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Morof's stomach turns upside down as he sees the walking corpse. Although he has read of the undead, this is his first encounter with one. He knows their reaction to illusion magic is different from the living. He holds his breath as the thing approaches, ignoring the comments from the others. He is nervous since no one seems to be reacting to it approaching with a big weapon.
In the end he is ready to fire his crossbow when he starts to talk. Gladly, Lina replies and the conversation seems to be over. The last words by the revenant strike Morof as odd, and he thinks He is a nightmare already, but stays quiet. It seems he wants the Stag Lord dead as well, but as a revenge, not to claim the land. Morof can't help but feel sad for the man who, according to his readings, must have quite the anger remaining from being alive. If living with such hatred is the price of eternal life, Morof doubts that anyone would want to pay it. He summons the courage to speak and says "We'll bring the nightmare to the Stag Lord's doorstep.", feeling proud of himself.
Davik snarls, air hissing through his clenched jaw. "I can only offer you my ranseur as a reward if that is what shall motivate you into action. But no one shall cross this river until the Stag Lord is dead. I assure you."
"No crossing, then. We will avenge you."
It was worth asking, anyways. Meneas turns back to Veil, mounting up and looking to the others. "So, shall we head onwards, then?" He waves towards the north. "We have other tasks to look for, after all."
Brental nods, remounting his own horse. He trots over towards Vodnykel, who looks a bit nervous around the whole ordeal with Davik. Brental pats the mastodon's head comfortingly.
Lina is glad to put what’s left of Davik behind her for now. She hopes that when the Stag Lord is dealt with, the sheer indignation that’s animating the poor ferryman’s body will dissipate. She makes a mental note to possibly look into it. She’s been taught that the undead are only twisted shadows of the souls that used to animate their bodies, whether corporeal/tangible or not. Still, even if Davik himself has gone to his eternal reward, perhaps avenging him will allow whatever one wants to call his unliving shell to rest.
Leaving the rotting corpse of Davik behind, the party progress onto their next destination. With directions from Oleg in hand it is, once again, fairly simple to track down the location the party seeks.
On a low hilltop stands a lone, lightning-struck tree reaching upward into the sky like a claw of some sort with no other trees around it in a two mile radius. Brental produces the map from the bandit's corpse in the spider den and is able to use it to track down a recently disturbed patch of earth.
After ten minutes of digging the party pulls up a heavy leather cloak which is wrapped around an assortment of items. Indie are a masterwork dagger with a bird skull emblem at the pommel, an exquisitely carved silver ring with images of ravens fighting one another in a continuous ring worth 75 gp, a charred looking stick that is surprisingly warm to the touch, and a leather-bound spellbook which has been heavily damaged by rain water but still has the silent image, identify, mage armor, reduce person, and unseen servant spells visible.
Brental feels better as they leave Davik Nettles' presence. He is quickly able to clear his mind and focus on the task at hand. Between the treasure map, Oleg's directions, and some of the geographical logic of the area, he draws up his next set of documents with relative ease.
He's also happy to use his shovel to dig something up for once instead of interring bodies. While Morof examines the spellbook and determines whether any of the items are magical, the druid puts the finishing touches on his sketches.
In the gazetteer draft, he includes some notes about Davik Nettles' story. The form it will take in the final draft he passes on to Oleg will depend on the resolution of his tale. If Davik is able to be put to rest, it will be a ghost story to make the area interesting and noteworthy, explaining the charred husk of his former home. If his undead body persists despite the death of the Stag Lord, then it will be a warning.
Meneas takes note of the local geography, speculating on what they'll find based on his knowledge of how the wild tends to develop over time - at least in the Material Plane. Trying to think about the First World in this way makes his head hurt.
He also keeps an eye out for animal trails and the like that might lead to other threats or places of interest.
Meneas discovers nothing else out of the ordinary here. Some animal tracks but nothing to be alarmed about.
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Morof comments "This is a wand with magic in it, with only 4 charges with a spell that casts out fire." He says this with a dismissive tone, as if it's not worth his attention.
He takes a few steps back and forth and says "So, here's my theory. We found this in the spider cave with the remains of a bandit, correct? Well, I reckon this stash here was his treasure which they hid because they probably didn't want to share it with their boss, say the Stag Lord."
He taps his chin twice then continues "Well, this treasure could belong to a friend of theirs, or it could be their loot, probably from fighting the owner and killing him or her. Now I reckon this belonged to a wizard, probably, not a particularly powerful wizard, from the lack of variety in this book . The only further clue we have, is this dagger and ring. Let me take a look?"
