During the last down-time, Shade spent some time travelling the colony and catching up on many of his protege.  These are the results of that trip.

1.  See what Sabel has in the way of trained people.

Sabel has a handful of old toughs from her mercenary days.  Some of them are just old line warriors, but a few make up her inner circle.

Roth, a tall, spare man with a grizzled beard who fights with a longsword and shield.  He has extensive facial tattoos that look very similar to Sabel's, possibly from the same tribal group.  He generally acts as Sabel's adjutant.

Sturmat, a blocky man with a scarred face and thick neck.  He wears battered chainmail and carries a shield and a spiked morningstar.  Sturmat is a heavy drinker, but that doesn't seem to impact his readiness.  Sturmat was a sergeant with Sabel's company.

Bran, a younger man with an elaborate mustache and cheerful attitude.  He's a bowman and hunter of considerable reputation.  Bran was a scout for the company back in the day.  Now he's pretty obviously Sabel's partner, although he defers to her in all rulership related stuff.

Adney, a grey-bearded old fellow, but still spry and with heavily muscled arms that he leaves bare.  He carries a shortsword and a heavy arbalest with a winch.  Adney does most of the militia training, and has a reputation as the luckiest bastard to ever walk the earth – he did 30 years as a mercenary sergeant without taking a major wound or even getting sick. 

2. Blaise — Status of Raven's Bay defense.

Blaise has made considerable progress with the Raven's Bay militia, but limited access to gear and his own inexperience at large-scale combat has kept him to basics – shield wall with spears and bowmen in back or flanking.  Trained bowmen are limited but lots of people are working hard.

He can currently field 250 militia with boiled leather breastplates, leather helmets, wooden shields and spears.  Most of them have a hand axe or dagger to back up the spears.

He has 25 archers with shortbows that are skilled enough to be useful.  He's mostly training them on basic drill and not stabbing each other, maneuvering in formation and marching.

He has also been working on getting them skilled at loading/unloading from boats.  ​

Blaise is a level 3 Rogue.

Raven's Bay

Raven's Bay has expanded to the point that all the old buildings from Caladur's Colony have been repurposed, and new ones are starting to be built.  The docks have been expanded, a small fishing fleet is working out of the bay, and the wall has been repaired and strengthened.  Acres of farms cover the east side of the hills above town, and small boats come and go regularly.

Almost 2000 people now live in Raven's Bay, many of them from the recent influx of refugees from Southfort, and those people are still building shelters or working on the quickly-expanding farms.  There is enough coin from trade for some shops and market stalls to spring up, but a lot of barter, work-trade and general "help thy neighbor" still happens.

Most of the inhabitants are transported, and most of them are human, with a few halflings, half-elves and easterlings.  Half sport the raven tattoo, and the temple of Morrigu is fill for daily dawn and dusk services, along other shrines around town.  There are also small shrines to Chauntea, Mael and Llugh.

Caladur's "manor" at the center of town has been reworked into a community hall where the council does business, and a large training field has been built just outside the wall, where able-bodied townsfolk drill on a rotating basis.

3. Cala — how is she doing?

Cala is happy in Sanctuary.  She'd like a bit more action, but she's gotten to meet gnomes, tritons, elves, and a druid and Erska is working with her directly.  She's lean, fast, tanned and she can make you sweat a bit when sparring, fighting with a pair of sticks approximately the size of long-knives.

The half-orcs call her the Little Serpent in an affectionate way.  She's happy to see you, excited to show you around all the new buildings in the village, her fancy elf-made bow and her knife collection.

Cala is a level 1 Rogue.

4. Elyel — Is she making progress?

Elyel's fighting skills are making more progress than her clerical training.  She's got more aptitude for fighting than pure clerical work, although she's definitely committed to the martial aspect of the Morrigu.

She's a focused attacker, not so much into defense.  Her philosophy is to hit things before they hit her – preferably while they are not looking.  You suspect The Morrigu approves.

Elyel is a level 1 Paladin, Oath of Vengeance.

5. Ershka — fighting progress, state of the salle in Sanctuary

Ershka basically lives at the salle or on the training field.  She's got the Sanctuary militia drilled to a somewhat higher level of competency than Blaise has managed – they focus less on mass maneuver and more on aggressive skirmishing and attack.  Individually they are better fighters and stronger than the Raven's Bay militia, but there are fewer of them.  With armor and better weapons, you think they would make a very effective assault force, and they are rapidly becoming a dangerous force in the woods.

Ershka works constantly, and her abilities have improved considerably because of all the different styles.

Erksha is a Level 4 Fighter (Battlemaster) now.

​ Sanctuary Militia.png

​The Salle

The salle in Sanctuary is always busy, and a truly fascinating place – it isn't uncommon to see tritons practicing their flowing, pole-arm based combat forms, gnomes bounding with short swords and bucklers, wood elves practicing knife and tomahawk or spearwork, half-orcs hammering at each other with hand and a half swords and humans drilling in formation or firing bows – all on the same field, at the same time.  

You even occasionally spot one of Bonebreaker's tall lizardmen throwing javelins, or one of the acolytes of the Raven Queen working on their spear-craft in a stylized raven-faced sallet helm with short raven-feather cloaks.

Raven-tattoos are common, although not the majority, and many of the Easterlings of Sanctuary have started to tattoo stylized flames rising from the black ship tattoo that marks them as transported.

6. Odkirk — fighting progress, Sanctuary update

Odkirk's fighting focuses on raw aggression to leverage his great strength and surprising speed.  He tends to spend his time in the salle wrestling or he's out just building things – levering massive beams into place and hauling sand and clay.

Odkirk is a level 3 Bear Totem Barbarian.  

Sanctuary

Sanctuary is rapidly turning into a bustling little settlement of about 1000 people – mostly Easterlings, but with a fair number of other races .  The palisade is completed, along with a guard tower by the dock and a second lookout tower on the headland.  Submerged logs protect the bay and cropland spreads out around the village.

The village itself is a rough circle, with the salle, communal hall and assembly area in the center and houses with woven-palm roofs, interspersed with workshops all around.  Fields and smaller gardens surround the village, with a cleared space between the fields and the forest.

Sanctuary is also becoming the main travel route from the Black River Valley and Raven's Bay – the elves have marked a trail through the forest, and the gnome hunters, Tinuvon elves and Sanctuary warriors patrol it.  It isn't suitable for merchant travel yet, but it's a quick (albeit dangerous) way to skirt the area around Southfort.

7. Threnna — fighting progress, operational updates

Threnna is operating in the Black River Valley, working with Sabel and Bonebreaker to bring the refugees and the Adholt militia up to a decent level.  She's essentially taken over as the militia commander and trainer in Adholt, but she travels quite a bit.

At this point, Threnna is focussing on commanding and training – her personal combat skills have suffered a bit as a result.

Threnna is a level 2 fighter.

8. Aldrin — current events around Sanctuary

Aldrin is down in the Black River Valley, splitting his time between patrolling with Bonebreaker's lizardmen and training scouts from the hunters of the allied villages.  He'd be happy to sit down with you and go over what he's learned about the surrounding region, along with the maps he made.

Aldrin is a level 4 Ranger.

After a bit more discussion with the druid council, a plan to deal with the plant creature was agreed to by everyone. Nektet, druid of one of the lizardman tribes, has offered to guide the party through his forest since his people have been most affected by the depredations.

The meeting over, all of those in attendance, save Nektet and Ra'Sterin transformed into their favored forms and left for home. Ra'Sterin suggested that he would gather a band of warriors at a camp about 3 days travel from the giant tree, and that he should be contacted when the task was complete. Nektet, quick and eager to get going, suggested meeting at the bottom of the tree and sembled into a lizard and vanished down the side of the tree.

Nektet led at a brisk pace through the forest, and found a much smaller, though still comfortable, hollowed tree to camp for the night. While traveling, and around the fire, Nektet answered questions about the creature but there wasn't much to go on. Most notably, the creature had left no traces in the forest to be found by elves, lizardmen or druids, using magic or not.

Late morning of the next day brought everyone to the banks of the river along which the problems had been occurring. Morwen had been chatting with Nektet about things druidic across the morning's travels, filling the miles with talk of plant lore, the local forest and so on. This led her to ask him whether he had spoken to the trees around where the killings had happened. He had not, nor had any of the others. He suggested that some willows he knew of near the river might have felt something.

The willows, after Morwen cast speak with plants, were quite willing to help, and provided quite a bit of information. They told of a darkness that had passed by recently, an amalgam of plants and a semblance of death; that the roots tell of the creature's destination: a cold place where the trees wear the raiment of autumn even through the summer. The roots could follow them no further, that there must be  a way in that location. The reeds at the river bank gave much less cogent information, but provided vivid images of many feet passing, trampling, crushing: one set of very large splayed feet, and several-to-many pairs of cloven feet.

