The Enemy Within (Warlock!)
Session 7, 15/02/2024
Kalvin remains behind with Cecilie and the brigands, while the rest of the PCs reconnoiter the fortified town of Wallbach. A queue of carts laden with fresh produce is forming outside the gate; today is market day. Visitors are charged one silver piece "for the upkeep of the walls", but the crooked guards pocket the coin. The guards are alarmed by Fritz's scaly rash, but a few more silver pieces convince them his condition isn't catching.
Kristen recommended the PCs approach the landlord of The Gifted Sheep, a man sympathetic to the brigand's cause. Rumours abound that the young Lord Jizzt visits the Polished Helm brothel most evenings, and must know of some secret route in/out of the castle.
The PCs also visit the apothecary (and alleged sorceress) Greta Lutz, to persuade her to lift the curse afflicting Henrich the tax collector. Greta agrees to do so if the party bring her soil from a child's grave, gathered on the stroke of midnight. That sounds unwholesome, but the PCs pencil some light graverobbing into their busy schedule. As the party leave the witch's shop, they bump into Lady Fannie Staynez (wife of Lord Urin, mother of Jizzt), who looks remarkably young and fresh-faced for a woman on the wrong side of sixty. The PCs are ushered out before they can eavesdrop on her conversation with the hag.
Gustaf spots Else & Ennge Hollen riding towards Lord Urin's keep. That cannot bode well.
Stammig visits the blacksmith, but the shop is closed. Lord Urin did not want the owner making swords for the brigands and forced him to move his forge to the castle compound.
Adeline approaches the keep under the pretext of looking for work. She is hired on to work in the kitchens. She meets Irmele Munser, a maid looking for her missing sister. She also encounters Lord Urin (short, barrel-chested man with a booming voice) and Captain of the Guard Curt Rottenburg (huge figure in platemail armour).
Back at the Gifted Sheep, Gustaf is cornered by the Hollen sisters, who demand to know what he is up to. Witnesses in Weissbruck saw him talking to Cecilie, but he hasn't handed the girl over to Lord Urin for the reward. Gustaf plays dumb, but the sisters aren't buying it.
That night, the PCs stake out the Polished Helm, hoping to discover the secret entrance Jizzt uses to sneak out of the castle. Several hours pass and there's no sign of their mark, leading Stammig to hypothesize the secret entrance is inside the brothel. The Hollen sisters shadow Gustaf & Co and note their interest in the whorehouse. 'Maybe that is where they have stashed Cecilie' they surmise, 'Just like the Golden Cat level in the first Dishonored game'.
The guards ring the bell for curfew, but this party have a rebellious streak and shan't have their bedtime dictated by the likes of Lord Urin. Instead, they sneak out to dig up some dead kids. Fritz picks the lock on the graveyard gate while Gustaf stands watch. As the party poke around the moonlit cemetery, they are accosted by a pair of mischievous ghost children. The spirits want to play hide & seek. Adeline and Stammig play along, but Fritz starts filling a bucket with grave dirt. Enraged, the ghost children animate their own diminutive skeletons and chase the PCs out of the graveyard.
On their way back to the tavern, the party botch their stealth rolls and blunder into an ambush by Captain Rottenburg and his men. The armoured giant arrests the PCs for breaking curfew. They are disarmed, shackled and thrown into the dungeon beneath Castle Staynez.
TBC
