Chapter 14: The Best Laid Plans
The Loud Boys in the Lost Mine of Phandelver, a D&D Report
The door slammed at their backs.
“That druid is a bit rude, isn’t he,” remarked Kila in a loud voice. The fighter loosened his sword in his scabbard and looked towards the ruined town. Behind them a muffled curse could be heard through the door.
“I don’t see why he couldn’t have come with us,” grumbled Uayak, secreting his various blades back into their sheaths around his person. He tucked the last one securely in his belt. “Even if he couldn’t fight, he should have been able to give us some sort of protective charms, or healing, or-”
The sky rumbled ominously. They looked up. It was a clear and beautifully light day, with not a single cloud marring the perfection of the sky.
“I wonder where the storm is?” said Jake.
“I’m just saying, continued Uayak, “he was a pretty useless character. He couldn’t even give us a potion or something to help us out.”
Thunder cracked immediately over their heads. The sky remained clear.
“I think,” said Kila cautiously, “that maybe that’s not how the world works today. And maybe you should stop talking about it now.”
A growl from the sky seemed to concur.
Uayak kept muttering, but under his breath, and thankfully there was no more portentous thunder. The three adventurers set off back up the path to the main part of the town. Overgrown bushes crowding the verge thrust prickly twigs into their faces. The path was still visible but uneven, and weeds dotted the packed earth. The hill crowned by the dragon’s tower rose to their left, and another path left theirs, winding its way up the slope. Kila, leading the way, paused.
“There’s some sticky white stuff on the ground,” he said.
Jake peered around him.
“That’s spider’s web,” he said. “I saw a picture in a book once.”
Uayak peered around the other side of Kila.
“Definitely spider’s web,” he agreed. “I’ve seen it before too. On buildings, and roofs, and trees, and things. You know, in real life.”
“There’s a lot of it,” said Kila doubtfully. “That’s about five feet square of web. How many spiders would you need to cover that much ground in web?”
They looked around. To their right, away from the dragon’s tower, was a cottage. It was covered with sticky strands of web. The open doorway was veiled with it.
“A rough rule of thumb regarding spiders and web size is that a spider will make a web about twenty times its own size,” said Jake. “For common garden spiders to cover a five foot square, you would need about… zero point one two times… then divided by… let’s say five times… roughly six hundred and twenty five spiders.”
They looked at the web covering the intersection before them, then at the web-covered cottage to their right.
“Or,” said Uayak slowly, “a couple of giant spiders who have made their lair in that house.”
“Web is vulnerable to fire damage,” said Jake excitedly. “I could just burn it all!”
“And I can chop the spiders in the face!” said Kila, joining in the excitement.
“All right, that sounds like a plan,” said Uayak, and stepped off the path into the bushes. He pulled his cloak around him, blending into the dappled shadows. “I’m just going to stand… here…”
The plan went as well as might be expected. Two giant spiders indeed scrittered out as the fire began shrivelling the signal threads attached to the web on the road. Jake and Kila made short work of them, and Uayak’s blades stayed sheathed.
There was a short debate about whether to explore the rest of the town or go straight up to the dragon’s tower, but they all agreed that it was wiser to make sure there were no enemies waiting to surprise them when they tackled the dragon, so they continued along the main path. There were several more buildings infested by grey and moaning zombies, quickly dispatched, and a few trinkets found, including a pretty gold necklace with a fine emerald pendant that Uayak quickly pouched. The town square was ordinary and of no interest. There was no beer left in the barrels of the tavern, and only rotted sacks that had once held rations in the old garrison. All the weapons had been taken by the inhabitants who had fled the town.
They reached the outskirts of Thundertree, where a two-roomed farmhouse faced a small cottage whose roof had fallen in. Creeping along beside the road, they peered over the broken wall of the cottage.
“Twig blights!” hissed Kila.
“You mean blighted twigs,” said Jake.
“How many?” said Uayak, who was too short to see over the wall.
“Can’t tell,” said Kila. “There’s bushes growing in there. Maybe five?”
“Let’s check out the other house first,” said Uayak, and sneaking across the road, he flattened his back against one wall. A window was shuttered above his head. Putting one finger to his lips, he beckoned the two taller adventurers to the other side of the window.
