Battle of the Bards - Les Abóminables - Singing Audition

Hangover Room
This attic-like room smells of cheap wine. A cot hides in the corner between a trunk and rickety shelving.
Here, the opera stores miscellaneous junk and the wine it serves to balcony guests. Cast and crew often retreat here for a drink or a nap.

Realising that the wine was far from good, the band decide to explore a bit.

They see names on three of the rooms
  • Oread’s Dressing Room
  • Delaney’s Dressing Room
  • Cleave’s Dressing Room
They decide to investigate each of them:
Oread’s Dressing Room
A dozen blooming bouquets, standing on small tables, fill the room with heady perfume. One of the bouquets is large enough to take up a whole corner by itself. A soft carpet covers the floor, and a book lies open on the vanity.
Cards on the bouquets show that they are from four or five different productions – re must be funny business going on to keep these flowers fresh!
The enormous (and expensive) bouquet in the corner is from Delaney, and the card reads, “Youʼre worth ten of that horrid shrew.” The book on the vanity is a collection of fairy tales.

Delaney’s Dressing Room
A spartan room with only a full-length mirror, bookshelf, chair, and dresser inside.
On a search of the room, the band find that the dresser is full of clothes of every size, from gnome to goliath. Some have holes for tails or wings. The bookshelf is full of scripts and romance novels.
Xlixi steals the costume made for a gnome.  

Cleave’s Dressing Room
A massive vanity littered with trinkets dominates the room. A well-used sword and shield are mounted on the wall, partially covering a blackened section of the panelling.
Cleave keeps mementos from her adventuring days on the vanity – a fox skull, an old wanted poster, a dagger hilt. The sword and shield are her own, covering a corroded patch of the wall where she accidentally sneezed.
Bardo tried to steal the sword, but was dissuaded by Hydrica.

To avoid any further suspicion the band head down for the singing audition.


Wizard Bunker
Snacks, papers, and books lie scattered around the interior of the old fortress walls. Narrow windows look onto the stage, and an apothecary cabinet stands on the far wall. It holds dozens of tiny labelled drawers and has a “Safety first!” poster pinned to the side.

Oread is in the western wizard bunker on the ground floor.


Oread is initially shy. 

Oread holds the audition. They ask the players to impress them, but they are a fickle judge and may hold one character to a higher standard than another.

Some of the songs:

Snow Bound
Yeti chorus, Bjorn Valjorn, Jawvert
(Work Song)
Snow bound, snow bound,
We hear the dragon roar.
Snow bound, snow bound,
We toil for her hoard.

I preened my wings
Hootine the owl
(I Dreamed a Dream)
I preened my wings in times gone by,
The moon was dark, the wind was chilling.
I dreamed the sun would never rise,
I dreamed of many mice for killing.

All my own
White dragon tyrant
(On My Own)
All my own,
Exquisite wealth around me.
On my throne,
I count it all till morning.
Without it,
My frozen heart is empty,
And when I crush a town I hoard each gem
And jewel and rupee

Do you hear the Yeti call?  
Yeti chorus
(Do You Hear the People Sing?)
Do you hear the yeti call?
Calling across the snowy glen?
It is the battle cry of monsters
Who will not be mooks again!

Each band member had two chances to impress Oread, with Heironmyo sounding like an angel to Oread.
Hydrica though sounded like a cat with its nuts stuck on a wire fence.

Oread goes on to explain that during shows, magicians use these areas to cast special effect spells onto the stage. The apothecary cabinet contains spell components (fleece, phosphorus, beans, etc.). The papers are cue sheets—scripts annotated with special effects notes. 

The band ask Oread where Delaney may be, which after some persuasion they inform them that Delaney is typically found in the loft.

Auditions



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