On the road
21–25 Gingemes, 333
Fate
The next three days are long and dirty and muddy, with little to do except sleep, play games, eat, and drink and smoke heavily. Thus, when the carts get moving again on the fourth morning, it seems everyone is at once sluggish and ready to move on. Sure enough, Fatina's ankle holds strong as if it'd never been injured. It takes a couple days for the routine to start feeling natural again, but eventually the caravaners and tag-alongs alike are back into the swing of things.
21-25 Gingemes
As the journey begins anew, so begins Mischief Week.
In the early afternoon Frankie spits out a letter which turns out to be filled with a fine pepper powder which will cloud upon being opened, evoking sneezes from sensitive noses and a bit of a burn from sensitive eyes and throats. Upon the paper itself a smiling skull face has been drawn. The image is unsigned, the artist unknown.
What are y'all up to on this week of journeying?
Aaren
Do the caravaners celebrate micheif week?
Fate
Nope!
Aaren
Poot.
Aaren
This week, Aaren is focusing on being less busy. She spends time with her family and their new friends, keeping an ear on Aurika, Kelly, Ivers, and of course Janin's (now florishing) new song.
Daina
Daina copies the design of the letter and after growing some sort of itchy inducing plant and powdering it. Asks Frankie to deliver this back to the sender.
Aaren
("Wow, Daina," Aaren sings, "You're a skull person??")
Slavina
Overall Slavina is doing a little better, but she's kinda plateued at mostly-okay with occasionally breaking out in tears or having a really bad day.
She has started venturing out to the main caravan campfire each evening to provide an hour or two's entertainment and conversation for the caravan workers, and occasionally to have long relatively-private conversations with one or two of them. Depending on the day this is either somewhat nice for her or (more often than not) incredibly draining. She's also discussed some of this with Janin on account of it's preist stuff.
She also sends one letter each to Borya, Krissy, and Brian.
Fate
Kelly spends a lot of time with Aurika, who's still working on getting a handle on her life in addition to trying to acclimate to life on the road. He also makes an effort to invite her to things involving groups (such as games or music-making), and has attempted to make a group out of him, Ilvers, and Aurika. (It's not going terribly well so far, given how Kelly's Kalba isn't great and how Ilvers is reluctant to have anything to do at all with Aurika.)
Janin manages to send a letter off to his parents. It doesn't talk about his transition, though. The rest of the time, he does odd jobs here and there, trying to be helpful, to the caravan workers and our heroes alike. This tends to look like helping Slavina take care of herself (or, failing that, momming her in faithful Janin-Mom fashion).
Esta, finding herself mostly without her usual buddy or with him and a stranger who doesn't speak either her language or the language she's actually making an effort to learn, ends up spending most of her time alone, either sitting in the cart or walking alongside it by herself. Come nightfall she finds herself not playing games with the caravan workers three days out of five, too tired to interact or preferring to listen quietly to Aaren's songs.
Aaren
Aaren will work to incorporate Esta into her Aaren bubble! Teaching her songs, working with her on whatever languages they share (Aaren's Esta-ese is pretty horrible), and even consenting to learn card games if Esta wants.
Slavina
If she's sitting in the cart most of the day, Slavina's there too. So on at least 3 of those days Slavina would be energetic enough to engage with her on various low-key conversations or activities or whatever.
Fate
Well then! Esta will learn songs and teach card games and her language and chat with Slavina!
Daina
Daina is available to help with languages as well.
Fate
What else is Daina doing throughout the week?
Daina
I think she still has more work to do to get the Yurt plant working quite right?
Oh and she's going to be part of the dance time Slavina does
Fate
That won't take the whole week.
Daina
Maybe some of her warmth studies and check out colors for different warmth ... just work on that kinda thing, unless she notices a need of her somewhere
Fate
Okay!
Fate
"Check out colors for different warmth"?
Daina
like if certain colors have different warmth than other colors and trying to learn the difference between them
Fate
I see!
Uh... well... I'd say that depends. On, say, clothing or skin, no. But in a fire, yes!
Anything else?
Daina
Oh is Frankie cool with Warmth Experiments on him, if it won't harm him.
Fate
Frankie will let Daina do as she pleases on him. What kinds of experiments?
Daina
Just at first does he have warmth of his own, learn about it's properties. Try adding some etc
Fate
He does not. When Daina attempts to add warmth to him, it disappears.
Daina
innteresting does he know where it goes?
Fate
To the Twisted Aspen.
