Jay's Friday Quest log

[jaylenek]

You find your self in a small tight nit farming community, made up mostly of humans though there are a few half lings and dwarfs residing in this town. There are roughly 10 buildings down the main road. Among these buildings there is a small tavern called the "drunken bard" a barn where there is a dwarven furrier and a few small shops and trade stands, as well as the homes of the more well off farming families. Up the road to the north there is the monastery, down the road to the south is a thick forest. Just outside the forest there is a small hut where the local wood cutter resides. . .

The land witch you reside to mostly flat grassy farmland you see many wandering pack animals. Wild horses are common. To the far north you see mountains, and to the east there is a river who has it's base some where in those mountains. Shortly further then the river the land becomes very swampy. To the east is a vast desert.

[jaylenek]

In our small town two strangers both dressed in dark colored robes come into town on horseback. One is Grayem a elven wizard dressed in black robes, the other is Zoe' a rogue ranger in a brown hooded robe. They ride to the stables and ask where they can find work. The stable master points to the tavern down the street as he takes in there horses. The two outsiders head to the tavern, as they walk down the street they see the town seems to be preparing for some festivities. People are decorating there houses sweeping the streets and making various crafts and trinkets.
Our young travelers enter the tavern and see, a orc drinking ale with a human covered in blood, the bar keep, several commoners and a small man dressed in bright colors, with bells tied to his shoes. The colorful man is dancing and singing to a happy sounding tune, but when you listen to the lyrics there is a dark story about how this man lost all of his friends in a horrible encounter with a large group of giant bugs. The outsiders comment to the bard about the nature of his music and the bard agrees that his music needs some new lyrics. The bard tells them how he dreams of writing happy music about adventurers overcoming evil and helping the average man.
The Orc overhears this conversation and agrees to help the bard by joining him on a great quest! The bard takes one look at the orc and his blood covered companion and comments on how under prepared they seem. "I know! Come over to my place I have some old armor that looks like it would fit you" Marten the bard says to the orc. "and you" he points to the elf and his companion, "I have something that might interest you as well if you agree to help me with my dream, and join us on a great quest."
So all four of them follow this now prancing bard out of the bar and to his home. Every step the bard takes, you hear the jingle of mettle clashing together. As the bard skips along, absorbed in his new hope and paying little attention to his surroundings, he runs straight into a cleric of the near by convent, Tod. "Watch your self" Tod says "you are going to hurt some one!" The bard apologies and has a great idea, maybe the cleric can join his quest as well. Before the bard can say anything about his new plans to the cleric Tod says "I know the harvest festival is coming up in a few weeks, and that means Duke Dellag is going to be visiting our little town. So I am going around offering to bless the houses of all who need it, for a small donation to the church of course"
There is a roomer that has been going around town for many years now that the good duke of the land is in reality a vampire. Many of the towns folk are suspicions of him Because the first year the duke took office, the first year he came to our harvest festival, a number of youth disappeared from town, never to be seen again. This rumor has spread to many of the neighboring towns and villages as well. That was over 50 years ago so perhaps it is more a old wives tail then a rumor.
The Bard says "of course just a second let me get your payment, wont you come inside?"
The bard prances off into another room and you hear the sounds of him digging through his belongings. After about 10 minutes the bard comes out with a medium sized wooden chest containing a few sets of armor and a small black pouch. The bard offers the Orc and his companion each a peace of leather armor, and pulls a few small rings out of his pouch. The bard offers the two strangers a golden ring in exchange for letting him join them on there journey. He also offers the cleric a Ivory ring with the holy symbol of the church for his services. So all of the people visiting the bards house were persuaded to join forces.
"hum now we need some weapons for you guys" says Marten the bard "I know! My companions all had weapons, and if you agree to give them a proper burial I don't think they would mind us taking them." The party agrees and they follow the bard out of town.
About 10 minutes walk west ward the ground becomes uneven and lumpy, in about 20 minutes walk there are now several large mounds or hills some of which have holes leading down into them. The bard walks up to one of these holes points down it and says "in there"
The orc is quick to enter the hole, followed by his human companion, the cleric then the bard, and finally the wizard and the rogue. They head cautiously into the cave who's passage ways get larger as they go deeper inside. The party come to a split, a fork in the cave and right in the center of this fork leaning on the wall is a skeleton. The bard points down, and the orc starts the loot the body claiming a morning star and scooping up the bones. Suddenly the sound of bats comes chirping through the cave. The rogue wizard and bard all duck to the side of the wall, wile the cleric ducks into the ground. The distracted orc and his apprentice get caught off guard and get scratched up by the passing bat swarm. The party decides to go into the room where the bats just came out of, it is large room with a 15ft high ceiling and the floor (as well as the cleric) is covered in bat guano. Upon closer inspection a corner of the room has a large pile of rocks and there is a hole in the ceiling going up into another room.
As the party approaches the pile of rubble a voice calls out to them echoing in the cave. This startles the blood covered human, but the other party members are unimpressed. The bard creeps closer to the rubble and finds a bat talking to the party. The party explains there presences in the cave and agrees to help look for the bodies. He flies up into the next room and tells the party what he sees there. 2 skeletal corpses. One of the corpses has a sack and the wizard the rogue and the bard all go around to the room (taking the other fork) as the bat yells down, "Hay I found some shines think you can catch them?" The orc centers him self under the hole, and the bat struggles to move the sack away from the body. Just as the bat was readying to toss the sack down the hole the wizard walks into the room.
"Hi" whispers the wizard to the bat.
"oh new plan!" says the bat quietly to the wizard "do you think you can help me move this rock?"
so the wizard and the rogue pick a large rock that weighs a little over 50lbs and they toss it down the hole. The orc catches the rock and stairs at it blankly for a minute, pondering why it was so valuable. As the orc ponders the value of boulders the party quickly picks up the bodies in the room and any possessions on them and heads back to the entrance. Just as the party was coming up to the fork where they split the orc realizes that the boulder is just that, a rock, and tosses it angrily at the wall.
Thunk! Then the ground starts to tremble below our heroes.
Another swarm of bats comes spilling out of the cave and the entire party dose there best to get out of the way this time. Though the meat cutters apprentice was slow to doge away and the swarm swoops past him doing moderate damage as they pass.
Then the noise gets louder and a 10ft long insect looking creature bursts out from the ground in the first chamber. The party hears the creature let out a loud screech and the Bard urges the party to flee. "we got what we needed lets get out of here" Says the bard as he begins running as fast as he can towards the exit. He is followed by the rogue, the cleric, the wizard and the human apprentice. The orc barbarian however Charged into the giant Hexaped and engaged in combat. The bat sat on the ceiling in the room to watch the encounter. The orc fought valiantly but in the end he was devoured by the beast.

The party heads back to town split the loot and give the bones to Tod, the cleric, to have burried. In the sac they find a glowing crystal orb with a swirling substance inside and a few odd trinkets.

The party decided they want a cart and a mule or horse, and the wizard wants a master work staff. The apprentice decides to try to obtain a horse, the stable keeper tells him that he can have a horse as a reward if he breaks and trains all of the horses in the stable. The elven wizard asks where he can obtain a masterwork staff in town, and the bard tells him that the wood cutter south of town is a masterwork woodsman and that he can probably make him what he needs.
So the rogue, the Wizard, the bard and the bat head to the wood cutters hut at the edge of the forest to the south. They knock on the door and ask the strange old man who resides there how much it would be for a masterwork staff. The old man stops for a second and stares at the young bunch a minute, "well there is one thing" he says and points towards the south. "see that tree in the distance? It towers above all else, it's would makes the best material for crafting magical items. . . Cut it down and bring it to me, and I will make you your staff and pay you 500g" The party looks at each other for a second and then heads into the forest.
After traveling for about a 1/2 hour through the woods the party comes across a wining baby bear. Our adventures decide to ignore the bear and sneak past it best they can, Then the come up to a gigantic tree that is over 15ft wide and 500ft tall. The lowest branch of this tree is just under 50 ft off the ground. The eyes of the wizard widen when he sees the tree towering like a mountain into the sky.
Zoe', the rogue, digs a rope out of her bag. The bat flys one end of the rope to the first branch of this tree and ties it off. Just then a Nymph come out from behind the tree and demands to know what the party is doing. The elf explains his needs and the nymph allows the party to take a peace of the branch, and gives them 2 large seeds. She tells them to plant them in a place like the center of the desert to the west. Far apart from each other. The wizard also offers to bring the wood cutter to the nymph since he seems hell bent on cutting down her huge tree.
The party brings the large branch (it is the size of an average tree) back to the wood cutter. The wood cutter looks disappointingly at the peace of wood the party brings back. "I guess it will do, did you even get to the great tree in the center of the woods?" asked the wood cuter "I am going to charge you to cut your staff... 100g" he hold out his hand for payment. The elf offers the wood cutter his golden ring instead. The wood cutter examines the ring "I guess that will do, come back in 4 days."
To be continued. . .

