Adv Log Session 34 Adventures in Botany!

General Summary

Kynetsday, Leafturn 8, 879 AFE


Alme was at the map, still spread out on the banquet table in the manor house’s ballroom. With the exception of some noise from the kitchen as Otha cleaned up after breakfast, the house was quiet. There was, after all, no service staff yet. The others were with him, making last minute travel plans as they readied themselves to go after Kallia the Necromancer.


“So,’ Taid said, “Lytan’s Mill to Fleetmilk?”


“No, I don’t think so,” Alme said. “Lytan’s Mill, then down this branch of the river to Dwarfchat.”


“Why Dwarfchat?”


“We know that Kallia lives in the mountains, with a view towards Port Karn. On cliffs, so she should at least be at the border of the mountain area, probably? And not too far into the mountains. She doesn’t live in one of the undercities, probably. I mean the inn could be a little bit away, but she abducted a person from the Mountain Stream Inn, and she probably won’t travel with the kidnapped guy for hours and hours. So she’s probably close to that.”


Alme rubbed his chin. “There are only three possible targets. That’s Dwarfchat, Hurrgah, and Tundonnen. Tundonnen is too far out, Hurrgah is in a valley, so the most likely target is Dwarfchat. And if she’s not there, we can just go to the other ones from there. There’s no need to go to some random villages that don’t even sound like Dwarven cities. So I think this is where we should start. She could be in an undercity, and I highly doubt it, but it could be possible. Then we hopefully find something in Dwarfchat that indicates where we should go.”


“Dwarfchat, then?” Taid asked, knowing the answer.


“Yeah, that’s the first target, I think. Any objections?”


“Yes, I didn’t get to use my witching rod!”


They had a targeted location. The first step was to get a boat and go upriver to Lytan’s Mill, then follow the tributary up to Dwarfchat. Actually, that was the second step. The first step was to get some cool-weather clothing, something none of them had, except for Ruby, who had one set, rolled up in the bottom of her pack, unused and nearly forgotten after the last four months.


Of the five of them, only Ruby and Taid had any real experience with cold weather, at least long term. Elitheris had some experience with it, but not for an entire winter; during her self-imposed exile, she had gone up into the mountains, but not during winter. Almë hadn’t had much need, and there weren’t any really high mountains near Nendo Lantasirë. And Eykit was a Port Karn boy through and through. His idea of a mountain was likely just likely just a rather tall hill, or the hazy, whitish shapes on the far horizon.


Ruby had lived on the northern coast of the Empire, in Adayn. While it certainly wasn’t ice bound, it also wasn’t equatorial.


Taid, though, grew up in the Melêkurâd Mountains, so he was acutely aware of how fast the temperature dropped with altitude. He told the others that typical cold weather gear consisted of long johns, woolen socks, mittens, stocking caps, winter clothing, jackets, and a cloak. And a second set of the warm winter clothing, socks, and small clothes, just in case the other set got wet. They opted to just get some thick wool hooded cloaks. Their gambeson armor would likely keep them warm enough for the most part, and the cloak should help quite a bit.


While they were clothes shopping, another thing occurred to Taid. Wilbur. Specifically, his saddle. Wilbur had a riding saddle. That was good, and useful, considering that Wilbur was trained as a riding horse. But he wasn’t being used as a riding horse; he was mostly being used as a pack horse. And a pack saddle, with the accompanying straps and bags, would be far more useful. On their way back from getting their winter wardrobes, they also stopped at a saddler’s and purchased a pack saddle harness, some saddlebags, and the straps required to properly tie down equipment.


That also got them thinking about climbing gear, which Elitheris, Eykit, and Taid didn’t really have. Not that they would be able to do anything with Wilbur, or Norolind, for that matter, if they had to make any kind of climb using rope and pitons. But it didn’t hurt to have rope and grappling hooks, just in case.


They went to bed early, and got a good night’s sleep. Almë didn’t even wake up screaming.


Jyprasday, Leafturn 9, 879 AFE


The day dawned clear and with a slight chill in the air that felt welcome after so many hot days. The day would warm up as it progressed, they were sure of that, but they appreciated the temporary relief. Taid saddled up Wilbur, struggling a little with the unfamiliar pack saddle. But it didn’t take him long to get Wilbur loaded up. He even had one of their preservation boxes tied onto the horse. Wilbur, for his part, took it gracefully enough, given that he was a riding horse, not a pack animal.


Their first stage of their journey was an overland walk through farm country, along the well-travelled road through Meke Learns and Donnington, then northwest to Hearavgizan. It was there that they planned on either renting a boat, or booking passage on one.


It took most of the day to get there. The most exciting part of the day was having to step off the road for a while as several centisentis of Imperial Army troops marched past, going in the opposite direction.

Hearavgizan was a port city, much like its bigger brother, Port Karn. Like Port Karn, which was the gateway to a very large river, Hearavgizan was also a river gateway. It sat at the mouth of the Grushagûl River, which provided a great deal of the water shed off of the Zirinibâr Mountains, passing through the major towns of Wormstead, Sheepshear, and Lytan’s Mill. Fleetmilk and Dwarfchat were also major towns, situated on different tributaries.


There was a lot of river traffic between those cities and Hearavgizan; waterways being the only sure route through the jungle. There were roads, built and maintained by the Tondene Imperial Army, but keeping them in a state capable of traveling on was difficult and expensive. The jungle simply kept growing over them, despite the deep roadbed and stone paved surface. It was simpler and cheaper to go by river when possible.

Going from Lytan’s Mill directly to Dwarfchat wasn’t the main route. The main trade route went from Lytan’s Mill to Sheepshear, to Fleetmilk, hitting several smaller towns, villages, and hamlets along the way. It took longer, because much of the route was overland, but there was trading happening all along the length of the route.

The direct route from Lytan’s Mill to Dwarfchat was entirely by river, and thus a lot faster. But there were no real settlements along the way until about a day out from Dwarfchat, so most traders didn’t go that way. It just wasn’t that lucrative, unless they got lucky with a shipment that had a time limit and needed to be delivered before a certain date.


Their first thought was to hire a boat. However, all of the boats they could hire were too small to take Wilbur. And no one wanted to leave Wilbur behind; they usually needed him to carry their things. Their only choice was to book passage on a cargo ship, and be subject to their schedule.


The docks were busy, which wasn’t unusual. There were a few areas where there were open berths along the quay, but those were few and far between, mostly due to the large number of small craft used by fishermen. And there were dozens of small and medium craft out on the Altasirya River, making their way between the islands that made up the delta of that vast river.


They had to dodge around wagons, carts, and masses of people, an occasionally difficult feat considering that their group was comprised of five people and two dogs, one of which was almost the size of a pony. Sailors were everywhere; those not loading or unloading ships either lounged around on piles of cargo or made their way to the string of local taverns that seemed to predominate the buildings along the docks area. Loud music, shouts, and the occasional swearing could be heard, even above the general noise of shouted commands on the wharves.

After a couple of hours of asking around the docks, they finally found a boat that would take them at least as far as Lytan’s Mill. The boat was a cargo barge, about 13 meters long, and three meters wide. It had a lateen sail on its single mast, room for eight rowers, and cargo space on the decks fore and aft. There wasn’t much room for passengers, but the captain took the passengers because she didn’t have a full load of cargo. And passengers didn’t require help getting on and off the boat, unlike crates, barrels, and bales. Its name was the Water Lily, and the captain, Poppy Tinyfoot, claimed it went about as fast as its namesake.


“But she’s a good, solid craft. It’ll get you upriver well enough. Hobble your horse between the two stacks of cargo, there at the aft. We’ll be tight, but I think we’ll be able to squeeze past him when necessary. Better than him getting in the way of the mast. We leave at dawn tomorrow morning. Fifty marks a head, including the animals.”


That was a fairly cheap price, but Eykit felt a moral obligation to not just accept it. He had to haggle. And he managed to get the price down to thirty five marks a head, with the stipulation that members of his party had to stand a few watch cycles during the times when they had to camp. And maybe help with rowing, occasionally.


She turned to her crew. “Hey! Remember we leave tomorrow morning at sunrise! So no staying up late drinking! No hangovers, or I’ll make you row them out.”


“Aye aye, Captain!” came several voices. A female Orc said, “Aw, spoils all the fun, that.” Although it didn’t look like she meant it, since she was grinning.


On the way to an inn, they found a general store, still open. Of course, the shopkeeper was an Orc, who had just started his shift. “Good morning,” he said, a tusked smile splitting his face.


“Good evening to you, too,” Eykit replied. “Which shelves have the traveler’s meals?”


“That would be those, along the back wall.” The young man indicated with a muscled arm and a hand bigger than a child’s head.


“Thank you kindly.”


They made their way over to the indicated shelves, and collected dried meats, cheeses, hard tack, and dried fruits. There was even a waxed brick of pemmican, enough for several meals. The firm mixture of lard, ground meat, and sweetberries fit comfortably in one’s palm, and made for a good soup or stew base.


Last minute provisions taken care of, they spent the night at an inn. Likely the last good bed they would have in a while.


Veliday, Leafturn 10, 879 AFE


Taid let the others board the craft before carefully leading Wilbur across the gangplank to the boat. The bulwarks weren’t that high, and it just so happened that the docks weren’t that much higher. He led the horse down into the aft part of the shift, then guided him between the two piles of tarp-covered crates. The others had found places to park themselves, trying to keep out of the way of the scurrying crew. Taid removed the gear, and the pack saddle. He didn’t want Wilbur to have to carry that weight on the boat.


There were eight crew, plus the captain. There were two Orcs, Snagagûl and Trumak, three Humans, Padrig, Aaron, and Alfgar, Poppy’s son, Rollo, a Dwarf by the name of Galnir, and a Goblin named Ochasa. Most of the time, they rowed. When docked, they were the cargo loaders.


Mainly, they manned the rowing benches, except when they had to man the sail, or take over piloting duties when Poppy needed a break.


