Ealda was right, Isa thought as she walked toward Lund’s in the growing dusk. She was in no shape to look at Tinero’s workbooks. Spellbooks. Whatever. She’d been so close, so close to going home. And then to have it snatched away. She knew Ealda hadn’t done it on purpose. She hadn’t meant to be cruel, but it was cruel. So cruel!
Certainly Isa might, over the next year or two make 5,000 gold coins from questing and adventuring, but that was a lot of shitty scimitars to sell. She paused with her hand on the front door of Lund’s, lost in thought. She could practice dentistry here. Nothing stopping her. And that might bring in some nice coin. Some local with a toothache, they’d pay good money to be relieved of the pain.
Maybe that wasn’t the most ethical thing, practicing dentistry without a proper degree, but she’d done many more questionable things in her short time in Varana. She’d ask Lund about it. He’d know what people do when they have a toothache.
The tavern was packed with people. Isa started toward the bar and got jostled by another patron. “Watch where you’re going,” the man snarled.
“Sorry,” Isa said. “I didn’t see you.” But the man had already melted back into the crowd. She got to the bar and leaned her staff against it. Lund wasn’t behind the counter, but Isa recognized the woman behind the bar. “Hey Tris. Can I get a--” Isa put her hand on her coin pouch. Or rather, where her coin pouch should be. More specifically where her coin pouch wasn’t.
That man, the one who’d jostled her, he’d pickpocketed her. The question was, where is he now? To the bartender she said, “I’ve been robbed.” After all the things that had happened to her in Varana, this felt among the worst. It wasn’t a fair fight; it wasn’t a fight at all. Unless, of course, she could find him in this crowd, then there’d be a fight. If he was still here. Without thought Isa grabbed her staff and leapt onto the bar, looking out into the throng.
“Hey!” Tris said. “What are you-- Get down!”
“I’ve been robbed,” Isa repeated. “Wanna see if he’s still here. Tall guy. Dark hair. Beard,” she said as she looked out at a sea of tall, dark, bearded men. “Fuck,” she whispered, but she didn’t get down. He might be here still, and the more faces turned her way, the better.
Vaguely Isa heard someone calling for Lund. Great idea - he could help her pummel the guy once they found him. A few seconds later Isa saw her friend standing in front of her with his hands on his hips. “Isa! Get down. What are you doing? Don’t make me throw you out.”
“I got robbed! Some sonofabitch here robbed me.”
More people turned toward Isa. She was suddenly the center of attention. Maybe she could use that to her advantage. “That’s right,” she said loudly. “Someone here stole all the money I had in the world. Actually, no it was more than all the money I had in the world because I had my friend’s money, too.”
No one spoke. They weren’t turning away, but no one was offering to help. More importantly no one was confessing to the crime. “Tall guy.” Isa held her hand over her head. “Beard.” She put her hand to her face. “Hair.” She pulled at a hunk of her hair.
Silence. The entire tavern stood silently watching Isa. She realized she was holding her staff like a microphone stand. “Uh, airplane food, am I right? Hipsters. Microbrews. Hahaha…. I’m not the headliner, folks. Although after tonight, who knows? Bah-dum bum.” Pause. “Really I just want to beat the shit out of the guy who stole my money. Who wouldn’t, right?” Isa heard the slightest murmur in the crowd. “Right?” she prompted them.
“Right!” Several voices responded, and it sounded like a righteous roar to Isa.
“So.” She looked into the crowd. “What are we gonna do about it?”
“No-no. Isa, no.” Lund was trying to get closer to the bar. The crowd had pushed him back about 3 feet. “No fighting. No fighting!” Lund shouted.
“Fighting!” Isa yelled and raised her staff in the air. She launched herself off the bar and into the crowd. By then several groups were already squaring off. A group of halflings had surrounded a elf with dark hair. “Is this him?” One of the halflings yelled to Isa.
“No! He’s human!” Isa yelled and then she was in the fray. She spied a man that might have been her thief, and she thwapped him in the face, bloodying his nose. “Give me back my money,” she yelled, but he kept both hands on his face as blood dripped down between his fingers.
“Isa!” Lund’s voice sounded close by, and Isa felt fingers clutch at her arm, but when she turned, he wasn’t there. Here on the ground it was harder to see anything. Isa tried to make her way back toward the bar, but someone yanked her hair and pulled her back.
“Ow!” Isa whirled around, but no one presented themselves as the assailant. After a moment Isa resumed her effort to get to the bar. Suddenly arms enclosed her, and Isa looked down to see pale, greenish forearms holding her tight. “Isa, calm down.” Lund’s voice in her ear. “What happened, and why are you trying to destroy my tavern?”
Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.
“Thief!” Isa craned her neck to try to yell in Lund’s ear. “I got robbed. My money and Mery’s.”
