Good. And, perhaps, this fine fella could teach me Aklo.
As the party converses with the creature, Ellery will begin looking around the room, while making hand signs.
The amphibious creature shudders continuing to speak in the disturbing language,
It zooms to the door across the room and opens it. This L-shaped room is mostly empty, but holds a few neatly stacked piles of military-style camping gear sitting against the walls. A case of arrows sits near each of the arrow loops. An extinguished hooded lantern sits on the floor near the arrow loop in the western wall.
Theophilus approaches the colorful creature; hands held empty. A smile on his face.
I--am--Theo. The sun's going down; the sun's going dowm
The Witch peers interestingly into the store room. He casts Detect Magic.
Dervak speaks to the creature.
Ellery also "speaks up"...
Mara followed Voonith, wondering where exactly the strange creature was leading them. She asked,
The creature holds out one of its four claws to Theo and says,
It turns to Mara and exclaims,
The creature makes a high pitched coughing sound, you think it might be laughing.
Theo finds no magical items but he could collect the camping gear, the hooded lanterns and a box of 20 tindertwigs if he wanted.
Mara answered the question that Voonith had posed to Theo,
She explained to the hatter, "Voonith is asking you what a hat is; why don't you show him?"
Then she responded to Ellery's question, "It met the skum before, but I don't know how long ago. I rather doubt that it's working with them."
Ellery arches an eyebrow and responds.
Theophilus points at his hat; smiling weirdly.
The Voonith circles Theophilus excitedly bobbing its head up and down,
Voonith as if suddenly hearing something, cocks its head south, then rushes to the southern door kicking it open.
This room was built in the same fashion as the othe barracks, including an arrow loop and spiral staircase leading up to a guard tower
Jumpy fellow.
Theophilus will go to the door. He casts Detect Magic and peers into the room.
Theo detects no magical auras.
Mara told Theo, "Our friend would like you to make them a hat!"
She followed the bizarre amphibian; after it kicked open the door, she walked into the room and looked around.
Mara finds some spare equipment presumably used by some of the guards before the fort was taken. Five masterwork longswords and longbows, five suits of studded leather, and 100 arrows. Otherwise she doesn't find anything else interesting.
After looking around, Mara suggested, "Let's go up the stairs and finish checking the top of the ramparts."
"I'm beginning to suspect that Cesyll has already fled the fort, but I'd really like to see if she left any notes behind."
”We should explore the rest of the fort.”
"I don't think we have time to explore the fort. If the skum have left to go slaughter people in the town, maybe we can catch them. I can look for tracks, or we can just start hustling to the town."
Ellery makes some hand signals.
Ellery shrugs then continues...
Theophilus nods at Ellery.
Dervak and I will confirm the skums direction, while you three search for clues as to what the flip is actually going on in this town. We shall rejoin you once Dervak finds their tracks.
He looks pointedly at Dervak.
We will not pursue by ourselves.
The gentleman holds his hand out palm down. He appears to be expecting some type of reciprocal action...
Mara translated Ellery's comments, and then added her own, "I got the impression that the surviving skum may have swam out via the water supply. I think we only know of the one, right?"
"Right. Will not pursue by ourselves," says Dervak.
Dervak then holds his hand out palm-down like Theophilus is doing, but in a random direction, and looks to the witch, confused. "Am I doing this right?"
"Oh! Yeah I saw this before."
He puts his hand over Theophilus's and looks to the others to do the same.
"Mara may be right, maybe they swam somewhere."
Just outside the front gate he will Take 10 on Survival for an 18.
Theo smiles.
Voonith mimics both Dervak and Theo clearly not wanting to be left out.
Dervak and Theo look at the tracks on the muddy ground and other than the party's they finds a single trail made by Holissa. As far as they can tell the no one else came this way.
Mara reluctantly joined in the bizarre ritual. Is this from some sort of secret society?
After Dervak and Theo looked for tracks outside the front door, she suggested, "The scum spellcaster could have left a spellbook behind. If so, would that be useful for you, Theophilus? We haven't searched the room upstairs that it was in at the start of the fight."
Ellery raises an eyebrow at the hand joining and shakes his head. He makes a few hand signs before heading for the stairs.
Theophilus wonders a bit around outside with Dervak. He hums and huums a bit. He whistles. He coughs. He sings a Journey tune.