They got the last of the cargo loaded before the passengers got themselves settled, and shortly after that cast off. There was no breeze, and the eight crewmen pulled hard on their oars to get the unwieldy barge moving away from the dock and into the slowly moving waters of the Altasirya River delta. The sail was reefed, tied to the diagonal spar.


The pulsating, surging motion of the boat quickly caused both Almë and Ruby to move closer to the bulwarks, ready to lean over the side in case their nausea became too much to bear. Both hated vehicular travel. Ruby had put up with it when she was in Adayn; she’d had to. Traveling by coach was the main form of travel for the people she worked with, and she needed to be in the coach with them. Many of her most important conversations had been done when she was green in the gills.


Taid wasn’t a big fan of water travel, either, but for a different reason. Dwarves didn’t really float all that well; they tended to sink. So swimming wasn’t his favorite activity. It was difficult, and tiring, and that was when he wasn’t wearing his armor. So he hoped he wasn’t knocked overboard.


Elitheris took up a position at the bow, watching ahead of the boat. She was used to being the eyes and ears of the group, and she fell naturally into that role when she wasn’t sending clothyard shafts of finger thick wood into people.


The boat rounded the edge of the confluence where the Grushagûl River flowed into the Altasirya, then turned into it, the boat juddering a bit at the turbulence where the waters mixed. On either side of them were buildings, some built over the water, others set back, leaving an open bank where people fished, or used canoes. Some washed laundry, laying out the clothes on large, flat rocks.

But it wasn’t long until they left the buildings behind, and they floated past fields and hedgerows. Most of the time, they didn’t even see the fields; the vegetation growing along the river obscured most of the farming activity. They could hear the farmers and field hands, shouting to one another as they harvested the fields.


The day was warm, and being in the middle of the river meant that there wasn’t any shade. There were tarps, but the rowers really only put those up when it rained.


Aaron Benno, the youngest of the crew members, started singing a sea chanty. Many of the others joined in, lending their voices to the song as they used its rhythm to time the strokes of the oars. Just past midmorning, a breeze could be felt, and they unfurled the sail, tying the corner to a point near the aft end of the boat. The large triangle of pale red canvas swelled with the light wind, and the rowers were able to ship their oars, letting the sail carry them upriver.


Captain Tinyfoot sat at the rudder, steering the ship, softly whistling to herself. Taid, Ruby, and Almë sat on the bench beside her. Eykit had climbed up one of the piles of cargo in the aft part of the ship, and lay on his back, gazing at the clouds in the sky. Elitheris sat on a tarp-covered crate, her feet braced on the front bulwarks, her eyes scanning the river ahead of them.


Mostly, she saw jungle, the occasional monkey as it leapt from tree limb to tree limb, and a multitude of colorful birds.

“Mind if I join you?” Ochasa Sokkoeko asked Eykit, peering up at him with blue eyes that seemed to compliment her olive skinned face.


Eykit looked down, seeing a cute Goblin a few years younger than himself. He smiled, “Sure. C’mon up. Plenty of room!”


Ochasa quickly climbed up the pile of cargo, seating herself on the edge with her legs dangling. “I’m Ochasa.”


“Eykit,” he said, sitting up and crossing his legs.


“Where you guys headed? Any place interesting?”


“I don’t know how interesting it is, but we are headed to Dwarfchat.”


“That’s a pretty busy place. Arranging to set up some trade deal with the Dwarves?”


Ochasa was pretty, and seemed nice. But Eykit thought better of telling her very much about the specifics of their mission. “Well,” he replied, “we’re hoping for something like that. There are a lot of trading factors in Port Karn who would love to get some sweetheart deal with the Dwarven traders.”


The female Goblin nodded. “Thought so. Good luck with that. Dwarves can be pretty brutal in their trades. Cut throat even. Maybe it’s a good thing you have a Dwarf with you.”


“Taid? Oh yeah. He’s solid. Won’t let us down.” He decided to change the subject. “How about you? How long have you been crew on this boat?”


Ochasa brushed a lock of deep black hair from her face, tucking it behind one of her pointed ears. Her arms were covered with several tattoos, mostly sea creatures, but a few were abstracts that gave the impression of seaweed. She shrugged. “Several years, now. Five, maybe? I actually don’t really remember. The Captain says I joined when I was drunk, but I don’t remember that. Maybe she’s right. But maybe not. I like being on a river boat. And I don’t really mind the rowing.” She showed her calloused palms. “After the first few weeks, I stopped getting blisters.”


“After seeing you at the oars for several hours, I can only imagine what those first few weeks must have been like.”


She smiled, dimples appearing on her greenish cheeks. “My hands hurt for a while, but Captain has some ointment that made them feel better. But like I said, I like it. I get to see all kinds of things, and it’s not nearly as dangerous as going out to sea.”

“I don’t go on boats much. What’s so dangerous about the sea? Besides the big waves, howling winds, storms, and huge beasties that can gobble down a ship in a single gulp?”


“Oh, besides those things? Not much, really. Pirates, maybe. Sharks.” She laughed, an infectious giggle that made her entire body quiver in mirth. “Fewer pirates on the river. And no sharks.”


“Why not? Sharks aren’t that big. They would fit in this water.” He’d never seen a shark. But he’d heard stories, and the stories didn’t make them out to be stupendously large beasts. Just hungry fish with lots of teeth.


“They like salt water. You won’t find them in the delta, either. They like the open ocean.” She ran her hand across Eykit’s mail shirt. “Aren’t you afraid you’ll drown in that thing?”


“I don’t plan on falling overboard.”


She laughed again. “Wait until we get to the rapids! Should we tie a rope to you, so we can haul you back aboard?” She grinned, the mirth evident in her blue eyes.


Eykit got the impression that despite her charming demeanor, Ochasa could be tough as nails if she had to be. There was just something about her, under the surface, that gave him the impression that she could eat him for breakfast. He wasn’t sure if he would have minded. He was glad he was wearing his mail. It hid the fact that his pants were feeling rather tight at the moment.


They spent some time, chatting, as the farms rolled by. They passed through the farming towns of Salapur, Demond, and Smokebury. They emerged into a lake, an oblong mass of water six kilometers long by three wide, at its widest point.


The lake was covered in a scattering of small fishing vessels, mostly based in the town of Transk, which lay at one of the ends of the lake. Transk was as close to a frontier town as it came in the Port Karn agricultural area, situated thirty two kilometers away from Port Karn, as the Aarakocra flies. Like many of the small towns and villages scattered amongst the farmed fields, Transk supported the farmworkers who tilled and harvested the lands. Much of that food helped to supply the city. Supplementing this, they had a large fishing fleet that caught fish, eels, and edible lakegrass.


Noticing the wind and the fact that they were nearing the river mouth, Ochasa said, “Gotta go, Boytoy. Back to the oars for me!”


The breeze pushed the boat southward, and Captain Poppy guided the boat skillfully into the mouth of the river, with the help of the rowers. Ahead of them, jungle could be seen decorating some hills less than two kilometers away, past the last of the farmed fields.


Padraig Yannick, one of the Human rowers, had a fishing pole out, its line dangling in the river as they moved upstream. It had been out for an hour or two, and he had yet to catch anything. Trumak, her gruff voice chiding, said, “Hey Paddy, did you remember to put any bait on that thing?”


“Uh-yup,” Padraig said, peeking out from under his hat, which he had pulled down low to shade his face. “Nice fat worm. I’ve got a few more, if you’re hungry.”


“Hah! Keep them. I had a good breakfast this morning. Save them for your fish. Maybe we’ll have trout tonight.”


“Maybe,” came the laconic reply. “Or eel.”


It was late afternoon when they got to the jungle, and the vegetation closing in over them made it seem darker and later than it actually was.

“So, Captain,” Almë said, “How safe is the way to Lyton’s Mill usually?” He shifted a little, trying to get more comfortable. The seat that stretched across the aft of the boat was a simple wooden plank, worn smooth by use. He’d doffed his gambeson jacket, folded it up, and was using it as a seat cushion. It worked pretty well.


Poppy shrugged. “It’s pretty routine. Not many pirates on the smaller rivers, at least, not at the lower sections where the river is wide like this.”


The river was about thirty meters wide or so. “You start to have a bit more trouble when the river gets narrow, where they can have people stationed on both banks with ropes or nets strung across the river. When that happens, we set Galnir and his axe on the rope, and hopefully we cut through it faster than they can board us. And if they do board us, Snagagiul and Trumak will pull their arms off.” At Almë’s and Ruby’s stricken looks, exacerbated by their queasiness, she chuckled and said, “But, so far, we haven’t had to resort to that.”


Poppy didn’t seem to use a seat cushion. Almë figured her butt must be calloused.


“Where do we sleep?” Ruby asked, looking around the boat. There wasn’t a lot of room to sit, let alone lay down.


“We camp every night, unless we hit a village and we stop there. Then we ask the locals to share their beds or haylofts or whatever.”


“How many villages are there on the river?”


“Several. We’ll be trading cargos at most of them.”

Captain Poppy Tinyfoot


The wind had slackened. One of the disadvantages of being in the thick jungle was that the vegetation blocked a lot of the wind. The sail hung slack from the top spar.


“Back to the oars, you laggards!” Poppy cried out to her crew. “Rollo, Ochasa! Reef the sail, then get on the oars.” The crew hopped to it, and six oars dipped into the water while the sail was reefed. Their speed increased from nearly nothing, to a brisk walk. A short while later, two more oars joined in.


“Well, Captain,” Ruby asked, “where are you from?”


“My son Rollo over there was born in Hearavgizan. I was actually born in Port Karn. My folks were sailors. Well, fishermen, but that counts.” She gave Ruby a lopsided grin. “How are you feeling? Nausea getting any better?”


“No, my stomach is still doing flip flops. I’m trying not to let it flop too much.”


“I take it you’ve never really liked sailing? She looked at Almë. “Him either, it seems.”


“Bleah. I prefer riding my dog. I don’t even like wagons or carriages. Rode on a palanquin once. I thought it would be like riding Norolind, but I didn’t like that either. Something about the motion just makes my guts churn.”


