Childhood's End
“Are you ready for this, uh… miss?” whispered the late thirty-something year old very tall, very thin human man dressed in stealthy blacks.
“I already told you, my name is Kathrri,” Kathrricallia, a dark-haired elf maybe half his age, whispered back. She made sure to properly roll the double r-sound near the end of what most might consider her first name. Hers was a proud, resourceful name derived partially from Drudic of the fey wilds and from that of her large, widespread family. She had only met the man, Edgeer, a handful of minutes before and he’d already forgotten it… This latest night time raid was starting out just great.
“Shh. Another guard. Everyone ‘gainst the wall again!” That young half-elven woman outfitted for stealth like her two companions was Stel. Kathrri had know her ever since they’d played during their childhood together a good ten years or more ago. The fiery red-haired Stel had volunteered for this dangerous mission even though she, unlike the other two, still called a house inside the walls of Aireden, the town they were about to slip back into, her home. For a long moment the three of them pressed up into deep the shadows casts by the damp, chilly stone wall as a guard holding a torch walked across the ramparts overhead. “Ok… he’s clear,” Stel whispered a minute later. “It’s now or never… can you do it Kathrri?”
Kathrri nodded then reached first into one small pouch strapped to her hip, and then another. Burnt mistletoe and a sprig of spruce. She clasped her hands and rubbed the two components together as she said a small, quiet prayer. After a moment she, and the two others with her, each gave the tiniest of starts when something around them almost imperceptibly changed. There was still the sounds of the wind, of distant bird calls, of closer nighttime bugs, but when Kathrri clasped her hands together a second time they made no sound at all. That same silence was true for the usual quiet rustle of her form-fitting, dark colored, hooded leather armor and even her cautious, experimental footfalls. The others were under the effects, as well. Not only was her spell dampening their sounds, it was doing something similar for their visibility and hers. It was like an odd camouflage or trick of the light powerful enough to make them hard to spot at a distance even if they’d been standing in full daylight.
A light grip and tug on her shoulder from Edgeer—speech and visual cues were much less effective now that the spell had been cast— signaled it was time to move. The three of them were free to walk a little faster and a little less cautiously, now, than they had when they were making their way from the woods, through the ever expanding clear-cut zone that boarded the city, and to the town wall an hour earlier. They rounded a bend in the wall then stopped near what looked to be a solid, heavy metal grate maybe three feet by three feet wide set almost five feet above the ground. Edgeer had to reach up to get his hand on it and then ever so carefully rock the center section of it back and forth until almost the whole thing popped seamlessly free. With a little more work, all three of them pulled themselves up and squeezed through the tight opening before returning the compromised grate to its previous, seemingly intact position.
They were inside the upper floor of a small, unlit storehouse, now. There was nothing around but a lot of cobwebs and a few dusty boxes. It was Kathrri turn to lead the way. She slowly led the way downstairs and out onto the dimly lit cobblestone streets, careful to check for anyone they might run into each step of the way. Although she’d grown up in the nearby wild expanse of the fey woods, Kathrri had explored the city streets with Stel and a few others so often back when they were kids that she knew her way around just as well here as she did in her own home section of the forest.
After a few uninterrupted minutes of travel slipping past more warehouses and the occasional storefront Kathrri froze and gently pushed back on Stel, the next in line. With quiet gestures and touches the three quickly pressed themselves into the a dark nook once more as a patrolling guard came marching by. His torch sent long shadows stretching every which way as he neared and then passed by. If not for their dark outfits, and Kathrri’s concealing spell, the three would have almost surely have been spotted. The small gang of three began moving again once the guard turned a corner and his torchlight faded from view. Down two blocks. Left. Then right and squeeze through a tight alley. Cross the street and circle around left… and then they were there. At one of Aireden’s smallest armories.
The town’s primary armory was a well-lit and well-guarded affair, but this structure was closer to a brick-built warehouse half-filled with old weapons and armor used to train new city guardsmen than it was a proper armory. There really was no other use for the worn out gear… unless you were a bunch of forest dwellers on the verge of losing your homes to the steady, murderous advance of progress and had no blacksmithing capability to speak of. Kathrri and her two companions were here to steal those weapons, as many as they could. With things headed in the direction they were, several dozens live might soon depend on their success this night.
Kathrri moved to the armory’s rear door only to find it padlocked. She moved back and gave a light touch to Edgeer. He was, supposedly, the best lock picker in the city’s small but thriving thieve’s guild. Now was his time to prove it. Kathrri had to huff and pout at just how little time it took the man to swing the newly unlocked door open. She’d been practicing on locks of all shapes and sizes for a couple years now, but there was no way she could have disabled that padlock so quickly. Edgeer returned to her side and his touch meant it was her time to lead again. He may have had more practiced nimble hands, but her senses were still a good bit better. She slipped into the armory and was instantly aware that they were not alone. Flickering lamp light and a distant, unguarded conversation were both coming from around a corner and down the hallway connecting the rear of the armory to the front. There were probably guards stationed in the armory’s front foyer. But that meant that the rows and rows of weapons back here were theirs for the taking.
Normally, a team of three consisting of a tall thin man and two even leaner young women could hardly hope to sneak off with much armament at all. A few swords and maybe three crossbows each if they filled both hands and arranged the rest just right. But that was the beauty of the plan Kathrri had come up with. She’d be able to easily carry ten times that amount, and making her way out would be far easier for her than it had been sneaking her way in.
It felt almost comical to Kathrri just how many crossbows and quivers full of crossbow bolts her companions were able to drape across her body even as she worked to clip a dozen swords in their scabbards to her waist and belt. By the time they were finished, she was so weighed down by her new myriad arsenal of arms she could barely move. Being stealthy like this was completely out of the question! And yet, she still had a big smug grin on her face.
At least until it happened.
Neither Kathrri nor her companions had noticed that the conversations coming from the front of the armory had stopped until an imposing, green-skinned guard holding a lantern stepped around the corner. He had them dead to rights, and not even Kathrri’s concealing spell could hide them from his direct view.
“Jellay! Get back here! We’re being robbed!” the guard yelled even as he lunged for Kathrri. As tangled up and bogged down as she was with weapons, there was really no chance of her getting away. She’d barely made it a couple of steps before the guard’s strong hand caught her thin wrist then wrenched her right arm around and pinned it painfully to her back.
“Go! Run!” Kathrri yelled even as she was being pulled sideways pressed into a nearby wall. Edgeer was gone in an instant, professional thief that he was. But Kathrri could just see Stel hesitating in the doorway out of the corner of her eye. And the second guard was coming fast! “I’ll catch up!” Kathrri promised.
With that, much to Kathrri’s relief, Stel ran, too.
“I’ve got this one, you get the other!” the guard crushing Kathrri to the wall said. Did he not see how many there were? The other guard ran out the back seemingly to give chance, and then all was quiet once more. And yet… something about the way her guard said those words was rattling around in Kathrri’s head.
She found herself roughly treated once again as the guard gripped both her shoulders tightly then spun her to face him. “Don’t move, don’t struggle!” The man… no, young man… no, his face was green, which would make him a half-orc. One very near her own age. And then the realization that had been working its way through her skull struck her at the same moment a similar insight struck him.
“Genki?!”“Kathrri?!”
The two had called out each other’s name in the exact same instant. There, standing in front of Kathrri, holding her painfully in place, was the now grown up half-orc named ‘Genki’ who had once, long ago, been her very best friend!
Like with Stel, she had first met Genki years and years ago when they were just children. One day he’d come crying from inside the city walls, a half-orc who’d caught more than his fair share of scorn for the mixed blood and angular features he could not control. She’d come from the fey woods and brought her own shame with her: An unquenchable thirst to know what lay inside the closed off town that the hunters and woodsmen flowed out from year after year to inflict incalculable harm on the very forest she called home. It had been her and Genki’s shared fascinations with styles of life not their own that had seen them and, over time, a handful of others, romp through the trees of her jungle and explore the back alleys of his city together. Just some odd kids making mischief when most anyone around them wouldn’t offer so much as a kind word. She and Genki had grown up together and gotten into all kinds of trouble together, despite both their parents’ protests. But that had been then. This was now. And things had clearly changed.
