Mund and Ally go drinking, the next morning
Subject A night of drinking
Stumbling back to his room, Harp tries to keep all of what he learned straight. Prices going up, taxes going up, new people moving into the town, rules enforced stricly and harshly, ID's for most everybody. Those passes they had were probably going to have to stay around.
Harp arrives at the room, seeing the sleeping form of Ragnar and Kal meditating on his bed. He nods to Kal and then crawls into his own bed to get a little sleep. He had not needed much in the past weeks, but he probably would need some now.
From: Mark
Subject Mund and Ally go drinking
Mund and Allistair watch as Ranthir and Salix head up to the room. Ally sends a thought to his familiar that the two would be there soon and to not be worried. The small snake sends back the image of a fat mouse and the snake swallowing the mouse followed by the snake sleeping contentedly for several days. Ally grins and sends a thought of approval. Turning to Mund he says "Ok are you ready to get hammered?" Mund grins and the two head out into the bar proper.
The two do not even hear Salix and Ranthir when they go down for breakfast. It is almost noon when Salix starts to wake them. "Ran is downstairs having lunch. He has seen Kal and Ragnar but not made contact with them yet. You two should get up and have some food. When the others get here we can report in and see what we want to do." It takes the mage and the barbarian about half an hour to get up and make themselves presentable. Throbbing headaches make wince when a noise is too loud or when the bright sun hits one of them in the eye, but they stumble down the stairs in time to get a full lunch.
Ranthir had gotten one of the larger tables and when the four were about done eating, Ragnar and the other three walk into the dinning area.
OODM: I am sending out more info to people and then you can role play the party getting back together.
From: Karl
Subject A night of drinking
Why were Ragnar and Kal sharing a sleeping form, and why was it meditating on Harp's bed?
From: Porter
Subject Mund and Ally go drinking
As soon as Mund has some food in him, he says "Did you say something about Ran seeing Kal and Ragnar? Why haven't we made contact with them? Let's make contact and discuss what we've learned."
From: Derek
Subject Mund and Ally go drining
Ally wakes up late with a headache, but it's nothing that he can't handle. Getting hit by that mandrake or those demon bugs and then falling from a tree was definately worse. Allistair gets a quick bite to eat before he goes up into the room to begin memorizing his spells. He tells Mund and the others to be sure that no one disturbs him while he is doing so, since he doesn't want it known what his real profession is. He also tells them he'll talk about what he learned last night after he is done.
OOC: Mark, do we have any pearls left over for an ID spell? If not, we'll need to do some shopping, perhaps discreetly, so that Ally can ID these city passes.
From: Mark
Subject Mund and Ally go drinking
I do not know if any one has any pearls left. Ally would have to ask the other characters.
From: Derek
Subject The next morning
After Allistair finishes memorizing his spells, he gets some lunch and joins the others. "I hear that we've found the others? Then we need to find a place where all of us can get together privately and talk. Do we want to all be in the same inn so that we can have privacy a bit more easily?"
From: Porter
Subject The next morning
Is there enough space in our room for everybody to fit in and talk?
From: Mark
Subject The next morning
Umm, Ragnar, Harp, Kal and Surin at at the Leaky Mug for lunch. They just showed up.
From: Derek
Subject The next morning
Allistair asks everyone of they would like to have lunch up in their room so they can have some privacy.
From: Derek
Subject The next morning
OOC: Sorry, I'm getting some lag between sending and receiving.
IC: "I think everyone can fit if we don't mind sitting on the beds. We can have a table brought up for the food, and I don't think the tavern keeper will care as long as we pay for everything."
From: Kevin
Subject The next morning
Harp saw Ragnar's form on Ragnar's bed (since he was covered with sheets) and Kal meditating on Kal's bunk since Kal does not have to sleep - he meditates.
From: Derek
Subject The next morning
The original phrasing was kind of strange though. I didn't think it was *that* kind of campaign. ;)
From: Karl
Subject The next morning
Ah, gotcha.
From: Mund
Subject The next morning
Mund gestures everybody to follow his brother up to their room, and then as the last person in, closes the door.
"Well, it's good to see that y'all made it in OK. Have you guys learned anything? Last night Alley and I tried to drink our way to information, but it didn't work too good. It looks like the Mayor is probably behind whatever's going on here. Since he became mayor a couple of years back, Bodentown has been growing, and all these rules have cropped up. It sounds like the Mayor also has a secret enforcement squad which makes people dissapear at night. We really don't want to piss off the Mayor until we know what we're doing.
