They were surprised to find that the forest on the south side of the road was no different from the forest on the north side. The trees were in autumn bloom with dry leaves of red, orange, and yellow covering the trees and the ground beneath the trees. The leaves on the ground crackled as they walked.
There was one difference between north and south.
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Gralen and Will’s “movement scores” are 11 and 12, respectively. Charlotte’s is 9, making her the slowest of the group. Seasoned adventurers will slow themselves down to the movement score of the slowest person in the group to avoid splitting up. These are not seasoned adventurers. |
“No one’s been here in a hundred years,” said Charlotte, to Sam, as they walked through the woods. Will and Gralen were strolling ahead a hundred yards or so. The donkey was with them. No one was walking in any hurry.
“No one human, anyway,” said Sam. “Unless the Astronomers are still here.”
“I can’t believe they’d still be around,” said Charlotte. “They’d have to come up to Hightown occasionally for trade. When the night trolls came through, they came far enough north to defeat the Knights of Illustration. The Astronomers must have been even more besieged.”
“Night trolls,” repeated Sam. “What do we do when night rolls around?”
“We find a secluded camp before nightfall,” said Charlotte.
“What if Will or Gralen snores?” she asked, and laughed. Charlotte laughed also.
“Smother them with a pillow, I guess,” she replied.
“Did we bring pillows?”
“I wish,” said Charlotte.
“You don’t like roughing it?”
“I love it,” said Charlotte. “I don’t normally go out like a pack animal, though. But walking in the forest, sleeping under the stars. There are wonderful animal trails throughout the forests around Crosspoint.”
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Creatures will often have multiple names, and different names in different places. Here, Charlotte and Sam know “goblins” as both goblins and as night trolls. |
“But we have no goblins around Crosspoint,” said Sam.
“We do,” said Charlotte. “But they aren’t very bold.”
“Let’s hope the goblins of west Highland aren’t very bold either.”
As the sun rose, shafts of bright sunlight shone through the leaves of the trees, illuminating dust in the air. Will and Gralen were lazily picking raspberries here and there, putting them into their bags as they walked on.
“I haven’t been this far from my father since I started working for him five years ago,” said Will.
“Your father’s a nice guy,” said Gralen.
“To you, maybe,” said Will. “He doesn’t understand me.”
Gralen stooped down and picked up some long grass, and fed it to their donkey.
“I mean, we just go back and forth, back and forth,” said Will. “Black Stag to Hightown, Hightown to Crosspoint, Crosspoint to Hightown, Hightown to Black Stag. For Christ’s sake, he’s been doing it for twenty years!”
“What do you want to do?”
“I’d like to start my own company. Go down to Great Bend. Or maybe not start the company, and just go to the bend. Or when we go to Black Stag, why not head up the river and see what’s up there?”
“There’s no money in it, probably,” said Gralen.
“Yeah, that’s what he says,” said Will. “Everything up the river comes down the river, we don’t need to go chasing it.”
They walked south silently for a little while.
“I’ve heard there are Elves up that way,” Will continued. “And Dwarves.”
“And little pixies that live in holes and smoke big pipes,” said Gralen. “You hear a lot of things if you want to.”
“Charlotte thinks there are Elves up that way.”
“She’s probably right,” said Gralen. “But not too many people visit them.”
“She’s going to.”
“She’s been saying that for as long as I’ve known her,” said Gralen. “Usually after she’s had a bit to drink.”
“That’s what everybody says,” said Will.
“Everybody?”
“Well, Sam said the same thing.”
Gralen looked at him.
“You know, you probably shouldn’t go talking about Charlotte to people you don’t know.”
“Why not?” asked Will.
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In some campaigns, non-human races will be as common as humans (Tolkien had more non-humans than humans, for example.) In others, such as this one, non-human races will be rare, with the possible exception of those non-human races infringing on human lands. |
“It’s odd,” said Gralen. “She’s got a secret, and secrets of that sort are often best kept.”
