As the two women return to the top floor and enter the Warden's chambers once again the group of Forsaken begin to toss around ideas of how to make their escape past the gate.
As everyone talks the Doctor strips the decased body of the Warden of all his possesions and walks over to Hecate and dumps them into her arms..... little Hecate just kind of smiles akwardly as her arms are filled with the items.
Hecate quickly sums up the items. She puts the dagger in her belt next to her own. She grabs what components would be useful from the spell pouch and adds it to her own before discarding the rest. The ring and Ioun Torch she sticks in her sack for the moment. The three scrolls she holds in her hands, these would need to be deciphered.
Hecate cringes slightly as the warden's still-warm blood is splashed on her hands, but she tries not to show it. "Th-thank you." She regards the ring silently for a moment, lost in thought. "I would have had one like that, in a few more weeks. If they'd, um, let me graduate, I mean. Oh well." She gives a small sigh.
She regards the scrolls with interest. "Let's see what we have here."
|
Tkaara shakes her head at Felrin's desire to burn the place.
I think we should make for the walls to eliminate the guards up there with bows. As I said before, a fire will likely be seen for leagues. This will cause an investigation and then trackers much earlier than simply eliminating the guards and fleeing.
While the others debated their fate Hecate set to work trying to make out the three scrolls, the first one she could not identify but from the symbols upon it she gave her best guess at it being some spell from the school of enchantment. If only all of us wizards would use the same symbols and markings for our spells then this would be much easier. she thought to herself.
The second scroll she knew right away was a Scroll of Hideous Laughter. The big smiley face in the script gave it away so easily.
The third scroll she didn't recognize either, a evocation spell if she had to guess. The Warden's hand writing did not flow well and some of the symbols she had never seen used in scroll work before.
If only she had prepared read magic as a cantrip before getting captured she thought.
Prison Map from Blackerly's Office
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Current Location: Branderscar Prison: Warden’s Private Chambers, Date: Oathday, Erastus 25th,(Summer) 4714 Time: 3:58 am (Day:One)
As Hecate studies the scrolls she's found, Felrin moves to a window on the side of the tower that faces away from the prison. He looks downward as much as the window allows, in order to gauge how much room there is at the base of the wall. If we could get down there, and there's enough room to walk, the guards would be very unlikely to spot us or hear us.
With this bit of reconnaissance complete, he walks up to the door they have not opened. He gives it a listen, then attempts to open it.
"Oh! - Um, sure." Hecate thrusts the two indecipherable scrolls into Tkaara's hands. She feels a need to explain herself, even though no one has actually said anything. "I normally prepare Read Magic as a matter of course, but the night Sir Balin - the night I was arrested - I was studying for a theory exam, and that spell isn't allowed."
She scrutinises the lawyer carefully, as Tkaara casts the spell. "Full of surprises, aren't you?"
Felrin looks over the room for a window but like elsewhere in the tower he has seen none to look out of. He then leaves the Warden's bedroom and makes his way over to the door across the hall. After giving it a listen and hearing nothing he then tries to open it. The door opens without any resistance.
This is the Warden’s office. Tastefully adorned in hard wood, the office is dominated by a massive oak desk. There is a small arrow slit type window overlooking the courtyard. Some owl feathers lay on the edge of the window seal.
Seeing that someone has left the room, Grumblejack lumbers behind Felrin.
Meanwhile Tkaara comes over to assist Hecate with the scrolls. As she cast read magic it takes her only a couple of minutes to determine that the remaining two scrolls are Magic Missile and Sleep.
Prison Map from Blackerly's Office
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Current Location: Branderscar Prison: Warden’s Private Chambers, Date: Oathday, Erastus 25th,(Summer) 4714 Time: 4:00 am (Day:One)
"Not that I would want to interrupt you, ladies and gentlemen," Erevan quips, his voice soft and his tone friendly as always, if only slightly colored by a hint of impatience, "but I should think time is of the essence? Perhaps we should take our leave of this place sooner rather than later, yes?"
