* Our day once again starts with a lavish breakfast at the Royale interviewing potential replacements for Elisha, but it’s a rather poor turn out consisting of two brooding rangers, an inept thief who introduced himself as Branwig Ninetoes, and the two serving Halflings (eager to flee their life of hog roasting drudgery and see the world).
* We were about to call the whole thing off and get on with some brave adventuring when we found a mysterious Tiefling stood at our table. When we asked his skillet he said nothing, when we asked his occupation he still said nothing, so we asked him his name and he replied “the Namegiver called me Silas, you may call me that” and sat down and started eating the leftovers. It would appear we had picked up another stray. o
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* With our fast broken, empty spot filled and the return of the bard we set about our day’s business. We retrieve the wagon from the Royale’s stables and head off to the Lyceum and is while we are travelling through the town that we spot a fleeting shape streaking through the sky above, Til’jan. She seemed to be fluttering from building to building carrying a sack, and as quick as she came she is gone.
* Curious, we follow her and trace her to a little market square not too far away, we find her stood atop a statue of a lion throwing sweet breads and spice buns to wayward children. She spies us and when he bag is empty she comes over, we ask about her search for Ettan-Eefi and she has reached a bit of a dead end. She hopes to speak to the Wayfarers or failing that someone at the Lyceum to see if they know of his whereabouts, so she joins us as that is where we are heading.
o The band of children follow our little procession much to the annoyance of Kane and Urien, as they call and sing and generally thank the “bird lady” over and over for her treats.
* As we are nearing the Lyceum we hear a strange and yet familiar song echoing through the streets and a green haired gnome steps jauntily around a corner singing the song of forms. Til’Jan rushes over to him and the pair seems very pleased to see each other, shaking hands and quickly hugging. “I never thought to see another Seela” says the gnome, introducing himself as Gilva, a member of the wayfarers and head of student affairs at the lyceum.
o The pair talk quickly about all things fey and faerie and then Til’Jan asks him about Ettan-Eefi, it turns out that Gilva knew him but hasn’t seen him for a long time now, some thirty years. He went in search of the Aquila, a temple of Old Sequen (the ruins deep in the harbour of the current Seaquen). He thought whatever was in the temple could aid the forest, a magical fountain.
o He tells her (and thus us) that more information could be found within the lyceums libraries, he can make the arrangements and so our merry bands grows in size once more, with singing faeries, gnomes and children in our sprawling wake to the Lyceum.
* Finally reaching the large college we spy a crowd, gathered around an odd looking bald fellow (identified as Perkins Frankheart by Gilva) speaking out against the lyceum, telling tales that they have lured the refugees here to bolster their “human shield” against Ragesia.
o Perhaps angered by public speaking, the singing children, or just a bad day but Urien takes great offence with the public speaking of Perkins and engages in his own debate, quickly proving that he can shout loudest, and the public opinion sways from one mans speech against the Lyceum to the Paladins speech of Bahumet and all he’s done for us. Without an audience the bald man walks away defeated.
* Finally we enter the school and find Bananamhen’Vett to deliver his dead spiders, as expected he tries to ignore our little deal, offering us first the original price and it’s only with
a bit of prodding that he honours the agreed price of thirty-five gold per spider. With that concluded we see if he’s interested in the body of the Hexing Creeper as well, but “no, certainly not, I suggest a temple and having it interred!” is his response and so we leave him to his spiders and go off in search of Rambousen.
* As we approach his laboratory there is a muffled explosion and a great deal of smoke emanating from within, we decide to wait in the corridor and soon enough the dwarf strides through the pinkish smoke with a magical bubble covering his slightly singed face. He calls for a few unlucky students to busy themselves airing out his lab and he takes us to one of the staff rooms, he points towards a dented but steaming hot urn “refreshment?” he proffers after filling a battered looking mug, finally dropping his charm and his voice loses its echoing glamour.
