Session #13 - “You got a little something in your eye”

[Nathan Sherman]

Paragon heals up the team from the battle but discovers that Torgrin and Aruzmathel still have the spider bites and they don't heal up. He tries to remove the poison but for some reason he can't.

After the ball is over, we hand the boy back over to House Tenney and escort the girl back to her house with her family. Lord Jandosh thanks us for the great job tonight.

We had the two prisoners from the attack taken back to House Qaigen and put into separate interrogation room. One is a half ogre fighter and the other is a human cleric.

The next morning we decide to interrogate the prisoners. Paragon doesn't want to be part of the interrogation so he goes up to the house library. We start the interrogation on the fighter.

The fighter plays if tough and wont answer any of our questions and Aruzmathel warns him that he'll get handed over to the crazy dwarf if he doesn't start talking. When he continues he silence in the face of our questions Aruzmathel tells Torgrin to break him. Torgrin has a lemon brought down from the kitchen. Without a word of warning he cuts off the half ogres eyelid and then pours lemon juice into it. Hugh gets upset and leaves the room to check on the cleric, Aruzmathel is very surprised but stays to follow through on the interrogation. The fighter still refuses to speak and after a few moments of warnings of worse things to come, Hugh comes in and asks to see Torgrin outside.

While they are out of the room, the fighter talks to Aruzmathel and says that his name is Dugarkin but won't give any more useful information. When Hugh and Torgrin come back in, Hugh makes Dugarkin the offer of he can give us information or he can die. He promises to have his eyesight returned as a good faith effort (from when Aruzmathel blinded him in the battle). We call in Paragon and Aruzmathel briefs him outside of the room that the prisoner tripped and fell and Torgrin cut his eyelid off.

After his eyesight is returned and the eyelid is healed, Dugarkin gives us lots of information in exchange for the promise that we will let him live.

He was hired by Jorman the Red, a red bearded human who came to the Gilren House apartments where he was staying in the poor part of town. The cleric's name is Shadak and Jorman the Red is his boss. He didn't know the other fighter in the group. They wanted to capture the woman. Shadak had others working for him inside the building as informants. He didn't know who the boy was. He was hired three days ago. Shadak is low ranking a priest working for the Scourge, the group that heavily uses blood magic. Shadack gave each of them a magical tattoo before the job started. The Scourge has a temple in the west section of town.  He was paid 10 gold for a couple hours work. The blood priests have mentioned the name Arxkula in hushed tones. He heard them in a tavern called the Drowned Rat down by the docks. He knew they were blood priests from the tattoos and the lower ranking ones wear studded leather and wear blacks and reds.

We let Dugarkin know that we will put him out the city tomorrow.

We figure that it would be best to have as much information on the Scourge as possible before interrogating the cleric so we check with Vordak, the Master of Arms for information about the Scourge and he doesn't have any.

We go out to talk to Pigeon about the Scourge. They have lost several members to them. They have a liar in the west end. They are hiring and growing. They keep their inner circle private and hidden. The Street Rats have lost 4 members this month to the Scourge.

When we get back in we find the Rinbura is waiting for us in the lounge. He had talked with Aruzmathel the day before about hiring them for a job. His nephew works in a small mining town, Churrat, to the north for house Xevani. House Xevani is trying to hush something up. We give him our blessing to talk to the nobles of the house to see about hiring us to find out what is going on.

The spider bites are starting to burn and Paragon has been searching for a cure without any luck at this point.

We call in Paragon to assist with the interrogation of Shadak. Paragon wakes him up and removes his gag and gives him some water. He lets him know that his only possible chance of survival is to work with us.

The priest calls out "Arxkula, forgive me, I have failed you". Then he says (in Iskren) "Blood Death" and blood pours out of every orifices and he dies in a bubbling pile of mess. Aruzmathel checks the body for magic and it has a very distinct and powerful aura.

We decide that we need to pursue the poison from the spider bites in all methods possible. Jamdin is one of the best healers so we go to see him. He says that since it is magical he probably wouldn't be able to help. He recommends that we go see Corthyra the Witch who lives 2 miles outside of town or Crayston who might have some knowledge of these things. 

Crayston on the north end of town is known for having the most knowledge in obscure bits of religion and the dark arts. He is of House Winair. He says that it is a high level necromancy touch spell delivered through the bite of a summoned creature. He says that Corthyra might be able to help.

We go out to the crumbling tower that the witch is said to live in. She answers the door and is a 7' 6" tall and nasty looking woman covered with disease. She says "yes, yes, yes, the spider bite, yes, come in". She dishes out a bowl of soups stuff for each of us. Hugh examines it and see all sorts of fun stuff in it. He samples it and it's not too bad.

She pokes and prods the wound on Aruzmathel and gets some puss out and claims that it is stage two. She has heard of the blood mages and that they are walking the streets of Drekkel and Asylum. First, the bad news... Arxkula the Mighty, a lesser lord of Ferunus, one of the 12 blood lords of the demon on Azor. She has seen the spider spell before but the spell that was delivered was far beyond the ability of the cleric that cast the spiders. The "Burning Blood" spell is a mighty spell that is demon magic. The only way to cure this is by drinking the blood of the one who cast the spell, and that wasn't the one in the alley who cast the spiders. We will suffer several days of declining health and abilities before succumbing to a horrible death if we do not reverse the magic...