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Story HourPost your ongoing tales from your campaigns, and read those from others for inspiration. Lots of other RPG boards post "Story Hours", but this is where it started!
I'd like to say "thank you" to all the lurkers and readers who kept up with the adventures of the Risen Goddess on the last EN-Boards incarnation. Unfortunately, those threads are lost to the ethers, which is a real shame. The witty and insightful posts by the thread's posters were worth the read, and half the fun.
You know who you are-- thanks!
A metagame note: This campaign is definately 'nonstandard' -- one player and one DM. The two of us involved switch DMing duties from time to time, and each person plays the roles of one primary character as a PC, and the secondary characters as NPCs.
The characters are based on previously played PCs from earlier editions of the game (dating back to 1e and OD&D) who have returned to life as 1st level characters through the pasoun of Ishlok.
You can also check out stat blocks for the PCs, as well as review a complete glossary of character, location and NPC names, at the Risen Goddess Rogues' Gallery thread.
Last edited by (contact); 10th March 2008 at 10:43 PM..
Four adventurers sit around a familiar table in a familiar inn, not too far from a place they must have surely known their whole lives-- if they could only remember any of it.
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Taran Tar-Ilou, a pugnacious ranger, thick as a bull, and twice as mean,
Thelbar Tar-Ilou, a brilliant wizard, more fair of face and favored of speech than his aggressive younger brother,
Kyreel, a dark elven paladin dedicated to Ishlok the Mother, in her aspect of The Protector, and
Indianichus, a lighthearted and imaginative elven rogue and historian.
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They are trained well for their respective professions, and suitably equipped. They have known each other for . . . lives? Life? Surely they should remember their meeting. But their acquaintance is itself a mystery. How is it possible that they speak a foreign tongue and revere a goddess no one has heard of, yet possess thin and watery memories of a life half-lived in Greyhawk? One thing they all know for sure: their destinies revolve around one another, and they trust each other with bonds that run deeper than those of family and companionship. Blood has been shed-- between them and by them, of that they are sure. They know without speaking that there will be more blood spilled before they come to full knowledge of self.
Taran is a grim and hardnosed combatant, a man who believes in the ascendancy of the adventuring class. He is as entitled as a nobleman, and views the common folk with much the same sort of protective disdain that one might see from a sheltered Baron. He believes he has a duty to the people-- but he does not understand their lives. An adventurer to the core, Taran knows that deadly force proves the final point in any argument.
His brother, Thelbar, on the other hand, is a deep thinking strategist. He enjoys complicated intellectual pursuits, and studies architecture and engineering along with his magical lore. Thelbar is fond of the damaging spell, but focuses his attention on those that disrupt the mind-- illusion and enchantment are his specialties. Thelbar keeps a hawk familiar by the name of Sartre.
Kyreel is something of an enigma. As a dark elf, she is shunned by most good folk. Her companions know her and trust her implicitly, but there is something about her current form that seems divinely inspired. She knows that she has felt the call to Service, and that Ishlok is her Goddess. She is unwaveringly moral and beneficent.
Indianichus, called "Indy" by his friends, is a creature of curiosity. He is extremely intelligent and imaginative, and loves nothing better than exploring new places, particularly ones he knows he should not be in. A tomb-crawler to his heart, Indy's life is made complete by ancient artifacts, lost cultures, and forbidden temples. Dwarves are his special field of study. He speaks the language fluently and is well versed in Dwarven lore and culture. Indianichus views himself as the central character in a High-Romantic drama. That this belief is often in conflict with reality is of no consequence to Indy. For this rogue, no passion is too obscure, no leap of logic too unbelievable, and no body of contradicting evidence convincing enough.
The four friends agree that they will find no answers sitting still, and make plans to leave Greyhawk City. Kyreel and Thelbar both have dreams that indicate a journey south would prove rewarding. They bid farewell to their feebly remembered childhoods, and soon find themselves on the road traveling away from the Domain of Greyhawk towards whatever fate awaits them, and hopefully some answers.
They travel leisurely, and pass the time in conversation about their past, trying to jog one another's memory about this or that event, but in the end, the conclusion is the same. They all have thin and wavering 'memories' of growing up together in Greyhawk city, although considering their racial makeup that cannot possibly be true. They all also have a sense that the lives they remember are not their own, and that Greyhawk is not their home.
For his part, Taran is sure that he was once a great lord, although why anyone would want to serve him now is beyond him. Thelbar also, remembers bits and pieces of magical lore that no mere apprentice should have learned. Kyreel and Indy have similar memories and recollections, and all four agree that it is a relief to be leaving Greyhawk City and getting on with . . . something.
Their second day out, Taran is scouting through the woods, ranging a few hundred yards ahead of the group as is his custom, when he notices a pair of stout, tusked humanoids standing together near a barrow-mound. He watches them for a moment, then returns to his companions to report.
Memories or no, it doesn't take a lifetime of experience to know that orcs are bad news. The group sneaks up on the two feral brutes, and Thelbar enchants their simple minds, putting them to sleep. After 'taking care' of the sleeping orcs, Taran notices that they were guarding a small opening in the side of the mound. A circular slab of stone, recently pried free from the opening, lies on the ground next to the bodies of the two dead orcs.
As the party is looking at one another and deciding what to do, an empty waterskin flies from the opening and lands on the ground at Thelbar's feet! A guttural, hoarse voice barks a command in orcish: "Fill the skin, you sheep-raping kobold-spawn, we're thirsty. And keep your damned eyes open, Tarkh, or I'll have your manhood off!"
Thelbar is the only member of the group who can understand the strange, croaking language, and he smiles to himself. While the rest of the party stares at him incredulously, he calmly takes the waterskin, places it under his robes, and relives himself in it. He motions the group to hide themselves and he tosses the skin back into the hole. "Here you go, boss," he says in his best Orcish.
Thirty seconds later, there is a harsh scream from down below, followed by a string of Orcish curses so fast and foul that Thelbar is only able to follow about half of the diatribe against Tarkh's mother, spawn, ancestry and eternal orcish soul.
The big orc who emerges from the hole barely has enough time to wonder what happened to his companions before he, too is cut down by Taran, Kyreel and Indy. The group searches the dead orcs, and finds insignia and coinage that indicates that they are travelers from the Pomarj, far to the south.
The group climbs into the hole where they see that they are in a low, circular domed chamber, completely consistent with the hill's outside appearance. Like many of the old ruins around Greyhawk Domain, the walls here are covered with enigmatic runes and carvings. A piss-filled waterskin lies open in the center of the room, and at the far end, a rude excavation has obliterated part of the runic symbols and opened a passage deeper into the earth.
The passage is a thin tunnel of the sort used by tomb-builders as they seal a cairn. It leads into a network of passages completely below ground, and the party must light a lantern so the humans can see. The group listens carefully for any sounds of further orcish presence, but hear nothing. A quick search of the walls near the tunnel to the surface reveals a hidden door that slides open when forcefully pushed.
