Sour Spring Hollow

[fireinthedust]

OOC: Wait, do the low-rolling members of my group die horribly, or did the attacks get used up on the first group? Is... is the goat okay?

IC:
The elven musician runs her fingers through her hair. "This is insane! Where are we? Who are you people? I just took the job at the wedding to make some coppers, I've never hurt anyone. Is this a human sacrifice?!"

She has a look around the cabin, taking in the surroundings for general cabin features.

"Where is this place?"

[Raven_Crowking]

I am fine with the only deaths being from the 8-PC group at this time. I feel certain that more will follow.

Re: clubs. Yes, any old chunk of wood can be used as a club, but few people carry one to a wedding.

At first glance, the cabin seems typical enough of the sort - a single-room place which is now falling apart. A fireplace area for cooking, a few rough cots, a broken table, some chairs that have seen better days.

[fireinthedust]

OOC: (shivers) oookay (looks around desperately for falling rocks!)

IC:

Amalthia looks at the... table! What is broken about it?

The goat rushes through the doorway, pulling Noot behind him. Soon the hunchback rushes through, and then the necromancer.

"Agh! Blasted ghosts!" And the apprentice leaps under the table.

Igor helps slam the door shut, and takes a look around as well. "Is everyone okay? Gran, are you alright? What a nightmare!"

[Raven_Crowking]

The cottage looks as though it had been deserted some time back, but simply deserted. There is no sign of violence in the cottage itself. Even the table looks like a bad leg gave out, breaking a crock in the process, and you could maybe balance it on three.

There is still a woodpile beside the hearth, a kitchen area, chests for clothing, and a couple of hoes and a shovel standing in one corner.

[Guang]

Gran tosses the shovel to Nan and the 2 hoes to whoever in fire's group looks ready to catch them. Luc pokes around in the fireplace with his club, Matt starts going through the chests, and Marissa looks through things in the kitchen area.

OOC: I'm fine with the way the deaths have happened so far too. Sorry it took so long for me to post this time - busy weekend so was just checking the bottom of the page each day, and missed that we had gone to page 2. Sometimes feels like Int is my dump stat

[fireinthedust]

Guang: believe me, my slow posting is far worse

Hoes: Igor and Noot will take them, as Amalthia has her dagger.

"This is madness. The people here just... left! Did you see those phantoms? They drained those others and then looked... like humans. Like the blood made them alive for a moment. You, apprentice, what do you know about those phantoms?"

"Why would *I* know anything about them? I just got here!"

"In your book! That... that giant book of shadows in your pocket!"

"...Oh. Um... Yes. Let's... see..." He picks his black book from his satchel, and turns the pages. It looks like he's never opened it before, studying how to look menacing more than having any talent for the arcane.

"Well... they're clearly phantoms. I think we need... black candles and a virgin? Ew. Who wrote this?"

Amalthia pinches her nose in disgust, and grabs the book from the apprentice. "Let me!" And the elven flutist goes through the tome, looking for information that might be pertinent.

ooc: would this be a luck roll?

[Raven_Crowking]

I can't complain about anyone else's sporadic posting.

The witch's apprentice certainly and the elven musician probably (Luck check) know the story of Sour Spring Hollow, as I outlined earlier.

The woodpile contains several stout pieces of wood, which might be used as clubs. In addition, beside the woodpile is a hawthorne walking stick, broken in two. Also, a hatchet for chopping wood....a bit rusty, perhaps, but definitely serviceable.

The chests contain clothing - typical Shudfolk gear - but also three flasks of oil. Presumably for the lantern near the kitchen. In the kitchen, as well, there are bundles of drying herbs, a small sack of salt, and a bigger sack of corn meal that the mice have barely touched. A frying pan and four knives round out what can be collected.

[Guang]

ok, so no trapdoors, attic doors, or anything like that?

Hmmmm......secondary weapons......
Fire's witch gets the herbs, of course.

[fireinthedust]

ok, so no trapdoors, attic doors, or anything like that?

Hmmmm......secondary weapons......
Fire's witch gets the herbs, of course.

Actually, Fire's witch and mercenary are not here at the moment, iirc; unless Bron and Arvandra were also at the wedding? It's his elven bard, plus a hunchback, an idiot apprentice waiting to be eaten, and a halfling farmer who is just kind of there until his awesome goat (Sir Cudsworth, let's say) goes off with Amalthia and your awesome heroes!

