Pick grunts at the messenger's words. The enemy moves before they can, it seems-- he knew he should have gone scouting in the night... ah well.
He nods to show he has heard the message, and taps his fingers against his pick's head: he is already ready; he is always ready.
A loaf of bread goes into his pack for later, because Pick does have a certain somewhat-unsanitary tendency to hoard food, and then it's off, it's off to see the wizard. Or the monk, as the case may be.
Kyra nods solemnly, taking in the news. She bites her lip and furrows her brow, trying to decide on the right course of action.
"We're planning to ride out to Foxglove Manor this morning," Kyra explains, thinking aloud. "We have reason to believe that many of the problems have originated from there." She shakes her head dismissively, "I am still not sure that I believe in these 'ghouls', but there is clearly something happening."
"I don't want the investigation to wait for me - especially if people are being killed." She continues, knowing that her primary responsibility is to protect her people. After biting her lip again, she nods decisively. "Okay. How many guards can we spare for the investigation? I don't want Sandpoint to be unprotected, but whatever is out there has been one step ahead of us, and I want it stopped." She frowns. "I'll speak with the others, as well. At the very least perhaps I can spare someone from the Foxglove mission."
"I have no idea how Aldern will take my visit in the first place." Kyra mutters.
"Well," responds Peguson, "We have forty-six guardsmen. I generally like to keep around twenty on call at a time. We might be able to stretch it to ten men and women sent in to the farmlands. I think Shalelu is in town, too. There might be others willing to head out and check it out, too?" Peguson scratches his close-cropped head. "Your friends are formidable and one of their company would be appreciated, but don't spare them if you don't think we'll need them."
At this point, Khalbar and Flibble and Pick and Rhanloi walk into the Town Hall, seeing their Mayor in conversation with her recently-appointed Sheriff.
The half-elf nods as Flible speaks. "And on your bird you can stay out of harm's reach. Then you can quickly direct the guards, or join us at Foxglove Manor. The rest of us can join Kyra and investigate what could be the root of this problem."
Pick grunts his approval of this. There is wisdom in what the drow-cousin says, of Flibble as an aerial scout to see what needs be done.
Kyra nods in agreement. "Alright." She says decisively. "Flibble, see if you can find Shalelu for this. With her knowledge of the wilds and your... bird... the two of you should be able to investigate without much risk to yourselves. We'll send some guards, as well," she says, nodding pointedly at the Sheriff, "but I imagine you'll both get there first. The rest of us will head over to the Manor, and see if we can put an end to this nonsense."
Pick shoulders his pack and stolidly trudges along after the others towards the manor, his short legs moving at a near-jog in order to keep up with Hammer, the Big Man, and the drow-cousin. The bright daylight still pricks his eyes a bit, but not anywhere near as much as it had a year ago, when he was new to the surface world.
Flibidnick gets together with a half-dozen guards and Shalelu (who is easily found occupying the common room of the Rusty Dragon Inn) who agree to head out to the farms and meet him just outside their borders with his intelligence report.
To that end, Flibble gets on Sovola and takes off, enjoying fair winds and a nice, sunny day during his half-hour ride to the farmlands. Flying over the Crade farm (the one where the most recent reports of attack have been coming from) at a height of about fifty feet yields very little information. The farm is a corn farm, with several acres of tall grasses. Crossing the farm in several directions are footpaths, and on the footpaths are interspersed about two dozen scarecrows.
The farmhouse and barn are on the border of the farm itself, and both are silent and empty, as far as Flibble can tell. The lights are off, there's no sign of neither life or unlife. There is not a sign of struggle, either.
Kyra, Khalbar, Rhanloi and Pick all get their things together for a trip out to Foxglove Manor. It's a trip of a couple of hours, as the Manor is placed out in the Hinterlands of Sandpoint itself.
The journey is pretty cold, and involves a good hike up into the hills and mountains, a fording of a river, and some climbing up a cliff or two. It's not hard, but it's not easy either. Neither life nor undeath is spotted on the hike up, but over the course of the hike night begins to fall.
Pick stamps his feet in the chill, eager to keep moving lest he get cold when he stops. When the shadows lengthen and the sun starts sinking towards the horizon, he looks towards Hammer and the others.
