Of Sound Mind the Halfling Way

[the Jester]

The Bakeswells are more than happy to see our heroes. The group is welcomed out of the continuing storm into the wagons with cheer, food and strong beverages. After warming themselves for a time and a healthy helping of pie and mulled cider, the group happily relates the tale of the jam contest to Leanne Bakeswell and the group pulls forth the jar of mysterious jam concocted by that Benjy Peachtree upstart.

Leanne examines it; sniffs it; looks at it carefully. She spreads a little on some crackers and then passes them around. The jam is certainly fine-tasting! Mmm, what a nice flavor!

But what flavor is it?

Leanne Bakeswell, well-known for the breadth of her culinary expertise, frowns. She tries a second cracker, then a taste of the jam by itself. Exasperated, she says, “I must admit- I can’t tell what’s in this.”

The wagon falls silent. Leanne can’t tell? That’s unthinkable!

She leans back and sighs.

“We can find out for you,” proclaims Ed. “Somehow!”

“But how?” wonders Trinia.

“Well,” suggests Sandy, “someone could apprentice himself or herself to Peachtree...”

“Maybe we can trick him,” muses Federico. “If we bring him back what’s left of the jam, he’s bound to need more, so we can follow him, you know, slyly, arf.”

“But there’s already so much jam missing, he’ll blame us,” protests Trinia.

“Not if we blame the kobolds that took it in the first place,” grins Sandy. “We can claim that we followed them and struck them down, but it was too late- they’d already eaten most of the jam!”

“And he’ll surely need to make more,” adds Trinia excitedly. “We can follow him back to wherever he does it!”

A few days’ rest, while the weather improves, and then our heroes set out again, heading back towards Blackwood. Hopefully, they’ll be able to find out just what is in Benjy Peachtree’s jam.

The ground is swampy as they walk; the rains of the last few days have left things bloated with water. Though it’s not too pleasant for walking, the day is bright and warm. Just the thing for overland travel!

And just the thing to bring out the leeches.

Fat and slimy, leeches the size of large dogs slither forth from the tall grass and the wet muck underfoot. Our heroes are assailed! The fall into a rough circle, seeking high ground, and put their weapons to use. Martini dances among the bloodsuckers, twirling his blade back and forth and skewering leech after leech. But soon there are two of the little beasts siphoning his life away, and he grows sluggish and pale and slow. With a groan, the halfling ranger sinks into unconsciousness.

The dog pack is barking furiously as they attack, tearing rubbery leeches from their halfling friends. Federico whimpers and fires his crossbow, crouching next to a bush. Sandy stays close by, jabbing at leeches and frantically trying to cut his way to the bleeding Martini, but by the time he finally does it’s been too long. Barring a miracle-

Checking Martini’s pulse among the ruin of leech bits, Sandy blows out a loud sigh. He’s alive! Maybe it’s something to do with the leeches’ anesthetic, or maybe just his will to live; but Martini made it!*

Our heroes set a camp; they’re in no shape to travel. Mama does her best to tend to Martini’s wounds. Federico offers to help, and she snorts. “I don’t know how much help a dumb dog can be, but you can try.”

The next day Martini comes around. He’s able to limp along or ride one of the dogs, so the group continues towards Blackwood, Benjy Peachtree and the secret ingredients.


Next Time: A little more trouble, then the group reaches Blackwood. What will Benjy Peachtree do when they tell him their tale??

*Or maybe it’s just one of those rare moments when someone successfully rolled to stabilize.

 

[the Jester]

A Little Jam Returns to Benjy Peachtree

Our heroes travel towards Blackwood. They follow the remains of an ancient road let go to ruin until it leads to a depression. The clouds begin to drop rain off and off throughout the day. As the group descends into an area of lower ground, they find themselves moving through a boggy area. The rainwater from the intermittent rain over the last week or two have run down and collected in this area, leaving the ground soft and muddy. As the group proceeds, they find themselves stepping at times into ankle-deep mud or soggy deposits of moss.

Thus, it’s only natural that Phenol Sandybanks (called Sandy by his friends, including us) would leap onto a log to avoid a pool of mucky water; and it’s just plain unfortunate that, as soon as he steps off it and onto a nearby rise of moss and grass, it raises its long snout from the water and takes a bite at him with its sharp yellow teeth.

“Crocodile!” cries Mama.

