Jared listens but says little, this being a little more than he can fathom. 

"This tarot card reading... it would be for the items in this domain or for the others as well?"  Kora is desperately trying to come up with a plan, already having made up her mind to go through with it.  It is what Aoelwyn wanted and she wouldn't be here if it wasn't for the woman, she owed her this much.

Madame Eva sniffs indignantly at Anthony’s comment. She clearly disagreed him, but she doesn’t say anything as a retort as she turns her attention to Auofie. 

“The only safe place for Tatyana,” she says pointedly, “would be buried in a graveyard somewhere. While she lives, she is the most wanted person in Ravenloft. Anywhere but Barovia would be at least somewhat safer for her.” This elicits a scowl and a glare from Ireena, but she continues her conversation with her brother.

To Kora, she says, “I have a hard time peering into Domains I have not been to before, so I could only try to see the locations of the artifacts here.”

Obviously ready to get moving on the incredible task laid in front of them, Kora looks to her brothers, "Ok, so we find these talismen in this domain while keeping Ireena safe, then we take her with us to another domain to keep her away from Strahd and to continue our search.  You all in?  Cause I'm ready for the tarot card reading."  she rubs her hands together in anticipation.

Anthony scrubbed his hair.  "I'm not going to leave you guys without back up." Not that he had many places to go. Borca if he took off and went solo it sounded like. " Just...get that the only outcome to this is more people dead and more souls sacrificed to these dark powers." If a fraction of what Eva said was true, that's what it looked like to him anyway. "But, if she's willing, getting Ireena out is probably our first priority. Fighting Azalin over artifacts just exposes her longer and is going to put her directly in the path of people trying to control her."

Mucking around with the planes was god level shenanigans. They had no business sticking their noses in. What, seriously, what had Aoelwyn been thinking?

((NOT is an important word))

Akyan gives no visible reaction to Madam Eva's explanation. He absentmindedly rugs the scarab shaped ring with his thumb. He has to agree with Anthony. This does seem like an odd way to run a prison. Why does a darklord need to exist? Why are they being reborn? What if someone took their place? How are they supposed to deal with a threat that can't be eliminated? These questions run through his head, but he doesn't voice them. He's heard plenty from Madam Eva at this point.

He scowls when she continues to insist on calling Ireena, Tatyana. Eva can believe what she believes, but she has no right to force those beliefs on another. He glances at Kora when she asks her question. He agrees with Anthony, no matter what they do in this situation, people will suffer and die. However he does believe that more will suffer if nothing is done. He's not sure what to think about this card reading, but he also doesn't see any harm in it. If anything, it would give them an idea of where to start...even if they prove false. "I'll do the reading, but I agree with Anthony. If Ireena is willing, we should get her out of Barovia. Even just taking her to one of these other realms is probably better than keeping her here. We can deal with the artifacts later."

Multiple lives and reincarnations is nothing new to Zathon. He's lived numerous lives before this one, and will have more after it. The boon he has over others is being able to recall those lives, to draw from them. He believes the seer's words, about Tatyana being Ireena. 

"I agree that we should take Ireena out of this domain. The question is what would be the safest of them.. Let's have the reading, then figure all this out."

Aoufie nods in agreement "Lets decide what to do after this reading. I am curious what she will reveal to us next." 

Anthony looked apologetically at Ireena and Ismark. “Sorry you guys bit off more than you planned linking up with us.”  If he could trade places with Ireena, he would, but something told him he wasn’t Strahd’s type. He did give Ismark an appraising look, wondering if there was enough of a family resemblance if they needed a decoy. Been in this place all of about 24 hours and you’re already that ruthless? Anthony shook his head and dropped the thought.

Heading to follow the others to head what personalized nonsense she was going to try to tell him,” Sometimes the lies people tell you give you more information than the truth, Brother Anthony.” he muttered to himself, hearing the words in Brother Lucas’ voice.

After the group makes it known that they wish to proceed card reading, Madame Eva smiles in her knowing way. "If it is your desire for me to consult the cards, I'll need about half an hour to myself to get into the right frame of mind. You may wait out in the other room as I prepare if you wish."  

Sensing the dismissal in her voice, you make your way back into the waiting room with the small table and cushions. There was a lot to process after the meeting with the enigmatic seer. Darklords on the prowl? A near deific lich plotting to overthrow the multiverse? How on earth did Aoelwyn wind up getting involved with all of this?

As you ponder and perhaps discuss with your siblings the situation you now find yourselves in, you hear the distant sound of thunder rumbling overhead, and a few raindrops tentatively plop onto the canvas roof stretching overheard. Barovia certainly did like raining it seemed. 

"So, " Jared says as he takes a seat. "What do you guys think?" he asks. 

"Well... how in the world did Aoelwyn get involved with all of this?"  Kora ponders

Anthony tried to keep his mounting anger in check. Pride is what got her involved, thinking she had the right to muck around with other people's lives because she had good iintentions. She'd doomed herself and was dragging everyone who'd cared about her down with her. But he shoved that to the side for now. It didn't matter why. They needed to focus on what they could do.

He gave Ireena and Ismark a sad look. “Sorry you guys bit off more than you planned linking up with us.”  If he could trade places with Ireena, he would, but something told him he wasn’t Strahd’s type. He did give Ismark an appraising look, wondering if there was enough of a family resemblance if they needed a decoy. Been in this place all of about 24 hours and you’re already that ruthless? Anthony shook his head and dropped that thought as well.

I feel for Ireena's situation if I am to believe what Madam Eva said. Though I do wonder if bringing along Ireena has put a target on our backs. "Just thinking about what we may be involved in makes my head ache. On one hand I feel like curling up in some hole and hoping all of this would go away and on the other I know if Aunty Gryn were here she would have helped Ireena and the people stuck in these dark realms." says Aoufie. 

