June 2-3, 1000
Flappity-Flap
Bugbears
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Myr's now tiny heart pounds so furiously inside her little rib cage that she's half convinced it's going to pop right out of her chest. Never has she felt such exhilaration - and fear - all at the same time. Her vulnerability is quite obvious, but it is all but overshadowed by the excitement of this raven suit's potential. The things she could do wearing this thing... why... Starmyst's voice permeates her thoughts, and she thinks giving the wings a try to be a splendid idea, one that she would surely have thought of on her own after a few more minutes of running over the possibilities of the suit. Then again, maybe the hood had squished her brain so that she would have sat there on the ground pondering for the entire evening. She did feel a bit light-headed. "Okay!" comes her squeaky reply. It sounds like common to her, but for all she knew, she might have squawked. Flapping her little wings furiously, Myr gives a little jump, and then stops, trying to test them without getting very far off the ground. As such, she resembles more of a drunken frog, and lands on her birdie butt more often than not. When she thinks about flapping the wings, they flap. When she thinks about flapping harder, they flap harder, and when she wills them to stop or slow down, that's what they do. It's as if she had normal neurological connections and controls to the extra limbs. But she's only had these wings for a few moments, and she flies about as well as a newborn baby walks. It's going to take a lot of practice before she's ready to soar into the sky and become bait for the larger birds of prey. Getting blown off balance by the light breeze sends her thudding into the ground. She decides fairly quickly that she may have the ability to fly, but she surely does not have the skill to do so...yet. Avon's mouth drops open. He can only watch. The possibilities are limitless.
After the brief trial flight, Myr pulls the hood back off and explodes back to her normal size. Those close enough can feel and hear the WOOSH as the air is pushed away by the expansion of her body. She fumbles in the darkness over to her pack and discarded clothing. Exhausted, she simply rolls herself into her blanket and rolls over. Soon enough everyone is asleep, except Sandros and Veneron. "Sure is dark," one says to the other. "Yep, sure is." comes the reply. But the time passes uneventfully. They startle each other several times with small noises or whispered comments as they look out into the blackness of the woods. Finally the nearly-full moon begins to rise, washing the campsite in a pale brightness. "Perfect," says one of the humans, "Now that there's something to see by, I'm going to bed." And so saying, they wake the next watch and roll into their blankets. During his watch with Myridian, Avon brings out the magic candle he's been carrying. After fumbling with flint and steel for a few minutes, he manages to light some dry grass and then transfers the fire to the small (1 inch) stub of candle. Avon holds the candle, and he sees it light. It casts a normal amount of light in the surrounding area. It looks completely unremarkable and normal to him. Myr, on the other hand, sees something completely different. In the moonlight, she watches as Avon transfers the flame from the dry grass to the candle's wick. To her, it seems that the candle does not light at all, it just sits there in Avon's hand, unlit. She does not see the flame on the candle nor the light that the candle casts. They experiment by passing the candle back and forth and discover that only the person holding the candle can see its light and its flame. During the few moments that both are touching the small candle, both can see the light and flame. The flame, however, will set other things afire, whether or not one can see the flame. Nor can either see the heat of the candle via infravision, whether or not he/she can see the flame. The wax of the candle does not melt. Avon has heard about a so-called "Theif's Candle" but had never seen one before. More than once during the next watches, Edge scrambles to his feet, alert. But each time, after looking pointedly at the forest to the East, he settles back down and falls asleep again. Each time, the individuals on watch spend the next few minutes trying to regain a normal level of adrenalin. Day comes eventually, and