"Light? You see, with lights. Also, they see us, with lights. Pick sees with no lights. Pick tells where to step?"
(If Kyra and the group want to try and approach without creating lights, then Pick will serve as a guide, advising the others as to the clearest path and warning of hard-to-see dangers on the trail. If the agreement is for light sources, then Pick will start moving about sixty feet ahead of the group, without a light source, attempting to spot things coming towards the light source in time to give a warning while remaining somewhat hidden himself.)
"I can also see well in the night - so I, too can continue for a while. However, we do not want to stumble upon a ghoul army in the darkness if only two of us can see them..." the half-elf offers. "I wonder how much farther the manor is from here?"
"Perhap,s" Kyra begins, "we should rest the night. I'd rather not stumble into a ghoul army at all, let alone after such a long hike. Plus, it seems to me that approaching the manor in the dead of night could be seen as somewhat... aggressive."
She pauses, considering. "If indeed he is behind this, we should approach carefully. I've been 'invited', and suspect the boy will be excited to show me every thing he's done." With a snort she continues. "As if raising the dead to prey on weak farmers is something to be proud of."
Shalelu and the town guards are waiting in the tree-line, and call Flibble down when they see him flying above.
Tersely, Shalelu approaches the mounted gnome, asking, "See anything? What happened to the farmers? And whatever it was that attacked them?"
Pick grunts his acceptance of Kyra's orders. He uses the last of the light to squint around, trying to find some high ground they might be able to use as a defensible campsite, in case the ghouls do attack at night.
Pick fails to find anything resembling a hill, cover, defensible terrain, or perhaps even his own nose...
Shalelu gladly accepts the aid of an invisibility spell, pledging to get in and out quickly and return with her report when she does.
When Flibble touches her she winks out of sight, but the party can see her footsteps in the tall grass, and they can see the corn-field part with her passage. After just a minute they can't see any evidence of her passing at all, except for the faint footprints left by her light feet.
The wind rustles the corn stalks while Flibble and the Sandpoint guardsmen wait for Shalelu to return. After just about three and a half minutes, she does so, dismissing Flibble's spell as she re-enters the small glade that they wait within. She is breathless with exertion, and her bow is out. "There's something in the cornfield." she says, in between gulps of breath. "Something moving, and growling."
The other group, hiking towards the Manor, find that they can actually get within vision range of it before dusk actually falls. They find themselves at the bottom of a high bluff, with a path winding up the side of it to reach its crest. At the top of the hill lies a large purple wooden house, though specifics of its appearance elude the party, so far away from it.
The bluff lies at the end of a short peninsula that sticks out into the Inner Sea, and the house is at the far end of the bluff, at the side that looks out over the sea. The bluff-face that the party is at faces land.
Camping is an option, as there are a few areas at the bottom of the cliff that are sheltered by rocks, and retreating back into the forest can allow for easy tree-climbing-and-sleeping (if anyone were so inclined).
"Perhaps we should move back into the woods for the night. Maybe even climb into the trees and secure ourselves for the night, in case there are any ghouls prowling about. I can take the first watch, or the last one." Rhanloi offers to the group.
"Trees good," Pick grunts. He rummages in his pack for Things-- in this case, rope and his collection of sharp little odds-and-ends for picking locks and the like.
"We can," says Shalelu. The men shift around her. "There're roads that run through the cornfields. They go straight through and can lead to the farmhouse. Do we want to go there?"
Kyra nods to the plans, having a sense of pride at how clever her friends were. As Pick begins to set traps, she nods with approval, and scales up one of the trees, finding a comfortable place, where she would be difficult to see. "Take first," she says to Rhanloi. "I'll take the last, it'll allow me to do my morning stretches and practise without slowing us down."
His tripwire rigged, Pick nods his acknowledgment of Kyra's orders.
"Big man, two, Pick, three," he offers, words intended to indicate watch order.
Pick squints at the trees, picks a solid one, then scales up until he finds a good, broad fork in the branches, not too far off the ground. He's still not entirely down with the concept of 'heights.'
