By the time the envelope reaches you, adventuring in a far off land, it is battered and crumpled and stained with mud and sea salt and possibly blood.
You open it, and find thick cream paper with fine calligraphy. You read:
Surveen Walsh, Sharadon Vos, Gideon Hawke, Tudan Davken,You are cordially invited to the wedding of Elyin Ursage and Kailah Winmede,
To be held in the chapel of Shelyn in Bellis Village,
This Spring Solstice.
Below the formal text is the familiar scrawl of Elyin, your former adventuring companion. He writes; Dear friends, please come if you can. It's been too long, and Kailah is keen to meet the folks behind so many of my stories. Elyin.
Spring solstice is tomorrow. You are half a continent away. You have just returned from rescuing the son of Albric Dayne, head of the local arcanist's guild, from the Cult of the Serpentine Labyrinth. He owes you.
There might just be a way...
As the pale wizard read the letter, he allowed fond memories of his friend Elyin to flood his thoughts. Few people had treated poor Sharadon as well as Elyin had. He glanced at his bone-white skin for a moment, before commiting himself to reaching Bellis no matter the cost. "It would seem that Albric Dayne will be paying up faster than I'd thought."
Surveen Walsh smiles at his companions as the letter is read. "A true friend indeed, honorable man with whom more than once we have fought beside against the evils that assail this land. It is with pleasure that I would travel to him on such a joyous occasion. To think we are part of his tall tales and stories, let us hope he hasn't exaggerated our roles as he is wont to do. Our destinies seem to intertwine once more, only this time with happiness and laughter."
"And how could we possibly miss a wedding?" Tudan grins widely. "There are few greater celebrations of life -- and of course we must meet this Kailah, to make sure that she's good enough for him." The genial aasimar winks, certain that his old friend Elyin has chosen well. "I only hope that you're right, Sharadon, and that Albric can get us there in time."
"Well, lets go find him then. We have a wedding to attend! I wonder if he has any nicer clothes... I think I'll feel silly in my armor and such."
Gideon looks over his travel stained garments with the sort of dismay you never see the boisterous magus show in battle.
Tudan chuckles. "Yes, it has been awhile since anyone cared what we looked like, aside from deadly or dead. If he can't help with clothes, we might as well wait until we get there, to get some in the local fashion. Besides, all we have to do is polish our mithril, and I bet it'll be finer than anything they've seen." Buffing his breastplate with his shirtsleeve has no visible effect on a labyrinth's worth of grime, but he beams with pride anyway.
Surveen surveys his clothes, meager rags that allow him freedom of movement, yet no the thing for a formal celebration as a wedding. "Tudan, I just hope they have something suitable for me to buy. These robes have seen better days, it is time I got some new ones. Do you think they will?"
The mage glances down at his own blood-stained, mud-soaked robes. It had been so long since he'd cared about his appearance, so long as his skin condition had remained covered. The thought of new cloths seemed alien to Sharadon. "I guess blood and dirt colored robes isn't the most fashionable thing to wear to a wedding..."
"Well, I'm not certain; and once we're gone, we won't have time to go anywhere else before the wedding. So we could look for wedding clothes here, then if we don't find anything suitable, we could look again after we get there."
"Why wait? We'll either find something or we won't when we get there. Elyin would rather have us there naked then not at all. If we delay, the arcanist's son could get kidnapped again or something. And then where would we be?"
"If I wash myself, maybe I'll get by with just my blue skin, if its a human settlement." chuckles Surveen. "But I agree with Gideon, let's get there first, before we worry about our dress." he nods to Gideon and starts to wrap some of his possessions up ready for the journey.
Laughing at their jests, Tudan concedes the point. "Okay, okay. Priority to getting there, then we'll consider our appearances once we've appeared."
"It's decided then. Let us settle with this arcanist before..", Sharadon eyes Gideon worriedly. "Before his son can be kidnapped again! Or we anger some balor or ancient wyrm and get trapped in a burning kingdom, saving the day."
Albric is welcoming and his gaunt serious face cracks into a brief smile as you explain your requirements. "Quick travel, indeed," he intones. "Well, that is certainly within the purview of the Arcanists Guild. Not easy, mind, or cheap in the ordinary run of things. But possible, of a surety." He claps, summoning an apprentice who scurries in, mouselike.
"Return in an hour and I will have prepared the requisite incantations and components."
There is a gentlemen's store located close to the Arcaneum building. There might be time to rectify any shortcomings in your apparel.
"In an hour then! Let's try this gentleman's store. I'm thinking something with a cravat."
The outdoorsy aasimar grimaces. "I'd rather avoid having anything around my neck, if at all possible. Perhaps they could make a stand-up collar look formal enough."
Gideon settles on a sky blue doublet, cream colored leather breeches, and manages to arrange a new black silk head scarf and veil into a sort of cravat with much of its length stuffed into the doublet. "Never know when I'll need a fight and I never fight without one. It's lucky. It must be or I'd never have survived this long."
The wizard settled on a simple gold-trimmed replacement for his adventuring robe. Woven in the same iridescent blue, Sharadon seemed content with a similar, if more fancy, appearance to his adventuring attire. "Call me a creature of habit, but I don't think our friend will have any trouble dealing with my usual attire."
