Hello, Everyone!
How have you been? This chapter is nearing its finale and I’m excited to go onwards. Currently, our heroes are in the office of Dynatos Perres, the ruler of Pamagos, and are discussing the different dragons threatening the country. In the room, with them, is Tesaya, the Elven Paladin, badly injured after being discovered eavesdropping on Tiriel Elaire’s plans to release another dragon on the world.
“So, let me summarise,” Dynathos Perres said with a deep, tired sigh. “There’s a Green dragon gathering an army in the south. A--possibly--Red dragon in the west. A Black dragon wandering the streets of Pamagos. And the White Queen, who might be prompted to invade us from the North.”
The room fell silent with the direness of this situation.
“Can we drive them to destroy each other?” Agatha said. “Like, what if we get Nurvureem on our side and make her fight Morgax? Two birds with one stone or whatever?”
“Are you serious?!” Mary burst out. “What do you think Nurvureem will ask in return for that favour? The only way we can get her ‘on our side’ would be if we promised a constant supply of fresh victims for her tortures! Would you take the responsibility for that?”
Agatha shook her head.
With her peripheral vision Mary saw movement. Tesaya had propped herself on her only elbow and was trying to rise up.
“There’s no time,” she said with a raspy voice. “We need to head out to the Swamp, I....”
She managed to get up despite her injuries, but only made two steps before teetering. Her legs crumbled beneath her, and Bruno--who had already popped up beside her--managed to catch her before she fell on the floor. They put her back on the carpet and wrapped her in a blanket.
“We should think about going to the Swamp,” Mary said. “I know that the whole area is dangerous, with the constant storm and Terpesh so close by, but we need to try and stop what the Order is going to do.”
“Speaking of Terpesh,” Dynatos Perres said. “I should employ you to be careful. Especially you, Sir Aurum. Word got to me, that a legendary assassin named Styx is looking for the current owner of Maheshvara's bells."
"How would he know that Aurum's got them?" Bruno asked.
"It seems like Miss Windfiddle's book has made its way beyond the Teeth."
That's right, Mary thought, their faces and equipment were plastered on the cover for the whole world to see! She gritted her teeth. That book was more trouble every time it popped out.
"But wait, there's only one bell in the story," she remembered. "By that time we had only found Mosrael. Did you said the assassin is after Maheshvara's bellS?"
Mr. Perres shrugged and continued. "There's something else I thought you should know. Elaria's contact has found out that a bow made out of a living tree has been sold for a large amount of money over there."
"Fen'thras!" Mary gasped.
Balaine Endoras’ weapon was surely yet another thing to worry about, if it had happened into the wrong hands.
“So, what do you want us to do?” Bruno asked. “We’re at your service.”
“The White Queen in the North is not something I want us to disturb right now,” Dynatos Perres said pensively. “As for the the army in the South, I don’t think it’s you four that need to take care of it. We have our own people for that. Same goes for Tiriel and the elves. That leaves the dragon in the Swamp of Agony. Problem is, the elves from the Order are probably already on their way. Considering that they received their orders in Myth Adofhaer, they’d have at least a week ahead of us.”
“Not necessarily,” Mary said, looking at their map. “We can teleport.”
She pointed at the mountains just a little bit south of Kipsos pass where the elves were supposed to cross.
“If we get access to some teleportation magic, we could get to Orswald in mere minutes, and then go from there. That’ll gain us about a week’s time.”
“Orswald?” Mr. Perres said. “What would you do there, the fortress has been empty since the Pamagos Agreement.”
Mary and her friends shared a look.
“Oh, no, it’s operational now,” Bruno said. “And it’s ours.”
“Yes, they gave it to us as part of the Heroes-of-Belfast thing,” Mary said sheepishly.
Dynatos Perres’ eyebrows shot up.
“O-kay,” he said slowly, as if trying to figure something out. “Give me a minute.”
He went out of the room and left the five of them alone. The canaries peeped one more time and then went quiet.
“What are we going to do with Tesaya?” Aurum said, glancing at the woman who looked asleep.
“We can bring her to Orswald with us and leave her to the care of the people there,” Mary suggested.
“She won’t stay there and you know it,” Bruno interrupted. “She was ready to jump up and go to the Swamp a minute ago, missing arm and all.”
“I can hear you, you know?”
They looked down. Tesaya had opened her eyes and was looking at them with a pale but resolute face.
“I’m sorry,” Mary squeaked.
“It’s ok,“ the woman said. “Don’t worry about me. I can rest and recuperate on the road, and be ready to join you in battle in no time. I can fight one-handed.”
“That’s all well and good,” Agatha cut in, “but I can't stop thinking that you're missing something. Can we even trust that ruler of yours? It seems too strange to me that he didn’t know anything about the dragons before we came.”
“He has a lot of other things to think about,” Bruno said. “Things that are here, in his city. He can’t be everywhere.”
“Don’t be too hard on him,” Mary added. “He’s a good person!”
Agatha frowned but didn’t say anything. A moment later, Dynatos Perres came back to the room.
“Here you go,” he said, holding out a magical scroll.
Almost impulsively, Mary started reaching for it. However, she stopped awkwardly when she saw that it wasn’t meant for her. Instead, Mr. Perres handed it to Aurum. She felt embarrassment--and a pinch of jealousy--redden her face.
“It’s a teleportation scroll,” Perres said. “But you need the coordinates of a permanent circle if you want to use it.”
“Don’t worry,” Mary said. “We have that.”
His eyebrows rose up once more. He shook his head and went on to ask them for anything else they had to report or ask of him. When they said they had already told him everything that they knew, he proceeded to give Bruno the message for Lady Kaire he had to Send in the morning.
“Remember, Miss Windfiddle,” he said before letting them go, “if you want my guards to go take care of your family, you should hand me a written message to inform your parents about the situation.”
Mary nodded.
Bruno and Aurum helped Tesaya rise and supported her out. When they exited the residence, they were met by Nymphadora, who looked at Bruno and Aurum with expectation.
Mary stayed back and watched as her friends talked to the girl. She’d hoped to make a friend in Jared’s sister, but felt like Nymphadora was never going to warm up to her. For some reason it made her really sad.
Mary tried to convince herself that she didn’t need recognition or thanks. She’d managed to spare Nymphadora from as much of the anguish as she could, and that had to be enough, right? She just hoped that the girl wouldn’t throw away the second chance she'd received.
That was a long conversation, wasn't it? Well, at least we found out what threats we need to watch out for in the future. See you next time when we'll try to gather a bit more information before the night's out.
Take care and be well!
(Also, here's a link to the Chapter Guide, the Glossary and the Map for the series. You're welcome!)
An important disclaimer: These are my notes from a D&D game turned into a narrative. All the worldbuilding and NPC encounters belong to our DM, and all the actions of the other main characters (Aurum, Bruno and Agatha) belong to my co-players. My contribution to the story is only everything Mary-related (actions, reactions, inner thoughts), as well as the writing itself.