BDW - Chapter Summary
Nov 17, 2024 13:05:28 GMT -8
Post by Daos on Nov 17, 2024 13:05:28 GMT -8
Chapter One:
Skulking Around
It's been a week since the party escaped from Mithas. They set sail for the nation of Nordmaar and just yesterday finally arrived in the city of Jennison. Jennison is a city of 3,000, one of the major ports of Nordmaar, about a dozen miles north of the ruins of Valkinord. Jennison is a thriving community, the last large port for ships traveling east to the Blood Sea.
Having just finished overseeing the ship's repairs and resupply, the group was approached by a humble-looking man named Austin. He offered them 50 steel, each, if they could deal with a little problem for him. He explained he was the first mate of the Shinare's Darling, and a weird noise was coming from within the hold. Two men sent down there never came back, and the rest of the crew refuse to go down there. He wanted the party to descend into the hold, find out what's wrong, and retrieve the missing men--without harming the cargo.
However, Sha'al immediately told the man to get lost, figuring it was another trap like Lord Myca's or Lord Rethoth's. Parra complained that 50 steel each was too low a price. But Sumina and Kaelestia convinced the party they needed to find some work while in port, and money is money, so they agreed to it.
Austin takes them to the Darling, where they descend into the hold, hearing a strange thumping sound within. Delving deeper, they find a bunch of oil kegs surrounded by tinder, and two unconscious sailors. Suddenly, four skulks leap out of the darkness to ambush them. Parra managed to put two of them asleep, but Sumina woke one up by attacking it. That one then woke up its partner. While Granker killed one, the other two kept slipping into the shadows, then backstabbing the party while the last fired two crossbow bolts at Granker (both missing) and then started digging around the cargo, finally finding a small wooden box. It shouted something to the others, then began preparing to light the oil kegs. Sha'al ordered the party go after that one, considering it a priority.
The skulk managed to set the fire, but the party slew all of them and Sumina and Sha'al put out the flame before it reached the oil kegs and exploded. Kaelestia recovered the small box while Sha'al speculated they set the fire to cover the theft of whatever was inside. The party retrieved the unconscious sailors, who were drugged, and returned to Austin who asked what happened.
After the party explained and Austin confirmed the box was safe (it held five flawless sapphires), he amended their earlier deal to only pay them 25 steel each, because the ship took some minor fire damage. Sha'al tried to argue this, but the captain showed up and made Austin pay the full amount. The captain also promised to spread word of the party's exploits, so they can find more work easier in the town. The party returned to their ship to rest.
The following morning, a lad came with a message for the captain of the Dark Squall. It was an invitation for a meeting with none other than Eiril Rosewood, the famous former pirate, whom even the Minotaurs and Black Dragonarmy feared. The party head to the docks and meet him, along with Cordelia, Griselda and Munirr, other members of his crew.
Eiril explains the sapphires they rescued were payment for him, after helping guard that ship. So he wanted to thank them. He said the sapphires have already been spent on a brand new ship, and he wanted to show it to the party. As they headed there, they spoke. Eiril asked Sha'al about being a sea elf, Cordelia seemed quite interested in Parra and her background, Munirr inquired Sumina about her sword and showed off his own, and Sha'al asked Cordelia, Munirr and Griselda how they wound up with Eiril. Eiril also mentioned that they had a sea mage on their ship, and perhaps he and Parra could exchange notes. Munirr brought up that they have a priest of Habbakuk on board, as well.
Eventually they reached the ship Eiril was eager to show them--the Will O' Wisp. It was a beautiful ship, powerful and spacious. Although Munirr seemed concerned it was too much for their simple duties as merchant guards. Suddenly, the party was attacked. A minotaur mage cast Slow then Stinking Cloud on them, as five warriors rushed at them. Griselda was killed, while Eiril and Cordelia were kidnapped. Three of the minotaurs stayed behind to stop the party from pursuing, but the party focused most of their attacks at the mage even as he ran away.
Once the mage was gone, the party seemed content to allow the minotaurs to escape, but the three making up the rearguard taunted them, so they began attacking again. Once they were close enough, the minotaurs dropped a net on the party. Only Munirr and Sha'al got caught in it, though. Just then, six skulks came out of the shadows and attacked, as well. The minotaurs seemed baffled by this. They stuck around long enough to ensure the party would survive, and then they bailed while the party fought the skulks.
