War for the Crown Gameplay

Momo thumbs at her chin, squinting off as the figure leaves her field of view. "Do you think he's on to us? One reason not to sound suspicious is if you already know something to be true."

”Nothing in his tone indicated he harbored suspicion, but beyond that, I couldn’t say for sure,” Adelaide answers. ”We should convene with the rest to discuss tax collection and investigation. And to see if Gul’s men reached anyone before the interlopers.”

"You meet with the others. I'm going to make sure the townsfolk under our protection are alright," Momo answers, moving towards the village with her whole bevy of healing at the ready.

”They may have a specific direction to point you in,” Adelaide comments with a small smile. ”Though I suppose Stachys isn’t too large either way.”

Momo pauses and then nods. "Alright, sure. Let's go see what they have to say."

"We're back, Corey," Sarina announces, still invisible, dropping the spell on herself and Josie shortly after. "Things went well, the thugs were all knocked out. Guisarne proved to be too much of a challenge for just us two to face, but we managed to make an escape."

Corey lets out a sigh of relief and sags into the sofa. "Good 'nuff fer me," he says. "Ah'm glad ya got away. Hopefully we won't gotta do nothin' like that again."

"We'll see what the future holds," Sarina says with a shrug. "Though, I do hope we don't encounter many more dangerous situations where we can't bring all five of us to meet it. Anyways, I'll be going to get changed, and be back to wait for Adelaide and Momo."

”Oh, our timing is good,” Adelaide notes, having walked in just in time for the last sentence. ”Before you go, where should Momo be going to heal the injured? Or were there any?”

"There was one man with a broken hand, looked like," Sarina says, giving the directions to the house. "Though, it might be best to ask someone on the way there about where the attack occurred, just to keep up the rise as best as we can."

Momo hastens to make her way towards the house with the broken-handed guy. "Back and forth and back and forth..." she grumbles.

She finds him and his husband seated at their table, wrapping the broken hand in spare rags, but when they see her they both scramble to their feet to bow. ”M’lady we are deeply sorry,” the uninjuered one starts apologizing. ”We couldn’t quite afford the tax and then they started rooting through the drawers and then...”

Momo shakes her head. "The way they tax collection is handled by him and his men is barbaric. We'll figure out some way that you can pay in another way, alright?" she says, before casting her hand forwards to channel positive energy towards the man with a broken hand.

”Thank you m’lady,” the injured one sighs in relief as the bones in his hand mend. ”We make tinctures and oils,” the uninjured one explains. ”We paid for a shipment of supplies earlier this week and so didn’t have the coin immediately, but we could pay you back with a month’s supply of lamp oil and candles for the manor within a week?” he offers, an arrangement surely worth more than he owes in taxes.

Momo smiles brightly at their willingness to work. "I don't want to scam the both of you. We'll pay you what it's worth properly," she answers.

Once Sarina has returned from changing out of her costume, she returns to where Adelaide and Corey are. "So, how did the talk with Sir Guisarne go?" she asks.

"Whatever you feel is appropriate, m'lady, thank you," the uninjured one bows to Momo.

Adelaide flips out her notes. "'Two bandits, likely working with Night Swan due to same style of costuming,'" she reads. "'Mage and archer. Capable spellcaster may mean Night Swan's operations expanding. Magic missile and invisibility spells. Noted neither are particularly distinctive. Archer talented, possibly trained by the Night Swan or the Night Swan in another disguise.'" She sets the notes aside and looks to Sarina, Josie and Corey. "We were tasked with following up on the bandits, and collecting the remaining taxes to send within the week."

Somewhat relieved, Josie replies, "Sounds like he didn't get anything incriminating. That's good. We should be able to gather up the taxes in the next day or two and get them taken care of."

"The taxes are relatively unconcerning, yes," Adelaide agrees. "And I think we should put forward some effort to 'locate' the bandits while we're collecting taxes. It sounds like by all means we won't find a 'lead', but we were specifically asked to report something back."

Sarina nods in agreement. "Besides that, just knowing the rumors the townsfolk are saying about the latest events is always useful too,"

The following morning, just as the sun's rising and Corey starts to wake, he sees Kalbio next to his bed, sitting up and staring right at him. The goat seems to be baring his teeth in an approximation of a smile. "Gooood morning Corey!" he brays, his voice having the frayed edge of a goat's, but with the intonation of the announcer at a big tournament, and an Andoran accent. Anyone outside the room but Corey just hears the quiet braying of a goat.

Corey sits up. Blinks. Stares at Kalbio. Blinks again.

"... Ah ain't never had a dream that started with gettin' outa bed before." Satisfied, Corey stands up and heads to the window, intent on going for a pleasant fly.

"Not a dream buddy!" Kalbio shakes his head side to side. "Decided to break the news to you slowly and all. You're a busy man, lots to think about, didn't need to add a talking goat to the list immediately."

Corey pauses at the window and looks at Kalbio. "... y'know, that's prolly what a dream would say, but Ah've... well, no, Ah ain't seen weirder than mah goat talkin' ta me, but it's been close."