As soon as he took a hit it was healed by Aoufie and Anthony tosses a grunt of thanks in the harengon's direction then winces as he see's Kora take a couple of solid hits. It takes him a moment to register the wail and taunts as he's got a face full of zombie, but it eventually clicks that things have calmed down. Still not taking any chances despite the mist witch's seeming departure, he moves his moonbeam back, putting it between him and Kora and the undead to give them a little breathing room. "You want some healing?" His hand glows softly as he asks her as he indicates they should move off the ice before it decides not to be ice any more, a dim, sunset glow.
Then he looks around at everyone. "Anyone else hurt? And who's Strahd?"
Assuming Kora wants to be healed: cure wounds for 10hp
As the skeleton leaks out it's warning while fading away, Kora takes stock of their situation in the deluge of the storm. She sees that the undead are now just standing there, but she is unsure how to deal with them now. She starts backing away to get off the ice when she notices her gauntlets.
Stopping in her tracks, all her thoughts go to what is going on with her bracers. Her moonbeam disappears as she has forgotten all about it. She turns them over and sees the faint gray glow eminating from the claw marks. She looks around and sees Anthony. She didn't even hear him when he asked if she wanted healing. (I'll leave it up to you if you went ahead and healed her or did not since she didn't say anything) She shoves her forearms towards his face, "What could this mean?" his question actually does reach her ears, "Strahd? I have no idea."
She goes back to looking at her bracers, trying to figure it out.
"Uh your arms? Oh, the bracers.. Look, I don't really know much about... anything. Let alone magic. But you took a couple of nasty hits from rotting corpses, yeah?"Anthony scrubbed his sandy brown hair, looking around at the others. They'd all handled themselves pretty well.
"Strahd..?" he mutters. Then responds to Anthony. "I'm fine," he says trying to catch his breath. He stows his weapon and begins retreating back to the cave as he doesnt think this ice is going to remain so for long.
History check for Strahd: 2 (Prob too rattled atm to think about it)
"I am drenched but fine. I agree we can talk in the cave. I don't know who Strahd is, but I am sure whoever they are they will do us no favors." says Aoufie. He checks to see if the waterfall thaws and if it has, he dashes in to get back to the cave. His fur is pasted to his skin and his regal aura vanishes and he looks miserable.
"Wouldn't mind getting out of wet armor and drying. Fire would be nice." hoping one of the wizards would indulge them. He brings up the rear into the cave, keeping his moonbeam up as long as he's able to cover their retreat to a more defensible area. "I think we're going to have to look through her notes just to be thorough. But after that weird message from the grave... I have a feeling she already cleared out anything useful to keep it from others.
Once he's able, Anthony sits heavily, more mentally exhausted than physically. While he rests and replays that message in his head, he takes out he pendant he was given and... well, he doesn't study it exactly, more like stares at it blankly why trying to sort out what Aoelwyn wants them to do and whether he really owes her enough to put himself square into business that wasn't his. 'You must not look awa-' ""Yep, no I remember. Can it, Lucas." The big man mutters to himself with a resigned sigh as he massages his leg.This was so dumb.
(as we're hanging out making plans and trying to camp maybe? if we manage to get a short or long rest here, Anthony will attempt to attune to the pendant.)
Zathon stations himself at the mouth of the cave. He is more or less unharmed. "I can keep an eye out while everyone rests up, if we're staying put that is."
The blades in Akyan's hands evaporate, but the green glint remains in his eyes as he makes his way back to the main group. He's not convinced that the battle is completely over. "I'm fine." He replies to Anthony. He glances back toward the mists. That felt to easy, and he has no doubt that they would indeed meet that foul woman again. As for this Strahd business, he's at a loss. That name means just as little to him as Azalin does.
Still tense, he looks back to the group and follows them to the cave. "You are probably right." He says to Anthony. He narrows his eyes when his friend starts rubbing his leg. "You alright?"He asks.
