Session 21: All’s Faire (part two)

Game Date: 12/08/2007
In-Game Dates: Disander 11th, evening – Disander 12, mid-morning

The panicked faire-goers make it difficult for the party to reach the were-rats. By the time they push, intimidate or slip their way through the people, the pair of were-rats have slain another guard. Not only that, but a cluster of fiendish dire rats are racing around, biting everyone they can and causing havoc.
Audric morphs into a much taller (about 6’3”) version of himself, carrying Badger on his back as he begins casting as many buffing spells as he’s able on the party. Nialia calls lightning on one of the were-rats as Grumble attacks the other. Dire rats swarm all over the rest of the party, spitting and biting. As Badger slides off Audric’s back, a third wererat changes from his unremarkable (but ugly) human form into a hybrid form, attacking Badger from behind. Seeing Badger both bitten and stabbed, Audric momentarily wigs out and casts wrack on the third were-rat, who collapses in helpless agony. Badger recovers a moment later and gives her assailant a merciful coup de grace.
Grumble demonstrates that one doesn’t necessarily need silver to kill a lycanthrope, as cutting one completely in half seems to also do the job, albeit very messily. Grumble turns his attention to the other were-rat while fending off a pack of dire rats that swarm around and over him. Badger gets in behind the were-rat, slicing away at the hybrid’s legs and other vulnerable points, keeping the were-rat from pressing his advantage over Grumble. Nialia and Rowan spot a human in the process of killing yet another guard amidst the still retreating crowd, about sixty feet from the combat. Nialia calls down the thunder (er, lightning) on this man as he changes from man to hybrid were-rat. Snarling and brandishing his rapier, he charges towards the druid. Rowan steps between the two and engages this were-rat, who seems to be in command. Both sides hold their own for a minute, give or take a few dire rats. Finally, after taking enough blows and cuts to drop four normal creatures their size, the were-rats take off in opposite directions. Rowan and Grumble streak after their respective opponents, but soon lose them in the warren of side-streets and alleyways.
By the time they return, the remaining dire rats have either been killed or have likewise fled, and the guards of Brindinsford have arrived on the scene. The guards obviously do not believe the outlandish account given by the party, all they see are dead guards, merchants, and faire-goers (the were-rats having reverted to human form upon dying) lying strewn about the street, with the party standing over them with bloodied weapons. However, Audric has managed to stabilize one of the guards, who vouches for the truth of the party’s tale. Then the crowds, returning to the scene, also clamor that the party are heroes, not villains. Lieutenant Shella is sent for, who arrives moments later. She asks them to accompany her to the barracks. As they walk back up the main street of the faire, they see another spot of similar devastation, with the guards working quickly to clear the bodies from the area.
Reaching the barracks, Shella asks them for an official account of what happened. The party faithfully relays the events to the grim-faced Lieutenant. She tells them that two other groups of lycanthropic assailants struck the faire, and while the guards drove them off, the guards took heavy casualties, and none of the guards succeeded in killing any of the were-rats. The lieutenant thanks the party once more for services rendered, and by way of reward tells them that they are no longer subject to the peace-bonding laws; they may keep their weapons ready at all times. The tone of Shella’s voice suggests that having their weapons ready at all times would be a prudent thing to do. After that, the party is free to go.
Tired, the party heads for the Shield and Shingle. Grumble almost immediately heads upstairs and is asleep almost before his head hits the pillow. The rest of the party is recognized by the crowd as being the slayers of the were-rats and are plied with compliments, questions, and all the free drinks they can swallow. Nialia ducks out of this and makes her way to the grove of the druid said to be within the walls of the city. The streets are dark, but she eventually finds herself before a large, walled enclosure taking up an entire city block. Above the 20-foot walls she can see the tops of trees silhouetted against the star-strewn night sky. A male elf druid greets her at the simple wooden gate and bids her welcome. He is Amrauthlen, and his familiar, a fierce-looking hawk, is named Kerrit. He gives her a tour of the well tended gardens, at the center of which stands a might ancient oak, grown, says he, from a seedling brought out of the Old Forest. Nialia could tell this, drawn to the tree like a faun to its mother. She feels the tree, the soil around it, even the air that the leaves enrich, as though it were a part of her own self.
