For Whom the Bell Tolls

The group begins in the tunnels under the Abbot house. As it was approaching dark, they decided to sleep in the caverns and rise early to travel in the morning. Galia cuddles next to Nira, Carindrina grumbles over into a corner, and the rest lay down to rest. Galia is the first to rise and brews ceremonial tea from the East Fingerling Isles for everyone. Belladonna slyly pours hers out on a weedy plant that has tried to make a hold in the cavern. They head down the cavern that they believe leads to Thornyside based on the T on the keystone of the arch. They come to a dead end, and Nira places her hand against the wall, trying to feel something beyond the stone. The rocks seem to be not just naturally carved, but almost like a few areas are faces carved into the rock. Furus looks closer and suddenly three gargoyle-like faces seem to coalesce out of the rock. The group sees them about the same time. Nira exclaims how cute the little goat-like one is and asks if he will let them through. His stony face moves, and a deep gravely voice says, “Each of us will let you through to a different place, but to pass you need to answer a question. Are you ready for the questions?”
Nira and Adalia are very excited and eagerly step forward. Carindrina, not as keen on sentient rock, backs up a step and prepares for the possibility of an attack. The group says they are ready.

The face in the middle begins, a dog or goat-like face, that looks like it might have earrings at one point, “I guide the steps of king and peasant of warrior, mage, and priest. i trek with them from city to hamlet and yet, i never move”.

The first face has two chips of a blue gem for eyes, “As destructive as life, as healing as death, an institutioner of strife, just as prone to bless. it is all that is good, yet with an evil trend; as it was the beginning of things, it can also be the end”

The third, with his tongue sticking out, says, “Travelled inwards, to that heart where no one else roamed. Where only birds and animals found a home. where the pixies flew with an audible air, and tangles twigs and leaves within my hair. ah. I love this place, this paradise. Where everything is so beautiful, so still, and so nice. Where did he go?”

The group stepped back to debate the answers and to decide which path they wanted to take to arrive at Thornyside. Nira thought the first riddle was “The North Star” Carindrina said she thought it was “Path”, but agreed North Star made sense due to the word guide in the riddle. The second riddle was debated as “Fire” by Nira and “Pregnancy” by Belladonna, then the group began to consider “Water”. The third Carindrina thought was “The Heart of the Forest”, and since they had sworn an oath on the heart of the forest, the group agreed.

Nira asked the gargoyles if they would take the group to Thornyside. The one with blue eyes answered, “We all take you there, but not directly. It is on you to find your own way to the town you seek.” She asks if they will send them together or only send the person who answers? He asks if they are answering as a group or individuals? Nira turns to consult the group. They discuss having some stay to take a different path in case the first answer doesn’t work. Furus asks another of the gargoyles, “What happens if we get it wrong?” He answers, “Well, you can’t really get a riddle wrong, but you might not end up as close to your destination as you want.” and has a gravelly laugh. Furus frowned and turned to the group, “I think this guy is fucking with us.”

Adalia says she is most confident in the answer “North Star” for the first riddle. Furus is adamant that the answer needs to be a place, and the group tries to blow him off, but Nira has a feeling from Oure that answering North Star will upset the balance of chaos, and will not help her journey. Adalia realizes the three answers are “road, water, and forest”. Carindrina says she is worried about traveling by water, she knows the area has many rivers and lakes, but worries that the group does not have the equipment for water-travel. The group agrees that taking the road is better, though Adalia says she personally, would like to travel by water. Galia says the group should look for the water passages at some point since all of the visions related to water. Nira tells the gargoyle “Road”, he has a rough, stony, laugh, and the world cut to black.

They awaken on the road, feeling very dizzy and disoriented. They are in a narrow ravine path surrounded by forest, they are heading down to a valley area, then the path begins to spike back upwards steeply. Furus explains that once they crest the hill, they should be outside the main gates of Thornyside. Carindrina know they have travelled a significant distance, but is a little lost as to direction. Midna investigates the flora nearby and everything seems fairly normal, but she hears a male voice making some frustrated or distressed noises. She heads to a small area that opens off of the path and sees a man with an overturned cart, kicking a broken wheel and sighing in frustration. She signals to the group to come help.

Furus approaches, asking if they can do anything to help the man. He throws his hands up, “Ugh! You would not believe it, these things came in and ripped the wheels off of my cart, then ran away up the hill to Thornyside! I am trying to get out of that town. Something weird is going on.”