the group wakes to the daylight. Each gets ready for the day in his or her own way: studying spell books, prayer, tending to animals, checking supplies and packs. Avon's first thought is for the dried sausage in his backpack. Eventually, the party mounts up and heads down the trail again, in the same order as yesterday. ..T....St.. The forest has not changed, but the party has. They feel refreshed and invigorated -- alert and eager to get on with their trek. The woods, of course, have sections of dappled sunlight and places of deep shadow. Along the way, during the tranquil moments of the morning, Star does indeed notice several raptors high in the sky, soaring on the thermals that are almost always present near seaside cliffs. They are so far above that it's hard to tell if they are eagles, hawks, or falcons... one thing for sure: they were not owls. After several hours of pleasant morning, it is in one of these shadowed places where things take a nasty turn. Edge begins to growl and snarl. Quill has not heard that particular sound from him since he encountered a wolverine in the wild. That time (with the wolverine) Edge did not charge, as he normally does toward interesting smells, but began to back away slowly. This time (with the party) Edge takes a small hop forward on his side (right side of the party, facing forward), and begins making the nastiest sounds he can manage. Naturally this alerts the group, and those with infravision can see 3 large beasts arrayed in a semi-circle in front of them. [They're arrayed at about 10 -12 -2 o'clock.] People begin to reach for weapons in an instant -- but all is pandemonium. The wolf-dog's snarling growls unnerves almost all the horses. And in the next heartbeat, the three beasts near the front of the party crash out of the underbrush throwing stones and making a lot of noise. The beasts are 7 ft tall and resemble giant goblins. They wear strips of tattered leather armor over their dark brown fur and are swinging large clubs. They are about 30 ft away, running directly at the front of the group. The one on the road is, of course, most clearly seen, and is moving at a pace to match the other two, but the two others in the woods are visible as well. Tavarak's trained warhorse stands his ground, and his ears flicker back in a gesture Tav understands: these things have a nasty smell, and the horse would prefer to leave, but he steadies from his training and the familiar movements of Tav getting into fighting position. Star's mount leaps sideways, away from the snarling wolf at it's heels and toward Tav. She is able to maintain control, but just barely. Avon's not so fortunate. The frightened creature rears and bucks -- dances sideways. His eyes are huge and panicky -- and so are the eyes of his horse. Avon is not thrown, but only because he is holding on to the saddlehorn with both hands. He cant even begin to try and keep his horse under control. Only the fact that there is a beast in the woods on his side prevents him from bolting. Myridian is even unluckier. On her side, the wolf has jumped in a heartbeat
from a calm companion to a snarling, growling threat -- at least in her
horse's opinion. And he is immediately next to the flank of her frightened
horse. She is unceremoniously dumped to the ground where she is stunned
but not injured. The horse leaps over the wolf-dog and runs back in the
direction they have come. Veneron has ridden extensively, but his mount has not had to deal with an apparant wolf attack (judging from the sounds) and some sort of nasty-smelling beasts. He remains seated, but the horse is difficult to control and takes all his efforts in the initial seconds. The horse quiets under Ven's experienced hands. Quill's horse is more scared by the wolf-dog under its nose than by the farther-away beasts in the woods. Quill is comfortable enough in the woods... but is not an experienced rider, and will need a few moments to settle the beast. The reins of the mule she holds provide an additional problem. The mule's desire is to leave... he's backing up and trying to pull away. Sandros has been on horseback quite a bit and has ridden this particular horse for a long time. In addition, the horse has a fair familiarity with strange and dangerous smelling beasts. In his (horse's) experience, they are no threat, since he'd met them in circus surroundings and they were always caged. He's alert and nervous, but not panicky.
