IC: Chapter II - Return to Escaroth

Caranthiel, Astrid, Finrod, Winfred and Vidar rumble back into Esgaroth on their wagon. There's no festival on, this time, and as such, feels a little anticlimactic, considering the adventure that was concluding. More than one player-hero will have a sneaking "where is our greeting?". Nevertheless, when you get the Tollhouse, mentioning the name of Leiknir gives a suspiciously* smooth entry under the Gatehouse, without even a token searching of your wagon!

As you lumber into the market square, a wet teen climbs out of the water between it and the next house and splashes up to you. They are sufficiently grubby that their gender is indeterminate.

"You'll be the group Master Onar told me to find. I'm Edda. Did you have a good trip? Was there treasure? Can I see the traeasure? Was there monsters? I've never seen a monster, although I've been told about lots by the bigger kids. Do they bleed black? I hear they don't bleed like us."

The stream of questions only briefly stops to direct you where to put the wagon, and where you're staying: The Dragon's Arms. It's a large pub with some stylised dragon wings painted onto its wooden facade. The common room is huge, and well filled with Men and Dwarfs. Few Elfs though. The few snatches of words you hear are all about trade, roads, weather, etc. You're assigned rooms, on the Leiknir account says Inga, who hands you your room and meal tokens. She gives you a polite smile but will move onto the next arrival the moment you stop talking to her.

Edda will help unpack in the hopes of a penny. "Anyways Master Onar says you should come to him tomorrow, the first hour after sunrise. Hey HEY did you bring a dead body!? Why did you bring a dead body back? You rescued someone! Wow. Do you need me to find a healer? I know a healer". Edda wants this penny.

The near-corpse of a man is still breathing steadily, but not waking. That's all he's done on the return journey.

A healer comes about an hour later. He is introduced as Girthun, and looks remarkably miserable for a healer, however this could be his extreme suspicion about this comatose man you have presented to him. "What happened to this...man to end up like this? He's barely alive! But I don't see any weapon damage to him.
Who did you say he was again?". Girthun sends Edda off to ask Inga for more wood for the fire.

"You just found him? Like this?". Girthun looks round at Winfred.

Girthun physically recoils, rearing away from his patient (and you lot).

"By the grace of- ... Well, I can see why you don't want to talk about it. And in fact, maybe I shouldn't know. Well, I suppose I wasn't sure how to heal him before, so maybe this won't change much. He appears physically exhausted, maybe he has been ....c-consumed. I'll come back and check on him, meanwhile, keep him warm, still, and quiet. Go and sit in the common room or something."

He gives instructions to Edda for small amounts of broth to be provided by Inga several times a day. He leaves, looking worried.

In the common room, Vidar looks uneasy. On the bright side, he doesn't sing, either. Eventually he speaks:

"I don't think I was supposed to come back to Laketown. I'm not sure my Purpose lies here. I won't see Master Leiknir tomorrow, I'll stay and keep an eye on our patient seeing as that Healer seemed pretty worried about him. Perhaps some devotion will inspire me into the right course of action"

---

The next day, Edda finds you in the common room again having breakfast, and offers to take you to Onar Leiknir's office. She asks about the patient (unchanged), the food, how the weather compares between here and anywhere else, and generally fills in any gaps in the conversation. She takes you past the Guild-Hall, as busy as the Market pool and square, but this time with people in much fancier dress.

It doesn't take much Insight to realise that something is up. People are gathered in small groups, and looking around at everyone else. And it gets worse as you go along. Eventually Edda picks up on it. "Uh, w-what's going on?" she stammers. "W-why's it quiet here? Why's the guard here?". She slows in her steps that lead toward a cluster of guards fending off a small crowd of curious laketowners. They assure all that there is nothing to see.

As the tension builds she suddenly runs ahead of you, wriggling past the guards and into the door behind them. She screams.

"Master Onar is dead!"

Ira will meet Edda as she's shooed back by the guards. "He, uh, well..he's a good man. Better than my last boss. And he paid well. And on time.". Her pretence of detachment is not convincing, as a few tears track down her face. She doesn't even notice Ira is an Elf. The town guard move you back with a time-honoured "Nothing to see here". Again, they're not terribly convincing either.You're a couple of handful of paces back from the front of this fancy-but-not-oversize wooden building, which now has a guard in front of its door in case Edda tries getting in again. Three more guards are keeping the crowd back while muttering among themselves.

