Ketra's caught by surprise at the cowardice of the nekomata. Looks like their allegiance to protecting Quietus is more on the tenuous side. She jabs out with a knife as the creatures dash away. She's very much hoping they won't soon come back - despite their last little jab.
Ketra's knife delivers a parting wound on the fleeing nekomata, though it isn't enough to bring it down. Garret's flare of light catches Quietus off guard again, drawing a furious hiss from the cult leader as he clutches at his eyes again. Snarling out another spell he vanishes from sight, though Garret is still able to track him as he slowly picks his way into the space between the pew rows.
+ ROUND SEVEN +
Rosalind (Fatigued)
Garret
Quietus (-22hp; Invisible, Blinded 1/1)
Sanduro (-21hp)
Ketra (-15hp)
Red Nekomata (Fleeing)
Green Nekomata (-63hp; Fleeing)
Feeling much better, Garret does his best to point out the location of the invisible Quietus to the others.
Ketra takes a deep breath and then chases after Quietus at Garret's direction. She almost barrels right into him before she takes a path around him to at least discourage his escape southward.
Seemingly content to be ignored, the nekomata flee through the front door of the Bastion of Light and out into the poisonous fog-bank. Sanduro follows Garret's directions but keeps his arrow nocked in ready should Quietus become visible again.
+ ROUND EIGHT +
Rosalind (Fatigued)
Garret
Quietus (-22hp; Invisible, Blinded 1/1)
Sanduro (-21hp; Readied Attack)
Ketra (-15hp)
Garret moves out where he can see Quietus easily, then summons a flaming sphere right at the foe’s feet, saying, ”That’s where he is!”
Fire Damage
Garret conjures an orb of fire right at Quietus' feet, badly burning the dandy and thoroughly distracting him from the split-second whistle of Rosalind's javelin which punches clean through his shoulder. With a choked gasp of pain, a mad smile spreads across Quietus face, pain forcing his voice to barely more than a whisper.
"I think it's...better, this way. False hope is all the sweeter, when it finally dies. You have won nothing here." Throwing his head back, a roiling cloud of sickly greenish fog erupts from Quietus' mouth and rolls outwarts. In seconds Rosalind and Ketra are absorbed, the stinging poison burning their eyes, skin, and lungs. Blood streaking down his cheeks from his eyes, Quietus gives a final shudder and collapses.
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Ketra rolls to her feet outside the cloud, coughing and wheezing "One final middle finger... Good riddance to someone so vile." After a pause to ensure that Quietus' body isn't about to do something unexpected and deeply unpleasant, she rushes over to check on Mirhet, Jando and Silvia. After so many surprises, she immediately thinks how bad it would be if the cat creatures returned right now to get their own last jab.
"That was great, but let's just be somewhere else for a bit in case they come back and snoop around. The cats that is."
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"One final middle finger... Good riddance to someone so vile."
"Yes, *cough* though part of me regrets him getting off so easily. I wish we'd instead been able to hand him to the inquisition at Vigil alive. Torture isn't exactly my favorite method of exactracting information but he *does* owe me quite a bit of it," She glares at the body and unceremoneously kicks it over once the cloud disperses. She stays there until then, casting a quick heal on herself and making sure the dogs didn't return not that something else appeared to steal the body. Then she kneels to search it for anything useful.
"Thank you, all of you, for saving us and avenging the townsfolk," She adresses Ketra, Sanduro, Garret and Sylvia and smiles warmly. "Each of you is strong warrior by any standard. I only wish I'd have seen that back then. Perhaps, if you'd been with the guard that day, we could have stopped him. But that is my failure for not recognizing your talent, as it was my duty to stop him myself."
Garret moves over and scans the room and bodies with detect magic as well. He watches for the cats, ready to send a spell their way if they show their faces.
Healed but still drained, the paler-than-usual halfling says, ”Do not blame yourself, Captain. The rigors of surviving the Deadlands have accelerated the growth in our power since the cataclysm. Thank you for leading us to victory in this battle—my spells are weak ever since the undead creature stole a good portion of my vitality.”
”If we have a way to bless the water in the fountain, we should destroy the evil artifact, then rest,” Garret suggests.