Eventually the party defeated the skulks. Searching them, Parra found a map to their base. The party was eager to go there and loot it, but Munirr wanted to return to the Will-O'-Wisp with Griselda's body and start planning a rescue of Eiril and Cordelia. The party was torn, but eventually decided to accompany him. Once back at the ship, they met Hafgrim Foammage (human white mage), Styrkunn (dwarf priest of Habbakuk) and Gjafny (human barbarian). The group argued on what to do and Gjafny was suspicious of the role the party played in the kidnapping, but Munirr wouldn't hear of it.
It was eventually decided to wait for a ransom note. In the meantime, they would bury Griselda and prepare themselves. The party agreed to return once the note arrived, so went back to their ship. They then followed the map to the skulks' hideout and looted all of their treasure, before returning to the Dark Squall for the night.
The following morning they returned to the Will-O'-Wisp and discovered a ransom note had been delivered from one Frachier-knol, the minotaur Lord of Windbreak. The crew had a plan to pretend to pay the 25,000 steel ransom with a few chests that only contained a couple thousand at most, then rescue the captain and sail away. Munirr asked the party to follow them at a safe distance, in case it was an ambush. The party agreed, in return for a share of any loot found and Munirr's personal bow, the Heart of Justice.
They set out immediately. The Will-O'-Wisp first, and then the Dark Squall followed from five miles away, with Hafgrim and Styrkunn on board, in case they were needed. While sailing, Kaelestia spoke with Styrkunn about his time with Eiril, and then showed him the Habbakuk blessed staff she took from an old temple back on Mithas. She was willing to give it to Styrkunn, as he is a priest of Habbakuk, but only if he traded 2/3rds of his current magical items in return. Styrkunn turned her down.
Meanwhile, Parra spoke with Hafgrim about his experiences as a Sea Mage and asked to exchange spells with him. She learned the black robed minotaur they fought earlier is named Tor-hoch. Hafgrims gave her some tips if she should face him again in the future. Parra also inquired on tips for passing the Test of High Sorcery, but all Hafgrim could tell her wais that it was a truly personal experience, tailored to each mage, so anything he told her about his own Test would not apply to her own.
After a couple of hours sailing, they neared the island where the exchange was supposed to occur, but noticed a large plume of smoke. Moving in, they found the Will-O'-Wisp on fire, her crew on the island fleeing some danger, and the minotaur ship sailing away. Parra and Sumina wanted to ignore the island and chase the minotaurs; but Hafgrim and Styrkunn did not want to abandon their crewmates. Sha'al considered doing a 'sail by' and dropping off those who wanted to help, then continuing on after the minotaur ship. But Sumina pointed out this would divide their party, and those left behind would be stranded. So instead they decided to ignore the minotaurs and help out the crew on the island.
There's a vicious fight and a number of crewmen die, but the party prevailed eventually, defeating the insects. They then learned from the survivors that apparently Eiril betrayed them, siding with the minotaurs and tossing Cordelia overboard. Cordelia told them the Messembra was heading back to Windbreak on Kothas Island. Styrkunn reckoned that if they risked using the outer winds of the Blood Sea Malestrom, it was possible to not only catch up to the Messembra but beat them to Windbreak. The party welcomed the survivors of the Will-'O-Wisp on board the Dark Squall and disembarked.
They approached the outer edges of the Maelstrom and thanks to some excellent seamanship from Sha'al, they managed to shave off an hour off their journey with no serious harm to the Dark Squall. They arrived at Windbreak Keep around 9 PM that night.
Sha'al came up with a plan. There were two rowboats in the keep's dock. The Dark Squall would stealthily approach from the side to avoid detection, so that the party (along with a score of NPC sailors) could sneak into the docks and steal the two boats, then row them out to sea beyond the keep's catapult range and fight the Messembra there. This causes some confusion, as Munirr wasn't sure why they bothered sailing to Windbreak if they were going to fight the Messembra anyway. Nevertheless, the party largely votes for this plan so they move the Dark Squall into position. However, it's dark and there are rocky shoals, so there's a risk of the ship running aground.
