18 Pflugzeit
I need to write another letter to Bova - so much has happened - to think that I sent one this very morning!
Armed with the grimoire we returned to the temple of Verena. Priestess Greta Harbokka listened intently and after some encouragement, accompanied us to the Temple of Sigmar. High Priest Ludo Edel had been murdered in his own chambers. Throat slashed and multiple stab wounds. Familiar by now.
We next spoke to Fabergus Heinzdork, a visiting "priest" who turned out to be a witch hunter. He declared we should go to the Adler Ring (that's where the rich folks live) and keep it under surveillance while he roused the Graf and got some troops to aid our cause. Priestess Harbokka would watch over the dagger, grimoire, and the broken bronze disk in Verena's temple. Left A&A with Harbokka. They're not fighters and shouldn't be treated as such. Every time you bring rookies to a fight, someone panics, and then shit happens.
Stopped by the Chief Magistrate to see if he was doing better and indeed he was. The medicine Anna and Annika had brewed made all the difference. Had a quick chat with both Richter and his housekeeper. Learned something interesting: Watch Captain Goetrin was the last person to see the magistrate, right before he fell ill. And the captain never makes house calls...
Leaving the house, we met Captain Goetrin and three of his men right outside. He was making a second house call. Naturally, I was a bit apprehensive. The man and insisted he'd never been to the magistrate's house before. The housekeeper insisted he had. Richter couldn't remember. It was a strange conversation, but the captain seemed honest and proper as they come. When the housekeeper said he's smelled of sulfur when last he came around the pieces suddenly fit. An impostor, using sorcery to wear the face of another? Is such a thing possible? I must write to Bova.
Returning to the inn, accompanied now by the captain and his men, we found it on fire. Some unsavory men had come looking for Thesalva, but the innkeep had spirited her away to safety. Shortly thereafter flames and smoke appeared. It got even stranger when Herr Landau told me witnesses had seen a man looking like Wigmar right before. As if von Liberung would stoop to arson!
Worse was to come. Lady Isolde, Janna, and Marie were gone, all three of them. Not a trace to be found. No signs of struggle, no witnesses to a kidnapping. Up until this point the whole affair had been business. Now it felt rather personal. Arsonists burning my rooms. The kidnapping of my future wife. Von Liberung will not stand for this. Honor must be satisfied. That's what baron Malthuus would have done.
It was rather late, close to midnight before we finally reached the Adler Ring. Whatever meeting may have been taking place was long over. Perhaps we should have moved faster but we were waiting for the witch hunter anyway.
Note to self: Having a watch captain at your side is both a good thing and a bad. It's handing for getting into places and convincing people but they have an annoying tendency to speak about 'the law,' what's 'proper', and 'evidence.' Quite limiting.
A lone figure appeared in the mist, eerily backlit by the light of the two moons. One Friederich Magirius, head of the Merchant's Guild and chief of the Town Council. Well known to Captain Goetrin if not to us. He admitted to coming from the Teugens, so I pistolwhipped him good and dragged the man into the park. A quick dunk in the fountain and he was cognizant (that's a word a noble would use) enough to speak.
He admitted the whole thing, quick and easy as that. Though he did try to convince us that the Ordo Septenarius - the Order of Seven - was a benign organization that wanted the best for all of Bögenhafen's citizens. The ritual, he claimed, was indeed magical, but blessed by Bögenauer and Handrich, intended to bring prosperity to all (especially the already rich). He had a rather hard time explaining away the dagger, the grimoire, and the human sacrifices.
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