Category: Blades in the Dark: Actual Play Reports

Blood on Silk: Episode 4 – Father

So I started a new job recently which has cut into my free time, so the last two episodes have been rolled together into one mega-episode filled with suspense, guilt, and a character death.

The Dusters, having sold their first real major deal, sat back in the luxury of coin and comfort. Yet the ambitious crew of hawkers were not content with their initial earnings and looked to capitalize on their good fortune so far. Nearby their ruined lair within Six Towers, the crew learned of a good area to hide their stash and use to secure their goods and hold onto excess. The rumors were that a group of masked thieves known as The Wraiths were using it as a staging ground between their heists, keeping their goods there before being sold to a buyer. Spying on the place, Lagertha the Lurk noticed that there were two ways in; a sewer entrance that required a boat or somewhere inside of a cottage.

Deciding to enter in through the cottage, the group would infiltrate through there and try to pass by undetected. The Dusters, used to their incredible fortune, took the riskiest route and suffered their first Desperate engagement. The camera focused inside the cottage, where are sophisticated trapdoor was set up and ready. Using a strange, clockwork design, the trapdoor had to be aligned right. However, arcane sigils were marked on the outside and trying to disable the trap incorrectly would cause the sigils to explode. With the help from Atiya the Whisper, the crew’s Lurk was able to align the trapdoor correctly but not without activating a second ward, one that sent a ping through the ghost field and awoke something down below.

The group descended into the sewers below, led by Torvald and his trusty Kritter named Runt. They passed through a labyrinth of sewers passages and newly created tunnels and artificial blockages. The passing was slow and plodding, even with Thaddeus the Spider’s blueprints. The group also heard this awful bell chiming throughout, a bell that resonated somehow wrong within their ears. They tried to avoid it at all cost.

Torvald, trying to rush them through and as quickly as possible, ended up activating a little trap that cracked a ceramic plate. The bells went silent before this awful screech filled the air, like nails against chalkboard. Speeding around a corner came this living, shattered crystal that glowed with a dark purple. Within its shards, millions of eyes looked over everything. The group encountered their first Summoned Horror.

The whole crew resisted their instincts to run in terror. The Whisper began to focus on trying to disrupt the strange, awful thing while the Spider aided her with ritual components and secondary functions. The Hound, Torvald, produced this incredibly thick blanket to try and catch the now fragmented, screaming colony of jagged, fine crystals. The Lurk, now being Reckless, would produce a firebomb and try to set the whole thing on fire!

What followed was a series of great rolls and bad rolls. Atiya was able to sense that the creature was bound to some artifact and that link helped sustain the horror. She also weakened its bond, trying to disrupt it. The others rolled terribly, with Torvald rolling a 3 and Lagertha pushing herself to Trauma and rolling two 1’s. It was decided that it made sense for Lagertha to die, as thousands of sharp, tiny knives sliced through her body as if she were nothing. Resisting the terrible result, Torvald caught what he could and tossed the blanket onto the horde rather than have his chest torn open by sentient, sharp shards.

Flashing back to his preparations, Thaddeus drew out a flash bomb and threw it at the Horror, hoping to blind it. The firebomb’s heat and flames caused it to explode too soon, blinding everyone. The group luckily rolled well to hear each other and escaped the Horror, maneuvering around it as it hunted them.

The group made their way down to the actual docking area, where a meeting was going down between the Circle of Flame and the Wraiths. It was also here that Celene the Sentinel, the Hound’s former lover who was spurned when he slept with another woman. Rather than give her a chance, he drew his weapons and went to try and take her out. They all rolled well to hear the overheard conversation, but no one rolled a six so no one noticed the soft breathing nearby the door. As the group moved forward, Thaddeus trying to stop Torvald from shooting, a knife appeared around Atiya’s neck and the group entered a hostage situation.

Caught by a master thief and a member of the Wraiths, the man threatened them and led them off down to the meeting. The scholar, a professor named Vaben, was irritated at their presence. The two members of the Wraiths, Fox and Crescent, led the situation quite handily. The former wore a simple, black fox mask and had a smaller, more feminine build, while the other had a mask designed after the three moons that occasionally appear but all of them crescent. He was a stockier, broader man but very professional.

