"'I hate the Swamp!'"Telryn's whining has become so regular you could tell time by it. Not that you can blame him. The more you explore this cursed swamp, the more you are horrified by the corruption it contains."
"At least you stuck a blow against evil by collapsing that hellish pit. Thank the Goddess you didn't have to crawl down there.
"But as you watch the twisted landscape pass by, you know that you've only scratched the surface of the horror that is the Mourning Marshes.
"Everyone is soaked through, and those not actively rowing are shivering within their mudstained clothes. Madriel's light, it will be good to be sitting by a roaring fire, sipping mulled wine, safe from Ratmen, stirges, and the other foul things of the swamp. Only about 150 miles till we reach Vesh..."
Corday, Belsamer 1, 150AV. The sun is shining for the first time in days, though it is still quite cold. To the west, the swamp looks as un-inviting as ever. The web-covered trees are behind us, but we can still see the foreboding rock spire. To the east, it looks like a storm may be brewing. Just to the north of us, we see what looks like a bunch of shoals. Chuck looks at the rocks and says they look very sharp. He and Goldpetal say that the storm is likely to come in fast. Miriel suggests going on, but the rest of the party says we should put in to shore. It would be easy to row inland, as the swamp reaches down to the shore. We turn west. Miriel casts a Lesser Restoration on herself, now that she is somewhat recovered and rested.
Goldpetal suggests watching for water creatures. Miriel says we should have Goldpetal make the tree fort, and tie the boat to several trees, in case the storm hits hard. When we pull the boat ashore, Chuck looks around to make sure there are no obvious dangers, and says it looks pretty good, given that we're in the swamp. Goldpetal casts his tree house, and Telryn casts a force shield inside, to keep the wind and rain out. Chuck turns the bottom of the boat to the east and lashes it to the trees. Miriel asks Chuck to clean her and her clothes, and this reminds him that it's been a while since he was clean, so he cleans both of them.
Miriel sets out some sourdough starter to warm and rise by the fire, rests an hour, then kneads it into bread and leaves that to rise for a couple more hours. About that time, the storm hits, and a few hours after that it has passed, but now it is dark out, though it's just past the full moon and the moon is very bright. Paks lays hands on Telryn to heal some minor wounds. He seems to enjoy it a little too much. Miriel puts the loaves of bread on to bake.
Chuck takes a watch with Telryn to watch the boat. Goldpetal casts Fire Eyes on Chuck, allowing him to see in the dark, and Chuck discovers that during the storm a tree has fallen on the boat and smashed it. Darmaon rests by the fire, complaining that there's no good spice beer. Miriel casts Bread of Life on the two loaves of bread, and finally gets to sleep. Near the end of his watch, Chuck notices a light to the northwest. It's not far away, maybe 100 yards, and it is not moving.
Chuck nudges Telryn, pointing out the light, which Telryn has already seen. They try to decide whether or not to wake us up, and finally decide to wake Goldpetal. Goldpetal pokes his head out and takes a look - it looks like a globe, hanging close to the earth and surrounded by reeds. He confers with Telryn - they think it has the same glow of phosphorous gas, but this is a very bright globe, the size of a small melon. They keep watching it for an hour, and nothing happens, so Telryn says get someone else to watch it, as he's going to bed. Chuck and Goldpetal agree that it's not doing anything to us, so we might as well leave it alone. Telryn asks to be woken up an hour before light. Miriel wakes up and takes the second watch with Goldpetal.
Late in the second watch, there is a blinding double flash from the globe, then it goes quiet again. Goldpetal looks more closely and sees that there is a bat-like thing flapping against it, then falling to the ground. Darmaon wakes up to take the next watch with Goldpetal. At dawn, the globe fades out. Goldpetal explains to all of us how it acted. Telryn studies while Goldpetal examines the boat to see if it can be mended, but it turns out to be smashed in such a way that it is not reasonable to repair it. Chuck and Goldpetal discuss reconnoitering, then notice that Darmaon has already gone across the water, taking an oar in case it got deep, to the little island where the globe was. He doesn't find anything interesting, just a circle of flattened reeds. The water never gets more than three feet deep.