Morof is unable to identify anything of significance about either object.
Brental watches and listens as Morof lays out his theories about their findings, and notes with a little amusement the hint of haughtiness as he diminishes whomever had owned the book. As the druid had never spent much time poring over arcane tomes, he had no frame of reference. He does point one thing out, however.
"The wizard who owned this could have been reasonably powerful. It's hard to say with the water damage. But you're right: this was hidden, and a lone bandit was far away when they got themselves killed. Perhaps the Stag Lord found out they were keeping things from him and could have executed him, disposing of his body with the spiders."
Brental knows that last part is going out on a limb. He chuckles grimly.
"If we want to know more, we could return to the skeleton. I can prepare some spells that will help us learn more."
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Morof doesn't really think the story of this bandit is important, but he is curious. He wonders if the spell book had more powerful spells in it, but he dismisses the thought, not wanting to consider the possibility that he missed out on it. He changes the subject and addresses the skeleton "I am curious about it, and am a little scared about what your spells can do. Still, are you really willing to go back there and face those spiders?" He then mumbles something about live spiders being a useful spell component.
"Hm... it's possible that he was hiding something from the Stag Lord, though most bandit leaders I have encountered would've done a more thorough job of finding the map - or, at least preventing the map from being found after the corpse was disposed of." Meneas flexes his fingers thoughtfully.
"But I think it's more likely that the bandit had found the spellbook, drew a picture to remind him where he'd put it or found it, then didn't have the chance to get back to it before being ambushed by the spider."
Brental flashes a grin. "I may not have your learning, but the spirits of the world provide me with many interesting ways of dealing with creatures. If we were to go back and face them, I would be better prepared."
He shrugs. "Meneas is probably right, though. There may be no grand plot here--just simple circumstance."
Lina is quiet after the encounter with Nettles, and the cache at the blasted tree does not brighten her mood. The book must have belonged to some poor apprentice at one point, and it occurs to her how easily something similar might have happened – could still happen – to her.
“That’s a pretty blade,” she comments, referring to the dagger included in the stash. While her tone is characteristically light, the trained eye she runs along the length of the weapon suggests that her meaning is more like fine, or well-crafted.
“Do you think you’d find a use for it, Morof?” she asks, with, again, a hint of additional meaning to her conversational tone – this time of concern for her wizardly colleague. To be sure, he’s much more gifted with magic than she is, but sometimes something gets close, and even the most bookish mage should be able to manage a good dagger if things get really desperate, to buy some time to get clear and escape.
In any case, as the group considers its next move, she asks, “Do we want to stop by the Sootscales again, before we head back into the forest? Or we could just leave them in peace for the moment.”
"Do we have anything that they need to know? It's only been a day since we were there last." Meneas points out. "I don't know how much will have changed for them since then. Maybe we should visit after a few more days, once they've had a chance to figure out how they're going to proceed in the future, without Tartuk?"
"It's good to have made friends with others here, but I do think that the Sootscales could do with a bit more peace for now. Unless we need to seek shelter or supplies with them, we can leave them be."
Brental considers the general layout of the region () along with Nettles' warning.
"I believe the fastest way to the Fangberries, and back to the Narlmarches for that matter, is to avoid the Shrike and cross the Thorn. We know that there is a bridge not far from the Old Sycamore. We could also find where the Shrike meets the Thorn and see if a safer crossing exists there. We'll heed Nettles' warning and still do what we set out to do."
The party continue to travel along at a reasonable pace as it starts to grow dark. They know they won't have much longer before daylight is completely gone as they scan for a place to ford the river where the Shrike meets the Thorn.
It's late, but Brental is determined to make the best use of the light as they forge ahead.
Like his druidic comrade, Meneas proves determined to investigate the area closely - looking for signs of what this area might portend with its particular geography.
Lina's not really worried about the falling light as such, but as more of a plant than an animal person she's normally in with her books and her herbs by around sunset, so although she keeps eyes and ears open for the evening movements of birds and other critters, she has a hard time keeping track of them all. She settles lightly in her saddle instead, ready to respond to any trouble.
As Brental makes his usual scribles (brilliant illustrations) Meneas uses his knowledge of the surrounding Kamelands to determine where a safe point to cross the rivers might be.
Steering the party in that direction they gallop onwards for a few miles before Morof cries out for their attention, signalling that he has found a crossing point.
