Sunday, Sarenith 29

Even as it sits there lifeless, it taunts. It beckons, it calls, and it teases. While some
can discuss it objectively, there are those for whom it represents equity and fairness. If
the universe has any balance to it at all, then this represents the counterpoint to poison
tails and sharp teeth.

Several are suspicious that it can either harm us outright, or be used to locate us later
for greater harm. Despite all that, Rigel continues to be obsessed with the fire opal left
glinting in the sand after the wyverns were killed.

“It’s worth about 200 gp,” she said, with a bit of anxiety in her voice. “I don’t see any
traps, either. It’s just sitting there and it’s foolish to leave it here for someone else.”
Kane confirms there doesn’t seem to be any traps. Would a magically trapped object be
detectable by a mundane? muses a mage.

“Yes!” says Rigel impatiently. As the others ponder, she reaches forward and picks up the
stone.

There’s a slight intake of breath.

She puts it back down and releases it, looking triumphantly at the others. She helps search
the rest of the cavern, but keeps one eye on the opal. Sabin pushed away the sand where the
opal was, slightly raised. Nothing happens. Rigel grins again.

It is rare to see Rigel so … engaged. Noteworthy, and so I take note.

It seems there’s nothing else in the cavern. But Rigel pauses, cups an ear, and points up.
There is a faint … singing, I guess it would be. Music of some sort. It’s simply
resonating off the ceiling, but its origin lies outside in the canyon somewhere.

Perhaps from the ledge above us.

Peering cautiously, we see we have harpies nearby. About 300 ft or so away they appear to
be luring something on the cliff with their song. I have heard they can do this; despite
their grotesque appearance, their song, when directed to you, can be very attractive.
Something actually does take a step off the cliff before hastily firing a lightning bolt as
it fell, striking a hovering harpy squarely.

Making a snap decision, Sabin casts featherfall on the being, breaks his fall, drags him
into our safe cave and secures him. It appears to be Elvish and carries no armor.

He is Rarallo, sent by the mayor of Roderick’s Cove to investigate the increase in giant
raids. He had arrived in the valley recently but had just woken to the harpy’s songs and
had been charmed into walking into their arms. We told him he’d nailed one with a lightning
bolt as he fell and that evoked a grim smile.

Moonday, Sarenith 30

A long, intense discussion has finally concluded, although I fear it may not go as planned.
Several have offered the opinion that the red dragon represents air support that we do not
have to want to worry about. I suggested we might contact it as equals and see if we can
make it friendly towards us by freeing it from whatever link bonds it to Mokmurian. Others
believe negotiation with an evil creature like a red dragon is doomed to fail, and would
rather remove the threat by killing it. It is, after all, a rather young dragon as dragons
go. Spell, wand, and scroll capabilities were carefully considered in view of the planned
assault. It was decided that fighting it in its own lair would be better than fighting it
after it has taken flight (and on that front I do agree.) But there was so much about the
approach we could now know, and we didn’t want to risk sending scouts since it was clear we
would need a contribution from everyone to defeat the red dragon. We couldn’t afford to
lose even a single party member if this were to work.

The spells we will use will be Fly, Airwalk, Mage Armor, Enlarge Person, Prot from fire,
resist energy (fire) and prot from evil. Several of these have durations measured in tens
of seconds so many of these will not be cast until we gain the ledge before the dragon’s
lair.

Later …

Would we be able to gain and keep the element of surprise? Once we found ourselves on the
ledge outside the dragon’s cave it was kind of moot. We were committed.

The entrance chamber was 50′ across, and about 50′ high. As we enter, we realize it empties
into an even larger chamber. Rigel hears the faint clinking of coins.

“This is a surprise,” says a voice from the back of the larger cavern. “I have not smelled
humans since Sandpoint.”

So much for the element of surprise. Perhaps we can still get him to underestimate us. He
may still think we have a white dragon at our disposal. Unless he can read my mind. Can
he? Would I know? What does that feel like?

I think I’m overthinking this.

Meanwhile, Takkad has taken up the conversational gauntlet. “We are some of his followers.”

The dragon expressed skepticism that Mokmurian would have human followers. “Really?”
remarked Takkad. “There are ogres and giants and dragons working together. Who do you think
helped give him the information on how to best attack Sandpoint?” Nolin added, grumbling,
“But we’re tired of taking his orders. Why do you continue to?”

“I do not take orders from him,” thundered the dragon. “We … share goals. We are peers.”

“Really?” I asked. “He seems to send you places where you can get hurt while he stays
safely behind.”

“Worse,” the dragon responded. “I was wounded by him and he refused to heal me. If I was
certain I could defeat him I might dissolve our alliance myself. Not that I could not if I
truly wanted to,” he hastily added.

As people brought up their lanterns, it was easy to see that 50′ back was a tremendous pile
of coins (many golden) and shiny expensive looking trinkets. The dragon’s hoard. Of course
the dragon lay squarely between us and the hoard.