Nektet knew of the strange grove, and led the way. He fished a canoe out of the reeds which had been completely unnoticed by everyone, grinning in evident pleasure at the surprise on everyone's faces, and led the way downstream to a circle of beech trees. They were red and gold of leaf, and the temperature near the bottom of the hill they crowned was noticeably cooler than that on the river.

Some investigation was done around the grove, and Wrenaldo discovered that the entire place had been consecrated to some Fey power long ago. Merrin found  lingering traces of conjuration magic on a pair of treen at the centre of the glade which had grown together to form a natural arbor, and Varis found the tracks of an elk which had entered but not exited the glade. It seems that the location of a portal had been found, but nothing was in evidence, except for the ruins of an ancient building, and some stairs leading down to nowhere — or rather stairs ending in dirt and rubble.

In search of more information, Merrin wanted to ask some questions of some of the elves which had been killed by these beings, so camp was made near where one of the groups had been killed. In the morning, after an evening of fruitless searching, Merrin found what he was after.

XXXX There was some description by the spirit of a dead elf of the forest coming alive, growing brambles, and poisoning them  XXXXX

That information in hand, the group paddled back upstream, and returned to the grove. At a bit of a loss for what to do, other than camp in or near the grove and wait to be attacked, Morwen had another chat with the trees. This time, rather than an earnest conversation, she found quite a bit of hostility. Apparently she was the child of an enemy to the beech trees, who, after a bit of flattery and boot… er… root-licking, told her that they had been created one thousand years ago to protect the way to the autumn grove. The traditional gift to these protectors was a fresh skull, and that blood on the stones would open the way.

Ra'Sterin, who came to Sanctuary as a representative of the elves of the southshore forest, agreed to set up a meeting between the party and the Druid's council in the forest. This is, apparently, the closest thing that exists to a governing body for the region. Druids seem to be quite influential; either leading a tribe/people or advising the rulers.

At the end of two long days of travel through wilderness that appeared trackless even to Morwen's practiced eye, they came suddenly upon the trunk of an enormous tree. Twenty large men would not have been able to encircle the tree. Ra'Sterin seemed to take some pleasure at the expressions of surprise on the party's faces, especially as he beconed and slipped inside a fold in the bark.

A stairwell, looking as if it had grown within the tree, beckoned, and was climbed. Morwen estimated that they only stopped after they were above the rest of the forest canopy. Ra'Sterin indicated that the party could sleep in the large round room that they reached, and continued up himself.

The next morning, as the druid council had apparently assembled overnight, everyone was ushered outside for the first time since they entered the tree. More climbing, but now on the outside of the tree. The staircase, two people wide, spiralled around the trunk of the tree and offered amazing views over the land unobstructed by even so much as a railing.

Once the long gruelling climb was over, the party found themselves on a very large platform perched atop the gigantic tree. Waiting at the top was a semicircle of beings, who Ra'Sterin introduced as most of the druid council. He explained that he was expecting one more to show up at any time. Indeed, as he was starting introductions, a whistling rush of air could be heard and a gigantic toothed bird backwinged surprisingly gracefully and landed beside the rest. Quickly the bird became a scaly lizardman with a toothy grin.

[much wonderful listing of names, tribes and descriptions passed over here in the interests of time, unfortunately]

Thecollection of druids were as close to a ruling council for the forest to the south and east of the lake as existed, and they had convened to consider what their new neighbours might want of them. Among them were several elves of different tribes and a couple of varieties of lizardmen.

Pleasantries were exchanged, Morwen was somewhat overawed and was seen by her friends to be trying her very best to exemplify good behaviour. After introducing her friends, and making sure that formalities had been observed (whether they were necessary or not), she passed the floor to Merrin to explain what had brought them together.

Merrin explained his relationship with the Morrigu up front, and answered the elves' questions about whether she was trying to regain a place of power in this world. They were apparently mollified, after an affirmative answer to that question, by Merrin's assertion that he spoke for the Morrigu. A subtle relaxation could be seen by the very perceptive. Apparently in the past, the being who had used that name would not have suffered a lesser one to speak for her.

The plan to liberate/deal with Longspire and their slaving was explained, along with the group's motivations. The druid shared the fact that adventurers from Longspire keep probing the borders and wards that kept the Queen of Thorns' realm bottled up. They also shared that they would lose the fight to keep inquisitive idiots out of places they should really avoid eventually just because of the speed with which humans breed. They also shared some information about the population of the city, and the number of fighting men; about 3000 and 250 respectively.

Merrin asked for help in dealing with the armed forces, and help was offered contingent upon them getting some help with another problem that several of the elven tribes and lizardman communities had been experiencing lately: giant animated plants had been swallowing entire groups of wanderers in the forest.

Proceeding to the small copse of trees near the bottom of the hill from which the obelisk rises, Wrenaldo announced that he could sense fiendish energy faintly from the trees. Everyone went to high paranoia mode, having been distinctly unimpressed by the last fiend they encountered.

Careful approaches were made, gentle, encouraging touches were tentatively extended by Morwen (resident tree whisperer), and eventually it was established that the being covering the entrance to the ancient Eld facility was, in fact, a tree. It was a very sickly tree that had its roots very near to the access pad for the facility entrance, which glowed with a sickly pulsing green light.

Axes came out, the tree was cleared quickly and without demonic incident.

Paranoia still being the order of the day, a magic circle was established outside the door. Morwen, being one of the few almost-eld able to open these antique doors, placed her hand on the activation panel while everyone else stood in the circle, weapons to hand.

The moment her flesh touched the stone, she felt her hand wither and feel as if it were being drained of life. As she withdrew her hand to the sound of the door opening, she felt something's attention shift to capture her in it's horrible gaze before the connection was broken. Shaken, the group, after making sure that nothing was about to come surging out of the darkness at them, proceeded into the building.

The entry room was high-ceilinged and round, about fifty feet in diameter. Near the centre of the room close to the three doors which seemed to lead deeper into the tower, laid a pedestal upon which rested a panel covered in glowing writing much like the one Decimar had used to convey information about making repars to the equipment on his island. The team's spirits started to rise at this apparent stroke of luck, since they intended to make repairs to this non-functional facility.

The gods may have been smiling, but in reality it was more of a smirk: the pedestal, panel, and line of carven runes leading towards where the obelisk must lie were suffused with the same pulsing green energy that Morwen had touched earlier. The decision was taken to not touch any green glowy things unless it was required, and also to not follow the glowy runes to the center until other options had been exhausted.

Going cautiously at first, then more confidently, the group explores the apparently empty complex, finding various inscrutable crystal instruments and further work surfaces covered in green energy.

In one room which was clevery concealed in wall engraving, a corpse was found to Merrin's delight. He called it back from wherever its soul was and had a quick chat about what the facility was, what happened to it, how it might be repaired, etc. It turns out there is a portal to the Eld's grand concourse in the central room, and that a demon has likely been feeding on the energy generated by the obelisk since the disaster that ended the Eld civilisation millenia ago.

In several other rooms behind a no-longer-hard-to-see doors, various panels mounted to walls were discovered. With a brief touch, they sprang to life, and with a bit of luck, Varis (our scholarly bard) was able to figure out what the status of the facility was, and how to operate it.

The obelisk was functional, but disconnected from all other nodes in the power generation and distribution network. Varis confidently declared that he could shut the system down and then turn it back on again later. Given Varis' confidence, the commands to shut down were issued, and the lights slowly extinguished.

Once the lights were out, a roar loud enough to make the thick stone walls and floor tremble was heard. Something was not happy about feeding time being over.

A bit of careful exploration later, and the central room was viewed from several directions showing a writing green ooze which appeared to have grown around the obelish, a couple of translucent beings, and a decrepit looking humanoid linked to the ooze via a line of green energy.

Whe the thing wrapped about the obelisk was continuing to try to free itself, the decision was made to hit fast and hard to try to take the undead out before the demon could free itself. Merrin, remembering the previous encounter with a demon, laid down a magic circle into which everyone stepped. Luckily, during this lengthy process, the beings in the room did not waver from their tasks.

Arnik opened the day's entertainment with a popular choice: fireball to the centre of the room. Despite a very satisfying explosion and thunderous boom, the occupants of the room were unimpressed. "They don't burn" he yelled at everyone else.

Morwen brought forth a circle of moonbeams, managing to capture the central creature, and the demon to which it was linked in the silvery glow. The demon flinched, and the undead eld(?) in front of it started to smoke. Merrin followed quickly with a guiding bolt, muttering under his breath that maybe this would be the first time this spell had ever worked. The central figure sizzled nicely, and Wrenaldo, spurred on by this success, cast another moonbeam hitting the same createures that Morwen already had. He then bravely moved to the front of the group to protect everyone from evil.

