Chapter Text
The messenger collapses in a miserable pile at your feet. You stare at her for a minute, not sure what’s going on. She’d skidded into the square, panting something about “Kalen” and “Raven’s Roost- collapsed,” before she’d thrown up and passed out at your feet. You bend down and rest a finger on the underside of her jaw. The steady tha-thump reassures you that she’s still alive. A couple, seeing her fall, run over. One of the women kneels down next to you.
“Do you know what happened?” she asks. You shake your head.
“No. She just-” you gesture. “She’s uh. She’s still alive, I think?” The woman snorts.
“That’s something at least.”
Her girlfriend leans over. “If you can get her to the inn over there, I know the landlord. He’d be happy to take care of her until she wakes up. She’s probably just tired, poor thing.”
“What was she shouting about?” asks the first lady.
“Something about Raven’s Roost?” you say. A few other people have wandered over to see what the commotion’s about. One of them pipes up:
“Didn’t they throw out their governor a while back?”
“Yeah. Kalen, I think,” says another.
“Well, let’s get her inside. Hopefully she’ll be up for talking after she gets some rest.”
---
“There-there was a revolution-” the girl coughs, and the landlord gently pats her on her back. She takes a deep breath and then continues. “We drove Kalen out, and then…” she wipes her eyes. “He collapsed one of the support pillars. It- it-” she’s crying in earnest now, sobs wracking her body.
One of the women who helped you get her inside squeezes her hand. “Where did you mean to go?”
“Ne-neverwinter,” she chokes out. “They might have been able to help, but then I took a wrong turn and there were goblin bands and then-” she looses her composure again and resumes sobbing.
“Was that all you wanted to tell us?” asked the woman.
“No- wait-” she takes a deep breath and tries to compose herself. “I was- they told me to try and find Magnus. Magnus Burnsides? He- he was at a carpentry contest in Neverwinter- he- his wife-”
You straighten from where you were leaning on the doorframe and mouth “I’mma go” at the landlord. He nods, and you turn from the room and head out again. Raven’s Roost was far enough away that it wasn’t really any of your business.