Session 33

The Knot spent the night recovering in the great Hunter's Hall.  The walls still splattered with the blood of it's angel defender.

The next day, the Cardinal Thorn's Ninth Knot stepped into the Gardens of Serenity and began to leave the prime material plane.

Quell led the way and was immediately approached by a floating mote of energy.  It whispered a riddle, "speak it's name and it dies..."  Quell pauses for a second before Mardus remembers what they'd found from their questioning of the town's Mayor.  "Silence!"  The mote floats away & waits for the Knot to follow.

And so, being led by this ball of energy, the Knot tramps through the Gardens of Serenity.

The mote leads the Knot along through the stone walled garden maze,  Quell & Emmerick leading the way with Yvainne's Nessian Warhounds tromping along with Brother Summit at the rear of the group.

Then as they travel through a nondescript section of the maze, the Warhounds start growling & snorting sulfurous smoke.  The hairs on the back of Brother Summit's neck stand on end.  Something is wrong...

Then the blink dogs, lead by their celestial blood alpha male, attack.  The dogs teleport all over the Ninth.  Causing confusion among their ranks.  Still, Brother Summit is worried, he sees visions of darkness & an unknown horror watching him.  And he sees, as the blink dogs continuously blink in & out of existence, an after image, of a darker hound blurs in his vision.

Then that horror manifests and the rest of the Knot sees.  For as the blink dogs start to dimension door out of the way of the counter attacks from the Knot, in their place stand Hounds of Tindalos.  The blink dogs look confused, as the hounds attack indiscriminately between the forces of Hell and Heaven.

Yet is takes only a short time before the hounds focus their ire on their true target.  Brother Summit, in the rear of the group.  As the hounds go through the ranks of Hell, their gaze attack weakening the Knot, another battle is forming at the front.  With arcane magic, the leader of the blink dogs conjures pits full of acid & tries to swallow Knot members, only to suck his own pack down.  Still, the gaping extra-dimensional pits separate Emmerick & Quell from the fight going on behind them.  So the Knight of Hell and Elven rogue push on, trying to flank & take down the dogs.

An epic battle raged, Hounds of Tindelos, Nessian Warhounds & Blink Dogs, with Knot members running in-between.

Brother Summit proved triumphant over the Otherworldly horrors, with the help of Mardus, Yvianne & her warhounds.

Meanwhile, the fight up ahead was more balanced.  Wasyli using magic to push ahead as Emmerick & Quell leap out of the way of magical pit after magical pit.  Quell was slowed by enchantments and Emmerick was unable to get out ahead, always landing on the wrong side of the pits.

Eventually the remaining Knot members arrived to help, Yvainne laying down a plane of Stone, covering over many of the gapping pits.

The alpha dog fought to the death, trying to cause as much death as possible, before eventually getting cornered & overwhelmed by the combined might of the Ninth.

The members of the Ninth Knot caught their breath.

After a short respite and peaceful travel, the glowing light asks another riddle.  "One to whom the mirror never lies..."  The answer came swiftly to the Ninth.  The Blind Man.  Answering the riddle, the Ninth continued as the wisp of light headed forward leading them to the opening of a large clear area.

The Ninth stopped, one of their member grumbling "It's leading us into another trap."  Another of their rank is quick to point out that likely the wisp of light is simply leading them forward through the Garden, blind to the actual situation.

Slow to advance, Quell spots a large clearing ahead, full of odd spotted horse-like creatures.  The Ninth, wishing to attack in silence opts to use stones enchanted with silence spells, along with a staggered ambush to ensure the melee combatants get out ahead of the spell casters.

Though the Knot had the advantage of ambush, Emmerick and others got off to a slow start & instead of getting out ahead, they got bottled up near the entrance.  Then the Kirin charged forward, trying to gore Emmerick, Quell & Brother Summit.  While those Kirin that were stuck at range called down Lightning.  The Knot's silence spell ended up blocking their own spell casters as they struggled to fight forward.

Still, even without spell support, the Knot showed of their brutish side, hacking and slashing through the creatures.  The only issue, their might scared the Kirin, as they saw their number slaughtered with brutal efficiency and they flew away, up through the barrier above the maze.

The knot considered pushing after them, but choose instead to stay the course.

Still, the shadow sorcerer of Hell did point out that the magical remains of the Kirin could be used for magical crafting.  And the Knot resolved to send Trik later to search over above the maze later, in case any of the wounded Kirin fell after pushing through the planer barrier.  After all, you can't afford to let a good pelt (or celestial blood & bone) go to waste.

The Ninth Knot stepped out of the grassy clearing & were approached by a mote of light, asking for the last riddle.

"A wick'ed thing from which  darkness files..."

Mardus blurts out "Candles"

The wisp responds, "The three at once where the answer lies" and disappears.

Remembering statues out by the docks of priests walking blind with candles, the Knot knew what they must do.  Walk forward, eyes closed & holding candles.  The members of the Ninth fumbled through their packs, looking for any candles.

Yvainne & Emmerick both found candles in their packs.  Wasyli was surprised that they had candles on them.  They remembered over a year ago, when they were all under Cardinal Thorn's roof.  Training.  And Galen had insisted they all get kits of useful gear.  Mardus lost his in the dungeon trial below the now abandoned manor house.  Yet Yvainne & Quell still had their packs.  And over the past year and a half, had lugged them around.  Through Balentine, a year guarding the Horn, a month in Ghastenhall.  And now they've carried them all the way to the Gardens of Serenity.  Somewhere off in Absolan, the City at the Center of the World, Galen smiled.  His foresight and planning having paid off for the Ninth.  Even if he struggles with aiding the Sixth Knot in it's endeavors...

With the candles in hand, Yvainne & Emmerick led the Ninth forward, blind & silent.

The Ninth arrived at the circular center of the Gardens, the towering facade of the Cathedral of Mitra Made Manifest as a backdrop.  It's shadow would likely cover the whole of the open clearing, if it weren't for the massive flame of Mitra burning in the center of the circle.  And standing before the Flame, already prepared for battle are Sambathe, High Oracle of Mitra, the Master of Serenity, and two junior monks of the Serene Order.  Battle is drawn as the forces of Heaven surprise the forces of Hell.

What ensues is a quick and fast battle.  The entrance to the clearing was covered in overlapping silence spells, blocking spell casting.  Yet the deft Oracle of Life didn't seem to mind as she rained down the divine wrath of Mitra upon the Ninth.  Mardus & Wasyli learned from earlier fights & scattered, using magic to distance themselves, & not a moment to soon, for Sambathe soon cast Holy Word, blinding and stunning many of the Ninth and outright banishing both Emmerick's Nightmare & one of Yvainne's Warhounds.

Still, Mardus was free of the blast & soon began healing his allies, restoring their sight.  And blind or not, Emmerick, along with Quell and Brother Summit unleashed a torrent of pain on the Master of Serenity that even the Life Oracle had a hard time curing.  Then Wasyli struck with his powerful spell... Suffocate.  And he chocked the air out of Sambathe's lungs, ending her life & by extention, the Monks.  For with no healing, they fell swift and fast before the overwhelming might of Hell.