Tales of the Obsidian Hammers

[Rhael]

Player's Perspective (010)

As we walked into the Centaurs’ clearing, Longstride trotted over to us, his pace slowing as he noticed the body in my arms and possibly the tear lines in the dust on my face.
“We’re heading back to Taureth, Longstride.” I said as he approached.
“What happened?” He appeared genuinely concerned.
“Terjon fell into a pit-trap.” I put Terjon on the ground and started using a kerchief soaked in water to clean some of the blood from his face.
Longstride stood in silence for a number of moments before he spoke.
“I may be able to assist you in this regard, Rhael.”
I looked at him, quizzically.
“Do not toy with me, Longstride. I have just seen my best friend die and carried his limp, cold body for half an hour. I am in no mood for jokes or the like.” I was annoyed at the insinuation.
Longstride did not take offence, understanding the situation.
“Do you trust me, Rhael?”
“I trust you implicitly as a defender of the forest, but – “
“If you will stay with us overnight, I will ask the centaur god Skereth to grant your friend another chance at life. Of course, the act will not be without obligation on your part.”
I looked at the centaur chieftain for some time before replying.
“Very well, Longstride. We will stay overnight.”
Longstride nodded solemnly and motioned for two of his men to approach and take Terjon’s body to a ceremonial hut near the centre of the village.
“As I said, this will not be without obligation. I require two things of you and your companions, if my request to Skereth is granted.” I turned and motioned for the others to approach so they could hear Longstride’s requests. “Firstly, this process requires the sacrifice of a diamond of considerable quality and value. I require a replacement – the measure is an appraised quality of five hundred gold or more.” I heard Reikon let out a whistle. “Secondly, we ask that you remove the orcs that formerly camped near our home from this forest. Their presence sickens us and surely their proximity to Taureth must concern you. Further, we ask that these tasks be completed before the end of the full cycle of the moon.”
“They are, indeed, defilers of the wilderness and they must be removed.” I replied. “Will you be able to assist us with some manpower in this regard?”
“Unfortuntely, no.” I was surprised, and a little concerned at his reply – it suggested perhaps something more sinister than was immediately obvious. “I do not wish to risk any more of my people fighting those creatures.”

I excused myself from Longstride to discuss the proposition with my companions. Generally speaking, the response was ‘well, what choice to we have?’. Reikon was suspicious, but agreed. Warramayl was excited and the others generally looking forward to kicking some orc-butt.

I returned to the centaur.

“Very well, Longstride. We will make these commitments to you, your god and your people. We will bring you the replacement diamond you require and remove the orcs from the forest, somehow, in the next 28 days.”
“I thank you for your commitment, Rhael. I shall now retire to pray for the power to bring your friend back to the land of the living.”
I nodded slowly, acknowledging his departure.

I wandered over to the spot we used as a camp-ground within the centaur-tribe’s clearing and sat in silence for some time. Finally I raised my head to the heavens and prayed, fervently, to Heironeous that Terjon be allowed to rejoin his friends to continue his work.

The next morning I awoke with a start, not remembering falling asleep. Terjon! I sat up, once again, a little too quickly. I had fallen asleep in my armour and felt quite stiff and sore, one of my companions having thrown a blanket over me the previous evening. I struggled to my feet and hurried over to the hut that Terjon had been taken to.

As I burst in, Longstride looked up and quickly motioned for me to be quiet. He trotted, wearily over to me. Terjon lay on a bed, of sorts, looking quite pale – I thought I could see his chest slowly rising and falling, but I could be mistaken.
“Skereth has answered my prayers. Your friend will live, but the recuperation process continues, he will be asleep for a few more hours yet.” Longstride whispered when he got close enough for me to hear.
I was overjoyed. Terjon would live!
“May I stay with him?” I asked
“Of course.”
With that, I stood next to the bed on which Terjon lay, determined to be the first thing he saw when he awoke.

It’s Alive!!!! Alive I tell you!
“Rha-?”
“Terj!?” I was overjoyed to hear his voice again. My friend’s eyelids flickered as he looked in my direction. “How do you feel?”
“What happened, Rhael?”
“We fell into a pit trap. You were on your way to meet Hieroneous, but Longstride brought you back, with a bit of help from Skereth.”
“Longstride?” Terjon sat up slightly, pushing himself onto his elbows.
“Yes, Terjon.”
“Thank-you.”
Longstride nodded.
“You will feel slightly disoriented, but that will pass in time.”
“Come on, let’s get some breakfast into you.” I elbowed Terj lightly in the ribs. I didn’t want to talk about death anymore. Terj slowly got off the bed and rose to his feet. “You’re going to need some new armour at some point.” I playfully stuck my finger into one of the holes in the chainmail of his half-plate armour.

Terj wandered out the door, shielding his eyes from the bright sunlight as they adjusted to the glare. I turned to Longstride.
“I thank you, Longstride. I will never forget this.”
“Go. Join your friend, Rhael. Your gratitude will not be forgotten, young Ranger.”
I nodded and left the building.

I caught up with Terjon as he made his way towards our camping site. The others seemed happy to see him alive.
“Alive to fight another day.” Warramayl said loudly has he clapped Terj on the shoulder. The paladin winced slightly, probably aching a bit from spending the night in his armour.

“Let’s get some food into him and get back into that tomb!” Chade went to grab Terj some food.

We ate a relatively hearty breakfast before getting our gear together and heading back to Adrestus’ tomb.

Once more into the breach, dear friends…
The last time I had stood at the entrance to this tomb, I was holding my best friend’s body in my arms, fully expecting never to speak with him again. Now he was standing next to me, dappled with the sunlight that seemed to drip through the thick canopy. It was a surreal feeling that I cannot put into words.

“Let’s go.” I said. Chade, Reikon and Ulric lit torches and we headed down the stairs to the still open doorway.

We headed once again for the south doorway, with Reikon leading the way. We moved a lot slower this time around. I was right behind Reikon, Mareth, Chade and Warramayl behind me, with Terjon and Ulric bringing up the lead. Ulric was talking.

“Tell that halfling idiot to shut up, will you?” Reikon hissed in my direction as he stuck his knife between two stones in the floor, checking for something known only to people of his profession.

“Ulric!” I turned and with a terse whisper, got his attention. The halfling bounded over to me, oblivious to the danger.
“Yes, Rhael?”
“Shut up.”
“Oh.” He looked a little hurt, but still managed to keep his chin up (everything is relative) as he headed back to Terjon’s side.

We made it safely to the south door, but not before Ulric happily pointed out the site of Terjon’s death. The paladin was not particularly impressed.

It took a bit of effort on the part of myself and Warramayl, but we got one of the doors open, the other would not budge.

We were presented with a passageway that we could not see the other end of by our torchlight.

There was a thin layer of dust on the floor which bore no impression of movement – it was obvious noone had passed this way in a long time, the skeletons in the first big room the most recent visitors.

We cautiously, very cautiously, made our way down the passageway. Another careful check of a doorway later we had entered another large room, not as large as the previous one, however. By our torchlight we could make out the south wall, and there was what we thought could be an altar towards the west wall. The south wall appeared to have a gap in it. We began to head towards the altar.

“By the gods!!!” Mareth suddenly yelped, his voice dying in his throat. We all spun around. From the shadows at the eastern end of the room a humanoid figure, with a horrible visage and completely grey in colour was walking towards us.

“It’s undead.” Chade said. He produced his holy symbol and shouted “In the name of St Cuthbert, begone!” I felt the wave of holy power emanate from the cleric. The grey figure appeared indifferent. It also appeared to be hostile. “It’s too powerful for me!” Chade gasped.
“Attack!” Warramayl yelled and leapt at the creature.

I’m not sure exactly what happened, but the undead simply looked at the monk, their eyes appearing to lock for just an instant before the monk simply crumpled to the ground.

“In Hieroneous’ name!” I couldn’t help but yell in surprise at what I had just seen.

“Don’t look at it’s eyes!” Mareth yelled as we all charged forward to attack, trying not to look directly at it’s face.

The creature did not panic at being outnumbered four to one. Four!? It was at this point I noticed that Terjon and Ulric were not among us. I was worried, but I had to concentrate on other things. We had all engaged the monster and had it pretty much surrounded, but it took us a little while to get its measure as it lashed out with feet and hands. While trying not to look at your opponent, you make it much harder on yourself.

After being struck on the shoulder by a grey fist, Mareth looked up for just a split second. My heart sank. The creature’s eyes locked on Mareth’s face, the colour drained from the elf’s face and he sank to the ground.

At this point, while it was facing away from me, I took a good swing and struck it heavily on the torso. Feeling pretty good about myself, I was horrified to see the wound close over almost immediately.

“We need magic weapons!” I shouted, knowing that none of us possessed such things. It was a mistake, Reikon looked up in response to my cry and ended up looking straight at the undead monster. He screamed as he beheld that terrible face and fell to the floor, his longsword clattering on the stone floor as it fell from his fingers.

“Whatever you do, don’t look at it!” I shouted to Chade.

The cleric nodded grimly and swung his mace at the undead with renewed vigour.

Trying to take an opportunity while the creature was defending against Chade, I decided to put my training as a cleric to the test. I held my sword up to where the sky would be and intoned:
“Hieroneous, enchant this weapon in thy name and grant me the power to destroy my adversary.” I barely noticed the undead take a hasty swipe at me as I felt the power of the divine flow through my hands into my sword.

I could feel the magic in the sword as I swung it and scored a palpable hit on the things ribs, this time, the wound did not close over. It screeched! It was as horrible sound as I had ever heard, almost freezing me in my tracks. Chade, mid-swing at the time turned slightly and caught the gaze of the creature. His mace clanged to the floor as it fell from his lifeless fingers, his body then went limp and he fell to the floor.

I was the last one left.

I had no idea what was wrong with my friends, but they didn’t look like they were going to be helping me out anytime soon.

Carefully keeping my eyes lowered, doing what Antoral had always told us not to do and watching the limbs rather than the face of my adversary, I dug my heels in and fought on.

The blows came quickly, and I was struck in the shield and then my right leg by two strikes in quick succession. I managed to get a few more good solid hits in quick succession, including one very deep cut to the creature’s leg which appeared to be hampering it’s movement somewhat.

The fight went on for what seemed like a lot longer than the minute or so that it actually took, and I took a few blows to my body and legs in the process but eventually I found an opening and cut through the creature’s shoulder into the centre of it’s chest and it crumpled to the floor. Not taking any chances, I cut it’s head from it’s body before turning my attention to my fallen comrades.

I went to Chade first, figuring that if I could get him up he could help me with the other two.

The cleric’s face was a pale shade of grey and he didn’t appear to be breathing. I checked for a pulse and found none.
“They can’t be dead? Can they?” I murmured to myself as I checked my other companions and found them in a similar state. “They can’t be.” I was getting a little panicked now. I figured they must be in a kind of temporary stasis of some description. That must be it. The undead puts them in stasis so it can do whatever it likes with them later. I’ve gotta find Terjon.

“TER-JON!!!” I yelled, heedless of the possible repercussions. There was no reply after what I thought was a reasonable period of time.

Sheathing my longsword, I picked up Warramayl’s torch which was sputtering on the floor of the crypt, I headed back the way we came, praying to Hieroneous I didn’t trip some trap we had missed earlier.

I found Terjon near the entrance to the crypt, coming in my direction with a strange dwarf in tow. Not really having time to question his presence, I launched into what I wanted to say. Unfortunately, he spoke at the same time and neither of us heard the other.

“Wait!” I said, holding up my hand. “Me first.” Terjon held his tongue.

“Mareth, Warra and Chade are all in some kind of weird stasis, I need you to help me get them out of here.”

“I think Ulric’s dead.” Was Terjon’s response. I felt strange at that – I felt like I should have been sorry that a companion had died and I felt callous that I could honestly say that I didn’t care. “He fell into a pit trap at the other end of the passage that is beyond that eastern door.” He gestured to the dwarf. “This – “

“We haven’t got time for introductions, we’ve gotta get the guys out of here!”
“Where are they?” Terjon asked.
“In a room at the other end of that passage.” I pointed at the southern doorway.

