Freeport Campaign

Rewards Earned

• Experience Points: 1800
• Treasure: 8 large heavy crossbows; 4 huge cutlasses; 4 huge greatclubs
• Unidentified magic items: rapier; studded leather armor; cloak; bag; 2 potions

After Ivan recovered his strength and woke back up, the party stayed up late into the night swapping stories with him, and finally turned in to get some rest before tacking the mystery of the darkened lighthouse. The next day, a message arrived addressed to the leaders of Poisson, demanding a ransom of 50,000 gold pieces for control of the lighthouse to be returned to the village. Ivan pointed out that the author of the note, one Black Molly, was a sea hag known to be a vicious pirate who led a crew of ogres and had a reputation for leaving few captives alive.

As Black Molly must have known, the village leaders had no way to come up with the exorbitant ransom, so the group renewed their promise to investigate the matter. They decided to rest up during the afternoon and evening, and to approach the lighthouse under cover of darkness sometime between midnight and dawn. They made sure to fix the location of the lighthouse, roughly a quarter of a mile out to sea, in their minds before sunset, so as to avoid missing the thing in the dark. Confident that they could find the structure later, they swapped more stories with Ivan and headed to bed.

Thick fog had moved in by the time they awoke, so they were sodden when they finally arrived at the lighthouse by means of Richard’s wind walk spell and some careful navigation. They positioned themselves beneath an overhang at one end of the island so that they could discuss their options out of sight of the lighthouse. While the rest of the group remained insubstantial, Balama materialized and tried to hide as best she could before summoning an arcane eye to survey the situation in the lighthouse. Unfortunately, although she tried to cast quietly, her voice carried in the fog. The group heard a couple of deep voices talking at the top of the lighthouse, and watched as a cask of oil smashed to the ground, followed by a dropped torch.

The party watched silently as a pair of ogres emerged from the lighthouse and made a circuit of the small island on which the structure stood. Apparently seeing nothing out of the ordinary, the ogres went back inside and closed the one door to the lighthouse.

Alarmed at the close call, Balama had to calm down for a moment before sending the arcane eye toward the lighthouse. A quick look revealed a couple of ogre guards at the top of the tower, a few more in various rooms inside the lighthouse, three inert humanoid forms in a room on the third floor, and Black Molly herself poring over a set of nautical charts in a library on the third floor. These revelations set off another conversation amongst the group, which again brought unwanted attention from the ogres in the lighthouse. This time, however, the ogres were more persistent in their search of the island, and forced the party into acting.

Spike and Richard slowly materialized out of their insubstantial forms to surprise the pair of ogre guards who were menacing Balama, while Chow wafted to the top of the tower to assess the situation there. After Spike and Richard make quick work of the ogres, Balama grabbed the two sailors and used a dimension door spell to step instantly into the library. Unfortunately, Black Molly had moved elsewhere in the building, leaving a couple of ogre henchmen to greet the party. Chow materialized by the side of the lighthouse and soon joined the rest of the group by kicking in the library’s window.

The pair of ogres in the library fell quickly, so the group headed out to search the rest of the third floor. Another couple of ogres put up some resistance in the adjacent room to the right of the library, while Chow heard pottery being smashed in the room to the left. During the fight among the oil cisterns in the next room, the party heard one of the huge bells at the top of the lighthouse begin tolling. Not sure of the bell’s portent, the group resolved to finish clearing the lighthouse as quickly as possible. As though summoned, Black Molly chose that moment to make her appearance.

The sea hag charged from a door at the other end of the cistern room with another pair of ogre henchmen. She shot vile looks at the party as she closed with them, but Spike, Richard, and Balama shrugged and glared right back. Spike in particular seemed to feed off the hag’s rage and finally seemed to shake off the slump that had affected him for the past few months. Within moments, numerous ogres lay dead by his hand and he turned his attention to Molly. The hag attempted to flee up the stairs, but Richard stepped into the doorway and calmly blocked her progess with a conjured wall of stone. The trapped pirate tried again to harm her attackers with her evil eye and claws, but she succumbed quickly to the party’s combined magic and steel.

Meanwhile, Chow, remembering that Balama had seen the slumped humanoid forms in the room where pottery was still being smashed, headed back through the library to check on the lighthouse keepers. As soon as he opened the door from the library, he had to dodge a crossbow bolt from the ogre on the other side of the room. Ignoring numerous other bolts, Chow dragged the bodies of the lighthouse keepers away from the oil fire that the ogre had previously set. In the meantime, the rest of the party closed on the ogre and slew him without incident.

The group moved quickly to put out the fires with the bags of sand conveniently placed in the room for just such an eventuality, while Richard checked on the lighthouse keepers. Two had died in the fire, but Richard managed to heal the third well enough that the man could walk.

A quick sweep of the lighthouse turned up no further opposition, but while they were investigating the lookout loft at the top of the tower, the party heard the distinctive splash and swish of oars. Telling the lighthouse keeper to stay put, they scrambled outside and arrayed themselves to meet whatever was approaching through the fog.

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