Chuck, Paks, and Goldpetal consult maps and we discuss how to get out of the swamp. After examining the terrain, Chuck suggests building a raft. As preparations begin, Telryn casts Secure Shelter and goes to study at the desk in the little cottage that appears. As the raft is being built, Miriel goes for a short walk to stretch and hears a thrashing sound to the west. It sounds like there is something really big in the reeds. As she heads back to the party, she thinks she might hear a shout. Everyone stops to listen, and we can now all hear the sounds of thrashing, and a voice barking commands. It's hard to tell how far away it would be in the fog. Telryn says someone needs to go check it out, and Darmaon and Chuck volunteer. Paks begins to put on her armor. Darmaon and Chuck advance with bows drawn. Telryn casts Mage Armor on himself. Goldpetal keeps working on the raft, with Miriel's help. She encourages Telryn to help as well. He says he doesn't know anything about rafts.
Darmaon and Chuck rush back, saying we have about 20 minutes before at least 20 disease rat men arrive; they're beating through the reeds towards us. Paks suggests walking, Telryn suggests flying. Chuck cuts the rope holding the raft together and spreads the logs around, to leave no signs of us. Telryn dismisses the hut. Goldpetal says he can cast Pass Without Trace on us. Telryn suggests leaving a false trail first. We head northeast. With Goldpetal and Chuck's wilderness lore, we make good progress. After about half an hour, we hear noises to the south of us, rat men yelling to each other that they've found tracks. The shouts go up and down the line, which is still close to us. After two more hours, we seem to have left them behind. Goldpetal has cast another Pass Without Trace on us. We move on a bit more, and hear no more sounds of them. Telryn keeps an eye out for a scrying sensor.
We reduce speed and keep walking. Miriel says again that we should fly. We're walking in a field of reeds, with knee-deep water. It's reedy and muddy. Telryn hates the swamp. We plod on, avoiding quicksand and other dangers with the wilderness skills of Chuck and Goldpetal. After walking for some hours, Miriel suddenly feels something against her leg. "Hey!" As she shouts, two tentacles come out of the water and try to grab her. At the same time, two try to grab Goldpetal. One tentacle hits each of them. It burns them. We see some sort of creature near the surface, about 10 feet away.
We see one of the creatures swim around and lash out at Paks, while the other two attack Goldpetal again. The two miss Goldpetal, one hits Paks. Paks swings at the creature that attacked her, but the water distorts her aim. She swings again, but misses again. Miriel watches for someone to need help. Telryn moves back 15 feet. Darmaon shifts to keep himself between Telryn and the monster. Chuck pulls out Hoarfrost ("Hoarfrost!") and moves forward to attack a creature. He his it. Goldpetal steps forward and swings with his scimitar.
The creature attacking Paks swings with two tentacles and tries to bite her. It hits her, and she's paralyzed. Miriel charges forward and stabs at it with her spear. She stabs it hard. Telryn summons three fiendish crocodiles. Two bite and one aims a tail slap at the creature Miriel attacked. The bites both hit, and it dies. The last crocodile heads for the other creature. Darmaon goes underwater and tries to see what he can discover, but it's very muddy and hard to see. Chuck swings Hoarfrost and hits the last creature, slicing it in half.
Telryn sends the crocodiles off ahead of us. Goldpetal asks Miriel about Paks' paralysis, and she says it is poison, and probably temporary; she thinks it will wear off in 15 minutes or so. Darmaon and Telryn drag Paks onto dry land. Chuck starts searching the tentacles, trying to find the poison glands.
Miriel hands out chunks of bread to the party; it heals and fills us. Goldpetal casts Pass Without Trace again and we move on, taking advantage of the few hours of light left. As it grows dark, we find a clear spot and have Telryn create another small hut. Chuck sets a watch. Miriel sets out more dough to rise. Telryn begins detecting magic on objects we have acquired on our travels. He opens a small box, and it goes completely dark in the room. He closes it, and the light comes back on. "Sorry, guys!" Chuck perks up when he notices the duck. Before Miriel goes off watch, she completes the bread and casts Bread of Life on the two loaves.
