Davon Stonde - Stonde Homestead's page

Davon and his Mother will both come back out, "Mr. Aldhranhald sir, after consulting with my Mother just to confirm, yes of course you can certainly lay Brother Guiness to rest here. Anywhere rasonable that you would like, as a matter of fact we would be honored if you would lie him under that big oak tree next to my father's resting place. Your group has done so much to help us financially and emotionally - Believe me, anything to break up the monotonous life of the daily routine on such a farm as this, is emotionally helpful! - that you are always welcome here and even a stay of various days instead of your typical 'overnight' is most welcome! Anytime you feel a need to rest and recuperate, please feel welcome to come give us a visit."

Sama looks a bit gobsmacked by the new arrival. ...

Literal LOL! Then I had to look it up to see if it meant what I thought it did, and I was basically correct. Never heard of 'gobsmacked' before though! I found it quite funny!

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With the weight carrying situation and everything else being what it is, I'm going to wave my 'DM' hand, and say you arrive at the Stonde home with no trouble.

As you approach the farm it is nearing night time once again. Once you are spotted Davon comes out and waves a greeting. Upon your approach he notices the new member right away. "I see your group has changed yet again?! It must be something to get used to having frequent changes like this." Then he realizes you are carrying Brother Guiness's corpse. "NO! what happened? Is there no way he could have been saved? I have heard stories of priests that are able to return the dead to life, but I doubt those are true, and if they are the price they charge is a king's ransom in itself anyways. ... I am sorry for your loss. Please forgive me, I ramble on. What can we do to help?"

... "I have met many farmers who brew their own beer. I am told that it is not hard as long as you grow the right things. Do the Hellknights hereabouts forbid it? "

Davon responds, "No, it is not forbidden, but having no adult men around, we just have not spent any of our meager resources on it."

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After having a huge feast (by comparison to whatever rations you have been munching on at least), though with little to no ale to go around, everyone except the Dwarf settles in and gets a good night's rest. Come morning of the 29th of Desnus, all feel refreshed and ready to move on.

"Oh my! WOW! Uuummm ... Uh ... I mean ..." Says Davon as he takes the sack of coin, almost dropping it in surprise at the heavy weight of it and obviously being quite surprised and flustered, not knowing what to do or say for a moment.

The mother, Ilyana, gets a very red face and huge smile before saying: "My goodness! Good sir, ... Brother Guiness was it? This is most generous and kind of you! I am afraid we have no ale here on the farm, only water or fresh goat's milk if you'd prefer? We cannot usually afford such things as ale. We are nought but poor, humble farmers you see, barely making enough to feed all the young ones now that my husband is gone. But we shall certainly be glad to give ye as much as a feast as we can manage!" And then turning to Davon, "My son, go quickly now and put that away in a safe place, then tell the rest of the family we are celebrating tonight and to make ready as quickly as possible! Then go and kill our best goat AND a chicken as well! Prep them for cooking as quickly as possible! We must hurry and do our absolute best to honor these guests!"

And Davon quickly runs off around the house yelling for the children to get cleaned up quick.

Ilyana & Davon relax their stances once they hear Boudacia's words. "Well any friends of yours are certainly welcome here! I am also glad to hear the others are not dead. That big, funny-sounding northerner will be missed, as will the others of course. As far as finding you a place to stay for the night? Just as before, you are welcome to camp out in our yard. And buying any food is always welcome as it saves us the trip to the market to sell! Welcome friends! Please, make yourselves at home!"

The party makes it safely to the Stonde homestead about 30 minutes before sunset. Everything appears to be safe as you hear the familiar sounds of the chickens in the yard and goats in their pen. Soon you see a couple of small children running around the corner of the house playing at something or other, until they notice your group. For a brief moment they just stare at you & then suddenly, "MOMMA!!! MOMMA!!!" as loud as they can manage as they streak off back towards the font of the house.

