Chapter 2: A Tangle of Vines

Ren discovers the first of her shadow gifts as she arises from her meditation on the Abbadon Seed. She's sees Remnants in the shadows, which cause her to flee the room, waking Bonnie and joining Velka in the stables. After calming down, she explains her backstory to the others.
They curl up together, and Bonnie has a dream of stars. A woman's voice (Kalteah?) speaks to her, in motherly tones. She awakes being able to see in the dark.
An owl overhead nods once to Velka, before flying out of the barn.
The cats return, tell Velka that there is a child with the Orcs, that the orcs are fighting, and that several of them are heading towards the town.
Sir Felcar, Knight of the Tower and vassal of Lord Elahad comes through town, denies the claims that there are orcs, and generally acts like a threatening racist piece of shit.
the orcs arrive and ask for aid- their fallen brethren are returning from the dead, and they fear a siege. They have the last scion of the house of Sathorn, Lady Aerona, as a hostage; they were hired by lord Elahad to slay they Baronal house, and did so. (see strongholds and followers)
The PCs have two weeks before war is upon the orcs at Andalbrass, and therefore likely Trent, and must decide what to do. The Sorceresses to the north may have information; the Fey to the south, in the Auld Fen, may be related to the Gardener; and the keep looms, with threats approaching soon.
Olia says that if there is indeed a coup upon the kingdom, she must do something unprecedented. She decides to request that the High Crown intercedes. She says she still has friends in the High Royal House, and she will use an old possession of hers to send a message to them. She does not believe an army detachment will mobilize and arrive in the fortnight they have, but it's the only thing she can think of to do.
The Sorceresses: on the way, they encounter Mother Liadda, the high Priestess of the Shadaren Coven, has seen Velka in her divinations. She seems to know things of the players they only recently discovered themselves. She quotes an old myth or poem. "First there where 3 sisters- the Mother Moon, the Lady of Stars, and the Hidden Sister- the quiet dark between." She knows:
1: The creature that hunts them is indeed called "the Gardener"- she has seen only fragments of foreboding prophecy in her divination about it, and her readings seem to indicate that it may have threatened the area once before, long ago. It seems to tear through the Veil wherever it steps. If she tries to view it through the veil, it inevitably sees her, and she worries for her faithful and the health of the Hidden Lady. She says the creature is like a hole in the world. She has not seen or felt anything like it in three hundred years of walking this world and others. She worries at what that means it could be, based on her knowledge.
2: The Witch of the Fen is very, very powerful. The Witch is a True Fey, more childlike than hoary, an unseelee spirit that largely keeps to herself. She fears, though, that there is something wrong with her. She does not believe the corruption to be her doing, but worries that it may affect her or be using her.
3: Ren is the inheritor of an ancient tradition; the Southern sister to the Shadaren's training. The Shadow Temple was long ago destroyed, but Ren may yet re-discover them. If she wishes to help those afflicted as she, she must seek knowledge and find a way to someday teach it. The sisterhood can help guide her on her path.
4: The Remnants- the creatures that haunt Ren are the Remnants, semi-sentient impressions left upon the veil of powerful beings long ago destroyed. Some are unimaginably ancient. They are not always malevolent, and are drawn to the emotions of those that pull upon the veil or move through it. The dangerous ones are motivated by hunger alone. They came to Ren because of her fear and anguish, and when drawn in to the world lashed out in pain and madness. She has already started to learn how to tread upon the veil more lightly, and the Shadaren can help her learn to dance lightly within it. She should have less trouble with them from here on out.
5: The elves may have records of this creature, and the Dwarves certainly once did, if the creature appeared before.
6: if Bonnie asks about her dream, Liadda names who spoke to her: Kalteah, goddess of the night sky. It seems she has taken a liking to Bonnie.
7: The Sorceresses knew there was some travesty upon the house of the Barony, but did not know the nature beyond treachery.
8: If asked, the Sorcs pledge their aid in the coming battle, as they cannot let those in league with this evil gain the secrets of Andalbrass, They ask a favor in return, though.
9: The Abadon seed seems to be a dark form of a Raenstone Shard. The Raenstones tether the Sitha to the Middeia, using the power of the Veil. The are impossibly ancient. But these seeds seem to tie to somewhere else entirely. Liadda believes they are designed to root this other realm to the world by tearing through the veil. "I worry what tree grows from such a seed..."
10: Destroying the seed: She believes that the Dwarves may have had the knowledge to destroy such things, she suspects, too, that there may be a way to cleanse them, and transform them in to Raenstone shards. The Fey may have the knowledge to do so, but they are tricky to deal with.
Other Sorceresses: Faera, a young woman who guides them to the stone circle.
The Witch of the Fen "You little things are all so kind, in death... No want, no petty desires, no senseless sound. You give and give until you fall apart. It is beautiful. There should be no greater act, for mortals, than to die, than to feed the moss and vines and quiet, peaceful rot. Why do you not see this? Your foolish, selfish souls are a parasite to your true, beautiful forms. Come. Let me make you beautiful. Let me make you soft, and kind, and gentile. Don't worry. You won't care once your silly, loathsome spirit leaves you." The witch, An-Samhach, as she says, looks like a mass of vines and fungi in the shape of a young woman. The flora grows around her in to almost a ballgown-like adornment. Her face is a stark white porcelain mask in the shape of a girl's face, with a perpetuallt placid expression on it. from one eyehole grows as tangle of vines and a massive red-orange flower, and the other is like a hole that reflects stars within. The witch, though initially hostile, chats with the players if they fight their way through her minions. She says she has no use for the worlds of men, but that her brother has returned, though he is different. He still sings to her, but the song is one of a hollow and horrible place. She misses him. "He sends me gifts, you know... how terrible is it, to refuse a gift from your beloved brother? How could I do such a thing? but I fear the dreadful sound his flowers now sing."

Parent Plot

The Roots of Hell