Furus asks if he can describe them, and he says he couldn’t see much, they were black cloaked and too fast for him to really see. The group shares a knowing look and Furus and Nira mouth vampires simultaneously. He said he was in a haze before he knew it and couldn’t see them as they ripped off his wheels and whisked away. Furus asks what he does, if he had anything in the cart that someone would try to steal, and he tells them he is a merchant, Merchant Maurice, so he has many things, but nothing was stolen other than the broken wheels.

Carindrina and Belladonna move to right the cart, but Galia tells them to wait a second so she can fix the cart wheel. Her family travels in a caravan and she has experience with helping maintain the carts. She can only get one wheel back on, but the other wheel’s spokes are so broken she can’t fix it. Carindrina investigates and thinks she can cut some wood and try to prepare a makeshift spoke. Furus tries to gather some of the items on the ground and help put things in the cart that they have righted. He asks if Maurice wants to go back to Thornyside, or if there is someone who they could notify and send to help him. He says no, he is going to Balvonier, but if they are going to Weatherby, he needs to drop off a package, and if they can drop it off for him, he would be grateful. He wants to begin heading back North, and it is now out of his way. The group says of course, they travel all over, and they could definitely drop it off. Maurice has a big smile, and hands Furus a large humanoid skull, telling him it needs to go to the man at this address, and produces a small envelope.

The wheels turning in the group’s minds, they recognize his name, Merchant Maurice, as one that was listed on the Abbot’s notes. Adalia asks if he knows them. He says he knows them vaguely, they are good people, but he hasn’t seen them in about 3 weeks. She asks if that was when he was in Balvonier. He says, no, he was in Thornyside, but left after meeting them, and is just now travelling back, he takes a while to get around because he is getting older and he has to stop at every small area to do business. Adalia, smiling, flatters him, “You must hear everything!” He laughs, “I don’t just deal in material goods.” She asks if he has any information on the missing kids. He agrees that it is awful, and says “There are what? 8? 9? Missing now. The first one was last year at Balansera in Spindledown.” The group stops what they are doing and move closer to listen to him. He continues, “It’s horrible. It isn’t like the North. Kids don’t go missing here. You would expect that along the borders of Epaul, Epaulette, and Wishwater, what with skirmishes and slave trade, but here they don’t really have that.” Adalia asks if he has any theories. He says that there are always horrible people, but his guess is that someone emigrated down from the North, but it is ok for him to say that since he is from the North. The group shares a concerned look. Adalia asks if there is any reason the Abbots needed to meet with him recently. He explains they wanted some items with pretty heavy duty enchantments, he was only able to get some of it, but told them he needed to go to Rosary Row to get stronger magical items. Nira asks if the package they are giving to someone in Weatherby is related to this. He says no, it is some fancy-pants son who wants to be edgy and have a skull to become a magician. Adalia and Nira ask if he has anything of the Abbot’s with him now. He says no, he needed to go closer to a ley line to get something that strong. Adalia asks if he knows what they wanted it for. He says he assumes it was something to do with being a ranger, it was pretty heavy duty magic like for a dragon or something. Adalia thanks him and asks if she can buy anything, she says she always likes healing potions. He hands her a potion of minor healing and tells her it is for taking the skull to Weatherby and for fixing his cart. He also tells them he will give them a free piece of advice, “ Be very careful if you are going into Thornyside, something is wrong in Hightown.” Belladonna asks him one last question before he leaves, “What exactly was the object that the Abbots bought?”. He says “blessed iron bars.” and headed away.

The group discusses the likelihood that the iron bars were to make up the cage found in the Abbot’s attic. As they do this, a black swirling shadows emerges from the tree and rams into Carindrina and Nira. As it seems to “see” the rest of the group, it retreats and zooms back into the forest. Nira immediately gave chase, and the group followed. They lost it in the woods and returned to the path. There was a fork in the road, and Furus told the group that the “up” path went to Hightown, and the “down” path went to Lowtown. It seemed like the shadow was heading towards Hightown, so the group went that way.

