Port-a-Lucine - Quartier Publique

[DM Indolence]

Shame. Otes Travert, a middling preceptor to young nobles in the ways of fencing and self-proclaimed 'Quartier Blade' challenges writer and duelist Cordelia Smith, putting his rapier against her broken dagger. He is humiliated in front of a miniscule audience, throwing his rapier into the baie and retiring from his chosen profession to pursue a career in the arts, instead.

[DM Indolence]

En Garde! Gul Lachapelle, a veteran of the Falkovnian incursion, the Black Watch Chateaufaux militia, and one-time retainer to House Rancourt during the Revolution dons his dented breastplate and his finest clothes to challenge writer and duelist Cordelia Smith upon the very steps where his protégé was defeated. The timely intervention of the idle nobility and courtiers of the city spares bloodshed at the Theatre on the Baie... but come rainy dawn, blood has stained the Rue des Pistolets, and Gul Lachapelle has lost his last duel...

...Or perhaps not. A bleeding Gul is seem half-carried in the company of auburn haired woman of means who Gul calls 'Anette' with what would be scandalous familiarity in the upper quartiers. The woman escorts the elderly and blooded veteran to the Sisters of Compassion, where he begins the long road of convalescence.

[DM Indolence]

Blunted is the La Pointe de Miseaux! After a cordial conversation, the Baron de Miseaux, Edgar de Fre, challenges Cordelia Smith to a duel upon the Baie, though it sems his sensibilities require he appoint a second in his stead. His retainer, Natacha Delisle, offers a salute and few words to Mademoiselle Smith. Despite a quick opening that leaves Cordelia on the backfoot, a well-placed blow sees Delisle lose her bucker, and ultimately the bout when she yields.

Later gossip has it that Delisle would have had the fight if not for her opponent's choice to employ medieval arms in a gentelperson's sport, but this is largely considered a case of sour grapes as the engagement gains little notice among Dementlieu's traditional duelists.

[DM Indolence]

Meurtre! Ucidere! Murder! Despite his lascivious boasting regarding his prowess with a blade and otherwise, Sostrato Di Santis, a Borcan sailor aboard the docked ship 'Iubirea Durabilă' is cut down by the Ghastrian duelist Cordelia Smith, though not before disavowing legal responsibility should the bout go awry. Cordelia does not still her blade despite her clear victory, however, and sinks her blade into the man's heart after as he lays bleeding upon the ground. A shocked crowd of gentry and well-to-do associates watch as the Gendarmes take a unshaken Cordelia Smith into custody. Di Santis himself seems a man of little note among his kinsmen, but there's unrest among his shipmates and a weary curiosity to see how justice plays out among influential foreigners within the City of Lights.

[WitchOfTheCity]

Notices advertising a supervisory-type job are being posted and consistently refreshed around a number of cultured venues around the Publique. The only requirement - not to be a wanted or banished criminal. Sounds like a good way for a fresh blood to estabilish themselves in the city, or easy income for someone with already fostered connections.


// placed in game

[DM Indolence]

On 18 Decembre 779, the trial of Cordelia Smith for the murder of Borcan sailor Sostrato Di Santis is helmed by Magistrate Louis Joseph du Roquefort, Baron de Vexin on behalf of the Cour du Justice. In a rare display, Mlle. Smith largely allows this particular battle to be fought by her legal representative, Gris Quarpied, an elderly Petits Personne transitioned from advocate for the State to defense solicitor. Mlle. Mariah Parsons leads the prosecution on behalf of the Gendarmerie Nationale. While the defense's strategy to paint Mlle. Smith as a young woman caught up in the glory of a dueling culture is largely countered by the prosecution's repudiations, testimonial miss step leaves the Gendarmerie Nationale with a black eye while Quarpied himself risks upsetting the nobility with his attempts to shift blame to those gentry who shared Mlle. Smith's company. The palette is muddied by Quarpied's legally dubious invocation of Dementlieu's treaty obligations to Borca, and the Gendarmie Nationale's reimbursement of the Stapan to Sostrato Di Santis indenture.

In the end, Mlle. Smith is convicted, though the Magistrate suspends her sentence in what is largely seen as a stopgap measures to avoid any wider diplomatic incident cushioned by the accused's own contrite admission of guilt and calls for clemency. The Magistrate's own decree mandates that the Gendarmerie Nationale ensure any further duels within its jurisdiction are fought in Dementlieuse style and conduct, with civilized weapons such as pistol or épée rather than 'medieval' implements. While efforts to curtail dueling (largely the domain of soldiery and the more hot-blooded and antique gentry) have failed in the past, there is little contention among the the enlightened of Port-a-Lucine to the notion a gentleman should carry a gentleman's weapon.

That Mlle. Smith was allowed trial at all is not-so-subtle credence to the influence of her employers at the Plume d'Or, while others question just how Gris Quarpied came to have such intimate understanding of the details of the Gendarmerie Nationale's investigative activities within the seedy confined of the Quartier Ouvrier.

