16 Praedus 1120

The Eye of Glaucus

The party returned from Valhalla energized, healthy, and possessed of a new and valuable magic item, the Compass of Fahrlanghn. They wasted no time putting their new treasure to use.

Mrs. Wilkins being off on personal business, Strontium took charge of the Compass and sought the whereabouts of Ramiel, the nomadic sibling of Uriel. The Compass returned the information that Ramiel was swimming in the River Styx between the fourth and fifth layers of Hell.

This was not good news. The party's amulet of the planes could not take them to a place between layers of a plane; the best precision they could hope for would be the border of one layer or the other. And then, assuming they got that far before Ramiel had moved on, there was the problem of the Styx itself. No mortal could enter that water without losing his memory. No, the search for Ramiel would have to wait.

The next day, when the Compass was usable again, Strontium inquired on the location of Gadreel, the third of Azazel's spawn. The result was somewhat better: Gadreel, he discovered, dwelled below a fortress in a plane of its own making, the entrance of which was through the eye of Glaucus.

Strontium immediately recognized Glaucus as the sea god destroyed by Azazel in that ancient conflict with the gods. The fallout from that killing had led to Azazel's imprisonment in the first place.

A day of intense research yielded no information on any landmark known as the Eye of Glaucus. Indeed, Glaucus himself was unknown to history. The party wondered whether the Compass had meant, literally, the eye in the god's dead body. Knowing that the remains of a slain god are consigned to the Astral Plane, the party used their amulet to plane shift to the Astral Plane and search for the body of Glaucus.

The Astral Plane is infinitely large and totally devoid of landmarks. For 19 days the party drifted through the timeless domain, focused on finding something they could only surmise must exist. Finally, they found themselves approaching what appeared to be a floating land mass in the emptiness. As the object drew near the party noticed it was shaped vaguely like a kraken, was nearly 300 feet long, and had a small columned tower where the kraken's eye would be.

Out of the tower poured a company of tall, gaunt humanoids in ornate dress. Their bodies shimmered with a silvery light. The leader floated forwarded and told the party, in Common, to be off -- that visitors are not welcome in this place. With Mrs. Wilkins and her legendary diplomatic skills unavailable, Audas stepped forward to speak for the party, stating that they had business of great import to discuss with Gadreel.

The leader let out a blood-curdling shriek. He and the others drew greatswords and took on a battle formation. Having failed with diplomacy, Audas aimed a vitriolic blast at the enemy leader. The leader absorbed the acid and charged Audas, landing a devastating blow with his greatsword. Caenus charged forward to assist and was met with two arrows from the area of the tower. The shots set Caenus off balance and caused him to miss badly with his halberd, striking himself instead of the enemy.

Aria had an equally unfortunate start. She landed a stunning fist against one opponent but then fumbled on the follow-up and accidentally hit Caenus. Strontium used an empowered magic missile against one of the archers and Melian positioned himself for a sneak attack.

Audas, having taken heavy damage from the leader, tried a fight-and-run approach. He moved up to the limit of his range and sent an empowered vitriolic eldritch chain attack at the enemy leader and the two nearest underlings. The creatures took the damage, uttered another ear-splitting battle cry, and charged Audas. The leader and an underling each slashed at Audas with greatswords, spilling his blood into the ether easily.

The archers in the tower hit Strontium and earned themselves a lesser missile storm that proved fatal to one of them, and Caenus and Quinn dropped adversaries and moved on to fresh targets. Audas, having felt the wrath of the leader's blade, became invisible and moved out of range, leaving the leader to choose a new opponent -- Quinn.

Ultimately the party's numbers gave them the day. They felled the rest of the attackers in rapid succession and, after applying magical healing, examined the tower.

Inside was an empty space with only a concentric circle design on the floor for ornamentation. There was no indication of an entrance or exit to anywhere but the astral space around. Melian searched the pavilion and found a concealed pressure point in the floor. When he stepped on that the middle of the concentric circle pattern fell away and several party members dropped through the black hole that appeared in the floor. The rest of the group followed quickly.

The heroes found themselves in the courtyard of a large stone-walled stronghold. There were dozens of people about -- tall, gaunt people like the warriors they had fought to get there. The party recognized the race as githyanki, a race of warlike humanoids who had settled on the Astral Plane after breaking free from the mind flayers generations ago.

The group's sudden arrival drew more than a few stares from the crowd. Then, from one of the ornate buildings ringing the yard, came a posse of obvious warrior types. There was a male in the lead, his rich garb clearly marking him as someone of high importance. Two deadly-looking females flanked him, and following them were a large number of soldier types similar to the ones the party had fought outside the tower. A couple of them looked exactly like the party's adversaries from outside.

The leader introduced himself as Ar'dru, Captain of the Citadel Guard and instructed the party to state their business or leave in peace. This time Strontium took the lead and explained, in brief, the party's desire to meet with Gadreel and discuss the danger presented by the apparent resurgence of Azazel.

