Game Date 5/2/09
Characters:
Rolan Daan (Bryan) - Elf Rogue
Rhogar Burnscale (Rick) - Dragonborn Fighter
Nara Cavell (Matt) - Human Cleric of Pelor
Our last session had left us with the MacGuffin in our hands, ready to turn it in for reward.
Fast forward one month, and we've received our rewards. Rhogar and Rolan each received some platinum pieces (Nara's was donated to the church.) The three of us separated and went back to our normal lives. Rhogar and Rolan quickly found that much had changed in their absence. Rolan could no longer receive jobs from his normal contacts. Rhogar's favorite fighting pits had been shut down. Guards patrolled the streets, and it was clear that the city was in a state of near panic.
Meanwhile, Nara was informed of a kidnapping, and she undertook the task to find the missing child. She knew she would need help on this mission, and the church gave her two Platinum Pieces to hire some help (as well as 40 gold for her own use). So of course, she sought out Rolan and Rhogar.
Finding them wasn't difficult. Coming up with a plan was. The name of the victim had not been released, so we didn't actually know who we were searching for. All we knew is that it was a child from one of the three following families: Duwenter,De Sillis, or De Rais. All three families lived north of Tantris, a bit too far away for walking. Also, we knew approximately where the kidnapping took place, which was also north of town. There was also evidence that the kidnappers were followers of Gruumsh.
We needed some horses. We went to a horse dealer, but his prices were too high. We got him to drop his prices a few times, but they were still too high. Finally we ran into a Paladin from Nara's church, and he talked the dealer into giving us the horses for free. We still promised to return the horses when we were done, if possible.
We went to the spot of the kidnapping first. The ground was too trampled to find any useful tracks. We did, however, nearly get shot by a not-too-friendly elf (or elflike being). The elf didn't tell us much, and considered it a human affair. But at least he didn't shoot us. We did find out that the kidnappers were probably not Orcs (something we had previously assumed because they were Gruumsh-worshippers).
We travelled to House Duwenter first. Nara knocked on the door, asked if they'd seen anything, and was given the brush-off. Nara knocked again, this time introducing herself as a representative of the Church of Pelor, and was given the royal treatment. Turns out House Duwenter is devoted to Pelor, and the party was given an exquisite dinner and oppulent rooms for the night.
In the morning, we left for House De Sillis. It turns out the De Sillis's were the ones whose son had been kidnapped. They weren't able to give us much info, though. They had already been putting all their considerable resources to the task, and we really didn't know anything that would help them. And since they were greiving, they weren't in a very friendly mood.
House De Rais and House De Sillis are kin to each other, and we'd learned that De Rais had lent some considerable help to De Sillis to search for the young boy. So we headed for House De Rais next. The guards wouldn't let us in, but they explained that the master wasn't seeing visitors, as he was in mourning for the death of his nephew.
Death? Oops. The guard explained that the child's body had been found by a merchant caravan, near the entrance to the Sleeping Wood. We also saw a mysterious rider enter the De Rais home (guess he wasn't against all vistors), and Rolan noticed that the rider had a peculiar smell.
So, we headed back to Tantris, rested, then went to the Sleeping Wood. There we found some guards (also there due to the same crime.) They gave us a slightly different story about the discovery of the body, and we found that the merchant caravan story was false. In fact, merchants never travel into that Wood. So... why had the De Rais guard lied to us? We decided to find out.
We stayed another night in Tantris, and Rolan bought a climber's kit. While there, a shifty character offered to sell Rolan some high-quality thieves tools. But when Rolan tried to pay, it turned out his platinum pieces (the ones rewarded to him by De Rais) were phony.
The next day we rode out to the De Rais compound and waited for dark. Rolan scaled the wall and hopped down to the other side, snuck around and listened.
He heard an argument between Lord De Rais and an Orc. Something about how De Rais had hired the Orc for a job, he had failed, so De Rais had had to hire someone else. The Orc rode off, De Rais turned around, and spotted Rolan. Rolan attempted to escape using his grappling hook, but the rope got cut by a spell. De Rais was probably about to do something evil to Rolan, when he heard someone screaming from the front gates. De Rais told Rolan to stay right there, and ran off. Then a mysterious elf appeared and helped Rolan escape. (Possibly the same elf we met earlier, but we didn't ask.)
Rolan met up with Rhogar and Nara, and the trio fled the compound. Lacking any other clues, we followed the Orc rider's trail, until we reached a cabin. The Orc's horse was tied up, so we sent Rhogar into the house to look around.
While Rhogar was in the house, Nara and Rolan were attacked by the Orc -and hard. Rhogar heard the scuffle, and burst out of the house, bravely intercepting the Orc's blows. He was a tough opponent, but the three of us managed to defeat him. The orc was missing an eye, and had an eye painted on his forehead, a sign of certain Gruumsh-worshippers.
We decided to camp for the night, but wanted to move away from the house in case any more Orcs came along. As soon as we got some distance away, more riders approached, which we believed to be De Rais's men. They burned down the house.
This is where we stopped. We haven't even decided for sure whether we want to rest for the night, or immediately follow the riders. We need to know why De Rais arranged the killing of his own nephew. We could go encounter De Rais, but that's probably suicide. We could go back to De Sillis and tell him what we've found out, but would he believe us over his own kin? We could also go back to Tantris and tell the high priest, since he's the one who gave Nara the mission in the first place, but that doesn't really accomplish anything. In any event, we have a couple of weeks to think about it.
XP Rewards:
175 each (75 for previous session, 100 for this session)
Rhogar - For bravery (protecting his teammates from the orc): 50 xp
Rolan - For bravery (sneaking into De Rais compound alone): 55 xp
Nara - For roleplay (roleplay as party leader): 65 xp
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