Logger's Peril, part 12
Log Info
- Title: Logger's Peril, part 12
- Emitter: Whirlpool
- Characters: Aimarra, Jozi, Randolf, Rumbo
- Place: Alexandros - Somewhere in Mythwood
- Time: Thursday, December 17th, 2020 11:00AM
- Summary: After fighting off a massive shambling mound that had been sent into the cabin to eat the loggers (and tidy up loose ends for the elven mastermind) the adventurers had managed to 'encourage' the elf to surrender by setting him on fire! Now that they had him under control Aimarra and Jozi (after some healing) were determined to question him to uncover the truth behind this scheme of his. Rumbo was less inclined about uncovering the truth and more interested in simply threatening the elf at the end of his dragonspitter ;)
- APL: 2-5
- Encounter 1: Questioning the elven mastermind after forcing their surrender in typical Gobber style.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= At a glance around PrP Room: Four =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Aimarra 5'1" 128 Lb Half-Elf Female Brown hair and eyes, breastplate, leathers, pointed ears. Jozi 5'8" 148 Lb Half-Orc Female A brunette half-orcess with a sunny disposition. Rumbo 3'2" 35 Lb Goblin Male A gun-toting gobber with a wooden peg-leg. Whirlpool Lb Otyugh GM I am stinky! -=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=-
So, the good news is is that the olant monster stalled its attack, largely because its controller was set on fire. He was rolling around on the ground to extinguish it when the assembled adventurers *pointed guns* at him on the ground and demanded his surrender.
His hands go up, a bit, in agfreement. He's smoldering and in great pain. Not one to simply forget about a creature because it has ceased its attack for the moment, Aimarra levels her bow at the creature and gestures with it for Jozi to get clear. "I'll watch this. Now what exactly were you intending to do here?"
Rumbo has both hands gripped onto his dragonspitter now that, it appears, combat has concluded and tries to keep a rock steady aim on the smouldering elf. "Stop whimpering," The Gobber suggests as he slowly makes his way outside to close with his target, "Weak looks. Rumbo big burns, times many! Not see Rumbo cry." After offering the advice he glances briefly to Jozi before fixing both eyes on his target.
Jozi is not in the greatest shape at the moment, and her sense of humor is just about bottomed out, so she errs on the defensive side with Aimarra's encouragement. She meets Rumbo's gaze and she nods a touch, then intones another soft orcish prayer to heal her wounds a little more, just in case.
GAME: Jozi casts Cure Light Wounds. Caster Level: 2 DC: 13 GAME: Jozi rolls 1d8+2: (7)+2: 9
" ... well ... nothing, now, I suppose," says the elven man on the ground. "This didn't go to plan. Damn. How did you even find this place? I thought I'd covered my tracks well enough."
"What was your plan?" Aimarra asks again, neutrally, covering the creature with her bow, an arrow nocked and half-drawn. She doesn't even look at him. "You're a hell of a tracker. You almost got me. What a waste of talent."
Rumbo thrusts the dragonspitter towards the elf as he grunts out in boken tradespeak, "Yes. Tell plan so we kill you!" The Gobber then gives a wide smile to display his sharp teeth.
Jozi levies her warhammer, though her stance is still more of a warding one as she brings her claws around to potentially deflect any rambunciousness from the shambler, "-Or- we kill him. Rummy, -or- we kill him. It's that carrot and stick concept."
"That... that's not how surrender works," he replies to Rumbo, after a moment. A nervous glance towards Aimarra and Jozi as if to say 'control the gobber already!'.
"I'm really good at tracking, but that doesn't get me what I want or need. Okay, so. The plaaaan." He sits up just a little, hands still up. "I surrender fully qand entrust myself into your care. Oh my *god* this hurts." He's groaning. Being burnt really does hurt.
"Uhmmm.... you know how ... there's a shadow elf priestess in town?"
"I'm afraid I'm clean out of potions," Aimarra answers, not taking her eyes from the shambler. "I've heard such rumors, go on."
Rumbo keeps his beady yellow eyes staring at the elf as he gestures with the dragonspitter gripped in both hands and growls out, "Healing after. Tell plan first. -OR- Blam!" The Gobber emphasizes the word this time.
Jozi frowns and passes her warhammer to her other hand, then uses that hand to fish around in her pocket for her goblin army knife, "... better." she ammends dubiously. She swaps objects between her hands and looks sidelong at Mad Salad, "And what's yer deal with this'n, here?"
"Yeah, they're not just rumors. So big high priestess of Taara. So, *some* folks don't like having her around, felt she's a threat. Too dangerous to leave alone, but too connected to cast out. So, better to lay something at her feet, right? Throw a pall over the whole ... whatever it is she's doing. LOok, I don't know. I just know I got paid a *lot* of gold to make a big stink out here qamongst the elves and leave a trail that'd ultimately make it look like shadow elves wer behind it."
