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Story Hour
Ghourmand Vale (3.5 campaign)
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<blockquote data-quote="Richards" data-source="post: 8999516" data-attributes="member: 508"><p><strong>ADVENTURE 22: EX LIBRIS AD DIABOLI</strong></p><p></p><p>PC Roster:</p><p style="margin-left: 20px">Ageratum Purslane, halfling rogue 7</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Alistair Mandelberen Pastlethwaite, human sorcerer 7</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Chaevaris Noarunal, elf archer 7</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Harlan Starblade, half-elf paladin 7</p><p></p><p>Game Session Date: 20 April 2023</p><p></p><p> - - -</p><p></p><p>The four heroes dismounted from their steeds and led them into the Stouts' barn, each horse - or pony, in the case of Ageratum's - being stripped of its saddle and saddlebags, rubbed down, and left in its customary stable with a sufficient supply of hay before the adventurers made their way into the farmhouse to say hello to the farmers who allowed them to stay there when they weren't out of town away on adventuring business as they'd just been for the past month or more. "It'll be nice to have a home-cooked meal!" enthused the little halfling, and she was quite right, for Mrs. Stout was an excellent cook, although Alistair occasionally missed some of the fancier repasts to which he'd been accustomed as a nobleman's son.</p><p></p><p>"Well, you're back!" greeted the farmer's wife as they entered the dwelling, tired from so many days on the road - it had been over a week ago they'd left Greyhawk City behind. "Have yourselves a seat and I'll whip you up some vittles!" Alistair didn't even wince any more at the thought of his cultured palate scarfing down "vittles" - he'd been an adventurer, among these common people, long enough now to appreciate a good, hearty meal despite the simplicity of the fare. "Oh, and this came for you while you were gone," said Mrs. Stout, dropping a folded and sealed sheet of parchment in Alistair's hands.</p><p></p><p>The sorcerer took a look at the seal, recognized it as the bard Holyrood Carp's emblem (a fish, naturally), and hurriedly opened it. "He's recently arrived back in town after weeks of travel himself," Alistair told the others after scanning the contents of the letter, "and invites us to the Dark and Light Club when we get back to hear him sing - and he has some interesting tidbits of information about the <em>Blood Mirror</em>!" At that, Harlan looked up with interest; the half-elf paladin was always curious to learn more about the magic ruby gemstone he carried, which helped stabilize the wounds of the dying around him.</p><p></p><p>"We should go catch up with him," suggested Chaevaris. "But tomorrow - I think we've all earned a good night's sleep in an actual bed with a straw mattress!" Thus it was the following evening, just as dusk gave way to full night, that the four adventurers entered the Dark and Light Club and found the bard waiting to go onto the stage for his night's performance. He greeted them and passed over a small pouch of platinum coins to Alistair. "Your payment for your last batch of songs," he explained, and the sorcerer took a moment to peek into the pouch to try to see how many coins might be in there before tying it to his belt.</p><p></p><p>"You have some information about the <em>Blood Mirror</em>?" pressed Harlan.</p><p></p><p>"Well, kind of," replied Carp. "I have information about where to find information about the <em>Blood Mirror</em>." He went on to explain that the gemstone had once been in the possession of a holy man named Balaur the Lightbringer, but it was rumored the <em>Blood Mirror</em> somehow turned him to evil. At that, the heroes looked worriedly at Harlan, the "holy man" now currently possessing the gemstone, but he had shown no tendencies to turn to evil himself - and besides, they were pretty sure "Balaur" was the name of the missing vampire whose empty coffin they'd dragged into the town square after slaying his wife Magda and their mummified servant. If this was the same person, they were confident his fall from grace had not been caused by the <em>Blood Mirror</em>, but rather by the fact his wife turned him into a vampire after having succumbed herself.</p><p></p><p>"There's a journal, written in the hand of the servant of this Balaur," Carp explained, and the heroes assumed that would be the one who had later been transformed into an undead mummy, "which details all he had learned about the <em>Blood Mirror</em>. And that journal recently came into the possession of a wizard in our own small boomtown here - although it was apparently just stolen from him."</p><p></p><p>"Who might this be?" demanded Chaevaris.</p><p></p><p>"That sad sack at the end of the bar, crying into his drink," replied the bard, pointing at a robed individual with a sour expression sitting by himself. Alistair recognized him immediately: it was Blorkane, an elderly wizard to whom the young sorcerer had often gone to have some particular bit of arcane esoterica explained to him when he found himself first walking the path of an adventuring sorcerer. Heading over to say hello, Alistair soon had Blorkane's story out of him: his place had been robbed while he'd been out, no doubt by the local thieves' guild, who were keeping extra busy with all of the visitors in town.</p><p></p><p>"Yeah, I thought this place was a bit more crowded than I remembered," Ageratum piped up. "What's going on?"</p><p></p><p>"There are delegations from both Celene and Veluna, come to determine once and for all which country owns Ghourmand Vale," Blorkane replied. "The thieves are out in full numbers, picking pockets and robbing the houses of even the most respected of scholarly wizards!"</p><p></p><p>"What all did they take?" asked Harlan, so far only aware of the mummy's journal having been stolen.</p><p></p><p>"Just about everything of arcane import!" complained Blorkane. "My books on aboleths, my <em>potions of water breathing</em>, my <em>wand of dispel magic</em>, my maps of the underground river systems in the area..."</p><p></p><p>"Aboleths?" Harlan interrupted. "Are you doing research on aboleths?"</p><p></p><p>"You're not still thinking about crossing them with pigs, are you?" demanded Alistair.</p><p></p><p>"No, no, nothing like that," Blorkane replied. "It's just that my sister, <strong>Porcelene</strong>, has likely run afoul of an aboleth, and I had been hoping to hire a group of adventurers to rescue her. But those thieves took the reward money I was going to use to pay them as well...."</p><p></p><p>"These thieves," Ageratum interjected. "They wouldn't be the Wild Guys, would they?"</p><p></p><p>"The very same," Blorkane answered, returning his attention to his mug of ale. "I've barely enough for the occasional drink now, and there's not much I can do about it, either, what with our illustrious head of security turning a blind eye to their depredations."</p><p></p><p>"The Wild Guys is the local thieves' guild around here," Ageratum explained. "They're headquartered in the Wild Coast Social Club, just a few blocks away from here, near the stream."</p><p></p><p>"I think we should pay these Wild Guys a visit," suggested Harlan.</p><p></p><p>"Hang on - I'm due on stage," said Holyrood. "At least wait to hear my first song - it's my first performance of 'Jasgund Singh' at this location." And he grabbed up his lute and made his way to the front stage, cheered on by the tables of people who had come to hear him perform, many of them several drinks into their night's allotment and already feeling no pain. The song went over well, although Alistair wondered if any of the people in the audience knew just who this Singh fellow truly was, before deciding they didn't really care; they just liked the fact the lyrics were taking down someone in some sort of authority. The sorcerer made a mental note of that, wondering if he should write any songs about the movers and shakers in Ghourmand Vale: Kasselban Picksmart, the mouthy dwarf in charge of the Slippery Shaft Mines came immediately to mind.