TheWiseWarlord
First Post
So is this story hour going to be updated again, or has the author given up?
-
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Cormyr: The Smile of Chauntea
- Thread starter MulhorandSage
- Start date
MulhorandSage
First Post
We gamed again tonight, so there'll be a write-up in the next few days.
TheWiseWarlord
First Post
Great. I'm looking forward to it.
MulhorandSage
First Post
22nd day of Uktar, in the Year of the Standing Stone, 1372.
Dear Gevrael,
Thank you for your recent hospitality and understanding in our recent stop. I must confess I was surprised by father’s (relative) courtesy – do you think he knows of Ulrick’s importance in the machinations of certain Sembian parties? We've both known for a long time that a heart of cold, barbed iron beats underneath the courtier's lace and magician's silk.
I wanted to explain this to you in person, but our departure was in haste, so this letter must suffice. It began with Ulrick, of course: the big lug had dreams again. One would imagine that the dreams of a paladin would consist of visions of epic struggle and great quests, like the wildest tales of a cunning Cormyte tavern-bard who sifts through knightly purses by telling them the only tales they wish to hear (regardless of how obnoxious they become in the retelling). I imagine most paladins dream of the deathscreams of dragons and the touch of chaste women. What else do they have to dream about?
But not Ulrick. His dreams are different than those of other men, more portentous and vivid. I can only imagine what is like to be him at night, when the comforts of a woman’s touch fade with the coming of slumber, and there is not a scrap of dream-glory to be had, only torment.
And that night, his torment was the vision of a lone dracolich, death-boned, steel fanged, raising its great horned limbs through a star-blue portal, destined to bring a final death to Cormyr.
####
Weeks ago, before we arrived in Wheloon, we had a chance encounter whose importance was lost on me until this moment. We had found three dead Orcs in the wilderness, on the path between Monksblade and Wheloon, one of them clutching an amulet with an odd symbol engraved on it. Unfortunately, the events of Wheloon had distracted me from researching the amulet, but now I suddenly remembered that it bore a great similarity to the sign of the Sammasterites, a cult which holds that undead dragons are the true gods of Toril, to be nurtured and worshipped as a prelude to their coming age of supremacy.
A cult whose ultimate goal is the creation of those same abominations that Ulrick had beheld in his vision.
It had struck me as odd that something as base and weak as an Orc-band could control something as important as the portals. Now it occurred to me that their mastery of the portals was due to information that they had stolen from their portal's true masters, the Sammasterites.
When I informed Ulrick of my theory, the bedevilled paladin immediately declared that we would travel to Suzail and warn the crown of the dracolich threat, despite the rather dramatic consequences of such an act. A reminder of the beholder-mage that blocked the path was sufficient to dissuade his (dubious) lordship from that course of action – barely – but the portals still held our attention. Two portals in particular seemed to demand further exploration: one which led to a wine cellar where Kord was attacked by someone who was dressed like a Sembian, and another which led to a ruined shrine to Mystra. So we spent a half-day riding to Monksblade (the pair should consider themselves fortunate to have a Sembian companion who actually knows a thing or two about horses) found the cliff opening, and returned to the portal room.
It is a marvel, this chamber. Sixteen or so portals, some dead, some blocked by stone, others only slumbering, doorways etched into the stone by the craft and magicks of ancient Netheril. When the appropriate word is spoken, the portals become alive, sparking to red as they ignite, then cooling to a green miasma as they settle, finally fading first to a blue shimmer (as pretty as the crown of Mystra) and then to dark grey stonework when the doors are closed. We divined the opening word for many of these doors on our previous venture, a disastrous expedition where nearly all of us had died. Now that we had mustered our strength, we were eager to renew the assault.
Finding the chamber unguarded by the Orcs, Ulrick once again entertained the idea of using the portals to get to Suzail, even though none of the doors would allow us to circumvent the obstacle of the beholder. Unfortunately, driving a point into a paladin’s head is enough to vex any man; a long argument followed that rattled me, and so I forsook my usual caution. Attempting to end the dissention before my headache became too great to endure. I stepped into the wine cellar portal, ready for (the expected) ambush.
Yes, I had remembered what Kord had told us about the archer who had been lurking in waiting. But what I failed to remember was the very powerful magical trap that was situated at the door. Idiot! As soon as I stepped through the portal, I was suddenly surrounded by a coriolis of lightning. Instinctively, I dodged to one side, otherwise the lightning would have done more to me than to smoke my robes and singe my legs and hands. The instant I stepped away from the trap, I immediately found myself wearing a thief on my back. Azuth, I have never beheld such speed! He plunged a dagger into my right kidney, and gave it a twist for good measure.
I would have been dead then, had it not been for Aron. The fool raced across the portal, bearing the brunt of another lightning bolt, and charged the thief. The distraction allowed me to stagger backwards through the portal, still clutching my side with one hand as shakily pryed a healing drought from my belt, and I quaffed it before it could fall through my fingers. I have never seen so much of my own blood in my life.
Normally, I despise the taste of these brews, but for once I welcomed the burning sensation as it raced down my throat, (tasting much like rat's dung floating in a lamp oil soup) but the light-headedness and the pain in my side suddenly halted. I was not completely whole – my side still throbbed like a succubus in heat – but I always hate to let an injury go without a response, so I steadied myself, cast a spell of myriad images and prepared to rejoin the fracas.
Alas, my comrades were not faring well. Seeing himself outnumbered, our quarry covered himself with magical dust – vanishing from sight, of course, and then he fired arrows at us while he danced nimbly around the cellar.
I never dreamt I would miss having Kord at my side.
“Cast a fireball!” Ulrick barked to me as yet another mightily swordstroke connected with empty air. “Fill the entire room!” But the paladin had clearly lost his mind. How could anyone forget that any thief worth his salt would be able to hide from my fireball in one of the room’s many crooks and cracks, while we would all be burnt to a crisp? Not to mention what the fireball would have done to the wine – burning Cormyte manorhouses is one thing, but destroying good Sembian wine is quite another.
Still, Ulrick had reason to worry. Twice the thief stabbed him in the back, in parts of his body where his heavy armor afforded little protection. I began to cast a spell to sense enchantments; within twenty heartbeats, I would sense where the cutpurse was standing from the very magical dust that hid him from our sight, and if tried to disrupt the spell, it’d be likely he’d expose himself to my comrades and be cut down like a dog.
The thief countered my spell by dancing around us and whispering a word to shut down the portal. Fearing that we would be trapped, we panicked. I dove through the fading gatewayl back into the portal chamber, and the others followed.
When we arrived on the other side, we realized that the thief had crossed the portal with us, so Ulrick decided to reopen the portal and return to the cellar. Unfortunately, as soon as he and Aron crossed the portal, the trap came to life again. Ulrick was electrocuted and fell dead to the floor; his armor was smoking and his father’s greatsword, sheathed in heavy cloth straps and fastened to his back, fell from his back and smoldered on the ground. Clearly it would never strike a blow again.