“If you need to, puke over the bulwarks into the river. Not in my boat, if you please. Anyway, Rollo lived most of his life on boats. It’s really the only home he has.”


Ruby looked around at the open boat. It wasn’t much for shelter. Just a tarp strung up during the rainstorms. She shrugged inwardly. To each their own. He seems happy enough.


Ruby’s stomach growled. Poppy looked over at her, winked, and said, “It’s starting to get late. We’ll need to look for a promising campsite soon.”


“Care to share a meal with me?” Ruby asked. Hobbits, due to their metabolisms, tended to eat more meals than the other races did. They were like hominid hummingbirds.


“Sure! I can eat! My stomach has been growling for a while.”


They shared a meal of bread, cheese, nuts, and dried fruit. Captain Tinyfoot noticed that Ruby didn’t have any meat in her satchel of foodstuffs, so out of politeness she refrained from snacking on her sausages. She did, however, break out a skin of beer, which she handed to Ruby before calling to Rollo to make sure the rowers were refreshed with their own snacks and drinks. She knew they didn’t really eat as often as she did, but they had gotten into the habit of having a little snack when she would eat her extra meals. Most of the time, the snack was beer or cider, whatever the skin was full of that day.

“Has there been any trouble in the last few weeks or months?” Ruby asked.


The captain considered for a moment. “Besides a snapped mooring line, or a torn sail, no. Not really. Every once in a while, there may be some dangerous animals that are seen, or some dangerous water beasts or something, but we can usually stay clear of those.”


“What kind of dangerous water beasts?”


“Oh, you know, crocodiles, hippopotamus, and stuff like that. But, you know, whack ‘em good on the nose with an oar and they tend to leave you alone. Most of them don’t bother with a big boat like this anyway.”


“Ah, okay. Do you have any weapons or stuff, or any mages aboard, for safety reasons?”


“No, just the crew. No mages. Couldn’t afford to pay one anyway. The crew have knives, and I think some of them have larger weapons. Galnik has his axe, and I think Snagagiul has a short sword. And there are a couple of boat hooks, of course. There are a couple of bows on board. Rollo, Aelfgar, and Trumak use those. Usually for hunting dinner, though.”


“But there haven’t been any issues with someone stealing the stuff on the boat?”


“Nah. We do post a guard at night, although it mostly to keep predators away, rather than brigands. While there are likely some brigands out there in the jungle somewhere, we don’t meet them. It’s not like we have specific places we camp on a regular basis that would be predictable enough to set an ambush.” She looked at Ruby directly. “Trading on the river isn’t much different than trading on any other roadway. This one is just fluid, instead of solid.”


“So what is on the boat? What cargoes do you transport?”


“Well, you know we take passengers, if they are willing to sleep like we do. The boat’s not really set up for passengers’ comfort. Most of our cargo is bulk materials: bales of fibers, rolls of fabric, lumber, crates and barrels, foodstuffs, grain, the usual. Nothing spectacularly valuable to the average thief, but vital to the villages along the banks of the river and those farther inland.”


“Captain Mom,” Rollo said from the rowing bench, “sometimes we take mail, too.”


Poppy smiled, nodded, and said, “Yep, we do. None on this trip, though. This time, we have mostly foodstuffs. Grain, pickled vegetables, salt pork, salt beef, and some fresh root vegetables. We are carrying a few other things, like a barrel of nails, and a half dozen carpets.”


Ruby had been wondering how busy the river ways were, but she really didn’t need to ask Captain Tinyfoot about that. She could see other boats on the waterway, going in both directions. It wasn’t crowded, but she saw another vessel at least once every quarter hour or so. A lot more when near any kind of settlement.


Off to one side they could see a small herd of trihorn antelope leaping through the undergrowth. They were moving upslope, and quickly disappeared into the jungle depths.


“Should I take a shot at one?” Rollo asked no one in particular. “Get some meat for tonight?” But by the time he had said it, they were gone, his opportunity lost. He grumbled to himself, but kept rowing, the oar seemingly oversized when compared to his tiny Hobbit body.


The sun was going down, notable only by the tops of the trees turning orange in the slanting sunlight. The captain called to start looking for a promising place to tie up the boat and make a camp. About twenty minutes later, they found a place that had a tree growing out over the river almost horizontally, while nearby a couple of tree falls had opened up a spot that would make a good camp for the baker’s dozen people and two dogs.


As soon as the boat was lashed to the tree, Almë leaped to the nearly horizontal tree, and used it as a boarding ramp to get off of the ship. The nausea he felt made his balance a bit off, so while he wasn’t as graceful as he usually was, he was still glad he was off of the ship. He sat down, waiting for the seasickness to abate. It still felt as if he was on the boat; it felt as if the whole world rocked back and forth underneath him.


The crew of the boat brought supplies to the spot that wasn’t quite a clearing, but did allow them to see the sky above them. The pair of trees had made something of a window in the canopy, allowing them to see the sky. Within a few seasons, the open window would be gone, overgrown by the rapacious vegetation.


It took nearly a half hour for Almë’s queasiness to go away. During this time, the sailors had gotten the campsite situated, the undergrowth tamped down for bedrolls, and a fire lit. They were currently working on putting tarps up over the bedrolls, to keep out the rain that was likely to fall. The campsite, formed by the pair of fallen trees, was about a dozen meters by eight meters in size, just big enough for all of them to cluster around the campfire.


Almë cast the spell of Plant Vision, which allowed him to see through the plants around him as if they were transparent, out to a range of 60 meters. The mass of vegetation within that range made a vaguely transparent texture, with what seemed to be a million plants all overlaid on top of another, so much so that it might as well have been a vaguely greenish haze. But he was mainly looking for dangerous animals.


This was a jungle; the area of transparent plants was full of animals: monkeys, birds, rodents, and several small predators that appeared to be catlike. There was also the impression of shapes of trees and plants made by what now appeared to be clouds of insects. Several of the trees seemed to be the homes of ant colonies, their tiny bodies barely visible even to Almë’s Elven sight. He could see the shapes of the tree outlined in ants, even if he couldn’t see the tree itself very well due to the spell. The tree looked like it was continually moving, without going anywhere.


He didn’t see any animals that appeared especially dangerous. They might try to get into the camp’s supplies, but the number of people in the area would likely keep the wild animals away. The fire wouldn’t hurt, either.


He looked for rogue dangerous plants, but he couldn’t see any. Although in this case, the Plant Vision spell didn’t really help him, as it made any particular plant, dangerous or not, even more camouflaged amongst all the surrounding vegetation. But he tried to trace out the various shapes of the mass of plants, but the jungle was so thickly overgrown that they all appeared to be a emerald-textured greenish haze with a verdant background surrounded by viridescent light.

But he knew, somewhere out in the jungle, ancient Elven experiments lurked. Life found a way, and despite their best efforts, defensive plants proliferated in the wilds. He hoped none were nearby.


At least he knew that there were no dangerous animals’ dens anywhere within 60 meters or so. And judging from the animals he did see, and their actions, he was pretty certain that there weren’t any nearby, even further out.


Taid walked the perimeter of the campsite, very carefully, looking primarily for reeks, although if he scared off any other animals from the area, that was a bonus. The fewer animals within the area of the campsite, the better. The humanoid activity in the campsite had done a good job of scaring off anything that would be scared off. But animate slime molds on speed didn’t apply, so he was making sure he wasn’t going to be stepping in any.


Satisfied there were no “enemies” within his casting area, he put into motion part two of his plan.


Taid cast the spell of Mystic Mist, making sure that everyone was within the area, in order to be “friendly” to the magic. Opalescent fog flowed out of Taid’s body, extending out about seven meters and four meters high, then disappeared, leaving only a slight oil-like sheen on everything within the area. To those protected by it, it was nearly invisible. To those coming in from outside, it was a very frightening thick fog with some severe disorienting effects. It was a very, very protective spell, and it would last all night.


“I’m going to take a walk around the area,” Almë said. “Scout it out a bit.”


“Want to take Nori?” Ruby asked.


“Okay, sure. Having a big dog around might be useful.” He cast a spell of Walk Through Plants on himself, then Norolind. The spell would allow him to move through the thick undergrowth more easily, as the the plants moved out of the way to let him pass. They moved off into the jungle.


Ruby cast a spell of her own: Sense Foes, on the campsite itself. She kept this casting quiet; there was no reason to let anyone else know that she didn’t necessarily trust them. But, she grew up in Adayn, the political capital of the Empire, and it was filled with cut-throat nobles clawing their way up the social ladder. So she was understandably wary, even of simple sailors. Old habits died hard.


The sailors had seemed nice enough on the boat. And her spell didn’t tell her that there were any people in camp that had any ill intentions towards her. She nodded to herself. Good, she thought. My paranoia was only paranoia.


Almë and Norolind went out into the jungle about ten meters away from camp, then started arcing around, keeping about that same distance.


The campsite was on the west bank of the river, about six meters from the water. Almë and Nori went north first, curving around the campsite until they got to the water, then reversing to traverse the arc all around the camp. On his way back around something found him.


Tendrils snapped around his legs, and they pulled, trying to yank his feet out from under him. But his Elven agility came to his rescue, and he managed to keep his feet and resist the pull. Despite that, he still screamed aloud in surprise. He heard a yelp, and out of the corner of his eye he could see several other vines striking at the large black dog. Bloody welts marked his back.


He looked down, and saw a plant he was quite familiar with. It was whipweed, also called petolva by the Elves. It was an unruly cluster of deep green vines, growing out of a wreath of broad, arrowhead shaped leaves. Around the base of the plant, just under the ground, was a network of roots that were able to sense pressure and movement. The long, thorny vines were over two meters long, and the ones not trying to entangle him were trying to beat him into submission. The thorns served two purposes, one was to help hold onto prey, the other was to help slice open the victim to better consume it.

It had been developed and bred millennia ago by the Elves as a defensive plant, often seeded around their settlements as a way to keep out wildlife and intruders.


It had been Almë’s job, not too long ago, to tend these plants. He grinned. He knew how to deal with this animate vegetable.


