Session 20

Date: 5/28/2018

Attending: Jake, Wes, Aaron, Justin, Joey

Absent: None

Start Time: 8:35 p.m. – the DM was very late

The party leaves the worship hall and continues exploring the underground ruins of the Temple of Thorns. They find a kitchen and eating area, long since out of use. Finding nothing of note they move on, eventually coming to a room, empty except for a pedestal in the center with a small cloth sack on top.

After searching to the best of their ability, and lamenting the loss of Ostar who was skilled at such things, they open the sack to find a set of augury bones – small bone tiles engraved with runes and symbols used in divination. They do not seem to be magical, so the party pockets them.

Jace uses his wand of Detect Secret Doors and discovers a hidden door in the room. Opening it they find what appears to be the last stand of some warrior. Now a skeleton, he is against the wall of the small hidden room surrounded by other skeletons and with a broken sword in his hand. Next to him is an empty wooden chest, its lid open and its hinges slack.

A quick detect magic determines that the broken sword is magical, and is identified as the legendary Darkblade. Or what’s left of it. Even in its broken state it is still a powerful weapon and Soromir offers to wield it in service to the party.

Exiting the room the party travels on before realizing that they are covering ground that they have tread before – the complex is circulatory in a box design. Assessing that they have thoroughly explored the Temple of Thorns the party exits the ruins.

It is late afternoon, and they head back to the road and camp next to the bridge, in what is now a regular camping spot. They party splits the night up into 2 man watches, as their habit when traveling or exploring.

That night, while on watch, Soromir pulled out the Augury Bones found in the Temple of Thorns and tried to use them, casting them to get a foretelling from Bajol the Maimed. Osbert notices and takes away the stones, telling Soromir that they are not toys.

When their watch is over Osbert has the following dream:

He is in a small rowboat on a still black ocean that runs as far as can be seen in every direction. It is night above. The oars slip into the waters before he can grab them (he is moving very slowly). As he peers over the side to watch the oars sink, bone augury tiles rise up, lit by a pale yellowish light and just under the surface of the water. They arrange themselves into words that read, “We have been activated.”

Suddenly Osbert is standing in a hall dominated by fire, fierce orange, red, and black flames all around. A figure towers before him – horned, winged, red skinned, holding a flaming sword in one hand and a nine tailed whip in the other. It peers down at him and in a mocking voice says, “You seek to avoid your destiny worshipper of Set. You cannot escape the fate that has been chosen for you. The power is yours when you are ready to use it, my dear newest Thumb.”

Osbert wakes up in the morning, drenched in sweat, and relays his dream to the party. They break camp and head to Evenshade, arriving at the Last Wood Inn an hour after sundown.

Knarls lets them in and makes them supper. While dining, Orenthal and Jace head down to the basement to see if Jace’s wand of Detect Secret Doors reveals anything about the mysterious wall Knarls showed Orenthal a week or so back. Orenthal duplicates trick with the iron tacks and the section of wall and Jace uses the wand. It reveals a hidden door in the floor, and a pattern of tapping on the wall to open it.

Orenthal fetches the party and Jace opens the door, revealing a metal ladder leading down. The party descends into a well-crafted hall made of stone. Magical script runs along the top of the walls which lights up when the party enters the hallway. It runs a short 20 feet before ending in a stone door. They approach and a mouth magically forms out of the stone of the door and says things that no one can understand, though they can identify the language as dwarven (which no one speaks).

Orenthal uses his magic to unlock the door, and the party forces it open. The other side leads to a balcony over a huge underground ravine filled with lava, heat radiating up and baking the skin. A stone bridge extends across the ravine, some 200 feet to another balcony on the other side.

The party enters and the door slams shut behind them. The magic mouth forms again and says a single word in a firm harsh tone. Orenthal, who has been studying the dwarven language with the intent to become fluent, recognizes the word as “Thieves.”

The party begins to cross the bridge, but magma and fire mephitis rise from the lava below and attack.

End of Session

1,000 XP