Zorg's Lost Souls III

Rowan tries pointing in different directions to see if that elicits any different responses from the mushroom choir.

"This way?" he sings to them, repeating that question in each of the directions out of the clearing.

Greg starts preparing his ritual spell as Rowan attempts to communicate in a manner the mushrooms will respond to. However, before either of them get very far, there is a sudden change in the mood. The change is immediately preceded by a strange voice... a strained voice, like wood bending under too much weight. It seems to echo through the surrounding grove, in a language Greginald identifies as Sylvan. To Rowan it doesn't sound like a different language at all...

The mushrooms cease their song and begin to move, slowly crowding in around the group. Their song is replaced by a plain chant without melody, echoing a single word in the fairy language, that Rowan and Greg hear as:

The smiles gone from their little faces, the mushrooms draw close enough that they start to butt their caps up against the legs of the group, in a manner that appears to be more comical than threatening.

Greg jumps back a little surprised and listens to the  words in sylvan, "ah balls! Mulligan, you got anything that calms or counters charm? I don't think they're acting on their own happy thoughts."

If nobody else can do anything Greg prepares himself to squish all of the shrooms surrounding him and his travelling acquaintances, with magic of course.

     Me?  I'm good with psychic blades and nicking the odd item on occasion, that's about it.

     Mulligan is as amused at the idea he could counter charms as he is at the little mushrooms trying to kick his boots.  Good thing he hadn't had a chance to put his new ones on yet or they might get scuffed!

     I mean I got my banjo back but...

     But?  He hadn't actually bothered to try to Speak with Plants with them since they were already speaking, after a fashion.  But actually using the magic might allow some proper communication...  If not, there were some other properties that might help.

___

Ok, ok... Mulligan will use the Banjo to Speak with Plants and try to communicate in a more straightforward manner with them.  The spell says you give them the ability to follow you simple commands but I do not think it forces them to follow such commands.  Maybe, MAYBE, makes them friendly towards the commands but I don't think it's overruling any other control or such.

BUT... If Mulligan cannot properly communicate with them and/or get them to stop attacking then he will talk to the other plant life in the area and create difficult terrain around the group.  I am assuming we have a higher move speed than them so we should be able to just step out of harms way?  Harm being a relative term.

And whether he communicates with the mushroom people or the actual plant life around, he will be asking if they know the source of that voice (which Mulligan couldn't understand) and where it is coming from.  Understanding it or not, seems something that should be investigated. 

Rowan looks around to see where the voice came from. Was it the trees themselves?

”We’re not villains. Unless vil-lains means something different. Maybe someone who lays out village streets or something. Though I don’t think anyone here does village planning either. We’re just looking to find this Will to see if he needs help.” 

Mulligan strums the banjo, effortlessly channeling one of its special magical powers, and a gentle vibration of arcane music ripples out from the instrument to the surrounding area. It causes no visible change in the mushrooms or other plants, but as soon as Mulligan begins to send out his telepathic thoughts, all of the surrounding mushrooms begin to respond, not verbally, nor mimicking words this time, but speaking directly into Mulligan's mind as he does to them. The influx of thoughts is almost overwhelming, like two or three dozen children talking at once, and even though the words come in the same monotone that Mulligan is used to, there is still the sense of the high-pitched nasal tone that the mushrooms employ. 

Looking to the trees, Mulligan (and the others) catch a glimpse of a strange feminine figure in the surrounding grove. Her slender form is almost naked, save for a smattering of what appears to be conveniently-placed bunches of leaves, but the adorning leaves, her leaf-like hair, her skin... all are of the same dull yellowish-brown. She glares at the group, one arm outstretched with finger pointing accusingly, and speaks again in the language that only Rowan and Greginald understand:

The figure walks behind a tree... no, not behind... into a tree! ...and appears some distance away, further around the perimeter of the surrounding grove. Still she glares at the group, and still the mushrooms butt their tiny caps against the ankles in a futile effort to drive them away. However, the gentle pushing has another more sinister effect. Soft, golden spores from the underside of each mushroom cap are being released with each head-butt. They cling to the skin, and get up the noses of the interlopers...