“Fine. I’ll be there in a couple of minutes.” With that, he and the dwarf ran off towards the east.
I was a little stunned by this behaviour, and I stood motionless for a few seconds before remembering that I’d left my friends lying in the middle of a crypt that appeared to be populated with hostile undead. I pondered exactly how these creatures came to be in a crypt devoted to one of Hieroneous’ favoured. Probably the same way as the goblins came to be in Enlor’s tomb.

I went back to the scene of the battle and waited for Terjon and the dwarf to arrive.

 

[Rhael]

Player's Perspective (011)

Now that’s just damned inconvenient.
I spent the next few minutes confirming that my fallen comrades had not woken from their undead-induced stasis, and they were becoming colder to the touch. I prayed that Terj would hurry up so we could get them to Longstride – hopefully he knew of a way to wake them up.

After what I guessed to be about ten minutes, I heard the familiar clinking sound of Terjon’s halfplate armour. He stepped through the door with the strange dwarf. It was only now, in the light of three torches that I got a good look at him. He was about average height for one of his race, brown hair and beard (which was cut much shorter than most dwarven beards I had seen). Other than that, only the longsword at his belt seemed out of place – the stereotype of dwarves weilding battleaxes and warhammers too strong in my mind. The dwarf was carrying Ulric’s body in his arms, bloody from the spikes that had pierced his body in three places and with his head slightly crushed from where it hit the floor of the pit.

“What happened here?” Terjon asked, rushing over to our fallen colleagues.
I pointed at the body of the undead creature lying on the floor.
“We fought that thing.” Terjon had started doing all the same checks on Chade as I had a few minutes ago. “It had some strange power in it’s gaze that made them just drop to the ground. I figure they’re in some kind of weird stasis.”

“They look dead to me.” Terjon said, holding up Chade’s wrist to feel for a pulse.
“They can’t be!” I protested. “How can they just die like that?”
“I don’t know.” My paladin-friend responded.

“They look dead to me too.” An unfamiliar voice sounded from behind me. I realised this was the first time I had heard the dwarf speak.
“Okay, they look dead,” I acquiesced. “but how can that be?”
The dwarf didn’t answer, other than a slight shrug.

“Come on, let’s get them up and get out of here.” Terjon grunted slightly has he hefted Chade and Reikon onto his shoulders, with some assistance from me. “Oh, this is Taklinn.” He nodded his head in the direction of our new dwarven companion. “He was tailing Ulric for the halfling’s family, and found his way here, just in time to find out he’d died.”
“Oh.” That was the only response I could think of. “Hang on for a moment, Terj.” I said, as he headed for the door. Realising that none of us would be able to carry a torch, and remembering Chade’s light-enchanted coin trick I used the divine power of Hieroneous to similarly enchant my helm.

After gently placing Uiric on the ground Taklinn helped me to get Warra and Mareth onto my shoulders.

We set off for the entrance to the tomb, my helm glowing strongly. The trip is a relatively short one, but climbing all those stairs with two bodies slung over your shoulders is no easy task. We were both puffing and red in the face by the time we emerged into daylight. Tired as we were, we willed ourselves onwards to Longstride’s village.

We headed for the area we had used as a camping ground and carefully lay the bodies on the ground.
“Stay here, Terj. I’m going to find Longstride.”

Leaving Terjon and Taklinn to watch over the comatose bodies of my companions and Ulric’s corpse I jogged off towards Longstride’s hut. I spotted one of the centaurs I recognised as one of Longstride’s personal guards – usually not far from their chief – and obtained Longstride’s location.

I found him not far away, praying at a small shrine to Skereth the centaurs maintained near the edge of their village, where it met the forest. I stood off to the side and waited respectfully for Longstride to notice my presence. Fortunately, the jingle of my scalemail and the occasional slap of my scabbard against my leg as I moved meant that Longstride became aware of me after a short amount of time. He looked at me questioningly.
“Yes, Rhael? What is it?”
“I need your help, Longstride.” I blurted. “Something happened to some of the others down in the tomb and I can’t tell what’s wrong.”
“I will take a look at them for you, Rhael. Lead on.”
On the way to our camping ground I told Longstride of the undead creature we fought, the circumstances behind my companion’s falling and Ulric’s unfortunate accident. Longstride listened intently.
“I fear your prognosis may be incorrect, young Ranger.” Longstride said, with a concerned look, once we reached my companions and he had had time to look over them briefly. “I believe that your friends are dead, killed by the power of that undead creature you met in the crypt.”
I was stunned.
“H- How can that be, Longstride? How could anything have the power to kill with a glance? Even dragons and demons do not have that power.”
“I do not know what I can say, Rhael.” Longstride was obviously troubled by the situation. “There are strange beasts and strange powers in this world. However, I do not believe they are beyond my reach. With a similar commitment of a diamond on your part for each individual, I can attempt to raise your friends from the dead, if you can stay with us for another twenty-four hours.” He looked at me, questioningly.
I looked briefly at Terjon, who nodded.
“Anything you can do would be greatly appreciated. We commit to provide the replacement diamonds for your ritual for each of my comrades which you can bring back from the dead.”
“Very well, Rhael. I am able to deal with two at a time, who would you like to go first?”
“Ulric and Mareth.” I said, after thinking for a moment. Nothing against the others, they were just the two names that came to mind. I heard Terjon’s sharp intake of breath when I said the name of the Halfling, probably wondering why, since I was obviously not fond of the little guy. I turned to Terjon. “Sir dwarf,” I indicated Taklinn, “has travelled far to bring Ulric back to his parents, “I do not want to hold him up any further.”
Longstride nodded and signalled for two of his guards to take up Ulric and Mareth and take them to the same hut where Terjon returned to life. Longstride departed wordlessly with his guards.
“We’re getting pretty far into debt, here.” I remarked to Terjon, thinking about the half-dozen five-hundred gp plus diamonds we had to source from somewhere.
“Yeah.” Said Terjon, distantly – probably distracted by something shiny.

We sat around for about a half-hour, Taklinn telling us how he came to be tracking a halfling bard across the countryside. We were interrupted by one of Longstride’s guards who came up to us requesting my presence in the hut. I excused myself and followed the guard back to Longstride.
“I have bad news, Rhael.” He started. My heart sank. “Ulric is beyond my reach.” My heart resumed it’s previous position. “His soul has departed this world, seemingly voluntarily. He cannot be brought back to life. Some say that the act of raising someone from the dead acts like a gate keeper on the way to the other side. The soul is given a choice – go back or continue on to explore the netherworld. Based on that theory, perhaps your little friend chose the latter.”
“Very well, Longstride. Is it too late to substitute Chade into Ulric’s position?”
“It will delay the process by about an hour, the preparatory stage was completed and that is required for your cleric friend.” Longstride signalled to one of his guards to accompany me back to our camp to retrieve the cleric’s body.

Time passes

The next day was relatively uneventful, with Longstride completing the raising of Mareth and Chade and then Warramayl and Reikon.

Terjon and I spoke with Taklinn at length, us describing our quest and our lives and he reciprocating with stories of his life. We told him that we had recently taken on a quest from Longstride to remove a clan of orcs from the forest, he grinned and a glint appeared in is eye. The dwarf’s voice took on a steely edge and he commented that since Ulric was dead and all that remained was for the halfling’s body to be returned to his parents. Once that was completed, he would very much like to join us in that venture. We discussed the timing and he came to the conclusion that he would have to pay a courier to return Ulric to his parents if he was to join our little group.

We decided that Terjon and Taklinn would journey back to Taureth with Ulric’s body, find a courier and send the halfling home while I stayed and waited for the others to be resurrected. They would return to Taureth today and then come back to the centaur village tomorrow.

I warned them both to give the orc compound a wide berth and to make sure that they got out of the way of any orc patrols.

I must admit I was a little concerned about Terjon, I had thought him dead once and the pain was excruciating, I couldn’t bear the thought of him dying at the hands of some lowly orcs and not even making it back.

We constructed a makeshift stretcher from a pair of saplings and a couple of sacks. I asked them to buy some replacement sacks and a few more torches while they were in town.

A short while after Terj and the dwarf departed, Ulric on the stretcher, I decided to do a little bit of hunting and gathering. I took off my armour, leaving it with my shield and other gear, grabbed a couple of pouches my quiver, shortbow and longsword and set off into the forest.

I returned a few hours later with the ingredients for a relatively tasty dinner of rabbit, wild mushrooms and some root vegetables which grew all over this region of the Freeholds. I settled down to make a stew. It was quite tasty.

Chade, Warramayl and Reikon all woke from their deathly slumber with a mark resembling a tattoo on their upper arm. The mark appeared to be a ring of leaves, wound together by their stems. Longstride explained that this must be a mark from Skereth, for his own divine reasons. Only Mareth was unmarked from his experience, which I found curious and was going to put it down to his being an elf, before remembering that Reikon is also of the same race. I also noted that Terjon was not branded by the god upon his resurrection. Maybe one day the god’s reasons would become apparent.

 

[Rhael]

Player's Perspective (012)

And again…
Once we were all assembled (and alive) around midday of the next day, Terj and Taklinn having returned about an hour ago and Warra and Reikon given sufficient time to recover fully from their experience, we decided to set off to the crypt again. We decided that we would stick together, regardless of what interesting things there were around.

We decided to check out the door where Ulric had fallen into the pit-trap first. We found that it would be very difficult for us to get across to the door. The pit was around four feet wide, with no ledge to speak of on the other side, and with nothing obvious to bridge the gap the decision was made to return if we did not find the Sphere of Haedros anywhere else in the tomb.

We returned to the room where we fought the grey undead creature. This was the first chance we had had to look around the room, so we moved around the walls first to determine dimensions before searching the middle of the room.

The room was large, but not as large as the room where Terjon died. Near the eastern wall was an altar with a large, golden hourglass. The southern wall (the furthest from the door we had entered from) had a small passage leading to what appeared to be a dead end. The wall at the end of the corridor had a mosaic depicting Hieroneous in a pose of victory with cowering, shadowy figures who gave the distinct feeling of evil at the edges. I knelt in front of the mosaic and said a short prayer to my lord and god. I secretly hoped that that was all that was required for the Sphere of Haedros to be presented from on high by Hieroneous himself – alas it was not to be.

After saying my prayer, I stood and walked back to the centre of the room.

Chade and Mareth had found a door at the western end of the room, which we decided to investigate next.

The door was of heavy stone, and similar to all other doors in this crypt. On the other side was a passageway, approximately thirty feet in length, that finished at another stone door. Reikon was called forth to check the door for deadly (or otherwise) traps and after a short while declared the door to be safe.

The door swung easily on it’s ancient hinges, revealing a pitch-black room beyond. Tentatively poking one of the torches into the room revealed nothing in the way of grey undead that kill with a glance so we entered the room and began moving around the walls. The room did not appear to be of the scale of the others, and there were stone coffins placed at regular intervals around the room, no further than five feet from the walls.

“Zombies!” Chade yelled, very very suddenly. We all looked first at him, then in the direction he was pointing as he removed his holy symbol from within his armour. A half-dozen shambling figures emerged from the darkness, moving slowly towards us as if drawn by the torchlight. There was one at the rear of the group that was slightly larger and quicker than the others, it bore a menacing look upon it’s decaying features. “In the name of St Cuthbert, I command thee to flee or be destroyed!” He shouted at the undead holding out St Cuthbert’s symbol for all to see. Before we could react any further than drawing our weapons the undead were upon us.

The zombies had us pinned in the corner of the room when they attacked, two had been disintegrated by Chade’s effort but three more had joined the initial group since.