</p><p></p><p>Harlan led the four heroes outside and allowed Ageratum to lead them to the Wild Coast Social Club, which turned out to be a single-story building made of sturdy stone, squeezed in between a couple of other shops. It had several latticed windows, with dirty amber glass that was translucent, not transparent - you could make out shapes and shadows inside, but that was about it. "So, how do we want to approach this?" the halfling asked the others.</p><p></p><p>"We're recruits?" suggested Alistair. Turning to the little halfling, he said, "You're the leader of our little group of would-be thieves, eager to prove our worth."</p><p></p><p>"Harlan hardly looks the part," Chaevaris explained patiently - and indeed, the paladin's gleaming full-plate armor, emblazoned as it was with the shining sun holy symbol of Pelor, made the half-elf a very unlikely-looking thief.</p><p></p><p>But Alistair had that figured out as well. Turning to Harlan, he suggested, "All you need to do is to keep quiet - you can't actually lie if you don't say anything. We'll just insinuate that the original wearer of the armor...doesn't need it anymore. Because we killed him. Because we're evil thieves and murderers."</p><p></p><p>"You don't really come across as a low-born thief, either," Chaevaris pointed out. "You look more like a foppish, spoiled-brat baby nobleman, who's more comfortable in a--"</p><p></p><p>"Why, whatcha mean, Elfy?" replied Alistair, cutting her off with a truly horrible attempt at talking like a stereotypical commoner - while visibly scratching himself, just for good measure. "I'm just a flea-bitten common man, same as any. I drinks me my beer and eats me down my vittles." Poised on his master's left shoulder, Ambrose took a step to the side as if wishing to distance himself from this performance.</p><p></p><p>Harlan put a hand on the sorcerer's other shoulder to get him to stop. "I will agree to the charade," he offered, "if you promise not to talk, either. We'll let Ageratum take the lead and do our talking for us."</p><p></p><p>"Fair enough," agreed Alistair, although he couldn't for the life of him figure out what had been so bad about his plan. "Before we go in, though, I want to cast a few spells." He placed a <em>mage armor</em> and <em>shield</em> enhancement upon himself, then cast a <em>flame arrow</em> spell upon both Chaevaris and Harlan's arrows. Finally, with the words, "Ogilvy, if you please!" he cast an <em>unseen servant</em> spell. "I don't dare have him carry any sacks of 'pebble-boulders,' but it might help having someone along that nobody else can see." And then he passed two sacks of "pebble-boulders" to Ageratum. For her part, the little halfling passed over her <em>potion of misdirection</em> to Harlan and had him drink it down, thinking it might be helpful if anyone tried checking up on the paladin's story using magical means.</p><p></p><p>Ageratum pushed open the door to the Wild Coast Social Club like she owned the place and the three men followed her inside. It was a fairly typical layout, with chairs pushed up around round tables and an open doorway to the kitchen visible at the back of the room; the only people there at the moment were a pair of men at a table in the back and another in the kitchen. One of the men at the table, a young fellow wearing wizard's robes, called out, "Hey, halfling! This isn't open the public - it's members only!"</p><p></p><p>Wracking her brain at top speed, Ageratum pulled up the name of the seedy man who had hired them to steal the "statues" of the petrified barbarians from a cargo ship some months back. "Boris sent us," she replied. "He said you might be looking to expand your ranks."</p><p></p><p>"You know Boris?" asked the wizard, clearly impressed, then frowned at Harlan's paladin accoutrements. Ageratum quickly went with Alistair's cover story, that they had rolled a paladin earlier and stole all of his stuff. "Figure having one of us look like a paladin might get us into some places that'd be otherwise harder to get into, and of the four of us, he fit in the armor the best," she explained.</p><p></p><p>"I like your moxie," <strong>Harold Hecuba</strong> replied, nodding to himself. "Okay, we can't let you into the rest of this establishment until you're officially voted in, an' that ain't gonna happen tonight because most everyone's out takin' advantage of all the visitors we got in town, but you're welcome to start making your trade pickin' pockets if you want to. Standard rates apply, though: we get 40% of everything you bring in."</p><p></p><p>"Thirty," Ageratum countered.</p><p></p><p>That got Harold laughing out loud. "I like your moxie -- but not that much! This ain't a negotiation, darlin', I'm just tellin' you how it's gonna be: 40% of everything you take within the confines of the Vale. You wanna go on up into the mountains and try your hand against the trolls and ogres, you go right on ahead and feel free to keep the full 100% of your take - I hear there's even more of 'em around than usual, for whatever reason - but you work in town, you pay your dues. Got it?"</p><p></p><p>"Got it," Ageratum replied, not wanting to cause any animosity against the wizard, although she did want to check out the rest of the place, for she could see a set of stairs leading down to a lower level over by the kitchen, and another door behind the wizard and his fighter pal. But it was the fighter, a dumb-looking thug who went by <strong>T-Two</strong>, who inadvertently caused a reason for the heroes to end up fighting their way deeper into the "social club," for he was staring at Chaevaris with a suspicious eye. "Hey!" he suddenly called out, causing Harold to look over at him questioningly. "Ain't you Chaevaris? The hero archer from that song?"</p><p></p><p>The archer took a moment to glare over at Alistair, his stupid song about her having blown their cover, all while simultaneously standing up from her chair, whipping a <em>sleep arrow</em> from her <em>quiver of Ehlonna</em>, drawing it to her bow, and firing it into Harold's chest in a few seconds' time. When that failed to knock him out, she followed up with a regular arrow that hit him in a spot a mere few inches from the first, and that had the wizard falling backwards from his chair to land in a heap on the floor, all before he'd had a chance to cast a single spell.</p><p></p><p>Quick as a wink, Ageratum followed suit, stabbing T-Two in the side with her <em>human bane short sword</em> without even getting up from her chair. He grunted in pain while trying to rise himself, his hand still fumbling at the hilt of his own weapon. Seeing the sudden battle, the thief in the kitchen, <strong>Tongo</strong>, ran out the door, turned the corner, and headed down the wide stairs to the lower level. There was a pair of double doors at the bottom of the stairs, which he slammed shut behind him.</p><p></p><p>Harlan, having already determined through the reading of their auras that both Harold and T-Two were of an evil nature, unsheathed his <em>flaming burst longsword</em> and brought it slicing down at the burly fighter, cutting deep into his flesh and causing him to spill off his chair onto the floor beside his wizardly partner. Knowing the <em>Blood Mirror</em> would likely ensure neither of the two would die of their wounds (and forgetting, in the heat of battle, Ageratum's penchant for frequent follow-up visits to those he rendered unconscious to ensure a more permanent disablement), Harlan went to follow Tongo down the stairs.</p><p></p><p>But Alistair, who had been seated on that side of the table, got there first. Passing over a sack of pebble-boulders to Ogilvy, he instructed his <em>unseen servant</em> to toss one at the doors at the bottom of the stairs. The pebble returned to its normal size upon impact, smashing open the doors so that by the time the sorcerer reached the bottom of the stairs, he had a good shot at Tongo when he fired off a <em>magic missile</em> spell. The missiles struck the fleeing rogue in the back, almost causing him to lose his footing and fall face-first onto the stone floor in a tangle of limbs; only a brief bit of floundering allowed him to keep his footing.