Tuesday 9th September Finn Finnegan - Male Halfling Thug 2 - NPC Flung Chow Wong - Male Human Monk 2 (FW TF) - Ian Luxton Halcyon - Female Priestess of Panadine 2 - Matt Carr Jack Rabbit - Male Halfling Thief 2 - Darryl Sherwood Mel Licious - Dwarf Psionicist 1 - Steven Krijnen Polly Ester - Female Human Bard 3 - Andrew Earl DM - Jeff ClendonFlung was still dubious about my intentions. Did he trust me over the Benign Benefactors of the Order of REAL, or did he not? I do not think that Flung would be very happy if he knew that he was working for the Thieves' Guild — no matter how honest and forthright the job was! And if Flung opted out, then Halcyon would follow pretty fast. And where would that leave us then? Up the Emerald in a barbed-wire canoe. Penniless destitutes.
Well, I would be anyway. Flung and Halcyon had the insurance and backup of their temples behind them. After all, their temples supply them with free accommodation and as much free spartan fare as they can wish for.
Would the Guild feed me? Yeah right. Altruism is not one of their strong points. I can see the exchange now:
"Excuse me, counter clerk," I would plead. "I'm hungry and cold. Can I have some food and shelter?"
"Of course, Ma'am," he'd reply sarcastically. "Now fuck off."
Or, more likely: "Show us your tits, whore." Unzipping his fly. "I'll be happy to feed you — suck on this."
So, I arranged a little proof of the Order.
The one thing you can say about namby pamby Lawful Goods is that they tend to lean on the side of the gullible. So I rented an attractive and well-spoken member off the Thieves' Guild and got her to pose as the Grand Facilitator of the Benign Benefactors of the Order of REAL — my contact and our employer. Then, with a few strategic and subtle spells cast (by me) on her, I made her look grand and important. She waxed lyrical and gave him a brilliant sob-story about the Order. Flung fell for the ruse, hook, line and sinker. He believed her story and proclaimed to Halcyon that we were indeed working for an honourable, just and much-wronged organization.
Now, some background. A season ago, the Thieves' Guild got a little too eager in the collection of tax. Protection tax, that is (after all, some varlet might rob the poor merchants, if it wasn't for the TG protecting said establishments). So a group of malcontented and shop-soiled merchants came together and formed the renegade Merchants' Association. This crowd then hired a whole lot of thugs to stop the hard-working TG tax collectors from taking their rightful tax. Seeing their neighbours not having to pay this tax, more and more shop-keepers and merchants joined the MA. The TG's revenues plummeted. Then we arrived on the scene.
The first Thieves' Guild job for us was to find out how the MA communicates. It appears every time the TG organizes a hit on a group of MA thugs outside a shop, reinforcements arrive very quickly. The reinforcements are gangs of more heavily-armed MA thugs who wander around town. But they get told somehow that there is a TG raid in progress and can arrive in time.
Halcyon, Mel and Flung got themselves employed by the MA. Flung and Mel as guards, and Halcyon as Healing Support. They were split up, so me and Jack Rabbit followed Flung and his new butt-boy Edward to their guard station, outside a nondescript hardware store. I then arranged, through my Guild contact Morten Frond, to have some TG gentlemen sent around to "converse" with Edward and Flung. Me and Jack watched the whole thing from the shadows.
The instant the members attacked, Edward talked into his hand — actually, into his hand. He had a ring on so there was some spell involved, of course. I cast a surrepticious Detect Magic and the ring glowed. That confirmed that.
Sure enough, the MA thugs arrived and beat the living crap out of the TG members. One poor TG guy was knocked down and the rest fled.
The MA thugs dragged this unconscious TG man away. I sneakily followed, and he was taken to the MA Building and HQ. We never saw him again.
That evening, back at the Guild, I reported to Morten my findings. He was most impressed, and gave me 100gp.
"Another 100gp if you get a ring for us to analyze," he quipped.
The next morning, I went with Halcyon and Mel to her guard duty. I told her that the Benign Benefactors of the Order of Real needed to borrow the magical ring, just for a few hours, to analyze how that it worked.
"... this would give them another arrow in their bow," I added with dramatic flair. "To help them rid the world of the scourge of the evil and no-good Merchants' Association. Who, after all, starve orphans and force women into whoring."
"Gosh!" exclaimed Halcyon. "Are they really that bad?"
I nodded sagaciously with a grim frown.
"In that case I probably should not be working for them," she stated abruptly.
"Ah.. no no... the more good work you do within the MA ... the more this will help the Order." Adding: "And the orphans."
She backed down with a worried nod.
I gave her a plain gold band (bought earlier), which matched the ring of her fellow guard Stephan, and asked her to see if she could swap. This worked a treat. She just gave him her biggest smile, wobbled her enormous bust, and he was more that happy to let her have a short look at the ring. I then simply brushed passed her and palmed the ring.
I rushed back to Morten with the ring. Then a few hours later, he returned me the ring, which I returned to Halcyon. And she did another switch. Stephan was none the wiser.
That evening Morten gave me the promised extra 100gp and proclaimed that the ring was a Ring of Whispering Wind. Whispering Wind is a wizard's spell that lets a message be magically passed to the nominated target.
Also that evening, Flung did some investigating in his temple's Great Library on the Merchants' Association. He got a list of the ten men who were on the board.