T - Harps, Lucca

[Harpsdesire]

Joel chomped into an apple a little too aggressively, doing his best to block out Zacharias’s condescension. Stupid freakin’ wolf… He was just too much of a jerk not to be up to something. His sudden desire to be around Faust seemed to confirm this, and Joel’s eyes narrowed slightly for a second as he regarded the injured half-Villa.

That guy was suspicious too, but he had gotten hurt fighting on their side, and Joel felt a thin wisp of protective feelings at the idea of leaving him alone with Zacharias. But since Faust seemed willing, who was he to demand otherwise? The bird would be a liability in a fight, anyhow, confused as he was. Joel’s ears twitched, then panned towards Faust as the man passed. Was that… music? Some kind of strings, maybe. Huh… He had hoped that the cursed whispered that led him to the attic would be the end of phantom sounds, but perhaps not.

Dania couldn’t help but be a little comforted by the weight of Faust against her shoulder. She frowned a bit at his question, not sure what to answer. ”I don’t really know, not for sure, that he even is bad. He just has a smile that looks… dangerous.” She felt embarrassed to admit how much she really knew about the man. ”He’s a Calloo, I think, although I’ve never seen one in person before, only read about them. I expected them to have more white fur, so maybe he’s a mix with… Corvie? I don’t know.” She shrugged; frustrated by her inability to explain the creeping sensation the king’s gaze had given her. ”Something about how he showed up here, not even a Spade, acting like this was a great time for a social visit even though the whole place is deserted just felt wrong. Out of place, or something. He… He was nice to me, but in a way that felt wrong.” Dania blushed a little. She might as well have just declared ‘He looked at me funny!’ for all the evidence she had against the man. He did look at her kind of funny, too…

”That’s perfect, stay right there… I’m going to get Colin.” She murmured, reassuring, as she helped him to a small velvet-covered chair which sat against the wall. It was the decorative sort, covered in a deep green fabric and better sized for a human than a tall biped, but it would hold his weight. The man was rather on the slim side, anyway.

At his hesitant question, she paused, making eye contact with him. It was something she tended to shy away from, gazing at the floor or just to the side of someone’s eyes, too bashful to meet another’s gaze. ”I will come back.” She assured him, smiling faintly, vaguely nervous about seeing the other Faust.

As she entered the hall, she was half relieved to discover that Zacharias was retiring for the night, and half dismayed at the thought of leaving him to wander the palace unsupervised. Thoughts of him springing out at her from dark corners intruded on her mind. She tried to dismiss them. Ridiculous.

Still, it wouldn’t hurt to make sure she stayed near the others and didn’t wander off alone. She bobbed her head respectfully to the wolf, trying to put the unpleasant thoughts away. It was awkward to see the Faust-like card when she knew the real thing was just out of sight, and seeing Zacharias was no more comforting. ”Good evening to you both. I hope you rest well.” She took her leave as quickly as was polite and retreated back to where Faust waited, the real Faust, with an expression of pain on his face. Poor thing, she regretted getting him out of bed, but leaving him up there alone seemed just as bad…

”Colin..” She started, once they were alone, ”Whoever is in there… isn’t Faust. This is.” Hopefully The Queen would have the presence of mind not to make a fuss and draw attention. ”There’s something else, too.”

Drawing close to the cardinal, she whispered into his ear as succinctly as possible what she had seen in Faust’s mind. It wouldn’t do to freak Faust out if she didn’t have to, and the last thing she wanted was to let the king and imposter know what was going on. This time she was able to speak of the matter without breaking down, although her face bore an unmistakable pain.

[Lucca]

The look in Dania's eyes was far from reassuring, and Colin's polite smile faded a little as they moved out of sight of the two guests, who he could hear walking up the stairs behind him. But he kept his look interested and calm as Dania spoke, though his purple eyes narrowed a bit. "What is it?" At first, the words she spoke made no sense, like they were in another language. He blinked. "What are you talking about? Who else would it b--" At that moment the Queen glanced behind Dania, finally, and saw...Faust.

