It
was already dark and the flames were burning by the gates of Haghill when a
tired and battered group of travellers asked for admittance. They were Gadur Yir the half-orc, Drolhaf Haffnarskørung the civilised
Northman, the shadowy Franz Who Wasn’t
Even There, and a short and pudgy little fellow who now called himself Phil the Terror of Turkeys. They were
inspected by the night sergeant, until at last the man held out his hand: “It will be two silvers at night.”
His
eyes grew wide as Gadur Yir handed him an electrum coin: “So you are with them! Why
didn’t you say so from the start?”
Whatever
the man meant, they were ushered through, and they could mingle with the crowds
between the Mead Hall and the Treasury & Mint – as seasoned adventurers, careful
to watch their purses as they made for the Dancing Basilisk. Someone else in
the crowd was not so lucky. Cursing his misfortune after finding his bag of
money gone, a shadowy form made for the side street, hoping to find either the
thief who had wronged him, or at least employment to earn the money back.
***
The
tavern’s common room was again crowded with revellers; local farmers,
travellers; a sullen dark fellow by the fire, and an elegantly dressed man in a
black, gold-embroidered coat. The company (minus Drolhaf, whose player was
absent) sat down next to a newly freed table, and were surprised to find
someone else sitting down with them.
“Greetings!” came the cheerful call of a
short dwarf with a braided black beard, a large sword on his back. “I would seek friends for a fine adventure.
By the name of Haldor, would you be interested?”
Gadur
Yir blinked, then grinned. “Ha! I am none
else but Haldor’s champion, my friend!”
The
dark fellow next to the fire looked interested, then sauntered to the counter
to pay before leaving. The dwarf introduced himself as Balthasar the Elf-bane: “...and
when I was just a tot, I was already beheading elves. I have fought in three of
the dwarf-elf wars... the thirteenth, the fourteenth and the fifteenth.”
They
drank and talked some more, until the conversation came to the subject of the
abandoned mines. Balthasar was not the only one who was interested in the wild
tales; among others, a portly traveller’s interest was also piqued.
“I did not even know of these fabulous mines.
Where did they lay?”
“They were...” Gadur Yir grimaced as Phil the Terror of Turkeys
elbowed him in the gut. “They were to the
north.”
The
stranger smiled and introduced himself as Bramerlic,
a dealer in rare minerals. The conversation turned to business, and eventually,
Gadur Yir struck a bargain: the stranger would examine the crystals they found
in the mines the next morning. Franz, already a little tipsy, ordered the
house’s strongest drink, the Gurgling Brew (“Kotyogó Fortyogó”); then, as the tavern owner came forward with the bottle, placed 200 gp before the man and the
astounded guests as every eye tjrned towards their table.
“Prepare a feast for tomorrow evening, invite everyone, and
don’t you skimp on the food and the drink!”
As
they discussed the details, the mineral dealer, who was feeling drowsy, left,
and his place was soon taken by the elegantly dressed man, who seemed much
impressed by Franz and his gesture. His name was Eldiband, a judge who was travelling to Gont to oversee a land
dispute.
“I am from the Twelve Kingdoms, originally –
I was asked to decide in this case because I am a neutral party with no
interest in the quarrel – they wouldn’t even let the Baklin judges handle it”
he recounted.
"Land dispute?"
"Some kind of old manor house, long abandoned - lots of claims, but all weak."
Feigning
to be sleepy, Phil the Terror of Turkeys slipped below the table and examined
the man’s belt. He was wearing a long, straight sword and a full money pouch.
“And can you handle your sword, Sir?”
asked Balthasar Elf-bane. “I mean: have
you been free from threats and the like?”
“Why, that’s the reason I carry this”,
smiled Edilband, failing to notice Phil as he put a pinch of confusion-inducing
poison in his wine. Soon, he was thoroughly wasted, and Phil made away with the
purse, which he discovered contained 50 pieces of silver, 80 pieces of gold,
and a small pouch of cloves.
 |
| Haghill |
The
night was uneventful save for rattling noises out in the corridor and drunks banging
on the doors. In the morning, Gadur Yir went down to the common room to meet
Bramerlic the mineral dealer and make the deal, but Bramerlic didn’t turn up.
Bored, he went to see the armourer and have his bent pauldron fixed. He paid in
advance, but the armourer looked more sour than happy.
“Your kind again, and your mud-covered
electrums you dug out from one of those old graves! Truglag and Rothald’s kin
in Haghill, making trouble!”
