TWO HUNDRED
(I/C)
Brendon gave the wall a kick, peering through the hole, sucking his teeth, “Well this sucks moose balls.”
"Oui! Dis do sucks,” Wyn was looking around, brows furrowed. Abraxas appeared to be bothered, shoulders tense. Lannis was idling straightening one of the knocked over chairs.
“We need the oil but can’t let Corfard have it.” Pushing back from the hole, Brendon smacked his fist into his palm.
Kovid was twisting the bottom of his beard, head shaking slowly. “This stinks like Thor’s balls after a hard sweat.”
“You are just a walking stereotype, aren’t you?” Lannis asked.
The Scout gave the Magic User a piercing glower. “Maybe we could store something in a barrel, and like Doc suggested, destroy the rest?”
Wyn held his hand up, “Whoa dere,” he said slowly.
“Lyra’s in that direction,” Lannis offered helpfully.
“Dick,” the Cleric muttered.
“Seriously,” Wyn continued, “Dere is no way we cen know if de orcs have more oil somewhere.
Lyra nodded, “I’m also against burning all the oil UNTIL we have some of it in our possession. Is there any empty barrels around they haven’t tainted with green slime? We should take enough for a few days and burn the rest. Sick of them using it against us.”
“Turn the tides against them,” Brendon shrugged, “Any ideas on how we could take out the orcs out with the oil?”
“You missin’ de point,” the elf pointed at the gaping hole in the wall. “Fact, dat could be de reason why dey made it dis obvious dat dey found de oil. Doze sneaky pig fuckers already showed us dat de cen think ahead, plan fer contingencies, en hide their true intentions. So if dey be capable of dat... why make it so obvious dat dey found dis? Could it be dat dey want us to tink dey found de "only" oil in de whole castle?”
Lyra signaled no. “I have to disagree, I don’t know if Orcs are smart enough to have enough complex thought that they’d be capable of intentionally manipulating us. They must have know oil was here, but didn’t know WHERE. Hence why they tossed it.”
"I have some toughts dat dey have access to oil somewheres else,” Wyn waved his hand casually up and to the east. “If dat be de case, we could destroy dis oil en it would only hurt us.”
“You give the orcs too much credit,” asserted Brendon. “They’ve been here longer then us and they never found the oil. I bet they flipped out because they can’t find us and threw the desks around.”
“They did engage in needless destruction,” Kovid muttered.
“Your memory for the last few days may be a bit porous, Monsieur du Lac,” Wyn said. “De orcs may not have had to come down here because the hobs en kobs were down here. Now dat de first floor races are gone, dey come looking for it. De orcs could have had the first floor races bring them oil directly, or dey have another supply.”
Brendon appeared to grow frustrated, “Aren’t you guys tired of being on the defensive? I know I am.”
Wyn smirked, “Not sure where you've been de last 24 hours, but I basically lit myself on fire and ran at the orcs yesterday. That's not what I'd call ‘defensive’.”
“Let’s use their arrogance against them,” He continued, pointing west towards the Scriptorium. “They never fell into the pit. Which probably means they never went over to THAT area. What could we place on the shelves to entice them closer?”
Lannis shook his head, "They didn't fall in because they found the hole when they threw a chair through the blackboard, they didn't literally stumble on to it"
“No, Big Brain,” The Scout was pointing again through the hole. “Pit trap in the Scriptorium, remember? Dumped from there into here,” his hand slid down to the oil filled room below them. “Think about it, once they fell in they can’t get out without help. Their rescuers would have oil on them for pulling them out. I’m sure they’ll be making a lot of noise screaming and yelling.” He rubbed his hands together gleefully, “THAT’S when we plan B them.”
“I'm just not sure if de making de trap you have been muttering about is de best use of our time. It may be satisfying, but we got to speak wit de Jailer den get up to de second floor.” The room grew quiet, everyone thinking. Wyn finished up with, "My vote is to fill up our oil supply en leave dis pool here. De other option is dat we deprive ourselves of a valuable resource without knowing that we are ACTUALLY taking that resource from de enemy."
