Campaign: The Turakian Age

[James Gillen]

Chapter Two
Of
PARANOIA in the Turakian Age
Or
“Dude, Where’s My Amulet?”

Rogar was waking up and dressing at about the same time. Lo’ma’ndra knocked on his door and he answered.
“Yes?”
Lo’ma’ndra asked, “Would you happen to have seen my pouch?”
“Which one?”
“The one with the Worm pendant in it.”
Rogar grimaced. “You LOST it.”
Lo’ma’ndra said, “I didn’t lose it, I just don’t have it.”
Rogar shook his head. “No, I didn’t see what happened.” The priestess nodded and went down the hall.
Lo’ma’ndra had the staff open Thunk’s room. It was completely empty.

As Lo’ma’ndra went downstairs, one of the town guard came up to meet her. He asked, “Is something wrong?”
She said, “Tell me, did you see the man who was with our group last night? He wore a grey cloak.”
“That one, eh? Just saw him leave, two minutes ago.”
Lo’ma’ndra gave a quick thanks and went down to the dining area, and out the door, into the rain. Rogar just walked down to where Valdergast was eating.
“Good morning, Valdergast,” he said. The mage only nodded. Rogar mused, “What IS my alias in this town, anyway?”
The mage said, “Ah… Simon.”
Rogar smiled. And then frowned. He said, “Guess what. She lost it.”
Valdergast didn’t need to be told what “it” was. He said, “She went into the rain like her butt was on fire, looking for Thunk. I figured she wouldn’t have asked for help.”
Rogar looked like he was having a headache. He said, “THIS is why I didn’t give her that scroll.”
Valdergast looked over an apple he was coring with a knife. “Maybe this will be a learning experience for her,” he said.
Rogar got up and went out into the rain.

A little over half an hour later, Thunk came back with his traveling gear under cloak. By this time, Valdergast had his writing materials out and study books at his table. The mage looked up at the scout and told him, “Hey, Lo’ma’ndra wants to talk to you when she gets back.”
“Where is she?”
“Looking for you.”
”Can’t see why,” Thunk told him. He went up to the bar and ordered ale from the bartender. Once he got the mug, he took a deep sip. At that point a very large hand clapped down on his shoulder. He warily looked to trace the arm and found that it was attached to one of the town guard. Thunk had to resist the urge to feel the makeup over his scar.
“Are you Thunk?” the man asked him.
“I would be he…”
“The priestess in your group was looking for you. I guess it was fairly important.”
Thunk smiled and said, “I appreciate you letting me know.”

It took a few minutes for Rogar to find Lo’ma’ndra.
She looked up and said, “Yes?”
Rogar sighed, “I think you’re going to need some help.”
Lo’ma’ndra didn’t say anything. Rather she allowed Rogar to accompany her while she looked over the town.
After some time, Lo’ma’ndra shrugged in frustration and doubled back to the inn, Rogar following.
The first thing Lo’ma’ndra saw as she opened the front doors was Thunk sitting up at the bar. Sloshing water and tracking mud as she went, she strode across the hall, as the matron looked and shouted, “Ey! The brushes are there for a reason!”
Rogar came to the doorway and politely grabbed one of the brushes by the door to brush the mud off his boots.
Lo’ma’ndra looked at Thunk. He looked back, briefly. Lo’ma’ndra said with an even tone, “Good morning, Thunk.”
“I don’t have it.”
“Eh?”
“I don’t have it, I didn’t take it, and I had nothing to do with it.”
“You’re in the habit of going out into the rain for no reason?”
“Are you?”
“What were you doing?” she asked.
Thunk said, “I was running errands, trying to see what the local market was like.”
Lo’ma’ndra’s face narrowed. Thunk tried to put an appealing tone in his voice. “Do you really think I’m stupid enough to steal from you and remain with you?”
Before Lo’ma’ndra could respond, the guardsman she met before came up to the bar. “Is there a problem here?”
Thunk smiled. “She’s just a little miffed, I play little tricks on her every so often.”
“Really, now,” the guard remarked, looking to Lo’ma’ndra for confirmation. She said, “He is my newest friend.”
“What sorta trick are we talking about?” the guard asked.
Lo’ma’ndra said, “I need to report a theft. It is a golden pendant, with a triangle-shape amulet. It has a very strange design.”
”What is it, magic?”
She said, “It is a… type of holy symbol. It has some patterns of worms interlaced in the triangle.”
The guard and the bartender both made some kind of ‘evil eye ward’ sign. Rogar, sitting by Valdergast, winced.
The guard said, “And you’re sure this one has nothing to do with it?”
Thunk said to him, “As I was saying, I certainly wouldn’t stay if I did. I have nothing to hide, I assure you. I’m even willing to turn out my pouches. Here, I insist.”
Thunk cooperated with the guard’s search of his person, but the man patted down his clothes and checked his ankle. He pulled a pouch from Thunk’s boot. He opened it and revealed a set of small Lockpicking tools. “What’s this?”
“Those are mine.”
The guard said, “And just what need would you have of these?”
Thunk said, “Sometimes I have need of such tools on missions. I’m a professional scout.”
The guard shook his head. “We’re out of the way, but not THAT far out of the way.”
“Really I am,” Thunk said. “I was last employed by the Vestrian army during their campaign on the Grimwash river. I do have my papers still.”
The guard went ahead and checked the documents. He seemed satisfied- or at least not willing to press the matter further- but he gave Thunk a suspicious nod and went outside. And during this time, Valdergast took a good look at “Thunk” and remembered that face was on a wanted poster the last time he’d been in Daravel….
Rogar audibly groaned next to the mage. Valdergast said, “What?”
Rogar said, “Great. Now the City Guard knows that we had it and that we lost it.”
Trodgor came down the stair, with no armor, but wearing the Red Sword over his back. “What’s going on?” he asked.
“Not much,” Valdergast said.
“Just looking for the item we’re supposed to be taking back to the Church…” Rogar muttered.
Valdergast said, “Let me put the books away. I may be able to help.”
Lo’ma’ndra and Thunk came to the table shortly after the guard left. “So you heard, I guess,” Thunk said. After a pause, he said, “What now?”
Lo’ma’ndra said, “We need information. If it wasn’t one of us, we need the description on who got the pendant.”
“Like I said, I have a possibility,” Valdergast said. “I’ll let you know.”
Lo’ma’ndra sighed. “Meantime, I’m not sure what we can do. I for one am going to try to relax… I’ll have a hot bath.”
“That sounds like an idea,” Rogar said.

