The lock is no simple affair, but Snake's delicate picks penetrate to the heart of the mechanism and undo it like a pair of shoelaces.
As he hears a *click*, somewhere deep in the recess of his mind that familiar feeling returns once again. He pauses a moment to consider it before mentally storing it away... for now. "Got it." Snake replaces his tools and reacquires his weapon. He then steps aside to let Braddon go first. "I believe you're up, bub."
As Serpe backs away from the lock, Phil takes a few moments to admire the work performed. Sotto voce he adds to the man in question "Remind me to take you for the occasional nocturnal stroll through the better side of town... we could do some good work"
Tendal straightens his collar, then turns to Gristav.
"Friend Gristav, if you would be so kind to provide a prestidigitation before we advance, I would be thankful."
"One should endeavor to provide a level of sophistication when mayhem may be soon afoot. Further, a disheveled appearance reduces opportunities for subtlety and misdirection."
"Maybe I'll get to use these boots for kicking in some heads instead," Braddon mumbles.
With the barrier removed, he steps lightly through the door leading with his swords. He looks around, especially for stairs, and keeps moving, staying on the balls of his feet.
"Keep up," he whispers over his shoulder. "It's only a matter of time before you're heard or I'm seen."
As Serpe backs away from the lock, Phil takes a few moments to admire the work performed. Sotto voce he adds to the man in question "Remind me to take you for the occasional nocturnal stroll through the better side of town... we could do some good work"
Snake cuts his vision toward Phillip and the slightest visual of a wry grin forms before giving a nod that is equally as slight.
Tendal straightens his collar, then turns to Gristav.
"Friend Gristav, if you would be so kind to provide a prestidigitation before we advance, I would be thankful."
"One should endeavor to provide a level of sophistication when mayhem may be soon afoot. Further, a disheveled appearance reduces opportunities for subtlety and misdirection."
The tall man gives a roll of the eyes and a shake of the head - not to mention a quiet sigh - at the words of the well-dressed man. "I'm fairly certain they won't be interested in how 'clean' you are, bub, when they're trying to take your head off. Just thought I'd throw that out there."
Tendal straightens his collar, then turns to Gristav.
"Friend Gristav, if you would be so kind to provide a prestidigitation before we advance, I would be thankful."
"One should endeavor to provide a level of sophistication when mayhem may be soon afoot. Further, a disheveled appearance reduces opportunities for subtlety and misdirection."
Wordlessly, Gristav waves a whisking wyrd toward the wizard, willing unwelcome waycruft... went.
As Braddon pushes the door open and starts through, a blast of fire explodes from the doorframe, burning both him and Gristav behind him.
Immediately inside the door, three steps lead up into a 25-foot corridor with doors on either side. Straight ahead the corridor opens up into a wide living area; more short flights of steps can be seen as the level of the house steadily rises toward the south. At the extreme end of the house, a curved wall of windows frames a splendid view of the Varisian Gulf. Braddon is more interested in what lies between him and the windows, however: Bojasc and Lil Scarlet, both turning to stare back at him!
Braddon coughs and chokes and throws himself forwards through the blast. As he sees down the corridor, he shouts "There they are." and charges down the corridor.
Bojasc swiftly draws two axes.
Lil speaks and gestures, and the hallway between Braddon and the rest of the party fills with layers of strong, sticky spiderwebs.
Round 1:
Matters taking a further turn as fire and brimstone give way to revelation before matters are finally obscured by silk... Phillip can't help but smirk. To those taller nearby he opines "I've no way to see the web removed... might make for easier passage if it were..."
Braddon charges forwards feeling sticky strands of web pulling at him.
"That's not gonna help you when I shove this sword down your throat."
He pulls himself free of the sticky strands and advances towards them, stopping at the top of the stairs looking down at Bojasc.
"I can't believe you killed Larur. Worst bodyguard ever. Try someone who can fight, you drunken loser."
(* +2 hit and damage vs Humans)
Checking himself in a sprint after Braddon, stopped of a sudden by a wall of wyrded web, Gristav draws a long breath, says "Bring this to me.", to no one in particular, and drops his staff.
Raising and closing his fists before him, palms up, Gristav thought of the shadow in the creases of his hands, in the core of his grip, and how it grew as he started to open the clench.
The shadows grew, and spilled over the pools of his palms, between his opening fingers, cascading toward the floor, thickening, shaping, changing, chaining, chains from handles now held in his hands, all hard as iron, black as night, and at the end of the chains, heads like... aspergilae? Clepsydrae?
A flick of each wrist, and the shock shook down the chains, until at the odd head-parts, something worked within, and they flared to flames.
Gristav, as if he knew how, as if it was all he'd ever done, set to spinning the paired and burning weights, in spins and arcs that flared the fire, and fed the flames that ate swaths of the webs with every pass, and turn, and step...
