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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ancalagon" data-source="post: 7242092" data-attributes="member: 23">SESSION 14 We ate a venison stew for dinner; it was quite good, but not very filling. Rinver announced that he was going to teach Suleiman his first spell--magic missile. We all had a good laugh about that; Suleiman has been casting spells for weeks. Somehow, Rinver always seems to miss it when he does. Finis followed the war party to the Dun, and met a bard named Urym O'Shane, who wants to meet us in the inn later. While we were waiting, a boy ran in and told the innkeeper something about more cattle being stolen. The innkeeper began sharpening a sword, and the boy ran out. Apparently, another fight is brewing. A short while later (it was fairly late in the evening now), Urym came in. He explained that he served Cobthach MacFinden, the King of the MacFinden clan. He said that something about all the cattle stealing was strange. Finis suggested that we move to our private room (which is actually a separate building, outside the inn). After relocating, Urym told us of the events of the past few days. The cattle started disappearing, and both clans accused each other of cattle theft. The battles began, but a local druid became suspicious. He did not tell Urym precisely what was wrong, but he did suggest that he was going to call a truce until things were cleared up. Unfortunately, the druid disappeared. I suggested that someone was killing the cattle in an attempt to goad the two sides into killing each other off. We've planned to march with the war party tomorrow, and Finis will declare a truce. Tonight, we will go with Bron, a boy of about fourteen or fifteen years, to investigate the site of the disappearances. Bron led us into the cold night breeze, and we lit our way with a rock (with continual light cast upon it). A storm brewed to the north, but we continued on, reaching a large field. A stream flowed nearby, marking the MacFinden/MacMane border. Atop a hill stood a kronog, in which they keep the cattle at night. Apparently, the cattle disappear just before they are rounded up for the night. Torin looked around for tracks, and soon found something unusual. There were, of course, cattle tracks everywhere, but there were unusual footprints, too: a group of four men, walking in perfect synchronization, never varying their pace or their distance from each other. Following their tracks, we found a badly mauled cow lying on the ground. We put it out of its misery, and decided to follow the tracks back to their source. Along the way we found several places where cows had been picked up, but not set back down. We eventually traced the tracks back to the stream, where we could see an unusual transformation. A deep slithering groove or rut, like that of a snake, emerged from the stream, but it suddenly turned into those odd footprints. We surmised that there was either illusionary work at foot, or that there was a huge shapechanger (which could pick up and carry four cows) on the loose. After a brief inspection of the opposite bank, Torin found that the tracks do not continue on the opposite side. Finis suggested that we go to the Kronog and wait for the rain to end. It took us two hours to walk from the town to the pasture, so I'm not sure why he wanted to wait; the rain showed few signs of letting up, and we needed to rest to regain spells. Nonetheless, we thought the druid must know something we didn't, and we waited. After a couple hours or so, the rain slowed, and we walked back to town. Of course, there is not enough time to rest sufficiently, so we will not regain our spells tomorrow. I will try to get at least a little sleep, as tomorrow will be a busy day. July 16th Blades walked off this morning, while the rest of us tried to get a little extra sleep. He returned a few minutes later, very quiet. I wonder what happened? We followed the war party out to the stream. At the banks of the stream, both sides offered challenges and insults. Finis borrowed Torin's ring of water walking and stepped out onto the stream itself. It was very dramatic, as the stream was covered in mist, and Finis floated above the water. He asked to speak to the leaders of both clans. The clansmen looked a little confused and uncertain (ordinarily I would attribute this to Finis' mumbling, but he spoke very clearly this time), but Urym let everyone know that Finis was a druid, and could be trusted. The leaders of both clans emerged from their troops, and Finis called for a truce. The Kings agreed, but set the truce for three days only--and if evidence of a third party stealing cattle was not found by then, the fighting would resume. Satisfied, we went to look for more tracks. Of course, the night had erased most of them, but Torin's keen eyes managed to find some traces of them. As the creature was, judging by its tracks, moving downstream when it emerged from the water, we went upstream, hoping to find its lair. Blades used his magical otter pelt to check the water for clues or traces of the monster's passing. We didn't find anything in the water, or near the stream, but we did see a riderless horse atop a hill, on the other side of the stream. The