(Scars do not appear to be cause of death –shock ... - Bad Request

My jaw dropped, "But... he's your father. Don't y-"
"Not me real Da, he wasn't." Her eyes took on a hard look. "He was greedy,
an' he was stupid, an' he was selfish, an' he was weak. An' now 'ee's dead.
And that's all."
I sighed, hefting the crutch in my hand. The rickety wooden staff had a
crosspiece nailed across the top, itself wrapped in rags presumably to keep
the damn thing from jamming too sharply into Pharod's armpit when he
leaned on it. Not surprisingly, the crutch smelled terrible, and every inch of
it was covered in dirt, sewage, and unidentifiable remains.
Something about it made me wonder: despite its fragile appearance, it had
held up rather well. I even tested it with my weight and it held up without so
much as creaking. Considering Pharod's scavenging nature, the crutch
probably had some value beyond its surface appearance for him. Perhaps it
was a weapon (even if he didn't defend himself in the end), or...
I wandered around the Court, holding the crutch in one hand, pointing and
gesturing and hobbling on it. I only had to search for a few minutes
before....WHOOOOOSH…..The air before me cracked open into a familiar
blue portal.
Brilliant.
The air took me by surprise when we entered the portal. It was musty and
stale, but clean of the foul sewage stench of the Buried Village. High,
graceful alcoves contained books, books, and more books, all indexed and
placed in neat order among the shelves. They were free of dust, subject to
meticulous cleaning by a hand that knew how to arrange things. I pulled a
few tomes out, looked over the faded ink. A few had patches of
yellow-brown paste carefully applied to mend tears.
This was Pharod's hidden side... a library deep beneath Illwind Court, the sad
remnant of what glory this place used to bear.
How often had Pharod closed off Illwind Court so he could walk these halls
undisturbed, reading ancient books and sighing wistfully over his lost days as
a Guvner? Did he try to rebuild something he once had here, patching up
lost annals and archives?
504