News:

- Chubby Dwarves are low fat.
- Pippen accused of getting drunk and feeling Merry
- Mexican Hobbit corrupted by One Ring. Known as Smiegel

Main Menu

Session 7.5: Garbhan

Started by Dray, September 27, 2005, 12:19:56 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 2 Guests are viewing this topic.

Dray

Gahban woke with a start.

?Wha? sort?ve place is this tha? I?m in?? he thought. He was lying on his back in a large bed. From the feel of it, it was stuffed with goose-feather-down, for it was extremely soft and giving.

?Ach! Tha?s j?st bloody great!? he said as he sat up, waiting for his back to snap in protest. He was young, but his body always protested against civilzed comforts. Give him a clear spot on the ground at night and he slept like a baby in the womb. Yet surprisingly, and almost with a touch of disappointment, his back did not protest as he swung his feet over the side of the bed.

?P?rhaps it?s me tha?s goin? soft?? he thought. ?I cannea r?memb?r j?st how I came t? be here, let alone sleeping in this?this?bed! Bah!? He stopped as he looked down in horror at the quilt on the floor beside the bed.

It had a flower pattern.

Grabbing it, he held it aloft. ?Wha? the blue blazes is this piece o? chrap?!?? he said aloud.

?Mother, he?s awake!? he heard a child yell from the other room.

Startled, he took a better look around him. Wiping the sleep from his eyes, he looked about the small bedroom. The bed had no frame and was flanked by two nightstands. Across from the bed was a simple wooden dresser, and to his left, adjacent to the door, was a matching armoire. The floors and ceiling were hardwood, the walls mortared stone. Two unlit oil lamps were on the dresser, but the daylight filtering through a curtained window to his right allowed him to see.

?Damn th? gods! Wha?s the sun doin? up afore me?!?? he cursed to himself, lowering his head into his hands, trying to remember how he got here.

?Walls an? a damn roof?!? What?m I in a house? An inn p?rhaps? Why? Am I travlin?? Where would I be goin? to, I wonder? Damn me, wha?s goin? on here?!?!?

?Gahban? Come quickly!? asked a woman from outside the bedroom window.

?Ach, I can no longer ?scape tha? way. Blast me! Now I?ll ha? t? find some other way out! Luck j?st in?t a friend o? mine t?day, I see! Now I?ll ha? t? be thinkin? on me feet t? find a ?nuther way out.? He didn?t like the situation, never comfortable with change, especially so if it occurred without his knowing.

Thinking he couldn?t be in too much trouble, after all, it was a woman and a childs? voice he had heard, he walked over to the bedroom door. He paused at it, ?Did I slep the night in?nother mans home?? For a moment he filled with sudden dread. ?Waz th? harlot who call?d him yel?n in fear?? he thought.

?No,? he reprimanded himself. It wasn?t in his nature to lie with another mans wife, no matter how drunk he got.

He stepped through the door.

Beyond it was a common room that was clearly the only other room of a small farmhouse. Sitting at small table barely big enough to sit four was a small dark haired child. She was a thin but tall little thing who was probably no older than six or seven summers. A wood cooking stove was to his right, as was simple wooden cabinets from which pots and pans hung. Behind the table and the girl was another, much smaller, bed, beside which was a small rocking chair.

Gahban made a line for the door that was near the bed. Halfway across the room he stopped in his tracks.

?Morn?nin pappy.?

Dray

Ships.

A dozen of them were floating a few hundred feet away, just beyond the ridge of the grassy plateau. They were stationary, simply hovering over the valley that bordered the hill which the small farmhouse was built upon. Each was facing different various directions and at different elevations.

Each looked like a galleon from the Dullstrand Fleet, but Instead of a sail, each ship had a massive elliptical leather-banded, cloth balloon holding it aloft. The balloon, which was just slightly longer and wider than the ship, was attached to the ship via dozens of steel ropes. A mystery was how the balloon was even able to hold its shape, let alone a ship aloft, for each balloon had hundreds of small cut-out holes in it. How any gas got stayed in it, or where the gas even came from Garbhan could not guess.

Garbhan was alarmed at the massive amount of armament he viewed on each vessel, six cannons sticking out of portholes on each side of each ship, 10 feet below the upper deck. He had not been involved in the Greyhawk Wars years ago, but he had heard stories of such weapons. They used some powder that when ignited hurled a human-head sized ball of steel.