A small ford awaits the party ahead but the waters are rapid and treacherous and at its deepest point it reaches up above the adventurers' waists. Having been forced to dismount to guide their nervous horses across the ford Brental ends up being pulled by the rushing waters and begins floating downriver quickly. Lina's rapid reflexes and strong swimming skill come in handy now though as she allows herself to be taken by the river and uses it's momentum to catch up with Brental guiding him safely to the opposite shore. The others have no more trouble making it across and soon everyone is safe and sound on the opposite shore of the Thorn River... although they are all soaked and throughly exhausted now.
Sputtering, disheveled, and a little embarrassed, Brental thanks Lina profusely as he checks the seals on the maps that he has been drafting to be sure that they didn't get waterlogged. Seeing no apparent damage, he sighs and settles down. He then looks at the flame flickering on Lina's ring and wishes that it would provide any actual heat.
"This seems as good of a place as any to set up camp. I'll get the fire going so that we can dry off."
Meneas shivers slightly before slipping off of Veil and beginning to dry both her and himself. "We should probably settle down for the evening - I don't know how much farther we can push without risking... well, exhaustion."
"We covered a lot of ground. And we didn't get ourselves in heaps of danger. Yet."
Brental enjoys some remnants of Morof's stew while he sets up his usual camping regimen. After stretching out rope and bells across the most prominent parts of the campsite, he considers preparing something for a better quality of sleep the next night. He also offers a goodberry to anyone who wants one.
"Does anyone have a story? It doesn't have to be a ghost story. Any story, real or fiction, would do."
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Morof accepts Brental's goodberry. Afterwards, he takes half a mouth full of his own stew to chew on and let the sweet minty flavor fill his mouth. He thinks hard on a story to tell. The other children in his village used to tell ghost stories, but he was always too scared of them and never joined.
He decides to tell the story of his father "I don't know my father. My mother told me he was an elf who she found one day when she was collecting blue-triangle berries to treat mrs. Carson's fever. He was hopping from tree to tree, apparently playing with a squirrel. They started talking, he helped her forage and she took a look at his scratches from the trees. He was a free spirit, my mother says, not caring about elf culture or customs and just wanted to be friends with the forest."
Now that Morof is a little older and actually telling the story, he feels a little silly, talking about having a father that seems more like a child than a grown person. Still, he can't stop himself and continues telling the story, as if he's lifting a weight from his shoulders "My mother constantly went back into the forest to visit my father. As is natural, they eventually fell in love and well, my mother got pregnant. She miscarried three times before she had me. It's like... It's like they didn't have a care in the world." Morof seems upset with the story, somehow.
His tone grows somber as he says "After I was born, my father never showed up again. My mother tells me she still found traces of him in the forest, such as a small flower arrangement, or a smell... She says it's like he became part of the scenery, whatever that means. Typical man, she says. When I grew up, I asked her about him, his name and other things. She never told me. I think she never bothered to ask him his name and was embarrassed to admit that to me. The other children at the village teased me saying that my father was actually fey, but I don't believe them. I think. I became interested in illusion magic and the secrets of the world in part because I want to find out who... or what... my father is. I don't care if that's silly or childish, but it got me this far, meeting amazing people such as yourselves, so I guess it's a worthy cause." He stops talking, feeling a little better about himself.
Meneas pulls off his gauntlets and lifts his hands to the fire, accepting a bowl of stew once he has fed Veil. "Fathers are overrated." He says, the words cooly absent-minded from beneath his hood. "Who you take as your teacher matters far more than who bore or sired you. Our choices make us who we are, not our parentage alone." He glances over his bared hands in silence for a time, flexing his fingers.
"I don't have a story to tell... No, wait. I do. I once dreamt that I awoke next to a river of fire, and I had to put it out by throwing anything I could on the blaze. First my armor. Then my clothing. I'd started pulling off my skin before I woke up." Abruptly and dissonantly, he laughs. "It didn't hurt, so I knew I was dreaming. When I told my mentor, they also pointed out that I'd been sleeping too close to the fire - which is where, I guess, the fire and heat came from."
His laughter fades, and the knight-errant muses aloud. "I'd forgotten that. It's amazing what you remember when prompted, no?"
After the camp is set up and everyone starts drying off, Lina sits down to listen eagerly to everyone’s stories, trying to think of something suitable to offer in turn.
Morof’s story is curious, and rather melancholy. She has a hard time imagining losing oneself quite so much in someone else, let alone the attempts to have children… The poor thing. “You must miss her terribly,” she says. “She sounds like a really caring person.”
Not something with ghoulies and ghosties and long-leggedy beasties, she thinks, after the past few days, and not “The Song of Emelye,” though she thinks it’s lovely. Too tragic, even if it is also terribly romantic.