* We hand over the tools and materials that he asked for and he reaches deep into one pocket fishing out two shining platinum pieces. “so now you can fix the box and find out what it does?” we ask “oh that, no not quite… you see I was there tampering with the thing when I had a surprise visit from Commander Zavius, he was most curious about the box, curious chap in general I’ve always said, anyways he has the box now, keen to meet the chaps the brought it here” he explains. He then rolls up his sleeves, tenses his hands and performs a little “mundane” magic, some well practiced sleight of hand produces a tidy little piece of white card, stamped with black ink. “But ignore the box, those documents you left” “the ones you had no time for” “no… well that’s to say yes… those, but I did look and you were right, they are very important, if I had known wouldn’t have sent you into the swamp after that boat, would’ve taken you straight to the big cheese himself, and that’s where we’re off to now!”.
* Rambousen leads us through the many winding corridors of levels of the lyceum steadily going up and up, lazily kicking doors open and stomping passed whoever raises protest, until finally he stops at one set of doors and knocks politely, and then pushes the doors open, it would appear we’ve reached the top and find ourselves within the headmasters private study. Here we meet Simian Gohanach (the master of the Lyceum) and Kianen Steckhart (a dwarf) who is the head of the recently formed War Department.
o The trio asks many questions about the information and our ordeals to bring it here and for once we mostly honest (or as honest as Brick can be). Satisfied they ask us to watch and wait; they have several rituals that need to be cast to make our information useful to them. With much muttering, finger wiggling and awkward looking gestures the pages spread across the desk start to rise and sort themselves, binding themselves together like a book with only its spine, coverless.
o Their ritual complete the trio cast furtive glances between each other, obviously some mental game of rock, paper, scissors as finally Kianen gathers he has been picked as the scapegoat and steps forward to turn the blank first page to reveal the juicy titbits within. When he doesn’t explore the other two scuttle up behind him and read over his shoulder “hmmm supernal… written by Krevan, second in command to Leska, and there is her seal of approval”. Lembit wanders over form a quartet of chattering voices, each reading snippets before they turn the pages over.
o The book seems split into two sections; the first is a large (almost impossibly large) list of names of arcane spell users, targets for the Scourge to be caught and detained. The second (and somewhat smaller) is a gathered array of myths, stories and legends regarding The Trillith, and our cadre of learned academics looks to each other, all looking as stumped as one another, like the knowledge within the book they can only clutch at rumour and not even solid rumour as to who or what a Trillith is.
* Simian requests that they keep the book for a while so they can study it further, as we have no direct use for it we agree; hopefully they can make more sense of it, certainly more than we can. We ask for access to the Lyceums wide libraries (so we can find more information about the Aquila) and they are more than happy to give us guest passes, we sort out the details with their head of Student Affairs, and Gilva is more than happy to give us a guided tour of the place.
o Brick, Silas and Lembit quickly get to work sorting through old maps of the area, back before the catastrophe that formed what is now the harbour area. The ancient city of Seaquen once stretched across the whole area and we manage to find the rough location of the temple. Armed with a copy of the map and matching natural landmarks we believe that we should hopefully be able to pinpoint the rough area of the harbour where the temple would’ve sunk!
* On our way to the Dock Area we overhear a town crier shouting more news from the north:
o The First Ragesian army has ceased formal hostility due to the bad weather, they have set up camp to ride it out, now the only informal hostility performed by the army is the pillaging and looting to sustain themselves through until the weather breaks and they can go back to proper war… A huge fleet of Ragesian ships has been sighted and is believed to be trying to rendezvous with the first army.
o The Second Ragesian Army currently occupies Gate Pass.
o The Third Ragesian Army is on the way to Dassan but bad weather has stalled their progress.
o The Fourth is preparing to invade The Shalhalisti by going around the mountains and soon the elves will be fighting their war on two fronts as the mountain passes at Gate Pass will be used to also launch an invasion.
o No news of the other Ragesian Armies or Fleets….
