Aycenia smiles. "I will miss you yes, but I will not be bored. The land will have far more interesting things to say now that it can be healthy again, and that makes me happy."
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"I wouldn't have staked you," Douena scoffs. "You'd have been much better looking as a vampire. I would have tamed you, and we'd travel around the world fighting evil at night. A vampire sidekick would be almost as much fun as a Tiny bear. Oh, that reminds me, Aycenia! Do you know about a little captain who lives in a shipwreck under the sea near Red Mountain? Does the land tell you about him, or would we have to ask the water?" Aycenia thinks for a moment, then nods. "I think I know who you mean," she says. "He is a mephit from the Plane of Water. I know little about him other than he was familiar to the ship's captain until the captain was eaten by the winged chupacabra. He never leaves the ship now."
Aycenia looks at Mahjik and frowns. "He definitely doesn't look well," she says. "Alas, as I've mentioned before, I cannot cure him of his condition. However, I can alleviate the symptoms for at least a little while." She motions Mahjik over to her and places a hand on his head. A moment later, her hand glows and he feels rejuvenating energy pour through him.
Aycenia shakes her head. "The winged chupacabra has never demonstrated such abilities before. I doubt very much that it could have caused what happened."
Aycenia shrugs. "I'm not sure. What I learnt from the land was jumbled and confusing. I am hoping that when I commune with the land again tomorrow, I will learn something more precise. Until then, we can only speculate."
Aycenia lowers her head. "I am sorry to hear that. What I have been able to learn from the land today has been...confused at best. The land reported many deaths, but I hoped those were only the cannibals and that you would all come back whole. I am sorry for your loss and wish there were something I could do to lessen it. But greater troubles are afoot." She turns and looks to the east. "No doubt you saw and heard the lightning display in the early afternoon. The land was tormented by what happened. A portal...or door...or something long closed was opened again. An entire portion of the sea was redirected for nearly six hours. What was uncovered in that time, I do not know. But something that has been buried on this island longer than I have been here was brought to the surface, albeit only for a short while. Perhaps I will be able to learn more from the land tomorrow. I do not know." She turns back to look at the party. "I fear that while you were dealing with the evil of the cannibals, someone else was doing something far worse than anything the cannibals ever managed."
Douena pops awake in the morning with the announcement, "I had a dream.... I dreamed I had a Tiny bear I could carry around in my pocket. Do you think I could find a bear like that on this island, Aycenia?" Aycenia looks at Douena with amusement and shakes her head. "I'm afraid not. There aren't any normal sized bears here, never mind tiny ones."
"Aycenia! Do you want to try Makoa's swing? I can't believe you've lived in a tree your whole life and never had a swing!" "That's kind of you to offer, Douena, but I'm not really..." Aycenia trails off and contemplates the swing for a moment. Then she smiles slightly. "Then again, perhaps it won't be so bad. It won't collapse on me, will it?" She gives the swing a tug to test its strength, then timidly sits on the seat. After a few more moments, she is swinging gently. "This is actually rather fun!" she says and begins to swing a little faster and higher.
"Oh," Aycenia says. She ponders for a moment. "I suppose a swing would be all right. Just so long as you don't harm the tree."
Aycenia shakes her head. "I'm afraid that is beyond my ability. If they were to come here, I could make the plants grab and entangle them, but I cannot affect them in their village. It is too far away."
Aycenia shakes her head. "There are never very many children, and the few there are are often deformed due to inbreeding. They kill the deformed children as infants. The land has not mentioned any current children to me. As for the women, there are women in their tribe, but they are much fewer in number than the men. I don't know where they are kept though."
"Aycenia," she raises up her head to call to the lady of the hill, "was the lighthouse already here when your tree grew? Or do you know when it was built?" "The lighthouse is old, but not that old," Aycenia says making her way over to the group. "It was built by people who hoped to colonize this island, but it was abandoned before completion. I'm not sure why. The colonists simply left the island. I think something must have happened in their homeland that drew them back to it, but that is only speculation on my part."
"The village is on the other side of the small southwestern bay," Aycenia says. "It is only a couple of miles in a straight line from here, but you will need to go around the bay, which could add a bit to the distance. The village lies at the at the southwestern corner of the bay."
