Brother Aldric kept the only written list of the disappeared, and the Red Guard who took him will burn him and the ledger together at first bell unless someone pulls both out of a flooding cellar tonight.
The Situation
The Red Guard arrested Brother Aldric three nights ago, and with him the ledger where he wrote every name the conscription sweeps erased. They hold him in the condemned textile warehouse under Koss's Curiosities, a cellar Devorlen Koss never agreed to lend and cannot refuse. At first bell they march him up the Cliff Road to the castle, and the Cliff Road runs one way. The Resistance wants the ledger more than the priest. Koss wants both gone before the Guard thinks to search his shelves.
Objectives
- Primary · Get Brother Aldric out of the cellar and clear of the Marrow District alive before the transfer column forms at first bell.
- Secondary · Recover his ledger of the disappeared, held apart from him by the watch sergeant as evidence for the magistrate.
- Secondary · Leave without burning Koss, who is worth more as a contact than a corpse.
The Clocks
- Main · First Bell. A six-step countdown to the transfer. It advances one step each time the party makes noise, forces a door, or blows a bluff. At six, the column marches and Aldric is gone up the Cliff Road.
- Fast · The Cellar Fills. The warehouse stands condemned because the Erdo runoff floods the lower level. Once the party descends, the water climbs one step every other turn; at the third step Aldric, chained to the floor, drowns first.
- Social · Koss's Patience. Koss grants quiet until the watch changes. Stay loud past that and he sells the party to the Guard to save his shop.
The Five Beats
- Entrance · Condemned and chained, the warehouse is the one ruin on the lane the Guard trusts, because no one squats a cellar that floods. The party comes down through Koss's shop past his careful "I saw nothing." Fresh boot-mud on the stair and a Guard cloak drying at a brazier say the cell below is not empty.
- Discovery · The ledger is not on Aldric. The sergeant keeps it on his belt for the magistrate. Aldric, half-starved, has already torn and swallowed three pages of names he would not surrender.
- Setback · The lower cellar starts to flood, and the stair becomes the only dry way out, with the brazier-Guard standing between the party and it.
- Climax · Strike the chain as the water climbs and the transfer horn sounds above. The sergeant arrives to collect his prisoner for the column and finds the party instead. One barred window to the alley, a chain that wants his key or a hard cut, and the water at the knee.
- Resolution · Out through the alley fog or up through Koss's stockroom and a debt owed. The man lives or the list survives, rarely both clean. A name in the ledger belongs to someone the party knows.
Leverage Points
- The sluice lever. Drops the floodwater fast, but the surge slams the cellar door and announces the party to the whole lane (advance the Bell clock two).
- Devorlen Koss. Trades the sergeant's key and a dry exit through his stockroom for a price: a name, a favor, or first read of the ledger.
- The swallowed pages. Aldric carries three names inside him; a healer or a hard choice recovers them, but moving him at speed loses them for good.
- The drying cloak. Worn, it walks one person past the forming column, until someone calls for the man who owns it.
- The brazier. Tipped into the oil-slick runoff, it lights and seals the stair both ways: cover and trap in one act.
The Cast
- Brother Aldric (the Resistance, loosely) · Chained and fevered, refusing to name his sources even to his rescuers. Wants the ledger saved over his own skin. Cooperates only once he believes the party means to protect the names, not sell them.
- The Watch Sergeant (Red Guard) · Methodical, carries the ledger as his ticket to a promotion under Captain Ashford. Wants the transfer clean and on time. Will not bargain, but hesitates if the magistrate's authority is thrown at him or his evidence starts to flood.
- Devorlen Koss (Terrassian, broker of secrets) · Above it all, literally. Wants the Guard out of his cellar and his stock unsearched. Sells the dry exit and the key's whereabouts to gain a hold over the party later, and folds toward whoever threatens his shop least.
Climax Variable (d6)
Roll once when the sergeant reaches the cell, or choose the twist that pays off what the party already did.
| d6 | Twist |
|---|---|
| 1 | First bell rings early. The column forms now; jump the Bell clock to five. |
| 2 | The sluice has failed upstream. The water doubles its rise; the Cellar clock runs twice as fast. |
| 3 | The sergeant takes the magistrate's name. Invoke Voron's authority and he stands aside, but only if no blood was drawn in the cellar. |
| 4 | The barred window gives. A hard pull opens the alley early, but the noise brings the cloak's owner looking for it. |
| 5 | Aldric will not leave without the ledger. Hold it and he moves; lack it and he sits in the rising water and refuses, and someone must carry him out. |
| 6 | Koss cuts his losses and bolts the stockroom from above. The dry exit is gone; the alley window is the only way out. |
Breadcrumbs
The swallowed pages and the sergeant's ledger are the same list, and whichever survives names the party's own contact as next on the sweep, which is why carrying it out matters more than the priest believes. Beyond this quest: one name in the ledger belongs to a Red Guard officer's own sister, proof the sweeps have started to eat the Crown's own household.
The Not-Line
This quest is not a quiet jailbreak. It is a race against a rising cellar and a dawn bell, where saving the man and saving his list may not be the same rescue.