Theft, Arson and Explosions
In the previous session of our Zweihänder game we got back to the city late in the night and decided to raid the warehouse by the river. This was one of the first places we’d tried breaking into after getting to the city, and had left with some information but had been chased out by some creature. It was time to see if the creature was still there.
It was late at night by the time we arrived back at Sielzen, and we decided to try a raid on the smugglers warehouse on the other side of the river from the city. Last time we had been chased off by some form of creature so hadn’t had a chance to perform a full examination of the place.
There was no sign of any guards around the warehouse itself this time, though there were some guards in the general area who were on a long patrol so that gave as plenty of gaps in which we could operate.
Calthar had her big bundle of keys so we headed down to the door beneath the quay and tried to get in that way – unfortunately none of the keys fitted the lock. It was Djarin who spotted that the lock seemed new – as if it had been replaced recently. Given that we’d broken into most places belonging to the smuggling group by using keys, in hindsight it wasn’t that surprising that they’d got around to replacing their security. The keys didn’t fit the other doors either, and neither could we get through the barred door.
So eventually Calthar climbed up onto the roof and broke in that way. This was how we’d done it last time, and this time they’d put a second roof over the office we’d dropped down into before. The rest of us got up there and climbed down, squeezing between the lower ceiling and the roof to get to the upper walkway that led into the office.
There was an interior door, which had a lock which we couldn’t open. So Calthar used brute force to break through it. Noisy, but the guards were over the other side of the river at this point.
Inside the office were lots of books, as well as a couple of paintings up ont the wall. They’d been there last time, but this time the one of a woman looked familiar – she seemed similar to Lady Zinofiel, the owner of the White Orchid, though the painting was probably a couple of hundred years old. She was standing with a group of people, possibly the founders of the business that owned the warehouse. The other painting was of a sailing ship.
My first thought though was to grab the most recent record book and start looking through it, an activity which Djarin and Calthar got bored of within a few seconds, so they wandered off to have a look at the stacks of crates down on the ground floor.
I only found out what happened afterwards when they called me down, but there was an opening between the crates which led into an open space which was the nest of an undead creature. Djarin killed it pretty quickly with a crossbow bolt to the head. It was similar to the undead we’d found in the tomb so long ago, and Calthar later found a warding stone above the main door which was arranged to prevent the creature from escaping.
The records showed evidence that the merchants had been bringing in slaves, quite regularly over the last 10 months or so. There had been some deliveries for the year or so before that, with a gap around the time when we attacked the slavers who were taking from the local villages. Of course they didn’t actually write down “slaves”, but used the term “Luxury Goods”, but I’m pretty certain from the context that is what they were referring to.
The ship they used was the Pale Knight, a river ship which as it turned out had the same name as the painting of a ship up on the wall.
Calthar and Djarin called me down to the crates to investigate what they’d found – not the undead, but more (very old) books and some jars and bags of some powder. The jars contained glue, the powder we later guessed was gun powder. The books when back a couple of hundred years, again they were shipping records, and the use of a ship named the Pale Knight seemed to have been a regular fixture.
We grabbed some glue, since it was worth quite a bit, and a small selection of the records and were planning on leaving when we heard the sound of fire bells going off in the city. Which gave us an idea…
We set a small fire in the books, which would catch nicely but give us plenty of time to leave before the entire warehouse went up. We left via the river exit, and headed back towards the forest not wanting to be seen coming into the city just as a couple of fires were going off. The other fire seemed to be a building outside the city walls.
We’re settling down for the night in a somewhat uncomfortable spot, and there’s just been a very large explosion from the direction of the warehouse. Definitely gunpowder. I guess that covered up our method of entry.
The first thing I did on getting back to the inn was to get a bath. On the way in we’d met up with Lt Gruber who was investigating the first fire – it was a brothel and apparently Jarl Sten Skardeson’s aid had been visiting at the time and he hasn’t been seen since. They weren’t sure what had caused both fires, but Calthar suggested maybe it was basilisks.
Calthar had insisted on dragging us down into the sewers with Noreen to pick up the corpse of the basilisk we’d killed a couple of nights ago, but by now it was pretty rotten and mostly dissolved from its own acid.
The Inquisitor Bernado had wanted to meet with me. Apparently he was leaving the city since he believed that his cover had been blown. He provided me with the location of various dead drops around the city, and I filled him in on what had happened over the last few days.
I must admit to have completely forgotten to let him know about the events at the White Orchid, so have agreed to right up a report for him to take back to his superiors. I’ll drop it off to him tomorrow morning, assuming he’s still alive or hasn’t had to flee.
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