Session Twenty-One: Counterpoint

General Summary

- 9 of Solas -

Cyrus and Aldous made their way out of the temple flying at full speed. As they exited they saw the large treant from earlier this time unrooted and seemingly stretching. They quickly flew up into the sky and head straight for the clouds. The treant paid them no mind and let them pass. Aldous scanned over the horizon, his view blocked by clouds, and made his way East towards the woods. There he could study this in peace.

Yarrow and Alabaster looked at each other as the temple continued to fill with dirt and rumble, strange shadowy beings slowly drifting towards them. Alabaster ran up with the bag of holding and the two of them bound and gagged Gifu and then put his body in the bag. Maneba pulled the dribbling corpse of their leader into the bag and waited. Alabaster motioned to Yarrow and they started to run, jumping over mounds of dirt and going at full pace to get out of the temple.

As Yarrow and Alabaster made their way out of the temple they looked around. Alabaster shouted in frustration as Cyrus and Aldous were no where to be seen. Yarrow turned and saw Oakheart now standing and moving around. The Tola caught his breath and then waved at the large Treant.

"My bond is broken, Gifu must be dead." Oakheart said while nodding.
"Where'd our friends go? Did you see them leave?" Yarrow asked looking around.
"Yes they did leave but they flew into the clouds above and I did not think to look after them." Oakheart lowered himself to be closer to Yarrow and Alabaster.
"What will you do now?" Oakheart nodded at the question.
"I will go and destroy the Tenders and Ashbarrow for imprisoning me. Then I shall go to the elder trees in the heart of the wood and work on awakening them to help with the Scorched Grove. Eventually the haven of the White Stag will return." Oakheart looked to Yarrow who now appeared a bit flustered.
"Weeeeell, I don't think all the Tenders were bad. With Gifu dead they may be able to help you. They want to help the grove too but they have been trapped by Gifu as well." Yarrow was a bit panicked at the idea of the Treant decimating Ashbarrow.
"I do not wish to work with them. I cannot trust them." Oakheart said sternly. Yarrow nodded.
"Then send someone in your place. Awaken another tree and send them to work with the Tenders!" Oakheart smiled and looked out towards Humblewood.
"Very well. I will start with recruiting the oldest trees of the forest. The Ash Snakes in the Grove are many. Do you wish for transport away from here?" Oakheart lowered one of his hands to the ground.

Meanwhile Aldous and Cyrus were flying Northeast. Aldous wanted to go to the forest line and get as far away as he could to examine the Borealis. The two argued over placement before they agreed to stop in the clearing between the Scorched Grove and the Humblewood forest.

Aldous reached the ground and immediately began to get out his supplies to study the Borealis. Looking around there wasn't as much cover as he wanted but it would have to be fine. "Acceptable." He said as he opened his bag.
"We've strayed too far from them. Can I trust you?" Cyrus asked the Corvum, "You're not going to try and kill me with that staff while we're away from the others are you?" Aldous rolled his eyes.
"I just want a moment with the staff. Besides if I wanted to kill you with this I could do it in front of them. They wouldn't be able to help you anyway." Aldous got out his glasses and started inspecting the artefact.

Oakheart brough Yarrow onto his shoulder and placed Alabaster on one of his lower branches. Alabaster, furious with his abandonment by his friends, began to yell obscenities into the sky as Oakheart began to walk.

"So why are you in Humblewood?" Yarrow asked getting comfortable on the walking tree.
"My earlier statements were no lie. I was coerced into coming in order to help the Scorched Grove. With my particular abilities I thought I would be able to help the grove and bring balance to the spirits of nature. Perhaps I still can if the damage done to me was not too great." Oakheart spoke slow and methodically.
"Why is the grove like this? What's going on?" The Tola started kicking his feet as he listened.
"The world- the world is in balance with its elements and the forces of magic that hold it together. Long ag-"
"STOP! I know most of this, can't you get to the point?" Yarrow said impatiently. The large tree nodded in understanding.
"The elements are out of balance and their anchors to this plane are reacting violently. Something is once again throwing off the balance of magic in the world. Without addressing this root cause the problems will only continue even if there are temporary fixes made." Oakheart became quiet after this and looked to the distance ahead. In the skyline they could see clouds above disturbed by passing bodies. Yarrow pointed out that direction.
"Can you head that way please?" He asked politely. Oakheart shifted course and continued to move. "After we fix the grove and stuff you should go visit my Momma in Meadowfern. There's lots of trees and plants there and I'm sure they'd love to have you visit."

Cyrus looked at Aldous and didn't know what to say. He wanted to say a lot of things but the Corvum was just investigating the staff with a fervor that was unsettling. Cyrus began to wonder why Aldous was so set on an hour of time alone. He wanted to attune to the item. That was the only explanation. After attuning to it he would be able to use it better and that could be dangerous.

"Well, I'm going to go pee." Cyrus said motioning to a large bush over in the distance. "Yep, gotta pee, oh so bad. Might take a while." Aldous waved his talon in the air dismissively. Cyrus ran off and once out of sight he cast Invisibility. Trailing back he tried to be stealthy. Once in Aldous's space he could see that the Corvum was attuning to the object. In a flash he stole the staff from Aldous, the Borealis now floating in mid air away from the Corvum.
"W-what!? Cyrus is that you!? This was not our arrangement!" Aldous yelled furious at the betrayal.
"I can't trust you! I don't want you to attune to this yet! We should go back to the others!" Cyrus was still invisible and keeping the Borealis just out of Aldous's reach.
"What do you mean you can't trust me! Just trust me! I don't want to go back to our to the team THEY NEVER LET ME STUDY THINGS!!!" Aldous was furious. The Borealis was in his grasp and so much could be gained from it.
"They'll let you study it! We just need to go to them! This staff is dangerous!" Cyrus was beginning to panic.

