Solarious said:
Okay then. Which should I start working on first? An advanced Carcass Crab 'skeletoned' by it's own bodily armor, chosing choice Mournland Horrors (perhaps an Eberronian remake of the Shalebridge Cradle
![:]](http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/devious.png "Devious :]")
), putting together a Thuranni extraction team, or maybe something custom to shilsen's plans?
Decisions, decisions.
Ah, corpse crabs! I always liked those critters and never got to use one on my other group of PCs, who did go in the Mournland. Maybe the Angels will give me a chance someday. For now, I'm guessing more Emerald Claw goodness is in the Angels' future. We'll see.
Anyway, you're too kind
* * * * * * * * * *
The day before the Angels are to depart, Nameless suggests that Gareth perform a
divination. The paladin does so, choosing – after some discussion – “How can we best protect princess Haydith on this journey?” After a few moments, he feels a glow of warmth in his mind, one which he experiences whenever in contact with the power of the Silver Flame, and then the answer: “Watch for many daggers, not all wielded by the same hand.”
When Gareth repeats it, the others discuss what it might indicate, presuming that it most likely means they need to watch for people besides the Emerald Claw. “After all,” points out Six, “Haydith getting killed could suit lots of people. Especially since it would happen while she’s under Brelish protection. It could easily lead to war again, so anyone wanting Karrnath to reopen hostilities, especially with Breland, could support it. Or anybody who wishes to reopen the Last War at all.”
“Or,” says Nameless meditatively, “Someone wanting to seriously embarrass the Brelish monarchy and make it look incompetent. Perhaps a person like this Ruken ir’Clarn, who Talleon said Hass supports. And Hass, maybe not so coincidentally, is the guy who hired us.”
“Do you think we’re being set up by Hass,” asks Gareth, “With the expectation that we shall fail?”
“I don’t know. I’m just thinking aloud,” says the alienist, his tentacle slowly stroking Edgar, who is curled up on his knee like a particularly strange pet.
“Tell me again,” says Luna, with a growl, “Why we’re doing this instead of going to Q’Barra and setting lizardfolk on fire?”
“Because,” says Korm, “Pulling this off will get us a lot of very powerful friends. I think.” He sounds somewhat unconvinced.
“No. We won’t likely be making friends,” says Nameless. “To people at this level of society, at best we can prove useful and perhaps have them owing us some favors we can trade in later. Since we have a way of attracting trouble, having the authorities indebted to us is never a bad thing. Also, should we prove sufficiently useful, we might be able to leverage that into other benefits. Much as we leveraged our relationship with Talleon into obtaining the house. It would be nice to have an airship for travel, after all.”
That nobody disagrees with, not even Luna, who promptly begins to plan the decorations for her quarters on the airship she believes they will – and should – receive.
* * * * *
The next day, precisely at 9 in the morning, two bored-looking guards in Karrnathi livery snap to attention as five people appear in the center of the room in front of them. After quickly identifying the Angels, they lead them out of the meeting room. Outside is a large corridor made of rich paneled wood, one end of which culminates in ladders, leading to decks above and below. The guards lead them in the opposite direction and around a couple of turn. Passing more doors to left and right, they reach an especially large doorway in the far end of the corridor, guarded by two more Karrnathis. Beyond the doorway is an antechamber, with doors to left, right and in front. One of the guards knocks on the one to the left. “Enter!” commands Maddox’s voice.
Proceeding inside, the Angels find themselves in a large stateroom. Part of it holds a four-poster bed, separated by a half-drawn curtain from the area they enter, a small, but comfortable, sitting room. It is currently occupied by the armored figure of Maddox, who is speaking to a middle-aged woman and an elderly man, both in traditional Karrnathi formal wear, and a girl in her late teens, dressed more casually. “Ah!” he says, rising at their entrance, and then turning to the girl, “These are the Guardian Angels.” Turning to them, Maddox indicates her in turn. “Princess Haydith ir’Wynarn of Karrnath.”
Gareth bows deeply, saying simply, “Princess, it is an honor,” followed with slightly less facility by Six, and significantly less so by the other three Angels. Haydith rises quickly with a pleased smile. “Please, call me Haydith. There’s to be no formality here. I’ve been looking forward to meeting all of you. Sit.” Then she glances around, comparing the number of people to the available space. “Or maybe we’d be better off in my room.”
