Road to Kebnegard, Chapter Twenty-One

Other Half of Party Losing Members Rapidly
Friday, April 13th, 988 AD

Vera and Moishe become very sick and aren't able to do very much, unfortunately, but we go back to Toksha to grab supplies and try to find a jeweler to sell our two massive rubies to, and also a library just 'cause. Neither are to be found in this smallish town, but there is a metalworker who says the giant rubies aren't rubies at all, and offers us 40gp for one. Reynaldo turns him down.

As we're leaving Toksha for Kevel, a city on the coast of the Baltic Sea, we notice a huge commotion on the outskirts. There are a lot of women listening rapturously while a lot of men are turning away, grumbling. It turns out that Anna and Stepanova are preaching about how women need to throw off the shackles of man. As the party tries to reach them, Reynaldo is stopped by some women and told he can go no further.

Reynaldo: What? Ridiculous. I know that woman. She's my... uhh... acquaintance... no, that's too much... look, she makes it easier to kill my enemies, okay? Now, let me through, you cow.
Woman: Make me.
Wong: Done.

Wong turns on her fear powers and makes many of the gathered women run in fear. Anna finally notices us.

Reynaldo: Why aren't you in Kebnegard?
Anna: St. Michael told me it would not be safe to board the ship that the others were getting on.
Wong: But you let the others get on!?
Anna: He said it'd be okay for them. He told me I should come and find you guys because you lacked a conscience.
Reynaldo: Well, yeah, but we liked it that way.

We travel towards Kevel, with Grettor guiding us, until nightfall. We make camp, but during first watch, someone scryes us. Reynaldo flips them off and turns on a darkness stone. The rest of the night passes.

Riding to Kevel
Saturday, April 14th, 988 AD

In the morning, Anna Summons horses and we ride all day. We make camp again at night, not at the fishing village we've come upon, but in the woods, just in case we're scryed again.

Up the Baltic and Pig-Man Attack
Sunday, April 15th, 988 AD

While traveling up the coast of Baltic, we notice that people are speaking less and less Norse. We travel all day until nightfall, and rest again. We send a note to the other party asking them if either they are scrying on us, or are being scryed. Edward replies in the negative to both questions. We sleep.

During first watch, a hail of arrows hits Reynaldo. Stepanova, his watch companion, decides to help Anna put on her armor instead of helping Reynlado repel the ranged attack. After a few more hails of arrows (all aimed at Reynaldo), the party finally locates the source and Wong fears them away. We get a look before they turn tail and run. They look like men with pig faces, never before seen not under Reynaldo's thrall (with Monster Summoning). We continue sleeping and Reynaldo vows never to watch with Stepanova again.

Much Shenanigans in Kevel and Dwarven Street Fighting, part II
Monday, April 16th, 988 AD

In the morning, Reynaldo is healed up and we head towards Kevel. Along the way, we discuss ways of getting to Gotland.

Grettor: The sea route is the best. We'll take a ship from Kevel to Gotland, easy peasy.
Wong: We don't have very good luck with boats.
Reynaldo: As a party, anyway. I'm awesome on boats, but talk to me about the land route.
Grettor: We can't take the land route.
Shara: Why not?
Grettor: Because we'd have to go through the Finnish lands.
Anna: And...?
Grettor: What do you mean, 'And?' The Finns are all witches! No one who goes through their lands ever comes back!
Anna: That's absurd. The entire people can't be witches.
Grettor: You're right. The males are warlocks.
Reynaldo: Smartass.

After hours of riding, we reach Kevel. Before Anna mentions her friend Udrez Kudrez, Reynaldo and Shara expend two spells trying to get a non-Norse speaking local to give us information. It doesn't work out all that well. We go to the docks to try and get passage to Gotland, but the harbormaster tells us there are no boats going out.

Anna: Why not?
Harbormaster: Because we have no beaver musk.
Reynaldo, Wong, and Shara all burst into childish laughter.
Harbormaster: We're waiting on a beaver musk shipment from the Norselands.
Anna: Why do you need beaver musk?
Harbormaster: It keeps all the sea monsters away. They hate the smell.
Wong (still laughing): You'd think they'd be used to it, living in the sea and all.
Anna: Don't you have any beaver musk here?
Harbormaster: Some, but they're very small beavers. The Norsemen seem to have giant beavers in their lands, what with all the musk they're able to bring.
Reynaldo (in tears): Stop! You're killing me!
Anna: Pay them no mind. So, how does one prepare beaver musk?
Harbormaster: First, you have to catch a beaver, and that's a difficult skill in and of itself that many men lack. Then, you have to shave the beaver before inserting a hard rod to extract the musk.

