Finding the Spark (Pathfinder 1E Quest)

2nd of Lamashan 4707 A.R. (Absalom Reckoning)

A battle that never was may not be as good as a battle won, but it is a hell of a lot better than a battle lost and in this city of teaming thousands you are all too aware that 'losing' might come at more than the end of a poisoned blade. The four of you stride boldly, Sirim dimming the hateful afternoon light... and none bar your way. Certainly the man Gorok has first seem watching for them is long gone by now.

It seems your guess was on the mark...

You gain 1,000 gp -> Now at 2,079 gp 19 sp 21 cp

"I think we may have a rat problem, and the kind that walks on two legs as well," you explain what little you had pieced together then go on to speak of the battle at the temple to Mirindi since you had not heard any word of it since. Probably the priests keeping it quiet so as not to alarm the faithful who come to the house of Pharasma for solace not tales of bloody battle.

The usually cheerful potioneer's expression goes darker and darker. "A whole pack of wererats... You don't want to be loose with that kind of talk, not after that happened the last time."

"The last time the wererats attacked someone?" Mina asks, confused.

"The last time a stranger claimed to have spotted the rat-men killing and stealing and setting their plague on folks. It was back at the tail end of the Last Crusade, even though the present one isn't doing so good I heard... but anyway, it was after the Crusaders gave up on Sarkoris and raised the Wardstones to keep the demons contained to the Tainted Lands. A lot of former Crusaders drifted back to their home countries; broken men some of them, not zealous enough to stay in Mendev but still hungering for a cause. Well, when a troupe of them came through Augustana one hot Summerwrought, that's a festival to Sarenrae, the bright and Brigh the Clever, they thought they found it. A man among their number called Narmor said he had been blinded by the demons and given visions of evil things, screamed right in All Gods Square in front of the temple of Sarenrae and proclaimed the temple choirmaster a wererat. There was a fight with the guards then the mob fell on her. Well, you lot fought a wererat, so I'm betting you can imagine how that went. Hundreds of people who don't know how to hold a knife right against a cornered rat."

"We did not allow the foe the chance to raise hand or claw against us," Sirim explains, in what's probably as neutral a tone as he can manage, though he cannot hold back his contempt of anyone who decided to fight a moon-mad shape-changer with their bare hands.

"No one knew how many had been scratched. The mayor's office and the temple tried to organize healing for everyone, but the rumors started to spread that the high priestess was in it with the wererats and so was the mayor. There was talk of ballot stuffing, don't worry, that's an election thing, demon worship, plague spreading... madness. You had folks with torches wandering the streets at night looking for potential wererats. They found some, then they started finding wererat kin and... 'wererat sympathizers', if you catch my meaning. A whole family of eight was burned in their house in East Copperdown and then..."

"Narmor was found to be behind it all?" You and Mina ask practically at the same time.

"Happens more than folk will admit in Ustalav," she explains. "Real monsters are hard to kill, good at hiding, but some vagabond whose all skin and bones and no one in town trusts or a merchant from far away with foreign ways... those are all too easy for people to turn on and the dark powers know it too."

You do not have anything like as personal a story to share. "What other reason would you have to scream that someone was one of these moon-mad changers in the middle of a crowd besides wanting more people infected? From there it's just a question of asking why, and the power that came with directing these hunts seemed to be enough."

"Worse than that," the alchemist shakes her head and takes out a small flask from one of her drawers, only to sniff it and put it back: "What's the wisp glue doing in there? Anyway, the bastard was a servant of Corosbel the 'Silent Saint'." She flashes a small bronze mirror hung as a pendant around her neck in warding against the evil name. "Got tripped up trying to recruit another crusader who pretended to go along with it then went right to the Eagle Knights. Turns out he had daemons with him, six of them died along with twenty seven marines seconded from the Arsenal Island Garrison, including the lass who gave the warning. I think she wanted to die doing the right thing since she didn't have much to live for."

"So it would be unwise to make accusations of wererat presence, even though we have faced one in battle?" Gorok asks after a long moment's solemn silence.

"You are the first ones I actually heard about the fight at the temple from and I've been keeping an ear to the ground," the diminutive potioneer explains. "I think the priests are keeping it quiet, especially with it being on holy ground and all."

"But you believe us though?" The 'why' at the tail end of your question might be silent, but it is not unheard.

"None of y'all gave me a reason not to trust ya, not to mention all the gold ya made me," she answers with the kind of easy shrug that you can only be grateful for and jealous of in equal measure. "Take care now, I'd love some more snail eggs, spiders fangs, and stirge's wings."

