"Atzi, get back!" Natalyah cries when the witch turns her gaze on the druid. The ranger follows Rollo and leans over the witch after the hound has felled her. She raises her blade and readies to strike. "You are beaten. Give up and tell us who you are."
The woman mumbles something at you lifts a hand then falls into unconciousness
Atzi, no longer gripped by the witches evil eye, staggers and leans against the wall heavily. "I knew there was someone here but... I would never have been able to take her alone." She looked at her hands, noticing the fading signs of burns and frost bite. She had asked the great mother for her help today, perhaps too much so.
LEaving the rope tying to more skilled hands Atzi strikes out to search the shake and deal with the monkey if she can.
Setebo tries to calm the Captain as the sword falls from his hand as the claws fade.
"Get a rope and bind her. Could someone stabilize her."
"What for?" Helga asks. She is more interested in searching the hut and the fallen woman than saving her.
The monkey screeches at you and hides up in the rafters as Rollo's teeth crush the old womans windpipe
CDG from Rollo who will not take orders from anyone but Caithen.You could try and pull him off as Caithen is still under the effects of Hideous Laughter
No, Hetaher likes her limbs.
"Rollo, get back!" Natalyah says to try and stay the dog. (). Except her command the half elf does nothing to hinder the hound from slaying the witch.
Rollo killing the old woman was annoying but saved them the time of having to do it themselves Atzi concluded to herself. It was a horrible way to think but it was better this way, she died with her people. Since the monkey had proven to wild to befriend Atzi went back to searching the shack for anything useful. Weapons, Potions, scrolls and the like.
[ooc]I will be away from my PC from tomorrow(Tuesday) until Friday Evening
You find the following items.
A wand of Vampiric Touch (8 charges)
6 potions of CLW
2 Potions of Lesser Restoration
3 Antitoxins
2 Smokesticks
3 Tanglefoot Bags
1 Thunderstone
Helga will suggest the wand for Ammisi (she's the only one who can use it easily), share the CLW potions between us (can Helga take two as she's used her wand up?), she and Atzi take a potion of Lesser Restoration each as the party's healers, and she'd like to replace her tanglefoot bag with one of those here.
rnd1
rnd2
Caithan picks himself up after a time looking rather embarassed. Rather than show it he goes outside to have a smoke. Then curses loudly when he realizes he not only has no tobbacco but he's misplaced his pipe as well.
Setedo fusses over the recovering captain until the chelish man waves him away. After Caithan steps out Setebo busies himself by lifting the body and taking it outside. He dumps the corpse in a corner of the hedge. They will deal with bodies in the morning.
As he does this he keeps a dark eye out for the monkey.
Natalyah stands quiet and watches Rollo ravage the witch until Caithan tells the hound to stand down. She wonders if her last chance to get off the island died with the witch and why she couldn't get herself to care. The fight had left her hollow and without purpose. She abcentmindly accepts one of the tanglefoot bags, wipes her blades clean and returns outside.
To all: ”Are we done killing now? Is there anyone left?” The beast-man’s eyes are bright with tears and fading battle-lust.
Atzi shakes her head at Setebo and takes the items gratefully. "We will have to scour the island, or stay here and wait to see if any more return to their home village. But the killing may be far from over. We have to finish this or their remaining people will do whatever it takes to finish us. Or wreck our attempts to get help off this island..." Atzi doesn't relish the feeling of being the bearer of bad news, nor slaughtering ignorant cannibals either, she did know that it was best to chose the lesser of two evils and be judged when her spirit passed from this world.
"Come let us search the village, Helga, Amisi and Setebo please return to the guard tower and keep watch. We can't let them come in and catch us unaware. Caithan, Natalyah and I, along with our companions will search the rest of the village and pile what we find in the house of light."
"Aye, we need to scour the tower as well. There could be more there, after all."
You find nothing of any interest in the village apart from the fact that the area beside the tower is not as you first thougt a random heap of planks but a hatch that covers a deep dark hole in the ground..the sound of tidal rushing can be heard from down below.
Helga sings a snatch of song and a cluster of glowing orbs spiral down into the darkness to illuminate what lies beneath...
It appears to be a cavern of sorts..you can't be sure of the dimensions though.