Aron was grievously injured, so I rolled my other healing potion to him. Once he quaffed it, he was ready for the fight. The armor that the Thayans had given him fortified him against thief’s most deadly attacks, so our adversary decided to play a waiting game. The thief fled the cellar and hid in the upper levels of the building, but fortunately he was alone. The slow but diligent Aron carefully searched the building and finally discovered the thief hiding in an attic crawlspace, the dust’s dweomer having worn off over time. Aron smote the thief with several mighty blows, flaying him to death.
So! Our enemy was dead, brutally harvested by my strong-armed companion. But Ulrick was also slain, and I was in no mood for funerals. I bade Aron to return with Ulrick’s body across the threshold before the trap reset, but he suggested that we should inspect the area outside the building first. To my surprise, his counsel was the wiser. That’s how we discovered that the portal led to our home city of Saerloon, where healing would be much easier to find than in Cormyr, and Ulrick could be raised from death to renew his task.
Now you know why I demand such secrecy from you, sister.
We stripped the thief’s body of its possessions, taking it as weregild for the priests of Azuth, whom we would employ to return Ulrick to the tragic lands of the living. Remembering the wounds he had given me, I spat on the thief’s body, a satisfying if petty act. I almost wish I had a raven familiar to feast upon its eyes. Aron changed his bloody clothes, and we wrapped Ulrick in a large hooded cloak and stood on either side of him, carrying him like a drunken man who had passed out from the excesses of the night.
Our deception was made much easier by our fortuitous arrival at festival time. I had quite forgotten what a gaudy spectacle the Ravenswatch frivolity can be; the flight of the ravens from the jail to the citadel is impressive, of course, but the swaggering host of mages that follows it, casting their "spells", is laughably pretentious. None of these pups could challenge the city fathers’ as the Ravenswatch founders did a century ago. They are primping, posturing and perfumed pack of little beasts like poodles, who are utterly untroubled by the fact that they are lapdogs walking in a world of wolves.
But they did provide a distraction, in case the thief’s comrades were watching the building. Singing a drunken, off-key ballad, we bards of the damned carted the huge paladin (with Aron bearing most of the burden) down the clogged streets of Saerloon, eventually dragging him to the House of Azuth.
After three clangs on the heavy iron gate, we managed to rouse a half-drunken acolyte, who shivered in a hastily thrown nightshirt as rain began to fall. All the high priests were away at festival (probably listening to the Ravenswatch bravos tell drunken stories of spellcasting mishaps and childish pranks) so after some haggling and exchange of coin, we hauled Lord Ulrick's paladinly corpse down a (much too lengthy) passage and several long flights of solemn stone stairs down into the temple’s necropolis. And to think that I enjoyed hiding in those catacombs as a boy!
We laid Ulrick upon a slab in its catacombs, covered it with a sheet of canvass, and hoped that the rats didn’t pry into it. (Fortunately the body had not yet begun to smell). Our business could not be concluded until the morning, so we retired into the depths of the city and looked for lodging.
I really did not wish to see father, so I took Aron to the Winding Serpent Inn. The big Cormyte was famished and demanded a meal fit for three hungry men, but the sight of a man in such heavy armor at festival time was an affront to the innkeeper, and so they refused to serve the Cormyte. Ah, what a satisfying turn that was, after being a target for everyone’s spittle in the Dales and in Cormyr for so many miserable months.
“Why should they care what I wear?” Aron growled as we sat down at a table.
“Why should you care?” I replied. “I’ve seen you dance around naked.”
“I only do that once a month,” Aron protested. “For religious purposes.” The knight is a devotee of Selune. Selune! Have you ever heard such foolishness? What good can come of worshipping the Moon, unless one wants to be a howling idiot?
I ordered a huge meal, and tormented Aron by forcing him to watch as I devoured the repast. Grievous injury does encourage a certain hardy appetite. Once I had finished the meal, I purchased the use of a grand suite, to celebrate my return to civilization in the appropriate style. Aron’s keen (and hungry) glance espied a man who was carefully watching us while I ate. I didn’t know if he was a thief or someone more sinister, so I retired to my room, had food brought up, and retired to bed. Though I was sleeping in the city of my birth, both Kord and Ulrick were gone, and their absence brought only a grave discomfort. Enemies seemed to be everywhere.
Dear Gevrael,
Thank you for your recent hospitality and understanding in our recent stop. I must confess I was surprised by father’s (relative) courtesy – do you think he knows of Ulrick’s importance in the machinations of certain Sembian parties? We've both known for a long time that a heart of cold, barbed iron beats underneath the courtier's lace and magician's silk.
I wanted to explain this to you in person, but our departure was in haste, so this letter must suffice. It began with Ulrick, of course: the big lug had dreams again. One would imagine that the dreams of a paladin would consist of visions of epic struggle and great quests, like the wildest tales of a cunning Cormyte tavern-bard who sifts through knightly purses by telling them the only tales they wish to hear (regardless of how obnoxious they become in the retelling). I imagine most paladins dream of the deathscreams of dragons and the touch of chaste women. What else do they have to dream about?
But not Ulrick. His dreams are different than those of other men, more portentous and vivid. I can only imagine what is like to be him at night, when the comforts of a woman’s touch fade with the coming of slumber, and there is not a scrap of dream-glory to be had, only torment.
And that night, his torment was the vision of a lone dracolich, death-boned, steel fanged, raising its great horned limbs through a star-blue portal, destined to bring a final death to Cormyr.
####
Weeks ago, before we arrived in Wheloon, we had a chance encounter whose importance was lost on me until this moment. We had found three dead Orcs in the wilderness, on the path between Monksblade and Wheloon, one of them clutching an amulet with an odd symbol engraved on it. Unfortunately, the events of Wheloon had distracted me from researching the amulet, but now I suddenly remembered that it bore a great similarity to the sign of the Sammasterites, a cult which holds that undead dragons are the true gods of Toril, to be nurtured and worshipped as a prelude to their coming age of supremacy.
A cult whose ultimate goal is the creation of those same abominations that Ulrick had beheld in his vision.
It had struck me as odd that something as base and weak as an Orc-band could control something as important as the portals. Now it occurred to me that their mastery of the portals was due to information that they had stolen from their portal's true masters, the Sammasterites.
When I informed Ulrick of my theory, the bedevilled paladin immediately declared that we would travel to Suzail and warn the crown of the dracolich threat, despite the rather dramatic consequences of such an act. A reminder of the beholder-mage that blocked the path was sufficient to dissuade his (dubious) lordship from that course of action – barely – but the portals still held our attention. Two portals in particular seemed to demand further exploration: one which led to a wine cellar where Kord was attacked by someone who was dressed like a Sembian, and another which led to a ruined shrine to Mystra. So we spent a half-day riding to Monksblade (the pair should consider themselves fortunate to have a Sembian companion who actually knows a thing or two about horses) found the cliff opening, and returned to the portal room.
It is a marvel, this chamber. Sixteen or so portals, some dead, some blocked by stone, others only slumbering, doorways etched into the stone by the craft and magicks of ancient Netheril. When the appropriate word is spoken, the portals become alive, sparking to red as they ignite, then cooling to a green miasma as they settle, finally fading first to a blue shimmer (as pretty as the crown of Mystra) and then to dark grey stonework when the doors are closed. We divined the opening word for many of these doors on our previous venture, a disastrous expedition where nearly all of us had died. Now that we had mustered our strength, we were eager to renew the assault.
