[UNPOPULATED] [REPOPULATED] [CHAPTER 1] [CHAPTER 3] [CHAPTER 6] [ZONE 2]

"Welcome to nowhere, sires."

CHAPTER 1

LOCKLEAR: Which god did you say this Festival of the Stranger was in celebration of?

DEVON: The fertility goddess - Bringer of Harvests, The Earth Mother, Silban. Pick a name. All mean the same thing. She's the wench to whom ma and pa ugly pray to have little runt ugly and enough wheat to eat through the winter. Can't say I have much use for her.

LOCKLEAR: Is there a temple of hers nearby, or...

DEVON: Straight west of Eggley, then north at the crossroads. Big white building with the columns, smells like a whore's bedchamber. Hard to miss.

LOCKLEAR: Someone we ran into up the road told us they had seen a moredhel near here. I don't suppose you've seen him have you?

DEVON: Him? I've seen enough moredhel to start a barrel ball city league. Whole clump of them came by here a few weeks ago heading south in packs of twos and threes down the road towards Tanneurs.

LOCKLEAR: Were they armed?

DEVON: Like the war god Tith's own legions. Looked like they might be out to sign up as caravan guards, but who would hire them?

LOCKLEAR: Did you get a look at any of them?

DEVON: None of them came close enough to the Stranger that I could get a good look at them. Now that I think of it, it's kind of peculiar. On the off occasions when moredhel will crash through a town, they'll usually kick up some kind of ruckus with the locals to prove who's the toughest kid on the block. These just marched through town like they were in a parade review, like they were expecting someone to watch them come through.

LOCKLEAR: With a whole town to yourself, I'm surprised you haven't opened up any of the other shops or houses.

DEVON: I'm leaving them be until I know what's eventually going to happen here. Never know when some folk is going to show up and want his property back. I don't want to be the idiot holding the bag. If most of the folks were smart, they probably locked their houses and I'm not much of a lockpick.

LOCKLEAR: Know anyone who is?

DEVON: Strange character named Abuk. I ran across him when I was working for the Dauphiness Cassandra of Queg. We discovered him once when we boarded a Keshian vessel. After he helped open a few choice chests of mercantile, we chained him up in the belly of the ship so we could make a present of him to Cassandra. But when we docked in Palanque, all we found in the hold of the ship was a note saying he could be found in Silden if ever we needed his services. I've never hired anyone else for a lockpicking job since.

LOCKLEAR: Now I think of it, a man we know told us he lost at pokiir to a Devon here in Eggley. Would you be he?

DEVON: Depends on why you're asking, now doesn't it? If you're interested in playing a hand or two, then I might say I'm the same man. If, however, your friend decided to send round a few bravos to collect what I rightfully won from him...

LOCKLEAR: What's yours is yours as far as I'm concerned. I was just wondering how good a player you were. Isaac said that you had an unusual talent for it.

DEVON: Isaac? Isaac said I had an unusual talent for it? Now if that's not the pot calling the kettle black, I've never heard it at all. While we we're playing, it was as if that scuff knew every thought I had in my head. Every time he would fold he'd just look over at his elven friends with a big smile.

LOCKLEAR: Elven friends? Like Thorgath here?

DEVON: They could have been brothers by the look of them. Yeah, he looked kinda like your friend, but he damn sure wasn't an elf. He was wearing the clothes of one of Delekhan's moss-troopers. Moredhel. No doubt about it.

LOCKLEAR: I'm more familiar with pashawa, but I've played pokiir a few times with men from the Shamata garrison. You play by special rules?

DEVON: Straight game. Mercy's rules, full deck, nothing wild. Only special rule I have is you cheat, I ventilate your liver. Simple as that. Interested in playing?

SELF DEFENSE (if Isaac)

LOCKLEAR: If you were a Dauphiness' bodyguard, you must be a superb swordsman. Perhaps you could teach us a thing or two?

DEVON: I have my tricks. You don't stay alive as long as I do without picking something up here and there. I might be able to give you a few pointers if you're willing to pay. Eighty sovereigns a session. Interested?

MERCENARIES (if Marc)

OWYN: One of the brothers from the Abbey at Sarth has seen several mercenaries on the move through the principality, and he said they looked Quegian. With a good Quegian name like Devonius, I was thinking you might know something about them.

DEVON: I haven't had anything to do with the Dauphiness of Queg or her bastard father-in-law for over three years now. I burned my Writs of Passage the day Spitzer and I boarded the Dauphiness' war galley, the Storm's Master, and sunk King Lebeus' flagship with all hands on board. Since that day, I've only worked for me. Me.

OWYN: Then you have no idea why there would be so many mercenaries wandering free in the Kingdom?

DEVON: You don't get more than three Quegian mercenaries together in one spot unless you're paying them to be together. Small little island like that, most of them have killed a member of another mercenary's family. Pay them well, they'll put their personal vendettas aside long enough to do what's asked of them before they start on one another. Whoever's funding them must have an incredible fortune in rubies somewhere.

OWYN: Rubies?

DEVON: Isles sovereigns won't buy you a thing in Queg except a month underground in King Lebeus' pain pens. Rubies. That's all they'll take.

OWYN: You mentioned someone named Spitzer who boarded the Storm's Master with you. Was he a friend of yours? Is he still around?

DEVON: You know, to be passing through you ask a lot of questions.

OWYN: Just curious. I was wondering if maybe he would know anything about the Quegians.

DEVON: He's got more reason to be afraid of King Lebus than I do. He'd avoid Quegians like the plague. Now if you want to play dice with him, I'm sure he be plenty happy to talk to you. He was in Tanneurs last I heard.

CHAPTER 3

JAMES: Anything of interest happening around here?

DEVON: Seems business around here is picking up. We already got our first new full time resident and he's as mad as old King Rodric.

JAMES: Really? Why do you say that?

DEVON: I discovered him out in the graveyard clawing up a grave. He'd already broken into one of the coffins, but I guess the body had already decomposed because there wasn't anything inside the box. After I got him cleaned up, I took him to one of the houses and I put him in bed. I'll need to check in on him later. If you'd like to pay him a visit, he's in the last house on the right before you leave town heading North.

CHAPTER 6

OWYN: We're looking for a tax collector who went by the name of Stellan. Have any idea where he went to after the festival?

DEVON: Third headstone on the right and six feet under, that's where you'll find Stellan. That's the gentleman that was killed by the Collector. Why are you trying to find him?

OWYN: He had an old document I wanted to look at...

DEVON: It might still be locked up in his office here in town. Be a matter of finding his key, of course.

OWYN: The brothers at Sarth told us the Quegian Fever is hitting the coastal areas of the principality hard. You're from Queg. Is there anything we can do about the fever?

DEVON: For them, nothing. For yourselves, keep off the main roads. When a lot of people get the fever, they run off from wherever they are in a blind panic and they imagine anyone and everyone around them as a threat. Stay away from the roads and you should be able to avoid running into them.