Ath's Diary - Spring 806
Summary
Valentine gets a comission from guild security and grabs us from the guild pub.
We head out from the guild.
We clear out some trolls at the Seagate bridge.
Have a nice fight in Old Seagate while rescuing some whore friends of one of the party.
Kill a flying hippo at Goodblood.
Kill Guede's pet Greater Undead Goat at Goodblood.
Kill a nasty earth elemental at Goodblood.
Vladimer joins the party.
Clear out a band of undead, wicca and necro smugglers at Goodblood. (Valentine Died)
Save the town of Dune from a band of drunken dwarves and other unsavouries.
Kill a band of dire wolves and gobbies and Whitecross.
Train at Rothmans Abbey
Save Rothmans Abbey from flying boogeymen made of vegetables!! (Jaundice Died)
Rid ourselves of a nasty imp infestation at Redtree
Fianlly meet our employer at Bluegrass.
Rid the Bluegrass harvest fields of a nasty wiccan curse.
Oh, and lots of body piercing and sex!!
Thaw 1st......and away we go
Well, it seems that once again I’ve slept in and managed to miss the guild meeting. Last time was no work for me so I had to stick around here and string out my training for as long as I could. Now I guess I’ll have to drink away my silver in the guild pub for another three months.
3pm Good news, it seems that I’ve fallen into some work. Some small human came into the pub and gathered all us idle drinkers and offered us guild sanctioned work. Not sure exactly what it is that we’re upto and I don’t believe that there was any mention of pay but I guess that it’s better than sitting here in the pub.
Hmmm, looks like a party of humans, but you take whatever you can get I guess. I checked with guild security and seem to confirm that the Valentine (the human that seems to be running the show) is as trustworthy as any other human guild member. Odd behavior by guild security as we left tho….they seemed to be measuring us up for coffins.
So, as I mentioned earlier I seem to be stuck with a bunch of humans. I’ll describe them to you so you can get a sense of what I’m stuck with.
First of all there’s Valentine. He comes mounted on one very mean looking war horse. Looks like the both of them have been through this a few times so it’s good to have them around.
Then we have Jaundice. Human, female and a caster of fire magic. She seems to have some pretty cool equipment on her so I’m guessing that she’s been around the mill a few times too.
Daisy comes next. Another female human. Actually not bad looking for a human but she comes from farmer stock so not even if she was an elf she’s not worthy of contemplation. Not sure what skills she brings to the team. Might be useful with that lasso of hers tho, if we find a wandering herd of cows wthat is.
Lofar’s the next human in the party. Seems to be your usual armed human tank. Say's he's an enchanter, doesn't seem to be scared enough for that to be true.
Lastly there’s Guedesh. The darkest skinned human I’ve ever met. From what I can tell he seems to be a practitioner of the wiccan arts. By the sounds of things he’s new to the guild and this is his first job with a party. Hopefully we won’t get him killed on his first job. A few odd things about the wiccan. Firstly, he has to be the darkest skinned human that I’ve ever seen. Black as midnight. Secondly, he seems to have no memory before the time he washed up on the coast NW of Seagate somewhere. Very suspicious. I wonder what it is that he is hiding. Thirdly, he has a pet goat! Why? I have no idea. He seems to be a bit muddled in the head and can’t remember his past so I’m guessing that he’s one of those simple minded humans that dad warned me about. I’ll make sure to keep a close eye on him and his goat.
Well, we've finally left the guild. The guild was nice enough to give us 10 healing potions. On closer inspection it seems that 2 of them are experimental and have a chance of giving you the runs and a chance of fully healing you. I think I’ll let the humans give those a try, after all, you might as well get some use out of the humans.
At last…..some action.
As we approached the bridge leading into Seagate we found the bridge guards dead and a couple of trolls wandering up towards us.
I lept into the fray with my silver daggers at the ready but the trolls had the bad taste to die before I could get a blow in. Valentine and his horse were stupid enough to get in my way and the horse paid the price for their folly.
The fire mage also managed to lend a hand and Daisy managed to cushion the fall of a dead troll as it toppled to the ground. Not sure what the others did but we prevailed in the end.
It’s very odd, but the goat seemed to sniff around the dead quite a bit. I’m beginning to think nasty thoughts about that goat, like, it'd make a good stew.
After our morning exercise on the bridge we went looking for more trolls. The wiccan human sent off some ghostly doggies which brought back a mob of trolls, so rather than press our luck we decided to go do our shopping in town.
As we entered Seagate the local guard took us aside and gave us 500silver as a reward for saving the town. Guild strictures state that I must share this reward with the rest of the party even tho I did most of the work.
The guard also took a great interest in the location of our employer. Apparently he knows of the local sheriff, a corrupt human called Sheriff McGreedy. (hmmm, seems to be a common theme….human + power = corruption). Anyway, I digress, apparently this sheriff McGreedy is in the pay of some Cattle baron. The local guard here has given us a badge and permission to act as a deputy to help us avoid any trouble.
God these humans are slow. We seem to be wandering around aimlessly a bit. I’m sure we started off in the wrong direction. But, Valentine seems to know what he’s doing so I’ll follow along like a good guild member.
So, we went shopping.
In the space of 15minutes we managed to spend all the silver that we gained from killing the trolls.
We each received a necklace that stops us turning into undead. (called Ghouls Bane)
Some swab things that you wipe on your blade and it slows the undead somewhat.
Also got six herb bags that makes the horse do damage to undead if the horse has eaten the herbs.
As we walked through we were accosted by the poor humans, one of which pretended to be a fortune teller. She told the fortune of some of our party.