Bojasc growls at the half-elf, but Lil speaks one word: "Wait."
Gristav conjures an exotic weapon.
Oh yeah. I can already tell this is going to be fun, Snake thinks quite sarcastically. He then brings forth magical armor to help protect himself. "Stay down, Luck, this isn't going to be pretty."
Lil smiles enticingly at Braddon. "Oh, I'm so pleased you've come. I've been waiting for you."
Braddon shakes his head.
"I don't think..."
"...don't... think..."
"He's been holding me prisoner here, and at last you've come to rescue me!" Lil goes on, pointing at Bojasc. "He killed the dwarf, you know, and Saul as well! You have to stop him!"
"What?" Bojasc stammers at Lil. "What are you...?"
"Ms. Scarlet, I am disappointed. I expected far better from you than acting like a diseased rat in its final throes, simply biting out at everyone around you. While a traitor and soon to be corpse, Bojasc does deserve better from you at least." Tendal called down the hallway, his dry, bored drawl easily weaving its way down the hall.
With slow inhalation of breath, Phil reaches into his core and hardens the edge of his words with Calistria's venom. Heavy comes his intonation as he pleads "Still your ardour and dull your blade a moment Braddon..." hoping that the threads of divine instruction imprint upon the half-elf as he continues "...Lil is discarding you Bojasc, as empty vessel. Think hard on who you should be raising your blade against..."
Braddon shakes his head again.
"Don't think... "
Braddon launches himself up the stair towards Bojask, lunging to the right at the last minute and twisting to bring his bastard sword down at Bojasc's shoulder.
Braddon's sword cuts deeply into the meat of Bojasc's shoulder.
Bojasc grunts in pain. "Bring it on, pretty boy," he growls. "I've been looking forward to this." He twirls his handaxe expertly before the two axes slash in from opposite angles, wounding the half-elf.
"Thank you, Mapache", Gristav says, observing the staff in the halfling's hand, "But I might be staying with these..."
Gristav swirled and arced the flaming constructs of force in streaking circles, carefully above Phillip as Gris stepped past, and not to, bit into the closest web...
Avoiding the worst of the binding threads, he knew the flames would get to him, but not just yet. Before the flames caught him, he reached into memory, and through it, to times past and far, and spirits, now present, still now, now here. And as the flames rose, and he struck out at the further webs, he danced a touch more dandy, struck a breath more surely.
Then the flames rose, but he knew comfort in watching them also spread further, closer to Braddon.
Gristav advance through the flaming webs until all that is left is a single diaphanous layer veiling the end of the hallway.
Shaking his head, "'Pretty boy'. Got to give the big fella credit on that one. That's a good one. Unfortunately, he's not going to be around long enough for me to give him grief about it if we don't help him," Snake says as he moves toward the ranger, drawing his weapon as he does.
Bolbo, either by luck or timing, avoided the swirling pots of fire to alight on Gristav's shoulder, the indetectably light weight somehow buoying the half-elf.
Guidance on Gristav.
The path to the Teifling swept clear at last, Gristav allowed himself the instant, appreciatively nodding, and saying, not so much to be heard, as simply felt, aloud, "You are lovely."
Snake moves down the cleared corridor, evading the last sticky wisp of web in his way as he draws his morningstar.
Gristav's butterfly lands on his shoulder, bringing Desna's blessing.
Snake narrows his eyes at Lil. What are you up to now, little lady? he thinks as he attempts to discern what type of magic they are about to have to deal with.
Tendal, finally seeing the way open moves as quickly as he can, passing by his allies and into the open space near the front of the house.
It appears that she is trapped. The only way out is through us! Which, judging by the spell, she might be in the process of doing.
"She is likely attempting a summon of some sort, if anyone can throw something at her, that would be preferred." Tendal said, attempting to take cover behind some furniture.
Concealed as Lil is behind the fighting duo of Braddon and Bojasc, her somatic motions are too hidden from both Snake and Tendal to be sure what spell she might be casting.
Tendal hurries down the corridor hoping to take cover before her spell resolves, but in his haste to locate a safe corner, he blunders into the last of the web and is momentarily stuck.
"I disagree, Magnimar", Gristav rejoins. "Review and recall, what we've learned of her methods. And make firm in your minds, all my fellows, the scent of the salvaged, whispering speach slabbed in Shoreleave. Let that scent override the perfume in the room."
Still bereft of a means to move through the web unheeded, Phil considers the situation grave enough to risk a less wise path. He attempts to slip past Gristav's twirling firepots...
Escape Artist (untrained):
... but meets the same fate as Tendal. Stuck fast he swears in a mixture of halfling and Varisi.