Reynaldo, Wong, and Shara all fall over. The conversation has to wait until composure is regained.

Anna: So, until the... item... comes from the Norselands, no ships are traveling.
Harbormaster: There was one, the Valgae Leya, which could sail without the beaver musk, but unfortunately, its captain was recently killed. It was a magic boat that could fit in one's pack, but now that Udrez is dead, it has returned to its resting place in the Chamber of the Twelve Doors.
Anna: Udrez Kudrez is dead!? How? Why?
Harbormaster: It's a strange story. They say a little girl named Veehaldjas came looking for him. She had a small doll with her and they went into an alley to converse. Witnesses say they heard a blood-curdling scream and the girl came out. She said she was actually Vanaporgueitsi, the devil. They found Udrez Kudrez dead, with a look of utter horror etched on his face.

Anna looked shaken. She had apparently fought with Udrez Kudrez for awhile here after the rest of the party had continued on to Kebnegard. They'd become good friends, which is strange considering her stance on men.

We took our leave of the harbormaster so that Anna could pay her respects to Udrez' family. She learns that two men had come to meet with him before he died, a dwarf named Hornbore and a man named (uhh... what was his name?). The rest of us went with Grettor because he said he had proof that all Finns were witches. He took us to a statue of Linda, mother of Kalevipoeg (an Estonian hero of some sort), at the outskirts of town. Grettor said that this was the real Linda, after she had rebuked the advances of a Finnish wizard.

We meet up again in the city (and learn some rumors to be inserted later) and find a jeweler who tells Reynaldo he'll give him 275gp for the one large ruby. Reynaldo produces the other ruby and says a matching set should be worth more. The jeweler agrees, and quotes 590gp for the set. Reynaldo tells him the story of how he got the rubies and the jeweler agrees that the story makes them worth a little bit more. Reynaldo walks away with 600gp, which he distributes among the five party members who helped get them. We eat a good, hot meal and head out into the forest, to rest. We want to hack the Chamber of the Twelve Doors tomorrow, and need our rest. Unfortunately, we're stopped by a group of dwarves. The lead dwarf introduces himself as Hornbore. He tells us that Mr. Duskytarn considers us friends, and then says he is the brother of Prince Rathsviv, whom we have killed. We don't immediately recall killing any dwarves, but they attack us anyway. Hornbore grows to about eight feet in height and drops Conrad like a bad habit, but aside from that, the fight is pretty even. So even, that their cleric separates us from each other with a force field of some sort. Unfortunately for them, one of the dwarves ends up on our side. We quickly subdue him and move away for an hour.

We start questioning the dwarf, but unfortunately, Reynaldo forgets that Anna and Stepanova have rejoined the party and resorts to torture by breaking the dwarf's finger. Stepanova immediately steps in and the in-figting begins. Reynaldo actually tries to take a swing at Stepanova. I can only assume he didn't want to fry her with a Lightning Bolt. At the end of it all, the party decided to turn the dwarf over to the Kevel guard, mentioning that this dwarf's boss met with Udrez Kudrez before his death.

Shara calls for the removal of Stepanova from the party after the possibility is mentioned by Reynaldo.

Shara: She fought against us and tried to impose her beliefs on us. That's absurd and she should leave.
Stepanova: I can't leave. God has ordained this mission for me. I must follow the Lady Anna.
Shara: We can't trust you. You tried to let the dwarf escape over our objections. I was told this party worked on voting and there were three of us and two of you. We can't let your beliefs guide this party. Most of us think your beliefs are ridiculous.
Stepanova: I was not imposing my beliefs on you, but I had to make sure my beliefs weren't imposed on.
Reynaldo: Okay, shut up.
Shara: But--
Reynaldo: Both of you. No one's leaving this goddamn party. I need you all. I shouldn't have to remind you that defeating the octopuses is ridiculously more important than any of this petty bullshit. This is why we're going to Kebnegard and helping them even after that stupid bitch stole my book, and why Eorl is off my list.
Wong: Ah, c'mon! We're helping them?
Reynaldo: Stepanova, I'm sorry for resorting to torture. I had forgotten your aversion to it.
Stepanova: It's not a question of aversion; it's just plain wrong.
Reynaldo: We've established that you're in the minority on that. Wong, Shara, and myself think it necessary on occasions. Whether today was one of those occasions can be debated ad nauseum. Regardless, I still apologize. Shara, while I agreed with you in this instance, you need to understand that you do not get to call for the removal of a party member. You are a new recruit, after all.
Shara: But we can't trust her.
Reynaldo: I can't trust you. I've known you all of a week. Stepanova I've known for months and I know exactly what she will do in any given situation. I may not always agree with her, but I know beyond the shadow of a doubt that she very much wants to destroy the octopuses and that she will not kill me in my sleep. I don't know that about you yet. Now, no one's leaving unless one chooses to of their own free will.