While Lo’ma’ndra, Rogar and even Trogdor had a hot bath sent to their rooms so they could clean off, Valdergast went to his room and got out the Crystal Ball the group had taken from Gardvord’s room months before. Focusing his attention, he stared into the device and sent his awareness outward, creating a disembodied perception just outside the walls of the inn. From there, he began to practice, using his will to move the point of view in one direction, then the other. It was something of a mental strain. But it seemed that he had most of the day to work at it.

Meanwhile, Thunk tried to make things up by going out to gather information. He went out to the stables at the side of the inn. The only people under the roof were a couple of stable boys barely into puberty.
Thunk nodded, “Good day, boys.”
The older-looking one nodded back and said, “I heard y’all got robbed.”
Thunk concealed his reaction. He just said, “Yes. Now would you happen to know anything about who might have done it?”
The two boys looked at each other with deliberately dumb expressions on their faces. “Don’t think so,” the younger said.
Thunk shrugged. “I can give you a Silver a piece for what you know.”
The older one smiled, saying, “Sure.”
Thunk gave each a coin, and the younger one said, “Sure. There’s this one guy.”
”What guy?”
”The old guy who used to be at the bar,” the older one said.

Not getting much more in details, Thunk came back inside, and sat at the bar for another drink. He looked back and noticed a couple of guardsmen at the table before the bar. This made him nervous.
Rogar came down after his bath, and sat by Thunk, also keeping account of the guard. He muttered to Thunk, “Notice anything?”
“The guards?”
”They’re not eating or drinking anything.”
“Oh.”
“Now they’re assigned to keep an eye on US,” Rogar muttered through gritted teeth.
“But we didn’t do anything.”
”As if that matters.”
“So what do we do?”
Rogar said, “I’ll go out and do my own searching around. You may want to distract those guys while I do.”
”Got it,” Thunk said.
“And just to make sure, in this town, my name is Simon. The last thing we need is for own reputation to be mixed into this.”

So after another drink, Thunk came to the guards and asked to buy a round, which they curtly declined. While Thunk distracted them with questions about the local trade, Rogar slipped out the front door.
After realizing that most of the people in town weren’t in position to have seen anything of Lo’ma’ndra’s pouch last night, Rogar went back and checked with the stable boys. The two lads looked at each other and smiled.
“Afternoon, kids,” Rogar said.
“You found what was stole yet?” the tall one asked him.
“Depends,” Rogar said. “What did the guards say it was?”
The tall kid said, “Guards said it was some pagan holy symbol.”
Rogar smirked. “Do *I* look like I’d wear a holy symbol?”
They shook their heads.
“So what did you find out?” Rogar asked them.
“The other guy gave us money,” the shorter one said.
“And it didn’t give him much, did it? What did you tell him?”
The short one said, “We said there was this old guy who sits at the bar. We didn’t see him this morning.”
“All right.”
The tall one said, “Is the priestess in your group?”
“Yeah…”
The tall one told Rogar, “She’s hot.”
“Uh, yes.”
The tall one told the shorter one, “I think we could score.”
Rogar said, “Well, maybe if you could give her more information, she’d be willing to pay.”
“That’d be cool,” the tall one said.

