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This narrative is taken from the pages of the personal journal of
Imam Gabriel bin Sarenrae al Katheer, Pathfinder.
This is the story of how Gabriel, while tracking down his wayward sister, Fatima, who was fleeing a proper marriage their father arranged, somehow got embroiled in the explosive politics of Korvosa.
It is strange sitting here as I write this entry in the temple of Sarenrae. I have not set foot in Korvosa for twenty years. I was only six then, and my father, Ibrahim, ran a successful coffee import business here. I have only vague memories of the lilting Varisian songs, on the air and the little dragons that would chase the frightening imps away. Then disaster struck, as my Mother was returning from the market, with my sister Yasmin, there was a surge in the crowd, and she lost hold of my sister. We never found her again. My father tried his best to find her with his merchant contacts, and through pleading with the guard. The guards were not moved by pleas of a bereft father, or the subtle promise of gold. We were outlanders not worth their time. After this tragedy my family left Korvosa and returned to Katheer in Qadira. My father started his own shipping business and he and his family prospered.
It is strange how life takes you on paths you didn’t intend to tread. In university I studied both in the Veniciaan College of medicaments and Chirurary, and the college of Divinity. I graduated a Chururgeon, and Imam of Sarenrae. After graduation from university, I intended to settle down, marry and begin tending a flock for Sarenrae. One of my other sisters, Fatima (not Yasmin), ran away from a marriage to an important Pasha, arranged by my father. She had run off to Absalom and joined the Pathfinders. My father asked me to go and find her and bring her back to Katheer. I then traveled from Katheer to Absalom and joined the Pathfinders. I have been on Fatima’s trail ever since. Her trail has led me to Korvosa.
I have found it exceedingly easy to travel. People always welcome a priest of Sarenrae, because of her clergy’s dedication to healing, and I have easily found work as ships Chirugeon in exchange for free passage.
Two days ago I was on a ship, sailing for Korvosa. At dawn as I was performing my Salah, or ritual prayer to Our Lady Sarenrae, and I found a strange Harrow card, (a fortune telling card) tucked into my holy text Of Light and Truth. The card was beautifully decorated in Varissian style. On it was a note written in beautiful calligraphy. It read, “ I know who abducted your sister Yasmin. His name is Gaedren Lamm. He has wronged me as well. I know where he dwells yet cannot strike at him. Come to my home at 3 lancet street at sunset. Others like you will be there. Gaedren must face his fate and justice must be done.” I dropped my text in surprise, and it fell to the deck open on its spine. The wind blew and turned pages. The book blew open to the Parable of the lost Lambs. This was a sign from Our Lady. I was on the path She intended for me, which was not the path I intended for myself.
Our ship neared Korvosa. We had sailed along the cliffs of the heights district, a crewman pointed out the landmarks to me as we passed the giant granite “Gate foot”. Next we passed the white marble spires of the temple of Sarenrae. After that we passed by the black spires of Castle Korvosa set atop the colossal grand Mastaba, a huge four sided sandstone pyramid. Next we sailed past the red glass dome of the accursed Temple of Asmodeus. Then The immense edifice of the Hall of Summoning, the main building of the Acadamae came into view. After that we passed the Great Tower, home of the Sable Company, a contingent of Hipogryph mounted marines.
We sailed up the Jaggere River, along Endrin Isle, which is entirely covered by the district of Old Korvosa. We passed the Palace of the Arkona; its black marble architecture covered with elephant, peacock and tiger motifs. It seemed distinctly Vudran. After sailing by the Arkona Palace, we passed under the North Bridge, and into Midland harbor.
I spent the morning finding my pathfinder contact, Sasha, the proprietress of the curio shop “world of wonders’ in North Point, and the afternoon in the temple of Sarenrae in the Heights, helping out in the infirmary where I could. There is always a need for a kind word and a healing hand.
Session 1
In the evening I headed to 12 Lancet Street in the Midland district of Korvosa. I was surprised to find about nine people milling about the front of the modest house, all discussing how Gaedren Lamm had wronged them. At someone’s suggestion we headed into our hostess’s house. The home was small and tidy, the walls were covered with Brocaded tapestries, depicting Varissian themes. One tapestry depicted a black beast juggling men’s hearts, and another a pair of angels dancing on a snow-covered peak.
In the center of the living room was a small table. On the table was a basket with some nice smelling bread. Tucked into the basket was a note inviting us to eat, and letting us know our hostess would be with us shortly. Some people had some bread, and shared the injustice that this Gaedren Lamm had visited upon them. Others were less forthcoming. And looked around suspiciously. As best as I can remember there were ten of us in total, all victims of Gaedren Lamm’s viciousness.
First I remember Laelda. She dressed in leathers, with a rapier at her side, a dark green cloak about her. She wasn’t the friendliest nor the most trusting of souls because she immediately got a chair and sat herself in one of the corners of the room, looking out suspiciously at us. Her red bangs covered half of her face, while the rest was pulled back in a loose ponytail. Two slightly pointed ears peeked out from her red hair. I am guessing from her paranoid behavior that she might be some sort of rogue; I will have to secure my coin purse. I later noticed some hints of scaring on her face as her hair moved. Who knows what viciousness this half elf endured at the hands of Gaedren Lamm. Perhaps she has good reason to be paranoid.
Next I remember Vasily. He was a cheerful half-orc of medium build. I remember he commented how Gaedren Lamm had framed his father for a crime he didn’t commit. Perhaps Lamm ensured his father took the fall for one of his deeds. I’m not sure. The half-orc mentioned that he was a sorcerer.
Next I remember Angus, a Dwarven paladin or Torag. He was a likable Dwarf, straightforward and honest with a magnificently braided beard. He mentioned that Gaedren Lamm was responsible for his parents’ death he was left to raise his brothers and sisters. He mentioned something about apprenticing at a blacksmith and finding faith in Torag as he worked and crafting things.
I mostly remember Talee, the gnome sorcerer for his bright green hair and electric blue eyes. He mentioned that Gaedren Lamm had gotten him addicted to shiver. We didn’t talk much it was a large group.
I found myself next to a quiet and reserved man named Kanthos. He mentioned that he was a fighter, and that Gaedren Laam had killed his parents and he had to raise his siblings. He didn’t say much more then that, but I do remember in the street before the meeting asking him for directions to #12 Lancet Street.
The next person I barely remember now what was his name? Ivo Cobierre, He also kept himself apart from the group with back to the wall. I remember him eyeing Laelda suspiciously. Perhaps they are birds of a feather. When asked what he did and why he was here, he curtly said he was a ranger, and that Gaedren Lamm had murdered his father. At the third mentioning of Gaedren Lamm orphaning a person here, someone mentioned that Gaedren Lamm must have had a busy night, in the same ally murdering one person after another. Some people laughed, but I don’t think the ranger found it amusing and he withdrew into himself. It must have been the gnome who made that joke. They have a strange sense of humor.
The next person I remember was a half-orc named Kuldak. He had a great axe strapped to his back, and sported a kilt. He mentioned that he was Acquisitions expert. I expect that is a euphemism for thief and yet I find strangely that he is likeable and friendly. I will still have to watch my coin purse. When asked what our villain did to him, he replied that Gaedren Lamm had framed his brother for a crime. I commented “ So Gadriam Lamm has sullied your brothers good name by bringing libelous and unfounded accusations against him?” Kuldak looked at me with puzzlement and replied “ Good name? Maybe reputation not so good. My brother shouted ‘I’m not crook’ from deck of leaving ship. His hands were held high in victory sign” Kuldak shrugged.
Next I remember the half-orc Dargox. Who would have thought a half-orc becoming a bard possible? Usually one thinks of a half-orcs as barbarian brutes. But here we have three examples of half-orcs being something other then what you would expect. One is a sorcerer, another a bard, and a third a rogue. Someone mentioned Gaedren Lamm must not have liked half-orcs and there was laughter. Must be that gnome again. I felt a great sympathy for Dargox as he relayed how this fiend had kidnapped his younger sister and made her beg. I hope that was not the fate of my long lost sister Yasmin, whom I only dimly remember at age six before she disappeared twenty years ago. Perhaps I should re examine my assumptions about half-orcs. They may not all be the uncivilized mindless brutes I have encountered in the past.
The last person was Gloriana, she was a priestess of Shelyn the goddess of art and beauty. While Gloriana is certainly a natural beauty herself, she seems to have lived quite a sheltered life, and might need a little protection as she learns to navigate the world. I did note she very skillfully brought out of everybody his or her story, even mine.
After fifteen minutes of talking our hostess arrived and thanked us for coming. She was a middle-aged attractive Varisian woman. Her long dark hair was kept back in a brightly colored scarf. She introduced herself as Zellara. She began by thanking us for coming and she apologized for the unusual means of contact. She briefly told us, that one of Gaedren’s lambs, or pickpockets, had lifted her Harrow Deck of cards. Not only was this fortune telling deck a family heirloom, but also it was her sole means of support. Her son tracked the pickpockets down and Gaedren murdered him for his inquisitiveness. Her pleads to the guard fell on deaf ears, and she was worried that he would slip away again. The word on the street she said was that Gaedren Lamm had wronged us all, and now it was time to see justice done. I commented that, my fortune card was found tucked into my prayer book, this morning while I was on a boat out at Sea. Zellara blithely continued and mentioned that the Villain Gaedren Lamm was in an old fishery building on Pier 17. He was running a fish slurry business, while having his orphans, make the fish slurry during the day, and in the evening he would send them out to pick pockets. Excitement gripped us, and all ten of us rushed over to pier 17.
We milled about a block away trying to decide what to do. We realized we would be noticed soon, so we decided quickly to surround the Fishery, and burst in through all the entrances. Our quarry couldn’t possibly get away then. The building had four entrances that we could see. We split up into four groups, one for each entrance.
Next things happened quickly and with much confusion. I can only really relate my part in this amusing comedy of collapses and narrow escapes. I gathered what happened to my other comrades later. Angus, dwarven the paladin of Torag and I decided to approach the loading dock on the left side of the building. The smell of rotting fish was overpowering. We hastily put a plan together to pose as buyers for this cheap fish slurry they produced and sold to the dock laborers. Angus would be my guide, and I would be the purchaser. Angus and I both saw the irony of us, a paladin and cleric, trying to bluff some rogues in their own den. After a brief chuckle, at my direction, Angus “rang” the loading bay doors with a sound swing of his war hammer. The door creaked open a little bit and an overpowering stench wafted forth. A grimy face peeked around the corner. I bellowed as imposingly as I could “ Child go fetch your master, I am here to buy some fish slurry from you. My galley leaves on the evening tide, and we need something cheap to feed the galley slaves” (never mind dusk was approaching). We shouldered our way into the room, over the waif’s protests “ but sir it doesn’t work that way”
The stench of the place made even my eyes water. There were piles of fish parts, blood and entrails, being shoveled into a vat in the middle of the room; the vat fed a chute, which must have led to the interior bowls of the building. I remember there must have been a little over a dozen waifs working there. And the oldest was addressing me. Realizing I had somehow erred, I leaned over to the child, letting my cloak part. I knew he could then see my sheathed scimitar. As I passed him a silver coin, I said “ Child we have come to kill your master Gaedren Lamm”. With a swiftness that left both Angus and myself flat footed, the child grabbed a pitchfork full of fish guts, and flung it at another child hitting him squarely in the face. We looked on dumbfounded. Then I said “ Angus, on big estates in my country Qadira, often slaves are used as overseers to keep the other slaves in line, and they are often far more despised then the masters. Perhaps this is what we are seeing” Angus replied with a grunt, “That’s no child, that’s a gnome”. We readied our weapons and shields.
Meanwhile this gnome overseer, had wiped the fish guts from his eyes, and opened a door to an adjoining room. In bounded a woofing slavering cur of a dog. The children shouted “Bloo!” in terror and cowered against the far wall. The gnome drawing a poniard came at me from the front while Bloo came at me from the back. Angus moved in behind the cur, shield and war hammer ready. I was able to block the Gnome with my shield, spin and slice the cur in two with my scimitar. I used the momentum of my swing to fling the blood on my scimitar all over the gnome. I must have blinded him somewhat, because in the next few seconds. I was able to deliver a nasty slice to the belly. With a shout of pain and a shocked look on his face, the gnome fell into the vat of fish slurry where he thrashed.
About this time several things happened at once. Adversaries emerged from the two doorways into this room, The children seeing their chance for freedom bolted out the open loading dock door, at the same time my other comrades were getting in the room.
Meanwhile a few moments before, down the left side of the building, further down from the loading dock entrance, along the wooden dock that surrounded the building, Vacily the half-orc sorcerer, and Kanthos the Human Fighter, were going to force open that door. Kanthos had a crowbar in hand for this purpose. Surprises always seem to happen. Vacily fell through the sodden planks. One would have expected Kanthos to fall through, being heavier and clad in mail, but Vacily did. Oh did I mention the puzzle shark hiding in the water beneath the pilings upon which this fishery rested? It was very happy to see Vacily, and took a bite out of him. Vacily screamed. Kanthos did his best to help Vacily, and he held out his crowbar, For Vacily to grab, while trying to keep his balance on the collapsing dock.
At that moment, Gabriella, the cleric of Sheylin, Gradox the half-orc bard, and Ivo Cobierre, the silent but violent ranger, were guarding the front door of the Fishery. The main door was locked and chained. It looked as if nobody had used it for a long time. Somebody must of heard poor Vacily’s screams, (who wouldn’t if one were faced with a shark intent on eating you) because they all rushed around the corner of the building, and along the collapsing dock. Gradox got out his lute, and began to strum a tune to bolster the spirits of his companions. Ivo Cobierre, got out his bow, and shot Kanthos in the back with an extremely well placed arrow, just about killing him. Kanthos then fell in the water, with just the fletching of the arrow protruding form his back, and the point cleanly through his torso. Glorianna, showing surprising courage and bravery, dove into the water to heal both Kanthos and Vacily.
On the other side of the building, the right side was another dock, which wound its way along the side of the old fishery. Covering the two entrances there were Laelda, the female half Elvin rogue, Talee, the gnome sorcerer, and Kuldak the half-orc rogue. I think Kuldak being closest to the back and corner of the fishery, must of heard something of Vacily’s screams because he dashed around the corner to the back of the fishery. At the back of the building Kuldak discovered a barge flush against the back wall of the fishery, the dock wound around the outside of the barge. Kuldak leapt onto the barges deck and raced across to try and help his distressed comrades with the shark. He fell through the deck into the hold of the ship, after hanging briefly to a beam. Inside he found spiders, and he spent the next few moments trying to fend them off as they bit him repeatedly.
Impatience seized Laelda the half Elvin rogue, and she hurled herself at one of the windows, intent on entering the building. Unfortunately at the same time the floorboards gave way, and Talee the gnome sorcerer fell into the water. Laelda bounced off the window and fell into the drink on top of the sorcerer.
I think at this point Kanthos drove off the shark. He kept whacking the beast on the snout with his crowbar.
Back in the room with the Slurry vat, Angus the dwarven paladin of Torag and myself had two new adversaries to face. Through one door, on the south-facing wall I think came a half-orc laughing manically. Angus took care of him, by bull rushing him through the door, and down the stairs on the other side. The gnome, whose name we later learned was hook shanks, had fallen into the vat of fish slurry; I prodded at him with a pitchfork to see if he was still alive.
Through the other door emerge a man by the name of Yargen. He burst in from the door to the east, and demanded to know what was going on. He held a wand and with it began conjuring dollops of acid to fling at us.
By this time our comrades recovered and I believe it was Ivo Cobierre, who killed Yargen with a couple of well-placed arrows. Then Laelda, the half-elvin rogue surprised us all. She pulled out a small cylindrical shiny metal object. At first glance it looked like it might be a wand. She turned to Glorianna, the cleric of Shelyn, and said, “this is for later, we can save this for later you know. “ Everyone looked at Laelda shocked and puzzled into silence. In exasperation and embarrassment Laelda explained, “ You know after you smoke some halfling pipe weed, and you want to munch on something…” We realized the cylinder was some candy called sweet tarts, which was wrapped in metal foil not a wand. Everybody collapsed with laughter. Laelda only turned redder and poor Glorianna looked confused.
After that moment of levity we proceeded after Angus and found that he had killed Giggles, at the bottom of the stairs. This room was much larger, at least two stories high, it had wood catwalks lining the walls, and the middle was a great vat of fish slurry, which the vat in the loading room fed with shoots. Our other comrades joined us; Poor Kuldak was looking positively green from spider poison and bites. I beseeched Sarenrae and channeled Her grace. A warm light filled the room emanating from my holy symbol and I was able to heal Kuldak’s bites and bring him back to good health. Kuldak found a fish on the floor, and held up a fish, and he asked “ Laelda, we could save this for later” More hoots of laughter. We now had one problem. Where was our quarry? Gaedren Lamm was nowhere to be found in the fishery. His three underlings were dead, and the orphans had fled the fishery.
What should we do next? Perhaps we will search the boat.
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Session 2
Someone got the idea that there must have been a secret door or trap door somewhere, so we began searching the floors and walls. I suggested to Vasily and Ivo Corbierre that they go watch the front of the fishery in case any orphans returned, in case any of Gaedren Lamm’s allies showed up, or in case any curious souls showed up intent on interfering with our grim businesses (The players were not there to run their characters).
After our search for secret doors in the main room of the fishery began in earnest, the door at the head of the stairs opened. In walked a middle aged woman, clad in leather armor wearing a green cloak, holding a drawn scimitar. I drew my scimitar and called out “ Halt where you stand. What is your good name and business here? “ she replied “ I am Kari Goldenhair, Gaedren Lamm killed my husband and sold my son into slavery “ I replied “ You seem honest and trustworthy. We share a common enemy in Gaedren Lamm. Please join us and help us to visit upon him the justice he has so long evaded.” We sheathed our scimitars.
Whatever her reply it was lost in the cacophony of our group as we searched for secret doors.
Kuldak thanked me for helping to healing him of the spider bites he suffered in the barge secured to the back of the building. I decided to go and investigate the barge. After carefully picking my way along the remains of the dock on the side of the building and around the Kuldak sized hole in the deck of the barge, I entered the cabin.
I found the air in the cabin to be thick and musty. The cabin was dark. I prayed to Sarenrae to light my way. My scimitar blazed like the sun illuminating the room before me. All of a sudden a spider, the size of a cat, dropped on my face and tried to bite me. Thankfully Sarenrae protected me. The spider’s piercing mandibles missed my face and hit my helm causing no harm. With a careful sweep of my now glowing scimitar, I was able to swipe the offending arachnid off of my face and kill it. The golden light from my illuminating scimitar revealed thick sheets of cobwebs hanging from the walls of this room. Mounds of blankets and straw littered the floor. I noticed a narrow flight of stairs leading down into the hold of the barge.
About this time our new friend Kari Goldenhair, along with Laelda and Glorianna joined me to search the barge. Upon closer inspection I noticed that Kari Goldenhair was also a half elf like Laelda but her hair was blond, whereas Laelda’s hair was red. Glorianna was simply blond and bubbly. We descended the stairs into the hold. It was lit by a Kuldak sized hole in the ceiling. The dank hold smelled of mildew. Boxes and barrels littered the hold along with the corpses of 4 hairy cat sized spiders. Koldak gave as good as he got. He trashed the place and killed the spiders that were trying to make a dinner out of him.
We spread out to search for a hidden compartment. It was Kari Goldenhair who found something. She found a secret door in the hull of the barge. Laelda stepped up to search the secret door for traps. Finding none she opened it and proceeded through.
We found a hidden layer. Below the docks and the floor of the fishery, which was built some six feet above the water, just above the water’s surface, was a second plank walk way, running in between the pilings of the dock above, directly beneath it. There was only four feet of clearance the walkway lead to a door, which must be the basement of the fishery. Water lapped everywhere. The walkway sagged under our weight, and the river water rushed over our boots filling our boots. We spread out to make sure we didn’t break the rotten planking. None of us wanted the shark, which had taken a bite out of Vacily earlier, to take another bite out of us. We also found a skiff, tied off to one of the pilings holding up the fishery, floating gently against this secret walkway we were making our way along. Llaeda was taking up the lead; I was second, and Kari Goldenhair third, with Glorianna bringing up the rear.
Llaeda was first through the door. We heard “ Llaeda you fiery haired brat. I should have killed you instead of burning your face with acid after you ruined that deal for me. I wont repeat that mistake.” We heard a twang, and a startled yelp of pain. Laelda bolted out of the doorway. She had a wound in her shoulder from a hand crossbow bolt. It must have passed completely through her shoulder. I called upon Sarenrae’s grace and channeled it to heal my companions. Her radiance spread out from my holy symbol and my companion’s wounds healed somewhat. Glorianna said she would run and fetch the others. Llaeda, Kari Goldenhair and I decided to rush the room.
The room was dark, so I asked Sarenrae to light our way. My scimitar again glowed brightly like the sun. It illuminated the room. We found the air in this large room was somewhat chilly and stank of the river because of a huge opening in the floor that dropped away to the river below. Several pilings emerged from the water to support the roof above, with mossy ropes slung between them. In two places, rusty manacles hung from the ropes over the water. Two five-foot-wide walkways crossed the hole’s edge to the other side of the chamber, where a collection of old cabinets, lockboxes, and piles of clutter were strewn about. Chipped porcelain plates, a cracked goblet, badly rusted silverware, an old wooden shield with a crossbow bolt embedded in it, the odd dinged helm, and other “treasures” were littering the floor of this entire chamber. Three tables, their tops heaped with additional clutter, stood amid this mess, while just west of that a wooden door seemed to provide access to a walled-off section. The room was otherwise empty. Kari Goldenhair went along the left hand walkway, while Llaeda worked her way around the other side keeping to the shadows. Both women converged on the door. Kari uttered a brief prayer; she conjured a tongue of flame into her hand.
We began to hear a rhythmic thuncking from the ceiling above; bits of sawdust began to fall. Someone must have been trying to chop their way through the floor from the room above.
We also heard a creak splashes and cursing from the open doorway. I later found out Dargox the half-orc bard and Talee the gnome sorcerer fell into the river while running along the walkway. Angus the Dwarven paladin of Torag, Kanthos the human fighter, and Glorianna the cleric of Sherlyn burst into the room. The thunking turned into thumping. Someone was jumping on the floorboards above us.
Then things began to happen quickly, the door on the other side of the room flew open, and Kari threw her tongue of flame into the doorway narrowly missing our nemesis, Gaedren Lamm. He held a pair of hand crossbows. He wasn’t what I expected. He was dressed in a tattered moth eaten grey cotton robe. He regarded us with yellowed eyes. His bald head was covered with a few wisps of grey hair. His skin was jaundiced and speckled with age. He limped. Hardly the menace I imagined from everyone else’s description. He sneered at me “ Ah yes you must be Yasmin’s brother, you look like her. You will be happy to know, I sold her virginity several times, and she was an excellent money maker for me the little whore, before she killed her self. “ With this he shot both Kari and I each in the chest with a quarrel from one of his two hand crossbows. Age hadn’t diminished his accuracy. Llaelda engaged Gaedren Lamm with her rapier and he shouted “ Gobblegut Din Din”. From the water boiled a huge crocodile.
The crocodile opened its maw and closed around the surprised Dwarven Paladin, Angus. Kanthos hit the crocodile with his great sword opening up its side. Gloriana called upon Sheylyn to bless us. I called upon Sarenrae's grace to heal us. Light burst from my Holy symbol, and Kari and my wounds healed. Kari advanced on Gaedren’s other side to engage him with her scimitar. I am sure she intended to flank him with Llaeda. Then Gradox the half elf bard and Talee the gnome sorcerer made it into the room dripping wet from their swim in the river.
Kuldak burst through the ceiling. With his battle axe high over head, his feat spread wide his kilt blew up into his face blocking his vision of the crocodile. The women’s eyes grew wide, as I averted my own. There were some things I did not want to see in this life. The startled crocodile fell back into the water dragging its prey under. Angus was gone. Kuldak landed squarely on his feet on the dock where the crocodile had been.
Our nemesis Gaedren Lamm took advantage of the distraction Kuldak provided and dove in the water. Llaeda was able to stab Laam with her rapier as he dove into the water. Several of us dove in as well. I headed down to the crocodile my scimitar lighting the way. Between Glorianna and myself, we drove off the crocodile and brought Angus to the surfaces. I don’t know what else happened under water. Kuldak told me that he loosened an arrow at Gaedram Lamm once his head broke the surface and killed him.
Gloriana and I healed Angus. Once we were all gathered in this basement room everyone was trying to decide what to do with Gaedren Lamms corpse. Kari Goldenhair the half elven druidess, wanted to have his body taken to a “good aligned temple, to see if we can get a speak with dead spell cast”. Somebody else asked how we were going to transport the coprse. I think I remember Koldak asking weather there was a reward for his sorry corpse.
Llaelda was working on picking the lock of a chest she found in Gaedren Lamms “bedroom”. It was full of refuse. I commented, “ Perhaps you should let your Colleague Kuldak help, your tool looks fatigued, see how it is bending? You don’t want to break your tool do you?” Llaeda turned and glared at me, her lock pick broke. As my comments drifted into the neighboring room there was a roar of laughter. Perhaps I had said something inappropriate in Taldoran common, which we are speaking here. Taldoran common is such an imprecise and inelegant language compared to my native Kelish.
In strode Kuldak with a big toothy grin on his face. “Little girl please to be leaving lock picking to real men. We know how to put tools into little holes yes?” Llaeda let her hair cover the rest of her face and stalked out of the room muttering. Kuldak pulled out a fish, and said in a helpful tone " Little girl I have something you can save for later" Roars of laughter. Llaeda released a string of expletives which only made us laugh harder. I have no idea where Kuldak was hiding the fish. Best not to ask.
On a table in the room was a hat box covered in flies. While Koldak was working on the chest, I opened the box, and dropped the lid in suprise “By the Horns of the Efreet! She is dead!” I continued “ it is Zalara, her severed head at least, she has been dead for weeks”. Beneath the severed head I found a wooden box with a Harrow deck inside. I heard a voice in my head, as I touched the deck. It was Zelara’s, she asked “ please come back to my home where I will be able to answer your questions”.
Instinctively I picked up one of the cards of the harrow deck and touched it to an obsidian wand sitting on one of the tables. I heard Zelara’s voice tell me that it was a wand of magic missiles. I relayed this to the group, and we agreed to give the wand to Talee the gnome sorcerer.
I found the Harrow deck in my pocket, even though I left the deck on the table. Hmm.
Kuldak got the chest open. We found some valuable little treasures in there. We even found a golden box we thought must belong to the queen.
We had a debate about what to do next. In the end we decided to have Angus the paladin of Torag, hold the treasure we had found, until we could get it sold. WE held a vot about what to do about the queen’s golden box, and everyone except Kuldak thought it would be a good idea to bring the box to the castle to see if we could get a reward. After I told the group what the spirit of Zelara had said to me through the her harrow deck, We decided to go fist to Zelara’s house. Then to the city guard to inquire about a bounty for Gaedren lamm, and possibly to the temple of Sarenrae to see if we could get one of the clerics to perform a speak with dead miracle on the corpse of Gadrian Lamm. Kari still wanted to know what had happened to her son.
We asked Vacily and Ivo Corbier (the characters of the players who were not here) to guard the corpse of Gaedren Lamm until we could return with priests of Sarenrae.
When we emerged from the fishery Korvosa was in flames. There were riots all over the place. The Hellknights were out. The sable company was flying over head on their gryphons. Fire was and angry mobs were everywhere. People were looting and assaulting each other. It was Chaos.
More to come…..
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As we progressed down the street we came upon a mob chasing a young man dressed in finery. Bottles were being thrown at him. We heard the mob shout “Dandy” “Queen’s man” “Fop” This was truly a dangerous situation. A madden mob could charge in any direction, and yet we couldn’t stand by while they killed this man to vent their anger.
One particularly large man with greasy muttonchops yelled, “ my brother lost his arm in an accident unloading barrels, He will never drink with that arm again. Ill bet you have never worked an honest day in your life” he yelled brandishing a crow bar. We drew our weapons, and Angus the dwarven paladin bellowed:” back off our you shall feel our steel”.
There was a tense moment where the crowed stopped and turned their attention on us and they shuffled back and forth, unsure what to do next. Then there was a shout from the other side of the crowd of “ it’s the guard” and the crowd bolted we pulled the man to the side of the street as the crowd passed with guards on horseback in pursuit. They didn’t seem to care about us.
