Llewela regards the guard thoughtfully, hearing in her voice the lack of someone speaking from experience. "Oh, did you capture them yourself? Find any hard drugs on them? Or just peppermint? I don't think you even know for sure that they are smugglers. They're probably just those who would oppose Thrune's unlawful takeover of the city and he's thrown them to you to get rid of them."
"Ah, but 'The harshest tyranny is that which acts under the protection of legality and the banner of justice.' Believer quotes, and then asks of them earnestly, "Do you feel protected? Your contributions valued, your future secured? Or have you been shuttled off to this oubliette to be forgotten. Breathing in the same foul air as those you judge deserving of this fate of bondage and enslavement? Is your place here that of Master, or are you just a slave whose shackles lie not upon your body, but in your mind? Do you live in fear of drawing his ire next? Perhaps you will now that you must face him in defeat. I will pray for you, as I pray for us all." She says, shaking her head sadly.
The guard's fiery temper and bravado break under the stern gaze of Llewela and questioning of Believer. Her voice is not as sure as it was anymore, and it shakes.
"Fancy words you use." she says, trying to remain calm. "I serve this country, this city, above all and you can't shake my faith in Cheliax with simple words."
She looks over at Believer, grinning widely. "Spare me your prayers and your pity, they are wasted."
Also I had asked about valuable equipment?
Each of the four CCG members each have a studded leather armor, light mace, manacles, bronze Thrune pendant worth 30 gp, and 4 gp. Kossrani carries two potions, two strange bags, masterwork chainmail, heavy steel shield, composite longbow (+2 Str) with 20 arrows, masterwork heavy mace, and 28 gp.
"What do we do with them," Tessa asks after mostly recovering from whatever it was that had taken hold during the brief fight.
Maccha finishes gathering the Chelish Citizen Group's members' equipment, letting the rest of the group speak. They know the words to reach people. Or browbeat them. I don't. Her faith in Milani was not of the preaching kind. More reserved one, she liked to think. What she feared is that it was lesser than.
Shaking her insecure thoughts off once more, she decides to speak: "Let's leave them tied up here, to be found in the morning. Probably knocking them out so they don't cause trouble."
Believer strips the deceased dwarf of his trappings. Examining the potions to determine their effects.
The guard's fiery temper and bravado break under the stern gaze of Llewela and questioning of Believer. Her voice is not as sure as it was anymore, and it shakes.
"Fancy words you use." she says, trying to remain calm. "I serve this country, this city, above all and you can't shake my faith in Cheliax with simple words."
She looks over at Believer, grinning widely. "Spare me your prayers and your pity, they are wasted."
"Good, I would not wish to turn your head from Cheliax. The nation is her people, not her petty despots. Who would be Lord-Mayor of Kintargo if you could raise up someone worthy from among us. Likely a better sort than Her Infernal Majestrix's nepotism has inflicted upon us." She left the idea to hang in the air, the notion of we rather than the us and them mentality that divided people. The thought of choosing who to elevate, rather than be lorded over by some outsider.
"They do have manacles," Llewela remarks, "We may as well make use of them."
She uses them to secure the two awake guards, and locks the unconscious ones to the beds.
Aoede lets go of Tessa and walks over to Llewela as she starts to cuff the woman.
"Hold on, doesn't she look about the same size as Em," she asks quietly while nodding over to Maccha. After confirming her suspicions, and while Tessa is giving her apparent twin a curious look, Aoede turns and smiles at the woman.
"Say, sweetheart, you wouldn't happen to have a change of clothes, would you," she asks as her smile threatens to turn into a mischievous grin.
Tessa starts to blush as something is communicated silently between Aoede and her. She turns away, hoping that she isn't about to spontaneously combust as she walks over to where Believer is standing.
"Aoede wanted to know if you could help her with--um, procuring a suitable disguise," Tessa asks in a whisper.
"Sure, let's see what we can do."
"It's for Em." Tessa says while nodding towards Maccha.