Barria first giggles at the sight of the mushrooms butting caps to get closer to them.  She doesn't really notice when one tries to bump her harder than the others as it misses, but notices the change in them when Mulligan starts strumming something new.

She is focused on this and doesn't notice the tree lady until she speaks in that strange language, but she definitely recognizes the glare.  Holding up her hands towards the woman who walks through trees, "Wait, we aren't doing any harm, I don't understand why you look at us like this!  Would you like some food?  I'm not sure what you eat, but I will do my best!"

As the spores reach her nose she sneezes hard, but it doesn't take hold.  Not liking the feeling of that, she starts backing away from the mushrooms.  If she is surrounded, she pushes her way through.

Greg, employing the use of the ring of mister Light responds to the tree walker in the same tongue "you have us mistaken if you think we bow to that hag's wishes. When we are done in this land she will hold no power over you and your people, we have done away with one of her sisters and freed yon from oppression. We wish to make allies of yourself and young William."

Bréaga! comes the voice of the wood-maiden, as she disappears into another tree and appears again from yet another on the opposite side of the clearing. Boladh a deoch luibheanna triomaithe ort. Tá daoine eile tagtha le focail bhinne freisin, ach rópa agus slabhra á n-iompar acu! Fiafraigh díot!

Greg and Rowan understand the words, but they sound as natural to Rowan as Common, and he alone senses an inflection of uncertainty in the voice...

Translation:

Meanwhile, Barria notices that Mulligan appears somewhat overcome... perhaps the mushroom spores have had some effect on him. Meanwhile, the ground around the group starts to rapidly change, growing weeds at an alarming rate... weeds with small thorns and suckers. The weeds wind rapidly around the legs of the group, threatening to entangle and engulf them. And all the while, the mushrooms continue their headbutting...

     Frozen. Incapacitated. Stuck. Mulligan exists, but only barely, like a thought someone started and then forgot to finish. His body is distant, a rumor of limbs and breath, while his mind drips… slow… thick… each idea stretching until it snaps and recoils back into nothing.

     Except below that.

     Deeper. Sideways. Somewhere that isn’t supposed to have a direction.

     In the underdark of his mind, the dark has color now. It doesn’t belong there. It insists. Colors that shouldn’t have names slide over one another—velvet blues that taste like copper, sharp yellows that itch, deep reds that hum like a plucked string. They don’t stay still. They notice him. They fold inward, bloom outward, spiral into impossible shapes that almost make sense if he could just… hold onto one long enough.

     He can’t.

     Because they slip.

     Because he slips.

     And the slipping leaks.

     The others feel it before they can stop it—Mulligan brushing against their thoughts, not as words but as… impressions that don’t ask permission. A sudden saturation of too much. Color floods in, looping, doubling back, eating its own tail. Their faces appear inside it—G’reG, Rowan, Barria—but not quite right. Too many eyes for a moment. Too wide smiles. Then softer. Kinder. Then wrong again. Then right. Then all of it at once, layered like poorly shuffled cards.

     There’s a feeling tangled in it. Urgent. Important. Mulligan trying to point at something that keeps dissolving the moment he gets close. Like remembering a dream while still inside it. Like knowing the answer but the question keeps changing.

     And under everything—

     —not under, through—

     a laughter.

     It doesn’t sound. It echoes without noise. It bends around thought, curls through the color, presses lightly against the edges of awareness. Not mocking. Not friendly. Just aware. As if something has noticed Mulligan noticing it… and finds that endlessly, quietly amusing.

     For G’reG. For Rowan. For Barria—it’s there. Invasive. Intimate in a way that feels mildly impolite. A presence in the room of their mind that wasn’t invited but hasn’t overstayed yet. It can be pushed aside. Dimmed. Ignored like a persistent afterimage.

     But for Mulligan—

     there is no edge to push it past.

     No outside.

     Just color that thinks it’s him.

     And as Mulligan mindlessly stands amongst the Campestri and sways ever so slightly due to the little headbutts against his toes, the growing suspicion that, for a moment, the color may be right...

