Session Summary
In which Theren rages, Donnerjack flees, the Silver Talons take shelter from the Emberstorm, but must share said shelter with a party of raptor-riding halfling barbarians, a sophisticated trio of hobgoblin wizards and a millennia-old monstrosity slumbering under a few feet of murky water.
Session Recount
Riding half and hour north from the wild fire, the Silver Talons come upon the ruins of the Acropolis of the Thrallkeepers. They dismount outside the entrance amidst the ancient stone columns and looking back to the south and below a smoke filled sky the burning horizon races towards them. In the distance, dinosaur herbivores and carnivores alike flee in swarms from the inferno. With soot-smeared faces and between smoke induced coughs Ifrid calls out,
“The fire will be upon us before we realise, we should seek safety inside the temple before it is upon us!”
A crack of lightning splits the northward sky through darkening clouds and rumbles in warning of a storm quickly approaching. Caught between fire and lightning, the gods of nature themselves seemingly call out in rage and pillars of tornadoes touch down a kilometre away. The wind howls around our heroes ears as another shatter of lightning illuminates the sky in a menacing purple hue.
Surrounded on all sides by natures wrath and with sorrow so deep in his heart, a sudden, agonising pain cleaves across Theren’s chest. Clutching his breast, he takes a deep breath and clears his lungs enough to utter a few divine words – casting an Entangle spell on Donnerjack. Vines and roots erupt out from the ground around his feet and to the column that the wizard had been using to support himself whilst hacking out the smoke in his lungs. In his weakened state Donnerjack fails to find the strength to fight off the vines as they restrain him in place. Shooting a panicked glance towards Theren, his own eyes widen as his gaze is met with rage-filled elven eyes. In a first seen display of anger, Theren growls through gritted teeth,
🙶How dare you? How could you? How could you do such a thing? Such a thing that could spiral out of control so easily? Did you not think? Did it not cross your mind that your actions have consequences? No. No I think not. I don’t think you thought about anything further than what was in front of you. Not one step further.
Let me tell you what you did, let me tell you what I heard, and what will now haunt my dreams. How many times have seen me communicate with the beasts of this world? I have not kept it a secret. For as long as I can remember my friends are the animals and birds, I had no other but them to keep me company and I am their guardian.
In the flames I heard their screams, their anguish, their suffering. Their screams are still ringing in my ears. I am still there. Those flames hold me Donnerjack. I feel them.🙷
Without breaking eye contact, Theren stretches out his hand and whispers a chaotic incantation that had not escaped his lips for decades. A scimitar of blazing fire appears in his waiting grasp and gripping the searing hilt Theren aims it at Donnerjack. He continues with detached composure,
🙶You are so intent on destruction. On chaos at the expense of effort. On your own pride and ne’er thinking about those around you.
So Donnerjack, as the flames hold me, let them hold you. Let this be the reminder of the terror of flames and a warning to all custodians of this land of exactly who and what you are.🙷
Donnerjack raises his hand in protest against this unexpected onslaught from his friend. He calls out in protest,
🙶Theren, please, I’m sorry! It wasn’t my intention! I only wanted to keep us safe! Please! Don’t do this!🙷
Seeing Donnerjacks desperation, Arabella moves between Theren and Donnerjack imploring Theren to listen to reason. To fight against his feelings and try to see that it was an innocent mistake that does not deserve an extreme punishment. Scarcely registering Bella’s pleas as if whispers in a gale and without a thought to their blossoming friendship, Theren throws her aside into the dust. The elf brandishes the flame blade with intent and in two quick motions he brands Donnerjack’s outstretched palm with the fiery point. Screaming in pain the wizard recoils with fear and takes several steps back as Theren renders his final statement,
🙶You were my friend Donnerjack. I’m not sure if you realise what that means. I was willing to let you raise Sarge from his grave because of what it meant to you regardless of what it meant to me. I thought you were my friend Donnerjack and this animated corpse represents that friendship.🙷
With a powerful swing, Theren slashes down through the body of the reanimation standing next to Donnerjack. A final, resolute kick, Sarge crumples into dust and Theren turns his gaze once more to Donnerjack with a goal to finish the branding of the 3 part sigil on Donnerjacks palm. Seeing this shocking display of vengeance from the druid, Kaster rushes forward and attempts to restrain Theren from further scarring their comrade. As Donnerjack scrambles away clutching his wrist he takes a quick look back to see Theren parry Kaster’s attempted hold and dashes after him. Quickly upon the exhausted wizard, the elf throws him into the dirt, and pins the terrified wizard stepping on his wrist. With tears welling in his eyes, Theren’s blade slowly pierces into the center of Donnerjack’s palm and sears the final part of the druidic sigil with a cauterising sizzle.