- Valentine gets told of a future attack on his brother. Necromancers will attack his brother on the great North Road and he should go to his rescue with some healing potions at the ready.
- Valentine was also told not to trust the drunken dog and that the healer with the blue teeth will assist him. Lastly she sees some sort of fastness in his future.
- Daisy was told that where the grass is green but turns blue to dig under the third stump.
- The goat gets it’s fortune told, but oddly the old hag says that it is no goat. The hag says that the 9th thing that the goat finds tomorrow will be of help to us.
I don’t think that this hag is any good tho. She can’t even tell me my name let alone tell my fortune.
After our shopping trip we ended up in a very seedy pub full of humans gambling and drinking themselves into a stupor. The pub is called The Brass Door Inn and is situated next to a brothel called The Leather Whip in Old Seagate. As we entered the inn our resident amnesiac wiccan found an old friend that knows him even tho he doesn’t know her. Seems he was banging her sister some time back and now she expects him to save her from her current predicament. Her name is Jasmin and she’s got herself into some debt with the local brothel owner who is making her work it off on her back. Her sister Kellia (Guedesh’s old flame) got herself into the same situation but managed to escape. Guedesh seems to fall for this unlikely tale and started to consider ways to help Jasmin.
Meanwhile, Daisy goes outside with half the males in the pub, returns later covered in horse shit and disappears upstairs with 3 human males. Must be some strange sort of courting ritual.
Jaundice managed to get shit faced while hustling a stupid human out of it's cash playing domino’s.
After the domino’s game three thugs turned up expecting payment for the services of Jasmin. However, Valentine was his usual charming self and the thugs left promising to return at 2am with the “Boss Man”.
As they left they stole Guedesh’s goat.
After that meeting Jasmin sneaks back to the brothel to grab some personal items and returns with a friend who also needs rescuing. We all then went to bed to get some rest
Thaw 2nd......a fun little fight
At 1:30am the Inn Keeper wakes us and I use my abilities to make our group invincible.
At 2am the Boss Man promptly appeared out of thin air (with his gang of thugs) and demanded payment for the girls. When asked to return the goat the Boss Man seemed to get a bit pissed as the goat had killed their pet troll then politely departed their company. Again he asked for payment and implied that he was willing to take Guedesh as partial payment. Oh, I should mention that the Boss Man gang consisted of 8 mages, a 15 fighters and two dozen prostitutes with lots of long knifes. While Valentine and Guedesh discussed payment options Lofar and I hid behind the gang ready to strike.
Valentine finally has enough of the negotiations quite rightly decides that paying for a humans freedom is a waste of silver and attacks.
I immediately step up behind the earth elemental and once he saw my obviously superiority he joined our side and pummeled the evil earth mage. Things went pretty well from there. Our new friend rocky smashed a few evil mages and fighters. Valentine & Jaundice hacked and slashed. Lofar kept up a steady reign of arrows before drawing his sword and joining the bloodwork. Guedesh and I used our daggers to good effect while Daisy kept a few knife wielding prostitutes busy by throwing herself on their knifes. The saner of our enemy ran from the battle while the rest of the Bosses army succumbed to our superiority.
Their dead consisted of: The Boss Man 1 necromancer 1 earth elementalist 2 fighters 2 female prostitutes who were too busy flashing their breasts instead of fighting!
We also managed to save the Inn Keeper who got in the way of one of the thugs robbing his safe. After healing the innkeeper we packed our gear and made to leave the Inn. On the way out Lofar took the time to charm the Earth Elemental who seemed to take a real liking to him and has started to follow him around.
On the way out of the Inn we met up with Guedesh’s goat who was working his way back to the Inn carrying 16 sacks of loot. Bearing in mind the predictions of the old hag the previous day we checked the loot and it appears that the 9th thing it “acquired” was a set of fancy ceremonial knifes.
After our hasty departure from town Valentine had us swimming across the river….again. I still have no idea where we are headed and I’m beginning to think that nobody here knows either.
Once we got out of the water and walked to the top of the nearest hill Lofar casts a nasty spell that had shadowy magical leeches appear and attack himself, Daisy, Valentine and Valentines horse. Jaundice started shooting fireballs everywhere and burnt the leeches off the humans, but Trample attacked Jaundice before she could burn the leech of him.
After our pyrotechnic display on the hill top we wander south to a small hamlet. After Guedesh blesses the camp site (by decapitating a chicken and spraying Valentine with its blood) and after setting the watch order we set up camp and promptly go to sleep.
The Watch Order
2100 – 0000 Daisy
2200 – 0100 Guedesh
0000 – 0300 me
0100 – 0400 Valentine
0300 – 0600 Jaundice
0400 – 0700 Lofar
As I fell asleep I notice that Jasmin and her friend have joined Guedesh in his bed roll. I also notice that Valentine was very keen to in ensuring that his 12yr old boy servant also gets “to bed”.
We awaken to the smell of cooking food as the good folk of the nearby hamlet set out to turn a quick buck by selling us food. After breakfast the locals offer to sell us some food and other necessities.
We have arrived at the hamlet of Goodblood
Goodblood village orchard in full blossom.
We purchase some supplies from the villagers.
For 72silver we find to our amazement that we have purchased:
3 pack mules
3 Giant wicker baskets
2 Medium wicker baskets
4 side bags on one of the mules
17 brass stakes
1 mallet
Tent poles
2 cross beams
3x 9 grommet tarps
3 bed rolls
6 mats
16 chickens and one crow
1 Milk Urn with 1 bee hive and 86 bees
6 pounds of honey
1 tea pot
1 Cart with differently sized wheels
4 pounds oats
3 urns (6pounds each) of dried mackerel
3 pounds dried cat entrails
1 Urn with 4 waxed left human hands.
9 unfired clay pots (64pounds)
1 Porcelain billy containing 3litres milk
1 wicker basket full of hay
1 sack containing 28 apples
3 dozen eggs
1 7yr old girl called Suzy
Guedesh manages to divine Suzy and ends up with another garbled reading.