</p><p></p><p>But then Chaevaris was standing beside the sorcerer, releasing an arrow that flew into the small of the thief's back and burst out of the front of his chest, leaving him to fall lifelessly to the stone floor. There was no doubt about it: the <em>Blood Mirror</em> would not be stabilizing this particular thief's wounds any time soon, nor would Ageratum's blade be needed to ensure his death. (Which was all for the best, as she was currently slitting the throats of Harold and T-Two, now that Harlan's back was turned.) Harlan joined the pair in time to see the evil fade from Tongo's aura, for dead bodies are inherently neither good nor evil.</p><p></p><p>The hallway in which the three heroes now found themselves went straight ahead for some distance before turning to the right; there was also a doorway about halfway down its length, also on the right. Alistair sent Ambrose flying down to the end of the hallway to check it out, and the grackle found it to be an area overlooking a combat arena some ten feet below. As there was nobody down there - nor in the "gladiator prep room" on the far side of the arena, blocked off by a lowered iron portcullis - Ambrose flew down to the arena floor and had a look. There was another lowered portcullis off to the right, through which the bird could see a rectangular room with several passageways leading off from it - and another human figure rising up from a set of stairs leading into the room. Ambrose flapped his wings and returned to his master to report back what he'd seen.</p><p></p><p>Chaevaris and Harlan had moved up to the closed door in the side of the wide corridor, but they preferred to wait for Ageratum to get there, as she was the one with the skills needed to determine if there were any traps waiting for intruders - a not unreasonable fear in a guild devoted to thievery. Once the halfling arrived and gave it a look-over (during which time Harlan cast a <em>bless</em> spell upon the group), she announced it to be safe and pulled the door open, revealing a short flight of stairs leading down into the rectangular chamber Ambrose had seen through the portcullis. Harlan and Chaevaris went down immediately, while Ageratum activated her <em>cloak of arachnida</em> and scampered up the wall, moving over to the ceiling once she hit the room below. She'd tucked the bottom of her cloak into her belt so it wouldn't dangle below her as she traversed the ceiling. Shrugging at the little halfling's antics, Alistair went down the stairs in the normal fashion, his familiar once again perched upon his left shoulder.</p><p></p><p><strong>Roy</strong>, the rogue coming up from the guild's lowest level, saw the group of strangers advancing upon him with weapons drawn and spun about to flee back the way he'd come. Harlan was in fast pursuit, but then Roy entered a lower chamber where he had two companions there providing additional combat support. "Intruders!" he gasped as he burst into the room, and a fighter, <strong>Jonas</strong>, stepped up to block the doorway and prevent Harlan from entering - not without first dealing with him, in any case. He swung his longsword at the paladin, catching him with a nick in the side before he could get his shield up to deflect the blow. Behind him, off to the side, the cleric <strong>Father Gilligan</strong> started casting some sort of spell.</p><p></p><p>But Harlan was well up to the challenge Jonas provided. He brought his <em>flaming burst longsword</em> crashing against the fighter's own blade, but it took several thrusts before he was able to get past the fighter's defenses and penetrate his armor. But then Ageratum struck down from just above the doorway, standing inverted above Harlan's head, and Jonas couldn't block the halfling's blade in time, not having expected an attack coming from that direction. Ageratum's <em>human bane short sword</em> split open the top of Jonas's head, causing blood to flow into his eyes - at which time he was taken out when Alistair tossed a "pebble-boulder" over Harlan's shoulder to crash into the temple of the guild warrior, spilling him backwards onto the floor, unconscious, only now with a full-sized boulder perched upon his chest. The doorway was now clear of any resistance and Harlan stepped into the room, but not before Roy decided that fleeing was what he did best, and proceeded to do just that, running down a short corridor off to his right. Ageratum followed along the ceiling, cutting off his escape with a <em>web</em> spell that blocked off the far end of the passageway; Roy barely had enough time to prevent himself from running head-first into the sticky strands.</p><p></p><p>Still at the top of the stairs leading down into the room with the others, Alistair cast a <em>touch of idiocy</em> spell upon his familiar and instructed Ambrose to go employ it against the spellcaster below. With a flap of his wings the grackle was off, flying into the room and heading straight for the robed cleric, who had stepped even further back when Harlan had entered the room. There was a moment of hesitancy when the grackle tried getting closer to the cleric - almost as if some unknown force were trying to keep him away - but then Ambrose shrugged off the effects and flew right over the cleric's head, casually tapping him on his bald pate with a clawed foot in passing. The <em>touch of idiocy</em> spell, thus triggered, reduced Father Gilligan's mental faculties to such an extent he found himself not able to cast any but his most basic of spells. Ambrose, his job completed, flew to the far side of the room - well out of immediate combat range - and alit upon the rung of a wooden ladder leading up to a hidden door in the ceiling.</p><p></p><p>Chaevaris had activated her <em>boots of speed</em> to enter the room in time to prevent Roy from escaping and seeking additional help from any guild members still in the area. She shot the rogue in the back with a <em>sleep arrow</em> as he stood helplessly before the webbing that blocked off his escape, but that failed to bring him down.</p><p></p><p>Harlan spun to face Father Gilligan and found himself up against the same force trying to prevent him from attacking the cleric, but he forced himself to ignore the <em>sanctuary</em> spell and attacked him with his flaming blade while the cleric was casting some other unknown spell. The paladin, after determining Father Gilligan was as evil as they came, channeled Pelor's holy energy through his blade and brought it down upon the cleric in a smiting attack which caused him to stagger backwards, barely keeping on his feet. Alistair, finally entering the lower room, tried finishing him off with a <em>magic missile</em> spell but found himself unable to attack for some reason, the sorcerer having a more difficult time in ignoring the cleric's previously-cast <em>sanctuary</em> spell. With nothing better to do, he ordered Ogilvy to block the passageway in which Roy was trapped; although the <em>unseen servant</em> couldn't out-and-out grapple with the thief if he tried rushing past, he at least was a perfectly invisible form the size and shape of a man that might hamper Roy's efforts to escape.</p><p></p><p>Chaevaris turned in place and sent an arrow into Father Gilligan, hesitating for the merely briefest of seconds as she overcame the effects of the <em>sanctuary</em> spell. Her arrow pierced all the way through the evil cleric's neck, and then he was dead, far beyond the <em>Blood Mirror</em>'s ability to do anything about it. At the same time, Ageratum went creeping down the corridor ceiling and unleashed her sword's <em>human bane</em> blade upon Roy, cutting him down to pieces. Then, once he was dead, she removed the webbing from her spell so the heroes could exit through the open doorway she'd blocked Roy from using.