Releasing Donnerjack, he turns his back on him and walks away as the wizard screams out to him,
🙶Betrayer! I trusted you! You knew me! I trusted you with my family history and this is how you treat me?! Betrayed by my family, betrayed by my friends!🙷
Donnerjack pulls himself to his feet and stumbles southwards without a care of the smoke and fire quickly surrounding him. Kaster rushes after the distressed hero and is quickly hit with the heat of adjacent wildfire. Turning to see Kaster attempting to rescue him, he yells out with an arcane strength,
🙶Leave me be! I do not care for your attempts to pull me back to those that betray me! Go! I said go!🙷
A bewildering feeling stops Kaster in his tracks and for an inexplicable reason is compelled to think that Donnerjack knows exactly what he is doing. Limping back to the safety of the temple entrance the flames rage forward, blasting through the mournful wizard with tidal force. The flames mercilessly ravage the side of Donnerjack’s face, robes and hair, yet as he collapses into the ashes of the burning brush a friendly, soothing, familiar voice echoes into his mind. Donnerjack’s mother calls out,
🙶Donney? Donney, are you well? I’m sorry your aunt tried to take you against your will – it was only because I missed you so. I’m sorry for pushing you to do something you didn’t want to do. Can you forgive me?🙷
Donnerjack, resigned to his doom in the fetal position on the scorched earth of the Talenta Plains weakly responds,
🙶Betrayed…🙷
🙶Donney? Are you ok? Do you need me to take care of you? Say the word and I will call you here and make everything go away. All you have to do is say the word… Donney… do you agree?🙷
🙶I… do.🙷
The now nearby tornadoes swirl into the flames and light up the darkened sky with columns of fire that lap Donnerjack’s body with scorching winds. The strong winds threaten to pull Donnerjack to a fiery end, but before they can drag him into the blazing void a tear in the fabric of reality opens next to him. Beyond, a restful, familiar sitting room of his family manor in Passage and with the last of his life and breath, Donnerjack hurls himself through the glowing fissure.
At the entrance to the temple, the Talons are joined by Micco and the halflings who were tracking them from Gatherhold. Smiling a toothy grin Micco goads the Talons at their lack of composure and for ‘doing his job for him’. Watching Donnerjack running into the fire he nods in agreement, maybe because of courage, maybe because of stupidity – both are equally worthy of this halflings nod. As the fire and lightning edge ever closer all are forced down the stairs into the Acropolis of the Thrallkeepers.
Leaving Allrianne, the horses and the raptors the other halflings were riding at the foot of the long stairwell, the various members of the halfling tracking party and the Silver Talons enter into the darkened temple atrium. The atrium hosts a large pool of black, opaque water with a stone walkway bordering its edge and a wide stone bridge bisects over the center. Deeper into the room Vim spots a light moving its way down the wall. Readying to defend themselves as the light moves closer, they see it is accompanied by a group of hobgoblin wizards. Ifrid acts as intermediary between the two groups and discovers that these Hobgolbins have been seeking refuge in this temple for a time. Imparting this information to the Talons, they additionally warn the newcomers to keep quiet – the last group that had come through the Acropolis met their end because they were noisy. Heeding their words the Silver Talons proceed with the first leg of their quest chain; to discover the Spherewalker’s mark, a mark they will need to convince the halfling truthspeakers to witness their heroic deeds.
