A Busy Night

 Present:

• Sophia Beauchamp (half-elf priest 21) - Ian

• 

  Selina Porshay

  Joe Manco (human fighter) - Shane
• MARMALADE: Balder Dash (gnome wizard) - Jamie
• Slim Jim (human rogue) - Darryl
• Walton Formalin (half-elf mystic of 21) - Andrew
• Red Feuersturm (human temple fighter of Hob) - Chris
• Donk Platebreaker (human fighter) - Jeff
• Malcolm Gandhi (gnome thief) - Kevin

By Walton

We were in the tunnels beneath Zephyr the Turk's saffron farm compound (two days down the Draser river from the city Draser). Zephyr was a famous saffron farmer. It was suspected that he kidnapped young Draser women and enslaved them, then used them to pick his saffron (there was some characteristic unique to such girls that imbued his saffron with added potency). We were here to rescue 16-year-old Selina Porshay, one such girl. Secondly, Simone and Tommo Fussell, our employers, wanted us to get the accounts ledger of Zephyr. This would yield further evidence with which to accuse the Globe Casino of fraud towards Vingt-et-Un.

TEN

We had just killed the Axe Man - a fat butcher with an apron and large axe (see last time), and tried to make his death look like a whittling accident. It was now ten hours until dawn. We wanted to be away by dawn, or at least in a safe place in case this whittling ruse failed. 

Gandhi had found a secret door at the end of a passage. There were no traps and it wasn't locked, so we went through. It went to a large room with two doors and stairs going up.

Upstairs, was a cold room; unnaturally cold, but there was no taint of evil. There were shelves in here along the walls, with about 40 glass jars each filled with a fine white powder. We touched nothing, but the powder was the wrong colour to be saffron.

NINE

quern

We went back downstairs and through a door into a room with three quern grinders. We assumed that the querns ground the white powder that was stored in the cold room.

On one of the doors here Gandhi found an Alarm trap and disabled it.

In another room was shelving with coat racks, buckets with bins, and weapon racks.

Worryingly, there was a door here with lights on in the room beyond. And we could hear male voices. So, we carefully avoided that door.

EIGHT

So, back upstairs, through another door into room with a furnace. It had four metal funnels; not sure what these were for. 

Next to the furnace room was a well room with a hole in the floor and a room beneath. In the floor of the room below was a shaft down to water. We guessed this was the same shaft that we explored from below next to the underground pool (with the tunnel from the guard bear entrance - they way we got into this complex).

porcelain embalming table

In the next room there with a porcelain embalming table (to clean and drain corpses) with manacles.

And there were two drying tables, covered with with lots of bones drying. These were quite clearly human bones. Sophia identified them as the bones of human girls.

A door led off this room.

"No traps here!" exclaimed Gandhi. But when he opened it, immediately the air filled with a WHOOP  WHOOP  WHOOP noise. I cast a Silence spell, but it was too late.

From the direction of the door that had light, came running two guards. 

It was a short sharp battle. My Sleep spell took out one guard and the other guy was severely outnumbered. We waited a but, but no-one else came. So it must have been a localized alarm and didn't rouse the whole compound.

SEVEN

Next was a room with double doors to the outside - and a winch to load wagons, but there was also a large trapdoor in the floor, and that went down to a large storage room with pallets.

Off this lower room was another locked door (Gandhi opened it) to a corridor and six cells, then through a concealed door to a second cell block with four more cells. 

Frieda

In one of the cells was a blonde girl of about 18, in threadbare rags; she was awake but drugged and delirious. Sophia cast Slow Poison on her, and that made her coherent.

She was called Frieda, and was a saffron picker. Like Selina Porshay, she had been kidnapped in Draser. She worked with the other pickers and she knew Selina pretty well. 

Frieda had just turned 18, and the guards had drugged her and left her here. She did not know why. It seemed once any slave girl turned 18, they were removed from the picking squad. (Note that Selina was 16).

We questioned Frieda further and asked her to draw a map of what she knew about the compound and buildings. She was happy to help.

Frieda was strong enough to walk, so she came with us.

SIX

We kept exploring this building. Another room had boxes and jars of dried goods.

