Murder in Denerim! (Mystery Mission)

[Elissa Vuronia]

A warm but gentle feeling appeared with her heart as Elissa stood before the open gates of Denerim. It had certainly been a few years since she last came to the great capital of Ferelden and home to the Monarchy; Elissa's father would often travel to Denerim to conduct some family business. But her best friend Amity was quite nervous and began to walked backwards; Elissa noticed this and immediately did her best to calm him. With a few heart-warming words he ceased his anxiety and was given a rather generous but gentle rewards as the teen rubbed his nose and kissed his check, she grabbed the reigns and slowly they marched into Denerim.

And as always the two friends were greeted by the noises of a busy market day. Shouts were called out to invite people to look towards them and their filled stalls, a sound of coins was also heard as people began to buy various items. Voices new and old moved across the area as people young and old talked to each other, yes it was just a typical ordinary day in Denerim market place. After all these years the city had not changed a bit, Amity stood feeling a little nervous once again but he did not waver as he marched right next to Elissa. The teenage noble woman felt calm and was so glad to be back in Ferelden again, still while she was indeed back it seemed to be a perfect time to buy some much needed supplies so that her journey to understand life itself can continue.

First she had to make sure her friend was safe and was well taken care of. So she and Amity walked northwards and headed towards the nearest inn, she soon came upon an inn called “The Gnawed Noble Tavern”. As a smile crept up on her face she guided Amity to the stables and made sure the inn’s stable boys did their best to look after Amity. Elissa also asked them to give him a good brushing and that he was well fed and watered, she soon stroked her friend and walked out of the stable and into the inn. Slowly she opened the door and walked in to see that the inn was filled with many people eating and drinking the inn’s fabled food.

Dressed in just her silver tunic, black trousers and soft boots while her sword rested on the weapons belt, which sat around the waist. The Innkeeper greeted her with a smile and in no time at all she ordered a room for a few nights and paid for it and the stables for Amity, but her rest and relaxation was put on hold after she had heard word of a Captain’s dire troubles. She learned that there was a murder that took place in the lower human quarters, which was basically a place where poor humans now lived, Captain Bran reminded Elissa of her big brother. Erik was also the captain of the guards in Amaranthine and knew that it was a tough life to make sure the city had enough security and to also deal with crime within the city.

And with the lack of manpower Captain Bran had offered a reward to anyone who would help him investigate the murder and bring the one responsible to justice. Elissa decided to volunteer and promised to do her best, with a focused look she headed immediately eastwards where the crime scene awaited her. As she walked down the quiet but rather dank streets, she could smell something horrible as if the place where her boots were walking had been used like a toilet. It didn’t take that long to reach the indicated place, luckily Bran guided Elissa to the spot and stood before two well armed guards which stood guard in front of the place where the murder took place. The guards stepped to one side and Elissa slowly entered the crime scene, slowly but surely it was filled with the horrid stench of death.

A man in his late thirties was on the floor and had been bathed in a pool of his own blood. He had short black hair and an average height of about five foot eight, he seemed fairly average size, the clothes the man wore was a old ripped shirt and trousers. He was laying down with his face on the floor and with his back pointing to the sky, Elissa felt nauseous but she took her time and did her best to analyse the situation and the actual crime scene itself. Due to the actual smell It looked like the poor guy had been dead for a rough estimate of twelve hours, as she scanned the area Elissa did notice small drops of pure red blood which had dried up just about ten centimetres away from the dead body. With a sigh Elissa prayed to the Maker and spoke out a small pray so that the dead mans soul could join him, then she used her hands and searched the dead body for anything on him.

But all she found was just a single copper coin. Then she turned the dead body over and noticed that his throat had been slit open, Elissa gasped but remained calm. Slowly she used her hands to close his eyes and gently the teen got back up to her feet and looked over at Captain Bran, she sighed in utter sadness while she asked him a question. “Do you know the name of this man?” Unfortunately he shook his head, which made things a little, complicated, still Elissa decided to investigate who this man was and even asked Bran where he had lived. With a determined look on her face she headed to different parts of the Dregs and asked any person she came across to not only find the identity of the victim.