“But Sam doesn’t know me,” said Will.
“True, and that was my point,” Gralen replied.
“Who is Sam?” asked Will.
“A friend of Charlotte’s,” said Gralen. “She’s a tough one.”
“I don’t know,” said Will.
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As the players get more experienced, they will choose better camp sites. If it rained, they’d be flooded out. If they get attacked, they haven’t anywhere to run. |
They set up camp that night in a small dell nestled within the hills. They set up their tent, hung their food from the trees, and built a small fire with which to cook their dinner. Afterwards, Gralen went to studying his notes and the two books he’d brought with him. Charlotte went off on her own in the woods around their camp. And Will began to practice his swordplay. Sam watched Will as he fought imaginary opponents and blocked imaginary attacks.
“Can you teach me how to do that?” she asked him.
He turned and looked at her.
“Uh, yeah,” he replied, “uhm, why would you want to?”
She looked him in the eyes, and surprisingly he didn’t look away.
“I’m never going to be the girl who lets someone else protect her,” said Sam.
“I noticed that,” said Will.
“As long as we understand each other.”
“Show me your positions,” said Will.
“My what?”
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Some groups won’t like calling things “short sword” and “long sword”, they’ll want to use the real medieval names for those weapons. If you’re interested in that sort of thing, you can find it in books such as Stone’s “Glossary of the Construction, Decoration, and Use of Arms & Armor”. |
“Attack that bush with your short sword.”
“Oh.”
She hacked at the tall bush he’d indicated.
“You taught yourself, didn’t you,” said Will.
“Yes, and I do pretty well,” said Sam. “The tree didn’t lay a hand on me.”
“You can do better. Put your sword down, and follow my steps.”
He showed her three basic fighting movements.
“You’ll want to practice these whenever you can,” said Will, then he handed her his sword.
“Yours is heavier than mine,” said Sam.
“I’m not touching that line with a ten foot pole,” said Will.
“Touché,” said Sam.
“Well, you know the words, let’s see if you know the walk. This is your enemy,” he said, pointing at the abused bush. “Attack it.”
She took more foliage off of the bush.
“Don’t look at your sword,” said Will. “It isn’t going to attack you. Watch your enemy.”
“My enemy’s a bush,” said Sam.
“Always keep the sword moving,” said Will. “And pretend that the bush can fight back.”
The first night was awkward. They shared a large tent, but not large enough. Each lay out their own bedroll. Will and Gralen slept on one side, Charlotte and Sam on the other. Will and Charlotte were in the middle. They put their packs between the two sides.
“I went camping like this once when I was twelve with a girl from down the hill in Crosspoint,” whispered Will to Gralen. “I didn’t get anywhere then either.”
“Watch out for the thing that gropes the wood,” said Sam, and everyone chuckled, even Will.
“Oh, I’m quite familiar with him,” he replied. “Go to sleep.”
In the middle of the night, Sam tapped Charlotte’s shoulder until she awoke.
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More experienced adventurers would have set a watch, taking turns staying awake so that they could warn their companions if anything dangerous arrives in the night. |
“Do you hear something?” asked Sam.
Charlotte tapped Will’s shoulder until he woke up.
“Something’s outside,” she said.
Will tapped Gralen’s shoulder.
“The girls are worried about something outside,” he said.
Sam tried to hit him, but Charlotte was in the way. Gralen lifted the bottom of the tent up and peered out.
“There’s some animal out by our fire pit,” said Gralen. “It’s a deer or something.”
They heard a sudden noise of branches moving.
“What was that?”
“The deer just ran away. Maybe we scared it off.”
They heard a wolf howling, and it didn’t sound distant at all.
“Or not.”
