So the House had lost contact with the Achmenis satrapy, so a few of my cousins and I were tasked with discovering what happened and fix it. To provide a little extra backup, my unit was to accompany me.
My cousin Belak booked us on a ship to cross the sea, and from there we were to travel to the capital via riverboat. Quickly into our journey we discovered we were being shadowed by pirate vessels. It became clear we wouldn't be able to outrun them, so we decided to just let them catch up and take them out. I had my soldiers go below deck to hide our numbers and get ready to surprise any fool enough to board. Turns out they weren't needed.
When the vessels finally did decide to attack. Isha held the deck herself as Rathimund and I rained down fireballs and arrows. One ship eventually broke and left, and the other just surrendered to our overwhelming counterattack. I though Az was sleeping in his cabin, believing the coming attack beneath his concern, and that we could take care of it. But apparently, the mysteriously slaughtered captain on the ship that surrendered was his work.
Apparently, I guess Az didn't want to be beholden to the whims of the captain of the vessel we set sail on, he wanted his own ship. Well, we got one. We thanked the captain, but moved our people over to this new vessel. We threw the surviving hostiles in the brig, and I had my men help secure the ship. Those manning the stations had no particular loyalty to the pirates, so they were perfectly fine to keep crewing. We did discover we were not attacked because we happen to be there, but the ship was specifically targeted. But, they weren't trying to attack us, they were after some lady. They must have gotten some bad intel, because they obviously had the wrong ship.
Eventually, we get to port, and the scene was quite ominous. It was deathly still, and a large, black ship was trying to bar us entry, warning us of plague. We docked anyways, and decided to accept the ship's invite to meet. There, we met an Anathema named Piercing Voice of Winters. He had come to port investigating the plague, as it had attracted many hungry ghosts. He wanted us to come to him with any information we discovered if we got on land. I suppose in exchange for not fighting us? To try and show he was on the up and up, he wanted us to sign a contract. Isha was vehemently opposed to signing such a thing, which is wise, because who signs contracts given by creepy looking dudes? But Az had no such compunctions and readily signed it. Bold, that one is.
Anyways, once we make it to shore, we were overwhelmed by the stench of rotting corpses that littered the streets. We eventually make it to our house compound, and manage to convince them to let us in. The captain of the guard thought we were there to relieve him, but we broke the news to him that we hadn't heard anything from them at all, and we were investigating.
Apparently, the master of the house was mortally wounded- he and his family were celebrating the exaltation of their daughter, a wood aspect like me. On the way back to town from their celebration, they were beset by hungry ghosts. It turns out the chief of staff of the house was a apostle of some god named Adorned in Brass. He convinced the daughter she need to come with him to save her father. And so she did.
Great, so now we need to find his daughter…