Something that he has been strangely unaware of until this day.
Write up follows:
We decided to stick around the Black District a bit longer and then made our way back to the Bawdy Wench Tavern. Once there Dizzy made a brief contact with the local guild personages there to get some information on King Seljack and Barb took a more prosaic approach and hit up the bartender with a hefty bribe.
Between the two of them they got some information and we discussed their findings. When King Seljack got the Sovereign Stone there were two other hirelings in the party – an assassin woman who joined him as his King’s Thief and personal bodyguard (we met her standing behind the king at the meeting today) and a wizard of some skill who was struck and cursed with a permanent invisibility. He’s taken to becoming King Seljack’s fixer and spymaster – but he has become strange over time and taken to not wearing clothes, personally spying on those he needs to instead of relying on spells.
He can become visible but only when he polymorphs himself into something else.
The Fox and the Henhouse is directly owned by King Seljack and the wizard has the place under surveillance should need be. The Bawdy Wench pays a stipend to King Seljack based upon volume of business and the king’s wizard tends to shy away from scrying unless need be. Just to be safe, we bounced from the 2nd floor to the 3rd, taking a room there. And we also learned that the wizard can easier scry on someone if he has a small token, personal, to them.
So we sat and ate and surreptitiously checked everyone over to see if anything was missing. It was later in the dinner that Thalin and Shim both noticed that one of Percy’s beard fetishes was missing a charm – something small and personal to him. Thalin escorted him upstairs to the 3rd floor where there seemed to be a serious number of plants in the hall – 2 on the right hall, 2 on the left, and 3 by the stairs. The majority of the plants were fichus, but the three by the steps were a transplanted juniper bush and 2 other smaller white dusted ground plants.
After getting Percy in the room, Thalin fired off a light spell on a coin wandered by the plants, gave it a piercing look, and then dropped the coin by the plant before walking away. When he turned back the juniper plant was gone and the window at the end of the hall had opened and someone was out there excited about his luck at finding a glowing magic coin.
Closing the door he informed Percy of the missing fetish and the dwarven priest was worried. Was he part of the King now watching the group? Should he stay behind? The thought was to be honest in our dealings and not give the King any reason to be concerned about us or our doings.
Meanwhile down in the Common Room, a guy came in with his friends, clutching a red glowing copper common and declaring it was a lucky magic coin and he needed to play darts again with that guy who beat him last week – triple stakes. The party left the Common Room and made their way upstairs where we saw two small white dusted ground clearance plants in pots outside our room.
As we were entering, Barb got pissy and moved the plant, pinching one of the leaves real hard to break it. The plant suddenly yowled in her hand, and BIT her, turning into a large tabby cat who then clawed the hell out of the barbarian before running down the hall and leaping out the window. The 2nd plant did the same, another cat. Inside the room Percy felt horrible for the cause of this and healed Barb of her injuries while we discussed the invisible wizard and then eventually fell asleep.
We awoke on the next day the 7th, knowing we were checking out today, where we were going to walk around town for a bit before meeting King Seljack for lunch @ 12. While touring the western ends of town, near a series of malters, we were stopped by a group of 5 green clad elven folk who were doing surveys. They were representative from Greenmourning, and the Emerald Queen Nylwire and they were wondering about the beers we had drunk and what flavors we liked. Greenmourning was looking to set up trade with Canaslan but wanted to send only what the people would want to drink and taste – not what the vendors were willing to purchase.
We answered as best as we could and then made our way to Castle Whitehall. The King had a meal set up for us and we ate and talked for a while, discussing our past adventures, killing kobolds, and things we had done and seen in our past. Eventually he decided the group was well meaning enough and wanted to have a better relation with Erylond and Pha-iyr Carom so signed off on the two letters of Credit and returned one to the party to take back to Erylond. We left on good terms and decided to head off to the Black District and get our required delivery package from Thimbles and the Canaslan Export Company.
There were 4 larger style companies in the district and Thimble’s organization seemed to be about the same as the others. He had 9 people working the warehouse and about a dozen shopping the wares. We went back to an office in the rear of the building where a human with leather pants and sword was waiting but Thimbles had him sit down and express this was all ok. As we were entering, it was noted that 2 people left the selling floor after watching our party, and headed out the door.
He is an acquirer and is always in the market for anything interesting that comes out of the Terror Dungeon or other places that he can turn a profit on. King Seljack has an intense hatred from below the board smuggling and thievery – as long as it’s known and he can get a piece of the action, he’s ok with the operations. The blood of the crested dracomen was in a stoneware jug, corked, covered, and wax sealed. We took property of it, signed off on the manifest that we had done so and then asked him to keep it here. He refused saying it was not his job but agreed to warehouse it for 30 bits until tomorrow.
We left, pushing our way through the crowded selling floor and eventually back to the open air. We went to the Bawdy Wench and was going to stay one more day, leaving on the morning. Arranging a room we went to the Common Room and ate a hearty lunch, listening to the minstrels ply the crowd. It was closer to 3:30/4 ish when there was some drunken brawl going on behind us. Barb thought she recognized one of the guys when he was shoved hard and hit Hjalgrim, bowling the cavalier forward.
He had his arm pressed tight against Hjalgrim’s back, partially inside the backpack and seemed to be fumbling about. As the group got up and it was about to get ugly, the man’s companion gave him a full on body check, smashing him into Hjalgrim’s back and then he pulled away, grimacing in pain and holding his hand cradled to his chest as the two of them made a mad dash for the exit.
We were going to follow when Hjalgrim started complaining about his back hurting and we quickly took a look. Something was broken in his backpack, the back of his backpack was dried and cracked looking, and his shirt was damp. We went up to the room and took a look. There was a spot on his back about 5” in diameter that looked like dried cracked flakey skin, the flesh below was angry and red. He was complaining that it hurt and a fast Cure spell fired into him..but nothing happened to the wound – it stayed.
No one knew what that was and the back of the label showed that it came from the Canaslan Export company – Thimbles organization. Maybe he would know what was going on? As for Hjalgrim, we even tried putting on a layer of bear grease but it only caused the cracked looking skin to spread, giving the cavalier a bit more pain for his efforts.
It was almost 5 when we came back to the Black District and Thimbles business where we found his people pointing and shouting at each other and Thimbles angrily telling the group ,”no refunds – you paid for a full day.” He didn’t have much time to talk to the group, seems someone robbed his place earlier today and his staff were frantically pointing fingers.
Shit.
We asked if it was Freyleaf Astringent and he grew cold, telling us to come in and tell him everything. Turns out the Astringent was stolen earlier today, around the time we were in the shop. The belief was one of the “shoppers” planted it in one of our backpacks “Hjalgrim” with the assumption they would retrieve it later far from the Black District. During the altercation at the Bawdy Wench it broke and covered the thief’s hand and Hjalgrim’s back through the pack.
It is used to rapidly dry the flesh of various oozes, slimes, and molds in the preparation of crafting components and inks. And it is expensive – that little ampule was 900 nobles, money that Thimbles was out. He did know it was not supposed to get on anyone’s skin ever and if it does happen, the person will die in horrible agony in about 2 weeks – nothing to be done for it.
Hjalgrim asked, “So, I’m going to die?!” Yep – nothing for it. And you’re going to die in agonizing pain.
The group was stunned. Surely SOMEONE knew something that could be done? Thimbles didn’t know anyone but suggested the party try Erylond as they might have some luck there.
So we took the jug of blood and decided to brave the 7 to 8 hour trek to Erylond now, leaving Paxian @ 5:30 and won’t arrive back @ Erylond until maybe 2 in the morning.
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