ZEITGEIST Tizbiz Zeitgeist Campaign

The return of Elanor Janette

Session 22

We take a happy Damata Griento and return to the train enclave by carriage. Then we say goodbye to him and wish him good luck with clearing up his family affairs. (Even if we are sure that Pabo will claim that she would have preferred a bloody fight and see her dad return with the severed heads of his enemies...or something like that.)

After this, we decide to do what we do best: Going to the hotel lobby and having a drink while trying to keep an eye on our usual suspects. After a few minutes we see Bree Kaldeckis leaving together with both Luc Jierre and Ottavia Sacredotte. Seems like they got themselves tickets for today's arena show. Unfortunately, even those three cannot tell us more about the “special surprise”, so we finally decide to get tickets as well. Maybe they got some magical fireworks or traditinal Bear Games or something like that?

When we are about to leave, we see that the dwarf Tantalovich is about to go into the same direction, so we ask him whether he'd want to get a ticket for the arena as well. He explains that while he does want to go to the arena building, he'd not be attending to the actual show. Instead, he'd like to test his luck in the casino. So we offer him to share a carriage then and split up once we arrive at the arena.

(And there we thought that Tantalovich learned his lesson. Hopefully no one tries to assassinate him this time...)

We don't get that far though as our carriage is stopped right at the border of the enclave by a group of police officers from Nalaam. They accuse Hector of having abducted Amiranya (or rather “the eladrin”) and we return that this is utter nonsense as we both are a married couple from Ber. As we are law-abiding people, we agree to accompany the officers to their police station though to get our papers checked - our genuine beran passports should be more than enough proof that we are indeed who we claim to be - and hopefully dissolve the matter soon. After all, we still got a show we don't want to miss. Still we ask Tantalovich to get us a lawyer just in case.

After a rather long trip in the police carriage, we realize that the large building we are heading to cannot reasonably be the main police station of Nalaam as it is way too large and doesn't look official at all. Before we can ask any further questions, the (either fake or bribed) officers knock both of us out.

(Critical hit by plot bat! Tizbiz asked us about the best ways of get control of both our characters and I went straight to poison/alchemical substances as Auryn doesn't have the best of fortitude saves and is fluff-wise even highly susceptible to alcohol and narcotic drugs. For charms I told him that he'd have to bet on a really low roll as eladrin have a natural resistance against charms so he could easily spend a whole wand on Auryn alone or so...

Carlyle was an even tougher subject as alchemists are naturally resistant to poison, so we said “better hit him on the head with something really hard. Repeatedly.”)

Amira/Auryn wakes up lying on a divan in a spacious hall while still feeling dizzy. To her surprise, Elanor Janette is present as well and she approaches her with a big grin that turns into an amused chuckle. She explains in an almost villainous manner that her plan can come to fruition at last, now that she got her eladrin back and she can proceed to earn a lot of money. This naturally enrages Auryn who tries to confront the fat lady on her presumptions and atrocities as she cannot seriously consider to sell a free, married woman from Ber. As she's still unable to react as quickly as she'd like to, Auryn is unable to dodge the nonchalant bitchslap that follows her outrage. Elanor then proceeds to feed her another, all too familiar drug which makes her heed basic orders regardless of her own will.

(Yep, the same stuff the pirates used to get Auryn from their ship to Fordren's estate. I wonder if Tizbiz took this one from my written background because there were so many similarities in this whole adventure...
I guess I might just share a part of Auryn's background a bit later for comparison.

Regarding Elanor's return, Tizbiz explained that it would have been much easier for us had we just killed her when we freed Isobel. Carlyle and Auryn did in fact discuss what to do with Elanor as she had committed a crime punishable by death in Auryn's eyes. However, killing Elanor while carrying out our plan would have put her death on Mr. Mapple as he accepted to act as a scapegoat in Isobel's abduction.

Also, Mr. Carlyle put a lot of emphasis to the fact that Elanor's trades were perfectly legal in her -danoran- culture and it wouldn't be right to kill someone for a crime when said person didn't even consider her actions to be a criminal act. Of course Auryn wasn't too happy about his reasoning, but she understood his ethics and his point of view. Only to regret the decision once she had to see Elanor's face again.)

Hector/Carlyle is tied up and brought to a cell area inside the arena of Nalaam. When he wakes up with a nasty headache and tries to orient himself, he's suddenly staring into the masked face of a fully adorned Vekeshi Avenger. He explains the pretty confused Hector that he's in the gladiator area of the arena and expected to fight soon. However, the Vekeshi is quite furious about today's scheduled spectacle as it violates the holy traditions of the arena. Hector joins in the man's anger as he explains that someone abducted his beloved wife and put the blame on him. He assumes that him being fed to wild beasts or something like that is just the icing on the cake.

The Vekeshi chuckles in a much higher pitch than his almost booming voice he used before should allow him to. He then asks Hector whether he is truly innocent in terms of possible crimes against this lady Amiranya and Hector replies that she probably wouldn't have married him in the first place if he had done anything close to harming her. Also, he notes, that it is usually him who has to try to keep her at a distance when she gets too passionate.

The Vekeshi laughs again and says “I understand. Take this. It is a powerful antidote that should neutralize whatever drugs they might have used on your wife”, then hands him an alchemical injector as well as Hector's and Amira's equipment. He then explains that Hector should probably join the main fight through a side entrance later and leaves.

Due to the poison, Amira isn't able to fight against getting her clothes changed into a pretty revealing, pseudo-elfaivaran costume. Elanor then puts the same veils she used to hide Isobel behind on top of her to hide her lascivious appearance. After that Amira is ordered to move to a balcony above the arena where three older men are already relaxing on comfortable seats. To her shock, her body reacts as she's been told even if she does her best to fight back.

Elanor Janette joins the group on the loge/balcony and announces that today's show will be accompanied by a one-of-a-time spectacle: The auction of Isobel Traverse, a unique eladrin beauty. She then orders Amira to lift her veils and the crowd goes wild at her sight. Elanor adds that whoever will be the lucky one to win this auction will surely be envied by men and women all over the place and will most likely be Nalaam's most famous VIP in no time. She then announces that the bidding shall start at a price of no less than 2 million gold.