On the top of each ship he counted five spear-sized heads of ballista arrows pointing over the upper decks side-rail which was built like castle parapet.

Garbhan became nervous as he realized the men scurrying all over the ships were heavily armed hobgoblins. They appeared to be preparing for battle.

?There not doing what I think they are doing are they?? asked the woman, who he had almost forgotten.

?Tha?be not gett?n ready for break?n fast in the valley,? Garbhan scolded.

?But they couldn?t possibly be attacking Outpost City, not after all these years?? she asked.

Just then, his mare cried out in warning. Garbhan burst into speed towards the corral before her first neigh had even stopped. As he rounded the small farmhouse, he saw two score hobgoblins, only a hundred paces from him.

They all wore black leather over dark red clothes. Each one of them was a massive specimen of his race. Armed to the teeth with heavy crossbow, bastard swords and in plate mail, this was no ordinary group of hobs. These were trained killers.

?Get in tha? house!? he yelled at the woman, then bolted towards the corral.

As seven hobgoblins advanced towards him drawing their weapons, five others fired their crossbows at him. Two found there mark.

One steel bolt ran through his thigh and continued on, blood violently sprayed from both gaping holes. The other hit him square in the chest, just above the heart. He was amazed at the hobs deadly accuracy, even as he fell face first into the grass.

As the lifeblood tried to gush from the wounds, the poison from the bolts ate away and the veins and tissue near the wound, opening them up further.

The last thing he heard before he sank into the void was the scream of the woman.

[color=green:efca7a7c99]END OF SESSION 7.5[/color]

Dray

?Ach! Whait one bloody damn minit! I don? drink!?
 
Garbhan watched the little girl color on the chalkboard, getting much of the chalk on herself. She stopped and smiled at him. ?Mumma?s in th? back.? She said happily.

?Perfect.? He muttered as he headed for the front door. ?It?s out th? front wi? me then.? The child giggled musically and got up to follow him as he reached the door. Opening it slightly, he cautiously poked his head outside. As his eyes adjusted to the abrupt daylight that met his emerging head, a woman rounded the corner of the house. She looked at him purposefully.

?Damn!? He swore under his breath.

The woman was tall and slender and her long brown hair tumbled down to pool in the small or her back. Although she wasn?t curvaceous, her face was pleasant and her demeanor ? somber and serious ? was one that Garbhan could appreciate. He was certain that she was going to bring him trouble, as women were wont to do, but he was equally certain that she was a woman who would be welcome in his bed. She even wore a holy symbol about her neck on a string of leather.

He shook himself with some effort. 'What?m I thinkin??' He thought angrily. 'Tha?s probly what got me int? th?s mess in th? f?rst place!' He reprimanded himself.

?You?ll have to barn your grumpiness, Pappy.? The woman said, opening the door and grabbing his hand in one motion. ?We?ve got problems today.? She led him through the door and out off of the wooden porch.

The small house was built high up in the hills, and shared its small plateau with lush grass. Garbhan noted that at the front of the house stood a sturdy, well-built corral with a small barn attached to it, allowing his horse easy access to the shelter that it provided. His robust mare was chewing grass in the corral; it was good to see her again. He had his weapons and his horse, all he would need in order to make a quick getaway.

Garbhan allowed himself to be lead; out of the periphery of his eye he noted that the little girl was following them. ?Ye should go back t? th? house, girl.? He addressed the child. ?This isn?t somethin? fer wee eyes.? He had a strong sense that her real father was nearby, and he didn?t want her to witness what might be to come. Much to his surprise and relief the little girl stopped and pouted, but while biting her lip, obeyed Garbhan, albeit looking very dejected.

As the two adults rounded to the rear of the house, Garbhan suddenly recognized where he was. Behind the house, beyond the short, grassy plateau, stood a familiar mountain. It was the very same mountain that stood south of the corral on Outpost Beach. How that could be he didn?t know, but he was sure that this was that same mountain. Peering into the distance, beyond the mountain and to the west, he could even see the edge of Outpost Bay.

A moment before she pointed at them, he noticed the flying contraptions. ?Wha? th? hell?? He breathed.