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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Cabe Zeree" data-source="post: 2134065" data-attributes="member: 20453">The story thus farThe two groups met up separately in Sigil, pretty much how I described in their brief descriptions. To keep them straight, I’ll call Barnabus, the Old Man, and Kort the Sigial Triad, they seek the berg of Lornhall in the Outlands and Blue-eys’ friend Azim Rheedmance. Panaver, Zee, and Rexx will be the Wanderin Three, and for them the Outlands are only a temporary stop, their goal lies somewhere in the Hinterlands, a lost minotaur city awaits. The Sigil Triad set out from the Cage through a portal in the basement of a dilapidated merchant’s house that rested in the Hive like the jumbled bones of an exposed skeleton. From the Hive to a swamp in the middle of the Outlands, the portal didn’t improve the Triad’s surroundings much. Luckily, they had a floating bridge they kept the out of the worst of the fetid mire. Things didn’t start off as planned, and they were quickly surrounded by a multitude of snakes. A great telepathic anaconda uncoiled from the nearest tree and addressed the Triad. “The way is closed,” it hissed in their minds. Intrigued by the Old Man the two spoke further, but their conversation ended abruptly when the snake warned if they didn’t leave soon, the Triad would be going to where the snakes and the swamp belong. As the three watched, the swamp began to shimmer and fade before their eyes. The Old Man ordered a dead run and the Sigil Triad burst into the surrounding grasslands in time to see the great willows and clumps of mangroves shimmer and fade away like heat waves rising from the parched earth on a hot day.The way was definitely closed, and like true planewalkers they chose to press on for Lornhall, where Blue-eyes’ friend had retired. Again things weren’t as simple as Nikos promised, and the Old Man’s fears of a cony-catch were near the mark. The Sigil Triad found Lornhall, but they found it the morning after a band of mercenaries nearly burnt it to the ground. And the mage they came to met, Azim Rheedmance, had stood up to the mercs and got a shiv through the gut for his trouble. Luckily, another group of planewalkers had found Lornhall earlier in the day, and one of them proved to have a knack for healing…The Wandering Three left Sigil through temple gate portal in the Guildhall Ward which led them to the ruins of another temple somewhere in the Outlands. Ready to head for Hinterlands, they encountered a minor delay when Rexx wandered off and encountered an irate spinagon. Once the party came to Rexx’s aid, the spinagon spared the tiefling, her first assumption was that Rexx was a “flame-blood baatezu dog,” and in turn the party spared the spinagon. She revealed the dark that she was AWOL from a baatezu army bound for the Blood War, and the Three further earned her friendship as they promised not to reveal her presence to any other baatezu.  The party was reorganized some, and Rexx was placed at point while Zee took up the read, the githzerai wanted to watch their backs, and make sure the tiefling didn’t wander off again. The Three began again, and the Outlands proved to be an easy march, a trail marked the path Zee roughly wanted to take anti-spireward. Eventually the trail led to a town that looked like it had just barely survived a siege, which wasn’t far from the case. A band of mercenaries had just ridden from the town and put a torch to many of the buildings and fields. They quickly learned the mercs had been plaguing the town for days, and a local wizard stood against them, he turned a few into human torches, being a fire mage by trade, but there were too many mercs against him. The merc captain ran the wizard through for his defiance, and then set fire to the town on his way out. The town was none other than Lornhall, and the wizard was Azim Rheedmance.  The altruistic soul, Panaver, offered to use his magical ability to try to heal the wounded of Lornhall, and even Rexx was able to help some with the little magic he had gleaned from a wizard’s necromantic tome he had somehow acquired. Azim was the worst off and demanded all of Panaver’s attention, but with his sketchbook, Panaver achieved amazing results and closed all of the wizard’s wounds. After their day helping the wounded, Rexx and Panaver were in need of a place to recover, so Rabian, Lornhall’s spokesman, led the Wandering Three to Nara’s Gambit, Lornhall’s only inn. When the Sigil Triad arrives in town later in the day, Rabian brings them to the Gambit as well, and the two groups meet for the first time. Both groups are also invited to minor celebration that will take place that evening, it’s a celebration of being alive and the rebuilding of the town, but in the mean time it was suggested they rest and clean up. The Old Man showed interest in helping Nara repair her inn, and spent most of the afternoon doing so, a guarded friendship formed. Within the Gambit, Panaver and Kort, nearly the same age, also started to form the first bonds of friendship.  At the festivities, which felt more like a funeral party than a true celebration, some of the six learned the truth about the mercenaries and the blow they dealt Lornhall. The mercs had come to town and initially they were good business, but the longer they stayed the ruder, crasser, and more destructive they became, and the more they wore on the nerve of the town.  Then the mercenary leader, a blood named Cedric, made very aggressive advances towards one of Lornhall’s beautiful young women. She had been spurning him throughout his stay in Lornhall because her heart belonged to another, and Cedric had grown tired of not having her. Unfortunately for Cedric, her heart belonged Azim, the two were deeply in love, and Azim didn’t stand for Cedric’s actions. Azim rose up against the mercs, and he’d hoped the village would stand behind him, but they aren’t made of the sterner stuff that makes up a planewalker. Cedric sneered at the flame mage and demonstrated fair play was part of his vocabulary, he and a handful of his henchmen went after the wizard. Things had already gone horribly wrong, so Azim pulled out all the stops and fried a handful of mercs with his fire magic. Enraged, Cedric eventually cut Azim down, and then set flame to Lornhall using the fire that still engulfed his fallen men. Still not satisfied, Cedric and his mercs kidnapped a few of Lornhall’s young adults and then rode out of town. After working and talking with the Old Man for an afternoon, Nara decided to approach him at the festival. Calling it her “second gambit,” she was nervous but hopeful the Old Man would hear her out. She and a few others from the village were riding out the following morning to track down the mercs and get back Lornhall’s “children.” Nara, Rabian, the village spokesman, and their ranger were past planewalkers, but no one else had the experience to take on a band of mercenaries. That left three against eleven, poor odds all around. Slightly enamored with Nara, the Old Man quickly agreed. Zee, who had been talking with the Old Man when Nara approached, knew Cedric, they’d “worked” together in the past, and he had score to settle, but he said he had to ask Panaver first. It was the young man’s decision, as it was his mission that would be disrupted. Panaver quickly agreed himself, and Rexx was always up for a little danger, as long as Zee and the Old man were leading the charge of course. Kort also agreed to help, a former slave himself, he knew the pains it brought and would help any in a similar condition. Barnabus said they were all fools for risking their hide, and vowed to leave town as soon as Azim woke up and he got the goods for Nikos. So the game continues…</blockquote>

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