On the outer road, a man in weathered leather steps from the brush and lifts one hand, palm out. The west gate looms open behind Slaan and the paladin, but the hoofbeats behind them are closing fast.
The Stranger
Hold. If you mean to live, you need this more than I do.
He raises a sealed scroll, wax crest dark against the pale road dust. His eyes flick to the paladin, and recognition hardens his face into fear.
The Stranger
That seal is from the High Chapel. They name you oathbreaker already. And whoever killed the pilgrim wanted you blamed.
The Paladin
Then speak plainly. Who sent you?
The man does not answer at once. He glances toward the distant riders, then thrusts the scroll forward as if it burns his fingers.
The Stranger
A courier died on the north spur. Before he fell, he named a witness hiding beyond the city. Take the road east, find the ash shrine, and read the seal there. It proves where the truth begins.
✓ Quest Accepted
Read the seal at the ash shrine
Slaan leaves the outer road behind and arrives at the ash shrine.
“"thanks!" I take the scroll ,and to the paladin " ok rusty keep up" and take off to the ash shrine”
SUCCESS (Fair Agility, rolled +3)
Ash drifts across the shrine steps like gray snow. Slaan and the paladin arrive under a broken lintel blackened by old fire, where a ring of standing stones leans around a low altar sealed with soot.
Slaan
Thanks.
Slaan snatches the scroll from the stranger and moves past him in one smooth stride, her daggers still low and ready.
Slaan
Keep up, Rusty.
The paladin huffs a sharp breath, then follows hard, one hand brushing the cracked sigil on his armor as he scans the shrine.
At the altar, Slaan breaks the seal. The wax gives with a dry crack, and a slip of chapel vellum falls free, marked with a pilgrim knot and a name written in hurried ink.
The note names the courier's witness and says the pilgrim was diverted here by a bounty hunter wearing false road colors.
The Stranger
That mark was not for the dead pilgrim. It was for you, paladin.
✓ Quest Accepted
Expose the bounty hunter in false road colors
Quest Complete
Read the seal at the ash shrine
“I search the altar for any sign of the hunter's recent presence.”
SUCCESS (Fair Perception, rolled +1)
Slaan lowers the slip and runs her fingers along the altar’s soot rim, finding a fresh smear where something was set down in haste. Ash clings to her glove, and a thin crescent of red wax flakes from the stone.
Slaan
Recent hands. Not old residue.
She leans closer. A boot print is pressed into the ash beside the altar, toe turned outward, and under it lies a grit of road salt still wet from the night air.
The paladin steps in beside her, then stops short as if not to disturb the mark. His armor’s cracked sigil catches the shrine light.
The Paladin
He was here recently.
The stranger stays at the entry, shoulders tight, watching Slaan’s hand as it lifts a thread of false road cloth snagged on a stone edge, faded by mud but still dyed in a hunter’s bright pattern.
The Stranger
That cloth should not be on an altar.
Slaan turns the fragment over. Beneath it, scratched into the soot in a quick traveler's mark, is the same pilgrim knot from the note, pointing east from the shrine.
“"whatcha know bout this"”
SUCCESS (Mediocre Persuasion, rolled +0)
Slaan
What do you know about this?
The stranger flinches at Slaan’s calm, then steps in from the entry. He points once at the pilgrim knot, once at the false road cloth, as if the two ought to sting together.
The Stranger
That mark sends pilgrims east, away from the main road. Someone used it to funnel the dead man into waiting hands.
The paladin’s gauntlet tightens on the shrine stone. The cracked sigil on his breastplate turns as he shifts, catching ash-light in the broken lines.
The Stranger
The hunter wore road colors to look lawful. He asked about a paladin, too, before the pilgrim ever set foot here.
The Paladin
Then the blade was meant for me.
He swallows the rest, eyes fixed on the eastward scratch. Slaan’s glove comes away gray with ash, and a loose flake of wax smears onto the scroll when she lowers it.
The Stranger
If you follow that way, you find the place he waits. If you want, I will show you where the road bends.
“"you can come, you a scout?"”
SUCCESS (Mediocre Persuasion, rolled +1)
Slaan
You can come. You scout?
The stranger’s shoulders loosen at once. He gives a small, relieved nod and shifts his grip on the scroll case, as if the answer matters more than the ash underfoot.
The Stranger
I am. Not for a banner, for a road. I read tracks, weather, false colors, the sort of lie a coat can tell from a distance.
The paladin lifts his head at that, one hand hovering near the cracked sigil on his breastplate. The ash on the altar stirs in a thin draft from the east.
The Stranger
If I walk with you, I can point out the hunter’s habits before he sees us. If he still wears road cloth, I will know where he learned to hide in plain sight.
The Paladin
Then let him stay near us. If this man knows the road, I would rather trust his eyes than another chapel seal.
The stranger taps the pilgrim knot once, then folds the false road cloth between ash-dark fingers, already thinking ahead. He looks from Slaan to the eastward mark, ready to lead.
“"why he call you oath breaker?" I ask the paladin”
SUCCESS (Fair Willpower, rolled -1)
Slaan
Why do they call you an oathbreaker?
The question lands cleanly in the shrine’s hush. The stranger stills, and the paladin’s hand tightens once against the cracked sigil on his breastplate.
The Paladin
Because the chapel chose a word before it chose the truth. I broke no sworn charge, only their command to stay silent when a pilgrim died and a hunter wore holy colors over the hunt.
His jaw works with old anger. Ash clings to the edges of his armor markings, darkening the lines that mark him as chapel sworn.
The Stranger
He said that in the square too, only nobody listened. The seal was meant to make him vanish into blame.
The paladin lets out one bitter breath, then gives Slaan a direct look, stripped of ceremony.
The Paladin
If you need more than that, ask me now. I would rather speak plainly than wear their lie any longer.
As he finishes, a flake of ash slides from the altar onto Slaan’s opened scroll, smudging the inked edge before anyone can catch it.
“" names Slaan by the way, nice to me you" I say to the scout. "And your welcome for me saven your neck." I say to the paladin”
SUCCESS (Mediocre Persuasion, rolled +1)
Slaan
Slaan gives the scout a small, level nod. She names herself, and thanks him for getting them this far. Then she turns the thanks toward the paladin too, with a dry reminder that she saved his neck.
The Stranger
The stranger’s mouth quirks at that, half amused, half relieved. Slaan. Fair enough. I am called Bram, and I will take gratefulness over grave markers any day.
The Paladin
The paladin huffs a short laugh, and some of the strain leaves his shoulders. I will accept the debt, then. Your timing at the gate was better than mine.
Bram
Bram tips his chin toward the altar, where ash still stains the scroll. If his chapel wanted him dead, it means the lie is bigger than one hunt. That is worth knowing before steel starts talking.
The Paladin
His gaze drops to the dark smudges on his armor markings, then back to Slaan. I have carried their seal long enough to know when it has turned against me. You saw that too.
Bram
Bram gestures east, toward the pilgrim knot scratched in soot. The trail does not end here. The man in false road colors wants us to think it does, and that is how hunters like him breathe easiest.
The Paladin
The paladin squares his battered breastplate and meets Slaan’s eyes. If this road clears my name, I will say it plain when it matters. For now, I can only ask whether you want the truth chased to its end.
“"let's go" I say with a mischievous smile and start heading in the direction of pilgrims knot”
SUCCESS (Fair Agility, rolled +2)