Session 48
The I of the tiger
We return to Kasvarina's home with a sense of accomplishment as we really feared that High Matriarch Athryalla might be a too tough nut to crack. But before we can share our success with Kasvarina, Kieran Sentarcore and Asrabey, we spot said Dreadnought in front of the house, carelessly sharpening his daggers.
As we see that the Asrabey is very obviously still feeling the frustration of being unable to be of help or even do anything besides sitting here and waiting, we join him and ask him about his thoughts. But to our surprise he doesn't really talk about himself, but rather Kasvarina. Turns out that he still places more value in her as he claims that his major problem would be the fact that his wife would be so weak and dependent on others.
“My wife has always been a strong warrior. But 'this' Kasvarina is unable to protect anyone, lest the whole of Elfaivar.”, he growls.
“May I remind you that it was the 'old' Kasvarina who built the Colossus, joined the Obscurati and whose plans now endanger all of Elfaivar? This 'weak' Kasvarina has the potential to grow strong again once she regains her memories. And then she will remember you and everything you shared.”, Carlyle replies, urging Asrabey to be patient just a little more.
Asrabey sighs deeply and continues to sharpen his blades. So we tell him that we at least have some good news regarding the Arc of Reida, so he should really join the rest of us for planning the next steps.
Once inside, we tell Kasvarina and Sentacore about our permission to go search for the artifact. We don't tell Kas too much about Athryalla's antipathy for “old Kasvarina” and just mention that she and the past version of Kasvarina had quite the different methods of dealing with the Clergy which is why she would be so cold and uncaring.
(Really didn't wish to disturb her any more while she was in this unstable state)
We then tell the three that the Matriarch insisted that we'd look after the Arc without Kasvarina, and we'd be happy if she had someone around her who she knew well. Fortunately, Asrabey agrees that it would be best for all if he just stayed in Sentosa with Kasvarina just in case she either remembered something important or some Ob would try to sneak into the city.
When we tell the group about the location of the Arc, Kieran Sentacore's eyes widen and he unpacks several old maps and scrolls to show us his vast knowledge. We let him do his historian magic and plan our path from Sentosa to the Sanctum of Ingatan. When Sentacore realizes that our trip would lead us close to the Perpetual City, the historian gets really excited and states that seeing or even visiting the city just once would be a dream come true for him. Auryn encourages him to follow this dream as we all could visit the city together once we're done with restoring Kasvarina's memories.
Carlyle bites his tongue however and then sends her a mental message telling Auryn that he wouldn't be so sure about that possibility. After all, Sentacore is no Eladrin and a kind-of prisoner from Danor. A prisoner who was just exposed to some of the more important secrets of a major Eladrin enclave. So he'd probably not be allowed to leave Sentosa for the rest of his life.
So we pack up and leave Sentosa as soon as we're ready. Our path leads us through the jungle for a whole week where we get the impression that we're very much alone in the wilderness. Then, we spot a gigantic mountain and realize that this must be the location of the Perpetual City. We venture closer until we finally spot the trail of a wooden carriage in the soft ground. It is accompanied by hoof-prints, so we guess it might just have been an ox cart that came through this clearance. And once we're closer to the peak of the mountain, we find a wooden watchtower.
So we continue our way in stealth mode in order to avoid any ruckus and get a clearer image of the situation in the city. Once we spot a scout in typical danoran clothing, we're glad that we took the extra precautions. We make a quick mental exchange and conclude that the Danorans wouldn't be here for no reason, so we'd risk the detour to take a closer look at the city.
We sneak down the crater and find a forsaken, but still magnificent ancient eladrin city. Unlike the other ruins, this one seems to be untouched by overgrowth and we quickly realize that there might be some subtle magic which keeps the jungle at bay. But as we venture deeper, the architecture changes bit by bit until Carlyle points at some really ancient but totally characteristic crisillyiri influences among the oldest buildings. And when we come to a larger, open space, we spot an inscription which mentions a family name that is clearly Crisillyiri. Carlyle remembers that name and also the lectures he had when he was in school: That the last descendant of this family had been executed for heresy because he had falsely claimed that Eladrin and Crisillyiri might have had the same roots.
Unfortunately, these hints are all we find about the theory that humans and Eladrin might have once lived side by side. We guess that the Danorans might have found more information, so we surprise the sole scout on the watchtower and ask him about the city. But alas, he doesn't know more than we already do, so we wipe his memory of this encounter and move on. After all, we still got an Arc to find.