"Two nights after the full moon, dark cloud turns into 3 fingers, Jaundice and Valentine are fighting 2 people that look like brigands…..Suzy has been cursed by the evil eye."
Later that day a village elder came to us and asked for our assistance in opening a mysterious chest that fell from the sky. We manage to open the chest with judicious use of brute force and find 80 bags of a sugar cane like substance. Valentine seems to recognize the contents and convinces the village elders to burn the contents. Thus a feast and huge bonfire is set up for that evening.
The feast was adequate and the company plentiful and a nice fireworks display fills the air as the contents of the chest goes up in flames.
After dinner Daisy managed to have a good look at Guedesh’s goat and finds that it is infact a greater undead thing that is trying to turn Guedesh into IT’s familiar. We decide to work off the feast that we’d just consumed with some light evening exercise and give the “goat” a damn good thrashing. It did try to turn into a shadowy ghosty type thing after seeding the area with some trapped pots but we managed to vanquish the nasty beasty. Pity tho….. I preferred it as a goat….Damn good eating on a goat.
Around 11ish the Head Women tell us that we should seek shelter. After some skillful investigation we find that the village is being menaced by a giant flying boar some 9 foot tall with flaming hooves. The head women’s apprentice has been killed by the giant boar when he tried to banish it from the village. We scout around the village and find some hoof marks burned into the ground. Further investigation finds the spot where the boar must land as it flies into the village. We seed the area with silver coins to attract Lofar’s friendly earth elemental and prudently retreat to a nearby barn.
As planned Lofar’s earth elemental smells the silver and comes wandering into the village. It takes time to stop and eat the remains of the greater undead goat. (hmmmm…..that doesn’t look healthy for us) It then eagerly eats the remains of the bonfire which we used to burn the “sugar cane”. It really seemed to enjoy those ashes. It then remembered about the silver coins and wanders over just as the flying boar arrived in town.
By the sounds if things it was a fun little fight out there. We didn’t get to see it though as we took a rest in the barn. 20mins or so later the Earth Elemental has successfully purged the village of it’s boar infestation and we decide that now is a good time to save Lofar from his stalker (the earth elemental).
Before we leave the barn Jasmin offers to pierce all our buttocks with splinters of wood. She claims that will strengthen us for our upcoming fight. We politely decline and go running after the earth elemental. The elemental is easy to spot as it is carrying two legs with flaming hooves. The elemental disappears down into the basement of a house with valentine in hot pursuit. A minute later Valentine runs out of the house as a flying flaming hoof flies out of the building and clangs into the back of his helm. The elemental follows the hoof out of the building and fighting ensues. After a wee bit of swinging, hitting, missing and dodging Jaundice manages to get off a spectacular fire bolt that blasts the elemental into a pile of burning rock.
We notice that the blasted burning elemental pieces are giving off a nice mana glow so Jaundice gives us all fire proofing and we all take a molten magma bath. We then gather up as many pieces of elemental as we can for future investigation. I did find it easier to cast when I was near these rocks, if we can somehow refine the rocks then maybe they can do something for us.
Having a “look” at my leather armour later the next day I find that it can now absorb 2 points of endurance damage thanks to our molten magma bath.
OH…..before I forget, just as we were in the middle of the magma bath a solo guild member wandered into town. His name is Vladimir and he is a human mind mage who has only just joined the guild. Seems to be a brave soul for a human as he eagerly joins us in the magma bath (after Jaundice gives him fire proofing). Seems that he was a member of a 3 man squad that the guild sent out to investigate a crime wave perpetrated by a gang of evil goats. I don’t think that he has realized that is was a single goat, that we’ve killed it and that we have all it’s stolen booty.
Anyway, we investigate the massive flying boar only to find a rotting Hippo corpse. It’s pretty well decayed and stinks to high heaven. We gather up the other glowing hippo feet and head off to the barn to get some well deserved sleep.
Back in the barn Valentine discovers that he is unable to bend down as his helm exerts a Positive buoyancy effect. When he takes off his helm he discovers that it now floats at a stable 4ft off the ground.
At last……sleep.
Flying Hippo.
Thaw 3rd......fun in some tunnels
I wake in the morning to find Lofar and Vladimir heard noises and saw a big pussycat and goat on the roof of the ceiling. I suspect that they fell asleep while on watch. I think that Valentine has the same suspicion as he decides to climb up onto the barn roof to investigate. Once up there Daisy decides to follow but falls quite a distance and badly bruises her very pretty behind. Once healed by Jaundice, Daisy allows Jasmine to talk her into a butt piercing before attempting the climb. The thought of falling on her butt piercing seems to motivate Daisy to successfully complete her climb. Saner heads (me) stay firmly on the ground. If I want to check rooftops I’ll go get me my wings. Wile on the roof they find tracks to support the claims of Lofar and Vladamir.
After the party are all back on the ground we gather our gear and head off to see the Head Women again. As we chat to her we discover that the big cat may belong to a Necromancer in the employ of the local smugglers and that the basement the elemental went down into is actually an entrance into some smuggler tunnels.
Being adventurous guild members in good standing we promptly rush off to investigate these tunnels.
