Putting one foot in front of the other:
knowledge history
Harlynne looks at Elinor, still the target of her disgruntled attitude, There are other things to learn from men besides the size of their members.
Tkurzhan continues to sniff at things and generally make a menace of himself in the rain, shaking his coat time to time.
Aidan continues his slow, methodical search of the site as the group approaches the small building.
"I'll show you some of the things I learned from men!"
Elinor's raises a fist to Harlynne before getting hold of herself. Her usual good humour is rusting like her armour in the deluge.
Oh, dear! They beat you too? Harlynne responds almost naively to Elinor's elevated ire.
Narnel will approach the structure by dismounting and stealthily moving forward in cover.
"Only if I accidentally stabbed the wrong person or dropped my shield."
Taedric closes to take a position near Bryndyn, for similar reasons.
Aidan comes to a stop and studies the face of the building. Tkurzhan sniffs at the air.
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There is no movement from within the building, though it is now apparent that the door is open. You hear nothing either, but then, how can anyone hear anything in this deluge?
Narnel will emerge from the shadows and waive the group forward before silently attempting to duck just inside the door to the mausoleum, staying in the shadows with bow drawn.
He peers into the gloom as his eyes adjust to the lack of light.
Narnel waits with his arrow drawn for the others to arrive.
narnel whispers to the newcomers.
We have distrurbed the resting place of something further inside. Some light would help.
He thought he recognized the voices. The half-orc immediately shielded his eyes. "Ugh, Abbas! I just woke up."
The towering person decided to sit down back on his makeshift bed of rusty armor. "At least you made it easy to find you." He stared back into the darkness blinking and squeezing his eyes shut in order to try to adjust his eyes to the light level. "What in tarnation are you doing out here anyhow that I'd have to chase you all this way?"
"You Monster! What are you doing here?!"
A soaking wet and suddenly a lot less grumpy Elinor clanks down the hallway and throws herself at Pluchak with a clang!
Elinor slammed into the tall half-orc with abandon and although he was blinded by Abbas' light, he was able to remain standing due to his comparative bulk. The noise of their clash assaulted the room, echoing off the walls. One arm absently wrapped around her back or was flung there through the impact and Pluchak took a step back and pivoted spinning about three-quarters of a circle. Throughout the maneuver, he found that he had gained a whiff of wet Ulfen hair which smelled far better to him than he expected. It was the most brutal assault to his senses yet.
He set her down quickly and brought the arm that inadvertently grabbed her behind his head as he blushed a little. He averted his gaze away from her, the light "I'm under attack by adventurers, that's what!" he gruffly spat."And they brought their worst! Smiles and hugs and bright summer sunshine! What's a monster to do?"
Narnel puts down his bow.
Well, I'll be...Pluchak, how did you come to be here?
Aidan smiles almost imperceptibly and waits for what he is sure to be a great tale unfold.
Taedric rides forward, his tone a strange mix of hope and wariness, "Is it really him?"
Harlynn steps behind the meaty warrior types and peers into the darkness, her eyes glossing over to black.
"Ya, it's really me Taedric. I must have missed your campsite. You can't see anything in this weather. Our expedition to go get reinforcements was met with a goblin ambush. We were too injured to keep going. I came back to town and Levi sent me off this way to catch up with you guys."
He motioned to the tomb that he was currently in. The half-orc was still a bit uncomfortable from all the positive attention. It had only been a couple days. "I just found this place with the door broken in and I came in to get dry. All I did was bring some of this old armor to sleep on as it's got more give than the stone does."
Taedric smiles at Abbas' quick acceptance, I'd say it was because he has so simple a view of the world, and yet I can't help but think he sees more than I do...
He pats his friend in the back and says, "Welcome back, Pluchak. You've been missed."
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Once you realize that it is a friend not a foe that you are facing the shelter is very welcome. The building is dry and set into the ground so what you see above ground is only a small part of it. It is old, no doubt, but despite its age there are scarcely any drips of water inside.
There appears to be an upper area, and a lower area. The lower is where Pluchak slept. Scattered here are the long dead remains of humans, it appears. From the wreckage it seems they might have been buried in armor? And the bodies were interred on shelves, carved from the earth and stone and without any covering.
Who or what disturbed their rest, and why is not immediately apparent.
"Remind me again why we came here in the first place? Pretty sure it wasn't to find monstrous half dragon lairing amongst the bones of the long dead."
She grins happily at Pluchak.
"Sorry about being Little Miss Grumpy out there. My underthings are soaking wet, and not in a good way."
If there doesn't seem to be any immediate risk, Elinor will do what she can to get dry. Does prestidigitation allow you to dry things as well as clean/dirty them? A few glowing light globes in warm friendly colours
Maybe we came for the magic shield?
Taedric chuckles at Elinor's joke, resisting the urge to expand upon it, and smilinginnocently when she glares.
He says, quite cheerily and with almost a perfectly straight face, "This is, apparently, one of the places of power -- like Levi's stones, the Herbalist's stones, and Haughin's Ear itself.. And it's related to what's going on -- though I couldn't quite get the man to tell us how." He shrugs, "To be fair, I'm not sure that he knows himself.... or ever knew, for that matter."
We are simply investigating, Eli, based upon the information we have at our disposal.
Despite his crankiness from being awoken from his slumber, Pluchak was still glad to see his friends. It had only been a couple days but it seemed longer than that. Since they had been brought together so much had happened in his life that it could fill books while whatever happened before that felt like it would barely fill a page.
He warmly clapped Abbas on the back. "I suppose it is good here since you're here too."
The half-orc also patted Taedric on the helmet as it was the easiest place to reach, even when he was on top of Trumps. "It's hard to miss me when I'm so big. You'd have to aim to miss me, and I'm glad you did. Pluchak said this while giving Trumps a pat as well. It was like he was trying to be a bit clever, but was still confused by what it was that he was saying and finished the whole statement off with a smile that looked as warm as it did fearsome.
Half-dragon? Now it seems she was flirting with him. But then she lost interest. Had she already hit on all the other guys while she was gone? Women were confusing enough, Eli was moreso.
He put that away and turned to Harlynn. He was kind of glad they got past the hellos. That was exhausting. "Yah, I didn't like that one, it was too hard to sleep on. Anyone can have it as far as I'm concerned. I never got the hang of shields."
"If we're here to investigate we should take a bit of a look around. I didn't make this mess, although I could have. Something else has been here recently. Something not terribly interested in magical shields."
Narnel, pats Pluchak on the back as he heads deeper into the tomb, staying to the shadows with his bow drawn.
Welcome back, friend. Let's have a look.
Now I'm here, does it jog any memories about thinks I might have heard in passing?
Bardic Knowledge, history/geography
Bardic Knowledge, local
Also, not having heard, or caring very much, that curiosity killed the cat... perception
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Despite a careful search by numerous parties, this place seems to be nothing more than what it seemed at the very start. A tomb for a dozen or so humans. Your search does turn up one clue that in retrospect should not surprise... There are troll footprints here, and that gate has been broken recently. There is not even the slightest hint of rust on the broken steel. The strength to do such a thing would be incredible.
"Well, let's wait here till the rain stops and then have a proper neb. In the mean time, did you say something about a magic shield young un?"
Would a troll be strong enough to bend steel like that? Or is there something stronger out there?
Was I able to identify the shield with the spellcraft check of 24?