Oakheart reached the clearing still a good distance from Aldous and Cyrus. Yarrow asked to be let off and that they would catch up later. Oakheart nodded and began his way into the forest. Yarrow quickly changed into the White Stag and Alabaster hopped onto his back. The two then made their way towards their runaway friends.

Once within a decent distance they could see that Aldous was yelling at the staff which was floating. They assumed it was Cyrus and began to strategize. They wanted to remain hidden and approach them. Alabaster began to dig underground making a long tunnel towards them. Yarrow hid amongst the brush using Druidcraft to make the grass give him more cover.

Aldous and Cyrus were far too busy arguing to give any heed to their surroundings. Yarrow cast Ensnaring Strike on a rock and tossed it at Aldous. Vines grew from the rock and they quickly entangled Aldous. The shock and tightness of the vines made Aldous pass out almost immediately. Alabaster popped out from underground and Cyrus became visible again.

Alabaster yelled at Cyrus for leaving them behind while Yarrow tied up Aldous. Yarrow cast Goodberry and put one in Aldous's mouth. Aldous quickly woke up.

"I don't like this staff. It's too dangerous." Cyrus said holding the Borealis, his paws growing colder.
"We need it to fight the fire" Alabaster said with a sneer.
"Let's throw it in the ocean. Just get rid of it." Yarrow turned to Cyrus and stood up the light catching his antlers. "I have a sacred mission. We need that to help the grove."
"I have a sacred 25 hit points to work with" Cyrus jeered at the Tola.
"We just need trust between us." Yarrow said with a smile. Alabaster scoffed, "We have trust, all of us except Aldous."
Cyrus moved over and untied Aldous, "We all need to trust each other. It's time for a group talk! Group therapy because we fucking need it!" Aldous got up and moved to speak. It looked like he had a lot on his mind. Yarrow picked up a stick and pointed it at him.
"This is a talking stick. You can't talk unless you have this! Okay." Aldous moved to speak again and Cyrus put his finger on his beak. Yarrow handed the stick to Cyrus.
"What do we need to do to build trust? This is our main concern right now." Yarrow raised his hand and Cyrus passed the stick to him.
"We could take blood oaths." The rest of the party looked concerned for a moment and then Alabaster raised his paw.
"You could stop fucking running away. That would help a bunch!" Alabaster looked right at Aldous.
"You didn't need me! Everything was fine, besides I needed time to look at the staff before you stole it from me!" Cyrus smacked Aldous in the arm. "You don't have the stick! What do you need to build trust Aldous?" Aldous sighed and held out his talon for the stick.
"I want to examine the Borealis to learn more about the Great Calamity. I just don't want any more research materials to be taken away from me." The group nodded and Aldous looked to Yarrow.
"I'm fine with you having the Borealis. We need to know what it does so we can help the grove. I'll let you keep it on one condition. You have to do me a favour later. It won't be life threatening but you have to agree to do it." Aldous nodded and the two shook hands. A faint magical energy exchanged across their paws.
"Now that that's all settled we should get Gifu out of the bag." Alabaster said calmly making Cyrus and Aldous jump up. "Gifu's in the bag! Why?" Yarrow held up the stick.
"Gifu had a ring like the other ones we found. When we took it off of him his body went comatose but he's not dead." Alabaster moved to dump out Gifu's body and Cyrus stopped him.
"Wait, let's make camp first. We don't want someone to see us if we can help it." Alabaster nodded and then had an idea.
"I was so angry at Aldous that I dug all the way here. With the ground the way it is we could probably make an underground camp." The group looked at Alabaster and Yarrow smiled.
"I can use Mold Earth to reinforce the walls too! That'll give us lots of cover!" Both Alabaster and Yarrow began digging as Cyrus and Aldous looked on.

The group got to work quickly on digging camp. The sun was beginning to set behind the trees. Alabaster and Yarrow built two rooms and two entrances. One room was for the Borealis since it made the surrounding area so much colder. The other was for people to sleep in. Cyrus moved some shrubbery over each entrance to camouflage them. Once they were done they had some air flow and an underground campsite.

Alabaster dumped out Gifu's body along with Maneba. Maneba watched as the group looked over Gifu's body. Aldous cast Detect Thoughts and focused on Gifu. Nothing. He dug deep and found no resistance. Deep inside Gifu's mind were a few memories of Gifu as a child. Playing in the forest and hugging a friend. Aldous turned his attention to the ring and tried to read the ring with detect thoughts. Nothing.

Alabaster cast identify on the ring. Try as he might the ring guarded itself from divination magic. Aldous made a motion to take Gifu's body and the party resisted. Yarrow wanted to keep the body in case Gifu could be healed whereas Aldous wanted to practice Necromancy.

Meanwhile Cyrus and Albaster went through more of Gifu's things. Gifu had a note from Mordane the librarian and notes from a meeting with Bita the council speaker. Looking through more of his pack they also found two healing potions and a seal for the bird council.

Alabaster used Sending and sent to Bonda

"We are heading to you tomorrow news about Gifu. I need to talk to you alone when we get there don't talk about this danger."

"Ugggh, fine, I will meet you with Tender Taru and we will discuss this. I will not discuss this with anyone else. Make Haste."

The group made their plans to return to Ashbarrow tomorrow with Gifu's body. Hopefully Bonda could help them.

Report Date

17 Jun 2020