At Qivas's words Kas snorts skeptically. "Yeah, sure, a hot meal and a nap and I'll forget all about weremonsters gutting people in the streets. Maybe we could grab a croissant and some tea before the next attack, right?"
He allows Omen to help him to his feet. "Look, I'm sorry. I don't know if this kind of thing is normal for you but it is not for me. But you're both right -- food, bed, and bath, then fall apart. Someone lead the way." He trudges toward the Mariner's Guildhall, still shivering but now mostly from the cold.
Unless someone else steps up, Omen will take the lead just to the guildhall. He will nod to any passersby but also try and keep a tired eye out for anymore danger.
You walk, as a group, east along the road toward the Mariners’ Guildhall. You pass a tidy home, next to the Carpenter’s Guildhall, with an imposing gate and fence around it. As you pass, you see a large, watchful man sitting on a stool outside the front door, inside the gate.
The next few houses are run-down, with the look of rowhouses, or closely-packed (but half-empty and decrepit) housing units of some kind. A grim-looking woman stares at you from the upper floor of one. You see some empty wharves on your left, but some active wharves further east.
The younger acolyte accompanies you with his borrowed cart and its gruesome cargo, but turns north at the intersection. “Come see us, later.” he repeats. An old building stands at the intersection (very bottom of your map, half-cropped, with blue roof. I’ll give you an updated map soon.) Outside is a small and humble sign reading “Mariners’ Guildhall.” A cold, burnt-smelling breeze cuts through your tattered clothes.
Omen leads the way into the Mariners' Guildhall. It’s neither an inn nor a tavern, but rather a dormitory or hostel for sailors. A woman greets you in the small, cramped entry foyer. She sports a total of three teeth, a forest of thin white hair curling out of her wrinkled chin, and one eye clouded with cataracts. “Welcome to Mariners’ Guildhall,” she drones joylessly. “No drunks, no fights, no cheating at cards, and keep your spit in the spittoon. One silver a night, with board.”
To your left is a large and mostly empty dorm filled with triple-decker wooden bunk beds. The ancient woodwork is covered in years of carvings. There is a stack of clean, if scratchy-looking blankets. A bulletin board is stocked with notices. Only one bunk has an occupant.
Behind her you see a tiny kitchen with an ancient, hunched cook, close to ninety by the looks of him. He is shirtless and stirring a huge pot of stew in a room blackened from decades of soot. It smells pretty good, even if the sanitary conditions give you some pause. A roaring stove makes it overly warm.
The moment he stepped through the door a weight seemed to lift from Kas's shoulders. Just being surrounded by walls with the promise of food and a bunk he feels as though he has a sense of some control for the first time since his imprisonment. He's still wet, dirty, cold, and tired, but all those problems -- so crushing a minute ago -- now feel manageable. Already the warmth of the room is driving some of the chill from his bones, and the smell of the stew makes his mouth water and his stomach growl. He steps forward with his most engaging smile. "Good morning, madame. Please, do not judge us too harshly from our current state. My companions and I are not so rough a lot as we now appear. Terrible misfortune -- our ship was dashed on the rocks, and we the only survivors -- this misfortune is the cause of our wretched appearance. I assure you, we are all quite respectable and you'll have no trouble from us." With this he presses a gold piece into her hand. "I'm certain a bowl of that wondrous stew and a long rest will go miles to restoring us all."
"Ahhh, this brings back memories of the barracks..."His sentence trails off as he casts his mind back to his friends from home.
Solemnly, deep in thought, he hands the old lady a gold piece "For the week. The rest is for you" he says with a smile. "Now, how do I get some of that great smelling stew?"
The woman holds up Kasimir's gold piece and squints at it suspiciously. She silently pockets it. She repeats this with Qivys, then looks at the rest of you expectantly,
"Ob!" she screams. "Ob! Mix! Five!" To Omen's inquiry about baths, she replies, sourly, "What are you? A member of the royal family? It's almost winter." And again, "Ob! Five mix!"