"Off easy? He seems very dead to me, and that doesn't seem all that easy. If we go torturing him too, we'd be sinking to his level."
Ketra shakes her head at the praise that follows from Rosa "Garret's right. The only reason we managed this is because we had weeks of been a hair away from being killed by some horrible undead or fey or who knows what. If you'd had me there the day this all happened, well, I can't imagine we'd have stopped any of it."
"As for the fountain, it should probably recover now that we've dealt with that weird thing that was inside it. How about we take a look before we go to rest?"
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""Off easy? He seems very dead to me, and that doesn't seem all that easy. If we go torturing him too, we'd be sinking to his level."
"...You're right, of course. By doing this, perhaps we would be confirming his claim of humanity having no decency. However, if this mass explosion effect can be replicated by the cult, the fate of the entire nation, perhaps even the entire world, would depend on what we could have learned from him. I'm not sure the lives of so many innocents are worth giving him a quick way out. Not when the cost is all of it turning into a wasteland ruled by The Whispering Tyrant," Rosalind sighs and looks at the body again. "Regardless, we have to make a choice. Either we hide his body so well that he can never be resurrected or animated by the cult and hope that is enough, or we take his remains with us and see if some information can be gleaned anyway by Speaking with the Dead. It is beyond my own capacities, but surely not to Vigil at large."
"...Assuming they're willing to listen to the servant of a heathen god for once," she mutters.
Each of the undead cultists had a well-made dagger and some half-repaired armor--seemingly whatever was on hand to re-equip themselves with upon awakening as undead.
Quietus' fine cloths are ripped and stained with blood, thoroughly ruining them, but several other items on his person are of interest:
+1 spell-storing dagger
Amulet of Natural Armor +1
Bracers of Armor +2
Headband of Vast Intelligence +2 [Knowledge: Nobility]
Ring of Protection +1
Black iron key, whose aura seems...strange
When you check in on the injured members, they all agree that they're no more injured than before. Falling back, you see that the fountain is--not clean, exactly, but certainly cleaner than before. It's obvious that without the constant pollution of the polong's bottle the fountain's magic will restore the water to physical and spiritual purity.
Garret checks out the items before they go…
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Ketra scoops up the daggers where she sees them. The spell-storing one in particular makes her ponder the potential uses. Otherwise once the group's had a chance to look at the fountain she asks "Then we more or less have to rest. Probably for the best. Let's pick somewhere less awful, if we can find a place like that in here..."
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"I'm not sure what the strange key is... if no one knows, we should probably handle it with care and not touch it directly. Knowing Quietus I wouldn't put it past him to curse his possessions just to spite whoever got the best of him," Rosalind says.
Once back inside and barricaded in what they thought was a safe area of the mansion with the survivors, she does her best to treat and stitch the wounds of the remaining survivors. Afterwards, she begins the slow process of wrapping up Quietus' body in a number of blankets from inside the mansion and then tieing it up with rope. "Personally, I think we have no choice but to take his body with us to Vigil. Assuming you're all willing to go there with me? The danger to the nation is too great to not glean from him what we could, I feel."
When the guard schedule for the night is set, she finally allows sleep to take her.
"I think the plan was to head to Vigil from the start. We need to bring news of what happened here to good people with a lot of soldiers and a lot of magic, and Vigil's the only place that comes to mind. Quietus surely has some evil friends who won't be sitting quietly either." Ketra nods. Though Ketra's relatively well traveled for someone who group up in a little town, she's always made her journeys in much safer seeming conditions. For a trip in these circumstances to Vigil, she's glad to have Rosa with the group.
”Vigil seems like a reasonable place to go,” says Garret as he prepares to sleep. Perhaps with their victory some of his vitality may return overnight.
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Barricading yourselves in the offices Quietus had commandeered--it has sufficient space for all of you, while also being less tainted by bloodstains and the faint smell of rot that so much of the Bastion now holds. As you bed down and parcel out food and watch orders, Garret and Sanduro set to unraveling the mystery of Quietus' gear, Mirhet watching with interest.