As they approach Hightown, the gates are down, but Carindrina is able to lift the iron bars and the group sneaks in. Not only is the town in lock down, it is completely deserted. There is no one in the streets and no festival decorations, which is truly bizarre for the area. Furus begins to play a song, singing and letting his violin ring out. The group notices a woman in the window waving a white cloth, trying to get them to come to the window. He stops playing and the group goes over to her. She whisper-shouts, “What the fuck are you doing? Don’t make noise! Why are you here? Get off the streets!!!” She ushers them inside. She looks like someone from lowtown. She is dirty, her clothes are dirty, and she looks haggard. She explains that she doesn’t know what happened, but she has been stuck here for three weeks. She works here, but can’t get out. “You can’t make noise or they come for you.” Belladonna tries to calm her down, “Who comes for you? Why can’t you make noise?” She is babbling, confused, saying that they are people she knows, but they aren’t right, saying that they seem “magicked” or “bespelled”. Belladonna’s frown deepens and the whole group knows she is going to suggest the Fey. She continues, saying that they roam the streets with lanterns and come for you, then you never come back. One of them was her mistress, who owns the manor. There was a big to-do in the manor, then when people came home, they weren’t right. Shortly after, people started getting taken from the streets. Adalia asks what happens to those who are taken. The woman admits she doesn’t know, when she saw someone taken, she screamed and hid. Furus asked why she screamed if they can’t make noise. Her face is crestfallen, and she whispers, “I didn’t know. I found that out when they took my sister. We tried to run together. I haven’t been able to find her, but I am too afraid.”

Furus asks if they can go on the streets. She says they can but they should only go out in the middle of the day, it might be a bit safer, but the lanterns they carry emit darkness, not light. She explains that she has tried to get out but she isn’t strong enough to get through the gates. They ask her to explain the layout of the town. She explains the town leads up the hill to the canal and the market, then behind that the castle is located on the hill, with the back of the castle off the sheer cliff face. Nira whispers to the group--wasn’t someone’s vision very similar to this? Galia says it was, and summarizes her vision. Nira explains she thinks that the rift she opened in the dungeons under Stoneblood Manor was possibly under this town, especially if they angered the water god. The group says they haven’t done anything to offend the water god.

Adalia asks her name, and the woman replies Nell Bund. She asks her to explain again. Nell goes through the story again. Belladonna says that most of this doesn’t seem like fairies, but the blank faced wandering, searching seems like the fey or something similar. In the background, Carindrina grabbed wrappings from her bag and begins to wrap her plate armor. Nell notices and asks if she is trying to wrap her armor, Carindrina says yes, if she is sure that noise attracts them, she will need to find a way to be strong and quiet. Nell runs upstairs and returns to hand her a pile of blankets. Nell cautiously asks if they can please look for her sister. The group says of course they will, and asks what she looks like. Nell says her sister’s name is Alora, and she is her twin. They ask if there is anything else they can do and she asks if they can open the gate for her, they offer to take her to the gate they entered, but she says there is a gate directly into low town and she needs to go to her family. The group agrees to do this. She tells them it needs to be quickly because it is almost the brightest part of the day. The group hurries over and lifts the gate. Nira tries to look under the gate, but manages to bend down as Carindrina lifted the gate and smacks her head onto the bar. Nira asks if she wants an escort home, she says she is fine, but they are welcome to come with her, and if they find her sister, come find her. Nira asks her if the castle above them is the Tangelwood Castle, she laughs and says she knows they aren’t from here, yes this is the Tanglewood castle. She ducks through, very grateful, and is swept up in the crowd. The town looks like a normal level of busy, most people look normal but there are several people traveling in small clusters in long black cloaks, where you can’t see the people inside the cloak. Midna says they need to find black cloaks and play dress up later.

The group begins to head back towards the castle, now noticing things they didn’t notice when they first entered the town, such as the series of stocks in the main entrance in front of the statue of Liguaquide, which are crusted with blood. Nira whispers, “Vampires.” and Adalia sarcastically says, “Love this town.”. There are also areas where the town seems to have been destroyed by something. There are bits of road that are torn up, and some of the houses have big holes in the roofs, as well as some hovel-type tents set up. There are also dead giants rats drained of blood laying in the grass.

Adalia went to sit near the canal and meditate. Nira followed at a respectful distance, not wanting to intrude, but worrying about splitting the group and leaving anyone unattended. Galia went inside one of the houses and it looked like there was a massacre. There is blood all over everything. There were no bodies. Belladonna came in to help Galia and realized that these were not just random splashes, but a specific pattern that reminded her of something she had seen under Scath Mountain.The group decided to enter the church in the middle of the town to hide and make a plan. Adalia explains that she noticed floating, glowing orbs in the water. Midna shares that she found a sewer system. Carindrina shares that there is really old blood staining the streets. The group explores the church a bit. There is a hanging banner that seems familiar, but isn’t a religion they immediately recognize, until Belladonna tells them that this is the same symbol she found printed on a deck of cards under the Stoneblood Manor as well as under the mountain. Out of nowhere there is a loud clanging that rattles them. They realize it is the church bells right over them. It rings 12 times, then one more time, and a dense fog begins to roll in and press against the church windows.