It makes sense, though: a shadow elf starting a war between humans, fey, and elves *would* be ... problematic to *any* shadow elf in Alexandria.
Ivy, who remains nearby, keeps themselves focused on the shambling mound. They are looking increasingly angry as their prisoner spills the beans. Whirlpool has partially disconnected.
"Who paid you?" Aimarra's a cooler head, listening with some remove from the situation as she is, but the bow does not waver. "Rumbo, go easy on him."
Rumbo sighs at the recommendation but does slip a hand off of the dragonspitter's grip so that the Gobber holds it only in one hand now. He does ask in his broken tradespeak, "Where *lot* of gold?"
Jozi shakes her head, "I heard about her." she says with a snort. She starts fiddling with the teeny little levers of her knife. "So... ya been paid by... someone ta make that kinda trouble." mercenary hijinx.
"Stir things up so folks think the loggers are getting killed by the elves out here, do it in a way that looks like dryads did it.." Potentially cause a bloodbath or two.
"Then ya went ta feed yer dupes to a shambler." Premeditated murder.
Click-clack-click. What was the combo for 'rope' again...?
"And have it all lead back to the shadow elves, yeah?" He clears his throat. "Everyone was gnna be compensated nicely, down to the families, I swear! I mean, only needed to eat a few loggers and that's no big loss. They're replacable!"
He holds his hands up with a big, wide-eyed smile of desperation. "And I was gonna be *rich* and able to get my dad out of prison and..."
GAME: Aimarra rolls sense motive: (4)+2: 6 GAME: Jozi rolls sense motive: (10)+9: 19 GAME: Rumbo rolls Sense Motive: (7)+2: 9
"Got it. Where you got bitten in the arse was that the logging company called the Guild in Alexandria for help." Aimarra still hasn't moved from the mound, even as she maintains conversation. "And you were going to start a war between the dryads, the sylvanori, and the humans. Bet the sylvanori aren't going to like that." She shoots a look over at Ivy."
"Honestly," he replies, agreeing with Aimarra's assessment, "that was ridiculous. A few assholes wandering off with the fey whom they were told not to log from? I mean, the company *agreed to this*. They were going to rake in the money on the insurance too!"
He huffs. Pauses.
"Aw, shit."
Rumbo gestures with his dragonspitter as he says, "Just give him," and continues as the dragonspitter points to Ivy, "to her." Then the dragonspitter settles back pointing at the burnt elf and Rumbo continues. "Split *lots* gold with her. Go home. Collect reward. Job done. No?"
"I think that is an excellent idea. He and his mound friend can face us. We have ways of ensuring his cooperation."
Ivy's expression is flat. A cold, simmering rage. Her people were nearly brought into war with the Fey *for gold*.
Jozi glances sidelong at Ivy, understanding, at least conceptually how she must feel about all this, "Yeah." she says coolly. She then starts to approach the elf, still fiddling with the knife to, at last, produce some rope, "You've been a very..... bad.... boy." She looks to Rumbo, to Aimarra, to Ivy and she weighs that.
Three communities at risk...
A number who would have been murdered if the adventurers hadn't sent the loggers off to be a little uncomfortable with the Dryad on their way home...
And the potential that any investigation into something that really -does- involve the shadow elf will be viewed with undue suspicion because of this...
"This man's actions posed the most direct threat to yer community, and the dryads." Jozi says, starting to truss him up, "He came here to do murder before he surrendered to us."
Once that's done, she stands, looks to Airmarra, then Rumbo, "A word, real quick?"
Rumbo shrugs his tiny shoulders, with the dragonspitter fixed on the now tied-up elf, and nods his head.
"Ivy, do you feel you need us to watch this?" Aimarra nods to the shambling mound.
"If he can control the mound, I can handle it .. and him."
Ivy places a hand on the burnt half-elf's head. "Understand, that the dryads of the wood are displeased with you. Understand that the elves are displeased with you. If you so much as attempt to unleash that thing again, there is not a place between the trees you can run, not a cave you can hide in, not a burrow you can dig into, where they, where we, will not find you and they will be far less merciful to you than I will be."
Ivy's rage is cold and all too real.
For a moment, there's almost a flicker of sympathy for the man's plight from Aimarra. For a moment. It doesn't last long. "What say we let her take him and the Mad Salad and we head back, we talk on the way?"
Jozi cants her head a touch as Aimarra chimes in, she glances to Rumbo, who'd spoken on the matter, previous, then turns to Ivy, "Madame, as the representative a yer community, an as likely a contact with the dryads as any, I remand this bescumbered varmint ta yer custody fer justice."
Rumbo offers Ivy a wide gobber-grin!