Part 1: In which our heroes creep around
Svardborg Book Two, Chapter 3.2
(session 72, 22 nd January 2019) The Party: Naergon Harna, elven wizard (Diviner) Mads Rangle, human
fighter/warlock (Fiend: Archdevil Zariel) Jamna Gleamsilver, gnome rogue (Arcane
Trickster) Tomaz Stormwind, human ranger
(Hunter) Druscilla Oakenrock, dwarven
cleric (Trickery: Mask) Talis Wintercrest, half-elven
cleric (War: Bane) Jamna re-enters the main hall “ there’s a corridor and a back door ” she says to no-one in
particular. Druscilla, Naergon and Talis nod and head upstairs to join Mads. Tomaz
pushes aside the walrus skins, and inspects the long corridor for himself. It
is well lit with the same cold, blue continual flame sconces and it is clear to
Tomaz that a considerable amount of snow and ice has been tracked in from the back
door, whilst a lesser amount has been tracked through the skins from the main
doors. Letting the skins fall back in place, he and Jamna follow the others
upstairs Assembling on the balcony the party views the slightly charred
large red dragon horn, wedged into the smouldering ruin of the window, outside the
ice still drips slowly. On the far side of the balcony, Druscilla notices a stack of
barrels. Taking a look, she discovers several barrels of apples and some of
beer. Grinning she cracks the beer barrels open and fills her waterskins. In
the other corner are some huge crates, full of basic foodstuffs. Druscilla
notes that the crates are probably giant sized but the barrels are definitely normal
size. Naergon approaches the horn and window and looks out, along the southern
side of the iceberg, he can see another even larger lodge, also heavily
shrouded in ice. Mads turns to Naergon “ should
we destroy this horn, prevent it being used? ” Naergon replies “ sure, why not .” Mads advances and uses his
glaive to chop the silver mouthpiece off the horn, “ that should do it ” he says “better
safe than sorry ” although no one can hear him [Silence]. Druscilla calls out from the side corridor “ there’s a pair of doors down here ”. Bending down she peers under the
doors; the northern room is dark but she thinks she can see broken timber on
the floor. The southern room is lit with the usual cold blue light, she can see
the legs of a massive table. Otherwise the rooms seem empty. “ Do you want to explore these rooms?” she
calls back. “ Hells yeah!” shouts Mads.
“ Then, you’re going to have to come and
help open the doors ” Replies Druscilla. Heaving the doors open, Mads stares into the northern room, it’s
a shambles. Huge broken slabs of timber and rafters lay around, massive weapons
racks hang precariously against sagging walls or fallen on the floor. Ancient
spears and javelins lay scattered amongst the debris. The weapons are giant
sized and in Mads’s opinion decrepit and unusable. Druscilla and Jamna look into the southern room, it contains a
10’ tall wooden table – on the southern wall a continual blue flame burns in an
iron sconce. They can just make out that there are some things on the table. “ Can anyone see on top of this table?”
cries Druscilla. “ I’ll get Ringo to take
a look ” replies Mads from the corridor. Ringo flies across and informs Mads
that there is a golden platter about 8’ across, a wooden fork about the size of
a pitchfork and a huge bronze goblet with handles in the form of a dragon – it’s
about the size of a barrel. “ You say the platter is
gold?” asks Tomaz. “ If it’s gold then
it might be of value to trade ”. Mads looks at him “ we might have trouble carrying it, it’s eight feet across!” “ Won’t it fit in your bag of holding?”. “My
bag of holding doesn’t have an eight-foot mouth ” says Mads scornfully.
