Day 6: 16th Day, 7th Month, Year 507

After resting in Orlane for a day, the group returned back to the cult hideout in the caves with the two rescued sailors Kevan and Nolin and their three goats. Haren, Alamar, and Ilmari went to set up an ambush for the sailors that were expected to arrive in the night to pick up the next shipment of slaves.

With the moonless night being pitch black outside, they waited in the underground dock until they saw the light of a lantern approaching over the water. Alamar put on the purple robes of serpent headed staff of the priest to greet the four sailors that stepped out of the boat. When the leader of the sailors asked why they didn’t hang up the lantern to find them in the dark, Alamar told him that they were busy recapturing prisoners that had escaped from their cell. Which would get done much quicker if the sailors could help them with that. The leader of the sailors was not happy about the delay but sent one of his men back to their ship to get more people to help with the hunt.

The sailor demanded to be taken to Garban and Alamar led the three men deeper into the cave where they were ambushed by Haren and Ilmari, who managed to overpower and capture them after a fierce struggle with the leader. When the boat returned with another load of sailors they repeated the same procedure and captured five of them alive, with only one dying in the fighting.

After questioning some of their prisoners, Haren felt quite certain that these men where not more victims of some kind of enchantment, but rather regular pirates who had been hired to smuggle slaves, and that they should be dealing with them accordingly. They learned that the captain of the ship waiting outside was called Satar, which wasn’t one of the names they recognized from the letter they had found on a priest’s desk.

Alamar suggested that they should be using the golden mask to charm one of the pirates to learn more information. Haren and Ilmari approved of this idea, but Haren insisted that Ilmari would be the one to use it. Unfortunately, the attempt to charm Satar failed, so Ilmari made him an offer that they would spare and release him if he cooperated with their questions. He admitted that he was working for another pirate leader named Mazdak, whom the priest Garban had been writing a letter to, and that they were delivering the slaves to another man called Tsorasz on Inixon near the pirates’ hidden base.

Haren wasn’t happy that Ilmari had promised the pirate his freedom, but was determined to honor it. But all the other pirates were still guilty of raiding ships and helping in the kidnapping of slaves and would certainly be put to death if they handed them over the the elderman in Orlane. So he decided to take it on himself to behead them. The grim work was quickly done and the bodies burned on a pyre. Satar was allowed to leave without his weapons as promised.

The next step of the plan was to capture the ship of the pirates and everyone got into their rowboat, including the sailors Kevan and Nolin and the three pack goats. When they reached the ship waiting outside the cave, Alamar shouted up to one of the remaining pirates that the caves where under attack and they had to flee immediately. When he climbed up the ladder to the deck with Haren and Ilmari, the leader of the remaining pirate asked who they were and where any of the other pirates were. With only three pirates and a big monkey on the deck, there was little need for further deception and a fight broke out immediately. More pirates and another monkey came up to join the fight from below, but they were all easily defeated. One of the pirates jumped for his life into the water, and as the fighting came to an end, Haren managed to capture one of the monkeys alive and put him into an empty fruit crate.

Day 7: 1st Day, 8th Month, Year 507


After a quick look over the ship, Kevan concluded that with the seven of them, they would be able to make it to the next port, but he didn’t want to dare sailing away from the coast without a full crew of sailors. So they set out to sail south to make a first stop in Abil to hire a crew.

Day 9: 3rd Day, 8th Month, Year 507


After three days of slow progress the ship finally made it to Abil, which turned out to be located inside an enormous sea cave. Kevan left to search the taverns for trustworthy sailors and Alamar excused himself for a few days to make some visits.