Ar'dru was clearly a warrior and thought in warlike terms. Interestingly, he seemed to have no knowledge of Azazel or of Gadreel's history. The names of Uriel and Ramiel likewise meant nothing to the captain, and he met Strontium's mention of the party's encounter with Uriel with mild disbelief that another creature of Gadreel's power could even exist. Ultimately Ar'dru agreed to allow the party an audience with Gadreel -- provided they proved their worthiness in astral combat.

The party agreed to the trial, having little alternative, and followed Ar'dru to an open circle ringed with glowing stone pedestals. On the way he and Strontium spoke about arcane power, prompting Ar'dru to summon a new participant into the challenge, an arcanist called Na'rai. The six heroes took places on the pedestals opposite Ar'dru, his two female lieutenants, Na'rai, and two warriors. There was a flash of light and all were projected back out to the Astral Plane.

Ar'dru reminded the heroes that any wounds suffered in their astral forms would not affect their physical bodies, thus ensuring that the combat would be nonlethal for all. Then his group and the heroes assumed combat formations and opened the trial.

Initially Ar'dru and his warriors held back, inviting the heroes to advance and strike first. The party exercised caution, though -- Melian cast cat's grace on Aria and Caenus entered his rage, but nobody advanced right away. Then Na'rai cast a spell and the area where the party stood was filled with tiny spider-like fire elementals that bit and burned and the party sprang into action.

Caenus charged Ar'dru, who was ready and waiting for the attack and met it with three great swings of his silver sword. Caenus returned the onslaught with a blow of his own and the battle was joined.

The heroes quickly settled on Na'rai as the target of choice. Audas sent an empowered vitriolic chain from Ar'dru to a fighter to Na'rai. Quinn followed up with a drown spell against Na'rai that failed, and then Strontium made her the sole target for a lesser missile storm. While one of the lieutenants retaliated against Strontium with a physical blow, Na'rai exacted her own form of payback by hitting the wizard with an enervation spell that rendered Strontium unable to cast his remaining higher-level spells and severely handicapped with his lower-level ones. Aria missed Na'rai with a stunning fist but Audas struck her with another vitriolic chain. Strontium's empowered magic missile, even at his reduced power, then managed to end Na'rai's role in the fight.

Quinn earned some direct attention from the females by sending an arc of lightning between them, prompting one to come after her while the other attacked Audas. The fire spiders summoned by Na'rai likewise remained on the field, biting and burning any who entered their area. The party discovered the advantage of mobility, using their generally higher intellects to move farther and faster than the lower-level soldiers could and escape multiple attacks. Audas developed a tactic of moving far out of the githyanki's attack range and then sending an vitriolic spear back at them, thus avoiding their retaliatory attacks and bypassing magic resistance at the same time. The fighters considered this cowardly but it was certainly effective.

Aria dispatched a lower level fighter, briefly increasing the heroes' numeric advantage on the field, but the skills of Ar'dru and his lieutenants were impressive even without their arcanist as back-up. Ar'dru traded blows with Caenus with apparent relish, absorbing punishment and dealing it back round after round, until Caenus lost hold of his halberd and then took a death blow from the silver sword. Caenus's astral form vanished, leaving him back in his real body along with the dispatched githyanki. One of the lieutenants had the honor of dispatching Quinn soon after, evening the count on each side.

The balance tipped in the party's favor again quickly, though, as Aria felled the last of the junior fighters and a lieutenant fell victim to the fire spiders. Audas landed another far-flung vitriolic spear against Ar'dru and set him up for a killing strike from Melian, leaving one of the lieutenants alone in the field. The female githyanki fought on, striking Melian twice before Audas finished her off with another of his long-distance vitriolic attacks.

Back in the citadel, the githyanki captain expressed his admiration for the party's warrior spirit. His underlings were less impressed with Audas, perhaps owing to some irritation at what they viewed as unsportsmanlike tactics, but Ar'dru acknowledged that the heroes had met the challenge and were worthy to be taken before Gadreel.

Ar'dru conducted the heroes to a cave below the citadel, where a murky pool of water served as the opening to Gadreel's undersea domain. The water stirred and the Elder Aboleth emerged, similar in appearance to Uriel yet clearly unique.

Gadreel read the party's minds easily, gleaning from them the details of their adventures and the reason for their visit to its plane. The creature accepted the galadiir from Strontium and instructed the party to return in 24 hours, then vanished back into the depths.

The party spent their day among the githyanki. They made a point of buying drinks for Ar'dru and his fighting party and socializing with the ranks, showing their respect for the githyanki's culture. In return the githyanki treated the party with more respect than most non-githyanki ever receive from their ilk. The heroes learned that Gadreel's world had become home to a splinter faction, githyanki who had broken off from larger cities and revered Gadreel instead of the lich queen who was the titular goddess and ruler of their people. Gadreel, they learned, allowed githyanki in this realm to advance beyond the limits imposed by the lich queen -- a tolerance that had earned Gadreel the githyanki's loyalty and respect. Strontium established a friendly relationship with Na'rai, and even learned from her the highly effective fire spiders spell she'd used against them.

After a day as guests of the githyanki, the heroes returned to the undercity pool and received the galadiir back from Gadreel. The black stone had a faint glow to it now, and the party was assured that it contained a day's worth of Gadreel's psionic power.

The galadiir was now one third recharged.

<MR>
6/26/08