Most of the items are valuable but straightforward, the only real mystery is the key--its abjuration and evocation auras seem ephemeral somehow, until it clicks: the key itself is not magical, but it is tied to a magical trap wrapped around the Fetoring Maw! Had you tried to submerge the relic in a liquid of any kind, it would have unleashed a lethal pulse of electricity into everything around it! The key is bound to this trap and can dismiss it as well; simply rap the key thrice against the Maw and with a small effort of will the arcane menace will be undone, allowing the destruction ritual to proceed safely.
When the subject of traveling to Vigil comes up, Jando and Silvia come over to join. "I fully support warning the Knights of Ozem at Vigil, but I don't like leaving the border towns in the dark. In my current state I'd only slow you down, so I'll break off at the first village we reach and turn northwest to warn the forts along the Hordeline. Once I reach Everstand I can make my to Vigil and maybe link back up with you."
"I will go with the ranger," Mirhet announces. "We are injured, alone either us would be vulnerable but watching each others backs makes our warning more likely to reach those who need to need to hear it."
"That's not a bad idea," Silvia muses. "Vellumis is Lastwall's second greatest city--if I can catch a ride down the river to Lake Encarthan and then charter a boat, I could be there before any of you are in Vigil."
Ketra looks over at Mirhet "I know you're worried about your family too. We should get a message to the tribes as well somehow. They may be farther away, but a rising of undead like this is exactly what they were always preparing for. Are you sure you and Jando shouldn't go west?" After Mirhet's terrible ordeal at the hands of Quietus and his minions, the last thing Ketra wants is for her weakened mentor to be snapped up together with Jando by some of Quietus' friends. "We can always spread the word as we travel and get word to the border towns that way..."
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“Vigil sounds right. If my family’s caravan ran into trouble around Roslar’s Coffer after the explosion, they might decide to fall back in that direction rather than risk the Northern Fangwood.”
Sanduro winces as he shoves a stiffening arm back into place as they wrap up their adversary’s corpse.
“I can’t do anything about the rot or the stench, but if you want to try to question Quietus tomorrow, I can ask Pharasma for the power to make his corpse answer.”
He peers back through the doorway to the center of the nave, where they have dragged the corpses of the cultists and arranged them as neatly as they could given the party’s exhaustion. “Zsofia is going to be so pissed she missed all this.”
Despite what the bards' stories say, Quietus' death doesn't bring with it a sense of elation or victory--instead a heavy disquiet follows you around as you take your rest, the poison fog just outside serving as a reminder that the the dandy was just one part of a larger plot. Though the rest is badly needed you can't help but feel that you're losing valuable time.
If the nekomata have remained in the area, they don't show themselves, and after some sleep you really do feel better. Jando in particular is able to move unassisted, the strength-sapping magic of the sigil trap slowly fading with time. Taking a peak downstairs, you can immediately tell that the fountain's magic has been hard at work; the water bubbling up into the basin is clean and clear, and even the fountain's stonework seems less grimy.
Garret wakes up feeling somewhat better, but still looking quite pale compared to his usual health.
Moving over to the Fetoring Maw, Garret casts Detect Magic and inspects the magic item. He then taps the evil artifact with the magic key three times, willing the trap to disengage. Checking the Fetoring Maw again with his arcane sight, he tries to discern the effectiveness of his disarm.
Turning to the fountain, he looks at it and asks, "So is the water here blessed already, or do we need to bless it ourselves?" Regardless of the answer, Garret says a prayer of thanks to Sarenrae for bringing them through darkness into the light of her presence.
"The story we heard made it sound like the spring here had blessed water to begin with..." Ketra eyes the water "But extra blessing can't hurt, right? And we need to do that thing with the key as well."
Garret raps the Fetoring Maw with the key once, twice, thrice--and with a sharp but inaudible snap the threads of magic that form the trap unravel and dissipate harmlessly. That done, Garret quickly determines that the fountain the water flowing from it are both suffused with a mild but persistent divine magic.
”The trap is disarmed and the fountain is blessed,” says Garret. Trying to lift the heavy object, he says, ”Could I get a hand moving this thing into the holy water?”
"Sure. It's a relief that nothing else went wrong after all the rest we went through." Ketra nevertheless doesn't touch the Maw directly, holding it only with a few layers of cloth between her hands and the artifact. "Here goes nothing..." She dips it gingerly into the holy water.