She shoos you into the dorm, to a set of low wooden tables and stools. It's hot, and the light dim. Ob, the old man, brings in the "mix" - a bowl of mysterious but good-smelling stew, some hunks of bread, and some biscuits.
"Pay first," she says to Omen, Red, and Claire, palm out. "One silver per night, with board. Two copper for the late breakfast." "My name is Marnie. Supper at seven, lights out at ten," she adds, mechanically.
A man sleeps nearby on a lower bunk, under a blanket. He doesn't stir.
He will eat in silence, Being washed ashore did have its advantage, the cold sea did wash off the filth he had been covered in in his days as a changed prisoner.
Food and warmth will be fine for him at the moment, he thinks to himself.
After eating trying not to but probably filling up on bread, Omen will find his cot, use Prestidigitation to make sure his pack and gear is dry then use the pack as a pillow and pass out on his cot.
Omen leads the charge into the stew, which is tasty, filling, and filled with unidentifiable bits. Even more unidentifiable are the contents of the coarse grey biscuits, which are tough and fibrous. Marnie brings a sour tea to wash it down with. It's not fine food, but its nonetheless satisfying.
The middle-aged man in the bunk awakes from his slumber. He is covered in sweat and disoriented. He is alarmed to see Red in the room. "What? From what ship do you hail?" He doesn't look well.
"Morning. We never saw the name of the vessel. All that matters is that it, and it's vile crew are at the bottom of the ocean."Even Qivys himself is taken aback at the speed of his response. It then dawns on him, the ordeal that he and his companions have endured. Slave traders. They were spoken of in stories back home. Stories to keep children in line. Not something that was actually present in the world. But here he was, an escaped slave. A slave attacked by beasts from the Abyss.
Well, they say that what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. With this final thought he lefts the fatigue overtake him.
"I thought Kas was paying for us all?"Red mutters watching the others step up and pay. Still, she gives Marnie a smile and hands over a gold coin. Probably a waste but, well, she couldn't give less could she? Not a good look. Even if she hopes that getting a few connections in town will let her get them some free lodging, even if it wasn't in any better condition.
She follows Omen to a table and starts to chow down on a bowl. She startled when the man on the bunk speaks up dropping her spoon into the stew. She glances over at him and when she sees he's looking at her she straightens and wipes her mouth.
"Uh." She starts, before looking at her companions. She had no idea what the ship had been called, and seeing as she had been a prisoner on it she wasn't even sure if she counted as hailing from it. "None. We were prisoners." She figures the cats probably out of the bag at this point, even if she does still have the shackle tied to her arm. Neither Omen or Claire have bothered to hide theirs.
The man grunts, lies on his back, staring blankly at the bunk above him. "I wanna go home," he mutters. He sits up and has a brief coughing fit. "This place is slidin' into th' abyss... The monsters runnin' things... Ghost houses... Pirates, corruption, liars... Bleatin' things comin' outta the hills, killin' folks..." His rambling drifts off and he rolls over, his back to you.
You finish your "mix" and eye the uncomfortable-looking bunks. You badly need the rest.
Kas gives Red a wry smile and shrug. He places his pack on an empty bunk and hangs his sodden coat on the bedpost to dry. He pries off his boots and leaves them near the fire to dry. The stew is on the table by the time he lowers himself to the bench with a sigh. He digs in and finds it better than expected (or maybe he was just that hungry?). He finishes the bowl, using the bread to wipe every hint of stew from inside, and leans back. He hears the weird ravings of the man on the bunk, but the warm room, full belly, and last night's long, cold swim overwhelm any sense of curiosity. "I look forward to getting to know each of you better, and I hope you will not think me unsociable, but right now there is nothing on this world more enticing than that hard, lumpy mattress." He grabs two blankets from the stack, hangs his clothes on the bunk to dry, and flops down to sleep. It takes seconds to fall asleep.