The croc’s snap takes Sandy in the left leg and almost pulls him from his feet; but those Sandybanks are slippery, and he twists free and backpedals away from it. His leg is bleeding profusely and he’s limping handily. Mama Flapjacks frowns at the crocodile. “You leave those kids alone!” she chastises. Her hand gropes at her belt and she pulls out her mace. Gripping it firmly, she gives the beast a stout blow to the nose!

Federico dismounts clumsily, then casts mage armor on Ethel, his riding dog, who has already sprung forward bravely, snarling and snapping at the crocodile. The reptile must be 6’ long, not even counting its tail! It’s bigger than any of the halflings!

The crocodile ignores a sling shot from Sandy, its legs churning as it bears down on Mama. Water sprays violently as it snaps with its long jaws, this time seizing Mama Flapjacks about the waist. “Mama!” screamed Federico.

Mama struggles heroically as another sling stone whizzes harmlessly past her and the croc. For a horrified moment, our heroes think that this is it; this is Mama’s last moment. And then, with a terrific effort, she breaks free and rolls away, savaged but alive. Federico springs forward, using his bardic magic to heal some of her wounds. She stands and heals Sandy in turn.

Meanwhile, Ethel and the croc have squared off, snapping at each other in a blur of bites and movement. The crocodile clubs the dog with its tail, eliciting a loud yelp from her. The dog’s strength is flagging, but suddenly, from the other side, a longspear crashes into the crocodile’s rear leg! Sandy, thanks to Mama’s curative magic, has moved into melee- and into flanking. Better still, his blow knocks the crocodile over onto its back!* It scrambles to get up, but both Ethel and Sandy press the attack as it does, and Sandy skewers it to the ground. It takes a few moments for it to stop moving, but then he jerks his spear free. The group harvests the crocodile’s corpse; not only can Mama cook the meat and some of the organs up, several of our heroes take trophies and fetishes. Then the group moves on.

Wary, of course, of floating logs.

***

The stars are just starting to peek out when the group reaches Blackwood. As they approach- they can see a number of lights, either pouring from windows or fires lit outside. As they approach, Federico suggests that they get their story straight.

“Let’s say we tracked the kobolds down,” he begins.

“And most of them got away!” interjects Mama.

“And maybe they were working for some big bad guy or something,” suggests Federico. “A demon, or a dragon or something.”

“I say we know nothing,” Sandy opines. “Try to keep it simple so that we don’t trip ourselves up. We’re better off the less we know about them. Let’s just say that we tracked them down and slew most of them, but that some got away; and we didn’t really ask what they wanted. Why would we? We were after the jam.”

Everyone generally agrees that this course might be wisest, and indeed, about thirty minutes later when they find Benjy Peachtree at the Displacer Beast, that is pretty much what they intend to tell him. They go to his room and knock at the door, announcing themselves and that they’ve come to return what they’ve recovered of the jam.

The door opens and Benjy Peachtree scowls at them.

“Here you go!” Federico says cheerfully. “Um, and I think you should pay us or something.”

Peachtree frowns at the small amount of jam remaining in the jar. He glances up at the kobold and answers coldly, “You volunteered.” He closes the door on them, and the sound of the bolt being thrown is clearly audible.

“No, wait!” cries Sandy. “We didn’t mean that bit about paying us- ah, crap, too late.” He sighs heavily and the group moves off.

After some quiet discussion they decide to stake the place out and follow Peachtree to find out what he’s using. It seems to be the only way; attempts to gain his trust seem to have fallen flat. Sandy watches Peachtree’s window from the grassy area behind the building. Federico takes a shadowed corner table in the common room. Mama goes to purchase supplies in anticipation of pursuing Peachtree. After she does, she keeps a discrete watch on the Displacer Beast’s front door from the porch of the Three Legged Blink Dog across the street, knitting as she waits.

Benjy Peachtree notices Sandy outside, surmises that he’s being watched, and exits his room, pausing only long enough to gather a few precious items- including the remaining jam. As there’s nobody watching the hallway upstairs that his door opens onto, he’s able to slip downstairs and outside, right past Federico, unnoticed.

Fortunately for our heroes, Mama sees him hurrying off, and after a discrete moment, she rushes across the street to fetch Federico, then signals for Sandy. Together they follow Benjy Peachtree, trying to be subtle.

Next Time: Where the heck is Benjy Peachtree sneaking off to? What is the secret ingredient? And how will the party deal with Benjy? All the answers- and probably none that you expect!


