Manor of Origin (REDUX)

"Thanks," Louis responds to Faux with a friendly smile. "I appreciate that."

Banshee’s question seems to startle him a bit, but he answers, "…Not exactly. Time seemed to slow down for a moment there and I just… moved without thinking, I guess. Good thing I did too, or else our friend the magician would be needing an eyepatch. Or a coffin." He frowns. "More importantly and more bizarrely, there are no bullets in this gun so I don’t actually know how I managed to fire it at all. I’m hoping that Faux might be able to explain it with his spell."

An evil grin grows to a new width.

Once in the room, Luc will immediately start preparing the rituals.

"So, how long are you willing to wait? I can identify everything in 20 minutes, but Familiar would take another 1 hour on top of that. Since Danzig will cast his Familiar, maybe I'd better cast mine later. I don't think it's a good idea to sit still for so long." Luc says as he searches for the right pages in his spellbook. "Can I borrow the Orb for a few minutes?" He asks Archie.

Sitting on the floor, with the items in front of him, Luc holds his open spellbook in one hand to read the arcane formulas of the spell, small magical runes float around the item in question, while his other hand hovers over the item, making small movements with his fingers, in which runes react to it, as if he were solving a puzzle.

" Before you start, might I have a moment of your time?"
"I feel I’ve been rather patient, but you keep ignoring me."

Gharn deploys his shield and has his sword ready in hand;
"Sure thing. One might say that it's rather impolite to stay out of sight while wanting to have a chat. May I suggest that you show yourself for good manners sake? As long as you don't make a move on any of us you'll be unharmed." said Gharn trying to sound reassuring while he tried to spot their stalker.

Gharn doesn’t have to look very hard.
There, crouched down behind the child with his knife drawn, is the mysterious man.
He’s idly cutting her hair into a more manageable length, lowly humming.
The girl looks absolutely horrified.
"Who said I was hiding? That’d be horribly rude." he says with a wide grin.

"That's a move against us, fiend," Banshee says, pulling the
girl away. "How many chances do you think you'll get to earn ears that listen?"

As Banshee moves to pull the child away, the knife moves positions.
Before you can blink it goes from hair to neck as the man narrows his eyes.
"I’d say that listening is in everyone’s best interest at the moment, eh?
So I’d suggest you all step back and relax, especially you Mr. Gunslinger.

Luc slowly gets up from where he was going to do his rituals, as he gets up, he casually and quietly tries to tuck the Orb into his bag without the creature noticing.

"Okay, let's not do anything we might regret, understand?" Luc gazes at the girl and then back to the man. "What do you want with her?"

"I will say you were not very keen to talk a bit ago, yes?" Gregory's hand quietly falls on the pistol in his pocket, his body shielding most of his movement "Appear, smile, then go away and hide. That is not how you... how you say... begin conversation."
Though he cares little for the child, he is not so hardened as to be indifferent "That, with the child, I understand. Is security. Is armor." he looks at his companions "No harm to you, no harm to child, yes? So first thing I want to know. What do you want? You need some thing from us?"

The man turns his grin at Danzig. " A man of reason! Excellent!"
He draws the knife away from the girl’s neck and continues trimming her hair.
" I can’t say I want anything in particular, but we both know that we can’t exactly coexist at this point."
At this point in the sentence he grabs the girl’s head with his empty hand and turns it, squinting at the length. He then brings the knife to the apparent offending section and turns back to the conversation.
"I’d have done this over dinner, but you killed my kitchen staff yesterday, and since you know the rules of the Manor, I figure why not pick a time and place and get it done without anymore screwing around?"

Banshee watches with a little fascination. She holds the girls hand and vineyards her options, but his speed makes all the risk on the girl.

"You would cut her hair over dinner? That would ensure hair gets in the food."

The man cocks his head. As his eyes return to what he was doing.
" Ahh. Couldn’t help it. Used to be a barber once upon a time, and it’s former state was… unsightly."

"I did not kill any kitchen staff, and I do not know rules of the Manor." Gregory would be puzzled if it wasn't clear that the was talking to a madman "But you say pick time and place: it is duel you are proposing, yes?" honor duels were old-fashioned even in the Second Reich "Settling of scores, like old custom for love rivals?"

Louis’ tail swishes in annoyance and his fingers twitch but, not wanting to endanger the child, he refrains from drawing his pistols. He crosses his arms and waits for the cannibal to explain himself.

"Close enough."
Me versus the 5 of you, the cripples can sit on the sidelines with this lovely little thing."
He runs a hand through her hair, which he has cut into a close approximation of a girlish bob.
" To keep things fair one party will choose one variable while the other will choose the other. For example if I choose the place, you choose the time, or vice versa."
"Does that sound agreeable?"

"Sounds fair to me. May we have a moment to discuss this amongst ourselves?"