The young man thanked us profusely. He was nicely dressed with a chiseled jaw and blond hair. “Thank you good sirs, my name is Amin Galento. Here is something for your trouble” he tossed us a small bag of coin. It was filed with platinum.
Glorianna gasped, “your not the Amin Galento? Oh my god, I have been to all your performances. You are Shelyn’s gift to Korvosa” With a wink and twinkle in his eye he took Gloriana’s hand and said “ the one and only” as he kissed her hand. Spying her sea shell pendent, he asked,” why my lady are you a servant of Shelyn, Goddess of art and perfection?” Glorianna blushed beautifully. “Well there is a party back at my place, would you care to be my muse?” Amin asked, not letting go of her hands. “Why I have never been anyone’s muse,” gushed Glorianna.
I noticed a distinctly predatory look in his eye. I debated whether to say anything. I remembered my sister Fatima, always did exactly the opposite of whatever I suggested, and resented me all the more for being right when she got into trouble. I have only just met Glorianna, and she isn’t my younger sister. We all have to make our own choices, and mistakes.
Amin Galento mentioned slyly “ I have lots of shiver at my place, it’s the best stuff from the Mwangi expanse”
Talee the gnome sorcerer began sweating and licking his lips “ the best stuff from the Mwangi expanse?” he asked nervously. Kari Goldenhair placed both hands on Talee’s shoulders and said sternly and motherly “ you are not going” Kuldak announced “ well old lady, I am always coming at parties. Lets go” Amin Galento winked, “Well my big man, your coming too? You know what they say, the more the merrier” Dargox the half orc bard piped up “ I can play the lute” he strummed tentatively at his instrument. Amin said testily “ well if you are only going to play your instrument you can come too” And with that, Glorianna, Kuldak and Dargox went off with Amin Galento to party. I thought Glorianna would be safe enough with to of our comrades.
We made it over to Zelara's house, and decided to make ourselves as comfortable as we could to wait out the riots. About an hour later Dargox showed up with Glorianna. She was hugging and writhing against everyone and everything in a happy daze. With an irritated “oh now she wakes up and wants to be friendly”, Dargox lets her slide of his shoulder onto the floor of Zelara's house. “ what happened my friend?” I asked. Dargox replied” Well Amin Galento intended to give her some shiver, and while she was out and dreaming, to have his way with her. She took the shiver, and then when she passed out and began dreaming, Kuldak pounced on him and held Amin Galento down. He said he would give him a good thrashing. I took the opportunity to get out of there with Glorianna while I could.” Glorianna squealed “I'm so happy this feels so good.”
I replied, “Dargox thank you did the right thing, she can weather out the effects of the shiver here”. Kari Goldenhair, the half elf Druidess, and Talee the gnome sorcerer, put Glorianna to bed in her bedroll amidst squeals of “I feel good”. The poor girl was going to have an awful morning and find out why the drug shiver is called shiver. Hopefully this experience will dissuade her from trying that vile stuff again. Who knows, we all make our own choices.
I noticed that Dargox was sweating profusely. “ You do not look well my friend please sit, I think you have caught a disease. “
“Yeah” Dargox replied, “ Old guy was muttering something about the eye of Groetus has turned from the Bone Yard to look on Korvosa, then he hugged me and coughed on me. He was sweating allot too.”
“ I need to examine your bodily humors to determine what sort of disease you have.” After I examined his boldly humors, the evidence pointed to a new disease, only recently emerged in southern Varisia. It was called Voral’s Phage. This morning in the Temple of Sarenrae I had seen a their first case of Voral’s Phage. I asked Dargox to sleep apart from us this night. Ideally I would have liked a separate room for him, but we will have to make do.
Dargox said this old man mentioned the Eye of Groetus was going to turn from the Bone Yard to Korvosa. Hmm. I remember when I was studying Pharisma’s faith, I read about Groetus. Pharisma is the goddess of fate death prophesy and birth. The text mentioned that Groetus is the god of the final Destruction. He or It is the destruction of all creation. Some argue he is only a symbol, some argue he is a deity. The Eye of Groetus refers to some sort of moon, which hangs in the sky of Pharisma’s Bone Yard. The craters on this moon form a pattern that makes the moon resemble a human skull. This “moon” is supposed to represent the end of all things. It is a harbinger of doom. Prophesy Feh.
Ever since the Aroden, the god of Human culture, innovation and history, died a century ago, prophesies have been failing. Besides people are always prophesizing the end of the world. In Sarenrae’s book of Light and truth, our holy book, it is written, “ if you are planting a sapling and the world is ending, finish planting the sapling. See the lilies how they neither spin nor toil yet they are clad in bright colors, as Sarenreae provides for them she shall provide for you. Worry not about the troubles of tomorrow, for today has enough as it is.” Anyways this mad prophet’s comment is worth noting and passing on.
The next morning I preformed my Salah, or ritual prayer at dawn. Kuldak arrived. He looking a little worse for wear. He was limping a little bit, as if he was saddle sore. He was also shaking uncontrollably and sweating. Shiver.
We all headed over to the temple of Sarenrae. Imam Raamiel greeted us. Imam Raamiel was a fellow Keshite, from my home Katheer in Qadira. He had attended the same chirgury college I had only ten years previously, and we knew many of the same professors. He greeted me in Katheeri “Ah my brother it is good to see you again. Our lady in her grace and mercy has brought you back to us. It looks like you have gathered a few stray cats as well yes?” He switched to Taldoran common “ please excuse me, I do not often have someone with which to speak my mother’s tongue. What do we have here?” I presented him with Dargox and Kuldak and Glorianna. Upon looking over Dargox Raamiel said “ ah our second case of Voral’s phage and two cases of shiver. “
Dargox continued to sweat. I asked “ my brother would it be possible to beseech our lady Sarenrae to remove the burden of this Phage from my friend Dargox?” Raamiel replied “ I have prepared that prayer this morning. Insalah, yes. Come “
We were led onto a balcony. It faced west and overlooked the sea. At one end of the balcony was a big mirror. This mirror reflected the morning light onto a couch in the middle of the balcony. Imam Raamiel brought a couple of bowls a pitcher or water and a cloth. He instructed Dargox to lie on his side. He asked me to put one bowl next to Dargox’s face, and to fill the other with water so I could clean his face and mop his brow. Imam Raamiel began praying to our lady. The gold thread in his robes began to glow. It might have just been the reflected morning light. He passed his hands over Dargox. A fit of coughing came over Dargox and he doubled over. After a minute of this he hacked up some black fungus looking stuff in the bowl I placed by his face. Then Raamiel took the bowl over to a stand near the balcony. The morning light fell on it, reflected by the mirror on the balcony. As we watched the black stuff evaporated in the light.
Raamiel then gently said “ Dargox you must drink plenty of water, to restore the balance of you bodily humors. This Voral’s Phage is vileness. Some foul necromantic process must have created it. I fear we have not seen the last of it. “ I took Raamiel aside at told him “ he caught this from some old man who was preaching the end of all things. Specifically this mad prophet mentioned that the Eye of Groetus has turned from the Bone Yard to Korvosa” Raamiel replied, “thank you my brother, I shall pass this along.”
Imam said to me “ alas we do not have any miracle to wipe away the effects of this drug. All we have is a patient touch a kind word, and lots of water” I replied “ well perhaps this experience will help to dissuade them from ingesting such poison in the future.”
“ Insalah my brother, Sarenrae willing, but we all make our own choices. Our lady in her mercy allows us that.” I replied “ Insalah my brother”
Kuldak and Glorianna were shown quite rooms with beds, where they rested, as they were wracked by shiver withdrawl. Their shaking became so violent we had to restrain them at times. We spent time giving them water and wiping their brow. After a few hours it passed.
Imam Raamiel conducted us out of the Temple of Sarenrae. “Now my brother, you must join us for dinner at the very least. Please spend some time with us. Our Lady the merciful knows, we can use another skilled Chirugeon here, and please, share with us what you have learned in the Veniciaan College of medicaments and Chirurary, and the college of Divinity. I graduated ten years ago, and I would love to know what the current theories are, and what they are discussing in the Divinity College as well. “ I replied “ gladly my brother. Insalah, Our Lady Willing, I will be able to spend this evening, or perhaps next evening here.” Raamiel replied “ I look forward to it my brother” and with that we were back in the streets of Korvosa.
A tension hung in the air. The sound of boots tramping rang off of the sides of buildings. The Hell knights were out. Everyone was out. After some debate we headed for the castle.
More to come......
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Castle Korvosa alone is a huge intimidating structure, no doubt by design. It’s many crenellated towers and high walls made of black granite, are decorated with many spikes and gargoyles. I was told that this grotesque architectural style was called Neo-Chelaxian. The keep was made even more impressive because it sat atop a huge four-sided step pyramid called a Mestaba. I was told it was of Thassiloian origin. In these trouble times the castle bristled with pikes and ballistas. Overhead the Sable Company flew their gryphons on patrol.
We headed up the grand stairs of the Mestaba to the guard post and presented the broach and ourselves. The guards conversed briefly amongst themselves and then the captain said “ all right you are to go in and see her grace, she wishes to thank you for bringing back her property. However I cannot allow you to enter her presence so armed. “
I relinquished my Scimitar and crossbow. A small mountain of weapons formed as various great axes, long swords, scimitars, war hammers etc, were piled in one corner of the guard room. At the captain’s signal we proceeded up the stairs to the castle proper. I had to admit, the view from the top of the grand mastaba, the pyramid, at the foot of the castle, was breathtaking. You could still see fires burning here and there across the sweep of Korvosa. The clouds hung heavy and black over the city. Here and there, a squad of the Sable Company Marines, mounted on their gryphons flew here and there on missions and patrols.
I was jerked out of my reverie by a sudden “Halt”. Pikes were leveled at us. Crossbows were trained on us. “All right Greenie hand it over” There was a screech as if from a large bird of pray and a huge thump. I turned around to see Kuldak squatting and puling a knife of his boot. Beyond him was a huge gryphon with a sable company marine riding him. Under the fore claws of the magical beast, was the limp form of Llaeda. The marine commented, “She tried to run” before taking off on his gryphon to patrol the castle precinct again.
Kuldak said “ what what? is kitchen knife for eating, I forgot. I don’t see big problem.” It's always a crapshoot with Kuldak
We were herded into a dungeon cell. After being left there for a couple hours to stew, an imposing figure entered into the cellblock. She was a tall gothic black haired beauty, dressed in resplendent plate mail. We were taken out of the cell one by one and interviewed by her.
Apparently satisfied, she said to the guard “ these adventurers don’t pose any threat to the queen bring them in to see her grace” and to us she said, “ I am Sabina Merrin, Her Grace’s personal Guard. What is your group called?” We muttered amongst ourselves, we hadn’t given that any thought. Then in exasperation she asked, “ well then how would you like to be individually introduced?” we gave her our names and professions. We were then led into an anti room before the throne room. There were red carpets and tapestries everywhere, set on the black granite of the castle. Sabina Merrin bid us wait in the anti room until we were each called. She announced each of us in a loud, clear voice, and we each entered the throne room in turn.
As we were being introduced, I had a moment to take in the throne room. The throne room itself was pristine but strangely empty. I recall it was an open area with a vaulted ceiling, stained glass windows of past kings and queens looking down from the eastern wall, and crimson tapestries hanging along the others. An immense fireplace offered additional light and heat to the hall. There was also a silk carpet
which provided a gently arching path to the throne’s base.
Queen Ileosa Herself sat upon the Crimson Throne. She was a
vision of celestial beauty despite the black mourning
dress and veil she wore in honor of her husband’s death.
In her lap was a small silver coffer. Sabina then produced the broach and passed it over to the queen with a flourish. After that she took up a position just to the left of the throne.
Dargox the half-orc bard began “ my lady..” but was silenced by a glare from both Sabina Marin and the queen. The poor fool didn’t know to wait until your betters have spoken before speaking. My head began aching and I wished I could massage my temples. The queen began.
“This brooch was stolen from me some time ago—I
had not expected to see it again, truth be told. And
yet, here on my darkest day, you come before me with
kindness. The return of this brooch is much more
than an honorable deed. It is inspiration. It is hope.
“I love Korvosa, as my husband did before me. His
death has shocked the city as it has me, but I will not see
his legacy destroyed in death, and I shall not see my city
torn apart. All Korvosa stands at the precipice of a disaster
wrought by her citizens—these riots cannot continue. You
have already done my heart a great service in returning
this bauble to me on this dark day, and you shall be
rewarded. Yet, perhaps you can serve your city more.
“If you so choose, I shall have Sabina see to it that you have
an escort of guards when you leave here—they can see to your
safe journey to Citadel Volshyenek. I shall send word ahead of
you to Field Marshal Cressida Kroft to let her know you are
on the way—the Korvosan Guard is stretched thin, and it can
certainly use the aid of heroes such as yourself. Now, I need
to retire to my personal quarters—my grief has drained me.
Again, I thank you for the kindness you have shown me, and I
hope your days of serving the crown are only just beginning.”
With a wave of her hand, Sabina reached into her lap, took the small silver chest and passed over to Angus the dwarven paladin of Torag. We bowed, and were escorted out of the Throne room. Sabina saw to it we were given an armed escort, and we were swiftly escorted or was it marched over to Citadel Volshynek home of the Korvosan guard.
More to come
::chuckle:: Someone in your campaign is a Brother Cadfael fan :)
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Out of Character
Gamer girl thank you for reading this. I didn’t think anyone else would. And you guessed it. I am a brother Cadfael fan. I didn’t think it was that obvious.
I suppose I should mention a couple of things.
First we are using the Pathfinder Rules.
Secondly, I am blatantly using passages of text from the Edge of Anarchy adventure here and there.
I also think that a list of Characters would be useful. There is now a pack of 11 of us.
Dramatis Personae
Imam Gabriel bin Sarenrae Al Katheer, Pathfinder: Human Male Keshite, 26, 1st level Cleric of Sarenrae. The campaign journal is from his perspective. These are the pages from his journal.
Currently he is searching for his wayward sister Fatima, who ran off from an arranged marriage and became a pathfinder. Gabriel’s father asked him to go look for her and bring her back to Katheer. Gabriel traveled from Katheer to Absolom and became a pathfinder himself. He has been tracking down his sister ever since. His trail has led him to Korvosa. With help from the spirit world, Gabriel found out the identity and helped get revenge on the kidnapper of a long lost sister Yasmin, whom Gaedren Lamm had Kidnapped 20 years ago, when Gabriel was only six.
Kuldak Half Orc Male, 1st level Rogue. Kuldak carries a great axe and sports a kilt. One never knows what kind of trouble he will get into or what kind of trouble he will pull a comrade out of. With Kuldak it’s a crapshoot.
Gaedren Lamm framed his brother for a crime.
He likes to pick on Laelda
Laelda Half elf Female 1st level Rogue. She is sullen and resentful. Wears her red hair in a loose ponytail, with her bangs covering a good part of her face. She was one of Gaedren Lamm’s Lambs, until he tortured her by burning her formerly beautiful face with acid. Kuldak often teases her.
Glorianna, Human Female 1st level Cleric of Shelyn. Glorianna is blond bubbly and naive. She is up for trying anything, anxious to experience life to the fullest, after living a sheltered life in a Convent. In a pinch she has shown surprising courage, diving into the river to save another, when there was a shark circling and taking bites out of one of her comrades.
Dargox, Half Orc Male 1st level Bard. Does his best to bolster the spirits of his companions with his music. Unfortunately he often puts his foot in his mouth, and drops his lute in the river. However, when the chips are down he does the right thing. He saved Glorianna from the predations of Amin Galento. Gaedren Lamm had kidnapped his sister, and made her into one of his “lambs” she was forced into begging.
Kari Goldenhair, Human Female, 45, 1st level Druid. She is the most recent addition to the group. Gaedren Lamm had killed her husband and sold her son into slavery. She has taken a motherly interest in Talee the gnome Sorcerer
Talee, Gnome Male 1st level Sorcerer. He has bright green hair and electric blue eyes Gaedren Lamm got him addicted on shiver.
Angus, Dwarven Male 1st level Paladin of Torag. Gaedren Lamm killed his parents and he worked hard as smith’s apprentice to raise his brothers and sisters.
Kanthos Human Male 1st level fighter. Kanthos wields a great sword with quiet precision. Gaedren Lamm killed his parents and he had to raise his brothers and sisters.
Vasily Half Orc Male 1st level Sorcerer. Gaedren Lamm had framed his father for a crime.
Ivo Corbierre, Human Male 1st level Ranger. Gaedren Lamm had murdered his father. Ivo Corbierre is silent but violent. In our first battle he shot Kanthos in the back with an arrow. Is he an asset or liability?
Our next game is this Saturday.
Out of Character
Gamer girl thank you for reading this. I didn’t think anyone else would. And you guessed it. I am a brother Cadfael fan. I didn’t think it was that obvious.
<snip>
You are welcome :) I am GMing Crimson Throne for my own group, so I love reading other folks takes on this great AP.
I recognized the name Ivo Corbierre as being from somewhere very familiar, and just happened to be rereading the series and started on book four yesterday. And there was Ivo!
Good luck with your campaign, and I look forward to the next installment :)
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Gamer girl thank you. I will need all the good luck I can get. I have a long and dubious relationship with lady luck. She is fickle at best, sometimes giving me lots of 1s and sometimes a few 20s.
I am one of the players not the DM. Around the table we have two people in their late 30’s, namely the DM and myself, one person in his early twenties, and the remaining eight players ages range from 18 to 12.
There are a couple of things I took dramatic license with because I thought it would make the story flow a little better, for example, when Ivo Corbierre shot Kanthos, he was already in the water with the circling shark, and the DM described him getting an arrow in the eye. I just felt that the story would flow a little better, if Kanthos was shot while teetering on the dock and then fell in. Also Ivo Corbier isn’t the characters real name. The kid who made the character chose Felical Dildong. Since creating the character three weeks ago, he hasn’t shown up for the first two sessions. I didn’t like the name, and since the player had not been there, I chose Ivo Cobierre, I thought that was a more menacing name then Feleical Dildong.
The first session, the wife of the player running Kuldak ran our errant ranger character Ivo Corbierre.
I also took dramatic license with the morning in the Temple of Sarenrae. The DM by necessity handled the whole remove disease with a couple of sentences. I wanted to develop a contact for myself, and to give some personality to the Temple I expect my character will be spending lots of time at.
With the DM wrangling 10 players and he is doing what I think is an excellent job ( if he wasn’t, he wouldn’t be “blessed” with so many players) , I am also using the campaign journal to augment his detailing of Korvosa and Golaron.
I am glad you enjoyed the read. I will begin posting the next session on
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Set, thank you for taking the time to read this campaign journal. It means allot to me that some other people are reading it. Yep 10 players +1 DM makes for a lively table. You may also know me as ElyasRavenwood. That is my main avatar on these boards. I will keep posting in the journal, and I hope i don't bore you all with my focus on minutia and details.
Speaking of details, Gamergrrl and Set how do you think I handled the escapade with Shiver, and the coming down off of its high? Did I put in too much? too little? Thanks.
Yes, is big party. Safety in numbers, perhaps, but is less treasure for each. Also, is more people for to be hiding legitimate business dealings from.
Friend Gabriel, my thanks being to you for your recounting of tale. Is, how you say? Painting me in good color? Yes.
Is good thing not be telling full extent of my near death at hands of puny spiders. Or being taken advantage of by drug addict after being secretly drugged with "shiver". Yes.
Speaking of details, Gamergrrl and Set how do you think I handled the escapade with Shiver, and the coming down off of its high? Did I put in too much? too little? Thanks.
So far so good :)
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In real life, for the past two weeks I have been in the hospital sick with Pneumonia. Thankfully I am on the mend, and out of the hospital. I have just gotten home. I am going to ask my friend Niska Kuldak, if he might be willing to fill in the couple of weeks while I was ill.
I suppose we can say, my character, Gabriel caught Voral’s Phage, from Dargox the bard, and has had to spend a day or two convalescing in the Temple of Sarenrae while another cleric prepared a Cure Disease, for my character. I will return to the gaming table next Saturday and continue this journal.
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This Entry attempts to cover the three sessions that I was absent for.
Sessions 3,4,and 5
As we were walking from Castle Korvosa to Citadel Volshynek I felt a pain grow in both of my temples. At first I thought that it must be from the sound of the marching boots of our armed escorts, but then I became dizzy, and I noticed that I was beginning to sweat. By the Efretti’s horns, I must have caught the disease that Dargox had, what was it called again, Voral’s Phage? I should have taken better precautions while tending to him the previous evening.
I informed the Sergeant, that I needed to go to the temple of Sarenrae. He shrugged, and I parted from company from my comrades. Luckily I was able to find my way back to the Temple in spite of the dizziness and disorientation. Sarenrae must have been guiding my steps.
I ran into Imam Raamiel on the Temple steps and he ushered me into the temple. He took me to the same balcony that we had brought Dargox to earlier this morning. It faced west and overlooked the sea. At one end of the balcony was a big mirror. This mirror reflected the sun light onto a couch in the middle of the balcony. Imam Raamiel brought a couple of bowls a pitcher of water and a cloth. He instructed me to lie on the couch. I began grousing. I told him I was fine. He reminded me that healers make the worst patients. So I lay down, well collapsed is more like it. My brother began cleaning and mopping my brow. It brought me some relief. Imam Raamiel then began praying to our lady. The gold thread in his robes began to glow. It might have just been the reflected day light. He passed his hands over me and I felt the warmth of our Lady infuse me. My Disorientation and fatigue passed. I felt better. “Now my brother, Do you feel better?”
I replied, “ yes I do, thank you, by the grace of our lady I have been healed.”
“ Alas no my brother, you are still sick, but this Miracle from our lady, has I have merely delayed, or suspended the Phage. We refer to this miracle as a Delay Disease. It allows you to rest in comfort and gather your strength to fight off the disease unburdened by symptoms, nor are you infectious either, but the disease is still there. It gives us time to treat sick patients. Tomorrow we will ask Sarenrae to lift this disease from you.
I spent the rest of the day reading and sleeping and pacing, wondering what my comrades were up to. As it turns out I convalesced for three days. There were cases worse then I, and of course those in most dire need of care must receive it first. In the evenings Raamiel would visit, and ask about various professors we both knew from the Veenician medical college, which we both attended. We also talked about new chirurgery techniques, and about what theology was being debated in the divinity college.
All the Worlds Meat.
Kuldak came to visit me and filed me in on what the group was up to. Gallatin Yellow stone, a new member of our group, has also let me read his journal, so I have two sources to use to piece together what has happened during my absence
Apparently the meeting with Field Marshal Cressida Kroft went well, and she put the group up in the Three Rings Tavern owned by Theandra Darklight, in the Five Corners. The group has decided to call themselves the “Reapers”.
The group’s first job was to deal with a rebellious group of guards led by a Veric Vankaskerkin a watch sergeant. They had taken over a slaughterhouse called All The World's Meat on Stirge Street. Marshal Kroft wanted them captured alive if possible dead if necessary. She wanted to know why they deserted. She offered 1,000 gp for the job. When I asked Kuldak how things went, he mentioned that it was a slaughterhouse.
Kuldak then related how the group approached the place in the afternoon. Laelda the half Elvin rogue, Dargox the half-orc bard and Kari the human Druid scouted out the butcher shop. Laelda was the first to go in. The salty meat was very smelly. Dargox and Kari soon followed Laelda in. Dargox bought ten pounds of meat, even though the two men there, one in a guard uniform, were giving the meat away. While distracted, Laelda was able to lift the key, and they all walked out of the butcher shop calmly. The guards realized too late that their key was stolen.
After this Laelda went to a hoar house and changed her hair from red to brunette. She hired two girls to pleasure her.
She found out that the guards in the All the World’s Meats were calling themselves “the cow hammer boys” and had been giving meat out for a while. If you wanted to hire them as mercenaries for a special job, you needed to ask for the “night’s special cuts”
They returned to All The Worlds Meat that evening and asked for “the nights special cuts”. After much hemming and hawing and some gold changing hands, the deserting guards agreed to do a mercenary job. They agreed to rough up Lamm’s house.
The Party now called the Reapers returned to Lamm's fishery and set up an ambush.
Ivo Corbiar wasn’t with the party and 4 thugs with long swords and 2 crossbows cornered him. The rest of the party left Lamm’s and went to help. After Ivo Corbier tried to tumble through the 4 attackers, but he was hit several times and collapsed into unconsciousness. Before the “cow hammer boys” could finish Ivo Corbier, the rest of the Reapers showed up to fight them. After a pitched battle all 4 men are slain. Ivo Corbier, who fell unconscious from loss of blood, was healed.
The party now had four corpses, and their 80gp back.
However a Guard patrol noticed them and challenged them. Papers were produced that showed they are acting agents of the Queen. The bodies are turned over to the guard, and the Reapers are allowed to go on their way.
The Reapers returned to All the Worlds Meat and began searching for Veric Vankaskerkin. The searched the upstairs and found his bedroom, empty with a broken window. They also found a rope leading out the window tied to the bed. Some of the party went out the window, and others descend the stairs and leave by a doorway. Veric Vankaskerkin peppered the party members with arrows while they climbed out of the window. Laelda took an arrow to the face and went down. The group cornered Veric Vankaskerkin and captured him.
Veric was tied up to a chair in the shop front of All the worlds meat. Veric denied everything vociferously even though several diplomatic attempts were made to convince him to reveal whom he was working for. A search of the entire Slaughterhouse began. Talee, Dargox, and Canthos went into the Mucks cesspool to search for evidence. Three Reptilian like Reefclawas attacked the three of them. Tale was clawed viscously by one of the monsters and fell unconscious, succumbing to his wounds. Tale was stabilized. Canthos and Dargox were able to dispatch the reefclaws.
Human bones were found in the cesspool. The group found evidence that part of the meat that was being sold was of the human variety. They brought Veric Vankaskerkin to Citadel Volshynek and turned him over to Field Marshal Cressida Kroft. The Reapers were paid 1,000 gp for their efforts.
Ha Interesting, Somebody wrote Cressida is a Foxy woman in the group’s journal. I wonder who that was. I will have to keep my eyes on peoples handwriting.
The Eel’s End
Kuldak informed me that the next job the group did for Marshal Kroft involved a matter of “delicate diplomacy”. The group was introduced to Vencarlo Orisni, one of the most renowned masters of fencing and swordplay in the city. Kuldak mentioned that Laelda seemed more interested in Vencarlo, then he was in her. This was odd to hear, because, now that I think of it, Laelda was flirting with Sabina Marin. I remember the sword maiden grabbing Laelda’s behind, as we were being lead from the dungeons of Castle Korvosa to the throne room. Hmm, Maybe the answer is a very simple one. Laeda is drawn to power and perhaps she will do anything to get close to power so she can have some power of her own. Well we shall see how things unfold. Enough of my unfounded suspicions about her.
Kuldak related the conversation between our group and our patron almost verbatim. I have recorded it here.
Field Marshal Kroft:
“As much as I would enjoy continuing the conversation, I
fear we just don’t have time. Vencarlo has often come to me
with news of important changes on the streets, and this is
no different—indeed, what he’s learned could degrade into
sanctions, embargos, or even war against Cheliax if we don’t act
now. This problem is a man named Darvayne Gios Amprei. You
might have heard of him—he’s an ambassador from Cheliax
whose disdain for Korvosa is well documented, and yet he’s
taken great pleasure in what our city has to offer. Even before
this recent unrest, this man was ready to recommend to his
government a sanction on trade, or perhaps even an embargo.
Vencarlo has learned through his own considerable sources
that Ambassador Amprei’s actual goals are to undermine
Korvosa’s economy to the point where he can buy up large
portions of the city from desperate landholders and establish
himself in a position of power here. Whatever the ambassador’s
reasons, we can’t let his bias or personal plans hurt Korvosa.
Yet neither can we take drastic action—not only would killing
him be wrong, but it’d simply martyr him in Cheliax’s eyes.
“Fortunately, Darvayne has his foibles. Again, Vencarlo has
learned that Ambassador Amprei has been making fairly regular
visits to a place in Old Korvosa called Eel’s End. This den of
vice is run by a dangerous man named Devargo Barvasi, better
known in Korvosa’s alleys as the King of Spiders. I’d love to put
Barvasi out of business, but he pays his vice taxes regularly
and never causes any problems—in fact, since he keeps his
business constrained entirely within the five ships moored at
Eel’s End, he’s actually one of the least of my worries. Truth be
told, I can’t decide whether Devargo is a stirge or a kraken. He
seems like a bloodsucking pest most days, but sometimes I
fear just how far his tentacles have wormed their way into our
great city. In this case though, his insidious web stretching
across Korvosa’s underworld might prove to our advantage.
