Storm Over Starsong

This session is dated July 11, 2009.

My regular players didn’t arrive, but they sent others to take their place and carry on with their characters. The new girl, who was playing a longstride shifter barbarian/warblade, took over for Kikkeni in addition to her character, while Holden and Loven were subbed for as well by another player. Unfortunately the cleric’s player did not arrive, so the party had to slog through the adventure without a divine caster.

I’ll try to go through the adventure by timeline.

Day 7, 5 pm:
The party departs from Drellin’s Ferry along with the remnants of the militia, Norro Wiston, and Soranna. They head eastward towards Terrelton. Halfway there they camp for the night.

Day 8:
The camp begins to pick up and continue eastward. Random weather brings fog, slowing down progress, but they get to Terrelton around noon. There they meet Lyka, the new player’s shifter. She was also an adherent of the Silver Flame, but not really given any special honors apart from a military rank in Thrane’s army. She was dispatched to support Holden’s efforts.

They immediately get thrown into the action when they realize that a nearby tavern is being looted. The newly-reformed party easily mops the spilled wine on the floor with the four looters. One has her head opened up by Holden’s maul, while the second is torn to shreds by Lyka and Holden via AOOs. Kikkeni greases the remaining two inside the tavern; one fails his reflex save, faceplants in the broken glass, and fails to move when he tries to get up later. Loven snipes him fatally with his crossbow.
(Strangely enough, this new player snipes with far greater skill than Loven’s usual player).
The last looter is Charging Minotaured into a wall by Holden, knocking him down to 3 HP. He sheepishly begs for mercy as the party knocks him out and ties him up for what’s left of the local law enforcement (Leille, also a Silver Flame cleric) to deal with. The party then heads eastward towards Bridol.

Days 8-9
The party travels to Witchcross, passing through Nimon Gap and Talar. They part ways with the Ferry folk there and head north, but not before spreading word of the coming Red Hand. They arrive in Witchcross on the evening of the 9th day and continue to advise townsfolk to pack up and move toward Brindol.

Day 11: The Rhest Blockade.
Severe rain impedes the PCs’ progress. They decide to stay in Witchcross for one more day.

Leaving Witchcross at 6 am, they travel 12 hours to the Rhest Blockade. Due to tree cover, they’re able to hide in a ruined cottage close to the palisade. Loven sneaks up to the blockade and uses his new crossbow skills to snipe. He easily takes out the 2 half-asleep sentries on the roof, then retreats as the guards go on alert (one of the roof sentries topples down the ladder).

 

Since the playing field is literally not level, the PCs decide to take advantage of their abilities. Kikkeni airbursts with her newly-learned energy ball and gets the drop on one of the ogres (made it a Skullcrusher), who runs into the tower in agony. The eastern half of the palisade is now on fire.

Kikkeni then turns to the other half and repeats. The ogres, being skullcrushers, are a bit smarter and decide to head for the cover of the tower instead of taking repeated hits. As the structure begins to burn, the hobgoblins and ogres dash out the front gate. The sergeant is a beefed up Crusader 4 brandishing a halberd, while his minions retain their generic Warrior 2 template. The skullcrushers drag with them barrels of throwing rocks.

Hiding out inside the ruined cottage, Loven continues to snipe, dispatching one hobgoblin with a headshot, while Lyka uses her awesome Jump modifier to leap onto the wall. The grunt hobgoblins and the injured ogre get mowed down rapidly by Kikkeni’s suppressing fire, while the sergeant crashes through the woods to get to the PCs’ makeshift bunker. Holden goes out to meet him, uses Battle Leader’s Charge to close the distance, but fumbles. The sergeant duels him while Lyka leaps onto the sergeant from above.

Deciding he’s taken too much damage, the sergeant tries to flee, using Douse the Flames on Holden to prevent AOOs. He takes one from Lyka, though, and is down to dangerous HP levels. The remaining ogre keeps trying to throw rocks (he threw one at Lyka while she was still on the wall, though she dodged that with great skill).

Day 12, Noon: Scouting

Since Loven is immune to the exhaustion from the scorching heat, they decide to send him to scout the sunken city once more. One key problem: Loven’s sensory skills suck.
I tell the player that if he took time, he could actually end up seeing everything that someone with better sensory skills would detect in no time. He then stakes out the city for an hour, then three, then five.

 

He gleans the following from his observations:
-He hears the distinctive chittering roar. They haven’t met any of the razorfiends yet, so he has no idea what it is.
-The troopers in the tower are indeed hobgoblins.
-The lizardfolk are not really part of the Red Hand. They simply worship the “dragon god” inside. This comes from his realization that Regiarix dissolved a couple of lizardfolk for bothering him.
-He sees Regiarix and Saarvith take off to go hunting towards the 5th hour of observation. Regiarix is a black dragon, and larger than Ozzyrandion by a noticeable margin.

Loven reports to the other PCs, and again, much OOC griping at the lack of a buffer. They attribute their success in taking down Ozzy primarily to their overbuffing. Kikkeni makes a knowledge check to try to learn what the creature is. I give her some hints, but I don’t tell her what it is exactly—only that it’s a spawn of Tiamat, and that it’s probably either black or green given the surroundings. Without a buffer and without a way to get to the ruins in the first place, they begin to succumb to despondency.

They then wander around the swamp for a while, trying to find a decent place to rest. It is then that they come across the remains of Lanikar’s Greater O RLY Owl Giant Owl and try to examine it—only to hear the distinctive chittering roar that Loven had heard earlier. Two razorfiends pounce.

Loven snipes the last remaining grunt hobgoblin while Kikkeni wails on the sergeant. Eventually, his damage pool isn’t enough to stem the damage, and he dies.

Holden draws Divine Surge and tries to take out the skullcrusher in one hit, but fails his attack roll by one. The ogre then offers the crusader a face full of morningstar, to which Holden gladly obliges. The ogre crits, smashing off half of Holden’s HP. He then follows up with his spiked shield, but fumbles that roll. Lyka uses her agility and nails the ogre with Soaring Raptor Strike. Kikkeni fires a final energy missile that scorches the brute to death.

With night falling quickly, the PCs decide to spend the night in the ruined cottage, with the burning palisade to warm them in their sleep. They decide to continue going to Rhest, since Koth’s map marks the ruins as suspicious.

Day 12: Heat Wave
The PCs trek the remaining 2 1/2 hours down the Rhest Trail. Lyka begins to take nonlethal damage from the miserable heat, though the rest of the party is none the worse for wear. They get close enough to the giant sinkhole where the ruined city of Rhest lies rotting, but Lyka decides to go ahead of the party to scout more effectively. She spots the soldiers in the town hall, the bell tower, their respective modifications, and the lizarfolk and their rafts.

 

Before they continue, the PCs try to make knowledge checks. Holden remembers a little history: Rhest was the capital of one of the goblinoid Dhakaani empire’s provinces, although unlike most of the empire which slowly declined into civil unrest and anarchy, Rhest collapsed suddenly, though he doesn’t know why.

Thinking the lizardfolk neutral and indifferent, Holden and Lyka go up to try to talk to them while Kikkeni and Loven stay some distance behind, with Loven hidden.

To their horror, Holden and Lyka discover that the lizardfolk were at least as big as the ogres they had fought, and were black-scaled. At first the unintelligent brutes didn’t react much to their presence, and simply demanded why they were there. Holden is still clueless and asks if the party could use the lizards’ boats. The lizardfolk demands that they not disturb the “dragon god” and that they leave immediately. Holden tries to maintain a respectful mien, but when the blackscale taunts him that the 2 PCs don’t even know the dragon god’s name and is are thus unworthy to enter his presence. Holden says “…is it Saarvith?”

The blackscale froths at the mouth and charges, rambling incoherently in broken Draconic, while its companion jumps out of its hut as well.

Kikkeni opens fire with energy bolt, which was of course a mistake. She badly chars the second blackscale and slightly injures the first. Loven snipes the second blackscale as well. He gapes as the bolt lodges itself firmly in the brute’s skull but fails to kill it outright, though it begins to bleed profusely from the wound. The lizardman bounds toward Loven (he failed his snipe hide check) and swats him firmly with his greatclub. The blow leaves a massive dent, shearing off 25 HP. Just before Lyka’s turn, a bell starts ringing in the tower. Everyone groans, but Lyka perks up:

“Permission to speak, sir?” she says to Holden.
“Speak!”
Turning to the blackscales, she screams “WE ARE WORTHY, YOU HEATHENS!”

…and executes a Soaring Raptor Strike on the first blackscale, critting and opening up its belly. Holding in its guts, the blackscale flails madly at her, hitting with both its club and its bite. Lyka takes over 30 damage. Holden decides to finish off the heavily-injured blackscale and uses Bonecrusher on its sternum. Its chest implodes, and it falls over backwards, quite dead.

Kikkeni realizes that while the alarm has been triggered, there’s no point in delaying, so she blasts the remaining blackscale with energy missile. Burned and bleeding, the second brute drops dead.

With the entire camp in a flurry of action, the PCs decide to hightail it for now and flee toward the cover of the marsh. OOC, they lament on their lack of a full caster and gripe a bit about how the player didn’t show up.

Anyway, back IC, Lyka once more asks for permission to speak. When granted permission, she simply whimpers “We are doomed, sir.” With the lizardfolk being a lot larger than they’d expected and the superior visual range of the tower, they simply couldn’t think of a way to get into Rhest. They pull back and decide to find a way to beat the heat before the badly-injured Lyka collapses from heat exhaustion.

They pull back about a mile away and then meet the Tiri Kitor elves for the first time.

Since both Lyka and Holden can speak Elven, they call out to the rangers. One of them lands while the others continue circling. Holden explains their situation, but the elf simply tells them that Rhest is nasty business and wishes them whatever luck they need. After the elves leave, Lyka is able to find a shaded mangrove spot for the party to cool off in.

Day 12, Evening: Starsong Hill

Short Session

I haven’t been updating this journal in  a while, but I’m simply reposting here what I’ve been posting on my Giant in the Playground thread. Since this is going to be a more permanent location for the journal, I’ll be transferring everything here eventually.

This session is dated June 20, 2009.

Short session today; this served mostly as closure for the first chapter so we could cleanly introduce the new PCs next session: Linnea Leiranoff, cloistered cleric of Aureon, and Lyka aka “Pickles,” a brilliant, savage, shifter warblade.

The party decides to bury Ashie quickly and send House Orien a lock of her hair should they wish to resurrect her. After resting (the previous session was a pretty solid thrashing), they woke up to find Teyani Sura entering the Old Bridge Inn.

Teyani, as haggard as she is, quickly fills them in on what happened to the Rhest Trail. It’s beginning to become clear that the Red Hand is sweeping far wider than they had expected, and that simply taking out a bridge isn’t going to stop them for long. She asks for a map to mark the blockade, and is surprised to see and hear from the PCs what else is coming their way. She quickly scribbles down notes on whatever scraps of paper she has, and leaves for Brindol without even getting her ale.

The Town Council
The party’s immediate impression of Iormel is that he is a Grade A jerk; he harshly tells Holden to shut the hell up when he begins trying to plead against Iormel’s stance (fight).

After hearing all of the council members’ cases (one each for fight, flight and parley, one undecided [Norro] and one that’s practically an abstention [Soranna]), they try to convince Kellin first. Holden rolls really badly at first (he’s the only guy with ranks in Diplomacy), but the others are able to aid him in saying that the goblins wouldn’t have tried to torch the town the previous night if they wanted to plunder. They get Kellin’s vote.

Second, they try Norro. I assigned the lowest DCs to Norro (using The Giant’s Diplomacy rules) since he isn’t committed to any particular course of action. Kikkeni easily makes the case; Norro told them to destroy Skull Gorge Bridge if they had to, and they did. Norro changes his stance to flight as well.

Finally, just to be sure, they try the cantankerous Iormel. He has the highest DC for the flight option (DC 29), but Holden rolls a 20. His +6 modifier is bolstered by Jorr’s testimony, the map, and their performance in fighting against the goblin raid.

<Holden> A town is more than its holdings. A town is its people too.
<Iormel> …I…No way I’m fighting under the banner of the Lord of Brindol.
<Holden> Better to live to fight another day.
<Iormel> What do you know about fighting?
<Holden> We cleared out Vraath Keep. We defeated Wyrmlord Koth. We slew a dragon. I assure you, sir, we know about fighting. But we also know when to run, and now is one such time.
<Iormel> Fine.

The council reaches a unanimous decision to flee, and the town begins packing.

Chimera Attack
At about 2:30 pm, the chimera attacks. The thing died practically as it hit the ground. It rolled dead last on initiative, and even with its beefed HP and the party down one man, the combined firepower of Kikkeni, Loven and Holden takes it down to 13, then 3, then -21 HP before its third turn. The chimera does try to thrash Holden, but only hits with its first bite and gore. Its breath weapon (I gave it lightning instead) barely grazes Kikkeni.

Evacuation
As the party leaves, they decide to escort Norro, Soranna and the rear guard to Terrelton first, and then proceed to the blockades to the North.

Anyway, it’s reeeeally early into the timeline and they’ve already sent the people along the Dawn Way packing. Rhest is a pretty small place and will be pretty easy to clean out if they observe it. The encounters are going to be beefed up a lot more. The speed at which the party slew the chimera is pretty insane.

Death of the Lion: An Eberron Adaptation

Here’s a short story told in the form of a legend, meant to adapt the Ghostlord’s story into the Eberron setting.

Raat shi anaa. The story continues.

The empire of Dhakaan. The epitome of bloodstained glory.

The Dar, known to Khorvaire’s humans as the goblinoids, ruled the continent for several millennia. Its people were strong-willed, skilled in steel, spell, and the blending of both. Its succession of emperors thought their lineage would last forever, but as we all know, empires always fall in the end.

The madness came. It came pouring into Eberron from the mad plane of Xoriat. Twisted flesh and minds, known to sages as the aberrations, filled the Material Plane with their unnatural might and magic. At the van of this tide of insanity came the Daelkyr.

