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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Amaroq" data-source="post: 1861249" data-attributes="member: 15470">Issue #16: The Shrine of Gormoth - Episode 2 of 5During the night, the wind relents, and the rain lessens to a steady drumming. Goldpetal slips outside to sleep out doors, as is his wont – the previous night was the first time anyone remembers seeing the elf sleep indoors of his own volition. By dawn on Belsaday, the seventh day of Madrer, the rain has stopped, and the sun peeks through from the horizon. The storm has passed. Miriel and Goldpetal are both pleased, as their dawn rites are more meaningful with the light of the sun.When they return, we gather in the dining hall. Over breakfast, enjoying the fine meal which Myrs has prepared, we resume our discussion about where to go. “We need to decide where we go from here,” Miriel tells us firmly. “I would like to set out for Lave as soon as possible. If any of you are willing to come with me, that’s good, but if not, I will go, regardless.”“I still think we should stop through Southport,” Paks argues stubbornly. “We still have unfinished business, and we at least owe Grilliam a report.”“I agree with Paks,” Chuck says. “We should finish out our contract.”“I’ll go where Miriel goes,” Stone says implacably.“That goes for me, too,” Telryn agrees, “Though I would like to stay here for a few days to have some quiet time for studying.”“I have little interest in going to Lave,” declares Goldpetal. The druid turns his eyes to Paks. “Paks, if you decide to go through Southport, I do feel we owe Grilliam our report. If you follow Miriel to Lave, I will return to Southport with Dorin – though elves have no love of dwarves – and discharge our obligation there.”Six pairs of eyes turn towards Novalia. The newcomer shakes her head. “Oh, no. Don’t look at me to play tiebreaker,” she says emphatically. “I’d rather stay here.”It is evenly split, and it seems no argument can break the deadlock. A silence lingers, and the specter of dissolving our companionship begins to loom in everyone’s minds. Finally, Paks steps in conciliatorily. “We could all use a rest,” she offers, “And the roads won’t be easy to travel so soon after a rain, anyways. Let’s stay here for another day.”This meets with almost universal agreement. Seeing that everyone but her agrees with this, Miriel reluctantly concedes. “I can stay for a short while at the freehold,” she says, “So that I can travel back to Lave with at least part of this company for protection, but I must leave tomorrow.”Through that morning, we are all feeling happy and full of joy. We are not in the cursed swamp, we don’t have to constantly watch out for rat men, and we’ve all had a bath. Even Stone, over his half-hearted protests, has enjoyed his first bath since the Laughing Ogre Inn. Stone, Paks, Chuck, and Hands of Fire spend the morning working with a large group on building shelter for the refugees. The solution of having them sleep in the freehold’s great hall would not work for an extended period, and an additional dormitory-like building needs to be constructed. With the strength of the half-orc and the lizard man, they make much quicker progress than expected. All throughout the morning, Llewyn finds excuse after excuse to be by Chuck’s side. The rest of us find this very amusing, but all he can seem to think about is flying and ducks.While the stronger folk work, Telryn begs not to be interrupted, and finds a quiet room in which to study his books. Goldpetal performs a harvest ritual, helped by a couple of the townsfolk, Miriel, and Novalia. By lunch, however, the mood begins to grow more somber. “Have you seen the Nameless Orb?” Goldpetal asks, referring to the world’s second moon. “It is full today.”Stone shrugs it off. “The gods tell us we should not pay attention to it,” he declares.