#rosella vidal

[house-rogala]

The State of Death

 Rosella Vidal composed a new list in her head as she let shadow swirl in their ‘usual’ meeting spot. 

Fact:  the coroners’ records, finally completed, were clear.  Two other assassins had been working at the same tasks as Rosella over the last five years.  One preferred poisons, the other, slender blades.

Fact:  Lady Alissa had provided two names -- both former Whispers who’d been drummed out at an early age, just like Rosella.  Both older than her, but perhaps they’d been vulnerable to the “Keeper’s” lies, just like Rosella had been.  Severine Boudray.  Dashiel Vaughn.

Fact:  Just because Rosella had turned down the job to kill Alissa didn’t mean the other two had turned it down as well.

Fact:  Torres, that old “Keeper,” had an ex-wife in Ebonhawke, which was where Vaughn had been recently seen.  The ex-wife was one Bettina Gray, who had no job and a lot of coin.  Names, an address, a potential motive -- they all lined up like soldiers in a row.

Shadow billowed up to cover the Grenth statue in a way only one man would recognize.  Perhaps he’d be in the mood to go hunting with her.  One could never tell.

( @alissabryliss-fairfax, @iamkuryakin )

[house-rogala]

The Code-Breaker

( A follow-up to @rookmenagerie‘s “Communion.”  Read that, it’s good! )

It wasn’t that hard a cipher, not really.  Rosella had dealt with worse in her Whispers training back when she was a girl.  Gods, she needed to find those people, the Whispers she’d known back when she was sixteen and seventeen, when they told her she was brilliant and she’d have a future of utility, of service. Of fun, for certain values of fun.

But Torres had reclaimed her after the others had rejected her, and the bolt-holes and secret passwords she’d known so long ago were nothing now. Nothing.  She was a woman adrift with one last job to do -- and cipher-breaking, that was better.  That she’d do while the contract waited.  She always did have a talent for ciphers.

And a substitution cipher didn’t require men to be smart or canny, or to keep notes or to remember more than a word or a phrase.  Just one word, and the whole coded mess might unlock.  Joko hadn’t worked, or Mordant or Crescent or a hundred other words she’d tried up in her little attic room.  Two days passed, three.  

And then she thought of ego.  This wasn’t Joko’s project, this was that prosecutor’s project, and he had his own name.  What would satisfy an ambitious man under a tyrant more than using his own name as the key to everything?  She rifled through her notes until she found it, tested it against the cipher, and laughed aloud.

“You egotistical freak bastard,” she murmured.  Akif.  Not even a family name to follow.  Just a four-letter key, and from there, two levels of classical Elonian shifts, and there.  Akif’s lists, Rabiah’s targets.  

She jotted down names and locations as quickly as she could.  A long-standing Priory dig near Lornar’s pass.  A ship called The Queen’s Mercy, sailing north from Orr to Lion’s Arch.  A fisherman and his family in Triskell Quay.  Another group of separatists, this one near Ebonhawke itself.  One of the Seraph who guarded the passage into Lake Doric, gods.  

Some of the information made little sense, but she wrote it down all the same. Rabiah was an honest woman with an honest cause, and Rosella hadn’t known many of either.  Perhaps, when the contract was done, and Rabiah had returned...

She shook her head.  One issue at a time.  “Miss Bahar?” she called as she headed out of her room and stepped lightly down the stairs.  “Miss Bahar, I have some of that information for you.”

[house-rogala]

Context and Observation

Rosella Vidal’s boots set down lightly on the townhouse roof.  She folded her collapsible glider and slid through her chamber’s tiny window before letting the shadows that wreathed her slip away.  In case Nasim was wandering again, she changed quickly into her drab secretarial garb and set a ledger on her desk, open to tidy columns of household accounts.

With the necessary stage set, she instead sat on the floor beside her bed and wrapped her arms around her knees.  Give your observations context, Keeper Torres would have said.  Put your observations in proper order.  She shut her eyes to remember the scene and reported it in her thoughts as if to Torres himself:

Context:  Rogala met with a man so thick with shadow that it seemed to cleave the very air. 

Observation:  The meeting was neither planned nor especially friendly.

Observation:  They engaged in no violence and minimal posturing.  The encounter ended cordially. 

Observation:  The shadowed man may have noticed my passage.  Act accordingly.  

The last was the most worrisome.  She flicked a glance toward the still open window and the deepening shadows beyond.

( @iamkuryakin , @alissabryliss-fairfax )

[house-rogala]

Because all good NPCs eventually become PCs -- Rosella has her own toon in-game now, and her own facial inspiration.  And her own secrets (yessss, secrets).  I’ll keep her on Jovan’s tumblr, since she’s part of his world.  A few facts, what’s known:

Name:  Rosella Vidal Nationality:  Krytan Age:  Early to mid 20s? Profession:  Secretary to men and women of means, if not title. Family:  She hasn’t spoken of them.  Or of friends or lovers. Flaws:  A bit rigid, uptight, fanatical about protocol and rules. Strengths:  Organization, communication, anticipating her employer’s needs Contacts:  She provided references.  Jovan, being desperate, didn’t check them well.