Nori barked, biting at the flailing vines, but they were moving too fast for him to grab onto with his jaws.


The camp heard Almë’s scream, and Taid and Elitheris found themselves on their feet before conscious thought told them to stand. Mr. Wiggles barked, and the rest of the people in the campsite were looking around, trying to figure out what was going on.


Almë tried to shake off the vines by kicking his feet, although his knowledge of the plant told him that the purpose of the thorns was to make that nearly impossible. They would have to be cut off.


Norolind pounced on the vines stretched taut between Almë’s feet and the plant’s central body. His jaws clamped down on the vines, tasting sap.


The plant attacked Almë with several flailing vines, whipping them at the struggling Elf, but with a quick twist of his body, managed to cause them all to miss.


Almë knew how to deal with this hyperactive salad. He cast the spell of Plant Control. The magic reached out from Almë to the whipweed plant, and while the animate, sessile plant tried to fight the control, it ultimately failed. Almë was a plant mage. It had attacked exactly the wrong person.


Almë commanded it to let go of him, and stop attacking the dog. The vines stopped flailing about, and the ones on his legs released and withdrew. He had full control over the plant. He and Norolind moved back, out of range of its vines. He made the vines dance for a bit, which made him laugh, then he made them tie themselves into a bow knot. “Now it looks pretty,” he said to the dog. The vines tried to move, but their range of motion was heavily curtailed.


Norolind chuffed in response, then turned and started licking at his wounds. They were shallow, and not bleeding much, but Almë knew that it was the impact from the whipping vines that did most of the damage, not the tiny thorns.


He figured there were more out there. But they weren’t in range of the camp. He just had to make sure no one wandered too far outside of the campsite. He and Norolind went back to the camp, and Almë pointed out the pathway he took, and made sure people knew where that once-dangerous plant was located. Now it was pretty well taken care of. It would likely break the knots soon enough, but for now, it was safe.


“Are there any more of those things out there in the jungle, and can you find them?” Captain Tinyfoot asked.


“Do you want me to hunt them down?” Almë replied. “And why do we care if they can’t move to the camp?”


“Someone might wander off too far and get grabbed by one of these things.”


“Then don’t wander off tonight. How about that?”


The Hobbit, ignoring the rather rudely spoken response, looked around at the campsite. It was fairly crowded, but no worse than when on the Water Lily. “Listen up, people. No wandering off tonight. Stay in this sparkly area.”


“You know, if something is coming towards us from the jungle,” Ruby said, “maybe they will end up protecting us. At the very least, if someone gets attacked by these things, they will scream like Almë, and we will all wake up!”

Almë turned to the captain. “Why is there a need to wander into the jungle.”


“Just in case we want a bit of privacy when we do our business.”


“Then you can take the path I just pointed out a few meters. Just don’t go too far.”


“Fine,” Poppy said. She turned to her crew. “Okay. The path he just pointed out—don’t go farther out than several meters, and that’s now the head.”


Almë nodded. “I’ll build a latrine area for you. Give me a few minutes, and I’ll clear an area.”


Poppy looked at him askance. “You’re a mage.” It wasn’t a question.


“Of course. I’m a plant mage. I used to be a gardener, not too long ago, so dealing with plants is sort of my thing.”


Almë sat on the trunk of one of the fallen trees. It wasn’t far from the path he’d taken when scouting the area. He rested for a time, recovering his magic power. Then he stood, walked over to the area he wanted to use as the latrine, and cast a spell of Withering. It didn’t work, and he swore under his breath, trying to figure out what he did wrong. Likely a sloppy hand gesture, probably made too abruptly.


He tried again, paying closer attention to his hand motions. This time it came easily. So easily that he didn’t even need to expend his own mana reserves. Instead, he was able to power the spell completely with the ambient mana of the local environment. The area encompassed by the spell had been a mass of undergrowth, with a few saplings sprinkled in here and there, taking advantage of the tree falls. Those plants curled up, turned brown and crisply, then crumbled to dust. The area, a space about three meters in diameter, became bare earth.


As the area had been browning, he’d noticed a pair of whipweed plants just beginning to grow near the edges of the area, and he was able to redirect some of the magic to them as well, causing them to wither as well. There had been no chance of them reaching the latrine, but he figured, why take any chances.


“There you go,” he said, indicating the now-denuded area. “Have safe pees.”


Poppy called to two of her crew. “Get the shovels. We’ll put a head here.” Padrig and Alfgar nodded, and headed to the boat. It didn’t take long; they were back and starting to dig within a couple of minutes.


Almë watched them coming, then decided to help them with their labors by a judicious application of the spell of Earth Shaping. He dug a trench, as they stood back, watching the earth move of its own accord. He shaped a trench, with he dirt piled on one side. He remembered digging latrines during his stint in the Tondene Imperial Army. He’d had to use that spell quite a bit during his military days. There had been days when that was all he did—move earth around. Trenches, ramparts, berms. Every camp had to be fortified. At least it wasn’t all latrines.


Padrig found a log about a meter long, setting it along the edge of the trench to act as a seat of sorts. It was more comfortable than trying to squat at the edge of a hole, and reduced the chance of falling in. No one needed that to happen.


The camp was set up, the fire lit, and food was in the pot hanging from the tripod of sticks. Inside bubbled a stew, thick with vegetables, pork, and flour. Day old bread, purchased just before they left, made a good addition to dinner. Ruby picked out the meat, eating only the vegetables. She didn’t really like it, since the pork flavor had suffused all of the vegetables, but ate it as a supplement to the food she had in her pack.


Once dinner was eaten, and the utensils cleaned in the river, Galnir Hardback started telling stories. The ones he told tonight were stories that he had heard when he was a lad, growing up in the undercity of Gimil Nor, a huge underground metropolis.


One was a simple story about a farmer whose main crop was puddle clusters, and his quest for a wife. Puddle clusters, also called Pond Stands, were bamboo-like plants upwards of ten meters tall, and circled shallow pools of bluish, glowing water. There were hundreds of the pooling stands, many ready for harvesting, although they never harvested more than a third of the stalks from any one stand at a time. More than that would kill the plant.

Dwarven biology being what it is, finding a wife wasn’t all that simple, since Dwarven women were a mere one fifth of the Dwarven population. This usually meant that wives were rare, and that they practiced polyandry, which meant that the farmer would have to share his wife with other husbands.


Normally, this wasn’t a problem. It was an accepted part of Dwarven culture. But Bofur Brightdigger, cultivator of pooling stand, barrelstalks, and bulbfruit, didn’t really want to share. So he went a long time without a mate, until he finally found a potential mate. One who didn’t have any other mates, for none would have her. Kairleen Marblebane was a hard woman to please. Some said impossible, and that was likely the reason she had no suitors who lasted very long.


But that didn’t deter Bofur. He wooed her for months, putting up with Kairleen’s incessant criticisms and generally bad demeanor. She was, in the eyes of most, an unpleasant woman. Pretty enough, with a stylish, curly, and very soft beard, and a firm body made strong by work in the Causeways. She wasn’t easy on Bofur, but he somehow, strength to him, managed to accept her as she was, unlike any other potential suitor.


She was a builder. He was a farmer, although since he grew the bamboo-like puddle clusters, which were used mostly for construction purposes, he was familiar enough with builders and their needs. He showed her his cavern, taking her on walks through the stands of bamboo-like stalks, past uneven rows of the waist-high barrelstalks, and along areas where the stiff, reedy bulbfruit grew. The only light being that cast by the glowing pools of water, the whole cavern had a mystical, dreamlike feel to it that Bofur loved. He shared that with Kairleen, who also grew to appreciate it, despite her initial inclinations.


Eventually his patience won out, and they became husband and wife. She took no other husbands, despite some trying, once they found out that she had a husband already. After all, if Bofur could be a husband, then she couldn’t be as bad as the rumors, right?


Alas, to all but Bofur, she was indeed the shrew the stories portrayed her as. But to Bofur, she was a brilliant light in the darkness, his own pool of radiance.


The other story he told was a horror story, about a horde of slimy zombies attacking a frontier outpost in a far flung cavern. It was a small community, formed around a series of mine tunnels that had promising amounts of emeralds and rubies, along with a few other precious and semiprecious stones. There were maybe sixty people, living in a cluster of a dozen or so structures at the intersection of six tunnels.


One day, a miner digging with his pick at the far end of the tunnel, broke into a cavern. His opening was high up on the cavern wall, and before he knew it, he had made a hole large enough to cause the structural integrity around the hole to fail, and he toppled into the cave.


He landed on a mossy hillock, in a cavern covered in the stuff. Of course, it wasn’t moss, as this was growing in a cave with no light in it. But it felt like moss. But there was something in the cavern with him. It wasn’t an animal, like a cave hydra, or deep worm, or even a reek. It was something else.


He climbed out, and went back to the settlement. He had found a cavern, and wanted people to come and see it. So a few came. Most were busy, and some had no interest. But he led four others to the cave with the moss-like fungus in it. They had brought a rope, in order to climb down into the cave safely. And to use going back up, of course.


The miner led them over to an outcropping of rock, coated in flowstone and looking like a fountain of melted wax. This was where the Something Else was. It had infected the miner on his first visit, and made him bring the others closer to it, so it could get them, too. One by one, it got them. Using its slimy yellow fingers to worm its way into their brains, where it could control them.

And it wanted more. More people to control. Those four climbed out of the cave, and went back to the settlement to get more people. They abducted several people before anyone was the wiser, and by now the earliest victims were starting to show the yellow slime mold markings on their bodies.


Now numbering nine, they attacked the town, taking it by surprise, attacking and capturing six more people. The others locked themselves in their houses. The slime mold puppets pounded on the doors, and climbed up onto the roofs to break through those, since they were hardly necessary in caves, and were built more as privacy screens than as shelter.


They broke through, and the survivors were forced to make a last stand. They fought well, and tried to make a run for it. Only one person survived to tell the tale.


Galnir told the story as a typical scary story told around a camp fire. But Taid had heard rumors of such a thing, and he doubted that it was only a tale. But he didn’t say anything to the others; puppetmoss was a subterranean thing, and not something that could exist in sunlight. Besides, scary tales are always more frightening with real monsters in them.