“What are you doing here, Kathrri?” Genki asked. His voice was deeper than she remember it and split between anger and disappointment. “No, I know what you are doing here. What I want to know is why?”
Kathrri tsked at him, then sighed. She was feeling quite a bit of disappointment of her own. “Why did you join the guard, Genki? It’s not the Hunter’s Lodge or the Logging Guild, but still… We… you… saw what they were doing to my home. And that was years ago. It’s so much worse now!”
“So bad that you’re here now stealing weapons so you can arm yourselves and kill?” Genki asked in reply. “…And you, you have killed, haven’t you?!” he added. There was sadness and a touch of true anger in his voice now.
“How did?” was all Kathrri could mumble. How could he know that? Why was he so angry at her?
“The four men last week they briefed us all on… Dead in an uptown market alley…” Genki was recounting things with an almost hollow voice of realization now. “One had his throat slit almost side to side… Another was in armor but had half his skill almost burnt clean off… And the other two had been stabbed to death. And three of them had been slashed with… with tiger claws… That was you, wasn’t it, Kathrri?” he asked dumbfounded.
Kathrri couldn’t help but shiver at her friend’s revelation. “Panther claws…” was all that slipped out of her at first as she looked away her face flushed with shame of her best friend having learned what she’d done. But then she took a breath, got her wits back together, and explained.
“I was leading someone through the markets,” she said, slowly. Careful not to reveal too much to the guard who was holding her in place. “Three men from the Hunter’s Lodge surprised us. And I did what I had to do.”
“I never though you’d commit…”
“…murder?!” she interrupted. “It wasn’t…” She tried to push back her rage and find the right words to say. “The only one murdered there was the forth young man. Stabbed to death, but no panther marks or magic on him. You know why? Because that was Bobbit!” she all but yelled now. “You remember Bobbit, right? From when we were kids? Fat. Friendly. Always let us back through the gate. Always knew where to scavenge something delicious to eat even when we had no money. He was one of the four you were briefed about. He was killed because they wanted to send us a further message.”
“Bobbit? They’d taken the bodies away. There’s no way I could have known…” Genki protested.
“You didn’t know about Stel, either,” Kathrri continued. “They didn’t kill her. They carried her back to their ‘Lodge’. I found her myself. They’d beaten her bloody and broken and then chained her to a cot. She wouldn’t have lasted two days if I hadn’t come to get her that night. I killed two more doing it. Are you going to complain about them, too?!”
“You can’t justify…”
“That was her just now. The girl who fled out that door? That was Stel. Miss Wild Magic, we used to call her. Mended up well enough in the last week so we could come here and ready ourselves to fight back against what they did. What they’ve long been doing.”
“Genki,” Kathrri surmised, though her emotion-drenched words were coming out more like a plea, now, than a statement of fact, “you’re the only one of us from when we were kids who is still here behind the walls. Here helping them tear down my home, and over hunt our animals, and kill my people.”
Genki’s face, which had been twisting with tearful, pent up emotion, suddenly hardened.
“No,” he said sternly. “I guard the places within the walls they tell me to guard. I break up fights and help people and patrol the town. And people thank me for it! I’m not that shunned little half-orc anymore. And I’m not out there cutting down your forest, or poisoning your river, or… or… whatever your people have accused us of. But you are in here stealing and killing in my home…”
Kathrri, too, clenched her jaw, but she said nothing. There had been no hesitation in Genki’s voice once he’d started. And there was nothing to say in response. Lines had just been drawn, and they were not on the same side. Kathrri had hoped against hope that maybe he’d come with her. That maybe he was stuck and looking for a way out. That maybe… no. Her task was too important to get caught up in endless maybes.
“Let me go, Genki,” she said slowly. Threateningly. Giving him one last chance. “Or I’m going to let myself go.”
He reached for her arm and moved to put his sword to her throat as he replied with, “The only place you’re going is…”
Kathrri didn’t let him finish.
It only took a moment for all the clothing and armor and weapons and weight she’d been saddled with to magically merge into her black-as-the-night panther form. She sprang forward then rebounded off the nearby armory wall and came back towards Genki before he could even raise his sword. Kathrri stuck hard and fast and without mercy. A swipe of her claws to this leg sent him toppling to the ground. A vicious bite to his sword arm saw it rendered useless. Another rake of her claws across his abdomen and belly saw him very nearly out cold with his blood spilling off him and pooling around him on the floor.
But then Kathrri was her elven self again. Kneeling by his side. With a short prayer she opened her connection to the spirits of nature and called forth a regal horse of recovery that sported only a single horn. She then cast a well-worn spell and summoned a cloud of her healing butterflies. The ethereal glowing insects gently landed on Genki and worked to close his wounds. A minute later his eyes fluttered open and she gently gripped his hand in hers.
“It seems we’ve crossed into two different worlds now, you and I. Or maybe we’ve just returned to our own,” she said, a tear or two now actually falling from her eyes. “I want you to stay here and guard your world. I’m going to return home and do the same for mine. You really… were…my best friend…”
And with that, she shifted into a feline form once more.
Kathrri exited the back door of the armory with all her stolen weapons in tow. But she departed not as a terrifying panther who had, out of necessity, attacked and nearly killed her best friend, but as the black-haired kitten she used change into back when they’d played during their childhood.
It was a shame that that, too, like so many precious things, had truly come to an end.
It's This Way
Meeting a contact in the sewers would seem like a quiet affair, but it never is. In fact, it is often downright noisy. There is, of course, the flow of sewage water. A mixture of slushes, slurps, drips, and gurgles that echo off the maze of subterranean brick-laid tunnelways that help keep the city clean. And then there’s the various creatures that live among the sewage. Rats and bats and far worse things. Plus there’s the people. An series of underground passages leading to almost anywhere in the city safe from easy viewing? They may not be clean, but the sewers are handy.
Speaking of not clean, there is the man before you. He’s a little too fat. Has a little too much unkempt facial hair. His voice would be echoing off the walls of his little lantern-lit hidey-hole office, if he weren’t smart enough to keep his words to a whisper.
“All righ’, I says you done righ’ by us. Earned you'self a proper meetin’,” he tells you standing on the other side of a beat up desk after inspecting the thing he sent you to obtain.
The man glances behind him, toward the doorway and pops his neck in agitation upon not seeing what he had hoped to see. “Kathrri!” He yells angrily, his tongue giving a little roll to the “r’s” in her name. His voice certainly echoes now…
It takes a few moments, but then the young woman you briefly saw crouched and waiting among the shadows of the nearby passage you came from slinks in. She’s not cowed or frightened in the least. If anything, she looks defiant. Annoyed. A rebellious teenager with eyes that gleam slightly in the lantern light. She’s fitted out with high quality blackened leather gear. Has a hood pulled up over her head that just about fully hides her dark hair, an oddly pretty face and… pointy ears? You spot a bevy of matte-black k nives strapped to her person anda dark colored shortbow strapped across her back.
“This ‘ere is Kathrricallia…”
“…I told you not to give ‘way my full name.” the girl interrupted. Her manner of speech is different. Not of the city and certainly not of the numerous thieves that do their business in the sewers. She almost sounds like she belongs elsewhere. In the wilds, maybe? That said, she does seem to have picked up a few bad habits. Dropped syllables, shortened words. Or is she trying to hide her original accent? Like the hood hides her ears and face?
“…She’ll show you to th’ meetin’ point,” your contact tells you and her. For a second nobody moves. Not your contact. Nor your new escort. It takes a violent grimacing head gesture from your contact aimed back at the open doorway for thing to progress again.
“Fine…,” the girl says. “But then I am headin’…”
“No! Then you’re comin’ back ‘ere.
The girl gives a little ‘tsk’, more like a hiss really, and meets the larger man’s stare. You notice her back straighten just a little. He does too.
