Wandering Wolves: Pursuit of the All-Seeing Eye (1)

Sypheros 8 - Sypheros 10, YK 999

Enough circumstantial evidence had been gathered to charge Tyrant One with the attempted regicide of King Boranel, Lord Kor and the successful murder of Viorr Maelak. As a result, The King's Citadel raided the Tyrants and rounded up the council, all of whom disguised themselves as Tyrant One. House Deneith blademarks under the command of Erich d'Deneith were hired to guard the Tyrant Council while the King's Citadel, with help from Medani sentry Gaina d'Medani, interrogated them one by one. When the count came, they were short one changeling, and they found Erich's body alongside that of the Erich d'Deneith. Vadis had replaced him, used his identity to take a House Orien teleport circle to Rhukaan Draal, where House Deneith has an enclave and, more importantly, Brelish law will have a difficult time finding him.

Medani, Deneith and the King's Dark Lanterns all needed agents to go and find Vadis, whom they have confirmed as Tyrant One. The Wandering Wolves, minus Brand (who is in The Shadow Marches) and Pel (who told the Wolves he had a different meeting), were summoned once again to Viorr, who hired them under the auspices of House Deneith, House Medani and The Crown of Breland to bring in Vadis, who had committed numerous crimes against all three. He gave them what information he had, offered an operating budget of 4,000 gold, and told them that Gaina d'Medani would meet them at the Drunken Dragon to brief them further.

He never let on that he was in fact Pel, trying out his new identity with his closest friends to see if they could penetrate it. Even Lysander was fooled.

Gaina d'Medani met the Wolves, now joined by Pel, at the Drunken Dragon. She told them that House Medani suspected that the reason Vadis fled to Darguun, in addition to it making perfect sense for a Deneith heir to go there, was that they have an agent in the area. Nock, an agent of House Medani, has been operating in Darguun for some time, and Medani believes she can identify Vadis.

The reasons for these are two-fold: One, she's one of Medani's best operatives. Two, she's Pel's mother. It was during one of her earliest assignments that she met Vadis, then a young up-and-comer in the Tyrants, and she used him as her informant. Or so she thought. In fact, Vadis was using her to eliminate rivals and smooth his way into power. He seduced her before she could see this, and the two of them had a torrid, short-lived and ill-considered romantic relationship that resulted in Nock becoming pregnant. She gave up her child to stay with the House.

Medani believes that Vadis intends to kill Nock while he is there, and then disappear into a safe haven. They can't send a message to Nock, because she is undercover in a slaving/kidnapping ring that has been kidnapping dragonmarked heirs from Khorvaire and Xen'drik and selling them into slavery or ransoming them back to their house.

Gaina d'Medani gave the Wolves a dossier on the slavers that Nock was infiltrating. Their boss is called "The Eel." They trade heavily in "exotics" like dragonmarked individuals, shifters, goliaths, changelings, etc. They use local hobgoblin muscle, but the boss and his enforcer come from "somewhere else." Rumor has it they have dragonmarked operatives amongst their crew. They're mobile, but they have a base of operations in the jungle outside of Wyvernskull, the port city that gives Darguun access to the Thunder Sea.

After a brief shopping trip at The Dragon's Hoard to buy a Deep Pocket Cloak for Lysander, the Wolves took the teleport circle provided by Viorr to Rhukaan Draal. There, they wasted no time in tracking down Failin d'Orien and hiring his land cart again, just as they had on their first adventure outside of Sharn. They bartered him to a reasonable 130 gold to drive them to Wyvernskull and wait for two days.

It took two days to get to Wyvernskull, the hub of slavery in Darguun. Following information from the Medani dossier, the Wolves went to a goblin bar called the Ugly Bastard, bypassing the gimpy hobgoblin prostitute outside to step into the bar. It was filled with goblins who got very nervous when "big 'uns" like the Wolves stepped in, and watching Luggoth down their foul-smelling green drinks didn't do anything to make them feel welcoming.

They made their way to Canker, a goblin wearing a colorful ascot, whom they had heard was a contact for slavers in the area. He offered up some information about the Eel, nothing too specific, but a general direction to their camp in the Darguun rainforest. He asked 200 gold for this service, but was quickly bargained down to "5 gold and you get to keep your head" by William, Pel and Lysander.

He sent them to meet his scout, a one-eyed goblin with an empty eye-socket filled with pus (The Wolves appropriately, if not affectionately, named him "Pus One-Eye"). They gave One-Eye a piece of parchment marked with Canker's scrawl, and he told them that he had seen hobgoblins and slaves headed off into the rainforest and pointed out the direction. It was relatively easy for Pel to find the trail, and just as easy for Luggoth to track it.

At mid-day, tracking through the jungle, the group came upon an Ettin Spirit-Talker and two Hill Giants who had a pair of frightened shifter teens on a spit over an as-yet unlit campfire. They were arguing about who was going to get the largest portions when Luggoth charged out of the woods.

William moved up, stepped into his reign of steel stance, and kept the Hill Giants and Ettin as focused on him as he could. He was doing massive damage to the beasts with his axe Terminus, and then Luggoth joined in as well. Pel moved in to focus on the Ettin along with Lysander, and before long they had slain it, with Pel delivering the killing blow.

The other two Hill Giants, one bloodied and the other one mostly unwounded, tried to make a run for it, but Luggoth put on a burst of speed to chase them down, killing one of them immediately and then, with the help of the rest of the Wolves, putting the other one down as well.

The Wolves cut down the teens, who identified themselves as Savenn and Reryar, and told them that they had escaped from a slaver camp. They also gave them some information about what they had seen, including that the camp had about two dozen captives, and that it was mostly hobgoblins, but there was an umber hulk and a bearded human there as well.

Savenn and Reryar were unwilling to return to the camp, even under the protection of the Wolves, so William gave them his bow and a dagger, and then gave them Canker's mark and instructions to go to Pus One-Eye and tell him that Canker wanted them hidden until he came for them.

It took two hours for the Wolves to reach the camp. When they got there, they saw that it was surrounded by wooden walls and well-guarded, with the hobgoblins sending out patrols of five men at a time and circling the camp, and another five patrolling inside. They didn't see any sign of the Eel himself, but they guessed, from what they knew of Umber Hulks, that he might be a mind flayer.

With night falling soon, they continued to plan, trying to decide when the best time would be to launch their attack, and how exactly to do it.