Bounty Hunters - Session 21

Seeking the Dark Heart of the Forest

• Elian has a surprisingly coherent conversation with the white elk. He relays the gist: Their arrival is fortuitous, and they should seek the Dark Heart of the Forest.
  • Someone kicks Whip awake just in time to see the elk run off. He wipes the drool off his face and takes off behind it with no further questions. Elian follows.
• The rest of the party packs up camp and follows their tracks. The ghost elk's path is already disappearing from the woods, but Whip and Elian are much easier to follow.
  • It goes this way for hours. Elian elks up and Whip is able to get a respite riding on Huge Elian's back. The wild shape wears off, and Whip continues running to catch up while Elian lags behind.
  • Deeper and deeper into the forest they go, daylight slowly disappearing from under the canopy.
  • Everyone gets tired.

• • EVERYONE.
  • Another few hours, and Whip's zen exhaustion is broken as he is flung upwards into a net. He's dragged away in a fugue by two people he doesn't pay much attention to.
  • Elian reaches this point, and is not able to follow the trail. He waits for the rest.
  • They catch up and Elian describes what he knows. Bern deduces the rest, and picks up the trail. They follow.
• More hours pass, and they finally reach a bubbling stream. Even though it should still be daylight, their surroundings are pitch black.
  • A woman's voice from the east warns them not to cross the creek. A tense, yelled conversation ensues.
  • The voice accuses the group of stealing their birthright and of trespass. She seems of the opinion that they are poachers or similar.
  • Whip stirs, finding himself bound (and without the Belt of Dwarvenkind) and in the dark. He summons a dagger to free himself while talking continues.
  • Bern tries not to appear too hostile and talk the voice down, approaching the creek edge hands-up, but not crossing. Madrin furiously consults her notes.
  • Whip gets his gag off and interjects that they may be supposed to find the two. A male voice tells him to shut his mouth and moves closer to threaten from the darkness.
  • Madrin makes the connection and identifies the pair as possibly Lea and Levan Absold, children of the man with the name inscribed on the Belt. She says as much.
  • The pair become a smidge less hostile. They tell the party to leave their weapons and follow. They are equipped in gleaming armament, "Levan" with a guisarme, and "Lea" with an impossibly long and thin sword.
• The party complies, and they follow to a small clearing where a single woman sits, back to the rest. Her hair is silvery white, and she is also finely equipped. She is wearing the Belt.
  • She is Anise, mother to Levan and Lea, and mother of the forest,

• • They get to talkin':

