The Captain's Log: 1010 LD Book 2

Never Quiet

14th of Sunreign

We are home, but this place seems less like a home and more like, I don’t know. Not normal? It is never quiet when we are here and something always goes wrong. Sea spirits are neutral, but this place is starting to feel restless. The island that is. Parish Manor still feels like a good place to relax.

Lea is preparing to sell all of the goods as soon as she finds a solid buyer, and I’m taking a well deserved break. Tydel got himself into some trouble and Kiera convinced us to help because Gregory was partying. The trouble was some kind of bloodsport fighting ring. The Orc Boys got roped into it too and are now dead because of it. Gregory lost a close friend of his too, but Kiera and I saved Tydel so there are some good things.

Gregory punched me and broke my jaw, and I’m still picking out pieces of that frog thing. I’m going to take the best bed in the house for a change, Lea and Alenka be damned.

15th of Sunreign

My jaw hurts and I have a bit of a headache going. Here is what happened, in case anyone needs details. This is going to be a bit scattered.

We went into The Underbelly to save Tydel from what I suspect was a gang related fighting ring. Gregory hasn’t gone into much detail, but it seems that his friend Rogar was running the thing. It all fell apart when Alenka killed him. Gregory is preparing the body, and has been given leave to pay respect and grieve. I touched a nerve somewhere in there and ticked Gregory off, which is difficult to do. He lashed out and struck me, knocking me unconscious. When I came to, I returned to the manor while Alenka patched up Tydel at her alchemical shop.

Speaking of the shop, Alenka was gifted the deed to it by Kelsey DeMaria. Lea has been a bit prickly over the whole thing, and I can’t say I blame her. The Alchemist is not to be trusted, and I’m not sure Alenka is thinking straight right now with her own mad experiments on Ichor (he can talk now in case I haven’t made record of that).

The Underbelly. We found the fighting ring, and they had Tydel in the middle of it where he was being fed on by a frog beast. It was a mirror and lights trick and ended with Gregory in the fighting ring taking on Sharkshanker. Lea found Zagan at the ring as well, and when she tried to distract him, he used her to get close to Alenka and attacked her. Lea was forced to kill him, but her first blow killed Sharkshanker instead. Some kind of shared pain magic. We really need a wizard or something to identify these things…

Keira and I set on some guards as we tried to recover Tydel. There were prodding the frog beast with an electric prod. I dropped one of the guards, and Kiera took care of the other before pumping the frog full of lightning, cooking it from the inside out. I got showered with the bits. Alenka has had some time to study the remains today and is convinced that it was created by someone, rather than occurring naturally.

I was given a package with instructions to check out a warehouse for our reward from the Chest thing. I have recovered the content in the warehouse. 1 amulet, and a map. I will share more with the crew when we are away from the Island, as Fimton seems really keen to gain whatever I may have been given. They seem to think it will do some damage to House Xemnon.

Lastly, I have met with Marissa and intend to turn over The Barracuda to her. I can’t make up for what I did to her, so this should help a little bit. We had a bit of a heart to heart and she set me straight. It was… good. Time to start calming my own Spirits. Lea expressed a willingness to help me find my family. I think it may finally be time to start thinking about it again. A new ship, a close family, and people to help pick me up if an Oni spirit starts to lead me wrong. This will be a good beginning.

Lea, Second in Command

25th of Brightreach, 1010LD

Gavin, you told me. You told me and there were witnesses and now its official AND it is written in the Log. You made me 1st Officer. Alenka told me not to write in here, and I told her to SHUT UP. I make all the difference on this crew and I’m so proud that you have come to accept that. This will be really good. You made a good choice.

- First Officer Lea De Soleil

The Man Under The Mask

27th of Brightreach, 1010LD

I see Lea was here… She has been pestering me about this. Her taking charge is new. I think it might be attractive too if I weren’t waiting for the other shoe to drop. This may be the least of our problems right now though. It seems that Jenny has taken it upon herself to start brewing coffee, which would be fine if it weren’t for her funding the coffee blends by creating nests of those damn red orb spiders. She roped Tai into seeing the red orb silk for her. I’m glad he came clean when asked because Jenny disavowed her experiments until confronted with the evidence. I had Alenka and Gregory confiscate her “collections”, but I have a bad feeling that Alenka might be in on it too. I’ll have Re Shii keep an eye on things as Gregory seems a bit distracted right now.

