62. Contracts Are So They Don't Take Your Kids In The Divorce

5th Sypheros, 999 YK (3/12/993 FTC)

They have just disembarked from the haunted Ship-of-Prayers in the dock in Sowshore.
Warren and Valaari just had an awkward, clammy hug.
They make their way to the Consortium of Cliffclingers to meet with the other Everdelver's Guild of Underplunderers.
They finally see The Cleft and it takes their breath away. Bhaltair starts to ambiently join in with the chaotic symphony of musicians up the cliff.
Valaari is totally overwhelmed. It's so noisy! There's so many people!
Runmae is taken back to her days in the Mror Holds. "If we hadn't dug too deep, this could've been us"
And it kinda was
Naze isn't too perturbed, it's not too different to the rest of the city to him.
Warren is trying to act nonplussed, but by Kalok Shash is he plussed.
They're feeling very small, the scale of Vralkast is just beyond their wildest dreams.
The Everdelvers negotiate their passage up the Cleft, and they're all introduced to their geckos and their riders. They're so excited!
They begin their ascent on gecko-back.
It's a nauseating experience. None of them were meant to be sideways like this for long periods of time, and the geckos move in unpredictable bursts of speed that mean they never quite get used to it.
Runmae is particularly struggling with it. Bhaltair's not too bad, trees in the Eldeen Reaches also get pretty big.
Valaari has to meditate to try and distract themselves from it.
Warren curls into a ball in the saddle, all of his bravado having left him. He hates it so much.
Shortly afterwards, their geckos are spooked by something, and then an enormous multi-limbed serpent the colour of lightning emerges from a nearby cave. A Behir.
It speaks to them! What the hell!?
It introduces itself as Ghyrugal. It can smell the dead behir parts in their bags. It says it's not angry, it understands its people are beasts, but it would like to hear their story.
Valaari recounts their encounter with the Behir accurately, with no embellishments or removals. Runmae translates it for Ghyrugal.
Ghyrugal thanks them for speaking to him, explaining that he gets lonely. The sole mind in a kingdom of beasts.
Valaari asks if he's tried to get more of his kind? He hasn't left Vralkast since he was recovered by the Everdelver's.
He asks if they would be willing to part with some of their trophy?
They give him a claw, they had plans for most of the parts.
He thanks them, and wishes them a good rest of their day.
Valaari leaves him with some wisdom: cultivate what makes you unique. It is not a bad thing to stand out from those around you.
Ghyrugal uncoils and returns to his cave.
They have several more minutes of nauseating travel before arriving at a landing.
Nobody throws up! Win!
There's some harpies singing nearby, it's beautiful but contains none of the compelling magic they'd usually fear from that
And on the seaward edge of the landing is a huge standing stone, covered in notes and carvings
Runmae goes over to check it out, and reads a bunch of petty complaints, arguments, and love letters. Rigwi explains that it's a Hexing Stone, they carve their troubles into it and then eventually the stone beneath it erodes, or a giant pushes it, and their problems fall into the sea.
It's a good idea
They ask what happens when they run out of space on the stone?
"They find another stone, and the cycle repeats"
Runmae comments that it must take decades for the stone to fill up, do they hold onto their grudges for that long?
Rigwi says that no one holds a grudge like the Fomor'ren. The entire city is a monumentous "fuck you!" to the archfey of Thelanis, a grudge they've held for about 40,000 years
Runmae lets out a low whistle
Now that they're ready (and Warren's fear of heights is kicking in), they head into the tunnels to get to Tor Udar
As they start moving, Valaari informs Warren they're gonna have to go back down eventually
Warren blanches
Tor Udar is obviously the Dwarven district, and it's very wealthy. The architecture is brutalist, but there are stories artistically carved into the walls detailing their history. Runmae recognises several of these stories, cementing that they share history!
It also caters to adventurers, as the home of the Everdelver's Guild of Underplunderers. In particular, Rigwi explains that they have a cadre of talented alchemists and Chimeramancers.
Valaari asks "what's that?" and Rigwi explains what alchemy is
"No, the other one"
Rigwi explains that body modification is popular in Vralkast, people want to emulate the Fomor'ren. Chimeramancy is how they do that.
(It's grafts and mutations)
Naze is particularly interested in the chimeramancers. That's so cool! He wants to do that
Bhaltair is also, they wanna get a little friend that's stuck to them forever.
The Everdelver's lead them to their headquarters, and they're shown to a room.
As the door shuts, their alerted to the presence of an elderly Boggle in the room. She introduces herself as Tricks-of-Pixies, she explains that (as they obviously know), every household in Vralkast has a contract with a Boggle to keep their homes clean and maintained.
What? What's a boggle? Or a contract?
Oh, they're new new
Tricks explains the concept. The Boggle Housekeeping Cartel keep the homes clean, the people pay with a thimble of soup or some shroomloaf. Don't pay, and mischief'll be made.
Tricks isn't here to negotiate their contract, her daughter will be. She wants them to give her a hard time.
"So, are we being shaken down?"
Valaari doesn't take well to being threatened, what does she mean mischief'll be made?
"Things get lost when there's too much mess"
"So you steal from us?"
"Absolutely not"
Tricks explains again why she's here. "Just do what you're doing now, to my daughter."
But why?
Tricks explains that she's getting old now, over the storied course of 5 Olmtides (years) she's made countless deals to keep this city clean, and found jobs for all of her nephews and nieces and niblings and giblets and grandpups and grimlets. But she'll be dead soon, and she needs to know they'll be okay after she's gone. She needs a difficult customer.
She's prepared to pay them 500 bonegeld for the trouble.
Oh wow okay
Runmae explains all of this to the others. It's easy money, right?
Runmae still distrusts her, and says something about it being a bad look if they don't follow through.
"This distrust is unusual. Where you are from must be terrible..and filthy. You mustn't have any Boggles"
"We clean our own messes"
"I can tell"
Runmae holds her hand out to shake on it. Tricks just looks at it, "what is this?"
With that settled, Tricks asks Runmae to help her with the door. She can't reach the handle.
Okayyyy
Runmae shuts the door and puts her head in her hands.
Valaari asks who these people are who don't clean up their own messes?
Runmae explains that housekeepers are fairly common in the Five Nations. Valaari is flabbergasted
It's not, like, a racket though. That's weird.
Runmae explains the request anyway, they just need to give her daughter a hard time when negotiating the contract.
Valaari says it sounded like they didn't have a choice, they're being threatened
"Yeah so we may as well get something out of it"
Warren wants clarity on the meaning of "hard time"
"Just be an asshole, I guess"
Business as usual, then
Bhaltair is confused, "we're not assholes?"
"You're not."
lmao
Warren goes into detail into how all of them (except Bhaltair) are assholes
Naze resents this
Anyway, they finally look around the room. It's all sized for dwarves, everything is just a bit too small.
Valaari's going to have everything below the knee just hanging off the end. They just put their bedroll on the floor, this is bullshit.
Runmae comments on how good the beds are! "They even got the king size!"
Warren makes a nest out of blankets and curls up on a bed.
Naze is too tall, he also sleeps on the floor
Bhaltair sleeps standing, apparently
Sleeping in a comfortable room is, apparently, the first time Runmae hasn't had a dream about turning into a plant in ages
Warren's never been more comfortable, and it's temporary. That's so sad.

