Moonday, Desnus 16 (late afternoon)

We spent the rest of the morning at the Observatory, and I do mean that literally. I slept in almost to noon. You know, like a normal person.

The irony of squatting at the Observatory is not lost on me, but it was too late to hike out to the house and too early to barge in on Allustan, which I guess was the plan for the morning. If you’re going to squat in Diamond Lake you may as well follow tradition.

Why Allustan? Well, aside from being Viktor’s mentor, he’s also willing to do research into pretty much everything we stumble upon, including this business with the worms, and do it all for free. I don’t really understand the “for free” part, but he can charge or not charge as he sees fit, I guess.

Allustan said he had heard from a friend named Marzena who serves as a battle mage at Blackwall Keep, and she, too, has come across or heard rumors of the same worms that we have. Given that her story and our story seem to be overlapping, and that Smenk’s and Dourstone’s organizations might not look too kindly on us as of later today, maybe it would be a good idea to go visit Marzena and compare notes. And maybe, perhaps, we should set out sooner rather than later. Hence we are spending the night at the house and heading out in the morning.

Allustan also requested that we escort her back to Diamond Lake to meet with him in person, and also share notes. Why does a battle made need an escort? I don’t have an answer to that. But we do need to get a message to her regardless, and we need to come back afterward, so maybe it’s just a figure of speech.

Blackwall Keep is a small fortress on the edge of the Mushfens, the largest swamp in Varisia and quite possibly in all of Avistan, sitting at the base of the mountain pass that climbs up to Diamond Lake and eventually across the Fenwall Mountains. It and Marsh Keep (also constructed on the edge of the Mushfens, only farther south) were built to more or less discourage the lizardfolk from expanding to the east because colonialism is only for us.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve heard stories about clashes between the lizardfolk and the holdings of Korvosa. The two sides used to butt heads constantly, with the lizardfolk gradually growing more and more aggressive because who wants to live in a swamp?  Anyway, the stories say that, once the keeps were constructed—and manned with heavily armed soldiers—the lizardfolk raids more or less fizzled out, and there’s been an unspoken truce since. The soldiers at the garrison in Diamond Lake do rotations among the Keeps, since ignoring the corruption and violence in Korvosa’s favorite money-making hellhole doesn’t take a lot of their time.

Are the lizardfolk really violent, aggressive, expansionist savages? I don’t know. I mean, I’d be inclined to say “probably not” but then we found that group in the house, and they were way outside their designated territory (though I am inclined to believe that they were not consulted on that matter) and pretty belligerent about it. So, maybe there’s some truth to all of that. Or, maybe it’s just the winning side writing history. I’ve certainly seen firsthand what happens when a select few who are in power get to write the rules for everyone else.

For references on that, see Balabar Smenk and Ragnolin Dourstone.

(night)

I stopped at mom and dad’s before we headed back to the house for the night, as I wasn’t sure how long I’d be gone, or when I would have a chance to see them next. Also, they were going to find out soon enough that I quit my job today, and maybe it was best to hear that from me, first. And, I had an ulterior motive on top of all that.

After selling much of what we found down in the temples under Dourstone’s mine, I am sitting on a sum of gold that would take me four years to earn working for Osgood. Back when I lived at home, I used my income as a server to supplement my family’s, which was fairly meager. Dad has worked in Gansworth’s mine for as long as I can remember, and though Gansworth is one of the least objectionable mine owners in town, no one is getting rich in his employ. Mom does odd jobs for Tidwoad, but it’s never been what I’d call steady work.

A couple of gold per week waiting tables doesn’t sound like a lot, and it wasn’t, but it always felt like we were living on the financial edge once I was old enough to understand finances, so every coin I brought in helped. My parents stretched to keep us out of the warehouses, which is where most miners and their families live, and how much stretching was required depended a great deal on how much work mom was able to get. Kids are expensive.

Once I moved out, they went to a smaller flat and that made things a bit easier on them. Easier is not the same as easy, though.

I knocked on the door, and braced myself.

“Belessandralena!” mom exclaimed enthusiastically. She turned her head to yell back into the flat. “Henric! Belessandralena is here!”

I cringe inside every time they use my name. Especially at full volume like this.

Mom led me to the kitchen, where they were eating dinner because I have great timing, I guess. I greeted dad (and suffered another “Belessandralena!”) and sat down at the table, dropping a coin purse with 50 gold on top. I’d have given them more, but it turns out this new life I’ve started for myself? It’s expensive if you want to survive it.

“What’s this about?” dad asked.

“I haven’t contributed since I moved out. I still want to contribute.”

He opened it up and his eyes went wide. This was easily two weeks of income for him.

“Where did you get this kind of money?”