water was fairly wide and deep here, so we looked for a place to cross, and soon found a safer spot. The horse allowed us to approach, but it didn't seem to like Blades very much. Torin managed to calm it down, and we noticed a wound on its side--seemingly caused by a weapon with a serrated edge. Finis used speak with animals to find out that its rider had been captured by some kind of humanoids, which smell like fish. The horse offered to lead us to the spot where it was attacked. We followed, and soon came upon crushed cow bones and other decaying cow parts. We continued on until reaching a stand of trees which looked upon a clearing and a hill. The hill had a large cave entrance in it. The horse indicated that the attack occurred in this area (we couldn't be sure, as Finis' spell had expired). We decided to get a closer look, so Blades took off his noisy armor, Rinver cast invisibility upon him, and Blades walked off into the clearing. What happened next is all a blur. A short time later, Blades came running out of the cave, completely visible, pursued by a huge, shifting blob! We all assumed that he had attacked the creature, canceling the invisibility, but we later found that he had, by no fault of his own, stumbled upon an anti-magic area, which ended the invisibility. We ran to assist him, but it managed to envelop him, crushing the life out of him. Fortunately, the wish we so wisely used back in Duma Faifni instantly returned him to life, and he fought his way out of the gelatinous mass. Rinver struck it with several magic missiles, and Suleiman struck it with thorn dart. Rinver shouted in anger when he saw the thorn dart; I'm not sure why. Finis covered the area with fog with obscurement to cover our escape (although it seems to me it just caused more confusion). Blades and I made it back to the tree line, but the monster was in pursuit of Finis, who looked badly injured. Rinver struck it with a lightning bolt (why didn't he do that in the first place?), and it stopped, sizzling, and dissolved into a pool on the ground. I asked Finis to cancel his obscurement, and we saw two blue fish-like creatures standing in the cave entrance. They did not seem to care for the sunlight, so they stayed at the entrance, but this was irrelevant to us. We set off running again, headed back for Prolingmur. Blades, however, wanted to find his armor, so he stood there, in the field, close to the cave entrance, looking. That infernal dwarf drives me crazy! He soon decided to run, but not until after the fish-men had struck him with some kind of magic. Blades, still in fairly good shape (as the wish spell had restored him to perfect health) made it back to the tree line). Once back in town, we went straight to bed, exhausted. After some rest, Finis went to tell Urym what happened. I can barely keep my eyes open. Our party almost had a total disaster today; Blades would be dead, if not for the wish. Perhaps tomorrow will go better. July 17th Today was even worse. I think that our group must be biting off more than we chew; our attempts to be more cautious were to no avail. Now we are truly in a bind. After waking up, we used almost all of our magic to fully heal all of our injuries. Urym came by to tell us that he could not convince the king to believe our story without any proof. We set out, once again, to investigate the cave. Along the way, we looked through our encyclopedia (contained in the bag of holding) for information about the creature we had faced, and the beasts we had yet to face. The fish-like humanoids are called Gogglers. They once lived on the coast, but men drove them to the water. Sea creatures drove them from the water to Longshadows, the network of underground caves and tunnels that lies under this continent. I could not find an entry for the shapechanging creature, but Suleiman did. It was a "Protein Polymorph", an intelligent shapechanger that sometimes works with other malevolent beings. Once we had reached the woods, Rinver cast invisibility on Blades, who went to search for his armor. He could not find it, despite a thorough search of the area. Rinver rememorized invisibilty, and cast it upon me. I tried to use locate object to find the armor, and I even approached the cave mouth. I noticed a scaly foot drawn into the shadows of the cave, so I retreated, but not before I was close enough to the cave to be able to determine if the armor was inside, or at least near the entrance. Blades' armor had disappeared entirely. I can't imagine what use Gogglers would have for dwarven armor, but they must have taken it inside. I told the others that two Gogglers remained inside, so we circled around the hill, and climbed to the top, above the cave entrance. After casting several preparatory spells, we charged down the hillside and attacked the two Gogglers waiting for us. We tore through them like paper, and charged deeper into the cave. Unfortunately, we charged straight into the anti-magic area Blades had encountered, and all of our spells were canceled (and we later found out that all of our potions were rendered useless). Proceeding more carefully, we followed a passage in the back of the cave and found a room with five men in cages. One of them, apparently their leader, offered to help us if