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From humbug Fri Jul 23 02:30:01 1999
From: humbug
Subject: Diddles.
Newsgroups: redbrick.rpg.board
Organization:
Summary:
Keywords:
User-Agent: tin/pre-1.4-980202 (UNIX) (SunOS/5.7 (i86pc))
Status: RO
Content-Length: 14497
Lines: 226
Working away in the city of Irrendi, on the island of Irrendi, time
passes. After a couple of weeks Slate announces that he has talked with
some other dwarves (and got some respect for a change) and arranged work
in a small mining community in the mountains in the centre of the island.
The pay is to be better, and it is nearer Tooraka, so the party agrees.
After another couple of weeks Uro and Unou show up, a couple of dwarves
who had come down to Irrendi to trade, and now to escort the party up to
the mining village. The party set off along the Irrendi river towards the
mountains. The night of the first day out is spent in Makalaui, and during
the next two days the party travel from hills to mountains. It is starting
to get cold, and the dwarves hand out blankets from the pack animals.
After a total of about five days travel the party reach the village.
Roughly fifteen dwarves run the mine in the mountains and about twice as
many humans live in the village with the dwarves and support the mine.
Soon after arriving the party begin to think that they have little
to offer the mining community, and begin to wonder what is to be done.
Slate is happy to help with the mining, and everyone is scared of Los and
generally leave him to guard duty. Anya is well accepted as a cook and a
healer, and Greebo's ability to start and enhance fires more than offsets
Chanti and Nickos' relative uselessness to a mining community, even if the
dwarves do see Greebo as some sort of parrot that can start fire, rather
than a person. Within a day of the arrival of the group at the village a
house is built for the party to stay in. On the evening of the next night,
the villagers gather, in short, to get drunk. They insist on everyone
partaking, except for Los (nobody has ever seen him eat or drink) who is
left to guard duty. Chanti remonstrates, and Greebo is unsure if it is
safe for him to drink it, but both are soon unconscious after a small
amount of the dwarven brew. Everyone passes out sooner or later, except
for Slate who lasts the night with a couple of the hardier dwarves.
The party is not paid anything other than their room and board, but the
arrangement seems to be that if the group stay long enough, payment will
be received upon leaving. With winter drawing near it is decided to stay
at least a couple of months. During the time in the mining community it is
realised that there are no passes across the mountains, and that the best
bet will be to head for Irrendi in the spring, and then onwards to North
Keep, and then Tooraka.
When the time comes for the party to leave in the spring, each are
given a small gem worth about 100gp. Slate gets a second, more valuable
gem, and decides that it would look nice mounted on his axe, and also
decides to place the first gem in his empty eye socket. With a bit of tar
and some gritting of teeth he succeeds. The party are led back down to
Irrendi by Uro without incident, and again set about looking for
transportation to Tooraka. Nickos and Anya get Uro to sell their gems
along with the rest of his, and get a good price.
North Keep is the immediate destination, and the party manages to
find a ship heading that way. There is some debate as to whether it would
be a better idea to walk up along the coast, saving money.
The group spend a good deal of time purchasing supplies and the like, and
it is eventually decided to take the boat, more expensive, but safer. Anya
purchases a pony, and names it Edward. Rations, rope and other things
forgotten previously are purchased. The party even has a cabin on the ship
this time; it is small, but better than the brig.
On the second day out of Irrendi, some of the sailors are becoming
restless. Good progress is being made northwards, but the sea has the
appearance of a wind blowing south. Even the landlubbers can see this, and
it is most curious. The sea is beginning to get rougher too, and Anya goes
below decks to pray for a spell that might detect any evil goings on.
Greebo begins to meditate too, sensing that learning 'lasting breath'
might be a good idea. The seas are really starting to get bad, and Anya is
unable to meditate, but vomits instead. Greebo manages to maintain
concentration for the five hours, but by the time he has finished the seas
have gone from an extremely bad storm to almost impossibly high waves. The
waves rise what seems like hundreds of feet into the air, and come
crashing down, the ship somehow staying on the wave, and remaining intact.