We sleep in an inn, trying to make the rooms look as nondescript as possible, in case we're scryed on again.

Chamber of the Twelve Doors
Tuesday, April 17th, 988 AD

After resting, healing, and Divining about the Chamber (God says 'Don't be a pussy!'), we go the outskirts of town and hack the Chamber. Grettor stays behind to watch over Vera and Moishe, who are still feeling ill.

When we get to the Chamber, there are three runes on the outside of a massive pair of black doors. We can't make out the runes, so we head in. The Chamber is 100 feet long and 20 feet wide. There are twelve doors in the chamber (a very literal name, apparently), six on each side, as well as an unlit fireplace on the opposite end. We decide to systematically check the doors. The first door on our right (west side) opens easily and we see a moss covering a door. Wong shoots a flaming arrow at the mold, which puts out the fire and grows to fill in two-thirds of the room. Wong steps close to it and feels heat sapped out of her. We decide to leave it alone, for now. The next two doors contain Ghouls and a Ladybug Monster, respectively. We kill them al to get to the doors behind them, but the doors lead nowhere. They just open up to the wall. The fourth room contains a bear, but Shara is able to cast Speak with Animals and Charm Mammal. She convinces the bear that we're no threat to it, and in fact, if he tackles a certain moss, we'll give it food (the door in his room also leads nowhere). The bear reluctantly goes to the first room and tries to bite and claw at the cold moss. He recoils when he takes massive damage and complains. Shara gives it some cured meat and lets it go out into the wild. The fifth room contains a flying manta creature in a room with a pit. We quickly kill it and Reynaldo scales the walls to get to the door, which also leads nowhere. The sixth room contains three chests, one full of silver and the other two empty, and no door. Since God told us to "be generous" in Anna's Divination, we leave the money alone, much to Reynaldo and Wong's dismay. Having exhausted all the doors on the west side, we start on the east side, near the fireplace. We open the door and see nothing but another door at the end. Conrad steps in and opens the far door. Four men with shining red helmets run out of the door. Conrad gets out of the way and the four men put a very small casket on the floor before continuing on. They go outside of the room and into the fireplace before disappearing. Both the door in the room and the fireplace lead to walls, so we can't figure out where they've gone. We open the casket and see a small, frozen man. We take him out of the casket and thaw him out. He wakes and says he's been sleeping for over a thousand years, waking once in a while when adventurers dwell in here. He asks us to divide the silver in the other room into two equal piles. The silver is of course odd-numbered and as Reynaldo is about to give the last piece to the nameless dwarf, Wong says, "Why don't we just put in one silver piece?" Reynaldo does so, which makes the total number equal and therefore, easily halved. The dwarf says no one else had ever done that before. Only one other adventurer was able to equally distribute the money, but he actually cut the last silver piece in half. He admits that had we failed, he would have been forced to strangle us to death. Or at least, he would have tried. Udrez Kudrez apparently beat him and forced the dwarf to give him the ship. Which reminds him, he should give us our booty. He goes to second door from the main entrance and goes to the door at the back of the room. He walks over water to do this. He pulls a box made of white wood and measuring 12 by 6 by 6 inches from the small enclosing behind the door and brings it to us.

"This is the Valgae Leya," he says. There are three command words to make the ship into a box, a small boat, or a large ship with a cabin and below decks. We all dance with glee. Anna asks about the runes outside of the Chamber, and the dwarf replies that they are Sinilind, Jeekim, and Libahunt, which means a magical bluebird, an undead creature from a graveyard, and a werewolf, respectively.

We continue dancing for our new boat.

End Chapter Twenty-One