Daina
Ooooh that's interesting, she'd probably share that with the team just because it was quite a surprise
Slavina
Do we all know what the twisted aspen is?
Fate
The progenitor of the Guest, Ulfynja, Sasha!, and Kria.
In some circles, anyway. In others, they are all aspects of the Twisted Aspen, or a singular figure.
Slavina
Does the twisted aspen (or a twisted aspen) also appear in Chlovak myths?
Fate
Well, the World Tree is an Aspen. And Bakersfieldian scholars have drawn parallels between the Twisted Aspen and the Chlovak Aspen.
If not conflated them entirely.
Slavina
Cool, thanks!
Fate
Okay! Moving on then...
It takes a mere three more days to finally escape the vast, muddy crater in the forest—two days and a dusting of sawdust over each of the travelers before crossing beneath an archway made of a standing tree and a fallen tree. (Apparently the sawdust being sodden doesn't matter to the travel.)
When they emerge once more into thicker parts of the forest with much older growth, the driving rain has suddenly let up to a mild mist, and the mud has been exchanged for soft mulch. Beside them trickles a creek, and all around are large, vining bushes with ripe dewberries. There is no sign of the persistent but distant thunderstorm that characterized the last three days, although Saulė's light still proves elusive.
24 Gingemes
The night deepens, clear if still a little damp, the night sky painted in great patchy swatches between the foliage and Mėnulis's fair and handsome face shining over his dear world. After the night's usual festivities, after everyone retires to bed, a serene quiet falls, punctuated only by the usual distant night noises.
Okay! Luck rolls, y'all!
Aaren
Can I roll awesomeness instead? I have 6 in it.
Fate
:P
Aaren
3
Slavina
(I botched)
Fate
LOL
The dice do not like the PCs today.
Fate
(To Aaren)
A sharp whistle.
A cacophony of songs. New songs, with new, driving melodies.
Others, more familiar, still asleep.
The caravan master, very much awake, very much afraid, very much in pain. Adrenaline has flooded him. He's not the only one: Kelly is there, his song powerful, mingling in a familiar fashion with the song of his spear.
Their songs are moving away—the caravan master being dragged off by one of the new songs, Kelly running after him.
And then there's Seedless, now awake and active.
Esta, on the other hand, is starting to scramble from beneath the cart to its entrance.
Aaren
(To Fate)
Does this caravan have guards and are they awake?
How big are the new songs?
Can I tell what shape they are?
Fate
(To Aaren)
It does, and one of them is. He's only just noticed what's going on.
Their songs are not particularly big.
You can tell that whatever they are, they're physically big, and on all fours. And carnivorous.
Aaren
Aaren is singing at full volume before she leaps to her feet. She sing Slavina and Daina's 'Awake!' song.
She's already moving out of the caravan and toward the woods. "Big carnavores!" She calls, to the tune of the awake song of the various guards.
Fate
Okay! Roll Initiative [just straight Wits]! Since Slavina botched, she's gonna be at the bottom of the stack.
Slavina
Okie doke!
Daina
[so I'm sleep? or out doing wolf things away from people maybe?
Aaren
4 on Wits for Aaren.
Fate
You're asleep, Mel. You may roll [Wits] but you'll spend a turn waking up.
Okay! I have a turn order!
Fate
Just as Aaren opens the door she finds Esta there, fist poised for knocking. Luckily Esta manages to pull her fist back just in time to keep from beating on Aaren's hip.
'Big feckin' badgers!' she spits, then flings a finger in a direction which appears to lead beyond the circle of the caravan. Kelly's form can just be seen disappearing into the darkness.
Kelly's [Dex + Ath] nets a 5!
Kelly, pressing himself into his sprint, manages to pull apace with the badger who bears the struggling, shouting caravan master in its maw. He shifts his grip on his spear (to choke up towards the head) and banks towards his quarry, ready to strike.
Aaren's turn!
Aaren
Aaren sings Kelly's song—Kelly strong and smart and feirce, catching every detail. And she sings the song of the caravan master, just to keep him. And she listens to the songs of the badgers, and the whisper of the trees.
I would like to use singing singing to buff help Kelly!
Fate
Okay! Let's say every 2 successes will net Kelly +1 dice on his next roll!
Aaren
Aaren got a 10, so +5 dice for Kelly.
Fate
Nice!
Phew boy. Guards 1 and 2 now. Also Badger and Badger...
