In Their Majesty's Creepy Castle

A-maze-ing Adventures

We wander eastward, looking for the pooka maze. After about a day, we get to an area that Scout thinks seems friendly. Diomarch thinks the walls are trying to keep him from getting in. Gale and Managaratha think that the trees are moving around.

The tallest pooka Scout has ever seen opens the door.

“What.”

Scout explains his desire to find a more questing version of .

“The problem with trying to find a path is that once you are on it, you must not leave, or else it will be lost.”
“Oh, that could be tricky.”
“And it is often the case that metaphoric targets are difficult to stay on the path to, long enough to get there. And they are often the targets that you least want to lose.”

Managaratha: So it’s good for a sandwich, but not your soul.
“If your soul is lost, you might need to find it.”
“It need not be done in a day, but acquiring a different goal will cause the first goal to be lost.”
“Do you wish to proceed?”
“Yes, I believe so.”

After some discussion, Scout chooses the goal of "find aid for that freshwater lake spirit in the middle of the ocean." 12 DI 13 successes.

The pooka shuts the door, and we start following Scout again. He has the feeling that he needs to find a ring with a blue stone lost moderately nearby.

Grove of animate fruit-throwing trees, probably the result of a Green surge. They’re quarrelsome; some are happy to give Scout permission to enter, others say

One of the Trees wants bees to come because it wants honey; Scout grows some flowers that will attract bees, but that won’t cause the hive to be moved. Nesh finds a hive in a nearby clearing, which we could try to move or persuade to move. The other trees don’t seem excited

Speed Rolls!

Scout hears one of the trees say “Hey, stop that!” and a branch swings at Diomarch.

He takes the hit, which does 48 points of damage. Ouch.

In 5, the trees pelt us with apples.

Diomarch digs, revealing a ring! WIth a root growing through it. Scout tries to get the roots to grow around

+4 Magic dice for inherent Blue schticks. Gale says ooooh.

We look up.

The Lady of Air and Water is the full title of The Lady from the last Comet, but Managaratha is pretty sure that she died. But then the Buccaneer also died, so… huh. Well that could be exciting.

The local birds had suggested "up" - there is no obvious Lady above the orchard. Birds suggest asking the Golden Eagle, at the Gold Mine. More quest!

We head south, towards the Mountains. We’re very clearly not in the Forest any more, we’re in the Mountains. Okay.

The Golden Eagle is flying– its feathers seem to be gold. Scout calls out in Eagle, but then realizes it’s not an Animal, it’s a Spirit. So he calls out in Common, which gets its attention more. He hails the Spirit, and says he is on a quest, seeking information. It asks if he has payment, and he says he would offer power, or they could try for something more specific. It accepts power, and Scout asks how to find the Lady of Air and Water.

“Her abode is on the Western Shore of the Forest, near the border with Purple. It is often difficult to view. If you have something of hers, though it will likely be easier.”

Scout thanks the Eagle for the information, and gives 6 DI. The Eagle flies off, and Scout shouts a warning about the goblins corrupting Spirits. It shrieks.

We head towards the Forest; Managaratha teleports us to nearby. We talk to more birds! It says the castle is a navigation hazard.

Nesh notices a sylph standing over there. He calls out to her– she asks why they’re calling. We have a ring?

“Oh! Lovely. I’ll be right out.” She walks out of the Castle.

She seems to have some shaman DI, although she’s not a big shaman. (The Lord was the Lord of Earth and Fire.)

Managaratha offers that we could call her if we had a name– Phillippa.

(We should set up somewhere in the boat to be good for guest receptions.)

Scout asks her to help out with the Lake Spirit that's near Blue; she's happy to help, but we don't have great directions, so it might take her a while. We thank her for her help, and head towards Their Majesty's realm.

In Their Majesty’s Court

We teleport into a thunder storm. There’s a creepy black castle over there. Scout shudders. We go and knock on the door. It creaks open, and a Raven pooka with slicked back hair opens the door.

“Yes?”

