The Ballad of Adler Young, Canto 2.5

pass the time by playing hours upon hours of "I Spy" and "Truth or Dare".
>Ms. Thompson: Be surprisingly passionate about masonry and keep favorably commenting on the dungeon's stonework.
Adler, try passing time by searching the cell. Find some old debris and a bunch of jailhouse graffiti written in various places. Including a juicy piece recently written by the rat. Then use your wand of office to knock on stones in order to determine if anyone has been digging a tunnel. Discover something odd, but ultimately useless.

Time passed.

Despite claiming to be sleepy, Doris kept trying to involve us in her drunken amusements.

"I shpy with my little eye, shomething made of shtone," she burbled.

"This holding area dates back to the reign of Yngvar," Ms. Thomson remarked enthusiastically. "It is some of the finest dungeon masonry in the Shining Land. The stones fit together so precisely, one cannot slip so much as a whisker between them."

I looked around the cell. Aside from the water jug and chamberpot, there wasn't much to look at. I tapped the walls with my Hand wand, but the stonework seemed solid. On the underside of the bench was an assortment of mostly-illegible graffiti, presumably scratched into the wood by the claws of previous inmates. The freshest-looking inscription said "RATSO WAS HEAR."

"Truth or dare," Doris called.

"I've never understood the point of that game, since elves do not lie," Ms. Thomson replied.

"Dare, then," Doris insisted. "Aren't you guysh gonna make out? Come on. I dare ya."

"I am technically a Floozy," Thomson pointed out. "Fully qualified for all varieties of venery."

"Totally not in the mood," I sighed.

"I begin to wonder if you truly are a descendant of Sartorius," she muttered suspiciously.

(Doris) Bang on the bars with a tin cup, and yell for the screws.

Suddenly Doris leaped up and started banging her water cup violently against the bars.

"GUARDSH!! GUARDSH!!!" she yelled.

"Yes, yes, what is it?" the jailer grumbled irritably as he strode up the aisle.

"How mush longer are we gonna have to shtay in here?" the doe asked mournfully. "Thoshe two are borin' the crap outta me, an' I don't know how mush longer I can shtand it!"

Doris, admit that you have a drinking problem. And then sob even louder.

"Lady, you are drunk," the jailer observed, with scorn.

"Yesh I am," Doris wailed, sitting down heavily on her bench. "Not bein' able to hold yer liquor ish an asshet in the Floozhy bizhnessh."

The jailer turned away, shaking his head in disgust as Doris began to sob quietly to herself.

(HSH Prince Adler) Request the latest edition of Jane, the Lowfolk Femme to pass the time.
(Ms. Thomson) Be slightly annoyed Adler wants to pass the time with a fictional vixen instead of a real, live, Legal Floozie.

"Hey, is there any chance I could get the latest issue of Jane, the Lowfolk Femme?" I asked him. "Anything to pass the time."

"Sure," the jailer replied with a grin. "Next courier that goes out, I'll tell him to pick one up."



"Why would you waste your energy reading that tawdry rubbish when you have a real live Legal Floozy right here?" Thomson demanded irritably. "If you wanted, I could make you forget about everything else for the rest of the afternoon."

"I'm not as into hooves as my brother is," I explained. "And the setting isn't conducive to venery."

"Any place is conducive," she muttered. "You just have to use your imagination."

Thomson, give Adler some more information about the sisterhood and their plans. And scold him for nearly ruining them.
>transform into a ixie and look around

"I need to devote my imagination to coming up with a way out of here," I exclaimed. "There's too much at stake for me to spend the entire day sitting around. I need to know what's going on! I need to be out there, helping!"

I transmogrified into an Ixie.



"Stop that right now," Ms. Thomson scolded. "Didn't you hear me when I said that not even a whisker could slip out of here? And don't try doing a Pooka Vanish, if you even know how. Escaping now would only hurt your case. The Sisterhood has invested a lot in you, and you owe us. Why, your very existence is due to our intervention. So turn back into yourself and trust me to guide you safely through these legal procedures."

"It would help if I knew what the Sisterhood's long-term goal was," I grumbled, transmogrifying back into my normal form.

"I was under the impression that you had been told," Thomson said, surprised. "You are to take the throne, eventually, and instate proper Elfly policies once again."

>Adler: Complain about ms. Thomson's lacklustre performance, rue not picking the wolven queen instead

"I should have chosen the 'Wolf Queen' to Floozy for me," I sulked. "She would have been more fun."

"I repeat, I am highly skilled in Sisterhood venery techniques."

"Give it a rest," I sighed. "The situation is bad enough already. I'm not going to let you use your Wiles on me."

Our conversation was interrupted by the sound of the jailer's footfalls in the corridor.

"Here's your Jane," he announced with a grin, passing a tightly-rolled scroll through the bars. "Enjoy."



I broke the seal and unrolled the scroll.

"Whoah, this isn't Jane, the Lowfolk Femme," I observed. "This looks like a transcript of an interrogation."

"What an improbable stroke of luck!" Thomson exclaimed. "Let me have a look at that."

The Marshal and the sergeant, examine all the evidence in detail. Come to a troubling, and quite incorrect, conclusion.

The document recorded the conversation between three persons: T and A, which were most likely Theronmyathus and Avogadro, and an unknown entity identified as S.

T: Did you see Prince Adler enter the Vulpitanian thaumaturgists' laboratory?

S: Yes.

T: And what did he do there?

A: Did he have a beautiful white vixen with him?

S: No vixen. He was alone.

A: Did he show any signs or did he boast of using his sick Irenaeid Mojo to seduce a beautiful white-furred vixen and corrupt her to do his sinister bidding?

S: Uh..

T: We'll need to strike that question from the record. Please stay on topic. What did the Prince do in the lab?

S: He swapped around the contents of a bunch of containers. He stared out the window. Then he went into the other room and spoke to the SALVs.

T: They were conscious?

S: No, asleep. He looked into the bowl, I think it was a scrying bowl set up between the Vulpitanians.

T: Did he set up the scrying bowl?

S: No, a weird fox came in earlier and did that.

A: A beautiful white vixen?

S: No, a gray tod in old-fashioned clothes.

T: Did this tod knock out the SALVs?

S: No, they went to sleep before that. After they ate dinner, they danced around for a while and then passed out on the floor. I thought it was a bit strange, even for Vulpitanians.

T: Sergeant, you stated that the Prince had you slip something into the SALVs' meals before they left the kitchen?

A: That's right.

T: What did His Highness do after speaking to the unconscious Vulpitanians?

S: He came back in and broke a piece of crockery. He picked around among the shards, then an Ixie showed up and he talked to her for a few seconds.

T: What did they say?

A: Did they mention a beautiful white-furred vixen?

S: I couldn't hear them.

T: Did the Prince take anything from the pottery shards?

S: I'm not sure.

T: What happened next?

S: He picked me up and left the apartment. The rest I think you know.

>Cunning plan: Consist of Adler transmogrifying into Relda, using sapphic acts to beguile Avogadro to let her go. Flee to the boonies.

"Interesting," Ms. Thomson mused. "It could be to our advantage, knowing of this evidence without them knowing we know. May I keep it in my briefcase?"

"Sure," I said, handing her the scroll. "Avogadro seems obsessed with that white vixen. I was SALV Relda Fauxfox, of course, and I was in the Vulpitanian Embassy last night. Maybe if I transmogrify into her again, I could influence the Sergeant .."

"Unwise," Thomson snapped. "Please, let the Sisterhood handle this by conventional means."