Session notes 27-5-2020

18th of Vilrand ???? - 3rd day in the Feywild
 
 
The morning is one of planning and seating. How are we going to obtain this portrait? Steal it? Trade for it? Use the splendiferous bauble? Eventually, the plan is going for a house tour and trying to find the painting and trying to trade the splendiferous bauble for it. Oranje and I volunteer and make our way inside. We get the ring of spell storing from Thalmiir with 'sending' and 'locate object' in them, and the bauble from William.
 
It was simple to convince Earlton to give us a tour after sitting through the last part of his lecture about how he build this entire castle by himself. Some smooth talking from the Oranje and Blue team even gave us access to a tour on the next floor! I had to pretend to write everything down. So that is why I am writing all of this right now. He is telling a story of him killing a hydra all by himself! Next to having a large sense of self, this man has many many collections. Books that I would love to look at, but also paintings of himself, that he made himself, which I would love to turn away so they would not look at me so strangely. He even had pegasi in his house! And a lot of wines, all named after the emotions he had when he suppositly made them. But no sight of the painting.
 
To get this tour we told him some of our adventures, told as spectacularly as possible with some fancy magic effects. He seemed interested and intrigued, and I suppose he was as he tried to tell as interesting stories while showing his collections.
 
Our attempts to see more paintings, such as sweet-talking his artful style and ideas for a gallery only made him show us a statue of himself. Still, he seemed quite pleased with himself, and we got gifted one of his earliest self-portraits and with a forceful smile and semi-respectful nod, we were escorted out of the castle quite drained. With a mutual understanding that we need some silence after all that talk, we walk back to the rest of our group.
 
Second plan. Liya and I will simple use my newly learned spell to teleport right to the location of the painting. Using the locate object spell Thalmiir provided, I soon pinpoint the location of the painting to be somewhere in Earltons bedroom.
 
The whole retrieval was quite quick but bad for my heart. With a simply drawn door and some magic, we were soon on the balcony that would lead to Earltons bedroom. However, he was still there. Looking into a mirror of some kind, practising his speech. When he got up, we hoped he would walk to the door and go downstairs using the teleportation circles Oranje and I had seen earlier, but instead, he walked straight towards the balcony doors. At this point, I had already lost Liya, like she was never there, so I tried my best to hide. Luckily, he did not seem to notice us immediately, but as he started to look around, I decided to use a simple spell to make it sound like someone was knocking on the door and that made him turn around. Pffffff.
 
As the room was clear, Liya and I made our way inside and looked for the painting. We found it in Earltons closet, wrapped in cloth. Looking at it was a mistake. The person depicted in the painting was, well they were dead, and they were rotting and sick and bleh. We quickly re-wrapped it and made our way out the way we made it in, via a pretty magic door. We had to wait a bit for the street to become calm again as all the addicted people came to the lecture to get their fix afterwards. But after that, we were outside once again. As unsuspiciously as possible, we made our way back to our group.
 
A few fly spells later, we were on our way out.
 
Baradox was waiting for us at the Highwind. As we landed, we saw the once flourishing hedges of the maze surrounding Earlton Keep wither at an alarming pace. While flying, we had already seen some of the towers collapsing, but standing here, we can truly see the sudden decay of Earltons lands. Baradox was a bit surprised to see us arrive while the place fell to ruins behind us. But he did not ask many questions. Though he was curious about the painting and wished to see it. Somewhat spooked by what had happened, we urged that could wait until we had returned to the mountain and asked if we could leave.
Now, we are on our way back to the Order of the Sapphire. The flight is relatively calm and we try to relax in the following hours. We saw the giant turtle wading through the forest once again, while in the distance we can faintly make out what was once Earlton Keep.
 
Eight long hours of watching the sunset later, we arrive back at the Sapphires.
 
After we got out of the Highwind, William showed Baradox the painting we had retrieved. Not the one painted by Earlton, but the 'grey painting' we were supposed to 'research'.
The thing glows with necromancy and transmutation magic, and strangely enough, the withered old sick person in the painting has gone, leaving a blank canvas for Baradox to look at.
 
