The Fall of Darkstone

Tasha Dennison ready to fight

The Fall of Darkstone is the sixth session of Campaign 1. In the session, Arine of Riveryew, Lord Darcy Hall, and Orion Brightward travel to Darkstone in order to find their missing carriage.

The following contains spoilers for the Tale of Locksmith's Bane.

## Plot

Sun Day 14 Chauntoro 1021 TE

Waking up in Sorrington after finding Stefan and Miriam tied up in the stables and the carriage missing, Arine, Darcy, and Orion go downstairs to have their breakfast, a morning porridge with Helena and Céline. Helena has a full Thornish breakfast, thanking the trio for deciding to go to Darkstone, as Céline finishes Darcy's meal. The bartender informs them that they will be able to find rentable horses at Alistair's Stables but he charges a lot due to the rise in horse theft.

Orion ventures out in search of the protester they met the night before, finding her at the fountain, protesting alone. She informs them that the horse she mentioned might be hard to get a hold of and that they should haggle with Alistair. Meanwhile, Darcy informs Miriam and Stefan that they are heading out and Arine goes to collect money from the Sorrington guildhall for The Slayers of Darkness. Earlier the group had decided not to call themselves 'the Knock Knocks', but instead 'Locksmith's Bane', so she gives the receptionist this name and they become an official adventuring party.

Locksmith's Bane reunite in front of The Horse and Carriage and proceed to Alistair's Stables. Transforming himself into Helena, Darcy greets Alistair as "Mary Smith", with Orion as her partner "Barry Smith" and Arine as their little daughter "Beverley Smith". With some intimidation, Orion is able to lower the deposit for the horses. They are given 'Horse 1' and 'Horse 7'. After some trouble handling the animals, the trio ride on for Darkstone, approaching the Darkstone Tower, and spotting the town flag with the image of a black book. Carefully heading down the steps into the town, they search the area for any sign of Clop or the carriage. Orion spots a woman, Geraldine, walking Clop down the street and interrogates her. She insists that the horse is hers and that she bought her from the Horse Market a few minutes ago to help her father carry goods to Pontoporea after he hurt his back. The trio persuade Geraldine that the horse was stolen and she agrees to take them to the horse merchant if Orion heals her father's back. On the way, they are followed by a creepy gentleman.

In the Horse Market, Locksmith's Bane come across Riffie, the horse merchant, who appears to also be selling pumpkins. She informs them that the horse was raised on her family farm and that she has had her for years. An obvious lie, the trio try to intimidate her into given them the carriage and pumpkins, but Riffie threatens them by asking them if they know how many people in the market would assist her in a fight.

With their plan failing, Geraldine takes the horses to her father's for safekeeping as Locksmith's Bane go around the side of the market. They find a door, locked, but Arine decides not to use a new spell to open the lock as it will reveal their position. Darcy casts an illusion of boxes as Orion helps him and Arine onto the mouldy wooden roof. Through a crack, Darcy and Arine can only see a wooden structure in the backroom of the market, but are unsure if it is the carriage. Unsuccessful, they leave.

On the high street, the adventurers decide to lure the creepy gentleman into an alleyway, where he informs them that his name is Ronald and that he was interested in purchasing Orion's armour. Orion declines his offer. Ronald reveals that Riffie and he are part of The Flaming Hand. Fortunately, he doesn't reveal anything under his trenchcoat, apart from a bubbling orange potion. He leaves and the adventurers head to Geraldine's to aid her father. Orion heals the old man's back, and in gratitude, he tells them more about the Flaming Hand: there's a rumour that Lord Jack Dennison's daughter, Tasha runs the Flaming Hand and is keeping foul beasts in cages in the tower.

In the hope that they can make a deal with Tasha, the adventurers go into the tower, and find themselves in an exhibition for the 'Dark Stone' of Darkstone. Distracting a menacing guard by a side door, the trio attempt to sneak through, but Arine is spotted. Darcy convinces the guard that they are early guests, arriving to make sure everything is okay for Lord Dennison, who is scheduled to visit his daughter shortly. They head up the winding steps of the tower, climbing roughly 30ft before Tasha joins them from above. She rushes towards them and Orion defends himself. Arine and Darcy attempt to stop her from attacking Orion, but she doesn't listen to their reason, and continues to fight. She does little damage to Orion as he repeatedly hits her away from the edge of the staircase. With an arrow, Arine shoots Tasha's axe out of her hand and it falls 30ft to the ground. She tries to push Orion off multiple times, before Darcy slides between his legs and casts vicious mockery, insulting Tasha and bruising her ego. Angry, she tackles Orion off the edge of the stairs. Darcy eldritch blasts her away from him and her corpse flies back onto the staircase. Orion teeters on the edge as Arine grabs his arm, but she isn't strong enough to keep her grip. Darcy does the same as Orion falls off the edge, clutching ahold of the staircase he is laying upon. Slowly, his grip loosens until he unwillingly let's Orion slip through his fingers.

