Fire and Ice 12

General Summary

Okay, let's see if I can get it all down this time.

13 Arodus 4713

With Radosek defeated, we began a search of the level. I suppose I should describe a little what he had already seen. The room we had arrived in and fought Radosek in was huge. A translucent image of the whole world hung in the air over a large arcane rune carved in the floor. The globe spun slowly in place. Weird lines of energy glowed across the globe's surface, connecting multiple points across the world. In the rest of the room were tables and shelves covered in books, maps, and scrolls. Of course, there was also a large mirror. At the far side of the room from the teleporter, a pair of ice sculptures of fiends flanked a bubbling cauldron in an archway leading to a large alcove. Several doors led from the room. One went to an unused bedroom, and a second to a used bedroom, which was probably Radosek's. The last door went to what was certainly Nazhena's bedroom. It had a larger bed than the other rooms and more furnishings. Most notably there was a large ice statue of a woman with an owl on her shoulder. A statue of Nazhena herself, perhaps? I don't know, but she seems to me like the kind of person vain enough to have a statue of herself in her bedroom. There was a curtain that led to an alcove and another door. That one was locked so, but Ten-Penny was able to deal with that. She's resourceful that way. The door led to a combination storeroom and vault. There was also another ice statue of the same woman, but without the owl. We expected trouble and tried to be cautious, but it didn't quite work out. Ten-Penny entered the room and a voice boomed from the statue, "The uninvited shall wither and die like the frost-covered bloom. You should never have ventured here, and you'd do well to leave before my return." Or some shit like that. Ten-Penny doubled over and groaned. When she straightened up, she looked... It's hard to describe. She looked weak and pale. She insisted she was fine, but it was an obvious lie. Valeria looked her over, but could find nothing wrong with her. We knew something was up though. We started going through all the items in the vault, as well as the alcove past the cauldron in the room with the globe. There was a lot, and a lot of it valuable. The alcove by the cauldron was full of alchemical supplies and apparently could be used as an alchemist's lab. There were a lot of magical items, including the cauldron, but a bunch (also including the cauldron) stumped Cassy's attempts to identify them. One of them was a magic ring that Grinner tried to...um...take. He literally stuffed it in his mouth. Bronwyn spotted him and demanded he give it up. He handed it to her while pointedly not wiping it off first. There was a lot of stuff to gather and transport, and we weren't going to be able to carry it all without support. So we decided that Grinner and Bronwyn would return to Waldsby to fetch Billy. We also decided Ten-Penny would go with them to see if Nadja knew anyone who could find out what was wrong with her and how to fix it. We didn't know it at the time, but Hatch also went with them. The rest of us stayed in the Tower while Cassy started studying the books and scrolls to find a way of shutting down the winter portal. That was the reason we were there after all. I did my best to assist her, though most of the stuff she was reading through was way beyond my understanding. It took her a couple hours, but eventually she felt confident she'd worked out how to shut the portal down. Unfortunately, she didn't have the necessary spells. However, she said my own ability to force magic items to do what I want might work here. I had absolutely no idea what to do, but then again, I never have any idea when I try to do this, so I gave it a go. I stood under the globe, closed my eyes, and concentrated. I could feel the magical energy flow through me, but I couldn't do anything with it. Absolutely nothing happened, but at least it didn't go haywire like with the teleporter. Cassy said I could try again, but I needed to wait at least an hour first while the magical energies realigned themselves or something. An hour later, I tried again. And failed. I tried again another hour later, and this time, I managed to grab hold of those energies flowing through me. I say "grab", but honestly, I'm not really sure what I did. "Grab" just seems closest. At any rate, I grabbed them and told them to stop. And they did. The floating globe winked out, and the magical energy dispersed. The portal was closed. And we were trapped in Irrisen. Oh well. We had to be here anyway to find Baba Yaga's hut. Not long after I succeeded in helping to save the world (yeah, I'm feeling a little proud of myself for that and might just repeat it a couple times), Bronwyn and Grinner returned with a third person. Not Ten-Penny. She'd stayed in Waldsby where Nadja apparently knew someone who might be able to help her. No, this was a young woman who had arrived in Waldsby yesterday, apparently searching specifically for us. She had been staying with Nadja, who had introduced her to Bronwyn and Grinner. Her name was Siona. She had followed us all the way from Heldren all the way back in Taldor. While in Heldren, she had heard stories about us and was interested in the fact we were gun users (some of us), and wanted to find us. She tracked down the portal, went through it, and found her way to Waldsby. Siona is an alchemist and...sigh...another gun user. Ten-Penny, Valeria, and I are now officially outnumbered. What is it with guns? How did I go my whole life never seeing one and then, in the space of a couple weeks, I'm now inundated with them? It's just bizarre. Oh yeah, Siona also has a familiar, a tiny little dragon called Tianma. Frono instantly got along with Tianma. Anyway, once we managed to get Cassy and Siona to stop talking shop and flirting with each other, we returned to the matters at hand. Siona helpfully identified a couple of the magic items Cassy couldn't earlier, including the cauldron (some sort of summoning item) and a magic bag that's bigger on the inside than the outside. We seemed to be accepting Siona as a full-fledged member of the Firing Squad. I even happily explained our name to her. It was time to talk to Radosek. Oh, we hadn't killed him. Just knocked him senseless. He was conscious now--had been for a while, actually. We'd just left him tied up and gagged while we did everything else. But we needed information from him, so we had to talk to him a little. The questioning went about as well as could be expected. He didn't resist us much, but he also wasn't very helpful. He confirmed that Nazhena was in Whitethrone, though it was possible she was already on her way back. When Cassy questioned him about Sofia, he claimed not to have been part of killing her. However, he also called her a "little brat", which angered Cassy, who hit him with the butt of her gun. That knocked him out again. Valeria had to tend to him, and Siona brought him back to consciousness with something called "smelling salts". There was another teleporter in Nazhena's bedroom, and we were able to get the code out of Radosek. He said it would take us to the ice dragon statue in the courtyard. Then we dropped him out the window. Well, technically Bronwyn gave him the option to repent and seek redemption first. She wasn't satisfied with his response, so then we dropped him out the window. He might not have killed Sofia himself, but he was an accessory in her death. He didn't deserve mercy. He fell sixty or so feet to a messy death. During this time, Grinner had been packing Billy, and so we were ready to leave now. Our last action was to release the ravens from the aerie. Then we returned to Waldsby. When we got back, we reunited with Ten-Penny. A friend of Nadja's had determined that Ten-Penny had been cursed with ill health. It was permanent unless it could be magically removed. Luckily, some time back, we had discovered a scroll containing a spell that could remove curses. It was a divine spell, so Valeria had to cast it. Apparently, it was a bit more powerful than she could normally cast, but she successfully used the scroll, and Ten-Penny's appearance instantly returned to normal. Nadja told us that she was planning to move her family out of Waldsby to a town called Ellsprin. She would still guide us to Whitethrone as she'd previously offered. Ellsprin was on the way, so we just had to travel with her sons for the first part of the journey. She asked for a day to prepare. She also wanted to hold a memorial service for Sofia before leaving. We agreed.

