Skip to content

Dunmari Frontier - Session 17

Karawa’s Plight: in which the party returns to Karawa amid the aftermath of gnoll attacks

Featuring: Kenzo, Wellby, Delwath, Seeker
In Taelgar: Apr 16, 1748 DR to Apr 24, 1748 DR
On Earth: Friday Jan 22, 2021
From Stormcaller Tower to Karawa

The Dunmar Fellowship combats gnolls, arrives in a devastated Karawa, and uncovers ominous signs, including an enigmatic figure known as Agata Dustmother.

Session Info

The Dunmar Fellowship escapes Stormcaller Tower with a number of treasures.

Summary

  • The Dunmar Fellowship shares personal stories and contemplates recent mysteries over breakfast.
  • They fend off a desperate gnoll attack while traveling south towards Karawa.
  • Arriving in Karawa, they find it ravaged, learn of a gnoll siege, and gather intelligence from allies.
  • They discuss the possibility that ‘Agata Dustmother’ might be the ominous ‘Old Woman of the Dusts’.

Timeline

  • Apr 16, 1748 DR, late morning: Leave Stormcaller Tower heading towards Karawa.
  • Apr 16, 1748 DR, afternoon: Kill a group of emaciated and nearly undead gnolls on the plains.
  • Apr 17, 1748 DR - Apr 23, 1748 DR: Travel south towards Karawa
  • Apr 24, 1748 DR, afternoon: Arrive at Karawa. Here news of gnoll attack from an exhausted Candrosa. Learns news of the south from Alesh, including an orc scouting party, a mysterious empty stone house, and another band of emaciated gnolls heading south and west into the Garamjala Desert.

Mirror of the Past

Narrative

Bone tired from a night of stumbling through the mists, fog, rain, and thunder of Hralgar’s storm, we open on the party, resting over a late breakfast, telling stories of their childhood. Seeker, about his brother Frankar who vanished after an accident with a strange divination machine of his invention; Delwath, about cooking for his elders as rumors of darkness spread in the world outside; Kenzo, about the hard life of poor street kids growing up in Chardon; and Wellby, about being at home on the road and the stories his great-grandfather told. As these stories finish, the conversation turns to the events of the past month, as the party starts to puzzle over the mysteries they have experienced, and speculate on answers. Seeker records much of the conversation in his journal, and a few answers perhaps emerge.

Turning south to Karawa, an exhausted party decides to get a few hours walking in before breaking to rest. This first leg of the trip is briefly interrupted by an emaciated band of gnolls, many of whom seem to have begun consuming themselves out of lack of suitable prey. They are quickly dispatched, as the party holds their ground and rains arrows and magic down on the gnolls, charging across the plains at them.

The next seven days are relatively uneventful, as the party journeys south across the plains. The land gradually dries, turning from grassland to scrub to rocky desert with only scattered vegetation over the course of the journey, while Seeker maps Ley Lines and fiddles with the lenses Delwath found in Stormcaller Tower, and Wellby trains his pet axe beak. Camped outside of Karawa, the party spends some time contemplating the situation. Realizing the mirror of Eudomes can be used to look into the past, Delwath holds up the Ivory Scroll Case they found to the mirror and asks to see its past, when it was created and when it was used.

The next day, the party arrives at Karawa by mid-afternoon. From a distance, it is clear that the town has suffered greatly. Ikram’s the popular caravanserai and site of many early meetings, is mostly destroyed and burned, as are the small shops nearby, including Delwath’s apartment. The shade trees around the oasis square have been chopped down and some burned, and many houses are smashed and now open to the elements. As the party approaches, the centaur Tharandros and the Dunmari warrior Havdar ride up, and greet them with pleasure. Alesh and Candrosa are waiting in the outbuildings of the Temple, with news to share and receive.

Candrosa is surprised and happy to see the party – the centaurs have not informed him that it was Kenzo, Delwath, Seeker, Wellby, and Riswynn who convinced them to go south. Candrosa looks exhausted and worn out, and gives a brief update on what has happened. Many days ago, a large band of gnolls attacked, burned the town, and lay siege to the Temple. The siege was broken by the arrival of the centaurs a little more than a week ago, who crushed the gnoll lines, albeit not without casualties, and freed the Shakun Mystai sheltering in the temple. Some days later, Alesh returned, as did Havdar with some of his troops from Tokra. 

Alesh then reports on her scouting journey into the blasted plains. They passed by Kharsan, which seemed haunted but also deserted, at least by day, and full of nightmares of a choking red mist at night. South of Kharsan, they encountered an emaciated gnoll band, about half of which seemed more Undead than alive, heading south and west into the Garamjala Desert. They did not follow them far into the desert, as they were not adequately supplied for such a journey, but they noted that a raven also seemed to be following the gnolls. 

Alesh also reported two other odd findings. First, on the edge of the desert, a stone house, clean and neat, but empty except for the usual trappings of a house, a small chest, chickens and goats and feed for them, and a seemingly magical well. Second, they saw an orc scouting party, which struck them as odd as orcs are not usually very organized and discrete, preferring a straightforward charge. 

Finally, before the party begins to report on the events of the north, Kenzo asks about Agata Dustmother. Neither Candrosa or Alesh has heard that name, but Candrosa mentions the Old Woman of the Dusts, an old woman who lives in the desert, and who has some kind of magic. But not a pleasant kind of magic, rather it is the sort of magic that comes at a price, often a large one, and that you only turn to when you are desperate and willing to give up everything. 

The session ends with Candrosa finishing this story, and everyone wondering if this is indeed Agata Dustmother.