Date / Time: March 19, noon<br/>Tagging: Gregor<br/><hr/>Gregor had been given a horse and sent off into the great unknown in the company of two mounted soldiers of his father's, and a groom, as soon as the weather promised passable roads. The two armed men, the groom, their horses, and even the pack pony they had with them, would return to their master as soon as the young lord Kaal had been safely delivered to his destination.<br/><br/>The horse he rode and the goods the pony carried were Gregor's to keep, provided he did not sell any of it for his personal gain – that condition his father had made very clear. A member of the Kaal family should be appointed in some style, and that was what horse and goods were there for. Enrichment for his son had been the last thing on lord Kaal's mind when he outfitted this little expedition.<br/><br/>The horse was of a decent, if not remarkable, quality. The household goods were adequate for the manor of a young lordling. Some good linen. Silver cups and matching plates for formal, or decorative, use. A pair of silver candelabras decorated with oak leaves done in green enamel. A pair of tapestries depicting scenes from the life and death of Saint Berwin (an item perhaps chosen for the stock the church of Cuthbert placed on Berwin as an implacable foe of wizards). Among the few other odds and ends in the saddlebags, one almost made up for the slight inflicted by the tapestries, a game board for chess and checkers of darkwood and ivory, decorated around the rim with fine carvings of hounds and deer. If lord Kaal had picked it because he knew his son's interest in the hunt, or if it had just been something he thought he wouldn't miss from his own household, could only be guessed.<br/><br/>And so equipped they had set out on their journey to the distant Frontier Baronies and the modest manor the family held there. The first part of the journey had hardly been remarkable, as they traveled well-used roads and could find an inn or a hospitable household every evening. But once they crossed the river XXX at Scarborough things changed and roads turned to muddy tracks, inns were replaced by campfires and coarse tents. The worst of the spring rains had subsided by then, but they were still frequently plagued by long drizzles and the occasional downpour. Only during the last two days of their journey the weather had cleared up, the rains almost stopped, and the cloud cover broken enough to reveal the hints of spring covering trees and hills.<br/><br/>It was in the morning hours of March 19 that the party passed through the village of Clun; none of them being very familiar with these parts they had paused for the night only a few miles from the village without knowing it. By noon they had reached the river Thane and got a first look at the village that sat at the center of the barony of Kirborg and shared that name. Perhaps a little more than two score houses inside a palisade, and a number of dwellings sprinkled around the countryside, none of which looked very impressive or extraordinary to someone schooled in architecture like Gregor Kaal.<br/><br/>Fording the river to the island midstream was not too difficult for mounted men, and from their a bridge crossed the northern arm of the river, a wooden construction on stone foundations that lead them to a gate in the palisade. At this time of day the gate stood open, but one guard lingered nearby and came to greet them. The guard, a woman in studded leather armor and equipped with a longsword, took their measure, before offering a polite "good day, my lord. May I ask what brings you to Kirborg? I'd be happy to offer directions if you are looking for someone?"