</p><p></p><p>The group looted a <em>potion of cure moderate wounds</em> from Father Gilligan's belt and Harlan helped himself to the cleric's masterwork heavy mace (after determining the weapon itself was not of an evil nature); Ageratum found a small pouch filled with black pearls upon the cleric's belt and freed it. Jonas had another healing potion and one of <em>undetectable alignment</em>, which the heroes pocketed as well, before moving on and searching the guild for Blorkane's stolen goods. "They'll likely have it stashed where they keep the rest of their treasure," Ageratum explained, "which works to our advantage because I intend to loot this place down to the last copper coin!"</p><p></p><p>Fanning out, Alistair explored a room holding four upright human dummies, puzzling at their possible use until he realized they were a means by which the thieves could practice their pickpocketing skills; Ambrose, in the meantime, flew on ahead and found an empty barracks. Ageratum followed the grackle, opening a door at the far end of the bunkroom which turned out to be an empty office; a quick perusal found nothing of note. Chaevaris, however, had found an underground dock with nearly a dozen two-person rowboats, with water-filled tunnel exits to a stream to the north and a smaller passageway leading back to the south. She chose this smaller passageway, finding the water in this area to be ankle deep before leading to a side passageway back on solid ground with a pair of impressive-looking doors, one of them looking rather like a vault door. "Guys!" she called out to her friends. "I think I found the treasury!"</p><p></p><p>While the others converged upon the underground dock (and Ageratum followed the archer's path but on the ceiling, avoiding the muddy waters below), Chaevaris decided to give the non-vault door a try - it was, she figured, the least likely to be trapped. The small room beyond contained only a chamber pot, a small washtable, and a full-length mirror - nothing of real interest. But by then Ageratum had caught up to her, and the halfling applied her attention to opening the vault door.</p><p></p><p>The door had a lever which apparently served as a doorknob, and the greedy halfling, eager to get to the riches no doubt held within, gave only a cursory glance at the handle before trying to open it - thereby directly touching the contact poison that had been smeared on the handle's surface. Fortunately, while she cursed herself for not having noticed such a simple trap, the guild members had apparently not been very attentive in keeping the poison refreshed at a regular rate, for most of it had dried up and become ineffective; Ageratum felt none the worse for wear for having blundered into such an obvious trap. Wiping her hands upon her pants, she used the end of her cloak as a barrier to prevent skin contact with what was left of the poison, and determined the entire lever system itself was a ruse; the lever didn't actually move at all! Looking desperately for a hidden lever or something, she was dismayed when she came up empty on that front as well. Ageratum gritted her teeth, trying not to scream in frustration: to be this close the treasure and not be able to get inside!</p><p></p><p>"Wait a minute," murmured Chaevaris, recalling the mirror inside the other room. "I'll bet the mirror is the real way in!" She called for Alistair to come cast a <em>detect magic</em> spell on the mirror, and while the fussy sorcerer insisted on wasting time with a <em>prestidigitation</em> spell to clear his shoes and stockings of mud after wading through the ankle-deep waters, the elven archer examined the mirror herself - while being careful not to look directly at her own reflection, in case this was some sort of a magical trap. There were markings on the top and bottom of the mirror's frame, which - if you squinted just the right way - looked like the word "KNOCK" appeared once in each location. On a hunch, Chaevaris said "Knock knock" aloud and found herself pulled into the mirror's interior, only to be cast out again through another mirror, this one inside the vault they'd been trying to enter. Grinning at her success, and then even more so when she saw all of the sacks of coins and other valuables stored on shelves along one wall, she also spotted the vault door and noted it had a much simpler handle from this side. Wary of possible contact poison, the archer opened the door with her sleeve, revealing Ageratum and a grumbling Alistair. "I say, Elfy," he complained, "are you going to tell me I waded through that muck for nothing?"</p><p></p><p>"I found the treasure," Chaevaris replied, lessening the severity of Alistair's mood. She pointed to a large sack of Blorkane's pilfered goods, including the journal written by the mummy servitor to the vampire pair before he had been slain and reanimated in the undead form in which the heroes had met - and killed - him. But there was also a carrying case of some sort and 17 assorted bags of coins and such, all of which (after Ageratum had examined them for potential traps) Chaevaris stashed in her extradimensional haversack for easy transport.</p><p></p><p>"It's a shame, but we'll have to leave the magic mirrors behind," the archer said. "They won't fit into the haversack."</p><p></p><p>"Then by all means, let's smash this mirror and then close up the vault door," suggested Ageratum. "We'll leave the mirror in the other room intact, but with the one in the vault smashed they won't know why it isn't working - that ought to eat up some time before the theft is confirmed." She did the honors herself, smashing the glass in the vault with the hilt of her short sword. "Okay, let's go."</p><p></p><p>"One moment," pressed Chaevaris, reaching into her own coin purse. "I want to add a little salt to their wounds." And then, fishing out a single copper piece from her pouch, she flipped it to the floor in the place where there had once stood 17 bags of coins valuing a total of 3,500 pieces of gold. Ageratum frowned, recalling her desire to rob the guild of every last copper coin, but then she saw how much better this would be. "Okay," she agreed, "let's go!"</p><p></p><p>The trio returned to Harlan's side and the paladin reported there had been no further encounters during their excursion to the vault. "We can exit using a couple of these boats," he suggested. "That way, we won't run the risk of bumping into the rest of the guild, should they return early from their pickpocketing exploits." That said, he helped Ageratum into a boat while Alistair and Chaevaris took their places in a second small craft. Then they paddled their way down the tunnel to the north, which Harlan figured would take them to the stream that meandered along that side of Ghourmand Vale.</p><p></p><p>Right as they were entering the tunnel, another pair came running down the dock to stop them: a rogue in leather armor and another cleric. They got to the edge of the dock and the cleric swore, enraged that the heroes had gotten away - and ignoring the numerous other rowboats with which he might have tried to follow them. "Oh well," sighed Father Bouchard Coletrane, the vampire from Mitrek who had been responsible for the creation of the vampire spawn Carly who had given the heroes so much trouble before they were finally able to see to her permanent demise. "I suppose you're not much use to me now, are you?" And with that, he pulled the <em>dominated</em> thief's head to the side and plunged his fangs into the man's neck, draining him dry as the heroes rowed to safety.</p><p></p><p>At the very least, he knew who now had the journal with the notes about the <em>Blood Mirror</em>. And while he wasn't able to cross the running water to get to them at the moment, it would only be a matter of time....</p><p></p><p> - - -</p><p></p><p>Besides the 3,500 gp and Blorkane's items, the carrying case contained a stone with a permanent <em>light</em> spell cast upon it, a <em>wand of knock</em>, a <em>wand of arcane lock</em>, a <em>scroll of rope trick</em>, a <em>potion of gaseous form</em>, a <em>potion of spider climb</em>, and a small <em>bag of holding</em>: the perfect kit for a thief up to no good. We've decided to keep it all on hand, as there's no telling when any of that might come in handy.