26. March 13, 2016

We explore the passages: 4 go to overlooks, looking down mountain west into the elven lands. 2 (on the ends) are “shipping” areas that have mine carts to take stuff elsewhere; might lead to other dwarven communities. 2 are storage rooms.

We explore the terraced residential area. It appears that maybe the dwarves vacated and abandoned lesser-quality items or that were half-finished when it was time to go. In the dwarven Foreman's office, we discover a secret room under the desk. In it, are stone tablets that when put together like a puzzle form a topographic map (with some insets to show dwarven locations and hubs) of RYYN. Someone had started smashing stone tablets but didn't finish the job; the southern half of the map was destroyed. We send a complete copy of the map to Nemoriana/Aezlienne, one tablet at a time, but do not retain a copy for ourselves. The map content shows all the old dwarven locations, nothing else. We don't feel we need to finish the job smashing the rest of the tablets. Jessa continues exploring while Bel draws the maps for Nemoriana. Jessa finds left-behind crates of weapons, six gems, a pretty wooden chest that looks elven-carved. In the chest is an oak staff (detects as Moderate magic), an hourglass with stone ends encrusted with gems, a tin wind-up toy lizard, a fragile wooden anklet/bracelet, a carved stone dwarven funeral mask, and 8 rune stones. We don't take it—we know we can go back for it.

We cast an augury before exiting the waterfall, and get a “meh” (no weal or woe) result, and so exit. The guy who's been following us has lit our campfire and made stew. We talk...he doesn't give us his name but eventually identifies himself as an agent of the Evangierian duchy. He has the wanted poster for us. Asks if we're the girls on the poster, because Evangier wants inside information and people wanted by the Kirenweldan duke would obviously be welcomed in Evangier as heroes. We stick to our cover story. The traveler, who says his name is Therin, tells us that his simple advice is that we should finish our studies and leave Evangier before the first day of spring. He won't tell us the reason, but suggests we get out of Evangier before then. As friendly advice, from one traveler to another. (We figure first of spring is when it's a good time to march an army. It's also when the Emperor is supposed to start his processional. It's also a date on a calendar that could be meaningful to Evangier, but no one else.) Jessa's read on him is that the guy is a patriot, completely loyal to Evangier and with its best interests in mind. He's likely a classically-trained sword fighter. Therin leaves in the morning.

But he returns around lunch time, when Jessa is inside, fetching the chest. Therin lays out his “need-to-know” information to Bel, asking for help to avoid bloodshed. They say the new duke has men investigating a dwarven facility that can divert the flow of the main river through Evangier, which would dry up Evangier's livelihood. They want to infiltrate the royal family party traveling to a dwarven facility in Kirenweld to inspect the facility they are trying to get running again. Apparently some mechanisms are stuck or something, and Kirenweld won't be able to run it until spring. Therin theorizes that they need the weight of the runoff to run some lesser equipment that would make the bigger wheels run. The dwarves used the equipment in the past to divert some small amount of water to make equipment run, and historically in the past stopped the entire river to divert it to quell a massive gas burnoff in a mine that they'd accidentally set off.

Bel won't say if she's really the girl on the wanted poster, but said that she'd be happy to tell Therin where to find maps of the dwarven facilities, one of which is likely the place in Kirenweld where they're working, and maybe Therin's people could infiltrate the facility from underground instead of trying to infiltrate the ducal relative's party as not-seen-in-years family member who's going on the tour. Therin says he'll be back the next day with a few men to help him look into this and if we're on the side of peace he'd love if we are still here at this campsite by the waterfall to help them.

When Therin goes, Bel writes to Genard in the book and waits for a response: Genard tells us Therin is a member of the Evangier secret police, an agent whose organization reports to the duke. Genard has never heard anything about a dwarven method for diverting an entire river. Genard doesn't know who would have tipped off Kirenweld to the existence of the river-diverting facility. (Because Genard doesn't say “run, run away” we figure we can make our own decision.)

Oh—the oak staff seems to let the bearer pass without trace and wiggle through underbrush without making it rustle. Won't work from horseback, only to the bearer on foot.

What we want from Therin tomorrow:

1. Information on the Evangieran Duke's two daughters.

2. The collars off.

3. Information on the ancient civilizations. We are investigating dwarven ruins in case they came across older ruins.

4. A way out of Evangier before spring, that gets us on a fast boat toward the imperial capital OR the forest east of Evangier into the country Honal.

5. A large supply of beef jerky and dried fruit. Yummm.