The Ballad of Adler Young, Canto 2.5

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SpoilerEDIT SEP. 28, 2020.  This adventure is not dead.  I still update once a week, usually on Wednesday.  Photobucket made some bad business decisions and I had to delete a lot of images to comply with the new limits they imposed.  I tried to keep the best & most important ones, but ultimately had to sacrifice more than I wanted to.  Missing images therefore are ones that I chose to remove, albeit under duress.
The entire story with pictures is archived at https://adleryoung.tumblr.com and in March 2018 I stopped using Photobucket and began mirroring new posts on https://www.patreon.com/tegerio so there are currently three places to read the Ballad, two of which have illustrations.

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Spoiler
The recap, which is rescued & reconstructed from the MSPA crash, can be found at https://adleryoung.tumblr.com  (Fuma help you if you've not been keeping up, because now you have a LOT of reading to do.)  I decided to put it there before I found Eagle-Time, and Tumblr made more sense anyway because there wasn't any need for forum commands during the re-telling of the already extant story.  BUT NOW we are all caught up and it's time to start running this thing properly.

What follows is the final update which I tried to post on March 28, 2016, right around when the MSPA Forum exploded.  A lucky thing I had started saving updates on my own computer a few months earlier, so I have this archived.  You are seeing it pretty much as it would have appeared, with quoted reader commands and everything.  The only thing different is that I changed the narrative voice to 1st-person past tense .. which had been my original intention, but forum readers did not respond well to it when I started, so I had to adopt the conventional 2nd-person voice.  Hopefully now that the story is well established, readers can accept Adler telling it without him being "you."

ANYHOW, enough blather, here's the adventure post:

Adler: Return to your office and bemoan the fact that trouble is always two steps behind you. The knowledge that the Sisterhood had given you still weighing heavily on your mind.
Have you actually essayed to see if the Sisterhoods claims of Estmere's un-elf-dom are accurate? You're basically involved in high treason against your king and brother, whom you clearly love, and at least appear to like. Doesn't it make sense to, err... check their work?

As I trudged back toward my office, I sighed heavily and pondered the current situation.  Much against my will, it seemed that the Sisterhood had involved me at the heart of a treasonous plot to overthrow the rightful King.  Their argument that Estmere was not really the rightful King of Faerie sounded only half-plausible ... Elves do not lie, so it must be true ... but still I didn't feel entirely convinced.

Adler > gramerye estmere somehow with out changing him from a skunk, so he's compatible with ungulates

If it were possible to solve this problem with simple, straightforward Magicks, then surely I - or someone - would have done so by now.

If only I knew where Estvan Silverbrush was at the moment.  He would know whether something like this had any chance of working, and he would have the power to pull it off, too.

Adler > You cannot help but feel that the Vulpitanians might be in the know of the sisterhood manipulation and may do something the sisterhood haven't planned on.

Even if I agreed with the Sisterhood's goals and opinions (which I didn't .. not completely) it seemed extremely chancy to rely on Vulpitanians as such a key component of the plan.  The foxes would ever have their own secret agenda, and it seemed clear to me that they could not be trusted.

Adler > start thinking about preparing a evacuation procedure for everyone. you might need ravenmad to guide everyone out via the fae gates if he knows any

I briefly indulged in fantasies of skipping out of town and leaving this whole mess behind.  As justification for these thoughts, I wondered about the possibility of mass evacuation of Albric Tor.  Such action wouldn't really be necessary though - not unless Winter were to come unexpectedly.

>Everyone immediately accuse each other of being der Hand of der King.
(HSH Prince Adler) Look deeply alarmed, once you enter your office

I arrived at my office to behold Ambassador Chesswick glowering at me, and Mara pointing at me casually.

"There's the Hand of the King," Mara said.  "Right there.  Him."

"I need ein reqvisition form to get some Vulpitanian property out of detention," SALV Chesswick informed me.

"All right, all right," I grumbled as I circled around my desk.

Adler > See the thing in your office that is the scuti and ixie. Be in a mixture of amazement and horror! Demand your daughter ixie released!
Scuti&ixie > mock adler by playing the ixie like a kazoo *ppfffffftttt*
(Mara) Scold the Scuti for talking with its mouth full.

I leaned over to open a desk drawer when I noticed one of my Ixies standing there, with a huge fluffy white ... tail?? ... attached to her tiny derriere.

"GREAT FUMA'S WHISKERS!" I exclaimed, as the horror of what I was seeing sank in.  "What have you done to that poor Ixie??  Release her at once!"

The Ixie merely stood in a sassy posture, stuck out her tongue, and blew a tiny, high-pitched raspberry in my direction.

"The same rude and insolent creature as ever," Mara remarked.  "It ought to be ashamed, but I can assure you, it isn't."

(HSH Prince Adler) Realize that you haven't seen the exotic and beautiful antelope femme you helped Estmere rescue.
oh yeah and the queen

0328ohsister.gif

"Sire, I bear strange news for thee," another Ixie whispered to me via Elfmind.  "Minister Lynne hath found out something regarding Her Majesty -"

"GREAT AUK AND MIGHTY TEG!!!" she continued, aloud, upon seeing her sister ensconced on the Scuti's snout.

Ixie, try resisting the scuti, with moderate success.

The second Ixie attacked the Scuti with crackling electrical Magick, whereupon it released the first Ixie.  The two of them then started buzzing angrily around the fluffy creature, zapping it mercilessly while it cringed on the desktop and emitted a miserable high-pitched keening sound.

"HEY!" I shouted.  "STOP THAT!  I need the Scuti unharmed!  QUIT IT!  There will be unpleasant repercussions if you don't knock it off!!  CEASE!  DESIST!  That's an order!"

The Ixies flitted out the window, leaving the Scuti on my desk.  Grayish smoke rose from its fur.  I assumed it was still alive because it was emitting ragged, wheezing breaths.  I was tempted to examine it but I wouldn't have known what to look for.

(Mara) Demand that Prince Adler fulfill his agreement to pay you. NOW.

"Ahem," SALV Chesswick coughed, stepping forward with her hand outstretched.  "Der papers, please."

"Mmmrrr," Mara purred, nuzzling up next to me.  "Time to give me the reward you promised, since I was a good girl and came straight back here to your office."