Session 84: Dead Man's Bluff

General Summary

13th Unndilar 836PD   Kardar’s body lands with a loud thump that even the deafened and blinded members of the Unbroken could feel. Krak, Zeni and Raphael finish off the remaining bodyguards, Krak’s wild rage of surrounding thorns and vines slowing the last one down before it could run for help.   Simeon heals Orlando and Sabali with his hands and words respectively. Orlando shares the same prayer to bring Quill back from the cusp of the Matron’s embrace. The main chamber of the underground base seems clear, and the Unbroken start to take some time to recover. Raphael and Orlando soon gain their hearing back, but Quill and Sabali whilst conscious are still stunned.   The ceiling shakes with the movements of the orc forces above, the Unbroken can hold out for only so long before the guards outside get suspicious and they can’t carry Sabali and Quill around. Simeon kneels by Sabali and Quill, and calls on his Lady Sehanine, the Moon Weaver, to intervene with her divine light and heal their conditions.    Simeon has called on his Lady to intervene before, but this time she was able to answer her follower’s prayer. The Shadows that Sabali wields grew out from him, cloaking him, Quill and Simeon for a brief moment, before the pitch darkness warms into a night’s sky as their bodies glow with pale silver Moon Light before setting. Her favour can be found for those that follow her path, even unknowingly.   With Sabali and Quill cured of Kardar’s cursed magic, the group rally themselves for whatever else awaits them in this base. Krak finds a set of doors further down in the base, Raphael picks the lock to the door and as soon as it opens several arrows fly out! Some of Kardar’s orcs and stabbers had locked themselves in the treasure room to ambush them.   Krak pulls the deep thorny roots of the ground to spike floor, and promptly kicks back a stabby stabber into the spikes. Sabali summons Sabalo the shadow to finish off the stabber, and Raphael makes short work of the rest of the orc archers as he encases them in a cone of cold from his shield.   Double checking the rest of the underground base and getting all clear for no more ravagers, the party start to claim their bounty from Kardar’s hoard:

• 11,000 gold and 1x 1000g diamond
• A Luck Blade Rapier with 1 wish
• +1 Half Plate Armour
• Spellguard Shield
• Rod of Security
• Staff of Fire
• Rod of Lordly Might
• Cape of Mountebank

  Quill cuts the heads off of Kardar and Tennakar, whilst Raphael wraps Kardar’s spear Ruin’s Wake in cloth and put the loot into the haversack and bag of holding. The party decide to leave the same way they entered, bluffing themselves through with Simeon disguised as the other dead Slaughter Lord Klughig, and the others disguised as orcs or invisible. Simeon leads a quick march out from the doors, barking in orcish that ‘Kardar Plans, We Kill’. But something does not sit right with a guard. He stops them, and is incredulous that ‘Klughig’ would dare show his face with a poor warband, spend an hour with Kardar and walk off seemingly unpunished?!   The guard goes in to the base to discuss with Kardar, Krak in spider form follow him into the corridor. Tension and confusion builds between the ravagers, and the disguised/invisible party members who don’t understand the orcish between Simeon and the guard, Zeni subtilty casts darkness over the gate and ballistas to create a distraction.   Sabali uses the darkness to start attacking some of the guards by the gate, and the disguised Raphael attempts a ploy of there being an ‘assassin attack’. The Guard continues through the corridor and opens the door to see the decapitated body of Tennakar, but Simeon manages to Dominate his mind before he can raise the alarm. He instructs the Guard to go out and tell everybody that there’s “nothing to see here, everything is ok”.   The ravagers of the stronghold start to mobilise and fire into the darkness at the ‘assassin’, Sabali jumps through the darkness to outside trying to instigate a chase that’ll open the gates, but no-one yet takes the bait. Especially as some orcs bump into an invisible Orlando, which adds the to increasing pandemonium outside. The Unbroken are split with Simeon, Krak and Zeni inside and the others outside trying to stay hidden or open the heavy gate, all whilst the horde of ravagers start to mobilise around them…