Aidrin absentmindedly rustles through his spell-component pouches and sighs, "We had made camp. It was night. We were set upon by some sort of bandits  who had ogres and magic-users among their numbers."

"Hmmm." Asher ponders a moment and begins to scan the grassland for tracks, knowing that this is not his area of expertise.

OOC:We may as well all make Survival checks; who knows which of us (baring Asher of course) may roll that elusive natural 20.

06:40, Today: Asher Willbourne rolled 4 using 1d20+3. Survival check- track. I hope there is no such thing as a "critical miss" on survival checks-- "Asher makes a failed attempt at survival, and perishes immediatly."
This message was last edited by the player at 17:09, Mon 12 Sept 2005.

As the sun crests the horizon and begins her climb into the sky, the surviving party members finish breaking camp.  Perrato, having greeted the dawn with a series of silent prayers and quiet reflection, begins to call upon divine aid to stanch some of the wounds of his fellow party members.  His ministrations are successful, and many of the worst injuries of the others are substantially lessened.  Soon enough, the companions head towards the north, into the stench of decaying bodies and the cloud of carrion crows and vultures that hover above the killing grounds, or stride among the fallen and perch upon the bloated corpses.

Jackals and hyenas snarl as the five companions near the dead bodies of horses and men, but the surfeit of carrion has left little real aggression in these scavengers, and they slink away as the humans and halfling approach.  All told, it appears that over two dozen people perished here, along with at least fifteen horses, and the charred and overturned remnants of several wagons litter the area.  The bodies have been looted and torn by scavengers, and nothing of obvious value remains.  A stamped-down patch of grass leads to the northwest, and it appears that numerous creatures moved along this stretch--some of them quite large.

OOC:  Are you searching the bodies?  The stench in the warm summer morning is overwhelming, and will necessitate some Fort rolls to keep your chow down if you get much closer.  No one has any problem seeing the trail leading away to the northwest, but I'll need some Survival checks to see if any additional info is gained.  Asher does not gain any additional info ;), but neither drops dead nor starves.

Aidrin steps closer to the caravan and covers his mouth with his robe. Though the stench is unbearable, he manages to quickly mutter the words for Signify Arcane-Influenced Objects and waves his hand about in the air. The wizard then leaves his hand raised and concentrates, waiting for the magic to intensify.


OOC: Aidrin casts detect magic.
He will wait 3 rounds to find the location of any magical auras.
The range is 60', so I'm hoping he can cast without getting too close.

This message was last edited by the player at 16:22, Tue 13 Sept 2005.

Asher continues to walk towards the scene of devestation, drawn in by morbid curiosity. He covers his nose and mouth with the sleeve of his robe and approaches until his stomach shows the first signs of convulsions, looking, but unsure of what he is looking for.

"OOC: Intent is to move in as close as possible without throwing up. Scanning to see if he can find anything that is useful (obviously not tracks). Is there anything worth rolling spot or listen checks for?


12:04, Today: Asher Willbourne rolled 13 using 1d20+5. Fort save vs up-chuck.

Garryn, not being as brave as Asher, decides to tear some cloth off of his bloody clothes and fashion nose plugs. He then finds a stick and breathes through his cloak as he nears the bodies. He uses the stick to poke around the pockets to determine if anything fills them. He checks around the wagons for anything that may have been left behind.

"Lets not waste too much time here. I want to get a full days travels towards Bordertown," Garryn reminds his companions.

Upon hearing of the plan to travel to Borderton for a second time, Asher questions, Garryn, why Borderton and not Deuxchay? If we had managed to capture or kill the brigands that have plagued this road, I would envision  a very   generous reception from alderman Savin; but to drag the body of a former inmate and a beheaded 'diplomat' back through the gates of that city, without having learned anything that may aid the trade dillema-- I don't expect to be greeted warmly."

Asher casts a glance at the limp shells of Totmacher and Villhalas. "I do not know much about the sort of healing you seek for these two; if we must hurry for their sakes, then let's. But I feel it has become our accepted duty to bring justice to the brigands that threaten this road. Are you of a similar mind?"

