Sometimes paladins are annoying

General Summary

After a large portion of our party opted not to sleep, I woke up to brilliant sunrise and someone blocking it with their silhouette. The silhouette charges down the hill and after a second I realize this person is going to murder all of the women and children we just spent yesterday rescuing from the undead. “I am Therese (a very long name I didn’t catch) and I am here to avenge the children foully murdered by these creatures,” she commanded as she drew her sword. “These women and children,” and I really stressed that word, “Did not kill anyone. We stopped a group of undead disguised as soldiers from murdering them. They say they have not killed any villagers, but we have seen the undead going out and killing the innocents and making it appear as if someone else did it. We are up here to aid the Messene George to find the root cause of these attacks,” I handed Therese of the very long name our letter. “These women and children are under our protection.” “I am Connor, and I am here to chronicle the adventures of this noble lady,” the bard said dismissively. Seriously it’s like these two want everyone to hate them. “You should be glad for her to be here for your adventures.” “We will listen and hear more from you,” she said starting to put her sword away, “But I suspect anyone who would treat with orcs. Explain yourself, briefly,” she commanded. Well with a response like that, I, of course, had to give the whole sordid tale in great detail. Great detail. She was finally calming down and maybe understood what was going on when the warband arrived. “Are these orcs under your protection too?” as she started to draw her sword. Uresha, the orc woman we’ve been treating with cried out, “Husbands!” The orc warleader rode down and his wolf’s head swings over to Milli and rides up to her, “Urok,” as he pointed at his wolf, “says you family? Explain.” Milli gave a long explanation of being raised by wolves from far away and talking with some of the local wolves, and he nods and turns to the rest of us, “Leave your weapons here, and we will go talk to the wise woman.” “I will do no such thing,” Therese said. “I cannot disarm in the face of my enemy.” I roll my eyes as I put my weapons on the ground, but the orc leader seems somewhat impressed by her response. Live and learn, right?

CASTING BONES

We followed him into a hut thick with the smell of incense, “Old Crone,” and his voice changed to one of immense respect as he talked to her, “We need to learn more about these people, can you cast the bones for us?” As my eyes adjusted to the darkness and my tears cleared away from the strong smell, I saw a feeble old Orc in the back of the hut on a pile of cushions. She negligently reached into a basket beside her and grabbed a handful of bones and threw them on the ground. They bounced from place to place and finally landed with a boom much louder than their small size indicated. Dark days coming, the Five are claimed for the first time and the dance of power is called Know the Seeker and Plan abhors the void Those of old abandoned their purpose but the purpose remains The firmament shakes The Dark One stirs and the Song calls The dead will have a master again When blade and bier meet on propitious night The call will ring forth beckoning for the one to enter in Know you are watched, one who would call the tune A forest people, fallen now, once favored of the lady, now the carrion bird “I am Dane,” he said sitting back heavily after the Old Crone’s message, “We are going to Kaylum’s Peak. Garthus of the Forestrunner tribe called for a new warchief. We cannot leave you behind, so we will bring you with us to the gathering. I will figure out what we will do after that.” We ride for three hard days, I caught what sleep I could as we rode, a habit learned from my days in the military, but it’s not good to sleep. After a couple of days, Dane switches us over to wolves and gives us some orcish robes to wear over our clothes, “So you’re not seen.” Finally, we pulled up at the base of a hill, to the side we could see a legion encampment near a small river. Across we saw the orcs watching them. Dane rode up, “Get to Pink Skins before dawn, you smell. Be sneaky or they will kill all of our clan.” After much debate, all of the noisy metal wearers opt to remove their armor, and we head off to the legion encampment, but we all manage to make large amounts of noise. Maybe we decided to throw the armor rather than carry it? Of course, the Legionnaires stop us and escort us over to the Tribune. “Behold,” Connor announced, “You are in the presence of the most honorable Lady Therese and you should yield to her wisdom and listen to her plans.” “Excuse me, sir,” I said interrupting, “We bring word from Centurion Arlos and from the Duke of Brandenburg. The Centurion request you retreat to reinforce him as he is currently facing several challenges that are taxing the garrison. The Duke sends word of needing reinforcements because of a band in the West causing problems that need a legion.” I presented the letters we had brought with us. “That’s all well and good,” the Tribune said, “I can’t leave with these orcs right across the river from me. It will cause a bloodbath.” He turned to a soldier, “Get me Brother Flavius and tell him I need him to cast the bones for me.” The soldier bowed and left, returning a few minutes later with an older man in brown robes walking barefoot into the tent like a puppet on a string.” “He smells evil,” Cap whispers to me, and I see Therese do something out of the corner of my eye and look puzzled. “Brother Flavius,” Tribune Giovanni said deferentially, “Can you cast the bones on my nephew and niece? Are they still alive?” I jerked slightly with that bit of information, this is personal for him, no way he’s going to leave without them. Brother Flavius shuffled around the floor chanting and occasionally throwing handfuls of dust-up in the air, “Your nephew and niece are still in the orc compound.” He turned to Tribune Giovanni, “If you will excuse me, I’m going to return to the children now.” “If you will allow me,” Cap said to Brother Flavius, “I’ll walk you back to your hut.” They started walking back, and several small children ran up to Brother Flavius hindering Cap’s ability to walk well. Cap muttered something under his breath and Brother Flavius looked around confused and the kids start crying. “The Dark Queen is looking at me!” Brother Flavius screamed and looked at the tent, “DARK ONE!” Then he collapsed to the ground sobbing. The children start to cling to the Father and Cap crying, “The Dark Man and the Lady Perched on a Tree.” I really wish sometimes we would get a nice straightforward problem without children involved. “Bring me my hammer!” Cap yelled reaching back towards us. I looked around on the ground, “You don’t have a hammer Cap!” “Then bring the kids to the holy ground!” and he strode forward towards the hut as I saw kids scurrying back and forth in front of us. I ran out to the mess and started grabbing kids to drag them into the holy ground. The soldiers started to look worried and I hear cries of “What are you doing to those kids?” but I ignore them and keep trying to grab kids and throw them to the holy ground. Meanwhile, the kids are darting into tents and into Brother Flavius’ hut, and that hut just feels wrong. “Avant thee, the darkness has infected the brother and his home,” Therese said. She pulls out her sword and walks confidently towards the children. “Tribune, bring the children to the consecrated ground next to Brother Flavius so we may cure them.” I look over to see Cap knocked back from the hut by a black tidal wave of smoky fire expelling from it. That is not good, I think, but I’ll put out that fire. I gestured and a tidal wave rose up over the hut quenching the fire within, but some nasty tentacled creature appears out of the remains of the hut. The tentacle man flows through Therese and attacks Cap and Therese. Therese screamed in rage and hit the dark creature’s tentacles. Milli finally having a target to shoot, fired several bolts into the creature, and Thor swung his hammer knocking the creature back. The next several seconds featured a dizzying array of attacks as we all threw as much damage at the creature as we could. Tentacles flailed about and fell. Flamestrikes, ice knives, and many different spells were thrown. Finally, the creature fell to the ground with an eerie scream leaving behind dark silk robes. Thor poked around a little and found a ring with an octopus figure carved into it clutching a moonstone and a roll of parchment in oily leather. The Tribune finally catches up to all of us, and as he steps onto the consecrated ground we can see his mind-clearing, “I see we have much to discuss. Thank you for unveiling the creature in our midst, but we need to discuss this,” he glanced around at the gathering crowds of soldiers, “Privately.”

Report Date

21 Dec 2021