Erebus

"good. well its decided then we're of to see the wizards... when your finished with those books Tsanal, any that dont seem useful would probably fetch a nice sum at the markets, so id like to sell them (im broke )"

[I'm waiting for Nikis to answer the book thing]

You decide to ask for clearance to leave Paradera to travel to the Amurite lands. The bureaucracy takes some time but you finally get it. Finding a suitable way to travel there is a bit of a problem but you manage to get two possibilities: Walking or riding across the Isthmus of the lost, which will be cheap but potentially dangerous and time-consuming, or taking a ship across the Sea of Stars. A merchant supplying the military with Amurite goods has agreed to take you there for a price, or you could buy a ship of your own.

You think that the books you don't need or understand might be appreciated by the Amurite sages and they might give you a better price there, or tell what they contain.

i say we walk or ride. none of us has money for a ship.

ooc: can i sell thread from the banner to make some money?

"I agree with Thomas, riding will be better. im broke and after that affair with the ship and the Drowned, i dont care to set foot on another for a long time."

"if we will ride, im goin to the stables, i want to study the horses so i can transorm into one, that will mean less horses for us to get a hold of, as one of you can ride on my back." (after i go to the stables ill go back to my room to pray to Cerunnous untill the time comes for us to leave. i wish to ask forgivness for my lack of faith the past days.)

ooc: The books that we dont need or understand i want to sell to the Amurites.

OOC: I'm back now

Mipe tries to find that merchant again, because he last time didn't get all of the stuff he wanted to.

You are told to go to the west gate just before the curfew, with some gold to pay for the horses. As you get there you notice that Mipe has disappeared.

The guards get anxious after a while but soon enough Mipe appears. The soldiers rummange through the bag he's carrying but find nothing illegal. You notice a small glint in his pocket.
[Mipe has lockpicks now]

As you get the horses you notice that someone has sold you bad horses. "They are worth less than the gold you paid for them, but the army rules have prevented giving any better ones for you", they explain. Mryddyn, who quickly learnt to become one, seems to be the best one of them.

You get also a crude map of the lands between you and Glorairine.
There is no road from the border onwards, so it may be difficult to find the way. Beyond the Isthmus, in the Amurite heartlands, there are some well-known ruins, from a nearby village you could get a ferry along a river to the Glory Coast, according to the Bannor knowledge, which is true as far as the amurites among you know.



But before you get there, you will have to travel dozens of leagues of uninhabited area between the mountains and the sea.


When you have been riding for a while, Mipe asks Thomas:

"What did you do with the banner? That merchant would have been interested in getting it..."

[What did you do?]

*flashback to before i became a horse*

These poor horses have been terribly looked after, perhaps Cernunnos will allow me to tend to them, physically and spiritually so that they can reach their potential glory... (Mryddyn now procedes to pray to Cernunnos, calling for him to lift the horses spirits and mend their frail, ill treated bodies. Once this is done Mryddyn will converse to the horses to make sure they understand we will be friends and wont harm them, this should make riding them a lot easyer)

*end of flashback*

When our troupe of adventurers stops to make their first camp, Mryddyn transforms back into his natural form, and, whilst everyone is sitting around the camp fire he says (mainly to Tsanal):

" i was thinking while we were travelling, many animals are able to communicate to each other in mind-speach, as they have no real verbal communication other than warnings. they also relly very heavily on emotions for communication this is how i was talking to the other horses, they are really very intelligent creatures. Would it be possible, Tsanal, for you to enchant some item to make it so that all of us are able to communicate without speaking? just with our minds? something like an earing, hat, or scarf. and better yet, extent the enchantment so we can communicate over long distances? this would enable me to communicate to you and everyone else while i am in my Wild shapes, and also so that we can talk when we need to remain quite."

OOC: i got that idea from the Obernewtyn chronicles by Isobel Carmody.

that would be a nice idea.

about that banner,i'm still trying to get the gold out of it, here it is pulls the banner out of his pack. i've got a sizeable pile, but, not enough yet.

It would help a lot i think

I say burn the banner! The gold will remain, the rest will turn to ashes.

that'll work.

i'll set fire to the banner at the next campsight, and collect the gold

[Hey! I haven't been able to visit the market or anything, because I was waiting for an answer on the book thing!! That's not fair! Can't we say I've bought an empty spellbook?]