[skreyola]

From the journal of Graham Sharpleaf:

Arrived in small town. Zoë was wrong about there being problems with thieves in this area. Our welcome is chilly. A bard in the tavern led us on a trip to the nest of a large insectoid, dragging along a cleric, an orc (who is somehow the town butcher?) and the butcher's apprentice. My partner and I split 10 gold. In the nest, we recovered the bodies of the bard's unfortunate former companions and brought them back to town for proper burial. The orc did not follow us out of the nest when we spotted what I presume to be its owner. We have not seen him in town since then, and his apprentice is happy, claiming the butcher shop as his own. The town elders quickly agree and ask no questions. I wonder why they tolerated an orc living among them, but I am heartened to see that they waste no time mourning for him, or even investigating whether he is actually dead or lying unconscious somewhere. No matter.

-------

The butcher's apprentice tells us he has a mule we can use for our cart. For our troubles in the nest, we received a few more gold, but after buying a cart (for those of us who had the good sense to leave the cave when we could are heading north; We're going along because this town offers little for us), we are left with almost nothing, and I am no closer to getting the staff my teacher sent me to obtain. The bard tells me the woodcutter can make something suitable, so I will go see him.

-------

I was wrong about there being no thieves in this town. That woodcutter is certainly one. Unfortunately, the town seems to like him well enough and isn't asking for anyone to deal with him, so he will be able to go about his business, for now. What happened is that he sent us to chop down a certain tree, but he didn't tell us anything important about it, like the fact that it's wider than his shop, or that it's protected by a nymph, or that it's the grandsire tree of the forest. And he sent me, an elf, to cut it down. I have persuaded him to make the staff, but when he saw that we had not cut down the whole tree, never mind how we'd get it back to town, he would not make the staff without a payment. I gave him the ring the bard gave me, though it is worth much more than the staff. But that is no great loss. I expect I will have opportunity to recover the ring. I made a deal with the woodcutter that I would get him safely to the tree. Once he is there, however, I will let the ruling authority of the forest exact justice on him. I think I will ask her to provide a longbow for Zoë in exchange for this criminal who would have sent us (and any other innocent fool) to face the powers of the forest. Something else interesting happened while we were obtaining a branch of the great tree. The nymph tasked me with planting a new seed from the tree in some lifeless place. It rests in my bag, and I will keep an eye open for an appropriate place to plant a new forest.

[jaylenek]

So Grayem gets his quarter staff and then proceeds to lead Harold the wood cutter into the forest to meet the nymph. Though Herold dose not know that the nymph is guarding the tree that he wants to chop down. The party gets to the tree quickly. After they arrive Herold walks around the tree to try to decide which way would be the best angle from where to start the sawing. As Herold starts to circle the tree he freezes in is tracks. Then the nymph came around the corner and thanked the party. She asked Grayem to drag the wood cutter a few feet away from her tree. Then she gentility kissed Herold on the cheek, at that moment he unfroze and his feet rooted into the ground so he could not move from that spot.
Grayem asks the nymph where he can find a bow. She hands each party member a peace of a strange looking vine, as the vine touches the bodies of each person, it wraps it's self around there limbs like a peace of strange jewelry. She explains that this marks them as a friend of the forest, then tells them to head south and ask the elves of the forest for a bow. The party heads south and after some wondering about they find the elves, who happily give them the bow they asked for.
The party spends a few more days in good earth Preparing for there adventure before heading north to investigate the rumors of the duke being a vampire.
It takes the party about a day and a half to reach the dukes castle. On the road our adventures meet a druid human named Akira with a large camel, who joins them on the road. As they approach they see a great cliff rising into the clouds, and seemingly pouring out from the sky is a great water fall. Directly in front of this shimmering water fall is a castle with a great stone wall circling it.
The bat flies around the castle and sees that the river runs through the castle. There are several gargoyles adorning the castle roof and looking through the windows the bat could see that the halls are well decorated.
The party gets let though the gate as common workers and spend a few days working in the kitchen cleaning and chopping vegetables. They eventually get an audience with the duke (they made an appointment when they first got through the gate.) When talking to the duke he makes it very clear that the party is below him. The party voiced concern of undead in the east, and the duke replied "I know of this issue and have taken steps to protect my people." The audience was very unfruitful and the party was escorted back to the common sleeping area where they retired for the night.

The next morning there is an eerie silence then they hear a shout, "the waterfall!" They rush out and find that the waterfall had completely stopped flowing. The party quickly climbs up a path zig-zaging up the face of the cliff. At the top they find a Gigantic fire elemental attacking a large water elemental near a small lake. The two elemental are shrinking in size as they clash and it seems clear if they did nothing that the water elemental would lose. The wizard attacks the fire elemental with every spell he hads, the cleric conjurers water on top of the two elementals. The druid takes a barrel off of his camel and starts throwing water on the two elementals. With every splash of water the water elemental gained power and the fire elemental was hurt. Eventually they help the water elemental enough that he could over come the fire elemental.
The water elemental thanks the party for there help and tells them to give it's regard to the duke. So they ascend the cliff back to the castle below. The party is welcome back to the castle with open arms and the duke makes them honored guests each party member gets to pick an item for there reward and they are made honored guests.
As honored guests, the party was given free reign to wander around the castle. Zoie' and Tod wander to the basement and find the chamber the river ran through. There seemed to be a cult down there. There was several people dressed in dark robes swinging incense and chanting. Leaving them to ponder about the duke and his vampire-ism.

[skreyola]

From the diary of Zoë Smith (written in a secret shorthand):

After four days of waiting, Graham was finally able to get his staff from the woodcutter. He feels the man is a cheat and a thief who deserves to be punished, both for his false appraisal of the ring Graham offered in payment and for his willingness to send unsuspecting people into the forest to face the nymph of the great big tree. I'm with him on that.
So, we picked up the staff, and we led the woodcutter to the big tree. He asked Graham if he would start with the axe, but Graham suggested he walk round the tree to get a measure of its great size and decide how to transport it back. As the woodcutter disappeared around the tree, Graham and I backed up a few steps to wait for the nymph to strike him. She did, and he cried out for fear of the sudden darkness. She pushed him a little space from the tree and then touched his legs, which took root in the ground. Graham talked about cutting the woodsman down to size, but the nymph wasn't amused by the joke, so we left off taunting him and asked the nymph for a longbow I could use.
She gave each of us who went into the forest that day (Me, Graham, and Sengir) a vine that wrapped itself around the wrist of its wearer and told us to go south and speak to the druids.
We walked south for a while and ended up getting lost. So, I climbed a tree and looked around. I figured we'd passed our destination, so we headed north again, and we were soon surrounded by druids. But, as the nymph had promised, they gave me a longbow. They asked us to investigate matters in the forest to the east and we returned to town.
Graham was anxious about the magic ring he'd given to the woodcutter, but he couldn't think of any way to recover it without in some way stealing it, so he left it behind. He was upset that he didn't have the money to attune his staff, so we decided to leave the little town of Good Earth.
Traveling with us: Todd the cleric. Sengir the monk bat. The orc butcher's human apprentice, who hasn't mentioned his name in my presence. Martin of Dean the bard. And a druid we met this morning before leaving town, Kira.
After four hours of travel, we came to a place where the road split. Graham saw a cottage by the road and knocked on the door. A little old woman answered, and Graham asked her for directions. Instead, she asked him to step in for a cup of tea.
We've all heard bard's tales about women living in lonely places, preying on travelers, so we politely declined, but the bard wanted to take her up on her offer. So, he went in, and the rest of us continued on our way, choosing the leftward path. The butcher's apprentice decided, as the rest of us were leaving, to stand guard outside.
After about an hour more, we came to a town on the edge of the river, where we learned that something was tearing up their fishing nets at night. Because we hoped for more profitable work, and because we were anxious to investigate the rumors of vampires, we left almost immediately and followed a path beside the river all the way to the duke's castle town.
The guards were well dressed but unhelpful. We finally managed to talk our way in as common laborers and food preparers, but we couldn't see the duke.
-------
We earned some money by preparing food. Better money than we mad in the whole time we were in that horrid little town with the wicked woodsman.
But after a few days, we finally saw the duke. A scream woke me, and we found that the waterfall behind the palace had gone dry. The party rushed up the path on the side of the cliff to the little pond at the top and found a fire elemental fighting a water elemental. We did what little we could to help, and the water elemental, on killing the fire elemental, asked us to convey his respects to the duke. Now that we were emissaries, we went to see the duke. He was completely uninterested in the problems to the east, claiming he had taken measures to protect his lands. He rewarded us, and Graham gathered the materials he needed to attune his staff.
We were guests at a feast, and we now have rooms in the palace. Oh, and the bard and the butcher boy showed up again. They gained entrance to the town claiming to be Graham's servants. He took it well and didn't exploit the situation more than appearances required.
-------
Graham spent the next day concentrating his energies into the staff. I wandered around trying to learn something useful.
Sengir showed me where the duke's people were pouring things into the river and performing a constant ritual with censers and rods. I wanted to ask Graham about it, but he couldn't be disturbed. Todd didn't know what they were doing, even though he's a cleric.
The next morning, Graham had his staff ready, and we prepared to leave. The butcher boy must have done something terrible, because before we got onto the cart to leave, he had one of the duke's servants flog him.
-------
I found out that what had riled Graham up so much was that the boy, playing his servant, had said something insulting about the duke to his chamberlain's servant. Some of these small town folk can't go anywhere without sticking their foot in it.
We reached the town by the river, heading southeast, and agreed to try to learn what was tearing up their nets. They still couldn't pay us much, but we had no pressing need for money after our adventure in the duke's castle.
Sengir agreed to stand watch all night near the nets, and I got rid of the bard's jingling shoe bells at the same time. I'd been wanting to do that since I met him. Tying the bells to the nets, to give the bat an audible signal when something was happening, we went to the inn and slept until Sengir came and got us.
We rushed out, but we were surprised. That butcher boy had gotten into the river somehow and was tangling in the net. He'd pulled out his cleaver and started chopping.
After that, we beat a hasty retreat from town, though I would have gotten behind a vote to hang the lad and stay in the town.
-------
We rested in shifts on the way downriver, and we finally reached the town Graham and I passed through before reaching Good Earth. The butcher boy left us, there, returning to his town. Maybe he'll take up carpentry. We got a contract for the bodies of the last courier team that went into the swamp across the river. Sengir flew across the river and lured some undead back, but the townspeople ignored them, and we soon realized why. They stopped at the river's edge. I suddenly thought back to what the duke had said about taking steps to protect his lands, and to the rituals beneath the castle. He thought he was safe, but I know there is a way to his castle that doesn't cross this river. How shortsighted! The fool!
We are resting tonight and learning what we can in our chosen classes. Perhaps a little training will help us when we go out tomorrow to find the source of this blight.

