Eike's Journal (Part 2)

29th Sigmarzeit

He's back. I don't know how he found us but he's back. I woke up to Lubin pawing through my things and reading my journal. He claims he climbed through the window while we were asleep, too drunk to know where he was going, and just happened across us by Ranald's improvidence divine. Not sure I believe that but gods only know how else he could have found us, even if he had the nose of a hochland hound our trail would have been blotted out by stench of his ale breath. Once we'd recovered from the shock of his arrival (and I'd finished counting the content of my coin purse) we brought Lubin up to speed on the plan.

**The Plan:**

Disguise ourselves as ale merchants and smuggle the dwarves into the city in ale barrels. Cross the bridge with a forged permit and travel to the southern wall. There we deliver the ale to a guard-post and get them all drunk enough that they either pass out or won't notice the dwarfs exiting the city. We steal a key to one of the tower gates from the passed-out guards and let the dwarfs out of the city with no one any the wiser then head back across the bridge and leave town.

**The problems:**

1) We need some real beer for the soldiers to drink and it can't be the same swill that the local brewery makes given Volkmar forged us papers as ale merchants.

2) We need some documentation that will get us across the bridge. Which means forgery.

To address problem 1 we decided to try and make contact with the local underworld and find ourselves some moonshiners. Lubin immediately leapt on the idea as an opportunity to gamble, what better way to find an in with the local underworld than gambling at the Arm of the Dwarf... Well Elrik agreed with him and frankly I needed more distance between myself and Lubin than our room at the Margraf's Arms allowed so we headed over the road to gamble on the fighting pit. Enroute Lubin suggested that the gambling, given it was part of our plan, be covered by the discretionary fund (Verena alone knows where he found out about that). After a bit of haggling we agreed that the fund would provide 8ss to whomever wanted to place a bet on the condition that half of all winnings were returned to the pot and if anyone lost their full 8ss they would stand the cost of our alcohol purchase. Lubin and Elric both took 8ss from the discretionary fund.

I don't know whether the Arm of the Dwarf starts early or is open late but as we walked in fresh from our breakfast there were contenders lining up to take part in the next bought in the fighting pit. Either way we ordered a round of drinks for ourselves, one of which Lubin spontaneously decided to give to the bartender causing a brief scrimmage as the four of us raced to grab the remaining three tankards. Once things had settled down, and Lubin had bought himself a replacement pint, we enquired with the bartender, a man named Goro Klemm, about placing a wager on the fighting pits. Which is how we first discovered Real Limb Bingo (RLB for short).

As it turns out Goro Klemm is more than just the bartender and proprietor of the Arm of the Dwarf, he is also the sporting innovator behind Real Limb Bingo, which Goro assured us was a simple and profound method of gambling on a fight. I'll repeat the rules here as best memory serves.

**Real Limb Bingo:**

An RLB brawl consists of four fighters battling it out in an arena. However unlike in normal gambling where gamblers might bet on confusing and intangible concepts like "The Winner" or "Last fighter alive" RLB stream lines this process, counting only what matters - hits. But RLB is no boorish slugfest where jeering punters bet on which fighter will deliver the most blows to his opponents in a round, no RLB is far more refined. To partake in RLB is to walk the same path as the Halfling chef at the meat market, searching for the right cuts to produce their next fabled cockatrice, or that of a necromancer in a graveyard composing his ideal specimen. For in RLB a Fantasy Fighter is compiled by each punter selecting legs, arms, and heads from amongst the assembled fighters. Every time a fighter lands a blow with one of their limbs the punter with that limb on their fantasy fighter scores a point. The first to reach 10 points and shout REAL LIMB BINGO wins.

With Lubin and Elrik champing at the bit to place a bet Goro directed us towards Ruob (not a misspelling) "The Bookie" Gunther. There Ruob corrected a few errors on Lubin and Elrik's RLB fighters (preventing Lubin constructing a fighter exclusively out of right arms) and the fight got underway. After a few minutes of fighting Lubin's fighter had scored the 10 points need to win. During the presentation of his winnings Lubin was outraged to discover that the pub and the fighters each took a share from his reducing his winnings to 28ss. He was then even more outraged when I attempted to collect the 14ss he owed to the discretionary fund. It was only Elric tacitly threatening Lubin that convinced him to part with what he owed.

NB: Elric still holds 5ss of discretionary funds

Thankfully Elrik was able to smooth out Lubin's ruckus and won Roub round enough he let slip that the best place to pick up some illicit brew was the Schnorrer. Who or what the Schnorrer was Ruob didn't make clear but he stated that those in the know could find it near MarktStrasse. So we said or good-byes and set off towards MarktStrasse. Volkmar was the first to spot the signs, etched into the daub of merchant's house in the symbology known to thieves from Marienburg to Praag. They pointed us into a warren of back alleys which we wound our way through with only the occasional scratching of thieves signs for guidance. It was a suprise to us all when we rounded the corner of a wending backwynd to find ourselves face-to-face with a pair of bouncers guarding a door. Volkmar managed to style the meeting out by walking past the bouncers with a knowing nod before they could question him. The rest of us just filed along behind him.

The Schnorrer is large subterranean black market, Marktplatz of the underworld both literal and metaphorical. It didn't take long for us to find the local moonshiner, a man known as Gottwick Valgentz, who seemed delighted by our distaste for the local brewery. He offered us a free sample of his traditional brew "The Old Speckled Hen" and some of his newer until then unnamed recipe. Elrik suggested that given the difference in age and brewing method Gottwick name his new brew "The Young Striped Cock" which Gottwick immediately adopted. After some haggling, and the not so subtle application of my womanly wiles, we managed to negotiate 4 barrels (at 72 pints each) plus their smuggling out of the city to be collected at the north gate, for a reasonable price. Lubin, true to form, bought himself a 32 pint minikeg.

Whilst Elrik, Lubin, and me had been negotiating with Gottwick; Volkmar had found a local smuggler called Elspetta Schwarzheim that runs a gang smuggling goods between the north and south of the city. Elric and Volkmar tried to bargain with Elspetta for some advice or tools to help us forge some papers or smuggle the dwarfs over the river another way. Although they weren't making great headway all chance of assistance were sunk when Lubin decided to intervene with some hardcore negging. He went on a tirade, called her outfit minnows and told Elspetta she "should be grateful we're talking to you". If Elspetta had been impervious to our pleas before hand she was granite by the time Lubin had finally shut his flapping ale hatch. I don't think I saw her blink once through out.

Given the absolute steaming turd Lubin had just dropped all over our best lead we only had one option left, breaking into the castle to steal the papers and stationary need to forge our own pass. The thought of access to the Margrave's stationary cabinet proved enough to soften Elspetta towards us again and she offered some advice on the condition she could buy whatever we stole from the castle once we'd used it for our own ends.