"Melon, what point are you trying to make with the origin of this fan? Let us say it is of Tian descent, what then? Does it's value increase if it is, or is it something else entirely? Otherwise, I fail to see why it matters one way or another."
Melon pats Corinna reassuring on the back, far more companionably than her previous history with the wizard, she shakes her head just enough for Corinna to notice and whispers, "men..." as she rolls her eyes. She looks up to Rajah and retorts, "Because I like Ameiko, she's been the best friend I've ever known. And you might not notice, but I do. She's been getting... I dunno. Depressed, or anxious. Something. And her family comes from Tian Xia, I want to cheer her up with the fan and any other Tian goods we find."
"That sounds like a very noble idea, Honey. I applaud it. Let's find some goods brought here from Tian Xia, possibly by people she might have known, who met a grisly fate, at the hands of goblins or skeletons...okay, I hadn't really meant to turn that into a downer when I started."
He looks sheepish.
"There was that ... unfortunate incident with Ameiko's half-brother several years ago," Corinna suggests as the group begins to walk down the road toward the swamp. "If the fan is Tien, perhaps it was something he was carrying. I wasn't in Sandpoint at the time, but I understand he was ... involved with the goblins somehow. They could have gotten it then, as some sort of payment perhaps?"
You set out along the Lost Coast Road. Referring to the map, Corinna can see that there are three locations marked. Based on the crude drawings used to represent them, two would appear to be ships and the other location a cave. The closest location is one of the ships, which is due west of the Licktoad village. The other ship is southwest of the first ship and the cave is south of the second ship.
"Thanks Fez," Melon smiles at Gilfroy thankfully, then with a snicker she ruffles the gnomes hair a bit, pretending to search through it, "you know what? Still no grey hair! I think you being with us is doing wonders for your longevity. Pity that it is coupled with exposing yourself to mortal danger fighting goblins and maybe skeletons."
"Honey, my dear, the dilemma, unlike with humans, is not that I fear the arrival of grey hairs, but the absence of such. It is these infernal white ones which shall be the death of me. Blue or grey, any colouration at all is something to strive for. Interesting times and adventures are what bring the pigment back. It's the adrenaline rush that I need to quite literally keep me alive. One's life can become boring and tedious when one has no purpose to it. Now I have one. I plan to expose myself to as many goblins and skeletons as necessary."
He blushes a bit. "Well, that could have sounded better..." he mumbles almost inaudibly.
Aago strides at an easy pace ahead of many of the others, casual in appearance but eyes alert for the first sign of danger. He is too busy watching the road ahead to listen to the conversation between the others. After a while he pulls a sling out of his pouch and loosely carries it in one hand, idly tugging at the leather between his fingers.
"I hope this map actually has something to do with the skeletons and isn't just a guide to the goblins' favorite picnic spots," Corinna murmurs, examining it before folding it back up for safe keeping. "Do we just go to the nearest place first and see what we find? We've quite a walk ahead of us; the closest symbol on the map seems to be a ship, and it's on the far side of the goblin village where we were yesterday. Well, what's left of it," she amends cheerfully, the memory of the ramshackle huts and palisade going up in flame playing in her mind.
"Anyway, I'll have time," her voice falters a bit, "to explain a little about my family. I'm sorry if my uncle has seemed rude ... well," she admits, "has been rude, but you mustn't hold it against him. It hasn't a thing to do with you. It has to do with me ... and my mother." She takes a deep breath and laughs nervously. "It seems odd to be talking about it when everyone's gone to such lengths to hush it up for so long. Well ... Lord Valdemar is my grandfather. He's been ill a very long time; most of my life he's been confined to his bed, although I remember seeing him around the house in a rolling chair a few times when I was a very little girl. And when he discovered that he was going to become an invalid, he began to groom his oldest son, my Uncle Belven, to take charge of the family business, although he was scarcely more than a child at the time; he'll be Lord Valdemar when my grandfather dies. My mother, Elzeveta, is his older sister. And my father ... was ... a young man who traveled with a caravan that passed in and out of Sandpoint." Her eyes are fixed on the road in front of her feet, and her face reddens. "When my mother had to tell her family ... Grandfather and Uncle Belven decided that my father wasn't of sufficient character to be attached to the Valdemar family. And they were right." She looks back up at them fiercely. "Because he took the money they offered him to leave town and my mother never heard a word from him again."
