GoCorral

This post’s illustration is brought to you courtesy of Tyler!

Where the Best Smith Fell

After the dragovinian raid on Lakatia, Hektor felt unsure about the party continuing to use it as a base. The party could be safe in a magnificent mansion, but Hektor’s subjects could still be targets. Everyone else convinced a reluctant Hektor that no matter where they were, his people could be targeted by the dragovinians. Their best option was to stay close to protect the townsfolk of Lakatia and not expose another group somewhere else to danger by a fleeing association with the Exiles.

Hektor still needed something to worry about. His mind landed on locating Bart, his cleric cohort who had been captured by the Xorians during the raid on Lakatia. A scrying failed to locate Bart. The Xorians had shielded him from divination spells.

Tabling the rescue mission for now, the group decided to find another piece mentioned in the Druid’s Prophecy.

Go to where the Best Smith fell
To where in his fiery forge he dwells
Pick up the pieces of a broken god
Stir them in first with a golden rod.

The “Best Smith” was almost certainly Hephaestus. When Hephaestus was born, his mother, Hera, shrieked in disgust at his ugliness. She threw her newborn son down from Mount Olympus to the island of Lemnos. Hephaestus broke his leg in the fall and became the Lame God. He set up his forge in the volcano of Lemno, becoming the Smith God as well. He spent so much in this volcano that the Romans gave him the name Vulcan.

So the Druid’s Prophecy referred to the pieces of Hephaestus’s leg that broke off during his fall to Earth. Lemnos was their destination.

Wanting to be fully prepared for whatever might be awaiting them, the party spent a day shopping for new magic items and paying a few mages to hit all the magic shops the party could not get to themselves looking for specific items.

Prepped and ready to go, the party teleported off to Mount Vigla on the southern peninsula of Lemnos.

The party materialized flying above Mount Vigla. The volcano smoked and occasionally when the wind blew just right, a warm red glow could be seen below. A noxious smell came with the updraft irritating the noses of the party, especially Eathirilu’s enhanced senses.
Going down to investigate revealed nothing out of the ordinary. Just your everyday active volcano. Hektor used his staff of the magi to summon a few lava elementals and he sent them down into the earth and magma to learn more. The creatures returned soon. All was normal within the volcano except for a large, round, silver, vault door several hundred feet down. A twenty foot diameter bubble of air surrounded the door that the lava and earth did not penetrate. Was this the entrance to Hephaestus’s Forge? The elementals feared the door and did not touch it.

The party agreed that Eathirilu should go down in person to see the door himself. He turned into an earth elemental, still protected from all heat damage by his fire immunity spell that he cast every morning, and dived into the lava. Going deeper he found the silver door. Examining it with magic revealed deific magic upon the door. Eathirilu shared the fears of Hektor’s elementals, that touching the door would set off a trap. He shouted and wailed and knocked upon the ground beside the door. Nothing. Hephaestus did not come.

The party talked about it amongst themselves when Eathirilu returned. Where could Hephaestus be? Perhaps he just wasn’t at home? Examining the map they’d brought with them, the logical place to ask about Hephaestus was Hephaistia. The group teleported to the town.

Ancient Hephaistia

Mystery Cults in the Olympian religion provide ritualistic pathways to a truer version of life after death than that offered by the mainstream Olympian religion. Most people when they die become an absent shade in the Underworld, devoid of emotion or feeling. Through different Mystery cults people can secure something better for themselves after they die. Famous Mystery cults include the Artemisian Mysteries at Ephesus, the Orphic Mysteries, and the Eleusinian Mysteries of Demeter. One thing remained constant for the Mysteries, the rituals were only discussed with other members with harsh punishments for those that violated this taboo.

Hephaistia is home to the once popular Hephaestian Mysteries. The Hephaestian Mysteries had thousands of attendants at one point. People from all over Lemnos and the Greek world came to be initiated and gain immortality through Hephaestus’s gift. Over time the Hephaestian Mysteries fell out of favor until in the time of our heroes, less than a hundred Lemnian natives still kept the faith. Most of these people belonged to the tribe of the Kabiri in Hephaistia.