Finding the chamber unguarded by the Orcs, Ulrick once again entertained the idea of using the portals to get to Suzail, even though none of the doors would allow us to circumvent the obstacle of the beholder. Unfortunately, driving a point into a paladin’s head is enough to vex any man; a long argument followed that rattled me, and so I forsook my usual caution. Attempting to end the dissention before my headache became too great to endure. I stepped into the wine cellar portal, ready for (the expected) ambush.
Yes, I had remembered what Kord had told us about the archer who had been lurking in waiting. But what I failed to remember was the very powerful magical trap that was situated at the door. Idiot! As soon as I stepped through the portal, I was suddenly surrounded by a coriolis of lightning. Instinctively, I dodged to one side, otherwise the lightning would have done more to me than to smoke my robes and singe my legs and hands. The instant I stepped away from the trap, I immediately found myself wearing a thief on my back. Azuth, I have never beheld such speed! He plunged a dagger into my right kidney, and gave it a twist for good measure.
I would have been dead then, had it not been for Aron. The fool raced across the portal, bearing the brunt of another lightning bolt, and charged the thief. The distraction allowed me to stagger backwards through the portal, still clutching my side with one hand as shakily pryed a healing drought from my belt, and I quaffed it before it could fall through my fingers. I have never seen so much of my own blood in my life.
Normally, I despise the taste of these brews, but for once I welcomed the burning sensation as it raced down my throat, (tasting much like rat's dung floating in a lamp oil soup) but the light-headedness and the pain in my side suddenly halted. I was not completely whole – my side still throbbed like a succubus in heat – but I always hate to let an injury go without a response, so I steadied myself, cast a spell of myriad images and prepared to rejoin the fracas.
Alas, my comrades were not faring well. Seeing himself outnumbered, our quarry covered himself with magical dust – vanishing from sight, of course, and then he fired arrows at us while he danced nimbly around the cellar.
I never dreamt I would miss having Kord at my side.
“Cast a fireball!” Ulrick barked to me as yet another mightily swordstroke connected with empty air. “Fill the entire room!” But the paladin had clearly lost his mind. How could anyone forget that any thief worth his salt would be able to hide from my fireball in one of the room’s many crooks and cracks, while we would all be burnt to a crisp? Not to mention what the fireball would have done to the wine – burning Cormyte manorhouses is one thing, but destroying good Sembian wine is quite another.
Still, Ulrick had reason to worry. Twice the thief stabbed him in the back, in parts of his body where his heavy armor afforded little protection. I began to cast a spell to sense enchantments; within twenty heartbeats, I would sense where the cutpurse was standing from the very magical dust that hid him from our sight, and if tried to disrupt the spell, it’d be likely he’d expose himself to my comrades and be cut down like a dog.
The thief countered my spell by dancing around us and whispering a word to shut down the portal. Fearing that we would be trapped, we panicked. I dove through the fading gatewayl back into the portal chamber, and the others followed.
When we arrived on the other side, we realized that the thief had crossed the portal with us, so Ulrick decided to reopen the portal and return to the cellar. Unfortunately, as soon as he and Aron crossed the portal, the trap came to life again. Ulrick was electrocuted and fell dead to the floor; his armor was smoking and his father’s greatsword, sheathed in heavy cloth straps and fastened to his back, fell from his back and smoldered on the ground. Clearly it would never strike a blow again.
Aron was grievously injured, so I rolled my other healing potion to him. Once he quaffed it, he was ready for the fight. The armor that the Thayans had given him fortified him against thief’s most deadly attacks, so our adversary decided to play a waiting game. The thief fled the cellar and hid in the upper levels of the building, but fortunately he was alone. The slow but diligent Aron carefully searched the building and finally discovered the thief hiding in an attic crawlspace, the dust’s dweomer having worn off over time. Aron smote the thief with several mighty blows, flaying him to death.
So! Our enemy was dead, brutally harvested by my strong-armed companion. But Ulrick was also slain, and I was in no mood for funerals. I bade Aron to return with Ulrick’s body across the threshold before the trap reset, but he suggested that we should inspect the area outside the building first. To my surprise, his counsel was the wiser. That’s how we discovered that the portal led to our home city of Saerloon, where healing would be much easier to find than in Cormyr, and Ulrick could be raised from death to renew his task.
Now you know why I demand such secrecy from you, sister.
We stripped the thief’s body of its possessions, taking it as weregild for the priests of Azuth, whom we would employ to return Ulrick to the tragic lands of the living. Remembering the wounds he had given me, I spat on the thief’s body, a satisfying if petty act. I almost wish I had a raven familiar to feast upon its eyes. Aron changed his bloody clothes, and we wrapped Ulrick in a large hooded cloak and stood on either side of him, carrying him like a drunken man who had passed out from the excesses of the night.
Our deception was made much easier by our fortuitous arrival at festival time. I had quite forgotten what a gaudy spectacle the Ravenswatch frivolity can be; the flight of the ravens from the jail to the citadel is impressive, of course, but the swaggering host of mages that follows it, casting their "spells", is laughably pretentious. None of these pups could challenge the city fathers’ as the Ravenswatch founders did a century ago. They are primping, posturing and perfumed pack of little beasts like poodles, who are utterly untroubled by the fact that they are lapdogs walking in a world of wolves.
But they did provide a distraction, in case the thief’s comrades were watching the building. Singing a drunken, off-key ballad, we bards of the damned carted the huge paladin (with Aron bearing most of the burden) down the clogged streets of Saerloon, eventually dragging him to the House of Azuth.
After three clangs on the heavy iron gate, we managed to rouse a half-drunken acolyte, who shivered in a hastily thrown nightshirt as rain began to fall. All the high priests were away at festival (probably listening to the Ravenswatch bravos tell drunken stories of spellcasting mishaps and childish pranks) so after some haggling and exchange of coin, we hauled Lord Ulrick's paladinly corpse down a (much too lengthy) passage and several long flights of solemn stone stairs down into the temple’s necropolis. And to think that I enjoyed hiding in those catacombs as a boy!
We laid Ulrick upon a slab in its catacombs, covered it with a sheet of canvass, and hoped that the rats didn’t pry into it. (Fortunately the body had not yet begun to smell). Our business could not be concluded until the morning, so we retired into the depths of the city and looked for lodging.
I really did not wish to see father, so I took Aron to the Winding Serpent Inn. The big Cormyte was famished and demanded a meal fit for three hungry men, but the sight of a man in such heavy armor at festival time was an affront to the innkeeper, and so they refused to serve the Cormyte. Ah, what a satisfying turn that was, after being a target for everyone’s spittle in the Dales and in Cormyr for so many miserable months.
“Why should they care what I wear?” Aron growled as we sat down at a table.
“Why should you care?” I replied. “I’ve seen you dance around naked.”
“I only do that once a month,” Aron protested. “For religious purposes.” The knight is a devotee of Selune. Selune! Have you ever heard such foolishness? What good can come of worshipping the Moon, unless one wants to be a howling idiot?
