Sure enough, there was a pretty massive-looking wooden mug with rune-encarved iron bands inside that very same cupboard. Apparently the giants weren't very creative with hiding things.
Loki tipped his cigar towards Fenrick and then glared at Jake when he stretched out his hand.
"I'll be in touch." He flicked his cigar a final time as his entire body suddenly turned into bright flame and disappeared in a flash of light. Almost as soon as he'd left, the tunnels started becoming unbearably cold.
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.Deep Underground
"Well then," Jack said, saving his handshake by moving his hand up to adjust his hat, then awkwardly putting it back down. "Anyway... guess that's that. I'm going back to see if the others found anything out, you should come with so we don't get separated."
With that, he turned around and started heading back to the Foreman's office where the dwarf and the others were.
James took the cup with an appreciative nod. Almost as soon as his fingers had clutched the ancient mug, however, his eyes rolled back in his head, and his posture, previously languid and relaxed, became stiff and poised. When he spoke, his voice brokered authority:
"“All-father’s child Aid the Band
Heart replaced By hero’s hand
Tree and mountain Twisted fates
Tithe of blood Controls the gates.”
By the time the others had returned to the office, James was sitting on the floor, looking more pale and sickly than when they'd departed.
"Fuck me, that was horrid. Are you done faffing about in the mines so we can get out of this place? Feels like this bloody place is making me sick."
edited 13th Aug '14 10:31:10 AM by math792d
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.Foreman's Office
"Well in case you forgot, you aren't waiting for us, you're waiting for that great big ball of light in the sky that we like to call the sun," Jake said to James. "So unless you'd like that poor girl to burn right up as soon as we go aboveground, we're stuck here until sundown. You okay, though? You look a little pale."
"Anyway, bad news," he added to Donna. "Looks like there isn't a thing keeping these wards up. It's a giant, and judging by the size of the warding, Loki - oh, right, we met Loki down there - he thinks it's a big one, too. If we run into any more, we either have to convince the giant to take it down himself, or kill it. It's a real shame, those ghosts of yours are pretty useful, and these wards just outright shut down any advantage we could get from using them inside of these warded places. Still, they're good on the surface... they haven't found a moose or anything up there, have they?"
At the news, Donna stood straighter, looking rigid.
"Fucking Christ," she quietly growled before giving more of uer attention to Jake. "Still no sign of anything, surface-wise. Seems we really are the only living things here now."
She then went and knealed next to James. "We can't really have you like this for much longer. You think you could at least get back to sitting on the bed?"
Surprisingly enough, she offered a hand to him.
"I do not approve of the fact that my favorite quotes are too long for this character limit." - MeJames accepted Donna's hand with a greateful nod. "Trying to sort out prophecy, brother? Tends to end badly if you figure it out, you know."
The sun slowly started setting over the mining facility, and night came within a few minutes of the sun starting to set. An early night set over Røros.
Driving to Bixy Knoll took six hours. Six hours of riding through everything from regular highways to tight mountain passes to bridges over ice-covered fjords, until they finally reached a small village completely off the beaten path. They'd been driving on nothing but dirt roads for an hour before they'd even reached their destination, and they were met with signs saying "No Tresspassing" and "No Through Streets".
The village itself was like Røros - something that seemed completely out of time. But where Røros had been forever stuck in the seventies, this town looked like it was stuck in the 1800's, with a whole host of small but wide wooden buildings, each with a black thatch roof, and a chimney spilling grey smoke into the atmosphere.
"It's to protect the town," Ola said, pointing a finger at the signs. "It's fine. Drive on in. Just make sure me and James are the first to step outside, and they won't harm a hair on your head."
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.Looking out the window, Donna made eye contact with Tom, who was just outside the car and invisible to all without ghost sight. To him, she subtly twirled a finger in the air two times.
Have Kimura circle the perimeter. Notify me if anyone or anything potentially hostile comes our way.
With a silent nod, Tom vanished.
"I do not approve of the fact that my favorite quotes are too long for this character limit." - MeEven as Ola and James left the car, the more perceptive Scions could see people moving about in the shadows, even catching the occasional glimpse of a gun sticking out of a window or a door.
As soon as they step out, the town seems to dramatically shift. All the houses shrink in size to the point where most of the Scions would have to bow to get through the front door. Little shapes move around, still unwilling to be seen by the unfamiliar guests, even as Ola opens the remaining doors on the rental car and points towards a tiny little house at the end of what seems like the town square.
"Let's go to my house. I'll ask for Lódi, the one who runs the show around here. Maybe he can help you find what you're looking for?"
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.Exiting out of the car, Donna used her dark vision to see better, which probably helped her to spot some of the movements inside the small houses. She kept a hand on her now sheathed sword on her belt.
She didn't so much "see" as much as "feel" Tom watching out for them in the distance.
"I do not approve of the fact that my favorite quotes are too long for this character limit." - MeOla's house looked just as roomy and ancient on the inside. Someone had kept a fire going, spreading a very pleasant heat throughout the common room, built with a table in the middle of it long enough to hold several dwarves at the same time.
Of course, most of them had to hunch over, at least partially, just to get in through the door. The whole place was built dwarf-sized, which didn't leave a terribly large amount of room for maneuvering.
"Don't worry about them," Ola said, immediately zooming off to what looked like a pantry. "We don't like strangers in our house, Scions or mortals. The only reason James gets to stick around is that he helped us out of a bind a while back, and because we're in good standing with his father."
She appeared from within the pantry with a handful of (thankfully) human-sized mugs. "Tea?"
Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies."Much obliged, miss," Jake said, taking one of the offered cups of tea.
"Well if we have some extra time, we can always do a bit of community outreach to let the people get to know us better," he added. "We need to endear ourselves to them after all, if we want any help getting this Heart. You guys been having a giant problem, so I'm sure we could get a few willing souls. But I don't see any of those giants here now. They all long gone to go work elsewhere, or are some waiting nearby for some reason? I figure if we can take some of the pressure off of y'all here, show we're willing to stick our necks out for you, that might buy us a lotta goodwill."

Donna walked back over to the cupboard Nellig had been in and checked for the mug in there.
edited 9th Aug '14 3:04:10 PM by NaomiHansen
"I do not approve of the fact that my favorite quotes are too long for this character limit." - Me