Sunday rips open the midsection of the ogrekin that bit him and Ragnhildr finishes it off with her ice cold blast. Flopping backwards to the catwalk with a loud thump, only one ogrekin remains on its feet. His neck twitches repeatedly, either from a spasm or some other nervous disorder. He screams, "Jeppo! No!" as the ogrekin falls before the party.
Only one of Delendir's arrows sinks into the spider, but it proves deadly enough. The blood already lost from its severed limb coupled with the arrow the ranger just placed dead center sends the spider cartwheeling to the ground. The entire bard shudders slightly when the huge creature lands
Walking up behind Delendir, Yavenee rests a hand on her former Quah member, invoking her healing power.
Grace continues singing, staying behind, adding a chorus with emphasis.
"If you're too hurt, my sweets, retreat to me for healing."
Delendir breaths released as the spider falls and the soft hands of Yavenee touch him closing up his wounds "That's pleasing... in the mist of the fray I did not even realise I had been injured"
bursting from the ground and into the air Krysta dodge the falling corpse of the spider and reach a point where she could attack the surviving ogre. Her head snapped out and her crystalline teeth began to close down on the foolish creature's arm.
Krysta attacks the last ogrekin and takes him to the point of near death. With his body firmly in the grasp of her sharp teeth, she shakes him back and forth on the catwalk. Once she releases her bite the ogrekin staggers back a few steps to get away from her and loses his balance, falling backwards over the edge of the catwalk and landing awkwardly on the ground below.
With all active threads dispatched the party is free to approach the three caged and unconscious humans on the other side. Shalelu pushes Sunday out of her way and bolts down to the other catwalk side to approach the cage. She rattles it loudly and curses when she finds it locked. She looks among her party members, "Keys! We need to search them for keys!"
Turning to let Shalelu pass it's for naught as she pushes him to the side in her haste. If it bothered him he didn't show it or voice any outrage.
"Delendir has a sword that can cut through metal." Sunday simply says once she starts asking for keys.
Pleased with herself for dealing with the ogre Krysta landed atop the cage and looked at the bars. It had been sometime since she ate any metal, and it was always good for a growing dragon's bones, so when she heard Shalelu tell them to look for keys the young dragon decided to try and help. She arched her neck up and head down for a better Nile and clamped down on one side of the cage, away from the hinges or lock, and made an effort to rip part of it free to chew on.
Krysta's teeth scrape loudly against the metal bars, a sound similar to nails on a chalkboard screeching loudly throughout the barn. Her teeth slide down the bar as she pulls but no visible opening seems to come from the effort. Shalelu grimaces and grabs her hands and puts them over her heads. She screams, "What in the Gods is she doing? Is that supposed to sound like that?"
For the sake of everyone's ears, Ragnhildr quickly begins searching the ogrekin for keys.
"Here" Delendir tosses the adamantine longsword for Daud to catch it, then he starts to work on some of the locks with his own "keys".
"Thank you, Senir." Sunday quips before he turns and readies to hack at the locked cage.
Sunday slices through the locked cage and with a little bit of work creates an entrance point into the cage. The three men are extracted from the cage, but all of them are alive but unconscious. When all three have been taken from the cage, one of the men with long black hair stirs to consciousness, blinking his eyes several times as he struggles to grasp what is going on.
"Help us. We're - we're Black Arrows from Fort Rannick. We were escaping from... Ack, you probably don't know. Ogres from Hook Mountain - they attacked and overran the fort. We're probably all that's left. A few of us were taken by the ogrekin, so they might be alive in the house, and they took our gear in there. They're the Grauls, a local menace. They caught us in the woods as we were running for Turtleback Ferry. Their leader is Mammy Graul - she's the mother of this bunch of freaks. She's supposed to have magic powers or something, and she's cunning with it. And... A spider, a big spider. Careful."
He speaks in a whispered breath, either nervous about repercussions or simply unable to produce enough volume to talk loudly. It's clear from his mannerisms that the men are all suffering from malnutrition.
Well I guess that rules burning down the house, Sunday preemptively thinks.
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As Sunday slliced off parts of the cage Krysta waited nearby, pulling what he cut out away to clear the space for him to cut more. Once he'd finished she picked up the cage chunks and flew with them to a perch on the other platform where she began to devour them, ripping pieces free and then chewing on them. The noise was horrendous as crystal ground against steel but within the time the others spoke to the prisoners she had successfully eaten them all.
