Eberron Adventure Journal: Knight of the Silver Flame

Sypheros 2 - Sypheros 8, YK 998

With Lucan defeated, the Wolves faced the difficulty of how to transport him. In the short term, they had to figure out a way to get him outside without having him evaporate in the sun. In the long term, they needed transportation to the next town.

They decided to wait until night to emerge from the ziggurat, and grabbed some of the moldy tapestries from the Otyugh's room to wrap up Lucan's body. After a night of rest, they headed back up to the entry room to check on Grilsha and Arenydee. Arenydee would not reveal her employer, but did say she had worked with and against Lucan in the past, and that she had been engaged to locate and capture the Soul Blade. She also said that she realized she was outmatched, and she was grateful for being saved from a vampire's domination, and she would not try to take the blade or Lucan from the Wolves if they would take her with them to the next city and part ways.

Grilsha revealed that she had not been dominated, and expressed that loyalty to her brother, even as a vampire, had been what drove her to stay with him. She didn't know what he was planning, but he had told her he needed to get to Karrnath, and she had agreed to help him. She was not pleased that her brother was being turned back over to the King's Dark Lanterns, but she was glad he hadn't been destroyed, and agreed not to make any more trouble. This would be easy for her, as the Wolves decided to keep her bound and gagged to prevent any spellcasting.

When they emerged from the ziggurat into the night, the Wolves found a House Orien landcart waiting for them. The driver admitted that he wasn't sure they would ever see them emerge, but that he had been ordered to wait for them for a reasonable amount of time.

The 13 hour trip to Aruldusk passed uneventfully, and the Wolves, along with Grilsha, Arenydee and the body of Lucan, were taken to an office of House Orien there. Arinya, the head of household for the area, offered them food and drink and expressed his regrets about the trouble they suffered on the lightning rail. He offered them one way lightning rail passage to anywhere in Khorvaire, and to put them up at an inn in town for a few days if they'd like. The Wolves accepted both.

Arenydee took her passage as a trip back to Sharn, and told Lysander to get in touch with her sometime by checking for messages at the Barmin Tower Sivis message station. The Wolves, along with Grilsha and Lucan, went to The Silver Chain Inn, a House Ghallanda establishment. Kanatash, Tock and Whitehearth waited in the room to guard Lucan and Grilsha while Pel, Brand and Lysander went out into Aruldusk to explore and shop.

Pel did some research in their libraries on vampires and found rumors of a place in Xen'drik that could be used to restore even the undead to life. The information was extremely sketchy, but he believed it could point the way to more information at the Morgrave Library in Sharn. Lysander, meanwhile, sought out a magic shop so that the Wolves could re-equip.

Brand went to the Chapel of the Silver Flame in the area to get the life force that Lucan had drained from him restored. He met Draci Sarhain, the priestess of Aruldusk, and she told him that she couldn't help him, but that the Bishop, Ossul Hetrion, was in town and he could. She had a young acolyte show Brand around the church while the bishop finished visiting with some parishioners.

Bishop Hetrion met with Brand and told him that ordinarily, he wouldn't use the powers of the Silver Flame to heal someone not of the faith, but he believed that the Silver Flame had directed Brand and his friends here. They had successfully battled a vampire, exactly the kind of creature of evil that the church preached against, and perhaps they could help with a matter that was plaguing the local chapel. Brand agreed, and Hetrion called upon the powers of his faith to restore Brand's life force.

With Brand healed, Bishop Hetrion told him what he would like the Wolves to do. A band of marauding shifters had been harassing the chapel and its parishioners, and a paladin from the church named Verodin Atrelioth had traveled up to the Burnt Wood to deal with them. That had been several days ago, and no one had seen him since. The Bishop asked if he could send a young man named Drego, the same one who had taken Verodin up to the Burnt Wood, with the party and maybe they could find a trail, track and recover the paladin.

Brand agreed, and after the adventurers bought some magic items and scrolls, they were ready to go. They bought a coffin to store Lucan in and secured him in a House Orien locker, and they left Grilsha in the care of Orien security as well. The House arranged for them to have some magebred horses to take them to the Burnt Wood, and Drego lead them to the place he had last seen Verodin.

Brand was unable to pick up a trail for Verodin, but he did find tracks indicating about a half-dozen shifters. He lead the Wolves down the trail until they found a clearing. Unfortunately, the clearing was not full of shifters. It was a trap, a set of tracks skillfully mislaid to lead the adventurers to a pack of three owlbears.

