Fireday, 16 Rova 4707, late morning

[The session picked up immediately at the end of the previous session]

Inside the bedroom of the slain Thistletop chieftain, Larissa crouched by the door that led to the goblin throne room and pressed her ear to it. She heard the shrill guttural voices of goblins, but did not understand their language. “Stupid little freaks,” she thought. She motioned for the others to come into the room, and the other five Sandpoint Heroes crept in. She tested the door, finding it locked. She locked eyes with Charrone, who nodded back, and Larissa stood clear of the door, pulling out her bow as she stepped back. The rest of the party likewise took out their weapons. Charrone silently mouthed, “One, two, three…” and threw her weight into the door. It burst open, and the Sandpoint Heroes rushed into the throne room.

Inside the throne room were about ten goblins, including a warchanter sitting on what had been Ripnugget’s throne. Towering over the goblins was a heavy flail-wielding bugbear—the same bugbear that led the second attack on the party on the previous day. The goblins apparently had been alerted to the party’s presence, probably from the sound of Halfred and Charrone chopping through the secret door. Two female goblins stood aside the door through which the party ran, and they took swings at Charrone’s knees as she stepped through. The crude goblin swords bounced harmlessly off of Charrone’s greaves. Halfred ran straight at the bugbear, swinging his greataxe. Larissa tumbled into the corner, letting arrows fly.

The fight was on! Charrone engaged the goblin warchanter to prevent her from casting spells. Two other goblins attacked the paladin, but weren’t able to get past her defenses. Halfred and the bugbear swung their heavy weapons at each other, but could not connect.

“You longshanks back? We kill you MORE!” shouted the bugbear.

“You didn’t kill any of us the first time— how can you kill us more? WE killed a lot of goblins— and we’re gonna kill you!” shouted back Halfred, and he connected, spilling bugbear blood. The bugbear screamed in rage, swinging his heavy flail, connecting with the barbarian’s shoulder.

Larissa held off three goblins plus the slain chieftain’s pet giant lizard. The lizard leaped at her, catching her arm in its jaws. It tried to bite her arm off, but the rogue stabbed it in the eye with her rapier, and it let go. Decaln also waded into combat, fending off goblin attacks with his black Orcish scimitar, but the goblins were too agile for him to strike a solid blow. Ted charged his magic wand of shock, and zapped one of the goblins that got too close. McGregor fired bolts of magical energy.

The goblin spellcaster attempted to ensorcell Charrone, but the paladin’s will was too strong to succumb to such a petty enchantment. In return, she ran the goblin through. Halfred and the bugbear were wearing each other out— but the barbarian managed to get better positioning, and in a furious swing, brought his axe down squarely into the monster’s chest. The bugbear locked its lizard-like eyes onto Halfred and hissed “No…you…die…” as it dropped its flail and sank to its knees. Halfred swung again in a wide arc and connected his axe into the bugbear’s neck, almost completely severing it. The monster’s lifeblood poured out of it, and lay motionless on the dirt floor.

With their leaders dead, the goblins increased the frenzy of their attacks, but what little coordination they used fell aside, and they were little match to the combined forces of the Sandpoint Heroes. After two more rounds, all of the goblins and the lizard were also dead.

Declan healed everyone, and Ted felt for the presence of magic. The bugbear and the warchanter each had a few items of interest— including the bugbear’s heavy flail. Halfred claimed that. McGregor took the warchanter’s magic wand. The bugbear also had a smaller keyring with three keys, each of which were identical to keys on Ripnugget’s key ring that the party had found a day earlier.

The group explored the rest of the wooden complex, finding workrooms, a crude goblin armory, barracks, and an extremely unsettling larder— which included fresh and preserved human meat. No other combatants were found in the rest of the Thisteltop fortress.

Fireday, 16 Rova 4707

Leaving Charrone’s horse at the Goblin Squash Stables in Sandpoint, the party set off on foot to return to Thistletop. Since they’d already been there and back, finding the goblin lair took much less time that the previous day, and after about an hour, the Sandpoint Heroes found themselves before the entrance to the Thistletop goblin-tunnels in the thicket across from Skull Rock. The leafy curtain that served as a hard-to-spot door was closed. Larissa listened for activity beyond, and hearing none, opened the door. They looked into a familiar tunnel through the thorny thicket. Halfred, remembering that he fell into a pit trap, probed where he remembered the pit to be with his ranseur, and the branches and leaves covering the pit fell into it.

Larissa scouted ahead, and saw a goblin dog in the tunnel that led to the rope bridge. Reporting back to the party, they attempted to sneak up on them, but the rat-like creatures noticed them anyway and charged them. However, these goblin dogs didn’t move or act normally— they all appeared to have gaping bloody wounds, their eyes seemed milky, and they moved with a lurching stagger. To the party’s horror, they quickly realized that these goblin dogs were some of the ones the party had killed yesterday, and that someone or something had animated the corpses as new guardians (which was something they had seen earlier in the week in the Catacombs). One of the undead creatures bit Charrone, but she lopped its head off with her sword, and Halfred hacked a chunk out of another with his greataxe. While they fought the two undead goblin dogs, four undead goblin warriors lurched forward from their hiding place in a watchpost and joined the fight. The wizards zapped the zombie goblins with magical energy, and Larissa fired arrows at them. While one zombie managed to claw Halfred, the heroes destroyed the zombies with little difficulty.

The party approached the bridge over the chasm across from Skull Rock. Charrone spotted one goblin in each of the watchtowers, but neither of them seemed to be paying any attention: One was throwing stones at seagulls, while the other pretended to throw stones at seagulls but was really throwing them at the first goblin. Under cover of nearby brush, Larissa examined the bridge, and determined that the goblins had reset the trap that would cause one side to drop away if too much weight was applied to it. She ran across the bridge to disable the trap. Thankfully, the goblins seemed too interested in their game of killing birds with stones to notice. Larissa gave the signal, and the party ran across the bridge. They all attempted to hide in the bushes next to the towers in case the goblins decided to actually do their jobs as lookouts.

Larissa picked the lock on the door, and Charrone threw open the doors. Suddenly, the sound of a loud bell ringing could be heard. Ted recognized it as an alarm spell that had been placed on the door. Looking through the door, the party saw that the trophy room was now filled with zombie goblins! Also, at the sound of the alarm, the goblins at the watchtowers turned their rock-throwing attention to the party, but then switched to their shortbows. As the zombies clawed at Charrone and Larissa, Declan summoned the Holy Light of the Dawnflower at the zombies. Smoke rose from the zomies as the burning rays of golden sunshine shone from Declan’s holy symbol. A few of the zombies remained standing, but they quickly fell to Halfred’s axe, Charrone’s sword, and Declan’s scimitar. The group pressed into the room.

Deciding not to press straight to the Throne Room this time, they followed a corridor to the west. They found a couple of unoccupied store rooms, including one that held mostly foodstuffs (barrels of pickles and apples, sacks of grain, hanging sausages), and one that held goblin dog riding gear and bales of straw. Thinking that goblins might be distracted by food, Charrone took a pocketful of apples and some sausages. They also checked out the west tower, which by now was unmanned. From there they went north, and found an open-air courtyard.