You strip the thugs of their gear fairly easily and manage to get together good enough of a disguise that you think you could probably fool them, at least for a little bit.
Maccha puts most of the clothes over her own wherever she can but, other than that, simply changes in front of everyone. Probably the adrenaline of the previous and the imminent fight.
"Glory to Thrune!" she says in a mocking tone "so, how did that sound for an esteemed member of the Chelish Citizen Group?"
She picks up one the light maces and puts on her belt to complete the look "So, do I try to bring them here? Even if it's Just one of them?"
Tessa looks over to the tied up guards for a moment before nodding to Maccha.
"We'll ambush them when you close the door behind them."
Believer shakes her head. "Let's not separate, if they caught on while Maccha was leading them, it would be her against four."
After donning the chainmail and attaching the heavy mace to her belt, she cuts a length of rope and offers her wrists to be loosely "bound". "I can play captive since my height singles me out and the rest of you will be bringing me to join the other captives. By the time they realize you aren't their usual fellows, we'll have the drop on them." She suggests.
Maccha nods "What do we tell them? We are bringing the prisoner to the barracks?"
"I think Bee would rather try taking them out without trying to be fancy about it, Em," Aoede says. "And I don't think Tee or I will make good guards, and Bee's already volunteering to be a prisoner, so El, looks like you're elected to play guard."
"Ehee's right. And if we have to act, I probably need to play prisoner while Aoede sneaks in after us," Tessa adds. She doesn't look thrilled by the idea, but she doesn't back down from it either.
Llewela opts to remove her shield and quickly changes into the guard clothes, then grabs one of their maces and gives it a practice swing. She
"Yep, that'll work. Alright, let's go. If they buy it, let's all attack on a signal. Maybe say we forgot the manacle keys or something. " she suggests.
"So when one of you mentions grabbing a key, we attack," Tessa confirms.
The plan prepared and the first step enacted, you approach the door opposite of the barracks door and one of you knocks on it in an attempt to draw some attention.
A taller woman with dark red hair and a scar across one eye answers the door, obviously not expecting visitors. She eyes the two 'guards' up and down and then moves her gaze back to the two 'prisoners'. Her mace hangs from a hook at her belt and you notice her hand is on it but she doesn't look like she's wanting to draw it quite yet.
"Who are you and what is this?" she asks, obviously suspicious.
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Maccha sighs heavily before trying to get in character as they knock on the door. They are sized up by the one guarding the entrance. That's good. They are not immediately trusting us, sure, but also not leading us into a trap themselves.
"Found these ones..." she shakes Believer, the "prisoner" she is holding. "... Skulking around, probably smuggling something or the other, said something about mint? Whatever. I was told us to leave them here, something about leaving them in charge of Kossrani's crew." she nodded to Llewela, leaving some space for her to add something, if she so wished.
Maccha was nervous, so she improvised Kossrani's name, hoping there would be no internal schism among these very small group of guards.
Believer sneers disreputably, "You need some mint! In fact, you all reek of this place." She pops off, hoping to call attention on herself and off the "guards".
"Shut it," Llewela barks at Believer. She sighs, trying to channel a frustrated guard. "Can you guys just take them? I was meant to get off hours ago, but I got stuck having to escort mouthy prisoners.
Tessa flinches at Llewela's tone.
"She's right. Your breath reeks," the mage mutters under her breath, just loudly enough to be heard.
Your disguise seems to do the trick, and the guards let you past inside the makeshift prison and it is nearly trivial to overcome the tired quartet (they quite obviously had just been woken up) and within less than a minute they have all been dispatched.
You find the prisoners in the manager's office (D5) just like the other guards said you would, as well as the lock box in the front office (D1) that holds their accumulated wealth: 67 gp and 423 sp.
The leader of said smuggler group doesn't deny that they are indeed smugglers, introducing himself as a druid by the name of Forvian Crowe. When asked, he says that's how they get their small time smuggling done: wild shaping into aquatic creatures and swimming out through the river or through one of the city's many sewers. The group is willing to at the very least work with you, although they have matters of their own to attend to before they can actually join you at the Wasp Nest.
