Give me a Wits+Invest Daniel Leto and Malcolm Green , please - to examine the door at the far wall.
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It was amazing that the mountain could notice anything from across the basement, but he did.
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Daniel continued to poke around.
The door on the far wall appeared to be able to open somehow. There were inset hinges, hard to see unless you were close that would open the shelf like a door.
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"Hey guys. Check this out," he called. His question about looking at the Hedge momentarily forgotten even by himself in favor of the 'secret' door. He gave the shelves a tug and nudge to see if it would move or if there was a lever they needed to pull to make it open.
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Green grunted.
"I knew something looked odd about that shelf. What is this place? A Californian house of usher?" he rumbled, referring the archetypal house with mystery and secrets.
Still, he refrained from moving his giant frame deeper into the close confines of the basement.
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Evelynn hopped down the remaining steps and crossed the dusty basement to join Daniel by the secret door. Her eyes were wide and excited by the prospect of a secret passageway. She offered Daniel a warm grin. "Good eye! How exciting! I wonder what's behind here?"
She peered at the shelf where Daniel had been tugging, trying to find anything that might help open it - a latch maybe, or a keyhole perhaps?
The tug from Daniel made the small nearly unnoticeable latch jiggle. Evelynn spotted it with a bit of difficulty, but it was there. Upon the release of the latch's button, buried into the side of the shelving, it released the shelf from the wall which swung away from it's latch.
Next, was another door that looked like any standard front door of a house, aluminum on the outside and well insulated. This door was easily opened from the inside. When that door opened, there was a small landing and a set of stairs. There was dirt and bits of grass on the stars, water stains, dead worms, and cobwebs. There were no recent tracks and dust had collected for quite some time. It was plain to see that the above door that was flat lead to the outside and where the door was, indicated it was in the backyard of the Inn. Why it was there, was a question that was not answered by the looks of things.
L'aire
The Fairest watched the trio work on the door, looking around and surveying the inventory of the basement. She wasn't trying to be standoffish, but there were already three crowded around the shelving.
"So, what are you guys finding with that?" A hint of wild curiosity in the Onxy's voice.
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"Some sort of secret stairs," Daniel explained, venturing a little ways in. He picked one of the dead worms. It's dried out corpse stayed stiff and wrinkled. "Looks like it hasn't been used in a while but it seems to exit out into the backyard. The actual backyard... not... you know," he faltered a bit. Sometimes talk around could be confusing. He tossed the worm back down where it clicked on the ground.
"This could offer a perfect excuse to say some of us went to explore the grounds while we actually check out the 'other side'." He looked up at the horizontal door, odd that they should come across one here after finding the old Common's flat on the ground as well. "Assuming we can get this open."
He waited to see what the others thought before actually doing anything. They had already opened quite a few doors Arthur would probably have preferred stay shut.
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The door swung open, creating a puff of dust and stale air that sent Evelynn back a step, covering her mouth with her sleeve and coughing. Waving her hands in an attempt to clear the air, she followed Daniel into the small space and peered upwards at the door.
"Weird. I mean, not that there's a door to the backyard here, weird that it's hidden behind a secret door. Outside cellar doors aren't that unusual, and if they'd wanted to stop using it, why did they go to all the effort of putting in that inset latch mechanism?" She took a step back out of the space, tongue poking out between her lips in thought. "I wonder why...?" Her mind went back to the little butterfly brooch in her pocket, and to the quick explanation Arthur had given upstairs about where it had come from. It probably wasn't related, but her imagination was running wild with thoughts about the poor changeling woman escaping out the secret door in the dead of night because loyalists had come hunting for her...
She hadn't had a chance to mention it before, not with Arthur around, but they were alone for the first time since she'd found it. She pulled it out of her pocket, the little brooch sitting daintily in the palm of her hand, and held it out for the others to see. "I think a, um, Lost woman stayed here, once. Arthur said she disappeared and left this behind."
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