“Without a bucket, we’re not filling anything right now.” Kovid straightened up, spinning his hammer once. “Let’s meet with the Jailer as planned. Afterward, we can figure out a way to fashion a new bucket out of the ale casks or smaller crates from the storeroom. Maybe there’s a chamber pot in the Butcher’s room we can tie a rope to. Just thinking out loud. There’s probably a lot of solutions, we just have to use or noggins and think together. If the Jailer doesn’t kill us outright, maybe he can lend us a bucket, HaHaHa.”
"Speaking of the Jailer,” Wyn asked, “Do we want to get meat to give to the Jailer as a peace offering? The guy probably gets only scraps and rations... and we have lots of meat to spare. I know it requires backtracking, but the idea just popped into my head as something a lizard-brained individual might enjoy above all else."
“Actually... does anyone know what those things eat?” Lyra wondered. “IS it meat? I’m fine with taking a little detour to get some if that’s going to put us in a more favorable position.”
“I grabbed extra carne when cooking breakfast this morning, specifically por el Yailer,” Abraxas lifted his large sack and pointed to it. “It’s already in here.”
“Terrific, Abraxas,” Lyra said with a smile.
“We are good to go see el Yailer, unless we have other business now. Fill or not what we can with Oil, then move on, or just move on? No tiempo y no necessitamos por detour a este punto, correcto? As we walk, we should discuss what additional questions we have for El Yailer. Vamonos, hablamos a El Yailer."
“Abraxas is right,” Lannis noted, “Without a bucket we can’t really pull up any oil right now. Let's just get this smeller thing over with. Assuming he doesn't kill us all we can go find the stairs after."
The group lined up again, checked the hall, and then left the ruined classroom behind shutting the door. They proceeded east to the corner, checked around and saw it was clear, and then made to go towards the stairs when Brendon had the group stop. “Check it out,” he said, pointing to what was the room the with the hanging hobgoblin in it.
The door was closed once again, the frame around the door had been clad in iron, and there was a pretty hefty lock and hasp in place keeping it closed and locked as well. “Guess they found all the dead orcs,” Kovid chuckled.
“And the ritual of hanging a hobgoblin in there to weaken the rainbow ward as well. We took that guy out what, three times?” Lannis guessed.
“Anudder time, mes amis,” Wyn pointed ahead. “Let’s go.”
(WMC: Red/Black 6) The party proceeded to the open hall (no door anymore) and then down the first flight and the second flight of stairs – Travis’ rooms were open and empty (although the hall still smelled faintly of fire). From there it was a long walk down the hall and then after checking, a turn to the east. It was quiet, no one was in the halls and we looked in the wolf room, the Beekeeper room, and eventually the orcish barracks – everything was where it had been before but the halls were devoid of people.
“Brendon,” Kovid whispered, “Don’t forget you want to check that locked crate in the Beekeepers area that we passed over earlier?”
“I know,” he replied, “Not yet, but soon I hope.”
“Tell me about it,” Lannis whispered as well, “we never got XP for that room yet.”
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Mages, oi.”
The group continued east until the quality of the stone degraded to more cavernous than finished, and at the “T” intersection, turned to the south. Eyes peeled and listening hard, they proceeded along until they were close to the open cave on the west wall when they heard, “I wasss beginning to wonder about you all. Late risssersss, I asssssume?”
The party all turned to Abraxas who moved to the front and stopped just shy of the room. “Yailer. Thank you for your patience. We have brought some carne for you and would like to know if we can enter your casa?”
There was a menacing growl again but it silenced after a moment. “Sssssh, it’sss ok.” He paused. “Pleassse, come on in. But I sssuggest that you keep your weaponsss away for now. Don’t want to give usss the wrong idea.”
“Ask him about the lantern,” Kovid hissed.
“Senor Yailer, might we bring in a light a bit to help us to see?”
“Sssure. Whatever makesss you feel better.”