“OK,” Lund said, and he lifted Isa through the crowd and set her on the bar. He hopped up beside. “Oi! Shut up.” He took Isa’s staff and thumped it on the bar 3 times before the crowd began to quiet down.
“You know me,” he said loudly. “You come here because you know Lund doesn’t take any crap from anyone. Got two rules, don’t I?”
Several people said, “Yeah!”
“Two rules!” Lund bellowed. “What are they? Huh? What are they? No magic and no…..” He held his hand to his ear. “And no thieving.” he said. About half a dozen voices joined in.
“So,” Lund went on, “if I have to zone of truth my bar, I’m gonna be real pissed off. Why? Because it’s….. magic.” Several more voices chorused in on the word magic. “And once zone of truth tells me who the thief is, I’m gonna beat him bloody.” Lund glared out at the crowd. “No one wants that,” he said softly, his voice dripping with menace. “I don’t want that; you don’t want that. It’ll be a mess to clean up.”
In the silence of the tavern, one person coughed. Finally someone said, “What, ah, what’ll you do if they come forward?”
“Look, I’m not the town guard. Not my business what happens outside my business. If someone wants to come forward now and give my friend back her money, that’s great. No hard feelings. You leave the way you came in. I won’t touch a hair. Swear on my orc grandmother.”
A moment later a man pushed his way through the crowd, and once people realized, they made a path for him. He approached the bar and laid down a coin pouch. It looked like Isa’s pouch, but it was hard to say.
“Take a look,” Lund said to Isa. “Is it all there?”
Isa crouched down and poured some coins into her hand. They were mostly gold.
“Is it all there?” Lund repeated.
Isa tried to quickly assess. “Yeah, I think so.”
“Great.” To the man Lund said, “Don’t ever come here again. Maybe you’ll want to avoid Bywater from now on, yeah?”
The man nodded and made for the door. Once he was gone, Lund spread his arms wide. “Bar’s open again. Get some of the Red Robe ale before it’s all gone! Only got 6 barrels. And it’s a bargain at 1 silver a pint.”
He hopped down behind the bar and helped Isa down. “I’ll see you in the kitchen in a few minutes.” Then he turned to help Tris serve the throng of customers at the bar.
When Lund came in later he saw Isa sitting with several stacks of gold coins in front of her. “Whatcha got there?”
“This was in the coin pouch.”
“That’s a lot of gold. Did you have that much gold?”
“No. There’s 108 gold here.”
He started laughing. “Not everyone can get robbed and make a profit!”
“I don’t want to make a profit. This isn’t my money. Likely it’s a bunch of people’s money.”
“Don’t be a cheese face, Isa. No telling where he got the money. It’s yours now. Minus whatever you owe Mery. Oh and minus 2 gold for the smashed glassware.” He took 2 coins off the stack nearest him. “Amazing your riot didn’t cost me more than that. It’s early I guess.”
Spoiler: Spoiler
Name: Isa Chamberlin
Race: Human
Height & Weight: 5ft 6inches / 120 lbs
Class: Fighter Level: 4
Alignment: Chaotic Good
Background: Stranger in a Strange Land
Hit Points: 26 AC: 15
Current Hit Points: 25
Combat: +5 to Hit
Weapons: Scimitar +1 (left hand) 1d6 +4 (slashing) / Quarterstaff (right hand) 1d6 +2 (bludgeoning)
STR
11
0
DEX
16
+3
CON
11
0
INT
13
+1
WIS
13
+1
CHA
12
+1
Saving Throws: Str and Con +2
5
Acrobatics* (Dex)
1
Medicine (Wis)
1
Animal Handling (Wis)
1
Nature (Int)
1
Arcana (Int)
3
Perception* (Wis)
0
Athletics (Str)
1
Performance (Cha)
1
Deception (Cha)
1
Persuasion (Cha)
3
History* (Int)
1
Religion (Int)
3
Insight* (Wis)
3
Sleight of Hand (Dex)
1
Intimidation (Cha)
3
Stealth (Dex)
1
Investigation (Int)
1
Survival (Wis)
Special Attack: Two weapon fighting. When you engage in two-weapon fighting, you can add your ability modifier to the damage of the second attack.
Class Features:
Second Wind - On your turn, you can use a Bonus Action to regain hit points equal to 5 + your fighter level. Short or Long Rest before you can use it again.
Action Surge - On your turn, you can take one additional action on top of your regular action and a possible Bonus Action. You must finish a short or Long Rest before using it again.
Martial Archetype: Surgical Fighter
3rd level - Clinical Eye: Spend 1 combat turn studying your enemy and learn one of the following: if the enemy is equal to or stronger than you in strength, dexterity, or constitution. Can spend up to 3 turns to discern all 3. Can be used outside of combat as a free action - spend 1 minute to learn all three.