“Devargo would never let someone he recognizes as an ally
of the Guard into Eel’s End, but your group’s a different case.
I’d like you to pay a visit to Eel’s End and secure an audience
with Devargo. Find out what he knows about Amprei, get
proof of any illicit goings-on the ambassador might be
involved with, and bring that proof to me to use to undermine
any forthcoming attempts by him to get Cheliax to cut us off.
Devargo might not be willing to part with his information
easily. I’ll supply you with some gold to bribe him, and
whatever’s left over you can keep for yourself. Remember:
the man is dangerous, but so are you—if things get violent, I
wouldn’t mourn his passing.”
Vencarlo accompanied the group and chatted with them as they headed for the Eel’s End. He happily showed off his rapier, and demonstrated a few cuts thrusts and ripostes. The Eel’s End was located in the eastern waterfront of Old Korvosa. It was one big boat with for smaller boats surrounding it all tied off to a pier.
The “twin tigers” was a gambling den
The “house of clouds” was a brothel
The “dreams of the dragon” was a drug den.
The “ Golden hawk” was an inn of sorts.
The Eel’s end deck was the administrative center of the vice boats.
By using a mixture of diplomacy and threats Kari Tale Dargox, Vasily, and someone I don’t know Azitar, got to the back room on the Eels’ end. The Reapers, our group, got to meet Devargo, self styled King of the Spiders, and the local crime boss. In Devargo’s “audience chaber” there were six thugs. Devarg asked two of them to fight. Next he grabs a large cat sized spider and tosses it into a nearby bird cage. Inside is a pseudo dragon. Devargo has spiders crawling all over him.
When offered 100 gp, Devargo only confirms that he knows something about the Ambassador. After being offered another 400 gp Devargo’s interest is perked, but he insisted on playing a game of “knives”.And with another 1,000 gp Devargo offered to give the group the information they need. The group all successfully played a game of knives. They also coughed up another 1,000 gp. When Devargo went downstairs, Dargox went on playing a lute tune. Tale levitated the pseudo dragon, named Majenko, to the top of the cage, to be tortured by spiders. Dargox had an idea to free Majenko. Silas the rouge got called in to open the cage, while Dargox was distracting everyone with his singing. However some of the guards notice. Silas got pummeled by the guards and then “flushed “ downstairs where there were larger spiders by Devargo. The group pretended not to know him (They harldy did). Spiders sucked on his marrow.
Devargo said the ambassador had an affair. There were letters and Devargo has intercepted them. He sold them back to the Ambassador, but he had two left which he handed over to the group.
The group leaves the Eels end, and heads over th the Twin tigers, the gambling boat. A guy named Ford tries to introduce himself. (I think Ford is a newly minted character after the Silas character got eaten by spiders)
From what Kuldak told me the group enjoyed all the pleasures and excitement that the Eel’s End had to offer. Laelda and Kuldak went to the whorehouse, while the others went to the gambling den. Laelda hired the Madam to pleasure her, while Kuldak hired the other six women. The group also gambled. He told me they liked a dice game in particular. They lost some money. Apparently Laelda was able to find out the information about Dvargo. He manufactures Shiver.
The Pseudo dragon was able to escape with the groups help and decided to go as Tale’s companion for the time being. Laelda, Ivo Corbier, and Kuldak decided to do more gambling. They were ambushed by for invisible imps because Angus for some reason did not alert the group to their presence. Majenko summoned a pack of Pseudodragons to fight the imps of.
The group ran into one of Vincarlos old students Grau, he was drunk gambling and a mess. He mistook Kanthos as an old friend. And latched onto the group. They helped him get cleaned up and sober. a lesser restoration spell later Grau then headed back to the guard to get his life back on track.
By this time I was cured of Voral’s Phage. I decided to stay in the Temple of Sarenrae and serve in the Hospice for the next week tending to the sick.
Kuldak continued to keep me up to date. Over the next week Korvosa seemed to calm down. Laelda and Kuldak went over to Vincarlos to try and get some training. Apearently Vincarlo sences the anger and darkness in Laelda’s heart and he does not offer to train her. Kuldak however catches his attention and he gets some training, and an offer to train the rest of the group.
The Shingles chase
Then rumors that the King did not die of natural causes and that the Queen was behind the death began to emerge. The city became restless again, with mob violence beginning to break out. Then a new story emerged from the rumor mill. Apparently a young artist named Trinia Sabor poisoned the King. The city once again erupted into mob violence.
The while at their inn, a breathless guard whom burst in suddenly approached the group. He told them that Field Marshal Cressida Kroft was coming to see them. The marshal arrived a few minutes later. Once everyone was in a private room she began to speak.
“You’ve doubtless heard the stories that the king’s killer has
been named. Yet there’s something more going on here, I’m
afraid. Queen Ileosa could have quietly had this Trinia Sabor
arrested at any time, yet the way in which she revealed the
information to the city seems to me like she wants
the riots to come back. Certainly, with the mob
and the Hellknights out on the street, the girl
doesn’t stand a chance at a trial—they’ll lynch her
the moment they find her. And even if she did
kill the king, mob justice isn’t the way. Worse,
if she’s innocent, the real killer can use this
distraction to throw us off the trail forever.
“Before Trinia is executed, we need to be
absolutely sure she did this thing. And
that means we need to catch her before
the mob. We know where she lives—a
flat in Midland at 42 Moon Street—but
soon, so will the mob. The Hellknights
don’t seem to care as much about catching her as they
do about containing the mob—something about
the “order of law” makes it a greater priority for
them to contain than a possible assassin. I can’t
say I disagree completely, but the problem is,
the Hellknights are only making it worse. The
mob’s covering most of Midland now, and
Trinia’s flat is near the middle of the mess. I’ve
got all available guards at work keeping things
from getting any worse—and if I were to send
them into Midland, they’d trigger a riot.
“I’m sure you can see where this is going.
I need you to get into Midland, find Trinia,
and bring her back to me so we can deliver
her, safe and sound, to somewhere where
she can be interrogated—preferably with magic, so
we can be absolutely sure about her role in Eodred’s
death. Get in there, catch her, and get out without
letting the mob get its hands on her. I’ll have agents
and officers nearby. If you can get her to one of
them, we’ll be in the clear. Any questions?”
The group enters the Midlands even though there are mobs about. They head up to her third floor tenement, and after bursting open the door, (she had stacked a set of drawers in front of it, they noticed she was sleeping on her cot. Soon the group noticed this was an illusion. Upon peeking out of the window, they spotted her inching along the gutter and roof. A roof top chase began.
Tale, Kari, Lialda and Kuldak pursued her. Lialda leaped, and cleared one rooftop, but tripped and didn’t make the second rooftop. Kari and Tale, made the second rooftop. Triana used a wand and dazes Kari. Kuldak made it to the second rooftop but Triana made it across to another rooftop. Lialda falls again. Gloriana made it up to the rooftop level. Tale tried to sneak past a chimney, but got stuck. Triana got across to another rooftop. And used her wand to daze Kuldak. Ivo Corbier made it to the rooftop as Kuldak realized his kilt exposes himself wile bounding across the rooftops. Kari moved up and Triana moved along two more rooftops. Tale pursued again across two roofs. Lialda gets with Triana’s wand and Kuldak attempted to fit into a small hole. Ivo Corbiear moved up two roofs, and Kari moved up right behind Triana. Gloriana teeters but made it to the next roof. Triana bounded over three roofs with Tali and Kari in hot pursuit. Triana shot another daze from her wand at Tale but misses. The others moved up. Lialda moved up right behind Triana but doesn’t manage to grab her. (I think she missed by I for a grapple)
Tale sent Majenko the pseudo dragon to bite and stun Triana but it missed. The daze wand struck Lialda, and Kuldak fell, and landed unconscious on the ground bleeding. After several more failed attempts (Dammed dice) Dejectedly the players returned to the street. Gloriana healed Kuldak. Kari suggested tracking her. The players did so and sent Majenko out to scout. Majenko saw Triana cornered by Sable Marines astride their Gryphons. Trianna was then put in chains, and carried off by the sable marines on one of their gryphon.
The group decides to report on what happened to Cresseda. She seems a little upset at the news but glad the mob or the Hellknights didn’t get Triana. Though Triana had been captured, more riots begin.
More later
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Saturday evening I was able to get to the game at Toy city. It felt good to be back at the gaming table and to see my friends again. In the interim the group had calved, and five people had broken off to play another game. There were two new players (to me) at the table. There were now six players (including myself) and the DM who is running Glorianna.
I am enjoying writing this campaign journal. I will admit to cutting and pasting from the PDF. I hope nobody minds. If anyone does, I will stop. The folks at Paizo are excellent writers, and often their text conveys the information in the adventure far better then I can.
New Dramatis Personae
Imam Gabriel bin Sarenrae Al Katheer, Pathfinder: Human Male Keshite, 26, 1st level Cleric of Sarenrae. The campaign journal is from his perspective. These are the pages from his journal.
Currently he is searching for his wayward sister Fatima, who ran off from an arranged marriage and became a pathfinder. Gabriel’s father asked him to go look for her and bring her back to Katheer. Gabriel traveled from Katheer to Absolom and became a pathfinder himself. He has been tracking down his sister ever since. His trail has led him to Korvosa. With help from the spirit world, Gabriel found out the identity and helped get revenge on the kidnapper of a long lost sister Yasmin, whom Gaedren Lamm had Kidnapped 20 years ago, when Gabriel was only six.
Kuldak Half Orc Male, 1st level Rogue. Kuldak carries a great axe and sports a kilt. One never knows what kind of trouble he will get into or what kind of trouble he will pull a comrade out of. With Kuldak it’s a crapshoot.
Gaedren Lamm framed his brother for a crime.
He likes to pick on Laelda
Laelda Half elf Female 1st level Rogue. She is sullen and resentful. Wears her red hair in a loose ponytail, with her bangs covering a good part of her face. She was one of Gaedren Lamm’s Lambs, until he tortured her by burning her formerly beautiful face with acid. Kuldak often teases her. She has told us she prefers the company of women.
Glorianna, Human Female 1st level Cleric of Shelyn. Glorianna is blond bubbly and naive. She is up for trying anything, anxious to experience life to the fullest, after living a sheltered life in a Convent. In a pinch she has shown surprising courage, diving into the river to save another, when there was a shark circling and taking bites out of one of her comrades.
Talee, Gnome Male 1st level Sorcerer. He has bright green hair and electric blue eyes Gaedren Lamm got him addicted on shiver. He now has a Pseudodrago naned Majenko for a friend.
Gallatin Yellowstone, Human male 1st level Fighter. He is a quite but friendly warrior in training who hails from Sandpoint. He is a student of Vin Carlo Orisini. I believe he is a fellow Pathfinder.
Ford Prefect, Human male, 1st level rogue. He is another gregarious rogue. We shall see how the three rogues like each other.
Session 6
The Dead Warrens
Luckily I was abele to rejoin the party just as they were returning to Citadel Volshynek to report our Patroness Field Marshal Cressida Kroft, after their less then successful attempt to catch Trinia Sabor as she lead them on a mad chase across the rooftops and shingles of the Midlands district of Korvosa.
One of the guards nervously mentioned as we were being ushered into her office
“One of those Shoanti kids went and got
himself killed, and now the rest of them are all worked
up—if it’s not one riot about to erupt, it’s another! Field
Marshal Kroft’s in her office now, trying to talk some sense
into the Shoanti ambassador—in fact, she mentioned that
she’s looking for you all to help with the situation.”
As we were ushered into Field Marshal Cressida Kroft's office, we found that she was not alone. With her was a rail thin older man, perhaps of 60 winters. He leaned heavily on a walking stick, the polished femur of some giant beast crowned with a firepelt cougar’s skull. He wore a shirt decorated with countless jangling animal bones, many painstakingly scrawled with dozens of tiny symbols and glyphs. A bearskin cloak was draped about his bony shoulders, and war paint in the shape of a skull decorated his face. The old man’s eyes were milky as if he were blind, though he seemed to have no trouble seeing. Pearched on his shoulder was what I guessed to be a familiar, a regal red-feathered razor crow named Eats-Eyes. The old man regarded us impassively while Cressida introduced him as Thousand Bones, a Way-Keeper for the Skoan-Quah,
the Clan of the Skull. Cressida bade us to sit. She then elaborated.
“As you may or may not know, tensions between Korvosa and the Shoanti have existed since the city’s foundation some 300 years ago, when Chelish colonists attacked and defeated the Shoanti tribes who dwelt in the region destined to become the largest city in Varisia. Forced to retreat and relocate into the inhospitable Cinderlands northeast of Korvosa, the Shoanti persevered and even flourished, and many among them preach that the time to take back their ancestral homeland is nigh. Yet in Korvosa itself, the Shoanti seek a more peaceful accord. Led by
a visionary shaman known as Thousand Bones, a large group of Shoanti have been in talks with the Korvosan government for years now, hoping to find a way their two people can coexist in peace. Thousand Bones’s mission is anything but easy. A large number of Korvosa’s citizens are prejudiced against the Shoanti and see them as little more than violent
barbarians. Curbing and moderating the violence between these racists and the quick-to-anger Shoanti who dwell in and near Korvosa is a constant battle for the Ambassador and myself. A group of racist thugs have taken the opportunity to use the unrest and the mob violence to fuel their own agenda. They have killed the grandson of the Ambassador Thousand Bones, a Way-Keeper for the Skoan-Quah, the Clan of the Skull. His name was Gaekhen.”
Cressida then turned the floor over to Thousand Bones. The
old shaman spoke with a deep voice, his words carefully
chosen but delivered with a barely restrained anger.
“My people have worked hard to understand yours, yet it seems
each day we see new examples of how your people work just
as hard to foster old hatreds. My grandson is dead, beaten to
death by cowards in your city street. I do not blame you, yet still
Gaekhen is dead, and my son and his kin are not so forgiving as I.
They wish to return to the Skoan-Quah in the Cinderlands, to join
with the Sklar-Quah and rally to war against Korvosa. This would
be disastrous, for both our peoples. Amends must be made.
“Our ways are not as yours. If a body does not go whole to
the fires of the gods, the smoke of a warrior’s spirit cannot rise
to the Great Sky with honor and dignity, his father and brothers would listen to me and stay their wrath—the talks of peace between my
people and yours can continue. But he was not just murdered.
His body was taken from the scene of his death, sold by a
peddler of corpses to a necromancer named Rolth, a criminal
to both our people. I have spoken with the spirits, and they have
revealed to me that Gaekhen’s body has been taken to a place
below your boneyard, a place the spirits call the Dead Warrens.
“With this knowledge, I could surely lead a group of my finest
warriors into your boneyard to retrieve Gaekhen’s body, but this
would be seen as an act of aggression by your people. No, it
falls to you to make amends for what has been done. You must
bring me Gaekhen’s body, lest we be forced to recover him
ourselves. And although it pains my heart to say it—we
will not be gentle if it comes to this.”
Moved by his loss I said “ Father it grieves me to hear of the loss of your great son”
He replied, “ it is not for us to question when the Spirits choose to take us”
I replied “ Insalah, Sarenrae Willing” With that he took his leave of us.
Cressida then continued, “ I need you to get to this immediately, we have enough trouble as it is, with the city rioting, we certainly don’t need hordes of angry Shaoti tribesmen descending upon us from the north. I just hope that this isn’t the match that starts a huge angry blaze. Finding the body of Gaekhen, his grandson, and returning it to Thousand bones, will go along way to diffusing tensions. If you successfully complete this job there is another thousand gold in it for you. Any Questions?”
Gallatin Yellow stone, a new member of our group, had a few very pertinent questions. He asked “ Who is Rolth?”
Cresseda replied, “He’s long been a thorn in my side. A failed Academae student, Rolth’s a monster of a man who was expelled after the true nature of his experiments were revealed. He was butchering vagrants, stray animals, and anything else he could get his hands on to try to build some sort of golem from their collected parts. The Academae didn’t press charges because it didn’t want to cause a scene—it just quietly expelled him and the man’s been trouble ever since. We suspect he’s responsible for nearly a dozen slayings, each involving mutilation to the body, but to date we haven’t been able to find him or locate his lair. He might or might not be in the Dead Warrens, but anything you can find there that could lead to his arrest would be greatly appreciated.”
Gallatin asked, “ What are the Dead Warrens?
Cresseda replied: “Korvosa’s Gray District is riddled with underground chambers, some of them burrowed by ghouls or other monsters, others remnants of ancient Shoanti burial grounds. Some of these warrens
are patrolled and kept clear of monsters by the church of Pharasma, yet the Gray District is a large place and the tunnels below are vast and tangled. The Pharasmen focus on containing the problems with undead and necromancers, but as soon as they wipe out one, it seems as if two are ready to spring up in its place. The problem’s particularly vexing in Potter’s Ward, where the bodies of the poor and homeless are buried. According to Thousand Bones, the Dead Warrens were one of his people’s burial vaults, chambers that lie under Potter’s Ward.”
Gallatin asked, “Where are the Dead Warrens?”
Cresseda replied: “We have the man who sold Gaekhen’s body to Rolth in custody: a simpleton named Elkaris. He spilled everything when we told him what was going on and how much trouble he was in—in any event, Elkaris says he delivered the body via wheelbarrow to a partially collapsed mausoleum deep in Potter’s Ward, near the southern edge. A toppled and headless statue of a sword-wielding gargoyle lay in the dirt near the mausoleum’s entrance—he was told to leave the body behind the gargoyle. This location matches where Thousand Bones believes the Shoanti burial grounds called the Dead Warrens used to be located, so that’s the best place to start the search.”
Gallatin asked, "How will we recognize Gaekhen’s body?”
Cresseda replied: “Thousand Bones described Gaekhen as about 18 years old with short brown hair and a distinctive scar from a firepelt’s claw on his left cheek. Furthermore, Gaekhen had several large and distinctive Shoanti tribal tattoos on his arms and torso—it’s unlikely that any other freshly-killed Shoanti are in the Dead Warrens today, so
that should be a dead giveaway.”
With that we gathered our things and headed to the Grey District and into the Potters ward. We began looking for tracks. We found a long sinuous track with footprints on either side. There were also some smaller strange tracks. Whatever left those tracks had only four toes. I thought it must have been a Salamander, because they were, large snakes, and this to me looked like a big snake track with a man following. I thought Azers, other creatures from the elemental plane of fire, made the strange tracks. Some had their doubts, but I was certain. Salamanders and Azer made the tracks.
As we headed into the Dead Warrens, down a tunnel, the smell of rotting flesh wafted out. The walls were lined with strangely luminescent lichen, which gave off an eerie blue light. The first room we came to was large and square; with four pillars in the middle of it supporting a vaulted domed ceiling nearly 20 feet height. To the east and west were pits filled with bones. To the south there was also a crude hole gouged into the wall that lead to a tunnel beyond. The walls were of dressed stone.
As soon as we arrived, we must have woken the dead, because the bones began to stir and knit together into skeletons. In the western pit five skeletons arose. Kuldak charged into their midst, Swinging his great axe. I followed. Kuldak connected with one of the skeletons, but being all bone, they proved resistant to Kuldak's axe. I called upon Sarenrae “ By Our lady the Dawnflower, Return to the dust from whence you came, and trouble the living no more for thou art Dead. “ I felt Sarenrae’s warmth and power flow though me and out of my holy symbol that I was holding forth. Pure white light poured forth and burst forth. The skeletons were seared by holy light of Sarenrae. They were charred but did not collapse.
The five skeletons fell upon Kuldak in a fury of teeth and boney claws, biting and mauling him. He dropped like a sack of potatoes. I then faced the agonizing choice of whether to heal my friend or harm the Skeletons.
I called upon Sarenrae again and channeled her power with a “ Sarenrae, please help, your servant is very frightened”. I felt Our Lady’s power burst forth and sear the skeletons to ashes.
Meanwhile a horror arose out of the eastern pit of bones. It was huge, much larger then a man. I looked like it might be a bear, however its head was wrong, it was the head of a raptor. Tale hissed, “its an Owlbear Skeleton.” Gallatin and Laelda moved into engage it. Unfortunalty the skeleton proved resistant to their blades as well. While they were able to chip at it, they were unable to land a solid blow. Ford Prefect, the new rogue, was able to land a solid blow by throwing a dagger hilt first. Tale the gnome sorcerer was able to summon, arcs of lighting and he hurt it. The Owlbear skeleton turned on Laelda and bit her. She crumpled. It also landed a good scything blow on Gallatan with it’s claws.
Glorianna moved to the center of the room and called upon Shelyn’s grace. The Goddess of art and beauty heard her call and answered. Her grace filled the room. A multi hued light filled the room, of all sorts of colors. The Domed ceiling of the room briefly looked like an impressionistic painting of the sky, and it looked like Ivy surround the columns in the room, We heard the sound of music as well, and Kuldak, Laelda, and Gallatin injuries healed somewhat. Gloriana also prayed for Shelyn to bless the party, and Shelyn did.
Ford Prefect, our newfound rogue, dashed in, tumbled onto Laelda, and rolled Laelda to her feet. He ended up behind the Owl bear skeleton, flanking it. I commented “ Now Laelda knows what it is like to be rolled by a real man, it has puts her on her feet”.
About this time dark cloaked figures emerge from the hole in the southern wall. They began firing crossbows at Glorianna and myself. Thanks to Sarenrae the merciful they missed us.
Both Kuldak and Gallatin moved to intercept this new threat. A poisoned bolt hits Gallatin. The cloaked figures then switch from their crossbows to short swords.
The Skeletal Owlbear, was between both Ford Prefect and Laelda. Neither were able to make much progress with their edged weapons. Tale the gnome sorcerer, with his eletrictiy, was able to send bolt after bolt into the skeletal monstrosity, injuring it terribly. Laelda did land the final killing blow.
I also moved in with Gallatin and Kuldak to intercept the incoming threat. We later learned we were dealing with Derro. One of them began to cast a magical spell and everything went dark. Kuldak however could see. He asked for one of the clerics to bring forth light. I called upon Sarenrae, and light filled the room canceling out the magical darkness.
Once the darkness was canceled, only one Derro was left standing. I think Kulkad laid the other low, under the cover of the darkness spell. Unfortunately it cast a sonic stunning spell. The Derro retreated down the passageway. Gallatin and Tale pursued it with Tale’s light spell. Suddenly the Derro disappeared.
We headed through the hole in the southern wall and found ourselves in a passageway. It forked in two. I heard that our comrades had taken the left passageway, and we followed. The passageway opened up into a natural cave like ovaloid chamber, roughly 25’ by 25’. Three wooden tables stood in the middle of this room, their surfaces stained red with old bloodshed. To the east stood a ten foot wind hutch with wicker doors opening into a straw lined cage.
The body of a dead vagrant was strapped to one of the tables. Four stirges had attached to it, and drained it of blood. They were sitting in a happy bloated torpor too full of blood to move. However two stirges were flying about the room in search of a fresh meal.
Both Laelda and I were on the menu. One stirge attacked each of us. Both Laelda and I were bitten by a stirge. The Stirges began to drain our blood. Things got rather messy and confused after that. I think Kuldak was trying to help Laelda but he missed the stirge and stabed Laelda. Laelda furious tried to swing at him, and barely missed him. They both profusely mentioned that they were trying to go after the Stirge. Rogues.
I do know that Gallatin was trying to help me. Gallatin swung at the Stirge and missed. He wounded me instead. In my weakened state I collapsed from wounds, and knew no more. Gloriana healed me, and the Stirge was disposed of.
Gallatan apologized profusely. “Please my friend do not worry, I know that you were trying to help”. I went over to heal Laelda. I killed the remaining stirges.
We searched the entrance room and this room, but found nothing further of interest. Two passages lead out of this room, one to the east and another to the west. We took eastern passage. There was a short flight of stairs down to another chamber. This chamber was more like a hallway then a chamber. It was ten feet wide and about 100 feet long. The walls and ceilings of this tall hallway were encrusted with dozens of yawning skulls; their mouths open into Dark holes in the wall. The rogues got to work searching and disarming the traps. I have seen many strange things in this world, but never have I seen a half-orc disarm a skull trap embedded into the wall by mounting it. With Kuldak, it’s always a crap shoot.
Just as the Rogues were finishing with their various techniques of disarming the traps, we heard an ominous rattle and hiss. Three creatures pealed off of the wall. They were like skeletal snakes. Necrophidius. They began to weave and dance hypnotically. Everybody in the party except myself became entranced and dazed. The necrophediusi moved in and began attacking me. I got bitten a couple of times. By Sarenrae’s grace, I did not succumb to their paralytic bite. I called upon Sarenrae’s grace and power to drive them off “ back fiends, and by Sarenrae trouble us no more.” Thankfully I was able to turn the undead away and they fled from the Light of Sarenrae.
The rest of the party then came around.
More to come …..
That is it for this session, The next session will be next Saturday.
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Session 7 Even More of the Dead Warrens
The Adventurers who were present
Imam Gabriel, Human male Keshite, 2nd level cleric of Sarenrae,
Glorianna, Human female 2nd level cleric of Shelyn
Lielda (I have been spelling the characters name incorrectly all this time)
Half Elvin Female 1st level Rogue/ 1st level fighter
Ford Prefect, Human male 1st level rogue
Talé gnome male sorcerer 2nd level
Aristana Elvin Female Ranger 1st level (possibly a new addition, no back story yet)
Kanthos Human Male 1st level fighter (late in the evening he mad a timely cameo appearance to help with a tough battle, he also switched from wielding a great sword to a scythe.)
After everyone shook off their Enchantment from the Necrophidiusi, we preceded to the end of the corridor where we found two doors, one to the north and the second to the east. We tried the eastern door.
“ Mr. Prefect, would you be so kind as to examine the door for traps”
After a moment of grumbling and listening at the door, Mr. Prefect did so. He found no traps. Nor did he hear anything. Growing impatient, Lielda kicked down the door, and both the rogues hurtled into the room beyond.
In this room we found wooden tables stacked with vials, beakers, and other alchemical gear. The southern table was heaped with broken vials and leaned awkwardly on a hastily repaired leg. Three large cauldrons sat against the east wall, one of them
upended. Its foul, rancid contents of rendered fats had spilled over part of the floor.
Standing next to one of the tables was another Derro, holding a beaker. He stammered in surprise and dropped his beaker.
On the table next to him was strapped a female human figure covered with a sheet. Tubes went from under the sheet down under the table to a variety of glass containers, collecting fluids, and emptying fluids into the shroud draped human female figure on the table.
Both Ford prefect and Lielda raced and tumbled around into a flanking position around the Derro. Talé cast a magic missile spell and a bolt of magical energy flew across the room and slammed into the Derro. Mr. Prefect got his blade stuck in a wooden table. Lielda slashed at the Derro with her blade and drew blood.
Glorianna and I uncovered the body on the table. Before us was horrible sight. An Elvin women, was on the table naked. There were many leather restraints holding her immobile on the table. Numerous needles attached to tubes punctured her body. Blood and other fluids were being drained. What was more disturbing was that other mysterious clear fluids were being poured into her body. A quick check of her pulse revealed she was alive but unconscious. Glorianna and I began to removed the needles and undo her restraints. As I removed her restraints I accidentally exposed her.
All of a sudden she leaped up, grabbed a pair scalpels off the table, and pounced on the Derro. Whatever nerve the Derro had broke and he ran. We all gave chase. We ran the Derro down and killed him. Lielda then yanked a small satchel of gold from Ford Prefect. “ You lifted this from the Derro”
Ford Prefect didn’t deny it. I said, “ Mr. Prefect, It is not a good idea to steal from your comrades, it breeds resentment and distrust. We have after all three rogues in the group. In the future I would advise you not to do this.” I don’t know if Lielda was also skimming from the group as well. She probably was, and simply did this to make her look “honest”. Rogues. We have three of them. We only need one. On the other hand, you can never have to many clerics in your party.
When we returned the elven women was searching around the room and she had found a chest. She was facing away from us and she bent over at the waist to open up the chest. There were a variety of interesting reactions from our group. I think Lielda began drooling from both ends. She walked over and playfully smacked the Elvin women on the behind while she was bent over. The elf then tried to trip Lielda but she danced away. Ford prefect and Talé appeared indignant. Glorianna asked almost tentatively “are you all right?”
