Reaping 20th: The group decides to leave Sunless Citadel, lugging the body of Sharwyn to take back to the Hucreles. On their way up, the citatel seems strangely deserted... not a Kobold in sight. However, just before exiting the citadel they are accosted by what appear to be most of the remaining kobolds. Yusdrayl tells the party that they cannot leave, as they know too much about where the kobolds live. The party asks what happened to Meepo. She laughs and says that he and few others tried to rebel against the group and were killed. She then demands the party surrender and give up their weapons. The party, of course, refuses, and a pitched battle ensues. The majority of the kobolds are dealt with easily, but Yusdrayl causes a few problems, releasing a group of skeletons waiting in an alcove the party didn't explore, then dashing outside while the party deals with the skeletons. The group plays hide and seek with her for a bit before Tara uses her familiar to determine that she's hiding atop the partially-destroyed walls of the building itself, having spider climbed up there. With a few well aimed shots, the group takes her down (literally, splat!).

After recovering and searching the bodies, the group finds a key that looks to open the locked door with the keyhole in the dragon mouth. It does, and the party briefly explores further. They encounter a room that looks like a large gameboard with stone statues for pieces, and then a large pit that proves to be a bit of a challenge to navigate. Opposite the pit is a room with a sarcophagus. The party has a brief fight with the imp guardian of the room before it flees, warning them that they have doomed themselves to the wrath of the "dragon priest".

The meaning of this becomes all too clear when they open the sarcophagus. Inside is a troll, preserved somehow and wearing priestly ceremonial gear. It viciously attacks the party. After several harrowing rounds of combat in which the party discover its nasty regenerative properties, they manage to slay the creature and loot the chamber.

Deciding enough is enough, the party leaves the Citadel and returns to Oakhurst. The journey is made without incident, and the party receives a hero's welcome, and the Hucreles, while saddened by the death of their children, are glad that the party was able to return Sharwyn's body and Talgen's ring. They are paid twice the fee commissioned, and invited to attend the funeral. The town mayor is likewise impressed with the characters, as they have rid the town of the pesky goblins and a possible kobold threat. There's still the issue of rogue twig blights roaming the countryside (from previous plantings of the apples obtained from the goblins), but disaster seems to have been averted. Later, while attending the Hucrele's funeral, Kerowyn Hucrele gives them a lead that Baron Althon, an associate of hers in the nearby town of Blasingdell might have a job for them, if they're available. The party thanks her, and they part having obtained the goodwill of the Hucrele clan and the town in general.

They first visit Elakshi's monastery, where his tutor lies dying. They feed him the apple, and, as described, it completely cures him of the wasting disease. The core is kept, and brought to Tara's college of wizardry, where they can study it. Although Richter was originally commissioned to find the apple, the temple of Boccob is much more interested in the violet magical amulet with the conch-sigil found on the body of Belak in the Sunless Citadel. The temple has a good relationship with the college of wizardry (both highly involved in the study of the arcane), and often swap items for study. After a week, the temple and the college will trade, allowing the temple to study the apple and the college to study the amulet.

The party, having no other pressing assignments, gets leave to investigate the lead given to them by Kerowyn Hucrele. They make off for Blasingdell, about a day's walk north. They find Baron Althon's estate just outside of town: a sprawling ranch with a good-sized house set back from the main road. They are greeted at the front door by the Baron himself, who welcomes them inside. He explains that he is looking to commission a party to locate several lost blades of great historical interest and value to add to his collection. According to legend, one hundred years ago the great dwarven smith Durgeddin the Black held a secret stronghold called the Glitterhame, located beneath a rocky hill named the Stone Tooth. The fortress was raided by an enemy army of orc tribes; all the dwarves within were slain, and the fortress looted. While various goblinoid bands have inhabited the fortress since then, rumors still abound regarding the legendary blades that are still located in the fortress.

Althon shows the party the dwarven smith's mark (a rune looking vaguely like a D), and tells them he is willing to pay 500 gold pieces above market value for each recovered blade with the marking; the group can keep whatever other spoils they find. The party thinks this is a fair commission, and accepts the offer.