Shortly thereafter you see Ilyana Stonde & her son Davon come around the house in a prudent, but determined manor. Ilyana is carrying her pitchfork in a menacing manner, while Davon is brandishing a sledgehammer he looks quite capable with. Once they see your group they relax for the most part, but then as they look more, they tense back up partially. Davon speaks up, "Lady Boudacia, Lady Tamlara, Sir Aldhranhald! It is good to see you alive & well! Though you seem to be missing some people and have some other folks whom we know not. Is all well?" as he nods to each of the individuals mentioned, and then focuses his attention on the others, especially the two dangerous looking ones with all the weapons and armor ...

He clearly awaits a response.

They actually had to shut down our phones at work! YAY! I get to post from work!

Lady Illiana and Davon rise with the sun. They are definitely awake. The smaller children wake up whenever they do, or when Iliana calls out that breakfast is ready.

When Boudacia knocks on the door and inquires as to buying some eggs and the possibility of tea, Davon brightens immediately! "What a concept! People coming to me to buy my eggs instead of me having to take them all the way into town! I like this! Certainly, I have 21 eggs currently available. I usually sell them at 2 coppers for 3 eggs. How many would you like?"

"And as far as tea, well, I do have some leaves that we grow in the garden that we use for tea. It may not be quite as nice as some of what gets served in town, but it certainly is cheaper for us! And I'll be glad to give you some of those leaves, no charge for my friends."

After you conclude your transaction with him, as he is walking back into the house you hear him muttering to himself, "Now, what could I do to encourage people to come to me to buy the eggs instead of me having to travel into town every time?"

I have no idea what the price of eggs should be!?!?!?! And of course, the list of the cost of foods and spices from the PFSRD does not have eggs on it?!?!? What kind of a list of foods does not have eggs on it?!?!? Well, a chicken is listed as 2 coppers, so that is where I came up with 2 coppers for 3 eggs.

Upon hearing Boudacia, Davon goes ahead and opens the door wide. He stares in almost a state of shock at the north man in front of him covered in so much blood. He just continues staring, unable to make himself say anything. But his mother steps over and steps on out of the house.

"Well! I see you have met with something other than the old dried up skeletons! I'm sure you must have an interesting story or two to tell, but it is late for us as we rise with the sun. I have no room for you in our small house, it is already overflowing as it is, I'm sorry. If you have some bedrolls or tents or such your certainly welcome to make camp in our yard if you wish? But beware of the goat and chicken droppings! I am sorry that I can offer no better to you! If I at least had a barn I would gladly let you use it, but we can not afford such luxuries. You are of course welcome to use our well as well to drink and ... she looks directly at Tangar as she says this, clean up some maybe? Preferably before the little ones see you please? And ... I have not much to offer in the way of food, but if it is necessary I could provide you some eggs that I was planning to sell at market?"

It is clear from the look on her face that she doesn't really want to give you the eggs, but she does not wish to offend you either.

I checked and I see that everybody has bedrolls except Tamlara? I seem to recall something about Tamlara leaving a bedroll with the tavern keeper maybe? Hmmm ... I'll have to check to see if there is anything about sleeping in the out of doors without a bedroll. Does seem like a penalty to some movement or skills related to moving may apply? I'm not sure. Anyone happen to know? And for future reference, I'm fairly certain you could negotiate some sort of arrangement for the big guy to carry it for you. He has been 'flirting' with Tamlara after all right? For tonight Tamlara does realize he is wearing a bunch of furs, that looked very nice and cozy before he got them all bloodied. Maybe she could cozy up next to him for tonight if he gets them washed up first? But then they would be very wet most likely ... ;)

As Tangar walks up to the door, he notices it is very quiet in the house, but he can hear the voices of a man and woman in conversation, though it is too low to make anything out.

When Tangar knocks on the door there is sudden complete silence in the house.

After about 30 seconds the door cracks open just barely enough to peek through and you hear the young Davon, "Who is it and what seek you at these late hours?"

Nobody has said anything about what they are doing for lights at this point? It is dark and some of the party does not have darkvision after all. I would say Boudacia could do her dancing lights, but that would mean that every 1 minute she would have to shapeshift back to human form to cast it again.