* We spend a few hours at the docks pacing back and forth with out map trying to get a better feel for how the land looked back then, and a few chats to local sailors rewards us with some “old man tales” of the harbour, where at certain areas during low tide you can see the tips of the ruins, and if you hold your head underwater you can even hear the bells ringing!
o We feel confident that we’ve narrowed down the temples location to small and searchable area of the bay; all we need now is a ship. Which shouldn’t be too hard as the whole dock area is crammed with ships and more anchored within the bay and more arriving each day.
o However we realised we are woefully unprepared for actually reaching the temple once we are sailing over it, so we head back to the Lyceum to see if there is a magical solution and Gilva happily points us in the direction of a small and reliable ritual that allows underwater breathing, the only snag is that it will take many hours of study and training to memorise. Brick is eager to improve his plethora of abilities and we pay for a copy of the ritual and send him back to the Royale to learn it (and we’re thankful for the distraction that will keep him from any more “adventures” within the seedier spots of Seaquen).
* Now Bard-less we decide a visit to the Commander is in order, to introduce ourselves and find out why he is so keen to meet us. Heading over to the towns main barracks we spy Commander Zavius (a dwarf) shouting orders at a bunch of inexperienced militia, trying to march in formation. Outside the gates we spot the increasingly familiar sight of Perkins delivering anothering another of his anti-lyceum speechs, he is quicker to admit defeat as Urien strides towards him and he departs as fast as his feet can take him.
* With his drilling complete we approach the captain and introduce ourselves and we quickly find ourselves in his apartments that mostly comprise of a large office with a little bedroom off to one side, he happily busies himself preparing tea while we have a snoop around old campaign trophies (such as a battered suit of armour on a stand and two impressive looking Axes over the mantelpiece).
* The centre of his office is dominated by a large game board filled with little carved pieces. “ah so you’ve taken interest in my conquest board, do you play?” he asks and quickly explains the rules that only Lembit seems to remember (no doubt having played it many times in his many lifetimes), this is his own variation on the common game, the board and tokens represents nearby kingdoms and their estimated forces.
o As he explains this Kane tells him helpfully of the Ragesian scouts that we encountered in the swamps along with the inquisitor and wagon outside of the town. A frown crosses the dwarf’s brow as he hears the news, jots a few notes on a well scribbled pad and rearranges a few pieces on his board to take into account our new information.
* After his explanation he challenges us to a game, explaining there are room for four players and that he’ll take the currently weakest side (that of Seaquen & the Lyceum), only Lembit takes him up on his offer and takes Ragesian forces. The match takes several hours to play, each side coming up with interesting and surprising gambits but clearly the odds are in Lembits favour and quickly the weight of numbers takes its toll upon Zavius who puts up a long and bitter fight but eventually he is defeated with a long drawn out sigh. “Every match goes the same way” he says sadly “I’ve yet to find anything that will turn the tide in our favour!”
o During their game we find out that while Zavius is the commander of the militia and a great strategist he is not in overall command of the defence of Seaquen, he answers to Magister Lorb Vortberd and we should introduce ourselves to him, perhaps we could be of further service, issues his militia can’t easily deal with. However it is late by the time their game is finished so we return to the Royale to find Brick still toiling away over books and scrolls.
* In the morning we meet up with Torrent over breakfast and tell her of our plans to hire a boat, she share the knowledge that her mentor Lee Sidoneth is currently in charge of the Naval Defenses, she is sure that she can wrangle a boat out of him to aid our search and that she herself is an experienced sailor.
* However our boating plans are put on hold until we have seen the Magister, so we head into town and find his offices, they stand out by the armed guards filtering a long queue of peasants into and out of it at a fairly quick pace; it would seem the Magister runs a brisk trade! Nearby a town crier shouts about another fire and that any with information regarding the recent spout of arsons will be rewarded handsomely (based on usefulness of information).
* Soon we are inside the building, nearing our turn and we get to see Lorb (another dwarf) in all his grumbling glory as he blusters away either answering peasants’ questions with quick blunt truth or shouting at them until their nerve breaks and they hurry for the exit.
* “So” says Lorb, his stern grey eyes looking over us “more refugees come complaining!” “We’re adventurers!” states Kane boldly, the dwarf snorts a little “raise your complaints so can I get on with hearing more of the same useless blather from the idiots behind you!” and before any of us can protest continues on his rant, complaining about the refugees in general but specifically focussing his bile upon those of a religious nature, highlighting the name of one Lora’Bek or “that idiot wench with the giant eagle” as he often refers to her and her “crackpot ideas to build a temple for them, that’s all we need them putting down more roots!”.