</p><p></p><p>We've also decided it's time for our PCs to move out of the Stout farmhouse. As nice as they are (and despite Mrs. Stout's wonderfully filling meals), it's not right to continue to put them in danger, especially now that there's at least one vampire gunning for us. Instead, we plan to move into the Stone Keep, since the extra rooms are no longer being used by Alistair's sister-in-law, her twins, and his former nanny.</p><p></p><p>We've pretty much decided we need to go rescue Blorkane's sister from the aboleth next. Then we can focus our attention on the vampire(s) after the journal once she's been rescued and returned.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Richards, post: 8999516, member: 508"] [B]ADVENTURE 22: EX LIBRIS AD DIABOLI[/B] PC Roster: [INDENT]Ageratum Purslane, halfling rogue 7[/INDENT] [INDENT] Alistair Mandelberen Pastlethwaite, human sorcerer 7[/INDENT] [INDENT] Chaevaris Noarunal, elf archer 7[/INDENT] [INDENT] Harlan Starblade, half-elf paladin 7[/INDENT] Game Session Date: 20 April 2023 - - - The four heroes dismounted from their steeds and led them into the Stouts' barn, each horse - or pony, in the case of Ageratum's - being stripped of its saddle and saddlebags, rubbed down, and left in its customary stable with a sufficient supply of hay before the adventurers made their way into the farmhouse to say hello to the farmers who allowed them to stay there when they weren't out of town away on adventuring business as they'd just been for the past month or more. "It'll be nice to have a home-cooked meal!" enthused the little halfling, and she was quite right, for Mrs. Stout was an excellent cook, although Alistair occasionally missed some of the fancier repasts to which he'd been accustomed as a nobleman's son. "Well, you're back!" greeted the farmer's wife as they entered the dwelling, tired from so many days on the road - it had been over a week ago they'd left Greyhawk City behind. "Have yourselves a seat and I'll whip you up some vittles!" Alistair didn't even wince any more at the thought of his cultured palate scarfing down "vittles" - he'd been an adventurer, among these common people, long enough now to appreciate a good, hearty meal despite the simplicity of the fare. "Oh, and this came for you while you were gone," said Mrs. Stout, dropping a folded and sealed sheet of parchment in Alistair's hands. The sorcerer took a look at the seal, recognized it as the bard Holyrood Carp's emblem (a fish, naturally), and hurriedly opened it. "He's recently arrived back in town after weeks of travel himself," Alistair told the others after scanning the contents of the letter, "and invites us to the Dark and Light Club when we get back to hear him sing - and he has some interesting tidbits of information about the [I]Blood Mirror[/I]!" At that, Harlan looked up with interest; the half-elf paladin was always curious to learn more about the magic ruby gemstone he carried, which helped stabilize the wounds of the dying around him. "We should go catch up with him," suggested Chaevaris. "But tomorrow - I think we've all earned a good night's sleep in an actual bed with a straw mattress!" Thus it was the following evening, just as dusk gave way to full night, that the four adventurers entered the Dark and Light Club and found the bard waiting to go onto the stage for his night's performance. He greeted them and passed over a small pouch of platinum coins to Alistair. "Your payment for your last batch of songs," he explained, and the sorcerer took a moment to peek into the pouch to try to see how many coins might be in there before tying it to his belt. "You have some information about the [I]Blood Mirror[/I]?" pressed Harlan. "Well, kind of," replied Carp. "I have information about where to find information about the [I]Blood Mirror[/I]." He went on to explain that the gemstone had once been in the possession of a holy man named Balaur the Lightbringer, but it was rumored the [I]Blood Mirror[/I] somehow turned him to evil. At that, the heroes looked worriedly at Harlan, the "holy man" now currently possessing the gemstone, but he had shown no tendencies to turn to evil himself - and besides, they were pretty sure "Balaur" was the name of the missing vampire whose empty coffin they'd dragged into the town square after slaying his wife Magda and their mummified servant. If this was the same person, they were confident his fall from grace had not been caused by the [I]Blood Mirror[/I], but rather by the fact his wife turned him into a vampire after having succumbed herself. "There's a journal, written in the hand of the servant of this Balaur," Carp explained, and the heroes assumed that would be the one who had later been transformed into an undead mummy, "which details all he had learned about the [I]Blood Mirror[/I]. And that journal recently came into the possession of a wizard in our own small boomtown here - although it was apparently just stolen from him." "Who might this be?" demanded Chaevaris. "That sad sack at the end of the bar, crying into his drink," replied the bard, pointing at a robed individual with a sour expression sitting by himself. Alistair recognized him immediately: it was Blorkane, an elderly wizard to whom the young sorcerer had often gone to have some particular bit of arcane esoterica explained to him when he found himself first walking the path of an adventuring sorcerer. Heading over to say hello, Alistair soon had Blorkane's story out of him: his place had been robbed while he'd been out, no doubt by the local thieves' guild, who were keeping extra busy with all of the visitors in town. "Yeah, I thought this place was a bit more crowded than I remembered," Ageratum piped up. "What's going on?" "There are delegations from both Celene and Veluna, come to determine once and for all which country owns Ghourmand Vale," Blorkane replied. "The thieves are out in full numbers, picking pockets and robbing the houses of even the most respected of scholarly wizards!" "What all did they take?" asked Harlan, so far only aware of the mummy's journal having been stolen. "Just about everything of arcane import!" complained Blorkane. "My books on aboleths, my [I]potions of water breathing[/I], my [I]wand of dispel magic[/I], my maps of the underground river systems in the area..." "Aboleths?" Harlan interrupted. "Are you doing research on aboleths?" "You're not still thinking about crossing them with pigs, are you?" demanded Alistair. "No, no, nothing like that," Blorkane replied. "It's just that my sister, [B]Porcelene[/B], has likely run afoul of an aboleth, and I had been hoping to hire a group of adventurers to rescue her. But those thieves took the reward money I was going to use to pay them as well...." "These thieves," Ageratum interjected. "They wouldn't be the Wild Guys, would they?" "The very same," Blorkane answered, returning his attention to his mug of ale. "I've barely enough for the occasional drink now, and there's not much I can do about it, either, what with our illustrious head of security turning a blind eye to their depredations." "The Wild Guys is the local thieves' guild around here," Ageratum explained. "They're headquartered in the Wild Coast Social Club, just a few blocks away from here, near the stream." "I think we should pay these Wild Guys a visit," suggested Harlan. "Hang on - I'm due on stage," said Holyrood. "At least wait to hear my first song - it's my first performance of 'Jasgund Singh' at this location." And he grabbed up his lute and made his way to the front stage, cheered on by the tables of people who had come to hear him perform, many of them several drinks into their night's allotment and already feeling no pain. The song went over well, although Alistair wondered if any of the people in the audience knew just who this Singh fellow truly was, before deciding they didn't really care; they just liked the fact the lyrics were taking down someone in some sort of authority. The sorcerer made a mental note of that, wondering if he should write any songs about the movers and shakers in Ghourmand Vale: Kasselban Picksmart, the mouthy