Whitehearth rushed in and attacked, nipping at the heels of an owlbear that viciously slashed him and left him dying as a result. Kanatash lifted himself in the air as Tock cast Cat's Grace on Brand's armor, who moved in past the charging owlbears, stabbing one with his rapier as he tried to get to the fallen Whitehearth. Pel cast Bless and Lysander began singing.

Kanatash unleashed a fiery energy missile on the two lead owlbears, as Tock swung his armblade at the other owlbear, who dodged the attack while trying to claw Tock in return. One of the owlbears bit Brand, who followed through with a strike of his shortsword and rapier in response, which Lysander followed up with a longsword slash. Pel moved through the woods quickly and quietly to reach Whitehearth's side and prepare to cast healing magic on him.

Pel noticed that Whitehearth's bleeding had stopped on its own, and so he moved in and landed a vicious scimitar blow against one of the owlbears. Kanatash blasted another fire missile that killed one of the owlbears and wounded the others, causing them to attempt to flee. Brand killed one with a stab of his rapier, and Lysander quickly whipped out his bow and killed the other with an arrow through its head.

As the combat ended, the Wolves had the sensation that they were not alone. They looked around and saw what looked like thirty different pairs of eyes. A loud, booming voice told them to put down their weapons and they wouldn't be harmed. Reluctant to actually disarm but seeing the numbers up against them, the Wolves sheathed their weapons.

From out of one of the trees, a tall, muscular shifter stepped forward and introduced himself as Luggoth. He said that the paladin had come into the woods and had been taken, and that the shifters had only been attacking the chapel because they had been blackmailed into it by a Cult of the Dragon Below.

One of the shifters in the woods stepped too far out and revealed himself, and the Wolves could see that it was just a child. The others stepped out at Luggoth's call, and the Wolves could see that they were all children. Luggoth was the only adult. He explained that he had been passing through the woods and had found the children and taken them under his protection. Their parents had been taken by the Cult, and they had sent the children to harass the villagers to draw the paladin into the woods. Luggoth had seen a Dolgaunt attack and capture the paladin, and knew where he had been taken.

Luggoth agreed to help them recover the paladin, in large part because it would help smooth relations between the shifters and Silver Flame but also because it would mean he could help rescue the shifter adults. However, he needed someone to stay with the children and protect them. The Wolves were reluctant to leave one of their own, but Tock agreed to stay. He handed the Heward's Handy Haversack over to Pel.

Luggoth lead them to a clearing, the last place he had seen the Dolgaunt. Brand tracked the Dolgaunt to a series of bushes, and beneath that he found a divine rune. Kanatash attemped to dispel it, but the magic was too powerful to be suppressed. Pel called upon the Traveler for help, and, bolstered by Lysander's songs, succeeded in bypassing the rune trap, revealing a 10-foot wide passage descending sharply down.

The passage was completely dark, with no light of any kind, so Luggoth kept a sunrod out to illuminate the area. As they walked, the Wolves could hear a distant screaming sound. The passage soon levelled out and widened, and the Wolves found themselves face to face with a fiendish girallon. Luggoth immediately fired an arrow that missed the charging Girallon, who followed up with a punch to Luggoth's chest. Brand, guarded by Pel's Protection from Evil spell, tumbled past a clumsy attack by the girallon and sunk his rapier deep into the creature's side. Lysander moved in and cut one of the creature's four arms with his longsword, and Kanatash fired a ray of cold from his dorje that went wide of the mark.

Luggoth pulled out his greatsword and landed a solid blow on the girallon, slashing it from shoulder to waist and spilling forth gouts of black blood. The enraged girallon swung wildly, hitting Pel and biting Luggoth, but in flailing, it opened itself to a vicious scimitar strike from Pel and a rapier stab in the throat from Brand. It gurgled and bled, but didn't die, swinging another fist and connecting with Lysander and resisting Kanatash's mind thrust attack. Luggoth finished off the dying beast by chopping across its midsection with his greatsword.

After using the wand and some potions to heal up, the Wolves moved forward into another area, one full of chambes that had cloth and wood, clearly meant as living quarters. The screams were getting louder now, a cacophny of unearthly voices echoing from every wall and making hearing difficult. Brand spotted something moving in the shadows, and they were attacked by a pack of chokers.

The chokers swung their elongated arms, whipping at Kanatash but failing to grab him. Kanatash stepped back and fired an energy missile of fire that killed one choker and severely wounded another. The chokers responded by grabbing Lysander and Pel, and dodging further attacks from the rest of the Wolves.

