18: Upheaval At Castle Naerytar

That evening the group debates at tortuous, protracted length over what their plans should be.  After nixing a plan to break into separate groups, they decide to explore the rest of the castle as a group.  They move back through the mess hall and come to a room filled with Guard Drakes, which make a loud commotion and they close the door and make their way back to their room.  Other cultists appear, puzzled by the noise, and Davron deceives them into thinking they wandered into the wrong room.  One of the cultists snaps, “Look: if you fucking losers are gonna try to get into trouble your first night in the castle just try not to wake the rest of us up.”  The group returns to their room and discusses strategy again.  After much discussion they resolve to return to the guarded room and kill the Guard Drakes.

Upon reaching the room Shiv pulls the door open and Karendil throws a massive fireball into it, but not before two Guard Drakes leap out from the doorway.  Davron sends the signal to the lizardmen to begin the revolt as the group enters the room and slays all the creatures.  Outside a drum beats loudly. It is decided that exploring what lies beneath the castle is their most pressing goal.

They begin to push deeper beneath the castle and encounter a platoon of bullywugs. They shout a command at them to engage the lizardmen enemy; the bullywugs pass by them towards the fracas and the group continues downward.  They find a vast maze of caverns and begin to explore following traces in the floor which seem to indicate the direction which all the treasure has been carried and dragged. Arriving on the lower level of a split-level chamber, they see a sheer wall with a manual elevator and two ladders leading to the upper level. Shiv and Tamariel  climb a pair of ladders into the upper level and are confronted by elaborately armored Dragon Cultists.  One of them asks for a password and Tamariel  gives them a disparaging answer.  They all cast different jets of magic at him and miss, while Shiv ducks back down the doorway.  The group climbs into the room and engages in combat with the three. Tamariel  is dropped in the first round of combat, but is restored by Embra.  After a lengthy and vicious fight with the three powerful foes the group dispatches them and takes a well deserved rest.  Shiv scouts and takes a brief detour where she discovers a room with two shrines; one contains various cultists items and the second one contains an elaborate black leather mask molded in the face of a black dragon.  Shiv takes note of the item and returns to the group.  They continue into another room where they find a teleport circle. Exploration of the remainder of the cavern system reveals nothing but giant frogs in an underground lake and bullywug nurseries.

They return to the ground level, and head into the rest of the castle with the three elves dressed in the armor of the powerful fallen cultists. In the Great Hall where they earlier fought Guard Drakes, the party find Borngray who is conferring at  the table with 10 other cultists.  Borngray expresses frustrated confusion as to why they’re not below fighting, and as Shiv attempts to pass herself off as the cultist whose armor she wears castigating Borngray for hi lax security. Borngray blames the unreliability of bullywugs and blames Rezmir for trusting them. Before this ruse has a chance to play out, a black half-dragon in cult regalia marches into the room followed by a wizard of Thay.  They assume she is Rezmir, the target of their assault.

Rezmir immediately recognizes that those wearing the armor are not her guards and insults Borngray for even momentarily being taken in.

She orders him and the cultists to attack the group.  As the group struggles to respond the Thayvian clutches Rezmir and says, “Rezmir, we haven’t the time for this” and the two vanish from sight.  After briefly considering a retreat, the group launches forth into the room and attacks the cultists.  Karendil shouts a command and holds Borngray fast, but then he hears a voice casting a spell in Draconic from behind him in the passage downward. A sphere of total darkness appears in half of the room blinding everyone including those who can normally see in the dark. The characters manage to maneuver through this area safely.  They kill the men in the room and Tamariel  knocks Borngray out.  The group goes outside to see the massive fight has dwindled into pockets of skirmishing throughout the castle grounds.

The party retire to the lizardman enclave within the castle where Snapjaw greets them. They learn that the conquest of Castle Naerytar is complete with no one but themselves and lizardmen left standing (although it is not clear what may be going on in the caverns as the lizardmen never made it below ground). Everyone prepares to rest and recuperate.

MIA: Joe, Sean

• 7 Guard Drakes
• 3 Dragonsouls
• 10 Cultists

• Dragonsoul leather armor – One with blue trim, one with red, one with white
• Borngray

• 2500XP (18,085XP Total)