As the group is getting ready to depart, "Hey, since your heading to the Spire you may as well cut right across the meadows back behind our house. From here that's the most direct route and you will even find a bit of a path from here on into the forest. Just head straight east! Once your in the woods of course the trail will start to split up, but if your able to keep mainly to the east, you should get there within a few hours."
"And you little one, Ozzy I believe she said was your name? I'm sorry for not accepting your initial introduction, but I honestly thought you were just a child that was trying to get attention or something like that? If your going to the Spire you must not be the child I took you for!" Or more likely your very foolish and naive!

Davon gets one of the biggest smiles you have ever seen, as you agree to give him the 15 gold pieces. The mother starts to cry and thank all of you very profusely, while the other boy and the three smaller children all get eyes as big as saucers! You hear many various whispers and comments, some of which then turn into shouts, "Fifteen whole gold pieces! I've only ever dreamed of such!", "These people must be rich to pay 15 gold for a useless old skull!", "WOW!!!!", and such. You find yourselves suddenly in the midst of a spontaneous celebration of sorts with all the kids running around, shouting and jumping for joy! At some point or other each of them comes over to stare at the gold and reach out ever so gently to touch it, almost as if they can't believe it's real or that it will disappear.

After a moment to compose himself, Davon will focus more upon the group, but especially so on Boudacia and Aldhranhald, "If ever there is anything else you all need, or some way we can help ya, please let us know! We will be happy to help such good, generous folk in any way that we can! ... Um the skeletons ... I'm sorry to say I recall nothing else about them. Just the sheer terror that they caused us! Like I said, we were so focused on those mushrooms that we didn't even see or hear them until they were already upon us. So whether they came due to the noise, or some other cause I have no way of saying good Sir Aldhranhald! And no M'Lady, there is nothing significant about the area either. We had been through there many times before without ever seeing such!"

Then re-focusing to include the rest of the group, "We don't have much to offer, but would anyone care for a fresh drink of water maybe?" and turning to the other boy, "Darius! Go fetch a bucket of fresh water from the well for these fine folks! Dalia, bring out clean cups for our friends here!" Turning back to the party, "Now please, I got the name of the good Sir Aldhranhald here, what are the rest of your names please? Oh, my name is Davon, that is my mother Ilyana, the one fetching the water is Darius, my sister Dalia, the little feller over there is Donte, and my baby sister Darcia. You may notice my father had a fondness for the D." He finishes off with a sheepish grin.

"Well, this is a rather unique item, and considering my mother, my brother and I risked our very lives in obtaining this, do you think you could make that 15 gold? See, that way at least it represents 5 gold for each of the lives that was at risk? I think our lives are worth at least that much don't you?"

Boudacia casts her detect magic and takes the skull in her hands and studies it for a little bit. You do not detect any magic on it. Other than the symbol it appears to be a completely normal skull.

When Boudacia asks Davon about the possibility of selling it, everyone sees a large smile spread across his face. "For the right price, I certainly would sell it! My family has been on some very tough times ever since my father was unjustly hung! What kind of an offer can you make?"

While this conversation is happening other members of the party will also take a look at the skull. Some prefer to examine it letting others hold it for them, while others have no qualms about holding it and taking a closer look.

Alex will confirm that this is just a normal human skull other than the unusual mark. Ozzy and Tangar feel fairly certain that Alex is correct. While Aldhranhald, Mr. Blinky, and Tamlara don't seem sure if it is just a normal skull or not. Feel free to look at the die rolls. If I really didn't want you to see them, I wouldn't have put them there!

As Aldhranhald mentions the Lady Commander you notice Davon, and then the woman and other boy as well, relax their positions, and Davon even sets down the sledgehammer. You also see a young girl of about 10 holding an infant in her arms and a little toddler all come out the front door now and they are all staring with very big eyes at your group.

"Well, while I care nothing about the church, since they don't care about us at all, but the Lady and her soldiers do at least try to provide some medium of protection for us, though their 'taxes' are too high for such simple folk as us. So if she sent you, and you intend to get rid of this menace, then I can certainly share my story with you, and show you what I got out of it if you think that may help in any fashion."