At
last the half-orc could convince the fellow he didn’t know these people, and it
was a case of mistaken identity. The complains continued to flow, and the
armourer recounted how a tavern frequented by orcs and their kind seemed to
have sprung up in the nearby Singing Caverns along with a bandit lair... a cave
system whose depths held the untamed forces of nature.
Meanwhile,
Phil and Franz paid a visit to the Haghill temple, an over-large and cobwebbed
structure left over from the old days, and now used as a shrine to Filongar,
the humble god of wayfarers and woodsmen. Father
Bronk, a mild-mannered young man, bought the crystals Franz had pilfered
from Gadur Yir and Drolhaf, and also had a few wares to sell: simple medicines
for simple folks, a healing potion to the wealthy, and relaxing pipeweed for a
pleasant mood.
“And what do the spiders eat?” Greg
asked, eyeing a spider that was almost his size.
Father
Bronk smiled. “Large flies who venture
into the church... occasionally bees.”
“Bees?”
“Plenty of them around. There is a strange man
in the nearby caves who cares for them, the one we call The Beekeeper. Maybe he is touched by the gods, or maybe he is
mad, but all the same – he is not one to cross!”
Talk
turned to Haghill, and the pair learned of something interesting. Right next to
the church, there was a rectangular, windowless building called the Chamber of
the Griffon, which nobody has entered in human memory. Many had tried its
complicated locks and failed, and Sir Huberic of Haghill had announced that
whosoever would solve its enigma was welcome to try, and gain from its riches.
Meanwhile,
Gadur Yir noticed that Bramerlic still didn’t show up. Could he be so late?
When the others were back along with Balthasar the Elf-bane, he called to the
innkeeper to lead them to the man’s rented room – right across the corridor from
theirs.
“Mr. Bramerlic?” Silence. “Mr. Bramerlic, are you there?” No
response.
“I will bash down the door if he doesn’t
answer.”
“Noooooo!”
“Quiet! We will buy you a new one.”
The
half-orc charged the door, which came crashing down. The room was a mess with
everything thrown around haphazardly; there were traces of a struggle and
Bramerlic, along with the blankets, was gone.
“He must have been kidnapped!”
Now
it was the innkeeper’s place to protest: “But
Sir! That can’t have happened in this inn!”
“Am I tired of this...” muttered Franz,
and with a malevolent gaze and a few hand movements, hypnotised the fellow.
“Now where is he?”
“Wha… whaaaa?”
“Where do your special guests sleep, knave?”
The
innkeeper shuffled along the corridor, and tapped a section of the wall. A
narrow panel slid open, allowing entry into a tiny, cramped room with a cot,
and no other exit.
“Has anyone been there lately?”
“The gentleman from Gont… he showed the ring…
the ring…”
He
could say no more. The bird – if he had anything to do with the mineral dealer
– had fled.
***
Now
that the crystal sale was off, Gadur Yir decided to make up for the lost
opportunity at Filongar’s temple. He showed Father Bronk his piece of the
enchanted flower, and took his offer for a cache of magical potions. He tried
to ask for an audience at the residence of the local sage, Villofort the
Wizard, but there was no answer, and the neighbours told him he wasn’t home. He
also took a good look at the Chamber of the Griffon, examining the threefold
lock and the three wafer-thin slots on the bronze gates. At last, he gathered
the others, and walked over to the donjon at the northern end of the village to
request an audience with Sir Huberic.
“What a sight you lot are!” the fat
autocrat laughed in his throne. Surrounded by bearskins, large hunting dogs and
his close advisors, the master of Haghill listened to the introductions in a
jovial but disinterested way. When Gadur Yir brought the subject to the
chamber, he laughed, and said they were welcome to try and open the gates – but
the whole village would be around to watch the spectacle. He also recounted how
mighty fighters and clever thieves had failed, and how even removing the
shingles from the rooftop only revealed a flat stone surface.
“Maybe we will get in with the power of faith”
proposed the half-orc.
“That’s an original one!” smirked Sir
Huberic.
Slightly
later, a small army of sightseers gathered to see another group fail in some
new and hopefully interesting way. Huberic and his retinue were there; the
first on a large wooden throne, and the rest around him, all eager for a good
show. And a show it was all right. First, Balthasar Elf-Bane made his try at
uttering a prayer and rushing thegate, but it didn’t work. Then, Phil produced
a bunch of delicate tools and tried to pick the lock, to no effect. The crowd
was starting to get restless without entertainment. Franz Who Wasn’t Even There
blended into the crowd and cast an illusion spell...
