COME DIE WITH ME - 06/10/2021 - A Kavel Perspective

Prologue - Asking Morgana for Directions


There was a note advertising for adventurers to help find some missing spoons from a wealthy estate. Miller Mansion on Dreamer Street. I hadn’t been there before, so I checked with Morgana at the woodcarving workshop if she could direct me. I was not scheduled for a class today, so it was a surprise to her that I entered the shop.

“So just follow where I said to go Kavel and you should find the place. So, what is the job?”, she asked.

“Spoons”, I replied, and showed her the note.

“Hmm. This reminds me of something for your next lesson. Anyway, you better be off, I know you wouldn’t want to be late”, she said. And she was right. Off I went.


Infront of Miller Mansion

Having to find the place, I did not arrive as early as I would have hoped to. I had to forego my pre-adventure warm-up and stretching. Not good.

As I approached the front gate to Miller Mansion, before me was an adventurer I hadn’t seen in a while; Stejn the Half-Orc, a warrior, but also a magic user. He favours the spear and wears chainmail. I showed him my new weapon, the Chekan, a rather elegant poleaxe.

Next came Dwirhian, the fair skinned Elf with a similar bald dome to me. I hadn’t seen her since my arrival in Kantas!

“Comrade Dwirhian! How are you? It’s been a long time, how’s your rope climbing coming along?” This was how I greeted her. Apparently no gains had been made in rope climbing since our time at the Mysterious Mountain. Naturally, I informed Dwirhian of Kavel’s Corner for Strength and Conditioning at Fort Ettin. I’ll have to set up some climbing apparatus, when I’m next there.

Lastly, we were joined by Levuka, a comrade of Dwirhian. Another elf, but Levuka, was more olive skinned.

A Goliath exited the front door to the mansion, and approached the front gate. We were greeted by Victor, the butler.


The Butler of Miller Mansion

Victor led us into Miller Mansion through the front door and into a sitting room to wait for our employer. It was good to see another Goliath. I bet if there was a butler fight amongst the butlers in this rich neighbourhood, Victor would win.

The room smelt of lilac. There were ornaments displayed around the room in well-made display cabinets. This was a large room, to a large house, with a large garden. I assumed this meant pay was going to be good.

A portrait adorned one of the walls. It was a full profile of a beautiful Drow woman, who at that moment, through a different door to the one us adventurers entered, graced us with her presence.


Lady Jeziah Miller

The owner of the mansion was a recent widow, who unfortunately had once previously already experienced a burglary. The previous theft was more substantial and involved a missing collection. Other adventurers had dealt with this.

The current matter was more a sentimental loss than an expensive loss. Someone had stolen two sets of twenty-four spoons. There would be an 80gp reward for each of us adventurers if we could recapture the spoons and discover who stole them. 80gp. I was right about the pay being good.

Lady Jeziah left us with Victor, who escorted us to the dining room to inspect where the theft took place.

Victor had left the dining room as it was after the crime. On the ground, where they didn’t belong, there were drawers torn off of a nearby sideboard. Cutlery was sprawled out over the floor - no spoons amongst the forks and knives. Levuka began to inspect this.

Dwirhian was questioning Victor about the staff. Victor seemed confident that the staff wouldn’t steal anything. He did say that the thieves must have come in through the front door, but left in a hurry through the windows in this room. Victor remembered that he had accompanied Lady Miller to the cemetery on the weekend, a few days ago. They came back early and heard a commotion in the dining room. Bad timing is likely why the criminals left through the windows. Stejn went to inspect the window frame.

I was left with nothing to do.

I looked around. All three of my companions were engaged in work. The dining table was immense and looked to be of solid build. So, I tried to lift it. Oomph! Very heavy!

“Good table!”, I said to Victor after struggling to lift the table an inch off the ground. Must be made of double oak. I suspected this because of what I had been learning from Morgana. My woodcarving lessons were paying off.

“It is indeed, Mr. Castiron”, Victor replied.

We questioned Victor further. He informed us that neither Lady Miller nor the late Lord Miller had any enemies. Everyone was clueless as to why the spoons specifically were stolen leaving anything else of more value.

Levuka had found the remaining cutlery had a stylised pattern M on them and that they were made of a semi-precious metal. Victor confirmed that the missing spoons were similarly constructed.

Stejn had found a pair of medium-sized footprints on the window sill that had been missed by Victor. Stejn opened the window and could see from where we were in the mansion that there was a sloping, tiled roof above an extension on the ground floor. It seemed fairly safe to slide down here to exit the dining room and mansion.Getting up through here would have been harder.

Levuka decided to re-enact the burglars exit. She climbed through the window and off she slid, out of control and crashing into some shrubbery. No injuries, but with twigs now caught up in her hair; no dignity.


The Clue in the Shrubbery

Levuka’s reenactment served a purpose; she found a note left by the thieves.

The note was a list of places to steal from. Some of the places on the note had been stolen from, other places were deemed too far, and some had no spoons noted next to the address. In addition, the note said to deliver the spoons by Hunter’s Moon - which would be today.