Straddling the fork of the tree for stability, Pick leans his head back against the trunk of the tree, pulls his hood down over his eyes, and chews on a bit of dried jerky from his pack, settling in to rest away the (to him) calming night-time hours.
While the rest climb trees to rest, Khalbar stretches his bedroll out on the ground, as the gods intended. He looks at the others trying to sleep in the uncomfortable trees, and laughs to himself.
Khal stays awake during Rhanloi's watch, chatting with his friend and traveling companion. He takes his watch next, and shakes Pick awake, poking him with hilt of his greataxe, when its time for the odd dwarf to take over.
Shalelu nods and marches her men up and onto the road of the cornfield while Flibble takes off and begins to circle around them, watching carefully.
The group reaches a fork in the road with a scarecrow at it, and when they reach the scarecrow, it begins to flail around, growling and shouting. It's somewhat hard to see from the sky, but Shalelu reaches up to cut the scarecrow down...and that's when a figure bursts out of the cornfield, leaping onto one of the soldiers. Flibble flies in low and fires off a burst of magic missiles, disintegrating that particular (humanoid-looking) assailant, but the scarecrow that Shalelu took down attacks as well. Shalelu draws a shortsword to fend it off, and her soldiers draw weapons as well.
What follows is about a minute of tense skirmishing as several more of the creatures emerge from the cornfield, tackling soldiers to the ground. There are bites and scratches and sword-impalings but after all is said and done, four men are badly wounded, none are dead, but seven of the beasts have been destroyed.
They're certainly humanoid in form, but emaciated, with clawed hands and sharp teeth. They've got maddened looks in their eyes and their hair is falling out in patches. They're clad in ripped and torn farmer's clothing.
"No idea, Flibble." she says, looking in between the corpses of the slain enemies. "But they're fierce. And they SMELL." She's right, they do - they have a very....pungent, ripe smell.
Shalelu looks at Flibble. "So uh...we got pretty beat up. Are we gonna check out the farmhouse? Or are we gonna hightail it out of here, give our report?"
Shalelu nods, seriously responding, "Yes, I do 'ken', Flibble."
The group moves then, to search the farmhouse. Flibble is right, it is empty (of enemies), but it does contain what apparently are signs of a struggle. There is one corpse belonging to a farmer, and blood is spattered all over the walls and floor of the place.
Two of the guards that were involved in the fight amongst the cornfield have to be carried, and gasp every few breaths for air, even after potion-healing from Shalelu.
The body on the floor is mutilated, and even misses an arm, seemingly ripped off at the shoulder and it's gory and bloody. Piercing the man's chest is a knife, and pinned between the knife's hilt and the body is a note, addressed to Kyra.
It reads, spattered with blood, 'Take the fever into you, my love - it shall be but the first of my gifts to you.'
It, like the previous notes, is signed "Your Lordship".
There isn't anything else of interest in the farmhouse.
|
Flibble carefully takes the note and heads home again with the guards.
"Och, lads, we'll soon be home again and I'll see that Father Zanthus tends to ye're wounds. Ye've done a guid job, d'ye ken?. Lady Kyra will be pleased." He directs them to pick up one of the bodies of the creatures that attacked them for Father Zanthus to examine, and asks Shalelu to find out the names of the wounded guards, to make sure they receive extra pay.
Shalelu gladly takes the order and directs the men back towards Sandpoint (struggling and supported as they are) while Flibidnick takes off on Sovola towards the manor, to meet up with his allies.
He finds them setting up camp in the trees and on the ground at the foot of a rise that the Manor sits on top of.
Pick grunts at the winged form of the bird approaching, coming out from beneath the trees to watch Flibble's landing. His fingers sketch a greeting, of sorts.
Do not walk on my string.
|
|
Directing Sovola to land in the tree to roost, Flibble grins at Picks comment and his hands flicker in reply
Good to see you too, Holy Pick.
Edging towards Kyra, he adds,
"Och, lassie, got another of them messages for ye. Pinned to a dead farmers body." and produces the dagger and note for inspection.
Kyra nods a greeting to Flibble, reading the note carefully through twice before saying anything. When she speak, it begins with a grunt. "Nothing new here." She frowns, looking from the note to Flibble. "Be glad when we've put an end to this. Find anything useful?"