I walked over and held my cloak up to give her some privacy while she dressed. “My name is Imam Gabriel, I am a cleric of Sarenrae. Lady, might I ask your good name?” As she was dressing she replied tersely “ The names Aristana. I’m a ranger”.
I replied, “ We are an adventuring company called the reapers. Do you have any idea who did this to you?”
Aristana said “ well I was just out at a pub in north end getting some beer to wash the dust out of my throat when I passed out. I have vague memories of these Derro looking over me, and pain, and someone named Rolf who would peer at me. He appeared to be in charge. I remember he would say, “Excellent Smithers, I am very pleased with your progress” and a “thank you Mr. Rolf you are most generous”. Aristana continued “ I plan to find Rolf and kill him for what he did to me.”
Gloriana said, “ Well we are after him too. We have to recover the body of a Shaonti warrior prince, shall we work together?”
Aristana said “that works for me” With a couple of minor prayers to our respective goddesses; Gloriana and I healed the minor wounds left by the needles that were in Aristana.
To the south was another door. “ Mr. Prefect would you be so good as to examine and open the door?” I said. Mr. prefect did so. He opened it.
This room beyond was once a pantry. It was in shambles. Broken crates
and shelves lay strewn about the place, with the foodstuffs, firewood, and other supplies they once contained scattered across the floor. In the middle of the room was a horrifying abomination. A disgusting amalgamation of dead animal parts lurched from the shadows. The foul-smelling pieces were stitched together with thick black thread in a shape to approximate that of a man, yet it is certainly not human. Cobbled together from bits of a dozen carcasses from half as many different species, the staggering shape uttered a gurgling cry as it shambled forth to attack. It landed a viscous blow to Mr. Prefect and he retreated into the Alchemy lab where we were gathered. We noticed it was carrying a severed arm. The creature crossed the room to where Mr. prefect was doubled over. He was positively green and looked like he was going to be sick. We took swipes at it as it closed on Mr. Prefect. The Abomination stank of the grave. All of our stomachs lurched. Some of us were overcome by nausea like Mr. Prefect others were not. We wolf packed the abomination coming at it from all sides. Talé cast a magic missile witched ricocheted off the abomination, and then he tried his electrical bolts. These only seemed to invigorate it and it began to move faster and hit us more frequently. While Lielda, our new friend Aristana, Mr. Prefect and myself, hacked at the creature from all sides damaging it, Lielda puked on Aristana. It was Glorianna with her glaive, who really tore it apart, running the blade of her pole arm up the creatures back and severing its spinal column killing it. We picked up the severed arm it was carrying. We noticed it had Shaonti tattoos on it. We had found our first piece of the Shaonti prince.
I went around to check and make sure no one was seriously injured. I pulled a pickle out of my trail rations and handed it to Lielda. “ I thought you might want to save this for later”. There were roars of laugher. Lielda scowled at me and replied, “ I don’t use those I use anal beads”. There were even roars of laugher. With that Lielda decided to take the lead and went down a passageway leading east out of the alchemy lab.
Our new friend, the Elvin female ranger, Astrana followed Lielda. At the same time that Lielda turned around to tell us she wanted us to stay 10 feet behind her, Astrana lunged forward hands outstretched. Astrana’s hands landed on Lieldas breasts, and she shoved. Lielda off balance from turning around, fell backwards, and rolled into the next chamber. She came to a stop in front of a horribly deformed oger. The Oger bats her back across the chamber. Lielda rolled to her feet, and lured the oger to her. This made it easy for us to pour into the chamber, surround the ogre, and attack him from all sides.
With comments like “Cabbage head beat you and thump you and make you prisoners for Pappa Rolf” the Ogre pounded Leila with his bare hands with glee. Mr. Ford Prefect landed the killing blow on Cabbage head.
I then channeled Sarenrae’s power to heal everyone a little bit. Nearby, we found six emaciated, starved people in groups of two in three pits. We helped them out of the pits, and (the party members who weren’t present) Kuldak and Gallatin escorted these unfortunates out of the dead warrens.
Next we found a library. Inside there were lots of books. These books primarily covered the topics of necromancy, the animation and creation of golems, and flesh golems in particular. Also there was a section of books on diseases. I decided to help my self to these books. Sarenrae’s temple can always use more information on diseases so we can better combat them.
As we progressed Deeper into the Warrens, we found another chamber.
The nauseating mixture of decay and strange chemicals filled the air of this large room. Glinting saws, pliers, long stitching needles, and other surgical equipment were organized on shelves and benches along the walls. A sturdy wooden table in the center of
the room supported a large humanoid shape—a thing stitched together from a patchwork of dozens of different bodies. The thing would have stood nearly seven feet tall if it rose. We realized the head was Gaehken’s. After removing the head from the flesh golem’s body, we now had a head to go with the arm. Where was the rest?
For a change I took the lead and headed into the next chamber. This chamber held a large four- poster bed and a simple writing desk, along with a full-length mirror propped up against one earthen wall. As I turned my head survey the room, I felt a searing burning sensation in my side. My vision swam before me, and I ducked back into the corridor. Apparently I had been hit by a scorching ray spell.
I think Astrana and Talé ran into the room. I remember Talé casting a magic missile and Astrana getting out her bow and shooting an arrow and cursing. Talé cursed and said, “it’s shielded.” With that the rest of the group rushed into the room. Before them, in a small adjoining room was a Derro, floating near the ceiling. He kept pulling shapes off of his cloak, and when they fell to the ground they became skeletons and zombies. This was a long and confusing fight. The longest I have ever had in my life. The Derro would pull shapes off of his robe, to create zombies and skeletons, which we had to engage. He then would either cast spells on us or he would swoop in and use his wand of ghoul touch on us. It was a long battle. People kept going down, and I would try to use my meager healing to prop them up. I went down at least three times. Just in the nick of time Kanthos showed up with some more healing potions and entered the fray.
Because the Dero was flying, Gloriana was the only person that could engage it in melee with her glaive.
Eventually we killed the Derro. The only people left standing at the end of the battle was Glorianna Kanthos and myself. We had used all of our healing. I think I got the killing blow with my crossbow.
In the corner tied to the table was a torso with one intact arm. It arm kept twitching and grasping. We found more of Gaekhen’s body. What to do with the twitching thing now?
More later
I see my comrade Gabriel has not made mention of me in his latest report. Nyet, is truth only. I was not there for battle that almost killed all my fellows.
During battle with stirges, after accidentally injuring Lialda (yes! Was accident! She always assumes worst), I saw comrade Gabriel laid low by poorly aimed axe. I admit, have been enjoying spending time with priest (nyet, not like that, filthy-minds). Previously, had been working alone with Lialda, and I am thinking that she was...well, "a bad influence on my moral character" as Gabriel would say.
However, comrade Gabriel has had opposite effect. When I saw him struck down, was filled with rage had never felt before. I rushed to him, moving faster than had ever moved before, and tried to staunch his wounds, but am having very little training in those matters...I did not help.
When we stopped to rest, I retreated to the surface. What was meaning of all this? Not in many years had I cared so much about well-being of other person. I am so accustomed to being alone, except when working with other mercenary or having sex (not usually with other mercenary), and of course is no emotional attachment in either case.
But recently, many people are affecting me in ways I had not expected. Senor Ven Carlo Orsini has been a good teacher, and has taught me many apects of fighting, and shown me respect. "Little Girl", Glorianna, reminds me of myself when I was child - trusting and honest. I know how dangerous that is, and I try to protect her. And of course, comrade Gabriel has been a solid companion, in battle and out. He insists that I have a good heart under my scars, and perhaps he is right...
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Ah NIska my good friend. It warms my heart to see that your horizons are expanding beyond the limited ones of a hedonist. There is more to life then sex money and food. I have found if you take a holy book such as Sarenrae’s book of light and truth and brow beat someone with it, all you get is a beaten and resentful brow and yes maybe some bruises too. But if you try actually live and practice what you believe, instead of telling others what to believe, you might find you have piqued peoples curiosity. I can say I much prefer being with comrades I can trust. It makes life much easier. You don’t have to necessarily sleep with a dagger under your pillow, nor worry about your comrades stealing your hard won gold, and when trouble finds you, you can count on them helping you out of trouble. Well is suppose if that trouble is a big red dragon, we will all worry about that problem very briefly. Any ways, it gladdens me to hear that you are beginning to consider new things in your life. Out of respect for you, I will not tell you which path to tread, but allow you the dignity to make your own choices. And if the example of my life, with its few successes and many more mistakes are any help, I will gladly share them with you.
Session 8
The end of the Dead warrens, and Intrigue about the Execution of Trianna Sabor
Adventureres Present
Imam Gabriel bin Sarenrae Al Katheer, Pathfinder: Human Male Keshite, 2nd level Cleric of Sarenrae. The journal is from his point of view. Currently he is searching for his wayward sister Fatima, who ran off from an arranged marriage and became a pathfinder. Gabriel’s father asked him to go look for her and bring her back to Katheer. Gabriel traveled from Katheer to Absolom and became a pathfinder himself. He has been tracking down his sister ever since. His trail has led him to Korvosa. With help from the spirit world, Gabriel found out the identity and helped get revenge on the kidnapper of a long lost sister Yasmin, whom Gaedren Lamm had Kidnapped 20 years ago, when Gabriel was only six.
Kuldak ½ orc male 1st level rogue/ 1st level Barbarian. Kuldak carries a great axe and sports a kilt. One never knows what kind of trouble he will get into or what kind of trouble he will pull a comrade out of. With Kuldak it’s a crapshoot. He is the life of whatever party he joins.
Gaedren Lamm framed his brother for a crime.
He likes to pick on Lielda
Lielda Half elf Female 1st level Rogue/ 1st level fighter. She is sullen and resentful. She was one of Gaedren Lamm’s Lambs, until he tortured her by burning her formerly beautiful face with acid. Kuldak often teases her. She has developed a fancy for Sabina Marin.
Glorianna, Human Female 2nd level Cleric of Shelyn. Glorianna is blond bubbly and naive. She is up for trying anything, anxious to experience life to the fullest, after living a sheltered life in a Convent. In a pinch she has shown surprising courage, rushing into combat with her glaive, whether it is against a Carrion golem or a flying Dero necromancer.
Gallatin Yellowstone, Human male 1st level Fighter. He is a quite but friendly warrior in training who hails from Sandpoint. He is a student of Vin Carlo Orisini. I believe he is a fellow Pathfinder. When Field Marshal Kresseda Croft gives us a job, Gallatin can be counted on to ask the pertinent questions about our mission.
Kanthos Human Male 1st level fighter. Kanthos is a quiet solid dependable warrior. He is a man of few words. He wields a Scythe with quiet precision. Gaedren Lamm killed his parents and he had to raise his brothers and sisters.
I leant heavily against the wall, unable to stand unaided. The battle was over. The Derro was wizard dead. By Sarenrae that was a tough battle. I must have lost consciousness at least three times in the battle. Kanthos, Glorianna, and myself were the only ones left on our feet. Everyone else had lapsed into unconsciousness and was lying on the floor. With a quick prayer to Sarenreae, Our Lady granted me the use of a minor divine healing spell, an osirion. With this spell I quickly went around and stabilized all of our compatriots.
The torso and arm of the Shaonti prince was tied to a table in the corner. It thrashed and writhed with unnatural life. Feh Necromancy. I went over and used the same healing prayer on the torso that I had been using to stabilize my comrades. Luckily the positive energy from my healing magic dispelled the negative energy used to animate the corps. It lay still.
Then Kuldak and Gallatin arrived. They had been minding the prisoners we had freed earlier. Gallatin handed me a wand. He told me that a lieutenant of Cressida Croft had delivered it to him for us to use. Luckily it was a wand that contained Devine healing magic I took the wand and used it to heal the party.
After we were all back on our feet took the time to destroy the laboratory. We destroyed the tables the surgeons tools the chemeicals and all of the other implements of the necromancy lab. Normally I am not one for burning books. I made an exception for the necromancy books and the books on making flesh golems. I burned them. I kept the books on disease transmission. We cold probably make good use of them at the Temple of Sarenrae.
After this we began to explore the last tunnels of the dead warrens. Kuldak with his dark vision took the lead. Gallatan took the rear of the group with his hooded lantern. After traveling down a tunnel we came to a large chamber. The majority of this room contained a nasty-looking stretch of mud—a partially collapsed sinkhole—kept damp by rivulets of
water seeping from the walls. A patch of solid ground extended into the mud to form an island, on which was heaped a reeking pile of body parts. To the north, a rickety wheelbarrow sat on its side against the wall.
All of a sudden a terrible monster erupted from the muddy part of the chamber just north of the “peninsula’ of firm ground. This creature looked like a bloated ovoid covered with rocklike skin. A vine like stalk, about 2 feet long rose from the top of the disgusting body and has two eyes. Its mouth, A little more than a wide gas filled with razor sharp teeth, was in the center of its body. The creature shuffled about on three thick sturdy legs, and it had two long tentacles covered in rough thorny protrusions. The tentacles ended in leaf like appendages covered in even more thorny spines. It is an Otyough. With a bellow of “warm food” it lurched out of the mud and lumbered to wards us. Its tentacle arms thrashing about it. Only two of us could engage the creature at the time because of the terrain. By rotating our ranks we were able to stay fresh, and we beat the monster in short order. Kuldak landed the killing blow on the Otyough.
Amongst the corpses piled here we found the last missing piece of the Shaonti princes’s corps, it’s legs.
The party moved ot another room where we found a rat in a maze, some hammers and dice. What the Derro were up to I have no idea. I don’t think I want to know. There were straw pallets in the corner. This must have been their living quarters. Lielda discovered a secret door. She opened it and went into the passage beyond. Suddenly Kuldak shut the door behind her and shouted “ Come back save us! The room is filling with sand” he holds the door shut.” Lielda found that this secret passage lead to the to Otyough room. She raced around to see the party in an empty room. There was no sand to be seen. In frustration she rushes over and kicked Kuldak. Glorianna quickly said it was an illusion which Lielda’s shouting broke the illusion. Muttering angrily “ see I save you guys and this is the thanks I get” She stalks off. We were barely able to contain our laughter.
With the Shaonti corpse and treasure in tow, we headed over to Crisseda Croft’s. On the way we pass through a jubilant crowd. They shout “ the kings assassin has been caught. Trianna Sabor will be executed tomorrow. “
In our meeting with Credssida she told us of her conserns that Trinaa is to be executed. She wondered if Triana was under some sort of compulsion or enchantment and thus under Chelaxian control. There is rally no motive for her to have killed the king and she took no treasure.
The queen took the throne after the regicide and she is also from Cheliax. Cheliax is known for worshiping Asmodius, the arch devil. As we all know Devils try to corrupt people and countries. All of this was merely speculation. Crisseda was very pleased that we were able to retrieve the corpse so quicly and she rewarded us with 1,000 gp.
We left Crisseda’s office. As we were making our way out the castle of Korvosa’s guard, we spied Sabina Marin. Lielda looked pale. I think she was nervous. Quickly Kuldack and I hustled Lielda into a side room. Kuldak and I ducked behind a tapestry. We heard Sabina come into the room and greet Lielda. We began whispering to Lielda what to say, in order to catch Sabina’s interests. Sabina asked about our group, weather we had settled on a name. Lielda mentioned we were thinking of discarding the name the reapers for the crimson blades. Sabina then asked about our adventures. Lielda mentioned that we had killed an owl bear and an otyough. We whispered some more suggestions, such as “ your eyes are like burnished gold like the sunset” and things like that. I later realized that she has black eyes. Oh well we were behind a tapestry.
Sabina then asked Lielda “ what about Rolf did you catch him and kill him?” Lielda didn’t answer; she was staring at Sabina’s breasts. Sabina grabbed Lielda’s chin and forced her to look up at her face. “ Hmm” Sabina said “ not too bright nor very pretty. Pity, about that acid scarring on your face, but you still may have your uses. “ She gave Lielda a small medallion. “ If you have any information that you think may be useful to the queen or myself, use this medallion. I will come to your location and you can tell me what you have found out. “
Sabina then took a step back and she drew her sword. With her blade Sabina Marin made several precise cuts into the tapestry around Lielda. The tapestry parted and Kuldak and I were exposed. “How long were you here? “ Sabina hissed. Kuldak reached over and grabbed me in an embrace and kissed me. I realized that if I didn’t suppress my surprise and revulsion Sabina would kill us. I had to make this look convincing. Kuldak didn’t. I don’t know what Kuldak was chewing on recently weather it was puzzle shark or reef claw, but it was foul and disgusting. I felt soiled. I was embarrassed. Sabina roared “ get out of here” and we fled. Well I fled and Kulkac strutted proud and erect with his shoulders held high. He looked like he had eaten five canaries. With Kuldak it’s always a crap shoot.
Lielda caught up with us and complained that Sabina threatened to kill her if anyone else knew about their little “liaison”.
We spent the afternoon spending our loot. We went over to Vin Carlo’s to train a bit, and he recommended a place to go buy weapons.
He had his misgivings about the neatness of everything concerning Triana Sabor, but the execution was scheduled for tomorrow. He thought the whole thing was a a Chelaxian plot.
Gallatin, Kanthos and I went to buy some weaponry and armor. Over lunch I suggested that Gabriella might want to go to a museum with me. Initially she seemed excited, but then we heard about some bard giving a concert this evening, and she was much more interested in that. I think this was the same bard who tried to drug while she was at one of his parties, and have his way with her.
Well later we have the concert and tomorrow we have the execution of Trianna Sabor.
More later
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Session 9
Trianna Sabor’s execution, the end of “the Edge of Anarchy” and the beginning of “Seven Days to the Grave”.
Adventurers Present
Imam Gabriel bin Sarenrae Al Katheer, Pathfinder: Human Male Keshite, 2nd level Cleric of Sarenrae. The journal is from his point of view. The spirit of Zelara told Gabriel that Gadrian Lamm had kidnapped his long lost sister Yasmin, 20 years ago. Gabriel and his compatriots were then able to shut down Gaedren Lamm permanently
Kuldak ½ orc male 1st level rogue/ 1st level Barbarian. Kuldak carries a great axe and sports a kilt. One never knows what kind of trouble he will get into or what kind of trouble he will pull a comrade out of. With Kuldak it’s a crapshoot. He is the life of whatever party he joins.
Gaedren Lamm framed his brother for a crime.
He likes to pick on Lielda
Lielda Half elf Female 2nd level Rogue/ 1st level fighter. She is sullen and resentful. She was one of Gaedren Lamm’s Lambs, until he tortured her by burning her formerly beautiful face with acid. Kuldak often teases her. She has developed a fancy for Sabina Marin.
Glorianna, Human Female 3rd level Cleric of Shelyn. Glorianna is blond bubbly and naive. She is up for trying anything, anxious to experience life to the fullest, after living a sheltered life in a Convent. In a pinch she has shown surprising courage, rushing into combat with her glaive, whether it is against a Carrion golem or a flying Dero necromancer.
Gallatin Yellowstone, Human male 2nd level Fighter. He is a quite but friendly warrior in training who hails from Sandpoint. He is a student of Vin Carlo Orisini. When Field Marshal Kresseda Croft gives us a job, Gallatin can be counted on to ask the pertinent questions about our mission.
Talee, Gnome Male 2nd level Sorcerer. He has bright green hair and electric blue eyes Gaedren Lamm got him addicted on shiver.
Angus Firehammer, Dwarf, Male 1st level Paladin of Torag. Gaedren Lamm killed his parents and he worked hard as smith’s apprentice to raise his brothers and sisters. He mentioned finding his faith in Torag, while working the smithy.
The advenuture continues
The concert was enjoyable. There was a huge crowd, and the bard Amin Galento preformed quite well. I imagine this must be Glorianna’s idea of paradise, being a priestess of Shellyn. I remember Amin Galento was the bard we met during the first night of riots, when the king died just after we had raided old fishery and killed Gaedren Lamm. I remember Amin Galento invited some of our company to his place for a night of debauchery and drugs namely shiver. He planned to have his way with Glorianna once she was on shiver… Then I was jostled. Kuldak “ Lighten up comrade Gabriel, parties and concerts are for forgetting life’s troubles, not remembering them”. Bless him he had mead for the both of us.
Lielda was there as well. She was dressed up in a beautiful gown with a tierra, and various other jewels bedecking her figure. I must say it was quite an improvement to her studded leather armor. She stood up and craned her neck waving. We caught sight of Sabina Marin, with three beautiful women in tow: a human, an elf and a half-orc.
With a “ here hold this” Kuldak passed me his hat and mug of mead. He then lightly lifted the tiara from Lielda's head and put it on his own. He then muttered “ I don’t know what fine looking half-orc lady Roxanna is doing with that sword wielding strumpet Sabinia Marin but I must save her from from a fate, well I must save her for myself” and with that Kuldak plunged into the crowd, Tierra and all.
Meanwhile Lielda had found some company, Rosie the shipwright. With Glorianna enthralled to the music, Angus Firehammer stage diving onto some gnomes in full plate mail, and who knew where Talee was, Gallatin and I decided to return to the inn and retire for the evening.
The next morning the group showed up for breakfast at our usual Inn. Glorianna thought the concert was fantastic. Lielda thought it sucked, Kuldak showed up with a big grin on his face, looking as if he ate some canaries, with a tiara askew oh his head. With a “hey that’s mine” Lielda began chasing Kuldak around the table. Angus didn’t have much to say he was heavily into his breakfast of slated pork eggs and pancakes. Talee looked quite bruised. With a “never try to catch a falling paladin in plate mail” he sat down and nursed a cup of coffee.
Trinia Sabor was to be executed today. Over breakfast we discussed our doubts about her guilt. Gloriana was perhaps the only one who believed her guilty. She was quite unnerved by the plots we were coming up to try and rescue Trinia Sabor, and thought that we were being disloyal to the crown and queen. One of our plots involved two of us, in disguise rushing the stage, while the others tried to stop them. The ones who were trying to stop the rescuers would be pushed into the oncoming rush of guards tripping them, thus allowing the rescuers to get near the stand and save Trinia Sabor. We realized that most of our plots were quite unrealistic and probably suicidal, and we decided to go to the execution.
We decided to just go to the execution and see what happens.
The execution was not an affair to be missed. The toast of Korvosa was in attendance in garish gowns, fine capes, and enough jewels to blind a common man. The overall feel of the event was that of a grand ball or party, not an assassin’s public execution. We were able to shoulder ourselves to the front of the crowd, in amongst the nobles.
Queen Ileosa emerged amid a great flourish and pomp as heralds announce her arrival with a fanfare of music and drums. This queen was not the subdued mourner we met earlier. Queen Ileosa had now fully accepted the mantle of sole monarch, and carried herself with poise, style, and grace. She wore a green and white silk dress worth thousands of gold coins, and was attended by a small army of servants. Chief among these was Sabina, her expression neutral but ever watchful for possible problems in the crowd. Ileosa took her seat in a high throne-like chair at one end of the public courtyard, while the headman’s block stood ominously at the other. The executioner was a towering, muscular man who wore an executioner’s helm and stood idly holding an immense axe. He remained motionless.
Lielda wove her hand, and apparently caught Sabina Marin’s eye. The queen ignored her. Kuldak meanwhile decided to pay some peasants to make a human pyramid for him to sit upon, so he could have a better view. This venture cost him three silver pieces. Lielda tried to step on some of the hands of the peasants to ruin Kuldak’s throne.
As sunset drew near, excitement in the crowd grew. When the ominous beat of a single large drum began, the assembled gawkers fell silent. The drum set the pace for Trinia’s procession to the headsman’s block. As they reached the headsman’s block, one of the guards removed Trinia’s shackles and the hood, and revealed a very frightened woman who nonetheless bravely held back her tears, if only barely. Trinia was led up onto the platform, her arms bound behind her back by a leather cord, and she was forced to kneel over the wooden block before the headsman as Queen Ileosa stood to addresses the crowd.
“Fellow Korvosans! You have suffered greatly these past few weeks. Homes have burned, family members have died, fortunes have been lost. I feel your suffering, for not only have I lost a beloved husband, but with each riot, each burning home, each act of anarchy, my heart bleeds a little more. This has been a trying time for us, yet the torment is at an end. Before you is the face of your anguish and pain. Do not be deceived by this murderer’s timid nature—she is a black-hearted assassin, a seductress and sinner, a viper amidst us all. I offer you all her death as a salve against the hatred and hurt you have suffered. Her death will not rebuild Korvosa, nor will it bring back the king, yet tomorrow will be a new dawn—a dawn over a city ready to rise from the edge of anarchy to become stronger than ever before! And so, without further delay, let us usher in this new dawn with justice! OFF WITH HER HEAD!”
As the headsman hefted his axe, the already silent crowd froze in anticipation. Yet just before he swung, the headsman gave a strange little grunt and staggers. His raised axe faltered as he reached with one hand to the small of his back and then brought it to his face, the fingers dripped with blood. An instant later, he cried out in pain and dropped the axe as a dagger embedded itself in the back of his other hand. The axe sunk itself in the block inches from Trinia’s head, and the headsman doubles over in pain, revealed a second dagger that’s already embedded in the small of his back. Trinia rose to her knees, glancing up at the executioner in shock as a scream echoed through the crowded courtyard: “By the gods! It’s Blackjack!”
An instant later, a man dressed in a hooded cloak and leather armor sprang onto the executioner’s block. He wielded a rapier in one hand and a dagger in the other. Blackjack cut the bonds on Trinia’s wrists and then threw the dagger down to pin the executioner’s left foot to the wood below. He quickly helped Trinia to her feet and then briefly turned to address the shocked crowd.
“Yes indeed, my queen! Let us usher in justice, but let that be justice for Korvosa, not this shambles you petulantly call a monarchy! Long live Korvosa! Down with the Queen!”
Blackjack’s words spread like fire, causing the crowd to erupt into a frenzy of activity. Some demanded that he release the assassin while others called for the queen to step down from the Crimson Throne. Queen Ileosa stood stunned for a few moments, then whispered something to Sabina, and then quickly turned to flee into Castle Korvosa with Sabina and a dozen guards behind her to cover her retreat. The remaining guards in the courtyard move to apprehend Blackjack, but the gathered nobles, thirsty for blood, make it difficult to move. At the same time, the executioner recovered from his wounds and lifts his axe once again over Blackjack, who seemed to have momentarily forgotten the man in his apparent delight at having forced the queen to flee.
Our group already at the front of the crowd, dashed across the courtyard towards the executioners block. I yelled “ Executioner beware Danger”.
Kuldak from atop his wavering human pyramid began shooting arrows at the executioner’s bloc. One arrow ricocheted off of the executioner’s helm. Luckily Blackjack noticed the executioner and lithely stepped out of the way of the swing of the executioner’s axe. He then punched the executioner in the face, with the basket hilt of his rapier, and the executioner fell, poleaxed. Then Black jack handed Trinia a small potion which she drank, and the two of them climbed unnaturally fast up a huge hanging banner to the top of a wall.
I noticed Queen Ileosa and Sabina Marin watching the mayhem in the courtyard below from between the crenellations atop of Castle Korvosa’s walls. By some trick of the wind, I could of sworn I heard the queen say “Inconceivable, they’re climbing” and Sabina Marin reply “ you keep using that word, I do not think it means what you think it means.”
Backlit by the setting sun, both Black Jack and Trinia down another potion and then turn and bowed to the crowd. With that they hoped off the wall and vanished into the city.
By this time we had reached the executioner’s block. I cast a cure light wounds spell, and by Sarenrae’s grace, some of the executioners wound were healed. “ Bugger off priest” was the only thanks I got, so I decided to let him well enough alone, bleeding.
It was fairly easy to exit the courtyard we simply went with the flow of people leaving and we returned to our usual Inn.
End of “edge of Anarchy”
Beginning of “ seven days to the grave”
Next the party went to visit Vencarlo’s. He asked us to deliver a packaged for him in 3 days time. That evening at about midnight we heard the sound of a Trebuchet firing. We made Inquiries the next morning. We had to shift through a variety of rumors, ranging form foolish pirates from Riddleport, to a quarantined ship.
Kuldak Gallatin and I investigated in trails end. We investigated along the shoreline hoping to find some washed up debris. We noticed a pair of Shaonti boys carrying something they had dug up. I thought it had the glint of metal. Perhaps I was wrong. I called out “ stop we want what you have. We will pay gold”. I expected them to come over and give us what they had, but instead they bolted into the warren of shanties. Kuldak and Gallatin ran after them. I followed.
