Mi'Dre slipped back out into the hall, and to the left side of the doorway, putting it between him and the stairs, then simply waited until he saw the others reach the bottom of the stairs, before slipping inside and sneaking up behind the guard in good health.
Grumblejack's eyebrow rises as Gurthrock comes into being before he coalesces his feelings into a throaty laugh "Hur hur, that good trick" turning the bottle upside down and seeing it is finished he stands "Time to move on little'uns?"
"Let's proceed with the stealthier of us at the front so the guards have less time to prepare," Albrecht knows he is no master of stealth and offers to let Shendalyn or Albina go first.
Black Jack follows whoever decide to go first, if no one does it he will take he lead.
Where to?...
"Down the stairs," Albrecht says, drawing his longsword and charging a ray of frost.
The group above moves down the stairs with Grumblejack following at the tail of the procession. As you reach the bottom you go through another door into the Southern end of a large hallway running North to South. There are doors on the East and West side and you spy Mi'Dre holding station next to the open door on the East wall.
Within the room a snatch of talk followed by an exclamation "..feck it we should... Wait, what's that?" as the guards react to your coming...
Shendalyn and Fleshmince:
Albina:
Albrecht:
Mi'Dre:
Grumblejack:
Guards:
Action Tracker (Surprise Round): Shendalyn and Fleshmincer, Guards, Jack, Grumblejack, Mi'Dre, Albrecht, Albina
Theatrically Shendalyn moves infront of the door brandishing his pilfered blade and calling to the guards within.
"Behold your doom! Go forth my devil horde! Rend them lib from limb."
Despondent the little pit fiend brushes past the others and gives a rude gesture back at the undoubted sniggering.
Mi'Dre hung his head as his fellow escapees blundered down the stairs. He hadn't thought they'd be very quiet, but he'd thought they could at least try. He held back a sigh, right up until Shendalyn stepped into plain view of the door.
If the summoner wanted to make himself the bait however, then Mi'Dre was happy to oblige. He shoots Shendalyn a warning glance at the implication that he was part of the man's 'devil horde', but otherwise just limbers himself up, readying to leap onto the guard when he comes through the door.
Shendalyn and his minion step forward as you hear more sounds from the room. Footsteps and a warding word "Stay here I'll take a look-see" breaching the doorway and peering stairwards... eyes opening wide as he does.
Mi'Dre lunges at the guard, but despite his distracted attention is unable to get a firm hold.
Action Tracker (Surprise Round): Shendalyn and Fleshmincer, Guards, Jack, Grumblejack, Mi'Dre, Albrecht, Albina
Since combat is imminent Jack runs in to attack the guard.
Albrecht discharges his ray of frost at the guard.
As his companions move forward, Albrecht releases an ill aimed ray of cold that strikes the floor near the guard's feet.
Grumblejack lumbers through the doorway and the guard's face pales further as he sees him.
Round 1: Shendalyn and Fleshmincer, Guards, Jack, Grumblejack, Mi'Dre, Albrecht, Albina
Stepping forward to flank with the "lesser" devil Furthock half heartedly disembowels the guard.
Claw 1
Claw 2
Damage 1
Damage 2
With a wicked smile Shendalyn steps forward brandishing his new found sword before attempting to cut down the guard where he stands.
Gurthock tracks a deep gouge into the guard's leg, but his second claw is turned by it's armor. Shendalyn's sword strike is turned aside by the man's desperately raised shield.
He draws his own blade and lashes out at the miniature pit fiend...
Longsword: Crit Conf: for
...scoring a solid and almost deadly strike.
The injured guard rises in place and draws his weapons, hissing to the girl "Get away, lock yourself in the kitchen." and she does so, attempting to scramble over the table as she flees...
Acrobatics:
...and making a clean getaway to the Southern room slamming the door behind her.
