Dungeon crawl: Wine with your sandwich?

[Weremensh]

The abbot comments drily: "We're already prepared to knock; we were about to light the fuse when you showed up. Just tell us when you're in position." The mayor nods.

[CCC]

"We'll be in position in the time it takes for Teddy to get to the trapdoor." says Cloverleaf.

He heads back into the cellar and climbs up on the barrels, holding his staff ready to cast a spell on the trapdoor without blocking the ladder.

[Weremensh]

Before Teddy can get back downstairs, there is a thud from up above (or in Teddy's case, around in front). The building shakes a bit, and then the sound of feet running in, around, and back again; and various voices exclaiming can be heard. A minute later, there is a dragging noise on the trapdoor, and it opens. An unfamiliar human calls down "They down there?"

[FreakyBoy]

"No one here but us armed vigilantes," Kinzie calls back.

[Dom/SlimKop]

Teddy grins, holding his club at the ready for violence.

[CCC]

Cloverleaf climbs the ladder, heading swiftly through the trapdoor. "No-one went past us." he assures the man on his way up.

[Weremensh]

The stores, and the various living quarters, turn out to be free of residents. There are a lot of locals traipsing through, though; and it seems the abbot asked his monks to keep any stray bits from wandering out the doors accidentally. Or perhaps the mayor did. Either way, it happens.

After a moment, the Abbot comes into the same room as Cloverleaf (which happens to be the pawnshop). "They seem to have all gone. A travel spell, do you think?"

[FreakyBoy]

Kinzie puts her pistol away, and then starts searching around for alternate forms of egress - ladders, chimneys, heretofore undiscovered secret doors/trapdoors, and the like.

[CCC]

"It's not impossible," says Cloverleaf, "but it wouldn't have taken them very far. Unless one of them was a particularly accomplished mage, or they had a horrendously expensive scroll. It's also possible - it took us some time to get from the cellar to the abbey, and the abbot's message would have taken a few more minutes to get back to you, and all that time they knew we knew about the theft. If they were quick, it's possible they simply walked out the front door before the alarm was raised. Either way, they'll likely be nearby."

He leans nonchalantly against a nearby wall. Kinzie's still looking for secret passages the old-fashioned way, tapping on walls and listening to the echo; but Cloverleaf still believes that his method works well enough and is a lot quicker besides.

[Dom/SlimKop]

Teddy sighs and leans his club against a wall, taking the opportunity to lean himself against the wall as well. He does pick a wall away from Clover though.

[Weremensh]

The three rather quickly discover that this place is honeycombed with hidden niches, peepholes, panels, and such like; the common purpose seems to be to trick and/or cheat the customers. Or the tax man. Or, well, whomever might stroll in. Kinzie soon finds a small pouch of coins in a wall niche; that almost starts a mass treasure hunt before they mayor puts his foot down and orders out everyone but the monks and the sheriff.

"Hey, what about those three?"

"I'm not going to try to chase out a troll. No, they work for the Abbot. If he wants to, he can tell them to go."

The abbot glances up from organizing his people into a search party, and says to the three of you: "If you want to help search, feel free. Just bring anything here for examination, we'll worry about distribution later."

[FreakyBoy]

Kinzie helps. She even stays honest about it.

[Dom/SlimKop]

"Hey, what about those three?"

"I'm not going to try to chase out a troll."

Teddy grins at the man asking the question.

The abbot glances up from organizing his people into a search party, and says to the three of you: "If you want to help search, feel free. Just bring anything here for examination, we'll worry about distribution later."

The troll searches with the others, bringing whatever he finds to the Abbot to check out. He also keeps an ear out for Clover and Kinzie, they tend to attract trouble.

[CCC]

Cloverleaf blatantly cheats.

Not only does he look out for any sign of magic, he goes so far as to use an Oh-there-it-is spell to speed up the search. He happily presents anything he finds to the abbot (warning him of any potential magic); and keeps a particularly careful lookout for spellbooks while he's at it.

[Weremensh]

It looks like the residents grabbed the really valuable stuff before they split (however they did it), but a few thousand gold worth of various swag is turned up throughout the building over the next hour or so. And, of course, a lot of wine is found; along with a couple of silver candlesticks which have the abbot looking thoughtful.

Cloverleaf does turn up a few magical items; apparently low level stuff that seems to have been overlooked (a couple of potions and a coin). He also finds a bundle of what seem to be perfectly ordinary wizards staffs buried under some junk in the basement; but for some reason when he went to pick that up he immediately put it down again. Twice. Without ever going through the formality of wanting to.