The party popped into town and looked around in astonishment at the vast variety of erected buildings. Different architectural styles from different eras and different places were all present in the town. The simple Dorian columns of a modern classical temple stood alongside the ancient imposing designs of Mycenae and Egypt. Elegant spirals etched one side of the building while the other side held a mural depicting the brutal murder of Megara and her children by Hercules. Hundreds of magnificent buildings sprawled from the edge of town to the shore and not one person walked the streets. Hephaistia was as grand a ghost town as the party had ever seen.

Walking down a wide lane was sobering. Who had built these massive intricate structures only to abandon them to dust and decay? The party soon came upon one of the mysterious inhabitants of Hephaistia, one of the Kabiri. The Kabiri were originally a race of stone, dirt, and metal people made by Hephaestus to keep him company on Lemnos after his fall. They acted as his servants for a time as well until he replaced them with bronze automatons. The Kabiri maintained a special place in Hephaestus’s heart as the administrators of the Hephaestian Mysteries.

The person that approached the heroes seemed to be made out of earth. She worn a dun-colored robe with a hood and walked with her eyes at her feet. Eathirilu cleared his throat and she looked up. She spoke, “Oh! Visitors! I’m sorry, I did not see you.”
“Could you take us to the leader of this village?” Eathirilu asked.
“Yes, of course. High Priest Falkus should be on his porch. Come with me please.”

The woman led the party through varied architecture. Even the cobblestones and drainage sites of the streets had a look that mixed different styles from different eras and locations. Before too long the party reached a building where many other Kabiri with earthy skin gathered. The building resembled a temple, but with only a pair of columns at the front, one at each corner over the entranceway. A Kabiri with flakes of silver metal in his skin sat on a rocking chair upon the building’s front landing. He wore a simple brown robe with many pockets. In his hands was a piece of wood and a whittling knife. He and all the other Kabiri were as bald as a summer mountain top. The woman pointed at the Kabiri on the porch, “This is High Priest Falkus. High Priest, we have visitors!”
Falkus nodded and raised the hand with the wood piece in greeting, “Visitors are always welcome in Hephaistia. Come and speak with me. You will excuse me if I do not rise. I am old and not as spry as I used to be.”
The party gathered around the porch where Falkus sat. After introducing themselves Amalius began the conversation, “We’re here looking for Hephaestus. We need a piece of his leg bones from when he broke it upon his descent to Earth.”
“Ah yes. We’ve had others ask about the bones as well. The dragovinians. We told them there are no solid bones of Hephaestus on this island and never have been. They believed us… after a time.”
“Surely there must be some piece of Hephaestus that broke off,” said Hektor.
“Aye. There might be. But who can say?”
Hektor’s eyes narrowed, “These bones are of the utmost importance to the people of Cimmeria and perhaps the wider world. You know of the dragovinians so you must know of the power they command. These bones of Hephaestus are the ONLY thing that could stand in the way of their evil menace spreading across the entire world. We need them and we need them now.”
“The whole world you say? Well my whole world is my island. And tis been a sad island these past few decades. No one attends the Mysteries save for myself and the other Kabiri. Still, I feel the other people of the island may be made to sense the glory of the Smith God once again. Only they are so distracted by their plight right now.”
“Their plight?”
“Yes, the dragovinians took over Moudros and searched the eastern half of the island. They left last year for Myrina and began searching the western half. They search and search and all the while they steal, murder, and maim the poor folk of Lemnos. We are a simple godly people who have done nothing to deserve this evil.”
“And the bones of Hephaestus?” said Amalius
Falkus laughed, “You and your friend have a one track mind! Yes, the bones. With all these difficulties for the people of our god Hephaestus’s island it is difficult for me to recall… Perhaps if the dragovinians were defeated in the name of Hephaestus…”
“I see,” said Hektor. Amalius gritted his teeth and said nothing.
Hektor asked, “Do you know anything about the particular group of dragovinians here?”
Falkus answered, “There are about fifty of them. They wield flaming picks and wear chainmail armor. Their leader is a shapeshifter named Davonisi.” Eathirilu’s eyes widened at the mention of that name.
Hektor said, “We’ll take care of it.”
“In Hephaestus’s name,” added Falkus.
“In Hephaestus’s name,” said Hektor. “If you’ll give us a space where we can plan in quiet?”
“Of course. That building over there has no one living in it now, but there is a large table and sand pit for sketching. I’ll have food and drink sent to you. Alas, that is all we can provide you in these trying times.”