With that rescue done, you return triumphantly to the coffeehouse that morning to much praise and congratulations. Rexus is obviously happy to see you successful, and Laria has another delicious lunch made up.
"To your first victorious mission!"
D1. Front Office: This room is where the bulk of business operations take place.
D2. Salt Pit: Taking up most of the building’s space, the salt pit is 30 feet deep and lined with clay. A series of flues run through the walls, connecting to the three chimneys around the silo’s circumference, making the entire chamber a warm, arid desert with constant airflow from above. A small dock extends over the pit, with pulleys and hooks above. A layer of salt constantly dries on the floor below. The job of turning the salt to ensure it dries well, combined with harvesting dry salt into buckets for loading into sacks, is a grueling and painful task.
D3. Storage: This room is used to store shipments of rock salt and smaller sacks of table salt.
D4. Salt Furnace: The Salt Works’ furnace burns here, keeping the Salt Pit’s temperatures in the high 90s at all times.
D5. Holding Cell: Until recently, this was a manager’s office, but the mercenaries have converted this room into a holding cell for their prisoners.
D6. Work Yard: The work yard is a covered patio
for meeting with customers and readying larger loads
for delivery.
D7. Barracks: This outbuilding contains bunks now (formerly) used by the mercenary guards and their leader, Kossrani.
A lot of it is a blur. The anxiety of just pretending to be a guard did not overtake Maccha and soon the plan proceeded perfectly, quickly defeating the guards.
Meeting the smugglers, Maccha did not initially try to argue with them to join the Silver Ravens, but their method of travel through the sewers could be invaluable to the team, so she made a mental note to bring up with the rest of the group later.
The Saltworks were... as expected. Very dry, very salty, very hot.
"I guess our work is done?" she asked the group, clearly being done but unsure if she was forgetting some crucial step of their investigation.
---
Back to the coffeehouse, Maccha was unabashedly stuffing herself with Laria's food when she decides to actually do the worst: bring up work.
"I hate to do it, but better do that now in light of our success, what is our next step?"
After the fighting is done, Tessa looks relieved that they weren't going to have to worry about any new arrivals to the Wasp's Nest. She has more than enough to worry about especially after after she an Aoede talk about what happened during the first fight. It's a relief when they finally arrive back at what is their home, at least for now.
===
The food is delicious, and Tessa can feel herself wanting to nod off, but she has some things she needs to take care of first.
"I think we need to come up with names to use when we're out where others can hear us. I don't think anyone can tie Aoede nor me to anyone but Llewela, but don't the rest of you have family and friends beyond our little band? We also probably shouldn't be using our own faces."
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The leader of said smuggler group doesn't deny that they are indeed smugglers, introducing himself as a druid by the name of Forvian Crowe. When asked, he says that's how they get their small time smuggling done: wild shaping into aquatic creatures and swimming out through the river or through one of the city's many sewers. The group is willing to at the very least work with you, although they have matters of their own to attend to before they can actually join you at the Wasp Nest.
"Innovative!" Believer comments regarding the smugglers' methods.
She made sure to stabilize the guards and offer healing, if needed, to the former prisoners. "Seems so, let's give this place the laugh." She says in answer to Maccha.
She could not help but be a little disappointed and offered Llewella a sadly sympathetic smile. No sign of their missing Milanite mentors and this had been their most promising lead. It became more apparent by the day that Father Blom was likely lost among the ashes of Thrune's violent occupation, though she still stubbornly refused to believe it.
❦❦❦
She ate with gusto beside her friends and nodded along amiably with Maccha's Shop Talk. "We could look into the stolen cache Korva mentioned. With the ban on buying new weapons and increasing our numbers, we need to make sure we can arm our new friends. And maybe upgrade our own." She suggests, "We also might help Rexus with the decoding. Maccha and I both speak Celestial so it might make the process go faster."
