Astarael42

Rites Of Passage (a High Fantasy/Forgotten Realms Adventure)

yay for everyone who sticks around! this story does not die. Here when you are orcpunx.

I updated the monsters compendium for those keeping track.

@phantomsekai and @bunnita are you still with us? I shall be moving you to missing presumed dead list if we do not hear from you.

Rites Of Passage (a High Fantasy/Forgotten Realms Adventure)

Brisa had been doing her best to keep out of the way. Stronger than she was when she stared on this trip, she was no where near the boy's strength. Not to mention she tended to be a bit clumsy. The only reason she had worked on building a camp so smoothly was it had become routine. She learned fast, but she could not improvise. At least not in some areas.

She looked out through the rain and saw...nothing. It was just too much rain. She blinked trying to clear the rain from her eyes but it was no use. Instead she took the sharpened stick that she had been handed and tried to figure out how she could use it. She was no fighter but she could poke someone with a stick. Maybe. She was still working over how to use it when she heard Aiden's call about fire magic.

She almost laughed outloud. How could he be so clueless; she was no more a true mage than the others were able to claim the title of the classes they studied. She had to remind herself only a student of magic would know the difference between a neophyte like her and a true mage. And only a true mage could weild fire magic that was impervious to rain. Her magics were simple at best, tiny things that could be used to make life easier not so much for combat.

She didn't realize how much she would have to learn to adapt herself to this adventure, but she would learn, and learn fast or die. Maybe she had to be a bit more subtle about her actions, to learn to think outside the box. She discarded the idea of the fire cantrip even as she joined the boys, just slightly behind them, her own sharpened stick she laid on the ground nearby, not wanting it to trip either her or them and knowing it was best it not be in her hands if she came up with any kind of plan.

As she looked out into the dreary weather, the gray and the rain, then at the backs of the two boys standing in front of her, one thing did jump to her mind. Argurios was too noticeable, his garments were sturdier, darker, and occasionally the flash of metal could be seen from grommets and belt. But Aiden might work...his clothes were duller, older, and more muted. Plus he was smaller, easier to fade away. She looked him over carefully, scrutinizing him like a seamstress inspecting her stitches. It was a good thing the boys had their backs to her or her blatant staring might have aroused some suspicion.

She stepped up behind Aiden and spoke in a very low voice, aware that a whisper would carry further than softly spoken words.

“You are going to have to trust me” she said placing slim fingers on his cheek from behind.

She whispered the words before he could react, letting the cantrip magic flow through her and into him. It washed over him turning him a very dull and unobtrusive shade of gray. The exact same shade as the light through the rain. It wasn't much, but it might be just enough to let him fade into background. And maybe that would give him some sort of edge. She had planned to use the spells to change their hair color in case someone from the town was looking for them, it was the fastest means of disguise. Maybe this would work too.

Everything was a dull gray color, and now too was Aiden. A second casting turned his cloak to an identical shade and that was all she had. Her last spell was her firefinger, useful in normal circumstances but here in the oppressive rain it would be useless. She picked up her spear and prayed to Mystra for help, because if there was trouble they would need it. She hid a smile as she realized that the spell was permanent, the only way to turn his skin back to “skin” color was to recast the spell. And for that she needed another night of study. She hoped he wouldn't be too mad.

Rites Of Passage (a High Fantasy/Forgotten Realms Adventure)

sorry for the delay. Checking who is still here (orcpunx I know you are or will be)

Rites Of Passage (a High Fantasy/Forgotten Realms Adventure)

still here...just went insane. Will try and get a post up tonight (though as tired as I am at 3pm I don't see that happening) or tomorrow.

Rites Of Passage (a High Fantasy/Forgotten Realms Adventure)

no worries. I figured you would turn up eventually. :-)

Rites Of Passage (a High Fantasy/Forgotten Realms Adventure)

@orcpunx--you are up to take the reins for awhile.

@shadowefil--I assume you are still with us, will just write as if you are and just silent/preoccupied for awhile so your character will be ready for you when you come back.

Group B (@bunnita & @PhantomSekai)
I won't be writing adventures for you two until I know for sure if you are still here. If you are feel free to post here or in character. Orcpunx will guide your two characters toward the main group if you need. If you want to come back at any time all it takes is a note, we can write you into and out of the story with ease.

Rites Of Passage (a High Fantasy/Forgotten Realms Adventure)

The rain remained steady as the dreary day began. Even the sun had a hard time penetrating the gray of the day, and the whole day had an aura of heaviness. The rain muffled all sounds save itself, drowning everything in its steady noise. Even the fire, carefully babied and tended, went out in the constant wet.
For those on the road, the hard packed road soon became slightly mucky. A few centimeters of water lay everywhere, there was no way to walk without getting soaked from above and below.

Everything faded in the wake of the constant wetness. Even the river grew hazy despite its closeness, as it seemed to fade into the grayness of the rain. Above in the sky gray clouds stretched as far as one could see, a sign the rain would not be letting up any time soon. This was fall verging on winter, it was the rainy season here on the edge of the High Forest, a time when the rains filled the cisterns and lakes and when people used the rains to soften the ground so that they could do the hard labor of clearing the fields for planting come spring.

To those local to the area the rain wasn't a surprise, just a serious inconvenience. They were used to working through the rain and knew that a good rain would come through every couple of 10-days regular as clockwork. Travel in the rain was a different story.

Most folk rode horses, the strong animals could handle even the thickest muck. Travel on foot was nearly unheard of. But if you kept your head down and kept moving it was certainly possible.

