It has been three days since you left Elidir, climbing into the back of one of Bort Bargith’s wagons bound for the faraway Andoran capital of Almas. The smiling caravan master cut your travel cost to only a handful of coppers, so long as you promised to protect the wagons should any trouble arise. Fortunately, your journey through the hinterlands of Isger has been quiet, even if the ride itself has been far from comfortable.
As you broke camp this morning, Bort (an almost perpetually cheerful dwarf) announced you should arrive at the town of Etran’s Folly by nightfall, and he promised a comfortable bed for the night as a reward for a long day’s travel. The caravan’s teamsters shared a chuckle between them, trading knowing glances and subtle nods, but soon enough you are on the road again, the wagon bouncing and creaking along the uneven trail.
Dar grumbles as the wagon bounces - yet again - over a huge rock in the road. He reaches down to massage his sore backside. He looks over at the road-hand that's driving the rig.
"I think you've lost your touch. I've been counting and you've missed at least three rocks in the last hour," he says with a sarcastic smile.
He stands to his feet on the unsprung seat of the wagon and looks around for the umpteenth time for any other signs of civilization.
The young woman with reddish-blonde hair briefly takes her eye off of what passes for the road to give Dar a withering look, to go with the eye-roll and her almost perpetual chewing. What she's chewing is qat, a resin-gum based delicacy from Katapesh, laced with cardamom and cinnamon; it's not a narcotic as such, but Fliss picked up the habit a while back and hasn't kicked it yet.
"Puh-lease, daddio. You think it's so easy, you give it a try." She makes no move whatsoever to hand over the reins, although she takes one hand off them for a moment to readjust her hat, which always threatens to slip too far down over her brow.
Shaumatiel laughs airily at Dar's discomfort. The curvaceous elf lounges on the wagon's bench, her dark hair pooling about her slender shoulders. She idly caresses the handle of the whip coiled at her waist, and her leather corset creaks as she shifts position.
"Really, darling, you are far too tense. Just relax and enjoy the ride. We will arrive soon enough."
"Oh, the scenery's nice, m'lady, I'll give you that," Dar says with a smile at the cleric. "I'm just complaining about the accommodations. This isn't my preferred method of travel."
The man sits back down and attempts to adjust his position to something more comfortable. As he does so, the wagon hits another rock. "There's no need to make a point, Love," he says to Fliss.
"Well, perhaps you'd like me to sit on your lap for the remainder of the journey? I daresay that would make the constant jolts and jostles more enjoyable for both of us," Shaumatiel says with a teasing gleam in her deep purple eyes.
Giuseffe's mood is the complete opposite of Bort's. No, the road and its endless hurdles do not inspire positivity within this one. It is an unadulterated slog. A complete waste of time. Unlike a drink, where the journey trumps the destination - at least with Giuseffe's drinking habits, travel could do without the bit where you move from your current location to your destination. Though truth be told, Giu, this should inspire you to put a little more effort into the next girl you sleep with. Ha, yes, very punny. Sure, the performance that got her to notice you might be full of vigor and life, and so too the hours you spent drinking with her, but really man, you need to keep it up - oh, stop! - and drag those expectations over the finish line next time.
He violently shakes his head from left to right in an effort to snap out of the rather confrontational inner monologue. A pair of bored eyes squint at the world around him, stopping and then blinking when they come to rest on his fellow travelers. What had they been talking about? Oh, sitting on each other's laps. Why am I not more actively involved in all of this? Woe is me.
"That's akin to licking a spilled drink off a rough wooden surface, I'd say. Why waste what's good on what's designed to be bad? T'is a hole, my dear, you can't fill." The noble scion's voice croaks like you imagine a worn-out door hinge would: someone is in need of a drink to grease up that throat of his! Before anyone can finish that thought, Giuseffe is already seeing to it as he uncorks a small bottle of Sargavan rum.
Sharing is caring, but caring is one thing Giuseffe isn't too good at.
The elven cleric quirks an eyebrow at the surly bard. "Darling, I have always been quite adept at filling holes," she purrs.
"Oh, more enjoyable, no doubt," Dar acknowledges with a laugh and a wink. "But even with my, shall I brag, remarkable stamina, the distraction wouldn't last the entire journey." He turns a quick eye back to Fliss. "And I don't think this lovely lady has finished her assault on my kidneys."
