Baroom El Khadim storyhour

[Radiating Gnome]

Baroom El Khadim storyhour (minor bawdy material warning)

This is a story hour written by my character Spence Relmar of Clan Rose, in a homegrown campaign world called Baroom El Khadim. As I'm a player and the campaign world is homegrown, I'll be learning about it as we go, so I can't offer much by way of introduction. The DM is named Darren, and at this point I'm not aware of him being on these boards, but I may get him interested by continuing to post Spence's faulty, self-aggrandizing accounts of his adventures. Darren has created the world himself, but to save time is using the greyhawk pantheon for religion. Spence started out as a Rogue 0/Illusionist 0 (using the optional multiclassing rules in the DMG). Everyone in Baroom El Khadim belongs to a clan, and Spence's is clan Rose.

The rest, we'll learn as we go.

[WARNING]Oh, one more thing. I should warn all readers that Spence writes limericks -- bawdy ones, as they should be written, and includes them in his journal. If you're easily offended, read some other story hour. They aren't too bad, nothing (so far) that's tripped the profanity filter. But you've been warned.

-jpj

 

[Radiating Gnome]

Ode to the Barrier Mountains, Chapter 1. Introduction

Ode to the Barrier Mountains
The story of my adventures, by Spence Relmar of Clan Rose.
Told in prose and occasional verse (primarily Limericks)

Gentle readers, I have decided to write down the story of my adventures in and around the Barrier Mountains. I’m sure this account will prove interesting to other adventures in years to come. It’s also a collection of the verse I wrote about my adventures, the people I traveled with and the people we met along the way.

My name is Spence Relmar. I am a halfling of Clan Rose. Now, you may be saying to yourself – Relmar, why that’s a dwarven name! And that would be quite astute of you. You see, I am an orphan. My family was killed in a goblin raid on their caravan. I was rescued by a dwarven warband, and the innkeeper in the small dwarven community raised me as his own son. So I took his name.

My story begins at the Adventurer’s guild school in Fairholme. My brother Hawk and I came to the school some months ago to train to become adventurers. Hawk was also raised by my adopted father, Dans Relmar, the dwarven Innkeeper. Hawk is a gnome. We’ve been good friends and brothers ever since we were adopted, and plan to seek our fortunes together as well.

The adventurer’s guild was an interesting place. Many hopefuls came and tried out in the training program that prepares us for high adventure, but only a few make it through the entire program.

Now, I am not a bard, like my friend Junior Wales, who I’ll tell you about in a minute. But I learned a little in the Inn, from traveling minstrels and some of the other folk. I especially liked storytellers, and have taken up pen to work on my own story, hence this book. But even before that, I discovered another art form that excited me. On the walls of the privy outside the Tavern there were carved the most wonderful poems – short, pithy works, written by the miners that came to the tavern to drink. I studied the form for the years I lived there, watching the new ones appear as time went by, and after a while trying to write some of my own. Later, I learned that the form had a name. The limerick. Ever since I have been a writer of limericks, and I’ll share some of them as we go through this story.

I wrote this one about the very last washout in the program in the Adventurer’s guild.

There was a burly warrior called Gunter
Who thought he’d try is hand at adventure
But when the time came indeed
In his knickers he peed
Now he earns his bread shoveling manure.

When Gunter quit, just before we were given our order to go to the fortified town of Oakburrow and perform one final test before being accepted into the guild, he left a group of 6 hardy adventurers.

There was my brother Hawk (Hawk Relmar of Clan Upland), of course. Hawk learned woodcraft from some of the hunters who supplied Father’s Tavern with meat. He’s a gnome, as I said, which means he has a big nose, and it’s always into something it shouldn’t be.

Hawk got his name for his bill
Not just that’s is big as a hill
But it has such big hairs
That everyone stares
As if he were born with a gill.

That one isn’t very good, but I can’t be too mean, he’s my brother, after all.

Anyway, the rest of the troupe worked like this:

There was a Cleric named Trandle Hapenstance of Clan Porvoo. His last name is pronounced “Happenstance” despite how it’s spelled. I’m reminded of the old alphabet joke that ends “But where’s the ‘p’?” “DOWN MY PANTS!” Heh heh heh.