The stones thrown by all 3 bugbears thud into the horses, making them difficult to control but doing no real damage -- with one exception. Tav shouts "I'll take the one in the middle" and charges left toward the A beast for a few feet, but swerves back onto the road toward B as he indicated. His war cry of "ILLUVITAR" does not impress the Bugbear, but the sight of that lance does. The two thunder toward each other, Tav's charger galloping almost twice as fast as the beast. The beast ducks under the lance and swings his oversized club, but Tav fields it on his shield. Tav gallops past, turns his horse and lowers his lance for another try. The Bugbear struggles with indecision for a few seconds, but finally turns his back on the the group to face Tav's threat. He stands warily now in the middle of the road, the tree trunk he's using as a club drawn back menacingly. Star spends a few moments steadying King, then points at Bugbear C. She begins to chant:
and the Entangle spell causes a 40x40x40 ft area of the forest, centered on the creature, to turn, twist, warp and otherwise entwine itself around the beast. The creature fights against the trees and bushes with all its strength but it is futile, the thick entangling growth of vegetation is so dense, it's nearly impossible to even see the beast. A few other animals -- a rabbit and several squirrels are also held fast. Avon holds on to the saddle horn for dear life and tries to figure out what he can do. His horse is in near panic, and is undoubtedly calmed to a great degree by the high-pitched screams from Avon-the-Bold. "Get it away from me! Get it away from me!" He casts his eyes wildly about. No way he's going to head into the woods. There might be who-knows-how-many of them in there. One of the rocks thrown by Bugbear A spirals in a graceful arc thru the air and *SMACKO* lands on Avon's skull, opening a tiny wound. But even the tiniest of scalp wounds bleeds a great deal, and the feel of hot, wet, sticky, red blood on his forehead does not exactly calm Avon further. Staying on the horse isnt working ... he feels completely out of control, so he decides to attempt one of those equestrian leaps to the ground he's seen in the circus. Jumping off the bucking horse toward the side, he manages to land on his feet and rolls forward. His horse, freed of its rider looks around in fear, trying to find a way out of the fight, threatening to run into Avon, Myr and/or Ven. Myr finds herself on the ground near the snarling Edge. She's furious at the horse, but a quick mental check tells her that FlyBreath is fine inside her vest pocket. She stumbles to her feet, realizing that she'd landed on her wrist...it's not broken, but it hurts. She gathers her wits and starts to think what she can do. Edge ducks under the leap of Myr's horse as he looks back toward Quill. At her signal, he stops barking, but the low growl that is part of his snarling preparation for fight returns as he faces the threatening beast C that's heading in his direction thru the thick woods. Ven gets his mount under control in a few seconds, and looks around. This is his first fight, and there's some initial panic as all the spells he's learned have turned to blank thoughts. Finally -- after what seems like an eternity -- he remembers one, mumbles his casting verse and points to the ground in front of A.
The surface of the earth drops 20 ft -- forming a pit roughly 20 ft in diameter-- taking the trees & brush, that were on the surface, down with a soft magical *whump*. Bugbear A stumbles into the pit, landing on a tree stump with a crunch. The beast, stunned and damaged, drops it's club and staggers to its feet. It begins to climb up one of the trees rising from the bottom of the pit, toward the original ground level. Sandros, dagger poised for throwing in his right hand, looks briefly toward the front and turns away. A & C are in the woods -- he'd never get a clear throw, and Tav & B are just too far away. He scans the area behind the group for trouble, and is not surprised to find it. Myr's horse runs by, pauses in the middle of the road and screams again in panic and turns back toward the group again. Over the horse's back, Sandros sees a target. Bugbear D runs out of the woods from about the 5 o'clock position some 20 ft away. D's left arm is severed at the elbow, but he swings a mightly club with his right. D ducks around the horse and charges at Quill's back. Sandros lets fly with the dagger and charges after the beast, brandishing his sword. The dagger flies true and pierces the beast's side. D howls in pain and turns his charge toward Sandros. Quill ties the mule and horse to a tree and quickly dismounts. Her mumbled
mantra seems to calm her, the dog and her animals "You made the Earth
green, let my blade remain keen. As you made the sky blue, let my aim
be true." or perhaps they are taking their cue from her quiet, unfrightend
demeanor. She does not rush, but moves without a wasted motion. She turns
at the wounded cry from D at her back and frees her bow. She sees D turn
away as Sandros' dagger wounds it, sees Sandros on horseback, swinging
his short sword and charging at the beast. She nocks an arrow and draws
aim on D.
