7Crowns:
We enter. It's been a long day and we don't need to feign being exhausted.
The door opens with a familiar creak. The common room is more crowded than this morning - evening trade, locals finishing their suppers, a few travelers nursing ales by the fire. The smell of fish stew still lingers, mixed with woodsmoke and beer.
Oswin looks up from behind the bar, his round face lighting with recognition. "Ah! The merchant's companions return!" His voice carries across the room. "Petran will be pleased. He's been fretting all day, poor fellow. Room 4, top of the stairs - but careful, he's resting those ribs."
A few patrons glance your way with mild curiosity, then return to their drinks. Nothing unusual about adventurers checking in with their employer.
Flava leads the way up the narrow wooden stairs, the others following. The boards creak under Croup's boots. Swaggy's rings clink softly despite his attempt to muffle them.
Room 4 sits at the end of the hallway. A sliver of lamplight shows beneath the door.
Flava raises his hand and knocks three times - the signal Petran specified.
"Yes?" The merchant's voice is cautious, strained with pain. "Who is it?"
"Your salvage crew," Flava calls back. "We have news."
A pause. Movement inside. The sound of someone rising carefully, painfully. Footsteps. The door opens a crack, and Petran's face appears - pale, haggard, but his eyes sharp.
He sees the four of you and exhales with relief. "Thank the gods. Come in, quickly."
He opens the door wider, stepping back to let you enter. The room is small but comfortable - a single bed, a washstand, his merchant's pack in the corner. He's still wearing the binding Swaggy applied, moving stiffly.
"Did you find it?" he asks immediately, closing the door behind you. "The letter?"
What do you do?
7CROWNS
"Yes, we found your ruffians and showed them how it's properly done," Flava says.
"But things are not as they seem," Swaggy says, the truth in an ironic way. He is checking Petran's wrappings. He nods in satisfaction. "We left them in despair." He considers this statement for a moment. "We didn't see your horse. Apologies, sir."
Petran's face falls at the mention of the horse. "Ah. Well. The roan was a good mount, but..." He waves it off, wincing at the movement. "At least you dealt with the bastards. That's something."
His eyes fix on Flava with desperate hope. "The letter? You have it?"
Flava reaches into his tunic and produces the package - red wax seal broken, oilcloth wrapping intact. He holds it for a moment before handing it over.
"We found it exactly where you said," Flava says carefully. "But Petran... those bandits had already opened it. They were looking for something valuable, I think. Disappointed to find just parchment."
Petran takes the package with trembling hands, his face going pale. "Opened? They... they read it?"
"We don't know," Swaggy says, his voice unusually serious. "We drove them off before we could ask. But the seal was broken when we found it."
The merchant stares at the broken wax, then at the men surrounding him. His hands shake slightly as he peels back the oilcloth.
"I... I should verify the contents," he says weakly. "Make sure nothing was taken or... or damaged."
He's asking permission. Looking at your faces to see if you'll object.
Croup stands by the door, arms crossed. Silent as stone.
Angus shifts nervously in the corner.
What do you do?
DM: No, we didn't find it where he left it hidden. We tell him that we tracked the bandits for hours, hence our late arrival. (We were actually scheming at the other tavern.) We found where he had hidden the letter, found their tracks and no letter, and so pursued them.
"They left a devious trail," Croup adds quietly. His own little contribution.
"Yes, it was crooked. We think they knew they'd be followed." Angus said.
Flava is surprised at these two's interjections. "Sadly . . ." He sits where he can in the room and pulls the newly created 3rd letter from under his cloak. After the forgery was complete, we wrinkled and abused the letter as if it had fallen into coarse hands. "They opened it. I must confess, you made us curious, and seeing as it was open already . . . well, I think all of us are in a dire predicament." He hands the letter to Petran.
Petran's face drains of color. His hands shake as he takes the letter from Flava.
"You... you read it?" His voice is barely a whisper.
"We had to know what we were involved in," Flava says quietly. "Those men fought hard to keep it. Harder than common bandits fight for a sealed letter."
Petran sinks onto the edge of the bed, his bound ribs clearly paining him, but that's nothing compared to the fear blooming across his face as his eyes scan the parchment.
