The group was able to order food and drinks but at mid-day in a small work town there wasn't much in the way of entertainment. The tavern was extremely crowded and chaotic, with different tables held down by obvious crews of different boats. So it was extremely telling when the whole place quieted down as an extremely large man entered the taven, his shadow momentarily blocking the noonday sun spilling in the door.
He had to duck and hunch his shoulders to keep from hitting his head on the doorway, closer to 9 feet tall than 8, dressed in heavy hide armor complete with an enormous bear head for a hood. His face was brutish with a patchy, unhealthy looking beard growing over his jaw like a spreading fungus. There was a huge hammer on his back along with an overstuffed pack approximately the size of Basdemar.
The man stood just inside the open door and raised his voice to grunt into the sudden quiet. "I'm huntin' tha crew'a tha ship Tranquility. Cap'n Irig Maldos, couple'a low down 'an dirty thieves workin' wi' 'im. I know he's been in here a time'r two, so don' say ya ain't never seen 'em. I'm gonna ask nice'n friendly-like. Ta start."
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Levn leaned over and casually picked at his hand of cards. "Every time I just want a quiet drink," he complained under his breath. "That guy's a half-ogre, or I'm a goblin. Maybe we should find the back door," he whispered out the side of his mouth to his crew.
Kellen doesn't move his eyes from the hand of cards he's holding, Why do I feel like this is going to come in our direction in about thirty seconds flat... he mutters back to Levn. If we stand up now, he'll mark that we know something; just play casual for a minute. and with that he slaps his cards down face down in disgust, and grabs the couple coins left in front of him, making as to leave being done with the game...
Basdemar collects the cards making them vanish in thin air. He kmows ogres, this one is more than half of one. "Stay down. No one else is leaving."
Sir Alfric rubbed his chin, pretending to think of anteing another coin.
"Tranquility. Is that one of ours?" He muttered to the others.
The extremely large man stomped toward the bar, the haft of his enormous hammer nearly brushing the ceiling, ranting at the bartender but scanning the whole room as he closed in on the bar. "I know those cheats've been here! Tell me how long ago an' where they was headed!"
Alfric muttered; "He's not leaving..." and sighed.
He laid his cards down and stood up, his chair scraping back.
With heavy footsteps he walked up to the big guy.
"Ho, large one! What is your name?" Alfric asked aloud.
"Da*n. I prefer tribal warfare to this random violence." mutters Basdemar as he slips from his chair, trying to remain unnoticed, helped by Sir Alfric imperious appearance.
He will remain under the barstool, next to the brute's kneecaps, just in case.
add mods for flanking, surprise, denied dex etc...
add +2 if denied dex
The sound of Sir Alfric's chair scraping across the floor was extremely loud in the silence of the until-recently bustling tavern. Already nearly to the bar, the huge barbarian turned to look at the green knight. "Krizag. Why, you know me?"
Krizag glared at Basdemar as the kobold champion tried to stealthily slip out of his chair. "Where you goin', snack?"
Basdemar raises his hands "Just moving away from the flying bodies, snacker. Lets not come to that."
He smiles toothily.
Alfric smiled.
"Well met Krizag! You may call me the Green Knight.
"Now, looking around, do you see your friend Maldos?
"No? Well clearly if he's not here, he must be someplace else; perhaps another establishment? In my experience, you will have way more luck finding him away from here don't you think?" Said Alfric, trying to persuade the big guy.
Krizag grunted at Basdemar and turned back to Sir Alfric. "No, I know he's not here, I'm trying to find him." The huge... man shook his head, apparently confused by Alfric's suggestion. "I need to... look, I came in here because he's a river pirate! And this is where the riverfolk are."
"A river pirate can be reliably found on the water, not ashore. Usually. Look; while you are looking through taverns he's likely to just sail by on the river. THERE. There is where you'll find him. Right?" Continued Sir Alfric.
"What are you... No! He comes in here, I know they come in here!" The big brute waved a hand frustratedly at the rest of the tavern. "I know they're out on the river, but they have to stop sometimes." Krizag shook his head, knowing he was right but unable to counter Sir Alfric's relentless logic. "You're not making any sense!"