Unfortunately, that very fate befell them. With the ship stuck, Habryn announced it would take the rest of the night to fix the damage. The party had no choice but to go in on foot. The party, plus Hafgrim, Styrkunn, Munirr, Cordelia and Gjanfy gathered some rope and prepared to scale down the hundred foot cliff to reach the keep's courtyard. While everyone else descended fine, Sumina lost her grip and fell. She managed to catch herself, only to lose it again and fall all of the way to the ground. Sha'al tried to catch her, but while he did break her fall, she basically crashed into him. This alerted a nearby patrol of three minotaurs who approached cautiously. The party quickly recovered and prepared to attack from the shadows.
With swiftness, they managed to take out the patrol before the minotaurs could sound an alarm. They then sneaked toward the keep proper, and Cordelia informed them there were 42 remaining soldiers and 3 mages (1 apprentice, and 2 Black Robes). Sumina demanded to know how Cordelia knew that, and she claimed she was a spy who was captured for awhile here, but didn't like to talk about it.
After some discussion, the party decided to try and bend the bars on one of the windows on the ground floor and sneak into the keep from there. Granker and Sumina worked together, but even with the enhanced strength from Sumina's mace, it was not enough. Instead, they decided to ambush the guards at the front entrance--two on the stairs, two on the doors and two up on the battlements, patrolling. After defeating them all except for one of the battlement guards, who sounded the alarm and fled back into the keep, the party hurried inside and barred the door behind them. Three more guards awaited them in the foyer. As the party fought, two more guards, plus the one from the battlements, joined in the fray. Parra fell, but Styrkunn managed to revive her.
After winning the fight, Styrkunn asked for the magic staff that Kaelestia found in the last adventure. In her hands, it's just a stick, but in the hands of a true cleric of Habbakuk, it's a powerful weapon and healing device. Sha'al ordered Kaelestia to hand it over. Now that he had it, Styrkunn was much more powerful and able to heal and deal damage far more effectively.
The party headed upstairs to the second floor. The first room they searched has three Minotaurs--two warriors and an apprentice mage. As the party was fighting, another warrior came up the stairs behind them. However, the party was able to defeat them all. They considered barricading the door and hiding out here, but realized that would just give the Minotaurs more time to prepare for them, as well as give the Messembra time to join them. So they moved on.
They came across a large room, and although it was empty of guards, it appeared to be Frachier-knol's personal bedroom. Finding nothing of use there, they tried another room and discovered a mage's chambers. A mage and two minotaur guards attacked. However, once the party entered the room to fight, another guard--made invisible by the mage--jumped them from behind. The party won and decided to move on.
However, the final room on the second floor of the keep was locked up. Apparently it was some kind of vault. They were unable to get inside, and Cordelia warned them that even if they did, everything was trapped with magic. They decided to wait until they take the keep, then extract the key from Frachier-knol when they captured him. The party decided to return to the first floor, as there was nobody left on the second.
After they backtracked to the foyer, they continued east and found a smithy where four warriors awaited them. As they fought, though, another came out of the shadows to ambush them from behind. The party defeated them, but then another minotaur burst through a door and attacked Cordelia, who protected herself with a spell. After slaying the guard, Parra pointed out the spellcasting, and Munirr and the other crew were confused as they had never seen her cast spells before.
Cordelia admitted she took the Test and once served Nuitari, but she lost everything because of it. Her power, her beauty, and the man she loved. Parra became upset that someone so beautiful would say she lost her looks, which caused Cordelia to reveal she was once a Minotaur. But after taking her Test, she was judged too vain and so she was permanently polymorphed into a human.
She also admitted she was originally working for Franchier-knol. She was going to end her own life after her transformation, but he convinced her she could still be useful. He wanted revenge against Eiril for all his years of pirating, so the plan was for Cordelia to use her new human form to seduce Eiril and lure him into a trap. However, Cordelia wound up falling in love with Eiril and so convinced him instead to work for Franchier-knol, as Eiril was getting on in years and clearly missed his old pirating days. Eiril didn't want to abandon his crew, though, so came up with a convoluted plan in which Franchier-knol's men would 'kidnap' him and Cordelia and leave a ransom note. When his crew inevitably attempted a rescue, the plan was to leave them marooned on the island (to be picked up by the next passing ship) and sail off with the Will O'Wisp.
