04.03b - "The morning after"

The sun rose on the 4th day of the caravan, as Brynne started a fire and gathered supplies to make biscuits, showing Apostrofae how. As they cooked skillet biscuits, A’postrofae asked Brynne, “what was going on with the real Biscuit.”

"Welp." Brynne replied, sittting by the fire and poking at the dirt a bit with a stick. "I dinnae like ter gossip or guess. I figure I'll go talk ter Blak 'n Bismark separate-like. See wha' they say. Cause wha' i saw looked like an argument over a sword. Doesna seem like ole Bismark, does it"

“No it doesn’t.” Apostrofae told her.

"Seemed right happy after visitin' family, eh? An' gettin' ter show tha' pretty lass 'round." Brynne said, peeking at the biscuits and saying, "they'll keep. I'm gonna go see Blak firs'. Wanna come?"

“Sure. I have nothing to do until we start moving again.”

Blak, awake and glad he was not murdered in the night, decided he would take care of two birds with one stone. As the guards busied themselves with the necessities of breaking camp, Blak performed a self-deprecating, foppish comedy routine, as he powdered, preened, and prepared himself as if he's not about to be eating a full day's worth of road dirt. As he does this, he kept his eyes peeled for the gaggle of merchants hopefully interested in the auctioning of the remaining goods so he can sell them and divide out shares.

Brynne walked over to where Blak was grooming, unable to keep from chuckling, and waved. "Oy, ya got a minute thar, tart?" A’postrofae just watched Blak with a weird look on her face.

"Ah, good, you are finally here," he said, winking at her "Can you help me with my girdle, it shrank in the night and can no longer handle my girth"

Brynne looks at the young girl elf and whispers, "Ya ever wanna dress up, ya know who ter talk to fer sure" she belly laughed at Blak. "Girdle? Yer pullin' me leg"

“What is a girdle?” Apostrofae asked.

Blak started to fine-comb his eye lashes while fluttering them and then asks the nearest Guard if these pants make him look fat.

"Holds yer gut in so's ya look skinny" Brynne explained.

On the side, Blak whispered, "Good morning!"

“Oh, where I come from if you get fat the Yuan-Ti eat you because you can’t outrun them anymore.” Apostrofae said, nonplussed.

"Blak. Why don' ya tell us wha' in tha' hells was goin' on las' nigh'? I had to pick me jaw off tha ground" Brynne said, cutting to the chase.

He stopped his routine and regarded the both of them. "Oh, well.  That sort of makes 2 of us You remember that haul we reigned in yesterday evening?"

"Yerp" Brynne said, adjusting her belt. Apostrofae agreed - “I remember the fight. I didn’t bother with the boxes.”

"Neither did I,” Brynne said, “but I were 'ware you 'n tha others brought in some goods"

Blak start in on his story. "Well, before anyone strode out there, I was asking Leda about salvage rights to such things.  She said if the owners aren't alive anymore, well, then the finders can have salvage rights. Of course, we didn't make out for that noble to get killed, but things happen, right, and I figured let's take advantage of the change in fortune. So you probably heard me yelling out to claim it."

Apostrofae nodded. “Yes, I remember that. I thought it was odd that you were claiming a box.” Brynne grunted an assent.

Blak continued. "I figured that'd go easier.  Well, maybe except Gamble. Him and I don't really have charges and such.  Easier for us to do something like that on the side I thought.  Anyway, I checked out all the goods to see what help they'd be to us.  Fancy Northern cloths, animal pelts, gems, art pieces, and the noble was carrying a few things plus a very fine rapier. " Brynne nodded, waiting for more. "When I saw the goods, I thought, well, at least we're traveling with merchants.  I mean, I'm not a merchant, you all are not merchants, I don't think any of us intend to become merchants (especially with most of these good better aimed for the south and us heading north), so I thought them best sold off then carried.  I figured I could drum up some interest in their value and get these merchants salivating for an auction this morning. Leda read my mind!  She set everything up - a fine rough, and tough, woman she is, though arguably in need of better dental hygiene. Then, once it generated coin in hand, I could divi out shares, you know?  I mean, we all chip in and do good work and all."

"Ok, I'm followin'" Brynne said.

