27-29th of Eleasis (Highsun) – Summer 1486
Location: High above the Dessarin Valley
The nine giant vulture riders dismounted and flocked into the tower where Pinko, Smacky and Seepage were engaged in their leisurely and scholarly activities. The sudden appearance of lightly armoured and robed figures in the alcove caused silence to descend on the lofty room. Each of the newcomers was lightly built, human, and wore a steel helm that resembled a stylised bird's head and covered the wearer's eyes. Their long cloaks were fashioned into crude representations of wings. Two were obviously in charge, a man and a woman designated by their commanding presence at the front of the group and the red variant of the garb they wore in countenance to the black that adorned their lessers. The woman stepped forward purposely while the man's fingers drummed a light tattoo on the pouch of his shoulder bag that was adorned with a smiling face.
“You! Servant girl.” the woman called to an amused Cockseepage leaning over the edge of her giant-sized wine goblet. “Summon your Master. Tell him N’von and Amarath of the Howling Hatred seek an audience on behalf of Yan-C-Bin, the great and powerful.” Pinko quickly wracked his brain and recalled that name belonged to a particularly deranged Prince of Elemental Air who wanted only to see the destruction of the material plane and wondered what they could possibly want with an absent-minded yet seemingly kind Cloud Giant wizard like Zephyros. Seepage recognised the theatrical group for what they really were. Cultists with no actual clue what forces they served and merely filled with their own self-importance to be part of a group because their parents 'didn't understand them'. “Oh, sure! No problems, let me get right on that.” Seeps replied, jumping out of the cup onto the floor dripping with red wine that had stained her armour almost the same colour as her skin. “HEY ZEPHY! YOU GOT VISITORS!” she yelled to the hole in the ceiling.
As one, the cultist turned their gazes skywards. Smacky took this opportunity to make a series of overtly dramatic yet oddly silent side-steps to position himself directly beside the group of black-clad figures. With no sign of Zephyros stirring from his chambers above, Smacks raised his warhammer above his head, looked over to Pinks and pantomimed clobbering the nearest figure squarely over the noggin. Pinko began the reflexive action of shaking his head and raising his hands to waylay the barbarian’s primal tendencies when he thought to himself “You know what. Fuck it.” and lobbed a Produce Flame spell directly into the middle of the group before wild-shaping into a huge brown bear. “Attaboy!” called Seeps genuinely surprised and impressed that she wasn’t the instigator of chaos for once as she flung out her whip and wound it around the stem of the giant goblet, pulling it crashing down to the ground and spilling its contents over the two cultist leaders. Smacky seemed genuinely confused for a moment at this out-of-character display from Pinks, but then cheered and converted his practice swings into reckless raging abandon as he danced between the scrawny bird lovers, his blows making a mockery of their flimsy armour.
“Kill them!” screamed N’von as the battle erupted and she conjured a shield of wispy clouds to surround her. Amarath raised both hands to his forehead and stared intently at the half-orc who was already engaged with three of his underlings. As a mighty hammer blow from Blunt Rosethorn caved in the skull of one unfortunate follower of Yan-C-Bin the Hold Person spell took effect and Smacky found himself pinned in a most awkward position. Bear-Pinko bounded into the magic user and sent him sprawling across the slick wine-stained floor but his grip on Smacky remained. N’von next crafted a spectral mace, complete with a set of wings extending from just below the head which flew towards Seeps as she lined up an Eccy Blast at the robed figures now swarming the paralyzed form of Smacky. Pinko bore down on the prone figure of Amarath and chomped at the arm raised defensively before him. The futile gesture against the bulk of the wild-shaped druid may have been an instinctual response from the cultist, but as Pinko’s teeth found flesh, Amarath’s free palm shot out and caught the bear over the heart. Icey necrotic tendrils inflicted hideous pain and a gaping wound which rotted away fur and bone forcing Pinks out of form and back to his usual elven self panting for breath on the flagstones beside his would-be pray, clutching at his heart that still felt cold in his rib cage.
“You think you’re funny tiefling!” N’von accused Seeps as she approached the warlock menacingly, still wiping wine off her face. The fanatic pulled a wicked curved dagger from her belt as her conjured mace backed Seepage away from her companions. “You dare interfere with the will of the Prince of Air?!” N’von lunged and caught Seeps in the upper arm, drawing red blood freely. The blade hadn’t even had time to exit the wound before Seepage’s eyes flooded jet black and her whip had wrapped itself tightly around N’von’s wrist, the infernal energies within her swarming into a Hellish Rebuke that engulfed her adversary in flames. N’von screamed. “Oh honey,” crooned Seepage, “if you wanted to play rough you should of just asked.” In a single flowing movement, she spun the cultist 180 degrees using the leverage of her whip, twirled to face her, drew her own dagger and planted it squarely between N’von’s ribs. As Seeps held her opponent close she licked the last of the wine off the woman’s face. “You missed a spot”, she giggled, as she twisted the blade and let N’von collapse to the floor, the Spirit Weapon fading into a mist as its summoner expired
Across the room, Amarath had recovered enough to witness N’von’s demise and roared in anger. “What have you done, devil!” He unslung the bag over his shoulder and tossed it open to the floor. It seemed to deflate, but otherwise, nothing happened. Three of the surviving black cloaked cultists were wailing on Smacky’s frozen form while two others tried to bullrush Pinko. The druid was unsure exactly what creatures would come to his aid on a flying cloud but summoning help he attempted nonetheless. As the two darkly dressed men advanced towards him, four larger, smellier and more muscular shadows took corporeal form on either side of his assailants. Moments later, the apes were hurling cultist pieces across the room as they tore the skinny humans limb from limb.