Donnerjack comes to with his mother stroking his singed hair and weaving gentle magics to restore his health.
🙶Donney, you should be more careful. My beautiful boy, you’ve been too close to the fire – your face is marked. Let me heal you…🙷
🙶No! Please…. no, mother. You mustn’t. This I must wear, to remember, to own. These scars are because of my own mistakes. It was my fault. I must own up to that and accept these consequences.🙷
🙶You need not worry yourself over that, Donney, here drink this concoction and you will be fully restored. Come now, at least take enough that you regain your strength, I was so very close to losing you. Why were you there, surrounded by the flames? Did someone put you there? Is someone to blame for hurting you, my boy? Tell me who it was and I will have them disintegrated!🙷
🙶Mother. I… I thought I could count on someone but I was wrong. I need to be better at taking care of myself but I am struggling to do so. I thought I was stronger than this…🙷
🙶But you are, my special boy. You are so smart, so talented. You know so many spells! Do you remember these? These scrolls have the spells in them that I taught you when you were much younger, perhaps they will jog your memory. And if you need help, let me offer some assistance to help you on your way. I offer to you the house guard, they were needed very recently when someone tried to get into the manor but I have since dealt with them.🙷
🙶Thank you, mother. I’m sorry I didn’t come home when you asked me to. I promise that I will when you call on me next. I will be here when you need me.🙷
🙶That’s all I ever wanted Donney. Now, let me help you recover a little more. I would hate to send you back to the dangerous lands you were in without regaining some of your strength.🙷
Letitia Virtu casts a momentary time bending bubble around Donnerjack and as the bubble fades his strength is renewed. Standing with refocused purpose, perhaps even confidence, he wears the scars burnt into the side of his face with pride. Giving his mother a hug and a short kiss on the cheek he steps through the newly formed tear; the other side inviting him to the entrance of the Acropolis.
Whilst searching the temple for the mark, the Silver Talons stumble upon a statue holding a golden quill and jade whip. Ifrid cautions not take items that are so easy to acquire, or else they would have been taken already. Theren, not heeding his words of wisdom, takes them anyway thinking that they might be useful elsewhere in the Acropolis. Clambering onto the bronze statue, extracting the items and dismounting, he is suddenly stricken with blindness. His eyes cloud over with a milky-white hue and in a panic drops the items. Vim notices and calls out,
🙶Hey Theren, you ok? Why did you drop those artefacts?🙷
🙶Holy shit guys, I can’t see! I can’t see! What do I do?🙷
🙶I told him. Did he listen? They never listen.🙷
Theren assumes the blindness and the artefacts are connected and scrambles to find the dropped items and attempts to put them back. Without assistance from his two nearby friends, Theren scrambles around in the dust, eventually grabs the whip and quill and stumbles back to the statue. Somehow managing to climb a statue whilst blind, he puts the items back in the wrong places and drops down.
🙶Guys? It’s not working! What do I do?🙷
🙶They’re in the wrong places, idiot. They’re the wrong way around.🙷
Climbing back up Theren slips and falls from the statue and cracks his head on the pedestal. Blind luck sometimes favours the idiotic and defying logic a secret tray embedded into the pedestal pops open to reveal a step up to the statue. It also contains a strange, translucent, yellow metal that catches Kaster’s eye who promptly stuffs the metal into the bag of holding. Finally Theren manages to put the items back in the correct order and his sight is restored, indeed feeling like a moron and inwardly reminds himself that he is vastly uneducated in comparison to Ifrid.
