Ardil stays still and keeps quiet. He readies himself for whatever may come from the central corridor.
Bronn continues walking to the end of the hall.
Avala silently slides across the floor up to UU and Aeldris as they all notice four shapes, humanoid, and armored come around the corner.
The four orcs stop, actually surprised to see you all in the hall, and their eyes flare red...
Orcs Initiative
The orcs are visibly armed with longswords, wearing breastplate and a shield.
Aeldris will ready his sword and shield and close with the orcs during the surprise round, and then he'll attack the nearest orc on round 1.
Scimitar attack
Scimitar damage
Ardil casts his sleep spell again, placing the center of it just behind the orcs, or in the middle of them if they are more spread out.
Will saves...
Orc 1
Orc 2
Orc 3
Orc 4
As the magical energies leave Ardil with the incantation the four surprised orcs suddenly fall to the ground and as Aeldris reaches them with this sword drawn he is greeted by their snores...
Avala stows her bow again, having hastily withdrawn it.
She walks up to the sleeping orcs.
"Well, shall we bother interrogating these, or just let Master Bronn, um, work his magic? Frankly, I don't see us getting any more information from these orcs than the last one we questioned."
"I say kill them and lets move on."
"I agree." Aeldris says, slitting the creatures' throats and then hauling them out to the front bridge to be disposed off.
"Perhaps we should hide the horses in one of these rooms with the secret doors--they should be safe from passing patrols such as this one there."
Crystal coughs, her outburst unnecessary, and looks a little queezy at the thought of deceased Orc.
Though she perfectly understands the rational and necessity of the situation. With a smile, she move to begin moving the mounts into their new stables. (^_^)
Assuming no one objects, UU performs a coup de grace on one of the orcs.
The four orcs are disposed of with no issues...just to clarify you are 'slitting' their throats, casting their corpes off the bridge, and which one of the secret 'archer' rooms will you be using for a makeshift stable?
"Bah, these weak-willed brutes aren't going to cause us much trouble. I would expect that those in charge of them are going to be much harder to deal with... I'm not sure how much use my glorified parlor tricks will be. We should prepare for the worst and keep moving I think... they're going to notice this many missing soon!"
Bronn slaps Ardil on the back. "You make my life easy lad." He takes the armor, weapons and shields along with the gear the first orcs had and places them in the secret room that they are not storing the horses in.
I am seeing
4 long swords
4 shields
4 breast plates
anything else?
Two keys on leather cords worn around two of the orcs necks.
"These may come in handy" he puts both keys on one leather cord and waits for the other to complete the disposal.
OK, so what's next??
"Perhaps we should investigate the direction those orcs came from." Aeldris heads down the hall to the double doors.
Under Aeldris' suggestion you all move to the main intersection and steup up to the double doors. Both doors are closed. The doors themselves are large each almost being a full five feet in width and eight feet in height.
Perception
Avala silently points out the bootprints and the unusual nature of the door to the rest of the party.
Once Avala points out the oddness of the doors, anyone with Knowledge Nature may roll.
The doors are crafted from Ironwood, a rarewood that is not commonly used today because of it's rarity, the wood shows no signs of age and holds very well over time. It is prized by many architects/crafters for its durability and strength.
Crystal frowns, the intricacies of architecture still lost upon her.
"So...they're fine, quality doors then?" She asks in a whisper. "But what do the shoe prints mean?"
"The footprints are a good sign...this is the right direction. Be on your guard." With sword and shield drawn, Aeldris carefully opens one of the doors.
Avala draws her bow and moves aside to let the other party members enter first.
Aeldris pushes on the right hand door, with a strain of his muscles the door opens; albeit lightly gliding open making no sound. Immediately beyond the doors you can see the hallway maintains its twenty feet width and twenty feet in front of you seems to be a wall...
Perception
What is in front of you in fact is not a wall; instead it is a backside of a curtain.
What is in front of you in fact is not a wall; instead it is a backside of a curtain.
What is in front of you in fact is not a wall; instead it is a backside of a curtain.
UU says quietly, "That's a curtain, not a wall."
Crystal nods in agreement with Udaya, then holds a finger to her lips and sneaks forwards to try and peek around the edge of said curtain.
Crystal stealthfully moves beyond the double doors and upto the curtain; using all caution she gentle pulls the curtain slightly to the side allowing her a view of the room...her darkvision shows her a large chamber, its ceiling reaching up to ten feet, the 'curtain' appears to be hanging around the entire chamber and amonst the room itself are stone pillars (strecthing from the floor to the ceiling) about twenty feet apart.
Perception please Crystal.
Crystal notices that even in the darkness the curtains, on the room side, seem to have some sort of artwork on them. Though without light she is unsure of what it could be...
Crystal will whisper back to her companions a description of what she sees.
Avala whispers "no Orcs that you can see? Let's go in then!"
Crystal frowns and bites her lip, but she did not see any obvious evil.
"I could not see all of the room..." She gives a whispered warning, even as she draws her rapier.
Ardil curses his poor eyes under his breath and motions forward towards the big room, trying to feel his way through the dimly lit hallways without stumbling and making too much noise.
Aeldris will move into the room near the front of the group, sword and shield at the ready.
Ardil still has his staff with a stone tied to it. He recasts light on it when the last casting runs out every 10 minutes.
Crystal tries to slip quietly into the room ahead of the light source.
As she looks around...
Crsytal stealthfully steps beyond the curtain her companions just moments behind her...
The room expands further in and the curtain lining the wall seems to continue with the room.
Once Ardil brings the light into the room you notice the faded artwork on the curtain, almost like a tapestry; the picture seem to be of a mountain range...
Knowledge Local
It is apparent the Mtn range in the art work is the same range you are in; the Seacoast Mountians.
Crystal continues on into the room, again trying to remain quiet and circumspect.
Looking about at the walls, floor and ceiling of the vast chamber.
Ardil walks into the room slowly, swinging his staff from side to side to light up the tapestry. He looks to Avala.
"You've always been better than I at maps with these things... do these drawing tell you anything?"
Aeldris walks about twenty feet into the room, looking in surprise at the size of the room after the cramped hallway. He turns briefly to look back at the curtain as well, seeing if there's anything noteworthy about it from this side.