"There was just one problem:  That Rapier was really nice.  I could tell Bismark knew this.  He asked 'anyone want this...no?...good...and snatched it up with a quickness.  It was as if he was possessed or something. I get that it is immediately useful to us, but nonetheless, I felt it needed to be appraised.  Afterall, Busmark may have walked off with 10 shares to each of our 1.". Brynne continued to nod. "I said to him, hey Bis, let's get that appraised first before you add it to those 2 gems you already grabbed." Brynne chuckled slightly. "He basically told me He'd just take the gems and the rapier and we could all have the rest.  I shared with him how that may not have been an even split, and to make sure, asked that we appraise it with the smith over there. He told me no and wouldn't answer as to why.  I asked him for more and he just started walking off with the weapon. Well, to be fair, now I was irritated.  I don't like toughs or bullies - you may already know this from the few times I mentioned my brothers.  These things happen when you grow up a drow, like me in a predominately human city.  Anyway, I appealed to his faith.  He shrugged it off.  Then...I think I asked him if Helm condoned thieves or the like."

Brynne's eyebrows shoot up. "Ya did, eh? Yowch"

"That got him to turn around at least.  But then he did something I didn't expect:  He drew the new weapon on me and challenged me, a potentially lesser physical man to a physical contest, intended to do harm." Blak continued with his story, casuing Apostrofae’s wandering attention to suddenly focus back to the story. "I...just wanted the damned thing appraised so we could get shares right.  So...I may have tried to use a wee bit of magic to suggest he take it to get it appraised.  I mean, I could have told him to throw it in a lake or donate it, or any number of other things.  But I wasn't trying to be malicious."

Brynne snorted and rubbed a hand over her face. “You actually cast a spell on him to do something against his will?” Apostrofae asked.

"Everything went sorta fast at that point.  He shrugged of my suggestion and started to advance on me, so I did it again.  That one took. Then...well...we got it appraised.  I sorta felt like things were amiss with him though so I was on my guard.  As soon as we got it appraised, and the smith shared the 10,000 gold minimum value for that Lords weapon, the enchantment released.  Then his first instinct was, unfortunately, to try and maim or kill me.  Hence the running a screaming...more theatrics.  I figured by this point better get help to end it without bloodshed."

"Yah i sawr tha' bit" Brynne told him.

"This was after I congratulated him for now being rich.  Maybe that's what set him off...'Lord Mismark'. Sheesh"

“But he is not rich. That sword is not his. We all participated in that fight.” Apostrofae pointed out

"Do me a favor. I wanna know wha' tha' spell feels like. Cast in on me if ya' don' mind too much"

"Well, he thinks it is.  He wasn't interested in determining how many shares it is worth.  Maybe the rest of you will have a better time of it. It sort of reminded me of how he very...um...passionately dealt with that cultist he interrogated a while back near Greenest in the wood.  The only problem was, well, I'm not a cultist.  And I thought we were all allies."

“You should all know by now that I don’t care about gold or riches but we can’t have people worried more about what they can grab than they care about finishing the fight.” Apostrofae said.

“I wasnae gonna ask fer any o' that box seein' as I stayed back wit me charge. But, yah, i think we otter least have a talk abou' spoils since it dinnae seem like we're on tha' same page. Yah probly shouldna used tha' magic on 'im tho, son” Brynne told them.

"Oh?” Blak asked. “Should I have dueled him for it then?  As you saw, he well intended to maim me"

"Nah, i wouldna say you should duel him. Tha's a fair point brynne conceded.

"I agree with that A'postrophae.” Blak replied. ”And Brynne, you want me to try and put that spell on you to make you want to do something you may not want to that is not violent? I...always had a time backing down from those in a position like his.  I learned that never helped and only became self feeding, generating more and more. Now, it is sort of my personality now where when someone reacts negatively to me with their strengths...well...instead of shirking, I react with mine."

Brynne laughed. "no, nuthin violent. Just, ah, somethin' i wouldna do normally. keep me britches on if ya please."

Brynned nodded. "A'right then"

"But the spell...really?" Blak asked. "Let me think..."

"Yeah. Wanna know how 'tis,” Brynne told him. "Britches up. Me only rule"

Blak made some hand motions, and told Brynne “You know, I just drew fresh bath water in my tent earlier. You should go in there and scrub up good until you're squeezy clean. Go ahead, go into my tent and take a nice bath. you deserve it Brynne! And if you want, I guess you can leave your britches on. But I'll leave that up to you"

Brynne shook it off. "Dinnae work, son.  Felt odd tho"

As Blak did it again, he finished the spell, and said “so that’s exactly how it went with him…  Brynne began to sing a dwarven march as she happily marched off to the tent, stripped down and started scrubbing. “Hey, where are you going?" Blak turned to A'postrophae, "As I was saying, that, is exactly like how it happened with Bismark. See, the first time it didn't work, she said it felt odd but didn't want to murder me." he shrugged

“No I don’t expect you to dual an expert swordsman. I just want to understand what happened. This really doesn’t sound like Bismarck. I wonder if that sword has bewitched him somehow. I have heard of such things.” Apostrofae observed.

