[The adventurers Griffolk Ethyn the Dragon-Shaman, Sparkledingle the Gnome Wizard, Fangorino the Barbarian are on a mission to follow Lady Partick.]
DAY 13
And so, after the lads had a good time under the OJB, and Sparkledingle had a good time at the Temple of Oghma, today was the day to board the Dementor.
Corum gathered them together and handed them their tickets, then sent them on their way, saying,
'Well, good luck fellows, but once you are on that ship, you are no longer my problem!'
They had two spare hours and driven either by the evil aura they picked up from Lady Partick or by some wild premonitions of things to come, they went to a grocers and purchased a good amount of garlic. Then in the market though bought mirrors.
Griffolk also bought 10 vials of cinnamon, for some reason.
After that they made their way to the docks and got their first sight of the Dementor. It was a large galleon, fitted out for passenger travel. From what I gather it mainly sailed up and down the Sword Coast, but had, on occasion gone into other seas.
It also traded in each port that it entered, and must have made a fair amount of coin. The passengers, I assume, preferred not to use Wizards and others who could cast the Teleport spells to get about.
I know myself that Teleport is not always reliable, and it was expensive if you could not do it yourself.
The captain was a handsome middle-aged half-halfling called Captain Pickles.
He welcomed them onboard and showed them to their well appointed cabins.
By the time the evening meal was served, the Dementor had set sail and was headed south towards Candlekeep. Bosun Bonefinger, a female human, seemed somewhat grumpy with the Captain and ever the diplomat Fang called it out.
The room went silent, the Bosun gave him an evil look and went back to her meal. Pickles tried to smooth it over.
Meanwhile, Griff was sat next to a man called Gingols, and he soon made friends with him. Sparkledingle talked to Supercargo Flinty 'Dog-gobble' Koople, the ships gnomish supercargo.
Fang made friends with no one.
Gingols was keen to inform Sparkledingle that he was perfectly sane, in fact he was known as Gingols the Sane. Sparkledingle could not help himself and began to tease the fellow.
'If you are sane, my good sir,' he piped up. 'Then what is the craziest thing you have ever done?'
'I'd rather not say,' replied Gingols mysteriously.
'Oh!', giggled the gnome. 'If you see the colour red, then you are wrong in the head!'
He then cast Prestidigitation and changed the man's robe red.
'You'll have to do better than that my little friend!' cried Gingols, leaping from his chair.
Gingols knew what had happened, but he was still upset.
'Why look!' taunted Sparkledingle. 'Now your face is red too!'
Gingols stepped back and cast a spell, but whatever it was, the gnome resisted it.
Sparkledingle cast Charm Person, but it didn't land either.
'That's it!' yelped Gingols and cast again.
This time the spell hit - it was Hideous Laughter - and the gnome began to writhe on the floor in shrieks of hilarity.
Finally Captain Pickles stepped in. 'Now now gentlemen,' he said. 'We don't approve of magical duels as after dinner entertainment.'
'Did your bosun approve?' swiped back Sparkledingle between fits of laughter.
It was all over though, Gingols dispelled his magic and took his dessert to his cabin.
Later Sparkledingle played cards with a roguish fellow in his cabin called Yoram Pelloto.
The gnome reckoned that Yoram was counting cards and tried to distract him by talking about numbers and royalty, but in the end he was down ten gold anyway.
As far as I can tell, none of them did anything useful at all in aid of their mission on the first day of their journey!
DAY 13 (Day 2 of the Voyage of the Dementor)
Breakfast, as with all meals, was served in the dining room.
Griff talked to the Bosun about the events of last night.
'Drama at the dinner table we could do without,' she said. 'Least of our worries right now though.'
She would not be drawn on what her big worry was, and Griff pushed her no further.
Sparkledingle, far from having learned his lesson, was still as giddy as a child with a new toy, and was out on deck causing chaos.
He used Silent Image to put a big skull and crossbones on the mainsail.
'Pirates! Look! Pirates!' he squeaked. 'Oh? Are we the pirates?'
The Captain came down to the main deck and dragged the naughty wizard down to the galley.
'It was a joke!' pleaded Sparkledingle. 'Everyone is so serious!'
Cookie Cook, in the galley, was a gnome too, but having lived with humans for longer was more sensible.
'Now just you sit down there and help me cut these carrots,' she told him sternly and he did as he was told.
Once he had finished his breakfast, Griff went around and talked to any of the crew that were willing to chat, gathering information and making contacts, a wiser course of action than being banished to the kitchen.
At dinner, Fang talked to First mate Mull-Master, who might have been mistaken for a half-orc but who was of mixed gnomish-human-ogre parentage. He smelled of cheese. Baroness Partick was at the table and Fang tried to bring her into the conversation.
'Where are you travelling to?' he asked.
'None of your business,' was the reply.
Later in the evening they all played cards again with Yoram. It was a good-natured game, but they all lost a few gold to him. Fang noticed that the cards were marked.
Griff, wanting to change the game, said;
'Has anyone heard of the cinnamon challenge?'
The challenge, in case you don't know is to put a spoon of cinnamon powder in your mouth and if possible, swallow it.
Fang and Griff managed to do so, with a struggle, while Sparkledingle and Yoramcoughed and sputtered it all over the place. Luckily they were on deck and not in one of the cabins.
Later still, when Fang was asleep in his cabin, he was awoken by knocking at his porthole window. He went to look, but saw nothing but the darkness of night and the white tips of the waves.
He was not long asleep when the whole ship was woken by a very loud bang from the hold. Everyone went to their cabin doors, but after nothing else happened the Captain managed to shepherd everyone back to their rooms.
Not Sparkledingle, as you might imagine, who snuck all the way down to the hold and to the back where a large aft section was behind a locked door.
Feeling no fear (yet!) he knocked on the door. He thought he heard a voice from the other side of it. Lacking paper and pen he ripped off a shipping label from a nearby crate and using grease from between the timbers he wrote;
'I'm deaf. Who are you? How can I help you?'
I'm still not sure why Sparkledingle was pretending to be deaf, something to do with the bang perhaps, as after he had passed the note under the door he put his fingers in his ears.
Not long after this, a piece of paper was passed back and written in blood was;
'Open the door my friend'
Other notes followed:
'Who are you? Remember I'm deaf.'
'I am a poor prisoner. Please free me.'
'I'll be back.'
Sparkledingle tried to get back to the stairs he had come down, but the door was locked! He was trapped in the hold. A sudden, potent, feeling of dread and fear washed over him, emanating from the locked door in the stern.
In a panic he passed another note;
'Please set fire to this and pass back.'
I don't know what Sparkledingle was trying to do, but the reply - written urgently in fresh blood - was passed back,
'RELEASE US!'
Sparkledingle then went to the aft door and knocked on it as loudly as he could. He then cast Invisibility and hid behind some crates.
Once more the whole ship was roused, and as sailors bearing lanterns searched the hold, Sparkledingle tried to make his way back up to his cabin.
This he did, but he had to scare a guard out of the way first.
Trembling, he entered his cabin, locked the door and without undressing crawled under the blankets and shut his eyes as tightly as he could. And here he remained for the rest of the night.
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