Nerion sighed. "I do not think that she has grown as far apart from us as you think. You are a very forward thinking person, dearest, and you often have a habit of jumping about five steps ahead and expecting others to keep up with you. Nimora is cautious and doesn't like to be rushed. Be patient with her. Let your plans slow down a little. We are elves, there is time. And I think if you do that you will find her much more biddable."
Melusine nods
I knew there was a good reason why I married you Nerion, you are the veritable voice of reason.
Melusine sighs
If only she had agreed to marry Blurghoot then we would have peace for a generation! Plus our house would be tied to the nobility of the Brightwater Clan! Ah well, if wishes were hippocampi we'd all be nomads..
Melusine looks up at Nerion
Has anyone discovered who assasinated Blurghoot and his brothers yet?
Melusine looks up at Nerion
Has anyone discovered who assasinated Blurghoot and his brothers yet?
"No firm information yet, but there are rumors flying that it was done by a criminal organization within Pearl. They call themselves the Black Pearl. No word yet on who may have hired them or if they were acting on their own."
"Nimora will be placed in command of whatever forces we can put together, but I had them put in a clause that she is still answerable to me. That will allow us to continue to guide her. Also, I had Joren named as commander of the city's guards and liason to the nobility. He will still be answerable to Nimora, which he won't like, but I couldn't justify doing otherwise. Surprisingly, it turns out she knows what she's doing once you start talking about military strategy. If we play this right and actually manage to fend off the nomad attack, they will be the heroes of Sandreef. And if Joren does a good enough job of winning over the hearts of the nobles then it will not be very difficult at all to get him named as heir to King Orca."
...And if Joren does a good enough job of winning over the hearts of the nobles then it will not be very difficult at all to get him named as heir to King Orca."
Melusine sighs
While Nimora may be stubborn, our other child is very foolhardy. Hopefully he will come out of this a bit more cautious. Still, I worry about him...
Melusine sighs
While Nimora may be stubborn, our other child is very foolhardy. Hopefully he will come out of this a bit more cautious. Still, I worry about him...
"Sometimes it's hard to believe that he is the older sibling," Nerion agreed. "You may want to consider assigning a senior cleric to him as an advisor. Having a voice of reason on hand may help curb that tendency to act first and think things through later."
At a bank in Sandreef, a woman in a coral dress with a hermit crab nestling in her hair is having trouble with a clerk.
No. The name’s Lucinda Darkeyes: Lucinda as in ‘lucid but not applicable’, and Darkeyes as in ‘eyes which have seen the ultimate horror and yet not been gouged out’.
The clerk grumbles and heads off again. After a short while he returns.
When the bank’s previous owners were bought out by another bank, your account and deposit were relocated to another branch, ma’am.
Moved!!! What do you mean moved? Did anyone ask my permission? Was any attempt made to trace or contact me? Was I even sent notice of this event?
Outside on the streets a batch of instantly soggy muffins materialise and do their ineffectual best to smother surprised passers-by to death. In the palace, the king has a sudden vision of a very angry ice-cream spreading wings dripping with the vengeance of chocolate sauce over his town.
Inside the bank, the clerk mutters something else barely audible or intelligible.
Form? Don’t talk to me about form; you clearly have no kind of form or class at all at this establishment.
She sweeps out in a huff, and every octopus in the institution kept for ink at that moment happens to coincidentally escape.
Nymphaea sighed and settled in for a long ordeal as King Orca the fifth swam rapidly around the room screaming hysterically about ice cream and chocolate sauce and muffins attacking the city. Eventually she was able to interrupt his hysterics.
"Your Majesty, I agree that Sandreef is facing some very formidable threats. In fact, that is why I am here today. The Merchants Guild believes that the city will be better able to address these threats if we empower proper military authority to take command of our forces and coordinate the defenses. I have here a writ, that I hope you will sign, that details out the plans that we have made for just such an eventuality."
"They will protect the city from the chocolate sauce threat?" King Orca asked nervously from where he was cowering behind his throne.
"Yes, your majesty."
Nymphaea smiled smugly to herself as she swam away, signed writ in hand.
Once her grandmother got the official writ from the king, the work really began. She spent a couple of hours going over what resources she would be able to draw on with her father and grandmother before going to speak with the Knight-Captain.
She swam out to the camp of the troops from Pearl and asked to speak with Knight-Captain Velantium.
Nimora is directed to a simple command tent adorned with magical sigils, and displaying the flag of Pearl. The Captain is inside, looking over area maps with his staff. The rest of the company has yet to be given orders, so they await in loose formations.
"Yes, Lady Olbereth?"
"I came to let you know that my grandmother got the writ from the king signed this morning. So I am now empowered to officially grant you permission to be here. Also, I have a drop of siege weapons happening just outside the north gate this afternoon, so you'll probably want to stay clear of that area. Oh, and how well can any of you tolerate freshwater?"