dwarf in charge of the Slippery Shaft Mines came immediately to mind. Harlan led the four heroes outside and allowed Ageratum to lead them to the Wild Coast Social Club, which turned out to be a single-story building made of sturdy stone, squeezed in between a couple of other shops. It had several latticed windows, with dirty amber glass that was translucent, not transparent - you could make out shapes and shadows inside, but that was about it. "So, how do we want to approach this?" the halfling asked the others. "We're recruits?" suggested Alistair. Turning to the little halfling, he said, "You're the leader of our little group of would-be thieves, eager to prove our worth." "Harlan hardly looks the part," Chaevaris explained patiently - and indeed, the paladin's gleaming full-plate armor, emblazoned as it was with the shining sun holy symbol of Pelor, made the half-elf a very unlikely-looking thief. But Alistair had that figured out as well. Turning to Harlan, he suggested, "All you need to do is to keep quiet - you can't actually lie if you don't say anything. We'll just insinuate that the original wearer of the armor...doesn't need it anymore. Because we killed him. Because we're evil thieves and murderers." "You don't really come across as a low-born thief, either," Chaevaris pointed out. "You look more like a foppish, spoiled-brat baby nobleman, who's more comfortable in a--" "Why, whatcha mean, Elfy?" replied Alistair, cutting her off with a truly horrible attempt at talking like a stereotypical commoner - while visibly scratching himself, just for good measure. "I'm just a flea-bitten common man, same as any. I drinks me my beer and eats me down my vittles." Poised on his master's left shoulder, Ambrose took a step to the side as if wishing to distance himself from this performance. Harlan put a hand on the sorcerer's other shoulder to get him to stop. "I will agree to the charade," he offered, "if you promise not to talk, either. We'll let Ageratum take the lead and do our talking for us." "Fair enough," agreed Alistair, although he couldn't for the life of him figure out what had been so bad about his plan. "Before we go in, though, I want to cast a few spells." He placed a [I]mage armor[/I] and [I]shield[/I] enhancement upon himself, then cast a [I]flame arrow[/I] spell upon both Chaevaris and Harlan's arrows. Finally, with the words, "Ogilvy, if you please!" he cast an [I]unseen servant[/I] spell. "I don't dare have him carry any sacks of 'pebble-boulders,' but it might help having someone along that nobody else can see." And then he passed two sacks of "pebble-boulders" to Ageratum. For her part, the little halfling passed over her [I]potion of misdirection[/I] to Harlan and had him drink it down, thinking it might be helpful if anyone tried checking up on the paladin's story using magical means. Ageratum pushed open the door to the Wild Coast Social Club like she owned the place and the three men followed her inside. It was a fairly typical layout, with chairs pushed up around round tables and an open doorway to the kitchen visible at the back of the room; the only people there at the moment were a pair of men at a table in the back and another in the kitchen. One of the men at the table, a young fellow wearing wizard's robes, called out, "Hey, halfling! This isn't open the public - it's members only!" Wracking her brain at top speed, Ageratum pulled up the name of the seedy man who had hired them to steal the "statues" of the petrified barbarians from a cargo ship some months back. "Boris sent us," she replied. "He said you might be looking to expand your ranks." "You know Boris?" asked the wizard, clearly impressed, then frowned at Harlan's paladin accoutrements. Ageratum quickly went with Alistair's cover story, that they had rolled a paladin earlier and stole all of his stuff. "Figure having one of us look like a paladin might get us into some places that'd be otherwise harder to get into, and of the four of us, he fit in the armor the best," she explained. "I like your moxie," [B]Harold Hecuba[/B] replied, nodding to himself. "Okay, we can't let you into the rest of this establishment until you're officially voted in, an' that ain't gonna happen tonight because most everyone's out takin' advantage of all the visitors we got in town, but you're welcome to start making your trade pickin' pockets if you want to. Standard rates apply, though: we get 40% of everything you bring in." "Thirty," Ageratum countered. That got Harold laughing out loud. "I like your moxie -- but not that much! This ain't a negotiation, darlin', I'm just tellin' you how it's gonna be: 40% of everything you take within the confines of the Vale. You wanna go on up into the mountains and try your hand against the trolls and ogres, you go right on ahead and feel free to keep the full 100% of your take - I hear there's even more of 'em around than usual, for whatever reason - but you work in town, you pay your dues. Got it?" "Got it," Ageratum replied, not wanting to cause any animosity against the wizard, although she did want to check out the rest of the place, for she could see a set of stairs leading down to a lower level over by the kitchen, and another door behind the wizard and his fighter pal. But it was the fighter, a dumb-looking thug who went by [B]T-Two[/B], who inadvertently caused a reason for the heroes to end up fighting their way deeper into the "social club," for he was staring at Chaevaris with a suspicious eye. "Hey!" he suddenly called out, causing Harold to look over at him questioningly. "Ain't you Chaevaris? The hero archer from that song?" The archer took a moment to glare over at Alistair, his stupid song about her having blown their cover, all while simultaneously standing up from her chair, whipping a [I]sleep arrow[/I] from her [I]quiver of Ehlonna[/I], drawing it to her bow, and firing it into Harold's chest in a few seconds' time. When that failed to knock him out, she followed up with a regular arrow that hit him in a spot a mere few inches from the first, and that had the wizard falling backwards from his chair to land in a heap on the floor, all before he'd had a chance to cast a single spell. Quick as a wink, Ageratum followed suit, stabbing T-Two in the side with her [I]human bane short sword[/I] without even getting up from her chair. He grunted in pain while trying to rise himself, his hand still fumbling at the hilt of his own weapon. Seeing the sudden battle, the thief in the kitchen, [B]Tongo[/B], ran out the door, turned the corner, and headed down the wide stairs to the lower level. There was a pair of double doors at the bottom of the stairs, which he slammed shut behind him. Harlan, having already determined through the reading of their auras that both Harold and T-Two were of an evil nature, unsheathed his [I]flaming burst longsword[/I] and brought it slicing down at the burly fighter, cutting deep into his flesh and causing him to spill off his chair onto the floor beside his wizardly partner. Knowing the [I]Blood Mirror[/I] would likely ensure neither of the two would die of their wounds (and forgetting, in the heat of battle, Ageratum's penchant for frequent follow-up visits to those he rendered unconscious to ensure a more permanent disablement), Harlan went to follow Tongo down the stairs. But Alistair, who had been seated on that side of the table, got there first. Passing over a sack of pebble-boulders to Ogilvy, he instructed his [I]unseen servant[/I] to toss one at the doors at the bottom of the stairs. The pebble returned to its normal size upon impact, smashing open the doors so that by the time the sorcerer reached the bottom of the stairs, he had a good shot at Tongo when he fired off a [I]magic missile[/I] spell. The missiles struck the fleeing rogue in the back, almost causing him to lose his footing and fall face-first onto the stone floor in a tangle of limbs; only a brief bit of floundering allowed him to keep his footing. But then Chaevaris was standing beside the sorcerer, releasing an arrow that flew into the small of the thief's back and burst out of the front of his