The Daelkyr were beings so unnatural and warped that their mere presence corrupted reality. The land was polluted, and so were its people. Those Dar who had been captured by the Daelkyr were made into playthings by the mighty lords of madness. Those that survived saw their flesh and minds twisted at the whims of the Daelkyr.

One of the provinces that was badly hit was Rhestilaar. A gate to Xoriat opened in the dark chasms below the land, and legions of unnatural creatures invaded the surface. The Daelkyr who led them was known to the Dar as Marvesklurhan, the Lord of Writhing Coils. It established Rhest as its throne as it began sending forth its minions to meet with the Daelkyr who were invading the western reaches of Khorvaire.

But the proud Dar refused to be broken. They fought back, and with them came the orcs of the Gatekeepers. With swords of the twilight metal byeshk and mighty spells meant to restore the balance of Eberron, the unlikely allies fought back the waves of madness. As the war raged on, many of the hobgoblins were impressed by the power of the Gatekeepers’ natural magic, and sought to augment their martial might with it.

Very few of the Dar who tried to join the Gatekeepers’ ranks impressed the orc hierophants, but those who did proved to be mighty and wise indeed. One of these was a hobgoblin named Uriikel Zaarl.

Zaarl led a mighty pride of lions into the corrupted capital city of Rhest, and tore into the ranks of the Illithids who served as Marvesklurhan’s elite guard. He wielded a mighty byeshk blade he called the Devourer of Twilight, and fought fiercely all the way to the threshold of Marvesklurhan’s alien throne.

Zaarl struck swiftly, smiting the Daelkyr with his blade, but the blow was not enough. The Daelkyr’s mighty tentacles flung the druid away, and the Lord of Writhing Coils escaped deep into the caverns beneath Rhest along with its entourage.

Shocked by the maddening touch of the Daelkyr, Zaarl summoned all his brethren to pursue the alien lord to the portal at the bottom of the subterranean chasm. The Illithids, wielding swords forged of pure mindstuff, fought a retreating battle to cover the flight of their wounded lord, but Zaarl caught up with  Marvesklurhan as it was about to flee. The hero’s pride of lions fought with all their might, crushing the twisted Illithids and filling the room with carnage as the druid confronted the Daelkyr.

“Here you die, corruptor of flesh,” proclaimed the druid champion.

“Ah, flesh—what is flesh but something to be twisted?” answered the Daelkyr, its warped voice echoing in Zaarl’s mind.

Zaarl said nothing and smote the alien lord with his blade. Marvekslurhan’s death throes consumed its own minions as its psychic force clawed violently at life. The backblast shattered the portal, and the fabric of reality fell back into place as the rift’s energies drained away. The day was won, but the damage had been done.

Zaarl’s lions, their forms ravaged by the shockwave of chaos, limped out of the chasm, no longer natural beings. The druid himself emerged a hero. The people of Rhest lauded him as a hero and rebuit the city in his honor. Lion motifs practically covered the city in the months that followed, and the lion was adopted as the province’s emblem.

Zaarl, however, felt betrayed. Nature’s magic could not heal his beloved lions, and none of Rhest’s mages had the ability to restore them. His body began to manifest signs of the Daelkyr’s corrupting influence, and all natural magic was completely ineffective in arresting or reversing the corruption wracking his body. The druid consulted his orc masters, but they too could offer no answers. He felt the damage was irreversible, and that nothing he could do could save Eberron in the end. Flesh, in the end, was simply something to be twisted. Only death could save him and his lions.

Zaarl sought the tomes of necromancers and the power over life and death that they held. He slipped away from the teachings of the Gatekeepers gradually. After a hundred years of study, he decided to take the final step toward conquering the flesh-twisting effects: lichdom.

“I shall save you, my pride,” whispered the undead druid as he struck his beloved lions dead with his newfound magic. At once he began to work on raising the beasts back to unlife.

Rhest itself began to die. Dhakaan never fully recovered from the Daelkyr war, and one by one its provinces began to fall into disrepair. When the last emperor, Dabrak Riis, finally abandoned his throne, Rhest’s neighbors began to invade.

The goblins once more called upon the might of its druid patron, but Zaarl sent a simple reply: “Zaarl is no more. The Ghostlord shall go to Rhest.”

Zaarl marched into Rhest once more, not to save it, but to destroy it. Bitterness and the desire for revenge had been festering in his heart for a century. It was time to exact payment from the weaklings for whom he had suffered.

The ghostly lions rampaged throughout the city, tearing the goblins limb from limb. He descended the ancient steps to the caverns beneath and called upon his magic to dissolve the great earth pillars that braced the city above. Escaping to the surface, Zaarl threw his byeshk blade, the Devourer of Twilight, into the depths of the pit.

That fateful day, nearly five thousand years ago, Rhest died. Water from Lake Rhestin came flooding into the city as the tunnels below caved in. Those that survived fled across Khorvaire, some joining the human civilization that came on the heels of Dhakaan, others remaining proud and independent. The Ghostlord himself raised an enormous temple for himself in the blighted land south of Rhest, and there he brooded for millennia, delving deeper into the arts of necromancy.

It was only recently that the cult of Tiamat led by Azarr Kul came to these lands. By the hand of fate, the traitorous Ghostlord was once drawn back together into dealing with the Dar. A great conflict brews in the lands of Elsir Vale, and the Ghostlord will once more be put to the test. Only the gods know if Zaarl will be finally left to his dark fate as a lich, or if he will be finally freed from the haunting whispers of the Lord of Writhing Coils.

Raat shan gath kal’dor. The story stops, but never ends.

Night Raid

Day 5

The party decides to take it easy for now. Unable to do much, Ashie commissions Morlin Coalhewer (I gave him a human apprentice who does sculpture and pottery) to start making the three homunculi she wants to use: a new Iron Defender, a Furtive Filcher, and an Expeditious Messenger. Even with expert craft skills, none of the homunculi are completed in one week, and they won’t be done until the Red Hand arrives. Wanting to be nice to the players, I tell them that their choice of one homunculus will be completed by the day before the horde arrives. They decide on the Expeditious Messenger.

The party goes to sleep, only to be awakened at midnight by distressed screams coming from the far bank.

Outriders

Jorr accompanies the PCs, but he’s so badly wounded that they tell him to stay back and leave the fighting to them.

The goblin outriders and the dire wolf (for which I swapped out the hell hound) roll high on their initiative, while all the party ends up at the bottom of the stack.

Immediately the dire wolf charges Holden for a lot of damage and knocks him down, while the outriders break out of hiding (they were wearing wolf pelts and use their surprise advantage to score painful skirmish damage on the PCs.

The party is able to quickly subdue the dire wolf, but the outriders just prove too sneaky. Only Kikkeni’s [i]energy cone[/i] is able to deal much damage to them, but the tried and true “use your mount as cover” trick works like a charm, and the outriders roll really high on their reflex saves.

Eventually, the PCs are able to bring one worg down, but its rider makes a beeline for Sterrel’s Provisioning and sets it on fire. However, by this time, Ashie and Kikkeni have HP in the single digits and are only using the dire wolf’s corpse as cover.

(In case you didn’t notice—-they did not heal themselves between their fight with the dragon and now.)

Ashie is able to use her wand of entangle on the grass around the burning warehouse, trapping the goblin who set fire to the building.

Loven manages to use his bag of boulders+sneak attack to seriously injure one worg rider, so they begin to run away.

Second Wave

The two remaining mounted goblins begin running off the grid as quickly as they could; both escape, with the second wave arriving just in time to cover them—two Kulkor Zhul duskblades, two greenspawn snipers, a bladebearer, and a Kulkor Zhul War Adept.

One greenspawn sniper reveals itself, taking shots at Kikkeni from the roof of the other nearby warehouse (Jendar’s Warehouse), and it fails its attack roll and snipe check badly. When Kikkeni’s turn comes around, the greenspawn gets flung to the ground with telekinetic thrust for all his trouble. He survives the huge fall, however, but now that he’s out in the open, he has a hard time with hiding.

The first duskblade nails Holden with [i]ray of enfeeblement[/i], dropping his strength back down to 12.

Ashie thinks she could nail the newcomers with entangle, but the War Adept goes right before her turn and blasts her and Kikkeni with a scintillating sphere.

Both women fail their reflex saves badly. Kikkeni is dropped to the negatives by the explosion, while Ashie dies instantly. The spell deals just enough damage to send her to exactly -10.

The party gets screwed really badly from here on. The Kulkor Zhul War Adept uses its Pillar of Magic ability (see Hobgoblin Warcaster, MMV) to grant SR 14 to its lackeys.

Loven runs to try to heal Kikkeni and finds a potion of cure moderate wounds in her pack, bringing her back up to the single digits.

The party is lucky they’re able to move around so quickly–the hobgoblins have a hard time keeping up with them and the snipers have lousy shots. Readied actions would’ve taken them down easily.

Holden is quickly surrounded by the duskblades and the warblade; one channeled shocking grasp and a critical hit from the warblade later and he’s in the negatives; even his damage pool couldn’t absorb enough.

Seeing Holden go down, the duskblades and the warblade go after Kikkeni and Loven.

Kikkeni is able to breach the SR and flings the warblade away with TKT, while Loven drinks a potion of invisibility to help out his dwarven brother.

In the mean time, Kikkeni flings back one of the duskblades with TKT again (now her favorite power), squishing him. Ouch. The other guy survives and also runs after her.

Loven is able to run as fast as he could towards Holden, and he activates Holden’s healing belt bringing him back up to the positives. Not wanting to attract the nearby War Adept’s attention, Holden continues to play dead.

Kikkeni tries to outmaneuver the warblade, but she decides she’s not willing to risk a TWF full attack on her next turn, so she risks an AOO instead so she can get a safe distance away to cast a spell. Not this player’s lucky day.

The warblade rolls a 20 on his AOO, but fails the confirmation roll. This is still enough to bring Kikkeni down again, so the warblade rejoins the fray as the War Adept casts mirror image. Holden uses up the belt’s charges and gets up, attacking one of the mirror images (giving Kikkeni 2 HP due to Martial Spirit), while Loven pokes at the mirror images as well.

The War Adept is able to nail the now-revived Holden with scorching ray putting him at a dangerously low HP level—once his damage pool hits next turn, he’s going to go down to 0 again. He smashes the warblade with Mountain Hammer.

With Kikkeni back up, she’s able to nuke the mirror images with energy missile, exposing the caster. He barely takes damage from it, but he retaliates with summon swarm. The spiders take Kikkeni down to 0 HP again, though she thankfully saves against the poison.

The remaining duskblade runs off into the woods.

At this point the War Adept tries to escape as well; its buffed AC keeps it safe for the most part. However, as it moves away, it’s unable to maintain the concentration on the swarm spell due to a painful AOO from Holden, and tries to cast haste to bolster his escape.

Holden and Loven stay on his case, but eventually the War Adept is able to cast invisibility from a scroll and escapes with his life.

The party calls Jorr to ask for help with the fires, which thankfully haven’t spread so much. Ben Sterrel’s store is mostly intact.

Postmortem (Literally)

While the party has the staff of life, Loven’s crappy UMD ranks prevent him from emulating the 15 Wis required to cast the spell. They decide to lay Ashie to rest, cutting off a lock of her hair to send back to House Orien, should they decide to have her resurrected.

Now that the party has got a taste of the Red Hand’s competently dangerous side, they’re convinced more than ever that Drellin’s Ferry has to be evacuated. I also tell them that the implications of the outriders, the snipers, the War Adept and the duskblade getting away are very dire: The raid was not a coincidence. The outriders had found Vraath Keep empty and tracked the perpetrators to Drellin’s Ferry, and now that they’ve seen the PCs and gotten away to report to the Horde, there’s a good chance that later attacks will be much, much harder.

Ashie’s player decides to roll a character, and given the dangerous nature of the adventure, Holden and Loven’s player decides to roll an additional character as well.

Ashie’s player wants to tank this time, since she realized that having only one tank makes things kind of difficult. I ask her if she’s willing to give up her party’s utility casting, and she says she prefers survivability. As such, I recommend she roll a cleric instead, to which she agrees.

We recommend that the other player’s additional character (he’s going to be controlling THREE characters now O_O) be a fast, DPS striker, so we recommend a Shifter Barbarian/Swordsage or Warblade. He also decides to make this character female.

Due to Ashie’s death, I’m going to give the PCs a modifier on their Diplomacy checks during the Town Council on day 7—surely the death of a seemingly powerful adventurer would strike fear into the hearts of the people. (I’m using Rich Burlew’s  tweaked Diplomacy rules). However, this could also mean they are just as likely to surrender.

We don’t know when next session will be yet. It will likely include the council meeting, as well as the Chimera attack. I tweaked the beast a bit, giving it a blue dragon head (partially due to Azarr Kul’s and Tyrgarun’s vanity) to give it some range on its breath weapon.

RIP Ashiedae Jiourrn d’Orien

d: 16th Lharvion 998 YK

Ozzyrandion

This was supposed to be the final session for this summer, but it seems that we’ll be able to sneak in a couple more sessions before the school year breaks us down with work.

Ozzyrandion

Locked Girl ~The Girl’s Secret Room Betrayers of Siberys

I didn’t push through with my original plan to beef up Ozzy to Juvenile. At the recommendation of some other DMs, I kept Ozzyrandion’s hit dice, but I made him large. I didn’t even raise his ability scores; I only wanted higher damage dice and a tail slash attack. I’m glad I  didn’t use a Juvenile (CR version; this would have killed the PCs. Thanks to all those who helped me. Anyway, here goes.

The players decided to wait until dawn (approx 6 am of Day 4) before attacking so that they wouldn’t get hosed by illumination disadvantages. At this point they were very close to fatigue, but they didn’t want to risk concealment and getting spotted before they could even see their targets.  Everything else had better senses than they did.