Trandle serves Fharlanghn. When we first met he said he served Fharlanghn so much I thought it was a pastry he baked and was very proud of, but it turns out that Fharlanghn is his diety. Despite his terrible spelling, Fharlanghn has apparently asked Trandle to keep a journal of his travels, which he does faithfully – not that I’ve ever seen it, he guards it very carefully. Probably embarrassed about the spelling. Anyway, I wrote this one for him.

There was cleric from the clan Porvoo
Who ate nothing but hot steamy poo
In the pulpit he stood
Like a big block of wood
And to the faithful he started to spew.

Trandle didn’t like that one very much. He doesn’t seem to like most of my poems, which makes me think he must be doing other things in the privy than reading the writing on the walls.

Then there was Jaeger of clan Wicklow, who liked to go by the name Pandy. I could tell right away Pandy and I were going to be great friends. He wasn’t too bright, was very strong, and had a way about him that puts people at ease. Pandy likes barmaids – all kinds of barmaids, so I wrote this for him:

There was a great hero named Pandy
If nothing else, he was always quite randy
If he spotted a girl
He’d beckon, finger curled
And beg them lick his rock candy

Anyway, Pandy liked girls, but they didn’t always like him. Pandy became sort of a project for me.

And then there was the bard, Junior Wales, also of Clan Wicklow. Junior played Lute and wrote songs and chatted up girls. He’s still pretty new at the Bard thing, but he’s coming along.

There is a skinny poet named Wales
Who sings of the hills and the dales
He sits on his lute
Pulls out his hair by the root
He sings for his supper, and fails.


Last, but not least, there was [Mason’s Character. We’ll add this later]

Oh, and me. Spence Relmar of Clan Rose. I’m an illusionist and sometimes scout. And, a halfling.

A halfling can make a great hero
With cunning sharp as an arrow
Some say we’re too small
To answer the call
But we’re better than those nuts from Wicklow

Anyway, that’s the six of us. I hope we don’t die out in the mountains.

In my next chapter, I’ll tell you about the humble beginning of our adventures.

 

[Radiating Gnome]

Chapter 2. We set out. Pandy gets some.

We were gathered in the training room, waiting for Cinda to come in and tell us what our final exam mission would be. All we had to do was successfully complete one last task – albeit a tough one – and we would be welcomed into the adventurer’s guild as full-fledged members.

Gunter was edgy. He kept talking extra loud about how he wanted to go kill beasties up in the mountains, but I saw through his bravado right away. I didn’t say anything, because I thought he might straighten out when we knew more about what we were going to have to do.

Anyway Cinda came in and gave us some stern warnings about death and dismemberment, and then gave us an hour to make a final decision about attempting our final task. Most of us didn’t need an hour – we were ready to go, the sooner the better, but she left us to think it over anyway. While the rest of us lounged around on the practice equipment, and Trandle kept talking about how Fharlanghn gave him pearly white teeth and strong bones, (or something like that), Gunter skulked out and ran for the hills. We figure we won’t be seeing him again.

Anyway, Cinda came back in and told us that we had to travel to the fortified town of Oakburrow – some 60 miles away – go to the Trembling Maid tavern up there and find a guy named Benthick Plank. He would tell us what we had to do. We had two weeks to do what he asked and get back to report. We figured time was of the essence, and as we were going to be going on foot, we had better hit the road right away.

Our walk to Oakburrow took four days. It wasn’t a bad trip – lots of cows and farms and little taverns along the way. Every once in a while Junior would remember a song he learned once and start singing. He’s not bad, but his lute is never in tune. And Hawk and I are used to traveling already – we’ve done a lot of walking in our day. Jeager is pretty quiet for a big guy – he just walked along, sort of smiling as if he were thinking of something far away. He’d drop a little behind every time we passed women tending gardens or milking cows. He would come to a complete stop if they were bending over. I figured we needed to clear Pandy’s mind for him, help him concentrate on the mission a little better. So, I assigned myself a secondary mission. Get Pandy laid.