[skreyola]

From the diary of Zoë Smith (written in a secret shorthand):

We were awakened this morning by Sengir, who had gone into the swamp and brought back about a dozen zombies. The Duke's barrier kept them from crossing the river, but the townsfolk are entirely too easy-going about this. If the Duke's barrier fails, their town will be overrun, and they have no plan in place to stop it.
Arrows do nothing to these zombies, so Graham and I discussed what would hurt them most. He favors bludgeoning them with his staff, while I think slicing them with a blade will be more effective. We tested it on a pair of the zombies, and I was able to kill one faster with my dagger than he was with his staff.
He tried blasting them with a new fire cone spell he learned, but it didn't kill even one of them. Eventually, the zombies wandered off.
A merchant noted our interest in the swamp and offered us half of his revenue if we'd carry his cart of food to the town in the swamp, a place called Triplepoint. Graham didn't like his terms, which would involve going to Triplepoint, selling the food, and bringing the money back to this little wart of a town to pay the merchant his cut. So, I gave him the shiny dagger for collateral for our half, and we don't have to return. Plus, we can keep all of the proceeds. The merchant had a cart but no draft animal, so we gathered our party, and Kira agreed to have his camel pull the cart. For this, I will give him a large share of the proceeds.
Graham called a party meeting, and we sat in the back of the covered wagon discussing the need for an additional party member to strengthen our numbers going into the swamp. I suggested checking the tavern. While I was gone, Graham got a stranger passing through town to join us. He said the stranger had overheard our discussion and was eager to come along, wishing to complete some task of vengeance against a dragon lord. I've never seen dragons around here, but he says there are dragons up north, so whatever.
Our new party member has an odd dragon name I can't pronounce, so I'm calling him Arthur.
We made our way into the swamp and drove at a good pace until we came to a split in the road and turned north where the sign said Triplepoint. Not long past this, we came to a house. Sengir flew in the broken windows on the bottom floor, while Arthur flew up and peeked through the windows of the second. Sengir found two shambling zombies trying to claw their way out of a room, and Graham called them over to the window and bashed their heads in with his staff. We then made our way to the front door, where Graham knocked.
Someone inside said to herself that she wasn't supposed to talk to strangers. I called up that we weren't zombies. She expressed some doubt about that, and Sengir said, "Brains," really creepy, since I'd never heard a zombie say it, but the voice upstairs made a little squeal of terror. I picked the lock, and we went in. The stairs were a shambles, but there was a rope we could use to get to the top floor. We found a little girl huddled in the corner of one of the bedrooms, and she said she'd been there a few months. The wall where she'd started marking her height told a different story. We tried to talk her into coming with us, but she was reluctant. However, she was out of food, and once Graham had given her an apple, he was able to convince her.
Some hushed discussion was made of whether the two zombies had been her parents, but her story suggested they'd died at differing times and away from the house. Unfortunately, this discussion tells me we're not getting paid for bringing back the bodies of the last shipment team. They'll deny the corpses are the right ones. Oh, well. I didn't want to go back to that shortsighted, arrogant... Never mind.
If we hadn't had the carts with us, I'd have been for holing up here to rest, but I had invested too much in that cart to lose it. So, we continued down the road until we were all tired. Then, we woke Sengir and bedded down in the covered wagon.
------
Several hours of rest later, we got up and prepared to move on. It wasn't long, however, before Graham called our attention to shapes in the mist. It was a cart, one wheel missing, lying on its side. The food was in terrible shape, but Graham ordered that some of it be loaded into the cart, and he asked Todd to pray purification rites over it. Todd spent the rest of the journey to the city praying to his deity, but by the time we came into a collection of ruined houses signifying the outskirts of Triplepoint, he had finished his rites, and the food was all pure.
We saw zombies in the buildings as we came into town, but they kinda sidled away from us as we got near. This interested the city guard, watching from towers on the rough-built wall. When they learned we had food, they opened the gates and let us in.
I oversaw the distribution of the food and made 13,000 gold from the sale of the cart I'd bought with my dagger. I gave 2,000 to Kira for the use of his camel and 200 to each of the other party members for their help. Graham found a wizard and reached a price of the other half-cart of food in exchange for perusal of his library. Graham asked the party if they would agree to this bargain, since his spells would help them. All agreed, except for Martin, who had annoyed the wizard enough to get turned into a frog, so he couldn't agree to nothing. But Graham had saved his life by keeping him away from a hungry peasant dreaming of frog legs, so I think we can assume he would have been in favor of giving Graham more power to help the party. After all, wizards don't cast spells for themselves, most of the time. They cast them to aid the party.
-------
I guess Martin liked the idea, because when he returned to his normal form a day later, he spent the rest of the week assisting Graham in learning spells.
I spent the week looking for work, but the only thievery they'd had trouble with was theft of food. Very serious, but hard to investigate. So, I worked as a cook for this time, spending my spare time (after a few minutes in the tavern showed me there was nothing to learn) picking through houses obviously abandoned. Small wonder, since they were burned out. Somebody had thought a good way to kill the zombies that got into his house was to torch the place. Well, after a week of searching, I found two more chests to put in our wagon. I have carefully hidden my gold, and the location reminders are hidden in this entry. I don't plan to hold onto all of this money long. I feel naked without a good weapon, and I think it would be wise to get a weapon for slicing up zombies. I'll ask the wizard what he can make for me.
I realize now, I should have cooked the food and sold it prepared for a better price.
-------
Sengir returned and said there's a terrible gnomish monster in a tower in the swamp, whom he thinks might be a vampire or something. He seemed somewhat annoyed that the gnome hadn't attacked him, but I think that's not important.
Folks in town tell me that a holy weapon is best for fighting undead, and I think it would be a good badge for a thiefcatcher to weild a holy blade. Unfortunately, they say it costs more than I have. I can't just hang around slowly gathering wealth. This town will soon be back on the half rations the clerics can provide, and then food will be a drain on my hoard.
I feel good about our mission, however. I'll try to work out some arrangement to get a holy short sword, or better yet, a holy, shocking short sword, in exchange for finding and destroying the cause of this blight.

