"Wait! No! The bear's with us; he's trained," Gamble interjects, trying to stymie a resurgence in violence. "The tree spirit is friendly! She saved us on the road."
|
Deerslicer is startled to find the bruise on his face magically healed. He jumps up at the shouting, running across the room, waving his arms and standing protectively in front of her. "No, Gracie is my friend. No hurt her! She's just a baby bear! Very nice! Don't throw mugs at her ... she won't like it."
There is a moment of confusion in the taproom, as Pepper spins around looking for a monster. As Gamble and Deerslicer beseech the farmers to cease hostilities, Edra walks in and plants herself in front of Pepper. "Don't 'urt her or the bear! They're fine! What the hell did you do to the inn?"
The wounds on those around Sinan quickly mend and the patrons slowly lower their impromptu weapons uneasily. Somewhere on the floor, Bort is moaning about being tossed on the floorboards for trying to help. Hallod in the meantime looks disappointed and sits down sulking.
Thanks to Sinan and Valor's intervention, the fallen farmer regains his senses and is soon helped by the others and taken towards the left wing of the inn. All the patrons eye the six of you wearily, while keeping their distance and muttering among themselves.
"The priest stabbed Gort."
"Shh. They'll hear you."
"They've got a goblin and a tree-spirit, too."
"This is what happens to us for losing the faith in Gozreh. First the sickness and now goblins and spirits. Maybe Metmon was right."
"Hallod over there is in a mood."
"Be glad he didn't start it or we'd be out for a week."
A minute later, the door swings open and in comes a man in his mid-forties, body gone to seed and a club in his hand. He is wearing a brown vest with a badge with a turnip and a long mutton chop whiskers. Trailing behind him is a worried Delma. The man furiously strides towards Hallod. "WHAT IN DAMNATION JUST HAPPENED HERE!?"
Hallod raises an eyebrow.
"Peace, Garley", a shaky Flonk intervenes while rising from behind his table. "It was Eallom this time."
Sheriff Roth Garley pulls all fourteen farmers aside, including Hallod, to a corner table and gives them an earful for their recklessness. Trin, Delma and Kolnral, sigh and begin to clean up. Although the taproom is in shambles, it's mostly cleaning that will need to be done, as most of the chairs and tables have dents in them, but are still serviceable.
Tamli arrives and helps Bort get on his feet. The Redfren twins walk over to him, smiling sheepishly. "Did you cheat?", Bort says as he takes his seat, just loud enough for only those nearby to hear. The twins shake their heads. "No need, chief. He was so drunk he was showing us all his cards." Bort, stands up, complains that the food will be late and orders the twins to go ahead and unload the shipments of the locals. Hallod, Delma and some of the patrons leave with the them.
Leaving the farmers to stew, Sheriff Garley come over to Sinan and Valor and thanks them halfheartedly before telling them "We've got this covered, strangers. Let us deal with out own troubles. A word, priest", he tells Valor as he pulls him aside.
Garley eyes Pepper and Gracie, shakes his head and walks back towards the farmers.
Half an hour later, the taproom is almost as good as new, with the farmers pitching in to help. All is well save the overwhelming stench of turnip that floods the room.
Ulf and Olf bring two tables together, wipe them off for good measure and take a seat next to a stern Tamli and a quiet Cooky.
"Come join me", Bort says gesturing at the empty seats around the table. "Might as well eat a good meal before leaving tomorrow. That includes you, Miss Tree. You might not eat, but don't deny me your good company." He raises a hand and turns to Trin, "Young lady, bring us some of that delicious turnip porridge you make here" he turns to you, all smiles with a swollen nose. "It's an amazing taste. Never miss it when I come down here! You should try it, by Abadar, I insist, I'm buying!", he finishes laughing in good cheer.
Tamli and the other teamsters release a sigh and smile, Bort's good cheer infectious, even when faced against a long day and a chair to the face. It looks like you can finally relax for a bit after such a long day in good company.
During the intervening half hour, Sinan will try to help the farmers set the taproom to rights, share a drink and names with them to make sure there are no hard feelings on either side, and check on Trin since a mug hit her in the face.
At some point, he'll approach Valor. "Iomedae can be driven to vengeance as well. The tales of her exploits after Aroden's death hold chilling legend. So I forgive your trespass if you forgive my heat, my friend. Still, we should talk."
"If you're buying," he says with a chuckle.
With everyone seated, Bort has a taste of the porridge.
"Mmm, still as good as I remember. So where was I?" Bort taps the back of the spoon to his lips "Oh right, the story!"
Bort's team groans in unison.
The merchant takes a bite of porridge with his spoon, gulps it down and waves said spoon to his team.
"You just don't *cough* appreciate it because you already know it from the master storyteller himself", Bort chides half-seriously.