From: Mark
Subject The next morning
Karl has been hoping though. :)
From: Allistair
Subject The next morning
OOC: I only sent this to Porter, I meant to send it to everyone.
IC: Allistair nods in agreement with Mund. "I was able to find a little about magic users in this town. It turns out that magic users are few here, and not trusted. Since I'm literate, I passed myself off as a scribe, and will continue to do so. I also suggest to Kal that he doesn't make known his arcane abilities. Since he fights well too, that shouldn't be a problem. There has been similar problem for priests and their temples here. The mayor started levying exorbitant taxes against all the temples in the town. As such, all temples and organized diety worship has either left Bodentown or gone underground."
"Anyway, as Kal may have also noticed, there is something magical about these town passes. I can determine exactly what they are, but I need one of these 100gp pearls like I used to ID all the loot from the ill-fated caravan we came across. Does anyone have one of those pearls left? With these magical passes and the discrimination against magic users, I fear that someone in the mayor's organization may be a powerful magic user and is using these passes is some way. As such we need to determine exactly what they are for."
If someone has one, Allistair will use it to ID his town pass. If not, then he'll ask if Surin or someone else would be able to go and purchase/procure one.
Allistair continues. "Since it seems that this Mayor is at the heart, or at least head, of what has been happening here, we need as much information as possible on his organization. I was thinking that I could see if they need an experienced scribe. If I could get a position there, access to paperwork at the city offices would give us a lot of information. No matter how secretive their actions may be, if it involves organizing people and their wages then it will show up somewhere in the paperwork."
"Similarly, many of us could probably find employment here as laborers or guards. The closer we can get to the mayor, the sooner we can figure out what is really going on here."
From: Mark
Subject Info check
I have contacted every one with info they found out. Different people got differing quanities and qualities of info.
I would like to see every one check in with the info they got and the group come up with a starting plan.
From: Randy
Subject The next morning
"Ragnar and I were out this morning and learned a little. The town seems to be booming financially. Prices are high compared to what we are used to though. Apparently there are a lot of taxes that the merchants all have to pay." Ranthir scratches his chin and pushes his hair out of his eyes.
"Labourers are in short supply as well which seems odd since there are a lot of new people showing up all the time. It probably wouldn't be hard for some of us to get hired on somewhere. There also seems to be a slave market. To bolster labour I would assume but it could be for other reasons as well. It seems like the mayor is behind the growth of the town over the past year or so. Also, from what folks are saying, those who oppose the mayor seem to be dissappearing."
From: Derek
Subject The next morning
Allistair speaks up briefly, "Did you hear any rumors as to what happens to the dissenters who dissappear? Are they sold as slaves and shipped out? Is there a large jail/dungeon where they all go?"
From: Porter
Subject The next morning
"I've heard the same thing about folks dissapearing, but it's not just people who talk out against the Mayor. People ain't willing to go out at night in groups less than 10 in size for fear of dissapearing themselves."
"Kinda makes you wonder what's happening to all those folks, don't it? Maybe that's what we ought to look at first. We could get jobs and work for a long time without ever getting close enough to anybody to find out what's going on."
From: Derek
Subject The next morning
"So are there press-gangs that abduct people and sell them as slaves or conscript them into military service? Or does something else happen to them?"
From: Porter
Subject The next morning
"Nobody knows what happens to them -- they just 'dissapear'."
"You know, if we really want to know what's happening, the simplest way is get ourselves, or some of us, dissapeared ourselves."
From: Kevin
Subject The next morning
Nodding at Salix to get his approval, Harp dismisses that idea. "We might want to wait before we try that. We don't know enough yet.
There seems to be a larger number of fighting types moving into the town, but I don't know why. Maybe Ran, Kal and I can try to find out if they are recruiting or hiring them as mercenaries. If they are being hired, maybe we can get hired on to get a better idea of what is going on.
Maybe Surin can check those of a little more dodgy nature to see how these changes are affecting them.
Did anyone get the name of the mayor? I don't remember hearing it, but he has to have one, doesn't he?"
OOC: Mark when the groups were heading in, did they see any fields for growing food? I thought you said something about when we met the wasps that there were just stumps cut down, the land was not being truly cleared
From: Porter
Subject The next morning
"Everybody just calls him "The Mayor"." I never heard a name.
From: Mark
Subject The next morning
The sections of the woods that had been cleared were not being farmed or converted to farmland.
The some of the land around the town was farm land, but this far north there is a very short growing season. From what was seen there would not be enough to support a town of this size.