Captain Skraw

Captain Skraw is a Loxodon and captain of the guard in Rearton. The party met him while he was investigating the collapsed home of Professor Trilmer. Skraw explained to James (who was posing as Trilmer's nephew to get information) that an artificer power source reacted suddenly and caused artificer instruments inside the home to go haywire, causing the accident. Trilmer did not survive.

Skraw seemed genuinely taken aback by the accident, musing that Rearton hadn't seen anything like this and aside from the frequent knockout gas pranks, Rearton is pretty peaceful.

The party also asked him why there were so fewer people in Rearton, and he admitted that at the time of the accident several people just left, and they don't know why. When the party asked how the guard were handling that situation, he said that while he did have some people looking into it the city wanted the focus to be on the investigation of Trilmer's home and death. He also seemed to think that the disappearances weren't too concerning, as no one had reported anyone missing, and that they were unconnected to the accident. The party found this very odd, and realized that not one guard seemed to be going around the town to check on who was missing or not, and instead the guard was just patrolling in higher numbers.

They also noticed that the alleyway to the Rogue University of Skulkery had collapsed as well with rubble from a nearby building completely blocking it off. This was also seen as an accident according to the guard posted there.

While on route to complete their mission in the Thimblewoods, the party found three dead bodies, all with notes signed by one Renston Pike inviting the now dead people to Deep Root Laboratories, instructing them to look for someone with a hammer sigil to guide them part of the way. The notes promised the deceased that the rogue population would be "taken care of" (the most recent note promised that it had indeed been taken care of), and that they need not worry about them.

The party connected the content of the notes with the population decrease, and Bo had every intention of reporting this information to Skraw when he noticed a hammer sigil on his collar.

As it shakes out now, the party is convinced that Skraw is not only linked to the three dead bodies in the woods that had seemingly been lured there purposefully to be killed, but also the missing rogue population and Trilmer's death. It's not clear yet what Skraw's motives, nor the motives of Renston Pike are.

The next time the party encountered Skraw, it was after some Rearton guards had stopped Jeff, Bo, Margie, and Gerald and Qorn. They were stopped on the way to the wormway to get to Tome Spire, when guards stopped them and asked them to come in. The group chose to sit at a bench nearby, practicing their civil liberties by asking "Are we being detained?" (Margie has a badge in Knowing Your Rights.)

Skraw joined them, and has Zone of Truth cast around them for questioning. Only Bo made the save, which Skraw noted down. He began by mentioning that the group (and by the "group", he meant any Shipton crew that had visited Bol in the past few weeks) had been drawing a lot of attention, and said he wanted to know why. He asked if the group still worked with James, to which the group answered honestly: not right now. He asked if we were friends with James and if James had any ties to the Rogue University of Skulkery, but Jeff honestly answered that he wasn't sure, and that while James had one rogue friend, the rogue wasn't a member of the university.

He ominously mentioned that he has to treat Shipton as an organization, and therefore all Shipton guards were going to be treated as "responsible", but for what he didn't say. The veiled threat wasn't terribly veiled, especially when he also revealed that Skraw had been keeping tabs on the group via the cloaked figures -- undercover guards. Bo countered that Pote the Shipton Rep would probably be the one Skraw had to speak to, given he actually represented Shipton as a company and as Margie pointed out, the guards are just contractors. Skraw dropped that line of questioning, and asked if Jeff was an artificer, or if any of them knew Professor Trilmer.

Jeff said he was an artificer albeit one not affiliated with any Bol school of artificing, and he was excited to meet some Bol artificers. Each party member present honestly answered they'd never met Trilmer, and left it at that.

Skraw ended the interrogation, saying they'd be in touch. On the way out of town the group noticed guards plainly following them, not even trying to be sneaky about it.