"Like twenty-three times over", Ulf/Olf mutters to Deerslicer.
Bort's stomach rumbles embarrassingly loud enough for all of you to hear.
"Oof! Looks like after today's thrills, *belch* this isn't agreeing with me. *cough* *cough* Got me a little bit of indigestion, I wager! Kolnral! More ale, please!"
The servitor returns with more ale and tops everyone's glasses. Bort takes a swig and hacks immediately when it touches his lips.
"My apologies", he mumbles abashed, taking another bite of his porridge.
"So I find myself in front of Pharasma, but wouldn't you *weeze* know it, storm that capsized *weeze* the ship comes along with me. *cough* Her hair is tangles, but I *cough* *cough* open the lockbox with this beautiful ivory... *belch* ...excuse me. Ivory comb and she's so *weeze* relieved to be able to cont-control those tangles that s-she d-decides to send me *cough** cough* *WEEZE*"
He shuts up, looking at all of you panicked. Bort's eyes bulge as he seeks to stand up, coughing and hacking violently. His face begins to turn purple. He raises his arms as if seeking air before flailing around in terror as he obviously can't breathe.
The teamsters stand up watching Bort, but frozen, unsure what to do. The whole inn quieting down as they all turn to see what the commotion is about.
"Bort?! BORT!", Tamli cries worriedly.
"Well... if I'm good company!"
Pepper is very pleased.
She settles down, looking around at all the wood used in the tavern.
And at how to use the chair.
"Turnip porridge..."
Pepper looks at Bort, very worried, but then sighs with relief when Kunsheng of the Healer God moves in to help.
"Did he get his on the head during the fight?"
If she feels Bort is dying... now, or soon, Pepper will cast Stabilize on him.
Followed by Heal.
"Bort! Kunsheng! Someone! Do something!" he shouts as he stands, knocking over his chair.
The teamsters remain stunned. Bort keeps flailing fighting against Kunsheng.
Bort takes 6 dmg and the condition
Valor attempts the maneuver and fails. It's not doing anything for him. In fact, Bort looks sickly and scared out of his mind.
If Kenshung looked at the porridge, he'd see no lumps. It's rather liquidy. As Kunsheng tries to lift Bort's arms over his head, the dwarf proves too strong in his panic to be aided and his arms flap violently.
Cooky is the first to react, jumping out of his chair and toward Bort. "Snap out of it and help me, damn you!", he tells the twins.
The taproom's eyes are all on you. Trin covers her mouth. Not even Hallod has a quip for what's going on.
|
Valor Holysword is frightened. He's seen people die before, obviously, but this is the point at which he usually decides that it's really someone else's problem and swipes a few purses on the way out.
And yet ... he's staying.
Helpless and terrified, Simon watches as Bort's life ebbs away. He cradles Bort, desperately trying and retrying whatever he can.
Sinan offers his medical knowledge, but shakes his head. He has seen moments like this before. "I have none of the Lady's healing left until dawn."
Bort takes 9 dmg total and the sickened condition
The twins pin Bort down with Kunsheng as Sinan checks him. His throat is swollen shut, a characteristic of poison.
Around 30 seconds have passed. Tamli weeps.
Pepper cast Stabilize on Bort... then she casts Heal--
--then Stabilize again...
|
|
Deerslicer is startled by the arrival of local law officials, but when he notes that the man's badge has a turnip on it, he seems to calm significantly. Since people seem to be generally calm about Gracie's presence now, he guides her over near his seat at the table.
As the turnip porridge is brought out, he sniffs it, then lowers the bowl down for Gracie to have some. After she takes a few licks, he tries some. Gracie seems quite pleased with it, moreso than Deerslicer, and he passes it off to her.
He and Gracie clear space as Bort's episode commences. Wide-eyed, Deerslicer grabs the empty porridge bowl from Gracie and begins checking her, to make sure she's not having any negative reactions as well. "Stupid lumpy soup ... Turnip bits ... hard to chew, not like good squirrel meat," he mutters.
Going over Gracie, she seems fine, if a bit bothered with all the fuss. She is extremely nervous, moaning as she sees Bort trash around. The whole taproom is filled with nervous silence as Sinan, Pepper, Kunsheng try to aid Bort. The gregarious dwarf keeps trashing in Valor's (or is it Simon's?) arms as Kunsheng tries to help the former.
"Hells take me! What's going on?", someone whispers.
"How should I know?"
Pepper's timely intervention eases the pain for the next half a minute or so, but now you can see Bort's exposed skin turning a yellowish-purple. Bort's trashing settles as Sinan, Kunsheng and Valor see he's no longer breathing. Sinan would know the poison is aggressively coursing through his body.
Tamli approaches the unmoving caravan master.
"Bort?"
Bort dies in Valor's arms.
