Session 43 - A Chance to Breathe

General Summary

39 Amberspell - Contd.

Denye and Ell were the first to arrive at Aburgine's and stepping though the Haven door found themselves transported to wherever the magical shop truly stood. The fantastical interior of the shop was empty and as the pair neared the central area, there was a sharp bang and whitish smoke wafted out of the hidden workroom. Pushing aside the curtain, the copper dragonborn stumbled out coughing lightly. When he noticed Denye and Ell, Aubergine gave them a big smile before heading in their direction and greeting them.

Denye smiled in return, "It has been sometime and I have some exciting news, but that sounded bad. Do you need help with whatever you were doing?"

"No no no," said the dragonborn, waving his hands, "Just a little experiment I was working on, a touch too much crushed phosphorus in the mixture. I'll get it right eventually, and it's nothing vital so it will keep. Tell me what have you been up to since you left here and went down to Arborlisle Harbor?"

Denye laughed, "Quite a lot actually. After I left you and went to study with Master Bluff, I spent some time working with Master Waverider and then Ell sent a call for help." The Corva wizard waves a hand at Ell, "Just lately, I've been helping him deal with some...family issues. So yeah, we're in town for a bit. The others should be along shortly, Janora needed to speak with the Candlewicks, I think it was, but we were meeting here."

Aubergine smiled at that, "Oh excellent, I may have a few things of interest. Maybe even one or two that you haven't seen, Denye. And how are you today, young Master Ell?"

Ell lifted a shoulder in a shrug, "Well, the last couple of weeks have been a bit challenging, but I've got some good friends who are helping me keep on track." Suddenly remembering something Ell began rummaging through a pack, "I actually have something for you, we found it after stopping that Master Dark. I was supposed to bring it down and have you look at it, but I got swept up in other business. Here it is." Pulling the wrapped bundle of cloth out of the bag, the warlock quickly unwrapped it it. Instead of the sickly yellow stone that had been recovered from the necrotic ritual, all that remained was a bit of thick, sludgy goo.

Both Denye and Ell were a bit nonplussed about the melting stone, but explained it thoroughly to Aubergine as the dragonborn listened with interest. He took the cloth and scrapped the goo into a vial, promising to have a look at it.

Remembering another question she had had, Denye asked, "Do you know of any place in town were I could get some crafting done, particularly metal casting? We found another of those ancient pistols, but it is broken. I am going to need to get a few pieces made, but I'm fairly sure I can get it working again."

"Ah," said Aubergine with a broad grin, "You should try Black & White Crafting over by the docks. Spark does excellent work, particularly small, fine metal work. But you found a broken pistol? May I examine it?"

"Of course," chirped Denye, who pulled out a small bundle and unrolled it on the counter. The dragonborn had just enough time to examine the device and ask one or two questions before Jilken, Janora, and the others made their way into the magical shop. Both Vellikar and Ranunkel were rubber-necking around, impressed by the grandiosity and spectacle of the Celestial Dragon.

After greetings and introductions were taken care of Aubergine began to display his various wares. He had a number of potions, and the party bought him out of healing potions. They also picked up new weapons for Tear of Midnight Sorrow and Vellikar as well as an odd wand of giggles.

Thanking Aubergine the party left the shop, and found themselves once more on the streets of Haven. Denye wanted to head over to Black & White Crafting, and for various reasons of their own the others joined her. Heading over to the docklands, they soon found the smithy. It proved to be a large shop, split into two workspaces with a counter and display racks defining the customer area.

Spark, or more properly Spark of the Forge Black, was a whitesmith who specialized in casting and other detail metal work. When Denye explained what she was after and displayed the broken pistol the small goblin smith was interested. After she demonstrated the working pistol, he was hooked. Drawing the Corva over to a worktable, the pair quickly began molding and shaping wax into the shapes Denye had drafted.

While they worked, the rest of the party looked over the various goods for sale and spoke with Grathroc Whitestone, a dwarven fellow and Spark's husband. Ell picked up a new breastplate for Tear of Midnight Sorrow and Janora got a fine micromail shirt that could be worn under the leather armor.

By the time Denye and Spark had finished, the sun was a finger length from the horizon and Ell cheerfully let them back to the manor house and a warm supper. As they entered Ms. Crislock greeted them, "Ah Master Ell, I do hope you enjoyed your day out in the city with your...friends. A messenger from the palace delivered a note for you this afternoon."

"From the palace?" asked Ell. Giving a little shrug he added, "Thank you Ms. Crislock, may I have the letter?" Opening it, he scanned the short message quickly before turning to the others, "It seems the Queen has invited myself and my associates to an audience tomorrow afternoon."

Jilken looked askance, "The palace aye, does it say what they want us for?"

"It does not," replied Ell, "but then Queen Alara never reveals her full hand."

"Humph," muttered Janora, "Well I don't usually hold with royalty and all, but I for one will go with you."

Ranunkel looked lost in thought before asked, "So if we're the associates, does that mean Ell is the boss?"

"I've told Tear to stop calling me that," said Ell quickly, "and no, I think this is just a case of being the most well known to the Court." [color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 0)]Ranunkel appeared to absorb that and gave a solemn nod, but said nothing else. Looking around Ell realized that they were still standing in the front hall. Turning to the housekeeper he asked, "Can you see about having dinner served in the smaller dining room?" Jilken's stomach chose that moment to growl loudly and Ell flashed a smile and a wink at the elf and with a wave of his hand led the team in to sit down.

As the group settled around the table, Vellikar resumed the conversation asking with a bit of panic, "What should we wear? I've never been to Court before...or met a Queen. Should I...should I make myself look human?"