Felrin rifles quickly through the warden's desk and the rest of the office, taking a peek out the window as well to see if he can spot any guards or other movement.
Moving back into the bedroom, Felrin catches Erevan's question and Tkaara's response. "Some of us seem to think lighting a fire adds to the risk we face," he offers, "so it seems we're sneaking. I say we get out on the wall to the west of the tower and try to make our way around to the gatehouse, so we're at least closer to the exit. Once we're on the wall, I'd like to take a look over the edge and see what's at the base of it outside. If there's a path, or even enough space to walk, I say we tie a rope off there and get outside the wall."
He studies the prison map a moment, then says, "It seems like there should be room for us to go around the outside and get out of here. That doesn't kill all the guards, but the odds are we'll miss someone if we're trying to clear the whole prison. And if we're over the wall, at least we're outside this damned place."
Felrin glances out the tower window slit. The two guard patrols on the walls can be seen by their lanterns making their rounds.
Felrin then quickly rumages through the Warden's Desk....
Inside the Warden’s desk is a neatly folded map of the surrounding area. The map shows the quickest route through the moors. It also shows Old Moor Road – the place where the group was suppose to meet the woman that had come to the prison.
The desk has one locked drawer that looks to be secured with an average lock. Felrin takes a moment but makes quick work of the lock.
Inside he finds a book.....
This beautiful book is made of fine cerulean leather embossed with gold leaf. Its edges are reinforced with brass fittings and strange arcane symbols adorn its cover. It bears a draconic rune of “R” in the center of its front cover.
Prison Map from Blackerly's Office
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Current Location: Branderscar Prison: Warden’s Private Chambers, Date: Oathday, Erastus 25th,(Summer) 4714 Time: 4:01 am (Day:One)
Etna tries to hide her disappointment at a plan that doesn't involve wiping the Penny Dreadfuls off the face of Golarion. "Yes, maybe avoiding to draw attention will work. Nonetheless, I still stand by my point that trying to wipe off the entire prison would result in the death of more than one of us. I, too, would love to show Talingrade what happens when you put incompetent buffoons at the head of a prison, but that will have to wait."
Moving into the other room, the Ifrit scoffs at the sight of the cerulean book "Well, that looks like an expensive binding for a book that probably contains contents that would be of interest only to a boy in his puberty.". First detecting magic to make sure that the book wasn't magically trapped, Etna proceeds to give a quick glance at it's contents.
[Spoiler=Mechanics]/Spoiler]
Once he's voiced his thoughts, Felrin holds out the gold-embossed tome in his long-fingered hand and says, "By the way, I found this. I imagine you'll want to see it, Hecate."
"Omigods, yes! Here!"
Hecate doesn't quite squeal in delight, but her voice is somewhat higher than her normal tone. Pointing at the books, she gestures, and it flies towards her as Felrin releases it. Showing off, she knows, but sometimes you have to.
Hugging the book closely to her, she giggles slightly as she hears Etna mischaracterise yet another book. "You haven't really got the hang of this whole book judging by its cover thing, have you, Dear Flame?" The tone is affectionate, if slightly on the patronising side.
On hearing Erevan remind them of their plight, she nods crisply. "Our golden-eyed Mystery Man is correct. We need to be away from here before the shift changes, or all the remaining guards will be after us. Do you have a plan?" This last is addressed to Felrin and Erevan, on the basis that they likely know the most about jailbreaks.
"Not that I am overly fond, but our large companion has proven quite useful; keep in mind that any plan involving climbing out windows, and most involving stealth, will probably necessitate leaving him behind to whatever fate he can wrest from the situation."
Hecate flips through the spellbook. It contains:
Blank Pages 63
SPELLS
2nd – bull’s strength, flaming sphere, hideous laughter, invisibility
1st – alarm, charm person, expeditious retreat, feather fall, mage
armor, magic missile, mount, shield, sleep
0th – all CORE cantrips
Prison Map from Blackerly's Office
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Current Location: Branderscar Prison: Warden’s Private Chambers, Date: Oathday, Erastus 25th,(Summer) 4714 Time: 4:02 am (Day:One)
"Grumblejack vote, we smash all the guards. Dead men don't talk or blow loud wistle thngies."