“We have work to’nite…” he says, but this time there’s something else beyond just anger and command in his voice. A bit of fear? Pleading?
The girl ‘tsks’ again and nods. Still not cowed, but… resigned to her fate? Hard to tell.
“Come on. It’s this way,” she tells you before heading towards the exit. “And, for the record: To you I am ‘Kathrri’,” she too lightly rolls the ‘rii’ portion of her name, “or just ‘Kat’ if you can’t say it right.”
You nod, not about to argue how to pronounce someone’s else’s name, and soon you’re back alongside the noisy flowing sewage. You take a moment to check the opposite way and when you turn back the girl is… nowhere in sight. No… wait… there she is. Twenty, maybe thirty feet ahead crouched and peering around at the next right angled junction.
She really is a cat, you think. She’s quick and quiet as one, at least. Those traits hold true as she guides you further along the various passages of the sewer. Twice she stops you to let others pass at the far end of a tunnel or visible across the sewage going the opposite way. Busy place, the sewers, but she’s got good awareness and instinct, too, and she leads you onward undetected.
Eventually, you reach your destination: A kind of access shaft, a large circular hole, really, built into the ceiling some twenty feet above you.
‘Tssk’, Kathrri hisses again, a little longer and louder this time sounding even more like a pissed off cat as she paces back and forth beneath the opening.
“Oooh, when I get my claws on them I am gonna’…” she begins, talking to herself.
“Do we need to find another way?” you ask.
She turns and you can just barely make out the roll of her eyes before she answers saying, “No. But you are twice blessed lucky I am the one leading you and not Bobbit or Shel. Just… stand back a second,” she says, gesturing you away.
You do as she says even as you are curious what her plan is. There’s no hand holds. No rope. Not even a wall near by to jump kick off of. There are no athletics or acrobatics you know of that will get her up there. But then she just very slightly tilts her head and…
Nostalgia. Happiness. And a cool breeze and golden red sunset wash over you. Leaves: bright reds and yellows on the many surrounding trees. And beneath your feet are as many more dried brown leaves. You can feel them crunch as you step. Smell their dusty fragrant odor as they crumble.
… in an instant she is out of the sewer and looking down on you from above even as you start slightly at whatever just happened.
“Hold tight. I’ll be right back,” she yells down to you. She ducks away and a few moments later you can just barely make out a series of grunts. Something being dragged along the ground? Then she is back and attaching some kind of bundle of rope and wood to two hooks spaced maybe a couple feet apart at the top of the circular exit. She lets go of the large bundle and it falls and unfurls into wood-planked rope ladder long enough to stretch from the surface to a foot or two above the bottom of the sewer.
“We normally keep the ladder rolled up and balanced just right up here at the top,” she explains with a smile on her face almost like she is relaying gossip to you as you climb. “Shel just hits it with one of her little fire blasts. Bobbit? He throws one of those big rocks set up along the wall and knocks it loose. I just…”
She doesn’t just pause, Kathrricallia suddenly jerks her head to look behind her and then literally jumps to her feet.
“Trouble up here… sorry,” she whispers. “Might as well come up. They will just chase you if you run,” she says before turning and facing whoever else is up there.
With only a half dozen more wooden steps to go, you hurry up top and climb to your feet only to find yourself in a partially closed off back alley with three men facing down your escort and now you. Two of them are just thugs. One dressed more or less in street clothes with a simple club in hand. The other, fitted with a old, rusted breastplate. He holds a spiked club in one hand and a lantern in the other. The two are big, but none too bright looking. The third, however…
“What do you have there, Kathri?” asks the well-armed, fit looking man standing a decent distance from you crossbow in hand. He didn’t roll his ‘r.’ “I thought we’d agreed, you and I, that this side was ours and that you’d stay clear. Maybe if you’d heeded my warnings, your friend would still be alive.” You follow the man’s look back and see the larger of the two thugs move his lantern to reveal a burly young man slumped bloody in the shadows against the far wall.
“Bobbit?!” Kathrricallia yells as she runs past the men to her friend and grips his shoulder. She shakes him as if trying to wake him, but he is quite dead.
“Burge…” she says slowly, her voice low and angry.
“What? Oh! Of course! You’re wondering where Stel is? She is alive. For now. But I can change that if you continue to make things difficult for me.”
“We were just passing through, Burge. No looking. No takin’. You know that. You didn’t have to…” Kathrricallia answers. She looks up to him with tears in her eyes and a barely restrained quiver in her voice.
“I’m sure you were, Kitty Kath,” the newcomer leader teases, intentionally mispronouncing her name a second time. You take a step back at the dark look taking over the young woman’s face. This man has clearly mistaken her anger for anguish. “But you knew the rules I set. And you and your friends continued to defy them. So… You go run along. Now.” He says, pointing his weapon at her with a smile on his face. Kathrri holds up her hands and slowly moves away from her murdered friend. She pushes past you, seemingly intent on going back down her rope ladder, but she gently touches your side with her hand so as to get your attention.
“Be ready…” she whispers, her voice barely more than an enraged hiss, as she moves past. The look she gives you makes the annoyed, defiant glare she gave her boss down in the sewer seem daintily polite in comparison. She is going to do something. What? You are not sure. But she is not going to defer to this man any longer. You are sure of that.
“Now that we’re alone,” Burge says as your assigned companion begins down the rope ladder, “I want you to tell me just who it was she was taking you to meet.”
“I don’t know where we were going,” you answer.
“Oh, I know that. But it’s not what I asked you, is it?” Burge replies. He again readies his crossbow. “Who?” he asks, as he points the dangerous bolt directly at you.
Kathrri’s eyes are just about to disappear from view when it happens again…
A clear blue sky arcs high overhead obscured by the many trees. There’s just enough leaves left on them to provide comfortable shade. A chill wind sees all the shadows cast on the ground move and dance in time to each other.
…and in an instant she is behind the more lightly armored of the two thugs. Both you, Burge, and the man in heavy armor recover quickly from the flash of Autumn, but the other thug is just standing there. Confused? Or maybe still trapped within that vision? An instant more and Kathrri’s dagger is plunged in the side of his neck. With less effort than you’d expect, she cuts his throat open clean left to right in a sneak attack he had no ability to defend against. She gives his body a solid shove and it topples forward without any resistance.
Then, she does something else you’ve never seen. Thrusting her arms out towards you she makes some kind of full-handed gesture and speaks in a powerful, magical language you’ve never heard before. A wispy shape of a great bear made from a unending flow of rustling leaves and blowing winds gusts into existence and lopes towards you and Burge. To say the both of you are completely taken aback at this development is a vast understatement!
“Fight!” Kathrri yells to you from across the way.
Many things happen quickly now. Burge raises his hand crossbow at you and fires. There’s nowhere for you to dodge to and the bolt strikes you mid chest. A fatal shot. Or… it should have been. Instead, while the impact hurts, the bolt fails to penetrate when it should have and falls to the ground, rebuffed by some unseen forces as the illusory bear roars. Emboldened, you draw your weapon and Burge draws his and the two of you advance on each other and clash only for you to find yourself outmatched.
Past you, Kathrri is in much the same predicament. The thug she attacked is down and dead. But the other one is twice her size, much more heavily armored, and fully aware of her. It seems to be all she can do is stay nimble and dodge the swings of his spiked club scrambling to keep her distance as best she can. Her dagger doesn’t have near enough reach to strike back, and there’s not enough space for her to grab and use her shortbow. You block another one of Burge’s attacks then catch view of Kathrri lunging for her opponent. Not with her agile dagger, but with… animalistic clawed paws?! She connects with the man’s arm and blood goes flying. But he’s merely hurt, not dead. He counter attacks and lands one vicious hit to her head. Then another. The two grapple and plunge out of view into the shadows.
Burge seems to have you, as well. After a couple of his attacks are magically rebuffed, his sword beings to lands solid hits. First one. And then another. The wispy bear made of forest magic prowls nearby, but it’s temporary armoring effect seems spent for now as Burge’s stabs and slashes are bitting deep. And you’ve not done nearly so much damage to him in return. You’d contemplate your poor luck, but your feet are closer to the large opening in the ground than you’d like, and he is pressing his advantage knowing you are nearly out of room to maneuver.
