LogTorments of the Righteous-Jason-25

Game log for the 2019/10/06 session of AW: Torments of the Righteous, as taken by Jason

Egon's about to die in a duel in Schwarzhoele. He thinks he has a plan to live, but I think we all know better. He grabs a beer and asks for help in figuring out how a pistol works. Gerhardt explains the process for loading his pistol. He explains it, but doesn't demonstrate it. When our clerical friend asks to actually try shooting, Gerhardt tells him it's going to cost. In the course of their conversation, they discover that Egon's never actually heard a gun go off, nor own one. Hike, as second, ought to provide a pistol. She looks expectantly at Gerhardt, who seems oddly reticent. Hike soon realizes that despite her minion's protests, that pistol probably doesn't work. The three of them leave town and go down the road a bit, to a spot where there's an old tree that looks good for target practice.

Gerhardt walks Egon through the loading process, as Hike stays well clear. Egon primes the weapon, points it at the target, and squeezes the trigger. The pistol explodes. Egon's covered in burns and shrapnel wounds. Gerhardt explains he picked the weapon out of a privy and could never find anyone to test it. Egon's oddly happy, because now he has injuries that will prevent him from dueling. The Archimandrix will have to fight in his place now.

Hike goes in search of a working pistol. She finds a gunsmith, Master Timovay, with a few weapons on display, but he's not disposed to loan nor rent guns out. When he hears that she's the second in the duel, he changes his mind, since nothing too bad's going to happen to the second. She borrows the pistol for 1-barter.

When the Archimandrix returns to the bar, Egon's actually looking a little worse than when she left. There's a chunk torn out of the webbing between his thumb and finger, and he's also missing a pinky finger now, and also, his collarbone got a little cracked, but eventually those injuries will heal up, more or less. As Egon drinks the pain away, he tells the whole story to the Champion, trying to make himself sound tough. The Dammerung just can't believe that anyone would be so disrespectful to a weapon.

When the time comes, Egon and Hike meet at the square. Word has gotten around, and there's a bit of a crowd. Also, on the way, Gerhardt cheerfully explains that an injured hand doesn't actually mean Egon doesn't have to fight. He'll have to shoot lefty, is all. Egon can't believe it. Lord Marcus Entwiss and his boy Torsten Entwiss are there. Inga also sends Linus to observe. Egon tries to find a way out and thinks maybe his only option is to cheat. Hike, meanwhile, knows that dueling is frowned upon, and if some law shows up, they may have to scatter. That also has potential implications for Egon's behavior in the unlikely event that he wins.

Anyway, the parties meet up in the center of the square. Lord E expresses surprise that Egon even showed up, and Egon explains that he wishes to do the honorable thing, but since he's injured, his second will have to fight for him. The Lord doesn't think so, but he is willing to shoot with his off hand, to bring parity to the situation. That's when Hike decides to warn her Subaltern friend that the pistol's a rental. She does provide some good advice, though.

The two parties to the duel trade shots. Egon gets winged by a bullet, but he puts his shot into Entwiss' center of mass. Egon's pretty distracted by his recent wounding, but as Hike approaches the Entwiss camp to take care of the formalities, she overhears Torsten promise his dad that no matter what happens, he'll avenge this. She asks about the Lord's condition, and upon hearing that he was shot in the liver, tells Entwiss that he's going to take two days to die. The ref asks if Entwiss wants to fire again, since he has a second pistol, but Torsten says that they're done here. The Archimandrix shakes the young man's hand, and they both agree that this is done, but Torsten emphasizes "this" in a way that tells Hike that things are not exactly copacetic.

Egon's wound is in the left arm, so he doesn't have a good side anymore. Luckily, she brought bandages and first aid supplies, and uses a little fuse to try to cauterize the wound. Hike tries to use some brain mojo to help out, but it backfires on them, and instead ensures that Egon's going to get some pretty heinous PTSD out of this, as the cleric struggles to deal with an alien presence in his mind.

Back at Der Flammenkammer, Brother Silas reads from the Book of the Dammerung, when suddenly he stops and asks if it isn't awfully warm in there. Then he says he doesn't feel well. Then he pukes up black blood. He tries to say something, and he can't. He stands up, takes a step, falls down, and is out cold. The Champion immediately suspects poison. He looks around and notices that Inga has come out of the back to investigate, but Danziger hasn't. Danziger wouldn't have poisoned someone, so someone is calling the shot. Inga, for her part, knows this is poison. She figures either Lord Eisenbach, Deacon Flaubert, or Lady Entwiss could have ordered this. The Champion tells Inga that her cook should be held to account for this. When she goes back to look for him, Danziger's gone, and nobody knows where he went. Inga starts looking around as the Champion goes out the back to look for his quarry. Inga finds that the door to the tunnel to high street isn't latched, which isn't how she left it. Champion finds nobody of interest out back.