I ordered a huge meal, and tormented Aron by forcing him to watch as I devoured the repast. Grievous injury does encourage a certain hardy appetite. Once I had finished the meal, I purchased the use of a grand suite, to celebrate my return to civilization in the appropriate style. Aron’s keen (and hungry) glance espied a man who was carefully watching us while I ate. I didn’t know if he was a thief or someone more sinister, so I retired to my room, had food brought up, and retired to bed. Though I was sleeping in the city of my birth, both Kord and Ulrick were gone, and their absence brought only a grave discomfort. Enemies seemed to be everywhere.
Broccli_Head
Explorer
in the middle?
doesn't seem that you are quite finished!
How could you let Ulrick die?
I know that adventure. I glad to see someone playing it. Anyway, looking forward to the conclusion of that letter.
BH
doesn't seem that you are quite finished!
How could you let Ulrick die?
I know that adventure. I glad to see someone playing it. Anyway, looking forward to the conclusion of that letter.
BH
MulhorandSage
First Post
I was afraid for our safety, even in the heart of Saerloon, so I conjured a rope trick and scurried up the rope to rest while Aron guarded me. It was not a comfortable sleep, but one does the best that one can in such circumstances, and at least my gravest fears did not come to pass. I passed the night unmolested, then ate a quick breakfast and prepared to return to the temple of Azuth to see if they could work an undeserved miracle on our dear impetuous paladin.
Before we went to retrieve Ulrick’s body, I noticed Aron fumbling through his pack and uncovering a damp parchment (his wineskin was leaking) with barely legible writing. I asked him what it was.
”Oh,” Aron said. “I’d almost forgotten about that. It’s a letter I found on the person we killed in the wine shop.”
Immediately I snatched the letter out of his hand, regretting that I had not been more observant earlier. It was – to say the least – interesting correspondence.
“Treibor,
Kell and Gregor have gone missing. I think these demon-cursed Orcs have got them. I have signs(?) of the others using the portals. The rubble in the portal room has been cleared away and I have found fresh pools of blood there. However, the glyph that was still in the temple has been triggered but no one was found wandering about. You should remain here to guard the wine shop while I return to the tower by way of the temple portal to warn the others. Be ready to shut down the portal system if need be.
Kayll
P.S. The Masters are close to completing their great task. Even in death the pool will restore you to serve our great lords even in death, so fear not. Our sacrifice will pave the way for our great lord’s rule.”
I take the letter and set it among my papers and scrolls. Aron had made some even more illegible scratchings on the back; I think he was using it to record an inventory of treasures. The fact that the big oaf is literate is a great (and perhaps terrifying) surprise.
The reference to the “temple portal” seemed to point to only one place; months ago, we followed one of the portals we found near Galath’s Roost and discovered an ancient shrine to Mystryl (the progenitor of our most beloved goddess Mystra). Unfortunately when we examined the place, Aron triggered a glyph, and since his skill at dodging spells rivals that of a drunken kobold, he was immediately blinded. We then retreated back to Ashbeneford, where we begged the priestess of Chauntea to restore his sight. The matter clearly demanded further study – the place was so ancient that it was almost certainly beyond the knowledge of either the local Mystraites or Azuthites, so the best way to explore it was first-hand. But first we needed to restore Ulrick to life.
We arrived at the temple of Azuth and emerged to find Ulrick clutching a robe as he woozily emerged from the afterdeath.
“I suppose it is a good thing that Torm is such a forgiving god,” I say with a smile. This is not the first time the knightly lummox has fallen in the line of duty. Ulrick, as usual, does his best to ignore the jibe, although this time it’s probably due to trauma and exhaustion, not natural forbearance. But even if death did not diminish a man, it taxes them to the innermost fiber, and one need only look at the haggard look on Ulrick’s pallid face, and a stagger that’s one step removed from a zombie’s gait, to see that Ulrick has not completely rejoined the living. He’s certainly in no shape to confront our enemies, so I decide to retreat to the only place in Saerloon that offers a modicum of safety – father’s estate.
Father treats me with the usual cold formality. No one takes me to task for bringing a pair of big sweaty Cormyte human-horses into the house (perhaps your suitors have accustomed the staff to the habits of the breed), though I wish they had, as redress to the future injuries I’ll suffer when we return to Cormyr.
So that’s why we were at the house. I understand you had other business, on which even I am not so foolhardy to speculate. We were given rooms in the west hall, and if anything is broken there, it’s Aron’s fault. Once we rested, and a color other than green had taken bloom in Ulrick’s cheeks, we sat down by the Wolfwicker fireplace and discussed the situation. The reason we had left Wheloon was to explore the portal network of Galath’s Roost and to prevent the Sammasterites from unleashing a dracolich upon Cormyr. There was little left to do in Saerloon, so the next logical step was to explore the abandoned shrine of Mystryl.
Not wishing to repeat the same mistake we made at the wine shoppe (falling into a trap twice. We are such idiots!), I insisted that each of us recall whatever we could remember from our previous expedition. About the only thing Aron can remember is the glyph that blinded him. Ulrick sighs and mutters under his breath that Kord had the best memory of all of us.
“Well, to be honest, I was lost in thought over the uses of the portal system,” I confess. “Not to mention I was barely able to catch my breath after we escaped from that other portal. You remember the tentacle thing, that cross between a shambling mound and a otuyugh…”
Aron shudders.
“I remember,” Ulrick says. “It was a very starry night.”
“The moon had gone behind the mountains,” Aron added; as a devotee of Selune, he ought to know such things. “I climbed up the slope and we saw the pool and the statue of Mystra…”
“It was Mystryl,” Ulrick corrected. “An unaging statue of the goddess, standing in the pool. Then Aron touched it…”
“And I won my wager with Kord that you would be the one we’d need to drag back to the healer,” I smile. “Well, I think I’ll need to make a small detour and see if the local Thayan mageries has an erase spell at an affordable price.”
“They let the Thayans into Sembia?” Aron wondered.
“I heard somebody actually let them enter Cormyr,” I smiled, looking at Ulrick. He’s too busy making plans to empty the Enclave’s stock of healing potions to react. One day, I’ll find a taunt that will truly test his patience.
There is a saying in Sembia: “nothing proves one’s manhood like shopping”; there is truth in the saying, as barter requires a forceful will, a silver tongue, and a sharp eye (and even sharper mind). I suppose those who ply their trade in ancient ruins struggling to best magical beasts may dispute the claim, but I will confess that I am less nervous facing a troll than I am these Thayans. I keep one hand on my purse as I walk; cutpurses are as common as rats in Saerloon, and half as clean. The Enclave is a cluster of beaded tents, shouting voices, burnt quail smothered in spices and roasting on open spits. I keep Ulrick at my side, and I pull on him and occasionally poke and jabber at him as if he were my bodyguard. The masquerade appears to amuse him.
“Would you care for a drink, honored sir?” a Thayan asks, suddenly stepping in front of me and holding a bottle of a green beverage which smells like rotten beer.
