Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 70493" data-attributes="member: 143">Travels through the Wild West, Book IIISummary of Events so far: Four companions meet by chance at a desolate crossroads west of the city of Elturel, in the Western Heartlands of Faerûn.  Each of the four is a wanderer, by choice or by fate, and as they share a campsite upon an old ruin they are attacked, first by a group of brigands led by a dark cleric of Mask, and then by an ogre ghoul that had been entombed under the ruin.  Brought together by shared danger and shared loot, the four travel eastward to Elturel, and reach the village of Dunderion.  There they learn that Benzan was the target of the bandits, seeking to recover a mysterious statuette that the tiefling had stolen from the cleric.  That same night the sheriff of the village, a man named Kevrik Telwarden, shows up and announces that he is forming a posse to chase down a group of raiders who attacked a merchant caravan nearby.  Among those captured by the raiders was the daughter of a powerful nobleman.  Cal offers to join the posse, and his new companions accompany him.  The chase leads them south to the River Chionthar and beyond.  They track the trail to the encampment of a bandit leader named Steel Jack, who leads a mixed group of humans and hobgoblins.  Benzan’s scouting allows the posse to get the drop on Jack’s forces, and after a brief battle they emerge victorious.  But the prisoners have already been taken on to the Wood of Sharp Teeth.  Faced with dissention within his ranks, Telwarden and the trapper Cullan go on alone with the four companions, sending the rest of the posse back to Dunderion with instructions to send more help after them.  The six companions warily enter the outskirts of the wood, and tussle with a group of bloodthirsty stirges.  That encounter costs them most of their horses, but they press on regardless.  Cal communicates with a badger to learn more about the location of the bandit base, and with that clue they are able to find their goal: a small fort hidden within the forest protecting a nearby silver mine.  Apparently a group of hobgoblins is using prisoners as slave labor to work the mines.  The companions decide to attack the mine, to try to free the prisoners.  They are successful, but an alarm is raised and they find themselves in a desperate melee against more than a score of hobgoblins.  Working as a team, they are barely able to hold out, but the hobgoblin leader, a cleric of dark gods, retreats back to the fort, where the noblewoman prisoner is being held captive.  The companions, worried about what the cleric will do to his prisoner, hurry after in pursuit despite the fact that most of their spells have been depleted.  The fort has only a few hobgoblins left in garrison, so the companions try a desperate all-out attack.  Benzan is able to scale the stockade and open the gate, but is mauled to within an inch of his life in the process by the hobgoblins’ war dogs.  Luckily, Delem is able to awaken his newfound clerical powers at this point, and save the tiefling’s life.  Lok and Telwarden meanwhile head into the fort and confront the evil cleric, and are able to defeat him at the cost of Telwarden’s life.  Saddened by the loss of the brave sheriff, but with the prisoners safe, the companions return to Dunderion.  They next travel to Elturel, where they are honored by Lord Dhelt for their efforts and feted by the wealthy merchant and noble elites of the city.  Clearly their troubles are not over, though, as assassins try to kill them right after an audience with the High Rider.  Lok is able to determine that the equipment used by the assassins is from the same source as that used by the hobgoblins in the forest, leading them to track down the source of the weapons—a smithy located there in the town.  Their investigations at the smithy lead them to a warehouse along the city’s docks, where they find clues pointing them to one of the noble houses of Elturel.  They are also attacked by a shade assassin, whose strange powers nearly lead to their deaths.  After defeating the shade they decide to press on that very night to the estate of the nobleman who is apparently behind the whole thing—the raids, the mining operation, and the illegal trade in weapons and silver in Elturel itself.  They find the leader, all right, but it is not the nobleman, who was just a pawn, but a powerful cleric of the god Cyric.  They confront the cleric, who summons a demon to help him, and overcome him.  The cost is terrible, however, as Cal is killed in the battle.  The companions have uncovered an evil plot and defeated a mighty adversary, but the victory is hollow with the loss of their friend.  Lok, Benzan, and Delem elect to go to Baldur’s Gate, and seek a cleric with the power to raise Cal from the dead.  They travel swiftly down the River Chionthar, fighting off an attack by kir-lanan gargoyles along the way.  Once in Baldur’s Gate, they meet with the high priestess of Tymora, who agrees to raise the gnome—for a service.  The companions agree to escort an emissary of the church to faraway Chult, on some unrevealed errand.  Cal is raised, and reunited again, the companions prepare for their journey.  They upgrade their equipment, but before they can leave, they are approached by the same young noblewoman they rescued from the hobgoblins in the Wood of Sharp Teeth.  The young woman, Lady Dana Ilgarten, asks to accompany the companions on their journey for reasons of her own, and they reluctantly agree.  The companions depart from Baldur’s Gate on a sailing ship, the Raindancer, along with the Tymoran emissary, a halfing cleric named Ruath.  Near the Nelanther Isles they are attacked by pirates, who are repulsed after a desperate battle.  The ship limps back to Velen, where the companions are accosted by thieves seeking to relieve them of some of their extra loot.  Leaving a bunch of battered thieves behind, they continue their journey.  The ship is attacked by a flock of strange birds that shoot bolts of lightning on the next leg of their journey, but these too are repulsed.  After a stop in Memnon, the ship continues on the final leg of its journey.  Unfortunately, a severe storm strikes the ship in the Shining Sea.  Sensing that the storm is unnatural, the companions are able to discover a strange gem emanating green energy in the ship’s bilges.  Unable to approach the gem without suffering ill effects, they decide to destroy it using spells and acid arrows.  They are successful, but breaking the gem releases a vortex of energy that knocks them briefly unconscious.  They recover to realize that the storm is gone—and that the clerics’ links to their patron gods have been dramatically weakened.  Confused, they make their way up to the deck of the ship, where they realize that the stars above are unfamiliar…The story continues from there…</blockquote>

Verification