Talking Heads

June 17th of Albanus 1.

Morning dawned.  Hours passed.

Fluffy rounded up a few stray bandits and the party feverishly worked on their ambush -- knowing full well that if Terrens got amongst them, he could puree them.  They strung a rope along the stream bed and yoked it to four horses;  the bandits were to drive the horses once Terrens' band was halfway across the stream.  The men at arms and Philipus (aka Formerly Gutted Bandit) hid in some puckerbrush on the far side of the stream, with orders to shoot horses.  Gaius and Corvina gathered wild ginger and made a paste to smear on arrows.  Something, hopefully, to make the wounds sting a bit and panic the horses.  Then Gaius and Severus climbed trees on the up-hill side of the stream, across from the others.  The rest of the band hid in the bushes and waited.  Captain Marcus and Titus had a small squabble over who was going to slow Terrens down if he made it across the river (ie., which of them was going to get killed buying the rest of the band time to escape).  Titus finally pulled rank and ordered Marcus to flee with the others;  Marcus bowed his head... with a very rebellious gleam in his eye.

A little bit after sunrise, Severus received a sending from Abbot Micarius.  "I believe I have failed you," the abbot said.  "The king announced the deaths of your father, Matina, and Brennus.  They will not let me have his body;  I will continue trying to recover it.  Larentius is still alive."  Severus said nothing.

Shortly before noon, Terrens arrived.  In the company of nearly a dozen armed men.  He seemed annoyed and puzzled.  Severus overheard one of his soldiers say, "They must have gone this way, lord."  Terrens paused, then growled, "We'll continue.  The pass opens in a few miles.  We'll be able to see across half of Bendigroth.  They won't be able to hide if they went this way."

He and his men moved forward, inching their way across the rain-fed stream.  When they were half-way across, their horses up to their bellies in the cold water, the party sprung their ambush.

At the signal, the bandits spurred the hidden horses.  As the rope pulled tight, two of the riders were flipped over.  The rest of the group sent up a hail of arrows.  And the first barrage worked perfectly:  Terrens' horse dropped with a dozen arrows sticking out of it.  Terrens himself disappeared beneath the water, weighed down by his plate mail.

A second later, however, a mailed hand appeared above the water and grasped the stirrup of a nearby horse.  As the rider desperately tried to pull his lord up, the party shot his horse out from under him too -- and the dutiful soldier joined his master on the bottom of the river.  The rest of the men were confused and struggling to control their mounts.  One panicked steed charged off the ford into a deep pool;  the bandits entertained themselves plugging it full of arrows.  A few shot at the party, but none of their arrows hit home.  Corvina and Cassius tried to drop sleep spells on Terrens' group, but none of their magics felled anyone.

In the midst of the chaos, one soldier charged into the middle of the river, making a final attempt to save Terrens.  A well-placed sleep spell from Cassius dropped both mount and rider.  The last soldier standing whirled his horse about and fled back up the mountain.  He didn't make it far, though, before arrows brought him down.

With that, the party turned their attention back to the middle of the river, where Terrens had gone down.  And then they waited for the bubbles to stop...