Round 1: Shendalyn and Fleshmincer, Guards, Jack, Grumblejack, Mi'Dre, Albrecht, Albina
Albrecht moves into the hallway and fires another ray of frost at the hapless guard.
Jack steps foward and strikes at the injured guard trying to finish him off for good.
As the guard goes down Mi'Dre jumps over his body and into the room, disappointed that the woman has escaped-for now anyway. Seeing the injured guard on his feet the Devil moves towards the fellow, hopping up onto the seat beside him, and smiling at him menancingly.
Black Jack's strike is accurate and bites deeply into the man's neck. He goes down blubbering as Albrecht sidles into the chamber and releases a numbing ray at the injured man. His breathing grows heavy and shield arm drops down as he tries to defend against Mi'Dre's advance before collapsing himself.
You hear whimpers and fragments of two voices, one female and one male behind the Southern door.
As the fight is swiftly resolved Mi'Dre holds his hand up to the others as his ears twitch. He glances at the northern door, and moves towards it, opening it as quietly as possible to peer inside.
Moving to the northern door Mi'Dre finds that it opens into a barracks. There are a series of cots strewn about as well as a number of footlockers that seem locked. Most of the cots are empty, bar one which houses a heavy set man who is snoring horribly loudly and has an empty bottle of whiskey lying near the bed.
Mi'Dre slips inside the barracks room, creeping up to the sole occupant and giving him a look over.
Unless there is something particularly interesting about the fellow however, Mi'Dre slowly reaches down and rakes his claws across the man's throat in one swift move.
He then quickly tosses the room for anything that looks worthwhile, trying the keys he's collected in the footlockers, or else resorting to lockpicks as required.
Grieves moves to the kitchen door to check if the girl lock it from the inside.
If its locked he will whisper it to his companions:
We can use the tables to barricade from this side and just leave her locked there.It may be faster...
Mi'Dre finds nothing remarkable about the man... he seems to be sleeping off a significant drinking binge. His throat is soft and yielding and his last breath is a wet choke. The devil then sets about seeing if he can elicit the contents of the footlockers.
Black Jack does indeed find the kitchen door barred from within and it does not open to his hand.
Shendalyn nods in agreement as he sheathes his sword and helps jack start moving furniture in the way of the door. Turning to a despondent and wounded Gurthock he barks. "You there! Check down the hall and report back to me!"
Muttering under its breath the tiny pitfiend leaves the room and sneaks down the hall keeping an eye and an ear out for trouble. He despised this master. Both for hsi weakness and for the weakness inflicted on him. Oh how he longed to feel the crunching of their bones adn the bursting of their organs between scythelike claws.
And that would be the least of the torments he had planned...
Stealth
Perception
Gurthock reviews the hall and reports back no activity that he could detect. The sole exit from the hall to the outside remains closed and there are no guards present. It does hear a faint sound of dogs barking outside.
Mi'Dre finds that the footlockers are barred against easy investigation, and the keys on Blackerly's ring do not open any of the them. You'd wager that these are personal effects for the guards.
Slinking over to where the fat one bleeds out you lift his keyring and open the locker at the foot of his cot.
You'd also guess that the other guards might carry keys to their own lockers were you to gather them.
Mi'Dre scans a few of the books, before tossing them onto the floor in disgust, stomping on one and muttering to himself in infernal about humans and their perversions. He emerges from the room shortly thereafter, glancing at the work the others are doing, before moving out to start collecting keys off the defeated guards, as it would likely be swifter than trying to pick each one.
Mi'Dre's diligence eventually pays off - yielding:
Mi'Dre examines his haul, and spends a moment looking around for something to stash the stuff in, eventually settling for a blanket if nothing else presents itself. The tobacco gets a sniff before getting put into the blanket with the pipe, as does the cookies; the whiskey soon joins them after the Devil takes a swig, leaving him to consider the potion, which he eventually decides to attach to his belt, tearing a strip off the blanket to tie it in place. The holy symbol-which he glares at for several moments before picking it up-goes into the pouch with Blackerly's coins, while the Devil takes the time to relieve himself on the holy b&+++es' book, before carrying his bundle out to the others. He drops it onto one of the tables along with the traveler's outfit, and then without bothering to explain, heads back out into the hallway.