He returns his attention to the priestess. "Not that I would be opposed to the idea, you understand." He gives her another wink and then with a laugh returns his gaze to the road ahead.
"Nuh-uh!" Fliss shakes her head rapidly several times, taking her eyes off the road long enough to fix her companions with a stern glance, and to hit another rock, probably unintentionaly. "Don't wanna hear it. We all share this wagon, so keep it in your pants til we get to our destinations and we all go our separate ways, mkay?" She gives the two elves a scathing glance: "Plus you're, like, way old to be horny teenagers."
Having said her piece, she returns to keeping an eye on the road.
Shaumatiel scoffs. "My dear, sex is like fine wine. It only gets better with age. I'll take experience over misguided enthusiasm any day."
"Oh, never count out the pleasure of someone with misguided enthusiasm," Dar counters with a grin as he looks Fliss up and down while she directs the wagon.
"Although, I don't think we'll be engaging in any sexual gymnastics on this road." His trademark smirk of a grin grows in size. "At least not while you're driving."
He turns back to the priestess. "That doesn't mean that the Lady here can't regale us with a poem or two? And if they just happened to be a bit risqué, that would just be the nature of her faith." He winks at Shaumatiel.
The cleric inclines her head before proceeding to recite a few Elven limericks that would make a priest of any other faith blush.
Once the elf is done reciting the abject string of words posing as something 'amusing', Giu takes one final sip of rum and then puts away his most prized possession. "Thank you, Shau, for making me feel like a truly talented artist. Now, how much longer do our behinds have to suffer for the fact we opted to leave whatever sad collection of towns and hovels we happen to hail from?"
By now the elf knows that the Chelish dilettante doesn't mean half of what he says. Especially so when it is something positive about himself.
Fliss rolls her eyes as the lady recites a series of limericks before shaking her head at Giuseffe, trying to convey her sad disgust for old people. "Are you, like, deaf or something maybe? Bort said this morning we'd be at Etran's Folly by sundown."
"What? Are you like, twelve?" Dar says with a laugh as he looks sideways at Fliss. "You keep calling us old. I'm only twenty six."
He turns back and winks at Shaumatiel again. "I'll have to remember that one. 'There once was a gnome named Pril ..." he begins, repeating the lines of the limrick to himself to memorize them. Or, perhaps, just to annoy his young companion.
Giu dismisses Fliss's comments with a flimsy hand gesture. It's almost as if he can't be bothered with it all. "My being has troubles embracing the progress of time when it is suffering and there's no bar nearby. It's like, I get stuck in a loop, and the only way to make time move forward is to talk nonsense. Now, I'd kill the time with reading, but I'm afraid the words and stories would bounce about in my head and end up all over the place."
He then turns his back to his companions and takes out his notebook. It's not that the conversation inspired him. It's that he's simply done with it for now.
Fliss gives Dar a pitying look. "Oh honey, that's so sad - everyone knows that once you're the other side of 25 that's it." She shakes her head. "All downhill from there."
She gives the gloomy one an eye-roll. "You are like such a gloomster! Maybe focus on something positive, like how much money we're saving on this trip? Travel from Elidir from Almas would cost a lot more than Bort charged us."
Her eyes light up. "Ka-ching! Bargain."
“One hour to Plaguestone!” The call comes from the front of the wagon train, interrupting your scintillating conversations.
No sooner does the call fade than it is overshadowed by a series of long, mournful howls emanating from the woods to either side of the caravan. Moments later, you hear cries of panic as a pack of mangy wolves descends from the forest with teeth bared!
You barely have time to scramble down off the wagon and draw your weapons/shields/whatever before they are upon you.
Shaumatiel's lip curls in distaste as the wolves approach. She caresses her holy symbol as she casts a spell, then strokes the hilt of Dar's sword suggestively. The weapon begins to throb with power. "Go get 'em, tiger," she purrs.
Before the others can react, the wolves are upon you, the mud flying up from behind their feet as they spring forward. The stink of wet, mangy fur assails your nostrils as the wolves attack you with a crazed hunger. Giuseffe is particularly badly bitten, as the wolf's jaws sink into his thigh. Dar receives minor injuries while Fliss is noticeably hurt.