…A
mighty griffon descended from the sky above the square. On its back rode an
orc-faced angel who blew the horn in his hand, then exclaimed in a loud,
resonant voice: “I am the bearer of the
uttermost mysteries!”
The
villagers and pretty much everyone stood in awe of the spectacle. Then the
angel spoke again, pointing at the scrawniest barefoot peasant kid in
attendance.
“He will be the one!”
...and
with that, the heavenly apparition was no more. Gadur Yir, collecting all his
might and praying to Haldor, god of heroism, flexed his muscles, spat into his
hands, then rushed the gate... ...and rolled a natural 20, which, together with his 18 Strength and a +1 from invoking the name of his patron, came up as an utterly impossible 24. The threefold lock slid open and the
gate opened to the gasps and cries of the excited villagers.
 |
| The Pegasus Device |
“That’s something!” exclaimed Huberic,
standing up in his wooden throne to see better.
Beyond
the gate was a simple rectangular hall, its walls hung with several dusty old
banners. On a central pedestal, there was a winged helmet with the stamped sign
of a pegasus rider on a tiny shield, and a sword whose scabbard was decorated
with griffons and twisting vines. Suddenly, despite the open way, nobody wanted
to step forward into the hall and claim these treasures. There was an awkward
silence.
“He must enter!” cried Franz as he
pointed at the kid.
“Yes! He must enter!” came the cry from
the crowd.
The
boy, who looked tiny and stunned, stepped inside and, seeing that nothing had
happened to him, reached for the winged helmet. An excited murmur went up as he
turned around, the oversized helmet sitting lopsided on his head.
“He is the one! He is the one!” the crowd
went wild as he returned, and while Gadur Yir stepped inside to retrieve the
sword.
“Well, kid… what was your name again?”
asked Huberic.
“Little
Greg.”
“From now on, let Little Greg be known as my
own foster son, and I will raise him to be a mighty warrior for the time when
he takes my place!”
To
the standing ovation of the crowd, the shocked Little Greg was lifted up, while
Franz muttered to himself: “We will meet
again, Little Greg... We will meet again.”
That
night, everyone in Haghill was eating, drinking and making merry. Huberic the
Stout was celebrating the adoption of his son, and to the delight of the
commons, Franz had also sponsored a feast at the Dancing Basilisk. This time,
Huberic and his retinue had gathered on the lower floor of his tower, where the
master of the village was throwing rings to the gathered guests – each member
in the company, and others were richer by some valuable. There was some kind of
scratching sound from below, and for a single moment, everything fell silent –
there were rumoured to be things
beneath the Tower of Torpid Terror, and Huberic had once sealed the lower
entrances – but the moment passed, and the mood was merry again.
“Let’s bring out the bear!” bellowed
Huberic.
“The bear! The bear! Bring out the bear!”
A
great brown bear in chains was dragged in by a group of guards, muzzled and its
paws in leathers, but still powerful and dangerous.
“Who shall wrestle it? To him I offer this ring!”
Gadur
Yir spat and grinned: “Why not?”
They
squared off, and the beast lunged, pinning the half-orc to the ground. A murmur
rose in the audience of retainers and hangers-on. Phil the Terror of Turkeys
quietly slipped under the table, and swiped the money pouch of a man who had
just received a gemstone ring from Huberic. As for Franz, he had his own plans:
quietly, he made his way behind Little Greg, and whispered into the boy’s ears.
“What do you feel when wearing the helm?”
“Like a hero... leading an army!”
Franz
looked into the urchin’s eyes, and made a few hand gestures. “Don’t forget it – behind the griffin! You
shall grant us special conduct.”
Greg
nodded in confusion while the bear squeezed poor Gadur Yir, who felt his bones
crack in the vise of the beast – as Phil relieved another slack-jawed lackwit
of his treasures. At last, six men pulled the bear back with a winch and its
chain, and the half-orc was free. Huberic roared with laughter and threw him
the beautiful ring anyway.
“To Haldor, and heroism!” Gadur Yir
raised his cup, to thunderous applause.
