Forebodings and Revelations, 96-98

 
1996 to 1997

 
Introduction : Incident at the Merchants House

A gem is stolen, we must recover it. The gem was fake anyway (but a good fake), but we try to make a fake copy of that and hand it back. We're sussed.

 
Belltath’s Castle (8 Weeks)

Hired to take some beer to the dodgiest place in the country (Medham), Cheers Meledd. Nearby to Medham is the local undead infested tomb, with matching castle. We go in kill things, come out. Whitefight stole an important gem here, which used to beong to the elves. Lose lots of party members (leaving one there to die) and give everything (including a magical dagger, not the gem) to the Palladins of Issiad. We don't realise it, but they are disguised clerics of Mallus. We get the necromantic ring at some point.

 
The Monastery (8 Weeks)

Having done such a good job, we're hired again to deliver beer to monastary of chosen light, plus Yimuradict; who is kidnapped upon delivery. We try to track him down, following goblins who stole him. Find a lair in a cave and track to an underground river, where a viking nar is resting, holding Yimuradict captive. THe goblins turn out to be well trained. The nar is crewed by Barbarians of the White Forest, who beat up the party and so we flee. At this point, Corwin falls in love with Allaveer. Yimuradict remains their hostage. Also in the cave is the delightful, if anti-social, Rumag. This naga lords it over us 'cos we're only first level and suggests to Whiteflight that he'll look after my spellbooks whilst I go fetch the Bone ring from my companions. Or he'll kill me. Seems a fair deal to me, but when I try to explain it to the others they don't agree. The bone ring is then stolen by the Grey Claw - female elven mage/thieves. So we go back and kill the naga. Silanus the mage blows up my spellbook, which the naga had kindly trapped for me. So thenthe priest Zelda finds another spellbook. Ignoring the loud, and frankly unnecessary warnings, he opens this too, only to be blown up, this time burning the beautiful Whiteflight and scaring him. The priest somehow dies on his way out of the cave - Whitefight and Skarra drop him into a chasm.

 
Belltath’s Castle & Into Ravenloft (4 Weeks)

We're invited back for dinner! Wahay! Until the spirit of a hag (from the Grinyrach marsh) possesses Sir Vyurran,one of the dinner guests. He dies, so does Mileesha (a mage), and the party volunteer (!!! - NEVER volunteer again, EVER!!!) to go through the nasty portal where undead are pouring out, and suss what's happening. In we go, meet a nice Vampire chappy (who requests the memory of the mountain -don't they all want something?), Into

 
The House of Mazes (5 Weeks)

Yes, getting out was never going to be easy. We end up in a place where sane people are turned to stone. Due to a bureaucratic error, Whiteflight survives to rescue the party, befriending Rorke, a Wemic, on the way. We enter a maze, find 'Why', Kael's sword, find Kae'Esh, the domain Lord. We leave, not killing him, but losing a priest (fair deal).

 
Heronguard (3 Weeks)

There's 'another evil vampire' theme running in this plot too - why did none of us spot this (too many years playing with unimaginative DM's dulls your paranoia). Okay 'this time' it's a ravenloft style vampire taking his realm to another dimension 'cos he's so evil, and his kid sister, who moonlights as a ghost in the old abandoned church, asks us for help in prodding his buttocks. We go one step further and kick his ass. On the way a ring of pass without trace is acquired plus some nice chappies from Heronguard, like the guard captain, blacksmith (priest of Orath) and his wife. The MIB's running the town conform to all baddy fashion rules and kick in the locals periodically looking menacingly dressed like ninja wannabes. Rorke is killed by them trying to rescue Whiteflight from a building he isn't in. Such is life.

 
Belltath’s Castle & Out of Ravenloft

The party return to the castle with the Memory of the Mountain, and fight the vampire. Silanus dumps all the cash from his bag of holding to save a fellow party member. Hurrah we make it out. And yay there was much rejoicing.

 
The Island of Kilios (4 Weeks)

Cool - it had a name! This is the one I call the jungle isle, with Ligren the friendly, but helplessly imprisoned fairy dragon Grand (almost) druid, who directs us to the isle of much-kicking-in-of-nasy-green-dragons, which probably isn't its real name either. But we met Alwin, the Green Lady's son. We killed him, lots of pregnant women, stomped on some eggs, and killed nine dragons. Sadly there was another and badly injured everyone in the party, except Whiteflight. Whiteflight agreed to kill Lord Quintith if it'd let him go. It was possessed by the Green Lady at the time and Whiteflight was happy to say anything that would get him out alive. It worked - you got healed/resurrected and we buggered off - Whiteflight through a teleport so the Wizards guild could question him about stolen objects, and the rest through plants and the plane of Allivea.