Hawk would probably point out that I was just kissing up to the biggest fighter in the party to protect my “scrawny spell-chuckin’ ass.” But really, that had nothing to do with it. I was thinking about the mission, and trying to help a friend in need. Really.

Anyway, between Randy Pandy, Junior’s singing, and of course, Trandle’s preaching about the wonders of the open road – after all, did you know that Fharlanghn is the god of travel and traveling and he grants his faithful good journeys and special magic and so on and so forth – Hawk and I were itching for a goblin raid or a pack of wild wolves long before we finally made it to Oakburrow.

In Oakburrow we made our way to the Trembling Maid without wasting any time. And we looked up Benthick. He was a bartender there, and not the friendliest guy in the room, either. He gave us a hard time for not remembering to introduce ourselves to him first off, but really he wasn’t so bad. And he told us what we had to do for him. The next day, we would be led up into the barrier mountains – the mountains that separate the civilized world from the huge evil wastes beyond – where we were to find an old monastery and sort out what happened to it – map the grounds, figure out what’s there, kill anything we can handle and bring details back about anything we couldn’t. Seemed simple enough, and there was even going to be a guide to take us up into the mountains in the morning. So it seemed like things on that front were well in hand, so I set about sorting out the second mission.

You see, Randy Pandy was up to his usual tricks, but instead of farm girls a few hundred feet away, it was barmaids passing within inches of him, and he was beside himself. He couldn’t focus on our mission. There was one – a plump, dowdy thing if I ever saw one but she was paying attention to Pandy, and that’s all it takes – named Belle, who seemed to be the best bet. So I set the wheels in motion.

It wasn’t easy to get his attention. He was staring at her everywhere she went in the bar – he’d sort of snort if some other bar patron gave her a wink, and sort of melt every time she looked his way. I elbowed him hard. “She’s a cutie, huh?”

“I’m not looking for a relationship,” he said.

“Yeah, okay, but she’s a cutie, right?”

“Yes.”

I figure he needed to start out with a little something to set the mood, so I wrote him a little poem to give to her. Love poetry is my specialty. One of my specialties. It went like this:

There was a young maiden named Belle
Who had the most wonderful smell
She had breasts like great melons
Liked to party with felons
And knew how to treat men quite well.

So, anyway, he gave it to Belle the next time she came over, and she turned bright red, smiled, and then turned even redder. I’m a master.

Of course, the next thing I heard out of Pandy’s mouth was “I’m not looking for a relationship.” Smooth move. No wonder he’s so horny all the time. He’s going to need a lot of work, I can see that. But teaching him the right and wrong thing to say was going to have to wait for another day. I needed to make some grander moves, and for that I needed to talk to the innkeeper.

I talked to him, arranging to get the stage for a little while at about 8 p.m. He insisted that he wouldn’t pay me for the performance – I wasn’t worried about being paid, so I let that go. I had bigger fish to fry. Anyway, we ate dinner and Belle and Pandy kept making eyes at each other, but I knew the performance had to be a good one to seal the deal. So I was planning in my head the whole time.

What I hadn’t figured on was the Innkeeper sending out word that there was going to be some big performance in his tavern. People started showing up a little after 7, and by the time the watch rang 8 bells the place was standing room only. I was a little spooked, but I kept my primary mission in mind and hoped for the best.

The plan was to tell a story – a special story I’d been making up for the past two hours – and then to illustrate the story with an illusion show. The story went like this.

Once there was a dwarven warrior Hans and his love, the dwarven lass Graece. Graece loved Hans dearly, and Hans’ feelings for Graece were the strongest sort of love a person can feel. Hans would give anything for her, and promised her the sun and the moon, and all the treasures under the mountain. They were to be married in a few months time, and were eagerly waiting for the day when the marriage would take place, when goblins started to raid, and Hans had to go off to war. The night before he left for war he came to Graece and asked to make love to her. She was tempted – sorely tempted – but in the end she resisted, figuring there would be more than enough time for that sort of thing in their long lives together. She sent him off to war with a kiss on the cheek and an embroidered scarf.