[zorban1090]

From the Journal of Marten the Bard:

I am excited to be on this new journey with new and interesting people. Two party members have already come and gone and the days seem to drift by like dust on the wind. Sengir is as eccentric as ever and seems to real anti-social and I don't know enough about him to trust him. Graham is an interesting enough fellow and seems a worthy companion. I'm intriguiged as to what Zoë will do next. She's been a pecular sort sense I met her but, I don't consider myself an accurate judge on strange behavior perhaps she is normal for those in her profession. We are a rag-tag bunch to be sure though. I look back with a heavy heart to those that have been lost. My previous companions such a lively a bunch as could ever be found, were always a barrel of laughs. Alas, our boisterousness proved to be their demise. Upon meeting these new companions I have been through much. We ventured back to the cave and gathered the belongings of my fallen comrades and most of us fled the horrid place. The Orc fought bravely in the face of the cave's owner but, alas he fell and the foul beast claimed another life. Who knows how many more live it shall consume. I must return one day with a more willing party and destroy it. After selling his shop the Orcs assistant accompanied us out of town once the horse training and bow getting was completed. We came upon a house in the middle of nowhere and thought to ask directions, though finding none as the party left, I stayed behind and had tea with the old lady in the house. Next thing I knew I woke up inside of a small room with hay on the floor and a barred window. naturally I set the place ablaze and crawled through the window. I had hoped to stop and gaze lovingly at the flames as they consumed that wooden hovel but a troll came upon me as I got my feet and I was forced to flee. I arrived at the town and and talked with the butcher's apprentice. Apparently after I passed out he knocked on the door demanding to know where I was and after threatening her with his cleaver was chased away by the troll, whom the woman claimed to be her husband. He came to Heart's Rest and waited to see if I would come as surely as I did, then we both set off toward the duke's castle to regroup with the party. However, to get inside the castle compound we had to pose as Graham's servants. Vastly humiliating and even worse the butcher's apprentice had the audacity to ask a noble directly if the Duke was a vampire. In the next town he caused even more trouble when he got caught in some fishing nets and cut himself loose with his cleaver. He left us and we continued on through another town where we obtained a cart with goods to be delivered to a town in the middle of the swamp. We were all a little apprehensive about going because of the reports of undead and disappearances in the area. In the end however we took the job. On the way we met a little girl in an abandoned house and learned her parent's were dead and she'd been there a while. She was of course ravenous with hunger. We took her with us towards the town. Here I shall end this entry I lie here preparing to go back to sleep and wonder what the party has done since I entered the cart. I have felt the cart move but have scarcely opened my eyes let alone looked out of the covering, so I have no clue as to our whereabouts. I just hope Sengir hasn't been feeding on me while I've slept.

[skreyola]

From the diary of Zoë Smith (written in a secret shorthand):

We tried to find a family to adopt the little girl, and when that failed, we turned her over to the temples of life for rearing and training.
I talked the temple into making a holy weapon for me, but it took all the gold I had, and I had to promise to look for a rod that was missing from the temple outside the wall.
Thus equipped, we headed for the tower where Sengir had reported seeing what he thought was a vampire. As we got close, the undead became quite menacing, and we had to leave off fighting them and just push through to the tower.
One the tower's first floor, Graham, Kira, Kia and I fought some undead who were already in the tower, while Sengir and Arthur flew up and entered the tower on higher floors, and Todd and Martin defended the exit and our cart.
We had barely finished off the monsters when Arthur brought our attention to a pair of stone statues in the shape of gargoyles. They were tough critters, and harder to hit than I would have expected from statues. But we eventually destroyed them, expending all of Graham's spells.
We made our way up the stairs, but Sengir warned us not to come into the top floor, since there was now a large swarm of bats called by the gnome up there. So, we took the time to search the second floor. I found a chest with money in it. Graham found a few spellbooks. Kira found some vials of alchemist's fire (which I hope he'll keep away from Martin of Dean).
Finally, the air was clear, and we rushed up the stairs. Kia pushed past us, almost smashing me against the wall, and took up a position that was, thankfully, not in my way, and I charged at the gnome, but I underestimated him, and he sidestepped my attack. Arthur ran up to him and stunned him with a mighty blow, then relieved him of his curly, snake-shaped rod. Arthur dropped it quickly, though, claiming it had a curse on it.
I pulled out my empty sack and draped it over the rod, then managed to get it into the sack without touching it. I thought about how much of a reward the temple might give for this, that I could further the cause of justice.
The gnome seemed to awaken out of a trance and showed no recollection of his actions, so we tied him up and brought him back with us to Triplepoint, where we turned him over to the authorities for stealing the rod.
The temple was not much interested in giving us a reward for the rod, but they did toss a ring toward us with the suggestion that we should travel outside the walls and return the rod to the statue that held it in the dead side of the temple. This we did, and found an opening into a crypt. But this did not interest any of us who went, so we left the bones undisturbed.
-------
The town was running low on food again, so we went back to Good Earth and bought several carts of food and some draft animals, which we escorted back to Triplepoint and sold to the temple for 11,000 gp, which we split evenly.
Each time we passed through that stupid little town on the river, I spit on the ground.
And so, we returned to Good Earth and found ourselves face to face with the duke. He took the large orb we'd found, claiming it had been stolen from one of his temples. I wanted to investigate this further, but as he does appear to be the rightful owner, I can't as a thiefcatcher withhold his property, especially since he is the governing authority in the land, so there is no question of its being needed as evidence.
continued west to the little settlement on the edge of the desert.
Graham proposes we travel into the western desert and find a place to plant his seed. I think there must be some interesting lands beyond the desert, especially if we head northwest. So, Graham and I will head that way, with our cart, and the rest of the party can choose to come with us or not.
I need to spend some time training and see what I can buy here.
Who knows what adventures await us across the burning sands?

[skreyola]

From the diary of Zoë Smith (written in a secret shorthand):

We set off into the desert, with Kira providing direction, and we were only a day's travel in when we came upon a sign buried in the sand that pointed toward a pyramid in the south. Graham's purpose had nothing to do with pyramids, so we ignored this and continued west. Before the end of the day, we came upon a chest of drawers. I approached it cautiously, checking for traps. I had almost reached it when it sprang into action and attacked me. My party members quickly moved to help me, and Graham set the thing on fire with a werll-placed ray spell. Kira worried that there might be flammable items inside that could be useful to us, so he tosses his barrel of water onto the thing, destroying both.
Inside, we found some sets of clothing, a bit singed, which Kira claimed for his own, him being a tailor and all.
We made camp and rested.
-------
Sand. Sand, sand, sand, sand, sand....
-------
Crossed a dry riverbed. More sand.
-------
More sand.
-------
More sand.
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Sand! It's getting into everything!
-------
I stumbled onto an interesting item today, buried in the sand. My cat-like reflexes allowed me to avoid actually tripping over it, and if I'd done that, it would almost certainly have broken the ancient thing. It's a strange urn with a wooden stopper. Graham says it's probably magical. I put it carefully in the cart.
We saw some camels today. Fortunately, Kira was taking a nap in the cart, or he would have wanted to follow them and see what they were doing. He has shown a marked interest in camels before.
Near the end of the dark hours, we stopped, and Graham asked Arthur to dig a hole in the sand. When it was big enough, he pulled the giant seed out of his bag and set it in the middle of the hole and snugged the dirt around it and poured a whole waterskin of water on it.
We lay down to rest.
-------
When we awoke, the seed had already sprouted a little shoot about six inches high.
Graham asked Kira about towns outside the desert, and Kira suggested we first try to find the source of the dry riverbed. They argued about it for a long time and finally decided to head due north and see if we came on the river. If not, we'd head west alng the base of the mountains until we found a settlement.
We set off, but their argument was the most interesting thing that happened today.
-------
We have found a little cabin high on a cliff. Sengir flew up and told us it was abandoned. It took us three days to get here from where we planted the seed. Three days of nothing but sand and the maddeningly unreachable vision of mountains in the distance. We haven't found a river, so we're heading west from here.
-------
We have come to a dwarven mining camp. It is two days since we found the cabin. The dwarves were having trouble with strange monsters that eat their metals. Arthur and I explored the mine and found a cluster of them. Using cheap iron coins, we lured them out to some cages the dwarves set up for us. When we got all of the adults out, we found some rusty looking eggs. Perhaps we can sell these things as exotic pets.
------
It has been three weeks since we came to the dwarven camp, and we've been very busy. We sold the adult monsters to a ship captain. We also worked with the babies, trying to train them. I managed to train two of them. Kira trained two of them. Arthur's baby simply would not cooperate with him. I have named my two Castor and Pollux. I am working to train them not to eat metal unless given permission, and to rust specific things on command. Perhaps one of these will make a useful pet. However, I need to find some way to protect my gear. It is a pain to have to store everything safely away before I work with these cute little bugs.
Kira sold his two babies in the little port town an hour's walk from the camp.
We think we are nearly ready to leave.
-------
We have found a path that leads up to the cabin. When we got there, just after sundown, we checked the place over and saw some signs that it had been visited in the previous week. I saw through the window some papers that were not coated with dust like the furniture around them. I got mad when Sengir flew in and unlocked the door from the inside. The owner got mad when Kira opened the door and stepped inside. I got mad when the owner,a gnome engineer who is working on some strange project, popped out of a bush and said he'd been watching as we knocked on the door and shouted to ask if anyone was around. How could he watch us and ignore our cries? The gnome got mad when he went inside and found those papers missing.
I told him that Graham and I were thief catchers and offered our services. He allowed me to examine the room, and I found tiny claw marks near where I'd seen the papers. Kira suddenly started shouting that we should all go into the woods to catch the thief. I waved him away, and he went into the bushes. I kept looking for clues, but Kira returned before I'd finished. He had the papers, and he had blood on his hands. He said he'd killed the thief, and that it was a squirrel that had stolen the papers.
Something about this seems strange. Why would a squirrel steal papers? Why would a druid kill a squirrel?
But the gnome has his papers back, so that is all I care about. The gnome said he can finish his project (he finally told us it was an air ship) if we will go fetch him an artifact from the pyramid we passed.
-------
We have been to the pyramid and returned to the gnome. It took six days to reach the pyramid and five days to get back. In that time, we investigated the riverbed, opened the dam someone had built, fought off some bandits, recovered the rod from the pyramid, and locked a mummy away in a trapped room. The gnome is complaining that someone has diverted his river, which he'd been using to power his devices. We didn't tell him about our adventures.
His air ship isn't ready, and we have things to do, so we asked him to come visit us in Triplepoint when his air ship is ready.
-------
It took us two weeks to reach Triplepoint, and nothing interesting happened. The desert is still full of sand. The swamp is stil full of undead. The people were glad to get another shipment of food.

