Eya, still disguised as Martha, steps forward and replies to the captain's outbursts with a smug, sinister smile, "Traitors? That's rich coming from you, captain. We knew you planned to betray us from the start. Now, who was your Mitran contact what were you planning exactly? There's still a chance you live and don't suffer a painful death if you answer wisely."

 Odenkirk glares and spits at Eya, but one of his crew blurts out, "I dunno his name, but he was with the Gryphon brotherhood! We were supposed to meet him back in Estyllis when we knew enough to be useful."

Sakkarot shrugs in response to Respar's statement. "I'm certainly not going to hide it. Everyone in the camp will want to see this. If you have sharp elbows to stay in front of the crowd, by all means do so."

Respar leans over and whispers into Eya's ear.  "Can you send that tidbit to Thorn, and find out if he wants more details?"

Eya nods to Respar. Then, she replies to the crewman's response, "Excellent, that should be enough of a lead. Oh, and captain?" She steps forward and looks the captain directly in the eyes. Next, she drops her disguise and the illusion of Martha begins to fade. Her skin darkens from the pale white to it's normal ashen-grey color. Small branching horns protrude from her head and her tail whips about from behind. Her white dress transforms into the darker elven silk robe. Her teeth now bear their normal fangs as she smiles. Finally, her devilish eyes flare that flame-like orange as her glare burns it's way into the captain's soul.

"Enjoy dinner, captain. And don't worry, I'll take great care of your ship," she says with her toothy grin. Then, she nods to Sakkarot to have him and his men taken away for the night's festivities.

Odenkirk's anger finally melts away, replaced by fear, as he watches Eya's true form be revealed. He and his men are dragged off without further fanfare.

You are escorted back to the Frosthamar, and the unloading begins. The chest of gold is quickly recovered, along with some of what seems to be the Captain's personal treasures. His crew don't seem to have left much worth salvaging.

The evening's festivities are something of a violent bacchanalian festival. There's dancing, and fighting, and drinking, and more fighting. Slave girls are brought out and chained up for public "use". At least one of them you see still has attention in spite of apparently having expired.

Your escort grows grumpier as the night goes on, being unable to participate while fending off people interested in messing with the free 'humies' in their midst.

Odenkirk and his men are one of the highlights of the evening. They're given back their weapons, and faced off against adolescent bugbears, who apparently have yet to make their first kill. The crewmen put on a show, but die easily enough. The captain does a bit better, killing his first opponent. But the second wrestles the axe away from Odenkirk, and then breaks the captain's neck with his bare hands, earning great cheers from the onlookers.

Respar nods in grim satisfaction as Odenkirk finally succumbs to his fate.  He does imbibe a drink or two, but considering many of the host of creatures there might try to engage them in combat, he decides that keeping his wits about him is important.  Once Odenkirk and the others have been slain he turns to Eya.  "I think we can send a brief message to Thorn now.  To keep it brief, I was thinking, 'Goods delivered.   Crew compensated appropriately.  Leaving for next assignment.  Any contacts you can recommend at destination?'"  He turns to the others, "Anything else we should include?"

Eya's eyes beam at the bottles of fine whiskey. She grabs one bottle along with a couple of glasses, then pours some into two separate glasses. She then finds and tells Kili, "Keep an eye on our things and the boat, Kili. By the way, do you like whiskey? Only a little bit for you though, you are small and I don't want you hammered. Good work so far."

After that, she goes back to rejoin the festivities. She finds Jesla while holding two glasses of whiskey. The glasses appear to be chilled and very cold, with ice crystals having formed all around them. She hands one of the whiskey glasses to Jesla, "I found some nice whiskey on the ship. I thought you might enjoy a glass. Excellent work today, Jesla, everyone."

She raises her glass for a job well done and takes a sip. Her eyes light up, "So good. A shame Odenkirk made such poor decisions, he could have been useful to keep around." After Respar asks about the message to Thorn, Eya replies, "We can use the stone to send a message once a day so we should make it count. I was going to send it when we set off tomorrow morning to cross the lake so that we would be alone on the boat for privacy. Also, I was going to include the information we learned from both the sailor we captured and the information we just learned from Odenkirk's crewman at the very least. Perhaps he would have thoughts or advice on how to proceed. What do you think, Respar, Kiven?"

