Chapter Eight: Crescent City

The skyline of the city ahead of you is a strange mixture of graceful elven towers and humble slate roofs. In the centre of all is a high steeple, strangely plain and bland in design. As you draw closer, a medley of unfamiliar smells fills your nostrils: unknown meats simmering, cheap perfume, roses and violets, the swampy reek of black mud and something else underlying it all, the sugary spoiled smell of human decadence.

The Starborn reach Crescent City on the afternoon of April 10. The harbor master greets them, inspects the ships for cargo and levies the port taxes. The heroes leave these minor details to Captain Tabarak Loman of the Elensil and quickly make their way into the city.

The place is awash in exotic sights, sounds and smells. Street hawkers call out their wares . . . bowls of brown for a copper piece, magical charms against the diseases of the swamps at various rates, and pleasures of the flesh for an hour or a day. A cursory look around reveals dozens of inns and taverns varying widely in price and quality lining the waterfront on the harbor and the river.

Crescent City constantly buzzes to the tune of party-goers, street walking prostitutes and mystical merchants selling anything one can desire . . . for the right price.

The heroes find suitable accomodations at the Tumbling Drunkard where the evening entertainment is, in fact, a drunk acrobat who performs amazing feats of agility and gymnastics. The Starborn take rooms, baths and a private dining hall where they can discuss the situation. Rygorh advises everyone to lay low for a couple of weeks and get the feel for the place. After a bit of disucssion it is agreed that the party will stay at the 'Drunkard for a while and see what they can learn about the city and try to get a line on the Temple of Kharad.

Over the next few days the heroes learn a bit about Crescent City:

• Tilk: A vampire has stalked the streets of Crescent City for years. He kills beautiful young women, typically whores, once each week leaving them completely drained of blood near the docks.
• Neil: There are four competing crime lords running the city – Lord Raglan, Jimmy the Tailor, Little Reginald and Dark Mariah. If you commit a crime on their turf without their permission, then you are in a lot of trouble.
• Rumus: Members of the various criminal groups identify one another with hand signs. Jimmy the Tailor's group uses a complex hand gesture followed by a handshake which a man shows Rumus how to imitate.
• Rygorh: A serial murderer is doing away with people. He mutilates the bodies in a horrible way: he takes his victims' faces.
• Seebo: On each crime lord's territory, there is one tavern where the crime lord's men rule the roost and can drink in safety; the landlord is in cahoots with them and will provide alibis and hiding places when needed.
• Alev: Lord Malthus, the governor of the city, is in fact a woman called Jessica. The beard is false – somebody once saw it begin to peel off in the middle of a council meeting, at which "Malthus" rushed out of the room and did not come back for ten minutes. Jessica is Archbishop Vigilance Derrick's secret lover, which is how she got the position of governor of Crescent City.
• Casey: The swamp elves have been slaves for as long as anyone can remember, though there are rumours of a planned uprising.
• Dinah: The crime lords have an agreement with the guards, meaning that their people can usually get away with petty crimes, so long as nobody is badly hurt.
• Lorelei: Lord Raglan's tavern is the Merry Jackdaw, Jimmy the Tailor's is the Pig and Hammer, Little Reginald's is the Chandler's Arms and Dark Mariah's crew drink at the Lifeless Lass. There is a tavern in the centre of town called the Laughing Lord, which is the only neutral territory in the city as far as the crime lords are concerned. They meet there if they ever want to have a face-to-face discussion.

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