Not willing to step out of the circle for some reason, Shade positioned himself in the mouth of the hallway that was plugged by the magic circle and waited for the inevitable reaction of the no-longer-surprised opposition.

Arnik dispatched the demon-linked undead with a quick magic missile, and the demon quickly flinched out of the way of Merrin's sacred flames after reeling a bit from the continuing damage of the circles of moonbeam.

One of the ghosts which had earlier faded into the wall emerged right beside shade and started to attack, but the ever-vigilant Wrenaldo reacted more quickly than even he expected and poked his darkwood glaive into the creature's face. Too much to bear, the ghost dissolved into smoke before blowing away.

Still unwilling to leave the circle, the companions kept careful watch for the remaining ghost, and got to witness the ooze detach itself from the obelisk and take a hideous gelatinous form with too many arms and a tiny head. The gigantic apparition proceeded to rush down the hall towards everyone, picking up rocks to hurl at Shade as it came. Luckily Shade's shield sufficed to deflect them harmlessly.

Shade and Wrenaldo were, by this point, quiverin with anticipation and the effort of holding their attacks until they would be most useful. The quivering was not helped by Arnik's application of Hast to Shade (now fondly referred to as the blender). Myron got in another guiding bolt, and Wrenaldo managed to reach over everyone's heads and jab the demon as it approached. Shade finally got to release his pent-up energy as the beast moved to the edge of the circle and stopped. He grinned as he opened a nice gash near one of its arms.

Overwhelmed by the circle's confounding and repelling nature, the fiend couldn't seem to see well enough to connect with any of the party members, much to everyone's relief. In a truly impressive display, first Wrenaldo and then Shade demonstrated their prowess with their weapons (3 attacks from W and then 5 from S) and, after all of the damage the thing had taken before this point, pounded on it until it dissolved into a green smoke.

The smoke drifted quickly back to the obelisk, as if looking for refuge or solace. Two deadly moonbeams followed it relentlessly and made sure that nothing of that beast survived.

With a bit of guidance, Decimar was teleported and proceeded to guide Varis through the re-start of the facility, and its connection to Decimar's island to help avoid the cataclysmic explosion by sharing the energy load across two locations. Apparently two more will need to be connected to the network to ensure that the entire region isn't turned into a giant wasteland.

(given our long-ish break, not much got accomplished this session, but lots of visiting & remembering was done)

After spending some time apart, attending to personal matters, most our regular crew has re-assembled to discuss the pressing matters of the day for the region for which they seem to be feeling an increasing amount of responsibility.

Simply enumerated, they are:

• Decimar's assertion that the volcano, in which the eld magical energy collection engine is house, is soon going to experience an unfortunately explosive event if someting isn't done;
• The presence of a baby kraken in the lake, and the water elves' descriptions of its growing power and influence;
• The expanding influence in Ebonheart Vale of the Shadow Court of the Fey;
• The continuing struggles of the refugees and other residents of the valley against less-than-savory elements.

While the exact meaning of soon for a being as old as Decimar (16k years give or take) couldn't really be accurately gagued, it was agreed that this was likely the most important matter facing the region. Potential annihalation will have that effect.

Happily, Decimar provided some general instructions during previous visits about what could be done to avert disaster. One simply had to travel to the sites of the obelisks which were part of the old magical collection and distribution network and restore them to working order. This is something that any mildly skilled practitioner should be able to accomplish.

As luck would have it, one of the newest residents of Raven's Bay happens to be one of the Eld, recently released from stasis into a world much different from the one he remembers. In the magical laboratory he has attempted to set up in a large local doesn't-leak-that-much house, our crew spoke to him at some length about what tactics, tools and procedures one might use to repair one of the obelisks. He shared what knowledge he had, then bid them farewell and good luck; long term exposure to magical fields had been observed to create very strangely deformed magical abominations.

The closest obelisk is located on an island just south of Raven's Bay, so the gang pulled out their folding boat and went for a scouting mission. The plan was to sail around the island, check it out, land if safe, and return to port. The island has a very bad reputation in the area as a place from which one does not return, and around which the fishing is just terrible, so why would you even want to go near it?

Sailing around the south side, a nice beach for a landing was spotted, the only complication was an acrid stench. Our brave compainions observed a sheen on the water, and basically shrugged when nobody started immediately gasping for air. There was no animal life of any kind to be observed in the water or on the shore, which was deemed strange. Morwen, local expert on all-things-natural volunteered to scout about a bit, so a landing was decreed.

About 20 ft from shore, patterns started to swirl in the sheen on the water, followed shortly by the emergence of three tall shapes made of water encircling the boat. What would our heroes do?

Merrin, most alert of the crowd, decided that this boat needed more ravens, so he called forth some spirit guardians. Varis, not to be outdone — and to make sure that every eye was on our resident performer — blasted a two of them with a rolling wave of thunder, causing a bit of a splash with his re-entrance onto this stage. Hoping to make some icicles, Morwen threw some frostbite at a water thing; if body language could be read, a shrug might have ensued.

As the Towers of Effluent approached the boat, both the ravens and Wrenaldo took aim and made some waves in the creatures. The creatures, not used to victims that fight back, targeted Wrenaldo with the first attack, slapping him around and hauling him off the boat. Shrieks and a hissing noise could be heard as he descended to the bottom of the shallow bay the boat was in.

The next attack seemed to go slightly awry, as one of the enemies attempted a fancy, flashy attack, (perhaps emulating Varis?)  tangled itself in ripples and waves, accomplishing nothing. The third, however, might have laughed and promptly hauled Shade off the boat.

Shade called on his shield's ability, and poured himself out of Merrin's shadow to return to the deck of the boat, where his melted flesh was promptly healed by the shadow's bearer. Wrenaldo, too, decided that grappling with magical water, while under toxic water was less than ideal, and misty-stepped to shore. Morwen decided that two drowing companions was enough, made sure everyone could walk on the water, and promptly lept off the deck and ran to shore.

Varis was the next target for a dunking by a mightly insulted column of animated water, after having been compared to a rivulet of dirty water into which a cow had just pissed. Varis was made might uncomfortable while being firmly pressed against the surface of the water — everyone involved seemed somewhat confused.

A few more passes from the undunkable fighers plus a few spells from the peanut gallery later, and the beings collapsed back into the ocean from which they came. The boat was folded up and carried ashore.

A rest and some food was had on the beach, and a hike up the hill towards the monolith was undertaken. Several uneventful hours of slogging up a sandy hill later, a pulsing aura was felt when approaching the obsidian tower. No obvious entrance was in sight, so Merrin tried to magically locate the tools that would be required to make the required repairs. A confusing reading of several places was obtained, but it was enough to help locate a potential entrace to a complex below the hill everyone was standing upon.

Tune in later for the riveting tale of the exploration of an ancient magical power transmission tower, and of ad-hoc linesman work by untrained semi-professionals.

Since we've had a bit of a break, this is a catch-up post that will summarize the current state of the Southlands and the most recent events and plotlines.

The Colony - the Colony is in disarray after the destruction of Blawtro and the attacks by the Knights of the Shadow Fey.  They have withdrawn from the Ebonheart Vale and the Black River Valley, and Southfort has been reduced to a military outpost.  The status of Port Tanner is in question, although the town is currently still very busy.  Longspire appears to be increasingly independent, and the smaller settlements along the east shore of Lake Ebonheart and around Lake Whiteheart are definitely uneasy.

Colonial patrols, both overland and in ships, have effectively completely stopped south of Tatzlford, leaving Raven's Bay and Longspire as the only organized groups operating.  Colonial Guard continue to protect shipping leaving Southfort, but very little else.  There are also rumors of Transported uprisings in the plantations and huge grain farms around Crossroads, in the mining camps along the shores of the Saiqur Desert, and in the logging camps on the Pine Islands.

The Black River Valley - Bonebreaker has gotten Rowan and the southern fort organized, moved the villagers to the fort and is aggressively patrolling the southern end of the Black River settlements.  The Ashlanders seems to have been pushed back temporarily, although ongoing skirmishing continues between Bonebreakers lizardman patrols and small raiding parties.  Refugees from Ebonheart Vale are settling in along the valley, except for the Black Wyvern "Barony".

Sabel Guinte of Wrayford has been enlarging her militia and, along with some lizardmen on loan from Bonebreaker, has been keeping the Baron of Black Wyvern bottled up.  That area continues to be a potential problem, and Adholt and Meerfield mostly lack an organized militia.  Both are expanding very quickly from the refugees, though, and have plenty of people, albeit ones focussed mostly on building shelter and putting in crops.  

The priests of Chauntea have been extremely helpful in all the towns of the area, and worship of Chauntea seems to be expanding at about the same rate as the worship of the Morrigu – mostly among those more focussed on agriculture.  So far there haven't been reports of any trouble between the faiths, though.