A week passed and the dwarven warband returned, but Hans was not with them. The leader of the warband, the Dwarven Baron, came to Graece and returned to her the scarf, stained with the blood of her love, and told her the story of how brave Hans, in a moment when the warband was trapped in a ravine and sure to be massacred by the goblin horde, stepped up and held off the goblin horde single handed, killing hundreds of the green-skinned beasts, before he was finally overpowered. His sacrifice had saved the lives of everyone in the warband, but it had cost Graece her fiancé and the love of her life. She lived a long life, never wedding, never knowing the passion of love again, and died an old, lonely woman.

When I did the illusion show I did my best to make sure that Hans looked a little like Jaeger, and Graece looked a little like Belle. The crowd went wild – barmaids cried, even a few of the soldiers shed a tear when Hans was finally dragged down by the grasping hands of hundreds of goblins. The bloody scarf was the last image I left them with, sitting in Graece’s hands as her hands aged from those of a young dwarf to that of an old crone.

The crowd went wild. They threw money, which was pretty cool. Junior decided to get on stage after me, and not only was he out of tune, but this time he broke a couple of strings. I’m not so sure he’s a real bard, after all. But that didn’t matter. In the end, what mattered most was the Belle got the other barmaids to cover for her, and she took Pandy down to her bedroom. We didn’t see him again until the morning.

 

[Radiating Gnome]

Chapter 3: We go hiking

Now, gentle reader, I’m sure you know that I’m not a complainer. I mean, I’m a pretty hardy little halfling, and I’m perfectly happy to do what it takes to keep up with the crowd. But every once in a while there’s a problem and this time around it was our ‘guide’ Elmer. Trying to follow him was like trying to keep up with my bowels after Hawk makes his special red pepper stew. And just about as painful.

Anyway, we got up at the crack of dawn the next day, packed our bags and got ready to hit the road. Pandy edged his way out of the tavern a little after the rest of us, his hair sticking up at odd angles, his shoulders showing bright red scratches, and his eyes glowing with this blissful, vacant light. While we waited out front for Elmer to turn up he seemed to recover himself a little. Then, like the first drop of rain that announces a rainstorm coming, he idly scratched his crotch.

Elmer turned up and scowled at us. He looked us over and told us to go home. When we didn’t, he shrugged and turned and walked out of town, heading right up into the mountains.

We had to ask him to slow down a little. He has a pretty long stride, and between Hawk’s and my short legs, Trandle’s heavy armor and Pandy stopping to scratch every couple of minutes, we just didn’t have a chance of keeping up. Elmer was NOT happy about leading us, and even less happy about slowing down for us. Obviously it was going to be a good trip.

I tried to work on a limerick for him, but it was hard during the day. That night, while I was on watch, I worked on some, and came up with this.

There was a crusty hardass named Elmer
Who spat nails and fought like a badger
He never knew love
Except with his glove
And knotholes small enough for his pecker.

I decided not to show that one to him, or read it to the rest of the gang while he was still around. I didn’t figure he’d like it very much, not being much of an art lover and all.

While I was on watch that night Pandy got up to go relieve himself a little ways away from camp. I was sitting there keeping one eye on the underbrush for trouble and another eye on my poetry, when I heard a muffled wimper from the bush where Pandy had gone. Hawk and I grabbed our bows and covered the bush, but a few seconds later Pandy came out, wiping tears out of his eyes. “It hurts when I pee,” he said.

Hawk started to laugh, so I punched him to shut him up. “Really? That bad? I’m sorry, buddy. We can get that cured – I’ll bet a travel deity like Fharlanghn has lots of spells to help cure the local versions of the clap.” I wanted to wake up Trandle and get it over with – actually, I was surprised that Hawk laughing himself sick over near the fire wasn’t waking the cleric up already, but there he was sleeping in his armor as if it were a feather bed. Anyway, Pandy didn’t want to wake up the cleric, so he went back to bed, and I had something new to write about.

Goodman Jaeger met a buxom young maiden
Who made love like an immoral heathen
She bedded him hard
The grabbed his right nard
And begged him to give her many children

Jaeger learned about the birds and the bees
From a barmaid with well-calloused knees
She took him downstairs
Tugged at his short hairs
And left him with a bad case of Herpes

I think I’m getting better, don’t you?

