Celebrating and gathering intelligence

Jade waved off the challenges of several other bandits wanting to get in the ring with her, hopping out of the sandpit to her friends. There were now at least a couple dozen of the bandits eyeing up the three women, both because of Jade’s performance and the flashing. Olivia immediately started demanding the money from their bets, and they’d received good odds since Jade was maybe half the size and weight of Big Red Bronson. She got a bit of pushback after her antics and one of the men said he’d let it go if she gave him a private viewing, but Renee let a magical glow darken around her hands ominously in the background and they backed down.

Further revelry, or whatever they wanted to do, was cut off however when a strange change happened in the room. It didn’t get quite like when some stranger entered a Wild West saloon - it was more like a change in the air pressure. It took a long moment in the crowded space to figure out what was going on, but then the girls noticed the hard-bitten criminals making way without complaints for a trio who sauntered through the room.

The lesser two, and there was no doubting who was in charge and who followed, were a pair of what may have been brother and sister though their differences were as stark as their similarities. The man was thin, with a pinched face that looked like he had something bitter in his mouth but he didn’t necessarily care. He was scruffy and wore a pair of bandoliers across his chest that displayed at least a dozen throwing knives. The sister of the man had the same facial features, but she stood almost a head taller and was as thickly muscled as he was thin. She wore a breastplate, patinaed with age and slightly scarred but still functional. Her hands were clenched into what looked like permanent fists, and her hair was pulled back severely into a long braid.

On any street or in any tavern the two would have stood out as trouble, especially with their gold amulets hanging prominently from chains around their neck, displaying their allegiance to the Risen Wolf Gang. The third man, who led the way, was on another level.

All eyes of the bandits glanced and darted away as he passed, as if afraid of getting picked out of the crowd. If they were wolves, he was some sort of dragon.

The man wore a vest of leather that hung open, showing off a muscled chest scarred several times over from a lifetime of combat. His arms were thick like tree trunks and heavily tattooed. His moustache was a thick and full ruddy brown caterpillar across his upper lip, and his jaw was a chiselled block except for a cleft in the chin-

“He has a butt chin?” Elyse asked with a chuckle.

I rolled my eyes. “Yes, he has a butt chin.”

“He sounds kinda hot,” Rhia chuckled.

“How old does he look?” Tori asked.

“Probably in his mid to late forties,” I said.

“So he’s hot Daddy Henry Cavill,” Tori grinned.

“Oh my God,” I groaned. I was used to getting my NPCs ragged on or compared to celebrities - sometimes I even did it on purpose myself. I’d never had one called ‘Daddy’ before.

His hair was rough and shaggy, and his chest and arms were thick with body hair. He moved with a purposeful grace as he walked around the other side of the fight pit from the three ladies. The other bandits continued to shift out of his way without needing to be asked, and he approached a table near the back that seemed to have been left open for him and his companions. As he sat he cast his eyes about the room and it was like everyone in the rugged alehouse wilted just slightly before he pulled his attention from them and turned to say something to the man who had entered with him.

“That dude is definitely, like, a vampire. Or a werewolf,” Rhia said.

“What? Why?” Elyse asked.

“Because he’s too good-looking, and Shane spent too long describing him,” Tori said. “He’s all shaggy and rough, but muscley? And living out in the woods? And in charge of the ‘Risen Wolf Gang?’ And isn’t his name-” she checked her notes from earlier, “-Alexander Houndsfang? Definitely a werewolf.”

“Is he?” Elyse asked, turning to me.

“If your characters have a suspicion that might be the case, you’ll have to find a way to confirm it or not,” I said diplomatically, holding my poker face. I was going to need to decide if I wanted to change my plans now.

“Eh, we’re metagaming,” Rhia sighed.

“Sorry,” Tori said.

“It’s fine,” I said. “You can jump to conclusions about anything you want - just don’t be surprised if they might be wrong sometimes.”

The room returned to the vibe it had held before, just with a bit more glancing back into the corner of the building, and the girls needed to decide what they were going to do.

“We’ve made a good impression now,” Olivia said as she huddled up with her compatriots. “Good job, Jade. You’re not hurt, are you? I could give you some healing.”