She chewed slowly, considering Tessa's suggestion. "It is a concern. Llewela's family is certainly vulnerable. But for myself, I think it's important to be seen and heard for who and what I truly am. My kind are looked on as a sort of unfortunate cost of doing business. But it is a price deferred onto us to pay. We are discarded and despised for circumstances beyond our control, while those responsible enjoy only the benefits of their fell bargains. I will be seen for what I am and what I stand for so that all of Kintargo knows that the bill has come due." She pronounced decidedly.
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"I-- I guess that makes sense," Tessa says. "Believer is a bit like a name you'd see used in cloak and dagger stories."
===
After lunch and the shop talk are finished, Tessa gets Believer's attention and asks if she has a moment to talk.
"S-something happened during the job we did," she says quietly. "You were the only person I could think of to talk to."
===
The day after raiding the Saltworks, the others find Tessa laying across the writing desk, her fingers tangled in her unusually frazzled hair, with dozens of crumpled and smudged sheets of paper filled with ever harsher self-criticisms of her work scattered around. Aoede sits nearby with a worried look on her face.
"C-can you help Tessa," she asks in a timid voice. "I've never seen her this stressed out about her writing."
"I have some family" Maccha tries to sound nonchalant but it clearly bothers her "Uncle, aunt, cousins, haven't seen them in years, but they might be in trouble. I cover my face just in case. We could always just identify ourselves as Silver Ravens."
Turning to Believer "That makes sense, we should also lay low for a few days and keep an ear in the streets in case our attack in the Saltworks raised the alarms."
===
Maccha wakes up sore. The fighting the day before was brief but left its mark. She leaves the room she's at to meet the group and finds Tessa in a sorry state. She listens to Aoede's plea and sympathizes with Tessa, but is unsure in how to help.
"Help how?"
She moves closer and gently pokes her. "Hey, you awake? Did you even sleep?"
"I dunno," Aoede answers back, clearly at a loss.
Tessa looks up with a groan when Maccha pokes her and as if she got any sleep. The bags under Tessa's eyes say she didn't
"Maccha, it's-- it's terrible!" Tessa's eyes shimmer as she grabs the other woman's arms. "IthoughtIcouldwritesomethingspecialeandinspiringbutallthatIcanputtopaperis soinsipidthateveryonewilllaughandmakefunofusandI'lljustbeaburdenwhocan'tcon tributeanythingbecauseI'mstupidanddon'tknownaythingandeverythingIthinkofiss obadtheratswon'teveneatthepaperit'swrittenon!" The stream of blabber comes out like the bursting of a dam before Tessa buries her face into Maccha's shoulder.
"Why am I such a failure," she asks, her voice muffled.
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After lunch and the shop talk are finished, Tessa gets Believer's attention and asks if she has a moment to talk.
"S-something happened during the job we did," she says quietly. "You were the only person I could think of to talk to."
Believer nodded and schooled her features into the placid patience she assumed when readying to listen to her patients. "Of course. What happened?" She thought back but nothing concerning came to mind.
When she saw Tessa spiraling she shook her head in bemusement. "I'll brew some tea. Coffee seems like a bad idea."
"I couldn't think of what to do during the first fight, and I felt this--this anger welling up inside of me. I wanted to hurt them, to make them suffer. So I dropped the lanterns on them," she says. "I-I-I've never felt that way before. It was almost as if I was not myself."
Aoede nods in agreement with Believer's observation about coffee.
"Think you can add something to knock her out or at least calm her down," she asks while Tessa continues to blubber into Maccha's shoulder.
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"It wasn't a bad idea, anyway. The tactic worked quite well." She added.
Remembering how susceptible Tessa was to alchohol, she stuck to herbal tea and blended chamomile with rose petals and just a little soothing valerian with a touch of cinnamon to cover the rather pungent smell of the medicinal root.
Thankfully for both their sakes, the reference to "other feelings" goes right over Tessa's head.