If any of us survive this. Kind of a "pitch black" scenario, these funnels.

[Raven_Crowking]

Actually, Fire's witch and mercenary are not here at the moment, iirc; unless Bron and Arvandra were also at the wedding?

Nope. I am talking about Murphoi the Witch’s apprentice and Amalthia the Elven musician.

In any event, there is only the single floor, one room, and a floor made of split logs, flat side up, over dirt - pioneer fashion.

[fireinthedust]

House: Anything in the rafters? Pictures on the wall that we can look behind?

"If there isn't any kind of trapdoor or passage, and that mark on the door is the only thing protecting us from the phantoms, then we're trapped in here. That or we need to run to the other houses, to the graveyard, or run up to the top of the hill. Whatever we do, those phantoms are deadly. We'll probably lose at least one of us running... unless there's a way to copy that mark and protect ourselves?"

One of my characters has a holy symbol. Does the mark on the door look like a holy symbol?

[Guang]

Gran minutely examines the symbol, with an eye to figuring out how to duplicate it.

OOC: Hmmmm......top of the hill.....Fire, do you think this is an "escape the room" scenario where we need to find our way back to familiar surroundings safely (well, as safely as the last 2 or 3 standing in a horror movie), or do we need to get to the bottom of the curse and nullify it?

[Raven_Crowking]

Nothing in the rafters of any real value. The bundles of herbs had been hung there, but I believe you have those now. No trapdoors, no pictures.

The mark on the door is the "Devil's Thorn", used by conjure men and hoodoo folk, and as a bit of backwoods gramaree to protect against evil spirits (usually carved on talismans or the like). It looks a bit like a triangle intersected by a V to make six points.

[fireinthedust]

Gran minutely examines the symbol, with an eye to figuring out how to duplicate it.

OOC: Hmmmm......top of the hill.....Fire, do you think this is an "escape the room" scenario where we need to find our way back to familiar surroundings safely (well, as safely as the last 2 or 3 standing in a horror movie), or do we need to get to the bottom of the curse and nullify it?

I think it's EXACTLY that, with a bit of both, perhaps. I was thinking about the placement of the cottages following some kind of pentagram, but the numbers didn't add up. Now that we've had a look at the door symbol, I'm going to re-read the previous posts to double check if there are landmarks matching it.

Amalthia is still looking over Murphoi's black book (he's an idiot, but whatever the witch gave him could still be quality stuff. Btw, I was going to say he's a warlock, but with Murphoi I suspect he thinks the term is boy-witch...). Is there anything in the book about the symbol beyond what you've stated? Anything about phantoms?

Actually, is there info about the witchings in the region? Seems reasonable, him being a witch.

[Guang]

Using charcoal from the fireplace and one of the knives, Gran sets to work duplicating the Devil's Thorn on articles of clothing for the other 5 in my group (plus fire's if interested), tools, and even Byron Danker's bald spot. She also uses the knife to lightly scratch the symbol into the palm of her own right hand.

[Raven_Crowking]

NOTE: No one in the group is from Sour Spring Hollow. Who would wish to be? It used to be Sweet Spring Hollow until them Hobbs witches spoiled the place. It was a place of fear. Led by their patriarch, Byard Hobb, and his three boys, the Hobb clan practiced dark arts, venerated spirits best left untroubled by mortal men, and generally made folk uneasy. It is widely known, among those of the Shudfolk old enough to remember (or those who heed the stories of their elders) that the Hobbs could witch a well dry, lay a death curse on those who crossed them, and inflict trouble enough in other ways that they were feared and avoided by all.

Twenty years back, a young cleric of the Sovereign, Shuyr Rilla by name, took it upon herself to rid the Shudder Mountains of that dark coven. Armed only with her hawthorne walking stick and her holy symbol, she went to Sour Spring Hollow. Neither she nor the Hobbs ever came out of that Hollow again, but folk reckon she must have had a measure of success, because the witchings stopped.

[fireinthedust]

ooc: Okay, so we know the sour springs story (so that helps). I was thinking Murphoi was a local of the wedding area, not sour springs itself. That said...