Realizing the boys didn’t know much about the theft or most other subjects, Rogar went back to the dining hall. Thunk was sitting at a table with his back to the wall. Trogdor was lifting the heavy wooden tables with one hand while he looked underneath them.
“What are you doing?” Rogar asked.
“Maybe she just dropped it,” Trogdor answered.
The guard they saw earlier came in and talked briefly with the two guards sitting at the far end from Thunk. He then went up to where Thunk and Rogar were sitting.
“I’m the Guard Captain for this town. I made sure we put a search out on the item the priestess described.”
”And you didn’t find it?” Rogar asked.
“No one in town seems to have any clues.”

That night everyone went downstairs for dinner. It was immediately clear that the only people in the hall- including the inn staff- who weren’t eyeing the group with suspicion were fellow travelers from out of town.
Lo’ma’ndra seemed agitated, and Rogar’s headache was so obvious it was almost projecting a radius. Valdergast merely seemed tired.
As the minstrel played for the customers, Thunk spoke quietly to the mage. “What did you do this afternoon?”
Valdergast said, “I had a scrying device from an earlier mission that I used to search the town. But I didn’t see anybody who looked suspicious.”
”You mean anyone who looked like he had the item,” Lo’ma’ndra said.
Valdergast nodded. “And it would be pretty easy to tell if someone just looked at the thing without knowing what it was.”
Rogar grimaced again. “So more than likely, they knew what they were taking,” he said.
Lo’ma’ndra noticed Trogdor looking about. “What is it?” she asked.
The Drakine said, “All the travelers here are new.”
“What do you mean?”
”I didn’t see these ones before. And the ones from yesterday aren’t here now,” Trogdor told Lo’ma’ndra.
And it occurred to Lo’ma’ndra that Trogdor had a point. “Who was here yesterday that we didn’t keep account of?”
Rogar said, “Those four guys in cloaks who sat together with Thunk, looking suspicious.”
Thunk said, “You’re saying, they looked like me.”
Lo’ma’ndra got up. She came up to the bar and asked the bartender, “Excuse me, you were here last night, of course?”
“Yes.”
”Do you remember what happened to the four men sitting at the table, there?”
“You haven’t found your thing, huh?”
“Ah, no, we haven’t.”
“I really don’t keep track of people after they’ve left the inn.”
“But they were here this morning?”
“Yes,” the bartender told Lo’ma’ndra.

The priestess sat down. “So far that seems to be the best lead, the four men with Thunk.”
“What did you two get from information gathering?” Valdergast asked Rogar.
Thunk said, “Those two stable boys weren’t much help.”
Rogar said, “The worse thing is, they were the best source of information here.”
The matron came up to Rogar, deliberately avoiding Lo’ma’ndra, and said, “Would your group be staying another night, then?”
Rogar said, “Yes. It’s still raining.”
“All right, then.”
When the woman left, Rogar said, “We wouldn’t get anywhere searching by night, anyway.”
“But we do need to leave as soon as the rain stops,” Lo’ma’ndra said. “That thing is most likely in the hands of Evil.”
Thunk asked, “What makes you sure?”
“If they stole my pouch, they’re Evil.”

-

The next day came with somewhat less rain, and it appeared that the weather would soon clear up enough for travel. After a skillet breakfast downstairs, the group equipped themselves. Lo’ma’ndra announced she was going to check the guard gate for the town, and Trogdor agreed to go with her.

The sky was still grey when the two came to the gate, and Lo’ma’ndra talked to the guard who let them in to Vetroas two nights before. “Would this be about the theft that was reported?” the man asked.
Lo’ma’ndra said, “Yes. I think there were four men involved. Perhaps professional thieves. They were all together, in grey cloaks.”
The guard talked to his staff and told her, “Well, yesterday there were a lot of travelers reporting to get out of the gate, there was no reason to stop them. This was before you reported the theft.”
“No one you would recognize?”
The guard said, “Everybody came together in a group to get out of town. There was no one I’d have reason to recognize.” He pointed to Trogdor, saying, “He’s the most interesting thing I’ve seen in months.”
Trogdor went, “Mm. Yes.”
“But where would travelers most likely go?” Lo’ma’ndra asked.
The guard said, “North is the wilderness, where you were. South is the rest of Umbr. Due east is the river city of Londregos.”

