As Razarak's spirit fades, Terri hugs Tove tightly, giving the older woman all of the love and support she needs in this moment.
"We're gonna be okay," she whispers, "we're gonna be okay."
"Good bye." Tove manages to whisper, sinking back into Terri's embrace.
She wanted to run away and hide, somewhere far from here where no one would find her. She didn't like that the others could see her crying. No one had ever seen her cry like this before.
Terri and Ivo's hug anchored the priestess in place though, and she was left to try and stifle her tears in plain sight of the whole lot of them.
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"It's okay to cry," Terri tells Tove as she hears her friend trying to hold back the tears. "Please Tove, don't face the pain alone. Don't hold it in," she begs as she begins to cry too, sharing Ivo and Tove's grief so that it would be less.
"It hurts to hold it in, and I don't want to see you hurt."
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Terri's words wash over Tove like gentle rain, but whether she processes them or not is hard to tell. As the sound of the bard's soft sobbing reaches her ears though her chest tightens and her own sobs grow louder.
Tove stays there beside the body of her former companion for a long while, letting the waves of grief roll through her.
Finally, wiping the tears away on the back of her sleeve, she slowly gets to her feet and clears her throat.
"Well, that's done."
While the majority of the party is inside the fort, saying their final goodbyes to their fallen companion, Bassius is outside the fort going about the grim business of burying the Stag Lord's minions.
He steps off the path that leads to fort, looking for a suitable place to bury the dead.
Having a selected a spot he stabs his shovel into the earth to begin his work.
The paladin's grim work is disturbed by something more terrifying, as he notices multiple rotting hands breaking through the surface of the ground, as the hungry dead come to greet him.
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After calling out "Undead by the road!", the paladin will call on divine energy to rip at the energies animating the corpses
The burst of holy energy from the paladin washes over the unholy dead, destroying all but four of the zombies.
The remaining zombies lurch toward the paladin, successfully flanking him.
A second wave a holy power washes out from the paladin, battering the remaining undead.
As Bassius unleashes another wave of holy energy another of the zombies collapse. Three remain clawing away at the paladin, two finding their way beyond Bassius's meager, unarmored defenses.
(flank)
(flank)
Terri stands with Tove, drying her eyes as well. She looks to Ivo and the priestess and thinks for a moment before pulling them both into tight hug.
"Are you feeling better," she asks them as she lets them go.
After they answer she looks to Razarak and takes in a deep breath.
"When desnans die, they are cremated and their ashes scattered in a river or at a crossroads, so that they may always have a journey to look forward to. Their loved ones mourn their loss in the day, then celebrate their life under the stars. Do you think Razarak would have liked that?"
Terri looks from Tove to the gate where Bass' call had come from. She'd promised to stay by Tove's side, but if Bass was in trouble...
She takes off towards Bass, determined to not have another companion to mourn.
Calling on his power for the final time, he prepares to lay into any survivors with his shovel.
The third wave of energy finishes off the remaining zombies, leaving Bassius alone in the field when Terri arrives.
Terri stumbles to a stop just a few feet from Bass, gasping for breath.
"A-are you hurt," she asks, clearly worried for him even as she clutches at her side where the Stag Lord had nearly killed her. "I heard... I heard you yell about undead."
She sways a bit. Her head swims in a thoroughly unpleasant way as her fingers and toes tingle and she stumbles into the paladin.
"Woo... feelin' dizzy," she mutters before placing a hand on on Bass' chest and chanting in a singsong voice.
"I was being sure, since they jumped out at me, but I was able to take care of them, with the Master's help of course. I'm not hurt more than will heal with time." The paladin looks distinctly uncomfortable with the young woman, really a girl's hand on his unarmored chest. You must remember she was not raised with the same standards of propriety...
Taking her by the shoulders and holding her upright, Bassius asks, "Thank you for your assistance, but you look like you could use some help yourself. Let me walk you back. I can finish this job later."
"Sorry... Just a little... lightheaded," she apologizes as she leans into Bass. She stumbles a couple of times as they make their way back to the fort, but by the time they return, she's more herself again.
"Sorry," she apologizes again as they arrive at the gates. "I don't know what I did to make you uncomfortable, but I am sorry that I did."
Garathane busts through the bushes, following the shout of Bassius. Seeing the field littered with corpses and with Bassius already leading Terri back to the fort he comments, "It looks like I'm late to everything today."
Garathane grabs the shovel dropped by the paladin and starts dealing with the task at hand.
Terri thanks Tove for mending her the rest of the way up. She goes about preparing for the night, getting Razarak's body ready of the pyre and cooking as much of a feast as she can out of the food stores she finds after making sure they have enough to make it back to Oleg's. When night falls and stars come out, she gathers the others around a magnificent spread of food Razarak's pyre.
