Session 3: The Witch in the Wood #3 Report
General Summary
Our worthies, fresh off the high of having defeated three orks (with the help of Hitchcock's blusterbus-wielding Constable and six torch-and-pitchfork-armed farmers from the outlying communities) strut back into town covered in mud and blood (most of the latter of which is not their own. Most), where they meet back up with Fleur and Cedric, regaling the pair with the details of their daring foray to save Bacchus' loyal (-ish) page, Banzi and, in a corollary net shot, a kidnapped girl from the nearby village of Deadman.
Drinking and gambling ensues.
Though a few people make out well in the gambling portion of the day, others are less fortunate in the drinking of thier portions. Banzi and Grumble both get massively drunk. At least Grumble turns out to be a friendly drunk, telling jokes and roundly (around-ly?) hugging various random patrons of the bar. Banzi dances on tables.
Eventually, though, the newest addition to Hitchcock's population, the once-bailiff Tyrone, convinces the others that they really probably possibly should do something about the missing sibling Mary told them about: her brother Claude, also called, apparently affectionately, "Sorry." Banzi, from their perch atop a wooden chandelier, proposes fostering the duty off to the Constable, while someone else wonders if perhaps some more coin could be made if the Constable could be convinced to deputize them in the name of law and justice again.
With no more drunken ado (or plenty of it -- one or the other), the seven would-be adventurers stumble out of the bar and stagger north to the Market Circle and the Constable's office. Crowding into the front room, they make their case ... and then Grumble and Tyrone intimidate the Constable both into giving each of the party two silver a day instead of just one AND loaning the ex-bailiff the blunderbuss (though he had to admit to previously having been in law enforcement to do so, a fact that no one else overheard, despite them all being squeezed in around the desk). The Constable, however, would only agree to three day's-worth of pay for the job.
At that point, though, Fleur has a seizure and collapses on the floor of the Constable's office. At first it seems the Bravo was slain by a heart attack or possible stomach ailment, but no, she is only, perhaps, overwhelmed by the number of people pressed in around her and has passed out because of it. The Constable is good enough to put her up in one of the cells, saying she can stay there until she regains consciousness.
After that, and still an exercise in herding cats, the motley group sets out to investigate the possible current whereabouts of the second party of orks they had heard about from young Mary and thus find young Sorry (hopefully alive, but, y'know, whatever). Bahlsen and Tyrone go to the General Store to sell the javelins they took from the ork camp. Bahlsen sticks around to grill the shopkeeps for information and buy some gear, while Tyrone sets out in search of the Reverend Elric Kinsworth to do the same. Meanwhile, Bacchus has also bowed out of the forthcoming adventure, claiming that investigations are bad for his gout, but if he is needed, he will be enjoying the company of the elf sisters at the Tuppence.
Grumble and Banzi, in the meantime, peruse the Market Pole in the Market Circle for news. They are able to find the poster for the missing siblings, and several other's as well, spanning at least six years, including at least one elf child, though, Tyrone points out as he passes by on his way to the Church of the One, that one actually concerned a missing kitten, rather than a child. The drunken pair concede that, yes, indeed, it was a fine-looking elf lad or lass.
Hitchcock's Church of the One is a sprawling, blocky edifice just south of the centerline of town, a third of the huge, gold-domed church teetering out over the edge of the Fisting Cliffs on angled supports the size of whole trees.
Inside, beneath a dome covered in mosaics of the Martyred Saints, and surrounded by worshipers on their prayer mats, Tyrone speaks with the Reverend Kinsworth about orks and missing children, but all he discovers is that the Reverend has little concern for anyone not a follower of the One, but that, yes, one of his parishners did spot some orks close on a week past idling around the Pining Bridge.
Deciding to pursue their quest for knowledge and continued inebriation elsewhere, Grumble and Banzi decide to head to the Tuppence and find out what the prostitutes there know, what with prostitutes and priests being the primary repositories for information in any town.
There, they discover that a (shudder) shirtless Bacchus has already gleaned for them that which they seek ... but getting the information out of him requires more drinking, which puts Banzi out cold on the floor in a straw-and-vomit angel of their own making.
When the others (minus the still unconscious Fleur) show up, the Tuppence having become their unofficial office, Bacchus regales them with a tale of a man (Herbert) who had seen three orks upon the Pining Bridge, (supposedly) accosting them until they fled down the Pining River path to the west, into the Burnfaire Bogwood.
And, oh, yes, they also carried a bag with them. One which might have been squirming a bit.
However, with Fleur still resting in a cell, Banzi in a pile on the floor, and Grumble all-but-unconscious herself, there is little more that can be done to follow up on what the investigators have learned.
And the same goes for the next day, when the three remain all-but-useless. And so the expedition is postponed until well after the 48-hours that CSI and other criminal dramas tell us is the make-or-break period for searching for a missing person. Of course, the kids went missing a week prior, so there's that.
Anyway, still minus Fleur and Bacchus, the remaining five worthies set off toward the Pining Bridge and the path that runs westward along its south bank. However, Tyrone sees someone lurking beneath the bridge and goes to confront them. The figure in the shadows turns out not to be a troll, though, but rather Gillian, the town beggar/drunk (a position which Banzi appears to be hopeful of acquiring for themself). Gillian is, astonishingly, able to confirm what Herbert claims to have seen (except for the running-off-the-orks part).
Emboldened by this information, the party proceeds into the Burnfaire Bogwood and follow the narrow path for a mile, to the cabin of Granny Merry, the local hedge witch/alchemist/unlicensed alchemist/wise woman/strawberry grower and pie maker. While Banzi and Tyrone hide, Cedric, Grumble, and Bahlsen are confronted by Granny Merry, who tells them to get off her lawn because they're almost certainly monsters -- probably river trolls -- out to get her ... a claim that is backed up in part by the claw marks across the boarded up windows of her cabin. And by the dead and mutilated ork body Tyrone spots as he hunches in inches-deep bog water behind a nearby tree.
Through charm and guile, our worthies manage to elicit an invitation into the cabin. It is there, in the warm glow of a hearthfire and with a rabbit-meat pie cooling on the sill, that we will join our heroes next time.
Rewards Granted
Bahlsen, Cedric, Banzi, Grumble, and Tyrone: 200 RP;
Fleur and Bacchus: 100 RP
Missions/Quests Completed
Discover the Fate of Claude ("Sorry") -- Getting there
Character(s) interacted with
The Constable Right Paltor;
The Reverend Kinsworth;
Pius Frengi, Innkeeper of the Tuppence;
Some gamblers at the Tuppence;
Gillian the Beggar;
Granny Merry
Comments