At the doorway of the inn, Valdergast stood back with some wine, watching Mertwig fly about as the sun started to break. As he watched the owl, the mage got an idea. He drew up a note on fine parchment, reading only:
“The fiery comet will be me”
Signing it with an ornate sigil, he went to the stable and told the two stable boys there, “Give the Priestess this note when she comes back to the inn.” He then gave the tall one a Silver.
Going to the back wall, Valdergast invoked his Fiery Wings spell, and burst into the sky.

Lo’ma’ndra and Trogdor came back towards the inn. One of the stable boys caught them on the street and said “HEY!”
Lo’ma’ndra met the boy as he ran up, his brother coming behind. The child was holding a fine scroll. “The guy said he wanted you to read this.”
She took the scroll and read Valdergast’s note. And then she sighed. The boy who gave her the scroll said, “The guy said you’d pay me.”
“Of course,” Lo’ma’ndra said. She gave him five Copper. She walked back to the inn, wondering why the boys were giggling so much.

[JG- The rest of the morning was dominated by Valdergast flying across the countryside looking for travelers, finding nothing and attracting a great deal of attention from peasants who assumed him to be some kind of flaming demon. This meant that he attracted even more suspicion than Thunk did the day before when Valdergast returned to the inn.
With no other leads, the players decided to leave town and pursue the likely thieves to the most likely locale, the city of Londregos due east. We may be able to get a handle on the guy who took the item. I think his name was Godot.]

[James Gillen]

12/30/04

Session 23
That third day Lo’ma’ndra decided to get everyone ready to ride, as the sky was clearing up.
“Does everyone agree?” she asked.
“Let’s see which route we’re taking first,” Valdergast said.
Rogar said, “I guess somebody has to keep you two alive,” pointing at Lo’ma’ndra and Trogdor.
“I keep myself alive,” Trogdor said.
Valdergast got his maps out. The route from Vetroas to Londregos was almost exactly 200 miles- going straight through the “Forest Jevrain.”
“Screw that,” Valdergast told the group. “I think I’d make better time using the fire wings spell to get to the city.”
“What about your horse?” Trogdor asked.
“You can take him.”
“Thank you,” the Drakine muttered.

[Given that Jason couldn’t make it that week, Matt decided to not run his character. We figured his solution was in line with Valdergast’s personality, and solved the issue. I made sure that Valdergast gave everyone their share of treasure from Skarill’s lair, given that he’d been holding the party treasury in his magic bag.]

The Fire Wizard got his things and used his spell again to grow wings and streak through the air. Rogar and Trogdor decided to gather information before the journey. They talked to the matron of the inn. Rogar asked, “Do you know anything about the Jevrain Forest?”
“Such as?”
“What’s in there?”
“There’s a lot of logging and such around it, so I figure it’s safe,” she told Rogar. “There’s Goblins in the forest, though, I hear. And maybe Orcs and Ogres.”
“You eat Orcs for breakfast!” Rogar told Trogdor.
He said, “Yes. I do.”
Trogdor then asked the woman, “What else is there? What other monsters?”
The matron felt a bit odd that the Orc-eating reptile-man was talking about ‘monsters,’ but she said, “There were rumors of ghosts. And a coven of witches toward the center.”
”Really?”
The matron said, “Well, I wouldn’t know. Not many people go in that deep.”
“Thank you.”

Thunk, in his caution, got a tent for the journey and Trogdor figured he should do likewise rather than sleep in the rain wearing his chainmail.
Lo’ma’ndra made her final preparations- including giving a generous tip to the matron as a way of smoothing things over- and they decided to use Valdergast’s mount as a spare pack animal, which made it useful.
In the afternoon, they traveled through smaller hamlets and picked up gossip about a “flying man” seen overhead. That evening, one of the farmers was generous enough to let the Rangers sleep in the barn.

The second day, the group covered over 25 miles. An hour before sundown they reached the edge of the Forest Jevrain. Trogdor wanted to camp at the spot, but Lo’ma’ndra and the others decided to go on. Going through the wood, they saw several points that had been camp sites, cleared away with a central point scarred by fire. They picked one of these clearings for their first night’s camp. They set on a watch of two hours each, with Trogdor, Rogar, Lo’ma’ndra and Thunk in that order. Nothing unusual happened, except that when Lo’ma’ndra told Thunk to relieve her, she stayed awake to meditate and noticed that the scout went outside and concealed himself in the forest rather than stay in camp.

In the third day the group got up, breakfasted, and rode on. About noon, they came upon a group of Men having a rough meal; from the looks of their gear and furs they were professional hunters. One of them said, “Ho, strangers! Care to rest and talk for a bit?”
Lo’ma’ndra said, “Thank you.”
The group had their lunch with the hunters and made small talk, telling the Men that they were going straight east to Londregos. One of the hunters said, “It’s unusual to see travelers go right through.”
Lo’ma’ndra said, “Someone stole one of our valuables”- looking at Rogar- “and that is our best lead so far. We have to go the direct way.”
The senior-looking hunter said, “Londregos. Feh. You’ll have your hands full getting back what was stolen. I don’t trust city folk.”
Thunk said, “I don’t blame you. They’re scum.”
“Get that many people in one place, no telling what they’ll do.”
“Couldn’t agree more,” Thunk said. “It’s kind of why I’m out here.”

