Torgmund awkwardly shakes her hand with his left (clearly not dominant) hand, then looks at the broken cases, and also the cases that were left untouched, trying to gauge the value of the property left behind.
"Mrs. Walder," he says, "what all was stolen? Do you have a record of any sort, or a list?"
After she responds, he moves over to Dray and Sheriff Feldane, and says quietly, "Considering the effort they went through to stage the murder to look like a sphinx attack, I'm beginning to think perhaps it wasn't a simple robbery here. I think it's possible they were after something specific."
Draegoth nods at Torg, then begins scouring over the place for clues or more footprints. The footprints seem doubtful, considering how many guards--as well as Agnes--have been in and out of the building now, but he decides there's no harm in looking.
Agnes is still choking back tears, but she nods. "They didn't take much, mostly gems and jewelry. They had at least some knowledge of what they were taking because they left the less valuable trinkets." Torgmund looks specifically at the gems and jewelry left behind and determines that none of them are worth more than 50gp.
Feldane speaks up. "It looks to us like they just grabbed whatever they could carry. However, they were interrupted by the surviving three guards so it's possible they had grander plans and just escaped with whatever they could."
Draegoth and Yggni look over the showroom thoroughly but don't find anything of note.
Torg crosses his arms and tries to determine whether there's something more at play. He closes his eyes, mutters quietly, and draws threads of magic toward his eyes. When he opens them again, his sight is enhanced to sense eldritch energies, and sweeps his gaze over the store.
Dray moves up to the left office door and swings it open, taking a look around.
Torgmund does not detect any magic in the showroom.
Agnes follows Draegoth to the door in the western hallway. "That is the guards' quarters. It is where Nikolas's body was found. His throat was slit." She suppresses another sob.
Inside the room, you find two cots and a bunk bed. Footlockers are tucked underneath the cots. A table and chairs are in the room's center. A large, rusty red blotch is on the floor. Agnes says, "I tried to clean up the blood." It seems to be too much for her and she excuses herself back to the showroom.
The foot lockers hold nothing of interest; clothes, books, and other personal effects are all you find.
Torgmund, finding nothing of magical significance in the showroom, heads to the right-hand door and opens it up, scanning the room via both mundane and magical means for anything of interest.
Draegoth watches helplessly as Agnes leaves. He didn't have the easiest life growing up, but he never lost anyone like that, so he has no idea what to say to her. He can't even imagine what he would do if he lost Torgmund.
Finding nothing else of interest in the guard quarters, Draegoth heads over to join Torgmund, slipping his hand into the tiefling's and giving it a gentle squeeze before adding his eyes to Torg's in checking the room.
A large polished desk dominates the office. Hooks for hanging lamps are permanently affixed to the walls, while mounted behind the desk is a large framed portrait. Running along the east well is a large display case filled with Walder family portraits, a signed copy of the town charter, a stuffed and mounted bear, a mounted reefclaw, and a boggard short spear.
The desk is locked, but Agnes is able to provide the key. Other than Walder's accounting books, there is nothing of note.
Torg shrugs to the others. "Guess all that's left is the vault."
Yig grunts sourly. [color=purple]"Better be somethin' to hit in there. I'm gettin' bored."[/color]
Torg eyes him warily. "It's a sealed vault. I highly doubt it. Keep yourself in check, shaitan, or you're going back in the Prism."
Yggni glares at Torg but says nothing more.
Draegoth watches the exchange curiously. Prism? What the Hells is that? He frowns, but doesn't speak of it. Instead, he simply says, "Let's go."
He strides out of the room, leading the trio toward the vault.
Agnes, having composed herself once more, accompanies you downstairs to let you in the vault. You reach a corridor at the bottom of the stairs, which leads to the double doors of the vault. A hook for a hanging lantern is mounted on the eastern wall at the base of the stairs, and underneath it is a single chair.
It is currently dark in the corridor. Emilianna casts light on her spear.
