Calendula takes a step back after being twice assaulted by the beast.
Glaring daggers in the direction of the disappeared mushroom monster, she throws her arm forward, stabbing into the beast.
Her arm recoils neatly. This was going to be useful.
Though Rudrik slices only through empty air, both Calendula and Theodric hit. Chunks of plant matter hit the floor, and the smell of ozone fills the air as the sorcerer electrocutes the invisible creature. The fungus briefly appears as it bites Calendula a third time. Shenuska blasts it with magic missiles before it vanishes once more. It's badly damaged, but not enough to stop fighting.
WIFF!
Ignoring the appearing/disappearing giant fungus, Nime moves through the doorway to place her healing hands on Calendula.
Shenuska curses and, devoid of other options, waits to try again.
This time, Shenuska's magic missiles finish off the fungus before it can land another hit. Its invisible body thuds heavily to the floor.
"That was less than fun." Shenuska mutters as she redone her goggles and begins a thorough search of the room. She moves methodically, checking every corner with detect magic and slow, careful feeling, trying as she does so not to stick her hands too deep into the mushroom creature.
Shenuska's through search reveals an invisible chest in the corner of the room! It doesn't radiate magic. It is locked tight.
"There's a chest here!" Shenuska calls. "Invisible, but no magic! Anyone got some chalk, or something else powdered?"
With the chest (hopefully) revealed she turns to Rurik. "Can you have a go at this? Without breaking it? An invisible chest could be remarkably useful..."
"Uhhh... it will be really hard if it's invisible. There must be some way to make it visible, right?" says Rudrik.
In lieu of anything else Shenuska starts scooping handfulls of dust off the floor and pouring them over the chest, gradually revealing its contours to the rogue.
"Better, RuDrik?"
Rudrik takes out his thieves' tools and fiddles with the lock for a few moments until the tumblers click into place. Inside the coffer is a veritable treasure trove: a lesser empower metamagic rod, five bags of diamond dust (worth 500 gp each), seven slim ingots of platinum worth 1,000 each, and a curled series of scrolls containing the spells: daylight, dispel magic, fireball, glitterdust, lightning bolt, mage armor, pyrotechnics, scorching ray, shatter, shout, and unseen servant.
Theo let out an impressed whistle as the scrolls were identified. "I can think of several members of my family who'd have a field day with this sort of scroll cache. Well... maybe not my parents, I think they've got most of these in their spellbooks already."
"Anyone object to me taking the rod and Shen I can already guess the double-entendre you're thinking of and it is way too easy." He gave her a light-hearted smile with that last bit.
"None at all Theo." Shenuska responds, batting her lashes exaggeratedly. "It's a shame though... think of what I could do with it, when I'm all alone, by myself..." She makes an extremely suggestive hand gesture and grins widely.
"Huh; surprised you didn't go with one based on my 'too easy' remark there. Or are you less of a cunning ling- no, no; sorry, that one's been done to the Hells and back. If I'm gonna be discerning about vulgar remarks, I should probably follow my own advice."
"I think you've seen exactly what kind of linguist I am." Shenuska responds immediately, "And I didn't hear any complaints from either of you!"
Rudrik fiddles with the chest and eventually gets it open. "Well that was a challenge! Doing the entire thing just by touch!"
"Do I need to give you all a minute with the treasure? I've heard of people rubbing treasure on their body but this is a bit new."
Nime looks back and forth between Shenuska and Theodric.
"Are we talking about genitals again?" she asks, her face eager.
Calendula grumbles and leaves the room as the discussion inevitably turns back towards sex.
"C'mon, gang, that's not considerate," says Rudrik as Calendula leaves the room. "You know how tough things are for Callie."
Nime frowns and follows Calendula out of the room.
"Hey, sweetie," she says as she puts one hand on the woman's shoulder. "I'm so sorry. That was really inconsiderate. I know you don't like to think about that stuff."
She continues to walk next to the scarred woman.
"Is there something I can do to make it up to you?"
Shenuska actually looks a little bit chagrined, just a little bit. "We should be getting back then. There's a lot of gear here we need to deal with." She says, carefully avoiding any more innuendo for now.
On the way back Shenuska is quiet, occasionally muttering what sound like numbers to herself. On the outskirts of town she pulls a piece of charcoal and a scrap of paper from the pocket of her skirt and jots a couple of things down before passing the paper around.
