Meet 43, Adv 3, 8/31/13

This was an interesting meeting because for the first time the group ran into something that they did not expect or could deal with.

The threat of a doppleganger.

Now, I've never said it was, nor did I say it wasn't. Just the hint of it and the party has been driving themselves nuts trying to discover different ways to prove who they are to one another as well as the NPC's in town.

Write up follows:

The party walked through the rain to Castle Canastal where they asked for audience with the Castle’s Castellan. At this point, Fist’al left the party and worked his way to Pelis the Rug Merchant. The group had to wait only a brief amount of time before the Castellan was willing to see them. A portly man in his last 50’s, he was still in a foul mood from the group’s incessant questioning of him not too long ago, but he was asked by Baron Taugis to spend some time with the party now, clearing up some information from a few weeks ago.

 

And it was difficult getting any further information. The Castellan felt that the group was questioning his ability, as he did not KNOW where the other casks of ale came from. There were 2 originally in the larder, but obviously more were coming up. Everyone was working the 4 days, and they had hired 6 more people, but the amount of drink imbibed during that time made the Castellan’s notes and log books useless. We did verify though that 6 personages that were NOT part of the Castellan’s normal staff of 26 (including the guards) were here for 3 of the 4 days of the Baron’s Daughter’s party and might have been part of the party responsible for the strange going ons.

 

Meanwhile Fist’al made it to Pelis where after a strange greeting passed some information back and forth and then left, heading back to the Hall of Heroes with a rolled up leather scroll that had some information for him. He sat in his chair, opened it, and it read, “Boo”. And then something whizzed at him. He ducked; it hit the cabinet – a dart of some kind. Behind him a set of shutters was open but no one was there.

 

On looking over the dart, the pressurized glass vial in the heart of it burst, covering him in narcoleptic vapors. He fell to the ground, pretending to be knocked out, and waited. It was when someone was reaching for his magic ring that he latched onto its hand and stabbed the dart into it. They scrambled for a bit and then Fist’al stood up and beheld…himself.

 

Son of a…what the hell???

 

He thrust out at it but it SPRUNG backwards, folding its body into itself, and sailed through the shuttered windows to the street. The elven thief gave chase, getting to the window in time to see his double cross the street and start to climb the wall of the charcoaler. Then its body rippled and claws grew from its hands and it seemed to turn into…a 6’ tall yellow haired possum.

 

Aw…come on!!

 

He scrambled out the window and gave chase and it reached the roof, pulling himself up slowly the side of the building. Panting he made it to the top in time to see the pursued cross to Sutor’s forge and JUMP the 20’ across the road to the top of the closest Tanner’s Way hovel. It then disappeared over the side and was lost. Furious, unable to give chase and it was gone; Fist’al looked around Tanner’s Way briefly and then stormed his way back to Pelis.

 

At this point the party was coming back from Castle Canastal, where the noted the front door open, Fist’al missing, shutter open, and a bloody stain on the ground. He wasn’t here and no one knows what happened. Flimflam spoke with animals and had Whosea track the missing thief.

 

Fist’al meanwhile learned that he had (or a copy of him) visited Pelis earlier, and in a fit of “not gonna happen”, ordered Pelis to kill him (Fist’al) if he came to him and did not say a password first. Like “chocolate”. He then returned to the Hall.

 

It was here that the tracking was not needed and Fist’al told the group of what happened (doppelganger?) and they agreed to track the scent of the blood stain. They went to Tanner’s Way and Whosea did his trick again, leading the group to the home that we had been at earlier. Checking it over, we found dirty bandages and the remains of a healing potion. We then went back home.

 

Where we discovered we screwed up and had left the front door opened and were now robbed. The major thing missing? The Vortex Cloak from Candlewick Keep – capable of absorbing directed magic.

 

We no longer felt “safe” at the Hall and Fergus worked on possible ways to peg the windows from inside as well as preventing them from being picked from without. The day passed this way until it 9PM and it was time to go the Cemetery and do our walk/patrol.

 

This time Fist’al and Auri went with Fergus, the two of them eventually scaling the fence between the Cemetery and the Rescent Homestead. They proceeded to look in the dark for any holes or signs of digging, but after many hours, did not find. They then went to the barn where a single mule was and looked around there. Only a single sleepy dog came to investigate but after some time left. When it was done, they had found nothing that showed any sort of tunnel/digging from the Rescent home to the Cemetery.

