Age of Ice and Blood: A Pathfinder System Heroic Fantasy Quest

Sixth Day of Elnu-Hamba (Elnu Descendent), 1349 A. L. (After Landfall)

You do not have the men to siege a city ringed with stone and guarded with the bodies of its people, that much was true since the day you left Lirman and between the warriors you have gathered here on the continent and those you had lost at sea and in the battles against the dead and the damned it is no less true this day. Yet this is not the land of your birth, not by far. In this world men men conjure flame in their hands and gates of wood ringed with iron fall to ash... so at least you had expected it, to storm the gates of simple wood in arch of stone, ones that you had hoped at least would not hold those dreadful openings that had earned the name of murder hole.

What you did not expect to see was Ohun walking to the head of the host to show his power. There in the shin light of dawn when the men upon the walls of Norono would be the most weary the Stone Keeper showed his power and the wrath of his goddess. With words of wrath and words of ruin he called forth bats in their hundreds to darken the skies and with another he leashed the winds to ward off the arrows of those foes who would dare raise bows against the host that has the favor of Ikomi.

Then the men of Lirman charged, six times six, each bearing a log cut from the high hills of their land and taken aship for just this purpose, all of them covered with wet hides. Down down poured the arrows tipped with flame as on the high gate a captain of the city called out the name of their lord and for the glory of Olweje.

Upon your shield the runes burn with a cold flame as Silver charges in close on the heels of the advance Had this been a battle only of flesh and steel you would not be so close, but before you rides Inge and in her hands ice that flashes cold and flies to strike a high helmed captain upon the wall. Scattered arrows rattle against steel, but they do not pierce the rings forged by the craft of another world.

Behind the men of the Fellowship call on Saint Michael for valor and on Saint Nicholas for his eye and patronage. For Verley they charge and some call even your name out. Alas that horses in the midst of a melee make for better targets than the Anwa warriors all around and two of them find their mark by the pained whinnies.

Tom and Aubert's Horses take 8 damage

One of the rams falls, as too many of its bearers collapse from arrows raining down even as more warriors rush in behind to pick it up, but the second and the third both make it to the walls, to the gate that leads into Noromo and to victory.

Boom

The first blow strikes wood on wood heavy and hollow like the footsteps of doom that the damned have long avoided. Even as the legs of the man in front of you explode into blood and splinters of bone though some devilry you do not falter, victory is close and the archers on the wall faltering.

Boom

Great rocks, like onto the very blocks of which the wall is wrought are tipped over the walls to fall among the hosts of the attackers and with them waves of boiling oil, though not so many as the foe may have hoped, for with a shrill cry Ohun had taken flight and lightning was in his claws arching from the cauldron to the hands of those who bear it as it backwards to woe and agony of the foe. The warriors of Lirman and aye even those of Korman who had not fallen under the sway of darkness press forward.

And then in the midst of the battle there is a sound that is not the cries of warriors nor yet the strike of the ram, but deafening shriek of sundered wood as the second ram cracks down the middle with a sound like thunder and a storm of splinters that casts its bearers about, leaves to the storm winds.

Even Silver flinchers and falls back for all his bold heart and the horses of the company are in a panic to your left and yo your right... and then the gates open that has stood closed before the blows of the ram and there stands a man all garbed in armor of bronze, a black gauntlet on his right hand and he calls in a dreadful voice:

"What is this rabble of robbers that comes to my hall at the call of a bastard's get!"

This then is Unke the Red, you recognize from Antonio's account and behind him the dead men from the battle aboard the Marcella and this time she shall not save you.

What do you do?

[] Duel the false king, cut off the head and the body will wither

[] Keep away, you cannot fight properly with Inge before you, nor do you dare set her down in the midst of battle with maddened horses all about you. Zaia has yet used his magic and his horse was far enough away from the blast that he kept it in check

[] Let Darum Torag have his moment to face him afoot in recompense for the deaths of his warriors and the sinking of his ship

[] Write in

OOC: I know shatter cannot explode a battering ram normally, something has to be enhancing it, but Roland would not know that IC so he makes no remark on it.

Sixth Day of Elnu-Hamba (Elnu Descendent), 1349 A. L. (After Landfall)

The Halfhand is not halfhearted, that much you are sure of. He charges the foe with the name of Olweje on his lips as his guards part around him to let their lord onto the field of blood and blood there is aplenty. The heavy axe wrought into the shape of a ravens' beak comes down in a whistling arc, meant more to frighten than to kill, then all at once it turns to twist under the shield, pull it away and carve at the flesh beneath Alas the clan lord is not so fortunate. Unke ignores the first part of the stroke and steps forward instead of flinching back....

A moment's distraction an arrow whizzing by to almost pierce Tom had it not been for your warning and before you can turn your eyes back to the duel it is your ears that warn you. The air is filled with grinding unlike anything you had ever heard., metal twisting against metal. You see an axe head torn from the shaft as though it was a child's toy and not a weapon of war and then you see it crushed in the black fist and cast aside aside with ringing contempt. "Is this all you can muster, oh lords of the East Island, sons of the Beastslayer? Your father's would be ashamed to look upon you from where I had set their skulls beside my throne. To the sea I shall cast you, but no prayer shall you..."

Perhaps he should have spoken less for Darum had taken up the hammer of one of his warrior and struck him in the knee with all his might. Unke shudders a moment and the mirth goes out of his eyes for a moment. Distantly you realize that the fighting had slowed for the moment not even the archers on the wall daring to break the sanctity of the duel... it would not last for long as the clawed black gauntlet slaps aside the shield strapped to the Halfhand's maimed hand and and tears into the man's face with a dreadful crunch of snapping bone and tearing flesh..

Darum flails about with his hammer, blind with pain and blood, but it is not to be, the hammer strikes nothing but the stone behind Unke. then the dark warrior reaches about his neck and squeezes. You do not know if he would die of strangling or a torn throat, but this much you know for certain if no one calls another challenge or some other distraction one of the few remaining lords of Lirman in the host will be dead.

What do you do?

[] Call out a challenge
-[] Write in

[] Ohun prepares to dive into battle, let him have his chance at vengeance

[] Through the chaos of battle you see Esha raising a hand, clutched in one hand a vial of golden liquid, the musk of the dead dragon and you know without words her meaning, to cast a spell of enchantment on Unke... you do not think she would get more than one chance at it

[] Write in

OOC: Technically there is nothing stopping Roland from doing a challenge as a distraction from Esha, but that would be seriously dishonorable, enough so that I am going to say that at this point at least it would be out of character.