The Enraged Cleric

The fire embers had all but turned to ash when I realised I needed to check on my charges and catch a few hours’ sleep. I returned to the Three Rings Tavern and found that their condition was getting better, but I was going to have to train a lot more to perfect the more powerful healing required to fully remove their conditions. One of Watson's arms twitched uncontrollably and Justin sounded like an eighty year old man as he wheezed in his sleep. As I left the room I noticed Justin was holding ‘Vera’ close. Odd, I thought to myself, I could have sworn his noisy stick was leaning up against the cupboard when I came in.

I also checked on Mandraiv, he seemed relatively fine considering the shock and shear horror of his own looks being affected. You’d think the world was going to end when he cursed his proclamations of retribution to all who had taken part in the diseases afflicting the city through clenched teeth. I suspected however, it was more his vanity and pride that were scared worse than his physical good looks. Artox slept faithfully at the foot of his bed. There wasn’t much I could do about his condition for the time being. I’d have to rectify that soon, the poor snake had suffered a lot for the sake of our group.

Sparrowhawk, well there wasn’t much I could do for her either as her looks were beyond my help, even if I could remove the disease affecting her. She did have a sense of courage and pride about her though, which was heartening.

As for Grit, well ‘there weren’t nothing wrong with im’, as he put it. Since he was the only one who hadn’t come down with any afflictions, I was starting to think he either had the constitution of a stone or the diseases were just too afraid they would be chewed up and spat out if they got too close to him.

After morning prayers and over breakfast, there was a fairly lengthy discussion about what to do next, and although I didn’t like circumventing the law, I could see the wisdom in going straight to the hospice to confront Dr Davalus. We had a lot of evidence that he was part of a disease cult but nothing really solid that would hold up at trial. Just the thought that it was happening right in the heart of the city, and in the hospice where citizens were going supposedly for help, was enough to make my stomach churn and the eel soup taste fowl, even after casting purify a couple of times.

We easily talked our way in to see the Dr, but we’d taken only a few steps inside when for some reason known only to Sparrowhawk, she decided to cast a hunting spell and all of the Greymaidens and ‘physicians’ went on high alert. And it didn’t take long to escalate into a fight for our lives and the truth. It must have been an ugly sight, seeing us barge in and attacking the doctors and their wardens in amongst dying and diseased people rowed up from wall to wall in the hospice. I could feel a dull thumping pain as the nurse was trying her best to defend the weak and helpless but my heart truly sank when I saw Sparrowhawk turn to defend me only to realise in that instant that she had slain probably the only person who genuinely cared for the sick people. There was nothing I could do for the nurse as the ringing of weapons on armour and singing of bow’s, the gurgling of potions and slashing of war-razors filled the air.

Incensed at the death and decay in the room I could feel my blood starting to boil but the fight was soon over and we moved up the stairs to continue our search for the Doctor and to make some sense of what was happening. There were a few more maidens and witchdoctors but their lives soon ended as we were now relentless in our pursuit of the cause of this terrible disease.  We opened the doors into the main upstairs chamber only to find a couple of physicians ‘working’ on rows of restrained Varisians. As the familiarity of a torture room filled my senses, the sounds of the fighting around me dulled and my vision narrowed as the deceiving Doctor Davalus entered the room.  I was furious to the point of losing control. I screamed a challenge that even made Gritt look around as he stepped into the doorway to protect us but annoyingly getting between me and the Doctor.

“Davalus, we come for you!!” I yelled, “Abadar shall guide his community, their will is strong!”

Sparrowhawks bow sang and Vera made a lot of noise, but she couldn’t drown out my anger at the shear evil of the situation.

“Urgothoa cannot stand against us!” Serenrae’s light shall cleanse Korvosa of your decay” I screamed and continued “There is nowhere you can hide, Shelyn’s beauty shall wash away all evidence of your passing and cleanse the hearts of this magnificent city!”

Gritt started getting mighty angry as he saw the doctor spit and belittle his goddess’ name. “Shelyn can do nothing, she is nothing, Urgothoa shall prevail” and he ran towards us is a fit of madness.

In my anger I had lost all rational thought and now words came unbidden, “The great sword of Iomedae shall strike you down.” “Justice shall be brought upon you, even if I have to strike you down myself!! “

As the fighting continued around me, litanies stream through my conscious thoughts and words were as one and holy energy healed my companions, though I don’t recall whether I was channelling through my holy armour, the dawning light through the windows, the prayer beads I hold under my shield or some other divine manifestation.