However, the plan did not go smoothly. Eiril dragged the party into the mess, Griselda died in the 'kidnapping.' The island chosen for the ransom was full of monsters (something Cordelia suspected Franchier-knol already knew when he chose it). And she was betrayed. Franchier-knol had her thrown into the brig, taking her magical cloak and spellbook. When Eiril objected, he told the captain the truth of her--who and what she really was. This caused Eiril to forsake her. She was left on the island to die with the others.
So Cordelia had a vested interest in taking down Franchier-knol, and if the party didn't trust her, they could trust in her desire for revenge. The party decided to leave her be for now, although Sha'al questioned what exactly Cordelia would do when she confronted Eiril again--something she wasn't sure of herself.
The party continued on, reaching a large dining hall where eight more Minotaurs awaited. A fierce fight broke out and Granker fell, although Styrkunn was able to reach him in time to save him. After finishing off the guards, the party then explored the kitchen a bit.
They turned southward and found another bedroom. This one contained three guards and a Black Robed Wizard. The fight went well, at first, but then the wizard cast a spell of Hold Person, paralyzing most of the party. Although Sumina was able to avoid the spell and cut down the wizard, ending the spell, Granker was slain by one of the guards.
Once the remaining guards were defeated, the party speculated on how to bring Granker back. Styrkunn suggested sacrificing the staff might work, but first he wanted to know if Granker was a good man. Sha'al insisted he was, while Parra just shouted and insulted Styrkunn, the one person who could help them. Fortunately, he chose to ignore her and do it anyway. Recruiting the party to help, they each said a small prayer while remembering something special about Granker while Styrkunn performed the ceremony. The staff was destroyed, but its power was successful in raising Granker back to life.
Afterward, the remaining guards surrendered, as they realized they were no match for the two crews. Consequently, when the Messembra finally arrived, Franchier-knol found himself walking into an ambush and was handily captured without a fight. The party took his key and looted his vault clean. Eiril claimed he had been controlled by magic and begged Cordelia for forgiveness. She agreed, although the party felt like she shouldn't have. The two crews then parted ways.
Skulking Around
It's been a week since the party escaped from Mithas. They set sail for the nation of Nordmaar and just yesterday finally arrived in the city of Jennison. Jennison is a city of 3,000, one of the major ports of Nordmaar, about a dozen miles north of the ruins of Valkinord. Jennison is a thriving community, the last large port for ships traveling east to the Blood Sea.
Having just finished overseeing the ship's repairs and resupply, the group was approached by a humble-looking man named Austin. He offered them 50 steel, each, if they could deal with a little problem for him. He explained he was the first mate of the Shinare's Darling, and a weird noise was coming from within the hold. Two men sent down there never came back, and the rest of the crew refuse to go down there. He wanted the party to descend into the hold, find out what's wrong, and retrieve the missing men--without harming the cargo.
However, Sha'al immediately told the man to get lost, figuring it was another trap like Lord Myca's or Lord Rethoth's. Parra complained that 50 steel each was too low a price. But Sumina and Kaelestia convinced the party they needed to find some work while in port, and money is money, so they agreed to it.
Austin takes them to the Darling, where they descend into the hold, hearing a strange thumping sound within. Delving deeper, they find a bunch of oil kegs surrounded by tinder, and two unconscious sailors. Suddenly, four skulks leap out of the darkness to ambush them. Parra managed to put two of them asleep, but Sumina woke one up by attacking it. That one then woke up its partner. While Granker killed one, the other two kept slipping into the shadows, then backstabbing the party while the last fired two crossbow bolts at Granker (both missing) and then started digging around the cargo, finally finding a small wooden box. It shouted something to the others, then began preparing to light the oil kegs. Sha'al ordered the party go after that one, considering it a priority.
The skulk managed to set the fire, but the party slew all of them and Sumina and Sha'al put out the flame before it reached the oil kegs and exploded. Kaelestia recovered the small box while Sha'al speculated they set the fire to cover the theft of whatever was inside. The party retrieved the unconscious sailors, who were drugged, and returned to Austin who asked what happened.
