shifty louts

Castle Xyntillan #2 - July 17th 1323 (Summer)

Party Members

Overheard in the Market Square

Avoid the northwestern section of the Castle if you wanna make it out alive!

Casualties

Loot

Narrative

They came again.

Ton Nosfeg, now joined by a fellow novitiate of Her Solar Deity, Rag Sa-va, gathered their mercenaries and walked once more through the Valley of Three Rainbows, its strange hues cascading across rock and stream like a holy omen. But Castle Xyntillan cared little for omens, only for the souls who stepped through its decaying gates.

At the Gatehouse, the past came calling.

Gilbert the Fox and his band stood waiting, faces half-shadowed and arrows nocked. He accused Ton and the others of theft, breaking and entering, and "killing the help." Ton, never one for subtlety, shouted that Gilbert’s men reeked of elderberries and that his mother was a hamster.

The Foxes replied in kind.

A volley of arrows tore through shields and flesh. One struck Florentius, a light footman, through the throat. He fell, gurgling to the forest floor. The group retreated under a hail of laughter and woodshaft death. The hirelings did not break, though their knuckles whitened around spear and sword. Their resolve was hard-won.

Sheltered in the trees, a fire-born plan was hatched.

Rag Sa-va, full of zeal, proposed a divine distraction. Fire. He hurled his oil lantern to set the woods ablaze and give them an opening. But the flame chose him instead. His robes caught first. Then his beard. He died a charred offering beneath the open sky, his body ash for the Weeping Sun of Her Solar Deity.

As the smoke curled skyward, a new shadow emerged from the brush. A wiry thief calling himself Docksodock. No last name, no explanation. He offered skill in exchange for a share, and the desperate party agreed.

Together, they circled the castle's flanks, peering through grime-coated windows. One room held a coffin nestled in earth, as though the castle itself tried to bury its dead indoors. Above it, a balcony. Docksodock pole-vaulted effortlessly to the second story and lowered a rope for the others.

Two doors greeted them upon the balcony, one north, one south.

The south door was locked, so Docksodock produced his tools. Despite Ton’s moral protest, the thief made short work of the northern door’s lock. Within, frescoes of Solar Knights driving back moon-worshipping heretics covered the walls.

Southward, a game room. A dry, leathery man sat across from a disembodied hand that dealt cards. His sockets were spider nests. His hair, a moth colony. “Play?” he asked politely.

Docksodock sat.

The dead man wagered a dagger and a stolen lipstick case stolen from a former paramour. Docksodock lost. Twice. Meanwhile, Ton and the others found a dice game that always rolled sevens. Docksodock stood, bowed, and the dead man told him, “Come back anytime. Just don’t track dirt.”

Farther south lay a gallery of paintings, peaceful scenes of mountain pastures and sunny villages. But among them loomed grotesque, lifelike fat ravens, and when gazed upon, they wept blood.

The group fled the bleeding ravens and came to a door behind which a woman sobbed muffled and pleading, but they could not force it open. A western hall led them instead into a grand dining chamber beneath a dome. Paintings of strange family members watched from above.

Silver goblets. Rich meats. Wine.

Nicole and Alexander, humble porters, fell upon the feast. But as they ate, the food petrified mid-bite, and their chewing turned to gagging. A man stormed in from below, clutching a black cat, and shouted at them for ruining the family dinner. He fled down the stairs, yelling for the staff.

They fled again southward into a room draped in dust, the air heavy with mildew and something unnatural. A black door, half-melted brass, pulsed with heat. A skeleton lay draped on a couch beneath a shimmering gray sludge, prismatic in the torchlight.

Docksodock prodded it with his pole. Three feet melted instantly.

Using deft hands and quicker instincts, he retrieved a medallion of Her Solar Deity from the skeleton’s neck. The metal was warm. A balm against the cold dread in the walls.

They pressed through the black door into a study bathed in eldritch fire, its flames violet and obsidian, licking the air but giving no heat. The rugs were deep crimson. A ghost of blood slipped through the eastern wall. And then breathing. Chains. Gibbering incoherence.

It grew louder. And louder. And louder again.

Nicole and Alexander broke screaming, they fled into the darkness, vanishing into the halls of the Castle. Only Goph, the last light footman, and Alyssia, their torch bearer, remained.

Ton and Docksodock knelt amid forbidden tomes, pages of rot, plague, and incantations the soul should not read. They prayed.

Ton wept. Docksodock clutched the medallion, and a warmth suffused his chest. Her Solar Deity was watching, perhaps.

They had seen enough.

The books whispered still as they turned their backs. The neon fire didn’t flicker, but watched. They fled back to Tours-en-Savoy, trailing dust and dread behind them.

They had lost a cleric and nearly their minds.

They would return again. They always do.

GM Thoughts

Gilbert the Fox has been the easiest to roleplay given what the party has done so far.

The random encounters of them need a bit more. But I’m sure as the game develops, motivations will begin to emerge

May end up using a few of these miens tables from this or this to provide more inspiration for how to portray them beyond the initial appearance beyond contextually in whatever room they appear in.

I may have to keep a running log of party encounters with them so as to build up a rapport and refer to past sessions.