The session opened on a freeze-frame at the Starwater River crossing, moments after the plesiosaur had been pacified and Grimm's crew had fled. With Captain Stout marching down the bank, the crew scrambled to manage the aftermath: Vaela attempted to teach the plesiosaur to show its flipper in exchange for a pickle (and failed spectacularly on a nat one), Skrit wept openly against the creature's hide while finishing his healing of it, and Sanji quietly sabotaged the brass control whistle before it could be handed over as evidence. Stout collected the modified whistle, locked it in her strongbox, and paid the party 100 gold as promised. After investigation of the ambush site turned up slaughterhouse offal barrels — bearing, as Stout's guard confirmed on a second look, the same tally-mark-and-antlers brand found on the plesiosaur (an imprint of the same mark was also on the control whistle) — along with resin-dipped crossbow bolts and an order slip sealed in yellow wax marked with a 'V', the party successfully coaxed the creature downstream to a deep pool using pickle jars, clearing the crossing. Stout noted the brand and filed her report, and the 30 stalled merchant wagons finally began crossing.

The Greasy Spoon was guided to the best stall in the Thornwall Fords market square, and the crew ran a successful dinner service to a town that hadn't eaten well in days. Gorlog cooked to high praise — a passing merchant noted a 'Suzail fold on that garnish' — while Skrit picked up Sanji's slack after she abandoned her runner duties mid-service to chase a lead on the king. That lead took her to a frantic royal clerk named Maurice, whom she convinced she was an excellent shopper on a 19 deception check. Maurice handed her a sealed shopping list for the king's autumn hunting camp and five gold to acquire the items by sundown. Meanwhile, Skrit received a note in Draconic from an anonymous kobold directing him to a warren near the next town east, with the message: 'the tall folk don't go there, but we remember our own.' Wicket, manning the cash box and watching the crowd, overheard whispers that everything the Vances move on this river 'sleeps a night at the old Redwater Mill.'

Midway through service, two bounty hunters — Callum and Petra — worked their way around the square showing a charcoal sketch of Vaela to every stall. Wicket spotted them early, and Vaela used her last third-level spell to magically disguise herself, transforming into a stout dwarven woman with a beard and a raspy voice who immediately introduced herself as 'Lydia.' Callum and Petra reached the Greasy Spoon, declined the sliders (mostly), and made clear they were hired by the Mirethanes — confirmed to be Vaela's parents — to retrieve their daughter unharmed. Wicket brokered a potential trade: he moved to hire the pair to track down the two fugitives from the river crossing (no killing — just word of where they headed and whether they're up to more trouble), and Callum named their price: the party tells them what they know about Vaela and her current whereabouts. The negotiation was left open, with Callum and Petra promising to find the party at their own convenience.

As the dinner rush wound down, a cloaked figure approached the window, ordered turnip mash without intent to eat, placed a bloodied folded note on the counter, and melted back into the crowd. Wicket recognized him as one of the guards from Splinter's Bend. The note read: 'We know what you did in Waymoot. Your road ends at the Ford.' Ledger closed the session with a cold narration: a good day, by any measure — paid by the Kingsguard, cheered by a town, and a pickle order written onto the king's own manifest. But the note nobody wanted was already on the counter. Supper's coming, and supper's a meal where the knives come out.