"We'll see what we can find," Mina assures her in parting as you offer a smile too, Cob an enthusiastic wave, and Gorok a nod that might seem cold were it not for the way his tail lies flat on the ground relaxed.


The armorer Zimendel greets his would-be visitors with a sign that says in six different languages: 'No ornate scabbards, no dressage boots, no ceremonial armor, no commemorative daggers, and NO PARADE SWORDS! The next cretin to ask for any of this forge dross will be verily stabbed!'

"Well," Mina says brightly. "It's a good thing Warty doesn't have much of a sense of style," causing Cob to cackle, you to smile, and even Sirim to send a sense of amused approval from where he had slipped between two of the paving stones outside the blacksmith's shop. Inside thick smoke covers everything in a patina of soot, no whale oil lanterns here.

The elf, when you spot him, seems unnaturally pale in the darkness, seeming almost unhealthily thin to your eyes. He mutters something no doubt uncomplimentary under his breath then snaps: "Well. what do you want?"

"Slurk armor," Cob blurts out eagerly.

The elf smith narrows steely blue at him for a moment. "Four Hundred Gold Sails. I don't haggle."

Despite the foul temper it is about what you'd been expecting, so Gorok takes out the stacks of coin and the rest of the day is spent convincing Warty to go through all manner of odd contortions for his fitting.

Lost 400 gp -> Now at 1,679 gp 19 sp 21 cp

You do not see whisker nor tail tip of a rat the rest of the day, but you can't quite shake the feeling of being watched.


3rd of Lamashan 4707 A.R. (Absalom Reckoning)

On the next day you decide to follow up on some rumors you heard about the dwarf Urgor Shurefoot finding a patron among the many merchant houses of Oldtown. Unfortunately, it seems that if you show up to a wealthy merchant's door in the same clothes you had been roasted in a few days ago you are likely to be laughed out if you're lucky. The smell of burning hair may be mostly out of the fabric, but nothing is going to change the muted greys and browns meant to blend in with the natural rock of the upper caverns. Gorok on the other hand really doesn't want to buy 'show clothes', reasoning that that it is better to let your deeds speak for you...

What does Kori think the party should do?

[] Buy some Burhger's Clothes as Mina suggests (Cost 20 gp)

[] Let your deeds grant you entrance as Gorok suggested (Reveal the fight at the temple)

[] Write in

OOC: A bit of an exposition heavy update, but hopefully entertaining just the same.

4th of Lamashan 4707 A.R. (Absalom Reckoning)

Lost 20 gp -> Now at 1,659 gp 19 sp 21 cp

Nestled in the northwest of Augustana under the shadow of Fort Constance, bristling with steel that had seen off the threat of Chelish invasion time and again, are the Slopes, dotted with the manor houses of the well to do with sprawling stone edifices whose overhanging second stories are expansive enough to have whole rows of colonnades under them carved in the guise of fey fruiting trees and serene lyre bearing azatas. Fruiting trees reach out with bare branches towards the winding path, festive lanterns swaying in the evening breeze, sending the shadows dancing, though something tells you it's not weak eyes that has the grey clad servants of master merchant Lorico Gavhaul looking on in shock at your company.

Resisting the urge to pull at the collar of your own powder blue doublet or to kick some give into the new stiff leather shoes you had been assured are the height of fashion you look to your left to see Gorok, the least transformed of all of you. He had insisted on keeping his scales over his scales, as it was, though over that armor comes a bright yellow doublet, silk since he did not have to get as much as the rest of you. On his fingers steel claw-sheathes glitter, attached to the lower half of traditional Taldan riding gloves finishing the ensemble. On the other hand Cob had been, predictably, less restrained. Having manages to find a prismati uniform in a child's size he festooned it with all the scarves and bells that would fit on its many purpose built straps and then he got himself a large three cornered navy hat with a very impressive looking eagle feather, adding five inches to his height.

"Yes, what can we do for y...?" The man glups, his carefully rehersed line lost at the sight of Mina's uncanny grey gaze. Sirim had advised your friend that it would be much better for her to appear in her true guise to the mansion of one of Andoran's merchant lords, especially after the recent death of Lyndram Vaelyn.

"We would like to speak to Mr. Gavhaul about a matter of common and concerted interest," your friend begins, the cadence of her words obviously not her own but Sirim's.

Maybe the footman caught it too somehow, maybe he just does not want to let a goblin near the master's dogs, in either case his expression hardens. "Master Gavhaul will not be entertaining visitors until after Ascendence Day. I can certain the foreman at the warehouses can see to your needs. Do you require the address?"