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Despite its size and weight, the Fetoring Maw is reluctant to be submerged, requiring considerably more effort than you'd expect to go underwater and be kept there. Within seconds of immersion in the fountain the water begins to hiss with a heatless boil, roiling as necromantic relic reacts to the anathematic liquid. For several long minutes this violent bubbling and splashing persists before a visible weakening begins to occur; the outer layer of the Fetoring Maw grows pale and cloudy, even feeling more brittle. As this fading occurs, the roiling of the water grows less and less until the artifact's glow is almost entirely suppressed and the water barely stirs.
Lifting the maw from the fountain, Ketra sets it on the stone edge and gingerly steps back. Hefting the hammer you had recovered previously, Rosalind whispers a heartfelt prayer as she steps up and delivers...
A heavy blow, driven by grief, righteous anger, and divine will--and the Fetoring Maw shatters! A thousand shards fly in every direction, igniting like paper to burn away before they can reach the end of their arcs. And as below, so above: the poisonous dome that has kept you imprisioned in Roslar's Coffer for the better part of a week now begins to burn away like fog, receding so quickly you all find yourselves dazzled and blinking in the bright afternoon light. In less than a minute, it's as though the Maw's poison had never been there at all!
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Offer a prayer of thanks, Garret takes a deep breath as the sunlight returns and smiles radiantly—for what seems the first time in a long time.
”Nicely done! Let’s make sure we have distributed the magical items for best effect and get on the road,” says Garret, adding, ”I am not sure how we have survived so far through this mess, but I will attribute it to divine providence. Thank you all for helping us achieve this victory against the forces of evil that destroyed my home.”
Suddenly thinking of something, Garret says, ”Do you think with the power of the Fetoring Maw broken, that bear might have recovered?”
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Wiping the sweat from her brow, Rosalind looks up at the radiant dawn and smiles. "And so, hope goes on," she says, before she too clasps her hands in prayer. "Thank you, Lord of Claws, for your deliverence. May we fight for truth and mend again what was broken."
"Thank you all for helping us achieve this victory against the forces of evil that destroyed my home."
"Roslar's Coffer belonged to each of us - and its people deserved a better lot in life than they had. Their hopes and resilience go with us now. Orc raids couldn't break it, nor cultists wielding doomsday weapons. Not while we still draw breath. If we manage to stop the cult from doing this again, their sacrifices can yet have meaning. I'll strive to make it so."
Before the group sets out for their next destination, the Inquisitor hesitates. "All of you, before we continue, there is something you should know of me. I... was assigned here from the capitol over what some would say is a religious dispute. While I pay respects to the Lady Inheritor, I am not her servant. My divine patronage hails from Baekho, a diety from my Grandmother's culture. In Tian-Xia, he is the lord of Nature, Healing, Might and Duty. But also of keeping an open mind in disputes... which has garnered him a fair share of ill will in Vigil. Some believe he is too willing to forgive evil, regardless of what I say or do. That is, unfortunately, what led to me being stationed here... in what some would say is a dead-end posting meant to end my career." She snorts. "I suppose they almost got their wish. But the point is, I can't guarantee we won't face simular behavior in the future. And some... abilities I might manifest are not ones of common divine magic. Is this an issue to any of you?" She asks neutrally.
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Ketra rubs at her eyes, suddenly feeling deeply, desperately tired. They'd done it. Opened the way to leave Roslar's Coffer. Even gotten some sort of revenge for the explosion and all that followed. It's a relief, certainly. But she also just feels like it's far far too much. Struggling through life and death, dealing with absolutely mad mages... Even the most fanciful stories told in the Sagely Goat weren't like this.
"Out of the frying pan, at least." She offers a half-smile "Though we'll soon find out what's going on in other places."
"I wouldn't count on the bear Garret. The feeling I got was that it got mutated along with the first explosion, which was separate from the fog. Still, it wouldn't hurt to take a listen and see if it's sounding better." Ketra shrugs, then listens to Rosa's alarming speech "Not sure I've ever heard of them, but there's hundreds of gods and monsters in the tales people tell. If this one works for you, I suppose that's that. Still, does it mean you won't be welcome in Vigil?" It's clear that the comment about non-divine abilities hasn't even registered for Ketra. She's seen too much to be bothered by something like that.
