47. April 7, 2019

The dwarven spirit talker is unable to help. He cannot find any connection between her soul and body. He can transfer spirits of dwarves to a physical object; he speculates something like that could have happened and trapped her soul unwillingly in an object. He says if we can find the receptacle she's in, and bring it in contact with her body, we could possibly force a transfer. Since there's a connection between sisters, perhaps we will know if we are close enough to locate her. Because there's nothing in the body, and it will start to break down. We need to find a way to preserve the body, while searching for the vessel that holds the soul.

The Ghost in the Machine

The dwarven spirit-talker says the best he can do is ask an altruistic dwarven soul to inhabit Aishling. But the dwarven soul will die (no other home to go to) if/when Aishling re-inhabits her body. Aoife agrees with this. We all feel terrible that we put Aishling in such danger and lost her soul, and that a dwarf will forever die to save her. A dwarf named Horic volunteers to help save her.

Horic was a scout in life. He needs a day to acclimate to the tall, thin body and learn how to walk. Horic requests dwarven handaxes. Horic speaks both dwarven and elven.

Elves are Isolationist and Liars

We ride the rails back to the elven woods border. To the south is a dark, smoky haze. We use smoke signals to summon the border elf guards. Jessa talks to the elven outriders, and realize they are putting us on, they did not bother sending the message to Vethandra. We decide to fly a tapestry Vethandra would recognize at the dwarven outpost, so that if she and Shock decide to travel east, she will go there and get our message from the dwarves.

We engage a barge to go south down the river bordering the eastern elven border.

Seven-Headed Dragon

The barge's crew spots something flying in the distance, further south. The next day, a scout in the crow's nest screams horribly then the sound is sharply cut off, as a gigantic 7-headed dragon snaps up the scout between two of its heads. Then the dragon swings around for a second pass. It flames the deck, doing 56-points of damage to the ship and every person on it!

Jessa leaps onto the dragon's back, and is not hit. Six of the 16 remaining sailors die outright. Aoife is an elementalist; she absorbs and redirects the fire away from her and Aishling/Horic. Ghard yells “I told you we should have gone east!” from the crows nest as his eyebrows are burning off. IcyPop and Illial collapse into unconscious.

Desperate, Jessa takes the Mother's Dagger and plunges it into the dragon's back. The dragon's eyes had been foggy (which we later realize means that the Master was controlling it), and turn clear and are sharp-looking. The next round it disengages and races south. A summoned Giant Eagle gently plucks Jessa from its back. We put out the fires on the deck, and row the barge to the eastern shore. We compensate the surviving sailors with gold, bury the dead, and then set off east, north-east.

A Smudge in the Sky

We travel overland east. We see a smudge in the sky. Not an eye, but a dark smudge. It follows us at a distance, against the wind; when we stop, it stops.

At midday, storm clouds roll in. A little quicker than is normal. Calith says “someone is manipulating the weather.” And we can no longer see the smudge that is following us. Calith says “this will be intense. We're in a mountain pass. We need to shelter.” Horic finds us a 30-foot cave. The storm starts. It is no rain, it is all lightning crawling across the sky and hitting the mountains. Calith says, in case we don't realize it, “This is beyond my ability, it is someone very powerful doing this.” After 30 minutes, there are 10 lightning strikes in the same spot outside the cave. The last strike lasts about a solid second. When it ends, there's a giant lizard with a crocodile's head and horns and 12 legs, and a robed skeleton on its back with lightning crackling in its eye sockets.

Eeek

The skeleton hisses, “Give me the artifact. The Weapon of Nylaathria.” We try to bluff it. It pulls out a ball of energy—to which Aoife exclaims, “that's Aishling's soul!” The skeletal creature hisses that he wants the artifact, and will trade Aishling's soul for it. Jessa tries a second bluff, offers a regular spear as 'the artifact' as a distraction.

Bluffing Works! Skeletor is Dust!

The lizard spits lightning and the spear sizzles. Jessa bluffs again, walks up to it, and attacks it! The lizardy-creature only looks angry. It begins to cough up lightning again. Ghaard pulls out a giant stake of wood and hurls it at the mouth [natural 20]—and embeds it in the back of the lizard's throat, causing it to choke! Illial shoots the lizard, but the arrow bounces off. The skeleton begins to glow and power up. Crying out to Beseth that we need her aid, Bel attempts to Turn [natural 20] the skeletal creature and the Goddess responds, blasting the creature with a gentle draught of warm air that smells like baking bread. The skeletal creature turns to dust!

The Lightning-Lizardy Creature Attacks, but We Defeat It!

With its 12 legs, the lizardy creature starts mauling Jessa and Ghard and Horic/Aishling, who engage it in melee. Illial and Bel cast a variety of spells to help those three survive and hit harder. Calith casts a spell that over time grows from flowers to shrubs to a viney creature and tries to smother the lizardy-creature. Eventually, everyone's combined efforts takes it down and Ghaard makes the killing blow.

The sky turns blue as the storm clouds disperse.