Session 4: Unquiet Bones

General Summary

The party followed Bargess closely through the tunnels when a slight racket from Aaura captured the attention of a nearby goblin guard. Approaching the noise, the goblin didn’t see Bargess and Shadow hiding in the flickering torchlight until it was too late. A quiet strike from Shadow and the goblin gurgled out its last breath.   Peering through the tunnel ahead, the party saw the cavern open up into a large natural hall where dozens of goblins went about their business, unaware of the intruders spying from the shadows. Along the perimeter of this hall a number of side tunnels and cave mouths descended away into the darkness.   Bargess pointed a gnarled finger ahead at one of the side tunnels. “Through there. Under the armor. A passage blocked by the cowardly goblins leads to the Cold Things. The Dead Things. The place you seek.”   The party watched as Bargess’ body seem to pulse; the muscles under his skin spasming and distending as he peered into the goblin hall. He licked his lips and chewed on his tongue. He turned back to the party.   “Bargess kept his promise. Kept his oath.”   Aaura held out the strange iron spike that had once pierced through Bargess. “Here” she said. “You might need this.”   Bargess’ lips curled back into a snarl and he recoiled a bit from the spike. The muscles in his back tensed and expanded, dropping him to all fours. With his deep red eyes he gave one more sideways glance at the party and slunk back into the shadows from the direction they came.   The group moved stealthily into the tunnel Bargess had indicated and found themselves in an armory of sorts. Crude goblin weapons hung on the walls while old barrels held javelins, spears, and crossbow bolts. At the end of the chamber, chained to a stand, was a set of old armor, a helmet, and a shield with an antique Tabaxi design. Quietly moving the stand aside, they used crowbars (one of them magically conjured by Aaura) to lift a stone disc from its recess, revealing a passage of steep steps into the darkness below.   Shadow led the way into the descent, which soon became rockier, rougher and harder to tread due to a cave in. When she finally emerged into the chamber below she found herself in an old tabaxi barracks. Antique tapestries hung on the walls, chests and footlockers sat near tabaxi style beds, and a multitude of other furniture filled the room, glistening with years of mold and mildew. Remembering Bargess’ words, she focused her breathing, her eyes flashing in the dark, and saw the outline of three tabaxi skeletons hiding in small alcoves near the ceiling. Her eyese flashed again in recognition. Undead. As the rest of the group joined her, she held up her paw in warning.   Not wanting to waste any time, Keokan drew his scimitars and advanced on the skeletons who quickly dropped from their high perches and sprang to attack.   Keokan, Shadow, and Aatavi moved to the frontline against their foes, while Aaura and Faelyn provided ranged support and spectacular acrobatic flourishes; flipping off of a table after blasting the skeletons with arcane energy. This position in the back proved dangerous, however, as a new foe entered the fray shortly after it had begun.   With the sound of large cloven hooves echoing in the hall, a massive skeleton rushed towards Faelyn from a passage behind. Nearly nine feet tall, broad of shoulder and bearing a pair of massive horns, the undead minotaur slammed into the half elven sorcerer, knocking him unconscious and throwing his limp body across the room. A deep purple glow flashed in the sockets of its eyes and its hand grasped a tabaxi tetsubo; a greatclub studded with rings of iron.   Seeing this new threat Aatavi summoned up the storm within himself and flew into a rage against the minotaur. The hulking skeleton absorbed his onslaught and most of the party’s blows, its bones glancing aside the edge of blade and tip of spear alike. Even the fiery magic of Aaura’s chromatic orb could not bring the beast down easily, as she centered the blast within its ribs, blackening the cold bones and casting frantic shadows across the room.   After dispatching one of the smaller skeletons, Shadow moved to help the unconscious Faelyn, reviving him with Lun Weia healing magic. Battered and bruised but back in the battle, Faelyn slowly moved to his feet and began to cast a spell. Only a few feet away, the raging Aatavi had abandoned his harpoon and had forced the minotaur into a headlock. As Faelyn’s spell loosed and magical bolts of energy slammed into the minotaur’s skeletal frame, Aatavi pulled with all his might and tore the skull from the rest of its body, destroying the creature and scattering its bones.   The party moved cautiously in the aftermath, tending their wounds and keeping a vigilant eye out for any more “cold things” as Bargess had named them. Moving into the next chamber they found themselves in a sitting room of sorts, where dozens of tabaxi baubles sat stowed in tiny alcoves and cubbies. Taking note of a strange groove in the floor of the chamber, Faelyn discovered a secret passage, spinning a small antique prayer wheel and causing a section of the wall to slide open.   Making their way through this passage, the hall opened up into a semi-circular chamber whose far end emptied into a large black subterranean expanse. The floor became covered in soft rose colored sand that soon expanded into an underground beach rimming a large lake of still, wine colored water.   At the banks of this underground lake, Shadow spied a gong and small shrine dedicated to Ajix and Lun Weia, the twin gods of the her tabaxi clan. Feeling a sense of serenity at the lake’s edge, our battered heroes decided to try and restore themselves with a much needed rest.