To make things more interesting and to get the tensions high, Elanor then suggests that Kulp might just start with the first few regular fights to give the potential buyers some time to take a closer look at their prize. She then orders Amira to sit down on one of the loge's plush sofas and offers the three guys, Jamie (a druid who's making money by exterminating his own pests), Nikola (a necromancer-assassin), and father Balthasar (a clergy dignitary) to join her.

I know we wrote the setting to have human/eladrin trafficking, but it's so much more f*cked up when this stuff happens 'on screen' to characters we already know.

Oh yes, it totally is. But from my own perspective, seeing it happen to a hapless girl like Isobel (especially if you and your characters get to know a bit about her) is as f*cked up because you know that she wouldn't be able to fight back or escape on her own.

The whole Elanor/Isobel/Traverse subplot also has some potential for characters who like to get involved with the family's slave trade and to be honest, finding ways to end such atrocities can feel truly satisfying. We're not there yet, but putting an end to the machinations of all involved parties is definitely on our to-do list.

Regarding the whole auction of Amira, GMs should in general be careful with their players when putting their player's characters in situations like this. But Tiz and I have been friends for years and he knows what kinds of plots I'm okay with, so this wasn't problematic for me at all. I wouldn't have included such themes in my background if I wasn't ready to explore them. You just need a certain level of maturity to handle it properly.

One fateful day, eight years ago

So I guess this small cliffhanger might be the best opportunity to insert a part of Auryn's backstory to make the similarities between the events in adventure 4 and her past a bit clearer.

Regarding the style, I sometimes switch my backstories to full prose to explore certain NPC and explain their mindsets to my DM. So this is the chapter where Auryn just arrived at Fordren's estate almost a decade ago:
---

She did not know what time, let alone which day it was. The light that fell into the corners of her eyes bothered her a little. What really unsettled her, however, was the fact that her body did not obey her. These vermin had given her some strange substance that turned her obedient to their commands. She had been in a trance, followed them to a place tinted in green, to a place tinted in grey which smelled like burnt iron. Then they had her drink another liquid which made her world turn black.

She slowly regained her senses and everything turned much clearer now. Someone had brought her here, she assumed. Had put her on a couch. The temperature was pleasant. The smell surrounding her was pleasant. Somewhere in the distance, she could hear various birds chirping. Then she panicked as she felt a continuous pressure on her throat. Suddenly, she couldn’t breathe and neither could she raise her arms, nor her hands to find out what choked her. For several minutes she struggled with the fear of losing consciousness at any time.

Then, at some point she noticed a shadow looming over her, accompanied by an unfamiliar voice. The voice was soft like velvet, but it had such an eerie undertone that every hair on her body stood to an end.

“Welcome to your new home, my… modest home”
The person sat down next to Auryn and looked down on her.
"Don't be afraid. I'm unlike the others, you know? I don't wish to harm you and neither do I intend to make you my mistress or courtesan. I'm just here to enjoy your beauty."
He formed a thin smile on his lips as he took a strand of her silvery blond hair in his hand and held it against the warm sunlight.

"And you are so much more than I've ever dreamed of. A perfect, immaculate image of bronze and liquid silver, with eyes like sparkling violet gemstones adorned by tiny golden veins... I can't wait to see the full elegance of your body in motion. I've heard so much about it, you know?"

Auryn’s eyes did sparkle indeed in this very moment - albeit full of contempt. She couldn't object, couldn't move, couldn't do anything to teach this aberration of a human that these were her eyes, her hair, her body and hers alone he spoke of. And that he didn't have any claim on it. All he was talking about were gifts of her mother and her mother’s husbands. They had been given to her at birth, were part of her bloodline. And he, on the other hand, had no right to even dare touch one strand of her hair.

“Don’t worry, the paralysis will fade in time. But they had to put this choker around your neck to prevent you from slipping into this faerie realm of yours. It is made of gold and enchanted with a sleeping spell should you try to leave the boundaries of my estate. So you better don’t waste your energy on futile attempts to escape. From now on, this court will be your domicile. You’ll see that it is also a home to some of my animal companions – maybe you’ll even become friends in time.”

He then stroked one of the sleeves of her - obviously new – dress.
“Pardon me for this poor choice of a dress, I’ll make sure to get you more suitable clothing soon. This one was supposed to be a gift to one of my relatives, but it is unworthy of your grace. My tailors will surely conjure up something nicer and more adequate in time. Besides… I heard you eladrin prefer to perform your ceremonial dances while being clad in nothing but flowers? I would surely love to witness this spectacle.”

He got up from the couch, took her motionless left hand and lifted it briefly, then gently let it down again.
“I know these fiends hurt you badly with their bonds. My healer’s salves work miracles, though. Soon you won’t feel any pain anymore and your wounds will heal in no time. And now… sleep peacefully and softly, my Charusheela.”

The shadow looming over her vanished and the steadily softening steps indicated that the man withdrew from her presence. Auryn closed her eyes and despaired. She was imprisoned in the house of a foreigner, dressed in garments that weren’t her own and wasn’t even called by her own name. It had all been in vain, all without meaning. Zahir’s death had changed nothing at all.

Her memories of that fateful day came back at once. Her branch brother wouldn’t let the pirates take her away when they had boarded the Salty Spray. He had acted when no one else had dared to move a finger, all on his own. He had killed a pirate before she knew what happened, got struck by the cruel blow of a cutlass and thrown overboard. He had been so young, so naïve, so weak and yet so kind and brave. She had killed three of them in a bloody rage, including the one who had spilled Zahir’s blood, before she got hit on her head and everything turned black.

And now she was here, despite her efforts to flee from the pirates, to flee from captivity. Now her chances were utterly destroyed. All of her rage, her hate, her wrath, all of that dropped off of her at once, leaving only an empty void behind. She wept bitter tears that day and the night that followed. Zahir was dead. Never again would the seed of his actions, of his words fall on fertile ground. Her dearest branch brother was dead. And it was her fault.

Into the arena

Meanwhile, the fights start with some emaciated prisoners being chased and torn apart by a pack of wolves and some bulls. When almost all of the prisoners drop down dead, the arena's guards drag in another prisoner who turns out to be none else but Mr. Mapple who's seemingly unconscious. Elanor Janette gets on her feet and proclaims that this man made her life a living hell over the last days and has harassed both her and Isobel on multiple occasions. So she'll take pleasure in seeing him punished according to his crimes.