“It's very odd,” Novalia adds. “Its been visible all day, despite the clouds.” “This is a very bad omen,” Goldpetal warns. Half-orc and elf glare at each other, and then shrug. Miriel has felt a vague sense of unease throughout the day; however, she can’t define it, and says nothing. After lunch the priestess secludes herself in meditation, asking Madriel to aid her in divining the source of the problem. No inspiration comes to her, just a steadily growing feeling of horror.Novalia takes Paks off for a talk, and outlines her plan to build a small force to guard the Veshian border, using the walls of Kratys Freehold as a starting point. She has a very detailed plan for hiring mercenaries with the money we made, using lizard men as guides, basing a force around the Freehold’s new garrison of men at arms, building barracks, and reinforcing the walls of the freehold. Paks declines, saying that while she can see that it is an important job which needs to be done, she does not feel the call that tells her that it is her job.Novalia gives Paks a shopping list which she has prepared, and asks her to buy the items on it, and send them back to Kratys Freehold. One of the items on the list is a group of mercenaries, which she tells Paks to put in charge of delivering the remaining goods. Over Paks’ uneasy objections, Novalia tells the former mercenary that she trusts Paks to pick an honorable company for it.When Miriel is done with her meditation, she spends the afternoon studying with Myrs. Telryn is off on his own, buried in scrolls and spellbooks, as he has been all day. Stone and Hands of Fire keep helping with the building, while Chuck spends the afternoon working on fletching arrows. Llewyn takes the opportunity to approach Chuck, but again all he wants to talk about is ducks. What was funny in the morning strikes everyone as very sad in the afternoon. In the later part of the afternoon, Paks and Goldpetal go off to talk, walking through the apple grove beyond the walls of the freehold. Paks tells the elf that Milo told her, before he left, some very strange things about Miriel. “I don’t know if they are true,” she says, “But he implied that he was an agent of Madriel’s church, and that she was not behaving as a priestess of Madriel would. I don’t trust the little git, but he gave me this holy symbol, which spoke some words in his favor, at least.”“She was certainly the one most opposed to him,” Goldpetal says thoughtfully. “Which makes sense both if his tale is true, or if he were a liar.”“I don’t mean to spread discord. I just thought, if anything should happen to me, somebody else should know,” Paks tells him. “I don’t think there’s anything to do about it immediately.”They walk in silence for a minute, and then Paks changes the subject. “Have you felt anything odd today?”“No,” he says, shaking his head and giving her his full attention – an uncomfortable moment, since he frequently appears not to. “What do you mean?”“I’ve had a vague sense of dread all day,” she tells him. “I thought it was my imagination, at first, but it grows stronger and stronger. I feel like something is very wrong.”“I have noticed nothing,” the elf tells her. “But I will stay alert tonight.”As the sun begins to set, everyone gathers in the main hall. Conversation is subdued and quiet, and Stone and Chuck are drinking heavily. Miriel is in the kitchen, helping to prepare for the evening meal. Brand and Dorin enter with the morningstar, which they have spent all day forging for Hands of Fire. The lizard man is very pleased, and so overcome that he has trouble expressing his thanks in Common.Midway through the meal, Telryn arrives and asks for lunch. Normally, everyone might have laughed, but the somber mood has spread, and the hall is quiet. Conversation turns to halting awkward pause by the end of the meal, and afterwards everyone is sitting in an attitude of morose lassitude.Just after sunset, a guard bursts into the main hall. “Captain!” he says breathlessly. “We need you at the gate! A strange ratman needs to speak to you and the heroes!” “What?” Taryn exclaims, “A ratman? And he’s not dead? Why isn’t he shot full of arrows?”The guard looks embarrassed. “That’s just the thing, sir,” he says nervously. “We can’t seem to fire at it.”Taryn grunts impatiently. “Send for Myrs and Miriel,” he says. “Let’s meet this ratman.”The leader of the Freehold heads for the gate, followed by the rest of the party. We climb behind him to the top of the freehold’s hall, overlooking the gate. In the crisp autumn twilight, we can see a robed rat man leaning on a wooden staff, cloaked and hooded. Two guards stand staring at him, apparently unable or unwilling to draw their bows. Novalia and Goldpetal immediately try to draw theirs, but find that they cannot find the heart to bring their weapons to bear. Chuck manages to draw his, and aims at the rat man, but hesitates. Taryn, however, has no hesitation. He grabs a bow from a guard, and fires. The arrow flies straight towards the