Of Brands and Bovines

It was baking hot and dry, the kind of weather best suited for sitting in the shade and paddling your feet in the Idlewhile. A few days had passed since Pebbles’ party. The Foundlings had nursed their hangovers, and recovered from their adventure in Xalik Cul Zhan’s ancient burial chamber. Now, they had started to become restless.

Pebbles and Enid paid a visit to Axel Moorcraft. The apprentice rag and bone trader had recently discovered that his father owed an astonishing debt to the moneylender, but that wasn’t what he was calling about. Pebbles wanted a diamond in order that he might cast a spell he had read about.

At the door, they were greeted by Frobish, a lanky red-haired pubescent human garbed in ill-fitting livery. The friends had never seen this young man before, and he explained that he had recently arrived from Triel, especially for the job of waiting on Axel Moorcraft.

Their interview was a frustrating affair. The moneylender gloated about Pebbles’ father’s debt and offered to sell a diamond, but at vastly inflated price. Despite an attempt to read the moneylender’s mind, the two friends could not get the better of the canny devil. As Pebbles and Enid took their leave, he casually informed the young halfling that should his father die while still owing a debt, the balance would become Pebbles’ responsibility.

Meanwhile, Featherfew paid a visit to Tom Orphir, the town’s imposing but gentle blacksmith. He commissioned a suit of studded leather armour for himself and his friend Ilyad. Later, the druid tinkered with his almanac - the strange set of rotating discs he had been gifted by his mentor, Rimple Welby - and realised that beside predicting the weather, he could also use them as a conduit for his magic.

With Ilyad’s permission, Den approach Caris Flyte, the town’s bailiff and asked that she train him in unarmed combat. She quickly agreed, but then stunned him with an offer of her own - that he should become her new deputy, replacing the disgraced Eldo Temple, who had fled after his attempted murder. Den demurred, and told Caris that his next priority was locating his missing father, Gander Farlight. Caris accepted this, but asked Den to pass along a message to Ilyad.

Enid spent some time helping out Father Kendrick at the Rose Garden. The old priest of Chauntea seemed to bear no ill will over Enid’s choice of oath; that she had preferred to swear her sword to the old ways and the Widows, rather than in service of the church. His mute ward Twig, however, seemed to hold a burning grudge, and glowered at Enid fiercely. Wondering what advice he might have for her, Enid asked Father Kendrick for his guidance. The blind holy man only chuckled, and told Enid that she had mentors enough already; she should learn to trust herself and her own good judgement in future.

Pebbles asked Featherfew if he could serve as go-between in a conversation with his cat Clarabelle. This stray moggy had appeared after Pebbles buried his old dog near the totem for the Widow of the Wilds. Clarabelle confided her preferred name to Featherfew: Scrumscourgeous, the slayer of multitudes and nemesis of rats and mice. She declared that Pebbles was her servant and, when asked about the missing Sir Starling, purred that he would be a most delectable feast.

Ilyad eventually paid a visit to Caris, taking along the rest of the Lost and Foundlings. The bailiff told her that she was in earnest when she said that she was keen to apprehend the real perpetrators of the cattle rustling for which Ilyad was imprisoned. Someone, she reminded them, had stolen two of Bumpo Tungis’ cattle and attempted to frame Sir Hugo Dyer, Ilyad’s father. She suggested that they investigate further at Marrowbone Farm and Tungis pastures.

The party went first to interview Gull Marrowbone, the resentful neighbour of Bumpo Tungis, who bore a grudge against Sir Dyer. Marrowbone had motive: if he were able to discredit Sir Dyer, then he might be able to overturn the hedgewarder’s unfavourable ruling. But to achieve this, he would either have had to steal two cows from Bumpo’s herd, or have stolen the Tungis brand.

First, the party visited Tom Ophir, to ask if he had ever made a second brand for Tungis Pastures. He said that he hadn’t. They then left town, and travelled an hour or so to the east, along the Dusk Road, before arriving at Marrowbone Farm.

The unusually hot and dry weather has started to affect this seasons crops, but the party hadn’t seen the effects as pronounced as here at Marrowbone farm. The fields of barley look as dry as old straw, ready to combust should there be an errant spark. Marrowbone farm was scrupulously clean, as neat as a pin, though lacking in grace and warmth. The low farmhouse was built from grey stone which had collected and stored all the heat of the sun; it was scalding hot to the touch. Parched and unhappy pigs grunted from within an uncomfortably low and mean stone pen.