"Uncle Belven has taken care of my mother and me ever since. He's been very generous; my schooling was far from cheap. So I can't hear any aspersions cast against him. But I think you can understand why he wouldn't approve of me running around with ... well, strangers, unsupervised. My mother's indiscretion cost the family both in coin and reputation; if I were to repeat her mistakes...." She shakes her head instead of finishing.
"Ah, but was he generous due to a sincere fondness for you and personal wish for you to have the best of everything, or was he doing his duty to cover up any ugly truths from the outside world? To not provide for you and your mother would be just as scandalous for your family as the manner in which you were conceived. If you can honestly tell me it's the first, and that he is a devoted and loving uncle whose sole concern is your happiness and well-being (above even that of the family reputation), then I will sincerely apologize for everything bad I've ever thought or said against him. But only if you can do it honestly and whole-heartedly."
Sense Motive in case needed:
Rajah interrupts before Corinna can answer, "You know Gilfroy, regardless of her uncle's motives, the man still took it upon himself to care for them, whether it was strictly for namesake or not. Could he not have easily forced them to leave as well, never to return? More than likely. Yet, he didn't."
Turning back to Corinna, "But, if Gilfroy is right, then... you should not be here with us. So that just begs my next question: Why are you here? Maybe your uncle owns a bit more trust in you than he does your mother? Or maybe," he glances at Gilfroy and then back again, "he actually cares for you and worries about you like you are his own, and this was a truly difficult decision until you were able to talk him into letting you go? Please correct me if I'm wrong."
Corinna shakes her head at Gilfroy's accusations. "My Uncle Belven is not a ... warm man. By the time he was eight, when the other boys his age were playing and running around town, he was already in the shipyards, learning the family trade and how to oversee it, how to give orders to men four and five times his age. Grandfather's illness robbed him of his childhood. Is he devoted and loving and concerned with my happiness? No, but he is in truth no closer to any of my younger cousins. Perhaps he will be more tender to his own children, but he never even married until this past year. He is devoted to his family, and he is kind enough to include me among them, even if every time he looks at me, he sees the man who ruined his sister.
"And despite what you say, he did more than he had to. He could have sent my mother away to Magnimar 'to visit relatives' before her condition became noticeable and had me left at an orphanage as a foundling. It wouldn't be the first time it happened in Sandpoint, if you believe half the stories about the Scarnettis," she scoffs.
"What the, er, Rajah says is right," she nods at him. "One can't judge a man by his motives but by what he actually does, no matter how he feels about it. But if you mean to imply," she continues to address the Blue Rajah, "that I ought to have had my uncle's blessing to go with you, I must disagree. If I were still a child, you would have a point, but I'm not. I'm older than you are, young man," her face takes on a schoolmarmish look, "and I live on my own in Korvosa, a city where I could get into trouble far more easily than in Sandpoint if I were so inclined. I owe it to my uncle to bring no further embarrassment to the family, which I don't intend to, but I don't have to ask his permission to make my own decisions."
He looks at her without the slightest expression on his face. "No. I wasn't. But thank you for catering to my curiousity. I shall bother you no longer on the matter." He smiles as he gives her a nod of thanks.
"Then you have my sincere apologies, Corinna. I shall speak no further ill of the man...until he is rude to you again. I cannot abide rudeness, even though I tend to respond to it in kind."
Malan walks along quietly. He listens to Corrina speak of her family. "I am sure that your uncle is trying to do what he thinks is best for his family... for you. His tale is not so very different from any other paternal figure in history. I am more interested in your story, Corinna, in all our stories. When we stand under Pharasma's gaze, what will she see. Will we be found worthy or wanting?"
When the topic changes from Tian Xhi to Corinna's story Aago drops back amongst the others to listen it, fascinated to hear Corinna say more in the last few minutes than the entire time he'd know her put together.
"Families are always complicated. No one ever wanted me to leave home either, being the runt of the litter as I am. My mother was especially...protective. So I admire you, Corinna, for standing up for yourself and living the life you choose and not the one chosen for you. That's a courageous act of its own."
"Although I don't agree with it, maybe in this case it is right for Corinna to follow the motto of the Sczarni: it's easier to ask for forgiveness, than for permission," Melon nods enthusiastically. "So let's go, before anybody catches on."
Corinna offers the rest of the group an uncomfortable smile of gratitude for their support. "I ... I'm sure I needn't specify, but I would very much appreciate it if you didn't repeat anything I've told you about my family, particularly about my mother. I'm sure the people who snickered about the Valdemars' scandal all those years ago are busy with their own lives now and don't give it another thought, but she hasn't had a happy life and I don't want to cause her any further embarrassment by reawakening old gossip." She steps a little closer to Aago. "And I hope you understand why I'm not comfortable sitting in a tavern hearing men tell tales about the women they've left behind in their travels. They got their pleasure, but not all those women were left with nothing but a fond memory. There's not much laughter on the other side of the story."
