Session 4 (01. 02. 2020)

The rest of the party follows John into the Dancing Grape. At this time of early evening, the tavern is bustling. Making their way through the crowded patrons, they find seats at one of the few empty tables. Maverick notices two muscular figures in an adjacent room going over a map, while Agis, Sophia, and Vasya go to get drinks at the bar- run by a large, beefy-armed woman that they don’t learn the name of. As Vasya hasn’t drank much in taverns before, he takes Sophie’s advice on what to get. John and Cadfan abstain from drinking, and John leaves the tavern to check in at the guardhouse that the group had passed when entering Landow. He reports to the front door guards there about their current mission to Vardona, just alerting them that a squad from Merak is passing through and should be leaving the next day. When he asks to speak to the town’s captain, he is informed that the man is currently asleep, as he often is, but should be available to talk in the morning. With that, he heads back to the Dancing Grape. Inside the tavern, the group talks about activities that usually go on in places like this, with Sophia focusing more on illicit doings and Maverick pointing out how people can have fun here with perfectly legal games. When Vasya looks for something to do besides drink, Maverick suggests arm wrestling, and goes over the ‘proper etiquette’ to introduce yourself for a match. He tells Vasya to go up to the massive bearded man that he had seen in the nearby room and challenge him, to which Vasya agrees. The table is cleared of drinks and the map that the pair had been looking at, and the wrestling begins. Vasya starts off well, being stronger than he looks for having rowed a boat much of his life, but tires quickly in the face of the larger, more combat-experienced man. Maverick uses the distraction to sneak a look at the map, which marked a trail leading from the burnt-down house of Kristina that the group had been at the previous day, to a few other locations around Landow. After winning soundly and accepting Vasya’s bet payment, the large man introduces himself as Klaus, and his partner, the handsome and agile Valdo. The group talks with Klaus and Valdo for a while, and after asking about the map learn that the pair is trying to hunt down the witch hunters who had killed Kristina and her child, and have tracked them to Landow. After some debate over what to do, with John initially wanting to stay out of it, the party agrees to aid Klaus and Valdo in taking on the murderous mob. John places Maverick in charge of this improvised operation in a private conversation about responsibility in their newly acquired room. The rest of the group kill time, as Klaus and Valdo were planning to wait until after nightfall to look for the camp of the witch hunters. Agis leaves the Dancing Grape too, walking anonymously around town to make sure that the guard patrols in Landow were effective and that there was no wanton crime occuring in the streets. He finds the patrols to be sufficient, and returns to watch the common room in the tavern. Cadfan retires early to her and Sophia’s room, drained of energy from the day’s travel and night’s activities, and feeling sick. Now alone at the group’s table, Sophia and Vasya talk about how everyone’s going off somewhere else. Thoroughly drunk, Vasya reveals, after a few jokes, that he had a brother and sister who also served with him on the Eternal River, but who left for other places after the lifestyle didn’t agree with them. Sophia agrees to help Vasya write letters to them, as he never really learned how to. John goes to find Agis, and update him on the plan for Maverick to take point. Agis agrees to stay and watch the road and to follow Klaus and Valdo when they exit, just in case of any hidden threats or suspicious activity on anyone’s part. John then rejoins the others in the Dancing Grape, and when they see Klaus and Valdo leaving the tavern they follow them out. The witch hunter-hunters lead the party down one of Landow’s main streets, passing multiple small parks that line the sides. Vasya gets boisterous, and is encouraged to silence by Sophia. Eventually, the group cuts off onto a side street, being led to Landow’s southern outer wall, where Klaus and Valdo show them a hole that they all pass through. Now outside Landow in an adjacent field, the party tracks the witch hunters to one of the locations where Valdo suspected they might be, at a former logging camp on the northern shore of Lake Landow. Staying surprisingly quiet even with Vasya’s drunkenness, they approach the encampment under the cover of the night. Valdo takes a position with his bow in a nearby stand of trees, and the party spreads out along the path’s