Ambush In The Clearing

It is only because each member of the party is carefully observing the far end of the path that they saw them at all, as the Nyemetz stop before they set foot in the clearing. Each of the party made out a small patrol of seven orcs wearing chainmail and carrying light crossbows and broadswords.

Amongst them, on horseback, is a middle aged woman dressed in dark blue. In her hands, she has some sort of staff with a crystal on the end of it. They can just make out that the crystal turns a brilliant shade of red when she points it at the illusion of the party. They see her point the staff around her some more. They again see the crystal turn red again as she is pointing it towards where Corrow and Xavier are hiding.

They see the middle aged woman whispering to the orcs and giving hand signals to them. The group of Nyemetz breaks up. Three orcs break off from the rest and start to move around the edges of the clearing in a clockwise direction. They have their light crossbows in their hands with bolts loaded. Three more orcs do the same thing, but travel in an anti-clockwise direction.

The mounted woman and one other orc, probably a sargeant from the way he is dressed, wait at the 12 o'clock position to see what happens.

It seems as if the Nyemetz are more organized than the party, as the party’s plans are somewhat chaotic!

One party of three orcs is at 10 o’clock and the other at 2 o’clock when Darius decides that he is personally going to despatch the woman on the horse.

As Darius starts running towards the woman, the orc sergeant raises his light crossbow and fires. However, the nimble goblin, who is now in a state of frenzy, is a difficult target and the bolt goes flying way over Darius’ head.

As the orc sergeant is drawing his broadsword, Darius strikes with his short sword, but the orc is a good fighter and manages to avoid the goblin’s blow. The orc strikes back and hacks into Darius with his broadsword slicing into the unfortunate goblin’s body. Darius experiences the familiar feeling of intense pain, followed by relief as the waves of unconsciousness roll over him. He is bleeding badly and will die in ten minutes unless he is seen to.

Meanwhile, the others are busy with their own antics.

Corrow changes his illusion in the center of the clearing in order to confuse the orcs. However, this elite Nyemetz force has been forewarned that they will be encountering magic users and so they ignore the mystick visions before them.

Yaz creeps off into the forest in order to get behind the mounted woman. With all of the commotion happening in the clearing, Yaz has no problem in disguising his movements. It will, however, take him a minute to get into position.

Seeing that the 10 o’clock orcs are getting very close to Corrow’s position, Maire’ acts to save him. She moves a little closer in order to get within range, and then produces some fine sand and starts her mystick murmuring and actions, sending a wave of magickal energy towards the orcs. Her actions are successful, and the three orcs fall to the ground.

The mounted woman see the orcs fall and shouts something at the sergeant who is just about to strike a mortal blow to the unconscious form of Darius.

The three warriors all charge into the clearing in order to try to get to the mounted woman. Xavier is the first to reveal himself and his appearance results in two of the ten o’clock orcs shooting crossbows at him. Neither shots find their marks, however. One goes over his head, while the other fails to pierce his mail.

The third orc fires upon Winnacer who is the second to show himself. His bolt too, however, fails to find its mark.

The three orcs drop their crossbows and charge towards intercepting the three warriors. As they come towards them, Winnacer, Colin and Xavier are ready for them, and get in the first blows. Such is the chaos, however, that none of them manage to find chinks in the orcs’ mail.

The orcs strike back with their broadswords. The first manages to strike a terrible blow upon Winnacer, hacking the broadsword into Winnacer’s flank. The blow does terrible damage to Winnacer who almost keels over with the pain of the blow. Another blow would surely take him down.

Luckily, the other two orcs fail to land blows on either Colin or Xavier.

Yaz continues to move towards the mounted woman, no one noticing his stealthy approach. By the time that he gets within range of the mounted woman, the orc sergeant is far from the mounted woman’s position as he charges towards the sleeping orcs. When he is within range, Yaz starts to utter incantations while clutching his holy symbol. As he finishes using a sweeping motion with his arms, the woods around the mounted woman seems to come to life as creepers and tendrils head towards her. She is taken totally by surprise as the foliage starts to entangle her and her horse. As Yaz sees the results of his work, he reaches down to his belt in order to take one of his throwing daggers. While he is doing this, however, he is somewhat shocked to see that the woman is moving her arms towards her saddle bags despite the clinging branches, albeit slowly.