The Shaonti children were rogues. They proved much tougher then we expected. There was a chase through the alleys and the 11-year-old shaonti kids were using all sorts of trickery to get to us. Both Kuldak and Galatin were repeatedly stabbed, and I had to use my divine healing spells to keep them on their feet. Finally Gallatin was able to down his foe with an Earth beaker, a huge Maul with spikes coming form its head. Kuldak was able to kill his foe with his massive battle-axe as the shaonti thief leapt over him. Even though they were only 11 years old, they certainly were adept with their daggers, and would have killed us.
We then returned to the Inn where we were staying in North point. Over lunch a familiar face entered the Inn. It was Grau. He looked much better all cleaned up and in a guard uniform. We had helped him to straiten himself out from a drunken stupor earlier. We waved him over to our table. Upon seeing me he came over and asked me
“My niece is sick. I don’t know what she has and neither does anyone in Trail’s End. She’s broken out all over in red pocks and can barely keep down food, or even the swill that good- for-nothing herbalist gave her. Her mother’s talking about going to the Bank of Abadar, but her family can’t afford to pay the prices their clerics would demand. Then I remembered how you and your friends handled yourselves during the riots, and how you helped me out, and I figured you all could help.
A bunch of resourceful folk like you, I’d bet if you don’t already
have a way to fix this you must know who can. Surely you can’t
just sit by while a child suffers, can you?”
I replied:” No my friend, I cant sit by while a child suffers, Please take me to her and I will see what I can do. I am merely an acolyte of Sarenrae, and she has not graced me with a spell to remove a disease, but I will help however I can.”
We went back to trails end. Grao explained to me that thieves murdered his brother many years ago, and his sister in law Tayce Soldado was determined to bring their three children up right. There were two boys Charlo and Rello and one girl Brianna.
Only a crooked block away from the Jeggare river shore, the Soldado home was a squat, two- story wooden building in desperate need of repair and gardening. Overall, the building felt like the home of a family too busy living to bother with tedious chores. Inside, the house was remarkably clean and well kept, filled with worn, well-used furniture and decorated with the crafts and scribblings of children. Once Brianna fell ill, her mother Tayce put her in the single bedroom upstairs, and everyone else downstairs.
The two boys were quietly playing in the corner. From the kitchen wafted the smells of cinnamon and anise. In the kitchen by the cooking pot I saw another priest. From his robes and holy symbol I could tell he was a priest of Abadar, the god of cities and civilization. Upon seeing this priest, Grau hurried upstairs. I heard a whispered conversation where Grau was scolding his sister in law telling her he would handle it and that she shouldn’t have gone to some priest’s whose services they could scarcely afford. Tayce mentioned that Brianna was very ill what could she do.
I went into the kitchen. After introducing myself, the priest of Abadar told me his name was Ishani Dharti. He wanted to help the girl, but because of the tenants of his faith he could not give his divine healing spells without charging for it. Fee for service is the basis of civilization, and one of the basic tenants of the faith of Abadar. Ishani was concerned that he didn't recognize the symptoms and that this might indicate a new diseases.
Tayce Soldado came down stairs with her brother in law Grau, and greeted us. She apologized for not shaking hands her daughter was sick. I introduced myself and told her I was priest of Sarenrae, and while I could not promise anything I would be happy to take a look. She gratefully ushered me upstairs. The creaky steps opened up into a bedroom loft above the main room of the Soldado home. A young girl with auburn hair
lay in one of the beds, her slight frame dwarfed by the bed’s size and the pile of pillows, afghans, and quilts surrounding her. Splotches of an angry red rash covered her face and arms, appearing in irregular shapes and sizes. Suddenly, her restlessness is interrupted by a violent fit of hacking coughs that jerked her entire frame, lifting her well off her pillows. The
spasm passed after a moment, dropping her back to the bed, but seemingly having done little to ease her breathing.
After a quick examination I realized that this girl would die without a divine Cure disease spell. I then took a moment to talk to Mrs. Soldado. I mentioned that she had done everything that I would have suggested; keeping the girl isolated, making sure she was warm, etc. I mentioned that she was right the girl was very ill. I told her that I was going to head back to the Temple of Sarenrae, and I was going to try and get a Scroll with a cur disease spell scribed on It, and then return with it to heal Brianna.
I quickly left for the temple. Kuldak and Gallatin volunteered to go with me as bodyguards. When I arrived in the temple of Sarenrae, it was over run with sick people apparently with the same malady. I was able to buy a cure disease scroll for 100 gp (they gave me a 50 gp discount) and I returned to the Soldado household.
Up in Brianna’s bedroom, I got the scroll out and read the prayers and the spell written on it. All of sudden a golden light infused the room and Brianna’s splotches vanished and her breathing was much easier. The disease had been cured. She awoke and asked when supper was. A healthy rosy color returned to her face.
Mrs. Soldado was beside her self with joy and she insisted we stay for dinner. It was a delicious chicken and pasta dish. I left a gold piece in her salt bin. I wanted to make sure that she didn’t spend more then she could of afforded on us, and I didn’t want to insult her either.
After dinner we returned to the Inn and Zellarra appeared. She did a harrow (Tarot) reading for me. Zellara told me that I would see many ashen-faced children, death and fires. I have to stand up to this resolutely with courage and good will.
I spent the next two days helping out at the Temple of Sarenrae tending the sick. I'm not sure what the others were up to.
On the third day we gathered at VIn Carlos. There was a sign on the door saying that classes were canceled for today. He ushered us in and bade us to sit down.
“You were all at the Queen’s debacle, so I don’t doubt you recognize this charming young woman. I had only just reached my home the night of Her Majesty’s morbid gala when that rogue Blackjack and this startled woman arrived at my doorstep. The people’s hero and I have had some dealings in the past, but still, it’s been some years since I’ve seen the scoundrel. He was quick with his words, and soon swooped off—doubtlessly to right some other festering wrong—but not before entrusting Miss Sabor into my protection and care. Although I don’t know Blackjack’s motives or politics, I trust his judgment and have seen much right done by his blade. He says the girl is innocent of the crime she’s been accused of, and I’m more disposed to trust a hero of the city than the tantrums of some bloody-minded harlot playing at queen. “The matter is simple: Korvosa is no longer safe for Miss Sabor. I’ve arranged for friends in Harse—a couple of well- respected ranchers—to take in our beautiful renegade until this whole ‘assassination’ foolishness blows over. Its the first leg of the journey where we find our problem, though. Both the Korvosan Guard and the Sable Company have been searching for the young lady tirelessly they’ve stopped by here three times so far, and each time I’ve only just barely been able to turn them away without inviting a search. My most reliable contacts have gone to ground in light of the recent uprisings, and Her Highness’s considerable bounty for Trinia’s capture makes the use of new agents inadvisable. Thus, after some time to let her trail cool, I
turned to you resourceful lot. Care to escort a lady home?”
We all readily agreed. Trinia apologized for giving us all of that trouble in the shingles a few weeks ago. The journey out fortunalty was uneventful and we safely brought Trinia to Vin Carlos friends outside of Korvosa. Much to Lielda’s surprise she got a peck on the cheek from Trinia. On the way out and back, there were quite a few sick people.
When we got back to the Inn that evening, I realized that I was sick.
More to come. The next gaming session is this Saturday
Is a moral quandary, I suppose. If you are attacked in alleyway by thugs who mean to kill you, you fight back if you are able. Nobody faults the man who kills in self-defense.
But what if your attacker is little child? Is situation different? Though small, child can still kill with well-placed knife...I can speak from experience in this area.
I have decided to not feel bad about this. Life on street is kill-or-be-killed. It is shame young boy had such brutal life, but I am losing no sleep over him. I will perhaps say a prayer in his name, or ask comrade Gabriel to do so.
Now, we are moving on. We are to escort Miss Trinia to her home, and I gather we are to be leaving city. Is good. City can sometimes be "too much of good thing" as Gabriel often says (although he is usually telling this to me about mead and whores), and will be good to have air that is less smelly for little while.
Session 10
Interlude: experience-focused side quest.
Adventurers Present:
Imam Gabriel bin Sarenrae Al Katheer, Pathfinder: Human Male Keshite, 2nd level Cleric of Sarenrae. A brave, good-hearted man, even if he would rather not be adventuring.
Kuldak Niska, half-orc male 1st level rogue/ 1st level Barbarian. Kuldak carries a great axe and sports a kilt, and is extremely classy. This entry is from his point of view.
Glorianna, Human Female 3rd level Cleric of Shelyn. Glorianna is "Little Girl" to Kuldak; is too trusting for her own good.
Gallatin Yellowstone, Human male 2nd level Fighter. He is a quiet but friendly warrior, and can be counted on to watch your back in a fight
Tale, Gnome Male 2nd level Sorcerer. He has bright green hair and electric blue eyes, and tends to shoot off sparks at random intervals.
Ford Prefect, Human male, 2nd level Rogue. While I admire his skills in the roguish arts, Ford is often a little foolhardy. He easily gets in to trouble while attempting to be impressively daring. He is headstrong and cocksure...I, on the other hand, am the other way around.
Kari Goldenhair, Human Female, 45, 1st level Druid. She had left the group while following up a lead on her son's disappearance, but it amounted to naught. We caught her up while returning from our escorting job with Trinia.
Sindra Blueleaf, half-elf female 1st level Ranger. Formerly known as Felosial Deldon and/or Ivo Corbierre. He/she seems to delight in changing his/her identity, always reappearing wearing a new disguise and insisting on being called a new name. I am not sure what the real identity of this chaotic person is...
The Session:
After returning from escorting Trinia Sabor home, we reunited with our previous companions Kari and Sindra, and learned that our comrade Gabriel had fallen ill. Apparently, spending much of your time healing the sick and diseased is bad for your health. After Gabriel changed out of his vestments (we did not wish to be waylaid by sick beggars asking for divine help) we rushed him over to the temple of Sarenrae, with Gallatin and I supporting him when his legs were too weak to walk.
The temple was a very impressive thing. Huge columns supporting arched ceilings, with sunlight and golden caryatids everywhere. My gut instincts noticed many valuable things that could potentially be "borrowed." We did not spend much time sight-seeing, though, as the health of our friend was the most important thing.
The clergy quickly set about healing Gabriel. I gathered that he was getting preferential treatment on account of his position in the church. Once he was feeling better, we were approached by on of the head priests. I am afraid I cannot remember his name...I am better with faces than names. Perhaps Gabriel can help my telling of the tale?
Anyway, the head priest told us of a vision he had had (apparently a side effect of being religious is that one is prone to hallucinations). He was told by his goddess of a magical artifact called the Chalice of St. Raphael. It was said to have great powers of healing, and it would certainly be a boon to Korvosa, overrun as the city was with disease. The priest's vision had said that the Chalice was locked away in an ancient burial chamber under the Grey District. He asked us to recover the Chalice for the sake of the people of Korvosa. Yes, all well and good, but more importantly, he offered to pay us. Besides, everybody knows that grave-robbing is an extremely entertaining way to spend one's weekend.
We set off across the city, and shortly arrived at the Grey District. We were stopped by clerics of Pharasma, but Little Girl showed them a parchment that the priest of Sarenrae had given her, and they let us right in. I asked Little Girl if we could get more of those pieces of parchment; it would be nice to have people let you in every door you came to, and not have to pick the locks all the time.
We easily found the mausoleum the priest had mentioned - hallucination or not, his vision was certainly accurate. The tomb was very, very old - the inscriptions were illegible with age, and it had apparently been made without any sort of mortar, yet I would be hard-pressed to even slide a dagger between the granite blocks that formed its walls. Tale, who has an interest in such things, posited that perhaps it had been built by dwarves. He started a lively discussion on the subject with Kari, but the rest of us were mostly bored by the talk. Who cares what kind of winch was used a thousand years ago to lift the blocks? Not me, I can assure you. While Tale and Kari were talking, they lost track of their pets (Kari has an adolescent tiger with her, and Tale is still followed by the pseudodragon Majenko that we met several days ago). After some frantic searching, we found them napping together behind a tombstone, Majenko idly scratching behind the cat's ears with his tail.
Once the pets had been reunited with their humanoid companions, we started into the tomb, which was unlocked. Little Girl insisted on casting light-giving cantrips on pebbles every few steps, and throwing them around the tomb. The rest of the party seemed to delight in scattering the glowing rocks every which way, but the practice bothered me on many levels. For one, I can see in the dark with no problem, due to my superior orcish eyesight. Secondly, I was concerned that the light and the sound of the pebbles might attract unwanted attention from any sentinels that may be guarding the tomb. Lastly, and most importantly, they kept hitting me in the back of the head with the blasted things.
The first large room of the tomb seemed deserted. Investigating the dust layered thickly on the floor, we realized that the clerics of Pharasma must come in on a regular basis to check for intruders, but they rarely ventured into the far end of this room, where there was a set of double doors. Ford, Gallatin and I, having had experience in these areas, moved along the edges of the room and approached the doors from the sides, fearing some sort of trap in front of the doors. Unfortunately, Tale decided to run up in front of us, and before we could stop him, he confirmed our suspicions by triggering a spiked pit trap.
After we fished the gnome out of the pit, we jury-rigged a series of ropes that Gallatin was able to balance across and open the doors. When he opened the door, he lost his balance, and in order to avoid falling over, he had to throw himself through the door. He ended up landing on a trip wire, and took a glancing blow from a scything blade trap set into the ceiling. He wasn't badly injured, and I took the discovery of another trap as a good sign - there was certainly someone trying to keep intruders out of this place. We all quickly crossed over the pit, except for Ford, who made an incredible display of acrobatic ineptitude, with limbs windmilling every which way, before plummeting into the pit and skewering himself on a spike. We hid our smirks and helped him out.
Beyond the doors was a long, wide hallway, perhaps 100 feet long or more. We made our way carefully down, and were rewarded for our caution - we discovered another blade trap, and were able to disable it without harm. We also found 3 large doors hidden in the wall, but they appeared to be openable only from the other side. Little Girl was intent on trying to bash down one of the doors - she was concerned about being ambushed from behind. However, I pointed out that spending several minutes bashing on stone with Gallatin's big metal earthbreaker would only serve to attract the attention of whatever might ambush us.
At the end of the hallway was another set of double doors. We were immediately fearful that these doors would also have a pit trap in front of them, so we thoroughly searched the area. Finding no trap, Gallatin and Ford opened the door and walked through...only to realize that the pit trap was on the other side of the door! Gallatin's armor protected him, but Ford was skewered once again. Before we could put any effort into rescuing them, though, there was a scraping sound, and we turned to see the 3 one-way doors opening, revealing small rooms full of the walking dead. The room that Gallatin and Ford were stuck in also had zombies in it. Little Girl made some sarcastic comment about being ambushed from behind, but I was already in the midst of battle and wasn't listening.
Although the number of undead was overwhelming (at least two dozen), they were slow and unintelligent, and fell quickly before our blades and spells. Once Little Girl had used her powers to cause the lest of them to flee, we investigated the room Gallatin and Ford were in. It seemed to be exactly like the first room of the tomb - large, square, with the double doors and pit trap. However, even spending many minutes searching, we could find no hidden doors or hiding places. Was this a dead end? We decided to head back towards the entrance of the tomb, checking for anything we might have missed. This was a good strategy, and we found a secret door back in the first room of the mausoleum. Let this be a lesson to you, young tomb raiders: always check the corners of the room!
The door led to a much narrower hallway, and we could hear crazed babbling coming from around a corner. I motioned for the rest of the party to be silent, and Little Girl threw glowing pebbles at me in response. I think she was still upset about the doors. When I peeked around the corner, I saw a shadowy cloud of moving faces and wailing mouths - obviously some sort of undead. I turned to tell our clerics about it, but it spotted us and moved to attack. Unfortunately, our weapons were little use against it. Tale, Glorianna, and Gabriel were able to bring it down, but its babbling and screaming took a toll on Gallatin and Kari. It took a minute or two for us snap them out of their stupor.
After the turn, this new hallway continued down for longer than the first hallway had. I guessed that this hallway was running parallel to the first. At the end of the hallway, we came into a large room. On the right wall was a large stone door. Directly in front of us there was a horseshoe-shaped pit of inky blackness, with shadowy tentacles slowly emerging and then retreating back into the pit. To either side of the pit was a human skeleton, well armored and armed, with glints of malice in their eye sockets. Standing on a dais surrounded on three sides by the pit were two more undead creatures. One was hunched and twisted, and the other one stood tall, with ragged priestly garments draping its dessicated frame. These two were obviously intelligent, and malevolent.
The tall one spoke to us: "Intruders! What are you doing here?"
Little Girl immediately responded: "We're here for the Chalice of St. Raphael!" I winced at her naive honestly. However, I was surprised at the creature's response: "Well, its right through that door to your right. Go ahead and go get it. We won't stop you."
Even more surprisingly, Gabriel and Ford told us that they thought the creature was telling the truth. What danger might be guarding the artifact behind the door, that the undead would willingly let us pass by?
Ford, Gabriel, Tale, and Glorianna moved cautiously towards the stone door, while Gallatin, Kari and I stayed at the door, our eyes flicking back and forth between our allies and the undead creatures (Sindra had left the tomb once we reached the entrance again...not the most reliable of companions, that one). The wood of my bow creaked in my hands. I was waiting for treachery at any moment. Gabriel and Little Girl had gone through the door, while Tale and Ford waited outside, eying the undead with suspicion just as I was.
After a handful of very long minutes, the two clerics emerged from the room, and started to move back towards us. I couldn't see that either of them were carrying the Chalice, but the undead were predictably unhappy about us leaving unmolested. The tall undead summoned a pair of undead shadows, and the hunched undead ordered the skeletal warriors to attack. Things devolved fairly quickly from there. I was soon in the midst of a chaotic melee, with the living and dead all around me. Gallatin and I were able to defeat the first skeletal guard handily, but Gallatin was attacked by one of the shadows, and the color drained from his face, and his hands visibly shook on the haft of his hammer. Glorianna was attempting to turn back the undead, but her repeated attempts were only able to drive back one of the shadows. The tall undead apparently still had some vestiges of its former priestly powers, and was summoning the energy of unlife to weaken our entire party, while the hunched undead exchanged a spell or two with Tale before jumping into melee.
The battle was vicious and bloody, and I was still standing in large part thanks to pure adrenaline when I finally brought down the final blow on the undead cleric. I collapsed against a wall, and was glad when Gabriel channeled Sarenrae's power to heal some of our wounds. After ensuring that no threats remained, and learning that Glorianna had indeed obtained the Chalice, we collectively limped towards the surface, and emerged into the sunlight, bloody, battered, and covered in several centuries of dust.
As I said before: an extremely entertaining way to spend one's weekend.
Commentary
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Kuldak thank you for a most humorous thorough and thoughtful description of our adventures in the tomb.
What happened in the Chalice room.
Perhaps I should fill in what happened in the chamber in which we found the chalice. Glorianna, Talé and myself entered and found a fairly large chamber. It was decorated in white marble and gold trim. Three were six columns, carved in the likeness of angels, and these “columns” were holding silver scimitars. Tale´ mentioned that these were most likely Carytid Columns. These were lesser golems that would stand guard over a particular treasure, and animate when it was threatened.
At the end of the columned chamber was a simple white marble altar upon which rested three chalices. The one on the left was wooden and unadorned the smallest of the three, the one in the middle was made of some sort of copper, when light reflected off of it, it glowed like the rising sun. We could also see that this chalice was covered in engraved script. The final chalice on the right was golden and studded with jewels and gems. Clearly this bejeweled chalice was the most costly of the three, and the largest.
An angel was standing next to the altar. She looked remarkably human like. She had white fluffy wings that folded over her shoulders like a cloak, and beautiful brunette hair with highlights of fiery red and golden blond. Her skin was of a pleasing olive complexion like the ladies of my homeland Qudira, however the pupils of her eyes were the varying colors of molten gold. They rippled constantly with barely contained power. She wore a simple white tunic with sandals, and had a scimitar at her side.
“ Come in friends and enter” she bade us with a mellifluous voice. “You have nothing to fear but the fear you bring with you. Those with a shadow on their heart and evil intent in their veins cannot bear this place”. We approached the altar. “Be comforted for Sarenrae has heard the prayers of her people, and sent the chalice of St. Raphael here to help stem the tide of the approaching darkness”.
Glorianna asked, “ why not just give us the chalice?”
The angel replied, “ I am here to help you, not to remove the challenges you will face. However then will you grow?”
I asked, “ So, my lady, we have to make choice and pick the right chalice?”
The angel replied, “ Of course, for life is choice. Choice is one thing you mortals have that we immortal servants do not have. We can only be what we are weather a spirit of kindness and creation, or selfishness and destruction. Because our spirits and flesh are one, our true selves are expressed in our physical forms. But you can choose your own paths.”
Gabriella then said, “ wow that’s neat, and I like you, but I follow Shelyn.”
The angel put her arms on both Gloriana and my shoulders, and she said, “Do not worry for it matters not to Sarenrae or Shelyn whom you follow, they are not jealous goddess, but it matters to them whether you leave the world a little better then when you find it.”
Glorianna could not contain her self and with a “ that is the most beautiful thing I heard” she got up on her tiptoes and kissed the angel on her cheek.
The angel smiled and with her arms on our shoulders she gently pulled us both close to her and enveloped us both with her wings. “ I can’t tell you what a pleasure it is for me to spend a few moments with a pair of good souls. And as much as I wish we had more time to together you must choose”
She gently propelled Glorianna and myself to the altar. Now we had a choice. Which chalice was St. Raphael’s? Gloriana leaned over and asked me “ so which one is it? You are the servant of Sarenrae.” I bent my head and cleared my mind. I prayed to Our Lady Sarenrae to guide my heart and my hand. I reached for the middle chalice, which was fiery copper, with inscriptions etched in its surface. It reminded me of the rising sun, which in our faith, the faith of Sarenrae, goddess of the sun hope and redemption, is our most powerful symbol. The dawn symbolizes redemption, renewal, and the triumph of the light over the dark of the night.
The angel smiled and said “ you have chosen wisely Gabriel. Now you must bring this chalice to the temple of Sarenrae up above. “
Glorianna asked “ cant you get rid of the undead just outside?”
The angel replied, “ It is through facing challenges that you will grow. It will do you no good if I remove them for you. Besides I cannot leave this room. “
We turned to leave and we headed for the exit and steeled our selves to face the undead.
The angel called after us. “Wait, while I cannot help you directly, I can help you indirectly” She took both of our hands, and we felt warmth and light flow into us. I noticed the angel’s eyes luminous dimmed just a little bit. I felt renewed. All of he clerical spells (divine prayers) I had received this morning and had cast were renewed. I could cast them again. My ability to channel Sarenrae’s grace or positive energy as it is commonly called was also refreshed as if I had just woken up. Glorianna full of exuberance got on her tiptoes and with a “ thank you” kissed the angel on her cheek.
The angel smiled broadly and handed Glorianna a simple worn leather satchel. Since the angel was clad in only her wings, a simple white tunic, sandals and a scimitar at he waist, I have no idea from where she produced the satchel. Noticing my furrowed brow, the angel laughed, and traced her finger along my jaw “ Gabriel, why not allow yourself to accept a simple miracle when you see one, besides sometimes we girls like to be mysterious and we certainly love confusing you men”
And to both of us the angel said, “As the wisest of the Maiar once said, ‘All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.’”
“ Shoo, before I begin quoting someone again “ and with that she propelled us towards the door. Glorianna looking back asked, “ Will we see you again? “ And the angel replied, “ I hope so, now scoot.”
So we opened the door and faced the maleficent undead waiting for us.
Ah, so that is what happened in the other room.
I did not know it was going to be a kissing story.
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Session 11- Wererats here wererats there wererats everywhere!
Adventurers present-
Imam Gabriel bin Sarenrae Al Katheer, Pathfinder: Human Male Keshite, 3rd level Cleric of Sarenrae. Gabriel planned to marry settle down run a mosque and tend a flock of Sarenrae however that was not to be. His sister Fatima ran off from an arranged marriage and joined the pathfinders. At the behest of his father, Gabreil has set off from Katheer to track down his wayward sister. He also joined the Pathfinders. Fatima’s trail has led him to Korvosa. Now Gabriel has found himself embroiled in the volatile politics of Korvosa.
Kuldak ½ orc male 1st level rogue/ 2st level Barbarian. Kuldak carries a great axe and sports a kilt. One never knows what kind of trouble he will get into or what kind of trouble he will pull a comrade out of. With Kuldak it’s a crapshoot. He is the life of whatever party he joins.
Gaedren Lamm framed his brother for a crime.
He likes to pick on Lielda
Lielda Half elf Female 2nd level Rogue/ 1st level fighter. She is sullen and resentful. She was one of Gaedren Lamm’s Lambs, until he tortured her by burning her formerly beautiful face with acid. Kuldak often teases her. She has developed a fancy for Sabina Marin.
Glorianna, Human Female 3rd level Cleric of Shelyn. Glorianna is blond bubbly and naive. She is up for trying anything, anxious to experience life to the fullest, after living a sheltered life in a Convent. In a pinch she has shown surprising courage, rushing into combat with her glaive, whether it is against a Carrion golem or a flying Dero necromancer.
Tale, Gnome Male 3rd level Sorcerer. He has bright green hair and electric blue eyes, and tends to shoot off sparks at random intervals.
Angus Firehammer, Dwarf, Male 2nd level Paladin of Torag. Gaedren Lamm killed his parents and he worked hard as smith’s apprentice to raise his brothers and sisters. He mentioned finding his faith in Torag, while working the smithy.
Ford Prefect, Human male, 2nd level Rogue. While he has skill in the roguish arts, Ford is often a little foolhardy. He easily gets in to trouble while attempting to be impressively daring.
He made a late night cameo appearance with the wererat fight
Kanthos Human Male 1st level fighter. Kanthos is a quiet solid dependable warrior. He is a man of few words. He wields a Scythe with quiet precision. Gaedren Lamm killed his parents and he had to raise his brothers and sisters.
Adventure:
After returning from the Tomb of St Raphael with the chalice of St Raphael, we turned the chalice over to the clerics of Sarenrae. Then we took a couple of days, to divide and sell our loot and to relax in our favorite inn in north point the Three Rings Tavern owned by Theandra Darklight, in the Five Corners. The dungeon delve had netted us all nice shiny silvered weapons. Most importantly we found a wand empowered with the divine spell cure disease. We put the wand in Glorinna’s care.
.
I decided to go and check on Tayce Soldado’s daughter Briana, whom we had cured of this new emerging disease earlier. We found her in trails end, happily making mud pies near her home.
I asked, “Now my child how are you? Feeling better I hope?”
She replied, “ Yes I feel much better. Thank you for making me better” then with a twinkle in her eye, she asked me “ would you like a mud pie? They are fresh. I made it especially for you! “ And with a big smile with both hands she passed me her latest creation. Kuldak said “ yes I would love a mud pie” and he grabbed the pie and ate it, mud roots bugs and all. “ Thank you” I said “ that was very generous. May I ask before you got sick did you notice anything out of the ordinary? Were you bitten by any rats cats dogs or anything else?” Brianna replied “ no not bitten but this boy came by to play jax with me, and he had some silver coins. I won and bought lots of candy” I replied “ thank you” Brianna said “ oh and that other priest dropped by, Ishini, or whatever his name is. He wanted to know if I was well too. Do you want to come over for supper?” “Thank you No little one we have other children to check on. Sarenrae’s blessings be upon you. Insalah”
We left and returned to the Three Rings tavern in north point.
We debated what to call ourselves. Our first name the Reapers, I did not like, we discarded. Our next name the Crimson Harrowers, didn’t set well either especially with its possible connection to the Crimson throne, and more ominously, the plague now gripping the city, called the Blood Veil or Crimson Veil. We tossed around a few names, I liked the silver blades, but that didn’t catch. We all scribbled down names on pieces of parchment and placed them in a hat. Lielda pulled each name out of a hat. We all found the name pride of Korvosa to be a nice one. Then I suggested the Lions of Korvosa. This name caught, and we are now calling ourselves the Lions of Korvosa, no longer the Reapers, nor the Crimson Harrowers
A messenger arrived and asked for me. He handed me a small envelope and I paid him. Inside was a small note from Ishani Dharti the cleric of Abadar we had met earlier at the house of Tayce Soldado. We went to Tayce Soldado’s house to cure her daughter Brianna of the blood veil a few days ago. The note invited us to the Church of Abadar, so we could meet and discuss the spreading problem of the blood veil. I decided to accept the invitation. We got our gear together and headed for the Church of Abadar. It was a short distance from our inn.