Maddox leads them out and through the door to the left, opposite the large guarded one, while introducing the Angels to the other two individuals, lord Gustavus Thul and lady Theda ir’Bara, the diplomats mentioned by him on their previous meeting. The room they now enter is a huge one, dwarfing the one that they had been in, and subdivided into multiple areas. On either side of the entrance, wooden partitions with curtains create a number of smaller rooms, each containing a bed. Beyond these, the chamber opens up into a large sitting-cum-dining room, with sliding wooden walls to the side for a smaller sitting room and two bathrooms. Beyond it, a little distance from the far end of the room, is a curious wooden-structure, perhaps twenty feet wide and a dozen long, like an oblong lozenge, stretching from floor to ceiling. A curtain and sliding door lie open on one side, and the Angels soon discover that it is a special private sleeping area so that the princess (or whoever is the guest of honor at any given time on the
Serenity) can have a private bedroom while being surrounded by guards and attendants. A half dozen members of the latter, all women, are in the chamber when the Angels enter, but they vacate the main sitting area on Haydith’s command.
Once everyone is seated, Maddox quickly gets down to business, producing papers listing the various people on board. The Angels learn that Haydith is accompanied by a personal retinue of two ladies-in-waiting and six maids. Gustavus and Theda are also accompanied by a dozen Karrnathis, including personal guards and attendants. Maddox has fifteen elite Karrnathi troops providing security, backed up by a warmage. Besides these forty people, the
Serenity itself has nearly fifty crew-members, all told, so the airship currently holds nearly a hundred people. Maddox also informs the Angels about the accommodations. Haydith is staying in this primary cabin, with Gustavus and Theda occupying the ones on either side of the antechamber beyond. Immediately beyond the guarded doorway to the antechamber is Maddox’s room and, on the opposite side, the two rooms that have been assigned to the Angels.
After a little discussion, Nameless suggests that the Angels meet the crew of the ship and everybody on board, sweeping them and the ship as a whole for magic and anything suspicious. Maddox agrees that it’s a good idea and suggests they begin by meeting the captain. The Angels excuse themselves from Haydith, who smiles prettily and says she’ll be waiting to talk to them when they are free. Maddox leads them out and through the corridors to the stairs leading up to the helm area above (Haydith’s room being on the floor immediately below the deck).
The Angels emerge on the deck to be greeted by the sight of a giant, softly crackling ring of fire, between and ahead of which stretches the bulk of the ship. Standing nearby beside the helm, which is currently in the hands of a young human with a dragonmark prominent on his left forearm, a rugged-looking man in a brown coat says, “So, Maddox, these would be the Angels?”
“Yes,” says Maddox, pausing to glance over the side towards the rear, where the capital city of Wroat is slowly retreating beneath the
Serenity. “That was a smooth takeoff.”
“Thank Wash, not me,” says the previous speaker, indicating the pilot, who grins and nods, before striding towards the Angels. “Welcome to my ship. I’m Malkom Lyrandar, but everyone calls me Mal.” Introductions are made, and after the Angels explain that they’d like to meet everyone on board, Mal leads them around the ship. First, they meet his officers. The first mate Zoey, a fierce-looking shifter warrior, wife to the pilot Wash, a Lyrandar scion who (like Malkom) left the House decades ago; the half-elven magewright Kaylee, who performs any in-flight repairs needed by the ship; the ship’s healer, Symon; a diplomat, Inara, who always accompanies the ship on any trips into other countries, representing Brelish interests and dealing with any diplomatic problems that might arise. And the other forty people that make up the crew, which includes ten soldiers, led by the security chief Jayne.
Gareth scans all of the individuals they meet for signs of evil, unsurprisingly detecting faint traces of it in a small number of them. All of the crew, Mal explains, are long-standing members, who serve purely on board the
Serenity. Nameless also checks them for magic, finding a small magical item here and there (other than on Mal and his primary officers, who are all well-provided with magical equipment), but nothing untoward. After going over the crew, the Angels also explore all four decks of the ship (or five, including the op level), again finding nothing that is suspicious. While they are doing so, Inara – who they are handed over to by Mal, who returns to join Wash at the helm – explains that the
Serenity was originally intended to be the largest airship in Breland’s fleet, which explains its huge size of nearly two hundred feet from stem to stern. However, with the end of the Last War before its construction was completed, it was transformed into the main airship serving Breland’s royalty and its diplomatic needs. King Boranel himself has used it on multiple occasions.
The entire process of meeting everyone and searching the entire ship takes nearly four hours, and by the time they are done, most of the Angels are completely tired and ready for a rest. After joining Haydith and some others for lunch, they head to their rooms, except for Six and Gareth. The former, of course, needs no sleep and heads to the deck to watch Breland unfold below the ship. Gareth, the group agrees, is to remain in as close proximity to Haydith as can be throughout the course of the flight, using spells such as
shield other and
status to better safeguard her. A bed and makeshift sleeping area are set up in the huge cabin near Haydith’s one, so that Gareth can sleep in the same room.
