Narrative

A Narrative of the Stories told about the Covenant of Sagehollow and its inhabitants.

(Spring) 1190 - Lenton Prison Breakout
The bandits under the command of the covenant heard tale that there was a game of football played in the nearby village of Stratford, this friendly game of football, as was tradition ended in only a few deaths. However due to the property damage that was caused during the game, including vast parts of the village market and the damage to saleable goods, caused the Sheriff of Nottingham; Robert Giscard to deploy solders under the command of his right hand man; Guy of Gisborne, to arrest those who took part in the game for interrupting the tax collection and property of the king.

Guy of Gisborne decided to utilise this moment to make his mark upon Sherwood and the surrounding lands by holding a mass execution of those responsible. Gisborne was given this right as the property damage had interrupted and robbed taxes to be paid to the king, as such was granted under law to conduct executions.

Gisbornes’ men arrested around twenty to thirty people and took them to the village of Lenton to be executed in a public display in five days time. Lenton, approximately a days march from Nottingham, was chosen variety of reasons; firstly being a days march from Nottingham it would dissuade an attempted jail break by the footballers families, secondly they could utilise a jail that Giscard has access too outside of the kings royal demesne.

Not wanting to lets this opportunity for covenfolk pass them bye, The Magi of Sagehollow decided they would subtlety rescue the prisoners within the jail and offer them employment as covenfolk at Sagehollow. The Covenant sent the magi; Arianwen, Essel, Evelyn and Rian on the rescue mission and they were to be accompanied by the companion Little John and the grogs; Silk, Islwyn and Erik.

Heading off in the morning, the group decided to pass though Sherwood as quickly as possible so that they would have amply time to scope out the jail and do some reconnaissance within the village of Lenton. Walking though the Forrest, they headed towards the village of Lidby, Evelyn wanting to experience new things and meet new people was watched like a hawk by the others and Little John was tasked with making sure that the young and rather naive magna was kept within arms reach at all times.

Reaching the village of Lidby the group noticed that it was a small but rather prosperous village with a converted Mott and Bailey castle serving as a rather nice estate for the current forester-in-fee of the south-eastern part of Sherwood; Sir … who had his own personal retinue, (and one of a larger size than his apparent wealth would have suggested) act as the militia of the village. The group attracted the attention of the men and women of the village; as Arianwen was dressed as a noblewomen, Little John stood many feet above the tallest villager and Evelyn’s great beauty attracted and distracted many of the villagers. The group decided to pass though the village quickly, even though Evelyn wanted to stay and speak to the blacksmith of the village and meet new and interesting people, Little John was forced to pick the small maga up and carry her away from village before she caused a scene.

Heading away from Lidby the group headed towards to the village of Hockendale; a village which can only be described as a point on the map, neither particularly wealthy or poor, with a rather simple manor house nearby for the lord of the village (currently vacant). Again the group caught the attention of the villagers and eagerly pressed onwards towards the village of Ernehale. Ernehale was famed in the area for its bee hives and honey, it was a wealthy part of the kings royal demesne outside of Sherwood Forest however and was known for its production of high quality bee’s wax and mead made from the honey.

Just before arriving at Lenton, the group decided to split up; one group would go into the woods and locate the jail outside of the village and the other would head into the village to investigate and ambush the officers and guards in order to make the collection of the prisoners easier. The first group entering the woods consisted of Arianwen, Evelyn, Rian, Little John and Islwyn, this group attracted too much attention when going though the villages and would have caused issues if the guards had spotted them within the village, especially before and after a jail break.

Heading into the woods, the group took longer than expected to locate the jail, as the area they were walking though was not known to most of the group, in the end thanks to Arianwens Gyrfalcon Heartbeast, Little Johns knowledge of the area and Islwyns knowledge of woodland they managed to locate the jail in a few hours. The jail itself was a large L shaped building with the end of the smaller part of the L making up a stable, the wall along the lower part of the L also lead to an underground section supported by minor earthworks. Thanks to Arianwen scouting out the area in bird form, they discovered that other than the guards stationed at the three entrances (underground, main entrance and stable), there were two separate groups of guards who patrolled in a strange pattern meant to prevent people to guessing their rotation speeds. While Arianwen spied out the jail specifications, the guards noticed her in Gyrfalcon form and set a trap hoping to capture the valuable bird in order to sell to the nobility; as only Earls and Kings could own a Gyrfalcon due to their great worth and prestige.

While watching the jail, the ex-soldiers in the group; Little John and Islwyn, realized from the patrols and guards, that there would be a total of eighteen guards in the jail complex; six currently on guard, six resting off-duty inside and six sleeping for a later shift. With this information, the group returned into the woods and prepared a camp for the evening and then would meet up with the second group the next day. Setting up camp took longer than expected due to Islwyn and Little John trying to one up each other with how to set up a camp, while Rian growing tired of his two servants taking too long, decided to take matters into his own hands and correctly set up the camp himself.