The death of Gregory’s friend Rogar put him into investigation mode. He found an enchanted poster indicating a fight at a place called Crickets. He wanted to get more information so I gave him the OK and he set out to see his friend Sargel. Sargel made 4 wrestler’s masks for The Iron Snapjaw and his Ferocious Four. Gregory has it in his head that he can turn around the blood sport that Rogar seems to have put into motion. I’ll entertain the idea for now. Gregory is certainly capable. I just hope I don’t have to don a mask too...

28th of Brightreach, 1010LD

We checked out Crickets to get some real information this time. I’ll be damned if we are going to walk into this fight knowing nothing. Seems like some of the Xemnon guard are in on it, and we got to see that Gregory’s dead friend is not only alive, but working with those Fimton assholes. Leah did some snooping and it sounds like he was cutting some kind of deal with The Alchemist. Gregory is still down for going to the fight though, and he headed out to sign us up. I’m going to run to see Marissa. I’m not wearing a pink and white mask.

28th of Brightreach. Update

My mask now reflects my family colors. This is much better. Things are moving fast. We have some extra muscle. Seems Pasquit the gnome took a liking to us and brought Bruthr along. He is going to be some extra muscle for this fight. I’m feeling better already. The Dauntless Drifter is on his way!

28th of Brightreach. Aftermath

Everything hurts. Everything is sore. This is not OK.

Every time we come to this dumb island, EVERY time, the experience is not pleasant. I got pummeled in a fighting ring, not on my ship, but in a dumb dwarf ruin surrounded by people I don’t like... All because I went along with Gregory’s plan. On the plus side I did win some coin by betting on Martin Hazard. Raul was a great help. We had a really good fight.

Almost forgot. Rogar, Gregory’s friend, Alenka thinks he was a simulacrum. A fake human, created by alchemy to fill in for the real deal. He came to greet us and give us the grand prize after the fight. Gregory started pressing him for information and some kind of magic wrapped around his neck, a tattoo or something, and strangled him to death. I’m not sure this is the kind of thing we should continue to deal with, but someone should know what we saw.

Voyage of the Silver Bird; Reunion

29th of Brightreach, 1010LD Gregory is “dead”. Everyone is freaking out, but I got a note from his assassin girlfriend that cryptically says so. She almost broke my thumb just to give it to me. Gregory needs to make better life decisions, because this is ridiculous.

Alenka just confirmed that he is in a coma state. She isn’t sure how long. 2 days according to the note. And something about us needing to leave. Guess we’re stocking up and departing. I sent Lea out to try to find some additional talent for the ship too. I’m going to let the elves we hired go. We don’t need a situation because Kiera and a group of Tashminaen elves can’t get along.

30th of Brightreach, 1010 LD

Does everything about our little family have to scream “interesting”? Lea hit up the nearby brothels to get new crew. Rather than grab sailors, she stole the brothel workers. That’ll make me popular down on the docks. They’re green crew, not much sailing talent between them, but they seem keen on workers rights and understanding their role on the ship as sailors rather than for their services. We’ll leave that option open to them, and treat it just like booze and drugs. If they don’t make it a problem, then it won’t be.

We christen the new ship in the morning. Then we can finally get back to something normal.

1st of Sunreign, 1010 LD

The Silver Bird is away! I guided her through the channel and into open waters. Our Emii is pleased, even without a figurehead to house it. I wonder if it wants a name too? We are heading to Venom Bay. I’m hoping we can pick up some information about my family, or any Jospei in the area. If we can find a flotilla we can narrow down where the Endili flotilla might be. Perhaps we can do a cabbage run while we’re at it too. A little extra spending money is better than nothing.

7th of Sunreign, 1010 LD

This stop wasn’t helpful. There was very little information about flotillas in the area. Sounds like they are congregating on the Northern end of the island, as well as the Eastern coast of Na Ahn Wae. There are plenty of river inlets and islands for them to hide on between here and there, and they will definitely be on the move. That makes them hard to find, but adding to that are reports of Merr activity in the North, and it’s Siren season. Earplugs for everyone!

A cabbage run is out of the question too. Leah sniffed around for goods to trade in, and the easiest to purchase and carry are mud bricks, but at best we will only make a couple gold off of it if we fill the whole ship, which will slow our progress. I am undecided if we are going to carry any of this

Alenka wanted to make a run into the mire around Venom Bay so she could catch a snake. I allowed it with the requirement that it was only a short excursion whether we found one or not. I’m glad we didn’t have to test that. Navigating Venom Bay’s root maze sounds like a great way to drown.