Our Mythic Bastionland, Session 18

Here’s the play report for our eighteenth session of Mythic Bastionland, which we played last night. If you’re just joining us, I’d recommend starting at the first session and reading forward from there. It’s all organized in a series, so it should be easy to find the posts that follow the first.

I wrote this a few days after the session, but hopefully my memory held out sufficiently.  The session was once again a bit short due to one player’s family commitments:

We began exactly where we left off, with the Knights waking after a night’s accommodation at the Garden of St. Bristofast. The Knights’ squire Davith:

… had stayed up late into the night, trying to catch the horses, which like all animals in the area, were in a frantic state after the strange omen that the characters  had seen the night previous. (Gigantic red eyes on the horizon that disappeared after a burst of hot air seared across the land.) 

On the way to Caerwyn Keep, the Knights encountered an old woman gathering nettles and thorns from some scrub plants in the hills southeast of the keep. They spoke with her about what she was doing, and she explained that there were stories of The Black Claw, a kind of giant lobster, being abroad. Apparently the monster was said to attack by night, and was said to be repelled by thorns and nettles. (She advised that they throw them into the monster’s “face”). Supposedly the monster had been sighted “up north” along the Gold River, up where it flows into the sea past Port Mullen, and hadn’t been sighted in the area, but the old woman wasn’t waiting around till it showed up to take precautionary measures.

While the Knights were not convinced of her sanity, Sirs Yorick and Leif:

… dismounted long enough to gather a pouchful of thorns and nettles each. Meanwhile Sir Tyack,

never having heard of such a monster, was dubious about the reputed effects of the nettles and thorns and didn’t bother. Then, the Knights bid the elderly woman good day and continued on to Caerwyn Keep.

As they rode along, it was quite apparent that Davith was in a poor state, the horses were no better, but the Knights at least had recovered from some of the effects they’d endured while infiltrating King Aeldrin’s barrow-mound. They set out for Caerwyn Town, where they checked in with Veralak:

… who assured them that the Scab Knight had returned a changed man, much kinder and more Knightly overall, though he’d been reluctant to speak much about what had happened during his absence. One thing led to another, and as the Knights decided to stay the night in Caerwyn Town, they were feted by the locals. Sir Tyack, now much more handsome than usual was even wooed by Veralak and spent the night with her, while Sir Yorick had a drink in the pub and then appreciatively received a report from Davith about the state of the novices that had been sent up from the Garden of St. Bristofast to replace some of the lost guardsmen at Caerwyn Keep. Sir Leif attempted to gather information and “maps” about the Realm from locals, and learned a few details, such as that Mullen Town, a fishing village on the coast, had grown into Port Mullen, among other details.  He made limited progress, though, since most of the common folk of the Realm rely not on maps but rather on itineraries for conceptualizing travel over longer distances. (Just like folks did in the real Middle Ages!)

The following morning, the weather was fair and the Knights set out for Belfin Village, the remnants of the settlement that was destroyed by the Tree back at the start of the this campaign. (Which, in-game, was only a couple of weeks before.) Of course, they had to cross the Gold River, which no longer ran beneath Caerwyn Bridge thanks to the Tree-induced cataclysm. Fortunately, they were able to find an old fellow with a raft willing to schlep them to the far shore. 

During the ride across, the Knights asked the old man if he’d heard anything about the Claw, also known as the Black Lobster, and it turned out the old man had heard some of the same stories as the old woman. Apparently, these were told him by barge-men working the river. The old man showed the others the small pouch of nettles and thorns he was carrying, and reiterated that he’d heard throwing them in the face of the Black Lobster would repel it. Heartened by the confirmation of this folk wisdom, the Knights shared other news of goings-on in the realm with the old man.   

Also during the crossing, Sir Yorick remembered to check his magical prophetic scabbard, and found upon it an image of a lobster-claw emerging from the ground and seeming to attack the last of a trio of figures on horseback, with a half-moon visible in the sky above. (The moon was, indeed, in the half-moon phase at the moment.) 

The Knights rode north to Belfin Village, and on the way they grilled Sir Leif about everything he knew about giants from his own time: 

• Had there been a giant forest in the realm during Lief’s time? No, there hadn’t. 
• Had giants been common in the area? No, giants had passed through from time to time, on business they didn’t disclose to humans, but were mostly harmless and kept to themselves, though occasionally a troublesome giant had to be met by a warband of Knights and taken down. In Lief’s time, the common story was that there was a Realm of Giants somewhere off to the east, and rumors also that giants sometimes dwelled in the Realm of the Sky, though Leif wasn’t sure how true either story was.  

When they arrived at the village, they were greeted by the members of the haggard community whose survivors they’d mostly saved. The poor folk of the village shared what they had with the Knights, and this was much appreciated. Sir Yorick made sure to pass on the news that there would be a tourney at Castle Blackwort a few weeks hence, supposing that there might be opportunities for trade during the event. Belfin Village’s people were grateful for the news, and also shared the fact that they had heard some noises from in the woods to the west—like trees being felled—but had seen neither hide nor hair of the giant Enkel since he left the Village. 

The Knights spent the night in a ramshackle, half-rebuilt hut that the villagers provided them with, and the night passed uneventufully. In the morning, the Knights bade the villagers good day and set out to the west, arriving around midday at the Temple (?) of Mavrydd—the temple-like ruin filled with the image of a green-faced, leaf-haired woman—that they’d run across when they first visited the realm, and where Enkel had agreed to wait for them. 

A surprise awaited them. The dry moat running around the Temple no longer was crawling with oversized ants… but it did stink to high heaven. Also, a young boy of about ten years old, in peasant dress:

  … waved to them from the temple-side of the moat. The lad called out to the Knights, who called out a greeting and asked what had happened to the ants. “Papa Enkel got rid of them!” the boy declared proudly. This set off a wave of confused speculation among the Knights, who after all did not know much about gianrs. Sirs Yorick and Tyack conferred with Sir Leif about the nature of giant reproduction, and whether giants perhaps sprang from the ground, originally human-sized, as infants. Finally, the Knights asked the boy if there was some way across the moat, and the lad pointed them toward a tree that “Papa Enkel” had laid across the moat. Since the horses couldn’t cross that way, Davith agreed to stay and watch them while the Knights went into talk with Enkel. 

The boy led the Knights inside the temple walls, and into the main building. Within, they saw Enkel:

… sitting on the floor, hunched over and distracted. They also noticed, nearby, a woman in peasant garb, busy sweeping the floor of the ruined temple. 

“Oh,” said Enkel, when he noticed the Knights had come. “You’re back.”

And that was where we left off.