(Note from the DM: Grigor receives this on the 24th of Spring, just as the Sea Hero rounds the horn and heads north along the western coast)
Grigor,
I don’t know
where to begin. It has been over 70 days since you and your fellows rode out of
Halvenspring, but it seems like a lifetime given the events that have occurred.
I guess the best route is to give you the sequence of events chronologically,
even where the narrative splits.
The Knights
of Mist Valley rode out early on the morning of the 4th of Winter
Waning. Things were relatively quiet for a day or two. Then on the 6th
a cleric of Omnos named Feanor arrived. He announced that he served the true
Omnian Church, that of the Chovalian Empire, and called upon all of the faith
to swear fealty to the Chovalian Church.
When Father Theodore invited him into the village church to discuss
things, Feanor denounced him as a false teacher who consorted with witches;
witches he identified as me, Onsmythe, and Klaus. Your father and Marc Risus
drove him out of town, letting him know he and his brand of Omnianism were not
welcome.
Early the
next morning, before sunrise, I was awoken by the cries of “fire”. The church had gone up in flames. We were
able to contain the fire but the church was lost and Theodore badly burned,
almost to death. Onsmythe was able to get to him in time and heal the most
severe wounds, but he slipped into a deep sleep (Klaus called it a coma) from
which he could not be wakened. That evening Dorian came to me in our tower. He
believed that Feanor returned and set the fire, and he, Wren, and Uval were
going after him. I was invited along, and I went. We left that night.
We tracked
Feanor and his retinue, some 12 guards (who had not entered the village with
him originally) north to Halvenstomb. We found them taking rooms in the inn. He
had denounced the Halvenstomb priest as well earlier that day, but Halvenstomb
had not driven him out even though they were clearly uneasy about his presence.
Uval wanted to confront Feanor directly, but instead we took Wren’s advice and
set a hidden watch on the church instead. Sure enough Feanor’s group showed up
past midnight, laying oil doused wood along the building. The Halvenstomb
priest, Norris by name, was awake and came out to confront them. Feanor split
his head open with his mace, killing him instantly. We attacked in that moment
and slew Feanor and his guards.
It was a
hard fight, and I killed several with spells. I changed a little that night. We
all did. Each of us had killed redcaps before but this was different. The
villagers came out and Sarl, the de-facto mayor I guess, put us under loose
arrest for the next day. That evening (10th of Winter Waning) he
held an informal trial examining the event and declared us absolved of any
wrong doing (and thanked us for our actions).
The
following morning we left Halvenstomb and began making our way back to
Halvenspring. We took a different route, swinging further to the south, and
stumbled upon a tomb in the Firnockt. After a short group vote, we descended
into the tomb.
The tomb was
a mess of old forgotten crypts, and redcap warrens. We moved from room to room,
fighting and examining both. We barricaded ourselves in defensible rooms and
spent several nights while wren healed us. Each of us took our turn staring
down the reaper; I sincerely wish we had someone with Fyn’s mechanical
expertise and attention to detail – traps hurt us as much as the redcaps and
walking dead did. Along the way we found quite a bit of gold and some magical
items, mostly weapons and armor and such. No spells although I did acquire a
staff of not inconsiderable power and a few wands. The bracers I mentioned in
my last post (oh so very long ago) worked admirably and no doubt saved my life
multiple times. After a week of working through the tomb we came upon a long
tunnel. Having some familiarity with your adventures I suspected that this was
one of the interconnected tunnels that the redcaps are using to move
underground. After a brief discussion we decided to continue to explore, and
thus went down the tunnel on the 18th of Winter Waning. As near as I
can tell this is when you sent me Journal Entry 22, though it would be sometime
before I would be able to receive it.
We wandered
that long tight tunnel for 7 days. There were many unlabeled intersections, but
it seemed that every choice we made led only to more apparently endless tunnel.
