<NOTE> Able doens't actually keep a diary, so none of this is actually written down, but if he did, this is what it might look like.
<session>
5th day of Tiamark, year 1030
Visiting my uncle is rarely boring. Parties, lavish shoping trips, excentric wanderings and rambling discussions on every topic. He does have some amazing stories to tell though. Animals around the Forge are talking about evil wolves in the forest, worth checking into. Last week someone broke into the Tower and tried to rob him. Didn't apper to take anything, probably couldn't find it, hes a worse packrat then my father. He suspects they were after some books he sent south a few months ago to an aspiring wizard in Tyr. Apperently they are valuable, so hes sent me and Evlyyn down to find them. Not sure abou her, just met her the day before we left. Human looking, but odd white hair and violet eyes. Kinda like a boisonberry snowcone. Seems nice enough though, and doens't abide rude people which is handy in travele inns. Personally i'd rather just sleep on the grass under a tree, but she seems to get all jittery if she doens't go a day with out a bath or two.
10th day of Aurismark, year 1030
After a month or so of traveling we arrived at the VIlla of Lady Ashel Godsblessed. Nice vineyard, personally I would have let them grow more naturally, grapes taste better when the vines aren't lashed to posts. She claimed the books never arrived, a bit odd since they should have beat us there by many weeks. Seems to be a trustworthy sort, , or at least smart enough not to anger a source of such valuable knowlege as she might desire. We decided to head out the next day to the coast and backtrack, see if we could find the lost shipment.
12th day of Aurismark, year 1030
Books were being sent on the Sea Ghost, a ship that plys the eastern coast from Volkrad to Tyr and captained by Tillek. But he hasn't een seen in some time, and he should have been back by now. One of Lady Ashel's servants find her breathless, having run all the way from the Villa reporting that it was attacked by wolves. I was all for heading up the coast in search of the books, but the ladies convinced me to follow them back to the villa in search of more information about our enemies. On our way back I scout above as an Eagle and spot wolves on the road ahead. We get in defensive positions and prepare for battle. Emboldend with Nature's power and the form of a Dire boar I took on 4 of them by myself which felt good. Even taking one captive so we could question it. It spoke of a master, and being ordered to kill us, but nothing of books. Trying to follow it back to its master proved fruitless.
13th day of Aurismark, year 1030
The Villa was only slightly damaged, a few drudges killed in the fighting, but whatever they were searching for, be it books or us, they didn't find. We return to the coast and head NE.
19th day of Aurismark, year 1030
We reach Chiros, and learn from the harbormaster that the Sea Ghost was taken by Pirates and only a few survied. From one of the survivors (Pilius) we get a strange tale of storms and lighting and magic taking the boat. Encounter the Lt from a Tyrian man-a-war galleon drafting crew for an assault on the Rake. The mysterious and deadly pirate who took the Sea Ghost. Met Alexander, Sebastian, Mordekai, Tulena, and Angsur who are interested in taking down the rake, or at least in the heafy gold reward and possible loot for it.
21st day of Aurismark, year 1030
Lady Ashel, Evlynn, Sebastian, Mordekai, Tulena, Angsur and myself set sail following the man-a-war towards the pirates island.
23rd day of Aurismark, year 1030
man-a-war attacks the pirate settlement and we come ashore and make our way through the jungle. Get attacked by Yuan-Ti while following a game trail through the dense jungle, their friends the Vipers and some giant man eating plant. But we prevail, even if I did black out a bit there at the end of the fight and came too in boar form resting on the shreded remains of the plant.
<session>
The heat and humidity seem like the very jungle's hot breath on our necks. A couple of us are starting to get fatigued. Not the Dwarf though, Mordekai tromps through the jungle in full plate armor and barely seems to notice the heat. Of course he's probably used to standing at a forge in that armor, so I guess its not surprising.
