Session 56 - What Do the Shadows Hide

General Summary

31 Harvest

Having gone to bed early in the evening, the Tiny Hut vanished almost as soon as the first rays of the new day were visible. As the bubble popped it took with it the heat of the spell and a cold, damp breeze smelling of salt blew through the camp rousing the party. Jilken grunted and pulling out a coal box, rolled the smoldering ember into the small teepee of kindling. As the flames began to consume the twigs, she dropped a couple more branches on and then began brewing tea as her teammates began to stir.
A moment or two later Denye appeared, climbing down an invisible ladder and joined the others as Ell began to ponder how they could learn more about the house. Vellikar suggested, "I could turn into a rat or something and try to sneak in somewhere. With these earrings I could give you a running commentary on what I find."
"Or maybe a bird and then you could look through some of the windows," suggested Jilken, "then you don't have to go inside."
"That's a good idea," replied Janora, "maybe Helenwye could take a look as well. I really didn't want to get too close with the raven, he's not exactly inconspicuous."
Denye nodded, and began whispering to her familiar as Jilken laughed, "What, you think a giant bird just showing up and trying to land on the building would be suspicious?"
Janora glared at the Aiel as Ranunkel offered, "I could stick my head through a few walls. I might be able to dig a tunnel under the wall as well."
At that point Denye stood and launched the pseudodragon before turning to the group, "We should probably try to get closer." Turning she went over and picked up the brass hoop, muttered a few words and slipped the ring back onto her finger. The others quickly broke camp, put out the small fire and began moving slowly toward the sanctum. Finding a small stand of trees, only a hundred yards or so southwest of the walls the party stopped seeing several of the familiar green robed figures standing on a second floor balcony, overlooking the courtyard and the surrounding areas.
Bracing herself, Denye shifted her mind to Helenwye's and began muttering softly relaying what they saw. As Janora had spotted, the interior area of the courtyard was trimmed grass almost to the dirt and the courtyard was divided into thirds, with gates cutting off access to the sides of the buildings. In addition to the main doors, there were secondary doors into the building on either side, near where the single story walls the building itself. Helenwye also spotted a thick clumping of vines that had grown up the western wall. Many of the windows were smudged and covered with dirt so it was hard to make out anything beyond, except that almost all of the windows were barred. There were a few windows that had lost their glazing so it was a bit easier to see inside. The rooms inside were dusty and appeared to be a bed chamber with 3 cots, that oddly included worn straps dangling from the sides. Helenwye was about to return when in one of these rooms she found five of the Taken, standing about the room, unmoving and unblinking.
Freaked out, Denye broke the connection and as Helenwye flitted back, the wizard turned to the others and said, "I think our best bet is to try to climb those vines on the western wall. Those Taken on the balcony won't be able to see us and that gives us the opportunity to get inside."
"That makes sense," said Vellikar nodding, "I could still turn into a rat and sneak inside to take a look ahead."
"Or maybe you can run across to the other side and cause some kind of the distraction," suggested Jilken.
Denye shook her head, "I don't know if we want to alert them that something is happening. Besides I worry about leaving Vellikar separated from the rest of us."
Ranunkel rumbled, "So we sneak in together?"
Ell nodded, "Agreed, so we sneak in together. What do we say if we run into anyone?"
"At that point," said Denye, clicking her beak, "I think the time for conversation is over."
"Or," said Jilken excitedly, "what if we say we are inspectors from that guild of churches and we're here to follow up on some of their paperwork."
"Excellent," Ell said with a grin and pointed at the firbolg druid, "Vellikar, that will be your moment."
The tall firblog gulped and began blushing a deeper blue, but nodded quickly. "So just to be clear, sneaking in is plan A, and lying is plan B." At Ell and Denye's nods, he muttered, "Let's hope it doesn't come to that." Squaring his shoulders he lifted his staff and cast Pass Without a Trace on the party, wrapping them all in shadows and cushioning their footsteps. With that the group raced for the walls in almost silent and began quickly climbing the walls.