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Putting stuff like this in, you have to gauge your players. Some players will spend all day at the standing stones trying to figure out their relation to the adventure. Still, you want to foreshadow other adventures, and put physical evidence of the legends of the past throughout your world. |
Halfway through the second day, they saw a small structure on a small hill beyond some trees. As they drew closer, they saw that it was a circle of columns set into the ground. The stone ring that the columns once held was fallen in pieces around the hill. In the center of the columns and broken stone was an altar on a round dais, with strange markings inscribed on it: slashes and straight corners, no curves at all. But it looked like it ought to be writing.
“What does it say?” asked Charlotte. “Do you know?”
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Gralen was able to read the other one because he has a spell called Understand Languages. But he wasn’t expecting to need it until arriving at Kristagna, so he currently has Farseeing and Mage Bolt impressed. |
“I can’t read this,” said Gralen. “But there’s one between Hightown and Byblion that I’ve deciphered, and it is a dedication to a king, or god, of the silver hand.”
“And this one says the same thing?” asked Sam.
“Who knows?” asked Gralen. “I’ve heard that these monuments lie scattered throughout west Highland. Perhaps each is dedicated to a different god or demon.”
He ran his fingers over the inscribed markings.
“Whatever it is, its been abandoned for a long time,” said Will.
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Yes, so now that I mentioned it, now would be a good time for Gralen to use Farseeing. But when you’re a first level sorceror, you tend to conserve your spells. |
“You get a nice view up here,” said Charlotte. ‘This forest is as wonderful as any back east.”
“Speaking of that,” said Sam, “don’t we have to start going east soon?”
“We should be running into a road sometime,” said Gralen.
“Or be able to see the breasts,” said Charlotte.
“We might be able to save some time by going kitty-corner, but we might also end up getting horribly lost if we do that,” said Gralen. “Though I’m thinking that on the way back we might be able to go straight north to the low road, or north-northwest.”
“We can’t hardly miss the leather road,” said Will.
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They’re called thieves by the game rules, but in adventuring terms, and especially outside, it almost makes more sense to call them scouts. It’s only inside dungeons or in cities that their lock-picking and pickpocket skills really become useful. |
The second night, Sam decided to scout the perimeter of their camp. Charlotte thought she’d seen some animal following them for an hour or so before they stopped. Sam stepped as quietly as she could--and it was surprisingly quiet to the rest of the friends. When Sam stepped into the trees, she practically disappeared.
“I hope she’s going to be all right,” said Will.
“Let’s set up the camp,” said Gralen.
Sam snuck through the trees as quietly as she could, and it was quietly enough. Hidden in the ferns only about fifty yards from camp were three human-like creatures half her size, but with splotchy white faces and two small fangs. They were watching Gralen, Charlotte, and Will set up camp. Each carried spears, and one carried a short sword of some kind.
“I think they’re night trolls,” said Sam to the rest when she returned to the camp site.
“They’re probably waiting to kill us when we go to sleep,” said Gralen.
“Where are they?” asked Will.
“Don’t look!” said Sam. “We don’t want them to know that we know that they’re there. Not yet.”
She motioned him to move behind the tent.
“Go to that side of the tent, so they can’t see you, and load your crossbow,” she said.
“Why?”
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The group hasn’t chosen a leader. Some groups don’t need them. They simply let whoever is most qualified at the problem in question take control. |
“We can’t let them go find more of their kind,” said Sam. “We’ re going to have to sneak-attack them before they sneak-attack us, or before they go for reinforcements. I need you to cover me while I go back around.”
“I should go back around,” said Will. “I haven’t taught you anything yet.”
“I know how to use a crossbow,” replied Sam, “and you make as much noise as a herd of cattle. I’ll go, you cover me.”
“What do we do?” asked Gralen.
“I’m going to sneak back to the other side of them. One of you go behind the tent and count to a hundred, then sneak up as well as you can.”
“What about the other two of us?” asked Charlotte.
“You back me up when you hear me yell,” said Sam.
Sam went back into the woods, with her and Will’s crossbow armed and ready.
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On the other hand, arguing about who is going to cover a friend after that friend walks into danger is probably not the best strategy. |
“I’ll go,” said Will.