As we bested the fake physicians and at the moment when Davalus fell to the floor, I looked down and realised I held a longsword, a sword that until then I didn’t own. The longsword, a symbol of Iomedae…. Justice had been done.  Was this a sign?

Gritt's Tale - Parts 10 & 11

The scribe and the grizzled old warrior had arrived at the banks of the river, and stood for a moment, looking at the murky, fast-flowing water.

“Well, it was I-don’t-know how many years ago that I stood here with the others, peering out over the water just like you and me are doing now.  Mandraiv summoned some sort of watery creatures – elementals, he called ‘em – to look for a sunk ship in the river.  They didn’t have any luck.  So, we drunk our potions and figured to do it ourselves.  We got in the water, and found out why they hadn’t spotted anything.  That dirty colour goes all the way to the bottom.  The water’s just too darn filthy.  Well, we walked around down there for a while, and eventually stumbled over a wreck.

It was in two parts, split over a big rock.  We checked out the smaller bit first.  Sure enough, there was something down there that didn’t like the way we just strolled on it to its new house.  A few eels.  Longer than a man, and thicker than a log, with a nasty bite.  Well, we killed ‘em.  I took one back, and got the cook to prepare it later.  Damn thing was just too silty though.  Each mouthful just a little too gritty.”

Gritt paused, and a thoughtful expression appeared on his face as he digressed, “Figure if you put them in some clear, clean water, maybe in a tank, and let them swim around for a while, all that mud and silt’d pass right out of ‘em.”

He shook his head ruefully.  “Never had the chance though.  Might get around to doing it one of these days.  Reckin’ they’d be good eatin’ with the right sauce if the mud was all took out of ‘em.  Anyway, we went round the other part.  First thing we spotted was a shark – a big one.  Well, as soon as it saw us it swam backwards and hammered its snout onto a cabin door.  Weird – looked just like it was knocking on the door.  We cottoned on soon enough that it was warning something – and sure enough a real ugly looking thing – with hair like rotten seaweed, scaly scabby skin and a real snuggle-toothed mouth – came out.  Made Sparrowhawk look almost normal.  Someone said it was a seahag.  Don’t know about that – but I do know it was tough.  Thing damn near killed Watson and Justin with its spear.  Ran Justin all the way through, and almost stabbed one of Watson’s arms clean off.  Later on, we eventually got them back on their feet – but they were the worse for wear.  Watson’s arm and hand were scarred, and he couldn’t flex his fingers no good no more, while Justin sounded kind of wheezy, and didn’t look as full of beans as he normally did.

Well, we searched the wreck, and found some clues alright.  There were plenty of those coffers, some bloated, diseased rats, and a box which had some paperwork in.  There was also a dead body of one of those doctors that was being employed by the town, with his long-nosed plague mask still on.  Turned out the ship belonged to Doctor Davalus.  Well, just like we’d all figured, he was up to his neck in it.  The question was – who was behind him?  Was it the queen?  Mandraiv swore it was, but it still just seemed to stink of a set up.  Anyway, there was nothing there suggesting it was from Cheliax, so I put that theory on hold for a while.

Still, we’d need to get to the bottom of it, so we headed off to the hospice where the Doctor and his minions were working.  We had a good talk about whether we were going to let anyone know.  I thought I should tell Sabina – she deserved to know about it for sure – but it’d be too risky – for her as well as us – if anyone found out.  We also figured there weren’t any point in telling Kroft.  She was giving money to take care of her problems – not bring her new ones.

We got to the hospice and bluffed our way in.  It was a real sad sight.  Pallets with plague-struck people just lying there groaning and moaning.  Seeing those so-called doctors walking around made me pretty furious.  But, even before I could say anything, Sparrowhawk started the fight.  There were a few grey maidens, they were pretty tough, as well as those doctors, who were all wielding huge war-razors.  Turned out they were all alchemists, as they were downing potions whenever they got the chance.  It was a good fight, but there was one moment which stuck in my mind.  The receptionist, a doughty woman, came in while the fight was going on and started hitting Sparrowhawk with a sap.  Kinda looked like she thought that they were real doctors, and we were the bad guys, and she was just trying to stop us from doing evil.  Anyway, she was really hurtin’ Sparrowhawk with that sap, so Sparrowhawk shot her with the bow.  It went straight through her heart and she dropped to the ground in an instant.  The look on Sparrowhawk’s face has stuck with me.  She looked shocked alright, but then it was a mixture of regret and satisfaction – the two emotions fighting with each other.  Figured it wouldn’t be the last time I’d see that expression on the face of one of my companions, and I was right.

