GREYFORGE: ARCHIVE

[Grendelthebrave]

Yeah my plan was to return to Greyforge, just wasn't sure where the Owl was going to run off to.

We'll spend the last EP heading to the trail at L02, then set up camp for the night. Cholum grudgingly eating rations.

The next day the group will travel hard and fast back toward Greyforge, up the trail to J01, then west along the mountain path back to town.

[Longman]

You move into L02 and the owl keeps following, although flitting off periodically.

Camping is done.

Rather oddly, you notice for the first time that the owl seems to settle down overnight. As far as you knew they were nocturnal but maybe this one has been trained to be active during the day, somehow.

No encounters overnight. Another 4 days food down.

The following morning, the day is gloriously sunny (morning mist once again). You head up the path at top rate and make it to F02 before something happens. Greyforge is in sight.

You meet some dwarves (3) out hunting just off the main road. Unfortunately, Owly panics when she sees them, and flies off southward towards F03.

The dwarves looks startled and one of them even points a bow at the bird, but doesn't fire.

You realize that this is going to be a bit tricky, getting the bird back into Greyforge...

[Grendelthebrave]

Time for an infamous party split I think.

Milly and Cholum will head off after the bird into F03. With Milly trying to lure the Owl back to her. Chevo will tell them to try and bring the Owl closer to Greyforge and that Chevo and Thann will try to find some Aleuti traders at Greyforge to help recover the Owl. He'll tell the pair to return through the wilderness (E02) back toward Greyforge.

Chevo and Thann will run at the group of Dwarves screaming for them to not shoot at the Owl for the true God's sake. Hopefully they'll recognize him, if not he'll pass on that the owl is with them and that they're returning it to the Aleut. After hopefully convincing them, they'll hurry ball to Greyforge looking for some Aleut who might be willing to help. Barring that Chevo will send Thann to the onyxbreaker kitchens to fetch a pig, or the carcass of something equally tasty.

[Longman]

Cholum and Milly track down the owl OK. It only goes about half a mile off and then resettles and waits for them to approach. They end up luring it back closer to the road in the southern part of D02. The rest of the party know where you are. This area is pretty well known by hunters and scouts - Cholum has been out here before - and is most likely not dangerous.

Meanwhile - - the hunters definitely know who Chevo is. "Sorry, Master Onyxbreaker. We didn't know! We thought it was attacking you!" It turns out that the hunters have been told to keep an eye out for you, as people have been expecting you to come back.

Your luck is good, perhaps...there are some Aleut traders in Greyforge at present, although not the same ones as were there before. (These ones came down the western road on the other side of the mountains.)

But the traders seems a bit suspicious of the whole situation when Chevo begins speaking to them. "Where is the bird now? Is it well? Does it have anything on it? Where did you find it?" They do not offer any reward.

"Something's not quite right with this," says Gurr (Chevo's father). "Did you ever take a look to see what the bird was carrying?"

By the time all this has transpired it's about 5pm. Gurr suggest giving you 4 guards and an expert bird handler called Mannish, to go and find the bird and the other 2 party members, tomorrow morning, and see what is in the saddle bags. He orders the Aleut traders to stay in Greforge while this is happening.

You can ignore this and head out alone tonight, if you'd rather. (Gurr knows Chevo is his own man.)

[Grendelthebrave]

Chevo will order Thann to stay in Greyforge and accompany Gurr's men and the bird handler in the morning. Thann will put on a show of wanting to head back out, in case the party needs defence! But won't argue the point, and is 'in his slippers' before Chevo finishes his sentence. Thann will also start to make some inquiries into selling the fancy woodwork the group acquired at the old logging camp.

Chevo doesn't want anyone else to find out what the bird holds in its saddlebags before he does.

In an act of benevolence, Chevo will grab some decent food before he leaves, a leg of something for the owl, and anything better than rations for Cholum and Milly.

He'll then head out towards E03 to find Owlie, Cholum, and Milly.

[Longman]

People are a bit concerned at the idea of the chief's son going out alone and eventually Gurr insists his son take a guard along (Mangerin Ironshield).

The pair make their way out to the rest of the party with no difficulty. (They are actually near the road in D02 by the way. The owl didn't go that far).

Meanwhile, Thann shows the carvings to a few of his friends of the Clerk's Office and his estimate of 200gp was right on the money. You can consider that sold, and take 200gp cash. Did you find any other treasure...I don't recall that you did except for some loot on the bugbears.

Once Chevo and the guard are at the camp - what do you do? So far no one has really attempted to get any closer than about 20 feet of the bird. Milly is probably the best bet. Still risky though.