Whip: Looks good on you
Whip: A little big maybe
Elven Woman: I hear you seek me.
Elven Woman: Congratulations, you have succeeded in your quest, adventurers.
Whip: Yeah that elk was something else
Elven Woman: Indeed. She has been my companion for many years. A faithful friend.
Madrin: Our apologies for the nature of our intrusion.
Elven Woman: You have brought me a great treasure that I have as much right to as anyone. Forgive my childrens' temperament. They are zealous defenders of their adopted home. You come from Wydmoor then?
Bern: Unfortunately, yes.
Whip: No worries, we were forewarned it would be politically sensitive we just didn't expect, uh, "politics" in a forest you know
Elian [Elvish]: [Translation] We hope to negotiate passage through this forest; I apologize for any damage my shape did here. We hope to negotiate passage through this forest; I apologize for any damage my shape did here.
Elven Woman [Elvish]: [Translation] Oh, an elf! You have a strange accent. A recent exile then. I hope the mainland is treating you well.
Elven Woman chuckles.
Elven Woman [Elvish]: I share your annoyance with the politics of the outside world. Even here it finds me, I see. I am grateful to you for returning this to me. I remember well the days when we won it. It is sentimental and useful both. Elven Woman: You are granted passage through these woods.
Elian [Elvish]: [Translation] Thank you for your graciousness. I'm glad we were able to return the belt to its rightful owner.
Bern: Thank you for not hurting Whip.
Elven Woman shrugs.
Elven Woman: You remind me of friends I once knew, oddly enough, the same ones that were there when Kib won this belt. Elven Woman: We were an ecclectic mix ourselves.
Bern: Did these friends also know the Azure Geese?
Elven Woman: that's a name I have not heard in some time. Are they still.... "a thing?"
Elian [Elvish]: [Translation] It depends who you ask.
Whip: Yeah I guess? Never really heard of them growing up but they were on pretty good terms with Lady Meade
Madrin: They are, though politics in Wydmoor are.. prickly
Elven Woman: They always are. I have spent some time there in my travels.
Whip: Gave us some gear as an apology for basically getting us kicked out, so I dunno I guess good and bad
Elven Woman: You are sent from Wydmoor, then?
Bern: If you can see magic, you could see our tattoos of exile from Wydmoor.
Bern: We were outplayed. Badly.
Whip: Outplayed? I don't think we were even in the game, just pieces on the board
Elven Woman: Politics were simpler there when it was rubble. Perhaps that's a better state for the place/
Madrin coughs
Half Elf Woman: It was a good home to us.
Elven Woman grunts.
Elven Woman: My children were raised there, by Kib. Their father.
Madrin: It was a good home to me as well. I hope we will be able to return eventually A good many books to tend to. Speaking of books.. you haven't encounteed any of these bloodthirsty, amber buying, cult type folks have you?
Joana: And vengeance to enact.
Whip: Lotta self-important types, kinda glad for an excuse for a trip if we're telling the truth. On our way to Nia-Agliare. Taking the, uh, "back roads"
Elven Woman sits up straighter.
Elven Woman: Nia-Agliare. What brings you there? I would suggest... not. It is a dangerous place.
Whip: Crazies in white robes doing end-of-world shit mostly. Weird body-horror magic nonsense
Elven Woman: I am aware of them. They know better to come into my wood, but they are of concern to me.
Bern: We have undone their works in every town we could. We seek to undo more.
Whip: They're assholes and we're mad
Elven Woman: In that case, I would doubly recommend avoiding Nia-Agliare. The Amber Queen's hold there is absolute. Your secret goal will not survive long.
Madrin: One of the reasons we travelled the desert and your forest was to come unawares. The Amber Queen?
Elven Woman: She who styles herself the second coming of Alexandria. Her power is tremendous, greater by far than my own. Tread carefully.
Madrin nods and updates some notes
Whip: "Amber" hey any idea what she's doing with all that stuff? I mean, beyond filling them with homeless person soul energy
Elven Woman: I do not. We keep to the forest. Her city is the exact place we do not need to be. I have my own agendas to persue and, at present, Her goals and mine do not intersect. Her ambitions involve the worlds of men, mine the exact opposite.
Madrin: I am curious then what chance you had to gauge her power?
Elven Woman: she appeared on these shores, I can sense it from here. I am attuned to the leylines of the world
Joana: Appeared from where? Is there any truth to her claim?
Elven Woman: As best I can tell, she appeared out of nowhere. I enough to know to avoid the city, which means I know little of it. I cannot evaluate the truth of her claims.
Whip: Well, one way or another we can't go back to Wydmoor and we have a grudge against these guys. Nia-Agliare was the only direction that presented itself
Bern: If not Nia-Agliare, where? Where could we improve the world, given [waves hands at the party]
Elven Woman: Well, fate has brought you to me at an opportune time. Tomorrow is the solstice. I have a need. I was going to send my children, but now you have presented yourselves to me.
Half Elf Man: Wait, what? Why am I ONLY hearing of this now?
Elven Woman hisses him quiet.
Elven Woman: Tomorrow is the Solstice, when the walls between the worlds grow thin. Once, long ago, I made a bargain with a creature of the Faewilds. The time to renegotiate those terms come due.
Half Elf Woman: Wait -- WHAT???
Elven Woman hisses her quiet.
Elven Woman: You are clearly... adventurerers.
Elven Woman says the word with distaste.
Whip: Everyone seems to spit that word