The temple of Abadar was impressive. It towered over the surrounding buildings, and was aptly named the Grand Vault of Abadar. The Temple offered a vision of divine luxuriance amid a sea of mortal troubles.
Its grey-veined white marble reflected the midday sun.
Yet, for a deity of law, the steep stairs and ramps leading up
to the temple’s great bronze doors offered a strangely discordant
scene. Dozens of citizens—mostly of the working class, although
the silks of a few merchants show through the crowd—thronged
the entry, scarcely being held back by a group of gold-armored
Abadarian clerics. All seemed intent on gaining entry to the temple,
but the clerics turned away nearly all comers. The clerics’ reasoning
became clear as one desperate believer was turned away, his pitiful
Countenance mottled with violent red sores.
It was difficult to make our way through the packed masses. Before leaving the inn I had made sure my holy symbol of Sarenrae was inside my tunic. Looking at Glorianna eyeing all of these poor diseased souls, I gently asked her if I could carry our wand of cure disease for a while. I was worried about her emptying the wand of its magic and leaving us without any curative magic ourselves. Using the wand and curing diseases amidst a sick and desperate crowd could set off a riot.
Tale tried to use his magic to create a loud bag, to try and disperse the crowd a little bit, but they were so tightly packed they couldn’t move. We had to shoulder our way through the mob. Once through, the Armored clerics guarding the temple entrance demanded to know who we were. I identified myself and showed them Ishani Dharti’s letter. We were quickly admitted to the temple.
The interior by contrast was cool and orderly, with colonnaded hallways, marble floors and gold trim everywhere. Our footfalls echoed on the marble floors, and people eyed us with some suspicion, obviously worried if we carried contagion. An acolyte showed us to a side meeting room where we met Shane Dharti. He welcomed us in and asked us to sit around the table.
“Thank you for coming. I assume you already suspect my reasons for calling, having seen the crowd outside—poor lot. You recognize the symptoms too, I’m sure. I had hoped that the Soldado case was isolated, but apparently we have a bigger problem on our hands than I’d feared.
“I’m concerned for the city, but also for my brethren here. The morning after my visit to the Soldado home I came to the temple to hear that three of my brothers awoke with similar symptoms, although they had already been healed. I spoke to each, and aside from their usual duties in the temple, none have had any dealings with the sick. Later in the day, more of my brothers— vaultkeepers, guards, and acolytes—developed symptoms, and folk from throughout the city began arriving in search of healing. It’s been more than a little bit frightening. They’re calling the sickness ‘blood veil.’ An apt enough name, I suppose. “
“This affliction has spread fast, yet I’m not yet sure how. Most of the patients we’re treating have come from North Point and Old Korvosa. The disease seems to spread fastest through the lower classes. Although we here at the temple can heal some of the ill, I fear that the spread of the disease will soon outpace our resources. The only way to stem the growing infection is to involve all the city’s resources. We need to organize. We need to call upon the faiths of Sarenrae, Pharasma, and even Asmodeus to face this attack. Archbanker Tuttle and several of his assistants are out pursuing alliances with these other faiths, but even that won’t be enough. We need to involve the Korvosan Guard, at the very least. And that’s where you come in—with the number of desperate souls growing, it’s not particularly safe for a priest to walk the streets of Korvosa. I hear that you have a good relationship with Field Marshal Cressida Kroft—perhaps you would be willing to escort me to Citadel Volshyenek to introduce me to her? I fear that the scene on the temple’s steps is but a precursor to the dangers that lie ahead. Of course we do not expect you to do this for free, and I have been authorized to pay you each 200 pieces of gold for this task”
We all readily agreed. And after disguising Ishani Dharti as something other then a priest of Abadar, we headed back into the streets. Our trip to Citadel Volsheynek fortunately passed without incident.
On the way Ishani Dharti and I compared notes. He told me that the first case he came across was the Soldado case, and then next one was the bartender and his wife at the Three rings tavern, whom came to the temple of Abadar for healing. I told Ishani Dharti that I was most likely the carrier, because we were staying in the Three Rings tavern, and I had gotten sick after visiting Briana Soldado. I had been healed at the temple of Sarenrae. Our trip to Citadel Volsheynek fortunately passed without incident.
One of the guards on duty recognized us and urged us to hurry if we wished to catch the Queens Physicians. When we entered the baily, echoes of forcefully spoken but still just-missed words resounded off the imposing granite and iron walls of Citadel Volshyenek’s outer curtain walls. Dozens of red-and-silver-armored guards stood in assembly upon the pitted stone mustering ground here, mumbling in hushed, somber tones. Before them, atop a weathered wooden platform, paced Field Marshal Kroft, her eyebrows arched sternly as she momentarily tolerated the crowd’s murmurs. Behind her upon the scaffold stood three grizzled veteran guardsmen at attention, as well as an ominous-looking group. These men wore cowled robes of oily-looking leather, supple gloves, and wide black hats. Some griped heavy canes, others dark satchels. Each of them, though, wore a dark-goggled mask tapering to a pointed beak. Among them stood two others. The first was a middle- aged gentleman in a simple black overcoat with streaks of white gracing the sides of his short dark hair. He watched the gathered guards with a soft, concerned expression; his hands tightly clasped a heavy-looking doctor’s case. The second figure was an imposing one indeed—a woman dressed in full-plate armor, a longsword and shield at her side, and her blank-faced full helm sported a bright red plume. The Field Marshal’s fierce tone cut through the rumble of whispers. “You will escort Doctor Davaulus and his men in their royal duties wherever those might take them. Furthermore, you are to consider orders from any of the queen’s new order of Gray Maidens to be as binding as any superior officer in the Korvosan Guard or Sable Company. You are guardsmen of Korvosa. You will not balk. These are dire times and your city needs these healers. Your city needs you. Your patrol leaders have your assignments. Dismissed”
The guards muttered a little more as the woman in full plate descended off the platform and began barking orders. Field Marshal Kroft and this Dr. Davalus began heading for the keep, their heads bent in consultation. Our group made our way over to the Field Marshal, and when she saw us her face lit up. “Dr Devalus, let me introduce you to the “Lions of Korvosa” a group of specialists I have employed on occasion to handle a variety of difficult tasks for me. “
“ Ah yes “ the doctor said as he came over to me “ Imam Gabriel of Sarenrae I presume? You hail from Katheer correct?”I replied, “ Yes doctor I do and I trained at” Before I could finish the doctor grabbed my ear, and looked within, then pushed an eyelid back with a for finger and examined my eye “ I understand you have recently recovered from a bout of Blood Veil yes? Such cases are of great interest to us” He moved onto grasp my throat with his thumbs where my glands were. With this I grasped his wrists and forced his arms down. Somewhat shocked the doctor commented “ I expected ones such as you to display a better attitude” To which I replied “ It was through the grace of our Lady Sarenrae, and a spell of cure disease she provided, which restored my health, not a feat of my own constitution. We have been doing our part. We recently recovered the chalice of St Raphael from the clutches of the undead in the grey district. This relics curative powers should help stem the tide of disease, we have also uncovered books on the transmission and nature of diseases from a necromancers lab.” Dr Devalus then asked ‘ where are they?” “ Where they can do some good, in the temple of Sarenrae.”
With this he produced a writ. It read:
Attention!
By Decree of Her Royal Majesty, the Radiant Queen Illeosa I, all citizens and members of the Korvosan Guard are to aid and admit the newly established Queen’s Physicians in this time of urgency. These royal agents will extend healing to the sick and organize defense against the spreading affliction known as “blood veil.” They are to be allowed access to any home or building they deem necessary in the course of their duties. All those suffering from disease or disorder are to submit themselves to the Physicians for treatment. To aid in the duties of the Queen’s Physicians, know that the order of the Gray Maidens has been established to provide military support as needed. The Maidens answer directly to the Crimson Throne, and will be called upon as necessary to augment and strengthen
the peace where simple city guards will not suffice. Impeding or distracting the duties of the Queen’s Physicians or the Gray Maidens is punishable by imprisonment. Impersonating one of the Queen’s Physicians is punishable by death. Knowingly harboring or hiding the infected is punishable by death. Purposefully spreading blood veil is punishable by torture, then death. The Queen’s Physicians will be making rounds of every city district henceforth until Her Majesty deems this misfortune abated.
I asked him about how he thought the disease was spread. He mentioned sputum and other bodily humors. Dr Devalus seemed to know what he was talking about.
Cresseda Kroft cleared her throat,” Gentlemen we have a meeting to attend and plans to make?”
I asked Cresseda Kroft “ May we attend? I have with me Ishani Dharti a fellow cleric of the Church of Abadar. There might be much the clergy of the temples of Korvosa can offer to help with the crimson veil. “
Ishani Dharti spoke up “ yes if we are able to coordinate the efforts of the clergy of Abadar, Sarenrae, Pharisma and yes Asmodeus, with the Queens Physicians and the Korvosan guard hopefully Abadar willing we can better deal with this plague.” With that we went into the meeting. Dr Devalus introduced himself as a physician from Egoran, the capitol of Cheliax, and he had long served Queen Illiosa’s family there. The queen had asked him to come here to Korvosa from Egoran, to help find a cure for the plague. Dr. Devalus seemed as far as I cold tell to be genuinely concerned but he was Chelaxian. I have a particular dislike for Chelaxians, the devil worshipers that they are. The meeting was long, full of details and duty rosters.
Afterwards the doctor left. Cressida Kroft asked if we would be willing to relocate to the barracks so we could be close at hand for any “special” jobs she might need tending to. We readily agreed. We left to escort Ishani Dharti back to the temple of Abadar, and to pick our stuff up from the Three Rings Tavern, and we returned to Citadel Volshyenek. Space was made available to us in the barracks. As soon as we had settled into our space in the barraks, a guardsman informed us Cressida had a job for us. We went to her office.
Creseda Kroft began “ we have hired lots of carters to transport the corpses off to the grey district where they can be safely burnt. I have heard disturbing rumors of Racker's Alley in Old Korvosa. Apeareltly the some of the carters in old Korvosa don’t want to cart the corpses all the way down to the grey district. I need you to investigate. We can’t have bodies stuffed into alleyways and left to rot. That will only prolong the Blood Veil plague, and spawn more disease. “
We agreed to do the job, and headed out to old Korvosa. On the way we ran into Ishani Dharti, again escorted by some armored clerics. He told us that news had come to the Church of Abadar of a woman named Vendra Loaggri, owner of a prosperous perfume shop in the heights district called Lavender. She claims to have a cure for the Blood veil. Ishani Dharti asked if we cold investigate this to see if it was fake or not, and to report to him in the Temple of Abadar. They were willing to pay 1,000 gp for our report. We agreed to do this.
No sooner had we gone a few more blocks and a jaundiced eyed old fishmonger woman approached us. She asked if we were the Lions of Korvosa. I wondered how our new name had spread so quickly.
When we said yes, she told us her name was Eries Yelloweyes. She told us about how people were blaming wererats for the spread of the plague. Usually she said in the face of such persecution, wererats simply melted into the sewers and waited until the humans got board and left. This time there was a firebrand named Girrigz Ripperclaws who was refusing to back down and organizing a band to attack the humans in their weakened state. She said she feared the return of a government directed rat purge, a distinct possibility considering the plague. Attacks on humans by were rats were just the thing that could set a rat purge in motion. She wanted us to venture into the sewers and “convince “ Girrigz Ripperclaws, either through diplomacy or violence to give up his plans for revenge. In payment she offered the spoils of his lair and information as to what might be the true reason behind the plague.
We agreed this was an urgent problem that needed addressing, so we decided to deal with this Grizzigz Ripperclaws immediately. We followed Eries Yelloweyes’s direction into the sewers and to Ripperclaw’s lair.
As we made our way down a sewer passage, we came across a large hole in the wall, just as the Eries Yelloweyes told us. Beyond this hole wsa a relatively large chamber with two exists. Mushrooms grew in thick patches. Kuldack then told Ford Prefect “ look those are special Mushrooms if you eat them they will make you very strong” Kuldak sounded so convincing he almost had med convinced. Ford prefect looked at him suspiciously “ are you serious about this?” and Lielda chimed in “ really” Kulkak continued “ yes you must eat them while they are still moist otherwise they loose potency” Ford began heading over to the mushrooms.
All of a sudden a large purplish one began emmiting this god awful noise. We all put our hands over our ears. Ford Prefect began stabbing the mushroom with his rapier, killing it. The alarm had been sounded. From one direction came dire rats, a swarm of rats, and I think some wererats as well. From the other more wererats. It was a pitched battle. I blessed the group. Tale unfortunately became engulfed in a swarm of rats several times. Luckily he was able to kill the swarm with a couple of burning hands spells. I killed dire rats. Llaelda began grappling with one of the wererats. She had her arm around is neck and attempted to choke it into submission. It twisted hits head around and bit her. I wasn’t sure but thought Llaelda had an excited look in her face.
Angus, Kuldak and Glorianna were able to finish of the other three wererrats.
As we proceeded deeper into the complex we ran across an Outyoug. It boiled forth form the confines of its lair and grabbed ahold of Angus, and popped the dwarfen paladin in its mouth and began chewing. Luckily we were able to kill the otyough by wolf packing it.
I was able to cure most everyone’s superficial wounds by channeling positive energy, or Sarenrae's grace. It looked as if a good number of us had contracted filth fever, and I think Lielda had contracted Lycanthropy although I wasn’t entirely positive. We hadn’t found our quarry yet, so we need to bind our wounds and keep looking.
More next weekend.
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Session 12
Creepy Toys and things that go bump in the Fog.
Adventurers present-
Imam Gabriel bin Sarenrae Al Katheer, Pathfinder: Human Male Keshite, 3rd level Cleric of Sarenrae. Gabriel planned to marry settle down run a mosque and tend a flock of Sarenrae however that was not to be. His sister Fatima ran off from an arranged marriage and joined the pathfinders. At the behest of his father, Gabreil has set off from Katheer to track down his wayward sister. He also joined the Pathfinders. Fatima’s trail has led him to Korvosa. Now Gabriel has found himself embroiled in the volatile politics of Korvosa.
Glorianna, Human Female 4rd level Cleric of Shelyn. Glorianna is blond bubbly and naive. She is up for trying anything, anxious to experience life to the fullest, after living a sheltered life in a Convent. In a pinch she has shown surprising courage, rushing into combat with her glaive, whether it is against a Carrion golem or a flying Dero necromancer.
Tale, Gnome Male 3rd level Sorcerer. He has bright green hair and electric blue eyes, and tends to shoot off sparks at random intervals.
Gallatin Yellowstone, Human male 3nd level Fighter. He is a quite but friendly warrior in training who hails from Sandpoint. He is a student of Vin Carlo Orisini. When Field Marshal Kresseda Croft gives us a job, Gallatin can be counted on to ask the pertinent questions about our mission.
Angus Firehammer, Dwarf, Male 2nd level Paladin of Torag. Gaedren Lamm killed his parents and he worked hard as smith’s apprentice to raise his brothers and sisters. He mentioned finding his faith in Torag, while working the smithy.
Ford Prefect, Human male, 2nd level Rogue. While he has skill in the roguish arts, Ford is often a little foolhardy. He easily gets in to trouble while attempting to be impressively daring.
Aristrana Femal elf ranger lvl 3- She occasionally helps us with missions. We freed her from a grisly laboratory of Rolf the Necormancers a while ago.
Group #2
Lielda Half elf Female 2nd level Rogue/ 1st level fighter. She is sullen and resentful. She was one of Gaedren Lamm’s Lambs, until he tortured her by burning her formerly beautiful face with acid. Kuldak often teases her. She has developed a fancy for Sabina Marin.
Kanthos Human Male 2st level fighter. Kanthos is a quiet solid dependable warrior. He is a man of few words. He wields a Scythe with quiet precision. Gaedren Lamm killed his parents and he had to raise his brothers and sisters.
Dargox, Half Orc Male 1st level Bard. Does his best to bolster the spirits of his companions with his music. Unfortunately he often puts his foot in his mouth, and drops his lute in the river. However, when the chips are down he does the right thing. He saved Glorianna from the predations of Amin Galento. Gaedren Lamm had kidnapped his sister, and made her into one of his “lambs” she was forced into begging.
Kari Goldenhair, Human Female, 45, 3st level Druid. She is the most recent addition to the group. Gaedren Lamm had killed her husband and sold her son into slavery. She has taken a motherly interest in Talee the gnome Sorcerer
Sindra Blueleaf, half-elf female 1st level Ranger. Formerly known as Felosial Deldon and/or Ivo Corbierre. He/she seems to delight in changing his/her identity, always reappearing wearing a new disguise and insisting on being called a new name. I am not sure what the real identity of this chaotic person is...
Session 12 Adventure: Creepy Toys and things that go bump in the fog.
After binding our wounds, I got out our Wand of Cure Disease, and I used it to cure several party members of their filth fever, which they had contracted from the Otyough. Funny I don’t remember healing Lielda. She must have been hiding from me. I will have to track her down.
We pressed further into the were-rat warren and found and cornered Grizzigz Ripperclaws. It was a very difficult fight. He seemed to move with blinding speed, and his outlines were blurred, so much of the time we couldn’t land a telling blow on him. But after a few grueling minutes we brought him down. He managed to infect quite a few of us with Lythencropy, but thanks to the Cure Disease wand, we were able to cure ourselves.
After dealing with the gang of were-rats, we returned to the Castle to see Cressida Croft. She asked us to go to the old city to investigate if the Corpse Haulers, hired to cart away the dead bodies of the plague victims, from the Old City in the north of Korvosa to the Grey District cemetery in the south of Korvosa. We need to see if they were doing their jobs or merely dumping their corpses in some convenient alley. She suggested we investigate a place called Raker’s Alley.
Amazingly every one who had ever been affiliated with the Lions of Korvosa showed up at the meeting with Cresseda Croft. There were 12 of us in total. At the marshal’s suggestion we split up into two groups to better cover Old Korvosa. We split into one group of 7 and another of 5
One group consisted of myself Gabriel, Glorianna, Gallatin, Angus, Aristana, Ford Prefect, and Tale. The other group consisted of Lielda, Kanthos, Kari Golden hair, Dargox, and Ivo Corbier/ Sindra goldenleaf.
Strangely Kuldak was nowhere to be found.
We headed north to Old Korvosa to begin our investigation. On our way we ran into Erin Yelloweyes, the were-rat who asked us to get rid of Grizzigz Ripperclaw, she motioned for us to go into a nearby alleyway. We told her that in the battle we accidentally killed 3 were rats, but were able to spare 6. We also told her we put an end to Ripperclaw. Erin Yelloweyes seemed pleased with this solution. She told us that the-were rats saw the boat that came into the harbor, the one that was fired upon by the Trebuchet. No one was on deck. It had a quarantine signal on the bow. Erin golden eyes mentioned that after the ship was sunk by the trebuchet and when the debris washed ashore, there were bags of rats and bags of money tied to the timbers. She said both the money and the rats smelled bad, so they pushed the stuff back in the river. She thanked us for our help and melted back into the shadows.
In short time we reached old Korvosa and began to ask around about Rakers alley. After a few short inquirers we found it. The alleyway was littered with garbage. There was also dead and rotting plague corpse as well. There must have been at least 40 of them. The stench was overwhelming. Glorina pulled out a “doctors mask” and put it on. She looked like some sort of strange bird.
We investigated the corpses a little more closely and discovered that many had twin puncture marks on their necks. We also noticed that there was a small hole in the wall of the side of one of the buildings. We decided to investigate further.
In the front of the building was a faded sign indicating the place was a toy store. The store was boarded up and abandoned. Angus Charged the door and burst his way in. in the center of the front room, Angus called upon his divine gift of Torag, to sense the presence of Evil. He sensed a powerful emanation coming from the center of the main room. Once cute stuffed animals peered creepily from the shelves. Thick fog covered the floor to a depth of two feet.
In the back of the room was a door marked “private”. The fog seemed to breath in and out of the door, moving by it self inhaling and exhaling. Tale opened the door and saw half constructed dolls and hobbyhorses with sparkling eyes, apparently glaring at him. Unnerved Tale shut the door quickly.
In one corner of the room we found a slumped form covered in the mist. Upon closer examination we found it was an old bearded man hunched over and dead. He had a small key ring at his waist. We could tell that the body had been exsanguinated. We also noticed that there weren’t any of the usual sounds that rats make. It was eerily quiet. We thought might be vampires.
Under the mist we also found a trap door that was locked. We tried one of the keys and opened the trap door. Glorianna lit some torches and used them to burn some of the fog away. Once the trap door was open, we discovered a 3-foot crawl space underneath the store. Glorianna decides she doesn’t want to fight vampires in such cramped quarters so we gathered around the trap door, weapons ready. Glorianna called upon Shelyn’s grace and channeled positive energy. Multi-colored lights filled the room in a kaleidoscope of colors. We heard shrieks of agony coming from under the floor. We woke the vampires up.
The mist began to roil and boil. For misty shapes emerged from the mist behind our ring. The vampires were gaunt pale faced and angry. With their clawed hands, they slashed at our backs. In the Confusion of the fighting Gallatin put down his weapon. The fight was fast and viscous. Both Glorianna and I channeled positive energy. The Vampires couldn’t stand up to two Clerics working together. We drove them back and seared them badly. They melted into the mists.
We realized that we had only defeated them temporarily and had to find their resting places, their coffins, so we could put a permanent end to them. Gallatin suggested we check a nearby church or graveyard. We decided to check the crawl space under the store first. Underneath we found four coffins, and four baldy injured vampires. We were easily able to stake them and put an end to them.
We returned to Cresseda Croft and she thanked us for our efforts. She paid us for investigating Raker's alley, getting rid of the vampires, and she paid us a bonus for dealing with the were-rat problem as well.
We discussed what we needed to do next. We had a supposition that Cheliax was behind Korvosa’s woes. We realized that we needed evidence. What is the importance of the coins? Glorianna mentioned that they were tied to pieces of the boats wreckage, Briana Soldado, mentioned coming across some coins, and Ishani Dharti, our friendly Cleric of Abadar, mentioned that the vault keeps became sick as well, without any outside contact.
Our next job is to go to a perfume shop in the Heights district. This is a mission for the Church of Abadar. We are to investigate this shop to see if there is a cure, or if it is a scam.
We also want to check out this “plague ship” wreck to see if there is anything of interest there.
We have lots of threads to work with More next week
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Session 13 Danger in the Deep.
Adventurers present
Imam Gabriel bin Sarenrae Al Katheer, Pathfinder: Human Male Keshite, 3rd level Cleric of Sarenrae. Gabriel planned to marry settle down run a mosque and tend a flock of Sarenrae however that was not to be. His sister Fatima ran off from an arranged marriage and joined the pathfinders. At the behest of his father, Gabreil has set off from Katheer to track down his wayward sister. He also joined the Pathfinders. Fatima’s trail has led him to Korvosa. Now Gabriel has found himself embroiled in the volatile politics of Korvosa.
Glorianna, Human Female 4rd level Cleric of Shelyn. Glorianna is blond bubbly and naive. She is up for trying anything, anxious to experience life to the fullest, after living a sheltered life in a Convent. In a pinch she has shown surprising courage, rushing into combat with her glaive, whether it is against a Carrion golem or a flying Dero necromancer.
Gallatin Yellowstone, Human male 3nd level Fighter. He is a quite but friendly warrior in training who hails from Sandpoint. He is a student of Vin Carlo Orisini. When Field Marshal Kresseda Croft gives us a job, Gallatin can be counted on to ask the pertinent questions about our mission.
Ford Prefect, Human male, 2nd level Rogue. While he has skill in the roguish arts, Ford is often a little foolhardy. He easily gets in to trouble while attempting to be impressively daring.
Lielda Half elf Female 2nd level Rogue/ 1st level fighter. She is sullen and resentful. She was one of Gaedren Lamm’s Lambs, until he tortured her by burning her formerly beautiful face with acid. Kuldak often teases her. She has developed a fancy for Sabina Marin.
Kanthos Human Male 2st level fighter. Kanthos is a quiet solid dependable warrior. He is a man of few words. He wields a Scythe with quiet precision. Gaedren Lamm killed his parents and he had to raise his brothers and sisters.
Dargox, Half Orc Male 1st level Bard. Does his best to bolster the spirits of his companions with his music. Unfortunately he often puts his foot in his mouth, and drops his lute in the river. However, when the chips are down he does the right thing. He saved Glorianna from the predations of Amin Galento. Gaedren Lamm had kidnapped his sister, and made her into one of his “lambs” she was forced into begging.
Sindra Blueleaf, half-elf female 1st level Ranger. Formerly known as Felosial Deldon and/or Ivo Corbierre. He/she seems to delight in changing his/her identity, always reappearing wearing a new disguise and insisting on being called a new name. I am not sure what the real identity of this chaotic person is...
Andor Arceneaux- human male, 3rd level wizard. Recenly joined our group. He seems a bit Chaotic in nature, we shall see if he is a good fit for the Lions of Korvosa.
Session 13 Danger in the deep
I got up before the sunrise as usual. After I used some water from a basin to wash myself, I dressed and headed out of our barracks. I climbed up one of the spiral staircases in one of the towers with my prayer rug rolled up under my arm. This particular tower was on the east side of Citadel Volshyenek. It overlooked Midland harbor, the High bridge and up the Jaggere River. The view was quite beautiful actually. A mist clung to the river, covering it in a blanket of grey. I rolled out my rug and began my ritual Sallah or morning prayers just as the sun began rising. The guards, now used to my presence paid me no mind. One even asked “put in a good word for me.”
Yesterday had been a long day. We fought both Were-rats and vampires. Through our lady the Dawn flower’s grace we came through alive and in one piece. I gave her thanks, and prayed for the success of today’s ventures. Invigorated and renewed by my morning prayers, I packed up my carpet and headed back to the barracks where I dropped it off and headed to the mess hall.
By ones and twos our group gathered as they awoke and came to breakfast. After a bit of discussion over whether to investigate the ship wreck or the perfume shop we decided to investigate the shipwreck.
We headed down to Midlands harbor to find a boat. It was very easy actually. Gloriana found a fisherman just returning from his morning catch and she leaned over. The fisherman gladly leant us his boat for a few silver, and we rowed out into the river. We rowed out to the wreckage and then drank our potions of water breathing. We all dove in. Gloriana dove first. She had shed her armor, and just had three strategically placed pieces of cloth on covering the necessities. We all watched her dive in. we followed, some in armor some not. Ford and Dargox decided to stay in the boat to mind it.
The decent down was eerie, the deeper we sank the darker it became. With a brief prayer to Sarenrae, my silver scimitar began to glow like the sun. Eventually we got to the sandy bottom. The boat was split in two by the Trebuchet. We headed over to the breach and entered the ship. From the bow of the ship, six eels emerged from some iron pots and swam over and attacked us. Sindra kept getting bitten. A large shark swam by, circles the boat and then rammed it with its snout. The shark took a bite out of our new wizard friend Andor. Through out the battle Sindra tried to fight with two weapons but she finds it’s beyond her skill. Gallatin manages to single handedly kill all of the eels. He collected them on a string to take back to the surface. We were all able to work together and drive off the shark.
We noticed that there is another cabin deeper in the hull of the stern section of the boat. The hold was full of debris, there was also quite few silver coins scattered in the wreckage. Andor had his invisible servant gather the coins. The party was worried about infection. When we entered a Sea Hag confronted us. She hissed in anger and attacked. I have never seen something so horrifically ugly in all my life. The sheer shock of seeing her drained some of the strength from my arms. “ My eyes, my eyes, I shall be blinded if I don’t look away”
It was a difficult battle, we kept trying to land a meaningful blow on her, but the water kept impeding our swings. She was swift enough to parry our strokes and skewer us repeatedly with her spear. Luckily Glorianna was able to get a decisive blow in with her Glaive and she killed the hag. Beauty triumphed over ugliness.
We found a pair of magical bracers, and a magical spear. We also found a pair of metal “deaths head” metal coffers emanating necromantic magic. I decided it was best to take these back to the Temple of Sarenrae for further examination. In another room we found a drowned Queen’s physician with a holy symbol of Urgathoa around his neck. Urgathoa is the goddess of undeath and disease. We decided to take the body and the boxes back with us. Lielda hauled the body up to the boat.
