"I say leave well enough alone," Anders offers his opinion.

"Not that I followed what you said. I like the idea that as long as a person is remembered, his Fate lines linger on after he's dead."

"But aren't we talking about an individual here? It's not like an entire army or city of people has a single Fate strand, right? Because no one left alive... not for centuries... remembers any of the Syrne. We're pretty sure they were people, but beyond that is a mystery."

"So, if a pearl was interwoven with a particular Syrne--somewhat like Prad here was linked to the Black Pearl--and both Syrne and pearl left the world in whatever manner, would there still be a Fate strand left for either of them?"

"No. Never mind. I'm already starting to get a headache."

"It's staring to sound like we are damned if we do and damned if we don't, so, either way, we need to make a decision. We can't just stand here all day and chatter about it."

"Shall we continue to explore this place while the Black Pearl recharges itself?"

"I think so, Anders. We should fully explore this place. At the very least to satisfy our curiosities. It seems unlikely that we will ever return here, at least voluntarily."

"I wouldn't be so sure." Fiora looks back at the pearl, staring into the writhing fate around it.  "The Pearl doesn't seem like something that will be content to remain here forever.  We haven't seen the last of it."  Blinking a few times, she turns back "But yes, we should finish exploring."

Having entered the cathedral by way of what was presumably the front door, the group was immediately confronted with a pair of broad curved stairways that terminated together in the middle of the second floor balcony.

From there, you'd gone through the doors and down the hallway to the balcony at the other end. That balcony overlooked an enclosed amphitheater with the 'stage' immediately below you and the curved bench seating along the outer curved wall of the back of the cathedral.

Both ends of the balcony led to a tower that housed the spiral stairs, which led down to the ground floor and appeared to lead further down to a basement. The towers are square and the steps of the spiral staircase extend all the way out to the walls.

You vaguely recall there might have been stairs going down up at the front that were on the outer side of those curved stairs. Plus, there was a set of double doors straight ahead under the balcony.

The alcove that holds the Black Pearl is on the landing of the tower stairs at ground level, inset into the wall towards the back of the cathedral. Considering the symmetry of the building, there could conceivably be a similar alcove in the other tower.

Now that you are on the ground level, you can see that there is no 'stage'... that is, there is no raised area that the people in the seats could observe. Instead, the entire wall opens out into the ground floor of the cathedral which is one large open room. There are dozens of pedestals scattered throughout this room, most of which have some odd looking object on them. There are a few other things in the room that aren't immediately identifiable.

So, you have several options for continuing to explore.

1. You can go outer into the seating area to see if there's some significance to it.

2. You can cross the gallery to the other tower and see if there's another alcove there.

3. You can proceed into the gallery and investigate the pedestals.

4. You can go down the tower stairs to the basement and see what's down there.

OOC: Thanks for recap, GM! I was getting a bit lost and confused after all this time.


Up till now, there had only been one course of action to follow... well, mostly. Valentino couldn't remember if Prad had chosen to go up the stairs or if they'd led him there. It did seem like a long way around to get to the alcove.

"If we can't decide on what to do with this pearl, I don't see much point in checking out the other tower to see if there's a similar alcove there," Valentino comments as he glances around considering there options. "So what if there is another pearl... or several... there? Do we each want one of our own?"

"I'm thinking we should investigate the basement first."

"Two questions come to mind, however. The first is... is the Black Pearl really a pearl or is it just a construct that was made to look like a pearl? And is there a significance to the answer either way?"

"Second question is directed at Fiora: Since Alessandra grabbed the Black Pearl, has that action affected her Fate strands? You may have already mentioned this but does this cathedral have any Fate strands unto itself? Have ours intertwined with its in any way if it has?"

While they discuss what to do next, Vasily goes to the nearest pedestal with an object upon it and looks at it closely while speaking, to see if he can determine what it is, hopefully without touching it.

"We chose to go up the stairs; by the time we had come here, Prad had become completely passive. It's only when we got within sight of the alcove that he once again became compelled to action. Unfortunately, it appears that his mind is still shattered from his contact with the pearl.

I doubt that the pearl is an actual pearl. If it were, it would have surely been destroyed by now, as pearls are not singularly robust.

I do agree, however, that the basement seems like a reasonable place to go next."

The pedestals are all black, though some are square, some are round, and some are hexagonal. The nearest pedestal--a square one--has a cube sitting on it that's standing on one corner.

He can now see that one of the items he couldn't identify before is a pair of tusks, one inverted to the other and both lashed together with some type natural fiber rope. They are 6 feet long, standing up on the floor, not on a pedestal.

"Well... that's interesting. How did they manage to get this cube to do this... and what do you suppose those tusks belong to? Are they from an elephant? And what would they be doing here?" Having seen two strange things already, Vasily proceeds to look more closely at more of the pedestals. "Could this be some sort of naturalist museum?"