"Aycenia," Douena asks, "this logbook talks about a gray, silent island. Do you know about anyplace like that around here that the castaways would have been able to get to?" "That refers to the fungal blight, I am sure," Aycenia says. "The captain traveled there once and came back from it much afraid. It had not progressed as much at the time, but I think in his madness, the captain saw what it would one day become."
Aycenia nods. "I did." After a pause, she adds, "In a sense. The land does not communicate in the way you do. However, I did learn through it that you were all right."
Aycenia smiles and nods. "I would be happy to." She approaches Aerys. "Remember, I cannot cure the disease, but I can relieve some of its effects." She places her hands on Aerys's face, and they glow for a moment.
Aycenia frowns. "They do go back to those sites frequently," she says sadly. "I cannot say for sure why, but I believe it is because they go in search of new castaways. The abandoned camps tend to draw the interest of those who have shipwrecked here. They see them as either convenient places to rest themselves or as places to be investigated. The cannibals take advantage of that. At least, that is what it seems like to me. I do not know precisely what the cannibals' reasoning is." "As for the other places..." She looks at where Douena is pointing. "That one by the shore is the location of a strange rock formation. Four monoliths surround a pyramid-shaped rock. It is one of the things here even older than I. I think the cannibals view it as a shrine of some sort. The other trail leads to the top of the mountain. That is where the cannibals perform their sacrifices to the winged chupacabra."
"The cannibals chose the spots where their trails cross a river carefully," Aycenia says. "The rivers are at their easiest to cross at those points."
Aerys suggests bringing out your map of the Shiv so that Aycenia can provide direction. Aycenia looks it over and quickly begins making additions to the map, drawing on rivers and trails. "Your map is a bit off on scale," she says, "but it will do. You need to go almost directly northeast from here. The first trail you encounter will not lead you directly to the hut. Keep going past it until you reach the second trail. Then look for the branch off that trail that goes northeast. That is the one that will take you to the captain's hut. If you come out of the jungle at the top of a narrow canyon overlooking the trail, you have gone too far north and will need to backtrack south a bit. Hopefully, these changes to your map will help you." She finishes her additions to the map and hands it back.
Aycenia shrugs. "I do know that the cannibals place traps along their trails, but I cannot say for sure where."
Aycenia shakes her head. "I never went to visit him. I can go no more than a few hundred yards from my tree without taking ill. No, the times I spoke to him were times that he wandered here. His hut is about 4 miles northeast of here on a plateau. The cannibals have a trail that leads directly to it. As for leading the cannibals here into an ambush, I would rather you didn't. I cannot risk my tree."
Aycenia smiles. "You have already done more than enough for me by ending the fungal blight, but thank you for your offer."
"How old are you?" Douena asks curiously. "And do you know how far it is from your hill to the cannibals' town? We promised Pezock we'd kill them." Aycenia thinks for a moment. "I am not really sure," she says. "Very old as you would term things. I don't fully remember how or when I came to be, it was so long ago. But as I said, the land is older, and there definitely were things here before I was." She smiles down at Douena. "But it is of no real matter. I exist and have done for some time. That is all that matters to me. Now, for the cannibals, perhaps it is time that their blight be removed from this land. They are only a couple of miles from here, on the other side of the small bay at the southwest corner of the island. I am afraid I cannot give you much assistance against them, however. I cannot leave this hill. I must remain close to my tree or I will die. But I can help in other ways. As I said, you are welcome to use this place as a safe haven to retreat to if necessary. And I can heal your wounds. Indeed, one of you looks in need of attention already." She walks over to Jask, who is sitting on the ground, exhausted. "May I?" she asks. He nods and she bends down over him. "I cannot remove the affliction you suffer from, but I can mitigate its effects." She places her hands on his head. A dim glow briefly surrounds Jask's head and then fades. She removes her hands.
"Hmmm..." Aycenia says. "That was clearly not enough." She bends over again and repeat the process.
She shakes her head, obviously annoyed. "I can only do this one more time before the sun next rises." She leans over and repeats the process again.
Aycenia scowls. "I am sorry I could not do more," she says sullenly.