Jaundice gets cold feet however, makes a lame excuse about "protecting the girls" and skulks off to the barn for a nap.
We enter the tunnels and find a large room with a number of torch scones. Pulling one of these triggers the trap door (door? I meant floor) that dumps us down 30 feet or so into the tunnels. Well, dumps us all….except Valentines who gently floats down to the floor thanks to his flying helm. We set off in haste to investigate and hopefully over run any smugglers that we might meet. After a bit of bumbling around we find some villagers that are being held captive by the smugglers. They point out where we can find the smugglers so we burst into their room and surprise them. At this point I realized that in our haste we had forgotten to power up. I had managed an extremely good purification the day before and managed to protect myself with a few spells, but the rest of the party were pretty vulnerable.
So, we burst into the room and find a bunch of imps and skeletons. The imps immediately go on the offensive and the skeletons ominously start to creak as they animate and lumber towards us. Valentine and Lofar dive into the fray as a Soul Eater materializes in front of me. Luckily Guedesh gets off a Harm Entity spell on the Soul Eater which keeps it from eating me. However, it seems to have some very thick armour and my dagger is failing to penetrate. Valentine does a huge amount of damage but as soon as we look like winning a Necromancer steps out of the dark and casts at the party. With my limited knowledge of necromancy and due to the damage done I think he was casting a stream of corruption at us. The necro gets off a second spell and soon after Valentine falls and I get that little buzz down my spine indicating a death nearby. We go into overdrive and one imp decides to join our side and slows our enemy and gives us the upper hand. However, just as we are about to be victorious the imp shows its true colours, slow us and makes a run for it.
In the end we manage to kill the necromancer, loot his body, loot the dead imps and rush thru the tunnels with Valentines floating body in tow (remember the floating helm? Handy for moving dead bodies).
As we leave the tunnels we are followed by a cloud of dust and as we look around we can see evidence of collapsing tunnels all around town.
We get Valentines body onto the back of a mule and the head women supplies us with a guide to take him to a herbal healer just a few miles into the forest. Unfortunately Valentines horse Trample takes one look at valentines dead body and tries to take a bite out of Daisy. Daisy demonstrates her expertise in handling animals by hitting Trample on the nose. Time Passes. 5 minutes later and the mule and the guide have been killed by trample. Lofar and Daisy are hiding up a tree. Guedesh is lying on the ground and bleeding to death. Vladimir is hiding behind another tree and I am standing very still, hoping that I don’t sneeze and loose my blending. Oh, and I am only a foot away from Trample who is trying to untie Valentines body. Damn that’s one tuff horse! Daisy manages to lasso Guedesh and pulls him up into the tree where Lofar manages to force a healing potion down his throat. I once again demonstrate my boundless courage by breaking cover and risking life and limb to get my healing potion to Vladimir. This gives him a much needed boost allowing him to take control of Trample. We lock Trample into the barn and after borrowing another mule and guide we go off to find the healer.
Healer Found!! His name is Gungagast and he has yellow teeth so he's not the blue toothed healer that the old had in old seagate fortold would help Valentine. And much to my surprise he says that Valentine is not completely dead. He pours 1 drop of a special potion on his tongue and Valentine opens his eyes. The healer then passes out potions to all to restore us after our mighty battle. He takes a shine to Daisy and invites her back to visit him later that night. He also promises to supply her with some potions when she returns for her night time rendezvous. I hope he’s got some clean sheets somewhere cause Daisy had a spell go awry earlier in the day and seems to have trouble with her bowels. Hmmmm….last time she went off with some men she was covered with horse shit. This time she’s off with the healer and again there’s shit involved. It just has to be some sort of human courtship ritual.
After his return to life Valentine wanders back to Goodblood to fetch Trample, Roger (his boy servant) and the girls and returns to the herbalists hut. As soon as Trample gets a whiff of Daisy he goes into another hysterical fit that sees half the party climbing trees and the rest hiding. Vlad casts a mighty spell that seems to calm Trample (indeed it was a mighty spell, he cast it 6 times to achieve maximum potency. Jaundice has fallen asleep and is snoring loudly. We seem to be unable to awaken her so we load her onto the back of our cart.
I take the opportunity to have a chat with Jasmin about piercings. She takes me behind a tree and gives me two piercings that she says will protect me from elemental magics. Jasmin also seems suitibly impressed with my obvious superiority but unfortunately for her I have no interest in interracial sexual encounters.
0nce things get back to normal we load up and hit the road in search of Bluegrass, it must be around here somewhere....
A hard day's travel and we manage to travel 6 miles to Saxton. I manage to secure us lodgings in one of the more up market Inns (The Saxton Arms) and we all spend a restful night in our rooms. All of us except Valentine, Guedesh and Lofar that is. There seemed to be a lot of argueing and shouting coming from there room and lasted until the early hours in the morning. As a result they come down to breakfast looking a little tired. Guedesh looks guilty for keeping them up all night and whips up a brew to perk them up a bit. Seems to work well as they quickly start to look like their chirpy selves.
Thaw 4th.....walk walk walk....I want my wings!
After breakfast we round up the crew and head out of town.
As we leave town four Raphaelite monks join us to keep us company as we head to Monck's Corners.
During our journey to Monck's Corners I chat to the monks and they are so impressed with my insights that they decide to bless all the members of our party. (This potent blessing adds 10% to our magic resistance and 1point of fatigue) The monks warn us that the blessing will fail if (when) we next sin. Guedesh takes the opportunity to thank the monks by sacrificing a chicken and swinging it's headless body around his head spraying the monks with it's blood. I have a feeling that this may be considered a sin.
