Session 24 | Chapter 3
Mercifully the sight of a small village comes into view a few minutes later–Parnst. It’s small and nondescript. In other words, perfect for a sector of a rogue cult to hide out without bother. There’s a few dozen houses, all built from wood and stone and in various states of disrepair, but I suppose living conditions aren’t a priority when you’re trying to destroy dragonkind. In addition to the houses, there’s a tavern, a few outbuildings, and a shrine that appears to have seen better days.
Most notably though, looming in the fog beyond the village is a giant castle. The thick air hangs low in the valley, twisting itself around the towers piercing through the veil. Something looks different about this castle though, and I tilt my head to the side. The rocking of the carriage along the descending incline of the road causes the light to flicker along the surface of the castle.
But rock isn’t reflective…
Ice…but ice is reflective. This mammoth stone castle is encrusted in a thick layer of ice, so dense and compact it shines blue in the sunlight. The walls surrounding the castle are nearly fifty feet high with towers jutting towards the sky above – all covered in ice.
A chill hangs in the air of the village as we come to stop outside the tavern. Inside, the atmosphere is raucous, vibrant, like this could be a normal village. But outside…there’s a haze that lingers over the buildings, the road, and the shrine. Not a haze from the fog, but a feeling. The skin on the back of my neck pricks and I can’t help but scan my surroundings every few seconds. Every fiber in my body is telling me to run. This place is not safe for us–for Goose and Blue.
Did you think your mission would be luxury? A dip in a hot spring and a stretch in a shaded glen? Get over yourself, huntress. You’re trained for danger. Sense it and press forward. The Priest’s voice is biting, but not mocking, strangely not mocking. I straighten my posture before climbing down from the driver’s platform. My jaw is set and my shoulders square. I need to be sure of myself at this moment. Everything else can be crumbling on the inside, but I can’t let them see weakness–not when I’m here for Bahamut.
My hand instinctually goes to the pendant that’s tucked beneath my duster, the platinum symbol of my temple and devotion to the Platinum Dragon. I wait for a wave of calm to flood my senses, but it never comes. The sensation of someone watching me has lessened, but every hair on my neck and arms still stands on end.
The rest of the party piles out of the carriage and the group spreads out to handle our respective tasks. Alba takes a moment in the cover behind the carriage to place the Hat of Disguise on her head, and when the transformation is complete, Tallis, the no-longer-living owner of the lodge we spent the previous night in, stands before us. Similarly, Layna fiddles with a simple ring and her form shifts–her short cropped indigo hair lengthens and the color drains from it to reveal a long, pale blue ponytail tied tightly at the crown of her head. Her scars are gone and her skin looks icier than normal, but most notably, there is an aura of dignity and grandeur that radiates from her form.
Lastly, Silvyr flicks his fingers and casts Disguise Self to alter his form into that of Willis, the human man that had been accompanying Lady Tallis and held Silvyr hostage not more than 24 hours ago. I can’t help but to laugh at the irony.
After a short exchange, the trio arranges themselves and enters the tavern, which according to a sign hanging overhead is called The Golden Tankard. For a moment, my mind conjures the image of a man, maybe a human, maybe half elven, but simple and hardworking, with a dream of opening a tavern.
Who was this person?
Did he have a family?
People he cared about?
Who cared about him?
Are we standing on the place where he was cut down by the vermin now cheering and singing inside the walls he built?
Were his bones tossed out back in a pile along with those he served alcohol and food?
My breaths are ragged as my anger boils through my veins at this story my mind has created. I know this man, this particular man I have pictured in my mind never lived, never walked these streets, but a man did live here. A family lived in the little cottage down the way. A woman worshiped at the shrine up the path. People lived here. Lives happened here–in this village–and every single one was upended, destroyed, eviscerated by the scum masquerading as a religion, a false god and her vermin.
It isn’t until Goose nudges me with his tail that I am pulled from the nightmare in my mind – the animation of the perversion of the scene before me. I come to stand at his shoulder and methodically check his harness and the leather straps at his sides–anything to keep my hands busy and off the throat of the nearest cultist. A moment later, Perona and Zeref start rummaging through the carriage, digging in the crates for gods knows what. The sound of creaking wood and items being pushed about is enough to send me back into the horror show my brain painted.
