"I would rather we get started now and reschedule dinner for the triumphant victory celebration," Alix agrees, "And if you could arrange for a private room where the details of our discussions needn't disturb your repose, my lady, that would be wonderful," Alix smiles gratefully.
*Assuming the others more-or-less agree, Alix follows Kora (or whoever leads them) to the new room. Once he is sure that the room is in fact actually secure, lest Lady Lavinia have spies for her enemies among her ranks (or her own spies listening in on them), Alix begins.*
"Well, gentlemen, we have a complicated task ahead of us, but I think I have a sense for all your mettle, and if I'm right, it shouldn't be anything we can't handle. There are a few opening concerns that need to be considered, and then I have a few tasks that we should assign amongst ourselves, and I'm interested in hearing ideas from all of you as well."
"But to start--we have several knowns in this case and many unknowns. There are also coincidences that are too convenient, and I shall be positing theories to connect these. Foremost of which, and of course this is as-yet unsubstantiated so consider it a theory and not an accusation, I believe that the 'loss' of the ring followed by the burning ship was no coincidence. It seems fairly likely that Vanthus may have been behind this--there are several possible motives, but jealousy over his sister's heiress status seems most likely. This also means that if we are to believe that the vault has not already been plundered of its riches, it must be because of some sort of extra safeguard within, be it trap, guardian, or password, that Vanthus needs us to bypass for him--we'll thus want to be careful when we proceed to the actual vault. But that gets ahead of where we are now."
"At the current moment, we need to deal with Vark in some fashion--perhaps it will be as simple as sneaking aboard, but he doubtless has the ship guarded at most junctures. That's where our next move comes in. I'm going to make a series of suggestions, and if anyone wants to volunteer for a task, that would be great--I know that most of these are well beyond my meagre skill to perform."
"First and simplest, but perhaps most dangerous for an amateur, will be a sneak and scout who watches for activity on the Blue Nixie by the docks. Vark can't stay on the ship forever, or if he does, he has to send men out for supplies, so crucial will be any regularity in that schedule. Assaulting Vark on the Blue Nixie is a danger to our lovely patroness's ship as well as leaving an advantage to our foe in letting them defend the ground they hold. Preventing Vark's thugs from returning with supplies (if they are using a supply chain) or catching Vark at the shifting of watches (if they aren't camped out there and are just shifting watches) gives us the element of surprise and the field advantage. Intelligence collected by our sneaky scout will thus be crucial if it comes to blows. Then again, I hope it shan't come to blows."
"But that task is not something I could do competently--I have a feeling that you may be excellent at it, Tereg."
"What shall I be doing? I'm going to dig up some dirt on Vark for purposes of outmanoeuvring him politically or potentially blackmail. To that end, I'm going to check with Rowyn Kellani--her family hopes to take over the position of Harbormaster, so she'll know something if anyone in Sasserine does. Plus she may be involved--which means that we should gather some information on her as well. And speaking of gathering information, checking up ourselves on Vark as well as Vanthus would be prudent. If we find Vanthus and he has the other ring, we don't even need to deal with Vark yet. Julian, I'm guessing that gathering random snippets like that is easy for a minstrel who can move fluidly between every strata of society and listen when loose lips speak. I bet you'd be great at it."
"How does that sound so far? Thoughts, fellows?"
)
