Drider
Retracing the Rat's Steps
Sunday, August 13, 1852. 9:30AM
Owl, Irfan, and anybody else who volunteers to join her makes their way to the front gates of the school, where Mr. Popov gives you new medallions and lets you outside. You find the town just as busy as yesterday. It's a little cooler than yesterday though, with a nice refreshing breeze blowing through the streets.
Phase Spider
Irfan takes the medallion. Outside, he turns to Owl, "I'm still confused. What are we out here to do again?"
Aranea
"A grad student got blackout drunk off just a few drinks and woke up missing a valuable item. Someone told him he had gambled with it and lost. He needs the item back. That's the core of the issue." Owl pauses briefly before continuing. "The student, a ratfolk called Eshan, claims that he is not a heavy drinker, and according to him he did not drink enough to have lost his memory of the night's activities. The item doesn't actually belong to him, and he does not believe he would have gambled with it. The man who has the item, a Corocan called Ricardo, has offered to sell it back for a thousand gold, which is well beyond Eshan's means."
"I just met Eshan today, so I don't know how much of his story is true. We need to go to The Tortoise Shell and try to find out what happened last week. I don't want to confront this Corocan with just Eshan's word. If Eshan did get drunk and foolishly gambled the item away, he will go to the item's owner and confess all. If the item was stolen from him, he wants to steal it back. He doesn't think he will get truthful answers if he handles the investigation himself."
"My plan is to go to the Turtle, have a drink, and talk about the story we heard about a grad student who was stupid enough to get totally wasted and gambled away everything he had - his money, his boots, you know how stories get exaggerated in the telling. Then we hope someone tells us what really happened."
Phase Spider
Irfan smiles, "noble mission. Also, I do like your plan. One consideration, we don't knock the gambling so much as losing at gambling. That way it leaves open the option of baiting the guilty party." He holds up his new magic pocket watch, "for example".
Aranea
Phase Spider
Irfan lets the silver pocket-watch fall from between his thumb and index finger to rest against his palm. "By rewinding the watch to the desired time, you can see a snippet of the past from up to 24 hours ago. The face of the watch shows an image of the room you are in and plays a few, non-audible minutes of events taking place in the room starting at the indicated time.
"It might have been useful for our current objective, if not for two things. 1, it only works once a day, and I have already used it today. And b, we don't have an exact time when this possible theft happened."
Aranea
"Well, the incident happened last week, so the watch couldn't have helped us anyway," Owl replies as she starts walking into town. "So, did you hear about that ratfolk that got so drunk he gambled away his spellbook?" She starts getting into character, so to speak.
Phase Spider
Irfan happily lets Owl take the lead. Ches follows behind the groups, keeping to the shadows.
Drider
The two of you find your way to The Tortoise Shell. It's an actual enormous tortoise shell, the size of your average tavern, plopped down in between a goldsmith and a book store. The Tortoise has a set of doors in its neck-hole and you can see a little bit of smoke coming from a chimney in the back right leg hole. It sounds quiet enough inside, but it is only 9:40 in the morning.
Phase Spider
Irfan moves to open the door, then pauses to look at Owl. "Are you ready?"
Once inside the young man scans the room in a slow pan. "I'll get us some drinks," he makes his way to the bar to order a bottle of wine and two glasses.
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