***
The
morning after, Franz sunk into a fever dream of incense and visions, and saw
himself wielding the sword found in the Chamber of the Griffon against a host
of plant monsters. This was the famous sword
of Tyr Wulos! (longsword +1, +3 vs. plants)
Shortly
afterward – while most of the villagers were still sleeping – the company left Haghill
and headed for the mysterious Singing Caverns across the river. They passed by
a flowering meadow and a hut swarming with bees, and were soon standing before
three cave entrances. Wind was blowing between the rocks, and this sound could
be mistaken for faint singing. Balthasar the Elf-bane – who was outfitted with
the company’s donations for a new set of armour – cast a light spell on his
sword, and ventured forward through the middle entrance. It soon turned out
that this passage was soon joined by the leftmost one, and they both lead to a
small grotto with the burnt remains of a campfire, and a massive iron door
barring further progress. The door had no keyhole, only a mesh on the top where
bees were flying in and out, and three faces in bas-relief: one angered, one
(painted by a previous explorer) sleepy, one laughing. Further examination
revealed the faces could be turned around, and Phil ascertained the middle one
was used most often but there were some suspicious grooves around it. Finally,
Gadur Yir turned this face, and pulled away just before two protruding blades
would have lopped off his fingers. It was Balthasar’s turn, who turned the face
very carefully. The blades remained inside and the door opened.
 |
| The Singing Caverns |
The
grotto was followed by a cavern passage with several muddy footprints. Their
trail lead north, but they decided to continue, then explore the southwest
passage, the source of a wet earthy smell. The passage lead to a spacious
cavern with multiple exits, lit up by massive mushrooms and overgrown with lush
green vegetation. Finding nothing of value but some kind of black rot that was
eating into some of the mushrooms, and a basketful of fresh raspberries (which Franz
collected), they continued to the next cavern.
Great
green leaves swayed in a gentle wind, and the smell of wet earth was everywhere. Among the plants, half-covered with colonies of moss, there was a
primitive, half-hidden statue with three lips, waves indicating a hairy chest,
and an enormous... club. Gadur Yir chose to investigate behind it, and found a
crawlway behind it... but also found that the statue had moved and was intent
on smashing him with its fist. Gadur Yir jumped back as the statue began to
babble with its three mouths – capturing Phil’s attention, before he was saved
by an audible glamer cast by Franz,
the noise countering the babbling. The statue fought mercilessly and proved
resistant to blows, but with some trouble (and Gadur Yir’s new magical weapon)
it was at last brought down. The half-orc crawled into the hole on all fours,
and, after poking his hand into some tarry substance, came back with a handful
of bones and a palm-sized piece of metal forming a flat fish. There was nothing
else here, but Balthasar’s detect magic –
oriented on the crawlway – discovered the fish was at least magical.
They
returned to the mushroom chamber, and proceeded north, into a roughly hewn
west-east passage. To the west, the passage ended with a short flight of steps;
from here, further stairs went down to the east, taking a turn to the north.
Since they did not wish to descend even deeper, they turned west, feeling a
slight draft and the smell of vegetation. Moss and plants grew on the floor of the
passage, over the downward flight of steps further west and a small chamber to
the north seemed full of them. Torn filaments of some kind littered the floor.
This chamber – as Gadur Yir and Balthasar the Elf-bane found – also contained
an open sarcophagus, overgrown with thin green vines bearing several
finger-shaped pods. Two dusty, headless clay statues, of a large feline and a
griffon, guarded the resting place. Bones and old linen seemed to rot inside
the clay vessels. Gadur Yir turned back, stepping on a few pods, which split open as they crunched underfoot, and scattered their spherical green seeds.
“Peas? What the...” the half-orc
grumbled, but his brooding was interrupted by the sound of heavy steps. Two
crude stone statues emerged from the stairs, and attacked without hesitation.
The statues were smaller and weaker than the one in the cavern, but the company
was growing more exhausted, and both Gadur Yir and Balthasar were heavily
wounded in the affair. In the end, Balthasar called out to Haldor to fill him with heroism,
and dispatched both statues with a mighty series of blows.
“Haldor is the greatest!” he cried.
Down
the stairs, the passage turned northeast in a broad semi-circle. On the
opposite wall were a series of carved glyphs, and a large depression, about two
inches deep. Phil and Gadur Yir stood guard with lanterns while Franz and
Balthasar began to decipher the runes.
“H…A…L…T…A…N…D…”
“I hear some kind of scraping noise from the southwest”
growled Gadur Yir.