At this point it seems like a good idea to move out of the cabin, and when
the group are spotted by sailors orders are given to the party members to
help, be it bailing water, or holding a line. The storm continues, but the
ship somehow remains afloat. The waves continue to crash down, seemingly
higher and higher, and nobody doubts that magic is afoot.
Nobody remembers when, but the party all fall unconscious at some stage,
because they all find themselves coming to on the deck of the ship. The
sailors are there too, coming around, and everyone is wondering what is
going on, and what happened. The seas are calm, or at least normal, and
the group starts asking the sailors where they are. Greebo, knowledgeable
about that sort of thing, looks to the stars, and chirps in surprise. The
stars are back, back to the way they were before things started changing.
Things like fire started changing. Slate reaches into his pack and pulls
out an old tinderbox. He strikes the flint, and a spark, then a small
flame appears. Fire is back.
The sailors report that the ship is only about twenty miles off
course, and continue towards North Keep. About five days after the storm
the sailors seem pleased to see that the 'old lighthouse' is in operation,
and the ship docks at North Keep. The people of North Keep experienced the
storm too, impossibly high waves, but seemingly not to the same extent as
was experienced by the ship and the party.
The group is wondering about getting round the coast to Tooraka when it
comes to light that the ship will be sailing south. The ship has been
commissioned to sail round the island and the area to determine if all
parts experienced the storm, and to see if fire is working elsewhere too.
They still want 100gp from the party for the voyage, and Greebo parts with
his gem as payment.
After a brief stop in Mataraki, Tooraka is eventually reached. Heading
straight for the home/church of the clerics of the passing, Nickos
explains what has happened, and returns the heart of Eltric that he may be
laid to rest. Upon doing so a weight is lifted, and Nickos feels confident
that the quest has ended. Los is welcomed by the clerics too, and glad of
the opportunity to receive the spiritual part of his training.
Bad news for Slate though, the clerics here can do nothing for his
lost eye, but Anya is more confident that clerics of her faith (more
specialised in the healing arts) may be able to help if they can be found.
The "STOP THIEF!" spellbook is still with the party (although not
currently making any noise) and the group asks the clerics if they can do
anything about the protection. They offer to cast 'dispel evil' upon it,
that being the best they can do. The next morning they do so, and Nickos
opens the spellbook. Not a sound is to be heard, and Nickos and Greebo
begin looking over the spells contained within.
This being the town where members of the group had previously
gained training, again they seek to do so. Nobody has any real money, so
deals must be made. Slate arranges the possibility of getting himself
trained in exchange for undertaking to take part in an exploratory sea
mission northwards to the main continent (where all the crazy war is
happening, at last word). Slate would rather be trained by his own people,
or someone better with an axe, so is unsure whether to take up on the
offer or not.
Greebo meets with the transmuter who had trained him here before,
and a deal is struck to train Greebo in exchange for several of the third
level spells from the newly found spellbook.
Nickos is unsure whether he needs training, and confident that he cannot
afford it, so meets his prior trainer on more general terms. Nickos is
still looking for his lost spellbook, taken by the wizard Eltar, and the
conjurer offers some hope of finding it. The affinity between wizard and
book is so strong that the conjurer may be able to point Nickos in the
correct direction. Nickos is also eager to build a new book, and in
exchange for some of the newly found spells does get a new book. The
conjurer has bad news for Nickos though. He asks about Meow, and how long
the little cat has been around, and points out that the summoning created
by a first level spell will not last indefinitely. From his knowledge of
such things Nickos sees that this is true.
An interest in getting to Greeb is mentioned to the conjurer, who
replies that he has a magical item of limited charges that can open a
portal to another plane, Greeb being one of them. Greebo is well pleased
to hear this, and, in short, tells the transmuter "deal's off", and gives
the conjurer a lesser number of spells in order to get to Greeb, where he
hopes he can be trained for free.
Nickos and Greebo set about learning spells from the new
spellbook. Greebo adds a couple of alteration spells to his collection,
and Nickos does as well as usual, learning less than not, despite the
chances being in his favour. Some remaining spells are of no use to Nickos
or Greebo, and after a lot of talk and offers one is exchanged for a
potion with the conjurer. Greebo is going to Greeb regardless, and
promises that he will be able to get the party to Gallantry City from
Greeb, providing it has not fallen in the war with the Illari/Modrons.