Kellen, following Sir Alrfic's line, sits for a moment, and then addresses the half-ogre. This Irig did you wrong, and we don't know where he is, but Sir Alfric's right, he's probably out running blockades even as we speak.
The huge half-ogre shook his head like he was trying to fend off an annoying fly, even slapping himself on the side of the head in an attempt to jar loose an appropriate response. "I KNOW!" Krizag stamped his foot hard enough to shake dust down from the rafters. Shaking his head and muttering to himself, the enormous angry barbarian turned and stomped back out of the tavern.
Alfric gazed after the half-ogre.
"Hm. I wonder what that privateer did to that half-ogre..." He mused aloud.
Then he went back to the table.
It took a few minutes but eventually the tavern was once again bustling and noisy. The younger waitress, possibly the bartender's daughter, brought the group their food and drinks, saying "Food and first round is on us. Thanks for getting that guy out of here without breaking anything."
The rest of the group's lunchbreak went uneventfully and by early afternoon the wagon caravan was ready for the days-long trek up into the Tors. The wagonneers were all tough looking men and unlike the bargemen, these men were all wearing at least light armor and carrying a weapon. They looked like they expected trouble on the road.
The Tors themselves are known to be populated by tribes of strix. The black-skinned, winged humanoids have a nasty reputation as cannibals but like the hill giants they usually leave large caravans alone.
Daymar couldn't be bothered to have done any digging into the interactions of peoples in this region - they were just passing through, after all. As annoying as the half-ogre had been, Daymar hadn't even looked up for more than a moment or two, before returning his attention to a book he'd been reading on suspending the laws of hydro- and thermo-dynamics via interweaving of conjuration and evocation magics.
Later, as they were preparing to leave, he did take some note of the gear the caravaneers were wearing, and nudged Levn.
"I would suggest we retire in the extradimentional pocket at night time for the remainder of the trip," he said, referring to the spell that Levn had come to know as "Daymar's rope trick," which allowed the team to hide safely in a magical pocket of space some distance off the ground, accessed by a floating length of rope. "It seems safety may be an issue."
If he was aware of the irony in his observation - the team having been hired to provide security to the caravan as it traveled, after all - Daymar's tone gave no sign of it.
Alfric turned his head to look at Daymar and turned his words over thoughtfully.
"Mm; no." He concluded.
He looked up at the terrain ahead.
"Up in the foothills, sometimes Hill Giants come raiding. Beyond, in the Tors the Strix lurk. Either way, the bigger the caravan, the more likely they are to avoid us." He said.
He glanced back at Daymar.
"Might be alright for the spellcasters though."
"Nah, we're here to protect them and their spells may make a difference in the initial confusion. Also, we are hired to protect them, not the hide."
Basdemar doesn't know these mountains, but there must be a reason everyone goes armed...and they ARE the guards. No hiding for them.
Levn had raised both his brows and his mug at Sir Alfric at his smooth handling of the half-ogre. "With charm like that, you should have convinced him to join the caravan and work for us," he joked.
On the matter of the rope trick, he shrugged. "We're not protecting them while we're asleep," he pointed out. "There are enough caravaneers that a handful like us probably won't make the difference. We can set a watch, and have the one on watch warn us so we can get into armor without being stabbed before coming out to wreak havoc."
Daymar blinked at the flat dismissal from Sir Alfric, though he appeared to take no real notice of the follow-up from Basdemar. Likely, he wasn't ignoring the kobold as much as he'd not fully processed Alfric's response yet.
Daymar was a creature of logic and intellect, mostly, despite being an Elf - descended from Fey and, as a race, largely prone to emotional connection to the natural world - and he had gotten caught up in trying to sort out the logic Alfric had used to so casually dismiss what was obviously an intelligent suggestion, and what had become standard operating procedure for the group prior to having been saddled with Alfric and Basdemar at the beginning of this particular enterprise. It had taken him several seconds to realize that the issue wasn't a matter of differing approaches to accomplishing the same goal, so much as having different goals all together - or so it appeared. After another moment's consideration, in which he mentally realigned what had seemed to be conflicting goals, he spoke again.