Aago looks startled by Corinnna's quiet words. Blushing a surprising scarlet red, he does his best to keep his voice down. "I don't care to tell such tales myself, la...ahem, Corinnna, especially in polite company. I thought he was going to tell us stories of genuinely dangerous women. At the academies, the women were often the ones you had to watch out for during training. So much more, ah, limber and even when their not as strong as you are, they're fast and can hit you twice as often. The masters used to emphasize the importance of remembering that appearances can be deceiving."
He coughs. "But yes, I understand better now why you left."
He laughs in an effort to mask his embarrassment and he raises his voice. "Believe me, nothing you say of a personal nature here will go beyond my lips."
The trip back to the goblin village goes smoothly and without complication. The village itself is quite a different sight today than it was yesterday. A couple buildings still stand, not completely consumed by the fire you set yesterday, but most of the buildings have collapsed. A section of the wall remains completely unburnt, but only because it fell over into the swamp where the wet ground doused any flames that might have tried to touch it. For the most part, all that remains of the village is a collection a burnt wood and cinders.
From the Licktoad village, the first ship should be due west along one of the tributaries of the Soggy River. There is a particularly wide tributary just south of the village, so that is presumably the one you need to follow.
As you move past the village and head towards the water, you quickly notice a trail of sorts on the south side. It's not a proper trail. The Old Fish Trail that leads to the Licktoad Village stops there. This is a newly created trail clearly made by something heavy being dragged along the ground, flattening grasses in its path. The trail stops at the tributary river, but you can see it resume on the other side. A closer look at where the trail reaches the river reveals that whatever it was went right into the river, presumably along the bottom, and then came up the other side!
So you have a choice: do you wish to follow the southern trail wherever it goes (which will require getting across the river; there's no bridge here) or do you wish to follow the river west towards the ship marked on the map?
Corinna, in fact, sees nothing but mud, no matter how many times the others try to point out the trail. "If you say it's there, I believe you," she assures them. "Ought we to follow the map or this trail?" She waves her hand vaguely, managing to point several degrees off the actual trajectory. "If our motivation is to destroy the skeletons, then I have to assume this is the way they went when they left the gobin village with the treasure the chief gave them." She sighs. "I'd rather not swim across a muddy river, though. Do you think there'd be a better place to cross elsewhere? I wish we'd thought to bring the Warden with us; he'd surely know."
"Corinna's probably right, this is where they crossed. I also agree with her in that I would like to try and find a better place to ford the river."
"Good show, ol' bean!" He tells Malan as he pats him on the shoulder. "I couldn't agree more myself. Especially seeing how I don't have drowning on my to-do list." He laughs then abruptly stops. "Onward! Let us venture forth!"
"If the trail on the other side of the river is as obvious to find as it is on this side," Gilfroy says, raising a quizzical eyebrow at Corinna's apparent blindness, "it should be safe to find a better crossing place, or at least take an hour to cobble together a raft out of the boards from the goblin huts. We can pick up the trail on the other side."
"I'm interested in the ship on the map myself, and the river will lead us to that. Maybe there'll be another place to cross, maybe not but at least we'll know for sure we're heading for something."
"I'm interested in the ship on the map myself, and the river will lead us to that. Maybe there'll be another place to cross, maybe not but at least we'll know for sure we're heading for something."
"For what, though?" she asks Aago. "A filthy ship in the same state the village was in, if it's been frequented by goblins? I think we need to decide if this is an exploratory expedition, just to find what's out here in the swamp, or one that's focused on finding the skeletons the sheriff's been told I'm so keen on exterminating." She gives Malan a nervous smile. "We need to devote today to one or the other; if we try to do both, we're liable to make a poor job of each of them."
Aago is surprised at Corinna's question. "I thought you, more than any of us, would recognize the value of knowledge. We don't know anything about the ships, the skeletons, or what exactly the goblin's stole. We do know that the goblins thought it important to mark the locations of the ships as well as the cave."
He glances at the river. "We don't know where the skeletons came from. The cave might make more sense than the ships, but are we sure? If the goblins thought the ships were important enough to mark on the map then it must have meant something to them. If we check the ships along the way we might have more information than we currently do. We might learn where the fireworks came from, or who the ships belong to. Each of those marks on the map are a mystery and I, for one, want to know the answer to them all."