The party entered the building and set to planning their attack on the dragovinians. Eathirilu started, “I know Davonisi. She was a druid before my time but she turned to evil and darkness. She was a faerie. A powerful shapeshifter, but a blight upon the land. If she’s a dragovinian now as well… Bad things could happen. I knew I sensed something before! The whole island is corrupted by her presence. She’s killing the landscape here, sucking up its energy and leaving nothing behind. We HAVE to kill her.”
“Do we?” said Amalius. “Why don’t we just dominate Falkus and force him to tell us where the bones of Hephaestus are. He clearly knows. It’d be faster and we can leave Davonisi here, searching in vain, without any threat to ourselves.”
Hektor said, “I don’t think there’s any reason to attack the people here. They’ve been kind to us.” The other party members nodded in agreement. “Besides, we should be killing Davonisi anyway. She’s a dragovinian, she was evil before she was a dragovinian, and it might earn us the friendship of Hephaestus.”
Amalius folded his arms and stayed quiet for the rest of the meeting. Bread, cheese, and wine were brought in by the Kabiri. The group maintained an awkward silence while the plates were set down on the table before the Kabiri left.
Danar said, “I think we need more information first. We still don’t know where the dragovinians are in Myrina, if they have hostages, or what their search pattern is on the western half of the island. I can use my magic eyes to scout out the town and give us a little more knowledge of what we’d be getting into.”

The group cast invisibility spells on themselves and teleported about a mile east of Myrina. Hektor surveyed the city from the sky while Danar sent his scrying eyes through the streets to get a feel for the situation.

Myrina was clearly being oppressed by the dragovinian occupation. People walked through the streets with their eyes downcast. Dragovinians tromped by and the citizens scurried to get out of their way and bow before them. A dragovinian approached a teenage boy with a sneer. The boy shivered and offered his neck. The dragovinian drank and then slapped the boy when he was down, sending him to the ground with blood still flowing from his neck.

Hektor returned to the others with information on the dragovinian headquarters. They’d killed the old mayor and taken over his large house near the center of town. Danar sent one of his eyes inside. It circled through a few hallways until it found half a dozen dragovinians talking in a sitting room. They stopped talking for a moment then turned to look in the direction of the eye. A moment later the eye’s magic fizzled out as it was dispelled by an unknown force.

“They might know we’re coming,” said Danar.
“Then let’s get set to go!” said Hektor.

Fairy of Peril

Buff spells were cast, the party drew their weapons and teleported directly into the sitting room. Popping into the room allowed the party members with true seeing to see the invisible dragovinian pixie hovering by the hearth in the room. “Davonisi!” shouted Eathirilu. “She’s flying invisible by the hearth!”

The party got their bearings and prepared to attack, but as they did so the pixie began to transform. Her form molded and shifted, becoming visible and growing larger and larger. The walls of the sitting room cracked and broke. Furniture moved and tumbled as the other dragovinians scrambled to accommodate their leader’s new size. Soon Davonisi appeared not as a draconic/vampiric pixie, but as a large fanged bull with iron scales and green glowing eyes. A dragovinian gorgon. She breathed a noxious gas upon the party. Tagenadi was immune, but Eathirilu and Danar felt their skin beginning to calcify. They resisted the shapeshifter’s magic, but the rest were not so lucky. Hektor, Zelus, and Amalius turned to stone.

An enraged Danar flew at Davonisi. He hit her with a flurry of axe blows carving into her gorgon body. Davonisi shrieked and began to shift and transform once more. Tagenadi engaged the six dragovinians. Eathirilu shapeshifted into an earth elemental and moved into the ground.

