The Scepter (I've Lain With Kent Ax)

The clergy of Deep Sashelas welcomed the castaways to the Temple of the Waves, a multi-level complex carved into the stone cliffs of Orlumbor. They were greeted by Jabby, an earnest young gnome and Dwyer, a middle-aged human. They wrapped the party in wool blankets and called for an elderly priestess, Galandra, to take them upstairs for a bowl of fisherman's broth in the tavern. Galandra turned out to be a whisperer, and when asked to speak up she would overcompensate. With Safad poisoned, and everyone else wounded and spent, it was a little jarring. But the broth warmed them up and the stone tavern's fire fended off the last of the spring chill coming off the ocean. 

As they slurped their soup, Safad reflected on what it might mean to be seek to champion a good and wholesome goddess like Arumbelle while often acting like...well, like Felak'Doun. Falka was taken aback: killing is not the domain of Felak'Doun. Animals kill, in fact, and wasn't she herself barely more than a feral beast, embracing her wild side and harnessing its power, mind you, to seek vengeance for Zireael and to stop at nothing to find justice for those who enthralled them all!? Safad acknowledged the point, and the party understood his message as well -- to find more black and white lines of morality and ethics in the grey morass that was adventuring. 

Galandra's eyes widened but it may have been a chunk of pepper in her stew. She then explained in her whisper-yell that Orlumbor was a shipbuilding island, fiercely independent and relied upon by all sorts of powers along the Sword Coast and even the Sea of Fallen Stars for the quality of their ships. The party gathered that the town was made up of a number of groups: the joiners (shipwrights), dockers (laborers), guilders (merchants), farmers, and clergy. They all got along well and worked together to ensure the prosperity of the island and to maintain its open-mindedness and independence. 

"So, you're, uh, not part of the Lord's Alliance?" Falka asked.

"Oh no, dear," Galandra said softly. Ironica breathed a quiet sigh. 

And that's when they heard the sounds of many booted feet running through the streets. An alarm went up. A weary patron grabbed a woodcutter's axe he had resting by the hearth and flung open the door. He looked outside, looked at the party, and asked, "Ain't ye coming!? It's the general defense alarm! All hands! Come on, I see you're armed to your teeth, we're nothing but a volunteer militia--we need you!"

Galandra whispered something and ran off down into the interior of the Temple below. 

Well, shit, no rest for the weary. 

Falka, Dala'gse, Ironica, Safad, Rya, ran toward the door. Slothrop finished his stew and joined them. Best see what this was all about then.

They followed the chaotic scamper of the townspeople herding toward the island-side gate, joining the flow of bodies coursing through the cobbled streets. 

As they approached, a hush had fallen over those assembled. The party maneuvered to get a view over the wall--or, fence, really, was more apt. Beyond, they saw a line of heavily-armed humanoids--humans, elves, bugbears, orcs, goblins--all rag-tag in their get up, but brandishing weapons meaningfully. At their center was a handsome, brawny wood elf holding a hefty bow in one hand. He took a step forward and called out to the assembled Orlumbor militia.

“Send us an orc named Kent Ax and we will return to the Trollbarks!--"

The party heard some of the assembled murmur, "so it is the Trollbark Reclamation Project! But what are they doing here? They're the good guys!" 

“--and if you send us all of your homosexuals we will leave and promise never to return!" the wood elf continued. 

Someone next to the queasy Safad muttered, "That's Acklan Ro, that is. They say he's the best shot between Waterdeep and Baldur's gate." 

But who was Kent Ax? 

Everyone looked around, and heads started to turn toward a burly orc with subtle fangs and sad eyes who was making his way through the crowd. Whispers went up around him as he walked calmly through the crowd. 

The orc spoke, in a lightly-accented Common, "I am Kent Ax, a docker here. I know these fools, and I will go. Save your fighting for another day, friends." 

Kent reached the gate and looked out. A smile crossed Acklan Ro's face from across the would-be battlefield. 

"These people took me in when you cast me out, Acklan. Do them no harm, I will come on my own," Kent shouted.  

A man with soft hands and fine clothes disconcertingly holding a roughshod cudgel reached out and grabbed Kent by the arm. 

"No, Kent, you are one of us," the man said, and then stepped forward and called to the host assembled. 

"Kent Ax is an honorable docker here on Orlumbor, if you have quarrel with him, you have quarrel with this town."

Acklan Ro sneered and his troops adjusted their stances and grips on their weapons. "So you harbor this man, this aberration, who would practice the unnatural--even while we seek to remove the unnatural forces corrupting our dear Trollbark Forest?" 

The guilder stood taller, Kent's eyes begged him to stop and to go home, but the guilder looked around and a few heads nodded. He smiled and yelled back, "I never understood why anyone would add constraints to their lives with made up rules, particularly around love-making," the man laughed. "Orlumbor is a free and independent city and we will remain so, and that includes who we choose to lie with!"

Acklan was angered, "Send us Kent, and your homosexuals, and we will return to our forest," he called through gritted teeth. 

Kent held out his arms, and said, "Enough, I go alone. Leave these people." He began walking toward the TRP army. 

The guilder watched him go a few paces then gripped his cudgel and called out,

"I've lain with Kent Ax!"

Silence. The ocean wind whistled through the gate, someone's leather armor creaked. 

Acklan looked at the guilder. Kent's shoulder's slumped. Falka gripped her bow tighter. Safad gasped for anyone who knew how to cure poison. Dala'gse watched a caterpillar work it's way along the wood of the wall. Ironica began slipping silently through the crowd. 

Acklan yelled, "Then you too, come along, then, aberration!" 

A half-elf man stepped forward.

"I've lain with Kent Ax!" he yelled. 

Two more joined in, "I've lain with Kent Ax!" they yelled. 

Acklan's eyes tried to track them all. 

A woman this time, jogged to where Kent was standing, grabbed his arm, and joined the chorus, "I've lain with Kent Ax!" 

A chorus that turned into a crescendo went out through the town, for a solid minute, the words, "I've lain with Kent Ax," echoed around the narrow streets. 

Falka and Dala'gse joined and yelled out, "I've lain with Kent Ax!" Falka brandished her longbow. 

The guilder joined Kent and the woman in front of the gate, took Kent's other arm, and called out to Acklan, "So you see, you want Kent? You want the gays? We're all gay!"

The assembled TRP army was restless now, clanging their weapons. Eager. They looked toward Acklan Ro, who set is face in stone and said quietly, "Fine. So be it. Then you will all die." He appraised his army and lifted his right hand high above his head. Something he held glinted off the morning sunlight. 

It was a black scepter, carved from volcanic rock.