"I think this is everything we can sell. If my knowledge of the markets is still accurate we should make a pretty penny profit."
Once everyone has looked at the paper she clears her throat and looks towards Callie. "So, where next? What do you think Calendula - what makes sense to you?"
Calendula is, predictably, gruff and cold in response. "I don't really care, Nime, sex is fine, I just don't want to be around it an don't need to hear about it every second. No need to change fer me, I'll be dead sooner or later," she jokes, following with a slight cough
At Shenuska's question, Calendula scratches her head. "We were gonna check up on th'other gang, yeah? The Horny Toads. As fer me, I dunno, I'm still stuck on if'n Baraket were inactive, c'n we be sure that the urge to murder felt by Ms. Big Peacock t'weren't jus her own poisoned heart? I'd like a more in depth look around that manor, talk to her some, but I'll admit, dealin with th Horned Frogs's prolly more urgent."
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Calendula is, predictably, gruff and cold in response. "I don't really care, Nime, sex is fine, I just don't want to be around it an don't need to hear about it every second. No need to change fer me, I'll be dead sooner or later," she jokes, following with a slight cough
Nime wraps a long arm around Calendula's shoulder and pulls her close as they walk.
"We all die, sweetie. That doesn't mean we can't enjoy our time here." She leans in again and kisses the woman's head. "No matter how much or how little we have."
"Well after you got here to turn herself in surely she'll be in prison by now?" Shenuska asks. "I don't think Miss Peacock is going to be a problem any more. The Horned Fangs should be our play I agree." She looks between Nine, Callow and Rise in. "I'm not local, should we go back to this Jana woman now we've dealt with the Roadkeepers, or just try and track them down ourselves?"
"I just want to understand more of it," she murmurs, still scratching her shorn head.
"Yeah, let's get the other gang outta the way, then we can worry about the mystery of Baraket. Prolly best we catch the Horned Lizards by surprise."
"So, back to Jana and find out what she knows?" Shen summarises. "We don't actually know where the gang hangs out so lets see what she can tell us."
You find Jana at the same table at Creekside. She waves your over with a thin smile. "So, how's it going? Did you take down any rival gangs lately?"
"Yes," Shenuska says with a smile of her own, one that is a little bit like a shark eyeing up a meal. "The Roadkeepers are disbanded."
She takes a seat at the table, sitting very close to Jana. "So, I think that means you owe us a favour."
She leans in, letting her breath tickle Jana's ear.
"We want to know about the Horned Fangs. Everything. Please."
"Oh," Jana breathes, flushing. She clears her throat. "Well, if you guys were able to take out the Roadkeepers without breaking a sweat, maybe you can help me out with something more challenging.
"You see, I founded the Horned Fangs a while ago, but I'm not the one calling the shots any more. When I first came to the Cove, I paid Garleena to crash in her storeroom here at Creekside. But I found a secret door there that lead to an ancient underground complex. It's there I first saw the symbol that I chose for our gang sign. It was a great place for our gang to hideout, until Mozamer showed up.
"He's a real monster. Claws, sideways mouth, pale skin, the whole shebang. He convinced me to give him control of the Fangs. Granted, I was drunk and high at the time. But now he's training my people into his own personal army. Plus, he brought lots of other monsters with him. Some of them have been slipping out of the well into town at night to cause trouble.
"So, if you could take out Mozamer, I could regain control of the Fangs and restore them back the way they're supposed to be."
Calendula inserts herself, frustrated and bewildered.
"An what're they supposed to be? A youth boxing club? They was already a nuisance when you was in charge. No the only way I see this goin your way is if ya help reform them, make em stand-up kids. Otherwise we'll right it ourselves."
She pinches her eyes and sits down, assaulted by a sudden headache. Clearing her throat, she continues. "To reiterate: If we fix yer gang, you rein them in, direct their anger and energy in positive ways, fer the benefit of the community. Maybe take up gardenin."
Jana nods. "Alright, that's fine with me. I made my gang to protect this place, after all. Roderic's Cove is my home. I finally have a chance to make up for what my mother did all those years ago, and I'm not about to let some monster screw things up here again."
"They could take up gardening," Nime says with a smile. "Or they could form a theater troupe. Or they could collect food for the poor. There's lots of things they could do."
She looks around at the others waiting for confirmation.
"So where is Mozamer? We should go talk to him. Is he down underneath the inn?" The woman looks down at her feet. "That would be very convenient."