Surveen looks through the exotic and regal clothes, searching for a simple robe and cape, without the fine accoutrements of his friends. He looks for the clean and country clothes of a peasant, yet with the colour of a bard, before eventually finding a pure yellow robe and smock, to hang loosely on his body. Affording him the manual dexterity he requires in his choice of wear. The bright yellow of the full length robe, fall down to show his new hard wearing sandals on his feet, solid black leather, tied tight on his lower legs and feet. The thongs criss-crossing up his legs in diamond shapes, although only the first two or three show from under the robes thick yellow corded hem. His muscular blue arms, extend out from under the short sleeves, but they can easily pull the red cape around his body to further warm himself in the cold.
Thus dressed resectfully, he is ready to attend his friends wedding.
After some discussion with the storekeeper, Tudan takes a cue from Sharadon and creates a finer version of what he's used to wearing, using muted forest colors but in impractical materials. He ends up with hunter green breeches and a matching jacket over a russet shirt with a stand-up collar, all in fine linens; soft leather boots, gloves, and a belt, all russet like the shirt; and a rust cloak of fine wool in case of chill. "Nice! I look good, it's dressy enough, and it's me. I'll take it."
You complete your purchases and the efficient young man behind the shop counter wraps them for travel. With quick deft hands he swaddles them in great squares of protective linen cloth and an outer layer of waxed canvas, before tying them with twine and presenting them with a neat bow.
On your return to the Arcaneum you find all is ready. The nervous apprentice ushers you into Albric's workshop once more. It is transformed into a dark cave of a room, shutters closed tight and chinks of light blocked with black fabric. A single candle reveals Albric's pale face and hands, moving in the darkness as he prepares some spell. The apprentice, head bowed, gives you each a small piece of smokey grey quartz fastened to a loop of silver chain, and motions for you to put them around your neck.
In the darkness, a voice. Albric says, "When the gate opens, walk the dark road. Do not stray from the path. It will lead you to Bellis, in something less than seven hours of travel. Do not leave the path."
A string of multi-syllabic words follow, that Gideon and Sharadon recognize as a powerful spell invoking illusion and shadow. The darkness deepens. Suddenly, ahead of you the shadows leap and flicker in the candlelight, rising and curving overhead to form an archway, a gate, of living shadow.
Beyond the gate lies a dark road.
Peering into the darkness, Surveen nods to his companions, "A dark road to a joyous reunion awaits. Let us go." Surveen walks towards the gate and starts along the path, he is quiet in the darkness, focussing his mind on the path ahead and the ceremony to come.
Gideon pokes his head through to look around. "Looks shadowy and terrible. Should be fun. Unless its uninhabited, then it will be seven hours of tedium and monotony and I shall probably die from boredom."
Muttering a brief incantation, a simple ring on Sharadon's finger flared to life, glowing faintly.
To Gideon he turned, "Better to die of boredom, than in the gullet of a Roper. Or perhaps a Frost Worm, yes?"
With that, Sharadon stepped through and began follow those ahead of him along the dark path.
Gideon follows, lighting the pommel of his sheathed scimitar. "Much better to not die at all, obviously..."
Tudan takes up the end of the line behind Gideon. "Unless 'to not die at all' means to become a monster." Shrouded in shadow, the sensitive aasimar waves a hand to brush aside the anticipated objection. "I know, that isn't what you meant -- but it's why some become undead. I can think of little worse than to persist wrongly, so let's please all be careful to stay on the path like Albric said; I don't trust this place."
The road stretches ahead of you. On all sides you see glimpses of strangely shadowed landscapes. Sometimes it seems you walk amid tall trees, their shade-leafed branches lost to sight above you. Then the trees seem instead to be, to have always been, the tall cracked pillars of some ruined city. In turn the pillars were never pillars but great ropes and strands of kelp swaying in the currents of some vast dark ocean.
After an interminable time of walking something breaks the shadows Off to your left a light burns briefly, like candle, then gutters and dims. You hear a voice, faint and panicked, "Help! Oh please, please help. I'm so lost. Please help me."
"Remember, don't leave the path, no matter what! You can't help anyone if you're lost too -- and besides, it's one of the oldest tricks in the book, along with 'Watch out! Behind you!'" Tudan hisses at his comrades, then raises his voice, all the while peering into the darkness. ""
"I'm going to summon a water elemental to send out, just in case it's for real." The good-hearted oracle begins the familiar gestures and mutterings of one of his favorite spells.
Sense Motive:
Knowledge (planes):
Sharadon stood patiently, waiting for whatever Tudan may summon to scurry off into the darkness. Power magic like this sometimes came with a cost, and although he'd perfer the more direct application of this kind, he had to admit: "This paticaular spell certainly came with dinner and a show..."
Surveen stops and turns back, watching Tudan complete his magic as the water elemental makes its way off towards the sound. His face shows a mind torn between his hearts inclination to help a creature in need and his head that knows the dangers found from wandering away from the path. As his fellow samanera Shogthar had said, "The path holds the substance of the planes, its way is tortuous and cold, but it is the way we follow." Now the words came to Surveen's mind as he smiles at the peace they bought.
