Session 16

Two weeks passed. YFPB’s foray into enemy-occupied territory proceeded, for the most part, with surprising calm. T’Sais and Cristanta led the group through game trails and through tree cover for most of their trip, hunkering down when enemy patrols passed by. It wasn’t that they and YFPB couldn’t handle even a full squad of Torvani soldiers, but the mission on which Roland had sent the pair required stealth. Or so they claimed. In any case, it had been nearly half a month before the narrative returned to cover our heroes.

In the intervening time, the members of YFPB coped with their trauma. Irene was quickly unbound when it was clear she posed no immediate (or at least, voluntary) threat, but she all but begged to remain restrained. As a result, the group compromised with a corded rope that tied her wrists together but retained enough slack as to be discarded in an emergency. The act was at its core performative, but Irene played her part with fervor. During the nights, Irene would be camped out on the opposite side of the site from her team and was often flanked on both sides by T’Sais and Crisanta. She said little, engaged in shenanigans even less, and for the most part was the definition of self-pitying.

Her teammates did not blame her, for they had not absolved her of her betrayal and were burdened by their own trauma. Harlan spent his nights cradling his missing arm, and spent his days training his body to compensate. Vireya found a cloth sack in which to keep all the jagged shards of Peeble glass, and each night she painstakingly attempted to piece them together with some tree sap she had gathered on the road. Lorien was quiet, even by his standards, and often spent the nights by candle or firelight attempting to find meaning in the ink-soaked pages of Astrid’s journal. Harlan, Vireya, and Lorien often tried to ignore Irene’s presence entirely, and avoided talking with her whenever possible. Vierya often felt the ache of her missing friendship, but the real ache of the scars on her stomach and legs dissuaded her from reconnecting.

The group had trained extensively since Kalzaharn’s sacking. Under the tutelage of the two female warriors, the members of YFPB saw their strength grow measureably. The magic-users of the group even found inspiration from their struggles to grow and learn new spells. The night when things changed was like any other; the camp was silent save for the crackling of the massive bonfire. T’Sais had built the fire much larger than normal but had refused to say why. As Irene stared into the fire with hollow eyes, T’Sais tried to convince Lorien and Vireya about the tenants of worshipping El. She described time as its own concept and explained that the past, with everyone’s choices made with free will, is already set in stone. If the past is set in stone, you can imagine a being who sits outside of time and sees all time at once, to which the future would be as set in stone as the past. This argument obviously did not land with the prideful and headstrong pair, and T’Sais looked to Harlan for support.

The paladin, who of course was not the zealot he claimed to be, opened his mouth to demur. But before he could, he heard the howl of wolves close by. Too close by for comfort. Lorien heard the howls too, and in one smooth motion twisted from his cross-legged position to a standing pose, rifle butt already placed against his shoulder blade. His fears proved valid as three large wolves loped from behind the group’s tents. Lorien did not wait. If the wolves had gotten this close without alerting anyone else at the camp or being scared off by the fire, there was an intelligence to them that needed to be addressed. He pulled the trigger and struck true: the arcane energy streaked through the air and burned a hole directly through the nearest wolf’s chest. As it dropped to the ground, the two farther behind howled loud enough to force Vireya to cover her ears. Howls all around the camp answered the call, and nearly a dozen wolves emerged to surround the camp.

The camp descended into a frenzy. This was the first fight YFPB had had since Kalzaharn, and the cathartic release was sorely needed. The six fighters got to work slaughtering the unnatural canines. The wolves proved strangely weak and yet at the same time strangely coordinated. When any fighter managed to land a hit, it nearly always defeated the creature, whether the damage came from a scythe through the throat, a massive battleaxe cleaving them in half, or arcane bullets. Crisanta, attempting to fend off several wolves at once, failed to slay one in a single hit, drawing crude commentary from T’Sais. Harlan, too, was limited both fighting three wolves at once and by his missing arm. His mace swings lost leverage and strength, but with his training and frustration still managed to break ribs and crack skulls.

As the wolves died and fell (without any sounds of pain or anguish), more took their place. It reached the point where the numbers of wolves would have been comical if the situation had not been so dire. The animals began to overwhelm the fighters, clawing Harlan through his armor and chomping down on Irene and T’Sais. Irene, still partially bound, was distracted not by the wolf on her arm but the flash of movement behind a distant tree. Breaking her self-imposed rule of nonaggression, Irene raised her bound hands and fired a blast of arcane energy at the tree (with enough leeway to pretend she was aiming for a wolf and simply missed). The tree splintered into dust and bark, but the only creature behind was another wolf.