Well, Davalus was nowhere to be found on the ground floor, so we headed upstairs.  There were some more of those maidens and fake doctors, but we took care of them.  Then the doctor came out.  He was another tough one, but he concentrated on Sol.  Sol was acting a little funny that fight, actually.  Usually he’s quiet and inoffensive, just goes around helping us out and giving us blessings.  This time though, it was like Davalus someone had really rattled his cage, or got on his goat.  He kept telling Davalus that he was cursed in the name of the gods.  Didn’t mention Abadar much – but went through a bunch of gos including Shelyn and Sarenrae, like he was trying out how their names sounded rolling off his tongue…  Looked like he was hacving second thoughts about the his faith.  Made sense though.  He’d always been too good for the Abadar church.  Tuttle and the rest of them just seemed interested in money, while Sol actually wanted to help people.  Anyway, Davalus was taken down, but he kept proclaiming his innocence to the end.  Don’t know whether he was mad or not, but didn’t make a difference.

We almost had a chance to capture one of the Doctors, but he just kilt hisself and cursed us to Urgathoa. Half the fight had taken place in a room full of Varisians strapped to beds.  Looked like they’d been tortured and experimented on, and weren’t in good shape.  After the fight, Justin said something that baffled me then, and still don’t make sense.  Said it would be evil to release them.  Said they were our responsibility, and whatever happened to them once we let them go would be on our hands.  Don’t see that that’s right.   It ain’t right to deny someone the choice as to how they live their lives.  They weren’t crazy, and we told them what was going on.  Leaving them strapped there would just be wrong.  Sometimes Justin looks at the world in a real strange way.  Maybe its his Shoanti upbringing.

Well, we had a good look around the top of the hospice, but there wasn’t anything incriminating.  Mandraiv said if we used a strange lever that Davalus had been carrying, it would take us down the lift into the hidden temple of Urgathoa.  He said it like it was real obvious.

.Mandraiv’s a real smart one, even if he is a little cold.  He said we should leave those Varisians strapped up in case any of them warned the guards.  Well, he had more of a point than Justin, but Sol and Watson weren’t having any of it, and the Varisians got released.

Anyway, we had a tough decision to make.  Would we keep on going, beat up as we were, or would we rest, and come back fresh.  We decided to keep going.  Didn’t want to give whoever was down there the chance to slip away.

Well, sure enough, Mandraiv was right about the temple.  We went down the lift and found a temple of Urgathoa.  The place was crawling with doctors, skeletons, and priests to Urgathoa.  It was real creepy down there.  There was one room where the walls and floor were glass, and there were diseased and groaning bodies moving around underneath it.  Well, it was evidence alright.  We took care of plenty of the minions, but then Watson’s old master, Fyffe, got hisself into the fight.  He hit me with some kind of gross tentacle growing out of his shoulder.  Well, I don’t know what kind of poison that thing was oozing, but things got kind of woozy, then the last thing I remember is falling to the floor with him laughing.  Turned out it was the same poison that Watson had been hit with when we fought Fyffe’s other apprentice. 

Found out what happened in the fight later.  The team had picked off a few more of the minions, but had retreated, thankfully with Watson carrying me, and gone back up the lift, to decide what to do next.

Mandraiv's Diary 11

We headed upstairs looking for the doctor, and sure enough we found him.  He had a few more Grey Maidens and Queen’s Physicians with him, but we were able to kill everyone.  He kept accusing us of being the cause of the plague throughout the fight, which seemed a bit odd, but did bring on an interesting slagging match between him and the cleric.  While everyone else was going about their business, the cleric started yelling abuse at the doctor.  The most interesting thing in this was that he started out cursing him in the name of Abadar, sensibly enough, but then started invoking the names of other gods.  Looks like he might be having a crisis of faith.  I wonder which way he’ll go with that – hopefully he’ll convert to a church that will thus provide us with free healing.  Anyway, after we’d killed the doctor the last remaining Queen’s Physician opted to suicide instead of fighting to the end, cursing us in the name of Urgathoa.  Unfortunately, this was still a little short as far as useful evidence as to our killing of a bunch of people supposedly responsible for stopping the plague tearing the city a new and very ugly, bloody asshole at the moment, and in their hospital as well.

