Forest of Wyrd Session #54 - Two Knight's Tales

DRAMATIS PERSONAE:

Ranza (Changeling 4)

Gnarl (Wood Gnome 5)
Hobbs (Hedgefey 6) 

Thrax (Fighter 5)

[Slugs MacKenzie (Hedgefey 1)]

Leaving Jonesomon and Vegarious with the raft and Feedbag II, the rest of the party climbed the bluff. At the top they found a neat little campsite. A large, brightly coloured pavilion stood at one end of the clearing. Next to it fluttered a blue and black pendant, emblazoned with a silver crescent moon. A large black horse stood at a hitching post close to the remnants of a fire. Seeing nobody about, Hobbs called out, and in a few moments a figure emerged from the pavilion.  It was a knight, over seven feet tall, and clad in a suit of blue plate. In a deep echoing voice, he said: "I am Sir Azra, Knight of the Blue; Whom might you be, and what is your quest?" Hobbs explained they were seeking the Tomb of the Half Blood King, and the Crown of the Forest therein.  Sir Azra asked whom they served, to which Hobbs gave a somewhat evasive answer. Asked his purpose, the knight stated he was guardian of the tomb. He would let them enter if they brought him the key, for it was complex and the knight would need to explain it's use. Asked where they might find the key, Sir Azra stated it has been stolen by his co-guardian, Sir Pallis, a millennia ago. Find Sir Pallis in the Green Mist, get the key, and bring it back to the campsite. As he spoke this, Sir Azra was addressing Thrax, who immediately became convinced this was exactly what they needed to do. And for now, the party agreed. One last departing question was where exactly could they find the Tomb of the Half Blood King? The knight waved a hand to the west, indicating the grey fogbank over the lake.  

Taking leave, the party returned to the raft and poled it around the point. However, it was getting dark so they decided to beach just outside the green mist for the night. Their rest was interrupted by a stealthy attack  from a pair of jack-in-the-green, who were dispatched after a short bitter fight. When the sun rose, it dawned as a bright and calm spring day. A prefect day to penetrate the sickly green mist. Paddling out to the green wall, the party first nudged in the bows where Hobbs perched. To see what would happen. The hedgefey was momently disoriented, but that feeling passed. Hoping no one else would be stricken, the party rowed all the way into the mist. Most felt the same fleeting feeling, except Ranza who became bewildered and confused, unable to tell up from down and left from right. But with the rest of the party to guide her, she was OK. 

Moving into the mist, they could see little more than a few feet in front of them. Thrax tried to use a gust from his sword to clear a path, but it had little effect. Somehow Gnarl was able to mostly keep them on track, or at least he thought so. As minutes passed like hours, there was occasional movement in the mist. At one point something slithering swam under the raft and disappeared. A short time later, a ghostly figure appeared off the port bow. Dressed in archaic armor, they first thought it was Sir Pallis. But it turned to attack, and the party swiftly slashed it back into the surrounding mist.  After yet more drifting through the eerie green air, another figure appeared ahead. As it came closer, it resolved into the form of a knight in armor, riding a giant swan. He paddled towards him, and introduced himself as Sir Pallis. Questioning the party, his initial friendly demeanor turned to rage when told they had been sent by Sir Azra to recover the key to the Tomb. Sir Pallis had a different story to tell; one in which the Blue Knight turned on him and tried to steal to key for his masters, the lords of Faerie. The party tried to reason with Sir Pallis, saying they wanted the key to get the Crown of the Forest and help the Prince Who Would Be. The swan knight seemed amenable to the idea, but eyed Thrax warily. He would not turn over the key until Thrax was dead, knowing that the fighting man was under a spell from Sir Azra. He ordered the party to drown Thrax, becoming more and more vehement as time wore on.

The party tried to convince Sir Pallis all would be good, even going so far as to have Gnarl try entangling Thrax to keep the fighter out of commission. But the knight finally lost patience. He raised his sword, set a lance to float beside him, and the swan lifted into the air. He charged straight at Thrax. Their hand forced, the party retaliated. After the knights' first pass, Gnarl entangled the swan with a mass of water lily (this time catching Thrax at the same time), while Ranza turned on both swan and knight with colour spray. The rest of the party turned on Sir Pallis, and after a tight combat the old knight was slain. They quickly trussed up the swan (so Hobbs who later use the saddle to tame it) and Thrax (until they could figure out how to deal with the geas he was under). Looting Sir Pallis of jewelry and lance, they also pulled the key from under his amour. It looked just like any other key, which certainly raised the question again about just how much they could trust Sir Azara. They now turned around to head (hopefully) out of the mist. Gnarl's direction sense was good, and they found themselves once more just off the Blue Knight's headland as the sun dipped low in the western sky.  They headed back to the cobble shore to rest for the night and plan for the next day. 

TOTAL XP 

7434

GAINS

67sp

helm with golden plume [100sp]

3x gold and ruby rings [3x 750sp]

Lance +1, Freehand

Key to the Tomb of the Half Blood King

Wattle the Giant Swan 

KILLS/VICTORIES

2 Jack-in-the-Green

1 Lost Soul

Sir Pallis the Wyrd Paladin 

LOSSES

none

Forest of Wyrd Session #53 - Jonesomon , Beavers and the Crazy Man

DRAMATIS PERSONAE:

Jonesomon (Specialist 5)

Ranza (Changeling 4)

Gnarl (Wood Gnome 5)
Hobbs (Hedgefey 6) 

Thrax (Fighter 5)

[Slugs MacKenzie (Hedgefey 1)]

