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After receiving the healing, Marcus stands up and looks around. Seeing Tomnus with a wand, "thank you. Thought I was dead for a minute there."
"Now I wonder what that was about?" He looks around, and scavenges a bow and 20 arrows. "Been meaning to get me one of these, and this will do just fine."
Entering the town, Marcus looks around to see if anything unusual stands out. . When the towns folk come out of their homes, he stands ready, sword in hand, weapon pointed down, and waits as Tomnus carries on the conversation. He is constantly looking around, and will say something if it seems that they are being surrounded. .
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As the group enters the town, and the villagers begin to respond with hostility and thrown garbage, Milo begins to tense up noticeably. His hands slowly clenched into fists and his jaw set with barely controlled rage as he ponders burning the entire place to the ground.
When Dalard and the militia approach, he maneuvers quietly into position for a clear line of sight to the entire group, his hands flexing slowly his eyes almost seeming to burn with their own fire.
"Grald is the one in charge of the mercenaries." Dalard explains. "You look like fightin' types, but you're not his men. What's the Pathfinder Society and what kinda business could you possibly have at a time like this?"
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"The Pathfinder Society is a group dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge. We look like fighters, and some of us are perhaps able in that area, because some of the missions we are sent on by the Society are rife with creatures that mean us harm, or resent our intrusion into their secrets. Zombies and skeletons in tombs, for example. As for what business we have in Railford, we have no connection to this Grald of yours. We were tasked to make contact with the son of Iodon Railford, and to gain his assistance in the overall goal of the Society."
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Knowing that he is next to useless with words, and remembering the time that he annoyed the mayor of his home town just by speaking, Marcus wisely keeps his mouth shut and lets others do the talking. He, however, still continues to look around at the townsfolk, keeping his senses attuned to what is occurring and he is prepared for any further outbreaks of violence.
"Hm. Never heard of the Pathfinders before but you certainly don't look like the brutes Grald brought in."
"I believe you're search of Becher Railford, the distillery's owner, but he just recently left on some private excursion. Two days ago Becher and a few other men went out into the swamp to recover some secret cache left by his father.
"Presumably Becher's father left him the deeds to the entire town but Becher doesn't have them right now, which is why we're being besieged by some upstart who's trying to use some inane archaic law to claim this town as his own. Only just this morning one of Becher's men stumbled into town sickened with fever. He tells a horrifying tale of walking corpses that fell upon him and his friends just after Becher got ahold of his father's strongbox.
"If you folks say you've dealt with zombies and skeletons and such, perhaps you should talk to him and hear the story then. His name's Jessup Bose and he's down the road here at the healer's place."
Dalard and his men will escort you down the road to the house of an old woman acting as the town's healer. Upon the bed lies a young man with festering wounds surrounded by leeches.
When prompted by Dalard, Jessup recounts his tale. "Becher led us through the swamps down an old trail to what used to be the barrel-aging caves. Them caves where vinters would set the casks ta dry ‘em out an give ‘em good flavor. When we got there, the caves was all boarded up, so it took us a while ta get in. The place was flooded, barrels floating everywhere and it had a foul stink to it. We poked around a bit till Becher found the back office. Inside, there was this strongbox where he said the deed was. That’s when they came... these things rose out of the muck and started attacking. Dead folk with sharpened fangs. We tried to fight ‘em but they was too strong. They tore Padrik’s arm right off and started eating it... we tried to get out the way we came in. I made it out, but some of the creatures started following us, escaping. They blocked the entrance, trapping Becher and Walmont inside and after that the entrance collapsed on them. One of the creatures that followed me tried to grab me and took a bite out of my leg, so I ran. I ran as fast as I could. I don’t know what happened after that."
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Milo's not too concerned if the man lives or dies... as long as he's not infectious or about to start chewing on people himself.
"Got lots of infections in Underbridge, bad ones too. Often the only answer was to burn it out or cut it off." He smiles wanly at Jessup and adds ( ), "I'm sure you'll be fine."
Everyone seems to recognize the tell-tale mark of a ghoul bite and it is glaringly obvious that this man is suffering from ghoul fever. If not treated properly, he will not live through the night.
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The gnome shrugs absently, "How long ago did you get bit?" he adds glowering at the diseased leg. "Might not matter much beyond the evening anyway. He suddenly smiles, though it doesn't appear particularly comforting. "You'll be up and walking around in a day or two, either way for sure."
"How hungry you'll be however..." He adds.
"I left with Becher two days ago. Took us a while to find the cache. I was bit last night, just made it to town this morning."
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Milo shrugs slightly, glancing at the others. "This mean we gotta go find this unlucky bastard?" He seems unenthused. "Trapped in a cave with ... " he hesitates a moment, looking back at the sick man and leaves the obvious unspoken.
"So where're these caves?" He asks Jessup.
"And Grald..." The gnome directs this question at Dalard. "How strong is this claim of his? If Becher had returned with these documents, would that have sent him packin'? Or he gonna be a problem regardless? Where's he holed up?" He glances briefly back at the others. "Can't imagine he'll be too happy when he finds the state his ... uh... dogs... are in."
Jessup gives directions to the cave.
Dalard responds, "Well, I'm not overfamiliar with the laws Grald is quotin' but it sounds to me like Becher needs those papers or else the whole town is essentially unowned, in which case Grald can just take it for his own keep. Grald's got men all over the place surroundin' the town."
"Before you go tromping out into the wilderness after these monsters and whatnots, you better take these." Dalard hands over a scroll of remove disease and a potion of remove paralysis.
After resting up for the night you all head out down the path suggested by Dalard to search out for Becher's cave. A narrow footpath leads down a gentle but muddy escarpment, disappearing into thick tangles of shrubs and swamp-weed. At the base of the hill, the dirt path turns to soft sticky mud. It winds back through the shadowy mire. Nailed to a nearby tree hangs a moss-covered plank crudely cut into an arrow that points towards the mucky path. Beneath the moss, faded writing on the plank reads, “Barrel-Caves 2.5 miles.”
The path continues for about a mile and a half when it comes to the edge of a shallow bog whose waters rise above the muck, covering the tracks entirely. A patchy film of sickly colored, rubbery fungus floats upon the surface. Near the water’s edge, three moss-covered planks hang cockeyed from a rotten wooden post. The first sign reads, “Railford 1-3/4 miles”, the second reads “Barrel-Aging Caves 3/4 mile,” and the third sign reads “Beware of Screamers.”
The party can easily spot a path through the water presumably where Becher and his men disturbed the film on the surface as they waded through.
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Having spent the night sharing eldritch secrets with the young gnome. Tomnus awakens early to fit his studies into his schedule as well as some staff katas.
Taking a roll towards the back of the group walking slowly relying on the staff. He finally approaches the group as milo asks his question about the screamers, the old man answers Generally it's referred to a woman who gets rather enthused during the love making process.
Lia notices that floating in the water is a rubbery fungus.
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"I have never seen anything like it before" chimes in Marcus. He looks at the path that leads to the caves to determine if the rubbery fungus still covers the path or not.