“Middlesea Free Rangers, here to pay our respects to Their Majesty.”

“I suppose you’d better… come inside.”

Once the door opens, the inside seems decked out in candelabra and surprisingly bright.

A sluagh dressed in red and green comes bouncing (?!?) in. “Managaratha! So good to see you! And Scout! The Heroes of the Comet! How wonderful to meet you all! Scout what happened to your eyes?”

“Uh… goblins.”

They got you? Oh, I see. Brother dearest did mention that they were doing this, he gave the report about Silenalania.

Managaratha found a note– “Tell Their Majesty it’s only going to work for a couple of months.” “A couple of months! Better than nothing. Okay.” Twig (raven pooka)

Then you probably want to talk to Petal instead of Leaf. And you said there’s something to read? Okay, you talk to Petal, I’ll see you in the morning.

We get shown to some rooms. Twig gets us set up. Nesh asks how long the castle has been like this? Since shortly after the departure of Silenalania

Is there any part of the Castle we should avoid? It’s all open at present.

We wander through the (alarmingly non-creepy) castle.

Twig is there when we look. We ask if Their Majesty has always been like this? No, this is new. The castle responds to the needs of Their Majesty. Is this was deliberate, can he say why? That would be for Their Majesty to reveal. Okay. Is there anything that needs doing around the castle? There are some repairs that are needed, if Managaratha has Orange.

In the Morning

There’s a Vulture Pooka hanging over Managaratha. (creepy!) “Good morning Petal! Have we met?”

He inquires about the assassins.

They’re largely confined to the Empire; if they’re moving south, they have not established a base here yet. He would not be surprised that half-orcs and goblins speak to each other. Their targets are primarily political; he doesn’t know Empire politics well, but they are targeting politicians rather than merchants or generals. They’re not coordinated with the invading orcish army. A few of them have likely assisted by taking out someone with authority at the right time, but they are not primarily militarily-motivated. They’re not even after Priests.

What are the patterns of assassinations?

The organization is new. It does not have a long history; perhaps a decade. It’s not clear who’s running the organization / who they work for.

Is there a pattern, the type of politician? That would require Petal to understand their politics better than he does. If you truly desire answers to these questions, he could go North to learn more.

You can speak with Their Majesty at breakfast, but they asked me to assist in your endeavor, so I imagine they could spare me for a time.

Thank you very much for your help.

Of course.

At breakfast, Their Majesty is eating a cinnamon bun.

“I have to assume that, if they had a drow in my castle for three centuries, she must have learned a lot about me. So I figured it was time to change it up for a while.”

“Tell me you’re not playing with your song.”

“No, no.”

“The fact that it will work for a few months implies there will be a trap.”

“It seems likely that Futeau had a plan to take out my sister; she doesn’t share details. Likely Brother Dearest was also targeted, but he doesn’t share normally, either. Neither do I, normally. He has a temper, the easiest way to trap him would be to trigger that. My expectation for the setup would be to lure him into getting him angry enough to move at their place and time. He’s quite good at Green, so they’d have to have a way to deal with that. But he’s less well protected against Divine, so a demon targeted on that. They’re probably turning spirits in all three Kingdoms in Green. If you want to come back, it would be great to have Heroes of the Comet cleaning up the demons in the Plains. Maybe you’ll finally come work for me instead of Brother Dearest. [to Scout]

“Scout is a loyal retainer.” – Nesh

Alas.

Having revealed that one is a traitor perhaps did not reduce the efficacy of other traps of that nature.

To the extent that there are pockets of Brokenness, that’s more within my area than defeating Demons. Anything that has actually Broken will try to stay Broken.

Scout describes the mushroom demon’s lair and the snake’s.

Looking for those sorts of hidden broken-lands-ish things is definitely within their purview. Okay, they can do that. (Their Majesty calls Managaratha a Hero of the Comet!)

The queen has things under control?

Well enough.

We could probably find things to help.

Certainly, it’s a Comet.

Loot

+8 EPs +10 SPs