*Thanks to my ‘colorful critical hit’ system, where a crit deals a lil extra fun.

 

[the Jester]

Benjy Peachtree’s wagon is just outside of town. He has several clansfolk within; Sandy sneaks up next to it, so as to eavesdrop, and can make out bits of conversation within. Benjy sounds angry.

After hearing enough to satisfy his present curiosity, Sandy sneaks back to his own clansfolk and reports in.

“He said he’s going to have to take shortcuts with this batch. There’s another contest in three weeks- he has to hurry. And they’re leaving early tomorrow to get whatever the secret ingredient is.”

Our heroes’ pulses quicken. At last, the answer!

***

By the time our heroes rise in the morning, the Peachtrees have already departed; but their tracks are easy enough to follow. Halfway through the morning, Trinia spots something and cries out, pulling her dagger. Two dire porcupines emerge from the brush, noses quivering, and stare viciously in the party’s direction.

Then they scramble forward to the attack, and our heroes are hard pressed almost immediately! The porcupines are hard to engage in melee; their long quills are dangerous, and lodge in the flesh of those that get too close! Soon Mama and Trinia both have an almost porcupine-like aspect themselves, with quills bristling from bleeding holes in their flesh!

However, a concentrated attack with missile fire has served Federico and Airhead Ed well. The two keep their distance, aided by the dog pack that is growling and barking and engaging the two porcupines.

Finally, one of the porcupines goes down under the withering hail of sling and crossbow fire and the savage bites of the dogs and wolf. Wincing, bleeding, our heroes begin pulling the quills free are carefully as they can.

***

Three quarters of an hour later, after all their wounds are tended as best they can be, and after a tasty snack to hearten the halflings after such an unexpected attack, the group continues following the wagon’s tracks. Trees dot the landscape, and the ground is soft and grassy, with its fair share of mud. When they top a hill, they see the Peachtree wagon in the valley below, and they are just in time to see Benjy Peachtree riding off alone on a garen. He canters over to a sinkhole and dismounts, leaving his garen to graze, and enters the cave.

Our heroes move a little closer to the cave, excitedly discussing what they should do. They are trying to stay under cover for the moment.

They observe nothing exciting for a few minutes, so Federico and Ed sneak up to the cave itself. They have a short whispered debate, and then Federico creeps up to the cave entrance and peers in. There’s no visible sign of Peachtree. He slowly creeps inside.

Ed, meanwhile, meanders over to the garen.* “Hi,” she says to it.

“Hi,” it snorts back.

“What’s your name?”

“Daisy.”

“Is Benjy nice to you?”

“The grass is good here.”

“Is he a nice man?”

“He rides me.”

“I don’t think he’s very nice. Do you want to come with me? We’ll be nicer to you than he is.”

“Oh, I don’t know.”

“Sure! It’ll be fun!”

“All right.”

From their hidden vantage, Sandy quietly asks, “Is she stealing his garen?”

***

Federico creeps quietly down the cave’s steep slope. He’s looking for motion, for Peachtree, for any sign of danger. His ears are scanning the air for anything- any sound.

He stops.

Scratching, something climbing up- Peachtree? He squeezes aside and holds his breath. In a few seconds, Benjy Peachtree climbs up past him and back out of the cave.

Federico slowly, carefully, descends.

***

When Benjy Peachtree emerges from the cave and spots Ed leading his garen off, he cries out, “Hey! Stop!” And he immediately draws his sling and looses a stone.

Ed drops the garen’s reins long enough to draw her bow and fire.

“What is she doing!” gasps Sandy.

“Ed, NO!” Mama cries, rising up.

Too late.

The arrow takes Benjy Peachtree in the eye. He collapses.

“He was attacking me,” Ed wails.

“You were stealing his garen,” Sandy groans, and slaps his forehead. And then, as if the universe itself were conspiring against them, the ground suddenly shakes. An earth tremor!

***

Federico creeps to the bottom of the cave, and he sees a small crawlway. He looks at it uneasily. It looks like it opens into a room right away- but while he was crawling through, he’d be exquisitely helpless. If there’s anything in the room.

Shivering slightly, Federico turns to climb back out, but suddenly the ground starts to shake, and to his horror he sees rocks start to fall all around the entrance up above. A choking cloud of dust rises up, obscuring his darkvision for a moment. When it clears, he sees to his dismay that the exit is blocked.

