Session 2 - Mysterious Apples
General Summary
17 Planting, 498 TA
As the party finished their meals and rested from the travels. Since there was still an hour or so of daylight light, Jilken expressed interest in getting a closer look at the waterfall and the shrine. Denye reminded everyone, “We do still need to go to the village hall and see the mayor.” The rest of the party agreed to both destinations, but decided to head to the shrine first.As they neared the waterfall and small pool, the sound of splashing water blending soothingly with the sounds of the birds singing the sun to bed beyond the western mountains. Passing the small tree house and entering the grove, the party was met by a small gnome woman, dressed in loose green and brown robes with a silver chain around her neck, her holy symbol hanging below. She greets the group warmly, “Strangers! And what has brought you to our peaceful grove on such a fine day?” She introduces herself as Dem Nackle, “but you can call me Corkie….everybody does.”
Jilken was entranced by the waterfall, here was so much water just flowing along the ground….and it was beautiful and hard to look away from. With a quick, half-hearted glance over her shoulder at the gnome she said, “Hi Corkie. What, umm, can you tell me about this place?”
Corkie replied, “Oh this waterfall and pond are sacred to the Lady Eldath, Mistress of Flora, Fauna, and Fall. This once was a healing spring, it’s waters a curative for most ailments. But those powers are long faded, now it is just pure, fresh water. Still, it is both useful and beautiful and I thank the Lady everyday for my home.”
“Beautiful,” murmured Denye.
“Would you all like to have a cup of water? Perhaps Eldath will offer a blessing, but at the very least the water is sweet and refreshing,” offered Corkie. Jilken quickly spoke for the group in accepting the offer and Corkie handed her a dipper to pass around.
Jilken hesitantly approached the pool and gathered a dipper of clear water. Holding it up, she gave a cheer of “Never no thirst” and swallowed the water with a look of joy. Passing the dipper around,the others all drank. It was cool and sweet, with just the hint of minerals.
Corkie took the dipper back with a smile and said, “So what bring you to our small town? I doubt it was this simple place…though I am glad of your visit.”
“We’ve heard that you’ve been having problems with goblins.”
Corkie looked puzzled for a moment, “Oh you mean the tribe that lives to the south. I really don’t know what has made them so aggressive. They lived there peacefully for years.
I’ve lived here for about 15 years and for most of that time they haven’t been a problem. Sure, a farmer would lose a goat or a farmwife might find her best blanket stolen from the line, but nothing like the last winter. For the last ten years the goblins, three of them anyway, used to come into town every year, right around midsummer. They would bring a single apple to sell. But this was a perfect apple, bright red, juicy and sweet. More than that however any one who ate at least half was cured of any disease or ailment they might be suffering from. But they haven’t come the last two years…and I doubt we will see them this year either.”
As Corkie paused and took a deep breathe, Denye said, “Two years you say, maybe something happened to their food supply?”
With another deep breather, Corkie was off again, ”Funny you should mention growing. Every single villager who has ever bought an apple planted any seeds from it. It never hurts to try and grow your own….I mean this is a magic apple. But anyway, none of the plants ever seemed to grow right. They always grew into this mass of twigs and small branches with no discernible trunk. Even stranger, all of them have disappeared before they get about 1-2ft high. Most people think it’s the goblins stealing them so the village can’t have it’s own magic apple tree. I’m not so sure, I always got a feeling of darkness and malevolence near one of the plants.”
“Maybe something has happened to their trees and that’s why they have been raiding,” suggested Denye.
Corkie just shook her head, “I know not. But if you are going down into their caves to take a look, if you could, if you could help them...that would be wonderful. They aren’t really all that bad as neighbors, as long as you stay upwind.”
“Can we get a waterskin of blessed water from the shrine?” asked Denye. “As an offering, perhaps it would be useful for dealing with the goblins.”
With a smile Corkie’s face brightened, “Of course my dear, do you have a waterskin that I can fill? No, then I shall run up to my treehouse and fetch one, I shall return momentarily.” And with that she darted off quickly and then returned just as quickly holding a waterskin. Moving to the edge of the pond, she knelt and filled the waterskin. Bending over it she said a small blessing to Eldath and touched her holy symbol to it. With that Corkie stood and brought the waterskin over to Denye. “Here you are dearie, may this be a boon when all wells run dry.”
“Thank you,” said Denye. “What kind of offering should I make in return?”
“Whatever your heart tells you is right,” replied Corkie. “Water is meant to be shared, water binds us all together.”
Bowing her beak over her bag, Denye counted out two gold pieces, “For the waterskin at least.”
