9th November 2021 - Faces in the Falls
During the preparations for their journey on the road to the Dead Falls to find the Ultros, Xan puts her focus into her head, giving her body a rest following the games and the fight in the squash patch.
Xan focuses on looking and listening and trying to understand the river and its relationship to the Ultros.
She looks at plants that grow on the rocks and riverside, it is more treacherous water - seaweed… wait no… algae, maybe bladderwort and some berry bushes. The birds are gently squeaking and flitting about over the trees, they seem to be steering clear of the water as it rushes far down the valley. Insect swarms hover above the water in swarms, angrily buzzing about and adding to the humming sound.
The river is not wide enough for a large ship - how does the Ultros do it? It is not wide enough, it is impossible. It is baffling how a ship has been reported on this river.
Xan sits on the edge of the river and stares down in the water, hoping to understand its mysteries.
The Faces in the Falls
They travel to the gorge, and it seems to be made of faces carved within the rocks. Helikaon waves the group to a stop as he stares down the carvings on the sides of the rocks. Xan looks around at the chosen, each one seemingly soggier than the rest. Xan looks down at her feet, which are quite wet although she cannot see the puckering of her skin. She notices Braz staring out of the corner of his eye at the rock faces. When she stares directly, they seem to disappear into normal rocks.
The path gets narrower as they walk on, the rock faces seem to begin screaming with the strong gusts of winds rush through the rock faces. It’s really creepy.
The water begins to sink, disappearing into the base. Xan looks down and before sprinting down the river she second-guesses her urge to jump down, and gets as quickly as she can down the path. Receding water is never a good sign - it always comes back. She keeps speed with the mounted parts of the party - maybe she is a hurricane like the posters said.
The walls come so close, then open and reveal an impressive waterfall with seemingly no bottom and even more strangely, the water makes no noise.
It reminds Xan of the massive chasm in the Mithral Forge. She grabs a pebble and throws it into the middle. It lands and sinks, without a sound. She looks around to see if she can find this described ‘inlet’, but there is so much movement she cannot tell what would be more likely.
She hears Theo whispering from across the water. She splashes through the little pools over the waterfall top, and finds the Chosen standing at the edge of a silently still village with a beautiful ship waiting for them.
As the chosen discuss the approach, Xan walks forward, sneaking past an abandoned house. As she looks to the ship in the distance, that appeared briefly and then flashed out of vision, she hears a groan behind her - and in a mad swarm, they are surrounded.