Date: Friday, 11 Sep 1992 00:47:59 EDT
From: Mike Sander <344LWKC@CMUVM.CSV.CMICH.EDU>
Message-ID: <92255.004759344LWKC@CMUVM.CSV.CMICH.EDU>
Newsgroups: alt.pub.dragons-inn
Subject: [DQ/W/MI] Lancos Intermission: a new member...

Characters: Lancos, WIlliam, Alfvaen, The Little Rat (all with permission)

>Lancos: "We'll have to ask him when he wakes"

Almost as if on cue, William's head slowly rises, as he reawakens.
"What happened", he said.

"That's just what we were going to ask you!" Alfvaen countered.
"How do you know Elstree, to put her in a sculpture like that?"

"Yes, and how are you familiar with TrueSilver?" Lancos added.

"Elstree? . . . TrueSilver?", William looked confusedly at the clay,
"Oh! I see . . . which one's which, hold it there are three! No . . four?
Three and a half . . . . that girl is almost Eloise, but . . no it's not.
It's someone else. Ummmmmm, working . . yes I remember a feeling like,
like someone was placing images in my mind but there were too many
They . . . they wanted to be formed, . . no _demanded_ form, they
wanted to be real . . . Sorry, I guess that doesn't help much.

Alfvaen and Lancos exchanged brief disappointed looks, this time with no
danger of laughter breaking out.

Alfvaen sighed.  "I was afraid it wouldn't be THAT easy. I guess it was
more the fact that >I'm< worrying about her, and you picked up on that."

LIttle Rat looked curiously at the sculpture. The man had looked like he
was playing with mud, but somehow Little Rat's mud never stuck together
like that. It must be a special expensive kind of mud, she decided. But
Mr. Elfman kept saying that he saw somebody in there. She picked it up for
a closer look, momentarily worried that someone would slap her hand and take
it away, but nobody did--in fact, Delmara smiled. Oh--that was the woman
they were talking about. It didn't look like a real woman, 'cause instead
of legs she had a big lizard or something. But as she looked closely, she
saw that the woman's face did look familiar...

The day before, she had been watching this one house she liked to watch.
There were lots of women in there, and some of them looked really nice,
wearing big frilly dresses and things. Sometimes Little Rat wished she
could be like them, and wear a frilly dress all day. But there were always
nasty men that went in there. Not the Gutt Man, but others like him. And
some of the women really looked old and ugly when she saw their faces.

But yesterday she'd seen a bunch of men bringing a really pretty girl there.
SHe had been wearing a simple dress, no frills at all on it. But she had
been one of the prettiest girls Little Rat had ever seen anyway. She must
have been a princess. Her hair was like gold, like the gold Elfman used to
pay for her meal. And Elfman was a prince. Suddenly she realized the
truth. Elfman was a prince, and he was looking for his princess. The bad
men had hidden her away in this house.

She held the statue up to Mr. Elfman and said, "hey, Mr. Elfman, I know da
woman in dis mud thing. I seed her yesterday. Some men taked her inna
house a bunch of ladies live in."

Alfvaen looked at Little Rat in surprise. "That's very good, Little Rat.
That's exactly the kind of information I want. Let's go back to my office
and you can tell me more." She put the statue back on the table, and they
and Delmara made their way out of the Inn. Little Rat looked around one
more time, holding this place in her memory--this was easily the nicest
place she'd ever been. Then she followed the Elfman to his "offis",
whatever that was. Probably his secret prince's palace.

Lancos watched the procession. Seeing Little Rat's tattered-rag outfit
and dirty appearance caused him to remember Valgar's condition the
first time Lancos had seen HIM. Even though he barely knew the man,
somehow Lancos felt Alfvaen would see to it that the Little Rat would
receive as much of the same treatment as possible.

He then turned to William. "Well, as far as I'M concerned, that dragon
cinches that you were meant to join us. We'll discusss it in the
morning --when four [Lancos, William, SunStorm/ShockWave and Valgar] of
us have clearer heads-- but I'm sure the rest of the party will agree
quickly enough."

William --after storing the clay figure-- nodded agreement, and the
pair headed to their seperate rooms, Lancos informing William about
some of the party's previous action along the way....

As Lancos entered his room, downstairs, 'Raelf had decided to accompany
Alita back to her place.
[ADMIN: In other words, this takes place BEFORE the Kadrys disappearance
 post. For my response to that, stay tuned...]

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Michael Sander 344lwkc@cmuvm.csv.cmich.edu
AKA Lancos Erredan
SAQ: "Now it's time for change"-Motley Crue