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The Reflections of Galahad
I am Galahad. When you see me you see a gnoll, yet I am unlike any gnoll you have known. I follow the good.
I am companion of irregular company. Grolsch, a half human priest of the Sacred Axe, Kessan, a dwarf of the mind, and Maze, an elf woman of various ways and means. With us is one Kraken
Blackendecker, a human sorcerer, and three followers of the Sacred Axe, members of the Order of the Red Tunic.
The good in this region has been under threat. A portal to the foul planes is opening. Evil has taken hold on a hilltop. Its minions scour the land taking bones from the living. The bone
church nears completion.
We have the means to stop it all. The fire opal. We take cautious preparation and begin the day trek north.
There is soon distraction. Maze investigates a barge that holds a dead man angry at his incomplete funerary arrangements. Destroying the monster takes the life of a Red Tunic. A second,
frightened into the water, is saved by his priest.
That all calls more blood hunters. Wolves. Under the domination of a hellish black dog. They are a brief threat. Blackendecker slays three as I slay the leader. The others soon follow. We
sally forth.
Our way is blocked. A monk from the Temple of the Celestial Sai claims the gem as his order’s. Reason does not prevail and violence erupts. The monk is talented but his spectacular style
wins nothing. He is killed and we are sure to hear more of it in later days.
Our trials do not end. We are peppered with arrows, arrows enchanted with infernal magic. Evil knows our threat. A Red Tunic slain, then the third. Even the mules are threatened.
Flashes of crimson in the woods speak of sniper. Unfindable even to the elf. We are thrice threatened and hurt dire. Our strategy changes to bluff, and the sniper is convinced a legion is
nearby. Maze speaks of spying it -- a four armed Outsider with the training of a monk. It leaves, but we see it again later.
At dusk we find the grave of Yondalla’s priest. His mission to stop the evil is done. The site is holy, a night spent there is safe from the beast roaming the forest.
In the morn we reach the hill. The bone church tops it, surrounded by a field of white roses. Three bodies rest amid the flowers, torn and twisted from a violent death. A step into the field
reveals the killers: the roses. White, vampiric roses rise to strangle Maze. She escapes soon, and learns the identity of the fallen. The Paladin Deacon Cross and the high priest of the Church of the Sacred Axe,
have met their end in this field of white.
Cassius is nowhere to be found.
We must reach the Bone Church. Our protection is stronger from Grolsch’s miracles, but they will not keep. The Bone sucker is seen, a floating mass of tentacles and entrails topped with an
obscene head. Above is impossible. Aground is impossible.
Maze uses the Dabber gift.The Amulet of Mook. Mook comes. A rodent thunders to and towers over us. Mook burrows to the underside of the bone church. We have a tunnel and we enter the chamber
of evil. The mirror, the portal, is there -- incomplete.
Evil is waiting with chaos. The sniper appears. Imps have been seen. The mirror fragment of Maze is targeted. Father Cassius is bound to a bone cross. We battle. We save Cassius. We keep the
fragment from the great mirror. The details are lost in a whirlwind of desperate actions.
The sniper falls. The Bone-altar around the mirror splits apart. From the dust comes a greater servant of the evil. The battle continues. The bone sucker returns, seeking our bones to crown
the unholy church.
In the chaos a plan forms. The fragment is put into place by the magic of Blackendecker. The mirror forms and shimmers and shows the way to hell. The half-human cleric casts the
fire opal into the void and good is unleashed.
The bright purifying light of good shines as a beacon and the hosts of the Heavens are heard giving battle to the minions of darkness.
Grolsch is blinded from seeing into it. But he has seen the best of sights.
All evil is drawn forcibly into the portal, and the draw is strong on all. We flee with Father Cassius. The tunnel remains secure as the bone church collapses. The roses wither and die. Good
has allowed us to gather the fallen.
Evil has been beaten back.
For now...
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