Astvanor Session 190 (8/14)

[cinaed]

Session 190: Month of Veksdan (8/14)

Mixie says they can’t find Endive anywhere. They checked where the groom was getting married, they checked the food tables, they checked everywhere they could think of. He wouldn’t run away from his wedding. And if he has, she needs him to be found so she can kill him herself.

Galowen says he wouldn’t do that and she agrees. She explains he was last seen going over his vows behind the tavern. She gestures at the building where people are coming and going with food.

Az says that will be a good place to start. Galowen asks why Endive doesn’t have anyone to look for him, and Mixie says that they’re the only ones she trusts not to snitch to Yesra. When Diana leans to Yolov and asks why they shouldn’t tell the bride, Yolov says that they don’t want to disrupt her wedding, whether that’s causing her to be worried about Endive getting lost or something worse where she has to kill someone.

The group goes in the direction Mixie pointed them in, where they see several people. There’s a half-elven woman who is grabbing at a tiefling and then yanks her hands away from him and says they weren’t stealing anything. The group watches the two bolt away, debating among themselves about the ethics of thieves stealing from a stolen wedding.

Galowen ignores this back and forth, focused on finding Endive. He sees some trampled grass and sticks, implying someone was pacing a great deal. Endive was maybe pacing when he was here. Az studies the space as well, but there’s no other set of footprints there.

They both notice that at some point there had been some kind of scuffle near one of the bushes. There’s flattened foliage and a half-crushed bush. There’s also a handful of feathers, some as long as the length of Galowen’s arm. Galowen knows it’s too big to be an aarakocra and absolutely belongs to a monster of some kind.

When he turns it over and examines it more, it’s almost like a roc. That doesn’t make sense. Rocs are too big for this area. Someone would have spotted them. Even as he thinks this, the roc’s feathers disappear from his grip.

Audacity casts See Invisibility and sees more feathers just sitting there in the Ethereal Plane. When he looks around, he sees that many of the feathers are by the destroyed bush. He also notices a handful of glimmering feathers on the Ethereal Plane going away from the tavern side and further towards a small copse of trees a quarter mile away.

Audacity points in that direction.

They all begin to walk with purpose towards that copse, until he leads them to a tree that is the tallest one there. Most notable about it is a collection of these feathers strewn about the base of this tree. This is probably the tree the roc has been roosting in.

Audacity begins to sneak up the tree, keeping himself from stepping on any loose branches or particularly crunchy leaves. He makes it up the majority of the tree before he hears a little chirping sound and then another chirping sound. He pokes his head up and looks into the Ethereal Plane where there’s a nest containing Endive and three roc babies.

Endive is on his knees and reaching as far up into the tree as humanly possible, fixated on something. A handful of feet above him is a green booklet, clearly his vows. He only notices Audacity when Audacity is right next to him.

Endive chatters at him even as Audacity retrieves the notebook, excited about seeing him and that they could attend the wedding. Together with Hava, they get him down. As soon as he lands, he starts profusely thanking them even while they all shoo him back towards the wedding venue.

Mixie is there to greet them, demanding the tea. When they tell her about the roc, she exclaims that this is the third time. Apparently Endive draws blink creatures to him. She doesn’t know if he’s cursed or not. She shoos them to go sit down before the bridesmaids get angry.

They ask about which side they should sit on and are told there’s not a bride or groom side. When Mixie adds that everyone would sit next on Yesra’s side, the party disagrees, saying they would have sat on Endive’s side. Mixie admits that anyone who actually knew Yesra would choose Endive’s side as well.

The Hooligans all find different spots on the left side of the seats, Galowen, Az, Audacity, and Dwayne towards the back, Hava and Taion and their babies in the middle, and Yolov and Asa towards the front with Yolov nervous about where the mother roc is.

The music begins. They all instinctively look towards the entrance, where, wearing a long white dress with coiling red snakes on her bodice, is Yesra. Her hair is a half-buzz cut with the rest of her long hair tumbling down her back. She has a wedding bouquet of poisonous flowers.

Endive is already teary-eyed and Hava is sobbing into Velik’s hair as she watches.

The priest is a lizardfolk who has a ton of inside jokes that go over the Hooligans’ heads. The vows themselves are short and extremely sweet. Endive’s is all about how he knows how much better his life is with her.

Galowen looks towards the altar as the lizardfolk announces they’re married and that they may now kiss the bride. Still empowered by Yolov’s Foresight, Galowen gets a deep sense memory of blood spattering across his cheek and the sound of fabric tearing. He can hear it as he instinctively tosses Dwayne off to the side towards Glyn and away from the coming danger.

Yesra turns and mouths what the fuck at him as everyone looks at Dwayne sprawled on the ground.

Then something blots out the sun. A sudden darkness descends upon the wedding, as if night has fallen without any warning, as if midnight has forsaken dusk.

It doesn’t last long, because the source of the darkness becomes clear: two large smears of deep void and shadow-stained purple streak down towards the wedding. People begin to scream and run.