The group steps through the secret door and finds themselves in a hidden area. Magical writing covers the walls here, and at the far end of the chamber a large blue gem is ensconced in an ornate holder. A quick detect magic spell reveals that the gem retains some magical properties, but is currently inert. Thelbar studies the writing on the wall, and after a few minutes tells the group that this orb is only part of a complete magic item-- a rod, or staff of some sort, likely very powerful. It seems that this burrow is the holding place for a magical artifact, one that is stored in two parts to avoid its detection through magical means.
The group reasons that the orcs here are tomb-robbers, and likely have no idea what treasure is hidden in this place. Not that the friends could, in all good conscience, allow a war-band of orcs to come into possession of a magical artifact of power. They resolve to find these orcs, eliminate them, and unite the blue orb with its other piece. Kyreel says a short prayer of thankfulness, and invokes the Mother's blessing on the group.
Leaving the secret chamber, the party hears booted feet approaching from one of the passageways. They hear a orcish voice shout "Look! There! Lights, dead ahead! Let's kill it!" and an answering yell from several voices as weapons are drawn from sheathes. Within seconds, the party is embroiled in a terrible melee as orcs attack them from both ends of the passageway. Taran and Kyreel stand toe-to-toe with their orcish foes, as Indy uses stealth and trickery to fight the monsters. Thelbar sends several more orcs to a sleep that will prove their last, and when the final blow is struck, a half dozen orcs lie dead, and everyone is bleeding from wounds inflicted by Pomarjian steel.
The group quickly casts about, and Indy reports hearing more orcs down one of the corridors. Hoping to avoid a fight they can't win, the group snatches a few trophies from the fallen and retreats back out into the woods. After finding a suitable hiding place not too far from the embattled cairn, Taran does his best to hide their tracks, and the group tends to their wounds.
In the night, Thelbar dreams of the goddess Ishlok, and wakes up the next morning with a renewed sense of faith. He and Kyreel discuss the priesthood of the Mother Ishlok, and realize that they know of no one else who worships her. Between the two of them, they are able to reconstruct several rituals of blessing and sacrament sacred to Ishlok, and they both undertake vows to worship Her and search for knowledge of Her faith.
The group returns to the cairn and after a careful search discover that the orcs have left the place, stripping their dead, and marching to the southeast. A similar chamber to the one containing the orb is found, but unfortunately, the orcs found it first. The haft of the item is in their possession, already a full day ahead of the group.
The band moves quickly, and as fast as Taran can lead them, follows the tracks of the remaining orcs. Taran guesses that a full half or more of their number fell in the fighting, and the orcs seem hell-bent to get away from the area as quickly as possible.
After a few days of travel, the party discovers a camp where the orcs they had been following met with some other humanoid creatures. Trails leave that campsite in two directions. One group, the original orcs, travel due east, while the newer group leads a wagon to he south.
The party follows the original group, and catches them a day later. An ambush is sprung, and after a brief battle, the party is in possession of a prisoner, but not the item they seek. The prisoner is willing to talk in exchange for its life, and tells the group that he is the sub-leader of a raiding party that left the Pomarj twenty strong. After some losses due to infighting, and one particularly nasty fall, the group happened upon the cairn with sixteen of their members alive.
When the party killed nine orcs, the remainder panicked and bolted. The orc describes the other half of the orb-- a shaft of some strange metal, covered in runic inscription that "looked valuable". Unfortunately, the band traded it for healing magic to a mixed group of orcish and goblin traders at their last encampment. He says that the traders were from a clan of orcs that lives in an abandoned dwarven complex in the mountains to the south. He says that the orcs call the place "Frowninghome", but to the dwarves who built it, it was Khundrukar-- the Forge of Fury.
The group releases him with a promise to return straightaway to the Pomarj, and returns to the meeting place, hoping to follow the traders from Khundrukar and claim the staff for their own.
They arrive in the town of Blasingdell, Kyreel taking care not to show her face. The group meets with the Constable and other town leaders about the orcish activity operating out of Khundrukar. The Constable assures the party that they would come into the favor of Blasingdell were they to put a stop to this orcish activity. In addition, the dwarven merchant Kheldegan Tolm expresses an interest in purchasing any dwarven artifacts the group might recover.
In addition, Kheldegan tells the group the legend of Dugeddin the Black-- a master smith who was forced to leave his ancestral home when it was sacked by orcs. He fled to the mountains north of Blasingdell and built Khundrukar, the Forge of Fury. From there, he waged a decades-long war with Orcs until he was finally overrun, and Khundrukar looted.
Indy in particular seems interested in exploring dwarven ruins. In his conversations with Kheldegan, the young elf exhibits much knowledge about dwarves and the dwarven way of life. Despite his gruff intent, the merchant finds himself relating to Indianichus, beard or no.
The party determines to hire some help, and find themselves particularly attracted to a young man by the name of Rex, a local warrior with big dreams. Rex agrees to go along with the group for a half-share of treasure, or one gold piece a day, whichever is greater. He hopes to help his grandmother pay off the lean on her home, and buy himself a striding warhorse.
The group searches the mountain face of Khundrukar, and discovers a well-hidden and well-fortified entrance, along with a smoke-hole further up the side of the mount. Indy is made invisible, and scrambles down the hole, then returns with good news-- the hole leads to a cooking area, currently unoccupied. The perfect place for a quiet assault.
The group's first foray liberates a pair of halfling prisoners, and surprises the orcish shaman, killing her before she can fully prepare herself. Thelbar is able to decipher her diary, and determines that she came into possession of the star-cairn staff, assuming it to be a magic item, but once she determined that she could not activate its powers, she grew discouraged and traded the object to the 'lizard-people' that live below.
The group discovers a stair leading to a lower level, and starts down, only to be ambushed by huge, bat-sized mosquito creatures-- stirges! After a brief and horrific few minutes that nearly spells the end for Indy, the group is able to drag his sagging form back up the stairs and fend off the stirges with lit torches.
They surprise a pair of wandering orcs on their way back to the smoke hole and are able to kill them before the orcs can recover and summon reinforcements. The group limps away from Khundrukar and sets up a base camp. Several days pass while Indy recovers from the horrible leeching, and Rex takes the freed halflings back to Blasingdell and picks up more supplies.
The group determines that the haft for the blue orb lies beneath the orcish-occupied areas, but decide that leaving any orcs at their back would be a horrible tactical error. Thus, they are in agreement-- the orcs must be killed or driven from Khundrukar, both for tactical reasons as well as Noble Principle. An assault is planned.
When Indy fully recovers, he scouts out the smoke hole, and sure enough, the orcs have lit a huge fire beneath it, no doubt hoping to discourage further assault. Indy is made magically resistant to fire, turned invisible, given the ability to spiderclimb and granted darkvision. He creeps into the orcish chambers, taking an account of their numbers and defenses. There are a pair of close calls, but in the end, he makes it back to the group with heartening news: The orcs suspect the smoke-hole entrance, and have had to split their defenses guarding the smoke-hole and the main entrance. Better yet, the orcs guarding the fire are standing within sleep spell range of the fire itself, easy pickings for a mage looking down from the surface.
