Taking stock of what they've found Phil nods gravely "Well... fair to say we've found the right place. The birds tie them to the flay-house and the mirror to the sea. The only question is whether we're at the right end of the flowpath to catch the flies." shuffling to the side of the room as those stronger seek to pare up the floorboards and shed a mite more light.
Snake removes the three floorboards to reveal a dark pit. It is wider than the one Tendal found in the other building, and a large and sturdy iron hook protrudes from the side of it, just below floor-level.
"Well, these fellows here imagine you're to feed them.", Gristav says to Braddon. "Must be a part of the rituals of this, the Grand Cathedral of Roderic's Cove. Let's do maintain the decorum...", Gristav jests, seeking seed for the birds. "Plus, hungry is how - hunger is why - they fly. You see that part of the cage, set apart? So a bird or two can be kept hungry, while the others are fed, is my guess."
Braddon shrugs.
"They use the mirrors to make the sun fly to the ships. I guess they use the birds to fly to Riddleport. Pretty view."Braddon takes a final look around then heads back down to the others.
"Nothing dangerous up there. Pigeons and a lovely view out to the sea of the ships coming in."
Braddon looks to what the others are doing.
"Where'd this pit come from? Want me to climb in?"
The tall man looks to Braddon and then down to the pit and then back to Braddon. "Go for it. I'll give you some light." Snake then sends several points of light out and down into the pit a short ways. "Ready when you are, bub," he tells the ranger.
Snake's arcane lights reveal a fairly-straight drop down into what looks like a natural cavern some fifteen to twenty feet below ground level.
"If we trust the ring, a rope knotted to it, and run under one boot, would let us lower you gently, with twice the rope, moving over distance, halving the weight, and then the friction of the boot..."
Gristav looks about for understanding expressions. "Or, we might tie knots in the rope, and climb down.", he offers finally.
Braddon peers into the space.
"Shouldn't there be like a ladder? Or steps? It seems like a dumb idea to have a cellar with no way in. I'll use a rope."
Braddon takes the newly acquired rope, loops one end around a foot and let's the others lower him into the space.
The others lower Braddon carefully through the hole in the floor. At first he has to pull in his elbows not to bump against the sides of the shaft, but after that he emerges into a spacious natural cavern. Snake's arcane motes illuminate his landing spot, a floor of rock and mud sloping downward toward the east; thirty feet to the west, a pale streak of natural light coming through another hole in the ceiling spotlights a higher point on the slope. The air is cooler and damper down here, and there is a sound of trickling water from the darkness to the east. He touches down among a half-dozen buckets and a wooden platform about the same size as the duct he passed through, with ropes running from the four corners to a pulley mechanism in the middle, clearly some kind of dumbwaiter.
Braddon peers into the space.
"Shouldn't there be like a ladder? Or steps? It seems like a dumb idea to have a cellar with no way in. I'll use a rope."Braddon takes the newly acquired rope, loops one end around a foot and let's the others lower him into the space.
"Unless it's an oubliette, and then it's a cellar with no way out."
"He shouldn't be alone.", Gristav adds, looping a portion of rope through the ring. Tying a bowstring knot in the rope end, and stepping a boot arch into that loop, he settled his other boot arch in the second loop, and held up the fly end of the rope to Snake. "At thrice the distance, your bulk alone should serve. Let it slip, slowly, please."
"There's a ladder thing down here. I'll give it a go."
Braddon tugs on the rope on the pulley and tries to get the platform to rise back to the others.
It looks as if the platform is meant to have a rope run through the pulley from above. Once Gristav is down in the cave, the two half-elves run the rope through and toss the other end back up to Snake, Tendal, and Phillip. Raising and lowering the platform would have to be done by someone remaining at the top, however.
Raising and lowering the platform would have to be done by someone remaining at the top, however.
"I can do it and then you can lower me down again."
"While very inefficient, I cannot see another answer that would suffice at this time. I suggest that we follow Mr. Hurst's suggestion with alacrity." Tendal said, holding his cane out over the lip and peering down into the depths.
