Compiling your posts to play catch-up (with a few add-ons of my own)
******************************************Center of square******************************************
Though injured the tawny collie maintains a stoic demeanor so as to avoid drawing unwanted attention to his plight. Turning his head to quickly inspect the wound in his flank, the dog takes advantage of the obscuring dust and causes the riven flesh to ripple and seemingly mend itself with but a moment's thought. Trusting that no one in the panic ridden square noticed any of this, the vigilant collie carefully surveys the area for more lurking threats.
Abruptly, the collie curses his luck. Standing at the edge of the square is a dark-haired woman in leather armor, staring slack-jawed at him. Abruptly her features set, and she begins to advance. The longsword in her hand, while not immediately threatening the collie, remains free of its scabbard.
Elyra glances around the square. The crying child and the injured villagers call out for her attention, but the dog-thing appears the more immediate threat. Her skin crawls as she sees the dog's flesh seem to creep over the wound, and she walks slowly forward.
The swordswoman pauses perhaps ten feet from the ersatz collie, eyes narrowed in a cool stare and jaw set like steel. "Here now," she says to no one as she calmly looks the creature over. "What are you, then?"
The tawny collie catches sight of the dark haired woman advancing menacingly towards him. Instinctively the dog's long tail sinks down between his hind legs. Uncertain what the woman might have seen, the collie is at least thankful that he didn't recognize her as a local. The dog offers the woman a simple bark in answer before pulling the corners of his mouth into a innocent canine grin. Letting his long tongue dangle freely from his lips, the collie begins to pant.
Elyra's expression does not change. "You know I'm on to you, don't you?" She asked suspiciously. "You're playing me. How smart are you?" Driven by the memory of the collie's barely glimpsed scales and crawling flesh, part of her wanted to get away from the creature, but the thing could be dangerous. Goblins she understood, but clearly this was sorcery.
Cocking his head to the side and watching the unfamiliar woman curiously for a moment, Taran hesitated. The dark-haired woman's interrogation was proving to be rather distracting and unproductive. The collie had already allowed one goblin incursion into his city during the holiday; he wouldn't tolerate another. Turning his attention away from both the woman and the dead goblin lying at his feet, the vigilant guard dog raises both ears and resumes surveying the square. Perception +4, taking 20. Taran notes the townsfolk fleeing the festival square en masse--though some folk still linger in either confusion or due to injury, most are running or stumbling away. No town officials are present at the moment, but somewhere in the distance a bell tolls warning peals and the din of shouts resonates throughout the town. A careful scan of the square reveals just the three (presumably dead) goblins--Taran detects no more threats in the festival square.
Elyra watches the animal go, resisting the temptation to shout at it. How smart is it? It brings off its dog act well, but what does that mean? She remembers a cuckoo's egg her Uncle Bara had shown her when she was a child. Is the dog something like that? Looking down at the dead goblin a few paces away, Elyra muses, Whatever it is, it fought for the town. It could wait. Disregarding the tawny collie for the moment, Elyra makes her way over to help Tac tend the townspeople.
****************************************By the wagon*********************************************
Tac starts at the utter pulp of the goblin, rendered by the half-orc he'd been pestering before the fracas began. "Reminder: do not make half-orc angry," Tac says under his breath. Swearing at his own inadequacies at missing the goblin on the table, Tac forgets his thoughts and stares, wide-eyed, as Talashia begins to crackle with elemental power.
"Also: stay on Talashia's good side," Tac whimpers, adding to his mental Staying Alive To Do List.
Noticing the smoldering of wood, Tac looks about, hoping for water but being content with any non-flammable liquid to douse the goblin carcass if that's what it takes to keep the table from actually catching fire. Two mugs of ale, both miraculously unspilt after the commotion, rest at Tac's elbow. Using the ale to douse the smoldering table, Tac wets the wood, seeing to his satisfaction that the ale quenches the beginnings of a fire in the bench table. Surveying the rapidly emptying festival square, Tac calls plaintively, "Are there any clerics still about? We have, um, there are people who seem to be broken here." Moving to the closest wounded person, a young man--a temple artisan by the look of his cloth--Tac queries the injured worker. "Can you stand? What hurts?" The youth rubs his head and, with Tac's help, rises from the packed dirt square. "Oi, me head. Best be getting home, then, eh? Me thanks, kind sir." Despite a bleeding cut in his forehead, the artisan grins at Tac then pushes off with a nod and a bob, making his way west.