Frightened, Claire remains unusually silent as the group heads towards the guildhall down the road. She'd always heard of the dangers of the outside world, but the world's monsters had always been slain by noble knights and paladins or hardened adventurers, in the stories. She imagined that any encounter she had with beasts would be a simple matter of outsmarting it, using teamwork to fend it off. Her first battle went by so quickly that it was still hard to believe. She couldn't stop thinking about how the woman had died; in one moment, she had simply been walking on the road, and the next...
Human lives really were so fragile. Watching someone get killed, just like that, was overwhelmingly cruel and shocking.
When the cleric stepped into the inn, when she was greeted with the small amount of normalcy and hospitality, it hit her - this wasn't a dream. All of the abuse she'd suffered happened in reality. But now...it was finally over.
She broke into tears as she ate the stew that was served to her. "By the gods, who cooked this? It's so good." Her voice wavered as she chewed, savoring the hard bread, questionable stew, and mediocre tea as though it were the best meal she'd ever had in her life. Her energy was restored, and light was already returning to her eyes as she filled her belly for the first time in weeks. Tears of joy continued to stream down her cheeks as she cried out in a whiny voice."I swear to the Morninglord, I'll always be good from now on! I'll never do anything bad, ever, and I won't allow anyone else to die if I can help it!" She wiped away her tears and spittle, nodded resolutely, and threw herself into the creaky, hard bed with a determined look in her eyes. After only a few moments, she was out cold.
You slowly wake after about ten hours of deep slumber to a growing cacophony of loud voices – dirty and tired sailors filing in from a long day on the water. Daylight is fading outside.
Half-awake and listening to the fragments of conversations, you conclude that most of these mariners are visiting travelers and traders, sailors between jobs, and a few locals made temporarily homeless for a variety of reasons. Almost all are human. Conversation centers mostly on seafaring topics - job opportunities, navigation, and foreign news. The bulletin board is a common gathering point, as a lot of maritime jobs seem to be posted there. Some card games start up. One bit of gossip: The town guard has been cracking down on smuggling, going house to house in search of contraband. Another: Horrible shrieks and eerie lights have been witnessed emanating from the old haunted house outside of town, where once lived an alchemist who was said to be able to transform base metals into gold.
You feel like you could sleep another ten hours, except for the noise. It's almost time for a new round of Ob's "mix".
Omen opens his eyes, stretches his neck a bit as he listens to the gossip. He gets up, checking his gear for a moment then he starts stretching a bit, to work the kinks out.
Omen will speak to whom over of the group he came to this town and says: "Would you keep an eye on my things for a moment, need to find the outhouse or privy."
With that Omen jots off for a moment. Upon his return he will take a stool and put it in a corner, get his gear and sit on the stool with his back against the wall.
Omen will pull out his spell book and study for a while. (Changing my prepared spells.)
He will keep an ear our for anything else interesting, marking the story of the alchemists home as interesting.
Once done he will smile at each person in the group.
Kasimir wakes from a disturbing dream, disoriented by the noise and the unfamiliar room. He's just getting his bearings as the wizard asks him to watch over his pack. "Certainly. A good idea among strangers." Among strangers? Odd that we've somehow become a group and not 'strangers' ourselves. Shared experience, I suppose.
His clothes are mostly dry from the hours in the warm room, though stiff from the salt and smelling of fish. Still, they're a great improvement over their former state, and in this crowd no one is going to notice a fishy smell. He gets dressed, eavesdropping on the gossiping sailors. Horrible shrieks and ghost lights? I guess I know one house to steer clear of. But it might pay to keep an ear out and find out who's running the smugglers around here. He strolls over to the bulletin board to see what's considered newsworthy.
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Kasimir:
At Qivas's words Kas snorts skeptically. "Yeah, sure, a hot meal and a nap and I'll forget all about weremonsters gutting people in the streets. Maybe we could grab a croissant and some tea before the next attack, right?"