Slipping the coins into her pocket seemed to remind Corkie of something. Pulling out 3 vials of a pinkish liquid, she held them toward Jilken. “One of the herbalists in Wexwood occasionally sends me healing potions. The midwife and I are really the only healers of any kind out here. I had a vision telling me to set a few aside because someone would be coming through who would need it. Take these with Eldath’s blessing and my own.”
With sheepish grin Jilken takes the potions and while Corkie is standing next to her Jilken surreptitiously slipped a few coins into Corkie’s pocket.
With a final round of the thanks, the party heads back towards the Inn now that the sun has set. Arriving back at the tavern, they find that the common room has filled as the townfolk come in after finishing the day’s work.
Garon greets the party as they enter and approach the bar. Janora approached Garon about renting a couple of rooms for the night. Garon takes a quick look and says, “I have two rooms still open. They can be yours for a gold piece each.” Janora agrees and the party hands over the requisite two gp. With a hearty thank you, Garon drops the coins into his apron and pulls two large iron keys out. “Here ya’ll are, the rooms are at the top of the stairs, first doors to the left and right.”
The party takes the keys and after a moment’s conversation on who would share whom, the party went upstairs to drop off their gear before heading back downstairs to gather more information from the townsfolk.
Taking a table in one of the corners of the room, the party looks around to see who looks like they would be amenable to talk. Shortly after sitting down, a youngish boy, probably the son of the innkeeper. After discussing some drinks and food the boy ran off to gather the provisions. When he brings over the food, Jilken asks if there is anyone around who knows anything about local history. He replied that his Pa (Garon) would be the best to ask. Jilken thanks him and he runs off to care for other patrons.
“So the goblins used to come every year, then they stop for almost two years and now they show back up acting all aggressive,” Jilken says to the groups.
Ell nods, “That does seem very suspicious.”
“I wonder if anything around here has changed in the last two years or maybe even the year prior to that,” Jilken continued. “Seems like we should ask around, maybe something happened to cause this shift in behaviour.”
Denye put in, “If they went from having more apples to not enough, that would certainly make folks mean.” Janora agreed, “That could well be. I also wonder how the lack of apples is treating the town here. It’s worth asking about.” With that, Janora stood up and picked up their drink, walked over to another table, sat down, threw their arm over the shoulder of the man next to them and said, “So how are you doing handsome?”
This older farmer (late 70’s, bald pate covered in liver spots, and with only a few teeth left, looking little confused, turns and with a quick glance up and down to check Janora out, smiles back and says, “I’m doing right well, how you doin?”
After some flirting back and forth, Janora discovered that it was only one apple per year that goblins would bring to town. Returning to the rest of the party, they shared this knowledge. “If they were only bringing one apple a year, it doesn’t really seem likely that they are experiencing a decrease in supply. Unless whatever tree it was is dead.”
Jilken finished her cider and walking back up to the bar waited a moment for Garon to walk over. After negotiating another drink, she asked Garon what he knows about some of the local history.
Garon replied, “No, nothing major. Things have been fairly quiet the last couple of years. Well up until the goblins started attacking things.” He stops and wrinkles his nose a bit, “I have heard lately about some of the farmers and trappers who are claiming some kind of monster is hunting their livestock. No one has actually seen this monster, just the animals, dead in the field, covered in hundreds of marks like needles punctures.”
Jilken asks if there is anyone here in the bar who had found one of these dead beasts. After a quick scan of the room Garon says no. Jilken then asked if he could think of anyone they might talk to on the way out of town. Garon said he’d think about it and Jilken went back to the table while Garon went on to serve some of the other guests.
Back at the table, Denye is entranced with the quality of the bread. Regaling Janora and Ell with descriptions of the butter, the honey, and the bread she becomes oblivious to everything else happening in the bar. She was so into her story that she didn’t even see Jilken sit back down. Ell on the other hand did and makes big eyes at Jilken to share what she’s found out and stop the bread chatter. Jilken obliged and told the party about this new threat which had been killing beasts in the area.
Shaken out of her grain reverie, Denye listens to this description and tries to think if it was something she had ever heard of before. It doesn’t ring any specific bells, but it does sound like some kind of twisted magical creature. “Maybe that explains the apples and seeds as well...some kind of magic got in and changed the plants? I’m nowhere near the Canopy Library, if I were home I could probably look it up.”
About that point, the young server boy came by and refilled drinks. With a smile for Jilken he said, “Pa said you should talk to Simaran Lorafiel. He's got a farmstead south of the village. Take the Ol’ South Road about 5 miles till you get to the crossroad and head east. Simaran’s farm is about 3-4 miles down the road.
With that last bit of information, Janora says that they were ready for bed, “We’ll deal with the mayor in the morning and then perhaps check out this farm.” The rest of the party agreed and they all headed up to their rooms for the night.