Ashie the artificer then proceeded to buff the hell out of the party while they stayed in the trees at the very edge of the Witchwood:
Holden: -shield of faith, bull’s strength, enlarge person
Loven: -cat’s grace, shield
Jorr: -cat’s grace
Ashie: eagle’s splendor, shield

She also cast haste on everyone and gave Holden the potion of fly.

Dripping with buffs, they rolled initiative, with Ashie, Jorr, Loven and Kikkeni staying in the undergrowth, “hiding” (they didn’t know that Ozzyrandion had spotted them all), while Holden and Seiza charged down the stone pathway toward the Hell Hound Scorch Drake. Unfortunately, Ozzyrandion rolled a natural 20 on his initiative.

Immediately, Holden and Seiza were bathed in a shower of supernatural acid. Seiza was instantly reduced into a spitting, hissing puddle of slag, which severely injured Ashie with its death feedback. Holden also failed his save and was left at half HP.  He went next and charged the closer scorch drake, pulping it instantly. The other scorch drake also died before it was even able to attack—it ran out of move speed right outside Holden’s reach and he burst it like an overripe tomato the next round. (I should have replaced them with Dire Wolves here; Hell Hounds are seriously rather useless.)
The archers in the camp began grabbing their gear (with the one round delay stipulated in the adventure), while the archers let loose. Due to some wise placement, however, the PCs were able to avoid fire from the archers on the far side by placing themselves behind one of the towers. Ashie and Kikkeni ran up the stairs; Kikkeni’s speed was up to an amazing 70 feet thanks to Speed of Thought and haste.

Almost immediately the hobgoblins started dying. Kikkeni was able to throw one of the nearer ones into the other with telekinetic thrust, knocking the target out of the tower and to his death at the base. Jorr kept missing this time, and would prove to be mostly a distraction for the archers. He took potshots at Ozzyrandion, but he just kept missing.

And so did the archers. The total AC ratings of the PCs were about as high as Ozzyrandion’s, so they’d only hit on a roll of 17 or higher. The Stormtrooper Effect seems to apply to these guys, as they kept rolling badly while their numbers were large and then started rolling better when they began thinning out. The archers in the camp and the sergeant immediately closed in after picking up their gear; the sergeant had no ranged capability (due to being a Warblade 3) and double moved as fast as he could across the bridge in order to take out Kikkeni, while Jorr tried to flank and sneak attack (but he missed).

Kikkeni stayed on the staircase of the southeast tower for a good part of the encounter, as she wanted to avoid the breath weapon and Flyby Attacks coming from at least half of the possible attack vectors. Ashie wasn’t so fortunate, as she stayed on the ground. Their combined firepower, however, packed a punch. After Holden had smote Ozzy, who was hovering above him, with a successful Bonecrusher, the two girls were able to blast the dragon down to less than half HP in short order.
Loven just made some rather ineffectual attacks for most of the encounter (having 1d4+2 damage on his CSB is really lame. Any suggestions for making this guy work better? He hasn’t really been making an effort to get into sneak attack position.), managing only to crit against the sergeant, who was threatening Kikkeni as she came down the stairs for a better spot.

Kikkeni renders the sergeant useless by making him chase her like a lovelorn stalker by using déjà vu (Seriously, I hate this power now), wasting his turn.

Enraged by the barrage, (and almost getting smacked into a wall with energy push) the dragon flies back to his roost and to drink his potion of cure serious wounds, then his potion of invisibility. Freaked out by the dragon’s sudden disappearance, the party attempts to stay put, thinking it mostly unwise to devote all their resources to killing the archers. Ashie casts call lightning from a scroll and begins blasting away while the flying dwarf dive bombs the crossing archers. His Charging Minotaur shatters one’s body in several places, sending him flying like a rag doll along the bridge.

Everyone is still frustrated by the dragon’s invisibility; they did their best to spread apart to avoid being bathed in acid. To their chagrin, however, Ozzyrandion reappears right beside Kikkeni and proceeds to wail on her. Kikkeni survives the full attack with 5 HP left.  Holden, coming from the bridge, dive bomb-charges the dragon, but he fumbles his attack roll.

Kikkeni accomplishes something amazing here. She makes a concentration check to manifest defensively, and uses energy push on Ozzyrandion.

The dragon makes his Reflex Save.
And fails his opposed Strength check—by 10.
The impact of the psionic power sends him skidding 15 feet toward the edge of the map. Using her incredible speed, Kikkeni runs out of the danger zone and towards the bridge itself. Ashie blasts away at Ozzy with her dwindling call lightning shots in the meantime, and finds herself backed into a corner at the edge of the map. Ozzyrandion charges her on the ground. His bite bounces off the edge of her shield. Ashie risks the AOO and she runs as far as she could in the tower’s direction—she just really wants to stay away from the dragon’s full attacks.  Holden runs to her rescue, attacking the dragon but missing once more.  This puts Holden and Ashie directly in the path of an acid blast. But we’ll get back to that later.

In the mean time, Jorr is exchanging fire with the hobgoblins and taking most of their shots. The archers fire mostly at Holden, the giant flying dwarf, but seeing that this doesn’t work too well, go after Jorr instead. Loven simply keeps missing or dealing pitiful damage, though he does manage to KO the sergeant.

Ozzyrandion uses his breath weapon on Holden and Ashie. Both save successfully, but by now are at critical HP levels—however, Ozzy is critically injured as well. Holden retaliates in the most fantastic manner—using Revitalizing Strike, he shoves his maul into the dragon’s maw, splitting the dragon’s head open. I describe the fatal strike as a surge of warmth and strength while the dragon’s polluted life force drains away—the Silver Flame’s power fills Holden, rewarding him for smiting this foul, corrupt dragon.

Just as Holden strikes down Ozzyrandion, Jorr takes a fatal shot, dropping to 0 HP. I rule that the extra 2 HP from Holden’s Martial Spirit saves his life and gets him right back up, but the cinematic image of Holden turning toward Jorr just as he gets shot down is pretty awesome.

Jorr stands right back up and crits the guy who shot him as he runs away, shooting him through the head.

Ashie, in the meantime, attempts to overtake the hobgoblins by doing the most awesome action movie stunt in the adventure so far. She first wanted to slide down the scree-covered slope in order to get close enough to use her dragonmark’s dimension leap power to teleport across, but I rule that she needs to make a Reflex save to avoid falling, then make the Concentration check to cast her spell-like ability in violent motion.  I give her an alternative, but she chickens out at first. Then she remembers her action points.

She has an awesome move speed thanks to haste. This gives her a prodigious boost to her Jump check. She rolls a 2 on her d20. She spends an action point to gain an additional 4. Her total Jump check lands her a 13—enough to jump 10 feet off the edge of the cliff. Then she taps her dragonmark to dimension leap the remaining distance and lands right on the edge of the other cliff. She lands with a wand in each hand, ready to kick some Red Hand rear.

Kikkeni, emboldened by their victory over the dragon, runs over the bridge as well, and slams the northeast tower archer with telekinetic thrust into the northwestern archer.

At this point the hobgoblins begin to retreat, but Holden beats them by landing at the base of the stairs of the northwestern tower. Kikkeni lays down psionic grease, and both the hobgoblins slip up and fall. Holden ends them with a full attack.

Cinder Hill

The party apprehends two hobgoblins—the sergeant and one of the archers–and ties them up, hanging them off the side of the bridge while they’re unconscious.

Jorr and Loven continue to scout out Cinder Hill, while the rest of the party searches the bridge.

The scouts confirm their worst fears: The Red Hand is a horde, and they have not only thousands of hobgoblin and goblin warrios, but worgs and ogres as well—not to mention a red dragon and at least 3 warforged titans, which Loven spots being stripped of their tattered Cyran battle banners and refitted with Red Hand heraldry.

The party decides to hightail it back to the town, dragging their prisoners behind them. Kikkeni easily destroys the bridge by using energy cone to blast the weak spot, ruining it after 3 shots.

I decide against throwing another random encounter against them since we were running out of real time, so I let them get quickly through the Witchwood back to town.

The party gets back to town at about 10 pm of Day 4 to deposit the prisoners at the Old Toll House and rest for the night.

Jack Bauer. Again.
The next morning, the PCs take Norro Wiston and Sorrana to the interrogation. Wiston expresses his distaste for the torture, but the PCs are determined to do this.

The torture is pretty fruitless by now. The grunts don’t know much; all they get from the crazed sergeant are visions of glory that Azarr Kul showed them, of a Dragon-inspired hobgoblin empire greater than Dhakaan, spreading across Khorvaire and Argonnessen.  A dragon-inspired hobgoblin empire ruled by Tiamat.

Kikkeni rolls a high enough knowledge check to realize the implications of this crazy idea, but by now the sergeant is no longer saying anything helpful. Both hobgoblins are executed.

Ahead of Schedule
It’s only day 5 and the PCs are already itching to get Drellin’s Ferry evacuated. This seems to be something that the adventure doesn’t expect. I make the lame excuse that they have to wait for two more days since Iormel is out of town and Wiston sort of fears him, and thus refuses to start the town council without him.

The PCs try talking to Sorrana, and although she expresses utmost concern for the safety of the town, she says she ultimately has to follow orders, and that despite Iormel being an unlikeable, proud bastard who is likely to oppose the town’s departure, they really have to wait for him.

OOC I tell the players that they’re actually way ahead of schedule and that the Red Hand is not going to reach Drellin’s Ferry anytime soon. This causes them to relax a bit, so they decide to craft stuff—Ashie wants new homunculi to replace Seiza.

Postmortem
-The PCs performed admirably on the bridge despite the difficulty of the encounter; their strategic discussion paid off.
-The dragon died faster than I had expected—he was already supposed to run away after he attacked Ashie, but Holden and Ashie presented him with such a great opportunity to kill them that I decided to just have him use his breath weapon again.
-I was a bit frustrated by the PCs being a bit too] convinced that fighting to save the town was a hopeless cause, their panic really caused me to make some lame, railroading excuses which I preferred not to do. Also, they’re way too early—the Chimera attack and the town council would have to be bumped up way earlier.
-We’re about to enter the second part of the adventure, and I’m pretty happy with the progress we’ve made.

Session 3

Days 2-4 of the adventure: Much wickedness is smote with a flying, burning, stuffed owlbear, allies are made and an old paladin is given a chance at redemption, and the PCs behold their first dragon.

12 Lharvion, 998 YK
Hydra Aftermath
After defeating the hydra, the party searches the wagon and retrieves the +1 mithral breastplate. This goes to Ashie.  The party crosses and continues north.

The trip to Vraath Keep is approximately an hour from the Blackwater Causeway, but 30 minutes into their trip, they run into a not-so-friendly forest denizen.

Girallon Attack
Jorr spots a girallon stalking the PCs in the woods. The monster growls at them.
Initiative: Kikkeni, Girallon, Holden, Loven, Ashie, Jorr.

This random encounter goes by surprisingly fast. Kikkeni opens up by moving behind some trees to prevent the girallon from charging at her, but it covers the distance pretty quickly by double moving (it spotted her first).  Everyone else moves to close in.

At the top of the second round, Kikkeni uses a simple but highly effective power on the raging monkey: déjà vu. Naturally the creature fails its save—It has to repeat its last action, so it moves toward Kikkeni. Again. A risky tactic, but this prevents the ape from using its decidedly deadly full attack. By this time everyone was within its 10-foot reach, but due to déjà vu, the girallon couldn’t do a damn thing. Everybody wails on the monster with Jorr joining in to flank and plant a dagger in the girallon’s ribs. This continues for one more turn. The girallon fails to make any attacks at all until Holden bashes its skull in with Mountain Hammer. One dead ape.
Stakeout
The party continues north and arrive at the periphery of Vraath Keep at around 11 am of Day 2. Loven and Jorr scout ahead and scout the perimeter. Jorr identifies the scattered large skeletons as those of werebears and wereboars, but apart from seeing the breach in the wall and the crushed gates, they don’t find anything else outside.
Jorr didn’t want to go in, and Loven wouldn’t dare venture in alone, so the two retreat to the camp.

Kikkeni is completey out of power points, and deciding they didn’t want to enter the keep without heavy artillery, the party sets up camp and rests, with Loven staking out the castle from a tree. He spots the fake haunt (of course he just knows there’s a glow and eerie moaning), and the smoke rising from the keep.

Once more before they enter the keep, Loven, Jorr and Seiza the iron defender sneak towards the breach in the southern wall. They hear hobgoblins making lame elf jokes (Jorr translates), and they see the embers of a fire burning low, casting a flickering light. They report back to the rest of the party.

At approximately 8 pm, the team moves in, with Jorr remaining in the camp to watch over the horses.

Breach
The party decides to enter the doors to the right of the entrance (the stables). Listening carefully, Holden detects creatures speaking Goblin inside. With nothing else to do, the party sticks to the wall of the north guard tower, and Holden opens the door.

The goblin riders inside were too busy with their game of stickbeetle to notice that they were being creeped up on, so the PCs get a surprise round. However, due to bad positioning (only Holden had line of sight into the stables interior), all of them end up passing their standard actions.

Round 1: Holden and Ashie roll 23s on their initiative and go first. Holden enters and attacks the first goblin rider, taking off about half his HP using his greatsword. Ashie uses up her second eternal wand of shield use for the day.
The gobbo (already damaged) closer to the door makes a run for the worg stables, but Holden makes his AOO and cuts the goblin in half before he’s able to do anything.
Next, Seiza, Ashie’s homunculus, runs inside and attacks the second goblin, taking out a good chunk of its HP. Hearing the death scream of the goblin, one of the worgs (the closer one) closes the ground between its stall and Ashie quickly, and tries to bite. However, Ashie’s high AC keeps the worg at bay.
Kikkeni enters, and also raises her inertial armor. The second worg rushes to confront Ashie and misses as well.
Loven enters , rapier drawn, and runs up to the haystack in position to attack the last goblin. Loven sneaks (Rider B is still flat-footed), but rolls low. He ends up dealing only about 12 damage, but his bleeding attack renders him a dead man walking. He retaliates, attacking Loven, but he misses badly.

