Icemule: Big Crime in Small Town

GM Wakefield says to keep an eye out for a new, mysterious individual you may, or may not see around Icemule. The next post is … BIG CRIME IN THE SMALL TOWN – Part 1, and it involves a vignette of a half-elf male…

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Category: Towns
Topic: Icemule Trace

Date: 03/25/2017 10:43 AM CDT

From: GS4-WAKEFIELD

Subj: Big Crime In Small Town – Part 1

Large flakes of heavy wet snow fell from the overcast night sky, finding purchase to stick to everything they landed on. The ground in Icemule Trace was always frozen, and snow was always present. Piles of the white powder slowly grew in the silence of the late hour. The half-elf barely noticed the growing collection about his person as he stood perfectly still in his vantage point. Watching. He had more important things on his mind this night than the relentless march of the white armies in their indomitable quest to cover everything.

A sparse clump of that snow fell unobserved from the half-elf’s shoulder, as he leaned out from his cover behind the corner of a grocer, dark and shuttered now in the blackness. He continued his surveillance of the small shape attempting to sneak down the street ahead of him. The rapid rate at which the snow fell, combined with the light cast by the evening lanterns that helped keep the streets safe at night, created a sort of snow blindness that made it difficult to make out anything other than movement and relative size. The half-elf was pretty sure the shape creeping through the murk ahead of him was the target he had set out hours earlier to finally catch in the act. The criminal who had been perpetrating the most heinous of all crimes. A crime that violated the unspoken social order of Icemule Trace’s halfling community. Yes, he was sure that this was the tart thief.

While the half-elf himself wasn’t overly fond of the crusty little pastries, he fully understood their significance and importance to the halfling culture as a whole. His manager at the bakery where he worked, a plucky middle-aged halfling named Horace, was beside himself with concern over the missing product. The half-elf suspected, however, that this worry stemmed less from the lost cost to produce the misplaced tarts, which surely couldn’t be more than a handful of silver, and more from the fact that Horace had a standing agreement with Ma Leaftoe to take home any unsold tarts at the end of the day for personal consumption.

Nevertheless, the half-elf had decided to take it upon himself to get to the bottom of the mystery. While he told himself it was for the most noble of reasons; justice, integrity, the Icemule community’s well being and safety! He grudgingly admitted to himself that he really just couldn’t stand to see the forlorn look on Horace’s face as he shuffle-huffed around the bakery in a fit of despair.

With a start, the half-elf realized he was losing sight of the criminal mastermind in the blizzard that enveloped them both. Moving carefully to avoid detection, he slipped away from his observation at the grocer and started down the street after his mark. The man made it about four steps before his boots hit a patch of ice on the uneven cobblestone paving of the alley, and he lost his balance. Arms windmilling, he frantically fought for his footing, while his feet slid across the slick stone. A fight that was ultimately lost as the half-elf pitched face first into the side of a hulking mountain of snow. Kicking wildly with his legs and waving his arms uselessly, the half-elf eventually managed to pull himself from the frozen prison and deposit himself with a loud smack on his bottom in the middle of the deserted street. Scrambling to his feet, he brushed snow from his face and hair. He was extremely grateful that there was no one about to see what had occurred at this early hour. Taking a deep breath, he skittered off down the street, the way his prey had gone, in an attempt to find a sign of the thief’s passing.

The impression of a smallish footprint, filling fast with the falling snow, caught the half-elf’s eye, and he heaved a sigh of relief. That treacherous alley would not aid the purloiner in his dastardly quest after all. He squinted at the shifting footprint in the powder before him. It looked littler than he expected, even for a halfling. The snow must have hidden part of it already, he thought. Making his way, more carefully this time, in the direction of the footprint, the half-elf kept a close look out for more impressions in the snow. He, however, already more than suspected the bakery, just a few streets away now, would be the intended destination of the mysterious figure.

The half-elf caught up with the would-be thief just in time to watch him in action. Grabbing the closest hiding spot he could, the man took a knee behind a low stone half-wall that obscured the burglar’s view of him. However, his cover happened to be within the edge of a pool of light cast by a nearby street lamp, and made him easily visible to anyone else that might be looking out a window. The half-elf cautiously peeked an eye over the top of the wall to watch the exterior of the bakery. Sure enough, lined up on the slightly opened windowsills, a series of tarts and other baked pastries sat cooling in the cold night air, before they were to be placed in the front display for sale when the shop opened in just a few hours.

The half-elf’s face hardened as he watched the shadowy figure skulk up towards the windows. A small hand darted out in the darkness. Suddenly, two of the tarts were no longer where they had just been resting a moment before. With surprising swiftness, the pilferer darted away from the shop, heading west away from both the building and where the half-elf had laid in wait to ambush the crook. With a start, the man realized his target was getting away, and he hurried to catch up without being seen. Crap, crap, dangit, oh boy, CRAP! he thought, as he gave careful pursuit down the ill-lit narrow alleys of town. The half-elf was surprised a second time to realize that the bandit was not making his way to ground somewhere within the city limits themselves, but rather seemed to be headed for the south gate that lead out of town entirely.

The half-elf slowed as he approached the gate himself. A guardsman’s back was to him currently, but he wasn’t sure how he would be able to sneak by without being seen. Squinting against the snow flurries blowing into his face, he could make out what appeared to be tiny footprints filling with snow, heading away from the gate and to the west in the wilds outside. How the man he followed managed to sneak by was unknown. The half-elf sat watching and cursing his luck as the guard fiddled with his armor and looked left and right outside the gate. Just when the he was about to give up on being able to get by unseen, and resort to trying to talk his way past the burly man, the guard turned to his left to answer a question from an unseen peer inside of a squat, square stone guardhouse. The half-elf seized his opportunity!

To be continued…

-Wakefield