Meanwhile Ford Prefect and Dargox were having a lovely time playing cards and napping. I think they got sunburned as well. We woke them up when we emerged from the water, although they deny it.
They certainly were surprised to see the withered body over Lielda’s shoulder. Ford then rows the boat back to shore and believes he should get the bag of silver (which Andor's unseen servant had collected and delivered from the wreckage to the rowboat).
I warn Ford that the silver pieces are probably contaminated with the plague. I also suggested that sunbathing on the boat doesn’t necessarily earn one a share of the treasure.
The boat reached the dock and we return it to the fisherman. We put the body in a cart covered it in a burlap sack and wheeled it over to the temple of Sarenrae. The two boxes and the corpse of the queen’s physician are left at the temple.
At this point the Lions of Korvosa decided to share the news of their findings with Cressida Croft. She was excited to hear of our successful exploration of the wreck. She decided to see the body in the temple herself.
We head over to the temple with Cresseda. When we arrived we are greeted by Solaris, the high priest of Sarenrae. He bowed politely to Kresseda and greeted her warmly. He was dressed in simple white robes with gold trim. The symbol of Sarenrae was on his chest.
Solaris led us to the basement of the temple. Inside of a stone room was the corpse of one of the queen’s physicians, and the two “death head” boxes. Solaris then cast a speak with dead spell.
Solaris then asked the corpse “what is your name?”
It rasped “Rois”.
Solaris then asked “ what is your favorite color?”
The corpse rasped “Green no Blue”
Solaris asked “ whom do you serve?”
“ Urgathoa” the corpse replied.
“Why do you serve her?” Solaris asked
The corps of Rois replied“ because there is so much disease in the world, if I serve her I wont get sick”.
Solaris sighed, “ Whom do you serve in this world?”
The corpse replied, “ I serve Lady Andaisin she is a powerful cleric of my mistress Urgathoa”.
Solaris asked, “ Do any of you have specific questions?”
Gallatin asked, “ What was your mission on the ship?”
The corps of Rois replied, “ I was to ensure the safety of the cargo of specimens and see that it got to Korvosa”.
Gallatin asked, “ How were the specimens to be delivered?”
The corpse replied, “ some through the poor quarters, and others were going to be deposited in the bank of Abadar, to be distributed that way.”
Gallatin asked, “Is anyone else involved in this plot?”
The copse of Rois replied “ the red mantis”
Gallatin asked, “How are they involved?”
The corps of Rois replied “their agents loaded the boat in Cheliax and sailed it up to Korvosa”
Gallatin asked “ where does the Red Vail, the plague come from?”
The corps replied, “ the Red Vail was developed from a newly emerged disease from Sand point in Varisia called Voral’s Phage.”
Gallatin asked, “ Was a cure developed?”
The corpse replied, “ Why bother when we can rely on divine cure disease spells to keep our selves healthy? Besides, we are trying to spread disease not cure it”
Solaris and Cressida then open the boxes. In one they find a diseased dead rat, and silver coins infected with the Blood Veil plague. In the other box they find a collection of ledgers and papers, including the deed to the ship Direption, all from a group called “B 7” titling one “R. Devalus” with ownership of the ship and cargo, only titled as “specimens”.
Cressida said that these papers and ledgers would require further investigation. Cressida also told us that we should say nothing of this to anyone unless we wish to end up in the queen’s dungeons.
Solaris says that he will call a meeting of the high priests of the churches of Abadar, Pharisma, and Shelyn to tell them what has been uncovered and to coordinate efforts to combat the plague.
More to come next week.
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Campaign summary thus far. I have used the date when we stared the campaign for the month and day for example September 5. And for the year I took the Golaron year that the Adventure path is supposed to take place. Although three months have passed in the real world, it surprised me to find out, only 17 days has passed in the campaign world.
9/5/4708
Day: arrive in Korvosa,
Evening:
go to Zellara's, attack the fishery we free the orphans and get our revenge on Gaedren Lam
Riots
We save Amin Galento Gloriana Kuldak and Dargox go for party and shiver The rest of us go to Zelara’s house to spend the night and wait out the riots Later Dargox brings Glorina back to Zelara’s house he is sick
9/6/4708
Morning : we head to temple of Sarenrae. Dargox gets cured of Voral’s phage, dargox and Glorianna pass a miserable morning coming down from shiver
11:00 am we head to Castle Korvosa to turn over the broach. We were ordered to Disarm before entering the presence of the queen. Kuldak tried to sneak a knife past but was caught. We were tossed in the dungeons to stew.
2:00 pm Sabina Marin comes to our cells interviews us, and escorts us to visit the queen.
Lielda falls for Sabina Marin
2:15 pm we are presented to the queen, she rewards us and suggests we report to Field Marshal Cresseda Croft head of the Korvosan Guard, for further “opportunities” to help the watch. We are given an armed escort.
I get sick and make my way back to the Temple of Sarenrae. I have Voral's Phage
3:00 the party meets Field Marshal Cresseda Croft She puts them up at the three rings tavern in North point. She also hires them to investigate All the World meat
4:00 the group begins investigating All the World’s Meat. Lields manages to lift a key from one of the guards.
7:00 the group returns and hires the cow hammer boys to rough up Lamm’s house. After a pitched battle at the old fishery, the cow hammer boys are dispatched.
8:00 the group searches all the worlds Meat looking for the leader of this batch of guards called Veric Vankaskerkin. He was caught and the party found out that human meat was being mixed into the real meat. The place is shut down and Veric Vankaserkin turned over to Cressida Croft
9/7/4708
Morning: The group reports into Cresseda Croft’s office. They are introduced to Vencarlo Orisni. The group is hired to go to the Eels End to get hold of some Embarrassing evidence on the Chelaxian Ambassador, who is stirring up trouble.
Morning- the group goes to the Eels end. They split up. Kuldak and Lielda go to the pleasure barge, while the rest of the group to Davargo’s barge. He runs the Ells end. After some negotiating, and a hefty amount of gold paid, Davargo sold them the letters. They free a Pseudo dragon named Majenko.
Afternoon and evening: The group spent the rest of the day at the Eels end
A week passes some people train at Vencarlo Orisni’s
9/14/4708
Morning:
There are more riots; rumors about the king’s assassin have surfaced.
Cressida Croft hires the group to enter the Midlands district of the city, where the riots are and to apprehend a young artist named Triana Sabor. She supposedly murdered the king. Cressida suspects some sort of magical compulsion, perhaps a Chelaxian plot.
The group enters The Midlands district, and chases Triana Sabor across the “shingles” or rooftops. They fail to catch her, and the Sable Company, Gryphon riders, snatches her up.
Mid Day: The group returns to Cressida Croft to report their failure.
Cressida is there with the Ambassador of the Shaonti, a barbarian people who live to the north in the cinder lands. Apparently during the riots some thugs killed the ambassador’s grandson, and violence is about to erupt between the Chelaxian (most of the city is of Chelaxian decent) majority, and the Shaonti minority. The party is hired to go into the Grey district, the main graveyard for the city, and to retrieve the body of the Ambassador’s grandson. A necromancer named Rolf has procured it.
Early Afternoon: The party entered the Grey district and head into the Dead Warrens. In there they had a long series of battles facing everything from skeletons, to Otyoughs to flying Derro wizards.
The group was able to successfully retrieve the body of the Shaonti and they reported back to Cressida Croft. She is pleased that we have retrieved the body, and expresses her concern about tomorrows scheduled execution of Triana Sabor. We are paid for our efforts
Late afternoon: some of us spend the rest of the afternoon trianing at Vin Carlos, buying armor Etc.
Evening: Amin Galento’s concert some people like Gloriana had the time of their lives, and others like Lielda did not.
9/15/4708
The execution of Triana Sabor was an all day affair more like a ball then an execution. Everyone who was everyone was there. The queen came out looking glamorous, and made a speech about justice.
Around 5:00 the prisoner was brought out to be executed
All of a sudden just as the executioner raised his axe high to deliver the killing blow, a dagger flew out of nowhere and sunk into his hand. A man dressed in black leathers with a cape and rapier leaped onto the executioners block, the crowd roared” black jack.” He turned to address the crowd, and mocked the queen’s justice. With that chaos erupted. The queen was rushed to safety. We rushed the executioner’s block, and he put down the Executioner. He cut Triana Sabor's bonds gave he a potion, and they climbed up a banner to the castle walls, with a flourish and a bow, to the crowd form the top of the parapet, they hoped off the wall to safety.
Later that evening we visit Vin Carlo’s and he asks us if we would be willing to deliver a package for him in three days time.
At midnight that night we hear the sound of a trebuchet firing.
9/16/4708
Morning: Galatin Kuldak and I investigate Trails End. We find debris from the ship, and saw some children dragging something into their warren of shanties. We followed. They attacked us. The shaonti rogues practically cut us to ribbons. Galatin with his earth breaker and Kuldak with his Battle-axe were soon able to put an end to that messily.
Midday: we returned to the three rings tavern in north point for lunch. Grau, a down on his luck city guard that we helped out earlier, approached us. He was much improved now. He asked us if we would help his niece. We agreed to
Afternoon: we went to the Soldado household, and saw the girl. She was very ill. I was able to get a scroll of cures disease from the temple of Sarenrae to heal her. We also met Ishani Dharti a cleric of Abadar. He told us that his biggest worry was that the girl had a disease he hadn’t seen before.
The mother gave us a wonderful dinner.
Two days passed
9/18/4708
The group went to Vin Carlos. They met Triana Sabor and escorted her out of Korvosa, because of the huge bounty oh her head. Luckily we make it out without any guards noticing. On the way we notice that lots of people are getting sick.
9/19/4708
The church of Sarenrae hired us to go to the Tomb of St Raphael and to retrieve his chalice. Raamiel, the priest of Sarenrae gave us directions to the tomb in the grey district. We headed for the tomb. Inside there were lots of traps and lots of zombies. We also had to deal with a wight and a Hecuva. The chalice was in a chamber guarded by an angel. She took a liking to Gloriana and myself. We retrieved the chalice from the angels care, but had to battle our way out through the wight and hecuva.
After turning the chalice over to the Church of Sarenrae, we took a couple of days to relax and spend our loot. We found a wand of cure disease in the loot.
9/21/4708
Morning: we were debating what to call our group. The original name was reapers. I didnt like the name. We tossed a few names around and came up with the Lions of Korvosa. A massager arrived with an invitation.
Ishani Dharti invited us to the church of Abadar. We gathered our things and headed over there.
The front of the temple was a mob of desperate diseased people .It took us a few moments but we finally managed to get up the front steps by forcing our way through the packed throng. Ishani Dharti ushered us into a conference room. He talked of the need for all the clergies of the different faiths to work together in order to combat this plague. He asked if we could escort him to Cressida Croft’s castle and to provide for him an introduction. We happily agreed to.
We disguised Ishani Dharti as something other then a cleric and hustled him to Cressida Croft.
She was in the middle of organizing the guard. In order to combat the plague the queen formed a group known as the Queens physicians. To aid them in their duties she formed the grey maidens to give them some muscle. There was a long meeting that Ishani Dharti and I took part in organizing everything. We got to meet Dr Devalus the head of the queen’s physicians as well.
After the meeting Cressida asked us if we could move to the Keep so we would be close at hand for any special jobs she might have. We did so. We also escorted Ishani Dharti back to the temple of Abadar.
Afternoon: Cressida had another job for us. She needed us to investigate Racker's alley. She needed to find out if the carters, hired to cart the dead to the cities graveyard, the “grey district” were actually doing sol. She had heard rumors that bodies were being dumped in Racker's alley in Old Korvosa. We took the job and left.
On the way we ran into Ishani Dharti again. He hired us to check out a perfume shop claiming to sell a cure for the plague.
We also ran across Eries Yellow Eyes. She told us of an impending conflict between the community of Were Rats, and the citizens of Korvosa. We decided to take care of the were-rat problem first. There was a pitched battle in the sewers. Our target Grizzigz Ripperclaw was tough to kill. He moved with supernatural speed and his outline was blurred. We finally were able to bring him down. We also had to face an Otyough.
Late afternoon: We returned to the castle to confer with Cressida Croft
Amazingly everyone who had been a part of the lions of Korvosa was there. There were 12 of us. Cressida Croft broke us up into two groups to better cover Old Korvosa to investigate the cart haulers.
We were able to find Raker's alley easily and we found it was piled with corpses. There were at least 40 of them we found some disturbing puncture marks on their arms. The group investigated a neighboring toy store and fought 4 vampires. Luckily we survived.
Afterwards we report back to Cressida
9/22/4708
Morning: The group went into the Jaggere River to investigate the wreck of the plague ship. They faced eels, sharks and a sea hag. Luckily Glorianna was able to dispatch the hag. On the wreck they found a Queens Physician’s corpse with a holy symbol of Uragotha around his neck. They also found two “death’s head” coffers.
Afternoon: All of these they brought to the temple of Sarenrae. After reporting to Cressida Croft, she instead on going over to the temple herself. Inside one of the boxes they found papers indicating who owned the ship. The name was Devalus. Inside the other box they found an infected dead rat with some coins, which were also magically infected with the plague. The high priest of Sarenrae cast a speak with dead on the corpse they found. From him they found out that the red mantis was involved in addition to the cult of Uragotha
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Session 14 Smelly Shops and Smelly Corpses
At Toy city, we usually start in the gaming room at 6:00 when the store closes to the general public. If there is more then one group, people will spread out with portable tables and set up their games in the store as well. Because of the holiday season the store is open until 8. We had 14 people wanting to play. The other DM took six people to another table in the gaming room to play a board game. It would have been very difficult to run two games, let alone two of the same D&D game in the same room. We had seven people at the table.
Adventurers present
Imam Gabriel bin Sarenrae Al Katheer, Pathfinder: Human Male Keshite, 4th level Cleric of Sarenrae. Gabriel planned to marry settle down run a mosque and tend a flock of Sarenrae however that was not to be. His sister Fatima ran off from an arranged marriage and joined the pathfinders. At the behest of his father, Gabreil has set off from Katheer to track down his wayward sister. He also joined the Pathfinders. Fatima’s trail has led him to Korvosa. Now Gabriel has found himself embroiled in the volatile politics of Korvosa.
Kuldak ½ orc male 2nd level rogue/ 2st level Barbarian. Kuldak carries a great axe and sports a kilt. One never knows what kind of trouble he will get into or what kind of trouble he will pull a comrade out of. With Kuldak it’s a crapshoot. He is the life of whatever party he joins.
Gaedren Lamm framed his brother for a crime.
He likes to pick on Lielda
Ford Prefect, Human male, 3nd level Rogue. While he has skill in the roguish arts, Ford is often a little foolhardy. He easily gets in to trouble while attempting to be impressively daring.
Tale, Gnome Male 4th level Sorcerer. He has bright green hair and electric blue eyes, and tends to shoot off sparks at random intervals.
Andor Arceneaux- human male, 3rd level wizard. Recenly joined our group. He seems a bit Chaotic in nature, we shall see if he is a good fit for the Lions of Korvosa.
Angus Firehammer, Dwarf, Male 3rd level Paladin of Torag. Gaedren Lamm killed his parents and he worked hard as smith’s apprentice to raise his brothers and sisters. He mentioned finding his faith in Torag, while working the smithy.
Dargox, Half Orc Male 2nd level Bard. Does his best to bolster the spirits of his companions with his music. Unfortunately he often puts his foot in his mouth, and drops his lute in the river. However, when the chips are down he does the right thing.
Session 14 Smelly shops and Smelly Corpses
As we left the basement of the Temple of Sarenrae, our patroness’s words rung in my ears “ say nothing of this to no one, or we shall end up in the queen’s dungeons” I wonder where our Investigations were taking us. Our next job was to investigate a perfume shop in the heights called Lavender. That was tomorrow. We returned to Citadel Volshyenek for some well-disserved rest.
As usual I awoke before dawn and headed up to top of the eastern tower of the citadel. Today it was over cast. The sky was steel gray and mist hung in the river. The threat of rain weighted heavily over head. The air was still. I could see small groups of imps and pseudo dragons chase each other from rooftop to rooftop flitting here and there. To the west was the massive bulk of Castle Korvosa, brooding atop the grand Mastaba Step Pyramid like an angry spiky beast. To the east starched out the river Jaggere, silver serpentine and cloaked with mist. Laying my carpet out, I knelt and preformed my Sallah. Unfortunately the sun did not pierce the clouds as it dawned.
A little later, after breakfast we headed over to the Heights to find the lavender perfume shop. It was fairly easy to find, up near the Acadamae. There was a line spreading around the block for people patiently waiting their turn for this miracle cure. There were two sturdy bouncers guarding the doors dressed in purple cravats and berets.
Both Dargox and Tale tried to convince the guards to let us pass because we were on “official business” but they were not impressed. We waited in line. An hour later we were ushered into the shop. Kuldak went in first. The owner of the shop, a Chelaxian named Vendra Loaggri, met him. She and Kuldak traded some witticisms about the endowments of half orcs, and how skirts and kilts facilitated access for some of the most enjoyable activities in life to happen. The store, Lavender, was clean and neat with perfume bottles stacked here and there. People were far more interested in “ Lavender’s luxuriant liniment.” This was the supposed cure. Dargox reminded me that this place was famous for all sorts of outrageous promotions, like the “free imp with every purchase” a few years ago.
Dargox charmed (without magic) one of the shop girls into a date at he blushing mermaid after work hours. Kuldak asked if he could be shown the storeroom by the other store girl, and they ducked behind a curtain. I provided my friend with a spell of silence so he could conduct his investigations without drawing attention to himself. A great challenge to be sure. Tale spent his time examining and buying some samples of the miracle cure. I found myself amidst the perfume bottles. I decided to buy a bottle for Glorianna. Pity she wasn’t here. Well on second thought perhaps that was for the best. I could not imagine anything inducing her to leave this shop, note even a charging Behir.
We left the shop and headed back to the citadel. Kuldak was striding with his usual grin, and a spring in his step. No doubt he found something he enjoyed in his investigations. He leaned over to me conspiratorially and told me “ Friend Gabriel, I have good evidence that “lavender” is actually front for brothel. Good evidence.”
“ My friend how would you rate the place compared to other brothels? Was it Courtesan quality?”
“Even better- it was the Acadamae student next door quality “
We headed back to the Citadel and Tale made use of the alchemical lab in the basement. Tale discovered that “Lavender’s luxuriant Liniment” was composed of sugar, cheap perfume and river water.
Ford Prefect volunteered to watch the place that night.
That evening Dargox had a date at the blushing mermaid. We talked with the shop girls and found out that they were Acadamae students earning some money to help with their books and tuition. They just sold perfume. They were even willing to drink one of the samples Tale had with him.
We didn’t think they had anything to do with the fraud. They were just pretty faces selling perfume. Those pretty faces invited Dargox and Kuldak back to their dorms rooms. Tale, Andor, Angus and myself waited in the blushing mermaid, as Majenko. Tale’s pseudo dragon friend, would fly back and forth and give us reports.
At first two of the bouncers were taking a barrel down to the river to fill it up with river water then Ford was complaining about being crapped upon by a neighborhood imp. After this we decided to head on over to the store for some B&E as Ford prefect put it. Kuldak joined the group just before we left. I asked Kuldak what B&E meant, boobs and excitement?” Kuldak replied, “ Yes in some circumstances, which reminds me, my friend we will have to get you some. But In this instance, no, it means breaking and entering. “
There was one guard standing watch outside the shop. Andoran very cleverly cast a cantrip to make the guards purple beret smell like sulphur, something irritable to an imp. Soon enough an Imp flew by and stole the guards purple beret. He ran off down the street cursing and swiping at it with his baton.
The coast clear we crossed the street, and Ford Prefect tried to open the lock on the front door of the store but failed. Kuldak tried the lock and it popped open noiselessly. We went in to examine the store. All of the “Lavender’s luxuriant Linament’s “ were sold. All that was left was perfume. We checked the back storeroom and we found a large stack of the clay vials which the elixer was sold in. We proceeded through the back door, across a narrow alley, and found an apartment opposite the back door of the store.
It was neatly furnished. There was a painting of the grand opera in Egoran, in Cheliax. There also a a neat bedroom as well. Leaning against the wall was a pink suffed Flamingo. Kuldak was fascinated. He had never seen an animal like it. Neither had I, but I had seen large water birds in the mangrove swamps on the borders of Garrund, this was similar only pink.
After fumbling around Kuldak found a secret door behind the flamingo. We moved the stuffed bird that was standing on one leg, and in our way away.
Kuldak then opened the door silently. On the other side was a small room filled with debris. Beyond the first room was another room. This room had a table, several vials and alchemical apparatus. A vat was near by, obviously to mix the elixir in. Andoran cast a color spray spell and stuns the two guards and our quarry. Majenko the pseudo dragon then swooped in and stung the guards and proprietress. Putting them to sleep.
We turned them over to the authorities and we returned to get a good night’s sleep at the citadel. The next morning we headed over to the Bank of Abadar and are shown in to meet Ishani Dharti, a cleric of Abadar with whom I am familiar with. He was impressed with our report and he paid us 1000 gold. After a few minutes the Darb Tuttle, the Arch banker himself came into the meeting. There was a priestess of Pharsima with him. He complimented Ishani on how he was handling things, and introduced us to his friend the high priest of Pharisma. He told her that we the Lions of Korvosa were an adventuring group who knew how to get things done. With that he left,
She came in and sat down in the conference room. The High priest was dressed all in black with silver tracery in her robes. She introduced herself as Wen Histani. She told us that they had a delicate matter that needed looking into. Apparently someone was going into the mass graves and animating the corpses and walking off with them. We were hired to find out who was doing this and where were the corpses being taken and for what purpose. Angus Firehammer asked how much she was willing to pay us for the job. Tale asks Angus, “aren’t you a paladin?” to which Angus replies ‘ oh yeah right I am”
Wen Histani the high priestess of Pharsima agrees to pay us 1,500 gold pieces for the job. We agree to look into the matter. She then takes us into the grey district, and shows us the open mass graves, which have been robbed. She leaves for the cathedral. Kuldak examines the ground and he is able to find a clear trail from the mass grave to a mausoleum.
Inside the mausoleum he finds a tunnel leading down underground
We follow the tunnel. It leads us to an underground chamber, a huge oval shaped stone cistern. On either end of the oval were.
In the stone cistern were many gaggles of zombies milling about. They couldn’t get out. We go around the bowl of the cistern. We are on its lip; to the other side and head up the other passage way. The hand-dug passageway from the cistern dead-ended into another underground passageway. To our immediate right was a stone door. Kuldak began to examine it for traps. He saw the brief flash of a blood red pentagram and flames consume him. Then he announces that “ the door is trap free” I pray to Sarenrae and cast a couple of cure spells and Kuldak’s burns are healed.
We enter the room to find an antechamber beyond. Kuldak listens at he door “ how are our plans progressing? “ very well your Excellency, we think what we have planned will both prolong the plague and further weakening Korvosa, leaving it ripe for the plucking.
With that we burst into the doors and began fighting. On the other side were four fighters and one man sitting on a dais. We recognized him as the ambassador of Cheliax. The fight was difficult, but we were able to bring the ambassador down. We killed him. In his death throes he turned into a cloud of bats, which exploded. The bats themselves exploded too.
Well we have another piece to the puzzle. The ambassador to Celia was up to no good. Hopefully Cressida Croft can help us put the puzzle pieces together.
More to come next week.
Apparently Andor got in on the action in the perfume shop as well, though that was more to cover for my bathroom break than any choice on my part. The combat in that session went down like clockwork, we totally ruined the heck out those guys. Between Gabriel and Andor laying down the buff spells, Kuldak's brilliant axe-work, and everyone's efforts the day was won far more easily than I would have expected.
The combat in that session went down like clockwork, we totally ruined the heck out those guys.
There's no game Saturday the 26th, right?
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Session 15 Mad Elves, Zombies, Doctors and Cults.
This was to be the last session on December 19, before the holidays.I was determined to finish the module. I had only four hours and I had the Carowyn Manor and the House of the Blessed Maiden to do This meant shoe horning stuff in, railroading the party along, and, doing a hatchet job to the dungeons cutting out stuff that I didn’t have time to do . Oh and there was a full house, including me the DM, there was 9 players.
We had fun; at least I think we did. I suppose I will find out this Saturday evening when things resume at Toy City. Maybe there will be lots of players, maybe none. After tying up some loose ends from Seven Days to the Grave we will be starting Escape from Old Korvosa. As much as I enjoy Dming, I am hoping the other Dm will pick up the thread, and I can return to just playing Imam Gabriel bin Sarenrae Al Katheer.
Adventurers present
Imam Gabriel bin Sarenrae Al Katheer, Pathfinder: Human Male Keshite, 4th level Cleric of Sarenrae. Gabriel planned to marry settle down run a mosque and tend a flock of Sarenrae however that was not to be. His sister Fatima ran off from an arranged marriage and joined the pathfinders. At the behest of his father, Gabreil has set off from Katheer to track down his wayward sister. He also joined the Pathfinders. Fatima’s trail has led him to Korvosa. Now Gabriel has found himself embroiled in the volatile politics of Korvosa.
Glorianna, Human Female 4rd level Cleric of Shelyn. Glorianna is blond bubbly and naive. She is up for trying anything, anxious to experience life to the fullest, after living a sheltered life in a Convent. In a pinch she has shown surprising courage, rushing into combat with her glaive, whether it is against a Carrion golem or a flying Dero necromancer.
Gallatin Yellowstone, Human male 3nd level Fighter. He is a quite but friendly warrior in training who hails from Sandpoint. He is a student of Vin Carlo Orisini. When Field Marshal Kresseda Croft gives us a job, Gallatin can be counted on to ask the pertinent questions about our mission.
Tale, Gnome Male 4th level Sorcerer. He has bright green hair and electric blue eyes, and tends to shoot off sparks at random intervals.
Andor Arceneaux- human male, 3rd level wizard. Recenly joined our group. He seems a bit Chaotic in nature, we shall see if he is a good fit for the Lions of Korvosa.
Kanthos Human Male 2st level fighter. Kanthos is a quiet solid dependable warrior. He is a man of few words. He wields a Scythe with quiet precision. Gaedren Lamm killed his parents and he had to raise his brothers and sisters.
Dargox, Half Orc Male 2nd level Bard. Does his best to bolster the spirits of his companions with his music. Unfortunately he often puts his foot in his mouth, and drops his lute in the river. However, when the chips are down he does the right thing.
Torvoldk- Human male 2nd level barbarian (Sindra’s/ Ivo Cobier’s latest incarnation)
Fathonir- Human male 2nd level Druid. New addition.
Session 15 Mad Elves, Zombies, Doctors and Cults.
9/25/4708
As was my custom I awoke before the dawn and headed up to the eastern turret of Citadel Volshyenek. The guards used to me paid me no mind. They were watching the northern western and southern directions. I think they might have been trying to give me some privacy. As I knelt to perform my morning Sallah on my carpet, facing the dawn, red light filled the horizon. It was a red dawn. The sky was filled with black roiling clouds threatening rain. This wasn’t a good omen for the day. When I lifted my face up from my carpet I saw a sandaled foot. Seated on the crenellations of the parapet, was a beautiful angel, She had white fluffy wings that folded over her shoulders like a cloak, and beautiful brunette hair with highlights of fiery red and golden blond. Her skin was of a pleasing olive complexion like the ladies of my homeland Quadira, however the pupils of her eyes were the varying colors of molten gold. They rippled constantly with barely contained power. She wore a simple white tunic with sandals, and had a scimitar at her side. All I could stammer out was a “ hello it is good to see you again my lady” Normally I am much more eloquent.
She laughed “ and it is good to see you Gabriel. Please call me Za’afiel. Our lady Sarenrae is pleased with your efforts in this storm. Today you will face many difficult challenges and we wish to help.” Za’afiel handed me a small white silken pouch. “ Inside are some small golden sugar crystals. Eat one just before or just after you will face a foe today. It will restore you in mind body and spirit. Your spells and other abilities will be restored and you shall heal as if you had a nights rest. This is mana from heaven, it will not keep beyond today.” I replied, “ Thank you Za’afiel, I hope that we can see each other again.” She smiled and said, “ So do I, Insallah, Sarenrae willing. But my time is short, old lady Zomara’s cat is stuck up a tree, and I have to go fetch the feline down for her, before she does anything foolish like trying to climb the tree herself. Sarenrae watch over you” and with that Za’afiel spread her wings and flew strait up into the clouds. “ And may Sarenrae watch over you too, as you pluck frightened cats from trees.” I rolled up my carpet and headed downstairs for breakfast.
