Posted: 12 April 2021 (reading time: 6 minutes; 1142 words)
Recap by Joel Hermann
An unlikely group of fellows found themselves at the threshold of Clærk Hall, each with a different story, but with a shared goal (as yet, unrealized), to improve the world they found themselves in.
The demi-jarl at Clærk Hall, flanked by his imposing guards, took a moment to size up the motley group. Hrafn, a likable and rakish, well-spoken Viking sailor, was the boldest of them, and asked for the opportunity to assist the lords of the city to earn their favor and a reputation among them. He and his companions were presented with an undertaking on which one would normally expect to find family and neighbors, the location of two mysteriously missing girls: Hallgerd, the daughter of local blacksmith Ketilbjorn Svensson, and her friend Jarngerd. It was noted by many in the group that additional girls had gone missing within the past year.
The group, not yet coalesced, made their way to the blacksmith’s shop, where they found the imposing man, disconsolate. Ketilbjorn shared the basic details of his daughter’s disappearance, that she and her friend had gone missing the previous evening after they’d left a longhouse near Jarngerd’s house, in a more residential (and wealthier) neighborhood. Laguza, the mountain dwarf fighter with experience in a plethora of skills and tools, found a moment to bring light back into the blacksmith’s eyes in a moment of shared admiration of craftpersonship.
Upon reaching the longhouse, the characters searched for clues to the fate of the missing girls, first by questioning the bartender, and then searching the longhouse’s immediate surroundings.
The barkeep knew of the girls disappearance, but was not working when the girls were last seen, and suggested speaking to Hrodny, one of the barmaids who had been working then, who was due to return in a little more than an hour.
While they waited, the group realized that they never had been properly introduced. They proceeded to make their introductions over mead and the sundry victuals on offer; Norsk’Mænth, a Shadar-kai hexblade warlock from the Shadowfell who had never tasted mead before found the beverage particularly enjoyable. While this helped the group to bond, in some cases, knowing more about each other did not necessarily result in additional trust, particularly for Thor’s cleric, the Wood Elf Vyshka, who seemed to be skeptical of everyone at the table. Belnirith, a cleric of ambiguous racial origin with both divine and infernal characteristics, seemed disillusioned by her order; when Hrafn extolled the virtues of having multiple clerics around, she replied with a dismissive “Meh.”
With the group acquainted, they agreed that a search of the surroundings was in order, with Belnirith offering a prayer of magic detection while Greunthrn, human ranger, and Hrafn would search manually.
The search of the surrounding area by Greunthrn turned up a mysterious bloody handprint. It was found very low to the ground, in an alleyway nearby. The blood was older than the timing of the girl’s disappearance, but still relatively fresh.
Enough time had elapsed at this point for Hrodny to have returned to the longhouse. Though the barmaid had an imposing appearance, once again Hrafn was bold, and engaged her to seek for clues. Her description of the girl’s night at the longhouse sounded natural enough, but when pressed on whether there had been anything unusual in the recent goings on, Hrondy and the barkeep confided that there had been a lower class sort of patron in evidence recently, unlike their usual middle-to-upper crust clientele.
In the interest of exploring other angles of the disappearance, the team then made their way to Jarngerd’s house. Vyshka and Laguna were allowed to walk through and look at Jarngerd’s sleeping area and belongings, while Greunthrn spoke briefly with her mother and brother. They were grateful for the team’s effort but unable to offer additional information of note.
It was then that Hrafn hit upon the idea to return to his friend Radhani’s house, trusting that his friend knew the town well enough to provide insight into what the mysterious bloody handprint might mean. Radhani did not disappoint. He indicated that the disappearances and the mysterious handprint sounded like the work of cultists, evoking memories of the dark times before the Restoration.
Arriving in the warehouse district, the still-forming party diverged.
Laguza perused some of the warehouse goods, checking to see whether anything appeared out of the ordinary. Belnirith and Norsk’Mænth watched the street. Greunthrn asked Hrafn to help him look for bloody handprints like the ones previously found. But even before they noticed a handprint, they noticed someone who was mimicking the actions of a warehouse worker, but was actually carefully observing them as they looked at the sides of the warehouses.
They quickly formed a plan to have Hrafn circle around the “worker”’s warehouse so as to cut off any potential escape route, while Greunthrn first pretended to continue looking for clues, and then swiftly approached their observer. As they converged upon him, their quarry ducked inside the warehouse, but simply continued to pretend to work. Despite some spectacularly bad acting, Hrafn was able to get out of the spy that he worked for a shadowy group operating out of an older, unused section of the warehouse district, and had been tasked with observing anyone who seemed interested in bloody handprints. Hrafn paid the spy double his weekly wage to not report their encounter, then collected his fellows to plan their next move.
It was decided that, with night falling soon, the group would enter the older area of the warehouse district to pursue more information about the cult of the bloody hand.
Laguza immediately noted the dilapidated nature of the area, with damage to the buildings that was extensive enough that apparently it simply made more sense to move elsewhere than to fix. One old warehouse, however, looked shabby, but solid enough. Hrafn stealthily reconnoitered around the entrance and discovered the main door in front was padlocked, but also some loose boards that one might be able to get in between on the west side of the building, and most interesting of all, the outlines of a secret door, concealed in the wood framing, on the east side.
After some discussion, in which Greunthrn pointed out that it may be important to watch the various exits identified if attempting to infiltrate the building caused those inside to rush out, and Vyshka made it clear that she really wanted to be of help, but also didn’t much like being around any of her compatriots, and was not eager to enter a mysterious building with them, it was decided Hrafn would attempt to safely enter the secret door, with Belnirith watching his back, while Laguza and Norsk’Mænth would guard the front door, and Vyshka and Greunthrn would watch the west side’s loose planks.
TO BE CONTINUED…
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