After the party explained and Austin confirmed the box was safe (it held five flawless sapphires), he amended their earlier deal to only pay them 25 steel each, because the ship took some minor fire damage. Sha'al tried to argue this, but the captain showed up and made Austin pay the full amount. The captain also promised to spread word of the party's exploits, so they can find more work easier in the town. The party returned to their ship to rest.
The following morning, a lad came with a message for the captain of the Dark Squall. It was an invitation for a meeting with none other than Eiril Rosewood, the famous former pirate, whom even the Minotaurs and Black Dragonarmy feared. The party head to the docks and meet him, along with Cordelia, Griselda and Munirr, other members of his crew.
Eiril explains the sapphires they rescued were payment for him, after helping guard that ship. So he wanted to thank them. He said the sapphires have already been spent on a brand new ship, and he wanted to show it to the party. As they headed there, they spoke. Eiril asked Sha'al about being a sea elf, Cordelia seemed quite interested in Parra and her background, Munirr inquired Sumina about her sword and showed off his own, and Sha'al asked Cordelia, Munirr and Griselda how they wound up with Eiril. Eiril also mentioned that they had a sea mage on their ship, and perhaps he and Parra could exchange notes. Munirr brought up that they have a priest of Habbakuk on board, as well.
Eventually they reached the ship Eiril was eager to show them--the Will O' Wisp. It was a beautiful ship, powerful and spacious. Although Munirr seemed concerned it was too much for their simple duties as merchant guards. Suddenly, the party was attacked. A minotaur mage cast Slow then Stinking Cloud on them, as five warriors rushed at them. Griselda was killed, while Eiril and Cordelia were kidnapped. Three of the minotaurs stayed behind to stop the party from pursuing, but the party focused most of their attacks at the mage even as he ran away.
Once the mage was gone, the party seemed content to allow the minotaurs to escape, but the three making up the rearguard taunted them, so they began attacking again. Once they were close enough, the minotaurs dropped a net on the party. Only Munirr and Sha'al got caught in it, though. Just then, six skulks came out of the shadows and attacked, as well. The minotaurs seemed baffled by this. They stuck around long enough to ensure the party would survive, and then they bailed while the party fought the skulks.
Eventually the party defeated the skulks. Searching them, Parra found a map to their base. The party was eager to go there and loot it, but Munirr wanted to return to the Will-O'-Wisp with Griselda's body and start planning a rescue of Eiril and Cordelia. The party was torn, but eventually decided to accompany him. Once back at the ship, they met Hafgrim Foammage (human white mage), Styrkunn (dwarf priest of Habbakuk) and Gjafny (human barbarian). The group argued on what to do and Gjafny was suspicious of the role the party played in the kidnapping, but Munirr wouldn't hear of it.
It was eventually decided to wait for a ransom note. In the meantime, they would bury Griselda and prepare themselves. The party agreed to return once the note arrived, so went back to their ship. They then followed the map to the skulks' hideout and looted all of their treasure, before returning to the Dark Squall for the night.
The following morning they returned to the Will-O'-Wisp and discovered a ransom note had been delivered from one Frachier-knol, the minotaur Lord of Windbreak. The crew had a plan to pretend to pay the 25,000 steel ransom with a few chests that only contained a couple thousand at most, then rescue the captain and sail away. Munirr asked the party to follow them at a safe distance, in case it was an ambush. The party agreed, in return for a share of any loot found and Munirr's personal bow, the Heart of Justice.
They set out immediately. The Will-O'-Wisp first, and then the Dark Squall followed from five miles away, with Hafgrim and Styrkunn on board, in case they were needed. While sailing, Kaelestia spoke with Styrkunn about his time with Eiril, and then showed him the Habbakuk blessed staff she took from an old temple back on Mithas. She was willing to give it to Styrkunn, as he is a priest of Habbakuk, but only if he traded 2/3rds of his current magical items in return. Styrkunn turned her down.
Meanwhile, Parra spoke with Hafgrim about his experiences as a Sea Mage and asked to exchange spells with him. She learned the black robed minotaur they fought earlier is named Tor-hoch. Hafgrims gave her some tips if she should face him again in the future. Parra also inquired on tips for passing the Test of High Sorcery, but all Hafgrim could tell her wais that it was a truly personal experience, tailored to each mage, so anything he told her about his own Test would not apply to her own.