Agnes moves forward and unlocks the vault door, then steps back to allow you to pass. Beyond the heavy steel door, this darkened chamber is lined with shelves, including freestanding shelving in the center. There is ample room in the vault, but labeled boxes, bags, weapons, and armor are spread throughout.
Agnes says, "Sheriff, the doors automatically close; would you mind holding them open?" She turns to you. "I haven't been through the inventory yet but so far as I can tell, nothing was taken from the vault."
Torg, feeling slightly claustrophobic down here, lets his paranoia get the better of him. He nods at Yggni, and the shaitan's usual arrogant, smirking demeanor vanishes as he steps forward side-by-side with Draegoth. He waits for Agnes to unlock the door, then for Emilianna to join him behind Dray and Yig, before nodding to the monk.
Draegoth, sensing his partner's unease, starts to try and placate the tiefling, but sighs and keeps silent instead. He offers an apologetic look to Agnes and Feldane, but steps up to the doors with Yig. Once Agnes unlocks the vault, he waits for the signal from Torg before stepping in.
The party begins searching the vault. After a few minutes pass, you hear a loud bang come from the corridor behind you. Everyone whips around and moves back to the door, directly beyond which an enormous pit trap has opened. The pit is 20 feet deep and dark, but Torgmund can see movement at the bottom. As his eyes adjust, the movement coalesces into a humanoid figure looking up at the party. A few seconds pass, and you notice that whenever it stops moving, it becomes very difficult to see; it almost seems to blend into its surroundings.
Agnes exclaims. "Oh! I am so sorry! I completely forgot about the trap! It only triggers when exiting the vault; there is a hidden button in the vault to disable it. Did one of you step out of the vault?"
Torgmund looks down into the pit. "No," he says soberly, "we did not." He looks meaningfully at Dray and Yig. The shaitan hustles over immediately, and Torg points down into the pit.
At first, Yggni just shrugs and shakes his head, but Torg points more forcefully, and after a moment Yig blinks in surprise. [color=purple]"Damn!"[/color] he mutters quietly. [color=purple]"What the Hells is that?"[/color]
Torg sighs and puts his hands on his hips. "I was hoping you could tell me. It seems to use shadows somehow, so I thought maybe it was from that Plane. Extraplanar creatures are something of a specialty of yours."
Yig shakes his head. [color=purple]"Whatever it is, it ain't from the Shadow Plane. Leastways not that I ever heard of."[/color]
Draegoth strides over with the others and glances down into the pit, frowning. "Emilianna, dearest!" he calls.
"There's some kind of weird... humanoid of some sort down there. None of us can make heads or tails of it. Any ideas?"
Once the others have gathered, Dray calls down into the pit, "Hello, friend! You appear to be in a bit of a pickle. We could help you out of there, but I suspect you were in this place, erm... extralegally. However, if you agree to be cooperative and do not attempt to escape, I promise you will be treated fairly. If you are helpful, we may even sue the sheriff for leniency on your behalf! What do you say?"
Emilianna steps to the edge of the pit and holds her spear over it to illuminate its entirety. The creature becomes more visible in the light.
"That is skulk. The are... cowards. Violent. Awful creatures. Can hide with skin, change colors, like... lizard? He will not fight us alone. Look, he is scared."
The skulk at the bottom of the pit looks at the half dozen pairs of eyes peering down at him and his shoulders visibly slump. In passable common, he says, "My name is Rogi. Do not kill me and I will tell you what I know."
"My tribe is called Nisku. We do favors for a group of humans and they give us shiver. They gave us the keys to this place and told us to kill the guards. There were supposed to be four guards but there was only one, so we decided to steal what we could too. Maybe we would get more shiver. I fell into this trap when the other guards returned and we tried to run away."
Torgmund crosses his arms and scowls, turning to the others and muttering so the skulk hopefully won't hear. "So these humans paid this group of... things, to kill the guards, but not to steal anything. They did that on their own. Sounds to me like they wanted the guards dead but whatever they were after, they didn't want the hired help to know about it. Which means...?"
He looks hopefully at his partner, but Draegoth just stands there with a cheerfully vapid look on his face.
