He shakes his head, ruefully. "No, I guess when I saw Nikki it woke up thoughts of the past, when I was young and had everything ahead of me. Now, I'm older... haven't had a meaningful relationship in a decade or more. By choice, mostly! Not that I regret my life's path, but maybe I should have set aside time to make a family."
"It's not that... things grow and they die, making way for the new. My best friend is a human. I just... didn't expect it to be gone so quickly."
Shalelu shakes her head and sighs. "Still, it was probably fourty years ago, when I found this place. It felt like weeks. How did I lose track so badly?"
Koya chuckles, "Depends on what you drink, my girl! You're more than welcome to join us, but don't delay your libations on our behalf." She gives Maeve a wide smile.
The tea house is small, but precisely decorated with Tian styles and autumn flowers. A novelty at the room's center is a perfectly manicured miniature tree. The room smells of flowers, foreign spices, and green tea, filling your thoughts with the exotic lands ahead of you.
"I'm your family Dru. I know what you mean but for now we have each other. We'll find you a nice girl on this trip and you can have lots of babies. Oooh, maybe when we get to Minkland we'll find you a nice Minky girl to settle with."
*
... turns out to be a non-event, secured by the group's presence with Kelda. She waits a couple days to let the King's justice take effect, and when you all appear at his doorstep to see her gear returned, without rebuke or resistance, Utleheim's thrall brings out the items in a burlap sack. You never see Utle Utleheim himself, but based on the sullen looks you get from the guards, its clear they were told not to cause trouble.
Kelda retrieves the sack then leads you away. Once a ways down the street, she says "My thanks. I can newer properly repay you for vhat you'we done for me."
"That's what brothers are for!"
Harlan playfully punches Sandru on the thigh.
"Let's get out of here, we've got a long road ahead."
The elf whispers to his falcon familiar, asking Valwen into to the air to fly over the village and report back what she sees.
Valwen climbs up and around, circling the village and relaying her impressions. The humans appear to have been here for several years. Some of the stumps in the field new, further out, but the nearest ones show a few years of overgrowth. The villagers appear to be primarly woodsmen and their families. going about their daily tasks. There is a shrine of Erastil at village center.
"Do you still wish to hunt?" Shalelu asks.
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"Do you still wish to hunt?" Shalelu asks.
The magus smiles at the ranger and nods his head. "Maybe I can show you a trick or two if you can keep up." With the that, Malnival spins and begins to run into the woods hopeing to find sign of passing game.
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"Look there," she susses out a game trail, not too far back into the woods. With her help, you quickly pick up the trail of a small herd of deer. Based on the texture of their spoor, they passed less than a half-hour ago.
"Quietly now," Shalelu whispers, readying her bow. She waits to follow your lead.
Over the week following your defeat of Kimandatsu, you spend your time in ecclectic ways: shopping, in study or sparring, preparing the caravan, talking with friends, enjoying the temporary respite, or most often, resting. The enormity of the journey ahead lends profundity to the days, and you seem to cherish every moment, taste or scent.
Notably, in the days after returning from the city with Parity, Ameiko is reserved and insular, spending time to herself and waving off concerned inquiries with a quip and her lopsided smile... "nervous, for the trials to come."
Then, on the last day before your planned departure, you awake to a cool morning, thick with heavy fog. Drawn by the smell of Harlan's delicous breakfast, the group gathers slowly as people roll out of the their tents. All is normal until one of you checks on Ameiko, and finds her tent empty but for her samisen and a tidily folded note.
Parity accepts the weapon gingerly, and bows to Ameiko, "Thanks to both of you for this honor. I will accompany Suishen into battle with my attempt to match the valor and courage that a member of your family would possess. You've been family to me for as long as I've know you, Ame, and the only gift I have to offer you is my undying loyalty. Having been shackled for most of my life, I'm surprised to find that the connections of our relationship are in no way constraining. May the House of Amatatsu be everlasting."
Cha Check Need to do this more often
Parity crouches down on his heels and grinds his teeth while he waits for someone to read the note.
Parity will kick in 500 in an unexpected expression of generosity, "Heng, this is because I respect you ... don't read into it." he says gruffly to counter-weight the act.
Once the discovery is made, it's hard to restrain the young girl from being the first in line to read the note.
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Heng hides his disappointment as he realizes that even with Maeve's generous support, they don't have enough for the Harrowing deck. Later that day he hesitantly suggest getting a loan from Sandru and is surprised when Parity offers to chip in. Heng smiles, "Thank you, Parity."
"What does it say, Maeve?"
Maeve quickly unfolds the note. It reads simply 'I'm sorry' and is signed with a single "A".
"'I'm sorry...'" Maeve blinks back a few tears. "...dammit. Shalelu, I'm sorry, but can you do anything to track her?"
"Well son of a gun. Ok, let's go find her."
