Sailors on the Starless Sea

fireinthedust

Explorer

• Mar 7, 2014

• #31

Borok takes his hammer and sets to the grim task of smashing every one of the seeds into mush.

Alaric's grimace is hard as he tears his gaze from the body of the slain child. He turns to the bodies themselves, expecting to see the faces of the lost villagers.


Dudles whimpers as the vimes slay their comrades.

Zim lowers his sling, frowning. "Well, there's always next time, Dudles. Ooh, hey, let's see who we just killed! And buck up, it's not like that orphan was your kid!" The impish halfling giggles and then skips up the hill, followed by the much-frightened Dudles.

OOC: brutal!

 

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doghead

thotd

• Mar 7, 2014

• #32

Xim

fireinthedust said:

"Well, there's always next time, Dudles. Ooh, hey, let's see who we just killed! And buck up, it's not like that orphan was your kid!" The impish halfling giggles and then then skips ...

Click to expand...

... straight into a stinging round-house slap from the furious Xim. Zim has seen that face before, like the time when he used the red dye (the most expensive and difficult to make) on the rough heavy cotton used for farmers tunics. Boy were the farmers who bought tunics that year strutting around like a bunch of peacocks.

OOC: I couldn't resist

 

GlassEye

Adventurer

• Mar 7, 2014

• #33

Kurl is already rolling over the bodies to get a good look at their faces when Alaric turns his attention to them. The two are Keary and Alban, sons of Krivstad's smith and vanished from the village eleven days ago.

Siva and Borok spend several minutes chasing down seeds and smashing them. The seeds don't move fast but the cilia draw them with uncanny precision towards the fresh corpses. Eventually the two are sure that they've smashed them all.

 

fireinthedust

Explorer

• Mar 7, 2014

• #34

Zim looks into Xim's eyes as the smack connects... and he grins that grin when he realizes he's hit a nerve. "Sorry, Xim, you know how I never... mean... to be insensitive."

Alaric takes a look around the area, seeing if he can spot an entrance on this side.

 

doghead

thotd

• Mar 7, 2014

• #35

Narančasta

After laying down the body of Bejila and gathering up the items he carried, Narančasta pulls out a small vial of holy water and dabs a little on the forehead of the boy, saying a prayer as he does so. He then does the same for each of the other dead.

Done, he rises slowly to his feet.

"When we have finished, we will return and take you all back home."

He looks older than he was this morning somehow.

"So Alaric, what do we have?"

 

GlassEye

Adventurer

• Mar 7, 2014

• #36

In arranging the bodies it is discovered that Keary still has a short sword and dagger strapped to his side. They were gifts, you remember, forged by his father for the boy's sixteenth birthday. Alban's corpse has a scrap of cloth wrapped around 5 pieces of copper and tucked inside his shirt.

Alaric, and any others who look, see that the path leads up to the southwest corner of the keep and a dark, moss-eaten gatehouse that towers above you, grim and forbidding. Murder holes, fashioned in the likeness of looming toads, threaten to gout forth flaming oil and tar. Black arrow slits pierce the high stone walls. You can hear the flap of the heretical banner above, hidden from sight by the vine-draped battlements.

The ancient drawbridge has long since fallen away into ruin, leaving only a few rotting planks placed across the ditch. The heavy iron portcullis stands half-raised, the rusty spikes a mere four feet above slots cut into the stone floor.

 

D

Dogmatron

First Post

• Mar 7, 2014

• #37

Brom and Geoffrey carefully carry Roger's body and place it next to Bejila. "Sorry friend, but we'll need these more than you will right now." Brom says as he strips the weapons and items from Roger's body.

"This is a bad omen." blurted out Geoffrey. "We're not even to the keep yet and two of us are dead!"

"Quiet you!" replied Fendrel, " We all volunteered to do this and knew the risks. If you don't want to be here then run home with your tail between your legs. Otherwise let's get moving."

Guess we should move up and check out those planks...do they look sound enough to walk across?

 

GlassEye

Adventurer

• Mar 7, 2014

• #38

The planks, though old, look sound enough to hold the weight of a man and, in fact, probably have done so recently.

 

D

Dogmatron

First Post

• Mar 8, 2014

• #39

Brom, Geoffrey, and Fendrek scurry across the planks and quickly move to the wall next to the entrance. The press themselves as flat as they can against the wall and wait. If nothing happens after a couple of minutes Brom will peek around the corner and try to see what is through the entrance.

 

GlassEye

Adventurer

• Mar 8, 2014

• #40

Brom, Geoffrey, and Fendrel wait and are rewarded for their caution. They hear sniffing sounds and the scratch of claws on stone coming from above. When Brom peeks around the corner he sees that beyond the half-raised portcullis the passage opens into a large courtyard. From his vantage point he can see down the length of the battered west wall of the keep. As seen before, the northwest corner of the keep has collapsed but between the gatehouse and the collapsed wall, some 75 feet or so into the courtyard is a well and wooden structure built over it. The rest of the courtyard remains out of view.