18 Planting, 498 TA
Gathering in the common room the next morning, the party begins to plan their day. Garon offers some breakfast and so they dine on bacon and eggs, bread and cheese.Janora opens with “So clearly the Village Hall is our first stop, but after that it looks like everything is out of town. Is that correct?”
Denye quickly nodded, “Yes the hall is first, then Simaran’s farm, and on to the citadel.” As she was saying that, Garon walked up with the food. “Good, so my boy told you about Simaran. I hope he can help you.” Ell leaned forward and asked, “I think we’re going to talk to the mayor first. What can you tell me about him?”
“He’s a pompous ass,” was Garon’s quick reply. “He don’t even come into the tavern anymore to drink, swaggering around in his mayoral sash, bossing folks around.”
Ell smiled, “Oh, how long has he been mayor?”
Garon thought for a moment, “Seems like 20-30 years. No one else wants the job….it’s not like he does anything useful anyway, just handles the doomsday book and reports back to Wexwood. The clerk handles all the taxes so at least we know he isn’t skimming money.”
“Well he sounds lovely, let’s go meet this wonderful gentleman,” quipped Janora. With that they paid the tab and got ready to head out.
As everyone was standing to go, Kerowyn Hercule appeared in the doorway. “Oh good, you haven’t left yet. I was up all night thinking about you. I baked you these.” With a small smile she hands a basket to Ell, “Sausage buns and some lovely seed cakes.” Kerowyn takes one of the seed cakes out and hands it to Denye, “Here you are my dear, I made these just for you. It’s my own special recipe. I’m sure you will enjoy them.” Denye ducked her head as Kerowyn hands it to her, but begins to make small appreciative sounds as she nibbled on the sweet treat.
With a final look at each of our adventures, Kerowyn lets out a small sigh, “Well, I’m sure you have much to do, I won’t hold you. Good luck, and please bring back word of my grandchildren if you can.” With that, she turned to speak to Garon for a moment and the party took the opportunity to slip outside and head across the square to the Village Hall.
The front door of the hall was open and as the party entered, they found a large meeting room. In the back along the north wall was another door with a small desk next to it. No signs of any people, although the sounds of snoring could be heard through the back door.
Ell looks at everyone with a look of disbelief at the snoring and then loudly clears his throat as he forcefully closed the front door. At the sound of the slamming door, the snoring choked off and a moment later a man in his late 50’s emerged. Dressed in red silks, stained and a little threadbare, his paunch was easy to see as it strained the maltreated fabric. Mostly bald, with just a few greasy strands of hair combed over, he walked with a pronounced limp in his left leg. He shouts, “What do you want? Waking me this early in the day, this had better be important.”
“You were sleeping,” chirped Denye.
“Of course I was sleeping. It’s only a little after sunrise. Why would I be up this early,” roared the man turning to glare at the unusual Corva.
Janora interjected, “Take a breath, we mean you no harm. We were sent here by Watcher Gelestro.”
With a huff and a sniff, the mayor walked over to the meeting table and pulled out a chair. “Oh so he finally decided to send someone to deal with the nuisances. Well, I hope you have better luck than the last person who thought he could handle it.”
After some frustrating back and forth, the party learned that the goblins had once brought another type of apple, one midwinter about five to eight years back. This apple was ghostly white and the skin appeared slightly wrinkled. One of the jail guards bought it on a dare. He took one bite and fell over dead! Asking what had happened to the body and the apple, Janora was incensed to learn that they had buried the apple along with the body.
Ell stepped in and tried to charm the mayor a bit, but it didn’t seem to have much of an effect. Janora, fed up with this annoying man, slams their staff on the ground with a loud growl as the lights being to dim, “Anything else you are ‘forgetting’ to tell us?”
Getting very little else from the mayor other than the citadel was once home to a dragon cult, the party walked out in disgust. Gathering in the square, Denye asks, “So where did they bury that different apple.”
“That’s a good question,” replied Janora. They turned, looking around the square for one of the village dogs. Not seeing one, they tapped their staff on the ground, letting out a small woof. With an answering woof, a small black and white mongrel comes running out of the blacksmith’s shop.
Getting down on one knee, Janora reached out one hand, “Hey there, could you answer a couple of questions for me?” The dog for its part was sniffing warily and didn’t respond at first. They pulled out one of the fresh sausage rolls, broke it in half and tossed it to the dog, “Here you might like this. I have more if you will answer my questions.”
With a loud bark of “Food!” the dog gobbled up the treat. Looking at Janora he said, “More food? Yummy!” Janora smiled back, “There will be if you answer my questions. Can you show us where they bury the dead people? As they spoke, the dogstaff translated it into a series of yips and barks.
The dog sits on his rear for a moment and scratches behind his ear for a moment. “Graveyard, all the best bones are there. I show you.”