“Arf,” he says miserably.

***

Peachtree is alive, and Mama tends him quickly. A cure light wounds brings him around, but he’s dazed and confused- and he’s lost an eye. Pale faced and grim, he mounts his garen without a word. Our heroes protestations fall on deaf ears as Peachtree glowers at them, glares at the collapsed entrance to the cave, and wheels his mount around and leaves.

“Crap,” moans Sandy.

“Hey, where’s the dog?” asks Mama suddenly.

Everyone looks at the collapsed cave.

Next Time: All right, Federico, you know where you have to go to find... the Secret Ingredient!!

*Tallfellow halflings, in Cydra, can speak with equine creatures like a gnome speaks with small burrowing mammals.

 

[the Jester]

Secret Ingredient pt. 2!

Federico shivers in the cold cave. At least it’s dry.

He sneezes, raising more dust- said dust being the reason he sneezed in the first place.

He glances at the small crawlway that seems to be his only exit. Whimpering softly, tail between his legs, he squats down and tries to see what’s on the other side. All he can make out are a few rocks and a bit of floor. It looks like it opens up after only about six feet. With a sigh, he starts squirming through the crawlway. For a few seconds he’s terrified as he nears the other end. What if there’s a guardian? What if there’s a monster, like that ogre zombie they fought a while back? What if there’s some sort of deadly trap?

What if there’s no way out?

He whimpers again, but finally drags his body out of the crawlway and into another chamber. And something smells delicious.

***

“Could he have survived?” wonders Trinia.

“Depends on what’s down there,” muses Sandy. “He’s a good dog- we’ve got to at least try.”

Our heroes survey the mass of stone that has collapsed inward, sealing off their kobold friend. It looks to be tons of material. It looks impossible.

“Let’s get to work,” says Mama.

***

What the hell is that?

The chamber is small, almost cramped even for him alone; it seems to be a natural cave with a single elevated shelf. On this shelf there is- something.

It smells so good... Federico is fascinated. Whatever the stuff is, it appears to be growing on the stone. It’s a weird silvery color, almost iridescent; and it looks like... like... like nothing he’s ever seen before. The closest thing that Federico can come up with is gelatin, a halfling dessert with a strange, shiny, jiggly surface and a near translucent appearance.

The temptation to eat the stuff is so strong that Federico, after a long moment’s hesitation, decides to exit the small cave. Besides, there is no obvious exit.

He crawls out, then catches his breath without.

Cocks his head, as if listening.

Was that- yes! A tapping!

Elated- his clan is trying to save him!- Federico bounds up to the rubble, then raps on it with a rock, eliciting a sharp sound. He does this again and again, as long as his pitiful strength lasts (which is, in fact, a very short time).

They know I’m alive, now, he thinks. He can definitely hear things shifting. But if they’re at the entrance, and it’s collapsed all the way to him- he’ll starve before they can dig him out.

Unless he eats that stuff.

Shivering, the little kobold moans in distress. “Arf,” he says heavily.

Well, maybe there’s a secret exit- a back door. Big villains always have secret escape routes in all the old stories. I can at least search around. So thinking, Federico begins tapping on the walls, feeling for hidden seams or levers, and so forth. He doesn’t really expect to find anything; after he examines the remains of the entry tunnel- the part not collapsed and filled by the cave-in- he contemplates checking out the secret ingredient room as well, but it makes him very nervous.

Listening again at the entrance, he thinks, They sound far off... it will take a long time to free me. Unhappily, he suddenly realizes that it might not be his friends- it could be Benjy Peachtree.

It seems he’s caught between a rock and a hard place, as the dwarves say.

With a groan of unhappiness, Federico scrambles back into the chamber with the glistening stuff. The aroma wafts over him, but he manages to keep focused on his task.*

After a few moments of searching around, Federico is surprised to locate a secret exit- a back door, if you will. An escape hatch. What do you know, the bard thinks in wonder. There is something to all those old stories after all. Immediately, he trots out the secret back cave and, upon following it for several hundred yards, emerges beyond a rise, in a boulder-strewn defile. Quickly he scrambles over the broken landscape and heads towards his friends.

Reaching them in only a few moments- and they are, indeed, pulling stones from the entrance of the cave; it’s truly hopeless from that approach- Federico hails them and the group rushes together happily. Quickly he tells them what he found- “I’m not really sure,” he admits- and the group relates the sudden escalation into violence of the encounter with Benjy Peachtree.