We asked Victor if he had a map. He kindly provided one to us. With little time to investigate the other properties, we each took one place each and split up. We would meet up at 1 Castle Road, which was one of the locations on the note.


5 Black Alley opposite the Watch

I went to the address opposite the Watch, just outside of Stoneside. 5 Black Alley was a large family house. The parents there said their spoons had been stolen and they saw the thieves flee north-east to Stoneside, where I’d come from.

I reconvened with the others at 1 Castle Road and exchanged information. We gained no deeper insight, until we connected each location up, by drawing lines on the map, and the shape formed into a pentagram, which the magic-users - which was all three of my comrades - said had magical significance. The centre of the pentagram was also the direction in which the occupants of 5 Black Alley said the thieves fled towards, straight towards Honor Lane, it now seemed.


Honor Lane

As we looked to the sky, it was very close to the Hunter’s Moon. We hoped we had found the right place, otherwise we would be too late.

There was nothing particularly interesting amongst the buildings of Honor Lane, except for this one shed that was boarded up on it’s double door entrance. No lock from the outside.

I knocked on the door as Dwirhian put an ear to the door to listen inside. No response to my knock, but Dwirhian told us she could hear a voice saying, “quick! Shut him up!”

This information alarmed us, and with that we decided we had to force our way in.

Stejn charged at the left door with his shield and body. I opted for my maul for the right hand door. Stein made a strong impact on the left door. My maul obliterated the right hand door. Hardly the sort of technique I’ve been learning at my woodcarving lessons, but it was effective here.

As I stepped inside, it was dark. I lit a torch and it was clear that this shed housed a larger basement than the outside suggested, and the stench inside was abhorrent. A repugnant combination of ash, sulfur and blood entered my nose. Before we rounded the corner to go down the stairs, Levuka casted something on herself. Is there a ‘Reduce Smell’ spell? I do not know what she cast.


There’s More Than Spoons and Spoon Thieves Down Here

The light of my torch alerted us to the blood covering the stairway all the way down to the basement. Stejn blessed us with his divine magic. Levuka, made an owl familiar called Eustice appear. Seems owl familiars are popular amongst the magic-users. Why not a hawk? It’s stronger.

We proceeded with caution.

Levuka sent Eustice down ahead of us and a sound like a thrown, metal object hitting the wall could be heard. Levuka, who could sense what Eustice could see, informed us what lay before us: “A man in robes threw the dagger from the back of the room. A Half-Elf was tied down on top of an altar. Beside the altar were markings on the floor of a large pentagram. A formerly living Half-Elf was being eaten by these three mounds of blubber with rats encircling in and out of them”.

“Mounds of blubber”, I thought to myself? Can owls not see well enough to determine race?

I rounded the corner at the bottom of the stairs, javelin in hand, and inexplicably there really were three mounds of horrendous blubber. Were they humanoid with limbs under all that blubber? Clearly a case of too much cannibalism, and not enough strength training. I threw my javelin at the nearest blubber man. Revoluted by what I saw, my aim was off, I managed to miss.

Levuka charged forward to engage all three of the blubber men. Warrior! However, from the look of her face, this was unwise. It seems, the horrible stench is immensely more powerful the closer you get to the blubber men. Levuka’s face has gone from olive to green, and the rodents encircling the blubber men are biting her. She manages to entangle one of the foes with a thorny whip and pull it towards her, and then transform from a green face elf to a Direwolf!

One of the blubber men has moved closer to the captive on the table. Dwirhian looks past this foe and renders the dagger thrower in the back paralysed with her magic. This is powerful magic. The robed man is incapacitaded and defenseless.

The two blubber men attacking Levuka’s Direwolf form are not having much success. Direwolves are tough, but I suspect the ‘reduce smell’ spell she cast upstairs was actually a protection spell of some sort. My companions may not have my conditioning, but I guess they do make up for it with their interesting magic.

I engage the miscreant that is now standing next to the captive. Curse their blubber bodies! My new chekan polearm just bounced straight off of the enemy. And curse the smell! I am taking advantage of the chekan’s reach, yet still my nose is filled with that foul stench. As I am failing to damage the blubber man in front of me, Stejn has joined Levuka against the other two, and seems to have cast a similar protection spell on himself that’s warding off the cloud of vermin's attempts to bite him. I don’t know what divine word Stejn is saying, but the mere word is hurting one of the blubber men. Levuka the direwolf follows up Stejn’s offense by tearing the sides off of a blubber man with her direwolf jaws.

Quick as a flash, Dwirhian moved from the back of the room, passed me, and leapt up the altar to help the captive.

While Dwirhian was busy untying the captive, the dagger thrower she held captive in her spell broke free, and was now standing. He was retrieving another dagger from his belt to throw again. Dwirhian saw this, and recast her spell at the man. Back down to the ground he went.

Occupied with the blubber man in front of me, I was being double teamed by the stench and vermin bites. So, I fought back with poleaxe swing, and poleaxe smash. I could see Levuka and Stejn facing a similar problem. But, it almost seems like Stejn’s protection spell is persuading the blubber pair to favour attacking Levuka rather than Stejn. Wonder what Levuka makes of that?

