In the event, O Magister, that your attention has been somewhat diverted from the course of recent events, we left, to the thinly disguised relief of the monks, pious and chaste, of the formerly inestimably hospitable Deepingrun Abbey, a veritable well of priceless and irreplaceable knowledge before our arrival, more an exploration of the ruins resulting from the assault of a battering ram and a volley of flaming arrows upon a small wayside inn at the time of our departure; intending to move, journeying in the direction often referred to a south by travelers of every stripe, on to the trading crossroads of Blesingdell. Once there, we had every intent to join the merchant train of one Captain Byrne, under the employ of Antoine Hucreole (sp?) of Oakhurst, a truly splendid little hamlet with an unfortunate location in relative proximity to the line of travel chosen by our merry band. After re-equipping and readying our group for the hazards of the road, we were to accompany Captain Byrne's caravan to the south, serving as men-at-arms and 'hired swords', as goes the vernacular, as far as the southern Dalelands, where we had meant to part company with the merchant train to strike out for our intended destination, the much lauded, Silverhall.

All well and good, except we had forgotten that we were being doggedly pursued by Commander Noh Riddick and his company of Black Talons, a group not widely known for having a great affection with our intrepid protagonists. Commander Riddick had arrived in Blesingdell ahead of us, undoubtedly because of our unintentional delay at Deepingrun Abbey. The Commander had notified the chaps of the city watch of Blesingdell of our passage through the area, even going so far as to provide them with a wanted poster supplying our names and several detailed descriptions of the appearance of several members of our group.

Upon our arrival at the gates of Blesingdell, we gave the militia our names and waited as instructed in a small watchtower just to the side of the gateway. Thelisn found the time useful to begin assembling a list of the goods he would be looking for while we were waiting to depart with the merchant train. Hornwood, a dwarf of little patience and less good judgment, as you will come to understand, rapidly growing tired of the delay, decided to busy himself with a bit of target practice, an idea to which Tsaran (having had his fill of keeping an alert watch through a convenient arrow slit) readily subscribed to.

That's when it hit the fan, as the phrase often goes.

Finding the door to the tower locked from the outside, we decided it would be most prudent to seek other egress. Finding the only other as securely door locked as the first, we were most concerned. Thelisn, deciding that his shopping list could wait without incident, left the very wanted poster mentioned above on the table, his unfinished shopping itinerary neatly penned on the reverse. Producing a rather suspicious alternative to the actual key, the elf (being a creature of what we'll address as 'creative means' hereafter) proceeded to allow the door a greater freedom in fulfilling its intended purpose. That done, several members of our stalwart group moved beyond said portal, to look about the heretofore unexplored remainder of the tower's interior for a means of achieving much preferable position outside.

Now, if you follow the progress of our various and sundry heroes, you will find that they were somewhat less than successful in finding an exit from the watchtower in either the cellar below the initial starting point of the 'waiting room' (hereafter,) as well as the 'barracks' (hereafter) surmounting aforementioned 'waiting room'. To continue, Tsaran, a fighter, brave and strong, found what appeared to be a window in the wall of the 'barracks'. Deciding that, with nothing better to while away the time and an exit from the watchtower not forthcoming, it would be the best course of action to resume his alert watch from the new and decidedly more favorable vantage point of the window in the 'barracks'. Simultaneously, Thelisn, apparently still confident that his shopping list, still waiting patiently for the return of its author, could just continue to wait until he was jolly well ready to take pen in hand once more, and proceeded upwards via a clever combination of ladder and trap door placed in the ceiling of the 'barracks'. The dwarf of little patience and less good judgment seemed just delighted enough by the antics of the elf of creative means to follow him to what would eventually prove to be an utopia of mischief upon the roof of the watchtower.

At this point, the fighter, brave and strong, made it known that, after a long and vigilant observance of the town of Blesingdell, his efforts on our behalf had borne bitter fruit, and that an individual bearing all the trappings of the Black Talons mentioned above (fig 1a.) was approaching the very watchtower in which we found ourselves unable to find a suitable means of departure from. O, bother!

Well, when they received this notice, the balance of our heroes decided to a man to depart the 'waiting room' so as to gather our forces in the 'barracks'. In no time at all, once our assembled group was all present and accounted for in the 'barracks', the fighter, brave and strong, an enlisted the aid of Alain, a paladin, noble and true, in moving a writing desk (an unattractive example of the type, being, shall we say, more functional that beautiful) to a position much better for blocking the motion of the door at the top of the stairs to the 'barracks' from the 'waiting room' below.

Now O Magister, if you are following closely, you will remember that both Thelisn, the elf of creative means and Hornwood, the dwarf of little patience and less good judgment, as you will come to understand, had taken up advantageously defensible position upon the roof of the watchtower. WELL, just as the members of the group of Black Talons under the command of that decisive fellow Riddick, the one with the poster upon which Thelisn had abandoned his literary work to the whims of fate in the 'waiting room', the very ones that had arrived in the town of Blesingdell in advance of our hardy adventurers, were themselves taking up a somewhat less defensible but still admirable position (should the situation turn, as it inevitably would, from grim to Most Dire) immediately surrounding the watchtower. At that exact moment, Hornwood, who, as I have mentioned before, is a dwarf of little patience and less good judgment, as you will come to understand, apparently remembered his original plan of having a bit of target practice, and released a perfectly straight and well-made arrow from the tightly drawn string of his rather stout and sturdy bow, and *CAW!* placed a very well-aimed and as-close-to-perfectly-timed-as-I-have-seen shot into a most assuredly slow and now undoubtedly sorry member of Commander Noh Riddick's company of Black Talons! Understand now?

So, to shrewdly trade rather a long story for a vastly preferable brief summation, a something-or-other official of the militia of Blesingdell arrived on the scene to calm the matter down a bit. She was an impressive one. All serious and businesslike and not at all pleased with the sticky bit of mess that was going on at the gate. She was quite unflappable, even in the face of the noble and true paladin's, unyielding arguments about the interpretation of several points of jurisdiction and code of conduct, and insisted on taking the dwarf of little [remaining hit points] and less [hope of getting out of this with all his digits still in a close working relationship with his hand] into authoritative custody, and sending the balance of our heroes on their way to wherever they would go to do whatever they would like with themelves. When it eventually became unfailingly clear that Hornwood was going to have to have pay a rather expensive and insistent piper no matter how many times he tried to throw himself onto the spears of the Blesingdell militia, Alain, being a paladin, and, as a matter of course, noble and true, took it upon himself to accompany his rash and battered companion into the steely hands of authority. No one else, in the eye of the casual observer, thought of that as a wise or prudent course of action, and chose instead to take to their heels as instructed and refrain from entering the town of Blesingdell for at least the immediate future.

Thus, here we, meaning the balance of our group after the removal of one paladin, through and through noble and true, and one dwarf of impressive motivation but rather uninspired restraint, and the addition of a Brother Armondo, a monk, pious, chaste and unobtrusive, whom I have most egregiously but of complete unintention left out of the tale up to now, standing just outside of the now closed and barred wooden gates of the town of Blesingdell. Caw.

There's a good familiar - have some dried corn.