Anthony gives Akyan a soft smile. "I'm good. Just human and not young anymore." Chuckling a bit. "Gotta have a few souvenirs to remind us where we've been, right?" In the calm, he looks Akyan over, then the others. "Seems like Aoelwyn managed to recruit herself a capable group." Part of him eondered if that had been her intent all along. Build herself a little orphan army, but he shoved the unkind thought away. She was dead. It didn't matter anymore. "So VanRichten. We only have all of Toril and the planes to search. Can't be that hard."
Jared swings his weapons in a small arc a couple of times. "Couldn't hit a thing with these." he mutters to himself. He doesn't pay too much attention to the others but he will find a place near the mouth of the cave to sit and watch.
Zathon chuckles at Anthony's comment."Right, only everywhere, but if what that.. woman said is true I have no doubt we'll get our answers soon enough."He looks down at the new sword, the mist token. We've gotten quite wrapped up in things, havent we A?
Aoufie listens and nods that "We know too little and have no clue where to find Van Richten or who by the gods is Strahd. I am not sure heading into the fog is a good idea, as we already know the fog hides the undead. I'd say we can hunker down in this cave and wait for dawn to come." As he talks he is wringing the water out of his clothes and shivering. "Does anyone have a torch we can light. We can use it for warmth at least."
You spend a minute or two examining the bracers while recalling what Aoelwyn said in her programmed illusion. She had mentioned that these new items would act as guides and keys for various prison dimensions, but she didn't say much more than that about them besides the fact that they were incredibly important and were not supposed to fall into the enemy's hands. Aoelywn was cursedly vague about the whole situation, but you suppose that makes sense if she didn't want to give too much information away just in case someone else besides you and your siblings heard the message instead.
You turn from your musings and focus your attention back to the bracers. Stilling and quieting your thought and emotions, you just focus, your mind perfectly calm. Your breathing slows as your body relaxes. In. Out. In Out. You become aware of the chill mists gently caressing your body as it swirls around you. You can smell rich tones of damp earth, brackish pond water, and the vibrant aromas of the forest around you as you breath in the damp air. The rainfall becomes a gentle backdrop of sounds as you fall deeper into a meditative state. Closing your eyes, you simultaneously become both increasingly more and decreasingly less aware of your surroundings as your focus deepens.
At last, you reach the moment of perfect clarity that you search for. All of your senses snap into place, becoming synchronous, becoming one. This was the transcendent state spoken of reverberantly by the elders and sages of your druidic order. You've reached this state of being only once before when you were initiated into the Circle. This state only happens when all five senses become aligned, freeing your soul to experience all of life and eternity.
You can hear the pulse of the world all around you, suffusing your very being with its unimaginable power and majesty. You feel its quiet, yet unstoppable power pulsing throughout you, a silent, yet earth-shattering symphony of energy, rhythms, and beats. You bask in the song of life itself, feeling your consciousness bleeding into the earth, sky, and forest around you. This is what it meant to be alive: to be connected to everything in the ever-growing majesty that is the Song of Life.
You notice amongst the swelling rhythms and pure tones of the world is a second song. Puzzled, you focus on this song, singling it out of the interconnected melodies. This song was different: it was dark, brooding, mysterious. It was a quiet, haunting song full of suspense. Its slow and dark harmonies are punctuated with occasional tremulant flurries of shrill notes full of terror and anticipation that only lasts for a moment before falling back to the solemn main theme. With some alarm, you notice that this dark melody is slowly expanding, gaining strength and momentum, spreading out and slowly changing the tune of the world's song to match its own.
Sadly, your focus begins to wane, and you are quickly brought out of your reverie and back to the real world. Your senses return to normal. You feel empty and almost lifeless now that you are separate from the world, but you find solace that you still feel your druidic connection to nature. You can still snatch faint echoes of the world's song still reverberating throughout you from your connection.