Ochasa had sat next to Eykit at dinner, and leaned against him while Galnir told his stories. “Hey Boytoy,” she said softly, “any stories of your adventures?”


“I’ve had my share, but I’m hoping for better in the coming days. How about you?”


“I spend my time rowing all day.” She poked him in the shoulder. “I’m asking for your story.”


He considered. He had plenty of adventures to choose from. And that was just in the last few months. He told her about the kidnapped slaves, the old Orc temple, and the summoning of the servitor of Ghebbiloth.


Ochasa was impressed. “So you are an actual, bona fide hero? Wow. Color me impressed. You helped save a lot of people.”


“Oh, I forgot the best part!” He went on to tell her, in the funniest way he could, about Taid’s adventure with the reek.


“Ah! So that’s why he stomped around the campsite when we got here!” the Goblin woman laughed. “So, how long have you all been together?”


Eykit shrugged. “It varies, really. I met Taid a little over two months ago. Then we both met up with Elitheris shortly after that. We met Almë a few days later. Ruby joined us only three eightdays ago.” He was a bit amazed at how little time they have been together. “Wow, so much has happened lately. It’s felt like I’ve known them a lot longer than I actually have.”


Ochasa laughed. “Life is like that, sometimes. I sense more stories of derring do, and likely some of derring don’t.” She looked into his eyes with a smile. “I hope I get to hear them.”


She patted his hand with her calloused one. “Good night, Boytoy. I’ll see you in the morning.”


Eykit smiled back. There was promise, there.

After a bit more chatting quietly at the campfire, everyone retired to their bedrolls in ones and twos. Soon, everyone except the person on watch was laying on their sleeping furs, under their tarps. Taid and Eykit wore their metal armor to bed, in addition to their gambesons. They slept uncomfortably, getting a lousy night’s sleep, both from being hot all night, and from having metal bits digging into soft skin.


Taid was awakened toward the end of the night, since he had agreed to take one of the watch shifts. Things were uneventful, although he had a hard time staying awake. But although he was sleepy, his military training (and the harsh punishments meted out to those on watch who fell asleep) kept him from nodding off. He was really grateful for the Mystic Mist, however, as that kept out 99% of anything that might have bothered them.


Ralsday, Leafturn 11, 879 AFE


At dawn, the campsite started to show signs of activity, with the Water Lily’s crew starting to take down the camp and get everything back on the boat. Ruby, being a person who needed a couple of extra hours of sleep in the morning, was cranky and drowsy, but she knew that she would rather be on the floating nausea producer than left behind in the jungle. She grumbled, but not at anyone in particular. Mostly, this was ignored.


Shortly after sunrise, they were on the river again, the rowers propelling the craft upriver in the still air. Ruby fell asleep, despite her motion sickness, awaking only when her stomach growled so loudly it woke her up in the late morning.


Captain Poppy handed her the end of a loaf of bread, knowing that Ruby hadn’t had a chance to eat breakfast.


“Thanks,” Ruby mumbled sleepily.


Elitheris, sitting at the bow and leaning back on the stack of cargo, saw some glints in the air ahead of them. She frowned, trying to make sense of what it was, but it was barely there. “Does anyone else see glinting up ahead?”


Before she could get an answer, everyone lurched forward as the boat came to a sudden stop. Now she could see what had stopped the boat. A great web stretched across the river, from bank to bank, a distance of almost twenty meters. The mass of the boat had snapped some of the fine filaments, but enough held to bring the boat to a stop.

Both Norolind and Mister Wiggles were barking, looking over on the bank at the right side.


Branches moved, and huge arachnid scuttled out onto the web, moving quickly towards the boat.

Ruby acted quickly. Animals were her thing, or one of her things. She cast the spell of Beast Soothing. The magic reached out, enveloped the spider, and calmed it. It no longer had any inclination to attack the large thing that had disturbed its web, and it turned around and went back into its hiding spot on the riverbank.


“Shit!” Poppy said, “Cut that web before it comes back! Who knows how much time we have before it changes its mind again!”


Two of the crewmen, Galnir and Snagagûl, pulled out their axe and shortsword, respectively, and started hacking at the thin but tough strands of webbing that were stuck to the boat. The stretchy silk was tough, and resisted being cut.


Galnir looked up. “We can’t cut it high enough to allow the mast to pass through.”


“Is it burnable?” Almë asked.


Ruby nodded. Then she stood up, grabbed her staff, and made her way forward, between the aft stacks of cargo and Wilbur, the rowing benches, and around the front stack of cargo. Then she cast the spell of Flame Jet, and a gout of flame poured from the tip of her upraised staff, burning a long swath up through the middle of the web. The flames and heat cut through the webs, just a few meters shy of the tip of the mast.


Eykit thought that a flame jet half a boat away was a lot better than when that Nopuzu guy had tried to spray him with it during hand to hand combat in that old Orc temple. Only Eykit’s quick thinking and quicker reflexes saved him from some nasty burns.


There were some cheers from the crew, although they didn’t last long. The rowers jumped back to their benches, and rowed hard, hoping that the upper section of web wasn’t strong enough to hold the boat simply by the top of the mast. There was initial resistance, but the mass of the boat and the straining of the rowers pushed through the web.


“That could have been ugly,” the captain said to Ruby. “Thanks for taking care of that. Glad you’re aboard. Just watch where you point that thing. Boats and sails are notoriously flammable.”


Ruby nodded. She was glad that the spider was still alive; it wasn’t evil, it was just doing as its nature mandated.


“We don’t usually have giant spiders spinning webs across the river. Too much river traffic for that, usually. This one must be new to the area, or really hungry or something.”


“So that’s not normal?” Taid asked.


Poppy shook her head. “Nope. I mean, there are giant spiders in the jungle, sure. But they usually don’t try to catch river boats.”


“Maybe we’re special,” Taid mused.


“We do seem to attract attention,” Eykit said, from his perch on the starboard cargo pile. “I mean, look at us. A Goblin, a Dwarf, two Elves, and a Hobbit. Not to mention a dog, and a dog and a half. We stand out.”


“You think the spider knew you were here?” Poppy asked.


Taid shrugged. “Probably not. Maybe it’s just Fate. I don’t think anyone paid off the spider to attack us or anything.”


Poppy looked at the Dwarf askance. “You guys bad luck or something?”


Taid laughed, and Almë said, “I don’t think so! The people we’ve gotten close to seem to do all right in the long run. We just seem to be attracted to trouble, which we then take care of. We solve problems.”


“I see.”


At midafternoon, they came to a small village, spread out along a slope above the riverbank. A few docks projected out into the river, each one L-shaped, giving passing boats an easy way to tie off to the piers without a lot of maneuvering. The village looked like it might have maybe 400 residents or so, based upon what they could see from the small wharf.

Egger's Hamlet


There were several small fishing boats, both tied up to the docks, and scattered all over the local area of the river. On the graveled road that lead from the wharf to the village proper, was a wagon, loaded with crates. There was a second, empty wagon as well, and the teamster started moving it forward almost as soon as the Water Lily was tied off to the dock.


The rowers started unlashing the ropes that tied the tarps and the cargo down, getting ready to unload the portion of the cargo that went to this village. They carried the cargo off the boat and placed it into the bed of the wagon. The teamster helped, and he arranged the cargo in the wagon as soon as the Lily’s crew put it on the edge of the bed.


The captain came over to the five travelers, who had gotten off of the boat to stretch their legs. Of course, Almë and Ruby got off the boat just to get some non-moving ground beneath their feet. Hopefully, they would be here long enough for their stomachs to settle.


Captain Tinyfoot came over to them, after watching the unloading for a few minutes. “It’ll be a while before the cargo is unloaded, and new cargo loaded. A few hours, most likely. So we’ll stay here overnight.” She waved towards the buildings. “Welcome to Egger’s Hamlet.”


“So is there an inn,” asked Taid, “or are we camping?”


“No inn,” Poppy replied. “Most of us stay with the locals. There is a nominal fee; sometimes you get to share a bed, but most often you just get a spot by the hearth.”


“Or the hayloft in some barn?” Eykit asked.


“Maybe. You’ll need to ask around. My crew and I stop by here all the time, so we are kind of like regulars. We all have people that we typically stay with each time we are in town.”


And, true to her word, some of her crew were already filtering into the hamlet, to secure sleeping spaces. The rest of the crew took care of the cargo, offloading what needed to be delivered here, and shifting the remaining cargo to make room for the wagon full of new cargo they were taking on.


They led Wilbur up the roadway towards the village, one of the villagers saw them looking around like the tourists they were. “Excuse me, sers, but I have a place where you can stable your horse. Only three marks, unless you want oats, then it’s five.”


He was a middle aged man, who gave his name as Walter Gant. He led them up into the village, then past it, to a farm on the outskirts of the village. There were three buildings, a small house, a shed, and a good-sized barn, all surrounded by fields, circled by a withy fence five feet high. It wouldn’t stop a charging steer, but it would stop most animals under most circumstances.


Walter opened up the barn door, exposing a large open space with four stalls on one end. Two were empty, and above them was a loft that extended about halfway across the building.


“Ah!” Eykit said, “Shelter! That’s better than we have most nights.”


There was plenty of room up in the loft, with space for everyone. “Can we stay in your barn?” Eykit said.


“You have the five of you, plus the two dogs?” Walter asked. “Sure. Call it twenty marks for the lot of ya, plus the stabling fee.” He looked at them, his eyes resting on Ruby for a moment. “We’ll be serving dinner soon, if you’re interested in joining us.”


“That would be great,” Taid said, “Thanks. What are we having?”


“Does it matter?” Eykit asked.


“I’m just curious. I want to know what the local cuisine is.”


Walter had overheard on his way out of the barn. “Dinner is roasted chickens, with vegetables and mushrooms. Fresh bread and butter, and some cheese. Roasted mango for desert.”


Taid looked at Eykit, shrugging. “It could have been recently roasted spiders on the menu.”