They meet back in the inn. Inga tries to dismiss the Champion and implies that Marko will usher him out. The Champion leaves to go tell the authorities that there's been a poisoning. Inga decides to go with him. As they prepare, Inga tries to find some way to stay open, but the Champion is having none of it. That leaves just a pile of resident Torchbearers to hang out in the inn. She asks Jens and Fritz to make sure nobody comes in or out. Just to impress her, they round up one of the guys who already left and bring him back.

Back at the tor, Tendahl is feverishly calculating how the realignment would work. Carl looks in the bright place to see where best to look for healing materials. Tendahl warns him that some of those plants grow best in wet soil, which can sometimes be pretty much the same as quicksand. That turns out to be an important tip, and by being careful of his footing, he brings back the needful, and restocks Lisel's healing supplies. She starts boiling stuff down, which adds to the reek in the area, and heals Tendahl a bit. Himmler, meanwhile, is busy rigging torches and other improvised demon defenses. Tendahl thinks the problem is that one of the standing stones at the top has been swapped with one of the ones at the bottom, and further, one of them has been turned 180 degrees around its long axis. Fixing that means dragging a very, very, very heavy object up the hill, and another one down the hill. Tendahl also determines that this was done intentionally, as part of a process meant to close the portal. He can fix this misalignment with rope, help, and time. We know right where the rope is, since it's in the well.

Tendahl tries to open his brain to see whether it's better to change eleven more stones or to revert it, and in the bright place, the stones are properly aligned, and down the well, he sees the rope dangling up. If aligned properly, the well is a portal to the bright place, which is somewhere else.

They confer and decide to unhook the wagon and ride the goats until they're just outside of town, then walk in and try to hire help.

Hike and Egon return to Der Flammenkammer. On her way, she sees Inga and the Champion heading into town. When they gets to the inn, Fritz and Jens don't want to let them in, since their instructions say "nobody in or out." The troops can't believe Egon isn't dead, but they still won't let him in. They seem to believe that Inga is their boss when they're at the inn. Hike responds with a look they recognize - the one that says that there's still time to change their answer before something untoward happens to them. They decide that since Hike is here now, she's in charge of them again. Hike dumps Egon on the bar and invites the subaltern to tell everyone about the way he got shot. Hike goes to return the pistol.

She does so, with no difficulty, and when she returns, her minions are still poking the body with a stick. They're also taking bets as to whether Inga will hang for it.

Inga and the Champion arrive at the Caer. They first meet Subaltern Einar, and Inga goes right up to him, greets him fondly, and then tries to slowly introduce the issue. The Champion interrupts to spell out that his Brother was slain by poison at the inn. Einar immediately goes to get Captain Schmitto, who is not at all surprised to see Inga mired in controversy. She reads him and calculates that maybe, if she explains that Danziger fled through the tunnels, he'd believe she wasn't the culprit. The Captain summons some help, and a group of Guardsmen, accompanied by a guy with long, thin, white hair, a hooked nose, and a pinched mouth show up. Inga knows, by reputation, that the guy with the hair is Artzt.

As they walk, the Captain introduces himself to the Champion, which turns into a private conversation as they pull ahead. The Champion explains their plans, and that he's disappointed to discover that justice in this town will apparently cost. He has a frank conversation with the Captain about the odds of finding justice in Schwarzhoele, and isn't happy with what he hears. Inga gets close enough to hear Schmitto tell the Champion that she can be an ally in his search if she didn't do it, but that if she did do it, her connections ensure that she'll get away with it.

They all arrive at the inn to see that there's a body on the floor and a recently-shot subaltern at the bar. Artzt produces a leather case full of his professional implements, and asks the Champion a couple questions about the food and the bowls. He does some tests on the stew, and then starts dissecting the body on the table. Inga protests, but Artzt tells her that moving the body would have repe rcussions on the investigation, while Champion tells her that justice is more important than her table. Someone mentions that Inga gave the Damerrung her special brew, and she protests that they were eating and drinking for a couple days without incident. The Champion interrupts and clarifies that they ate and drank for sustenance, but weren't drinking to intoxication. Artzt, meanwhile, determines that Silas was poisoned. Discussion of the rules of the kitchen reveals that Danziger is the most likely suspect, but his current whereabouts are unknown. The fact that there's an escape tunnels out of the inn does create considerable conversation, and the guards express an interest in searching the basement for them. Inga won't let them, so that leaves Schmitto with a strong suspicion that she has other tunnels.

