Trog-lo-dyte!

Our intrepid adventurers were in the midst of fighting the elusive quickling, Buttersnips, but so far she’d been too quick for them. The only time they could see her was when she would zip past them with her poisoned sword. Bella had been briefly poisoned but quickly recovered, but Zhustin was still suffering from the poison’s weakening effects. Meanwhile, Sawyer and Shinjiro were in the throne room, guarding against the return of the troglodytes they’d chased down into the dungeons, while Marie did some exploring. Oh, and Nicki had set Ameiko’s castle on fire, ostensibly in an attempt to flush out Buttersnips, but more likely just because he just enjoyed watching things burn.

 

Zhustin and Nicki began to anticipate Buttersnips’ hit-and-run tactics, and they tensed in readiness for her next appearance. She didn’t keep them waiting long – she reappeared in the spot where she’d vanished, flitted around the columns to strike at Sandoval, then buzzed out of the ballroom into the throne room, where she immediately disappeared. Zhustin grazed her with an Acid Bolt, while Nicki tried a Color Spray, but it had no effect on her. Sandoval felt himself weakened from her tainted blade, but soon shook off the poison’s effects. However Zhustin still felt himself growing weaker and weaker.

Out in the throne room, Sawyer caught a glimpse of the quickling’s blurred form just before she disappeared. He swung wildly at the spot where she’d been, but didn’t connect with anything. Sandoval rushed forward and tossed his net, hoping to trap her at least long enough to reveal her position, but it fell to the floor, empty. Zhustin and Nicki cocked their fingers in anticipation, and just as she appeared again, they both unleashed Magic Missiles before she could dart out of sight, and her tiny body fluttered lifelessly to the ground.

Back in Buttersnips’ parlor, the flames were threatening to burn out of control, and the party remembered that directly above it was the ruined solarium, with its tangle of broken rafters and tinder-dry canvas roof. If the fire spread to it, the entire castle might go up in flames. Since it was, technically, Ameiko’s property, they felt bad about destroying it (at least everyone but Nicki), so most of them turned their attention to extinguishing the fire. Their experience fighting the fire at the Riverside Inn came back to them quickly: Zhustin stood at the doorway casting Ray of Frost while Bella, Shinjiro, and Sandoval scavenged some pails from the storerooms to form a bucket brigade, hauling water from the stagnant pool in the garden just outside. Nicki even pitched in, running into the smoke-filled room to try to clear away some of the exhibits that hadn’t yet started to burn. Zhustin began to feel light-headed from the poison, but he fought bravely on; luckily the poison wore off just before he fell unconscious. Ultimately, they succeeded in extinguishing the flames, and the smoke began to clear. Zhustin noticed that the smoke in the hallway seemed to be flowing out between the very stones themselves; Bella investigated, and discovered a pair of secret doors, one leading into the garden and the other into the courtyard.

Muthildah

Marie hadn’t joined in their efforts; she’d continued exploring. A short hallway with a pair of doors led off from the throne room. One door led into an empty washroom/latrine that didn’t appear to have been used since the castle was overthrown. The other opened into what had been the castle’s kennels. It now appeared to be home to the ogrekin. They’d killed two of them earlier, but there was still one left: a corpulent female named Muthildah. As soon as the door opened, she charged, hitting Marie hard with her flail and spiked gauntlet. Sawyer saw Marie stagger back, blood flying, and charged down the hallway to help. Marie managed to quaff a healing potion as she parried the ogrekin’s blows with her mace. Muthildah was a more effective fighter than either of her brothers had been, but she was still no match for Sawyer and Marie together, and she soon joined them in wherever it is that ogrekin go when they die.

As the party caught their breath, they remembered that their original plan had been to leave the castle and return to their friends in the caravan. Deciding that might not have been such a bad idea after all, they took the secret door into the courtyard, pausing just long enough to loot Zaiobe’s body and for Marie to do some quick healing and cast a Lesser Restoration to give Zhustin some of his strength back. Then they headed for the gate. As they reached it, the doors to the stables opened, and a tall figure strode out. It was roughly humanoid, but had a head with too many eyes and mandibles like a spider’s. “Oi!” it called, its speech garbled in the passage through the mandibles. “What’re you doing ‘ere? You ain’t no business ‘ere!” From the stable behind it, a giant hunting spider emerged, and the two charged the party. Sawyer tried to get off a quick arrow before they engaged, but the shot went wild, and he was quickly face-to-face

Flatbelly

with the ettercap, Flatbelly. It snapped at him with its jaws, and up close the fighter could see they were dripping with poison. Luckily they missed. His pet spider stopped short of the party, and shot out a web that entangled Sawyer in its sticky strands. Despite its encumbrance he could still fight, and he continued swinging. Shinjiro joined him, and landed a powerful flurry of blows on the ettercap, who responded by gouging the monk with his claws. Bella fired an arrow at the spider; it struck directly in the center of the beast’s cluster of eyes, and it rolled over dead, legs twitching.

The ettercap was badly wounded by now, and Sandoval trapped it in his net. Nicki only made things worse with another Acid Splash. “Do you want to surrender?” the sorcerer asked (to the astonishment of his comrades). “Yes! Yes!” the ettercap squealed pitifully. “Please don’t kill me!” But before anyone else could move, Marie stepped forward and jabbed it with her Wand of Inflict Moderate Wounds. His eyes (all eight of them) went wide with surprise and then dimmed. Everyone stared in shocked silence at the cleric, who strode grimly away, not choosing to explain her actions.