But just then a stranger approached her and wondered if Captain Bran hired her. Perhaps Bran too hired him? Either way she had hoped that help would come, because the more people was hired the more chances of finding the culprit and bring him to justice. As she quietly stood up Elissa looked towards the stranger and happily responded to him while being as polite as she could. "Good day to see you sir, and yes I was. Someone took this poor man's life and no one has the right to do that, so I decided to offer my help to Captain Bran. Um are you also hired by Captain Bran?” She asked him in total curiousity.

Soon she decided to follow her gut instinct and once again spoke to the man. "I must deeply apologise but I must go, I'll just be going around the area just to see if anyone knew the name of this poor soul" Elissa said as she ran northwards to start at the top end of the Dregs. The teenage noblewoman also decided to investigate his home to find any kind of information as to why he was killed and for what reason. However what she didn’t know was that she was not the only one that volunteered, there is strength in numbers however Elissa promised to do her best for Denerim.

[Arley Voegeli]

Arley had gotten a message from someone in Ferelden that his help was needed because someone had gotten murdered, being a Grey Warden from Ferelden it made sense for him to be there. Arley was glad to be back home, even though it wasn't his hometown, he was still glad to be back. He didn't get many details on what had happened , but he decided to check it out anyway. yeah only been to the capital once, but it still hadn't changed one bit.

Captain Bran had promised a reward to anyone who could find the murderer, and he knew that there would be others on the mission with him, one is better than none and Arley was happy he wasnt the only one. He arrived at the gates of the city, and went to the scene murder.

When he got to the site of the murder he saw a teenage girl, she was inspecting the body. 'She must've been sent to help me solve the murder' Arley thought. He decided to go say something to her. She got to him first, and asked him if he was hired by Bran. "Yes I was hired by the Capitan, I understand Ill help you." Arley asked, he had never done this before so he was a little nervous.

He followed her around the tavern, she talked to some people and found out that his name was Lucius. After that she left, he followed.

[Alex]

Alex had received no messages, no warnings and no information whatsoever about the events that had unfolded on that day. In fact, he had arrived a day earlier and rested for the night at the local inn - the locals called it "The Gnawed Noble". It wasn't that bad, to be honest - the daily visitors seemed to have a distaste for the nobility. Alex liked it: he didn't like them that much either. The nobility, that is. But right before entering the tavern, he thought he had seen a familiar face somewhere - the face of a woman. A face he had seen before. He couldn't spot that face anymore, however; he only saw a strong-looking horse escorted towards the inn stables by some footmen. Even stranger... looking at the horse gave him shivers and the most strange feeling of déja vu - had he seen the horse before, too? Alex thought for a moment: a young woman who had a strong horse? No, he couldn't think clearly... he was far too tired. The journey had been extremely dangerous, almost taking his life in the process but ever strengthening his relationships with a certain woman. A shame that it was only friendship, but you know, one couldn't have everything he wanted. So he rented a room and stuttered in, closing the door carefully behind him - just incase - and fell asleep almost immediately. He didn't bother to change his clothes - what was the point? - and simply sleep with his traveling gear on. But the next morning wasn't any better.

As Alex opened the door, he was greeted by a hullabaloo of chaotic conversations, some monstrous noises that distantly reminded him of eating and some burps here and there. You liked these people yesterday... and now suddenly, they seem very insignificant to you. Alex grinned as he entered the warm room. Still grinning, although now warmly, he ordered some breakfast from the tavern-keeper and sat down on a window table. He liked that - this way he could keep an eye on the outside, too. Usually he saw nothing of use. Now, however, instead of the usual "nothing", he saw a "dead man" lying on the ground. Guardsmen were flocking around him. He couldn't see what had killed the man, but he intended to find out. Alex immediately rushed outside, curious to see what had killed the man. At first he wasn't really interested in his identity - until he saw his face. All colour was drained from his face as he stared at the corpse - he knew the man. He knew him very well indeed. "Lucius...", he whispered subconsciously. Suddenly Alex felt someone glaring at him. He raised his gaze from Lucius and met the gaze of Captain Bran, commander of the Denerim Guards. Alex obviously had no idea of his name, so the first thing he did after the short, awkward silence where they just stared at each other, was to ask for his name.

"Excuse me, sir. I... I know this man here. But may I ask your name before we continue?"

Captain Bran gave it a short thinking pause before he made his answer. "I am Captain Bran, commander of the Denerim Guards. And are you sure that you know him?"