* With his vitriolic speech coming to a close he points at us in turn “and as if I didn’t have enough on my plate without these Ragesian Terrorist trying to burn the place down around me!” sensing an opening Kane steps forwards and manages to squeeze enough words of our dealings with the nearby Ragesian scouts into the conversation that he sees us in a new light.
o Supposedly a Ragesian Terror Cell called “The White Worms” has been claiming responsibility of local warehouse fires, their attempts to destabilize Seaquen. He believes his own militia is incompetent and tahts why these blaggards haven’t been found and no progress at all has been made on the case and offers us a substantial reward for stopping the fires.
o Getting the address of the latest warehouse fire we decide to postpone our boat trip much to Til’Jan’s annoyance, but stopping the arsonists seems a more urgent task!
* Searching the warehouse we discover some curious animal tracks amongst the wreckage, tracks that Lembit strongly believes were left while the building was burning and not before hand. These tracks (most likely rats) disappear beneath the wooden floorboards and vanish into the dirt.
o A closer examination of the tracks reveals trace amounts of fire based magic, this conjures a very ancient image into the Deva’s mind.A very powerful fire mage that caused some great catastrophe that was responsible for destroying most of the city and the ground beneath it leaving a huge crater that is now the harbour.
o Kane drools a little at the idea of an ancient and powerful mages tomb literally beneath his feet and when digging at the cracks proves ineffectual he suggests the sewers! We split into two teams, those who wish to search the Lyceums library for any information upon the mage and his tomb and Kane who wants to search the sewers (and the unofficial team 3 that comprises of Cricket and Urien who simply follow the rogue to make sure he doesn’t do anything too stupid).
* Library: The fire mage was the town’s founder, no one seems to know why or how he caused the explosion that destroyed most of the city, but it’s believed that he was buried underneath the molten rock.
* Sewers: Kane does indeed find an entrance to the sewers nearby but doesn’t want to go in alone, so we wait and Urien talks to some nearby tramps.
* Tramps: They saw no one coming or going from the warehouse when it caught fire “but those white worms are like ghosts in the night aren’t they!” but we do learn there was another warehouse burnt down a week ago not too far from here, so we investigate that.
* Warehouse #2: In the second warehouse we find a locked door that survived, with his picks Kane quickly springs the cheap lock and we push the door open to a room that seems to have avoided worst of the fire. Inside we find some crates containing rotting vegetables with more rat trails, this time leading to a hole in the stone wall, further examination of the stone supports the theory the rats were on fire when they came out of the hole. We deduce that some kind of fire rat came up into the warehouse lured by the food and the fires spread as they bit their way into wooden packing crates!
o In order to confirm this theory however it does seem that a trip into the sewer is required and only the rogue seems thrilled at this idea, however his eagerness lasts only a few minutes of wading through the unmentionable and a solid two hour search for secret tunnels or entrances into ancient tombs ends in a severe case of boredom. Mere moments from giving up and turning back we find a tunnel that
smells some how… worse than the other parts of the sewer and discover this is in fact because everything is burnt and charred. At the end of the tunnel we spy several burning rats, their fiery eyes starring at us in defiance but bolt as we try to approach and vanish into smaller pipes and cracks. There is however no sign of any one else that could be in charge of them, such as a Ragesian Terror Cell, we decide the White Worms are a farce and that rats being rats (fiery or otherwise) was the cause of the fires.
* We return to the Magistrate and reveal to him our findings; he seems happy enough to believe our findings and thinks that even his idiot men should be able enough to arrange for rat poison and better storage of the town’s food supplies. The demeanour of the town seems to soften as the Town Criers spread the news of the rats being the cause of the problem and not the nefarious Ragesians.
o We are rewarded with a sizable amount of coin and a magical treasure which goes to Lembit, we are all offered Deputy Badges (along with the weekly wage of 1gold piece!) however only Lembit, Kane and Urien take up the magistrates offer.