He allows Omen to help him to his feet. "Look, I'm sorry. I don't know if this kind of thing is normal for you but it is not for me. But you're both right -- food, bed, and bath, then fall apart. Someone lead the way." He trudges toward the Mariner's Guildhall, still shivering but now mostly from the cold.
Omen
Unless someone else steps up, Omen will take the lead just to the guildhall. He will nod to any passersby but also try and keep a tired eye out for anymore danger.
You walk, as a group, east along the road toward the Mariners’ Guildhall. You pass a tidy home, next to the Carpenter’s Guildhall, with an imposing gate and fence around it. As you pass, you see a large, watchful man sitting on a stool outside the front door, inside the gate.
The next few houses are run-down, with the look of rowhouses, or closely-packed (but half-empty and decrepit) housing units of some kind. A grim-looking woman stares at you from the upper floor of one. You see some empty wharves on your left, but some active wharves further east.
The younger acolyte accompanies you with his borrowed cart and its gruesome cargo, but turns north at the intersection. “Come see us, later.” he repeats.
An old building stands at the intersection (very bottom of your map, half-cropped, with blue roof. I’ll give you an updated map soon.) Outside is a small and humble sign reading “Mariners’ Guildhall.” A cold, burnt-smelling breeze cuts through your tattered clothes.
Omen leads the way into the Mariners' Guildhall. It’s neither an inn nor a tavern, but rather a dormitory or hostel for sailors. A woman greets you in the small, cramped entry foyer. She sports a total of three teeth, a forest of thin white hair curling out of her wrinkled chin, and one eye clouded with cataracts. “Welcome to Mariners’ Guildhall,” she drones joylessly. “No drunks, no fights, no cheating at cards, and keep your spit in the spittoon. One silver a night, with board.”
To your left is a large and mostly empty dorm filled with triple-decker wooden bunk beds. The ancient woodwork is covered in years of carvings. There is a stack of clean, if scratchy-looking blankets. A bulletin board is stocked with notices. Only one bunk has an occupant.
Behind her you see a tiny kitchen with an ancient, hunched cook, close to ninety by the looks of him. He is shirtless and stirring a huge pot of stew in a room blackened from decades of soot. It smells pretty good, even if the sanitary conditions give you some pause. A roaring stove makes it overly warm.
Kasimir:
The moment he stepped through the door a weight seemed to lift from Kas's shoulders. Just being surrounded by walls with the promise of food and a bunk he feels as though he has a sense of some control for the first time since his imprisonment. He's still wet, dirty, cold, and tired, but all those problems -- so crushing a minute ago -- now feel manageable. Already the warmth of the room is driving some of the chill from his bones, and the smell of the stew makes his mouth water and his stomach growl. He steps forward with his most engaging smile. "Good morning, madame. Please, do not judge us too harshly from our current state. My companions and I are not so rough a lot as we now appear. Terrible misfortune -- our ship was dashed on the rocks, and we the only survivors -- this misfortune is the cause of our wretched appearance. I assure you, we are all quite respectable and you'll have no trouble from us." With this he presses a gold piece into her hand. "I'm certain a bowl of that wondrous stew and a long rest will go miles to restoring us all."
Omen
Omen will quietly order a meal of what is on hand and inquire where one could get a bath.
Qivys
"Ahhh, this brings back memories of the barracks..." His sentence trails off as he casts his mind back to his friends from home.
Solemnly, deep in thought, he hands the old lady a gold piece "For the week. The rest is for you" he says with a smile. "Now, how do I get some of that great smelling stew?"
The woman holds up Kasimir's gold piece and squints at it suspiciously. She silently pockets it. She repeats this with Qivys, then looks at the rest of you expectantly,
"Ob!" she screams. "Ob! Mix! Five!"
To Omen's inquiry about baths, she replies, sourly, "What are you? A member of the royal family? It's almost winter."
And again, "Ob! Five mix!"