ratman, aimed directly between his eyes. Just as it reaches him, the ratman casually knocks the arrow away, as one might brush aside a fly. The ratman pulls back his hood, and we see that his fur is mottled black and white, and he has no eyes at all! He addresses us in a strange whistling accent, as if he is speaking a tongue very foreign to him. “Humans! Slytherin Killers! Listen to me, you must! “I am Sklar-d’sklas of the Unseeing. Evil, unspeakable, stopped, it must be. Feel it, can you not? Are you blind? Waxing, the power of the dark moon, night of ritual power. To the site of power, look!” With his last words, he points off to the hill of the standing stones, looming many miles to the east. As he points, a large bonfire of lavender flames ignites atop the hill! “Ancient hated enemies, followers of Twisted Gormoth, prepare. Evil Rituals to enact! Stop them, now, you must! Or too late it will be!”“Why do you tell us this?” Goldpetal demands.The rat man does not answer, he just covers his head with his hood and quickly strides off into the gathering gloom. Chuck looses the arrow at him, and he casually reaches behind himself, batting the arrow out of mid-air without breaking stride or turning.“No way!” Stone exclaims passionately. He jumps off the parapet, landing in a tumble which breaks his fall. “I’ll take care of the blind one,” he yells up at us. “You guys take care of the ritual!” He sprints after the rat man, quickly disappearing into the shadows of the orchard.“What do you make of that?” asks Chuck. “I have never encountered one of the Unseeing before,” Goldpetal tells us. “But I’ve heard many tales of them. It is said that they live in the south of the Ganjus Forest, where I grew up. They used to follow Golthain the Faceless. Golthain had the power to feel all living things. The other Titans mocked him, and tortured him; destroying all his senses. He was the only Titan who surrendered, and the gods allowed him to be absorbed into Denev. The Unseeing are all blind, born without eyes. Instead of sight, they have an empathic sense. They hate all the other tribes of rat men terribly; this hatred is equaled only by their hatred of the followers of the gods, who they believe betrayed the Titans. They are hard to find, as there are very few of them, and each is an expert monk.”Paks inquires, “Who or what is Gormoth?”“Gormoth is one of the worst Titans of all,” Goldpetal tells her. “He is known as the Writhing Lord. He was the first Titan to figure out how to create sentient beings, and all the other Titans were jealous, so they poisoned him and fed him to parasitic worms. They then buried him; he was supposedly dead, but eons later he returned twisted and mad. Eventually, he was cloven in two by Chardun and Vangal. His two halves lie on either side of a forgotten canyon. His followers are all mad, and devotees of pain, both giving and receiving.” Taryn adds, “The rat men who follow him are known as The Stricken. They live far south of here. They are all twisted, with weird appendages and strange powers, and they are very evil, and very mad.” Miriel asks, “How long would it take us to get to the hill?”“You won’t make it by midnight on foot,” Taryn tells her. “You can borrow horses from the freehold, though. I’d think, in the dark, you can make it in about five hours on horseback.”“I’m going to go get my armor,” Paks says, stepping down off the parapet.Miriel, Chuck, and Goldpetal all go to get their armor as well.  Miriel also grabs a couple of loaves of bread from the kitchen. We leave the treasure in the freehold, taking only those items, such as the potions, which have become part of our equipment.On the top of the parapet, Telryn gives a quick summary to Hands of Fire, in Draconic. “Is good,” the lizard man tells him. “I try out new morningstar.” Within minutes, we are all gathered in the courtyard. We only have to borrow a few horses, as most of us had left ours at the freehold before we went into the swamp. Paks asks Taryn, “Will anyone from the freehold come and help us?”Taryn shakes his head. “No. I need all of my people.” In lieu of manpower, Myrs offers a blessing upon us. We ride away, moving as quickly as we can to take advantage of the last light. Goldpetal leads, since he can see in the dark. As we travel, Miriel casts bread of life on the two loaves of bread, imbuing it with Madriel’s healing powers.</blockquote>

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