The courtyard ground was packed earth, with a few tufts of grass sticking up here and there, and liberally sprinkled with of piles of fecal matter— this place appeared to be where the goblins once kept their ratlike pets. But now, the goblins seemed to be using the courtyard as a charnel-house: about a score of goblin corpses were neatly stacked like cordwood along the eastern wall, and six dead goblin dogs were piled along the western wall. A wooden shack stood along the northern wall, and two bloated goblin corpses lay next to its door. These two dead goblins appeared to have been laying there for several days at least, and a quick examination showed that both of their heads had been bashed in with a large blunt object. The door to the shed was nailed shut, then covered over with more boards that were also nailed in. The door itself was battered, as if something inside had been trying to bash its way out. Larissa listened at the door, and heard the sound of a large animal breathing, and perhaps a sickly whinny.

They pried open the door, and found inside a once-handsome heavy horse, but now it seemed both very sickly and wild with rage. It bolted out of the shed, charging past Larissa, and then reared, striking at Charrone with its hooves. Charrone, being an expert horsewoman, stood her ground and managed to calm it by offering it an apple. She could tell that the poor beast hadn’t had anything to eat or drink in days, and must have been shut up in that shed for the whole time— and that probably it had been what had killed the two goblins. Someone went back to a storeroom for the straw and more apples, and they then took a few minutes to see to the horse’s needs. Once it seemed that the horse would probably stay put, they continued to explore the goblin lair by taking the northern door.

That led to a winding corridor that led past a few empty rooms, including the goblin latrine, and to another door that led to a stone staircase leading down. Larissa searched the area and found two things of interest: the wall behind the latrine was hollow, as was a section of the corridor wall across from the door to the stairs. She found a catch in the latrine to open a sliding door, and in the tiny room behind it was a large seaman’s chest. She dragged the chest into the hallway. As she got out her lockpicks, Ted said, “Hey, why don’t you try one of these?” and offered her Ripnugget’s key ring. One of the keys seemed to be the kind that would fit the keyhole, and she tried the key. However, she had an odd feeling about the chest, and decided to turn the key to the left instead of the right, and the chest opened. Looking at the lock, she saw that if she had turned it to the right, she would have been stuck by a spring-loaded needle that seemed to be covered by a black tarry substance. “Glad I didn’t set that off,” she said. Inside the chest were a thousands of coins (mostly copper and silver, but a few gold), a fine chainmail shirt, some jewelry, and a few other useful items. They dragged the chest to the shed that used to hold the horse, and nailed the door back shut.

Larissa turned her attention to the hollow-sounding panel in the hall. She estimated that this panel was most likely a secret door, but one that could not be opened from this side. Tapping it again, she said that the panel was likely not very thick, and that someone strong could probably chop through it with an axe fairly quickly. Ted handed Charrone a hatchet and suggested that she and Halfred should strike the door simultaneously to try to bust it down in one blow, so as not to give anyone on the other side any warning. Everyone agreed that this was a good idea.

So, on a silent count of three, Halfred and Charrone chopped at the door at the same time with all of their might. The door, being of goblin construction, couldn’t withstand such an assault, and splintered open. Everyone rushed into the room. The room appeared to be a richly-furnished (for a goblin) bedroom: a four-poster canopy bed with an ornately carved headboard stood at one side, it filthy silk sheets in a messy pile. Horse and dog skins covered the floor, and the walls were “decorated” with horse and dog ears nailed to them. Empty wine bottles littered the floor and a table, which also was covered with bloody seagull feathers, beaks, and feet. A single door led south. Larissa listened at the door, and heard goblin voices beyond…

Oathday, 15 Rova 4707, early afternoon

[Note: The game picked up immediately following the events of the previous session.]

After defeating the goblins in the Thistletop throne room, including the goblin shaman and Ripnugget the chieftain, the Sandpoint Heroes began to systematically examine the bodies of the fallen goblins, and to check the room for treasure and any clues about Nualia. A detect magic spell cast by Ted revealed that the chieftain and shaman had a few magic items, including the chieftain’s halberd (or “horsechopper” as it’s called in Goblin) and breastplate, and several potions. Ted found Ripnuget’s ring of keys. McGregor also noticed that a few of the goblins were still breathing, and he used a dagger to put a stop to that. Larissa assumed that the goblin who’d ran out the back door was going for help, and spiked the door shut.

Without warning, two side doors burst open and six more goblins ran in, brandishing dogslicers! The unexpected attack caught the entire party off-guard, and several of the goblins managed to slash party members. Following the goblins were a bugbear wielding a two-handed heavy flail, and an armored human(!) with a hand-and-a-half sword and shield. The bugbear charged Larissa and smashed her squarely with its flail, knocking her aside. She staggered back behind Halfred for support, who used his ranseur to keep the bugbear at bay. Meanwhile, the goblins swarmed Charrone and Declan, who held them back with their swords. Charrone managed to take down a goblin, but he managed to cut her again before he fell. The wizards were down to using their cantrips, but, between McGregor’s ray of frost and Ted’s acid splash, managed to take out another goblin.

The bugbear evaded Halfred’s ranseur and smashed him on the shoulder with its flail. The enemy human mainly seemed to defend himself, but drew some fire from Larissa, who managed to drop back and get out her bow. Halfred thrust his polearm at the bugbear again, and connected, but at the same moment, felt a stabbing pain in his back. Wheeling, he saw a female half-orc dressed all in black with a black face veil pulling back a dagger dripping with both his own blood and a foul-looking green oil. He felt a chill course through his veins, but managed to shake it off.

“Fall back!” shouted Ted, and the wizards and Larissa backed into the corridor from which they had entered the room. Larissa kept to the shadows, trying to make herself inconspicuous. Charrone and Halfred held the enemies at bay, and Larissa, firing from the shadows, targeted the veiled half-orc woman, and let fly an arrow. The arrow caught the green-skinned woman in the neck, spraying crimson blood across the room, and she collapsed to the floor gurgling. At that, Halfred, Charrone and Declan fell back through the doors, and Ted used magic to pull the doors shut behind them. Larissa quickly jammed the lock, and the group ran back for the main entrance. Seeing no pursuit, the party ran back across the rope bridge and into the tunnels through the thicket. Exiting the thicket, Charrone found her warhorse safely grazing next to the tree she’d tied it to earlier. Declan summoned the healing power of the Dawnflower for the last time of the day, and the Sandpoint Heroes quickly retreated from Nettlewood. They then followed the Lost Coast Road back to Sandpoint, making it back by late afternoon without further incident.

The party returned to the Rusty Dragon for drinks and a hot meal. After their early dinner, the group did a bit of shopping to replenish their supplies. They then retired for the night, planning to return to Thistletop again tomorrow morning to finish the job.

Oathday, 15 Rova, 4707, early afternoon

[The session picked up immediately after the events of the previous session.]

