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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lars Frehse" data-source="post: 938371" data-attributes="member: 1674">Bosom of the Mother- part 1Once again, Kelemis Durn welcomed them in the sunroom. For a moment, while they were exchanging pleasantries, Jan's mind wandered back to their trip to Lave. They had travelled down the corridor, where Vengauraks had ambushed them. When afterwards Jan had used his powered of healing to heal himself first, he had felt how his connection to Corean had wavered...As Kelemis started briefing them, the paladin was suddenly jerked back into the presence. "... so your previous mission has turned out to have formidable results" the home commander said ". However, we cannot simply perform the ritual here in Lave. We need a place of power, and the nearest such place is in the Ganjus Forest. There the Amphora can be destroyed- and we will be rid of that damned thing once and for all."He continued to tell them about the elves of the Ganjus, and once again, Jan felt how his mind left the lecture and wondered away. It was just the same as in the times of his training, when he had often spent the endless lectures about religion and history dreaming about his future heroics.When the connection had failed him, he had lost the ability to heal and cure, among other things. Even though Jan was far from being book smart and it often took him a long time to understand complex issues, he nonetheless realized that Corean had left him because he wanted no selfish servants.So, for the rest of the trip, he had stopped whenever he could to help out farmers, using his powers to cure livestock or forging small items when needed. By the time they had reached Lave, he was back in Corean's grace.But now, in the sun-room, Jan focused his attention back to Kelemis Durn's speech:"... but you shouldn't worry about the Jordeh. One of the men who will come with you has had experiences with them and he had gained their thrust. Furthermore, they will certainly respect an incarnate and a fellow elf."He personally refilled their glasses with the light wine the steward had served upon the heroes' arrival, and then continued:" To make a long story short, I would like you to accompany the Amphora and the True Ritual to the Ganjus. The route itself isn't precisely hostile territory, but of course it can be dangerous and we're all but certain that someone will make a play for the Amphora along the way. So be wary."All of the friends agreed to go on that journey without thinking twice about it. After all, they had been involved with the Amphora for so long now, and they wanted to see this threat gone. Kelemis Durn told them to meet with a dozen handpicked soldiers and Vian Piridur, the officer who had dealt with the Jordeh, the keepers of the Ganjus, in the morning and begin their trek then.Their two weeks journey through Vesh was pleasantly uneventful. They travelled on horseback, and the amphora was kept in a heavy, magically sealed chest, which was kept in an oaken wagon. Everywhere in Vesh, the farmers were planting and sowing. Shepherds were lazily sleeping next to their flocks of sheep and spring lambs while the bees were busy buzzing from flower to flower.Still, the friends and the soldiers kept their guard up. After all, the friends knew that agents of Mormo could be anywhere, just like they had in the past. Even the friendliest farmer boy could be a sinister agent of the witch queen, and so they never dared to let the idyllic surroundings lull them into a false sense of security.Still, after two weeks they saw the kelders towering in front of them, and nothing exciting had happened to them until this point. At the foot of the mountains, near a path that lead downwards into a deep and rocky gorge, they came across an encampment. The bulk of the camp was formed by tents, which were solidly staked to resist the gust of wind that blew up from the valley and there was a handful of wooden buildings as well. The men and women were Ontenazans, the people who had found a way to live in and between those mountains, in spite of the unpredictable and often-lethal winds that were blowing there. They were dark skinned and both men and women wore the same loose tunics and leggings.Trepat had been briefed by Piridur before on how to behave towards the Ontenazans, and he approached one windwalker, a young dark-skinned woman called Aisha. Since Ontenzans didn't haggle and considered the whole procedure to be uncouth, the negotiations were short, and after one hundred gold had changed hands, she lead them to some tents."Make yourselves as comfortable as you can, and try to sleep," she said her melodic voice tingling slightly with with the accent of her people. "We'll set out first thing in the morning.“Shortly before dawn, Aisha and the soldiers got up. Niklas, who hardly ever slept anymore ever since he had acquired a technique that allowed the monks of Hedrada to stay awake all day, woke up his friends, and by the first light of dawn, they were ready to go.The path ahead of them looked daunting. The earth was hard and rocky and the footing was so precarious that the horses had to be walked, not ridden. The walls of the canyon were rough and unyielding, and as the sun rose up, they reflected the heat downward, heating up the surface and the air and blinding the eyes.The next days were a miserable experience. The winds turned out to be truly hideous, making speech nearly impossible, and only by screaming at the top of their lungs could they shout over the constant noise. The direction of the winds changed randomly, and it often happened that a hero or a soldier who was leaning heavily into the wind fell flat on the face when suddenly the wind changed direction and pushed them to the ground.Split lips, chipped teeth and bloody noses became a universal part of the soldiers' uniforms. Even though the horses were well trained, they nonetheless pulled and strained against their halters, with their eyes rolling in constant panic.Since no tents could stand against the wind, night-camps consisted mostly of sleeping bags stuffed behind rocky outcroppings. And since the winds never ceased, sleep was hard to get, and they were constantly woken up whenever they had drifted into the deeper regions of their dreams.Even more frustrating, Aisha refused to a straight course. Often, she doubled back, paused for hours on end and made turns that took the expedition into what looked like the wrong direction. The heroes knew that all windwalkers worked like that, avoiding the worst of the winds this way, but still it didn't make the trip any either, especially since they wanted to spend as little time in this hell made of rock and winds as possible.Then, on the fourth day, disaster struck in form of an avalanche.</blockquote>

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