"Well, I suppose we'd better see what's inside the lighthouse," Helga remarks
"Or should we rest up and heal a little first? We can bar the door again from the outside."
Atzi looks up at the lighthouse and grimaces. "How is everyone doing? Should we push forward one last time?"
She scratched the scaled chin of her new scaly friend as Quetza stood behind her, oddly silent and unnervingly vigilant. "Last thing I wish to see is someone ruin our way off this island... I have some strength left to fight. Amisi, Helga what of you?"
"I have a few spells left, but my magic isn't the strongest. I can inspire us a little more, but if we run into anything really serious," Helga shrugs. "If anyone needs healing now, I can use my last spells on them and then we can rest."
Natalyah stands next to the hole and looks abcently down into the cavern. "We can't rest until we know that they're all gone", she says.
You prepare as best you can and enter the 50' tall lighthouse...on the ground floor you discover three rooms. The first seems to be a meeting room or council chamber..the second is a cluttered shrine dominated by a large wooden carving of a Devilish Figure whom the Chelaxians among you will immediately identify as Asmodeus.
The third room comes as something of a surprise to Atzi, Natalyah and Amisi..the place has been turned into some sort of guest chamber..it contains a crude but comfortable bed made of timber and with a feather Matress..and the remains of some meals which would appear to have come from the stores in the Jenivere
Moving upwards you find the chiefs bedchamber which is furnished with aging and poorly treated Chelaxian style Furniture.Against the wall is a battered foot locker which turns out to contain what must have been the ships payroll..6,300Sp and 270 Gp.
The coins themselves are at least 70 years old going by the portraits and minting dates on them.
There is a balcony attached to this room which seems sound despite its rickety appearance. on this floor you are about 20' above the ground.
Stairs continue up towards the light itself.
Caithan idly picks up one of the coins. "Hmmmmm remember this chap. Not a bad old boy all things considered. Then he was caught in bed with several of the halfling servants. Come to think of it that's about the time they stopped minting these."
Tossing the coins back in the pile he ignores the shrine and makes a thorough search of the guest room.
Perception check
Natalyah spits defiantly at the statue and is returned to full zeal when she sees the guest chamber. "Jos kâerm ja hene por ott suoa tallë...", she starts and trails of into something inaudiable as she searches through the chamber and lower floor for tracks or signs that the Jenivare captain has been here.
If that snake and his harlot took shelter here...
Helga looks about, then considers the cavern and the new finds...
"There's something not right here. Not just the cannibals, but something else as well. Why the hatchway over the sea-cavern? Could you sail a ship into it, maybe? But who, and why?"
Perception:
Atzi looks down into the pit and spits. She had the horrible feeling that more fairness infected this island, more then she could or would allow to stand. "Let's cover up this pit, and set up two watches one in the tower and one here. We will rotate every couple hours. Quetza and I will take the first watch on the ground, Setebo please take watch in the tower, Helga or Amisi please sleep in the tower, Natalyah you will relieve Setebo as your eye sight is better then any of us in the morning dark. Caithan will replace me. Then first thing in the morning Amisi and Helga will take over for us. We'll figure out our next step in the morning."
The bed contains a number of scales..but it must have been a pretty big snake going by their size..you are convinced the Captain and his Sorceress companion were here..though those off you who were on the Jenivere you cannot recall her having a snake..you do recall however that the cook on the ship was killed by a snake bite.
"Something strange was here...who sleeps with a snake?" Helga murmurs.
"Let us look to the light."
"I will check the upper floor."
Setebo trots up the stairs.
Later at the hole.
Setebo looks down black eyes straining against the dark
"Why a hole?"
To Atzi
"Aye aye."
Setebo playfully offers his arms to the two lovely ladies.
Natalyah's anger rises with every trace she finds of the Jenivare's captain. With grim determination she starts to acend the steps.
"She had magical power and she 'acted' like a snake. COuld it be possible that we got fooled by a shapechanger."
"If we find her, you can ask her," Helga notches an arrow.
Amisi marshals her facts before speaking of the Serpentfolk
"Few solid facts are known about the reign of the serpentfolk in the lost ages before the ascendancy of the Azlanti, yet what little can be said with certainty is enough to chill the hearts of modern mortals, and takes on deeply nightmarish aspects upon deeper introspection and calculation."