“He was attacking me,” Airhead Ed pouts, then bursts into tears.

“You were stealing his garen!” Sandy shakes his head in distress. “That’s fine and all, but don’t do it when we’re trying not to let him know we’re here!”

“What’s done is done,” Mama shrugs. “Let’s focus on what to do next.”

Sandy says, “Benjy Peachtree isn’t just going home to cry out his remaining eye. He’s probably going to be pretty pissed off about this whole incident.”

“Do you think he’s going to come after us?” Trinia asks.

Sandy shrugs eloquently.

“Let’s get back to the Bakeswells,” Mama decides. “Maybe they can help smooth things over somehow.”

So the party strikes out immediately, neither returning to Blackwood first nor even seeking a major road. They head directly, across the countryside, for the Bakeswells’ camp of wagons. Leanne is waiting there to hear the outcome of their mission; she probably isn’t expecting what they’re going to have to tell her.

Next Time: On the lam!


*As is often the case with 3rd Edition, an initial successful saving throw constituted immunity for 24 hours.

 

[the Jester]

(I'm cross-posting this to all my current and recent story hour threads.)

Well, gang, Lester's player is having a baby so he's not gonna be able to game with us nearly as often as he previously has.

Since neither of us are made happy by this, we've been discussing playing a game by email, but it occurs to me that there's a great place to play a game via the messageboards, so I've proposed this to him. I like the idea- even if he's not big on it, I think that before too long I'm going to start a Cydra play by post for people who can't come over to my house to play.

Any of my readers interested in getting involved with this? Especially if you can post once per day or more. I'll probably be posting a recruiting thread soon, but I'll give you guys first chance to jump on the Cydra wagon.

 

[the Jester]

On the Lam

It was a reasonable spring day near the end of Newmonth as our heroes began their climb into the Stern Mountains, heading south towards the Asylum of Advanced Mental Treatment. Ed was downcast, crying off and on throughout the day; it was her fault they were on the lam, after all.

The Peachtrees, as Leanne Bakeswell had pointed out, are a powerful and wealthy clan. Shooting one of their scions in the eye was sure to elicit an unfavorable response of some kind. Best to head elsewhere for a while.

So our heroes had perked right up when Sandy had said, “Hey, I know what we can do!”

The vegetation, as they climb up the skirts of the Stern Mountains, consists of tough, stringy scrubs able to survive harsh seasons without much water. After all, the Stern Mountains tended to be steep enough, in many cases, that what rain fell just sluiced right down to the inevitable valleys and chasms at their roots, spending hardly any time at all with the native plants. And then there were always droughts- with the Grey Waste encircled in the center of the mountains, it was said that half the moisture that fell was sucked away by the ashen desert.

Still, crossing the mountains is a must if the group is going to reach the asylum where, apparently, Sandy’s friend Norman, who is (again, according to Sandy) imprisoned against his will, awaits rescue.

To this end, the group has hired a guide, a human named Nyrin who spoke brusquely and is clearly not too educated. However, he knows a bit about the local area, and he constantly points out examples of what he calls “catastrophic” geography- shaped by powerful forces of magic or divine power in the past.

Nyrin is also a bigot of a surprising stripe. During the journey he reveals his opinions of elves as liars and thieves. Worse, he tells the halflings, the elves are holding out on the other races.

“Holding out on what?” asks Federico.

“The secret of immortality! You ever wonder why elves live so long? They know something! And they ain’t sharing!” Nyrin shakes his head. “Some day, somebody else is gonna get wise to them and start burning forests until they tell!”

Several members of the group are appalled at the man’s attitude; others are more intrigued by his assertions.

Two days into the mountain, as the group traverses a fairly narrow ledge, a group of seven goblins comes into view around a bend. There are a few rounds of exploratory missile fire back and forth to no real effect; then Federico charges forward on his dog, and streams into a goblin and first knocks it down and then savagely tears out its eyes! The shrieking goblin demoralizes his friends, who waver and break as the dogs and wolf rush forward and a steady stream of thrown weapons and slung stones rains down around them. The engagement is over in only a few moments, with a total victory on the part of the halflings, who even manage to find and rescue a captive (calling himself Lovejuice), who shows an interest in Federico, following him around and muttering about Saint Yurnam.

