Spreading the Word

Githyanki Bridgehead, Sar'Prime, 28th June 1656

Above, Eloy rained Word of Chaos spells cast from scrolls down on the Sarkrith to either side of the wedge, but it was apparent that both sides were becoming too badly mauled to fight more this day. The two lines seperated, each backing towards their own lines. As they did so, Gorfang and Eloy retrieved nearly a dozen wounded orcs, fending off the githwarriors who - like the Sarkrith - took no prisoners in this merciless war. Each was healed by Eloy, and once again the double-edged gift of Sabath's healing left agony and a tiny scorpion-shaped scar in its' wake.

Gorfang shook his blades toward the enemy one last time, then turned and stomped down the mound to where Eloy was finishing his ministrations. In each case, as they came around, their first reaction was horror and rage at having been healed with magic. Some seemed close to madness from fear at being "polluted by the taint", and some were clearly considering wounding themselves again in order to excise the corruption. Gorfang halted and spoke brusquely to them in their own archaic Orcish tongue, telling them they would be taken to his land ("the land of your ancestors", Eloy put in quietly, as he worked among the mortally wounded Githyanki nearby, saving those he could with spells and Bog's potions) to live as free orcs instead of slaves. Their view of normal was to soldier for the Sarkrith; Gorfang pointed out that as his vassals they would be directed only by orcs, would soldier where orcs desired, win treasure and females and keep some of them. Magic, he insisted, was not the abomination the Sarkrith claimed, but their heritage.

As he spoke, Eloy quietly cast a Calm Emotions spell, easing the orcs' horror and despair at being touched by magic enough for them to listen to Gorfang's words. When the Master of Weapons concluded with, "Will you follow me, or am I wasting my time?" the nine orcs tenatively nodded acceptance.

Nine was a good start, but not exactly a horde. "How are we going to get the message across to more of them?" asked Eloy. Gorfang glanced across the battlefield to where the fighting continued, as ever, at the edge of the bridgehead. "Ideally, I want to release them back into the enemy army," he said thoughtfully. "to spread the message. We need to talk to General Vanazha."

The prisoners nominated one Glufrag as their spokesman. He held a position roughly equivalent to Sergeant in the slave-army, though after speaking with him Gorfang judged he would make a fine general with training and a change of attitude. They walked over to where the Gith general's command post stood, and Gorfang introduced them, noticing how tense the Githwarriors around the map table were at the close proximity of an 'enemy' soldier.

He sketched out his plan to re-insert the nine converts into the ranks to raise an insurrection. Glufrag sketched a map of as much of Sar'Prime as he knew, locating nearby cities - both Sarkrith and slave-race. He explained that each city was guarded by slave troops from a different city, and that the penalty for any resistance at once city was the extermination of the guards' home city. Examples existed, and he marked their ruins on the map. His home city, Unnlor, was ten miles due south of their position and guarded by ogres from Wyria.

Finally he marked dotted lines across the map. These indicated the lines of g’narf’taelic’dula - the vast mithril-plated spheres that generated the anti-magic field that blanketed the entirety of the Sarkrith homeworld.

After some discussion a plan emerged. The nine converts would be knocked unconcious and left on the battlefield to be 'rescued', and would spread the word that willing orcs could escape to a better life. Gorfang and Eloy would attempt to repeat the process in a different sector with the ogres of Wyria. The signal for readiness would be given by the Gith illusionists, who would produce an impressive-looking but harmless blast of magic with a strong pink colouration (not a usual shade!), on which the orcs (and, hopefully, ogres) wishing to desert would pretend to be stunned, go down, and play possum. The Gith forces, pre-warned, would roll over the 'stunned' troops without their usual response of slaying the wounded and incapacitated, and the deserters would then be collected and quietly ushered away from the front lines.

Eloy chuckled. "I take it orcs and ogres aren't colourblind then?" he said. Glufrag and Gorfang gave him a flat and very similar look, but the Man in the Shadows wasn't fazed. They left Glufrag talking over the details of the signals with the Gith illusionmaster - the two were getting on surprisingly well considering - and went to look at the maps to find an ogre sector.

Two hours later, Gorfang and Eloy stood at the top of a monstrous mind-built earthwork looking down at another battlefield. A company of Githwarriors was drawn up behind them; the survivors of the wedge Gorfang had led into the first battle. His success in the first battle, plus Eloy's healing of some of them, had generated considerable respect among these wierd soldiers, and they had asked to be included in his next mission. Yavara was also there, now completely recovered from the beating Gorfang had given him.

Looking down across the battlefield, the Master of Weapons saw a pattern emerging. To his eyes, it was almost as if there were invisible lines of string across the blocks of troops; lines of control, the threads of direction and reporting. They converged to a point, and without checking he could tell that this was where the Sarkrith general for the sector was located. His eyes narrowed. If he was going to impress the ogres, breaking through to that man and killing him was the way to do it.

The major difference here was the presence of the sphere. Just over the Sarkrith lines, a vast glittering ball of the g’narf’taelic’dulastood on a pylon of some alien metal, radiating the suppression of magic across the whole area. To the north and west could be seen in the distance the next ones in the chain; west and south - within the bridgehead - they were gone, demolished by the Githyanki. Eloy and Gorfang felt the now-familiar absences of all their many magics, excepting only the powers of their Khabran Regalia and, oddly, the gift of ta'nara.

