Session 14
General Summary
11th day of the Snake, 678 AR - The Tower of Shivers
Quintus questioned Martialis - the leader of the scouts and the one with the torn cloak. He told us that three years ago he and his band had spotted Kar'ha on the edge of the Vale doing some arcane surveying and reconnaisance. They tracked him and managed to get a piece of his cloth bindings. But one of their number, Gordio, got hurt in the encounter. Gordio was cursed and started to get very sick. The scouts tried to return to Fort Hadrian and along the way stopped in a farmhouse. Overnight Gordio died, but he then rose as an undead and killed the farmer's wife and child. Sadly that was Flynn's family. The scouts put him down but not in time. As the scouts left the farm, taking Gordio's body with them, Martialis' cloak caught on a nail and the pocket in which he kept the bindings ripped, unknown to him. This all made sense and explained how Flynn's family were killed. It also meant that revenge for his family would mean attacking and killing Kar'ha. Martialis also told us that Reynold refused to listen to their report - because they had no proof. So if Reynold had listened to them three years ago, and if he had let Quintus talk to the scouts, then perhaps Flynn's heart ache would have been lessened and importantly, perhaps the planned attack on the Vale would have been stopped or prepared for long ago. Thorn decided to do a tarot reading to see if possession of the bindings would aid us in the upcoming confrontation with Kar'ha. He drew The Chariot, Justice and Temperance. He read this to mean that possession of the cloth would aid us bring Flynn's family and the whole of the Vale justice for Kar'ha atrocities. So we decided to press on and take the fight to Kar'ha and his minions. At this stage Thorn admitted that he felt drawn to Kar'ha in much the same way as he had with Drewm Quintus' mother-in-law. Perhaps he was another shard of the many-faceted soul Thorn was made from? We headed on, deeper into the Tower, which involved heading up. The next chamber of significance was a large room with a fountain of skulls at its centre. Nice. Staircases led in different directions. We headed into the room with a view to move up a staircase but as we did a dark figure rose up from the mounds of skulls in the fountain! The dark figure waded forward to appear like a pile of skulls somehow linked together. On top of that some of the skulls animated and stared to fly around the chamber! [Fight 2/4] Quintus and Ferrint rushed in to engage the skull-golem. He was tough as old bones but they started to chip away at it. Thorn focussed his ire on the golem's psyche and it wavered. The Flynn-bear rushed in and smashed it with a ferocious swipe. Many of the skull-golem's parts fell off it and rolled to the ground. The golem smashed at Quintus bt his shield took the brunt of the attack. The skulls, meanwhile, whizzed around the room, screaming. The noise was horendous, even worse than Thorn's awful whistling and it caused Quintus to almost drop his sword. But Flynn-bear was obviously used to the terrible sounds and obliterated the golem. This meant we were free to fight the flying skulls. We split up and took one each, with Thorn providing mental back up. We quickly demolished them but not before they had mentally fatigued Quintus, who was clearly sensitive to untuneful sounds. After the fight Ferrint found that the skull golem's chest made a great shield which he strapped on. As it were. The Rodinian scouts, meanwhile, had scouted ahead and suggested a route for us to climb. We took their advice and headed up the south staircase. Up these stairs we came into an area which had big balconies, open to the sky. Here we encountered Kar'ha's mount. It was only a Dracolich. As if that was not bad enough the mount was attended by futher undead. [Fight 3/4] Facing a powerful dracolich and two vampire-spawn we split up. Thorn's eyes rolled up into hs head and went all weird. Usual behaviour. Flynn-bear rushed one of the vampire-spawn and slashed it with his claws. Ferrint bravely rushed the draco-lich and bumped it gently with his axe. Quintus rushed in and smote the other vampire-spawn - which Thorn was able to supplement. This caused the vampire to bleed heavily. Then the initiative passed over to the other side and the enemies responded. Flynn was slashed by his vampire and Ferrint was bitten by the dragon. At least he was not breathed upon. Yet. Quintus decapitated his vampire and then rushed across the room and smashed into Flynn-bear's vampire with his shield, thus knocking it away from Flynn. Unfortunately this meant that the vampire turned its full attention on him, and both clawed and bit him back. Ferrint was still dwarf-fully handling the dracolich singlehandedly, whilst the rest of us eventually took out the last vampire spawn. The dracolich was starting to look bored now, but it still had not breathed. Was it waiting until another warrior joined the dwarf? Just as the rest of us were about to rush in the dracolich answered the question as it let out a blast of fridgid air. Brrrr. Ice formed on our shields and armour. At this stage Thorn stepped out from behind the wall and rushed in to slash at the dracolich with his scythe. He landed a mighty blow and split a huge hole in the dracolich's side! We all rushed in to engage the dracolich and surrounded it. The lich opened its jaws wide and breathed lumps of ice over us all. Flynn was struck by a lump of ice and was about to drop when Thorn's command of time-and-space somehow spun the ice around and flung it at the lich, causing it to collapse! Quintus also fell in the blast, hit full in the face with it. Thorn took a tooth from the dracolich and made a magical pendant from it. The dracolich was dead. Again. We licked our wounds, patched ourselves up, and prepared to head up the final staircase. Above us we knew was Kar'ha and the final fight in the Tower of Shivers. We headed carefully up the stairs to meet our destiny. In the final circular chamber we discovered Kar'ha, all bound in inscribed magical glyphs. Around the walls of the chamber were all manner of torture instruments. Each of these contained a live orc commander who was being interrogated about the orcs' failure to provide a single Semangi survivor for him to experiment on. Ten commanders in total. As we entered the room the small sliver of Kar'ha's bindings which Thorn had possession of started to glow in a positive way. We took this as a good omen. Alongside Kar'ha was his personal bodyguard. Quintus identified it as the spirit of a Wendigo which he warned them was extremely maneuverable, including the ability to fly and teleport! It was also able to inflict a terrible confusion on its enemies. Was Kar'ha able to release the orc commanders from their torture instruments with the click of his fingers? Would we have to face 2 enemies or 12? Would Thorn change sides and join with Kar'ha, who he felt a great affinity with? Would Ferrint hit anything? Would Flynn-bear remove his tutu?
Report Date
09 Dec 2015
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