Meneas’ tale also strikes a chord. “Absolutely,” the witch says, before simply leaving it at that as her thoughts wander on. It didn’t feel like skin in her case, exactly, though it might be something like that. And if it hadn’t been for – well, several things, where would she be now?
But she’s finally thought of something, and something lighter too. Lina retrieves her violin from her things – horses for overland travel do have some advantages, she concedes – and checks its tuning. Might as well start practicing now, if she wants to add song to her repertoire, though she hopes she doesn’t traumatize her first audience.
“Do you know ‘Orphiiss and the Imp-tree?’ About the king of Chrace, wherever that was? The stories don’t even agree on much beyond that he played a stringed instrument, mostly, though whether harp or fiddle, or maybe even a cittern… They might know in Iadara, or somewhere. Or maybe some library there keeps the secret, at least.”
She spins a tale of the power of music, love, and a careless promise, that nonetheless ends happily, somehow managing to accompany herself as she sings.
It's been a long and exciting bit of travel, though, and before too long she's fair drooping, and even if she takes the last watch and gets a longer, solid block of sleep in first, she hopes it will be a quiet night.
Brental listens happily to the stories and songs. It had been nice to have a comparatively uneventful, or at least less dangerous, day.
"I imagine that it is hard to lose one's parents. I'm sorry, Morof. But if it has motivated you towards all this, then..." Brental smiles at the half-elf. He isn't sure how, or whether, to offer comfort.
Brental isn't sure how to respond to Meneas' tale, but Lina launches into her own song. Her song certainly made him feel cheerful after Morof and Meneas' melancholy and chilling, as he expected a tragic ending given the patterns.
Given the uplift in mood, he holds back on the story he had thought to tell. How does one bring up a sibling gone too soon, much less three? No, there was no reason to bring the tenor back down with his macabre. But his thoughts do wander to his younger sister...
Although it looks like Lina may not have much more light in her, Brental feels obliged to offer a story of his own. It was nice to have another music-maker around.
"I didn't know that song, but it was beautiful." He looks over at Vod, who had been swaying along with it. He had always liked music. Brental wondered, not for the first time, whether there was any latent tendencies towards music in either of them. Heaven, Nirvana, and Elysium, or so he was told, were filled with music. If either he or Vod had some celestial spark, and they both seemed to based on the prognostications of various scholars over the years, then maybe there was some distant ancestral love of music. It was difficult to say, though. Like elves, the influence of the immortal denizens of the outer spheres on the mortals of the material plane was fickle and difficult to ascertain.
He had gotten lost in his thoughts again, and not gotten any closer towards a story. He bites his lip, though not necessarily with anxiety, and tries to come up with something worthwhile.
At last Brental gets an idea for a story to share.
"I'll finish, then. Once upon a time..."
It was trite, but the best way he knew to begin.
"Well, though I've ranged as far west as Ustalav and as far south as Osirion, I have never drifted to Iobaria to the East. We're told that the fey are wilder there, and that the druids who remain have a tendency towards barbarism not usually tolerated in the circles I associate with. I cannot recall the last time I met an Iobarian druid at the Moot of Ages. Of course, that doesn't mean there are no representatives. But when you meet Shoanti shamans of the Varisian highlands, members of the Halcyon Circle of the Mwangi Expanse, and even survivors of the Sarkoris diaspora or the occasional Tian emissary, you start to wonder."[/b]
"I won't get into the rumors this evening, though. Nor ghost stories. Instead: there is a druid who has styled himself a king in Okormirr, a small town on the eastern edge of the Lake of Mists and Veils. He and his kin worship a god called Perbov. Druid-King Aalgin of Okormirr has taken to ensuring the health of the lake. Legend has it that Perbov became so angry over some slight that he boiled the original water lake away in his fury. So to abate his wrath, Aalgin told Perbov a story that made him weep, refilling the lake partway and preventing most of the creatures that lived there from dying. But making a god cry is challenging, and a bit dangerous. So Aalgin challenged Perbov to a test of phyical strength and endurance. The god sweat profusely during the challenge, and the lake was restored."
"The Of course, it's not a saltwater lake, so either the story is truly a myth of the god needs to change his diet to incorporate more salt."
Brental chuckles. "That's all I have for now. Meneas--wake me when it is time for my watch."
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Morof tells Lina "Well, she is a little carefree, but a good person. I hope I'll someday be able to provide her with a better house than the place where I grew up, and with more welcoming neighbors too, but I wonder if she'd even care enough to move away. I hope you meet her someday and she'll make you laugh with her rabbit hunting story."