After a couple of hours sailing, they neared the island where the exchange was supposed to occur, but noticed a large plume of smoke. Moving in, they found the Will-O'-Wisp on fire, her crew on the island fleeing some danger, and the minotaur ship sailing away. Parra and Sumina wanted to ignore the island and chase the minotaurs; but Hafgrim and Styrkunn did not want to abandon their crewmates. Sha'al considered doing a 'sail by' and dropping off those who wanted to help, then continuing on after the minotaur ship. But Sumina pointed out this would divide their party, and those left behind would be stranded. So instead they decided to ignore the minotaurs and help out the crew on the island.
There's a vicious fight and a number of crewmen die, but the party prevailed eventually, defeating the insects. They then learned from the survivors that apparently Eiril betrayed them, siding with the minotaurs and tossing Cordelia overboard. Cordelia told them the Messembra was heading back to Windbreak on Kothas Island. Styrkunn reckoned that if they risked using the outer winds of the Blood Sea Malestrom, it was possible to not only catch up to the Messembra but beat them to Windbreak. The party welcomed the survivors of the Will-'O-Wisp on board the Dark Squall and disembarked.
They approached the outer edges of the Maelstrom and thanks to some excellent seamanship from Sha'al, they managed to shave off an hour off their journey with no serious harm to the Dark Squall. They arrived at Windbreak Keep around 9 PM that night.
Sha'al came up with a plan. There were two rowboats in the keep's dock. The Dark Squall would stealthily approach from the side to avoid detection, so that the party (along with a score of NPC sailors) could sneak into the docks and steal the two boats, then row them out to sea beyond the keep's catapult range and fight the Messembra there. This causes some confusion, as Munirr wasn't sure why they bothered sailing to Windbreak if they were going to fight the Messembra anyway. Nevertheless, the party largely votes for this plan so they move the Dark Squall into position. However, it's dark and there are rocky shoals, so there's a risk of the ship running aground.
Unfortunately, that very fate befell them. With the ship stuck, Habryn announced it would take the rest of the night to fix the damage. The party had no choice but to go in on foot. The party, plus Hafgrim, Styrkunn, Munirr, Cordelia and Gjanfy gathered some rope and prepared to scale down the hundred foot cliff to reach the keep's courtyard. While everyone else descended fine, Sumina lost her grip and fell. She managed to catch herself, only to lose it again and fall all of the way to the ground. Sha'al tried to catch her, but while he did break her fall, she basically crashed into him. This alerted a nearby patrol of three minotaurs who approached cautiously. The party quickly recovered and prepared to attack from the shadows.
With swiftness, they managed to take out the patrol before the minotaurs could sound an alarm. They then sneaked toward the keep proper, and Cordelia informed them there were 42 remaining soldiers and 3 mages (1 apprentice, and 2 Black Robes). Sumina demanded to know how Cordelia knew that, and she claimed she was a spy who was captured for awhile here, but didn't like to talk about it.
After some discussion, the party decided to try and bend the bars on one of the windows on the ground floor and sneak into the keep from there. Granker and Sumina worked together, but even with the enhanced strength from Sumina's mace, it was not enough. Instead, they decided to ambush the guards at the front entrance--two on the stairs, two on the doors and two up on the battlements, patrolling. After defeating them all except for one of the battlement guards, who sounded the alarm and fled back into the keep, the party hurried inside and barred the door behind them. Three more guards awaited them in the foyer. As the party fought, two more guards, plus the one from the battlements, joined in the fray. Parra fell, but Styrkunn managed to revive her.
After winning the fight, Styrkunn asked for the magic staff that Kaelestia found in the last adventure. In her hands, it's just a stick, but in the hands of a true cleric of Habbakuk, it's a powerful weapon and healing device. Sha'al ordered Kaelestia to hand it over. Now that he had it, Styrkunn was much more powerful and able to heal and deal damage far more effectively.
The party headed upstairs to the second floor. The first room they searched has three Minotaurs--two warriors and an apprentice mage. As the party was fighting, another warrior came up the stairs behind them. However, the party was able to defeat them all. They considered barricading the door and hiding out here, but realized that would just give the Minotaurs more time to prepare for them, as well as give the Messembra time to join them. So they moved on.