Eloy clicked his fingers. "If I go null", he said, "I could get across to that and bring it down; that would tip the odds a bit." He turned to Yavara. "How easy is it to knock one of those things down?" he asked. The Gith began to explain, then paused and reached a finger toward Eloy's forehead. "May I?" he asked. Eloy nodded, and the finger touched. Thoughts and images sleeted across his mind, fed in from outside in a waterfall of information, gathered from those Gith who'd participated in bringing down the mighty spheres. In an instant he knew the entire structure of the great constructions, including the weakest points that could be attacked to destroy its' balance. He grinned at Gorfang. "Give me three hours," he said, and - after dashing off a quick and heartfelt prayer to Sabath for a dose of His deviousness - disappeared into the spaces between the atoms of the universe.

Eloy on the pylon - click it for larger image!

Undetectable as he was, the transit of the battlefield was achievable for Eloy, though still fraught with danger. No combatant could see or sense him, so he was safe from being selected as a target; but stray arrows, backswings, and staggering fighters could still intersect with his location by accident - and he had none of his defensive enchantments under the shadow of the magic suppressing sphere. As a result, it took him nearly half an hour to make his way across to the sphere.

On arrival. he was a little surprised to find Sarkrith warriors under the pylon and spaced at intervals within the webwork of metal, guarding the structure. These, though, had no more hope of finding him than the fighters, and he climbed quickly into the maze of metal struts that supported the vast globe of the g’narf’taelic’dula. Glancing around to match what he was seeing with his acquired memories, he set to work.

Standing on the top of the earthwork, watching the battle unfold beneath him, Gorfang considered. It had been at least three hours since Eloy had set off. His troops were restive, glances at him betraying puzzlement at his holding them back from battle for so long, their memories of Eloy temporarily excised by the magic of nullity. Suddenly, a mighty metallic groan echoed across the battlefield, loud enough to be heard over the roar and clamour of strife. It came again, and soldiers on both sides paused to look up at the obvious cause of the sound. The third time, the noise didn't stop, and to it were added tearing and snappings, and the zingof parting hawsers. With slow, ponderous grace, the vast glittering ball of the sphere tilted sideways, leaning further and further towards the battle as the pylon on that side crumpled beneath it. Suddenly, something major sheared, and the ball was rushing earthwards. It struck with a devastating noise, vastly louder than the sound of the fighting. For a moment it seemed to squash and bulge at the sides as its' mass pressed down on the lower edge; then suddenly the structure gave way and the spherical shape collapsed. The force of the collapse was such that great chunks and shards were hurled outwards in all directions, scything through the Sarkrith ranks from the rear, felling many and demoralizing more.

Eloy fought his breathing and heart-rate down towards normal. The collapse had come suddenly as he worked at the girders, and he'd spent several heart-stopping moments scrambling through the churning mass of collapsing girders as the pylon disintegrated. Only the return of magic to his Ring of Flying had saved him from crushing by allowing him to turn invisible and soar out of the wreck.

Gorfang Charges - click it for larger image!

As the diminishing echoes of the wreck rolled away across the plain, Gorfang lifted his arm, feeling the khopesh draw it as the magic returned. "Charge!" he howled in the bizzare Gith language. Below, light and sound flared as the githwarriors already fighting reacted to the removal of the antimagic by hurling their arcane attacks at the Sarkrith. Taken aback by this on top of the casualties from the globe's fall, the reptiles began to waver. Gorfang's wedge smashed into the Sarkrith front line.

The peculiar sun was beginning to set as Gorfang's now-diminished wedge crested a slight rise to where they could look down on the command post of the Sarkrith general Vraspi. It had taken them a whole day's bloody fighting to cut their way through to this position; now, only the general's bodyguard stood between them and their target.

All through the long day, Eloy had flown invisibly above the Sarkrith lines. Gorfang's reading of the flow of command had shown him where to look, and as the Sarkrith general had issued orders and sent messengers sprinting out across the field, so had Eloy shot them down among the ranks of bewildered soldiers. The loss of direction had taken its' toll, the co-ordination of the Sarkrith army fading faster and faster. Now, poised above the wedge, he readied his spells to support his orcish comrade's assault.

The ring of massive thanes around General Vraspi was slashed in two as a Wall of Fire slashed across behind the commander. Thanes screamed and roasted in its path, others scattering out of the heat and weakening the defensive ring. Gorfang, covered in gore from helm to heel, sprinted across the open ground between the wedge and the bodyguard and tore into the general's defenders. Hacking and slashing with both blades, the Master of Weapons scattered the bodyguards like skittles. His momentum broke him through their lines and on to the general himself.

Vraspi was a huge thane, a head taller than his bodyguards, and his six-foot greatsword was ready in his scaled hands as the orc hurtled towards him. It did him no good. Leaping into the air over the corpse of a felled bodyguard, Gorfang levelled a terrifying blow at the Sarkrith. The reptile's skull disintegrated competely under the impact, and his lifeless body sprawled across his command post.

As the surviving bodyguards scattered, Gorfang looked towards the distant ogre battalions, and was fairly sure that his deed had not gone unwitnessed. They, like the rest of the Sarkrith forces in this sector, were now retreating and regrouping. Scattered pockets of cut-off troops were being mopped up by the Githyanki, and Gorfang and Eloy hurried over to the largest of these. As they did so, the Man in the Shadows prepared another spell.

"Ogres! Your slavemasters have abandoned you, and only death awaits at the hands of the Gith. I, however, offer you a new home, and a new cause, and freedom. Capitulate to me. Here are my credentials!" He held up the helmet (and few remnants of head) of General Vraspi, just as Eloy's Greater Command spell kicked in. Most of the front rank dropped their weapons. About half were promptly cut down by their neighbors, but a massive nine-foot brute who seemed to be in charge reasserted order. This was Shathil, senior surviving sergeant, and once Gorfang offered to fight him, and Eloy had Bluffed him, he agreed to join the growing empire of Gadhuvras.

Session Date: 5th June 2012