Ebonheart Vale - Most of the settlers and transported seem to have fled the Ebonheart Vale, although there are still reports of wildcat loggers and miners working in the area.  Some of the small settlements south of Port Tanner, like Eastmere are still occupied, but there are rumors of strange creatures in the forest and missing people.  Fey power seems to be gaining strength in the Vale, and barring any change, it seems likely that it will be absorbed into the Fey Demesne of the Shadow Lord.

The Gnomes - Having agreed to a formal alliance, the Gnomes have been buying food from Meerfield and paying with metal.  They have also been sending their Wayfinders out to keep an eye on things in the Ebonheart Vale, and have been escorting stragglers to safer areas.  They have also been improving the underground tunnels between Glitterwarren and the hills near Southfort, and plan on scouting further tunnels southward.

Raven's Bay - Traven and Caladur have been managing the rapid growth and restoration of the town, expansion of the docks and reinforcement of the palisade.  Some of the refugees from Ebonheart have made their way to Raven's Bay, increasing the town's population.  The temple of Morrigu is being enlarged, and the fields around town are being expanded as well.  Tools and material remain in somewhat short supply, as does hard currency.

Sanctuary - Fewer refugees travelled to Sanctuary, but many of those that did are half-orcs or foresters or both, so the town has also grown.  A large dock, with a watchtower and a palisade have been constructed, and a fair bit of land has been cleared.  Negotiations with the local elves have resulted in a good supply of timber, and the assistance of the tritons has made fishing possible, although there have been attacks by creatures that the tritons say are attracted by the kraken.  Ershka has developed the militia into a very competent force, and every adult in the community has some weapons training.

The tritons report that they are still exploring the sunken city and skirmishing with creatures loyal to the kraken.  They haven't taken serious losses, but also haven't made much progress, mostly keeping an eye on the creature.

The Island - Decimar identified that there is a real possiblity of a catastrophic explosion from the Eld Engine on the island.  He believes that if the Engine could be reconnected to the Eld network by reactivating 5 or 6 of the obelisks in the area, it would be possible to release the energy in a controlled way, possibly allowing future collection to be harnessed and used.  Knows obelisks are on the island south of Raven's Bay, sunken underwater in the Eld city now controlled by the kraken, at the cliff of Black Glass, in the hills southwest of Southport.

It has been a little while

We have managed to stabilize the valley down to the south and are working with the populations there and we found ourselves at the point where we were freed up enough to work on the consecration of the temple.

We traveled into the mountains and found ourselves facing a flat rock door along the side of the hill.   When the door was opened, the flying bats attacked us as we climbed to the entrance and we managed to fight them off.   When we arrived at the top of the entrance we managed to get ourselves settled into the entry hall but were faced off nearly immediately by some constructs.  There was a nasty fight and we eventually gained entrance to the Eld structure.   

During our explorations we were able to find a laboratory and in that lab we managed to free up a living Eld who had been captured in stasis.   We had a significant chat with him and during that period of time learned some of Eld History, their approach to science ( magic ) and had a chat with our anachronistic friend.

He gave us some idea of what the structure was for and some of the issues that had led to his putting himself in stasis.   We took hints from him and managed to fight down both a paper demon type creature and a very nasty demon that were trapped in the treasure room.  Magic Circle and magical protections were exceptionally helpful and useful here.

We managed to retrieve the bowl and several other items in the cave and after that we prepared to get Decimar out of the place and bring him somewhere else.  We found out about Eld History, their approach and he helped answer questions about what we were doing and what the place was.   He is knowledgeable about magic and so on but he's been out of the loop for some 16000 years.

On our way out of the laboratory we were attacked by Gloom and his Gloom hounds.  In addition there were a trio of giants waiting to stop us from leaving.   Merrick prayed for help from the Morrigu and the triad of Morrigu's chosen were given ravens wings to help fight.   We managed to fight the hound down and burn down Gloom in the bright daylight of Merricks spell.  Finally at the end of the fight Shade flew out over the giants and proclaimed them to stop in the name of the Morigu and one of the giants proclaimed themselves to the Morrigu.  She was the shadow priest from the giant tribe.  Her tribe was an old follower of the Morrigu and some of them have remained faithful.  We will need to return to them and get them fully under the sway at some point.

An uneventful sail across blackwater bay, and a paddle up the river towards Blawtro.  Midnight wolf rescue and river crossing.  Morwen reclining (read: passed out) in the outrigger canoe while the big burly men paddle her (and everyone else) upstream.

Meeting the gnomes, preparing for the council meeting with Oswin.  Oswin is generally in favour of dealing with the Morrigu, probably accepting her patronage in return for protection from the Lord of the Evening (from whom they escaped long ago, with Oswin as one of the architects)

Talking with Oswin about the Eld and their power generation network, and whether it's wise to bring it back online. Talking about trading for research materials on the eld at the Goblin Market.

Much talk at Raven's Bay of revenge and piracy — perhaps revenge piracy — and the suprising endorsement thereof by the party and leadership at raven's bay.

A trip to sanctuary to deal with the prisoners, explore the coastline near sanctuary to visit an obsidian monolith, and find a gnomish (maybe) cave that doesn't appear to be connected to the underground path network (yet).

The being with the blue eyes introduced himself as Decimar, and bargaining commenced once the usual pleasantries and how-do-you-dos were completed.

Myron could sense the artifact he was after as being almost directly upstairs, and Decimar knew which one he was talking about.  Two choices were offered: barter in items of magical significance, or service.

After a quick run through the party's magical items revealed that only the best ones were acceptable, they settled on service.

[service was provided]

 

 

 

Guiding several hundred people through dangerous woods.

Interpersonal discussions.

How to deal with angry red caps and suprise them

Hiding 500 people is fun

Planning to steal a boat,,, with no plan but a great location.

 

Party settles into meeting with Traven and his associates.

Makes a deal with the remaining colonial administration (they get their stuff out, leave the extra food, no harm will come to them).

Round up the people of the village, prepare to travel.

Merrin and Shade get some visits and get to make some decisions.

Departure from the town, meeting up at a mining camp about a days march east of Blawtro.

 

 

write write write

Charming our way onto the boat.

Killing the guards

Removing the rowers 'leader' while we freed them.

Giving the rowers an alternative that would make them no longer slaves.

Transporting the Transported to their new home.

Going into some down t

Early in the morning we decide to depart the gnomish village.   After some discussions, it's clear to everyone that we're eager to investigate the happenings in and around the eastern end of the lake.   There are numerous concerns about the unknown elements and the dangers brewing beneat the waves.

We do decide to try to help with the events in Blawtro, and particularly we want to help Traven with his poison issue.   We decide to send in some of our 'less well known' friends in to discuss with Traven and to try to cure his poisoning.

The situation in Blawtro is terrible and this is quickly evident as we arrive in town.   The keep has been closed by the colonial guard and the town is bloated by transported from all over the southern colonies who have fled or departed the nearby camps and mines.

The find their way to Travens bunker, escorted by a very busy Orik.   He has been trying to handle Travens affairs, but things are extremely busy and things are on the edge of blowing up in town.   There are lines of people leaving Blawtro, or at least lines of richer people leaving Blawtro.   The more modest people of Blawtro and most of the transported are stuck in town.

Morwen manages to assuage some of the disease which Traven has but they decide to hold off on removing the poison.   The poison itself is a highly addictive substance that may be more of an issue in withdrawal than it is in his system.   Traven asks the party to help keep a lid on Blawtro and he asks that we come offer what help we can.   He tells us of the flying creatures hunting in the woods, the giant wolf creatures and the trees that come alove.   Most of the colonial guard was slaughtered in the woods a few weeks back and the town is basically unprepared or defended from the dangers in the woods.

Morwen and Varris return to the party and manage to convince us to come take a look at the town.  We hike up towards town seeing manage of the refugees on the street and as we get close the thunder in the storm associated with the great hunt starts in earnest.    As we travel under a pass without trace spell we manage to get right up next to town and we see horses flying in the air with riders on their back.  The riders have huge long spears that they are harassing people with, swooping down and killing them.   It's a slaughter.

Merrick pulls out a few cold iron arrows and some cold iron daggers from his pack and he hands them out amongst the party members.   He hands some of them to everyone and then, as we're deciding if we should hit these things or not he utters the words "Well you should use your judgement" afterwhich Shade lets loose with an arrow, striking the mounted fey with a longbow shot.

The fey dives towards us on his mount and treats for us to duel him in honorable combat.   He is nearly immediately hit with a 'shrink' (reverse enlarge), an entangle and this really hurts his ability to hurt us with his charge.   Somehow we manage to keep him down and in a bloody, quick and vicious piece of combat we manage to beat this superior foe.  Heroically doing everything we can against this extremely dangerous, extremely powerful creature.  It's a great victory and then we slowly realize,,,, oh yeah,,,, all his friends are here too and we just killed their ally……….