chest, leaving him to fall lifelessly to the stone floor. There was no doubt about it: the [I]Blood Mirror[/I] would not be stabilizing this particular thief's wounds any time soon, nor would Ageratum's blade be needed to ensure his death. (Which was all for the best, as she was currently slitting the throats of Harold and T-Two, now that Harlan's back was turned.) Harlan joined the pair in time to see the evil fade from Tongo's aura, for dead bodies are inherently neither good nor evil. The hallway in which the three heroes now found themselves went straight ahead for some distance before turning to the right; there was also a doorway about halfway down its length, also on the right. Alistair sent Ambrose flying down to the end of the hallway to check it out, and the grackle found it to be an area overlooking a combat arena some ten feet below. As there was nobody down there - nor in the "gladiator prep room" on the far side of the arena, blocked off by a lowered iron portcullis - Ambrose flew down to the arena floor and had a look. There was another lowered portcullis off to the right, through which the bird could see a rectangular room with several passageways leading off from it - and another human figure rising up from a set of stairs leading into the room. Ambrose flapped his wings and returned to his master to report back what he'd seen. Chaevaris and Harlan had moved up to the closed door in the side of the wide corridor, but they preferred to wait for Ageratum to get there, as she was the one with the skills needed to determine if there were any traps waiting for intruders - a not unreasonable fear in a guild devoted to thievery. Once the halfling arrived and gave it a look-over (during which time Harlan cast a [I]bless[/I] spell upon the group), she announced it to be safe and pulled the door open, revealing a short flight of stairs leading down into the rectangular chamber Ambrose had seen through the portcullis. Harlan and Chaevaris went down immediately, while Ageratum activated her [I]cloak of arachnida[/I] and scampered up the wall, moving over to the ceiling once she hit the room below. She'd tucked the bottom of her cloak into her belt so it wouldn't dangle below her as she traversed the ceiling. Shrugging at the little halfling's antics, Alistair went down the stairs in the normal fashion, his familiar once again perched upon his left shoulder. [B]Roy[/B], the rogue coming up from the guild's lowest level, saw the group of strangers advancing upon him with weapons drawn and spun about to flee back the way he'd come. Harlan was in fast pursuit, but then Roy entered a lower chamber where he had two companions there providing additional combat support. "Intruders!" he gasped as he burst into the room, and a fighter, [B]Jonas[/B], stepped up to block the doorway and prevent Harlan from entering - not without first dealing with him, in any case. He swung his longsword at the paladin, catching him with a nick in the side before he could get his shield up to deflect the blow. Behind him, off to the side, the cleric [B]Father Gilligan[/B] started casting some sort of spell. But Harlan was well up to the challenge Jonas provided. He brought his [I]flaming burst longsword[/I] crashing against the fighter's own blade, but it took several thrusts before he was able to get past the fighter's defenses and penetrate his armor. But then Ageratum struck down from just above the doorway, standing inverted above Harlan's head, and Jonas couldn't block the halfling's blade in time, not having expected an attack coming from that direction. Ageratum's [I]human bane short sword[/I] split open the top of Jonas's head, causing blood to flow into his eyes - at which time he was taken out when Alistair tossed a "pebble-boulder" over Harlan's shoulder to crash into the temple of the guild warrior, spilling him backwards onto the floor, unconscious, only now with a full-sized boulder perched upon his chest. The doorway was now clear of any resistance and Harlan stepped into the room, but not before Roy decided that fleeing was what he did best, and proceeded to do just that, running down a short corridor off to his right. Ageratum followed along the ceiling, cutting off his escape with a [I]web[/I] spell that blocked off the far end of the passageway; Roy barely had enough time to prevent himself from running head-first into the sticky strands. Still at the top of the stairs leading down into the room with the others, Alistair cast a [I]touch of idiocy[/I] spell upon his familiar and instructed Ambrose to go employ it against the spellcaster below. With a flap of his wings the grackle was off, flying into the room and heading straight for the robed cleric, who had stepped even further back when Harlan had entered the room. There was a moment of hesitancy when the grackle tried getting closer to the cleric - almost as if some unknown force were trying to keep him away - but then Ambrose shrugged off the effects and flew right over the cleric's head, casually tapping him on his bald pate with a clawed foot in passing. The [I]touch of idiocy[/I] spell, thus triggered, reduced Father Gilligan's mental faculties to such an extent he found himself not able to cast any but his most basic of spells. Ambrose, his job completed, flew to the far side of the room - well out of immediate combat range - and alit upon the rung of a wooden ladder leading up to a hidden door in the ceiling. Chaevaris had activated her [I]boots of speed[/I] to enter the room in time to prevent Roy from escaping and seeking additional help from any guild members still in the area. She shot the rogue in the back with a [I]sleep arrow[/I] as he stood helplessly before the webbing that blocked off his escape, but that failed to bring him down. Harlan spun to face Father Gilligan and found himself up against the same force trying to prevent him from attacking the cleric, but he forced himself to ignore the [I]sanctuary[/I] spell and attacked him with his flaming blade while the cleric was casting some other unknown spell. The paladin, after determining Father Gilligan was as evil as they came, channeled Pelor's holy energy through his blade and brought it down upon the cleric in a smiting attack which caused him to stagger backwards, barely keeping on his feet. Alistair, finally entering the lower room, tried finishing him off with a [I]magic missile[/I] spell but found himself unable to attack for some reason, the sorcerer having a more difficult time in ignoring the cleric's previously-cast [I]sanctuary[/I] spell. With nothing better to do, he ordered Ogilvy to block the passageway in which Roy was trapped; although the [I]unseen servant[/I] couldn't out-and-out grapple with the thief if he tried rushing past, he at least was a perfectly invisible form the size and shape of a man that might hamper Roy's efforts to escape. Chaevaris turned in place and sent an arrow into Father Gilligan, hesitating for the merely briefest of seconds as she overcame the effects of the [I]sanctuary[/I] spell. Her arrow pierced all the way through the evil cleric's neck, and then he was dead, far beyond the [I]Blood Mirror[/I]'s ability to do anything about it. At the same time, Ageratum went creeping down the corridor ceiling and unleashed her sword's [I]human bane[/I] blade upon Roy, cutting him down to pieces. Then, once he was dead, she removed the webbing from her spell so the heroes could exit through the open doorway she'd blocked Roy from using. The group looted a [I]potion of cure moderate wounds[/I] from Father Gilligan's belt and Harlan helped himself to the cleric's masterwork heavy mace (after determining the weapon itself was not of an evil nature); Ageratum found a small pouch filled with black pearls upon the cleric's belt and freed it. Jonas had another healing potion and one of [I]undetectable alignment[/I], which the heroes pocketed as well, before moving on and searching the guild for Blorkane's stolen goods. "They'll likely have it stashed where they keep the rest of their treasure," Ageratum explained, "which works to our advantage because I intend to loot this