Elven Woman: Well, in your defense, you are adventurers forged by circumstance not ambition or greed. This is to your credit. And one of the few reasons I would consider strangers for this. Plus, I have read the essence of your character in this short time. It's a .... thing I can do.
Whip: Sounds great, sounds like more than I'd know I'm up for it, let's talk to a fairy thing
Madrin: How did you managed to contact a creature of the Faewilds?
Elven Woman: This wood is my wood. The leylines between the realms are repairing themselves. The old pathways are slowly reopening. The Lady of the Mountain granted me a special boon. I have the power to traverse these pathways.
Elven Woman: I followed these paths across the Faewild to negotiate the power to renew the forests of my people. I traded away something of trivial importance. I would like it returned.
Whip: It's always about place and whatnot. Big fans of mushrooms
Elven Woman: The irony of this bargain is that I cannot now abandon this project to return to those pathways.
Madrin: What would you have us return with?
Elven Woman: My love of my children.
Both children, in unison: WHAT?!?!
Bern: Ma'am, I'm decent at stabbing. I'm not sure returning abstract concepts is going to be my forte.
The children are horrified by this. She is... unphazed, both by the revelation and their revulsion.
Whip: Faeries, man, of course it'd be something weird like that
Elven Woman: You are perceptive and clearheaded. The most important weapons of all against the wiles of the Fae. They are shifty and duplicitous. They are masters of twisted phrases and dark bargains. Especially in the season of the Unseelie.
Bern: ....are they impatient?
Elven Woman laughs.
Elven Woman: The Winter Court is impatient, moody, and cruel.
Bern: C... Could you please explain to my gnomish friend what Unseelie and Winter Court mean?
Bern: How deals are made? Is there ceremony or is speaking enough to accidentally make one?
Whip: They always want weird shit like "three drops of sweat from the brow of an upside-down frog after its seventh chirp"
Elven Woman: In the Faewild, time works... diferently.
Elven Woman , sounding surprised...
Elven Woman: Actually, yes, it's a lot like that. Both of you are correct.
Madrin gives a flustered look around the group and continues writting
Elven Woman: In the Faewild, time works... differently, but is still connected to this world. The realm grows more stable during the equinoxes and more.... moody during the solstices. The Winter Court reigns during the months of darkness, the Summer court during the months of light. During the interregnum, no court is held.
Whip: Yeah just put that gag back on me and point my red iron in the right direction I guess
Elven Woman: Oh, I'm glad you mentioned that. None of you happend to have anything of "cold wrought iron"?
Bern: I'm suddenly not glad at all.
Elven Woman: It is an antiquated method of working iron, but the Fae find it tremendously offensive. In exchange for this task, if you are successful, I will give you an item that those such as yourself might find very useful and that I no longer need.
Bern: And do you have something to give them in exchange, or would we have to make the offer ourselves? From something of *our* possessions, abstract or concrete?
Elven Woman: I do not know what they will want. You all seem clever - I'm sure you can come up with something they would value. Perhaps you can pay them in services rendered. I am not... clever like your kind.
(the party judges that by this, she means: Adventurers, humans, gnomes, in that order)
Elven Woman: In fact, I can give you something to help you on this quest, and an additional reward on your return.
Madrin turns to the "children" behind her
Madrin: Your mother bids us on a quest of particular impact for you. Please feel free to speak up if you wouldn't entrust us with this.
The twins do not speak
Elven Woman: I would hate to lose one or both of my children just as I begin to love them again.
Whip claps his hands and rubs them together to break the tension from Madrin's question
Whip: Well, that's that, it's up to us then. Not gonna lie you might not like it even if we succeed but we'll do our best In any case, this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and I am all-in for the experience. Danger? Shifty stealers of emotions? Probably weird food and drink?
Madrin: Sounds like we will help out, but can you tell us more about this fae you made a deal with?
Elven Woman: Excellent. A pathway exists in this wood. I can lead you there. First: bring as much of your own food and drink as possible. I can help you somewhat in this. You do not want to eat anything there, and even drinking is dangerous and might require a bargain.
Whip glances wistfully down at his empty flask at this
Elven Woman: Do not fight unless you have to, and be canny in assessing threats. In Winter, the Faewild is more hostile so be prepared to fight. Things are not what they seem, be on guard. A giant might be harmless and a rat might be a king.The Fae is a Hag, a dangerous beast. I caution you not to try to resolve that negotiation through steel. Mother Lorinda is her name.
Elven Woman: There should be a village nearby the portal - Viktal. Perhaps you can learn more information there. The faewild winter is wildly individualistic, so courtesy for one denizen may be grave offense to another.
Bern: Does Mother Lorinda like anything especially?
Whip: Hopefully roc feathers
Elven Woman: She likes motherhood and childbirth.

• • She has conducted this entire conversation with her back to the party. It's definitely a flex.
  • She gives the party the Blood Arrow as the promised item to assist them. Bern holds on to it.
  • Talking concludes. The party moves to get some rest.