Orion falls.

As he prays to Ilmater, Orion lands on the hard stone floor below. His legs are crushed by the weight of his armour and he lies, paralysed on the floor in severe pain. Arine and Darcy head back down the stairs to their fallen companion, who shows signs of life as he screams in agony. Darcy commands him to heal his own legs. He does so and passes out. Lord Dennison arrives with guards. The menacing door guard flees. In response to his daughter's death, Lord Dennison reacts surprisingly calmly, apologising for what they had to go through, and saying that Tasha could now rest peacefully. The guards take her body and carry out Orion on a stretcher. Everyone heads to the Darkstone Medical Center where a cleric of Helm begins to perform healing spells on Orion.

Lord Dennison sends guards to the Horse Market to retrieve the carriage from Riffie and tells Arine and Darcy about his daughter's activities: working for the Hand and trading with a contact in The Larsinian Empire. He invites them to join him in Tasha's room to investigate. Before doing so, they spend time with Orion, high on magic, who reveals that he found 'magazines' in the priest's chambers when he was a teenager.

They head up the tower, with flashbacks to Orion's fall, and Arine uses her lock opening spell, which creates a huge 'knock', echoing through the town. Inside there are three chests. Using Darcy's crowbar, he and two guards open the chests to reveal a chained up, angry Gargoyle, a couple of dragon eggs (Arine identifies them as Blue and Brass), and a calm, unchained gargoyle. Darcy, in shock, fires an eldritch blast at the creature, but it doesn't respond. The duo convince Lord Dennison that the eggs are ostrich eggs, decorated, but not expensive. He gifts them to the party, ordering yards to carry them down. On their way back to Orion, Darcy read the information under the Dark Stone. It reads: "Here is the Dark Stone of Darkstone, touched by Tzermir in the founding of the town." Darcy and Arine realise that the black book on the flag must be Tzermir's Tome.

Returning to the medical center, Arine and Darcy find Ronald recovering after drinking the orange potion. Finding Orion, they relay everything back to him, and are informed by the guards that the carriage and pumpkins have been found, but Riffie is nowhere to be seen. Lord Dennison says farewell, but gives them the name of Tasha's contact, Mortund, who lives in Tyr's Pass in the mountains beyond Pontoporea. If they are going that way, he asks that they inform his son, Sir Edwin Dennison, of his sister's passing. He is the Silver Knight of Pontoporea.

They retrieve their horses from Geraldine's and pop Orion in the carriage. After some trouble heading up the stairs out of Darkstone, Arine is informed of another way, for carriages out of the town, and Darcy takes over the reigns. As the day draws to a close, the battered heroes make their way to Sorrington, returning the horses 1 and 7, with Darcy disguised. He reverts back to himself to confuse Alistair as Orion gives him the finger from out of the carriage.

Back at the Horse and Carriage, it's a busy night, but the trio find a table. Arine let's the travellers from Hazelstump know of their successes, omitting their failures. Miriam and Stefan join them, but there is an awkward silence as no-one wishes to speak, and they leave the trio to it. Darcy gets really drunk on absinthe, hoping not to dream this night, as does Orion to relieve his pain. Arine goes up to bed as Orion passes out, attempting to order two more whiskeys. Darcy dances, hallucinating a dwarf with Arine's face and a big beard, and a tall, skinny gentleman with her face also. He finds Orion and tries to wake him up, but he passes out on the other side of the table.

Gold Day 15 Chauntoro 1021 TE

The next morning the bartender gets them half a shot of absinthe as a hair of the dog remedy as Arine and the other travellers eat up some breakfast. Orion and Darcy never wish to speak of porridge again. Everyone clambers onto the carriage, as Miriam and Stefan lead them passed Darkstone to Pontoporea. They make it as the sun begins to set. Stefan calls for them to come and have a look and the session ends there.