After several weeks off while people had holidays and various bouts of not feeling well, we managed to get everyone together this week for the second session of Dungeons and Dragons I’m running with some colleagues from work, as well as Lady M and the boy s. We’d left them in the middle of a fight with two apprentices and their animated champions: a small shrub, and a broom. Chaos and hilarity ensued as the broom flew around the room smacking people as it passed, and people variously tried to grab and wrestle it into submission.

Lila, a thief with an extensive knife collection, was able to intercept one of the pair of miscreants and pin him to the wall. She told him to get his shrubbery under control, but at more or less the same time the cleric Wilhelm cast cause light wounds on it and it shrivelled away to dust.

The artificer, Xander, was knocked unconscious by the broom, but was stabilised by Pan before Caitriona (the other cleric) arrived and got them back on their feet. The distraction was enough for the second apprentice to flee to the other side of the chamber and say something into a rune-carved stone that he produced from his pocket. Moments later, a shadowy portal appeared in the air and a gaunt hand pulled him through. The portal promptly disappeared.

As a distraction, Xander imbued the broom with a fart-generating property – and blamed it on their concussion. Between them, in the meantime, Pan and Caitriona were able to smash the broom into several now-noisy segments.

The captured minion confessed that he and his companion had been practicing the animation spells to gain the favour of “The Maester” who had promised them power and work if they could manage it. He was offered a job in the kitchens of Wilhelm’s husband’s mansion and allowed to leave – and was last seen running as fast as he could. A few moments’ collective thought identified the portal as having been the manifestation of a dimension door spell – which meant that the Maester would have to have been at most 500 feet away. With no obvious additional ways out however, the group decided to gather up the abandoned book that they had been sent to retrieve and return it to the Morgrave University Library. They then gathered back at the inn on the campus before going their separate ways.

Wilhelm informed everyone that his husband had extended an invitation to them all to attend a black-tie event with rare book dealers who may be able to provide more information on missing books – or indeed this mysterious Maester.

We’ll be regrouping in two weeks’ time, and I’ve told the players there will be downtime activities to resolve and to think of what they might like to do with that time.