It was a hard-fought battle, but the real surprise came when the larger one attacked Mareth. After it had closed within striking distance, it opened it’s mouth and a long, purple worm-like tongue with sharp teeth on the end shot out and latched onto the elf’s breastplate. Mareth shuddered slightly before ceasing to move. He didn’t fall to the floor, he just stood there, paralyzed. The rest of the zombies fell to our blades and we were able to concentrate our attacks on this larger, more powerful zombie with the purple tongue, restricted by the geography of the room in that the placement of the coffins prevented more than three of us from attacking it at once.

It was certainly much stronger than the other zombies. It took some time and quite a few hits before it finally fell to the ground, releasing Mareth from the grip of it’s tongue. It was another half minute later when the paralysis wore off and Mareth stumbled groggily against one of the stone coffins.

“What, was that?!” He gasped.
“I’m not sure,” Chade responded, examining the body of the creature more closely. “but it’s un-undead now.” He continued with a chuckle. Only Terjon laughed.

After healing a few wounds, we headed back to the previous room and began examining the golden hourglass on the altar.

“What should we do?” Mareth asked no-one inparticular.
“I say we turn the hourglass.” We were all surprised that Warramayl had spoken up, but the fact that he stated the obvious, but potentially most dangerous course of action mitigated that somewhat.
“You want to see if it’s trapped, Reik?” Chade asked the rogue.
“Fine.” Reikon sighed. He stepped forward, wary of traps in the floor surrounding the altar as well. After some minutes examining the construction of the altar and the hourglass he turned and shrugged. “I can’t see anything, but it’s difficult to determine what will happen if we turn the hourglass.”

“Does the document from Enlor’s tomb hold any clues?” I mused out loud, not even realising I had said anything until Mareth started rummaging around in my pack, looking for the scroll-case. He pulled out the translation and held it up, beckoning Chade to come and hold the torch.

After reading through the entire translation he shook his head.
“There’s nothing obvious here that refers to anything around here.”

“I’m turning the hourglass.” Warra said as he stepped towards the altar. Before any of us could do anything, the monk had picked up the hourglass and turned it over, placing it back on the altar.

We stood, waiting for the seemingly inevitable rain of death and destruction to fall upon us. Meanwhile, the hourglass had sprung into life. The sand did not fall to the base like a normal hourglass, but swirled as if a raging gale had erupted in the glass confines.

“Guys.” Terjon said, warily. “Check this out.” He pointed down the corridor towards where I had found the mosaic of Hieroneous. The mosaic was no-longer there. Instead, a doorway lead to a room that contained a highly embellished and intricately carved stone sarcophagus.

“The tomb of Adrestus.” I breathed as the paladin and I walked down the corridor, the others not far behind us. Only Warramayl and Taklinn stayed behind with the hourglass.

In a steel, three-legged brazier-like object standing atop the sarcophagus lid was a massive sapphire, cut into a ball-shape.

“That must be the Sphere of Haedros.” Terjon said as we stepped into the room.

“Hieroneous, forgive us, but we must remove this object from your warrior’s tomb to prevent great evil from overrunning our world.” I intoned as I lifted the sapphire from the stand. “Quick, let’s get out of here.” I said, once I had the gem.

“There’s another door on the other side of the room!” Mareth pointed.

“No time.” I replied quickly as I hurried from the room.

“Something’s happening out here!” Taklinn shouted down the corridor. We all hurried towards the altar and watched as the sand in the hourglass slowed and began to settle.
“The door’s closing!” Chade gestured towards the picture of Hieroneous being lowered into place once again.

As near as we could tell, the door closed at the precise instant that the last grain of sand settled to into a neat pile at the base of the hourglass.

“It won’t turn!” Warramayl grunted slightly, once again trying to lift the hourglass from it’s place on the altar. “I can’t even lift it.”

“Great. Now we can get out of here.” Mareth spoke up.
I was standing near the altar but apart from the others, silently regarding the gem that I could not close my hand around, such was it’s size.
“It was too easy.” I murmured. Only Terjon was close enough to hear me and he was happily humming some tune he had heard a minstrel play in Taureth last week. “It was too easy.” I turned to my companions. “There must be more to it than that.”

“Well the hourglass doesn’t turn anymore, so it doesn’t really matter, does it?” Chade asked.
“Let’s just wait for a little while.” We all looked at Reikon. “We can’t be the first ones to turn this hourglass, can we? I’m sure it will be released at some point.”
“That could be a decade away.” Chade argued.
“I think not.” The elf replied, but did not elaborate.

With nothing better to do, we decided to wait around for a while and test out Reik’s theory.

Time Passes…
Every so often, Warramayl would try turning the hourglass and after about fifteen minutes, he was able to lift it and turn it. Once again the sands within the hourglass began to churn and swirl and the mosaic picture of Hieroneous began to rise, revealing again the tomb.

“One… Two… Three… Four…” Terjon started counting, slowly and out loud. I’d never heard him count over twenty before, I wondered briefly what would happen if he got to one-hundred.

“Quickly, let’s get to that door. Reikon, come with me!” I jogged down the hallway with the elf, around the sarcophagus and to the second door. I was vaguely aware of the floor being wet and not noticing that earlier. The elf gave it a quick trap-check and pushed it open, it revealed a second corridor leading to another door. We hurried down this corridor to the next door, Reikon repeated the check for traps.

I could hear Mareth back in the other room.
“It all makes sense now! Warra, hold that torch up again!”

We pushed this next door open to reveal a lit room, with a much simpler stone coffin in it’s centre. Against the far wall was a chest, brimming over with gold and atop the coffin, in another three-legged metal stand was a completely spherical, blue stone of some description. The light in the room was coming from the stone! Also atop the coffin was a magnificent longsword.

I whispered a quick prayer to Hieroneous, wary of the time constraints and lifted the stone from it’s stand. Reikon had headed towards the chest of gold.

“No, Reikon!” I said, sternly. “These things were buried with Adrestus for a reason, they shall not be disturbed.”
The elf shot me a caustic look, but complied and we hurried out of the crypt.

As we exited the tomb, Terjon had counted to two hundred. I then remembered the sapphire I had taken earlier. I rushed back down the corridor to the first room, made a quick apology to Hieroneous and replaced the gemstone on it’s stand and left the room. The paladin got forty more counts in before the mosaic began to settle into place again.

Once the paladin stopped counting Mareth beckoned me over to the altar.
“I figured it out! Look!” He pointed to a passage in the translation.

~When desert storms begin to rage,
A portal opens wide.
Beware the calm that heralds then
The coming of the tide.~

“That first room was completely saturated when we went back in. That room must flood when the hourglass runs out!”
“I did notice that it was damp in there.” I replied. “I knew it was too easy the first time.” I continued. “That first room is a test, and we passed.”

“Right. Now can we get out of here?” Mareth asked.
“Yes.” I replied. Relieved at the thought of being able to return to the forest above.

We headed out of the crypt as I stowed the Sphere of Haedros in my pack. I could hear Reikon and Chade at the back of the group talking in low tones about gold and swords. Chade appeared to be particularly keen on the gold.

When we returned to the centaur village we headed for our camping ground.
“Now we can head back to Taureth.” I stated. “You guys pack up your gear, I’m going to find Longstride and thank him for his hospitality.”
“Not quite, Rhael.” Reikon said suddenly.
“What do you mean, Reikon?”
“I’m going back in for the sword.” He replied.
“And the gold.” Chade added.
“No you’re not.”
“Yes we are.”
“Reikon, I will say this here and now and I beg you to listen: If you return to that tomb of one of Hieroneous’ favoured and take the sword and the gold that is buried with him, you will no longer be welcome in my sight. That goes for you too, Chade.”
To their credit, neither interrupted. Mareth appeared shocked by this turn of events, Warramayl seemed bored and Taklinn was obviously feeling a little awkward at the situation. Terjon stood at my side, facing the cleric and the rogue defiantly.

It was obvious that none of us were going to budge on their stance and hence the party, this group of friends that had been together for some time now, would be dividing this day. However, the line of the division was yet to be determined.

 

[Rhael]

Player's Perspective (013)

Party Update
Rhael (Human Ranger/Cleric), Reikon (Elven Rogue/Illusionist) Terjon (Human Paladin), Warramayl (Human Monk), Mareth (Elf Fighter), Taklinn(Dwarven Fighter), Chade (Human Cleric of St Cuthbert)

Divide and conquer… well, not really
I found it hard to believe that it had come to this – an ideological disagreement about loot.

Mareth was attempting to be the go-between, trying to broker a deal that would keep the party together. Trying to find a compromise situation. From my point of view (and that of Terjon), there was to be no compromise – they either took the items or they didn’t. They could relent now and we could continue on our quest and live up to our deal with Longstride and rid the forest of the orcs or we could part ways now before anyone got hurt.

Many arguments were thrown up by all parties. Warramayl sided with Reikon and Chade, citing the reason that if the sword would help us on our quest then we should take it. Taklinn sided with Terj and myself, possibly because he thought it was right. After what felt like hours, Reikon and Chade finally returned to the crypt, Warramayl went with them, but said he would stay outside the crypt. We decided that we would wait for him

Reikon and Chade returned soon after, the rest of us had packed our gear and were ready to leave, the make-up of the group yet to be decided. Reikon had the magnificent sword in it’s scabbard, strapped to his waist and Chade was struggling under the weight of the chest. Warramayl following along behind.

“I see you went through with it.” I remarked to Reikon.
“Of course.” He sneered. Chade was chuckling to himself, looking like he wanted to throw the gold in the air and be showered with coins.
“Then you are lost to me.” I said, sadly. “I had hoped that you would think of what our friendship has meant over the years and it would win out. Alas…” My voice trailed off.
“Is there nothing that can be done to rectify this?” Mareth asked desperately. “We are weaker if we divide. No sword that I know of can make up for this.”
I was willing to offer no compromise and shook my head, defiantly. Terjon spoke up.
“If they return what they have taken, I will accept them again.” I was shocked at first, but after a short period of contemplation I saw his reasoning. What sort of cleric of Hieroneous would I be if I could not offer my friends a chance at forgiveness?
“Fine.” I looked at Reikon and Chade. I saw men who had been my friends for a long time, rather than the two I was ready to call ‘thief’ and never speak to again. “I prayed that you two could respect the wishes of Terjon and myself. This crypt is a monument, consecrated in the name of the god to whom we have devoted our lives to the service of. If we had happened across a tomb of one of St Cuthbert’s favoured, Chade’s will would hold sway.”

I looked at Chade, specifically. My statement seemed to have a significant effect on him – he looked down at the gold, then up to the heavens. He set the gold on the ground and took out his holy symbol. Warramayl also seemed to be thinking seriously about his position, and moved to stand near Terjon and myself. “If it were elven artefacts in question, we would look to Reikon and Mareth to make the decisions.” Reikon was unmoved.
“No, Rhael. This sword is mine now.”
I shook my head slowly, genuinely disappointed. I walked slowly over to the elf, he stood tall and put his hand on the hilt of his new sword, obviously expecting me to try to hurt him. I extended my hand, he looked at it quizzically but eventually took it.
“I wish to bid you farewell as a friend, Reikon. I will overlook the sword at your waist as you leave my company. However, next time we meet you will be my enemy.”
Reikon nodded silently, walked to his horse and lead it out of the encampment.
Chade was on his knees, tears in his eyes, holding the holy symbol of St Cuthbert in his hands.
“Rhael!” He sobbed slightly. Please forgive me. Please return the gold to the crypt. I have shamed myself and my god and… my friends.” The cleric got to his feet and, avoiding all attempts to wish him farewell, walked hurriedly off towards the east – away from Taureth. I hoped that he would find peace, somewhere.

When Chade was out of sight I sought out Longstride to assure him that regardless of the split in the party, the remaining group would, of course, honour our previous obligations.

With a pall of sadness hanging over the party, despite our recent success in locating the Sphere of Haedros, we bade Longstride farewell and headed back to Taureth. Now we could concentrate on ridding this forest of the orcs that defiled it by their mere presence, let alone their destruction of trees and other wildlife.