Another room had a large metal urn for heating and rendering flesh. There was a hole in the floor with a bloody slide down to a stinking pit filled with rotting flesh and offal.

So, the theory of what all this equipment was for: 

• When the saffron-picking slave girls turn 18, they would be killed and butchered. 
• Their flesh would be cut off the bone and, with their viscera, tossed into the offal pit.
• The bones would be cooked to remove any flesh, dried, and then ground into powder. 
• Maybe this powder was ensorcelled, and then added to Zephyr's saffron. We were not sure of the significance of the age of 18, but maybe that was a requirement of the dark magic. 

FIVE

In another room was a well with water barrels, and had a shaft going down to the underground river below. This was beneath the well room above (next to the furnace room). 

Frieda had mentioned that she remembered this room and the water barrels. So we thoroughly explored the wall here and, sure enough, were rewarded by finding a secret door.

"Dere is being no traps here!" exclaimed Gandhi enthusiastically. And he opened the door. 

Immediately, a trapdoor beneath Donk opened, and he slid down a shaft and splashed into a fast flowing stream and into the underground pool. The trapdoor closed.

We hurriedly tried to open the trapdoor so as to get to Donk, but couldn't pry it open.

"Open the door again," I cried. "That ought to reopen the door."

Underground pool

So Gandhi opened the secret door again. However, another new trapdoor opened, in a different part of the floor, right under Joe, and he slid down a shaft and splashed into the fast flowing stream and into the underground pool.

Donk managed to shake off his armour and swim to the surface, just as Joe (also in armour) splashed in the lake next to him. Joe could not swim, so Donk swam down and rescued Joe.

[ Swimming is one of the skills where, if you don't have it, you can not swim, full stop. Luckily, Jeff had given Donk a point of Swimming and lucked-out with his roll. That said, it takes 10 minutes to remove armour, and you can't swim in metal armour ... Lucky Donk. ]

We could shout to Donk down the well shaft, so had echoey comms with him. He and Joe managed to get to the edge of the underground lake, and then take the long walk through the tunnels (past the mushroom room, past the (now dead) butcher's room, past the cold room, and winch room, and cells) and back to us.

FOUR

The secret door led to another tunnel. We assumed this went to the central keep (in Zephyr's compound). As we walked down, Red suddenly collapsed in a marmalade fit and had to go into the marmalade sack with Balder. 

The long passage, about fifty paces, finished at another concealed door. 

"No traps here!" proclaimed Gandhi.

This time the whole corridor sloped. Gandhi and Slim were at the front, so they scrabbled into the room before it tilted too badly. But they were greeted by two guard dogs! Next was Sophia and me. We clambered up the steepening slope [ made DEX rolls, Luck spent ]. And bringing up the rear, Donk and Joe [ everyone made DEX ].

Gandhi is a crap fighter, so he just dodged. Slim is okay, but he had second-hand armour (he lost his armour in the fungus room, but now wore armour off a dead guard). They were both wounded by the dogs. But when I joined the fight, and then finally Joe and Donk, the poor dogs did not stand a chance.

I cast Heal on Slim, and Joe too.

Off the dog room was a store room with tasty cheeses and salamis. Slim and Gandhi had a good nom nom.

THREE

Another concealed door went to a short corridor with six bedrooms. Frieda knew this area quite well, so she pointed out who was sleeping in what room. We used Sophia to carefully enter each room to wake the sleeping girls. 

Calcutta say "Is better to wake nubile sleeping girl with pretty lady rather than ugly burly fighter or big-nose gnome."

The first bedroom had Selina Porshay, yay.  There were six other girls, so we collected them all. 

TWO

Now we had a dilemma. It was two hours before dawn. There was no chance that we could remain undetected (because of the two guards and the dogs).

It would be one hour to go back through the tunnels to get to the pool. And then maybe another hour to get to a copse outside. Sophia was drained of all spells and I had almost none, and we still needed to get past the bear.

Even at the copse, we wouldn't necessarily be safe. Selina said they had guard gargoyles, and plenty more dogs.

