Orig Post: 2010-05-29
Go to the Blackfoot Stables in Dunstrand City – seek out Pekki Netherwood, the owner of that fine establishment. He can help supply you and get you started on you path, the merchants and him are allied in this matter, and all further contact should be through him.
200 silvers per month, per person. Help with healing, repair, and supply where possible, reimbursement in kind where not – after the fact. In return, the fate and status of each of the old families must be completely researched and documented. Is there a living heir? Who was the last? Is their branches not dead? Gather what proof can be gathered. Get signed witness statements as much as possible.
Cover Story: A rich and powerful family from far away to the south (who wants to remain un-named) had one of their line marry into one of the Riverdan lines – though she never wrote back. You are looking to find her name or one like it in the lists. Her name is ‘Heather’ (or whatever)
The crew goes to meet Pekki Netherwood at the Blackfoot Stables. There, they also meet Grak (a big half-ork who prefers to be called Abani), and Don – Abani’s assistant. Pekki pitches his deal, 200 silvers a month, healing, equipment replacement – he even claims that it may take a year (which we were all interested in – more silver). We excused ourselves to talk about the deal away from the stables and prying eyes of our potential employer. The mission and pay all seem to be acceptable.
Greetings: Pekki greets you warmly and thanks you for accepting the job. “It may take a while, a year even, but whatever the time it takes, it needs to be done. Me and mine, we got patience. Maybe not the coin and the power to make it all happen at once, but we’ve learned to wait – thats just the way of things when you’re small fish in a big pond. But, with your help, us wee fish can move fast and eat up all the big pieces when things change around here. Of course, if you do this well, we’ll want you in on that action as well (if you are interested, of course). Whatever comes, someone will pay handsomely for the job you will do – no doubt there. So, we’ll want you to get started right away. Coin we may not have a lot of, but we are merchants and businessmen – ‘things’ we got plenty of and anything we can help with (within reason, of course) we’re willing to help with. There’s several shops here on Cardman Street – in addition to the gambling halls. I’m known to all the fine establishments around here, so you just go see what you need and you just go ahead and ask – and if you have any problems, you just see my business associate Grak – he’s the assistant head stablemaster and lives above the mains tables just around the corner. In fact, if you have any problems, you see him. I’m just as liable to be out of town as in (i’m a busy man you know), so you report to him when you are ready to leave. I’m gonna give each of you a hundred silver crowns right up front – you seem trustworthy. You can stay here in the stables if you have nowhere else – Grak will see to everything. I’m sure you are going to like him, he was once an adventurer like yourselves. Well, then, business must be taken care of… i’ll let you enjoy some grub i got here – not much, sometimes i just don’t eat and there’s lots here. When you’re done, you can see Don, Grak’s assistant and he’ll find you beds. tomorrow you can ‘gear-up’ and ‘head-out’. Ha! Best of luck then.”
With that he snaps his fingers, winks and waves as he leaves – whistling to himself. Don comes in and helps you wash down the last of the 2 pitchers of beer and finds you clean stables to bed down in.
They have given us a strange ring, so that their affiliates along the way will know us as allies and aid us – a ring with some sort of raised, black lizard on it. We talk over our fears; ‘certain parties’, and ‘certain powers’ always scare us…we really don’t know who we are dealing with. On the other hand, we’ve all been given a bonus of 100 silvers without doing a single thing. We confirmed our desire to work on the research project after meeting Grumwell and discussing it. Pekki seemed pleased and said we should contact Grak with all issues – so we do. Grak gave us a list of all the place in the ‘dans where we can find shops and persons part of the Surefoot Merchant Coster which could reimburse us, re-supply us, and help with healing. Its about 1 place in every other ‘dan territory, and widely varied in their business (smith, crofter, etc.). We were told to talk to the locals for any supplies we may need. Belim haggled down the cost to nothing in a few cases, but the most we paid was half price for any goods. Don helped us find a bed and we vowed to set off the next day.
The group is given a quick knowledge dump of basic [[original riverdan info|basic Riverdan information]].
The taciturn and dour halfling Gellwin joins the group in meeting, brought at the last minute by Sira Goll.