Fate
The guard who had been sleeping stumbles, fully, almost painfully awake but disoriented, towards the opening in his tent and flops clumsily onto the ground as if disgorged, sending fallen leaves flying as he scrambles from a four-limbed lope to a standing run.
The lone guard who was awake runs towards the fumbles at her belt, cracks open something that looks like a stick, about as big around as a coin. „Light!" she cries. It flashes briefly, dims, and then begins to build in brightness as she sprints towards where Kelly disappeared and throws the object into the forest.
And then, like that, light begins to bloom, as bright as a lantern and growing brighter, illuminating the two fleeing badgers, the writhing caravan master, and Kelly.
Badgers' [Wits + Endure], botch and 6 respectively...
The light suddenly filling the first badger's eyes sends it writhing back, stumbling and listing straight into Kelly and smashing against the other badger. Luckily it moves away in time.
Giving Kelly a [Wits + Ath] opportunity to grab onto the badger. He gets +5 dice thanks to Aaren.
He needs a 4 to succeed
And it's a 6!
Kelly leans into the weight of the badger and grabs a large handful of its fur, flinging himself over so that he ends up hugging its neck with his whole body. Facing the correct direction will be another matter, however.
Okay! Seedless!
Seedless blooms to life and leaps down from its place atop the cart, already mid-gallop after the badgers.
Aaand he rolled a 1 for Dex + Ath...
It takes a moment for its legs to form and lengthen properly, slowing its gait.
Daina! On deck is Janin. Then after that Slavina. All actions are the "waking up and getting ready" actions, so unfortunately no rolls. If you'd rather pass on posing stumbling to preparedness then you can say so.
Daina
Daina rolls out of sleep and to her feet, the words shared giving her a good idea and she takes off, using her nose to direct her more precisely.
Fate
Wakefulness comes less readily to Janin, as it's not his song being sung presently. He casts about in an uncertain, half-awake haste, flinging off his blanket and moving out of the cart, looking around blearily but quickly for... whatever it is he's supposed to be looking for.
Slavina
The "being awake" part is no problem for Slavina—the "figure out where you are and what's going on" takes quite a bit longer. She thrashes a bit and gets hopelessly tangled in the covers, causing further panic and more thrashing until she eventually breaks free and stumbles out of the cart.
Fate
H'okay! Kelly's and Esta's turn!
Half-formed plan abandoned, Kelly instead brings his spear to bear and jabs it into the badger's neck.
Rolling [Str + Combat: Brawl]... He needs a 4 to beat the badger's hide...
Aaren
He' still gets his buff, right?
Fate
Hmm. Yes.
If he gets an 8 or higher he'll kill the badger.
Aaand that's a 10. On 11 dice.
Oh, right. I added Legend. Earth to GM!
Song pumping through his veins, his muscle fibers, his very marrow, he drives his spear deep into the badger's neck. Its jaw goes nerveless and the caravan master falls out with a thud and a yelp, quickly overcome by running badger feet. The caravan master rolls underneath, emitting a sickening crack! and a stifled cry of agony as the badger stumbles over him, eventually listing to the side and slamming to the ground.
Esta, meanwhile, simply runs to the edge of the clearing, eyes flicking over the lit tableau before her, her knuckles whitening over her whalebone knife and her whole body tight.
Aaren!
Aaren
Aaren runs until she reaches the caravan master, already begining stabalizing and healing.
She reserves five voices, to continue her Kelly song.
Singing singing to diagnose and stabalize Vytenis?
Fate
Go for it! It'll take a 2 to diagnose, 4 to stabilize.
You only need one roll
Aaren
What's the thing for when you are doing two things at once? Like, 5 voices are doing Kelly, which I am assuming I don't roll because it just keeps going, and 2 are doing Vytenis. Do I half my pool, or -2 or?
Fate
-1 success for each action, applied to all rolls involved. So it's 2 actions, therefore -2 successes.
Aaren
Cool, thanks. Aaren got an 8.
Wait, 6, I subtracted 2 dice not 2 successes. Sorry.
Fate
Okay!
(To Aaren) Diagnosis: Four broken ribs, a punctured thigh with arterial bleeding, nicks and abrasions and small punctures where his back and head were dragged on the ground, plenty of nasty bruises forming all over.
Guards and remaining Badger!
The guard at the edge of the clearing cranks her arbalest with practiced haste and lifts it, aiming towards the remaining predator.
