Reya surged her mastiff forward, screaming a battle cry...
...gutting the beast as she passed under. Meanwhile Fisk disappeared behind a wall...
...only to reappear some 15 ft down the way, leveling his deadly crossbow.
...unfortunately a sudden wind tossed the quarrel of course, sending it tumbling off the hill down into the forest below.
Round 2:
Reya, Fisk(cover), Simon(hex), Mal(hidden), Donal(cover), Grim <--UP
Wyvern
Mal dismounts behind the ruins and loads his crossbow. When ready, he pops up and shoots the wyvern.
Then, he takes total cover again hissing at Corsair to do the same.
Guiding bolt at it again...
for
Oh, damn, damn, how fast it's rushing here!!
What happens next is what happens. The sting enters deep into the body of a nobleman, tearing the doublet and staining it with blood. Mortally wounded, he makes the only right decision - to hide. A few passes with a trembling hand (while he clamps the wound with the other) and suddenly he disappears. "Invisibility" as it is clear to anyone versed in magic. Then, already hidden from view, he moves away as silently as possible to the nearest bushes.
Donal shouts, Get behind cover!
Drawing a bead, the warrior of Torm looses another arrow!
Simon's terrible impalement has him at death's door, but suddenly in a devilish twist of light and rolling searing flame the noble vanishes among the bushes.
Across the way, Malaric's head pops up and just as quickly fires and is behind cover again...his mastiff whimpering and licking at his face. The strike angers the wyvern, which chatters "SCREE, EEEK ECH...SCREE!!" indecipherably.
Nearby Donal makes his stand, keeping a steady barrage from the relative safety of the abandoned construction site. A nearly perfect shot, the arrow sinks into the beast's haunch to the sheaf.
Grim meanwhile leaves the previous conduit to Kelemvor blazing wide open, and another surging radiance is gifted upon the party in a terrific, arcing trail...biting the creature in the face and giving it a supernatural, glimmering aura that perfectly contrasts the bright sky.
Round 2:
Reya, Fisk(cover), Simon(invis), Mal(cover), Donal(cover), Grim
Wyvern <--UP
With a mind-bending burst of wind and surging of wings, the wyvern spirals in flight, flipping around towards Reya...
...the halfling ducks at the last second, bringing her head down nearly to touch the nape of her steed. In that moment, the wyvern's tail lashing around impaling the dog from the other side! With a sad *whelp* the poor pup dies instantly, and Reya nimbly tumbles off out of the saddle and into the scrub.
Suddenly the trees behind the ruin and Donal shiver and shake "ReeRcH? ScrEEE!" and a second, much smaller and more masculine looking wyvern emerges...free of the colors and stripes of his mate but perhaps with a sense of a heightened intellect, and certainly no less deadly looking.
...the massive, zweihander of a stinger punching right through the crumbling masonry shielding Donal, catching him in the gut.
Round 3:
Reya, Fisk(cover), Simon(invis), Mal(cover), Donal(cover), Grim <--UP
Wyvern
Donal spits blood, feeling the venom burn through his veins, but he grits his teeth and fires another shot at the injured wyvern!
Running to another broken wall, Donal takes a deep breath and refuses to die.
Reya sheds no tears for her fallen mount, but rather grimaces with rage. Leaving her swords for the moment, she scrapes at a leather bracelet around her splint gauntlets...with a flick it unravels into a simple sling. *bzzzz*
...punching a hole in the draping flesh of the wyvern's left wing, taking a wide bloodvein with it.
Back in the stones of the inn that never was, Fisk watches with terror as Donal is the next to be impaled by the terrifying dragons. He drops out of sight crouched with his back to the wall, working up the nerve to strike again...
...he slides across a pile of bricks, but trips over a rusty mason's trowel along the way, drawing the beast's attention but nonetheless resolving to take the shot...
...striking the smaller of the two right between the toes.
Round 3:
Reya, Fisk(cover), Simon(invis), Mal(cover), Donal(cover), Grim <--UP
Wyvern
No one sees it, but warlock drinks healing potions while he is in invisibility.
Mal reloads and readies to attack the wyvern that attacked Donal when it gets into and distracted by melee.
He's sure Shar has more potent magic in that spell-book than the enchantment effects that he has learned.
Guiding bolt...
*gulp gulp gulp* Was that a quaff you heard from over in the bushes?
Mal had to put the mysterious imbibing out of mind, focusing on readying a shot as soon as the beast within the construction site was properly distracted. Meanwhile the Doomguide again lit up the wyvern outside like a divine beacon, a mathematically perfect circle of a rainbow following the creature's aura.