edge with Klaus. Two sentries are posted down the path, where it splits off to the main campground. Valdo picks off one with an arrow once everyone is in position, prompting the second one to call for help and beginning a fight. Klaus charges right at the main camp, stopping to finish off the second sentry. Maverick and Agis sneak around the side, down a small embankment and behind piles of discarded equipment and logs. Vasya and John move up as well, leaving Sophia behind them with Valdo as a crowd of crazed, vigilante witch hunters pours from the camp. Maverick puts one to sleep with a spell, only to have him stabbed awake by the camp’s leader, who shouts at Sophia after she throws a sphere of fire, thinking her to be a witch even with all the evidence pointing to the contrary. He charges her, getting past John and Vasya, who is mostly too drunk to hit anything. Klaus continues to carve through people with his greatsword, and Agis rushes across the entire camp to engage a few sentries from the other side after catching a crossbow bolt, alone. Seeing Sophia about to be pummeled by the leader, John is forced to use his previously unseen magic to reposition members of the party, also getting Maverick away from the men that he tried and failed to hide from. Sophia covers Agis’ back from across the camp, slamming the fire sphere around to engulf a few more vigilantes. Vasya and John are able to get the leader on the ground, with Vasya also needlessly encasing himself in magical ice that Klaus and Valdo generally ignore. The leader and Sophia shout profanities at one another, and when he keeps trying to go after her, he is killed by Valdo. Agis easily deals with the multiple opponents he was fighting, and Klaus mops up the rest. The party, injured but still standing, convene in the camp’s center to talk. Valdo searches the leader’s body, finding a locket that belonged to his now deceased wife Kristina, a picture of himself inside. Klaus tears through the tents around the camp, coming up with a book on witchcraft that he hands over to Sophia. Maverick loots the rest of the bodies, getting money, a new-ish set of armor, and woodcarving tools for his trouble. Vasya, still totally intoxicated, stumbles down into the waters of Lake Landow and dips his spear in, causing it to disappear and reappear in his grasp, a strange symbol now inscribed into its thin point. Agis keeps an eye on him to make sure that he doesn’t fall in and drown, and the others speak with Klaus and Valdo about vengeance and what to do next. John is able to locate one of the vigilantes who is still alive, and Sophia stabilizes him with her magic, planning to hand him over to the Landow guard for holding and interrogation. John promises to speak with the guard captain in the morning, and has the exhausted group split up. Agis, Vasya, and Maverick, along with Klaus, make their way back through the hole in the wall, and to the Dancing Grape. John, Sophia, and Valdo take the unconscious vigilante and head for the southern gate of Landow. Identifying themselves to the guards there, John explains the situation and is allowed to enter after they all promise to give statements at the guardhouse in the morning and cooperate fully with the subsequent investigation. They also go back to the tavern, and John talks with Sophia about hiding his magic. She says that she obviously has to report it, but that she would of course give the context for its use- John was saving her life. He thanks her, and tells her a bit more about his past at the military academy. He isn’t just afraid of using his magic because revealing it could get him locked up, but because someone he trusted from back before he became a guard, blackmailed him after he revealed it to them. Sophia thanks him in turn for confiding in her, and promises not to use the information against him like that, citing the excessive effort that would be needed on her part. They separate and prepare for bed. Sophia exits the tavern instead of going to sleep, walking back down through the hole in the outer wall. She intends to go back to the vigilante camp, but is stopped by a voice behind her. Turning, she greets the same man that had applauded the group after they set fire to Cornell’s warehouse in Keld. He tells her that there is nothing of use back in the camp, but that it showed her to be thinking correctly. They talk cryptically for a while, with the man advising her to keep an eye on Vasya and telling her to continue on her present course. They wish each other well, and Sophia retires to the Dancing Grape once again. Vasya drunkenly reaches for Agis, telling him that no one was supposed to die. Agis reassures him, and makes sure he gets to bed. The group goes to sleep for the night.