"We may have already been there. Do you remember the building we found with the pentagram that had teeth stuck in it?""I told you destroying that wall was a good thing," Douena says triumphantly. "I knew it was evil. Desna told me." Aycenia shakes her head. "The shrine has not been destroyed. The land would have told me. Unless you destroyed it in just the few hours since I last communed with the land, but you would not have had time to reach here if that were the case. I think you must be thinking of one of the old castaway camps along the shorelines. The captain's hut was on a plateau in the heart of the jungle northeast of here." In response to Mahjik's question, she shakes her head. "I'm sorry, I do not know of such a cave. However, there are ancient caverns beneath the island. It could be one of those. They are older than I am. But Desna is older still. She would know better than I."
"I follow you, Lorenz," Aycenia says. "I have a strong connection with the land, and it tells me many things. But I can only travel a short distance from my tree, so I am reliant on visitors to tell me all the details, and I don't get a lot of those. This island does get more than its share of castaways, but despite the large numbers, the wrecks are usually due to perfectly natural causes. I do not know why someone would want to purposefully shipwreck themselves here, although I do know that when your group arrived, another smaller group--presumably your captain and this Ieana--arrived at the same time. Perhaps she seeks something specific, and is willing to use any means necessary to find it. This island holds many secrets, some of them ancient and far older than even I am, secrets the land hasn't even revealed to me."
Douena tags along at Aycenia's feet through the introductions, not wanting to be parted from her new friend. "You said the cannibals 'arrived' here? They're not from here originally? Were they shipwrecked, too?" Aycenia nods. "They weren't cannibals originally. That came later. They were from a ship called the Thrune's Fang. It crashed along the southwest coast. There were many survivors at first. They set up a camp near the old ruined lighthouse. But then they started fighting amongst themselves. One of them led a mutiny, I believe, drove their captain out. I don't know the details. Their captain lived alone for many years after that in an old hut on one of the plateaus northeast of here. I spoke to him a few times, but isolation had driven him somewhat mad. He never made much sense. Eventually, the others who had rebelled against him turned to cannibalism. At first, I think it was just out of fear of the one who now led them. She demanded that they eat human flesh and so to save themselves, they did as she commanded. There was something unnatural about her. Of course, they could not survive as a group long if they ate each other, so they decided their former captain would be ideal as one of their first victims. They killed and ate him. They now go on occasional pilgrimages to his old hut, which they've turned into a shrine. The poor man. I feel sorry for him. And I feel sorry for his crew, who only did what they did out of fear. Of course, all the originals are long dead and their descendants are highly inbred. I don't know whatever happened to the unnatural woman. Presumably she died at some point."
"A pleasure to meet you, Makoa and Lorenz," Aycenia says. "And the rest of you. It's so rare I get visitors. To answer your question, Lorenz, the chupacabra is like a giant lizard, somewhat dragon-like in appearance. This one has wings, which is very unusual for a chupacabra. You may have seen it flying around from time to time. I believe the cannibals call it the Red Mountain Devil since it has a reddish tinge to its coloration and it lives on the mountain at the southeast end of the island." She turns to the rest of the party. "Please make yourselves at home. I look forward to getting to know you and hearing your stories." The others begin introducing themselves.
Aycenia looks momentarily confused by the mention of "flappybites", but she smiles as Mahjik does his impression. "Ah, of course," she says. "I am glad to hear that you have made at least one friend here." She stands up and looks over the entire group. "I owe you a great debt of gratitude. The fungal blight appeared many years ago, but it was isolated. I did not consider it much threat as long as it remained in its rock. After all, we all have a right to exist. But then it began spreading, a first so slowly it wasn't noticeable. It took years to overtake the entire northern island, but the more land it took, the faster it progressed. If the rate had continued to increase, it would have infested the entire Shiv in matter of a few more months. I thank you from the bottom of my heart. I have little I can offer as a reward, but you may remain here on this hilltop for as long as you are on the island. It is a safe haven here. The cannibals of the island do not come here. They are superstitious and consider me an evil spirit. And the island's predators know that I am their friend. They will not bother you here. Only the winged chupacabra remains a potential threat, but it has not bothered me in many years. Not since the cannibals arrived. I think their sacrifices placate it enough. I'm not sure."
The woman kneels down in front of Douena. "Welcome, Douena," she says. She has an accent that Douena and the rest of the party don't recognize. "My name is Aycenia. Are you the ones who ended the fungal blight to the north?"
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