D 18/20
F 13/20
G 5/17, Sickened 1
S
"Finally something to do other than sit on my arse," Dar says with a laugh as the creatures approach. He speaks an arcane word and the tattoo on his right arm shimmers with arcane energy. An instant later and the energy takes the form of a disk of eldritch energy hovering near his arm.
He then slashes into the creature in front of him.
"And such a tight arse, it is!" Shaumatiel says appreciatively, eyes darting to the fighter's backside.
Seeing Giuseffe badly hurt, the elf prays again. The bard feels warm hands massaging his wounds, the magic making them melt away. She then whispers words of guidance in Fliss's ear.
"Anything for the ladies," Dar calls back over his shoulder.
"Eww, eww, eww! Also, ewwwwwwwwww." Fliss looks disgusted as the flea-ridden things tear up her tunic (also her flesh).
She strikes at the wolf which attacked Giuseffe, using her divine power to shield him from some of the harm.
She then flails her sword at the wolf threatening her ("Get away from me!"), before raising her shield to guard against further harm.
Giuseffe groans as the wolf's cruel intentions sink in. Burning agony sets his world on fire and he feels forced to retreat. He stumbles back and rubs his wound whilst reciting a line from a long-dead poet's reflection on the waning nature of life. Surely his companions don't want to die like this, with Giuseffe quoting (rightfully so) long-forgotten poetry?!
Dar's sword strikes a mighty blow, cleaving flesh and sinew as he decapitates his foe; the wolf falls, its blood staining the churned mud
with red. Fliss' divine intervention lessens the seriousness of Giuseffe's wounds, which close almost instantly as Shaumatiel heals him. Her retributive strike badly hurts the wolf attacking Giuseffe, but her strikes against the wolf facing her are ineffective.
No sooner has one wolf fallen than another appears on the scene; this one however is larger, its coat not so much mangy as almost burned. Green saliva drools from its mouth, hissing as it lands on the withered grass. It throws back its head and howls as it lopes into the fray, a soul-piercing sound that cuts through to the bit of the cortex labelled "primal terror." Only Shaumatiel is unaffected.
The remaining wolves continue to attack, but only Dar is bitten this time.
D 11/20, Frightened 1
F 13/20, Frightened 1
G 17/17, Frightened 1
S
Red - dead
Green - 6
The bard ends the five seconds of poetry by sneaking in a line of the elf's naughty limerick from earlier that day. Hopefully, that will bring to life a spark of hope within the hearts of his companions, but just in case, Giuseffe incants an occult prayer of protection to shield a companion against the big bad wolf's attacks.
As his shield vanishes, Dar doesn't even seem to notice. His attention is drawn to the large creature.
"Hello, Beastie," he says with a grin as he slashes down at it as he grabs at the thing's ear.
Calling on her otherworldly nature, Shaumatiel fires an icy ray from her outstretched hand. She follows up with a crack of her whip!
"Nuh-uh! Fliss strikes at the wolf attacking Dar.
She then swipes at it twice more, for good measure, before raising her shield protectively.
Dar's spell blocks the worst of the bite, and Fliss' protective ward takes care of the rest. The half-elf's sword gets in one good hit on the acid-drooling beast, but the other two attacks bounce off its scarred hide. Shaumatiel's frost-ray and whip both strike, although the whip doesn't do much.
Fliss puts down the wolf that bit Dar, before turning her attention to the primary danger. Her sword-strokes are lethal, and the wolf is dead even before the echoes of its primordial howl have died away.
D 18/20
F 13/20
G 17/17
S
Red - dead
Green - dead
Acid-wolf dead
Shaumatiel nods with satisfaction and coils her whip. "Nicely done. Was that an acid wolf? Never seen one of those before. It seemed... unnatural."
The elf sees some of her companions are wounded, so she removes some scented oils and herbs from her healer's kit. "Please, allow me to administer to your injuries."
She starts with Dar, rubbing a poultice into his bite wounds and massaging the sore muscles to alleviate the pain.
She then sees to Fliss, attempting to gently probe the teamster's wounds through the rents in her tunic. Unfortunately, she ends up being a bit too rough, and only makes things works.