Using stealth (and the sleep spell), the characters make their way into Khundrukar for the second time. This time, they are moving purposefully from room to room, on a seek-and-destroy mission against the orcs. Robbed of their shaman, the orcs are not prepared to stand against a stealthy foe who strikes with deadly effect, then slips away into the darkness. The party kills the orcs in small groups, and finally finds themselves confronting the orcish leader Ulfe, an ogre of unusually bad temperment (which, given the fact he is an ogre, is extremely bad indeed). Ulfe hands Taran and Rex the beatings of their young lives, and may very well have killed the entire group, save for some last-minute heroics, a pair of critical strikes, and a well-placed sneak attack from Indy.
The group accepts the surrender of the last few orcs left alive, and takes them to Blasingdell, where they will face human justice. The party sets about looting the orcish home, and making themselves comfortable in their new base of operations for further assault on Khundrukar.
An assault that proves all too quick in the coming. Within 24 hours of the last orc breath taken in Khundrukar, the stirges have been eliminated, and the party has explored the lower level, discovering the caverns occupied by the "reptile folk"-- lizardmen and their giant lizard companions. Luckily the group is able to confront the toughest of the cruel lizards before attacking the mass of the lizardman population.
The fight is fierce and almost fatal for the party. The lizardmen are tenacious, and fight as if they have nothing to loose. The lizardman have a sorcerer amongst their number, and he turns the tables on Thelbar, attacking the party time and time again with magical sleep. Thankfully, Rex proves entirely resistant to the sorcerer's spells, and saves the party with his accurate crossbow fire. All is almost lost as the sorcerer's pet lizard rampages through the sleeping group, but fortunately, Taran is able to rouse himself and run the beast through from a prone position just before its jaws sink into Thelbar's throat.
Badly shaken, and severely wounded, the party is forced to flee to the orcish warrens, and hide themselves in the shaman's disgusting lair. By the time they return to finish off the remaining lizardfolk, they discover that the remainder of the clan has fled. It seems that they fled in a hurry, because they left quite a bit of their treasure behind. But they must have also fled purposefully, for they have taken the best of their treasure with them, including the haft to the blue orb.
Thelbar and Kyreel have both taken vows to the Mother, and Kyreel chooses to pursue this path more deeply, reasoning that her devotion to the unique religion all four of the heroes share may very well provide the answers they seek.
Thelbar, for his part, is ever practical, and devotes the majority of his attention to the arcane arts, stating that his devotion to destroying his foes may very well keep them all alive long enough to find the answers they seek.
Indianichus shows a keen interest and aptitude for the arcane studies, and begins to take lessons from Thelbar, proving himself a quick study.
Taran begins training Rex in some of the finer points of swordplay, helping the young warrior improve his capabilities in melee.
A further exploration of the complex reveals the Forge itself, an area currently occupied by a band of Duergar Dwarves, up from the Underdark, looking for Dugeddin's secrets. The Duergar arcanist is a master of illusion, and the group wastes resources fighting with shadows before putting the villain down. The surviving Duergar call for a sundering of hostilities, and offer to exchange information with the group in exchange for peace. In the end, it is determined that the lizardfolk did not flee this direction with the staff-- they must have gone deeper still, into the unexplored depths of Khundrukar.
The group naively descends into the bowels of the Forge, and come across a large cavern containing an underground lake. The party carefully steps out onto an low shelf of rock that overhangs the edge of the lake. They are making a first cursory examination of the water itself when Indy cries out a warning that something . . . some things, are swimming toward them. The group readies itself for melee, only to be taken by surprise as a huge lizard, the size of a pony and covered with black scales, darts out from behind them slashing Kyreel with its razor sharp claws! The party attacks the beast in a state of general confusion, but their blows do little against the creature's armor-like scales.
The beast lifts its head and spews forth a stream of acid, burning Taran, and ruining his armor. The party scrambles madly to recover their wits, and manage a couple of feeble attacks, but the dragon fights like a half-ton house cat. Before anyone can truly hurt the beast, it springs at Kyreel, grabbing her and diving over the side of the ledge.
Indy and Taran are quick to shed their armor and dive in after their drow friend, but they have underwater troubles of their own-- the surviving lizardmen have gathered en masse around the ledge, and attack the newcomers with spears. Kyreel fights for her life, trying vainly to escape the cruel clutches of the beast, but to no avail.
The lizardmen prove more than susceptible to the deadly one-two punch of Taran's dagger and Indy's rapier. Kyreel manages to struggle free, and during the fighting, the dragon exposes itself to the surface, creating a target for Thelbar's magic missiles. Indy manages to position himself between the lizardmen and the dragon, freeing Taran and Kyreel to attack the horror, if somewhat ineffectively.
Nightscale, for her part, is smart enough to know when her window of opportunity is closing. In a flash, the serpentine horror uncoils and jets away, disappearing into the murky waters of the underground lagoon.
By the time the PCs manage to swim out to Nightscale's island in the center of the lake, the dragon has packed for a long vacation and taken her most cherished treasure with her, including all of her magic items, and the haft piece to the blue orb.
Kyreel, Indy and Taran horse around in the treasure pile, throwing coins at each other, and retelling parts of their first dragon fight. Thelbar stands alone, at the edge of the water. Looking at the orb, Thelbar sighs helplessly and reflects on the Magic Staff that Almost Was. Half in the possession of a no name mage from Goddess-knows-where, and half in the possession of a baby black dragon, fleeing for its life.
When the last nook and cranny of Khundrukar has been searched and scoured, several more monsters have fallen to the blades and spells of the party. (Don't even get me started on the f***ing roper. --author). In a side passage, shunned by the lizardmen, and covered with Yellow Mold, the group finds a limed-over skeleton clutching a magical bastard sword, Taran's weapon of choice. He gleefully claims it for his own, and names the blade "Black Lisa", after the heroine of a particularly gruesome folk tale involving patricide, poison and revenge.
Kyreel has experienced a divine rapture in the embrace of the Goddess Ishlok, and has begun channeling Her Divine Will in addition to her paladin abilities. Thelbar also has taken Holy Vows, but prefers to concentrate on his arcana. Indy has proven to be an apt pupil for the magical arts and can cast several spells now in addition to his stealthy practice. Taran, on the other hand, believes in dancing with who brung ya-- he pours his energy into the arts of war.
Thelbar crafts the first wondrous items for the group, most importantly a hat of disguise for Kyreel. Now the drow can travel openly amongst Good society without fear of unwarranted assault.
Indy takes several of the dwarven artifacts to Kheldegan Tolm, and the two of them haggle for days about points of minutiae regarding dwarven history and the value of the artifacts. In the end, Kheldegan agrees to buy a few of the objects, and arranges for Indy to meet some dwarven traders from a dwarf-fast to the east.