Now the party finally made good on their plan to leave the castle, making sure to leave the gate open behind them. As they made their way through the ruined village, Spivey flew out from the cemetery to greet them. “I’m so glad to see you again! I was so worried when you didn’t come back yesterday.” The party filled her in on what had happened in the castle, and she cast a Lesser Restoration of her own on Bella. Nicki invited her to join them on the trip back to the caravan, and she gladly accepted, eager to meet still more new faces.

When they finally reached the caravan, Sandru and Koya were equally relieved to see them; they too had feared the worst. Unfortunately, Ameiko still languished in her coma. Spivey examined her, then shook her head with a frown. “This coma is clearly of magical origin, but I’ve never seen anything quite like it. I think there is some powerful lawful force possessing her, but I don’t know what it is or what to do about it.” Ameiko began to mutter incoherently again, then whispered, “A key you seek lies in the grip of the ten-handed one—his fear is your greatest ally...” Then she lapsed back into unconsciousness.

After a night’s rest, the group decided that curing Ameiko must have something to do with some as-yet undiscovered secret in Castle Brinewall. They fashioned a litter to carry the unconscious woman back to the castle with them, but as they started to move her closer, she began to thrash and shriek as if in intense pain. Thinking that perhaps she’d revive if they took her away from the castle, they tried that, too, but got the same result. After that, Sandru and Koya were insistent that Ameiko had to stay where she was, and that they would continue to watch over her. Nicki invited Spivey to join them in their return to the castle, and she immediately agreed; the lyrakien seemed eager for any excitement after her years of tending the deserted graveyard.

The castle’s gates were open as they’d left them the day before, and no one but flies had disturbed the dead bodies in the courtyard. Once inside the throne room, they debated what to do next. They knew of at least three different sets of stairs leading down; should they take the ones that the troglodytes had used, even though they might be waiting in ambush at the bottom, or should they take a different set, hoping to get surprise themselves? The debate didn’t last long – straightforward frontal assault was more their style.

They moved into the room through which the trogs had fled. This might have once been used as a meeting or planning room for the master of the castle. A large table lay in shambles in the middle of this room, with a litter of old papers drifted in the corners of the room. Crumbled suits of armor bearing decorations of dragons twisting around castle towers lay in rusted heaps along the walls. One set of stairs curved up along one wall to the tower study upstairs, while another led down to the lower levels. There was a closed door in the west wall, and another to the northeast.

Marie pulled open the western door. A large number of ruined bunks had been heaped into a crude nest on the far side of the room. In the nest crouched a huge monitor lizard. It was in the process of shedding its skin, and flaps of dried skin hung down over its face, giving it an even more ferocious appearance. It hissed angrily and began to charge. Marie hastily slammed the door shut. She heard it thump against the door, but fortunately it had no means of opening it.

Bella opened the other door. A moldy pile of mattresses, probably from the bunks in the other room, had been heaped together near the northern wall. An eye-watering reptilian stink caused the rogue to gag as she opened the door: a pair of troglodytes slept, snoring softly, on the mattresses. Holding her breath, Bella crept into the room, and slit the throat of one of the sleeping creatures. Its gurgling death rattle woke its comrade, but Bella and Shinjiro finished it off before it could even get to its feet. Bella began searching the room. She spotted a secret door leading out into the throne room. Underneath the mattresses, she found a surprise: a bejeweled silk gown set with pearls and in remarkably clean condition. Whether the troglodytes considered this a treasure worth hiding beneath the mattresses, or if it was just extra padding to them was impossible to say.

Back in the briefing room, Sandoval had been going through the papers on the floor. They appeared to be documents, maps, and troop lists dating back to the night Brinewall was attacked. From what he could piece together, the guards believed that the citizens of the village below were rioting, and that several of the buildings had caught on fire. They were preparing to mount an expedition to investigate and bring order, but there was no indication of their success or failure.

Having at last explored all the rooms on the ground floor, everyone headed down the stairs. They descended steeply, turning at a landing before ending at a closed door. Taking a deep breath, Sawyer pushed the door open. Inside was a large room that had once been the mess hall for the castle’s guards and servants. Long benches in various states of disrepair and several battered and filthy wooden tables stood between stone pillars that supported the low ceiling. He found himself gagging at the stench of three troglodytes that crouched in the southeast corner of the room. Shinjiro and Bella pushed past him to rush forward to attack the trogs, who held their ground. They too had to struggle not to vomit from the stink. Two of the trogs quickly went down, but then a pair of double doors in the north end of the room flew open, and four more troglodytes ran into the room. Two engaged Sawyer, while the other two held back and threw javelins at Bella and Zhustin. A moment later, a door to the east opened, and another pair of troglodytes charged in to all but surround Sawyer. Behind them was a larger trog, swinging a nasty looking morningstar. It seemed that those who had feared an ambush had been right.

Over Sawyer’s shouted objections, Marie stepped forward to engage the leader, who promptly bashed her with his morningstar. Sawyer returned the favor, and Nicki hit him with a Daze spell. Sawyer hit him again as he stood there stunned, and he went down with a thud.

The rest of the battle was no contest. Although by this time almost everyone was Sickened by their stench, the trogs were all but unable to hit the well-armored Sawyer. Spivey and Nicki continued using Daze on them as the rest of the party mopped them up. Finally the last troglodyte fell, and everyone stood gasping and retching, wondering what else the dungeons of Brinewall had in store.

The PCs gained 1114 XP for their efforts, putting them at 8598 XP with 9000 required for level 4. Everyone should start preparing their 4^th level characters, as its likely you’ll reach that by the end of the next session. We won’t meet next Sunday, but will resume again at Rich and Joette’s on 6/22.