-Hot summer.
-Summer solstice (6th day of
the 6th month (oooooooooooo))...
-Campfire on a hill.
-Sitting in front
of the campfire is Edward Steward (lol), roasting a hare.
-He has
pale white skin, thick black hair, and a black beard, but if you look closely
you can see that much of his skin has terrible burn scars. It's difficult
to tell his age because of the scars and his beard.
-He has
dark scale mail and a shield.
-Wandering up to
the campfire is an exhausted Erasmus Fortuna.
-He's in
his late teens or early 20s; he's somewhat gaunt and has a pageboy haircut.
-He wears
priestly garments under his ringmail. He holds a shield and carries a
quarterstaff on his back.
-He's been
wandering along the Uldoon Trail for days for reasons unknown...
-They meet and
Edward offers him a seat at the campfire and they hang out for a bit and make
awkward conversation for a bit.
-Steben
"Stebe" Stimball then materializes coming down a hill nearby, and
approaches the campfire while playing a tune on his golden (not real gold)
flute.
-He has frilly padding around his shoulders and waist, a sleeveless tunic
that's frilly on the bottom, and white cotton shoes with bells on the toes and
has a red-patterned headband with an abundance of curly golden locks puffing
out the top and tumbling down the sides along with a golden goatee. He
has a fairly large nose and beady black eyes. He has a kind smile and
puffy red cheeks. He's slender, but also fleshy. He's in his
early-mid 20s. He has a fairly large nose and beady black eyes and red
cheeks. He seems very happy.
-He
introduces himself as Stebe Stimball of the North Coast (maybe he meant
North Sword Coast or something maybe?).
-They start chatting around the
fire.
-Erasmus starts to
explain that he's traveling the Uldoon Trail because he's been sent by the
Order of Eldath in Waterdeep on a quest, but is interrupted by Stebe (actually
interrupted by me haha asking metagame questions; we never actually find out
what exactly Erasmus is doing here!).
-Stebe has
heard of the goddess Eldath (NOT male, my mistake). She's a
goddess of nature, tranquility, peace, etc. Stebe explains that when traveling
through the High Moor he believes that Eldath helped him survive.
-Stebe elaborates about how he navigated through the dangers of the High
Moor and how Eldath was possibly helping him do that (haha). The
conversation gets a little awkward.
-In the
light of the campfire Edward and Stebe can see that Erasmus has two visible
scars on his right cheek.
-Edward asks Stebe
what he's doing out here, remarking that it's an unusual place to encounter a
court jester.
-Stebe
explains that he's not a court jester (by trade), but actually a traveling
minstrel. Edward then asks Stebe what his "cycle" is (minstrel/menstrual joke
womp womp but it just went over everyone's heads haha). Stebe then
elaborates by saying he was recently working in the city of Daggerford before
traveling north through the High Moor with a friend before parting ways and
then he traveled south. At some point he'd heard rumors that there was a
great traveling performer who could be found just north of the Wood of Sharp
Teeth (so vague haha and also doesn't really make sense).
-Edward mentions that he doesn't really have anywhere to go (which is
also weird) so he offers to "chaperone" both Erasmus and Stebe on
their way along the trail.
-They continue chatting as the
sun goes down, and soon the moon is high in the sky.
-The moon is
yellow, almost reddish.
-There's finally a lull in
their conversation, but suddenly they hear voices.
-They look down
the hill and they can see five figures approaching.
-They
don't appear to be hostile, as they're talking loudly and laughing and horsing
around. They're all wearing traveler's cloaks with their hoods up.
They don't really seem to be paying the PCs much attention. They appear
drunk or intoxicated in some way, and one of them is carrying a bottle
(presumably of wine or something). When they get close enough, the PCs
can see that the group is composed of three men and two women. They
appear as if they're in their late teens or early 20s, and look pretty rough.
-Braden
(Stebe) asks me (the DM) if the PCs are near a town or anything, it's confirmed
that they're maybe a day or so by foot outside of the town of Greenest (in the
Greenfields, Western Heartlands). So, it doesn't really make much sense
for why these people would be out here.
-Stebe isn't sure what to make of them,
but they remind Edward of street youth from Baldur's Gate or something (as
opposed to farmhands).
-Edward starts a
conversation with this new group.
-One of
the dudes, Fordrick, has long hair and a scraggly beard. He has a scar
across his eye, and his eye is white (like Cable from the X-Men haha),
and his smile reveals that he's missing one of his canine teeth.
-Another
dude, Corbyn, has scraggly long hair, an eyepatch, and some gold teeth.
-(There's
a third guy too but he's not described here).
-One of
the women has darker skin and a stubby nose. She's shorter and a little
chubby with dangly earrings and she has purplish eyes.
-The other
woman, Vela, looks like she's maybe the oldest (maybe mid-20s?).
She's thinner and has darker skin, darker eyes, and long, thin black hair.
-She asks the PCs if they're going to celebrate the summer solstice.
-In response to this, Stebe starts to play his flute and dance a
jig around the fire (as a way to welcome them to celebrate the solstice
together with the PCs). This seems to break the tension and the teens
join the PCs around the campfire.
