Session 17: Jagadis Down


 * Cornerio is healed but is still unconscious. We borrow a cart (Mogen gives her business card) and bring him to the temple. (Before that, Vikrit tries to follow the bear, but can’t get very far with the mist.)
 * We turn him over to the priest.
 * We go back to the inn. In the room we were keeping Cornerio in…
 * Generic-featured, human? Half-elf? Androgynous brown hair, brown tunic, green pants. Rifling through our stuff. (AARIKA) “I’m Rio!”
 * “Is Rio short for Cornerio?” R: “That’s a stupid fucking name.”
 * They say they “no longer want to spy on us”. They say they were working for Burhan (not directly the Stargazers). They thought he was his friend, but he betrayed them–someone (Jana?) gave them a compass to track us. They were ‘using them’.
 * They have Rio leave the room. We think they could be useful. As far as we know, there is no connection between Rio/Cornerio and this Rio.
 * Rio: “Jana can do some weird magic things.” Tork: “She does… had a bird.”
 * Rio seems to know some things they couldn’t know without actually having followed us (e.g. the wrestling match, about 2 weeks ago).
 * Vikrit asks how Rio knows Burhan. They knew some “rough and tumble” folk and became friends. They also nursed him back to health after Sarienne gutted him, and he tried to convert them to the Stargazer cause.
 * Vikrit asks what Rio is. They are evasive when asked if they’re human.
 * COMPASS: Rio has it. DIMENSIONAL KEY: On Vesun.
 * Rio goes to get their things from the woods.
 * The next day, we head to the Bosko farm. We pay the stableboy to return the cart to the Burren’s.
 * Time to Speak with Dead! We investigate further. Woman died from something stabbing her in the back–she was shoved under the bed after she died. The half-buried man outside was mauled.
 * Vesun casts the spell. “Who killed you?” “The boy killed me.” Vesun asks for distinguishing characteristics. “Beard, young, dark hair, Cyran.”
 * Suspicion: descendant of the murdered Cyrans.
 * We head back to the Burren farm to look into the bear tracks now that the mist is gone. We track them for miles away from the farm… they go north until we hit a clearing. There are horse remains lying in a stream, blood spatter, broken bow.
 * We find a body with feet sticking out from a bush–hunting boots. It’s Jagadis. (DUN DUN DUN) He has a deep gouge shoulder height in his back–it looks too neat to be from an animal. Mogen finds a +2 Keen Kukri and gives Vikrit back the +1 shortsword. Vikrit points out that the same poison was used here.
 * Vikrit also finds human &amp; bear tracks back toward town. The smell fades oddly even though the visual tracks are still there.
 * Vesun casts Speak with Dead on Jagadis. His secret arrangement with Athone was re: poaching. He doesn’t know who killed him.
 * They go back to following the tracks after about an hour. It’s dark, so it’s harder. The tracks just stop about an hour away from the city. In a flat plane.
 * We hear the sound of about 6 men in the distance and the squeaking of a cart. Mogen hears orcish over the hill coming toward us.
 * About 4 orcs in front, 1 behind, mule carrying cart with cage on it (with a human man inside). The one in the back hears Vesun clanking around.
 * Rio tries to go up the hill quietly. Vesun walks toward them. We take up flanking positions. The lead orc tells Vesun to drop his weapon and comes up to him.
 * We kill all the orcs but one, Vesun casts Hold Person and knocks him out. Sarienne frees the guy in the cage. He says he’s been looking for her daughter since she ran away a few.
 * His name is Hiram, looks like a farmer. He speaks a little Orcish. They said they were going to take him to “the minotaur’s horn” which is probably Blue Dragon’s Tusk. We wake up the orc and ask Hiram to translate for us. He won’t tell us where they were going.
 * For some reason, Tork makes incredibly loud trumpet sounds in the orc’s head. They were going home. “We are all servants of the Watcher.” We can’t get a description. Why are they attacking? “We have to cleanse the land.”
 * We head back into town and sleep.
 * Vesun tells Athone we know about his arrangement with Jagadis. He reacts poorly. Mogen hints at us killing the orcs.
 * We talk to the bartender, who is clearly lying about not seeing any Cyrans around. Vesun reassures him. 20 years ago, there was “an incident”–the dwarf at the brewery, the blacksmith, the trade post granny, constable, abbot were around at the time.
 * We go to the brewery. Trevor Bog (brewer), Burgan (assistant) are the dwarves there. He is suspicious that we want to steal his recipe.
 * He says the orc raids have gotten worse recently. Mogen asks about the Cyrans. He seems more than a little bit racist against them. He talks about the incident: refugees showed up 25 years ago, 3 people died (poison), so they strung up Cyrans. Half elf Barris (blacksmith), humans were with him murdering them. The Abbot and one of his acolytes were there but didn’t participate.
 * We go to the blacksmith. Mogen buys some horseshoes then asks about the Cyrans. He doesn’t believe the Cyrans poisoned the kids. Everyone he knows of was killed. He seems to feel very guilty about it, but doesn’t think it’s a curse. He says if anyone would’ve hidden a child, it’d have been Brother Aram.
 * We go to the temple. No one responds to the bell, but the door’s unlatched. Cornerio is sleeping. Parsons is awake but seems messed up. We asked what had happened to him, he describes the Cyran young man telling him he had information, then tricking him. Vikrit checks out his back wound, doesn’t look like any sign of the poison. We let him rest.
 * We cross the hall to the study, and descend into a pantry. There’s a trap door with a heavy table on top of it.
 * There’s a forechamber down there and a hallway. Chamber: carving, torchlights, wave pattern. These don’t match Dol’Arrah symbols (neither does the red dragon on clouds outside).
 * There is a pedestal with tablet on it-jade, swirling symbols. The hallway is very long and very dark. Eventually we get to an algae-covered room. There are brick-lined cells with rusting iron bars, jagged hole in the wall. Cells are empty except for Brother Aram, who’s been thrown there. There’s a quartered, crucified Warforged (pained expression on its face), the symbol of the stargazers is carved in its chest. Reminiscent of the Warforged we saw in Khyber, but that wasn’t dismembered.
 * Aram’s eyes have been gouged out. He says he tried to stop the town from hanging the Cyrans. They’re all buried underneath the tree. There was a boy he hid–Ruven. They let him go – the Abbot, him, and a couple others who knew. The Abbot made the kid watch as the hangings happened. He suddenly starts smashing his head into the wall–some kind of possession/domination.
 * Mogen looks at the warforged. Its materials are not modern construction–before end of the war, don’t know how far.
 * Vikrit looks into the hole in the wall. Something foul smelling - unnatural (wet and stinky) in the cavern beyond. Brother Aram’s breathing stopped–we don’t know what kills him. Mogen checks with magic Geiger counter - it goes nuts on Rio (not sure if it’s from them or compass) and it’s gonna overload.
 * We hear something chittering (Mogen thinks elemental language) and moving in the cavern. Sarienne shines a light into the cavern. There’s a single chair with manacles in it in the center. There’s something that looks like a human-fish monster charging at Vesun, and it tries to bite him. Three more scum charge at us.
 * Vikrit shoots the one that bit Vesun. Vesun casts shield of faith. One tries to charge Rio, but Vesun is there and holds up his mace - so it runs straight into it and knocks itself out. We kill all of them!