Shaking his head, "Look, just give me a rope, bub. I'll tie it off on this hook which will give us a way to get back up. It's that simple. There's no way up if there's no one here to pull us up, so, give me a rope." Assuming someone hands the tall man a rope, he proceeds to do as said.
Meeting Tendal's eye, Gristav smiles, and reflects, "As with everything else so far, we have four workable approaches, and manage, somehow, to take each of them."
Already on the lower level, Gristav gestures Braddon ahead, or, if the ranger elects to operate the dumbwaiter, he waits rather more smartly, peering into the gloom ahead, with the lights behind him.
Tendal waits with Gristav and then descends the dumbwaiter down. As Braddon reaches the group waiting at the bottom of the descent.
"Thank you Mr. Hurst. While I imagine that I could, in time scale down the rope as Snake has done, I think it would be more likely, I not being very skilled or practiced in ascension or descending ropes, would slip and injure myself. When possible, and when not too cumbersome, I would rather avoid that likely outcome."
"Now that we are all down here, lets see what we can discover." he says, holding up his cane to illuminate the room.
The walls and floor of this natural cavern are a mixture of mud and rock, slippery and uneven. The floor slopes downward toward the east. Apart from illumination provided by the party, the only light is the indirect natural light filtering down through the two holes in the ceiling: the one through which they just descended and a smaller one some thirty feet to the west.
The dumbwaiter-type platform and several buckets are scattered beneath the entrance from the tower. Beneath the other ray of light are the broken and rotting remains of a wooden ladder. Braddon easily discerns signs of human foot traffic, leading from beneath the tower down the slope to the east toward the sound of trickling water.
Snake 'reactivates' his lights to go along with Tendal's light when he makes his way down. "What are we waiting for? Let's move."
Braddon draws both weapons again and heads down the slope.
"The tracks go this way," he explains casually.
Gingerly seeing himself from above to below, Phillip settles in at the rear of the convoy with loaded crossbow in hand... though not yet raised in anger.
Eyeing the dirt walls, the uncertain footing and the muck stretching out into the gloom from the magical lights Tendal's frown deepens.
"It is times like this that I am glad I decided that magic was an appropriate pasttime. I certainly would be a betattered ragamuffin if I didn't have the appropriate spells to clean my garments. Thought I wonder if I will get the thought of the muck out of my clothes later...there may not be enough magic in the world for that."
"Before this is over, I will wager we will have to crawl through some narrow passageway, I am certain of it. Ah well. Onward! The muck awaits."
Braddon leads the way down the slope. The floor underfoot is slippery and uneven but not actively treacherous. The sound of trickling water grows louder as the cavern funnels down to a ragged opening punched through a rock wall.
The floor in the next chamber is about two feet lower than the end of the first cave; it's an awkwardly-large step down for most of the group and a short leap for Phillip. This room is almost entirely filled with a dark pool. The wall on the northern side of the cave reflects the lights carried or manipulated by the party as water trickles out of miniscule cracks to fill the pool from some natural spring on the other side of the rock. A narrow rim around the edge of the pond leads to another tunnel about three feet above the surface of the water.
...it's an awkwardly-large step down for most of the group and a short leap for Phillip.
Gristav stands by to offer by posture and expression whatever presence or absence might be welcome, his staff grounded as firmly as a flagpole.
After stepping down off the small ledge Tendal looks out over the pond and then after a quick glance at his sodden boots, his frown deepens.
"Gentlemen, it occurs to me that while we may be successful in finding some clue to Lil Scarlet's whereabouts as we delve in these subterranean environs, I cannot picture Lil herself skulking about in such...filthy conditions. She seems to pride herself on finery and cleanliness."
"If I was her, I would have a house somewhere quiet, or live aboard a nicely appointed ship. I cannot fathom her living in a cave in some far off wilderness."
"A whore could manage, with coin at the end.", Gristav says, peering into the unexplored being offered. "But you're right. Whatever this is, it's not hers. Still, it was guarded, hidden, maintained among other left to rot..." Gristav sighs, and cyphers.
"Braddon, your eye is trained. The tracks that aren't ours, do they go in, and return? Or just, go in?"
Gristav looks above for signs of scorching torches past, doing his part of the parsing...