-Before long, everyone is
passing the bottle (or jug) around.
-Edward takes a
quaff of the bottle. It tastes pretty gross, like grog or something, but
it's definitely high in alcohol content. Edward likes it.
-Erasmus puts the
bottle to his lips but he doesn't drink any.
-The thin woman
tries to pour the booze into Stebe's mouth while he's playing but he dodges out
of the way, so she ends up stumbling and accidentally flinging the bottle
behind her down the hill.
-Stebe
stops playing, baffled about what just happened.
-The mood
quickly changes, as one of the men yells at Vela and kicks the campfire and
then grabs her by her hair while continuing to berate her.
-The other woman tells the PCs not to pay attention to Vela and Fordrick
because they always fight so it's nothing to be alarmed about.
-Erasmus intervenes in the fight between Vela and Fordrick and gets them
to calm down, offering to go fetch the bottle himself. He then shows them
his necklace that he wears around his neck (but under his clothes) which has a
cube pendant hanging from it, and he casts "light" on it (but as
like a kind of party trick). Fordrick doesn't really seem to notice,
but Vela is very impressed.
-Erasmus then explains that he's able to do that kind of thing
through "the light of Eldath".
-Vela asks if Eldath is a dragon before passing out.
-Stebe continues
playing.
-Erasmus goes to
look for the bottle.
-At some point later on, the
strangers start messing around with a deck of cards.
-One of them asks
Edward and Stebe if they've ever heard of "Tarokka".
-They
don't know what it is, although Stebe has seen similar kinds of cards before
but he's just never heard of Tarokka, specifically.
-During this time it's also worth noting that Edward mentions that he's a
follower of Tempus, a war god.
-One of the strangers explains to Edward and Stebe that the Tarokka come
from a group of people known as the Vistani.
-Stebe claims to have met a Vistani man one time who was
transporting some goods to "the east" (or East? Haha it
probably doesn't matter since Stebe seems to be bullshitting here, although
it's difficult to say).
-The strangers don't seem to care about Stebe's
story, but do go on to say that the Vistani are a strange people; they also
explain that one can use Tarokka to "see the future but can also learn
about yourself as well" (i.e. tarot IRL). One of the
strangers who was handling the cards explains that in order to do a reading or
whatever he wants to be alone with the querent, so he goes off to the side with
Corbyn (all of the strangers get their readings done this way over the
course of the evening). He also gets kind of mad and tells Stebe and
Edward that Tarokka "isn't a game" when he finds that they aren't
really taking the situation very seriously.
-Erasmus returns to the
campfire with the jug.
-After the jug is finished, the
strangers bust out more jugs of booze. Clearly, they're planning on
getting really fucked up tonight.
-Edward and Stebe
continue to drink with the strangers, too. Erasmus pretends to drink, but
he doesn't actually imbibe.
-At some point, Vela wakes up
and asks the PCs what they're doing out here (as in, the middle of nowhere).
-Stebe explains
his whole deal, but Edward makes a rude quip about Stebe's playing ability (which
was pretty funny actually).
-Vela asks Stebe
if he "has a lot of sex on the road" (weird question...).
-Stebe
explains that there are "wenches in every city" (haha not sure if
he's lying or not about this...).
-Vela then tells
Erasmus that he's "never had sex or been with a woman", but she can't
even focus on his face.
-(The
situation has gotten a little awkward now with Vela's aggressive questions and
statements)
-Erasmus
explains that devotion to his god is "truer living than any carnal
knowledge".
-She laughs and then mocks his faith. Then she looks at Edward and
says, "What happened to you?"
-Edward replies with, "What hasn't happened to me?" (good
one! haha)
-When Vela finds
out that Edward worships Tempus, she laughs and mocks his faith as well.
She then tells the PCs that their gods and beliefs are nothing, and that the
only power worth following is that of "the Universe" (i.e. the
cosmos, the totality of all existence, etc.), and that by embracing the
power of the universe "you can become gods yourselves". Edward
shoots back with his own barbs, but undeterred Vela warns them that "very
soon" they'll be "bathing in (her) glow, whether it be fire or
lightning or...even a burning acid...and when you're burning, you'll see me in
my new body with my wings and my scales and I'll be laughing at you very high
up in the sky as you burn...and die."
-Edward
really has to go pee, so he leaves the group to go take a leak.
-One of
the strangers (probably Corbyn) slaps Vela in the face and tells her to
shut up. She hits him back and they both start fighting.
-Erasmus tries to change the
subject and asks the group where they're headed to.
-The third
(unnamed) male stranger tells Erasmus that it doesn't really matter where they
were headed to because actually Vela's right and they're destined for
"greater things" and that if the PCs don't go with them they face
imminent death.
-Erasmus
tries to change the subject by saying that he's trying to get to know them and
make small talk and dismisses the concepts of regular people becoming gods as
"buffoonery".
-The unnamed stranger then starts laughing at this and soon he's joined
by the others.
-Erasmus also starts to laugh with them, albeit uncomfortably.
-Soon, everyone begins to fall
asleep. However, the PCs stay up to discuss the situation.
-They decide to
sleep in turns, with Edward assigned first watch.
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