Scramsax's page

★ When Mnemnosyne, the goddess of memory, was imprisoned it weakened the magic she used to make the Western Ocean impossible to navigate. More and more ships, 1 in 10 perhaps, were actually making it back to Barsella, the city at the edge of the world...
★ Among the riches celebrated throughout the streets along with the costly spices and exotic furs was a certain jeweled optical telescope. This scope was rumored to be on its way to High Geomancer Rothgazzi, but its path from Whore's Lot on the docks to the Citadel would be perilous, if a little halfling named Scramsax had anything to say about it.
★ With the exception of one detail, no one ever quite worked out how he pulled it off. From his telling, the heist is somewhat different every time: a diminuating potion reduced him to a 5 lbs bundle and he was carried to the carriage in the mouth of a trusty dog; a nest of exotic, ravenous termites from the southlands ate the hole through the bottom of the wagon; the telescope was concealed in a large subway sandwich; and other such questionable things.
★ The one detail was his escape route: 4th Avenue on Highgate. Every street urchin would remember that detail for years to come, for it was there the thief was thwarted by simple chance and the innocence and honesty of youth. A child, no more than 10 years, spotted Scramsax and was his prosecutor's sole testimony.
★ His punishment was exile from Barsella, until 'Algos turns to sand'. Algos being the major fortified castle built into the nearby mountains...
★ He made his way through the wastes with the Winged Lion Company, a Trilolo based shipping outfit on its way to Zobeck. Along the way, he acted fence for gemstones and other minor scores, eventually meeting up with Bentknee's caravan headed north.
★ He likes to trade stories about the Western Sea for tales of the Red Queen, and in his most drunken state has been heard saying 'Ill pluck the crown from her head'
★ With the recent success of Bentknee's forward scouts, Scramsax is eager to get out of his hammock and get a piece for himself.

You ready yourself for whatever odd personality or essence that might reside within the ancient item. But to your surprise the beautifully wrought item appears to be free of such manifestations. But it is not without power. Letting the ritual perform its work you discover its properties in blissful peace and quiet.
Bracers of the Deft Defender: +3 to the wearer's AC. The bearer can do one of the following action up to three times each day.
1. As a standard action cast a Major Image per the spell. This uses the caster's INT to determine the save DC.
2. The bearer can use their reaction to increase their AC up to their proficiency bonus when hit by an attack. This could prevent the attack from hitting.
3. The bearer may cast the Teleport spell.

Wondrous item, rare (requires attunement)

While wearing this belt, you gain the following benefits:

Your Constitution score increases by 2, to a maximum of 20.
You have advantage on Charisma (Persuasion) checks made to interact with dwarves.
In addition, while attuned to the belt, you have a 50 percent chance each day at dawn of growing a full beard if you’re capable of growing one, or a visibly thicker beard if you already have one.

If you aren’t a dwarf, you gain the following additional benefits while wearing the belt:

You have advantage on saving throws against poison, and you have resistance against poison damage.
You have darkvision out to a range of 60 feet.
You can speak, read, and write Dwarvish.