Another uneventful trip later…
We made it back to Taureth, well after dark but without incident, giving the orc encampment a wide berth. We needed to restock our supplies, but there would be time for that later, right now I think we all just wanted to get some rest. We all went straight to our beds back in the Drum and Sword.

The next morning Mareth and I set off to see if we could find some diamonds for Longstride, Taklinn decided he wanted to try to find a magical weapon at the various markets, Terjon went off to give away however much of his hard-earned wealth as he could and Warramayl just went wandering – we directed him to pick up the requisite supplies while he was gone. We arranged to meet back at the inn at sundown.

Eight Uneventful hours later…
We were sitting around our table discussing the results of our day. Taklinn had got lucky and found a magical longsword. Mareth and I had managed to source two diamonds of the quality required by the centaur chieftain from the gemsmiths in the town – and requested notification if they come across any more. Terj had successfully gifted his way down to his last few gold pieces and Warramayl had picked up the supplies we needed. All in all… an expensive day.

We had just finished our dinner of roast meat and potatoes when our table was approached by a large, wild looking man with a greatsword strapped to his back– obviously a barbarian – and a short, wiry and shifty-looking man dressed in loose-fitting, black clothing – probably a rogue. Since we had become semi-famous at this inn and most of the regulars knew us well we did get people approaching us occasionally. We all stood in unison, hands straying to our various weapons just out of habit. Neither of the two men had done anything that bespoke hostility, but at this point they stopped – a few feet away from us and the small man came forward.
“Is this Rhael and his companions?” He was looking at me.
“It is.” I replied. “Who is it that addresses us?”
“My name is Shadow,” Replied the smaller man. “rogue by trade and my burly companion here,” he gestured grandly toward the larger man, “is Hejkan, warrior and cleric of Kord.” The barbarian inclined his head slight in acknowledgement and greeting. “We have sought you out because we wish to offer our services to the group.
“Well then, that’s a happy coincidence.” I responded. “Because two of our members have just departed from our company and we are a little short of manpower at present.”

They sat down at our table and we attempted to explain our mission, just to make sure that they were up for trying to save the world. I also explain our obligation to the centaur chieftain with respect to the orcs – Hejkan appeared very keen to start hacking into some orcs at the earliest possible convenience – and my ambition to join the Knights of the Chalice and the requirement I had for some enchanted full-plate. After even this short time with them, I got the feeling that Shadow made most of the conversation in their odd pairing and it became clear what their individual motivations were. Shadow was apparently consumed with the collection of loot and Hejkan revered strength, both of character and body. I knew of Kord, the God of Strength and it all made sense. It wasn’t long before he was arm-wrestling with Taklinn – which he won. Despite him being primarily a cleric I admit I looked forward to seeing him in combat, it could a fearsome sight.
It was obvious that some of our number were getting ready for a long night at ye olde tavern getting ye olde smashed, it was at this point I reminded everyone that tomorrow morning we would be heading back into the Hoardeep to see what we could do about the orcs camped in the forest. The others agreed it would not be a good idea to be really hung-over so curtailed their interest in frivolity, for now.

Soon after we all hit the hay, looking forward to killing some orcs.

Out damn Orcs!

On the way to the orc encampment we started working on our plan – strangely having not really thought about it up to this point. A few ideas were thrown around, but the one we settled on, the safest, so far as we could tell, considering that there were quite possibly fifty or so orcs and only seven of us was a ranged bombardment of any movement we saw from a vantage point inside the forest.

The closest we could get to the walls of the walled encampment, while remaining in the cover of the forest was about a hundred and fifty feet. We found a good spot and began our stakeout. Mareth, Shadow, Taklinn and I all had our bows at the ready, waiting for movement around the guard towers or the low wall.
After around an hour there was some movement, obviously the changing of the guard. We began loosing arrows at whatever target we could see. Two orcs went down and the other two in the vicinity dropped behind the wall. We shot a few more arrows into the wall and then stopped.

This went on for some time, for the rest of the morning and most of the afternoon. After killing at least ten or so of their number, the gates of the fort opened. We waited, not knowing what to expect. After a few moments there was a cacophony of noise and what we could only guess was the entire population of the encampment poured out the gate and ran in our direction. Women and children included, followed by the warriors. The four of us loosed a few more arrows at some of the larger targets before I said:
“Run!”
With the orcs only a hundred feet from our position, we turned and fled deeper into the forest. Somehow we managed to stay roughly together and around ten minutes later we stopped to see if we were still being pursued.
“You guys wait here.” I said quietly. “Shadow and I will head back a short distance to make sure that they’ve stopped chasing us.” I motioned to the rogue and we headed off, with a good fifty feet between us, back the way we had come. I felt in my element, this was what I was trained for, but I was amazed at how quiet Shadow was being, even outside the urban environments that he had been trained for. I had no doubt that Shadow would be a useful addition to the group.

We retraced our steps for about five hundred yards and saw no sign of the orcs. Out of habit I made the birdcall that Reikon and I had used during our scouting – forgetting that Shadow and I had not discussed signals. It took some work but I managed to get his attention and signal for him to head back to the group. We head back to where the others were and on the way I told him of the signals that I used with Reikon for our scouting. It would take a while for him to learn them properly, but he had started well.

After regrouping with the others we decided that we may as well make the walk back to Taureth now and return the next day as the light was fading in the forest and we all knew that orcs were far more comfortable in darkness than we were.

We had a good night’s rest, restocked our arrow supply and returned to the same spot as the day before. Once again it took a few hours but eventually movement was spotted and two more orcs were dead from arrow-fire. Two more fell in the next hour before the gates opened once again. Expecting an onslaught similar to the previous day’s we readied ourselves to flee. We were surprised when two orcs emerged from the open gate, carrying a dirty white piece of linen we could only assume was a flag of truce. They walked fifty of the hundred and fifty feet to our position and were obviously trying to find us amongst the foliage. One was wearing the same blue facepaint as another orc we had met on the trail earlier and carried a huge two-handed axe, the other was dressed in half-plate and was armed with a longsword.
“Two!” The one in plate yelled, holding up two fingers.
“Let’s go, Terj.” I said and tapped the paladin on the shoulder. “Cover us.” I said to Taklinn, Mareth and Shadow.
“I don’t trust them.” Mareth said, tersely.
“Neither do I, but we should try to find out what they want.”
I made sure my sword was loose in it’s scabbard and that my shield was firmly in place before I stepped out of the forest a short distance to the left of our position with Terj at my side.

We advanced roughly half the distance from us to them and stopped.
“Half-way!” I yelled across the last fifty feet. The two orcs conversed briefly and nodded. We all advanced slowly and mistrustfully toward the mid-point on the field.

“Why you shoot us?” The larger, plate-clad orc said when we got closer. Obviously it’s common was not all that elegant.
“Because we want you out of this forest.” I replied. “You defile this area by your mere presence and we will continue to shoot your men until you leave this place.”
Obviously they had pre-planned this and the two orcs quickly drew their weapons and attacked.

Only a fraction of a second after their first aggressive move the first arrow thudded into the ground near the larger orc. Good old Mareth! Terj and I drew our swords and the fight was joined. I found myself fighting the shorter orc with the face paint and greataxe and he was giving me a run for my coin, it was all I could do to avoid his massively powerful swings and I only managed to a minimal amount of damage to him in return. I made the mistake of looking over my shoulder at one point to see what my companions were doing. Hejkan, Warramayl and Taklinn were charging to our position and it was at about this time when I felt a brief and sharp pain in my side and I found myself falling, my blood gushing from a new hole in my scalemail. I saw Warramayl leap over me to attack the orc with the blue facepaint before I blacked out.

It can’t have been much later when I felt the touch of a divine hand and Hejkan was pulling me to my feet. Taklinn, Warramayl and Terjon were still fighting the two orcs, but both were looking a little tired. I was still feeling a little groggy so I stayed back and watched Hejkan wade in as well. Taklinn took down the blue-faced orc and the other turned and fled. A few arrows thunked into the turf behind him as he ran into the encampment but he made it without further injury and the gates were closed. Terjon had grabbed Warramayl just as he was preparing for a one-man assault on the gates.

“Back to the forest.” I said wearily and we all turned and headed back to our position, casting a few glances back at the orc fortress.

We began our stakeout again, and Hejkan tended to my wounds and then Terjon’s and Warramayl’s, I threw in a few of my own healing spells and we were all looking decidedly healthy again. We saw no activity for the rest of the day – obviously the orcs were keeping their heads down.

We returned the next day to a very similar situation, except that we saw no movement whatsoever for about four hours.

After a brief discussion of the relative merits of the various courses of action open to us we finally decided to check out the fortress first hand.

We advanced slowly across the distance to the fenceline and scaled the wooden structure with ease. We checked the guard towers and found them empty before heading for the large building in the centre of the encampment. It consisted of two rooms, both of which were filthy, but uninhabited.

We decided that perhaps the orcs had retreated into the cave system that their wall encompassed and ventured inside to attempt to verify that theory. We went as deep as we had gone before, being careful to avoid the area where we came across our almost deadly meeting with the pair of manticores. We found no sight of the orcs and figured that perhaps we could ask the duergar dwarves that we met earlier. Of course two of our number which had not previously been seen by the dwarves would have to go, so Taklinn and Hejkan were elected.

We waited at the end of the corridor leading to the duergar home, straining our ears to listen for trouble. A few minutes later they returned, Taklinn telling us that we owe him fifty gold.
“They say that the orcs did come in here but after they killed a few and some of the other denizens took some others out they left in a fair hurry.”

“Excellent news.” I said. I didn’t entirely trust the duergar, but I figured they would hold little love for orcs and where money was concerned they were more likely than not to provide correct information. “Let’s head to Longstride and let him know.”

We made it to the centaur village without incident and sought out the chief.
“Greetings to you once again, Rhael.” Longstride said as we approached.
“And to you, Longstride.” I replied.
“What brings you back?” The centaur asked.
“I believe that we have completed the task we agreed to take on for you, Longstride.” I answered. I told him of our ranged attacks on the orc encampment and our finding the entire place deserted. “ I know not where they went, Longstride, but as far as we can tell they do not appear to be in the vicinity.”
“Yes. The information provided by my scouts is the same. I trust your judgement in this, Rhael and you may consider your task completed. We appreciate you and your group’s efforts in this and invite you to a celebratory meal here tonight.”

We gratefully accepted the invitation, of course. I took that opportunity to introduce Shadow and Hejkan and got Longstride to expand our knowledge of the area. He told us of some of the other paths through the woods and of the location of that wizard’s tower that we had heard of earlier. After some discussion about what may lie there, we decided to check it out the next day.

 

[Rhael]

Player's Perspective (014)

Party Update
Rhael (Human Ranger/Cleric), Shadow (Human Rogue), Terjon (Human Paladin), Warramayl (Human Monk), Mareth (Elf Fighter), Taklinn(Dwarven Fighter), Hejkan (Human Barbarian/Cleric of Kord)

Unjustified Trepidation
I the only way I could describe my hesitation in going to this tower which we had heard rumours about back in Taureth was that it just sounded like one of those places where you-go-in-the-door-slams-behind-you-and-you-can’t-come-out-until-you-climb-to-the-top-and-solve-some-riddle-which-if-you-get-it-wrong-you-die.

Sounds like a bit of a cliché, but while I don’t subscribe to the theory that all mages are wacked-out crazies bent on destruction, some of them do worry me.

Anyway, I voiced my concerns, there was some nodding and general agreement that it could be quite dangerous, but the consensus was to go anyway. Shadow was particularly vocal in encouraging us to go.
“A wizard’s tower! Think of all the fat, [I[magical[/] loot we might find in there!” The word’s ‘fat loot’ must have passed his lips on at least a half-dozen occasions during the discussion. “We’ll be able to boost all sorts of stuff!” I noticed Hejkan watching his young companion reprovingly during his excited tirade. I almost thought Shadow was going to challenge us all to a race to get there – sanity prevailed and when we did set off, but in a more considered formation.