[skreyola]

From the diary of Baroness Zoë Smith (written in a secret shorthand):

We took some time to rest in the city. We visited the wizard Doran and gave him Arthur's rust monster. He was so grateful that he gave me a gauntlet that protects my gear from the rust monster's touch. Kira seemed a little annoyed, for some reason. We split up the loot and upgraded our gear. Doran gave us a fortune for the strange urn. He says there's a djinn inside it. I talked the temple clerics into putting a frost enchantment on my scimitar in exchange for a shocking longsword. The temple clerics heard we were heading east, and they gave us a well-drawn map of how the country had been laid out before the blight. Nobody could tell me what the situation is now.
About this time, the orb Kira's been carrying around changed colors, and zombies started swarming around the city. Kira suggested the orb was drawing them, so we had Sengir fly it outside our lands, to allow us to deal with them when and how we chose.
While we were waiting for the zombies to go away, a strange little rat-like creature came up to us. It had strange hair and wore several skulls of small animals. The creepy little thing told us his name was Larry and asked if he could join our adventuring party.
I asked what he could offer our group, since we have survived many adventures without its help, and he had no answer to that. But he said he was trying to grow in experience to help his family back home. He claims they are being held captive by orcs. He said he would be glad to travel with us and did not desire a share in the spoils of our adventures. So, we agreed to let him come along.
When the zombies had thinned out enough that the guards would open the gate, I suggested we kill the remaining few with vials of holy water. Larry suggested he run out and splash them with it. I thought this was a silly plan, but I handed him a vial and told him to give it a shot.
He ran through the gap in the gate and splashed each zombie with holy water, but it wasn't enough to do any serious damage. Still, the zombies chased him away from the gate, so we were able to get out and get into good fighting positions. Graham and I surrounded a zombie, and while it tried to decide which of us to attack, I swung my scimitar and took its head off.
Graham shrugged and hit another one with a powerful spell. Arthur flew up and landed by another one, and I took the opportunity to slip around behind it and hit it. The remaining zombies near the gate were quickly destroyed, and we headed down the road.
We passed a mass of zombies where Sengir must have put the orb, but we decided to come back with mercenaries to kill them more easily.
After four days, we came to an abandoned village, Pleasantville. Finding no one there, we claimed the land for our country.
A few days beyond this, we came to a bunch of new buildings, which the people called New Hope. Learning that they were villagers who had abandoned Pleasantville, we offered them money for their property in the desolate village. They happily complied. Larry bought two lots for about 70 times what their fair value would have been, even before the blight made the swamp all but unlivable. Those who had no deeds gave us bills of sale for their properties.
We decided that our country ought to have a new flag. It would give the people something to signify their hopes for the future, and it would help us to solidify our claim on the lands around Triplepoint. So, we sat down and made up some designs, and then we chose one. Kira got some fabric, dyes, and thread. Larry gave him 200 gold pieces for making the flags. So, we ended up with 30 very large flags. We gave three of them to Arthur and asked him to take them to Triplepoint.
When Sengir heard about this, he suggested a bounty on undead corpses. So, Arthur headed to Triplepoint to speak to Martin of Dean. He'll offer a bounty to any person who brings an undead corpse to the town and gives it to Martin to burn. Arthur will also talk to the artisans in town and have them make flags from our three models, sell them to townspeople, who will fly them to show their patriotic pride. Or so Graham says.
-------
We passed through Pleasantville, where we put our new flag on the town's new flagpole, which we had to put up. Larry hung small flags of his homeland on the doorposts of his two properties.
From there, we followed the northeast road. We have arrived at a small town surrounded by a fence of sharpened stakes. Several zombies have speared themselves on the wall trying to get in. We made our way around to the only opening and found ourselves looking through the portcullis at an orc. Or so we thought. Graham said something to her in Orcish, but she just grunted. Kira greeted her in Common, and she spoke back. They eventually let us in, and I noticed that Larry didn't have a strong reaction to the orcs. I wonder why that is.
The people told us they were under a curse and could not leave their town, Burkto. They also told us they get things, like food and wood for their defenses, from praying to their fountain's deity. They claim that Dimron is chaotic good and likes to give things but balance them with a cost. None of us prayed for anything, or ate anything while in the town. Graham told me he thinks the curse might lift if the people leave the town, so we'll try to get one of them to travel with us.
-------
We got three to come with us, and we headed east on the road. We've now come to a stronghold called Fort Worth. They were slow to let us in, since we're traveling with orcs, but Kira gave them a song and dance about the orcs being trained performers.
We talked to the people and learned that they are not loyal to an outside country or leader but to their general. We also learned he's rarely seen. We decided we wanted to see him, to offer him the chance to return to our country. We asked for an appointment. The guard was not interested. Kira tried to give him the same song and dance about performing orcs as a curiosity the general would want to see. Graham took a different tactic. He told the guard we had a package to deliver to the general. He granted Graham an appointment. Larry offered the guard a bribe for his own separate audience, and the guard happily took 200 gold from him.
I helped Graham prepare the package we had to deliver. He found a box, and we put one of our new flagpole-sized flags in it. I added my ruby from the gargoyle, Arthur contributed one of his scales (he said he shouldn't come with us, to avoid lowering the value of the scale in the eyes of the general), and Graham finished off the package with the amulet he got from the gnome in the tower (He said he hadn't been able to figure out what it did, but it didn't seem evil, so he thought it might be impressive). I gave him a clean hair ribbon, and he wrapped it around the package and sealed the whole thing with his signet ring.
Graham marched up to the new guard on duty like he owned the place, and I followed behind, carrying the package and wearing the form of a humble servant. The guard let us in and left us alone with the general. I felt he was rather careless, this guard. He didn't even search us for weapons. The general greeted us, and Graham made his offer, telling the general that the people of Fort Worth would receive all the benefits of citizenship if he agreed to swear allegiance to our country. The general reacted warmly but not strongly. He took our gifts and said he would hang our flag in his banquet hall as a symbol of our alliance. Graham accepted his hand of friendship, and we excused ourselves.
As we passed the guard, Larry was giving him a bag of jingling coins. Larry simply must be rich, since he throws money around this way.
We returned to our rooms and made ready to rest.
-------
Imagine my surprise when I awoke and Sengir told me that little kobold had gotten himself thrown into the stocks. Graham gathered the rest of the party and prepared to leave before our welcome turned sour. I arranged to meet them outside the fort. Then, I wandered rather aimlessly toward the stocks. When I saw him, I had to fight down a surge of laughter. He looked so silly with all his wild hair cut off. More like a rat than ever. But we had given him a place in the party, so I wandered past and asked the attendant what the thing in the stocks had done.
He said, "He was telling soldiers to rob the treasury."
I said, "Really? How long does he stay in the stocks for that? Or are you just waiting to fit him with a different necklace?" As I said this, I made like I was tugging at a noose around my neck.
He said, "That's not a bad idea. But we thought we might be able to sell him."
I said, "Oh? I wouldn't expect you'd get much coin for him. He doesn't look big enough to be useful."
He said, "Actually, we'd be glad just to get rid of him. I'll let you have him for the price of a magic collar to keep him under your control."
I said, "I'm a little short on coin right now. I don't think 20 silver would cover a magic collar."
He thought about that for a minute and said, "Tell you what, if you'll promise to get him out of town, I'll let you have him and a ball for just the 20 silver."
I acted like I was thinking about saying no, but then I said, "Well, I guess that's a fair enough deal."
He put a chain and a 10-pound ball on the kobold's leg, and I said, "Do you have a name?" and Larry told me his name. I took the ball from the guard's hands, since Larry couldn't possibly have carried it, handed him all the money in my pouch, and walked out of Fort Worth free and clear.
As soon as we met up with the party, I had Larry climb into the wagon, and I picked the lock on the chain. I told him to stay out of sight, and I got out and walked with Graham until we stopped for the night.
-------
Since the orcs hadn't turned back to their right forms, we decided the curse wouldn't be easy to break. We passed Burkto with a fairly wide circle, since we didn't want to talk to them until we found a cure.
We kept going and reached the tower where we'd captured the gnome who caused the undead problem. Kira and I wanted to take some time to look around more carefully, and we found that each room had a couple of gargoyles in it. They didn't move, so we chipped out their gemstone eyes and split them around the party, reserving two of them for Martin, who was doing us a great service managing things in Triplepoint. We rested there. It's not a bad place, the tower.
-------
We reached Triplepoint and checked with Martin. The gnome engineer (I think he said his name was Simon) had finished his air ship and come to visit us while we were away. We gave Martin his gems and walked around town. We got some hooded robes for the trio from Burkto so they wouldn't stand out so much.
It did warm my heart to see some people were already flying our flag on their buildings.
We visited the temple and the wizard Doran, but neither of them was able to remove the curse. The temple thought something might be done about it south of Burkto, but nobody had a firm reason for believing this.
We asked about the town north of Triplepoint on the map. They said it was populated by dwarves who used to trade with them, but nothing has been heard from them in the longest time.
We spent a fortnight clearing houses and directing the building a wall around the outer region of the city. The people seemed happy to have an extra line of defense. We hope they will remember that when they make their voluntary contribution to the defense fund.
-------
Kira came and informed me that Larry was trying to sell his own scales as dragon scales. I don't even know where he heard they were valuable. I hurried to the shop and put a stop to his charade. I took him outside and asked him how much money he had. He said he'd made 50 gold doing petty magic. I told him to give me the money, and I'd give him his freedom. Now, I'de never really considered him my slave, but I wanted him to know that, and I felt he needed to pay for trying to steal from a shopkeeper in our town. I also didn't want there to be any reason for him to try to get out of punishment for stealing if he got caught by telling the guards that he was my slave, so I needed to make a formal buyout (since giving him a formal freedom for nothing seemed to me like a reward for stealing) to get him out from under my wing. I warned him that if I ever caught him stealing in our town, I'd slit his throat. It's harsh, but as a thiefcatcher, I can't have a thief operating under my protection. My reputation would suffer for that, and I have enough trouble with people thinking that all who take rogue training are thieves. he handed it over, but he complained that a con isn't stealing. I almost killed him, when he said that.
Instead, I decided to get him out of Triplepoint.
I had in mind that the nymph at the life tree might be able to let the orcs return to their right forms, so we headed west. I told the rest of the party about my plan. Kira asked us to wait a few hours so he could deliver the orb (which he would have Sengir fetch) to the temple for some sort of experiments. Graham looked at me and read my hurry in my eyes. He told Kira to meet up with us at the house where we found the little girl. When I next have a moment, I need to check on her and see how she's doing.
We reached the farmhouse without any trouble, and I got a chance to update this journal.
-------
Larry's behavior at Burkto seems even stranger to me now. We reached Good Earth and headed into the forest. We came upon a giant spider wrapping up a human-like form. Graham showed the spider his vine bracelet, but the spider did not react to it. Obviously, it wasn't a friend of the forest, but we couldn't know that for sure. But back to Larry. He immediately ran toward the spider to cast a spell on it. I held him back, and we hurried around the area and on to the life tree. The nymph greeted us warmly and told us that the spider was not one of her subjects. We hurried back and found the Larry had run ahead of us and managed to get caught by the spider. As it wrapped him up, we fought fiercely to kill the monster. When it was dead, we cut free an elven woman and did what we could to help her recover. I asked Arthur to bring Larry along but didn't ask him to untie the kobold yet.
The nymph suggested we talk to the druids, and she said we did good work in the swamp, for she could feel it returning slowly to health. She said we should go back to Harold the woodcutter's cabin and get the remainder of the branch she gave Graham for his staff, turn it into powder or tiny balls, and spread it over the whole swamp.
-------
We traveled to the druid camp, carrying the elf woman, and told them of our experiences. They asked us to clear the forest of spiders and eggs, and in return, they'd give us a set of druidic vestments. Kira was excited, so we spent a week clearing the forest. We gathered 100 spider eggs, which might bring a good price somewhere. I also talked them into giving me a gold coin, which I'll turn into iron when we get to Good Earth. I have to keep food on hand for my pets.
On the way back to Good Earth, we let ourselves into the woodcutter's house and got the branch. We put it in the cart and headed west to the desert.
-------
The river has dried up again, but the bed is now full of quicksand. We had to go all the way to where the ground is rocky before we could cross with our wagon.
The gnome was happy to see us and bought three of our spider eggs. In payment, he would fly us around for an unspecified length of time, assuming he didn't have somewhere else to be.
-------
We made it back to Triplepoint. We flew over the swamp, making drops of wood powder over the headwaters of the river, over Burkto, over Pleasantville, and over Triplepoint, high enough that it scattered far and wide. I was able to see the extent of the blight from the air, and the tower seems to me to be a central point in our country. Perhaps we should build our home base there instead of in Triplepoint. I don't know when I'll get to mention this, because right now, they're arguing over what should be in the stronghold and what flight path to take to visit Larry's people north of the mountains.
Larry has definite ideas about that. While we are in Triplepoint, I am keeping him on the ball and chain. He can cause too much trouble if allowed to roam freely.
I wonder what awaits us in the mountains. Perhaps we can get his people to send us materials for building our home base.