"She might not be here, but we've a fair enough bet now that Marzo and his lads are connected to Lil and the Teeth. Still well worth the coming... and we aren't done yet..."
In this chamber, between the stone floor and the water, clear tracks are difficult to discern. In the cavern by which you entered, however, the tracks seemed to lead in both directions: both toward this room with the spring-fed pool and back to the area beneath the tower.
"I thought this had nothing to do with the whore and we were chasing drug running cultist scum. How are they linked?"
Braddon approaches the tunnel in the opposite wall.
"Tracks go both ways but not many places to go down here."
Snake shakes his head, "Not real sure, bub, but I think Raccoon's right. Somehow, some way, they're connected. We just have to find out how."
"Let's keep going. We've come this far let's see where it takes us."
"The wastrel hunts the whore. The ranger, cults would slay. The third-and-half (half more), from shade, to win the day. The fourth, unnamed, unknown, as yet, yet quiets those who'd share it. And more fool I, would all support. And shown the chance, I'd dare it."
Delighted the extempraneous verse fell together, Gristav giggles, and goes onward, in the van.
Shrugging Phil puts together the threads as he sees it "The day Lil moved against us in Riddleport, there was a man I met on the river... Brett Scabb. The same Brett Scabb mentioned by the sot back in the Cove... with mention that Scabb's on Treeg's crew. We already know that Lil was off with Treeg towards here - and the mirror up top was likely to signal from here down to the harbour when the Teeth is at port."
"So aye... we're in the right place, even if it isn't for Lil."
Snake sends his dancing lights into the dark tunnel before anyone enters it, but they reveal only rough stony walls and ceilings. This new tunnel, a few feet above the surface of the pool, is dry, but the ceiling is low; Phillip doesn't even notice, but Snake, in particular, has to duck from time to time to avoid striking his head on a protrusion of rock. The tunnel, with only an occasional jag, seems to run consistently westward, toward the sea.
Braddon nods at the conversation around him and continues down the tunnel.
"If this is the only way, we should follow it till the end," he proclaims.
He is the first to start complaining if the tunnel doesn't end within the next 2 minutes but forges ahead in righteous indignation.
Braddon has ample opportunity to complain, as the tunnel seems to wind on for an interminable length. Perhaps it's only the monotony: there are no branchings, no features, no change in direction as they tramp through the darkness.
At last, however, something changes. The still and musty air is stirred by a hint of salty breeze, and behind the sound of the group's own footsteps shuffling over the uneven rock can be heard the pulse of the ocean, soft but steady. A few dozen feet farther and the first natural light the men have seen since the cavern below the tower limns the rock walls ahead.
The tunnel opens up onto a small expanse of shingle, overshadowed by the cliffs which line this part of the Varisian coast. Directly ahead, the sunlight sparkles on the waves, but this little niche of coastline is protected from both sun by the overhanging scarp and from the wind by sheer cliffs on either side. Out in the Gulf, a large boulder calved from the shoreline towers out of the water, blocking sight of the location from the sea.
In the most protected recesses of the beach, near the tunnel entrance, some dilapidated crates are stacked. Near the shoreline, a ship's mast has been erected in a pile of rock, a rope and pulley attached.
"So, leave the cargo. Run up a signal. And be gone. And the tower spots the signal, and the pickup is made. Unless the tower can't be seen...", Gristav thinks aloud, turning about to look for the tower. "In which case, it's the same in reverse?"
"Seems as likely as not." Tendal says in response to Gristav as he looks out to sea.
After taking a few deep lungfuls of the brisk sea air, he turns around, attempting to memorize the pattern of the cliff, trying to imagine what it would look like from a ship at sea.
"I wonder how much contact the ruffians at the tower and those on the ship actually have with one another...We could see about finding out the signal, signaling the ship, then see if we can identify what ship is responding. Perhaps there would be an opportunity for us to later work our way onboard the ship at a suitable port..." Tendal mulls aloud as he taps at the rocks of the cliff face with his cane.