The monks also tell us that they are on a mission to find an evil necromancer (this implies that there are good necromancers?) that has been raising greater undead goats. Their ultimate destination is Lip (via Rothmans abbey)
Nightfall see us arriving at Monck's Corners. We decide to follow the monks example by setting up camp outside of town. Two hours after midnight I observe 2 shooting stars streaking accross the sky. I awaken the Raphaelite monks to see if they can shed some light on this event. They confer and say that this is an significant event but that they would rather discuss this in the morning.
Thaw 5th....a pub full of dwarves
The rest of the night passes without incident. We wake up to find that Valentines boy has cooked us a sturdy breakfast. We eat, pack up and head off towards Dune. Not sure why we are headed to Dune, but we seem to have fallen in the monks. (note to self: learn how to read a map).
As we near the village of Dune some of the locals stop us and offer us a spot of Dandelion tea (which is reputed to help our night vision). After our tea i ask the monks for an explanation regarding the shooting starts that I saw last night. The monks draw a cross on the ground and they instruct me to step into any quadrant and toss a coin on the ground, but the coin must be of the biggest demoniation in my purse. I fish out a guinea and throw it on the ground. When it hits the ground it bursts into flame and disappears. The monks seem surprised by this, but tell us that there is touble out to the west and either Valentine or myself will discover a reward or insight. Hopefully it's a reward that will make up for the loss of a guinea.
Once we finish our tea the village locals ask us if we have arrived to help rid them of their troubles. A band of dwarves has taken over the local INN and is drinking the village dry <gasp>. Even worse, they're not paying for the booze. The locals mention that the local abbey will give us a reward for helping them. The locals also tell us that the we should not stray from the road as the dandelion fields are infested.
We soon learn that the fields are infested with Leprechaun as 2 of them shoot Daisy and I with arrows. Luckily I see the auras of the arrows and Daisy counterspells the charm spell that the arrows had been invested with.
We move to a barn near the Inn and ponder our next move.
As we ponder the village locals ply us with shots of dandelion syrup. The also mention that they have a sleeping potion but have not had the opportunity to spike the beer with it. Valentine bravely takes the potion, turns invisible (thanks to Lofar} and sneaks off to the Inn. 5 minutes later he appears in front of us and tells us that he was successful. An hour later finds the Inn "patrons" asleep. There are more than a few dwarves in the Inn, there is also a goblin, 2 Orcs, some humans and some dwarves (12 in total). We ascertain that they will sleep for another day or so, pack our bags and rush off to Rothmans Abbey to find some shackles and some help to deal with the sleeping thugs.
At the abbey the monks give us a mule each, a bunch of shackels and as if we would like a hand dealing with the sleeping thugs. So, we leave the abbey on our mules with 2 Michaline Knights and 4 Urielites. We leave our circus along with a sleeping Jaundice behind in the safety of the abbey.
The trip back to Dune is uneventful although Vlad and Guedesh are walking like a pair of ruptured spinsters at the end of the ride. They really need some horse riding lessons!
The Michaelines assist us in chaining up the sleeping ugly thugs. Valintine has an ethical discussion with the Michaelines and Urielites regarding their intention of throwing the thugs down the village well. If they were at the bottom of the well and chained up then they would be unable to escape justice. In the end a compromise is reached and end of the chain is attached to Tramples foot. I expect that Trample would not normally allow a chain to be attached to his leg but he still seems to be quite docile. Hope he doesn't revert to his normal self anytime soon otherwise we'll be burying these thugs.
Guedesh offers to cast Fear on the sleeping thugs and the Michaelines and Urielites all seem very eager for this to happen. Apparently this will give the thugs terrible nightmares.
Daisy discovers that the Michaelines are not a celibate order and spends some time getting on their good side. When the village offer us the use of the Inns rooms Daisy takes one of the Michaelines to her room with her. The rest of us find a room each and we try to get some much needed sleep.
Thaw 6th....gobbies and dire wolves for dessert
<early morning>
We are awoken by Daisy's scream.
Lofar, Valentine, Vlad and I rush into her room to find that she is being attacked by a gang of stuffed cuddly toys. (Geude is busy with his two gals and stays in bed) We proceed to knock the stuffing out of the stuffed toys while trying to cope with a delusional and hysterical Daisy. After ensuring that the stuffed toys are no longer a threat I go back to bed.
We are awoken by Lofar in the morning. He has discovered that one of the prisoners has escaped and that we should go get him after we have breakfast. Interestingly enough we find both Daisy and one of Guede's gals in bed with Valentine when we go to wake him up. Looks like Guede wasn't the only one to partake in some exercise last night.
After a very hearty breakfast Lofar leads us on a merry chase to track down the escapee. We finally catch him in the Black Iron Hills and drag him back to Dune.
Back at Dune Daisy approaches one of the Michaeline Knights and asks if he can have a look at her as she was hallucinating last night. He checks her out and says that she has been poisoned and that he could heal her. He then takes her into the barn for a private healing session.
15 minuters later Valentine enters the barn to find that the knight is giving Daisy a very penetrating...deeep....healing session. When Valentine asks whats happening Daisy says "He's healing me"...and Brother Codsworth (the Knight) says "I'm doing Gods work". Valentine then gets out his sword and spanks the Knight with it. Much to Valintines surprise Brother Codsworth seems to find this.....stimulating.
Hmmm....it's almost enough to make one find religion!
