A Taint of Chaos

 1618. Sea Season. Truth. Wildday

Blanka from the Ernaldori - Colymar Tribe, played by Bram
Ranath, a Lhankor Mhy student, played by Ben 
Odd, who mov es in the shadows, played by Kristof
A'ido, a Grey Dog Cottar, played by Bart

After locating the whereabouts of the protection gang, our heroes returned to the Grey Dog Tula to resupply. They meet up with A'ido, a young Grey Dog Cottar, restless after participating in several Lismelder battles and looking for adventure, and decide to take him along, his military experience could come in handy.  Gunnar and Ulic sort of disappear all of a sudden, without notice, and the party are killing time most of the day waiting for them, until they decide to spend some of the money they have already made, and buy themselves riding animals.  A'ido thinks the best place for buying mounts is the Snorri stead, and they head east into the valley.  They have no notice of the duo of assassins on their trail though, and are completely unprepared when they notice movement in the bushes ahead.  A young female barbarian comes out of hiding, pretending to have been startled by the adventurers' arrival.  A'ido smells a rat, he has never seen the woman before, she is not wearing any Vinga or Babeester Gor marks, something you'd expect an armored female to have.  Odd immediately hides in the bushes, the other three advance cautiously, awaiting events.

Just when the party starts believing everything is all right, from his cover Odd notices another shape stealthily approaching the party from the rear.  Odd tries to ambush the new assailant, but gets noticed, and the female immediately drops her 'innocent' guise and befuddles A'ido, jumps forward, drives her spear into Blanka's eye, pulls back, and charges A'ido, all in one swift movement.  She is ready to strike the Grey Dog warrior before Blanka hits the ground, bleeding to death.  Odd, rather than alarming the party, decides to go for cover again, leaving the party unaware of the threat approaching.  The second attacker sneaks up to Ranath, and tries to strangle him with his Garotte.  His garotte grabs Ranaths Staff as well though, and this buys Ranath a few seconds of breathing time, although he is clearly in big trouble.  Meanwhile A'ido is reawakened by the female's ferocious attack, and he manages to parry her charge.  Odd comes out of hiding, sneaks up behind the assassin strangling Ranath, and stabs at him.  The assassin has to make a choice: letting go of the garotte or being completely open to Odd's surprise attack.  Split second, he decides to evade, and lets go.  He fails to remain standing, and Odd follows up closely.  The fight now quickly turns, and both assailants are captured.  After some brutal examination and Ranath's mind reading both villains are given a dose of barbarian justice.

fter some rather sloppy looting, the party heads for the Snorri's, a good 2 miles down the river, and meets Galan Snorri, the horse master of the Stead.  They purchase several horses, including the one warhorse available.  Blanka and Odd also buy a War hound, but the choice is not great, and they end up with two rather ugly mongrels, the one even more weakly than the other, and both are too fat.  But they make a lot of noise and smell funny, and as such they fit their masters well.  With their new steeds, our heroes return to the Tula, only to find it in some degree of excitation:  A goat with two heads has been born, and people are of two minds: either this is an omen of a good year for the herds, or it is some kind of evil enchantment, another ploy of chaos, possibly orchestrated by the Lunar oppressor, in their ongoing attempt to put the Lismelder, the last fount of resistance in Sartar, down.  
A  divination, strongly supported by our heroes, and especially Blanka and Odd, reveals evil wrongdoings in the west.  The two-headed goat is clearly a sign of an evil ploy by chaos.  A'ido quickly learns the sense chaos spell, and the party rides out in pursuit of the chaotic aberration.  Near the bridge to Lawspeaker Hill they notice an old crone, on her knees, digging in the sand.  They come closer to see more clearly what the old witch is conjuring, and see her working with the innards of a dead animal.  A'ido casts the sense chaos, and the chaotic presence in the woods is clear, so the party advances.  This alerts the old crone, who turns around, and begins incantating her spirit song.  A'ido is attacked by a malignant spirit, and Odd kills the crone with a poisonous dart.  Out of the woods appear three broos, one with a lionesque aspect, one with stag-like horns, and one looking like a boar.  Only seconds later another, faster shape emerges: a scorpion man, who charges straight ahead.  The scorpion man, being faster than the broos, charges Blanka's horse, dealing some serious damage.  Blanka manages to escape, and the scorpion man turns on Odd.  Odd casts a dark wall, and manages to deviate the scorpion man onto Ranath, as well as slowing down the lion broo.  Brave Ranath has to stand and face the scorpion mans fierce attack for several rounds before retreating to his horse.  Meanwhile, the two wardogs are keeping the pig broo busy, allowing the party to shoot it.  The scorpion man turns out to have very strong armor, probably a chaotic feature, and the adventurers lose courage and retreat to Grey Dog Tula.