Searching the place and completing our looting of the bodies, we discovered a couple of things.  Firstly, it seems that some Varisians are immune to blood veil.  We discovered this because there was a room upstairs filled with Varisians, all restrained to beds, all in really bad shape and all having been experimented on.  We also found some notes in the doctor’s office regarding the experiments and the possibility of this natural trait leading to a cure for blood veil.  We took the notes, not exactly the kind of thing we could afford to leave lying around if there happens to be an investigation into the slaughter we initiated in this hospital.  We also noted, on removing the helms of the Grey Maidens, that their faces were all hideously disfigured.  I can barely conceive of such a monstrous act, or of joining a cult that requires that all members remove any hint of beauty that they possess.  I think I’ll suggest that the ugly chick join though – she’d look much better in full plate armour, and she wouldn’t need to suffer any rituals scarring to fit right in.  I’ll also need to investigate this.  If this is a part of any specific cult, I may have finally found a cause that I can ride to political power – the eradication of such an evil cult is just the thing to get the people behind me and believing that the tragic demise of any opposition occurred purely by coincidence, regardless of how many similar hunting accidents befall them.

We also discovered a lingering aura of evil around the corpse of the doctor, more inadmissible evidence that we are on the right track, and a lever that was clearly the way to get the lift downstairs to take us down into, hopefully, the Urgathoa cult headquarters.  And then the arguments began.

Four-arms declared that he was unwilling to proceed until we had released the restraints on all of the Varissian test subjects.  Talking to them revealed that they had all been abducted and experimented on, almost to the point of death.  Despite their ordeal, I was concerned about letting them go, as we still had no evidence with which to defend ourselves in a capital trial for the hospital ruckus, assuming that there is even the slightest semblance of a trial.  It seemed to me that letting them go was a sure way to reduce the time it would take for our activities to come to the attention of some kind of officials, and without any evidence I think even the city watch captain would be hard pressed to overlook this one.  I contemplated getting in some practice for my future political career by initiating a few hunting accidents with the Varisians, but figured I’d be unlikely to hide this from my companions, and a few of them might arc up a bit at the murder of a dozen or so innocents.  So I argued, along with the gun nut, to keep them restrained until we had some hard evidence.  We lost the argument, and the restraints were removed and the test subjects asked to stay here until we got back to take them away for medical treatment.  I’m sure that people who have effectively been tortured will stay in the room they were tortured in because we asked them to, quite nicely.  Regardless, there was little I could do, except move on to the next clear issue. 

Many of us wanted to rest and recover, having taken a fair beating from the doctor and his cronies, as well as having used quite a lot of their spells and such.  Unfortunately, given our situation I felt that this was impossible, as without evidence we were doomed.  We also faced the problem that having clearly discovered the source of the plague (assuming that we were right about the cult being under the hospital) there was a god chance that they would clear out overnight, leaving us once again empty handed after warning the bad guys that we were onto them.  Eventually, we proceeded.

The lift took us down to the cult’s headquarters, an apparent temple to Urgoatha. We headed in and found several Queen’s Physicians, undead and priests of Urgoatha.  Then we found four-arms nemesis, Fyffe.  Unfortunately, despite our best efforts, Fyffe proved too tough, as we had allowed him plenty of time to prepare for our attack and as an alchemist he was a very tough opponent, once prepared. He poisoned the warrior, causing him to fall unconscious (a familiar poison) and things went bad from there.  We were pretty much unable to hit the man, and as such were forced to retreat, although we did kill most of his minions during the fight.  All that remains to be seen now is whether I’ll be able to convince the others to head back down in a few minutes, hopefully to catch Fyffe before he flees.

