At the Old Gates
Season of Rushing Waters
The hills and woodlands are shaped as the hall long dwelt within might be shaped by the chisel of its people; dirt turned over from which emerge at odd angles, a root here, a stone there glowing in the moonlight as the sun has set well before it might restore its searing gaze to the world above. No place for Warty this, Mina had made clear. The farmers might not notice you, blind like all their kin, but they would sure notice a slurk trampling their fields. So Gorok is left behind with him while the rest of you, five counting the mercifully sleeping infant, make your way towards the town as quiet and secretly as you are able.
The most danger you had been in of being spotted, if you could call it that, was from a troupe of 'men at arms' who came thundering down the road towards the east gate, armed certainly... with torches to ruin what feeble night sight they may have and the clank of metal on metal fit to march an ironguard of dwarfs without one tenth the menace. For one thing the things they were riding seemed for all their size to be damn fragile on those long legs of theirs. Were 'horses' really the best they could do?
Stealth Rolls: 29, 40, 22 (Success vs opposed 7)
Still, it was on this occasion that Pepper, discontent with flattening himself on the cold ground, jumped up on his mistress' shoulder and took a long sniff of the infant in her arms...
Pepper Knowledge (Planes): 1d20+5 = 13 (Failure)
Alas, he does not have anymore of a clue than she does of its origins, unless it is about the need to change his... wrappings. None of you had handled infants before, so such things are rather beyond your collective skills, with Mina having only volunteered herself as his keeper because her face was likely to be the least troubling.
Either way you make it near enough the gate... and near enough to see the wall is not half as sturdy as it presents itself from afar, that Mina can once more set off to hand the infant over to someone more skilled in dealing with it than any of you. Shouldn't be hard, the cat is probably tied for the position. Your breath catches in your throat as she walks into the shadow of the old rickety gatehouse, but just as swiftly she returns, Click still in arms.
Mina diplomacy: 1d20+1+1 (Guidance) = 19 (Success)
"The guards said the local noble, Archbaron Darellus Fex, is looking for some kind of lost baby. That was the news those knights brought, said something about it being kidnapped by fairies..."
"And that is bad because?" you ask, catching the fear in her tone without understating it. After all, if Click is a noble child surely he would do well with some kind of noble if they want it.
"Because he's a devil worshiper, a Thrune Loyalist, and worse! His people spit behind his back at talk of his name and they'd spit him in the face if they dared. Lazy, they call him that because he has a lazy eye, not for any other reason. The guard told me all this so I could get away 'cause he wants to spite the archbaron."
"Arch...baron give... gives no reward?" Cob asks, somehow getting the unfamiliar word out.
"No, I think he expects to be obeyed out of fear," Mina says grimly
"Stupid," Cob proclaims definitively.
"Anyway," Mina continues. "The news about the baby must have been really important to send men-at-arms down to town in the middle of the night. Fex does not like to be reminded that he rules such a poor estate as Longacre and he prefers to keep what men-at-arms he has close to hand for his own prestige. The guard said 'hellhounds ran in his dreams'. I
think that was just an expression." She sounds like she was hoping for reassurance that does not come.
What do you or Cob know about devil-hounds?
"The gate guard would not take he baby to the temple with the men-at-arms around stirring everything up, but he said that if he somehow ended up there that Sword Knight Allamar, that's the name of the priest, wouldn't let any thugs into her church and she'd have some way to smuggle the baby out.... he thought... if that's not just a rumor."
She sighs, though by contrast Cob looks invigorated. "
Sneak baby in?"
"Either that or we wait for the morrow and hope the Sword Knight comes out to take him."
What do you do?
[] Have Cob Sneak the baby in
[] Hide in the outskirts until morning when the priestess of Iomedae can come to you as part of her usual rounds of the tannery and the farms
[] Probably safer to take the baby with you back down below
[] Write in
OOC: Alas, as you have guessed, there are people looking for the baby. Thankfully, at least so far, they are people with only Perception +2. 