Kanatash launched another energy missile, this time a burst of cold, killing all but one of the chokers, which fled back into the darkened hallways. Lysander healed himself and Pel and then the Wolves headed down the corridor to pursue the chokers. They found them there, chittering in a language they didn't understand but clearly asking for mercy. Kanatash pointed at them and indicated for them to lay on the ground, and they did, and the Wolves searched all the rooms except the one the chokers were actually in, finding nothing but cloth and wood.

Delving further into the cavern, they found a room that was clearly used for body disposal. Bones and corpses filled the room, and the stench of death hung heavy in the air. An open bag, showing a glint of platinum, sat atop one of the more recent corpses. Fearing a trap, Lysander used his mage hand to bring the platinum over. Nothing stirred in the room, but the Wolves did not press their luck, leaving the room behind to see what was in the room next door.

This room, also carved out of stone, was a prison with metal gates. Inside, the Wolves saw the shifters they had been seeking, seven men and three women, all beaten near to death, hanging limply from chains affixing their arms to stone pillars. Pel searched for traps on the door, but the Wolves then decided not to open it yet, leaving the captives in their relatively safe surroundings until they had dealt with whatever was causing the screaming.

The Wolves soon found the source of the screaming. A dozen or so dolgrims were carving out the rock wall with picks as the dolgaunt watched from atop a 5-foot tall, 100 foot wide altar carved of stone. In the center of the stone, barely visible in the light of the sunrod, was the paladin, stripped to the waist with an obsidian unholy symbol jammed deep into his shoulder. Shadows spun all around him, clearly causing the torment and pain that was causing him to scream.

Pel immediately fired his crossbow, and the dolgaunt deflected it, revealing his monk training. Luggoth revealed his own abilities, shifting into his animal form and leaping to the top of the altar and swinging his greatsword into the dolgaunt's hollowed chest, causing it to stagger backward, bleeding heavily.

The dolgrims responded, picking up crossbows and firing at their adversaries. The shower of bolts mostly missed, but one hit Luggoth and another the dolgaunt. Lysander put one of the dolgrims to sleep with his spell, then cast mirror image on himself and began singing to inspire his comrades.

Kanatash summoned a force screen to protect himself as the dolgaunt attacked Luggoth with his tentacles, cutting into his flesh but failing to drain his vitality. Pel, moving up to the altar himself, activated a sunrod from the Haversack and revealed another adversary, a cleric of the Dragon Below who had been moving in from the back of the altar. As Luggoth swung another punishing sword blow into the dolgaunt, the cleric cast a darkness spell that enveloped all three of them.

Brand and Whitehearth engaged the dolgrims in battle as Pel moved up to the paladin to see if he could help. Luggoth swung blindly at the dolgaunt, but his bestial agility protected him even in the darkness against the dolgaunt's attacks. Before the cleric could do anything more, Kanatash warped time around him, sending him about 30 seconds into the future.

Pel pulled the everbright lantern from the Haversack, canceling the darkness. The Dolgrims responded by firing crossbows at him, landing a couple of hits. The cleric shook off the effect of Kanatash's time hop and tried to curse Pel, who resisted the attack as Kanatash launched an energy missile of cold at all of the adversaries, killing the dolgaunt and severely wounding the cleric.

Lysander used his dragonmark to create an image of a wall of fire, holding off dolgrim reinforcements, as Pel moved toward the cleric and slashed him with his scimitar. Brand used his dragonmark to teleport next to the cleric as Lysander moved in, and the two of them finished him off.

Kanatash then used his telekinetic powers to pull the unholy symbol free of the paladin's shoulder, ending the spell. The paladin was grateful, and the Wolves made sure he knew that the shifters were partially responsible for rescuing him. The Wolves escorted Verodin back to Aruldusk. After a brief rest, they decided to take their lightning rail trip back to Sharn. Luggoth, nomadic by nature and intrigued by the "wolf" theme of the adventurers that seemed so ideally suited to his own gifts, asked to join them.

The lightning rail trip back to Sharn was uneventful, taking about 5 days and landing the Wolves back in Sharn on 8 Sypheros. They immediately went to see Viorr, who was pleased with their efforts and who took Grilsha, Lucan and the Soul Blade into custody. He gave the Wolves their reward, 2,500 gp each minus the cost of the lightning rail travel they had purchased, and expressed his sympathies on the loss of William d'Deneith. He offered to pick up the cost of the House Tharask inquisitives searching for William's body as an additional thanks for a job well done.

XP: 3850