A Curious Captain

Nov. 7, CY0
 
The officers of the fort are all on the young side. Not much experience in evidence. They all live in the 2-story building. The entrance to the captain’s quarters is a double door that’s been carved and painted and looks expensive. The lieutenant knocks, is told to enter, and ushers us in. It’s a combination office and quarters. He’s got a small bed, a heavy, iron-bound chest, and a nice desk. He doesn’t look any older than me! But he’s got very fancy plate armor on, even as he does paperwork. And he doesn’t seem to respect his subordinates, either.
 
He compliments each of us in turn as he introduces himself to us 1 at a time. For me, it’s my axe. He seems familiar with Truffle’s family/grandmother. Apparently her family are local to Thildwen.
 
He seems surprised that the Sergeant didn’t tell us the truth of the assignment. Orders the lieutenant to travel to Thildwen and send the sergeant back for discipline and take over duties in Thildwen. She really doesn’t want to go for some reason.
 
The captain orders her to see to the barge’s departure before we hand over the sliver from Cragton and get paid for it. He’s very secretive about the sliver. After he’s sure we’re not being spied on, he goes to the chest, waves a hand over it, and speaks a short incantation (that I hear). The lock dissolves and he opens it. The contents look like neatly stacked rolls of paper and pouches. After retrieving what he wants, he closes it, doesn’t lock it. Pays us our 25gp each plus the 75gp bonus, which we split evenly.
 
The captain says there were accounting irregularities in the funding of the camp’s build. He grabs the stack of scrolls and hands them out. The scrolls are full of stacked gold coins, 40 per roll. He apparently has more money than he's supposed to and despite us being unable to know that if he hadn't told us, he told us and now wants to bribe us to not tell anyone. I'm not sure what he's after and I'm not sure if he even knows what he's after.
 
He’s waiting on a specialist and supplies and would like us to be prepared to hunt down and kill the last 2 river drakes. The specialist should arrive on the 10th. Would like us to return here on the 11th. Offers us 100gp per drake. Tristana negotiates for more and gets him to agree to 125gp per drake and we can keep their hides and corpses.
 
Nov. 8-10
 
We have 3 days of downtime in Thildwen. Tristana busks as an acrobat. She's surprisingly nimble for someone even bigger than me. Truffle makes some alchemical concoctions. Rune tries to gather info about Thildwen. I try to figure out from the lieutenant what’s going on with the sliver of material.
 
The lieutenant’s excuses for why she doesn’t want to be here seem flimsy. She just seems to think the captain is distracted. She’s able to tell me info that the foreman told us in secret (that it broke tools, etc.). She met us at the dock when we first put into the camp and had very little time to interrogate the crew or the miners escorting us, so it would seem that she has some other source of intelligence on activities in Cragton.
 
Rune finds out from some sailors that the river drakes only appeared in the river after Cragton got some extra miners and equipment in to dig something up in the mines there. They were definitely from Calennen, but no idea where in the kingdom.
 
I get the purple pearl appraised. Fil is seemingly the only expert in this town, I’m sent to him to evaluate it. Doesn’t seem to be from around here. Maybe 15-20gp.
 
Then I get the drake hide looked at. Nobody here feels confident appraising it.
 
Hamish tries to make some elixirs but has bad luck. Rune also does some hunting.
 
I buy a horse, tack, and saddlebags.
 
Nov. 11
 
We get transport back to the camp without issue. I have Sigur with me this time. Rune asks for one of his shed feathers and draws him. It's quite good.
 
When we get to Camp Kargoth, there’s a barge that’s being loaded with things for sending back to Thildwen. The guards direct us to the warehouse, the other large building in the camp, where a smithy has been set up. The smithy’s tools are magical. The smith is a runesmith. The Captain has notified the smith to let us purchase what we can afford and affix them to our gear.
 
In our absence, the Captain has had a stock constructed and confined the Sergeant to it. He’s been given food and water, but he’s been left exposed to the elements for a few days. When we meet with the Captain, Tristana loses her shit. I don't know what in the world she's thinking, but she insults and belittles him, challenges his authority, and is seemingly intent on starting a fight. I guess she's not familiar with how armies work. To be frank, I don't think much of the Captain's leadership, but I was impressed that he didn't simply have Tristana thrown into a stock alongside the Sergeant.
 
Tristana checks on the sergeant before we head out on the drake hunt. She wants to know why he didn’t give us the details. He just wanted the job done and he’d had trouble filling it with telling the truth. He’s pissed off at us and the Captain, both.
 
It’s a 2 hour trek to the drakes’ den. A small group of camp scouts guide us. The den is in swampy terrain, but we don’t recall any swamp on our previous trip. The scouts will take us close, then leave us to handle the drakes.