She shoos you into the dorm, to a set of low wooden tables and stools. It's hot, and the light dim.
Ob, the old man, brings in the "mix" - a bowl of mysterious but good-smelling stew, some hunks of bread, and some biscuits.
"Pay first," she says to Omen, Red, and Claire, palm out. "One silver per night, with board. Two copper for the late breakfast."
"My name is Marnie. Supper at seven, lights out at ten," she adds, mechanically.
A man sleeps nearby on a lower bunk, under a blanket. He doesn't stir.
Omen
Omen hands the woman 1 SP and 2 CP's.
He will eat in silence, Being washed ashore did have its advantage, the cold sea did wash off the filth he had been covered in in his days as a changed prisoner.
Food and warmth will be fine for him at the moment, he thinks to himself.
After eating trying not to but probably filling up on bread, Omen will find his cot, use Prestidigitation to make sure his pack and gear is dry then use the pack as a pillow and pass out on his cot.
Omen leads the charge into the stew, which is tasty, filling, and filled with unidentifiable bits. Even more unidentifiable are the contents of the coarse grey biscuits, which are tough and fibrous. Marnie brings a sour tea to wash it down with. It's not fine food, but its nonetheless satisfying.
The middle-aged man in the bunk awakes from his slumber. He is covered in sweat and disoriented. He is alarmed to see Red in the room. "What? From what ship do you hail?" He doesn't look well.
Qivys
"Morning. We never saw the name of the vessel. All that matters is that it, and it's vile crew are at the bottom of the ocean." Even Qivys himself is taken aback at the speed of his response. It then dawns on him, the ordeal that he and his companions have endured. Slave traders. They were spoken of in stories back home. Stories to keep children in line. Not something that was actually present in the world. But here he was, an escaped slave. A slave attacked by beasts from the Abyss.
Well, they say that what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. With this final thought he lefts the fatigue overtake him.
Red
"I thought Kas was paying for us all?" Red mutters watching the others step up and pay. Still, she gives Marnie a smile and hands over a gold coin. Probably a waste but, well, she couldn't give less could she? Not a good look. Even if she hopes that getting a few connections in town will let her get them some free lodging, even if it wasn't in any better condition.
She follows Omen to a table and starts to chow down on a bowl. She startled when the man on the bunk speaks up dropping her spoon into the stew. She glances over at him and when she sees he's looking at her she straightens and wipes her mouth.
"Uh." She starts, before looking at her companions. She had no idea what the ship had been called, and seeing as she had been a prisoner on it she wasn't even sure if she counted as hailing from it. "None. We were prisoners." She figures the cats probably out of the bag at this point, even if she does still have the shackle tied to her arm. Neither Omen or Claire have bothered to hide theirs.
The man grunts, lies on his back, staring blankly at the bunk above him. "I wanna go home," he mutters. He sits up and has a brief coughing fit. "This place is slidin' into th' abyss... The monsters runnin' things... Ghost houses... Pirates, corruption, liars... Bleatin' things comin' outta the hills, killin' folks..." His rambling drifts off and he rolls over, his back to you.
You finish your "mix" and eye the uncomfortable-looking bunks. You badly need the rest.
Kasimir:
Kas gives Red a wry smile and shrug. He places his pack on an empty bunk and hangs his sodden coat on the bedpost to dry. He pries off his boots and leaves them near the fire to dry. The stew is on the table by the time he lowers himself to the bench with a sigh. He digs in and finds it better than expected (or maybe he was just that hungry?). He finishes the bowl, using the bread to wipe every hint of stew from inside, and leans back. He hears the weird ravings of the man on the bunk, but the warm room, full belly, and last night's long, cold swim overwhelm any sense of curiosity. "I look forward to getting to know each of you better, and I hope you will not think me unsociable, but right now there is nothing on this world more enticing than that hard, lumpy mattress." He grabs two blankets from the stack, hangs his clothes on the bunk to dry, and flops down to sleep. It takes seconds to fall asleep.