Our heroes continue to explore the temple, pressing symbols on stone doors which makes them open vertically with a rackety grind and rumble of stone. Further noise is created through the temple as the Silver Talons explore and their carelessness rises. Vim comes upon an interesting room with arcane globes off the main atrium, opposite to the main entrance, that the rest of the mixed folk are resting. On opening the door to the atrium he calls over the rest of the Talons to what he has found. At this point Donnerjack enters through the main entrance with four armoured zombies at his side, one with a faded dragonmark on its neck. With Theren at one end of the atrium and Donnerjack on the other they lock stares with icy tension. Wordlessly, Donnerjack raises his branded hand and points directly at Theren, who does nothing more than turn his back and stone the door slowly rumbles closed.
Kaster and Micco engage in a test of strength of lifting large boulders in a bet to coax Micco to reveal some secrets about the Acropolis. Kaster, as exhausted as he is, fails to hold on to the large stone rubble and drops it with a loud shattering of rock. The booming noise echos around the vast chamber and everyone holds their breath. A moment passes in silence. Kaster exhale in relief, until a heavy, low groan emanates through the black pools below from an ancient beast whom has been rudely awoken. Three enormous, squid-like tentacles slowly emerge from the waters, reaching, searching around the stone ledges for the culprits who dare to disturb a gods slumber. The hobgoblins whisper loudly to remain still and quiet, reminding all that it reacts to noise. Micco, still with the boulder above his head, strains himself to remain motionless. Beads of sweat trickle down his brow until, energy spent, he cannot hold the debris any longer and drops it on the tentacle. Enraging the creature, a deafening howl shakes the atrium and the tentacles whip around in fury.
A fierce battle breaks out between the fatigued Silver Talons, Miccos halfling trackers, Donnerjack and his undead troupe and the Hobgoblin wizards versus the gargantuan tentacles. Donnerjack and Kaster are immediately grabbed by two of the tentacles and slammed around on the brick work. Beyond the atrium, in the room with arcane globes behind the stone walls, Theren notices screams of panic and tremors in the ground and curiously opens the door to the main atrium. Touching the symbol on the door, it slides upwards and he is greeted with an insane scene of tentacles grappling his friends in the air, smashing them into the wall,s and for all intents and purposes – in dire peril. With dwindling divine energy he casts his last summoning spell and summons a parliament of Great Owls – the ‘Nightfeather Council’. Formations and dive bombs contribute to the cleaving, stabbing and mauling from all other members present whilst the hobgoblin wizards eviscerate a tentacle attacking them and escape up the walls leaving the Silver Talons and halfings to deal with the other godly tentacles of the ‘The Arms and Eyes of Forever’. Amidst the chaos, Donnerjack is crushed into a wall and falls limp in the grasp of a tentacle. Despite his current feelings, Theren looks inside himself and reconciles that Donnerjack does not deserve to be constricted into wizard paste. Using the last of his magical nature-born energy to weave a healing spell, he casts it on the broken necromancer and brings Donnerjack back from the abyss.
Party and owls in tow after the victory over massive tentacles, our brave heroes venture to the final, unexplored room where surprisingly most of the halflings took refuge during the battle and started smoking. The stone room contains a deep well that has no visible bottom in the center and another door with halfling words scrawled in chalk on it reading, “Do not open”. Micco once again goads Kaster about his courage and bets that he would never jump down the hole. Without a second thought and with his ego clearly in full control, he promptly attempts to rise to the challenge and jumps into the darkness. Micco nods once more – courage? stupidity? who can tell at this point. All but Donnerjack and his undead army jump in after Kaster, owl council included; instead he stays behind and ignoring whatever words of danger written in halfling pose, he opens the door…
Alone with his armoured zombies, Donnerjack finds himself face to face with a snarling, muscular demon with arcane fire burning in his eyes. It hisses and spits sticky ichor on the ground before lunging at him. Perhaps it was Theren that made him feel that he must start to take a responsibility, or the fire that seared confidence into his heart, but Donnerjack did not run away from this battle. Not this foe. It was time. With serene composure, Donnerjack blinds the creature with a spell in a blindingly swift weave of necrotic energy. Without sight, the demon fails to find his target and thrashes around viciously felling one of Donnerjack’s zombie soldiers. Slice by slice, stab by stab, Donnerjack and his troupe carve away at the ancient monster whilst Micco and his halflings stand by and watch, smoking their pipes and occasionally applauding as if watching a theatrical performance and not a fight to the death.
