The Scythes Have It

February 26, 2008

The group is wondering where Reece has gone.  He was just there but seems to have disappeared.  And the party is that night!  Nail shows up again, in his avarial form, and he starts tormenting Deuce pretty quickly.  Deuce is not amused. 

They talk a bit and decide they are restless, just waiting around for the party to start.  They wonder how quickly they can get to Ordulin to look for the scythe, one of the stolen artifacts.  Nail hasn't been there but he has been to Ordulin.  After that they could fly but it would take a lot of time.  Jaden says he can try and scry on the temple there and then teleport them there.  Deuce asks if they are taking Lisha and Julia.  Jaden wants to get going, so Deuce sends Messages to them letting them know if they are interested.  Lisha messes up the return sending but that was normal.  They both show up ten minutes later. 

By then, Jaden has seen the arrival point at the temple.  It's not unusual for the temples to leave one room, a teleport room, that can be scried, for other who want to visit.  Further, he saw that it contained a teleport circle, which will make sure they all arrive safely.  He casts the spell and takes them all to the temple.  They might have been questioned more but when Notch and Jaden are obviously worshippers of Lathander, they are shown to a nice room.  They ask to see the high priest and are told he would join them shortly. 

Deuce says something to Nail, who throws a turkey leg at him.  Deuce was about to get mad when Notch beat him to it, saying to be behave in the temple.  Suddenly, a few things clicked about Nail to Deuce.  He responded to Nail who used magic to dump a gravy tureen on him.  Then Deuce slipped.  As Deuce tried to pull magic to clean himself, he sense Nail blocking him!  Notch and Jaden were now both saying to behave and show respect to Lathander.  Deuce responded that he wasn't being disrespectful to Lathander, only the human built temple and surely Lathander wouldn't mind that? 

When the high priest came in, Jaden and Notch greeted him formally and he said hello to all, looking curiously at Deuce and the gravy.  However, questions from Jaden about recent events in the city pulled the high priest's attention away from Deuce.  Jaden and Notch asked about any recent deaths.  The high priest responded that there had been some but it was in the foreign district.  He did go on to explain that they didn't have a specific foreign district and began to explain things to the group. 

Nail and Deuce decided to amuse themselves and almost started a food fight.  The high priest keeps getting distracted by Nail and Deuce.  Notch and Jaden keep asking them to behave in the temple.  Finally, the high priest says he can help them find these areas, although it seems obvious to Nail and Deuce that he just wants to get rid of them.  Nail asks for Deuce's portable hole and Deuce gives it to him.  Nail mutters words of power and then starts leaving the room and the temple.  With copper coins from the portable hole falling out behind him.  Nail and Deuce go outside and walk around the temple.  Twice.  Dropping copper the whole way.  (When Deuce counts it up later, it turns out they dropped around twenty thousands copper coins!)  It causes quite the stir. 

The other get some more information from the high priest and then promise to take Nail and Deuce away.  The high priest is happy with this.  Nail, though, apparently isn't done.  While some acolyte, assigned to the group to show them where some ghost sightings, of a ghost with a scythe that Finn heard about from his cousin who lives in town, went to get a carriage, Nail and Notch were arguing.  Notch thought Nail hadn't been polite enough to the high priest or the temple.  Nail said that flinging food around wasn't a big deal and they had cleaned everything up.  No harm done.  Notch still thought Nail wasn't being polite enough. 

"Fine.  I will gift them with something."  So saying, Nail disappeared.  Notch groaned, hoping that the carriage would arrive soon.  Nail came back moments before the carriage arrived, smiling.  Deuce couldn't help but ask, and he said that he wanted to make up for ruining the turkey.  So, he was having some sent to the temple.

"You didn't send a bunch of turkeys into the temple, did you?" groaned Notch.  "They are filthy!"

"No they aren't," declared Deuce.  "They're delicious!"

"And they crap everywhere!  And it can damage things!" 

Nail smiled and said, "No turkeys were teleported into the temple." 

Notch wasn't sure of that but they loaded into the carriage.  Actually, Finn and Julia took the outside standing positions on the back of the carriage, where guards usually went.  Nail, Deuce and Lisha went inside to enjoy the food and wine in the carriage.  Notch sat up with the driver and Jaden finally got into the carriage as well.  They started going and were almost out of the courtyard area in front of the temple when the first of several wagons started pulling into the courtyard.  It was laden with chickens, turkeys and other birds to eat.  Lots of them.  Then Notch noticed the other wagons starting to arrive.

Notch leaned into the carriage.  "How many did you order?"

"Not many," grinned Nail.  Deuce couldn't help but smile as well when he noticed. 

"How many?" 

"Only a few."

"Wagons?"

"Thousand.  Birds.  Live ones.  For a new festival today."  Nail couldn't help it and started laughing.  Jaden and Notch groaned at this and wondered if it would cause them some problems. 

The mirth continued as they drove through town.  Finn asked the driver where his cousin's estate was but that turned out to be in the other direction from where they were going. 

They arrived in an area of town that their acolyte said was the foreign area.  It should have been called the adventurer's area.  There were three taverns in sight from where they left the carriage to walk and they passed a few more.  Mercenaries and other adventurer's were all around them.  However, when they got close to the alley in question, they all felt it, Jaden feeling it more than the rest.  Dark magic and death were in the air.  They told the acolyte to head back to the carriage as they went to the alley.  Even Nail was all business, he weapon out and looking around. 

Notes

• I think time has gotten away from us.  Not sure exactly how things are lining up like this but the group is busy.  So, not sure if the party was that night or not but it worked for drama. 
• We did this because Reece's player canceled pretty late in the day and I used this for "filler". 
• I really enjoyed playing Nail and his prankster nature.  It's gotten worse, for various reasons, and this was just fun.
• I know there is no way to specifically allow what I did to happen, having a spell drop things out of a portable hole.  However, it was funny and worked out well.  Now I have to teach the players that they can do this as well!