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Current Situation
- Days in the Feywild: 1 (Entering the Fey, the Calendar of Harptos becomes unknown. Days in the Fey will be tracked based on how many are spent on this Plane.)
- Finding the home of Skabatha Nightshade, the Trollmates work out terms, and begin to fulfill their end of the deal.
Session Summary
- Skabatha's house, from the outside, looks like it might only be one room. It's very small. Ramshackle and certainly needs repairs. The windows are boarded up and the porch is falling apart. The yard is covered will all sorts of wooden creatures, very much like children's toys, although a bit large. Granny herself is very much an old crone, her windup key spinning merrily listening to Z's music.
- She recognizes Ander as a Planeskeeper and he says that he is. Ander's definitely nervous about Skabatha, but is putting on a brave face. She invites everyone closer to the outdoor fire in the fire pit so they can discuss "in more detail."
- Upon walking into the ring of firelight, everyone is teleported inside Skabatha's home. Inside looks like the interior of a tree, and the room is cluttered with those statues again, but they're the appropriate size. Dust covers everything, which includes children's books and toys.
- Questions asked, and answers are given (Skabatha is obviously only giving the bare minimum of information):
- The hourglasses all look very similar so it wouldn't be difficult to identify the others.
- She has no preference of whose hourglass she gets.
- Others have tried to help with the prank before but were unsuccessful.
- Skabatha lives in Hither. She will tell how to get to Thither and Yon.
- Skabatha believes herself to be the most powerful of the three.
- She is unable to retrieve an hourglass personally, so needs someone else to do it for her.
- She gives the group a little toy compass, one side of the thing is red, and one side white. The red side is Thither, the white side is Yon.
- Of course getting there is dangerous! Like anywhere else!
- Avoiding a fight is probably best.
- Yes, she says she has a map that shows to get to the end of the Feywild. (Barrett scans a bookshelf, but they all seem to be children's books. One is even titled "Din the Dragon! Barrett looks through one book that happens to be about pirates and shows some maps and illustrations but nothing like what the group needs.) "See! I told you I have maps."
- Thither and Yon are "just a little bit away," about a day if they don't get lost.
- She suggests breadcrumbs to not get lost on the return journey, as the compass doesn't point to Hither.
- With an hourglass being taken, the sisters wouldn't notice it was missing for quite sometime, most likely. They actually used to lose them all the time. Skabatha is already quite clumsy with hers, showing them the rope belt that her hourglass is on.
- They most likely cannot see invisible things.
- The group reconvenes outside (it's early evening outside):
- Barrett illusions the Sanctum and Dhann activates all abilities except for the fog.
- Making a deal with Skabatha sounds like the best thing to do, and take an hourglass from one of her sisters. Ely suggests treating it like a game rather than approaching it as a battle.
- Z says, "If we fail, we live here forever." Hopefully, this doesn't happen.
- Ander says this is probably the best thing to do and ask Skabatha to clarify exactly what she wants. He also gives a bit more detail on the three sisters, now that he recognizes who the group is talking to:
- All of the sisters have something to do with time. Skabatha controls the past. She can make time go backwards, like Ander can.
- One of the sisters can control the future, and the third most likely has something to do with the present.
- The three of them make up the Hourglass Coven.
- Z remembers an old tale:
- They are the daughters of Baba Yaga and they share the spells within the Hourglass Coven. If the three hourglasses are together, they become more powerful. But, all three sisters are always fighting so this most likely will never happen voluntarily. Z also remembers a flying rocking horse, and that Skabatha, for some reason, always forgets the first creature she sees after waking up from a nice, long rest. As if they never existed and are gone from her reality.
- Slackjawed Lorna is the Sister of the Present. Her weakness is seeing creatures moving counter clockwise sends her into sneezing fits. She cannot stand things moving counter clockwise. She lives in Thither.
- Endolyn (also known as Creeping Lyn, or the Bitter End) is the Sister of the Future. The only way to kill her permanently is to slay her during a solar eclipse, or in the symbolic presence of one. That being said, the fairy tale probably exaggerates this. It's most likely that a solar eclipse, or image of one, weakens her more than anything, and does not hurt her more than that. She lives in Yon.
- The group decides to pursue the hourglass of Lorna, Sister of the Present, and go back inside to talk to Skabatha on the terms of the deal. She's currently whittling a little wooden person.