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Garret replies, ”I am more interested in what you do with your powers than how you acquire them—we are traveling with an interesting assortment of people and spirits already. From what I can tell, you have been absolutely crucial to our survival against the encroaching evil, so as far as I am concerned you are more than welcome.”
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Sanduro wakes early and anxious, but that’s nothing unusual for him. He manages not to rush through his morning prayers . He helps where needed with the destruction of the Maw but mostly waits on the side for the damned thing to finally be destroyed.
Responding to Rosalind, he says, "I agree with Garret, you've done more than your share already. I don't think you'll find any of us worrying too much about fitting your magic into a narrow box. Speaking of which...."
Sanduro excuses himself for a minute to sit down against a wall and close his eyes. He tunes out the conversation around him and concentrates on calling out to Zsofia, inviting her to return to the world of living for a while longer.
Sanduro opens his eyes in surprise at a loud THUD behind him, followed by a familiar voice swearing at him.
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Zsofia appears suddenly, stumbles against the side of the fountain, but manages to avoid falling into the newly-cleaned water and instead lands in a heap on the floor. She leaps back to her feet and looks around wildly, fists raised.
"WHAT IN ALL NINE HELLS AND ABADDON AND THE ABYSS JUST HAPPENED?"
Not seeing an immediate threat, she relaxes a fraction. The phantom nods at Ketra and Garret, then spots Rosalind.
Speaking in a stage whisper out of the side of her mouth, she asks, "Hey, stupid kid. Who's the new gal? She looks churchy - she isn't gonna try to exorcise me, is she?"
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"Yep, she's definitely going to exorcise you." Ketra grins and winks at Zsofia. It's good to have the rowdy phantom back, after the grim determination that had settled over the rest of the party.
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"Thank you, all of you, for your understanding," Rosalind smiles. "As to whether I am welcome... I suppose we'll see. I don't believe my posting away from the capitol was coincidental. If there's anything I dread, it's not man or beast." She shudders. "It's politics."
She's about to ask Garret what he meant about 'traveling with spirits' when Szofia suddenly appears out of thin air. Too stunned at the event (and her behavior) to even draw her sword, she glances around the group for help. "...Is anyone going to explain the pirate?"
"Oh Zsofia? Hmm..." Ketra makes a show of pondering as she taps the tip of her nose. "No, I think you'll just have to get used to her." She turns to the two of them and gestures from one to the other.
"Zsofia, Rosalind. Rosalind, Zsofia."
After introductions are made to both dubious parties, you all gather what supplies you have on hand and step out of the Bastion of Light in the grey of pre-dawn, giving Rosler's Coffer a final lingering look before setting off.
You don't make it far before you come across a strange sight: a wagon, hitched to a pair of nervous-looking mules, and two draft horses hobbled beside it. Standing next to the wagon in the middle of the road is a humanoid figure, wrapped in a deep grey cloak that hides their features. They make no moves of any kind as you approach, simply watching.
"You made it out," the figure--clearly feminine by the voice--observes without preamble. Reaching up to draw back the hood of the cloak, you all behold a woman (human by appearance) with lightly tanned skin, black hair and sharp features with red-irised eyes. She might be considered beautiful but her gaze is keen and unsettling, weighing you all with open calculation. "Strong enough to take on the cult and win; clever--or lucky--enough to survive inside the dome. Yes, I think you'll do nicely."
She holds up a hand in a halting gesture. "Who I am is of no importance to you, so save your breath. Suffice to say I am no friend of the Whispering Way and would see you succeed in your mission to warn the...leaders of Lastwall."
You don't get any sense of deception, but neither do you feel any real sense of warmth; this woman clearly sees you as allies of convenience and doesn't try to hide it.
You also get the impression she was about to something else before settling on "leaders of Lastwall".
”You have us at a disadvantage, it seems, knowing of us while we know nothing of you. If you do not wish to share your identity, what information can you relate so we may decide if we wish to accept your…aid?” asks Garret suspiciously.