"We took care of some of them and the spider," Ragnhildr tells the man, "How many did they take, including you, we've saved three so far."
"These poor souls need food and water and the healing touch of our witch." Grace says, though she keeps her voice low. She speaks to the captives. "Don't mind Krysta, dears. She's on our side. Or, I suppose, she would say we are on her's. A dragon comes in handy."
Krysta glared slightly as Grace said the young dragon was on their side but turned it quickly into a graceful preening as the lovely Treasure corrected herself. She ripped another chunk of metal apart and began to much on it as the bard said "a dragon comes in handy" immanently pleased that someone shows proper gratitude for her assistance.
Giving Grace a smile, and trying not to laugh when Krysta first becomes indignant, then immediately shifts to preening, Yavenee gently approaches each man, laying her hands on each in turn as she chants, calling upon the power of the ancient land to reverse the passage of time on their wounds and injuries, literally undoing some of the damage inflicted.
Delendir listens to the men story "Damn giants! We need to end this menace once and for all. I don't think you can fight right now, but do you think you can walk on your own?"
The ranger observes how Yavenee treats the wounded "Take care with her, you would find yourself naked before you realize you said 'help'" and starts laughing strongly.
The half-elf gives a look around looking for equipment that can help the Black Arrows.
"Well, at least we have fulfilled our mission. We have discovered why there are no news from the fort"
Sunday side eyes the half-elf before rolling his eyes and walking out in order to get a good look at the house. And any other sentries they might have.
Ragnhildr, rather impatiently, waits for the rangers to answer her question.
"Ragnhildr, darling, far be it from me to suggest you are anything other than impressively capable and strong, but do you need a spot of healing magic as well?"
The healing hex washes over the wounded rangers, bruising and lacerations fading away. Blood still stains their clothing, dirt ground and mangled into their hair and skin and signs of weakness from malnutrition remain. Yet despite the problems, the men seem rejuvenated from the magical assistance. Standing slowly he helps the other two men as they regain consciousness as well. Signs of relief wash over the speakers face as he catches sight of the downed spider, clearly having had a previous encounter with the creature. He says, "Thank you for rescuing us. I am Kaven, this is Vale and -"
One of the other two men whose worn face is as hard as leather cuts in, "-and I'm Jakardos." Standing with signs of discomfort he puts most of his weight against the wall as he continues, "I believe we are all that remain of the Black Arrows. We are led to believe all of the others were killed an assault on the fort while we were out on patrol." He wears a black patch over his left eye, with three straps stringing across the back of his face to hold it on. His voice is somber when he speaks, the words heavy with regret.
Shalelu hears the voice and turns toward the one-eyed man. "Jakardros!" She exclaims.
"Shalelu! Wha-What are you doing here?" Jakardros says completely mystified.
"When I heard that contact with Fort Rannick had been lost, I feared the worse. I am glad you are alive," Shalelu explains.
"I can't believe you came looking. I mean after," the man hesitates. "You know, your mother. And... " Jakardros looks down.
Shalelu begins to cry, then runs to embrace the man.
The man receives the embrace and also begins to cry, "Shalelu, the Fort is lost. I wasn't there to defend it. They are all dead. We three are all that is left. We tried to retake it, but the Kreegs were too many. Too many. Then the Grauls took us as we retreated to the forest. It is my fault," the one-eyed man looks down.
There is a brief silence.
"These....Kreegs, are they....ogrekin like the Grauls?" Yavenee asks Kaven as Shalelu and Jakardos share a moment.
Jakardos shifts uncomfortably, his tattered clothing all but falling off his unnaturally skin body."The Kreegs are a brutal family of Ogres that have terrorized this region for decades. We have been keeping them in check. But they knew when to hit us somehow."
Jakardos takes a moment to compose himself, then pulls away from Shalelu. "Retaking the Fort, and killing all the Kreegs along the way is what I must do, but I fear my companions and I are not capable of this at the moment. What size company did you bring? Dealing with these worthless Grauls would be justice too. They have been killing the hunters and trappers in the region. They all need to be executed."
Taking note of the dead ogrekin and spider nearby he asks, "Is Mammy dead?"
Between Grace's question and the emotional reunion between Shalelu and Jakardros, a lot of the impatience in Ragnhildr's demeanor is leached out.
"Yeah, I got a little banged up," she tells the diva before turning to the rangers again. "Who's this Mammy?"