"It would be difficult to provide protection to the camp if we are murdered in our sleep," Daymar pointed out, "and as any reasonably competent attacker would make note of and target any obviously sleeping guards early on in their assault, ensuring that we make such targeting as difficult as possible is the logical tactical counter-move. Any potential attacker who would be dissuaded from such an attack by the visible presence of four more sleeping figures is unlikely to be either brave or competent enough to be a significant danger in such an attempt, nor intelligent enough to completely abandon the idea of making a less-direct attempt to steal something - or pick off sleeping guards. Which means that rather than decreasing the difficulty of the task at hand - namely, keeping the caravan safe - we would be adding additional dangers to have to secure against."
Daymar shrugged as he continued, "And obviously, anyone who would be competent enough to be a threat would be competent enough to have watched and counted the guards during the day, so would know how many of us there are in the first place, and take that into account. Which again brings me back to the concept of making it as difficult as possible for them to neutralize us in the first few moments of an attack."
It was just possible that Daymar continued to win at those games of Elvish chess for reasons other than simply being an Elf. Longer-term evaluation of strategy and tactics were inherent parts of the game, after all.
Kellen listens to the elf make his reasoning, and his other companions' opinions, I suppose there is some logic to what Daymar is saying... somewhat befuddled by the twisting logical arguments, I guess it would work, as long as we can get to the people quickly... he offers.
The giant bat thing perches on his pack, unblinking at the humanoid's discussion.
The first day up into the Tors was relatively easy and not unpleasant as the caravan wound its way up the Varnway toward the real mountains ahead. It was a bit warmer but the grey skies kept the sun from beating down on the wagoneers. The heavily laden wagons groaned under the weight of the lumber, but it was less than two days to Fort Varn and the caravan master kept assuring everyone they would make it.
In spite of everyone's general anxiety about hill giants, nothing attacked them before they made camp at an established wagon lay-by, though the sheer size of the Consortium caravan far outstripped the typical one and left most of the wagons camping out on the Varnway itself.
This group of hard-bitten wagon veterans kept their fires small and smalltalk to a minimum. There were no card games and no storytelling; the men made their supper, ate with scattered bits of quiet conversation, quickly cleaned up to allow for the shortest possible morning preparation, and turned in. Every wagon left a man on watch, rotating on the same schedule as the hired guards.
Kellen prowls the camp, checking with each wagon's watcher during his patrol. Ryllia drifted lazily from wagon to wagon, watching her companion's every move.
Grey skies, I'd rather it not rain on us while we're moving up these hills...
Regardless if he sees it or not, he'll RUN to the rope trick, clambering up it as quickly as he can. Popping his head into it, Ryllia sees fire to the north, moving our direction, get down here lads! and then popping back down to the ground, he'll start to rouse the closest wagoneers. Up! Might be nothing, but get the teams hitched to move!
Give me 2 more sets of Perception checks, please. 2 for Kellen and 2 for Ryllia.
Torches to the north lads, time to get up, maybe two? Something's funny though, so I'm not sure.
Kellen will await his companions calmly, casting a spell upon himself. Spirits of the ancients, grants me strength from the spirits!
Daymar sat up in his bedroll and blankets and blinked, blearily.
"Torches?" He frowned. "Did anyone check to the South?" He notably did not make any move towards the exit.
"Let's do the job we were hired for, guys," Levn sighed, poking Daymar in the arm. He was not noticeably more enthusiastic than Daymar, but he knew trouble was best dealt with quickly when it happened, and if it wasn't trouble, they could retire again securely.
"Day, if you need your beauty sleep, use some of your fancy magic to let me talk to you while I'm out, and I'll tell you if there's a problem. You can rest until then."
"If I were planning on raiding this caravan, I wouldn't announce my presence with torches... unless my force was considerably more sizeable than the caravan's. They probably know we can't outrun them. The question is, ARE they here to raid us? Kellen, what do the spirits say?" Levn, for all that he'd traveled extensively with Daymar and Kellen, had never bothered to get into the nitty gritty of their abilities. "You know it so I don't need to," had been his attitude.