Dex + Combat: Marksmanship... needs a 3 to hit
Again, an 8 will kill it, but that ain't happening
Aaaand that's a 1.
The missile flies wide of the mark.
The fellow scrambling to alertness manages to grab the second arbalest and a quiver of bolts, loading it and then loping his way towards the lit clearing.
Despite the miss, the sudden, violent shifting of leaves and thud following so shortly on the heels of death sends the remaining badger starting in fear and bolting off into the forest as fast as it can go.
It rolled a [Dex + Ath] of 3. Gotta match or beat that to pursue effectively.
Seedless!
Seedless bounds off towards the fleeing quarry, leaves whispering against each other with each movement.
Aaaand it got a 2.
Daina!
Daina
can I roll something with survival like animal? t find out if we should follow? and then follow or do I gotta pic one or the other?
Fate
I'm leaning more towards [Wits + Survival] or [Int + Survival] although if you tell me the idea behind [Animal + Survival] I might be convinced.
And you can do both actions.
Daina
mostly because animal instinct to figure out if we need to chase the badger, is it still a threat seemed like an animal thing
Fate
Okay, sure!
It'll take a 2.
Daina
six, spent two legend for nothing XD
Fate
If you were it, you wouldn't come back unless you were feeling particularly bold or desperate. Even so, it'd be when everyone was asleep again. But this badger looks like neither—relatively unmarred by scars and unbitten by hunger as it is.
Daina
Daina blows a puff of air from her nose as she slows to a jog and moves towards Kelly to make sure he's ok after that. "We should get everyone stable and head back to the wagons ... " she let's out a shrill whistle that she trained the stretcher to respond to and waits for it to slither to them
Fate
Okay. I'm gonna say turn order is over, in that case. Y'all may act freely now.
Slavina
Can I get an empathy ping on Janin?
Fate
(To Slavina) He's ready to do something, anything. He doesn't know what. He's still processing what he saw go down in the stick-light in the forest.
Aaren
Aaren kneels next to the caravan master and turns her attention fully to him. She's already stopped the bleeding and tightened the muscles around the ribs, so she starts fixing the brusing while she waits for the streacher.
With the voice that's helping Vytenis stay calm and still, she sings to Kelly, "All okay with you?"
Fate
He tugs his leg free from underneath the badger corpse, tests it carefully, slowly stands, tests it again, and then sings a tentative yes as he reaches for the shaft of his spear to yank it free from flesh.
Slavina
Slavina looks around blearily, eyes wide, catching her breath. She surveys the caravan area, taking stock of any damaged wagons or supplies, upset fires, or people who might need assistance.
Daina
based on my survival roll would i know if we should move the corpse away from us at all?
Fate
The camp has begun the process of waking, as the commotion has roused a fair number of folks, and those folks have roused some others.
Not particularly. Although you may want its meat, bones, teeth, or hide.
Slavina
Slavina heads straight for Ilvers and gives a loud, low whistle to get everyone's attention. From there she gives a brief explaination of what happened, hitting the major points quickly: danger is over, no one is dead, Vytenis is incapacited currently, we have a dead badger to process.
Daina
Daina smiles and offers Kelly a shoulder to lean on if his leg is a bit iffy.
Fate
Esta makes her way over to Aaren to assist with getting the caravan master onto the stretcher; Janin, meanwhile, gravitates towards Slavina, quiet and drawn as the events play out over and over again in his mind's eye. Seeing that Aaren's got a helper and unsure if his leg will give out once the adrenaline fades, Kelly nods to Daina, humming a 'stand by' refrain to her, and heads back to the camp, using his spear as a walking stick.
A murmur goes through the gathered folks at Slavina's announcement, and a hush as Kelly returns to the circle of caravans, the blood shining dark on the metal tip of his spear and collecting and gunking in the multicolored, bristly hairs that surround the base of the spearhead.
Aaren
Aaren informs Kelly about the status of his leg has he passes, but she'll wait until she's back to start working on it. At the moment, she focuses on teaching Esta whatever she thinks Esta needs to learn about first aid in this situation.
Daina
Do the seedless pee? and like does it scare off animals from marked places?
Fate
Uh... Well. I'm highly dubious, but if you think Daina would've thought of that when making the blackberry wolves... I will strictly limit retroactive decisions of this nature, though.
Daina
hmm probably not... engineering something like that in her first creation of this sort doesn't make much sense...
Daina assists with getting the caravan master settled before looking around them and frowning. She questions Frankie "See anything else around that's planning to make a move?"