Round 2: Holden turns on Worg B, while Ashie attempts to put some distance between herself and the worgs, five-foot stepping back toward the door and shooting at the goblin with her magic missile wand. Her homunculus attacks the second goblin, tearing its throat out and killing it before it gets to act again. The first worg attacks Holden, but is unable to bypass his AC. Kikkeni fires cold energy missile at the two worgs; A saves, but Kikkeni rolls really badly. A only takes 4 damage, while B takes the full 8 damage. Still not daunted, the second worg fights on and attacks Loven, but misses. Loven tries to move into a flanking position, risking the AOO from the first one. Worg A hits and easily trips Loven.  This round is incredibly noisy, with the worgs yelping loudly. The manticore in the nest at the southern end of the keep climbs onto the roof of its lair, peering at the sources of the sound, but doesn’t bother to do anything.

Round 3: Holden attacks the first worg this time, rolling maximum damage, dropping it down to 8 HP. Ashie moves back even further and tries to use her wand once more, but rolls low on her UMD check. Seiza runs to engage worg B, killing it. Kikkeni conservers her power points and passes her turn, while Loven gets up, provoking an AOO from Worg A. He gets hit again, and his attack misses too.

Round 4: Holden finally takes down Worg A with Mountain Hammer.  The party quickly closes the door and tries to figure out what to do.

After a brief discussion, they wait for any reactions to the sound of fighting. Nothing really happens, so they decide to check out the building on the other end of the keep (the manticore’s lair).

They sneak up, avoiding the break the wall where the flickering firelight had been seen earlier. They open the door in the southern tower, cramming into it. Holden tries to listen through the door to the manticore lair, but hears nothing—Ashie can see why.

Ashie was the only party member left outside the southern tower; she sees the manticore looming on the roof of its lair. It peers at them and says  “No bother, Koth inside tower.”

A few halfhearted attempts at diplomacy end with the manticore telling them to go away since Koth “pay better,” and retreats groggily into its lair. (It’s not the brightest crayon in the box.)

Taxidermist’s Nightmare
Holden and Seiza take up positions near the crack in the barracks’ eastern wall, while the rest of the party goes to the north end.  Holden screams, with a thick dwarven accent, “Help! Help!”

Instead of rushing to his aid, one of the hobgoblins simply laughs, saying “I’m so drunk, I can hear a dwarf speaking in bad Goblin!” Much laughing echoes out of the barracks. Holden hears a deep, angry grunt from the other side of the room.

Holden: “Help! Gods damn it, HELP!”
Second Hobgoblin: “Hey, I think I can hear it too! ‘HELP! HELP!’”

By now, the hobgoblins are in stitches. Holden hears the grunt again; it sounds like a much larger creature. The minotaur can smell the dwarf now, so it angrily yells at its minions to wise up—intruders were about. The barracks goes silent for a moment, and then the scream of drawn steel rips out of the room. Holden steps straight into the breach in the wall, and he spots Karkilan the minotaur, and three of the four hobgoblins.
Initiative:
Kikkeni, Koth (not joining the battle yet, but he rolled 24), Loven, Veteran A, B, Seiza,C, Karkilan, Ashie, D, Holden.

Kikkeni opens the door, sees Koth’s stuffed owlbear and the fourth hobgoblin, and improvises. Telekinetic thrust sends the owlbear and one of the hobgoblins (B) flying. I made an honest mistake here, completely forgetting the augmentation cap on psionic powers. I rule that the owlbear, due to poor stuffing, is only about 100 lbs, while the hobgoblin with his armor totals about 225 lbs. She augments the power further than she should have been able to, and flings the owlbear (large enough to hit more than one target because they were all adjacent), while she sends B flying toward A.  Kikkeni crit misses on C, but hits D and Karkilan with the owlbear, dealing 4d6 damage. B fails his save and, being dense and heavy,  would deal an astounding 9d6 damage to A. Thankfully, Kikkeni rolls low and B smacks into the wall as A ducks. B falls on top of A. Loven leaps into the doorway, rapier drawn, but sticks to the wall. A is able to disentangle himself and attacks Kikkeni. He misses. B likewise gets up and stands beside A, right inside the doorway.  Seiza runs in and sticks close to Loven. C sprints for the doorway as well (provoking an AOO from Loven), attempting to engage the deadly caster. Karkilan moves to the crushed wall to attack Holden and misses, while Ashie casts fireball from a scroll.

A tremendous burst of fire sets Karkilan, C, D, Karkilan’s bed, C and D’s bunk, AND the owlbear alight. Karkilan saves, but C and D fail. Everyone survives it, though. D manages to run away from the burning upholstery, and then Holden goes in to attack the minotaur.

Once more, Kikkeni flings the burning stuffed owlbear, but at this point  I remember the augmentation limit—Kikkeni shouldn’t be able to augment at all, since she’s only at Manifester Lv 5. We don’t bother backtracking the previous telekinetic thrust, though, but this time, she can only fling the owlbear. Once more, she hurls it at the now angry minotaur. At this point, Koth opens the door to his tower, asking what the blazes is going on, SEES that the blazes ARE going on, and quickly casts invisibility. The encounter has just become a boss battle.

Koth actually double moves out of the place and is now in the courtyard, however. The manticore climbs onto the roof of its lair again after smelling the scorched minotaur.
Loven attacks C, but finds his blade parried. A and B continue to ineffectually attack Kikkeni. Karkilan tries to chop Holden down, but misses again. Ashie uses her last scroll of fireball, dropping Karkilan and D.

C soon goes down, then B. Memory is fuzzy as to how this happened, but eventually, it was just the party, the invisible Koth, and the manticore, who still isn’t attacking, and A, standing in the doorway of the barracks.

Koth spots Ashie and Kikkeni, and drops a fireball on them. Ashie saves, while Kikkeni fails. Kikkeni is now at critical HP, while Ashie is in the low teens. The fireball also catches A in the blast and vaporizes him.

Loven tries to go take a sniping position outside by the boulder at the barracks’ northeast corner. Holden spits curses, going after Koth, while the manticore rains its spines at Ashie—Kikkeni is thankfully out of the manticore’s line of sight. Two of the spines hit—Ashie is now down to single digits.

Holden yells at Kikkeni, telling her to get the hell into the room, but she bravely says she still has a job to do, and uses the last of her PP to energy push Koth. He saves against most of the damage, but he gets flung into the pile of wereboar bones leaning against the southern guard tower. Flitting behind the boulders in the courtyard like a shadow, Loven shoots from his bow, but is too far to make sneak attacks. Ashie also takes one last shot with a scroll of scorching ray before running back into the room to help Kikkeni get back up on her feet.

Koth goes invisible. With the girls vulnerable inside the building, Holden rushes in to support them, while the manticore jumps to the southern wall and perches there, shooting at Holden. The girls use Ashie’s potions to heal, while Koth reappears and blasts Holden with the dreaded ray of enfeeblement.  Seiza charges Koth, who fights it away with his morning star, while the manticore jumps down beside Koth to defend him. Eventually, Seiza shakes down Koth, dropping him to -1. The manticore flies away.

The party levels up—the encounter gave massive XP, and creativity got them through it despite having two near deaths.

Even better, Koth isn’t dead, so Holden stabilizes him and Loven leaves him gagged and bound. They drag Koth close to the burning bed, douse him in alcohol, and have the homunculus lie down on top of him to prevent him from escaping.

Skeletons in the Basement
They decide to go to the second floor first to check out the “ghost,” finding the dead man and the glowing light. Holden performs a few rites for the dead farmer and puts out the continuous flame. They then check out the room below.

Due to crappy sense skill ranks, Holden can’t find the vault entrance despite his stonecunning racial trait. I rule that he can sense something is off about the foor, but it takes 20 minutes of searching by Kikkeni to find the vault entrance.  They climb in.

The first thing they check out is the skeleton by the eastern alcove. They check it out to see that a silvered greataxe is embedded in its ribcage. “The Arm of Vraath” is engraved in Dwarven runes on the axe haft, while the Silver Torch emblem is embossed on the axe blades.  At first they surmise that Vraath somehow committed suicide, but Holden says it would have been impossible for him to swing a greataxe into his own chest. A sneaking suspicion comes upon them: Vraath may have turned against his men for some reason.  Holden does a little RIP ritual on the skeleton, then Loven comes in and shoves the skeleton unceremoniously out of the way. Holden picks up the greataxe.

Loven’s player realizes he HAS NO RANKS IN OPEN LOCK. Since he leveled up, I just let him put ranks in, but he still keeps failing. Eventually he just takes 20 on each lock, taking over 3 hours to open everything. Ashie gets impatient, imbues the big chest with the spell storing item infusion, putting knock into it, and basically has the chest open itself. They claim the staff of life and the other odds and ends inside the chest. While Loven slaves over the locks until past midnight, Holden goes back to camp, wakes Jorr up, and tells him what happened.  (I forget to give the PCs the replacements for Vraath’s bastard sword and gauntlets of ogre power, though they should have picked those up.)

Ashie and Kikkeni meanwhile read Vraath’s journals, learning how he boasted of killing over 300 lycanthropes (“They weren’t all that big.”—this was supposed to imply that he massacred children, though they didn’t catch that until I explained it later), then skip to his last entry (“We were attacked. My men were torn to pieces. Those left shouldn’t find out what happened to me.”—implying he got bitten, and Kikkeni feels her suspicions were confirmed.)

The players first think that it would be a good idea to give Jorr the deed to Vraath Keep, but don’t tell him this. As they move into the barracks, Jorr points out something the players missed almost entirely: The war room. As they read Koth’s notes (Ashie and Holden know Goblin), the PCs finally realize that they’re in much deeper than they thought they were.  Jorr then sees Koth, draws his dagger, and almost kills him. Holden tells him that if he keeps Koth alive, they might have chances to kill more goblins, so Jorr leaves him alone.

They bed down in the safety of the vault and rest until the next morning.

13th Lharvion, 998 YK

Jack Bauer, Pt. 2

The PCs drag Koth back to Drellin’s Ferry, along with the map and Jorr. They immediately set up an interrogation session with the town’s leaders. At first, Norro Wiston, the town speaker, is pleased to know that they’ve cleared out Vraath Keep, but then Holden shows them the map—-translating each note into Common, writing the notes onto the map.

Norro Wiston is flustered and indecisive. He has no idea what to do, and at the moment is in denial. The PCs then turn to Koth and have him talk about this.

Interestingly enough, Holden and Loven don’t actually physically inflict any damage on Koth, and most of their attempts fail. They prefer not to use the elixirs of truth in Koth’s bag. Koth refuses to say anything about their size and what the Red Hand is, though the party has a pretty good idea that it’s a large force, able to easily raze the vale’s hamlets—Koth says that they’re only hamlets, so it won’t take much to destroy them anyway.

Ashie really knows how to push the buttons here:

Holden: How many? Infantry, cavalry, artillery?
Koth: *grins, baring teeth*
Holden: How many tribes are there?!
Koth: We are only one tribe now!
Ashie: How many are there in your tribe?
Norro: We can handle a hundred or so.
Koth: If you could handle it, you wouldn’t be asking for help!
Ashie: “So apparently, you weren’t trusted with holding the Skull Gorge Bridge.”
Koth: “They trusted me with the vanguard.”
Ashie: “So you’re only part of a larger force.”
Koth: “*nervous, seething grin*”

When Ashie finally mentions how important the Skull Gorge Bridge is to Norro, he goes ballistic (while Koth goes pale). Norro says that it’s the only source of trade for them, and that the destruction of the bridge would render the land isolated until the bridge is rebuit.

The PCs are able to learn that Koth really is only in charge of the advance party. Norro is slowly being convinced, but he refuses to mobilize his town to evacuate until he gets a number—it’s just too much trouble for a possible false alarm. Ashie’s able to make a Knowledge (History) check regarding the Ghostlord, and remembers him as a powerful caster from the goblinoid Dhakaani empire and that his contemporaries were the old Dhakaani province of Rhest (had to throw out the idea that they were an ancient human kingdom, since this area had long been under the Galifar kingdom).

Ashie also suspects that while Kharn and Saarvith sound like Goblin names, she thinks Tyrgarun and Ozzyrandion aren’t. Koth gives vague answers to this question.

In the end, they decide that they can’t do much more.  Holden turns Koth over to Jorr. Jorr says that it’s no fun killing him with him bound, but Holden warns him that untying him would allow him to cast spells.

Jorr says “This is fer mah daughter!” and plunges his dagger into Koth’s eye.

The PCs leave the deed to Vraath Keep with Soranna, and say that she could probably use it to hold the Dawn Way for a while longer; in the mean time, they were headed to Skull Gorge.  Norro agrees that if destroying the bridge is the only way to save the townsfolk, then it must be done.

They buy a few more scrolls and leave Drellin’s Ferry at about 1 pm of Day 3.  Jorr mentions the effigy tribal marker up north along the Dawn Way, they could check it out too.

“Warklegnaw”
They travel the whole day, way into the evening. At about 10 pm, they see the marker and decide to walk up the track at Jorr’s suggestion.

After two hours of walking into the night, they get to the ruined fortress and find an old human sitting by his cooking dire boar.

They spy on him, listening to his ranting, and eventually they see the bottom half of the Silver Torch tattoo on the man’s face. Holden decides to approach in a diplomatic manner, thinking that as a Silver Flame member, the man could help them. He moves without stealth into the clearing, carrying his (Vraath’s) axe in a nonthreatening gesture.

The man notices Holden’s Silver Flame symbol and goes into a rage.

Holden: The Silver Flame needs your aid.
Warklegnaw: The Silver Flame ABANDONED ME! They TURNED ON ME!

At this point he changes into his werebear form and says he just wants to be left alone, and that he wanted nothing to do with them, while breaking into coughing fits.

Holden makes a diplomacy check (“You did not kill them—the demon that holds your body did. Your soul is innocent of those crimes.”), tells him about the situation, and eventually, the werebear says that he was willing to help—if they gave him back his axe. Holden then realizes that Warklegnaw was Amery Vraath, and he offers him the weapon.

