Marielda 12: The Killing of the King-God Samothes By The Traitor Prince Maelgwyn Pt. 2

## "The Killing of the King-God Samothes By The Traitor Prince Maelgwyn Pt. 2"

> *My light is flickering*
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## Background

### Episode description

> In one way or another, High Sun Day is celebrated all across Hieron. After all, there is a day each year on which the sun hangs in the sky, resplendent, for what feels like an impossibly long time. After all, there is a day each year on which the heat gets so strong, the weight of the summer becomes so much, that a celebration must be thrown. On the perimeters of encampments on the plains and forests, light dances brilliantly, impossibly. The orcs have called up thousands of reflective objects, shields, mirrored boxes, from their collections and positioned them along the tops of the walls. From a distance, the settlements appear ringed by flame. The sun does not reach the dwarven cities, deep underground, but the stone feels warm to the touch. They close the heavy doors and snuff out the light and in the darkness hear the sound of the stone cooling. In Marielda, there is a train. There is a train and a volcano and dancing in the streets. A god beloved and feared, a populace, for once, at ease. It is High Sun Day again.
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## Plot

### Arrival

The episode begins with everyone on the train, at a standoff: the Six and Maelgwyn in one car and the four remaining Golden Lance representatives in the adjoining one.

Thackeray draws his gun. While Sige provides cover fire, Aubrey throws a smoke bomb at the Lance Noble. The three of them are successfully distracted. Thackeray, though, is undeterred and starts to approach, but Maelgwyn draws his blade and cuts him down. The knife visibly drains the life from Thackeray. Maelgwyn continues into the smoke-filled car. Hitchcock, with a gas mask, follows after him, saying “This isn’t it, this isn’t it yet.” Maelgwyn kills Lance Noble Helianthus , and Hitchcock can sense something dark in him, but he stops.

The train doors open. A very old cobbin, wearing a blackened apron, is outside. “You’re a little early,” he says. “What the hell happened in here?” He invites them out, and everyone exits the train. The cobbin gets on the train briefly, checks it, and pulls some switches. He returns, greeting each of the arrivals; it’s clear he was told who to expect, by name.

As he leads them out of the train station room, Aubrey informs the others, very excited, that this is the legendary Artificer Mundane. Edmund Hitchcock questions whether he’s on their side. Ethan, meanwhile, is even more confused than everyone else. When asked how he knew to expect them, Primo simply says, “Come on. Samothes. Ingenuity alive. He knows everything.”

The two remaining Lance Nobles, Iris and Orchid, are still with them at this point; Iris seems uncomfortable with Maelgwyn.

Primo leads them to individual guest rooms. Snacks are promised, and Aubrey asks if there are any apples. Primo says he’ll see what he can do. Everyone goes into the guest rooms, although Castille enters only after glancing towards Maelgwyn for confirmation. Once each room has been entered, the space reconfigures.

### Clothes

After not too long, there’s a knock on the door to Sige’s room, and Primo enters. Sige asks if he can visit Aubrey, and is told that he can’t. Primo gets out tailoring supplies, asking Sige how he wants to look, to which he replies, “Approachable.”

Primo next visits each of the Hitchcocks. For his outfit, Ethan requests the dress uniform version of his cavalry jacket, medals included. Edmund, on the other hand, asks to have his every-day uniform back.

Primo and Castille spend a while joking around. She changes her mind several times about outfits, and eventually admits, “I just want to look alive.” Primo says this is doable, and leaves and comes back with a mirror. When she looks into it her appearance changes to look like flesh instead of stone. She then decides for her outfit to wear a saffron dress.

Aubrey’s initial reaction is to ask what’s wrong with the messy heist clothes she’s currently wearing, but after some thought, and some discussion, decides on a skirt.

Primo returns to Sige with a variety of options. He chooses an outfit involving a plum trench coat, a suit vest, and gray pants. Primo also encourages Sige to keep his gun on him, eventually admitting that he knows Sige is the one who is trying to stop Samothes from being killed. They talk about Maelgwyn’s knife, Primo strongly implying that it was made as part of an attempt to hold back the Heat and the Dark. He also explains the weirdness of gods’ perceptions of time, the inevitability of the situation. He gives Sige a shimmery collar that resembles Thackeray’s magic jacket.

When Aubrey gets her clothes, there’s an apple with them.

### Exploring

Everyone hears a clunk as the guest rooms reattach to hallway. Castille picks the lock to her door and makes it into the hall, where she finds Maelgwyn. He tells her to stay in her room, but she argues, and he soon relents. They head back to the train station together.

Sige hears their conversation, and decides to break down the door to his room to get out. By the time he makes it outside, they’re gone, and he heads down the hall the other way. He enters a big dining hall containing five thrones and a glass dance floor, beneath which there is magma and the sound of hammering. From the view from a window, he can see that the entire structure is rotating somehow.

Edmund and Aubrey both pick the locks to their rooms as well, and run into each other in the hallway. They let Ethan out, and not long after Lance Nobles Iris and Orchid emerge from their rooms, as well. Orchid also has a fancy new outfit. She asks Hitchcock and Aubrey lots of questions, clearly frustrated. Aubrey tells her,  “You don’t really know what’s going on here,” but she continues to question why she should trust a bunch of criminals. Aubrey tries to just leave, and Orchid grabs her. “You know something,” she says.

Aubrey tries to explain the situation while keeping it in vague terms. Hitchcock makes the argument that everything that’s happened with the clothes and such should make it clear that they’re supposed to be here, and Orchid reluctantly accepts this. She says that Lance Noble Iris has been to one of these High Sun Day events before, but she never has; asks why, if they were expected, they attacked the Golden Lance on the train; and eventually just goes back to her room.

Castille and Maelgwyn enter an elevator. He awkwardly complements her new look. The elevator lets them out in a big suite bedroom—it’s Samot’s room, when he wanted Samothes’, because the elevator operates by taking you wherever you’re supposed to be. Maelgwyn leaves his mask and crown there, and they get back into the elevator.

Iris enters the room Sige is in, but leaves him alone. Sige leaves and reunites with Aubrey and Hitchcock. He sends the Hitchcocks ahead to look for Castille and Maelgwyn so that he can talk with Aubrey. Once they've gone, he asks if he can see her gun, and discusses her new willingness to do violence. He shows her the part of the gun where the initials of his now-scrapped boat can still be seen: H.K.C., *His Kingdom Comes*.

The Hitchcocks arrived at the station to find the train gone. As Aubrey and Sige rejoin them, another train starts to pull in. The station they're in has five statues, depicting the five primary gods, and they hide behind them. (Aubrey, Sige, and Edmund hide behind Samot, Samol, and Samothes respectively.) A whole bunch of people, of all kinds, from all over, emerge from the train. Aubrey, SIge, and the Hitchcocks join the procession into the throne room.

A person made of geometric rock, whose presence exudes an aura of dominance, enters the throne room. Then a bald woman in a flowy blue dress, whose presence has a strange effect of making any action taken feel almost involuntary. They take seats on two of the thrones.

Castille and Maelgwyn arrive in Samothes’ room. Samothes puts a hand on Maelgwyn’s shoulder and tells him, “Not yet.”

## Cast

* Austin Walker (GM)
* Jack de Quidt (Ethan and Edmund Hitchcock)
* Sylvia Clare (Aubrey)
* Ali Acampora (Castille)
* Andrew Lee Swan (Sige)