Round 3:
Reya, Fisk(cover), Simon(invis), Mal(cover), Donal(cover), Grim
Wyverns <--UP
The protective male flips its entire body over in flight, plummeting madly only to extend its massive wings at the last moment...catching a cushion of air and thrashing out at Donal with its powerful legs and tail. Malaric's bolt at just that second screams in from the side, finding a soft scale behind its earhole. The claws kick at the loose masonry as the beast roars in pain, its attacks looking rather desperate...
...Donal avoiding the worst of it, using the order of the terrain to foil the chaotic strikes.
On the other side of the battle, the larger striped female swoops down at the source of the scintillating radiance and attempts to snuff out the offending colors...
...yet footwork is enough for the devoted of Kelemvor.
Round 4:
Reya, Fisk(cover), Simon(invis), Mal(cover), Donal(cover), Grim <--UP
Wyverns
"Grim! I lost Simon!" Reya shouted, winding up another sling stone...
...cracking of its bony talons with the intense impact.
Fisk was back to his usual game of hide the quarrel...
...dashing quickly through the overgrowth to reposition for a clandestine snipe...
...letting loose a string of Calishite cursewords as he fumbles the shot.
Round 4:
Reya, Fisk(cover), Simon(invis), Mal(cover), Donal(cover), Grim <--UP
Wyverns
The halfling reloads and steadily moves into position, but he knocks some rocks over giving away his position.
So, he readies to attack the first wyvern which gets distracted by melee.
The priest makes an attack of opportunity against the reptile.
for
"Grim! I lost Simon!", Reya shouted.
A priests work is never done!, he thinks, hurrying in Simons last direction and ready to cast Healing Word as an up powered spell IF Simon reveals himself...
...
He then whirls and calls down the Judgement of Kelemvor on the most damaged.
damage...
Donal stabs out with the arrow in his hand like a dagger!
As the creature flies away, Donal nocks the bloodied arrow, hoping its blood will find its own...
But alas... the arrow sails wide.
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"Grim! I lost Simon!" Reya shouted...
A powerful spell along with a curse falls on the wyvern and Simon winks at Reya at the moment when he comes out of invisibility.
Nobody expects that the sorcerer is still in business, right?
Simon startles Reya with a cheeky grin, flummoxing and frustrating the guardian at heart. The noble then fingers at the secret eldritch pocket his patron gifted upon him, triggering the cosmic valve that blasts outwards in a fountain of dark magic. The force of the crackling purple fire and nega-lightning shears the wyvern's face down to the skull on one side, and Simon sensed his master's sadistic thirst for both flesh and blood. "ScreEerCh!!" the tattered dragon seemed on death's door, extending its wings into a glide and looking to rout.
Malaric got into position near Donal, gambling again the beast would let down its guard during the next attack. Meanwhile Donal's arm muscles burned on fire, not used to the stress of repeated bow pulls...and sending his latest attempt arcing quickly out of sight into the blue.
Grim recited a healing word of power, a celestial conjugation of one of Kelemvor's last promises to mankind. The poison in Simon's wound boiled away harmlessly as new flaps and tendrils of flesh sprouted like saplings in spring to nurture the gaping wound. At the same time, he called for a quick judgement upon the routing dragon...
...but the cleric sensed the scales were tipped in the creature's favor for now.
Round 4:
Reya, Fisk(cover), Simon, Mal(cover), Donal(cover), Grim
Wyverns <--UP
The horribly wounded female routs, gliding across the valley and held aloft by the rising heat of the wet forest.
The male seemed confused "EeArCh?" taking one last heartless lash at Donal...
...and as Malaric's patient bolt buries itself deeply, the creature is convinced to follow his mate and live another day.
Round 5:
Reya, Fisk(cover), Simon, Mal(cover), Donal(cover), Grim <--UP
Wyverns
Mal sees the bigger dragon retreating. He reloads and leans on the ruins for stability. He leads the flying creature and squeezes the trigger sending the bolt.
Malaric the Keen-eyed executes an impossible shot, striking the fleeing female in the back. She drops like a meteorite with an earthy explosion taking out a huge swath of trees. Fisk laughs and pats the halfling on the back "Son of a b*tch, now there's a sniper's favor!"
With a smirk, the halfling replies, "that's Dragonslayer, Malaric Dragonslayer, to you." He shoulders his magic crossbow with a flourish.
Simon looks respectfully at the halfling. Then he looks thoughtfully at the other participants of the trip. Well, it is no less an honor for me to be in the company of such brave warriors, as it is for you to be in the company of such a noble man. With these words, he takes out a bottle of wine from the luggage on the horse, one glass (for himself), pours himself and begins to drink the drink calmly and slowly.
With the unwarranted attack concluded, you might poke around the abandoned inn construction. Your nose would bring you to the southeast corner, where a number of clean picked bones slowly rot. Some are certainly humanoid, some certainly not. The freshest and least eaten appears to be a basilisk, an 8-legged reptilian monstrosity known to turn people to stone with a glance.
