Of Damsels and Displacer Beast
The morning came early with the sun shinning light through the stain glass windows of the temple of Bahamut. The party gathered their things, ate a small meal and moved out. They searched along the southern ridge of the mountain until they found an old overgrown path winding down the mountain side. Lucan took the lead guiding the party through the wilderness, helping them to avoid hazards along the way. Towards the bottom of the mountain the path split running due east and west. Lucan took the western portion moving them away from the Orc held areas.
About a mile or so into the western branch of the path Lucan spotted a structure protruding from the free tops off to the north of the path. He guided the group through the overgrown forest to a small clearing in front of a old crumbling bell tower. Keeping just within the free line they observed a young elvish looking girl running towards the tower. Behind her stalked two large displaced beasts who Appeared and disappeared as they stalked their prey. Soon one of the beast caught the girl by the ankle with its tentile and knocked prone. Just as the creature was circling for the kill, Lucan let loose an arrow the struck it in the hide. Following his lead the party emerged form the forest to engage the beasts.
The creatures turned to confront the party, zippo g around the battlefield and pouncing on party meme era left and right. While this fight was raging, a nearby best of stirges were awoken by he smell of fresh blood. The made for the now wounded girl and began to sucking her blood with those stingers. Boom reacted by casting an area attack spell to try and save the girl. While it drove the stirge away, it also hit the girl driving her unconscious and much closer to death. Cursing his poor judgement, Adrick disengaged the displaced beast to come to the girls aid. The dwarf stayed by her side the rest of the battle trying to beat off the streaming nest of stirges.
Eventually the party defeated both groups of monsters and revived the girl. She explained that her brother was Baron Vandferlin and he was the lord of these woods. She thanked the party for their efforts in saving her and asked if we could be of assistance with getting her home. The party agree and so set out with the girl leading the way.
The Lord of the Wood
The journey to the font of Selune was short. The Barons sister knew the woods well and swiftly guided them to their destination. When they arrived the Baron was quite skeptical about their intentions. He was not prone to trusting people and was not keen on share his secrets with the new comers. His attitude towards them was borderline hostile, "why have you come to my woods?"
"We came looking for an artifact needed to complete the cleansing of Bahamut's temple," said Adrick. "We mean you know harm and would hope that you have infortion for us."
"I'm not one to give out information Frey master daArf especially to strangers such as yourself," responded the Baron. "Tell me why do you think yourself worthy to treat with me?"
"For starters we saved your sister you ungrateful elf," retorted Ballimor picking up his ax in anger.
"I do not respond well to threats master dwarf, if you feel so included you can leave the way you came," shit back the Baron.
"Let's just calm down a minute, everyone. We mean you not your people anyharm. We are haut looking for the brazier of sacred fire or card from the deck of many things. If you know of either of those we would appreciate your efforts," said Adrick stepping between the dwarf and the eladrin.
"Of the first I know nothing, I am sorry. Of the later I have found a few cards while establishing myself here in the abbeys grounds. If you agree to help me with a task, than I will help you," said the Baron.
"What kind of task," asked Lucan.
"Long ago my father left on an important task that neither my sister nor I ever knew the nature of it. Ne'er the less he never returned and so we set out a decade ago in search of him. I tracked him to these grounds but the trail ran cold and the beasts and orcs keep me from exploring further. There is aground keepers cottage near by that might hold clues to my fathers intentions. Please go and retrieve any evidence from shack and bring it to me," said the Baron.
The party agreed and so they detour for the cottage. The Baron sent his sister to guide the group through the forest. She again took them through then woods and they found themselves at the cottage clearing in no time.
Dressing up with Owlbears
The party approached the cottage cautiously. Hazlo scouted ahead, reaching the edge of he doorway and peering in before returning to the rest of the party. "Two owl bears inside, nasty looking too," he said.
"Great, I always love a fight. Let's do it," said Ballimor enthusiastically.
"Wait a second," said Lucan. "I know that owlbears fear displaced beasts a lot. Perhaps we could gather the beasts hides and scent and carry if back to scare the owl bears off?"
"That could be a good idea, I'm game to try it," said Hazlo.
"And if we fail we are going to have to fight anyway, why not just fight now?" said Ballimor gruffly.
"Comon Ballimor let's try something else for once," pushed Ruhdon. Before long the others were on bad with the decoy plan. Seeing himself out number Ballimor consented. The Baron's sister lead them back to he bell tower where they skinned and extracted scent from the beasts. They returned to the cottage shortly there after to attempt the ruse. Hazlo donned the skin while the others slathered up in the displaced beast scent. They then attempted to sneak up on the owlbears to drive them off.
Unfortunately Boom's skills of stealth and. Puffing proved not up to the task. Instead of mimicking the displaced beast sound he sounded more like a dying mongoose drawing the attention of the hungry owlbears who stormed out of the cottage ready to eat.
Seeing the ruse blown, Ballimor spring from is position and attacked the nearest foe. The others followed suit and before long the owlbears were finished. "You see, we wasted all that time when we should have just killed them form the start," chided Ballimor.
"Well excuse me for trying to think outside the box for once," said Lucan. Hazlo moved into the cottage and checked around for clues. He found an old diary left out on the desk and quickly stashed to away. Satisfied that the. Book was the intended goal the party set out back for the font of Selune.
The Secrets Game
The Baron was thrilled to learn of the parties success. He took the book with gratitude and showed a measure of kindness to the party for the first time. He established quarters for them and welcomed then to done with him that night. He retired to examine the groundskeepers notes. Later the Baron explains that the notes contained detailed infortion about the grounds and their landmarks. He told he party tr he knew of a place name that his father went searching for, but could never locate it on his own. The journal provided detailed accounts of landforms, enough for the Baron the piece together the spot.