Melon nods, after examining the trail; applying the common sense of wisdom to her opinion. "Look, whatever was going along here didn't bother with trails. It - or they? - just made its own. Doesn't even bother with the water - just go straight through."
"I'm guessing the trail maker just went straight from start to destination. Corinna, if you look at the map and draw a straight line from where we stand in that-ish direction, where does it go? You're smart, maybe you can figure out a likely place and form a shortest route that will tie-up all four destinations: boats, cave, and trail."
"We don't even know what made the trail. It could be skeletons, some giant swamp lizard with a long tail or an old hermit dragging a sack for all we know." Aago points out.
"You realize I'm working with goblin scrawls on a fan here," Corinna grumbles, digging a pair of reading glasses out of her pack and perching them on her nose as she unfolds the fan. "I very much doubt this is even to scale; there's certainly no legend or even a compass rose." "It's useless," she concludes, folding her glasses back up and putting them away. "The map's just too crude. So what do we know? The old goblin said the map led them to the treasure, and the skeletons came and took it back. The skeletons must not have been wherever they found the treasure, or they wouldn't have been able to bring it back, not if the skeletons were able to wreak havoc at the village and convince the goblin king to give the treasure back; they would just have prevented the smaller band of goblins from taking it in the first place. So wherever the treasure was, the skeletons weren't, at least not at the time. This trail, be it treasure or lizard or hermit, begins at the goblin village, and I hardly think a hermit with a sack would walk directly into the river, along the bottom and out the other side," she reproves Aago, "although a lizard might. So -- one of these places," she taps the fan against her hand, "is where the goblins found the treasure but not necessarily where the skeletons are abiding. The trail certainly leads somewhere, possibly to the skeletons, but not necessarily to one of the places on the map."
Aago grins. "I've never heard of skeletons hunting goblins down to take back what they've stolen either. Or, for that matter, goblins stealing a bunch of dogs from town. So who's to say what a hermit will do when the rest of the world's gone mad? Nonetheless, my point remains: It could be anything that's making the trail."
He runs a hand through his hair and glances up at the sun. "Well we either decide to swim across or walk downriver or give up the whole thing. I suppose we could try to build a raft but that'll take even more time. Time's a-wasting...what'll it be?"
Corinna ponders a moment. "Well, we can't cross here, so following the trail immediately is out of the question. Suppose we continue along the river toward the nearest point marked on the map: if we find an easy place to cross before we've traveled too far, we could come back and follow the trail on the far side; if we're nearer the ship than to the village by the time we can cross, we continue on to the ship. I'm afraid we're going to have to find some way to cross the river eventually if we're to get to the other two points marked on the fan."
"You heard the Lady. Let's get moving." Malan takes Corinna's hand and starts off.
Annoyed by Malan's tone, Aago opens his mouth to say something but forgets what it might have been when the elf grabs Corinna's hand and takes her with him into the lead.
He glances at Melon, shrugs and follows after, slingshot still in hand.
You set out west along the river tributary, slogging through the mud and muck and pushing through tall grasses. Insects buzz about, nipping and biting, and the air smells foul. After about an hour of travel, you haven't even covered a quarter of a mile yet. Poor Gilfroy has the hardest time, hard enough that you need to stick him on his pony to keep going. Umbral is much more capable of moving through this terrain, but the poor animal is getting very, very muddy.
After another hour and a half of travel, you finally reach what you think must be the ship on the map. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be much left of it beyond a burnt-out frame, which has mostly collapsed. Indeed, if it weren't for the fact that you were expecting to find a ship, you might not have even recognized it as a ship without a more detailed examination.
"Okay, so this is not exciting, but at least my hair isn't white anymore," he comments, almost a growl, as he scrubs at his now brown hair. "Corinna, you didn't happen to think to prepare prestidigitation before you left home this morning, did you?"
Upon seeing the ship, he says, "Looks like we're not the only ones who like setting fire to things we find in the marsh."
"We're just going to get dirty again, you know," she sighs with a weak smile.
"We're just going to get dirty again, you know," she sighs with a weak smile.
No easy way across the river presented itself on the journey. It occasionally got a bit narrower (as narrow as 30 feet) and frequently widened (to as much as 70 feet). This seems to be one of the major tributaries of the Soggy River.
The time is around 1 p.m.
"If we turned back right now, I think we'd be back in Sandpoint by dark," Corinna offers, glancing up at the sky.