“Well, it’s protein,” Elitheris said. “It’s sort of like eating crab legs, but a much different flavor. Less fishy.”


“Hey, if it was giant spiders, everyone would get a leg,” Eykit said.


“Cave spiders are a Dwarven delicacy,” Taid said. He wasn’t wrong, but most cave spiders rarely reached a half meter in leg span. He’d heard of monstrous ones bigger than the average peasant cottage, but hadn’t ever seen one.


The ecology of the underground was not something he had had much interest in. There were enough subterranean creatures to excavate out a lot of caverns; the mountains, and likely the valleys as well, were riddled with tunnels and spaces made by them over the eons. The Dwarves were just the only ones to really take advantage of all of that real estate and live in them, supplemented, of course, by their own delving.


They stabled Wilbur, fed him some hay and oats, and dumped their gear in the loft. Then they went into the main house for dinner. Walter’s family consisted of his wife, Mabel, his son Clement, his wife Natalie, and their two young children, Kelser and Rianna.


The dinner was nicely prepared, and tasty, with fresh herbs, and bread baked fresh that morning. And there was enough to go around. Maybe not as much as Ruby would like, but she had enough. If she needed a midnight snack, she had her rations in her pack that would take care of that. After dinner, and some exchange of news, they went to bed, climbing into the hayloft and spreading their sleeping furs on the hay. It made for a rather comfortable bed; much better than just the ground.


Even Almë slept through the night.


Taid dreamed. He dreamt he was on a boat, on the ocean. He didn’t like being on the ocean, most Dwarves didn’t. They tended to sink, and the ocean was really, really deep. The boat was a small sailboat, and he was alone on it, sitting at the tiller.

Ahead was an island, and Taid felt a deep need to go there. He’d never seen the island before, but there was a part of him that really wanted to go there. There was also a part of him that was afraid of what might be on the island. As he got closer, the wind pushing him inexorably, one of the mountains on the island blew up in a volcanic eruption. It wasn’t a large eruption, and Taid couldn’t see any lava. But fire and smoke could be seen rising up from the volcano.


As Taid got closer, he could see that the vegetation was dense, like jungle or deep forest. But every time he looked at the trees to see them as trees, they faded into a shapeless blob of “forest”. They never seemed to resolve into individual trees.


He beached his sailboat on the sand. He had the urge to walk into the forest, which was now finally beginning to resolve into individual trees and plants, although as he looked closer, they all still seemed to be the same plant, entwined with each other. It was like the abstracted “forest” all over again, but in higher resolution. It was weird.


Taid moved into the shade of the forest. He could hear the cries of birds and monkeys, but he couldn’t see them. Soon he found a large rock. At least, it looked like a large rock, until he came around to the other side and actually looked at it. It was a head, like a moai, but tilted to one side at about 45°. It was bald, but with a huge, bushy, curly beard. It opened its eyes and stared at Taid.

 “Come back,” the head said. “I am falling. Failing.” The eyes closed, and the head was silent.


Even the birdsong and the cries of the monkeys had fallen silent. He felt that he should hear the sound of the volcano, but even that was silent. Taid snapped his fingers; he could hear that. So he wasn’t deaf. It was just very quiet.


Taid woke up. He wasn’t sure what to make of that dream.


Starsday, Leafturn 12, 879 AFE


Dawn came too soon for Ruby, who again had to get up before she was ready to. But she figured she could nap on the boat. Kill two birds with one stone: more sleep, and less nausea. Almë, she noticed, started napping on the boat as well, likely for the same reason.

One of the rowers, Aaron Benno, came to collect them in the morning. “You guys were a bit hard to find,” he said. “I think I asked around four of five houses before someone was able to tell me where you spent the night. But come on, we’re ready to get going.”


They collected their things, got Wilbur, and followed Aaron back to the wharf, where the Water Lily was docked. It didn’t take them long to get Wilbur and the dogs aboard, and their gear stowed.


Aaron seemed to be in good spirits, and almost immediately starting singing a sea chanty while he rowed, keeping his rowing in time to the music. The other rowers joined in, with Galnir’s baritone standing out among the voices.


Padrig called out to the passengers from his rowing bench, “You are welcome to join in, we’ll teach you the words!” He grinned. “Especially the bawdy ones!”


Almë begged off, shifted his position on the rear bench, and rested his head on the bulwark, trying to nap. Sleeping was better than the nausea he felt. Ruby, woken up a few hours before she got her requisite amount of sleep, was already snoring.


Just before midday, they arrived at another small village, named after the shape the river made there. Gooseneck was a village that was even smaller than Egger’s Hamlet, with maybe three hundred inhabitants. It didn’t take more than two hours to offload the cargo, and take on some new cargo heading for Lytan’s Mill. Gooseneck had a deposit of very fine clay, and were shipping some to Lytan’s Mill’s brick factory. After taking on that cargo, the boat rode noticeably lower in the water, and moved a bit more sluggishly.


As they were coming to the end of the day, the riverbanks got a bit more rocky. Ferns and undergrowth grew between them, and Poppy and her crew maneuvered the boat into an area between the rocks such that the river’s current wouldn’t push the boat downstream. They tied off the boat, and went ashore to make the evening’s camp.


They were at a bend in the river, where the river doubled back, forming a spit of land that effectively had water on three sides. As usual, Almë and Ruby were the first off the boat, almost before it was completely tied off. They really hated being on it in the first place, and couldn’t wait to get solid ground beneath their feet.


“I’m going to scout the area,” Almë said. “Anyone want to go with me?”


Ruby nodded. “I’ll go with you.”


“Well, hold up!” Taid called out to them. “Let me cast Mystic Mist first!” He needed them to be in the area of the casting to ensure that the magic would recognize them as friends, not foes. After the several minutes it took to do the ritual of casting, the area was protected until dawn.


The crew set up camp, and made sure that their tarps were secure and angled properly to shed water, as they had seen clouds in the sky later in the day that looked like they might have some rain in store.


Almë, being both a plant mage, and a gardener who specialized in what he called “defensive plants” and everyone else called “carnivorous plant monsters”, liked to scout the area to make sure it was safe. Ruby joined him, knowing that her knowledge of animal magic could be useful as well. He cast the spell of Walk Through Plants on the two of them, and they headed out, zigzagging and moving outwards, making sure there were no hidden surprises.


The jungle around the river was thick and nearly impenetrable, which is one reason that Almë had cast the Walk Through Plants spell. It caused the plants to move out of the way for them when they got near, making it much easier to move through the jungle. For the most part, they could almost sprint, if they wanted.


The sun had dipped down behind the hills to the west, and the jungle was getting fairly dark. There was just enough light for Ruby to see, although Almë’s Elven eyes did much better in low light. He scanned the plants around him, looking for the telltale signs of dangerous plants. He kept an ear out for animals, as well, but he was confident that Ruby would be able to handle any animal attack, even a surprise ambush.


They could hear the chattering of monkeys, some distance away, and the cries of birds all around them. They could even hear a myriad insects droning away.


He felt stinging pain on his arms and shoulders. “Ow!” he said, “What the hell?” He looked around, seeing nothing threatening, then noticed some leaves that had fallen onto him.


“Ah!” Ruby exclaimed in pain. “Ow!”


Leaves had fallen onto her, too. They were teardrop shaped leaves, with serrated edges, a light green color with reddish veining. As they watched, the veins became even more red. The stinging pain seemed centered on the leaves. Both shook their arms, trying to dislodge the leaves, but, they seemed stuck onto them.


They tried pulling them off, and that worked, with a bit of effort. They seemed to have some kind of adhesive on them or something. More were falling all around them, landing on their chests and legs. They scrambled back the way they came, until they couldn’t see any leaves falling around them.


They were still pulling the leaves off, one by one, and tossing them away. They fluttered to the ground, but always seemed to float closer to them on their way down.


The leaves seemed to affect them through their clothes, so they knew it wasn’t a physical toxin. It was something else. Backpedaling, the two scanned the area, although most of their attention was on the leaves that seemed to be feeding off of them.


It didn’t take too long to get the leaves off, and soon they could devote their attention more fully to their surroundings. They could still see, ahead of them, some leaves falling, but they didn’t seem to be falling straight down. They seemed to be gliding downward, but also gliding towards them.

Leaf of a Bloodtree, as it starts feeding


It took a few more seconds, but Almë was able to find the tree that the leaves came from, and he pointed it out to Ruby in the dimness. She could barely make it out. Almë thought back, trying to figure out what this tree was. The campsite was about twenty meters away, and he could hear their voices.


“Ah!” he said. “It’s a bloodtree!” The blood tree was a species of vampiric plant that was able to drop its leaves, which could then drift over to its victim and latch on, draining its life force, and magically transmitting that energy to the tree. The leaves couldn’t fly, but were steerable when they glided down on the wind. The trunk was pale, like an aspen, but without the papery bark, and the leaves were a grayish green, unless feeding, in which case the veins of the leaves turned blood red. They were fairly rare, and most people didn’t survive an encounter with one.

Bloodtree


Fortunately, from what they could tell, the camp wasn’t in any danger. They were about twelve meters away from it, and the camp was another twenty meters farther back. So the tree wasn’t a danger unless someone got close.


“You know, we should get Elitheris and Eykit out here,” Almë told Ruby. “They could help pull leaves off of us.”


Ruby held up a finger. “Wait,” she said, as she started incanting a spell. A moment later, he felt an outward breeze. She had cast the spell of Air Creation, and it would blow air outward for another few seconds. The leaves, falling towards them, deflected away in the magically induced breeze.


They stepped back a bit further, to avoid those “lucky” leaves that made it far enough to latch onto them.


“Would the spell of Air Shaping help?” Ruby asked.


Almë thought about it. “Maybe. There is nothing keeping the leaves from dropping through the current of air, though. Then they would still be able to get us.”


“Do we have an umbrella? Maybe someone has one on the boat?”


Almë looked around, and saw a monstera plant with a large leaf. He contemplated using it as an umbrella, to keep the falling leaves off of him. But then he realized that they would just guide themselves underneath it, and get him anyway.