The path that Longstride had indicated lead us further away from Taureth, but after a while curved back to the south and we were almost heading back in the direction of the city when we crested a hill and saw what we could only guess was the “fabled wizard’s tower”. I could see Shadow getting quite excited and he immediately questioned why we hadn’t come here before. I muttered something about having more important things to do as we set off down the hill to the front door.

It wasn’t until we got closer and more level with the base of the tower that it’s proportions became fully apparent. The tower was around a hundred feet tall and constructed from huge stone blocks. The tower had a distinct stair-step appearance as the north-facing or left hand wall went straight upwards, but the south wall was in a three-step structure whereby the tower was only a third as wide at the top as at the base. There was a massive teak door set in the centre of the base of the tower, measuring at least ten feet high and five feet wide at it’s base. After a few deep breaths we cautiously entered the tower. The interior of the tower was lit by blue-tinged globes that were affixed to the walls at regular intervals. This room appeared to encompass the entirety of the bottom floor of the tower and had two staircases leading up to a mezzanine level, upon which was what looked like a room with two doors leading into it and a corridor surrounding it. After a thorough exploration of the floor revealed nothing either dangerous or interesting with the exception of the blue globes – one of which Shadow attempted to pry from the wall, but succeeded only in breaking the tip of his dagger.

We checked the doors on the mezzanine level – we found some giant beetles in one of the rooms. They attacked us on sight but were dispatched with no difficulty whatsoever. We found some stairs leading upwards in the corridor behind the rooms and followed it upwards.

On the next level we found some giant rats, dire bats and some goblins, which once again posed very little challenge. The next level up contained what I guessed to be the beginning of a series of riddles. The answer to the riddle set in a plaque upon a solid-looking door: “Feed Me and I live, give me a drink and I die.” appeared obvious, but what we had to do was not as apparent. The unfortunate thing was that the door-handle badly burned anyone who touched it. I cast a resist elements spell on myself and we tried several different approaches – saying ‘fire’ and turning the handle, casting create water spells before finally I must have said ‘fire’ while turning the handle and the riddle appeared to be answered for the door swung open.
“Well, that’s a little pedantic.” I thought to myself. Lo and behold behind the door was another set of steps. On the next level we met with two lizard-man statues that came to life as we approached a door and attacked with their shortspears. Once again, we didn’t have any real problems hacking them down and watching them turn to dust on the floor.

The next level contained a real challenge. A shambling mound moved to attack us as we entered a room I can only guess was very near the top of the tower. It packed a mean punch and several of us were looking quite worse-for-wear by the time it lay lifeless. Mareth and Warramayl had been engulfed and knocked unconscious by the creature and Hejkan and Taklinn had taken some fairly solid hits. We could see that each of our attacks was having little effect, but we wore it down and finally Terjon delivered the killing blow.

In a small room beyond the mound we found a light shining down on a short pedestal from the ceiling – there being no apparent source for the light. Of course, Shadow was the one to discover that it wasn’t harmful as he rose in the light and disappeared through the ceiling. The rest of us followed, some with more apprehension than others. However, the only thing that greeted us in this room, which I could only guess to be the top of the tower was a big pile of treasure. Shadow was beside himself, and appeared ready to leap into one of the chests full of silver and take a bath. There were two chests full to overflowing with silver pieces, one full of gold and some gems. There were two sets of full plate, one for smaller people than any of us and one human-sized which Hejkan informed us was magical – I was very excited. There was a longbow that only Taklinn and I could draw effectively and a few other bits and pieces. I entreated the party for the right to keep the magical armour in light of my need for it so that I could enter the Knights of the Chalice – they were happy enough for that to occur and I volunteered to take only a minor share of the loot from this find.

After the excitement died down we started thinking practically again and the subject of how we would get this back to Taureth was raised – even how we’d get it out of this room, was an issue. At least until good old, inquisitive Shadow found the teleporter behind a secret door and before we knew it we and all the loot had been transported to the grass out the front of the tower.

It would be a slow trip back to Taureth carrying these chests and such, but lacking any other options – a slow trip it would be.

We made it back to Taureth with almost no incident although it took us a whole day of travel where, by my reckoning the distance could have been traversed in roughly half that time. A pair of giant spiders with their web spun across a wider part of the path was our only obstacle and we came through that encounter unscathed.

Things were slightly different on the trip home – my new metal casing prevented me from being much use as a scout so Shadow was left to do that on his own now – which I think he preferred, to be honest.

Needless to say that we spent up big that evening at the tavern and made plans to go looking for some good-quality equipment the next day.

Only two things are certain in life…

In the middle of our revelry three men, one in fairly elaborate-looking robes of state and the other two in Taureth City Guard livery. He stood silently for a few moments until we had all noticed him.

“Good evening, gentlemen.” He had one of those slightly smooth voices that reminded you of a snake.
“And to you, good sir.” I replied. I stood as I said this, wondering what was going on.

The man explained that he was from the Office of the Exchequer and that our spending had come to their notice. Of course, this meant nothing to us and we were just as likely to listen to him as ignore him, but when he said that they were going to tax us, retrospectively for ten percent of our earnings, based on value of assets. The reason for this was that our spending around town and our minor fame for ‘shouting the bar’ on occasion had reached the ears of officialdom and they wanted their slice of our earnings. There were some loud protests at this, but the man raised his hand and explained that we had two other options. One was to become Crown Questors – this would mean that we wouldn’t be taxed, but could be called upon once a year to perform a task for the king with no compensation. The other option was to pay two thousand gold, biannually to be registered in the Dallarn Freeholds as a mercenary company – this would mean that our incomes would not be taxed and we could take out crown contracts.

After a brief discussion of the ins and outs of the various options and a few more protests, we agreed to meet the man the next evening in the tavern.

The ensuing conference was quite loud. Shadow and Warramayl were in favour of just skipping town, I was personally in favour of the Crown Questors option, as was Terjon, and the others seemed in favour of the Merc company. Since our group ran on a democratic-type arrangement, the rogue and the monk’s idea was quickly shouted down and we were left with the other two options – the idea of paying taxes never even came up.

Eventually, we agreed that the mercenary company idea was probably the best one. We then had to determine who the captain and the corporal at arms (required positions for the purposes of the registration) would be and the name of our company.

I was elected to be the captain – which I admit I was a little chuffed at – and Mareth was to be the corporal at arms. The role of the captain and the corporal is to negotiate and accept the contracts on behalf of the company and be the official face of the group. I was in favour of Terjon being the corporal, but the chance of him opening his mouth during an important conversation was deemed too great to risk it.

Naming the company was a difficult process and some of the names we came up with, in retrospect, would have been just embarrassing. In the end we came up with The Obsidian Hammers, and I hoped fervently that it wasn’t already taken after the length of time it had taken for us to come up with a name we could all agree on.

We all hit the sack, our plans made for the next day. Warramayl was going to look for a better quality sling. Mareth was going to canvass the gemsmiths again, looking for a diamond for Longstride. I had seen some suits of armour around in full plate with spikes on the shoulders, arms, shins, feet and hands and decided that I wanted to have similar accoutrements fitted to my latest acquisition. Shadow had fairly amorphous plans relating to the market area, Terjon was going to try to give away as much of his share as he possibly could and Taklinn and Hejkan were elected to renew our supplies in amongst whatever else they planned to do.

 

[Rhael]

Player's Perspective (015)

Birth of The Hammers
The next evening we told the government officer of our decision and he directed us to the Registrations Office in the government quarter the next morning to pay our registration fee and sign in.

I’ll admit that when I went to bed that evening the idea wearied my slightly, I thought it to be needless bureaucracy and a government-based money making exercise to get funds out of adventurers who otherwise might just leave town. The next morning I thought about it – I was going to be a registered captain of a mercenary company in the Dallarn Freeholds, albeit a small one. It was not an exclusive club, but it was a position that should be taken seriously and I planned to do just that.

Mareth and I headed off, to sign the requisite papers as early as we could the next morning. The registration process was relatively painless (aside from handing over two thousand gold pieces) – all my companions names had to be recorded on the register and Mareth and I were required to take an oath of sorts. I was informed in no uncertain terms that, as captain, I was responsible for my ‘men’ and their behaviour and was required to remember that I represented the Freeholds when I presented myself and my company. We were we could return in two days when we could collect our flag and symbol.

The clerk went on to explain what being registered as a mercenary company actually meant – the summary being that we were now eligible to take out crown contracts and earn commendations for our actions, which would be displayed on our standard. Since it came up, we asked if there were any contracts going that could be handled by a company of seven. The clerk shuffled through some papers and came up with some patrols that sounded fairly boring before pulling out a set of papers describing a police action – I was initially disinterested, but at one point he mentioned the word ‘Orcs’ and my interest was awakened. When asked to explain more fully, the clerk explained that there had been some unconfirmed reports of orcs terrorising some villages to the south-east of Taureth and that they wanted someone to investigate and possibly remove the threat. The job paid two thousand gold and had to be completed in the shortest time possible – a fortnight was the maximum. No further information was forthcoming until after the job was accepted.

We thought about if for a few minutes, and discussed whether any of the other guys would have any objections to it. Terjon would jump a the chance to protect villagers, Warramayl would look forward to the fighting, Hejkan and Taklinn would never take a backward step from the possibility of killing some orcs and Shadow would be thinking about loot. Coming up with no objections, we accepted the contract.

We were told to report to a Lord Thomast at his keep to the south-east, just to the west of the villages at which the disturbance was reported.

“Remember, Master Everard,” The clerk cautioned as we left, “you are representing Taureth and the Freeholds now.”
I nodded once in acknowledgement and Mareth and I left the building to return to the Drum and Sword.

“Sounds good, Rhael.” Hejkan gave me a hearty slap on the back, when I told them of our plan. “Kord will be pleased that I may show strength in his name destroying orcs.”
“If they’ve been looting, they could have all sorts of fat loot!” Shadow was probably the most excited of the lot of us, but for different reasons.
The reactions were as we expected and we quickly packed the necessary gear, retrieved our horses from the stables and set off toward Lord Thomast’s keep.

On the way we had a discussion about leadership in combat. The guys were thinking that since I was the named leader of our troop, perhaps I should be the battlefield leader also. I didn’t have a problem with this, as most of our fights had become almost uniformly disorganised and we did need some leadership in combat. We resolved that they would listen to me when in combat and we would try to stick together as much as possible.

Gotta love the aristocracy.
I find it difficult to describe Lord Thomast’s demeanour, suffice to say, he gave me a bad feeling about this task. He was notably guarded, rude and definitely unhappy at our interference in this matter – even though his own forces – numbering eighty or so soldiers, as far as we could tell – did not appear to be involved in stopping the orcs. Of course Shadow couldn’t hold his tongue during the discussions and I feared severe repercussions if a report of misconduct was brought against our company before we had completed even a single mission. Lord Thomast was justifiably furious at whatever he thought Shadow said, even if it did act to solidify by opinion that he was a fat, useless blowhard.

His evasive answers to our queries about what he was doing about the orcish incursions made me believe something was ‘up’, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.

I attempted to remain polite and apologised profusely for my men, before informing Lord Thomast – who seemed disinterested to the extreme – of our intentions to investigate and report back when the situation was found to be not as reported or when it was dealt with.
“Yes. Yes. Whatever.” Was his reply.

“Protection racket!” Shadow stated defiantly when we were out of earshot of Lord Thomast’s guards and back on the road.
“I agree, Rhael.” Hejkan echoed Shadow’s sentiments.
“Maybe.” I responded, thoughtfully. “Maybe that is the case, but it doesn’t really make much difference, does it? I admit, I found Lord Thomast to be a fairly disagreeable man, and he is definitely up to something –“
“Of course he’s up to something!” Shadow seemed exasperated.
“ – but there’s very little we can do about it right now.” I finished, looking at Shadow. “Let’s just conduct this investigation and see what we find.”
“Yeah, alright.” The rogue appeared as if he was going sulk right up to the point where he shoved his sword through Lord Thomast’s neck. He perked up somewhat when we were heading in the direction of several villages which were the subject of the investigation.