She leads the Captain down the escape tunnel so they can see where it exits, and on the way back, and accidentally kicks a small glass vial. She looks around and sees that one of the guards also heard the noise, but she decides to bluff it out and act like she didn't.

Hike says she wants to take her armor off, and goes upstairs. While she's there, she looks in the bright place to see where Danziger is. She senses that he hasn't escaped town yet, and that he's hiding someplace cramped and dark. She returns to the common area of the inn.

The guards usher Inga back up. One of them approaches Schmitto and hands him a small glass vial, explaining that it was in the tunnel, that Inga saw it, and that she tried to act like she didn't.

Over at the bar, Hike and Egon trade witticisms. There's a commotion at the the door, as some messenger claims noble privilege due to his errand for House Entwiss. He has a message for Egon, which must be delivered to him and him alone. Hike brusquely tells the messenger that the bar is closed because someone died here, and tells him to fuck off. The messenger asks if Egon is here. Hike ignores the question and explains he can tell her, or he can fuck off. The messenger decides that since Egon seems to be present, he'll deliver the note to Hike, and trust her to pass it on. He will await a response, across the way.

Egon reads the letter. It's perfumed, and it says, "Having shot my husband, I expect you to appear in person to atone for your crimes." Atone is underlined in red. Egon figures this means she wants a little something something, and that she's not a woman to be kept waiting, so he takes his leave and heads to Lord Entwiss, with the messenger. This is not the outcome the messenger expected. He tries to run ahead to tell his lady that Egon is coming, but Egon insists that he requires assistance himself, and makes the messenger help him.

About half way there, a dude in an alley jumps out and shanks the messenger. The assailant shoves Egon against a wall and says, "Perhaps your assignment, Subaltern, was not clear... Someone in control is losing patience with Miss Muller. Either she is not producing information, or you are not delivering it." Whoever this guy is, he's not well-disposed toward the randy young cleric. He instructs Egon to force Inga to pressure Inga for information. After a hostile conversation, he turns Egon loose to do whatever, but informs him that they'll talk again soon, and that if he doesn't deliver something of value soon, they'll find him. He should report his findings directly to Lord Eisenbach, or by confessing to Deacon Flaubert. The mystery assailant vanishes, leaving Egon with the messenger's dead body and some blood on his clothes. Egon runs to the Entwiss house and tells Lady Entwiss that he and the messenger were mugged in the street. She promises that she'll deal with that problem herself. For the moment, time for his penance, in her chamber.

Tendahl, Carl, Lisel, and Himmler ponder leaving the goats at an outlying hovel, but it turns out to be inhabited. The old women says the Schummanns have taken everything not nailed down and left. The Mardners remain, at least some of them. At her request, and as part compensation for her intelligence, Tendahl has Himmler set a fire for her. As they leave, she calls out, "Smith, Saint Barbarossa watch over you." The party rides into town, on goats, eyes peeled. Carl tries to figure out who's in control here, and guesses that the people holed up in the stone barn are as close to "in control" as anyone gets. The place is dead quiet and the party can't afford to make any noise, so the best way in would be cut through the bright place into the stone barn and try to influence things. Tendahl figures that the people in the other village buildings, all isolated and poorly armed, would be vulnerable to them. He feels like he's being watched and followed, but the people in the stone barn are still the biggest threat, because they have more to use and more to lose.

At Carl's suggestion, they wind through town to Tendahl's old junkyard, and then Carl hands Tendahl his shotgun and vanishes into the bright place, and pops out in the hay mount of the stone barn, about an hour later. It's chock full of people, including a few Mardners, Timovay, a few Klements, and so forth. Thaddius Margner, in particular, is there. It's a total of 15-20 people, most armed with something. It's been about five days since Carl left town, so he pauses to come up with an explanation of how he resurfaced after that time, and then pops up and says, "Hello?"

Everyone is surprised to see the smith's apprentice. Thaddius tells them to bring the boy to him. His first question is how the boy got in, which makes him feel clever for having come up with a good lie first. Carl explains his errand, and everyone laughs at him. Carl asks if he can bring Tendahl in, and gets permission. He runs back to the junkhard, and all four ride over to the stone barn, though only Carl and Tendahl go in.

Klemens Kiefer lets Tendahl and Carl in. Tendahl preaches himself a little sermon, but the people in this here barn think they have it made, and Tendahl's hope seems insane to them. Carl whispers to Tendahl that he'll trade away Barbarossa's shotgun, and that's the deal they make - the shotgun for the help of the stone barn crew. It's a plan.