Part the Very Thirteenth
In which: our heroes take a good long look at somebody’s chest
(as recorded by Fajitas)
Reyu and Hue emerge from the Fortunate Traveler just as Anvil staggers to his feet, clutching his dizzied head. Before Reyu can even ask what happened, Anvil gestures vaguely down the street towards the cart. Words prove unnecessary. One look is enough. Reyu dashes in pursuit, Anvil a step behind her.
“Hey! Wait up!” Hue shouts, as he follows them. Apparently, a few words were necessary.
***********
From cover of darkness, Cyrus scans the street along the Missola compound. Nothing. Good, he thinks. So far, they don’t know we’re here. That’ll keep this nice and quiet. He glances on down the street, where Thatch is watching from his hiding place…
…and sees Thatch’s leg sticking out of the shadows.
Crud, he thinks to himself.
And then he hears the cart, bouncing along the street, pulling up to the compound. “Let us in, you fools! Hurry!” Desalle’s voice all but shrieks, as the cart makes a hair turn towards the gates.
Double crud, Cyrus thinks.
Moments later, Reyu and Anvil come panting down the road, followed by a strange small person Cyrus has never seen before. They run straight up to the gates. “In Kettenek’s name, open these gates!” Anvil loudly declares.
Crud, crud, and double crud, Cyrus thinks, as he looses his sword and breaks his cover.
Cyrus joins the others at the gate. Thatch arrives a second later.
“Um. I guess it didn’t go so…” Thatch begins, but trails off as he sees Hue.
“Hi! Nice to see you again!” Hue says, waving at Thatch. The Ferret, from Hue’s shoulder, eyes Thatch suspiciously with his dark, beady, ferret-eyes.
“Right,” Thatch says, as his eyes refocus on Reyu. “Guess it didn’t go well.”
“Yes and no,” she replies. “We can now connect Desalle to Remmer. Unfortunately…”
“Desalle escaped custody,” Anvil says, “and is still wearing my manacles.” It’s almost hard to say which annoys Anvil more. He turns to Cyrus. “Run into the street and fetch the first contingent of Watchmen you come across. Tell them Justice demands they come here immediately.”
Cyrus runs off, giving the rest of the party enough time to introduce Anvil and Hue, and to fill the little man in on what is going on. Hue seems disturbingly entranced by the notion of taking part in an official investigation.
Cyrus returns shortly thereafter with a troop of Watchmen. Anvil and the Watchmen continue to demand entrance for some time before there is any indication that anyone is listening. Finally, a pair of guards opens the gate and allows the party in.
They are escorted into the house. Missola descends the stairs coming towards them, Desalle a step behind him with a sneer on his face. There is no sign of Anvil’s manacles. “What is the meaning of--" Missola begins, but Anvil has had quite enough.
“We are here to search these premises for evidence of an illicit conspiracy to frame and enslave innocent citizens,” Anvil says. “And to re-arrest your chamberlain.”
“My chamberlain informs me that you attacked him with a magical assault for no reason,” Missola says calmly, as if this is the opening salvo of a debate. But Anvil is having none of it.
“He is welcome to repeat that story in court,” Anvil says. “In the meantime, we will search these premises. If you hinder us, you will be arrested as well.” He gestures for the Watchmen to spread out. The Watchmen look back and forth between the Justicar and the Count, unsure who to listen to. Anvil is, after all, merely a First Order Justicar. There is a brief, tense standoff.
Missola’s face twitches. Finally, he regains his cool demeanor and walks straight up to Anvil. “Very well,” he says. “Search if you must, Justicar. But I assure you, you will find nothing.” He then adds, in an undertone that only Anvil can hear, “I will have your robes for this.”
Anvil ignores the threat and directs his companions and the Watchmen to begin searching. “Um. What exactly are we searching for?” Thatch asks.
“Evidence,” is Anvil’s only reply.
“Um,” Thatch responds.
“We will know it when we see it,” Anvil assures him.
“He’s right, you know,” Hue chimes in. “In my studies, I’ve seen a lot of evidence, and you always know it! This one time, I saw this squirrel--"
“Perhaps,” Reyu says quickly, “we should begin our work sooner rather than later.” There is a collective sigh of relief as the horror of another squirrel lecture is narrowly avoided.
