All The World’s Meat

“What now?” Jax asked as they left the Gray District. They had just left Madame Zellara’s head in the care of the clerics of Pharasma and the day was still young. “Should we head back to the Citadel, to see if Kroft has another assignment for us?” He had not been in favor of joining forces with the Korvosan Guard, but so far their work for them had been lucrative, and the weight of coins in his pockets helped overcome any other qualms he might have.

No one had a better idea, so they made their way to the Guard headquarters. This time, they were ushered directly into Field Marshall Kroft’s office. She looked up from her work as they entered, and shook her head in bewilderment. “I don’t know what you folks have been doing, but you’re making quite an impression. Yesterday, I got a glowing report from Marcus Endrin of the great job you’d done rescuing his missing Marine. And this morning,” she held up a piece of paper with the royal seal, “I get a letter from the Queen herself personally recommending your services. I don’t remember King Eodred ever taking a personal interest in the Guard’s business – I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. In any event, I don’t want our new Queen to think I don’t value her opinion, so I’ve got another job for you.

“Korvosa’s got enough troubles as it is without my own guards adding to it. A number of them have deserted their posts, more concerned about protecting friends and family than the city. I get that – I can’t condone it, but I get it. But not all of the deserters have family — some of them are simply using the riots as an excuse for personal gain. One of those is a sergeant named Verik Vancaskerkin. Worse than a lone deserter, he’s convinced a small group of fellow guards that Queen Ileosa is going to ruin the city. Whether she does or doesn’t isn’t the point — right now, we’ve got a city-wide crisis on our hands, and I need all of my guards working with me to see us through. A deserter is worse than a lost resource — it’s an infection. I can’t afford to pull any of my other patrols off duty to deal with Vancaskerkin, and I’d rather not expose any of them to him anyway, since I don’t want Vancaskerkin to infect more guards with his talk of revolution, nor do I want some overly patriotic guard killing Vancaskerkin outright. I need someone impartial, and skilled enough to take him down. Someone like you.

“Vancaskerkin and his followers have holed up in an abandoned butcher’s shop up in Northgate — a place once called ‘All the World’s Meat.’ I need you there. Try to avoid killing any of the deserters if you can, but if you must, they brought it upon themselves when they threw in their lot with Vancaskerkin. I’d really prefer it if you could capture Vancaskerkin alive and return him to me for interrogation, but if he makes that impossible, I’ll accept his body as well. Finally, see if you can find out why Verik deserted — if there’s more to it than simple personal politics, I need to know immediately. Bring me Verik alive, and there’s eight hundred gold in it for you; dead, he’s only worth half that.”

It sounded simple enough, and before long the party found themselves back in Northgate. They had little trouble convincing locals to point them in the right direction. “The Cow Hammer Boys are giving out free meat to poor folks,” one woman told them. “The only food my family’s had to eat since this trouble started has come from them. They’re good boys. You got to get there early though – they’re usually out by noon or so.” They heard several stories in a similar vein, but one fellow added a twist. “They’re giving out more’n just meat,” he told Tomas on the sly. “You got anyone you’re havin’ trouble wit, they’ll work ‘im over for ya – for a price. Just ask about ‘the night’s special cuts’ an’ they’ll set ya right up.”

With directions from several locals, they had no trouble locating the butcher shop. A sign bearing the image of a fat, smiling cow hung above the door, and it was the only shop they’d seen in days that appeared to be open. A long line of people waited at the front door, moving in an orderly fashion into the shop, then back out again with parcels of meat. A man with busy eyebrows and a large flat nose seemed to be managing the queue; he wore the armor of a guardsman, but not the uniform.

Wren sidled up the line, to try to peer through the shop’s front window. Through the grimy glass she could see a marble counter covered with cuts of unidentifiable meat, flies circling. Another ex-guardsman was handing out meat inside; behind him a door leading further into the building stood ajar.

“Hey! No cuts!” barked a stocky woman, giving Wren a shove. As she moved back towards the end of the line, a younger woman motioned her over. “I should warn you,” she said in a low voice. “Yesterday they made me flash my boobs to get any meat.”

“Ugh! I don’t think I want it that bad,” said Wren with a shudder.

“I’ve got four kids at home,” the woman said, turning back to her place in line. “I can’t be that picky.”

Shadow and Tomas had joined the end of the line. “So what’s going on here?” Shadow asked the man in front of him.

“They’re giving out free food to the people,” the man replied, as if Shadow were simple. “They care about the poor, unlike our government. If the Queen really cared about us, she’d be feeding us, instead of sending the Guard to beat us up.”

“Makes sense to me,” Shadow said agreeably. “Where are they getting this meat from?”

“I hear they’re confiscating it from bourgeois pigs who are trying to hoard their bounty for their own personal gain, instead of sharing it with the masses.”

“Pigs from pigs – how appropriate!” Shadow got the sense the man was repeating lines he’d heard from someone else.

