Our Fourth Adventure

It was only a few days before the ball that Lady Tia had invited us to. Druss and Crimson seemed to go somewhat stir crazy in the large town of Waterdeep, perhaps some strange form of agraphobia.

Not interested in balls, atleast not the kind where people dress up in fancy clothes and act civilized and dance, the finesse fighter signed on with the Adventurers Guild in the hopes of some manly action. Druss had come along with him thinking he might join also, however, when asked for his 5 gold joining fee he felt it was ‘a bit rich’ and declined the offer. Thus, leaving Crimson, the only member from our group as a guilded adventurer.

Still needing to have some purpose, Druss took it up0n himself to be my bodyguard at the upcoming ball.

We went to the tailer and I handed over 90 gold for a silk vampire outfit, it was a masquarade ball afterall. Druss wouldn’t get new clothes so the deal of his being my bodyguard was off, I didn’t want to be seen in such circles with an unkempt, unfashionable critter like that. I later sought out a ‘care package’ of manicure, perfumed bath and facial, those long days in the saddle and fighting for ones life, not to mention being bucked by ill tempered horses had taken a terrible toll on my compexion.

Crimson had some problem with a mercenary sword thief, finding that one of his prized Bastard swords was missing. Two deadly slashes and one thrust later the stunned mercenary lay in a crumpled heap begging for his life, “Don’t steal my sword!” Crimson spat. The Mercenary’s leaders show up. Crimson, knowing he couldn’t take all of them weighed up his options. The quick thinking fighter unstoppered one of his potions of healing, opened the mouth of the badly wounded merc and poured all of the contents down this sword stealing throat. The merc, happy to still be alive, apologises for stealing the weapon and hands it back. Impressed by the finesse fighters skill with a blade, and by his actions, the mercenary leader offers Crimson some work, to be part of his own personal guard. Crimson accepts.

As the time drew nearer to the ball, Druss purchased some extraordinarily tight leather pants and oils his upper body like some kind of muscle man, except that usually these kind of professionals shave their hairy chests first, not in this case however. Druss also pays a Dwarven carpenter to start work on fixing our home.

I now smell like lavender and cinnamon.

I hired an ornate carriage, easily the best in Waterdeep, for the evening. Sparkling white, it reflected the night lamps all over its silvery shell. Druss and Randall came along with me.

Our entrances made and some introductions over, we each split up. Druss decided to cruise the room. I think I hear “Go back to where you came from, horrible beast!” not long after I part company from the oily half orc. I try to put such embarrassment out of my mind and make the best of the situation. “I have an invitation”, I hear Druss drawl. Get out of my mind will you!
Giving up on making a good impression I head closer to Druss and all the fuss. “This cant be possible, someone of your disgusting magnitude cannot possibly have been invited to an event such as this!” I heard a nobleman say. Druss puffed himself up and glowered at the slight but arrogant man, and then balled his fists and wound back for a swing. The man seemed to shrink before our very eyes and slipped away into the crowd, never once turning his back on the hairy leather clad fighter.

The fuss over, for the time being, I decide to make my way to Lady Tia whom I felt a ‘connection’ with when we met. I find her in the crowd, it wasn’t difficult, she was a shining star in the heavens, an angel of beauty and properness…or something like that, poetry was the last thing on my mind at that point. “Oh Naiden, come ladies, meet Naiden the one who killed the dragon”, I think at that point I could have taken any one of them home for the night, my sights were set on one however. “Yes, yes its all in the reflexes” I gloated. They sighed like I was some kind of great hero.

Randall of coarse, never one to miss greasing the wheels of the upper clergy, sought out High Priest Naxxus of Tymora. Randall found the man and after introductions were formally made, set about selling himself, “I have been sent into the world to bring the words, the language, the knowledge and the culture of the church of Tymora to the west” he rambled. Then a loud and completely unbidden belch erupted from the pits of his stomach and bubbled out the corner of his mouth ruining all his good work. Pretending that someone had called him, he bid a hasty retreat and went to this imaginary saviour. On his way from embarrasment, he noticed a familiar tatoo on the arm of a man at the ball. It was a tatoo of a skull. His mind began to tick over, his eruption over the High priest already forgotten.

