[IC] Death & Taxes (Session 1)

Tronus hands Nera the reins for the horse cart, "Now's a good time to learn..."

"I disagree." Nera does in fact take them, looking cautiously at the horses. Still don't like these beasts.

"Would you prefer Nekurr try and watch as the horses sink into the swamp?" Tronus states with a raised eyebrow.

"...Maybe." The mental image almost makes Nera chuckle, but she can't afford the joke since they still have a swamp to traverse. "Come along...horsey." She doesn't look too happy about the responsibility, but leads regardless.

As the very floor of the swamp lurches up behind him, Ssyk-ssyk scrambles to stay ahead in his canoe. With Hildar's help, he plots a course through the swamp, aided as well by the birds-eye view his razorwings provide.

Between Ssyk-ssyk and Hildar's navigation, Nera's animal handling, and Bruv and Nekurr's wrangling of the swamp spirit, the trek through the swamp is remarkably uneventful. Ssyk-ssyk manages to avoid any unwanted entanglements with either poachers or wild animals. All told, the journey south takes about four hours, much shorter than you might have expected, even if you'd taken the roads. The only casualty seems to have been a few wine bottles: On a few occasions, the land spirit jostles the cart, causing bottles to clank and red liquid to seep through the crate. You estimate that with the half you gave the Lizardfolk and the breakage from the trip, you're down to about 40 percent of the crate.

Ssyk-ssyk eventually snags some rushes with his paddle and asks in a low voice, "We'zzz not going on. Humanzzz hutssss jusssst around that bend. Dry land and human plantzzzz. Thisss one not wanting to get killed thissss day."

Hildar breathes a sigh of relief as the canoe reaches solid ground. As the 'land bridge' slides into contact Hildar clumsily exits the canoe onto the ground and nods and smiles at Ssyk-ssyk "Yes, I doubt you would get a friendly welcome. Thank you for your help." he says before he rejoins the others.

"Well, if friend Ssyk-ssyk not coming, cat people say goodbye" Nekurr grabs another bottle as a parting gift. "If Ssyk-ssyk in big town, Ssyk-ssyk look for Fortuna's lucky places to find cat people".

"We'll likely get some looky lou's from coming in the back way through the swamp with a set of horses and a cart though. But thank you for guiding us we'll part ways here."

Bruv let's out a slow breath as they make land. "Aye... Oi reckon we'll be looked on wit great suspicion, but maybe we can turn 'at into reverence if we seem to have some mastery of the swamp?

Anyway, we're 'ere. Wit no particular exit... Let's do it, eh?"

"That went well." Nera looks rather satisfied with how the day turned out. "If you are worried about locals giving you sideways glances, shall I scout once more?"

"Any nonlocal will get a sideways glance if not several dirty looks from what we know though." Tronus admits with a shrug.

"well they don’t like hunters and we followed some into the swamp... we’ll wave it of as being lost while going for the bounty if need be" Nekurr suggests the little lie, unaware of how deep the trouble this may get them into may be