"Hmm, well, lets put it this way, if you wish to proceed you will be doing so without me. Although I am not sure if it will be possible I am going to bordertown to attempt to have them raised. I have heard that it is of the utmost importance that bodies be raised quickly as the insects that feast upon corpses will do the body permanent harm. I know we have only known you a short time but I have travelled many leagues with those foolhardy brothers and I will not so easily abandon them now and that debt supercedes our previous goal, at least as far as I am concerned. To that end my mind is set and the greeting I recieve from Savin and men of his ilk is of no consequence, I travel to Bordertown because it is the closest city. Caylin, are your thoughts on this subject similar to my own?" Garryn replies explaining his position.

Bravery having little to do with it, much rather a desire to keep down breakfast, Perrato follows Garryn's example and fashions from the expendable hems of his robes makeshift nose plugs and a mask to cover the lower half of his face. "I, too, am of a mind to return to Borderton. Whatever assistance we require to continue our journey to Deuxchay, is more likely to be found there than on the road." He joins the search for telling information among the detritus that is the vanquished caravan as he quietly regrets the loss of hardy traveler's lives.

Aidrin continues to concentrate on locating magical auras in and among the remnants of the caravan. "For my part, I too would prefer to travel on to Borderton. We may find our welcome in Duexchay somewhat cool."

The halting, tentative search of the dead reveals nothing of value.  At the end of a few moments, Aidrin is convinced that nothing magical is in the vicinity of the scene of slaughter.  The wizard is careful to keep himself at a maximum remove from the killing ground, but an intricate circumnavigation of the dead--and his spell's duration--make him reasonably confident he has missed nothing.

Perrato, Asher, and Garryn venture into the vicinity of the dead.  Clouds of buzzing flies swirl malignantly into the air at their approach, and small, strange rodents of some sort--their heads and forelegs bare of fur and appearing wrinkled and pink--scamper away from the cavities they have burrowed in the corpses of human and horse alike.  Asher is queasy, but is able to proceed with his inspection without incident.  Perrato appears to be virtually unaffected by the miasma of decay, but Garryn is not so fortunate.  With a gut-wrenching heave, the rogue expels his partially-digested breakfast onto the ground in front of him.  Three of the strange rodents immediately rush over and begin to lap up the vomitus, fighting for their place and rolling around in the chunky mess.  This sends Garryn into fresh paroxysms of retching, and the rogue is forced to move away from the site--wretched, pale, and sweating.  Caylin, disdaining to approach and search, has remained upwind and smoking his pipe.  Commiseratingly, he hands Garryn a small flask of whiskey and advises the rogue sit down with his head between his knees for a bit.

Perrato and Asher finish the unenviable task of searching these blackened, bloated corpses--torn by scavengers and housing all sorts of squirming white larvae.  Apparently, everything of obvious value had been stripped, and anything that would have been missed would represent a supremely disgusting task to locate.  The two move back to rejoin Aidrin, Caylin, and a recovering Garryn.

Perrato, in spite of the fact that the search yielded nothing tangible, nevertheless comes away with a sense of the trail leading away to the northwest.  Several Ogres; numerous hob-nail booted creatures of various sorts; two large, four-legged clawed creatures--and two others, whose footprints differed from all of the others in that the imprints indicated a more refined footwear.  The priest suspects these were either leaders of some sort, or prisoners from the caravan.

OOC:  Plans?

PM

When his stomach settles Garryn stands and examines the situation. They lack the fighting prowess to confront the raiders, even if they could follow them. Nothing of value seems to have been left behind and the corpses are too far gone to spend any amount of time around them burying them, or even piling them up to burn them. Garryn does have one idea but he's not sure it will work.

"Aidrin, could you use the flaming ball you used the other day to immolate the bodies? We cannot bury them, but perhaps we could at least to that, what does everyone think? Otherwise, we can't do much more here, lets finish up and head back to bordertown," Garryn says, gathering himself together.

"I am prepared to build a makeshift pyre by more conventional means, if you are disinclined to use your magical talents, Aidrin," says Perrato, still disturbed by the overpowering odor of carrion despite his recent display of intestinal fortitude. "I will not leave them like this, though it may require a little time to enact my particular approach to prepare these unfortunate souls for The Great Beyond."

"I am unable, unfortunately. I have prepared other spells, seeing as that particular one caused us some trouble," the wizard says, fingering the singe marks on his robes. "If I am able, I will help you, Perrato. I would not leave friends and companions like this."
This message was last edited by the player at 12:40, Mon 19 Sept 2005.

"What would you have me do to help, priest?" Asher offers.