The Grey Rangers rode on after lunch. By their third night out of Vetroas they were 30 miles into the forest. As they made camp, Mertwig appeared, flying down through the trees and settling on the saddle of Valdergast’s mount. The owl made little cooing sounds to indicate to Lo’ma’ndra that he had a note on his leg. The priestess came over and took it.
“What’s it say?” Rogar asked.
“He says, ‘Arrived safely in Londregos, have taken lodgings at the Golden Stag, have made inquiries to the locals as to the object, but haven’t heard anything useful,’” Lo’ma’ndra said.

They let the owl fly back to his master during the night. Nothing unusual happened otherwise. Likewise during the fourth day of travel, the journey was uneventful.

However, during Rogar’s watch on the fourth night, he heard some kind of shout in the middle of the woods. At that point, arrows flew from all directions into the camp. Rogar, taken unawares, got hit three times, but even though they were short arrows and minor wounds, he knew he couldn’t last long in the open. He took his staff and made a run, striking Thunk’s tent, then Trogdor’s. While the Drakine continued to snore, Thunk made a cautious move out the tent. This was the same tent where Lo’ma’ndra was already waking for her morning prayers. She set up her Staff of Thorns and Shield of Faith spells before anything else.

Rogar managed to dodge two more arrows, and Thunk likewise had to move to avoid more fire in his direction. Lo’ma’ndra came out of the tent. With her Elven sight she was able to see one of the bowmen in the wood. Casting her spell, she pointed and the ground itself erupted from under the attacker, entangling him in roots.
Trogdor finally got up after all the noise, and took both of his bastard swords out of their scabbards, going out mostly naked.

From nowhere, a pine cone was thrown, bouncing off of Lo’ma’ndra’s protective aura but fragmenting into thousands of tiny shards, cutting Trogdor, Rogar, Thunk and the horses, causing them to whine in great pain. The explosion also perforated the tents, making them near useless for cover.

Reacting, Lo’ma’ndra cast a Blessing on herself and her companions. However, Rogar was outside the range of effect by that point, as he decided to run into the wood toward the direction that Lo’ma’ndra had attacked. He managed to see two fairly tall Goblins dressed to blend into the wood, and they moved to intercept him. He used his staff to smack both of them with great speed, knocking one out. The other foe jumped and counterattacked, but Rogar used that same uncanny speed to dodge.

Meanwhile, Thunk had moved in the other direction to find another group of Goblins near the camp. Dodging their arrows, he drew a dagger from his wrist sheath and threw it, wounding one. Trogdor moved into the wood with his swords out, and with his Nightvision he easily saw the largest Goblin-man he’d ever laid eyes on, the warrior hefting a battle axe that would take a Man two hands to lift. The warrior then quickly drew another such axe with the other hand, and spun them around, grinning as he came toward Trogdor.

Lo’ma’ndra turned and Entangled two Goblins firing on Thunk, while a third ran up with a sword and swung at Thunk- by some luck managing to miss. But suddenly Lo’ma’ndra herself was attacked, as one of the trees surrounding the camp reached its great limbs down and grabbed her. As Trogdor turned that direction then back, he noticed a weasely-looking Goblin in robes chanting as the tree moved. But he had no time to move, as the Goblin warrior charged up and swung with both axes simultaneously.
Trogdor crossed his swords and parried both. And then he grinned.
The Drakine then spun his blades out and cut into the Goblin leader, the Red Sword slicing into his gut. The humanoid fell. And the Goblin in robes uttered a girlish scream of surprise.
Trogdor met eyes with the weasely-looking Goblin- to realize it WAS a girl. A girl Goblin, anyway.

Rogar was being flanked by two Goblins, and he moved past one to make a sweeping attack, his swing catching both opponents and the Goblin he’d already struck who was just getting to his feet. Thunk retreated to throw another dagger, catching his foe in the gut. But the warrior was wearing some thick hide armor, and managed to run up, scoring a glancing blow on the scout. Thunk ran back again and threw another dagger, stunning the Goblin.

The female Goblin chanted "Asshumba, Asshumba, Asshumba,” and somehow vanished into the forest. Trogdor stared, then shrugged and used both swords to cut the head off his fallen foe. Then he started appraising his battle axes.