Colin just barely refrained from letting out a loud noise of alarm, covering his beak with his wings and, though his expression remained mostly the same, he paled beneath his feathers. Suddenly, it all made sense...how strange Faust had been acting, how he hadn't seemed as happy to see Dania, why the stitching had looked to old...and why Zacharias had...

Colin stumbled a bit and had to lean on the wall as Dania went on, losing his composure by pieces. When did he ever think he could handle this problem on his own? This was far too big for him. He felt like he needed to solve this puzzle quickly--but this time he was going to ask for help. Gathering his composure, he nodded to Dania, standing tall and forcing his feathers to lie flat. "I see. Then I believe the situation is yet more dire than we before suspected." Used as he was to reading the expressions of other Cards, the look of pain on Dania's face did not go unnoticed. But there were more important things at stake here. He turned to Faust. "I am glad to see you all right, Sir." Then he turned to Dania, frowning slightly. "I need...I need to think."

And think fast.

[Harpsdesire]

Joel watched Zacharias and Faust go, bidding them a relieved goodnight. He couldn't say he was sorry to be rid of Faust's awkwardness or Zacharias' condescension. On the other hand now the pair could be getting up to just about anything on the upper floors... it made his skin prickle to think about it.

Once they were well and truly up the stairs, he trotted out to see what Dania had to say. She had asked for a private word with Colin, but he was curious! He'd just get to almost-hearing range and then see if they beckoned him over. When he rounded the corner, the sight of another Faust made the fur on his tail bush out almost comically with shock. "Woah!"

On one hand, this explained a few things, on the other, it raised an enormous number of questions. "Um....?" Joel made a sputtering sort of sound, anxious and distressed. He rushed over to stand protectively beside Dania, completely forgetting that she had asked to speak to Colin privately.

Luckily, by the time the boy intruded, she had finished what she had to say, and Colin seemed to be recovering. Dania bumped her shoulder into Joel's shyly, giving him a smile that was tainted by her discomfort at the whole situation. They needed a plan, and she couldn't think of anything except how lovely it would be to feel safe again. It seemed the Cardinal felt the same way. He looked a bit pale under his lavender feathers, and she smiled at him, a little more gently and reassuringly than one usually would smile at The Queen of the court, but these were unusual times.

"Alright, Joel?"
"Yep." He didn't sound entirely convincing. "Faust shouldn't be out of bed so soon." The man didn't look great, either. Joel struggled a moment to overcome his discomfort at seeing a second copy of the canine/corvid, then went over to start examining him gently to see how he was healing. He seemed to be feeling considerably worse than his double had, which was too bad, but still struck Joel as a good indication that this was the 'real' Faust. The other one, who ate so much... he wasn't acting at all like a guy with a recent serious injury.

So what was he?

[Nathalia]

((Faust met Dania's eyes and nodded...unable to explain why he'd felt the need to...what?
Make sure she'd come back?
Why wouldn't she?
His mind reeled and he gingerly touched the swollen, bloody mess at the back of his head.
Briefly...he wondered if he would ever really remember anything again.

He gave Colin a relived look when the Queen rounded the corner.
Odd stares and all.
An involuntary shudder passed through his sine as he tried not to jump when Joel seemed to appear in their midst.
Not that he could begrudge the Corvie a cry of surprise; he only narrowly avoided one himself by clamping his beak shut.

Once his heart rate had returned to any semblance of normal, he let go, shakily; one hand brushing Dania's coat lightly.
He wasn't sure why...but it was a reassurance.
At Colin's words, his ears twitched.
"I'm no 'sir'..." He whispered to himself, trying to order his thoughts.
Dania had just told Colin about the thing he'd seen, the thing Dania had recalled from his mind.
If it was in the Palace...
He shivered again, willing himself not to make noise and simply twitched.

