Session 30: In the Malyk of it all

The Stormhorn Guardians caught their breath at last. The preacher of Malyk lay slain, the cultists defeated, and their converted villagers still shaken and less than grateful. Almost immediately, the villagers began to shuffle toward the door, desperate to flee.   Lucky would not allow it. With a sharp incantation, he sent them tumbling into unnatural sleep, their escape barred by the Guardians. When one burly man was shaken awake, he rounded on Solas with fire in his eyes, demanding to be freed, his daughter was out there, and night was falling. “They come at night, mostly.”   The argument was fierce. In the end, Solas relented. The man stumbled into the streets as the sun sank, the door closing behind him, shadows lengthening over Eveningstar.   The others were roused by Orla, the elderly woman, who coaxed them to their feet and tried to calm their fears. Yet before order could return, a sound behind the stairs drew attention. There, bound beneath a ladder leading upward, a cloaked figure thrashed and motioned desperately with his head.   Erdan Nailo. His bonds were cut, his breath freed, and his first frantic gesture was to point upstairs, to the linen closet on the first floor, where a cultist had just fled. Lucky and Bob tore after him, cornering him at last upon the rooftop. A small chest clutched to his chest, the cultist backed to the edge.   “Drop it!” they demanded. And so he did, tossing the chest to the cobbles below. A heartbeat later he leapt himself, Feather Fall shimmering. He drifted down like a feather on the wind, until Lucky’s Sleep spell struck once more. The cultist landed softly on the stones below, snoring… but not for long. The shadows of Eveningstar converged, Thornspawn dragging him screaming into the alleys.   From the high vantage of the rooftop, Bob and Lucky saw more shapes moving with purpose. Slowly, deliberately, the tower was being surrounded.   Inside, Erdan searched frantically for his stolen kit, found at last in the dining room, just as Thornspawn began to close in. Smaller ones darted, clawing at windows, while a hulking Briarbound smashed through the door, overturning a table onto itself before tearing it aside in fury.   The crash drew the Guardians together. Solas and Erdan held the line, arrows singing from the Elf’s bow, holy light blazing from the cleric’s hands. Daylight seared through the stairwell, holding the Thornspawn at bay. One by one they fell, until a massive Briarbound lurched through, only to be struck near-headless by Erdan’s arrow, finished as Solas ducked beneath a final shot that pierced its eye.   A way upstairs was clear, and not a moment too soon.   The front doors burst. A towering armoured skeleton ducked into the chamber, the same Harbinger that had nearly ended the Guardians before. It had come to claim Solas’s life, answering the bargain struck by Famine and Despair. With a single motion, the Harbinger dragged Solas into its grasp, the Thornspawn snapping and clawing at his heels.   Above, Shadow shepherded the panicked villagers toward the roof. Their climb was hopeless, one slipped twenty feet and broke his neck. Cursing, Shadow abandoned the ropes, ferrying the survivors himself. From the north, an explosion rocked the town, proof that they were not alone in their battle for survival this night.   Downstairs, Solas fought for his life, shielding himself against Famine’s hunger and the claws of the horde. He glimpsed an alternate future, his body split by the Harbinger’s blade. With divine resolve, he forced his way through, shield shattering under the might of the blow.   Erdan’s arrows cut down more foes as Bob and Lucky hurled themselves into the fray. Lucky danced back, acrobatic and defiant, but Famine was ready. The blade dropped as Lucky twisted away, impaling him mid-spin, lifting him from the ground like a rag doll. Thrown aside, his blood spattered the stones, yet he breathed, kept alive by some unseen saviour.   Bob roared forward. With the press of walls and the Guardians’ fury upon him, Famine dissolved into dust, retreating to strike another day.   But the fight was not done. Thornspawn poured through windows, climbing the tower, clawing the stairs. One by one the Guardians fought their way upward. Shadow hauled the last of the villagers onto the roof, four souls clinging to life upon the Harbinger of Hope.   Then the tide crashed over them. Lucky, impaled and bleeding, was dragged down again beneath the tide of claws. His breath fled, only for divine light to blaze upon him. Holy fire seared his wounds closed, life restored once more. For the final time, he rose.   Together they struck back, Erdan’s arrows, Solas’s Guiding Bolt, eldritch blasts tearing through the last of the Thornspawn. Below, Famine’s hollow gaze turned upward, hunting for a way to reach them. But the Guardians had no intention of falling this night.   Ropes were hauled, wings of magic lifted. One by one they reached the airship above, the Harbinger of Hope. As the darkness below seethed and writhed, Lucky leaned over the side, spitting defiantly toward the Harbinger that had sought his end.   Erdan, Lucky, Bob, Shadow, and Solas collapsed upon the deck, bloodied, battered, alive. Not entirely safe, but alive. As they gathered themselves, Orla shuffled forward, rummaged in a bag, and with the calm of an old woman who had seen too much, muttered: “Now then. Let’s get the kettle on.”
What now for the guardians - in Session 31: Banned on the run