While the others watched the front of the shop, Erin and Jax circled the building. On the west was an open corral; a skinny cow and a small stoat grazed and rooted inside. Behind that was an open-sided, roofed shed containing a broken-down wagon. There were double doors from both the shed and corral going into the building, but both were shut. They found no other exits, and no windows on the ground floor, although there were several windows in a small second story above the front of the shop.

Tomas and Shadow eventually reached the front of the line, but the guard at the door roughly pushed Tomas aside. “Oy! Nuttin fer rich bastards like you!” he said, sneering at Tomas’ tailored clothing. “’ere we are redistributin’ the wealth o’ the pr’vileged class for to better the lot o’ the downtrodded prole .. prole … peoples.” He strugged to recite a speech he’d clearly learned by rote. “Wot that means is we only gives food to poor folks. Now get lost ‘fore I’s redistribute you!”

“As a poor folk myself, I applaud your mission!” Shadow said, tipping his hat to the guard as he entered the shop. However, once inside, his experience was anticlimactic. The guard inside scooped up a slab of meat, dropped it into Shadows bare hands (he hadn’t thought to bring anything to put it in, and nodded for him to head back out and make room for the next person in line. Shadow did note that the counter was almost empty; they’d be out of meat soon. He went to the back of the line and gave his cut to an old man at the back. “I think you need this more than I do.”

The group hastily reconvened to decide on a next step (once again, they’d neglected the planning phase of their mission). They decided to wait until the Cow Hammer Boys ran out of meat, hoping they’d leave the shop when they closed, giving  them a chance to ambush them. Sure enough, the guard at the door soon began shooing people away. “That’s it – all gone for today. Come back tomorrow.”

Shadow had a sudden idea. He rushed to the guard at the front door. You ‘eard me,” he growled. “Nuttin’ left til tomorrow.”

“I was hoping to get some of the night’s special cuts,” Shadow said hopefully, remembering the tip they’d gotten earlier.

“Well c’mon in then!” the guard said with a grin. The party watched in horror as the guard led Shadow into the shop, alone, and locked the door behind them.

“This fella wants some special cuts,” the bushy-eyebrowed guard said to the man behind the counter. He, too wore guardsman’s armor, although his strained to cover his ample girth.

“Is that so?” the second guard replied. “Well, we can ‘elp you out. If you’re havin’ trouble wit someone, we’ll work ‘em over for youse real good. Just cost you 50 gold sails.”

“That sounds fair.” Shadow wasn’t inclined to dicker over price, especially since he expected to get it all back soon anyway. “How about I pay you half up front, and half when you give me proof the job’s done?”

But the Cow Hammer Boys were having none of that. “That ain’t how it works. Full price up front. You don’t pay, we don’t play.”

Again, Shadow didn’t want to argue, so he agreed to their proposal. “Great!” the ex-Guard clapped his hands. “Who you having trouble with? We need name, address, and description.”

Shadow thought fast. “His name’s Giggles. He’s a half-orc who lives at Westpier 17. He’s called Giggles because he laughs a lot.”

“I hate them halfies,” the first Guard growled. “He won’t be laughin’ when we’re done wit’ ‘im.”

Their transaction completed, the guards ushered Shadow out the door and locked it behind him. Through the window, he saw them pass through the door into the back of the building, but they shut it behind them, and he couldn’t see anything.

Once again the group convened to discuss strategy. “What did that little stunt accomplish?” Erin demanded.

Shadow shrugged. “It proved they’re not just ‘good boys’ trying to feed hungry people. There’s more going on here.”

The Cow Hammer Boys didn’t show any signs of leaving the butcher shop, so the group settled in to wait. Erin and Tomas staked out the west side of the shop, watching the side doors and corral, while the others found places to hide while they watched the front door. The afternoon drug on. At one point, the doors into the corral opened, and a man (not one of the two they’d already seen) came out and herded the cow and pig into the building, closing the doors behind him. Other than that, nothing happened. The sun set, darkness settled in, and still they waited.

Around midnight, the doors into the covered shed opened, and two figures came out. They were the two ex-Guards they’d seen manning the front of the shop earlier. They opened the gate that led to the shed and turned up the alley towards the street.

Unfortunately, Erin had settled in to wait with her back against the corral fence, right in the alley in front of them. One of the thugs spotted her immediately. “Hey! What’re you doing there?” Erin briefly considered pretending to be drunk, but then had a vision of what these two might do to a drunk woman in an alley. Instead, she settled on Plan B, and started running like hell. They watched her go, not pursuing. “Damn!” said one. “She mighta been fun!”

The two men continued up the alley and turned onto the street; Tomas stepped quietly out of his hiding spot and began to follow. As they continued down the street, they passed uncomfortably close to the other members of the party, who were not hidden particularly well, but neither man was paying much attention, and didn’t notice any of the shadowy figures that watched them pass, then fell in behind Tomas in a silent parade down the street.

They let them get a couple of blocks away from the butcher’s shop, far enough that any fracas wouldn’t be heard by the thugs’ allies. The group exchanged glances in the moonlight, and Wren cast a quiet Bless. Then Shadow fired off a shot from the Wand of Acid, catching the portly thug right between the shoulder blades. The pair spun and saw the crowd behind them. “Shit!” they both cried together, and the fight was on.