“I mean, I’m not great, but I think that might be a good thing,” Jade sighed. “Better to wear my battle wounds in a group like this, maybe? That way no one thinks I’ll want to fight again, and it’ll earn some respect. But I don’t know if it was me who made the biggest positive splash with the crowd. What was with flashing everyone, you two?”

“I thought it was a good idea,” Renee said. “And it worked.”

“She’s not wrong,” Olive grinned. “I guess we should be careful about more guys thinking we’re easy or something though.”

“Well, let’s use it to our advantage some more at least,” Jade sighed. “Let’s work the room, see if we can flirt and drink our way into some more info about what the hell is going on in this camp.”

The others agreed, and I decided to make it a Skill Challenge - they would each roll twice, and depending on how many successes and failures they got would determine the information they would get out of an afternoon spent in the alehouse carousing with the bandits.

Olivia went first and decided that buying a round of drinks for anyone nearby was the best way to kick things off - she headed to the bar with a fistful of their gambling winnings and slammed it down onto the bar, ordering up drinks and starting to hand them out. I had Rhia roll a Diplomacy check for that and she got a mediocre result. People willingly took the drinks from Olvia, but their eyes were lingering more on her chest than their ears listened to what she was saying.

Jade went next and she thought being more direct would potentially get somewhere, so she approached the members of the Red Bronson family who were in the alehouse after buying a bottle of whiskey from the bar, grabbing a seat next to Big Red Bronson and pouring him a shot. Tori rolled diplomacy as well.

“Natural. Fucking. Twenty!” She crowed, actually jumping up out of her chair and pumping her fist for a moment.

“Natural twenty!” Rhia and Elyse both cheered.

“Very nice,” I said.

The Red Bronsons were thrilled by the offer of some good whiskey for the table, and Big Red didn’t seem to be holding a grudge.

Renee debated whether she should try to approach Alexander Houndsfang, but decided they needed more circumstantial information before doing that. Instead, she sat down at one of the smaller tables and drew her magic out of herself, giving off an ominous air as she tried to look like a Witch that someone would want to come to for her secret magics.

Elyse’s plan was solid, trying to set herself up to trade information, and I gave her the option to roll Bluff or Intimidation. Unfortunately, she rolled a three on the die so she didn’t get any takers.

“OK,” Rhia said, quirking her lips a little in thought. “That’s one meh roll, one crit, and one fail probably. We need to step up our game. Olivia is a Paladin of Revelry, so even if she doesn’t like any of these people she’s still got a duty to their party - if there’s one thing I know, it’s that two girls kissing gets a party kickstarted.”

“And how do you know that?” I asked with a smirk and a look.

Rhia blushed. “No specific reason.”

Tori snorted and Elyse laughed.

“Whatever,” Rhia said. “I’m going to look for the hottest lady in the room who isn’t Jade or Renee.”

I had her roll for a perception check and Olivia ended up approaching a woman dressed in tight leathers that accented her feminine curves. She had roses woven into her dark hair and pale skin. Olivia introduced herself, and I made a snap decision and scribbled out some notes before asking Rhia for her Diplomacy bonus. I rolled behind the screen, scribbled some more notes, and then handed the page over to Tori.

They knew the deal now - Tori was going to play the pale-skinned woman and I’d given her notes on how to act, including the fact that Rhia had failed the roll pretty badly.

The two girls got into the scene and Tori was obviously playing ‘hard to get’ as Olivia flirted with the bandit, but Rhia didn’t know if that was intentional or not. Eventually, Olivia made her move, and I was surprised when Tori leaned forward and actually accepted the kiss; the two girls had positioned themselves next to each other for the scene at the table, and watching Rhia lean in and kiss Tory was… well, I wasn’t some college-aged dumbass so I wasn’t sitting there rock hard under the table, but they were both gorgeous girls and I hadn’t expected it to happen.

Tori fixed the fact that Rhia had failed to roll, though, when she reached up and slipped her hand around Rhia’s throat and then pulled away from her lips. “You feel a sudden panic,” she said. “As a rope slips around your neck and tightens.”

“Guh!” Rhia said, acting out the panic as her eyes went wide and she clutched Tori’s hand at her throat.

“It’s not rope, though,” Tori continued. “It’s vines. The woman leans back in, pressing her cheek to yours as she whispers in your ear. ‘You might be a pretty one, darling, but I can smell the Gods on you and it disgusts me.’ You get tossed back from the table.”