- If the group retrieves and gives one of the hourglasses to Skabatha, she will not only show them the map they need to reach the End of the Fey, and tell them how to understand it, she is even willing to give them the book entirely. The Trollmates can keep the book, and she will "Show them the map's secret." "Well, I think that's a yes!" Says Z.
- If they do not retrieve the hourglass successfully, and are not able to uphold their end of the deal, the group will suffer no penalty, as Skabatha will not have done anything for them yet, either.
- To seal the deal, Z and Skabatha shimmy. Both sides have "shaken on it," as they say in the Material plane.
- Skabatha offers the group lodging for the night, and they take her up on the offer. Dhann offers to make breakfast for everyone (A Heroes' Feast).
- The next room is actually across a rope bridge, into another tree. Several more rooms over, she shows the guest space. There are smallish beds, most likely for children. About five or six of them. Skabatha uses a ring of keys, 16 or 17 of them, to unlock and lock the doors as they are passed through.
- It's decided to get to bed early, to rise early, so Skabatha bids them goodnight, and promptly locks the Trollmates into the bedroom. The Sanctum is immediately activated. All abilities but sound blocking, and fog. Shifts will also be taken, just in case.
- Z makes a scarf to give Skabatha as a thanks. Barrett sleeps in his hammock, Ander and Z each pick a bed, while Dhann and Ely opt for their bedrolls on the floor.
- Barrett scales the wall to see what's above the group in the gloom and it's just more tree, confirming that the room is, indeed, inside the trunk of one.
- Z attunes to the Ring of Evasion while Barrett takes the first watch.
- About two hours in, Barrett starts to hear a cacophony of tapping coming from the room outside of the door. It sounds like carpenter's workshop with multiple workers all at the same time. Barrett isn't concerned, recognizing them as definitely carpentry tools.
- Ely takes the next watch, and Barrett describes the sounds. As soon as he wakes her, the sounds halt, but then half an hour into her own watch, she hears them. Otherwise, nothing strange happens. She checks the door, and it's still locked. The sounds stop as soon as she checks the door. After she goes back to sitting, the sounds kick up again. Z weaves during his watch.
- As soon as everyone is up, Skabatha unlocks the door and bids everyone good morning, and back into the main room. Dhann prepares a Heroes' Feast and asks Skabatha if she'd like anything specific, and she asks for Bread Pudding. He also manifests anything else the others would like.
- Skabatha dismisses the tapping noise, saying it wasn't her.
- She also seems to have totally "forgotten" Ander, out of everyone in the group. To check, Dhann thanks her for hosting "the four of them," not five, and Skabatha says she's very welcome. Watching her through the morning, it's more like she has no "object permanence" for this person. Out of sight, totally out of mind.
- Z gives her the scarf, and she's delighted with it. As a thanks, she decides to show the group the map that she will be giving them. The book, titled Morg's Adventures in Feylax, is about a heroic wizard. She shows them some of the chapters and remarks on some of the stories inside. A map is in the very back of the book.
- The stories take place on an imagined continent called Feylax.
- Ander, seeing the map, comments, "That's NOT the Feywild!"
- It's not an exact map, with places that do and do not exist. Once the group has the hourglass given to her, she'll describe what's real, what's not, and what they need to know.
- Ely asks her how she knew the Warlock and Barrett may have been in the Fey before, and Skabatha says it's because they carry the "Feylight" in the Pearl and the scar. You can only get the Feylight, if at all, in the Feywilds. "It connects you very deeply to this place, in fact I'm surprised you don't know your way around."
- Dhann asks if she recommends something besides breadcrumbs to guide them back to her house faster, so she doesn't have to wait as long for the hourglass. Skabatha gives him a small canvas bag labelled "Breadcrumbs," but the contents are actually something like metal shavings, but appear to look like breadcrumbs.
- Heading out, it's a lovely brightish twilight morning, and the group decides to follow the nearest path that seems to go, currently, along with the compass direction they need to go. Z scouts a bit on Magic "Pet" Carpet. He sees lots of large spiderwebs and what might be giant pumpkins in the woods they're heading to.
- Dhann drops a breadcrumb at the edge of Skabatha's clearing, and then another about 30' out, and looking back, he sees that they do glint a bit, creating a line. He's able to gauge when to drop them to make a nice little line of crumbs.