 

The group slept well that night and it was about 8:30 on the morning of Firemonth the 8^th and Father Gavilerin of the Hospice had come to visit. He wanted Fergus to come and help him, two kids were in this morning, one 4 year, one roughly a year, listless, feverish and sickly. The paladin wasted no time and went off to the Hospice to help.

 

As for the rest of the group, it was fairly slow, learning eventually that some of the “copied” deeds they had picked up were of homes in Tanner’s Way – bracketing the Tannery itself. Finally Codron and Groon came, two local warriors in training, wanting to walk picket with Fergus @ the Cemetery. The night passed.

 

It was now the 9^th of Firemonth and the group went to the Pixie Down Inn where they ate breakfast with some 100 odd other members of Shakun. A variety of foods were ordered, but it was roughly 20 minutes after the fact that we saw a patron get up on shaky legs, stagger a few paces, and then fall down gasping. The party looked on in shock as another person did the same. Flimflam began to sweat and was having trouble swallowing and then Fist’al the same. The rest of the party was alright and hastened to get our friends out and to the Hospice right away.

 

Their symptoms grew worse and Fergus ran ahead to announce us to Father Gavilerin. Behind us in the Pixie Down Inn the sick number continued and spilled into the street, over 20 people so far ill. At the Hospice we had learned that another child had passed away this morning and then the call came of more sick people being brought in.

 

The call was made to clear the streets and citizens to return to their homes, thanks to Fergus’ quick thinking in getting the town criers, the Captain of the guard, and the Marshall’s office involved. While this was going on, Auri and Marcus took it upon themselves to try to piece together what happened, and that meant getting to the Pixie Down Inn again.

 

They were stopped on the streets and escorted back to the Hall of Heroes and told to stay there, which they did for 10 minutes or so before sneaking out again and making their way to the Inn. Once there Madis, the proprietor, bid them welcome and we learned that 37 people had gotten sick from the Pixie Down Inn. The two friends investigated and narrowed it down to the porridge served today. It was prepared with fresh milk just delivered from the Mekarin Homestead (the only daily farm that close to Shakun, all others were at much more distant homesteads). There was still some gallon or so left and Madis was very unhappy of it, with the dead kids from today and a few days ago, this was some sort of evil eye or hexery going on.

 

With some of the milk, the two friends made their way to Tanner’s Way where they enticed a few bums to sit and talk to them, eventually getting one of them to drink the suspect milk. As expected, 20 minutes plus later he began to sweat, grow shaky, and then fall over sick. Not the nicest thing to do, but bingo – identification of foul milk had occurred. They took the bum to the Hospice and the day passed. Fist’al and Flimflam eventually stabilized and would grow better after a day of rest.

 

The word around town was though (after the ban on leaving was lifted that afternoon) was that the Marshall’s office discovered the same thing Auri and Marcus did, and the townsfolk were wroth and angry and the Mekarin family. Their deal with some of the locals for milk trade disappeared, and the sick kids over the last 3 days were @ homes around their farm who had purchased some of the milk on their own.

 

We suspected we would talk to the Mekarin family again someday but most likely not until tomorrow. It was 9 PM and Fergus Codron and Groon were going to walk picket again soon @ the Cemetery.

Meet 42, Adv 3, 8/24/13

I like real world issues or the like in my game, it gives it a gritty and honest feeling. That brings up what occurred @ this meeting and that was the militant Marshall pressing for the raising of the legal drinking age and making public drunkenness a crime punishable now by time in the stocks.

The group was convinced it would not work and would only further cause a rift in the town, but the underlying issue IS that there is a rift in the town - and it's roughly along an imaginary age line of "above 20ish" and below.

With the goblin occupation over, the youth of the town expect things to be easy and no longer hardship and dominance. To the elders in town it is finally time to work for themselves and not have taskmasters taking what they've built. But it requires work - and the youth haven't seen a single drop in required work during the shift from occupation to freedom.

And the cracks are forming around the foundation of Shakun.

Write up follows:

Morning of Firemonth the 6^th, the majority of the party remained asleep but Flimflam awoke early and met with Marshall Westwinter briefly before the two of them continued on their way to meet with Baron Taugis. Given the recent number of issues regarding the local youths in and around Shakun, the Marshall wanted to establish, within the town limits including the cemetery, a minimum drinking age of 19 (currently 16). In addition, wanted to make the crime of public drunkenness punishable by 3 days in the stocks.

 

What followed was a rousing debate between the 3 of them, with Flimflam arguing that the two measures would not work, and instead we needed to find the cause of the drinking and definite poor attitude amongst the locals. The Baron did side with the Marshall but tempered the punishment to 2 days. The ordinance was going to go live today at noon and criers would be announcing it in the town square at that time.