With both leaders gone, the battle was turning against the Goblin raiders, and Rogar managed to evade his opponents just long enough to run back toward the campfire. He threw three miniature blades into the branches of the tree grasping the priestess; these had little effect against the thick bark. He ran up with his staff, and smashed the branch just hard enough to snap it and let Lo’ma’ndra fall. She managed to hit earth with both feet.

By this point, the only foes who hadn’t been beaten were Entangled, or running away. Thunk failed to catch the last running Goblin with a dagger, and had to console himself by searching for the blades he’d thrown.

[NOTE: I have to cancel this week (1/6/05) to go to my mother's birthday dinner, and Gary may be running his superhero game in a week or two.]

[irishspy]

The three miniature blades Rogar tossed into the tree -- are those a type of magic item?

[James Gillen]

They're like shuriken.

JG

[Rigel]

Please don't tell me the Fellowship is broken. The story must go on!!

[James Gillen]

Um, unfortunately I've only got one more story to get to. Right now the group is playing Gary's Justice League Reborn game for Champions. Although I do have ideas for the characters.
My last installment (for now) will be up in a day or so.

JG

[James Gillen]

1/13/05

Session 24

In the aftermath of the Hobgoblin ambush, Lo’ma’ndra healed wounds, given that both Rogar and Trogdor had been badly hurt by the first wave of arrows. After this, the group bedded down again as best they could. There was still a watch left, and Thunk was the scheduled patroller.
Before dawn, the scout heard odd noises in the brush, and inside the main tent, Lo’ma’ndra sat with Ubu. Suddenly the young wolf growled and raised his snout in the air.
Thunk yelled, “ALARM!”
Lo’ma’ndra stepped out. “Eh?”
Thunk, speaking to her from the safety of a high tree branch, said, “There’s something in the underbrush.”
Lo’ma’ndra looked out into the grass. With her eyesight, she could see what the scout noticed only indirectly. A pack of wolves were moving about outside the camp. She could hear them growl and tear as they chewed at the Hobgoblin bodies around the group.
The priestess told Thunk, “They’re wolves. They’re just scavenging the bodies.”
“They won’t hurt us?” he asked.
Lo’ma’ndra said, “As long as you don’t act like a body part, you’re safe.”
“I don’t know if I can do that.”
“Just sit up there.”
Trogdor sat up and said, “Maybe we shouldn’t have left all those corpses around the camp site.”
“Odd that I didn’t think of that,” Lo’ma’ndra said. “Something to remember the next time we go camping.”

The next day, the four packed up and rode out, coming to a very thick point in the woods where the trail was barely passable. They had to lead their horses single file. Trogdor volunteered to go up front to protect Lo’ma’ndra, who would follow behind as scout. Thunk volunteered to take rear. This left Rogar in front of him and behind the priestess.
They moved a good distance in, and as they rode, they heard a sharp voice call out in Trade Tongue: “Stop where you are! We’ve got bows!!”
Thunk decided to find a better tactical position than on top of his mule. He did an acrobatic flip off the beast, and as he did, an arrow flew from the brush and cut a part in his hair, just missing the scalp.
Lo’ma’ndra invoked her Shield of Faith and performed a quick Blessing on the team. Trogdor drew the Red Sword. Rogar looked about, but couldn’t see who yelled at them or who fired the arrow. Thunk was moving about using the mule as a shield.
The voice yelled out again. “We mean it! Anybody that moves again, we shoot!”
Lo’ma’ndra yelled, “What do you want?”
“We want your horses!”
The priestess straightened herself in her saddle. “Do you notice that I’m glowing?” she said. “This is the Shield of Faith! I am a Priestess of the Blue Gods! Do you realize what this act means to your immortal soul??”
“Do you know what it means to your mortal ass?” Rogar cracked.
Trogdor was listening to the voice in the trees, and he got himself up from his saddle. Leaping from atop his horse, the Drakine landed on top of the speaker, grabbing the man with his free hand.
Lo’ma’ndra saw this and called out, “You have just witnessed an angry Drakine!!”
Thunk yelled to Trogdor, “EAT HIS FACE IF HE MOVES!!”
Trogdor started pulling the archer up and dragging him back to the others practically under one arm. Thunk yelled, “Save the liver for me!”
“You are a very odd young man, aren’t you?” Lo’ma’ndra asked him.
The Man under Trogdor’s arm was little older than a boy, actually, and looked rather scrawny from a long time in the woods. It also occurred to the group that no one had fired on them since Trogdor’s sudden action.
Lo’ma’ndra looked at the boy and said, “Let’s discuss this like civilized people.”
Thunk: “EAT HIS FACE!!”
Rogar walked up to Trogdor, and the Drakine let go of the boy while still keeping next to him. Rogar asked the boy, “Who are you and what do you want with our horses?”
In response, the boy screamed.
Thunk said, “Give him some food, fatten him up!” Trogdor nodded.
Rogar shook his head and motioned Thunk for quiet. Once everyone else was settled, he asked the boy, “Are you QUITE done?”
The boy nodded nervously.
“You know, if you didn’t attack people tougher than you are, this wouldn’t happen.”
Lo’ma’ndra said, “He does need food. I will get him something.”