Whoa dudes...I totally luv fresh water. It's just so....fresh!
The Captain looks over the writ and seems satisfied.
"Though we lose some speed due to the reduced buoyancy and it tastes funky we can manage fine. What do you have in mind?"
"Sandreef is located near a river. We often go back and forth between salt and fresh water. We're acclimated to it. But those who aren't can find it uncomfortable. And with no walls or other such defenses, we can use every advantage we can get. I'm planning to have some of the druids and clerics use their spells to reduce the salinity around key points within the city. The nomads are deep-sea dwellers, and if it throws off even a few of their attacks, then it's worth the trouble."
She sighed."And any other suggestions you might have would be appreciated. There's not much of a military here."
"Any ways to limit their mobility. Entangles readied in the kelp farms, jellyfish traps, coral blocakdes, drums to disrupt communications, and light spells. The deep-swimmers aren't happy with near-surface light. Also, whirlpools tend to mess them up. They don't usually reach down to their home turf.""Put your less-experienced warriors and conscripts in groups led by veterans. It'll keep them steady, and keep them out of the way."
"What about your surface friends? Any warships up there? They could help corral the nomads with nets, especially thin-line, but that will come with a lot of risk and it only buys us time."
"Has anyone succeeded in contacting the Free Companions or the Brightwaters? A battle avoided is a battle won."
"The nomads are not responding to any of our attempts to communicate with them. We've even asked allies to try and negotiate between us. They won't have any of it."
"As for our surface friends, they're giving us the siege weapons, and some large nets, but that's as much as they're willing to do. After what happened to the surface-dwellers in Pearl, they're too nervous to trust to magic to save them if their ships get sunk.""And, while I agree that the idea of pairing veterans and new recruits is sound, it has one real flaw. I'm the only one from Sandreef with any real combat experience. But I'll try to use some of the older guards. They've at least occasionally arrested people and broken up the odd fight."
"There are reinforcements coming from Sargassia and Seahaven, but they'll take more than a week to get here."
"Thank you for your advice. Especially about the mobility limiting options. That gives me some good ideas to work with."
She massaged her temples, trying to ease the headache that was developing. "Here's hoping that we can somehow manage the impossible. Or, more likely, that the nomads decide to see reason and negotiate."
"Just a word of caution. Many a soldier has been wounded by a panicked rookie from their own side. Hold them in reserve if possible. The nomads aren't about to be cowed by our numbers, even if you add a thousand rookies."
"Thinking out loud here but the nomads might be a bit overconfident with their own numbers, so I'll try to hide some of my own. Do you think that they'll try to raze your city, or capture with little damage? Assuming plunder before destruction buys us more time. It also might limit their desire to gate in large numbers of planar shock troops, and open the seagate for us to do so against them."
"The nomads have been vocal in their dislike of reef-dwellers. It's unlikely that they would try to capture the city. Whether they mean to plunder it or not before they destroy it? I don't know. I know very little about them or what might motivate them. I can talk to my mother and see if she has any more insight into it. She's the one who was negotiating with them. Then again, seeing how well that ended, I'm not sure she really understands them either."
The dark basalt spires of the imperial capital of the realm of Orl rise far enough above the seabed that the uppermost reaches of the tallest spires break the surface of the sea, reaching like twisted claws towards the skies, and with floating piers and jetties attached so that vessels bringing tribute from vassal states on land and plunder by spelljammer from the stars might have somewhere to tie up. Down below in the depths of the towers, in vaults half a mile below the seabed, are the forges, arsenals, and fiend-summoning chambers that have seen this become the heart of one of the mightiest empires in existence.
Great gongs resonate to the infernal powers from the city’s red marble temples with every hourly sacrifice, and armed guards with spears and fiendish shark companions herd schools of slaves through the streets.
Gold leaf is ostentatious in highlighting the decoration of buildings everywhere, and the grotesque faces of carvings of the lords of the hells leer from corners.
On the edge of the city a minor skirmish between the vast and well-drilled armies of the capital and a minor group of ‘bright-spear’ rebels is taking place, the final act of the latest hopeless rebellion against High Lady Melusine Devilborn, Supreme Empress of Orl.
Lucinda hovers in the waters above the imperial capital, a little uncertain if this is the correct place. It certainly seems as gloomy as the Sandreef she left a short while ago, but down in the streets she didn’t have any idea that it was *this big*.
She pops down to the streets and after making some inquiries discovers that this does indeed appear to be Sandreef, and even if she can’t find the bank where she made her deposit there are certainly several others filled with just as impolite staff, so she heads back upto where she has left her invisible dimensional barges moored, mid water column, above the city – Lucinda never likes to come under-prepared to any party, which frequently results in ‘overkill’, but on this occasion it looks that there will be ‘just about enough to go around’.
She gives a mental pull on the latches on the bottom of the first of her barges and the barrels start to tumble towards the city below, delivering the first of the goods much needed, Lucinda feels, to cheer the place up.