Disappointed at the wreckage of the ship, Aago moves a little closer, looking for some sign of what the name had been, if nothing else.
Frustrated, he turns to look at where the river empties itself into the ocean (bay, lake?). "Well we could just cross here. It probably won't be too difficult and swimming will just help to cool us all and maybe clean us up a little."
"In that water?" Corinna asks unbelievingly, looking at the muddy river. "Magic does a much better job and doesn't leave you dripping. Now, before we go a step further, we're having a plan. If we turn back now, we can get back to Sandpoint before dark. If we go on, there's no telling how far it is to the next point on the map, or, if we decide to double back and follow the trail from the village, to wherever it leads. We will certainly not be back on solid ground before dark. We might be stuck in the middle of a swamp with no dry ground to camp or start a fire on and most of us unable to see our hands in front of our faces, most emphatically not a good position to be in if there are undead around. What do we do now? Go back and continue our investigations when we have a new period of daylight, or try to find a way across the river that doesn't involve anyone drowning? If we go on, do we keep following the map or follow the tracks you found back at the goblin village? And if you vote to go on, please include an explanation of how we will spend the night if we are unable to find any more dryness and shelter than we've run across so far." She folds her arms, as if stopping herself before going on to ask you to formulate your response in complete sentences and use proper Taldane grammar.
Aago bites his lip to hide a smile. "It's an adventure, Corinna. Sometimes that means you have to stay outside without shelter or a fire. Why, I bet Sandru and Ameiko have both spent whole weeks out in the wild while they were on their adventures. If we spend all our time traveling back and forth between Sandpoint and the river we'll never get anything done!"
He gestures back at Sandpoint. "Do we really want to go back to town and tell them all at the Dragon tonight that we traveled until it looked like we were going to get wet and a little muddy so we came back home?" Gods forbid we have to spend a night away from our comfy little beds!
"So you have no plan: no goal, no provision of food, shelter, or clean water, just the hopes of blundering into something while we wander at random so you can return home with a tale that paints us as heroes." She sighs. "Ameiko and Mr. Vhiski, I'm sure, did spend weeks in the wild; however, I'm also going to assume that they had supplies fit for the task and something other than a goblin-made map on a fan to guide them. And, as we have just learned, they were the sole survivors of their 'adventures.' How many of us are you willing to sacrifice so the survivors can return home triumphant?" She turns to the others. "Anyone else?"
"So, you mean you didn't bring any food or water with you? Well, that's not great planning." Gilfroy sounds surprised. "I'll admit, I have no tent for shelter, but I wouldn't if I were making a trip to Magnimar, either. Sometimes, when you're far from an inn, you just camp rough."
"On the other hand, there's only so much that supplies would help us here," Melon interjects, "Everything would get heavy and wet and incredibly dirty; and everything we carry we. Well. Have to carry. We'd be slower and spend even more time here than strictly necessary. Also consider: if we were to come back again tomorrow and go straight for the other ship, how long would it take just to get as far as we are now?" Melon grins, "Though I am playing Asmodeus' advocate - I don't particularly care either way."
Corinna lifts an eyebrow at Gilfroy. "I have never been far from an inn. Except in a carriage while traveling, which also provides shelter and a dry place to sleep. So, no, I have no food, water, or sleeping apparatus with me. You all seriously plan to just lie down in the mud and hope no one rolls over and drowns during the night? There isn't even firm ground to sleep on now we're away from the fishing trail." She lifts her boot where it has sunk a few inches into the mud just while she has been talking, and it proves her point with a resounding squelch.
Aago pulls out a waterskin with a smile. After rummaging in his pack for a moment he frowns. Snapping his fingers in disgust he says, "I did drink too much last night! I forgot to bring the food. Ah well, water's more important anyway. To answer your question, however, no I don't intend to blunder. We know the ships are along the coast. We've found the coast so that's easy enough to follow. I suggest we cross the water now so we can continue at least in the hopes of finding the second ship. Camp when it gets dark, sleep, continue on the next day. Perhaps there's fish we can catch for supper. Or a few snakes for breakfast."
Corinna sighs again. "Any plan that involves me sleeping in several inches of mud is not one I intend to endorse," she says stubbornly.
"In this, I think Aago is right. We should try to locate the second ship before returning. Also, I have some food, though not really enough for all of us, we can make do." More somberly he adds, "Besides, I figure that when you left with us you left that 'comfortable' life behind."
Malan has 4 days of rations.