So we continue in the general direction of the Sanctum of Ingatan until we finally find another road. As this road leads into the right direction and allows much faster travel, we follow its path for a while. We come across several smaller settlements which appear to be of Eladrin making, but which have been abandoned not too long ago. So we guess that we've finally entered the zone of conflict Athrylalla warned us about.
We continue down the road cautiously until we hear noises coming from somewhere further down the road. So we hide in the overgrowth along the road and spot a group of humans, obviously wearing crisillyiri clothing and armaments, who are transporting several injured on their carts. As this group is moving at quite the slow pace, we easily close the gap to them and follow them for a while. We see several claw wounds on the injured and guess that these might be soldiers who fought the Were-tigers, or Bagheva, as Athryalla called them. We also listen to their conversation and find that the group's morale is at a very low point. They are desperately waiting for the relief troops and have been far longer serving on the front lines than what they had signed up for.
We follow the crisillyiri soldiers to a small encampment surrounded by wooden palisades. Carlyle also smells the biting stench of pyre smoke, so we sneak in while being invisible and look for its source. As he had guessed,we find a still smoldering pyre where both human and eladrin bodies had been burned recently. Carlyle tries to connect to one of the deceased Eladrin and is able to summon the spirit of one man who died recently.
The Eladrin is very harsh and unfriendly at first, but Carlyle assures him that he is a friend who wants to help a fellow Eladrin woman. In addition, he would consider himself an enemy of the current Clergy, so any help he can provide us will probably weaken their enemy as well. The spirit sees the truth in his words and tell us about his home, Kanta Mahala, or Bramblehome. He tells Carlyle to look behind the curtain of the waterfall and to ask for Betronga, their leader.
Carlyle thanks the spirit for his trust and bids him farewell. We're about to leave this encampment when we suddenly hear commotion from further inside. So we sneak a bit closer and see that several of the crisillyiri soldiers are pointing hastily to the sky. We look into the same general direction and spot three larger figures advancing from the north. Before the Crisillyiri can get a better image on what these creatures could possibly be, they descend and disappear below the treeline.
We continue to stay hidden and listen to the soldiers' conversation regarding the strange sight and it appears as if they are in a heated debate on whether these would be larger birds or flying demons. In a flash of insight, Carlyle uses this uncertainty as a means to strike a heavy blow to their morale.
“Large birds? Haha, you fools, if you knew... if you only knew” he tells them mentally, one by one. with a truly malicious, demon-like undertone. Of course, the soldiers panic instantly and start looking for the source of these dark words.
“Now they know the true terror of uncertainty. Let's look for Kanta Mahala, these guys will most likely take the rest of the day to search for invisible demons” he tells Auryn mentally, this time in his usual voice. Still she senses a strange satisfaction and almost joy in his words.
(Telepathy or mental messaging in general can be a terrifying power in the hands of a creative player. And Carlyle is just the right person to know what trigger points he'd need to tap in an opponent.
As an anecdote, I had to tone down the psionic version of Sending in my WotBS campaign because the designers didn't realize it could easily be abused to constantly terrorize a person over a really long distance and for an almost infinite duration. Not that my players would have intended to use it that way, but the possibility was there...)
So we leave the crisilliyri encampment behind and follow the path to Kanta Mahala that we got from the eladrin's spirit. At first, we hurry as we want to make some distance to the encampment. But then we proceed with more caution as we know from our encounter with the eladrin hermit that traps can be quite deadly in these lands.
Just before we reach the final way to the Bramblehome, we start to hear more and more animal noises. Usually, more careless wanderers would interpret these sounds as a signal that wildlife is indeed abundant in this part of the forest, but both Carlyle and Auryn know the traditional signaling of eladrin scouts. Nevertheless, we continue cautiously, looking up to the trees every now and then to signal that we're quite aware of the hidden Eladrin.
Once the noises intensify, Auryn suggests Gabriel to go hide in the bushes as the scouts would be really close now and she doesn't know how the Bagheva would react to someone who looks so much like their Crisillyiri enemy. He agrees and makes a silent leap through space and time. It doesn't take Auryn much longer on the hidden path and she's all of a sudden being approached by a young Eladrin woman in hunter's leathers.
“And what would bring someone with such pretty garments to the territory of the Bagheva?” the woman asks with a raspy, almost feral voice.
Before Auryn can answer, the eladrin continues: “Seems to be one of the matriarch's kids. Smells like one, too. Your kind usually stays away from ours.”