Respar nods at Eya's comments.  "That all sounds good.  As long as you can fit it all into the message.  I confess I do not know if there is a limit."

  Jesla watches the crew be picked apart with a critical eye. As Odenkirk falls she reaches for his axe.  " I believe that is mine   We get the spoils from the captain.  " 

 She takes the glass with a surprised look and downs it.  " Thank you, Eya.  We all have our own part to play in this group.  That is some good whiskey. " She grins and continues drinking her ale.  

Eya finds some time during the festivities to go back to the boat privately to send a message off to the Cardinal on their progress. She retrieves the stone disc for her bag then telepathically sends the following message, "Eya here. Goods delivered, crew compensated. Headed for next assignment tomorrow. Learned some of target's potential weaknesses, more info tomorrow. Any contacts in next destination?"

Then, she returns to the festivities and checks in on Grumblejack while she still can. 

Kiven is pleased to see the captain and crew dragged away after Eya's last words to them.  He takes no pleasure in watching the evenings savage 'festivities' and even less in the whiskey, but he accepts it from Eya anyhow as the Knot celebrates the success of their first official mission.  The elf tries to hide the disdain for the burn in his throat as he sips Captain Odenkirk's 'emergency provisions'.

Kili sniffs at the liquid, uncertain what to make of it. After taking a tiny sip, the small creature collapses, unconscious. Traces of the dark liquid can be seen moving through his semi translucent body.

An hour or so after Eya sends the message, she gets a reply. Cardinal Thorn whispers into her ears, "Very well. Proceed as ordered with Ballentyne. A pawn awaits, grey wagon near the road. He has signed a contract, but use caution. Praise Asmodeus."

The bugbear adolescent who killed the captain snatches up the axe. When Jesla makes her claim, he looks ready to attack her in turn. But he ends up backing down and handing the weapon over.

It takes a little while, but Eya eventually finds Grumblejack drunkenly wandering around with two other ogres. He waves, "Hey there. Guys, guys, lissen, this nice lady I told about. One who opened Grumblejack's cage. Say hi to nice lady. Um, have youse seen any goblins? The tiny ones."

Eya smiles as she sees Grumblejack enjoying himself. "What are you boys up to? Goblins?" she asks, looking a bit confused. Then, she leans to her left to look around Grumblejack and points behind him a short distance at a goblin attempting to hide. "You mean that one?" she asks innocently. 

Grumblejack slurs, "Oh, I bets them that I could hits a goblin with my nice club and make it fly all the way out of the camp. They says prove it, so we're looking for one."

He turns at Eya's pointing towards the goblin, "Oh, yeah, that one'll work. C'mere you."

Having overheard the last bit, the goblin is not inclined to stick around, it takes off running as fast as its little legs can carry it. The ogres with Grumblejack start chasing.

Kiven asks Eya for another small pour of the whiskey and asks his escort to take him to see Sakkarot.  Kiven watches the apparent war chief and waits for a time that seems appropriate to have a private word.  When the time is right The Prince approaches Sakkarot, first muttering a quick, quiet word in elven and trying not to wince as one of his spell scars activates the Fallback Strategy spell.  "My new friend, your words earlier intrigued me."  "What life would you choose for yourself, if you could?  What meaningful conversations would you have?  I find that my new allies have goals that align with my own, and I believe that may include you, as well.  I wonder what we could do to help each other achieve what we really want.  You are already helping the cause a great deal with your work here, I must say, and I do not mean the cause of our mutual...friend."

Kiven does his best to hide both his disdain for the bugbears and their barbaric lifestyle and his fear of them, but does actually have some respect for Sakkarot because of what he said earlier.  The elf holds his whiskey at the ready so that he is not offered an even worse beverage, but only feigns any interest in actually drinking it.

Respar asks for a taste of the whisky as well.  He then returns to the ship to get some rest for the next day.

Eya laughs and smiles proudly as Grumblejack runs off to play with his new friends. As he runs off, she whispers to herself, "I'm going to miss you, big guy." Then, she returns to the party and enjoys one more glass of the fine whiskey along with some non-human meat before retiring for the evening.