The party moved in slowly to the rough and round chamber. It was a bit over 20’ in diameter once past the narrower entrance portion, and the north half of the room had eight statues standing there. One was an elf, four were hobgoblins, one was a kobold, and two were goblins. They all had a look of either fear or surprise on their face. They were stacked tight together with little interest in spacing them out. The other majority of the room had a couple of large leather sacks on the floor as a makeshift bed, a 5’ square scrap of carpet dirty and fouled, a three legged stool with a well made steel dagger stuck in its surface, a small three shelf unit on the back wall with a few small rocks and carved treasures on it, and a battered brass lantern currently not lit.
Standing there though was an anthropomorphic lizard creature, just a bit over 7’ tall with a large crest of fins on its head running down its back to a stubby tail ending in some bony spikes. Its scales were olive green and glistened with an oily coating. Its limbs were thick and beefy, muscles and tendons standing out under its skin. Its toes and fingers counted four on each foot and hand, and ended with 2” curved razor sharp looking talons. It smiled but there were too many teeth in its mouth, two rows easily. Its eyes though were huge, twice the size of a man’s and they had the disconcerting twitch of not moving in tandem, instead one moving and then the other following or looking slightly elsewhere. It was wearing a set of leather armor and two more steel daggers were in a belt at its waist. But there was a silvered steel flail draped around its neck by the chain, the head was flanged and there were little reliefs of spiders cut on the face of each flange.
Next to him though was a problem. 10’ tall and over 1,500 lbs, it was a huge ursine but with a twisted head of a razor beaked owl and long wings ran under its arms to its midsection. It growled on seeing the group but the Jailer laid a gentle hand on its side and cooed at it, calming it down. It sat back down on its haunches and leaned back. And there on its chest just over the left pec, was a patch of bare fur that looked like it had been burned long ago, and a Stylized “L” with the number “6” was tattooed right below it.
“Nice,” it said, smiling broader. “You are all here. Kicked the beesss nessst you did,” he chuckled. “High and Mighty was rumbling all night and the Pigsss were out early hoping to find you.” He shrugged. “They didn’t. And that’sss good becaussse I think you’ll be jussst what I need.” (Cha Check: Abraxas Blue 15 (over 2) vs Jailer Black 3 (under 6) – Abraxas feels the Jailer COULD be likable)
“What is that, Senor?”
“Can do me a favor. Or not. It’sss up to you. There is a cave with a ssstatue in it not too far from here that I need two things from and cannot get.”
“What are they?”
“One: I cannot get a Key from around itsss neck. If you go and get the key that would be a feather for me.”
“So, Senor, you want a feather key?”
The Jailer laughed, the smell in the room was getting thick again and starting to grow foul. “Very funny. No, it meansss that I can do sssomething that Corfard sssaid I could not do.”
“And the Second?”
“If you can get the key, there is a keyhole in the chessst of the elven goddessss that that key ssshould fit in. Open the lock and inssside will be the lassst monssster the Mother of Monssstersss wasss giving birth to before the Issspan Halgafar fucked everything up.”
“And you WANT this monster?”
“The Jailsss, Mammal, are filled with the Mother’sss children. They are my chargesss, and I want to free their lassst sssibling.” He smiled again. “Do all that and I will keep your presssence from Corfard a sssecret and maybe take my chargesss and go.” He leaned forward, “I mean, that’sss what you sssaid we can do, right?” He leaned back. “Think on it, you have a few minutesss to decide. I know how Mammalsss like to dissscussss thingsss for a bit first.” (<Lyra Wis check truthfulness, White 5 – He is telling the truth – at least on the surface, but also hard to read.)
“I’ll even sssupply you a map ssso you don’t get lossst in the cavesss beyond here. Watch out for the Ssshrieker, ssshe’sss a noisssy little thing. Also, I can sssmell you brought sssomething in that bag, ssso if you want to get on the better ssside of Hootsss and I, might I asssk that you ssshare sssoon?”
Time now is Day 6, 10:40
(OOC)
Ok – discuss, any questions? What’s the plan?
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