Malnival holds up his hands after the note is read. [b]"Noone touch anything yet, let us make sure foul play is nnot at hand.
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"'I'm sorry...'" Maeve blinks back a few tears. "...dammit. Shalelu, I'm sorry, but can you do anything to track her?"
Shalelu frowns and shakes her head. "Maybe here in the camp, but once we hit the city streets, there is no chance. Maybe Valwen can help, if not for this fog, or some magical way to locate her?"
Maeve nods. "...at least check that she did go to town. I'd hate to think she actually did something crazy like decide to try to make the trek by herself, but if she did we'd kick ourselves for not checking."
Malnival holds his arm up and Valwen swoops in to look the magus in the eyes. "Find Amiko, my friend. She may need us soon."
Shalelu gets low on the ground near Ameiko's tent, scanning at almost eye level. After a minute, she rises and nods. "Indeed, her last steps head towards the north, into the heart of the city. I'll try to follow them as long as I can."
"Right," Maeve swallows nervously. "Look, meet me at the river's junction between the Bone and Fire quarters in three hours. I'm going to go trying to ask around for her,"
Malnival speaks to his familiar, asking that she search that direction first.
"My thanks. I can newer properly repay you for vhat you'we done for me."
Malnival smiles at the blonde woman and shakes his head. "You are our friend Kelda. this is what friends do."
Parity thinks for a moment as the panic riles up around the party, "Maeve, stop. The note may very well been left by her, and it also may be a ruse. While I doubt that someone got in here without us noticing, let's not rush about randomly. Let's stay together or at least in small groups. I appreciate your desire to help Ameiko, but we're all in this together. You can't continue to run off on your own, else we'll be splitting into two search parties at some point in time." Finished chastising, "Let's build a plan to canvas the city in a calculated manner, assuming we lose Shalelu's trail at some point. Until then, we stay together, no exceptions."
Parity can give Harlan his last 300gp for the up-armored wagon.
You use a combination of Malnival's, Maeve's and Parity's suggestions, sticking together while asking about and tracking. Malnival sends Valwen into the obscured skies, and though the fog limits her greatest advantage, she instead keeps low, criss-crossing the streets at the speed of flight.
Amazingly, Shalelu is able to track what she believes is Ameiko's trail for a long ways. She follows it from the Bone Quarter, through the gates and along a wide avenue heading east around the fire damaged areas of the Fire Quarter. Then, it is lost in the heavy foot traffic.
Along the way, Maeve asks passers by about a woman of Ameiko's descript, but she only gets shrugs and shaken heads... until you pass by the damaged buildings. There, you meet a priestess of Torag, busy organizing clearing and rebuilding efforts, who admits to meeting a young Tian woman in a cloak this morning. She donated a significant sum of coins to the reconstruction, thanked them for their task, and then continued off towards the docks.
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"...if she's headed to the docks, she must be trying to catch a ship," Maeve's fingers actually curl into fists as she speaks. "Come on, I need to give her a piece of my mind, if nothing else." And with that she's off to the docks with barely-restrained speed.
"A ship, huh? Wonder why she's doing this ... she knows it's stupidly dangerous. If we missed her, we may be s*** outta luck."
Malnival give chase to Maeve, not wanting to let the hot tempered bard get away. "Give her time to explaine when we find her, I am sure she must believe she has a good reason for this."
The elf calls in Valwen, asking the falcon to search the docks and ship decks for Amiko.
"Why is she running, why now? I'm sure she's not heading back, maybe she thinks she can take the sword and handle the oni all by herself? Ah, she must be trying to protect us, classic hero behavior. Ok, let's go stop her."
Drawn to the docks, you are dismayed by the sheer size of the waterfront, running nearly six miles along the length of Kalsgard. But, refining your search around the ships that appear ready to sail. Valwen, even limited in her range of vision, is able to pick them out for you quickly, and Maeve's persuasive questioning along with Ameiko's 'cloaked' description bring you what you're looking for.
You learn that a woman of Ameiko's description was asking about passenger berths on any ships heading south; 'the farther the better', she said. From this, you quickly find out she hired onto the Jenivere, a merchant trader headed for Eleder in Sargava. It (and several other ships) were supposed to sail this morning, but have been delayed by the fog.
You locate the Jenivere a few minutes later, still moored but heavy with its cargo.
"She didn't take the sword, Harlan, she gave it to me safeguard and use. I should've realized ...." Parity pauses for a moment and then starts a different train of thought, "Based on what we just learned, I believe she's heading away from Minkai because of the danger she poses to people. I ... worry ... about her."
"The oni pose more danger to the people they rule and for the people around Amiko. The only way to stop the danger is to end the threat. We must finish them.
Maeve just glances at the others weirdly, like at the moment they're all speaking some interplanetary language, then she shrugs, dismissing whatever thought she was having as unimportant, checks her coin purse, and walks right up to the guards on the docks. "I'd like to speak with the captain to book passage, please."