Fortunately, Mapple is still the same as he had been when he fought against the bandits, so he is back on his feet in no time. He easily wrestles down the pack of wolves and takes on a wild dire bear as well (Now if Wolmi Heffanita could have seen this...). After he finishes off all bestial enemies, he takes a gigantic leap towards the balcony where Elanor, Amira and the rest are standing, but he isn't able to get any hold and is pushed back by the arena's guards.

Elanor is impressed by all this raw strength and it seems like she almost regrets her next move: She offers Kulp, the arena master, a sack of gold to let Mapple fight the fabled fire tiger. But before the beast is released, she demands to know the name of the defiant combatant. Mapple proudly presents himself in front of the crowd and exclaims that his name is Andrei von Recklinghausen. He calls Elanor a bitch who's walking around destroying lives wherever she goes. Andrei then vows that he will put an end to her misdeeds and make sure that she'll never ever harm anyone again. He also proclaims that “the nice Eladrin woman” is his friend, so he will use all of his power to free her from the bitch's clutches.

(I was literally cheering for Mapple at that moment, as I didn't expect him to be in the arena. The moment he appeared I had this big grin on my face and knew that Elanor was sooo screwed, especially given the premise that Hector/Carlyle might eventually form a tag team with our hero.

For Auryn... she knew of Mapple's regenerating powers, so her initial fear turned into a burning will to fight, reclaim her freedom and punish those who wronged her. She also put her trust in the fact that Carlyle would find a way to discern her location, no matter what, as she knew he wouldn't act as headless as Zahir had)

So much bravery and selflessness incites Auryn's own will to fight and she at least manages to reduce the drug's effectiveness which lets her push back the creepy guy's greedy hands.

Meanwhile, Hector is grabbed by his neck by a pretty stupid ogre servant who drags him to one of the arena's gates. To his surprise, there is another gladiator, a minotaur who's waiting for his turn to fight. The two men share a friendly chat where the minotaur reveals that he is originally from Ber as well as he muses that where he comes from only bears fight each other in such arenas.

“Don't really know how to fight though” he says “I'm only a merchant”
“Same. I'm an author. But they got my wife and try to blame it on me, so I'll definitely give them the hell of a fight.”
“Then die with honor, friend. And let's hope she remembers you as the hero you surely are.”

Then Hector is pushed into the arena where he lands on all fours. As he's about to obviously “search the sand for weapons dropped by his predecessors” (he already got his kukris from the Vekeshi), he sees Andrei just being impaled by the flaming tiger's metal claw. He senses that something isn't right with our hero and realizes that his regenerative powers seem to be suppressed by fire. So he charges right to the beast to get its attention to a still moving prey.

The move seems to be successful as the tiger withdraws its claw and starts chasing Hector. This gives Andrei enough time to regenerate and the two men team up to show the tiger who the true masters of the arena are. As the beast is still hungry, it tries to get his claws on Hector who manages to barely escape the tiger's paws.

Meanwhile, Carlyle/Hector tries to keep up his “beran author” appearance by fighting far more mundanely than he's used to. Once he and Andrei wear the flaming tiger down enough that it doesn't pose too much of a threat to Andrei, Hector asks him to propel him high enough so he might reach the balcony and help Amira.

Fortunately, Andrei's super strength and Hector's athleticism add up well and so he lands right at the balcony, next to Amira's feet. He pulls out the injector with the antidote he got from the Vekeshi and applies it to his wife. He then hands her her weapon while grinning grimly at Elanor and the three men. Amira instantly recovers, gets on her feet and stares down the remaining four people with a deadly glare.

“No matter what this woman told you, I am not Isobel Traverse. I am Amiranya Fernandez, daughter of Bosca and proud wife of Hector Ignacio Fernandez, this very same man who Elanor Janette wanted to see torn apart in the arena by wild beasts. To bring me here, to sell me, to try to buy me, was the last mistake you repulsive creeps will ever make in your miserable lives. From this day on, all of Nalaam will know what it means to earn the wrath of a free daughter of Ber!”

The mages, Elanor and father Balthasar seem pretty intimidated by “Isobel's” sudden personality shift and they prepare to unleash their magic at Hector. Auryn takes this as a welcome distraction as she uses a quick circling dance to protect herself, Hector and Andrei from fire, turns her back to the audience and forms a small ball of fire in her hands. Her eyes flash in a vivid lilac as she unleashes the fireball on the balcony, right in front of her.

(Needless to say that the fireball did no harm to Auryn or Carlyle but pretty much roasted Balthasar and Jamie. All while the audience thought that someone of the trio was actually mad enough to use a fireball in such a close space.)

“That's why I love her!” Hector exclaims and both he and Amira cut down Jamie who tries to flee the scene. Balthasar is next as he is felled by a double kukri slash when he tries to make a beeline for the exit door. Nikola the necromancer tries to magically link Amira's life force with his own, but she manages to shake off the spell. Hector makes sure to take care of the necromancer next. This leaves Elanor for Amira who grabs the severely burnt woman by the throat and strangles her while dragging her toward the balcony's railing.

“This is the inevitable fate of anyone who tries to get their greedy hands upon my people” she hisses. Before she finally throws her over the railing to give the flaming tiger its well-deserved dinner, Hector closes up to his wife, puts a gold piece in Elanor's pocket, returns to his grim smile and says “Well, you know what? I'll just take her back.”. Then he takes the rest of the lecherous trio's bodies and throws them down as well.

“Enough of this facade! 'twas a fascinating spectacle, but this ends now!” Kulp shouts and summons an (illusionary) meteor swarm which seemingly ignites the whole balcony. He then summons a magical hand which grabs Andrei and pulls him through the arena's surface. Then we feel the space around us shifting and suddenly we're all in an empty gladiator waiting room underneath the arena. And thankfully none of us got harmed by Kulp's sudden display of power.

We first thank Andrei who tried to help Amira despite the seemingly insurmountable odds. He replies that he considers Amira to be his friend and he also didn't want to let this nasty bitch get away after everything she'd done to both Isobel and Amira. Needless to say that Amira/Auryn is deeply moved by so much selfless generosity, so she gives Andrei von Recklinghausen a long, honest embrace. She says that she has never seen anyone as kindhearted as him and asks him to always keep his gentle, big and loving heart.

