The Summers Clasp

531TuSuCl

The temple’s inner chamber had quieted, its enchantments holding outside sound at bay despite the coffin being up righted and the doors opened again. The party stood in a small alcove flanked by stone reliefs of celestial victories, carved in the days before Carlo had earned his name among them. Three of the coffin bearers remained behind, separated from the crowd. They all wore the signs of recent travel: scraped armour, worn cloaks, and exhaustion that ran less deep than their grief.

The party and the trio were shown to a small room and given some wine to help calm their nerves. After a few moments the warrior spoke first, his voice cracked and low. He was broad-shouldered and thick-necked, but his posture betrayed no pride. ‘I owe him everything,’ he said, eyes fixed on a point beyond the party. ‘Two weeks ago I’d have bled out in the Obsidian Pass if he hadn’t thrown me out of the fire’s path.’ His fingers curled into fists. ‘He was still strong then. Still himself.’ He offered no answers, only admiration, and the kind of quiet that comes from watching a living legend fall.

Beside him, the young dwarf rogue stared down at her boots, her voice no louder than the wind through the stones. ‘He made me see I could be more than a shadow in someone else’s tale. Even when I broke ranks… even when I failed.’ She quickly rubbed her sleeve across her eyes. ‘He pulled me out of that ruin when it collapsed. Didn’t hesitate. Just smiled and said I’d did a good job at finding scouting ahead.’ She couldn’t look at the party.

The older cleric stepped forward, adjusting the mantle over his weathered robes. Unlike the others, his expression held something unreadable; composure honed from years of preaching his doctrine. ‘I saw him fall,’ he said, his voice catching lightly, ‘we were deep in the wizard’s sanctum. The air was thick with enchantment, and the wizards apprentices stepped through the plane like shadows.’ He paused, carefully. ‘One of them, one I believe, cut him across the chest with a dark red dagger. I… I thought nothing of it until now as he was so strong and he stood and he was the twice blessed. Nothing could have killed him. That’s what I thought at least.’

The trio exchanged glances, their thoughts echoed across their faces; splintering under the weight of the clerics words. If Carlo, twice-blessed, had truly been struck down in combat by some form of cursed blade and dying later from wounds that had unimpeded him, not phased him until after they had all returned. Guilt crept in uninvited, winding through the silence as they all felt like they could, no should have saved him from the blade if they were just a bit more. Their shoulders sagged. Their hearts, already shaken, began to fracture visibly in their expressions.

But the cleric; whose god was not Auronel nor Vorthuun, held up a hand. His voice grew gentle, almost rehearsed. ‘There is a plan for all of us. Perhaps not ours to understand, but shaped nonetheless. I just hope that the plan with Carlo finds meaning.’ He stepped back slightly, squeezing the shoulder of the dwarven rogue, allowing his words to settle. ‘The blame doesn’t belong to you. We all stood with him. And we all lost something, we all did something wrong in that quest.’

And yet something lingered. A flicker of restraint in the cleric’s tone. Though the party largely accepted his account, unease remained. His eyes had flinched too briefly when describing the wound. His certainty sounded practiced. Whether it was grief or something else left unsaid, the party could not be sure. But in that moment, they held to his reassurance as a fragile shield against what truly gnawed at them: not just that Carlo was gone, but that they had no idea how, or why.

Scholars of Yole

530TuScYo

The large tent boasted some of the messiest living quarters that has ever been seen. Shelves and bookcases that stretched from ground to canvas roof lined most of the tents and even acted as dividers for bed quarters for the Scholars of Yole. In front of the chaotic walls of shelving, books, scrolls and trinkets was a large wooden desk that had a young man sitting behind it scribbling in a ledger.

As men and women walked up to the front desk the man behind took their name, their occupation and then offered them a sum of money. As the parties approached the desk they could see that the man was in fact a young adult dwarf with a well groomed beard, neat overcoat and glassed. ‘Name and occupation please.’ the man asked as they stood before the desk. Upon hearing that the were adventurers he looked up at the party. ‘All here as one hey? And just in time as we just uncovered the way in.’ he said as he scratched in some notes in his ledger before opening a different book.

‘Ten gold pieces a day, double if you see combat, twenty gold pieces if you are seriously hurt, a further twenty if you are mortally wounded.’ he offered and pushed out the book to see the terms and conditions listed out. It was noted that based on what they had discovered so far that they would expect a few days exploration, at most a week. As they considered the gold they noted a finders clause that gives them the claim to any equipment, artefacts, relics or treasure that is found within the construct that was not deemed to have significant importance.

The next two days went by without massive incident. The party acted as the scouts and vanguards for the scholars as they explored further into the buried passageways, halls and rooms. Each room had some form of trap before the door which was easy to detect and soon the party expected a new trap to be just before every door.

Each room progressively got in a worse state with the first one being rich in items of significant importance to the scholars. However, as they travelled deeper into the structure they found many of the artefacts destroyed and eaten away by time and decay. As they pushed into the third day they came across a room which was spotlessly clean with no evidence of the moulded, decayed wood, fabrics or metals that the previous rooms had.

However, the door to the next room was opened and the trap had been sprung without any sign of what had triggered it. As the scholars looked around the room to take notes the party noticed that the next room and hall was much the same, spotlessly clean with another open door and another set off trap. Something was not adding up.

Sal Wethridge

529TuSaWe

Sal eventually had calmed down after the healers had examined the body of her companion, finding nothing that would have caused their death. The party had revealed the dagger that had half of it stop glimmering with magic which had taken Sal a few minutes to realise it belonged to her friend.

‘Tamiel always bragged about his dagger. Something about being blessed by a nighthag. We were coming to Miran to help the city look for its mage killer. We thought that us two would be able to handle it as Tamiel knew magic and I am rather good with a sword and can handle myself in a fight against foes both magical and mundane. Normally…’ she said as the gloom settled back over the top of her.

‘That’s why he was in that stupid isle looking for a stupid book that he thought may have held the secrets to what was happening. He hated being wrong and got embarrassed by Jake, the man at the reception, was quick to tell Tamiel where to find what he was after. I wasn’t paying attention though as I was distracted…’ she added as the sound of remorse and regret made her voice crackle.

‘As soon as I stopped talking to Jake I tried reaching out to Tamiel via our sending stones and when it didn’t work I rushed to where I thought he would be. Life less in shadow. Those stupid drifting globes of light had shattered on the ground and so it took me a moment to see him lying there.’

The party took a few moments more to talk to the tall woman, her shoulder length blonde hair resting against her armour and while she wasn’t a fine featured woman her proud features and imposing feature didn’t match the look of desperation nor the sullen look in her eyes.

Finding Jake and working back from where Tamiel had been investigating or looking for something seemed like the next best step but for now they waited with Sal and tried to see if she would remember anything else. The only thing coming to her mind was how the shadows had looked upon the body of her friend as she rounded the corner.