Vraath says that he may still be able to find some of his tribe—the tribe that had accepted him after he showed that he repented of slaughtering their children—and that he would be able to fight for justice again.  What he really wanted was this—a chance to redeem himself.

“I do not want to go back to Thrane. They will not accept me. They will kill me. But I will fight for justice once more. Only the Flame can judge me. I do not want to go back to the church and suffer their prejudices. Now leave me be. An old paladin has a lot to think about. To pray about.”

He offers them some food before they leave, and also says they can stay for the night. The party eats, while Loven attempts to amuse Vraath by telling him about the flying burning owlbear. His miserable façade cracks, just a bit. The party soon leaves Vraath, and continues hiking toward Skull Gorge Bridge.

They arrive at approximately 4 AM.

14th Lharvion 998 YK

Here Be Dragons

They see the bridge. And the hobgoblins. And Ozzyrandion. The party decides that it might be too late if they wait until midday (if they rested), so they decide to pull back about an hour’s walk and begin to strategize. An hour before dawn, they get back up and begin the walk back to Skull Gorge.

End of session.
DM Notes:

Chapter 2

Due to my brain going on Hibernate mode, I’m not able to write in a coherent manner at the moment. I’m also unable to put myself into the shoes of an alcoholic, vain dwarf. As such, I am simply going to dump the session summary of the previous session here instead of an actual story.
The Terminal
Ashie, the artificer, successfully brought the train’s berserk air elemental under control. Slowing down the train would mean the rest of the trip takes 2 hours, while keeping it at maximum speed means they arrive at the terminal in less than 30 minutes—at the risk of losing control of the train again, derailing, or smashing into the Vathirond Terminal, likely killing themselves and a lot of people in the process. Deciding to play it safe and avoid an imminent crash, Ashie slows down the train.

Kikkeni, the Kalashtar psion, having been dropped to 1 HP in the previous encounter, is healed with a wand of lesser vigor.

Knowing that the party is now riding one third of the train they’d departed Flamekeep in, and that the said remaining third of the train contains several dead crew members, the party figures out what to tell the authorities at Vathirond.  After weighing the pros and cons of lying and Holden, the dwarf Silver Flame crusader, says he’s beholden to tell the truth, and so they reluctantly agree.

The train arrives at Vathirond, and Father Larrister, the local contact, is shocked to see that only a third of the train is left. Holden quickly tells him they were attacked, and Larrister quickly calls in his guards to seal off the train before anybody tries to investigate, much to the chagrin of the House Orien personnel in the station.

Larrister brings the PCs to go to the Silver Flame diocese so he can brief them further.

At the Diocese
The PCs explain exactly what happened. Larrister is shocked, but since the PCs successfully identified the assassin as a rakshasa, Larrister explains that it wasn’t a random attack; a rakshasa who stayed in close proximity to them for hours wouldn’t have made a mistake. The attack was a deliberate assassination attempt, and the PCs have also come to this conclusion. Intrigued by the turn of events, Larrister says that they may be up against more than just a warband of hobgoblin bandits.

Larrister explains where they’re headed next: Drellin’s Ferry, a town at the forefront of a lot goblin attacks. Since the town is in the middle of nowhere (we joked that Drellin’s Ferry’s town motto is “More Nowhere than Nowhere”—there really is a town in central Breland named Nowhere, but at least the Lightning Rail system gets there. Drellin’s Ferry is over 160 miles from the nearest station.), Breland can’t really mobilize an army to meet the threat of a few random bandit attacks; said army would have to cross most of the country, and frankly, King Boranel is more concerned with the hostile Droaamite attacks on Breland’s western border than random bandit attacks in the east. The PCs have yet to make the Rakshasa-Khyber-Tiamat connection, but I expect they’ll get there by the time they get to Wyrmlord Koth. Either way, Larrister is convinced the PCs are up against more than just “random bandit attacks.”

The PCs bed down for the night in the diocese, waking up to find a House Orien coach specially chartered for Drellin’s Ferry. The coach driver/courier, Kien d’Orien, is a man of few words. Loven, the warforged scout rogue and the dwarf’s adopted brother, says the carriage reminds him too much of the boxes humans put equipment in, and declares that he wants to ride on the coach’s roof. Kien sarcastically tells him to enjoy the 160-mile ride.  Loven shuts up and sits in the carriage.

Holden also opens up a letter that Larrister slipped him as they left; the Letter talks about Amery Vraath and his failed lycanthrope-purging crusade into Elsir Vale. Vraath was nasty, bloodthirsty and altogether unlikeable, and ultimately he was killed by the lycanthropes he was hunting. There are lots of rumors about him being infected with lycanthropy himself or that his ghost haunts his old base in the Witchwood. Larrister simply asks Holden to check out Vraath Keep while he’s at it, but the old vicar himself says he never really liked the guy.

Marauders
Ah, the first encounter in the module. Kien spots the ambush for the PCs, and stops the carriage a few miles out of Drellin’s Ferry, and in a dreadfully quiet manner, tells the PCs that there’s an ambush just up ahead. The PCs get down. Kien hangs back to protect his cargo from looters, while the PCs engage.

Roll initiative.

The battle goes very, very badly for the hobgoblins. All of the archers miss their first attacks, and for the most part, miss over and over again for the entire encounter. Loven decides to sneak into the woods and carries his bag of boulders—one of the most fun low-level items for rogues, ever.

Ashie lays down a wanded entangle spell in the middle of the area, covering almost the entire map. However, since the trail down the center had no foliage, only the hobgoblins in the trees are entangled. Almost all of them fail; the only one who made the save was “hobgoblin A,” the furthest down the right side of the map.  Hobgoblin A constantly makes high saves and high attack rolls, even a couple of natural 20s. I dub him “Lucky” henceforth.

Kikkeni takes a round to get psionically focused.

Soon after, Uth-Lar the bladebearer and Zarr the cleric rush out of the farmhouse, telling the PCs to attack the spellcaster (at this point, Ashie is the only person who’s cast anything.) The two of them rush down the path with the two scorch drakes (just the hell hounds I reskinned to become bipedal lizards). The scorch drakes run at tremendous speed.

One of the scorch drakes runs past Loven, who throws a pebble from his bag of boulders. It would’ve likely been a fatal sneak attack, but unfortunately, he rolls horribly and misses. Holden, maul drawn, sets about bashing in heads on the left side of the map. He hits one hobgoblin, which he kills with a massive crit on his second turn. (x3 crit = win) With two hobgoblins dead, all but one of the archers entangled, and every single one of the hobgobins rolling badly, it looks like it’s over for them.

Zarr turns invisible; Uth-Lar runs at full tilt toward Kikkeni. Uth-Lar successfully lands an AOO on Kikkeni as she tries to slip away, while the archers keep firing at Ashie.

Kikkeni, with her 40-foot speed thanks to Speed of Thought, is able to get out of the way and shoots an electric energy bolt across the path, frying one of the scorch drakes and one of the archers. Ashie buffs herself with shield. Uth-Lar pursues Kikkeni into the forest, but as he enters he passes by Loven, who attempts to sneak him with his shortbow. The attack hits, but Uth-Lar’s uncanny dodge prevents him from getting creamed by the sneak damage.

One of the scorch drakes engages with Ashie’s  iron defender homunculus, damaging it for half its HP with a single bite. Holden charges the scorch drake with Battle Leader’s Charge, reducing it to a fine red mist. Holden: 3, Red Hand: 0.

The second wave of hobgoblins doesn’t do much better. Most of them miss consistently, although a number of solid hits land on Kikkeni and Ashie over the course of the battle, dropping them to single digits. Kikkeni responds in kind by killing almost all the second wave with one application of energy missile and then runs off into the forest.  Ashie, on the other hand, is unable to help much. A CL 1 magic missile wand really doesn’t do much. Uth-Lar pursues Kikkeni, and Holden follows.  Ashie orders her homunculus to chase down Uth-Lar as well.

Holden saves Kikkeni with Defensive Rebuke, forcing Uth-Lar to attack him. The bladebearer obliges, cursing Holden in his language (Holden knows Goblin; I translate Uth-Lar’s swearing as “Your mother has less honor than a flee-bitten centaur whore”) but his rolls are also bad. Only one of his Wolf Fang Strikes hits, and his Wall of Blades counter to parry Holden’s Mountain Hammer rolls a pathetic 3. Zarr reappears behind Holden and nails him with an inflict moderate wounds—Holden fails his first save but uses his Zealous Surge to reroll his failed will save. He takes token damage.

Loven throws another charge of his bag of boulders from concealment, this time successfully sneak attacking Zarr. The cleric takes significant damage and is left bleeding  (c/o Pathfinder Rogue talent); Ashie helps by pumping him with another shot of magic missile.

The homunculus shakes down Uth-Lar, finally dropping him to exactly 0 HP. Only Zarr and two hobgoblins—one still entangled and the other ready to piss in his pants—are left. Zarr attempts to rally the two and uses his smite on Holden, but Holden has cover thanks to the foliage. Zarr misses, and finally collapses due to blood loss. Holden makes sure he’s dead with a coup de grace.  The unentangled archer runs for the hills. The other one is stuck, and in no morale to fight any more. Loven walks up to him and executes him with an arrow to the back of the head.

I changed the treasure here. I said one of Uth-Lar’s short swords broke and replaced it with a bunch of low-level magic items that had been with the merchant whom the hobbos had ambushed earlier. Same thing with Zarr’s armor; nobody needed it, and since the town doesn’t offer much in the way of gear, I decided to scrap it.

Loot:
-one darklight (Secrets of Sarlona). A very interesting magic item that can change ambient light when imbued with psionic power. Due to simpy changing the ambient light and not emitting actual light, nobody can really pinpoint the bearer. The party finds it a very interesting item and thinks of all the various applications of the said lantern—then they see another darklight already in Kikkeni’s gear list (the character’s loot was prepared by me in an emergency due to players being unable to come). They shrug and move on.
-healing belt. Without a cleric, they needed it.
-restful crystal. Now the dwarf doesn’t take his armor off anymore. Ick.
-eternal wand of shield
-everlasting rations
-355 GP
-one unconscious hobgoblin marauder.

The party also hoovers the miscellaneous mundane gear and stacks it onto the carriage and ties up Uth-Lar BENEATH the carriage. They haul everything into town.

Kien delivers his goods and leaves while the PCs talk to the militia.

Tarnished Silver
Due to my re-fluffing of Amery Vraath as an unlikeable Silver Torch zealot who made life more than a little difficult for the Ferry folk during the Last War, the militia are wary of the PCs. However, desperate to have the hobgoblins dealt with, they’re let into the town.

Loven nonchalantly drags Uth-Lar toward the Old Toll House while the two girls look for an inn. They decide on the Old Bridge, which is a House Ghallanda operation—the only one for miles around.

The dwarf and the warforged start talking to Norro Wiston, and Soranna is impressed by how the PCs dealt with the ambush so easily. The women arrive just as Speaker Wiston offers a pay of 500 GP. Holden hates goblins so accepts off the bat; the others are fine with it. They tie up Uth-Lar in a cell.

Holden=Jack Bauer
Holden makes an Intimidate check as Uth-Lar comes to. Uth-Lar’s steely façade and pointed-back ears melt away—despite his+4 bonus to resist Intimidate checks, he rolls low and Holden easily makes his point by smashing a chair into powder with his maul.

Uth-Lar sings like a canary, telling the party about Wyrmlord Koth’s base in Vraath Keep, and also mentions Azarr Kul. He’s not sure of the entire horde’s command structure, and gives no certain description of Tiamat’s involvement—all the PCs know is that Tiamat is involved, since the hobgoblins keep raving about her, and that the holy symbol Zarr carried was Tiamat’s. The PCs puzzle over the title of “Wyrmlord,” but Uth-Lar doesn’t know why that title was chosen.

Holden explains to the party that the worship of Tiamat—a demon Overlord—is unheard of among goblins. The ancient goblinoid Dhakaani empire was agnostic, trusting in its own glory more than any gods; Darguun, the nation of Lhesh Haruuc, at least publicly worships the Sovereign Host in order to appear more civilized; other goblinoids in Darguun may turn to the worship of the Dark Six, the Sovereign Host’s dark brethren. An actual cult of a demon Overlord is very, very rare, as most of them are in suspended animation.

Ashie asks if there were other races involved. Uth-Lar snaps back at the artificer, saying that unlike humans, “the People” or “the Dar” have always considered themselves a single race with three different bloods (this is consistent with Eberron’s goblinoid fluff), and that humans were fools to separate them into three different races.

Uth-Lar mentions Karkilan the minotaur, but the PCs seem to gloss over this—Uth-Lar begins to get his courage back, Holden smashes Uth-Lar in the knee. Uth-Lar mentions one last important bit of information—the Red Hand is coming to slaughter the “human river village.” Ashie presses Uth-Lar some more for information, asking if the horde will continue pushing eastward past Drellin’s Ferry. Uth-Lar, his courage and adrenaline back, simply keeps raving about the Red Hand coming.

Annoyed, Holden orders Loven to shoot him “where it hurts,” but I tell him that Uth-Lar is too far gone and any further attacks would kill him. Holden then grabs Uth-Lar’s broken knee and twists it. Roaring in pain, the hobgoblin simply keeps swearing and says that he’s confident his brethren would feast on their innards, even if he were to die.

The party leaves Uth-Lar, and Soranna leans over to Ashie, saying that it was nice of them to leave the hobgoblin for them to take care of for the night. Loven hears this, turns around, and shoots Uth-Lar in the head. Soranna sighs, drags out the body herself, and orders one of her men to bury it out back. The captain tells the party that Vraath Keep wasn’t far, and that meeting up with the woodsman Jorr could help them get through the Witchwood without much trouble.

Shopping
The party visits Delora Zann, but she’s closing down for the day, so the party goes to sleep. Early the next morning, they go to Morlin Coalhewer, who accepts Holden as a fellow dwarf, and purchases the masterwork longswords and suits of mail. The party donates the rest of the gear to the town guard, much to Soranna’s delight.

