Ereworn Under The Shadow

Ardwynn is deep into discussions with Clotha about wrapping the crystal 'staff' with some cloth and leather. 

"If the moon is a danger, we need to make certain it is fully bundled up before sundown.  I think Barn is carrying spare clothing. ( party inventory )... perhaps we can wrap it up and then pull some rope apart to make twine to wrap the cloth?  What think you Clotha?"

Quote from Kol_Drake >>

Ardwynn is deep into discussions with Clotha about wrapping the crystal 'staff' with some cloth and leather. 

"If the moon is a danger, we need to make certain it is fully bundled up before sundown.  I think Barn is carrying spare clothing. ( party inventory )... perhaps we can wrap it up and then pull some rope apart to make twine to wrap the cloth?  What think you Clotha?"

Clotha looks up a little startled as Ardwynn speaks directly to her, " Oh.....uh....yes? Yes, I think that would work." 

" My fingers are quite nimble.....", she stopped and swallowed hard. " Um.....thats is, I can unbraid the rope while you lot deal with the transport."

She stared at the ground for a full minute before returning to her clothing search.

" If I may, Barn....", she said reaching for his back pack.

Jack nods at the other Jack. Maybe he's on to something, clever guy. 

Jack hands Clotha the rope we used to get into and out of the well.

Then steps back sheepishly.

Barn absently hands over his pack for Clotha when requested.

Smiling Jack blurts outs when they reach the boats, "that poem spells 'sword' when the last sword in the last line is read.  ...swords is s and w is welded and o is over and rd is rising doom.

And the beginning spells 'find'.  That is about as much as I came up with.    The middle was real confusing. Not sure if it means anything?"

"Wait, d-did you hear what I just s-said?"  the big man looks puzzled and crestfallen that no one acknowledged that he had used his friend's great idea to actually figure the rest of it out (for once - not a common occurrence for Barn!).  "It's like you said, Jack, you figured out the trick!  B-but it actually w-works for the whole poem!  Including the m-middle.  Not just 'find' and 'sword', taking the first letter of every w-word..."

Barn focuses very hard on NOT stuttering this time.

"Taking the first letter... of every word in Fabian's poem... you get:  find my tower then the eye mouth hand sword"

Reg had heard S. Jack at the riverbank with his epiphany about Fabian and his tower riddle.  He had been searching through his notes while they waited at the river as Clotha and Ardwynn discussed covering the crystal.  But then Barn from memory deciphered it all.

"Great Scotts Barn, what magnificent discovery...and all thanks to Smiling Jack.  Yes, I do believe you are correct about the interpretation.  And this purple stone the leaper gave us, doesn't it look like an eye? (Post #378/#382)

The Recluse wonders about the remaining items. The Barrows perhaps hold a clue, and wasn't there a hand from the stream (Post #190).  But what about the other items, had they seen them or were they still to be found.  He shook his head, priorities first.  Fabian's tower had been there for years, it would be there longer.  Getting Clotha sorted out was his priority now no matter how great the temptation pulled his curiosity.

Caelan moved to drag the boat into the water with Clothas assistance, " Shall we? Straight across or you want to stop at the island again?"

Smiling Jack looks around wondering who Caelan is talking to?  The group or just Clotha?

Caelan gestures to the group.....

Smiling Jack sees Caelan gestures, and says, "Been there, done that and got the Chalice."

" Straight across it is.  We're going to have to camp again in Gallows Wood tonight.", said Caelan with resignation.

Clotha looked concerned, the many warnings and prohibitions about entering Gallows Wood reverberating in her head.

" I know Ned and I crossed the Kings Road ....there were some gibbets nearby.  Is that the same way you all came?"

She made a point of congratulating Barn and Smiling Jack on solving the puzzle....though she had no real idea what they...or Reg....were talking about.

Smiling Jack sees Caelan gestures, and says, "Been there, done that and got the Chalice."

Barn nods his head vigorously, having no wish to meet the angry monk spirits haunting the island and hoping to go a day without a pitched battle.

[Clotha] " I know Ned and I crossed the Kings Road ....there were some gibbets nearby.  Is that the same way you all came?"