“What happened to you?” Rogar asked the boy.
He responded, “We were in a hunting party, we got set upon by the Hobgoblins. Which is odd, cause they’re not native. They’re supposed to be from further north. So I’ve been told.”
Lo’ma’ndra gave the kid bread from her rations. She said, “We’re going east toward Londregos.”
“THAT way?”
“What’s wrong?” Lo’ma’ndra asked.
The boy said, “That’s the way they came from.”
“We already beat up a dozen Hobgoblins,” Rogar said.
The boy shook his head. “There’s more than that. A tribe.”
The group paused a bit. Lo’ma’ndra said, “We still have to go that way. It’s our quickest route. If we can ride fast enough and find good ground, maybe we can outrun the tribe. Son, would you like to join us? You’d be better protected.”
”No, priestess. I think I’d be safer going the other way by myself.”
Thunk shrugged. “Suit yourself. Uh, sorry about the ‘eat your face’ thing.”
The boy again gave a nervous nod. The group decided to let the youth go, and gave him some food for his own ration bag. Thunk even slipped the child a couple of silver pieces, in hopes that he’d get back to town safely.

The fifth night on the road posed no problems with the camp. On the sixth day’s journey, they continued to ride. In the morning, they came upon a clearing and noticed a great deal of disturbance. There were signs of a camp site, but plant life near the area was hacked at, and there was dried blood in several places on the ground and on the trees.
Lo’ma’ndra said, “This happened two nights ago, to guess from the condition of the bloodstains. I think this is where the boy’s party was attacked.”
“There aren’t any bodies,” Thunk said.
“The wolves ate them,” Trogdor said.
“We hope it was the wolves,” Rogar said.

Toward evening, they came to a hill, and as the sun came toward the horizon, the sky turned a reddish hue, and the group heard drums in the distance. The sound was far off, but repetitive and intense, as if several drummers were in concert.
Rogar asked Lo’ma’ndra, “How far off are we from the forest edge?”
“Based on the position of the sun from where we were, I think we have twenty more miles.”
“That tribe can’t be too far off.”
“I think we should camp for the night,” Lo’ma’ndra said. “There won’t be so far to go in daylight, but it’ll be a hard ride to move past the Hobgoblins when they’re awake at night.”
Rogar said, “Yes, but if we go for it now, we won’t have to worry about getting ambushed tonight.”
Thunk said, “He’s right. We don’t know how many there are.”
Rogar looked to Trogdor. The Drakine said, “Let’s get it over with.”
Lo’ma’ndra nodded to herself. “All right. We ride. But we need to be very careful.”

The group advanced on foot with Thunk leading the horses. After a short distance, Trogdor, with his inhuman visual senses, noticed a Goblin on a tree stand with a bow, acting as sentry. Trogdor drew his bow quietly and strung it. He aimed upward, fired- and hit the sentry in the arm. And while the Goblin wasn’t going to be firing arrows at anyone, he could still scream.
Thunk threw a dagger toward the sentry, but missed. Rogar moved toward the tree, Lo’ma’ndra threw an Entanglement on the Goblin, but he still continued to cry out. Trogdor fired again, but this arrow served little purpose except to pierce the bark barrier surrounding the Goblin.
By this point, Rogar had managed to shimmy up to the tree stand, and he looked the Goblin in the face and punched him out. The impact broke the roots holding him in place, and the Goblin fell to the ground. “Sorry,” Rogar said.
Lo’ma’ndra Entangled the sentry again. She said, “Trogdor, pick him up and take him with us for questioning.” The Drakine reslung his bow and picked the Goblin up.
At that point the group heard the drums again. Pounding, thundering drums. Coming almost from every direction.
“They heard us,” Rogar said.
Lo’ma’ndra told Trogdor, “I think you can dump the Goblin.”
“Okay.” [thud]
They began to run back to the horses, but they could see the impact of some thing moving across the trees, moving faster than they could run- maybe it was even faster than the horses.
The group continued its retreat only to see the thing catch up- a great, two-headed humanoid pushed a small tree out of its way. One of its faces was recognizably humanoid. The other was bestial, Orcish or worse. The giant stood over ten feet tall. And it glowered at the four adventurers.
Trogdor cut across the dirt with his left-handed sword, drawing the Red Sword at the same moment. Lo’ma’ndra raised her Shield of Faith and prepared a Blessing on her team. The giant loped up with great strides, and the team knew they had to stand where they were.