“Hold on,” I said, quickly scribbling another note, folding it and sliding it down the table to Tori who read it quickly.

“The Tentacles won’t have anything to do with a bootlicker for the Gods,” Tori spat, then broke into a giggle and covered her mouth, unable to hold the venomous look she’d affected for long.

“Damn,” Elyse sighed. “Guess you failed the roll.”

“Guess so,” Rhia agreed with a shrug, then looked at Tori. “Good kiss though.”

Tori rolled her eyes and gave her a light shove, and then they both returned to their seats. It was the Indian girl’s turn next and she decided to keep working the Red Bronson Family. I reasoned that she couldn’t use the same roll on the same target so she would need to switch to a different skill, and she decided to try Perform as she told a story from her homeland to entertain them. She rolled an even ten, which wasn’t great, but she didn’t offend the Bronsons either.

Renee was last up, and she’d had time to think how to switch up her approach as she’d been doing her brooding act at the table.

“This is kinda like a war camp, right?” Elyse asked me.

“I mean, sort of?” I hedged. “What are you looking for?”

“Just, with all these people here and stuff, I’m wondering if there are prostitutes working,” she said.

I nodded and made a roll behind the screen. It made sense, so I gave her evens and rolled an 8. “Yeah, from your calm position at the table, you can see that there are several women who seem to be ‘working’ at the moment.”

“Any men?” Elyse asked. “Like a pretty boy or something? I can do my idea with a woman but it would make more sense with a man.”

I hesitated a moment. The Game had featured prostitutes in - well, they generally made appearances in every campaign. Brothels and seedy taverns were fun locations to roleplay in. I couldn’t think of a time I’d ever played a male prostitute though. “Sure,” I said. “You spot a young man, maybe twenty years old. He’s slimly built and has a soft, sweet face and is wearing a yellow vest with his shirt unbuttoned most of the way down to show off his sleek physique.”

Renee approached the male prostitute and perfunctorily hired him, leading him out of the alehouse and around the side of the building. Once they were away from prying eyes-

“Hold on, I want to act this one out too,” she said, standing up and motioning for me to stand as well. I went with it and she positioned me near the wall. “So, when we’re in the shadows I’m going to start drawing on my magic again, but before he can see it happening I spin around-” She did so and then planted her hands on my chest, pushing me back lightly. “And I pin him up against the wall of the alehouse and I kiss him.” Elyse went up on her toes, grabbing me by the collar of my shirt with both hands and pulling me into a kiss.

I grunted as our lips pressed together. The little chain from her nose to her ear, part of her costume, pressed against my nose, but I was enraptured by her lips as she kissed me fiercely. Her tongue darted out, teasing against mine, and I was about to reciprocate and deepen the kiss when she pulled away. Her eyes were a little dilated as she looked up into mine, and I wasn’t sure if it was surprise, shock or a slightly manic look that she was giving me as she grinned. “And as I kiss him, I release my Charm Person spell through it,” she said.

I let out a breath and smirked as I shook my head and blinked. “Alright,” I said. “I’m gonna say he rolls at disadvantage for the circumstances. Rhia, roll twice and give me the lowest.”

“Seven,” she called to me after rolling.

“Well, he fails to resist,” I said, realising I was gently holding Elyse by the waist while she kept holding onto my shirt collar.

“I spend the next hour interrogating him about what he knows,” Elyse said.

“What do you do at the end of the hour?” I asked.

She shrugged. “I let him go, paying him for his time.” She let me go, smoothing her hands over my shirt for a moment as she blushed a little.

“Great idea,” I said, giving her hip a soft pat before letting go of her and we separated. “OK. That’s the end of the skill challenge. I’ll write up a brief with all the things you ladies found out during your afternoon and evening in the alehouse. The big question is where you intend to stay for the night? Are you leaving camp, or do you feel safe making a campsite around the bandits?”

The girls talked for a few minutes and ended up deciding to use the rest of their gambling winnings to buy a six-person tent from someone, and then pitch it up near the Red Bronson Family since Jade had made friends with them. The three ladies and Fergus, who had been uncomfortably drinking all afternoon while keeping an eye on them, could bed down there in relative safety.

“That,” I said, “Sounds like a great spot to call it for the evening.”

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