He looked to Joel.
"I...I suppose not...but, this is important? Right? I want to help... What-"
He gazed around at their little group. "What can we do?"

-------------------------------------------

On the stairs, Zacharias paused.
One of his ears flicked back at the sound of a loud "woah!" behind them.
"No, go to your room." He muttered, tone steely as the Other Faust made a movement as though to head back down the stairs and see what had happened. "You've done enough. Go to your room, now, will you?"
The Other Faust seemed to wilt, expression falling as he tried not to sound too terribly upset.
"Yes...my room, um...ok, Zach."
"Don't look at me like that. Go and attend your home too, if you think it worthwhile. Are you feeling off?"
The Wolf's expression softened slightly, as they continued on upward and away, even his voice dropping the sarcasm.
"Um...a bit."
The Wolf patted the shoulder gently.
"Go to your room and go home."
"Ok...thanks, Zach."
"Any time."

The Other Faust skittered away quickly, running up the stairs to the grand hallway near the front of the building with all of the lovely windows.
Zacharias shook his head and turned down the corridors Colin had directed him to.
A bath, actually, sounded quite nice.))



~Nathalia

[Lucca]

Colin mostly ignored Joel, because he was deep in thought. There were so many things he could look into, and he needed to sort out which were more important and which had more to do with the state of the palace. That was his primary responsibility, after all...his Court. And now that the mania had worn off, he actually was a bit worried about what it was that might have happened to Donnie. But at the moment, the one thing he could be sure about was that Donnie was not here. Presumably she was in the Lakes, but with so many odd things going on, could he be sure she'd made it there?

All right. The three things that, as he saw it, they could explore. There was, of course, the Other Faust, who obviously wasn't the real one. And looking at the whole conversation in that light, it suddenly made things very worrying. Especially as, looking back on it, Zacharias's behavior towards him was very strange, as was the way Faust...er, Not-Faust, rather, kept staring at his wings. Which meant that it would be good to have a way to be sure that they had both made it to their rooms and weren't causing further trouble of any sort. Arpeggio stirred restlessly on his shoulder, and Colin brushed against the Tove with a wing to calm him. No, there was no way he was sending his Tove out alone, especially not with the way Zack had been speaking about wishing he had a familiar.

And it would look very suspicious if Colin himself went to check on the man he had just sent off to bed. So, as much as he hated the idea, he might have to trust the Wolf was, indeed, bathing. Next, there was the library, and the clue he could only half remember and...actually. He turned to look at Dania and Joel, eyes brightening in awareness. "Dania, Joel, do either of you remember what was in that book in the library?" He realized the absurdity of this question a beat later. "I mean, the one the wind blew open on the table. With the picture of the Selkie Mayor. I feel like it may indeed have been a clue."

The third avenue, and the one that Colin was quickly thinking was what they should do, was to see what was in the basement. After all, if the horrifying being Dania had mentioned earlier was nearby at all...well. It seemed as likely as anything else. And since his hunch about Zacharias had been right, he never doubted for an instant that there would be someone or something there.

[Harpsdesire]

Dania turned to Faust and smiled comfortingly as his fingers brushed over her fur. He looked terribly scared, rather like she felt, although she at least had the advantage of being able to think clearly. It was hard to imagine what Faust must be going through. She turned her head to touch his wrist very gently touch with her nose. ”It’s okay, Faust…” She murmured. It was probably an empty reassurance, but it worried her how his fingers shook as he touched her coat.

Joel looked into each of Faust’s eyes, inspected the bandages around his torso, and put his ear to the man’s chest to listen to heart and breathing. He was doing alright, for someone who had been through what he had. Pulse was good; pupils responded normally, bleeding was minimal. The Corvie made an approving sound. It seemed like what he had done was helpful, but Faust was far from healthy, still.