Looking down at the bracers, you notice that silvery light from the scratches pulse and throb almost imperceptibly in synch with the stark melody you felt just moments ago. Pondering for a moment in the rain, she comes to the conclusion that the new song she heard is the song of a different world converging with yours. The bracers are attuned with that other world, but you're not quite sure how this all works together or what it all means, but you can make assumptions if you'd like. Kazahd-nei's final few words become a little bit more clear as you think about them. She said the Betrayer was drawing you to him. Maybe that's the new song?
You are all able to squeeze into the cave. It's a bit crowded and not very comfortable, but you feel like you could rest here a bit if you'd like. The undead still stand quietly in the mist, almost akin to scarecrows standing as sentinels in fields of corn.
((You each successfully attune to the items if you take a short or long rest))
With a grunt, Anthony unshoulders his pack to fetch his tinder box and a torch, then scrapes together a small pile of debris from past camping trips. He leaves it for one of the others to light as he begins to methodically maneuvers out of his armor. "If we're trying to camp here, I'm getting out of some of this wet gear. So... eyes wherever you want 'em, I guess."
Fair warning given, he sheds the wet shirt and wrist wraps and lays them out so they can dry and does what he can to buff his chainmail before setting it aside in a neat stack. He's not on display and generally makes an effort with his facing and timing to be considerate of those with expectations of modesty different from his own, but he doesn't go so far as to hide. Scars of various sorts and a smooth muscled chest, a little soft in the abdomen, with a typically human amount of body hair in the usual places might be noticed by any looking that way as he settles down to try to rest with some basic level of comfort.
She stands there for quite some time. First staring at her bracers, watching the pulsing, silvery light. She then lifts her head and gazes out at the undead. The ones that are now standing like scarecrows, drenched like her, to the bone. The rain and cold doesn't bother her much, she's been stuck in storms such as this many times.
She lets the final words of Kazahd-nei wash over her. As well as the words from Aeolwyn. What has she gotten us into? This is the start, Kora feels it. And there is no turning back now.
After awhile, she finally turns and heads towards the cave behind the waterfall to join her siblings. As she is finally out of the rain, she shakes herself hard and droplets of water go everywhere. In such a cramped space, everyone gets splattered with the water off of Kora. She then sees the small pile of debris and with a flick of the wrist, fire is sent to the pile and it quickly ignites.
She holds up the bracers for all to see, ignoring the bedraggled look of everyone. "These are talismans, keys, right? Maybe they will guide us to where we must go next? We can't fail her, our mother." she grins then, looking upon her brothers, "I'm impressed, I must say, we have all grown quite a bit in our years apart. But.. we must continue her work. This Betrayer.. do you think my bracers will help to lead us to them? Do any of you notice anything about your gifts?"
She pauses for a moment, waiting for them to answer, "They mean something.. this light.. it is connected to.. shoot, I don't know how to explain it, but something that isn't part of our world. I'm hoping they will lead us somewhere?"
She sits down, hoping someone else will talk maybe help her put some pieces together.
Anthony shields his armor from the spray with a slight frown which deepens as he listens to her. Not frowing at her, but mulling over what she's saying.
Keys often don't tell you what they open. Prison keys. Who was the jailor.... Betrayer, but from who's perspective? This Azalin? Maybe that meant Aoelwyn had been courting...Strahd was it? as an ally. Gave her soul she'd said. What compromises had she been willing to make? Had she traded Grymhearth as well? What had she gotten in exchange besides death? Had she lined them up to give everything up as well? And for what? What was her goal exactly? Stopping Azalin she'd said, but what did that look like?
He thought all of this with his scarred arm across closed eyes, trying to rest and letting the others voice their own thoughts.
"We don't have to finish her work." arm still thrown over his eyes as he spoke suddenly. Not really expecting to steer the group, but feeling like it needed to be said. "Not just because she asked. It got her and looks like others killed. We can do what we came here for. Pay our respects to Aoelwyn and return to our lives."
Akyan nods. He'd be lying if he said he hadn't picked up a few souvenirs of his own, his are just less obvious.
He forces his mind not to dwell on the man's first statement. Knowing that he, as a young elf, will likely outlive most of the people he cares for, is not something he likes to think about. "Well, finding people is something I'm experienced with. Hopefully, my experience will be of use."
