Panther Conflict

Blažej

Tarthurac

Kinetto

Warren

Dolan

Warren spent all night digging through rubble of the town square to try to find and help survivors. Cassandra, Blanka and Tarthurac helped tend to the wounded in the remains of the Scurvy Dogs tavern where they met a little gnome named Kinetto. She helped tend to the wounded with magic and when she was all out she began to play a calming tune to settle everyone down. Her tune put an aura of calm and hope as more and more survivors were brought to the tavern and reunited with their loved ones. Blazej went to sleep to recover from his wounds and in the morning everyone had been accounted for. Five citizens had been killed in the attack, and Tarthurac asked Cassandra to perform burial rites on them. She finished surprisingly quickly and left.

It took a few hours before Tarthurac began to ask where Nyanta was. Helena told him he had gone to the panthers last night and hadn’t returned. Upon hearing this, Tarthurac grabbed Blazej and Dolan to go and get Nyanta back. Kinetto asked if she could help and Tarthurac said it would be nice to have another paladin along. Helena invited herself to go despite Tarthurac telling her to stay behind.

Nyanta had been locked in a metal cage inside one of the panther's tents for the entire cold and damp night. In the morning one of the guards assigned to guard him, a younger Panther warrior who introduced himself as Agzel talked to Nyanta and seemed genuinely curious about Alfenheim. He said other tribes called Nyanta a hero, and that he was the one who brought them back from the dead. But his tribe sees Nyanta as a traitor, and it was king Leonidas who brought them back. Nyanta says both versions are somewhat true and recounted his trip to Mega Gara. But their time together was cut short when the watch was changed and Nyanta's new guard wasn't as interested in talking to him.

On their way to the camp Dolan explained that the Panther Tabaxi, also known to themselves as the Shiorraidh, wanted their home back and wanted to get rid of the human and elf settlements. He told the group that their previous leader named Kakrar murdered two of the NewTown Defenders earlier that year before being overthrown by the current leader, Ussamej. Ussamej said he didn't want to attack NewTown or the other settlements in open war. The group reached the camp to find the panthers weren't hiding from them this time. But once the group entered they started hiding when Tarthurac came barging into the camp. Dragonborn aren't something ancient tabaxi were used to seeing every day.

Tarthurac demanded Nyanta be released, and the guards took him and the group to speak with Ussamej. Ussamej said he will comply with all the laws laid out and wanted both his man and Nyanta to stand trial. Ussamej and Dolan shared a glance of recognition but not friendship when they meet up, and this was not lost on Kinetto or Helena. The Panther tabaxi agreed to escort the prisoners, both Nyanta and the one who stole the cloak back to Alfenheim for trial.

On the way several arguments broke out as members of the guild pressured Ussamej, trying to get him to confess to ordering his men to summon the yellow skinned men on the skyship. Ussamej maintained his innocence and claimed his two men acted on their own, without his approval.

A fight nearly broke out when Kinetto used the spell suggestion on the prisoner tabaxi, ordering him to tell the truth. He maintained that he was working on his own and that Nyanta tried to kill him. Knowing this is a lie Kinetto accuses the shaman of removing her suggestion spell, but the Shaman offered up her ring of dispel magic to reveal it had not expended any charges.

Dolan told the twelve Tabaxi to march on one side of the prisoners and Wahda guild to march on the other side and not speak to each other until they got back to Alfenheim. Using this marching method they reached Alfenheim to have the trial, but Kinetto and Helena specifically request that someone capable of casting a zone of truth be present to ensure no lies were told. Dolan had his companion Zenmaer cast sending spell to summon another one of the NewTown defenders. A Genasi Ranger named Whirl who was capable of casting the spell.

During the wait Kinetto tried again to trap Ussamej in a lie by asking if he would try to help his man, but by trying to make the question very specific, she ended up confusing Ussamej with her wording and he said he was sworn to protect his men. But he added that he is more bound to obey his agreement to follow Alfenheim’s laws. Kinetto took this as a confession of guilt and told Alfomal, but he was less convinced of this as usable testimony.

During the wait for Whirl's arrival Nyanta noticed the prisoner trying to pull a pill out of the claw socket in his finger. The group confiscapted the pill and tried to detect magic on it but it seemed mundane in nature. But Dolan stepped forward and identified the pill as a Feyblood pill. It would help the one who consumes it to better resist a zone of truth.

Whirl finally arrived and cast the zone of truth after asking Helena to stop grabbing her face. The zone was cast but before the trial began Helena asked Ussamej if he was behind the attack and he said no. Helena asked that the zone be cast again since Ussamej seemed to have resisted it. The room erupted into shouting over this outrage and Tarthurac decided he’d had enough and he tried to intimidate Ussamej by slamming him into the floor. But upon taking damage the illusion of Ussamej faded, leaving Tarthurac holding thin air. Helena and Blazej rushed off to find the real Ussamej with Dolan seconds behind them. Nyanta, Tarthurac and Kinetto got ready to fight the remaining Tabaxi in the courtroom, but Agzel was among them and he surrendered, breaking their spirit and causing them all to surrender before any blood was shed.

Helena and Blazej, on their broom were halted by a hold person spell from one of the shamen of the panthers who was waiting for them in the forest below. They broke the spell, attack and killed the shaman as his allies rushed to his aid. Several of the panther warriors had medallions of fire that they would activate once they were badly injured. They would run in as suicide bombs to try to finish off Helena, but she tanked them all. Dolan rushed past this battle to make sure Ussamej didn't have time to escape. Ussamej and his two bodyguards had Dolan on the defensive when the rest of the group arrived, killed his bodyguards and were about to kill him when Dolan said no.

Dolan pointed out that they need to try him to avoid angering the still reforming tabaxi empire. They needed to hold a trial for him, and to try a clan chief of the Tabaxi, two other chiefs must be present. Dolan sent for the Bobcat chief Casper and Nyanta sent for Buraka to attend the trial. The group pulled the battered and defeated Ussamej to jail to await trial.