After, he hears her soothing song and it seems to fit perfectly in the night. He finds Meneas' and Brental's stories amusing, and they're making him ripe for sleep.
Night passes without incident and gives way to the chilly morning air. The sun is just peaking out over the hills the party departs fully rested.
After a few hours of following the river the party come across a long, thin valley filled to the brim with brambles with little, vibrantly red long thin berries dangling from them. You instantly recognize these as the fabled fangberries you've been searching for.
You would be able to harvest a small amount of berries from here but you know the vast majority of the berries would be in the center of the grove and with the sharp thorns covering the vines from which the berries sprout and the gossamer webs covering the bramble... you are given pause.
Brental wakens feeling refreshed. He finds a calm place near the river ford to complete his morning communion, anticipating that the group will find the fangberries on this day, and then rejoins the group.
As they come upon the brambles covered with webs, Brental nods.
"This is more or less what we expected. A bit of magic should keep us safe."
And the druid begins to cast unless one of his allies interrupts him.
Druid Spells Prepared
Lv 2: Gusting Sphere, Control Vermin
Lv 1: Hide from Animals, Entangle, Shillelagh
Orisons: Detect Magic, Create Water, Grasp, Guidance
"Given the webs, I anticipate spiders may live amongst the berries. If we can harvest without harming them, that would be for the best. Who would like to help me? I can protect three of us. One should hang back, in case we need help."
Brental makes a series of hand motions, generating an abjurative effect to help himself and two others to hide from animals.
"Let's try to avoid damaging the berries, too."
"I think I should help you - I'm not as much use at a range as our two spellcasters are. Veil can stay here." Meneas declares before pausing. "Mind you, if it's another swarm of spiders, perhaps that's less true."
“Unless you’d rather, Morof,” Lina offers, “I don’t mind hanging back a bit. I’ve still been preparing that fire spell, though I hope we won’t need it, given how thick the berry-brake and webbing and all seems to be. I can help with the berries along the edges, and then I’ve an idea to keep my hands occupied while keeping watch.”
Her eye flickers to a pine she’s spotted at the mouth of the valley, whose resin she thinks might be useful to blend in with some odds and ends in her pockets and pouches for various alchemical purposes.
Brental smiles at his companions. "My hope is that even if it is a swarm of spiders, we'll be protected so long as we watch our reach. And Lina: if it comes to it, I'd rather us leave the thicket alive than be consumed by whatever lies within. As long as we don't burn the whole grove, we'll be able to replant part of our harvest."
He really must encourage her to learn spells less dangerous to the land. He had met some of those flame druids who worshiped the cleansing purity of fire. There was certainly a time and place for controlled burns, but these zealots bordered on obsessive.
"Vodnykel," he says gently with a glance towards Lina, "Skydda." The mastodon approaches the elf and looks very serious, ready to defend his new ward at all costs.
"Well, Morof: care to come berry-picking with us?"
Brental smiles at his companions. "My hope is that even if it is a swarm of spiders, we'll be protected so long as we watch our reach. And Lina: if it comes to it, I'd rather us leave the thicket alive than be consumed by whatever lies within. As long as we don't burn the whole grove, we'll be able to replant part of our harvest."
He really must encourage her to learn spells less dangerous to the land. He had met some of those flame druids who worshiped the cleansing purity of fire. There was certainly a time and place for controlled burns, but these zealots bordered on obsessive.
Lina nods at Brental’s prioritization. “Try running this way first. I’ll come and help, of course, but you’ve seen how limited the range is.”
The quirk tugging at the corner of her mouth betrays her deadpan delivery. Turning to her saddlebags, she searches for containers for berries and for what she hopes to brew up with the help of some of the other local greenery.
Venturing deep into the brambles the trio have to be wary of the sharp thorns litering their environment.
Using their skill at surviving in the wilds, Brental and Meneas manage to avoid the majority of the thorns but the happless half-elf is not so fortunate. He has taken an absolute beating from the brambles and is now coveres in cuts and scratches.
It appears it is as Bokken said, these berries have a bite to them. The party theorize that one would need a significant amount of armor or perhaps skill to get through the brambles unharmed.
In the meantime they have managed to gather one bucket of berries. Just three more to go.
"Morof, why don't you go back... unless you have some spell to shield yourself from physical harm?" Meneas looks at the half-elf wizard.
Brental reaches into his belt pouch and pulls out a handful of his own berries, handing them to the half-elf. "Eat these. They should help you feel a bit better."
He turns to Meneas. "So far, so good. We may as well continue."
Brental will continue picking berries, pleased that his magic seems to be working...for now.