Elrohan searches for relics from ancient elven kingdoms believed to be in the area. He is keen to make contact with the Dryad who is friendly to the party as he believes she may have knowledge of hidden structures.

Duke Baldwin holds court mostly in Baldwins Gate and Varnhold. There are many courtly dances and gatherings where Baldwin and his betrothed are the centre of attention.  At fairly random intervals Baldwin tries cases, favouring trial by combat for those important enough to warrant it.  All the talk in Stoland is of the coming Royal Wedding.

Gilgamon has decided that the slight rash he has developed requires some treatment and heard about a cure in the wildlands made from the powdered horn of blink rabbits so has gone on a quest to see if he can find and retrieve the horns. He has yet to return! 

In his research Elrohan come across the legend of AshRhasadilaria.

AshRhasadilaria was the much loved daughter of Telandia Edasseril, Queen of the elven realm of Kyonin. The legend was made popular by the Bard Cynddelw who turned it into an epic tragedy of love and betrayal.

AshRhasadilaria had the misfortune to fall in love with a human by the name of Dominic Duas Cara. Dominic was persistant in his wooing and swore undying love. Against the wishes of Queen Telandia AshRhasadilaria married Dominic and they left Kyonin to set up home in a small keep in the River Kingdoms.

For a while everything was fine however Dominic started to become jaded. Having obtained the unobtainable his eye started to rove, seeking a new challenge and before long he had a string of lovers. Inevitably AshRhasadilaria found out and flew into a mighty rage. She slew Dominic and then burned their house down around them. It is said her dying screams could be heard for miles around.

Queen Telandia wept constant;y for over a month on hearing the news. She emerged to offer her gratitude for anyone who could return to her a momento of her daughter - the crown she wore to signify her status as an elven princess. That was over 200 years ago and there is no news of the crown being returned.

Elrohans research leads him to believe AshRhasadilarias keep may be located in the Southern edge of what is now the swamp known as Hooktongue Slough

The King of Brevoy is not happy with the Sword Lords, and by extension us. They're withdrawing direct support due to politics.

We approve of Baldwin's fiancée's hips as she appears at the weeding in a slutty red dress. The wedding goes swimmingly. Until an assassin hits Baldwin with a poisoned crossbow bolt. We pursue the assassin as he attempts to escape. Oriel and Flik stop him and I teleport us all back to the castle as he drinks a dubious substance.

Oriel tries to disarm him but the assassin dies before we can interrogate him. Hmmmm.

We decide to investigate Tatzlford after a missive comes suggesting they're under threat of attack by an army of barbarians and barbarians. A small teleportation accident sends half the group awry for a few hours, but we eventually make our way there.

Mayor Fizban greets us and they explain the situation. Pitax have annexed Fort Drelev and Drelev is now following the whims of Pitax.

Baron Drelev's forces, Barbarians and Trolls are no more than two days away from Tatzlford. We prepare some offensive traps for the incoming forces and set tactics for the fight.

The Battle Of Flik - flik stands with the main body of the militia, as the enemy approaches she summons water, wind and lightning in a torrent holding the army at bay while the rest of the party try to take out the trolls. As her spells start to run out she starts to summon eagles and wolves to the battle to bolster the line of militia, she hopes the trolls fall soon otherwise the line will not hold. The barbarians and cavalry charge the lines, the cavalry cause damage but the barbarians in their reckless charge are heavily pushed back from the barricades.

The rest of the party engages the trolls. They fight.

The barbarians rally striking a massive blow against the militia, we held quite well against the cavalry but the main battle was again with the barbarians who are looking a bit shaky.

Back to the trolls who are confused and dying after only a few seconds. I can't see the remaining ones lasting much longer...

The barbarians and routed by the defensive line again the cavalry press but do little to us.

The trolls all finally fall.

The militia turn there attentions to the cavalry the spike stones cast by the druid caused a lot of deaths among the cavalry who appear heavily damaged. Eventually General Flik and his spells manage to fight off the cavalry.

We go exploring.  Willow tree spurts stuff - 2 go down. Noam nearly dead, as grabbed. We kill the tree.

We make our way to Fort Drelev by joining a mercenary band. We arrive and plot our entry into the Fort.

Barbarian leader Ahman.