At breakfast I noticed that Lielda was missing. I think this might have been the second or third morning we hadn’t seen her. When I asked where Lielda was Glorianna mentioned between sips of tea, that she thought Lielda might have gone and joined the Grey Maidens, but she wasn’t sure. I was worried because I thought she might have been bitten by a were-rat.
Our peaceful breakfast was interrupted by one of the guards who said that there was a woman in the courtyard asking for the Lions of Korvosa and if they could help her. We went into the courtyard. Before us was a distraught Varisian women named Deyanira Mirukova. She was dressed in simple Varisian clothing with headscarf that held her black hair back. “ Please, the guard wont or cant help me, my brother has gone missing, and I was hoping you might be able to. His name is Ruan. He is a talented musician. With the plague in the city there isn’t much work, because people are afraid to gather. He was hired by Lord and Lady Carowyn to play in a band for a party they were throwing a couple of days ago. My brother hasn’t returned and I’m worried. “ We agreed to look into the matter, and headed to South Shore to the Carowyn estate.
When we got there the place was strangely silent. After vaulting the wall we crept around the garden and found our way to the back door, which we entered. We found ourselves in a dining room. It was filled with zombies. They were eating dinner.
Tale Quickly dispensed with the zombies with a burning hands spell. He also set the table on fire. After Andor extinguishes the table, a clown like woman appeared on the chandelier above us. She told us that we have spoiled her fun. Gallatin attempts to hit her by throwing his earth breaker. She swung on the chandelier. She dodged the massive weapon, which crashed, into the portrait of the manor lord. After throwing some daggers at the party, she tumbled off the chandelier and then tumbles successfully through the party. The party pursued and successfully restrained her. Meanwhile Gallatin wandered off and found a stairwell to the basement. In the basement he found the frightened manor lord who explains that he was throwing a party when a harlequin dressed elf came in, began killing people with the bolts of her crossbow, and then she began raising the dead by reading spells of scrolls.
After interrogating the clown like women Jolistina Susperio, the party learned that she is a mad forlorn elf, who is in love with Rolf the necromancer. Her orders were to kill all but the healthy Varisians and to turn them over to Rolf. The only one she had matched the description of Ruan Mirukova, whom the Lions of Korvosa were hired to find. Rolf showed up a day after her rampage, and took the Varisain Ruan Mirukova. Two armored women flanked Rolf the necromancer. Jolistina Susperio’s description of the armed guards was similar to the garb the grey maidens wore.
The party returned to visit Cressida and to tell her what has transpired. Jolistina was escorted to a cell. Cressida wants us to go to the “Hospice of the blessed maiden,’ the head quarters of the Queens physicians, and bring Doctor Davaulus back to Cressida. Because the Queen has set up the “Queen’s Physicians” and the Grey Maiden’s (who protect and support the physicians) by Royal Fiat, Cressida needed deniability for this operation hence the adventurers.
The Lions of Korvosa learned of Dr. Devaulus’s schedule through one of Dargox’s contacts. The girl he dated from the perfume shop was a mage specializing in Divination magic and a student at the Acadamae. She predicted where Devaulus would be at a certain hour. The party decided to plan for an ambush.
The lions secreted themselves at the ambush site, at the corner Gorgon Street and Cockatrice alley. Initially Glorianna approached Dr. Devalus. He was flanked by a security detail of 4 grey maidens. She invited him to a concert and tried to charm him with her curves and assets. The Doctor didn’t bite. He thanked her for her invitation and excuses himself headed for his appointment. Then the Lions sprang their trap. I used a hold person spell on the Doctor. Andor used a hypnotic Pattern spell on the gray maidens, enthralling them. Majennko the pseudo dragon landed on the Doctor and put him to sleep with his soporific sting. We were then able to drag the doctor to a nearby cart, throw a sheet over him and wheel him to the Citadel so our Patroness, Cressida Croft could have a chat with the good doctor. The cart was whisked to the basement of the citadel.
As we were sitting in Cressida’s office and as she was preparing to congratulate us, and presumably pay us, in burst Sabina Marin in full armor. Sabina handed a small scroll to Cressida which she open and read. I noticed the royal seal on the scroll.
Sabina announced due to a threat to her Royal Majesty’s life the Grey Maidens were being recalled to Castle Korvosa to augment security there. The Guard was hereby ordered to assume security for the Queens Physicians. When Cressida commented that she didn’t have the manpower, Sabina replied, “I’m sure you will think of something creative, you always do. “ and with that Sabina left.
Cressida muttered, “this is a little to convenient, but we may as well take advantage of it.” She wrote a quick note on some official parchment and handed it to Gallatin. “ Here, the Lions of Corves are herby ordered to assume the security of the house of the blessed maiden. Go there and find out what you can.”
The Lions of Korvosa headed over to the House of he blessed maiden. With their official document they had no trouble entering the hospice, and one of the nurses showed them around. They found many people dying of the Blood veil, in its final stages. The Queen’s physicians hovered over them almost like vultures. Upstairs they found a room full of formerly healthy Varisians. They didn’t have the Blood Veil. When confronted with this, the doctor present explains that they are trying to find out why these Varisian’s have immunity to the blood veil. He asks, “ Wouldn’t you sacrifice the lives of a dozen people so that thousands can be saved?” We find Dr Devaulus’s notes in his office.
The party was also able to get the lift to work and we found a secret basement beneath the first floor. In the basement we found a room full of alchemical apparatus. In the middle of this room were four large glass cylindrical tanks. Inside each tank was a Daemon, a Leukodaemon. A horse headed monstrosity, a Daemon, of disease. Beyond this laboratory we found a long hall leading into the darkness.
The long hall opened into a circular chamber rising into a high dome. Seven basins jut from the walls, ensconced within evenly spaced alcoves that circle the room. Each was filled to the brim with a unique liquid corruption—blood, bile, milk, or other unidentifiable fluid.
Each filled the air with its own distinct reek, creating a noxious, eye- watering bouquet. Upon the floor around each basin lay several small, empty metal boxes, each carved with images of skulls. At the room’s center, rose from a wide pool of crystalline water, rose a golden statue of a sight that was both erotic and horrifying. The statue was that of a beautiful nude woman, human above the waist, but below this the figure was nothing more than a skeleton.
Hovering twenty feet in the air above the font was a gothic raven-haired beauty, clad in black armor wielding a scythe. We had found Lady Andaisin, high priestess of Urgathoa.
“And so you have found your way to me, hopeful heroes. Know that you stand before the architect of your city’s death. You call this sending blood veil, yet I know it as the gentle kiss of the Pallid Princess. Your reward shall be great—choose of the seven scourges to become one with the goddess. Those who drink, I shall only cripple, leaving you alive to enjoy her as she quickens inside your flesh. Those who abstain are fools, not fit to house the divine gift. You may prostrate yourselves at my feet and I shall make your end all the more swift for it. Swifter, in any event, than this delightful end your lovely queen has enjoined me to create!”
Since none of us chose to prostrate ourselves before the priestess, battle ensued. She held forth her hand and in it was Urgathoa’s unholy symbol, a small ebon figurine of a fly with crystalline wings, and highlighted in blood red. From this unholy symbol erupted a roiling mass of shadowy darkness. It moved as a vapor and the black cloud spread out and engulfed us. We gasped as the cold darkness took our breath away, and it sapped our life’s energy making us numb. She was calling upon Urgotha the pallid princess and channeling negative energy to kill us. I called upon the Dawn flower, Sarenrae and held forth my holy symbol. From it a light bright as the sun filled the room and beat back the dark cloud of inky blackness. I was channeling positive energy. Our wounds were eased somewhat.
And so the battle went, with party members sending their familiars or flying animals up to harass the priestess. I think Majenko the pseudo dragon was there. Andor’s raven was there, as was the new druid’s eagle. The new druid also had summoned a stirge that latched onto the priestess and began feeding. Others got out their bows and crossbows, and shot at her. Some arrows pierced the evil priestess's armor and drew blood but and others ricocheted off of her armor. She would time and again send forth this roiling darkness that wounded us as much in spirit as flesh, while I called upon Sarenrae’s holy light to heal and drive back the darkness. Lady Andaisin, priestess of Urgothoa was struck down filled with arrows like a pincushion and crumbled to dust on the floor, with a last utterance “ death is only the beginning”.
This Saturday evening we finish up Seven days to the grave, and we begin Escape from old Korvosa.
I had surgery earlier today and was told that I shouldn't do to much for a week, so I won't be joining you guys on Saturday :(
I had surgery earlier today and was told that I shouldn't do to much for a week, so I won't be joining you guys on Saturday :(
Had my follow up visit, they said I could resume most normal activity, so I may come after all. It depends on whether or not I'm in sufficient pain to have to take my painkillers, if I do take them, I can't drive. Hope to see you guys tomorrow.
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Hey man, sorry to hear about the surgery. On the plus side, it sounds like you're recovering nicely.
Where do you come from? Myles and I come over from Brattleboro. If you're not too far out of the way, I could swing over and give you a ride.
Oh, and feel free to email me at
piratical taoism (at) gmail (dot) com
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Cain I’m sorry to hear you had surgery earlier this week. I’ m glad to hear you are feeling a bit better.
Unfortunately I had a bit of a relapse with my phenomena, and I have been in the hospital since Tuesday. I only just got out of the hospital this afternoon Friday. At the moment I have to have oxygen. They have sent me up with a R2D2 like machine which compresses the oxygen in the apt, so I can have a some pure oxygen to breath which I need at the moment, however if I need to go anywhere I have to bring a tank with me.
My father has come up to visit for the weekend to make sure I am all right, so I wont be able to make the game tomorrow.
Jagyr, I did try to call you before my cell phone died (I didn’t have my charger nor address book on me when my doctor took one look at me on Tuesday and had me stuffed into an ambulance and sent off to the emergency room at Brattleboro.) but I couldn’t get your number on Information. Apparently, you don’t live in Brattleboro according to Verizon 411. I was really missing my Nerd Herd, in the hospital and i was desperate for someone to geek speak with.
I hope you are well. I hope I am on the mend. Take care for now.
I hope Robert is planning to pick up the DM thread for the next installment in the adventure path. "Escape from Old Korvosa" i am pretty sure we were planning to do that anyways.
I didn't see your response in a timely fashion, but as you know I managed to make it anyways. Thanks for the offer, but I'm currently staying in Dublin so it would have been well out of your way to pick me up.
Myles, I hope you're comfortable and wish you a speedy recovery.
I just had a thought regarding how I'm higher level than most of the group. I have neither my character sheet or a pathfinder book on hand to check this out, but perhaps when I created my character at third level I wrote down the base XP from the hard column instead of the medium column. Maybe we can check that theory out next week. I hope that's not the case though, I like being seventh level :P
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Session #16
9/26/4708
As I have finished one journal book and I am starting another, as luck would have it, the new book fell in the water. So I have lost one entry.
Perhaps I should put pen to paper and lay out some of what I suspect has been going on behind the scenes politically here in Korvosa. It can be summed up in a nutshell. Queen Illeosa wanted power so she grabbed it. The Queen is from Cheliax; perhaps this is part of some larger plot by Cheliax to annex Korvosa I don’t know. I believe the queen’s first step was to poison her husband. Then when the mob was howling for her head, she provided a scapegoat in Trianna Sabor. Luckily Black Jack intervened and saved Trianna Sabor. Next the Blood Veil Plague infested the city, and began killing many people.
Publicly in response to this threat, the queen by royal Fiat created the Queens Physicians and the Grey maidens to help combat the plague and maintain order.
The Lions of Korvosa, working for Cressida Croft Field Marshal of the Korvosa Guard, has been investigating the plague and helping combat it. Through our investigations we discovered that Dr Devalus, appointed by her majesty and head of the queen’s physicians, was both affiliated with the Red Mantis (a notorious organization of assassins) and the cult of Urgothoa, the goddess of undeath and disease. Through our further investigations we found the cult confronted the high priestess of Urgathoa and killed her. She mentioned in her battle that the queen commissioned their work.
There is another piece to the puzzle I must lay out. Some of our first clues were found in the shipwreck of the plague ship, which brought the disease into the city. The infectious agent we found was coins. We also found that Dr Devalus owned the ship. We discovered this piece of information from two sources, first from a speak with dead spell cast upon one of the corpses removed form the wreck of the plague ship, and secondly from some documents which were in a sealed box which we recovered from the same sunken plague ship.
After we discovered these clues Lielda left the Lions of Korvsa and joined the Grey Maidens. No doubt she told her heart throb Sabina Marin, what she knew about what she uncovered, and Sabina now doubt told the queen.
At this point Cressida Croft asked the Lions of Korvosa to arrest the “good doctor”. The Lions were able to apprehend Dr Devalus and delivered him to Cressida Croft. She then put him in Her dungeons. At this point I think the Queen Illosa realized Cressida was closing in so she decided to cut the Queen’s physicians loose. I think that was why Sabina showed up when she did, ordering Cressida Croft to take over security for the house of the blessed maiden, where the Queens Physcisians were headquartered.
I think the queen felt she was going to need a scapegoat to get out of this potential mess, and the Queens Physcians were going to take the fall for the plague. That was why we were assigned to “secure the house of the blessed maiden”. So we could investigate the queens physicians discover what they were really up to, and the queen emerges clean of the situation. Well these are just thoughts. Perhaps dangerous ones.
Enough of what I think happened, onto what is happening.
Lets see what can I remember? With my boook falling in the water, and loosing the entry from yesterday? The queen has ordered the city of Old Korvosa closed. All of the bridges have been closed off, and the island is quarenteened. The plague still rages there.
I seem to remember we talked allot. I remember that Cressida Croft told us how the Queen was wearing a new crown made of fangs. During the gala, the captain of the sable company pulled out a cross bow and shot the queen in the temple with a crossbow. Unfazed the queen grabbed the captain by the neck lifted him off the ground with one hand. She then snapped his neck by shaking him like a rag doll. Then she took the crossbow out of her temple and was ushered away by some grey maidens.
Cresseda told us that she had received a message from VIn Carlio and he was asking for us. She wanted us to get into the now quarantined island of Old Korvosa and find Vin Carlo. Lots of discussion ensued. Gallatan patiently suggested that we get a boat. An hour and a half later, after visiting our friend Mrs. Soldado, we were able to get a boat. We were able to cross the Jagerre River with ease, but once we landed our boat was destroyed. We were beset by a mob, which we dispersed by throwing food.
When we arrived in Vin Carlos house, red mantis assassins attacked us. Some of us were almost killed .a fire was stared by the red mantis. Luckily we were able to kill them. That is unfortunatly all I remember. Also I remember the sound of broken glass as Kuldak jumped through a window.
Session #17 Wriggly Wigglie Piggies!
9/26/4708
Adventurers present
Glorianna, Canthos, Andor, Tale, Ford, Gabreil, Icosa ( Kuldak’s player is trying a new character), Odgrym (Dwarf, Lielda’s replacement) Gallatin.
Luckily we survived the attack of the 2 Red Mantis Assassins. They have a well-disserved reputation for deadliness. As we searched Vin Carlio’s house we found a locked metal box. Ford was unable to open the box. We gave it to Gallatin for safekeeping.
A few moments a man named Amin came up to the house. We had saved him from a mob earlier. Amin was a student of Vin Carlios. He told us that the red mantis attacked Vin Carlio at his school. He tried to hold them off but there was too many so he had to flee. He did mention that a man with paint on his hands had been coming to visit Vin Carlio in recent weeks. His name was Salvatore Scream. They seemed to raise voices and argue. Amin Suggested that we should go find the painter at “old dock” at 140 wave street.
About a stranger comes into the house. We all draw blades after drawn blades all around and a few tense “ who are you?” Amin and Gallatin recognize the new comer as Icosin, one of Vin Carlios other students. We agree to pool our resources in our search for Vin Carlio. With our only clue really being this artist we had off to see Salvatore Scream.
On the way we fund out that Salvatore Screams art was grisly and controversial. As were working along a sagging dock, we come to a break into it. Icosa volunteers to jump over the gap and help us line across. In mid air an Outyough tentacle reaches out and snatched Icosea out of the air. Two more otyoughs emerged from the water and attack us. A fierce battle ensued. Luckily we are able to dispatch the otyoughs.
We then knocked on the door of Salvatore Scream. An elf girl in spiky leather armor answered the door. She gave her name as Laori In the house we found some skulls set around the living room with candles mounted on top of them Glorianna and I recognized they were prepared for speak with dead spell. Laori felt uncomfortable with Gloriana and my presence and she asked us to stand outside. So we did so.
Apparently Gallatin mused that the artist might torture and kill his painting subjects.
Laori wanted to join our group and help us find the artist. She said she wanted to help because she was enamored with his grotesque artwork. She told the group that she is a follower of Zon Kathon. He is an evil god of sado Maschicism madness death and despair. Gallatin observed the elf seemed to be demented and masochistic. She provided a bloodstained piece of cloth. The group recognized that it belonged to the uniform of the Seneschal of Korvosa. Laori lets us know that Salvatore Scream has been kidnapped and that he has been taken to the “emperor” Pilte of old Korvosa. She decided to join us in our search for the artist.
9/27/4708
The emperor’s neighborhood was a disaster area. We approach his compound, and after hinting that we would like to play blood pig, we are disarmed and led inside.
We stood before the “emperor of old korvosa” in the middle of his arena. We asked if we could see and talk with Salvatore Scream. The emperor, ( a man named Pilt, who ran a theater which put on grotesque playes), Decreed that we had to win a game of blood pig in order to win the right to see the artist.
A note about the game, It is played in a retangular “field” or area with a hole in either end. In this hole is a pit with a hungry wolverine. The goal of the game is to carry a wriggling pig down to your end of the field and drop the pig into a pit with a starving wolverine. The wolverine eats the pig. And anyone else who happens to “fall int the pit.”
Session # 18 Wriggly Wiggly Pigs part 2
The game began on the rooftop of a warehouse with bleachers on either side. It was a rough and tumble game with the pig darting this way and that, us grabbing punching and stomping on the other team while they did their best to do the same to us. Finally we got the pig in. the hole with the hungry wolverine. I remember the new dwarven fighter, what was his name, was able to stand near the edge of the wolverine pit for quite a while as the opposing team tried to push im in the wolverine hole.
Enraged the emperor decided it was best of three, and then after we won, in froth he declared it was to be best out of five. A servant timidly said “ uh sir your magnificence, we are out of pigs.”
The emperor stood dumbstruck and read in the face. I thought he wa going to collaps under his own rage. Then as if a door was closed, h closed his mouth and said, yes of course let me take you to see the artist.
Salvatore Scream looked starved, frightened, beaten and flea bitten. We were in his room along with the “emperor “ and three of his other flunkies.
Salvatore wouldn’t say anything while the emperor was present and the emperor wasn’t leaving.
Andoran decidd to cast a hypnotic pattern upon the emperors three guards. One succomed. Chaos and punches ensued. Icosa, our new “shadow assasain” and fellow student of Vin Carlo’s, conjured forth a blade made of pure shadow and he tosses a dagger he managed to sneak in to Kanthos. Emperor Pelt cast an enchantment spell of Confuseion. Mot of us succombed to the spell. So most of us were reduced to babbleing incoherently or attacking each other wildly. The emporer raised a wand and cast forth a stinking cloud. Most of us were thouroughly nauseated by the stench from the billouous green cloud and begin to vomit profusely. Thanks to Sarenrae I didnt immedialty succumb to the stench, and in a moment of clarity from the confusion spell, I was able to call upon Sarenrae and cast a Dispell Magic. By Sarenrae’s hand I was able to cancel the spell of confusion. As soon as I dispelled the spell of confusion, I succumbed to the stinking cloud and become sick fouling the floor in front of me.
I don’t have much memory of what happened after that, I couldn’t see much because of the cloud, and with my innards in full revolt, I could not do much other then stumble around. I recall seeing Tale´ the gnome sorcerer flying around in a confused circle vomiting upon those beneath him, including the emperor, I remember a startled look on Icosa’s face as he looks positively green. Then blue. Ford prefect was blinded on top of being nauseated. I stumbled out of the room and down the corridor. Andoran found me and opened a door. Behind are two thugs. I was able to push Andoran the mage out of the way and hold back the thugs.
A moment later some one cried the Emperor is dead. With that the thugs fled. I also find out later, that the emperor surrendered to us and Icosa killed him. Glorianna and I were outraged. We were able to retrieve our things and retreat to Vin Carlio’s house with Salvatore Scream and the Laory the elven priestess of Zun Kathon in tow.
Once at Vin Carlo’s house Salvatore Scream revealed that the Seneschal had trouble with the red mantis. They tried to assassinate him after the king’s death, and the seneschal came to the artist for a place to hide. Once he recovered Salvatore suggested that the seneschal go to the Arkonas for protection from the queen. Grudgingly the Seneschal did so. Salvatore told Vin Carlio that he had advised and sent the seneschal to the Arkona’s. Vin Carlio was furious and told me that the Arkonas were viscous criminals; I thought they were patrons of the arts and had always paid well for my work. Vin Carlo left to go and try and free the Seneschal from the grips of the Arkonas. I’m afraid if have merely saved friend the seneschal from one trouble only to toss him into another.
Salvatore scream has also asked for help getting out of old korvosa.
That was where we left off.
This will be my last entry for a good three months I have to take a Haiatus from the game to take care of my health. Perhaps another player will pick up the narrative thread.
Perhaps not. We shall see.
I hope you have a speedy recovery. I (or rather, Andor Arceneaux) will gladly take over writing the journal.
And so it came to pass that goodsir Gabriel had to part ways with the Lions for a time. I am certain he intended that I hand this log to another member of our august company, in fact he said something to that effect "Andor, please make sure so-and-so gets this."
However, as my comrades are not exactly men of letters, I shant be humoring his request. I am certain he shall understand when and if the time comes that I am able to return this journal to him. It was his custom to list the roster of Lions who participated in the recorded events:
Gallatin: The swordsman, student of Vin Carlo, is a voice of modertation when he elects to speak at all.
Glorianna: This casually racist woman-child is a priestess of the Goddess of Beauty. Her virtuous nature asserts itself sometimes, typically to our detriment or inconvenience.
Kuldak: This half-Orc hedonist is a warrior with numerous tricks at his disposal. I am not certain if his disdain is genuine or in jest when it comes to...
Odgryn: The newest member of the Lions, this Dwarf's brutality in battle is exceeded by the brutality of his thick Linnorn accent.
and finally myself, Andor Arceneaux: I am a Transmuter by trade, though the schools of Necromancy and Illusion also interest me greatly. I always seem to be one comment away from a sword in the gut. La, what can one do?
Having discovered that the vagabond noble family House Arkona has the old Seneschal and possibly our friend Vin Carlo in their clutches, we set out to divine the best method of winning them back. We decide to case their palace, a gaudy Vudran affair, before bluffing our way into a meeting with an Arkona scion, Glorio or somesuch.
Left to our own devices in the Arkona's salon for a few minutes, Odgryn and I tried to look around a bit. The manor is a tacky thing, full of gigantic statuary and glamors. The only redeeming thing about it were the flourishes dedicated to the Vudran goddess Chamidu: a multi-limbed terror riding atop a tiger with human hands (a Raksasha perhaps?). Those colorful Vudran gods are far more exciting than our dark, morose deities. More than illusions, I detected divination effects which made me a bit wary. No such luck with Odgryn who was ready to scale a fourteen foot tall statue to pry out an enchanted gemstone when Glorio finally arrived.
Glorio decided to hear our concerns as he bathed, freely admitting to having both Vin Carlo and the Seneschal. As we had only mentioned Vin Carlo, and only in such a way as to not suggest that he might be a prisoner, I concluded that this Glorio expected us or is quite mad. He was pleased to be rid of the so-called Emperor Pilt though, and gave us a Ring of Evasion which we let Gallatin have. He bid us find the two men we sought in his "Vivified Labyrinth," a dungeon said to have rotating chambers in which the Arkona's test their agents and dispose of their enemies.
We agreed to do so, naturally. So we were led to the concealed entrance to the labyrinth and set upon to the descending path to the dungeon proper when we were surprised by four skeletal-fungoid abominations, each taller than a man. Once the battle was joined, Gallatin and Kuldak fell into a familiar combat formations: the Half-Orc tumbled behind one of the giants and Gallatin flanked it. As both warriors had both weapons and limbs empowered by my magic, they were well positioned to destroy it. Odgryn and Glorianna held the line against the other three.
Oh how smug I was, to see the Lions set before our enemies. Other than that embarassing conflict with Pilt (which I confess was my fault), the Lions have generally hewn into their enemies with such skill and precision as has likely ever been seen. How quickly the universe addresses hubris!
The abominations laid down a withering assault, felling Odgryn and soundly thrashing the rest of us. Glorianna's healing powers were taxed sorely, and I was forced to withdraw and magically displace myself. Additionally a noxious yellow spore cloud errupted from the fungoid miscreations and sapped the vigor from my companions. The Lions were destroying them however, and I reentered the fray to further enchant Kuldak with the cat's grace and to enfeeble one of the remaining creatures.
Glorianna kept us all from death's grasp but we realized that even though we had won through, we were tested to our limits before we had even reached the dungeon proper. It became clear that we would need some reinforcements from the rest of the Lions if we were to conqour the Vivified Labyrinth. So smile while you can Glorio, you varlot, we'll have your damned chamber of horrors and then we'll see what we do about you.
Upon finding our fellows we purchased some supplies and returned to the Arkona manor. Our roster includes all that came before and the following Lions:
Talè - My colleague in magic, the Gnome sorcerer emulates a storm cloud: flying about, throwing thunder and lightning. The diminutive dragon-like Majenko is his constant companion.
Kanthos - A grim, stoic figure who wields an enchanted scythe that seems to hurt him almost as much as the foes he wields it against.
Ford Prefect - Loud, brash, and vulgar: Ford makes up for the relative silence of Gallatin, Kanthos, and Talè and then some. He is quick to participate in acts of deviancy and lechery with Kuldak and quicker to interject at any opportunity with a plan to corrupt Glorianna. I am still not quite certain what it is he does for the Lions.
Though there are a number of hangers-on and outliers counted among the Lions, we could not assemble them in a timely fashion. Gallatin's mentor and the old Seneschal weren't getting any freer. I am not proud of our romp in the labyrinth, not at all. It was a frustrating exercise in endurance as we encountered trap after trap: none of which we were able to detect or circumvent beforehand. The Arkona’s have a fondness for magic symbols and we encountered a number of them. Mother and Father would be pleased to know my education was not wasted; I ably identified them in turn as they ravaged the Lions: Pain, Stunning, Fear, and worst of all Insanity. Only Talè, Odgryn, and myself kept their sanity even if I failed to keep my wits about me. Desna knows what Talè was doing, but Odgryn got things under control and kept the rioting madmen (and madwoman) from killing each other: disarming and restraining them. I will have to remember to intervene on Odgryn’s behalf next time Kuldak gives him a hard time.
The three of us led our pack of mad comrades about like prisoners until we found an enchanted pool that restored them (well hidden among the rotating chambers and undoubtedly intended for use by the Arkonas and their servants). There are a number of other traps as well including an empty chest slathered in contact poison, a chest filled with naught but insanity mist, and a chest filled with magical elixirs guarded by a viper. Then there were the damned theme chambers that were themselves giant traps, the creations of sadists with more money than class: a room with a mural of stinging insects, bees or hornets where cascading waves of needles threatened anyone who made contact with the floor or walls and a long hallway punctuated with alcoves occupied by iron maidens that turned into a downward ramp towards the wide-open, spike filled maidens. No fatalities, a few trinkets, and much frustration so far. We’ve taken this time to tend to our wounds and rest. I sense a conclusion oncoming like a charging boar, a tingling sensation th
Actually it was just Talè reading over my shoulder, the chap collects stray bits of electricity like Varisian crones collect cats.
Cain, thank you this was a good read. Things are going well. I wish i was there.
No problem. We finished the module though and now Jagyr Ebonwood is running a game set in the Firefly/Serenity setting using the Cortex rules. We had our first session last night and my character, being a gonzo journalist, has taken to writing the group's exploits.
At Jagyr's suggestion I'm writing at a Cortex oriented forum: http://cortexsystemrpg.org/index.php?topic=3776.0