. TAVARAK remains calm as he wheels his mount about, unconcerned with missing the beast during the first pass. He quickly scans the situation, forming the strategy for his next attack. He lines his foe up and urges the horse back to full gallop, targeting Bugbear B. He thunders down the road toward B and back in the dirction of the party. The beast tries to duck, but Tav saw that move before and is ready for it this time. His lance drives into the creature's side, and the lance cracks as the beast lurches, half-a-lance projecting from his flank. The wounded Bugbear swings his club at Tav, missing him entirely, but landing solidly on the hindquarter of his horse. The horse rears in pain. As Tav draws tosses the remains of his lance aside and draws his sword, he signals the horse to attack the monster. The horse's front hoofs crash down on the wounded creature, crushing one of its legs and knocking it to the gound; his head follows the beast to the ground and he bites the beast's arm, causing it to drop the club. Tav directs his horse a small distance away as he looks at the beast warily, sword ready for the next engagement. His horse is breathing hard, but is steady. MYR's brows furrow into a point as she growls - too pissed off to be scared at the moment, however, her shaking hand belies that this could change at any time. She looks at C, and see that he's going nowhere for quite a while. Pointing at bugbear B, she chants:
And two bolts of energy fly from her fingers. Star, who had decided to cross the road at that instant is startled as the small stars of flame ZAP across in front of her. Turning her head toward Myr for a moment, then looking at the target, she makes a small wave with her scimitar and rushes across to the pit. Wounded and bleeding from side, bitten arm and crushed leg, the beast B reaches out trying to claw Tav's horse. Suddenly 2 magic missiles flash thru the air and swoop down to strike it from beneath. This double magic-missile-enema knocks the beast to the ground once more. Still not dead, the bugbear drags itself erect, and turns to face Tav with a viscious snarl, swinging his one good arm, razored claws on the end. STAR, pleased that her spell had disabled one of the two bugbears that she could see, wheels her horse over to the pit. She knows that it will hold him for about 10 minutes.. which she hopes will be more than enough. She dismounts, patting the horse on his neck and nickers to him using the name she memorized the night before. Drawing her scimitar, she walks thru the woods toward the pit. As she reaches it, she sees that bugbear A will need at least a couple of more minutes before reaching ground level. The creature has dropped it's club so he can use his clawed paws to climb better. He is huge and powerful, but clearly favoring one side where he fell when the pit appeared. AVON unsheaths the long sword strapped over his shoulder and wipes his bloody hand to dry his grip. Seeing that no one seems to have heard his warning, he charges toward the back of the group, after bugbear E. VENERON, liking the way the first spell worked, feels more confident now. He remembers one of the easier ones, Sleep, and looks around from his saddle for his next victim. Avon's shouted warning catches his attention and he looks at the half-elf pick himself up from the ground, his head bleeding profusely. Avon scrambles with his sword briefly and then runs toward the back. Then Ven sees what he assumes is the reason for Avon's reaction: Bugbears F, G & H leap out of the woods, pouncing on the spot that Avon had just vacated. Ven makes one final check to be sure nothing is too likely to interrupt his spell and begins:
And the three towering beasts thud to the ground, rolling forward 'till they are nearly at the feet of Ven's horse. The horse is not pleased at all and becomes hard to control for a little while. He looks at Tav, sword gleaming in a ray of sunlight, seeminly having matters in hand... at A in the pit and Starmyst ready to slice him with her scimitar... at F,G & H sleeping, waiting for whatever he might choose to do to them... and at C hopeless held by the trees that answered the Druid's call. This is going well, he thinks to himself. Then he turns to look at the back of the party. Sandros is glad that he took the time to look behind them; otherwise things could have gotten even nastier rather quickly. He's even more pleased when his dagger finds its target, and he moves to engage the creature. SANDROS and D finally close, and beyond the beast, he sees Quill raise her bow, aiming at something behind him. His horse hard to control in the face of the raging beast, Sandros nevertheless manages a mighty slash into the beast's shoulder, and a gout of bugbear blood spashes Sandros' leg and his horse's side. QUILL pulls an arrow from her quiver and notches it immediately. She is now whispering her battle mantra as she takes a bead on the bugbear coming up from behind Sandros (Bugbear E) And suddenly becomes silent. As soon as her rythym reached the line "Let my aim be true," she looses her arrow at the goblinoid -- but Myr's paniced horse also sees E and chooses that moment to bolt away from it, and runs into Quill, knocking the ranger to the ground, just as the arrow is loosed. It flies ineffectively wide of its mark and she is pinned momentarily as bugbear D, twitching and bleeding from Sandros sword strike, falls down across her legs. Cursing at the frightened horse, she kicks at the large monster, and squirms free. She recovers her bow and scrambles to her feet. EDGE turns and runs toward Quill. As the wounded bugbear D falls across her, he leaps at the beast's throat, delivering the coup de gras. Bugbear E has also closed on her target: Sandros. She sees the mounted man strike down D and bellows in rage. The large club she weilds connects solidly across the back of Sandros' shoulder, numbing his arm and causing him to drop his blade. Sandros' horse, unnerved by this new threat, leaps unexpectedly to the side, and Sandros is thrown to the ground. E clubs him across the head with a great paw, and Sandros falls unconscious. E does not see Avon running hard at her back nor did she notice the misaimed arrow. She bends over the still-breathing Sandros and surprisingly lifts him up onto her shoulder, like a sack of potatoes, and turns, running down the road, Sandros' head and arms bouncing against her back. She runs a dozen paces down the road and the then darts quickly into the woods.
AVON keeps on running after the bugbear (E). She looks over her shoulder at him -- *just* beyond the reach of his arm+sword. Looking frantically for a suitable gap in the thick brush and tree line along the road, she pauses for a second before jumping off the road into the brush. That's all the opening Avon needs. He slashes down with his long sword, catching the beast on the side and opening a gash in her flank. She screams a growl, looking at Avon with bright red eyes. Then she clamps her hand to the bleeding cut and jumps into the woods. A little out of breath after his long run, a little off balance from the follow thru of his sword, and somewhat shocked by the unnatural look in the beast's eyes, Avon staggers to a stop at the edge of the woods. He puts one hand on his knee to steady himself, taking long gasps of air, and dabs carefully with his other hand at his head, relieved to find it's just a small cut. He looks into the woods ... in 2 strides, the beast is already out of sight, but he can still hear her crashing thru the forest. QUILL calls Edge as she returns the arrow to her quiver. She starts running toward the edge of the forest where Sandros was taken, slinging her bow around her shoulder and unsheathing her sword. By the time she and Edge are at the place where Sandros and his new companion left the trail, she already has the hand axe in her off hand. She turns to Avon, looking at the bloody head, "Are you all right, Avon?" "Yes," pants the theif, marvelling to himself that she's hardly breathing hard. The ranger and the dog seem to look at each other and then Quill says, "Get him, boy," while gesturing to the woods. She knows that she hasn't taught the dog an attack command, she just figured the dog would want to attack these beasts. EDGE understanding the encouragement from his Mistress jumps into the heavy brush. He and Quill had hunted together -- so what if these things smelled unedible? Hunting was FUN! He sniffs his way along the obvious track of broken branches and trampled bush left by the bugbear ... leaping over or crawling under thickets that slow his clumsier 2-legged companions. Quill enters the forest, too. The trail is clear, but she's moving slowly and cautiously -- there is blood on some of the branches. She can hear the beast ahead of her, but out of sight, crashing thru the bush. She doesn't see any traps. "There's no way that thing could move well in this thick brush carrying an ex-slave fighter," she thinks. She motions to Avon, "They went this way." "I can see THAT," Avon thinks to himself, watching the ease with which Quill moves thru thickets of underbrush that seem impenetrable to his city-bred eye. VEN, still ahorse, turns and sees the bugbear fleeing with Sandros. "Jorandor's eye," he curses under his breath. He makes ready to cast a magic missile at the beast and then it suddenly veers into the woods, making that tactic ineffective. His impulse is to ride pell mell after Sandros, but reason dictates otherwise. He doesn't have any kind of tracking skills and will soon loose the trail; that job is better left to Edge and Quill, he thinks. Ven reassesses the situation. Tav seems to be holding his own against the last remaining beast, so he decides to keep his last magic in reserve should he need it later. Before dismounting, Ven looks all around once more, ensuring that no more of the bugbears are pouring out of the woods. Once upon the ground he draws his dagger, and sets about slitting the throats of the sleeping bugbears. MYR's eyes still locked on bugbear B, Myr mutters, "My, aren't we the stubborn one." Focusing her attentions on him yet again, she begins to chant, rewording her spell just a bit this time.