“There she goes again...” Carlyle mumbles, even if he keeps his eyerolls to a minimum this time. Before Amira can take her turn on him, Kulp joins us, this time without his full Vekeshi garb. He explains that he had to put up a small show for the rest of the audience as it would be in our best interest if not all of Nalaam knew what exactly happened on this balcony. He'll also make sure to keep the political impact minimal.

We then go on to carefully get to know more about each other as we don't wish to tell Kulp too much about the fact that we are RHC agents. We hint that we all might share a mutual connection and devotion to Srasama and we also explain the whole Isobel Traverse story to the master of the arena. We add that Andrei von Recklinghausen played a major part in getting her to safety which is why we consider him to be a friend of the eladrin people as well.

Hector adds that Amira just seemed to be the next best eladrin woman after Elanor Janette lost her grip on Isobel and she didn't care that Amira was in fact a free woman from Ber. He frowns and grows quite angry while sharing the story of Elanor's misdeeds and then adds that he's always acting quite ungallantly when it comes to incidents like this. Amira adds that hopefully everyone will know to keep their fingers off her kin after what happened tonight.

Unfortunately, Kulp doesn't know anything about the Traverses, so we hand him all the information we got so he might spread the word on them among his Vekeshi community. Maybe someone will know more about the family name and act accordingly...

What happens in Nalaam...

After saying goodbye and thank you to Kulp for one last time, Hector uses his magic to turn himself and surprised Andrei invisible while Amira uses her ring to do the same. We head towards a carriage, but Amira insists to change clothes before driving back to our hotel. She'd like to keep the outfit Elanor made her wear as a trophy though. Hector seems quite relieved that Amira takes being almost sold into slavery without any sign of a breakdown (especially as Carlyle knows enough of Auryn's trauma to be really worried at this point).

On our way back to the enclave he turns quiet for a while as if he's clearing up his thoughts and then all of a sudden promises that whatever happened today will never ever happen again.

As we still don't know whether we are secretly being followed by more fake or bribed police officers, we make haste to get to our hotel as the enclave is separate territory with its own laws. We wish Andrei a good night and hope to see him again tomorrow morning and then go to our hotel room.

As soon as we enter our room, Auryn makes a beeline for the bathroom although Carlyle tries to protest that he's still stained with lots of blood and gore of all these disgusting people. Knowing what she must have been through on that balcony he lets her take all the time she needs though. Since Auryn is doing her best to wash away the feeling of dirty hands touching her, it takes quite a while, just as he expected.

After he finally gets his turn and comes back to the main room, his eyes fall upon a rather unusual sight: Auryn is sitting calmly on their bed, arms open, while a small storm is whirling through the room. One of the windows is wide open while leaves and even the occasional tiny electric discharge dance around her.

It seems like Old Stag found us after all and is trying to comfort and encourage his dearest friend from a distance. As we left the Vekeshi when he was still suffering from heavy fever after his fight with Lord Byron, we also know that he must have regained his strength by now.

(I absolutely loved this little scene. What a magical way to show Old Stag's friendship and care.)

Carlyle seems a bit worried at his partner's sight, but Auryn tells him that everything is alright as soon as she takes notice of him. She smiles faintly and adds that she's glad she has such close friends who care for her well-being.

As soon as the storm fades, Carlyle closes the window and proceeds to sit right next to Auryn. He gives her a stern, but thoughtful expression and then vows to make sure that no one will ever dare to touch her against her will. Auryn thanks him for his loyalty and his help in the arena, especially for daring to perform the leap of faith to free her from the poison. Carlyle replies that all he did was acting like any good husband should and would have, and, in case she forgot this already, they are indeed a married couple right now.

Auryn grins slightly at his comment and says that she knew he wouldn't simply leave her and finish the mission, even if she, being an RHC agent, would have totally understood had he done so. She then tries to explain her inner workings to Carlyle. She tells him that, for a moment, she was back aboard the Salty Spray with Zahir. She relived the tension, the fear, anger and pain and struggled with her inability to do anything to prevent the tragedy that followed his desperate attempt to protect her. She then relived the moment when the pirates brought her to Fordren by using the very same poison Elanor used on her to do her bidding.

But she also instinctively knew that Carlyle wasn't Zahir, that he wouldn't do the same mistakes and get himself killed. She also knew that she'd grown much stronger than last time, so all of her worries and fears quickly turned into anger and disgust which she could then direct towards her enemies. Also, there was this spark of confidence inside her that this time, the story would come to a completely different ending. She then jokes that there's really very little separating him from a truly esteemed husband right now which causes Carlyle to, again, remind her that they are in fact married people.

Auryn takes this as an opportunity to explain that it is sometimes a bit difficult for her to sharply differentiate between Amira's feelings and her own and that his constant reminding of being married is adding just another layer of complexity.

“You know, I trust you. I really do. You are my partner and my equal and I don't know too many people who can not only keep up with me, but also got my back when I need them. Truth is that somehow... it's almost as if I feel invincible or able to do deeds beyond the scope of mere mortals when we're together.” she confesses.

In return, Carlyle says that he's feeling more and more connected to the eladrin people which is why he also feels kind of responsible for them. He guesses that this is due to the part of him that once belonged to Srasama and he feels as if the sliver of the goddess somehow woke up and grew stronger. Carlyle adds that all of this led to him being personally touched by Isobel's fate and also caring so much for Auryn that he'd gone through the Bleak Gate to help her.

He realizes though that this new aspect of him kind of pushed him back to his old ways when he was acting as the Vantrys family's shadow guardian. He also feels that another part of him has a special connection to Auryn herself, even if he cannot really judge these feelings. (and it might easily be possible that Hector's and Carlyle's emotions somehow got intertwined)

Now this leaves Auryn a bit overwhelmed as all she has to say is that she has grown quite fond of Carlyle over the last few months. She then finally thanks him again for all he has done for her and embraces him affectionately. As Carlyle reacts quite the typical Carlyle way, she adds that even an esteemed husband is no servant to his wife, so she expects him to tell her when she's getting too close for his taste.