I regale Lady Tia and her blushing friends with a small impromptu song I made up on the spot. It turned out to be the best work of my career and brought tears to all who heard its perfectly lilting phrases.

Randall spies Druss and tells him about the man with the skull tatoo. Randall decides to question this suspicious looking character.

“Get away from me you bore”, replied the white haired man with the skull shaped tatoo after the cleric had tried not very successfully to wheedle some information out of him. The suspicious man then walks up the staircase and dissappears from view.

Randall managed to get my attention for a brief moment, he whispered to me that they had spotted a suspicious character sporting white hair and a skull tatoo. Not seeing a way out of my current company, and not really wanting to find one, I thought compromise was the best solution. It didn’t take much convincing to get an ‘architectural viewing’ of the upper bedrooms. At one point in one of the rooms I thought I saw a shadowy figure just outside of my field of vision. I walked over to the doorway to investigate. After walking to the door and not seeing anything out of place I returned to the waiting arms of my gracious host, Lady Tia.

Some time later I joined my friends downstairs again, my Vampire suit a little worse for wear but otherwise, looking as splendid as usual. Lady Tia went back to the party and I managed to get away for a moment. All three of us tried to get back up the stairs as we hadnt noticed the white haired man come back down. Being a little worn out from my recent antics with Lady Tia I didn’t manage to get past the guard in time and had to remain downstairs. I managed to keep his attention my acting a little drunk, “Ive had a little to mushhh ta dwinky, wereeee be the refwesher woom? Hic!”. Randall and Druss managed to get up the stairs unseen.

Randall and Druss enter one of the rooms. A figure enters, Randall hides but Druss panicked slightly and pretended to be a table. To Randalls surprise the figure leaves without a word, perhaps it thought Druss was some gross taxydermy.

Randall and Druss follow the figure however he appears to be rather fleet of foot and dissapears around a corner. Druss spots him again, it is the white haired man alright.

I happened to look outside, to my horror, my carriage seemed to be leaving without me. I run from the ballroom and run down the road after my carriage, without stopping, Randall reaches out with a meaty paw and hoists me into the speeding carriage. We loose sight of the fleeing man in his carriage briefly but then soon spot him again. We follow the carriage all over town and finally to a dock area, the carriage goes into a forboding building labelled ‘Delahunties Mercantiles’.
Frustrated that we didn’t catch him before he entered his home, Druss tries to argue with the man from the street. After a small pause a voice says, “come this way” and a door swings open.

We walk down a dark long corridor and up some rickety steps, we then find our way to a large dusty study. A figure sits in a large high backed chair. It speaks.

“You seem to be very curious”, it says, “Curiosity can be dangerous……why have you been following me?”

Druss blurts out he first thing that comes into his head, “I reckon you are one of those bastards what hang around with the dead and all!”

“And who are you” the figure states, turning to the hairy greasy half orc.

“A Dragonslayer!” Druss bellows tying his best to be intimidating, as intimidating as a greased up, thight leather pants wearing half orc can be anyway.

The white haired man stands and we think we hear the sound of a weapon being unsheathed at his side.

“We know your employer!”, states Druss

“My employer wishes to remain anonymous”, hisses the man.

We draw our weapons, and I begin a song of battle that will rally my friends into greater feats of heroism.

A battle ensues.

Randall uses his Command spell and the man falls to the ground. I steal his shiny looking rapier and try to finish him off. I sink my new rapier into his side but not deep enough to do the trick. Guards enter and slash at me and the others. Druss ignores the guards prods and lays down the finishing blow onto the prone white haired man.

I cast sleep and one of the guards falls to the ground. The second guard trips on his slumbering friend and I bury my rapier into his unhelmed head, the blade goes deeper than I expected and my guess is buries in his heart.

Druss wields his Sickle with such ferocity it slices through two enemies.

More guards approach, Druss grabs up a heavy oak table like it was a feather and uses it for a shield.

Randall sound blasts more approaching guards to death.