He asked the party to help him again, to brig closure to his fathers story for he and his sister. If the agreed he offered to give them his cards and aid them anyway he could going forward. Satisfied with these terms the party set out in the morning looking for the spot the Baron described. The Baron's sister lead the way and soon they found themselves in a small forest clearing near a natural spring. As the neared they heard beautiful music being sung by three lovely maiden's voices. They spotted the figures dancing near the spring and approached them causally. As the got closer Lucan recognized them to be river nymphs. The nymphs paid no attention to the group until he got within a few dozen feet. The. All at once they turned to address the trackers, "we are the river nymphs of this stream. Welcome to our home travelers. Will you play a game with us?"
"What kind of game?" Asked Adrick.
"We call it the secret game, you tell us a deep secret of yours, we will tell you one item of information you want to know," replied the nymphs in unison.
"Well I suppose if can't hurt," commented Ruhdon, "I'll go first." Ruhdon admitted that he had partook in evil rituals with his former master Tharkun the mighty. The nymphs discussed his story and deemed it worthy. In exchange the answer Ruhdon's question about the location of the brazier of fire (in a special building on the far eastern end of the abbey).
The party members continues on it this fashion. Ballimor admired he'd always wanted to e a dancer, and learned that the Barons father was not here, but in the watchtower further west. Adrick admitted he rejected his father on his death bed out of spite and learned that the duke of Dolketch Notting, the rival to the prince for the throne believed he was fighting for the right reasons. Hazlo admitted to resenting the rest of the party for not allowing him to seek vengeance for his family an leaned the location of every other card not in their possession. Finally Lucan admitted that he was afraid hai former compatriots would one day come back to hurt the group and learned that he Barons father was indeed dead, but his spirt remains.
Satisfied with their answers the party left the grove and headed for the tower seeking answers for the Baron and his sister.
The Watchtower
The trip to the Watchtower took longer than most of the others. The Baron’s sister guided the group just as well, but the tower proved to be quite a bit further away from the rest of the settled areas. The three story tower stood at the far southwestern point of the abbey grounds, at the apex of the lower defensive wall and the cliff face that lead up to the Dragon’s Roost. The eastern portions of the tower were surrounded by a ten foot deep moat, spanned by a lone drawbridge. The party searched the area for some time, looking for any alternate entrances or other oddities and finding none proceeded to approach the main doors of the tower.
Hazlo found the door to be clear and unlocked. Pushing the large unit open he stepped inside. The room was dark and very strange. The walls were covered with a thick viscous black slim that grabbed onto anything that got too close. The center of the room was bisected by a deep trench. Spanning the trench was a small bridge that appeared at first glance to be made out of two large playing cards. Curious, Hazlo approached the area. The others entered the building one at a time, leaving only the Baron’s sister to wait outside to stand guard. Ballimor was the last to enter and the door closed on behind him. He tried to push it back open but found it unmovable. Whatever strange magic held sway in the tower, it was clear that the group would need to confront it in order to find freedom.
Meanwhile, Hazlo approached the trench and looked down. He saw more black goop, similar to that on the walls. It swirled and bobbed, but did not appear to be harmful. He then examined the card bridge and could not detect anything unordinary. Despite his suspicions he decided to cross the bridge, but not before tying Ballimor 100 ft rope around his waist. He tested the bridge as the started out and finding it capable of supporting his weight he crossed it quickly. As soon as he had reached the other side of the trench the card nearest him detached from the other and scrambled up next to him, fully transformed into a humanoid like shape.
Panicked, Hazlo backed away quickly taking a couple of strikes from the creature as he retreated. Meanwhile the rest of the party sprung into action fighting the other card which had similarly transformed into a creature on their side of the trench. Soon after, a large black pudding crawled up form the bottom of the trench followed by a dozen or more underlings. Before long the entire tower was crawling with enemies. Taking advantage of the close quarters, Boom cast a powerful fire attack that destroyed all but the largest pudding and the humanoid creature. Now with room to maneuver the party spread out to deal with the treats more effectively. Hazlo danced from side to side on his side of the trench avoiding the creature’s attacks and firing arrows when he could. Lucan provided supporting fire from his side of the trench as much as possible. In the end the monsters proved a simple task for the group once they had eliminated their numbers.
While the group was still finishing up the monsters on their side, Hazlo searched the door on his side of the trench for traps. Finding it clean he proceeded to open the door and stepped inside. He was instantly transported to another world of strange screeching sounds and images of horror. He was so shaken bye the experience that when Ballimor eventually pulled him back through the door with the rope a few minute later he was unable to even verbalize what he had experienced.
Concerned, Ruhdon checked the door way for magic and found that it was very powerful but of an all together foreign nature. Boom recognized the magic’s aura as having been from the far realms, a place of strange twisted realities and magic’s. Both Boom and Ruhdon were confused how the farrealm could have twisted with the material realm in this tower. Suspecting that the distortions had to do with the power at the top of the tower, the group decided their only option was to ascend upward. They all tied themselves to the rope and entered the door and experienced the same horror that Hazlo had.
The sounds and sights pressed on each of their minds, causing hallucinations and other terrible tricks of the mind. At length however Ruhdon’s knowledge of the arcane and Lucan’s will power were able to overcome the areas hazards enough to guide the party up wards to the top of the tower. At last the party found themselves in a dark bare room at the top of the tower, mental exhausted. There before the drained group sat a beholder who turned to them in curiosity and said. “Well what have we here, guest? I have not had any in so long and I do long for a bit of entertainment…”