Delendir observes Shalelu crying and his heart seems almost to break, specially at the sight of the battered Black Arrow. The half-elf waits silently for the conversation to end.
All of a sudden he seems to resolve his attitude on this deep inside "Those giants killed my people too. If you really want to retake the fort, count with my bow. We must cut their presence out of the region"
"I believe Mammy is the mother of this lovely little clan of imbreeds." Grace notes before she sings scales and her healing magic flows out into Ragnhildr.
"Probably not then," Ragnhildr says as Grace's magic knits her wounds closed, "I haven't seen anything that looks like it's ah, that way."
The ulfen fighter moves about a bit to see if everything's still working. Other than some scratches, she feels fine.
"Thanks," she tells Grace before turning to the others
"Well, I don't know about the rest of you, but I've got a feeling that going through the front gate isn't going to be a good idea. I think a back window would be better. If you guys can walk, I think it might be best if you find a place to hide," she says, gesturing to the three Black Arrows with her last sentence.
"That would be best. Before we leave here things are going to get far more violent." Yavenee says with what might be a hint of a feral smile.
"Jessica would have healed you all in a second guys. You would have loved her" says Delendir with a smile "Anyhow, it is perhaps better if we wait for you to be fully healed so you can help us. Three more men is always extra advantage, more so when they perfectly know the building we have to clear out of giant rats, and a couple more days would be no real difference for the ogres"
"Except they might call in reinforcements. Is there a reason we can't just had the exits and burn the building down? These beings are truly vile."
Shalelu looks to the three Black Arrows for input on burning the house down. Jarkados doesn't answer right away but eventually adds, "When we were engaged by the Grauls we were five. Lazner fell during that battle and Astika, Kaven, Vale and I were all brought back here. The third day they took Astika, to be tortured and killed for amusement.
" His jaw tightens, fists clench and eyes close as he continues, "One of those ogrekin came back here with Astika's head later that day, playing with it like a toy."
After a long heavy breath he opens his eyes and adds, "There are no Black Arrow prisoners that I am aware of inside. It doesn't seem like the type of group that would keep prisoners alive for information or humanity. The only thing I can see worth going in for would be to reclaim our gear and possessions should they still exist, but I do not know if it is worth the risk of heading into that house of horror."
Shalelu adds, "I can stay here with them and protect them while you take care of the home. Do what needs to be done."
Sunday grins viciously. "Okay then, time to burn. Anyone have any Fire magic on them? Senir Delendir, do you still have that flask of alchemist's fire?"
If not he'll go about trying to find the best materials in order to start a blaze.
Finishing her meal of metal from the cage Krysta finally came to where the rest were talking, gliding down on her wings, and said, "Let me make sure there is only this...Mammy inside first." With that the young dragon burrowed again, going under the house, and made sure that there was only one inhabitant that she could sense through the ground.
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"Nice. Care to do the honors?"
First the party sets off seal all the exits on the house to ensure no one sneaks out. Before this takes place however, Delendir scouts the perimeter and points out various traps placed on the porch and near the doors. A brutal door spoke, floor saw, pit trap as well as a half dozen others are scattered nearly everywhere.
Once the exits are sealed the with sets numerous fires on various points around the building. The old rotten wood is wet from recent rains and takes a fair bit to get going, but once it starts it seems to catch and spread quickly. As black smoke fills the air and the large home burns, screams and sounds erupt from deep within the house. Eventually three ogrekin blast through the upper story windows as they try to escape burning alive. Cut by glass, burned by the fire and broken from the fall to the ground before you.
As the three ogrekin prepare to stand a brilliant green flash lights the interior of the home and suddenly the air outside is consumed by a putrid, nauseating odor that's a cross between a charnal house and broken-down sewer. A shrill scream erupts from behind you. "You boys, help your Mammy now! Those idiot brothers of ours let these trespassers burn the damned house down! Kill them!"
Mammy Graul, an incredibly corpulent monster with stringy hair and bald patches, stands behind you. To better hide skin splitting from mounds of colliding fleshy rolls, she wears a huge red curtain as a shroud, and her bed creaks out in anguish as she shifts her massive form to regard you. In truth, multiple Mammy's occupy the same area, doubtless some form of evil sorcery she has mastered.
"I never thought I'd miss the smell of troll," Ragnhildr mutters as her eyes water.
"Ugh, shut her up." He says to those around him before turning to the downed Ogrekin and rushing it. "You should have stayed in the fire!"