The first village we came to was a burnt out ruin with no-one in sight. I found tracks leading everywhere, including some that resembled that of a giant lizard, but most were just of booted feet. There were too many to tell anything meaningful, but even a child could tell that this village was attacked and torched. I guessed that this could have been up to two weeks ago. There didn’t seem to be any bodies, but I guessed any survivors would have returned and buried their dead before departing, probably for Taureth.

The next village was the same. This was quite upsetting, as I felt like we had failed before we had begun. Obviously the news of this destruction had not reached the ears of officialdom in Taureth soon enough, and I couldn’t help but think that any local lord worth his salt would probably want to prevent the villages near him from being burned to the ground. All was not as it appeared.

It being very late in the day, we decided to find a place to set camp. We headed north-east from the second blackened village into a forested area that was nearby – thinking that it would provide good cover during the night. Once in the forest, we came across a path hewn into the forest, leading away from the road. I was becoming more and more angry at the situation – not only were villagers being killed and their homes burnt, but the forest was being destroyed by these orcs. And Lord Thomast appeared to be doing nothing to prevent it.

There were footprints everywhere, ranging from small to large and including some of those lizard-like prints we found at the village. The path ended at what appeared to be an abandoned campsite for a large group and did not appear to have been used in at least a fortnight.

We moved a little further down the road and into the forest on the other side of the road to set up our own camp. We set a staggered, two-man watch and bedded down for the night.

The night passed uneventfully and we woke to a clear, but crisp morning. We knew that the next village was to the south and we headed in that direction. When we emerged from the southern edge of the forest, we saw something that made my heart sink even further. A plume of black smoke rising from a point to the south – probably five hours ride away.
“Let’s go.” I pointed to the smoke. No further words were necessary.

Unfortunately, after the half-day of riding, we were greeted with a similar vision to the last two villages – except this site was far more recently ruined. Smoke still rose from the debris that once were houses and there some fires still clung to the wooden beams. The lack of wind during the day meant that a smoky pall hung over the village, obscuring vision and making it difficult to see anything approaching – that made me nervous.

“There you are.” I head Shadow say quietly, and probably to himself. I turned and saw him draw his bow, aiming at something he’d spotted through the smoke.
“Shadow! Wait!” But I was too late, he had already loosed his arrow before I called his name.
“Yeah!” He exclaimed – obviously celebrating another true shot.
“What was that?” Mareth asked.
“An Orc.” The rogue replied. “Probably.”
“Probably?!” Mareth started off in the direction Shadow had fired and drew his rapier. “You should try to verify your targets!” We all drew our weapons and Shadow nocked another arrow as we advanced.

I have to give him credit for spotting the target, and for the shot, but not for the target. We emerged from the smoke to find a man crouched over another man with tears in his eyes.
“Damnit!” I muttered under my breath.
The man stood defensively as soon as he saw us and looked ready to flee.
“Our apologies, good sir.” Mareth said quickly. “My companion here mistook you for an orc.” He motioned at Shadow who tried his best to look chastened.
“I am – um – skilled with herbs.” Hejkan said to the man as he stepped forward. “Perhaps I can help him.”

I was impressed with the barbarian – he knew that actual healing magic would probably scare the hell out of this simple man and made quite a show of mashing up some herbs he had in his pouch and placing them in the stricken man’s mouth while saying his prayers to Kord.
The other man looked a little concerned at the magic-sounding words, but Mareth stepped forward to reassure him that the words were merely incidental to the herbs and were more of a concentration measure than anything else. Good old, quick-thinking Mareth.

Fortunately, the man had not been killed by Shadow’s arrow and soon after Hejkan had applied his healing magic he was sitting up, groggy but alive.

The other man seemed to forget that we had just almost killed his friend and started blubbering. Once he calmed down I thought we might be able to get some information out of him.

When asked what happened here, he spoke of a mist seeming to rise from the ground itself an hour or two after the sun had set Then some tall beast-men riding demon-steeds with flashing teeth rode forth slaughtering and devouring all in their path. More of the beast-men came on foot and some other smaller ones too. They were ferocious and the two men claimed they were very lucky to have escaped by hiding in a copse of trees near the village while trying to ignore the screams of the dying. Since the attackers left, the two had been burying the dead, intending to head to Taureth when they were done.

After attempting to extract as much descriptive information from the pair as possible, and realising that it would not be forthcoming, we assisted them to complete their task and then took our leave.

There was one village left in the area, as far as we were aware and I fervently hoped that we would reach it before it was attacked. It was already late in the day when we left but we made it to the forest to the east, on the other side of which was the last village, and found a decent campsite – a clearing within the forest - before it became too dark to continue travelling.

We set our watch and went to sleep.

 

[Rhael]

Player's Perspective (016)

Monsters have interrupted your rest. *

It was in the middle of the night when Shadow and Warramayl were on watch that we were awoken.
“Guys!” came the terse whisper breaking our fitful slumber. “Guys!”
Generally, you don’t need to be told twice, Taklinn appeared to have not heard the alarm. I sprang to my feet, which were now hidden in a thick fog that had appeared, apparently from nowhere. I was immediately reminded of the villager's tale of the rising mist prior to being attacked.

Shadow was pointing to the south.
“Over there.“ He was squinting, trying to make something out in the dappled moonlight.
A voice boomed out, rousing even Taklinn.
“Be you from Lord Thomast?!”
Being the unthinking honesty-bound automaton that I am I yelled back almost immediately.
“No!” I found out moments later that that may have been a grave error. A small number of horns blared from the darkness and were drowned out by shouting as orcs and goblins charged us from the forest, some of the orcs mounted on huge lizard-like creatures. There appeared to be a huge number of them, and I was feeling quite exposed not wearing my armour. Time stood still. My options were to get out of here or stay and fight a battle with an unknown number of the enemy in circumstances that suited them far more than us. Further, we were out in the open and could be easily surrounded.
Weighing up the various factors the conclusion was obvious, I grabbed my pack and the sack I kept my armour in and ran to my horse yelling “Retreat! Follow me!”
Whether they all heard me or not was not apparent. What was obvious was that the little chat we had a couple of days ago about battlefield leadership had been forgotten. Taklinn had been woken by the yellings and was scrambling to his feet to follow me. Mareth also, appeared to be moving in my direction. The others appeared to have their own little plan. I should have known that Hejkan and Warramayl would never voluntarily remove themselves from combat and Shadow tended to stick with Hejkan, so he wasn’t going anywhere. Terjon’s typically slow decision making meant that it didn’t really matter whether he heard me or not.

Orcs and goblins were streaming out of the forest, led by five orcs mounted on the huge lizard-like creatures – I have no idea how any of them there were. It took me a few seconds to remove the hobbles from my horse and begin to lead him away. Mareth also began this task. Mareth attempted to leap onto his horse to save time but the horse moved slightly as an arrow hit the tree next to it and the elf fell heavily to the ground. Taklinn didn’t make it to me until my horse was unfettered and decided to leave his behind.

Taklinn and I ran, slowed by the equipment we had picked up before we left. After a few seconds I realised that the other guys had not followed my lead. Looking over my shoulder I could see Taklinn behind me and three of the mounted orcs not far behind him – quickly gaining on us. Taklinn was attacked, I stopped and turned, only to be almost run down by a pair of the mounted orcs as they bore down on me. I could tell that the rest of our group had stayed in the clearing to fight. I could see through the forest that Mareth’s latest attempt to mount his horse ended badly, he managed to mount his horse, but was quickly accosted by a mounted orc and the elf’s horse was disembowelled by the raking claws of the lizard-creature. The elf once again fell heavily to the ground, rising only to be confronted by the slavering lizard-creature.

Dropping my sack and drew my sword and shield to meet the attack. Taklinn had his hands full with the one and I had two orcs and two lizards attacking me. I was able to manoeuvre so that I could attack the orc rider, having a theory that perhaps, unguided the lizard creatures may not attack us anymore. I took down the rider and waited to see if the lizard pressed the attack. The lunge of the second lizard hit my shield with full force, almost knocking me from my feet and jarring my arm. The rider-less lizard appeared disinterested and began to wander off but then spotted my horse and attacked it. The animal put up a reasonable resistance but stood no chance and was quickly felled. I was disappointed and saddened that I had been unable to protect the mount. The lizard stopped and began to feed on the carcass of my horse.

My moment’s distraction almost proved fatal as I was slow in sidestepping an attack from the other lizard and was close to being bitten in two. The jaws snapped shut on the spot I had been only moments ago, but I was not so lucky when it pressed the attack with it’s claws, both caught me mid twist and tore a huge gash on the left side of my torso and my right leg respectively. Ignoring the excruciating pain for the moment I twisted one last time to stand beside the lizard and thrust my sword through the rider’s chest. The orc gasped and fell to the ground. The same tactic had worked on the other one, so I stopped briefly and waited for the lizard to move away. I exhaled, relieved when it appeared to lose interest in food it had to fight for and began munching on the comatose orc that had just fallen off it’s back.

I cast a spell of healing on myself to close my wounds and began to head towards Taklinn.
“Kill the rider!” I yelled at the dwarf, who had been previously concentrating on the lizard, without much success. He must have heard me for his next attack was directed at the orc, his sword cutting the orc’s arm off at the bicep. It fell, screaming to the ground where its former mount stepped on it stricken creature’s head.
“Hold still!” I was still twenty feet away.
Taklinn obeyed and the lizard began to wander off.

I ran up beside the dwarf.
“Let’s get back and help the others!” I took note of the spot where we left our gear and ran back to the others. The sight that greeted us was one like I had never seen before.

Shadow was in the branches of a tree, frantically shooting arrows at the goblins who tried to climb up after him as we entered the clearing I saw him put an arrow through a goblin’s head from point blank range and send it crashing to the ground taking two of it’s companions with it. Mareth and Terjon were standing at the base of Shadow’s tree, fighting for their respective lives against orcs and the last mounted orc which threatened to surround them. Hejkan was locked in mortal combat with an enraged orc with a gigantic battle axe. Behind that orc stood another, carrying a staff with a skull atop. It appeared to be casting a spell. Warramayl was just beyond the barbarian in the midst the bodies of dead goblins, he looked a bit the worse for wear but was grinning and was just heading towards Mareth and Terjon’s position. Slightly less than half of the horses we had remained, the orcs and goblins had killed several of our pack-horses and some of our warhorses, meaning that at least on of us would have to walk.

“Go help Mareth and Terj!” I said to Taklinn as I ran off to help Hejkan who looked to be on his last legs. The dwarf nodded and ran off.

I charged at the orc with the staff which had just hit the barbarian with several magical missiles, it only barely had a chance to see me coming before I plunged my sword through it’s throat, the words of a spell dying on its lips. I turned to see the orc knock Hejkan to the ground and turn to me. I noticed that Hejkan was not quite unconscious and appeared to be casting a spell of healing (at least that was my best guess). The orc didn’t notice and the barbarian climbed to his feet behind the orc and wearily thrust his greatsword through the orc’s head as I dodged a hefty swing with it’s axe.

I smiled grimly at the barbarian as we turned our attention to the combat at the base of the tree. Several goblins and orcs lay dead and Shadow had just put an arrow through the lizard-rider’s head and I yelled for them to leave the lizard alone, but from what I could tell, my words were lost in the cacophony of battle.

Taklinn was now attacking the orcs that surrounded our companions from behind and we began heading in that direction. The lizard began to wander off, but found Warramayl in it’s way and attacked, striking the monk with it’s powerful claws, knocking him to the ground. I looked at Hejkan, worried that the lizard may decide to stop for a snack. The barbarian nodded once before running around the battle to assist the monk. Luckily the lizard appeared contented that the immediate threat was over and had begun to wander off by the time Hejkan had made it to his side to administer the required healing spell.