What was the condition of these homes before the cultists arrived? Is there a chance they were already abandoned, long left to ruin and be reclaimed by nature? Or was the stoop of each cottage swept by their occupants? Were shingles tended to and leaks fixed before nightfall?
Again, I’m jolted from my hellish reverie by a light tap on my shoulder. Perona is there. I shake my head, stunned that I didn’t notice her approaching–the sound of her boots, the swish of her clothing.
She strokes a hand down Goose’s back and muses absent mindedly, “How did they hold up on the journey?”
Furrowing my brow, I reply slowly, skeptical at her casual nature, “They seemed to fare well…”
She angles her body towards me and slips a small object into my palm. The cold metal feels slick against my skin, and I immediately recognize the form and weight of another pendant. My gaze drifts to the object in my hand. The sight sends my blood boiling even hotter. The circular plate is emblazoned with a five headed figure–the image of Tiamat.
“To blend in,” Perona whispers in my ear before moving back to the carriage.
I don’t want to blend in with them though, not ever, but especially not in a place like this, where their defilement of good, innocent people is so obvious. Goose groans and I release the leather strap around his torso. Unknowingly, I’d tightened it to almost the final hole, surely restricting his breathing and pinching his scales. Bending my head to place my forehead on his, I apologize to the drake.
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After pacing back and forth outside the front of the tavern enough to wear a noticeable path in the dirt road, Silvyr, still wearing Willis’s image, exits through the front doors. He catches sight of the group, an expression in his eyes that I can’t quite discern. Did the show inside not go well? Did he learn information that’s damning to our mission? He comes to stand beside the carriage and directs those of us outside to explore the edges of the village off the road. Raesh, Perona, and Zerif opt for the shrine up the hill while Silvyr, Crimm, Goose, and myself circle around the back of the tavern into a barn yard area.
Behind the tavern is a large barn, likely for stabling horses and oxen of travelers previously moving through this area. There’s a small paddock off the side of that along with a number of small outbuildings for storage and other various necessities for running a hospitality business. Trudging slowly through the muck and wet soil, Silvyr turns to me and comments, “So jerky was really all you could come up with to talk about?”
The din in my head amplifies, taking me back to the moment on the road where I locked eyes with Layna and heard Silvyr’s voice through the crack in the carriage. That damned window! Why do people need to speak to their drivers anyways?
“No, no, no, no! I am not talking to you of all people about this,” I blurt, pressing forward through the mud as fast as I can. Anything to get further away from him. From this conversation.
“I’m just saying a comment about the weather, ask her about her home, her interests. Did none of that cross your mind before the types of jerky this godsforsaken town might have?” He continues.
I tip my head towards the sky and groan, “Gods, Bahamut please just come down and eat him already!”
“It was painful to listen to, Maire!” He calls after me.
I wheel on him, stopping dead in my tracks. “Then maybe you shouldn’t have been listening in the first place! That conversation wasn’t for your ears!” I spin back to the stable and continue the wasted effort of trying to get further away from the elf.
“Maire! Slow–” Silvyr starts, but he’s cut off by the sound of liquid…I turn to see Goose’s leg hiked up and he’s peeing on the leg of Silvyr’s pants. Laughter bubbles up from me and I shake my head at the drake, proud of the way he has my back even outside of our mission.
We reach the exterior wall of the stable and the sound of rustling and flapping makes its way to my ears. “Something’s inside,” I comment, shushing Silvyr’s complaining about the state of his pants. Peering through two cracks in the wood siding, the interior comes into focus, revealing two massive wyverns nestled into a bed of hay and scattered bones. “Wyverns,” the word escapes my lips before I have a second to think. “We have to get inside! We can’t leave them to the cult.”
Silvyr looks to the doors, which are chained shut with a heavy duty lock. He looks from Crimm to the locks and back again before musing, “Think you could crack that lock open?”
“I’m not a very good lock pick,” Crimm replies, a little sheepishly. The enormous, black shrouded aasimar looks at the door before turning back to Silvyr and I with a look of disappointment.