"I--" she starts to reply, then squirms as she tries to find how to put what she's feeling and thinking into words. She shakes her head as she thinks about what Believer said. "No, it's--I wanted to hurt them. I wanted them to suffer. I wanted them to scream. It wasn't about fighting them but causing them pain." She looks up at the taller woman with worry clear in her eyes. "I fear Alekto may have more of a hold on me than I thought."
Tessa gratefully accepts the tea and takes a long sip before sitting back down. As she starts to drift off, Aoede finds herself starting to slip off to sleep as well.
"Oh crud," Tessa's twin mutters. "We should--*yawn*--should have gotten her changed first. Sorry," she apologizes as she fades away and Tessa falls asleep.
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Maccha barely blinks as Tessa hits her with a barrage of anxiety. Figuring out about half the words she said, Maccha could assume the rest of them. While Tessa was crying, Maccha was stealing peeks of what she could see written down.
This isn't that bad.
Well.
Not to this extent. Just... very bland?
Sure, Maccha, but that's not something you should just say.
Maccha cleared her throat and tried her best "I don't think anyone's expecting a deeply intelectual and touching essay about the horrors of Thrune. A lot of people already agree with us and the fliers are just to show there are people out there that agree with them... even if they feel like they cannot say it out loud."
"Also, you cannot get better if you stop doing it, you know? I don't think people are going to laugh at you. We have maybe two groups of allies and they are both criminals..."
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Llewela returns Believer's sad smile. "Maybe they're being kept somewhere more secure." she suggests, though not very confidently.
Llewela agrees. "Yes, I think going after the weapon cache would be a good next step. In fact, we should try to take the weapons from any other guards we fight - the fewer weapons they have the better. It might be tricky to transport though - we'll need to bring along someone with a wheelbarrow, and we'll need to fix up some safehouses or routes through the sewers to secure them."
---
"Fake names would be a good idea, but maybe we should think of something inspiring? We want the rally the people behind us, eventually." she ponders. "Then again, if we just want to get each other's attention, then we should probably pick something short."
Llewela reads over some of the scrunched up papers. The stories she'd heard about the old rebellions mentioned propaganda, but she'd never thought much about how exactly to write it. "This is better than I can do. she offers. "If it was up to me, I'd be scibbling insulting things on the walls. Maybe try writing about the stuff we've been doing to fight back? He might try to cover up what we did at the salt works. Just letting the public know there's others fighting back would be good."
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"I'm definitely not getting anything from you now. Would you say it was Alekto feeling the anger and desire for suffering? Do you think she took the action, or did you?"
Believer shakes her head with a rueful but affectionate smile as Tessa fell asleep. "By Milani, she has the tolerance of a mouse. We really must make sure to never leave her unattended at a party." She reaches down to scoop her up and carries her to Tessa's bed so she would rest well.
Tessa shakes her head.
"No, I don't mind at all. Please. It'll at least answer one question," Tessa says.
Aoede stands close to Tessa, letting the Believer looking her over.
"I--I don't know," she says when asked if it was her or Alekto that felt that anger and took that action. "I--I think that's somehow worse than if I could say for sure if it was her or myself."
Tessa mumbles something at the others as she lays her head down on the desk, but the words are unintelligible by the time they reach the other three women's ears. She stirs a little as Believer picks her up, but doesn't wake until some time late the next morning.
The next morning, you are awoken by the sounds of Rexus and Laria attempting to quietly discuss something in the meeting room next to your bedroom. They are not very good at being quiet, and you wake up a little bit earlier than you wanted to.
"Walls don't just fall on their own, Rexus, and you know it." Laria's normally calm voice is quite strained, seemingly having had this discussion for a while now.
"I know that, of course I know that." he replies, his voice tired and obviously fatigued as well. "One of those tengu sisters died under the collapse, there's a chance they were messing with things and didn't want to tell us." he says, in rebuttal.
Tessa sits up and mumbles to the others in her half-awake state.
"What's going on? Did something happen," she asks.
Maccha enters the meeting room after being woken up, but still alert, the nights on the streets forever training her for these occasions. She lacks the context to fully understand what is going on, however.
