You live and work in Castle Selkrave, which is on the slopes of the east side of Mount Selkrave.

In fact, it is the slopes of the east side of the mountain. Every square inch of the mountainside -- except for the bottom 500 feet or so, which is too sheer a drop-- is covered with castle, or ornamental gardens (or fruit and vegetable gardens).

Of course, humans don't live in the whole castle. They used to, centuries ago-- or so you've always been told-- but now the royal family and its servants (that includes you, you're a servant) occupy less than 5 percent of the total living space available.

The royal family are:

--Lord Selkrave: Went insane after his royal library caught fire and burned up. Believes he is one of the ravens that live up in the Tower of Night. The court baker bakes Lord Selkrave little rolls in the shapes of mice, beetles, lizards and frogs, which Lord Selkrave always grabs and eats right away as soon as he sees one lying around. We hope they make him happy.

--Lady Giovanna Selkrave: Lord Selkrave's wife. A recluse. A very tall (about six-foot-six), very well-fed woman, Lady Giovanna spends all her time in her rooms, with her birdcages full of birds and her cats. Only grave emergency will make her leave her rooms. In or out of her rooms, though, she is quite intelligent and insightful.

--The Young Lady Dolores Selkrave: The eldest child of the royal family. Dolores is fifteen. She is whimsical, impatient, immature, passionate, and self-absorbed, but she can also be impulsively warm and caring. She is the only one who can make her father act even remotely human (for very short times).

--The Young Lord Casimir Selkrave: The only son of the royal family. Casimir is six. He is very quiet, very introspective, but very wise for his age. He has it in him to be energetic and athletic-- but he has been taught that good behavior should mean being still and quiet and serious, so he's always torn. Likewise, he's always torn between being a good boy (as defined by most adults around him) and wanting to be free of all the rather stupid expectations and traditions that surround him every day of his life.

--Stefana and Saffron Selkrave: The sisters of Lord Selkrave, Stefana and Saffron Selkrave are twins. They have always resented Lady Giovanna for marrying Lord Selkrave and giving him heirs-- thereby knocking them out of the line of inheritance (not that they have any heirs, themselves). (They were originally triplets-- there was also a Saffira Selkrave, the oldest-- but she died not long before her 40th birthday.)

--Quicklime: a 19-year-old castle servant who is currently the apprentice to the Master of Ceremonies (a sort of court historian).

--Mr. Scathe: Lord Selkrave's personal servant. Now that Lord Selkrave spends hours at a time perched on things in the Tower of Night, Mr. Scathe is freed up to more or less run things. He is cold until you get to know him, but fond of Dolores and Casimir.

--Dr. Furrow: Royal Physician. Seems mean and silly and weak, but he's not. Really, his heart is in the right place-- he just suffers fools poorly.

--The Master of Ceremonies: Master Lintroad. A stuffy, stiff, thin old man who's no fun at all.


YOU work in the castle. Choose your profession:

--Alchemist: you can make potions
--Apothecary: you can heal others
--Beekeeper: you can command bees
--Blacksmith: you swing a mighty hammer
--Cook/Baker: you can grant strength and vigor and energy to others
--Falconer: you can command falcons
--Gardener: you can grow (or shrink) plants
--Goatherd: you can command goats and walk on rooftops
--Musician: you can make others feel emotions, even the dead
--Sage: you specialize in useful knowledge of history and folklore and maps
--Tailor: you can make clothing that makes the wearer hard to see-- and also quilts that can cover even ghosts and fairies

Recently, someone more important than you has asked you to go on a mission to one of the unused parts of the castle. There used to be castle guards who would do things like this, but they're all gone, and there really aren't enough to spare for this sort of thing anymore.

--Basically, someone wants you to go find something and bring it back-- something they used to own that has sentimental value, or a medicine, or a special bottle of wine, or an albino goat (or cat or bunny), or a rose from a far-off garden, or a book, or an old recipe, or a telescope-- or maybe even the young lord Casimir has gone off exploring. Or maybe it's just that no one remembers what's down THAT hallway, and they're sending you to go find out. As long as you don't get lost, how hard could this be?

---

WHY IT'S HARD: The unused portions of the castle are dangerous, for at least three reasons:

1. Fairies. The ancient lords of Selkrave long ago bargained with the fairies for wealth and power. In return, certain debts are owed. One of the main ones is that the fairies live in many of the unused-and-forgotten rooms of the castle. Sometimes they're invisible, but audible. Sometimes they're visible, but inaudible. Sometimes they're visible, audible, and they want to use you for sword-dueling practice-- or to play tricks on.

2. Goblins. The ancient lords of Selkrave long ago bargained with the goblins to build the castle in the first place. In return, certain debts are owed. One of the main ones is that the goblins, who live below the castle inside of Mount Selkrave, come up from forgotten stairways and cellars at night and party in many of the unused-and-forgotten rooms of the castle. There are always signs-- empty bottles, candle stubs, confetti, discarded wrapping-paper, full ashtrays...

3. The Undead. One of the things that the ancient lords of Selkrave asked the fairies for was immortality... and so many of the unused-and-forgotten rooms of the castle are haunted by ghosts or have other types of undead-- skeletons are particularly common.
This message was last edited by the GM at 00:26, Sun 24 Sept 2023.