“I must decline,” I tell him, as politely as I can when I have a Thayan looming over me like a drunken familiar. “Another time…”
The merchant bows and returns to his stall, and I observe him with somewhat morbid curiosity as he blows on a large pipe, which issues a white smoke that is very harsh on the throat and nostrils. It is times such as these that I’m thankful to be such a nimble mage, as I’d have choked if I’d been caught in the center of the cloud. The narcoticist blows the opium mixture in heavy white rings that dissipate before they can rise above tent level; I suppose the wind is blowing harder than I thought. After a few seconds of inhaling it around the periphery, the bitrous smell is almost a temptation.
But we don’t have time for distractions, so I continue walking. Arriving at the main stall, I’m forced to wait for close to a half hour as the vendor argues with a customer, a sagging old wizard with the motliest Raven familiar I’ve ever seen, and a voice almost as harsh as his bird’s. I never imagined that even a Sembian Ravenswatch could get so upset over the fabric of an old cloak. I keep my hand fixed on my purse, in case the quarrel is staged as a distraction for the benefit of the Thayan equivalent of the Knives. Finally, the exhausted merchant, dragging his prize on the ground, stomps away to the main streets of Saerloon, and it’s my turn to barter. With little argument, I sell the items we had taken from the man at the wine shoppe and use them to purchase scrolls containing eight or so low level spells, including a spell designed to erase magical glyphs.
“Well?” I ask Ulrick, who’s returned from a potion vendor with enough potions to heal a wounded dragon. He passes me a pair of minor curatives, and flashes a wand of healing, displaying it with a proud, shaggy-toothed grin.
“Additional healing,” I smile. “Of course when you die… again… the damned thing will be bloody useless to us.”
“Such an optimist,” Ulrick replied. “Of course, there was a reason I purchased potions.”
“Considering you still owe me for those potions that I used on you on our first battle in the Dales…” Like any good Sembian, I never forget a debt, but I must confess I’ve forgotten which battle it was that I used those potions on him – it was before the fight with the manticore, I’m sure of it. Maybe against that zombie we found in the undercrypt, yes I think that was it…
We’ve all had our fill of Saerloon, at least for awhile, so I bid the others follow me to the wine shoppe. Because of the distraction caused by Ulrick’s death, we really didn’t get a chance to properly explore it, so I’m hoping that we’ll have an hour or so to search the premises unmolested. We’re about halfway from the Inn to the shoppe when I once again notice the shifty fellow who had been spying on Aron at the Winding Serpent. He’s obviously following us. Abruptly, I step in front of Ulrick, causing him to stumble into me, then I shout at him and slap his face.
“Cormyte!” I snap, adding: “we’re being followed by a black cloak” under my breath. Ulrick, playing along with the ruse, looks penitent. I snap us back onto course – when Aron collides with a second black cloaked figure, who drops a large bowl of clear liquid onto the ground.
“You Cormyrean oaf!” the man shouts, turning away from the shattered container just a little too quickly, like an actor who knows his role too well. “That cost me ten thousand gold! I demand immediate repayment!”
I take a step back and watch in some amusement. Aron stammers while Ulrick also watches, though much less amused than I. Aron refuses to pay the money – he doesn’t have one-tenth of the price- so the man demands satisfaction. Confused, Aron turns to me with Cormyte astonishment that the authorities would allow a duel to take place on the street.
"It's gauche," I admit. "But not uncommon."
"Draw your blade." the bravo says. Aron draws his dire flail. "Do I look like a chaff of wheat to you, sir?" the bravo snarls. "Draw a real weapon." Wrestling against a rising anger, Aron draws his other weapon, a greatsword. "Are you a knight or a barbarian?" the Sembian gasps in wonder.
I must admit the bravo has a point - armed with a dire flail and a greatsword, Aron simply isn’t equipped for proper dueling. Given his love for huge weapons (no, it isn’t compensation for the inadequacies of his anatomy, a fact I can attest to because I’ve seen him dance naked under the full moon as part of the rituals of Selune), I do wonder how Aron ever achieved any rank of knighthood in a nation as hidebound as Cormyr.
The bravo threatens to involve the local authorities, so Ulrick finally offers to take Aron’s place. I can’t help but laugh. “What is your name, sirrah?” I sneer at the aggrieved blackcloak. “Is it not customary for a challenger to speak his name? Or are you afraid to speak it aloud, knowing that everyone on the streets of Saerloon will treat it as an object of ridicule, for anyone who would handle an expensive potion in the middle of a crowded street and then complain when he drops it is an unmitigated fool!”
The man snorts like a horse and accuses me of poor manners and threatens to gut me after he’s dispatched Aron. Such a cheap, self-aggrandizing bravo – is it not pathetic what’s happened to the young men of Sembia? Of course, Ulrick will not allow him to do make good on his threat, and insists on staging the duel. The bravo showers the paladin with a drunkard’s drought of insincere praise – how noble he is, how full of honor, to defend the unworthy - and then draws a long rapier that glitters like ice and a snub nosed dagger. Battle is joined.
The duel that follows between paladin and bravo is mercifully brief; despite a flurry of quick motions with scimitar and dagger, and a display of showy cave-waving, our third-rate countryman can barely graze the paladin. Ulrick, on the other hand, is fighting well (if not as stylishly); he bites his adversary’s shoulder with one sword stroke and follows it up with a slash along his rib cage. His side bloodied, the bravo falls to one knee. Ulrick immediately grants him mercy. The bravo forgives Aron’s debt, and, clutching his side, staggers away. I notice him duck into a back alley - the same alley where Aron had noticed the man who had been following us had also gone.
You do hate it when the conspiracies are this obvious, don’t you, sister?
###
It’s an hour past dawn now, and Aron is rousing at last. I will resume the adventure another time, hopefully soon.
Your loving brother,
Ascarin Nevermoon
Before we went to retrieve Ulrick’s body, I noticed Aron fumbling through his pack and uncovering a damp parchment (his wineskin was leaking) with barely legible writing. I asked him what it was.
”Oh,” Aron said. “I’d almost forgotten about that. It’s a letter I found on the person we killed in the wine shop.”
Immediately I snatched the letter out of his hand, regretting that I had not been more observant earlier. It was – to say the least – interesting correspondence.
“Treibor,
Kell and Gregor have gone missing. I think these demon-cursed Orcs have got them. I have signs(?) of the others using the portals. The rubble in the portal room has been cleared away and I have found fresh pools of blood there. However, the glyph that was still in the temple has been triggered but no one was found wandering about. You should remain here to guard the wine shop while I return to the tower by way of the temple portal to warn the others. Be ready to shut down the portal system if need be.
Kayll
P.S. The Masters are close to completing their great task. Even in death the pool will restore you to serve our great lords even in death, so fear not. Our sacrifice will pave the way for our great lord’s rule.”
I take the letter and set it among my papers and scrolls. Aron had made some even more illegible scratchings on the back; I think he was using it to record an inventory of treasures. The fact that the big oaf is literate is a great (and perhaps terrifying) surprise.