The party begins the upstairs search, while the Watchmen search the downstairs. After a quick scan of the layout, the party agrees that the Count’s personal study is probably the best place to start. Missola and Desalle accompany them, watching haughtily and occasionally reminding the party not to damage anything. At Anvil’s command, two Watchmen keep a careful eye on them at all times. These Watchmen are in turn watched by two of Missola’s household guards. Thus, it is a rather tense group that squeezes into the study and begins its search.
By Pykosian standards, the study is fairly ornate. Delicate carvings (clearly the work of artisans in Dar Karo) adorn the walls and shelves. A few bits of mildly erotic artwork (clearly of more dubious origin than the carvings) are hung on walls or set on corners. Exquisitely crafted weapons are hung about the place. A fine fur rug lies across the floor.
Anvil makes for the large desk on one side of the room. He begins rifling through the drawers, flipping through letters. Thatch checks out the bookshelves, pulling on books, looking for a secret trigger. Cyrus turns his attention to a small chest sitting atop a table. Hue looks around at everything wide-eyed. “Wow!” he says. “You have some cool stuff!” He waves his hands and chants, and to those looking closely his eyes flash blue for a moment. Now Hue looks around the room again, scrutinizing things more carefully.
Meanwhile, Cyrus is having little luck with the chest. “I can’t get this thing open,” he declares.
Hue turns his sight to the chest. It is maybe a foot and a half long and half as wide. Like everything else here, it is crafted from the finest of materials. But to Hue’s eyes, there is something more interesting about the chest. It is tinged in a bluish aura. “Maybe it won’t open ‘cause it’s magic!” he exclaims to Cyrus. The others look around in surprise. “Conjurational magic, I think,” Hue adds.
“Where are the keys?” Thatch asks Missola.
Missola scoffs. “I am under no obligation to aid you in this endeavor,” he says.
“Your aid will not be necessary,” Anvil informs him, as he holds up a ring of four keys he has found in the desk. He tosses them to Cyrus. “Try these.”
The four keys are nearly identical. They are shaped the same, but each has a different colored gem in the handle. Cyrus shrugs and tries the one with the ruby handle. It clicks in the lock. He opens the chest. The interior is lined with red velvet. Inside is a sack of coins, nearly 100 gold pieces.
“That’s it?” Thatch asks. “He has a magic chest, and all he keeps in it is money?”
“Try another key,” Reyu suggests, and she notices that Missola stiffens slightly at the suggestion. However, with a glance at the Watchmen watching him, he takes no action.
Cyrus closes the chest, picks another key at random (the sapphire handle), and inserts it into the lock. Again it clicks. Again Cyrus opens the chest. This time the inner lining is blue velvet, and the contents of the chest have changed. There are now about 15 small vials inside the chest. Cyrus whistles under his breath. “Looks like some kind of arcane enchantment on the chest. This thing may well be the most expensive item in the room.”
Reyu picks up a vial and inspects its contents. “It looks very much like the… substance… we found in Captain Hemlek’s cart,” she says. “The Blackroot Distillate.”
“Blackroot Distillate is perfect legal in--" Missola begins.
“--in Dar Aego,” half the group finishes.
There are still two more keys left, so Cyrus tries them out. The diamond key produces a white-lined compartment containing two larger flasks of liquid. Reyu inspects them, but is unsure what they are. Hue, however, squints at them, concentrating. “Hey!” he says. “These are magic, too. Probably some kind of potions.” He takes them from Reyu, unstoppers them, and sniffs deeply. “Yup! Definitely potions.”
“But not evidence,” Thatch mumbles. The potions are replaced, and the last key, the emerald key, is inserted into the lock. Click.
The green-lined compartment is filled with a large quantity of gems. There is nothing else to be seen.
The group’s shoulders collectively slump. They had so been expecting something more here. After a slight pause, Thatch speaks. “Um. Maybe there’s another compartment in it somewhere.”
“We’re out of keys,” Cyrus points out.
“No, I mean, y’know, a normal one. Like, a fake bottom or something. Um. That happens a lot in stories. Or so I’ve heard,” he adds lamely. It seems worth a try, so the party removes the contents of the green chamber and searches the inside carefully. They repeat the process for each chamber, placing the contents on the table and running their fingers along the inside.
In the red chamber, they find something. There is another key, hidden underneath the lining. It is identical to the first four, but with a piece of obsidian in the handle.
to be continued...