"Yeah, he's down there now. But so are his minions, and the Horned Fangs angry enough to buy into his rhetoric. You can expect a big fight if you go down there."
"I'd really hoped we could just talk to him," Nime responds. Although her expression indicates that the hope is a very slim one.
She pulls her new hat off her head and looks down at it as if it might offer answers.
"Maybe we can convince him to listen to reason," she says after a moment. "Let's go." She puts the hat back on her head and takes a firm grip on her walking spear.
"And hpw are you hoing to help us now?" Shenuska asks. "Seems like we're doing a lot for you. What are you going to do to make our lives easier?"
"Um, stay out of your way? Honestly, I don't think I can bring myself to fight against people I used to call friends. I've, uh, got a couple of healing potions you can use," Jana offers a bit lamely.
"You said 'the ones that buy his rhetoric'." Shenuska replies, "Take off and find the ones who dont. Then get them out, and make life difficult for those staying behind. How long do you need to do that? Also," She pauses, "What are the ways in?"
Jana nods. "I can do that, thin the ranks for you a bit. Give me a day to get them somewhere safe. You can get down to the underground complex through the secret door in the inn's storeroom, or you could climb down the well in the Circle, if you don't mind getting wet."
Jana nods. "I can do that, thin the ranks for you a bit. Give me a day to get them somewhere safe. You can get down to the underground complex through the secret door in the inn's storeroom, or you could climb down the well in the Circle, if you don't mind getting wet."
Nime's face looks completely innocent as a number of pairs of eyes turn and look at her.
"What?"
"Secret door might be easier," Theo said, "easier to retreat through if necessary and I doubt - or at least I sincerely hope - that they wouldn't be stupid enough to go trying to murder us and any townsfolk here if it comes to that. Maybe sabotage the well exit somehow so they don't escape out that way?"
"Tomorrow then" Shenuska proposes. "Give Jana some time to do her work."
Out of respect(!!!) for Calendula's feelings she doesn't propose evening recreation but if someone chooses to come to her room...
The next morning Theo is woken unpleasantly early by an annoyingly chipper Shen. Her attire, a very tight tunic and thin leggings, might make up for it somewhat however... "How about that run we were talking about?"
Rudrik shrugs and says, "I'm down for whatever. Just point me in the stabby direction."
As the group heads to their separate domiciles (or not) he jogs to catch up with Calendula.
"Hey Calllll-endula," he says, obviously drawing out the name because he was about to say 'Callie' and caught himself at the last second. "How's your arm doing? Not giving you any trouble snapping back? That was pretty uh... incredible."
Calendula turns around in response, "What? Oh that." She clears her throat and leans against a fence, under a lamppost.
"My arm's fine, Rudrik. Here, look," she throws a punch at nothing, and indeed, there seems to be nothing strange about the punch; her bones don't melt, and her fist doesn't sail off into the distance. Just a normal punch.
She beckons him over and rolls up her sleeve, displaying her a web of thick scars up and down the arm, and large, black veins. "Don't think I've showed ya this, have I? Touch it. You'll understand better."
Her skin is cold as death and paper thin, even over her scars. Pressing down, Rudrik finds her pulse weak and slow, barely eking out a single pump once every three seconds.
She pulls out her rusted, notched sword and pokes the tip into her finger, allowing her thick blood to flow out.
"Hold out your hand," she instructs, sheathing her weapon. Assuming he does so, she drips a single drop into his hand. Her blood, thick with disease, falls slowly, remaining connected to her finger til the last. It hurts to hold, so cold it almost burns right through.
"There's far stranger things about my body than jus my joints actin up, kid. I ain't right and ain't been right for a long time." She sniffs and tugs her sleeve back down, shivering.
Rudrik obediently feels the odd, thready pulse and the cool skin. The half-orc's brow furrows, hard, as he thinks. Calendula, having known him for a few years now, knows that while he's not well-educated, he's not dumb - he can, in fact, be clever from time to time.
Finally he says slowly, "I don't think you're dying, Calendula. I think you're changing. I think your body is having aches and coughs and pains and spasms and I don't know what it's changing into but... somehow I think this isn't gonna be what kills ya."
He shuffles his feet uncomfortably. "... but you don't want to hear that because you are um... unhappy with the idea of living like this."
"S**%, I'm sorry."
