This game is now tied for the longest one I've ran with Tower of the Stargazer of all things which somehow also took four sessions to bring to a closure if memory serves me right.
Session one can be found here, and last session here.
This session we got to witness how when one rises, another one falls as Blue's player was finally able to join us again but Claude's player in turn could not make it.
Such are the obligations of real life, getting in the way of our hobbies.
Characters:
Angelo, an amnesiac magic-user.
Beau "Blue" Smith, a heretic magic-user that was once caught translating forbidden texts.
Thrallmar Righthand, a disgraced dwarven cleric with his beard shaved off.
Where we last left off the party had returned back to Talen, bringing back the news about the hunter's passing as well as managing to re-unite the missing girl with her mother. For this they were given ownership over the hunting shack of the now dead hunter.
Thrallmar also had negotiated himself a place as defendant of Blue for the trial he was due for having gone over the time limit he was given for retuning from the forest after which inquisitor Thackerey had said he would consider Blue as having ran away.
Journey to Falm
At dusk on the fourth day after the return to Talen, a wagon accompanied by two riders pulled into the middle of the village.
A priest in a gray robe with golden stripe running along it's entire length, as are the holy colours of the church of Varchic, stepped down from the driver's seat of the wagon and onto the little wooden platform at the village center and loudly proclaimed that he and his fellow knights of the church had arrived at the request of the holy inquisition of the church of Varchic to apprehend and take with them a heretic by the name of Beau Smith to be trialled against his sins in front of the church and that anyone not cooperating in handing the man over would be considered an accomplice of this foul heretic.
Blue stepped forwards willingly, surrendering himself to the priest and the two knights accompanying him along with Thrallmar who, as Thackerey had to explain to the priest, had agreed to share the burden of Blue's heresy in the event that the dwarf would be unable to defend Blue from prosecution.
What followed was a bumpy two days of travel in a small wagon with hands tightly tied behind their backs for Blue and Thrallmar, with Angelo following behind on foot out of curiosity.
The journey was largely uneventful. The party escorting Blue to his trial made camp shortly outside Talen to pass the night, picked up camp at sunrise and headed towards Falm. Another night was spent camping outside roughly midway through the journey and towards evening of the second day of proper travel the silhouette of Falm could be seen against the mountain range of Foundation onto which it was partially built. (Think something like Minas Tirith from LotR, now make it wider and separated into upper and lower part by another inner wall and you get Falm.)
Arriving there, the two knights of horseback passed a few words to the guard stationed at the gate before having the wagon pull in to the city. Inside the buildings were mostly constructed of stone, and shortly after rolling in to the city Thrallmar's hands were untied as he was let out of the wagon and told that there'd be someone sent for him tomorrow to come and get him for the trial. Blue on the other hand was driven all the way to beyond the second wall to upper Falm where the architechture was largely dominated by church buildings and noble houses, and stuffed into a prison cell to wait for his trial.
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| A simplified map of Falm and it's districts. Church and nobles reside in upper Falm while commoners and markets are in lower Falm |
Before, during and after the trial
Seeing as it was not quite night time yet, Thrallmar took a stroll around the city to see if there was any work he could involve himself in to earn a coin or two only to find out that a beardless dwarf -sign of being disgraced among their kin- is not that well welcomed among people. No fair folk wanted to associate with him and people would carry away valuables as he approached as dwarves who have lost their honour have a tendency to turn all prescious metals and gems into common pebbles and rust should they die.
The following day someone had indeed been sent for Thrallmar, as a town crier could be heard announcing the coming trial of a heretic that would be held later that day as well as calling out for a dwarf going by the name of Thrallmar Righthand.
As Thrallmar approach the man he also noticed two church knights accopanying the crier, who promptly stepped forward to escort him through the streets of lower Falm towards the upper city and further through there up a winding mountain path to a large open field that had been cut into the rocky mountainside. The field was surrounded by shabby long wooden benches and there in the middle of the field on a slightly raised wooden platform was Blue, tied down to a kneeling position and secured tightly to the platform with thick ropes. Further towards the end of the field stood another platform and considerably higher elevation, and upon it stood two thrones.