The reference to the “temple portal” seemed to point to only one place; months ago, we followed one of the portals we found near Galath’s Roost and discovered an ancient shrine to Mystryl (the progenitor of our most beloved goddess Mystra). Unfortunately when we examined the place, Aron triggered a glyph, and since his skill at dodging spells rivals that of a drunken kobold, he was immediately blinded. We then retreated back to Ashbeneford, where we begged the priestess of Chauntea to restore his sight. The matter clearly demanded further study – the place was so ancient that it was almost certainly beyond the knowledge of either the local Mystraites or Azuthites, so the best way to explore it was first-hand. But first we needed to restore Ulrick to life.
We arrived at the temple of Azuth and emerged to find Ulrick clutching a robe as he woozily emerged from the afterdeath.
“I suppose it is a good thing that Torm is such a forgiving god,” I say with a smile. This is not the first time the knightly lummox has fallen in the line of duty. Ulrick, as usual, does his best to ignore the jibe, although this time it’s probably due to trauma and exhaustion, not natural forbearance. But even if death did not diminish a man, it taxes them to the innermost fiber, and one need only look at the haggard look on Ulrick’s pallid face, and a stagger that’s one step removed from a zombie’s gait, to see that Ulrick has not completely rejoined the living. He’s certainly in no shape to confront our enemies, so I decide to retreat to the only place in Saerloon that offers a modicum of safety – father’s estate.
Father treats me with the usual cold formality. No one takes me to task for bringing a pair of big sweaty Cormyte human-horses into the house (perhaps your suitors have accustomed the staff to the habits of the breed), though I wish they had, as redress to the future injuries I’ll suffer when we return to Cormyr.
So that’s why we were at the house. I understand you had other business, on which even I am not so foolhardy to speculate. We were given rooms in the west hall, and if anything is broken there, it’s Aron’s fault. Once we rested, and a color other than green had taken bloom in Ulrick’s cheeks, we sat down by the Wolfwicker fireplace and discussed the situation. The reason we had left Wheloon was to explore the portal network of Galath’s Roost and to prevent the Sammasterites from unleashing a dracolich upon Cormyr. There was little left to do in Saerloon, so the next logical step was to explore the abandoned shrine of Mystryl.
Not wishing to repeat the same mistake we made at the wine shoppe (falling into a trap twice. We are such idiots!), I insisted that each of us recall whatever we could remember from our previous expedition. About the only thing Aron can remember is the glyph that blinded him. Ulrick sighs and mutters under his breath that Kord had the best memory of all of us.
“Well, to be honest, I was lost in thought over the uses of the portal system,” I confess. “Not to mention I was barely able to catch my breath after we escaped from that other portal. You remember the tentacle thing, that cross between a shambling mound and a otuyugh…”
Aron shudders.
“I remember,” Ulrick says. “It was a very starry night.”
“The moon had gone behind the mountains,” Aron added; as a devotee of Selune, he ought to know such things. “I climbed up the slope and we saw the pool and the statue of Mystra…”
“It was Mystryl,” Ulrick corrected. “An unaging statue of the goddess, standing in the pool. Then Aron touched it…”
“And I won my wager with Kord that you would be the one we’d need to drag back to the healer,” I smile. “Well, I think I’ll need to make a small detour and see if the local Thayan mageries has an erase spell at an affordable price.”
“They let the Thayans into Sembia?” Aron wondered.
“I heard somebody actually let them enter Cormyr,” I smiled, looking at Ulrick. He’s too busy making plans to empty the Enclave’s stock of healing potions to react. One day, I’ll find a taunt that will truly test his patience.
There is a saying in Sembia: “nothing proves one’s manhood like shopping”; there is truth in the saying, as barter requires a forceful will, a silver tongue, and a sharp eye (and even sharper mind). I suppose those who ply their trade in ancient ruins struggling to best magical beasts may dispute the claim, but I will confess that I am less nervous facing a troll than I am these Thayans. I keep one hand on my purse as I walk; cutpurses are as common as rats in Saerloon, and half as clean. The Enclave is a cluster of beaded tents, shouting voices, burnt quail smothered in spices and roasting on open spits. I keep Ulrick at my side, and I pull on him and occasionally poke and jabber at him as if he were my bodyguard. The masquerade appears to amuse him.
“Would you care for a drink, honored sir?” a Thayan asks, suddenly stepping in front of me and holding a bottle of a green beverage which smells like rotten beer.
“I must decline,” I tell him, as politely as I can when I have a Thayan looming over me like a drunken familiar. “Another time…”
The merchant bows and returns to his stall, and I observe him with somewhat morbid curiosity as he blows on a large pipe, which issues a white smoke that is very harsh on the throat and nostrils. It is times such as these that I’m thankful to be such a nimble mage, as I’d have choked if I’d been caught in the center of the cloud. The narcoticist blows the opium mixture in heavy white rings that dissipate before they can rise above tent level; I suppose the wind is blowing harder than I thought. After a few seconds of inhaling it around the periphery, the bitrous smell is almost a temptation.
But we don’t have time for distractions, so I continue walking. Arriving at the main stall, I’m forced to wait for close to a half hour as the vendor argues with a customer, a sagging old wizard with the motliest Raven familiar I’ve ever seen, and a voice almost as harsh as his bird’s. I never imagined that even a Sembian Ravenswatch could get so upset over the fabric of an old cloak. I keep my hand fixed on my purse, in case the quarrel is staged as a distraction for the benefit of the Thayan equivalent of the Knives. Finally, the exhausted merchant, dragging his prize on the ground, stomps away to the main streets of Saerloon, and it’s my turn to barter. With little argument, I sell the items we had taken from the man at the wine shoppe and use them to purchase scrolls containing eight or so low level spells, including a spell designed to erase magical glyphs.
“Well?” I ask Ulrick, who’s returned from a potion vendor with enough potions to heal a wounded dragon. He passes me a pair of minor curatives, and flashes a wand of healing, displaying it with a proud, shaggy-toothed grin.
“Additional healing,” I smile. “Of course when you die… again… the damned thing will be bloody useless to us.”
“Such an optimist,” Ulrick replied. “Of course, there was a reason I purchased potions.”
“Considering you still owe me for those potions that I used on you on our first battle in the Dales…” Like any good Sembian, I never forget a debt, but I must confess I’ve forgotten which battle it was that I used those potions on him – it was before the fight with the manticore, I’m sure of it. Maybe against that zombie we found in the undercrypt, yes I think that was it…
We’ve all had our fill of Saerloon, at least for awhile, so I bid the others follow me to the wine shoppe. Because of the distraction caused by Ulrick’s death, we really didn’t get a chance to properly explore it, so I’m hoping that we’ll have an hour or so to search the premises unmolested. We’re about halfway from the Inn to the shoppe when I once again notice the shifty fellow who had been spying on Aron at the Winding Serpent. He’s obviously following us. Abruptly, I step in front of Ulrick, causing him to stumble into me, then I shout at him and slap his face.
“Cormyte!” I snap, adding: “we’re being followed by a black cloak” under my breath. Ulrick, playing along with the ruse, looks penitent. I snap us back onto course – when Aron collides with a second black cloaked figure, who drops a large bowl of clear liquid onto the ground.