Hecate listens as various plans are proposed, discussed, amended, rejected. Finally, once it appears that some sort of consensus has been reached, she walks down the stairs to the main entrance of the warden's tower. Looking out carefully, she watches the two guard patrols on the wall - the lucky ones, who are entirely unaware of their good fortune: they will be allowed to live, this night... provided their paths do not cross the Forsaken.
She shakes her head, to dismiss such distracting thoughts. Once the guards have passed, Hecate does her best to calculate when they will be out of sight of the garden. It's difficult; the pain from the branding on her arm is competing with the more recent wound from the warden's magic. Concentration is hard to come by.
Finally, she speaks: "Now, Herr Doktor, if you want to look at the vegetable patch, you should be out of sight of the guards for a few minutes. Meet us back here once you're done and we'll move to the tower as a group."
Just inside the door to the warden's tower, Felrin raises an odd, bony hand to forestall the doctor, saying quietly, "Visiting the garden in the quiet of an evening sounds lovely, but it makes it that much more likely we'll be spotted. And separating the group seems to add to the risk even more, if we all aim to get out of here alive."
With a tip of his head to the west, he continues, "If we're going that way to get out of here, it doesn't make sense to go back the other way to go pick some flowers or whatever you've got in mind. You might find something to put the dogs down, but we're hoping to avoid the dogs anyway - and you might just find a guard taking a quiet piss instead. I say we skip the garden."
Grumblejack follows the others down the stairs, you can tell the giant is ready to leave this place. He looks extremely bored and irritated at this point.
Hecate glares indignantly at Felrin as he changes the plan on the fly: she improvisation. "Did anyone ask you to think? In case you hadn't noticed, we're fugitives: any resources we can get here, any at all, may save our bu - save us later on." She blushes as she hastily corrects herself; she really hasn't got the hang of swearing...
Breathing deeply, she calms herself. "Go on, Herr Doktor. While the guards aren't watching."
|
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Her clothes now covered with her own blood, Tkaara listens to the others debate. When Hecate speaks up, she nods in agreement. When Felrin voices his opposition, she sighs:
The Doctor should inspect the garden, but better make it fast. We do not know how long until someone decides to go into the keep to speak with Blackerly's corpse.
She does not doing anything else at the moment, worried about all the unknowns that are before them at this point.
The Doctor's eyebrow raises in amused admiration at Hecate's flash of temper. "Do not worry yourselves. I shall not be long. He takes a flask and unstoppers it, immediately downing the contents. Within moments the angular man's features blur and his whole form becomes indistinct as he takes on the coloration of the objects behind him. Quickly, quietly, he stalks off into the night.
Erevan raises an eyebrow and smiles at Hecate's outburst. "Perhaps you should start with a word such as 'posterior'," he offers with a soft chuckle of amusement, "before moving on to more... robust profanities. STill, I have always considered sarcasm a much more interesting alternative to swearing myself." And then he winks before settling in to wait for the good Doctor to return.
Hecate runs her fingers through her hair (a nervous habit) and scrutinises Erevan carefully; but he gives nothing away and she can't determine whether he's laughing at her, or with her. Most unsatisfactory, she decides. Best to say nothing in return.
Instead, she bites her lip and waits for Ottakar to return from his botanical survey.
The good doctor's blurred and blended form slips out from the Warden's tower into the darkness toward the garden and he is gone.
This is a small vegetable and herb garden. There are many days’ provisions here if one takes time to harvest them.
Also of note – there is a belladonna shrub separated from the rest of the garden. Sometimes called deadly nightshade, these poisonous leaves sap the strength of those who consume it. Refining the poison into useable doses is no more difficult than making tea. There is certainly everything required in the nearby kitchens.
