Quoted By:
<span class="mu-s"><span class="mu-b">Winner:</span></span> Joana and Pimped Out Armorsilks.
Your business with young Lothar complete, you return to Castle Liliendorf to make your preparations. The sun is well on its way towards to the horizon for the evening, leaving you with precious little time to get ahead of whatever chicanery Damien and the Earl have hatched these past three days. May the LORD give you the patience to deal with whatever it may be.
The first thought that crosses your mind would be to go to Olanna and confiscate all of the goods.
The second thought that chases after it is the suspicion that they want you to do just that.
If those men want to act like scheming, shady courtiers pulling underhanded tricks to curry favor in the King's court, then you must needs demonstrate the appropriate means to deal with such chicanery. No, Olanna can act subtly, but sending her and the men-at-arms would be like using a sledgehammer to engrave a name on fine porcelain. The Duke taught you better than that. When a job must be loud, you give it to someone who can be loud; and when a job must be quiet, you give it to someone overlooked by all.
Which is why you approach your most trusted hand-maid. A woman getting on to her forties, who rules imperiously over the laundries of camp and castle alike, but otherwise falls beneath most people's notice. A former servant of the Duke of Somnenblume who retired to Liliendorf with a slight limp, to live out the rest of her days in peace. A maid who gets a little restless from time to time, and enjoys the opportunity to stretch her legs, even the bad one.
"Hello Joana," you greet the queen of the laundry. "How's your leg doing?"
"Well, I won't be doing cartwheels anytime soon, but it won't be giving out on me just yet," she says. There's a glimmer in her eye when she catches the serious look on your face. Her lips crinkle into a wolfish smile. "There some challenging work to be had, milady? Hilde built this lovely brace for my knee, and I've been dying to get the chance to really stretch my legs..."
"There's a warehouse down by the wharf where Damien and Earl have been squirreling away supplies that they purchased very <span class="mu-i">loudly</span>," you tell Joana. She nods for you to continue. "I'm not interested in what they bought, I've heard enough to know that it's supplies for an expedition to the Road Beneath. What I do want to know is the identity of everyone keeping an eye on those supplies, and if anyone decides to tamper with them. Can you and your students get me that information?"
Joana simply curtsies. "It will be done, milady."
===
With Joana taking one of her students out for "a walk", you can rest assured that whatever secrets Damien and the Earl have been hiding, they will be uncovered. Whether the supplies are bait for a spy, a test of your awareness of the goings-on in Liliendorf, or if it's exactly what it seems - an attempt to switch plans to the Road Beneath - you will know it by tomorrow morning.