Thrallmar was likewise fastened onto the platform from where his hands had been again tied behind his back, although he was allowed to remain standing.
Slowly people started to trickle in and take seats around the field. At some point Angelo had also arrived at the city, met up briefly with Thrallmar, and was spectating the event from the sidelines.
Some hours later several official looking figures hurried to the higher platform, followed by a priest clad in rather impressive robes as well as what would appear to be a nobleman of some sort. The current High Priest as well as Lord of Falm, the twin rules who govern the city.
A sharp round of gunfire into the air by church knights stationed near the platform that Blue and Thrallmar were tied to silenced the rumbling chatter of the crowd and the priest started to speak on his throne. His voice barely reached the interrogation platform, let alone the crowds gathered at the field, but as soon as he finished speaking a man standing next to the priest's throne repeated his words in a clear and resounding voice that carried throughout the open field, announching the trial of the heretic Beau Smith as having begun.
The trial itself had it's ups and downs. The sins and heretical actions of Blue were brought to light for everyone present (translation of forbidden texts, formulas deemed too complex and something that a sane man should not possess). Blue was given an opporturnity to defend himself, with a cried of his own announcing his words to the two men acting as his judges and was helped by Thrallmar embellishing the truth of what transpired in the forest, claiming that Blue being late from his given return time being his own fault rather than Blue's and the reason he had shaved his beard off as a sign of disgrace and loss of his own honour for he knew he had caused harm to come upon Blue for delaying his return.
The lord and the high priest exchanged several private discussion that were not shared by the criers for those attending the trial, and with the high priest buying the story Thrallmar was spinning the trial finally concluded in the lord standing up from his throne to loudly proclaim with his own voice that Blue would still be allowed to keep his head, he would be given only six months rather than the initial year he had had to procure a miracle that would both benefit the church and Falm as well, and that he should start with the investigation into the local swamp from where locals where telling all sorts of unsettling rumours.
Afterwards Blue and Thrallmar where picked up by the knights that had stood watch by their interrogation platform and lead to "backstage" of the platform that the high priest and lord had been seated where they were given only the rudimentary information about the swamp, where to find it, and pretty much told to gather whatever men they feel they require and left to their own devices with a familiar looking inquisitor looking over them.
Preparations for the next adventure
Trying to ask around the city for any possible mercenaries, hirelings or even porters was not easy and those that were willing were asking for forward payment in order to have something to leave behind for their families in case of those who still had them or simply in order to atleast gain something if they'd need to turn tail and run from where they were headed or if their employers met an untimely death.
Some plans were thrown around about gathering more gullible religious people and make them believe that whatever they find in the swamp is holy and miraculous. Perhaps they could pass whatever was rumoured to poke out of the thick fog enshouring the swamp and towards the sky as a finger bone of the god giant Varchic who was said to sleep under this very mountain range?
These plans were also put on hold due to their current situation with funding and everyone asking for forwards payment.
The group decided that since they were told to start with the swamp by the lord and high priest of Flam, they would first need some starting funds to gather up an expedition to the swamp.
And in order to gather funds, it was decided that they would head back to Talen and poke around the forest some more. After all, Jacob and the kids had found the bear skin from further in the forest according to Jacob who also claimed that they don't go deeper into the forest than the witch's house since things get weird and dangerous there. Who knows what all treasures could be found there?
With that decision the party headed back towards Talen with Thackerey once again breathing on their necks. Thrallmar spent the few days the party used for travelling by practicing his knowledge of herbs that he had started learning about back at Talen.
At Talen they re-supplied and picked up another hireling. A cattle herder by the name of Dylan who Blue managed to trick into coming along with them for no pay at all with the use of Charm Person.