His fury building more from his impotence than the blunt stikes of the clubs against his head and body, Smacky maintained his rage while the room around him exploded with fire, blood, and primates. Through sheer force of will, he finally managed to shatter the spell and caught his opponents off guard as the stationary warhammer once again sprung to life and caught two of them in a golf swing. The apes piled in and the tides of battle swang firmly in favour of the Mickale trio and their furry allies. Seeing a large, brutish, primal animal jumping up and down repeatedly on a long-since defeated foe muttering gibberish (Smacky, not the apes), Amarath magically elevated his voice and called for his vulture mount while bolting towards the exit of the tower. The huge avian creature hopped clumsily into view through the portico as Amarath made his dash to freedom. Three steps short of the dark wings the purple and black eldrich beam broke through his chest and startled the bird, which took to the sky squawking, closely followed by its fellows who knew how to take a hint.
Victorious the party caught their breath for a moment, before one of Pinko’s apes suddenly went crashing across the room, slammed into Zephyros’ desk and despawned in a puff of furry dust. “Wat da hells waz dat?!” exclaimed Smacky as an unseen force pounded into his lower back nearly toppling him forward. He reactively swung his warhammer around but found nothing but air. The three remaining apes got jittery and started running back and forth across the room, bouncing off dead cultists and knocking the smiling bag on the floor that Amarath had dropped. Midway through a bound another ape suddenly changed direction in the air and went sailing out the front door when Seeps put two and two together… and got five. “THE BAG!” she accused with a certainty of conviction she rarely committed to. An ecky blast left her hand and streaked in a zig-zagging arc to the offending piece of luggage and exploded it into many tiny pieces. Smacky applauded as bits of the Bag of Holding gently floated down around him, quickly followed by the giant-sized goblet lifting into the air and being swung like a club into the back of his head.
Rechecking the Warlock’s mathematics, something clicked and Pinko cast Faerie Fire over the scene in front of him. Smacky, the goblet and the previously invisible roughly humanoid-shaped creature holding it all started to glow in the green morning light of his home under the trees of the Neverwinter Woods. The creature had no legs and seemed to be a native of the elemental plane of air. Sensing its nature had been uncovered, the Invisible Stalker flew into a rage whipping up papers, cloth and even small pieces of dead creatures around it. With something to target Pinko set his last two apes in to engage it as Smacky hefted his hammer and went about getting his revenge for the sore head. Strong as the elemental was, with its optical advantage taken from it, it was soon little but a cold breeze escaping into the afternoon sky.
N’von had carried a small pouch of faerie dust on her hip which Pinko liberated to see if he could work out a way to add some ‘kick’ to his usual blend of pipeweed, but otherwise, the cultists didn’t seem to have anything much of interest on them. Zephyros had made an appearance around dinner time bearing some roast ox which one of his favourite griffons had apparently ‘acquired’ for him. Purely by coincidence, it would seem they had flown low over the town on Beliard late that afternoon, the smells of its cattle markets able to permeate even the airs above the village through which they passed. With a few flicks of his wand, the chaos in the lower chamber reverted to its previously pristine state without so much as the slightest hint of interest from the cloud giant as to what had transpired to create such a mess.
The following day was spent passing higher over the unadorned Dessarin Hills. Rugged and scruffy, only the odd old ruin of a long-forgotten tower or fort broke the rolling vista until the town of Yartar came into view on the horizon as night fell. Just after dawn on their third day of aerial travel Smacky was standing at the edge of the cloud watching as that same busy river port slowly passed beneath them and decided it would be most amusing to ruin their local weatherman's forecast of clear skies by providing an unexpected early morning golden shower. He chuckled to himself as a stream an ogre would be proud of rained down on the Yartar locals. A few hours further north with the settlement still just visible behind them, the adult silver dragon carrying what looked like a couple of talons full of angry dwarven warriors sailing gracefully towards them made him question the laws of cause and effect. He rushed back inside to warn the others of the beautiful but deadly threat he believed his ill-timed piss had inadvertently brought to their door.
Next Episode: Operation Orb Strike
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