Session 9 opened with Ledger's cold-open narration reviewing the crew's precarious position after a triumphant day: paid by the Kingsguard, fed the town, and earned a spot on the crown's shopping manifest — but also delivered a bloodied threat note and surrounded by professional hunters, Vance spies, and an ominous river. Sanji and Skrit spent the session completing Maurice's crown shopping errand, managing to reopen reluctant market stalls, haggle on a tight budget (aided by Sanji's 17 insight), and haul their goods back to the East Gate in a hand cart — with Skrit riding in the back — just barely in time. Maurice met them with visible relief and presented Sanji with a purveyor's chit naming her and her compatriots as approved vendors to the crown's provisioning circuit. He warned them that the king does not take kindly to anyone trying to locate his whereabouts, and begged them not to mention his name if they ever found the king. On the way back the two attempted to find the animal-speaker they had noted during their shopping, but the stall was already closed.

Back at the wagon, Wickett examined the bloodied threat note with a nat 20 investigation roll, determining the blood was human, relatively fresh, and that the splatter pattern did not look like it arrived violently — suggesting it was placed deliberately rather than as a result of injury. Wickett showed the note and his own sketch of the Vance tally-mark logo to Captain Stout, surrendering both as evidence. Stout confirmed she was doubling the gate watches and posting a guard at the strong box, but bluntly noted she had only eight spears spread across three locations. She advised the crew to choose carefully where they slept. Separately, Gorlog used his culinary expertise to liquefy the rare truffle into oil for extended use, rolling a 4 on a d4 to stretch it from one meal's worth to four, though he kept its poison-resistance properties to himself. Wickett borrowed a jar of Vaela's pickles while she was lost in her drawing and flow state, then took up a conspicuous position on a bench in the square in an attempt to lure Callum and Petra into a meeting — though his poor performance roll made the effort painfully obvious.

Callum and Petra eventually made contact outside the wagon. Petra reported that they had tracked the two fugitives from the river ambush upriver to a raft camp at the old shallows by the mill — approximately twenty men, with toll chains for blocking rivers and tally-mark logos on everything. More urgently, Callum added that as they left to return, they spotted three rafts coming downriver with no lanterns — warning the party that they might not see morning. Wickett confirmed to them that Vaela was with the crew, safe, and happy, and offered her sketch of the plesiosaur as evidence for their report to the Mirethanes. The hunters accepted and departed, leaving behind an ornate coin bearing an engraved M — which Vaela identified as a calling card placed deliberately, not dropped by accident. Wickett pocketed the real coin and flicked a decoy, then brought the intelligence immediately to Captain Stout, who recognized the location Petra described as Redwater Shallows — a place she had long suspected of being a ruffian stronghold but had never been able to get reliable intelligence on.

The crew settled in for the night at the Thornwall Inn, the nicest lodging in town, where the fastidious clerk Benjamin greeted them with dwindling enthusiasm as the full party filed in. Vaela paid three gold for a room with two large beds without haggling, to the quiet horror of Gorlog. Thaddeus the halfling bartender proved to be a genuinely gifted mixologist: he prepared a fragrant juniper-and-lavender steeped tea for Sanji and Vaela, and a King's Island iced tea with actual chipped ice and fizzing liquid for each of them, then an extra-spicy hot drink for Skrit. Wickett, quietly watching the door, nursed a standard ale and attempted to case the bar for Vance markings — a nat 1 stealth roll meant Thaddeus caught him looking and asked directly if he was looking for something. The session closed with Ledger's narration noting the crew's hard-won rest, while cataloguing the exposed vulnerabilities: the wagon unguarded in the square, the evidence whistle in Stout's strong box by the water, the plesiosaur alone in her pool, and Ledger himself in the muddy square — four things worth taking, all in four different places, none behind the hotel's fancy lock.