The Blackwood Heist, Part the Second Report

General Summary

After the party's relatively smooth clearing of the vault, a problem presented itself when Count Ciarti Blackwood seemed to appear out of nowhere in his study, coming face to face with Vondal standing guard in the hall. Rather than promptly initiating violence, however, he congratulated Vondal on his skills and invited him into the study to discuss a potential resolution to their adversity. Seeing no other good choice, Vondal obliged, knowing that Guinevere and Raro would not be too far behind. The Count took his seat by the desk and had one of the guards pull a balcony chair into the room so Vondal could sit opposite him. A stiff but cordial conversation transpired, where Count Blackwood praised the abilities of "Master Dwarf," stating that no ordinary thieves would have been able to get as far as they did. He also mentioned that he had suspected this group of new guests was not necessarily who they claimed as he has had run-ins with Julius and the Obsidian Laurel in the past.   Meanwhile, Raro took a look down the hall where he remembered seeing Vondal and instead noticed a gruff-looking human, dressed in the same livery as the downstairs guards with a longsword at the ready. The man appeared to be waiting around for someone. After warning Gwen, the two of them concocted a plan. Using the scroll of invisibility from the potions room, Raro disappeared while Gwen, counting on her stealth skill, progressed towards the study, hoping to enter unnoticed. The guard was more attentive than she anticipated, though, so she was also escorted in to speak with the Count. Raro, invisible and undetected, sneaked past the study to make his way further back towards the stairs to pull the attention of the guards away from the room.   After Gwen entered the study, negotiations continued with Count Blackwood. Gwen and Vondal were mostly honest with Blackwood, telling him that Julius hired them to locate information about the Count's new allies, but that they didn't know what kind of evidence or who he was working with. The Count, seemingly unbothered by this revelation, proposed a way out of this situation that would, according to him, be mutually beneficial for both him and the party. They would allow him to remove them from the estate, making it look like they were captured, and return to Julius stating that the vault was impossible, and they failed to get the items required. In return, the party would be allowed to take the items they found in the vault. Count Blackwood reasoned that if he just killed them where they stood, Julius would simply hire more and better thieves, inconveniencing Blackwood further. Ciarti said that the peace of having Julius off his back would be worth whatever they managed to steal. The two of them contemplated this offer, weighing their odds of making it out of this room alive if they tried anything else.   Outside the study, Raro's activities by the stairwell worked. The exterior guard alerted the Count and the other guard, a lithe wiry man, to the noise before he went to go find the source. As the two guards exited and closed the door, Vondal and Gwen noticed an oddity: the sound of the men walking away was completely absent, seemingly by soundproofing or an enchantment. The lithe man took up post outside the study just in time to see his companion disappear behind a corner as Raro pulled the man into a chokehold and began to bludgeon him unconscious. A scuffle broke out between the two guards and the barbarian, both soldiers using swords while Raro channeled his recent learnings to use hand-to-hand combat. Sensing that he should warn the Count, the lithe guard began running back towards the study as Raro finished incapacitating his companion before giving chase.   While Raro had his fight outside the study, things took a turn for the worse inside. Deciding that they needed their own out and disinclined to accept the Count's offer, Gwen attempted to use a Charm person scroll on the Count now that he was alone. Had it worked, they would have simply asked for some evidence and strolled out unharmed. Unfortunately, the Count seemed unaffected by the spell and responded with a lightning-quick pair of rapier strikes against Gwen before backing himself against the door, dealing an unexpected amount of damage as Gwen felt a poison sink into her veins. Offended by not immediately aggressive, he offered them one more chance to leave before he struck them down. Vondal, spotting the house crier climbing the exterior ladder, cast Silence to prevent the man from causing problems before receiving a dagger to the shoulder as the Count responded to the spell being cast. Negotiations fully breaking down, the trio began fighting within the study, Blackwood showing a speed to his movements and strikes that rivaled Gwen's own skill with her blade. During the fight, Blackwood felt a slight rattling on the door and pulled it shut, not knowing who was outside.   