SESSION ENDS 7/?/01

SESSION BEGINS 9/23

Begins Reaping 22nd

The unlikely heroes spend a night in Blasingdell at the Griffon's Nest inn, and make their preparations, purchasing basic supplies to travel north to the Stone Tooth. The night passes uneventfully, and in the morning they set off. It is about three days' travel, through the forest and fieldlands to the north of the town. Being off the main road, the party encounters no travelers, and eventually spot a steep, tall hill rising to a prominent bare knob of rock-- the Stone Tooth. A thin spire of smoke rises from some unseen point high on the hill's slopes, and the party makes out a steep, narrow road or track that runs back and forth across the face of the mountainside. The party decides to take this road, following its widing path up the side of the hill.

After an hour or so, the path climbs up one last steep switchback toward a bare shoulder of rock. The hillside climbs up steeply on the party's right and drops away precipitously on their left. Scattered about lie debris and rubbish, confirming the idea that the place is inhabited. A wide ledge is formed ahead before doubling back into the side of the mountainside. The party notices two bestial humanoids in scale armor standing there, looking more or less over the valley below. They don't immediately notice the party, and the party overhears them speaking. They speak a gutteral language, and Elakshi understands it: they are orcs. Tara and Richter quietly drop back around the corner, while Minaret and Elakshi creep up to try and quietly dispatch the two guards. Unfortunately Elakshi steps on a piece of debris, and the two look over and shout, "Hey!" Quickly, Minaret rushes up and slashes at one. It falls over the edge of the cliff with a shriek, and Elakshi bounds up and breaks the neck of the other. The others move forward quickly, but no other guards immediately appear. Cautiously the party moves into the entrance.

A long tunnel with climbs upward, leading to an entry hall where a set of steps lead up to a pair of large stone doors standing ajar. The doors are enough apart for the party to slip through the gap. Beyond is a large chamber lit by torches on either side of the entrance. A wide chasm lies in the center of this room, spanned by a dangerous-looking rope bridge. The far side of the chasm is in darkness, but the group can barely make out two natural stone pillars and some other door exiting the chamber. Elakshi starts across the bridge, but quickly two orcs begin firing arrows from the far side, hiding behind the pillars. Minaret and Elakshi cross the bridge to engage them, and Tara starts across, when several more orcs emerge from secret doors on the lit side. A dangerous crossfire ensues, but with the help of several celestial badgers summoned by Tara and a spiritual weapon conjured by Richter, the rear guard is driven back while Elakshi and Minaret take out the guards on the far side. The group quickly makes it to the far side and moves through the door. Beyond they find a tunnel leading to an intersection of cave-like tunnels. In one of these they discover two human prisoners of the orcs. Naming themselves Geradil and Courana, these two farmers are brother and sister, and were apparently abducted by the orcs during a raid. They plead with the party to free them. Minaret obliges by picking the lock, but the party is unwilling to accompany them out. They do draw out a brief map of the path to the exit, and try to give them enough information to escape. Thanking the party, the two make a break for their freedom.

Following the network of tunnels for a bit, the party wanders about, finding a room with a large cookfire, whose smoke escapes through a large chimmney in the ceiling (apparently the source of the smoke they spotted earlier). They then find a storeroom containing a well and numerous boxes, crates, barrels, and other goods that look to have been stolen on raids. A tunnel to the south leads to a dead-end; a secret door is easily located, which the party opens and passes through.

Beyond is a hallway leading to another secret door; beyond the second door the party finds a room with a smoky cooking fire and numerous skulls suspended from the ceiling by fraying ropes. Three female orcs stand ready, one of which wears a ragged black robe. A battle breaks out: two of the females fight with the party, while the black-robed orc casts spells at Richter. The three are defeated, and though Richter succumbs to a fear spell, he is collared and subdued until it wears off. Searching the room seems to indicate the robed orc was a cleric of Gruumsh, god of the orcs.