But then something else happens.
The armored thug you though had gotten the better of Kathrri goes running past you both screaming while frantically pulling at his chest plate which is now glowing a bright heated red. He trips and falls and screams a few seconds more before his voice quiets into near silent whimpers. Both you and Burge look towards the inky shadows where the man ran from and you see them: Two gleaming eyes looking back.
But these eyes are not at the correct height for an angry young woman. No, they are much lower to the ground and a moment later you see why. A long, black-furred panther comes slinking out of the darkness. It bears its fangs, lets out a long low growl, then charges Burge. The thug leader turns to face it, but the panther topples him with a slash of its claws then lunges for his neck, grasping him in a mighty, bloody bite. He gets a solid stab in between the panther’s ribs, this attack is not deflected like his crossbow bolt was for you, and the large cat yelps in pain but goes for another vicious bite. Seeing an opportunity, you move in for the finishing blow on Burge and he falls still.
The panther falls, too. Weakly onto its side before shifting back into the shape of the leather-clad young woman who was ordered to escort you to a secretive meeting. She’s hurt. Bad. A gash on her leg. Another stream of blood flowing from her head. Kathrri holds her side, too, where she was most recently injured. But then she clenches her eyes shut and cries out in that same unfamiliar language and suddenly the air is thick with hundreds of glowing butterflies that appear out of nowhere. They flutter all around you both lighting up the dark spaces where you lay. Most of the bright glowing insects disperse and vanish in all directions leaving just one to land on Kathrri’s leg. You watch intently as her wounds close and her tense muscles begin to relax. Soon, she releases her side and pulls herself shakily to a sitting position before turning to you.
“He got you pretty good, I see,” she says. She reaches out her hand and her butterfly briefly moves to land on it before it crosses the short gap between the two of you and lands near where you were hit by the crossbow bolt during your fight with Burge. You feel a slight chill and the burning pain of your wounds soon cool in kind as the healing spirit mends your injuries like it did for her. She helps you to your feet, and you to hers.
“I know this is asking a lot, but they… they have my friend. My only friend. I’ll get you to your meeting, I swear it on my life, but first… will you help me save her?” Kathrricallia’s words are, for the first time, simple and honest. No anger. No slyness or defiance. Just a request from a mysterious contradiction of a young woman to the only person she thinks will listen.
You nod.
“Ok. Thank you. Come on, I think I know where they have her hidden. It’s this way.”
The Thaleniel Guards
Sharp sounds of clashing metal ring out beneath one of the many tall, oil burning street lamps that intermittently light Thaleniel’s dark, southern warehouse district. Bathed in orange-tinted light, two figures, clearly engaged in combat, move and circle each other. They trade slashes, thrusts, blocks, and parries as their swords meet again and again. Eventually, one of the combatants gains an upper hand and drives the other back with a powerful, barely avoided stab.
"'The night shift will be easy coin’ they said…” seventeen year old Bidella Rimony mutters as she reels from the attack she only just managed to turn aside.
The young, strongly-built human woman is dressed in the rudimentary armor and headgear common to the capital city’s many guards, but given the state of combat, whatever she is guarding does not look like it will remain safe much longer. She gives a glance back to the stable she was assigned to watch, and even though her sword arm aches and she can’t quite catch her breath, she straightens her stance and readies her blade against her attacker once more.
”You are winded and soon be bested. Fighting on sees you injured. Killed. What will you do?” the half elf advancing calmly toward her asks.
”I would yell for help again,” Bidella answers. She cups her hands to her mouth and quietly makes a show of shouting to the left and right for help. ”…and then I would…” she pretends to hesitate as she checks her footing, ”…attack,” she very nearly yells for real as she springs forward towards her attacker.
The girl clearly has some skill with a blade as she feints and dodges past the answering swing that comes towards her. She has just enough time to catch the surprise on her attacker’s face before she begins a well executed heavy slash aimed at his left shoulder. A slash that is easily rebuffed by the light leather shield strapped to his left arm…
Her half elf opponent briefly looks down on her with disapproval, then takes a strong step forward and swipes his sword an inch from Bidella’s face causing her to flinch sharply away. With her sword arm woefully out of position and her momentum already carrying her backward, it is an easy maneuver for her opponent to step up and shove her roughly to the ground. Bidella grunts in pain as her thin armor does little to soften her impact. Her sword clatters to the stone paved street beside her and she reaches for it, but her attacker moves again and all she can focus on is the point of his sword as it comes to a stop directly in front of her left eye.
”Wrong answer,” her attacker tells her. ”If you are outnumbered or outfought, you must run. Horses or jewelry or what you guard can all be gotten again. You cannot.” The blade near her face remains for another moment, emphasizing its holder’s point, before it is withdrawn, sheathed, and replaced by a helping hand.
”By the gods, Nme’an, do you have to be so rough?” Bidella asks as she takes his offered hand and pulls herself to her feet.
"I only am so as to make clear your mistakes," the half elf, half again her age, responds firmly.
"It is hard to practice against you when I am so... wary... that you will punish my slightest mistake," the guard-in-training complains.
”We learn best by mistake, then avoiding it in the next time,” Nme'an replies.
”There is never any winning with you is there?” Bidella half laughs, half grumbles. In the two weeks since she’d joined the city guard, her assigned mentor had not once backed down from an instance when he thought he was correct. It certainly did not help that, so far, he almost always had been.
”Ok…” she sighs, ”What did I do wrong, then?”
”Aside from failing to retreat?” Nme’an first asks, so as to not let her forget his point. But, as quick as he is to chastise or roughly punish, he is just as quick to teach.
”You made a clever move but followed it by attacking my strongest side. You may very well done serious harm and won the fight if I had not held a shield. But I did. A battle is a string of moves from you pit against moves from the one you fight. Winning one round only to leave yourself two moves behind is no win at all.”
The teenage girl does her best to consider her teacher’s words as she picks up her weapon and begins acting out the final moves of their mock engagement in slow motion. She shakes her head as she stops her swing in the same position as when it made contact with her instructor’s shield, then starts the routine a second time.
Though her face is crestfallen at first, it lights up slightly as she acts out her surprise attack once more.
”You thought my move was ‘clever’?” she asks. A number of distant bells begin ringing out the new hour before her mentor can reply, but the small half smile that appears on his face tells her all she needs to know.
Soon, the bells complete their four rings, indicating the top of the fourth hour past midnight, and leave the moonlit city in silence once more.
”What do we do now?" Nme'an asks once their echoes fade.
The first time he had asked the question, on her first night of training some two weeks prior, she'd had no immediate answer and had been sent home for the night with a warning to know her duties. It was one mistake, at least, that she had learned from.
"We go on our rounds," Bidella answers confidently, earning herself a small nod from her trainer. A minor victory, but for Bidella, it was enough.
Magma & Team IcyHot vs The Friendly Fortune Teller
Magma entered the small farming town she and her companions had agreed to visit, hopeful the job they had heard of was still there. It had been a long, exceedingly lonesome day of riding… and now, snow was beginning to fall as she searched the few streets and alleyways for the tavern her friends were to be at. Though not as bad as a heavy downpouring of rain, the darkened evening sky and falling icy flakes affixed a frown to the face of the dark-skinned Fire Genasi. None too soon, however, the faint sound of music called out to her, and lead her to where she needed to be: a tavern with a depiction of a harvest goddess of some sort set large above its entrance.
Pushing her way inside, Magma let out a sigh of relief at the upbeat fiddling and generally cheerful attitudes before her. The small marks and faint longer lines on her skin glowed ever so more brightly red as a smile came to her face for the first time in more than a day. She reached back and pulled at the tight bob on her head so that her dim, glowing, red-orange hair fell around her down to her shoulders like the lava from a volcano erupting down a mountain. She gave her head a shake and ran her hand through her hair to make sure it had all loosened properly, then let herself move, and sway, and twirl in time to the music as she made the short trip over to the bar with a big smile on her face.