* With a good portion of the day spent, far too late for any aquatic adventures we agree the search for the temple will have to wait until tomorrow. With no other immediate leads and keen to flash their new badges, Urien, Kane and Lembit head in to the Refugee camp to “patrol” while the rest of us return to the Royale.
o They wander the camp, the broad grin never leaving the rogues face as he slides up to random refugees, keen to abuse his new found power “do you have a permit for that?” he begins each time, watching the refugees squirm under his gaze as they profess they didn’t know they were breaking any law, he toys between watching them work extra fast to escape his gaze or with promises to head to the magistrate first thing in the morning to collect their Permits for “dog ownership”, “carrying amounts of water between three and five galleons without intent to supply” and “owning a barrow with more than one but less than four wheels”.
o In the distance they overhear the now familiar voice of Perkin’s up on his little crate addressing people who mostly don’t seem interested in listening. He doesn’t spot them advance and is shocked when the paladin strides out of the crowd and grabs his wrist “I’m arresting you on the charge of disturbing the peace”, wide eyed Perkins looks to flee but has no where to go.
o The trio of deputies then strong arm a confession from him, he was put up to making these speeches by some people that he met in a pub, a Half-elf and Halfling named Serbahn and Makom, when questioned why “they tell me the truth, how things really are!” he replies amidst frightened sobs, he’s been speaking with them for the last few months.
o Urien threatens him with life imprisonment unless he stops making these speeches and out of fear the man complies, running for his life when he’s eventually released from the paladins vice like grip.
* In the morning we are finally prepared to head out into the bay and find the temple, gathering our things we head down to the towns docks, Torrent leading the way to her Mentors abode when we are accosted by another one of Lorb’s deputies, he hails us pleasantly and says he has a message for us from someone named Jess (the name doesn’t ring any bells) her message comes from Beuron, the priest and resistance member back in gatepass and that we should contact her, more information has been left at a house, and he gives us the address.
* Our days plan already decided we ignore the message for the time being, we must reach the temple area at low tide to aid our search, we let Torrent lead us on to Sidoneths’ place and find a note attached to the door “will be out back feeding lulu, let yourself in. Lee.” We head
inside and follow the sound of people talking and find Lee talking to an odd couple of people, one a Half-elf (that he refers to as Brutus, but his appearance strongly resembles the description of a person called Malebicus that we found in the swamp witches hovels) and someone / thing that had been augmented by Biomancy (extra arms, odd shaped body and skintones). They quickly conclude their business as we shuffle in and depart as Torrent introduces us to Lee and he seems very sincere, offering refreshments and if we wish to meet “lulu”.
* He guides us out the back of the house into basement / sunken cave style affair, at first we think its some sort of private dock as it leads straight down into the harbour but no boat is docked there and soon we discover that its an enclosure, Lulu is a “giant” pink and orange squid that reeks of magic. She would appear to be both a pet and a grand experiment in the field of Biomancy.
o Most of us are slightly confused by the neon squid, Brick is practically giddy with seeing such raw Biomancy at work, while Dag voices his concern with punctual barking until Cricket takes him back into the other room and a few fishy treats from Sidoneth sooths him. But quickly Lee’s attention is brought back to the main room to stop Kane from tormenting the animal.
* Still things stay civil enough for Torrent to convince him to lend us a boat, which she’ll captain and he guides us to a serviceable looking boat outside “It’s a bit leaky so with all of you in you’ll need to bail but she’ll serve your needs I’m sure” he offers as advice, reinforcing the comment about bailing as the heavens open before we’ve even made ready to set sail. Still the tide is right so we must leave or not at all, and soon under command of “captain” torrent we’re out into the bay, sailing towards where we believe the temple to be located.
* While it takes an hour or two of sailing back and forth we finally spy the tip of a ruined tower through the water, we drop the anchor and Brick begins to prepare the water breathing ritual, granting us the ability to breath water as if air for a couple of hours. And into the water we go, some dragged down into the depths by the weight of their armour while others must clamber ever deeper down the anchors line, but eventually we reach the bottom and the entrance to the temple, its wide doors closed shut.