Crisanta sliced the wolf’s jaws holding onto Irene, but she continued to scan her surroundings, catching the same flashes of red through the treeline as it circled the camp. It was not by her failure that the invader managed to infiltrate the camp. While the others fought for their lives against the fragile but deadly dogs, Irene merely blinked. And during that blink an old, muscled man appeared in front of her wielding a heavy two-headed spear that was attached to his body. Irene didn’t have time to blink a second time as the spear pierced her body. In a flash of blue light unfamiliar to everyone present, T’Sais’ massive battleaxe slammed down on the spear and tore the tip out of Irene’s chest. The axe was indeed being wielded by T’Sais, who had until mere moments ago been deep in the trees across the campsite. The man, whose stare chilled Irene to the bone, disappeared into the treeline followed closely by T’Sais and Crisanta.

The women (T’Sais) shouted behind them that they would meet the group later “at the battlefield” before chasing the assassin out of sight. Quickly the sounds of their pursuit were lost to nature and YFPB was left alone again. Many of the wolves remained alive but had become utterly still. Upon touching them, the “wolves” dissolved into a strange red sludge. Irene poked one puddle with a stick, and the goopy liquid clung to the branch without revealing any acidic properties. Irene and Vireya independently began “popping” the wolf constructs before coming together to taunt their corpses. Vireya suggested farting on the wolf-sludge, which was such an absurd concept Irene forgot to keep her distance from the group and began enjoying her time with her pseudo-sister again. For a short time Harlan and Lorien simply gazed in amazement as the two women ran around popping wolf constructs and then squatting over the resulting sludge to tee-bag. They hadn’t seen Irene smile for weeks, and now she was wreaking chaos like nothing had happened.

Vireya may have forgiven Irene, but the men certainly hadn’t. Seeing their glares, she sobered quickly. Irene apologized for causing even more trouble for the group and for causing their escorts to disappear. The group was worried, but decided to stay optimistic about T’Sais and Crisanta’s strength. However, with the women gone, Irene reminded the group that they could execute her. Despite their willingness to do so in Kalzaharn, the group’s bloodlust had cooled, and they demurred. Vireya in all the ways that mattered had already moved past the incident, Lorien was not particularly maligned by Ai’Renia, and Harlan had for better or worse grown fond of the pitiful Torvani traitor. With her execution commuted, the members of YFPB turned the discussion towards the future. Irene’s hands were still bound, and nobody had any desire to release her, least of all Irene herself. Even so, if Irene was to participate in future fighting, or travel with the rest of the group unsupervised, they needed some way to prevent Ai’Renia from returning.

The first idea Vireya suggested was cutting off a limb every time Ai’Renia returns. This single sentence derailed the discussion completely for nearly an hour. No amount of argument from Harlan and Lorien about how that A) wouldn’t stop Ai’Renia from appearing the first time, B) wouldn’t help them defeat her the next time, C) only punishes Irene when it’s obvious to everyone that she wasn’t actively deciding to hurt her friends, D) wouldn’t even debilitatingly hamper Ai’Renia if she returned a third time, and E) make it harder for Irene to fight with her spear, could sway the fiery tiefling. The argument devolved into insults, with Vireya accusing Harlan of defending limbs unjustly as a result of his missing arm and designating him “nubby”. After a long while, the group eventually settled on doing nothing in the short term, and instead seeking out a capable healer to either seal or banish the demon inside Irene.

The group then had to decide where to go with their newfound independence. They chose to follow the path laid before them and prompted by T’Sais rather than move back southward and head to Calloway their own way. Before leaving, they slept through the night and looted the tents of the two missing Women of El. There was irritatingly little to take, some food and some money, but Irene found something very strange in T’Sais’ belongings. She found a list in strange handwriting that had only a note designating entrance to some unknown place, and 12 names: Harlan, Vireya, Lorien, Irene, Morren, Esper, Zephyra, Bryan, Logan, Cassian, Cynthia, and Foil. Every name besides Foil was either crossed-through or check marked. This was disconcerting; the group recognized the first 11 names, that being their own party, their rival party, and Roland’s party. But who was Foil? And who was keeping track of all of them to gain entrance somewhere? As they mulled these questions over, they headed northward.