"As we know the forest can be a dangerous place, and also sometimes the mushrooms can be difficult to dig out when they are under logs or rocks, we had taken along these very pitchforks you see here and this big hammer. It turns out it was very lucky for us that we had them with us! We had found an unusually large patch of the mushrooms, but they were well back in a crevice between some rocks and difficult to reach, so I was hammering away on one of the rocks while my Mother and brother here tried to pry it up. I don't know if it was all the noise that attracted them or what, and it really was silly of us, being in such a dangerous area to let our guard down and be so focused on those mushrooms, but there was enough there to provide food for at least a week!"

At this point Davon pauses for a moment, but you can see in his eyes that he is re-living the moment and while you see terror in his face, you can also tell he is becoming very animated and ecxited. "Anyways, just as I swung my hammer back to take another hit on that rock, I felt something like claws grabbing my shoulder! They ripped into my skin and caused me to spin around. Look here I can show you the scars!" As he lifts his shirt off over his head and you can clearly see a set of 5 parallel scars that certainly look as if a skeletal hand had ripped through the skin on his shoulder.

"I realized I had gotten quite lucky indeed, in that my backswing had also just happened to coincide in meeting with the skull of that skeleton as it was grabbing me, crushing its skull and dropping it to the ground! But there was another skeleton a mere 5 feet away! And we were in an area surounded on three sides by impenetrable forest! We had no where to run to! Here was this horror of a walking skeleton, strangely enough wearing a blue robe! And it eyes glowed blue as well! It was trying to grab at us and who knows what it wanted to do to us, but we weren't about to just stand there and find out. My mother and brother both tried to shove it away using their pitchforks, but only succeded in getting them entangled in the creatures robe and bones. That however proved to be luck on our side again, as then they were able to keep it from coming in closer and hold it somewhat still, while I took my hammer and swung at its skull! I missed the skull, but went right into the shoulder area causing it a fair amount of damage. I swung again, missing the skull again, but this time my hammer went right through the bones in its back! At that point it had little to no movement left, but out of the sheer terror of it, I went on to smash all the bones to dust! As I did so, I noticed there were several small green pieces of what looked like glass of some sort attached to the bones. I tried to take some of those, but as soon as I would touch them they would just crumble into dust. However I did keep that skull intact! I have it in the house and can show it to you if you'd like to see it." At this point he starts to head to the house, pointing and waving for you all to follow. Then he stops at the door and looks back at you, "If you all come in its going to get very cramped in there! Let me get it and bring it out here for you to see in the sunlight!"

He comes back out holding what certainly appears to be a human skull. "I kept it because it seemed strange, something I didn't notice during the struggle, but I saw just as I was about to smash the skull, there was a symbol engraved into the very bone of the skull on the top! Here take a look for yourselves." As he holds it out for anyone to take and look at it closer.

Anyone who looks at it will see an image of a skull wering a crown clearly etched or somehow engraved into the very bone of the skull.

Ozzy I realize the RAW indicates you had a great result on your diplomacy skill check there, but I cannot by any means allow people to take a little 13 yr old girl seriously as the speaker for a group of armed adventuring types out in the dangerous forest. Realistically speaking it makes no sense what-so-ever that they would have a little girl speaking for them. Other members of the party have already stated that they would not allow it, even if it came to physically holding you back or pushing you aside, and I have to agree with them. Alex would not allow it either. If this means you need to adjust your skill points, by all means, do so!

Davon who appears to be about 18-19 yrs old. looks at the little girl and he smiles at her, "That's nice kid." Then he looks around at the rest of the party, looking at each of the more 'adult' looking ones, obviously awaiting for a 'more serious' person to speak up.

After a short time you arrive at what you believe to be the Stonde homestead based on it's location. You see a woman and 2 teenage boys out working in a small vegetable garden. There are several chickens running about, and you see some goats in a pen a small ways off from the house. It is a very small house, not of good quality nor very sturdy appearing, but with a relatively well kept yard. Upon seeing you approach they all stop their work and the woman and the younger boy each pick up a pitchfork that was laying on the ground nearby, while the older boy picks up a sledge hammer that was also lying on the ground near him. They do not raise the 'weapons' in a threatening manner, but just hold them at the ready. They watch warily as you approach and once it is clear that you are not merely passing by, but coming to see them, the older boy will take a step forward, "Be wary strangers! There have been some strange things happening lately, and we want no trouble! Who are you, and what is your purpose in coming here?"