The party stood before the main doors of Thistletop. They could see that the wooden fortress was made mostly of wood scrounged from shipwrecks. Indeed, the nameplates of a few ships could be read from where they stood. Halfred glanced down at the surf 80 feet below, to try to get an idea of where his earthbreaker may have fallen. He noticed the bodies of two goblins and a goblin dog floating on the surf, and that there was a lot of blood in the water. He then saw something pull one of the goblin bodies below the surface, and thought he caught a glimpse of a dorsal fin breaking the surface, but the shape looked more like that of a seal.

Larissa successfully disabled the lock (by sawing through the wooden bar that held the door shut), and Halfred opened the doors. Six goblin dogs immediately attacked from the room beyond the door, and two goblin archers let loose arrows from behind an overturned wooden table. Halfred and Charrone engaged the dogs, and MacGreggor and Ted cast spells at the goblin dogs and archers. Halfred seemed to take out one dog every round, but the rat-like creatures seemed to be more interested in attacking Charrone for some reason, and chewed her up pretty badly. Larissa managed to shoot one of the goblin archers with an arrow through the eye, and the other turned and ran out of the room screaming. After three rounds, the goblin dogs were all dead, and the party entered the room.

The room appeared to be some kind of grisly trophy hall. The badly-preserved heads of over two dozen dogs and five horses adorned the walls. Affixed to a wall by several daggers were a pair of large bat-like wings. Horse, dog, and firepelt skins were scattered over the packed dirt floor. MacGreggor noticed that most of the daggers were human-sized, but old and rusty. One of them had a silver and mother-of-pearl handle and might be valuable, so he pulled it out of the wall.

A set of double doors led north, and the group decided to head that way. The doors led to a short hallway, which ended in another set of double doors. The next set of doors were locked, but didn’t slow Larissa down very much. She stepped aside, and Charrone threw open the doors. Beyond was a large throne room— filled with goblins! Several goblin arrows rained down on the party, but the goblins were terrible shots, and they all missed. Led by Halfred and Charrone, the adventurers fought their way into the room. The goblins scrambled to defend themselves, bounding to and fro. One produced a flask of alchemist’s fire, and hurled it at Larissa, who managed to dodge it. Then, everyone noticed that several of the goblins were singing a terrible (but disturbingly catchy) song, led by a female goblin. Declan called the power of Sarenrae to silence the evildoers, and a field of silence filled the back half of the room. The silence made it impossible for the enemy shaman or warchanter to cast magic, and the shaman fell to Halfred’s ranseur quickly.

But the most dangerous figure in the room was a burly goblin with an impossibly big head who rode a giant gecko lizard. This goblin was apparently the chieftain, as he wore a dented golden crown on his head. He charged Charrone, and managed to slash her with his goblin-sized halberd. Halfred waded through the goblins to assist, and between the two of them, they killed the chief. Now riderless, the lizard ran up the wall and retreated to the ceiling!

Without their leader, the remaining goblins fought even more desperately, one dropping his weapons to fight with his teeth— he got a boot to the face for his trouble. The chanting goblin then pulled out a wand, pointed it at the ceiling, and a huge purple curtain suddenly dropped. It turned out to be an illusion, but in the moment of confusion, she slipped out a back door. At that time, though, no one paid her much mind, as the fight was still on, but it was over in two more rounds.

The group took about a minute to search the throne room and gathered up the treasure on the fallen goblins.

Oathday, 15 Rova 4707

Just after dawn, the Sandpoint Heroes marched from the North Gate of Sandpoint along the Lost Coast Road. The plan was to follow the road northeast until the road crossed the Thistle River over a stone bridge. They would then leave the road and follow the river north through Nettlewood to the coast east of Thistletop, then follow the coastline west until they found it. Charrone rode her warhorse, but the rest of the group walked. They made it to the river without incident after an hour, and followed the river as it made its way through the moors. After about a quarter-mile, the moors gave way to a scrubby forest that got denser as they approached the coastline. There was no trail along the river, but they did find a game path that led in the right direction. The terrain also got rockier, with large boulders and deep ravines that cut through the hillsides, making it difficult to follow the river, and after an hour they lost their bearings. Halfred also noted that the plant life included a lot of irritating plants, including poison ivy and stinging nettles. The trees got shorted and the underbrush got thicker as they got closer to the shore. The party tried to put rumors of strangle vines out of their minds.

At about an hour before noon, they made it to a rocky overlook on a sea cliff, and spied Skull Rock about a half mile to the west. It was indeed a gigantic round boulder, about 80 feet in height, and perhaps 100 feet of the shore. The top of the boulder was more-or-less at the same height as the opposite sea cliff, and a large wooden fort had been built on its top. There was some kind of bridge that connected the rock to the mainland. It was too distant to see any activity.

The party found a goblin path that led to a dense thicket of thorny bushes that grew on the edge of the cliff opposite the bridge. Halfred noticed tracks that seemed to go in and out of the thicket, and discovered a woven mat of branches and leaves that had been placed over an opening in the thicket. Moving it aside, Halfred got the distinct odor of goblin from the chamber within.

The passage into the dense thicket was barely five feet tall and only two feet wide, and Charrone decided that getting her horse into that passage would not be a smart decision, so she tied the horse in the woods, giving it plenty of slack to defend itself. Halfred stooped over and entered. Almost immediately upon entering, Halfred stepped onto a covered pit and fell in. Fortunately, it was only five feet wide, so climbing out wasn’t difficult. Larissa scouted ahead for a few moments, and reported that the tunnels opened up into larger chambers, and that she saw a few of the rat-like goblin dogs ahead. The group moved through the tunnels into the first large chamber. The branches of a tree held up the canopy of thorns, but the major feature of this chamber was the open hole in the middle. Sounds of surf could be heard coming from the hole. MacGreggor looked in, and saw nothing but darkenss, so he cast dancing lights and sent a globe of light down into the hole. It went pretty much straight down for 70 feet, ending in a chamber. The ceiling of the chamber seemed to be about 10 feet above the surface of the water, which was churning. MacGreggor brought back the light.

The party then moved to attack the goblin dogs in the next thistle-walled chamber. The eight rat-like creatures fought ferociously. While fighting the goblin dogs, a goblin appeared to step out of the thistles as if they had been a silk curtain. He wore hide armor, and had numerous amulets, medallions, talismans, and fetishes adorning his body. He then cast a spell, and a small globe of flame launched from his hand toward Charrone, singeing her slightly. Halfred ran forth and smashed the goblin in the gut with his earthbreaker, and the goblin stepped back into the hedge of nettles as if it wasn’t there. The party turned its attention back to the goblin dogs.

Just as the last of the goblin dogs fell, goblins began to stream into the room. These goblins seemed to be using gear that was ragged even by goblin standards: their dogslicers seemed to be ever rustier and flimsier than usual, and their leather armor was in a very bad state of repair. The goblins themselves appeared to be thinner than typical. Nevertheless, they fought with typical goblin ferocity. During the fight, the goblin spellcaster stepped out of the hedge again, and this time cast a spell at Halfred. Halfred felt his armor get warmer for a brief moment, but then it returned to its normal temperature. Larissa, hiding in the underbrush, managed to hit the goblin shaman in the back with an arrow, and again he stepped into the brush.

