This episode begins with another character flashback. We see Vyr striking down an outsider, her ebony blade slicing through the figure. She sees a flash of blue light and witnesses the figure raise up a bloody hand as the body rapidly withers to a husk in front of her eyes. She finds herself holding a small crystal in her hand as her uncle watches on, seemingly recognizing what happened. He ushers her away from the scene, telling her they must run, and quickly.
As the pale glow of the overcast morning rises, our crew gets an early start heading West towards Gavra. They fast-travel until the morning of the third day of this trek when they spot a large amount of thick smoke on the horizon. Whisper scopes ahead and finds the town of Calgary on fire. He also notices a caravan with Andros markings on the outskirts, seemingly abandoned. As they approach, they find themselves under an ambush. As the attackers draw near Whisper recognizes them as part of his guild, the Stalkers. Notable among this group are two new PC’s. A fighter named Krum, and a rogue named Ego. They lay into Whisper and Ernan, blaming them as the cause of their recent job going sideways.
The group’s attention turns towards the town, and as they approach they hear crying and general noise coming from the town hall building. Walking through the streets they see the aftermath of a massacre. Bodies lying everywhere, torn apart with little regard for decency. Three figures burst from the doors of the town hall, wielding cobbled-together weapons and armor. After convincing them that the new-comers are not a threat, the townsfolk explain what happened. A small contingent of the city guard came and laid waste to the town, wielding a green light that turned neighbor against neighbor. The group offers to assist in cleaning up the remains and looking for survivors. Part of them head off in search of Slim, who they were requested to track down. They find him in his house, but obviously in mental disarray. He was stammering under his breath, talking about being left alive on purpose, needing to spread the word, needing to tell people. As they try to calm the man down, Normandy sees a flash of a figure in some broken glass on the floor. Suddenly the glass erupts as that same figure begins to pull its mass from the shard of glass. Simultaneously, the cabin locks itself up, trapping the occupants. They find themselves facing a mage that has fully emerged. He spoke enigmatic words of suffering, silence, and remembering what must remain forgotten. He ends with, “We will be watching.” and shatters like the glass at his feet.
On the other side of town, the rest of the group investigate some barrels that were brought in on the Stalker’s wagon. They report having taken them in their recent job, but not yet knowing what was inside. Bjorn recognizes the iconography as the same that was on the barrel of darkened glint, which they suspected to be the source of the plague at the farm house a few days prior. Ego and Krum pry open one of the barrels a short distance away and discover that it is indeed full of the same type of black rocks as before. After a quick decontamination and farewell to the towns remaining denizens, they take the barrels away from the population and burn them. Th’Marek appears and informs the group that Ego is infected with the plague, and proceeds to draw the darkness out of him. Ego is cured, but his soul is left unbalanced. Speaking on what this substance might be, the group decides to investigate the process of making Glister from a man Normandy knows in Gavra. They make camp for the night before proceeding into the Wintere Wood.
The next day while traveling through the woods, the group is ambushed once again by a clan calling themselves the Flowers (Dread Stalkers? Stalkers? Who knows…) They strike a parlay for assistance getting out of the woods and on their way to find a light that can cure any ailment. They make camp together and finish out the evening in typical pirate revelry. Somewhere else, we see a group of seven knights walking towards Gavra.
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