I waded into the remaining orcs surrounding Mareth and Terjon. With most of their efforts directed towards not dying, the elf and the paladin had not managed to kill many of their attackers, but now that we were all together again, they pressed the attack and the rest of our assailants were dispatched with very little fuss, several ran into the forest during the dying stages and were not pursued.

Like at the beginning of the battle, time once again seemed to stand still as I surveyed the battlefield. The eerie glow of the moon robbing everything of it’s colour, making the scene look like a charcoal sketch, albeit a detailed one. There were bodies everywhere and we were all covered in blood, our own intermingled with our attackers’. I have no idea how many attacked us, and I have no idea how many ran away, but there had to be at least twenty goblins and probably thirty orcs, not including the mounted ones and the mage.

Mareth and Terjon had a great many wounds, Hejkan was leaning against a tree, catching his breath, Warramayl sat near his feet, bleeding from many places. Taklinn and I had several injuries from our meeting with the lizard-riders. Shadow was lying down in the branches of his tree, exhausted, his arms and legs draped either side of his chosen perch.

Once we had caught our breath, Terjon, Hekjan and I exhausted our magical energies on healing the group, so that we could travel - the idea being to get away from this area as soon as possible, just in case their were more. Shadow broke some small but sturdy looking branches off the tree before he climbed down, saying that it was his lucky tree and maybe Hejkan could make a wand of healing out of one of these sticks. Hejkan smiled.

While the rest of us gathered up our gear and I headed back into the forest to pick up the stuff I left behind, Shadow went through his obligatory looting of the corpses. The haul was relatively meagre, the only item of real interest being the skull-staff the orc mage had. The rest of the booty was made up of a couple of handfuls of coins and the battleaxe the big fighter was wearing.

Weary from the combat and lack of rest, we put on our armour, strapped on our weapons, mounted the horses that remained, Warramayl opting to walk (he could outpace the horses anyway), and headed back to the road.

Hard to do good when the bad guys are doing well
Once back on the road and heading north we came across another path cut through the forest, very similar to the other one. Once again there were tracks everywhere, and these appeared to be relatively fresh. We cautiously followed the path, Shadow out in front silently stalking along. After short distance of no more than fifty yards the path opened out into a clearing, very similar in dimensions to the last one we found, but in this case, filled with tents. This was the current base of operations for the band – and it appeared deserted. We checked every tent, and found no-one and it wasn’t until we looked in the larger tent in the centre of the encampment that we found anything of interest. Aside from a small chest full of gold coins and a couple of small gems, we found a map of the area with the villages in the area circled. Three of them had crosses through them.

This smelled, and not just of unwashed orc body.

“I was right!” Shadow stated, triumphantly. “Protection racket!”
“It would appear so.” I responded, thoughtfully. It did seem that he was correct in his assertion, but what could we do?
“This Lord was taking money from his people and burning their villages if they didn’t pay?” Hejkan asked?
“Yup!” Shadow replied. Hands on hips.
“But he didn’t do it.” I pointed out. “He got some orcs to do it for him, thereby removing his connection.”
“That is wrong.” The big barbarian said pointedly.
“It is, my friend.”
“We should report this Lord to the authorities in Taureth and warn the people of the remaining village.” Hejkan was quite angry about the situation. As was I, but a bit more rational.
“It wouldn’t make any difference.”
“But - !”
“Think it through, Hejkan. We go back to Taureth and tell the government that one of the Lords of the Dallarn Freeholds is paying orcs to run a protection racket against the villages in his area and we present them with this map and the coins and our opinion of his general demeanour.”
“And he is arrested and hanged for treason.” The barbarian finished.
“No!” I was a little angry that he couldn’t see my point – that was unfair, of course as Hejkan knew an entirely different justice than those meted out by ‘civilised’ governments. I made an effort to be calm. “We would be accusing a Lord of criminal activities with no real evidence – “
“But we have the map.”
“The map means nothing! The map is just a map. There is nothing on the map that points to Lord Thomast – we might know what it means, but to the authorities, it would be just a map.” I paused. “You can’t go around accusing Lords of things, you have to have proof! Do you know what would happen after we laid this accusation?”
“No.”
“Lord Thomast would dispute the claim, pointing at the lack of evidence and the absurdity of the claim and call for us all to be hanged for accusing one of our betters of criminal activities. The authorities would have no choice but to do so, even if we were able to convince them that we were right.”
“Oh.”
“I support you completely in your outrage and your desire to do the right thing, Hejkan, but this is one of those situations when discretion is the better part of valour – there is nothing more we can do. We are required to report back to Lord Thomast that the orc band is dead, then return to Taureth to collect our payment.” I looked sadly at the big man’s face, trying to convey that I was dreadfully sorry for the situation. “I’m sorry, my friend, but there is nothing more we can do.”
Hejkan thought for a few moments.
“We should warn the remaining village.”
“And tell them what? That their lord is planning to exhort money from them or he’ll burn their village to the ground?”
“Yes.”
“Hejkan, I counsel you against this course of action. I think it’s a bad idea, however I will not stop you if you really want to do this.”
“We must show strength in the face of this evil.” He replied, defiantly. “Kord would want me to do this, at least.”
I looked at the other guys.
“What do you guys think of all this? Does anyone disagree with my thinking on this matter?”
All responded that they agreed with my take on the situation, and agreed to go along with Hejkan’s desire to warn the remaining village.
“Very well. We will head to the last village. Only two of us will go in, however. I don’t think an armed band would help our case, Terjon, you should go with Hejkan. Just stand there and look Paladin-like.” Terj nodded in response.

We travelled through the rest of the night and neared the village by mid morning. The rest of us waited by the road a half-mile out of town while Terjon and Hejkan headed in to town.

When they returned they had a sad tale to tell. Hejkan had been unsuccessful in convincing the leader of the townsfolk that they meant no harm and only came to warn them and obviously believed that they were merely trying to warn them of their lord’s unscrupulous nature. After a short period of trying to win her over, the barbarian admitted defeat and left, angry and sad at the same time. Terjon vouched that he managed to keep his cool remarkably well through the exhange.

“I’m sorry, Hejkan. You did your best. That is all you can do.”
He just looked at me, sadly.

“Come on, guys. Let’s get out of here.”

It took us a couple of days to get back to Lord Thomast’s keep, and I wrote my report during the evenings, careful to leave out anything about protection rackets, I reported the facts as they would appear to anyone else. As I suspected, he was not particularly interested in our report, dismissive, even – although I got the feeling that his unconcerned demeanour was a bit of an act. I took my leave of him as soon as I could politely do so and lead the group back to Taureth. On the way, Mareth reminded me that we were due back at the Loremasters to retrieve the report we paid for all those months ago.

We reported back to the commissions office to hand in my report and receive our bounty and the standard of the Obsidian Hammers, with it’s freshly embroidered point (five points making a star) in the top left hand corner. It looked kind of pathetic, there on it’s own, but I felt a sense of pride, nonetheless.

Mareth and I decided we would return to the Loremasters the next day to see if they had finished our report as yet.

* This heading is a throwback to the message that appeared in the old gold box AD&D games. Long live Poolrad.

 

[Rhael]

Player's Perspective (017)

Party Update
Only change is that Mareth now is a Fighter/Mage.
Rhael (Human Ranger/Cleric), Shadow (Human Rogue), Terjon (Human Paladin), Warramayl (Human Monk), Mareth (Elf Fighter/Mage), Taklinn(Dwarven Fighter), Hejkan (Human Barbarian/Cleric of Kord)

The Loremasters
The rising of the sun told me that it was time to go back and see those supercilious know-it-alls who call themselves Loremasters.

We all rose a little later than usual and had a hearty breakfast before Mareth and I headed off to the Loremasters to see if they had any information for our one hundred and fifty gold. It seemed like a lot of cash at the time, but a much larger amount of funds had passed through our hands since then.

The Loremasters informed us, with an upturned nose that before they would deliver their report we had to be deemed worthy of being the recipients of the information. They went on to inform us that a certain cult that listed worshipping demons among their hobbies had established a presence in Taureth, albeit a relatively minor one. They wanted us to prove our worth by eradicating them. They were far from the most threatening presence in Taureth, but the Loremasters found their presence to be unacceptable. I shared their objection to the presence of demon worshippers in the town – I was apprehensive about facing a demon that was potentially far beyond my strength – but it was important to me that we did this and not only for the furtherance of our quest.
“Of course we will undertake this task for you.” I responded after an approving nod from Mareth.

One of the Loremasters told us of the exact location of the demon-worshippers’ hideout – in an old building that had, in the past been an insane asylum, but more recently had simply been a warehouse.

We collected our gear and the others and headed for the designated building. It was a squat, iron structure that was built as the entrance hall to the asylum, which was predominantly underground.

Considering that this was supposed to be a stronghold of demon worshippers and we hadn’t seen any guards or resistance to our approach, Shadow made a very thorough check of the front door. Sure enough, he found two traps – one on the door handle and one in the lock. He extracted his tools and set to work disabling the two insidious devices in a matter of moments.
“Decent traps, but not terribly well hidden.” He commented, more to himself than us as he stowed his tools.

Terj and I readied ourselves for an attack as Shadow swung the door open. Nothing.
“Wow. That was exciting.” Remarked Mareth, dryly. “Can we do that again, I don’t want to miss anything.”
“Shut up, elf.” Taklinn said, gruffly and gave Mareth a defiant look. The elf sighed and let the jibe pass.

I turned and put my finger to my lips.
“Shh” I hushed, tersely.

With a signal from Shadow, we ventured forth into the darkness, only the light of Shadow and Hejkan’s freshly lit torches guiding our way.

This level of the building was basically a large room with a desk at the far end and some waiting areas off to the side. In the far, rear corners behind the desk were two spiral staircases, leading downwards. A quick search of this level revealed nothing except the relatively recent footprints of the last people who came up the stairs and headed for the front door.

“Well, something’s alive down there.” Commented Taklinn when I mentioned the tracks.
I quickly looked at Mareth, hoping to silence any witty retort he had and avoid any unpleasantness. Luckily he caught my eye because the dwarf wasn’t as good at letting things slide as he was.

Peering down the middle of the spiral stairs, which descended some fifty feet I could make out the barest hint of light. I urged everyone to be as quiet as possible while heading down the stairs and we began climbing down.

At the bottom, we were faced with a corridor that ended in a doorway, the walls were wood panelled and adorned with tapestries. The door was slightly ajar and there was light shining through the opening.

Shadow handed his torch to Warramayl and approached the door. He poked his head around the doorjamb and looked around, after a few moments he signalled for us to approach and swung the door fully open.

The room was certainly not what we expected. It was expensively furnished and decorated, bookcases lined the walls and elaborate rugs covered the floors and was obviously once a very pleasant place to while away a few hours. Once.

Now, however the rugs and the couches were stained with the blood of the dozen or so black-garbed bodies that lay strewn around the room. A large pile of books stood in the centre of the room where they had obviously been set alight and then doused with water.

Shadow was close to tears.
“Look at all this stuff!” He said, through gritted teeth. “It would be worth an absolute fortune if it hadn’t been for this destruction. This was a surreal and slightly comical moment for me – Shadow’s reaction was somewhat similar to Terjon’s reaction to starving children and diseased or downtrodden people. I could envision him kneeling near the pile of soggy books in the centre of the room, falling to his knees and shouting to the heavens “By the gods! Why? Why?!”

“They are only material possessions, my friend.” Warramayl sensed Shadow’s distress and placed his hand on the rogue’s shoulder. “They will not provide happiness. True happiness comes from within. Look within yourself and seek the riches inside.”