 
The Tournament at Vern (2 Weeks)

Whiteflight gets followers and the party get noticed big-style as we dress up and hit people in the name of entertainment. Kael is sponsored (sort-of) by Duchess Jekya and Corwin kicks butt elsewhere on the field, and nearly wins the archery. Sillanus finds out that the magic gem he grabbed in Ravenloft contains a huge dragon. The prize, a magical shield, is stolen by some nasty people. We're asked to get it back so we track down said thieves and retrieve the shiled. Then we're asked to find them again and exact retribution - this time for money (and a cure to the nasty curses we picked up in the nether worlds - Whiteflight smells of undead and Corwin and Skarra are bloodthirsty vampires - nearly) :o) Cool - who could refuse. Off we trot to find that they were hired by some priests of Mallus - and thus we must investigate..

 
The Abbey of Mallus (3 Weeks)

Fortunately we hear that at this time of year the Gon'wrath moors are delightful, and no-one has reported seeing dragons for quite some time. In fact most people who cross the marsh don't. That is they never make it across and so the dragons may have taken them all on holiday - you just never know. Thus we are fearless when we seek out the alleged Temple of Mallus somewhere on the Gon'wrath Moors and hire a most competent, if alcoholic guide to show us where it is. He shows us a shed. Or at least something fairly unconvincing on the Temple stakes. We go in and politely question the half-ogre priest who tells us he just sacrifices sheep and grows vegetables. All very nice. So we leave. Only joking we butcher him mercilessly and find the secret tunnel down to the real temple of Mallus, which looks more like a cathedral and is much more satisfying. We fight through the gnomish skeleton guards. Kill some priests and leave. Well most of us do. Whiteflight is killed stealing back the bone ring - and you had your chance then, remember that - but is kindly reincarnated as a dwarf by Silanus. Cheers!

 
1997 to 1998

 
To Catch a Thief (6 Weeks)

Melled was robbed by some guards he hired to look after his treasure. The party eventaully work this out, and track down the guards to the thieves guild in Lanmere. Along the way they meet with Istfan the Grey, an enterprising wizard who is ripping off merchants. Istfan is living in Orgal's Tower and after working out the magic lift, Whiteflight finds Orgals' study and spell book. After casting Find Demonic Familiar the party left.

 
The Inquisition (5, then 1 Week)

Sir Kayguard (twin brother to Sir Borli, of Merenbrook) is a knight in love but his feelings are not reciprocated. The lady of his love's desire is found hanged, and shortly after Sir Kayguard is found dead, eviscerated, and the organs are located in Corwin's backpack. Things do not look good. The Inquisition arrive and suggest that Corwin might be involved. Desite his protestations they decide to imprison (and torture?) him. The group runs off to find Kayguard's servant. Instead we find his body, as the Inquisition found him first. However, we are nothing if not resourceful and get the high priest to question him. It was he that committed the nefarious deed (acting on behalf of the girl's father - a knight, though we do not determine this from our questioning). The Inquisition are upset. They had hoped to implicate Corwin and the young Sir Isandr, whom had been accused of the murder of Sir Kayguard, after having challenged him earlier - believing him to be responsible for the lady's death (Isander being a friend of the lady's father). Instead of killing him directly he was supposed to have hired Corwin to perform the deed. And thus implicated the Inquisition would be justified in killing not only these two, but Isander's superior, and thus complicit abeter, Count Pheranoth, Head of the Palladins of Issiad. Now robbed of this opportunity, they no longer consider us to be friends.
Whiteflight was quite fortunate to have taken on his dwarvish form at this stage, as the Inquisition had arrived most specifically for him. The deadline by which he was to have killed Lord Quintith had passed and Whiteflight had achieved a highly sought after status. Occassional skirmishes between the groups saw Whiteflight take credit for all Inquisition deaths, as there was no need to place a bounty on the heads of all the party members. This culminated in the deaths of many Inquisition in an alleyway in Barrinder, but most notably with the deaths of 12 members of the Inquisition, and one Inquisitor, on the road to Towerford. For this last act we were fined one iron tick for littering the King's highway

 
The Box (2 Weeks)

The party were asked by a hobit to rescue a man named Morliff. He was trapped in a box/pocket dimension formed after the clerics of Tarrak fought a batlle with the Circle of the Rat (this was the temple in the pocket dimension). After entering they fought a hydra summoned by priests, then did battle with the rats. they had ben told not to remove anything from the dimension. Milo the hobbit, however, did, and was trapped there forever.