Torg sighs. "It's always the pretty ones. It means that whatever they were after, they didn't get, because the guards showed back up before the skulks could take care of them. So we need to figure out what they were after."
Draegoth's eyes light up. "Ohhhhh! Okay. I gotcha. Well, let's see if our new friend can lead us to these humans, while we're at it."
Dray leans over the pit. "Say, friend! Who are these humans who gave you drugs to do stuff? Where can we find them, and what do they look like?"
"We don't ever talk to them. Two from my tribe, Kymeth and Onamae, work for the humans, and they are the only ones who ever see them. They handle orders and deliveries from the humans."
He looks up at you desperately. "That's everything I know! Will you let me out now?"
Dray blinks innocently. "Out? Out of the hole, certainly. But you did kill someone. That is the sheriff's purview, I'm afraid. I don't think it will end with you walking away, friend."
He turns to the sheriff. "After we're done here, we will start looking for these two ruffians, Kymeth and Onamae. Hopefully they can tell us who hired them."
Torgmund nods absently at Draegoth's words, but doesn't seem to be entirely paying attention. After a moment, he strides back into the vault and scours it carefully again, this time looking for anything unusual or out-of-place that might suggest what exactly the perpetrators might truly be after.
Sheriff Feldane looks grim. "Pull him out. We'll see if we can get anything else out of him at the constabulary. Agnes, can you reset and disable this trap?"
-----------
Torgmund doesn't find anything else of note in the vault. Agnes again reiterates that she needs to do an inventory, but she doesn't actually see anything missing down here. It's possible the skulks were interrupted shortly after breaking into the vault.
Agnes invites you up to her late husband's office before you leave. "We still don't know who killed my husband, but you helped capture one of those responsible for the robbery and poor Nikolas. Please take this as a sign of my gratitude." She hands you a pouch containing 520gp.
-----------
Draegoth watches Torgmund stammer and stare at the pouch of gold in his hands and sighs. He snatches the pouch and stuffs it in his pack, smiling at Agnes. "Thank you, ma'am, I'll see to it that it's divided evenly. And we will find whoever is responsible, I promise you." He gives her a small bow, and leads Torg away, giving a nod to Emilianna to follow.
Once outside, he shrugs. "Well, there's nothing more to be learned there, I think. What next? Where should we look for these skulks? Maybe someone at the carnival has seen them?"
Torgmund nods. "Good call. You ask around, I'll inform our employer of what we've learned so far. Emilianna, where would you like to go?"
"I will come with you, Torgmund."
The party travels back to the carnival. As you enter the midway, you start to notice people walking quickly away from the area near the big top. Over the next minute, more and more people are streaming in the opposite direction as you, and they appear to be more and more panicked. You overhear one person shout, "The thievin' Varisians are trying to bleed the town dry!"
Eventually, you reach the origin of the disturbance. There are four Ilsurian men (each armed with a short sword) in a full-blown confrontation with two circus enforcers, who are trying to drive the men back toward town. The situation has not devolved to violence yet, but it is apparent it is not far off. The men are yelling things like "You freaks need to go back where you came from!" and "All lives matter!", etc, etc. The carnival guards, clearly used to this sort of bigotry, are remaining relatively calm, but seem ready to defend themselves if necessary.
This situation is a powder keg about to blow. What do you do?