"Tomorrow then" Shenuska proposes. "Give Jana some time to do her work."
Out of respect(!!!) for Calendula's feelings she doesn't propose evening recreation but if someone chooses to come to her room...
The next morning Theo is woken unpleasantly early by an annoyingly chipper Shen. Her attire, a very tight tunic and thin leggings, might make up for it somewhat however... "How about that run we were talking about?"
Despite his behaviour with Shen and Nime, Theo doesn't seek out any nocturnal companionship. He told himself years ago that he wouldn't indulge more than two nights in a row at the most, the only exception being with his girlfriend back in Magnimar.
He was a little bleary-eyed when Shen turned up at his door. While he was appreciative of the sight (and he got the feeling Shen didn't mind the sight of his bare chest), he was still clearly tired.
"I hate to sound like a stereotypical noble, Shen, but now? The sun's barely up, there are Sarenrite's still in bed at the moment."
Almost on cue, a gentleman walked past humming a well-known Sarenrite hymn, the tune hitching a moment as he caught sight of Shen, before resuming as he continued.
"... I never said all Sarenrites."
Nime debates about spending the evening with Calendula, but after considering the feel in the air, decides that she needs to take a night for herself.
Whenever this feeling comes upon her she finds herself on the edge of the dock looking downriver to the ocean. She sits, tailor fashion, on the weathered wood just taking in the sensations. The call of the gulls. The feel of the rough wood beneath her. The scent of fish. The sound of the lapping water. And the ever-present wind.
Usually the wind is filled with Her words, but She's quiet this evening. That's not to say that Nime can't feel the change coming in the air. The breeze is pregnant with upheaval and Nime and her friends are on the cusp of those changes. So many things are going to change.
It's always best to navigate changes with friends by your side and Nime is happy with the friends she has. Even if parts of her are still sore from the previous evening. She smiles at the thought. Those thoughts are quickly replaced by similar thoughts going much farther back. Cold nights spent beneath the furs keeping warm. With him.
Her smile fades.
Sometimes it seemed like ages ago and she could almost forget. Other times, like now, it felt like if she opened her eyes he would be standing there - his rare smile just for her.
Thoughts of him were always a distraction though, and with the changes coming she couldn't allow something like that. One night. She would allow herself one night and then she needed to be looking at the future, not the past. For now.
The breeze cools the tears on her cheeks.
~~~~
The pre-dawn finds Nime still sitting on the pier as fishermen begin arriving to tend to their boats.
"Coming wi' us this mornin', Nime?" one of the fishermen says in the way of a greeting as he moves to begin adjusting ropes on a nearby boat.
"Not this morning," Nime says, opening her eyes and smiling at the familiar weathered face. "My friends and I have to save the world." She uses her nearby spear to rise clumsily to her feet.
"Well, best be on it den," the man says with a gap-toothed grin. "The sun be up soon."
"I will, thank you," she says as she turns to make her way to the inn. She stops and turns back. "Oh, and don't use the new net this morning. Trevor's wife will be very upset if he loses another finger."
"We'll see what we can do about that," the man says. Whether his tone is reverent or condescending isn't clear, but Nime doesn't seem to care as she continues on her way.
~~~~
Arriving at the inn, Nime takes a seat and waits for her friends to gather.
"I hate to sound like a stereotypical noble, Shen, but now? The sun's barely up, there are Sarenrite's still in bed at the moment."
Almost on cue, a gentleman walked past humming a well-known Sarenrite hymn, the tune hitching a moment as he caught sight of Shen, before resuming as he continued.
"... I never said all Sarenrites."
"And here I thought you valued a good body as well as a good mind." She says, winking over her shoulder at the Sarenrite as he passes by. "Clearly there's one kind of exercise you prefer! I'll leave you alone then, maybe Nime will go for a swim with me later."
She turns to leave, deliberately puts some extra sway into her walk as she heads downstairs.
As Nime arrives at the inn she is nearly run into by Shenuska, her hair fly-away and a flush on her cheeks. She's clearly been running and is breathing deeply as she pulls up.
"Hi sweetie. I'll be along in a few minutes, I need to change first." Indeed her thin top is now clinging completely, between her sweat and the early morning mist.
"If you see Theo tell him he missed a great run and he needs to get up earlier!"
As she heads up the stairs the psychic throws a last comment over her shoulder. "Feel like a swim tomorrow morning?"