Only once did we encounter a band of redcaps larger than 4. Twelve redcaps and
2 steel toes came upon us in the dark while we camped and we only survived
because the narrow tunnel prevented more than 2 from coming at us at once. Even
still Uval barely survived and Dorian was severely wounded. Wren’s healing
ability was tested as never before after the fight, but she rose to the
challenge.
Our food
supplies were running low so it was with a sigh of relief that we made a choice
on the 8th day that led us to another tomb complex. It took us 3
days to clear that particular tomb, and we stepped into sunlight for the first
time in 17 days on the morning of the 4th of Spring Waxing (Happy
belated New Year by the by). We did not know where we were, save only that we
were in the mountains. We took a day to
climb a peak and get a lay of the land.
We were in
the West Almeneids of course, just north of Morning Mirror Lake. We took a day
to rest on the peak and discuss our options. The Almeneids are largely
impassable, so running along the range was out of the question, and we were on
the east face so the Hidden Hills were out even if that was where we wished to
go. Unfortunately the only viable option (and the one we took) seemed to be to
head down out of the mountains and through the Tainted Wood section of the
Firnockt on our way back to Halvenspring. In hindsight I suppose we could have
re-entered the tunnels, but I think you can understand why we would have been
very reluctant to do so. So the Tainted Wood it was.
It took us 2
days to come down off the mountain and enter the woods. The Tainted Wood… it
was a nightmare. Almost no sunlight pierced the canopy, and every moment we
were on edge. It was eerily quiet. Half way through the first day I heard a
faint whispering. It was constant and though I could not make out the words it
made my flesh crawl and my mind reel with a primal nameless horror. I found
myself singing songs, doing math problems, repeating recipes – anything to distract
from that mad whispering. Would that I had spoken up to my companions. Alas I
did not and it was that evening that Uval went insane.
We began
making camp and Dorian and I were agreeing that the Tainted Wood was not a good
place for a fire when Uval walked over to Wren and suddenly buried his greataxe
in her stomach. He tore it free, bringing out a good portion of her internals,
and made to behead her when Dorian tackled him. Not knowing what to make of the
situation Dorian tried to reason with Uval and subdue him. Uval began
screaming. I was careful to take mental note of what he said. Here it is
(repetitions deleted):
“The chains
loosen!” “The God King comes, the Shadow falls, now is the time of chaos!” “The
tide sweeps north, the fount shall be poisoned! The Harbinger lands on the
shores of night!” “Wicker must not rise again!”
While Uval
screamed these things over and over, he (being quite a bit stronger than
Dorian) swung his heavy crossbow around from his back, put the point in
Dorian’s chest, and pulled the trigger. The bolt punched all the way through
him throwing his body back onto the forest floor. I then blew Uval head apart
with a Blast of Force spell.
The crossbow
bolt managed to miss Dorian’s heart and lungs, punching through under his
collar bone and shattering his shoulder blade on the way out. Wren had managed
to close her horrendous wound with her magic after pushing back in most of the
contents of her lower abdomen, but passed out from the effort. That’s when I
heard the drums. I punched Dorian full in the face, which brought him back to
his senses. Pouring our only 2 healing
draughts into him, we conferred quickly. It seems we had all heard the
whispering, and we certainly both heard the drums now. We each threw an arm of
the unconscious Wren over our shoulder (I due to my stature actuall supporting
her body more from the waist) and began a panicked stumbling run south. The drumming followed us, and soon we could
hear and then see redcaps in the woods.
We ran. I don’t remember much of that endless night, running through the
trees, drumming filling our heads. What I do know now, after the fact, is that
we ran all night, exited the Tainted Wood at sunrise and still they chased us.
The drumming did not continue into the day. We continued running, quaffing
potions of Bear’s Endurance and Haste as we went until our meager store was
gone (a total of 4 Bear’s Endurance and 2 Haste). They followed, slowly closing
the gap between us. It was midafternoon when they began throwing darts and
spears our way. Both Dorian and I took many wounds, and as we broke free of the
tree line in the late afternoon, a spear went through my leg. We didn’t stop.
We ran right into the lake and sank into the still waters of the Morning Mirror
as spears rained down around us.
