Hester Oxley
the tally-woman at Corran Ford
Ink tally marks run up both forearms in neat rows, one row for every body she has pulled from the Corran. A brass ferry whistle hangs on a chain at her throat, and she has never once blown it.
Read aloud"Four coppers a head, or you're on my ledger by sundown."
What they want
Three hundred gold from Edric Vane of Vane Mill, enough to re-rope the ferry cable before the spring flood. Vane has been cutting the cable on purpose to force her to sell the crossing, and she wants the cable paid for and Vane's men kept off her landing.
What they hide
Hester is the one drowning people. On the nights she shifts, she sinks travelers who try to cross without paying, then writes their names in the ledger so the Corran bodies look like accidents. If the party sees the ledger's dates match the moon, she will kill them to keep it quiet.
Ideal · Bond · Flaw
- Ideal — Every drowned person gets a name written in the ledger, and no one is forgotten.
- Bond — The ferry Patience, which her husband built and which still carries her name on the stern board.
- Flaw — She cannot leave a debt unpaid. She will hunt a debtor across three counties, and she will pull a man under before she lets him leave without paying.
Hook
A body snags the ferry cable at dawn wearing a Vane household ring, but the name Hester writes in the ledger is not Vane's. Someone else has been drowned in his place.
Stats
- Stat block
- Werewolf, Human Form
- AC
- 11
- HP
- 58
- CR
- 3
- XP
- 700
Play her in Human Form for the talking and the ledger. When she is cornered at the landing, have her shift to Wolf Form and fight with the ferry pole as her weapon, described as a long iron-shod quarterstaff.