by James "Sir Tao" Murphy
I
arrived at the feast hall early as the Blackwood Clontarf casino had
been invited to set up shop. The hall was perfect for this event.
Obviously the hunters of Fairhaven had been very busy as many trophies
decorated the walls.
Early in the day I had had some business but it
had been light so far. During a break from the tables I happened to be
outside when a small horde of human barbarians showed up and started
swinging at the guests. There appeared to be a servant
of Hel (one “L”) who was nigh indestructible. He was able to throw magic
that would literally freeze us in place. He could also throw lightning
bolts. With him was a (his?) champion who was able to be affected by
normal weapons but when he fell and was raised
by the servant of Hel, also became indestructible (for a short
period). The rest of the horde were very good fighters who could also
freeze us in place. As we could not affect the servant, and sometimes
the champion, we were quickly defeated and apparently
the servant and the horde got bored and walked away into the woods.
We gathered what strength we had and learned that
there was a druid in the woods that probably had more answers to what
happened and what we could do. Before we set off, I asked Edonae for
help with two of the newest fighters (first event)
that were joining us to grant them help. Edonae granted them spirit
armor that they could call for the day. It was weaker than normal armor
but we were taking all the help we could get. As part of the bargain,
Edonae tasked me with presenting five of the most
interesting leaves that I could find in the woods we were about to
enter.
The druid was able to tell us that that there
were three totems scattered along the path and that if we performed certain
things we would be able to affect the servant and win the day. The druid's
first quest was to find a small brown wooden piece
of a magic sphere that had dropped out of her hand into leaves on the
ground (in this we were not successful, she later found it on her own). This
first quest was obviously a portent of things to come.
The druid let us know that we had to
consecrate the ground around each totem. The way to do that was to surround
the totem with salt, “call the directions”, have a person perform a
complicated dance, and then solve a small wooden puzzle.
Well, the message of the order of doing things was
not paid attention to very well. We started to do these things at the
first totem and did them all in the wrong order. Some magic later and we
had the right way to do things. The first one
is always the hardest.
While other people were figuring this out, I was
able to talk to the servant in between him throwing things at me. I
learned he was from Hel, and that my memory of Norse legend was lacking.
(Really? The three-headed dog was not Norse? Crud,
was that finfar? Crud). He finally got tired of throwing things at me
and generally ignored me from then on.
After we had completed the first totem it was
discovered that the person who was supposed to hold on to the small wooden
puzzle pieces had lost some of them in the leaves and the sticks, and
he was not sure where he was when he lost them. So
back to the druid one more time, she was able to sanctify one of the
pieces we had so it would work for the second totem.
At this point with the help of the two fighters
Edonae had blessed with armor, I had gathered the five leaves. I
presented them and was blessed with the ability to cast raise dead once on
everyone that could hear me as well as access
to some seer spells. Using the seer spells, we figured out that the
servant was a servant of Hel and Loki was involved. If instead of
finishing a puzzle at the third and final encounter we instead did some
kind of mischief that would work.
About this time the Druidess had decided to
accompany us on our excursion which was good as she had a lying turtle
that could raise us with its shell. Many things about that sentence I do
not understand. But it was not to be the weirdest
animal-related thing that we did that day.
At this point another spellcaster stepped up and
said that he had a song to Loki written in his spell book. We decided
that would work. It was also about this time that my newly-acquired
abilities from being turned into a troll failed
me. Up to this point a protection that Edonae had granted me had
blocked the effect of being frozen in place. Unfortunately it stopped. (Because I am a darn dirty cheater that thought that resist death would protect me, but this was not a damaging effect.) After some false starts we were able to sanctify
and remove the second totem. At this point I was once again able to cast
a seer spell and find the path that lead to the third and final totem. On the way a few of the members had learned that we needed to go into a swamp to get the “knitted nut,” which they did.
At the final totem much confusion happened. I had
used the salt, but I was unsure if anyone had done the rest of the
steps. Also, the servant and the champion were much more prevalent and
causing problems. We finally got our act together
and were able to sanctify the ground. As soon as that happened we were
all frozen in place and maniacal laughter was heard by all. That is
always a good sign.
The druid told us that while the servant had been
weakened. he still needed to be banished. To do this, we needed to feed
her pet squirrel the “knitted nut,” and throw it at the servant while
saying “Squirrel of Banishment!” Yup, more questions
that I don’t want answered.
The squirrel seemed ok with this plan so we journeyed to where the servant, the champion, and the small horde were. A young helper feed the squirrel and passed it to
me. I walked calmly up to the servant and when he turned his attention
to someone else threw it at his back. Very soon after I was brought down
by the horde and did not see the rest of the
fight. From what I understand from the accounts of others, the
young helper was able to recover the squirrel and throw it at the
servant again at which point he was banished. The champion and the horde
were soon defeated without the servant to raise
them. The squirrel ran back to the druid.
I was back up just in time to enjoy the food,
lots of it. Three different types of soup, breads, several different
types of butter, slow cooked spicy bear, pulled pork, different types of
cottage pie, cupcakes, apple crisps, and snacks galore.
During a break in the food, the Lord stood and offered a toast, and he awarded a box to the mage with the Loki song (whose name I still can’t remember, sorry) for his snazzy garb. A few of the other people graced us with dance, and
I even sang a song.
After that the gambling tables were running again and people left as some had long rides home on their horses.
What you missed was a fun quest, fantastic food, and a good time.