Claire
Frightened, Claire remains unusually silent as the group heads towards the guildhall down the road. She'd always heard of the dangers of the outside world, but the world's monsters had always been slain by noble knights and paladins or hardened adventurers, in the stories. She imagined that any encounter she had with beasts would be a simple matter of outsmarting it, using teamwork to fend it off. Her first battle went by so quickly that it was still hard to believe. She couldn't stop thinking about how the woman had died; in one moment, she had simply been walking on the road, and the next...
Human lives really were so fragile. Watching someone get killed, just like that, was overwhelmingly cruel and shocking.
When the cleric stepped into the inn, when she was greeted with the small amount of normalcy and hospitality, it hit her - this wasn't a dream. All of the abuse she'd suffered happened in reality. But now...it was finally over.
She broke into tears as she ate the stew that was served to her. "By the gods, who cooked this? It's so good." Her voice wavered as she chewed, savoring the hard bread, questionable stew, and mediocre tea as though it were the best meal she'd ever had in her life. Her energy was restored, and light was already returning to her eyes as she filled her belly for the first time in weeks. Tears of joy continued to stream down her cheeks as she cried out in a whiny voice. "I swear to the Morninglord, I'll always be good from now on! I'll never do anything bad, ever, and I won't allow anyone else to die if I can help it!" She wiped away her tears and spittle, nodded resolutely, and threw herself into the creaky, hard bed with a determined look in her eyes. After only a few moments, she was out cold.
(Unless any of you have other business first, I'll assume you all climb into the bunks for a long rest. Another post soon.)
You slowly wake after about ten hours of deep slumber to a growing cacophony of loud voices – dirty and tired sailors filing in from a long day on the water. Daylight is fading outside.
Half-awake and listening to the fragments of conversations, you conclude that most of these mariners are visiting travelers and traders, sailors between jobs, and a few locals made temporarily homeless for a variety of reasons. Almost all are human. Conversation centers mostly on seafaring topics - job opportunities, navigation, and foreign news. The bulletin board is a common gathering point, as a lot of maritime jobs seem to be posted there. Some card games start up. One bit of gossip: The town guard has been cracking down on smuggling, going house to house in search of contraband. Another: Horrible shrieks and eerie lights have been witnessed emanating from the old haunted house outside of town, where once lived an alchemist who was said to be able to transform base metals into gold.
You feel like you could sleep another ten hours, except for the noise. It's almost time for a new round of Ob's "mix".
Omen
Omen opens his eyes, stretches his neck a bit as he listens to the gossip. He gets up, checking his gear for a moment then he starts stretching a bit, to work the kinks out.
Omen will speak to whom over of the group he came to this town and says: "Would you keep an eye on my things for a moment, need to find the outhouse or privy."
With that Omen jots off for a moment. Upon his return he will take a stool and put it in a corner, get his gear and sit on the stool with his back against the wall.
Omen will pull out his spell book and study for a while. (Changing my prepared spells.)
He will keep an ear our for anything else interesting, marking the story of the alchemists home as interesting.
Once done he will smile at each person in the group.
"Get enough sleep did we?"
Kasimir:
Kasimir wakes from a disturbing dream, disoriented by the noise and the unfamiliar room. He's just getting his bearings as the wizard asks him to watch over his pack. "Certainly. A good idea among strangers." Among strangers? Odd that we've somehow become a group and not 'strangers' ourselves. Shared experience, I suppose.
His clothes are mostly dry from the hours in the warm room, though stiff from the salt and smelling of fish. Still, they're a great improvement over their former state, and in this crowd no one is going to notice a fishy smell. He gets dressed, eavesdropping on the gossiping sailors. Horrible shrieks and ghost lights? I guess I know one house to steer clear of. But it might pay to keep an ear out and find out who's running the smugglers around here. He strolls over to the bulletin board to see what's considered newsworthy.