The party members have an uncomfortable night, sleeping in trees or (as the Gods intended, apparently) on the ground. Even with Flibble's bit of news, the night cannot be considered interesting. A few times, the person on watch catches movement in the trees just beyond their range of sight (for not even Pick's night-vision is as superior as it once was) but nothing ever comes of any of it.
The sea churning up against cliffs is audible all throughout the night, and sleepers are woken by the shrieking cry of hundreds of seagulls. The morning's light reveals other things, as well - nature itself is twisted and aggressive near the Manor - the closer you get, nettles and thorns are more prominent and trees have fewer leaves per branch. The wind bites through clothes with its cold, despite the warmth of the season.
Khalbar gets a creepy feeling from the place and unslings his axe, ready for action. Other than that, he doesn't know (or need to know) anything else about the Manor.
Pick squints hard into the night, cursing the year on the surface that has weakened his once-keen sight. Damn you, sunlight. Soon enough, the morning's light pierces the sky anyway...
Pick gnaws on some dessicated meat from his pack as everyone else stirs. Since Hammer and Big Man are here, he deigns to use speech.
"Pick hear... stories. In town. About place." He jerks his hooded head towards the old building. "Fox-glove elders live there... then. Bad. Fire. Death. One Fox-glove dead on rocks at water. One Fox-glove kill self. Little ones sent... away. Ald...ern come back, grown up."
Pick chews in silence a little longer. "Winged... thing there. Living in cave. Lights... screams... bad place."
With his strip of hard jerky chewed, the 'dwarf' gets to his feet, rolling his head side to side and testing that his pick is ready. He follows behind Khalbar, head twisting left to right as he goes, teeth bared at the prick of thorns and nettles.
Rhanloi nods at Pick's handful of words, and adds in some details. "Yes, Foxglove Manor here is known by the locals as "the Misgivings." They talk of strange lights in the windows and muffled sounds of screaming from above and below. Pick has heard the tales of the bat-winged devil living in the caves below. If I remember correctly, Cyralie Foxglove was found burnt and dashed upon the rocks below the cliffs behind the house, and Traver Foxglove was the one who apparently killed himself. The children, including young Aldern, were sent away to be raised in Korvosa by distant relations."
"Aldern Foxglove recently returned to live here, but I heard that he had a hell of a time hiring locals to aid him in reconstructing and repairing the place. Rogors Craesby used to care for the place before Aldern arrived, coming in 3 days a week from Sandpoint to check the place out and make any minor repairs. That's about all I remember." he finishes, looking up at the rough terrain. Following Pick and Khalbar, he concentrates on the surrounding area and the manor above, trying to sense any magic auras that may be in the vicinity.
"Bah, I've heard the same. Superstitious rubbish." Kyra actually hadn't known much of what Rhanloi said, but she wasn't about to admit that. "Still, stay alert. Seems likely that there'll be at least one mage inside."
"Bad Spirit place, bad spirit family. Need shaman to get the bad ju-ju out of this place." says Khalbar thoughtfully -- that's how the Shoanti would treat a haunted place.
"For now, axe will have to do."
The climb up to the Manor is easy enough, only taking a few minutes. It's eerily quiet (except for the crash of the sea on the shore two hundred feet below) on the approach. The Manor itself is quite large - three stories, painted a fading and chipping purple.
To the right is a burned-out outbuilding. It's impossible to tell how many stories it may once have had, for all that remains are sooty, scorched stones from its foundation.
When you pass by the outbuilding, you notice a few sickly-looking ravens perched amongst the scorched stones. They stare eerily at you as you pass.
There are two obvious entrances to the Manor - both double doors, though one is obviously the front door.
Both entrances, upon investigation, are locked.
Pick gives the black birds a dirty stare, and idly fingers his sling, but decides that would be a waste of his energy.
On finding both doors locked, he gives a little shrug and inquiring look towards Hammer, to see which one she wants him to attempt.
Pick approaches the door, fishes out his tools, and studies the frame and any marks around the door before proceeding to the lock itself.
"Should we knock? We are supposed to be upholding the law and all..." the mage asks the group in general.
Pick gives Rhanloi a long, wordless look before turning back to work on the door's lock.