The eastern gate of Mossgate groans beneath a crush of wagons. Bram Barrelbalde reaches it with Merren Vask still under guard as hoofbeats and frightened voices echo from the old root-road.
Elora Vale-Walker forces her way through the queue, one arm braced around a bloodied militia scout. In the scout's clenched hand, a broken convoy seal bears a smear of red wax.
Elora Vale-Walker
Bram? By the roots, I hoped I was wrong. No time for old wounds. Merren, which wagon did Ulrik mark?
The Wounded Scout
The attackers came from the old root-road... they knew the convoy's sign. One wagon carried the hooked branch.
Merren Vask
The third wagon from the gate. Green canvas, iron-rimmed wheels. The notch on Bram's token names its road-master.
Elora Vale-Walker
Then that is where we move. The road-master may still be alive, and whoever sent those raiders will strike again before dawn.
“I move straight to the third wagon”
Bram Barrelbalde cuts through the halted wagons and reaches the third. Green canvas sags above iron-rimmed wheels, while the brass tally badge and red-wax token mark its passage as the credible trail onward.
✓ Quest Accepted
Verify the marked convoy passage
“I present the token and brass tally to the wagon's road-master.”
FAILURE (Mediocre Diplomacy, rolled -3)
Bram Barrelbalde raises the red-wax token and brass tally badge toward the wagon's narrow driver's hatch, presenting both marks without a word.
Road-master Hadrik Pell
Keep those seals away from my wagon. The road-master does not answer to a stranger in a bloodied lane.
The hatch slams nearly shut. Hadrik's refusal turns the marked passage from proof into a guarded suspicion, and the wagon's team stamps nervously beneath the green canvas.
The Wounded Scout
That is the wagon. I saw its third wheel cross the old root-road, just before the attackers struck.
Merren Vask
The notch on that brass badge matches the token. Hadrik carries the convoy's passage mark, whether he admits it or not.
Road-master Hadrik Pell
Merren knows the mark. The scout knows the road. I will not open my ledger, but the third wagon is bound east by the root-road before dawn.
Hadrik bars the hatch again, leaving the token's red wax and the matching brass notch plainly established, but denying Bram the road-master's cooperation.
Quest Complete
Verify the marked convoy passage
+ New Item Acquired
Brass tally badge