Meanwhile Ringo grabs hold of the platter and straining to his utmost manages to
drag it to the edge so it falls to the floor with a clatter. He then pushes the
bronze mug off the far side. Mads picks up the mug and puts it into his bag,
looking at the platter he asks “ do we really
think this is important?” “Oh, it’s not important” says Tomaz “I was just
thinking it might have trade value”. “Well yeah, it’s an eight-foot disk of gold,
so I guess it has value” replies Mads “ but
how do we get it to where we want it to be?” “Hmm ” muses Tomaz “well if we come across a furnace, we might
be able to melt it down into smaller shapes ”. Mads turns and stares at him “I think we’ve run out of ideas, leave it
here, it’s not going anywhere”. “Fair enough” responds Tomaz, still staring
at the plate and contemplating. Heading back downstairs Mads asks “ Druscilla what do you reckon, there’s a door over there” pointing north
“or those skins over there?” pointing south. “ Jamna and Tomaz have already peeked behind those skins, let’s look at
the door” the dwarf replies. Beyond the find two rooms, both lit by the
usual sconces and each containing four giant sized hammocks strung across the
beams. “ So, there’s a possibility”
says Tomaz “that if there’s eight beds
and we’ve killed three giants, that there are five more giants out there
somewhere.” “there’s no doubting your mathematical skills Tomaz” mutters
Talis “ that would be all that, there book
learning no doubt”. “Indeed” preens Tomaz, missing the sarcasm completely. The far room opens onto the long corridor, adjacent to the back
door. The floor is thickly covered in heavily trodden-in ice and snow. It’s not
possible to see under this door due to the amount of ice and snow. Tomaz says “I’m betting that this leads outside,
judging by the ice and snow”. “Possibly” says Mads “ whether it does or doesn’t I say we open it anyway” “Agreed” says
Druscilla. Heaving the door open, they reveal a long ice tunnel, carved into the
berg, heading north-east. Following the tunnel for about sixty feet they peer out of the exit
to see a vast lagoon, nestled in the open heart of the iceberg. To their right
[east] they can see a large lodge extending out of the ice onto the lagoon
shore, complete with docks or jetty and a chute (oddly the docks and chute
appear to be of human size construction). Dotted around the shore of the lagoon
are a number of part-ruined and buried lodges. In addition, they can see two giant Greatships, each about 240’
long moored to the southern eastern banks of the lagoon. A frost giant stands
aboard each, engaged in some kind of ribald game of snowballs, throwing great chunks
of ice at each other and laughing and shouting. On the opposite, northern shore
are two giant sized rowing boats, lashed to the side of a Greatship that is part
embedded in the wall of ice. A giant lounges in one of the small boats,
shouting instructions at a swarm of northern tribesmen [humans] that dangle
from ropes attached to the ice wall. They are using spears to chip away at the
ice entombing the ship. Another two large white bipedal bear-like creatures
using their claws to scrape ice form inside the ship. “We don’t want to fight
this lot, do we?” asks Druscilla. “ We never want to fight this lot ” affirms
Mads. “ not really” says Naergon,
rather more noncommittally. “ Right should
we go back through the lodge and see what’s on the other side then? ” says
Druscilla. “ The other side ?” asks
Mads “ you mean back out the front door?” “Yes,
let’s do that ” says Naergon “ and make
sure you shut the door behind us!”. As the party trudge through the lodge and out onto the southern
edge of the berg, Tomaz asks “ Naergon, do
you by any chance have some magic that would allow us to communicate with these
giants?” “Hmm, possibly but nothing that’s available to me today, no ”
replies the wizard after a moment’s consideration. “ Right, I’m just thinking that they may have information we’d find
useful ” continues Tomaz. “ Well they
may very well do so but I’m not sure they want to talk to us ” says Naergon.
“ Well, no reason to admit to anything is
there? We just say we’ve just got here, stumbled on their dead colleagues,
express surprise, concern and condolences and then move on from there . . .”
says the ranger. “Ha, ha, ha, Ok. Well I’m
not going with that plan ” responds Naergon, amused. Stepping outside, the party turn to their right and head
northwards around the edge of the berg. They pass the remains of three more
lodges, crushed and buried under a mountain of ice, clearly uninhabited. Tomaz
confirms that there is very little evidence of any giant activity, no tracks or
litter. Nevertheless, the party continue onwards through the howling wind and
sheets of horizontal ice and sleet that tears in from across the trackless
depths of the icy sea. To the far north-east they come across a large building that is
not entirely buried, although it is clearly damaged and partially crushed.
Looking up they can just make out a tower thrusting out of the ice, eighty or more
feet up the berg – there’s no signs of any windows in it. Turning the corner,
they find that the ice has cracked the beams apart and created an entry way
into the building. They feel confident that this is not meant to be a doorway.