Go to contact in city.  Secret passage to keep.  We find it.

Baldwin is gay.

Elrohan finds a black pudding. Fight try and get round. Gate locked. Get through. find a bag. Door.  Open.  Find gems in room. Stuff in chest.  Get rid of force wall find secret door.

We open the door and find ourselves in a wine cellar. There are brandy flasks. We find four large locked iron bound chests. A torturer stands in a torture chamber. As we attack he lets out a cry. Four guards answer the cry and soon wish they hadn't. A fireball, lightning, fists of death soften them up. Baldwin cleaves one in two. In the dungeon there is the prisoner we came to rescue. Terion Numesti tells us that the Duke is a despot who has betrayed the trust of the people. He offers to help us but he's shakey on his feet. We tell him to escape while he can. 

We miss a level and Oriel opens a door triggering a magic glyph. Oriel opens the door to find a bearded wizard in black robes. He is surrounded by a glowing sphere. In the fight Noam is turned to stone and the wizards disappears. We loot his chest which has spellbooks in.

Elrohan and Baldwin carefully carry the statue down the stairs. Flik uses magic to hide some the Drelevs treasure. We head back to our kingdom and govern for a month until Denion finds a stone to flesh scroll in Restov. We set up a magical sending network with Satinda Morn the cleric in charge of the brothel. We hear that armies continue to gather and Drelev is still in power.

We head off exploring into the swamps in Drelevs lands. We enter a clearing. We see heads of several humans. An malignant influence seems to emanate from them. Fireballs and lightning bolts finish them off. It's really unpleasant with mosquitos and slugs, mud.

A spiney cloven hooved slavering beast attacks us. It's breath is poisonous. Duke Baldwin dies from the poison. 

Balwin is buried and after a couple of months it becomes obvious his performance in battle was better than his performance in the boudoir. (The Queen isn't pregnant).

We proceed to explore. We proceed to fall asleep as an ooze surprises us in the woods. The druid is awake fortunately.

The mephit and the horse get covered by the ooze. We think about running away.

A dead man floats in the waters of the swamp. He seems to be a farmer from his clothes. We find a bracelet with the names of elenor, james and angus on it.

We hear the wail of a women in anguish deep in the swamp and decide to head that way, legend speak of an Elven maiden in that area who died after being betrayed by her human lover.

We awake in the gloom of the mist shrouded swamp and girding our loins we head into the haunted keep.

Something rises out of the ruined floor of the burnt keep. I kill it with one blow.

The Banshee rises and howls in rage.....

I die, so does Noam. Flick saves and keeps on fighting..

Get her that was our entire plan... get her!!!

Noam quits adventuring. They recruit one of his subordinates, me, to take his place, and Merisiel's consort Locke joins us. Ser Gregory returns, a little bemused by his resurrection, to join us too. His armour appears to be substantially flatter on one side.

We debate going back to the banshee for revenge, but hold off for now. We decide instead of that we will hunt down the dragon! Off to the swap we go....

We find some giant slugs, but are unprepared to collect their acid spit, so i journey back to Gilmouth for vials while Gregory preaches to the others. Two days later we assault the slugs. Ser Gregory shows his true colours, critical hitting both slugs and making short work of them.

Ser Gregory handily discovers the quicksand for us and Gol manages to pull him out before he sinks too far and we abuse air elementals to clean us.

The next day we find a pool of water, in which dwells a Hydra with twelve heads. It briefly retreats then surges out hunting for tinned meat (Ser Gregory). It then misses and Locke and Ser Gregory make short work of it in about 3 seconds. Anticlimax! We explore some more of the swamp, getting more and more depressed as we do.

Just as we're on our last nerve we spot a lovely dry cave to spend the night in. Predictably we have to remove its present occupants - some chulls! Ser Gregory negotiates the surrender of one, in exchange for a promise to leave and no longer eat children.

We decide that the Banshee has over stayed her welcome and return a little better prepared. Ser Gregory absorbs the wail for us, and we assault her. Gregory goes down, but Locke brings him around, and between all of us we pummel her back into the grave. Banshee dead!

From the Journal of Gregory

We are journeying to the elves to claim a reward. Looks like we will go for a breeding pair of Griffons to help our forces.

The armies are marching.

Spell casters are cheating on both sides.