“No, you need to cover her from here,” said Gralen. “You should stay here because you can get there fastest when she yells.”
“And you’re too obvious,” said Charlotte to Gralen. “I’ll follow.”
Charlotte stepped into the forest from behind the tent.
“Let’s just finish setting up the fire,” said Gralen to Will.
“I hope she knows what she’s doing,” said Will.
“Lay your sword down as you try to start the fire,” said Gralen, “in case they’re worrying about where the other two went.”
Will leaned his sword down against a rock that was next to the space they’d cleared for the fire. Gralen looked up into the sky, and whistled once. Then he turned to Will again.
“Hold still,” said Gralen. “I’m going to do something so you can better use that crossbow.”
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The spell’s description simply says that the character can see things as if they were only a third their distance away. Some Guides will treat this as 3x ‘telescopic’ vision. I like the hypersense treatment better myself. It’s all a matter of taste. |
Gralen spoke for a few seconds in words that Will did not understand, and then touched Will’s eyes. Will blinked, and when he opened his eyes, everything was suddenly much clearer. Things he didn’t previously notice suddenly came in focus. He could see the veins on the leaves ten feet away, and could see for three times the distance he could have before.
“You can see further and better now,” said Gralen.
“This is incredible,” said Will.
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A crossbow has a range of fifteen yards. Will is fifty yards away from the goblins. This gives him a penalty of 3 to attack. However, with Farseeing 2 of these are negated, for a total penalty of only 1. |
He glanced slowly around the woods, and could now clearly see the goblins hiding behind some bushes over a hundred feet away.
“I see them,” said Will. “Three of them, just like she said. Shouldn’t we head over there now?”
“Wait for her signal,” said Gralen. “It’s her plan, we don’t want to screw it up.”
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Of course not, Sam’s a thief, it’s her job to be silent. Still, Charlotte was probably better at it than Gralen and definitely better than Will. Charlotte needs to get close because her psychic abilities work best at very close range. |
At the perimeter of the camp, Charlotte was not quite as silent as Sam had been. Sam realized that the creatures were getting nervous. When Charlotte arrived within about twenty paces, Sam aimed her crossbow at who she assumed was their leader, and stepped out of the brush.
“Stop!” she yelled.
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Cover round: Gralen needs to be within 30 yards to use his Mage Bolt spell. Sam’s player, Sarah Dent, rolled an 18 to attack. Even with the bonus for having the goblin covered, this still misses. Will’s player, Tony Barlow, rolled 8. Since Will no longer has any penalty to attack, this hits easily--he needed a 10, and he had them covered. He only rolled 1 for damage, but his target only had 2 survival points--and he got a bonus of 1 for having the target covered. |
Will grabbed up his sword and crossbow, and pointing his crossbow at one of the goblins, he walked quickly but firmly towards them. Gralen moved slightly to the right and walked with him. He also fished into his pockets for a small model of an arrow. When they were about forty paces, the goblins screamed and jumped at Sam with their spears.
Sam pulled the trigger on her crossbow, but in her surprise at their ferocity her bolt went wild. Gralen whistled and pointed his staff at the creatures, and began running towards the goblins and Sam. Will chose his target and shot his crossbow. The bolt hit the goblin and the goblin fell to the ground.
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First round: Charlotte is attacking with a visual illusion that can do one point per round to its opponent. It started with 3 and has 2 points left. No one else can see it. Sam got speared for three survival points, and missed her opponent, but Gralen cast a Mage Bolt for four survival points. It started with 6 and has 2 points left. Will is running towards the combat at 11 yards per round. He is now 29 yards away. |
One of the goblins began spearing at the air as if fighting an imaginary opponent. Sam didn’t take time to be confused by it. She dropped her crossbow and drew her sword against the remaining creature, but it thrust its spear forward, barely missing her. She twisted round its attack and, off-balance, was unable to complete her counter-attack. Will threw down his crossbow and ran towards the fight.
