| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The woman and the man lie in the almost darkness of their bedroom. She quietly and slowly rises from the bed. She is naked, and she is beautiful as an angel, white hair on white skin.
But her eyes are red, smoldering with hate and fury.
She kneels before an unholy altar with the figure on a pregnant humanoid monster in the middle and starts praying silently.
Her scream wakes up the man, a half-elf with strange tian features. He looks in horror as her arm starts to boil and mutate as if rotting of burning with no apparent reason. He stands frozen, not knowing what to do.
After a minute the arm is no longer human. A demonic claw now protrudes from a monstrous appendage.
The woman smiles savagely under her tears.
"She has blessed me! It is time to make the burnt offering to her! Now it is time to destroy Sandpoint!"
She starts to laugh maddingly.
=================================================
@Anton Chauvelle: As he is not pressed about money, Anton decides to find a good group of traveling Varisians, and drink his way up the Lost Coast. Good times.
There are two groups of Varisians that seem promising. One has three wagons, they are about 15 people, and seems very "musically inclined". There are a couple of pretty varisian girls there, but they seem very... chaste... at first sight. They have small children too, so maybe the party options are somewhat limited.
On the other hand, there is a small group of 6 varisians too. And 2 of those are very beautiful ones that seem, at first glance, "receptive" to a foreigner joining them. They all are young, fit and already a little drunk. They seem to travel light, with no carts or wagons, carrying all they need on their persons.
=================================================
@Anton Ionescu: Still a little bit hungover after your goodbye party with your old comrades, you quickly find job guarding a noble going to Sandpoint. He seems a nice enough fellow, by the name Aldern Foxglove. He provides you with a horse for you to escort him (he will ride too), as well as 5 sp for your services as "valet" (whatever that is) and bodyguard.
"Unless is one of those beauties..." - he says eyeing a couple of varisian women that will make the voyage too.
First, you think you know what kind of woman they are, and yes, your employer is the kind of man that they like to "accompany" on the nights of long voyages, for a price, of course.
You can't say you approve but it is too frequent for it to bother you.
But wait... one of those women. Is that Nan?
Nan, the girl you used to play as a child in Sandpoint?
But you return to reality when Aldern starts talking to a pretty Varisian woman.
- "My name is Aldern Foxglove. And I love to have beautiful women attending me on my trips. May I ask your name?"
She doesn't seem like a "professional". But that, sometimes, is the way to know she is VERY professional.
=================================================
@Delin Chiri: One book, or more exactly, one piece of a book. That was all you needed. The theories and ideas in it were short of the work of a genius. Most of the things that don't make sense about Thassilon he analyzes as if he knew. As if he understood them. But the book was very damaged (and it seems damaged on purpose), and you were told the only way to find it completely was looking for the author, which is still alive and living in Sandpoint. Brodert Quink.
That is why you find yourself walking alongside all of these people, which seems are going for a cathedral consecration while ignoring all the history under their feet.
Wait, is that Ulfen in the caravan you arrived into Magnimar?
=================================================
@Etna Venus Van Ash: You arrive at the caravan looking for work, and a couple of minutes after you start looking, you find something. He looks rich, he has a wide smile, and he is attractive. Young, but not too young. Worldly, but not too worldly. Rich, but not too rich. You have had dreams with nobles like him.
- "My name is Aldern Foxglove. And I love to have beautiful women attending me on my trips. May I ask your name?"
His guard, a young varisian, quickly turns to eye you suspiciously.
=================================================
@Lief Stoutspear: The job is simple. Whatever gets near the carriage, you kill it. No one, except for the old lady and the two old drivers, is to be allowed within 10 feet of it. Under any circumstance. 1 gold piece is waiting for you in Sandpoint if you all arrive there, on that condition. Easy.
What is in the carriage? Gold, probably. And some nobleman's virgin daughter, you imagine, as they take food in at regular intervals, and a pot out in the mornings.
Nothing that worries you too much.
And when you arrive at Sandpoint, well, your father once told you a history about a battle with some goblins there, where he saved Daviren Hosk's life. Maybe he can give you a job there.
=================================================
@Livia Taviskin: The Abbess calls you to her quarters. They are not like a cell of a cleric in other religions, with naked walls and grey ceilings. This one is filled with color and beauty. Drawings, music sheets, figurines... The home of a Shelyn follower.
"Sister Livia, thanks for coming. A new cathedral will be consecrated in the town of Sandpoint, and we would like you to go and sing at the ceremony. It is a long journey, but hardship makes for the most beautiful of art. One of the founding families of the town has made a big donation to us, and we want to answer his request. Please look for House Kaijitsu in Sandpoint, and give them our thanks."
As soon as in known she will go to Sandpoint, an extended family of Varisian travelers asks her to join them. They have three wagons, are little more than a dozen people, and are Shelyn followers.
=================================================
@M'ara: Your "readings" have made an impact, and you even got a letter of recommendation addressed to Madame Mvashti, and elder Varisian woman of some fame living at Sandpoint, who, you are told, can help you improve "your act". In fact, the old varisian woman that gave you the letter implied that you could be able to do much more than just "pretend" to make readings, and that keep performing them "for a show" was a waste of your "real talents". They also referred you to caravan departing soon to Sandpoint (there seems to be a festival of sorts soon there, and many people are traveling in that direction) that she can join.
"The lost coast if not for traveling alone." - The woman tells you.
Shivi, later on, makes you know your future lies north. At Sandpoint.
=================================================
@The Magician, Zomeraand: No one really interesting in the travel group. Varisian families, chelaxian nobles, a dumb city boy about to be robbed by some Sczarni women. Everything you expected to find on your first solo trip.
Except for her.
A half-elf, obviously... but not a "look at me I am so pretty" half-elf. She really looks intelligent. The book fragment she has doesn't seem old but is it damaged. She writes and writes as if her life depended on it.
Why is she going into Sandpoint? It is a mystery. Is it a mystery worth resolving?
=================================================