Giving one last glance at the rotting bodies standing in the mists, Akyan follows the others into the small, cramped cave. He shakes his head when Anthony asks about a torch. He'd left most of his things back at the house.
He glares at Kora when she splatters him with water, but it quickly fades back to his usual grim expression when she starts talking. He considers her words. He had initially thought that these items were merely for protection, but what his adoptive sister says may be a possibility.
He looks to Anthony, "No. I don't see that as an option anymore. Our fates were sealed as soon as we touched these...talismans." He says bluntly. "These things may be meant to protect from whatever darkness was following Aoelwyn, but even if they were that fiend who we just struck down clearly wanted them. So unless any of you plan on leaving these behind and letting them fall into this Azalin person's hands, we are stuck in this mess."
Jared sits silent for a bit then speaks up. "Stahd is a vampire," he tells the others. "or at least that is what Tom called him. He rules a place called Barovia, where Tom is from. Barovia is in a valley that is surrounded by a mist that keeps it hidden and keeps people inside of the valley. This Strahd preys on people and kills them once he's had his fun. Mum went into Barovia somehow and brought Tom out. That's why he has stayed with her for all those years." Jared goes silent again.
"Do what you think is right, or wrong if you don't care. But don't blame fate. There's always a choice." he muttered sleepily. Sounded like they were going to Barovia. This wasn't going to go well, but he didn't see much point in bringing the others down. "Aoelwyn's friend from Waterdeep might have some leads if we can hold out that long."
Aoufie lifts up his arms to defend himself from the splashes from Kora and he gives her an annoyed glare "Kora I was trying to get dry. Let me see if I can discern anything else about that bracer you are wearing. This will take some time" He sits closer to the fire and strums the cittern a few notes soon cascade into a curious tune, and they transform into magic. He cast detect magic as a ritual. "Revelare Oculus"
As soon as he took a hit it was healed by Aoufie and Anthony tosses a grunt of thanks in the harengon's direction then winces as he see's Kora take a couple of solid hits. It takes him a moment to register the wail and taunts as he's got a face full of zombie, but it eventually clicks that things have calmed down. Still not taking any chances despite the mist witch's seeming departure, he moves his moonbeam back, putting it between him and Kora and the undead to give them a little breathing room. "You want some healing?" His hand glows softly as he asks her as he indicates they should move off the ice before it decides not to be ice any more, a dim, sunset glow.
Then he looks around at everyone. "Anyone else hurt? And who's Strahd?"
Assuming Kora wants to be healed: cure wounds for 10hp
As the skeleton leaks out it's warning while fading away, Kora takes stock of their situation in the deluge of the storm. She sees that the undead are now just standing there, but she is unsure how to deal with them now. She starts backing away to get off the ice when she notices her gauntlets.
Stopping in her tracks, all her thoughts go to what is going on with her bracers. Her moonbeam disappears as she has forgotten all about it. She turns them over and sees the faint gray glow eminating from the claw marks. She looks around and sees Anthony. She didn't even hear him when he asked if she wanted healing. (I'll leave it up to you if you went ahead and healed her or did not since she didn't say anything) She shoves her forearms towards his face, "What could this mean?" his question actually does reach her ears, "Strahd? I have no idea."
She goes back to looking at her bracers, trying to figure it out.
"Uh your arms? Oh, the bracers.. Look, I don't really know much about... anything. Let alone magic. But you took a couple of nasty hits from rotting corpses, yeah?" Anthony scrubbed his sandy brown hair, looking around at the others. They'd all handled themselves pretty well.
"Strahd..?" he mutters. Then responds to Anthony. "I'm fine," he says trying to catch his breath. He stows his weapon and begins retreating back to the cave as he doesnt think this ice is going to remain so for long.