[skreyola]

From the diary of Baroness Zoë Smith (written in a secret shorthand):

Simon flew us to Burkto, where we asked for volunteers to fight in Larry's home country of "Stonia", which Simon says is the orcish land of Kopno. I paid out 10 gold each to five Burktals. Larry is staying to teach them Orcish while the rest of us walk to Fort Worth for more soldiers.
On reaching the fort, we met with the general and passed the night. He agreed to release into our custody all the men in his dungeon if we would guarantee they would not return to cause more trouble for him. The dungeon master turned over 30 denizens to us.
We marched them two hours fast march from the fort and stopped to rest in a relatively pleasant spot (It was dry and firm). There, Graham laid our cards on the table. If they would agree to serve Meho by either fighting orcs with us in the northlands, or by helping to reclaim Pleasantville from the swamp, we would give them their freedom, they would become full citizens of Meho, and nothing would ever be said about their criminal pasts. Any who did not desire this life of freedom would be killed.
One by one, we released them from their manacles. The first prisoner released ran as fast as he could, but Graham's lightning bolt was faster. He didn't get a dozen yards before he fell down dead and twitching. Most of the others moved quietly and slowly to one of the two circles I'd drawn in the ground, deciding to fight or settle. Five crazy-eyes men attacked Arthur as soon as he loosed their chains, and I dispatched each with ease.
We marched toward Burkto.
-------
When we got to Burkto, I looked around for Larry to give him an update on our situation. He was nowhere to be found. The Burktals told me that he had disappeared one night, and that a gnome calling herself Leona had appeared that same night. Leona said she had been sleeping with Larry that night, and that he was gone before she woke.
I can't put my finger on it, but something is fishy, here.
The morning after we arrived, Arthur left with 14 of our new Mehoza for Pleasantville. I outfitted our new soldiers and started training with them. Graham spent the time hunched over his spellbook, scritching on the pages and smiling to himself and muttering about various spell effects.
With Larry's departure, I wonder if we should continue with this quest, but now that we've gone to the effort of gathering all these armed soldiers, I feel we must move forward. When Arthur returns, tonight, we expect, we will ready the airship and go.
-------
Arthur met up with three architects on the way to Pleasantville. Graham has given them leave to set up a clock shop in Pleasantville, and he is granting them two years' free rent if they will assist in designing and building our stronghold.
We contracted with Leona for guiding services for 1 gp/day. I don't like her, because she has been offering her body to anything that moves.
We loaded the airship, and Simon pointed it in the general direction of Kopno. We were on our way, but we were only about halfway there when Leona started flirting shamelessly with the captain while he was steering the ship. The two of them slipped away to his cabin, and the airship wandered. Graham got upset and started looking over the controls. He managed to figure them out. Kira helped Graham navigate, so we were okay, but I am beginning to think that Leona killed Larry and did something with his body. I feel that this seduction with our captain was intended to place us in horrible danger.
-------
When we reached the land of Kopno, Simon and Leona were in his cabin again, so Graham made the airship drop suddenly a few feet. The jolt brought him out in his robe, but he took the event with good graces. Leona came out in only her skin, and all of my companions looked away, some in disgust, others out of gentlemanly dignity. She ignored this and the stares of some of the soldiers, pointing out landmarks until we reached the area of the cave, which we learned is the utter extent of Stonia. Simon dropped an anchor, and we looked out over a virtually unbroken canopy of leaves. We couldn't even find the road from the cave to the orc settlement.
Sengir flew down as soon as it was fully dark, and he brought back this report:
A road winds through the dense forest, leading from the cave to an orc stronghold. Guards stand every 50' or so on opposite sides of the road. This gives them a clear view of all the road but not always of the nearest guard. Near the cave, there is a guard pos set into the side of a hill, where a single orc operates a ballista.
The kobolds march from the cave to the stronghold night and day, carrying the spoils of the mine.
Leona tried to sneak to the door, but we all turned when she started untying the rope ladder. She returned to her cabin.
Arthur flew down and grabbed a kobold from the road. We asked her about the conditions in the cave, and she told us the kobolds were being forced to give all of the produce of the mine to the orcs, and that the orcs don't go into the cave for fear of Nibbler, which Kira tells us is a very large creature that likes to dig in the ground.
Kira went into the common area with Leona, and I followed behind, curious. The walls and the door were too think for me to hear what they talked about, though. I don't trust that gnome one bit.
When Kira came out, the companions met and decided that Sengir should scout out the orc stronghold and, if possible, neutralize their leader. Graham and Kira and I would go down and disrupt their mining operation.
At this point, I noticed that Leona was gone, and the ladder was lowered. I hope her actions do not make the upcoming mission more dangerous than it already is.
------
What a night.
Sengir took off to the north, Kira approached the cave from the west, and Graham and I set down to the east of the path and approached with four Burktals, who would play the part of orcs, if the opportunity presented itself to take the guards by surprise and allow them the chance to flee from their country rather than be killed outright. Unfortunately, it didn't work out that way.
We decided the guard post was the first priority, so Graham and I snuck slowly around to where he could see into the hut, and he whispered some words and moved his fingers rapidly, and the orc in the guard post found himself covered with spiders. He let out a cry of panic and leapt out of the little shack. It was quite a fall, so that had to hurt. Immediately, four guards on the road ran to aid him. The spiders followed him out of the shack and covered him again.
One of the guards was suddenly struck by lightning from a small cloud that gathered on the east side of the road. Kobolds fled in every direction off the road. I decided our first plan was no longer worth the risk. I had hoped the guards would not notice the guard post in trouble. While Graham concentrated on the spiders, I took the Burktals and moved quickly to the other side of the road, where I thought I could get a good shot on two of the guards. As soon as I could, I drew my longbow and let an arrow fly. It hit him but didn't seem to do much damage. The pair turned back and came toward me. I fled into the mine. The two orcs followed, and the Burktals leapt out of the undergrowth and attacked them. They turned around to meet this new attack, so I turned and charged at their unguarded backs. Suddenly, a great lion appeared and killed one of them. The other surrendered.
Larry suddenly came out of the mine, wearing a ridiculous set of goggles.
Graham told me he had captured another orc and a ballista with ammunition. We took our prizes back to the airship, and Graham used a levitation spell to load the ballista into the airship.
We interrogated the orcs and learned some valuable information about how they were organized. We are now carrying the two orcs to the border of Kopno to release them into exile. We have warned them that if they return, we will kill them without hesitation.
------
The mission is over. We have succeeded.
It turns out that Leona is Larry. He tried to tell us that he'd found a hat that transported him here, but Graham touched the hat with his staff and told us that it had an illusion effect, not a travel spell.
We decided on a plan. We and our 18 fighters went back to the mine and defended it as one by one the guards tried to man their posts. Some fled at our suggestion, while others died at our swords when they refused. We piled their bodies in the guard post.
Larry talked Nibbler into digging a bolt hole for the kobolds to escape through in case our entrance was captured.
We then loaded about half of the kobolds onto the airship, along with nearly all their supplies. Kira went with them to help them get started mining directly north of Burkto, with instructions to point their mining efforts east so they wouldn't come into dispute with the dwarves. We defended the mine until the last kobold was loaded onto the airship, adn then we got aboard with all our company, and we returned to Meho.
Now the kobolds are busy setting up their new home, Simon is on his way back to the desert of Talamh, and we are back in Burkto.
We leave tomorrow for Triplepoint.
Kira wants to find out what the temple clerics have learned about his orb.
I think we owe the Burktals a great debt, and we should do everything we can to find the cure for their condition.
Graham wants to have an award ceremony to grant lands to the fighters from Fort Worth who helped us, and also to any Burktals who do not own land.
We also need to talk to Doran about any information he might have on how to turn this swamp back into what it was before, plains or hills.
Kira thinks we should go back and investigate a dark spot in the sky over Kopno.
It looks like it's going to be a busy day.