6th Sypheros, 999 YK (4/12/993 FTC)

Over the rest, Bhaltair attunes to a spirit of the fey court and enquires about Boggles. They learn that they're generally pranksters, though these rarely cause any real harm. However, the housekeeping thing is closer to Brownies than Boggles, in Bhaltair's experience.
In the early hours of the morning, they're visited by Pick-the-Locket.
Steph says they're cute, and the other players give her shit for it. "We're being shaken down!"
Bhaltair answered the door, but can't understand Locket, so they wake up Runmae.
Bhaltair wants to cast magic, but doesn't want to spook the boggle.
Locket immediately goes into her obviously pre-prepared sales pitch, whilst Runmae tries to interrupt her. Runmae explains that they can't understand her, so they need to cast a spell to enable them all to negotiate.
"Oh if Dwarven is the problem, I can also speak Elvish and Sylvan and Gnomish and Giant and Thalassic and I'm also learning Quori!"
"No!"
Bhaltair just casts the spell, true speech, on her
"Oh, could you not understand me before?"
She goes back into the sales pitch and Bhaltair has to try to interrupt her because they need to wake the others
Bhaltair kicks Warren awake whilst yelling at the others to wake up
She does the sales pitch again, and is hit with "what's a house? what's a contract? what's a cartel?"
She explains a contract as the thing that means when you're screaming at each other in the divorce and your piece of shit husband wants to take the kids, you keep the kids.
They really give her a hard time. They question everything she says, even asking what constitutes a room for the purposes of these contracts?
"Do you even know our names?"
"I'm not asking for much, just leave out a thimble of soup and your room will be kept clean"
They don't have soup, or thimbles
"Do you have any food you could leave out?"
"No"
"Look, Lick-the-Pocket, we don't own this building"
"I appreciate the effort but my name is Pick-the-Locket. Lick-the-Pocket is my cousin"
They say they will clean after themselves, they're not signing a contract for two days
"But what will I do when you try to take my kids?"
"Why would we do that?"
"I dunno but the contract makes sure you won't!"
Maybe she could pay them and then she cleans
She doesn't like that
"Wait, are you saying that without a contract you're going to take our kids?"
"The possibility is open, without the protection of a contract"
They're pretty sure it'll be fine, none of them have kids and Warren has a low count
"You don't have to talk about that IN FRONT OF THE BOGGLE"
wait does Zaphkiel count as Naze's kid
Imagine Zaphy just leaving with the boggle
"I guess...uhh, then if you don't want a contract then we don't clean and the Boggle Housekeeping Cartel can't be held responsible for any messes you may incur."
"okay then...I love you"
"Nope"
She starts to walk away, crestfallen, but keeps turning back to look at them with her oversized, cute eyes
Steph (the player) is dying. She'd last 5 seconds in Thelanis
They stay strong, they don't fall for it
Runmae slowly shuts the door on her
"Well, that was easy" - Bhaltair
"That was harder than I thought it was gonna be" - Runmae
"Were you really planning to accept a housekeeping contract for a room they're staying in for one day?"
"I dunno, around the second set of puppy dog eyes I was beginning to think the room does need cleaning"
Valaari really doesn't get it.
Warren says he's just chalking it up to Vralkast being weird.
Right then, shall we?
A while later, there's another knock on their door. This time it's Rigwi Thromwud.
They ask about the boggles. Rigwi is confused by their confusion? That's normal
What
Anyway
They cleaned up after themselves
Well, Valaari did.
Runmae did make her bed though, which confused Bhaltair. "Have you never made a bed?"
Apparently not. Bhaltair doesn't see the point of making the sheets neat
Warren left such a mess
Anyway, Rigwi mentions they asked about maps when they first met? Is there somewhere in particular they want to go?
There's a quick OOC recap about what they're doing out here