He almost snorted when Colin mentioned the book in the library. As he remembered it, Colin was quite dismissive of Joel’s ‘clue’ when he had originally mentioned it. Now he thought it was important? His deer-like ears flicked back, then forward. The boy was more amused than offended, but in light of the situation he wasn’t in the mood to give Colin any reason to be upset. It just wasn’t the moment for goofing off, even a kid could see that. ”There was a picture of him, a Feline biped, I think. With… Antlers?” A lot had happened since then.

Dania couldn’t remember much more than Joel, although she added, ”It said something about him enriching the realm… he discovered something-- gold? Maybe it was oil.” She gave Colin a confused look. Was it important that she remember? The Queen seemed serious about it, at any rate, and that made it important enough. She wrinkled her nose in concentration as she tried to bring forth more details. ”Oil. ” She suddenly remembered that it was oil that took Queen Donnie to the Lakes just before all this started. And now Donnie was presumably dead. It seemed like it had to be connected, but she couldn't imagine what the connection was. "Do you have any idea what that has to do with what's happening here?" She asked Colin, but the question encompassed the other two males as well. Joel shrugged in response. ”Not really.”

(( This is the clue, but I had to read back to get the details so I’m assuming my cards couldn’t remember them either.:
The pages stopped on an open description of the current Selkie Mayor. A thick-bodied Maine Coon Feline with some sort of antlered heritage, he is quite a stately Biped and looks wealthy enough. A description of him speaks of his wealth he's discovered for the Lakes, and his quest for oil to transport.
It also speaks of his childhood friend; a Benyan man named Toolock who hasn't been seen in years; apparently, they found their first oil well together.))

[Lucca]

Colin nodded, an expression of deep concentration on his face. Antlers...right...it was vaguely coming back to him, but since, at the time, he hadn't seen what it had to do with his palace...well. Technically, it still might not have anything to do with it. It could be completely unrelated to everything. He just had no way whatsoever of knowing. That was the most frustrating part of all this, really.

"Oil..." he repeated, eyes narrowing even further. He could tell by the way his Tove was shifting restlessly that the familiar could sense his tension. Finally, Colin let out a frustrated sigh and shook his head, rubbing at it with a wing. "No. No, it doesn't. I just can't make any sense of this. We need to go to the basement. And be more careful, this time." He looked around at the faces of the group, beak set in a determined line. They needed a bit more a plan this time, so that this excursion didn't turn out as badly as the last one, what with the creepy corpses and...come to think of it.

"Dania...what happened to that Feline Queen?" he asked, afraid of the answer. Why did this job suddenly just feel like too much?

[Nathalia]

((Faust curled his fingers on Dania's shoulder, trying to stop the tremors running through his body as Joel checked him over.
The quick-run for diagnosis made him uncomfortable, for all that he knew he needed the help. There had been too many people touching him lately...most of them in a painful fashion.
Dania was the exception...it was...comforting, when it was her.
He flushed lightly and coughed as Joel backed off.
"Thanks, Joel...I-" His sentence trailed off as he rubbed the back of his blood encrusted head and fumbled in his pocket.
"I forgot...I found this. When, I think...when I was upstairs. It's been in my shirt, it was stuck to the...the blood."

He handed it to the Corvie.
A small slip of paper, stained with old blood and torn at the corner, reads:
Do as brother says, do as brother says, do as brother says, do as brother says. In continuous script that is increasingly sloppy and deranged looking.
Over it, has also been written.
Go home when you feel bad. Don't take the tools, they make the girls unhappy. Take the te- The fragment cannot be finished because of the torn edge.

Faust looks uncomfortable.
"Sorry, Dania...you told me about...what was down here and I forgot, but I only found it when...I woke up?"
His head jerks up at Colin's question to the Rat, eyes dilating.
"The...the dead one?"
He asks, voice dry.))