Don't stop believing...
Dervak goes back in to report.
"Nothing there. They probably swam like you said, Mara. Can't track them that way."
In the one story donjon, everything is in disarray. Overturned and broken furniture litters the floor, and sprays of dried blood mark the room’s stone walls. A cracked mirror hangs on the eastern wall at the top of the stairs to this room. A portrait of an aging couple lies amid bloodied and torn bedclothes near a large double bed. The room's wardrobe stands open, its contents spilled out in front of its mahogany doors.
Mara finds a secret cache under the floor planks, a pouch with some money and 3 freshwater pearls.
The lower of the two floors in the two story donjon is furnished with a large table, a few comfortable chairs, and a standing mirror. The room appears reasonably clean compared to the rest of the fort. A fireplace sits cold in the corner, and a pile of books and folios is spread across the table. Searching through the books reveals a handful of scrolls sandwiched in between pages: Blink, Cat's Grace, Remove Disease, Silent Image, and Zone of Truth.
Finally in the upper story is furnished with a double bed, two chests of drawers, a small table, and a couple of stools, this room also contains a bulky steel safe, its door standing open. A cold fireplace occupies the northeast corner of the chamber. The shutters of the three windows here have been torn from their hinges and lie broken on the floor.
Mara looked through the scrolls. "You might like some of these, Theo," she commented. She also looked briefly at each of the books, in case one of them was a journal.
"Well, I think we've looked everywhere, save looking behind the ghost's wall. I wouldn't mind looking through those records again, to see if there's anything concerning Iris Hill."
Mara finds no more magical auras and the books on the table are similar to the rest of the archives dry and boring,: trial records for 4714, records of liens, and town meeting notes for 4710-4712. They might have information you need if you spend some time with them.
"Let's go take care of that ghost. Put him to rest if we can."
Ellery makes some hands signs.
The White Rabbit eyes the scrolls hungrily.
Mara suggested, "Let's go back to the room where we met the ghost. Some of us can try to dismantle the more recent masonry, while others can look through the records. We should take these books with us."
Dervak looks around the fort for a crowbar or hammer and gets to work on the masonry.
After an hour worth of work Dervak is able to break through the wall. Fairly soon into the work a stench of decay escapes. Bales of hay have been placed behind the wall and once they are removed Dervak finds a locked cell door. Huddled in the middle of the floor, next to a bench, lies a desiccated corpse dressed only in a ragged loincloth. Still visible are tattoos on the torso and thigh depicting abstract swirling monstrosities with too many eyes and too many mouths.
Anyone who is going through the archives in the meantime doesn't really find anything interesting but they have gone through only a small fraction of the records.
Mara spent an hour going through tedious records, until Dervak got through the wall. She went over to have a look and commented, "That's a terrible way to die! We should take the body to Winter for a proper burial."
She started packing up a few of the records. "I think we should start ferrying these to the Sleepless building, where they'll be safe. We'll want to sleep there from now on, until we've dealt with the cult at Iris Hill. They won't be too pleased with us after today."
Ellery examines the lock for traps and attempts to bypass it if there are any, or to bypass the lock if not.
Dervak looks with fascinated horror at the shriveled body's tattoos. Was he a cultist of the things from beyond?
Theophilus cast Detect Magic prior to anyone opening the cell. He sweeps the room.
The Witch then takes out a handkerchief, dapping his eyes at the sight
Rowan approaches the cell door and tries to examine the tattoos from a distance.
He also tries to remember methods to put a spirit to rest.
Ellery easily pops the aging lock.
Theo sees a strong transmutation aura emanating from a point within the corpse's torso.
Rowan knows that a cleric of Pharasma, such as Winter, would probably know the best how to deal with the body.
With everyone contributing the party can carry all the records and the body wherever they please.
Strong Transmutation magic within the torso., sniffles the Witch.
Mara pondered Theo's discovery. A strong source of magic inside the torso! Could it be something he swallowed? Something deliberately embedded by someone else?
She consulted with the others, "That's very strange! We could either try to cut the corpse open ourselves, or take it to Winter and ask her advice. My inclination is to do the latter — what do you guys think?"
Agreed. We need to regroup, resupply and refocus.
"Yeah, that sounds good to me. We also need to warn Winter about these creatures and figure out where they might have escaped to."