Back to the woods
The group reached the dried out river bank, made their way past now barely even noticeable campsite that nature had had time to start reclaiming, past the clearing with an un-inspected gravel path leading somewhere towards the south and to the burned remains of the log cabin they had spent their first night in the woods in. From there they continued further forwards, arriving once again at the twice cursed swamp.
As Blue's player had not been with us when the party had first encountered the swamp he wanted to investigate it based on what he had heard about it. The party tied all their ropes together to form a long and continuous piece that they would give to Dylan, who Blue coaxed into wading through the swampland and to the dark and gnarled mass of tree that looked almost as if it was trying to strangle itself. Upon reaching there, Dylan was to tie the rope around the trunk of the tree which would allow others to pass safely over by allowing them to pull themselves towards the tree as they moved through the fetid soup that was the swampland.
It was determined that someone of more magical nature should be sent over to investigate, leading to the decision to send over Thrallmar.
When he reached the little patch of stable land that the lone tree stood on he closed his eyes and cast a small prayer to detect evil. Upon opening his eyes Thralmar needed a double-take to make sure he had indeed opened them as what he saw in front of himself was nothing but dark with faint fleshy tones like one might see when pushing their eyes tightly closed. Turning around to his friends and realising that he did see them just fine the loudly proclaimed to them what he had proclaimed on the night they last made camp by the swamp: "Ayup, that's a devil tree!"
Angelo likewise decided to cast Detect Magic but failed to see anything magical about the tree.
Having determined that the tree must in some way or shape be evil he did what any logical priestly type would and carefully examined the tree, tapping it to find if it might be hollow as well as rummaging his backpack for a hand axe he was carrying with him, with which he hacked few splinters of the wood for further examination. Seeing as the dent he had made into the wood started to slowly seep this thick viscous and dirt brown liquid he also chose to grab some of it in a vial.
What came next was getting back which was easier said than done. The further Thrallmar fought his way through the swamp from the tree the harder it was getting to move, untill finally somewhere around the halfway point towards the shore where his companions were standing he could no more advance even an inch. After some throwing around of ideas it was decided that he should try and go back to the tree.
Turning around was a fight in and of itself but the closer he got to the tree the easier it got to move and soon Thrallmar was back on solid ground with now slightly worried looking Dylan.
Another return trip was attempted but this time with Thrallmar leaving the liquid and the tree splinters he had in his pack by the tree, for they had hypothesised that mayhaps the tree was preventing him from leaving since he was carrying part of it with him.
This attempt soon came to a smiliar halt as the first one though, with thee dwarf stuck halways from the tree and only able to go back to where he had come from.
After a short outburst from Thrallmar after finding out that his backpack had ripped open as he was wading through the swamp and that his lamp was now lost somewhere among the brown muck he swore to bring the tree down and started to furiously make a dent into it's trunk with his hand axe, an activity that was only eventually stopped by the fact that the tree was as thick as three dwarves and the sun was now rapidly starting to set in the horizon.
One last effort was made to retrieve the men stuck by the tree before nightfall, this time by tying the rope that had been tied around the tree around Thrallmar instead, having Dylan and Angelo (who had come to the tree in order to cast his Detect Magic earlier) in front of him holding onto the rope and having everyone on the shore pulling with all their might as the trio fought their way forwards. It was not an easy task, but as the setting skie dyed the forest shades of orange two men and a dwarf that were covered in mud, dirt, dead moss and god knows what else were now safely back from their excursion to the middle of the swamp. A quick check on their packs revealed that Angelo had likewise torn his backpack while travelling the swamp and lost a waterskin and a pickaxe, while Thrallmar had somehow managed to pick up a stray antler into his pack.
Setting up camp was not a trivial task either so close to the swampland, as it was not easy to find stable enough ground to pitch tents and no natural sources of water were nearby, requiring the party to dip into their supplies in order to not suffer from exhaustion after all they had gone through the day.
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