Session 64: See the Forest Through the Trees Report

General Summary

The morning came, everyone still feeling a bit shocked at the sudden loss of their friend Cigfran . Filled with much confusion, and noticing the sun was rising too early. The first, and most confusing thing was the sun. It should be late Nightglow; but the sun was rising as though it was still Blazing. The trees around were in full summer foliage. Something was wrong with the time. Roy did get drunk last night; did they all travel in time?

Roisin Marshfield opened the door, and saw a mid-teen youth standing outside, clearly waiting for them to awaken. Startled, the young woman jumped, and asked if she could assist. Roisin Marshfield asked the date, and the youth answered that it was 31 Blazing, two days before the Truthsong festival and the beginning of the Dance Song festival marking the end of Summer. This represented almost six months of time difference, perhaps more. The group wondered what year it was, having neglected to ask initially, and meandered around all sorts of wild theories before someone thought to simply ask. Some time later, the youth from before arrived, with a few additional mid-teen youths, carrying the breakfast. They asked the date again, and this time thought to ask the year, finding that they had, somehow, spent close to 6 months less time than they thought traveling through the badlands. So much less time that it was now two months before they had left Triliobarn in mid Embers; Roy warned that they should be very careful not to return that direction for a while, to ensure they did not somehow meet themselves and create very unpleasant magical side effects.

Attention now turned to creating a disguise for Roisin Marshfield; Jeeves imagining that a costume disguise might enable Roisin Marshfield to pass through the region unnoticed. While the disguise created, with quite a bit of effort, was sufficient to distract the average person, it soon became clear that there was no way to disguise Roisin Marshfield from highly perceptive individuals. Jeeves also suddenly remembered leaving thousands of gold worth of alchemical reagents and other rare supplies behind somewhere in the wilderness, and spent a bit of time cursing his forgetfulness. The group started discussing all manner of strange or fanciful approaches to hiding their identities, but their absolute absence of skill with duplicity and deception showed as they began discussing code names like Beauregard or Sir Temoris, and generally planned something more akin to a stage play than a life-or-death deception. Eventually, Roy managed to bring some sanity to the discussion, and Jeeves though more soberly. They all quickly realized that disguising her companions was beyond anything less than powerful magic. It would be highly improbable that anyone could possibly miss Jeeves ' ten foot neck or Roy 's severely disfigured appearance. Trying to hide, and failing, would create vastly more interest, than just letting themselves be noticed and know for who they are.

The group put the disguise away for another time, and Roisin Marshfield leaned out the door to ask who ruled in the city. Roisin Marshfield learned that her aunt and uncle had left, also her older sister Aoife and her older brother Rian had ascended to the green throne late in K74R. Roisin Marshfield closed the door and turned back to her companions with an expression both nervous and disgusted, and informed them that they might have some difficulty in this city. When Roisin Marshfield mentioned possibly leaving via the window, Jeeves glanced out and noticed a large troop of guardsmen standing below in the forest livery of Arenfell, a fact that caused Roisin Marshfield to begin to panic. After gathering their posessions, they reopened the door and found two guardsmen in gleaming plate waiting to escort Roisin Marshfield downstairs. When her companions tried to stay with her the guardsmen simply stated "behind us". Downstairs, Roisin Marshfield found the Seneschal of her Aunt and Uncle's court, a dear, very old, friend, someone she always called "Uncle Corwyn", and Roisin Marshfield hugged the old man fondly. The old man mentioned that things were "different" after her siblings took the throne, a slight shudder of horror crossing his features. He then whispered in her ear to "Cross the river to Sudafell, and for The Source' sake don't come back. They know you're here, and you have... Maybe 10 minutes. My dear, I won't be seeing you again. Goodbye". Roisin Marshfield noticed the man weeping in sadness as he turned away, and signaled to the soldiers. The soldiers formed to block the road, leaving a clear path to the bridge leading across the Ardenford gap, above the Louk rapids, to Sudafell, which was cleared of the normal traffic to allow them to pass. Once the party had crossed the bridge, the soldiers moved aside and the heavy morning traffic across the bridge resumed. Boris looked back, and observed an horrific event as the old man, Corwyn, was beheaded at the instruction of a couple of halflings carried in a curtained van. The head was delivered quickly to the female who drained the blood from it before the couple began to engage in an even more disturbing act. Boris, unable to resist the horror, vomited violently into the street before encouraging the group to move away at a brisk pace. The group quickly found themselves in a dusty, dirty, city build almost entirely of adobe structures. The contrast between the desert city and the green forest city only a mile away across the gorge was startling. After Boris spent a minute in prayer and silence to recover from what he had seen, and Roisin Marshfield shed a few tears for her friend, they noticed nobody had crossed the bridge. As they commented on this a passerby laughed "The council runs this town, it's why the stupid scum from across the gorge can't come here". Paying the man a few silver, as it seemed the locals were unusually mercenary, they got directions to the market square. They found themselves very grateful for the directions as the city seemed purpose built to ensure anyone not native would become instantly and hopelessly lost. Choosing to browse the massively crowded open air market that consumed a full square kilometer of the city, they spent much of the rest of the day browsing the wares, purchasing needed supplies, and sampling all manner of exotic street food. Eventually, they ordered some items for Boris (Gem encrusted bowls, and a sunburst pendant), and also spent substantially all of their ready cash on a combination of spell components and consumable magical preparations.

Much better supplied, and vastly less wealthy, the party turned their attention now to finding a place to spend the night as the thousand or more merchants packed up their blankets and tents, leaving the vast square almost completely empty as dusk fell. Heading toward the edge of the square, Jeeves noticed movement in a dark corner nearby. Looking in that direction, Jeeves was shocked to see a familiar face; his old friend and mentor Carver. There, in an alley leading off the square, Jeeves saw this individual he knew as a gentle healer, standing over an obviously, and viciously, mutilated corpse.