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"The double doors in the hallway seem like they might be our best bet to find a wall that faces outward, that we might be able to create a portal in using the window patch of the silken veil." Albina says in a low tone, so as not to carry behind the closed door, to those who have locked themselves away. "Should we head that way next, unless someone has already got an idea which route is closest to getting us out of here?"
As she mentions the veil, she draws it from her hair and pulls forth the patch that appears to be a holy symbol of Asmodeus. She has no particular need for it, but it's presence comforts her.
Gurthock also cracked open the double doors at hallway's end to find that they led outside and into the grounds of the prison. He can spy a fountain and a little further away what looks to be the gatehouse that sits on the island side of the stone bridge that grants access to Branderscar. The dogs that he heard are in a cage to the North and East of the door, and despite their barks do not look in a position to threaten.
As gurthock reports his findings Shendalyn waves for it to be silent again.
"Hmmm, a gatehouse after an open courtyard. The dogs may prove a problem if released. Perhaps our sneaky devils can make that more difficult before the more rambunctious of our group run across and take the gatehouse?"
Mi'Dre pauses in the doorway as Albina speaks, leaning back through to offer his opinion. "That is the only way out of here Milady that I have been able to find." the devil advises her, and without knowing the orientation of the prison, they would have no idea which other wall might be external. He lingers longer enough to hear Gurthock's report of the outside, snearing at Shendalyn's suggestion as he returns to the office and bedroom across the hall, searching through both rooms, and giving the storeroom another quick once over for anything useful.
Mi'Dre checks back over the bypassed areas and reports back the following:
Armory: lots of weapons as listed here
Office: there are many papers cluttering on top of one another atop the desk. You flip through them quickly but find nothing of interest.
Bedroom: under the bed you find a heavy lockbox, and in the wardrobe is a canteen filled with whiskey that has a heady aroma of herbs.
Storeroom: 200 torches, ten lanterns, two 10 gallon kegs of lantern oil, six spare guard uniforms, dozen signal horns, twenty 50’ lengths of rope and two barrels labeled ‘emergency rations’.
|
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"Everyone but Grumblejack and Mi'Dre should get into a guard's uniform." Albina says, while taking her own advice and pulling on a tunic, breeches and the most comfortable pair of boots she can find.
She then fill two lanterns from one of the kegs of lantern oil, and takes one for herself and leaves a second for someone else to carry. A 50 ft. coil of rope goes over one shoulder, next.
She then checks the barrels labeled 'emergency rations,' for something to eat (or something more interesting...).
As Mi'Dre takes a proper look at the storeroom he can't help but smile a little as he realises what's in the sizeable kegs. That could certainly be some fun for later... When he finds the lockbox under the bed however he settles down to work, trying the various sets of keys he's accumulated, before resorting to picking the lock if necessary, taking his time to crack it open before they go anywhere else.
Opening the barrels of rations, Albina is greeted by a seething mass of maggoty old iron rations that has gotten wet, moldered and not been replaced. If you weren't picky you could probably salvage something... but you'd have to be desperate indeed.
Mi'Dre finds no traps and discerns a likely key from Blackerly's keyring. Opening the box he is pleasantly surprised to find a case of a dozen bottles of rotgut whiskey and a spread of golden coins in a variety of hempen pouches and small sacks.
Grumblejack has until now contented himself by eating the little food that the guards had on offer in the mess. Having finished he lumbers into the hall "What now? We leaving?"
"If we go, we leave the Warden alive. He can marshal the remaining guards and hound us quite quickly. It might make sense to at least assassinate him so that the remaining guards are left to stand around with no leadership," Albrecht says thoughtfully.