- If the gang leaves the physical path they're on, Ely plans on burying the Ring of Beacons to give a waymarker they can Locate Object on, as a bit of a potential safety net.
- As the group walks, they seem to be heading in the direction the "sun" would be rising in the Fey, so while it might not be their material East, it's the direction that the morning light comes from on this plane.
- Approaching the woods, it's revealed that yes, the big orange blobs Z saw earlier are indeed larger pumpkins. The spiderwebs in the woods, to Z, actually seem quite abandoned. From his high vantage point, he does spy a young girl that looks to be about fifteen in human years, but he can't tell the race of her. She's walking towards the group from the opposite direction, but it's unknown if she sees them or not. She's walking at a casual pace. Z alerts the group.
- The girl is very blue, with crystalline "horns" from her brow and Ander tells the group to stop, while he checks it out. He moves forward, and just when they come into contact, Ander beckons the group to wait behind him. He and the girl start talking, and while Dhann can't catch anything, he tells the group he can tell the discussion is getting heated. Ander seems to swear loudly, she responds in kind, and then in the blink of an eye, the girl is transformed into a young, sapphire dragon. As her wings thwack in the air, in preparation to take off, they make a shimmering, almost chandelier-like sound. (Roll initiative!)
- Ghost flies to a nearby tree and scowls from the branches. Ely Blesses Rascal, Barrett, and Dhann, while Z casts Dancing Lights around the face of the dragon. Battle begins! Ander blasts with Thunderwave.
- Whirling around, he yells to Rascal, "Rascal! Now!" at which point, the raccoon gathers himself, launches from Ely's shoulder, and with a flip, transforms into a young human boy, landing, drawing a bow, and firing a shot directly at the dragon. Ely sprints past Rascal, snapping, "We're going to have words later!" to draw the Gun and shoot at the now entangled dragon, from an arrow shot by Barrett. Ander, who's been hit by a shriek attack of some sort, hasn't been able to do anything since yelling for Rascal to make his move.
- Leaving the vines behind, the dragon burrows and heads in Ely's direction. The ground ripples, showing where she's moving to, so the gang gets to a position in which there's going to be one hell of a round of Whack-a-Dragon as soon as that sapphire head shows itself. Dhann readies his mace, Rascal behind him with a longbow shot, while Ely preps a Thunderstep and Barrett, in the branches of the nearest tree, readies himself as well. Z continues to maintain height on the carpet, moving to monitor the beginning of the dragon's burrow in case she retreats that way, Hideous Laughter prepared. Ander summons a mammoth to join the fray.
- The dragon's head bursts from the ground, and everyone attacks. Dhann's mace comes down, and Barrett's swings stun the dragon. Rascal's arrow flies true. Ely Thundersteps away. Amid mindful punches, Barrett tells the dragon to stand down, but she only replies with a high pitched laugh, snarling, "Never!"
- Rascal takes a running leap, launching off of Dhann's knee in an assist to gain air, and lands pretty much on the dragon's head and begins pummeling her alongside Barrett. (Ely's very proud) Z continues to play his drum while watching the fight.
- Ander jumps into the mosh pit himself, his hands emanating a bluish glow. As she's touched by it, the dragon transforms back into the more human state, and she, Ander, and Rascal all burst into laughter and the fighting, suddenly, stops. The girl ruffles Rascal's hair, declaring, "You did so great!" and Ely seeths. Ander is clearly using the light to heal this girl, and she stands. The girl looks at the Maybesitters and says, "Wow! That was fun!" and Ander has the decency to look sheepish.
- She's obviously still beaten to hell, and, taken aback at the turn of events, Dhann swears in Deep Speech, channeling some Divinity to usher along the girl's healing. Barrett says, "Dang it! That was two of my best arrows!" and joins the group.
- Ander asks the girl if she feels better, and she remarks she does, and she is introduced as Dindrin. Ander apologizes for her attacking them and he looks even more guilty, while Din continues to laugh, patting him on the back and mussing Rascal's hair. Din then corrects Ander, saying her full name is Dindrin, Slayer of Slynn ("If you must know! Get it right, or something, Ander!").
- Pissed to the Nine Hells, Ely eldritch blasts Din.
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Next time on...
On the way to find an hourglass for a hag, perhaps the Maybesitters have a new ally? If Ely doesn't slay her, first.