Slavina
Slavina turns her attention to Ilvers and Dange. "Dange, could you get a group to handle the badger corpse? Ilvers, Aaren will need some broth and warm blankets for the caravan master."
Fate
Perhaps, Frankie replies.
The guard snaps to look over her shoulder at Slavina, then lowers her arbalest and motions to the younger guard to get ready to cover them. Then with some curt words she picks out a few folks, shoulders her weapon, and begins rifling about the cart with their tools in it.
Meanwhile, Ilvers nods and starts off to go find exactly that.
Daina
Daina nods a little "go keep a watch ok... we don't need another scare like this tonight... or for a few days at least" she huffs softly and heads back towards the cart to start planting yurts for the other caravan members. "We're probably staying put a while" she reasons aloud kinda to herself.
Slavina
Now that things are pretty well handled, Slavina goes and sits down on the edge of the hometown cart with her bare dusty feet dangling off the side. She keeps her composure rigidly in place as she watches the action, absentmindedly fiddling with a bit of amber on her necklace.
Aaren
Aaren sweeps into camp with Esta and the stretcher at her side, and settles down near the fire to get to work. After a few moment, caravan master stabalized and healing, she extends her range and starts working on Kelly, too.
Fate
As the trembling begins to set in and his heartrate thins, Kelly takes a breath and moves over to Aaren and Esta, there to offer what translation services he can.
Janin, a city boy who knows little about first aid and less about dressing a corpse, can only stand there as the reality of the situation sets in. Once it does, squarely into place, he breathes a, "Holy shit," and runs a hand through his hair. That done, he puts his hands over his face and concentrates on figuring out what to do next. As a walk isn't presently viable he settles on sitting at the edge of the cart as well, leaning back and staring at the stars.
Slavina
Slavina pulls a rag-leaf off the cleaning-things-bush and wipes her feet with it. She shifts slightly to look at him. "You doing okay?" She asks in a toneless murmur.
Daina
Daina leaves the shelters to sprout as they have been designed and returns to the nest as it were, lightly humming a 'foreverybodysong' of calmness. It likely has been heard by everyone at some point so works in a placebo like way, if nothing else.
Fate
"Vytenis just got dragged off by a fucking badger in the middle of the night," Janin says. It's not a terse response—more like a fact, with a slight marveled, fearful edge to it.
Slavina
Slavina nods. "Yeah." She finishes wiping her feet, getting in between each toe. Then she says, "Did you want to go on a walk? You look tense."
Fate
He lets out a little humorless laugh. "No!" Then he takes a slow, stabilizing breath and regards Slavina. "You faced this on the regular? When you lived on the road, I mean?"
Slavina
She thinks about it for a second, getting (even) more subdued as she immerses herself in memories of her family. "Depends what you mean by regularly. Maybe once a season?" She tucks her knees up to her chest and wraps her arms around them, heels pressed in close. She looks out into the forest. "A little more often if you count bandits and dangerous spirits too."
Fate
"Fuck," is about all he can manage. Then he laughs again, a hard edge to it. After a moment, he murmurs to Slavina, "The risks I'm willing to take all for a dick." He swallows, then his gaze slides over to Vytenis. "I'm glad he'll get to see his grandkids again."
Slavina
Slavina swallows and looks at the ground. "Oh. I'm sorry. I guess I... it didn't occur to me that this was dangerous. It just... it seems normal. Even if..." She trails off with a small shrugging motion and stares at her toes.
Daina
Daina does a run through check of the place, scenting if anyone is in need of help, were there other injuries is anyone too worried etc. Nose Empathy Ping?
Once again Daina wuffs to clear her nose a bit and starts back to the cart, Aaren would call if she was needed for something.
Aaren
Aaren utilizes Kelly's translation to teach Esta more useful terms. Vytenis is wrapped up and sipping broth, at Aaren's insistance, most of the pain being taken away.
"I'll let you sleep in half an hour or so." Aaren tells him, determined that things should be settled down by then.
Fate
Janin's gaze falls to the ground. Then he shrugs. "You don't have to be sorry. It wasn't your decision."
Slavina
Numerous rebuttles come to mind and die on her lips. She shakes her head and buries her face in his shoulder, and hugs him really really hard as she starts to cry.
Fate
Startled, baffled, even, he turns his complete attention to her and hugs her back, tight.
As the night wears on, it returns to its prior peacefulness, save a last lingering strand of wariness strung between the company at the camp.