After that we talk some strategy. Our first fight all together has brought to light some of our individual strenghts and weakenses and Mordekai started the discussion. Tulina was a big help in this, not only is she a good fighter but she also seems to have an exelent grasp on tactics. Evelynn as well, but then what do you expect for someone who fought in the Dragon War. Finally getting to the edge of the jungle looking over the pirate camp we sit a while and discuss our plan. We hadn't really had one up to this point. Ashell sent out some magical eyes to scout the area, came back with some good information. Probably 100 or so pirates still in the village, 3 large ships and a handful of smaller ones out in the cove with twice as many pirates on them. Each ship has a captain, and we figure the Rake is on the biggest ship with a wizard.
We decide to go in under a cloak of invisibility, along the beach so we don't have to scale the wall. Take out the catepults, and help the Marines storm the village and hope we can find the rake in the ruckous. I slip away as we go along the beach into the water, swim under the boats, and summon a mighty wind that begins blowing the pirate ships towards the beach, wreaking havok and blowing several pirates overboard as a bonus. Meanwhile I guess the rest of them fought some pirates and taking out the catepults and balista, they say the killed more then 20, I dind't see it myself though.
Finally the marines show up <<thats how you know the battle is over (someday some GM is going to exploit that philosophy to the players peril)>> and take charge. They didn't seem too convinced we were with them, but we obviously were killing pirates, and not attacking them, so they were ok with us. Plus Sebastian started talking to them, gesh, he seems to be real good at convincing people of stuff. He tricked them into thinking that the pirates buried their treasure in the sand under their huts, which ought to keep the marines busy for the rest of the day at least.
Unfortunatly we find out the Rake wasn't on the ships, but lives in the jungle, and only the captains have ever been there. Since we killed the only captain we ran across so far, we march across the sand to the beached ships and see if we can't interogate some of them and find out more. We begin a yelling parlay over the sand and let slip that we have a boat on the north coast of the island. A bit later we notice that the captain, wizard and 8 men have slipped out and are making a bee-line north towards our boat. I call up a mighty wind and we start after them, they have a head start though and we aren't making th ebest time. Lady Ashell takes to the air and flys on ahead, using her tricks she charms the Captain and convinces him that the men around him are double crossers. He attacks and is quickly cut down where he stands.
Realizing they will likely beat us to the boat I shapechange into a dire wolf, and Angser and Sebastian get on my back to try to ride me. They hung on for a while, but when I let fly and really started making speed they quickly tumbled off. I got to the boat first, but the pirates approached soon after. Seeing a giant wolf they stoped and started letting fly with arrows, not liking that I ran in circles (chasing my tail) called in the winds again and made my skin strong as stone. Attacking the Wizard first since he was such an unknown quantity, but he turned out to be nearly an aprentice and didn't have much besides a few little spells. Munching on a few pirates the rest quickly fled. Finally the rest get there, Sebastian interogates the mage, but hes never seen the rake either, only the captains. Of which we have none left to interogate.
Now what, do we return to the vilalge and take the trail from there toward the rake, braced for whatever traps and beasts we might encounter. Circle the island to the east and approach from the far side, hoping its safer and catch him off guard. Or return to our ship to rest for the night. Its decided that Sebastian and Angsur would head back to the ship to keep it safe and keep the captain from stranding us here.
<session>
We discussed it a while and ended up heading back to the pirate village. Marines are in the midst of their clean up, and are packing up loot and the pirate captives onto the Man-a-war. Alexander meets us at the gate with a cart which will probably come in handy either to haul our dead bodies, or the loot out. As we travel down the dirt road towards the Rake the Yuan-Ti attack again. By they sure can set some nice traps, but they aren't much for a stand up fight. This time they actually turned a few of our party into little snakes and inspired fear so strong even Tulena, who seems like a very diciplened sort of fighter ran in fear. Course she came back quick enough with another horse which was handy. Then a huge snake man appears and stops the fighting.
We parlay with him a bit. He askes about a letter (can't remember if he asked if we got one, or were delivering one). we didn't know anything about it, but I wonder who was sending him letters, or maybe he sent a letter out requesting assistance. Anyway he seemed to think we could take care of the "Dark Stain" that was causing him so much trouble. We agree, and he and his people melt back into the jungle.
