By the time Evren went upstairs, the constable looked physically exhausted. He knocked on the door and said, "Evren." Quietly. The door opened with the clicking of a lock and once he was on the other side, he looked around the room to make sure everyone was there and cast 'muffle' on the room.
"Mr. Evren, how'd you do that?" Harley asked.
"Ahh, I just fed him some bullshit about ancestors and legends. I kept talking long enough to wear him out and keep him from asking any questions. He didn't even notice you all had left." Evren said with a shrug.
Walter asked, "What's the plan now?"
"Now?" Evren said as he took off the dirty cloak he was wearing and his backpack. He reached into his backpack and pulled out his dark colored cloak and put it on. "Now, I go out and look around. He's left and gone back to the place he came from. There's one guard posted across the street and one at the back door. I don't think they're puppets, so just use 'hallucination' on them when you get ready to leave."
Isobel nodded as she pulled her black armor out of the backpack. Evren peeked out of the window and chanted 'hallucination' at the guard in the back. He looked away from where he was looking and was staring off into the darkness to see if he could find what just distracted him. In the meantime, Evren had cast 'levitate' on himself and exited through the window, pulling himself quietly up to the roof.
He remained levitating in a prone position as he pushed himself, with his fingers, up into the shadows and over the top of the roof. On the other side, he moved towards the back of the inn to slide off the roof in a position where the guard across the street wouldn't see him. As he lowered to the ground, he used the roof to upright himself. Upon reaching the ground, he balanced on one leg and used the other to push himself off, as if he were riding a skateboard, and he disappeared silently into the night.
Evren was using his sensory field as he moved around town. He knew the position of all the stationary and patrolling guards and when he had to pass by them, he did so without them noticing. He made his way to the governor's mansion. Because of reasons untold, the mansion had the bare minimum of guards posted around it. There were two at the gate, two at the entrance, two that patrolled around by themselves. And two that were being used personally by the governor. Yes, the guards around the governor's mansion were all female.
He would use the guards until he tired of them, or they got pregnant and then send them back to St. Gloria to be recycled. He had timed it out and knew exactly when to send the puppets back so they would still be pregnant by the time they were used as sacrifices. The governor hadn't heard that the summons had stopped using sacrifices, nor that they had stopped completely because the summoners had run away.
While he was observing the mansion, he noticed a person outside a back entrance that was neither part of the governor's staff, nor a guard. Evren double checked that Isobel was still at the inn and decided to follow the sneaky person. There were other people in the house besides the governor and the guards, most likely the staff members and one person in the basement, which Evren assumed this person was moving towards.
He entered through a ground floor window and slipped inside with 'levitate,' getting to the basement before the intruder did. Twice, Evren had to use telekinesis to distract someone so the intruder wouldn't be noticed. By the end of the night, several people would be under the impression the mansion is haunted and wanted to move elsewhere.
When Evren got to the basement area, he could tell from the soft snores the person was asleep, so he positioned himself and a spot where he could watch without being seen. When the intruder finally made its way to the basement, Evren slipped in behind it and grabbed them with telekinesis and his hand over their mouth before they reached the cell where the person was sleeping. There was a little bit of a muffled struggle and after being turned around with a finger held to his lips before the person, the person nodded, so Evren released his hand from their mouth and released the telekinesis.
The person whispered, "Who are you?"
Evren replied by first casting 'muffle' then whispering, "If I told you I was a nobody, would you believe me?"
They looked around suspiciously and said, "What did you just do?"
Evren's reply was, "I cast magic to make our conversation quieter, so we don't alert the guards."
The person looked at Evren's attire and said, "You're not part of the governor's staff."
Evren smiled and said, "Are you going to turn me in?"
The person frowned and said, "I'm getting my friend out of here and then we're leaving this town."
Evren glances past them and then asks, "What did your friend do?"
The person looks off to the side and said, "Umm, he said some things he probably shouldn't have."
'Jackpot!' Evren thought. 'Now I know the one in the cell is a man.' He looked at the one in front of him and thought, 'No beard… still don't know what delicate features means. Are there breasts? Can't tell with these clothes on.'
"What's he to you?" The person blushed a little and said, "He's, my lover."
Evren thought, 'Nope, that didn't help.'
Evren cleared his throat a little and said, "Let me help you out of here, or you'll never make it on your own."
The person said, "I made it in here fine."
Evren smiled and said, "Not without my help you didn't."
The person frowned, "How can you help?"
A series of clicks were heard, and the manacles fell to the floor, while the cell door opened. Evren looked at the person and shrugged, "Maybe that?"
The person turned around and gasped, turning back and asking, "How did you do that?"
Evren gestured with his head to the man in the cell and whispered, "Magic." The man was floating in the air and moving towards the door to the cell and then lowered to the floor again. "Keep him quiet when waking him or this'll be a problem."
The person turned to the man sleeping on the floor and put their hand over his mouth quietly saying, "Ellis. Ellis wake up."
The man struggled for a moment and looked at who was keeping him silent and said, "Karina!"
Both Evren and Karina shushed him.
His eyes opened and he covered his mouth with his hands. Evren looked up and then to the two and nodded, "Go ahead."