Valaari explains that they're trying to stop the Carrion Tribes, to prevent them circumventing The Labyrinth. They're interested in any maps of Khyber, but Valaari also has a personal interest in finding Arak Yor.
Rigwi can definitely look into a map for Arak Yor, or putting together other general maps of Khyber. She doesn't know anything about any tribes though. They won't have attacked anyone they encounter.
Valaari says they may want to be careful, the tribes are aligned with fiends.
Hmm
Rigwi says they may want to speak to the Fomorians about that. Anyway, she also thought it would be good to show them Unda today, and Thydar mentioned Bhaltair wanted to see a Harbour God?
Yes
Okay, maps first
Rigwi identifies two routes they could take, they could go through the Fluxforge, which connects to a region of Khyber that connects to both il-Yannah's Cry and Arak Yor.
Alternatively, they could go via Sol Udar
Valaari asks if they can copy the maps? Rigwi says they need to pay for it, 50 geld per map
Valaari checks their pocket and finds a purse they didn't have before. It's nicely stitched, with flower-like embroidery. It contains 500 geld
"Oh, someone lost their purse in my pocket"
"What? did you steal it?"
"No"
Valaari counts it out, and comments that it matches what the little lady offered them.
They ask about any maps to the surface? They have a few, but they're low on detail. They don't particularly care about the surface.
She mentions Ravener's Maw leads to a forest. Taer Umbra leads to a mountain range somewhere. There's a path from Vralkast to somewhere in a place called Xen'drik. The route to Arak Yor also leads to a "big rock in a dusty desert place". The Lagoons of Piety lead to an ocean somewhere.
Oh, there's also a place that they were confused about for a while. It seems very much like the surface, but it loops on itself. There's just a cabin there and a guy with some chickens, but you have to leave via a portal. There's loads.
Oh they found that one once! The Moth Mask disapproved of chickens being allowed on the counter.
That's a potential route they can take back home, if they don't want to go through Ravener's Maw again. They can get home from the Ironlands.
They ask Rigwi to describe the man in "rural Karrnath", as they put it. She does her best.
They decide to buy the Fluxforge -> Arak Yor map, which includes the "big rock in the desert"
They also ask for a map to the chicken place. Rigwi offers two routes: via the Fluxforge or via the Abyssal Forest of Khaar. Fluxforge route works, since they need to go there for Arak Yor anyway.
They just buy those two maps for now. They'll come back if they have more money left.
Right, Unda or the God?
"Which is closer?"
"Unda's kinda everywhere"
What a sentence
Rigwi takes them to the Undamarket in Unda. It's so chaotic, it's packed full of more people than they've ever seen (but they're mostly small). They walk past so many stalls before they're approached by the Unsanctioned Hinterpocketer. He's selling Hinterpockets!
They seem unsure, so the Pocketer lowers their prices. Hmm.
Bhaltair is very suspicious, and doesn't buy their explanation that them being unsanctioned doesn't matter because there's no regulatory body to sanction them!
Bhaltair suggests they should shop around, lowering the price is a weird tactic.
"Do you usually just lower prices on a whim?"
"Everything I do is on a whim, that's why I'm unsanctioned"
"No thank you"
The hinterpocketer climbs into his bag, and then the bag inverts into itself and disappears. What the hell?
They continue their search, and eventually run into the Sanctioned Hinterpocketer. They have much more stuff, but the prices are higher.
They're particularly interested in the Hinterbelt.
They try to haggle the prices down, but the craftsmanship is too good and the pocketer explains that they are sanctioned to sell them at these prices, sorry. They could always try and find an unsanctioned pocketer.
Very well, they pay 600 geld for a Hinterbelt.
They debate trying to cast Suggestion or something to try and influence the pocketer to lower their prices, but decide against it.