[house-rogala]

Masquerade

“Right.  Animal.”  Jovan stood in front of the crate that held the bulk of his clothing.  Leather.  Some linen, some wool, all of it sturdy, dun-colored, dull.  He rubbed his forehead, given the headache that was building behind his eyes. Alissa was worth it, of course she was worth it.  He’d take her to the thing, meet people if he had to, then hopefully drag her wherever to get her fancy costume right back off again.  Worth it.

But for him...eh.  He had that one suit, but it felt like a fucking vise and he looked like a fool, so no.  He looked down at his current attire: hide trousers, hide jacket over a linen shirt.  Hide hat.   “That’s that,” he muttered to himself.  When he clambered down the staircase, he ran into Rosella dressed in cunningly sewn black feathers.  “What are you?” he asked.

“A crow,” she said.  “What are you?”

“Dead cow.”  He tipped his hat before heading out the door to fetch his...whatever she was, whatever people called it... from the Settlement.

[many-voices]

If you're doing it that way - 💭 for Ken from one of your chars?

Her employer rarely sent her on errands after dinner.  It was ‘her time,’ as he called it, and though she served many more masters than him, she at least appreciated the sentiment.  She slipped into the weapon-master’s even as he was shifting the sign on his door from ‘open’ to ‘closed.’  “Please,” Rosella said, setting a worried expression in place.  “I need to bring ammunition back to my boss, or I’ll be sacked three times over.”

The man grumbled, but let her into the strangely dim room.  His expression grew lighter – or at least more greedy – when he had a look at Jovan’s shopping list.  “Be right back.”  He paused, and his gaze flickered briefly to one of the room’s shadowed corners.  “Don’t touch anything.”

She didn’t notice the other man in the room until a full minute had passed.  The tiniest of signals alerted her, perhaps a breath taken off-beat.  When she slowly turned to face in that direction, she saw little:  black reflective lenses, dark clothing, a strip of skin from when a Seraph passed the storefront with a lantern held high.  “I beg your pardon,” she said aloud.  To the stranger, she didn’t offer a smile or a pout or a gasp of wary surprise.  Instead he received a respectful nod, just one, as she backed to the room’s opposite corner. 

The expression of gushing gratitude returned when the merchant did.  She traded coin for a small, weighty crate.  “Thank you,” she said earnestly as the merchant herded her toward the door.  “You’ve just saved my life.”  Perhaps it was even true, she thought as the door clicked shut behind her.  It hadn’t felt that way, but one never knew.  Surprises weren’t so easily categorized, and neither were strangers in dimly lit corners.

(Rosella pretends to be a secretary over at @jovan-rogala)

[house-rogala]

Rosella:  The First Report

((The message is coded in a cipher dependent on a tiny book she keeps with her at all times.  To the uninitiated, it would simply look like columns of sums.  Rosella executes the code flawlessly.))

No sign of sylvari.  No messages, no contact.  No mention of sylvari by subject.

Correspondence from colleagues  - no mention, no messages.  No seeming awareness of sylvari’s actions re: Pact.  if aware, blithely unconcerned.  if not aware, strangely disconnected given prior connection.

Please advise.

[house-rogala]

The To-Do List

Rosella took quick notes as her employer paced the room.  “Cancel the Nebo Terrace deals,” he said.

“All of them?  You’ll be out-”

“All of them,” he said, in a tone that brooked no discussion. 

“Yes, Mr. Rogala.”  What would a slightly miffed secretary do?  She let out the tiniest huff of breath, flipped a page in her notebook, and asked, “Will Mr. Nasim suit as a tutor?”

“He has to meet the children first.  Their decision.  And then Rabiah and I will go find a second one.  For art.”  He rubbed his forehead, then said, “Ever had no idea how to make someone feel better?”

Yes, Rosella might have said, had she been answering as herself.  Gods, yes. Rosella-the-secretary merely looked at him blankly until he shook his head and said, “Make the room ready for him anyway.  Second floor -- ah, shit, his eyes.  First floor?  No, second.  He said he didn’t need much.”

“Yes, Mr. Rogala.  If Mr. Nasim’s content to use the Green Room, the connecting room would make a wonderful classroom.  And there’s a room on the other side that’ll work for an art teacher, if you find one.”

“See to it,” he said.  “Ah, last thing.  Some gin.” 

“Gin.”  No one in the household drank it, though she had an idea--

“Lady Alissa drinks it.  Make sure we have a bottle of the good stuff.”  Despite her employer’s obvious worry for Rabiah, his mouth curved into a small smile. “Send her a bottle too, aye?  She’s running low.”