Blackwood's efforts to keep the door shut were in vain, however, as an enraged Raro came barreling through the door, taking the lithe guard to the ground before curb-stomping the man into the floor. Seeing that there was violence already afoot, with both his companions injured-looking, Raro immediately joined the fray, and it became a three on one. Despite the numerical odds, Count Ciarti Blackwood proved a graver threat than they expected, critically injuring all members of the group and rendering them unconscious multiple times even as they landed hits on him. After the first time Raro went down, Blackwood did something odd by reaching down and stabilizing him, preventing Raro from passing into the afterlife. A strange lull in the combat arose as Blackwood proposed to Gwen and Vondal that they had one more chance to go, dropping their ill-gotten gains and leaving Raro as a prisoner. Shortly after this, the house herald entered the study and surveyed the situation before informing the Count that mass hysteria had broken out among the houseguests (a consequence of Raro's earlier adventures with the young servant) and inquired what the Count would have him do. Grimacing, Blackwood ordered the man to use the house guard to contain those who were uncontrollable and send home those still stable, and he'd attend to it when he could. After the man left, the two considered the Count's revised terms unacceptable and resumed the fight.   Raro was revived, though it came at the cost of Vondal going down himself. Conferring with each other, Gwen and Raro realized that Vondal's devotion to Thor meant he would never leave and considered retreat unacceptable, so the trio elected to utilize the Eversmoking Bottles to create a visual obstruction as Gwen and Raro made an exit after reviving Vondal and sending him off with a "Til Valhalla." Surprised by the rapidly-billowing smoke filling the room, the Count did not pursue the two fleeing members as they thought he might, but rather calmly walked over and, with a dual stab, sent Vondal back into the embrace of unconsciousness. He stepped to the balcony and watched the sprinting forms of Gwen and Raro disappear into the distance before reaching down to the stabilized Vondal and teleporting the two of them somewhere else.   Gwen and Raro, bleeding and battered, escaped the high walls of the Blackwood estate with creative usage of their last Eversmoking bottle and aided by the distraction at the house. Navigating the rough cliffside along the southern perimeter, they hurried back to the bush where they had stashed their gear and made the arduous climb back down to the dock, where Threri arrived just as they did. Boarding the Red Wave, Threri immediately asked where Vondal was, concern mixed with anger in her voice. Stating that things went south, and they were sorry, the pair made their way down to the lower decks as Threri set the ship to leave the narrow rocky channel and back to Navarre, where they hoped to gather themselves, find Elanis, and figure out their next moves. Whether Vondal was alive or dead, they had no idea, but they knew that they needed direction after the heist went south.   Vondal awoke, a serious headache raging as he took stock of his surroundings. Locked in a 5'x5'x5' stone alcove with 2" iron bars for the front wall, no door to speak of, a pitiful excuse for a straw cot taking up the back wall, and his disguise suit still tattered and slashed from the party. The next thing he noticed was that his Necklace of Prayer Beads, the Periapt of Wound Closure, and his necklace bearing the symbol of Thor were on a pile on the floor outside his cell, sitting next to a chair. The chair contained Count Blackwood, now wearing a simple but well-tailored suit instead of the military dress uniform he fought them in. The last thing of significance Vondal spotted was a being standing behind Count Blackwood, its head scraping the taller ceiling of the main room or cavern. Vondal was unable to tell what race or sex this figure was as every identifying feature was covered, but the sheer scale and build told him that it was not to be underestimated. A massive frame concealed beneath dark leather and metal armor, its large hands holding a pair of cestus with striking faces made of bits of blackened metal. Most unsettling was the face, hidden by something resembling a mask of tragedy but elongated, almost coming to an oval shape as it disappeared behind the heavy hood. The being did not move or give any indication it was alive as Count Blackwood leaned forward in his chair and said to Vondal, "Let's continue our conversation from earlier, Master Dwarf."

Rewards Granted

None, though Guinevere and Raro were able to escape with most of the materials the trio located in the vault.

Missions/Quests Completed

Elanis: Located and acquired the statuette, broach, and ring for the Obsidian Laurel. Still missing any evidence to link Count Ciarti Blackwood to the Hidden Hand.

Character(s) interacted with

Count Ciarti Blackwood: An enigmatic man, high-ranking officer in Timere's marine corps, and member of the Seabreeze Council. Tall and well-trimmed with a thin mustache and short black hair with flecks of grey. Paranoid and powerful, he's turned the Blackwood estate into a fortress to protect himself and his family. New information: The Count is also a formidable swordmaster, demonstrating his extreme proficiency with a poisoned rapier and daggers by thwarting the attempts of the C.U.M. to incapacitate him after a Charm Person scroll failed to sway him.   Sleepy Mark, Not Sleepy Mark: Members of 1st Company "Bastion." These two guards were the men posted on the balcony outside the Count's vault quarters. Both men were promoted to the afterlife after negotiations broke down.