"I have some oil that may assist us in starting a fire, but for this small amount to be any real aid to our cause we must gather the remains of the fallen," says the cleric. Thinking of the Burning Disc, a symbol of the source of life which resides in the skies of Arret, he continues, "I wish to arrange them in a circle with whatever available easily combustible scraps of wood and fabric that we can uncover among the wreckage. I would like to treat any scraps of fabric with the limited oil I possess before placing them among their remains. I would also appreciate the opportunity to touch each body in turn with my torch in order to facilitate our purposes, both earthly and divine."

Aidrin takes his pack off his shoulders and begins to rummage though it. "You're welcome to the oil that I have." He removes a flask and extends it to the priest.

The small group of companions--Garryn, Perrato, Asher, Aidrin, and Caylin--are standing some distance away from the scattered, festering corpses of the caravan as the morning sun begins to turn the day sweltering .  Caylin stares at Perrato in outright disbelief as the priest utters these words.  "Fuck that, priest.  They lie where they be.  I'll not sweat an' struggle in th' slime o' decayin' bodies t' move 'em inta some circle."  The halfling archer appears to be seriously assessing Perrato's sanity, and literally snorts when Aidrin offers his one flask of oil.  "Them gnolls tore us up, an' then some.  I'm nae waitin' around an' workin' on movin' corpses like t' be fallin' t' pieces by now--dodgin' jackals, hyenas, vultures, an' who th' fuck knows what all else.  We've go t' GO, lads.  We got two o' our own stone cold dead, we're two days inta th' Wilds, we got two dozen dead men AN' half th' number o' dead horses drawin' flies an' a hell o' a lot worse, AN' THEY BE LAYIN ON TH' GROUND RIGHT NEXT T' US!"  Caylin pauses, then continues a bit more calmly.  "Lets' away back t' Borderton, soonest done be best.  Any other course'll get us killed, sure."

Caylin glances over at Asher, and mutters, "Deuxchay!  Danu's tits..."

"Well said, lets go," Garryn agrees with his small friend.

"I am willing to make practical concessions, but I still insist upon doing something for the dead," says Perrato as he contemplates whether or not the halfling has what in later ages may come to be termed "a mood disorder". He ponders how he might more efficently set the corpses aflame without moving them from their current locations.

In an even and passionless tone Asher speaks, "I am not accustomed to venerating the dead; so to stay for these," Asher gestures to the bodies of the caravan, and then nods to the pair of deceased travelling companions, "or to travel for those, means the same to me. I leave it to the rest of you to decide. I will support whatever action the group should choose."

OOC: Asher's lack of empathy aside, it would be nice to get things moving in some direction soon.

"Priest, we don't have time for this. If Aidrin had been able to recall the flaming sphere, well, that would have been fine, but that would take us a whole day, and that we cannot afford. We lack enough oil to do more than singe them and start a brushfire, and I, for one, lack the intestinal fortitude to even approach the corpses. If it will make you feel better say a prayer but be quick about it, we've got to start moving if we don't want to join them," Garryn says waving his hand in the direction of the rotting corpses.

"A pyre is out of the question. Very well," says Perrato as he searches his memory for some ceremonial act he can perform in lieu of taking proper care of the souls of the travelers, "This will have to make do."

The cleric lights his Everburning Torch and uses his oil to place an unction on the foreheads of each of the fallen members of the caravan. After placing the small amount of oil upon each he recites, "Potestas Vagranae animam tuam liberet" and uses a thin scrap of wood to transfer a small amount of flame from the torch to the unction.

"I am prepared to go, " says Perrato as he turns his head to look at the carnage one last time, "As are they."

Perrato completes the Mithran ceremony, symbolically applying the cleansing flame of the Unconquered Sun to each of the fallen caravan members.  Satisfied that the dead have been honored as well as can be, given the lonely wilds in which they fell, Perrato is prepared to depart.

The companions gather their belonings, their mounts, and their dead...and ready themselves for the journey back to Borderton.  Wounded, weary, and minus two of their number, the remaining companions depart the little lake, small hills, and surrounding prairie with a sense of loss.  The hyenas and jackals slink back to the site of massacre as soon as the party begins their departure, and two vultures tear into one another in a dispute over a corpse--not thirty yards from the party.  The scene of death and decay contrasts strongly with the sunny, rapidly warming day, but the companions are determined to put this grim place behind them.

The trek back to Borderton begins.