There are currently enough leaves to produce three doses of the poison worth 100 gp a dose. The shrub has obviously been pruned back recently.
Prison Map from Blackerly's Office
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Current Location: Branderscar Prison: Warden’s Private Chambers, Date: Oathday, Erastus 25th,(Summer) 4714 Time: 4:07 am (Day:One)
"Found anything, Doctor?" the Ifrit asks Ottakar. Even if she wouldn't ever admit it, she was nervous about their escape. Even with complete, blind faith in her abilities (and with a moderate trust of her new-found associates' abilities), Etna still can't shake off the fear that something in the plan may go awry.
One would think a man who maintains such an elaborate laboratory would have more interesting herbs than simple belladonna on hand, the Doctor thinks to himself. Still, waste not, want not, his internal monologue continues as he quickly and efficiently harvests the remaining leaves and berries, deciding it not worth the time to dig up the roots, even if they are the most toxic part of the plant.
On his return, he responds to Etna's question with a decidedly malevolent grin. "I did indeed. Deadly Nightshade, it is called by the layman; a few of these leaves or berries can kill a grown man if ingested. Give me a few minutes and some hot water and I can distill an anesthetic, or a vicious toxin that will induce hallucinations, convulsions, and, ultimately, death, among a few other less deleterious effects."
"Now then," he continues as he stuffs carefully wraps his find in a spare shirt, stuffs it in the sack, and retrieves his quarterstaff, "I believe we have an appointment in the moors."
Relieved that the doctor has returned without giving away their presence, Felrin listens to the man's description of the plant, impressed at the man's knowledge and that he's found such a useful thing. "I wonder why it was in the kitchen garden," Felrin wonders aloud. "These Mitrans are not so holy as they claim, any of 'em, damn 'em to hell."
He nods in response to Ottakar's mention of their appointment and says, "Let's go." Leading the way, Felrin moves quietly across the grass to the first tower west of the warden's residence, eyes and ears alert for guards, a spare wagon, or anything else of note in the night.
With the good doctor's return Felrin makes for the tower to the west.
Making it to the tower and finding the door unlocked he slips inside and looks around.
The tower is three stories tall with a stout but aged door at the base. No lock has been installed on this old portal. A spiral staircase leads up to a rickety wooden landing that accesses
the battlements atop the walls and further up to the crenellated and roofed stone turret. A trap door leads down to what where once store rooms but are now empty chambers left to the rats.
Felrin's best guess is that these towers are seldom, if ever used. Also he now notices that the two latern lights that signify the two roving patrols up on the tower walls has now only become one light. Which means one of the patrols has either turned off its lantern or has left the top of the walls.
Where did the other patrol go?
Prison Map from Blackerly's Office
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Current Location: Branderscar Prison: Warden’s Private Chambers, Date: Oathday, Erastus 25th,(Summer) 4714 Time: 4:08 am (Day:One)
Hecate watches as Felrin disappears into the night. The plan is sound, it gets them onto the walls and means they only encounter the bare minimum of guards. She knows this. But it does rely on a certain amount of stealth - or, in her case, plain luck.
Hecate is not a believer in luck. Planning, forethought and intelligence; these are her tools. Improvisation means that you didn't plan with sufficient rigour. Still. She didn't plan to end up in prison, so a certain amount of improvisation has to be acknowledged.
She's stalling. Time to move on.
Taking a deep breath, she steps out of the warden's tower towards the other tower, trying to follow where Felrin trod.
Moving quickly and silently, Erevan barely makes a sound as he follows closely behind Felrin and Hecate. But while the tiefling is almost as quiet in his movements as he is, the young mage appears to be anything but. Shaking his head, he smiles a crooked little smile; if they manage to survive and escape, perhaps he should show her a trick or two on how to make a little less noise when the situation calls for such a thing. And perhaps, just perhaps, she might have something to offer in return. Wizards are notoriously privy to knowledge and secrets other more mundane folk are not, after all.