[ META: Thanks to the way this system works, we will get a Luck recharge and Jamie will be here --> Balder will wake up fresh with spells! ]

Zephyr's Farm

 Present:

• 

  Selina Porshay

  Sophia Beauchamp (half-elf priest 21) - Ian
• Joe Manco (human fighter) - Shane
• MARMALADE: Balder Dash (gnome wizard) - Jamie
• Slim Jim (human rogue) - Darryl
• Walton Formalin (half-elf mystic of 21) - Andrew
• Red Feuersturm (human temple fighter of Hob) - Chris
• MARMALADE: Donk Platebreaker (human fighter) - Jeff
• Malcolm Gandhi (gnome thief) - Kevin

By Walton

[ NOTE: All the pictures are bespoke using Stable Diffusion (A1111) running on my PC. ]

We were in the city of Draser. We were trying to find Selina Porshay at the behest of Simone Fussell. Selina was the daughter of wizard Jason Porshay who had got into a large gambling debt; she had been kidnapped by the evil Zephyr the Turk when Jason could not pay the debt, and, we suspect, enslaved and taken to his saffron farm downstream the Draser river. 

In was further rumoured that Zephyr had been kidnapping the daughters of wealthy Draser locals for a years. Whether this was with the blessing of the Globe Casino, the Draser rulers and, perhaps, the Draser Thieves Guild, we had no idea. But it did seem odd that people of power let him get away with this, if true.

According to Tommo Fussell, the saffron produced by Zephyr's farm and picked by his slave girls, was one of the best quality saffrons in the Known World, and it had special, almost magical, powers (one of its powers was rumoured to enhance male performance). The rumour continued in that the reason for this superb quality was because the saffron was harvested by "special" slave girls.

I tried to push Tommo on this matter. What made the slave girls special? Did they have some unusual unique characteristic that made them different from any old saffron harvester, be she slave or nay? But Tommo could not think of anything special, so didn't know. Maybe it was just a rumour.

Tommo and Simone further asked us that when we got into the mansion of Zephyr, that could we take the accounting ledger of Zephyr? It would get more evidence against the Globe that Simone could use. We, of course, enthusiastically said "Yes! Anything for Vingt-et-Un!"

Tommo arranged for a barge to take us downstream to Zephyr's farm. The trip would take two days.

We had some treasures that needed identifying, and tonight was a good opportunity to do this. So, I used the Identify spell on the Thieves Tools - they were +1. And on the magic dust: it was actually enchanted saffron, 5 doses, each one makes the breather's Mind immune to Charm and ESP spells.

Cortez barge

Next day we boarded the barge. It was captained by Hamish Cortez. He had two mates Freddy and Ben. The rest of us would pose as his "crew."

Hamish said that the Zephyr farm was one league inland from the Klib bank of the Draser river (on our left as we went downstream). Out of note, upstream of the Zephyr farm was the McKenzie farm, and further downstream was the Charles farm.

We spent a lazy day watching the banks go by as the barge drifted downstream. The area around Draser was one of the most fertile patches of land in the known world. So, we saw farm after farm, luxuriant and bucolic. More crops and horticulture tended to be on the Zephyr side (Klibwards) and livestock on the Funken side.

That night, the barge moored at a way-station on the Funken bank. They don't sail barges downstream at night - it is too dangerous to not hit bars and shoals. (Upstream travel is by horses pulling barges, so is much slower, so upstream barges do keep moving all night. The upstream speed is less than half downstream speed, so plenty of time to spot those hidden bars, plus the horse team is way out in front of the barge, so can provide plenty of warning).

The next day was uneventful until 4 be'light. We passed the Zephyr jetty. There was a small guardhouse and we could see two bored guards there. A track went off through the scrub and Hamish told us that Zephyr's actual farm was just over the ridge.

We stopped 90 minutes further downstream and all surreptitiously disembarked. 

saffron crocus

"I will be at this very spot in 6 days," Hamish said. "Make sure you are, if you want a ride back to Draser. I will not wait."

We made our way to the close hill, out of sight of the Zephyr jetty, and crossed it.

In a circular basin, a few kilometres wide, was Zephyr's saffron farm. Rows and rows of the purple flower covered the entire basin. In the centre was a fenced 50x50 paces compound with buildings and guard towers.