Alex answered with no hesitation: "Yes, I do. His name is Lucius, Lucius Valerius of the house of Triarius. He was a dear friend of mine before... he died", he ended sadly. Lucius was one of the few people that really deserved his attention - for one thing, he was very smart. He and Alex had once travelled together for two years. Lucius hailed from the Tevinter Imperium, from where he had been banished for treason - Lucius never told Alex what was the reason, and Alex had never pushed him for that information. But now that he thought about it, perhaps it was this old feud that had killed his good friend - maybe he had been on the run for years, even with Alex, and now they had finally caught him. But as he had been thinking, the captain apparently had said something, because he was looking irritatedly at him. Alex coughed and put on his best smile.

"I'm very sorry, captain, could you repeat?"

"No problem. What else do you know about Lucius Valerius Triarius?"

Alex noted how the captain used his full name when he spoke about him. It didn't seem to be very important, although his words had a certain ill ring to them. Alex couldn't figure out what it was, though, and so he dropped it. "Well, we traveled together for some time. I know him personally, but not very much about his life otherwise." Alex knew that he was concealing important information from the captain, but somehow he didn't fully trust the officer.

"I see. But you said that he was a dear friend of yours - how long did you two actually travel together?"

"Three years."

"Oh... now, that is a lot of time.", he said with a queer tone.

"It indeed is..."

"Well, anyway. I don't think that we need your aid anymore, mr..."

"Alex."

"Mr. Alex? Why, isn't that a funny name..." the officer certainly looked as if he was just having some fun on Alex's account, but his tone suggested something entirely different. It was almost threatening, although not quite.

"My name's Alex, Alex of Pearlmouth, and I unfortunately have no family. And it is a tradition at where I come from, that if one has no family then he is not allowed to bear his family name anymore."

Captain Bran nodded, satisfied with his response. "Very well. Carry on then, citizen...", he said, and glared queerly at Alex.

Alex smiled back to the officer and went back in the inn again, masterfully hiding his worries. The captain... he seemed a little odd. Just a little queer. Somehow, doubt grew in him, and with the doubt, came the fear. The officer had glared at him very queerly... almost dangerously so. Suddenly, he gasped. A possibility rose in his head, a clear image of how the events must've gone. His face went even paler. What could he do now...?

[Elissa Vuronia]

Murder was a terrible crime to commit. No one had a right to take another’s life in cold blood, especially in the capital city of Ferelden. Elissa marched onwards three the Dregs as stopped to question each person about the dead man, soon she came across an elderly lady. She was in her late seventies and wore an old ragged dress; her hair was pure white while her skin was crippled. Elissa smiled at the woman and soon spoke with a gentle but polite voice while showing her respect to the elderly. "Good day to you" The elderly lady turned around and bowed her head in reply.

She returned the greeting. "Why hello they’re young lady, what can I do for you?" Elissa could see that she was a very kind person and her voice filled with gentleness, with a happy smile Elissa soon spoke again. "Um I was just wondering if you can help me? I am currently investigating the murder of a man who was killed just around here. Do you know him by any chance?” At first the elderly lady began to think for a few moments, which made Elissa wait for a good few moments.

A good minute or two later the woman smiled and turned her gaze to the teen. "Ah! Yes! Now I remember! His name was Lucius dear child. He lived just at the back of here, I must tell you my dear that he was such a lovely man. Very kind and very generous but then lately Lucius just kept to himself, in fact several days ago he began to change and very rarely came out of his house". It seemed that Lucius did in fact have a home in the Dregs, perhaps this was a perfect time to investigate there?

Elissa slowly nodded to herself and smiled back at the woman. Gently she held out a single coin to the elder lady and spoke out to her while revealing her gratitude. "Thank you so much, here please take this coin. May the Maker watch over you" The elderly lady nodded her head and gave Elissa a big smile, however she told Elissa that she would guide her to the home of Lucius.

After mere moments she arrived in front of a house which was in the very corner of the Dregs. Elissa said good bye to the elderly lady and watched her leave, and then she headed to the door and tried to open it. However after several moments it opened outwards into a rather dusty and smelly room, it was filled with cobwebs and broken furniture. It was truly a horrible smell but Elissa marched onwards and gazed around the dead man's home.