(Does anyone else know the show Lucifer? Because the titular character is reacting totally the same way to hugs with facial expressions ranging from “What is this?” to “Oh, she's doing that hug stuff again” to “I'm so confused but she obviously needs this so I better play along”. But this, being handsome and wearing suits is about all that Lucifer and Carlyle have in common )

“I will give you notice when you're making me feel uncomfortable” he says almost stoically, but with a charming smile. Auryn seizes this opportunity, grins and adds “So... what about this?”, then kisses him playfully on his cheek. Yet Carlyle's expression doesn't change the slightest bit.
“Tell me to stop...” she whispers and kisses his lips. As Carlyle still doesn't seem to react at all besides smiling constantly, she looks at him curiously before smiling back. “Still no objection?” she asks before kissing him with more passion. She then carefully frees him of his bathrobe and pushes him down on their bed where they both spend a night in bliss and harmony.

Both awake quite relaxed the next morning, even if they are both unsure whether they just did something they'd regret someday. Carlyle is unsure whether Auryn's emotions and desires were truly her own or whether she was still influenced by some aftereffect of Elanor's drugs while Auryn fears that Carlyle had just tried to comfort her after all she's been through and acted according to what he thought to be her wishes. She also fears that her rash actions might have just endangered their growing partnership, but Carlyle does his best to reassure her.

“There is a saying, you know? What happens in Nalaam stays in Nalaam.”

Phantom train

When we go down to the lobby we meet our usual suspects. Luc Jierre, who was present in the arena as well but left during Andrei's fight with the flaming tiger, asks us whether we know more about the strange incident yesterday. We tell him that we both are not really sure whether this was all just a show or part of a public penal system. After all, the Avery Coast Railway Company might have recognized our excitement after the attempted robbery in Beaumont. We act quite nervous though and say that Nalaam is both crazy and terrible and we'll be more than happy to get aboard the train again.

The moment Tantalovich sees us he says he got us a lawyer who waited all night in vain at the police station of Nalaam. We reluctantly tell the dwarf that we assume that these officers were fake and part of this arena show. We hint at Amira being abducted and tell Tantalovich of a rather chaotic spectacle in the arena. We still don't know if there were an unknown rebel group involved as well, but don't go too much into detail.

Then we are finally able to hop onto the train again to travel to Sid Minos. After a bit back and forth, we agree to maybe leak a bit of the truth to team Luc should one of them (most certainly Bree) ask again. After all, we might have been afraid to face repercussions and Luc and Ottavia might have seen Elanor Janette on her balcony. So we'd just tell them that Amira got abducted, Hector was accused of being her captor and fed to the lions... err flaming tiger alongside Andrei von Recklinghausen. Elanor Janette used Amira as substitute for Ms. Veil and tried to sell her when some mysterious rebels stepped in and freed them all.

However, Luc and Ottavia are quite distant after the oracle receives another sending and they both retreat to their compartment shortly after. Tantalovich comes around a bit later and gives us a big grin when he tells us that he won a good fortune in the casino yesterday. Which is why he'd like to share his wealth with his fellow passengers. So he hands each of us a silver coin and says he hopes that these coins might bring us luck. Together we share a drink and we suggest that he might just quit gambling and start a career as a math professor in one of Danor's famous universities. Or maybe he could keep playing and work as a teacher for gambling.

Rock Rackus seems to enjoy himself as well and tells tales of his journey to the moon. When we see that he's playing with one of Tantalovich's silver coins as well, we get a bit skeptical and test our coins for traces of magic or planar energy. We find both on the coins but cannot match the planar signature with any kind of planar energy we know. As we prefer to play it safe, we decide to hide both coins in one of the train's public restrooms.

Carlyle wants to check up on Luc and Ottavia after that, so we return to our compartment where he turns invisible again and climbs out of the window towards the compartment of the pair. He finds them both conversing in sign language, but unfortunately Carlyle isn't able to get what they are saying. He can only see that Ottavia tries to convince Luc who seems reluctant, afraid and somehow desperate.

Carlyle then returns to Auryn and tells her about his findings. He can only guess that this might be all about Ottavia's sending and their mysterious lantern.

Before we reach Sid Minos, Malia Baccarin asks us to stay in our compartment for our personal safety. Then Carlyle suddenly disappears from one second to the other and finds himself in a dark dimension. Before Auryn can go looking for her colleague, she joins him a mere moment after he vanished. To our surprise, the lanterns in our compartment turned to a purple hue and our surroundings are eerily dim lighted. Then Carlyle holds his ears as he somehow starts to hear the wails of the damned.

As we know that something is definitely not right, we quickly examine the magical properties of our compartment and come to the conclusion that we somehow got to the plane of Nem, plane of ruin, impossible as that may seem. We also get the feeling as if we've been torn from our actual bodies which might be still in the real world. As we are quite sure that the separation of body and soul for a prolonged time won't be that healthy, we try to find a way to get us back as quickly as possible.

First, we dismantle the lanterns in our compartment, but cannot really switch off their magic. So we guess that maybe finding all lanterns and dismantling them might help. Once we go outside our compartment, we find Rock Rackus who's kind of confused but recognizes this event as simply being another one of his strange planar trips. We manage to ensure him that this trip might turn quite lethal in the not so far future, so he'd better start getting the purple lanterns off the wall. Just when we think that there might be far too many of them, we see that the empty compartment of Luc and Ottavia has no such purple glowing lights.

We continue towards the locomotive and suddenly see a familiar face as the spirit of the assassin who choked on the peanut days ago haunts the place where he died. Carlyle puts him to rest once more and we decide to make haste and ignore the other lanterns (or leave them to Rock) as there might be other passengers trapped in here who could be attacked by the spirits of those who died recently: 40 raptor victims plus one malevolent Boone.

(This was the point when I knew I had seen this before and gleefully exclaimed “Phantom Train!”. Carlyle's player agreed with a grin and we instantly knew that we had to get to the locomotive to leave. And maybe fight it. And maybe even, depending on whether Mapple was trapped in here as well, suplexing the engine.

For those who ask themselves what the heck I'm talking about... there is this sequence in Final Fantasy 6 where the party boards a mysterious train and finds out that this is the Phantom Train which is carrying the dead to the underworld. So they must leave it asap. But in order to do so, they must fight the train's engine, a fight that can be quite hilarious.

