Deephouse: Further adventures involving the employees of a mid-level adventuring corporation. New to Deephouse? Start here.
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“Welysa Gumpkin? The geologist?” Yeji’s eyes swallowed his eyelids. “You’re sure of it.”
Durgin had found Yeji working a ledger in his office and had quickly recapped the interview. “If your bauble works like you say it does, aye—I’m sure.” He slipped the amulet off and laid it on the desk.
Yeji shook his head. “I… I can’t believe it. Welysa is so… kind.”
Durgin gave him a skeptical look that went unnoticed. Yeji normally spoke like he was paid by the word, and given bonuses for long and usual combinations. This sudden inability to find words, to stumble in the searching, was a new look. Durgin wondered if there was something between the two of them, at least on Yeji’s side. But he didn’t ask or dwell on it—it was irrelevant to their purposes.
“It caught me off guard too,” Durgin said. “She doesn’t have a killer’s disposition. She said her best friends were rocks. Rocks, Yeji.”
“There must be a mistake.” Yeji sat forward. “What did you ask her? Precisely.”
Durgin sighed but decided to indulge the gnome. “I asked if she had any reason to want Sergeant Mountainfist dead. She said no. The amulet named her a liar.”
Yeji sank back into the chair. “That doesn’t mean she did it. Only that she wanted him dead.”
Durgin didn’t honor that with a response. Someone had killed the sergeant. Welysa had motive.
“But… why? Why would she want to harm the sergeant?”
“Maybe he insulted her favorite rock. Listen—the why is not important. We have our mole. Now we can throw her in irons, and be done with this.”
“No.” The words came out hard. Yeji’s eyes were flat. “We’re not doing that.”
Durgin swallowed his first twenty words. “Oh? Were you promoted to foreman while I was doing the job?”
“Apologies.” He smiled thinly. “I only meant that locking her up would be a mistake.” He started to say something else, paused, continued. “There’s still much we don’t know. Why she wanted him dead. How she acquired the black curse. Who she’s in league with, and the greater mystery yet: why has Deephouse been targeted?”
He wormed his fingers through his beard. He wasn’t convinced that Yeji wasn’t just playing for time for a gnome he was smitten with. But there was a certain cunning in what he suggested. Taking Welysa off the board would not deter whoever was interested in Deephouse. It’d only make them more cautious, and more careful. The only advantage they had was that their unknown assailant didn’t yet know that they’d found a loose thread. Something they might be able to follow back to the source of all this.
“I’m not saying I agree with you. But if we did it your way—how would it go? We can’t just follow her around at all hours without drawing suspicion.”
“No,” Yeji agreed. He smiled darkly. “We don’t have to. There’s someone else who could handle it for us, and she’d never be the wiser.”
Durgin’s fingers stilled. “Blasé.” It fit. It made sense. He could even see it working. Only problem—he wasn’t exactly on speaking terms with the ghost. “Fine. I’ll talk to him.”
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