Session XXVIII - To Buy A Slave (2002-05-14)

In the tower, Jobric found a book on the first floor. As he opened it, he froze completely. Radagast couldn't figure out how to get him out of it. Radagast quickly scanned the room: there was a blue ceramic stove in one corner and a wooden box. While he was checking out the room, he heard the faint sound of skirmish from outside. He carefully opened the door, and saw Cassandra at the edge of the clearing.

Radagast quickly flew to his old friend, where he found a scene of rapidly rotting bear-like creture and battle weary Cassandra with a man she introduced as Gronthor. Cassandra and Gronthor seemed puzzled because they could not find Gaius Julius anywhere. It seemed like he'd left them as hastily as he'd left Radagast earlier. Strange man.

Radagast filled in his part of the story and then listened to Cassandra tell of her travels. Gronthor explained that they had gotten ointment against orc poison from a man in Shopik. He gave one portion to Cassandra and one portion to Radagast while keeping the third one himself. The man had also explained how to make the antidote. It required some pretty hard to find plants and Radagast was pretty sure that he'd never be able to find them on his own. It would require someone like Bardia, he figured.

Radagast guided Gronthor and Cassandra to the tower. Searching the ground floor again they found a trapdoor in the floor. It opened into a small cellar, which was mostly empty. On one wall there were three large glass jars; other wall was covered by shelves filled with old and rusty tools. On one wall there was what appeared to be an entrance that was sealed with stones and mortar. After inspection three flasks on the shelves turned out to be magical, and Gronthor took them. The sealed entrance turned out to be too tough after Cassandra tried to hack through it: she estimated it would take at least a day to get through. Radagast pointed out that they did not have a day since he'd seen movement around the other clearing. The opening mecnanism Radagast thought he'd found in the ground floor turned out to be the way to operate the wolf's head: pour water into the snout in the wooden box, and pull a lever, and anyone standing outside the door would feel a cooling sensation. Good to know, but not immediately useful.

Having exhausted their options at the tower they decided to search the second clearing. As Cassandra moved up front she saw some orcs hiding in the edge of the forest. As she spotted them, the orcs shot arrows at her and charged. Radagast flew up and rained poison arrows at the leader, but he just kept on going. After more than half of the orcs' numbers were down Gronthor finally succumbed to his wounds and Cassandra was forced to heal herself. The orcish leader grabbed the unconscious Gronthor and using him as shield withdraw and ordered his troops the withdraw as well. This came too late for a couple of them, but the rest disappeared into the bushes. Radagast discusses the situation briefly with Cassandra, trying to avoid the greasy spots on the ground where Gronthor had cast the interesting spell that made it almost impossible to stay on ones feet as the orcs had discovered.

The only hope Gronthor was was that Radagast and Cassandra would be able to locate him and rescue him. So Radagast mad himself invisble and flew into the forest searching for orcs. He did not find an orc traveling singly, and he feared he might not be able to take down two orcs before their companions showed up, so he just followed a par of orcs. They soon joined with some more, and they finally came to a clearing and disappeared inside some well camouflaged cave openings. Radagast had his information and flew back to Cassandra.

Cassandra, Radagast, and Gronthor's familiar, a pseudodragon named Bobo pondered on the situation. Bobo could sense that his master was alive, but unconscious. He was also sure he could be able to find his master. So the party decided to find a safe spot for the night and try to rescue Gronthor in the morning.

The night was not very restful, with all the evil creatures stalking them. Bobo had to wake Radagast several times just to shoo away a squirrel that seemed to be interested in sinking its teeth into Radagast. Not knowing what kind of unholy creature it was Radagast did not want to take risks. They even killed on squirrel, but did not learn much.

In the morning Bobo lead them to the cave. Radagast's plan was fo him to sneak invisible to the two guards at the cave entrace, and prevent them from enetring to alarm the rest of the orcs. He'd also try to kill one of them while Bobo would simultaneously try to put the other one to sleep with his poisonous sting; he was really good at hiding so it worked almost as good as being invisible.

The plan worked reasonably well: Radagast sneaked past the guards and killed one of them with a single strike. Bobo hit with his sting too, but the orc resisted the poison and yelled alarm. To Radagast's dismay the cave didn't appear very deep, since he heard stirring inside.

Radagast figured they might have had a change even then, but alas, the orchis chueftain was too smart. He threatened to kill Gronthor if they did not back down. The orc was willing to trade Gronthor for gold, though. So Radagast and Cassandra bought Gronthor the slave for 100 gold. "So much for initiation rituals," Radagast though, "exactly like me and Drik at one point."

The party grabbed still frozen Jobric from the tower, dropped five days worth of food to the girl in the dungeon, and watched from a distance as the orcs took over the tower. The orc leader had said they'd been keeping eye on the tower and they wanted it. Figuring Radagast and Jobric had killed the owner they moved in, even though Radagast tried explaining it was just a servant to the real owner. The orcs did not believe, and now they had the tower to themselves.

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