Quoted By:
<span class="mu-s"><span class="mu-b">Winner</span>: Bully Damien
<span class="mu-r">13 + 21 = 34 Intimidate vs DC 30. Success!</span>
<span class="mu-g">You will have none of this</span>.
Yes, you will have <span class="mu-i">none</span> of their perfidious schemes, their verbal sleight of hand, their making like showmen from a Wildflower caravan, putting on a grand flourish while the urchins cut your purse! Not from the Earl of Lavendel and <span class="mu-i">certainly</span> not from Sir Damien. <span class="mu-g">Your patience has worn thin as the last scraps from the butter dish spread across your morning toast</span>. Their schemes nearly saw Joana, Eloise, Alexa, Hertha - over half your maid staff, all dear friends - raped and made into seedbeds for a greater demon. To say <span class="mu-i">nothing</span> of what might have happened to young Lothar had he gotten caught up in Rebecca's web whilst carrying out their plans.
Unfortunately, you cannot give the two of them the same sort of spanking you have planned for Rebecca. She is your responsibility as subject and servant, and by the badge upon your breast you have both authority and discretion to drag her kicking and screaming into whatever penance you see fit. But that is a matter of the Faith and the Church. Whatever grievances you have with the Earl and Sir Damien are a <span class="mu-i">secular</span> matter. In matters of King and Country you are Damien's peer and several steps below the Earl.
Besides which, Damien strikes you as the sort of man who would <span class="mu-i">enjoy</span> a woman of your size paddling his bottom. Makes the whole deal less than the punishment you would intend.
The one good thing about schemers is that they tend to think more straightforward wyfs and weirs cannot scheme themselves, an overconfidence that will bring their downfall. From his expression, the Earl at least sees that resigned smile on your face has to be hiding something, but that matters not. It's Damien you need to trick. "All that for a scenic route? My lord, you could have just told me, and we would have planned for that from the beginning. No need to have young Lothar go around flashing gold coin on your behalf to buy up enough supplies for the road."
Damien looks quite smug when the Earl looks at you aghast, asking if, "You noticed that?"
"I told you she would, Theo," Damien says. The grin on his face resembles a cat with a fish in its mouth.
"It was the talk of the town, my lord," your words only make the Earl turn a whiter shade of pale. You can't see your own reflection, but your expression must match Damien's cattish grin. "This isn't Stamen, you know. When the local urchin suddenly starts buying up a caravan's worth of goods, flashing gold coins, it's only a matter of time before everyone hears about it. There's only a handful of people who even see gold coins regularly, and certainly no one wealthy enough to toss them into a urchin's begging bowl or what have you."</span>
