All Aboard for Guard Duty
General Summary
The team head to the Bristleshore to hear the about the job. As they approached, they could see an orcish lady—clearly the captain, Lash. Guy Fieri vaulted aboard to introduce the party, who was reluctantly invited aboard after Lash realized they wanted to talk about guard duty. The offer was guard duty aboard the Bristleshore as they finished their journey to the Dwarven Atoll—2,000 gp to the group if they stayed to the next stop, Syllener, through the area with an active "pirate"/privateer problem, and another 1,000 gp if they stayed on through Port Greta, Manaes, and ending in Mogkihm. After proving their abilities—Bessie the boatswain confirming Guy's abilities as a boatswain, and Tethrys using the Mariner's guild to verify their fighting capabilities—Lash agreed to take them on. The party spent their last night in Saltmarsh doing some shopping for the trip (4 healing potions, one given to Bayleaf), and then shipped out the next day. Guard duty is light work, till it isn't, so the team had a chance to bond for a while with the crew and passengers on ship. Murtagh spent his time with the dwraven passengers, hearing their stories of their work in Ahnk Dracas and performing apparently traditional dwarven throat singing. It's... an acquired taste. Bayleaf offered stories of giant hunting in the shattered lands, and while the dwarves weren't thrilled they were bonding with a human, Murtagh's blessing and Bayleaf's embellished stories about giants in the north were good story telling. Brine spent his time distracted, staring into the ocean. Guy Fieri crawled into the crow’s nest with Galyn Phidi, learning that he quite liked heights and also how to do the work of a quartermaster. Tethrys and Lash were caught up in what can charitably be called an Orc-Off. Tethrys looked down on Lash for being a half orc, while Lash, knowing her exact place in orc society, trusted with a ship from her tribe, and decked in the tattoos that decorate her as an adult in orc society, remained firmly Unimpressed. While never resorting to outright hostility, or ever acknowledged between the two, if there was a conflict going on, Lash would be undeniably winning. All was relatively quiet until they reached the area off the coast of the Hool Marshes, an area known for human privateer activity, and the area Lash most wanted protection when she sailed through. Fog, rolling off from the marshes, made visibility limited, and it was Lash who called out an approaching ship, when it was nearly on top of the Bristleshore. The ship was smaller, faster, more nimble than the Bristleshore, with a dragon masthead, silver sails and narrow rows of oars for speedy maneuvers. None of which the Bristleshore really expected to deal with. The ship-to-ship fighting weighed in favor of the human ship that spit ice from its masthead to immobilize the Bristleshore and launched volleys from its cannons. On the deck of the Bristleshore, Bayleaf, Brine and Tethrys launched spell attacks while the others tried to man the weapons. Tethrys summoned swarms of insects to prevent the humans from being able to stay at their cannons. Guy and Tethrys soon grew impatient, and jumped to the deck of the other ship when it drew close for more hand to hand combat, by which I mean throwing people into the ocean. As Tethrys spelled and threw the crew overboard, Guy Fieri saw a silvery shape materialize on the rail by the ship wheel, seeming to crouch, and then leap ferally to bowl one of the human crew over the deck before vanishing. On the Bristleshore, the tide seeming to turn, Murtagh tried to call the others back to the ship, even as Bayleaf launched himself off the deck, into the water to clutch at the human ship's bow, and repeatedly cast Thunderwave to destabilize the hull. As Murtagh was screaming "don't," Brine went weirdly still, looking into the water. He turned to Murtagh, and oddly quiet over the noise of the fighting, said
I can hear it... They're singing. Find the hammer, anvil and tongs, and I'll find you.And then he dove into the ocean, and did not resurface. The fighting stopped, with one human left on the deck of the human ship, on his knees surrendering. Guy accepted his surrender, seeing the human was just a teenage kid. Which leaves the crew with a certainly haunted ship, a human they have to do something with, and a missing Brine.
Rewards Granted
Y'all have a mother fucking Pirate Ghost Ship now how good
