The PC's playing today:
- Alan: Ron "Foul" Guttermann, a human who is a rat catcher by trade, and has a small but vicious dog named Dog.
- Ali: Aeslor Arha, a Wood Elf who is a Wizard's Apprentice.
- Cassandra: Fayth, a Human Initiate of Shallya who is fed up of religion.
- Daniel: Grimmick Grimjaw, a Dwarf who is a Student Engineer.
The adventurers sat around Altdorf asking after vampires and the Purple Hand, but nothing. Some tramps did try to claim a vampire had bitten someone's legs off, and that a gold crown would help, but nothing more concrete than that, so the team loaded the barge up full of cheap brandy (plus one case of good stuff) to trade and decided to head towards Castle Reikguard, and let the Purple Hand come after them if they wanted.
Along the way, they passed through a lock (1 silver shilling, Ron in charge of steering and doing a perfect job) and as they passed one of the new half built Signal Towers, two Dwarven engineers came running out.
The Signal Towers are one of the Emperor’s pet projects to give warning of any attack or other emergency. This signal tower is being built on the remains of an older, partially ruined structure.
‘Oi! Give us a lift! We can pay!’
Before the adventurers have a chance to question the two Dwarfs, another one comes running down to the bank. The first two fall silent as the newcomer arrives. She glowers at them and points at the half-finished signal tower, wheezing as she speaks: ‘Unless (gasp!) you want to be blacklisted (wheeze!) with every dwarf in the Empire (splutter!) you’ll get back to the site NOW!’
With a look that is a mixture of apology, embarrassment, and appeal, the pair of dwarfs trudge back up the bank.
The newcomer introduces herself as foreman in charge of the construction of the Emperor's signal tower, apologises for Thingrim and Belegol, and explains she runs a crew of twelve engineers, all good, solid dwarfs until this job. They were hired in Altdorf six weeks ago, with an Imperial Commission to build this signal tower as specified.
‘It seemed like an ideal site. Good visibility to the next towers up and down the chain, and this ruin is sound enough for a foundation. ‘Nothing went right from the start. There were accidents and injuries. And mind, these are trained and seasoned dwarfs. They’d no business slipping off scaffolding and dropping hammers on each other. Then they started disappearing. Two more vanished only last night, leaving six. The rest of the crew are asking for danger money now. They think the place is an accursed elven burial mound, and elf ghosts are behind it all.
She offers the party 5 GC to investigate.
The wall is made from blocks of a black, shiny and completely featureless mineral. The Dwarfs have managed to complete the bottom floor of the signal tower, It is from this room that the workers have disappeared. The players quickly discover that there is a trap door in the floor, but they are not able to open it, so they try digging up the floor surrounding it until suddenly, a powerful ghoul ghoul springs into the room from it and attacks. the ghoul is wearing what looks like a strange, cylindrical key on a leather thong around its neck.
The fight is a long and brutal one - a critical hit to Ron's hand left it bleeding badly until he cauterised it after lighting a fire in the fireplace, and Fayth suffered a broken nose, until they finally managed to destroy the ghoul with fire and retrieve the strange key from around its neck. It is a rod of iron, 6 inches long and with a five-pointed star cross-section.
This is where we ended the session.
