As the session starts, the characters are preparing to venture once again into the jungles of the Second Plateau to hunt down the Jhokkada Master Matok. Matok has possession of the Egg of the Jhokk and a large supply of food and water.
The characters currently possess only one or two days worth of food. The dead pascullo could be butchered to provide some additional food, and the Jhokkada had about five days' worth of food (for the characters) left on the creature. The Skin Adapoi certainly have additional food, but they're currently mad at the characters due to Tarrago.
Messerbad speaks with the Skin Adapoi speaker Agopon. His negotiations are not too successful, and Agopon essentially says, "Stay and teach us fire magics or we will kill you and your friends" Teaching the magics will take about a week. In the meantime, the other characters gather up the gear of the slain Jhokkada and trade it to the Skin Adapoi for enough food (dried vegetables that can be made into stew) to reach the Last Home again.
By the end of the week, Messerbad has taught Agopon one point in each of Ignite Fire and Create Fire.
The coffer of opal coins (24) contains forty coins, each worth about eight challock. The coins have a Jhokk carved on one side and a series of runes on the other side. The coffer itself is probably worth about ten challock.
The ivory carving (29) is clearly magical, but the characters don't know that it contains the spirit of an old Jhokkada Master. Messerbad is carrying it.
The characters decide to return to Paiden to pick up their translations and return the books stolen from the Translators' Guild. On the journey, Yorden has a dream that the ivory carving is speaking to him (in Jhokkada). Of course, he doesn't understand it. The dream does not recur. Yorden repeats the statuette's phrases to the other characters, but none of the other characters speak Jhokkada, so none of them understand either. The journey to Paiden takes about ten days.
Yorden has an IOU for 1000 challock from Tarrago for saving him. He and the other characters find that Tarrago lived in a small townhouse slightly outside the fashionable section of town. His home is empty, and an old woman nearby says that nobody's been in for weeks. The old woman says that Tarrago's family isn't around, but that he had a wife in Hegger.
The characters decide to speak with Yadal Dillir, a youda Gate Warden that the characters had previously befriended. They explain the situation to him. He says that before an individual can be declared dead in Paiden, there must either be a body or three witnesses who will swear to having seen the body.
Yadal all but opens the possibility that the characters could lie and arrange for Tarrago to be declared dead, allowing their money to be taken from his estate.
Pawag talks with the characters and gives them their translations of Forbidden Ecstatica and the Tome of Grotesquerie. He keeps the originals of the books, and takes extreme precautions in dealing with the translations (triple-locked strong boxes, etc.). The characters then negotiate with him to teach them all askalach: 200 hours of training for 300 challock. In return, the characters give him two copies of the Book of the Jhokk for 100 challock each. Yorden also asks about instruction in Literacy; the Translators' Guild runs classes lasting two months and costing 80 challock.
Inn of the Crossed Hammers costs 3 challock per night (including food).
The characters head to Curras' shack outside Paiden to get the objects they took from the Jhokkada identified. He charges 10 challock for "harmless" items and 50 challock for "dangerous" items. He successfully identifies the ivory statuette and explains that there is a dead spirit inside, and the Jhokk Bracelet. He doesn't manage to successfully identify the Greed Choker, though he does manage to tell Yorden that it has something to do with wealth.
The characters engage in a number of activities in Paiden that take about 60 days. Among other things, they all learn some askalach from Pawag Akowa (as noted above). Pawnbroker reads from The Book of the Jhokk and The Strength of the Jhokk, using his newfound askalach knowledge. Messerbad buys a nice cloak (for 8 challock), reads from the translations of the Tome of Grotesquerie (which he ends up giving to Yorden) and Forbidden Ecstatica (he manages to avoid addiction to Celebrants, though he doesn't try to learn any of the spells). Garret gets quite drunk, and learns some Fire magics from Messerbad.
Yorden uses a minimal amount of disguise magic to pass himself off as Tarrago and get into Tarrago's house. He searches the place, and uncovers:
A day after he arranges Tarrago's return, the other characters come by, bearing Tarrago's IOU to Yorden for 1000 challock. They take everything on the list above, save for six books of poetry.
Armed in part with the wealth they liberated from Tarrago's home, the characters seek to buy a townhouse. Pawnbroker makes a remarkable success on his Merchant roll (3), and finds that Lembey Abbas is selling a nice two-story townhouse next to the Abbas Family compound. The house is easily worth 2500 or 3000 challock, but Lembey sold it to the characters for only 1500 challock. Later, after the characters spent 200 challock installing heavy window shutters on the first floor and a large tank of water (for drinking and firefighting) on the second floor, he also agreed to have Abbas Family guards keep an eye on the house for one challock per day. Relations between the Abbas Family and the characters have never been better.
The characters' new house also includes a low wall, a front courtyard with a well, and a garden in back.
The characters also hire two servants to work as maid and cook. Both are paid two challock per day.
About 40 days after the characters move in to their new abode, they are visited by Yadal Dillir. He drinks jaya with them, and compliments them on their fine-quality jaya (selected by Messerbad). He also tells them that he just recieved word that another Gate Warden saw Matok, the Jhokkada Master who escaped the characters on the Second Plateau, re-enter Paiden about ten days before. The Gate Warden didn't realize who Matok was until well after the Jhokkada had disappeared, else he would have stopped him then.
Yorden spent some time looking for non-Jhokkada criminals in Paiden. After one brief interlude with three Jhokkada goons (whom he evaded using the Wallwalker spell), he managed to find Fessen the Eye, a human jeweler in the Old Market. Fessen is willing to purchase a wide variety of questionable goods, and is affiliated with a fairly large number of independent thieves, cutpurses and other riff-raff.
Near the end of the 60-day time, both Messerbad and Yorden decide to find legitimate employment. Yorden seeks out alchemists, and manages to persuade Tellwae the Mixer, a female human alchemist in the Council Market, to take him on as an assistant. Tellwae is a plump, jovial sort, and set him to work tending her garden, drying herbs, and crushing ingredients. She agreed to pay him one challock per day for sixty days, and promised that if she liked his work she would pay him five challock per day after that. His work hours begin at dawn and continue to some time in the afternoon, depending upon the workload. In the meantime, Messerbad set himself up as an independent plant magician, working freelance. His income is (on average) seven challock per day, and he works 1d days in every seven (roll every week).
Pawnbroker remains without steady work. Instead, he has been selling off stuff from his collection to support himself.
Now that the characters are settled in Paiden, they intend to hunt down and kill off as many Jhokkada as they can find. Their intent is largely to wipe out the religious fanatics, while leaving the simple criminals alone. In particular, they want to kill Matok, even though he is likely to be one bad dude. They suspect that, depending upon the current tenor of his fanatacism, his own comrades may be willing to feed him to them with sufficient prodding.
Each character gained four experience points.