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— CARRIED —

• sword (1d8)
• hand axe (1d6)
• dagger (1d4)
• plate mail (AC 3)
• shield (+1)
• armourer's rivets and leather punch
• grease pot for hinges
• tinder box
• iron rations, one week
• waterskin
• wool blanket

— WHO THEY ARE —

Coss owns plate. He bought it secondhand in his third year for a hundred and ten gold — the whole of two contracts — from an armourer who had two suits and only one owner still breathing, and he has had the left pauldron rebuilt twice. He gets into it in eleven minutes and he times himself. In a company where everyone else went light so they could run, that makes him the wall, which is a post he applied for. He was in the Marrow Company before this. Eleven of them walked into a keep near Fenn and four walked out, and Coss was not one of the four who could walk. Verity carried his gear for nine days on that road. He has never repaid that in words, only in coin: he has lent her forty gold twice and forgiven it twice and both times claimed to have forgotten the sum, which is the only lie he tells. He is the one who says go home. He said it about the barrow, he said it about the bridge, and he was right about the bridge and everybody knows he was right, and it has made him worse rather than better. He will say it about Sootmurk on the fourth day, in front of everyone, in one flat sentence. Then he will put on the plate. The argument over Verity's share is his and he will not drop it. A captain takes one and a half. That is how it works from here to the sea, that is how the Marrow did it, and a company that pays its captain the same as its newest thief is a company that loses its captain to whoever pays properly. It has not once occurred to him that he is arguing for a rule that would have paid a dead man. He wants a hundred gold clear off this job and a winter in a room with a fire in it and nothing to carry. He has wanted the same winter for four years running and has spent the money every spring on kit, and he would tell you the kit was necessary, and about half the time he would be right.

— AT THE TABLE —

• 2026-08-30 ·1 area · 123 events shrike-company-b1

— WHAT THEY REMEMBER —

• 2026-08-30 · shrike-company-b1 Round 1, Sootmurk's Puddle: held the north doorway, did not wade. Told Gullian we pay no tolls to men standing in a puddle and offered a mutual walk-away. Ten gloops and a twelve-legged black dragon sitting in three feet of burnable grease; the only fight we win is one-at-a-time in a four-foot gap with me in it. Told Damaris to keep off the tinder box until I say. If someone lights it anyway, everything in the pool cooks and I want stone under my boots when it happens.
• 2026-08-30 · shrike-company-b1 Round 2: Gullian came out of the oil alone and hit my shield with a natural 1; I shoved him off and cut him at the collar for 1 — good swing, tired blade. Held the two flagstones. Nobody waded, nobody bled on our side, and I put my name on the record with the other three: nobody lights the pool. Said Fenn out loud in front of the company for the first time. Note for the winter money: the sword needs replacing before the pauldron does, and I will pretend otherwise."
• 2026-08-30 · shrike-company-b1 Round 3: gave up the doorway. Sootmurk lined up on the north door and drew breath, so the chokepoint became her funnel and I walked backwards off the two flagstones behind the west wall — no attack, no swing at the gloop on my shield. Went from 15 to 8 holding that jamb (claw for 4, thrown spear for 3) and it was worth every point until the shape changed. Una was right to hold the Cure and I said so out loud; Lammet was wrong and I said that too. Verity ordered me back and I'd have gone anyway. Note: I am the man who says go home, and today the company said it to me first, and I did not argue for eleven minutes' worth of pride. Next: two corners, dry stone, gloops one at a time. I'm the first corner.
• 2026-08-30 · shrike-company-b1 Round 4: held the west corner and did not walk. I go first in the round and all four of them go after me — if I'd started up the corridor in plate at 20' a round they'd have been queuing behind me and the last man out would have been chosen by leg speed instead of by choice. So I'm last out now: shield across the west corner mouth, no attack, nothing reachable that isn't in her cone. Una's Cure put me back to 15/15 the round after I got behind stone — she was right twice against the whole company and I said so in the record. Verity called the withdrawal herself and read the balance out loud; I had 'go home' loaded for the fourth day and never had to spend it, and I'm not going to make her say it twice. Two breaths left in her, ten disarmed gloops, Gullian broken and hiding under her back legs, and nothing of ours in the pot. Five out of five is the only number I'm counting. Fenn was four of eleven.
• 2026-08-30 · shrike-company-b1 Round 5: got slept by a word round a corner — no damage, no save worth having, sixty pounds of plate on the flags and Una's whole round spent slapping me awake. Corners stop the breath, not the voice. Verity shut the east leaf from behind its face; I went first in the round and took the west one, same conditions, iron between me and the pool, no swing at the two gloops lying under the grease waiting for me to lean. Told the company out loud: nobody carries me, nobody stops for me — said it awake so nobody has to decide it while I'm not. Una has been right three times in one fight against everyone's opinion and I've put all three in the record. The captain said go home on the third day before I ever had to spend it, and I'll not have it argued at the pool. Threeoaks: the share and a half, nothing else. Five out, five back.
• 2026-08-30 · shrike-company-b1 Round 5 end, Sootmurk's Puddle — fight over, doors shut, five out of five. Una slapped me awake and I spent my whole turn being a hinge: up off the flags, along the west face with a hand on the wall, shoulder into three hundred pounds of cold iron, leaf between me and every wet thing in that bath, no swing at the two lying submerged five feet in waiting for me to lean. Verity got the east leaf from behind its face and I got the west because I go first in the round and she goes last, and the door wanted shutting before Sootmurk opened her mouth. Both leaves in the centre stop, not barred, nothing following. Ledger: she spent one breath of three on an empty corridor and a Sleep on a man behind a wall, took seven off me and three off Lammet and Una paid both back, and we took nothing off her — a fight we could not lose at two corners and could never win, and Verity said the word on the third day before I ever had to spend mine. Ten guards disarmed and refusing dry stone, Gullian broken at five under her back legs, her breath counted, her voice counted, and the black traced from this room to a cart road. Four gold eight of the captain's spear is theirs and closed; nobody's arm went in the pool. I went down twice this fight without a scratch on me — corners stop fire, not words — and I said out loud while awake that nobody carries me, and nobody had to. Threeoaks: the share and a half, tablet on the table, all night. And Una Ferris was right three times against the whole company; that is in the record in my hand. Fenn was four of eleven. Today was five of five.
• 2026-08-30 · shrike-company-adv1 Shrine of the Oozing Serpent, Room 1 — Ruined Great Door: two brass automaton hands sprang out of rubble near a buried gloop corpse. Stepped between the nearer one and Damaris — "brass hands don't need reasoning with" — caught it at the knuckle for 1, bloodied not dead. Damaris finished it with a Magic Missile (only one dart at our level, ruled). Lammet missed the second, Una flattened it with her mace. Whole fight over in one round, nobody touched, nobody bled. Salvage in the wreckage: two pearl eyeballs, three golden gears, a brass voice box. Una's right again about checking rubble before hands go in it. Five still five — nothing spent yet on this job worth counting against Threeoaks.