 

After the Marshall left, Baron Taugis impressed upon Flimflam that the party should further investigate the drunken youths in a different manner, since their attitudes/actions were reminiscent of the GoblinWater issue from 3 months ago. He agreed and returned home to the Hall of Heroes where he sat with Fist’al and Marcus, filling the 2 elves in on the situation as it stood.

 

We also learned from Fist’al that he found no obvious holes anywhere in his walking and the digging tools had been dirty, but dry.

 

By early noon the party was up and then the criers were making the announcement. This brought wails from the younger people in town and barks of support from the older. We wanted to avoid being out there this day but we had some errands we wanted to accomplish so we split up and hit them as fast as possible while joining up during our mission.

 

Auri, Marcus, and Flimflam went to Captain Thragriel @ the Militia where they verified some information, learned the girls captured last night would fall under the new ruling and suffer 2 days in the stocks but not until the Magistrate met with them in the morning and sentenced them (it was Restday). We would be helping out the watching of the cemetery by having someone on hand from 10 PM to 3 AM each day until the Undertaker and the gravedigger were better and able to resume their duties. Auri was offered a job as a night walker on the walls, given that Captain Thragriel was looking to hire 20 more militia and rotate the experienced guards from the walls to walking the streets. This of course, in the interest and issue regarding the new decree and ordinance.

 

Fist’al and Fergus went to visit Zarik Ikarsbane, the Consul and former adventurer in the process of training the latest class of young men in the warrior arts. They wanted to meet with Codron, Thrish, and Hagan – three men that we had met with and used earlier. We learned that Thrish was no longer in the program, quitting after becoming increasingly cruel and short tempered. This was different for Fergus to learn, since our belief to date was that the pseudo-goblinwater symptoms were trafficked through the imbibing or alcohol. Thrish was a well-known teetoller and to our understanding, never drank. The paladin instead told Codron that we might need him soon and would be in touch.

 

Flimflam and Marcus took a brief detour to the baron where a note was written and dropped off for the nobleman regarding things learned and interest in meeting with the Castellan at a future time to have some questions answered.

 

Auri went to Sern’s general store where she watched a seeming rush on whatever alcohol the trader had in stock and the refusal to sell to citizenry of Shakun under the age of 19. She purchased a half-sized wine/waterskin and tried to get a bottle of red wine, but had to get someone to vouch for her age so Mamma Rhyback came down and spoke for the half-orc girl.

 

Fist’al and Fergus went to Thrish’s home and spoke with his mom for a short while. The 17/18 year old was not home and had left a week or so ago. No, he was not drinking, but did hang out with a new class of rude teens. She doesn’t know where he is and hopes he is well and would one day come back.

 

At this point the party met up together and went to the Hospice where they checked in on the Undertaker and gravedigger. The two men were still pretty bad off but were out of danger. We were able to get the Undertaker’s keys and knew that night that Fist’al and Fergus were going to walk patrol.

 

Flimflam went off to talk to the herbalist briefly and then the party returned to the Hall and the day passed. Auri went off to report for duty and handled questioning of the Night Captain poorly, who fired her from being in the militia and asked her to leave.

 

During the night, Fergus was walking picket in the cemetery and Fist’al continued his searching of the grounds, this time armed with the keys. We learned that the Undertaker’s shed had new iron tools in there, most likely replacement of the tools that might have been stolen/misplaced – pretty similar to the ones we found hidden in the mausoleum. Fergus was able to walk about, learning that roughly 1/8^th of the cemetery along the south east section had a very low aura of evil radiating from it, but like Castle Canastal some time ago, it was at ground level or lower.

 

The next morning we shared what we learned with one another and talked about what was next. From what we gathered there was some angry youths in town standing pillory around the stocks where Gisette and the others from the attack on the Undertaker was fulfilling their sentence. We decided to find out where the Rescent homestead was, since during various questioning, we learned that apprentice Rescent had been let go from Ungoth’s Distillery for selling his own drink out the back door to anyone who wanted it. Was this the origin of the strange pseudo-goblinwater?

 

What made it even more interesting was the Rescent Homestead was the closest to town, and was situated right next to the cemetery, along its eastern edge. We were not welcomed onto the property as Master Rescent and his son (early 20’s) met us at the gate and answered our questions tersely and with no elaboration.

 

There was some sort of burial going on this morning and from what we were able to tell, it was a half-sized coffin which meant a child.

 

We left the Rescent Homestead with the feeling that we needed more information and maybe a trip back to the cemetery was in order.