After finding out that Daisy has been poisoned we get another of the monks to have a good look at the party. We discover that all those that had breakfast have been poisoned and will start to hallucinate later tonight. We decide to rush back to Rothman's Abbey to get deliver the prisoners and get us some healing. The trip to the abbey was uneventful and after a nice drink of holy water the poison is clensed from our bodies. Guede is his norm well behaved self and he manages to get both himself and me kicked out of the abbey. Later they take pity on me and allow us into the guest room to sleep with the rest of the part. Daisy goes off with another healer to complete another session of "healing". The monk is so happy with Daisy's ability to be "healed" that he offers the services of the abbey to prodie special training to the party after we finish our current task.
In the morning we notice a number of gibbets being constructed for the prisoners that we captured in Dune. Valintine feels that death is too harsh a punishment for their crimes but upon further investigation we find that they will only be spending a week in the gibbets.
We pack up our gear, our camp followers (Valentines boy servant, Guede's two gals and our sleeping fire mage) and we head out of the abbey. Today we have decided to keep the Raphaelite monks company and escort them and thier pig silver pole to Whitecross. The day day passes uneventfully but as we enter Whitecross that evening we spot a band if 45 or so goblins in the distance. The band of goblins appear to have two wolves with them. We talk to one of the town elders and find that the goblins have been stealing livestock. We also find out that the wolves are actually Dire Wolves and are adepts of Celestrial magic.
While we come up with a plan on ridding the town of it's Goblin problem Daisy and Guedesh disappear down a big hole on the outskirts of town to visit the local witch. They return with some potions to aid us in our upcoming fight. The potions make you much stronger but the side affects are a little too smelly for one of my sensibilities. They have also been given some neclaces of teeth that supposedly protects you from spells.
The fight goes well thanks to a nice wall of fire (thanks to the barrel of flammable liquids that some goblins left for us), a nicer wall of Starlight and a number of counterspells. Not to mention some good old heavy handed disciplin metered out by a sword or two. In the end 5 Dire wolves were slain, a necro construct destroyed and any number of goblins dead or fleeing our superiority.
Thaw 7th......Training at the Abbey
After freeing the village of its Dire Wolf and Goblin problem we take a well deserved nap. In the morning Brother Clistaramous (a Michaeline Knight) arrives from the village with 4 men of arms. They say that the Mistress of the Abbey has offered us their services for Training. We discuss our options and decide that we will spend 15 days or so training at the Abbey.
Daisy has a few issues with her training. No matter what she does she seems incapable of casting her spells and they all seem to go awry.
Vlad also seems to have a few issues with his casting but eventually manages to get his training completed.
Thaw 13th......training and backfires for all
Early one morning (4am 6days into our training) Daisy, Jaundice and Valentine think that they have spotted some scarecrows flying around outside. They go outside to investigate.
A fight ensues between them and 4 animated scarecrow boogey men.
While they fight Valentines trusty steed does his best to wake the remainder of the party. Unfortunately Tramples method of waking me was to slam me in the chest, breaking some ribs and leaving a gaping wound.
Trample the rushes out font and runs down the scarecrows while at the same time trampling over Valentine.
During the fight I felt the tingle that tells me that somebody close has died. After the fight we find that Jaundice has died during the fight.
In thanks for protecting their abbey the Mistress of the Abbey resurrects Jaundice. However she needed two human eyes to do this. Daisy and Guede give up an eye each to the cause.
The mistress of the abbey then heals us all up, although it will take some considerable time for my ribs to return to their natural position.
Thaw 23rd......tornados accross the plains
We have completed our training. We pack up and depart in a westerly direction. The abbey has told me of a dark pit of celestial bats that I can visit later to gain additional training. I make a note to come back later to take them up on that offer.
Valentine seems to know where he going which is more than can be said for the rest of us. He seems to be competent reading these map things while Lofar seems to have trouble reading at all.
We arrive at Whitecross and spend an uneventful night.
In the morning we set off west again.
Eventually we find ourselves out on the rolling plains…..somewhere.
From his vantage point on his horse Valentine spots two columns of Waargs and goblins making their way across the plains. We try to sneak around them but one column comes across our tracks. While the others discuss what to do I suggest that old one eye (Guede) calls a storm to help cover our tracks and slow the gobbies.
Guede jumps at the chance to blow his head off and attempts to call a storm.
Guede lets his enthusiasm get the better of him and he calls a mighty storm down upon us. We flee south as the plains are covered in lightening and great columns of wind tunnels (twisters I think he called them) appeared all over the plains. You don’t see those at home!
A few hours finds us wandering into a wooded forest type area. We’ve lost sight of the gobbies but I think that Valentine has lost his way.
Another hour of fruitless wandering….
Success…..looks like I did Valentine a disservice. We have found the town of Red Tree which, or so I am told, is close to where we can find our original employer.
In town we find that there is a tower at Redtree. A bloody big, very odd tower that is incredibly tall, has a whole lot of floating platforms and rooms and pools and contraptions, and most importantly of all a Inn & Pub. We proceed to the pub and book a room for the night. The Inn keeper shows us to a nice room and warns us that thanks to the magic of the tower any fighting or magic usage will result in a nasty death which occurs in your sleep.
We decide to tae a bath before dinner and during our bath we discover that some of the part are infested with nasty blood sucking Imps. The locals tell us that there is a local with in the village that can help us.
At the witches hut we receive a nice brew that revives us but leaves our teeth blue. Looking closely we see that the healer has blue teeth and is probably the healer foretold by the old hag in Old Seagate.
The healer cures the party of the imp infestation, kindly hammers my ribs back into place. She also says that she can regrow the eyes that our arty members donated for Jaundices Resurrection but that we would have undertake a journey to farm some plants that grow in the forests near some giant spiders. She also takes a liking to Daisy who offers to do some additional shopping for her when we head into Gugnirs Hope.