14 Arodus 4713

We took it easy this day. Well, some of us did, myself included. Cassy spent most of the day crafting new magical items, and Bronwyn worked on her gun. Siona also identified the remaining unknown items. It wasn't a perfect day though. One of the items--the ring Grinner had tried to steal--turned out to be a particularly powerful item. It would heal the wearer's wounds--not instantly, just gradually, but still potent. It could also regrow lost limbs. We debated a lot over who should have it. It came down to either Ten-Penny or Valeria. Eventually, it went to Valeria. Alas, that was when we discovered the ring wasn't what we thought it was. It was a cursed item that didn't heal wounds; instead, it made wounds worse. Its curse also made it impossible for Valeria to take it off. And we had just used our curse-removing scroll the night before. Valeria was stuck with for now until we could find another way to remove the curse. In the evening, we held the memorial for Sofia. Not a lot was said. Cassy said a few words, and I echoed them. Bronwyn also said a few words. Nadja spoke last. She didn't say a lot either, but what she said was heartfelt. She hurried off to her room afterwards. When we saw her again, she'd clearly been crying. I'm pretty sure it was the first time she'd let herself cry since learning of Sofia's death.

15 Arodus 4713

We set out for Whitethrone this morning. We'd only travelled an hour or so out of Waldsby before we noticed ravens gathering in greater and greater numbers. They didn't attack at first. They waited until there were swarms of them. I'm pretty sure there were more this time than there were the first time we fought a swarm of ravens. We did better though. Well, the others did. I threw blast after blast of fire at them. I burned. I took on more burn than I've ever taken before. But last gasp of the sky! I could barely hit a fucking thing. I really have to practise my aim. The thing is, my flames don't really go in a straight line. They kind of swerve. Aiming is really hard. I know it sounds like I'm making excuses. Maybe I am. I really need to practise. Anyway, we dispersed them without too much difficulty. Unfortunately, Siona and Nadja were blinded. So was Tianma. Even Billy got scratched and poked. Mjoli and Orm came out of it unharmed, thankfully. Well, that's all the time I have for now. Talk again soon.

All the best,
Izzy (and Frono)