DAY 303 (6th Hammer)(January) cont...
Roztov here again reader! You may remember Fenrir, Arahel and Veddic were taking on a squad of Night Masks. Well, from what I can gather there never was a chap book revealing what the motivation of the Gruesome Giant was, not that I've located so far anyway.
In any event, on this night, the Night Mask attack had been broken and the remaining rogues and the other warehouse guards slinked back into the night.
Once the coast was clear the six men that had been sent by Nebulus to take all the warehouse goods away managed to catch one of the runaway horse and carts, then they sped off back to Westgate as quickly as they could.
With no other reason to stick around, Arahel turned into a giant owl, and with Veddic on her back she joined Fenrir in flying back to their cottage.
They were tired and went straight to bed. A couple of hours later, at around three in the morning they were all startled awake by something crashing through the roof.
Now, follow me here readers, and see if you can guess what was happening based on these facts.
1. Fenrir and Co had recently raided Castle Cormaeril.
2. Fenrir, when captured, had told Lord Cormaeril their address.
3. The Cottage is roughly six hundred yards from the Castle.
4. The Castle had several very visible and pretty large bolt-throwers mounted on its battlements.
Can you now guess what had just knocked half the slates off their roof?
More fell, not always hitting the house, but those that did penetrated the slates and continued down right into the rooms. One of the thumped into the bed beside Fenrir, narrowly missing him.
Wisely they all headed downstairs. Veddic started putting on his armour, with the aide of Groza.
As more bolts landed in the lane outside they could see that some of them were aflame and that smoke was coming from inside. Fenrir and Arahel went back in and managed to put out the fires, but after a while it seemed futile. They did not fancy taking on the castle, so they simply packed up all their belongings and after a short discussion they decided to fly to Ferbone.
An hour later they knocked on the door of the Dead Badger and woke up the landlord. He arranged them a small apartment in the inn and they slumped back down into their beds, weary and extremely annoyed.
In the morning they went to see Weynay in her shrine.
'What brings you back to Ferbone?' she asked.
'Our inability to gauge the range of ballista,' muttered Veddic.
'We are hiding!' declared Arahel.
'It's not fair!' said Fenrir. 'All we did was raid them, kill some of their guards, leave a big hole
in the side of the castle and release a demon inside! Some people are so touchy.'
She was a friend of theirs, so she presumably bit her tongue on any sarcastic thoughts that may have entered into her head.
That night they got drunk at the inn.
DAY 304 (6th Hammer)(January)
Fenrir and Arahel did not report for duty with the Day Air Watch that morning. They took a look at the cottage though. It was a smoking ruin.
They spent the rest of the day sulking in the Dead Badger back in Ferbone.
DAY 305 (7th Hammer)(January)
They were all set for another day sulking in the pub, when Weynay came to them with some information to cheer them up. She knew of an ancient tree ent that had long since taken root in the forest south of the bridge.
It would occasionally give out treasure to people, or so it was said. They thanked her and decided to take a look.
Following her directions, and with Arahel using her tracking skills, they found the ent in a clearing beside a waterfall.
Arahel did the talking and it appeared that the ent would tell them of the location of some treasure in return for answering riddles.
The first was:
When you went into the woods you got me.
You hated me yet you wanted to find me.
You went home with me cause you couldn’t find me
What was it?
The answer was:
A splinter
They didn't get it.
The second riddle was:
The one who makes it, sells it.
The one who buys it, never uses it.
The one that uses it never knows that he’s using it.
What is it?
The answer was:
A coffin
They didn't get that one either.
In the end they got this one right:
It cannot be seen, it weighs nothing, but when put into a barrel,
it makes it lighter. What is it?
The answer was:
A hole
The end then said:
''
Hum, hum, hum...
Follow the narrowest trail to the largest lake,
What shines in the middle is the thing you should take,
Down in the depths, guarded by scale, gill and fin,
Courage and strength together riches will bring.
''
Above the waterfall was a large pool with water so clear that they could see a golden chest at the bottom of it.
They could also see some aggressive looking fish.
Arahel jumped in and turned into an aboleth and made short work of them though.
The chest contained a reasonable amount of treasure and was valuable in itself.
After this, they decided to get back into the swing of things by taking all the loot they had gathered recently into Westgate to sell. They went in disguise.
Among other things Fenrir purchased a bag of holding.
Later in the afternoon they flew out to the '100 islands', a cluster of small islands five miles north of Westgate.
This was a region used by smugglers and low level pirates. The water was shallow and full of hidden rocks so was dangerous to ships any bigger than a rowing boat. It was also where the Night Parade had told them that the portal they knew of was located.
The island they were looking for was a finger of rock that jutted out of the sea by about ninety feet. There were some ruins on it, and on landing they went to investigate the largest of them.
They were attacked by wraiths and a spectre, but Veddic was powerful enough to send them packing. The portal they were looking for (a glowing red circle on the cobbled floor) was in the ruins and while the others perished one of the wraiths made it through.
Not before it was zapped a few times by Arahel who had turned into a will-o-the-wisp.
They explored the rest of the island but it was no more than a 150 feet or so across. The other buildings looked like sheilings, temporary shelters that had been built by persons unknown long ago.
As the island offered no more threat or excitement they decided to enter the portal.
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