After a night of exhausted sleep spent on a ledge, the party continues along. They are now three days in. Their guide seems competent, though he showed no aptitude for combat with the goblins. (He had climbed to an overlook to try rolling a big boulder down on the goblins, but by then the fight was over.) Continuing through the mountains, trying to stay on whatever paths they can find, the party finds themselves nearly trapped by a sucking mud pit. Sandy loses a shoe, but manages to retrieve it with his longspear. Still, they vow to be more careful.

The group comes into an area where it appears they’ll have to climb a rather steep ledge. Federico groans in resignation. And then-

Charging out from atop the ledge, clinging to the walls like spiders, but looking like some bizarre scorpion/spider cross, two weird things come towards the party!* Before anyone can react, one of them snatches Nylin in one of its pincers! The guide screams in pain, then jerks and goes limp and it squeezes him.

“Oh no, our guide!” cries Mama. “We have to save him, or we’ll be lost in the mountains!”

The party surges forward, but the monstrous creatures retreat back up the cliff to feast. With cries of dismay, the group pursues, clambering after them- and finds themselves facing not two, but four of the monsters!

Brother He leaps in to the attack, Mama quick on his heels. The others rush forward or lend the support of missile fire; but they all can see the body of their guide, a huge hole chewed in his stomach already.

The battle is long, but the clan claims its revenge.

“Now what?” wails Ed. “Where do we go?”

“Well,” says Sandy, and pauses.

“Let’s at least bury Nylin first,” whimpers Federico. Mama nods. The group checks him for maps- he has nothing on the scale required to guide them now- and then Mama gives a small sermon about the value of life, and of giving oneself for the clan. It’s a morose little ceremony. The others build a cairn for the guide while she speaks. By the time they’re done it is staring to get dark.

“Well, at least it’s flat here,” Sandy sighs. “We can rest.”

“What if there are more of those things?” the kobold whines, shivering.

“We’ll kill them,” Mama snaps. And, as traveling through the dark across rocky broken terrain seems like a worse path than resting somewhere potentially dangerous, the group sets camp.

Their night is uneventful. The sounds of night animals, owls and wolves, reach them; but the wolves sounds like they are mostly down below and behind, and owls are no threat to a well-armed group of halflings. Though they have on rare occasions been known to steal babies.

In the morning, Sandy climbs up a large rock and looks for any sign of, well, which way to go or something. He scans the surrounding shafts of rock and sharp clefts in the ground. Strange angles of stone, some areas smooth as if once liquid...

Something is shining. Something big and several mountains away.

Sandy waits a few moments to make sure he isn’t imagining it, then descends to tell the others.

“We make for the shiny,” Mama says decisively.

Next Time: Our heroes begin journeying to the shiny object!



*Remember the thread about camel spiders a few months ago? Just think if all the nasty stories were true, and they were medium-sized!

 

[omrob]

?We make for the shiny,? Mama says decisively.

Next Time: Our heroes begin journeying to the shiny object!

Real halfling bait, that.

 

[the Jester]

Harried by a Hippogriff!

Our small heroes clamber over rocks, follow narrow trails and scramble over scree that forms a shifting landscape beneath their feet. The sun is pleasantly warm but the temperature varies widely as their elevation rises and falls as they climb up and down the skirts of the mountains.

When the first night of the halflings’ journey towards the shiny place falls, they are at the top of a cliff that drops a sheer hundred feet. As they set up their camp, they regard the descent dubiously, glancing nervously at the lengths of rope they have stowed on their beetle.

In the morning, they descend the cliff and follow a cleft between two of the mountains. Hardy grasses and wild flowers grow all along their path; to one side a small creek trickles rapidly towards the bottom of the mountains. The group stops for lunch in a widening of the cleft, almost a valley.

It is while they are eating lunch that Brother He hisses a warning at the group.

They flatten down against the ground, the high grasses and stringy brush serving to give them concealment, and they watch apprehensively as a strange figure, humanoid but with the head of a yak, moves through their general area. It doesn’t seem to notice them, and in any event causes them no trouble (save perhaps that caused by their own nervousness), and soon our heroes pick themselves up, finish their meal and continue along their way.

Soon they find themselves struggling up a frustrating mountainside whose face seems covered in loose fragments of shale and a thin coat of pebbles. The footing is terrible; even barefoot, the halflings spend almost as much time sliding back down as they do clambering upwards, but slowly they manage to make progress.