Rigel stepped forward and says, “It is wrong that he leaves you wounded. I offer you my
healing potion.” The dragon looked at it thoughtfully, sniffed it, and finally drank it.
With a visible sigh, he seemed to relax a bit and even appeared slightly bored.

“So you are unhappy with Mokmurian. It seems we do at least share that,” mused the dragon.

With a conspiratorial tone, Takkad half whispered, “I think we’re going to try to kill him.
With him dead, the army he is raising will simply go home and this will all be over.”

“Don’t be too sure of that, little one,” condescended the dragon. “I get the sense that
many of them are hear having burned bridges to get here. They may have nowhere to return to,
and simply select a new leader.”

In a relatively friendly state now that we’d healed him some, the dragon offered some more
interesting tidbits.

• The harpies pretty much live in the Black Tower, and their command of the air would
  make an aerial assault very risky.

• Mokmurian’s magic is stronger than the dragon’s, “although in a fair fight I would
  win.”

• Looking at Lucretia’s head, the dragon remarked, “there’s only a few of those around”.

• “If it is true you have defeated the wyverns, then you may indeed be able to handle
  the insects as well. There is an abomination that looks like a spider there. If you
  can defeat it, the passages lead to under the tower.”

• These harpies are different from those at the Stairs. These have a deal with
  Mokmurian. They occupy the tower with MM’s permission.

The dragon appeared to have a ring on one talon, a silver armband, and an obsidian amulet.
My concern about defeating him seemed valid, but fortunately we seem to now have abandoned
that strategy.

“If Mokmurian were to .. fall from power … you would benefit from that would you not?”
asked Takkad. “Yes, I could see certain benefit from that,” admitted the dragon. “But I’m
not prepared to battle him again.”

“What if,” proposed Takkad, “your role in this was to do … nothing. Suppose he did not die
at your hand nor at your bidding but that you did not stop it from happening if it were to
happen?”

The dragon thought for a bit. “I tire of Mokmurian and his constant assertion that he is
superior. If I had but to do nothing to make that stop, I would find that quite
acceptable.”

One of the last things we learned before leaving the cavern was that the dragon’s name was
Longtooth. Or so he called himself; probably not his true name.

Tollday, Erastus 1

Based on the dragon’s assertions and information, we were ready to take on the insect cave.
This was a job that simply screamed for fireballs to cleanse the arena before our arrival.

Using my fly spell, hovered in front of the cave and cast a fireball. Awful smell. Flying
in, careful not to touch the ground, walls, or ceiling, I could see the back part of the
cave was still crawling with spiders but I could also what appeared to be a large exo-
skeleton of an ex-spider. Countless small spiders appeared to be running in and out of it.
This must be the abomination that was foretold.

The other team members had arrived via fly, or airwalk, or spider climb, and they now
entered cautiously.

Boom, another fireball, and advance a little farther. I could see now there were apparently
three of these abominations, although they’d been fried pretty good and Rarallo shot some
lightning off as well. One “spider” bit it went Sabin threw his axe at it. In close
quarters now, I had time for one more fireball before we’d all be too close together. Boom.

The second spider died at the hands of Rarallo’s scorching ray. The third one did manage to
attack Nolin by disgorging dozens of spiders upon him, but another scorching ray killed it
and with the “host” dead, the other spiders either died or ran off.

I’d lit a flaming sphere to help with Spider 3, but now I used it to burn webs so we could
advance safely. We found a collection of other people’s belongings; seems we were not the
first to come and play in the spider’s den. Our inventory was:

<

p style=”padding-left: 30px;”>[610] fire opal (from the wyverns)
[611] +1 long sword (giant sized)
[612] +2 halberd
[613] spell staff, already containing rusting grasp

While we were doing that, Kane found a secret door. It opened to a passage 3-5 feet wide.

As he told us later, Kane scouted the tunnels, which seemed to be natural tunnels. He was
doing okay up until he felt a sharp point in the back of his leg. As he turned around he
saw blood, and red caps with knives and mean expressions, but then they looked at him and
screamed DESNA! and ran.

When Kane returned and told us, he led us back to where this had happened and we went
searching. We finally found a larger cavern in which a single ratcatcher was sharpening a
single spear. He looked like a kobold, but we approached cautiously.

Good thing we did.

The ratcatcher was not dispatched easily; for a small creature he had incredible stamina.
Rigel eventually got the killing blow, and made a quick inspection of his belongings before
we turned to a doorway into a room in which there appeared to be a number of ogres. Rarallo
fired off his lightning even though he’d only seen a glimpse of him. The lightning seemed
to hit someone or something, but then a screech and the more vulgar version of “What the
heck?” was screamed in ogre. Hee hee.

But this initiated the battle of the ogres.