Gartens responds less quickly, being preoccupied with regathering all of her weapons. "They are. One was killed, unfortunately, and I was unable to bring him in; my hounds are not well-trained at bringing down runners alive." As she stowed all of her weapons again and signaled for her dogs to follow her ("I can take care of them, if you point me to where these Pens are, if I must."), she hurried after the dwarf, armor clanking as she hustled.
"Do not worry yourself, it's too far out of your way. I have a smuggler to drop off anyway, so it's no trouble to take them along too." Raising her voice, she speaks to the group. "We may need you to testify against the accused, so if you could stop by our headquarters in the morning so we can take down your testimony, we'd appreciate it." Turning back to Gartens, "Have a good one."
"Mind telling me the general state of affairs, if you would, Master Dwarf?"
When asked this question, he strokes his long, braided gray beard thoughtfully for a moment. "Well. There's onl' one state of affairs in Kalgena." He pauses for a moment, both in his gait and speech. The buildings around you are very expensive looking, the road is well kept and paved with cobble, and there are some grates along the sides of the street, indicating a sewer system. He strolls over to one and pries it up and open. As you approach, a foul stench wafts up. It smells like someone made a piss, shit, rotting carcass and mining offal perfume and sprayed it everywhere. The hounds refuse to even get close to the grate. As you peer inside, you see what looks like the bottom of a pit toilet in river form. "One of the first things that Church Coalition did was ta setup a way to get rid o' waste. So we dug dry sewers and offered a new home to a number of groups of Otyughs." He slides the grate back into place, and continues on his way. "Kalgena is like our sewers. If you c'n survive the monsters, the smell, are prepared ta struggle through the conditions, and are very, very lucky, ye might just find a bit o' gold that a big man dropped. Fer the miners, it be Moradin. Fer the
toshers, it's a rich man." He chuckles a grim laugh.