[ The active component of saffron is from the red stigmas of the flower - each flower has three. The three stigmas of one saffron crocus, when dried, weigh only 7 mg, so you need 150 flowers (450 stigmas) to get a gram of saffron, or 150,000 to get a kilogram. It's very labour-intensive to harvest, and takes 40 hours of fiddly work to pick 150,000 flowers (450K stigmas). That's about one flower per second. Retail 2023 price is NZ$30,000 per kg for Te Anau saffron, or $15,000 per kg for others. ]

Picking saffron

We found a copse on the edge of the farm (far side away from the river) and waited and watched. Points of interest:

• There was a low wire that surrounded the entire area of the farm about knee-height. There were no saffron crocuses outside this wire.
• Two ogres were let out at night. They stuck religiously to the paths.
• During the day, six women, four guards and four dogs were sent into the fields. The women worked picking the ripe saffron while the men guarded. We assumed that the girls were slaves, but they were clothed and not mistreated.

Along the edge of the basin, we came across a spring bubbling up in a little stone well. Next to the well was a cave. The spring water flowed down here, next to a path, into the cave.

Gandhi investigated and returned reporting a large bear on a chain. Rather than slay the guard bear, Sophia charmed it (with Charm Animal spell [ this is a level 3 spell. Sophia took 4 attempts, and 12 points to get it to work - she is not very good at this spell! ]).

After this was a long winding underground path where we followed the stream. It proceeded under the basin and under, we guessed, Zephyr's compound. 

Exploring, we used Gandhi as a sneaky vanguard with the rest of the group not moving into an area until he cleared it, and thus we explored most of the paths. There was a small cave complex here with some fungi caves, pools of water, a guard cave with a single guard, and eventually Gandhi found a suspicious dead-end.

Axe man

We were very low on spells; Sophia and I were all but drained, so we need to rest the night. We stayed in the fungi cave. That didn't turn out to be such a good idea. We all awoke with severe eczema and asthma, and poisoned.

The guardsman was strange - he was a great big guy, naked wearing an apron, with a huge axe. Not wanting to fight him, I got him with a Sleep spell. Then Joe killed him. We tried to make it look like an accident. The axe man had a whittling knife and we arranged it to look like he slipped while whittling and cut a wrist artery. Blood everywhere.

And now we stand next to a secret door. With eight hours left before dawn, suspecting this passage emerges somewhere in the central compound.

The Debt

 Present:

• 

  Simone Fussell,
  Vingt-et-Un auditor

  Sophia Beauchamp (half-elf priest 21) - Ian
• Joe Manco (human fighter) - Shane
• MARMALADE: Balder Dash (gnome wizard) - Jamie
• Slim Jim (human rogue) - Darryl
• Walton Formalin (half-elf mystic of 21) - Andrew
• MARMALADE: Red Feuersturm (human temple fighter of Hob) - Chris
• Donk Platebreaker (human fighter) - Jeff
• Malcolm Gandhi (gnome thief) - Kevin

By Walton

We were in the city of Draser, fourth largest city in the Known World (95,000). We were trying to find Simone Fussell. She was a Vingt-et-Un auditor and had been sent to Draser to audit the books of the Globe casino - divine law insists that all casinos and gambling establishments pay specific pecuniary homage to Vingt-et-Un, Goddess of Luck. 

We were at the Bedraggled Lizard inn speaking to the staff there, and the barmaid Thelma. We had spent the last few days following leads for Simone and had ended up here. That night, an hour after dark-fall, in our room, who would arrive, but Simone Fussell herself ! Large as life, and hale and hearty.

We quickly introduced ourselves as working for Vingt-et-Un Priestess Amy Fazarkerley from Toluene, and related our tale so far.

She then regaled us with her tale:

"... I was investigating the upper storey of the Globe..."

This was the storey of the Globe that we were forbidden to enter. It was for the high-rollers and one had to pay 10,000 gp just to get access. Miranda would not let us in.

Simone continued:

"... I suspected that there was some illegal gambling going on up there, that was not being reported to Vingt-et-Un. This was both illegal and a heresy. It did not help that priestess Miranda refused to give me access too. Despite this, I probed and sneaked around.  I happened to overhear a conversation between a rotund gentleman and a velour-clad older man, a wizard.

'I can not give that up! I can not give that up! Please, no!' said the velour guy.

'Ah, but you already have!'

