Tales of Neutral Ground IC

[3SecondCultist]

The leader of the group - or at least the one that Kleris seems to have identified as the most experienced, judging by the way most of the eyes of the others glance his way - is a darker skinned man in rough leathers and a fur collar, a big axe at his belt. When he shoulders his way to the front of the group, his authority goes unchallenged, making him a prime target for magical mischief. He seems a bit skeptical of all the words that the changeling is telling him, but the suggestion seems to have taken a hold of him, as he scratches his stubble thoughtfully.

"Aye, the docks," he gravels in a thick Reacher accent. He nods in open approval to both of your 'shifters', and gives what could technically be constituted as a smile. "Figures the rat'd try to stow passage on a ship. Thanks for the tip, Ristairn. Come on, lads! We've got us a bounty to catch." Several of the others in the group seem a bit unwilling to follow, a few casting looks back towards you, but when the Reacher man and the main body of the hunting party head off, they reluctantly depart from your sight. Of course, they will eventually see through Kleris' story once they search the docks, or stop to question why a fellow bounty hunter would willingly split a profit he could be earning all by himself, but for now your path is clear.

Moving ahead with the help of your newly conjured steeds, you push towards your first roadblock: the gate to the Thrane Zone. The trip doesn't take long, especially not on horseback, although the roads are not exactly empty of people. You spot the broadsheets with Maugrim's face no less than three times in the first minutes of your trip, and you can see the fear in the way that near everyone you pass is standing up straight, shifting glances at each passer by. You earn more than your fair share of looks from those who can count to six, but nobody sees anyone matching the Nameless' description among your number and so nobody approaches you or takes any sort of action.

At least the disguise seems to be working.

---

You know you're going the right way because the volume of both noise and people gradually increases as you get close to Thronehold's market. A steady pulsing of shouting voices, the bustle of footsteps, the bleating of animals and the jangling of wares are the first signs that you're getting to your first stop. "Oysters, clams and cockles!", cries a young girl with a cart of shellfish, her bleating drowned only by the literal baying coming from a pen of goats not too far away. The red smell of cooking meat seems to have agitated the beasts, as they trample around their woeful enclosure with the dim knowledge that they're supper. For all the bustle though, the East Market in the Port District is one of the calmer and more well-to-do parts of the city's bazaar. Well-established and constructed lanes of shops line the streets here, and folk know to let a trio of horses past without getting in their way.

Up ahead loom the walls; Throneport's physical dividers, they are made of plain unvarnished stone and their highest points are perhaps thirty feet above the street. There are three sections here, separating the Aundairan, Thrane, and Port zones of the city and all converging at a single point. Atop the battlements, you see patrol groups in grey armor and dark green tabards, the sigils of House Deneith clear even from a ways off. You count at least forty on the various sections of masonry, not including those amidst the populace on the ground in the shadow of the most defining feature of the market: the large fortified hexagonal tower that rises from the point of conflux where the walls meet. The Triptych, the locals here have taken to call it, is the biggest and most traveled zone gate in the city.

And it casts a long shadow indeed. Two different open passages from the other side join at the base, where gates of wrought iron nearly as tall as the walls come together in a triangular arc. At their widest, each passage can easily fit two wagons next to one another and have room for pedestrians on either side, and although they split right at the mouth of the gate, each offers a similar view of the market in the other zones of the city. However, at the moment the gates are barred by the riotous colors and glinting armor of the Five Nations' finest. Soldiers and officials from both Aundair and Thrane appear to be on high alert, what with the way there are full squadrons of them setting up blocks to painstakingly check the papers of every single person aiming to cross one of the boundaries.

Spoiler: OOC

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Kleris' 21 beats the DC for this challenge, so that's 2 successes! I included in the narration leading up to this next obstacle you effectively 'beating' the first obstacle in that nobody recognizes Maugrim out and about, so you're on your way to properly making it through this thing with no failures. There's absolutely no way that you guys could fail one of these now.

Onto your next hurdle, which is of course getting into the Thrane Zone. Again, you can try a number of skill checks here, it really depends on your approach to the situation. Persuasion on the guards might work, as might Intimidation. You could also do Deception again, but you'd need to use someone different from Kleris. Maybe someone might want to do a History or Survival check to find a sneaky way through the wall, or an Acrobatics or Stealth roll to get over it? Or if someone has proficiency in forger's tools, you can do a flashback to making 'papers' for the party. Again, it's really up to you how you want to go about it.