MacGreggor cast a spell that caused several of the goblins to fall asleep, and Ted cast a spell that caused Halfred to grow to 10 feet tall again. The goblins were little match to a giant-sized Halfred, and the Sandpoint Heroes prevailed with minimal damage. However, just as they started to lower their guard, a man-sized wildcat pounced on Halfred! The cat was a locally common orange-and-black striped creature called a firepelt, and it managed to maul Halfred somewhat seriously before he and Charrone killed it.

Exploring the rest of the tunnels through the thicket of brambles, the party found what was apparently the shaman’s chamber, and while the hand-made totems hung from the ceiling seemed genuinely creepy, they didn’t find much of value. Later, they found a chamber that until recently housed about 10 goblins, although their supplies seemed to be in a very sorry state. While that part remained a mystery, none of the party members seemed to think it was worth trying to solve with all of those goblins dead.

While searching that room, in the distance, they heard the sound of a conch horn being blown in three short bursts, followed by another three short bursts. Ted suggested that someone had tipped off the fortress that they were under attack, so they pressed forward quickly. They found a tunnel that led to an opening in the thicket right on the edge of the sea cliff. Thistletop stood directly ahead, but to reach it, everyone would have to cross a rickety rope-and-plank bridge that was supported by two stout wooden posts on either side of the chasm. Goblin sentries on two 30-foot watchtowers could be seen, as could a patrol of goblins mounted on goblin dogs.

Without debate, Halfred charged across the bridge, screaming, and brandishing his earthbreaker. Still 10 feet tall by Ted’s spell, Halfred was a very imposing figure. Unfortunately for Halfred, the bridge was trapped: As soon as he made it to the middle, the right rope supporting the bridge came loose, and one side of the bridge went slack. Dropping his earthbreaker hammer, Halfred managed to grab hold of the rope before he plunged 80 feet into the water and jagged rocks below! Unfortunately, he now became an excellent target for the six goblin archers, three on each tower. Luckily for Halfred, the goblins seemed to be poor shots, and he made his way hand-over-hand to the Thistletop side. With a mighty cry, Halfred swung himself onto the ledge of Skull Rock, and managed to knock two goblins off the ledge in the process! Once on his feet, he drew his greataxe and started chopping up goblins.

While Halfred faced three goblin dogs and their riders, four additional goblin guards, and six entrenched archers, the rest of the party fired missile weapons at the goblins from the sea cliff. Ted, MacGreggor, and Declan used their magical abilities to attack at range, Larissa fired volleys of arrows, and Charrone used her sling to let loose lead bullets at the goblins. Ulfen luck saved Halfred, who was only scratched a few times before he dropped the goblin riders and slew their mounts. The rest of the party managed to take down four of the foot soldiers with missile-fire before the remaining two retreated into the fortress. Halfred took that opportunity to re-tie the bridge, making it possible for the rest of the party to cross over

They then began to break down the front door.

Moonday, 12 Rova 4707, afternoon

[The session picked up immediately following the previous session.]

After their exploration of the Thassilonian catacombs, the group decided to finish following the smuggling tunnel that originated in the Glassworks basement. About 30 yards northeast of the side-passage that led to the catacombs was another side-passage to the east. Painted on the rock wall in white paint was the phrase “Dead End” in Varisian. That passage ran for about 400 feet, and ended in an impassible cave-in. Returning to the main passage, the tunnel ran straight northeast for about another third of a mile. It ended in a small rectangular chamber. Larissa checked for secret doors, and found a sliding stone panel that opened into a short passage. That passage led to another stone door that opened into a large natural cave with a sandy floor. Sunlight streamed into the natural cave opening, and they all heard the sound of surf. The cave opened out to a secluded beach on the Gulf of Varisia, about a half-mile northwest of Sandpoint. It was now late afternoon. Inside the cave were remains of a goblin camp. Outside, Larissa found a switchback trail that led up the 40-foot cliff face to a goblin trail that went into the woods. The group returned to the tunnels and went back to the Glassworks.

Exiting the Glassworks cellar, the guards on duty (now Zandu and Mirian) mentioned that Sheriff Hemlock had returned from Magnimar, and had asked the Heroes to meet him at the Garrison “whenever you can make it over.”

The Sandpoint Heroes went straight to Hemlock’s office and filled him in on what they had discovered in the Glassworks and below, especially Tsuto’s journal which detailed a possible goblin invasion. Hemlock sighed deeply. “Damn. This is even worse than I’d feared. His Corpulence the Lord-Mayor brushed me off entirely for three days, then gave me a ten-minute audience. In the end, he loaned me just six members of the City Watch, the least prestigious, and least trained, of the various military and police forces in Magnimar. I know local farmhands that are better soldiers than these guys! And I can only have them for a month! Why do we even bother paying taxes to those guys?” He sighed deeply again.

“So, I wanted to ask Tsuto a few questions, but it seems that he hanged himself in his cell last night. No, I have no reason to think that anybody did it but himself— none of my people would murder a prisoner. Hell, three of those goblins you captured are still alive and waiting trial!

“From what it looks like, he was working with Nualia to do some very bad things in Sandpoint. Nualia? Before I thought she’d died, I’d always liked her, and actually pitied her a bit. Why? Well, she was a real fish out of water. Twenty three years ago, an elderly villager brought her as a six-week-old baby to Brother Tobyn, the old village priest. The villager said that she’d found the infant in a basket on her doorstep. Tobyn took the child in and raised her as his own. It didn’t take long to realize that Nualia had celestial ancestry: she was strikingly and unearthly beautiful, with perfect skin, violet eyes, and ash-blonde hair that sparkled in bright light as if it were made of spun silver. She was much taller than any of the other children her age, and the other kids were either jealous of her beauty or extremely shy with her, and teased her mercilessly. Tobyn was also pretty strict with her: he felt that since she was a gift from the Heavens, that it was his duty to keep her “pure” so that she could become a priestess of Desna and maybe become one of the Rectors of Windsong Abbey some day. The adults in town weren’t much better: old ladies were always asking her to touch their warts or to give them clippings of her hair to “bless” them. I kept telling them to leave her alone, but they wouldn’t stop! Tobyn told her that they meant well, and to indulge them, which I think she really did not like at all.

“Anyway, when she was sixteen, I heard rumors that she started courting Delek Szarniasian, a real unsavory guy. A few months later, I heard that he was bad-mouthing her pretty publicly at the Feedbag Tavern, saying that she was a real slut. Tobyn started keeping her at the church all the time, and Delek skipped town. There were rumors that she was pregnant. That was about a month before the Chopper started his bad business, and three months before the Fire. But I guess that the charred body we found in the fire wasn’t Nualia after all!