“Hey, ‘Keep, I need a drink, first off. Something good, but not too good,” Magma said cheerfully, “…and after that, this road weary traveler needs something good to eat. Local specialty or what not, if you please.”
“That’ll be a silver for the drink and…” the barkeeper began to say, but Magma cut him off.
“I’ll want a second drink with the meal. This cover it all?” She asked as she placed two gold coins from her coin purse onto the bar. She got a enthusiastic nod from the barkeeper and a large tankard filled to the brim with drink of which she quickly downed enough of to allow her to move again without fear of spilling. Only then did she see Red, their party’s Dragonborn cleric, who was naturally still dressed in his gaudy heavy armor. Elsewhere in the establishment were Cheldon, their Tortle Artificer and Welty, their Halfling Rogue. Each was eating and talking to those around them.
“Red!” She called out cheerfully, since he was the closest. “Nothin’ seemed to be on fire as I rode in, so I’m guessin’ that means I’m probably not too late?” A couple of the locals turned their heads at that statement, but she just smiled and moved deeper into the venue to sit by the cleric. A couple of the plainly dressed regulars gave her an annoyed look, one even seemingly finished his meal early and left the table altogether, but Magma took it in stride.
“The name’s Magma, it’s a pleasure to meet ya,” she said to the few that remained.
“Brad. Likewise,” one said in return, but most of the others just continued eating or talking amongst themselves. Over the next few minutes, Magma managed to hold herself mostly quiet as Red sat beside her and regaled her at length about the rest of the party’s adventures during the past day. Mysterious disappearances among the townsfolk, a crazy Lord, the Lord’s wife who worriedly hired them, and an out of place fortune teller who seemed maybe more involved in things than she should. Magma could already tell that this would be one heck of a job.
“I rode. The wind was near freezing. There was no one to talk to. Now, I’m here,” Magma deadpanned once she was caught up. About then, one of the serving girls placed a large dish of lamb and yams before her along with a second drink. “Oh, thank you! This looks wonderful,” Magma said, smiling warmly.
It was then that Magma caught eye of the very fortune teller that had the others in doubt. The woman was older, but more fluid in her movements than one would think she should be. Her dark colored dress with its blues and blacks was pretty enough, and it was certainly tailored a large step or two above the clothes the other locals wore, but it was her bright orange sash she wore around her shoulders and the large, equally orange dyed hat that she wore on her head that really made her stand out. She was not an outsider, though. If anything, she was a trusted friend to many within the tavern. They talked to her, nodded to her as she passed by, or smiled when she greeted them. The older woman came and took a seat across from Magma a few moments after Red wandered off for another ale.
“Darling,” she said, drawing out the word, her voice happy and extravagant, “my apologies if you haven’t received the warmest of receptions. The people here, they’re… not so used to visitors, and I’m afraid your friends have already stirred the pot somewhat.”
“No worries from me, and please, call me Magma,” the Fire Genasi replied, mouth full of yams.
“Helgram Grendal,” the woman said with a big smile.
“Sounds like something out of one of those old fairy tales, tha ones where children get eaten,” Magma mused after swallowing her latest bite. The older woman gave a good natured laugh, but there was the slightest twinkle in her eyes that conveyed that there was, perhaps, a slight truth to Magma’s musings.
Though she was taken slightly aback, Magma nevertheless continued, “Sorry. Don’t mind me. I’m sometimes too straight forward for my own good. I’m just glad to have something good to eat and someone interesting to talk to. I had to stay behind on our last job, make some extra amends, and… well, I cannot stand riding alone.”
“I completely understand, Magma darling. May I ask why you and your friends have come? Four such yourselves is a bit out of the ordinary, after all.”
“The disappearances. We’ve been hired to do something about them.”
“Oh, indeed? Eighteen gone so far. It’s just awful. I do the best I can to help, but this so does have the town in a foul mood.”
“So, you know about the disappearances?” Magma asked.
“Oh, only just more than you. But enough of that, darling. Would you care to play with me? I have cards, I have dice. I do so enjoy wagering with newcomers.”
“Dice sounds good. Do you know Bos’ton?” Magma asked.
“I do! And I have a perfect set for it!” Helgram reached a hand into one of the large hanging sleeves of her dressed and came out with a small, deep leather bound tray with tall walls that held five identical dice. “Your wager darling?”
“One gold, if that’s not too much. I enjoy overpaying a bit when I first arrive somewhere new. I’ve found it helps ease tensions some,” Magma said.
“I’ll wager three gold then.” As the one with the higher bet, Helgram went first. She scooped all five dice in her hand and rolled them into the tray then picked out the highest roll of the five which she placed in clear view between herself and Magma. She then repeated the process four more times, each time lining up that turn’s highest roll. When it was all said and done, she’d totaled a decent score slightly on the lower end of what she could have rolled.
Magma went next. From her first roll it was clear that fate was on her side. She beat Helgram’s rolls with each of her five turns and ended up with a very high total.
“Ah! I’m afraid that’s what happens sometimes!” Helgram exclaimed before hading over her three gold coins. “Again?”
“Mmm, I’d like too, but I’m afraid I’m gonna miss out on the best of this meal if I continue to play. Another time?”
“Of course, darling. Whenever you wish. Which reminds me, your halfling friend requested a fortune reading of me. I’d be glad to provide you with a reading as well, once you are finished.”
“Thanks, but no thanks. I make my own fate,” Magma replied with a confident smile.
“Oh? Very well. I shall leave you to your meal. It was a pleasure, darling.”
With that, Helgram placed the dice and tray back into her sleeve then stood and moved away to spread conversation and joy to a group of townsfolk just entering the tavern.
Dusk turned to night by the time Magma finished her meal and the delicious pudding she allowed one of the serving girls to tempt her into. A steady snow was falling outside now, and the tavern slowly emptied until only a few regular patrons, Magma and her companions, and Helgram remained. The fortune teller was busy now speaking to a mildly well dressed middle aged woman at a table near the front of the room.
Though the two spoke in hushed tones, Magma and the others could make out a few of their words in the now quiet tavern. The snow and a very rare failed harvest seemed to be the topics of discussion. Magma looked around to her companions and rolled her eyes at the way they each seemed to be trying to eavesdrop yet still be discrete when they were literally the only other ones in the entire tavern aside from the barkeep and the two women talking. So, instead of joining in on her companions’ brand of awkwardness, Magma decided, as she often did, to create some awkwardness of her own.
“Hi. My name is Magma. The Lord and Lady hired my companions and myself to solve the case of these disappearances. I heard others speaking of their own unexpectedly bad harvests. When did they start. Which crops did they affect? Has anything else unusual happened recently?” she asked after she sat down across from the local woman.
“Darling!” Helgram exclaimed in shock by Magma’s side
“The nerve!” The middle-aged woman from the town all but shouted. “This was a private conversation with a trusted friend… and… and, you would not find any of us who would simply tell you the extent of our harvests. We all run tight businesses, after all!”
“I’m not interested in learning your coveted family farming techniques,” Magma shot back, “the land reacts and changes in response to mysteries more often than you might think. All I’m asking is…”
“You are being a pest and… and a bother, that’s what you are!” The woman said. She shoved her plate away from her and stood abruptly to leave, only to nearly run into the tall, stoic mass of armor and faith that was Red blocking her way.
“I ask you to forgive our Magma, there,” he said gently while holding out a pair of gleaming gold coins to the woman, “she is often hot-headed, hot-tempered, and never learned to take a gentle approach. It is all we can do to keep her in line, sometimes.”
“Hey!” Magma called out.
The farmer seemed ill at ease at it all. At being the center of attention. At the large dragon-like warrior before her. At the put out fiery-haired trouble maker behind her. Tentatively, she took the coins and said, “Well… please try harder.”
“You can go, dear,” Helgram interjected, “I’ll speak to them.”