So, cautiously, I followed the wizard. He went into Goldenton [posh district of Draser] to a mansion on Exeter Boulevard, number 143."

Simone must have been followed. Because that very night, she was beaten up and kidnapped outside the Barbaric Monkey in The Sprawl by, we already knew, Jasper the Mask. Then she was rescued at River Bend, again we knew, by her brother Tommo, then taken to the warehouse behind the Bedraggled Lizard and then on to Disen. 

Doily, thug of the Globe

A few days later, in Disen, Tommo's house "The Oaks" was raided, lead by thug Doily of the Globe. She and Tommo fled Disen, and made their way back to Draser. Here they hid in the warehouse near the Bedraggled Lizard, laying low, seeking out the poorer quarters where the ragged people go, looking for the places only they would know. (Lie la lie. Bizzzh ...)

Why didn't Simone simply send a message to Toluene? Why not tell Amy that she was okay? And report the treachery of Miranda? Well, being in Draser, and knowing Draser's prejudice towards gnomes, she mistakenly assumed this hatred would corrupt Gnomepost's raison d'etre.

Since our primary mission was to locate Simone, we were now at a loose end. So, we offered to guard Simone and to work for her, and help her investigations. We could be her muscle. She agreed whole-heartedly. So, we negotiated new rates. Of course, Sophia and I would work for free - helping the glory of Vingt-et-Un was enough reward for us! - but the other mercenary party members needed their own rewards: 500gp per week was the final figure.

So, first things first: COMMS. Unlike Simone, WE trusted Gnomepost. After all, Gnomepost runs in far more dangerous and bigotted parts of the Known World than Draser. So, we sent a Gnomepost message immediately:

TO: PR. AMY FAZARKERLEY, 21 TEMPLE, TOLUENE.

FROM: PR. SOPHIA BEAUCHAMP, WALTON FORMALIN, ET AL, OBSCENE GNOLL INN, DRASER.

MESSAGE: TARGET FOUND HEALTHY. PARTY UNDER NEW ORDERS UNLESS OTHERWISE INSTRUCTED.

This message was vague enough so even if we Simone's Gnomepost paranoia was real, the readers could not get that much information. And if they targeted the Obscene Gnoll, we no longer frequented it. But, should the message get through unscathed, then Amy would have a place where she could contact us. Amy would know full-well who the "Target" was.

That afternoon, Slim and I headed for the Eternal Goose, the front for the Thieves Guild. 

Reggie

On the way, we encountered a  group of frightened elves on the street who were rounded up by townsfolk and soldiers, and then summarily killed in front of us. This is normal fare for Draser, so I mention it here only for context.

Slim went inside the Eternal Goose and found Reggie, his contact, and he tried to find information on the wizard who lived at 143 Exeter Boulevard. Nothing.

The next day, we sent another message to Toluene. This time with no contact address for return messages:

TO: PR. AMY FAZARKERLEY, 21 TEMPLE, TOLUENE.

FROM: S.B. & W.F.

MESSAGE: MIRANDA UNDER SUSPICION.

We then went to the council records (Funken Wagnall) and got data on 143 Exeter Boulevard. It is owned by the Porshay family: Jason and Greta. There was also a Death Notice: Wizard Jason Porshay, "natural causes". Oh dear.

So, we all went to visit the actual mansion on 143 Exeter Boulevard. An elderly woman answered the door. She was Greta. Wizard Jason was indeed the guy we were after. To make things worse, they had a 16 year old daughter, Selina, who was missing. We found out that Jason had a big gambling problem and he had gambled the mansion away, and then offered his daughter a stake in a game to win it back. And lost her too. She went missing that day.

Jason couldn't handle this, so he hanged himself.

The tragic gambling debt was to the fat guy that Simone had overheard. He was named Zephyr the Turk. (The "Turk" epithet was used ironically in this case. Turk is a gnomish derogatory term for humans, from ಟರ್ಕಿ "tarki" which is gnome for dog faeces. Originally from the famous ballad "Me and Kirk and a dog named Turk" by the gnome bard Lobo. C.F. the 1971 song)

Zephyr the Turk

To rub salt into poor Greta's wounds, only yesterday, Doily, thug of the Globe, had come to the Porshay house to take possession of the ownership papers. She had two weeks to leave.