Erin charged, her sword flashing in the moonlight, and blood sprayed from the thug with bushy eyebrows. “We want to take them alive!” Jax reminded her, as he tried to hit the other one with the flat of his sword. But he discovered that trying not to kill someone with a sword was harder than it looked, and the blow was clumsy. A crossbow bolt whizzed past him and sank into this opponent’s shoulder. “Sorry!” Nat called.

Tomas and Wren joined the attack. Tomas hammered one with the hilt of his sword, but Wren’s blow went wide. Another blob of Acid from Shadow’s want flew through the air and hit the thug Tomas had just injured, and he dropped like a rock. Erin followed Tomas’ lead, using her sword hilt like a hammer, and the other Cow Hammer Boy fell unconscious at her feet.

Once they’d made sure they were just unconscious and not dead, they stripped the bodies of anything dangerous, tied and gagged them, and drug both out of sight in a nearby alley. With two down, they made their way back to the butcher’s shop. But they still didn’t have a plan of attack, so they reverted to their former positions: Erin and Tomas at the side near the rear, the others in the front.

After fifteen minutes or so, Jax began to get antsy. “I’m going to try the front door,” he whispered, and soon all four of them were huddled at the front of the shop. It took a couple of tries, but Jax’s picks were able to open the lock. They crept quietly inside.

Erin’s patience ran out about the same time. “I’m going to see what’s inside,” she whispered to Tomas, and passed through the shed to the double doors the two thugs had recently exited. Taking a breath, she pulled them open.

She found herself looking at a grim chamber strewn with blood-stained straw; the reek of slaughter was almost overpowering. The room was a killing floor. Meat hooks dangled from a metal track affixed to the ceiling that allowed the hooks and their gory loads to be moved easily around the room. In the northwest corner, a large hammer lay on the floor amid a permanent bloodstain. A man stood next to it, skinning the small pig they’d seen earlier, who was now suspended from a meat hook. To the south, a bloodstained grill covered a wide hole in the floor. Just north of the grill sat two large vats of water, one boiling and one cold. Two large butcher blocks stood to the east next to barrels of salt, and in the southeast corner was a reeking vat of cast-off meat and bones. Another man was chopping meat at one of the butcher blocks, while a third pushed a large dangling carcass along the racks towards the northeast corner of the room. The man butchering the pig spotted Erin instantly. “Trouble!” he barked to his mates.

Erin wasn’t sure what she had expected, but it wasn’t this, and it took her a moment to recover from her shock. Tomas had no such problem; he rushed past her, took up a position in the corner of the room, and sank an arrow into the butcher. All three of the ex-guards picked up longbows and returned fire; two missed Tomas, but the third’s arrow found its mark, and startled Erin into action. She rushed the man butchering the pig, but he used the carcass as a shield to parry her blow.

Back in the front of the building, the rest of the crew was unaware of the fight that had just started. The building’s thick walls and solid doors, built to prevent the squeals and shrieks of slaughtered animals from bothering the neighbors, muffled the sounds. Jax crept through the shop, and checked the door leading into the rest of the building; finding it not locked, he pushed it open. He found himself in a hallway; a door was to his left, a set of stairs led up to the right, and a pair of double doors ended the hallway straight ahead. He crept down the hall, followed by Shadow and Wren. Shadow stopped at the foot of the stairs, worried about ambush from above. Still they heard nothing.

Tomas fired a pair of arrows at the man who’d been chopping meat. They sent him sprawling backwards over the table; this one, at least, wouldn’t be taken alive. The butcher abandoned his bow and drew a sword, but Erin easily dodged his swing. Tomas grunted as an arrow from the other thug sank into his thigh.

It was at that point that Jax finally opened the doors at the end of the hall, and found himself walking into a battle already in progress. The thug who had been pushing meat was standing right in front of him; Jax stepped up and put his knife to his throat. “Give it up! We’re here from the Guard, and we’re taking you in!” The man looked panicked, glancing back and forth between Jax and the butcher fighting Erin. Then a pair of arrowheads appeared through the front of his shirt, and he coughed a spray of blood into Jax’s face. He dropped to his knees, bleeding profusely. “Please – don’t kill me! I give up!” he wheezed.

Nat pushed past Jax and cast Daze on the lone remaining Cow Hammer Boy. All expression left his face, and Erin easily yanked his weapon out of his grip and pushed him to the ground; she was already tying him up when he regained his senses.

Jax was questioning the wounded man, who appeared to be on the verge of bleeding to death. “Is there anyone else down here?” he demanded. The man shook his head. “Just the meat locker and holding pens,” he said weakly, mouth full of blood. “How about upstairs?”

The man nodded. His eyes rolled back in his head, and he threatened to lose consciousness. Jax shook him back awake. “Who’s upstairs?”

“Verik,” he whispered. “Verik and Sven.” Then he collapsed.

The PCs each received 200 XP for returning the brooch; I’ll award XP for the current fight once everything’s resolved. Next week we’ll be back at Rich & Joette’s, although Roger may be on call.