 

In the early days of the morning a pair of elder sea elves arrived into the village, in the negotiations that followed the elves and the leadership of Sanctuary come to an agreement on giving the elves a place to recuperate on land, provision of some basic supplies and help for them from the town.   The elves agree to pay a significant amount of silver to Sanctuary per month (DM edit: 500) and they also agree to help build out some of the in water defenses to prevent the hatchling or its minions to attack the town.

Most of the party spends the time in break helping with the town, building out the town and supporting their building, farming and defense.    After around a month we receive word and a visit from Dunwick who in an angry flurry presents an emergency letter.   The letter is a well sealed item, with the wax and the seal of Traven, the elderly fellow who we worked with for a long time in Blawtro.

We convene a meeting once everyone has returned back to the camp and we review the letter.  The letter lets us know that (DM Edit: Hanrik Kosk), the crime lord of Blawtro is apparently preparing to leave town and that he's moving all of his important materials out of Blawtro.   We get details of a specific shipment out of town and that there will be a boat leaving Port Tanner to go to Port Greyscale carrying some significant materials.

We quickly decided to move and after some very quick prep we take off by boat up towards the Port, setting in after an uneventful trip along the coast.   For the next day or so we look for appropriate places to set an ambush.  We consider ambushing along a tree line, at the waters fjord and finally, heading back up the road towards Blawtro a bit we find an ideal spot on a downhill which allows us to prepare a box ambush upon their cart.

We fell some trees to prepare rolling log traps and lay out a log across the road.  We then take up ambush locations and we wait, and we wait, and we wait for about a day and a half when finally we're told that the cart is coming up.

Loria takes up a position in the trees to the west ,  Morwen , Arnik and Merrick take up positions on either side of the road with logs ready to roll down on the convoy.  Wrenaldo and Shade take a position in front of the convoy with the plans to keep them busy once our ambush is sprung.   The combat starts with a rolled log, a silence spell on the cart and an entangle spell designed to cover up the start of the ambush.

The fight moves quickly as most of them are quickly dispatched, including the man driving the cart.   Loria keeps the huge barbarian busy kiting him with bowshots and stealth and he chases her in a blind rage.  The fight is short and bloody.   We take in the survivors as prisoners.

Merrick questions one of the prisoners, Merrick recognized him to be one of Kosks main retainers and one who was very intimate with his business.   The questioning is quick and intensive and we are informed that Kosk has been poisoning Traven for a while now, is planning on departing Blawtro very soon.  In addition Kosk is planning on burning down Traven's place on his way out and finally Kosk has owned Travens serving girl for a while and he's been poisoning him slowly for years.    Merrick drives a bargain and sadly, the two other living thugs didn't have the resources or character to remain alive and they were dispatched.  The party made a deal to get 5000 silver and some potions in return for letting him walk.

We take the cart, the chest and the other supplies towards Port Tanner.   We ditch the cart along the side of the road with the oxen, and we go into port tanner shortly to get our bribe.   We get our bribe at what could only be described as a smugglers den and we say goodbye to Kosks' retainer, him having plans to head to Greyscale, round up what remains of Kosks network and take off back to the empire.   Merrick isn't sure about hte deal but the money is great and he seems fairly convinced that this guy is mostly done with the colonies and just wants to get the hell out and start a new organization elsewhere.

We take the boat south with the chest and find our way to the gnomish village.  We approach via a river that we had never taken before and on this river we notice that the forest is starting to feel more wild.   It would seem that the barrier between the fey and the realm are very thin in these woods and several of us seem to be both at ease and nervous about this.

We make our way to the Mistfell.  But on the way we stop at the fork in the road and send for Traven to meet us at the fork.  We let him know about the dangers he's facing.  

We see that there is some magic lock on the chest and based on the we think that the gnomes might be our only chance to find a wizard with the skills and ability to unlock the check.  We are escorted into town and down into the house of a very ancient gnome, perhaps he's a bit senile but he's clearly a wizard of some skill.  He welcomes us and escorts us into a cavern.  We open up our boat, and show him the chest.   He seems intensely interested in the boat, the chest and all of our divine magic as well as anything from outside of the forest.   We are nothing if not friendly with him and in the end we bargain to have him open the chest, in return we'll share some hobgoblin drugs with him and give him the lock once it's been opened.     He opens the chest and we find a huge pile of silver inside.

We go and get extremely stoned in the parlor, his daughter , a magic user of some renown dotes on him and provides us with food and drink.  We have a very fun and enjoyable night and wake up in the morning, ready to depart town once more.

   

Departing the quiet isle we drop off our paid passengers up in Port Tanner and after an extremely briefly supply stop we take off, making our way south towards the town of Sanctuary.  It's smooth sailing when we eventually see a flock of birds circling in the distance, as if picking at something in the water.  We turn to investigate and we come upon a blue skinned elf body which we pull onto the boat.   We start to take off with the wind when we see some figures swimming towards the boat at an extremely quick clip.

We make good time but they are catching up and eventually we seem fairly certain that the one humanoid is being chased by the others and we make the executive decision to save the lead creature from its pursuers.   We fish an elf or as they call themselves "Ali Zor Toss" and as we start to take off again, we are beset upon by the creatures which had been in pursuit.

These are indeed the same vicious undead we saw before and as they try to get onto the ship we pummel them with various spells , cantrips and protections.   At one point one of the creatures takes a rip out of shade who manages to maintain his composure but we manage to shoot the creatures apart with magical energy and the larger creatures sinks down into the depths, allowing its prey to escape its' chase. 

With things somewhat more calm, we help the exhausted elf and Morwen speaks elven with them.  The discussion allows us to  find out why they're here.   Typically they live in the ocean but would only come to a lake like this in extreme emergency.   We try to find out who they're dealing with what those things we fought were, what they want for help.   How they can help us, what they're chasing. They express interest in speaking with some representatives in Sanctuary who might be able to provide them solace from time to time and they offer to be able to help with 'things'.   A meeting is struck for 10 days after we arrive, out on the point near the community and we agree to speak more then.

We complete out trip down south, bring the new people to town, things seem to be ok   There are numours activities which people wish to take care of when we arrive.  Merrick takes atik and Arnik up to tasslefort, and strikes a deal to gets Atik trained as a water cleric

Wrenaldo makes a deal with the raven queen at a shrine in the woods (trained)

Loria manages to hook up with some rangers in the area to learn more of their ways.

We have a meeting planned shortly after Merrick arrives back in town with the water elves where we could / should / may find out more.

After an uneventful trip overland back through the tamer woods of the Southern Ebonheart we traversed a path towards our base of operations in Sanctuary.   We're mostly steering clear of the settlements of the Colony at the moment, particularly Southfort.   There seems to be a few factions there which might consider us to be undesirables.   Merrick and Morwen do make their way briefly into town to deal with Nana Ogg.   We settle in with her and trade some of the underdark drugs and herbs we obtained for money, as well as use of her training materials for Arnik.    Deals struck and done we make our way out of town, Merrick stopping by the temple on the way out to thank them for their recent political help, the way a priest of Mael would thank them of course.

We arrive as a group back in Sanctuary after being picked up by the boat.   Oh yes, for those who might not have been reading from the beginning we managed to procure a folding boat which has proven to be an extremely handy magical item.  The town is doing well and after a meeting with Odkirk, Tal and Shade amongst others who have been in the village we are much better appraised of their current situation.   They have built most of a palisade around the village, built the village and they have a number of crops planted.  The town is working hard but appears to be making a go of it.   

We stay for a few days, doing some minor things to help but the plan all along was to make our way to the islands up the lake and towards the ruin which we were told existed on an island in the Ebonheart.  Our plan is to chart out the northern islands of the lake and to explore for ruins and knowledge on those ruins.

We set and follow the shipping lanes on the west side of the lake and we make our way out to the islands.  After several days of circumnavigation we find an island that's completely devoid of any life and has a dangerous looking, ancient spire on it.   We are creeped out and decide to look for a less dangerous looking ruin to go after.   As we're driving away we're beset upon by a trader ship with balista that seems intent on boarding , being pirates or doing something we really don't want them to do.    Not wanting to cause trouble, as a group we duck over to the extremely scary island, hide our boat and ourselves in the forest until they've passed on and then we take off in our ship the other way.    We settle in for the northern island which seem much more quiet.   Oddly though, we find ourselves at a small, poorly maintained village at the southern end of a larger island that appears to be inhabited.   We sneak up to the village and make ourselves known.

We find an extremely odd village that is living at a subsitance level that appears to populated by idealist nobility and intellectuals from back in the Empire as well as a number of transported (who seem to be doing all of the work).   They are in fairly bad shape, poor repair of items, not much food but they seems resolute on making a go of it on the island.  Or at least some of them do.