Knocking at the front door of the farmhouse, the party were greeted by Gull Marrowbone, a brusque and suspicious man, who towered over them all. While Enid kept him occupied, claiming to be conducting a survey on behalf of the Devlin’s Dower Town Council, Ilyad snuck about the farm sheds while invisible. Pebbles probed Gull’s mind, and found no trace of guilt. The rude old farmer soon tired of the friends and left them with his meek daughter Ingrid, who managed to sell Enid a large bottle of her pig tallow based beauty cream. Ilyad found no trace of a second brand in Gull’s stores, but she did steal a map of Marrowbone Farm, which indicated the areas into which he intended to expand his allotments.

The party carried on to Tungis Pastures, which was a markedly different type of farm. The grass there was yellow and almost completely dead; besides lacking water, it had also been cropped down to stubble by a herd of healthy looking cattle. Broad and tall, Tungis cattle are renowned throughout the Dower.

Though he may be good at rearing prize-winning livestock, Bump Tungis seemed to lack all other aptitudes required of farming life. The farmyard was a shambles, filled with broken wheelbarrows, rotten straw, and rickety looking fences. There was something particularly off-putting about the chicken run, a network of shoddily built hen houses on little stilts from which an unpleasant smell could be detected.

A lugubrious old Bloodhound took a desultory sniff of at the visitors, then flopped down as though exhausted by the effort. Pebbles rifled through the assorted clutter, discovering a rather lovely little bronze hourglass amidst the junk.

‘You can keep that, if you like,’ came a broad country accent. The party met Bumpo Tungis, a seemingly benign and cheerful bumpkin. Bumpo welcomed the Foundlings and offered them a cool drink; he enthusiastically took part in Enid’s survey. Pebbles read his mind while he was being questioned about any missing cattle, and was rewarded with a vivid vision of a furnace, and a nagging thought about a job left undone. Quickly he communicated this to Ilyad, who slipped away in search of this spot on the farm. Bumpo seemed keen to end the interview and hasten off to do something important, when a Clarbelle, loosed from Pebbles’ cart, wandered over to the chicken run, intent on finding some unsuspecting lunch.

The cat came yowling back, streaking toward the road as though she was on fire. Emerging from the chicken hutches, came a veritable flock of basilisks. Like evil-looking chickens, but with scaly, prehensile tails, the furious birds set about attacking everything in the farmyard.

Featherfew swiftly sent one of the evil birds to sleep with a magical incantation, before he spun his almanac and took an iridescent appearance, glowing with star charts and shifting weather patterns. Den let on a basilisk and hammered it with a flurry of blows. Pebbles cast a spell, but something seems to flare and magical energy coruscated from him. For the first time since the night at the witch’s hut, the young halfling felt fear wash over him - it was transfixed with terror.

Enid, seeing her friend struggle, whispered encouragement to him, freeing him from the magically induced affect. She then hurled a javelin, neatly skewering a basilisk. Featherfew and Den continued to eliminate the beasts, with magic bolts and fists. Pebbles froze one with a blast of energy, but when he went to cast another spell, it backfired again, transporting him to a strange ethereal mirror version of the farmyard. The effect was brief, but unsettling.

The party made swift work of the creatures - Bumpo, it seemed, had bought them for a bargain price, and had intended to harvest the eggs.

Ilyad meanwhile, scoured the farm and discovered an unlit furnace; nesting inside was a torn sheet of paper. Reuniting with the rest of the party, who had made their excuses and left Bumpo to clean up the basilisks, Ilyad revealed the note. Pebbles worked some rag-and-bone magic, repairing the rip in the page, and the party read the message therein:

‘It would serve our purposes were Sir Hugo Dyer removed as Hedgewarder. By night, take two of your cows and leave them in his barn. When you are accused of bribing him, as you surely will be, you must tell everyone that you saw a young woman steal them. People will either believe that he is corrupt or that he instructed his ward to rustle the cows.

In return, your considerable debts will be wholly forgiven. Should you refuse, then you will die, by order of the Secret Council. Do not defy us. Destroy this note.’

Bumpo, it seemed, had intended to destroy the incriminating note, but just hadn’t got around to lighting the furnace. It was a fortunate thing, as this short message was likely all the evidence the party needed to exonerate Ilyad! Despite their delight at this turn of events, they couldn’t help but wonder who were the Secret Council, and what did they want?