Rowan wrinkles his nose at the mushroom spores but doesn't notice anything too offensive about it. He does mumble "Umami" a couple of times after smelling it but is otherwise unaffected.

When the tree-woman speaks again he notices her uncertainty and smiles.

"You seem really familiar," Rowan says in Sylvan, still not realizing he's not speaking Common. "I wonder if I've met one of your relatives before. But yeah, we did meet Granny Hag. It was hard to avoid her. We arrived on this cloud-ship and got dropped off right at Granny Hag's house. There was no chance to avoid her. But we needed to talk to her anyway. She and her sister-cousins or whatever stole a bunch of things from my friends and we had to ask her if she'd give whatever she had back. I don't really remember what she said to that but she did offer us some gross tea. Then we found out she wants someone to kill a unicorn and take Will's horn, or maybe it was the other way around. We're not those kind of people. We're good at rescue missions and things like that. We thought maybe Will could use some help. Or he might know about the unicorn and we could help protect it while we look for a missing hoe or a recipe."

Rowan gasps out the last of that, having run out of air. He's about to say more when he spots the growing thorns and weeds. Rowan steps over the weeds and mushrooms to come closer to the tree-woman his hands out to the side in what he hopes is a non threatening gesture. As he does, flower petals open up and bloom all over the weeds.

At that point he senses some odd images and feelings in his head. Is it Mulligan? This doesn't seem like the time to play games. Though he does like games.

The forest-maiden cocks her head like a bird as she listens to Rowan speak, and instead of stepping back inside another tree, she steps into the clearing and walks toward Rowan. Her eyes are like pools of water, and her movements just as fluid... her leaves rustle as she walks, and in fact seem to shift places on her body, still managing to always at least partially cover the most provocative regions. With her eyes still locked on Rowans (and not even a sideways glance at Greginald) she says:

The text is given here, although she still speaks only in Sylvan

Your speech is as a flood after rain... but also like those of the Summer Court. And yet... I see you are a stranger here. 

She regards Rowan wordlessly for a few moments more, before looking down at the flowers blooming by his feet. She then softly speaks a single word: Scith! and the mushroom folk cease their efforts to drive the group away, and withdraw on their tiny pseudopods. They sing no more, but simply bob up and down. The feminine figure then turns and walks to the center of the clearing, and squats down by a slightly thicker patch of grass. There is a low stump there, previously obscured by the grass, and she tenderly caresses the exposed rings like a lover. Her voice now is soft and sad, and she speaks toward the stump, despite addressing Rowan and the others:

You say you are true enemies of Granny Nightshade. It is she that felled me... to make her cursed toys. I wish you could have seen me... I was beautiful, and tall, and mighty. My branches touched the sky, and were home to many creatures...

Then looking up once more she asks:

Tell me... if something beautiful is broken, is it still worth anything?

The weeds and thorns that so suddenly sprung up do not as yet dissipate.

"Kintsugi!" Greg says to the woman, as the shrooms begin to ease their efforts and back off. "The eastern isles have a tradition of mending broken pottery with rare and coveted metals. The broken thing is higher regarded because even though it was broken, it persists. The strain and suffering it has gone through is worn upon it like a badge of honour.

Folk think that they are the things that others value in them, beauty, strength, power... But what you were when you had no problems is not who you are, that is not the measure of your worth. It is what you do now. When the realm is on top of you and you have nothing, that is when you truly show your worth, for what you're willing to do to get it back!

Now we come to you asking for help, but it seems that you need ours too, so help us help you. Persist. Survive. And come out the other side better than you were before you were broken." 

To the others Greg seems to be passionately spouting some nonsense in sylvan.

Barria is confused.  Rowan starts talking the same jibberish that the sprite thingy is talking and now well... she's stuck.  How is it that plants can hold her like this?  It isn't a magic she appreciates in the least.  Looking over at Mulligan, he seems worse off than she is.  G'reg... well, no change there it seems.

She huffs and crosses her arms.  This just will not do.  But then the demeanor of the sprite woman changes and she watches as she caresses the stump.  So very strange.  Barria looks to Rowan to see his response.  Even knowing she won't understand it anyways.  As a matter of fact... "Rowan!  Can you please translate?  I have no idea what is being said!"