Akyan has conflicted feelings towards Aoelwyn. Mostly because she barely gave them any choice in whether or not to get involved. Sure they could just do nothing, but they are apparently stuck in Barovia now. Plus how could anyone live with themselves if they chose not to help when it's been made fairly obvious that they are the only ones who can do so? He didn't need some psychic reading to have that point made blatantly obvious.

Sighing he glances at Jared, "I think, our first priority is helping Ireena. We already said we'd help her before learning all this anyways." He scowls and holds up his ring, "I suppose we should have asked how these things to guide us to the other realms."

"Getting Ireena to safety is a priority, for numerous reasons now..I would like to know how to activate the talismans, the one that brought us here just.. did?"

They are already too deep in this to do nothing. They have to press forward. 

Anthony didn't know about the others, but he needed to talk things out to make sense of them. "Ok.. so here’s my take on all of this: we’ve got a dead wizard who broke himself to pieces to try to become boss of the whole prison. We’ve got a bunch of prisoners who want out. We’ve got “Dark Powers”, whatever the ef those are, who’ve been working hard to collect all of this evil in one place and want to keep it here.” He’s ticking things off on his fingers, and looked around at his siblings on that last one. They should be asking themselves why that was. “We have some big bads who already busted out and a group of wannabe heroes who claim/think they can put them back them by recreating some evil artifact and harnessing its power for their agenda.” His look said it all. Really? “A couple of frenemies who both have reasons to want that artifact put back together. And a woman at least two people want to see end up in Strahd’s arms. I’m sure there are more willing to turn her over for favor.”

He pauses waiting for the others to take it all in and maybe come to some conclusions. “Let’s assume that Madam Eva and Aoelwyn and her gang are on the same side and they have good intentions.” Not a given. Hadn’t Aeolwyn said she’d sold her soul? And he felt pretty sure the only thing they could rely on with Madam Eva, was that she’d do what was in the best interest of her people… Which might be business as usual. Same as the dark powers. They seemed to have a pretty sweet deal going far as Anthony could tell. "Whatever.” 

“Questions we might want to ask ourselves, why would these dark lords getting what they want set them free? If it's that simple, then why wouldn’t Azalin and Strahd team up to help each other achieve their goals instead of going to the all of the trouble of making an artifact together? Why is all of this evil being gathered here in the first place?” There had to be something a little more going on with all of this.. 

“Not gonna lie. I think trying to recapture those that already got out is a lost cause. They were out in the world before, right? Up to no good when they were brought here? In a lot of ways, They’re probably easier to fight and kill out in the world than here in a prison dimension that keeps them alive for …what exactly? Torturing them? Feeding them? Feeding off of them?” 

“Breaking the pieces of this deathstar or whatever as we find them is probably better than putting it back together.” He shrugged. He also thought if Azalin destroyed these realms of dread as he tried to consume them, that was probably better for everyone in the long run.  It sounded like this was a corruption of the shadowfell as it was. “As much as I don’t love the idea of trying to fight any of these darklords, it’s worth considering that it could buy us some time maybe?” Anthony frowned in thought. “I mean, hear me out. If we kill one, they don’t really die right? It sounds kind of like the realm … resets. Maybe that makes it harder for Azalin to mess with it, yeah? He’s gotta wait for the darklord to … respawn or figure out who the new one is before he can help them find their ‘heart’s desire’?” Maybe he was completely out of line with that thinking.

Realizing he'd been rambling. "Sorry. I know we don't have to sort all of this out right this second. I just. Yeah. This is such a mess."

Kora tries to follow Anthony's ramblings and finds it difficult.  "You want to try and fight these darklords?  I don't know... they sound pretty terrible and way beyond our abilities if you ask me.  Though I could be wrong."

"As for the pieces?  I don't know... I can see it both ways and I wonder how many pieces there are?  This whole thing is just... man, I can feel the weight."  Kora sinks further in her seat as she tries to unweave the tangled web.

Jared listens to his siblings in silence. After they speak out, he sighs and speaks up.
"Ya know." he starts. "Mum was pretty smart. She had her quarks like everyone else but she had a knack for knowing things about people and what was going on. But she never did not see the big picture. She knew that what she was up against might have been the end of her so she raised a backup plan, US. She took the time to raise us in a way that we were drawn to and in a way we could succeed, and I am starting to think, in a way that this thing that is bigger than all of us would fail if we took the path she's offering us. Now I'm not saying things won't get bad or will be tougher than we can imagine but she had faith in us. That faith is so strong she is asking us to do one last thing for her. Now life is hard and Mum knew that but she also taught us that the best part of life is making the toughest choices. I for one feel I can do what she's asking me to do because she raised me."
Jared pauses before he goes on.
"I plan to tell her when I see her in the next world that I did or tried to do what she asked me to and I didn't do it stupidly. I think that would tick her off more than anything. So going up against 1 Lord of some Dark realm let alone a bunch of them ain't gonna happen. I think she would want us to get at least 1 of those pieces and get it as far away as possible or destroy it if it can be destroyed. If Mum thinks it can be done then I have faith in her faith in us." 

"You're a lot smarter than you pretend to be." grinning at Jared. To Kora," I'm really not saying what we should do." Scrubbing his hair in frustration "Just trying to lay it all out to make sure we're not missing an angle. Nothing about this place is natural or straightforward. I'm sure you, of any of us, has felt that. Something here is very, very broken and I honestly think we can make things worse more easily than we can help if we start chasing the wrong things." Not that he had any ideas what the right things were.