When she does return to the boat however, she goes to check up on Kili. She squats beside him, her face looming over the collapsed mephit's small form. She pokes him in the belly. 

"Kili, you going to make it? It was just a little whiskey..."

---

Later on, Eya can be seen sitting on the deck of the ship with several papers and books out as the ship bobs gently on the river. After some time, she finishes her work on a couple of new spells then begins the usual process of memorization to prepare for what she thinks tomorrow may bring. Once she seems satisfied with her progress, she goes to lie down and stares up into the starry night sky.

Throughout this entire mission, she has payed very close attention to the stars due to her practice as both a sailor and a navigator. They have provided her a certain level of comfort and something to focus on over the last several days. Now however, the stars remind her of just how much there is out there for her to learn. To her, it's a peaceful moment...or it would be at any rate if they weren't camped right next to a bugbear camp. Nevertheless, she takes some time to reflect on the journey thus far before finally drifting off to sleep.

OOC:  If others have stuff to do before sunrise, go for.  Just trying to help things along.

IC:

As the dawn breaks, Respar sits with the rest of the team.  "I just want to run an idea or two past you all.  And I want to hear everyone's ideas as well.  Sakkarot says he needs three weeks to unite the tribes, then has at best another three weeks before he must attack.  So we have plenty of time to attempt to find ways to help crack that keep open.  Since we really know so little, and only have a few rumors for leads, I want to keep some options open for us.  First, I'd like Sakkarot to have some folks sail with us to our drop-off, and keep the boat.  Because we might find a use for a strike team coming in via boat when the attack begins.  And when we are ready, I will propose to Sakkarot that one fire means launch your attack as best you can, and we will work from within.  If we set two fires, he should sail a strike team to the docks, and we will lead them into position for the attack.  And we can even set three fires if we need to communicate with him directly.  So, what ideas and changes do you all have?"

"I like the idea overall," Eya replies. "As another option, we could choose to have our bugbear commando team infiltrate via the secret tunnel in the Lord’s Dalliance Inn if we find the boat strategy unfeasible for whatever reason. Still, let's review what he have learned so far. First, from the sailor we interrogated earlier, we learned a few key pieces of information for potential targets." 

Eya pulls out a sheet of paper and writes some things on it:

Info on BK
--------------

Strong garrison led by Sir Thomas Havelyn

Captains Eddarly and Mott work under him

Defenses include:
- Big catapult
- Rookery to deliver messages
- A pair of battle mages that might be strong

Rumor: The Lord’s Dalliance Inn in Aldencross might contain a secret passage connected to the keep

After reviewing the paper, Eya continues the planning session, "Knowing these things, I say we have three overarching stages to this plan. Stage 1, Preparation. This stage includes information gathering and reconnaissance. For example, investigating the rumored secret passage, mapping out the keep and identifying targets, recording patterns of patrol movement, noting feeding times and shift schedules, and so on. Stage 2, Sabotage. This stage focuses on eliminating or crippling targets. For example, sabotaging the catapult to not work or be dangerous to use, eliminating the birds in the rookery, and eliminating high power individuals such as mages or leadership. Finally stage 3, Execution. This is the part where the bugbears invade and wreak havoc. We could have the commando team go in at this point as they are focused on the encroaching bugbear horde."

"As for potential ideas on my side, I personally need some time to learn some spells that may be helpful as well as create a few magic items for us that will aid us if we have the time. I may investigate the town for a spot where I can work uninterrupted. As such, I may let you all handle the bulk of stage 1, though I will help as needed. I can also concoct various poisons that may help in dealing with the rookery or even making the guards sick by putting it in their meals. Also, Kili will be around to help with reconnaissance as well. His flight and invisibility could be very useful for scouting and maybe poison delivery."

  Jesla nods as the discussion goes on.  " I have no experience  attacking a city.  This does make great sense though.  The three of us can scout things out while you craft.  It should be just fine.  We ought to also examine the walls and other weaknesses to exploit.   Maybe open the main gate for the horde.  I will be more than happy with killing leaders and their magic users as well   That will be very satisfying to be honest.  " She thinks about her oppressed homeland for a moment.