Anyway, the trip got more dull after the first day. We were sore and tired most of the time. Pandy finally asked Trandle for a little help, and I think he got it. Elmer led us to the foot of a huge ravine – some sort of glacial wash, probably. He pointed up the ravine and then turned and left us there to make our own way up to where the old monastery was supposed to be. Thanks for nothing, big Elmer.

It was really slow going on the way up the ravine. We were climbing over sharp rocks every step of the way. At one point we had to build a raft for our heavy gear and swim it across a lake. That was a drag, let me tell you. Mountain streams are NOT WARM.

It took another day and a half, but eventually reached the foot of a cliff. About 200 feet up we could see the monastery. No sweat, right? Well, it was decided that I should climb up first, anchor ropes and let the others follow me. It was a crazy idea. But, I’m no chicken, so I did the climbing. I slipped a couple of times, got beat up a little on the rocks, but made it up about half way, with the rest of the gang coming up behind me, when we found an entrance – a doorway in to the cliff. We decided to go inside and look for a place to hunker down for the night.

This little 5x5 doorway opened up after a while into a big hall, and that into a bigger chamber filled with little stone huts. And it was dark. I’m going to have to figure something out about light in dark places, because the dark was really getting in my way. Hawk, of course, has much better vision in the dark than the rest of us, so he was scouting around.

We poked around in that room for a while, and it was pretty boring. Lots of moss and little insects, but all we found loot-wise was an old pouch and a scrollcase. And there were bugs in both (ew). After we finished poking around in the stone huts, we went down that hallway, wandered around until we came to a room filled with water. Well, half filled. There were steps down from the floor level, and they went down into very, very cold water.

Just to our right as we looked at the pool, trying to talk Pandy into going in for a swim, there was a big iron lever sticking up out of the floor. Not having any better ideas, we got Pandy to try pulling the lever, to see what would happen. And, of course, it broke off in his hands. Big lug doesn’t know his own strength. Maybe it was his new-found strength after Belle made a man of him. Anyway, we ran out of ideas there, so we went back a ways to another room.

And as soon as we stepped into the doorway something started screeching REALLY LOUD. It was a couple of big mushrooms that just would not stop making a huge racket until the big guys (Junior, Pandy, Trandle) hacked them up good. Hawk and I were standing just outside the doorway when the noise finally stopped and we could hear again.

My ears were ringing. I could barely hear the sound of Pandy cleaning off his axe in the room behind me. Trandle was jabbering something about the name for the mushroom creatures – and what it was in Draconic as well as common, and what he’d read about other travelers encountering them in the holy travelogues of Fharlanghn. The screaming was almost better. Then Hawk touched my arm. “Listen.”

So I did. And I heard scuttling. Big scuttling. And then he pointed, but I could see what he was pointing at – it was too far outside the light. That was spooky. Watching Hawk get out his bow and look spooked was spooky, too. And then it came into the light.

It was a huge scorpion – like the size of a big dog, maybe. Its huge poisonous tail waved around over its head and seemed to be pointing right at me, the way Dans used to when I’d broken a tray full of crockery again. It was coming for me. I just knew it.

I reacted quickly, yelling for help and casting the first spell that came to mind – Color Spray. It was the first time I’d actually used the spell when it wasn’t a training exercise. I didn’t think about it at the time – I was moving too fast – but the training the guild put us through really did prepare us well. I mean, before I joined the guild and went through the training I probably would have been too scared to do anything when I first saw the scorpion. But now boom. A huge cone of bright colors and sparks and flashes flew out from my hand and streaked towards the Scorpion. It stood there for a few seconds, stunned and disoriented, while the rest of the gang gathered around it and start bashing. It did fight back a little – scratched up Junior and Trandle a little – but it was fighting blind, thanks to my spell, and it missed a lot more than it hit. It wasn’t long before the thing was pulp (thanks to a HUGE blow from Jaeger), and we all stood back, leaning against the wall, and realized we had just won our first battle in the Barrier Mountains.

It felt pretty cool.