Sneak Attacks and Surprise Rounds....

Before I begin my recap... here is the symbol of the Ebon Triad.


.... laying in wait on the beach in this amazingly warm and humid cave. The phosphorescent lake giving the whole cave a green glow. Staring at the party is the face of some alien looking cityscape with only a few entrances.

following the lead of Barrett, the group makes their way over to a door where the previous set of guards exited earlier. the party lays in wait while Connell begins to move the "basket" back across the lake. Not 15 seconds after the basket begins to move the door opens and a very nonchalant guard exits from the well lit room. Noting the party, her eyes open with surprise and then quickly shut as the spiked chain tears handfuls of flesh from her neck. The party jumps to action. Donner nimbly leaps across the room and blocks access to a warning bell. Others take position.

Combat is fast and furious. One desperate guard makes a run for the bell, gets it in hand but the clapper has but one ding before his life is forfeit. Quickly, the party searches the guards and moves the dead member from the beach into the room. Pepper grabs Connell from the Gear House and they make their way back to the Guards room.

After surveying their surroundings they (annoyingly) come up with a set plan for how to determine what to do at each door. Door plan "A" is put into effect. [personal DM note... the only part I like is Bolgrim determining if anyone is injured..because it is as annoying to him as it is to me :)]

The door opens into a huge corridor that obviously is part of a vast complex. Everything is oversized. What ever built this had to be at least 8' tall or at least 8" wider than the typical human. Of note, they see a door with light leaking out below it. There is also a lock on the door. After some examination the door lock could be opened, but it would take some serious time... 10 min or so. Instead Donner listens at the door across the hall. There is snoring emanating from behind the door.

Barrett sneaks in with the rest of the party in wait. The room is a barracks that can easily sleep 12. Only 4 of the bunks are currently occupied. Barrett swiftly cuts the throats of the of the members. The fourth awakened barely had time to gargle a warning. Waiting... the party hears no commotion.

Continuing down the corridor the party explores some more rooms such as a mess hall of some kind and a pantry. On the back side of the pantry is another locked door and a room where they can hear some jubilant discussing. Listening for a bit longer it sounds like a small group of people gambling. the party decides to do a bit of exploring before they open the door.

Sneaking down the hall they find some more doors. One is stuck and seems to have something blocking it from the back side. After putting a shoulder into the door and then sliding a blade through the door crevice they realize the resistance is coming from a tremendously large number of spiderwebs. The party ops for the next door. This door swings open to a room full of webs, but seems to have lost their sticky nature. Again, the party abandons this room and explores a series of other rooms. One being a long room with a series of arrow slits aimed at a central corridor.

With dead ends or spiderwebs facing the party at every turn, they opt to return to the pantry. Barrett spends a bit of time picking the lock and within they find the beer and the storage of extra weapons. Here the party restocks more arrows and places a few long swords amongst their belongings. Then, with a surprise rush then party bursts in on the gambling game.

Here the party begins to make quick work of this group of guards. However luck and and some fast acting guards causes the party to worry about others in the complex. Pepper quiets the room with a silence spell. Bolgrim jumps on a table to bash in an opponents head. Donner does some fast and fancy footwork and Connell comes in swinging. Unfortunately these guards have some alchemical fire and decide to try and make Churchkey and Bolgrim burn for attacking them. They are relatively successful but pay for their heresy.

Opening the next door they see a room full of taugh sticky lines about 6 inches above the floor. It looks nearly impossible to cross without tripping something. Using the body of a dead guard they throw it on the webbing. With a quick click a net connected to bells drops from the ceiling.

After a bit of deliberation, they decide to exit back onto the beach and reenter the complex from the extreme other end. The fear being that other doors will have similar traps.

After moving across the beach the party opens a room. The room is dark but there was a sound of some kind when the opened the door. Scanning for evil Churchkey looks around not finding a thing until his gaze moves high up on the wall. When four arrows come bouncing across chuchkeys armor. One arrow finds its mark making only a scratch. Connell makes a charge into the room when the floor of the room collapses 6" and little spikes shoot upwards. Connell's foot is part of a shish kabob. Moving carefully the rest of the party enter the room and the combat becomes a ranged melee fest. For a couple of rounds it looks like the Alleybashhers on the balcony with their cover are going to be a real danger. then in one round Pepper fireballs them from his neckless. Connell impales one, Donner deflects their attack and Bolgrim makes it to the far side of the room guarding the only other exit from the room. Pepper is up again and makes a great shot with his crossbow. The rest of the party shoots the rest of them down in another round.

Leaving this room they enter another large corridor. doors dot either side. Donner quickly listens at a number of them but doesn't hear a thing. Choose the first door on their left, the party opens it, only to find another corridor ending in a door. Again they hear voices. Gaining a surprise round the party bounds into this room.

This room is a bit different then the others. First these are all Hillfolk... a little slower, but a lot tougher than the Alleybashers. second, there are 6 of them. Third, there are two other doors and two warning bells and lastly; there are symbols of Hextor painted on the wall and etched into some of the tabletops.

Combat ensues. The Hillfolk are screaming bloody murder. Some try to escape out the doors when an opening presented itself. It doesn't take more then a couple of rounds, to close them off from exiting and taking them down. Of the ones trapped in the room, one totally charges Bolgrim, knocks him over and runs into the corridor the party entered from. Donner tumbles past him and blocks him from going any further. Barret charges into the corridor and Bolgrim gets up angry as.... as... a dwarf who just got knocked down. Connell takes up residence guarding one door as the rest of the party begin to tie up the captured Hillfolk trapped by Barrett, Bolgrim and Donner.

At this... a sexy and scary looking woman wearing spiked full plate with the symbol of Hextor etched into it emerges from a door and casts a spell off of a scroll at Connell. Connell screams for help. Churchkey runs to the rescue. With devastating blows this madam of death swats at Churchkey and with two massive blows of her flail Churchkey drops to the ground a bloody mess. Pepper summons all the energy he has and gives up his turn to cast a spell to hopefully stop their fearless paladin from dying.

The other rush to the room. Blows are landed on the red haired woman of death. Bolgrim brings out the blessings of Pelor. She swings at Barrett dealing another almost lethal blow, but misses her second attack. Barrett dodges back into the room while the other launch into action. Wounded she hits Donner with two solid hits and Donner hits the ground. Again Pepper steps up to the plate and places his energy into Donner. Bolgrim puts massive healing into Churchkey while they watch this maddened woman step back and heal herself with a wand. The rest of the party dodges around her swinging madly. They land multiple blows of substance. She stumbles and collapses.

With sighs, the party drags her back into the guard room. They realize she is just below zero and so stabilize her and tie her up. Strangely, no other sounds seem to come from the complex, no guards, nothing.

Upon searching her, they find keys, four wands and of course her equipment. The party is pretty sure they have at least some of the wands of water control they are looking for.

With a little debate, they are going to take the prisoners back to Cauldron and then return as quickly as possible, before any other occupants wake up in the morning and find the carnage.

It is here where we leave our party.