Thaw 24th......at last, Bluegrass
The next day we pick up Daisy’s shopping list, and depart for Gugnirs Hope. We are escorting the dead bodies of some bridge builders that did not heed the Inn Keepers warning and died due to the little fight that they’d had the night before.
At Gugnirs Hope we deliver the dead bodies and decide to quickly move on to Blue Grass and meet our employer.
At Blue Grass we meet up with the Reeve of the village and find that two local boys had been killed by Sheriff McGreedy’s men. The local boy’s have been known to get into a little trouble now and then but nothing that would account for their deaths. However, we do discover that a couple of Merchants from hope had recently been robbed after delivering some cattle to Gugnirs Hope. The merchants were supposed to have received a promisary note but for some reason had accepted cash and then had been robbed near Dwarf Hold on the way back to Hope.
Investigation of the two dead boys show that when the sheriff’s men had killed them the boys had actually been undead and were probably under the control of a necro at the time that they died.
We have dinner at the Reeve’s and during the night we deduce that some locals are in communication with the sheriff. After talking to the Reeve we locate the local suspects and set a trap to catch them tomorrow morning.
Thaw 25th......a trip upto Dwarf Hold
We get up nice and early, get out onto the road and spring our trap. The catch for the day the local dimwit who is on the way to the sheriff with a missive from his sister. Under our skillful interrogation we find that he and his sister are the owners of the “Blue Grass” growing fields and that the crops have been failing for a number of years. We head back into town and have a chat with the sister.
After using our charm (and our deputies badge) we convince the brother and sister that we are here on official business. The sister has been keeping an eye on the strangers for the sheriff believing that anybody “odd” (us for instance) are part of the local bandit band that has been a problem in the area. We also find out that they are greatly in debt to a money lender in Gugnirs Hope and the loan had been underwritten by Sheriff McGreedy.
Remembering another of the Old Hags predictions I suggest that we head out to the field and look and the third stump where the green grass turns blue. Under the stump we find a wiccan type curse that has been buried to cause the harvests to fail.
We head back to the Reeves House and have breakfast while we discuss the many possibilities of what has been occurring. After breakfast Vlad, Jaundice and I set off for Dwarf Hold to gather more information while the rest of the party search for more info in Blue Grass.
We arrive at Dwarf Hold just as evening is setting. We head for the finest Inn in town and hire a suite of rooms for a couple of days. We enjoy an excellent meal with the Inn Owner (a Mrs Glack). Also at dinner is a couple of merchants. Mrs Glack mentions that the local store is selling Hard To See Rope. One merchant at dinner tells us of his amazing candles that reveal invisible people and things. Calamity (another merchant) offers to sell us some silver leather tacks that when made into a pack can make a 60lb pack weigh only 30lb. Calamity also wants to know if we are interested in a trading deal which would see us supplying these packs to the Seagate Guild. I purchase some silver tacks and say that we will consider her ideas.
After dinner Jaundice once again displays her phenomenal gambling abilities and cleans up at the pokir table.
I talk to the barman and find that the two merchants we’re interested in were actually robbed before reaching Blue Grass and that the witch that healed them lives here in town. When queried he also mentions that some dwarves from Irongate have a shop here in town and may be able to fashion interesting items.
When I visit the witch (Catelin). She looks at me and tells me that my spleen is in dire need of healing. When she is finished I find that I have fully recovered from the damage that Trample had dome 2 days earlier. The witch also tells me about the merchants that had been found by the local ranger . The two boys were quite badly beaten up and were still receiving healing. I also query her regarding other witches in the area and she says that there is one witch in particular that would be interested in seeing the Blue Grass Harvests fail. This witch is a Ogre who works for the sheriff.
The witch warns me that Willow Gaths has a very ugly daughter called Sue-Ellen and that he has been trying to marry her off for quite some time. However, if we were able to somehow get the poor girl to come to the witches hut tomorrow night she may be able to cure her of some of her troubles.
As I return to my room 4 of the local girls latch on to me and join me for an entertaining night. They seem quite taken with me and I decide to let them enjoy their short time in my presence and protect me from the charms of “the daughter”.
In the morning we have a leisurely breakfast, visit the bakery and head off to the Irongate Dwarf Shop. The dwarves get very excited when I show them a sample of the ore that we salvaged from our dead earth elemental. The suggest that they could make :
- a special shield covering
- a dagger that pierces cloth and leather armour
- a healer tuning fork
- a dagger that can hold spells?
- a device that when held against a wall allows you to see through the wall.
We leave a sample of the ore with the dwarves to experiment with.
Moving on we find that the ranger is at home as is his very ugly daughter. She’s not as ugly as I was told, she’s worse. I casually let it drop that Vlad is single, available and is otherwise unengaged. Very quickly Vlad finds that he has a date set with her tonight. Lucky boy!
We question the Willow Gath and learn that he had found the two merchants out in the woods. They were tied up very tightly, so tightly that limbs were in danger of being lost due to the lack of blood flow. He mentions that the knots were “proper knots”. At the location where he had found them had tracks leading from and to the west. After he found them he brought them back to the witch here in town for healing that is still taking place. In fact they are working in town trying to get some blue rock that the witch requires to fully heal them. He then offers to go fetch the two merchants for a chat.
While he is fetching them his daughter takes the opportunity to get close to Vlad. Yuck!
Willow Gath quickly returns with Islay and Ernest.
Their Story.
They left Hope with their cattle and headed down to Gugnirs Hope. At gugnirs hope they found that Mr Big (the cattle baron) was not in town and therefore could not supply a promisary note. They accepted the cash and snuck out of town on horseback.
