Drûr 1, 652 DR: A typical Monthturn at the Red Cock. Mern presents a job to the three. Infiltrating Torrom’s Watch. The apple cart. Daga triggers a trap. Whitey and his license to kill. The tunnels beneath Torrom’s Watch. Dogsbutt faces off with the Den Master of Sarnus. Oldrem is killed.

The Beginning:

Alídor, 1 Drûr 652

The Red Cock was smoky, filthy, noisy, and crammed with lowlifes. It was a typical day in Monthturn. Outside the city was growing cold and damp as winter crept ever closer. “Rita”, barked a small ugly man. “Bring me another ale!” “Go piss yourself, Dogsbutt!” the barmaid screamed back. The man stopped his solo game of mumbleypeg long enough to bark, “Dirk, my name’s Dirk!” “Into the Neth with you,” she yelled back across the crowd. Somewhere within the screwed up ugly little man, love welled. Across the table sat another man whose skin glowed white in the darkness; his pink eyes stared intently down into his half-empty mug. Next to him sat a tidier man, cleaning his spectacles with a handkerchief.

After more insults and yelling, the front door opened and a familiar face moved through the crowd. Mern grabbed himself a chair and sat down at the table. The Den Master described a “job” that matched the talents of the three before him. A thief named Oldrem had been imprisoned and was due to die but somehow escaped from the gaol that morning. He wanted the three to find Oldrem and return him to gaol, or kill him. It seemed that Oldrem had been taking improper “cuts” of his “earnings” from theDerékaln, so he’d been set-up to be captured by the Merchant Guard. Mern further explained that he was a member of a Den dubbed Torrom’s Watch which operated out of Sarnus, the neighborhood to the north. Mern assured them that there would be 300 Aurad whether one or all three of them completed the “job”, and that the ‘Cauln didn’t care how many people “got in the way”. When asked how they would know which one was Oldrem, Mern said “he’s the one with the rotted chin. Just tendon and bone. Has a rotting disease or something.”

Late that evening Rita woke Dogsbutt with the end of a long stick. The Grob wandered back down into the tavern din where he found his friends gathered around their table. Rita brought some ales to the table explaining that Mern had given them an open tab until the job was complete. The men filled themselves up and hit the streets. Within the watch, they had navigated the sloped and rutted cobble avenues to a fortified compound of old buildings. Outside the complex, the group met with an old woman hauling a heavy wooden cart of apple sacks through the streets. After sending the woman away, Dogsbutt nimbly scaled a compound pallisade and disappeared over the other side. The others moved around the compound’s exterior until they found a door with a lock that Daga could pick. Skillfully opening the lock, a cloud of black dust issued from the keyhole. Daga was seized with a hacking cough. Inside, Dogsbutt sneaked through the compound’s interior to get a view of the layout, and peeked up onto balconies.

As the cough subsided, Daga opened the door and entered the building, followed by his ghostly swordsman Whitey. Closing the door behind them they were plunged into an interior darkness. They moved down the hallway listening at doors where firelight flickered from beneath,. They entered a room that appeared empty. The complex seemed mostly asleep as Whitey moved up the creaky staircase to the first floor. At the end of that floor they met reunited with Dogsbutt who had scaled the wall and crawled in through an unlit balcony. After a brief time they heard conversation outside. Daga realized that the glass-paned balcony door remained open, alerting a passerby in the compound. Dogsbutt maneuvered toward the balcony and saw two men talking below. When Daga looked, there was only one waiting and glancing upward; they’d been found. Daggers and a sword slid from their scabbards as the thieves awaited company. Somewhere below, a door opened and closed followed a minute later with the room’s knob turning. The white assassin slashed at the hand through the opening door. The room was filled with the sharp wet sound of cut flesh and cracking bone. The hand pulled back in a bloody mess as Whitey stepped through the doorway hacking at the man in the hallway. The man withdrew screaming “Intruders!” but did not make it to the stairs. Dragging the body into the room, they closed the door. Expecting a flurry of reaction the group decided to abandon the compound. Hanging and dropping from the balcony they made their way to the northernmost pallisade wall. Unable to climb the closely bound timbers, Whitey moved sword-in-hand into the interior compound, looking for the man who’d been standing there earlier. Daga, having remained inside, nervously made his way down to the exterior door, passed the occupied rooms, and into the street beyond. An arrow struck the wall near Whitey as he moved.