"Last night, we lost one of our number. Today, we mourned his loss and grieved for the shortness of our time together. Tonight, we should remember him as we send him off on his grand journey and celebrate the man he was." She holds up a goblet of wine and smiles wide. "Razarak, the Fierce! May his courage and stout heart strike fear into the wicked," She toasts before crashing her goblet against the others.
After Terri's toast, Bassius will return the toast. "To Razarak, the Bold!"
"To Razarak, the Fierce," murmurs Ivo quietly as he too raises a cup.
When Tove saw the feast Terri had prepared, her spirits lifted a little.
Having retreated after this morning's ritual and then spending much of the remainder of the day in solitude she was beginning to feel a bit better about how everything had transpired the night before.
Stirred from her thoughts by Terri's toast, the cleric cheers, "Aye, to Razarak!"
After the paladin drains his cup, Bass lowers his head for a moment "May the angels keep him." He then turns to his companions and says, "Not to dampen the celebration, but we should make plans for tomorrow. I propose we leave in the morning to Oleg's to send word to Restov of our success. Then we can order materials from Restov to begin rebuilding the fort."
"Agreed, there's no point hanging around here another day until we've actually got a reason to be."
After the toast, Terri offers up a prayer to Desna for Razarak and lights the pyre. The flames crackle and pop as the feast and remembrance begins.
===
"No reason we can't plan and enjoy the food," Terri says between bites. "I don't have any problems with going to Oleg's. It'll be nice to see them again. We'll need more than materials, for the fort. I don't know how to carve stone, and I am no carpenter. We'll need to hire craftsmen," she adds over her cup before she takes a swallow. From the little she's had and the color of her cheeks, it's pretty clear that Terri's a lightweight when it comes to wine and liquor.
"Besides that," she says, "I thought we're supposed to be exploring these lands! I know we had to take care of the Stag Lord, but I don't wanna play guard all the time. I could do that anywhere. I want to see things I've never seen before. I want to make... my... mark," her voice trails off as she realizes something. she stands suddenly and sways a bit as she goes to her pack and digs around. After a moment of muttering and sighing, she hangs her head in defeat. She turns to rejoin the others. Then, another thought comes to her, she pats her belt before crying out in joy and pulling out her dagger. She skips to the gate and in one of the timbers framing the gate she carves a glyph that resembles a woman with butterfly wings dancing while silhouetted against the moon.
"I can't believe I almost forgot to do that," she says before returning to the others. "So, yeah, I joined to help make things better, but I also joined to see new stuff. I'm all for packing our stuff and riding back to Oleg's, but starting tonight, y'all are telling me all about your adventures and the places you've been to."
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Once Terri finishes her prayer, Tove casts a blessing over the party as the bard lights the funeral pyre.
Afterwards she quietly takes the girl aside and thanks her before the feast resumes. She could have performed an Erastillian funeral ceremony of course, or muddled through some kind of generic service, but it was nice to have something more fitting to honor Razarak's free-spiritedness.
===
As Terri returns to the table a smile crosses Tove's lips.
"Indeed, it'll be a fine way to remember our time with Raz, and get you up to speed with the state of the Greenbelt."
Tove begins recounting the events of the past couple of months for the group's newest member. She weaves exciting tales of hermits, bandits and giant spiders, of wicked worgs, cursed bears and legendary boars. She explains the tricky politics of the derro and the deep gnomes, of the mites and the Sootscale kobold tribe. She speaks with reverence of the mysterious and ancient Temple of the Elk. She warns of fairy tricksters and in a hushed tone she speaks of the evil Fey Queen and Baodan's warning.
She recounts as much of the charter holders' adventures as she can recall, allowing the others to interject whenever her memory falters.
She recounts everything that she can recall that is, with one exception.
The one thing she remembers most vividly of all of her time in the Stolen Lands. The one thing that even now, three weeks on, still woke her in the middle of the night in a cold sweat with a sharp, stabbing pain in her chest.
She omits every single detail about Dovan, his fort, his men, and the things that those men did.
Terri hangs on to every word with wide-eyed wonder. She's like a child hearing a grand story for the first time. By the end of the retelling of the group's adventures, she's looking on in utter amazement.
"You meet a dragon," she asks just before a beaming smile spreads on her face. "Can we go see him, please? I'd love to meet a dragon that wouldn't try to eat me! And the Temple of the Elk! It sounds so beautiful, I have to see it."
Her face flushed and her words slurring together, Tove certainly didn't look a picture of her usual self. But then again, the crying wreck of a priestess she'd been this morning wasn't really in keeping with her usual image either.
Tove coughs, the burn of the Stag Lord's liquor rising in her throat before she suppresses it momentarily with another swig.
"Well, like I said he wasn't really a dragon but he wasn't so bad. He did help us find the Temple. Erastil's grace, I would love to take you there, it's so beautiful Terri, it really is. Perlivash and Tig...Tig-Tutter, Tig-Tug? They probably live close-by." Tove beems back at the bard.