Shortly after leaving Gignirs Hope they ran into an area of noxious fumes which rendered them unconscious. They awoke to find a large 8ft male Ogre had tied them up (the Ogre had a scar down one side of his face). There was a second person near them talking to the Ogre in an odd language. When Ernest tried to turn and see the second person the Ogre punched him (breaking his eye socket and nearly destroying the eye). The Ogre then proceeded to give them a serious beating until they passed out. They awoke when the ranger found them and brought them to town.
Important Notes:
They delivered 100 head of cattle priced at 200sp each. The payment of 20000sp was paid in gold ingot. They have never met Sheriff McGreedy but Catelin sent the Sheriff a report when they were brought to her. They have also never met our two dead boys in Blue Grass and they don’t recall ever seeing them. They feel that they were found by the ranger two days after their capture.
Their personal horses were a pinto and a mustang. Both were branded with a 2inch square brand on their hind quarters. Their tack was also branded with the saddles having an additional brand hidden on the underside of the saddle.
We invite the two to dinner tonight to meet the remainder of our part whom we expect to arrive shortly.
Later that day the rest of the party arrives. At dinner they meet the merchants, the ranger and his daughter, the Irongate Dwarves and Calamity. We find out that Calamity has had dealings with the bandits.
During dinner Vlad hypnotises Valentine and turns him into a devoted love slave to the rangers ugly daughter. Valentine takes her on a date to the healer who manages to fix from ogre-like to troll-like. Ugly, but human.
After dinner we talk to Calamity and find out that the bandits are in the woods to the west and that some are expected in town the day after next. Calamity also informs us that there are 3 ogres in the gang. A witch and at least two others. These ogres are likely to be in the pay of sheriff McGreedy.
We make plans to go hunting in the woods the next day.
Thaw 26th......Hunting in the woods
We wake up, have breakfast, grab the ranger and rent some horses.
Into the woods we go. After many hours we find a rock face full of caves.
We keep a discrete watch on the caves and we identify the most likely cave for Ogre Hunting. We also spot a column of goblins on waargs approach the caves. In the eveninig we spot a column of giant bats fly out of the caves. Each bat has a goblin rider.
As some of us are tired after a long days ride we head back to Dwarf Hold.
Back at Dwarf Hold we all go back to the Inn for dinner.
All except Valentine that is. He heads off to find finer fare.
Later that evening the local constable approaches us to complain about our associate (Valentine). Seems that he and Trample busted up a reasturaunt when they refused him service. He politely asks us to leave town by midday tomorrow.
Thaw 28th......Bandits and Trample
The next morning we hang around the general store waiting for the bandits to arrive.
Around midday they arrive and head into the store. Lofar follows them and find that they are indeed robbing the general store. We rush in and Justice is delivered to the scoundrels.
After the battle Vladimeer heads off to get the healer. At the healers he finds that both the healer and Valentine are lying dead at the "hands" of Trample. Trample spots Vlad and heads off in pursuit.
Over the next 8 hours Trample manages to kill all the towns guard dogs. A number of horses. 8-10 villagers. Almost kills Ath.
Eventually Trample grows tired of menancing the town and heads off into the fields.
With he help of the Ranger we manage to bring the Healer-Witch back to life...who then ressurects Vlad.
We all head off to bed to recover from the day.
Thaw 29th......Back to Gugnirs Hope
The next morning we leave the good town of Dwarf Hold and head back to Bluegrass. Valentine decides to head elswhere.
At Bluegrass we infor the Reeve of the situation and tell him that more experienced guild members will be required to clean out the cliff caves and rid the area of the bandits, goblins and ogres. He thanks us and gives us a note to deliver to the guild.
We then head down to Gugnirs Hope.
At Gugnir's Hope Jaundice and I find a good leather worker to make our new back packs. We then find a very cheap pub to spend the night in.
Thaw 30th......walking again....still no wings.... <sigh>
An uneventful day of travelling sees us reach Telninton. There we find a very homely INN run by hobbits. These hobbits tell us all about the "spiders" to the SW. Sounds as if the spiders are actually scorpians. We also find out that they don't like fire at all.
Seedtime 1st....spider hunting
We head into the forest and quickly spot the webs that these scorpians weave. Jaundice very wisely casts fire armour on us and then throws some fire bolts at the web. The webs explodes and suddenly this area of teh forest is ablaze. Looks as if those webs are flammable.
We burn the "spiders" then dig up the bulbs that the Redtree witch needs for regrowing eyes.
back to Telninton to grab our gear then off to Redtree we go.
Seedtime 2nd....brown eyes for Daisy
We arrive back at Redtree where we hand the bulbs to the witch. She quickly grows back eyes for Daisy and Guede, however they are a different colour to their originals.
Some locals are having a problem with some goblins in their basement. easy solution....we smole them out.
Unfortunately....to git rid of the smoke both Daisy and Jaundice manage a rare combination of back fires and now Jaundice feels the sensation of Daisy's left breat...and vice versa.
The witch can't heal this so back off to Rothmans Abbey we go where Daisy craves the healing that they can give.
Seedtime 3rd....we keep abreast of the situation
Back at the abbey the monks announce that they can indeed heal up Jaundice and Daisy's breasts. Daisy is keen but Jaundice needs some fortification of the alcoholic kind to perform their brand of healing.
Seedtime 4th....Harvest Time
The next morning finds Daisy with a rosey glow while Jaundice seems to be trying hard to forget the healing from the night before.
The Abbey once again offers us all training on the condition that we help bring in the harvest.
We avail ourselves of this opportunity.