The negotiations go well, and Indy is able to win through the dwarves' distant nature with his knowledge of 'proper' custom, and obvious respect for dwarven ways. The traders agree to purchase the artifacts from Khundrukar, and agree to spread the news to nearby dwarven communities that the Forge of Fury stands open and ready for resettlement.
The traders linger in town for a few days, and Indy hosts them, toasting to their clan, and their Fane. This troubles one of the dwarves, and after beating around the subject for a proper length of time, tells Indy the following story:
He is from a dwarven hall near Ratik known as the Great Delve. He, like many other young dwarves were forced to expatriate because his King had gone mad. The King lost his senses sometime after a visit from a group of strange dwarves who came up from the Underdark, but claimed to be surface dwarves from a burrow far, far away.
The dwarf presents his shield, a gift from the foreign dwarves. Indy is shocked and transfixed by the glyph. He is sure he has seen it before, but cannot recall where. He reacts very emotionally to the symbol, and knows it to be the warren mark of the Filas Hali. None of the other dwarves recognize this name.
Further, the dwarf from the Great Delve tells Indy that the foreign dwarves had a king; a king by the name of Alvodar. The name sends tendrils of memory through Indy, and he is sure he has known this dwarf.
The rest of the party needs little convincing, as they recognize the name of Alvodar themselves, though none of them know exactly why. They are sure that this Alvodar is a being of great virtue, and must certainly be sought. If the dwarves of the Great Delve are having troubles, and Alvodar is there, then into the Great Delve they shall go.
The catch? The Fallen Hall is on the other side of the Flannaes. Between the characters and their eventual destination are the Flinty Hills and the Bone March, a land every bit as unpleasant as its name would indicate. The group prepares itself for a long overland travel, spending their hard-won adventuring loot on magic items and gear. Horses are purchased, stout hill ponies suitable for long overland travel. Rex, for his part, purchases the largest and most impressive warhorse he can find, and proudly names it 'Lac.
During their first week of travel in the Flinty Hills, the group notices a strange sight off in the distance. A long, narrow object, suspended in mid-air, stretching from approximately 2 feet to 20 feet off the ground before it disappears. As they approach, they spot a very strange bird in a nearby tree.
The brightly colored four-winged creature is the size of a small horse, and as they approach, it attacks them with bursts of lightning that issue from its hooked beak. Its wings radiate equilaterally from its central axis, and it possesses an amazing level of mobility that no normal bird could ever hope to achieve. Merely keeping one's eye on the thing is difficult enough, nonetheless convincing it to stand still long enough to shoot at!
They defeat it, but must use all their most potent magic to do so. They then approach the object, which they can now see is a ladder, and call out. Indy and Thelbar explain that the ladder is most likely a rope trick currently being used by an adventuring party hiding from the bizarre and predatory bird.
Unfortunately for them, there are no friendly adventurers here. The ladder is in fact completely normal. Of course, no ladder can really be called normal when it is dangling from a rift in space bridging the prime material plane with the plane of Air. On the Air side of this dimensional rift is a transmuter of malevolent disposition with his gang of hyper-aggressive gnome barbarians digging in a chunk of floating prime material plane for buried treasure.
Yes, literally.
One of the gnomes climbs down the ladder, and tells the PCs to mind their own business, and move on. Or at least that's the general drift-- he isn't near that polite. The gnome is nasty and insulting, and it isn't long before Taran decides he's had all the lip he's going to take out of a little half-dwarf who would need a step ladder to polish his own belt buckle. Hostilities commence, and it's not pretty.
Unknown to the party, a large air elemental has been resting quietly at the base of the ladder, and once swords are drawn, it begins tearing through the party's ranks, picking up characters and depositing them one hundred feet away. The transmuter, on the other side of a vortex, orders his remaining gnomes to find out what is keeping their companion, and terminate with prejudice anyone they don't recognize.
The aggro gnomes drop screaming from the vortex (which is kind of like a horizontal door between the two planes) with their blades drawn, only to charge face-first into a color spray. They fall unconscious, wake up, go blind, then stumble around. It would be like a typical night on the town, except at the end of it, they all die.
Meanwhile, the air elemental is causing complete chaos amongst the spellcasters, and Kyreel and Taran have just managed to fight their way underneath the dimensional rift where they can be seen by the watching transmuter. The two heroes charge up the ladder and into the plane of air, where the dire fellow attempts to parley.
"Gentlemen!" He says with an oily leer, "We've gotten off on the wrong foot. Perhaps there is enough treasure here for all of us?"
As soon as he sees that his ruse isn't going to work, he is quick to lightning bolt the dirty do-gooders. Unfortunately for him, they don't die. (Strange, that's never happened before . . . they usually die when they are blasted in the face like that.)
The mage is backing away from the heroes toward the opposite end of a 20' x 15' slab of earth, clay and grass floating in an endless expanse of blue sky and majestic clouds. A stiff breeze whistles through the place, disturbingly void of the normal earthen smells such a wind might bring.
Thelbar sends his hawk familiar Sartre up through the portal with a live shocking grasp spell. Sartre dodges around the mage's shield and delivers a critical hit! The mage is staggered, and in far too much pain to put up any sort of defense against the big man with the sharp sword. Taran cuts him into two twitching, evil pieces.
The PCs gather on the slab of dirt and begin to explore the prime pocket floating in the plane of air. The mean little gnomes had already dug up a large, wooden chest, and were in the process of destroying the lock to get it open. One whack from Black Lisa later, the PCs are counting coinage and examining a pair of magic items.
On the body of the transmuter (well, the upper half, that is), Thelbar discovers a hide bound diary, of ancient manufacture. The book is stamped with heraldic markings revealing its maker to be a craftsman from the Great Kingdom, pre-splintering! Thelbar opens the tome, and discovers that he is holding the spellbook of an ancient wizard, now long gone, who had sequestered caches of coins and magic in various pocket dimensions and inner planes, then connected the caches to a series of static 'portals' in and around the Great Kingdom. The portals are partially sealed, opened by spell-completion, like some magic items. This transmuter (Mother have mercy on his soul), bought the book from a curio shop in Nyrond, and has partially translated the text.
What the transmuter missed, but Thelbar does not, was the hidden text describing a series of rituals that would fundamentally change aspects of an applicable spell. If the rituals in this book work, any spell could be made more mighty, or lengthy in its duration, all without a greater expenditure of magical resource by the spell-caster. If this book is correct, Thelbar realizes, every wizard in the Flannaes would kill to possess it.
The implications of the work captivate Thelbar, and he calls for a camp. The heroes settle down on the prime material pocket to rest. Indy and Thelbar pore over the ancient tome, while Kyreel and Taran watch the majestic (and altogether too massive) cloud formations whirl and tumble through the endless expanse of sky.
When they awaken in the morning, well rested and ready to resume their journey, they find that the portal back to the Prime Material plane has closed. They are standing alone on a 15' x 10' x 20' chunk of dirt and grass floating in an infinite void of Air . . .
The better part of a day passes while Indy and Thelbar debate possible ways to get off the plane. Tempers grow heated, then frayed. Taran cycles through a manic phase, followed by despondency that leads to black implications of how bad his next foe will have it.