Rowan eventually heads off to bed, as do Badger and Audric. In the privacy of their room, Badger asks if Audric thinks it would be worth looking at the locksmith booths to see if perhaps any of her brothers are here showing their wares.
Audric, as gently as possible, reminds her that she saw them all in their home far to the north just a scant week ago, and they could not possibly have traveled all this distance in that time. Badger sighs; listening to Bruge and Chlyra reminisce about Rowan as a young girl has made her terribly homesick. Saddened, she goes to sleep, Audric providing what support he can.
Back in the grove, Amrauthlen bids Nialia good-night and leaves her to her meditations. Nialia falls into a trance, and as if in a dream, she and Anealus enter the old oak, only to emerge in a forest. She walks among the trees as if she knew them all by name, and comes to realize that there are wolves everywhere, watching her. They call her to join them, and as she becomes a wolf, she realizes that these are her kin, the Wolf Clan. They run, they hunt, and finally, they sleep under the boughs of a tree very similar to the one Nialia fell asleep under. Nestled in close to Nialia is a Lythari who smells very familiar.
“Araven?” asks Nialia.
“Shhh,” comes a whisper in her mind, “Now it is time for resting. Sleep, my young one.”
The next thing Nialia knows, it is just past dawn, and she feels more refreshed than she’s ever felt in her life. She realizes, however, that she is in wolf form, and there are wolf prints all around her. She cannot possibly have made them all, for they vary in shape and size, but none of the tracks leave the area just under the tree.
Amrauthlen does not comment on the tracks when he comes to greet her. He does tell her that he had a strange dream: he saw Nialia sleeping under the tree, and an elf lady of great beauty and power came from the tree and commanded Amrauthlen to render Nialia any aid she may require.
Amrauthlen asks Nialia who this elf lady might be, but Nialia merely repeats, “as you say, she is a druid of great beauty, age and power,” and does not elaborate.
Nialia is invited back to the grove whenever she wishes, which pleases her immensely, she has not been able to work in an elven garden for too long. She promises that she will return later in the day and will help him tend the grove.
Meanwhile, Grumble is woken once more by the mysterious Auger. Auger leads Grumble to an abandoned warehouse, where once again they practice the axe kata. Grumble asks Auger if he knows any dwarf matching the description of the one Grumble encountered the last night of his drunkenness. Auger responds that he knows of no such dwarf.
“Well then,” says Grumble,” what do you know of my axe?”
Auger smiles, “I know many things about your weapon.”
Grumble’s momentary excitement turns to frustration as all Auger gives are vague hints and cryptic responses to specific questions. The most often repeated answer he gets is that he will have to find the answers for himself. When they finish, Auger walks out the door, but is nowhere to be seen when Grumble exits a second later.
Back at the Shield and Shingle, the party awakens and reassembles. The fair is even bigger the second day as more people have arrived this morning. The events of last night do not seem to have much dampened the mood of either the merchants or faire-goers. Even so, today the party goes out in full armor and with all their weapons. Grumble, Badger and Audric want to go see the famous Librarium of Brindinsford. Grumble hopes there may be found some information about his axe, while Audric wonders if someone there may know something about the House of Bel. The trio’s first stop is Shooma’s smithy, where they pick up a weapon of alchemical silver for each member of the party (except Nialia).
Rowan heads out of town and tracks down (literally) the party of rangers she met several nights ago. The two rangers, both half-elven, greet her. They are brothers, one is Simmin, the other is Grellick. They are tracking a strange creature they have only found the tracks of, and never seen. The Halfling encampment outside the walls of Brindinsford has been having disappearances and other unpleasantness in the past several days, and the rangers wonder if this creature could be the cause.
At the smithy, Shooma tells Grumble, Audric and Badger that thugs have been running protection rackets and extorting and robbing the merchants in the Chatterstreet Market area for three months now. None have ever been caught by the city guard, but Shooma muses that if these thugs were were-rats, that would explain much. She does not know where such fiends would lair, but it is common knowledge there has always been a rat problem in the town’s central bell tower.
Nialia returns to the inner city grove. Today the feeling of wrongness seems to have cleared in her mind. She feels an alienness about the city, as if two worlds were trying to coexist in the same place. However, the wrongness of the city bothers her less in the grove, and she turns her mind to more pleasant things, like tending the plants with Amrauthlin, with Anealis and Kerrit looking down at their masters from the branches above.