So here's a picture of Cyan aboard the locomotive http://img15.deviantart.net/4201/i/...phantom_train_by_lukecastellan909-d4ewk4y.jpg as well as an illu I found that's looking even more like our Nem-Train https://i.imgur.com/Xl2xP2u.png )

When we reach the 2nd class carriages, we find Margit aka Victoria Royceton who's busy keeping more phantoms at bay. We team up and manage to destroy them quite quickly due to her holy energy. Together we make haste towards the locomotive and destroy more groups of specters by hurling fireballs at them. When we reach the baggage cars, we find Andrei who's really not sure what's happening. Turns out that Tantalovich gave him a silver coin as well and we ask him to simply come with us as there is not time for further explanations. Before we arrive at our destination, a last, deformed phantom tiefling comes at us, trying to drain our life. Carlyle exorcises this ghost before it can reach us though.

Once we reach the locomotive, we see that the whole thing seems to be consumed by violet flames. The smoke surrounding the engine then manifests and forms one gigantic wraith.
“Leave him to me, you take whatever Luc got built into this engine” Auryn says and draws her rapier, ready to defend the rest of them. Carlyle nods and teleports behind the wraith, opens the engine's cover and finds a magical lantern beneath it. Thankfully he can destroy it with a few hard hits.

Suddenly, the world around us changes and we are back in the real world, a good part of our team standing right next to the train's confused looking driver. Hector climbs back inside the train and explains that it seems like someone tried to manipulate the train yet again as this lantern-thing did some evil magic on quite a few passengers. As the driver already knows that “Mapple” and Hector Fernandez are quite capable bandit fighters, he decides to ask no further questions.

Just as we are about to return to our compartment and plan to check on Rock Rackus, we see that team Luc is about to leave the train more than quickly and immediately call for a carriage...

A parley on the forsaken island of Odiem

Session 23

As we assume that team Luc is about to get away, we decide to make haste and follow them. Auryn uses a quick spell to connect her, Carlyle, Burton and Margit with shadowy whispers to make last minute arrangements before leaving the train as well:

We ask Burton who's been the most inconspicious one of our team to stay in deep cover for the rest of the trip and be on alert if should other possible Obscurati members enter the train next morning. Meanwhile, Margit should keep her appearance as a doctor and care for injured passengers in case of events. She's also free to team up with Andrei von Recklinghausen should she be in need of a fighting buddy. Regarding the two of us, we totally believe that we're about to blow our covers should we have to directly confront Luc Jierre, Ottavia Sacredotte, Tantalovich and Bree Kaldeckis.

We then leave the train, call for a carriage and ask the driver to follow the quartet at a safe distance. The carriage driver is a bit irritated at this request, but Carlyle uses subtle Familia phrases to show the man his “true colors”. He, again, emphasizes that we'd like to cause no commotion and just wish to coincidentally arrive at the same place the other carriage is most likely headed to. Fortunately, the Familia's name bears much weight in Crisillyir and so our slightly intimidated driver guesses that they are headed to Sid Minos harbor and uses a side-alley route to get us there.

(I'm always positively surprised when Carlyle uses his growing knowledge of Familia customs and signs to mislead people into thinking that he's affiliated with them. Especially in Crisillyir. He put quite an effort into keeping a good contact with Cippiano without crossing Delft's lines and I guess the two men have much mutual respect.)

The whole harbor is surrounded by thick fog and we can barely see that team Luc is being led to a separate part of the harbor before vanishing out of sight. Thanks to a combination of Auryn's musical inspiration - a quick hymn praising Srasama's fiery grace which allows us to gaze through the fog unhindered - and Carlyle's magically enhanced sight he can see the quartet depart on a small steam-powered vessel, heading towards a slender, tall building somewhere on the sea. Seems as if they are about to visit another lighthouse. Even if this one doesn't emit any light which doesn't make too much sense.

Auryn is just about to look out for a boat which might be fast enough to keep up with the steam vessel when Carlyle asks her to turn invisible and take his hand. He then turns invisible as well and quickly teleports the two of us on top of the boat's roof.

We stay hidden during the transfer and notice that the crew turns increasingly nervous the closer we're getting to the island. Once the boat lands and the quartet departs, some of the crewmen are almost terrified to be here, on this island called Odiem and it seems as if the sailors try to leave again as fast as possible. Luc and company are heading straight to the entrance of the island's old tower, so we decide to follow them at a distance.

As soon as the quartet comes close to the massive door, the three that are not Ottavia Sacredotte seem to be suddenly frozen in time while Ottavia starts drawing a summoning circle into the sandy ground. As we carefully examine the three at a distance it turns out that they were merely illusions and we come to the conclusion that this all was a cleverly set up plan to draw us (or other pursuers) away from the train.

As Ottavia is deaf and we are still invisible, we exchange a few words on whether Nevard's “woman torn into three” and “man torn into two” could be a metaphor for Ottavia and Luc and their loyalties for each other, the lantern project and maybe the Clergy ( in Ottavia's case) as Kasvarina was most certainly not aboard the train. Then we decide to drop the invisibility and approach Ottavia.

We ask her what she's doing here and why she left Luc to lead us here. We also wish to know why Luc tried to kill us, Rock Rackus, Andrei and that doctor Royceton with his phantom lantern and these spirit spectres. Ottavia seems surprise at our sudden appearance and puts her ongoing summoning ritual to a halt. She establishes a mental link to the two of us and explains that she'll do everything to protect Luc Jierre which is why she has to draw people who could harm him away from her protegee. People like us. She calls us risuri spies and adds that she won't let us stop him from making the world a better place.

We return that we don't wish to harm anyone, neither Luc, nor her. All we try to do is to understand what Luc and his other contacts might be planning. And while Luc seems like a genuinely good and benevolent person (as long as he's not trying to kill others with lantern-induced phantom zones based on assumptions...), we have more than one reason to doubt that the other people he might be working with share these traits. We tell her that we know some of these people and know that they don't shy away from using cruelty, murder and torture and that they conducted experiments that endangered thousands of people.