“You Cormyrean oaf!” the man shouts, turning away from the shattered container just a little too quickly, like an actor who knows his role too well. “That cost me ten thousand gold! I demand immediate repayment!”
I take a step back and watch in some amusement. Aron stammers while Ulrick also watches, though much less amused than I. Aron refuses to pay the money – he doesn’t have one-tenth of the price- so the man demands satisfaction. Confused, Aron turns to me with Cormyte astonishment that the authorities would allow a duel to take place on the street.
"It's gauche," I admit. "But not uncommon."
"Draw your blade." the bravo says. Aron draws his dire flail. "Do I look like a chaff of wheat to you, sir?" the bravo snarls. "Draw a real weapon." Wrestling against a rising anger, Aron draws his other weapon, a greatsword. "Are you a knight or a barbarian?" the Sembian gasps in wonder.
I must admit the bravo has a point - armed with a dire flail and a greatsword, Aron simply isn’t equipped for proper dueling. Given his love for huge weapons (no, it isn’t compensation for the inadequacies of his anatomy, a fact I can attest to because I’ve seen him dance naked under the full moon as part of the rituals of Selune), I do wonder how Aron ever achieved any rank of knighthood in a nation as hidebound as Cormyr.
The bravo threatens to involve the local authorities, so Ulrick finally offers to take Aron’s place. I can’t help but laugh. “What is your name, sirrah?” I sneer at the aggrieved blackcloak. “Is it not customary for a challenger to speak his name? Or are you afraid to speak it aloud, knowing that everyone on the streets of Saerloon will treat it as an object of ridicule, for anyone who would handle an expensive potion in the middle of a crowded street and then complain when he drops it is an unmitigated fool!”
The man snorts like a horse and accuses me of poor manners and threatens to gut me after he’s dispatched Aron. Such a cheap, self-aggrandizing bravo – is it not pathetic what’s happened to the young men of Sembia? Of course, Ulrick will not allow him to do make good on his threat, and insists on staging the duel. The bravo showers the paladin with a drunkard’s drought of insincere praise – how noble he is, how full of honor, to defend the unworthy - and then draws a long rapier that glitters like ice and a snub nosed dagger. Battle is joined.
The duel that follows between paladin and bravo is mercifully brief; despite a flurry of quick motions with scimitar and dagger, and a display of showy cave-waving, our third-rate countryman can barely graze the paladin. Ulrick, on the other hand, is fighting well (if not as stylishly); he bites his adversary’s shoulder with one sword stroke and follows it up with a slash along his rib cage. His side bloodied, the bravo falls to one knee. Ulrick immediately grants him mercy. The bravo forgives Aron’s debt, and, clutching his side, staggers away. I notice him duck into a back alley - the same alley where Aron had noticed the man who had been following us had also gone.
You do hate it when the conspiracies are this obvious, don’t you, sister?
###
It’s an hour past dawn now, and Aron is rousing at last. I will resume the adventure another time, hopefully soon.
Your loving brother,
Ascarin Nevermoon
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Broccli_Head
Explorer
Glad you're back to continue the tale of Ulrick and co.!
I like the conspiracies that are unfolding, also. Dragon Cultists....the temple of Mystra...crisis in Cormyr...Semiban and Thayan oppurtunists.
Very grand!
I like the conspiracies that are unfolding, also. Dragon Cultists....the temple of Mystra...crisis in Cormyr...Semiban and Thayan oppurtunists.
Very grand!
MulhorandSage
First Post
22nd day of Uktar, in the Year of the Standing Stone, 1372.
In the shadow of the Death That Grows
Dear Sister,
Though mere days have passed since my last correspondence, it somehow seems much longer to me. A brief letter now, to prompt thy memory, and then we shall speak of the Pool of Radiance - and the three humiliations we suffered there - in greater detail some other time.
###
Meanwhile, in the marketplace of Saerloon, Ulrick is again displaying the two wands of curing wounds that he just purchased and is grinning like the idiot he is, boasting how much more cost effective they are. Actually, any good Sembian would agree with his assessment, of course, but I'm hardly in an agreeable mood.
"You do realize that if you die, they'll be useless to us," I point out.
"Then I guess you'll have to keep me alive," Ulrick answers.
"Judging from past experience, that's a task beyond mortal ken," I reply. The sarcasm washes off his skin like rain, as always. I hate that.
We proceed to the wine shop which holds the portal network we found - aware that we're being followed as we enter the doorway. Fearful of Orc guards, we scurry past the nexus and into the portal that leads to the shrine to Mystryl. Surprisingly, no one ambushes us on the way.
The shrine itself is trapped with dark magicks and ugly glyphs that hover in the air like twisted, charred hummingbirds. Carefully, I speak words of magic to counterspell them, and gradually, a rune at a time, the ancient spiritual bastion of the goddess is cleansed. All except for one rune, which is beyond my power to erase, though we can walk around it easily enough.
Ulrick slaps me on the back and the chain mail coif he wears is lit up by a too-handsome smile. "Good work. Ascarin,' he says, in the condescending manner of an elder mate at wizard's school upon seeing a spell-addled apprentice cast his first cantrip. He can keep his praise for worthier deeds.
We reach a stone stair that leads out of the enclosure. I send Willhih, my weasel companion, up the stairs to scout. I instruct him to do so quietly and not attract attention. Unfortunately, when he sees the two guards standing over the exit with drawn swords, he panicks. The weasel nimbly dodges a sword-thrust and runs down the stairs, diving into my cloak and burrowing into it frantically. The poor thing is such a coward - much, as it pains me to admit it, like his master. Fortunately, when I have two such doughty companions as Ulrick and Aron, courage is rarely a necessity. The two howling sword-wavers rush up the stairs, quickly dispatch the guard, then give chase to her companion - the guard who fled for reinforcements.
We're forced to leave Aron, languishing in his armor of sluggardness far behind us, and Ulrick finally gets a good crossbow shot into the guard's back. Kord would have been proud. The sentry grabs his back out of instinct, realizes he's running with an arrow stuck firmly between the shoulder blades, and panicks. Ulrick readies a second shot - which isn't necessary. for a tree suddenly grabs the guard around the throat, hoists him upward, and breaks his neck.
Friendly shrubbery. How wonderful.
"Well!" a gnome says, suddenly scuttling out of the underbrush. His bright eyes (do all gnomes have bright eyes?) shine in suprise. "You aren't the Dragon's Men!"
"Indeed we are not!" Ulrick says, introducing us. "It's a pleasure to meet such a distinguished looking forest gnome..."
"Forest?" I smile, mocking him with both glance and word. "He looks more like a lone gnome to me."
The gnome narrows his eyes at me, but continues. It's a good thing you came." he says. "I'm a lone gnome alright, but I wasn't always - unfortunately the Dragons have got him... he's a prisoner at their tower."
"Who?" Ulrick asked.
"There isn't time for that," the gnome says shakily. "The Dragons - Cult of the Dragon, you call them - they're draining magic items. They're using them at the Pool of Radiance. They're trying to spoil the Weave!"