The cliffs that the tunnel ran through block all sight inland from the shingle in their shadow, but the mast looks to be high enough that a flag run all the way up would overtop the cliff and thus be visible from the tower, and likewise from a ship already aware of the hidden beach's existence. The huge boulder standing just offshore should be an obvious landmark for any sailor who knew to look for it.
The shallow shingle is certainly no landing place for a full-sized ship, but one can easily imagine one anchored the other side of the boulder and sending in a jolly boat or some similar smaller craft.
Braddon sheathes his weapons, stretches outside in the fresh air and heads over to a crate.
He immediately opens it and starts rummaging through the contents.
"This better have something valuable, or I'm turning these guys straight over to the Overlord."
Braddon is disappointed to discover nothing of obvious value in the crates. There are some coils of old rope, a heavy folded stack of sail canvas, a rusty grappling hook, a few near-empty clay jugs that smell of rum, some moldy ship's biscuit, a dozen partially-burned torches, a bronze knife, and a piece of scrimshaw half-carved into a mermaid, the tapered end carved into a long fish tail, the rest curving into an incomplete hourglass figure.
He also finds, lying in the top of one of the crates, a small metal strongbox; inside is a filthy square of dark red flannel which must serve as the flag to be run up the mast as a signal. In the narrow gap between the crates and the base of the cliff are five battered oars, one with a broken shaft.
"The collected abandoned, jetsam unworthy even of flotsam's favor. Though canvas is always useful. Just not worth their effort. Nor ours, I suppose. Let us return to the tower and tumbledowns, perhaps our prisoners will talk if we're more patient."
Staring at the rambling magus, Snake simply shakes his head before looking to Tendal. "We'll try it your way, bub. We might bring trouble straight to our doorstep but at least this way we don't have to go looking for it."
Braddon looks at the dark red flannel and then the mast, and back again, with a puzzled look on his face.
"Were they in the Cove last week? Or here? Or both? Could we use this to make them come back."
A wicked grin crosses his face.
"If we can make them come back, then we can kill them, right?"
"Perhaps Mr. Hurst. But we cannot be certain of what numbers or manner they will arrive in. And killing several sailors does not equal the taking of a vessel. We would still need to proceed to the ship, under watch, board and then subdue those remaining. I would imagine that to be very difficult if done in the day." Tendal says to Braddon as he thinks through the scenario.
"I think that Gristav's suggestion is the most prudent, and most likely to come to a suitable fruition. If they are not able to provide any information, then we will be left with raising the flag and signaling from the tower as our best option. There is a third, and least palatable option. We could lay an ambush for whomever does the signaling. If that person is someone other than the miscreants that we have already apprehended."
Braddon's eyes light up as his hearing becomes very selective.
"Yeah, we could take a ship."
His eyes glaze a little as he continues.
"We could run up the flag. They'd only send a small jolly boat into the shallows here. And when they come up on the beach there'd be less than a dozen and we could take them surprise then take their rowboat and go and take their ship too."
Braddon looks around to see if anyone else is convinced by his scheme.
Snake cuts his eyes from one to the other before coming to a decision. "I say we run up the flag. Let's see who pays us a visit." With that, the tall man prepares to do just that.
"With respect to your respective bloodlusts, a jolly boatful is not so sad a slice from a ship's complement as to be any great insult to her defenses. They'd bring few, leaving space for cargo."
"And we'd be boarding uphill, against the wind, as it were. If we want their vessel, we'd be better to first find a way to inspire them to come in force, leaving the ship lighter. We might also - and I do not suggest this, so much as observe it's possibility - book passage for Phillip and perhaps myself, in the cargo, in the manner of the famous horse."
"Any better plan, I think, begins with a better batch of banter by our bound and bundled brigands."
Snake attaches the square of flannel by its grommets to the rope and raises it to the top of the mast.
"I feel that this course of action is ill advised at best. However, lowering the flag now will only raise suspicion. I think we should remove ourselves from the beach for the moment, and conceal ourselves in the tunnel opening."
Tendal relights his cane and heads back into the tunnel, moving far enough back so that he is well away from the entrance but can still hear noise from the beach. He then cancels the spell, and waits, allowing his eyes to adjust to the gloom.