This isn’t the roc Yolov was worried about. These things have leathery wings. Two tremendous shadow-stained dragons land in the middle of the wedding, one on the other side of the guests and one almost directly on Az.

Its claws knock Az aside, sending that blood spray across Galowen. It rears its head back and screams, a piercing, echoing howl. They are all hit with a poisonous and forceful breath, Yolov taking the worst of it.

Audacity strikes out at the dragon that just attacked them, hitting it twice. He realizes that even his magical staff is doing less damage than expected as he casts branding smite upon his staff.

The dragon slaps him with its tail in retaliation. When it strikes him, it feels cold and frigid, a cold that shouldn’t feel like anything but ripples through him. There’s something wrong about these dragons. Even the color and shape of them is wrong.

Taion has taken both babies and is sprinting into the woods, calling for Hava to deal with this. Hava uses Channel Divinity to cloak them all in protective twilight before she moves further away from that dragon and towards Yesra and Endive and casts Mass Healing Word.

The dragon lunges down towards Az, trying to bite him, while Audacity hits it again and Galowen interposes himself to take the brunt of the attack.

Audacity examines this dragon. His paladin oath speaks to him, telling him that these dragons are from the material plane but they have had something similar done to them like Iceclaw back in Radiscune. He sees the faintest tinge of green under the shadow when he hits the dragon and remembers that in the Tessvar forest north of Staghart they had made a game of capturing green whelps. These two have been similarly captured and abused.

He reports this to the group.

Galowen debates Dispel Magic before he strikes out with his sword. Both attacks hit, radiant light flashing across his blade. The dragon has taken some injury, but still looks sturdy as the other dragon eats one of the guests and stalks towards the Hooligans.

This one opens up his mouth and sends another wave of poison and force on them again. Yolov looks badly hurt, taking the brunt of the attack once more as the others mostly manage to mitigate the breath attack.

Az teleports over to Yolov and Dimension Doors them both to the opposite side of the fight.

The dragon goes after Hava and bites her.

Yolov examines the dragons and knows their current state stretches beyond the normal concept of what a transformative event would be. It isn’t a curse or a spell, nor an ongoing change, but he does know Dispel Magic can temporarily subdue the effects, making it no longer resistant to magic for a few seconds. These dragons have been irradiated with the energy that is suffusing them, a long, constant and consistent exposure. Whatever was done to them took a long time and much like what happened to Victoria, this is the result of the continued desperate experiment.

The thing that makes him the most nervous is that this one was successful, or at least more successful than Victoria. He attempts to dispel magic on one of the dragons but is unsuccessful.

That dragon attacks Audacity. Both claws slash into him.

Audacity experimentally attacks with his normal scimitar and realizes the dragon isn’t resistant to regular weapons. He strikes it again as it howls in rage and bites Audacity with a tremendous snap of its jaws.

Hava escapes the dragon and casts Spiritual Weapon, striking the one attacking her.

The other dragon strikes Audacity with his tail as Galowen hits it in retaliation. Both sword strikes land, flashing with that divine light again. The second dragon looms over Galowen and attacks him once more, all three claw and bite attacks landing.

Az runs over towards the altar and uses the Wand of Fear on both the dragons. Both dragons are affected, flinching back from Az and their heads bobbing slightly towards the ground, a visceral fear growing in them.

Asa has joined Yolov as he casts Dispel Magic on the dragon that hasn’t been injured. This time the magic takes effect, temporarily banishing the protections.

The injured dragon attacks Galowen again, biting and gnawing and clawing at him with the desperation of a dying thing. The second dragon begins to stomp its feet and look terrified, its gaze fixed on Az before its eyes slip above Az and something else scares it further.

Beyond and behind Az, something gleams. It looks like the reflection of the setting sun bouncing off of metal, hard to make out, but the dragon gets increasingly agitated, making an anxious chittering sound. Hava can’t quite make it out, but Audacity flings up a hand and squints at armor.

With her wedding dress bloodied by people she’s hauled out of the wreckage, Yesra looks over her shoulder and says shit. They need to leave. When Az asks what trouble she’s gotten herself into, she snaps that it’s not her trouble.

The Hooligans realize that they are in Previdian and the approaching danger are soldiers from the Previdian army.

Audacity hits the dragon and begins looking for an exit as Hava races towards Yolov and gestures for Taion to come over with the babies.

Taion begins to run over even as Galowen eyes the injured dragon and tries to take it out with his last few attacks.

Yesra calls for her people to scatter, placing a hand on Az’s shoulder and tells him all things considered it was a lovely wedding. He tells her she looked lovely.

As she pushes him towards Yolov and the army of Previdian draws closer, Galowen cuts the throat of the dragon, killing it. The sight of this breaks the other dragon’s spirit and it begins to fly desperately towards the Previdian army.

The Hooligans and their loved ones gather around Yolov as he teleports them away to the safety of Refuge.