"One of the tengu sisters? You mean one from Korva's group?"
"Died? Are you sure? Maybe there is still something I can do?" Still in her night-wear, she prepares to rush down and try to help.
"What?"
Tessa, more awake now and climbing out of bed in her rumpled clothing, looks alarmed by the news that someone had apparently died.
Llewela hops out of bed. "Did you say a wall collapsed? How could that happen?" she asks in concern.
"Ah, apologies." Rexus says, apologetically. "We did not intend to wake you with our discussion until you had slept fully.
"A wall section down below in the Wasp's Nest's storage room collapsed last night, killing one of the tengu sisters. They've been using that room as their nest since before you came here, and they haven't had any issues with walls collapsing in the weeks they've been down there." Laria explains.
"That we know of, anyway. They wouldn't tell us about any wall digging in order to escape their precarious position, would they?" Rexus counters.
Should you wish to descend into the Nest (and I assume you do), you see it exactly as they had described. The body of the tengu still sits under the rubble of the wall, clearly deceased. Seemingly crushed in her sleep, she most likely didn't suffer at least.
"Ah, apologies." Rexus says, apologetically. "We did not intend to wake you with our discussion until you had slept fully.
Standing in her meager underthings, Believer stares between Rexus and Laria in frank disbelief. "Someone has died and you didn't want to wake us?!" Almost on instinct, she blinks her eyes and looks them over with her ability to detect evil. She ignores their argument completely and grabs her things, slipping into only her cloak and armored coat as she makes her way downstairs without a care for her modesty. She keeps her Milani granted ability active, watching for even a whisper of wickedness.
Her features drawn in sympathetic pain, she looks over the scene carefully.
She spots a pair of tools and concentrates on them, casting detect magic as well as detecting evil, examining them thoroughly. "Don't touch those yet." She advises anyone she notices spotting the same.
Finally she approaches the Tengus. "I'm so sorry for the loss of your sister. Can you tell me what happened?"
They had just met the Tengu, so Maccha was in a strange spot on how to feel about it. But it was a death and a death "at home" and Rexus and Laria did not even seem to know which Tengu died. She just nodded and followed the group to the Wasp's Nest.
Maccha couldn't avert her gaze from the body, trying to articulate a prayer. She asked Milani to intervene in Pharasma's judgement of the Tengu's soul, dying right after joining a noble cause. Maccha also made a quick prayer to Calistria, it seemed appropriate considering what this place once was. She did not know what to say to the goddess, but promised revenge in case this was malicious since this was not a simple accident.
She finally spoke, turning to Believer "There are tool marks on the collapsed wall. I'm pretty sure those you are examining were used."
Tessa Follows Believer and Maccha down the stairs, her mind too busy trying to work through what is happening to notice much of anything really. While Believer and Maccha examine the tools and the wall, Tessa does what she can to off comfort to the others.
"Someone has died and you didn't want to wake us?!"
Rexus stammers for a second, seemingly not having realized just how bad this situation looks. "Ah, yeah, you all got back so late last night, and we couldn't do anything for her immediately without disturbing the scene..." his words trail off, obviously not finding a good excuse for their actions. He looks hurt as Believer uses her detect evil power, wounded you'd even try. "We only wanted to give you your rest, what would you have done for Jay? She died instantly, there was nothing either you or I could have done for her. Be upset if you wish, but focus that anger on whatever or whoever caused this, not me."
Finally she approaches the Tengus.
Korva is actually the only tengu still in the nest, and she's just sitting on one of their small cots staring at the broken wall and her broken sister. "I wish I knew, but all we heard was the wall falling and...her scream. None of us were awake when it happened, including Jay." she says, her voice sounding significantly more calm than you'd expect it. "I sent them away, to get out of here until we could inspect it more."
"You saying someone did this on purpose?" Korva says, her voice as strained as an avian's can be.
Tessa kneels down next to Jay and wraps her arms gently around the tengu. She doesn't know what else to do, so she hums a soft, melancholy tune as she gently strokes the feathers on Jay's head.