Venture
Finding and persuading such individuals to help her required more spherewalking and questing. She made more friends and contacts on each trip. Some of these could provide her with advertisements for her bar, other supplies, and yet others information. She was also manipulated a few times, used by powerful patrons for their own ends to do harm to third parties without realizing it until afterwards.
Returning to Everway, Venture was able to expand and upgrade her bar. She hit upon the idea of rerouting the energies of her customers, usually expended in duels and brawls, into competitions: chess games, darts, theaters of illusion by wizards. From one such bizarre contest, the bar got its current name, "The Roaring Mouse", and it quickly became a very popular place among more powerful spherewalkers.
Venture found out the hard way just how powerful, and potentially how malevolent, her customers were. She kicked a bunch of toughs out for refusing to pay their tab and a couple of days later, their employer, a raddled old mage named Bloodthirst, stomped in and offered to let her become one of his minions. All she had to do was serve his troops and let them spy on the mages who had come to the pub for contests. In exchange for that, he'd grant her his protection. Furious, Venture threw him out personally, then slammed the door on him before he could ready a spell. He swore an oath of terrible vengeance and stomped off. Deepwater, one of her staff, told her that, in his prime, Bloodthirst had held most of a realm under his thrall and been quite the Dark Lord before his subjects rose up and kicked him out. He'd been hanging around in Strangerside for years, looking for trouble. He still possessed some of his magics and a small army of thugs.
Venture realized that Bloodthirst had the power and the desire to destroy the Roaring Mouse if she didn't stop him, so she sent the staff home, closed the bar, and packed for another quest, this time for the realm that Bloodthirst had once ruled: Red Sands. She arrived to find the port town near the gate besieged by pirates, former servants of Bloodthirst. She joined the battle against the pirates and killed one of the primary captains in a swordfight.
After the pirates were driven off, the townspeople welcomed Venture and introduced her to another spherewalker, their general in the battle against the pirates, the invincible warrior Avatar. The dead pirates were stripped of their wealth and the spherewalkers offered first choice of the loot. Venture explained that she was looking for something, anything that would help her to defeat the magician Bloodthirst. The townspeople were appalled to learn that he was still alive and making trouble. The mayor offered Venture an amulet he had, that turned spells back upon the caster, in exchange for her share of the treasure. When she protested that the amulet was of far greater value than any of the treasure, the mayor said that he'd kept it in case Bloodthirst returned in person and he'd not miss it if she'd finish the wretch off for good. Avatar announced that she would accompany Venture back to Everway and help ensure that Bloodthirst would never have an opportunity trouble Red Sands again. Venture accepted both the mayor's and Avatar's offers, amazed to have found so much help within hours of her arrival.
Venture didn't even bother to go home when she got back to Strangerside, but headed straight for Bloodthirst's encampment. Armed thugs were waiting in ambush for her, but Avatar strode into their midst and mopped the ground with them, her wounds healing almost as soon as they were inflicted. When Venture heard Bloodthirst querelously ordering his guards aside, she stepped up to confront him.
He'd been preparing to cast a spell on Avatar, but his eyes widened when he saw Venture and he directed his incantations and gestures at her. She just waited. Suddenly, the old mage collapsed. The thugs scattered. Once she determined that Bloodthirst was dead, Venture had a doctor examine the body to determine why. His heart had given out. It might have been the effect of a spell which had been reflected back on him, if he'd ever cast it, or it might just have been the excitement.
Avatar remained in Everway, because its many gates allowed her the opportunity for quests to "fight evil". Venture opened her bar again. When Bloodthirst's thugs started telling people that she'd killed Bloodthirst, her clientiele gained a new respect from her and since then, there hasn't been any trouble in the Roaring Mouse that she couldn't handle.
Roaring Mouse Staff
Nightsky: human mage: young, handsome and egotistical
Redleaf: furrycritter mage (thought to be female)
Deathblow: tigerperson bouncer
Ogrebane: human mage: most powerful of the staff magi, old and grumpy
Venture's Stats
Virtue: Dragon (cunning)
Fault: Smith, reversed (evil effort)
Fate: Overlooking the Diamond (recognizing/failing to see opportunity)
Powers (2 points)
Scores & Specialties (18 points)
© 1996 Rebecca Teed