TAV pulls up and dismounts, without taking his eyes off the Bugbear B, he pats the wounded STALWART on the neck: "Thats ok boy, I'll take it from here you stay put." Tav advances sword in hand and shield at the ready. The wounded beast limps toward the dismounted man, fixing him with eyes that gleam blood red, and Tav can almost hear him thinking: "Finally ... Smaller... Kill !!" But as they can are closing to melee distance, Myr's pair of magic missiles cut between them, blasting the beast in the nose. The top of the creature's head blows off in a shower of magical fireworks, flinging bugbear brains (what there is of them) in every direction. Tav manages to cover his face with his shield, but the bloody brain-goo splatters his so-carefully cleaned and prepared armor. He checks his swing as the beast is flung back, obviously dead. Tav looks down at the mess on the front of his chain and thinks, "Could have been worse....Might have gotten splattered from the previous missiles !" He quickly looks around, and decides that Starmyst is the nearest damsel in distress and does his clanking trot over to help her at the pit against bugbear A. STAR advances to the edge of the pit, looking down at bugbear A. She is looking at the upper portion of a thick pine tree, about 20ft up from the trunk. "It's going to take him a long, long time to climb up and get out of there," she thinks. Then she looks again, noting that the beast is using it large claws and seems a good climber...."well.. or maybe at least 2 or 3 minutes..." The beast is about half-way up toward the surface, its head a few feet below ground level. "Take THAT!." The Druid jabs her scimitar down at the creature's head, making him dodge and duck to the other side of the large tree trunk, slowing his rate of climb, if not actually hitting him. It looks up, eyes a baleful red glare, pain-distored face snarling at her. Star is taken aback. No natural creature she'd ever seen had eyes like that! She redoubles her efforts -- jabbing down at this hideous demon-spawn --- or whatever it was. As Tav trots up, he sees Star hacking fiercely at a bunch of pine-tree branches trying to get to the beast, with a bugbear climbing up the other side of the trunk. He asks her, "Are you all right?" She sees Tav and, without stopping her almost frantic hacking, gasps out, "It's [slash] not [slash] natural [slash] creature [slash]." She doesn't even think of the damage she's doing to the poor tree -- in her almost-berserk frenzy to get at the beast.
VENERON, having finished with the unpleasant throat slitting
task and feeling somewhat sick to his stomach--killing a sentient
being, even one bent on bashing his head in, felt a lot worse than
he had expected--wipes the blade on the last of the slain bugbears
and stands up unsteadily to see what needs to be done next. He sees
that the entanglement spell is still holding up and that Tav and Star
are happily engaged with the bugbear in the pit. Bugbear E, with SANDROS on her back, continues crashing thru the underbrush, with a slight change in course, but more or less in a straight line. She issues a strange warbling-growl and runs up a small slope, Sandros' head banging on her back, each jouncing bound sending blasts of pain thru his shoulder. Sandros feels his mind slipping away as a thorn bites deeply into his thigh, and he finds himself someplace else...