~Nathalia

[Harpsdesire]

Dania couldn't help but make a little whining sound of worry as she felt Faust's shivers and the way he curled his hand against her. It was like he wanted to hold on for dear life. She scooted over a little so that she was closer to his chair, allowing him to keep his hand on her shoulder, if he wished, without extending his arm as far.

Joel stepped back when he was finished with the cursory examination. He tried to be gentle, but medicine wasn't his primary interest, and while he avoided causing pain quite meticulously, his bedside manner was somewhat businesslike. His internship with Dr. Price had hardly focused on the trivialities of making the patient feel comfortable with the physician.

"Um." Joel read the slip of paper a few times over, but the meaning of the words didn't seem to become any more obvious with repeated viewing. He moved so Dania could see the bloodied scrap as well. "Do any of these words mean anything to you?" He asked Faust, puzzled expression on his face. "Dania, Your Majesty, have you heard the phrase 'Do as brother says' before?"

"Faust doesn't have a brother!" Dania answered, perhaps just a little too loud. The words were unsettling, and everything about the note was off and creepy. It was exactly the sort of thing that would be found in a crime novel, stuffed in the pocket of the victim of a brutal serial killer. Maybe the monster that attacked Faust had written it, planted it in his pocket... or... she shuddered suddenly. "Faust... is that your handwriting?" There was something almost like fear in her gentle tones. It looked like the writings of a madman, but there was always the chance the Faust had known he would lose his memory, and it had been meant as a warning... or it could all be a stunningly creepy coincidence.

The queen... She had almost forgotten about that. "When you and Joel went downstairs, she followed. If you didn't see her she must have gone a different way after I lost sight of her down the hall." She shrugged. She didn't feel particularly threatened by the mummified feline, compared to other things that she knew or suspected to be around. The lonely undead sorgaire was positively cuddly compared to that... thing that she had seen in Faust's mind.

She shifted uncomfortably on her feet and looked down at the note in Joel's paw once again. "Go home when you feel bad..." She murmured, eyes distant. Oh, how much she wanted to go home. She could take Faust, Joel and Colin, too. Her mother would tuck Faust into clean sheets under a patchwork quilt and feed Joel until he couldn't move while her father tried to hide his awe at meeting The Queen of Spades.

[Lucca]

Colin frowned when Faust produced a note, and tilted his head so he could get a look at it, too. "You found it...in the room where you were staying? Or do you think you had it all along and just didn't see it?" he asked as his light blue eyes skimmed the writing. Well that...was ominous. He had to suppress a shiver. He shook his head to Joel, a frown turning the edges of his beak. He turned the words over and over in his mind, but...for such a simple phrase, he couldn't make heads or tails of it. Only that the way it was written, over and over, like a mantra, bothered him.

"Someone wanted to remember it, that's for sure," he muttered, and then nodded to Faust, his expression wry. "Yes, the dead one. And it...hmm." Downstairs? Then it couldn't have gone back to the attic, its prior resting place...so where was it? He concentrated, seeing if he could get that knowledge back about where in his Court there were other beings. To his delight and surprise, he still knew instinctively. Someone was in the bathroom...several someones in the basement...and...that was it. So the Queen, assuming that he could even get a lock on the dead with this, had to be in the basement as the bathroom was surely Zack.

Something else felt like it should be bugging him about that information but he wasn't sure what. "I think she must have gone to the basement as well..." he began, and half wondered if she, too, wanted to push out intruders to the Court...almost like some undead guard dog. It was a surprisingly amusing image, but he quashed it. They still needed to see what was up down there.

"We're not leaving the Court until this is solved," he said to Dania at her outburst, a bit more harshly than he intended, and took several deep breaths to calm himself down. "Sorry. I think we should go to the basement and..." It abruptly struck Colin what was strange about the placement of Cards in the Court. "...I think Faust's double is no longer with us." A prickly of fear made the feathers on the back of his neck and crest stand up, and Colin whirled around, suddenly, as if expecting to see the creepy man behind him.