While watching, Paks and Goldpetal hear rat men shouting off in the distance. Paks offers to wake everyone, climbs down off the roof, and gets us all to get ready. Telryn casts Mage Armor on himself. Goldpetal listens to see if the sounds are coming closer. It's hard to tell for sure, but it sounds like there are a lot of rat men coming. He looks that way and can see some torches in the distance. It's nearly dawn, so we decide to just get going. Telryn dismisses the shelter. Goldpetal casts Pass Without Trace again. Miriel passes out chunks of bread to everyone.
There are minor incidents as we travel, but nothing of real note. Near the end of the day, Telryn casts Fly and Invisibility on Darmaon so that he can scout the area. He warns Darmaon against attacking anything, as he will then be visible.
As he flies south, Darmaon sees a camp full of rat men, more than he can count. Maybe 500. The leader, his face covered in a long scar, is riding a horserat. Around his neck are 5 amber mediallions. Darmaon notices that it's very similar to the one that Chuck wears.
He decides to see if he can steal one of the medallions to take it back to Chuck. Invisible, he swoops down and easily lifts it off the ratman, but as he does so, the horserat smells him, and bites his leg, leaving a nasty gash. Darmaon flys back to camp and shows the medallion to the party.
Chuck asks to see it, and he recognizes it as Jim's Vigilant medallion. Chuck is very upset by this, but takes the medallion and puts it on. Miriel notices that Darmaon is bleeding and gives him a chunk of bread. She asks him how it happened and he says he was bitten by a horse rat. She questions and examines him further to be satisfied that he's not poisoned or diseased. The trackers say that now there is a trail to us, and we'd better leave. Goldpetal suggests leaving a false trail first, then change direction.
It's slow going and hard to tell how much progress we're making, but we do move on steadily. It grows dark, but there is still moonlight to see by. We continue on until Goldpetal can no longer cast spells. Goldpetal gets Telryn to cast Fly and Invisibility on him so he can go scout.
As we're sitting around the campfire, Paks notices Telryn's pack disappear. Paks says "Goldpetal, is that you?" Chuck listens to see if he can hear who it is. Paks feels around where the backpack was to see if it is there. It appears at Chuck's feet. Paks: "Goldpetal, why aren't you talking to us?" Goldpetal tells us that he found the army, sliced open his arm to draw blood to draw them off in the wrong direction, then ate his bread to heal himself. He says that they seem to have lost our trail. He also saw a small patrol of Red Witches to the East, which we have seen before - Sysy's tribe. We consider if we can set the two tribes against each other.
We settle down to rest, keeping watch carefully for an ambush. We rest for a couple of hours, then decide to march on. We travel east for 3 and a half hours, managing to travel about five miles. We hear something up ahead; it sounds like rat men, pretty much due east. As we look harder, we notice that they have a big bonfire going. It looks to be about half a mile away. Paks advises circling around them. Miriel suggests flying. Paks agrees. Telryn casts Fly on all of us but Goldpetal, who Chuck ties to his back (back to back) with the climbing rope.
As we fly over the rat man camp, we see that there are about fifty of them, Red Witches. Looking down at them, Chuck recognizes Sysy, and he sees her looking at a pool of water and talking to it. We can't see more, and fly on for another hour, then we settle down to rest after the flight. Chuck unties Goldpetal. Miriel tells everyone to eat their bread. She creates fresh water to fill everyone's water skins. We rest all night. Just before dawn, around 6am, Paks and Darmaon hear the voice of what sounds like a small child, calling for help. They wake everyone up, and Paks tells Goldpetal to lead us there. Miriel says a real child would not be out here in the swamp, and that she's going back to sleep. The cries continue as we discuss it. Miriel says it's clearly a trap, and she's staying put. Chuck stays to guard her. The rest, led by Paks, head towards the sounds. Goldpetal changes into panther form. Paks casts a Bull's Strength on herself.
As they cautiously move through the reeds, they find a small island with trees. The trees are standing up out of the water, and there is a child up in a tree. He appears to be a human child, and there is a big boa constrictor wrapped around him, which he is trying to fight off. Paks does a Detect Evil and determines that the child is evil. Darmaon says we have to save the snake from the evil child. Goldpetal says it's a natural snake and a natural child. Chuck and Miriel hear some giggling in the reeds just behind them. Chuck moves towards the giggling with his bow drawn; Miriel shouts out "Come back here, we're under attack!"