((Continues tripping balls, tasting colors and hearing odors... Not entirely minding the experience at all.))

Rowan looks from the tree-woman to Barria with a frown on his face.

"Did you inhale the spores?" Rowan asks Barria speaking Common without missing a beat. "Translate what? What didn't you understand? The hag chopped her tree down."

He turns back to the woman and nods at what Greg has just said.

"I loved the tall trees back home," Rowan says in Sylvan, again not realizing he has shifted languages. "They are one of the few living things in the forest that have seen more than we elves have. But sometimes they got old, died, and would fall in a storm. It was sad, but then you could see so much life again, even in the stump. New seeds would find a home there. Insects would make nests. Mushrooms loved growing on the sides. Soon a new tree, sometimes more than one, started to grow."

He looks back over at Barria to make sure she's following along this time, a little worried that the spores have affected her somehow.

"Can you join with another tree?"

The dryad (for such she must be) listens thoughtfully to Greginald's speech, stroking the top of the stump always. She also turns her attention to Rowan and his words of intended comfort, but they don't seem to have the desired effect... her expression seems sad and she stops stroking the stump. The elf's final suggestion even elicits a mild look of disgust and she looks up at him.

Your words are kind, Elf. But I cannot be a new tree, nor any other. This part of me is dead and gone, and I mourn. Only Queen Zybilna could grant the wish of my heart, and I know not what has become of her.

Then she shifts to face Greginald.

Your speech is strange, earth-child. Unnatural. But your words give me strength....

The dryad stands up straight, and a breeze creates rippling waves through the grass of the clearing.

I cannot be restored. I cannot grow. But my pain can be my power.

Still looking at Greginald, she raises her arms and loose leaves start to whirl around the circle of trees as the wind strengthens.

I will not leave my grove. I will be what she made me. I will become something she fears. All the forest shall hear of the hurt of Meadowleaf. We will hedge up her way, she and her unseelie servants, that they will have no place among us.

By now the wind is roaring through the surrounding grove, but as she finishes speaking, the tempest begins to calm, until the grove returns to its former tranquility. The mushrooms barely register any of this, but just remain as before, smiling and bobbing. 

Finally, the dryad walks right up close to Greginald... too close... she reaches out and her fingers lightly brush his cheek.

Little earth-child, she murmurs. You speak well of the worth of broken things... 

For Greginald, the world shifts sideways as he feels a pull towards this doomed creature... 

Perhaps you should stay and share with me more of your strange words, and the wisdom of eastern lands…

How beautiful her face and features are... how strong yet tender she is... how worthy of his care and protection...

     Mulligan watches slack jawed.  However long and strange a trip it has been it seems to him as if it has changed but continues on and on and on...

Greg feels the pull. His mind goes to a place, imagining himself in the comfort and freedom of the grove, no responsibility, all the time Inn the world to read, to gain knowledge and power, and to care for this dryad. He takes a step forward as he regards her beauty and strength... Wait that's not right. Care for his dryad? That's not his responsibility, nobody is his responsibility other than himself and that's how he likes it, he needs his hoe and to kill this hag and to get out of here and... Well there are bounties and riches of knowledge out there to be had. No library to speak of here.

He bows and steps back again, "your offer is indeed appreciated, but I have my own gripes and business to attend to in regards to the hag Skabatha. Your curiosity in me will have to wait. Until then will you help us find allies against the hag as we have requested?"

Rowan. continually fidgeting and moving about even with the weeds entangled around his legs, listens to Meadowleaf.

"So if we found Queen Zybilna, she could fix this?" Rowan asks. "Sounds like she could fix a lot of what's wrong here. It would make Amidor happy too."

He looks around, nodding as if he has made a decision, which he has.

"We'll just do that then. Well, I'll just do that then. My friends have told me I promise too much. So I won't speak for them. But this place needs to be saved. It feels like it could be somewhere special. More special, maybe. Specialer." Rowan says. He looks more closely at Meadowleaf. "Yes, If helping Will and the unicorn willl make this place better and help us find Queen Z, then that's what we should do."