Thelbar occupies himself by learning about the laws of physics in this place. He is able to stand comfortably on all sides of the Prime pocket, simply by stepping over the edge, and onto the alternate surface. He determines that 'down' is relative here, relating to one's belief, rather than a physical constant. He ties rope around himself and attempts the following experiment. By believing that 'up' is 'down', Thelbar is able to fall away from the Prime pocket. By reversing his mental orientation, he can fall back towards his friends. Although it is crude and clumsy, Indy points out that should their situation grow desperate enough, they could 'fall' through the Plane looking for help. Thelbar points out that he thinks they already are.
Objects have neither a 'down' or an 'up', traveling through the void at a constant speed, along whatever path they were launched. In fact, this Prime pocket is surely rocketing through the void, its trajectory swayed by the mental 'down' of the beings sitting upon it. If there is a 'terminal velocity' here, Thelbar reasons, it would be determined only by an individual object's weight, not any constraint imposed by the atmosphere.
Late in the afternoon of the second day (at least as they remember time-- there is no sun or moon here, just an even expanse of unchanging light), the group has resigned itself to its helpless state. Even Indy has grown sullen and quiet, and stopped pestering Thelbar to let him examine the book. Kyreel is flinging chunks of dirt and clay into the void when she spots a speck off in the distance. The speck grows larger at a leisurely rate. The entire group is soon staring 'up' at the spot, arguing amongst themselves about what it is.
Hours later, the argument is settled. The thing is close enough that there can be no doubt about the object's nature; it is a ship. A sailing vessel, by the looks of it, complete with masts and sails. The heroes are at first overjoyed, thinking themselves rescued, then subdued when Taran points out that the ship may not be friendly.
The fact that he seems to relish the prospect of fighting an entire ship full of people does not diminish the validity of his observation. The group readies themselves for whatever may come, and settles in to wait.
Hours pass, and Kyreel, Rex and Indy strike up a tense game of 'hidden stone', an orcish gambling pastime the duo have come to love. As they play, they keep an eye on the ship. Thelbar manages to coach Taran at believing in a different down, and between the two of them, they rotate the Prime pocket until they can watch the approaching ship without straining their necks.
The ship sails closer, and is soon near enough that the party can make out individuals standing at its rails, watching them. A loud bellowing floats toward them, and they make out a crude and heavily accented phrase in common: "On the rock, there! Prepare to be boarded!" Weapons are swiftly readied, and shortly thereafter, a pair of large humanoids leap from the ship and sail through the void toward the Prime pocket.
The two aggressors are half orcs, armed with orcish double axes, and Indy is barely able to observe how strange it is that sailors would be wearing plate mail armor before battle is joined. Thelbar hides himself around one 'corner' of the Prime pocket, and opens the hostilities with a magic missile. Taran and Kyreel attack one of the half orcs, while Indy fences with the second. Rex darts about, covering his friends with his crossbow and firing into the melee. The fighting is intense, but it soon becomes apparent that the half orcs intend to subdue and capture the group rather than kill them. They are extremely skilled fighters, and use their double weapons to swiftly disarm Taran, sending Black Lisa twirling end over end into the void.
Sartre is dispatched to fetch the blade, and Taran draws his backup weapon, badly wounding one of the half orcs. In a matter of seconds, the battle has turned against the boarders, and both of them fling themselves from the rock, and 'fall' back towards their ship, which is sailing in leisurely circles around the Prime pocket.
"Well done, well done!" A voice calls from the prow. The heroes look up to see that they are hailed by a female orc, dressed to the nines in garish and loose fitting clothing. She wears a prominent medallion depicting a series of arrows radiating outward from a central point, a universal symbol for Chaos.
"Listen, you're not off the reefs, yet," she shouts. "You can be stubborn, and starve to death here on your rock, or you can join us. My name is Ragna, and this is my ship. The Marrow Down needs good fighters like yourself. Join me, and I can promise you a fine life of high piracy, along with an equal share of any salvage gold we might win for ourselves. Scorn me, and I will send my Raiders," she gestures toward the horde of small, gray humanoids crowding on deck "to kill you all. What say you?"
The party converses for a moment, but realizes that the cards are all in Ragna's hand, and they have no choice to agree. Indy, for his part, is beside himself with excitement. He exclaims that he has always wanted to be a pirate, and could we join them? Oh, please! Taran shrugs, pointing out that killing dungeon inhabitants for treasure isn't that much different than killing sailors for treasure, despite Kyreel's protests to the contrary. Thelbar, in the end, casts the final vote, pointing out that at least with Ragna, they will be less likely to starve.
And thus the group joins Ragna's Raiders, sailing through the void of Elemental Air, as the Marrow Down's new ship-to-ship combat specialists.
6-- "Below there, on deck! Land ho . . . and she's flying right toward us!"
The group is brought onboard, and introduced to the half orcs who just a minute ago were their mortal enemies. Ragna introduces the two as Mishkal and Hamm, her sons, and the Marrow Down's former ship-to-ship combat specialists. Mishkal and Hamm look less than pleased about their new shipmates, and the two groups stare daggers at one another while Ragna presents her first mate, the lieutenant and the bosun.
After getting the details of the Marrow Down, her routine, and their role in it, the party settles down for a hearty meal of salt beef and hard tack. Ragna tells them of a place called Haven that is the Marrow Down's port of call. She refers to herself as a privateer, and approaches her piracy with a religious dedication. Ragna, and her Raiders, oppose a group they call the Wind Dukes, great creatures of Elemental Law that seek to order and subjugate the free denizens of the Plane of Air.
Ragna herself was once a Prime Material denizen, but stumbled through a one way portal, and found herself marooned like so many others. She was taken in by a pirate (the father of her sons, by the way), and soon found a clerical calling serving Chaos, and opposing Law.
Kyreel bristles at this tale, but diplomatically refrains from argument.
Haven, she tells them, is protected from the scrying of the Wind Dukes. She says that the Marrow Down is due to dock there in a few weeks. Perhaps, if the group proves themselves worthy, she might introduce them to some friends of hers who possess the means to travel between the planes.
Ragna's Raiders, with the exception of her sons, are neither human nor orc. They call themselves Gith, and are thin, grey humanoids possessed of a sullen and generally disobedient nature. They all revere Ragna, that much is clear, and they call her the greatest pirate any of them have ever had the pleasure to serve under.
Below decks are the 'oars' manned by ogres. As velocity through the plane of air is determined by relative weight, the 'oars' are actually huge chairs set into the hull and oriented so the massive giants are seated with the prow of the ship as their 'down'. The ogres have the easiest job on board-- sit there and grow fat, the fatter the better. Indy remarks that he's never seen so many happy ogres in one place, and they certainly eat better than anyone else on board!
Several days pass, and the PCs play with "Head"-- a captive vargouille the Gith pirates have turned into a mascot. They practice 'falling' through the Plane of Air, and are tutored in some of the finer points of fighting in free-fall by Mishkal and Hamm.
