Blades in the Dark: He's a Demon

[Part of the Party Time journal]

The Shield of Dawn rebuilds Tangletown and lets Ulf and his Skovlander buddies move in to keep the peace. Juris then experiments with a new drug: Lure 2.0 called Bait, and this time he finds himself waking up in the Church of the Ecstasy of the Flesh and meets Elder Rowan (who is a disguised demon) so he quickly gets himself out of there to accompany DL to recon on Maestro Helleren (alleged murderer of Kenny V) only to discover he too is a disguised demon, so the both back off and instead go to talk to the Sallies squad (fire fighters) about their "fire insurance" policy. One of their members, Grace, has the hots for DL and confirms that it is an extortion racket wherein they set fires to holdings for people who don't pay.

They take the issue up to Lord Elon Dalmore, head of the Ministry of Preservation who is the over all boss of the umbrella that covers the Sallies and with Grace's cooperation immediately fires all of them. Elon then tries to buy the hand of Kotar from Juris after showing him and DL a highly guarded research center that contains the Heart of Kotar, explaining that he's trying to solve a potential power shortage issue as metrics suggest the Leviathan Hunters are bringing in less and less demon blood to fuel the lightning barriers around the city. Juris refuses.

Meanwhile Rose and Mom go to the docks where Rose participates in Grist's boxing challenge, ringing out her first foe, getting the second one disqualified and then having a decent match against the third but she gets ringed out this time - one match away from championship. While she does this mom follows some drug dealers back to their den but doesn't engage them at all. The next day all four go to confront Helleren who is convinced to speak of his crime to a "recording ghost" Juris pulls out. A fight ensues in which DL has to cut through a flying piano but ultimately Helleren is decapitated and killed.

Returning to their home district they find Warden Pope (he's a demon) and the Ironhook prison guards searching for escaped convicts believed to be with Ulf and the Skovlander community. While mom and DL buy time from the guards, Juris and Rose convince Ulf that they can help get the three away through a ghost door, and they do especially as Rose has ghostspeak now and basically commands them to leave them alone. By luck they also pick up Eisele, the last gondolier who has been trapped here ever since Juris' first encounter with Scurlock and they all make it out to the docks.

Here Rose brings them to the the only Skovlander she knows, Grist - who also turns out to be a demon. The escapees are quite happy to go with Grist despite Juris' warnings so he takes a devil's bargain and floods the warehouse (inside) to push them away from the demon before they finally get the message. The bargain: by saving these three, (2D6) dock workers died in the flood / crushed by containers. I rolled double 6. Running off they deliver the three to the Fog Hound, a small smuggling ship and head back home to find that Warden Pope and his team have moved on to search elsewhere.