The Silver Hands' Many Mad Adventures

Well, here goes nothing. I've read a few story hours here and really enjoyed them--especially DocM and P-Kitty's--so I figured I'd try and write one of my own. It's riddled with grammar mistakes (I write them late at night, AFTER the game sessions) so watch out for shifting tenses, run-on, sentences and just general weird crap. Anyhow, this is the latest episode, probably the best written one too. Post whatever you want--hatemail, praise, constructive criticism, death threats (but only if they're creative!!!) :)

Here's a link to the complete story hour on my crappy little website too: http://www.geocities.com/JShadow007/Journal.html

The Cast:
Traithelir, male human bard, played by Ed (Fayredeth)
Ossondrea, female moon elf fighter, played by Alyson
Bladewin Goldshadow, male gnome druid, played by Nathan
Aramil Damodred, male moon elf cleric, played by Darren
Kyri Zuepsh, female gnome sorceror/cleric, played by Susan

“Catch Me If You Can”

Leaving the troubles of Raven’s Hollow behind them, the Silver Hands made their way home to Silverymoon. Sticking mostly to the roads, it took several tendays to reach their home. It's 15 Uktar in the Silver Marches, and a typical one at that; snow thinly coats just about everything. Finding their tower much as they had left it, they gathered some of their extra items and headed for Silverymoon itself. Finding a bottle of universal solvent was a top priority for Aramil since his tongue was glued to the top of his mouth, so they headed for an old favorite shop—Myrdivar’s Magical Emporium. Selling two magically enhanced breastplates and the remaining sovereign glue as well as throwing in a few hundred gold purchased the tongue-tied cleric a dose of solvent to loosen his tongue.

The door burst open and a young guard huffed into the store. “Are you the Silver Hands?” he asked, his breath coming in gasps.

“Who wants to know?” answered Bladewin, tentatively.

“The city guard,” he replied, “we received notice that you had passed through the city gates and are in dire need of your help.”

All visibly relaxed, Traithelir answered the question, “Yes, we are the Silver Hands.”

“There has been a murder…we…we are in great need of your assistance, heroes,” stammered the guard.

Following the guard to the southwestern corner of town, the heroes noticed that a section of street had been roped off and was being patrolled by armored guards. Crossing the lines with the guard, they were escorted through guards combing the scene for clues. Standing in the middle of the search, was a tall, beautiful armored woman with symbol of Tyr emblazoned on her armor. “It is good to see that you have returned to Silverymoon, heroes…though you have some new members I see,” she said grimly, nodding her head to Ossondrea. “I’m afraid I can only greet you by asking you to help us once again. There has been a horrible murder, and we are quite honestly stumped.”

Saeunn, the armored woman, indicated a section of wall where a storm drain emptied into the sewers; crammed into the drain was a body, nearly completely folded in half. Its clothing was soaked in blood, though most of the body was crammed into the storm drain. “We’ve haven’t had such a grisly murder here in Silverymoon for…for years,” she said with a vacant stare in her eyes.

Bladewin looked around a bit, and then started inspecting the scene closer. Walking along the wall, he spotted something—more blood, in the shape of a footprint. Looking near the bloody footprint he easily noticed a trail of faint bloody footprints in the heavily packed snow. The trail was short, however; it ended in a large puddle of slushy water. Pausing for a moment to disturb the murky cold water, something else caught Bladewin’s eye—a bit of color. A ragged piece of fine dark blue cloth, to be precise.

Meanwhile, Ossondrea took hold of the corpse, tugged it free from the drain, and set it on the cold ground. The woman lying before the party was horribly mangled. Her neck was dark blue and it was obvious that she had been strangled; cuts and bruises marred her face—she had been smashed into the floor or wall repeatedly. The most obvious wound however was below her dress. A deep slash ran along her side, gouged through her dress and into the side of the abdomen with near-surgical precision.

Examination by Aramil, Kyri, and Bladewin, after he had found several clues, revealed that her left kidney was removed completely with nearly no damage to the surrounding organs. Someone with some real medical knowledge carved this woman up like a turkey.

Avoiding the grisly examination, Ossondrea noticed a crumpled piece of paper and a small metal box in the storm drain. Removing the items and opening the box, Ossondrea gasped. Floating in red wine was a large chunk of meat—a kidney. Taking the note from Ossondrea, Aramil opened it up and began to read it—it was written in Espruar, so he had to translate.

It was signed only with a simple challenge: “Catch me if you can, Miss Saeunn.”

TO BE CONTINUED...

Edit: added the cast and fixed one or two typos
 
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cthuluftaghn

First Post
Cool... too few straight-up sleuth mysteries in D&D anymore. Looking forward to more.

Only thing I don't like is self-critisism...cism... sizm... er.... being negative about your work. It's good! Be proud of it.
 