Our small army holds the fort as an army of giants approaches.

Oriel holds the line whilst I bring our forces up from Deepwater. Time is against us as the army of giants closes in hopefully our mages can weaken them enough for us to survive. There may come a day when the lands of men fail but it is not this day...

Arise, arise, Armies of Stoland

Fell deeds awake, fire and slaughter!
spear shall be shaken, shield be splintered,
a sword-day, a red day, ere the sun rises!
Ride now, ride now! Ride to Olegs

We hold for a day and I arrive with our greater force to join the battle.

We join the battle but prove ineffective. Then we rally and bring the pain to the mercenaries.

We leave the armies to try and take out the leaders.

We fight the leaders giants.

Baron Drelev flees and both armies fight themselves to oblivion.

We raise a marker stone and carve upon it the words -

Brave men fought and died here in the 3rd year since the founding of Stoland, in defence of all our freedoms and for the greater good against tyranny and opression.

We capture Fort Drelev!

We head into the Swamp looking for trouble.

We find a lake with a settlement of Evil Boggards.

I wipe out the village of the Evil Boggards.

From the Journal of Locke Tohab

On our way up into the mountains tracking Speartooth we come across a group of shambling mounds, the druid Flik turns into a mound and interrogates them to find out if they have seen the ancient sabre tooth tiger.

The druid then transforms into a sabre tooth and stalks off in search of Speartooth, we follow her from a distance Flik locates a cave where the tiger dwells and enters.

Speartooth turns out to be an ancient dire tiger and attacks Flik grabbing her in his jaws. Balt rescues Flik using dimension door.

The monk and I attack and make short work of the tiger. we skin it and continue on in search of the barbarians.

We find the barbarian camp outside a tomb. I have heard this tomb is that of Armag a legendary barbarian chief who was favoured by my god Gorum. Gorum imbued Armag's sword after his death with the chieftains soul. It is believed Armag will one day return to his people.

We enter the tomb in search of the barbarian's living chief who entered to find the sword and has not returned for 3 days. As soon as we enter we are attacked by two shadowy women, who summon two demons to block our path. We kill the summoned demons and the women.

There are two path's 'The Warrior's Way' or the 'Tactician's Way' we choose to take the warriors path. In the first room there are four progressively larger boulders which seemed to fit holes in the floor. After several attempts we manage to move the boulders into position to open the door.

In the next room a metal wheel in the center needed to be turned. Gregory set off a trap in the room which locked himself and the monk inside, the rest of us had to move the boulders again while they turned the wheel in the room which magically dropped to freezing temperatures. After a while we manage to proceed to the next room.

In this room we find a massive suit of armour produced in the image of Gorum. The party shows respect for my god except for the monk at which point the suit of armour animates and moves towards Oriel. I step between him and the golem and declare his ignorance giving him another chance to show respect, Oriel fails to take the clue and offers a pitiful display which does not appease the golem, it moves forward and hits him. I then offer my blood as the blood of a worshipper to appease, Oriel prostates himself and the golem is satisfied and returns to the center of the room.

We move through a set of doors into a cave filled with skeletons. We wipe them out.

 
From the Journal of Anon

We find two empty rooms.

A shaman blocks our path. We try talking but pick the wrong skills.

Fall into a blade barrier having tried to reach the shaman.

Gault attacks the Shaman and pushes him down the stairs.

Flik is down on the ground. It's not looking good. The golem bashes a skeleton which falls apart. The skeletons surround Flik. They swing their weapons ineffectually and only bruise him slightly.

Gol is hit by a pillar of fire.  He batters the barbarian chief. The greatsword wielding skeletons get their act together and hack Flick into tiny pieces. A collumn of fire destroys Gol. Ser Gregory charges the barbarian chief cutting at his legs with his longsword. The Barbarians sword glows. Amarg cries out "coward" at Ser Gregory but fails to hit him. A flamestrike hits Baltir who is healed by Lok. A celestial dire lion is summoned by Baltir. It bites and claws at the shaman. Three more celestial fire lions appear and the shaman and barbarian chief are starting to look worried.  

Locke slices the barbarian chief with his Falcata. The paladin reaches for the sword. As he holds it in his hands he starts glaring at the rest of the group. The shaman stops fighting when he sees his chief defeated. He disappears.