Sivan, seeing the young girl momentarily tended by the white-haired lady, looks for other wounded to help. Listening for distress calls, Sivan finds that there appears to be no pressing matter in the festival square other than aiding the injured and dazed. After helping a number of folk back to their feet, some of whom are too disoriented to offer their thanks before heading on their way, Sivan notes a pair of booted feet sticking out from under a buffet table. A quick check of the feet's owner reveal a woman with a dirk in her hand lying unconscious under the table, her knife hand twisted at a grostesque angle. Heal +0, checking for injury. Sivan is not completely certain, but it appears as if the woman may have suffered a broken arm...though why she's also unconscious is unclear.
Grokk took several deep breaths as the surge of energy withered away. Glaring at the dead goblin at his feet and snorting at it derisively, the half-orc turned around, surveying the scene. Wounded, he thought, ignoring his own blood. Gently moving amongst the townfolk, Grokk offered up prayers to his god and channeled divine energy to heal the wounded people. He also murmured soothing words to keep them calm. What happened? Was this a one-time raid? A prelude to something more? I need answers. The cleric walked back to the goblin he killed and began examining the corpse for clues as to where the thing came from and its purpose. Perception +3. Grokk finds a small but wicked blade lying in the dirt by the pulped goblin under the wagon. A savage-looking weapon, created from castoff bits of sharpened metal, the blade's length has been drilled with holes to lighten the heft. The weapon is crude and ill-formed and has the look of trash, as if it might break on a misplaced thrust. The goblin had obviously been wearing old nattered studded leather armor, for bits of nail-ridden leather peek through the creature's bloody remains. The goblin itself has no other distinguishing features and no possessions, but Grokk does find a lady's trinket half-buried in a bit of beer-sodden mud a couple of feet from the wagon--a golden clasp with a beryl inset in the center. The trinket has the look of something suitable to fasten a woman's cloak about her neck. With the crowd of festival goers fleeing the square, the owner of the trinket isn't immediately obvious.
While surveying the area for more goblins, the tawny collie catches sight of the stray dog's bloodied carcass under the nearby wagon where it fell. Glancing around, Kell sees that the humans are all seeing to their own and yet are ignoring the true victim of the day's tragedy. Padding gingerly over to the wagon the collie tenderly noses the snout of his slain would be kin and emits a mournful canine whimper. He wasn't certain, but Kell thought he recognized the stray as one that usually kept Naffer Vosk, the Boneyard's poor hunchbacked groundskeeper, company. Close inspection of the dead dog's scent and matted fur confirm Kell's suspicion that the dead dog is, indeed, the cur favored by Vosk.
****************************************Southwest corner of square************************************
For a moment Talashia rides high on the power, a leaf on a torrent. As always there was an urge in the back of her mind; a witless shriek to keep going, to strike indiscriminately, to become the force of nature that fueled her. As she had learned, Talashia let the urges go around her without touching her, and they were quickly gone. Leaning over to rest her hands against the earth, Talashia allowed the blue-white dance of lightning around her to cease with an abrupt CRACK as the energies of Air were absorbed by Earth.
From there, Talashia noted someone (a lank youth) already putting out the goblinfire, so she crossed the festival square to see to the child. Kneeling beside the little girl and carefully avoiding touching the child so as not to startle the girl, Talashia softly asks, "Are you all right? The goblins are gone now. You don't have to be afraid anymore. None of us will hurt you."
The girl, her dusty face streaked clean in places with tears, looks at Talashia with frightened eyes. "Where is mother?" the child asks Talashia in a small voice full of expectation that Talashia will know.
Status: The festival square is rapidly emptying. There are still people in the square, but the crowd is by now greatly thinned and continues to follow this trend. Most of the injured townsfolk have been assisted. No townsfolk appear to be dead. Tac put out the fire on the table. There is one unconscious woman lying under the wagon--Sivan is looking at her. Grokk is also by the wagon and has just spotted a gold trinket. Talashia is assisting the frightened girl. Elyra "conversed" with Kell then left to check on Tac. Taran/Kell checked for more goblins then went to sniff at the dead dog.
[sblock=Die Rolls]Name, Type, Raw Roll/Modified Total
Taran, Perception 5/29 (taking 20)
Sivan, Heal 14/14
Grokk, Perception 11/14
[/sblock]