Brynne hollered from the tent. "Ya took tha' words righ' outta me mouth, 'Postraphae!"

“That is a powerful spell.” Apostrofae said, looking over at the tent.

"Hey! 'Old on a momen. Jus' be 'o bit longer in tha' tub!" Brynne called out.

“Can you drop the spell when you want? She’d going to scrub her skin off by the sound of it.” Apostrofae asked. Brynned eventually made her way out, clean and pink skinned and damp hair, and clothed. “Then again, maybe we are seeing the real Bismarck. We just met the guy.”

Brynne looks skyward and squints her eyes against the morning light. "Could be truth yer speakin' bout him, but I hope yer wrong, all tha same.” She started to shake water out of her ear. "Well, I weren't in a mood fer me annual terday, buuut i guess i got it out 'o tha way"

Blak waved and walked off to see if the merchants had had time to look at the goods.

“You smell funny now.” Apostrofae told her.

Brynne sniffed herself. "Smell 'o bit like you, Blak," then laughs salaciously

“We should go talk to Bismark.” Apostrofae said to Brynne.

Brynne tousled her damp locks. "Yup, let's go say hi"

As they walked off, Able walked over to the untended biscuit skillet. Looking left, and then right, and seeing no adults, he quickly snatched a biscuit from the pot.

As the majority of the merchant train continues to break camp, the morning light found Leda speaking with about a dozen of the merchants, all the boxes on the freight wagon having been opened and inspected at first light. Seeing Blak approaching, she nodded to Blak and motioned him over.

"Salvage rights to go you and your group mister entrepreneurial entertainer. You're gonna fetch a pretty low price unfortunately. The majority of the wagons are already near capacity and we don't have enough spare animals to salvage the freight wagon." Behind her a few guards and laborers were already tearing down what they could for spare parts for the road ahead.

"This stuff would've sold for a few thousand gold all told, per my discussion with the group. However we can only probably offload one part out of ten. Then they have to get it for the cheap so they can make a profit. If we had the horses to spare you'd have a hell of a payday mr. blak"

A couple of the merchants came over after shaking hands. "Mistress Leda, after selling the different boxes in lots, the auction finalized at 455 gold. Plus another 30 gold in parts for wagon repair that we're salvaging. It pains me to leave so much else behind. Chardin over there wants to burn the rest out of spite so no one else can have it after we've left."

Leda smiled with the corner of her mouth, "That's up to Mister Blak if he wants to see it go up in smoke or if some merchant traveling south finds one hell of an unexpected fortune in his path." Turning back she glanced at the freight wagon and shook her head, "I can't for the life of me figure out what would fill that dead noble's head with such ... riskless confidence to take a freight wagon with only a half dozen guards all by itself, and not part of a train."

Blak nodded. "I thank you, Leda for putting this together.  Do you get a cut of what these merchants sell? As to the oddity of that Noble's traveling arrangements, I'll trust your expert judgement on that."

"Not my salvage. I collect a guard free at the start of the journey and at the end. Although donations and tips are appreciated" she said with a wry smile.

"Well then.  I don't think you should go unrewarded for your organizational skills and willingness to help a poor, skinny, Drow, entrepreneur, entertainer, out." He'll give her 20 of the gold

--

A'postrofae and Brynne tracked down Bismark for a conversation. They found him sitting up against a tree with his gear mostly packed up sitting beside him, eating an apple & watching over toward Orvuestra's wagons. They walked up to Bismark. Apostrofae blurted out "So, Bismarck...We were hoping that we could talk to you about the what happened between you and Blak."

Brynne smiled cheerfully as they approached. "Mornin', Bismark."

Bismark glanced up, finished his apple and tossed the core over to his horse. "Oh, hi."

"So...the thing with Blak. The whole caravan is talking about it. What happened?" Apostrofae pushed.

"Why, have you two come to read me ze riot act as well?" He says fidgeting with a stick he picked up off the ground

"Naw, son.” Brynne told him. ”Yeh've bin good ter me and good ter have on tha' road. Jus' wan ter hear it from you, tha's all."