Darius, meanwhile, is still unconscious, his blood starting to seep into the muddy ground beneath him. Luckily, he is outside the area of Yaz’s spell and the ground is calm under him.

The orc’s terrible wound upon Winnacer seems to focus all of his energy upon exacting his revenge upon the Nyemetz warrior. He brings down ‘Old Bohavia’ on the orc, sending its head spinning across the clearing. With his lightning fast reactions, Winnacer tries to strike again at the orc fighting Colin who is standing next to him. However, the blow does not manage to find a gap in the second orc’s mail, and so he does not damage it.

Winnacer’s success seems to spur Colin on as he strikes the orc facing him. Colin launches a mighty blow against the orc, which hacks through the orc’s armor. The blow would normally be enough to despatch an average orc, but this orc is a tough brute, and somehow manages to cling onto life. The orc tries to exact his revenge against Colin, but the orc’s blow, weakened by the terrible pain he must undoubtedly be feeling, fails to pierce Colin’s mail.

Next to Colin, Xavier tries to take out the orc facing him. However, as Xavier tries to strike, he somehow manages to lose the grip upon his bastard sword and it goes flying into the clearing over the head of the orc. A stream of Saxon obscenities tells the others that he is not at all impressed with his misfortune. The orc facing him tries to take advantage of the situation by attempting to strike Xavier. However, Xavier is ready for the orc’s attack and easily dodges the orc’s clumsy attempt to injure him.

Corrow, seeing the three orcs sleeping in front of him, realizes that only he is in a position to despatch them before the orc sergeant reaches them and awakes them. Bravely, Corrow leaves his position of safety and rushes towards the orcs. Carefully, he pushes the end of his staff through the eye sockets and into the brains of all three sleeping orcs. They are not going to be any more trouble.

However, by the time Corrow has finished this operation, the orc sergeant is upon him. Bellowing with the fury at seeing his troops slaughtered with such ease, he raises his broadsword in order to seek revenge. Corrow nearly manages to avoid the blow, but the sword still catches him. With no armor, the blade cuts deeply into Corrow’s flesh as he cries to the others for aid.

These are the last words Corrow utters as he slumps to the ground, unconscious.

Maire’ meanwhile is starting to make her way in a circuitous route to the top of the clearing. She saw Darius fall and realizes that it is up to her, yet again, to save him.

When Heimlin sees Corrow fall, he too acts, moving the short distance from his position to where Corrow fell.

Yaz takes one of his daggers from his belts and hurls it at the mounted woman - well, that’s what he tried to do. Instead, he fumbles the throw terribly and the dagger goes spinning from his hand, off way into the woods. A stream of elven obscenities greet the fact that everyone seems to have problems in keeping their weapons in their hands.

He then looks on in horror as the woman manages, with great difficulty, to move a hand down to her belt and manages to work loose a piece of parchment.

She manages to open the piece of parchment and starts to utter an arcane incantation. She finishes the uttering and…nothing happens. Now it is the woman’s turn to start unleashing a terrible stream of Bohavian obscenities!

The orc sergeant has now left the fallen figure of Corrow behind him and is heading towards the mounted woman, who screams something to him in Nyemetz.

This gives Heimlin an opportunity to creep up to Corrow’s body. He rips some strips from Corrow’s robes and starts to bandage up the bleeding Corrow.

Seeing the orc sergeant approaching, Maire’ decides to stay in her position in the cover of the woods rather than going to Darius and risking being attacked by the sargeant.

In the center of the clearing, the combat continues. Winnacer tries to strike the orc facing Colin, wielding ‘Old Bohavia’ before him. Unfortunately, Winnacer’s swing is wide and his blade fails to connect.

Colin also tries to despatch the injured orc in front of him, but his blow fails to penetrate the orc’s mail. In return, the orc strikes back with a terrible blow that hits Colin in the neck. The blow catches Colin’s vein, sending his blood spurting and Colin falling straight to the ground, unconscious and losing blood fast.

