Jorune: Strange Allies Sequence 1.2

Vordenir is familiar with talmaron from his time in the military and flies with ease, the wind rippling his fur eliciting an involuntary grunt of glee.

Everyone feels confident of his or her flying ability today; you're all old hands at this now.
With that confidence, you set off over the vast forest. Soon all you can see are trees to the horizon in every direction, but Barragar continues to navigate unerringly by the shining orb of Ebba, just visible in the western sky, to continue your group flying in approximately the right direction.

Despite the feeling of vastness of the seemingly endless trees passing by beneath you, you know that this is only the very southern tip of Glounda Forest, which stretches far, far to the north, all the way to the coast, many hundreds of miles from here.

In the early afternoon, gaps in the trees beneath you signal that you are approaching the edge of Glounda. The gaps grow larger, and now only occasional copses are seen as the trees give way to fields, streams, and eventually, pastureland. You are relieved to rejoin the road from Ardoth, as it means that Kaigon (and rest from the arduous tasks of clinging on to a furry bat-lizard's back) is near. Turning north, by mid-afternoon you see the first farms. Within an hour's further flight, the towers of Kaigon rise up in the distance.

This location has long been a stop for talmaron riders within Burdoth, and a trading post and market square built up around the Aerie for local farmers to trade with travelers, and so Kaigon was a significant village. But its location was auspicious for its isho currents as well. It turns out that a natural current of isho flows through Western Burdoth as part of a vast ring encompassing most of the continent. So when Jasp created the crystal schooners, they were able to follow this isho current, and suddenly Kaigon found itself an international port, despite being hundreds of miles inland. Large boarding and cargo towers have been built for the schooners to dock, and it is these that you see first. The rest of the village comes into view, and there's a fair amount of activity at the moment as people from the village attempt to entice visitors from Jasp and elsewhere to buy a little something while in Kaigon. The crystal schooner lashed to one of the boarding towers in enormous, like a small skyrealm floating above the town. Cranes work continuously, loading and unloading crates of supplies and merchandise onto the vehicle.

Your talmarons come into land, obviously eager to be back at a familiar Aerie and eager for a meal after a long day's flight. This Aerie is very similar to the one you stayed in last night, except that the ladder down to the ground seems to be permanently in place, and the person level is unoccupied…any visitors to Kaigon do not stay here any more, but in any of a variety of the more comfortable incleps on the ground that have sprung up since the schooners started coming.

Gythaar and Marik are both Familiar with Kaigon. They know that Kaigon was a small settlement on the road circumventing Glounda between Ardoth and Lusail. In the last decade since the crugar invasion, the dharsage of Burdoth has welcomed thriddle to the nation, and for some reason, thriddle have been fascinated with the lands in the extreme west of Burdoth. As a result, Kaigon was booming even before the arrival of the crystal schooners, just from all the thriddle custom coming through town on the way to and from the settlement they created, Cosahmi, which is somewhere to the west of here. Miniri knows this was well, and has actually been to Cosahmi on querrid missions. Kaigon was selected as a stop on the crystal schooner route over other settlements built on the path of the isho current in part because of the talmaron Aeries built in Kaigon to accommodate all the querrid activity (which has died down a fair amount from the boom days of years ago). Querrids and thriddle still do brisk business in Kaigon, but the big commerce is now connected with the crystal schooners, which bring goods and produce from distant lands for far less money and faster than conventional ocean-going vessels. There is ill-will between the shipping industry of Ardoth (particularly the ocean-dwelling salu, who operate the fastest ships) and the crystal schooner fleet of Jasp, because the Jaspians are cutting into their trade. At the same time, there is also resentment in Ardoth because the Jaspians refuse to fly their schooners into the capitol. Many believe this reluctance is politically motivated, that Jasp does not trust the dharsage to not seize a crystal schooner when it came into his grasp, while others argue that the isho current does not flow to Ardoth.

Vordenir takes the ladder very slowly and carefully, cautious about his bulk buckling the rungs and sending him plummeting. Despite his ease with talmaron, he's never liked climbing down all that much.

While the rest get their bearings, Yongap (who disregards the roll as his Familiar is sufficient) investigates, asking around the town. It's easy to get gossip, and to inquire among the throngs of people involved with serving/loading the crystal schooners whether they've seen anyone matching Luce's description. A porter reveals that someone very much like Luce tipped him a yule to help him get his case aboard the Moon Drifter, the previous crystal schooner to pass through town on its way north, which left yesterday morning.

Each player, make a perception check for your character: either SPOT as it is, or LISTEN with +2 penalty on the roll.

Yongap has determined that someone matching Luce's description boarded the Moon Drifter, which left north on the isho current to Reet yesterday morning.

While they await his return, the rest of the party are moving in a loose bunch through the bustle of the town. Gythaar notices someone familiar in the crowd, and after a moment the crugar recognizes him as Ullis, another tauther he's worked with before. The muadra youth is not being especially furtive, but he has a natural tendency to skulk which drew Gythaar's eye.

Miniri, meanwhile, is looking forward to checking in at the querrid center when she overhears the name "Luce." Uncertain at first that she heard correctly, she pauses, flicking an ear toward the sound as she pantomimes removing a burr stuck in her paw.

She overhears:
(edit to reassert mention that Ullis is muadra)

Vordenir and Marik have become separated from the others for a moment as they cut through an alley that turned out to be a dead end rather than a shortcut. They look sheepishly at each other, shrug, and turn back, but then they overhear this from an open window (while Miniri hears the tail end of it on the other side):
The voices were heard from a shuttered window in a low building, and as they speak, there is the sound of moving furniture and the voices move away from the window and out of earshot.