Powerful Apothecary traps

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Tuesday 17th June

Smorgus Bord - Male Halfling Thief - Ian Luxton
Ulotta Puck-off - Female Shield Maiden Parry-Fighter - Edwin Muir
Polly Ester - Female Human Bard - Andrew Earl
Finn Finnegan - Male Halfling F/T - Jeff Clendon

Elaine trained me up so I can now cast spells. I am now a powerful Bardic
spell caster with eight lordly spells to my name (to name four: Colour
Spray, Magic Missile, Feather Fall, Shocking Grasp). Bwuhuhuhahahahaaaaa!

Back to the Jake's Apothecary after dark.
Just me (Polly), Smorgus, Finn and blind Ulotta.
On the way we saw two dead bodies on the street. These were in black robes
with hoods. Dead assassins. No signs of injury.

After some puzzled shrugging, we arrived at the apothecary door.

Smorgus picked the lock and Ulotta went in. She saw movement and threw up
her shield. A dart thunked into it - fired from a trap.

Every door of the place had some kind of trap, a poison dart trap, a wicked
blade trap or crossbow trap.

This gave us an idea. We went outside to the street and hauled the dead
bodies back into the apothecary. We arranged them in positions so that it
looked like they had been killed by the traps. Like dart in the eye, or
wicked blade puncturing abdomen, or crossbow bolt through the forehead.

Outside there was another new body, similarly attired and dead.
And then another one.
But this one had a black figure hunched over it. This figure looked up at
us, his face a pale twisted grimace of congeniality, then snuck away.

Smorgus muttered "Zorro...", then we all broke into broken four-part
harmony:

Out of the night, when the full moon is bright
Comes a Jos' that's known as Zorro
This bold renegade, carves a Z with his blade
A Z that stands for Zorro
Zorro, the fox so cunning and free
Zorro, who makes the sign of the zee

Since Zorro had fled, we dragged these two new bodies back into the
apothecary and propped them up on the other traps.

Finally, in the back room, we found two large iron trunks. Both locked.
Smorgus and Finn picked the locks. Then I cast Unseen Servant and got the
servant to open the trunks. Sure enough, more traps. The larger trunk had a
phosgene gas trap - the very trap that had caught Arzie earlier that day.
The other trunk, a needle trap.

Eventually, the gas cleared and in the trunk we found a stuffed animal with
glowing eyes and an ivory dildo. Some money too.

But no Cauldron of Spoils.

So we spent the next three hours going over the whole building with several
fine-toothed combs, some fine tooth-combs and a couple of fine-tooth combs.
But no, the Cauldron eluded us.

We even paced out all the rooms to see if there were any secret areas.

Fed up by now, we left the place.

Sure enough, out on the street, *another* two bodies out in the street.
These were duly dragged back inside and propped over the poison trap and the
needle trap.

Then we went back to Elaine's.


The next mormning I went for a little reconnoitre. Sure enough, Jake's
Apothecary was swarming with Furndeck militia. I spoke to one of the guards,
feigning innocence.

"A whole pack of 'em," he muttered. "Broke in to the building... and died
like flies. I have never seen such carnage over a few traps. Every one
dead."

Jake, himself, was strutting around thoroughly vindicated at his use of
traps.

Back in her manse, Elaine did another scry. The Cauldron was still in place
even though we never saw it.
She even zoomed in with the scry and found the very position in the very
room where the cauldron was.

"But we searched there!" I exclaimed.

We returned the next night at 5 be'light.
Outside the apothecary there were now two guards stationed. Evidently, Jake
no longer trusted his traps, despite their killing success.

We spotted Zoro lurking in the shadows.

A brief flurry of hand signals later and he signed "I've got to go. Fly, you
fools!".
We all disappeared into the shadows, except blind Ulotta of course. She
didn't even notice us vanish.

Thwack! The deadly dart of an unseen assassin.

"Uggghh!" grunted Ulotta as she slumped to the ground.

"Furck, where did thart come from?" said Finn.