Druss bends down and loots a ring off the body of the white haired man. The bewitched creation speaks directly to the dull witted half orcs mind, “You have meddled too much in my affairs, you will all die!”

Druss decides its time to leave and gathers up the table shield again and burst through the door with it.

I spy some archers and cast sleep on them. One remains standing and Druss, ever the improviser, rips a hefty leg off the table and throws it with a great roar at the archer. The archer, stunned from what he had just witnessed, didn’t think to move out of the way of the wooden torpedo and pays the price, he slumps to the ground with a gaping wound in his skull.

We make good our escape before more endless guards spew out of hidden corners of the dusty old building.

Upon entering the carriage, we notice that our driver has been killed, an interesting dilemma presents itself. Before we have time to visit our thoughts on this conundrum three more evil doers step out from behind the carriage, probably the ones who murdered our driver. Seeing this as an opportunity to test out my shiney new rapier I thrust it deeply into the chest of one of the ruffians who presented himself as a convenient target, he collapses groping a spurting hole in his chest that was not there before, “seems to work just fine” I muse to myself. With that I toss my old Mithril rapier to Randall since my replacement seems to work even better. Druss dispatches the second attacker without a second thought as does Randall with his new Rapier.

Atlast, time to think. I feel that our biggest mistake hereafter was overthought however. Do we take the coach driver and coach away or leave them both here? Can they trace the hire of the coach to us? Do we have any proof that the guy we just killed was evil?

In the end after a heated debate we drive the carriage to what we consider to be a perfect location, and hotfoot it down the road while the drivers body is left slumped over the front of the carriage. No sooner do we exit the coach however as a voice seemingly out of no-where says, “You cant park that here!”. Randall attempts to diffuse the situation and almost drops us in the deep end however I smooth things over and we get back inside the coach and drive off, the guard none the wiser that its driver has been throttled by evil doers.

A little concerned now that we will be caught with our pants down so to speak we pick up the pace. Careening around a corner the wheel picks an inopportune moment to break. We come to a halt rather quickly and a thougth pops into my mind. “We should make it look like the wheel broke and the driver met his doom by falling amongst the horses”

I position the driver in a way that I think looks plausable for just that situation and trot off down the road pleased with myself. I then realise that no-one is following me. I run in the other direction where the others went.

Finally we arrive home and try and get a nights sleep.

We wake the following morning, not to the sounds of angry guards beating down our door to haul us off to prison but to the usual sounds of a busy city.

Crimson’s merchant caravan is attacked by highwaymen. He slays five of them and saves the merchant himself. He is gifted 100 gold by a greatful merchant. Some days later Goblins assail the caravan and again Crimson puts in a good showing. Rendall Harmon the merchant is most impressed with the finesse fighter. Crimson is away on this mission for a total of four weeks.

In the four weeks of peace we have from the continuous spouting of his prowess we find the time to visit Wunderstaff in the Magic Academy where he has been studying. We also have more fittings for our Dragon Armor.

Druss sold the ring and bracelet that he grabbed of the still warm body of the slain Necromancer sympathiser. Now we have enough to fix our home and we set about hiring the appropriate staff for just such a task.

I put some time into researching the unique Skull symbol we saw on the necromancer. It is a sigil that is of an evil bortherhood based in Skullport.

Finally the Dragon Armor is completed and I must say we look rather fetching in our matching bright red armor.

Some weeks later the repairs on our home are completed and have stables built also. We shop around for a good quality buttler who is trustworthy. We buy good quality furniture for the house including the ten bedrooms, stables, basement and cellar.

We decide after some discussion, not much discussion really…that we will leave the Master Necromancer to his own devices for the time being. We are sure its for the better.

Crimson finally arrives back and we swap stories of our exploits. Conversation running dry after not much time at all we decide to set forth for further adventures. For some reason we actually listen to a suggestion of Sander Wunderstaff’s that there is possibly some ruins located at the Spine of the World Mountains. Apparently they have been dubbed the Ruins of No Return, which left me wondering that if that were truly the case how would they have a name at all.

Adventrue ho!