Tear of Midnight Sorrow was the first and got almost halfway up before he slipped and fell, hitting the ground with a bounce and roll. Growling softly under his breath, the goblin started back up. Jilken quickly clambered up the vines and dropped to the other side, just in time to see Vellikar crest the wall and slip awkwardly over. In a flash of movement Jilken caught the druid and spun, using the momentum of the druid's fall to set him once more on his feet. Even Janora's husky made it over the wall, through it took both Janora and Denye to help the giant dog over the top.
Jilken approached the door and peered carefully through the keyhole. It was hard to see in the gloom beyond, but it was possible to see a short hall with several doors and no sign of movement. The Aiel tested the door before backing up, "Ell, it's locked, can you do your thing?" Nodding, the young man pulled out his set of lockpicks and quickly went to work. A moment later there was a soft click and Ell backed up and gave Jilken a courtly bow. The elf grinned back and approached the door. Turning the handle carefully she opened it slightly to get a better view.
As the door opened, there was a sound of commotion and movement in the courtyard. While it did not sound like an alarm, Ranunkel snuck around to get a better look and found that two to three score Taken were heading out of the main gates carrying tools. Over the link, the stone druid, said, "Looks like some of them are moving outside. I guess that's better for us."
With that he began making his way back over to the others, just as Jilken pushed the door open and slipped inside. The corridor was quiet and the rest of the group followed and began checking the other doors. Unlike what Helenwye had seen in other rooms, this hall was cleaned and dusted, with several oil lamps hanging on the wall, although none were currently lit. One door led to an empty storeroom with broken shelving, while two of the others led into comfortable looking guest rooms. The final door let into another hallway sporting five more doors.
Ell began the right, finding that first door led to another dusty empty room. The second led to a similar room, but as he cracked the door open he saw another group of five Taken standing slack jawed around the room. Silently but swiftly he shut the door warning the others to keep quiet over the earrings. On the left side, the first door was locked and the second revealed a squarish room set up as a chapel to Kosyn, similar to the sanctuary back at the Temple in Dreford. Denye moved to the door on the far end and cracking the door open she found a large open common room where almost two dozen Taken were standing around. Carefully shutting the door, she warned the others, "More of them in there. Do we even know what we are looking for?"
Janora's eyes narrowed for a moment before nodding at the door just behind Denye, "The portal is in that direction, but I think it's upstairs."
"Well," began Ranunkel pulling his head out of the stone wall, "I've got some good news, there is a set of stairs up in the next room." Ell suggested Tear try his hand at the locked door. Unlike Ell, the small goblin didn't need to kneel down and it only took a moment for Tear to get the tumblers in the right position and he carefully pushed the door open. A set of stairs stood directly across from the door and there seemed to be a corridor that extended southward with more doors. Unlike the other areas of the house that they had explored, this hall had not be cleaned and there were dusty tracks leading back and forth.
Deciding that it was better to find this planer rift and figure out what was going on, Jilken took point and led the group up the stairs. The second floor seemed similar to the first and clearly looked to have been abandoned for 15 or 20 years. Poking her head into an empty room, over the link Denye said, "I'm pretty sure this was some kind of asylum or sanitarium. Why else would you have bars on the windows?"
Ell nodded, "I think you are right. I vaguely recall Mother speaking of some sort of scandal a while back." Trying another door, Ell called to the others, "There is another hall here that leads back toward the middle of the building. Janora is that right direction?"
Closing their eyes, Janora raised a hand and began sweeping it through an arc. Bringing it to a stop, she opened her eyes and nodded, "It's right there, 80 or 100ft that way." Pushing into the hall beyond, the only other door was at the far end. Vellikar slowly eased the door open and found a large open room with two rows of Taken standing in the center of the room along with two figures in armor on either side of some sort of archway that was filled with a gray smoke. Pulling his head back, Vellikar relayed what he had seen and finished, "If we go in there, they are going to absolutely know we are here. Do we want to look around more first?"
"I don't know that there is much else to find," said Janora, "whatever is happening here, a portal to the Shadowfel feels like it's probably at the center of it."
Ell nodded and the vanished into the shadows of the dark hall. Over the link, he said, "I'm going to try to sneak in and get a better look. It's dark enough for me to hide, I think." He reappeared as he pushed the door open carefully as in the back, Janora quickly cast Bless on the entire party. It took all of the young man's skill to get about halfway across the room. He reported that there were another flight of stairs leading up to the third floor in the corner and a third of the armored warriors standing in a nearby alcove at the back of the room. But it was the gate that caught his attention, made out some sort of black metal that twisted and bent into a braided arch. At the base on either end was a large blocky box that flickered with an orange, arcane light.