To the north the party enters a large, open chamber. The far end of the chamber is blackened and charred, and several burnt skeletons and axe-blades without handles lie near a door exiting north. An iron gate blocked with straw pallets lies west, and in the center of the room a large rift exists with stairs leading down. A faint buzzing noise can be heard from the rift. Richter moves to explore the rift. The buzzing noise grows louder, and out fly four small creatures that resemble a cross between a bat and a mosquito. Their small size is deceiving: two of them batten on Richter, draining an alarming amount of blood. Two are shot down, but crawl on the ground towards the cleric. The other party members rush out to try and stamp the creatures out, but they are nimble even near death, and manage to lock on to Minaret and Elakshi with their proboscii, draining them before expiring from the effort. Meanwhile, the other creatures detach from Richter and fly off, seeming to have drink their fill of Richter's blood. They are brought down as well. Badly weakened, the party decides to spend the night in the hallway leading to the orc shaman's room.

Reaping 23rd

The next morning the party heals up, and decides to venture down the rift in the chamber to the north. The steps go down a long ways, bypassing a small stream running into a fissure to the north and then running along the wall of a large open cavern. This area of the underground complex is quite beautiful, consisting of glittering gemstones and natrual rock formations. Unfortunately, the beauty is decieving: the party is surprised by four more of the winged blood-sucking creatures that fly down suddenly from the high ceiling above.They group is further weakened, only managing to dispatch one of the creatures while the rest drink their fill and fly off. They are in pretty poor shape, but since they just rested they decide to press on, despite their weakened condition. This proves to be disasterous.

Following a passage exiting the large cavern to the northeast, the party enters another irregular chamber with many exits and some sort of caged area at the far end. A heavy animal smell lingers in the air, and below that the scent of something fouler. Before the party can act, two creatures suddenly detach themselves from the walls where they had been hiding chameleon-like. They appear to be bipedal lizards armed with javelins and longspears: troglodytes!. They emit a nauseating stench that strongly affects poor Richter (already severely weakened from blood loss). One of the creatures launches a javelin at the party, while the other rushes to the cage to the north. As the party engages in combat, the second trog opens the cage and the party hears a low, savage growl of something VERY BIG. A large, furry brown shape barrels suddenly from the cage, charging the group: a vicious, hungry-looking brown bear! The trogs quickly become the least of the party's worries, as the bear causes horrifying amounds of damage with its claws and bite. Things look bad for the party, with Elakshi unconscious, Minaret nearly so. As the bear moves in to devour Richter (who has just prevented Elakshi from dying), Minaret frantically cries out in common and undercommon, "We surrender!" The trogs pause, training their spears on Minaret and Tara, while the bear growls and bares its teeth inches from Richter's face. One trog croaks to Minaret to throw all her equipment, including her clothing to the floor; she obliges. The other trog shouts for Tara to do the same, but Tara is not ready to surrender: she casts invisibility. Immediately the trog barks a command, and the bear lunges forward, bowling over Richter and racing towards Tara. But Tara gets the drop and vanishes, and the bear swipes at empty air. It still has her scent, however, and as Tara flees madly up the steps to the upper level the bear gives chase, roaring. The moment the bear leaves, Minaret and Richter turn on their captors, fighting desperately. Elakshi is revived, and the fierce battle resumes.

Tara, meanwhile, runs past the stream on up the steps, the bear right on her heels. She is hit twice, but her invisibility helps her dodge several blows and keeps her ahead of the angry animal. She wills up a last burst of energy and runs as fast as she can. Gasping, she races out the rift in the upper chamber and into the shaman's room. She quickly turns, expecting to be mauled. The bear is nowhere to be seen: it must have given up the chase. She rests for a moment, catching her breath and trying to decide what to do next.

She decides to investigate the doorway in the rift chamber where the charred bodies lie. Unfortunately, the cause of their demise becomes all too clear, as she accidentally triggers an ancient trap that covers her with alchemists fire! The hapless mage, being all alone, is consumed by the firey substance and expires.

The rest of the party manages to take out the remaining troglodytes and quickly hides in the bear cage. Not a moment too soon, for the bear returns. It angrily tries to attack them through the bars of the cage, but after being peppered by multiple slings and other missile fire, it quits and lopes off. It takes quite a while before the party, very low on resources and near death, summons enough courage to venture forth from the cage. They retreat back up the stairs unassailed, where they discover Tara's body. They haul it back into the orc shaman's room, and hole up there for several days, blocking both exits.