“I am Auryn, and yes, I am the daughter of a matriarch. But I am not from Sentosa. My mother is matriarch Galadin of Pallita, but you'd probably never heard of it. I've come to find the Sanctum of Ingatan, for it is of utmost importance for the future of all our kind that we find an old relic of the god. So I'd be really glad if you could guide me to Kanta Mahala.”
When she realizes that Auryn shown no sign of aggression, the woman comes a bit closer and sniffs at her. She then nods and introduces herself as Talios Valanar, a scout from Bramblehome. This is a true surprise to Auryn as this young warrior apparently has the same name as matriarch Athryalla. Talios smirks when she mentions the matriarch of Sentosa whom she calls a very distant relative. She doesn't know exactly how they are related though as her ancestor must have left Sentosa several generations ago.
(In my headcannon, the original Bagheva went into the sealed temple of Hewanharimau and drank from the blood of the god. Maybe it was a stupid dare of one of the matriarch's kids, maybe it was a full-blown schism. But they were most likely exiled after that)
Auryn signals her interest in Talios' story, but she also has another point she'd like to talk about. First she asks the huntress to please stay no matter what happens next. She then tells Talios that she didn't come here all alone because no sane matriarch's daughter would do something that stupid and Talios laughs from all of her heart at that remark. Auryn then explains that she brought her Sahodar Mitra with her, a man she trusts with her life. She adds that he has quite the unusual appearance for an eladrin's Sahomi, so she hopes Talios will show him the same respect she'd shown her.
Talios seems intrigued, but also wary at this prospect. She nods again and Carlyle finally leaves the undergrowth to greet her. The Bagheva was very much ready to see a disfigured Eladrin, but she clearly wasn't prepared to see a human, lest a deva. So she transforms into a weretiger on the spot and growls at Carlyle. In reaction, he shows her his bare palms.
“Please, I mean no harm. Every word Auryn said was true. These people, these humans who may look like me are my enemy as well. We came here to look for the Sanctum, but we are ready to defend the Eladrin against the foreign intruders.”
Auryn adds that we two only recently learned of the conflict between the colonists and the Bagheva, which is why we would like to speak to their chief Betronga. Talios stays in her tiger form for a little longer before she calms down and transforms back. She seems still wary, but agrees to lead us to Kanta Mahala.
The I of the tiger
We return to Kasvarina's home with a sense of accomplishment as we really feared that High Matriarch Athryalla might be a too tough nut to crack. But before we can share our success with Kasvarina, Kieran Sentarcore and Asrabey, we spot said Dreadnought in front of the house, carelessly sharpening his daggers.
As we see that the Asrabey is very obviously still feeling the frustration of being unable to be of help or even do anything besides sitting here and waiting, we join him and ask him about his thoughts. But to our surprise he doesn't really talk about himself, but rather Kasvarina. Turns out that he still places more value in her as he claims that his major problem would be the fact that his wife would be so weak and dependent on others.
“My wife has always been a strong warrior. But 'this' Kasvarina is unable to protect anyone, lest the whole of Elfaivar.”, he growls.
“May I remind you that it was the 'old' Kasvarina who built the Colossus, joined the Obscurati and whose plans now endanger all of Elfaivar? This 'weak' Kasvarina has the potential to grow strong again once she regains her memories. And then she will remember you and everything you shared.”, Carlyle replies, urging Asrabey to be patient just a little more.
Asrabey sighs deeply and continues to sharpen his blades. So we tell him that we at least have some good news regarding the Arc of Reida, so he should really join the rest of us for planning the next steps.
Once inside, we tell Kasvarina and Sentacore about our permission to go search for the artifact. We don't tell Kas too much about Athryalla's antipathy for “old Kasvarina” and just mention that she and the past version of Kasvarina had quite the different methods of dealing with the Clergy which is why she would be so cold and uncaring.
(Really didn't wish to disturb her any more while she was in this unstable state)
We then tell the three that the Matriarch insisted that we'd look after the Arc without Kasvarina, and we'd be happy if she had someone around her who she knew well. Fortunately, Asrabey agrees that it would be best for all if he just stayed in Sentosa with Kasvarina just in case she either remembered something important or some Ob would try to sneak into the city.
When we tell the group about the location of the Arc, Kieran Sentacore's eyes widen and he unpacks several old maps and scrolls to show us his vast knowledge. We let him do his historian magic and plan our path from Sentosa to the Sanctum of Ingatan. When Sentacore realizes that our trip would lead us close to the Perpetual City, the historian gets really excited and states that seeing or even visiting the city just once would be a dream come true for him. Auryn encourages him to follow this dream as we all could visit the city together once we're done with restoring Kasvarina's memories.