“From what you’ve uncovered, it seems that we don’t have a lot of time before Nualia puts together a real army of goblins and there’s going to be real trouble here. It looks like Thistletop is the center of the action. I’m going to get some miners to collapse the smuggling tunnels shortly, and will also start building better fortifications for the town. But that will take time, and I’m not sure how much we have. I don’t have any men to spare, and I don’t have a way to get in touch with Shalelu to help you out. I can give you a rough map and any supplies you think you’ll need.”

The group said that they already planned to tackle the Thistletop goblin problem, thanked the sheriff for his support, and left to determine the best way to attack. They spent the rest of the night at the Rusty Dragon.

Toilday, 13 Rova 4707

The next day, Declan, Halfred, Charrone, Larissa, Brother Zantus, Brodert Quint (the local scholar), and one town guardsman (Zandu) returned to the Catacombs. Declan, Zantus, and Charrone performed a ritual to break the Demon-Mother’s unholy connection of the shrine to Lamashtu, which they deemed a success. While Zandu assessed the security situation, Quint and Larissa re-examined the Thassilonian runes, particularly those in the underground cathedral. “This is odd,” said Quint, “while the shrine was to Lamashtu, the cathedral seems to be dedicated partly to the Runelord Azlantist herself, and partly to the, ahem, ‘virtue’ of wrath. Y’know, it’s interesting that the runes for ‘wrath’ and ‘righteousness’ are the same rune, but with the ‘negative’ and ‘positive’ aspects respectively. You see, the ‘negative’ aspect of Thassilonian runes are spikier in form. Hmm… for that mater all of these runes seem rather spiky… Interesting…”

Ted and MacGreggor stayed in their rooms studying their magical tomes and working on magical writings.

Wealday 14 Rova 4707

According to the map, Thistletop is located atop a huge boulder island called Skull Rock. Reportedly, the top of Skull Rock is about 80 feet above the surface of the waters of the Gulf of Varisia, and the rock is about 100 feet away from the 80-foot sea cliff. Reports also indicate that the goblins have built a bridge from the top of the cliff on the mainland to Thistletop. MacGreggor suggested that sailors may know a bit about the area from the sea, so he and Halfred decided to head over the Hagfish Tavern, which was most popular with the men and women of the sea.

“Hey— it’s the heroes of Goblin Day!” shouted someone when they entered the Hagfish. Jargit Quinn, the owner, came up to them and shook hands. “You’re finally giving us a visit! Welcome!” Halfred ordered two ales and two bowls of fish chowder, the tavern’s specialty. MacGreggor noticed a large fishtank sitting on the bar, filled with opaque green water. He thought he saw something move in the water, and asked Quinn about it. “Oh, that’s Nora. My pet hagfish. Wanna meet her?” Quinn rolled up his sleeve and stuck is arm in the thick-looking water, swished it about slowly, then said, “Gotcha!” with a wide grin. He pulled from the water an extremely revolting 2-foot-long grayish-brown eyeless eel that wriggled and exuded white milky slime from its skin. “Ain’t she a beauty?” he asked as he pushed the thing closer to MacGreggor’s face. “Um…” Most of the patrons burst out in laughter, Quinn dropped the eel back into the tank. “You can’t call your bar the Hagfish unless you actually have a hagfish, right?”

MacGreggor then noticed that there was a pouch of coins tied to a stake that was hammered into one of the posts holding up the roof next to the fishtank. Looking up, he saw carved into one of the rafters “Nora’s Challenge Winners” and a list of about thirty names with dates. “Um, what’s Nora’s Challenge?” he asked.

“Oh, that’s easy! Costs you one silver. Wanna play?” MacGreggor handed over a coin, which Quinn put into the coin pouch. He then pulled a large tankard from below the bar, dunked it in Nora’s tank to fill it, and handed the mug to MacGreggor. “If you can drink the whole thing, you get all the money in that purse, plus bragging rights!” MacGreggor looked at the thick, slimy, greenish water that smelled equal parts a salt marsh at low tide and the trash pile behind a fishmonger. He rose the glass to his mouth, and just couldn’t bring himself to do it.

Everyone applauded anyway. “That’s the smart move!” shouted one voice. Halfred pulled out a silver and said, “OK, my turn.” Halfred managed to down the whole thing, and, while thoroughly revolting, managed not to lose his lunch. The crowd erupted in applause. Quinn slapped Halfred on the back, and handed him the purse, which contained about a hundred silver pieces. Halfred then bought everyone in the bar a round, and carved his name on the rafter.

Asking about Skull Rock, a one of of the fishermen said that he’d sailed near there occasionally, but the fishing is notoriously bad there. “I hear the Sandpoint Devil sometimes goes there, and he eats up all the fish!”

“I saw ’im there once!” interjected a second sailor. The others rolled their eyes. “It looked like a huge seal with shark teeth and fins!” he continued.

“Roger, all you saw that day was the bottom of a whiskey bottle!” said the first. The others laughed.

“Well, he’s right that the fishing there is terrible, plus the goblins sometimes shoot at ya.” remarked a third.

“Plus, there’’s no good place to go ashore— the currents there are unpredictable. Actually, there’s no good reason to go there at all.” said a fourth.

“Of course, the rock does look like a big skull.” said Roger. At that they all nodded.

Halfred and MacGreggor chatted a bit longer, and returned to the Dragon. After discussion, the party decided to leave the following morning and to approach Thistletop by land: They would take the Lost Coast Road as far as to the Thistle River, then would follow the riverbed to the coast, then would follow the coast back west until they found Thistletop.

Oathday 15 Rova 4707

At sunrise, The Sheriff, the Mayor, and Brother Zantus were waiting in the Rusty Dragon barroom before the party left, to wish them luck. Zantus also had several small bottles to hand out to each member of the party: one vial of holy water, one potion of cure light wounds, and one potion of cure moderate wounds to each of the six Sandpoint Heroes.

The heroes then left for Thistletop to stop Nualia and her army of goblins.

Moonday 12 Rova 4707, late morning

[The session picked up immediately following Session 9]

After defeating the six human zombies, Halfred and Larissa examined the prison chamber again, while Declan and Charrone examined the zombie corpses. The zombies were wearing tattered rags that seemed to be extremely old and brittle, and were otherwise unarmed and unarmored. The room itself appeared to be unchanged since the previous day. Freshly dried blood still stained the floor from yesterday’s fight with the “catacomb creatures.” Larissa found a cell which still had a working lock, and Halfred and Charrone piled the zombie corpses into it. Larissa then locked the cell door and jammed the lock, making it unlikely that the zombies would be able to escape if they were to somehow re-animate.