Tomaz scans around and says “ there’s been
some activity here. Not as much as at that other lodge but something’s climbed the
shelf here and the ice around this opening has been trodden flat”. Looking
inside the ranger identifies that ice has been trodden into the building. “ the giants have gone in and out here but not
often ” he says. Set into the back of this room is an alcove that holds a 25’ tall
statue of a huge frost giant, they suspect it is some form of giant god carved
from some form of impenetrable ice. Dark, deep blue ice. Broken rafters lie on
the floor and to their left is the remains of a shattered door, frozen open on
shattered hinges. The wooden walls and door bear the marks of huge talons or
claws as if something monstrous wrenched the door open long ago. Mads turns to Naergon “ Naergon,
what do you know of giants and the arcane arts?” “Next to nothing Mads, next to
nothing” says the wizard distractedly as he steps closer to the statue “ what I can say is that this is a statue not
a golem or anything. However, there’s something about this room, some
background aura or power. I think it’s more faith or mythological maybe as if
something ’other’ is watching. I can tell you this, I’m not about to go and
mess with that statue but I can’t tell you why exactly. Good enough?” “Always ”
says Mads Tomaz sneaks past the statue and peers into the large pillared and
galleried hall beyond, further to his left he can make out multiple openings in
an inner wall. Beyond, set in niches are stone statues of frost giants standing
atop large plinths. Each of them has had its head smashed off. Looking around
Tomaz can see no evidence of where those heads might be now. To one side of the
northern statue, ice has broken through the wall and there are great patches of
rough, rippled ice stretching across the gallery around the southern plinths. Mads looks past Tomaz and communes with his armour [scales of
Tiamat] to locate the direction and distance to the closest chromatic dragon
within 30 miles. His eyes flick open and he gasps, turning he whispers to
Naergon “ there’s a dragon here, about 160’
away over there ” and points wildly in a vaguely south-westerly direction
and upwards – towards the rising tower structure in fact. “ Lovely” grunts Druscilla, gripping her crossbow “it’s what we came
for!” Tomaz and Mads creep to the corner and look out into the
pillared hall, beams and rafters extend across the hall 40’ overhead, in the centre
a beamed tower raises into the darkness. At the far end of the hall stands a
nine-foot tall block of ice. They can’t be certain but it looks as if something
is frozen within the block and the top of it is dark as if some dark liquid had
been poured over it. In the far southern corner they can make out a great opening in the
floor. It looks as if something has clawed through the floor, splintering the great
boards and leaving a 50’ diameter hole. Ice has crept over and encased many o the
broken boards around the hole. In the far western corner is a huge mound of
ice, reaching almost up to the ceiling. It is quite transparent and they can
clearly see the glint of copper and gold coins, cups, plates, boxes and items
of jewellery encased in the icy mound. In the north-western wall there’s an
archway into a further chamber Mads looks at Tomaz and turns to the others “I think we should quietly leave and discuss what we want to do
somewhere else. I have a bad feeling about standing here in ear shot of a
dragon!” “Good idea” says Naergon as the party quietly retrace their
footsteps past the large ice statue of the giant god and out onto the iceberg.
Once outside Mads says “Naergon is it possible for you to summon that shelter
of yours so that we can rest and plan in the dry and warm instead of out here
in a driving gale?” “Absolutely, happy to do so” says Naergon. Tomaz leads the party back round the northern edge of the iceberg
looking for a good place to camp. He finds a sheltered fissure, under the ice
shelf and out of sight of the sea. Naergon casts Leomund’s Tiny Hut and
everyone settles down for a short rest. During which Mads confirms the location
of the dragon he sensed “it was inside
the building, I reckon in that tower we can see from the outside, that’s where
it’s roosting”. “You only sensed the one dragon then?” asks Tomaz “ because there are supposed to be two of them”.
“I can only sense where the closest dragon is Tomaz, there could be thirty dragons
in there but I can only confirm the presence of one – even if they moved about” “It’s interesting” says Naergon “ maybe the
giants don’t like having the dragons around? If the dragons are nesting here
why would the giants be digging boats out? As far as I can recall my ancient history,
I’m pretty sure dragons and giants have always been enemies. What does concern
me is that open hole in the temple, the dragons could come and go that way” “I agree Naergon” says Mads “ but the way
the giants were larking about, some were drunk, some were having a snowball
fight – that doesn’t seem like people who are trying to sneak away under the eyes
of a dragon to me.” “yeah they didn’t even seem to have any guards set”
says Druscilla. “Hmm, maybe there aren’t very many giants, we’ve seen what? Six
giants, a couple of yetis and a couple of dozen northmen” muses Naergon. “It is possible ” says Tomaz “ that these
giants have only recently returned to this whaling station, not knowing about
the dragons” “Maybe” nods Mads “ but I
reckon that each of these Greatships would require at least ten giants as crew
and we’ve seen evidence of only eight.” “Great! So, where’s the rest of them
then?” “ So, what’s the plan then?”
asks Mads “ do we just pile in and start blasting?”
“Whoa, no, no, let’s be a bit clever” says Naergon. “ If I cast the old Rary’s and link us together, then a couple of the sneaky
types ” he looks from Jamna to Tomaz “ can
sneak in, check it out and report back. That way we’ll all know what’s going on”
“Pah” says Mads “ dragons see through
invisibility, everyone knows this”. “ Now,
now” says Naergon “No they can’t, that’s an old wives’ tale. They might be very
perceptive and canny but they can’t actually see you if you’re invisible. Trust
me on this I am a wizard!”
Jamna looks up “ if you can
make me invisible, I’m up for scouting out the lair”. Mads sighs “ ok, ok, I’ll send Ringo in, he’s naturally invisible
anyway”. Tomaz looks up “ Err, you don’t
think it’s worth going back to Waterdeep and getting the money from Rian. So
that we have something to bargain with the dragon for?” “NO! No, no, no, no”
says Naergon “ no, absolutely not. No, no.
No. The money isn’t going to help and anyway this way you can end up with the money
AND the mask. Think about that!”