* * * * *
Over the course of the next day and a half, the airship flies north, bearing slightly to the east, heading towards the Breland-Aundair border. As it passes over the fertile center of Breland, those on deck can see large plains unroll below, dotted with small woods. Even though scores of small villages and hamlets cover the landscape, a large part of the land is unoccupied, and even the various settlements seem to hold less people than they could. Though almost untouched by the War in comparison to the lands of many other countries, the lands of Breland have still felt its effects, with much of its population lost to the fighting further north.
Eventually, the
Serenity reaches and passes the Blackcaps, flying not over the dark mountains but detouring slightly to curve around their eastern side. While passing them, at one point those watching see a giant crevasse splitting the earth in one of the many secluded valleys. Strangely, considering the near uninhabited nature of the region, a small village sits nearby. That is identified for them as the Black Pit, a chasm fabled to lead into Khyber. The same name is used for the village, which is a popular place for fugitives from the law to flee to. Upon its identification, Nameless recalls that they had heard of it earlier with reference to Desro.
Having passed the Blackcaps, the airship turns due north, passing over the border town of Cragwar and into Aundair. While nearing the border, they notice what seems to be a huge fortress to the east. By the time the airship reaches Cragwar, it is clear that the fortress is closer than should be, as if it were moving too, as well as evidently on a similar level to the airship. It is Argonth, the mobile fortress of Breland, endlessly floating along the border from west to east and back again, one more reminder of the Last War.
The Angels are surrounded by other reminders of the War in the people on board the
Serenity. Maddox, Malkom, Zoey, and many of the soldiers on board are veterans of the War. Though not a combatant himself, Gustavus Thul was one of those who represented Karrnathi interests in the drawing up of the Treaty of Thronehold that ended it. Also, though nobody mentions that particular aspect, everyone knows that the arrangement between the two nations regarding Haydith and King Boranel’s children is a direct result of the uncertainties and tenuous alliances that followed the War. Haydith’s presence in Breland provides the nation some assurance of continued Karrnathi goodwill while they possess such an important bargaining chip, and her growing knowledge of Breland might also be helpful to Karrnath in the future. Similarly, this short return to Karrnath is intended to show that Breland neither considers her as such, nor fears that Karrnath will take advantage of it in any way.
Interestingly, Gareth, who gets to spend more time in close contact with Haydith than anyone on the ship besides her personal attendants, quickly learns that she is not only very fond of Breland but deeply attached to King Boranel, whom she speaks of as if he were a combination of a beloved uncle and a dear friend. During the course of the trip, Haydith tells Gareth that when she first came to Breland she was deeply unhappy about the arrangement and having to leave her home in Karrnath, but is now as happy here as she has been in her young life and looks forward to many more years of the same. While she spends most of her time in and around Wroat, at the royal court, she has made short visits to Sharn twice and is fascinated by the City of Towers. She hopes, Haydith says, to visit it again in the future and spend a longer time there, perhaps spending some time at Morgrave University.
Gareth in turn tells Haydith tales of the Angels’ adventures, some of which she has read about in the
Korranberg Chronicle, leaving the princess both fascinated and impressed. While the two speak, her attendants whisper and giggle among themselves, since it is clear to many on board that the young princess is steadily developing a crush on Gareth, older and more mature in comparison to her teens, handsome and well spoken, member of the most famous group of adventurers in Khorvaire, a paladin of the Silver Flame, and, last but certainly not least, a fellow Karrnathi living in Breland. Gareth, characteristically, is quite unaware of the gossiping around them or the meaning of the gleam in Haydith’s eyes as she speak to him or reaches out to touch his shoulder to punctuate a point, seeing her simply as a pleasant traveling companion and, much more so, a ward and dependent as well as a royal he owes allegiance to.
The other Angels, spending their time interacting with others on the ship rather than watching Gareth and Haydith closely, have an equally interesting time, for different reasons. The trip itself is quite a novelty for them, since none of them have traveled by airship before, and they are able to see Breland as they never have. Aundair too, but then none of them have been in that country before. The Angels also find their various companions quite interesting, beginning with the forbidding bone knight Sir Maddox, constantly focused and taciturn, but with a surprisingly dry wit that he sometimes reveals. In some contrast stand the officers of the
Serenity, whom they are often interacting with, ranging from the cheerfully cynical Malkom to the effervescently optimistic Kaylee.
All in all, the first half of the trip is quite peaceful and pleasant.
* * * * *
The
Serenity flies north into Aundair, staying a good five hundred feet above the ground at its full speed of twenty miles per hour. The Brelish border recedes in the distance behind, the lightning rail track, which crossed the border at the same place, bends northwest away towards Passage, the central hub for rail transportation in Khorvaire. After a couple of hours, as the fertile plains of southern Aundair unroll below the airship, the battlements of a powerful fortress appear to the northeast, made diminutive by distance. Maddox, standing near the front deck, says to Six, “The Tower Vigilant, guarding the border with Thrane. We shall pass its sister fortress, the Tower Valiant, tomorrow.”
