Present:
- Sophia Beauchamp (half-elf priest 21) - Ian
Joe Manco (human fighter) - ShaneSelina Porshay - MARMALADE: Balder Dash (gnome wizard) - Jamie
- Slim Jim (human rogue) - Darryl
- Walton Formalin (half-elf mystic of 21) - Andrew
- Red Feuersturm (human temple fighter of Hob) - Chris
- Donk Platebreaker (human fighter) - Jeff
- Malcolm Gandhi (gnome thief) - Kevin
By Walton
We were in the tunnels beneath Zephyr the Turk's saffron farm compound (two days down the Draser river from the city Draser). Zephyr was a famous saffron farmer. It was suspected that he kidnapped young Draser women and enslaved them, then used them to pick his saffron (there was some characteristic unique to such girls that imbued his saffron with added potency). We were here to rescue 16-year-old Selina Porshay, one such girl. Secondly, Simone and Tommo Fussell, our employers, wanted us to get the accounts ledger of Zephyr. This would yield further evidence with which to accuse the Globe Casino of fraud towards Vingt-et-Un.
TEN
We had just killed the Axe Man - a fat butcher with an apron and large axe (see last time), and tried to make his death look like a whittling accident. It was now ten hours until dawn. We wanted to be away by dawn, or at least in a safe place in case this whittling ruse failed.
Gandhi had found a secret door at the end of a passage. There were no traps and it wasn't locked, so we went through. It went to a large room with two doors and stairs going up.
Upstairs, was a cold room; unnaturally cold, but there was no taint of evil. There were shelves in here along the walls, with about 40 glass jars each filled with a fine white powder. We touched nothing, but the powder was the wrong colour to be saffron.
NINE
 |
| quern |
We went back downstairs and through a door into a room with three quern grinders. We assumed that the querns ground the white powder that was stored in the cold room.
On one of the doors here Gandhi found an Alarm trap and disabled it.
In another room was shelving with coat racks, buckets with bins, and weapon racks.
Worryingly, there was a door here with lights on in the room beyond. And we could hear male voices. So, we carefully avoided that door.
EIGHT
So, back upstairs, through another door into room with a furnace. It had four metal funnels; not sure what these were for.
Next to the furnace room was a well room with a hole in the floor and a room beneath. In the floor of the room below was a shaft down to water. We guessed this was the same shaft that we explored from below next to the underground pool (with the tunnel from the guard bear entrance - they way we got into this complex).
 |
| porcelain embalming table |
In the next room there with a porcelain embalming table (to clean and drain corpses) with manacles.
And there were two drying tables, covered with with lots of bones drying. These were quite clearly human bones. Sophia identified them as the bones of human girls.
A door led off this room.
"No traps here!" exclaimed Gandhi. But when he opened it, immediately the air filled with a WHOOP WHOOP WHOOP noise. I cast a Silence spell, but it was too late.
From the direction of the door that had light, came running two guards.
It was a short sharp battle. My Sleep spell took out one guard and the other guy was severely outnumbered. We waited a but, but no-one else came. So it must have been a localized alarm and didn't rouse the whole compound.
SEVEN
Next was a room with double doors to the outside - and a winch to load wagons, but there was also a large trapdoor in the floor, and that went down to a large storage room with pallets.
 |
| Frieda |
In one of the cells was a blonde girl of about 18, in threadbare rags; she was awake but drugged and delirious. Sophia cast Slow Poison on her, and that made her coherent.
She was called Frieda, and was a saffron picker. Like Selina Porshay, she had been kidnapped in Draser. She worked with the other pickers and she knew Selina pretty well.
Frieda had just turned 18, and the guards had drugged her and left her here. She did not know why. It seemed once any slave girl turned 18, they were removed from the picking squad. (Note that Selina was 16).
We questioned Frieda further and asked her to draw a map of what she knew about the compound and buildings. She was happy to help.
Frieda was strong enough to walk, so she came with us.
