Session 2: Fort Grasp

  Seek the Myths. Honor the Seers. Protect the Realm.

Spring. One day until Sceptremass.

Sir Baldric and Sir Brom part ways with Jabek, a captain of the warty guard, and decide to ride towards Fort Grasp; the Seat of Power of the Realm. Journeying North, they come across a group of shepherds at night. They speak of tigers killing sheep in the East. In the morning the Company gallops with urgency to the fort. The river joins trifold and the knights have difficulty crossing. Brom is across with ease, but Baldric must be aided by his squire Dorf.

Afternoon on the day of Sceptremass. The Company approaches the colossal structure, noise and jubilation inside. A courtyard filled with guardsmen training, archery, sparring with hay dummies, dogs chasing carved sticks. They tie their poor exhausted horses up with a young squire named Spike. The Company enters the grand hall, tables set with food and drink. Two Sworn Bell Knights guard a locked door on the right. One of them, Sworn Bell Knight Ruan, tells the knights that they cannot enter, the council is currently re-swearing their vows of loyalty. Brom makes sure that it is the normal rulers of the holdings, and that the Toad hasn't already infiltrated the ceremony. Ruan insists it's the ordinary rulers, and that the Company will have to wait for the ceremony to finish before they have the attention of the council.

Dorf returns to the courtyard to check in on the horses. Brom's squire Noll pokes around the storage room of the fort and hears talking through a far wall. Talking from the ceremony! He can't make out the words. As he's heading back to the courtyard Noll knocks over glass in the darkness of the storage room and shatters it. Guardsmen rush and reprimand him, searching out his knightly master Brom.

As the guards find Brom in the grand hall an explosion rumbles from the back of the fort! Baldric and Brom ignore the guards and rush across the hall into the kitchen, where they find the Toad's prize pet Blotch has broken a hole into the wall of the fort and is terrorizing the chef. Blotch is simultaneously weeping and slurping soup off of the ground. The knights heroically dispatch the beast and explain the commotion to the guardsmen in the grand hall. 

But the story is interrupted as the Toad himself and eight warty bowmen burst through the southern entrance of the grand hall. The Toad tries to blame the mess on the Company, claiming that the knights provoked Blotch. But the chef stands up for the knights, defending their actions. The Toad "wants to have a chat outside" with the chef, and sends two guards to capture him. Baldric and Brom surround the guards and try to talk it out with the Toad, but the Toad takes a bite into Brom's shoulder and a massive combat in the grand hall begins. The Company throughout the warfare call on for help from the guards present. The chef joins the action. The Toad swallows many fort guards whole. The warty bowmen shoot down Brom. Baldric rallies remaining troops behind him. The chef tries and fails and tries and succeeds to help Brom back up! Some of the warty bowmen flee for their lives. Baldric chops down the warty captain and hails Ruan to help! Ruan joins the fray. Brom gives out one last hit with his massive pillar, and a rallying cry, before he dies. Dead. Dorf rushes into the room, sees his friend's knightly master dead and his own knightly master gravely wounded, and one-hit-kills a warty bowman. The Toad eats another fort guard, pushed into a corner. The council adjourns their meeting and the Knights Grasp enter the field; Rigus the Splinter Knight, Poldross the War Knight, Gressen the Riddle Knight, and Morbaine the Tourney Knight. Baldric, with a proper force behind him, leads an epic charge on the Toad, landing the killing blow. The Toad has been defeated, and the Myth resolved!

The other rulers of the Realm exit the courtroom; Margoes the Demon Knight of Castle Barbate, Goyon the Drunkard Knight of Goyon's Tower, and Elysir the Harvest Knight of Harbeger. Dame Elysir gives her gratitude and offers that if they ever want a proper celebration they can visit her town. Dame Gressen, having been knighted by the Jawbone seer, wants word of her watcher. Sir Poldross congratulates the Company and offers condolences over Sir Brom's death. Baldric asks about a proper burial and Sir Margoes says there would be room amongst his cemetery at Castle Barbate. Sir Rigus is cold, but accepting of their victory. 

Baldric asks after the seers of the Realm. Poldross explains besides the Jawbone there are three others; the Floating Seer in the mountains Northeast, the Screaming Seer in the forests West, and the Prey Seer in the forests Southeast. Sir Baldric and squire Dorf agree to head to Castle Barbate for Brom's burial, and then seek out the Prey Seer in the South.

20 years later...

Winter. Six days until the Feast of the Moon.

Sir Baldric the Gilded Knight, now a mature Knight Gallant of notable renown. And Sir Dorf the Whip Knight, having been knighted by the Prey Seer in the South after the battle at Fort Grasp. They sit on the council of the Demon Knight Margoes. Castle Barbate is a solemn gothic structure, befitting of its ruler but unbefitting of its knightly legion: the Fanged Knights, a warband of barbarian berserker-cannibals, are host to its grim halls. And a new Myth brews amidst the Realm...