"What!" I say. I admit that I am no hero - not an Ulrick - but even I can hear the clarion call of necessity ,and I know when I'm required to risk my life for the greater good. I know it and hate it, it's a curse.
"So where are we?" Ulrick asks. The gnome points to a huge forest in the distance - a wood that's so thick and so tall that it appears like a black shadow on the horizon, rising above the hills.
"Myth Drannor," the gnome says, and I suddenly feel the urge to vomit. Myth Drannor! Admittedly the wealth it contains - and the lore! - are an almost irresistible siren call, but I know enough about the demonic creatures who abide in that accursed wood, long abandoned by the elves, including a dracolich (which goes a long way toward explaining Ulrick's dream) to know that I never want to go there until I get very very much more powerful.
"You do realize we're dead men, don't you?" I tell Ulrick. He ignores me.
"And there's other problems beside," the gnome says. "There's also the matter of the corpse!"
"What corpse?" Aron asks. The gnome's already in motion, and we follow (nearly leaving Aron behind again). What the gnome takes us to is a badly bloodied thing, clad in forest green and brown raiment, a broken bow at his side in the underbrush, his fingers quivering. He's still alive. The gnome flips the body over, and I begin to laugh.
"You do us ill, forestling, to show us this sight!" I mock. "This is truly the ugliest and most disgusting corpse I've ever seen!"
It's Kord.
###
And so, having reunited with that insufferable insane elf, we begin our walk toward the certain death that is called Myth Drannor. And that's where we'll leave it for now.
Oh, and don't wear out your current boyfriend so quickly.
With affection,
Your loving brother,
Ascarin Nevermoon
In the shadow of the Death That Grows
Dear Sister,
Though mere days have passed since my last correspondence, it somehow seems much longer to me. A brief letter now, to prompt thy memory, and then we shall speak of the Pool of Radiance - and the three humiliations we suffered there - in greater detail some other time.
###
Meanwhile, in the marketplace of Saerloon, Ulrick is again displaying the two wands of curing wounds that he just purchased and is grinning like the idiot he is, boasting how much more cost effective they are. Actually, any good Sembian would agree with his assessment, of course, but I'm hardly in an agreeable mood.
"You do realize that if you die, they'll be useless to us," I point out.
"Then I guess you'll have to keep me alive," Ulrick answers.
"Judging from past experience, that's a task beyond mortal ken," I reply. The sarcasm washes off his skin like rain, as always. I hate that.
We proceed to the wine shop which holds the portal network we found - aware that we're being followed as we enter the doorway. Fearful of Orc guards, we scurry past the nexus and into the portal that leads to the shrine to Mystryl. Surprisingly, no one ambushes us on the way.
The shrine itself is trapped with dark magicks and ugly glyphs that hover in the air like twisted, charred hummingbirds. Carefully, I speak words of magic to counterspell them, and gradually, a rune at a time, the ancient spiritual bastion of the goddess is cleansed. All except for one rune, which is beyond my power to erase, though we can walk around it easily enough.
Ulrick slaps me on the back and the chain mail coif he wears is lit up by a too-handsome smile. "Good work. Ascarin,' he says, in the condescending manner of an elder mate at wizard's school upon seeing a spell-addled apprentice cast his first cantrip. He can keep his praise for worthier deeds.
We reach a stone stair that leads out of the enclosure. I send Willhih, my weasel companion, up the stairs to scout. I instruct him to do so quietly and not attract attention. Unfortunately, when he sees the two guards standing over the exit with drawn swords, he panicks. The weasel nimbly dodges a sword-thrust and runs down the stairs, diving into my cloak and burrowing into it frantically. The poor thing is such a coward - much, as it pains me to admit it, like his master. Fortunately, when I have two such doughty companions as Ulrick and Aron, courage is rarely a necessity. The two howling sword-wavers rush up the stairs, quickly dispatch the guard, then give chase to her companion - the guard who fled for reinforcements.
We're forced to leave Aron, languishing in his armor of sluggardness far behind us, and Ulrick finally gets a good crossbow shot into the guard's back. Kord would have been proud. The sentry grabs his back out of instinct, realizes he's running with an arrow stuck firmly between the shoulder blades, and panicks. Ulrick readies a second shot - which isn't necessary. for a tree suddenly grabs the guard around the throat, hoists him upward, and breaks his neck.
Friendly shrubbery. How wonderful.
"Well!" a gnome says, suddenly scuttling out of the underbrush. His bright eyes (do all gnomes have bright eyes?) shine in suprise. "You aren't the Dragon's Men!"
"Indeed we are not!" Ulrick says, introducing us. "It's a pleasure to meet such a distinguished looking forest gnome..."
"Forest?" I smile, mocking him with both glance and word. "He looks more like a lone gnome to me."
The gnome narrows his eyes at me, but continues. It's a good thing you came." he says. "I'm a lone gnome alright, but I wasn't always - unfortunately the Dragons have got him... he's a prisoner at their tower."
"Who?" Ulrick asked.
"There isn't time for that," the gnome says shakily. "The Dragons - Cult of the Dragon, you call them - they're draining magic items. They're using them at the Pool of Radiance. They're trying to spoil the Weave!"
"What!" I say. I admit that I am no hero - not an Ulrick - but even I can hear the clarion call of necessity ,and I know when I'm required to risk my life for the greater good. I know it and hate it, it's a curse.
"So where are we?" Ulrick asks. The gnome points to a huge forest in the distance - a wood that's so thick and so tall that it appears like a black shadow on the horizon, rising above the hills.
"Myth Drannor," the gnome says, and I suddenly feel the urge to vomit. Myth Drannor! Admittedly the wealth it contains - and the lore! - are an almost irresistible siren call, but I know enough about the demonic creatures who abide in that accursed wood, long abandoned by the elves, including a dracolich (which goes a long way toward explaining Ulrick's dream) to know that I never want to go there until I get very very much more powerful.
"You do realize we're dead men, don't you?" I tell Ulrick. He ignores me.
"And there's other problems beside," the gnome says. "There's also the matter of the corpse!"
"What corpse?" Aron asks. The gnome's already in motion, and we follow (nearly leaving Aron behind again). What the gnome takes us to is a badly bloodied thing, clad in forest green and brown raiment, a broken bow at his side in the underbrush, his fingers quivering. He's still alive. The gnome flips the body over, and I begin to laugh.
"You do us ill, forestling, to show us this sight!" I mock. "This is truly the ugliest and most disgusting corpse I've ever seen!"
It's Kord.
###
And so, having reunited with that insufferable insane elf, we begin our walk toward the certain death that is called Myth Drannor. And that's where we'll leave it for now.
Oh, and don't wear out your current boyfriend so quickly.
With affection,
Your loving brother,
Ascarin Nevermoon
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darkbard
Legend
excellent story! i'm new to it with today's posting but it's already among my favorites. it seems i've been steeping myself in your writing lately [i'm the fellow who was inquiring about more information about mulhorand on a thread in the general boards some weeks back and went on to download the ESD of the old empires and your 3e conversion]. thanks for the inspiration and here's hoping to some more frequent updates!
Broccli_Head
Explorer
Alright!
You're back!
You're back!