[DM Indolence]

A single gunshot in the Quartier Publique sends a mass of nobility on promenade into an unseemly scramble. The Vicomte d'Orleon, in the City of Lights to receive his supposed Lamordian kin, is nearly struck by the stray musket ball. To the his credit, he leaps into action like a man half his age, taking cover with with pistol in one hand and épée in the other before joining with the Baron de Puymeras in escorting nearby gentlefolk to the shelter of the banque.

A frequent refrain comes in the form of lamentation for the frequency of such occurrences within the Publique in recent months, though this misguided narrative is quashed by influential folk of good standing who point out that such attacks are statistical aberrations that fail to upend the trend of peace within the Serene Republique. Some few gentry of suspicious mind paint conspiracies in whisper, pointing out that after the pall cast upon the Baron de Puymeras by the murder of his father by his own retainer, he seeks to cast himself as a victim in turn.

Some unsavory folk throughout the lower quartiers toast to the unnamed gunman, though the prevailing sentiment among the Commons remains that the troubles of the gentry all too quickly become the troubles of the working class when they follow such matters with too much interest.

[Agony]

Warden Eponine Verrox was seen running through the Publique with no regard for decorum, her face blanched with fear. She made straight for Saint Mère-des-Larmes where she sat in prayer for some time before closing herself in the Chapter House for the night, clearly still shaken.

[Maiyannah]

A train of foreign Ezrans, numbering five - or perhaps four and one, if one singled out the redheaded dementlieuse woman at the head of them - wind their way through the city to Cathedrale Sainte Mere des Larmes, the purpose unknown, save to them.

[DM Indolence]

The clatter of iron-shod hooves upon cobblestones interrupts the peace of the Quartier Publique as the Baronet de Courcillon and a dozen of his closest retainers, to include his nephew speed east on some errand of haste. They are girded in breastplate with muskets upon their saddles, and they fail to halt in the city of Chateafaux, only lingering long enough to trade for fresh horses before riding hard in the direction of the Falkovnian border.

[Starburst]

Eventually gossip infiltrates the various circles that Dame Enora de Courcillon was seen striding through the Quartier Publique with a single retainer following her, wearing her house colors and her riding clothes. The uniform was fairly recognizable, as the same she wore to the recent execution of Mariana Dragavei, and the same she wore when she served in the Silent Field campaign. She carried her familiar leather satchel, enough to be traveling with supplies. Her retainer was armed.

Further rumor later would come back that both were seen riding east past Chateafaux on horseback, in the direction of the Falkovnian border.

[House de Courcillon]

A rider bearing the uniform of House de Courcillon is seen entering the city from the Eastern Gate.  He stops to attach one parchment to the public Notice board and then leaves a second outside the Place de Leon itself.

House de Courcillon unequivocally condemns the treasonous actions of the false Captain Felix Charbonnier and his band of rogue Gendarme.

For the crimes of:

Dereliction of duty, in the heinous abuse of power against the peasantry of Ameranthe
The unspeakable Assault and Abuse of female Prisoners of War
The Murder of Alain Cartier, Retainer to House de Courcillon

For these crimes and many more there can be no forgiveness, only justice.

Until such a time as Lawful Order is restored to Ameranthe, the forces gathered there under the de Courcillon banner shall remain, lest the Hawk seek to benefit from the poison that weakens the lifeblood of this, our Serene Republic.

- Baudouin de Courcillon, Knight of the Order of Serene Abundance, Baron of Puymeras

[Avela]

A carriage is brought around the Governor's Hotel, awaiting only shortly as retainers dressed in red and black carry a couple smaller traveling cases into said carriage, with the Madame Baroness de Courcillon in step. Hardly a moment is spared after the Baroness and the Puymeras retainers board the carriage before it takes off to the east, posthaste.

[DM Indolence]

Tutting, sympathetic word travels through the city's social circles that Prima Dona Maria Diosa has taken ill, preventing her performance at the forthcoming Lady-Governor's fete. A host of would-be climbers with some measure of artistic talent view this 11th hour gap in the festivities as an opportunity to make themselves known before the elite of the capitol, or at the very least be paid handsomely for a chance to win accolades from the Lady-Governor herself. Naturally, aspirants eager to win an invitation as entertainers for the evening would need to seek out a relevant Councilor in order to plead their case, rather than waiting to be noticed. In the Serene Republique of Dementlieu, ambition and initiative walk closely, hand in hand.

[DM Indolence]

A rather lovely performance by a foreign minstrel is encored by the wails of Mademoiselle Cécila-Valentina Von Chéreau. It's unclear what so moved the young woman to fright or anguish, but most of the gentry simply shrug their shoulders at the woman's odd display and dismiss it with a single word of resignation. "Thespians"