Bismark looked up. "We finished that fight and I found this rapier on that dead Noble. A very good weapon, possibly better quality than my teacher had when he trained me... So I took it. The entertainer disagreed and said that that was group property and it should be appraised. I told him to forego any of my pay, save for 2 gems then, as I wanted to give one to my charge since it was her first battle... Blak insisted that I get it appraised, he obviously wanted to sell this beautiful instrument for coin." He said, pulling it out slightly and admiring the details. "The fine edge, it's light and fluid movement... I had to have it. Have you seen the thing that I've been having to work with?"

Brynne nodded and listened quietly

"Blak has a point.” Apostrofae interrupted. “You didn't fight that battle on your own. Just because you happened to roll over a body and find something special doesn't mean that it is yours. I don't care about pokey swords, I have no need of them nor do I care about gold...but we need to have an agreement in place and I don't think, "I found it it's mine is going to work."

"Now hold on, darlin, let 'im finish" Brynne said, holding up her hand. A'postrofae shut up but looked annoyed. Brynne patted her shoulder in thanks

"Anyway, I told him I had made my appraisal that this would make me a better fighter, better guard, and if he disagreed, he could challenge my conclusion. The coward wouldn't draw a weapon, but rather used magic to try and force me against my will to obey him." Bismark's voice started to raise and then he took a deep breath to calm down. "It didn't work, so I called him a coward and turned my back to walk away, and he forced himself into my mind this time and had his way with me, making me walk it over to the appraiser, him dancing about cheeky and parading his control over me the whole way."

Brynne looked as though a lightbulb has gone off in her head, and waited to see if Bismark had more to say.

"So then once the spell wore off, I grabbed the sword to spin around and knock him on his rear and teach him a lesson about forcing his will on me, but he had already turned to run, yelling to the whole" bismark opened his arms wide in a hyperbolic gesture "freaking camp that I had attacked him." Bismark looks Brynne in the eyes. "I didn't chase. I let him run. But I keep thinking that if I had gone snitching like that where i grew up, I wouldn't be alive today. And his filthy magics, so help me, if he ever tries that again on me, I might not be able to stay my hand." Bismark paused, and started playing with the stick again. "So, Leda and a bunch of her guards come riding up, and I explain to her that I was just going to teach him a lesson - I would have healed him you know - and she pulls my charge from me and gives her to freaking Hendren, or whatever the hell his name is. Amatuer. have you seen him swing a sword?" Bismark said making a dismissive wave. "She took my charge, Brynne! I failed her" he said in a raised voice again, and then lowered it again, softer. "just like Vik, just like Talis... " and tossed the stick off into the tall grass, watching it.

"I 'preciate yer tellin' us how it was fer ya." Brynne scratched her head sheepishly and said, "Ya ever figure though that he's a wee bit smaller'n you, and might no' see a one on one fight as a fair suggestion?

Bismark shrugged and started rolling up his bedroll, murmuring as he did. "took me a year and a half to steal enough coin to make that old rapier even usable. that idiot wasn't worthy of it."

Brynne opened her mouth to say something, that chokes it off mid word. "Steal, eh? I ain't judgin' but I wouldna figured you fer tha sort"

"Why do you say that? He stole a sword right in front of those that fought beside him yesterday." Apostrofae said, pointing

"Well yeah, but i thought mebbe somethin' else were wrong. Or hell, mebbe the sword were tha problem" Brynne said. "I mean, dangit---i ain't accusin' yeh of thievin', Bismark. I jus meant tha what i sawr yesterday was passin strange fer what I've seen of ya up ter this point"

Bismark stopped and took a deep breath, standing up facing Brynne. "Brynne, i know you don't mean anything by that, but when you're an unwanted kid from a whore in the outer city, you do what you have to. stealing was how I survived." Bismark goes back to his roll, stuffing it in his pack.

"well, are yeh sayin' yeh dinnae want ter appraise tha' fancy sword cause yeh thought we'd all wanna sell it?"

"well yeah." Bismark said, his expression showing that he thought that was obvious. "why else would he want to know what it was worth and broadcast it to the whole camp?"

Brynne "I'm here fer tha booze 'n biscuits. I figure we can talk out tha rest yah know?"

"We should sell the damned thing! If it's worth what the weapon smith said it was worth we can buy a hell of a lot more useful things than a fancy pigsticker for one person!"

"So how's abou' we all git together and talk it over, eh?" Brynne said, interrupting Apostrofae.