By this time, Gralen had moved to about thirty paces from the creatures. He began mumbling, and threw something towards the fight. It burst into an arrow of light that slammed into Sam’s opponent.
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Sam was hit for another three points: she now has only one point left. But she hit her opponent for three also, bringing it below zero. (The raven, Gralen’s familiar, helped by hitting for 1 point damage.) Gralen and Will, meanwhile, are still running towards the combat, and while Charlotte’s illusion has nearly killed her opponent, the illusion has run its course and she was very lucky that the creature didn’t make its saving roll vs. a simple, sight-only illusion. The team might want to rethink this sort of plan in the future. Especially since none of the individuals were aware of the other individuals’ special abilities... |
A raven swooped out of the sky and clawed at Sam’s opponent, and that goblin tried to run past Sam to get away, thrusting again with its spear. Perhaps she should have let it go, as its attack drew blood before she twisted it out of the way with her sword and followed the spear down to its bearer, thrusting it into its chest and pulling it back out. The creature fell backwards a few steps, and then keeled over onto the ground.
Sam pointed her sword at the remaining goblin, which was now looking scared as well as confused, and it tossed its spear away and jumped to the ground whimpering.
“Great,” said Will. “We’ve got a prisoner. Jesus, Sam, are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” said Sam, “I think. You sure as hell were right about that raven bringing good luck,” she added to Gralen.
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Sam couldn’t afford leather armor--she was one monetary unit shy. But Charlotte, as a friend, gave her the money before they left. Always a good idea to make sure that those who can fight, can do so effectively. |
She touched at her side, inside her leather armor, and came back with blood.
“Shit.”
“Get her back to camp,” Will told Charlotte. “I’m going to tie this thing up.”
Will pointed his sword at the goblin.
“Go,” said Will.
The creature didn’t seem to understand the words, but it did understand the gesture. Will led it at sword’s point back to the camp and tied it up.
“Charlotte,” said Will. “How bad is Sam?”
“I don’t know,” said Charlotte. “There’s blood everywhere.”
Will went to take a look at Sam’s wound.
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Nobody here has any healing skill or powers. But Will has survival, which the Guide rules is enough to know how to put bandages on wounds. If he didn’t, Sam would still be “okay”. But she’d have coagulated blood all over her clothes and she and Will would be denied a special moment. |
“It doesn’t look too bad,” said Will, “though I’m no barber. Tie it up with some strips of cloth. Use the blankets if we don’t have anything better.”
Will turned to Gralen and pointed at the goblin, tied now to a small tree.
“We’re going to have to keep a watch tonight,” said Will, “to keep an eye on this thing. We can’t let it go, and we really can’t just kill it. Too bad we can’t talk to it.”
Later, in the tent, Will asked Gralen about the legend of the silver hand, and Gralen told them the story.
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Most likely the Guide tells this story through Gralen, but there’s nothing wrong with Sandy making it up with the Guide’s approval. |
“This is what I read on the stones north of Hightown,” said Gralen. “The king of the silver hand, the father of kings, ruled a great city, and his brother ruled another kingdom. Evil creatures came from over the sea, creatures that could hear any word spoken if any wind was blowing around the speaker. The wind would carry what was said to the evil ones, who could terrorize the countryside with full knowledge of their enemies’ plans and secrets. So the king held council with his brother in a place of no wind, and his brother told him of a dream he’d had: that the invaders could be defeated by forcing them to eat insect mash, insects ground into water. The king must do this himself, for if he asks anyone else to do it, he runs the risk of telling it to the wind, who then would inform the invaders.”
“So the king mashes up insects?” said Will.
“And,” continued Gralen, “he sneaks into the camp of the invaders and switches their porridge with his insect mash. When they eat it, they can no longer hear the wind. And now he and his advisors can create their stratagems without being overheard, and so they defeat the invaders.”
“Insect mash?” said Charlotte. “That’s disgusting. Wouldn’t they have noticed?”