"I'll take you! I mean, um, we'll take you, she trails off.
Morning arrives seemingly earlier than it has any right to, or perhaps that is just last night's festivities and the Stag Lord's alcohol stash talking.
You likely would have been able to sleep the entire day away if weren't for the growling and hooting coming from the owlbear in the caged off room downstairs.
The creature is seemingly hungry and growing increasingly angry.
"I'd love to go with however many want to come," Terri says as she pulls Tove close and raises her cup. "To many adventures together," she cheers in a toast.
Terri is slow to rise, having fallen asleep cuddling with Tove. She groans then finally gets up to see what the noise is. She's surprised to find the owlbear before she remembers yesterday.
Rrr, Why didya have to wake me up, she thinks at the creature as her head throbs from last night's revelry. It takes her a moment to realize that the others are there with her.
"Maybe we can feed it and poison its meal," she suggests, her voice sounding loud in her head. "Doesn't feel right to just let it starve then kill it."
Tove wakes to the owlbear's racket with a splitting headache. She flails her arm, searching for her waterskin only to have it connect with something entirely different.
Squinting in the morning light she cracks open an eye to find Terri sitting up in the bed beside her, between her and her pack.
"Sorry!" she moans.
Slowly sitting herself up and finally getting a hand on some water, Tove starts to wake up more fully. She leans close and listens carefully to Terri's suggestions as the bard starts making plans in a much softer voice than she probably realised.
"The fresh air would be nice." Tove replies, the prospect of a morning hunt sounding mildly more appealing than jumping straight in to battle or straight onto her horse at least.
"Huh?" Is Terri's only reply to Tove's apology. It's clear she's not fully awake herself and is not a morning person.
---
"Is there a well or stream around here," Terri asks, "I don't think I can magic the smell of the Stag Lord's rotgut off of me well enough."
She takes a sniff of her clothing and recoils as her eyes water.
"Yeesh, how did he taste anything? That burned my throat just smellin' it!"
Dawn finds Garethane in a contemplative mood, watching the Owlbear. He's never had an opportunity to study an Owlbear before. Much as he studied the animals of the forest in his youth, he tries to learn what the fearsome beast has to teach. After the recent losses taking the fort, he doesn't relish what they need to do to the powerful monster in the cage.
Once part members begin waking up, he will propose the following: "Tove and Terri, if you will hunt us up some meat, I'll try to find some soporifics and poisonous plants to lace the meat with. We'll need a fair amount to put such a large creature to sleep permanently."
Tove does her best to find some food for the owlbear.
The fresh air does do her well after all, and in the end she is able to take a moderately sized doe for the cause. Offering a quick prayer to Erastil, she hoists the animal up over her shoulders and makes her way back to the fort.
Terri, seeing Tove getting ready for the hunt, casts a few minor spells to try getting clean. She doesn't smell, but she can't help feeling like she is scaring the deer with her scent. She has more luck with finding the "seasoning" for the owlbear's last meal.
With no wilderness training or experience, Bassius lets the others work on finding food and poison, and spend the morning finishing his organization and catalogue of the bandits' goods and gear.
The party splits up, each to do their part in preparation for leaving the fort.
Bassius is able to find a couple of wagons suitable for loading the majority of the trade goods into for a trip back to Oleg's, provided that a couple of the horses in the party are amenable to being hitched up to the wagons.
Tove returns with the doe she was able to hunt down, providing her part of the plan. Terri is unable to find much of anything that she had in mind for weakening or outright killing the owlbear. Garethane returns with a number of plants, thinking these will do the trick, but Terri looks them over and believes at worst these would only upset the owlbear's stomach and likely make it even angrier.
"Um, Garethane? I don't think those will work. It'll probably just make it angrier," Terri tells the elf before describing the plants they actually need.
Ivo finishes packing away the toys rather gently, almost wistfully, then completes a little more tinkering on his gun before he helps pack up the camp.
"You can hook my pony to the cart and then I can ride in the back," he suggests. "It might look a little weird to have a pony and a horse side-by-side, but maybe they can pull it together."
After a brief conversation with Garethane, Terri heads off into the woods again, as the elven hunter seemed to remember the location of some of the plants Terri was speaking of.
A hour or so later, the young bard returns with the poisonous plants.
"Okay, so who's gonna help me with getting this doe seasoned," Terri asks as she sets down the bundle of plants she has gathered.
When it came time to discuss hooking up the wagon, Terri offers to have Placid hooked to the wagon since he's the same size as Raz's horse. She offers to ride in the wagon as well.
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A number of members of the group contribute to preparing the owlbear's poisoned meal. Once ready, now you only have to figure out how to get the deer to the owlbear without becoming a meal yourself.
"Anyone got an unseen servant spell to carry the bait in?"
"Perhaps a Silence spell once it falls asleep tonight to cover the sound of a creaking gate and manual placement?"