Pepper remains rooted-- totally distraught.
"He is... dead?"
Not knowing how to go about dead people-folk, Pepper watches what the others are doing.
Cooky is trying to comfort a sobbing Tamli, who has fallen on her knees next to Bort. For the first time, you see the twins without smiles, grim. Around the tavern, Valor's voice echoes and people begin to whisper among themselves.
"Murder?"
"Did he say murder?"
"Gods spare us!"
"MURDER?!" bellows sheriff Garley, ambling over with his large girth towards Valor. He eyes the Bort's dead body and blanches. "That's a grave accusation, priest. Hope you can back it up." Yet the last statement is hollow as the state of Bort's body is anything but a natural death.
The patrons begin to eye each other, and their food.
"Strangers, none of you leaves, this is now a murder investigation! You!", he points to Gort, "Cover this body with... something.
"I ain't touching 'im, Garley! You can go to hell for all I care!"
"There's some sheets in the rooms", Delma, pale, offers.
The rest of the farmers begin to grumble and makes gestures against the evil spirits at the corpse. It ends up being Hallod who goes to the rooms, and tosses a stiff dirty white sheet at Garley.
"Good, good." Garley smacks his lips nervously after covering the body. "The rest of you", he says pointing at Bort's teamsters and yourselves, "come with me. I've some questions that warrant answering." He motions you to follow him out the front door.
"Turnips are not murderers!"
Several of the present blink surprised at Pepper's statement, then mutter to themselves that the tree-spirit has lost its mind.
Several of the other patrons push their food away from them.
"One thing at a time, brother Valor. This is a small town. No one will get far. Let's see what the sheriff has to say."
To be fair, Sinan doubts this sheriff could have stopped Sinan from picking a pocket when he was still a boy, but better to follow instruction for now.
As the group begins to file out, Sinan pulls Kusheng aside and speaks in a low whisper. "Kusheng, you are far more learned with potions, concoctions, and liquids for healing than I could hope to be. But I've seen those very symptoms before, thanks to the slavers in Katheer. Bort was poisoned. Even if I hadn't used all of Sarenrae's grace today, I could not save him. Neither could Valor. But that means your studies may be the best method for us to find out what precisely killed our friend. Let me know what you will need as it comes up, and I'll make it happen."
Gamble releases a held breath with a sigh and grim expression. He nods silently a few times and then follows Garley.
"Certainly," he says simply.
Pepper is quite surprised: "What made that carrot so mean it attacked a Goblin?
Was it self defence?"
Pepper follows along, going with the sheriff.
"The difference is in the word with rather than by," the bard comments to the leshy as they follow the sheriff.
"What? You don't tell me how to do my job, priest, and I won't tell you how you're supposed to bless, smartaleck.", Garley says, shoving his finger against Sinan.
Grumbling, he takes both hands and pulls up his belt and speaks to Delma. "Have the others come into the taproom. No one leaves until I say so."
The locals in the taproom groan and begin to complain. Garley ignores them until he hears the bantering between Pepper and Gamble about a carrot, the sheriff gives them a disapproving look. "Glad to see that murder don't bother you much. I think I'll be talking to you two first."
|----|----|----|----|
Garley leads you towards the stables, the rotund man is sweating profusely. Edra is resting on the hay, the bottle that Bort gave her lying half empty next to her while she eats some porridge from her plate. "Huh? Why are you all here? Horses aren't doing so well. You'll end up scaring them."
"Out, Edra." Garley motions with his thumb at the exit. "I need to talk to the strangers."
Once Edra leaves grumbling, he turns to the group. "You", he says selecting one of you. "Come with me. The rest of you wait here." He takes one of you to an empty stable. Once you're in private "All right", he wipes sweat from his brow, his voice nervous. "Talk. what just happened back there?"
Pepper smiles, happy to have been chosen to go first.
In the barn, Pepper will explain: "There was some big ritual battle, with people-folk hurting one another.
Then people-folk went over to eat food.
And, sadly, Bort ate too much porridge made from nice turnips. Or it had lumps.
Then his spirit left his body."
"I honestly don't know," Gamble admits to Garley. "The brawl had settled down with nobody too worse for wear and even better after our Sarenrite healed us all. We had sit down to listen to Bort tell a story. Not long after he started the tale and started to eat the porridge, he looked to be choking. Several of the tagalongs are healers--not me--and they tried to help. Sadly, it wasn't long and Bort was dead. I don't think he choke on porridge, though. They feed that to babes for a reason."
Once alone with Garley, Sinan relaxes to tell his tale. "You came in at the end of the brawl, sirrah, so you already know about that. It had gotten a little out of hand, so I used the last of Sarenrae's grace to heal the bumps, bruises, and injuries I could."