"Oh, dear! Terribly sorry, darling. Let me kiss it and make it better." Shaumatiel touches her holy symbol and prays briefly before pressing her lips to Fliss's cheek. Warmth suffused the champion, and her injuries magically seal.
While Shaumatiel tends to the wounds of their companions, Giu takes a closer look at the nature of the oversized wolf. He prods its corpse with the pointy end of his rapier to make sure it is truly dead before squatting down next to it. "A creature molded in the likeness of Rovagug himself. How worrisome ..."
"Hey, I didn't get a kiss," Dar protests with a smirk. "What makes her so special - other than the obvious." He keeps his sword ready, however, and his eyes continue to search the surrounding area for new threats.
"Why, Dar, obviously I was trying to make you jealous. It seems to have worked." Shaumatiel laughs and trails her fingers over Dar's arm. "Do not worry, my dear. Once we are safely at the town, I shall give you your kiss, and perhaps a few other things. If you are a good boy, of course..."
"OWWWWW!!!!!" Fliss jumps almost two feet in the air after Shaumatiel's failed attempt at healing her. "Are you, like retarded or something? Crazy elf lady, keep your hands to yourself. I got this!"
Pulling out her silver symbol of Abadar, she gives the elf's wooden symbol a disdainful hair-flip and eye-roll. She doesn't say anything, she doesn't need to.
Shaumatiel crosses her arms and pouts, but lets Fliss tend to her own injuries.
Dar winks at the cleric. "What do I get if I'm a bad boy?" he asks. Not waiting for an answer, he moves to check the rest of the caravan to ensure everyone else did as well as they did.
"Why, a spanking, of course!" the elf promises.
Giu's lips purse together even more than they normally do when the priestess and Dar exchange words. All of it reminds him of his first crush: a cute young blonde Andoran who had invited him into her dorm room. A mistake, so it seems, for inviting him into her sanctity had led Giu straight to her trove of holy texts. Amongst those books was one that so blew his mind, he probably can never fully let it go. "That, or a recital of the best works from Bernabor Bloomp's Blossoms of Love. It boggles the mind how the Church of Shelyn hasn't sanctified Bloomp's work yet."
He then scrapes his throat and stares off into the distance as he recites an extraordinarily remarkable passage from Blossoms of Love. "She pushed on my hips, an order that thrust me in. I answered and entered her. Not only my blossoming love, but the whole of me entered her, into her innards, into her darkness, eyes wide open, seeing nothing. My whole body had gone inside her, her heartbeat, now mine."
A dramatic pause follows. "And for what it's worth, I've studied the occult to such a degree that knitting back together traumatized flesh through magic and rite is something I can do. Yes, yes, I am more than a repository of song and poetry."
The wagon-leader, Bort, a cheery dwarf who braids his short beard with gold rings, swiftly descends towards you from the front of the wagon. "Ha! All good, and so it should be. By the beard of the Forge-father, that was a brisk little skirmish, was it not! And praise be that we're all safe."
His second-in-command, an unsmiling half-orc by the name of Tamli, keeps her gaze focused on the wagons and checking that the cargo is still secure. She utters a short curse as she reaches the last cart. "Boss! Problem!"
She isn't wrong: the wolves spooked the horses, and while most of the wagons were kept under control, the rearmost wagon was pulled off the road. Bort's smile fades slightly as he sees all four of the wheels slowly sinking into the mud, but he regathers himself swiftly. "This is nothing! Why, I can tell you of one trip where..."
Ignoring him, Tamli throws herself into a struggle against the wagon and the mud, the veins sticking out on her neck and biceps. She glares at you all, the bark in her voice betraying the strain she is under: "Well come on then! Earn your keep!"
Shaumatiel struggles to help push the wagon. "This is not the type of physical exertion I am accustomed to!"
"I think I've already done that," Dar mutters under his breath, but he takes a position next to the wagon and sets his back to it. Unfortunately, his feet begin sinking immediately into the mud.
Fliss squelches into the mud, wincing as she tries not to think about what it's doing to her calfskin boots; although she gives a little moan of protest as her feet sink further into the muck the harder she tries to lift the wagon.
"Ewww..."