Soon she entered a small bedroom, which was filled with just an empty bed. Elissa carefully examined the room and soon came across something odd, she saw something threw a small hole in the wooden floor. It looked like a book of some kind, using the hilt of her sword; Elissa used it like a hammer and tried to smash the part of the wooden floorboards. Finally a small hole was made and gently she grabbed the object and pulled it out to reveal a book.

Elissa blew off the dust from the book and opened its contents, which seemed to be some kind of diary. She flipped it to the last page and looked surprised at what was written there, apparently the dead man called Lucius was involved in something that was most dire. He described it as that which makes us who we are, with this in mind she flipped the pages to the beginning of the diary and slowly read every single word to learn more of Lucius.

[Arley Voegeli]

He noticed the man talking to captian Bran but he paid him no mind. Arley figured they would meet soon. Arley followed the girl to the Dregs, to the murder victims house, Lucius. He lived in a dirty slum it wasn't suprising he was found murdered. Arley looked around outside for anything suspicious; there was nothing but some assorted garbage.

He walked inside of the house, it was a dingy little place, extremly dusty, and fulled with spiders. He saw the girl reading a diary. "What did you find out? Im going to look around in this living room," Arley shouted to the girl in the other room. He looked around and everything was relitively untouched, that was strange, only the room was being lived in other than that nothing.

He looked around the living room, only thing he could see that was strange was an assortment of paintings. Why would he have these? It was obvious he didnt paint them himself. "Hey did you notice these?" Arley said

[Alex]

He sure knew as much to justify them a motive to kill him. The Antivan Crows could reach the King of Ferelden himself when he's on the top floor of Fort Drakon in some locked-up tower, if the fortress was guarded by an army. No doubt that it's their work, or if not theirs, some of their subordinates. The amount of blood indicates that he was killed by a dagger to the heart.

'I've never seen a mace or some other blunt cause that amount of blood loss. Maybe it was a hit and run; the layout certainly suggests that. And these sorts of murders aren't usually that complicated... even if the layout would only be a distraction, it would be found out soon enough.'

Six guards appeared from the market square, all clad in shining mail that clanked loudly. They looked more like soldiers than the regular guards you would see loitering around and ordering people, but that was as much as he could tell from the other side the grimy glass window. Some of the passers-by turned their heads to gape at them, but most noted them with only a passing glance.

And now I've to deal with the possibility that the Crows are after me, too. Whatever they wanted from Lucius, they might want from me, as well. Blood and bloody ashes, the man got me in a worse mess than in the caravan robbery. What...?

Two of the armored soldiers suddenly changed direction, heading for the door instead. Against his better judgement Alex decided to walk over to the furthest table he could find - it was not very concealed, but he hoped that it would be far enough from the door to avoid the soldiers' stares.

Burn me, but I wish I wouldn't have this feeling that they mean trouble.

The soldiers entered, equipment clanking, mail rustling under the metal carapace. They took in the tavern's visitors with one sweeping glance, and Alex was sure that they were tensed, ready to jump at anyone in their close proximity. But then, instead of causing any trouble, they settled down on the nearest table. The bartender seemed to share his concern; or at least he did not go to their table right away.

I already thought that they were coming for me. Great, now I'm becoming paranoid, too. At his last thought he raised his eyes from the two soldiers, almost embarrassed. It's only the murder, he kept telling himself until he thought he almost believed it. He really almost did, when he thought about it.

Lucius had told him a story, once, he remembered. In it, he had told Alex why he had been banished from the Tevinter Imperium. He was drunk, no doubt. Trying to recall the story in his head, he slowly took out his dice and began fiddling with them.

"What dice do you sport? Spotted, or crowns?", he heard a voice speak to him. The accent was so heavy that he had trouble making out his actual words. Alex had no idea how long he'd been in his thoughts, either. Apparently for a long time.

"Spotted", he mumbled a little dizzily.

"That be good, for I no play with the damned crowns. Me name be Dom Argill", the man said finally, sitting down heavily opposite of Alex. He gave a heavy sigh of relief as he slid lower on his chair, stretching his legs out under the long board.

"What will we play for?", Dom added.

"Ten silver apiece. How's that? And I'm Alex."

Dom pondered his offer a moment, eyeing Alex as if weighing him from head to toe. Finally he agreed with a nod. "Aye, ten silver it be."