Ottavia says that this simply isn't true and that this might all be a misunderstanding, but we count all the facts we got from the Macbannin incident (without using any names of course): These guys almost obliterated a city district (the Nettles), tried to kill us and two innocent bystanders (Dr. von Recklinghausen and Lynn Kindleton), are responsible for the death of the High Skyseer, abducted of one of Auryn's relatives, and used the souls of workers who got killed in “factory accidents” as fuel for their empowered Witchoil.

Ottavia tries to deny any connection to her organization again, but we give her the name “Obscurati” and she seems to be shocked at this revelation. She then fetches the silver ring from her finger, and throws it right in front of our feet as if she'd wish to be rid of its influence. We pick it up and see that it contains an OB-code quite similar to those of Bergeron and Finona.

“I cannot believe it. I don't want to believe it. But I can sense no lie, no evil intent in your thought” she mutters mentally and collapses onto the wet sand.

We try to explain that these people used the same kind of trickery to get one of our own “good-hearted” Risuri to work for them and who lost his life once he realized his mistake and tried to make things right. Whoever leads them is most certainly trying to abuse the good intentions of powerful people who wish to make the world a better place. People like Luc. We say that it is heart-breaking for protectors like us to see a good person like him being fooled and his knowledge abused.

Ottavia slowly understands where we're coming from, but seems to despair again. “If you tell the truth, then I just doomed us all. My sacrifice will be in vain. For this is Odiem, the island that keeps the Crypta Heraeticorum and it is cursed. There is no escape for us. The dead will consume us all.”

Just as she finished this thought, the sea around us turns turbulent and the dead start to emerge from it. We ask Ottavia how long we'll have to fight them off and ask her to hide behind us. Ottavia explains that they'll rest again once the sun reaches its zenith which is in more than a half day. Auryn jokingly says that there probably won't be a Titan coming to their aid this time and Carlyle just replies that we really shouldn't wish to wake the Kraken.

Besides seeing the dead rising from the sea, we also realize that our own magic starts ebbing off as well. We feel like we have no choice but to take the bull by the horns and flee towards the cursed crypt. The two of us do our best to clear some of the rubble that's blocking the entrance of the tower. Then we convince Ottavia that she has to conquer her fears and follow our lead down there if she ever wishes to see her dearest Luc again. Besides that, getting eaten by zombies probably won't be the most glorious of ends for an oracle of the Clergy.

Fortunately, Ottavia puts herself together and uses her divine power to open the door to the Crypta. We hurry inside and make haste to lock the heavy door behind us. Then we take a deep breath as we know that, at least for the moment, we are safe from the undead. Auryn and Carlyle share their knowledge about this place and we remember that this is one of the places where the Clergy locked cursed and heretical objects away. Just as Auryn muses whether these fanatics might just have stored ancient artifacts of her own people down there, we hear a faint and strange whisper coming from further down the complex.

“Come inside, find me, child of Elfaivar, child branded by the goddess. You two, unlike the hypocritical priestess, are welcome to join me in this cursed crypt. My name is Ashima-Shimtu and I await you.”

Her whispers send shivers down our spines and we ask Ottavia who this Ashima-Shimtu might be as we never heard that name before. She isn't sure herself, but guesses that she'd be a powerful foe of the Clergy. We promise Ottavia to protect her and to be careful, but as it seems like we got a few hours to spare, are quite interested in these “heresies” stored here and are keen on getting as much distance between us and the zombies, we'd like to proceed further.

Crypta Heraeticorum

We venture down the hall and are positively surprised to feel that our magic seems to be coming back. We find some objects on an altar: Iron trinkets which seem to act like magnets and magical torches. Ottavia explains that these items must be some kind of keys to the inner crypt, so we better take them with us.

However, we soon realize that there is a huge door blocking the entrance to the inner crypt. And while we quickly figure out the mechanism to open the door – an invisible chain that needs to be pulled down and locked behind a pole – even the three of us combined are simply too light-weighted to pull down the chain.

(Auryn being “small” and therefore pretty lightweight for an Eladrin is a running gag in our Zeitgeist campaign, but Carlyle isn't much taller and only a bit heavier. And Ottavia seemed to have an even smaller frame.)

So Ottavia says that she could continue her planned summoning spell to get celestial help in the form of a Bralani. We accept her offer and a slightly confused Celestial guardian greets the oracle only to be used as additional leverage.

The four of us finally manage to pull open the door only to face a towering tidal wave that seems to be locked in time. We quickly realize that the wave is rising and lowering whenever we pull or release the chain and so identify it as an illusion. We ignore the crashing wave and emerge as dry as before.

In the next room we find a rich library containing “heretic texts”. The books are far too many to read them all, so Carlyle and Auryn decide to sort them roughly by source: We ignore all texts written by or for or about demons and their worshippers and get all holy scripts and theological-historical tomes that look elfaivaran. Also, we find a rare collection of Miller's theorems which are signed by the philosopher himself and decide to free this library of their “corrupting influence” (*cough cough*).

We tell Ottavia that while we'll surely read these books first, we'll also make sure to get them to places where they can serve their original author's intents: In the case of the elfaivaran books, we wish to get these back to Auryn's people as they were stolen from them. In the case of Miller's scripts, there are surely lots of scholars and researchers who'd be more than grateful to get their eyes on these authentic texts. Ottavia doesn't object and so we proceed to collect the tomes of interest.

We leave the library after a while and get to a corridor filled with water. There we see two boats, one of them fancy and decorated with ornaments, the other one old, rusty and barely able to float. We remember the teachings of Triegenes and his origins as a humble fisherman, take the old boat and succeed.

After the wet corridor, we find a door inscribed with the saying that courtesy is the most beautiful of decorations and we get that this door needs some sort of password to pass through. As Carlyle is master of polite courtesy, he tries his full repertoire of reverences, but the door stays close even if he gets the gut feeling that he's clearly on the right path. Auryn observes this for a while and jokes that, were that her door, she'd just demand it to open for her. The door doesn't seem to like that though. After a while, Carlyle asks the door to “please open up” and this seems to be doing the trick.