SIX
We kept exploring this building. Another room had boxes and jars of dried goods.
Another room had a large metal urn for heating and rendering flesh. There was a hole in the floor with a bloody slide down to a stinking pit filled with rotting flesh and offal.
So, the theory of what all this equipment was for:
- When the saffron-picking slave girls turn 18, they would be killed and butchered.
- Their flesh would be cut off the bone and, with their viscera, tossed into the offal pit.
- The bones would be cooked to remove any flesh, dried, and then ground into powder.
- Maybe this powder was ensorcelled, and then added to Zephyr's saffron. We were not sure of the significance of the age of 18, but maybe that was a requirement of the dark magic.
FIVE
In another room was a well with water barrels, and had a shaft going down to the underground river below. This was beneath the well room above (next to the furnace room).
Frieda had mentioned that she remembered this room and the water barrels. So we thoroughly explored the wall here and, sure enough, were rewarded by finding a secret door.
"Dere is being no traps here!" exclaimed Gandhi enthusiastically. And he opened the door.
Immediately, a trapdoor beneath Donk opened, and he slid down a shaft and splashed into a fast flowing stream and into the underground pool. The trapdoor closed.
We hurriedly tried to open the trapdoor so as to get to Donk, but couldn't pry it open.
"Open the door again," I cried. "That ought to reopen the door."
 |
| Underground pool |
So Gandhi opened the secret door again. However, another new trapdoor opened, in a different part of the floor, right under Joe, and he slid down a shaft and splashed into the fast flowing stream and into the underground pool.
Donk managed to shake off his armour and swim to the surface, just as Joe (also in armour) splashed in the lake next to him. Joe could not swim, so Donk swam down and rescued Joe.
[ Swimming is one of the skills where, if you don't have it, you can not swim, full stop. Luckily, Jeff had given Donk a point of Swimming and lucked-out with his roll. That said, it takes 10 minutes to remove armour, and you can't swim in metal armour ... Lucky Donk. ]
We could shout to Donk down the well shaft, so had echoey comms with him. He and Joe managed to get to the edge of the underground lake, and then take the long walk through the tunnels (past the mushroom room, past the (now dead) butcher's room, past the cold room, and winch room, and cells) and back to us.
FOUR
The secret door led to another tunnel. We assumed this went to the central keep (in Zephyr's compound). As we walked down, Red suddenly collapsed in a marmalade fit and had to go into the marmalade sack with Balder.
The long passage, about fifty paces, finished at another concealed door.
"No traps here!" proclaimed Gandhi.
Gandhi is a crap fighter, so he just dodged. Slim is okay, but he had second-hand armour (he lost his armour in the fungus room, but now wore armour off a dead guard). They were both wounded by the dogs. But when I joined the fight, and then finally Joe and Donk, the poor dogs did not stand a chance.
I cast Heal on Slim, and Joe too.
Off the dog room was a store room with tasty cheeses and salamis. Slim and Gandhi had a good nom nom.
THREE
Another concealed door went to a short corridor with six bedrooms. Frieda knew this area quite well, so she pointed out who was sleeping in what room. We used Sophia to carefully enter each room to wake the sleeping girls.
Calcutta say "Is better to wake nubile sleeping girl with pretty lady rather than ugly burly fighter or big-nose gnome."
The first bedroom had Selina Porshay, yay. There were six other girls, so we collected them all.
TWO
Now we had a dilemma. It was two hours before dawn. There was no chance that we could remain undetected (because of the two guards and the dogs).
It would be one hour to go back through the tunnels to get to the pool. And then maybe another hour to get to a copse outside. Sophia was drained of all spells and I had almost none, and we still needed to get past the bear.
Even at the copse, we wouldn't necessarily be safe. Selina said they had guard gargoyles, and plenty more dogs.
[ META: Thanks to the way this system works, we will get a Luck recharge and Jamie will be here --> Balder will wake up fresh with spells! ]
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