Thaddeus wasn’t sure what he could do to change the situation around and then I remembered to roll for their benefit for having “The Good Stuff”. While they couldn’t tell whether or not the Wraiths were addicts, the professor was. Using a flashback, Thaddeus had conspired with the professor to do a betrayal after the fact in order to secure a large amount of Dust. The man was willing to if the group could keep them distracted enough for him to secure the items they wanted. The tables had suddenly turned and the Wraiths were unknowingly in a trap. Torvald tried to hit on his ex and suffered a painful cut to the top of his foot from the skilled woman.

However, Thaddeus was unable to keep the ruse up long enough to keep them distracted and Crescent and Fox tried to escape. Blowing out the black flame on this strange, red candle, crystals began to rise out of it as the horror was summoned. Thaddeus hid with Atiya, trying to help her further as the woman sought to break the connection between it and the artifact that she learned was sustaining it. Torvald produced a bomb vest with a deadman’s switch on his person. Trying to intimidate the Wraiths into helping, he didn’t realize that they had basically let the horror of the leash and were just trying to escape.

Their allies ran in terror, escaping on the boat as they did what they could. Torvald successfully tracked them despite the best use of their tricks, skill, and gear and caught them as they tried to escape via a hatch. Taking the jacket off, he threw the bomb at them hoping to blow up their escape and hopefully them. Crescent, seeing the threat coming, closed the door on his ally, caught the bomb, and tried to run back! Torvald was caught in the concussive force as the bomb exploded, killing Crescent instantly and sending Torvald crashing through the boxes nearby. I think this was a poignant moment, the players were not expected a moment of honor on part of an NPC protecting another NPC. It was interesting seeing their moment of regret, even the guy who threw the bomb was a bit touched.

Atiya, after accepting a Devil’s Bargain that she would be noticed by something when she tried to break the connection, rolled the session’s only critical success. She severed the connection, which originated from a large manor house somewhere in Crow’s Foot. Before she could react though, something pulled her down in the canal and into a sea of darkness. All light faded excepted for the lights below that seemed to glow so brightly now. Large and terrible things swam near her now, things large enough that their very movements buffeted her back and forth. Yet all stilled as a massive eye that was impossibly large opened and stared down upon her. It spoke in a terrible voice, one that reverberated in her mine like a shout off of the mountain.

“You are mine. I have chosen you.”

Then something grabbed her arm and it burned terribly before dragging her down into the dark

She awoke from her stupor at that moment and watched as the Summoned Horror faded into grey dust, the candle crystallizing and breaking apart. Upon her arm, her tattoos were erased and now there was a scar of these tentacle suckers upon her skin.

The score was a success but it cost the crew one of their founding members and likely had ruined relations with another crew for a long, long time.

The crew secured their art objects, selling them off for a nice sum. Their heat was relatively low, even with a death, and the engagement was nice and easy with a small bribe to the Bluecoats to go and release one of their friends.

Torvald, on yet another pilgrimage to worship the King On Bended Knee, got lost in a psychedelic state and disappeared due to overindulgence. Atiya consorted with dark spirits, learning what she can about the strange being she met. She learned only one thing; a name. The Father of the Abyss. Thaddeus worked harder on trying to make a connection with Peter Pendragyn, setting up a friendly connection with the nobleman. He also took care of his stress, drinking and celebrating with the social elite. A new Cutter looks to join the Dusters, an Ex-Bluecoat with something to prove and the support of the group’s contact Laroze. The group paid the coin and rose in Tier, now settling into Tier 1 status.

Overall, I was really happy with this session. I did a little forcing with the master thief but Torvald has a tendency to push everything to combat if left unchecked and I wanted a bit of a different ending for this one. We had humor throughout it, we had a moment of actual connection with an NPC (that was threatening them. I’m glad they liked him for the time they met him), and I was able to really let the flashback system shine by changing a situation where they had none of the cards into one where they had most of them. Killing the PC felt right for the situation and I think the players are testing me somewhat. They are constantly pushing for desperate situations and I have been too lenient up to this point. Now though, now I’ll beat them up if the fiction supports it.

As for other things happening in the campaign; Lyessa is dead after being assassinated by an unknown criminal. Crow’s Foot is in a panic and the whole place is going to hell. War is coming though, as their enemies the Graycloaks begin to get close to settling all of Six Towers. All that will be left in their way will be the Dusters themselves. We’ll see how long it takes before something finally goes down. Luckily, they just got a group of thugs just in time for such an occasion!