Lothar, in answer to your knocking (you'll probably have to bang the door a bit, or call out, to get the apothecary's attention), the door opens and you'll see the fellow you spoke with a few days ago looking shabby, overwrought and apparently having not slept. When he sees it is you, his eyes will widen. "Jesus Christ," he will murmur, "it is you. Come in, come in."
He will make room for you and Embla, and with some distraction and his insistence on one of you brewing some tea, he will sit down at a table in the apothecary's shop. There are twenty open books on the table, surrounding the tome that you brought him. He explains in a few words that he has been trying to translate the text ~ and that much of it horrifically coincides with the news he has been receiving through his business agent about what is going on around the town.
"You have woken something up," the apothecary, whose name is Gizur Aakur. "This book was written by a wizard named Hgiggle, somewhere near abouts the time of Beowulf. The humans were expanding through Sweden and Norway, pushing out the gnomes, the halflings and the stone giants and, apparently, a tribe called the Elba Pyarish; I've looked for a translation and find that it might mean 'evil frogs.' Does that sound like something you've encountered?"
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Yes! We were attacked by four man-sized frog creatures with wicked claws and teeth just before we left. Does it say how they were beaten, or how to banish them back to the hell they came from?
"Far from it!" says the Apothecary. "If I read this book right, the frog culture was at risk of being destroyed. They took the last of their kind into the deep earth, where Hgiggle put them all to sleep. He buried them, putting this book at the entrance, then disappeared. The book says something to the effect that when the world is unready, the frogs shall rise again. But I am paraphrasing."
If they were on the brink of destruction once, we can put them there again. My companions and I know where they were buried, and stand ready to put them back in their graves. Let us go to the Prince and the Burghermeister that we may lead them to the slimy hole these demons came from. Let us finish what your forebears began. If you wish, we might bring you back one or two of them to dissect.
[OK. Engelhart was correct.]
Have you uncovered any information about the creatures themselves? Did they have any particular weaknesses or limitations that Hgiggle exploited to drive them back?
"Wait!" Gizur shouts, not hearing Embla's question. "You can't tell the Burghermeister, not yet! Do you not have any idea how valuable this book is? How important the contents might be? If you tell, they will seize the book and its contents will be buried ~ worse, they may fall into someone else's hands!
"Just give me a week, please! Let me understand more about what's written here, before destroying my chances to learn anything further."
A week! How many more innocents will die at the claws of these monsters in a week's time? My conscience cannot bear that much blood, for any price. We must speak to the Burghermeister, as soon as possible. But - if you can gain us entrance to his council with the Aldermen and the Prince, we will keep quiet about the book for the time being. Tell him the frogs attacked us as we took the stones, if you wish. We may still save many innocents by assaulting their stronghold immediately. You paid us for the book, it is yours to do with or speak of as you see fit. All I ask is that you help us to speak to the men who defend this city, let us give them every advantage we may. If you wish us to, we will keep the book a secret for one week. Make a copy as best you are able, and for heaven's sake if you learn anything from it that will help us to defeat them, tell it us immediately! Will you help us to defend this town and the people in it?
[To the rest of the party: I realize I'm making some big promises here, but I think boldness is warranted in the current situation. If you wish to override me later, let us discuss that when we meet again, I'm not above breaking a promise to serve the greater good. My goal is to get the army to back us in assaulting the tomb, and to curry favor with the chief muckymucks by being so helpful. We get XP for damage taken by anyone on our side in a battle, and it sounds like there is a real battle coming. Granted, we may lose exclusive rights to the loot in the tomb, but a portion of the gold with our lives (and possibly the lauds of the town) is better in my estimation than death and all the gold in the world]
"Are you mad?" asks the apothecary incredulously. "Do you think the Burghermeister will not have magic at his elbow? He will detect lie with me or you, and know that I am withholding the knowledge of the book.
"What does it matter than a few peasants and farmers have died? Can you not see the larger picture? The forces that exist will already be emptying the outer farms, moving the people there into town ~ whatever knowledge we give them now won't stop that. If there are a few more people to die, it will only be those so far from the ordinary things that they cannot be reached to be saved. They are probably dead already! What good does it to play our hand when already plans are in motion. Let the common business of running the land be taken up by those made for it ~ we have bigger things to concern ourselves! What magics might they have? What devices? We don't know if there are only hundreds or thousands. Do you want all that to fall into the hands of empty-minded BUREAUCRATS?"
Mad? Perhaps. But the longer we sit on top of this information before we do anything useful with it, the less inclined the higher powers will be to show gratitude for our sharing it. What is the worst that a detect lie will do? Detect a lie? Then tell no lie. I came to you, offering to sell some carved stones we had won from a barrow. In the barrow we were attacked by frog demons. After healing from the battle we learned of the attacks in the countryside, and the description of the attackers matched those creatures we slew in the tomb. Wishing to aid the Burghermeister in dealing with the creatures, we sought you out, a respected member of the community, to gain an audience to tell them where the barrow is, where the frogs might well have their base. Do not mention the book, and he will have no reason to question you about it, and thus you will have no need to lie. I would much rather ride at the head of the victorious than be dragged behind them in chains for keeping silence when speaking might have saved lives.