The man looked at Evren and said, "Who is that? And why are you here? You'll get into trouble!"
Karina sealed his mouth with their own and said, "Shut up, I'm here now. Let's get you out of here."
Evren interrupted, "If you follow me, I can get you both out of here without issue. If you do what I say, that is."
Ellis asked, "What do you want out of it?"
Evren smiled and said, "Information."
They frowned and looked at each other for a bit before turning back to Evren and nodding. Evren put a finger in front of his lips and moved the blanket and a couple extra back inside the cell and locking it with telekinesis. He then dispelled the 'muffle' spell and moved to the stairs going up. He moved up the stairs and double checked everyone's position with his sensory field and opened the door, heading to the room he used to enter the mansion.
Stopping next to the window, he waited for the guard to pass and opened the window. He put his finger over his lips again and picked the two of them up with telekinesis, moving the both of them outside of the mansion one after the other. Evren cast levitate on himself and slowly they dropped to the ground. Keeping everyone at a low profile, he moved them across the field to the bushes and waited for the patrol to pass by.
Once it was clear, Evren carried them to the wall and over to the other side without any issues. Once on the other side, he lowered them to the ground and stopped using telekinesis, motioning with his hand to follow. When they were a couple of blocks away from the inn he stopped them and asked, "Where are you two staying in this town?"
Karina answered, "The Dancing Lion."
Evren asked, "Do they know of his imprisonment?"
Karina shook their head and Evren continued. "Walk to the inn, stumbling a little like you've had too much to drink. If you hold onto each other, it'll make it more convincing." He took off his cloak and handed it to Ellis. "There's a guard out front of the inn, keep your hood up and you're face down, then meet me at the first room on the right." They both nodded and Evren disappeared behind a building into an alley and out of sight.
Evren entered through the window quietly almost causing everyone to shout out in surprise. He asked Walter, "Walter, is Karina a man's name or a woman's?"
Walter looked at the others and shrugged saying, "It sounds like a woman's name."
Evren nodded and said, "Thanks." He walked over to the door and unlocked it, but not opening it immediately.
Walter asked, "Why do you ask?" and jumped as Isobel entered through the window a moment later.
"Welcome back." Evren said.
Isobel smiled and said, "Thank you."
Evren turned to the door, cast 'muffle' on the room and opened the door to the surprise of the two outside the door about to knock. He gestured with his hands for them to come in and closed the door behind them, locking it. He turned around to the six of them and said, "This is Karina and Ellis." Ellis handed Evren his cloak back and nodded to the others.
"This is Walter, Isobel, Fletcher and Harley. Oh, and I'm Evren." Evren said as he introduced the others. "I know it's a little cramped in here, but please, bear with it for the moment."
"Mr. Evren, why do you always introduce me last?" Harley asked with a frown.
Evren, completely confused, said, "I just introduced you all from left to right."
"Hmph!" Harley said and looked away, trying not to smile.
Evren clicked his tongue and said, "So these two got into a bit of a mess and I decided to help them out in exchange for information."
Ellis rubbed his ear and looked away, "Apparently voicing an opinion is taboo in this town."
"Ellis, you called the governor a fat, disgusting, slob." Karina said.
Evren said, "Well, from what I've seen of the Grandia folks, that's probably not far from the mark."
Ellis gestured to Evren and looked at Karina with his eyebrows up as if to say, "See?!"
Evren said, "Tell me about Grandia's influence here."
Ellis said, "Well, there's the governor, his aides, the guard supervisors and a few representatives around town that live off the people."
Evren said, "Hmm. I suppose what I'm asking is if Grandia weren't around, would people complain?"
Both Ellis and Karina said, "No." at the same time.
Walter asked, "What about everywhere else?"
Karina asked, "Who are you people? How can you not know what's going on?"
Evren pointed with his thumb over his shoulder and said, "Well, they're all from the Aernide dungeon. Spent their whole life there, and only got out a couple of months ago." He looked at the others and nodded.
"As for me, well, that's a little complicated, but I guess you can say I was once a puppet. But I wasn't. I never was, but I was supposed to be. I was summoned here, but because…" Evren started to say but was interrupted.
"You're a puppet?!" Karina said as both of them moved back a little.
Evren nodded a little and said, "As I was saying, because of certain circumstances, my summoning failed to put me in Grandia's control. And my body wasn't summoned to St. Gloria like it was supposed to, instead I wound up naked in the woods about five months of a walk east of here. OH! The puppets have tattoos, right?" Evren pulls his shirt down exposing his chest, "Look! No tattoos."
The two of them look at each other and then back to Evren, he continues to explain, "My circumstances are a long story, best saved for a safer location, so I'll just say that my goal is to stop puppets from being summoned and freeing the ones that have been. Oh, and taking down Grandia in the process."
"You plan to take down Grandia?" Ellis asked.
Evren nodded in reply while looking Ellis in the eyes. They looked at each other and Karina said, "Can we think about this first?"
Evren nodded and said, "Of course. But we've got to get you out of here in the morning, before they find out he's missing. Come here, tomorrow before your morning meal. If the sun's yet to come up the better.
He got up and unlocked the door, opening it for them. "See you in the morning?"
The two got up and left the room after a nod from Karina.