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"A fair question," the stranger turns her unsettling gaze to consider Garret. "The Whispering Way has gone into a flurry of activity in the region--their master stirs again, I suspect he has set in motion a new bid for freedom." Her gaze goes unfocused for a moment, as though her mind is elsewhere, before suddenly snapping back to you.
"His attention turns to Vigil, the center of power for his ancient enemies. I have learned of an agent of his, a creature called Gildais, who was recently active in Vigil itself. After you deliver your warning, I would like you to find out what this Gildais and his catspaws wanted in the city."
"As for my aid, I offer two boons." She gestures to indicated the wagon and mules. "First, supplies I suspect you need rather badly--weapons, healing, food, transportation. I found the poor beasts rooting around in an abandoned farmhouse near here, I suspect their owner perished with the rest of this poor town. Second: several of you are damaged by the cult's magic, and recovery without magic may be slow and painful. As a gesture of good faith I would offer to soothe those wounds--at my own expense."
She reaches out a hand to Garret, inviting him to take it. "May I?"
Garret turns to his companions, asking, ”What do you think? Should we trust her to help us?”
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"I get the sense you do not like the Whispering Way, but that the same is true of us. And of the Leadership of Vigil. You consider us the lesser of two evils. But who here would like neither side?" Rosalind wonders aloud to the mystery woman, peering intently at the woman's odd physical features.
When Garret speaks, the inquisitor shrugs. "There's no telling if or when she will turn on this... 'alliance'. However, I do not get the sense that she is part of the Whispering Way and that this would be some Elaborate trap. So I say we accept her aid for now. At the very least so that Garret can be restored."
Turning back to the woman, she adds: "If you do not wish to tell us of yourself or who you serve, that is fair as far as I'm concerned. For now, at least. Still, we do need a name to call you by."
Nodding, Garret moves forward and lowers his guard, accepting whatever spell is laid upon him…though he does pay attention to the spellcasting, ready to leap back defensively if it is an offensive spell in disguise.
Ketra balks at the sudden and (frankly) unwelcome appearance of the mystery woman. She'd just spent some good time making her peace with the current situation. She didn't need another strange magical lady to worry about. Following Rosa's comments, she adds "If she's not going to give us her name, it's up to us then." She sizes the woman up "How about Dandelion? Considering she popped right up out of nowhere."
She adds her own question "What is Gildais exactly, and how do you know about them?"
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"Or Mushroom Farmer! Because she wants to keep us in the dark and feed us..."
Sanduro sends the phantom a silent warning not to make the strange woman angry before she has finished healing Garret and Zsofia cuts herself off.
Sanduro interrupts Zsofia with a question as though he was following up on Ketra's query.
"And what kind of goods do you have available?"
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The stranger considers Rosalind, expression blank and unreadable. ”The Knights of Ozem have a long history. Not all of it flatters them, to say the least.” Ketra’s suggestion draws the barest hint of an amused smirk. ”A stubborn survivor, returning season after season in defiance of the gardener’s will to see it destroyed. I think it suits me.” At the question about Gildais she shakes her head. ”There will be answers, but first a demonstration of my goodwill.”
Dipping one hand into her cloak, she steps up to Garret and kneels down. She smells of strange spices as she grips his arm and whispers words of power, the gathering magic making the hairs on Garret’s neck stand on end. Her other hand emerges from her cloak glittering with a thick coating of diamond dust. With a sudden lunge she plunges her hand into Garret’s chest! The sorcerer feels a strange numbness overcome him, while her eyes widen and her look of concentration become one of alarm.
”What…what has he done to your soul?” she murmurs, seemingly to herself. With equal suddenness Dandelion yanks her hand free. Garret’s chest and cloths are unmarried by her touch, but instead of diamond dust the stranger’s hand is covered in a tarry, evil-looking substance. Clenching her hand into a fist, Dandelion whispers more words of power and the tar begins to flow into her clenched palm, her fist glowing with a ruddy light. As the magic peaks she opens her palm to reveal a small black diamond—which she holds out to Garret in offering.
”This is my gift to you, Garret Fallows. May it guard well what remains of your soul.”
This is…this is an astonishing work, stronger by far than anything you’ve ever beheld before. You don’t know who, or what, this woman is, but it’s clear she’s capable of reality-bending magic you’ve only ever heard stories of.