Fiora spends a while examining Alessandra's fate, fingers plucking at the air to test the tension on the lines she can see, searching out whatever changes she might be able to find.  She hadn't examined Alessandra's fate all that closely before, and when the woman grabbed the pearl she was more focused on pulling her away if things went obviously wrong, so she wasn't watching for something subtle.  But her eyes are keen and she knows her craft.

Although they'd just agreed to investigate where the stairs down led, Vasily walked off into the big room.

Well, they weren't under any time pressure--that he knew of--so he followed along, leaving Anders to continue wrangling Prad.

Approaching the pedestal with the cube standing on one corner, he heard Vasily's comment... apparently to himself.

"Maybe there's something holding it up like that? Obviously, something invisible," he answered. "I've not seen any elephants in person, so I can't say if those are the right size. Maybe one of the extinct woolly mammoths?"

Alessandra decides to head over to the other side, just to see what is there.

"It could be, I suppose. If so, then that would seem to be even more suggestive of some sort of collection of elements of the natural world. That sort of implies that whoever put them here expected at least some people to visit and examine them, especially since they are erected as a sort of display."

Not wanting anyone to wander off on their own, Anders decides to follow Alessandra, dragging a nearly-zombie Prad along with him.

He figured Fiora was close enough to Vasily and Valentino to not be 'alone', and she'd probably follow them anyway.

"I don't think you should go wandering off on your own like that," he says when he catches up to Alessandra. "Or is something pulling you over here because you held the Black Pearl in your hand?"

He keeps watch on the area ahead, unsure of what might be there.

"We're interpreting this from our cultural point of view," Valentino responds to Vasily. "While it may well be that the Syrne think just like we do, we don't have a point of reference to make that statement. Their thinking could be so foreign as to be incomprehensible to us."

"On the other hand, without any other input, it's just as reasonable to treat it like what we think it is."

"However, that doesn't mean there might not be a consequence for touching or removing these things."

He glances back at the others for a moment and only sees Fiora... but then he glimpses Alessandra, Anders and Prad apparently heading for the other side to see if there's a second alcove. His glance back, however, takes in the amphitheater seating... and a new thought pops into his head.

"I think this might have been some sort of academy," he suggests. "For what I can't say, but it looks like these items might have been used to demonstrate or teach something to whoever sat in those seats."

"Ah, yes, I think that seems likely to be a reasonable read of this situation. Perhaps we should go have a seat, as if we were the students being taught? There may be something interesting or unique when viewed from that angle or soemthing?" Vasily gestures towards the seating and starts heading that way.

In reply to Anders Mendelsson (msg # 673):

Alessandra shrugs."I do not feel any pull. I simply wish to see what is over there."

Upon reaching the other side, Alessandra, Anders and Prad (who seems to be getting a bit more alert) find another niche in the same location as the other side. There are the same little indentations that could hold a pearl, but they are all empty.

A search of the area does not reveal any hiding places, secret compartments or secret doors.

The number of indentations is both puzzling and a bit frightening if each of them could recharge a different pearl.

In reply to Dread Pirate Robert (msg # 677):

"I wonder what each pearl did." Alessandra wonders out loud.

Vasily, Valentino, and Fiora moved over to the amphitheater's lowest tier of seats, sat down and waited. Nothing happened, and after waiting for several minutes, it did not seem as if anything would.

"Perhaps it's just a stage?  The Syrneth may have had plays as we do, but without living actors a stage is just a stage."  Fiora speculates.  "Maybe they have some manuscripts in the back, if we could even recognize them for what they are."

[OOC: Still waiting for a GM response to examining Alessandra's fate in post 669 above.  I guess you just missed it.]

"That's an interesting thought, Alessandra," Anders said. "I guess I was thinking that they all did the same thing. That seemed like a reasonable assumption since we don't really know what the one we have does, and tales have claimed a lot of different things about it."

"But if each one had a different purpose, it could have a different power to make that happen."

"I keep thinking how mind-boggling more than one would be, but when you put it your way, maybe to the Syrne, the pearls were no different than, say, a blade weapon is to us--just a tool, with different designs for different purposes."

Fiora definitely detects a tenuous strand that now connects Alessandra to the Black Pearl. It's faint... more like there's potential there that has yet to be realized. It's possible that she 'stole' Prad's strand by grabbing the pearl.

Fiora also realizes that the strand seems to be getting stronger as the Black Pearl recharges, though it's not really very much.

"I was just thinking something similar," Valentino responds to Fiora.

"Nothing's going to happen because there's no longer anyone here to perform... or, more likely, demonstrate. If this was something like a classroom, an instructor would bring one of the items forward and explain it to the class or demonstrate its proper use."

Over on the side, Prad starts glancing around with a confused look on his face.

"Where am I?" he asks. "Who are you?"

He clearly directs this last question to Anders... and maybe Alessandra. Being a sailor, he's not used to asking questions of women or getting an answer.
This message was last edited by the player at 17:39, Mon 13 June 2022.

"Well, perhaps. Should we try to imitate that? Could you try to explain one of these displays while I sit here and listen? I would imagine if there are any special properties of this location, it should become obvious relatively quickly, right?"