After Thalmiir cast 'Identify' on the painting, he explains the following about the artefact: If this painting is in your possession for ten days, all that would otherwise hurt you (disease, attacks or anything harmful in any way), will go to the person in the painting instead of to you. This makes you basically immortal. However, if the painting is taken from you, the diseases and wounds on the painting directly transfer to you, most likely killing you instantly. Which is what happened to Earlton.. that painting looked horrific, I can only imagine what things he had avoided throughout his possession of this painting.
 
After this short break, decided to make our way to the council to bring the good news of us completing our 'research'.
 
 
The meeting at the council was, surprising? When we arrived back at the council's room, we were once again met with the group of people with the large crystal helmets. With a mix of pride and doubt, I presented the painting to who I thought to be Siadarvinax. After a short inspection, we were told to follow one of the council members. He brought us deeper into the mountain, where the number of crystals, and light they emit increased with every turn we took. Finally, we were brought into a large underground cavern. There, a large crystalline dragon lay in the middle, surrounded by the blue crystals in which he almost seems to disappear. This is Siadarvinax.
 
We were somewhat agog and posed quite some questions. Most of which were answered by the Sapphire dragon.
 
Some quick notes:
Ingredients:
Phoenix fire, (can be found here in Feywild) at the Giants in the north
Lightning in a bottle, can be found in a Storm Elders temple (?)
Heart of a Titan, can be found in Zarathan, a walking mountain
Eternal Frost, can be obtained from a Leviathan.
 
Most of these things can be found, and some can be summoned. However, Siadarnivax does not know the rituals required to do so, the Elemental Prince does. This prince lives in the East, just above the northernmost lake.
 
The dragon did have more information about the giants who have the Phoenix currently. They are with a group of 60-70 and use the fire of the bird in their forge. They are making some kind of metal man to fight for them, which sounds somewhat terrifying. - no offence Ferrum- .
 
Finally, we also learn that the phoenix is most easily transported after defeating it, and can be kept quite long if it is without air (otherwise it will combust and respawn the bird)
 
All useful information, but a lot to take in. With a polite nod, and some words of Siadarvinax, about us always being welcome, and him using the painting to ensure the past is never forgotten again, we are led back to the council room, and finally to a room where we can spend the night.
Baradox accompanied us for that last trip, curious to hear about our encounter with Siadarvinax. He has been there before, for the gifting of his mask. We decide to tell him more when we are outside in the Highwind once again, which will probably be tomorrow.
For now, we are in this really quiet room, and most of us are going to sleep. I see that Oranje has already switched off for the night. I am just going to play a bit of music, have not done that in a while.
 
 
 
I think I must have fallen asleep when I was playing, but I experienced something very curious tonight. As everyone was slowing going to sleep, I decided to softly play the music that I hear in my mind, almost all the time. Sometimes I forget it is there, but then something happens or I use a spell, and then it becomes more apparent again. Not too long ago I had written down the music, but it is easier to just play along with what I hear I noticed tonight. Anyhow, while playing, the room slowly seemed to change. Once again I thought I would find myself in that void again, just like at that wicked cursed house on our way to Cosynest. But it was different. This time I ended up in a forest, it felt somewhat like the forests near Mercia, but older, much older. Here, I kind of saw the story of four musicians, travelling the land. They changed faces, a lot, and travelled a lot as well. There were flashed of this group throughout the world, some places looked familiar, others did not. Throughout the story, it became clear that the people were slowly losing 'themselves'. Not necessarily in a bad way, but they had forgotten who they were as individuals. The final image was of them in some kind of magic circle, through this, they form and change into the figure that had become familiar to me: the Bard.
From this final image, the Bard emerged. He sat down in front of me, with the four instruments that the figures in the visions played: A lute, a small drum, a fiddle and a very familiar flute. The one currently in Thalmiirs possession. After this, there was a brief moment of me sitting there with the Bard, a moment of rare silence, after which I was returned to the now dark room, back in the mountain of the order of the Sapphire.