And as spires start to crumble and fall in such pretty patterns, and people start dancing around, obviously excited that such a dreary place is being livened up, Lucinda feels a warm glow of satisfaction at a job well done…
Whoa dudes, I had a terrifying thought once.....
Nimora sets plans in motion, putting traps in place, assigning troops to positions, evacuating as many people as possible upriver, making plans to protect the ones who stay as well as they possibly can. It is a daunting and depressing task, and she is faced with the sheer impossibility of victory. Even if the reinforcements arrive in time to help them, it may not be enough. And then there was Joren...But she was trying not to think about Joren. She really didn't need another headache right now.
I had some bad shrooms that gave me a headache once.....along with some really trippy dreams.
Nymphaea arrived back at home after an invigorating day of arguing with idiots. If by some miracle their city survived the coming attack, she might finally see these complacent morons finally agree to fund the building of some permanent defenses. She'd been wondering for decades how it was that a group of wealthy merchants could possibly be so complacent about defending that wealth. The evacuation continued, more citizens heading upriver each day, special preference being given to the very old and the very young. Nimora was working tirelessly, but every so often she could catch a glimpse of fear in her granddaughter's eyes. They were anything but prepared to meet this threat.
Plus one building material (wood) may not function so well underwater, and then there is that 'they can swim above your walls anyway' bit...
A few towers with strategic fields of view to fire ballista type weapons from might work, but I'm not sure what else by way of permanent structures would be effective underwater apart from some sort of very big dome (which naturally the nobles would complain blocks favourable currents and cuts off the best of the light...)
Whoa dudes, I sat in a meeting once, but I had just taken some shrooms and fell asleep. When I woke up, it was over and everybody had just left me there. Can you believe?
The preparations for war continue in Sandreef, but Nimora can feel panic pressing in as more and more reports come in about the growing size of the invading army.
Joren trains with his hippocampi cavalry, having the time of his young life
Melusine sits in her study, inviting over members of Sandreef's noblity and merchants for meetings and receiving reports from spies sent out to discover the nomad's intentions
Nimora sends as many of the refugees through the omniportals to the encampment upriver as she can. She's been working around the clock trying to get defenses placed, and keep the inexperienced troops from hurting themselves during their hurried training.
Nimora sends the signal to the spellcasters to be ready. Entangles in the kelp fields, light spells, summoned water elementals all are prepared to be sent against the enemy. She swims among the nervous, inexperienced troops providing encouragement as best she can. She holds her trident at the ready watching warily for the advancing enemy.
Joren fights on with his cavalry, but the eels pull him off his mount and he is lost in the swirl of mud on the battlefield
Nimora redirects a squad towards the area where the eels erupted, leading them herself. She fights through eels at blinding speed, desperately trying to reach the spot where she saw her brother go down.
Nimora manages to fight through the eels. The Hippocampi cavalry is in disarray, and Joren's barded steed swims about aimlessly.
Nimora sees the bloodied form of her brother on the muddy seabottom, inert.
She swims over to him and picks him up, looking for any sign of life, but not hopeful.
If he is still alive, she will call for the field medic to stabilize him before sending him back to the healing center. If he is already dead she will tie the body onto his hippocampus and charge some of the more wounded men to take the body back with them to the healing center.
Joren still lives, but he is at death's door. Nimora manages to grab him and bring him to the rear to where her mother is working on casualties. Melusine lets out a shreik when she sees her son.
JOREN!!!
She rushes over with her assistants and begins casting curative magics on him.
Relieved to know that her brother was still among the living and in good hands, Nimora returns to the battle.
She signals for the entangle spells set out in the kelp beds to be activated against the advancing enemy.
Relieved to know that her brother was still among the living and in good hands, Nimora returns to the battle.
She signals for the entangle spells set out in the kelp beds to be activated against the advancing enemy.
Without rebuke, Tempest follows Nimora into every skirmish, refusing to leave her charge undefended. Several times she takes blows from the cowardly nomads that might have struck the High Lady. In one battle they found themselves pressed hard, and Tempest released the power that became her namesake. The whirling of her trident became a blur as she spun in every direction, seemingly at the same time. The mini-whirlpool pulled her enemies in close where she awaited them with the sharp points of her weapon. After these attacks she was winded and bleeding from several small gashes but no enemies were left to take advantage of her vulnerability. So far.
Entangle spells, areas of desalination, summoned water elementals, magical bolts of lightning from the new ballistas; none of it was slowing the enemy advance. It seemed like for every one that fell, two swam in to to take their place. Nimora began to suspect foul play.
"Are there really that many of them, or are they animating the bodies of the fallen?"
She shook her head glumly as she evaluated the situation and gave the orders to fall back. There was still some chance that they could hold the city if reinforcements got here within the next hour, but she wasn't feeling optimistic.