Exploring Ravenscraeg

The party had begun exploring the clifftop fortress of Ravenscraeg. After fighting their way through ninjas and thugs in the great hall, they’d discovered a back corridor. Behind one of its doors was someone’s laboratory. All manner of alchemical equipment littered the workbenches around the room, and a profusion of dried plants and herbs hung from hooks on the rafters and beneath the stairs that wound upwards around the edges of the room. But what drew their attention was a table in the center of the room. On top of the table was a long glass case, and inside was the body of an elf.

Unable to tell if the body was living or dead from a distance, Marie cautiously approached the case. As she did, the body suddenly jerked into motion, and began beating feebly on the inside of the glass. At the same time, it began speaking in a strange, droning voice. Everyone looked at each other, but no one could even recognize the language, let alone understand the words. Everyone, that is, except young Nicki. For some reason, the words were perfectly intelligible to him, although he could swear he had never heard the language before, and had no idea what it was. But it was clear to him that the elf was begging for help. “Please! Let me out! I beg you – help me!” He approached the case and called out to the elf inside. “What is your name?” The elf continued repeating the same pleas over and over, although his head did turn towards the sound of Nicki’s voice.

Marie was closer to the body now, and with a start, she noticed an unnatural movement beneath the elf’s skin, as though something was crawling inside him. And his eyes did not blink, or seem to focus on anything he was looking at. The glass case had a lid, but it was locked shut, and Bella was tempted to open it just on general principle but resisted. The party concluded that the elf was beyond saving, and left him locked in his glass prison, although his begging for help continued as long as they were in the room. Marie began examining the contents of the lab; she recognized that most of the plants were from the nightshade family, and would provide the base for any number of toxic poisons. She also found a few magical items: some potions, a bottle of salve, and a ring. Under one of the workbenches was an iron strongbox containing a stack of gold bars; each bore the imprint of the Rimerunner's Guild. Nicki saw that many of the substances scattered on the workbenches were spell components. Taken together, the contents of this lab would be worth a pretty penny at a magic shop or apothecary back in Kalsgard.

Besides the stairs leading up and another set leading down into darkness, there was one other door in this room – a small locked door in an alcove to the south. Bella listened, and hearing nothing easily picked the lock, then backed away to let someone else do the honors. Shinjiro stepped forward and pulled the hatch open. Inside, a cramped cell ten feet deep and no more than five feet high had been excavated in this corner of the tower’s foundation. The cell was rank with the smell of feces and urine, and a pair of rats scurried among the rib cage of some former inhabitant. In the far corner, a filthy, trembling figure cowered, shielding his eyes from the light and whimpering pitifully. “Please don’t hurt me! Don’t make me take any more of your potions!” He looked like he had once been fat, but now his skin hung loosely from his skeletal frame and was covered with bruises and weeping sores. His hair was falling out, as were most of his teeth, and his eyes were dark and sunken.

Marie crawled through the filth of the cell and cast some healing on the wretched creature. He gasped with shock, then began to weep, grasping at Marie’s feet and clothes. He alternated between thanking her profusely and begging for her not to hurt him. She led him out into the light, and he gradually overcame his fear enough for them to learn something about him.

He introduced himself as Lute Haggersly. He had been a merchant in Kalsgard, and had been newly elected to the board of shareholders of the Rimerunner’s Guild. Eager to show he was up to his new duties, he’d begun asking questions about why the guild was spending so much money on Ravenscraeg. Thorborg Silverskorr had taken him aside, and politely suggested that as a junior partner it was not his place to question his betters, but he persisted, and she made more pointed threats that such insolence would not be good for his health. He continued to challenge her, and when he was on a trip to visit some of his properties east of Kalsgard his party was attacked. All his men were killed, and he was taken prisoner and brought here to Ravenscraeg. Whether that was weeks or months ago, he could not say.