“There!” Sandy points out excitedly at one point, when the group clambers past a recess in the mountain that allows them a view of the far side. There is a glinting something not more than another mountain away. Mama Flapjacks smiles, and the others grin, taking heart.

Then there’s a loud eagle cry from the sky, and the halflings have only an instant to look up before one of the many hippogriffs that live in the Stern Mountains is diving for them. “Look out!” cries Brother He, shifting his body into a fighting stance; and Federico starts singing and japing humorously, trying to incite his companions into a courageous stand on the awkward footing. Meanwhile the kobold himself laboriously cranks back the winch on his crossbow, his tiny muscles straining to the ultimate, and then slips a bolt into the slot.

Mama has scooped up a handful of rocks from the ground and is whispering a prayer over them when the hippogriff comes for her. It swoops in, its eyes glinting, and makes a vicious grab for Mama with its talons; but the halfling matron throws herself flat against the slope with a yelp! The creature’s wings beat furiously as it pulls up short, giving a screech of hungry frustration, and then suddenly its cry changes to one of pain as Federico’s crossbow bolt zings into its wing!

“Get it, Ethel!” Federico urges his dog, and she’s off like an arrow, barking and growling as if her volume reflected the intensity of her dislike of this big bird-garen thing. But Ethel has trouble clambering up the shifting slope, just like everyone else, and can’t get close enough to attack.

The hippogriff’s wings beat again, and it spares a talon for Mama before it tries to pass over our heroes. There’s a splash of red as the claw rips across Mama Flapjacks’ arm and she spins out of control with a cry, sliding down the scree. “EEEEEK!!!” she shouts. The great beast’s wings, meanwhile, begin to raise it away from our heroes’ reach.

But Sandy is having none of that. His spear, though sized for a halfling, is enough to prevent an easy escape for the monster. A strong thrust hits it directly in the belly, and the hippogriff gives a terrible scream, almost a whinny, and loops of guts explode outward. The griff falls onto the cliff side and starts doing an odd combined slide and roll down the scree. Mama manages to halt her own descent just as the hippogriff’s corpse comes down towards her, and is sadly shoved further down slope before she can arrest her passage.

Panting, the group tosses a rope down to Mama and helps her return to the rest of them. Grumbling, she brushes the dirt off and the group continues their climb, soon reaching a ledge where they determine to spend their evening.

”Climbing sucks,” complains Federico, then passes into an exhausted sleep.

Early the next day the group reaches the shoulder of the mountain and with a ragged cheer they cross over. The descent is easier than the ascent was; but crossing the grassy valley they find themselves in is, unfortunately, not nearly so easy.

”Why, look at that,” Mama comments.

The valley is split by a deep chasm. It looks to split the entire length of the valley; and it looks to be somewhere around a half mile to the bottom.

Frowning, our heroes examine it. “I doubt whether we have enough rope to make it to the bottom,” Sandy comments thoughtfully.

“Not more climbing,” groans Federico in despair.

“Look at that,” says Brother He. “There’s a bridge across.”

Crowding around, the others look at where he’s pointing.

“That’s a bridge, all right,” Mama says. “But it’s about a third of the way down there. How do we reach it?”

“Was that something moving at the bottom?” asks Sandy nervously. “I can’t tell, it’s too far down...”

“Well, whatever it was, we’re about out of time for today,” announces Mama. “It’s almost time for the sun to go down.” She puts her hands on her hips. “All right, boys and girls; let’s set up camp.”

The others nod.


Next Time: Undead in the night!

 

[the Jester]

Tragedy in the Night

The night of 5/4/368 O.L.G.

Our heroes rest around a low fire. The stars are brilliant; the air, though cold, is clean and fresh, and still enough that the smoke from their little campfire doesn’t blow in anyone’s face but rather manages to rise above our heroes’ heads before dispersing gradually into the sky.

Snuggling down, the halflings (and the dogs) are just beginning to nod off. Brother He is on watch and has taken to lighting brush on fire and dropping it down into the chasm, hoping to illuminate the bridge more clearly. He has been attempting this without success for some time when there is a strange sound, like a windlass slowly being let out.

“What was that?” whimpers Federico.

Mama gets up and pulls her mace. “I’m not sure, but it makes me nervous,” she says primly. “Best to be safe- we should keep a watch for a while.”

Hmm, thinks Federico, maybe we should have discouraged He from sending flaming vegetation down below...