Ell waved a soothing hand, "No, no, wear whatever you would like, what you are wearing now will be fine. I promise you that the Queen won't mind. This will be a private meeting so we won't have to deal with any of the court gossips."

Janora barked a laugh at that last comment and muttered, "It they wanted us to wear something special, they should have sent us clothes."

Ell smiled, "100% true."

"On the other hand," said Janora with a wicked grin, "They would have also needed to send the hundred or so trained fighters and mages to get me to put it on."

Jilken slapped the table and laughed heartily, but sobered when the servants began appearing with serving trays. Dinner was delicious as always with a hearty leek and onion stew, a pork roast with citrus and peppered crust, and small loaves of bread, still fresh and steaming.

Tired of the day spent walking around the city, most of the party headed to their rooms to sleep or work on projects. Jilken decided she still needed to blow off some steam and went out to look for some trouble. She found what she was looking for at a seedy looking tavern down by the docks called the Aggressive Goat.

40 Amberspell

The next morning the party discussed the day's plans over breakfast. Ranunkel wanted to visit the Library, so Denye volunteered to lead them there. Ell begged off, claiming the need to check in on a few things while home and Tear stayed with the young man. Janora also headed off on their own to run a few errands, including picking up their new hat.

So it was that Denye, Ranunkel, Vellikar and Jilken headed up the hill to the Wayfinders Collegium. One of the trainees greeted them and was more than happy to escort the group to the Great Library, turning them over to one of the librarians.

Said librarian, a late-middle aged human woman, introduced herself as Wayfinder Tirlin Shorsk. The head librarian, Labradorite, the bookwyrm, was away at a conference, but Tirlin and the others were more than happy to help the visitors in their research.

Ranunkel inquired about a magical artifact called a Stone of Connection. Not finding anything at first, they widened the search to include the magic stone circles. That did turn up one volume, a study of the rings and the magic they channeled. It did actually reference the Stone of Connection, but only to say that none were known to have survived.

Denye was interested in spell research, wanting to follow up on ideas and see if anyone had done prior work in those areas. Unfortunately she didn't have much more luck than the dwarven druid, but in her case Denye's mind kept drifting back to the pistol that was now half assembled and all the progress she had made on it.

Vellikar had also wanted to do some spell research, but was overawed at the size of the library and all the potential knowledge that it contained. The orrery was inspected and the druid was a bit confused when he recognized that the model Vestra only had two moons. He might have asked but the enormous map of Ellebore drew his attention and Vellikar spent a long time just examining the details and marveling over all the tiny villages marked as small dots spread across much of Paxtopa. He was also able to estimate where Stillglen was, but it was not on the map. Vellikar flagged down one of the librarians and pointed out where his home village would be. The Wayfinder was quite excited to hear about this forest paradise and brought Vellikar over to a table and began interviewing the firbolg.

Jilken spent some time scanning the large map for open areas where a new clan could find a home. Noting an area or two to look into the Aiel turned to the books and went looking for books on leadership. The elf found a number of books on everything from public speaking to dealing with interpersonal conflict. One volume, an autobiography of General Tacticus Ashkevron entitled, The Arte of War, in particular caught Jilken's eye and the elf read through the entire book just before the noon bells soon sounded. Realizing they still needed to head back to Darnet Manor to get Ell and Janora, Jilken gather up her distracted friends and began making their back to Ell's family estate.

---

Ell spent a couple of hours going over books in his father's study. At first he checked in on several of his own ventures that were started before running away, but that didn't take long and he soon found himself flipping through various family histories, unsure of what he was looking for.

With a sigh he closed the book he was thumbing through and looked over at Tear of Midnight Sorrow who had been staring at all the shinys. Ell asked in Goblin, "You know you don't have to stay with me, right? Or even stay with the party if you don't want to."

The goblin's eyes got big and he replied, "Where would I go? I took you to forest, wanted to see big magics, and now I'm here...so many people in this clan home. Not know what to do, but you save home so I follow...and protect."

"You don't owe us anything," said Ell, looking a bit surprised at his own words, "You are one of us now, everybody was quite impressed with your skills. So just remember that you are here because you are our friend and that you get a choice in stuff."

"Friends?" asked Tear quizzically, "you all so stronk but I am only simple goblin."

Ell awkwardly patted Tear on the shoulder and said, "You are strong too Tear, in your own special way. Don't worry about it for now. Just know that if you ever want to go home, you just have to ask." Leaving Tear to think about things, Ell returned to the histories but nothing of particular interests caught his eye.

Eventually lunch time rolled around and the entire team reconvened at Darnet Manor to freshen up and get ready for the audience with the queen. After a light, but refreshing meal, the party headed around to the gates and the palace beyond. Ell presented the note to the guards at the gate and the seven adventurers were quickly ushered into a waiting room.

It wasn't long before a page appeared and led the party down a short hall, stopping at a pair of double doors flanked by a pair of guards. One of the guards gestured to an open closet nearby and ordered the party to place all weapons inside. After divesting themselves of the obvious weapons, the party were ushered into the Lesser Audience chamber.

A long room of white marble, the audience chamber is decorated to impress. The white marble floor is broken by a rich, blue carpet leading from the door to the dais at the far end. Several large banners of a similar blue festooned the walls, each with the Paxtopa coat of arms. Five steps lead to the top of the dais and the pair of thrones that sat upon it.

As the party approached, Queen Alara was speaking with a page but soon dismissed the girl and sat back surveying the party. She spent a moment examining each of the party, ending with Ell. Clasping her hands, she leaned forward and said, "Master Darnet, it is quite good to see you again. I do hope you have all prospered since you were last in Haven."

Report Date

05 Mar 2022