Estelle will shadow Lito and Jaymiss, acting like Lito's body guard.
"So ye can make anything outta that scrimshaw?"
"No." Jamiss replies. "But if you tell me what you want I can tell you what it will cost you."
As I said I was thinking something beautiful for my wife. Do you work in coral too? Maybe a Srimshaw and coral bracelet or necklace with images of our ship and home, or a set of some ornate Hair combs... I really am open, What have you worked on lately that you have been most proud of?
Lito works to get him talking until they are settled with drinks in a secluded corner of the inn. He really is planning to buy something for Agasta so he works to try to find something that he thinks she will like.
Once the are pretty much settled on what to make, Lito shoots the breeze buying some more rounds for the three of them. When the time is right he brings up the second point trying to draw out information about the spies:
ya if there is any truth to the rumor of spies.... well that’s a bit scary. After all anything that threatens my wife is something I would want to be prepared for. But I’m sure that’s just a nasty rumor right? Have you heard anything like that?
Jamiss gets a pouch from his belt and puts the contents on the table. It's a collection of brooches and other small trinkets he created. He explains what they are and how he created them. He drinks together with Lito and as the topic changes to the dangers in the Shackles and spies he relates "I have suspicions about a man named Haddon Pike, a beachcomber, fisherman, and occasional smuggler. The thing is, many of Haddon’s supposed smuggling trips down south in a hired boat don’t actually involve moving goods. I know the black market in Drenchport pretty well, and I've noticed that Haddon seldom buys or sells any contraband goods before or after these trips. I can tell you where you find that guy." He continues to tell where to find Haddon’s cottage.
Pluck flaps around with his new scrimshaw claw upgrades!
Estelle stays close to Lito, keeping the drinks coming for Jamiss but only have sips of her own.
"Hey buddy, if you ever get bored with doing scrimshaw, you can always come on my ship." Besmara invites Jamiss. "But for today I think I'm good. Maybe we meet the other day."
She then gets up and leaves to follow the lead Jamiss pointed them to.
Haddon’s residence is a small driftwood cottage perched on the rugged coast just outside of Drenchport. The door is locked and one neighbor tells, that he hasn't seen Haddon recently, though he tends to keep his own company. The front door has a simple lock, and there’s an open window at the back. Haddon’s dead body lies inside the cottage. Two crossbow bolts protrude from his back, and his head is submerged in a fish tank.
The tank holds Haddon’s pet, “Grinner,” a piranhalike creature with frilled spines, huge eyes, and lots of teeth, which has consumed most of its master’s exposed flesh. Clutched in Haddon’s hand is a piece of driftwood carved to resemble a birdlike humanoid with a narrow beak, recognizable as a tengu.
Looking through the window, Besmara decides that Haddon will have no objections to her entering so she unlocks the door.
"Looks like that one will not answer our questions easily." she sighs.
SQWAK! Curse this sudden but inevitable misfortune
"Aye, a bit funny that he be dead like that. I be wonderin' why he is carvin' a tengu from drift wood?" Estelle looks the place over hoping to find a clue.
We should search the place for any clues. And if all else fails I remember a story of a priest making the dead talk. Maybe Sandara can manage that magic.
Then Lito starts looking around
Sqwak! Time to split up and look for clues!
While everyone else is moving around Trytton spends a good deal of time searching, in silence
Tryttons finds something. While the cottage has been thoroughly ransacked, there is a concealed compartment in the fish tank’s heavily carved wooden base. Inside is a waterproofed bag containing 40 pp, 259 gp, and a scrimshaw walrus tusk scroll case (worth 50 gp). Inside the case are several rolled up scrolls of sheet music and lyrics, part of an old Chelish opera written in Infernal.
Secret notes?
"Where is Chay? He is the paper and secret stuff guy." Besmara asks while checking the dead guy.
Inspired by the opera script she tells "Let me see." Holding the corpse at the back of the head and looking at the skull where the flesh is eaten off "Alas, poor Haddon! I knew him, Noonan, a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy. He hath borne me on his back a thousand times, and now, how abhorred in my imagination it is! My gorge rises at it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know not how oft. —Where be your gibes now? Your gambols? Your songs? Your flashes of merriment that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one now to mock your own grinning? Quite chapfallen?"
Dropping the corpse on a chair she adds "Also, where is Sandara? I know the gods can make the dead speak. If they have lips or not."
I think you missed your calling Captain.
But you should know, that opera, if that what it truely is, should not be written in infernal. It is from a time when they were still worshiping the God of Man. We need to get this translated as it probably is not what it seems.
"I'd rob the rich folk at the theatre box office instead. But it lacks the vast sea." Besmara jokes.
"There has ta be an opera house on the sea we could rob, maybe we go scout it out next?" Estelle says after listening to the captain.
