steps - half past eleven (Compline) 0/1
It has been a very long day. You have walked far across the English countryside to reach the abbey and your bones are weary from travelling. The sun has long since set but the countryside is illuminated by a bright moon. The late summer breezes are cool and you begin to feel the chill beneath your habit.
In the moonlight, you can just make out the neatly trimmed fields tended by your brother monks. Ahead of you, perched on a crag, looms the abbey. It is a complex of humble stone buildings surrounded by a high stone wall. The only approach is from the west, over a high flight of steps that span a chasm and climb to a sturdy wooden door in the abbey wall. The abbey itself is surrounded on all sides by cliffs.
It is well past Compline when you a climb the steps. By now all of the monks will have retired. Arriving at the door you knock and Father Emmanuel himself opens the door to greet you.
"Pax vobiscum, brother. We have been expecting you. Can you find your way?"
"Yes Father." you answer. "I have been given a diagram of the abbey. I will be fine."
"Then you will forgive me if I retire. Matins comes all too soon and I must be rested.
"Dominus vobiscum."
With that, Father Emmanuel withdraws and you are once again left with your thoughts.
[Picture number 3 here.]
A medieval murder mystery. by Steve Blanding
Release 1 / Serial number 080626 / Inform 7 build 5T18 (I6/v6.31 lib 6/12N)
The steps descend to the west for nearly fifty yards before they reach the path that leads to the fields. Along the way they arch over a chasm. The walls of the abbey curve toward you from the north and south. In the center of the high wall in front of you (to the east) is a solid wooden door.
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