Part 1 here.
Clerics walked out of the Star Keep to pour oil into the
newly created moat, which they then lit. It burns with a bluish flame and
smells slightly minty: detect magic reveals a very, very powerful ‘protection
from evil’ aura from it. We have helped create an artefact!
Knight Commander Meinhoff welcomed us to the fort and found
billets for at least most of the army, allowing us to rest up for a couple of
days. The Star Keep only has about 100 remaining inhabitants who have been
under siege for significant period of time: they have no food or water and were
being sustained simply through the power of the goddess Iomedae. We resupply
the fort and ensure the supply lines for our army are coming this way in future
to help protect the Star Keep.
Then onwards to Kenabres, a city actually just outside the
Worldwound. They are not especially welcoming – Aaron, as a tiefling, is not
even allowed into the city and must stay outside. We find their brusqueness (not
born of actual rudeness so much as absolute focus on fighting the Worldwound)
difficult and use the 2 weeks we were planning to wait here (to allow the other
parts of the Crusade that will be meeting us at the destination of Drezen to
catch up) to pop home with the help of Mr Tiddles’s teleportation skills – a chance
for Alexei to play with his forge, Kieran to oversee his corner of the
Dawnlands and arrange for reinforcements, Aaron to do whatever it is he needs
to do (assassins!) and I to spend a bit of time with my husband.
Back, and we continue the march onwards, crossing back into
the Worldwound. When acting as vanguard for our army, we spot a small village
with 6 bearded demons and a large minotaur in steel armour with a bronze mask.
We’ve faced similar looking demons before so figure this isn’t anything we can’t
handle. Kieran, Aaron and I fire off a few shots at the minotaur and then, with
Evander, brace for the inevitable charge.
The bearded demons come at us, but the minotaur steps behind
the buildings. Alexei turns into a bird and flies up to find him whilst the
rest of us fight the demons – who summon more of themselves and generally cause
trouble. Alexei, unable to spot the minotaur, starts burning the buildings down
(what the rest of us don’t spot is that he burns people in the process…).
Kieran and Evander are handling the demons on them fairly well, but Aaron and I
are struggling slightly more. Alexei finally spots the minotaur as it circles
back around to us, which means he and he alone is in position to watch as a
demon rips me to shreds – his bird form flies over to breathe life back into me
and that’s me out of the fight. Kieran is badly hurt by the minotaur but
manages to take it down – Aaron is similarly badly hurt but manages to hold on
long enough for the others to take out the remaining demons.
Alexei walks over to me – breath of life may have brought me
back from dead, but I’m still badly hurt. He heals the rest of my wounds but I
remain where I am. Realising something more is wrong, he arranges for the
others to build a fire and put on some tea whilst he collects the deceased
villagers and gives them a proper funeral pyre and then uses spells to dig a
pit and fill it with salt to bury the demon bodies. Finally doing something
good and I’m not noticing! (even if he did cause the death of the villagers…)
Mr Tiddles lays in small cat form on my chest and after a
while I roll over and curl into a ball with him so the other won’t see I am
crying – so far, their attempts to find out what’s up have consisted of various
healing and status removal spells, shaking my shoulder and offering tea. The
rest of the army arrives and they bundle me into a palanquin, asking clerics to
check on me: “it looks like severe trauma” they explain. What to do? They talk
about sending me back to my husband* but
ultimately decide to leave me to it for now – I’m probably safer at the centre
of my army than I would be being transported out of the Worldwound to anywhere
where I could be teleported home – and we continue to the outskirts of Drezen.
Yes, I will explain at some point where the trauma has
occurred – no spoilers for the other players yet, though. Suffice to say, we
were warned from the start that the GM did not want resurrections – even ‘gentle’
resurrections like breath of life – to cheapen death. I, at least, have been
dreading a player death for this reason, and this has been the first one!
*Husbit tweeted quote of
the evening as “Monks are naturally arseholes” but I was more entertained by “Send
us another Queen, this one’s broken”
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