VEN looks down at Tav, "Well, Tav, except for the one in the entanglement and the one that dragged Sandros into the woods, they all appear to be dead. So," he says, turning to the no longer maniacal Star, "are you feeling up to finding Sandros, Avon, and Quill? Sandros didn't look too good." STAR, realizing that she had finally killed the dratted
bugbear, looks around at all the damage shes done. She spots Tav
caught in some branches in the pit, and sees his sword spiraling
down, down, down, to the bottom of the big hole. She looks at
the way she hacked the branches of the pine tree. What *had* come
over her, damaging a tree like that? She liked to think she's
not that kind of person. She resolves to be diligent in her daily
prayers and hope to understand and control this side of her personality
-- a side she never suspected even existed. MYRIDIAN, who had vapor-locked when bugbear A elevated
himself out of the pit, backs up into the nearest tree trunk,
and pulls the lizard from her pocket."It's okay, Flybreath,"
she whispers, her eyes as big as cat's head biscuits. "It's
okay... don't have to be scared." She is petting the lizard
so hard it's surprising her fingers aren't green. "Bad
monster's gone away now..."
QUILL sees Sandros move his left arm and
relaizes that he's alive. But after what that thing did to him
he can't be for long. She springs into action and starts making
her way down the path to find a way accross to her fallen friend. "WOOF!" EDGE is right at her heels, watching
as she and Avon stumble/run down the trail leading from top of
hill to stream. When the clumsy 2-legs are out of the way,
he runs down, and in a couple of leaps is splashing thru the water.
He stops in mid-stream to drink. It's about a foot deep
in the middle.
Coughing up more blood, Sandros returns to the present, feeling
like his chest is caving in. "Not today..." he
murmurs, so softly that no one but himself can hear it. "Not
now." Gathering up the last of his strength, he rolls
over onto his side and spits, trying to clear his air passages
enough to breathe comfortably. The others would come for him,
he knows. Just a matter of waiting until they got to him. SANDROS leans back a little, putting his left hand out
to support him. It comes to rest on a bone. It is
a femur -- the long thigh bone from a smallish human or perhaps
an elf. He starts, then pushes it aside and leans against
some pine boughs. Quill arrives first, followed quickly
by Edge and Avon. The dog contents himself with sniffing
furiously all around the matted vegetation.
VEN turn to Starmyst "Yes, you're right
about that. But, I'll be able to get Tav out in plenty of
time to assist Myr and myself; I think the three of us will be
able to keep it at bay. With its partners lying in pools of their
own blood at our feet, however, it may just decide it's safer
to run at the sight of us. But, if any of the others are
available to come back and help out while you tend to Sandros,
I'm sure we'd be more than obliged." Ven then points
in the direction that Sandros was last seen and Star heads off. Thank you pit you served me well, I'll call again, but for now . . . dispell. With that the pit magical closes up and desposits Tav again at ground level. STAR heads off in the direction Ven pointed, wondering why they had bothered to wander so far off from the battlefield. She pauses and looks around the area, feeling kind of disappointed, almost sad, at the way the beasts had been mutilated. True, they were aggressive, but every living thing deserved to live. And here she was, mutilating it to pieces. She has a fleeting thought that she should rescue the last bug bear before the others got to it, but that would raise bad questions. The party might be wary if they found out they had a monster-lover Druid in their midst. She fought a self-battle, until she finally began leading King on again, turning her back on the scene. "They attacked us first," she comforted herself. She walked back along the path, searching for any sign of Quill or Avon. TAVARAK is a bit amused at being *poofed* to the surface as the pit area zooms back to ground level, but he's been around mages before and nothing they do can really surprise him anymore. He turns to Veneron and Myridian, "I think Ven's right and that
last one is going to run when he gets a chance.... So how about us not
being here when that happens? Why don't we collect all the horses
and equipment left around here and go join the others -- wherever they
are. Maybe later on we can come back and dispose of all these
corpses... a fire sounds good for them. I dont know if it would
be a good idea to leave so much fresh meat laying around, especially
if we're going to be nearby. And from what you said about Sandros,
I'd be surprised if we're going to cover too much more ground in the
remainder of the day."
Tav looks over the body of A and then checks on the injury to Steadfast (his horse). He retreives the sharp lance point from B's body and adds it to his saddle bag.
[OOC from DM: ** Your attention please. **
------------------------------------------------------------------ The 1 remaining beast has failed his morale check and will bug out when he can move again current status: Avon is going thru the pile of
bones and body parts at the bugbear nest |