The party spends the gold buying scrolls from Brother Derny, the local cleric of Dol Arrah (female Pelor to non-Eberron players, she’s one of the Sovereign Host, the predominant pantheon-based religion), and  Sertieren the Wise. Finally, they buy mounts and gear from Delora Zann, and ride off for Jorr’s place.

Jorr the Badass and Hydra Soup
Jorr greets the PCs in typical hillbilly fashion. They make their intent to explore Vraath Keep known; Jorr blows them off and tells them that it’s just “down the road, can’t miss it.” He responds a bit favorably to their flattery, but since the PCs feel they can’t trust him yet, they only speak in uncertain terms.  He responds by saying the wood isn’t that unsafe, and that while the Keep is haunted, they don’t need his help. It’s only when they mention the goblins that he perks up and offers his help.

Not long after, they arrive at the Blackwater Causeway. Jorr takes point, tells the PCs to keep watch, and leads the crossing. The PCs dismount and take the horses with them. Jorr fails his spot check and misses the Hydra completely.

“Aw hell. I dinnow there wuz a hydra here.”

Roll initiative.

Intiative goes as follows: Kikkeni, Loven, Hydra, Jorr, Ashie, Holden. Kikkeni’s Knowledge check result spooks the player; she advocates either mounting the horses and attempting to run full speed across the causeway (which would’ve made an awesome chase scene reminiscent of that one area in Metal Slug), or running back toward the town.  Holden stows his maul and draws his greatsword.

I simply tell her that the hydra will give chase, that horses can’t run at full speed with a rider, the causeway is too slippery and rickety to cross with charging horses, and that the beast will follow them all the way back to town if they ran.

Kikkeni uses inertial armor, while Loven tries to get cover and hides to snipe. The hydra takes the path of least resistance—the river. Ashie fires a ray of enfeeblement from a scroll, greatly crippling the hydra’s abilities. Its attack bonus is down to +5, and its bites no longer had their damage bonus. Jorr Rapid Shots, hitting both times. Holden scrambles straight into the path of the monster as it swims up the river to where the causeway crosses the deep water.

Kikkeni opens fire with her energy bolt, but rolls low. To make matters worse, hydras have good reflex saves despite their size, and takes very little damage. All its heads are intact. Loven sneaks the hydra with his bow, dealing a good amount of damage. The hydra moves in to attack Holden, using its superior reach to savage him with bites. Only one hits, and deals a pathetic 4 damage. Jorr keeps the arrows pumping, dealing 7 more damage. Ashie fires a magic missile from her wand, dealing 2 damage.  Holden pulls out a blast disk, sets it to “Proximity,” and plants it in the bridge.

Turn 3. Kikkeni blasts again, searing off a head. Loven sees what his brother is doing, and makes a run for it, climbing back over the causeway to the side opposite the hydra. The hydra stays put, attacks Holden with everything, and misses all but one bite. Again.  Jorr goes “What th’ hell are ye doin’? KEEP SHOOTIN’!” and stays on the bridge. One more Rapid Shot: 17 damage. Ashie makes a run  for it, jumping into the bog on the east side of the causeway, and Holden makes a run for it, ducking under the hydra’s would-have-been devastating sextuple AOO (none of it hit), and jumps into the bayou as well.

Turn 4. Kikkeni blasts yet again. A second head comes off, dealing damage to the beast’s body. Loven is already off and running away. The hydra takes the bait and steps right into the [I]blast disk[/I]’s range. [B]BOOM.[/B]

The bridge is sheared off its posts and falls into the water on the far end.  Unfortunately the hydra makes its save again. It does take enough area damage to shear off another head, though. Jorr almost falls, but manages to stay up—and keeps shooting. “I hope that wasn’t the  only one ya got, because it’s still COMING!” Another Rapid Shot and the hydra’s HP is down to 26. Holden swears at his failed plan, stomps back toward the hydra and plunges his greatsword into the body.

And rolls a 20.

And confirms with a 17.

The hydra’s heart bursts under the impact of 28 damage, and the whole thing collapses into the water.

End of session.

Spoilerrific DM Comments:

Chapter 1

A hot southerly wind whistled through the twisting alleys of Flamekeep, the capital of Thrane. Five of Eberron’s twelve moons were already well on their way across the sky, and three more were on the rise. The Ring of Siberys spread its ghostly glow in a wide band straight across the sky.

The stiff, humid air inside the room made Ashiadae Jiourrn feel like she was pasted with librarian’s glue onto her bed. Tossing and turning didn’t help; the sheets clung viciously. She sighed and wished she had stayed at the House Orien station instead. Even least dragonmarked like her could avail of quarters that were at least more comfortable than the common inn her new companions had dragged her into.

She turned over to her left, where her companion Kikkeni lay, completely dead to the world and snoring softly. The light of three moons drew stark lines on the sharp angles of the kalashtar girl’s face.

“You sure sleep soundly for someone who can’t dream,” Ashie grumbled. She turned again on her bed to face her homunculus companion, a dog-shaped construct named Seiza.

“At least you don’t need to sleep,” Ashie grumbled once more.

A sharp rapping, urgent and jarring, rippled from the door one floor down. Seiza cocked its head in the direction of the sound, gears and pistons whirring and clicking.

“Wait for it. Wait for it–” Ashie said as she buried her head in her eiderdown pillow.

“Crooked Khyber’s loins!” roared a voice from the other room. “Can’t a dwarf sleep peacefully for a moment? Loven, get the thrice-damned door!”

Ashie waited a moment. She knew the angry dwarf would force her to open the door if he realized she was awake. For now, the dwarf would force his adopted “brother,” a warforged scout, to do it. Ashie then wondered what it would be like to live like a construct, requiring neither food nor sleep. Maybe she could finish the body-swapper device in record time.

The rapping came again.

“Stop staring out the window, Loven! Get the blood-clotting door!” came the dwarven roar.

“Alright already,” came the metallic reply.

Moments later, the diminutive warforged’s voice rang in the other room. “Brother, it’s for you.”
Ashie realized she hadn’t heard his footsteps at all, considering that Loven was made of metal and wood fiber.

“Khyber spit!” swore the unseen dwarf, his heavy feet landing on the floorboards. With a series of thumps, the dwarf stomped furiously down the stairs to the inn door.

The steps returned, tramping up the stairs with the same urgency the rapping had.

“Uh-oh,” whispered Ashie. The steps were coming her way.

“Oy, Ashie!”

The door to Ashie and Kikkeni’s room burst open, kicked so hard it swung right back at the frantic dwarf, who kicked at it again.

“Oy, Ashie! Wake up! We’re being summoned to the Cathedral!”

Ashie tried hard to feign slumber, until she smelled the oppressive scent of alcohol wafting up underneath her nose. Her nose twitched, and knew she couldn’t keep up the illusion of her being asleep anymore.

“…please, take that foul brew away from me. I can smell alcohol all over you.”

“‘Course it smells of alcohol! It’s a hundred twenty proof! Family recipe, this gravy is.”

Ashie groaned and turned on her bed away from the dwarf.

“Oy! Did ye hear me lass? The Keeper of the Flame’s summoning me!”

“Summoning you.”

“Ye’re coming with me!”

There wasn’t any point in resisting now. The girl sighed and pointed at the other bed while rubbing her eyes. “What about her? Wake her up too.”

The dwarf stomped over to the other bed and held up his flask of gravy underneath Kikkeni’s nose. The kalashtar girl turned away.

“I don’t want to get up.”

“Ye don’t have to!” roared Holden, grabbing Kikkeni by her ankle and pulling her clean off the bed with one tug. “I’ll drag ye! Me boss is callin’ me!”

“Is your boss more important than my beauty sleep?”

“I don’t give a Khyber-spitting lick about yer beauty sleep! Wer not even the same race ye crooked girl!”

Ashie shook her head as she wrung the sleep from her face and gathered her accoutrements about her. Looking over her shoulder, she saw that Kikkeni simply threw her day robes over her nightgown and picked up her pack and staff while Holden marched triumphantly to his room to gear up.

***

Ashie, Seiza by her side, reached the inn’s threshold with Loven and Holden already there. Kikkeni was last to exit, dragging her feet as she went.

Holden raised his fist to his chest, saluting the man who had summoned them.

The man was human, tall and balding, and likely in his fifties. His face seemed like partially melted wax to Ashie, made especially pale by the multiple moonlight.

“I apologize for the trouble,” said the man in a slightly scratchy baritone. “I am called Brother Silesi. Keeper Jaela Daran requests your presence immediately. Let us not tarry. Even in Flamekeep, the shadows grow darker.”

***
Brother Silesi said nothing else as he led the group down the streets leading to the city center. His footsteps were measured but quick, blending into Holden’s fierce cadence, Ashie’s own pace, and Kikkeni’s wretched trudging. Only Loven seemed to make no sound as he glided along the cobbles.

Alleys gave way to streets, streets gave way to main roads, which gave way to the massive boulevards that radiated out from the Cathedral. Soon, they passed Castle Thalingard—austere and dark compared to the gleaming Cathedral in the city center. As the royals had been all but eclipsed by the Church of the Silver Flame, so had the castle been overshadowed by the mighty temple in the city center. Ashie saw the church-fortress’s mighty gates across the street open, and her breath deserted her.

The Cathedral of the Silver Flame was beyond monolithic. Its soaring alabaster parapets glowed in the wash of moonlight, and the illumination of candles danced in the rows of tall, narrow stained glass windows down the structure’s sides.

Ashie had seen the great basilica many times, but never this late at night. The flood of light from the heavens gave the structure a truly ethereal appearance.

The guards at the gate motioned for the party to stop, but retracted their hands and bowed as soon as they recognized Brother Silesi.

“This way, please,” whispered Brother Silesi.

The acolyte led the sleep-heavy party down a passage that went off to the side of the great nave of the fortress-like church. Seiza’s metal claws clicked on the black marble floor. Ashie looked down and saw that it was shot through with gleaming veins—likely silver, or maybe even mithral, she thought. Even the pillars were made of the same material.

Numerous candelabras stood burning along the corridor. To Ashie, the individual tongues of fire looked like will-o-wisps dancing in the gloom. She had heard from Holden that when the Purified–the collective term for the Silver Flame’s faithful–would offer prayers, they would light candles that burned with flames of different colors: green for prosperity, blue for protection, red for healing, and purple for the dead. Occasionally, candles of expensive silverburn were lit–for festivals and crusades. Ashie then noticed that a disturbingly large number of the candles were burning silver–and there was no approaching festival.

“Why would they launch a crusade now?” she thought.

“We are here,” rasped Brother Silesi. He knocked on a door nearby, and immediately it opened. “Mistress Jaela has been expecting you.”

Ashie and the three others entered the room. Seated on an enormous black oak throne against the far wall was a thin, petite slip of a girl. Her skin was dusky and her short-cropped hair was completely black, and her black robes fell loose around her slender frame. Ashie’s gaze was drawn to the girl’s eyes, which were a mournful, pale gray. As soon as Holden met the girl’s gaze, he genuflected and bowed his head.

“Rise, Priest-captain,” said the girl in a voice that sounded far more formal than her appearance would betray.

“It is an honor to meet ye, Mistress Jaela.”

***

Akviradh was hungry.

Staying in the form of a human for a long time had made him susceptible to mortal sensations, and even though prolonged periods of eating did nothing to weaken him, the rakshasa craved the taste of human flesh and blood.

The master is to be obeyed, he thought to himself. His superior had instructed him to watch out for any emergency summons that the Silver Flame sent out. In the guise of a zealous churchgoer, he had paid the foolish guards enough platinum to convince them to notify him if ever an emergency summons was sent out—he wanted to offer prayers for the mission, he had said.

Those guards were dead now. After they had met with Akviradh in a tavern down at the docks to tell him that the Keeper of the Flame had ordered an acolyte to leave the cathedral late at night, the rakshasa called them outside to pay them further, stabbed both with a common dagger, then cut out their tongues, in the manner of common dockside killings. Beheading them would have been far more convenient–heads were enough for investigating clerics to cast divination spells–but it would look far too clean. It wasn’t often that ruffians would murder someone execution-style, and less often that one could afford a fine greatsword. For the same reason, he had avoided chewing on the bodies to sate his hunger. Half-eaten bodies washing up on the shore would provoke more in-depth investigations.

Akviradh’s brethren had taken the dead guards’ places for the night. By tomorrow morning they would be gone, and the party headed for Elsir Vale–whoever they were–would be dead.

In order to facilitate his journey to the target area, Akviradh assumed his natural form—that of a black-furred, orange striped humanoid tiger–and climbed to the nearest rooftop. The rakshasa assassin leapt from rooftop to rooftop, landing silently each time, until he had cut across the bulk of Flamekeep and arrived at the Lightning Rail station.

The master has not yet been wrong, the rakshasa reminded himself. It was not long before a small company of mercenaries passed by. Akviradh landed on his padded feet behind them, and changed his appearance once more.

***

“Nay, it is my honor to meet a hero of the Last War,” replied the girl. “With all my lessons here, it is rare that I get to meet true heroes.”

The dwarf bowed his head once more–partly out of humility and partly to hide a blush, Ashie thought–and spoke.

“Mistress, though it is an honor to be in yer presence, I’m rather confused as to why we were called at this unholy hour.”

Ashie spotted a pair of red eyes staring out of the gloom beside Jaela’s throne, after Holden had spoken, a deep, throaty growl accompanied the piercing gaze.

“Ah, Flame bless thee for coming here at all!” replied the girl as she reached out her hand towards the beast in the darkness. “Easy, Skaravojen,” she said, turning to the growling monster.

Skaravojen slipped out of the shadows and lay its massive horned head on the throne’s armrest, where Jaela stroked it idly as she turned back to Holden and the others.

“Pardon us,” she continued. “Everyone here has been uneasy as of late. The Flame has sent—rather disturbing visions.”