“Thank you, Helgram,” the townswoman said with honest relief before making her way out into the cold. Red shuffled off back to his own table, leaving a dejected Magma to mumble to herself as she nursed her drink across from the ever opulent Helgram.
“…just trying to sort out why more than a handful of their town is dead. Not like we can do that if no one will talk to us. ‘Extent of our harvest’, as if I’ve grown anything in years…” Magma grumbled. Though her hair and markings were never especially bright, their glow now seemed almost nonexistent as she sat chastised, mug held in both hands.
“Darling,” Helgram said, placing a reassuring hand on one of Magma’s, “I don’t know where you’ve come from or been, but many here work their farms and send off their crops and go all their lives without seeing more than a handful of outsiders, and never any as radiant as yourself. Your desire to help is clear, perhaps just hold yourself in a little more, is all.”
“Grrr,” Magma grunted. Holding herself in wasn’t really something she was used to.
“I know something to cheer you up! Your friend, the halfling, requested a fortune telling from me earlier. Why don’t we do that now. I think you’ll enjoy watching,” the older woman said temptingly in an almost sing song voice.
“Meh… alright,” Magma said begrudgingly.
“Sir, I think it has quieted enough, now, let’s see to your fortune,” the teller said. Curious at all that would entail, Magma stood from her table and followed the woman over to where Welty sat. The Rogue actually looked slightly nervous, for once, as Helgram reached again into her same sleeve. This time, using multiple pulls, she came out with a line of chalk, two wood-wicked bottles of incense, and a hefty crystal ball. She arranged the incense at opposite ends of the table with the crystal ball in the center. She then took her time drawing a magic circle with the chalk that consisted of shapes and runes that ultimately served to connect all three items to herself and Welty.
“You said before you did not know what kind of fortune you wished me to tell. I could tell you of your prospects in love, or life, or livelihood,” Helgram suggested.
“Well… I just ain’t sure…” the deep-voiced Halfling replied. “Can you just… sum things up?”
“A general reading then? Yes, darling, I can look ahead and find anything extraordinary I see.”
With a flick of her wrist and a few precisely said magic words, Helgram began the reading. Her eyes flashed to an eerie white and the lines of chalk on the table began to glow. The incense, which had not had any discernible smell thus far suddenly filled the air with a sweet perfume, and the previously clear crystal ball became clouded with dark, wispy swirls. Magma and her companions watched this all with interests while Welty looked on with something more akin to concern.
Several long moments passed as Helgram concentrated, but finally her eyes returned to normal and she shook her head.
“It is not such good news, I’m afraid,” she said gravely. “I see your mission here going badly for you, Welty. I saw you caught up in a storm of ice and of failure. It was quite ghastly, to be honest. For all of you, in fact. I don’t do this often, but you each seem so good natured in your own way, that I urge you to move on. Forget about this mystery. In all likelihood, it is mere coincidence, not something that even can be solved.”
“Well, damn,” Welty said after a moment. “And here I was hoping to spend a few gold on some fun lies.”
“Yes, darling, but sometimes the truth is the more pressing. Please, keep your money. A warning such as this is far too important to be played off as a game.” Helgram sat for a moment with a sorrowful look on her face, but then placed her fortune telling items back in her sleeve and stood to leave. “Good evening, to you all,” she said in parting.
“To you as well, I thank you for your hard work,” she said to the barkeep as she breezed on past toward the door. She did take a moment, though, to reach into her sleeve and toss him a small bag of coins that clinked when he caught it. Helgram nodded to two guardsmen who had largely stayed silent and unseen at a small table near the door. They too rose. One opened the door for her and then both they and the fortune teller exited out into the snow. A few moments later the sound of horses and rolling wheels echoed faintly inside and Magma could just see a sliver of an expensive, well made carriage rolling off towards the large, high-walled manor of the Lord and Lady in the distance.
“Ok,” Welty said once he and his three companions were alone. “So… spooky fortune aside, we’re still going with the plan? I sneak into the manor house while the rest of you see if you can find anything in the woods where the lord’s wife says he likes to wander at night?” The other three nodded.
With their own meals finished and final tabs settled, the four companions headed off into the night. They made for the manor and the forest beyond it where the townsfolk had all disappeared, but took the long way there through the center of the town. There, in the center of the cobblestone square, a talk, ornately carved obelisk stone pillar stood, with various runes and markings on its sides. Around it, along the edges of the town square, were a variety of shrines to various gods and goddesses. Magma stopped briefly to pay her monetary respects to a local goddess of fire and life, before continuing along with the others.
As the four neared the walled manor, Magma hurried a bit forward and with a few quickly spoken words caused a dance of twisting fire to appear in her outstretched hand. She held it effortlessly and allowed it to light her way. That, along with her hair and face glowing faintly in the darkness, made her easy to pick out by the guards atop the manor wall. Consequently, it made the company’s small, darkly dressed Rogue traveling several paces behind her all that much more difficult to notice.
“Hey, who goes there?” One of the guards called down to Magma and the others.
Magma waved her fire back and forth in a wide arc and called back, “we’re the group hired by your Lady to investigate those who have gone missing. We are heading to the woods to see what we can find.”
“Very well,” the guard called back. “Be careful!” He did not notice the rogue drop back even further from the others.
“Pour this on your head,” Cheldon, the group’s Tortle Artificer said in a whisper to Welty as he offered him a small flask of liquid he’d pulled out of his lumpy bag of odds and ends. The Rogue did so, and within moments, instead of simply being hard to spot, he disappeared from sight completely!
Magma and the others continued on without him. Soon, they reached the edge of the forest and Magma extinguished her flame. The three companions waited some minutes silent and still. Magma even did her best to keep her glow to an absolute minimum with slow shallow breathing. It was like being told to sit still and stop fidgeting as a child, or like being forced to stay silent and talk to no one in the midst of a roaring party, but somehow she managed. Through no small amount of tension and effort on her part, her eyes, face, hair, and hands became dark as the night surrounding her and her companions.
Finally, after several more long minutes of standing silent and still, Red, the Dragonborn Cleric, spotted someone moving through the night. Once pointed out, Magma spotted them too, her unnaturally good night vision allowing her to better make out the person concealed by the darkness. It was none other than the farm woman she’d spoken to earlier! But there was something off. The woman had no torch or lantern, and she did not seem to be looking to her feet in the dim starlight to avoid tripping or stumbling. Neither did she once look back or around as she approached the tree line. Instead, her movement seemed both strangely stiff yet perfectly confident as she entered the forest.
The three companions followed, with Magma and her dark vision allowing her to better lead the way. The woman ahead of them seemed to know the exact location of each leaf, branch, briar, and vine, and avoided them all with effortless ease. Magma, and her companions, in contrast, made more noise than they would have liked as they attempted to keep up with the woman… yet strangely, she never once turned to notice them.
Over the course of another half hour, the woman lead the companions deeper and deeper into the forest until she emerged into a clearing. In the center was a small lake perhaps a hundred feet wide at its widest point. And, in the center of the lake was a small grassy island with a single ornate stone pillar similar to the one in the center of the town! Like before, the townswoman preceded on the straightest path to her goal which now seemed to clearly be the pillar. She waded into the cold water without a moment’s hesitation and swam the short distance over to the island before taking to her feet again and moving to touch the pillar. That’s when something truly strange happened! The woman’s hand and arm pushed through the pillar with some effort, and vanished into it as if it were some kind of portal. This must have been what happened to the other townsfolk!
Magma and her companions sprung into action.
Cheldan reached into his lumpy bag and pulled out then assembled pieces of a tube about the size of his forearm which he then threw at the woman and the pillar. It shattered on impact with the ground and released a large mass of stringy webbing that slowed the woman’s progress into the pillar.
Meanwhile, Red said a brief prayer then ran across the surface of the water as quickly as he could in his heavy armor. He grabbed the woman who was now more than halfway into the pillar and attempted to pull her back.
Magma approached the lake but stopped at its edge. Maybe it was just the though of throwing herself into the near freezing water, but no… something else made her stop. There was a foreboding feeling she got at the though of crossing through the water to the island beyond. Instead of wading in, she did what she did worst, and paced anxiously back and forth along the pond’s bank desperately wishing to be useful.