We speak to them at length about the island and find out there is a nasty swamp along the western side of the island where people dont return from but beyond that the island seems to be fairly safe, well safe for being in the colonies at least.   We eventually enter into negotiations and put a tough but fair deal past them to get supplies from Port Tanner to help support the community and its on going success.

Travelling to Port Tanner is amusing as we settle upon a 300 silver profit for the venture and 2 days work.   We bring the supplies back to the village, let them pay and then, seeing that there are some people with useful skills here that could be of use to Sanctuary we open up the floor to individuals there who might be of use to come down to Sanctuary.  We want to support their community /of course/ but clearly they cant have people with negative attitudes dragging them down.  So, in order to support the community we broker transport for several of the workers and the artists to get off of the island and to somewhere ,,,,, anywhere else?  

Merrick charges an arm and a leg to two people who are annoying artists and drops them off in Port Tanner, a redneck leatherworking town.  But hey, they only paid to get transport to a town.  We then bring several transported and a few or the more useful people from the colony down to Santuary where we speak with Odkirk and Tal and come to a level of agreement that we should or can be able to encorporate them into the growing but still small town.

The party makes its' way back through the woods, along paths that we know back towards Cliffhaven and we let ourselves be known as they come into the general vacinity of town.    The gnomes soon find us and escort us down to see Grimalkin who seems both happy and a bit suprised to see us arrive.   Merrin relates to him what we learned about the valley, the effects of what we saw as the corruption and a blow by blow accounting of what we saw, found and noticed in the Valley. 

Grimalkin shares some knowledge about the Fey, the creatures called Hags and redcaps and seems to be additionally concerned with what we saw in the sky with the wild hunt.   Oh yes, before we had entered the valley, we saw what our gnomish guide referred to as 'the wild hunt' being played out in the sky, we avoided detection by use of magic but it seemed to be exceptionally worrysome to our ranger guide.

The party shows Grimalkin the set of gnomish plate armor which we found in the Hags lair and he identifies it and sighs when he sees it.  He told us that "It belonged to a gnomish Paladin named "forgetname" that went to explore the swamp.   We had feared the worst when he didn't return and he seemed troubled by this."   The plate mail was exceptionally nice and well made and we decided to return it to the gnomes,,,,,,, for free.   This act, or investment in the future as Merrick chose to convince himself bought favor and trust with the leadership of the gnomish community and we were then given a proper feast and treated with a level of trust and respect.  We traded with them while we waited to move on and managed to sell of several items which would be difficult to move in the colony.

The gnomes of Cliffhaven have excellent skills with gemcutting, woodworking and forging but they let us know that they have limited access to metals and leathers and expressed interest in trading.   They also made it very clear to us that their survival was tied to their ability to remain hidden and based on our willingness to stand by our word to Stump and our respect for their fallen Paladin they were willing or able to share some things with us.  They told us of the goblin markets but really didn't say that much else on the subject other than make a vague offer to show us where they were.

Grimalkin also let us know about several of the ruins in the area during our discussions.  He highlighted us to the ones that lie along the mountains to the south as well as what he knew about the standing stones ot the north east.   The evening ended with us well fed, rested and thinking about grandious plans to explore ruins and venture south.

When morning came the party was approached about the prospect of taking the underway to another gnomish village and providing escort to a gnome making that journey with his family.   Not having heard any of this, we were intrigued and while some of us had heard about the underground tunnels we had no idea that they existed here.   

At the appointed and agreed upon hour we met with the migrating gnome and saw him activate some form of gnomish guiding magic at a stump in the ground.  The tree base opened and we made our way into a set of underground tunnels.  The gnomish magic illuminated our path along an underground riverbank that leads between the two villages.   Travelling underground was safe and quick with a guide and the magic to help us.

As we approached the other gnomish village and a fork in the road we became aware of something lurking at the fork ahead.  We scouted what was ahead of us and the gnome nervously let us know that it looked like there were some hobgoblins camped out at the fork.  After a quick discussion it was decided that would try to approach them without hostility and the gnome called out to them in an odd language, after a start they responded and informed him to come to their camp.   Merrin and he went to their camp and saw a collection of four hobgoblins hunched around a fire.   They offered tea in welcome and distrust.

Merrin tried speaking to them in dwarven and their leader suprisedly was able to converse in that tongue.   They spoke at pretty good length and had a lengthy bargaining session.   The Hobgoblins are evidently very strong, danger loving, nearly psychotic traders who love to trade in rare and dangerous things.   Merrin was able to spark a good deal with them and purchase drugs and spices from them as well as a few minor magical items.   The gnome seemed impressed with the exchange and we continued on up to the new gnomish village where we drpped off our new friends and took rest for the day before heading back to Ebonheart Lake and the town of sanctuary to gather ourselves and our bearings.

The evening passed slowly and come the early morning the brave adventurers were feeling little bit more rested.   Having mended our wounds and pride the night before in camp we were awoken when our camp watch detected something on the periphery of the camp.  Eyes of creatures started staring in from the edges of the darkness, hinting at creatures of the night looking to have a tasty snack.   The party scrambled to its feet and light spilled from the clearing lighting up the night as Merrick popped up a light cantrip.   We were unable to see anything specific in the woods.

Wrenaldo opens up his senses in a brilliant move and comes to understand that there if a fey creature, not that far away from us obscured.   Moving and closing quickly on the startled Fey, Wrenaldo smacks them out of their invisibility and the Hag becomes visible to the party.  Leaping on this opportunity a Fairie Fire spell is cast and then the Hag is blistered in her back with a guiding bolt from Merrick.   In the flash of an eye, the hag went from being startled to dead, this clearly was a good omen for the day ahead.

Slogging back into the swamp, using the same techniques as the day before we find our way back to the clearing where we had been attacked the day before finding it pretty much undisturbed.    We make our way cautiously around the water, plotting a path to avoid the shore where the undead 'ambush preditor humanoid thing' is waiting to try to kill anything that gets into its line of sight.   We use some clever minor illusions to get the creature to come out of the water at a place of our choosing and after some well timed saves and applied damage the creature falls to the ground dead.    Relived to have that thing out of our lives we settle in to try to find the spider.

The entire glade is centered around a mound that seems to have 3 or four entrances and we make our way to one of those and make our way carefully down into the darkness.   Upon reaching the first large room we see a chamber with what appears to be a well, an altar and in the distant corner there is a wolf like beast.  We have a spirited battle for the room and are jolted into action again when we are also attacked by some vicious slime that seems to be living down in the well.   The halls is quiet and much to our nervous chagrin there are a number of tunnels branching off.

We explore the tunnels further and eventually find our way to a fairly large treasure room where we are engaged in combat with more of the wolf creatures but we are able to dispatch them.   Oh my! We have found a treasure trove.   The room is full of interesting trade goods, some very impressive gnomish armor and some other items of significance and note.  We pack up as many of them as we can, fairly certain that we have managed to clear out the source of the decay in the swamp or at the very least willing to go claim a measure of success to the Gnomes who sent us here. 

As night fall hits, we camp back at our same camp up in the woods where we had found the hag the night before and enjoy our first restful nights sleep in some time.

Sneaking out from the gnome village, watched by our ranger guide we made our way out along a mountain ridge towards the troubled area.   Our guide pointed out the mining colony of the humans to the north and eventually we made our way to the far side of the valley.

Settling into camp, we decided to take a markedly slow approach to digging into the mysteries of the swamp.  We camped above the swamp with our ranger guide and we quizzed him as to what terrors the gnomes had heard were found in the swamp itself.   He let us know of numerous large creatures which inhabited the woods and walked us through what they knew of the place.  Granted they didn't know too much but they definitely knew of large snakes, giant spiders & toads as well as wolves and jungle cats all of which seemed warped by something in nature.

Making our way to the swamp we started to cast ritual magic to detect where the animals were in the swamp and almost followed a 'radar' like approach to finding out where the  major issues would like.  We located giant snakes, spiders and toads as we made our way through the swamp itself.  We noticed that there were several parts of the woods where there was odd and warped fungus growing between the trees and in those areas the corruption of the woods seemed extremely prominent.   

The first one of these we came upon was very thickly grown over and we could see some form of an old altar up there, we decided to press on but the next time maybe we didn't make as strong a decision or choice.

We came upon a clearing where we knew a giant spider was hiding.   We got into the clearing and were greeted with a view of some still brackish water, a man made bridge and a mound that appeared to have some form of caves going into it. 

From out of the bushes a large dog like creature burst on us and we engaged in a heated battle.   The battle was pretty vicious with spells flying and distractions abound,  unfortunately in D&D distractions tend to = bad and we were set upon by some form of an undead putrefied creature who made its way out of the brackish water.   The wolf fell and the party was nearly overcome  by the undead creature.   With several people down and unconscious, we managed to fight the creature back and bead a retreat back to a camp on the other side of the swamp.