The room is silent except for the sound of his breathing growing more rapid.
Steward Gregory of New Sevetburg...
Your crimes are known...
The merchant Petran, who delivers this message, does so unknowingly. He is marked as a conspirator in your records - a loose end to be eliminated...
His hands tremble harder. The parchment shakes.
Captain Dalmar, Sergeant Marcus Thorne, soldiers Willem and Gregor...
Quarter-Master Aldric, merchant factor Hagan, innkeeper Oswin - all who might testify to your expeditions. All scheduled for quiet deaths.
"Oh gods," Petran whispers. "Oh merciful gods."
The Knights of Delius have been notified. Paladin Lord Aris Gerasimos himself may ride north. Pholtus's Inquisitors are being assembled...
He reads the final passage:
If the chalice is delivered into our hands immediately - brought forth in genuine contrition - perhaps you alone need answer for these crimes...
The letter falls from his nerveless fingers onto the bed.
Petran looks up at the four of you with the eyes of a drowning man. "I'm... I'm dead. Gregory will..." He can't finish the sentence. His breath comes in short gasps.
Swaggy moves forward, ostensibly to check his binding, but really to keep the merchant from panicking completely. "Easy. Breathe. You're not dead yet."
"Not dead
yet?" Petran's voice cracks. "I'm named in an accusation against the Steward! Whether Gregory gets this letter or the Church does, I'm ruined! If Gregory thinks I'm a witness, he'll have me killed. If the Church thinks I'm a conspirator..." He looks wildly between you. "I was just hired to deliver a letter! Fifty silver! I didn't know—"
He stops, realization dawning.
"You read this. You know what's in it. And you came back here." His eyes narrow through the fear. "Why?"
What do you do?
7CROWNS
"Because we helped you, friend. It was an act of mercy, and now we are conspirators as well." Flava says. "We discussed this together on the long trip back--have we not, men?--and we see a way to save our skins here. Ours as well as yours."
He details the plan to fulfill the letter's final request. Bring the Chalice to Matthias and the Church.
"All of us would be absolved. In fact (and this is the truth), they might even reward us, the unwitting heroes in this catastrophe. It will take resources. As wanderers in these parts, we have little more than our own strong arms. And yet . . . if you were to aid us, aid us in aiding you, we might survive. We might even profit."
Petran stares at Flava, his merchant's mind visibly working through the angles even as fear grips him. He picks up the letter again with shaking hands, rereading that crucial final passage.
"Deliver the chalice... to the Church... immediate contrition..." His voice is hollow. "You're saying we should actually
do what this letter demands? Go into that vault, retrieve the chalice, bypass Gregory entirely?"
"It's the only way out," Swaggy says, his voice carrying genuine conviction now. "For all of us. You deliver this letter to Gregory, you're signing your own death warrant. He'll read his own condemnation and know you've seen it too. You're a witness. A loose end."
Croup's gravel voice adds weight: "Man who hires adventurers to die doesn't leave merchants alive to talk about it."
Petran's breathing is still rapid, but he's listening. Calculating.
"But if we retrieve the chalice ourselves," Flava continues, "deliver it directly to the Church - to the Bishop, not Gregory - we're heroes. We exposed corruption. Saved a holy relic. The Church protects us. Gregory hangs, not us."
"We need your help," Angus adds nervously. "We're... we're new to this region. We don't know what Gregory's previous expeditions faced down there. We don't know who survived, who might tell us what's waiting."
Petran looks at the young wizard, then back at Flava. "You want me to... to outfit you? Fund this expedition? Give you information?"
"Your life depends on our success," Swaggy says bluntly. "If we fail, Gregory gets the chalice eventually anyway, and you're still marked for death. If we succeed, you're the merchant who helped expose his crimes. The Church will remember that favorably."
Petran sets the letter down carefully on the bed. His hands have stopped shaking. The merchant is reasserting himself over the frightened man.
"What do you need?" he asks quietly.
What do you tell him?
I really wanted to keep going. You have to watch those usage limits carefully. They time out every 5 hours and there's also that weekly limit. Next time I'll be more strategic with my time. I can't start again until Monday, which sucks. Whatever.