Still cursing the loss of his bastard sword, Xavier pulls his bec de corbin from his belt. However, he hasn’t time to pull the weapon and concentrate completely upon getting an aimed shot in at the orc, and his blow goes wide. The orc tries to get a hit upon Xavier, but Xavier’s thick mail saves him from any damage from the orc’s broadsword.

Yaz swiftly pulls his second dagger from his belt, determined to get the mounted bitch this time after his last lame attempt. With all of his might, he hurls the dagger towards her. The mounted woman looks round to see the light blade heading straight for her. Unable to move swiftly because of the entanglement, she is powerless to avoid the blade. With a disgusting squishing noise,the dagger goes straight through her eye and embeds itself in her brain. Supported by the entangled branches, her body stays completely upright staring at Yaz with her one remaining eye. She is well and truly dead.

The death of his mistress and the stream of insults that Yaz had been baiting him with drive the orc sergeant into an even more berserk fury. He manages to avoid getting entangled by the spell due to the earlier warning from the woman.

Waving his broadsword around him, he charges at Yaz and slashes him with a very nasty cut which cuts through Yaz's flimsy leather armor. Yaz draws his scimitar ready to defend himself next turn.

Meanwhile, in the center of the clearing, Winnacer and Xavier are also driven to a furious state by the slaying of Colin. Winnacer strikes at the orc responsible for Colin's demise. He strikes twice. The first time he misses, but the swiftness of his second attack takes the orc totally by surprise. Very much weakened by Colin's first attack on him, the orc is neatly sliced in two.

Xavier is heartened by Winnacer's action and brings his bec de corbin down hard of the orc's head, smashing its skull instantly.

With Corrow now bandaged up and in no danger of dying, Heimlin rushes towards the fallen Darius as fast as his little legs will carry him. Maire' seeing that Darius will be cared for dashes towards Colin's bleeding body in order to provide him with aid.

Realizing that another good hit from the orc sergeant could easily kill him, Yaz starts to utter another of his incantations in order to restore himself. However, as he is attempting to dodge the attacks of the orc sergeant as he does so, he is not able to concentrate fully on his endeavors. As a result, the spell restores him only by the minimum power of the spell, much to Yaz's annoyance.

His determination to avoid the sargeant's broadsword, however, does ensure that the sargeant did not get a hit on him while he was casting it.

With the orcs in front of them down, Winnacer and Xavier charge forward to aid Yaz, who really has his hands full with the sargeant. As Xavier runs forwards, he crouches and manages to pick his bastard sword up while he is running, in one fluid movement.

Yaz wields his scimitar and attempts to strike at the orc sargeant. Although his strike is very much on target, the sargeant's thick mail means that he is unharmed by Yaz's blow. In return, the sargeant strikes back and just manages to cut through Yaz's leather, giving him another slight wound in the arm. In Yaz's already weakened position, even this slight wound means trouble for him.

Yaz strikes once again at the sargeant, but the pain from Yaz's wound in the arm means that his blow is well off target. By this time, both Winnacer and Xavier have reached the combat, and join in with the melee. Winnacer strikes first, thrusting 'Old Bohavia' into the sargeant’s side, easily piercing the orc's mail, leaving him bellowing in pain. An instant later, Xavier slashes the sargeant with an almighty blow from his bastard sword. The blow cuts straight through the sargeant's mail with devastating results, as it cuts the sargeant's spine in two, making him slump to the ground, quite dead.

The Nyemetz patrol is vanquished and the field is won. Yaz, Winnacer and Xavier are all panting through the exertions. They take in the situation. The status of all members of the party is as follows:

Yaz: Badly wounded

Winnacer: Very badly wounded

Xavier: Totally unharmed

Darius: Unconscious but bandaged

Maire': Totally Unharmed

Corrow: Unconscious but bandaged

Heimlin: Totally Unharmed

Colin: Unconscious but bandaged

There are seven dead orcs around them. Each was wearing chain mail and had a broadsword, light crossbow and have 19 bolts remaining.

The body of the woman is still entangled. She was mounted on a riding horse. The horse, despite all of the chaos that has been surrounding him has remained very calm. It is simply chewing on the long grass that is surrounding it.

The current time is around 11.30am. The Entanglement spell has another 4 minutes to run.