So, they know me. They know I won’t do anything illegal or unsavory, but they worry anyway. And I suppose they were right to, even if they didn’t know it, since the circumstances behind this were something of a grey area. (How grey? Think charcoal.) I explained it the best I could. And let me tell you, it was more than a little uncomfortable. I left out a few of the uglier details, too, because I didn’t want to scare them.

To say they weren’t thrilled about me revisiting the cairn would be an understatement; they remember Masildi, too. Dad was pretty excited about Dourstone and Smenk, though. “Serves the bastards right,” he said. “Never did like those two. And I can’t wait for them to get what’s coming to them!”

Mom took a more practical approach.

“Does this put you in danger?” she asked.

“A little. But we’ll be away for the next few days, delivering that message to the Keep. Things should cool down by the time we’re back.”

Mom didn’t seem convinced. And to be honest, I didn’t feel so convincing.

Toilday, Desnus 17, 4722 (evening)

Allustan said there was an abandoned farmhouse about halfway to Blackwall Keep, and we reached it just before nightfall. We’ll spend the night here (that sounds so much better than “squatting”) and head out for the keep in the morning. It seems the house serves as a communal rest stop, and there are signs that people have done some maintenance on it here and there, just enough to keep it from falling into disrepair.

It was not an uneventful journey. About noon we came upon a clearing along the trail that looked like a good spot to have lunch, but I’ve spent a lot of time in the brush (albeit mostly at night) and this one looked an awful lot like someone was trying to hide the fact that they recently camped out. There’s no reason to do that unless you 1) don’t want someone to know you came through here, or 2) you don’t want someone to know you’re still here.

I was more concerned about the second one, so I brought the group to a stop and concentrated, trying to find tainted auras in the tree line.

I don’t do this sort of thing very often because I grew up in Diamond Lake, and the few times I have used this power I’ve found the results to be depressing. Sometimes you are better off just not knowing. But this was the wilderness, and we needed to know if we were walking into an ambush. Not that this was a perfect solution—not everything hostile would have a dark heart—but we could still learn something from it. And in this case, the precautions paid off as I sensed several foul auras, just out of sight.

Sensing that their little setup wasn’t going to improve with time, an orc stepped out of the trees near Zhog.

Zhog stared at him and asked, “Are we talking, or are we fighting?”

The orc advanced on him, answering, “It’s a good day for fighting!”  And then a dozen more stepped into the clearing at various points along its length, We had stopped short of being completely surrounded, but it was still not a great tactical position and since I was in front, I was voted most popular target.

Zhog pounded his dance partner, sending them to the ground, bleeding out, as two more took its place.

For some reason, Viore thought that exploding a ball of fire in the middle of them was a good idea. I mean, this worked as a demonstration of force, but here’s the thing about trees: they’re flammable, especially when the wet season has passed. Fortunately, Snagsby had a spell to create water, which he could repeat over and over, and got to work putting out the flames before we had a firestorm on our hands.

Though I had orcs on all sides, I also had my horsechopper. I used that to pin them down as the others picked them off, one by one. I cut a couple down, myself, then barked at the last one still standing: “Sit!”

He sat. And we had a nice little conversation.

“How many of you are there?” I asked.

“This is all of us.”

“What brings you this far northeast?”

“Nothin’ personal, y’know, just figured there’d be spoils to be taken, y’know, when the war comes.”

“When the war comes.? Tell me about that.”

“Y’know… it’s inev’table. The Twisted Branch have been on the path to war for…well, the past month.’

The Twisted Branch is one of the larger lizardfolk tribes in the Mushfens.

“Why? What’s going on with them?” I asked

“They’re just…I don’t know! But they’re hoppin’ mad, obviously gearing up, soldierin’, marching through the swamps…”

“They’re displacing your people?”

“No, it’s just an opportunity we sees up here. Figure if they take on the soft skins, eh, we’ll get a piece of it, maybe, y’know, it’s just how it is.”

We tied him up along with a couple of the other orcs that were still alive, then ate our lunch. They weren’t tied so tight that they couldn’t eventually work themselves free, but they were tight enough that it wouldn’t happen soon.

When we left, Zhog said, “You are at the mercy of the road. May Desna protect you.”

Wealday, Desnus 18, 4722 (morning)

We woke up to the sound of roosters crowing, only the roosters sounded like they’d been breathing gravel and had woken up from the grave. Then it got louder and louder and we realized they weren’t just screechy roosters. We threw open the windows and saw three large, emaciated birds with bat-like wings converging on the house.

Cockatrices. Just great.

Sera, Viore, Viktor, and Zhog took shots at them from the windows, which was a great plan right until they flew up onto the roof. I took a position in the middle of the house in case one of them made it inside, but what we really needed was to get them onto the ground so my defensive position wouldn’t even be necessary.

Varin used a spell to conjure a wolf as bait, they fell for it, and then they were easy pickings.

Maybe if the inn doesn’t work out we can get a job as monster hunters for hire.