Kyreel manages to debate with Ragna about her views on Freedom versus Order, without the issue coming to blows. Ragna is a zealous woman, fully in opposition to the Wind Dukes and what she terms as "their senseless and arbitrary oppression of our Natural right to determine our own destinies". Sartre, for his part finds himself agreeing with Ragna, and through his connection with Thelbar engages Kyreel in a lively argument about free will contending with duty to determine a creatures moral obligation. Kyreel contends that laws provide the structure that allows Good people to work together for the betterment of all, and without worldly Law, the consequences would be disastrous. Furthermore, she argues, the Pasoun (the central spiritual reality of the Ishlokian faith-- a type of reincarnation) proves that our temporal laws merely mirror irrefutable Metaphysical Principles.
Sartre contends that as long as an individual cleaves to the Good out of fear of a law, he has not really made a choice, and therefore is not really good. Laws, Sartre argues, are necessary only because the mass of sentient-kind are petty and scheming at heart. A true Being of Distinction should regard laws as beneath him, and strive for righteousness out of his own capacity for reason.
Thankfully, neither Ragna, nor any Wind Dukes were around to hear this.
On day three of their first voyage as Pirates of Elemental Air, an object is sighted. The crew hastily prepares the ship for a chase, and a tense waiting begins, with the crew attending their normal duties, but in a very subdued and tense manner. Over the course of the next day, the object gets slowly closer.
Ragna glowingly tells the PCs that she has caught "The Lighthouse", and seems eager for revenge against someone called Captain Philius and his associate Kruul. Philius and Kruul, she states, serve the Wind Duke B'hii, who has claimed this stretch of Air. As the day (a relative term in the plane of Air) wears on, it becomes obvious that the Lighthouse cannot hope to outrun the Marrow Down.
The Lighthouse itself looks like a narrow sliver of cliff face, cut from some rocky shore and suspended in space. On the top of the cliff is a narrow tower, the upper half of which is glowing with a magical and eerie light.
As the pirates get close, the Lighthouse begins an unusual maneuver, sacrificing its forward motion in order to spin on its horizontal axis. Thelbar immediately realizes that this is a defensive maneuver meant to make it impossible for the Marrow Down to grapple and board.
Ragna looks confused (and a little worried), but says that this will only delay the inevitable. She is outlining her attack strategy when the call comes from the crow's nest:
"On deck, there! Object off the starboard bow! Half-noon and sinking fast, Cap'n"
Ragna dashes up to the lookout as nimbly as any rogue, and returns just as quickly. She pulls the party aside and summons her sons.
"Silver 'gainst gold that's a Wind Duke warship, comin' on. We don't have enough time to destroy that sodding rock," she points toward the lighthouse, "but I'll not run off without bloodying Philius and Krull." Ragna looks up toward the oncoming object, still only a speck in the sky. "The boys need me here, and we've got to get this ship ready to run - - the seven of you're gonna have to dry-jump over there, and give 'em what they got comin'."
She fixes each of the group with a cold stare. "I'm counting on you. All those who love Freedom are too. Let's black this Duke's eye, and slip their hangman's noose! Now get to it!"
DM's note-- The party was attempting to 'dry jump' (without a rope) from one plane of a slowly moving object to one plane of a rapidly rotating object. They were aiming for a spot at the base of the tower, and were using an untrained skill. I was giving the smarter characters an Int check, and the more nimble characters a Dex check, depending on what tactic they would use. To hit the target (a 5' x 5' square on the combat map) was DC 25, to land within 10 feet was DC 20, and to hit the right plane at all was DC 15. Mishkal (Jump skill at +8) and Thelbar (Int 18) were the only ones to miss entirely, but landing across the face of the rock so spread out almost got them all killed:
The party follows the lead of Mishkal and Hamm, and for the most part land near the Lighthouse tower. Thelbar overshoots completely, and has a moment of panic, before he realizes he can move in any direction by believing in a "down" other than the one he's falling toward.
Indy, Taran, Rex and Kyreel land safely, but are separated from one another. Indy is invisible, but the others are swarmed by bloodthirsty bugbears wearing the Ducal livery.
Thelbar tries again, but overshoots his target-plane a second time. To the characters standing on the Lighthouse, the ground is their "down", and thus, they do not seem to be moving, rather, everything else is whirring around them like the sun and moon gone into overdrive. The roars and cheers of the Gith watching the fight from the Marrow Down slowly become louder as the ship "circles" into view, then fade just as suddenly as the rock blocks out the sound. Thus, Thelbar, falling in a straight line, seems to be flying a graceful curve over the battle site.
Taran would have wondered how Thelbar could fall in circles like that, but he is surrounded by bugbears. But he is not alone. Everyone is surrounded by bugbears, as they swarm out of the empty-looking lighthouse. The bugbears are all Ducal Marines.
"It's a trap!" screams Hamm, "Kill them all!" (Apparently, it's been awhile since Hamm went to strategy school, because 'Kill them all' does not generally follow 'We've fallen for a trap'.)
Rex has the presence of mind to drop to the ground and play dead, after facing off with six of the furry bastards. Kyreel rushes to Rex's side, fooled by his ruse, and the two of them proceed to cut a swath of death through the ranks of their foes. A swath that dies a premature death when a nine foot tall bull-headed behemoth "falls" toward them from the top of the tower, then gracefully "falls" the other way at the last moment, landing right behind Kyreel. Kruul the minotaur, right on schedule.
Magic missiles come streaking from the top of the lighthouse into Taran, weakening him. On the other side of the lighthouse, Mishkal joins Hamm, and the two of them start killing bugbears in a frenzied orgy of double-headed axe swipes and gore.
The vicious minotaur has a wicked looking brand on his chest that matches the symbol on the bugbear's livery. The first thing he does is bellow a challenge at Kyreel, sonically assaulting the paladin. Fortunately, Kyreel's inherent spell resistance is up to the task, and she is unharmed. Unfortunately, there is no resistance that will help against a minotaur's greataxe. Soon, Rex is forced to grab Kyreel's unconscious form and "fall" back to the Marrow Down where Ragna is able to provide some magical healing, and get her back into the fray.
Taran manages to get near to Kruul and lays into him, but cannot stand toe to toe with the beast for long. He falls, but is rescued in time by Kyreel who "lands" nearby, and administers some healing magic of her own to stop Taran's bleeding.
Meanwhile, Indy has used a spiderclimb spell to reach the top of the lighthouse, and spots an older man dressed in an outlandish outfit (replete with multiple buckles, no less) clutching a spear wreathed in a crackling blue electrical field. Unbeknownst to the man, he is stalked by a Master Thief. Indy creeps ever closer to the sorcerer, taking careful aim, then . . . he strikes! And misses! And stumbles!
Fortunately, Thelbar has finally landed, and yells "cover your eyes" in the foriegn language he and Indy share before enrapturing Captain Philus with a hypnotic pattern. Thel turns his attentions toward Krull, casting the last of his magic missiles at the beast.