Time passes. The sounds of insects in the night and the crackling of the fire are all that our heroes can hear. Finally they begin to relax again. And then, without enough noise to hear, a small form dashes into the camp!

“Gah!” cries Federico.

It’s the skeleton of a dog or wolf- and before the party has a moment to respond, it’s on Ethel, Federico’s dog, with a fierceness that belies its size. Ethel responds as any big, tough dog will: she tears savagely into the bone hound, and it cannot withstand her powerful bone-cracking jaws. In an instant the living dog has slain the undead one.

But there are more of them... more than a handful. Skeletons swarm forward into the campsite. It’s only a matter of moments before the party, half-sleeping, is overwhelmed...

Mama cries, “Taste the light of Lenorash!” She channels positive energy, turning the undead, and they flee into the night from her holy energies.

Federico looks at her, awe on his face. “Wow!” She winks at him.

***

Later that night, the undead return.

Complacently asleep until almost too late, the halflings are woken just in time by Brother He. They start scrambling for their feet even as the bony enemy advances into their midst. Federico scrambles aside, laying a mage armor on Brother He. The monk smashes a fist through the skull of one of the skeletons, shattering its cranium; but the thing doesn’t even slow down. It advances on him implacably.

The dog pack springs into action. Brother He’s dog rips a skeleton’s leg off, felling it; another strikes it with a rusty spear. The dogs bark and howl, a frenzy of noise and violence.

Mama grimaces. If I turn them again, they’ll just return again, she realizes. Glancing around, she scoops up a handful of rocks and begins praying to Lenorash. They begin glowing softly in her hand.

Then a fleshy, shambling corpse springs at her.

This one is not skeletal; it is the color of a buried body that has dug its way free but not yet had a bath. Stringy hair exists on its head in tufts. A long, black tongue falls out of its red mouth. Its teeth are a jagged mess.

Mama hurls a stone at it and hits it in the head. There is a soft ‘whump’ and a spray of dirty gobbets of flesh from the monster’s head. It shakes itself once, as if ensuring that it’s still standing, and then swings one of its filthy hands at Mama Flapjacks’ head. She ducks to one side and it almost misses, but instead it catches her by the ear, tearing it free.

Mama gives out a blood-chilling scream.

Something white, a small simulacrum of her, seems to flow from the wound into the monster. Mama staggers, gasps, and falls.*

“Mama!” screams Federico. “NOOOOOO!!!”

Brother He and the dogs are tearing skeletons apart, but the wight is unopposed. It turns to the kobold, licking its lips. Its wound has clearly healed somewhat. Federico tumbles away, desperately bringing a mage armor into existence around himself. The horrible monster pursues, and he drops back past the dog pack. Ethel immediately springs to his defense, as does Brother He’s dog.

Snarling, the wight strikes wildly for Ethel but misses. Another blow strikes Brother He’s dog, who yelps and backs off, growling. Moving as quickly as he can, Brother He is destroying skeleton after skeleton; and finally, he springs in to aid the fight against the wight.

“You killed Mama!” cries Federico, firing disrupt undeads from his fingers. Zap! Zap! Again and again he unleashes his cantrip fury. The monster finally begins to falter. It hisses in rage as it ducks a blow from Brother He’s mighty pounding fist, and then Ethel leaps for its throat and drags it down to the ground. In an instant the dogs are upon it in a terrible, rending mass. In less than twenty seconds they’ve torn it completely apart- but they leave the pieces. None of them, dog or wolf, will eat this flesh.

“Mama!” wails Federico, weeping.

***

The halflings, exhausted, cry for an hour before they even have a snack.

“What are we going to do now?” wails Federico.

“We should burn her body,” Brother He says stoically. “Some undead will spawn through their victims.” He cannot suppress a shudder at the thought of fighting Mama Flapjacks.

They take her money and cooking implements, and Federico takes her rainshield. (She was the only one other than Brother He to purchase one.) Then they build a pyre and burn her corpse before it can rise to hunt them.

“We had best move our camp,” Brother He says gently, and they do- traipsing almost a half mile from the chasm. Then they fall towards an exhausted slumber, with neither fire nor joy, and as the dawn starts to creep in they cry themselves to sleep.


Next Time: New friends! The Neversun Chasm! And even more tragedy for our heroes!


*This was a critical hit that dealt two negative levels to Mama. She, alas, was 2nd level.

 

[weiknarf]

poor mama