Kellen shakes his head in the negative, Nay I don't rightly know, the shaman says, tapping himself with a wand, I haven't prayed to the spirits for spells to tell me more, mostly these days, it is about staying alive. Maybe Bas can get a closer look for us? Heck or I can fly over there and see what's coming.
Daymar gave Levn a look of longsuffering, then shook his head.
"The effort to cast such a spell and then remain awake to monitor for messages - and sort through the difference between your random thoughts and actual messages of value - would negate any extra rest I might get," he said, though without rancor.
"I'll be down in a moment." Even as he spoke, Daymar pulled one of the metal rods from his pack, graven with Elvish runes. He closed his eyed and moved his fingers on the rod in a well-practiced pattern, and summoned up his magic. A shimmer of light coalesced around him, before fading into invisibility.
Then he slung his bandoleer over his shoulder, grabbed his second rod, and began to make his way towards the rope that would lead to the ground outside.
Levn grinned at Daymar, unmoved by the elf's brusqueness, but it was Kellen he addressed. "I just feel you'd make too tempting a target, even if you stayed over sixty feet up," he said, adding, "but you're right, Bas is sneaky enough to get there unseen. You up for it, Bas? Hey... can you make him fly?"
Kellen nods, No I don't think that works that way. We've got a minute or so, coming from north and south - torches are being held real high...
When Levn gets down, Kellen will hold out his wand for the elf to cast its protective magic upon him, Thanks Daymar. and looking at Levn, he casts a spell upon him, May your ancestors guide you in battle, should it come to that.
Looking at Bas, he quickly makes a sign at the Kobold, sprinkling dirt in the general direction. Then he closes his eyes and spiritual energy extends from Kellen out to Levn and Alric.
Daymar gave Kellen an odd look, but tucked one of his rods into his bandoleer and accepted the wand. Then he activated the wand, causing it to create a similar effect to the one he'd created for himself earlier.
Basdemar sleeps in a wagon, away from the fires and the central gathering. His thinking is that any problems will come first to those most exposed and those are the wagons on the road.
He does however react to the subdued alarm of Kellen and he joins the group for the discussion.
"Sure, I can scout, but I'm not sure I'll make it on both sides. I'll go where the bigger group is. If there is time enough, I'll go for the smaller group and I'll report on the way through. See ya."
He disappears northward. Several minutes later he reappears, reports and ghosts toward the southern group.
Levn clapped Kellen's shoulder, then took cover behind anything available that gave him a decent view of whatever might be approaching.
...o_O;
Basdemar does a quick estimation of giants great strides and runs back full tilt. Still, his training keeps nagging at him to keep sheltered and he weaves a bit as he runs.
Not enough to really keep him hidden, but the instinct is there.
Like Kellen, Levn also realizes that the torches moving toward the caravan are much larger than normal and are being carried much higher than a human could hold them.
At Kellen's warning, the wagonneers roused themselves and started tugging on their armor. The men already on watch lit lanterns on the wagons and started lighting torches and throwing them out into the darkness to illuminate the area around the caravan.
Sir Alfric sleeps without armor, but dons it for his watch.
When warned, he dons it as quick as he can.
"Giants," Levn hissed. "Time to pull out the big wands, Day."
Avalanche whinnied and stamped his feet twice, shaking his head to the west and south as the horse endeavored to warn Sir Alfric about something.
"Look southwest..." Hissed Alfric as he hastily strapped his armor on with Levn's help. "Avalanche spotted something."
It only took Daymar a few seconds, standing at the top of the magically suspended rope, to put together the situation. He nodded, then grabbed a few more items from his haversack, which he left in the magical space as he slid down the rope.
Before Basdemar had headed out, the elf spoke words of power and touched the kobold, granting the scout magical force to his attacks. Then Daymar started strapping scroll cases to his belt.
He cast a spell that heightened his awareness of the situation around them, and put it to use, before giving himself the ability to fly, and then kneeling to examine the results of a handful of chicken bones he dropped to the ground.
Just as Basdemar returned, Daymar finished up his preparations by magically boosting everyone's metabolism - including Avalanche's - and increasing the power of his spell with the rod once more, so that the effects would last longer.
"I will lock down the giants from the North," he said, "so that you may deal with whatever is coming from the South and West."