Within in moments, everything began to go awry. The webbing Cheldan had deployed, which had worked wonders on creatures large and small in the past, seemed to do little to deter the woman from the pillar. Likewise, although Red was the largest and strongest in their group, his attempts to pull the woman back met with little success before she somehow tugged free of his strong grasp! Finally, having waited long enough, Magma let lose bolts of fire directed towards the top of the pillar. Her first hit the obelisk and it seemed for a moment as if the woman’s progress was slowed, but Magma’s second bolt missed in her frustration and went wide into the forest beyond. The trees around the three companions shuttered and frightening nosies and whispers rose to prominence from among the them even as the woman disappeared completely into the pillar. The unnatural noises of the forest continue to increase and the three companions look at each other uncomfortably.
“Maybe we should leave?” Magma suggested, but as she did so, a tall, white-skinned woman emerged from the lake. She was elegant and timeless with long hair, indistinct eyes, and a flowing dress that turned into a thick misty fog that concealed her lower legs and feet. The woman hovered atop the water as her fog spilled out across the lake. She was the spitting image of one of the goddesses depicted back in the town square. A nature goddess of some type, if Magma remembered correctly.
The goddess looked among the companions then asked in an echoing voice filled with warning and contempt, “You trespass! Why have you disturbed us, the powers and spirits of this forest? Why have you threatened our designs?”
Magma was the first to speak, her hair and body now glowing with worry and challenge. “We did not mean to trespass, we only wished to help the people of the nearby town. Several have gone missing like the woman who just now entered the pillar behind you. One was found dead at the forest’s edge, his flesh torn apart as if by some sort of beast. What have you to say to that?” She demanded.
“You come to our forest and make demands of us?” The spirit woman asked incredulously.
“We come to put an end to these disappea…” Magma began, but was cut short when Red spoke over her from across the lake.
“We have only come to gain understanding of why the people of the town have been vanishing into your forest. Why the one was killed at its edge. We have no demands of our own,” Red said diplomatically while glaring at Magma from across the water. The Genasi glowered back, but, for the moment, she held her tongue.
“The death… it was not our doing. It was… inconvenient. The others? We took them in recompense, in payment for their peoples’ misdeeds. We have repaid them three fold for what they have done. The woman just now was the last. On this small part… we are satisfied.”
“What was the town’s crime?” Red asked.
“They stole from us,” the spirit woman said, a harsh, angry edge now present in her voice. “They built their pillars and sapped the life of our forest so that their harvest would remain bountiful come snow or drought. But we are finally free enough of their magic. For fifty cycles of the seasons they used their ill-gotten power, and so for one hundred and fifty cycles, the snows will come and their crops will perish”
“You said the debt was repaid… that you were satisfied!” Magma challenged.
“On one small part, yes. But the years, too, must be repaid. All of the forest demands it. Nature itself demands it. On this, there is nothing we can do, even if we wished it.”
Magma took a step back, her face filled with worry and sadness. “But… few if any in the town know know of these wrongs. They are good people who will be punished for something they did not agree to. Is there nothing we can do?” she asked, clearly in anguish over the thought of so many being harmed.
“There was one who knew, but she is of little consequence to us now. She fancies herself a protector of the people and facilitator of the good harvests, but she is a hidden rot, a hag disguised as a helper among the people. It is she who killed and devoured the one you spoke of. He was to be ours, but instead we were forced to choose another. The long winter cannot be stopped, it is already here. By morning this plentiful green valley will be buried in snowfall. But, it may be delayed perhaps long enough for you to warn these people you hold so dear. A payment delivered for services rendered.”
“What services? What can we do to help?” Red asked.
“The one you spoke of. I think we know who she is. You say she is of no consequence, but we have a story among my people,” Cheldan said, speaking up for the first time.
“There was once a fisherman in the islands of my people that went out every day and caught just what fish he needed to live. But one day a greedy gull saw this, and would sneak along and steal from the fisherman when he didn’t see. Day after day the fisherman would have to fish up more than he needed because of the gull’s theft, till at last the sea grew angry and lashed out, sinking the ship. But the gull escaped, and found another ship, hungry to glut itself on more fish. The sea sank ship after ship, until at last there were no more. But by then, the waves were too rough, the currents too wild, so no more fish would live there. So all were ruined by a greedy gull, who flew free still.”
“You speak wisely,” the spirit said in admiration. “Very well, Do these two things and the forest and valley will coexist in peace one again after the long winter ends. First, we will deal with the pillars within our forest in time, but there is a larger pillar, one that stretches from deep in the earth to taller than even our trees in the sky. The others are of little consequence, but the final pillar is out of our reach and beyond our power. Smash it so that true healing may begin. Second, rid us of the deceiver we spoke of. She must not be allowed to steal our power a second time. Do this, and we will delay the onset of our wrath long enough for you to lead the innocent to safety beyond the valley.”
“Thank you,” Red replied. “We will do as you ask. Is there any chance you can speed us back to the edge of the forest?”
“No,” the spirit woman answered. With that, she sunk back into the water and the angry sounds of the forest ceased.
The three companions stood still for a moment, surprised at the devastation coming soon to the town and at the deals they made to delay but not avoid it. It was Magma, naturally, who spoke first.
“Come on, guys! We did it! We solved the puzzle. Now, let’s smash it and save these people,” she said excitedly, glowing brightly once more.
“That is not how puzzles work,” Cheldan said to her with a wry smile. She just scoffed and relit the fire in her hands so she could help guide her companions back through the woods once more. An hour later they emerged back at the town where there seemed to be quite the commotion going on. Though some snow was falling, it did not appear that the deadly blizzard had yet to start. Their first task was to find Welty, or rather give him a way to find them which Magma made simple by shooting several bolts of fire high into the air.
A short time later, the small rogue appeared out of the shadows, looking haggard from his time sneaking into the manor in search of clues. He was injured quite badly, in fact, something Red saw to with a spell of healing.
“Helgram, the fortune teller,” Welty told the others breathlessly, “she isn’t what she appears. She attacked me, and would have killed me if not for the priestess we met this morning. She saved me and fought Helgram while I escaped. I think she is in serious trouble if she isn’t already dead.”
“We need to find her and a pillar. One far bigger than the one in town. We were told it is both buried deep and is taller than the trees.” Red said.
“The only thing taller than the trees around her is the Lord’s tower at his manor,” Welty answered.
“The Lady spoke of catacombs this morning,” Cheldan said.
The four companions looked to each other then all at once rushed back to the manor. There they told the Lord and Lady all that had happened. The Lord seemed incredulous at first, but then revealed he had suspected something was amiss for some time and had been going into the forest in secret in order to protect his town and his wife and avoid the suspicion of the fortune teller. He quickly led them to a secret tunnel set behind a bookshelf in his grand study and told the four companions that it lead down into the hidden catacombs.
Inside was a series of tunnels leading to unused burial chambers, which made sense since the manor itself had only been built some fifty years ago. No one in the family had died since its construction. The four searched the passages for the better part of an hour before they came across a room supported by four columns. There, a number of shadowy creatures emerged from the darkness and rushed to attack. Though two or three of the creatures got hits in on Magma and the others, two of them fell instantly to Magma’s twin fire bolts. Their edges burned and flickered until they were consumed by fire. All but one of the others were destroyed by a blast of bright divine light that lit the entire room as Red channeled the power of his god. The final one, weakened by the holy light, fell and dissipated when Welty delivered a surprising killing blow with his rapier.
The four pressed on and soon found a secret door that had been left open. Inside, they found a large round chamber with a huge pillar that extended from the floor all the way up through the ceiling. It had to be the core of the Lord’s tower! And there, at the base of the pillar, was the priestess, beaten, bruised, and passed out on the ground. And towering above her was not the airy, good natured fortune teller, but a large monstrous werehag with rows of sharp teeth and large arms that ended in sharp claws. She greeted them with the teller’s voice, saying, “I know why you’ve come, but you cannot stop me! I’ll weather this storm and deal the forest a harsh lesson once it ends.”