The group took the wooden gangway to the next chamber. That room appeared to be the ruins of an office of some sort, but the furniture and papers had long since crumbled away into only partially-recognizable debris. Bits of wood and paper littered the floor, and a large pile of bones was in the corner. There were also three stone doors on the south wall, each bearing the seven-pointed star shape the party had seen previously. The scraps of parchments were inscribed with Thassilonian writing, but were too fragmented to make any sense. Larissa listened at one of the stone doors. As soon as she touched a door, the pile of bones in the corner animated, and rose to form the shape of a skeletal snake with a fanged human skull for a head! The skull had glowing red gems in the eyesockets. Startled, Larissa was struck by the snake-skeleton. She felt a brief numbing sensation, but almost immediately shook it off. The thing then began to sway back-and-forth in a manner that was hypnotic to watch. Declan and Ted became fascinated with its movement, but Charrone and Halfred were not, and managed to smash it to pieces. The glow in the gems in its skull dimmed, and Larissa liberated them. Inside each of the doors was a tiny chamber, to which was chained a skeleton. However, each of the skeletons seemed to be terribly deformed: one had three arms, one had an immense skull and a very long limbs, and one had a ribcage that went all the way to its pelvis. The party decided to smash these skeletons as well, and they crushed easily. A detect magic spell indicated that one scrap of paper was magical— a scroll of flaming sphere.

A door to the east led to a stairway going down 20 feet into a dimly-lit chamber. As the party began its descent, a creature stepped from the shadows, vomited a stream of acidic fluid at the party, then stepped back into the shadows! Halfred burst into the room to find a disturbing scene: A large rectangular room with a high ceiling. Eleven chains hung from the ceiling, each passing through a wooden trap door in the floor. Standing next to a large iron lever sticking out of the wall was a hideous creature. Standing a hand taller than a man, it resembled a stout, oversized goblin, but it had strange bulbous growths on its face and arms, and several extra limbs: a foot grew out of the side of its face, a tiny arm sprouted from its shoulder, and a fully formed arm grew out of its left hip. It held a shield in its left “normal” arm, a glowing laongsword in its right, a handaxe in its large extra arm, and a dagger in its tiny arm. It roared in rage, and pulled the lever. Immediately, a grating sound was heard, and five of the eleven chains began to move upward into the ceiling! Halfred attacked.

The creature attempted to keep itself between the party and the lever, but Halfred and Charrone engaged it in melee and managed to get it to move away. It struck Charrone a mighty blow with its sword, but then Halfred impaled it with his mithril ranseur. Not quite dead, it belched more acid at the party before the party took it down. Ted managed to push the lever back just as cages began to rise out of pits in the ground— stopping them. Each of the five cages held a humanoid zombie which resembled the earlier-encountered ones. Still immobile in their cages, the party made short work of the trapped undead. Charrone claimed the mutant zombie’s glowing sword.

Heading south from that room, they checked out a side passage that led to a collapsed staircase heading down. That staircase was completely impassable. The main passage led to a strange spherical chamber which had several objects floating in air: a bottle of wine, a book, a wand, a scroll, and a dead raven surrounded by a halo of floating maggots. The smell of death was heavy in the room. The metallic walls of the room glowed red and crackled with bolts of black lighting, and occasionally the bolts formed spiky runes— Thassilonian runes. MacGreggor saw that occasionally, whole words formed. He saw the words “slay,” “fury,” “avenge,” and “scribble” form briefly after several minutes of observation. He then entered the room. MacGreggor found that he also floated in midair in the room. Careful not to touch the walls with his hand, he collected the book, scroll, bottle, and wand. Examining the raven, it appeared to have several bites taken out of it, as if it had been half-eaten, and had probably only been dead for a couple of days. The bottle was of fine Korvosan wine of recent vintage. The scroll was ancient, and was in a strange arcane script that used Thassilonian runes. A read magic revealed it to be an arcane scroll of burning hands. The wand was magical, and tests indicated that is was a wand of shocking grasp. The book was written in Abyssal, a language that Declan recognized but could not read, and it included accurate drawings of scores of terrible-looking creatures.

Larissa was able to open a secret door behind the hollow panel, which led to a short passageway that ended in an iron ladder leading up through a chimney-like passage. At the top of the ladder was a stone trap door. Halfred climbed the ladder and opened the unlocked trap door, finding himself in a large closet. Tattered remains of robes hung from hooks on one wall, and two rusty ranseurs hung from a rack on the opposite wall. A closed stone door stood to the southwest. The rest of the party climbed into the room.

Larissa listened to the door and thought she heard bubbling water and the sound of a guttural voice chanting. Halfred threw open the door and the party burst into the next room. The room looked to be an immense underground cathedral. Large closed double-doors seem to lead to the northwest. The vaulted ceiling arched 30 feet overhead. The walls were covered with spiky Thassilonian runes. In the center of the room was a large pool of clear water, about 20 feet across and three feet deep, with a ring of polished human skulls balanced on stone spikes surrounding the deeper middle section. At the far end of the room, a pair of stone stairways led to a pulpit on which stood a second pool, this one triangular and filled with churning, bubbling water that glowed bright yellow. The glow filled the room with dim light. Six skeletons, each holding a rusting scimitar, stood immobile along the stairs. A tiny winged humanoid creature wearing a golden tiara and a black dress flew into the air above the glowing pool, and shouted in a guttural, hoarse cry “Intruders! Face my mother’s wrath!” It slashed its hand with a dagger, and the blood dropped into the glowing pool. Immediately, the larger pool bubbled violently, and another “catacomb creature” rose out of the pool and attacked, just as the immobile skeletons animated and brandished their scimitars wickedly.

The battle began. Declan summoned the power of the Dawnflower, and the light of Heaven burned away most of the skeletons. The catacomb creature attacked Halfred, and Charrone charged up the stairs to try to engage the creature. It suddenly disappeared. Charrone cleared her mind to bring forth her Sense of Justice, and felt a dreadful evil from beyond radiating from where she had last seen the thing. She swung at the place she felt the evil most, and called out to Iomede to smite the thing from beyond. Her strike was true. The creature attempted to enchant Charrone, who resisted, and became visible again. Larissa hit it with an arrow, and MacGreggor hit it with a magic missile. The creature then swooped at Charrone with its claws out, but Charrone struck it in midair, and it fell, lifeless, into the triangular pool. Both pools bubbled violently, and three more of the catacomb creatures came forth from the larger pool. However, then the bubbling stopped, and glow of the triangular pool quickly faded to nothing. The four catacomb creatures (two male, two female) fought hard, but unarmed and naked were not much of a match for the party, and were all slain.

Charrone pulled the body of the tiny creature from the triangular pool, but it quicky began to liquefy into a foul-smelling black ichor which began to evaporate. It left behind its possessions, including a tiny golden tiara, a magic wand, a magic amulet, and an uholy symbol of the demon-goddess Lamashtu.

MacGreggor translated the runes carved on the walls. They were praises to the Runelord Azlantist, and admonishments to “Revel in the fury of battle,” “Crush your enemies and slay their children,” “From hatred comes strength, and from strength comes power,” and other equally disturbing phrases that exhort violence, hatred, and embracing anger.

The double doors led to the strange alcove in the shrine to Lamashtu. Exploring the rest of the complex, the group found two other empty rooms, and a set of stairs leading up, but the roof above the stairs had collapsed and the passage was impassable…

Moonday, 12 Rova 4707

The Sandpoint Heroes woke up early on Moonday morning, and had a quick breakfast at the Rusty Dragon before gearing up for another foray into the catacombs under the town. Everyone felt refreshed and ready for another adventure.