Mandraiv's Diary 10

After the old wererat crone finally caught up to us, and provided her crucial tip regarding the source of the plague, we were off to search the riverbed for a ship.  Fortunately, we were able, through the wererat crone, to get some cheap potions of water breathing and so went for a dip.  Since Artox was fairly debilitated by the plague, I decided to leave him out of this, and instead rely on minor summoned minions instead.  After a couple of hours searching the riverbed, we found a ship, named the Direption.  An amusing enough name, and in this instance a wrecked ship inhabited by a sea hag (literally a hag, and yet still not as ugly as our woman) druid and her shark companion.  We killed the hag and her shark, although it was a very tough fight thanks to the watery conditions and both four-arms and the gun nut were dealt grievous wounds.  A search of the ship revealed that it was owned by Dr Davalus, and that it was the source of the plague.  Quite an ingenious option, those responsible were using some kind of magical item, deaths head coffers, to spread the disease.  The is clearly what that little girl found on the beach filled with silver coins, the magic of the box being that it will infect anything stored within with a disease, and so apparently the coins were the start of the plague.  Not only the coins from the little girl though, as apparently the wererats had found several of these coffers as well, on the beach, and realizing that there was something amiss with them simply pushed them back into the water to be found by someone with a less sensitive nose.

That a ship owned by Dr Davalus was the source of this plague made it quite clear to me that the warrior was right all along, and that the queen was responsible for this terrible event in her city.  It appears that her personal physician is in charge of the cult, and that he and the Queen’s Physicians are actually worshipers of Urgothoa.  I decided that this was sufficient evidence, and most of the other agreed that we immediately look into the good doctor in detail, and hopefully obtain evidence as to the location of the temple of the cult of Urgothoa in Korvosa.

We returned to the inn so that four-arms and the gun nut could recover from the fight with the hag, only to discover that they had both been crippled by their wounds.  We headed for the bank in the morning to investigate healing the gun nut, since four-arms was OK with his issue, as he seemed only to have damaged the fingers of one hand, and with three extras he was happy to wait for repairs.  At the bank, the gun nut was appalled at the price quoted for healing and decided to live without it, at least until the plague was over and the Archbanker’s excuse to massively over charge him had gone.  After this debacle, we headed to the Hospice of the Blessed Maiden to question, or more likely murder, the good doctor.

At the hospice I was able to talk our way past the receptionist, a very solidly built woman, and once we entered the main room saw four Queen’s Physicians ministering to a large number of plague victims, and four Grey Maidens standing guard, one in front of a door and three on raised catwalks, with bows ready.  I had just drawn breath to talk our way past all of these people when the gun nut, as per pre-arranged signal, revealed that the Grey Maidens were all evil.  The Queens Physicians weren’t, but this wasn’t a significant issue as they were all wearing plagubringer’s masks, magical items we know to conceal alignment.  After this, rather than letting me talk our way into the doctor’s office, the ugly chick decided to pick a fight, and we were on.

The fight wasn’t too bad, although the Grey Maidens were very well equipped, and we were able to overcome them without too much trouble, and in fact it was the solidly built receptionist who caused us the most trouble, entering the fray as soon as she heard the ruckus and laying into the cleric and the ugly chick with a sap.  The ugly chick took care of her, although strangely she seemed to regret killing a woman.  Regardless, her issues with this seemed to last for about 3 seconds, and then we were off searching the rest of the place for the Doctor, and hopefully for sufficient evidence of his involvement with a cult and the plague, otherwise we may be in for a lot of trouble, having just killed eight people it currently carries the death penalty for interfering with, and one “innocent” woman.  And all in a hospital.  Incedentally, during the fight I dropped into the reception area to lock the doors and hang the closed sign.  Not entirely convinced that this will keep the watch or guard out if anyone finds out about our activities here, but it may slow the spread of the news.

Should also note that four-arms, oddly, decided to claim a bunch of the war razors that had been used by the Queen’s Physicians in the fight.  Maybe he’s finally worked out that there’s little point in having an extra pair of arms if all you’re going to do with them is to fold them across your chest and try to hide them under your cloak.  He honestly thought no one could tell that they were there too.  Bizarre.  You make yourself look like a misshapen freak, and you think that no one will notice that there is something odd about you.  On the other hand, he’s almost as delusional as the ugly chick about his looks, constantly insisting that he’s really good looking and merely has poor social skills. Trouble is, the really, really good looking people with no social skills start out seeming really, really good looking and as one gets to know them, they become really, really good looking and a dick.  Four-arms started out seeming at best average looking, poor bastard, and now he’s just an average looking dick.  Artox can barely contain his mirth at the idea that the big fool thinks he’s attractive.  Strange for someone as ridiculously good looking as myself, even with this hideous plague disrupting my looks to be hanging out with two people who are so ugly, especially since they both lack the ability to compare themselves to me and see that they are sorely lacking in the appearance department.  Maybe I should buy them both mirrors.