"It is accepted by those knowledgeable about such things that the serpentfolk once ruled Sekamina in the Darklands, as well as large reaches of the surface world, during an age before the first appearance of humanity."
"How long this domination might have lasted is subject to heavy debate in scholarly circles, but even the most conservative estimations tentatively place the length of their reign in the thousands
or perhaps tens of thousands of years, while high-ranking archivists within the Aspis Consortium quietly hint that their organization is in possession of serpentfolk records dating back several ages before Earthfall."
"What other creatures and cultures may have been crushed within their coils in those incomprehensible days cannot even be guessed, although serpentfolk art shows entire sentient races hunted to extinction for sheer pleasure."
"With the coming of further centuries, the growing Azlanti kingdoms came
into violent conf lict with the fading serpentfolk, and bitter wars waged; a partially-translated treatise from that time, entitled The Alaberos Analects, makes mention of the “abundant slavemen shoeshod/chainhanded rising in breakingwave-ever-breaking against [we]. Deprivation abound/shall abound.”
"The text goes further, making a philosophical point apparently in argument against the premise of a still-lost text referred to as The Typhonian Proposals: “In victory, great-loss. In retreat, proposed, perhaps... less-loss. Query: Better to burnsphere sunworld with plague/storm, or to sleep-and-in-sleep-replenish while poor masters of slaves these slaves foresee making, and falter? The stars [shall
turn] right again.”
"It is believed that, in the end, a war raged between the races, escalating for more than a century as the serpentfolk committed more and more resources to the task. That the war finally came to an end with a serpentfolk loss is apparent today by their scarcity, yet details of how this conflict resolved remain obscure. Legend holds that an Azlanti hero decapitated the serpentfolk god, Ydersius, and in so doing cast the serpent empire into a lasting chaos."
"It may seem curious that so few records from this conflict have been
found and that the hero’s identity has remained a mystery, but Earthfall shattered entire civilizations, so perhaps the loss of a single champion’s name is not so surprising after all. In short, by means not fully understood, this Azlanti hero successfully defeated Ydersius, severing the epic serpent-god’s power and spelling the beginning of the end for the serpentfolk empire."
"Though crippled by the sudden silence of their patron deity, the serpentfolk were far from destroyed. Further bloody struggles against their enemies are well recorded by the ascendant Azlanti, wherein nations clashed with weapons of divine fire and incomprehensible spell-engines, including one improbable account of a single desperate serpent-mage laying waste to himself and an area “greater than two hundred and thirty leagues across.”
"And then..they just vanished, no-one knows where they went or what became of their civilisation or if they did it was destroyed in Earthfall. The Legends speak frequently however of the Serpentfolks ability to take human form and move amongst their enemies with ease"
You make your way up to the light platform and discover..that the builders never finished it...the parts for the light are here but you will have to assemble them.
Setebo smells the sea from the hole
The Cauldron would work to weigh the hatch down certainly
"A chilling story indeed," Helga murmurs, committing the history to memory.
Helga looks thoughtfully at the complex task ahead of them.
Knowledge (engineering)
"Interesting Amisi but I fail to see how this exactly gets us off this island." Caithan says as he looks over the half built light house somewhat sadly.
Perception
"Cheer up Captain. You'll be back among the politicians soon enough."
Before retiring to the tower Setebo rolls/drags/carries the huge pot over to the hatch and weights it closed.
"There." he dusts his hands, a satisified if toothy smile on his face. "That will keep whatever is down there, down there. 'least for tonight anyway."
"Sounds like superstition and make believe", Natalyah mutters. She is still fuming after the traces reignited her anger of being betrayed. "How do we get this lit?"
Caithan's left eye twitches at the mention of politicians. "Unless they're here on this island of no return at my mercy I think I can live for a few day, nay, decades without their presence."
Helga reckons it will take about 5 days off work to piece together the reflectors, and other machinery, to make the light work.
Amisi shrugs "It's possible we might be dealing with one off the Serpent Folk..I just thought you might want to know that..and off course she is still alive and active and, it would seem, an ally of these savages.Off course if you do not consider that important"