Lito glances at the music and shrugs:
Well I can't read this. Maybe bring this back to the ship and one of the crew would have a chance? Or maybe we need to bring this back to Tessa or the maybe someone at the House of Stolen Kisses. But the last I worry will spread this information all across the Shackels.
"Then back to the ship it is. Bring the corpse." Besmara decides and leads the way.
Back on the ship she summons Sandara to do some prayers on the dead to coerce the information from it.
"I can do that earliest tomorrow. I'm not prepared for that." Sandara tells.
Bring body to the hooker temple?
"Ya better not call it that to their face. For Calistria is the goddess of lust, revenge and trickery. They might try to arouse you and then send you off with blue balls the next time." Besmara comments with a mischievous grin.
Noonan starts getting ready to sail.
Sandara uses the rest of the day to contemplate the experiences she made as a pirate so far and with the help of Besmara (the Deity) gets the insight into new levels of divine prayers. Returning to the deck in the evening she calls the officers to join her. When all are around she leads them under deck where the body is stored and casts speak with dead on Haddon. "Mr. Haddon. Tell us, who killed you, what your part was in spying for Cheliax and who your contacts are."
The corpse starts speaking with a coarse voice "I was shot in the back. I don't know what sucker killed me. I was instructed to report on the movement of ships visiting Drenchport, especially those belonging to the Master of the Gales. And report to Roweena Kellet in Hell Harbor on Devil’s Arches." After that the corpse returns to acting dead.
[dice=Know Local For "Roweena Kellet in Hell Harbor on Devil’s Arches"]1d20 + 12[/dice]
Lito thinks hard about what the corpse said trying to remember anything he knows about this person, or place.
The Master of the Gales is a middle-aged human man, a druid, captain of the Kraken. While there is not a captain in the Shackles who could oppose this mysterious man of the sea, the eerie Master of the Gales appears content to hold only the battered town of Drenchport. Rumors abound of his links to the Cult of the Eye, and many believe that his allegiances lie not with the Pirate Council, but with the incredible power of the Eye of Abendego itself. He won the Free Captains Regatta the last five years.
Hell Harbor is the largest settlement on Devil's Arches, one of the larger islands of the Shackles. It is found north of Port Peril.
Isn't Besmara the captain of the Kraken? Are there two boats with the same name?
Besmara checks on her maps where all that is in relation to their current position and sets course.
Arriving in Hell Harbor the next morning you easily find your way to the warehouses she has under her control. But even while asking for her you hear that she is missing. You find the warehouses empty as all business was moved to other warehouses since she didn't appear to work one morning. You move on to her private place, where you foundthe door broken and everything inside in a mess. All kinds of papers about her business are scattered everywhere.
Lito starts poking around the place looking at the papers as well as looking for any other clues on what happened here. He’ll also look for any things that might have been missed while the place was tossed.
Well someone was obviously looking for something...
On first sight Lito finds nothing out of the ordinary.
Check for bodies
Estelle starts to gather up the papers and tries to sort them out so they make sense.
Trytton takes his time searching through the room, looking for anything out of place.
As Estelle removes the papers from the floor it becomes clear that there are no bodies here. After two hours work Estelle has all the papers in tidy piles and holds in hand a ledger listing the names of numerous major pirate lords of the Shackles, each with a large number beside it. Of these names, one stands out: Arronax Endymion, whose entry has only a dash, rather than a number, after to his name.
Scribbled at the bottom of one page is a single line: “Send with Corlan.”
"Corlan, no bodies but all these papers be left here. Guess we have more ta find out about what is going on here."
Estelle hands the ledger over to Lito
Lito looks at the ledger.
Ahh of course. Arronax. He was Roweena Kellet's boss, and also do happen to be a former admiral in the Chelish navy. Looks like he never left.
I wonder if these names do be the number of spies in the crew or something.
Now who this Corlan might be seems to be the obvious question.
The numbers range from 30 to 150.
Asking around reveals that Corlan is a Tengu in the employ of Roweena and where he lives. You move to his apartment house on the edge of Hell Harbor’s tengu rookery. Corlan’s house sits at a crossroads where two wide streets intersect in a “T.” As you knock on the front door, Corlan comes to the door, but any interaction with you is cut short, as a barbed crossbow bolt embeds itself in the Tengu's his chest.
The Tengu drops to the ground.
The assassin hides on the roof of the house across the street.
Waggghhh! Pluck! Fly high!
Pluck flaps up into the air to keep a lookout
Follow da killa!
"Incapacitate the killer!" Besmara demands and throws some knives at the man.
It is an unknown assassin who is now pissed off. He shoots a bolt at Besmara and then another one at the tengu. But the wounds throw him off and he hit neither one of those two.
Someone guard the bird man! Noonan charges across the street so he can parkour up the building.