Session 221: Whispers from the Hearth: The Light and the Soot

Day 6 - 7 Sunsebb CY 576

Gather ’round, if your boots aren't too muddy and your ears aren't too full of the winter wind. Old Vilma has seen the shadows lengthening over Orlane, and oh, how the "watchful and strained" air of our little village ripples when the restless ones pass through.

The high-and-mighty ones have moved on, their horses’ breath steaming in the sharp morning light as they rode for Hochoch. But before they left, there was quite the stir at the Slumbering Serpent. The new one—the Paladin, Lalie, refused to share a roof with the "Fearsome Five". She says she detected a foulness in them, an evil that would not let her sleep. She’d rather tuck into the Golden Grain than breathe the same air as a black soul, and so she moved her retinue in the dead of Sunsebb.

They’ve reached the stone walls of Hochoch now, a place that feels stable, though perhaps just as strained in its own way. They’ve been frequenting the Green Dragon, where the floors are swept but the eyes are just as guarded.  

But listen to what the birds tell me about the Temple of St. Cuthbert! Rosalind Greenshield, the High Priestess, nearly wept to see what Lalie carried in her hands. A relic lost to the records—a mace of disruption pulled from the "Barrowmaze". It’s a terrifying thing, blessed to blast the walking dead into nothingness with a single strike. The heavens seem to be arming their soldiers, for the paladin was told to wield it and smite the unrighteous.

Yet, where there is brilliant light, there is always soot. Armatzi, that cleric who usually knows better, has draped himself in darkness. He wears cursed plate mail now, a black skin imbued by necromancers. The Priestess says it’s a magnet for the enemy — that the dead can see him through it, like a beacon in the night. He’s walking a narrow bridge, that one, needing to slay twenty "enemies of the cloth" just to atone for his vanity in putting on a suit of mail without asking the stars what it was first.

And then there is the fire. Lhoss has laid claim to a staff that once belonged to a pyromancer named Pinto. It’s a hungry thing, filled with fifty-three charges of "burning hands" and "continual flames". It even tastes of gold — requiring a heavy price in coins and materials just to keep its fire fed. 

The party grows heavy with treasures — rings of protection and books of fire. But even as they sharpen their steel in Hochoch, the Barrowmarsh still thins its needles and peels its bark, waiting for the corruption to spread. 

Be careful, travelers. A mace may break a bone, and a staff may light a fire, but the shadows of the maze have long memories. Now, leave an old woman to her tea. The fire is getting low, and the wind is starting to howl.

Session 220: A Hazy View from the Bottom of a Cider Glass

Day 6 Sunsebb CY 576

The wood smoke is thick tonight, and the smell of hearth-fire almost—almost—drowns out the lingering stench of the Barrow Marsh that clings to those poor souls who just wandered back into Orlane. I was just resting my eyes over a nice glass of cider when the door creaked open, bringing in a chill and the sort of stories that make an old woman’s head spin.

You should have seen them. Feno the elf looking like he’d seen a ghost (or at least a very angry statue), and that new Paladin, Laile, standing so tall you’d think she hadn't just spent the day wading through muck. They tell me they found a room in that wretched maze that smelled so putrid the whole lot of them lost their lunch—except for the little gnome Gnorcia and a few others with stronger stomachs. They even met a goblin in a gas mask acting like a polite construction worker! "Off limits," he says. Imagine that! A goblin with a union card.

They should have listened to the walls, though. They found a message scrawled in common: "Don't go on!" But do adventurers ever listen? No, they tossed a coin—or a poll, or some such nonsense—and marched right into a ceiling collapse that sealed the way behind them.

The most delicious part of the tale, if you ask me, involves the "Barbecue Room". Poor Lhoss tried to spider-climb her way to a treasure chest after a 10-foot pole turned to ash in a burst of magical flame. There was a metal cobra hiding in a box, clicking and hissing like a clockwork nightmare. It bit Lhoss, and she went all convulsive and foamy at the mouth. That’s when things got truly odd—Feno decided to use Gnorcia as a literal projectile, tossing the gnome across the room in a "Wolverine toss" to deliver the cure! Gnorcia took a bit of a singeing, but she’s a tough one.

They came back with a radiant mace of St. Cuthbert, silver-bright and etched with holy sigils. It’s a fine thing, though I hear the Paladin and the others are already bickering over whether to give it to the church or keep it for "justice".

But mark my words, the air in Orlane is getting heavy again. While Feno and Lhoss are busy splitting a bottle of expensive Elven wine and trying to forget the smell of burning hair, there’s trouble brewing at the Slumbering Serpent. A group called the Fearsome Five has rolled into town, and Lalie says she smells evil on one of them.

The cider is tart, the fire is dying, and the "shifty" folk are gathered just down the road. I think I’ll stay right here at my table. It’s much safer to tell the stories than to be in them—especially when people start throwing gnomes.

Stay odd, Orlane.

— Vilma

Session 219: A Tale of Scented Silk and Sour Stomachs

 Day 6 Sunsebb CY 576

Gather 'round, children of Orlane, and listen to old Vilma, for the air is heavy with more than just the usual winter chill. I watched them depart the inn at 9:00 this morning, a motley crew if ever I saw one, led by a new "Lady Lordship" named Leila. Now, this Leila, she’s practically royalty, they say, with hairs and curls and a monthly bill of a thousand gold pieces just to keep her "slumming it" lifestyle afloat. She brought along a young cleric named Aila, only eighteen and slight as a reed, and a squire named Colette Beaumont, who stayed behind to mind the horses and that fancy jousting armor.

But mark my words, the land itself is weeping. As they marched toward the Dim Forest, the elves among them saw what I’ve felt in my bones: rapid deterioration. The trees are rotting, the evergreens are shedding their needles, and even the woodland beasts have fled. It’s a grim, overcast day, and the forest feels like it’s exhaling a slow, chill breath of resentment.

They reached the Barrow Marsh, a place of wet earth and old rot, and ducked into the darkness of the Barrow Maze. It wasn't all just shadows and gloom, though. Deep inside, they found a room of roaring flames and geysers of fire—the burial place of Pinto the Pyromancer. While the others stood tentative, afraid of being burned to a crisp, the elf Lhoss took a leap of faith. With a spell of protection and also levitation, and some magical gloves, she crawled along the walls like a spider while fire erupted around her.

She reached a sarcophagus decorated in beautiful, enchanted flames and, after surviving a glyph of warding that scorched the air, she found the treasures. A ring with a ruby, a staff colored with flames, and a mysterious book. She was wise enough not to open that book, mind you—I reckon she remembers that nasty business with Tatania.

But the heroes’ glory didn’t last long. They moved to a door of wood and iron, and when they pried it open, a horrible stench billowed out, worse than a month-old corpse in a summer drought. It was enough to reset anyone’s "vomit clock". Poor Leila, for all her royal breeding, was the first to puke all over the floor, and a chain reaction followed until nearly the whole lot of them were losing their breakfast. Only Nikki and Dwerom seemed to have the stomach for such a foul odor.

So, they sit there now in the dark, clutching their new magical baubles and heaving their rations. Whether those treasures are greatly cursed or greatly blessed, only the next turn of the moon will tell. But for now, Orlane remains quiet, and I’ll just keep my eyes on the shifting mists.