* Kane quickly checks the doors and can find no sign of any nefarious traps and uses one of his picks to flick the latch, suddenly the double doors lurch inwards, a mass of bubbles escape the room as the ocean swallows it and we are all sucked into the temples antechamber.
o The doors swing slowly shut behind us, a loud click from ahead draws our attention to a second set of doors, now seemingly unlocked that the seal is back in place.
* We open the second set of doors and the weight of the water flings them open, emptying into the temple leaving the place flooded to around waist height, in the room beyond luminescent glows start to appear in the darkness. As if reacting to their presence the walls start to glow, lighting the room and fully reveal the glowing creatures inside. Near the back of the temple was a large fountain but did not appear to be active, any water in the room came from our entrance.
o “Giant” Luminous Red Crabs (size of a row boat) with vibrant blue feathery plumes erupting from their shells like peacock tails, and massive claws obviously. We discover they can swat their tails around and attempt to knock people over into the water, and Kane finds out the painful way that they can spit some form of acidic venom quite a distance.
o Bright Glowing Green Squid (about the size of a wolf) that would grapple and pull people under the water with their hooky tentacles (however seeing as we can breath underwater their attempts to drown us was hampered somewhat). We did discover that they are quite nimble with their tentacles however as Brick attempted
to use his new boots to “walk” up the side of the temple and hide in the dry but was literally plucked from the wall and dragged into the room.
o Finally a bipedal octopus man thing of many colours that liked to slip under the water and generally swish at people with his barbed tentacle hands.
o Lembit is quick to point out the potential obvious when he states that all of these creatures has suffered (or been blessed in Brick’s view) from the effects of Biomancy!
* Urien, Brick and Kane take a savage beating from the aquatic menace with the rest of us walking away relatively unscathed. The stick of seawater and dead fish pervade the temple now so we hastily search for any treasure, sadly it seems to be lacking.
o However not wanting to leave two tonnes of crab meat behind we agree to transport the crabs back up to the surface and try to sell them (either as food or to the zoologist at the Lyceum).
* However Til’Jan lets out an excited squeal as she discovered Etan’Eefi’s mark upon one of the walls etchings that describes the Aquiline Heart, an ancient artefact (supposedly the heart of a giant eagle, torn out by an evil dragon), it would appear her erstwhile mentor has been and gone, the temple leading him towards the heart. She now hopes that meeting with the Wayfarers can put her on the same path as he.
* We leave the temple and Kane uses the last few moments to carve “empty, don’t bother!” upon the wooden entrance and we start hauling the dead crabs back up to the surface and head home.
o Sidoneth agrees to be a broker for us on the selling of the crabs to the local markets and we make 50gp and a mental note to avoid the fish pie at the Royale for the next few days.
* Back at the royale the place is a little more subdued than typical, the normal rabblerousing Vikings are inside quietly drinking, nursing more than a few welts and bruises. When we ask it appears they picked a fight with some monks “they wear dresses and carry sticks, we are strong, brave and massive, how did we lose!” seems to be the typical response to any questions. Their leader Sven was beaten senseless and has still not come around from the severe kicking he received.
o Kane and Urien wish to pay these “peace disturbing monks” a visit in the morning when they do their morning patrol of the Refugee Camp.
* In the morning we get directions to the Monks from the Vikings, they have established themselves in a small clearing in the forest well away from the noise of the Refugees, here the air is clean and only the gentle gong of wind chimes can be heard. An aged bald woman sits cross legged in pale blue robes, eyes closed and hands clasped. Her eyelids flutter open as Kane steps lightly into the clearing; her stern grey eyes watch him as he glides from a light step to a purposeful stride, Urien stomps in behind him, the rest of us follow.
o The deputies and the monk make peaceful enough small talk, she ignores any goading of there’s and she summons a younger monk, a young man who introduces himself as Three Weeping Ravens, the current voice of the order (so the other monks can get on with the serious business of finding enlightenment instead of talking to scruffy adventurers). He tells us a little of his order, the Order of Echoed Souls, they were originally a Shalhalesti order but fled their temple during a previous war, only to settle in Sindar. However much like before with war looming they have relocated again, the forty monks that make up their order.
o Kane asks what their order believes, to which the monk replies “we seek the infinite”, the rogue replies with a smile “me too, I just take it a bit at a time”.
o Finding no laws broken and only us disturbing their peace we depart and head off to the squalor of the refugee camp.