“What about that great axe of yours?” Silvyr retorts, trying to hold his frustration at bay.
At the mention of the great axe strapped to his back, Crimm perks up, a light coming to his dark eyes at the thought. He smiles wickedly, before warning us to stand back. With a single swing, he connects with the lock and chains, cracking them in two and allowing us entry to the stable.
Silvyr pulls the doors open, allowing light to filter deeper into the space, illuminating the two wyverns, one brown and the other a grayish tone, along with the mound of bones littering the stable floor, and finally two sets of harnesses hanging on the opposite wall. Quickly, I scan the creatures before me–they look well cared for, fed and tended to considerably, and the even temperament of the usually volatile species leads me to believe they’ve been well trained. “This should be easy then,” I mumble to myself before moving intently towards the harnesses. “Silvyr, take one of these and get the other wyvern ready to go.”
“Whoa! Whoa! What do you think we’re doing? We’re not just taking these wyvern in broad daylight, Maire!” he exclaims.
I look him square in the eye and declare, “Yes we are. And if you won’t help me, I’ll do it myself.” I hold his gaze and wait for a response, wait for him to retort again about the recklessness of this act. “You can go if you don’t want to help,” I push him, prodding for weak spots in this stance he’s taken.
“Maire, what’s your plan then?” he asks, and I’m satisfied that he’s not going to stop me. So I move to the first wyvern and begin speaking to it softly in draconic, informing it what I’m doing with each movement and keeping my tone even. The wyvern appears indifferent, but they are notoriously unpredictable creatures, so I don’t want to take any chances. Then a heartbreaking thought passes over my mind–seeing the docile nature, the well-mannered temperament of these beasts means they likely were raised from eggs, around people, around these cultists.
I have to get them out of here! The air in the stable feels like it’s been sucked out, taking everything from within my lungs with it. My chest contracts and I gasp, working hard to maintain a semblance of composure so as not to spook the creatures before me. I can’t let them be caged like this–they can’t be slaves to this cult and perverted by Tiamat further. The brown wyvern before me swivels its head around to face me, allowing for me to more easily place the bridle over its head and fasten it into place. The single orange eye visible to me blinks slowly before pivoting its head back to face towards the exit.
“Maire!” Silvyr yells, pulling my focus from the wyvern. He stands beside the gray creature, the harness in place and Crimm mounted on the wyvern’s back. “Now would be a great time to share a plan if you have one!”
“Why is Crimm on the wyvern? We’re not riding them into a fight! We’re freeing them!” I exclaim, mortified at the thought of using these creatures like the cultists have until now.
Silvyr’s eyes go wide and he retorts, “Have you lost your mind? Oh wait from that conversation earlier I shouldn’t have to ask that! Of course you have! We have a flying castle that we have to catch with limited means of flight between the members of our group!” He pauses, holding my gaze and waiting for me to comprehend his point.
I pause too long before replying so he continues, gesturing to the two creatures beside us, “And here we have two wyverns, trained and ready for flight! These could carry at least two of us a piece! And you’re just going to let them go?”
I roll my eyes and give the wyverns another once-over. Their condition looks okay, and it would be better to get them away from the cultists before releasing them. It’s likely if we release them here in town that they might just return to the stable or be shot down by the bastards inhabiting this place. “Fine,” I grumble, “We use them for transportation only and then we get them safely away from the village and release them.”
I can tell Silvyr isn’t satisfied with that statement, but the longer we sit here with the door wide open yelling at each other, the more likely we are to be compromised. Unable to stand here and bicker any longer, I snatch the other set of reins from Silvyr’s grip and begin to lead the two wyverns out of the barn.
What in the hells am I doing? I scream to myself. My hands are shaking as I cling to the leathers giving me an embarrassing impression of control over these huge creatures.
Steady, huntress. You are casting judgement as our Lord instructs. These wyvern are innocent and not to be held captive by these vermin! Free them! Rain fire on this village! The maniacal laughter of the Priest fills my head as I turn onto the main road through the village. The first image my companions at the Shrine receive as they turn back to the small village is me, flanked by two massive wyverns, Crimm mounted on one and Silvyr striding behind us.