History check for Strahd: 2 (Prob too rattled atm to think about it)
"I am drenched but fine. I agree we can talk in the cave. I don't know who Strahd is, but I am sure whoever they are they will do us no favors." says Aoufie. He checks to see if the waterfall thaws and if it has, he dashes in to get back to the cave. His fur is pasted to his skin and his regal aura vanishes and he looks miserable.
"Wouldn't mind getting out of wet armor and drying. Fire would be nice." hoping one of the wizards would indulge them. He brings up the rear into the cave, keeping his moonbeam up as long as he's able to cover their retreat to a more defensible area. "I think we're going to have to look through her notes just to be thorough. But after that weird message from the grave... I have a feeling she already cleared out anything useful to keep it from others.
Once he's able, Anthony sits heavily, more mentally exhausted than physically. While he rests and replays that message in his head, he takes out he pendant he was given and... well, he doesn't study it exactly, more like stares at it blankly why trying to sort out what Aoelwyn wants them to do and whether he really owes her enough to put himself square into business that wasn't his. 'You must not look awa-' ""Yep, no I remember. Can it, Lucas." The big man mutters to himself with a resigned sigh as he massages his leg. This was so dumb.
(as we're hanging out making plans and trying to camp maybe? if we manage to get a short or long rest here, Anthony will attempt to attune to the pendant.)
Zathon stations himself at the mouth of the cave. He is more or less unharmed. "I can keep an eye out while everyone rests up, if we're staying put that is."
The blades in Akyan's hands evaporate, but the green glint remains in his eyes as he makes his way back to the main group. He's not convinced that the battle is completely over. "I'm fine." He replies to Anthony. He glances back toward the mists. That felt to easy, and he has no doubt that they would indeed meet that foul woman again. As for this Strahd business, he's at a loss. That name means just as little to him as Azalin does.
Still tense, he looks back to the group and follows them to the cave. "You are probably right." He says to Anthony. He narrows his eyes when his friend starts rubbing his leg. "You alright?" He asks.
Anthony gives Akyan a soft smile. "I'm good. Just human and not young anymore." Chuckling a bit. "Gotta have a few souvenirs to remind us where we've been, right?" In the calm, he looks Akyan over, then the others. "Seems like Aoelwyn managed to recruit herself a capable group." Part of him eondered if that had been her intent all along. Build herself a little orphan army, but he shoved the unkind thought away. She was dead. It didn't matter anymore. "So VanRichten. We only have all of Toril and the planes to search. Can't be that hard."
Jared swings his weapons in a small arc a couple of times.
"Couldn't hit a thing with these." he mutters to himself.
He doesn't pay too much attention to the others but he will find a place near the mouth of the cave to sit and watch.
Zathon chuckles at Anthony's comment. "Right, only everywhere, but if what that.. woman said is true I have no doubt we'll get our answers soon enough." He looks down at the new sword, the mist token. We've gotten quite wrapped up in things, havent we A?
Aoufie listens and nods that "We know too little and have no clue where to find Van Richten or who by the gods is Strahd. I am not sure heading into the fog is a good idea, as we already know the fog hides the undead. I'd say we can hunker down in this cave and wait for dawn to come." As he talks he is wringing the water out of his clothes and shivering. "Does anyone have a torch we can light. We can use it for warmth at least."
Kora
You spend a minute or two examining the bracers while recalling what Aoelwyn said in her programmed illusion. She had mentioned that these new items would act as guides and keys for various prison dimensions, but she didn't say much more than that about them besides the fact that they were incredibly important and were not supposed to fall into the enemy's hands. Aoelywn was cursedly vague about the whole situation, but you suppose that makes sense if she didn't want to give too much information away just in case someone else besides you and your siblings heard the message instead.
You turn from your musings and focus your attention back to the bracers. Stilling and quieting your thought and emotions, you just focus, your mind perfectly calm. Your breathing slows as your body relaxes. In. Out. In Out. You become aware of the chill mists gently caressing your body as it swirls around you. You can smell rich tones of damp earth, brackish pond water, and the vibrant aromas of the forest around you as you breath in the damp air. The rainfall becomes a gentle backdrop of sounds as you fall deeper into a meditative state. Closing your eyes, you simultaneously become both increasingly more and decreasingly less aware of your surroundings as your focus deepens.