Carlyle bites his tongue however and then sends her a mental message telling Auryn that he wouldn't be so sure about that possibility. After all, Sentacore is no Eladrin and a kind-of prisoner from Danor. A prisoner who was just exposed to some of the more important secrets of a major Eladrin enclave. So he'd probably not be allowed to leave Sentosa for the rest of his life.
So we pack up and leave Sentosa as soon as we're ready. Our path leads us through the jungle for a whole week where we get the impression that we're very much alone in the wilderness. Then, we spot a gigantic mountain and realize that this must be the location of the Perpetual City. We venture closer until we finally spot the trail of a wooden carriage in the soft ground. It is accompanied by hoof-prints, so we guess it might just have been an ox cart that came through this clearance. And once we're closer to the peak of the mountain, we find a wooden watchtower.
So we continue our way in stealth mode in order to avoid any ruckus and get a clearer image of the situation in the city. Once we spot a scout in typical danoran clothing, we're glad that we took the extra precautions. We make a quick mental exchange and conclude that the Danorans wouldn't be here for no reason, so we'd risk the detour to take a closer look at the city.
We sneak down the crater and find a forsaken, but still magnificent ancient eladrin city. Unlike the other ruins, this one seems to be untouched by overgrowth and we quickly realize that there might be some subtle magic which keeps the jungle at bay. But as we venture deeper, the architecture changes bit by bit until Carlyle points at some really ancient but totally characteristic crisillyiri influences among the oldest buildings. And when we come to a larger, open space, we spot an inscription which mentions a family name that is clearly Crisillyiri. Carlyle remembers that name and also the lectures he had when he was in school: That the last descendant of this family had been executed for heresy because he had falsely claimed that Eladrin and Crisillyiri might have had the same roots.
Unfortunately, these hints are all we find about the theory that humans and Eladrin might have once lived side by side. We guess that the Danorans might have found more information, so we surprise the sole scout on the watchtower and ask him about the city. But alas, he doesn't know more than we already do, so we wipe his memory of this encounter and move on. After all, we still got an Arc to find.
So we continue in the general direction of the Sanctum of Ingatan until we finally find another road. As this road leads into the right direction and allows much faster travel, we follow its path for a while. We come across several smaller settlements which appear to be of Eladrin making, but which have been abandoned not too long ago. So we guess that we've finally entered the zone of conflict Athrylalla warned us about.
We continue down the road cautiously until we hear noises coming from somewhere further down the road. So we hide in the overgrowth along the road and spot a group of humans, obviously wearing crisillyiri clothing and armaments, who are transporting several injured on their carts. As this group is moving at quite the slow pace, we easily close the gap to them and follow them for a while. We see several claw wounds on the injured and guess that these might be soldiers who fought the Were-tigers, or Bagheva, as Athryalla called them. We also listen to their conversation and find that the group's morale is at a very low point. They are desperately waiting for the relief troops and have been far longer serving on the front lines than what they had signed up for.
We follow the crisillyiri soldiers to a small encampment surrounded by wooden palisades. Carlyle also smells the biting stench of pyre smoke, so we sneak in while being invisible and look for its source. As he had guessed,we find a still smoldering pyre where both human and eladrin bodies had been burned recently. Carlyle tries to connect to one of the deceased Eladrin and is able to summon the spirit of one man who died recently.
The Eladrin is very harsh and unfriendly at first, but Carlyle assures him that he is a friend who wants to help a fellow Eladrin woman. In addition, he would consider himself an enemy of the current Clergy, so any help he can provide us will probably weaken their enemy as well. The spirit sees the truth in his words and tell us about his home, Kanta Mahala, or Bramblehome. He tells Carlyle to look behind the curtain of the waterfall and to ask for Betronga, their leader.
Carlyle thanks the spirit for his trust and bids him farewell. We're about to leave this encampment when we suddenly hear commotion from further inside. So we sneak a bit closer and see that several of the crisillyiri soldiers are pointing hastily to the sky. We look into the same general direction and spot three larger figures advancing from the north. Before the Crisillyiri can get a better image on what these creatures could possibly be, they descend and disappear below the treeline.
We continue to stay hidden and listen to the soldiers' conversation regarding the strange sight and it appears as if they are in a heated debate on whether these would be larger birds or flying demons. In a flash of insight, Carlyle uses this uncertainty as a means to strike a heavy blow to their morale.