Draegoth holds up a hand for Torgmund, Yggni, and Emilianna to wait, and strolls calmly between the two groups, hands on his hips, his most charming smile facing the Ilsurians. "Hi guys! Name's Draegoth. Now, that probably doesn't matter much to you, but I bring it up because I've been working with Sheriff Feldane on this here murder-slash-robbery situation. And you are just gonna be flabbergasted by what I found. Turns out, it was not the carnies! I know! Wonders never cease, amirite? Turns out it was some weird things called skulks! Yeah, I'd never heard of 'em either. But thankfully they're like, super stupid, because one of them managed to get caught in a burglar trap at poor Master Walder's business. Anyway, the skulks don't work here. Trust me, these creatures are like, super unique-looking, you'd know them if you saw them. And I've been poking around here and haven't seen any. So winning money is on it being someone else. But don't you worry! I'm on the job and I'm good at finding people. Once I find the ones that actually did it, I'll kick their teeth into their a+%!+%@s for ya." He pantomimes a kick that might, theoretically, place an opponent's teeth into their rectum. He then points over at Yggni. "Oh, and see that? That's an honest-to-goodness genie! A strong one too! No, he doesn't grant wishes--I wish! haha, bit of genie humor there--but he does kick a whole lot of ass. I mean, look at those arms! He hits like an angry aurochs, let me tell ya! Show 'em Yig!"
Yig pauses in confusion, and Dray throws him a furtive, desparate look. The shaitan rolls his eyes and flexes to show the size of his absurd biceps.
Dray turns back to the Ilsurians and grins. "See? Friggin' tree trunks, amirite?"
Torgmund tries very hard to keep the smile off his face, but he cannot stop himself from eyeing his boyfriend like a lion eyes a particularly tasty gazelle.
The townies look at Draegoth quizzically. One of them says, "What the hell are you talking about? Everyone in the carnival is getting their pockets picked today." He takes another look at the party, then to the carnies, then drops his sword arm to his side. "Eh, f!&! it." He points a finger at you. "If you're so good at solving murders, maybe you should stop these pickpockets too. Come on, guys, let's go." The man and his three idiot friends walk away.
The carnival guards look at Draegoth and nod their thanks. At just that moment, a small woman in a colorful leotard -- you recognize her as one of the acrobats from last night's big top performance -- runs up. She looks in a panic, but keeps her voice low to avoid being overheard by passersby. "There's been another murder!"
Torgmund scowls. This is getting entirely too complicated for my tastes. He's tempted to tell her they weren't hired to solve that murder and walk away, but Draegoth speaks before he can make up his mind.
Draegoth's face drains of color. "Lead the way!" he says soberly, and follows the acrobat.
The carnival worker leads you to the large tent where you met the sphinx. Jherizhana is not here now; in fact, the tent is empty except for the dead body of a human woman in cleric's robes next to the sphinx's cage. Her wounds look like claw marks from a large animal. The carnival worker sobs into her hands. "I came in here to prepare for the sphinx's next show and found her like this."
Torgmund turns to Yggni. "Yig, stand guard by the door. Make sure no one else comes to disturb the scene." For once, the shaitan doesn't give Torgmund any lip; he nods curtly and stands sentinel by the tent flap.
Torgmund isn't terribly talented in medicine, but he does his best to assess her wounds.
Draegoth hunkers down, inspecting the area around the body. "Torg, love, help me look around."
After noting her wounds, Torg nods and helps his partner check the scene.
You kneel down to examine the body. It is clear that this woman was a cleric of Erastil, and her wounds certainly look like they were caused by claw attacks. However, Draegoth also notices a slight but unmistakable rope burn around her throat. This suggests strangulation, which could explain why no one heard a scream and why she apparently did not cast any spells to defend herself.
Draegoth also takes note of the ground surrounding the body. The ground is firm and the inside of the tent has seen a lot of foot traffic, so any recent tracks have been ruined. However, he is able to determine that a large, heavy feline body would have made more visible and durable tracks, so again it seems like the sphinx is being set up as the suspect.
After checking the body, Draegoth begins looking around the rest of the tent. He is close to deciding that he has exhausted all the evidence in the room when he notices three small glass vials tucked in a corner. The vials only contain trace amounts of their original contents, but it is perhaps enough to determine something.
Torg moves over to the vials that Dray points out. He mutters strange, spidery syllables that seem to vibrate in his teeth, and makes a sharp, peculiar gesture with one hand as if gathering spaghetti in his fingers. Wisps of arcane energy drift from his fingertips as he does so, and he pulls them up to his closed eyelids. When he opens his eyes again, he can sense any magical auras before him, and tries to identify them before they're gone.