Sirim Diplomacy (DC 30): 1d20+14 = 23 (Failure)

"A pity," she sighs dramatically. "I'm certain master Surefoot will regret how lightly we have been sent away." The best lies you know are the one half spun in the mind of the listener, the implication here being that you have some connection to the excitable Urgor, though as soon as you speak to someone with a bit more heft in the household you can clarify you are interested in discovering more about the expedition, to see if it is worth your while. Never come off as a supplicant unless you want to be treated like one, Sirim had said and it seemed to both you and Gorok like perfectly good sense.

What you had not expected was for the man to suddenly rock back on his heels as though you had struck him and say. "Yes, of course I'll take you right to him! Apologies, I didn't know..."

Sirim Bluff vs Footman Sense Motive: 34 vs 24 (Critical Success)

As you pass along the columns Gorok motions to one of the vines artfully wrapped around an angelic marble figure and whispers: "Strange vine, slumbering."

Slumbering, you wonder, or sated? Either way it makes for a clever guard, especially since anyone living in this house would have no trouble feeding it.

Gorok Perception (DC 20): 1d20+9 = 25 (Success)

You are quickly lead through rooms arrayed with, if anything, even more wealth than Vale Manor, though with an air of quiet neglect in places, the dust swirling in the beams of moonlight as though it had been many a long year since all its rooms were filled. Gavhaul was either being very careful to live within his means or he simply cared for other things than ostentation, both of which would align to sending an expedition into the Verduan looking for adamantine. Nobles and merchants in precarious financial circumstances often took risks.

They are not the only ones.

The footman ushers you into a circular room sporting a skylight marked with images of the constellations. Perhaps at one point it was a chapel to some obscure god, now made into a kind of meeting room or office where the dwarf from the Foresters' Endowment is looking over a worryingly high stack of papers.

"Who the hell are you?" he bristles looking up from his work as the footman scurries away. Fortunately he does so in the dwarf tongue, which the man does not seem to hear.

"Gorok's Company. We're here to see if your journey's worth offering our aid to, for a price of course," Gorok himself says bluntly.

"What do you mean 'to see if it's worth yer time?'" the obviously bewildered dwarf asks, looking the iruxi up and down, thankfully entirely missing your own shadow which took that moment to mine slitting his shadow's throat with fingers elongated into claws. "How did you even get in here?"

Urgor Wisdom Unnatural Shadow (DC 15): 1d20+1 = 10 (Failure)

"One might say that we implied we were expected," you answer. "One would of course be mistaken," you dare to offer a jest.

"Ah, they must think you're from Westcrown," the dwarf chuckles, seeming to relax into the almost conspiratorial air of someone who has had far too much formality on his plate for too long. "Folks don't go around claiming to be from Cheliax too loudly around here, even if it's just a merchant's fixers. I heard old Don't-Call-Me-Lord Garhaul has family there and connections too, that's where the real money comes from. So you are adventurers then? The er... goblin too?"

"Yes? Why would Cob not be adventurer?" Bright red eyes narrow under the tricorn hat.

Urgor raises his hands. "Never met a goblin who could keep one thought in his head for more than half an hour, never mind seven hundred and fifty miles by sea and by land over the breadth of the kingdom."

"Maybe you need to meet more goblins," Cob offers guilelessly... or at least that is what it would sound like if you did not know what that ear twitch meant.

Mina clears her throat. "So what does the pay look like for your expedition, master dwarf?"

"Shares in any adamantine we find..." You can practically see the numbers turn and twist behind his eyes. "If you're willing to pay for your own supplies, let's say... ten percent of the whole load. Ah... I see how it is, sounds small right, but there's pillars of worked adamantine just standing in the center hollow, cylinders taller than twice dwarf height. That is tens of thousands of gold in payment."

Azlanti Lore (DC 10): Automatic Success

The image of a reentry pot, the kind you had seen streaming down from the moon before you had even first seen its face, passes through your mind.

"And what would Garhaul be getting?" Gorok presses, not bothering with a title, humorous or not.

"He gets sixty five percent for providing the manpower to move the stuff and smoothing the wheels of the claiming process, as well as using his contacts in Almas to get it smelted down into sensible ingots. I'm supposed to get thirty five, but I'll settle for twenty five as it gets me four more sets of eyes to watch out for my interests in the claim, if you catch my meaning."

What do you say?

[] Take the deal and present Lord Garhaul with the results

[] Try to talk the dwarf into a higher cut for such stout and skilled protectors

[] Try to negotiate with Garhaul himself, he has more of a cut so more room to be generous

[] Ask more questions
-[] Write in

[] Write in

OOC: Enjoy.