Online Session Recap 04.04.2018

Frostmorn, the 28th

Tylendel wakes up and routinely, tries to reach Syr Nathyn Evett through meditation, without luck. The room still has the lingering scent of the woman who had the room before him; he hears people talk down below, and gets dressed and armed before finding the stairs down. He passes through the long hallway that bisects the North Ward Council House and finds a meeting already underway, the discussion at hand concerning the great terror that attacked the Griffin Gate, Black Cuddles.

Duke Harmond explains that he let Tylendel sleep as he must have been weary to the bone after his trek up and down to Lish, but that he is welcome to join this morning meeting mid-session. Tylendel sits down and joins as the nobles and knights discuss. Those who are present aside from Tylendel and the duke are: the duke's two brothers, Syr Decebal, Syr Yaskar, Count Ales Malion, Baron Prister Torrister, and an elderly knight whom Tylendel has only heard of, but now finally meets: Syr Dakov of Bródford.

Tylendel learns a number of things:

It turns out that more people have fallen sick and have been moved to Summergate; Quartermaster Ëamhyn is preparing to repair a forge to produce iron bolts so that the Prophet's engineers can finish repairing the Griffin Gate; There is a problem with increased crime among the refugees, mostly in the form of theft of food and water - Syr Decebal is ordered to arrange for one guard outside each of the refugees' temporary homes; Syr Yaskar suggests putting Cuddles' skull up where the griffin fell off the barbican; Duke Harmond announces that a meeting with Syr Gylian Urunmyst and the Prophet's commanders is being planned for later this day; Syr Bohumíl has not yet arrived; Syr Comton and his squad have not yet returned from searching the North Ward for a cultist; the bear meat Tylendel brought back from Lish is to be cooked and distributed, with the sick at Summergate being prioritized; Patrik Vomir enters the meeting and hands Duke Harmond a scroll - he reads it and tells the assembled lords that "Syr Jerek writes that he spotted Night People climbing the ruins of Camrey Castle and slipping into the harbor district. He went out with his infantry and slew many, but lost six men"; Syr Decebal wonders if anything could have happened to Syr Bohumíl; Syr Dakov offers to ride out and scout for him, but Tylendel says that no one should leave Bormost for now. Syr Yaskar objects that Tylendel himself left the city (to hunt down Cuddles); Baron Prister says they need to give Bohumíl more time, as the darkness and the terrain makes it hard to cross the Slidil Riverlands; Lord Haralamb unrolls a map and points out Syr Bohumíl's most likely route.

After the meeting, Tylendel drops by the kitchen where a black-bearded man gives him a bowl of heavily spiced meat and a flagon of water. He eats it by the hearth, realizing Dinja isn't around. Finishing his meal, he slips out of the North Ward Town Council's yard and goes to check on Dinja in the house she's placed in. Here, he meets a fellow who tells him she's been transported to Summergate after having fallen sick.

He then decides to make the long walk through Oak Street toward Summergate. On his way, he sees someone has tagged a house's walls with "The Lost God was never Found. He is dead." Further down Oak Street he passes a peasant and a youth; the man is seemingly trying to teach the boy a rhyme. Even later, a pair of breeches are thrown out of a second-story window, and as Tylendel listens he hears a man's low muttering and a woman giggling. Shrugging, he continues and reaches Summergate which is guarded by four Horvath soldiers.

He finds the Great Hall of Summergate, where many beds have been set up, turning it into a sick bay. Erik the Rose presides over the sick. Tylendel sees Dinja among them, and goes to console her. She tells him it is awfully boring listening to the priest's sermons and he tells her to visualize sword practice, though he admits it won't make her better at it.
Erik the Rose, a very polite man, tells Tylendel that he is arranging a parade (of all things) to honor Saint Jokúbas, whose feast day it is. The priest asks if Tylendel will join, as the saint is, after all, the Lord of the Mountains and Tylendel was a Moonguard soldier. The priest also explains that on the saint's feast day it was customary to walk in a parade, but that he will have to limit his parade to the North Ward. Tylendel asks for Syr Ramon Duntry. Erik explains that the man talks all the time, perhaps delirious, and has been moved to a chamber in an adjoining tower, with the woman Emmalyn.

Tylendel paces up the stone stairs and finds Syr Ramon standing by the window, while Emmalyn lies comatose in one of the two beds placed in the room. Syr Ramon continues to have rather grand visions of himself and his future, and obviously sees himself as the epitome of chivalry. This becomes quite annoying after a while as they speak, and so Tylendel punches him in the face, right above the eyes, and Syr Ramon stumbles backward to sit down on his bed, blood massing in one of his eyes. Shocked to notice he also bleeds from his nose, Syr Ramon is insulted and calls Tylendel out as an uncouth and impolite fellow. Tylendel, angered, persuades Duntry to say the name of the goddess who is supposedly speaking in his head. "She names herself Ehenné," Duntry finally says. Tylendel remembers a statue he saw between the Wailing Widows and the Black Lakes, east of the Remheck Mountains, of a now forgotten saint with the same name. Tylendel tells him he has told Erik to remove Emmalyn from his chamber, and again Syr Ramon displays an air of offense, especially when Tylendel calls her Ramon's sex-slave. He tries to insist she is his mistress, but Tylendel sees through the charade. In the end, Duntry gives up and asks Tylendel to remove himself.

Tylendel returns to the great hall and spots Bug while Erik is reciting the text of a holy hymn from a leatherbound book. He manages to awaken Bug enough to have a quick talk but notices how weak the dwarf is. Tylendel asks for the key to Duke Amos Oldrich's vault, and Bug tells him it is in his trunk. Bug also says Duke Amos had great faith in Tylendel, and that Tylendel could "end this darkness." "But how?" Tylendel ponders. "Ask...my...master...", Bug replies. Tylendel says that Duke Amos is hard to converse with, and Bug agrees: "He is no longer the man he used to be...His wits, they wander."
Leaving Bug to his sleep, Tylendel has one more quiet talk with Erik, who says that Bug is feverish and dying. The priest knows of the trunk and goes to fetch it for Tylendel. He picks the key in its pouch and hands the trunk back to the Rose. Tylendel asks if Erik has heard any legends about obsidian that emits heat, and Erik has heard stories about the walls of the halls of the Dragon-kings being warm, imbued with dragon-fire. Tylendel notices that Erik the Rose has a dizzy spell.

Tylendel returns to the North Ward Council Hall, where he sees a skinny horse pull another wagon of weak and sick people out through the gate, headed for Summergate and Erik the Rose. He then walks to the Griffin Gate, enters the eastern tower flanking the barbican, and makes his way to the upmost floor, beneath the wooden beams holding up the pointed roof. A Horvath archer stands guard by one of the windows here, his face lost in the shadows, but his voice familiar. A bronze bell is suspended from the roof, engraved with the old sigil of House Camrey.

Tylendel sits down with his back to a wall and tries to meditate, again trying to reach for Syr Nathyn Evett, and again without luck. He decides to wait here until he hears activity either from the Council House or from the gate itself, thinking that Syr Bohumíl must surely arrive soon if he's going to arrive at all...