The party escorted the rescued merchants and their new guards/erstwhile captor's to Kreland's Ford. There they parted ways, the party taking their reward in portable wealth and opting to bypass the town. They didn't want to answer questions about why neo-Jonsomon was trussed up and gagged. In fact, they just didn't want to deal with any neo-Jonesomon issues, suspecting he may be known and wanted in the town for his banditry. So they slept in the woods for the night, and then started their journey north to Twitten's Hollow and, hopefully, an audience with Queen Botsum and King Thorbus. The two day journey passed without incident, and they arrived at the great white bridge. Paying the Thayn's men their toll, the party proceeded to the other side, and was disappointed to not find one of the seelie court awaiting them. Instead there was a scrap of paper, which unfolded into a rather elaborate scroll announcing that the toll for passage was the cry of a human child. That threw the party for a loop momentarily, but they backtracked to the two men on guard and somehow got one to agree to bring his newborn to the bridge that night to provide the fee (in return for payment of a fee, in silver, to himself of course) .

The guard was true to his word, and that night joined the party at the far end of the bridge. He was nervous and held the child in a death grip, but a little teasing with a bottle of warm milk from Thrax's robe elicited the necessary sound. At which point a short fat goblin dressed in brown appeared, seemed to inhale the cry, and then  proceeded to thank the party for their payment. He was about to disappear again when Ranza interrupted, to say they wished an audience with Queen Botsum. That required some negotiation and payments to the goblin  before he would make the arrangements, but in short order the party (less the father and child who'd wisely bolted by this point) was lead into the fairy shee, and in moments the full fairy court had appeared. Queen Botsum appeared to be quite pleased to see the party, and she gladly answered the question about THEIR Jonsomon and his whereabouts. The fairy queen explained that Jonesomon was no more, having merged with neo-Jonesomon to become the 'whole ' Jonesomon. Nothing short of the most powerful magics would bring him back. At which point Gnarl piped up, reminding the party he still retained his wish from the path of the black dog. And so the wood gnome used it to wish that their Jonesomon had survived the encounter rather than neo-Jonesomon. And within the blink of an eye,  neo-Jonesomon was gone, replaced by the 'real' Jonesomon. Who was more than a little confused about what was going on at this point. 

Thanking the royal couple once more, the party took their leave and headed to town for the night. Next day they headed west to follow the directions given by Eya to the Tomb of the Half Blood King. They passed over the river and turned to head south, skirting the edge of the Mere of the Green Man. The first day passed without incident, except for the very slow going in the trackless forest. On he second day they came to a large clearing in the, until then, dense and primeval woods. In the centre was an old stone well, overgrown with moss and vine. Approaching cautiously, they party found that on initial inspection it seemed to be just an old well.  But curiously, anything that went down it came right back up again. Clearing away the moss and vines reveled an inscription: "Three they be, but one they are. If two agree, then cursed though are". On close inspection, Ranza noted the word 'cursed' seemed to hover over a palimpsest of the work 'blessed'. The party wracked their brains for a bit, but couldn't make heads or tails out of the whole situation. And in the end, decided this was just a distraction from their goal. So the party headed off to the south again. 

The next day, they reached a stream flowing into the Mere, the point at which Eya had told them to head upstream. But there wasn't much of a stream, just a bare trickle. Which didn't quite match their expectations. But they followed it just the same, and soon discovered why the paucity of water. Coming up onto a rise, they looked down to the west to find a huge dam across the stream, which had caused the water to back up and form a lake miles wide. They could see something on the dam below, and headed down to see if they were friend of foe. They were in fact a trio of huge beavers, lead by a grizzled old one who called himself Farquir Old-Tooth. For not only were they huge, they spoke Common. Asked about a tomb, the beavers could tell them nothing; they just tended the dam like their fathers, and fathers-fathers, and fathers-fathers-fathers, and so on. Asked about the lake, they said may strange creatures would be found there, like strange frog men. Asked if there was any one else they could talk to, Farquir noted two cleared spots to the west. One on a small island, where a weird little man lived. And the other a high headland, where a knight on horseback dwelled. Maybe they could help? He also pointed out two misty patches over the lake, one green and one white, warning the party to avoid them. 

The beavers seemed eager to get the party out of the way so they could return to work, were glad to carve them a raft to allow the landlubbers to cross the lake. And so the party headed first for the island. Along the way, they encountered a strange round spongy thing floating above the water. As it approached, Thrax opted to use a gust of wind from his sword to blow it away, at which point the thing vanished and the party landed on the island without further incident. They were met at the waterline by a wild man; short and knobby kneed, with an ankle length beard and no clothing. He immediately was attracted to Jonesomon, trying to snatch the  ioun stone which orbited around the specialists head.  When unsuccessful, the man accosted Hobbs, indicating by broken word and pantomime that he wanted a shiny stone. Hobb complied, giving him a small unpolished gem. The man then went through an elaborate act of cupping the stone in his hands, hiding it from the light so it 'disappeared'. But then becoming very frustrated and aggravated when the stone reappeared in the light when he opened up his hands, as if the disappearance of the stone seemed somehow significant. This went on for some time, even as several of the party explored the rest of the island (finding nothing but the mans crude hut, hung all over with small rock crystals.) 

In the end, the party could not understand what the man was getting at, and decided to push off and head for the knight on the headland. Leaving the raving lunatic behind, they headed across the lake, only to have the green globe reappear. Once more Thrax used his mighty gust, but this time the thing continued to chase them. So while a few tried pelting it with arrows, everyone else pulled hard on the oars, beaching the raft below the headland and scrambling ashore as quickly as possible. At which point, the green ball disappeared again, leaving the party to contemplate the climb to the headland above ...  

TOTAL XP 

0

GAINS

none

KILLS/VICTORIES

none

LOSSES

none