Outside the compound, Daga and Dogsbutt met on the south street. The apple woman was standing at the street corner smoking. Dogsbutt told her to leave. She did. Next, Dogsbutt quietly scaled the southmost timber wall, where he’d first entered the compound. This time he noticed an archer beneath him who was aiming at something across the way. Dropping from the stable room with his knife bared, the small man landed heavily on the archer, who crumpled bloodily to the ground. Whitey came out from hiding and they regrouped in the stables.

Keeping to the shadows, the trio crossed the compound and entered the far building. Inside they found the remains of an old tavern, covered in dust and webs. On the next floor they found some more abandoned rooms but had to extinguish their lights once they saw their reflections in the glass-paned balcony door. Crawling through a ceiling hatch in one of the upper rooms the group found a recently used store-room filled with crates of loot. Grabbing what they could, they left the room to continue their job. Returning to the stables, they found a hatch kicking through the straw. One by one, the thieves dropped into the lightless corridor below, closing the hatch behind them. Exploring the passageway, they discovered a ceiling hatch that opened into a tool room, and another tunnel leading south. The south tunnel soon came to a dead end. The floor at the corridor’s end consisted of a circle of wood with leather straps which could be easily pulled from the floor. Below this hatch was a gaol cell. Dogsbutt was lowered into the cell and looked around. Examining the ceiling he learned that positioned just right, the ceiling hatch became almost invisible. This is how Oldrem had escaped. Climbing back into the ceiling the group returned to the compound of Torrom’s Watch.

Within the tunnels beneath the compound, Whitey dispensed of a thief waiting in the darkness. Whether he’d been waiting for the group or trying to escape was unclear. Back on the surface, Whitey and Daga moved toward the last building where they heard an argument going on inside. The argument was between a close voice and a much more distant one, regarding the “intruders” and what to do with Oldrem. Dogsbutt scaled the south pallisade one more time and circled the main building looking for window exits. In the street he found the apple woman standing and watching from around a street corner. Speaking with the old woman he asked her to move her cart against the front door and with some help she obliged. Whitey opened the door while Daga prepared his flintlock for anyone exiting. The man in the room turned, sword in hand and a gun’s shot echoed through the streets. The shot didn’t strike the man well. He was wounded however and tried to retreat. Whitey pushed his way into the room and cut the man down. His cry caused movement in the room above. Outside, Dogsbutt watched a man open shutters above and grabbing the window sill, swing out and drop to the cobbles beneath. Dogsbutt greeted the man with his dagger but the man swiftly produced one of his own. The two stood facing each other for some time. In the room above, Whitey and Daga closed in on the fearful man with the rotting chin, Oldrem. The man pleaded for his life but found no mercy. Dogsbutt and Torrom spoke briefly and agreed to part ways when it was announced that Oldrem had been “captured”. Taking a pouch of coins from the upper room, the three left the compound behind.

Continued in Fleeting Memories.

Characters

• Daga Grey
• Dogsbutt
• Whitey
• Davir (Sarnus Thief): killed
• Grenna (Red Cock Barmaid)
• Mern Salydis (Derékaln Den Master)
• Nuus (Sarnus Thief): killed
• Oldrem (Dishonest Thief): killed
• Rita (Red Cock Barmaid)
• Sart (Sarnus Thief)
• Solem (Red Cock Barkeep)
• Torrom (Derékaln Den Master)
• Trell (Sarnus Thief): killed
• Yalsa (Sarnus Thief)

Played: 23 Jan 1999