Barn, his head already spinning from Ned's stories and Fabian's riddles, has already forgotten how upset Clotha was at hearing Oengus had died.

"Yes, a b-bunch of smelly, hungry dead things attacked us n-near the gibbets.  They were trying to g-get at this nice, wise w-woman, Elen.  We saved h-her except Oengus went down after healing m-me."  The big man looks crestfallen.  "And in the end, I think Elen w-was going to die too.  She s-said she was too tired to g-go on.  We left the two of th-them together.  It's so h-hard to make things right.  I h-hope we can make things r-right for you, Clotha."

“The isle presents an interesting mystery…but for another time, perhaps. Un-needed risks should not be taken at this time. Straight across and as safely back to the inn as possible I reckon.”

”We stop where it’s safest for the night. Make camp, set watch, fill the chalice with water, and pass the night as we can.”

”Barn, rest easy my stalwart friend. We made hard decisions for difficult choices.”  He makes no mention of his part for Elen’s passing, but only a whispered “Rest well, and watch over us.” At the mention of her name. 

"Aye," Barn grips his halberd, thinking of Elen and Oengus, both dead.  Ned too, maybe, come to think of it.

"I... I w-would not have done anything d-different, Reg.  I don't feel g-guilty or... or anything like that.  Just... I want t-to make a difference.  Do something g-good that lasts and doesn't j-just fall back down into the same death and destruction and d-darkness..."

The big man sighs.  "Maybe Clotha w-will be a start.  And the ch-chalice."

Knowing the currents and eddies from their previous crossing Barn is able to pole the group across, the boat even more perilous with Clotha aboard as well, Caelan and the Jacks keep an eye out for snags and shallows as they cross and after some time they are safe on the northern bank.

Venturing northwards along their previous trail they arrive back in sight of the Kings Road and the gibbets,  on the northern edge of the road across from the gibbets Ardwynn spots a clear trail leading north-west that they must have missed the previous evening.  As always there are animal trails leading in all directions and the companions know that if they follow the Road westerly they will find the place where they emerged onto it the previous day.

Clotha wants to lay some wildflowers on Oengus' grave and the companions are somewhat confused to find no sign of the wise woman's corpse, rather a broad blackthorn shrub heavy with sloes and flowers has grown over his grave apparently overnight.

As Smiling Jack was a big groupie of Oengus, and because Oengus was in this group, that was a big reason Jack joined as well.  Jack joined Clotha to also pick and lay flowers and to pay his respects.

Once that was completed, and Jack saw the bush, he asked Reg and Ardwyn, "could Elen now be the bush?  If so can there be other trees and shubs that can be people as well?

"Just as a precaution, when we set camp and make a fire... only use deadfall.  Just to be on the safe side.."  Ardwynn chipped in.   "Remember that woman and her monster husband.  He messed with a tree that had a witch inside or something.  We do NOT need that on our heads."

Despite having tortuously poled the now overladen raft back over the river, Barn is not quite is tired as he has been, since the return trip has not been as hurried and he has not had to jog for long distances in his chain mail as the party chased after Ned.

He is just about to gather wood for a fire when he notices that bush where Elen's missing body could have been and hears Jack and especially Wynn.

"I w-wasn't even thinking of that!" Barn gulps, "No we d-don't want to end up like that w-woman's husband.  Right.  D-deadfall only."

The big man sets about his work, putting his back into gathering deadfall and helping set up camp.  He reaches out with his senses once more, as he had before in search of undead or fiends, but this time to sense whether this is now hallowed ground thanks to Elen.

Divine Sense:  The presence of strong evil registers on your senses like a noxious odor, and powerful good rings like heavenly music in your ears. As an action, you can open your awareness to detect such forces. Until the end of your next turn, you know the location of any celestial, fiend, or undead within 60 feet of you that is not behind total cover. You know the type (celestial, fiend, undead) of any being whose presence you sense, but not its identity... Within the same radius, you also detect the presence of any place or object that has been consecrated or desecrated, as with the hallow spell.

( Barn senses that it is....at least whilst the blackthorn remains......he also gets a strange feeling from the sloe growing on the blackthorn....his same primal senses that tell him this ground is protected also tell him there is something about the fruit that ' Elen' provides that partakes of the old Cunning Womans power.)