"what, bigger bottles of booze, apos?"

"I buy my fucking booze with money I earned. Not with what I stole from the people that were fighting with me." Apostrofae yelled.

Brynne stepped in between the two of them, and smiled, "Eh, now, sweet bairns. How abou' we all take wee bit 'o time ter ourselves. Then we kin talk again, ever one o' us, at dinner, huh?"

"Since when have you cared about coin? and what sort of high horse do you think you're riding 'round on?" Bismark snapped. Brynne is not sure which one she should start to try to pull away. Bismark is too big and Apostrofae has hand fangs. She looks back and forth between the two of them trying to figure this out. "and when have I ever stolen from you? in fact did I make you pay for that dress? tha backpack?"

"I don't care about coin.” Apostrofae said. “I care about destroying a cult that is killing everyone that disagrees with them or gets in their way and your fancy pigsticker there isn't going to do that."

Brynne looked back and forth. “Yup, tempers! They be high righ' now. Migh' want ter stop afore this gets boilin'"

Apostrofae reached into her coin purse grabbing a handful of gold and tossed it at Bismarck, then turned and walked away.

"that is exactly why i need it, A'postrofae." Bismark said as she walked away.

"Oy! Able! Son---poke yer head over here!" Brynne called out.

Bismark took a scrap of leather and put it in there, tying  it off, handing it to Brynne. "give that back to her somehow. she won't take it from me. I already told blak i didn't want any share of the treasure we found, other than this sword and that gem, but hell, here - take that too." Bismark reached into his pocket and tossed her the gem. I'm not gonna take back the one I gave Orvuestra. she deserved something. here." he reaches into his coin purse and puts 10g in her hand. "You all happy now?" he said with a little sarcasm.

Brynne caught the one gem and said, "Like I said, I ain't accusin' you of thievin'. I dinnae think tha's what's in yer mind. Think there's a question o' scale tha's on their minds, is all." She sighed and said, "Welp. There's biscuits at the fire. I kin save ya one if yer inclined"

Bismark went back to packing his things, and Brynne came back about five minutes later with a biscuit, still warm. It seemed awfully heavy to Bismark, though. She handed it to him, and then scampered off to her fire.

Bismark set it with his stuff, checked his horse and took a quick look over toward Orvuestra's wagon to make sure everything is okay over there, then grabbing his biscuit, started slowly making his way toward the party's fire area, against his better judgement.

Brynne approached A'postrofae with a pouch in her hand. "Boy wanted ya ter have yer gold back"

"Not my gold." She said brusquely.

Walking back from Leda, Blak found Able near the other guards and handed him a small sack of coins.

Blak hefted a bunch of sacks, and gave one each to Brynne and A’postrofae. A'postrophae's sack seemed a little bulkier. He also laid one with Gamble’s belongings.

Brynne chews on a biscuit. "Wha's tha'?" she said, crumbs falling out of her mouth as she spoke.

"I've got animals to check." Apostrofae said, walking off.

"A'right then. Just know yer gettin' 19 gold worth o' souvenirs tha' next town we come ter!" Brynne yelled to her.

"It's a share of the auction of the goods we claimed yesterday.” Blak told her. ”The merchants were thrilled to get stuff at a bargain, but not so thrilled they don't have the means to carry it all.  Most of it is going to have to stay put, but the choiceier bits...well, it was win-win for most everyone except that Noble."

"Gotcha" Brynne said. "Wanna biscuit? They're no bad"

"If you made them, I'm not sure they can be bad" Blak said, grabbing one.

She looked at him strangely for a moment, then laughed. Crumbs flew. She said, "Yer a nice lad ter say tha'. I burned some buns good 'n black once tho. S'why I'm no' a baker no-more" She rummaged around her pack, pulled out a bottle, and sipped.

Seeing who was around the fire, Bismark stopped at a distance, rethinking whether he should have just stayed back at his spot. Blak looked up, seeing him there.

"So...ya really got raised jus by humans?" Brynne asked. "Does tha' mean ya' got told Drow bogeyman stories as a wee one like ever one else?"

"On second thought,” Blak said, grabbing one of the sacks “I wouldn't want to drive off those looking to sample your buns. I should get this sack to A'postrofae.  She forgot it."

"Ah, a'right. 'Nother time, then" Brynne said.

"Another time, perhaps." Blak agreed. He gave her a small smile and a nod, then a deep bow toward Bismark. Then he turned and headed for the animal pens.