After disarming and binding the good Captain, Indy runs halfway down the side of the tower, and begins firing his bow at the minotaur. Hamm and Mishkal are still threshing bugbears like a drunken farmboy taking dad's plow out for a joyride. Kruul can't withstand the magic missiles and arrow barrage, and is felled. The surviving bugbears curse in Auran and "fall" in every direction, leaving the PCs alone on the rock with Captain Philius, and a dozen dead bugbears.
They return to the Marrow Down. Ragna congratulates the heroes heartily, bestows kisses on her embarrassed sons, and gives the command to shove off, and away from here!
She examines her prisoner, and removes his gag. Philius smugly regards the pursuing vessel and crows "You're done for now, Ragna. We have you at last. Surrender to me, and I can assure you the most civilized of treatment."
Ragna replies that the Marrow Down has a few tricks in her yet, and orders full sail! Three points into the wind! Thelbar seems disturbed at Philius' total composure and lack of concern.
The approaching object, it can now be seen, is a massive chunk of rock, shaped like a stalactite, swiftly gaining on the fleeing pirate vessel. "Thrice-damned Ducal Fleet," Ragna curses. She turns to the party and whispers conspiratorially "We won't win this fight. That's the D.F. Piercer, and she'll leave us in pieces. If you want to flee, well . . . I understand."
Thelbar asks for a moment alone with Ragna and questions her about the maneuverability of the Marrow Down. Can she rotate, like the Lighthouse? No. Can she turn? Much like a Prime Material sailing vessel. Thelbar proposes a bold strategy: Turn the Marrow Down around 180 degrees and charge the D.F. Piercer! At the last moment, the pirates will veer to one side, and use their position broadsides to board the Wind Duke's privateer. They will then battle the crew for possession of the ship. A do-or-die struggle, to be sure, the kind to inspire fierce fighting from the meekest scupper's mate!
Ragna looks at Thelbar with newfound admiration, and spreads the plan amongst the boys . . .
Philius' smug composure cracks when Ragna orders the ship around, on a course to ram the D.F. Piercer. It is now Ragna’s turn to gloat, and point out that she has more tricks up her sleeve than he has given her credit for, and this time it is the fox that will nip the hound! The prime-material reference seems lost on Captain Philius, but he is able to get the drift of it.
The D.F. Piercer is a massive vessel, fully one-hundred and fifty feet long, and sixty feet wide at its aft, narrowing to a vicious eight feet in width at is fore. The vessel is built for ramming, and flies without sails, at speeds unmatched by ships like the Marrow Down. Something about the D.F. Piercer bothers Thelbar, though he cannot quite put a finger on it.
The wait as the two ships close on one another is almost unbearable. Ragna’s Raiders leave only enough crew active to execute a last-minute turn, and Ragna sends up a parley flag in order to confuse the enemy. The rest of the Raiders lurk about the starboard side, trying to look inconspicuous and conceal their boarding-pikes.
As the two ships near one another, a collision looks immanent. Taran and Thelbar stand at the prow of the Marrow Down and can make out their foe: three score or more tall, willowy, blue-skinned humanoids, led by a winged man and a floating aberration that looks for all the world like a giant, grey cone of scaly flesh, with a spiky maw at one end, and two sets of arms protruding from its forepart at the cardinal directions. The fact that the thing is obviously casting spells to prepare itself and the winged man is not lost on Thelbar.
"A Lawgiver," Hamm says over Taran's shoulder. "They must want us bad, if they’ve sent that thing all the way from B'hii's court. The flyboy standing next to him is a Wind Duke Navigatior.
"Hamm," Thelbar begins, "The Piercer--is she . . . alive?"
Hamm laughs evilly and mutters "Not for long".
Their conversation is interrupted as Ragna shouts "Now, lads! For freedom! Turn this ship!"
The Marrow Down lurches suddenly as the ogres below decks shift their weight to the side, and the vessel veers onto a course designed to bring them deck-to-deck with the D.F. Piercer. The maneuver is only partially successful, and the horrible Wind Duke ship tears into the Marrow Down just to the starboard side of the prow, below decks. There is an awful rending tear, and the two ships are locked together, with the starboard-side ogres below decks smashed into a bloody mess and sent flying out into the void. Ragna’s Raiders give a hearty yell, which is matched by the Wind Duke’s marines, then leap over the side of the ship to engage their foe.
The adventurers tell Mishkal and Hamm to concentrate on keeping the Raiders fighting together, and say that they will engage the Wind Duke and his Lawgiver. They leap into the Air, this time with greater success than when attacking the Lighthouse. Ducal marines stand in their way, however, and while the Lawgiver releases small bursts of lightning from its fingertips, Taran, Rex and Kyreel begin laying into their foes.
They manage to fight their way toward the Lawgiver, his phalanx of bodyguards proving no match for the party’s fighting prowess. The Wind Duke Navigator, roused to action, sails effortlessly across the void, and lands on the Marrow Down, looking to engage Ragna with his greatsword. Thelbar grabs his brother and leaps to her defense.
Ragna’s Raiders fight viciously enough to make her proud, and the Wind Duke’s troops fall back before their assault. To finalize matters, a few of the surviving ogres manage to reach the D.F. Piercer and begin smashing blue-skinned men with pieces of the Marrow Down’s shattered hull.
As the fight progresses, the D.F. Piercer tears deeper and deeper into the Marrow Down, shattering the frail wooden ship and sundering it in two. The Lawgiver shows no desire to engage in hand-to-hand combat with a fierce human, a crafty elf, and blood-covered drow, and before the heroes can kill it, the Lawgiver speaks a phrase in Auran and disappears.
Meanwhile, Ragna is desperately ordering some of her Raiders to transfer stores from the forward half of her former ship to the aft, and Thelbar and Taran are left to confront the Navigator. The winged man fights coolly and mercilessly, and proves himself more than up for the task. Thankfully, a handful of Ragna’s Raiders aid the cause, and distract him long enough for Thelbar’s spells to stun him, allowing Taran to strike him down. Thelbar binds the Wind Duke’s wounds, and the two heroes leap for the aft side of the ship just as the Marrow Down splits into two pieces.
Without its Navigator, or Lawgiver, the D.F. Piercer has lost its will to fight, and the giant vessel does the impossible, reversing its course, and tearing free of the fore-part of the pirate ship. Indy, Rex and Kyreel leap into the void, and manage to land near Taran on the aft half of the Marrow Down. The heroes tend to one another’s wounds and watch the D.F. Piercer pull away from them, and sail off into the void. Ragna takes stock of the situation, and counts heads--twenty gith, four ogres, her sons and herself are all that remains of the once proud Marrow Down -- alive at least, but shipwrecked and floating aimlessly in an infinite void of Elemental Air.
8-- Left adrift, Fine Manners are proved to be a function of a full belly.
The ogres and gith begin the shipwrecked voyage in relatively high spirits - - they have just beaten a superior force of Wind Duke Royalists, and lived to tell the tale. They are, after all, still free.