Milly has been going through an unusually vision-free period over the last few days after her vision of the funeral.

[Grendelthebrave]

I don't recall any special loot. The bugbears had a bit of silver on them if I recall.

Anyway, Milly will take the leg of meat that Chevo brought with him, and approach the owl slowly, speaking Aleut words for 'calm' and 'stay' and 'it's okay'. She'll see how close she can get, she won't try reaching out for it yet, until it seems to be comfortable with her being within 10 feet of it for more than 15 minutes or so.

[Longman]

You've already made numerous positive reaction rolls and charisma rolls on the owl so that counts in your favor. In the end it all hinges on a final reaction roll to see if the owl will let you get near enough to it while it is eating.

You roll a 9, which is favorable. The follow up is a 10. Over the course of about an hour, you manage to get close to the owl and start looking in the saddle.

There is a blanket in there, some jerky, some leather cord, a fur hood, a pipe, some tobacco, some reindeer fur, some tinder, flint, and a pouch containing 17 bone tokens about the size of a coin. These are all inscribed with the simple runes of the Aleuti people. Milly does not know what they are for. She has not heard about the Aleut ever using currency.

There is also a bone knife, and an old dwarvish-made green glass bottle with some liquid inside.

While you are checking all this out the owl keeps lifting its leg and squawking at you, but she doesn't attack.

You need to spend the night in this location. There are no encounters over night. You have the evening to investigate the items you have found.

The next day is Tuesday the 20th of August. That's a full 8 days in the wild so far.
The weather is good on Tuesday morning.

[Grendelthebrave]

"What's in the bottle?" Cholum will ask as Chevo hoards the saddlebags.

"What kind of goblin-cursed historian do you think I am? Ask the girl, she's practically one of their kin."

Chevo will hand the bottle to Cholum, who will immediately pull the stopper and give the contents a sniff.

Thann, curious about the bone chips will examine them, perhaps comparing them to old Dwarven games or trade tokens in case that rings a bell.

The group will make their way back to Greyforge, thinking about how they might secure the Owl and give Milly a chance to rest and clean up inside.

Regardless, the Dwarves will take the trinkets to Gurr and his advisers, hopefully there will be some wise old Dwarves around that know something about Aleut history, especially in terms of the village that Milly was told about when she spoke with the Aleut at the onset of this expedition.

The group will NOT speak to the Aleut until after conferring with Gurr and his people, in case they have a reason to not pass off the bird after reviewing the contents of the saddlebags.

If those conversations fail, then Milly will speak to the Aleut to see what they have to say about the Owl.

[Longman]

I meant Tue May 20. Adventure over.

The contents of the bottle have no obvious smell. There's about a cup of red-brown liquid in there. Herbal tincture, probably.

Return to Greyforge:

Thann is not present when the items are found so needs to make an appraise roll the next morning. He does not know what the tokens are. Milly recognises them as versions of some Aleut runes, but has no info other than that. Gurr's trade advisor doesn't know either. However, Milly works out that the people who own the owl are are from tribe A, and the current traders are from tribe B. She also knows the two tribes are quite hostile to one another.

Please note: no one has detect magic in the clan. You have heard stories that some dwarves in remote areas still hold onto the old stone magic of the dwarves, in secret, so maybe one of these could help, but you would need to track them down.

The expert bird handler - who is about 350 years old and remembers when dwarves used to fly these creatures - manages to get the saddle off, and reveals the bird was in great discomfort underneath. He takes care of the bird - not inside Greyforge, but up on a safe, rocky promontory above the main doors the the fortress.

It's impossible to hide from the Aleut traders (tribe B) that the bird has returned, and they begin demanding to see it. They are now offering 250 dwarvish gold coins to get hold of the creature plus saddle contents.

Gurr: "Well done, getting the bird to safety. It's obvious that something in the saddle bag was important - or perhaps it is the owl itself. I will leave it up to you to decide what is to be done. If you want to take the reward, you can. All of these Aleut are good trade partners, but we know that they practice their own religion up there, nothing to do with the Very True God. Maybe these tokens are magical. After all, we know that the bird did belong to a shaman. Maybe these traders want to get the upper hand on a rival tribe, somehow?"

PS - please take note of all money you have gotten. You now have a chance to re-equip. Gurr will give you 6 1st level fighters to attend you if you want to go after the behir. You are all on 1000 exp, mostly from treasure and knowledge attained. Thann is nearly 2nd level, but everyone else still a way off.