Amalthia wonders out out, "Anyone think I'm crazy if I ask if the well and the gravestones, as well as the four houses, wouldn't match the points on the devil's thorn? Like this area was built to look like that symbol? Maybe to contain those spirits in this clearing? Think of it: we're in Sour Springs, in a field surrounded by the devil's thorn (ominous name, actually), and spirits looking like commoners when they feed EAT two of us. Maybe this is some kind of... sacrifice area? Maybe in the middle of the field the old witches buried their victims? But why the graveyard to the (south?)? Unless it was for family members."

Igor makes a pious motion to the powers of goodness at the thought. "I may know more about liquid spirits than ghostly ones, but what if we just... left the area? Are we trapped within this place as well? And I should like to know who put us here. We were just a few paces from the door to this cottage. Why not the others? Will the ghosts just... follow us if we flee out the back door?"

"I don't think there *is* a back door," Amalthia says, looking at the far wall.

OOC: How big is the area? We awoke 15 feet from one house, but no mention of distance for the others.

Is there a back door?

[Raven_Crowking]

There is a back door - the ground rises beyond, and you can see thick woods.

The house directly east of you is maybe 45 feet from front door to front door. The house directly south is a little farther, maybe 60 feet. The door to that house is ajar. The house opposite you is perhaps 80-90 feet. There is a well between the two eastern houses, a burying ground behind the two western houses, and a cornfield fo dry stalks to the west, maybe 20 feet from the corner of the house, but about 50 feet from either door.

Oh, and that initial encounter with the spirits? 1 XP each.

[fireinthedust]

"Okay, so we could run to the nearest cabin, but we'd be vulnerable to those phantoms the whole way. Whoever dumped us here had a reason for it, and if their plan was to just kill us, running out the back must have some kind of catch: trapped or something." Amalthia muses.

"Only one way to find out," Igor grimaces, looking at the holy symbol on Amalthia's pouch.

OOC: what would that holy symbol be? Igor is religious (being an outcast and hunchback), and maybe she only has it because it was payment for her performing today (made of silver), but it originally belonged to Igor; he hocked it to buy medicine for his sick mother, maybe, or it was taken by Murphoi and sold to buy new robes (because evil). If there's an in-setting LG deity, of cleric-ness, Igor would certainly be interested.

Unless Guang was going for cleric, too.

[Raven_Crowking]

The holy symbol can be for any god you choose. Pick one. That's the one.

[Guang]

OOC: Nah, hoping for wizard. Mercurial magic, random spell effects - it's irresistible. Probably not too healthy though.

IC:
Okay, so my characters all have the Devil's Thorn charcoaled on them somewhere, and scratched into the wooden part of their weapon. Gran has it carved into the palm of her hand as well.
"Maybe check out one more cabin - the one with the door ajar - and then for higher ground?" Marissa suggested

OOC: This'll be interesting. Devil's Thorn versus Holy Symbol against these spectres.
BTW, Raven, if they didn't get him already, you think the dog might come back eventually? He would be familiar with several members of my party.

[fireinthedust]

Only one of my characters has a holy symbol... I'm going to have the rest draw the symbol of "Paladin" on their foreheads with ash from the fireplace (including the goat, Sir Cudsalot). Murphoi, being awful, is going to draw the devil's thorn instead.

"Okay, to the next house? Let's hope we make it!"


ooc: eeeeee suspense!!!

[Raven_Crowking]

So, what do you do? If you run for the next house (the one to the south with the open door?) who leads the way?

[fireinthedust]

OOC: Yes! To the south!

Amalthia is going to have her dagger in one hand, and light up one of the sticks of wood to hold as a torch in the other, from the fireplace (looks around before we go for whatever medievals used for lighting fires before matches... sticks? Flint?). Noot and Murphoi and Igor will likewise have their brands lit.

Igor's other hand, however, will have the holy symbol, and he's going to display it forcefully ahead of him. He's going to lead the way! Then Amalthia, then Noot with the goat, and then Murphoi.

Murphoi, if trouble blocks their way, will bolt towards the woods and just run... but only if they're attacked by the phantoms.

[Guang]

Agreed. Matt and Byron will be the rearguard, watching for trouble in that direction. Torches seem a good idea - my 6 will also have torches in their "off" hand, knives and other tools in right hand. The rest of my group stays in the middle.