DavesGaming

It was a long walk to the Coalition Encampment beseiging Dragonspear Castle. We’ve known for some time that castle is the main base of operations for Caelar Argent’s Crusade. A while back we learned the *point* of the Crusade was to storm Avernus (Hell) to return the dead from the two Dragonspear Wars fought in the last couple decades. Each of those wars involved masses of devils let loose in Faerun. They were epic tragedies.
To many of us, it was obvious from the start this Crusade was madness. As we’ve learned more, the madness runs deeper. Apparently there is a sealed gate, direct to Avernus, somewhere under Dragonspear Castle. It can only be opened with divine blood. Caelar assumes I count for that.
Whatever her motives, the bottom line is Caelar wants to reopen the gate to Avernus with *my* blood. How does such madness acquire such a following?

We all had some talks about this on our long walk. Obviously we need to end this thing. But should I even be anywhere near this place? On the other hand, we don’t really know how many Bhaalspawn there are in Faerun. Is it possible (likely?) Caelar could just find another Bhaalspawn to accomplish the same end?
We will need to be sure the Coalition leaders know everything we know about all this.

Right after clearing the sergeant at the gate we were met by Marshal Nederlok, the site commander of the Flaming Fists. We were nominally attached to him, but he was hardly happy to see us. The incident back on Boareskyre Bridge had already been brought to his attention, and he regarded me as more trouble than I was worth. Nonetheless, the three main commanders would be meeting at the command tent later. Our attendence was mandatory.
Gee, a warm welcome.

We set out to get familiar with camp, and located a few familiar faces. Much of the crew that set out with from Baldur’s Gate was already here. We ran across survivors from Bridgefort, Brother Deepvein and his dwarves were here, and more from the long march continue to come in.

We also met a sergeant from Daggerford working with some new recruits. We helped with training for a time. I think the sergeant just appreciated the break.

Jaheira seems to be more of the “tough love” sort…

But the sergeant thought we had made a difference.

We also found an illness had broken out and a camp infirmery had far too many patients for having fought no battles yet.

By then it was time to head off for our meeting. Apart from Marshal Nederlok we met General Stonehand leading the forces from Daggerford. And the somewhat problematic Torsin de Lancie from Waterdeep. I quickly decided our own Marshal Nederlok was the voice of reason on this crew. I told them all that we knew about Caelar’s objectives, and why she wanted *me*.

de Lancie wanted us to find an entrance to an underground river, that was bypassing his seige with access to the castle. Further, he wanted us to explore it and see what more we could learn about the workings of the Crusade itself. I insisted this was bonkers. Caelar wants nothing more than to get me to Dragonspear Castle, and now that’s precisely where de Lancie wants me to go. Nederlok backed me on the foolishness of this, initially. But soon all three commanders had decided that this was the best thing for my “very special” team to undertake. This seemed utterly idiotic to me. But for now, it was the only thing all three “leaders” would agree on. Swell.
de Lancie wanted us to meet with a gnome for some special equipment.

de Lancie also had a poison for us to introduce to the food and water supplies. I was uneasy about this, but it would apparently cause more nausea than death. I like the idea of a less lethal confrontation with the Crusade, so agreed if the situation allowed.

I let him know we would reconnoiter the area first, I want to know the approaches and see what the Castle looks like before we go looking for caves.
As we were setting out, I ran across Bence Duncan at the front gate. He reported Skie Silvershield had gone missing again. She would have done better with us than joining the army…

As we continued up towards Dragonspear we encountered a number of refugees streaming south. We gave aid and directions as best we could. There were more dangerous things out here too, orcs, hobgoblins, spiders.

And she was now beset by angry Crusaders… Oh boy.

They almost bought it. But they soon decided we were not with them, and we had a fight on our hands. Not a hard fight, but we needed to keep it all quiet and away from the gate. I do NOT want to be seen and trigger a greater battle.
Soon enough we had them all down.

I congratulated Skie on some good actionable intelligence. And told her to report back to Bence Duncan. Then stay put in camp, we would catch up with her in a bit.
Skie seemed pleased, she gushed at the compliment. Maybe she’ll stay put for now?

We returned to exploring the area and found several old and abandoned structures. The most exciting was a cellar under a ruined farm house.

We found a journal that told the whole tragedy of it, a young man had slain his own mother as the vampirism overtook him.
A few other fights were not as dramatic.

Jaheira knew how to harvest what we needed, so we ran it back to the camp. Capt Corwin wasn’t too thrilled to see us there. “Don’t you have a mission?!” Yeah, yeah.
At least the Cleric of Illmater was happy to see us.

We set out again without delay. Didn’t want to be seen helping the sick when we have a stupid mission to fulfil. I may not be ideal for army life…