Tesia just nods.
"Given how old this temple is, it could be the Church of Iomedae on Icathia, who initially sent them here." the magus says after some thought. "Who knows who else had access to those levels of long-range magic back then."
"I could try to activate it....I have a knack with making unfamiliar magic work, the question is, do we want to know what's on the other end?" Sādhanā says looking at her companions.
"Aye, the winds pick up in the wintertime and kin shear the skin off yer face," the dwarf answers. "From where d' ye hail?"
Roshan finds a battered journal in one of the desk drawers. In another, he finds several bottles of wine. In a third, he finds a stack of papers and a gold necklace. The pendant is a flawless aquamarine set into a golden sun.
Sienna glances at Sadhana. "Depends on if it would actually be worth the trouble."
Sienna gleans nothing from her investigation of the mirror.
"We're from Valwick, a town on the southern coast," Mirrin says.
"Ah, heard about that new town from some traders. Ye them heroes erryone is talkin' about?" the dwarf asks.
Roshan looks up from the desk, his brows furrowed. He shakes his head slightly, "I'm not sure that activating it would be such a good idea. Especially if we're unsure of exactly whom we would be contacting. I'm just going to take these papers and things and look over them later. I don't want to take up anymore time than absolutely necessary. You know...some things from the past are probably best left there." Unless it can help me find out what happened to my family. Roshan thinks to himself as he collects the journal, a single bottle of the wine, the stack of papers, and the necklace with the pendant on it. Maybe he would find some answers with these things. He really didn't want to stay here much longer. He found out the most important thing he needed to know.
Tesia looks around at her companions before looking back at the dwarf. She wasn't really sure how she felt about these people yet, and didn't know if they could trust them or not. She wasn't sure it would be a good idea to lay out everything on the table right away, so to speak.
Trying not to look as nervous as she felt she gives him a slight smile, "Not really, but I was wondering if there was something you could help me with? A friend of mine asked me to look into finding someone that disappeared some time ago near these mountains? She promised their husband that she would try to find them, and since she's unable to travel much at the moment, and we had to come this way anyways...I told her I would ask about her. Her name was Floria, her husband Madgar told my friend about her and asked that if we were headed this way if we could try to find out what happened to her. She has a young daughter that's missing her very much, and he thought that if we could find her....or at the very least, find out what's become of her...that it would help him and his daughter. Does that name sound familiar to you at all?"
"That journal might have an answer to this puzzle," Sienna says, nodding in the direction of the mirror. She then looks around at the others. "Just making an educated guess."
The dwarf shakes his head. "Ah'm not good with names or faces. In the spring an' summer, people come an' go. Some ne'er return. If yer searching fer someone, yer best bet is to check the first mine. S'about a mile hike from the base o' the first mountain."
"If anything in here would, that's likely to be it." Sadhana replies with a thoughtful expression.
Roshan walks over to Sadhana and holds the journal out to her, "Couldn't hurt to go through it. I'm just going to look through these papers while you do that. We can go whenever you're ready."
Tesia looks at the others before looking back at him, "Alright, thank you for th eddd information."
"And how far from here to the base of the mountain?" Mirrin asks.
---
"Might be able to get there in 'bout an hour," the dwarf answers. "Ye have a lil time 'fore it gets too cold to travel."
Magestreia turns to Tesia. "Do you want to get going?"
Tesia nods, "Yeah sure, it would probably be a good idea to get moving sooner rather than later anyways. Does anyone need anything before we go?"
Once Sadhana takes the journal from him, Roshan goes and sits in the chair behind the desk to look through the papers he had found.
Mirrin shakes her head. "We can make camp when we reach the mine, I guess."
Roshan looks through the papers which are nothing more than reports. The earliest ones are fairly mundane, detailing the members of the temple and their provisions. Peppered in the early reports are copies of requisition orders sent to the mainland. Toward the middle of the stack, the reports detail orc troop movements and responses. The last few mention a secret tunnel beneath the temple meant to smuggle out noncombatants and nonessential personnel. Their escort was to be Lt. Commander Tobias Sparrowhawke.
Tesia nods, "That sounds like a solid plan." Looking at the dwarf she says, "Thank you for your hospitality and your help."
Looking up from the papers he says out loud, "It seems there is a tunnel underneath this temple."
The dwarf nods as you depart back out into the cold.
Tesia bundles up as they head back out.
Sādhanā finds a spot to sit as she reads through the journal, trying to gather any important information that might be available.