“Well, it’s a legend,” said Sam. “Strange things happen in legends.”
“And so they lived happily ever after?” asked Will.
“Not yet. There was another problem in the land. On each May’s eve, a scream permeated the land, a scream that curdled milk, killed crops, and made women barren. Warriors lost their strength. Children and animals grew sick. The sick died. His brother helped him here, also. He said that the screams were the screams of dragons in the earth, and that the dragons could be quieted by giving them strong mead. So every mayday he had his people bury crocks of mead in the earth to lull the dragons.”
“I could use some mead right now,” said Sam.
“I take it that wasn’t the end of his problems,” said Will.
“Of course not,” said Charlotte. “These things always come in threes if they come in pairs.”
“And so they do,” said Gralen. “The king’s provisions in the castle were disappearing the night after they arrived. They would eat the first night, and then the court would have to go hungry until they received more provisions, which themselves would disappear by the morning after they arrived. The king and his court would try to stay awake to find out what was happening to the food, but they always fell asleep before morning, and when they awoke the food would be gone. His brother told him that he didn’t know what or who was taking the food, but that when he felt tired he should bathe in cold water to keep himself awake. The king did so, and discovered that a wizard was using magic to send the entire court to sleep. The king jumped out of his bath, took his sword, and defeated the wizard in mortal combat, and the court was finally able to have breakfast.”
“I’ve known people who could use a cold bath at night,” said Sam.
“What I want to know is, who is his brother?” asked Will.
“That’s a good question,” said Gralen. “Who knows? You’d have to ask the night priests, or Druids, or whoever built the monument.”
“Sleep well,” said Charlotte.
“As long as the mist doesn’t rise,” said Will.
Gralen took the last watch, and spent it studying his books to regain his spells.
“Do we have anything we’d like to discuss with this creature?” asked Gralen when everyone else awoke and began digging through their packs for breakfast.
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Sam regains a survival point for her night of rest. She is now at two survival points. Gralen sort of did learn its language in the night: he impressed “Understand Languages” as one of his spells for the day. |
“Why,” asked Sam, “did you learn its language in the night?”
“Sort of,” said Gralen. “The same way I could read the stones north of Hightown but not the same stones yesterday. Now I’m prepared.”
“We need to know how many more there are, and where they live, I guess,” said Sam.
“So we can avoid it like a plague,” said Will.
“We might also ask if there are any breasts nearby,” said Sam.
“Funny.”
“So ask it about castles,” she added.
“Good idea,” said Gralen.
He took something out of his pockets, pinched between his fingers, spoke some words that no one understood, and ate it.
“What the hell is that?” asked Sam.
“Ginger,” said Gralen, and then he touched the creature on the forehead.
The goblin flinched. Then, Gralen began gesturing to it. When the goblin spoke, Gralen gestured further. He pointed east. The goblin spoke and pointed west.
The others made their breakfast over the fire. They still had eggs and bacon, though they’d have to start living off of hard bread and jerky soon.
“Well,” said Gralen when he was done. “If you can trust it, it lives back west and a bit further south. There are hundreds--or at least ten handfuls--more of them. And it not only hasn’t heard of a castle, it doesn’t recommend finding the castle that doesn’t exist. Also, it wants to know when we’re going to kill it, because it wants to kill us.
Will partially untied the goblin and handed it some of their breakfast.
“You notice he didn’t turn to stone when the sun came up?” he asked the others.
“Maybe it’s a different kind of night troll that turns to stone,” said Sam.
“He doesn’t appear to like the light that much,” said Gralen.
“What the hell are we going to do with him?” asked Charlotte.
“Let him go when we get further down,” said Will. “We can’t keep him, and we aren’t going to kill him now that he’s harmless.”
“He won’t be harmless if he comes back with a hundred more like him,” said Sam.
“We wait long enough to let him go, and he won’t have time to track us down before we get back home,” said Will. “We’re not going back the way we came, right?”