The Cleft

Sowshore's Consortium of Cliffclingers rests at the bottom of a region of the city known as The Cleft. Picture a great axe-stroke cut down the city’s cliff-face, from the city's topmost district all the way down to the sea. The two interior faces of the rift grow closer as you move deeper into the cut. The outer aeries are home to the larger residents, while the packed roosts deeper into the crack are crammed together.

There are ladders, but nobody who lives here would ever use them. They're too slow, too unsafe, the locals either fly or scale the cliff face directly. The geography of the Cleft is spectacular on its own, but what's even more so is what the population have done with the space.

The entire thing is a work of art, a mural of various cultures intersecting, each community adding to a vast and breahtaking tapestry; carved, painted, stuck and sculpted into the cliff. There's an enormous sculpture of a sea serpent rising out of the sea and caressing the bottom of the cleft, crafted from bone. Between two landings is suspended a gigantic tidal clock forged from brass, a network of rotating rings showing the current time, tide, and tide-cycle. There's a large set of windchimes that are frozen over, despite the ambient temperature here being much too warm for that. Monuments and sculptures adorn every landing, mosaics and paintings coat every vertical surface, and where they've run out of space they've hung more vertical surfaces in the open spaces. Musicians ply their trade up and down the axe-stroke, creating a somewhat discordant soundscape that's still somewhat pleasant.