At last, you reach the moment of perfect clarity that you search for. All of your senses snap into place, becoming synchronous, becoming one. This was the transcendent state spoken of reverberantly by the elders and sages of your druidic order. You've reached this state of being only once before when you were initiated into the Circle. This state only happens when all five senses become aligned, freeing your soul to experience all of life and eternity.
You can hear the pulse of the world all around you, suffusing your very being with its unimaginable power and majesty. You feel its quiet, yet unstoppable power pulsing throughout you, a silent, yet earth-shattering symphony of energy, rhythms, and beats. You bask in the song of life itself, feeling your consciousness bleeding into the earth, sky, and forest around you. This is what it meant to be alive: to be connected to everything in the ever-growing majesty that is the Song of Life.
You notice amongst the swelling rhythms and pure tones of the world is a second song. Puzzled, you focus on this song, singling it out of the interconnected melodies. This song was different: it was dark, brooding, mysterious. It was a quiet, haunting song full of suspense. Its slow and dark harmonies are punctuated with occasional tremulant flurries of shrill notes full of terror and anticipation that only lasts for a moment before falling back to the solemn main theme. With some alarm, you notice that this dark melody is slowly expanding, gaining strength and momentum, spreading out and slowly changing the tune of the world's song to match its own.
Sadly, your focus begins to wane, and you are quickly brought out of your reverie and back to the real world. Your senses return to normal. You feel empty and almost lifeless now that you are separate from the world, but you find solace that you still feel your druidic connection to nature. You can still snatch faint echoes of the world's song still reverberating throughout you from your connection.
Looking down at the bracers, you notice that silvery light from the scratches pulse and throb almost imperceptibly in synch with the stark melody you felt just moments ago. Pondering for a moment in the rain, she comes to the conclusion that the new song she heard is the song of a different world converging with yours. The bracers are attuned with that other world, but you're not quite sure how this all works together or what it all means, but you can make assumptions if you'd like. Kazahd-nei's final few words become a little bit more clear as you think about them. She said the Betrayer was drawing you to him. Maybe that's the new song?
You are all able to squeeze into the cave. It's a bit crowded and not very comfortable, but you feel like you could rest here a bit if you'd like. The undead still stand quietly in the mist, almost akin to scarecrows standing as sentinels in fields of corn.
((You each successfully attune to the items if you take a short or long rest))
DM- Azalin's Doom
DM- Surviving the Unsurvivable
With a grunt, Anthony unshoulders his pack to fetch his tinder box and a torch, then scrapes together a small pile of debris from past camping trips. He leaves it for one of the others to light as he begins to methodically maneuvers out of his armor. "If we're trying to camp here, I'm getting out of some of this wet gear. So... eyes wherever you want 'em, I guess."
Fair warning given, he sheds the wet shirt and wrist wraps and lays them out so they can dry and does what he can to buff his chainmail before setting it aside in a neat stack. He's not on display and generally makes an effort with his facing and timing to be considerate of those with expectations of modesty different from his own, but he doesn't go so far as to hide. Scars of various sorts and a smooth muscled chest, a little soft in the abdomen, with a typically human amount of body hair in the usual places might be noticed by any looking that way as he settles down to try to rest with some basic level of comfort.
Kora stands there in the rain.
She stands there for quite some time. First staring at her bracers, watching the pulsing, silvery light. She then lifts her head and gazes out at the undead. The ones that are now standing like scarecrows, drenched like her, to the bone. The rain and cold doesn't bother her much, she's been stuck in storms such as this many times.
She lets the final words of Kazahd-nei wash over her. As well as the words from Aeolwyn. What has she gotten us into? This is the start, Kora feels it. And there is no turning back now.
