=====================================
Round 6
Leoven moves to take care of Damien Wounds and call the eagles to help him.
Sam switches to his crossbow and runs out of the mist looking for a target.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Vhillish eyes the surrendering rogue with hard eyes and keeps his arbalest trained on the villain;
"Surrender is it? On your knees then cur! Hands on head if you will... lest I plug you to encourage compliance..."
The Deputy's moustaches wrinkle in resignation;
"Aye - you shall have your trial Mistress... Though not in the corrupt heart of Crimmor... where your puppet nobleman holds sway whot! No... you'll face trail - fair and frank elsewhere..."
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Jerrid staggers away, dripping blood and barely holding his sickle against his badly bruised face. He listens to the rogue's plea for clemency and a fair trial and all he can think about is slavery and what it cost him.
So Jerrid goes into zombie mode and shambles about, carefully searching bodies for loot and hopefully signs of fading life.
EDITED
Damien's eyes shoot daggers at the rogue but he straightens from a fighting stance, shortsword still at the ready. Moving forward, he divests Vorgya of her weapons as efficiently as his injured side will allow, "Leo, see if you can stabilize any of the others? Janna, check on their prisoner. Poor bastard."
Turning his attention back to Vorgya he looks her hard in the eye and growls, "On your knees.". Without waiting for a response, he drives his boot hard into the back of her knee to encourage compliance. Satisfied, he retrieves the rope from his gear and sets to tying the prisoner up.
seeing that that all fallen enemies are dead, Leoven release positive energy to heal his companions and the little prisioner.
Sam hands Vhillish a ring. "This will help you climb better! I have noticed you are short on magic baubles."
Sam tries to get the pony under control. He always wanted a pony, and he thought about naming it Bill the Pony.
Janna is rather relieved that the battle has ended and we all made it through.
Janna gathers the items that were obtained and spends some time identifying the magic items.
With Vorgya well secured, Damien sighs and heads over to the prisoner. Kneeling, he starts to pull the hood off of their head, "Right, you're fine now. How'd you get yourself mixed up with these pricks?"
"unnnnnhhhhhhh"
Astor looks all doped up on blue lotus blossom. The arcane mark of the golden palms is emblazoned on his forehead.
Damien blinks in surprise as Astor's mug comes into view, "Well I'll be. Looks like the poor bastard fared no better against these slavers than you Jerrid."
"He's pretty doped up. Lets sling him on the donkey for the trip to Fairhill."
Jerrid stops his search and jumps over to help with Astor. His face is screwed up at the man's plight, "Astor, we got you, we have you now. You're safe."
Leaving Jerrid to see to Astor, Damien heads back to check on the captured mage Jarra and ensure she is similarly secured to Vorgya.
"They picked me up on the road before I got to Fairhill. I was going to warn of the stirges... Think they recognized me somehow, they knew I ran... from the infirmary in Crimmor... They gave me medicine... Made me march..."
Astor's speech is slurry, his eyes darting in every direction.
Damien shakes his head, "Recognized you? Did you get that mark on your forehead before or after running into this lot?"
"Mark...?" Astor touches his forehead and looks at his fingertips to see if anything rubbed off. He looks confused.
Damien rolls his eyes, "Aye, looks like a mage brand. Bastards must have marked you in Crimmor. You do anything about it Leo? Janna? Well, let's just hope it's not permanent."
"We should get moving.", he jerks his head in Vorgya's direction, "I'm already sick of babysitting that one."
"Should try to round up those horses... "
"If they are branded too, those horses could cause us problems. Its evidence that we killed these slavers. They already have been in Fairhill and set that Lauriel against Lannet."
Jerrid lets the man rest and finishes his body searches. Then he speaks out loud over the corpse of the mage, "Janna, I gave you my word, I'll help you get to Eralion and his staff. But after that I have a date with Wistus of Crimmor. The obsidian citadel is no place for man or beast, I know what its like and he has to be stopped. Dead." The last is spoken emphatically in cold tones.
Leaving Astor with the others, Damien sees to lashing Vorgya sideways over the mule for the trip to Fairhill. Squatting down next to the group's new beast of burden, he looks the slaver in the eye, "You certainly have...had a tight crew. Makes me a little wistful for my pre-civilian days, I must admit. Coordination like that requires time. You lot must have been selling people like bushels of wheat for some time, no? Working hard to distinguish yourselves from Wistus' other agents? Or is he small time enough to only employ one group of proper operatives?"
Damien gives her a severely unimpressed look, "Right. All the more reason to avoid strong first impressions, no?", he raises an eyebrow, "You seem to lack faith in Fairhill's justice system. Do you really think a blowhard like Shandril is just going to let a bottom feeder like you go? Let me guess, diplomatic immunity?"
Damien frowns, "We'll see."
Pushing himself to his feet, Damien double checks that both Vorgya and the mule are secured before moving off to join the others out of earshot from the captured slaver.
Sucking his teeth, the half-elf looks around at the others, a hard look in his eye, "We have to kill the assassin."
Frowning he meets Kevezyat's gaze, "I know it's not your style but life is hardly ever kind to shiny principles. Look, that woman is part of something bigger than us or your ideals. She let herself be captured because she's banking on us honoring her surrender. There is no fear of punishment in her. She is completely confident that her allies can spare her any justice in Fairhill and based on what we've seen so far, I'm inclined to believe they can."
His gaze drifts back to the figure of the assassin tied to the pony, "We take her in and she will make sure we're these slaver's public enemy number one and she'll be leading the charge to take our heads. We have other concerns at the moment and beyond that, we can kiss any hope we had of taking them down later, goodbye if we start out at the top of their hit list."