"So if these Taken are all enthralled," began Vellikar, "if we get rid of the armored figures, would they come out it? I don't really know who or what is in charge or what we are doing here?"
"If possible, I think we should try to just knock them out," said Denye firmly.
Jilken sighed, "That's a lot harder to do, but I'll do my best."
"I agree with Denye," said Vellikar, "these people came to this group looking for love and acceptance, they don't deserve to die for that."
Janora frowned, "From what I've seen, I'm not sure there is anything left. It's almost as if the body was still moving but there is no person left. It might just be a form of mind control, but my gut says it's something a bit more permanent."
Denye sighed and her wings dropped, "Well, I guess now we know what is being Taken."
"In that case," asked Janora, "why aren't we just setting that room on fire?"
"Oh well," replied Denye, "we didn't realize that piece of the situation before, now Fireball is looking like a much more viable spell."
In response, Tear pulled out his new force pistol and flattened himself against the wall waiting for anything to happen. At the same time, Vellikar cast Aura of Vitality, ready heal anyone in the fight to come. Jilken took up a place on the other side of the door and cocked her crossbow, ready to kick open the door and fire at the person in the biggest hat.
One of the armored figures, stepped forward and turned to stare at the partial open door. A split second later, all of the others in the room turned to stare at the door as well. Denye bit back a squawk and conjured a small bead of flame between her claws and waiting for Ell to kick things off. A moment later, Ell provided that signal, firing off a pair of Eldritch Blasts at the glowing bases of the arch. As he became visible, he dove to the back of the room as all the Taken in the room turned in his direction. Before the young man hit the floor, Denye's Fireball exploded in the center of the room and dropped all of the cultists in the room. Jilken followed that up, throwing the door to slam against the wall and quickly firing a bolt into the face of the nearest knight. She followed it up with a second shot from the light bow and leapt up onto a table, putting her back to the wall.
Tear followed and joined the Aiel on the table and took aim before firing his new force pistol, rocking the armored knight in his tracks. Vellikar rushed forward as well and cast Primal Savagery and raked at the knight with green crystal claws, but at the last second the knight brought up a shield to block the blow. With the armored elf distracted, Jilken fired another bolt from the heavy crossbow straight into their neck. She tried again with the light crossbow, but the foe blocked it with their shield.
Ranunkel ran up just as the abused knight swung at Vellikar with his sword, but the druid ducked out of way, but got knocked to his back as the knight bashed him with the shield. The other two knights rushed forward and tried similar attacks on Ranunkel and Jilken. Both ducked the swords swings, but Ranunkel got knocked to the ground and Jilken got slammed into the wall.
Denye ran in as well and called up a Storm Sphere in the middle of the room, heavy winds battering the knights. A bolt of lightning lanced out at one of the knights, but it hit the ground near the elf's feet. Back in the hall, Janora's husky began to growl as more of the Taken shuffled up to the doorway. Leaving the steed to deal with those, the witch ran up into the doorway and crouching down to get a view of the gate, laid a hand on the ground and cast Erupting Earth.
Tile and stone burst up all around the gate sending debris flying up into the storm. Both crystals at the base flared and began pulsing in asynchronous rhythms as a loud hum filled the room and the mists within the portal flickered. Over the link Janora warned, "It's unstable, if we destroy those crystals it should close the portal."
"I can't see it with the storm up," complained Ell, "but I might be able to do something else." Turning and edging around the edge of the storm to line up his shot, Ell fired off two Eldritch Blasts into the weakened knight, throwing him into his peer and squishing Tear against the far wall. With a grunt, the small goblin untangled himself from the knight and fired his force pistol at one of the crystals. The blast went high and vanished into the mists.
Vellikar groaned and pushed him to his feet, before pulling out his crossbow and shooting the down knight straight at the back of his neck. Jilken grinned and pulled out her spear and lunging down at the same knight. The Aiel overbalanced on the edge of the table and fell, but turned it into a roll, coming back up onto her feet and bring the spear back down with both hands and finishing the knight off. As he went still, Jilken spun with lightning speed and slammed another blow into the third armored figure, also prone on the ground.