They could hear a drift of voices. Words slipped past the shutters, something about “sacrifices” and “alliance” and “dragon”. The adventurers looked at each other. Uayak pointed back across the road, and they huddled behind a bush outside the cottage wall. Grasses itched their calves and twigs scratched their cheeks. Mosquitoes whined cheerfully around their necks.
“There are still people in there!” whispered Kila.
“Do you think we should talk to them?”
Jake shook his head. “I think they sound evil. It sounds like they want to ally with the dragon. If we want to get rid of the dragon we probably don’t want them helping it.”
“So we’ve got to fight them,” said Kila.
Uayak rummaged in one of his many pockets and produced a flask of oil. “We’ve got to get rid of them and make sure none of them get in our way.” He swilled the oil around. Golden fluid ungulated down inside of the glass. “If I pour this on the back door and set it on fire, they’ll be forced out of the door on this side. I’ll set a tripwire. We can pick them off easily.”
Jake nodded. “And the noise will rouse the blighted twigs. I’m going to see if I can set them against each other.”
Kila loosened his sword. “I’m going to chop them in the face!”
“Great plan,” said Uayak, and as he shuffled sideways he somehow seemed to meld into the shadows under the bushes and, not exactly disappear, but become unnoticeable. The eye found the patch of landscape he happened to be inhabiting to be extremely boring and skate right over him. Jake and Kila were both extremely bored by, in turn, the edge of the path, the path itself, the grass on the other side of the path, and then the door of the farmhouse facing them. They couldn’t look back at the door for a minute or so, but when they could pay attention to it again, they could just make out a fine line, about shin height, spanning the width of the doorway. The boredom had meanwhile moved around the farmhouse to the back door. If one knew what to listen for and was paying close attention, there was a slight scrape that could have been someone very quietly piling some brushwood against a door, followed by a glug that could have been oil being poured from a flask. Then, as the patch of boredom reappeared at the corner of the house, there was a whiff of smoke.
Jake pushed back the heavy sleeves of his rather tattered robe as he slowly stood, looking over the broken cottage wall. He cupped one hand and drew an arcane symbol in the air above it, muttering indistinctly. A bright glow coalesced and he turned out his hands as it took form to guide the burning fire into the ruined cottage. Enraged squeals filled the air just as Kila, who had snuck back across the road, took his place next to the door.
There was a commotion inside the house as flames became visible over the back roof. Several people were shouting simultaneously, then the front door was dragged open and a black-clad figure rushed out.
At least, he tried to rush out. The fine tripwire Uayak had set up caught him by surprise and he sprawled, black dragonwing cloak flaring dramatically. Two other people tried to exit by the same route and piled on top of him, limbs and horned helmets tangling.
The squealing twig blights thrashed their way through the empty doorway of the ruined cottage, beating at the flickering flames transforming their limbs into torches. They spotted the figures leaving the farmhouse opposite and with earsplitting shrieks headed straight for them.
The three people had hardly time to stand before the twig blights were upon them. The razor sharp, flaming branches sliced through cloth and skin as though they did not exist, and the three people slumped back to the ground, bubbling and bleeding. Two more black-clad figures hurtled through the doorway, curved swords drawn. They leaped over the tripwire and their fellows but did not manage to evade Kila’s attack. His sword swung in a clean arc to slice their hamstrings, and they crumpled to the ground. As they thrashed wildly, their scimitars wounded the burning twig blights, who turned madly upon them. They made short work of each other and lay dead, a mess of flesh and ashes and burnt branches on the path.
Smoke was billowing inside the farmhouse now, as well as over the roof, and the last person was coughing and spluttering as he stumbled out over the tripwire and fell into the mess.
Kila grabbed the cloaked figure and hauled him upright at arm’s length.
“I caught one!” he said. “What should I do with him?”
Uayak popped back into sight. “Ask him what he’s doing here.”
“What are you doing here?”
The person coughed again. “Getting suffocated.”
Kila loosened his grip slightly. “No, I mean in this town.”
“The Cult of the Dragon heard that a dragon made its nest here. We were sent to offer alliance with it-”
“Oh, so you are evil,” said Jake. “I think we should kill him.”
“Okay,” said Kila, and stabbed the cultist through the heart. The cultist frothed a bit of blood, and then puddled onto the ground.
“Do you think they have any good loot?” said Uayak.
They looked at the burning house. “Not anymore,” said Jake.
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Next is Chapter 15:
Click here for Chapter 13:
And here for Chapter 1: