Day 2 (continued)
The party, weary from their flight from the hag, arrives at the city of Avalon by the south-west gate. Adrenaline courses through them and they are shaken by the intensity of the encounter. However, upon arrival, they find their way blocked by a pair of halberds. Temerity parlays with the guards in order to gain access to the city. It seems there is an unusual number of guards posted tonight, causing Lavender some concern. The guards, unfortunately, are unimpressed with Temerity’s appeals, so Lavender cuts in, informing them that they were sent by Captain Arran of Durvish City to pursue the culprits who kidnapped the Lady Bromelia from her wedding. The guards remain suspicious and request the names of the party. Temerity and Theren give theirs, but Lavender calls herself Lady Rose. The guards believe her deception and allow the party to enter Avalon.
‘Rose’ takes the group through the city to the elvish quarter, where they find an inconspicuous inn and bed down for the night. ‘Rose’ pays for the rooms and the others are too tired to debate the issue with her.
Day 3
The following morning, ‘Rose’ is up early and breakfasts alone. She can feel something unusual in the air; the city’s usual hustle and bustle is muted. Temerity appears and begins to question the innkeeper regarding the situation in the city. The young innkeeper — actually the innkeeper’s son — is far from impressed with Temerity’s efforts and offers no information. He wears a look of disgust when Temerity mentions invisible griffins, becoming deeply sarcastic and agrees to bring him an ‘invisible griffin steak’. Theren joins and the party discuss the lack of information together when the innkeeper, with a sneer, brings over an elaborate wooden plate containing nothing but an inedible garnish of thistles. His smile fades when Korako promptly eats them happily.
A bell sounds — the Rotunda at the centre of the city is sounding an announcement. ‘Rose’ rises and leads the party out; they loiter at the back of the crowd to hear what the announcement will be. The king’s herald reveals that the intended ball to celebrate the union of Requiem la Rouge and Lady Bromelia Porthwaite will go ahead as planned, despite the terrible events of the previous day. It will now be used to raise funds to finance the search for the missing bride. Temerity is very interested in attending; ‘Rose’ and Theren are not. Temerity is overruled and they agree to move on in pursuit of their quarry. However, before leaving the city, Temerity wishes to purchase a crossbow to supplement his arsenal; ‘Rose’ offers to front him some money to this end. His somewhat irreverent manner, which he has used to good effect in forming something of a love/hate relationship with ‘Rose’ causes tension between him and Theren, whose lack of social experience causes him to misinterpret the banter. Temerity attempts to smooth over the issue by distributing his healing potions between them. While ‘Rose’ and Theren head for the north gate, Temerity heads to the market, with a warning from ‘Rose’ that they will wait no longer than half an hour for him before they leave him behind.
Upon reaching the market, Temerity realises that he never did get the money from ‘Rose’ to purchase the crossbow, so instead uses his thirty minutes to try and obtain some information. He speaks to Guido, who is very grumpy at having been drugged and has had to nurse away a colossal hangover. When Temerity appeals to him for assistance, Guido bites him. Temerity eventually manages to bribe him with beer and cheese, which he quickly obtains from the market, and Guido speaks to the local rats to see what they know. When Guido returns, he is very excited and brings with him a small, wizened little rat who says nothing but “I saw it…” ad infinitum. Frustrated at his lack of success, he nevertheless rewards Guido and the demented newcomer with some cheese. Leaving the tiny rat behind and restoring Guido to his place in the satchel, he heads to the north gate to meet the party.
When he arrives, he informs the others that he couldn’t purchase the crossbow as ‘Rose’ forgot to lend him the gold. She apologises but he dismisses it and suggests that they move on. ‘Rose’ begins to get irritated by Temerity’s attitude and challenges his commitment to their collective cause. Temerity notices someone approaching ‘Rose’ and tries to signal this subtly to her but her aggravation prevents her from noticing. It is not until the stranger speaks that ‘Rose’ recognises her — it is her old handmaiden, Rowan. ‘Rose’ instantly calms and they begin to speak. Rowan tells her that she still works for the locke family and ‘Rose’ asks after her younger sisters. Temerity asks about the invisible griffin and ‘Rose’ breaks his nose. Feeling slightly guilty at her overreaction, she asks Rowan if she would purchase a crossbow for her from the market. Rowan invites ‘Rose’ to join her and she begrudgingly agree. Temerity begins to busk on the outskirts of the city and plays with Korako, while Theren enters the nearby woodland to search for herbs.
Rowan and ‘Rose’ head into the city and the conversation turns to the elder Locke brother. Rowan informs ‘Rose’ that he is off on his adventures but writes to them often. He isn’t married yet but has been training to become a wizard and has travelled far. Her sisters are now of age and will be busy courting and will soon be married. Lavender purchases the light crossbow and is pleased to have seen Rowan.
Upon returning to the north gate, she hands the light crossbow wordlessly to Temerity, who has earned some silver while busking. Together, they walk purposefully northward, towards Frostpeak Pass. Temerity sings as they walk and the atmosphere is calm and relatively pleasant.
An hour along the road, they notice a merchant’s cart that has been ripped to pieces. Temerity continues to sing to maintain the illusion that they haven’t noticed the damaged vehicle. Runcible flies up to look from the air, but sees nothing. Lavender calls for any enemies to show themselves, but none are forthcoming. A pained voice from the wreckage speaks and tells the group that the attackers came out of nowhere and that he is injured. The group are cautious and expect an ambush; Lavender’s sword is drawn. They find a tiefling merchant trapped under a beam. Lavender’s first attempts to free him fail. Her rage builds and she hefts the beam off him. When the merchant stands, he finds himself confronted by Temerity’s new crossbow. He pleads his innocence and explains that he has nothing left. Lavender checks him for injuries but he is not seriously hurt. They question him. He tells them that dark-clothed people took his things and that he saw no signs of a griffin. He begs them to retrieve his goods, pointing east towards the river. They tell him to wait at the north gate of Avalon for them.
Sensing ahead, Korako detects no magic in the forest. Runcible is sent to investigate but ends up flying into a tree and stunning himself temporarily. The party proceeds regardless, headed by Lavender. While walking through the forest, they see strange things in the trunks of the trees and begin to suspect that they are lost. Theren, however, has experience of living in the woods and leads them to a clearing. There are many empty crates here and the ash of a recently extinguished fire.
Suddenly, four bandits fire arrows from the trees, wounding Lavender and Temerity. The bandit captain appears, brandishing her scimitar and demanding to know who the group are. Leaving Lavender to draw the attention of the bandits, Temerity and Theren withdraw from the centre of the clearing. One of the bandits injures Runcible and he de-summons. The bandit captain is ferocious. She lashes out at Lavender with her scimitar whilst using throwing daggers at Theren and Temerity. Theren is trying to attack one bandit and Temerity another. Temerity’s opponent injures him with his sword, but hellish rebuke causes infernal flame to rise up within the bard an incinerate the bandit, leaving nothing but ash. The bandit captain’s throwing daggers find their mark and Temerity is mortally wounded. Leaving his foe, Theren moves to administer a healing potion and the two stand together just behind the tree line in partial cover. Meanwhile, Lavender has kept the bandit captain and the fourth remaining bandit busy in the centre of the clearing; her rage is steadily building as she fends off both enemies. The captain, likewise, is thoroughly disgusted with her bandits, who have so far managed to dispose of a pseudodragon, get one of them disintegrated and completely fail to hit anything else. Temerity uses his charm ability on the two bandits standing off from the centre of the clearing — the ones who had been attacking Theren and Runcible. They switch sides and begin shooting arrows ineffectually at their own captain, failing to hit anything. Lavender’s claymore and Theren’s magic begin to do serious damage to the captain. Finally, Temerity shoots his light crossbow and scores a devastating hit; the captain topples forward from the force of the bolt and is decapitated on Lavender’s sword. Lavender turns and lops off the head of the bandit behind her and then charges, blowing like a bull, at one of the remaining bandits. She mows him down and stabs down into his body so hard that her sword penetrates the earth beneath his corpse. The final bandit, who had previously de-summoned Runcible is now in her sights, but Temerity intervenes, rushing forward into her line of sight. He speaks to her and calms her, persuading her not to kill the last bandit.
While Theren begins the resummoning ritual, Temerity interrogates the final bandit, who reveals his name to be Dave. They learn that the merchant had magical items in his cart, which the bandit group confiscated and which were shipped downriver towards Avalon about an hour ago. Dave tells Temerity that Brian (the decapitated bandit) had seen something strange earlier — something big and flying and squawking that was heading north. Lavender approaches and demands that Dave tell her his worst crime, for Temerity wishes to leave his fate in her hands, hoping that she has calmed and will spare him. Dave replies that he’s hurt people, but never killed, and that he always steals from those who are richer than he, never from the poor.
Temerity removes his charm at Lavender’s request and she presents him with a choice: return to Avalon and live an honest life, or fight her. Dave realises that he cannot win, but he nevertheless refuses to return to Avalon. Lavender draws her sword but Temerity, seeing that this situation is not going as planned and having no wish to cause Lavender further pain, walks up behind Dave, places the crossbow at the base of his skull and executes him.
Theren, meanwhile, has completed his summoning ritual and has looted the bandits’ corpses, retrieving scimitars, daggers, light crossbows and a pouch of 60 gold, which had been the payment for the merchant’s supplies that they had sold to the River Barge Captain. One final item of interest is located on the captain’s person — a letter, with a black wax seal. It has no names but tells of the opportunity for profit as many merchants will be travelling to and from the city at this time because of the celebrations. The letter has clearly been written by someone well-educated but Korako detects no magic scent on it that reminds him of their quarry. Theren likewise detects nothing arcane about it. Runcible is sent on down the river to spot the barge and the party begin to make their way back towards Avalon to uphold their promise to return the merchant’s goods.