Ranunkel Wildshaped into their elemental form and slammed a stony fist into the knight as more Taken burst into the room. More Taken charged into the hall behind the party, but the husky had been waiting for them and let out a thunderous bark that threw three of them into the wall. The remaining two knights pushed themselves to the their feet. One made two attacks at Jilken with his longsword, but only one struck, leaving a long shallow cut down one calf that burned with freezing cold. The other struck at Ranunkel before raising a hand to cast a spell, but as darkness and shadow began to coalesce around his fist, Denye cast Counterspell. Flicking a claw she sent a Firebolt at the knight who had attacked Jilken, but it splashed over the armored figure's shield. Ducking between Ranunkel's legs and moving around the storm sphere, she sent a bolt of lightning at the other knight. This time it struck and the gray elf went rigid for a moment as the winds battered those with the spell's radius.
As more Taken came down the stairs from the tower, Janora cast Dispel Magic at the gate. It had no affect, but as the witch stared, there was something about the swirling gray mists that called to Janora and they took one step forward before shaking their head and stepping back. Out in the hall, the husky pounced on the fallen Taken and crushed all three. Several of the Taken reached Ell and began clawing at him. With a shout the young man turned invisible and ducked away just as Tear shouted that something was wrong with the gate.
A moment later there was a blinding flash and then a concussive wave of force that that leveled the central portion of the house and threw the party, as well as all of the Taken, around like ragdolls. As the smoke and dust cleared, the party looked around in amazement at the destruction. Ranunkel quickly rushed over and pull a rock off of Tear of Midnight Sorrow and shouted, "Tear's down!"
Vellikar leapt to his feet, muttering, "Not again, not another one." Rushing closer the firblog druid raised his staff and cast Mass Cure Wounds. As the wave of green magic washed over the various party members, the small goblin began coughing and a moment or two later slowly opened his eyes and sat up.
As the party picked their way out of the rubble and regathered, Jilken began looking for more of the Taken, but in the early morning light, there was no sign of movement in the still standing portions of the building. She did find quite a few bodies including the three score Taken out behind the house who had been working on the construction.
Over the link, Jilken reported her findings and Janora confirmed, "There is no sign of the rift between planes, so that may have not been the prettiest way to close it, but it was successful."
Ell looked unsatisfied, "Maybe, but we still don't know who was in charge here. What's to stop them from coming back and rebuilding?"
"Perhaps," replied Janora, "but it seems to me that whoever was the brains of the operation is most likely back in the city. We didn't see a single sign of anyone who could even think for themselves here."
"They could have been on the other side of that gate," suggested Ell.
Now it was Janora's turn to shake their head, "No, there had to have been a human operation here as well. It doesn't matter what was on the other side of that portal, it will matter eventually, but here and now what we can access is the city and someone registered all of this with that damned guild. That's who we should be hunting down."
Denye shrugged, "Unfortunately, I don't have any magics link to a portal that is already closed. Maybe we could find some pieces of the gate or something that might tell us more. If we are going back to confront people, we need evidence."
"Evidence," repeated Janora skeptically, "what do we need evidence for? We know what's going on?"
Ranunkel rumbled, "Is there anything left? We destroyed a lot of the building."
"Of course we need evidence," replied Denye looking shocked, "otherwise how will we show it to others, if we can't it's just hearsay. And our voices may carry some weight, but this really should be done through official channels."
"Just to be clear," said Janora, "my plan was to catch and torture these people. I have so many spells that could be useful."
Ranunkel, still in his large rock form growled, "We are not torturing anyone."
"Yeah no," said Denye looking a bit queasy, "I'm sorry Janora, but, I appreciate your enthusiasm, but that's just....cruel."
"Woah, woah," said Ell, raising his hands and stepping between the witch and wizard, "We only need the threat of torture."
Denye scoffed, "We don't even need that. If we can find some evidence, a spellbook, reagents, anything that could link to someone."
"Looting this place does seem like an excellent start," agreed Ell, "should we take a short rest first?" That seemed like a good idea as any and the adventurers all found someplace to sit and drink after the early morning excitement.

Report Date

23 Sep 2022