“Large birds? Haha, you fools, if you knew... if you only knew” he tells them mentally, one by one. with a truly malicious, demon-like undertone. Of course, the soldiers panic instantly and start looking for the source of these dark words.
“Now they know the true terror of uncertainty. Let's look for Kanta Mahala, these guys will most likely take the rest of the day to search for invisible demons” he tells Auryn mentally, this time in his usual voice. Still she senses a strange satisfaction and almost joy in his words.
(Telepathy or mental messaging in general can be a terrifying power in the hands of a creative player. And Carlyle is just the right person to know what trigger points he'd need to tap in an opponent.
As an anecdote, I had to tone down the psionic version of Sending in my WotBS campaign because the designers didn't realize it could easily be abused to constantly terrorize a person over a really long distance and for an almost infinite duration. Not that my players would have intended to use it that way, but the possibility was there...)
So we leave the crisilliyri encampment behind and follow the path to Kanta Mahala that we got from the eladrin's spirit. At first, we hurry as we want to make some distance to the encampment. But then we proceed with more caution as we know from our encounter with the eladrin hermit that traps can be quite deadly in these lands.
Just before we reach the final way to the Bramblehome, we start to hear more and more animal noises. Usually, more careless wanderers would interpret these sounds as a signal that wildlife is indeed abundant in this part of the forest, but both Carlyle and Auryn know the traditional signaling of eladrin scouts. Nevertheless, we continue cautiously, looking up to the trees every now and then to signal that we're quite aware of the hidden Eladrin.
Once the noises intensify, Auryn suggests Gabriel to go hide in the bushes as the scouts would be really close now and she doesn't know how the Bagheva would react to someone who looks so much like their Crisillyiri enemy. He agrees and makes a silent leap through space and time. It doesn't take Auryn much longer on the hidden path and she's all of a sudden being approached by a young Eladrin woman in hunter's leathers.
“And what would bring someone with such pretty garments to the territory of the Bagheva?” the woman asks with a raspy, almost feral voice.
Before Auryn can answer, the eladrin continues: “Seems to be one of the matriarch's kids. Smells like one, too. Your kind usually stays away from ours.”
“I am Auryn, and yes, I am the daughter of a matriarch. But I am not from Sentosa. My mother is matriarch Galadin of Pallita, but you'd probably never heard of it. I've come to find the Sanctum of Ingatan, for it is of utmost importance for the future of all our kind that we find an old relic of the god. So I'd be really glad if you could guide me to Kanta Mahala.”
When she realizes that Auryn shown no sign of aggression, the woman comes a bit closer and sniffs at her. She then nods and introduces herself as Talios Valanar, a scout from Bramblehome. This is a true surprise to Auryn as this young warrior apparently has the same name as matriarch Athryalla. Talios smirks when she mentions the matriarch of Sentosa whom she calls a very distant relative. She doesn't know exactly how they are related though as her ancestor must have left Sentosa several generations ago.
(In my headcannon, the original Bagheva went into the sealed temple of Hewanharimau and drank from the blood of the god. Maybe it was a stupid dare of one of the matriarch's kids, maybe it was a full-blown schism. But they were most likely exiled after that)
Auryn signals her interest in Talios' story, but she also has another point she'd like to talk about. First she asks the huntress to please stay no matter what happens next. She then tells Talios that she didn't come here all alone because no sane matriarch's daughter would do something that stupid and Talios laughs from all of her heart at that remark. Auryn then explains that she brought her Sahodar Mitra with her, a man she trusts with her life. She adds that he has quite the unusual appearance for an eladrin's Sahomi, so she hopes Talios will show him the same respect she'd shown her.
Talios seems intrigued, but also wary at this prospect. She nods again and Carlyle finally leaves the undergrowth to greet her. The Bagheva was very much ready to see a disfigured Eladrin, but she clearly wasn't prepared to see a human, lest a deva. So she transforms into a weretiger on the spot and growls at Carlyle. In reaction, he shows her his bare palms.
“Please, I mean no harm. Every word Auryn said was true. These people, these humans who may look like me are my enemy as well. We came here to look for the Sanctum, but we are ready to defend the Eladrin against the foreign intruders.”
Auryn adds that we two only recently learned of the conflict between the colonists and the Bagheva, which is why we would like to speak to their chief Betronga. Talios stays in her tiger form for a little longer before she calms down and transforms back. She seems still wary, but agrees to lead us to Kanta Mahala.