[skreyola]

From the diary of Baroness Zoë Smith (written in a secret shorthand):

We had an award ceremony in Triplepoint, where many brave warriors were inducted into the Order of the North Star for their help in the northlands. We then traveled to Pleasantville, where we awarded lands to those who had been most helpful in the northlands and to those who had been helpful in Pleasantville.
We talked with some engineers we had met, and we discussed their plans for recovering the area around Pleasantville.
They also told us about their house they had to abandon in an area that is now a lake.
We trekked out to the lake and killed a great water worm. Graham found a cape of flying. We used the item the water worm had used for opening the portal to the plane of water to allow the remaining water elementals to return to their home. We sent Kira to speak with Doran and find out what this object might mean.Then we made our way south to New Hope and spoke to the people there. Tey told us about a castle on an island way to the south, where there was rumored to be a castle that wasn't where you last saw it. I think this bears investigation.

-------

We arrived in Fairville, and I obtained a new dagger in exchange for carrying a box of mugs across the straight to Fishten. In Fishten, I caught a little thief who was picking pockets in the crowd and delivered the shipment to the tavern owner.

-------

We made our way to the forest and entered the castle before it could phase out again.
As we walked down the hall, a door suddenly appeared. We went through and found a dining hall with a chandelier. Kira airwalked up to the chandelier and asked if he could take the gems. No one answered. He tried to pull one off, and the chandelier disappeared. He expressed surprise, and I said that in this situation, the absence of a denial was not permission, and he shouldn't have tried to steal the gems. He disagreed and wouldn't hear me. He went back into the hall.
The rest of the party went through a secret door Graham found and up a spiral staircase into another room. The door in this room led out into the hall, which still had an open door into the dining room, as well as a new door into a bedroom. We looked around in the bedroom and found Kira's clothing, as well as a locked door leading into what sounded like a bathing chamber.
We continued down the hall, and another door appeared, leading into a library. Graham pulled a book off the shelf, but it was empty. He commented on this and found that the book now contained his comment. So he sat down at a desk and began rehearsing our adventures since about the time we formed a party with Sengir and Todd. When he had finished with this book of dictation, he closed it and put it back on the shelf. Its spine now showed a title in some language I do not know.
Back in the hall, another door appeared, and we made our way into an audience chamber, where we were greeted by Blythe. We asked her about the lake and the water worm, about the situation in Burkto, and about some other matters. She told us the item we got from the water worm was called the water key. She told us the water key is one of five keys scattered throughout this land, which, when brought together in a certain place, allow the holder of all five keys to open a portal to celestia and become a deity. She told us that her brother, Dimron, was petulent and mean, but she also told us that if we set a symbol she gave us in the water of the fountain on the night of the equinox, Dimron would be forced to appear and grant us a boon. She also said he would be very interested in the keys, since they would allow him to take physical form in this plane more than on the two equinox and solstice nights.
She granted Arthur the chance to go back and destroy the egg of the dragon that had changed him from human to his current form. He went through her portal and approached the clutch, but the mother dragon killed him before he could complete his task.
Blythe opened a doorway for us to Burkto. While we were there, Graham sold his flying cloak and bought a ring of feather falling, because he already had a cloak to wear. We are returning in the morning to our stronghold in the morning to await the solstice night.

-------

We returned to Brukto on the solstice night and dropped Blythe's symbol into the water. Dimron appeared to us, and we asked, for our boon, that all the Burktals would awaken on the morrow in whatever form they had held before the zombie problem cut off their food supply, and that he would give people a clear choice, including consequences, before granting them any sacrificial wish. He agreed to do this, but to give the choice in a dream. We accepted this stipulation, and a few days later, we received word that in the morning, everyone was restored.

-------

We're back at our stronghold now. Doran asked us to investigate a sand worm in the desert, so we went and destroyed it using the water key. Sengir demanded we give the sand key to Doran, so we promised Doran we would give it to him after we use it to defeat the holder of the fire key. Sengir returned to his kobold cave city, and Graham and I stopped in at Burkto, where we gave the water key to Dimron with a restriction that he should not turn it on opening a portal to the plane of water.

[skreyola]

From the diary of Baroness Zoë Smith (written in a secret shorthand):

It has been eight months since we returned from rescuing the kobolds, and they are proving to be a valuable resource to our country. Following our removal of the water worm from our land and our learning about the five keys, we went back to the desert pyramid and destroyed a sand worm, recovering the sand key. We then went into the northlands and used the sand key to fight the fire worm and recover the fire key. I plan to use it when we face the ice worm. Graham and I have been working on our stronghold and patroling the towns and byways of Meho. I am growing weary of this and ache to go adventuring again. I enjoy the tasks of ruling the Mehoza, but they are very respectful of each other's property, on the whole, so there is little for a pair of thief catchers to do, and managing the bureaucracy is not my idea of fun. I think Graham enjoys it, but I do not. I have asked him to regroup the party and let us seek the next key, which I think should be the ice key.
We ran into a man today who was seeking his spoon. He thought he'd lost it 200 years ago. I have to get out of this provincial setting for a while.

-------

That weird man showed up again. Turns out, he's not so weird. He's actually looking for things he lost over two centuries ago, because that's when he died. He's a ghost, and his name is Grim or something.
We met him at Kaycee after our visit to Triplepoint, where we finally gave the sand key to Doran. He's been helping us with our land restoration project. Seems we'll need a fair number of workers to do the groundwork, but I was talking about Grim. Sengir vouches for him and says he'll make a valuable addition to our party. Kira introduced a kobold he says will be useful to the party, as well. The new kobold, who I don't think ever mentioned her name, made a special handle for the fire key, which is too hot to hold comfortably for long. We discussed the situation in Fort Worth and decided to pay them a visit. We laid out contingency plans for diplomacy and plans for if Fort Worth would not deal peaceably with us. Then, we left Kaycee and set out across the countryside for Fort Worth.