Dagger with 1d6 extra cold damage

Earlier, in the bowels of the Courlandian Black Market...
"...by the way, how much rust this pig poker tab me?" sliding the lump of cold iron known as Morrin's Misery over to Sly Laura Smokes, the gold and silver toothed fence. She had her teeth knocked out...twice. The ups and downs of her clandestine fortune were now recorded in her mouth.
Scram didn't want to sell the dagger. It had been in the thief's possession ever since he stole it from Zove, and he was really more interested in learning something about it. It was the hidden, numb lump on his back...never far from his spine.
A stolen jewel of ice.
Eyeing the massive sac of picks and gadgets the halfling just haggled "You just klepped every glim, ginny, and kate in the Eastern Fencing Ken. Now you want me to switch you a story? Gonna cost ya a teize, Nim...but I think you've done shown me all yer King's pictures."
The thief recalled a different gender stamped on the Courlandian coinage "Heh. Don't you mean Queen? Nevermind. Listen, one Uncle to another..."
"Oh come off it. Sure we know about your bawdy basketing out with the Winged Lion Company. Don't make us fast chums. Remind me, what was our vig? 10 percent? And what you been doin' since, anyways? Coulda used you in Nargenstal when all that yellow tin hit the balance."
Scramsax shrugged, remembering the juicy bargain he had 'negotiated' with the Western Network out of blind luck "Eh...coulda used your own cutter on them chunks for 20. Night magistrate knows talent when the coin starts to click. ...anyways I told you, got pinched."
"'Hit the pound for the woman you love', was it? Never known a sharper lies as bad as you. Yer thinkin' you got a royal forgery but its daft scribbles. Swipin' the public ledger more like..." Sly Laura's suggestion that Scram had been visiting prostitutes during that time stung sharply, and the Barsellan exile couldn't hide it. "Pff. Are you going to cry? Whatever. Let's have a look..."
Twisting a brass knob on her ocular enhancement, droplets of arcane mist fell from Sly Laura Smokes' eye, coating the weapon with a sticky glow. Dazzling runes flitted in the reflections of her teeth, and presently a soft chorus of low frequency, Draconian iambic pentameter recounted the lore of the blade.
Scramsax didn't speak Draconian. "What's all that mewling and rhyming? Talon that size, I'd have guessed it a treble not a bass...heh...talk about a low blow" as the deep singing voice continued to resonate.
"Shutup..." Laura was trying to concentrate on the intricate historical details. The power exchanged, and the bitter sweet costs. "Ok, I think I got it. Pretty standard stuff for a jazzed up alleyblade. Morrin settled his crib on an island out in the Bay of Ghed. Worked a con there with his chum on the locals. Hoarded all kinds of chunks and ribbons: emeralds, rubies...bank notes from all the major kingdoms. Klepped that poker from some kind of spirit."
Scram's eyebrows did little backflips on his forehead "Hrm? A spirit? You gonna start preachin' me some mumbo jumbo..."
"*sigh* Who am I, Good Ben Flash?" There was a brief silence as the determination was made. No, she wasn't. "And yeah a spirit, an ice princess or ice hyena, the words are near the same in Draconian and I couldn't hear clearly over all your damn rambling. Pretty sure it was ice hyena. Anyways, Morrin had snapped that shard off a chunk thinking it was some choice blue opal or white sapphire. Well turns out it was the spirit's finger."
"So you're tellin' me this talon's an actual talon?" Scramsax twisting thieves' Cant with ironic reality.
"Poker's probably picked a pair of spirit's nostrils." Laura deadpanned. "So at first it just looked like some select cut o' glass. Morrin didn't ken his bungled move, but the spirit made a deal. Morrin could live if he sent his business chum up the ladder to bed. You know, crash him out in the gutter. Sure enough chum felt the ice, and the shard became that dagger in hand." Sly Laura gripped the cold handle, flipping it a few times and testing its balance. "See, thing is, lots of bad juju with blood and spirits..."
"Oh gods, here we go..."
"When that finger tasted chummie's blood, it crossed over and became a thing of this world. Morrin didn't know that meant the rest of the spirit could then cross over as well. In for a penny, in for a pound, eh Scram?"
"Let me guess, Morrin cracked the door of his latrine one day and found the boogie-boo monster all teeth and claws."
"Close, haunted him for the rest of his days. Drove Morrin to madness with its incessant cackling, which I suppose hyenas are known for. Shuttered his business. Eventually the miser took the blade and his dead chum's gems and locked them up in a strongbox. Tossed the whole lot into the sea hoping to be rid of the spirit forever. Its like a play on words, get it? 'Misery' like 'miser' bein' cached away but also 'misery' like 'suffering'. Morrin's Misery."
"Dang. Yer peeky squinter made it sing all that?" admiring Laura's eyepiece.
The fence admitted "Well there was a bit more, something about an octopus but I didn't quite get it."
Scram did.