They came across a large room, and although it was empty of guards, it appeared to be Frachier-knol's personal bedroom. Finding nothing of use there, they tried another room and discovered a mage's chambers. A mage and two minotaur guards attacked. However, once the party entered the room to fight, another guard--made invisible by the mage--jumped them from behind. The party won and decided to move on.
However, the final room on the second floor of the keep was locked up. Apparently it was some kind of vault. They were unable to get inside, and Cordelia warned them that even if they did, everything was trapped with magic. They decided to wait until they take the keep, then extract the key from Frachier-knol when they captured him. The party decided to return to the first floor, as there was nobody left on the second.
After they backtracked to the foyer, they continued east and found a smithy where four warriors awaited them. As they fought, though, another came out of the shadows to ambush them from behind. The party defeated them, but then another minotaur burst through a door and attacked Cordelia, who protected herself with a spell. After slaying the guard, Parra pointed out the spellcasting, and Munirr and the other crew were confused as they had never seen her cast spells before.
Cordelia admitted she took the Test and once served Nuitari, but she lost everything because of it. Her power, her beauty, and the man she loved. Parra became upset that someone so beautiful would say she lost her looks, which caused Cordelia to reveal she was once a Minotaur. But after taking her Test, she was judged too vain and so she was permanently polymorphed into a human.
She also admitted she was originally working for Franchier-knol. She was going to end her own life after her transformation, but he convinced her she could still be useful. He wanted revenge against Eiril for all his years of pirating, so the plan was for Cordelia to use her new human form to seduce Eiril and lure him into a trap. However, Cordelia wound up falling in love with Eiril and so convinced him instead to work for Franchier-knol, as Eiril was getting on in years and clearly missed his old pirating days. Eiril didn't want to abandon his crew, though, so came up with a convoluted plan in which Franchier-knol's men would 'kidnap' him and Cordelia and leave a ransom note. When his crew inevitably attempted a rescue, the plan was to leave them marooned on the island (to be picked up by the next passing ship) and sail off with the Will O'Wisp.
However, the plan did not go smoothly. Eiril dragged the party into the mess, Griselda died in the 'kidnapping.' The island chosen for the ransom was full of monsters (something Cordelia suspected Franchier-knol already knew when he chose it). And she was betrayed. Franchier-knol had her thrown into the brig, taking her magical cloak and spellbook. When Eiril objected, he told the captain the truth of her--who and what she really was. This caused Eiril to forsake her. She was left on the island to die with the others.
So Cordelia had a vested interest in taking down Franchier-knol, and if the party didn't trust her, they could trust in her desire for revenge. The party decided to leave her be for now, although Sha'al questioned what exactly Cordelia would do when she confronted Eiril again--something she wasn't sure of herself.
The party continued on, reaching a large dining hall where eight more Minotaurs awaited. A fierce fight broke out and Granker fell, although Styrkunn was able to reach him in time to save him. After finishing off the guards, the party then explored the kitchen a bit.
They turned southward and found another bedroom. This one contained three guards and a Black Robed Wizard. The fight went well, at first, but then the wizard cast a spell of Hold Person, paralyzing most of the party. Although Sumina was able to avoid the spell and cut down the wizard, ending the spell, Granker was slain by one of the guards.
Once the remaining guards were defeated, the party speculated on how to bring Granker back. Styrkunn suggested sacrificing the staff might work, but first he wanted to know if Granker was a good man. Sha'al insisted he was, while Parra just shouted and insulted Styrkunn, the one person who could help them. Fortunately, he chose to ignore her and do it anyway. Recruiting the party to help, they each said a small prayer while remembering something special about Granker while Styrkunn performed the ceremony. The staff was destroyed, but its power was successful in raising Granker back to life.
Afterward, the remaining guards surrendered, as they realized they were no match for the two crews. Consequently, when the Messembra finally arrived, Franchier-knol found himself walking into an ambush and was handily captured without a fight. The party took his key and looted his vault clean. Eiril claimed he had been controlled by magic and begged Cordelia for forgiveness. She agreed, although the party felt like she shouldn't have. The two crews then parted ways.