It was Wren
who saved us. She used her magic to somehow create a bubble of air under the
water, and we rode the gentle undercurrent away from the shore and our
pursuers. We rode out the night in that bubble, and Wren recast to allow us to
continue through the next day. That evening we had been washed into the
Greendeep. We put ashore at night and made camp. In the morning it was clear
that Wren was dying. Her magic had sealed the wound, but the mess of her
innards was slowly poisoning her from the inside. We patched up Dorian as best
we could, but had to reserve the majority of Wren’s healing to keep her alive.
Dorian and I rigged a stretcher and carried her along the shore and into the
Firnockt for 3 days until we reached Koylrest at night.
Koylrest had
been recently attacked when we arrived. It seems Baron Tullimus has converted
to the Chovalian Church and turned a blind eye to their activities in his
barony. A Chovalian priest, similar I suppose to Feanor, had denounced the
local Omnian cleric and made clear that only the Chovalian version of Omnianism
would be permitted in Woodspear Barony. The residents of Koylrest didn’t give a
flying fig what their baron approved and had gathering in the town square,
armed, to “encourage” the Chovalian and his guard to leave town. That’s
probably the only reason the town survived when the redcaps attacked.
Redcaps
swarmed into town and set fire to many buildings. Fully a third of the
population was slain before the redcaps were pushed back. Mysteriously all of
the Chovalians failed to survive. An Omnian Priest – our version – named Father
Eon was traveling north with a companion, leaving the meeting you described in
Carradeen I believe, and saw the fire. He came and did his best to help the
townsfolk.
Dorian and I
walked in the 2nd night after the attack. Father Eon was still there
and was able to fully restore Wren, for which he will always be mentioned in my
prayers. The small healing spells Wren had been casting over the past few days
to mend Dorian’s shoulder had actually healed the bone wrong, and Father eon
had to break his shoulder blade with a hammer before healing him. Let me tell
you, that is a sound that affects you in the pit of your stomach. We spent the night in Father Eon’s tent, and
being exhausted and emotionally wrecked Dorian and I told him everything. I had
wits enough about me to avoid telling him about Alerhaus and his box and the
Scrolls of Epic Legend, but most else got spilled that night.
Eon listened
and absorbed our tales. He did not comment, but fed us and healed us as he
listened. I slept better that night that any I can remember. In the morning Eon
invited us to a private breakfast. He told us many things, but the following I
found to be especially pertinent so I have reproduced it here:
“Vespatius
was the catalyst. Things could have kept going on a low simmer, but when he
called out into the Void he cranked the heat up to a boil. What you have to
remember is that the most valuable thing is and always has been information. It’s
why you might hoard moldering documents in a university tower. Or desperately
search for a receptacle with your animated proxies. Or send your shadows to the
four corners, listening. All looking for the same information. What I wonder,
is if you already knew this information, and perhaps quietly always knew it to
begin with, why send your pieces west?”
Dorian of course
was completely lost in this speech but through your journals and adventures it
made far more sense to me. Which is why I found myself saying, “You didn’t
mention the God King.” Father Eon looked at me and suddenly smiled. “Yes, of
course. That’s why.” He then gave us three horses and a scroll to give to
Onsmythe, which he said would restore Father Theodore. I asked him where he was going, and he said north
to the university, to visit an old friend and perhaps borrow a book. His final
words to us were, “Keep to the Omnian faith. Believe, place your trust in
people who believe, and fear not a death in the service of the greater good.”
We rode out
that morning heading northwest along the tree line. Our ride and camps were
quiet; none of us had had a chance to process Uval’s death and the reality of
that event cast a pall over our company. On the evening of the 3rd
day, 17th of Spring Waxing, we rode into Halvenspring.
Here is
where I have to rewind my narrative and cover events in Halvenspring in my
absence. But it is late and I still have much to fill you in on. So now I shall
rest my pen, pray that this missive finds you in good health, and continue my
tale at the next opportunity.
Sincerely,
Osgood of
Dragomir Tower