“Wait,
we are getting there… T…H…Y…W…E…I…G…H…T…”
“Hey, I hear some kind of heavy rolling noise
from beyond the wall!” Gadur Yir was getting nervous.
“Almost there! I…S…H…A…L…L…”
The
wall exploded into a myriad clay and stone shards as an immense rolling boulder
crashed through it. Phil and Gadur Yir cried out and jumped backwards into the
stairway. For a split second, Franz considered the possibility of what would
happen if his patron, the mysterious Edoran of the Threefold Moon, intervened
in the cosmic balance and stopped the boulder in its momentum. But the stone
rolled on mercilessly, causing 26 points of damage and crushing Franz Who
Wasn’t Even There and Balthasar the Elf-Bane under its massive weight.
The
boulder rolled down the passage and crashed into something with a distant thud.
Phil and Gadur Yir emerged to take a look at the carnage. There was an upwards,
sloping semi-circular passage where the wall used to be. Nothing remained of
Balthasar but a reddish smear and the ring he got from Sir Huberic. Nothing
remained of Franz but a similar smear and the small basketful of raspberries,
which he had inexplicably flung aside before he was crushed. Gadur Yir said a
short prayer over the place as Phil watched – there was nothing left to bury properly – and
they turned back towards the passage leading outside to the blooming meadows,
and the walls of Haghill.
(Session
date 7 April 2017).
***
Notable quotes:
“I will take favoured enemy: doors.”
“Don’t panic, that’s just corpse grease on
your hands.”
“My next character’s name will be ‘Why The
Fuck Do You Care To Ask?’”
“If I see an inscription, I don’t expect it
to kill me!”
***
Referee’s notes: That escalated
quickly. Starting with a few plot hooks on what was designed as a stopover with
perhaps a little dungeoneering thrown in (I finally mapped and stocked the
Singing Caverns!), the session culminated in “breaking” the Chamber of the
Griffon and establishing Little Greg as Haghill's future ruler, then ended unceremoniously with an easy to avoid newbie trap.
The
Chamber was one of the throwaway mysteries which could crop up later in the
campaign, with a gate obviously meant to be opened by “plot items”. But what do
you do when your players best it through inspiration and luck? When making his
foolish and doomed attempt, Gadur Yir combined a natural 20 roll, his 18
Strength (+3), and the divine favour granted by invoking the name of Haldor
(+1), and just barely beat Heroic difficulty (24) – something practically
impossible with ability checks. I was prepared to laugh at the characters
making fools of themselves – and Franz’s illusion could have easily been
exposed as a fraud by Huberic’s court wizard – but the combination of events
was so improbable, so utterly fantastic that it could not be anything but a
resounding success. When you are given this kind of chance, you roll with it –
and with that, the party gained a powerful ally, and Sir Huberic an adopted heir
(whom I kinda imagined as Barron Trump).
Franz’s
success was relatively short-lived. Establishing himself as the future power
behind the throne (both figuratively and literally), and gaining a level after secretly
throwing a lavish feast for the commons, he was flattened by a boulder trap
designed with a beginner dungeon in mind. His great coup went unnoticed, and most
of the commoners never even knew who had invited them. He died as he lived: as Franz Who Wasn’t Even There. Although,
to be precise, the money was borrowed from Gadur Yir and Phil the Terror of
Turkeys, just like Balthasar the Elf-bane’s new chain armour, which produced a lousy ROI if something ever did.
Finally,
this adventure also marks the return of the
sword of Tyr Wulos! This magical longsword +1 (+3 vs. plants) has a long
and storied history. The item was named after a low-level fighter in our 3.0
campaign who was killed by a shambling mound, in the same adventure that
claimed Grond the bugbear monk (my character), Morgos the dwarf fighter,
Panther the barbarian/sorcerer (played by Phil’s player some 16 years ago!),
Eldon the Purse the hobbit thief, and Valmard Levandell the sorcerer. In our
Fomalhaut campaign, the sword was taken up by the fighter Gwyddion, who had
received it from Panthozar, the priest-king of Khosura, at the behest of his
advisor, the treacherous Taramis, Daughter of Zafar (she was very grateful for
the assassasination of her rival and her return to the priest-king’s favour).
Gwyddion carried the sword through the rest
of the campaign, which was lost along with him in the cataclysmic
detonation of a 35-megaton chromatic warhead and the destruction of the city of
the Last Men. Now, chance has brought it into this campaign, and who knows
where it will go.