After two days of travel, the group began trending slightly westward, for no reason other than the winding paths and forests began converging in the same direction. They eventually began spotting strange stone statues of soldiers clutching weapons or laying broken in the grass. Once they emerged into a small valley, however, it became clear that they were not statues at all. An ancient battlefield frozen in time, with both sides of the conflict transformed into stone. In the small valley were several rock formations, one with a large gnarled tree stretching out its cracks, and one with..a woman? Indeed, a hooded woman was perched, cat-like, on a narrow boulder surrounded by three rock creatures. Lorien called out to the woman, and she whipped her head up to reveal a dazzling smile. She waited a moment as the three rock creatures turned around to focus on the new (accessible) threats, effused her thanks, and zipped away on a strange grapple hook.

The golems, large stone creatures that functioned as cocoons for decrepit skeletons inside of them, trudged towards the group at an unthreateningly slow pace. Vireya dismissed them completely as she spotted a Wizling watching them from the far cliffside. She pointed the creature out to the group and prepared to Misty Step up the cliffside, but Irene wanted to show off. She had learned some additional magic through her time as Ai’Renia, and opened a Dimensional Door in the nearby rock face. The two girls melded into the stone and reappeared directly above the WIzling. As Vireya slashed downward, the Wizling duplicated itself all around the valley and began taunting her. Irene was exhausted by the magic, which took a much greater toll on her Essence reserves than it should have, but Vireya began chasing down every clone with her Misty Step and dispatching them with ease. Eventually, several clones appeared in front of Lorien, and he blasted an entire group away at once with a Thunderclap. All but one of the Wizlings poofed away, but the one that remained was thrown against a rock and lay still. Vireya took the chance to Step over to the creature and slaughter it. Like before, the Wizling burst into Essence that was greedily absorbed by her scythe, and Vireya felt her body strengthen.

At the same time, Lorien and Harlan contested with the stone golems. The creatures moved slowly, but were incredibly strong. One managed to ensnare Harlan and began crushing him in an embrace. Luckily, the crush of the golem proceeded as slowly as the rest of its movement, and Lorien and Irene were able to extract the paladin after destroying one of the golem’s arms. As he did so, Lorien noticed that one of the frozen soldiers was reaching up and into a spot on the cliffside. He investigated further and discovered a small divot in the stone that led to something deeper. Fearing traps, he summoned his Mage Hand into the gap. He was right to be fearful; a sharp blade swung downward and sliced through the incorporeal hand. Past the trap was a small level that once pulled started a rumbling inside the stone. A doorway rolled back from the cliff face, revealing a cool, dark tunnel. Annoyed by the woman and the golems, the group all slid into the doorway too small for the golems to follow.

After some walking in the shaded tunnel, the secret path opened up into a large open crypt lit by many braziers and four massive sconces on equidistant pillars. There were two coffins on each side of the crypt, with a massive white coffin capping the far end of the chamber at the top of several stairs. Above the white coffin was a similarly massive stained glass window depicting a dragon wrapped around a tree. Harlan recognized the imagery from an old pagan creation myth, but was unfamiliar with the details. Vireya had seen the same dragon carved on ruins she’d looted, and remembered that dragons were (supposedly) the first sapient forms of life on Serulea; they were the first full combinations of the spiritual Essence and the physical flesh. Crypts marked with draconic symbols were almost always very old, and very religious. Vireya, always wholly unsanctimonious, began the task of looting the entire crypt. She tried pulling the lid off of one of the coffins, but the stone proved far too heavy. After some heavy cajoling and coercing, she convinced the rest of the group to help. With Harlan’s help, the lid of the first coffin fell to the ground with an echoing thud. Inside was a skeleton with rotted clothes and weapons, but with two rubies for eyes.

This was the best possible for the looters. Vireya quickly enlisted Harlan to help lift the other coffin lids, which contained more skeletons, money, and rubies. Only two of the four skeletons had rubies in their eye sockets, for some reason, but it was still a successful haul overall. Irene noticed that each of the coffins had inscriptions: the two with ruby eye’d skeletons said “Companion of the Unkindled Flame”, the others said “Honor Guard of the Unkindled Flame”, and the huge white coffin said “Burning Forever, When the Time Comes”. One uncomfortable effect of their pillaging revealed itself as Vireya claimed the gems: each time the skeletons were looted, the fire on the corresponding pillar was snuffed out. Harlan, already on the fence about their actions, finally stood his ground and urged the group to leave before the trap was sprung. But Vireya could not help herself, and went to check the final, large coffin. This coffin’s lid was light and unsealed, so it was easy for her to lift it herself. As she did so, a stone facade ground across the exit, trapping the group inside the crypt. The stained glass window glowed bright, and then shattered, scattering multicolored glass shards across the floor. Slowly, spinning, glistening, the shards began floating and combining until they formed the figure of a warrior who stood before them with hostile intent.