“Dammit,” he said, “I really want to wither that damned thing, but getting close to it is tricky.”


“Let’s go back and tell the others,” Ruby said.


They hiked back over to the group. Almë told them about the bloodtree, what it was, how it attacked, and how much he wanted to kill it. “We could destroy it, if you help me by picking off the leaves from me. And yourselves, obviously.”


It occurred to Ruby that the tree might have some alchemical uses, perhaps as an ingredient. She didn’t know specifically what those uses were, or for which elixir specifically, but the bloodtree was a magically infused plant, so it was likely an alchemist would be able to use various parts of it. Perhaps the leaves, dried and ground up, or samples of its sap, or even pieces of its wood or roots.


Ekain, their alchemist, had asked them to pick up any alchemical ingredients they came across. Elitheris also thought that the wood of the bloodtree might be useful for her bow, or arrows. Possibly amplified via her Elven ritual magics during the crafting process.


The hard part was figuring out to get the samples without the tree getting samples of them. Ruby, with her fire magics, could burn it down, but that would likely also burn down the jungle.


Assuming they were able to gather samples of the leaves, if they were apart from the tree for too long, they curled up and died. But maybe the preservation box would keep them fresh enough for the alchemist to use….


Almë went to the boat, where the box was kept when not on Wilbur. Swallowing, and hoping that he would be quick enough to avoid feeling sick while he grabbed the preservation chest, he boarded the boat. He had to rummage around a bit, since it was Taid who had unloaded Wilbur, and Almë wasn’t sure near which pile of cargo he’d stashed it.


But it really didn’t take him long, and he had the box and was off the boat before his stomach complained.


He held it on one shoulder. It was a bit bulky, if not terribly heavy. He walked back into camp, then he, Ruby, and Elitheris went back towards the bloodtree. They walked up to just short of where they could see a few bloodtree leaves. They didn’t see any leaves falling towards them through the leafy green jungle. Almë set the box down.


He grabbed a leaf. Almost immediately, he felt the burning, stinging sensation in his fingers, and the leaf veins got more red. He hurried to the box, flipped open the lid with his other hand, and peeled the leaf off his fingers, letting it fall into the box. Then he closed the lid. He shook the hand that had been stinging. “Well, that hurts,” he said.


“Maybe we can use sticks, instead of fingers,” Ruby said. She didn’t like the idea of using her blood to feed the tree.


The others nodded, and started scavenging for twigs. Using a stick in each hand, Almë pinched a leaf between them, lifting it off of the ground. It was clumsy, but he made it about two thirds of the way to the box before it fell from between the sticks, arcing towards him. He jumped out of the way. “Damn it.”


Elitheris stood ready, by the box, ready to open it and close it when needed. She scanned the bloodtree, hidden as it was in the jungle and obscured by other trees. But she could see several branches, just above the first level of the canopy.


Ruby was having trouble lifting the leaf in the first place. But she managed to lift it up just enough to make it able to glide towards her, but she almost nonchalantly moved out of the way, and if fell harmlessly back to earth.


Taid came walking up, and watched them try to use the sticks to get the leaves into the box. He shook his head. “By Aheru-Mazda! This is ridiculous. I can use the spell of Apportation to get a pile of leaves into the box. Go ahead and scoop them into a pile with your sticks. Let me know when you’ve got enough.”


There was enough space in the box for thirty or so leaves. Ruby and Almë pushed leaves into a pile, moving in and out of the area to get the tree to drop some leaves, then dancing back out of the area before they could get close. It didn’t take long to get a good sized pile of leaves.


While they were doing that, Elitheris readied a rope and grapple, in order to hook it on a branch, and hopefully break it off of the tree without getting too close to it. She was scanning some nearby trees for use as a place to position herself. Ideally, getting above the tree would be best, but there were no trees with branches big enough to support her that high.


She climbed up a neighboring tree, and found a branch to stand on. She threw the grappling hook, trying to get it hooked around a promising branch about a two and a half centimeters in diameter. Then she pulled, but she couldn’t really get enough strength in play to break the branch.


A few moments of thought, and she played out a bit of line, then jumped off of the branch, holding onto the rope. She fell straight down, the rope sliding over the branch she had been standing on like a pulley until it snapped taut, arresting her fall for a brief moment. With a loud crack! the branch the hook had snagged snapped off, and Elitheris was falling again. It was only another couple of meters to the ground, and she landed in a crouching roll. She still held the end of the rope, which now had on its other end, a branch of the bloodtree, dangling from the rope and swaying back and forth about four meters up.


The branch, still technically alive, shed several leaves, which drifted in Elitheris’ direction. She saw them coming at her, yelped, and leaped out of the way. Two still managed to get to her before she let go of the rope, dropping the branch to the ground. She ripped the two leaves off of her, their veins red with her blood.


Meanwhile, Almë and Ruby’s efforts to get bloodtree leaves into a pile were bearing fruit, and Taid cast his spell of Apportation, which allowed him to magically grab and carry the pile of leaves into the preservation box.


Elitheris had another little issue to deal with. Every time she got close to the broken off branch, it shed leaves at her. But after a few moments of dancing away from the shed leaves, she realized she didn’t need the leaves on the branches at all. They had enough of those with Ruby’s and Almë’s efforts. So she repeated moved towards it to make it shed leaves at her, then jumped back out of their range. Eventually, it was bare of any leaves. She coiled her rope and grappling hook, and grabbed the branch, dragging it back to camp.


Once there, she trimmed off any of the useless, small branches. She needed wood suitable for inlay work; they didn’t have to be large pieces, but they still had to be big enough to work with. She wasn’t sure how she would work the wood into the bow’s design, or what rituals she would use to integrate it into the bow, but she would come up with something. She kept about two or three kilograms of wood chunks, from the thickest part of the branch.

Bloodtree wood


It was another peaceful night around the campfire, as they ate their dinners and told stories. This time, Captain Poppy told a story about her one and only time on an ocean-going boat, when she was just a first mate. She had grown up with boats on rivers and lakes, and thought she knew everything about boats there was to know.


But she had never sailed on the ocean, and seeing it from the beach was a very different thing than sailing on it. She had a friend who was first mate on a coastal dhow, who had a death in the family and couldn’t perform her duties. So, as a favor, Poppy had stepped up, taking over her duties for that trip.


At first, everything was fine. The seas were calm, and shore was always in sight. They made their first two stops without any trouble at all.


But then things took a turn. The skies darkened, and a storm blew in. The seas were whipped into a froth, with waves bigger than the boat. Visibility dropped to mere meters in the flying rain and blowing wind. The crew had been alert, so the sail was reefed before the winds could rip them to shreds.


Poppy had never been in anything like it. Several times the boat risked capsizing as waves much larger than it was threatened to tip it over. As it was, the crew tied themselves to various points on the ship, to avoid being washed overboard as waves crashed onto the deck.


The storm lasted for two days, and blew the boat out to sea. Poppy had no idea where to go. She hadn’t been trained for navigating the open ocean, and lacked the skills to get them home. Fortunately, the pilot knew how to do it, and managed to get them back to land in only another two days.


After that, Poppy stuck to rivers, although she did learn the basics of open ocean navigation, just in case. But she had no plans on actually having to use it. She preferred the inland routes.


“Besides,” she said after her tale was done, “I like seeing the land go by. More interesting to look at than blank, open seas.”


After that, they crawled into their bedrolls, just in time to hear the first raindrops hit their tarps.


That evening, Ruby dreamed. She was back home, in Adayn, strolling along one of the marble avenues in the center of town, flanked by the rows of statuary that commemorated the history of the Tondene Empire. She was with her brother, Fridolin, and they talked about how successful he was being at commodity trading. Apparently, he was doing very well in the house cat trade, and had just recently gotten a good price on longhair tabbies.


As they passed the statue of Emperor Kevyn, called “the Bloody Emperor” by some, a dark figure jumped from the shadows, slamming the edge of his hand into Ruby’s throat. She gurgled, and tried to draw breath, but it was difficult, and she was unable to think straight. She could see shapes moving, and her arms were wrenched back, her hands enclosed in a bag that was too tight for her to move her fingers.


Her vision cleared, and she could see her brother, a dark shape behind her, with glowing eyes and a wicked, toothy grin. The man held a knife to Fridolin’s throat. Calmly and slowly, the man drew the knife across his throat, the blood flowing like a red tide into his white, frilled shirt and down his chest.


She screamed, and woke up, Almë’s screams echoing in the night.


Taid also dreamed. He was back in Zirak Dûm, in his family’s home. It looked out over the main part of the city, which lay in a vast cavern along one side of a softly glowing lake. The light came from phosphorescent water plants, and was a yellowish orange in color. The main part of the city’s buildings lay on the slope above the lake, in tiers, with a lot of the buildings looking like they were piled one on top of the other.


Which they sort of were. Dwarven architecture didn’t usually have a lot of space around each building; most of their structures were hollowed out of the living rock. When building in open spaces, like the cavern that much of Zirak Dûm was built in, they tended to build similarly, almost as if replicating the cavern complexes they were used to. The end result, in the case of the buildings on the slope, were a series of rowhouses, with occasional access ways between groups of them, marching up the slope, a roadway snaking back and forth between them.


Taid’s familial home lay about halfway up the slope. He stood, gazing out at the water below. A few boats, fishing for cave fish and crustaceans, floated out in the water. His thoughts were troubled.


His mother lay in bed, her constant moans of pain mercifully stopped by a dose of sleeping draught. She was very sick; some kind of rotting disease was eating holes in her. Most of her body was covered in red-stained bandages, as the doctors and healers tried in vain to save her.


He had had the misfortune to be in the room when one of the doctors was changing the bandages. He had seen into her side, the skin and much of the muscle gone, the edges of the wound red and inflamed. Her kidney and liver and some of her intestine could be seen through the gash. Healing spells, some cast by Taid himself, only put off the inevitable. They helped for a while.


Healing potions had helped for a while too, until they noticed that they did less and less each time they gave her one to drink. She had taken so many she was building up a resistance to them. The healers gave her no more than a week to live, a week of extreme agony.