-------

We got in to see the general, and I still don't trust that guy. We had to wait a long time to get in to see him, spending the night in the inn. We told him we were heading east and asked him if he had thought about our offer of citizenship. He said that if we would go find out if his king was alive and well, he would consider it, if the king were dead. He said all the people they've sent to check on the situation have not returned. We agreed to help him. He gave us cold weather gear.
By the way, we saw a gold dragon on our way here. It didn't respond when Graham sent it a message.

-------

We made our way out the east gate of Fort Worth and followed the road through the brown area around Meho to where the gras turned green, then got higher, and then gave way to forest. Not far into the forest, we were attacked by lions. Kira made friends with them by feeding them, and Grim got one of them to follow us.
Grim found a dangling thread he thought was his long lost twine, but when he followed it up, it turned out to be a drider's web. He brought the drider down and made it sit still while I plunged my scimitar into its body. Foul, evil thing. I'm glad we were able to ride the world of this menace.
We passed through the forest and passed through an area with scattered houses, some of which appeared to be abandoned. After this, on the morrow, we came to the edge of the forest, where it looked like someone had run a cookie cutter along the ground carving out a sheet of cookies and replacing it with a sugar-white dusting of snow three inches thick.
I do not think this sudden transition is natural.

-------

We came today to a little village of igloo dwellers. Grim went into one of the igloos and obtained a scream from its occupant. People boiled out of the little dwellings and threatened to kill us, but Grim got one of them to hold his fellows back and talk to us.
We learned that the people had been killing anyone who came from the west, fearing that they were zombies from the swamp. Not that I particularly blame them, but they should have been able to tell the difference between living Mandisan soldiers and undead zombies. The kobold told them we were immune to the zombie plague.
The village is called Kupota, and the people were nice enough to send an escort with us. We are heading now for Ardhi, the captial of Mandisa.

-------

On the road today, we saw the gold dragon again. It fell out of the sky after being struck by a front bolt from many miles away in the north, what looks like a little city on the horizon. We sped to where it fell to investigate. Graham sent it messages and got replies this time. It was hurt and freezing.
When we reached it, Graham mended its wing and used his staff to heal its wounds. The dragon told us it had had a rider, and we found him as quickly as we could, but unfortunately, too late. He had frozen to death. We carried him back to Kupota, where we hired four adventurers, for the price of a deed for each in Pleasantville, to carry his body to Triplepoint, where Kira apparently has some favors to call in for resurrection services.
We talked the dragon into lodging in the kobold city, and we returned to the road for Ardhi.

-------

We arrived in Ardhi this morning. The whole city appears to be made of polished ice. I wonder whether the ice key is holding this town together. The guards welcomed us in without any difficulty, but there were stories about a cleric going mad in the night and making a mess fighting off a bat, which the other guards thought was a silly thing to do, even if the cleric did think the bat was trying to take over his mind.
We talked to the guards, and they said the coldest place around was to the southeast, near the ocean. We head that way tomorrow. They say the cold there is beyond lethal, but we have the fire key, not that I'm telling them that.
I also bought a special cloak of sealskin that will allow me to reach high places.

-------

We've killed the ice worm. After all that trouble getting the fire key, it stunned the kobold, who was holding the key, and it lay in a puddle for the whole time we were killing the monster. Still, the key did allow us to make an easy ramp down into the ice canyon where the monster was hiding.
Well, Graham located the ice key, and we left our mounts up above near a hearty fire while we went down into the canyon, all except Graham, who wanted the benefit of the high ground. Kira and the kobold went out onto the ice floor to where Graham had said it might be, and they pointed the stream of flame down into the ice.
The worm let out a screech from under the ice that stunned a few of us, and the fire key fell to the ground. Then the worm popped up next to Kira and loosed its breath weapon on the two of them. Grim moved into position near the worm. I let an arrow fly toward it, but a wintry gust blew it queer. Graham, meanwhile, dropped a mighty fireball on it. Before it could react, he cast another fireball into its side, and Grim touched it with a wound inflicting glove.
The ice worm exploded, and I passed out from pain and shock as a hundred shards of ice tore into my skin. Kira revived me, and Graham healed us all back to normal. I found the ice key and put it together with the fire key. They each alter the air around them, but together, they're not hard to hold onto.
Kira immediately left us there while he hurried with the body of the kobold to return to Triplepoint. I don't know why he cares to hurry so much, particularly over a kobold who has been with us such a short time. But he did say something about catching up with the paladin we sent.

-------

The king of Ardhi received us graciously, and we told him the people of Fort Worth are wondering if he has orders for them. The king expressed little interest in the fort, so Graham asked him if he'd be willing to let us have the fort in exchange for twice the stone it took to build the outpost, plus the crafting to make the stone into whatever the king directs, within reason. He agreed. Graham asked about the people. The king didn't seem to care, so Graham asked for the lives of the people, as well. The king granted this, and papers were drawn up granting us the property and its inhabitants as citizens.
Graham tried to gain the town of Kupota in this manner, but the king didn't have any interest in the punishment of those who had not followed through on his rumor intended to start the slaughter of anyone who came from the west. So, we were unable to gain this town at this time.
The king said he would accept an ambassador from Meho and was unmoved when we told him his brother, who had been ruling Meho, must be dead because no one now reigned there but us. The king also offered to build his side of a pair of teleportation circles between our capital and his. We said we'd study the matter and give it every worthy consideration. Then, we decided to get moving before things start to fall apart. I haven't told anyone in the party about my suspicions that the city will soon melt, but given Graham's negotiations, I think he has the same suspicions.

-------

We arrived in Fort Worth this morning after an uneventful journey. Kira arrived yesterday, along with the resurrected paladin, whose name he tells me is Robert Thornhill. I met with him, and he seems like a sound man who could make a good leader.
Graham got us rooms in the palace this time, and we see the general tomorrow.

-------

We saw the general, and he seemed to be going along with our hopes, but then he asked us to come back in the morning. We agreed, but as we turned to leave, Kira popped out of one of the walls and said, "He's planning to put the deed in the message box. He's not the real general."
He called for the guards, and I quickly slipped the deed out of his hand. He noticed, but too late, and I put it in my cloak.
The guards came in, and the faux general said, "That man accused me of being the general!" and pointed at a blank wall of stone. I didn't notice where Kira had gone, but he was no longer there. We slipped out of the room and left the guards with their faux general.
A few minutes later, Kira caught up with us and asked us to come back. He handed Graham a coin from the desert lands and asked him to put it in one of the message boxes, which he did, after examining it. We then looked in the box and found it empty. We followed Graham's location of the object and found the coin finally in the basement of an inn outside the palace. The room contained a large receiving box, which had some papersand our coin in it, and a smaller sending box, which had some dials on it.
I explained to Graham how we could use this smoke and mirrors setup to our advantage.
He sat down at the table in the secret room and wrote out orders, which he sealed with the general's seal and sent through the master box to all the boxes in the palace. The orders stated that all personnel were to assemble in the courtyard tomorrow to hear a speech and receive new orders from the new ruler of Fort Worth, by order of the king of Mandisa. To prevent this method from being used to reverse our actions, we took the master sending box with us when we left the inn.

-------

Our plan worked splendidly. The people all gathered to hear our speech. Graham gives a good speech, and at the end of it, he ordered that the Mehozan flag be raised over the city, and he placed Robert Thornhill into office as mayor of the city. The new mayor can decide what to do with the palace, whether he wants to live in it or tear it down to build smaller and more useful structures. He will have all the help he wants for these renovations.
All the soldiers filed past Kira and turned in their old insignia and had their armor crests changed by Graham's magic into the new mark of the Mehoza armed forces. The soldiers seemed happy, except for one man I'd seen drunk in the inn on our last visit, who looked somewhat saddened by the changes. Perhaps he was the one pulling the strings in that basement office.
Then the soldiers began marching toward Pleasantville, where they will assist in Doran's plans for revitalizing the swamp. Those who distinguish themselves, Graham says, can be inducted into a new order of honor. He hasn't thought of a name yet, but I think that will please some of them. Those who bear the Order of the Northern Star are shown great honor by their fellow citizens, and they raise morale in the cities when they attend parties.
After they left, Graham and I prepared to go to Burkto and then to Triplepoint, and then to all the other cities. We're taking message boxes to each of them, and we're going to have a magnificent system for towns and for guard posts to send messages and request troops or supplies in case of invasion. I need to warn the people of Burkto about the possibility of dragon slayers, and how to handle them. And I have a few trinkets to dispose of and a few special items to obtain to help us as we investigate the dark spot in the sky over Kopno. I know Kira and Sengir are anxious to get on with that.