The D.F. Piercer’s former Navigator says little, but when questioned reveals the following: The plane of Air is mostly an empty void-- clusters of "islands" comprised of elemental matter, Prime pockets or sentient-made objects float in the void, separated by mere hundreds of miles. Away from a cluster center, floating objects become more and more rare.
The clusters themselves are many thousands of miles apart, each cluster administered by a different Wind Duke, each with differing levels of power, and thus, authority.
The splintered remnant of the Marrow Down is falling away from the populated center of this particular 'island cluster’. If they don't strike land soon, it will all be over for Ragna's Raiders -- starvation for sure.
The party sets up a small section of the ship’s deck as their own demesne. They surreptitiously examine their rations, and divide them equally amongst themselves, setting aside enough food to keep their Wind Duke captive alive. He is gravely wounded, but under Kyreel’s ministrations he can be expected to live. Indy, for his part, is ecstatic, adopting the gith pirate’s manner of dress and speech, and declaring himself a ‘Jaunty Pirate’, whatever that is supposed to mean. He jokingly threatens to make Taran ‘walk the plank’, and is rebuffed with a threat involving the haft of Kyreel’s spear, Indy’s posterior, and a decidedly unnatural and swift scabbarding.
The gith grow more standoffish as the days progress. Certainly they resent Thelbar and Kyreel’s stubborn insistence that the Wind Duke be kept alive, despite the rapidly dwindling food stores. The Raider’s attitude begins to degenerate as their hunger grows. Ragna and Kyreel can both create water but neither of them can produce food from thin air. The ogres especially are unused to the hardship, as they had been over-fed in order to keep them as heavy as possible.
Mishkal and Hamm keep to themselves, growing ever more surly (as if that were possible), and glaring at the heroes. It seems their recent victories side-by-side have not erased the memory of the humiliation they suffered at the hands of the party in their first meeting.
Indy, completely undaunted by the latest chapter in his 'great romantic adventure', practices swashbuckling, spouting pithy phrases while thrusting at the air with his rapier. If the ogres glare at him more balefully than usual, he takes no notice.
As the days blur past, one just like the former while adrift in Elemental Air, Taran has a pair of powerful dreams:
In the first, he is a great general, and has led his forces against a previously unbeaten foe. The dream takes place the night before a decisive battle. A battle he knows his men cannot win, but one he has committed them to out of pride and anger. It is a painfully poignant dream--he is addressing his officer corps, and gives them his pessimistic appraisal of their chances. He offers each one of them an opportunity to withdraw and return home, with no loss of honor. To their credit, they reply to a man that they will not leave his side.
The next phase of the dream takes place after this battle. Taran has been captured his troops defeated, and he is led in chains through a crowd of jeering foreign commoners, on his way to be beheaded. He is cursed by the enemy priests, and informed that the manner of his execution will prevent his soul from traveling into the afterlife, dooming him to a restless undeath.
He awakens with hatred in his heart, and the name of Ishlok on his lips. His foes were Ishlokians, that is for sure--his enemies named themselves after the Goddess he so passionately reveres. Even the wise council of Kyreel cannot answer that riddle, but they both agree that he is remembering his lives before this one, in the manner of the Pasoun.
His second dream is reoccurring and much more pleasant. In that one he recalls the friendship of a silver dragon, a being who--he is sure-- was a boon companion in this misty half-remembered life. As his dreams intensify, he seems to undergo a subtle physical alteration. He finds that through concentration he can enhance his speed and stamina, or cause a faint shimmering of silver dragon scales to rise on his skin, toughening his hide. The dragon's name is Galathonriel, and their souls, it seems, are intertwined.
Rex takes to watching the gith, sitting awake while the others sleep, and sleeping with a loaded crossbow. He petitions Taran for some more training, and they begin lessons, under the baleful gaze of Mishkal and Hamm.
Thelbar and Indy study the tome found in the possession of the wizard who had opened the original portal to the plane of Air. The book contains a few unique spells dealing with planar travel and dimensional magic, as well as an effective description of the rudimentary principles of Ritual Magic - - a casting methodology unknown to most Greyhawk mages. The time they spend shipwrecked is not wasted from Thelbar's point of view, and he takes to deciphering this book, studying during his entire waking hours.
Over the course of a week, the attitude of Ragna's Raiders degenerates, and one evening (morning? afternoon?) the party hears a loud argument taking place in Auran between Ragna, two gith and the ogres. Indy casts comprehend languages and is able to determine the following:
The gith have noticed that the party doesn't look as hungry as everyone else. The ogres point out that well-fed adventurers make for well-fed ogres. Ragna forbids them from harming her 'guests', berates the gith for forgetting their Code-of-the-Air, and states emphatically that after the Battle of the Lighthouse Spin and the fight with the D.F. Peircer, the party are now Raiders, just like the gith.
The gith and ogres reply that "Ragna's Raiders" is a meaningless designation if Ragna isn't the captain anymore. Ragna calls them mutinous scum, but the ogres take this as some sort of compliment. The gith spokesman points out that the Marrow Down is destroyed, and as the Auran saying goes; "there are no Captains on driftwood".
Hamm says that he is in favor of eating the party, but Mishkal (who has made friends with Thelbar) wants the mage to be spared. Ragna forbids her sons from aiding this mutiny, and Mishkal at least obeys. Hamm, on the other hand, has been spoiling for a rematch and intends to have it.
The ogres, ever the peacemakers, propose to eat the elf first, and then see about the others.
Indy says "I knew it! They always eat the elf first . . ." and slips into the shadow of a wood overhang.
The ogres step up to a landing (8' below the main deck level) where the party has been spending their time. The toughest of the bunch accuses Thelbar of hoarding food. Thelbar replies that he has not been hoarding food, he has been eating it, and if the ogre had not the foresight to keep his own rations, it will cause Thelbar no sleepless nights.
Perplexed at the aggressive response from such a little man, the ogre intimates that he might just take the food anyway. Thelbar slips his fingertips into the small pouches at his waist, and cooly informs the overweight ogre that he will die if he tries it. The ogre calls Thelbar's bluff with a guttural, mocking laugh.
But it's not a bluff. Thelbar raises his hands and places a fireball behind the four menacing ogres, wounding them, and instantly killing every gith left on the ship. In one fell swoop, only four ogres and Hamm remain to press their mutiny.
Of course, four ogres and Hamm may well be enough. The battle is pitched, with Thelbar and Kyreel exposed in the front ranks, both forced to flee the fight. Taran calls on his "scales of the dragon" to protect him from harm, but without Rex at his side, he could not have finished the fight.
In the end, the party is badly wounded, the ogres are slain, the gith are burned to a man, and Mishkal convinces Hamm to stop fighting, lest he too be slain.
Mishkal whispers into his brother's ear, "There is plenty to eat now, brother. Leave this fight be".
Ragna, tears streaking her orcish face, begs the party for mercy, and asks them in the name of the Goddess they serve to help her save any of her Raiders who still live. After a moment's hesitation, Kyreel steps