We gave our commiserations and sympathy to Greta, and promised we would help her. Then we left to go check on any town records for Zephyr the Turk. No sign.

Donk and Slim went to the Eternal Goose to check to see what the TG has on Zephyr. Reggie suggested "Try the Pits" (The Pits is the main slave district of Draser)

So, we headed there.

After some more investigations and machinations, we established that Zephyr the Turk owned a saffron farm down the Draser River, about two days' travel. He also had an interest in "special" slaves - human, half-elf & elf.

Tommo Fussell

We knew that Tommo Fussell was into saffron too, so, we headed back to the Bedraggled Lizard, and met with Tommo Fussell.

Tommo told us that Zephyr makes very high quality saffron. It needed special slave girls to pick it for some reason. We never did get an answer what made these girls special. Long fingers? Virgins? Delicate constitutions?

Tommo and Simone had some more information for us about the Globe. The Globe itself is "a Draser city asset". Arnie the hook runs the Globe. But Arfur the Lad, Head of the TG,  also has financial interest in it too.

Upon hearing the results of our investigations, Simone ordered us to go rescue the girl Selina Porshay. Presumably she was now a slave on Zephyr's saffron plantation.

"It is the least we could do to help the poor Porshay family," she said.

We tended to agree.

Fine-tooth comb

But first we returned to the Porshay mansion, and asked Greta if we could search it thoroughly. We had some fine fine-tooth combs.

Slim and Donk went up and searched the attic with a fine-tooth comb. The rest of us, searched the study. Detect Magic and Detect Traps revealed that there were magic traps on a unopened layer of the desk. Impatient to find something, Sophia touched it and there was a loud bang. She was shrunk to the size of a mouse. But that cleared the trap and we could then get into the locked section of the desk. Little squeaky Sophia rode on my collar.

We found a record of accounts and a key, both magic. The accounts ledger showed various amounts of money dropping from some account., Presumably it was Jason's gambling. They were large amounts - like -20,000 gp, -5,000 gp, -10,000 gp etc. 

WG locker key

I recognized the key as a Wizards' Guild locker key that we used in large guilds (Draser being a big city, had a big guild). So, while the others stayed and kept searching with their combs, I (with little Sophia) went to the guild. As a mystic and arcane spell-caster myself, I was fully entitled to the benefits and privileges afforded to wizards. 

First things first: I asked the desk clerk about the shrunken Sophia. He laughed in his stony voice and said he could ID her (8 hours and 100gp gem) but then would probably need a Dispel Magic, or "maybe it will just wear off".

In the WG locker room, the key identified the locker to me (think pressing the button on a car-key remote in an underground car park) and I opened it. Inside were some more books, a magical robe and magical walking stick (Detect Magic reveal). I brought all this stuff back to the Porshay mansion.

In our sympathy-driven goody two-shoes state, we gave Greta all of Jason's stuff, rather than loot it for our own greedy selves. But we did keep the books.

It was about then, half a day later, that Sophia popped and regained full size.

Sophia and I then headed off to see Miranda in the Globe. Miranda was now in the category of "hostile witness" so we were very careful what we said to her. We told her that our investigations had located Simone's trail down in the Sprawl near the Barbaric Money and that she went missing from that spot. We also mentioned our enquiries had implicated Jasper the Mask. But we said the trail went cold from then on. 

We then left, and suspected we'd be followed. So went to the Obscene Gnoll and stayed the night there.

Sure enough, we were indeed followed. This gave more evidence to the treachery of Miranda. 

We left the Gnoll the next morning, and managed to lose our followers. We returned to the Bedraggled Lizard.

Upon checking the Porshay ledger, the accounts ledger numbers had all dropped to 0. Magically. This was the unnamed entries of -5000, -10000 etc. They were all now 0s.

I cast an Identify spell on the magical ledger. It was a remote-script device and had a duplicate somewhere else. When one such ledger is written upon, using a special tuned magical quill, the other ledger mimics the writing and the entries. So, there would be an identical ledger elsewhere, and someone - Miranda maybe? - had changed these figures to 0. This was more circumstantial evidence to tar Miranda with. Our message to Amy (in Toluene) proclaiming Miranda's guilt was well-founded.

.