Darmaon takes a shot at the snake and child, then runs back towards Miriel. Paks advances towards the snake and child. Darmaon's arrow hits the snake.
Telryn heads back for Chuck and Miriel. Paks turns and sees what she can see behind her, but all she can see are reeds. She heads back towards Chuck and Miriel. Darmaon keeps running back. Miriel casts a Fire Shield on herself. Chuck moves towards the giggling again, and thinks he hears a splash behind the reeds. He puts his bow away and draws his sword, watching the reeds. Goldpetal races back to Chuck and Miriel.
Telryn keeps heading back. Paks turns around and heads back to the trees. Darmaon turns around and takes another shot at the child and snake. He hits the snake again. Miriel moves over towards Chuck and looks into the reeds, but can't see anything. Chuck moves towards the reeds and tries to hack at them with his sword, but all he sees are more reeds. Goldpetal keeps moving back towards Chuck and Miriel.
Telryn keeps moving. Paks gets to the tree and looks to see if the child is human, but as she gets to the tree, the snake slithers off the child and attacks her, but misses. The child leaps off the tree and runs away. Paks feels that the mud she is standing on is really sticky, and it burns her feet. The snake tries to bite her, fails, and tries to grapple her. Paks breaks free and moves back 20 feet. Miriel does a Detect Magic towards the reeds, but doesn't feel anything. Chuck says "I'm going in!" and steps into the water. Two snakes try to attack him immediately. They both miss. "Hoarfrost!" He swings both swords at the one on his right and hits with both. Goldpetal keeps heading back.
Telryn fires off a magic missile at the snake attacking Paks, turning it into char. We hear a childlike voice "He killed snakey!" Paks yells "Thank you!" We see three small childlike creatures, a girl and two boys; one yells "Leave Hiss alone!" They throw two tanglefoot bags at Chuck, but miss. One trips. The last one throws a dagger at Chuck and fumbles. The dagger hits the snake on Chuck's left. Paks runs back towards the rest of the party. Darmaon follows her. Miriel moves over and flanks the wounded snake, stabbing at it with her spear and killing it. The snake in front of Chuck attacks him, but misses. Chuck swings at the snake with both swords, but misses. He swings again and misses again. He steps back on to the land. Goldpetal steps into the water and attacks the snake with a bite and both claws, hitting with one claw and a bite.
Telryn moves back towards the party. He trips a bit as he is running and notices that as he was running through a shallow area, there was a rope strung across it. Four of the small creatures jump out at him and try to grapple him, but fail. Paks keeps running towards Telryn. Darmaon sees Telryn in trouble and shoots at the little guys, but misses. Miriel moves over to stab at the last snake and hits it. The snake, seeing itself outnumbered, jets off through the water. The child-creature which is not off-balance runs away. Chuck moves over to attack the other two, hitting one with Hoarfrost. "Owie!" Goldpetal moves closer to the creatures, attacking one with a bite and hitting it and killing. The last creature runs away.
Telryn steps out of the crowd of small creatures. Two of them take attacks of opportunity on him, trying to trip him. One succeeds. As he falls, he fires off a the magic missile spell at one of the creatures, toasting it. The rest all jump on him, fighting dirty; two grapple him but don't hurt him. The other starts rifling his pockets. Paks keeps running towards Telryn. Darmaon also moves towards Telryn, from the other side. He reaches Telryn and sees the creatures crawling all over Telryn. Miriel checks Chuck and Goldpetal for injuries, then steps out of the water. Chuck also steps out of the water. Goldpetal chases after the creatures and finds some sticky burning slime. He avoids getting stuck and moves backwards away from it. Telryn tries to identify the creature that stole stuff from him, as they run off.
Paks keeps moving towards Telryn. Darmaon takes a shot with his bow at the creatures, even though they are hard to see, but he misses. Miriel settles down and waits for something to happen. Chuck moves towards Goldpetal, scouting as he goes. Goldpetal moves back to the land. Telryn stands up and looks to see if he can see the little creatures, can't see anything, and moves back to the camp area. When Paks catches up with Telryn, she says she hates the swamp. She cleans him, since he'd been rolling around in the mud.