Licking their wounds, hurt and demoralized the party decided to return back to the swamp the next day, more prepared with what would be ahead.

In a quiet month, we all spent our time digging through Tazzleford, making connections but mostly working on our skills and abilities.   This was a huge piece of effort that kept us very busy and we really had very little time to deal with much else besides our training.

In our final week before departure Merrin decided to look for some helpful options that might help the refuge on the south shore of the lake.   Merrin arranged for transport for a few people to go south and help the community and we arranged to smuggle them south.   One is named Rollo, he's a bit of a nutcase but he's also a pretty good shipbuilder and a carpenter.   Merrin had a good discussion with him and in return for getting our of town he's agreed to help with the community.

In addition, we picked up a leatherworker and his young family and decided to help them duck out of town and end up with a new start and new names.   His family was in terrible debt and they were all about to get thrown into debtors prison and relegated to servitude.

We sailed south as a group and delivered thew new members to their community, talked to Odkirk and the other village leaders and they agreed with the potential benefits.    After dropping them off, visiting with Shade and seeing the progress made we took off to the hill country north of South shore to try to track down Stump, an odd little druid to whom we had made a promise of help.

We traveled up the river and we were able to see several places that had dangerous camps.  We eventually came upon some ruined docks and a path which was mostly overgrown.   We followed this path and eventually we saw a very odd tree looking over the path with 'stuff' hanging from the branches.   We decided to lay low and march quickly up the road.

Arnik became aware that we were being followed and magic was enacted to prevent things from following us.    Not ten minutes after we figured that out, we saw a few older looking humanoids wearing red caps with sharp weapons skulking up the path behind us.    They looked very similar to the creature that murdered the entire village north east of here and we decided to remain hidden.   Sometimes it's best to just avoid the fey, especially the really crazy and powerful ones.

We continued to travel south west and finally we met up with Stump.   Stump was happy to see us and helped to escort us off towards the south, throug a number of forests and paths and eventually to a hidden community of his fey forrest gnomes.    

We were told about their issues and they accepted our offer to try to clear up the problem which was just near their encampment.   We were given a few items and a guide to bring us there and after a days rest with the gnomes we broke out, and started to head up towards where we had most recently heard their nearly invisible issue resided.

 

 

We found ourselves in the woods, three captives in hand, with a column of transported half-orcs.

Merrin got right to work, questioning the captives with the ease of long practice.  Matters discussed included who they were, where the destination camp is, and why there were hired goons waiting for us in the woods. Answers to the first two questions were easily obtained.  The third required a sigh, a grimace, and a slow, methodical, laying out of inquisitorial tools on Merrin's part. Answers came fairly quickly after that.

It turned out that the Tall Trees Company was put on alert by the previous logging camp's missing inhabitants, and suspicious because of the party's association with Traven. The company has, in its employ, some free transported who have attached themselves to Traven and who provide intelligence: the party was seen on several occasions.  Good drawings had been provided to the guards, and warnings were provided that trouble might occur on the road.

After a frank discussion among the party members, in their presence, about what to with the now very inconvenient captives, the guards suggested that their lives were basically over if they had to return empty-handed. Cutting their throats and dumping their corpses in the woods for animals to eat was discarded as not the right thing to do, so off everyone went deeper into the woods. Much effort was put into concealing the direction of travel of the large group.

The efforts at trail-removal seemed to be effective (or perhaps the knowledge that dozens of now-free half-orcs roamed the woods), as no retribution was encountered during the rest of the day's travel, nor at night during camp. The mood in camp that evening was quietly pleased, but sombre: the rescued folk were asking "what now?" The question of the captives weighed on everyone as well, and during another discussion about their fate Wrenaldo saw one of their heads snap up.  The ex-guard's eyes unfocussed, and he cocked an ear as if listening to something in the woods.

Wrenaldo stopped to listen and smiled in recognition.  "I think our problem is solved."  He walked over to the guards, and asked the other two if they could hear "that music," too.  The others glanced at their companion, who was absently tugging at his knots trying to stand, and listened carefully.  Their eyes lost their focus on this world.  Wrenaldo untied them, and let them start wandering off into the woods.  He cast a backwards glance at his friends and mouthed, "I'll be back soon."

After a short walk through the woods with others, they emerged into a clearing on the other side of which two solid trees stood like sentinels.  The four continued to follow the music, crossing between the trees and emerging in the place of which Wrenaldo has lately dreamt.  Green figures emerged from the woods and escorted the three into the valley below.  One stayed behind, and said quizzically "We did not expect to see you so soon.  Do you bring these three in offering?"

On being reassured that the men were not about to be sacrificed, he replied with a thoughtful "Yes."

"Wait here."

On it's return, the creature gifted Wrenaldo with an acorn.  Wrenaldo, being the noble person he is, tried to decline. It was explained that sleeping with the acorn under his pillow would simply cement a relationship between the Dryads and Wrenaldo, and that it was his choice to pursue it or not.  Wrenaldo took the acorn, thanked the creature, and returned to the party.  He chose to sleep with the acorn, and awoke with new knowledge and a new sense of purpose. He appared to have found a new path to travel: a previously unnoticed, but, once seen, welcoming track through the woods.

The next morning, the group broke their fasts and headed in the direction of the burned-out village which was discovered during the last rescue mission.  The goal was to set this group of farmers up in the fertile, hidden, valley.  Morwen, with some obvious trepidation, returned to the village and sniffed about for evidence of the obvious smell of corruption that had been present before.  She was quickly assaulted with the stench, and observed that the village was in considerably worse shape than it had been in several weeks before.  A quick decision was made to simply move on.

The mood among the larger group went from nervous to depressed as a rain squall rolled in that evening. Not much progess towards the road was made, and camp was set early. Cold and wet, many went to bed immediately after a meagre dinner.  During the next day's travel, Loria, scouting ahead, happened upon a herd of deer just short of the road.  She skillfully shot one, and got to work processing it. Once everyone else arrived, there were smiles at the prospect of 400lbs of meat to be shared around.  Camp that night was much more pleasant, and made even more so by the amazing flavours Merrin was able to coax out of the fresh kill.

Many ideas about the disposition of the half-orcs were hatched, and tried or discarded on the road to Port Tanner. Farming an unfamiliar forest with no tools or local knowledge was, understandably, unappealing. The village which had previously taken in other transported could not accommodate a group this large, nor would they be able to hide them if head-hunters came around; if they were found to be harbouring fugitives, everyone would be back in manacles. As the party didn't want to be readily associated with a large group of recently liberated transported, going into Port Tanner with everyone was a non-option.

Eventually, it was decided that the larger group would wait on the lakeshore south of Port Tanner, while supplies and tools were purchased. Then everything would be ferried to a safe place near the southern end of the lake, where a new community could be set up.

Several days of boisterous, obvious, drinking and carousing were organized so that the part would be seen to be definitely NOT be hanging around with half-orcs. Then, at significant expense, though Merrin negotiated a tremendous discount, supplies for a new village were purchased.  A great site was found along the shore of the lake, around 70 miles east of Southfort.

Soon after arrival, Tal — whom Morwen had been teaching for several weeks — was initiated into the local circle of Druids, and Morwen promised her an introduction to Dunwick, a resident druid who lives between the new village and Southfort.

And there we left off.

After equipping and supplying the half-orcs, the party sets out to escort them to Blawtro and deliver them to the Talltrees Trading Company, but with assurances that rescue will come shortly afterwards.  Loria, the parties new recruit, heads off scouting while the rest of the party travels more slowly with the main body of transported.

Camping on the first night, the group encounter a strange group of man-high lizards with extensive natural camouflage.  They sneak up on the campsite, but don't attack, although they startle Loria badly.  Morwen is able to communicate with them using Speak with Animals, and they prove to be somewhat intelligent, bargaining for food in exchange for guarding the camp at night.

The lizards also mentioned that they were on guard against the "dead tree spirits" in the vast clearcut nearby.  Luckily, no dead tree spirits appear during the night, and in the morning the group moves on.

They aren't so lucky on the second night.  Upon waking in the morning they discover that one of the half-orcs is missing.  The others don't believe that he would have left on his own, so a search begins.

After some tracking, the trail of the lost prisoner is found, heading up into the hills to the south.  Morwen, in wolf form, also encounters an odd, rancid rotting-vegetation smell in the area.  Several miles into the hills, they discover the shredded remains of the missing half-orc.  He is half-eaten and bound to a tree with tangled roots and vines.   The rotting stench is thick around the corpse.  More tracking identifies that the stench trail goes further south into the hills, but the party decides not to follow.

Everyone returns to the road after burying the remains and the group continues on to Blawtro.