“Visions?” asked Kikkeni, still half-yawning.

“Aye.” Jaela inhaled for a moment, and shut her eyes, calling back to mind the nightmares that had plagued her.

“I see another war on the horizon. Legions of warriors, with scaly folk with them. Dragons, and darker forces, marching out of Elsir Vale in eastern Breland. A vast, clawed red hand sweeps all across Khorvaire, slaying and plundering, leaving blood in its wake. Finally, a whispered phrase in the darkness at the end: ‘Five sorrows’.” Ashie noticed a tear roll down the girl’s cheek as she opened her eyes once more.

“‘Five sorrows,’” repeated Kikkeni, growing more interested in the Keeper’s story. “‘Five sorrows’ in Draconic is–”

“Tiamat,” replied Holden. “A daughter—nay—the Daughter of Khyber.”

“It is as you say,” Jaela said softly. “Among the most powerful of the ancient demon overlords, even worshipped as a goddess by some of the twisted dragons, Tiamat could turn the dragons against each other with a thought. Her form was that of a vast, five-headed dragon, and her wings would easily overshadow a city as large as Flamekeep.”

A shiver crawled up Ashie’s spine.

“The dragon paladins of the Light of Siberys were able to imprison her, but at great cost,” continued the girl. “Her prison–the Pit of Five Sorrows in central Argonnessen–is said to be the most difficult defense to penetrate in all of Eberron. However, it seems now that she strains at her bonds.”

“What’s the Light of Siberys?” asked Ashie.

“Argonnessen’s army, named after the Father of Dragons,” replied Kikkeni. “If civilizations like ours can put together organized martial forces, what more the dragons? Almost everything our nations have learned came from the dragons somehow.”

“Aye,” grunted Holden. “And only one dragon crusader could level an entire city if it wanted to.”

“So—you’re sending us to Argonnessen?” said Loven. Ashie noticed it was the first time he had spoken since they had left the inn. “I don’t think the four of us have enough firepower between us to engage legions of rampaging dragons.”

Jaela cocked her head slightly and gave a small giggle. “Of course not, my metal guest.” The flash of levity evaporated, and Jaela’s mood grew somber once more.

“The dreams clearly said that the epicenter of activity would be in Elsir Vale. However, if you fail to stop whatever is brewing there–”

The girl leaned forward, her voice dwindling to a whisper.

“–I fear that the dragons themselves may act. If this cult–or whatever it is– weakens Tiamat’s prison, the Light of Siberys may take wing–”

“–and launch an apocalyptic invasion of Khorvaire,” finished Kikkeni.

Everyone’s eyes turned to Kikkeni.

“It will be Xen’Drik all over again,” Kikkeni said. “The last time a direct threat to the dragons of Argonnessen had come to Eberron, they put an end to the giants’ empire and laid an entire continent to waste. If they attack Khorvaire, the dragons will torch and level Breland, Thrane, Karrnath, Aundair, Droamm, Darguun, the Eldeen Reaches—everything. Even the combined military of the human nations put together cannot stand up to the Light of Siberys. Not even the Dragonmarked Houses can muster the strength needed to defeat legions upon legions of dragons.”

“Exactly how many are we looking at?” asked Loven.

“Over fifty thousand,” Jaela whispered, her words slowed for emphasis. “A full-scale invasion would blacken the skies over Khorvaire.”

Ashie’s eyes fell. The body-swapper device would have to wait. Again.

***

Akviradh sneered as he dragged the woman’s body behind a stack of crates. What kind of guards were these? They couldn’t detect threats to save their lives, much less fight. Whatever the case, the woman’s appearance would serve its purpose.

A tall, blonde, broad-shouldered female human Akviradh jogged quickly to the waiting lightning rail train.

***

“You have an hour to prepare,” Jaela said. “We have chartered a Lightning Rail train to bring you to Vathirond in Eastern Breland. There you will meet Vicar Larrister, the leader of our chapter there. He will explain the rest of the journey.”

“If I may be so bold, me Lady,” grunted Holden. “May I visit me wife before I depart?”

“You may do so within the hour allotted.”

“Aye. Thank ye, me Lady.” The dwarf stomped toward the door, bowed once more, and ran as fast as his legs could carry him.

Jaela turned to the other three. “If there is nothing else the rest of you need to do, then please go to the Lightning Rail station at once. Your travel papers have been taken care of, and we have done our best to ensure your utmost comfort. After all, we did wake you in the middle of the night.”

***

Ashie led Seiza down to the Lightning Rail carriage. Kikkeni was walking behind her, now fully awake. Just as they were about to board the train, Holden and Loven came running up to them. Holden had shouldered his favored weapon, an enormous maul, and was covered in sweat. Loven effortlessly came up by his side, his rapier tapping against his metal leg.

“I hope we’re not too late,” said Loven. “Brother here was way too slow.”

“SLOW?” roared Holden. “You never even tire! Of course I seem slow compared to you!”

The warforged only shrugged in response.

A deep hum began building up in the train’s engine car, and Ashie realized the pilot was powering up the dragonshard in the engine’s core. The others began to climb on board, Ashie stood on the platform for one last moment. She wouldn’t miss this for the world.

A flash of light and a peal of thunder ripped through the silence of the night as the air elemental housed in the engine awoke. Arcs of lightning weaved about over the train’s engine car, and the sizzle of electricity rippled down the length of the train.
Ashie’s eyes followed the veins of blue-white to the rearmost car, and it was then that she noticed the train had been downsized.

House Orien’s trains were usually at least seven cars long. This one only had three, including the engine. The Church of the Silver Flame must have paid an enormous premium for this jaunt. Ashie shook her head and hopped aboard with Seiza.

The train lurched forward into the darkness in the south.

Ashie walked to the cabin she shared with Kikkeni, and had discovered that the kalashtar girl was already sleeping. Exhausted, she lowered her pack and dropped onto her bed as well. A heavy feeling settled over her, and soon she was fast asleep.

***

It was already late morning when Ashie awoke. Kikkeni was still sleeping, and Ashie realized she had barely moved. She stretched and opened the door of the cabin, looking up and down the aisle.

“Oy! G’mornin!” said Holden from the lounge directly across the aisle. He was sitting at the table, ladling enormous blobs of gravy onto a mountain of mashed potatoes. “Want some?” he offered.

“Please keep that away from me.”

“Oh come on! It’s good for ye!”

Ashie retreated back to her quarters and locked the door.

“The gravy again.” It was Kikkeni’s voice. She was still lying down, but she had turned to Ashie and her eyes were open.

“Yeah.”

“Have you ever tried it?”

“Not really.”

Kikkeni sat up and smoothed out the kinks in her robes and looked out the window. Ashie sat beside her and peered out into the sunlight as well. The fierce Lharvion sun was beating down on the plains of Southern Thrane, turning them a golden yellow. These plains would soon yield to Breland’s savannahs–hotter, fiercer, and more remote than any prairie in Thrane.

“Kikkeni.”

The kalashtar turned to Ashie, her eyebrows raised in curiosity. Ashie noticed that the kalashtar had been picking up human mannerisms the more they journeyed together.

“I’ve been meaning to ask you. Why do you sleep so much? I’ve heard physicians say that humans and other mortal races find sleep restful because of dreams. But kalashtar–”

Kikkeni’s gaze defocused, and she turned her head slightly to look out the window again.

“We don’t dream, yes. Our quori ancestors were locked out of the Realm of Dreams by the tyrants there. When they journeyed to Eberron, they needed to dwell within human minds to survive, and that gave birth to our race. A race of dreamless beings.”

“So why do you sleep so much?”

“It helps me escape. Dal Quor’s minions infiltrate every civilization, worming their way through your ranks. They can reach anyone who dreams. As such, when I sleep–”

“You’re out of their reach.”

“Correct.”

“If only it were so easy to escape from the cares of this world.”

“Well, there’s the rub. To escape and not to fight is to lose. We would never win any battles if all we did was run away.”

“That’s true, I guess.”

Kikkeni rested her pointed chin on folded hands. To Ashie, it seemed as if her face had been sculpted with a knife–high cheekbones, angled jaws, and slanting, narrow eyes. Even Kikkeni’s black hair fell blade-straight.

Kikkeni spoke once more. “I wonder what we are up against, exactly.”

“Who knows? Even after the Last War, every strange group has been stirring up trouble. And the Dragonmarked Houses seem to make a profit from every single conflict that arises.”

Ashie laid a hand on her shoulder, where her Mark of Passage had manifested in her early teens. The bright blue-green lines and whorls of the Mark traced a rough, winged shape, akin to a hawk or dragon taking flight. As the mark grew in power, it spread across the skin, tracing an ever more intricate pattern. Sometimes the mark appeared suddenly and inexplicably on people, spreading over most of the dragonmarked’s body. In these rare cases the mark was called a Siberys mark, and the powers that Siberys heirs possessed were incredible indeed—beyond those of the most learned wizards.

House Orien, like the other Dragonmarked Houses, had grown from the mercantile use of the magical abilities the dragonmarks granted. In Orien’s case, the Mark of Passage gave the ability to travel vast distances in the blink of an eye. Ashie’s could travel no further than fifty feet, but this had saved her lives countless times.

“They say the presence of the Houses in Elsir Vale is almost nonexistent, though,” Ashie continued.

Kikkeni nodded. “Vathirond isn’t our final destination, but Jaela was rather silent about where our final destination was. That means the Lightning Rail doesn’t even reach that far.”

“I wonder if we’ll end up journeying to Argonnessen eventually.”

“Il-Yannah light our path if we do,” Kikkeni replied. “I’ve never faced a dragon in battle.”

“If the Keeper is right, we probably will soon.”

***

Akviradh stood on the walkway at the rear of the party’s first class carriage, apparently at the post his victim had been assigned to. It was perfect. He could easily tap into his race’s innate ability to skim surface thoughts of people nearby. He had spent the last half-hour psychically eavesdropping on the train’s passengers, drinking in their plans. Apparently the fools didn’t even know where they were headed.

He looked up at the sky. He still had hours to go before his shift ended, and he had to wait for the cover of darkness to act. The rakshasa gripped his weapon tightly, and stood still.

***

It was twilight when Ashie began looking over the scrolls she had scribed, studying the twisting lines and runes and diagrams. Through the open door, she saw that Holden was busy stuffing himself once more, again pouring his noxious gravy over a rack of lamb.

“What a waste,” Ashie murmured as she went back to her studies.

Seiza leapt onto Ashie’s bed and lay on its paws as a dog would, its heavy iron body leaving a deep depression on the feather-stuffed quilt. Ashie’s magical scrollcase–a convenient, easy storage and retrieval device she had proudly built herself–rolled into the hole, clicking as it hit Seiza’s side. Ashie stroked the construct’s polished armor. She had built Seiza as well, transfusing it with a full pint of her blood. It was practically a part of her body.

Ashie turned to her right. Kikkeni had since gone to sleep again, although since their little exchange of stories she had changed into her fine silk robes, in the usual kalashtar style of loose, open drapes, that left much bare skin along her arms, back, and midriff. It was only then that Ashie had noticed several tattoos scribed onto Kikkeni’s skin, which she hadn’t seen before. Psionic tattoos, she guessed: diagrams that contained the stored power of the mind, to be released with a touch. As laid back as Kikkeni was, she was well-prepared for whatever they were about to face.

A knock on the already open door startled Ashie. It was a tall, blond, broad-shouldered woman—one of the guards assigned to the express chartered train.

“Good evening, madam,” the guard said. “We’re about two hours from our destination. It might please you to get some sleep, as we shall be arriving at night.”

“Thanks, but I’m alright.”

The guard seemed to be startled at her answer, but nodded.

“As it pleases you, madam.”

Ashie watched as the guard closed the door and moved to the dining room.

“Oh, really?” she heard Holden’s voice. “Better get some sleep then.” The stomp of heavy dwarven feet followed, along with the slam of a door. In less than five minutes, snoring rippled through the wall.

***

Night had already fallen as Akviradh walked to the front of the first class car. He knocked on the door of the engine car, and when a crewman answered him, his response was yanking the fool out of the door and off the train, dropping him into the sizzling electric field below. The man’s life was over in a flash of blue lightning.

“Hey, close the damn door! That’s dangerous!” yelled someone from inside.

Akviradh obliged, stepping over the gap and closing the door.

The crewman who had yelled at him came in for a closer look. “Hey, who’re you? The engine’s for House Orien personnel only.”

Akviradh morphed into the shape of the man whom he had just killed.

“Is that better?”

The crewman’s jaw dropped open. “Wha–changeling?”

His words were cut short as Akviradh changed back into his natural form and tore the man’s throat out with his bite.

“Wrong. Better.”
***

Ashie was in the middle of re-reading her last scroll when the lights in the cabin went out. That was weird, she thought. House Orien trains were always illuminated brightly until the last person had gone to sleep. Something was amiss.

She stumbled out of the room, groping about. “Holden? Loven?”

“I’m here, Ashie.” It was Loven’s metallic voice.

“Could you wake Holden? He’s the only one who can see in this darkness.”

“If I can actually get–what?”

Ashie had suddenly held her finger to her lips.

“Did you hear that?”

“Hear what?”

“Someone’s on the roof.”

“You go and wake up Kikkeni,” said the warforged. “I’ll get Holden.”

Ashie stumbled back to her cabin and shook Kikkeni until she answered with a “What?”

“Lights went out. Something’s wrong.”

The kalashtar girl sat up immediately and grabbed her staff and pack, seeing only by the moonlight from the windows. Ashie did the same. From the other room, she could hear the fuss and clank of Holden pulling on his armor.

***
Akviradh cursed as the tingle of psychic activity registered in his mind. Everybody had awoken. His stealth advantage was gone. Swinging his sword to clean it of the helmsman’s blood, he changed shape once more.

The train’s lightning reins lay sputtering on the floor of the cabin. Uncontrolled, the Khyber shard the air elemental was housed in pulsed with unthinking malice.

***

Ashie looked at Kikkeni.