Mandraiv's Diary 9

Before delving into the sewers to kill this rat, we decided to pick up a few silver weapons.  Seems like some of my common sense is finally rubbing off on this band of misfits.  Or that they are starting to listen to me.  Either way, it seems that as a group we are developing some level of cohesion or cooperation that has until now been fairly elusive.  Actually, it might just be that they have seen how hard it is to take down creatures without using appropriate weapons, but then again, this translates, for me, to growing a little sense.  After our little shopping venture, we headed into the sewer and quickly found the lair of the rat army.  Hilarity ensued.

Since the old woman wererat asked us to try to spare everyone but the ringleader, four-arms was hell bent on not killing them.  He went in with a sap, hoping to knock the “innocent” wererats out.  The warrior was also using the flat of his blade, and there was some general consideration towards non-lethality from most of the group.  Seemed like a bad idea to me – reducing one’s effectiveness in order to save the lives of a few sewer rats planning to infect the city’s population with a curse like lycanthropy seems insane, and since Artox agreed with me, it was full effectiveness from us from the beginning.  The hilarity came from good old four-arms, who’s altruism towards the “innocent” wererats lasted until he was hit in the combat.  The smallest scratch, and suddenly he was all about killing them.  Artox’s comments were made primarily across out telepathic bond, but I was unable to hold myself and laughed quite a bit at this bizarre foolishness.  How can someone know themselves so poorly?  The other amusement came at four-arm’s inability to accept that the leader of the rats was competent with his rapier, and was handing out some nasty wounds with it.  Apparently four-arms thinks that the size of the hole left by a weapon is the only determinant of effectiveness.  I’ve not trained with arms much, but even I know that there are vital organs, joints and depth of wound as factors / places to stab that will make the tinniest hole into a lethal wound.  Makes me wonder at his own choice of weapon too, as he tends towards light options rather than what, in his apparent logic, must be the only way to hurt something – a greatsword, or perhaps greataxe.

After defeating the wererats and their friends (a couple of dire rats and a swarm or two of your normal, garden (sewer?)-variety rats) and looting, it was time to head back to our inn.  In the morning we discovered that the plague was running rampant through the group, and that there was a possibility of some of us becoming wererats.  We sorted out the wererat problem with the help of the Archbanker of Abadar, and spent a day or two trying to beat the plague, before concluding that we’d be better off trying to live with it until we could discover its source and eliminate the spread, as healing magic is hard to come by, potions of remove disease are not terribly effective and for every one of us who manages to shake the disease, another comes down with it.   I am still in shock.  A tiny blood-blister marring my perfect visage.  If this plague leaves a scar, I’m going to be pursuing its perpetrators into hell and tormenting their spirits for all eternity.  And clearly, marring the face of someone as really, really, really ridiculously good looking as myself, even if by accident, should be enough to condemn the souls of all connected with the people who started spreading the plague, those who developed it and all of their friends and families to torment for the rest of time. 

We decided to continue our investigations, and were becoming quite impatient for the arrival of the old woman wererat with our new lead.

Ch 2, Part 6: The Good Doctor Davaulus

Doctor Davaulus

The heroes climb the spiral staircase to the third floor where they face off against the Hospice’s remaining tenants. They fight more Grey Maidens and Queen’s Physicians plus also the good Doctor Davaulus.

Throughout the fight he maintains his innocence, accusing the heroes of being the true villains of Korvosa and the ones that are behind the plague. Eventually the heroes prevail. Though interestingly the last Queen’s Physician chooses to take his own life rather than be cut down in battle. Just before doing so he curses the heroes, asking that Urgoatha take their souls.

The top floor has a room filled with Varisians that have been experimented on, they are weak and barely conscious. None seem to show any signs of Blood Veil. A search of the Doctors office reveals many notes on his investigations into why some Varisians appear to be immune to Blood Veil and how they could possibly be used to create a cure for Blood Veil.