They re-entered the smuggling tunnel through the Glassworks cellar, and followed the tunnel to the first intersection, turning to the west. They followed that passage back to the natural cave where they had killed the strange creatures the day before. However, as they approached the cavern, they noted that blood from their fight yesterday was still on the floor, but the bodies of the creatures weren’t there. As they passed the entrance to the dead-end natural cavern, two more of the same creatures lurched toward them, striking with their claws!

However, as they fought, they noticed that there was something different about these creatures. They moved with a jerky clumsiness, there was no spark of rage or emotion that they had seen yesterday, and most disturbing, these creatures bore horrible bloody wounds that did not seem to still be bleeding. Declan shouted,“They’re undead! I think they’re zombies!” as two more shambled from the northern passage.

While the fact that they were fighting the animated corpses of the monsters they’d fought yesterday was very disturbing, the zombies were far less-effective combatants. The party destroyed the abominations before too long, while taking only minimal damage themselves. Halfred suggested chopping up the zombie corpses to prevent whoever animated them from doing it again. The party agreed, and commenced chopping.

The Heroes entered the complex again, and finding nothing in the entry room, proceeded to the first junction in the hallway. They decided to turn right this time, and followed the passage a short way to an irregularly-shaped room with a dais and altar on the back wall. The walls were carved with images of many foul-looking monsters, and the altar itself bore the carved image of the head of a three-eyed jackal. Declan identified it as the symbol of Lamashtu: The Demon Mother of Monsters. On the top of the altar was a basin-shaped depression, which was filled with water that seemed perfectly clear but smelled foul. MacGreggor took a flask of the water for future study. Charrone suggested that it was probably unholy water of some kind, and perhaps even a rumored unholy substance called “Waters of Lamashtu” which bestowed a dark gift to those foolish or devout enough to drink it. MacGreggor declined to sample the water. Ted and Larissa examined a suspicious-looking alcove, but were not able to figure out its purpose. Charrone sensed a palpable aura of evil in this place, and suggested that they get going— which they did.

They walked past the statue room, and came to the door to the prison, where they had fought their second battle with the strange creatures. Larissa heard a shuffling and moaning on the other side of the door, so she opened it very carefully— which was a good thing, because on the platform on the other side of the door were six humanoid zombies!

Declan summoned the power of the Dawnflower against the undead, and many of the zombies seemed to sizzle in concentrated sunlight. Charrone and Halfred waded into combat, and Larissa fired arrows into the frey. MacGreggor fired some magic rays at the zombies, and Ted used his telekinetic attack against them. The zombies put up a hard fight, slamming Halfred and Charrone a couple of times each, but the party was able to destroy them. and enter the room.

Sunday, 11 Rova 4707, early afternoon

The second room off of the secret corridor was even more interesting. It was a simple stone-walled room, but a five-foot wide worked stone passage was visible in the far wall. It looked like the opening of a mine shaft, with wood beams reinforcing the walls and ceiling every thirty feet or so, and went to the northeast. It seemed to slope slightly downward. Halfred could feel cooler air waft from the opening, and he saw what looked like a lot of goblin tracks come out of the tunnel into the room. Any tracks going back into the tunnel were obscured by the rest of he tracks.

The group guessed that the two escaping goblins must have run out through this passage, which was most likely the “smuggling tunnel” that Ameiko had mentioned. Lighting torches and lanterns, the group decided to pursue the goblins via the tunnel. Halfred led the way. The tunnel itself was expertly constructed, fairly old (at least 20 years old, thought Ted), and very straight. After following the tunnel for about 400 feet, the party found a side tunnel leading west. That tunnel had been bricked up at some point in the past, but now the wall had been knocked in, from the side of the main tunnel. Broken bricks and mortar were scattered on the floor of the side tunnel. given the amount of dust on the fallen bricks, MacGreggor estimated that the brick wall had been down for at least a few years. Painted on the wall of the side tunnel in Varisian was the message, “Do not enter. Danger.” The party decided to investigate this side passage.

The side passage went west for a few hundred feet, the bent northward. The tunnel continued northward for several hundred more feet, whn the party saw another side passage to the east. As Halfred moved to investigate this new chamber, he was suddenly attacked by two hideous creatures! The creatures were roughly humanoid, hairless, and stood on two back-bent doglike legs. Their skin was a sallow flesh tone. Their two arms seemed to have two elbows, and their hands were three-fingered talons. Their mouths were filled with canine teeth, and were flanked by tiny arms, each with a three-fingered hand. It also looked like their lower jaws could also open sidewise. Their eyes glowed red with malevolence and anger. They wore ancient-looking chain shirts and wielded ranseurs. They shouted with eerie deep resonant voices in an unknown but chillingly evil-sounding language.

A fierce fight was joined by the rest of the party. At one point, one of the creatures bit Halfred, and his head was suddenly filled with feelings of anger and hatred, but he managed to collect his thoughts. The creatures proved to be fierce combatants, but the party outnumbered them three-to-one and prevailed with minimal damage. The victorious heroes took the creatures’ weapons and armor, on the chance that they might regenerate.

The cavern that the creatures had been in was apparently a natural cave that the worked passage broke into by happenstance. There was nothing of else in the cave other than interesting rock formations. Following the tunnel again, the party found another side-tunnel heading east about thirty feet ahead. Like the entrance of the original side-tunnel they had followed, the entrance to this passage seemed to have been bricked up once long ago, but the wall had been taken down some time in the past few years. They decided to follow the main tunnel this time, but found that it dead-ended in about sixty feet. Ted, who had knowledge of stoneworking, noticed that the workmanship of the passage seemed to indicate that the excavators seem to have abandoned the tunnel and simply stopped digging. They returned to the eastern side-passage.

That passage went about thirty feet and then seemed to break into the western wall of an existing chamber: the floor of the chamber was about a foot below the floor of the tunnel. The chamber was of very different construction than the tunnel: the walls and ceiling were lined with ceramic tiles, and the floor was marble. The floor was littered with lots of rubble— some of it seemed to be debris from the side tunnel punching into the wall, and the rest seemed to be broken pottery. MacGreggor thought that the architecture had a late-period Thassilonian feel to it. There was a stone door to the north.

Larissa checked the door for traps and listened at it, and found nothing. The door opened up into a dusty hallway. Following the hallway, the group passed one side-passage, and entered into a moderately-sized room with a vaulted ceiling. In the center of the room was a finely-carved statue of a wild-eyed female warrior-mage, holding a ranseur in a threatening pose. The statue bore an inscription in ancient Thassilonian, “Alaznist: Runelord of Righteousness.” Examining the statue, it was apparent that the ranseur held by the statue was not carved of marble, but was a separate item that could be fairly easily removed. The ranseur itself was a work of art.

