Players:
Trustin Honesty
Antioch "Hammer" Malletor
Cedric Tarian
Downtime Recap:
N/A
Downtime Events:
N/A
Session Recap:
Tracking Eryndor
The party followed up on the information they had gathered about the cultist encountered under the last tower. After speaking to people at the docks, they learned that he was a mason named Eryndor Vell. Skilled enough to hold steady work, he had recently drawn the ire of several customers due to missed deadlines. There was speculation that he had taken a more lucrative contract down the coast at the lighthouse and bailed on his commitments in town.
Investigating the mason's yard, they learned that several masons were unimpressed with his decision to leave without warning, as it cast them in a poor light and left more work for the guild to cover. After being asked to leave by overseer Ryn, one mason discreetly spoke to the trio and passed along the location of Eryndor's house, asking them to deliver a message for him—a hunk of limestone hurled through the window. The trio then traveled to Eryndor’s home and found it undisturbed.
A neighboring housewife hanging out laundry was happy to gossip about her neighbor, complaining of the loud meetings Eryndor often held with his friends late into the evening, and his insistence on chiseling away at personal projects well past decent hours. Just the night before, she had yelled out of her window at several of his guests as they visited late at night, startling them away. The trio decided to come back later in the evening to investigate after dark.
Tavern Brawl
The trio met up again for dinner at The Stones Throw. While the meal itself was pleasant, the place was packed with people. Truston made inquiries and learned that many were attempting to be the first to negotiate favorable deals for recently arrived trading ships. A general feeling of unease permeated the air, fueled by the rising tension between locals and newcomers.
The brawl started innocently enough, with Darrick and Ruth trading insults from their tables. Their argument centered on the growing tension between newcomers and long-term residents, with Ruth accusing newcomers like Darrick of inflating prices and taking jobs from locals. As Cedric made an attempt to defuse the situation, a brawl broke out. Darrick shoved Ruth, knocking her back into another table, causing it to tip over. The other patrons, split between newcomers and locals, started joining in. The fight spread as both sides took sides.
Cedric and Antioch beat the daylights out of a carpenter's apprentice from Malabar. Truston eventually intervened, capturing the attention of the crowd with a forceful plea and reasoned words. He offered a round for anyone who sat back down and resumed their meals peacefully. The owner, Thalwin Ironfoot, gave him a grateful nod as he emerged from the cellar, about to intervene. He only charged Truston half-price. After finishing their meal, the trio left for Eryndor’s house.
Ambush
The three broke into Eryndor's house and began investigating. They found a small workstation with stones carved into the likeness of an eye with ten lines spreading from it—the symbol of the cult. They also found documents that appeared to be blueprints of local buildings, as well as rubbings of stonework that felt similar to the stonework they observed in the underground tunnels where they first encountered Eryndor and the other cultists.
They also found an undisturbed bed and rotten food, indicating that Eryndor had not been here for some time. They decided to wait and see if his friends would return. Cedric disguised himself as a beggar and hid across the street, watching the front door, while Antioch and Truston waited inside the tiny one-roomed house.
Eventually, three cloaked figures approached and picked the lock to the front door. Truston made he and Antioch invisible as the three newcomers entered. They looked up at one of the ceiling beams, where one of Eryndor’s carved stones had been embedded, and made a strange salute, overlapping their hands palms outwards and holding them behind their cult pendants. The three then began to search the room, apparently looking for the carved stones.
Truston and Antioch decided to ambush the cultists. Truston shot one in the back of the head with his crossbow as he extinguished the lantern. Antioch wounded another and knocked him into the third. The third man traded blows with Truston before deciding to flee, but not before killing his companion so that he couldn’t reveal any secrets. Truston wounded him with a crossbow bolt, and Cedric gave chase. After a short sequence, Cedric tackled the man and knocked him unconscious, revealing him to be Cregg, a wagon driver they had spoken to earlier in the day.
As Cedric prepared to search the man, two guards happened along and intervened. Cedric spotted a cult pendant under the first guard’s tunic. Thinking quickly, he showed his own pendant (taken from an earlier corpse) and claimed to be saving Cregg from an attack. The guard glanced quickly at his companion and made up a cover story to get him to investigate a sound in the alleyway. He told Cedric that he had done well to rescue Cregg and that he would take him for treatment. Due to the darkness and the trio wearing hoods, the party managed to remain anonymous.
Back at the house, Truston found the deed to Eryndor’s house, learning it was passed to him by his uncle, a long-term citizen of the town until his passing. He took the document, intending to forge a claim to the house through a string of "shell" identities. Antioch and Truston searched the bodies and learned that one was a merchant, Toren Ashford, who Truston had previously witnessed talking to Lysander. The other was a woman they did not recognize, but she was wearing a town guard uniform under her cloak. Both were in possession of cult pendants.
Session Conclusion:
After the battle, Truston and Antioch staged the scene for a cover-up by placing the bodies in the bed and starting a fire. Planting an idea via sending into the sleeping mind of the neighboring housewife, rumors spread quickly throughout the local rumour mill. Over the next several days, the official story became that Eryndor and his secret lover had tragically died in a house fire. Only the party and the cult knew this was false.