They were truly profound words from our almost silent companion. Shadow, however was unimpressed.
“With all due respect, Warramayl, that’s bull.” Shadow responded. “Nothing within me is going to allow me to buy castles, mountains of food and wine and the hottest women in the Freeholds!” Warramayl did not respond, Shadow’s gesturing was quite expansive as he continued. “That’s what fat loot is for. To be able tobuy whatever you want. To be able to afford to wear the most expensive clothes and eat the most expensive food – “
“And screw the most expensive whores?” Mareth asked, mockingly.
“Yes!” Shadow replied with a raised voice. “To screw the most expensive whores. And drink the most expensive wine and live in the most expensive houses and live and travel in luxury. To have people do the menial work for you and not have to sleep in the woods, always watching out for the next thing that’s gonna come bounding out of the forest to eat your liver.” He took a breath. “Nothing inside me is going to let me do that – unless one of you guys force-fed me diamonds while I was asleep.” He looked hopeful. Taklinn and Hejkan shook their heads. Mareth and I were standing near the far door keeping watch and trying not to laugh and Terjon had long-since been distracted by something shiny and was examining it intently.

“I’m sorry.” The monk said, simply and returned to the back of the group, showing no emotion. I had a feeling I knew exactly what he was sorry for and it wasn’t for what he said.

“Come on, guys.” I said, after a few moments of silence, allowing Shadow to calm down slightly. “We’ve got a job to do and whoever or whatever in here has probably heard us by now.” Everyone nodded their accedence and we headed out the far door.

It lead to another corridor which turned sharply after a short distance and lead to another room, very similar to the last, in terms of the carnage but not so much the furnishing. A room off to the side was a large storeroom which held all manner of mundane items as well as some tapestries and rugs which had Shadow salivating.
“These would be worth hundreds of gold, each!” He exclaimed as he knelt and conducted a more thorough examination.
“That may be, Shadow, but we can’t do much about it at the moment.” Shadow looked pained. “We can grab them on the way back, if you like.” I secretly hoped he would forget about them because I didn’t like the idea of the Loremasters finding out we had looted the place – just in case.

We continued onwards, meeting no opposition, but finding bodies all over the place.

We had to light our torches again, when we descended further, beyond what I believed to be the original asylum. The wood-panelled corridors became a rough-hewn tunnel with a pair of iron rails down it’s centre. This corridor wound slightly and we followed it for what seemed like at least two miles.

Suddenly, there was light at the end of the tunnel and we could smell the ocean. We cautiously approached and found that the tunnel opened up into a large cavern with a three-foot high stone wall splitting it in two, broken in only one place. This room was to contain the first resistance we met. We were suddenly attacked from all sides by men garbed in black. Two flying creatures which my knowledge of demons revealed to be quasits were on the other side of the wall and apparently engaged in some other task because they were not paying us any attention.

The battle was joined, the six men who attacked us initially fell back towards the only break in the stone wall once they discovered we were stronger opponents than we looked and three of their number had fallen. As we advanced at varied pace across the floor after our assailants I mentioned to my companions that they would need magical weapons to do any real damage to the two flying creatures and I then cast a spell of enchantment on my own weapon.

It wasn’t until a fireball exploded in our midst, severely hurting Mareth, Terjon and killing one of our black-garbed opponents that I felt like we might have been in trouble. A figure emerged from a side room. Humanoid, with large bat-like wings, about six feet tall was standing on the other side of the stone wall. By this stage, Taklinn, Warramayl and I had traversed the room to the break in the stone wall and fighting off the remaining men. One of the quasits had circled around behind us and was about to attack Taklinn as the last of the men broke and ran towards an opening in the far wall – only to be taken down by a well-aimed shot from Shadow’s bow.

Terj turned his healing powers onto Mareth before the elf turned and charged across the floor directly at the creature, leaping onto the stone wall and thrusting his rapier at it’s head. He missed. The distraction, however gave Warramayl and I a chance to move around the inside of the wall and attack. Terjon had joined Taklinn’s battle with the quasit and Shadow was firing arrows at whatever he could see from his hiding place behind some boxes.

The creature, which upon closer inspection resembled a cross between a demonoid and a vampire didn’t manage to cast any further spells as we surrounded it and hacked it down. As it fell, it became a cloud of vapour and floated towards the opening in the far wall. The final quasit, which had attacked Terj and Taklinn disengaged and swooped Warramayl and myself, I managed to score a light hit as it flew overhead but it ascended to a height I could not reach and flew out the opening after the cloud of mist.

We gave chase.

We had no chance of catching either of them, and I wasn’t entirely sure what we would do if we did catch the cloud, but after a half-mile or so the passage ended at what I assumed to be the ocean, under an overhanging cliff. A brief search revealed that there was no way of getting out of here aside from the way we came in, so we trudged back up the passageway to the large room.

Shadow searched the bodies and found nothing of interest, aside from a few coins and we decided that we had probably done what the Loremasters had requested. The rogue did forget about the goods on the way out and we didn’t have to bother about who was going to carry it out and we made it back to the Loremasters without incident.

We made our report, describing the occurrences and the foes. The Loremasters appeared satisfied that we had done as they asked and presented us with the report.

 

[Rhael]

Player's Perspective (018)

Note
To anyone who has been reading this, this post marks the catch-up point. That is to say, the session(s) of which this post speaks occur after the post that began this thread, the previous seventeen chapters occurred in the six months prior to this thread being begun.

The characters’ levels at this point in the story at this point in the campaign are as stated in the original post (with one small correction). Restated for posterity:
* Rhael 5 Ranger/4 Cleric of Hieroneous
* Warramayl 7 Monk
* Terjon 6 Paladin
* Mareth 4 Fighter/3 Evoker
* Hejkan 1 Barbarian/6 Cleric of Kord
* Shadow 7 Rogue
* Taklinn 7 Fighter.


Where do we want to go today?

There was plenty of text in the report the Loremasters had prepared for us, and some of it made no sense. Much of it was made up of passages from ancient texts that the researchers had found and transcribed into the report and was written in a very round-a-bout and cryptic fashion. Reference was made to what we could only guess to be some ancient units of measurement which only confused us further.

Sticking to the Loremasters’ conclusions, as opposed to the mystifying passages, there was very little in the way of specifics, although I’m not sure exactly what I was expecting. The report did speak of areas which we found out were far to the west of us somewhere towards (or within) the disputed lands where armies of undead and demonic hordes fight under the control of their masters for a large section of land near Amoria. Also mentioned was an ancient and lost dwarven kingdom called Eered Kazor which the Loremasters said was somewhere in a large region to the south and west of here, but they could provide no further details.

The document spoke of a ‘key’ which would unlock Mareciot, but it was lost and apparently only someone with the blood of Aldaraan could actually wield the key anyway. The key, it was written, was made up of the Ring of Destiny, the Sphere of Haedros, a staff of very specific dimensions and a mithril spike. We had no idea whether these latter two ingredients were specific items or whether we would have to manufacture them. The Ring of Destiny was most likely the one we saw around the old man’s neck (about a year ago now), which was now in the hands of the Fists of Hextor. We already had the Sphere of Haedros, but the rest of the things we needed were still out of our reach.

Sure, we had a fair idea that the Ring of Destiny was with the Fists of Hextor in the Old Karath Empire, but there was no way I was going to go wandering into a Hextor stronghold – especially not with Hieroneous’ symbol emblazoned on my shield.

After a fair bit of discussion, we came to the conclusion that all we could really do was head westwards – hopefully we may be able to find some more specific information about Mareciot and Eered Kazor.

There is a city called Illsarth on the edge of the Freeholds, south west of here. We decide that we can head in that direction, try to gather extra information there before striking out westwards towards Kadrendorst across a vast, mountainous wilderness, dotted with the occasional town and many a tribe of giants. Travellers are warned against veering too far from the roads, and even they can be dangerous.

The westwards journey took us through, what for most of us, was our old home town. Shadow, Taklinn and Hejkan were from elsewhere, but for Terj, Mareth, Warramayl and I it could be a pleasant homecoming.

However, it was not the uneventful trip that we had hoped for. Near the end of the first day of the three day trek (it was much quicker now that we had horses) Mareth told us there were four figures on horses coming towards us down the path – they appeared to be dressed completely in black. Even if that was unusual, I wasn’t going to do anything out of the ordinary and possibly start trouble.

“Just stay on the path and keep riding. Get ready to ride single-file to allow them to pass.” I paused. “We don’t want any trouble.”

As they closed to within a hundred yards, Mareth said that they were riding black horses and were covered head to toe in full plate armour. They made no unusual movements as they approached.

“Greetings.” I said, pleasantly, raising my hand.
“Greetings.” The leader responded. His helmed head looked up and down as he passed, slowly. “How goes the worship of Hieroneous?” I could tell he was denigrating my faith, but I wasn’t going to risk a fight over something like that.
“Fine, thank-you.” I replied. Pretending not to notice his tone. He laughed in response.

As they passed, I could see the symbols of Hextor on their saddles and on the back of their armour, the same garb as the men who fled Esgaro that morning after killing the old man, and revealing them as Fists of Hextor.

“We should attack them.” Hejkan said, in low tones after they had passed twenty yards down the road. Unexpectedly, the other guys were all for it. Since I liked to think that we ran a democratic-style party, I acquiesced. Then Hejkan did something stupid. By this stage they were a good fifty yards down the path.
“Hextor sucks arse!” Hejkan yelled. “Charge! In the name of Kord!” He turned his horse and rode at top speed towards the Fists.
I sighed, slightly, now that any surprise had been lost. Warramayl, Terjon, Mareth, Taklinn set off after Hejkan at top speed. I rode at a speed which still allowed me to concentrate enough to cast some spells. Shadow rode next to me and took out his bow.

One of the Fists began spellcasting (obviously a cleric), it was next to him that I conjured a magical floating longsword which began attacking him.

The other three Fists had ridden forward to meet the attack of my comrades, while the spellcaster had hung back. I got off my horse (not feeling particularly confident at fighting from horseback) and jogged toward him, not wanting to over-commit too early (as my companions had). I could see him casting another spell from atop his horse, blocking my mystical longsword with his shield. A brief look over my shoulder revealed nothing particularly unusual, but a longer look told me that Terjon had been paralyzed by a spell of holding. Hopefully the special paladin’s horse granted to him by Hieroneous – hopefully it would keep him out of harm’s way long enough for the spell to wear off.

By the time I reached my target, I was a good fifty feet from the others, but so was this cleric. Another spell from the fist summoned a large hound with fire in its eyes and mouth next to me, but the protection from evil spell I had cast moments earlier meant that it could not harm me as long as I left it alone. He was still on his horse when I reached him and scored a palpable hit to his upper left thigh with my first swing.

A cry from up the path revealed that something had gone wrong and Hejkan’s impassioned cries to Kord had ceased and I had no idea what had happened to Terjon, but I dared not look as I may miss one of the blows this Fist was raining down with his mace. Numerous blows were swung and blocked, but eventually, the cut in his leg forced the Fist to lose his balance and he fell too far towards me during a particularly heavy swing and I ducked under his shield and buried my blade in his side.

The other Fists obviously had a far better idea of what was going on than I did, for as soon as this happened the leader shouted “Away!” at the top of his lungs and the other Fists broke off their attacks and rode towards me and their dying comrade. This gave me a good chance to have a look around. Hejkan was lying on the ground, Terjon was stuck fast in his saddle but further down the path out of harm’s way. Shadow was up a tree, bow in hand and the others were in various states of readiness, Warramayl was looking the worst for wear. There was evidence of someone having cast an Entangle spell at the base of Shadow’s tree where a mass of vines and creepers writhed and grabbed at air, searching desperately for something to ensnare.

I backed away from the body of the Fist slightly and yelled at the leader as he rode up.
“If you wish to collect your comrade and flee I will not stand in your way.” I stood, ready for an attack, and had to dive to one side as he tried to ride over me. I rolled to my feet and came up in a defensive posture.