"Once again, you are wrong Damien. You cannot ask for and take a surrender and just kill the one who surrendered. Freya will curse this expedition for that. And Freya holds people to the 'shiny' principles you honor so lightly."
Sam points to Leo: "Leo asked for surrender up until the end. I gave a window for surrender, which in my opinion had expired."
Sam indicates Kev: "The paladin here seems to be legitimate authority of Freya. If she is willing to judge and execute the prisoner herself, then that is completely different. Her word can be law here and I see enough wrong to condemm her LAWFULLY."
"But in no way do I condone just killing helpless prisoners because it is convenient to do so."
We have to bring her to justice, that is the right thing to do
Jerrid butts in to all this holier than thou rubbish. "There is a better reason for taking Vorgya back to Fairhill, better than pretty words and honour that leaves you in a ditch. Whoever frees this one will have to break cover to save their agent, whoever that is in Unfairhill that person and their cowardly acts must be found. I say we act the honest john, we watch and see what happens with Vhillish and our paladin deep in the legal side and Sam and I sneaking about we should be able to flush this evil slaver ring out and deal it a more serious blow. Trust me, I would love to slit that gizzard but this one is tool."
Damien shakes his head, "I've seen a lot of people hold to a lot of gods. They end up just as dead as everyone else. Our friend over there wouldn't hesitate for a second with our lives in the balance."
Frowning, he looks at Jerrid, "Aye, someone will have to come for her, but when? The wheels of justice are slow moving, she could sit in a cell for days. We have other concerns for the time being. And who's to say we few have the resources to strike your more serious blow? What we find could easily be beyond any of us. Taking her in exposes us as well, if we can't deal with whoever or whatever comes for her immediately, we've just painted a giant target on all our backs."
"I want to see these pricks taken down too, but I intend to outlive their downfall. We already have the lead we need in Wistus. He's smalltime sure, but we'll gain the same information when we see who comes to clean up after we've dealt with him. Difference is, it'll be on our terms and we can be prepared."
He meets Kev's eyes, "So how about it? You want to clear your conscience and judge her here and now, be my guest. But the sun shouldn't set with her drawing breath."
Janna was busy learning what she could of the magic markings and couldn't help but over hear the discussion.
there have been enough distractions and side tracks on this venture than she cared for. keeping this group together and focused was becoming more difficult by the day. It would only be a matter of time before vortigern and his cronies would re-surface, that was something she was hoping to avoid.
finally as the dispute began to grow, Janna gets up, We take her to fairhill, she stands trial. also we question her under Shandril's watchful eye, I am sure I can convince Shandril to ensure things are done right.
Janna indicates the possibility of using Shandril's magic to get the information needed, but does her best to keep that information from the prisoner.
Janna's tone is less of a request but more of final decision.
Damien eyes the sorceress for a long moment before sighing frustratedly, "Then we'd best get moving."
Astor nods, saying nothing. He looks at his friend Jerrid in amazement.
He really is clever isn't he?
Damien simply leans on his hammer and gives an expectant look to the others.
As usual Jerrid is at the back, but this time he does not run or hide. He moves next to Damien and grins in his own inimitable fashion at Lauriel and Baran.
"I am the deep gnome and I bear an arcane mark but I'm no slaver. My wrists and back prove that. This one is a one eyed snake with a lie at every twist and the Golden Palms are the slavers from what he just said. I'll take Shandril's test and then when you know I do not lie then I'll love to listen to this canary sing a different tune. Ha!"
Maybe Jerrid was prepared too but there is that undercurrent of darkness to his attempt at humour.
Kevezyat was about to bring forth her own opinion on the fate of the devious slaver, but Janna's forthright leadership made her words moot.
Upon arriving back in Fairhill, she stands stoic beside the bound assassin as she spews her falsehoods.
"Jerrid speaks true. Crimmor is a town oppressed by the very slavers this one purports to hunt. She twists the truth to her own ends, seeking to sow confusion and doubt, a common tactic of the evil-minded. But have no doubt, she and her companions are the slavers."
Vhillish allows the others the open the parley then judiciously enters his own report to Lauriel;
"Well met fair Mistress. As detailed we did indeed encounter corruption within Crimmor, and were able to gain the release of one of my missing companions, the erstwhile deep-gnome Master Kinslarn, whose described treatment at the hands of these slavers I fully corroborate whot!"
The sergeant-depute wrinkles his moustaches before continuing:
"Upon withdrawing from the town we soon encountered a group of armed men and women of various ilk, who harboured a hooded prisoner. Despite initial attempts at diplomacy on our behalf, the cited presence of our reclaimed companion was cause enough for them to engage!"
Vhillish shoots a hard look at Vorgya before standing a little taller to proudly recount the resulting comba-blow-by-bow:
... at which point the last of the black-hearted bounders were felled! Save our prisoner Mistress Vorgya here - who surrendered and demanded upon me clemency and fair trail. We then discovered the identity of the hooded prisoner as none other than our other missing companion - good Master Astor; drugged and bludgeoned into a state of passivity! By Jingo! Hardly the work of alleged agents of righteous virtue whot-ho!?"
The diminutive veteran then offers a steely footnote:
"However despite her villainy I have given her my word that just Fairhill shall provide her true judgement and worthy punishment... and this has been respected fully by my companions who have good cause to see her dancing the gallows jig whot! I also pray that despite her scurrilous assertions that Fairhill's justice shall prove no obstacle to her freedom that you will see fit to hold, try and punish this villain!"
Janna simply crosses her arms across her chest. I have nothing more that I can add, except that I request the priestess Shandril, be summoned to oversee any proceedings. until the full truth is revealed I think it best that this one be locked up. indicating Vorgya.
Janna will then produce the prism stone that was the object of their quest. I believe this is the stone you were seeking?