Reaping 26th

After resting for three days unassaulted, the party hears shouting orc voices coming from the entrance to their room. The door is beat upon, and the party readies for battle. The door flies open, and the party faces a human male, bearing several swords and breathing heavily. He warns that several orcs are hot on his trail. Sure enough, quickly five orcs come charging in after the lone human. However, they are not prepared to encounter the entire party, and are dispatched easily.

After the battle, the newcomer introduces himself as Fletcher, a ranger from the North who came to investigate the deaths of some friends: a family he knew was slain by the orc raiders. He tracked the raiders here by himself, and was attacked and quickly outnumbered. He was fleeing deeper into the complex to hide and possibly take them out by stealth when he ran into the party. The group offers to join forces, and the ranger agrees that this would be wise.

Deciding to take care of the orc threat first, the party delays venturing further into the caverns below and explores more of the upper level. They run into no orcs immediately, but do find a statue that is trapped (Minaret finds and disarms it). Near the statue is a door with a skull on it. The group tries to force it open, but it takes multiple attempts and makes quite a racket. Thus the inhabitants of the room are ready for the party: a great ogre, with two pet wolves! The ogre, named Great Ulfe and apparently the leader of the orc tribe, engages the party in combat, doing huge amounts of damage with his axe while the wolves cunningly trip up opponents. The heroes carry the day however, and the chief and his two pets are slain. This battle has taken another huge toll on the party, so they rest up again for two more days.

Reaping 28th

The party is undisturbed while resting in the room (they shut the door, despite the horrid stench of the ogre's domicile); however, they do hear occasional hushed voices and movements of orcs in the passage beyond. When the group emerges again from the room, they find the complex deserted of orcs; many rooms that must have been barracks appear to have been deserted quite suddenly. Finally, they find a large barracks room where they encounter the remaining twelve orcs awaiting them all together, along with the second-in-command, an orc cleric. A long, drawn-out battle ensues. Fletcher proves himself to be quite skilled in combat, wielding his longsword and shortsword simultaneously in a flurry of blades. The orc cleric does substantial damage with spells before he is wounded to the point where he flees through a secret door from the chamber. At the end, three orcs are still alive, and only Fletcher remains on his feet, near death himself. However, a pile of bodies surrounds him, and the orcs, having seen him dispatch four creatures in less than a minute, decide that it's a stand-off. They sneer that the ranger will die alone, and escape out the back. Fletcher doesn't think to follow them, but quickly binds the remaining party members' wounds and drags them back yet again to the stinking ogre's chamber where they can recuperate.

Goodmonth 2nd

After another two days worth of recovery, the party sets forth again. It becomes apparent that the orcs have abandoned the fortress, as no more are encountered. The party does find a gnome named Erky Timbers, who was held prisoner by the orcs. He doesn't know anything about the rest of the fortress, having been abducted by a raid on the main road some miles west. He thanks the party for freeing him and departs.

SESSION ENDS 9/23/01

SESSION BEGINS 11/17/01

The group decides to resume exploring the lower caverns. They cautiously descend the stairs (again being attacked by stirges), and follow the side passage where the stream runs down to the bear's chamber. There are no sign of the trogs, and the cavern is quiet. They attempt to pass through the chamber, when suddenly a loud clatter of metal objects falling to the ground alters them. The bear cage has been opened, though no troglodyte can be seen. What can be heard, however, is the growl of the now-awakened bear within the cage! It rushes forward to attack the party once again. This time the party has better luck, and after taking a few nasty hits from the bear, they manage to slay the fierce beast.

After investigating, it appears the bear cage was booby-trapped so that opening the cage would cause a pile of scrap metal to crash to the ground, awakening the bear. The question is, who set off the trap? Fletcher uses his tracking ability, and follows a pair of reptile-like tracks back to a stream in the chamber containing the staircase leading down to this level. The stream appears to submerge beneath the western wall. The party figures that their unseen assailant must have come from this direction; however, they decide to defer further investigation until they have explored more of the cavern.

Moving north and east, they enter a large area containing many sarcophogi with dwarven runes on them. Of course the party must investigate these, as they're searching for dwarven blades. Fearfully they open one of the sarcophogi. Fortunately, luck is with them: the sarcophagus is not trapped, and the occupant (a crumbling dwarven skeleton) does not attack them. What's more, entombed with the skeleton is a masterwork warhammer bearing Durgeddin's mark. Feeling like they're finally getting somewhere, the party eagerly scoops it up and begins overturning all the other sarcophagi. While no traps are set off and they are not attacked, only two of the other sarcophagi contain remains, and none of them have weapons.