After delivering the Transported to Port Tanner (and to the small village outside Port Tanner), the party took a ship back to Southfort, intending to return to Blawtro and collect their reward from Traven for rescuing the Transported from the logging camp.

Upon reaching Southfort, the party spread out to take care of their own affairs.  Arnik was able to gain access to the Colonial Governor's library and found a number of old Exploration and Survey books that detailed several interesting locations in the Southlands.

Merrick headed to the Temple of Mael, to inquire about any work he might do for the temple.  Luckily (perhaps) the Temple did have a job that needed to be done.  The Temple had accepted a contract to transfer a group of Transported to one of the trading companies in Blawtro.

Merrick, being of a suspicious and mercantile mind, decided to do more investigation as to the circumstances of this contract.  It turned out that the transported were a group of half-orcs, imprisoned in extremely dubious circumstances and likely very dangerous.  Being a stout soul, Merrick negotiated a very favorable rate to perform the task, and headed off to inspect the prisoners.

He found them in a fairly bad state.  Sick with fevers, filthy and with inadequate clothing and food.  They were also suspicious and hostile.  Luckily for Merrick, he had Wrenaldo with him, too.  Wrenaldo, a half-orc himself, is both charismatic and empathetic, and his brave conduct and healing magic quickly disarmed the simmering violence of the prisoners.

After purchasing blankets, clothes and supplies, and healing the sick prisoners, some discussion on the logistics of moving them was discussed.  The party decided on two courses of action.  First, hire a few more guards to assist in the event that the half-orcs turned hostile.  Second, try to get the active assistance of the half-orcs.

The first course of action was only partially successful.  Loria, an elven ranger, was hired, but other guards weren't available.  The second course was much more successful.  Tal and Odkirk, the de-facto leaders of the half-orcs, were convinced that the party meant them no harm after Wrenaldo volunteered to stay with the prisoners by posing as a prisoner himself.  That, combined with the food, medical care and clothing, turned the half-orcs fear and anger into respect and hope.

With a collection of angry-but-sick guards soon to be on their tails, the crew decided that making immediate tracks towards the welcoming arms of Blawtro would be a good idea.

Not very long after setting out, still feeling confident after their plan at the logging camp succeeded so nicely, they were walking near to the road as quickly as their party of exhausted slaves could manage.  The regularly observant party let their guard down and were surprised when, without warning and immediately in front of them, a collection of leaves and twigs swirled down from a tree to become a woman-shaped being.

"Who are they, traveling at night in my forest?  Are they prey or friends?" Glowing yellow eyes, and far too many teeth were nervously observed during her musing questions.

"Friends," she was quickly assured by the party, who didn't much like the response she gave: a slow toothy smile. Morwen stepped forward and spoke in Druidic, again saying "Friend."

"Ah, you speak the language of the trees.  Good.  I speak that much better than gabble-gabble monkey-talk."

Upon the party's insistence that they were not food, she suggested that there would be a price to pay for being in her forest, and for stealing some of her children's meat.  It turns out that she and her children had been scouting the camp, and were planning to eat its occupants.  Interestingly, she stepped back from Morwen, when she mentioned being able to smell her children.

After some dickering, where the suggested prices were either "Magic, or blood," Wrenaldo suggested that she might be interested in a bottle of perfume that he was carrying.  A price of information about the camp and its inhabitant's health, plus the bottle of perfume was agreed upon.

The party were given four hours of safety for the price paid, and ran for the edge of the forest.  The newly-rescued transported needed some support keeping the pace, but they made it to a patch of forest where a certain feeling of menace dropped away.  Camp was made for the night.

More care was taken while traveling the next morning, with time taken for scouting and harvesting nature's resources.  Care was taken to enter the city from various directions and at various times, so as not to form an association with a collection of recently returned Transported.

Everyone ended up at the Hanged Man, and chatting with Oleg.  He happened to have a line on an old friend, a trapper, who wanted some company to check out some ruins he'd found.  As part of the conversation, the mystery in the graveyard of about a week past came up.  Oleg was concerned, and intrigued: something may come of it.

The next day, a meeting with Traven was arranged. He heard of the success of the mission, and the fate of the overseer.  He also heard about the encounter with the being in the forest.

Traven was very concerned with the fate of the 70 or so transported who remained in the camp, and managed to convince the party to attempt a rescue.  He broke out his stash of magical things, and offered 300sp to make the trip.

The session started with Morwen scouting the logging camp in cat form.  She found four of the five rescue-targets, but also found evidence of a strange almost-snake creature that had been circling the camp, doing its own scouting.  The scent of it freaked cat-morwen right out.

The party had several alignment-testing discussion, concerning whether blocking doors and burning down a building full of incapacitated guards would be an acceptable method of killing one truly awful Overseer.  Eventually the group decided that while the guards were probably all bad people, and likely wouldn't be missed, the nearly fifty transported would likely be executed as a result.  There was surprisingly little moral outrage from the paladin contingent on this potential course of action… perhaps his god prefers people dead and in her realm? ;)

The other option discussed was blocking the doors and starting to burn the building down, with an offer to let the guards out if they tossed the Overseer's head out first.  It was discarded as too loud, and too likely to let the guards identify someone later.

A decision on the Overseer deferred until later, Merrin "snuck" close to the wagon under which our lame cartographer slept and brought him out to our hiding place.  Morwen and Arnik then also loudly snuck over to the tents where the other to-be-rescued transported were sleeping. The occupants of the tent awoke at the slightest of sticks cracking in the woods near their tent… perhaps there are nasty things living in the trees they're cutting down?  All but one of the desired transported were rescued.  The one who wasn't had died the week before of a snakebite.

Everyone demonstrated their basic goodness in their decision to quickly and mercilessly kill the Overseer in a targeted strike.  They blocked one door of the longhouse that the camp management were decorating with vomit, and flung the other open.  Morwen entagled almost all of them, tying them to the ground.  Merin then said a quick hello by hitting critically with a Guiding Bolt: the Overseer was ripped from his vegetable bonds and slammed against the wall in a flash of light.  Arnik followed with a swarm of shining magical arrows arrows and the overseer, briefly pinned to the wall by the afterimage of arrows, slumped to the ground.

Mission accomplished, Wrenaldo slammed the door shut and dropped a gigantic round of wood in front of the door, and the party took off back to their hiding place feeling very merciful.

Morwen healed the worst-off of the rescuees, and the party stopped to regroup and discuss how to get back to Blawtro

After being thrown out of the Twisted Tree, you returned to the Hanged Man.

The following day, after a quick visit to the Temple of Mael, Shade and Wrenaldo headed up the mountain to the graveyard and everyone else went looking for a local market.

At the graveyard, Shade and Wrenaldo discovered a half-eaten, several-day old human corpse in a ravine nearby.  The body appeared to have once been clad in fine clothes and didn't appear to have a Transported tattoo.

After retrieving the rest of the group, a lively discussion resulted in a decision to bury the body with the appropriate rites and to say no more on the subject.

Later that day, the party decided to check out the other major drinking establishment in Blawtro, The Warrens.  A significantly lower-rent location than the Twisted Tree, the Warrens seems to be mostly a drinking hole for Transported.  After nearly being scammed on coppers for beer, a teenager named Oric showed up and invited everyone to meet another local person of influence.

Shown to a hard-to-find basement room, the party met Traven, an old Transported in workman clothes who presented himself as a benefactor and organizer for the Transported.

When the party expressed interest in maps, Traven identified a map-maker Transported who was working at a nearby logging camp.  He offered the party 300 sp if they rescued several other Transported from the same camp, and killed to camp overseer at the same time.

The party agreed to the deal and came up with a plan to poison the supplies in the weekly supply wagon, then go in to rescue the transported.  Oric is tagged to go along as a guide/identifier for the people that Traven wants.

After successfully dosing the alcohol in the supply wagon, the party traveled to the logging camp, which is where we broke for the evening.

You finished your commission to escort the wagons to Blawtro, delivering them to the massive Colonial Administration fortification at the center of town.

You got a lot of dirty looks from other Transported on the way through, and discovered that Blawtro is an unlovely town crowded with taverns, gambling dens and whorehouses.

Each of you earned 6 sp from the trip, and spent 1 sp on a night's accommodation at The Hanged Man, a fine inn run by the loquacious and sly Oleg.

Desiring to learn more about the town, you went to the Twisted Tree, a massive complex of entertainment centered around a stone tower with a tree growing inside it.  After sampling the local tobacco and beer (one quite good, the other very mediocre), you were invited to meet Hanrik, the owner of the building, and clearly a local crime-lord.

Hanrik offered a Salvagers License, and a reward of 500 sp (for good intel) or 1000 sp (for great intel leading to the defeat of a rival) if you are willing to infiltrate the organization of a fellow called Traven, who is apparently some sort of leader for the local Transported.