Journal Entry - 01/14/20

Our adventurers start their day returning to Oscar and Harris' escorted by guard captain Oliver Mason who questioned their overbearing interest in a wall in an alley where a house party was scheduled to take place that night. Oliver leaves everyone at Oscar and Harris and threatens to throw anyone he sees at the party out. The crew decides their best course of action is to infiltrate the party and begins working on a plan.

Avarra performs reconnaissance to find out more information about the party and what the best way to break-in would be.

Oscar is standing outside and guides the party to find Silvia Aare, going to the sun port and asking Mr. Declan. Rhak and Hal proceed to the Sun Port to investigate Silvia Aare, Mishal and Akmenos return to the stable with Charlie, the stablehand. Avarra returns to the party on a scouting mission.

Rhak and Hal go to the Sun Port and speak with Mr. Declan. He said the Silvia Aare left a few days ago to multiple destinations and won't return for another week. Rhak offered Mr. Declan a drink hoping for additional information.

Mishal and Akmenos drop off the stablehand and stop at the hidden passage again. Unable to open it (again), Akmenos back traces the steps and tries to follow the footsteps and walks mask-first into the wall. Mishal feels a magical implement is required to open it. They have another brush with the guards and narrowly avoid being captured through Akmenos' clever deception in spite of Mishal's best efforts.

Avarra talked her way past the guard to Jonah Forge under the guise of offering new information. She indicates we were in hot pursuit until losing him around a corner. Jonah suggests that Avarra mingles with the party looking for leads and follows up at the end of the night. Avarra notes a woman chiding Jonah about the conversation but can't hear the specifics.

Rhak and Hal return to the district of the party with the intent of finding Avarra but immediately notice a surge of guards in the area. They try to sneak into the square through the servants quarters and wind up in a storage room. Rhak holds a bag of potatoes to pass off as a servant and Hal begins holding his Explorer's Pack in front of him.

Avarra continues with the extravagant party with Poppy guiding her through the masses and giving background about the families at the party. There is a group of finely dressed undercover guardsmen at the party watching over the party-goers. Avarra returns to the second floor and takes Poppy to an unpopulated area....pretty sneaky...Avarra begins probing to find the other entrance to residence and is sent to the Servant's quarters "basement" which is on the first floor.

Mishal and Akmenos decide to break into the party suspecting Avarra is likely already inside. They enter the same room Rhak and Hal are in but in a strange time dilation, they were there first. Mysteriously, Rhak and Hal enter shortly thereafter! They all begin to talk about how they will get in and wonder where Avarra may be.

Avarra fails to sneak by the house staff and uses the excuse of looking for towels, insisting on choosing her own towel. The head butler arrives, telling the staff to get back to work and asking Avarra why she is here. She stays the course with the towel ruse and the butler invites her into his office while he fetches the finest towels. He returns with four high quality towels. Avarra uses this meeting as a stepping stone to attempt to strong arm the Butler into letting her do whatever she'd like.

Everyone else decides to walk through the kitchen like they belong and Rhak flings open the door to scan the room. He then confidently walks towards the alleyway with Hal, Akmenos and Mishal following in that order. It works thanks for the stealthy approach of...Rhak'Thall....of all people.

All the efforts were in vain though as immediately after leaving a guard shoos the party away. Giving up on stealth, they walk to the front door and Rhak'Thall convinces the guards to fetch Lord Jonah who is furious that the party attempted to enter the premises without any semblance of discretion. He turns them away with a note granting entry to the estate after scolding our poor judgement.

The party returns to the back entrance and stumbles onto Avarra! For some reason she is rifling through a broom closet. She encourages everyone to try and figure out the secret of the hidden door and Mishal and Avarra gleaned that the door from the outside seems to lead to a hidden room.

The ragtag bunch walks around and lockpicks the door in plain sight of the kitchen staff but the staff doesn't notice. With a display of extreme deftness and god-like hand-eye coordination Rhak manages to avoid the trap of the room...By seeing it and warning everyone not to trip it.

the group enters the room with the exception of Hal who is having difficulty overcoming his paranoia and stares at the external door intently. Meanwhile the contributing members of the team begin to search the room and suspect there's still another mystery that's yet to be uncovered in this room. They find Forge record books and Akmenos starts to peruse them while everyone else continues to investigate. Mishal finds that the tripwire looks like it has not been activated in some time, it has cobwebs on it. Rhak deliberately and dramatically triggers the trap! Nothing noticeable happens. Akmenos shakes out the book and finds receipts, bookmarks, other boring stuff, but he does notice they are from 50 years ago and Rhak notices books as old as 100 years and most recent from 40 years ago. Deciding there's nothing of interest, the party leaves the room and moves on to other things. Avarra returns to the party in a life of debauchery and indulgence. Rhak and Hal return to meet Dockmaster Declan. Mishal and Akmenos remain in the room to investigate dust bunnies and a musty sealed letter from the Fairisles family...probably nothing scandalous.

Rhak and Hal return to the Sun Port stopping at a bar on the way to pick up three tankards of ale. He is more jovial as Rhak questions him about Silvia Aare and its seediness. Decklin says he doesn't see many seedy folks around his parts. He is going to round up a dockworker to find additional information about Silvia Aare and Haldar.

Akmenos opens his secret boring letter no one cares about and it says something to the effect of,"Your secret is safe as long as you hold up your end of the deal -F" Nothing to read in to there... Akmenos shuts the door to get some privacy.Mishal buries the hatchet (in a wall).

Persons/Places of interest:

* Oscar and Harris - 127 Lily Street with the accountants Oscar and Harris. Calling location for the poison murder mystery

* Haldar - Half-Orc suspected to have murdered Miles Stenum, Ingrid...Forge...?, and the Rowly twins. He fled after the fourth murder.
* Scratch - Human vagabond hired around the same time as Haldar.
* Silvia Aare (Air) - Silvia was on a note found in Haldar's room after he fled the city...and it turns out she's actually a boat
* Sir Neil - Keeper of the City....? One of the three knights that serve under the duke
* Mr. Declan (Deck-lin) - Dockmaster of the Sun Port - Portly human man - Very busy, didn't seem interested in a drawn out discussion with Hal and Rhak.
* Poppy - Sister of Ingrid - Escorting Avarra around the party