Over the course of the next day and a half, the airship passes by the Valiant and the towns of Ghalt and Lathleer, before bending slightly northwest. Here too, the settlements have a diminished population. Many fields also stand empty and abandoned, and in some places large swathes of land show signs of burning or the results of large explosions. Much more than in Breland, the fields of Aundair still display the wounds of the War.
On the 19th, the airship heads towards the walls and battlements of a huge city, surrounded by outlying villages. As they swiftly near the city, those on deck see a lightning rail train heading for it from the southwest. Multiple caravans and thousands of travelers are entering and leaving through the multiple gates, especially along the Orien trade road running almost parallel to the airship’s route, while ships and smaller craft move back and forth along the river the city sits on. Fairhaven, the jewel of Aundair, unrolls itself in all its splendor beneath the
Serenity.
The airship heads for the tallest tower in the city, dwarfing even those of the central castle that surrounds the royal palace, which flies the colors of House Lyrandar. Another airship is already at rest against one of the four docking platforms that protrude from the sides of the tower, its elemental ring suppressed for the duration of its stay. Lights and a squad of waiting Lyrandar employees indicate that the
Serenity is to occupy the top level, and Wash, at the helm, neatly brings it into docking position. As the ship slides into place, ropes are flung aboard and tied off by the crew to hold it in place. A second later, there is a soft hiss as the flaming ring around the ship disappears, and the airship jerks slightly, before floating in place.
Large wooden platforms are wheeled up and extended to the ship, and those of the Angels on deck can see dozens of soldiers in Aundairan livery waiting to board. Maddox strides up to the primary boarding platform, Karrnathi troops falling in behind him. The Aundairan contingent is led by a tall man with a hawkishly sharp face, who stands apart from his compatriots in the complete lack of armor or weapons worn and in the royal crest on his cloak. He first shakes the bone knight by the hand, and then proceeds to do so to Malkom and Inara, who have moved up to join Maddox. The first mate Zoey, standing near Six, identifies him as Queen Aurala’s brother Aurad, governor of Fairhaven.
She then explains, “It’s a little more complicated diplomatically on this trip than usual. This ship is technically Brelish soil, with the captain representing Breland, but our diplomatic cargo is Karrnathi, so Aundair has to welcome both appropriately. While providing the right security for Haydith, which is also going to be complicated.” She indicates four Brelish soldiers waiting near Malkom. “The captain and Inara will be going along, as will they, providing Haydith’s Brelish escort, while Maddox and his troops will be the Karrnathi contingent, and the Aundairans will have their own troops. And you guys, of course.” She shakes her head and grimaces. “Too complicated. I’m glad I’ll be avoiding it.”
Zoey’s explanation is borne out by the events of the next few minutes. Once the formalities of providing the various visitors’ identification and, more importantly, meeting all the various protocols, is taken care of, Haydith and her escorts depart the
Serenity. Gareth, who has made sure to cast both a
status and a
shield other spell before they leave, stays especially close to the princess, walking immediately behind her. Luna, on the other hand, is relegated to a position far in the rear, not being asked to follow in animal form only because Maddox explains that could be a problem. And because the other Angels want Luna close enough to be able to watch her – and grab her if she does something … precipitous.
The group descends through the various levels of the Lyrandar tower, preceding guards ensuring that there are no interruptions, until they reach the street outside. There, they are whisked quickly into waiting carriages, which proceed towards the royal palace. Gareth shares Haydith’s carriage, along with Aurad, Maddox, Malkom, Inara, Gustavus and Theda. He notes that Haydith seems slightly uncomfortable at the start, but she quickly grows more at ease – or fakes doing so quite well – and spends the trip chatting casually with Aurad, while simultaneously smiling and waving at the crowds that line the path.
Gareth and the others, riding in carriages preceding and following Haydith’s, keep a careful eye out for trouble but notice nothing untoward, other than the odd critical cry from the crowd. Though their focus on the crowd gives them little leisure to notice it, they find that Fairhaven is a beautiful city, comparing favorably with the upper middle-class and higher areas of Sharn, though that might have something to do with the route they are taken on.
Soon enough, the cavalcade of carriages and accompanying riders reaches the palace. They are met by the Seneschal, who leads Haydith to a suite of rooms, surrounded by other chambers for her escorts and entourage, where Aurad takes his leave. While Haydith settles down for a little rest and to refresh herself before the meetings and dinner that is to follow, Gareth stays nearby, while the other Angels check around the area. Having found nothing untoward, they get a little rest too, during which they are all provided with the appropriate clothing for the evening and the next day. Soon enough, they are asked to make ready for the formal meeting between Aurala and Haydith.