(“Wasn't that a bit too simple?” Auryn asked afterward and Carlyle responded that “maybe the simple minds of the Godhands wouldn't know much more expressions of courtesy than a plain old 'please'”)

After the door we find a well-equipped armory. As in the library, ancient elfaivaran armors, trinkets and weapons are stored right next to those of demonic origin and Auryn sneers at so much ignorance. We take some time to sort the eladrin artifacts from the true corrupt ones and Carlyle even finds a small statue of Srasama that must have belonged to a priestess once. He asks to keep this one for himself and Auryn doesn't object as she knows that her colleague is eager to understand the nature of the goddess. She then writes a small note, remembering that “courtesy” theme, in which she apologizes for "plundering the armory" and explains that these items have to be returned to their place of origin and also their original purpose.

This earns her an honest laughter from Ashima-Shimtu. “You truly believe that anyone will read your puny note? To them, you are nothing more than a demoness.” she whispers from somewhere down the complex.

Next we find a room with three doors. We find three keys on a long forsaken rack and while they do work on the doors, the corridors behind each door only leads back to the very same room. As we know that persistence might be valued by followers of Triegenes, we just walk down the same corridor a couple of times, but we don't really make any progress. We then take some time to search for hidden doors or clues. We do find an old note saying “Haha, you're dead, dummy!” but thankfully there is no trap or other deadly mechanism attacking us.

(Yeah, Tizbiz returned the favour. I used this very same note when his character searched Nina Glibglammer's room in my WotBS campaign. Nina really had her desk trapped with a poison needle though)

After a while, we try to split up and this seems to work as we all end up in another room. But this time, a wall of ice is blocking our entrance. Now we did remember to bring the torches, but Auryn prefers to use her own magic to speed things up and so she burning hands her way through the ice.

Behind the icy wall are lots of cursed objects. We try to identify them from a safe distance and understand that many of these items can be quite lethal to a clueless user. So we better keep our hands from them. Fortunately, these items seem to be of human making and are therefore not really interesting for us.

We head for the next door, only to find ourselves teleported back to where we came from. “Ah, this one is easy. Does anyone have a golden loop? A ring? I'm not too fond of gold, you know.” says Auryn, looking curiously at her company.

“Well, you could just wear this golden choker over here. But I guess it would choke you quite literally.” Carlyle jokes while pointing at one of the cursed items. This, however, earns him nothing less than death stares from Auryn who isn't really keen on discussing the inappropriateness of certain jokes in front of Ottavia.

(This and the Fordren joke a week ago – or so – made her think that Carlyle really left his butler persona behind whenever he was impersonating Hector and then kind of “forgot” about Auryn's sensitive topics. And yep, he completely shocked her both times as she didn't see it coming.)

We do still have our mage-cuffs with us though and these let us move through the teleporting door quite easily. Behind the door, we find a corridor filled with reddish looking mist. We get that this mist must contain iron as it reacts to our magnets and as we really don't wish to inhale floating rust particles, we clear our way with the magnets and reach another door. As Auryn approaches this door, she feels suddenly pulled towards the ceiling as her rapier moves upwards.

We soon realize that this is another magnetic device which caught Auryn's starmetal weapon and unfortunately no one of us is strong enough to pull it off again. She curses heavily in elvish as she's grown really fond of Dr. von Recklinghausen's gift and doesn't wish to leave it behind. Carlyle just makes sure to remove all metal items from his body and approaches the door. As soon as he reaches it, he finds a switch that opens the door and shuts down the magnetic mechanism, and both Auryn and the rapier suddenly drop from the ceiling.

To our surprise, we find that the next room contains living people who are imprisoned in cages. Ottavia explains that these poor souls, who look more like zombies than people, are cursed humans who were beyond saving even for the most powerful priests of the Clergy. Auryn tries to help them anyway by performing a sacred dance of Srasama and conjuring down the goddess' holy light. But it doesn't seem to have any effect on them, so we decide to leave them imprisoned here.

The next door requires a connection between two electric poles, so we all line up to close the circuit and the door opens. Behind the door, we find glass tubes in which more people are kept imprisoned. Judging them by the looks, we'd guess that they were once Paladins or Godhands of the Clergy who became tainted and corrupted by demonic influence. They try to trick us into releasing them, but we see right through their lies and apologize for not being able to help them.

As soon as we're about to leave them behind, one of the armored knights calls out to us again and claims that he knows this eladrin lady from 500 years ago when she came here in the company of a priest named Miller. Auryn answers that she's not Kasvarina, but she does know about her as she's her ancestress. She then asks the knight about the matriarch, her reasons to be in a cursed place like this and why she'd be with a Clergyman. He doesn't know much more, but says they must have been pretty close as they were holding hands.

Now this is getting more and more intriguing. We discuss what Kasvarina might have been up to and whether she had come here before or after the Malice. Auryn explains that she has always been an enemy of the Clergy and continued to hunt down high ranked Clergymen even after the war had ended. Carlyle adds that Miller had been branded a heretic, so they might have shared a mutual hatred against the Clergy. Or maybe Miller freed her from captivity? After all, we know that Kasvarina was said to be caught and executed by the Clergy, but that would be just one of the many lies they told to keep their populace in check.

We also discuss whether Miller might have been a Deva and survived his Pyre by reincarnation. Carlyle mentions the worrisome irony of such a coincidence, as they'd then be the second Deva-Eladrin pair to venture these cursed halls.

The next obstacle is a mirror who tries to fear everyone who comes close with a screaming face. We try to cover the mirror with blankets and other clothes, but that doesn't seem to help. One of the knights sees our futile efforts and brags that he does know the trick and he'd be eager to share it with us in exchange for his freedom. We thank him for the offer, but prefer to continue on our own. Finally Carlyle has a flash of inspiration, takes out his own pocket mirror and reflects the mirror's face back to its origin. This causes the mirror to become afraid itself and drag Carlyle right through it. As neither Ottavia nor Auryn know whether this was a good or bad result, the two women discuss other methods of interacting with the mirror before doing the same as the Deva.

(We all know the horror-stories about dungeons, doors and spheres of annihilation. Mr. Carlyle's player had a high level wizard who lost an arm due to one of these. Not that I'd believe that a Zeitgeist dungeon would be so cruel to throw random PC deaths at us, but one should be cautious anyway...)

Fortunately, we arrive right behind the mirror where Carlyle has been waiting patiently.
“I thought you'd never come...” he sighs in relief and together we continue our way.

I didn't write any of that. Nifty. Well, maybe some of the loose themes, but I'm intrigued by the fresh take on the Vault of Heresies.