Stalking the stalkers

1618. Sea Season. Truth. Wildday


Brian Boru, a drifter without tribe, played by David
Xaldin from the Orlmarth - Colymar Tribe, played by Anthonius
Ragnar from the Orlmarth - Colymar Tribe, played by Maximus
Hjotra from the Hiording - Colymar Tribe, played by Dominique
Hund, a Humakt initiate, played by Ben

The stone bridge near Jonstown

e find our adventurers in the middle of a fight with a trio of vicious Tusk Riders.  Xaldin, who found out his friends left for Snakepipe Hollow, quickly realized the peril they were getting themselves into, and decided to follow their trail, only to run into the Tusk riders at the exact moment they ambush the party's camp.  He arrives just in time to see how his clanfellow Ragnar is grievously wounded and loses his right arm by a charge from one of the tuskers, and does not hesitate.  By now the other adventurers have realized how bad things are: they might not live through this one.  The party focused their attention on the riders, but the threat comes from the tuskers, huge trained warboars with an attitude, and they deal some fearsome damage.  At the same instant Ragnar loses his second arm, and although he bravely keeps standing, all that remains there for him to do is to bleed to death quickly.  Hund casts his Humakti Truesword spell.  Xaldin enters the fray.  Between the two of them there is some serious damage potential, and slowly the fight turns, although it takes more divine magic from Hund to heal a crushed arm.  Brian tries a bit of acrobatics and jumps on one of the boar's backs.  Riding the bloody animal is another matter and he is thrown off seconds after, but the party prevails just in time to staunch poor Ragnar's wounds.  They loot the beastly bandits and realize the Dangerford wilds may just be a bit too dangerous for them at this stage.  They need decent armor, better spells, and more experience to survive the trip to Snakepipe Hollow.  They then return to Jonstown.

rian gets noticed by an Eurmal trickster, and decides to join the cult.  He fails the first spitting contest, but the second time around he gets accepted as an acrobat.  But Ragnar is still running around without any armor to speak off, and since a set of lamellar armor should be just about ready in Old Man Village, they decide to return to their stead and pick up the promised armor.  They take the old road to Runegate, and run into a Lunar Patrol at the river crossing.  The Lunars squeeze some good money out of our adventurers, but when the guards continue their travel, the party has a sudden change of heart.  From nearby, they attack the Lunar guard party in the back, and a fierce fight develops.  Xaldin immediately charges the Lunar sorcerer and prevents her from doing her magic, while Hund charges the guard commander, who turns out to be a Sun God Rune Lord.  Bad news!  The other party members take care of the two guards.

he Rune Lord immediately summons a salamander, which attacks our heroes, but Hund puts a lot of pressure on him, and manages to cut off his arm.  It looks as if the fight is turning to their advantage, but the Rune Lord miraculously heals completely, and presses home  another attack.  The party notice the allied spirit hawk in a tree nearby, and they feel the fear.  Is this the one fight too many?  Xaldin remains occupied with the sorcerer, unable to finish her off, but at least disallowing her to weave her spells.  Hund has a Bladesharp from the matrix he gathered from the Tusk Riders, and has cast his Truesword successfully, and with a superb blow he beheads the Rune Lord, making the salamander disappear.  The allied spirit tries a divine intervention, but fails, and the Rune Lord dies.  The sorcerer sees the fight is lost, and tries to gate out of the fight using a divine enlightenment, but the party use their hero powers to refuse the sorcerer exit, and finally they succeed.  Against all of the party, the sorcerer is killed in an instant.  The party is ecstatic and loot all the valuables, including a scroll for learning Auld Wyrm, a scroll for learning Mindspeech II, and four bronze runic coins with Lunar Runes on them.  A magical choker worn by the sorceress and a similar magical hairband, both adorned with a Lunar Moon Rune are looted as well.  The bronze armor makes some good money, and the party happily continues their travel to the Orlamrth Lands.  What will the empire's reaction be?  Will our heroes flaunt their new trinkets and get caught?  We can only wonder!