“Do you feel that?”

“The train’s accelerating.”

The hum of the train’s movement became a whine, then became a roar.

“Khyberit gentis. I have to find out what’s going on in the engine.”

Ashie braced herself against the walls of the aisle as she stumbled toward the small square of navy blue moonlight that was the porthole in the front door. Kikkeni followed close behind her. As she was about to open it, she heard Holden stomp into the aisle. She assumed Loven wasn’t far–she never heard his footsteps anyway.

Just as Ashie reached for the door handle, the porthole darkened.

The female guard’s face filled the window.

Ashie turned the handle and opened the door.

“Is anything wrong?” asked the guard.

“I was about to ask the same thing,” Ashie answered. “The lights in the cabin went out. The train’s accelerating too—” she trailed off as she noticed the guard’s seemingly unconcerned expression and icy stare, and resumed speaking with caution. “I, uh, need to check the engine.”

“I’m afraid I can’t allow you to check the engine,” snarled the guard. “It’s off-limits.”

“Watch out!” bellowed Holden as the guard drew a black, curved greatsword from the sheath on her back. Holden raised his hammer and tried to push to the front of the crowded aisle. “Crooked Khyber’s loins, get the hell outta me way!”

Loven pivoted low and rolled across the floor, trying to pass between the guard’s legs and stand behind her, but the guard responded with a swift kick, sending the warforged’s slight frame sprawling back.

“Khyberit gentis!” swore Ashie. “We need light!” Stumbling back through the gloom, she felt around for a solid object to infuse her magic into. She grasped and felt a round, metallic object, and exhaled, feeling the warmth of energy travel through her fingers.

She turned back toward the door just in time to see the guard’s form distort and melt in the dim moonlight, reforming into a black-skinned, eel-like thing that stood like a man, but evidently was not of any race that she had ever seen. Even changelings she had met before did not alter their appearances like this. Ashie noticed a chilling detail out of the corner of her eye. “Its hands are twisted the wrong way!”

“Backwards twisted hands—It’s a rakshasa!” Kikkeni screamed as she tore back through the aisle through her companions. “A fiend of Khyber!”

The rakshasa snarled and swung its blade at Kikkeni as she ran, cleaving through soft silk and drawing a long, bloody gash in her back.

“Kikkeni!” yelled Ashie as the kalashtar girl stumbled behind her. “Are you alright?”

“I–I think so,” she answered. Kikkeni held her fingers to her temple and closed her eyes. “I’ll burn you alive for that!” Ashie saw that when Kikkeni’s eyes opened again, they were glowing like a furnace.

A bolt of searing fire shot through the air at the rakshasa, nearly signing Holden’s hair. It struck the rakshasa square in the chest, singing the creature’s slick skin.

“Oy! Watch where ye aim yer mind, ye stupid girl!” yelled Holden as he barreled forward, raising his maul. Ashie saw a brief green flash surround the sledgehammer’s head as the dwarf swung it across the rakshasa’s jaw. Bone crunched sickeningly, and the creature snarled in pain.

Ashie felt her magic ignite, filling the room with golden light. Just as her spirits rose, they fell.

“Way to go, miss greasemonkey.” Loven’s head shone like an everbright lantern under the magical infusion. “How do I stab it in the back when I glow like a lighthouse?”

“Stay here so Kikkeni can see,” Ashie replied. “I’m going into the engine.”

“But how-” Loven’s protest was cut short as Ashie put her palm onto the dragonmark onto her shoulder and inhaled. The dragonmark’s blue-green light flared, and Ashie felt its warmth envelop her. The train, the scuffle, and everything else blurred, melted, shifted, and coalesced once more as she reappeared in the engine.

“Khyber spit!” yelled Holden, drawing Ashie’s attention back to the rakshasa. Holden’s solid blow had barely slowed it–in Ashie’s eyes, the fiend swung its blade so quickly that it seemed to come from two directions at once. The blade sliced through the plates of Holden’s armor, drawing blood. “Eh, that smarts! I’m gonna send ye back to Khyber, demon!”

“Keep it busy!” called Ashie. “I need to make sure this train doesn’t kill us all!”

“With pleasure!” answered Kikkeni. Ashie saw the rakshasa begin to clutch at its leathers—the straps seemed to be tightening of their own accord.

“I’m going to gut you, witch!” snarled the rakshasa.

Ashie stepped forward into the shadows of the engine. Horror gripped her as she saw great puddles of blood on the floor, and the sounds of the scuffle seemed to fade away.

“Onatar’s forge…what happened?”

Ashie took a tentative step toward the control room. Two steps. Three. The door to the control room swung on its hinges, and the crackling glow of the lightning reins inside peeked out from the gap.

The train groaned again as the berserk elemental in its core poured more power into the system.
“The train’s nearing its limit,” Ashie whispered to herself. “If we hit a sharp curve—or worse, the terminal–” Ashie pushed the grim prospect from her mind and reached out for the door.

The train roared again, violently accelerating once more. The door snapped open, and Ashie saw why the device was going berserk.

She could make out the arm, head and shoulders of a man in House Orien livery lying on the ground. On the man’s forearm, the Mark of Passage’s lines were clearly visible in the stark blue-white light, but their lines were dark and brown instead of blue-green. Ashie bent over to check for a pulse—and noticed that it really was only the man’s head, shoulders and arm that were left. He had been torn in half at the waist.

“Not a good way to go,” she whispered. Ashie closed her eyes, stood up, and grasped the train’s lightning reins. “Alright, elemental. You’ve had your fun. You’re stopping NOW!”

The train continued to accelerate.

***

Akviradh swore. He knew the kalashtar would continue causing his uniform to grip about his body. It was becoming increasingly frustrating to move. The idiot dwarf had continued to pound him with the hammer too, but with little effect.

“Ashie!” yelled the kalashtar girl. “Blessed arrows! Spears! Anything like that!”

“The scum know how to hurt me,” Akviradh cursed between clenched teeth.

Akviradh’s form shifted and distorted again. Solid muscular arms whipped into flexible tentacles, still maintaining their grip on the sword. Slick skin sprouted fur. The eel-like head morphed into that of an emaciated feline. He leapt across the gap and into the engine.

“Oy!” yelled the dwarf. “He’s going after Ashie!”

Akviradh turned to see one of the most ridiculous sights he’d ever seen—a dwarf in full armor running down a train aisle, carrying a glowing warforged scout under his arm.

“Take ‘em down, brother!” roared the dwarf as he dropped the warforged into the engine’s narrow corridor.

“Aye!” yelled the ridiculous glowing construct as it landed on its feet and began to tumble down the corridor toward Akviradh–who kicked the warforged away with a snarl.

“Maybe I should just reduce you to firewood!” roared the rakshasa.

“That can’t be good.”

The sinuous tentacles whirled the greatsword rapidly, striking twice at the warforged, from opposite directions. Akviradh felt the construct’s mithral chestplates give way. Pivoting low, he lunged at the warforged’s arm, biting into its wooden fiber.

***
“It bit me! Agh!” a metallic voice screamed.

Ashie turned to see the rakshasa much closer, thrashing Loven repeatedly and backing him into a corner.

“Blessed arrows, huh?”

She reached for the scrollcase at her belt and pulled out a page. The scrollcase always magically supplied the page its wielder was looking for, so Ashie got what she wanted. As she read the incantation aloud, the scroll stiffened in her hands, and magic flared across the letters of the spell, burning them off the page. As the sheet floated in the air in front of her, aether lines traced themselves in space, and flowed down to Ashie’s hands, filling them with warmth. She drew her crossbow from her pack, and the aether lines embedded themselves into the wood of the weapon, as if they were iron filings drawn by a magnet.

“I guess bolts will have to do,” Ashie said to herself as she saw Kikkeni jump into the corridor.

“Back to Khyber, you fiend!” Kikkeni yelled as she stretched out her hand, palm down, towards the rakshasa. Roaring in agony, the demon lost control of its limbs and flew straight into the ceiling of the engine as the kalashtar girl flipped her hand upward. Kikkeni then made a throwing gesture, and the fiend fell back to the engine car’s floor, face planted in the boards.

“I’ll bash yer face in!” Holden howled as he brought the maul above his head, and crashing down into the floorboards. However, the fiend’s head was no longer there. The rakshasa grinned at the dwarf, and whipped its tentacle arms about, trying to regain its balance.

With the rakshasa unable to reach him, Loven scrambled up and leapt for the first class cart once more, sheathing his rapier and drawing his bow. Ashie saw him nock an arrow and take aim at the fiend. Seeing her own chance, she raised her crossbow and pulled the trigger. The demon rolled to the other side of the corridor, leaving Ashie’s bolt quivering in the boards, and leapt to its feet, ducking as Holden swung his maul across, bashing a deep dent into the wall. The rakshasa then leapt over Holden, its feet touching the wall, and landed between the dwarf and Kikkeni.

Ashie saw it attempt a second vault over Kikkeni, but the kalashtar girl brought up her staff, knocking the rakshasa out of the air. It still landed on its feet, its slavering jaws inches from Kikkeni’s face. Ashie saw her close her eyes once more, and a shimmering field of force snapped into existence around Kikkeni’s limbs and torso.

“EYAAAH!” Holden turned on his heel in an attempt to crush the back of the rakshasa’s head, but it ducked low and leapt over Kikkeni, scrambling onto the first class carriage. “Khyber spit! It’s trying to kill Holden!” Instead of lunging at Loven, however, the fiend scrambled up the ladder and climbed onto the roof.

***

This was it, Akviradh thought. He had failed, and Indravan-Yagna would have his head. Either way, he would still have to report to his superior. If he could not afford a show of competence, perhaps a show of loyalty would still prevent his lord from sending him screaming back to Khyber.

A flurry of thoughts coming from below filled his brain.

“What? They’re going to–”

***

“Holden, you’re going to have to decouple the train!” Ashie yelled as she struggled to impose her will on the raging elemental. “We’ve got everything on us anyway, right?”

“Aye,” said the dwarf as Loven leapt back over the rail.

“No,” Loven said. You’re forgetting something.

“Oh. Right.” Ashie remembered. “Seiza!”

The homunculus, which she had compeltely forgotten about, came bounding up the aisle and into the engine.

I’m going to have to get used to summoning it, Ashie thought.

“There’s one other thing,” Kikkeni said as she pointed to the rear. “There’s a third car on this train. It was the galley cart; guards were on it too.”

“But we haven’t heard from them all this time,” Loven said. “They might be already dead.”

“Best we make sure,” Kikkeni said. “Start decoupling the train. I’ll search the last car.”

***
Akviradh couldn’t believe how foolish this kalashtar was as her thoughts bubbled with heroism and urgency. He sensed her running at full tilt down the center aisle. He waited at the rear end of the first class carriage’s roof as the girl opened the door and stepped toward the railing.

“Hello?” He heard her call out. “Is anyone still there?”

The door to the galley carriage was swinging open. Of course, Akviradh had already slaughtered the guards and servants before he even cut off the train’s lightning. The kalashtar leaned closer to the caboose.

Akviradh leapt from the roof, bringing his greatsword down onto the girl. He relished her scream as the blade tore into her flesh—then he felt the carriage shudder.

“You think you can still make the jump back into the engine with your friends?” he gloated as the girl clutched at the deep gash in her shoulder.

Keep your wits about, Akviradh, he said to himself. This girl can destroy things with her mind.

For a tense moment, Akviradh stared at the girl, who stared back up at her. He half expected her next move to be to blast him off the train. Instead, she pushed herself off her haunches and into the train, running at full speed.

“I’ll feast on your brain!” roared Akviradh, chasing the girl through the length of the train.

***

Ashie grit her teeth and clenched her fists, turning her knuckles white. “Come on, work already!”

“Ashie!” It was Holden. “Kikkeni’s coming! She’s making a run for it!”

“Will she make it across?”

“Can’t say!”

“Make sure you catch her!”

“I’ll try!”

Ashie turned around just in time to see Kikkeni leap through the void, launching herself from the carriage’s railing and straight into Holden’s arms. Behind her, still in the doorway, was the snarling rakshasa.

Kikkeni pushed the dwarf away and picked herself up off the floor.

“Ashiadae Jiourrn, if we end up crashing because you haven’t been practicing your piloting skills for the last three years, I will fully blame it on you.”

“Blame what?”

“Us crashing, and not being able to slay the obviously-evil rakshasa that just tried to kill us.”

“But I had practically nothing to do with that battle!”

“Whatever. Where do I shoot this thing to derail it?”

“You’re not derailing a House Orien train.”

“I so am.”

Ashie rolled her eyes. Human expressions again.

“Aim for the base. Destroy the mounting of the conductor stones and you’ll send it flying off the tracks.”

“Done.”

Kikkeni turned to face the carriage once more, and pointed a finger at its base. Air rippled, ripped, and strained as she sent a shockwave with the mere force of her will hurtling into the train’s undercarriage. With a thunderous crash, the metal bindings came undone, spilling the glowing conductor stones onto their counterparts on the rail, sending everything flying like shrapnel. The whole mass twisted onto its side, and skidded across the ground in a great cloud of dust and flying metal.

“He couldn’t have survived that,” Loven said as he nursed his damaged plates.

“Great,” Kikkeni deadpanned. “That’s a nice foreshadowing of what might happen if Ashie doesn’t gain control of her elemental.”

“Shut up! You’re not helping”

~END OF CHAPTER 1~

A Week Before

So a week before campaign start, one of our players, Kate, backed out due to parental difficulties. It’s rather unfortunate because rolled really well and would serve as the party’s artillery (she was going to be the Kalashtar psion). I should’ve realized that she does live too far away.Oh well. Now I have to start doing my homework again and calibrate the encounters for 4 players, then for five players. Either way, we still have two full casters. We shouldn’t have problems.

Now that I have a hardcopy of Magic Item Compendium, I can easily put together some good loot to help them.

MM3 and RHOD GET!

I finally got hardcopies of MM3 and RHOD. This will make things a lot easier to run.