She took one look at the adventurers bunched in the doorway and unleashed a powerful swirling storm of wind and ice at them. Some of the adventurers managed to shield themselves from the storm, and Cheldan, especially, seemed to weather it just fine thanks to a blessing gifted to him by the forest spirit as they departed her lake. Magma, however, faced the blast head on. She glowed in bright defiance, as her fiery magic rebuffed much of the icy attack.
All at once, her companions struck back. Red flanked the hag and struck at her with his sword. Welty delivered a painful attack while she was distracted. Cheldan wrapped her in a thorny vine and pulled her closer, all of which gave Magma the shot she needed. She called upon her fiery heritage and unleashed four blindingly bright bolts that briefly lit the room. The first, and most powerful, along with the third and forth struck the fortune teller turned werehag and left sizable smoldering burns on her chest and torso.
In response to the group’s attacks, Helgram took to the air on a broom she had nearby. Magma ran round the pillar in an attempt to flank the hag, but Helgram flew the other way and cut her off. Welty fired an arrow at her as she flew, and some of the others tried to strike her as well, but their efforts did little good.
“I deal with you in just a moment, darling,” Helgram said with a vile, toothy smile. She turned and unleashed an even more devastating blast of ice at the others in the room. The priestess who still lay motionless near the pillar was shielded from the blast, and Cheldan with his gift from the forest spirit along with his thick, turtle-like shell fared the best of those caught within it. Red, too, avoided much of the deadly cold by deflecting it with his heavy armor.
Welty, however, was not so fortunate. The Halfling Rogue saw the icy blast approaching in time that his finely honed reflexes would have been more than sufficient to save him, but it was not to be. At the last moment he remembered Helgram’s words about ice storms and failure. Her words turned out to be more than just a pretend glimpse into the future. They were, instead a powerful curse she had placed upon him. Where he normally would have dodged to safety, Welty instead stood and suffered the full brunt of the icy attack. He fell to the ground bloody and unconscious a moment later.
“You all should have listened to my fortune!” The hag called out, sure she had won.
“Did you forget…” Magma asked, with determination and no small amount of smugness in her voice, “…that I make my own fate?”
The Fire Genasi pulled on every last reserve of strength and magic she had and unleashed it upon the flying hag. First, a fiery pinpoint of light streaked from her hand and detonated in front of the sneering former fortune teller, sending her smoldering body smashing up against the chamber’s circular wall. Then, an intense bolt of fire streaked towards the hapless hag and burned a deep hole into her chest.
Helgram fell to the dirt floor badly burned, but still not quite finished. She pushed herself up on her hands and looked to Magma, and over to the others, then, with a pained, agony filled voice said, “I… will have my revenge…” She cast one last spell then fell back to the dirt.
There was no time to verify Helgram’s demise, however, as the temperature in the room began to drop dangerously fast. Soon, a breeze picked up and intensified into a circular icy swirl that ripped at the walls and at central pillar and threatened to finish off the brave adventurers. It was only thanks to Red’s wide cast healing spell and the now revived priestess’ healing magic that they managed to get Welty on his feet and everyone back out the way they came. Magma and Red pelted the ice-weakened pillar with fire and a final arrow from Welty widened a devastating crack at its core that saw the whole thing, along with the tower it held up, come crashing downwards.
Back on the surface, the four companions and the rescued priestess had the unenviable task of telling a town of hundreds that their easy lives filled with plentiful harvests would have to change. That a deal that they had no real part in saw to it that several of them were lost to the forest spirits and that their town and entire valley were doomed to a snowfall that would last longer than any of their lives. They didn’t believe it at first. There were shouts and anger, but as the snow intensified, the realization that these adventurers were right quickly set in.
The forest spirit upheld her end of the bargain. Though the snow continued to fall, it built up slowly over the next few days giving most of the townspeople ample time to collect their belongings and exit the valley in an orderly fashion. Only a few stubborn souls stayed behind, unwilling to leave the land they had lived in all their lives. They, and their entire valley, were buried under several crushing feet of intense snowfall by the time the last of the townspeople had escaped to safety.
Magma looked back over the miles and miles of white and felt a eerie chill tug at her heart. She’d helped save an entire town. Even started the long process of restoring a balance between people and nature. But there was something about Helgram’s final words. Were a few arrows and stabs and fiery blasts enough to kill a creature that had spent decades siphoning the power of an entire forest?
‘Well, if not, I’ll just have to make sure I’m ready for her,’ Magma thought as she turned back toward the crowd of people, carts, and horses slowly making their way away from the snow-filled valley. It was going to be a long and possibly frustrating journey helping all these people resettle, but at least this time, she’d have someone to talk to.
Meet Magma
“I think they know we left…” Magma hears one of her companions say. A quick glance at the three rock-walled tunnels behind shows that to be one fabulous understatement. Coming down each tunnel are elite guards with weapons drawn and torches in hand. And ahead of them, backlit by the flickering flames? Spiders! Thousands of them! Maybe tens of thousands all spilling forward down each tunnel like three dark waves.
“Just how are we supposed to fight that?” One of her companion asks.
“Well, what else can we do? I can just see the exit, but no way we’re makin’ it…” another says.
“Yeah… but… but, uh…” a third trails off fearfully.
“No worries. This is why I never let the rest of you make me take a night watch. Being well rested has its advantages!” Magma says cheerfully to the others.
“Mag… what could you possibly…”
“No… she’s got this… but we may want to all step back. And cover our ears.”
“Yes. Thank you,” Magma says with a hint of sarcasm. “I know I’m talented and you all think the world of me, but I’ve got one shot at this, so no distractions or we’re all spider food…”
Having said her warning, Magma slowly walks towards the approaching threats. The distance, where the three tunnels merge into her group’s one, is just about right. And she is well rested, despite her companions goads and complaints about her needing a “beauty sleep.” And… she’s tried this before. Several times. Was even successful a few of them…
With a few seconds to go, Magma works to control her breathing. On each inhale, her dark Genasi skin glows a brighter, more fiery red, and on each exhale it dims again down to its usual darker brown. Then, when the time is right, when the spiders and their few handlers are the correct distance, she springs forward, yelling an incantation as she goes. Twin bright orange pinpoints of light form in her hands. After two or maybe three steps, Magma plants her front foot and let’s her momentum carry her into a fast, artful twirl. As she spins she releases one pinpoint of light towards the first tunnel and another towards the second. Halfway through her 360 degree turn she yells out with effort and no small amount of pain as she manifests a third point of fiery light which she releases towards the remaining tunnel as she spins back around.
The massive expenditure of energy and magic sees her collapse forward onto her hands and knees with not even enough strength to look up to the results. But then, she doesn’t need to. The three bright points streak to their destinations at the mouths of the three tunnels before exploding into searing fireballs that light walls and shake the ground. Spiders and men are consumed in the triple blasts, and any who aren’t are soon crushed or trapped as the three narrower tunnels cave in on themselves.
It takes almost a minute for Magma to open her eyes and notice a friendly hand being offered to her. The fingers that wrap around her’s as she’s pulled to her feat are warm to the touch. That’s something she hasn’t felt in… well… ever. There’s never been a case where she hasn’t been the more warm-blooded one out of her companions.
“I think maybe… I overdid it…” she says weakly as a chilled shiver passes through her body. But she still manages to crack a smile. “I feel like I’ll need another beauty sleep ‘fore trying that again.”
That earns her laughter and smiles all around as she and her companions make their way out of the secret tunnel and head back towards their rewards of wealth and glory.
Magma is a 5th level Fire Genasi for D&D 5th edition. She is brash, charming, quick to anger, loyal, and dangerous. There is little that can stand in her way when she sets out to do something, though she does, on occasion, overextend herself, which is why it’s good that she travels the world adventuring with an diverse oddball collection of friends. Here character sheet can be found here, and her triple lutz fireball attack is legal… once per day. (Except for that pesky Cantrip rule.)