He shakes his head solemnly as he recounts Bort's fate. "But Bort, a good man, was treating us to dinner for helping save the caravan from some vicious wildlife on the outskirts of Etran's Folly. His stories always have such...flavor. But alas, he never made it to the end."
Sinan gives a handsign of the Dawnflower with hopes that Sarenrae would stand for Bort when he is judged before Pharasma.
"Were my link to Sarenrae's divinity not spent, I could not have saved poor Bort. As a priest and healer in Katheer, we run across victims of slavers and assassins often. One of their most common tools is a poison called Purple Pesh. I knew, as soon as I saw Bort's reaction how similar his condition was to those poisoned by such a vile concoction. It did not seem to be Purple Pesh that took him, but similar enough that I knew I did not have the tools to save him."
Again, a solemn shake, but this time with a pause to keep his composure. Though Sinan had not known Bort long, the dwarf was kind to him. And in Sinan's voyages, that has been a rarity.
"Perhaps he drank something during the fight, or it could have been in the food. However, the rest of us dined on the same stock, so that would surprise me. Regardless, I would like to help to find out the specific causes, be they accidental or malevolent. I owe him as much. I cannot speak for my friends, save perhaps Valor. He has already stated as much, I believe."
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Valor Holysword stands resolute with Iomedae's grace.
"I must confess," he opens, "That I have very little idea what triggered the brawl. Upon our arrival, I was drawn to offer my aid to an old woman, and then noted with some shame that a chapel in your town has fallen into disrepair. As a result, when I arrived at the tavern, I knew little else than my friends were attacked.
I admit that I was hasty. I drew my sword and injured someone I shouldn't have. I hope that my transgressions will be viewed in the most favorable light seeing as I stayed to heal those I had wounded.
Bort was served his meal - an unremarkable act, I must say, until he started choking. I ran to help him, unaware of anything else that may have been happening. But Iomedae's grace was no match for a deadly poison."
"Sheriff, as a man of the cloth, will you allow me to pray with you?
Once he's done with all of you, Garley gathers you all together at the back at the, the large man seems out of his depth, a large frown, accentuated by his handlebar mustache, mars his face. Upon arriving, you find the Feedmill mostly empty except for Bort's team and some of the staff. Tamli has composed herself, sitting on a stool, with the twins at her side protectively. Cooky has both hands on her shoulders, attempting to give her strength.
"Hells? Delma, where's everyone?", he says shocked. Rolth Garley's voice more frustrated than angry.
"I sent them all home, Garley. Delma speaks as a matter-of-factly, as if she were dealing with a slow child. "There was no point in keeping them here. They were all rather eager to leave", she finishes by giving a pointed look at the dead body.
"Dammit, Delma! You know how long it'll take me to question them?!"
She just shrugs in response. "You're sheriff because of my father, Rolth. Time to finally work for it, cousin."
Everyone at the Feedmill looks unhappy, trying their best not to look at the sheet-covered corpse in the room. Garley harrumphs and addresses those present.
"All right, everyone. Listen up. I hate to admit it, but there's no clear suspect. Dealing with murder is a serious crime beyond my reckoning. So this is now the responsibility of circuit judge Lord Mubbage Cranberry. He'll be the one to set things straight."
Silence. "Problem is, judge isn't due for another month. I can't keep you all jailed. There's too many of you and heck, town doesn't have a jail even."
His face becomes serious, as he intones in monotone the following, sounding more as something memorized than natural, "By the authority vested in me by the mayor of this city, I hereby declare that none of you can leave town. You're all stuck here until he arrives."
At this point Bort's team bristles and begin to complain loudly as Tamli lets them speak for her, holding her hands and not looking up.
"Listen, all." Garley speaks while holding up his hands placatingly. "Unless I know who committed this hein-hein-aw, hell. Unless I know who committed this horrible crime, I'm bound to hold you all as possible suspects until the judge arrives. Deal with it. Now", he continues, looking at you six. "If you are willing to help along, this might be resolved sooner, eh. I'll be dealing with most of the farmers. Most live way off from the town and I don't want any of you leaving. That means no going beyond the river or past Etran's Hill, got it?"
He rubs his hair exasperated.
"Sorry, Delma, but I've no choice. Kolnral, help me move the body to the cellar. It's cooler down there."
Delma sends any stragglers back to their homes as Garley and Kolnral transport the body to the cellar. Tamli takes this opportunity to approach you.
"Will you please join us at the wagons in about an hour?" She struggles with the next words, her voice choking with each one. "We're... we're going to send Bort off."
Pepper is very distraught at being stuck in a... town!
But she nods, of course she will come for the dwarf-man's wake.
Pepper would ask if she can help prepare Bort: "Maybe some herbs I can gather would help? Or whatever I may do..."
Unless her new companions seem to need her somewhere.
Do they seem battered by the fight, she wonders?