Session 16 - "A Few Days Ride" Report

General Summary

Kona 35, 1246

The party leaves Belamaria, heading along the road towards Karasi, Olena finally comes clean.

She tells the party how she is sick with dreyra, and how she knows of a plant that is supposedly a cure located in the Arvandara Swamp in Dopplefen's river delta. The party is rightly concerned not only about their own safety but for how long Olena can continue to battle off the disease's worst elements. They decide as a group to take a detour to Arvandara before heading on to return Alimony Symphero's body to their Karasan hometown.

As the sun begins to set, the party looks for a place to hole up for the night, eventually settling on a place behind a tall outcropping of stones with their backs to the rock wall. Thais Argyri goes about creating a protective barrier of sharpened sticks, stuck into the ground facing out from them as a matter of self-defense.

Night falls, and the various watches are decided upon. The only one of note is the conversation between Olena and Thais, where Olena thanks Thais for backing her up as she divulged her medical status. Thais accepts, then asks Olena what she will do once she is cured.

Olena admits that she doesn't know, but that it would be nice to be able to touch - no, slap - someone without the fear of killing them by accident. But, she would also love to be able to take a cure back to Valsáth and help her people.

Thais wonders if dreyra, as deadly and difficult to cure as it is, is the result of some curse from the god Reka. Maybe the trouble they've noted on the road so far - particularly the undead creature they fought outside Belamaria - is related as well, seeing as she is a devotee of Syria, Reka's sworn enemy.

There are really no good answers to this question, unfortunately, and the conversation lapses into silence as the fire crackles.

Kona 36, 1246

The next day, Foenix Stolnent decides to make some meat pies in his portable bakery. Olena and Thais decide to help by going out to hunt for suitable meat, and come across a giant elk. Though it does attack and strike Olena in the shoulder with its antlers, leaving gashes in her flesh, the two of them together are able to take it down.

The amount of meat upon the animal is too much for them to hope to take with them, so in addition to the meat pies, Foenix hangs out the rest of the meat on lines to smoke and cure. Each of the party takes five days' worth of rations from the meat on the line, and then an extra five days' each is put in the wagon. The rest is left in view of the road, to be taken by other travelers or passing beasts.

Packing up and continuing along the road, the party comes across a strange person in the forest.

Nominally a water genasi, they seem at once delighted and perplexed by their own body, stating that they've "never looked like this before," and not having a name that they say could be pronounced by the party.

They have a map with them, and state that they have become lost on their way towards the mountains, pointing west towards Valsáth. There are others journeying with them: friends, family, and strangers, but they would not wait for the lost.

When the map is shown to Jacob Sterling, who realizes the map has no cities or paths he can recognize, but instead the key markings are waterways, wetlands, and major seasonal air currents. He points out the correct direction, and though Foenix attempts to attack the genasi (hidden behind Thais in her cloak on horseback), Thais wraps her cloak too tightly around Foeniz for the rogue to get a shot off.

The strange genasi thanks them, and with a comment that "you all like to be rewarded, yes?" gifts Jacob a black pearl.

Then they take out a cape of white feathers from their pack, wrapping it around their body and spontaneously transforming into a white crane to take flight.

They disappear into the clouds above, leaving behind the dumbfounded party in their wake.

Rewards Granted

• a black pearl (500 gp)