At this point, his tale became hysterical. “They kept me prisoner here, and never asked me any questions or asked for any ransom. They just wanted to experiment on me! Goti Runecaster – he was the worst! I don’t know what he is – he looks like some sort of cross between a troll and a gnome – but this is his lab. He used me to test his poisons, and he threatened to make me the new host of those things in the glass case. And some big hairy guy would come beat me up sometimes.” The party assumed this might describe Jorgan the Axe, who they’d heard about. Lute continued, his voice growing shrill. “But they don’t run this place – they’re not in charge. It’s that Silverskorr woman! But she’s not a woman – she’s not even human! She’s some sort of purple ogre!” The group exchanged glances, and Lute noticed. “No really – I’m not crazy! She came to see me once, to torment me, and she was this giant purple ogre! But I recognized her voice – it was Thorborg Silverskorr! I swear it!.” He began weeping again, and Marie tried to comfort him, while at the same time trying not to let his filth and stink rub off on her.

While the rest of the group had listened to Lute’s story, Bella had grown bored, and had crept back down the back corridor to a door at the far end. As she approached, she smelled the aroma of baking bread, and listening at the door could hear muffled voices and the clatter of crockery. She reported back to the party, and they decided that it was best not to leave unknown enemies at their backs before they headed either up or down the stairs. Lute became hysterical (again), torn between the fear of being left alone and absolute panic at the prospect of possibly encountering Goti again. The group finally persuaded him to let them hide him in the closet in the thugs’ barracks. Passing through the larder, he grabbed all the cheese and dried meat he could carry, along with a wineskin, and they left him huddled in a corner of the closet, stuffing himself with food.

Returning to the rear corridor, the group took up positions outside what they assumed was the kitchen, then threw the door open. Sure enough, a lean-to of stacked fieldstones, roofed with steeply sloping thatch, had been constructed against the walls of the main hall and adjacent cliff face. Two massive ovens occupied the south wall, and a number of tables and trestles had been set up about the room for food preparation. Four men were inside, busily preparing a meal, but at the sight of intruders they grabbed knives and cleavers and rushed to the attack. Bella immediately felled one with a well-aimed arrow. Sawyer slashed another with his sword, and Nicki finished him off with a burst of Magic Missiles. Sandoval cast Hideous Laughter on a third, and he doubled over in gales of forced guffaws, providing Bella an opening for her rapier and dagger. Shinjiro battered the lone remaining cook with a flurry of blows, and Bella finished him off with a quick flick of her blade. As quickly as it had started the battle was over. Sawyer calmly took a fresh-baked loaf from the oven, and began fixing himself a sandwich.

There was one more door in the kitchen, and it led out into a picturesque dell squeezed between the steeply sloping flanks of the nearby crags that rose a hundred feet or more overhead. A narrow waterfall rushed down one of these slopes into a small pool next to the kitchen lean-to. A small torrent exited this pond, wending its way toward the great hall, where it disappeared into a metal grate in the hall’s foundation. A path from the kitchen led over a narrow bridge of rough-sawn logs arching over the stream and farther down the defile, until it was lost among the rocky outcroppings beyond. When they first saw Ravenscraeg, the party had speculated that it might have a back entrance, and here it was, although the odds of them finding the far end of the trail among the mountains and forests would have been remote.

Once Sawyer had finished his snack, the group returned to the lab. This time the elf did not react to their presence; perhaps it – or whatever inhabited it – had decided they would not help it escape. Bella and Shinjiro crept stealthily up the stairs while the rest waited below. They found themselves on a landing. Here, the stone walls turned to heavy timbers as this tower climbed above the longhall. This landing was dark, illuminated only by what little light spilled from the room below. Another steep, narrow stair lacking any railing continued up through an opening in the ceiling 20 feet above. Beyond this stair, a closed door suggested there was a side room. Staying quiet, the rogue and monk approached this door. Hearing nothing, Bella yanked the door open.

The narrow chamber inside reeked of stale wine, rank sweat, and wild animal spoor. A rough bed filled an alcove at the far end, and a pot-belly stove sat between the windows, next to a large coal bucket. Across from the stove was a small table holding several empty wineskins and a small oaken statuette. At the table sat a heavy-set, muscular man with broad features, dark eyes, and thick red hair and beard. The hair continued down over his shoulders, chest, and back, and his forearms were equally hairy, almost as if he had a pelt rather than normal hair. With a bellow, he grabbed an immense battleaxe and charged at Bella, but his blow was deflected by the doorframe. She responded with a slash from her rapier; it bit deep, but he barely seemed to notice the wound.

