i thought i would go to see the local bazaar and maybe the university
instead "krayg" – someone spark does freelance work for – asked us to run a little errand for him
this involved taking a skyboat to where we could take a waterboat to a long-abandoned lumber camp called "ringbriar" so we could recover some lost goods or at least some info about another team hired by house cannith to do the same
(medya decided to stay behind to sing for coin)
when we got there we found out that just because all the mill workers are gone doesn't mean the spells powering the equipment are so we had to fight off some very confused sawblades
then we met that other group but two of them were hurt pretty bad and one had fallen in combat and they just wanted to leave before it got worse
all we had to do was clear out the three angry corrupted chitin-plated acid-dripping bears that mauled them
i really didn't want to have to fight wild animals but they were dangerous and clearly suffering so it was our only choice
zer' did something impressive to launch one of the bears over the river to where it couldn't get at us
i guess that was a big inspiration to one of the other bears because they swatted zer' hard enough to send him into the third story of the mill through a window which scared a bunch of giant bats off
don't worry he was mostly fine
we had to ... dispatch ... the other two bears but then we recovered the case of lost goods
it's a shame we have to return it because i can think of about two thousand uses for alchemically pure copper and tin and such
but we were able to salvage some other interesting items including some potions of unknown effect that i'll study once i get the chance
and a pair of "kaleidoscope spectacles" that spark seemed to enjoy
we regrouped at the boat
i was only a little scratched up but zer' patched me up with his "psionics"
then bell and i fixed up the other forged
i don't want them getting hurt but i'll admit i'm glad for the opportunities to learn more
it's a respected tradition for artists and healers to study anatomy by watching surgeries or autopsies and i'm super grateful that these folks are okay with it
let's not hurry into the autopsies just yet though okay?
we also had a long session of actually talking to each other and it turns out there's more to this group than i thought
every pony has a brand of destiny related to their greatest talent or inner nature
some fraction of the beings here have what they call a "dragonmark" which is a scribbly glyph that doesn't look like anything but relates to magical ability in a similar way
apparently forged never have them
except for relic
so that's interesting
it gets better
back when spark left their monastery they were gifted a fighting staff with a gem embedded in a knot at one end
they handed it to relic and it started to hum and glow red then the color of his dragonmark changed from blue to slightly violet and that had never happened to him before
just a coincidence?
i don't know about your world but ask any mage from mine and they'll tell you this
coincidences are merely the grace notes to harmony