Catching Up

Dearest Grun,

Well, I’m catching you up piecemeal. I’ll start with the events right after we left the angel’s chamber.

The angel had given us some ideas and a name - Urkel - who used to work for the evil lord, but could give us some help. He/she/it lives(?) north of the city and down in the catacombs. As we walked down through the room of bones, half the party felt compelled to dig around. Someone found a trap door, “Pockets” opened it, and Fafnir climbed right in. The rest of us followed, not wanting to get split up, even though this wasn’t the way to the north of the city!

We found ourselves in a passageway beneath the city. Several party members wanted to explore, so we decided to at least follow it northwards, hoping to have a safer trip than aboveground. We didn’t get far before we were surrounded by wraiths, which we fought off, but not before they weakened Drusilia pretty badly. We tried moving on, finding underground chambers and rats as we travelled the ancient sewers, but we were set upon by more wraiths and wights, and decided that walking in the sunlight and open city would be easier, after all.

We found that a lot of nasties had been following us, of course! And “Pockets” had been given the sword of Pelor, but he’s useless for fighting with it - ran for the back of the party as soon as anything he could damage showed up. *siGh* .. I guess Drusilia meant well but that was not the best decision. We all made it back to the ladder and spoke briefly with the angel, but he couldn’t help us any more than he already had. Aramil became really paranoid that we were being watched by invisible eyes, and I was embarrassed to be there anyway after wasting half the morning on a wild goose chase, so we finally left the tower and headed north - aboveground.

The city, of course, provided its own set of distractions. Fafnir watched avidly for any sign of old magic shops, and finally found one. I stayed on the street, watching for trouble, while people banged about and argued inside. Finally Fafnir came out with new jewelry, an earring that they couldn’t identify until Valon had the idea of reading the magic word on it. The earring became a set of thieves’ tools, so he handed it to “pockets,” thereby offending Fafnir. Better luck next time, I guess.

Drusilia was distracted next as we travelled, finding a broken-down house with a sun symbol over the door. The place was empty, except for a deep hole in the ground in the back room. It didn’t look like the entrance to the catacombs, so we made note of the place, but moved on. The next building we checked out was an old armory, full of skeletal bats - one of which paralyzed me as we were destroying them. I found out Aramil’s a bit dense - he just couldn’t understand why I’d stopped talking or moving, and finally put it down to me being angry and in a sulk. Halfies. At least “Pockets” had the thought to try to heal me with the sword! Finally I could move, and we started north again.

Unfortunately, we reached the edge of the city before any entrance to the catacombs was found. The mountains rose up with no sign of a cave, so we began to search along the outskirts. Night was falling and a storm was brewing, so we wanted to find the entrance, or shelter of some kind! Aramil had another paranoid spell, which also got us moving. (I’ve edited out a lot of the arguing we went through that day, Grun - it wasn’t one of our finer days for staying on track, as I’m sure you’ve guessed!). “Pockets” saw a half-roofed tavern and offered to buy us a round.. but the room was full of more evil creatures. They murmered and fascinated me, but Drusilia chased them off. Fafnir became a small dragon and checked upstairs, but we decided it wasn’t safe for long, and headed back into the storm.

At least we got to know our new members a little better, but I can’t say much for our efforts otherwise that day, Grun. I’ll fill you in on the rest later!

With love,
Ghelt

Follow the Leader???

Following the (of the now called “Angel”) advice to seek one called Urkel, we went to the bottom of the tower. And began looking through the bones, for bits and pieces before we traveled to the Urkel. To our surprise we found a trap door to the catacombs. We are lead by our newly chosen leader Valon. I voted for Aramil first, then when they didn’t like that idea, I voted for the elf.

Anyway back to the disaster, we are looking at the trap door and again it’s “Pockets can you check it out.” Maybe I should charge them 5 gold for every time I hear that. Well, playing along with this “let Pockets look for the trap” thing, I check the door and find it is trapped. Of course almost any fool could have done that. But I then disarm the trap, that is where the skill is. I then pull the pins from the hinges and move the trap door off to the side.

It is then that I take my proper place behind a couple of fighters. As the party then stood around arguing over what to do, the Gnome stomped ahead of us and went down first. I think he is either losing his mind or Aramil is rubbing off on him. I take this point to remind Aramil that the mage/fighter is mage first, fighter when all else fails. And as usual, he pretends to listen, pats me on the shoulder and says it will work.

Well off to our deaths we go, as we now walk through the catacombs looking for an Urkel, I can’t help but remember that the “Angel” said in the catacombs north of town, not go into the catacombs and work your way north. As this thought runs through my head the party is attacked. Although we get away the party decides to run and get attacked again. It is as we finally get back to the surface in the tower, that I realize that I feel different. Not weaker, but something has happened and I don’t like it.

So we travel back up to the “Angel” and get told tuff luck, go find the Urkel. It is at this point that I realized I haven’t seen our new leader make any decision or even get an ounce of respect by the rest of the party. And further more, the bard that he is, hasn’t chirped a single word of encouragement while we were in battle. I think the bard is scared of the new position. Maybe he will grow into it. If not, I think the gnome will claim it. And when he does, that may be the end of the bard.

As I am amused by the “Leadership,” Ghelt and Aramil said let’s go find the Urkel before it gets dark and head out. I join them, as we three head out bravely to fight the evil. Then we have to wait at the bottom for the “Leader” and the two who seem to pull his strings.

We begin traveling north. There is no creatures in sight. Aramil points out to me that he said we were being watched in the tower. I tell him he is just nervous and I will cover his back. So we travel with the emptiness of some of my pockets weighing me down. We find a few buildings of interest, and fight some big bat-like things, but what is really important is that Fafnir finds something in the remains of a magic shop. I then see our Leader make his first great decision. He asked to see the item and discovered (with my help) that it is an earring that turns into a very nice set of picks if you say the command word, and he gives it to me. I knew that Valon would make a good leader. Knew it from the start I did.

We eventually reach the end of town, having not found the Urkel. And the rain begins to come down. We travel a bit looking for some shelter when I spot a bar. Bringing the immortal words of Pokithes, “When all is lost, head to the closest bar and get drunk.” He was a fine man, I felt bad when the party had to kill him for stealing from our patron. I remember getting drunk that night and finding out that the patron had lied about Pokithes. I felt better when Aramil burnt Lord Kalen’s house down with him in it though. To this day Aramil says it was an accident.

Inside the bar we are accosted by three creatures singing a tune of evil. Drusilia and I were the only ones unaffected, before I could do much she raised her holy symbol and they ran. They wont be gone long I bet.