Davonisi’s head split where Danar cut it. The cut deepened and deepened until it reached her shoulder. The cut split and split again until Davonisi had twelve heads attached to long serpentine necks. Her body widened and her feet changed from hooves to scaled claws. Her iron bull tail changed into a long lizard’s tail. Davonisi now had the form of a hydra.

“Foolish heroes! You cannot hope to stand against me!” her mouths said in a purring chorus as they dashed forward to bite with fearsome strength. Danar did his best to ward off her attacks, but he still took several blows. Frighteningly, the blows still had the power of a dragovinian to sap blood from Danar. His fortitude weakened under the unexpected blood loss. He was not the only target of Davonisi’s wrath. Three heads spiked forward to shatter the three stone statues of the party’s casters.

“NO!” shouted Tagenadi. Ignoring the lesser dragovinians that sought to block him, Tagenadi moved and struck Davonisi with tremendous force. His white raven hammer strike clanged against her dragon scales and the shapeshifter paused as the martial move momentarily blackened her senses.
“We have to get out of here!” said Danar.
“I’ll get the statue pieces!” shouted Eathirilu as he came up from the ground. His arms encircled the pieces of Hektor and Zelus, bringing them into his own body of earth and stone for storage.
Danar unleashed another barrage of terrifying strikes upon Davonisi. He severed heads left and right and her body oozed green blood. Her form began to shift and change once more.
“By Zeus does she never die?!?” declared Danar.
Eathirilu took up the last pieces of Amalius and said, “Tagenadi, teleport us away!”
“Right!” Tagenadi stepped over a toppled cushioned chair to stand beside Eathirilu and Danar. He touched both of them and clicked his heels together to activate his boots of teleportation. As they faded away Eathirilu saw that Davonisi was growing larger and taking on the form of an enormous scorpion.

Half-Time

With the limited range of the teleport boots, Tagenadi could not return to Lakatia or anywhere else in Cimmeria. He chose the only other community they’d visited on Lemnos, Hephaistia. They reappeared by the porch where High Priest Falkus was still whittling away in his rocking chair surrounded by the other Kabiri who were also engaged in leisure activities. Upon the party’s arrival, Falkus jumped to his feet. “What happened?”
“She turned half of us to stone!” said Tagenadi.
“Are you hurt?” Falkus said, coming down from his porch with more solidity and strength than he had let on to before.
“Just a few scratches,” said Eathirilu.
“We have to put the statues back together,” said Danar. “I have a spell that can break her magic.”
“Statues? Stone? Slow down and tell me what happened,” said Falkus.
The party took a few moments to calm down and explain what had occurred to Falkus. He nodded his head and listened.
Falkus said, “So you have the spell? That is good. I can set the pieces of your stone friends back together with Hephaestus’s magic. Then you can make them flesh and blood once more.”

The party and the Kabiri collected the statue pieces and put them into piles of rubble belonging to each original person. The Kabiri’s training and natural knowledge of stone aided the organization. Once complete, High Priest Falkus concentrated and a magic light flowed out of his hands. Each statues’ pieces moved through the air and reformed into a single piece. Hektor, Zelus, and Amalius were whole statues once more!

“There. It is done. Now your part comes, Danar,” said Falkus.

Danar concentrated for many minutes, focusing on the intricacies of Davonisi’s magic. Pull this part here, push that ley line there. Yes, he could undo it. It would only take a few more minutes. Push and prod until the magic sustaining the stone forms fell away. With a hiss and a pop, the three were returned to life!

Gasping, they asked what had happened. Danar, Tagenadi, and Eathirilu filled them in.
Hektor said with determination, “We have to go back. Davonisi may retaliate against the people of Myrina or Hephaistia.”
“What? Right now?” asked Eathirilu.
“Why not?” said Hektor.
“Yes. Why not?” agreed Zelus.
“Then let’s go!” Eathirilu said.

The party healed before buffing themselves up once more. Particular attention was paid to gaining immunity to petrification this time. In a few minutes they were ready once more. They teleported back to Myrina, three hundred feet up in the air over the dead mayor’s house.