* This being our first real trip to the camp we finally start to see the divides and boundaries of the many factions that make up the inhabitants, split by country, race, and even religion.
* Soon we find ourselves at the heart of the camp, a well built (by camp standards) hut with a giant eagle resting outside, a thick chain around its neck keeps it grounded, a large sign with hastily painted letters reads “Dangerous Animal – Keep Away”. As we approach the giant bird begins to speak but is quickly interrupted a woman (that we assume to be Lora’bek) cradling a huge multibladed polearm and bids the eagle (called Takeshi) to be quiet.
o She introduces herself and tells us she is the leader of the Aquilline Heart, a Multi-Deific faith for the just and true. Obviously this brings her fairly high standing with all the refuges (as everyone bends a knee to someone or thing higher than them).
o She tells us of her vision; a grand temple to all gods to unite the refugees, there is far too much infighting and distraction amongst the faithful within the camp. She hopes that when people accept and embrace her idea, united by a faith they will unite into a people ready to fight a war, rather than a squabbling group who wishes to build eight different temples and keep everyone divided.
* While not all of us agree with her thoughts, enough of us do that we agree to help her try to unite the faiths.
o With us on board she lays down a plan of action, she believes they can all be swayed if they can be convinced to hear of the true benefits, something she and her agents have so far been unable to do, perhaps a bard of great renown can…
o As she tells us about each of the main sects that make up the camp:
o Four of the sects are Ragesians who have fled their own city because of the war they are made up of the Philosophers, Savages, Hospitallers and the Druids.
* They quickly put aside their differences when convinced that a show of unity against their home country will better far than division, that the temple will be an act of defiance against all that is wrong with Ragesia.
o The Dassani Dwarves who worship their ancestors.
* That the temple building itself will be a monument to their ancestors, a visible reminder of the skill and craftsmanship of the dwarves, passed down from generation to generation.
o The Seaquenites while not a faction within the camp themselves still hold a huge sway with their worship of the sea and its mistress.
* Are mostly convinced that a project as large as the unified temple would give the refugees something to do other than sitting around in squalor and they’d get to keep the temple as their own when everyone else finally returns to their countries.
o The Sindari Exiles worship the gods of sorcery.
* ??
o The only group that don’t fall before the mastery of Bricks silver tongue are the Ostaggar Mercenaries. Their Chaplin leader refuses an audience with Brick, his god is strong and would only bow to a stronger, a test of strength is in order, honest battle will decide!
* Brick skips lightly out of the Mercenary Chaplin’s abode, unwilling to fight the man himself “our champion is outside” he coos, the Chaplin following as his own followers begin to muster to witness the challenge. With an overly dramatic bow the bard points towards the Paladin, strong and steel clad in his Armour “Come Holy Warrior!” beckons the Chaplin, the paladin shakes his head with a small smile, “no, not me” and steps aside to reveal the barbarian standing behind him “the names Cricket, seems we have a differing o’ opinion” he says stepping forward, pulling the battered hat from his head and casually dropping onto Dags head who barks enthusiastically, as the Half-Orc sticks out one meaty paw to shake the Chaplin’s hand.
* He swallows slightly as the barbarian draws his own blade, a good two feet longer than the Chaplin’s own great sword, and with a wet thud he plants the tip of the blade into the mud and begins to pray “Let this blade be your voice Moon Mother, speak through me and let your will be known”, across the way the Chaplin says his own prayers, with both ready their steel begins its great and bloody dance.
* It is but a few moments later the Chaplin finds himself staring up, the coppery taste of blood in his mouth, the wide grin of Cricket looms over him “seems Sehanine wants herself a temple, you agree?” offering the man his arm “my god says similar it would seem” he says with a begrudging smile as he is hauled from the mud back to unsteady feet. In the darkening sky above the chill white of the moon looks down and is glad.