Edda finally looks up and her eyes widen. "Uh, my Lady!? My name is Edda, uh, an it please thee". Clearly, she doesn't talk to Elves much. "He's got a page, Harald. Oh yes, here he comes now, in fact." She points at a thin, wiry man who is pushing his way through the crowd.

"I came as soon as I could. What's happened here?". He sees the party (including Ira) and physically double-takes. "Oh, why would your business cause this?". The guards suddenly eye you all suspiciously.

"This is no place for discussing this crime," says a guard with better armour than the rest. "Join me inside.".

He looks over the players. "And in fact, you will join us as well, I think. We will squeeze in to the waiting room.".

---

You're politely but firmly ushered into the building, to the disappointment of Edda who is left outside ("hush, child" etc).

"Now, Captain Redsong, please tell me what's happened to our Steward?" Harald asks.

"In a word, murder.

It may be a burglary gone wrong, the office was being searched. It's a mess up there, with the body on top of most of the debris. Or maybe this was some planned kill, with the destruction just a distraction. What can you tell us? Who are these people?" the guard Captain responds, gesturing at you.

Both Harald and Cpt Redsong look askance at the news of your errand. Harald says "Oh of course, Edda welcomed you back last night did she not?
Ah, master Leiknir was very pleased indeed to hear of the return of even some of his family heirlooms". He then chokes up a little bit.

"Valuable, were they?" Redsong asks.

"Do you mean, 'not valuable' then?"

Captain Redsong shakes his head distractedly "No more questions, but don't leave the town. And yes, provide your details before leaving, please". He goes back the rest of the party.

"So you turn up the night before Master Leiknir is murdered by assailants unknown after running an 'errand' across the breadth of the country that you're saying is just knick-knacks of purely sentimental value? That seems... " Harald takes him away for a conversation the other side of the room for a few minutes, and you can't overhear it.Eventually they come back, Harald looking calm and the Captain looking slightly irritated. He says "Alright fine, Harald when I said I owed you a favour this is definitely not what I had in mind. But you're all free to leave, providing you leave your contact details.".

Harald coughs. Redsong glares and continues "And I'd accept your independent input on the terrible scene upstairs under Harald's character recommendation. I'm going to keep the crowds away and see if we found any witnesses, please let me know your thoughts". And angrily stomps out. The guards follow, looking very curious indeed.

It's just the party and Harald now. Unconcealed grief now covers his face. "Woe to this day. A good man has fallen, and I have to keep secrets from the town guard. Who could have done this? The only thing I know is that it was none of you. We will talk of your errand later, in safer locations. But keep what you found secret. And keep it safe!"

He gestures for you to follow him upstairs, where you see a large desk, with a few scrolls on it, and the corpse of Master Leiknir, bled out. There are many stab wounds. The office has many books - no longer on shelves. Drawers have been emptied from the furniture and tipped on the floor.

The body is cold (so not the end of the night), and has many defensive wounds on the arms. Onar was fending off an attacker. The fatal wound isn't too deep, looks to have been a lucky thrust rather than a death-strike, with a short blade or the tip of a weapon. If this was an assassination it was pretty clumsy.

No sediment, although you're not too surprised by that, being on a lake. If anything the floor is..damp. On the first floor? The stairs are dry. The humans in the party won't have noticed, but you heard the rain on the roof last night. What seems weirdly subtle to others is reasonably obvious to your eyes - the window ledge is still wet, but the window is closed.

Harald shows you a list:

* petty cash (10gp worth in silver)
* a liquor bottle
* 7-8 (harald isn't sure) books, about the same number that's left behind

Harald says "There are more valuable things that they didn't take, I assumed they just took the small old books because they're valuable, but on reflection I don't think those were the most valuable books here. And anyway, there's not exactly a thriving black market here of books from the Second Age. Who's going to buy it?". He looks unsurprisingly downcast and a bit bewildered.