Where did the Dolgaunt touch you, ma'am?

Welcome back to the Annandale Gaming blog. We now resume our service, and are rededicated to bringing the exploits of Kaloei, Soledyn, Amira, and Adan directly onto your computer screens. The people responsible for the long blackout have been sacked*.

Quick catchup: when last we left our heroes, they had joined Prince Lorrister in flying off to the Lhazar Principalities in order to combat the alliance of the Cloudreavers and the Diresharks which were threatening to usurp Prince Ryger, and had invested Regalport in a siege.

Of course, it's a bloody long way to Regalport and there were bound to be some adventures before then. Of course, first and foremost there were prisoners to interrogate; prisoners who didn't know they were aboard an airship. Adan adopted the guise of an old, careworn, paper-pushing Dwarven guardsman named Dirk Dirkenson, and informed the prisoners they were in the custody of the Sharn City Watch. He brought Kaloei into the bring as the assaulted citizen, and together the two spun a story for the captives of her having been assaulted by them and a Dolgaunt in concert (remember the Dolgaunt? I knew you did) which lead to Adan's classic, monotoned line, while taking notes:

"Where did the Dolgaunt touch you ma'am?"

The younger of the two prisoners...the incompetent axe-man...quickly broke down and spilled everything. His name was Sig. He was 15, not a guardsman, had never handled a weapon before, and the other captive was his uncle, a Redcloak captain, who had promised 1. He would teach Sig to be a man and 2. He would lead him to easy money. The Captain had produced the Dolgaunt. Nobody had asked how.

The Captain refused to talk, but quick consultation with Gideon (decked out visibly in armor with the Silver Flame upon it for the first time) confirmed that the other guy really was a Redcloak captain. Tossing him over the side of the airship would be a bad idea.

Ultimately, it fell out like this; Sig, the boy, elected to stay on the ship, which Lorrister allowed, so long as Adan gave his parole, and the Captain was temporarily charmed/mind-effed, stripped of his weapons and cloak, and set loose in the city. Finally the Spear of Dawn cast off. Sig was apprenticed to the cook, a goblin named "Snack" who, as far as the party could tell, had weapon focus: spatula, given the way he kept smacking Sig with it.

Now, given that the party had two names of ships believed to be carrying "statues" smuggled by Daask...the Trackless Sunrise and...some other name I can't remember.

At any rate, projected their likely course, Lorrister offered the possibility of flying to attempt to intercept them, rather than making straight for a rendezvous with the Heavenly Fleet.

So they did; on the first, they found a puffball of a crew that got mercilessly slaughtered by the Valenar elf mercs who formed one squad of the SoD's boarding party.

However, exploding out from inside the hold came an ogre mage and a flying gnoll....Cavallah and her chief Lieutenant. Battle ensued. Cavallah was defeated thanks in large part to Amira's summoning prowess, though certainly Kaloei and Soledyn and Adan all contributed; but it was the grappling of hippogriffs that brought Cavallah down to be killed. In the ship's hold? Two statues; one of a girl in mage's robes, one of a young boy in fine, expensive clothing. Huzzah!

(More updates to come this week!)

*By which we mean exiled to the Mournland with a dagger, a light crossbow with one bolt, and one full waterskin. We do not fuck around here at the Annandale Gaming Blog.