Janora looked up at the others, who had been staring at the scene before them. “I think I’ve found us a guide.” The party retrieved their horses from the stable at the inn and followed the dog out the southern gate and along the western wall to a small cemetery nestled between the town wall and the cliffs to the northwest.
Janora jumped off their mount and scratched the dog’s ear, while feeding him the other half of the sausage roll. “Who’s a good boy? You wouldn’t be able to sniff around and let me know if any of the graves smell wrong, would you? I’ve got more sausage rolls.”
With a leap the dog took off sniffing around the few dozen plots in this small graveyard, taking a moment to mark one or two in passing. After working his way around, he came back to Janora and sat down waiting for his reward, “Smells like grass, rabbits too!”
With a laugh and another head scratch Janora feeds him another sausage roll and sends him back to town. After watching the dog depart, Janora attempted to use the dogstaff to fetch the unique white apple, but nothing happened.
Denye stepped forward and performed a ritual to cast Detect Magic to see if she could sense anything. After completing the spell she spent a few minutes walking among the tombstones, but did not find anything either.
Janora let out a small sigh, “Well folks it looks like we’ve hit the dead end. Perhaps we should move on? If we get more information, maybe we can come back and have another look.” With small groans at the pun, the party mounted and turned their horses back to the Old South Road heading for the crossroads that would take them to the Lorafiel farm.
Nearing the crossroad, Denye heard some rustling in the nearby brush, but didn’t see a source.The dogstaff, however, took that moment to start issuing a low warning growl. Janora stopped their horse, “There’s something out there.”
“Oh there are, I heard a, I thought it was just birds, there was a rustling.” Denye added.
With a distracted look, Janora replies, “No there is definitely something out there, he only does this when there is danger.” Sliding off their horse they moved to the side of the road to get a better look at the bushes, but nothing obvious was in sight. “Anybody see anything, he’s never lied.
“I thought I heard, but it was only for a moment,” Denye said, scanning the bushes near Janora. As Janora turned to rejoin the others, Denye saw one of the dead bushes move and then leap at Janora’s back. She recognizes that they are some sort of evil magical clorafiend. Pointing a talon over Janora’s shoulder, she squeaked “Behind you!”
Janora whips back around, bringing the dogstaff down onto it’s head, shattering whatever it was into a pile of kindling. Stepping up to the remains, Janora looks down at the twigs, trying to identify the creature. Stooping down, they pick up one of the twigs and put it in their pouch.
Meanwhile, Denye studied the monsters for a moment, let out a satisfied chirp, “These look like they would burn quite well.” With a quick twist of her talons and a magic word or two, another one of the monsters went up like a candle, a pillar of flame almost 5 ft high. Moving back to the far side of the road, she put her back against a large pine tree...not to mention putting Jilken between herself and the other monster. As Denye reached the tree, a loud howl came echoing down the road.
The remaining Twig Blight rushed at Jilken, taking a swipe with its wooden talons, but her armor was good and the talons splintered on the breastplate.
Moving back up the road, Ell attempted to use Create Bonfire, but the blight had seen what had happened when someone pointed and dodged out of the way.
Annoyed at this thing that had tried to attack her, Jilken shoves her spear through the bonfire at it but again it manages to dodge. Lashing out with her dagger, she caught it across one shoulder and tore the thing in two.
As the party took a moment to catch their breath and discuss that howl, a large Worg came loping down the road the party had just traveled. Janora simply pointed their staff at it and mentally sent the Command “STOP.” The worg, for its part, immediately dropped it’s hindquarters to the ground with a confused but sullen growl. Impressed, but still a bit wary of the animal the rest of the party waited to see what else Janora could do.
As Janora walked closer, the worg gave a shake of its massive head and stood back up glaring and snarling at them. “Hello friend, who are you? What are you looking for?”
Saliva dripping from its jaws, the worg snarled back, “Hunting. Smelled meat. Two leg meat good.”
Janora gave a little nasty smile and asked, “Where do you come from?”
“From the snow,” was the snarled reply.
Lifting the dogstaff once more, Janora pointed at the worg and sent another command, “then by all means GO.”
With a sharp twist of the beast’s head it turned around and started running up the road and into the forest at almost twice the speed it had used coming up behind the party. Lowering the staff Janora turned to the rest of the group. “Sorry everyone, I can’t kill a dog if there is another way.”
Jilken let out a small laugh, “Easier than cleaning out teeth wounds.”
“That is pragmatic and I like it,” said Janora with a smile. “Shall we get on our way before anything else jumps out at us.” Agreeing whole-heartedly the rest of the party waited for Janora to remount and they headed southward continuing their interrupted journey. Arriving at the crossroads in only a matter of minutes, the party turned east and headed for the Lorafiel farm.