After awhile, she finally turns and heads towards the cave behind the waterfall to join her siblings. As she is finally out of the rain, she shakes herself hard and droplets of water go everywhere. In such a cramped space, everyone gets splattered with the water off of Kora. She then sees the small pile of debris and with a flick of the wrist, fire is sent to the pile and it quickly ignites.
She holds up the bracers for all to see, ignoring the bedraggled look of everyone. "These are talismans, keys, right? Maybe they will guide us to where we must go next? We can't fail her, our mother." she grins then, looking upon her brothers, "I'm impressed, I must say, we have all grown quite a bit in our years apart. But.. we must continue her work. This Betrayer.. do you think my bracers will help to lead us to them? Do any of you notice anything about your gifts?"
She pauses for a moment, waiting for them to answer, "They mean something.. this light.. it is connected to.. shoot, I don't know how to explain it, but something that isn't part of our world. I'm hoping they will lead us somewhere?"
She sits down, hoping someone else will talk maybe help her put some pieces together.
Anthony shields his armor from the spray with a slight frown which deepens as he listens to her. Not frowing at her, but mulling over what she's saying.
Keys often don't tell you what they open. Prison keys. Who was the jailor.... Betrayer, but from who's perspective? This Azalin? Maybe that meant Aoelwyn had been courting...Strahd was it? as an ally. Gave her soul she'd said. What compromises had she been willing to make? Had she traded Grymhearth as well? What had she gotten in exchange besides death? Had she lined them up to give everything up as well? And for what? What was her goal exactly? Stopping Azalin she'd said, but what did that look like?
He thought all of this with his scarred arm across closed eyes, trying to rest and letting the others voice their own thoughts.
"We don't have to finish her work." arm still thrown over his eyes as he spoke suddenly. Not really expecting to steer the group, but feeling like it needed to be said. "Not just because she asked. It got her and looks like others killed. We can do what we came here for. Pay our respects to Aoelwyn and return to our lives."
Akyan nods. He'd be lying if he said he hadn't picked up a few souvenirs of his own, his are just less obvious.
He forces his mind not to dwell on the man's first statement. Knowing that he, as a young elf, will likely outlive most of the people he cares for, is not something he likes to think about. "Well, finding people is something I'm experienced with. Hopefully, my experience will be of use."
Giving one last glance at the rotting bodies standing in the mists, Akyan follows the others into the small, cramped cave. He shakes his head when Anthony asks about a torch. He'd left most of his things back at the house.
He glares at Kora when she splatters him with water, but it quickly fades back to his usual grim expression when she starts talking. He considers her words. He had initially thought that these items were merely for protection, but what his adoptive sister says may be a possibility.
He looks to Anthony, "No. I don't see that as an option anymore. Our fates were sealed as soon as we touched these...talismans." He says bluntly. "These things may be meant to protect from whatever darkness was following Aoelwyn, but even if they were that fiend who we just struck down clearly wanted them. So unless any of you plan on leaving these behind and letting them fall into this Azalin person's hands, we are stuck in this mess."
Jared sits silent for a bit then speaks up.
"Stahd is a vampire," he tells the others. "or at least that is what Tom called him. He rules a place called Barovia, where Tom is from. Barovia is in a valley that is surrounded by a mist that keeps it hidden and keeps people inside of the valley. This Strahd preys on people and kills them once he's had his fun. Mum went into Barovia somehow and brought Tom out. That's why he has stayed with her for all those years."
Jared goes silent again.
"Do what you think is right, or wrong if you don't care. But don't blame fate. There's always a choice." he muttered sleepily. Sounded like they were going to Barovia. This wasn't going to go well, but he didn't see much point in bringing the others down. "Aoelwyn's friend from Waterdeep might have some leads if we can hold out that long."
Aoufie lifts up his arms to defend himself from the splashes from Kora and he gives her an annoyed glare "Kora I was trying to get dry. Let me see if I can discern anything else about that bracer you are wearing. This will take some time" He sits closer to the fire and strums the cittern a few notes soon cascade into a curious tune, and they transform into magic. He cast detect magic as a ritual. "Revelare Oculus"