Like so many times before, a small water elemental appears out of nowhere. Tudan converses with it quietly and briefly in Aquan: "Wait a little bit, then go out that way and look for someone lost. If you find them, then lead them back here. If attacked, run back; no need to be brave this time." Tudan smiles at the little bundle of living water, pointing off to his left where the light and sound came from.
"Say Gideon, could you make him light up? I never learned that spell; never thought I'd need to."
Tudan believes that magic should work similarly here, and has no reason to think that a simple summoning spell might threaten the integrity of the shadow path.
The water-denizen appears with its customary quiet "pillip" sound, and rushes off to do Tudan's bidding. As soon as it leaves the path, it seems to slow, become gelid and viscous. Crystalline flaws appear within the aquamarine and turquoise body of the elemental and before it reaches the dim light you can see that it is fighting to maintain its fluidity in the face of some oppressive magic.
Seeing the summoned being struggle in the depths of darkness around, Surveen's face shows distress, "Whatever magic out there can cause such distress to your watery friend, might easily present us with falseness on the path. In this plane of shadow, the darkness holds a myriad of dangers, so we must walk in the light."
Before the water elemental leaves, Gideon pulls a copper from his pouch and set it alight with a short incantation. This done, he plops it into the elemental's watery form.
"I know it's ridiculous, but I can't tell you how much I want to go out there just to see what happens." Gideon suddenly smiles brightly, anyone dare me?"
"Don't you dare," chides Spark, rising from Gideon's backpack and stretching her tiny frame languidly. She sits on Gideon's shoulder. "You stay right here and don't go haring off like a crazy person. And next time don't let me nap when you go into some terrible shadowy place. What if you needed me?" She is adorably protective.
The gaunt wizard began to mutter a protective incantation as he watched the elemental struggle for life. With that, he pulled his blade free from it's sheath. "We had best be prepared if those shadows out there decide to take offense to our light."
Tudan winces at the stubborn little water elemental's struggle. "Well done, Pluck! You found what we needed to know; now go home and rest." The empathetic oracle dismisses the summoning spell's bindings with a few seconds of arcane speech. "So, yeah. A trick to lure us to our doom. Let's move on -- we have someplace to be!"
Spark senses magic from the direction of the light, and something alien and uncaring and self-willed enough to be called evil. The tiny woman shivers and turns away. Pluck splashes into his own frosted puddle and is gone. It seems that within only a few steps down the path, the light is lost in the distance behind you, and the voice also.
The landscape continues to change around you as you walk. Mansions and ruins and forests and shadowed mountains flicker, change, and pass. Eventually after long timeless moments there is an obstruction in front of you.
A portal, a doorway, a gateway. It lies square across the path in front of you, filled with swirling shadow-stuff. It is probably the end of your road.
Filled with relief that the journey through the shadow plane is ending, Surveen turns to his companions, "Ready, looks like we've arrived." He waits so they can all go through together.
Gideon draws his scimitar. "Better safe than sorry, I think. Never trust a portal of swirling shadows, I say. I say that all the time."
Now prepared, Gideon moves through the portal.
Moving cautiously behind the rest, Sharadon took up the flank as they entrered the portal, sword at the ready.
"Of course, now that you have your swords drawn, we'll probably land in the middle of a children's game. Or young couples dancing. Or a council session." Tudan teases the two swordsmen, leaving his shield strapped to one arm and the other hand free as they go through.
"Ha ha Tudan, that would be preferable to opening straight into trouble. It's easier to put our weapons down, than to use their blade. Let's hope you're right." laughs the muscular blue humanoid. He puts his arm around Tudan's shoulders and pulls him towards him, shoulder to shoulder, before releasing. He continues to laugh at Tudan's words, enjoying the idea of starting a skipping game, or surprising the elder bureaucrats of a village.
Weapons drawn and ready, you step through the portal, from shadow into shadow. The cold tenebrious darkness of the arcane path fades behind you, and you emerge into the shade of several massive oak trees on a bright summer day. Above you paper lanterns and colored streamers hang festively, while several people dance a brisk foxtrot in their best part clothes.
At least, they were dancing until the musicians falter and stop as several heavily armed strangers appear from the shadows. A dozen pairs of eyes look at you in consternation.
When he sees the party that they interrupted, Tudan returns the blue monk's sideways embrace. "Sometimes I hate being right, and sometimes I love it." Squeezing Surveen's shoulder and dropping his shield, the halfling-raised oracle steps forward, giving an easy smile with hands raised placatingly. "Hi everybody! Sorry for interrupting, but we're old friends of Elyin!"
Tudan then turns to his comrades with exaggerated umbrage. "You'd think that the wizard could've told us where we'd end up, but no, he just had to be all 'wizardly' and 'mysterious'." Tudan gives Sharadon a discreet wink to show that he's joking, then turns back to the musicians and dancers, smiling brightly. "Obviously we're not dressed for a party yet, having just arrived; so where can we get rooms?"