You seem to miss that withholding the truth is a lie. When the Authorities ask, "How do you know this?", what will you tell them? When they ask, "What else did you find when you were there?", what will you tell them?
I can see that the wiki is not clear on what is a lie. I interpret that as the truth, the WHOLE truth and nothing but the truth. The spell will not tell what the lies are, but as long as the spell continues to indicate that you're lying, chances are they will just continue to hold you until they let you go.
To bring this to the point, the apothecary will, if you insist, turn over the book. But not happily. He will say that he feels that you are doing the equivalent of extorting him, since if you talk to the authorities, he will have to also.
Any dealings with the authorities, he will say, tend to go badly ~ unless a person is ALSO an authority. It isn't that you've committed a crime; chances are, they would welcome you with open arms, Gizur says, for the information, and never blame you for investigating a pagan tomb. Fair game, that. But they would want to know everything, then push you out of the game completely, since once they know what's going on they will take charge. That means, don't count on leading a team, don't count on getting anywhere near that barrow again. Obviously, it isn't completely lost; there would be other druids that knew about its location, or locate spells that could find it, divination and the like . . . so the authorities, once they have the info, WON'T NEED YOU. And therefore, won't want you. In fact, they'll be anxious to be sure they glom all the treasure for themselves.
(I can't provide input here because I foolishly didn't jump on the chance to tag along. But I believe in the both of your decision here, whatever it may be.)
(Also, since I don't speak Norwegian. Is that "Huh-giggle" "Hyeel-uh" or "Ha-geeg-luh".)
Gizur only has the name written down. He doesn't know how it is pronounced correctly. He thinks that Hgiggle may have been a frog creature himself.
[It's cool out here on the side-lines...]
I tell the apothecary that we will need to confer with our fellow adventurers and that we'll be sure to let him know if we decide to talk to the Burghermeister.
Lothar, shall we head back?
Yes, let's head back. We leave the book with the Apothecary for now, and promise to give notice if we do decide to go to the Burghermeister.
[In case it wasn't apparent, I really felt (and enjoyed) the tension in this exchange, and though I didn't get exactly what I set out to obtain from the conversation, I feel as though I learned some valuable information... Thank you, Alexis, well run!]
[it would have been really easy to just have the apothecary be upstanding and decent, but it is so much more fun to show other persons having their own agendas apart from the party's. These are the best exchanges ~ where there's conflict but no threats, where the nuance isn't right and wrong, but how narrow we can slice the difference between my gain and your gain. I so like writing that goes for this, but it is hard to find.
Give me an idea of what you and the party might like to do next; if talk about this, give me an idea of where. Common room at an inn? At Engelhart's? Someplace more secure? Lothar still has the shack out in the forest (near the lakes south of Hole, where his stolen furs are hidden).
I still have board at that Inn, but I'm willing to tag along wherever.
Perhaps it would behoove us to move to a more private location, the cabin looks like it might be a good location to discuss our options without being overheard. I don't know that I'd be comfortable with Engelhart's grandfather listening over our shoulders.
Alright, I'll follow Lothar to the cabin.
Let's get this thing sorted.
I concur - let's head to the cabin. I make sure to bring Petar and Willa with us.
Likewise with Bergthora, Valda and Fjall (especially since if I remember correctly the cabin properly belongs to one of them). It's not a big place, 10 feet square, so we may want to bring the tents or plan on coming back to town depending on how long it takes to get there and back, and what the weather is doing, and what we end up deciding our course of action should be.
The distance to the cabin is about ten miles, most of it along roads, the last two on a trail, so it will take five hours to get there. Still game?
We're devoting the day to this. Oddsdraken will accompany me, and we might as well pack everything up as if we're riding out given how long the round trip will be. I'll wear the Studded Leather for the duration of the ride.
No telling what sort of nefarious amphibians might be about.
How suspicious would it be if we were to leave town for an undisclosed location after all of this stuff starts happening?
Does the inn have a private dining room in which we wouldn't be disturbed and (theoretically) could not be overheard?
W-what's all this about leaving for 5 miles into the countryside?
Ahm, okay, I'm game, suppose it's arguable that we [i]will[/i] have to leave the borough sooner or later; but I'll be taking my brand new banded mail & maul out for a ride; And I'll be polishing that initiative die until we depart, for sure.
Embla & Lothar: for the record, I realistically think this is a somewhat dubious idea. Roving the countryside at the present moment for what could well be done here. I'm itching for a fight, same as you and patrolling the roads as part of the forces of law and order ought to carry no penalty, unless we're somehow made out as looters, but you ought to disclose the fur-angle, 10 hours of hiking seems a long shrift in exchange for privacy.
I'll second Embla's question.
I was interested in picking up those furs and having a good jumping-off point in case our decisions tended that way, but if we can make the same decision without rolling for random encounters against 3d4 frogmen, then that's good too.
The next post is up.
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