 
The Hunt (Side Trek with Jake & Geoff)

Duke Torman gets all buddy with the power rangers and invites them for some wilderness fun at his paintball lodge. Out on hunt, Corwin escapes from a Wyvern, though his squire Frenvic dies. corwin goes back to kill it, with reinforcments.
Duke Tormen is kidknapped, and taken to Sir Borley's castle in Merenbrook. We're guessing it's because as he's in charge of Rew, he'd know all the defensive strategies to be taken if a war with Turse were to start, plus it would weaken the Kursivalian position by leaving his post vacant, for any length of time. The party find him and rescue him, though DarkClaw, Sir Borley's green dragon finds the party and captures Whitefilght and Tormen. Whiteflight persuades Darkclaw to take him and the Duke back to Rue. Some diplomatic negotiations that we weren't party to put off the possibility of a full-blown war for the immediate future

 
Evil Writings (10 Weeks)

Having rescued Morliff from the box,he the asked the party to locate and destroy an evil book. Easier said then done - we eventually found it belonged to Glariand, a rather dodgy merchant. We set off a fire trap in Rew looking for the book, and luckily the blame fell on Glariand as 2 people, and seven horses died in the fire.On th order of Duke Tormen, we travel to Nyr'Danr, to find Glariand. Eventaully he's caught, and he tells us Halrun has the book. Halrun is a priest of Lodos who worked for Duke Torman - by the time we return to rew, Halrun has done a runner. WE catch up with him, and interrogat him - and he tells us sir Kayguard has the book. that evening we travel to Merenbrook. We fly in to the castle, and leave with it. Whiteflight and Aspen escape via the astral plane, betting with Griss to leave. Whiteflight wins, Aspen doesn't, and laughs ever after when in the middle of a battle. We regroup - the book turned out to be Fairbox, Morliff's spell book, packed with Chonomancy spells and attitude (sentient, 10 hit dice). We finally destroyed it with weapons after a long time failing to dispell it.

 
Beginning of the End (5 Weeks)

This was Corwin's quest to destroy the bone ring. The ring was created by Aragorn, and allowed the wearer to raise and control undead creatures. Aragorn had lost the ring, and it had found it's way into Corwin's possession at the beginning of the adventure. The ring was then stolen by the Grey Glaw, and delivered back to a temple of Mallus on the Gonrath mors, from where the party had rescued it. Corwin was asked by Allaveer to destroy the ring, and there was a riddle with instructions.

It controls the dancers without partners,
And when the stacked corn burns the fallen stems rise.
In it's misty clasp is forever night.
The circle ends in the heart of a strong goddess.

Eventually the party interpreted the riddle, and Corwin delivered it to a holy place of Alleveer, a grove, where it was destroyed.

 
Skeletons from the Closet (1, then 3, then 3 Weeks)

This story starts four thousand years ago, when three events occurred. An evil elven necromancer named Bacchun enters a tomb of Lodos to raise dead dragons. Rohannan, a silver dragon dies, believing he is killed by his nephew Baephius, though he was really killed by Bachun. (He turns into a ghost.) And Baephius is said to go mad, and is sealed inside the tomb to die. We arrive at the temple, looking for the cause of a desecrated grove of Allaveer. There is a new vampire about - the village of Strinton is run by vampires, and the tomb has been opened again. Inside the tomb are Baephius, now a vampire, Bacchun, and Rohannan. We venture into the tomb on many occasions, each time going slightly further, then coming out to heal up. We ran into Umeridicht here - he killed the recent elven necromancer, whose body we destroy (Asrune, one of the villagers). In a fight Baephius and Rohannen kill Bacchun - although he resurrects, we find where and so manage to kill him (Aspen was meant to do this, to get rid of his curse, though in the end someone else gets the final blow). We then attempt to kill Baephius, knowing that if he dies so will Rohannan, and Whiteflight, Kael and Brangwen die. Chryssiana and Corwen are rescued by Turgor, and Aspen was possessed by a necromantic sapphire - he went to Nyr'Danr, died and was resurrected there.
Corwen is asked to deliver a note for Pherenath - and ends up with Chryssiana, Umeridicht, our bodies and Aspen at Aisen's house.

 
Clearing the Road (2 Weeks)

In between out to-ing and fro-ing with the temple of Lodos, Lanmere was beseiged by Barbarians. They were about to batter down the door with a party member tied to the front of the battering ram, so we ventured out to rescue him (I think it was Aspen.) Whilist sneaking around outside, we found that the Barbarians were in league with the Green Lady - and with Aragorn. To cut a long story short, there was a huge fight, and lots of people died. Ct Svalrik died too (Chryssania cunningly lassoed Kael off the wall, leaving Svalric to defend himself. Which he didn't.) To top it all off, Svalric's body was stolen by a demon of Malice (it was later returned).

 
Dark Tidings

Kael and Rossenfur fight for Ct of Barandor

 
In Too Deep (2 Weeks)

Journey to Blakmar