As they prepare to leave, Rhadaya briefly casts a spell, resting a hand first on Magestreia's then Mirrin's shoulder, a warm breeze swirling around each of the anizari, dispelling the chill of the air. While the spell is still active, she moves over t Tes, giving her wife a kiss with a smile.
Rhadaya's spell makes the cold bearable, though snow begins to fall in sheets. The mountains ahead are obscured and you can only make out the land about fifty feet ahead of you.
Mirrin pulls her hood around her. "This ought to be fun. So, other than this mine, is there anything else we need to keep a look out for? If, by some miracle, we can see anything going forward."
"Flying's out the question, I think," Magestreia says. "We'll have time to look around."
Sādhanā determines from her reading that the symbols around the mirror are coordinates to points in space and time and planes. By aligning the arrows on the mirror, it is possible to contact various planes in the universe.
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Tesia sighs and smiles as her wife's kiss, brings a warmth with it that has her tingling all the way to her toes. She had no idea what they would be facing here, but she knew they could all face anything as long as they stuck together.
Tesia nods while holding her love's hand to keep her near, "I definitely am not able to fly in these conditions. So, aside from trying to find Floria, we need to be on the look out for some Nymphs that are being held captive or something by some necromancer named Wyvaire. This is kind of her domain, so we probably really want to be on the look out for her. I'm not sure what she looks like or anything though. Arista and the others had promised someone that helped them that they would help free them. There's no telling what we'll come across while here though, so we all need to be on our guard."
"This mirror is both incredibly powerful and invaluable, it allows contact with a number of different planes, just by making adjustments to the arrows in alignment with the sigils." the magus says looking up from the journal. "The question is who we'd be reaching out to."
"If she's anything like the other necromancers that have been taken down so far, she most likely won't be alone either.." Rhadaya adds as they walk along.
Sienna raises an eyebrow. "That doesn't seem like something we need to do."
Mirrin nods. "Wyvaire hasn't left the mountain in a long time...that's about all I know about her."
Rhadaya doesn't see anything in the immediate area as you leave the village behind you.
Sienna raises an eyebrow. "That doesn't seem like something we need to do."
"I agree with your friend. Some things are better left alone. There is no telling what we would reach on the other end, and there are so many planes that there's no guarantee that we wouldn't reach a hostile one and no telling what would happen then. I think it would be better to either destroy this device, or just cover it back up and leave it alone. I can lock this door the way that it was after we left, so no one else should be able to get in here and activate it either. It just seems far too dangerous to play with." Roshan says, his voice slightly shaking as the thoughts of what might happen if they actually try to use it makes him nervous.
"Well, we will have to cross that bridge when we get to it, but she will be something we have to deal with, along with finding and freeing the nymphs, as well as Floria." She says resolutely while attempting to look through the snow as well to see what's around them as well as where they're going so they don't get lost.
"Yeah, we'd better make our way up north," Sienna says. "No telling what Tichran is up to now."
As you proceed through the rocky foothills, Tesia spies a wooded area to your left. The ground looks peculiar there.
Tesia relays her findings to the rest of the group before moving a little closer to inspect the curious terrain.
Roshan nods, "It would probably be in our best interest to go as far as we can while we have daylight. I wonder where that tunnel they used to smuggle people out went to?"
Sienna shrugs and heads out of the room.
Roshan looks at the strange and highly dangerous mirror one more time as he approaches the Magus, "Are you ready to go?" Thinking for a moment he says, "I know how tempting it must feel to want to know what they were doing with that mirror, or whatever it is. I just...I think some secrets are best left unsolved. I don't think there's anything left here that we really need." Roshan tucks the few papers that referenced his great great grandfather into one of his pockets as he waits to make sure that Sadhanna is ready to go before leaving the room.
Tesia sees that the ground is actually a frozen lake. She sees that the trunks of the trees extend deep into the water. Surprisingly, fish still move in the water.
"Wow....now that is really weird." She says out loud as she looks into the lake.
"I'm against destroying it, you never know when something like this could be useful. It might be worth it to have Michael, he's is our town's resident Wizard, investigate it at some point, but I do agree that it's definitely not a priority. It's survived here without interference for centuries, it can sit a bit longer. You're right we should get going." Sādhanā says stifling her academic curiosity.
Finding a sheet, tablecloth or drapes to cover the mirror she follows the others out of the room. "I think re-locking the door would be a good idea, and yes we should make as good time as possible while it's daylight."