Shaking his head, he chases away such thoughts and ideas, at least for now. Better to focus on the task at hand.
Hecate trips in route to the other tower and crashes to the ground with a loud thud in the darkness. Erevan following her quickly scoops her up and continues into the other tower with Felrin.
Unfortunately a roving set of guards on the opposite wall must have heard the commotion as you see them begin to run toward your position. They will be on the wall by the west tower in less than a minute. Lantern is waving brightly in your direction.
They have not blown their horn yet so they must not have seen anything, just investigating the noise one would think.
Prison Map from Blackerly's Office
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Current Location: Branderscar Prison: Warden’s Private Chambers, Date: Oathday, Erastus 25th,(Summer) 4714 Time: 4:08 am (Day:One)
Sighing inaudibly to himself, Ottakar stoops down to pull Hecate to her feet. "Hurry, fraulein, to the tower, now!" He then waves at Etna, Tkaara, and Grumblejack, indicating that they, too, should cross the intervening distance as quickly as possible before the guards arrive.
Unconsciously, Etna swallows. She knows that she was about as fit as Hecate, and that it isn't out of the question that she could make the same mistake.
No. I will not ruin our only chance at freedom. I will get out of here. I will have my revenge.
Repeating these phrases in her mind, Etna steps out of the door. For a moment, she only shivers as her foot touches the grass of the courtyard.
Then, the Ifrit sprints off, running toward the tower, her hearth beating like a drum in her chest.
Once the rest of his party has made it to the tower, stealthily or not, the Doctor sighs and pulls out another vial. He downs it in a single swallow and waits. Moments later, as he mentally wills his form to stop blending in with his surroundings, he begins instead to shift and change. Where he stood only moments before, there now slouches a perfect copy of the first guard killed by their band (Timothy, he vaguely recalled one of the other guards called the man). Immediately the apparent guard begins stumbling about drunkenly, waiting for the lanterns atop the wall to approach...
Felrin cringes as his fellow escapees make a racket as they approach the tower, knowing it's too much to hope for to go unobserved at this point. He braces himself for the inevitable fight, flexing his long, claw-like fingers. He looks on in surprise as the doctor brings up the rear, noting the changes in the man's walk and bearing. Clever fellow, the doctor. That just might work.
Face flaming crimson with embarrassment, Hecate watches as Ottakar performs his alchemical transformation. She has no talent for the subject at all, beyond the basic first principles; the instructor at the Academy - Professor Hraknolth, one of the few dwarves there - was strict about clumsiness and threw her out of the class for breaking an orichalcum vial. She winces at the memory.
It was that failure that spurred her on to master the Dwarven language and write him an effusive apology; they subsequently even became friends, after a fashion, as much as the teacher-student distance would allow. It was one of Professor Hraknolth's (forged) signatures that got her some of the books she needed, she recalls now.
Shaking her head, she dismisses the memory, focussing on the present. Readying her spell components, she prepares to cast as necessary to support her companions.
During all the comotion Grumblejack goes running by everyone to the tower, heavy footfalls the only sign the ogre leaves behind him. Once he makes it in the western tower with the others Grumblejack just grins big "See Grumblejack quiet as mouse."
Everyone except the doctor makes it inside just as the beam of light from the guards lantern hits the good doctor. The guards on the wall have a quick exchange with what they think is the drunken Timothy.
The disguise seems to be working perfectly and with the supposed drunken state the sound of the doctors voice is convincing as well.
The guards now directly over the west tower make one final look over the grounds and the doctor....
Prison Map from Blackerly's Office
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Current Location: Branderscar Prison: Western Guard Tower, Date: Oathday, Erastus 25th,(Summer) 4714 Time: 4:10 am (Day:One)
After running into the tower, Etna slumps to the wall, catching her breath.
That was...a little unsettling.
For a minute or so, while the disguised doctor easily fools the guards, she stays still, trying to be as quiet as possible: her hair, that had taken a cinder-ish tinge during the run trough the courtyard, slowly turn back to their original color.