we would free them. He also told us that they were bandits, but we had pity on them, and freed them. Tringad (the leader) picked up a chain to use as a weapon. The rest of the men fled from the cave. Tringad said that the Gogglers had recently taken Fergus, another bandit, through one of the two doors in this non-natural passageway (the passage was covered with carvings, perhaps of a religious nature, and was far too straight and square to be natural). We went through the door and found an underground stream, which emerged from a passage to the right, and exited to the left. Blades went to have a look down the passage on the right (once again, as an otter), and found that the water filled with blood after a short distance. Finis gave Torin water breathing, and we swam toward the blood (except for Torin, who walked on the bottom). We emerged from the water after about thirty feet, and came upon three Gogglers dining upon Fergus. A fierce battle ensued. One of them tried to get away--and as it hopped toward the water, it started to turn pale. I'm not sure what that means, but I struck it with the warhammer, and it went limp in the water. We quickly defeated the other two creatures, and I said a prayer over the bandit's remains. On our way back down the watery passage, Torin discovered the submerged skeleton of a dwarf. It had, over the years, been encrusted with lime, and now seemed a part of the cave wall. He managed to remove a horn and a two-handed battle axe from its remains. Remarkably, both seemed undamaged by the many years underwater. We went to the other doorway, and looked inside. A huge troll confronted us, and we savagely attacked it. Surprisingly, Torin's new axe pulled him straight into the fight with amazing speed; I have never seen Torin move so fast. Unfortunately, he seemed surprised by it as well, and as he was also unfamiliar with the weapon, he was not very effective with it. While I lit a torch, Blades neatly decapitated the troll, and Tringad burned it. The troll had an odd collar on its neck. Before we could stop him, Blades took the collar off of the troll and put it on his neck! Blades is not a stupid dwarf, but sometimes I wonder if there are still some bits of Yellow Musk Creeper in his skull. We decided that it would be a good time to leave, as we were all injured and almost bereft of healing ability. As we turned to leave, we were confronted by a daemon, seemingly identical to the one we faced in Nelbar's tower, the day Rinver was kidnapped. Wearily, we charged into battle yet again. This time, the daemon was not so easily defeated. As Tringad charged the fiend, a Goggler emerged from the shadows and stabbed him in the back, knocking him unconscious. The daemon poisoned first Blades, who sluggishly continued to beat on it, and then Torin, killing him! In his death struggles, Torin even managed to destroy the magical axe he had found by beating it on the floor. There was no wish to save us this time; Blades, Rinver, and Suleiman had done a great deal of damage to the daemon, but it refused to die. Finally, I struck it and it dissipated, oozing into the floor. We also defeated the Goggler, picked up the corpses of Torin and Tringad, and ran out of the cave. We lay Torin's body on the horse, and Finis rode it quickly back to town, in the hope that the town cleric could do something. The rest of us slowly, angrily trudged back to town, carrying the heads of three of the Gogglers, as well as a claw from the daemon. We were allowed to see King Cobthach MacFinden, and I must admit, I was rather gruff with him. After all, we had lost a party member so that these two groups would put aside their ridiculous feud and see what their anger had rendered them unable to see. Why are people so foolish? Why do dwarves don potentially cursed items? What could possibly be the reason for Prometheus to keep them in the dark? I am becoming irritable and judgmental; perhaps I should spend a day thinking on this subject. The King accepted our evidence, and agreed to make peace. He also gave us a fine gold necklace as a reward, as if that could make up for the loss of Torin. We waited for Finis (who had found that the priest was unable to do anything for Torin) to perform a ceremony over the bodies (bidding Tringad all speed to the spirit world, but asking Torin's spirit to tarry a bit longer). Once this was done, we went to see the MacMane King, who also agreed to make peace. Not to be outdone by Cobthach, he offered a fine gold goblet as a reward. We returned to Prolingmur late at night. Tomorrow I will cast speak with dead, and determine whether Torin wants us to raise or resurrect him, or whether he would rather be granted his final rest. It is a four day journey by horse south to the nearest city that might have priests capable of this. That would mean eight days, if Finis can make it there and back safely. Rinver is threatening to refuse to travel with Suleiman; it is not yet clear why. Once again, the future looks dark. I must admit that I am becoming used to losing party members; I feel oddly numb about Torin's death, terrible though it is. There is nothing to do now but rest, and pray that tomorrow brings some hope.</blockquote>

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