My comrades are not rolling with the hits as well as me, in spite of their protection magic. Though impressive, the powerful stench of the blubber men is rendering my comrades weaker by the second and with the sheer volume of rodent bites; some are getting through. It’s time to end this!

I focus my rage. Rodents are chomping at me, all over my body and blubber tendrils are trying to pull at my legs. With one focused swing of my poleaxe, I land a finishing blow on the blubber man. The rats magically disappear and the blubber man bursts open spraying matter all over me. So much for a 10ft reach weapon helping with distance.

I see the dagger man behind the altar as Dwirhian finishes untying the captive. We move to engage the robed man. As we do this, Stejn and Levuka have killed one of the two blubber men they were facing. The other looks beaten.

Cornered by me and Dwirhian, the robed man turns the dagger on himself, brings it to his throat and says, “there will be others. They will come back!”, and slits his own throat.

I look at the body and then to Dwirhian. I shrug my shoulders at my comrade, “Okay. Thanks for the assist”, and head back to my other comrades with the last of our foes.

The last blubber man is between Stejn and Luveka in direwolf form. As I come up between them, I announce, “ comrades, careful!”, and bring the hammer of my poleaxe down on to the remaining blubber man, finishing it off, releasing blubber in all directions, “beware the splatter!”, but it’s no use. We all got covered in blubber. Them more than me. But, I don’t know if it’s because druid people have the mind of the creature they turn into, but Levuka shook herself like a wet dog and sprayed me and Steyn with all the blubber on her. She then turned back into her regular Wood-Elf self and showed no injuries, and no blubber.

Stejn spotted the spoons near where the blubber men were eating. The stylised ‘M’ for Miller could be seen on forty-eight spoons. Perfect. We amassed all the spoons. We soon discovered that what the blubber men were eating was the captive’s partner in crime...

Stan, the surviving captive, who had lost a lot of blood received some healing magic from both Dwirhian and Levuka, and at least physically was back to normal. He told us what had happened. Stan and his friend were hired by the robed man to get the spoons in exchange for gold. They got the spoons, delivered them but were then captured by the blubber men. His friend was sacrificed for a summoning spell that we interrupted. The spoons were part of the spell requirement too. We got there just before Stan was to be sacrificed.

There wasn’t much else in this foul room, although the robed man’s hat, it turns out, was magical. It was a Hat of Vermin. Levuka took it.


Returning the Spoons

My comrades are strong in magic, but soft in heart. Although Stan had witnessed his friend sacrificed and eaten, he was still a thief and should be handed in to the Watch. But, the team felt he deserved a second chance, and maybe this ordeal will help set him straight. I didn’t care strongly about Stan’s fate, and to be fair maybe their argument was persuasive, so I agreed that Stan could flee.

We returned to Miller Manor with the spoons. Lady Miller was pleased with the return of her belongings and satisfied with the explanation that the thieves had both died in the affair.
We gave the same explanation to the Watch and left the remaining spoons and addresses to whom they belonged with the Watch, and told them the robed man’s final words before ending his life.

Lady Jeziah Miller gave us the agreed 80gp each, and the Watch rewarded us with 20gp each for solving a case of theirs. Would we have gotten more if we had handed in Stan?

It was now after midnight. Hunter’s Moon was fully out. Now all it would remind me of is being splattered on by blubber remains. Great.

We were all staying at the Three Headed Dragon, so we had a drink together when we arrived and then said goodnight and goodbye to each other, as we retired to our rooms.


Epilogue - Back to Woodcarving at Morgana Starbright’s Shop

A day later, it was time for another woodcarving lesson.

I said hello to Morgana and my fellow woodcarvers as I entered the shop, ready for my next lesson, excited to get another lesson closer to being able to carve my heavy clubs.

Morgana asked how my adventure went. I told her about the Mansion, the elegant and very sturdy table, the thieves, the monstrous blubber men and cultist man, being splattered in ooze and many, many spoons.

“Being splattered with that smelly ooze. I’m not sure the 100gp for spoons was worth the stench and mess. Spoons just remind me of all that trouble now”, I said, finishing my account of the adventure.

“... well”, Morgana started with a slightly sheepish smile, “I’ve had you do basic cuts for a while on larger pieces of wood. It’s now time to start you with more finesse carving. This we can achieve by… making one of the most essential of utensils. Can you guess what that utensil is?”, she asked, biting her bottom lip nervously.

Essential utensil? “Oh! It’s time to make heavy clubs already?!” I said excitedly.

“..No Kavel”, Morgana’s sheepish smile turned into a more quizzical look, as if she was disappointed with my reasoning there. Maybe a knife is more important? … Oh… I look at Morgana’s face, I see where she was going...

“Yep. I think you’re with me now. Kavel, we’re doing spoons. And I’m sorry, but you’ll be doing a lot of them, all shapes and sizes and in different woods. This basic skill will really help towards making you a proficient woodcarver”.

“... Okay”, I sigh, “Very well. Let's make spoons”.