place down to the last copper coin!" Fanning out, Alistair explored a room holding four upright human dummies, puzzling at their possible use until he realized they were a means by which the thieves could practice their pickpocketing skills; Ambrose, in the meantime, flew on ahead and found an empty barracks. Ageratum followed the grackle, opening a door at the far end of the bunkroom which turned out to be an empty office; a quick perusal found nothing of note. Chaevaris, however, had found an underground dock with nearly a dozen two-person rowboats, with water-filled tunnel exits to a stream to the north and a smaller passageway leading back to the south. She chose this smaller passageway, finding the water in this area to be ankle deep before leading to a side passageway back on solid ground with a pair of impressive-looking doors, one of them looking rather like a vault door. "Guys!" she called out to her friends. "I think I found the treasury!" While the others converged upon the underground dock (and Ageratum followed the archer's path but on the ceiling, avoiding the muddy waters below), Chaevaris decided to give the non-vault door a try - it was, she figured, the least likely to be trapped. The small room beyond contained only a chamber pot, a small washtable, and a full-length mirror - nothing of real interest. But by then Ageratum had caught up to her, and the halfling applied her attention to opening the vault door. The door had a lever which apparently served as a doorknob, and the greedy halfling, eager to get to the riches no doubt held within, gave only a cursory glance at the handle before trying to open it - thereby directly touching the contact poison that had been smeared on the handle's surface. Fortunately, while she cursed herself for not having noticed such a simple trap, the guild members had apparently not been very attentive in keeping the poison refreshed at a regular rate, for most of it had dried up and become ineffective; Ageratum felt none the worse for wear for having blundered into such an obvious trap. Wiping her hands upon her pants, she used the end of her cloak as a barrier to prevent skin contact with what was left of the poison, and determined the entire lever system itself was a ruse; the lever didn't actually move at all! Looking desperately for a hidden lever or something, she was dismayed when she came up empty on that front as well. Ageratum gritted her teeth, trying not to scream in frustration: to be this close the treasure and not be able to get inside! "Wait a minute," murmured Chaevaris, recalling the mirror inside the other room. "I'll bet the mirror is the real way in!" She called for Alistair to come cast a [I]detect magic[/I] spell on the mirror, and while the fussy sorcerer insisted on wasting time with a [I]prestidigitation[/I] spell to clear his shoes and stockings of mud after wading through the ankle-deep waters, the elven archer examined the mirror herself - while being careful not to look directly at her own reflection, in case this was some sort of a magical trap. There were markings on the top and bottom of the mirror's frame, which - if you squinted just the right way - looked like the word "KNOCK" appeared once in each location. On a hunch, Chaevaris said "Knock knock" aloud and found herself pulled into the mirror's interior, only to be cast out again through another mirror, this one inside the vault they'd been trying to enter. Grinning at her success, and then even more so when she saw all of the sacks of coins and other valuables stored on shelves along one wall, she also spotted the vault door and noted it had a much simpler handle from this side. Wary of possible contact poison, the archer opened the door with her sleeve, revealing Ageratum and a grumbling Alistair. "I say, Elfy," he complained, "are you going to tell me I waded through that muck for nothing?" "I found the treasure," Chaevaris replied, lessening the severity of Alistair's mood. She pointed to a large sack of Blorkane's pilfered goods, including the journal written by the mummy servitor to the vampire pair before he had been slain and reanimated in the undead form in which the heroes had met - and killed - him. But there was also a carrying case of some sort and 17 assorted bags of coins and such, all of which (after Ageratum had examined them for potential traps) Chaevaris stashed in her extradimensional haversack for easy transport. "It's a shame, but we'll have to leave the magic mirrors behind," the archer said. "They won't fit into the haversack." "Then by all means, let's smash this mirror and then close up the vault door," suggested Ageratum. "We'll leave the mirror in the other room intact, but with the one in the vault smashed they won't know why it isn't working - that ought to eat up some time before the theft is confirmed." She did the honors herself, smashing the glass in the vault with the hilt of her short sword. "Okay, let's go." "One moment," pressed Chaevaris, reaching into her own coin purse. "I want to add a little salt to their wounds." And then, fishing out a single copper piece from her pouch, she flipped it to the floor in the place where there had once stood 17 bags of coins valuing a total of 3,500 pieces of gold. Ageratum frowned, recalling her desire to rob the guild of every last copper coin, but then she saw how much better this would be. "Okay," she agreed, "let's go!" The trio returned to Harlan's side and the paladin reported there had been no further encounters during their excursion to the vault. "We can exit using a couple of these boats," he suggested. "That way, we won't run the risk of bumping into the rest of the guild, should they return early from their pickpocketing exploits." That said, he helped Ageratum into a boat while Alistair and Chaevaris took their places in a second small craft. Then they paddled their way down the tunnel to the north, which Harlan figured would take them to the stream that meandered along that side of Ghourmand Vale. Right as they were entering the tunnel, another pair came running down the dock to stop them: a rogue in leather armor and another cleric. They got to the edge of the dock and the cleric swore, enraged that the heroes had gotten away - and ignoring the numerous other rowboats with which he might have tried to follow them. "Oh well," sighed Father Bouchard Coletrane, the vampire from Mitrek who had been responsible for the creation of the vampire spawn Carly who had given the heroes so much trouble before they were finally able to see to her permanent demise. "I suppose you're not much use to me now, are you?" And with that, he pulled the [I]dominated[/I] thief's head to the side and plunged his fangs into the man's neck, draining him dry as the heroes rowed to safety. At the very least, he knew who now had the journal with the notes about the [I]Blood Mirror[/I]. And while he wasn't able to cross the running water to get to them at the moment, it would only be a matter of time.... - - - Besides the 3,500 gp and Blorkane's items, the carrying case contained a stone with a permanent [I]light[/I] spell cast upon it, a [I]wand of knock[/I], a [I]wand of arcane lock[/I], a [I]scroll of rope trick[/I], a [I]potion of gaseous form[/I], a [I]potion of spider climb[/I], and a small [I]bag of holding[/I]: the perfect kit for a thief up to no good. We've decided to keep it all on hand, as there's no telling when any of that might come in handy. We've also decided it's time for our PCs to move out of the Stout farmhouse. As nice as they are (and despite Mrs. Stout's wonderfully filling meals), it's not right to continue to put them in danger, especially now that there's at least one vampire gunning for us. Instead, we plan to move into the Stone Keep, since the extra rooms are no longer being used by Alistair's sister-in-law, her twins, and his former nanny. We've pretty much decided we need to go rescue Blorkane's sister from the aboleth next. Then we can focus our attention on the vampire(s) after the journal once she's been rescued and returned. [/QUOTE]
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