Alerted by the shouts from above, the rest of the group made a mad dash up the stairs. Bella backed away, taunting, and everyone else took up positions to surround Jorgan as he came out to attack. But he just laughed at them. “How stupid do you think I am?” he bellowed, and threw a hand-axe that caught Marie in the shoulder. Then he backed into the room, overturned the table, and crouched behind it, daring the party to attack him on his own terms, in his narrow room.

Bella, apparently annoyed that her taunting had not drawn him out, allowed herself to be drawn in, and rushed to attack. Zhustin tried to hit Jorgan with a Ray of Frost, but his makeshift barricade absorbed the blow. Shinjiro saw that Bella was alone in the room with Jorgan and his axe, and there was little room for any of her allies to help her. But there was an open space behind Jorgan. The monk closed his eyes for a moment, summoning his ki, and then, eyes still closed, he rushed into the room. At the last second, he threw himself into the air, sailing over both Bella and Jorgan’s heads just below the level of the ceiling. Just before he would have crashed into the far wall, he tucked into a roll and landed lightly behind the astonished ranger. Jorgan turned to confront this new threat, and Sandoval saw his opening; he whipped out his Wand of Scorching Ray and Jorgan crumpled into a smoldering heap.

The group made a cursory search of Jorgan and his room, but aside from a ring of keys (which Bella suspected might fit the locked doors they’d found downstairs), they found little of interest. Fearing that the sounds of combat might have alerted anyone on the floor above, they wasted little time. Once again, Bella and Shinjiro went first, but this time Sawyer was close behind. At the top of the stairs, they found a large, apparently empty, room. Windows around the room were all open to the elements bringing a sharp chill to the room and a dusting of snow to the floor below the windowsills. A fireplace stood against one wall, but its ashes were cold, although a stack of firewood was piled nearby. A trap door with a wooden ladder leading to it hung open in the ceiling to the southwest. Six light cots were spaced about the chamber, with a small footlocker next to each. Behind the fireplace was a small room with a closed door, and a hidden alcove opened behind that room.

Tengu Ninja

The trio moved cautiously into the room, and Marie followed them up the stairs. As she reached the top of the stair, a figure suddenly materialized in front of her; it slashed at her face with a wakizashi, and she only barely managed to avoid its wickedly sharp blade. Simultaneously, three more appeared around the room, seemingly out of thin air. One swung at Sawyer while the other two moved to flank Bella. The attackers where tengu ninjas, the same as had attacked Nicki on the stair. As they dodged the ninjas’ attacks, they heard a croaking voice chanting from out of sight in the alcove. An instant later, a pair of small air elementals appeared, and moved in to surround Bella. At the same time, a swarm of ravens came pouring in through the open windows in the north to engulf Shinjiro and Sawyer. They quickly beat the birds off, but not before taking damage and Sawyer becoming disoriented.

Bella, Sawyer, Shinjiro, and Marie all began returning the ninjas’ attacks, and their damage began to mount. The rest of the party was still bottled up on the stairs, unable to join the fray, until Sandoval bulled his way past the ninja blocking the top of the stairs. A quick thrust of his echoblade sent the tengu to the floor, and the floodgates were opened. Zhustin was the first into the room. Seeing Bella surrounded by tengus and air elementals, he cast Summon Monster, and suddenly five eagles appeared, swooping and slashing at the air elementals. One disappeared, and the other began leaking wisps of fog.

But the balance of the battle continued to shift. From out of the alcove, a familiar figure flew – the bloodfeather raven! It croaked an incantation in some unknown tongue, and Sawyer felt his armor, shield, and sword begin to grow hot. A moment later, two more swarms of ravens flew through the open windows. One surrounded Marie and Sandoval, while the other attacked Bella and two of the eagles. Marie and Sandoval managed to fight off the birds attacking them, but Marie was blinded by their slashing beaks and claws, and stumbled down the stairs. One of Zhustin’s eagles also fell to the ravens, but two others broke off to engage the bloodfeather raven, who was continuing to croak out spells. Who knew what else it might throw at the party?

The PCs earned 800 XP for their exploits so far, putting them at 24,034 XP, with 35,000 required for level 7. We’ll be at Leo’s next week, although Dave will miss and there’s a chance Roger could be late.