Slate would rather be trained by dwarves to the north, so he agrees. The
main concentration of the religion of Anya lies to the north, so, despite
her reluctance she agrees. Before stepping through the portal, the
conjurer confirms to Nickos that his spellbook lies now in Gallantry City,
but is doubtlessly empty if it is there already.
The entire party, and pony, find themselves surrounded by small
trees, only a couple of feet tall, with branches. The trees stretch in
every direction, and the group find it nigh impossible to move around, all
except for Greebo, who seemed to forget this little problem. The trees go
up and down and surround the party on all sides. The main "city" is only
twenty minutes off for Greebo, but he reckons it would take the party a
day to get there. Greebo scurries off, promising to be back in forty
minutes. He does return, chirping and smiling, saying that he has indeed
been able to get training for free, but that the party will have to hold
up here for three weeks. Thankfully there are enough rations between the
party to last the time, supplemented to some extent by what seems to be
the only food on Greeb, berries. After the three weeks have elapsed the
time comes to make the choice of where to go. The portal to Gallantry is
open, but those sent there in the recent past have not returned; though
were not necessarily expected to return.
The party decides to step through, hoping to find themselves in a
meadow within the walls of the city. Stepping out of the portal and onto
grass, with normal trees around it seems as though it has worked.
Moving out of the meadow the streets seem to contain normal people, and
Anya stops and asks one of them about the war.
The war is over, and Gallantry never fell, but this is not what won the
war. The best explanation that the vendor can offer (after some of her
wares are bought) is that the Elves got together, came out of Alfheim, and
"kicked some serious ass". Slate suggests heading for an Inn, but Nickos
points out that finding one's way to any specific point in Gallantry can
be quite difficult, if not impossible, if you don't live here. Slate's
inherently non-magical nature proves to be useful though, and the vendor
points out that he should be able to find his way around, and directs the
party to an honest inn, where normal people can be found, and that magical
stuff wont work. Arriving at the Honest Inn, there is concern about
potions, and permanent magical effects, with respect to entering an area
where magic doesn't work. Anya goes inside, and is assured that it is only
temporary, and things will work once outside the inn. The group walks in,
and Nickos falls on his face and gets laughed at by some of the dwarves.
The party once again wonders what to do, and the price of 2gp per person
per night seems a bit steep.
Nickos recalls the wizard Queleb, who paid the then party to be teleported
to the strange orange land that he might pluck their minds upon their
return, and decides to pay him a visit, only fair to let him get his
money's worth. Anya pays for stabling of her pony, and Slate leads the way
to the address once it is remembered.
The door is answered by Ethel, the tea-lady, and she directs the
party to a sitting room (last seen sinking in a strange orange ocean). She
goes off to fetch tea for everyone, and something stronger for Slate, and
says that "the master should be with you shortly". Queleb appears in the
middle of the room, arms-folded, in a puff of smoke. A little
stereotypical, but this guy is nonetheless powerful.
He remembers Nickos, and asks does he want to tell him all that
happened, or he can just read Nickos' mind for the information. Nickos
opts for the latter, and reminds Queleb not to forget Meow's point of
view, which was paid for. Queleb seems pleased, and Nickos suggests that
there was quite a bit more there than just the one trip to another plane.
Queleb agrees, and offers to train Nickos, who doesn't realise he meant
there and then. Queleb waves his fingers, and it is done. At the same
time, Meow disappears. Nickos is saddened, but realises that it was bound
to come to pass.
Queleb isn't interested in chit-chat, and the party leaves after
declining to take the opportunity to be transported to another seemingly
random plane.
Anya is eager to talk to members of her faith, and heads for the temple of
Illiath in Gallantry. Slate accompanies her, still hoping to get his eye
back. No luck though, the healers are more powerful, but cannot heal
something that is not there. They suggest that in conjunction with magic
they may be able to help, but that doesn't help Slate all that much.
And that was the approximate stoppage point.
humbug.
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