We get to the end of the trail and find an ancient temple. Lady Ashel, Tulena and Gailen sneak up to the top entrance to take a look but get fired on by someone inside. The rest of us rush up and do battle. Some wizard shoots an acid arrow at us before rushing down the stairs. Elite pirates are guarding the entrance but we make short work of them. Tulena intimidates the one we didn't kill and Ashell questions him getting only a little information. Discover the pirates have been keeping their own harem of sex slaves, which we free and lock in one of the rooms for their own protection until its safe.
Since my protection spells were wearing off soon I rush down the stairs followed by the rest. Handful of pirate leaders down inside the temple. We spread out start picking them off. Unfortunatly they have had plenty of time to prepare so they are protected, and magically faster then normal. Mordekai is going toe to toe with a large fighter in black plate mail wielding two swords. The fighter keeps retreating and Mordekai follows with me behind casting spells on him. Then all of a sudden, that bastard sneaky fighter turns into a Blue Dragon that zapped both Mordekai and I with his lightning breath. Stupid un-natural creatures. So I summoned a Earth Elemental behind him and got around the corner.
<session>
First thing the Rake does after letting loose with his lightening breath is dig into Mordekai bringing him to the ground. I went back to gnome form briefly to eat some healing goodberries and call Peanut to do what he could to help. Then buff myself up some more, back to Dire Wolf form and ran around to attack him from the side. First thing I did when I got to him was brace myself, grab him with my teeth and yank for everything i'm worth, managing to trip him. Meanwhile Evelynn who was guarding upstairs rushes down, heals Mordekai getting him back on his feet, Tulena finishes off some pirates and we all rush in to start whacking on the Rake. So by the time he gets back up hes surrounded, and has lost the momentum, the battle quickly goes against him at this point. All his pirate minions are dead, hes cornerd and surrounded. Finally we bring him down.
and breathe.
Looking around we realize there is an actual dragon horde around us. He was a youg dragon its true, but its still more wealth then I have seen in one place before. We begin the long process of loading it up onto the wagons and carting it off to the ship along with the kidnap victims we rescued. I skin and gut the dragon, Lady Ashel telling me which parts to keep. And she whisks them off magically to her villa for some alchemical brewing. The Cpt of the ship is stunned, and offers to help us sell the loot for a bigger cut. Not wanting to deal with it ourselves we agree, and after getting this load to docks we return for the last of it.
We found Zeke's book. Lady Ashell has it for now, although Evellyn wanted to take it and bring it right back to Zeke. Me, i'm just happy its safe, i'll send him letter telling him so, and let Lady Ashell borrow it as he intended. Also, There is still the master of the wolves that was hunting for it originally looking for it. Must be mighty valuable this book.
We also found that the Feltrestian Navy had claimed they killed the Rake, so we prepare to go to court over that to get our reward. Have to go infront of the Magistrate for that, blah. All told, a very profitable journey.
Not that I care about wealth much, i was never much for fancy dress, or high city living. But, seeing Lady Ashell's nice villa has gotten me thinking, I could buy a good chunk of land, and both live there, and keep it from being ripped down and turned into farm land. Also I noticed there are a lot of animals down here I've never seen before. I need to spend some time here and get to know them before moving on.
<session>
25th day of Aurismark, year 1030
2 days since we killed the Rake
Head out to Baruse
5th daty of Flamerule, year 1030
Arrive in Baruse, meet the drunk minstral Devon, and head south to investigate dragon rumors. WItnes a dragon battle in the distance and come across a fallen and dying Golden Dragon, agree to take her heart to the Dragon Temple so she can rest with her kind.
<session>
travel by road east to coast (2 1/2 weeks)
travel by ship north to Volkrad (1 1/2 weeks)
3rd day of Dragonsmarch, year 1030
visit Zeke in LaForge (3 days)
Travel west, stop in the Red Roast in Gellius for lunch (smell of cooking beef was too good to pass) and hired to find and rescue Ol'inar from Bandits in the Griffon Wood.
<session>