I. The Stolen Lands : 1.4 Stories about previous settlements and the rule of the Staglord

Prisoners or an introduction to Justice

The aftermath of their first violent encounter in the Stolen Lands got the Heroes burdened with 3 lost souls and not the slightest idea about what to do with them.

The surviving bandits surrendered. It was then difficult for the emissaries of Restov to kill them in cold blood even though their charter stated clearly that they needed to clear the Green Belt from brigands. Yegor probably was the more eager to hang the prisoners after an expedite trial. His proposal was welcomed with a mixed reaction among the party and it was finally decided to interrogate the bandits to define if they had remorse and I they were likely to collaborate.

The sorry fellows were answering to merry nicknames such as Sourwine, Meatloaf Jan and Skinny Tomcat. The first two, and probably not the smartest of the lot, cried and begged and rolled themselves in the dirt to show how guilty they felt. The Heroes decided to give them a chance and the fellows got a full year of service to the community, just being fed twice a day and sheltered with horses. There was plenty of work to do in South Fort as the walls and defences were in quite a bad shape. The Heroes warned though, that if it happened that they'd try to escape, they would be tracked down and put to death like rabid dogs.

Skinny Tom was of a brighter side of banditry and proposed right away to lead the Heroes to his former colleagues' camp in the Great Forest in exchange of his freedom. Heroes accepted his offering and ended up leaving Southfort at dawn the day after. Before they packed, Evgeny, the knightly paladin and leader of the party pronounced a short but inspiring speech in which he promised to watch over the people of the land and therefore to defend them against any threat and unfair treatment. Despite they were quite unused to such formal statements, locals warmly welcomed the effort and ended up very impressed by the young warrior's oratory talents. 

After a couple days in the bush, the party approached a camp the bandits had set on the eastern bank of the Thorn river. The place was near a ford where men could cross over with water up their waist. Despite the efficient and discrete reckon the ranger Alyssa and inquisitor Yegor led prior to the assault, the group was quickly noticed by watchers who started to fire arrows at the incomers. This second fight was a bit longer than the first, probably due to a stronger opposition and archers hidden in the trees, but the result was pretty much identical. Both Kressle, the female bandit leader and her lieutenant Happs were killed but a few brigands managed to disappear. Among them, Skinny Tom, tried to flee across the prairie but three members of the party pursued him, caught him and hanged him to a birch tree. When searching the camp and the corpses, the Heroes who remained there found strange wooden pendants in the shape of a stag hanged at their former opponents necks.

Kellarim, Algernei and Sleek (left to right)

Going back to Oleg's Fort, the party asked about the stag pendants and got uncertain answers. It looked like the bandits of the Thorn Ford are only a fraction of an small army of marauders led by a cruel stone cold killer of a man (or may be was he a horned demon) going with the surname the "Staglord". He was based in a much bigger fortified camp way down South of the land, in the location of a former small village of peaceful settlers. He and his troop had taken the settlement by force a few years back in time. The fact of the matter was that all of this was second hand information. Only one inhabitant of the area had survived an encounter with the Staglord not being a brigand, and it was the procurer Algernei.

The idea of having a prostitution business around was kind of difficult to swallow for our prude devotes of Erastil, but despite their disgust, they met Algernei and his two henchmen. The first one Kelarim the strong was a huge Shoanti serving as muscle. The second was Sleek, a quick witted rogue who knew the area as the back of his hand and acted as a beater.

The discussion did not go very well in the beginning as words like "slaver" or "petty criminal" were quickly thrown at the mocking pimp. To calm the Heroes down, he just asked them to hear his story so they can assess if he was such a bad man as they seemed to believe.

Back something like five years in the past, Algernei was a liquor merchant travelling with a caravan of traders from Restov aiming to visit a remote but prosperous colony of Rostian settlers in the Green Belt. There were around two hundred souls in the isolated village with no access to civilisation what so ever. It was agreed with the leaders of the community that the merchants would cross the grassy Kamelands to come and trade manufactured goods, fabrics, tools or alcohol against local products like high quality furs, honey, grains and such. The perfect plan... until the hamlet was suddenly attacked by a ruthless hord of brigands led by the Staglord. The merciless marauders murdered half of the population and took over the place. A few young women were kept alive so the brigands could enjoy the infamous price of the victors.
When reviewing the survivors, the traders were quickly identified as useless as slave workers and they were therefore put to the sword. When Algernei was dragged out of the rank to be executed he called out the Staglord who was towering above his men and drinking bottoms up one of the merchant's bottles of wine. Intrigued, the bandit leader got the bold trader presented to him. Algernei caught him off guard by proposing a crazy bargain...

"Ô, my fierce lord, do you hear those screams ? These are the screams of the maids your men are forcing. Give them a week of this treatment and the only presentable women of the region will be nothing but corpses ! And your soldiers will only have sheeps left to satisfy their lust... Let me be of service and take the girls away with me and I'll have them pretty and fancily dressed and all, and your  men will be able to visit them for a few gold crowns... what do you say, ô my fierce but wise lord ? "

Surprisingly, the silver tongue of the liquor merchant managed to convince the Staglord. A handful of young women in tears could leave with Algernei. As he was driving them cuddled in his damaged cart, he was clenching his jaw hoping the brigand king wouldn't change his mind before they could get out of the camp.

The merchant kept his word and established an itinerant brothel, saving the maids lives as well as condemning them to a nonetheless terrible condition.

If some of the Heroes were troubled by this story with many shades of gray, it was very much clearer for Evgeny. The young paladin's hanger was palpable and he was very close to unsheathe his sword. The party managed to convince him that it would not be wise to attack the procurer as he seemed to be well connected to the community but he nevertheless promised to dismantle Algernei's nefarious business.

Next : I. The Stolen Lands : 1.5 About Jhod the itinerant priest and the lost Temple of Erastil