Tsanal studies Mryddyn silently for some time, and then says: "I think you should be careful about shapeshifting. As you know, I've studied Mind magic, and I know that altering too much with the mind and body of a person can permanently damage their mind. Until you get some more training, I'd advice you to avoid doing it more than once a day."
[Isn't there a limit on his Wild Shape ability?]

Tsanal then tries to get Ken to show him the basics of Force magic, explaining that he has a number of different strategies, if they get attacked again, but that there is always one of the things he can't do.

When they camp for the night, Tsanal gets approached by Mryddyn, who asks about the communication items. Tsanal answers: "I'm afraid it will be too complicated, but I can try. Do you have any items I can enchant?"
If Mryddyn has some items, he tries to enchant them.

[If I've bought the spellbook]:
He then writes down the different spells he has made (Until now, he's just cast them from memory). This is what he writes down:
Enchant Item: Minor Teleport
Minor Teleport
Lesser Teleport
Minor Animate Dead
Find Minds
Minor Charm
Enchant Item: Burning Touch

Also, Tsanal asks the others if they could perhaps hunt for some food - and perhaps bones - while he perpares his items.

"Yes, shape shifting is a strain on my concentration, especially some of the more wild creatures, like the bear. the more i do the easyer i find it gets, learning the patterns of a creatures anatomy, and the way its mind and instincts works is a very large learning curve. i just pray that Cernunnos will show me, in time, the extremeties of this blessing.

When i first became an Owl, i struggled ferociously with its urge to attack small mice, and to fly with the wind. this kind of sturggle always occurs when first i change into an animal, and i have to set a sort of mental wall between my mind, and the animals instincts. however, you appear to know what you say when you talk about the mind, so i will limit my changes, but with practice i may be able to change more."

[DM, please tell me how often i am able to shape shift]

"i dont have anything on me now, but i could fassion some wood into a neck band, or into an earing. would that work to hold the enchantment?"

[if so, then ill drain some more of my stored energy from my staff and channel it into trying to make a tiny wooden hoop earing from a freshly picked twig, which ill encourage to grow harder and more durable. if Tsanals enchantment works then ill try makeing some more for the other members of the party.]

ooc: do diciples need spell books too?

(ooc: i think our power comes from our gods, not from spells learned.

I think that because force magic is so versatile, i should'nt keep a list of spells

" While I don't know anything what's it like to change into an animal, but you shouldn't be on one form too long... If the animal instincts come when you transform into an animal, Is it possible that those instincts will 'burn' into your mind if you are in that form too long?"

"if you mean that if i stay an owl for too long will i have urges to eat every mouse i see in my natural form, then yes, for a time, untill my mind catches up with my real body. if i was to live in the owl form for days at a time then i would probably forget how to change back, and thus be stuck as an owl forever, with a vague memory of once being an Elf.
So i agree that it is dangerous to stay in wild shape for too long, and i was reckless before. its just so addictive, animals dont have a care in the world, its almost like being free, even though we dont see ourselves as being trapped...its almost like animals are closer to the Divine than any of us could imagine, they have some link with the Gods that enables them to have such happyness..."

[Tsanal has his book.]
[Spellbooks only help in learning or memorising spells, especially if one uses many different ones. Disciples can draw their god's powers more or less directly according to the strength of their faith, as rituals unlike spells. You may write books of rituals as well.]

As you camp for the first night outside Paradera for a long time, you stay awake for a long time, discussing the risks, rewards and ways of twisting the reality. Such abilities might earn you some respect in the lands of the Amurites.

[shapeshifting consumes your "faith", similar to magical energy, and as its amount lessens, the consequences begin to differ from the intended]

Mryddyn takes the twigs, and turns them to small earrings. Tsanal's enchantment works on them extremely well at first, allowing you to "hear" everything others of you think, when you concentrate enough. But soon afterwards, someone's mind starts to wander confusing you a bit, until you sever the connection. When you try it again, they work as intended.

As the banner burns, the gold starts to come out. The fire is not hot enough to melt it, so you have now a fist-sized loose bunch of thin gold thread.

The following morning, after memorising his spells, Tsanal asks Mryddyn and Mipe to go catch a deer or something - they could all use the food, and he would like the bones - and then tries to convince Ken to join him in a magical experiment (with a little help from his charms), trying to connect their magic.
If Ken is convinced, he will try to connect their minds, using his dimensional magic and Kens force magic to grab some faraway object, and then pull it through a "wormhole", making it appear before them in a matter of seconds.