***Group A***

Brisa finished her study in the rain, ignoring her misery till it was over. But when she was done and closed her spell book, a book magically protected from the rain in such a manner as she was not, she realized she was completely wet. Blinking raindrops from her eyes she stood up, stretched, and moved to see what the others were doing. It didn't look like the rain was going anywhere and she couldn't figure what good it would do to wait it out. She hoped they wouldn't actually.

She was not a seasoned traveler by any means but she was of the opinion that wet and moving was better than wet and standing still. She made her way to Argurios, she was no healer but she did try to discern how he was feeling, if he was hurt bad, and where. Not that she could do anything, but maybe she could make things easier on him. At the same time she was thinking about Aiden's question.

“No” she said in a tone that seemed to suggest even she was surprised. “I know nothing of what is around here.” She had her book of druid maps but what she had just realized is that while it mentioned dangers in terms of words; she had no idea what they meant. For instance one space said “Couatl live here.” She hadn't a clue what that was. She had thought she just hadn't translated the language right...but what if that was correct and it was just a word she didn't know. How much else had she mistranslated. Her eyes glassed over slightly as she realized what this might mean, how far she would have to backtrack in translating but how far forward it would leap her if she did it right. She stared into the rain, her mind clearly elsewhere, rain pouring down her face, as she mulled this over.

Rites Of Passage (a High Fantasy/Forgotten Realms Adventure)

well I will be going on regardless of posts soon. I had hoped for another but so be it. Everyone can trickle in when they are available.

and just for you orcpunx

Rites Of Passage (a High Fantasy/Forgotten Realms Adventure)

good grief I didn't realize how badly written my last post was. I apologize and will broom through it later in an attempt to make it a bit neater.

Rites Of Passage (a High Fantasy/Forgotten Realms Adventure)

----Groups A & B-----
The rain didn’t let up, all through the night. It was soft, and pleasant, but the unending drops soon soaked everything that wasn’t well protected down to the core. Soft and pleasant turned to chilly and soggy. The fires soon hissed and died out, but fortunately by the time they gave up a very dark dawn was on the horizon. Neither the road, nor the river, offered much shelter from the rain, and as light finally filled the sky the children could see that it was fighting a losing battle against the clouds. Thick and gray they stretched as far as the eye could see in all directions. The question became to wait out the weather or push on regardless.

-----------------------------Brisa---------------------------
For Brisa she wasn’t bothered, well she was, she hated it, but she would carry on. The only true difficultly presented was her morning studies. She normally woke extra early and by the light of the fire she studied both her book of maps, worked on her translations of the strange language, and memorized her spells. Then she would prepare breakfast for herself and Argurios, usually leftover meat from the night before reheated in the fire and if they were lucky a corn cake or two also left over from the previous night. This morning she still had to study, a spell had to be learned, but the rest of her work went untended. Breakfast would be cold and from their travel supplies, she absently munched on a piece of unknown dried fruit as she bent her mind to the task at hand.

Raindrops spilling down her face, eyes, chin, she bent her mind to the task. This journey had been stellar for one thing…concentration. She could tune out everything else to focus on a single thing, in this case the arcane words and formulas that she was committing to memory. Cantrips were simple things, but she was very young for a magician, young in mind and young in magic, and they still took much of her focus.
Still in a tiny sliver of her mind she began to wonder if she couldn’t push herself, expand her mind, learn more magic. With no teacher she had assumed it would be impossible, but would it really? She would mull that over for the next several days, trying to decide if it was possible to teach herself magic.

----Hairlissa (NPC)----
The being known as Hairlissa in a hollow created by an upended tree. The shadows in the hollow kept her concealed from almost everyone, and those creatures that wandered too close soon wandered away for she was unlike anything the natural denizens of this land had ever encountered.
Though her body, human at the moment, hairless and naked, remained here her mind was far away. She was deep in meditation and communion with her god. The chill and rain went unheeded. As an ectothermic creature all it would do was serve to make her sluggish anyway, she didn’t get cold. She got slow.
She had tracked the dark priests from their homeland, knowing they were up to no good. The dark god wasn’t well received in Chult, his cults were secretive and small, but here in Faerun he was unknown, and growing in power rapidly. Too rapidly for her own god’s comfort.

Hairlissa had been considered weak, an inferior among her own people, until it was learned she walked with the god’s favor. Now this pureblood had become one of the most powerful of her species, a favored of her god. And she had followed the priests on his command, to learn what she could and stop them.
But with the growth of Eshowdow’s power, with the flood of new worshippers fueling him, even she would not be able to stand against him. So she watched, and studied, and listened. And she saw what Eshowdow and his priests hadn’t. She saw children escape the shadow-enslavement or zealot-law of their own homes. She saw children go unnoticed by priests and dark god alike. She saw determination, a will to live, and more importantly she saw a spark of revenge burning in some of them that could be fanned into a flame . Human children, or mostly human anyway, weak and soft yet there was something there. Something unnoticed and unremarked on, so small and insignificant were they that they just slipped through the cracks.
So she pondered what she had learned and how to use it as she poured out her mind to her serpentine god.

watch, study, learn came the reply

Should she help?

Lurk, hide, observe.

It was clear, if the children could not survive they were not the answer. But if they could, if they made it to the sea port, then and only then….

speak, aid, poison

She opened her orange-gold eyes on that last word. Poison. She knew poison in all its glory. Not a poison of the body. A poison of the mind and heart. Some were halfway there already. Hate and revenge tinting their souls. It was a good start. Poison would strengthen them. She would see to it.