Torg frowns. There is no aura of magic emanating from the vials, not even the trace elements of a fading spell. Alchemical then.
He picks up a vial and investigates it, sniffing the container to see if he can sense what, exactly, was in it.
While Torgmund does his work, Draegoth says to the carnival worker, "Please go and fetch Mistress Delisen, make sure she knows what has happened." He pauses, then adds, "And you had best fetch the sheriff." If the woman looks hesitant, he adds reassuringly, "We have already shown to the sheriff that the first murder was not at the hands of Jherizhana, and this one is no different. But the sheriff must know of another murder in her jurisdiction."
Torgmund isn't quite sure what was in the vials beyond the fact that they were all alchemical in nature and they were all different.
The worker turns to leave just as Mistress Delisen and Master Venlock, the circus's chief enforcer arrive on the scene. You share what you've learned with them. Delisen is shocked but orders the worker to go fetch the sheriff; Almara is convinced of the carnival's innocence and wants to avoid any appearance of a cover-up.
After a while, the worker returns with the sheriff, who looks understandably miffed. You go over all the evidence again with her. She considers everything for a few minutes while she studies the scene for herself. Once she verifies everything that you found, she approaches you and Delisen. "Mistress Delisen, you have chosen your investigators well. They have satisfactorily shown that not all is as it seems. However, I am sheriff of this town and we still have two major problems. One, two prominent citizens have been murdered. Two, now there is a rash of pickpocketing at the circus. Neither of these problems have been solved. They need to be solved soon."
She looks at the empty sphinx cage. "I need to interview Jherizhana and I need to do it now. Why isn't she in that cage?"
Delisen sighs and pauses. She looks at each person in the tent, then nods. "What I'm about to say stays between us. The truth is that Jherizhana is a bard, who plays at being a circus star in order to travel Avistan and expand her knowledge of lore and history. She does not truly reside in a cage; she has her own private wagon. She willingly enters the cage so that the curious may regard her while feeling safe. It is imperative that we maintain this illusion."
The sheriff is clearly unsatisfied by this answer. "You've brought a dangerous creature into this community -- a creature you clearly cannot keep track of, let alone control. I can't say I know for certain there's wrongdoing here on the part of your people, but after a point it ceases to matter. For the safety of my town, I'm putting this circus under quarantine. I don't want any of your people leaving these grounds unless it's to leave town completely. I'm giving you two days to get packed up and go."
Torgmund's jaw clenches at the sheriff's words. "Look, copper, we've clearly proven time and again these people are being set up, and you're treating them like f!#$ing criminals just because of who they are--!"
Draegoth places a firm hand forward and speaks, sharply and clearly, "Torgmund. Enough."
The tiefling opens his mouth to snap at him, but instead slumps into a sullen silence.
Draegoth turns to Sheriff Feldane. "I am sorry about that. But... while his words were harsh, sheriff, I fear he does have something of a point. Even if this bard is, in fact, the one committing the crimes--which I find hard to fathom, but stranger things have happened--you cannot honestly blame the entire carnival for the actions of one person. It's beyond bigotry, it's madness."
He sighs, crossing his arms. Clearly the sheriff isn't going to change her mind. He doesn't really understand her reasoning--Torg is better at that sort of thing, and he's too hot-headed to think right now--but Dray knows an opponent who has planted their feet when he sees one. "Fine. We will have your perpetrator within two days."
Sheriff Feldane nods. "I must maintain order. I told you before that I would do what is best for my town. You may continue your investigation, but you must provide definitive proof of the killer's identity. I hope for your sake that you succeed." She walks off.
Watching the sheriff leave, Emilianna looks worried. "This is not good. We must find real killer. Perhaps we ask around? Maybe someone saw something."
Draegoth watches the sheriff leave, brow furrowed with concern. "Good idea, Emilianna. I'll talk to folks, see if I can't get a few people to open up."
He nods soberly to Mistress Delisen and leaves the tent. He goes to talk to the carnival workers first, then heads into town to talk to the locals.