The statue room had open passageways leading north and east, and they saw that the eastern passage ended in a staircase going upward. They went north, following the passage to another closed stone door. Larissa found no traps or heard anything through the door, and Halfred opened it. The door opened up into a much larger chamber, with a wooden platform just beyond the door. The stone floor of the chamber was ten feet below the platform, and the ceiling was 20 feet above. The room appeared to be a prison— small cells with iron bars lined all of the walls. Two wooden staircases led down to the stone floor, and a the platform extended as a catwalk into the middle of the room, then turned right into another stone passage. Halfred went down the stairs to examine the room, and a three-clawed hand grabbed his foot from below and tried to pull him off the stairs!

Two more of the same kind of creatures encountered earlier attacked. Again, they each wore chain shirts and were armed with ranseurs. However, these fought with even more skill and ferocity than the earlier ones. Charrone and Halfred both fought one of the creatures, while the other attacked Larissa and Declan. Ted and MacGreggor were out of spells, and were throwing knives, to little effect. One of the creatures knocked Larissa’s bow from her hand and closed in for the kill. In a desperate move, Larissa drew the blow-tube she’d taken from Tsuto earlier that day and blew the contents into the creature’s face. The effect matched what Tsuto had done to Halfred, and the creature broke off the attack, unable to see. Larissa and Declan were able to finish off the blinded creature, then assist Halfred and Charrone. While very bloodied, the combined forces of the party managed to drop the other creature.

While looting the creatures’ weapons and armor, the group decided that a retreat was prudent, and they went back through the complex to the entrance tunnel. Passing the statue of the Runelord, Larissa announced her intention to liberate the ranseur. MacGreggor did not sense any magic, Charrone did not sense any more evil than the rest of the pace, and Larissa did not find any traps, so Larissa carefully pulled the weapon from the statue. Nothing else happened, and the group left the complex, and followed the tunnels back to the Glassworks.

In the daylight, the ranseur’s quality, craftsmanship, and value became apparent. The blade was made of mithril, and the haft made of darkwood, and both blade and haft were decorated with exquisite markings.

Ted instructed the guardsmen to lock the Glassworks cellar doors, and to place a double guard on them. The party was surprised to find both Mayor Deverin and Father Zantus at the Glassworks, who said that they were discussing a discreet means of burying old Lonjiku without causing undue alarm with the townsfolk. Ted mentioned the double sets of books and said that when the catacombs were cleaned out, someone could go down and retrieve them safely.

The group went to check on Ameiko, and persuaded her not to leave the safety of the town without an escort. After that, everyone went to their rooms for a well-deserved rest.

Sunday, 11 Rova, 4707, late morning

[We picked up immediately following the events of Session 7]

After sending Tsuto off with the guards, the group decided to find out where the two goblins had fled, and proceeded downstairs to the Glassworks cellar. The cellar appeared to comprise of a single 10-foot wide corridor with two right-angle turns, as if it were three sides of a rectangle. There were storerooms on the outside wall, all of which were empty save for the one farthest from the staircase— in it they found a bound and badly-beaten Ameiko lying on the stone floor. She was alive, but semiconscious. They untied her, and Declan cast a curing spell, and she seemed to improve greatly.

Ameiko said, "Thank Desna that you came! I don’t know what my brother would have done with me— I think he’s gone completely insane! He’s working with the goblins, and I think it’s pretty clear that he had something to do with the attack during the Swallowtail Festival last week!

“Anyway, he called me here to tell me that Father is a crook— that he’d been working with Sczarni smugglers for years to buy and sell contraband using the Glassworks as a front: mostly poisons and drugs, things you put in bottles. Apparently, there’s some kind of smuggling tunnel here in the cellar somewhere. Tsuto used that tunnel to bring in some of the goblins during the raid, and he brought the goblins in that way last night.

“He also said that the first goblin raid was just the beginning, and that I was the only thing in Sandpoint that he thought was worth saving. He gave me the opportunity to join him and his little group of cutthroats. I slapped him for even contemplating committing such a heinous crime. At that, he sucker-punched me, then set his goblins on me. While they were beating me, he said that Nualia is their leader— and his girlfriend. I managed to say that she had died along with her father Curate Tobyn, but he chuckled and said that she had set the fire, killed her father, and faked her own death, and was glad she’d done it! I cursed him. At that, he back-handed me across the face, and I must have passed out.

“We’ve got to alert the Sheriff and the Mayor, and also tell Father what’s going on here. Let’s go!” Charrone broke the news of Lonjiku’s death, and Ameiko became quiet and solemn. “In that case, I think I just want to go home and be alone for a while.” Ted and MacGreggor saw her upstairs to the guardsmen, and Jubal brought her home.

While Ameiko was telling her story, Larissa and Halfred began looking for the smuggling tunnels that Ameiko mentioned. Larissa found a secret door which opened to a corridor linking the north and south passages. She found two rooms off of this corridor— one was an office which contined a desk and a bunch of filing cabinets. The cabinets contained records of Lonjiku’s dealings with the smugglers and other illegal activity. Also on the desk was a small leatherbound journal, with Tsuto’s name on the inside cover.

The journal had about two dozen pages of vellum. About half of the pages contained charcoal-ink-and-chalk drawings of the same beautiful woman, most often nude, in various erotic poses. The woman’s hair was always colored with white chalk. Interspersed with the erotic drawings were several maps of Sandpoint, each of which detailed a different attack plan with about 50 goblins. Four of these plans were crossed out, and a fifth was circled. The party recognized this plan as the actual plan used by the goblins for the attack at the Swallowtail Festival. After more erotic drawings were a second set of attack plans, these using about 300 goblins and included siege engines. A few of these plans were scratched out, and none were circled.

After the circled attack plan was written:

The raid went about as planned. Few Thistletop goblins perished, and we were able to secure Tobyn’s casket with ease while the stupid rubes were distracted by the diversion. I can’t wait until the real raid. This town deserves another good burning, and this time it won’t just be the north end!

After the second batch of attack plans:

Ripnugget seems to favor the overwhelming land approach, but I don’t think it’s the best plan. We should get the quasit’s aid. Have her send up her freaks from below via the smuggling tunnel in Father’s factory, and then invade from the river and from the Glassworks in smaller but more focused strikes. The rest except Bruthazmus agree, and I’m pretty sure the bugbear is just being contrary to annoy me. My love is too distracted with the lower chambers to make a decision. She says that once Malfeshnekor has been released and is under her command, we won’t have to worry about subtlety in our attack. I hope she’s right.

The second-to-last erotic drawing of the woman depicts her with a bestial right hand with three talons. The final drawing in the journal shows her with two such clawed hands, elongated canine teeth, horns, bat wings, cloven feet, and a forked tail. On the page between these drawings is the following passage:

My love seems hell-bent on going through with it–nothing I can say will convince her of her beauty. She remains obsessed with removing what she calls her “celestial taint” and replacing it with her Mother’s grace. Burning her father’s remains at the Thistletop shrine seems to have started the transformation, but I cannot say that her new hand is pleasing to me. Hopefully, when she offers all of Sandpoint as a burnt offering to Lamashtu, her new body won’t be as hideous as that talon. Maybe I’ll still luck out. A succubus is a kind of demon, right?

Larissa compared the handwriting of the journal with the letter to Ameiko, and thought that they matched.