?"
"'Tis a mystery, aye," the woman says, setting a pot of tea on the counter. "Looks like they got dressed, all quiet like, and just.. snuck out. Under a spell, they must have been."
The doors to the tavern open, and a group of men enter. It's obvious which are the townsfolk and which are the gypsies by the way they dress. They're all talking and gesturing at once, but it gets around fairly quickly that the gypsies are missing several children as well.
"And so the gypsies are being blamed? Under what ..." Thomas starts to ask, then stops. He then sighs, looks to Redmane, and does something rather Tomlike. He climbs up onto the bar. "All right, lets have a little order here, please. Who here can tell me exactly what has been discovered so far?" he calls out. Nevermind he doesn't even bother introducing himself...
Calls of "Who's that?" and "Is that the baron's son?" flit about, but everyone does eventually turn towards Thomas. "My Able is gone, barely old enough to wipe his own bottom!" cries one woman, and this seems to trigger a flood of others wailing about missing children. If anything is common, it's that the children were young, but not too young - all between six and ten by mortal reckoning, or one to two seasons in Mirari's old Year system.
"I count twenty names, Tom," Redmane comments.
So, Thomas sits down on the bartop and crosses his legs. He nods to Redmane then looks over the group. "When was the last time you saw your children?" he asks, "And what is the last thing you remember them doing? If they all attended the festival yesterday, what was the last game or games that they played?"
"I tucked her in for the night." "I blew out the candle." "She was watching the clowns." "There was a magic show that the clowns were doing." And so on. The common thread is the parents putting the little ones to sleep, and that some time during the day they'd been in contact with a clown or clowns.
Thomas steeples his fingers together and nods, an odd demeanor for one who looks fairly young. "Did they seem normal after the show they watched? Did any of them have an unusual smell to them that night?" he asks next. "And did any of you see the magic show? If so, describe it to me."
"I was busy with the booth.." "They were doing shadow puppets.." "I keep my boy scrubbed clean, and that's how he smelled!" "Fawna was happy and normal as can be!" "Funny though, I don't remember falling asleep myself last night, do you, father?" "Come to think of it.. I slept like I was drunk, but I hadn't touched a drop last night.."
"So, then we have a few points of interest. First, there are twenty children missing. Second, they all observed a show done by clowns with shadow puppets, and third, none of you remember falling asleep. That, to me, implies you did not fall asleep, but were spelled to sleep. It also explains why no one observed anything odd," Thomas says to those gathered. "For the people who put on shows and booths, did the down keep a registrar?""
"We.." one official-looking man starts to say, then pauses and turns to his compatriot at the table to whisper for a moment. Straightening back up, he says, "Only for scheduled events that need to be announced."
"The clowns came from the farm road," someone else pipes out, who looks decidedly farmer-ish. "I 'member them passing by my place in the early morning, capering and playing their music."
"So, you do not have a record of everyone performing entertainment. I suppose that would make it too easy," Thomas says as he pushes himself off the bartop and back to his feet. To the farmer who just spoke, he asks, "Can you describe their music?"
"Aye, it were.. ah.. pipes and.. violas.. and a drum!" the man says.
"The farm road leads towards the forest," Redmane whispers to Thomas.
"I don't suppose you could hum a few notes?" Thomas asks without much hope in his voice.
"Err.. notes?" the man asks. "We heard them playing at the festival," others chime in, but nobody can seem to actually describe the music they heard. "We heard it too, Thomas, but I couldn't tell you what it sounded like either," Redmane notes.
"Right, well I don't suppose you could pack myself and my companion a road-worthy breakfast?" Thomas asks, "Looks like our vacation is on hold for a bit."
"I've got it here, Thomas," Redmane notes, holding a sack she was just handed, and downing the last of a cup of tea.
"Right," Thomas says with a nod. He pulls out his road-worn beret and puts it on with a flourish of his wrist, then adds, "Your children will be back before three days pass. Before the sun sets this day, if at all possible. They cannot have much of a lead on us and with children, well, they cannot travel fast."
Several of the townsmen get up and make as if to follow along.
"Ah, this will be easier if it is left to Miurenn and myself," Thomas explains. "I will permit one other to travel with us, but only if they are experienced woodsfolk."
"Here now.." someone complains, and there is some grumbling.. but the townsmen all sit back down eventually. Apparently woodsmanship isn't a skill the townies have.
"Do not dwell on fears. This is to be a time of joy so focus on resuming the festival," Thomas says as he starts towards the door.
Redmane hurries after, before whatever spell Thomas worked on the crowd can break down and they start asking them questions.
As Thomas heads out the door, he glances back to Redmane and whispers, "If you act like you're in charge, people believe you are." He winks, grins, then heads onward. "Well, I have my theories now ... but I do not want to spend too much time on them in the absence of any real evidence. So ... to the forest! I believe a dance with the spirits of nature are in order, don't you?"
With a sigh, Redmane nods. "This is poking at something I remember, I just haven't quite pried it loose yet," she notes. "But I knew those clowns couldn't be trusted!"
"Well, as the old saying goes, 'Nothing is more terrifying than a clown after dark'," Thomas quips, "But ... we lave a long day of light to spare us from their horrors. The forest awaits!"