It was a quite regular bet for a tavern game. You seldom saw gold in the games, although occasionally there were some rich fellows who entertained themselves with the dice. Sometimes they were robbed, although not nearly as often in Denerim than in the coastlands. Usually you saw bets ranging from a few coppers to a few dozen silver, so ten was a safe bet.

Dom laughed out loud as the second dice stopped spinning and settled on the table. "A six and a five! Let us see how you fare against me best throw today!" Alex grabbed the dice, hoping for the best. He had thought himself lucky several times, but from experience he knew that luck wasn't a thing you could trust to work all the time. It was a part of it - sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't. He shook the dice hard and threw them on the table, perhaps a bit too hard. One of the dice flew spinning right past Dom, his hand a millisecond too late to catch them right off the air. The other dice rolled a few times on the table before it stopped. "A five...", he mumbled expectantly. Now a six. He could still draw it. Then Dom reached out under the table to grab the dice, Alex trying to wait patiently and calmly for it to emerge and reveal its mystery. Finally Dom placed it on the table, smiling widely, if a little grimly.

"A six. Congratulations, Alex."

Sighing heavily, he realized the amount he had just betted. Ten silver. He only had fifty; plenty enough to rent a room and buy some food, but not after he had paid for them and for losing the game. If he lost. Bracing himself for the next toss, he grinned confidently at Dom. "Thanks. Now, winner tosses first, doesn't he?" Dom's grin diminished slightly, but he still handed over the dice.

Alex tossed, now more confidently and softly than on the first round. He grimaced when the first dice turned out as a three, but his grin was restored when the next became a six. It was still an adequate throw. Dom looked at the dice for a moment with an unreadable expression before picking them up, weighing them in his hands. With a look of concentration on his face, he then threw them nimbly onto the table. He rolled a five... and a three. Dom reached out for his pocket and took out ten heavy pieces of silver from it, placing them delicately before Alex.

"There's that. Now, shall we play more? I want a chance to regain what I lost, at least", he said grinningly.

Alex could not resist answering the grin as he stuffed the coins in his purse. "Then prepare yourself for the match of your lifetime."

[Elissa Vuronia]

In this world there are secrets that are meant to never be discovered. And when one is discovered, chaos will ensue and their lives would be changed forever. The diary discovered in the victim's house began to reveal a secret which made Elissa look in complete astonishment, each page revealed how he spent his days inside some kind of a secret organisation which was reformed a few years ago after the disappearance of a man called "The Champion of Ferelden", the legendary Grey Warden who had stopped an ancient evil and brought an end to the blight.

What concerned Elissa was the fact that certain sections of the book had words like "Blood Magic, and rituals" While the rest simply mention of his thoughts and feelings over the course of his days, quickly she studied the book and poured all of her complete concentration about learning more of this secret group. When it come to things like Magic and Blood Magic, she knows full well that magic is dangerous but Elissa did think about the tragic war between the templars and mages.

The teen noble was neutral about the war. As she choose to make her journey across all of Albion to learn about life itself, but right now her mind was getting a small picture of what happened to the victim. Quickly she flicked through the book to the end of the diary and stared hard at the last entry, each words were written as though he was scared and fearful for his life. It seemed that he was cast out of the group because he refused to cooperate with the men and woman, and refused to kill anymore, but what was more intriguing was the fact that his last words were....paintings

Soon she heard Arley's voice and immediately she heard towards him and examined each painting. Sure enough something clicked in Elissa's mind, she flicked a few pages backwards and examined the front of the book. There she discovered a series of drawn boxes and numbers ranging from one to five, the small boxes had the number underneath each of them and a word underneath each one. The word was "Deceased" except for the fifth one, again she flicked to the last pages of the diary and saw the last words. It said that should anything happen to him, someone should find him before it was too late.

Looking to Arley she said. "Those aren’t just paintings good sir. They were the painting of past deceased. According to the diary the victim joined a secret cult of Blood Mages who wanted nothing more then to destroy Denerim, they were apparently stopped by the Champion of Ferelden. But because of the war that is now going on, they must have reformed in order to attack the Templars and carry out their original mission long ago, but the victim left us a clue, this painting here is apparently that of a man who knew the victim. It said to seek him out if he was killed"