There are plenty of tools scattered around, and if one was inclined a nice set of mason's tools could be easily gathered. Down the hill not even 100 yards you spot the quarry site, the local source of the stones being shaped here. The tattered remains of some kind of pully system now litter the abandoned site. Finally, you find a soggy pile of bags of mortar. However, digging a bit deeper there are still some dry sacks of slaked lime...an expensive building material.
Nearby, you find a large nest the size of a fisher's shack...the clusters of long timbers somewhat resembling a giant beaver damn nestled in the corner of some of the strongest masonry. Inside are a number of hatched shells, however one remains intact and is warm to the touch.
"Wow, look at those tools... And is that a dragon egg? Wonder what it would be worth in Candlekeep?" The dragonslayer wanders around feeling ten feet tall and not seeing anything that was not RIGHT in front of him.
The priest is content to let the survivor fly on...
During the search...
He looks at the ABSOLUTE worst of the remains and decides he's just not willing to go that far,
Not completely trusting his companions to spot another diving dragon, Malaric Dragonslayer keeps his eyes on alert. It's a new game that he plays with his magic crossbow: who can spot the threat first?
Scanning the horizon as they travel, Donal makes note of good ambush spots and attempts to warn the others when the road brings them close.
Absolutely not wanting to get dirty and being indifferent to small riches, Simon wrinkles his forehead again and tries to remember the stories of these places.
Listen up. I seem to recall the legends about the offspring of Baal. Yes, that's right. Very soon we will be near the place where he met those of his companions who were insane villains. The halfling assassin and an absolutely crazy necromancer. That's right, it's even further south... so Сandlekeep is to the west. We're going there!
He confidently points with his hand and leads you through the thicket again.
Grim spends his time looking for tracks, spoor and other signs of predators around the trail as the party moves on...
After leaving the inn that never was behind, the party again set off back down into the thick forest on the edge of the Cloakwood. The party may have been again lost if it weren't for Malaric, who spotted a game trail leading back towards the east. Grim believed some of the tracks matched the basilisk creature observed in the wyvern nest, but it was mixed with some other strange marks no one could quite nail down.
There was some argument whether to follow the game trail to completion, or to instead follow the historical recollection of Simon. In the end, the possibility of being turned to stone was outweighed by the possibility of becoming lost, so again the party allowed the noble to plot a course through the brush.
The tale of Xzar the necromancer and his halfling companion Montaron was recounted in part, though of course Simon was no bard and the tale was rather dated...being from that tense period when gods walked as mortals in the Time of Troubles. It was said the child of Bhaal met Xzar and Montaron shortly after leaving Candlekeep, cutting a reign of both terror and redemption across the Sword Coast. Specifically here in the Cloakwood, they together destroyed a secret base of the Iron Throne...an evil organization who manipulated the iron trade for wealth and power and cast a shadow over the entire region.
Simon led the party right past the now abandoned mine, and was lucky to find the supply routes feeding the site still clear enough for Fisk's wagon to get back to speed. It was only a few miles back to the Coast Way proper.
Of course the important part of the tale took place far to the south, in Amn...for it was one of the most sophisticated assassinations the Harpers ever accomplished. Xzar was convinced Montaron had been transformed into a bird, and with the child of Bhaal's help rescued him from captivity. In truth, the bird was a polymorphed assassin who transformed and slew the necromancer once reunited. Such precautionary tales tended to endure time.
Late in the afternoon, just when the shadows began to truly cool, the party crested another high hill. The fortress now known as the Friendly Arm Inn was visible just miles away, and from this height it seemed the thickest part of the Cloakwood would soon be left behind. However, Donal had reason to pause. The road crept down the hill is a winding manner, left to right and back left again. At the sharpest corner, there was a steep cliff that would have put the party at extreme disadvantage...almost cherry-picked for an ambush. So, it was wisely avoided in favor of a more difficult, but direct path down into the valley.
The sun was going down fast, but it was clear the Inn would be reached tonight. It was at that time another wagon crossed your path. An old farmer hailed and gave a friendly wave as he pulled by, his wagon full of hay being carried by a pair of draft horses. Amidst the hay was a pitchfork, which seemed to be either brand new or well cared for. "Woah there, sonnies...and miss halfling. Might it be you're headed for the Friendly Arm tonight? You must've had quite the journey coming from the north this time of year...surprised the hobgobbies didn't getcha! Did a number on my old dear mare. Well you must have some tales to tell, won't you humor an old man?"
The sun is low in the sky, old man. If you will be joining us at the Friendly Arm, I am sure my friends can spin you a yarn, Donal spurs his horse on, as if the conversation is over, only pausing to look over his should to see if the old man will join them.