Justin detects alignment on the slain doctor and discovers a feint aura of evil. Also curiousily when they remove the helmets of the Grey Maiden’s they discover that these women’s face have been cut enough times to leave ugly scars and effectively eradicate any sign of beauty.

Lastly they discover an odd looking key with a long handle that the heroes quickly deduce is a hidden switch for the lift to take them to a lower level.

The Temple of Urgathoa

The heroes have a long discussion on the merits of withdrawing to recuperate or continue the assault. In the end they decide that leaving now will almost certainly lead to the heroes being arrested for the murder of both Grey Wardens and Queen’s Physicians; not to mention Dr Davaulus who remains annoyingly free of real incriminating evidence.

So they take the lift down to a secret level, where they are quickly met by more Queen’s Physicians. The are easily despatched and the heroes continue their reconnaissance by force. They encounter more resistance, slaying physicians, skeletons and evil priests of Urgoatha before they eventually come face to face with Ernest Fyffe, Watsons old tormentor.

He proves a dangerous foe, using his alchemical compounds to transform him into a dangerous warrior. He successfully poisons Gritt who succumbs to his poison and falls into a deep coma. They heroes are quick to realise a hopeless situation and make a hasty retreat. Pulling Gritt to safety and fleeing to the warehouse floor above.

Encounter	Grit	Justin	Mandraiv	Sparrowhawk	Sol	Watson
Pre-Session	17,445	13,545	15,845	14,545	15,045	14,545
Journal	0	0	0	0	0	0
Upper floor guards	500	500	500	500	500	500
Dr Davaulus	1,067	1,067	1,067	1,067	1,067	1,067
Secret complex guards	400	400	400	400	400	400
1st wave	790	790	790	790	790	790
door trap	800	800	800	800	800	800
2nd wave	200	200	200	200	200	200
rp: changing faiths	0	0	0	0	500	0
Chief Tea Maker	0	0	0	0	500	0
Total	21,202	17,302	19,602	18,302	19,802	18,302

RP: Award for Davids attempt at role playing changing faiths from Abadar to Shelyn, plus also trying to roleplay dialog with Dr Davaulus during combat

Ch 2, Part 5: The Hospice of the Blessed Maiden

The Direption

The heroes delve into the river to investigate the report of the mysterious sinking of the ship. Aided by their potions of water breathing they locate the ship and discover that the sunken ship is inhabited by druidic sea hag.

A difficult fight follows that sees both Watson and Justin horribly wounded with an inch of death’s door. Despite the casualties they are victorious. A search of the ship reveals some interesting evidence.  That the ship was owned by the good Doctor Davalus; that in all likelihood the Queen’s physicians are Urgothoa worshipers and that the disease was deliberately delivered to Korvosa in a vile magic item known as “death’s head coffers”

The heroes then return to the tavern to rest; both Watson and Justin are revived though both still suffer some malaise as a result of the injury. Justin has wracking wheeze, his lungs still affected by the hags spear, he has trouble breathing and is easily out of breath. Watson has severe scarring on one of his hands that restricts the movement of his fingers.

The Sick Ward

Justin makes an appointment with Archbanker Tuttle to see about a cure for his breathing problem but finds the cost of healing too excessive. It is clear to him that the Artchbanker has a dislike for Shaonti savages.

Justin rejoins the party and the heroes head off to investigate the Hospice of the Blessed Maiden to ask some very pertinent questions of the ‘doctor’

Inside they find a lot of sick being tended by the Queen’s physicians and a number of Grey Maidens keeping watch. Sparrowhawk decides she has no patients for subterfuge and starts a fight which the heroes win without too much difficulty. They slay four physicians, four guards and one irate nurse (that is very capable with a sap).

The heroes start searching the Hospice for the whereabouts of Doctor Davalus

Encounter	Grit	Justin	Mandraiv	Sparrowhawk	Sol	Watson
Pre-Session	15,645	11,745	14,045	12,745	12,445	12,745
Journal					400
yvicca	533	533	533	533	533	533
eels	400	400	400	400	400	400
physicians	400	400	400	400	400	400
grey maidens	400	400	400	400	400	400
Nurse	67	67	67	67	67	67
Chief Tea Maker					400
Total	17,445	13,545	15,845	14,545	15,045	14,545

* No RP awards this week