Hey, I updated this thing! Hopefully it's a bit better!
==============================================

“This is most disturbing,” Saeunn muttered to herself under her breath. “Most disturbing…”

“We should probably go look for witnesses,” suggested Traithelir as he turned towards the street.

“Wait!” Saeunn exclaimed. “Why don’t you just head right over to the Bright Blade Brandished? The place is always busy, so perhaps someone noticed something out of the ordinary last night. And…since you are now on official Silverymoon business, in addition to compensating you, I should probably give you a liaison to the city watch, someone who can help out and keep you out of legal trouble.” She turned around and called over a tall, pale blue skinned woman, “Rielle!” Turning towards the heroes as the guard came to Saeunn’s side, she introduced her, “This is Rielle K’estarin; she will be assisting you in any way that she can during this investigation.”

The tall, blue-skinned woman nodded her head and rather haughtily examined the Hands, turned to Saeunn, nodded her head again and saluted her promptly. “Why don’t we head for the tavern and try to gather some information, then,” she said crisply.

Turning towards the nearby tavern, Rielle was soon trailed by all of the Hands. Walking through the doorway, they found the place to be bustling on the chilly late autumn day—though Silverymoon’s latitude made it seem more like winter, with a thin blanket of snow over almost everything. Splitting up in the cheery and warm common room, Ossondrea, Kyri, Bladewin, and Aramil headed straight for the bar, while Traith and Rielle questioned several people.

(DMs note: Now where the heck did I put Morrus’ drinking rules…)Finding themselves at a bar, with a bartender only too willing to help them out, Bladewin and Aramil decided to settle a bet: Who can out drink who? In a five-minute test of wills and guts, they both downed five mugs of dwarven spirits. Not surprisingly, both promptly fell off their barstools and passed out, Bladewin sending a fountain of vomit above him as he fell. Most of the bar didn’t really seem to notice.

Traithelir and Rielle walked up to the bar after questioning several people; they both gathered essentially the same information: there had been a strange figure in the bar last night, heavily cloaked and very tall; and the woman, a prostitute, hadn’t been seen in the bar for a while, though several people saw her in the streets early in the night. Deciding that with two members passed out on the taverns floor they were not in the best of shape to fight anyone, everyone went their separate ways, acknowledging that there was little to be done other than wait and see what the light of morning brought.

It unfortunately brought nothing but more death…

Waking up with hangovers that would almost incapacitate a dwarf, both Bladewin and Aramil decided to just roll back over and sleep; Kyri volunteered to keep an eye on them. Leaving the inn, Traithelir and Ossondrea set out to find Rielle; they didn’t have to search long. Her face grim, she informed the duo that the murders had continued. She carried with her another note, this one scratched out in barely legible common; it taunted “Miss Boss Lady,” telling her the details of the killer’s “double event.”

In a back alley in the northern part of the city they found the next victim suspended by lengths of rope to nearby buildings; her neck had a thin line running across the windpipe from garrote wire, and upon examination, more organs had been perfectly removed. Ossondrea’s keen elven ears perked up. What was that noise…? She quietly moved further down the alleyway, looked left and right, and proceeded left, followed by Traithelir. Rielle motioned them on and headed off to the right.

The streets were filled with fog, and it was eerily quiet in this part of town; keeping her sword drawn, Ossondrea squinted through the haze. Suddenly, she felt cold steel plunged into her side; whipping around, she stood face to face with a cloaked figure, his short sword dripping with blood. Enraged by the stealthy attack, Ossondrea brought all of her strength into her blows, quickly dropping the assailant to his knees. Begging for mercy, he swore he wasn’t the fiend responsible for the murders; he had only plundered the bodies that were left lying helplessly on the streets.

Disgusted and disappointed, Ossondrea, along with Traithelir and Rielle who had been drawn by the sound of battle, brought the cutpurse to the West Garrison barracks. How did the letter get past the guards and onto Saeunn’s desk where Rielle found it? Searching the outside of the guardhouse, it was rather easy to see that someone had forced their way through Saeunn’s window the previous night. One question was answered, but another remained: why wouldn’t the guard on duty have noticed the noise?

Rielle’s brow furrowed; when she left for her home last night, where had the guard been? Rushing in and asking the morning-shift guard, her worries were confirmed—the late shift guard had never shown up. Perhaps it was time for a visit to the guard’s house…
 

ewwww...

Man, what kind of pickpocket roll do you need to take out somebody's kidney?

Creepy, nasty stuff man. I like it :) I thought for a moment that some kind of cannibal was running around finding choice organs for his meals... the thought of someone simply using it as a taunt is just... sick.

Icky. Well done! Can't wait to read more!

-Femerus
 
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Dr Midnight

Explorer
Trevalon Moonleirion said:
I've read a few story hours here and really enjoyed them--especially DocM and P-Kitty's--

I got top billing over P-cat. NICE. You're my favorite Moonleirion, did you know that?
 


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