Rogar pushed his efforts, and made an all-out run just past the creature, attempting to use his staff as leverage to cut the thing’s legs out from under him.
He missed.
The giant pivoted, and reached out with both of his massive hands. They clapped together and crushed Rogar. The others could hear ribs break. Warily, Trogdor advanced. Lo’ma’ndra moved up and invoked the Staff of Thorns. Thunk chucked another one of his throwing daggers at the giant, doing little appreciable damage. He threw another blade- the giant didn’t even notice the impact.
The two-headed giant and Trogdor advanced on each other. Trogdor moved first, cutting upward with both blades, straight up the giant’s torso up to its neck. The monster staggered. And then fell. Trogdor ducked to the left as the great monster crashed to the ground where he stood a second earlier.
[Remember, this is where Matt was GMing and I was playing Trogdor as a PC. So the rest of the group was giving me high-fives for saving them from this Giant that could’ve killed the group with its bare hands. Matt wanted to hit me with a steel chair.]
Thunk ran up to slit the giant’s throats [we had considered just killing one head and leaving him alive, just to be mean], but the others heard drums and shouts in the distance. Lo’ma’ndra laid hands on Rogar and managed to heal his wounds. “He’ll come around in a half a minute.”
“I don’t know if we have that long,” Thunk said. “It’s the tribe.”
“How many?” Trogdor asked.
“How many have we killed so far?”
Lo’ma’ndra said, “The dozen before- and Trogdor’s Giant—that makes thirteen.”
Thunk said, “Well we’re going up against a whole tribe minus thirteen.”
“We should ride,” Trogdor said.

Lo’ma’ndra got Rogar to his senses quickly and the group went to the horses. And they rode. And they rode some more. They could hear the Hobgoblins in pursuit. They couldn’t catch up with the riders on foot, and the group just had to hope that they weren’t already surrounded.
They rode through a stream and the ground dipped. Thunk failed to hold on to his ass. So to speak. He fell off the mount, and had to dodge the other horses as they continued past him. The mule had advanced a little ways up and stopped. Thunk angrily trudged up and got back on. His dislike of the equine race was not improving.
The riders ahead reached another stream. Trogdor tried to jump it and failed. Lo’ma’ndra easily rode past him. Rogar barely managed to ride past the obstruction of Trogdor as the Drakine got back to his mount.
It worked like this for much of the evening, as the four pushed their horses as much as they could given how hard it was to maneuver on the rocky ground and through the wood. But soon, after midnight, they reached a point where they could stop.
Lo’ma’ndra said, “I don’t hear them anymore.”
Thunk said, “We still need to get out of the forest- we can’t let them catch up.”
“Yes,” Lo’ma’ndra said. “Let’s just rest a second.”
Rogar still looked winded. Lo’ma’ndra looked at him and said, “Are you all right?”
He said, “I wonder how long it’ll take these knuckle indentations to heal.”
“That must have hurt,” she said.

--

They continued to ride, more slowly, during the night. Before dawn they saw the woods break, and saw the moon over the clear sky. Before them was grassland, and farms in the distance.
About daybreak, the riders reached a small hamlet, and approached one of the farmers they saw. Lo’ma’ndra said in Trade, “We had to ride all night and are very tired. One of us is injured. Can we rest in your barn?”
The man said, “Of course, Priestess.”

Finally able to rest, the four tied their horses to stalls and laid down. After a bit of rest, they walked out and asked the farmer if there was anything to eat. He offered them breakfast with his family.
During the meal, Lo’ma’ndra heard a roaring noise in the distance, one that seemed oddly familiar. She went out, and the other adventurers followed, in time to see Valdergast make a fiery descent. The mage turned off his Fire Wings spell and Mertwig settled on his shoulder.
“Greetings!” Lo’ma’ndra said.
“I saw our horses outside,” Valdergast said. He walked up nonchalantly and gave Lo’ma’ndra a pouch. The one she was looking for.
The Elf asked him, “It’s in here? The pendant is in here?”
“That’s it, all right.”
“So who took it?”
“The minstrel who was at the inn the first night.”
[Gary said, ‘The minstrel! Of course! The D&D equivalent of the butler!’]
Valdergast continued, “Had to go around Londregos looking for him. It was kind of a pain, the guy had spells. He was probably using enchantments on us so we wouldn’t notice what he’d done.”
“Spells,” Lo’ma’ndra said. “Yes… that might explain why people had been acting so oddly lately.”

It occurred to Lo’ma’ndra, at least, that there were still questions unanswered- namely regarding who directed the minstrel to take the pendant, and how that party would have known about it. But in any event, it was back in her hands, and she had to resume her journey to Ytheis.

--

Like I said, see you when I get the GM's chair again....

JG

[irishspy]

Thanks for posting the account, and great kill on the two-headed giant.