The people of the Cleft will be seen, and they will be heard. It's a chaotic mess, but it's the sound of people living, and living fully. It's completely alien to most of you.

Tor Udar

The tunnel from the landing leads into Tor Udar, the dwarven district of Vralkast. The architecture is brutalist and simple, a concrete jungle, but the faces of the structures have been carved with intricate dwarven patterns that give the district a homely vibe for Runmae.

There's street art here, too. The dwarves of the district have turned the walls into a mural of their history, carving mural's of their cultural stories into stone. Runmae actually recognises several of the figures in these stories, cementing that although they broke off long ago, you share cultural roots with these people.

Tor Udar is also, blatantly, wealthy. Many of those carvings feature filigree of various precious materials, including gold and gemstones, which have been pretty scarce in your experience of the city so far. This is reflected in the people too, most of which are adorned with some kind of jewellery, even those who are dressed more like labourers.

Tor Udar caters to adventurers, as it is the home of the Everdelver's Guild of Underplunderers. You could find anything you'd conceivably need here. At least for tonight, you'll be staying in the Everdelver's Enclave.

The Everdelver's Enclave

The Everdelver's Enclave, the headquarters of the guild, is the most impressive part of the district. It occupies an entire neighbourhood, with both the guild hall and every building or business needed to support their operations contained within.

The wealth is clear, but also the capability of the guild's adventurers. Trophies of hunts or expeditions into Khyber are everywhere, practically turning the enclave into a museum. They make their living by exploring, mapping, and plundering Khyber demiplanes, and it's evident that they've gotten very good at their job.

Rigwi leads to a beautiful plaza, with a statue centerpiece depicting a squad of dwarves exploring the unknown, torches held high and expressions of hopeful optimism on their faces. The craftsmanship is exceptional, the statues are so lifelike, you can even see individual pores on their skin.

Your guides explain that they need to report back to guild leadership and catalogue their haul for this expedition, but they'll sort out some short-term accomodation for the party. If they want to see any more of the city, someone will be able to show them around tomorrow.

Unda

Rigwi leads the way through the relatively open streets of Tor Udar to a smaller, more cramped tunnel. She explains that most of Unda isn't accessible to them, they're too big, but there are thoroughfares that are sized for medium folk that can be used to travel, and the Undamarket is open enough to accomodate them.

Unda is a mindset as much as its a place. It's a veritable maze, though no one in their right mind would refer to it as such out loud, of worm-like burrows that stretch throughout the city like a network of arteries and veins, supplying nutrients to every organ in the city.

That metaphor is a bit stretched, but the mushrooms farms in Unda are the second largest source of food in the city.

Unda is where the small folk live, the actual small folk, not just those the giants call smallfolk. The boggles, gremlins, goblins, kobolds, buccas, pucas, snatchets, and definitely no hintergnomes. The main thoroughfares are big enough for everyone, but the intent is clear: if you belong in Unda, you can walk in. Everyone else is forced to crawl.

The community in Unda is tight knit, like a large family of small peoples. These are folk with a history of being abused by those larger than them, given safety and the space to grow in a city with no oppressive rulers, and this has allowed them to bloom into a thriving culture. They may be small, but they are numerous beyond imagination.

No one has ever mapped Unda, and nobody knows how deep it truly goes except for those who live there. The Undamarket is the smallest biggest market in Vralkast, mind boggling busy, with more people than you've ever seen in such a small space. It helps that most of the people are also small.

Rigwi explains that everything finds its way here eventually, and if you look hard enough you could buy conceivably anything in the Undamarket. The reason she's brought them, though, is that it's the only place in the city where you can buy Hinterpockets.