The healers had started giving her fewer healing potions and more and more pain relief elixirs. Sometimes they helped. For a while.


Tears fell from his mismatched eyes; he watched the small puddles form on the railing he was leaning on. His hung his head, sobbing, his shoulders shaking in sorrow.


“No no no!” his father screamed.


Taid turned immediately, his tears forgotten, his face still wet. He bolted inside, toward’s his parent’s room where his father had kept vigil. As he burst into the room, he could see his father, standing at the foot of the bed, facing his mother.


“Mother!” Taid cried. “Is she….” He couldn’t say the words.


His father turned to face him. Half his face was peeling off, the skin hanging down, no longer completely attached. The edges of the wound were red and inflamed. He sobbed. “I have it too!”


Taid’s ears were filled with loud noise. He wasn’t sure, but he thought he might be screaming. He woke up to Almë’s screams.


The whole camp was awake, Almë’s night terrors had roused all of the Lily’s crew, who stood about, knives drawn, looking around for an enemy they couldn’t find and hadn’t expected.


Elitheris was trying to comfort Almë, and Eykit was trying to explain Almë’s little nightmare problem to the crew, without giving them too much personal information. After a few moments, Almë apologized to everyone, and combined with Eykit’s people skills, everyone calmed down and they went back to sleep.


Almë, no longer able to sleep, took the watch. He didn’t expect anything to bother them; Taid had, after all, cast the spell of Mystic Mist.


Lifesday, Leafturn 13, 879 AFE


Dawn arrived, and with it, the Water Lily’s crew awoke and started getting the camp broken down. During the time when they were loading up the boat, Eykit noticed something around the curve of the river about thirty or forty meters upstream. It was movement, fluttering around a bush. The bush had large, palm sized blooms of bright yellow with red tips, and red lines that led to the center of the flower. The fluttering creatures were about the size of a finger joint, striped in yellow and dark red. They hovered around the flowers. The leaves of the bush were broad, heart shaped, and dark green with a yellow green center.


“What’s that flower?” he asked Almë. Might be nice to present some to Ochasa.


Almë looked at it. “It’s called a Tetherbee plant. One of the stamens of the plant’s bloom is actually a long, thin tether that is attached to the fluttering bee-like thing. They are harmless. Sometimes people plant them in their gardens. They are also useful for alchemy.”


Eykit was a bit disappointed. The tetherbees were for alchemy, not for giving to cute Goblins. His greed outweighed his lust.


Almë and Taid went to go harvest the tetherbee plants. They didn’t know how much they would get for the bee blossoms, but they figured that Ekain will give them something for them. Taid stood by, Maggie at the ready, guarding the others. He didn’t trust the jungle to remain peaceful.


They could keep them in the preservation box. They had some room in it now, after using up several kilograms of fresh food the previous night.


Once they got over there, Almë noticed some Healing Grass, an Elven creation they called Asëasalquë. It was a healing herb, and a tea made from fresh Healing Grass could heal as effectively as a healing potion. The fresh grass could also be chewed, although it doesn’t heal as effectively as the tea.


He pulled out his knife, and started harvesting handfuls of the grass. It would go into the preservation box as well as the nine tetherbees, the thirty or so bloodtree leaves, and their remaining fresh food. Enough healing grass for seven doses went into the box.


He had just about gotten all of the grass when he noticed another little treasure. Candaran, another healing herb. It was the same plant that he had blessed at the midwife’s home, the one she used a lot to help mothers with their child birthing. Candaran was a ground cover, with small, dark green leaves in clusters of five. A tea made from the leaves acted as a mild stimulant, helping to stave off tiredness and fatigue. He was able to harvest nine doses of the candaran.


As he stood, holding the Candaran leaves in his hands, he saw a tree with black wood.


“Wow,” he said. “Would you look at that.”


The tree was about eight meters away from where the Candaran and Healing Grass were located. Taid stepped forward. “Wow is right. I just felt the change in mana level.”

Taid stepped forward. “Wow is right. I just felt the change in mana level.”


Almë yelled back towards the camp. “Elitheris! Come here!” He was thinking that the dark wood of the tree might be something she might want to use for her new bow.


She placed her pack on the boat, then grabbed her bow and quiver of arrows. There were a series of rocks in the water, and she leaped from rock to rock along the riverbank. It was quicker than fighting her way through the jungle, or even climbing up into a tree and going from branch to branch. Most of the trees were too small for that anyway. She made good time, and had her bow ready when she got there, even though she knew that Almë’s shout hadn’t been due to any danger.


She saw Taid, laying on the ground, leaves all over his face, and his hands in the air, stiff.


“Taid, how are you feeling?” Elitheris asked.


He moaned, as if in pain.


“Ellë na haran imi intyalëva. Get up.”


He did so. “So, what did that Elvish epithet mean?” Taid asked Elitheris.


Elitheris smiled. “You are king, in your imagination.”


“I am indeed,” the Dwarf agreed.


Coming up to them, Elitheris had noticed the shift in mana level as well. Almë pointed out the tree with the black bark. “It’s sitting in a high mana zone. Might be useful for your bow.”


Elitheris recognized the tree; it was an ebony tree. She hadn’t seen many; but she had stumbled across a few in her travels up and down the Altasirya River valley. Its wood would make a fine ingredient for her bow, whether or not its location made it magical in any way. Even mundane ebony wood was beautiful, and would make a nice counterpoint to the red and white striated bloodtree wood.

Staring at it, she felt that there was something odd about it. It looked normal. It looked just like an ebony tree. But it looked funny, somehow.


Almë and Taid moved closer to it. Elitheris walked around it, looking at it from various angles. It didn’t feel threatening; she wasn’t getting a sense of warning off of it. There was just something about it….


As she walked around it, she felt for the shifts in mana, effectively mapping out the extent of the high mana zone. It wasn’t that big, only about six meters by four, in a rough, oblong shape, with the tree growing off center. It didn’t look like the tree was the cause of the higher mana; it just looked like the tree lucked out by growing in a higher mana zone.


Almë watched Elitheris walk around, gazing at the tree. He did the same, getting a view of it from several directions. Knowing what he knew about trees, their growth patterns, and how each species was different, he tried to see what was so odd about the tree.


And then he knew. It was balanced. Not symmetrical, but balanced. There was something about the weight of each branch, and its position. He could just feel that it was balanced. It was...beautiful. There was no symmetry, because that wasn’t how trees grew, and it wasn’t how the Eternal or nature worked. But he could tell that there was something about it that was inherently balanced. He wasn’t even sure he understood why he knew that, but he did.


“It’s balanced,” he said to himself. Then, louder, he repeated it. “I don’t know what it means.”


Elitheris walked up to it, and placed her hand upon the bark. It didn’t bite her, or drop any leaves on her, or try to kill her in any way. It was, simply, a tree. She looked at the branches. She’d need a hatchet or a saw to get wood off of it.


“I can break some branches off with the spell of Plant Shaping. That would be a more gentle way of getting some wood.”


Elitheris nodded. It would indeed be a shame to do anything that would kill this tree. “Yeah,” she said aloud, “we’re not hurting it.”


Almë cast his spell, then reached up to a decently sized branch and molded the wood away from it, separating the branch from the tree. He handed it to Elitheris.


She hefted it, trying to judge its weight and density, to make sure she would be able to work it, and to see where to use it in her bow. She frowned, confused. It felt odd. It didn’t move like she thought it should. On a whim, she grabbed the smaller of the two ends, and flipped it around like a club.


It wasn’t weightless, by any means, but it moved easily, and changed direction without difficulty. Where it should have been unwieldy, it simply wasn’t. She swung it like a bat, and she was able to make it change direction without any trouble, much more easily than she would have expected.


Almë thought about trying to get some of that inlaid on his wife’s staff, but carving the channels into the staff would destroy the enchantments. But Taid might be able to use it for Maggie….


Taid had been watching Elitheris swing that large piece of wood around. If his halberd shaft was that ebony wood, wouldn’t it make it so that Maggie would always be balanced? Easier to move around?


He talked to Almë about getting a Maggie-sized shaft. Almë used Plant Shaping again, and got a few more branches. One for Elitheris, two for Taid, and two for himself. They should be able to find room on the boat for a couple of branches. The two for Taid were three meters long, while the rest were about two meters long. Almë had taken off the small side branches in order to make them more transportable. The boat was already laden with cargo, plus Wilbur, plus the pony sized Norolind. So there wasn’t a lot of room left over to stash some long sticks.


Fortunately, the crew had a solution, and bundled them up and lashed them to the starboard side of the boat.


Then, finally, it was time to move upstream towards Lytan’s Mill again, continuing their journey.

Rewards Granted

3 CP
Various botanical materials, useful for alchemical materials, healing, and crafting. Specifically, 9 tetherbee blossoms, 30 bloodtree leaves, 7 doses of healing grass, 7 doses of candaran, 5 lbs bloodtree wood, two 3 meter pieces of balanced ebony wood, 3 two meter pieces of balanced ebony wood.

Character(s) interacted with

Captain Poppy Tinyfoot
Ochasa
Rollo
Galnir
The rest of the crew of the Water Lily

Report Date

24 Sep 2023

Primary Location

The City of Port Karn

Secondary Location

The Tondene Empire

Related Characters

• Almë
• Elitheris
• Eykit the Eel
• Mister Wiggles
• Norolind
• Ruby Smallburrow
• Taid Tehoredor Lasu

Again, this is just a first draft. I am planning on rewriting it, or at least doing an editing pass, during the holidays while we are on our road trip. Actually, I will be trying to do editing passes on all of the "first drafts". We'll see how far I get. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯


Almë's adventure with Plant Vision reminded me of this quote from THHGTTG.


“It’s the wild colour scheme that freaks me,” said Zaphod whose love affair with this ship had lasted almost three minutes into the flight, “Every time you try to operate on of these weird black controls that are labelled in black on a black background, a little black light lights up black to let you know you’ve done it. What is this? Some kind of galactic hyperhearse?”