Below, in the depths of the well, the Silver Talons discover a large bronze globe representing the planet. Slowly stretching out his hand, Vim touches it in curiosity. Immediately he vanishes, transported to an ethereal plain, and sees the planet from a distance. Realising that remaining in this place is sapping his mental strength he wills himself towards the region of the Acropolis – returning back into the same room next to Ifrid who has been cautiously investigating its origins. A strange glow appears on the back of his hand and looking down he realises it is a Spherewalkers mark. Ifrid and Kaster also volunteer to endure the same experience and each return with different marks on the back of their hands. Marks acquired, they return to the upper level, where they all observe Donnerjack standing over the demon. Bloodied, exhausted and proud he points at the demon and sneers at Theren,
This is what I can do, I’m done needing to be saved. Witness my power.
Theren refuses to give Donnerjack any recognition, especially after once again saving him when he was in the grips of a squid god not 20 minutes earlier. Yet instead of mocking him in front of the rest of the party as he would have done, he walks away towards the atrium in silence. On the body of the demon is a strange stone object which mimics an odd ocarina that Ifrid and Donnerjack become interested in. Ifrid casts a spell into the stone and a holographic spell book jumps into life with an array of summoning spells included. With the danger resolved, Donnerjack follows Vim’s advice to collect the final Spherewalkers mark from the globe below and the rest of the party huddle onto the stone bridge in the atrium to at last, finally, rest.
Theren slumps into a corner to rest away from the others. Today he destroyed his friendship with Donnerjack, his potential love’s interest, his calm and his party’s trust. To him, it was all necessary. He made a vow to protect the beasts of the land and keep them from harm. To him, he made the right decision and those who mistreat animals must be punished. He reasoned with himself that he was true to what he knew was right despite the heavy cost. With the adrenaline of the day dispersing, he finally feels the ache on his chest over his heart that hit him on the surface. In his corner of the atrium, he loosens his studded leather armour that was fashion out of the crocodile that he and his friends vanquished the very first day they met. Beneath the armour, he sees a mark on his chest softly pulsating with the same glow that Bella’s has done so many times before as she draws power to heal. Yet this mark was different to hers. Lacking knowledge about Dragonmarks he is unsure why this thing is on his chest or why it has suddenly appeared, but he does know that hasn’t seen one such as this as it gently stretches and warps on his elven skin. Covering the mark he resolves to enquire with Bella or Tivara when they are next alone, maybe they will know more.
In the morning, Bella and Drego inform the Talons that too much has happened and they cannot stay with them and they must go on without them. Climbing to the surface, the blackened grasslands greet our heroes, the wild fire finally extinguished. The air thick with carbon and charred flesh, our heroes press on with their marks to find the Truthspeakers.
Session Glossary
- Joramun Rhukaan Taash “Fist of Reckoning” – a hobgoblin from Darguun, seeking power and knowledge to aid his country
- Ayani – one of Micco’s halfling companions; a tribal singer
- Minara Vol – the last matron of House Vol
- Emerald Claw – her consort, a green dragon from Argonessen
- Vadalia, Aeren and Erandis – their children; all dead
- The Nightfeather Council – a group of great horned owls from Thelanis
- The Arms and Eyes of Forever – a mysterious creature summoned by the Order of the Thrallkeepers; still slumbering under the Acropolis
The Thrallkeepers’ Conjuration Compendium
- 1st level: find familiar, unseen servant
- 3rd level: summon lesser demon, magic circle
- 4th level: conjure minor elementals, summon greater demon, charm monster
- 5th level: conjure elemental, infernal calling
- 8th level: dominate monster
- 9th level: gate
Turn of the Age 