CH. 16 - Resistance

[JadedDM]

Haahqae (Prefect's Mansion, 2F)
Moving forward, Haahqae tries the next door. It opens into a small room with a small firepit. To the side are some buckets and tinder. It looks like this room is designed for heating water, possibly for baths.

There are no other doors or windows in this room. It is unoccupied, and the firepit is currently cold.

[Haahque]

Haahqae will investigate the room to the east of the guards next.

[JadedDM]

Haahqae moves back, past the guarded room, to the two doors to the east. The southeastern one is locked, but the northeastern one is not. Peeking inside the northern one, he finds a mostly empty room with a large hole in the floor, and another directly above it in the ceiling, exposing the night sky. Looking down into the hole reveals it leads into the dining hall, right above the fire pit. Apparently, this room is one big chimney of sorts, allowing smoke to raise up and out from the fire pit below. Currently, the fire pit is cold, so no smoke is present, although the whole room smells rather smoky nonetheless, likely after years of exposure to it.

[HorizonsDream]

Deciding that she has had enough of Sadron, Kendra struggles against her bindings to see if she can get free from them.

[Haahque]

Haahqae will make his way over to room 32 and take a quick look around. If he doesn't see any guards, he'll decend the stairs and try to exit out into the hallway below, making his way through the bathhouse and down to join up with the others.

[BishGada]

Tulbas looks at William, "I was distracted before. Sorry. You don't need leverage on Kendra. She is a good woman who lost faith in herself. You just need to find your way to her. I'm sure all her faulty deeds lie heavy on her shoulders and she would do anything to redeem herself if she would believe she deserve it. If it's only guiding you around and not going on a suicide mission to kill us all, I believe she will do it. I think she has issues with that guy you left to watch her though. She might act stubborn only to annoy him... But I might be wrong about their relationship... I just have the few hours I spent here with them..."

[JadedDM]

Haahqae (Prefect's Mansion, 1F)
Haahqae does find two kapak guards in the west wing halls. They aren't guarding anything specific, just patrolling around and keeping an eye on things.

He easily bypasses them and descends to the first floor. From there, he cuts through the bathhouse, back into the kitchen, and down into the basement where he finds the others still waiting for him. William and Tulbas seem to be having a quiet conversation.

Kendra (Hidden Room, Sewers)
Kendra struggles against her bonds in vain. "Stop that," Sadron says warily. "You're going to reopen your wounds." Sure enough, while struggling, she feels a sudden sharp pain in her right arm. The clean bandage covering the wound there starts to turn red.

Tulbas and Gobax (Prefect's Mansion, Basement)
William shakes her head. "Alas, there was no time to try and reach her. She said she wouldn't help us, and I cannot force her to. Nor would I, had I the power. As for Sadron...I trust him to watch over her. Make sure she doesn't escape. Whatever history between them shouldn't interfere with that."

[Haahque]

"There's four more guards upstairs, all Kapaks. Two of them are patrolling around the western wing; but two of them are stationed in front of a set of double doors directly up from the entrance. I tried scouting around for other entrances into the room they're guarding; but unless there's a secret door anywhere the only way in is past those two guards. I've checked the are all the way to the walls of the mansion. Given the lack of other guarded doors on the second floor; I find it very likely that the prefect is there.

"Now about how to get there, we sort of have three options.

"If we take the direct route up by the front of the house; we'll pass the two guards by the entrance. Who knows; they might have more outside. But they'll be fairly close to doors we can ambush them from. That's the most direct route up to the second floor.

"If we take the west route; we'll pass by those two kapaks patrolling the second floor west wing. It might be difficult to slip this many past them without being noticed so we'd have to neutralize them somehow.

"Or I noticed a chimney we could climb up from the dining room which should bypass all the guards except the two near the prefect's room. But the chimney wasn't designed for climbing so we might need a ladder or some such to get up there. And also the room we'd be climbing into is quite close to the guards, so they might overhear us while we're still assembling our forces."

[JadedDM]

Haahqae, Tulbas and Gobax (Prefect's Mansion, Basement)
"I'd have thought there'd be more guards," Miriam notes.

"He's probably got most of his men sweeping the streets, looking for us," Fiona says. "He'd never expect us to attack his home right now."

William thinks the options over. "We want to try and avoid bringing the entire mansion on us at once. At least, not until it's too late and the prefect is already dead." He looks over the group assembled. "What do you all think? Which option is best?"

[HorizonsDream]

Kendra looks down at her reopened wound, then looks over to Sadron. "Then untie me."

[JadedDM]

Haahqae, Tulbas and Gobax (Prefect's Mansion, Basement)
"Unless we can take out the guards in front of the bedroom quickly and silently, it doesn't matter which route we take. The noise alone will likely catch the attention of any soldier nearby," Miriam points out.

"I can drop another spell of silence on them," William says. "But I can only do it once. Which means if I do, we won't be able to stop the prefect from spellcasting when we later encounter him. Nor the dragon, should we run afoul of it."

Kendra (Hidden Room, Sewers)
"And what will you do if I untie you?" asks Sadron as he changes the bandage. "Finish the job and kill me?"

[HorizonsDream]

Kendra lets out a sigh. "No," she says in annoyance. "It is the middle of the night, and I'm tired. Being tied like this is aggravating my wounds, which means that sleep is almost impossible in this state."

[Haahque]

"Being hidden is a significant advantage to taking one of the guards out quickly and silently, a well placed arrow usually does the trick. But there's no way I could take the second one out in time unless someone else came along with me quietly enough to not arouse suspicion."

"I could try to draw them away from the door; but in my experience the dragon-kin are too stupid to fall to the common ploys. I'm not certain what I could do or say that would lure them away from there."

"I could do something like light a fire on the other side of the house which might draw the guards away; but that might also draw far too much attention to the manor in general. Perhaps our best bet would be to try and barricade the doors as best I can before we act; so that we'll only have to deal with half of the guards"

The doors that Haahqae noticed between the center and the west wing; did they have keyholes with keys in them? Or if not; did they have keyholes and could he use 'open locks' to lock the doors?

[TristenC]

"I could attempt to immobilize them with a prayer, but if it fails they will be able to cry out."

[JadedDM]

Haahqae, Tulbas and Gobax (Prefect's Mansion, Basement)
Haahqae remembers that the doors did have keyholes, but there were no keys in them. He could theoretically reverse pick them, thus locking them. This might buy a little time before the guards were able to unlock them again.

To Gobax, William says, "It's risky. Draconians have a bad habit of shaking off any magic like water off a duck's back. That's why I suggested the silence, as it affects an entire area instead of specific individuals. Still, it might prove necessary, especially if more of them show up after the fact."

Kendra (Hidden Room, Sewers)
Sadron sighs. "Then you shouldn't be struggling," he points out. "Fine, I'll watch over your while you sleep," he says, before untying her.