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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Xaltar" data-source="post: 6145" data-attributes="member: 480">-------------------------------------------Session 4, Part 2: Freeing the slaves...-------------------------------------------A short ways down the hall, Grack lead the party to the stables where his raiding party’s horses were kept.  As they stabled the horses, Holden took a few minutes to search around for the horse named Axel that they had been sent to recover.  Looking in each of the closed stables was tedious business.  The first several had nothing more then standard livestock including animals such as sheep.  As Holden opened one door towards the far end of the hall, he noticed that the stall was completely full of mud and had been converted into a pigpen.  However, the obvious factor had to be the large wild pig that charged the surprised ranger.One of the pig’s small tusks punctured into Holden’s mid-gut leaving a very serious wound.  It wasn’t long before the whole party went to his aid.  The wild pig was no match for Holden’s greatsword, but it had still managed to inflict several grave wounds before it met its untimely demise.  Holden while shaking his head as Ziona bandaged his wounds said, “I will never touch PORK again!”Holden and Drexel shoved the dead pig back into his stall and shut the door while Ziona and the other mock prisoners resumed their disguise.  They had managed to regain their composure just in time as a guard from the front gate had arrived to investigate the noise.As the guard demanded an explanation, Drexel poked Grack in the ribs.  Grack in turn spoke, “Uh, well…Uh you see the horse reared and the dwarf feel off onto the floor.  We’re bring them down to the stockade now though, so there won’t be any more disruptions.”Satisfied, although somewhat suspicious, the guard left the party and returned to his post.  The group quickly moved down the hall following Grack to the prison area so they could keep moving before their cover was entirely blown.After they descended the stairs into the lower level of the citadel, two human guards greeted them.  “We’ll take them from here,” stated one of the armored guards.“Perhaps we should give you a hand, there are quite a few prisoners,” responded Holden as he began moving up and passed the first guard.As the guard began turning to face Holden who had moved passed the guard, Holden drew his sword and slashed a brutal wound across the flat of the guard’s back.  His partner turned to witness his fallen ally and as he turned back around to face the party, found that crossbow bolt sink into his forehead.  Borghin stood across from the man, having slipped his poorly tied bonds, with a big smile on his face and a crossbow in his hands.Drexel relieved the guards of their keys and they continued to explore around.  The party proceeded to explore a passageway to the north.  After a long and slowly sloping set of stairs, the party came to a room that was roughly shaped like a hand.  As they peered into the room, they noticed that in each finger shaped alcove, there was a pedestal with a drum on it, except for the center alcove, which contained three levers.In the center of the room was a large grate that was about 10 feet long and 15 feet wide.  The foul stench of decay rose from underneath the grate, while the ceiling vault in the center above, and lit the room with a glowing light source.  There was an unholy feeling associated with the room that sent a sudden shiver up her spine.The party was not thrilled about searching this room, so they began climbing the stairs back towards the prison chambers.  As the turned to leave, they didn’t notice that Borghin’s curiosity had gotten the better of him again.  He rushed forward, attempting to jump over as much of the grate as he could.  Although he landed on grate in roughly the center, the cold iron bars did not falter and drop him to the obvious pit of darkness that lied below.  With the remainder of the party almost halfway up the stairs, he quickly searched the levers for traps, and began pulling them.  He turned as did the rest of the party to hear a large clanging.  The center section of the grate had swung down into the pit.  As a hand covered in rotten flesh reached forth from the pit, Borghin yelled, “GUYS, HELP!”    Turning to see the undead hand reaching for her friend Ziona charged down the stares and peered into the dark pit separating her from Borghin.  There were three ghoulish monsters working to climb they’re way out.  Calling to the power of Elistraee, Ziona called out with such strong conviction that the undead monsters burst apart and disintegrated.  Even the presence of Bane’s evil aura wasn’t enough to diminish the righteous might of this cleric.With Borghin safely back across the pit, the party headed up the stairs and back to the prisoners quarters.  Drexel, using his magically enchanted hat to alter his appearance, made himself appear to be one of the guards that greeted them when they first entered the lower level.  He convinced Grack to lead since this may not go smoothly.As Grack and Drexel entered into the next room under the pretense that they were delivering prisoners, the two half-orc guards appeared to be rather skeptical.  Unsure if it was because they had heard the previous commotion, or if it was Drexel’s tone of voice, the party took little time to remedy the situation by dispatching of the guards.As they searched the bodies of the guards they found a handful of keys.  They began by unlocking the furthest door.  Manacled in the corner was a knight in platemail.  He appeared to be unkempt, but also unharmed.  The party learned that he was Kurud, Paladin of Torm.  As Drexel searched through the keys to unlock the prisoner, he found that the manacle keys were not present on this ring.  However, Borghin stepped forward to make little work of the locks.The next occupied cell contained both a male moon elf and a female drow.  It appeared that they had enough slack to both reach the food, or each other in the middle, but both had retreated to one side or the other.  This was obviously some sort of sick joke setup by the now deceased jailers.The party quickly released the elf, but left the drow.  Gwenect Moondark, the still chained drow insisted that if the party frees her, she would grant them a favor.  Looking to the newly freed moon elf, Inialos Oakwood for the final vote, he nodded in her favor.  Holden was far from comfortable with the idea, and he insisted that he would always walk behind her…he wanted to be the one to do the backstabbing, not the other way around.The last inhabited cell contained several beaten, abused, and malnourished humans.  Among them was Walter; the young stable hand that had been kidnapped.  The party began distributing food to the half staved prisoners and told them to remain in this guard area until the party found a way for them to escape.  Most everyone was content, except for Kurud who insisted that he aid the party in taking over the citadel.Drexel, realizing how much time they had taken to get this far into the citadel quickly asked Grack to go back and check the paladin’s cell for his sword.  Grack was reluctant at first to the fact that they would keep Kurud’s weapon in his cell.  Drexel convinced Grack that he had seen it in there, and that a real friend would check regardless.As Grack walked into the cell to investigate, Drexel slammed the door shut and locked it.  “Hey guys, this isn’t funny.  Ha-ha, now let me out.”  Grack went on until the Drexel’s spell wore off and the others couldn’t help but chuckle.Drexel, Ziona, Borghin, Roughner, Hunter, Holden, Spiderfang, and their new companion Kurud moved out to explore the remainder of the Zhent citadel.  As they left the inner prison and returned to the entry room of the lower level, a secret door swung open.  Standing in the doorway was a heavily armored cleric wielding a morningstar.The battle escalated as another cleric and an acolyte of Bane joined in the fray.  After quickly disposing of the first cleric, Holden, Hunter and Spiderfang forced the other back and into his room while Drexel and Borghin accosted the acolyte with spells and bolts.  The remaining cleric posed a significant threat to the party however.  Not only was unbelievably well armored, he had an invisible ally interfering with the party.When Ziona moved forward she called to the others, “I can’t see what your fighting…where is it?”Rossal took this as his cue and poked his head out from under Ziona’s cloak.  He used his telepathy to inform the others of the direction of they’re invisible antagonist.  Once the monster had been located, Hunter sliced through the air.  The halves of an imp’s corpse and a stream of blue-black blood as Hunter used his own form of ‘Dispel Magic.’Meanwhile Spiderfang using his quarterstaff went toe-to-toe with the armored cleric while Holden flanked from behind.  Hunter soon joined his friends and they quickly finished off the remaining cleric.  Upon defeating the clerics of Bane the party looted their rooms and belongings and decided that with the lower level cleared, and with Ziona and Drexel low on spell-power, they should spend the night here and intercept the next changing of the guard.-------------------------------------------Still more to come...-------------------------------------------</blockquote>

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