The edge of the sarcophagus area is a drop off into a huge chamber illuminated by many glowing fungi and mushrooms, with a path running down the middle. Not trusting either the path or the fungus, the part weaves its way across the chamber north of the path. They are approaching a large iron door at the east end when they are attacked suddenly by two hideous, many-tentacled creatures hidden in a rocky slope to the north. These creatures prove to be very difficult to defeat, employing the rocks as cover and ignoring blows from all but magical weapons. Elakshi, Fletcher, then Richter are taken down, and one of the creatures remains. Minaret, who is near unconsciousness, is startled by a sudden voice behind her asking if she needs any help. She quickly looks behind her to see a large looking fighter type wearing shiny half-plate and wielding a massive greataxe. She frantically tells him to engage the creature while she heals her companions. The fighter shrugs and wades in on the creature with his mighty blade, slicing it up quickly with only a few blows.

After the others are revived, they express their gratitude to the newcomer and ask if he'd like to join their party. He names himself Ian McLaren, and he's apparently come for reasons similar to the party, to seek the blades of Durgeddin, and readily joins forces with the group. The party rests up for a day and then continues exploring.

Goodmonth 3rd

The door that they discovered at the east end of the illuminated chamber is massive, made of iron, and quite locked. Knowing better than to try breaking it down, Richter uses a knock spell to open the door. Beyond, a stair descends into a room with three ominous-looking statues. From beyond one of the room exits, the faint ringing sound of a hammer on anvil can be heard. Nervous about this, the party decides to continue exploring the level above before advancing further here.

Returning to the level above, the group explors a passage to the north, discovering a chamber with two skeletons covered in a yellowish, dusty mold. In the arms of one of the skeletons is a large gleaming sword. Fletcher's background in wilderness lore warns that this might be yellow mold, a particularly deadly form of fungus when disturbed. The group decides that while the sword is probably one of the blades they're looking for, they will come back later for it.

Exploration to the south leads to an underground stream, possibly the same one they saw earlier. They follow it upstream to find out; along the way they encounter a side-chamber where a lizard lies chained just out of reach of two chests. After somewhat botching an attempt at charming the beast, the group engages in combat with it. It's hardly defenseless, as it has a ten-foot-long sticky tongue to contend with. The party manages to defeat it, however, and finds some silver pieces and a couple potions in the chest. Continuing along the stream, they enter another large chamber. Before they can advance further, two troglodytes appear and attack the party, again emmitting a noisome stench. However, without a bear as backup, they are quickly taken care of by the party.

Further searching of the chamber reveals a door constructed of mud, which is broken down without too much effort. A narrow passage leads south, where they discover what must the lair of the troglodytes (the ceiling is only 5 feet in height). Their leader is a sorcerer commanding a giant lizard. However, what he has is magic power he makes up for in a lack of tactics. The troglodytes attack en-masse, but the party intelligently uses the entry tunnel as a bottleneck, and Ian shows quick reflexes, mowing the trogs down as they advance. The sorcerer and his lizard are soon dealt with as well. Within the group finds twelve trog hatchlings, which Minaret cheerfully dispatches (much to Fletcher's displeasure).

They then follow the stream leading to the trog lair in the opposite direction, and discover it opens into a slippery pool before falling into a sinkhole. The party discovers a stairway leading down, and find it emerges into a chamber into which the water from the sinkhole plunges into a swiftly-moving underground river. Two doors lead to a series of rooms containing nothing but debris and a dangerous gray ooze (which the party successfully detects and avoids). To the south is a stone bridge, but Richter doesn't trust it, and after debating a bit the party decides to return again to the level above and pursue the blade they discovered earlier. After some puzzling about how to avoid the fungus, they decide to employ magic to fetch the sword from the skeleton's grasp while outside the range of the deadly stuff. The blade indeed bears the mark of Durgeddin, bringing their booty count to two.

SESSION ENDS 11/17/01 --