Meanwhile in the village of Lenton; Essel, Silk and Erik entered the village disguised as a merchant and his retinue (with Essel using the  ‘Succubus Trick’  in order to turn herself temporarily into a man and act as Silks apprentice). Silk disguised himself as one of his usual disguises “Edward of Southampton” a reputable salt merchant who is currently down on hard times. Heading to the local pub, in order to see if any merchants were present in order to gather information, they ran into “Edwards” old acquaintance; Steve, a del boy-esqe merchant. While harmlessly chatting and gossiping about local news they discovered that Gisborne was preforming the execution to cement his authority after becoming Robert Giscards right hand man and prove that anyone who crossed him would dread the day.

Meanwhile Essel started chatting up the local barmaid and realized from the lack of jailers in the pub, that they must be getting their ale from an alternative source. Thanks that the Barmaid (Alice), she discovered that the Jailers came from Nottingham and were not permitted to drink in the local bars during their tenure at the jail. After two weeks another group would arrive to replace them and the first group would head back to Nottingham to continue to serve under Giscard and Gisborne. Erik decided to chat with the Bar’s bouncers and spent the evening drink and gambling with them and gathering similar information to the others. The group then spent the rest of the evening at the pub, speaking with their various guests before retiring into their room for the evening.

While enjoying the evening in the pub, another guest arrived. He was a larger built man with a tonsure and dressed in a monks habit in his mid to late twenties. Quickly acting on the new guests presence, both Silk and Essel spoke to the man and discovered that his name was Robert or Bob for short and was a Clerk from an Abbey at Derby. He was currently traveling down to Cambridge to deliver some books which had been requested from a patron. Though Silk, they managed to have a look at the books which the man was delivering and discovered that they were a collection of high quality tomes on a variety of subjects, including a good copy of St. Augustine's; ‘City of God’. Realizing this could be advantageous to the covenant they informed him of another collection of scholars who would happily converse and trade books with the abbey; Sagehollow. Speaking further with Bob they discovered that his intended client was a man called; Edward of Milton. Essel’s knowledge of the Order of Hermes revealed that he was a member of the Order and leader of Scholi Pythagoras Covenant in Cambridge, before spending the remainder evening chatting to him and Steve.

The groups met up the following day outside of Lenton to discuss what they had discovered and started to plan how they would break the prisoners out of the jail. Working out that leading a rabble in the dark at night would only cause issues and possible capture, they decided to act early in the morning just after breakfast. To distract the guards and cause a scene Rian would summon a collection of wild Boars, which would either cause a large enough distraction or would cause the guards to try and hunt them. While Rian would remain nearby to summon more animals or provide further distraction if necessary. Meanwhile Arianwen in Gyrfalcon form would fly above the jail and provide look out and if necessary illusions to create extra distractions if further complications arose. Islwyn, Little John and Silk would remain nearby in the woods for once the prisoners were freed to collect them and to provide military back up if required. Essel and Evelyn would head towards to eastern most side of the prison which didn't contain any windows that the guards could see though and would in Essels case teleport inside of the jail and inform the prisoners of their rescue, while Evelyn would bend the stone wall apart to create an entrance for them to escape though.

With this plan concocted, Rian summoned a total of five boars and then decided to assist them with making a further mess; by using some rego-herbam to open the door to the jail cellar, and asked the boars if they wanted to eat the supplies within. The alpha boar was also enchanted with  ‘Beast of Outlandish Size’  to make him more powerful and difficult to deal with. This worked with all of the guards distracted and humorously trying to work out how they were going to remove the boars from the cellar without of the guards getting killed, they also sounded their alarm as might have needed back up to deal with pigs. With this distraction, Essel and Evelyn made their move and got over to the wall where Essel teleported inside.

Inside the jail, Essel discovered a large collection of prisoners; all male. Having been advised by the other magi, Essel was under the appearance of the  ‘Succubus Trick’  and then spoke to the apparent leader of the prisoners; a bloke in his mid twenties who had big belly and seemingly had his nose broken a few times and were told that ‘he and his associates were Mighty Sorcerers’ and friends of Robin Hood and were going to spring them from the jail. At first they seemed hesitant, however realizing that there options were Death by Gisborne or Serving Sorcerers they decided at least for the moment to take the latter. At that point the wall split apart and revealed a smiling innocent looking Evelyn, with her beauty being a great motivator for the prisoners to leave they decided to join and escape.

Meanwhile in the sky, Arianwen discovered that a group of about a dozen horsemen coming from Lenton in the east (the side which contained the hole in the wall) in rather good gear, lead by a man in high quality chain mail and a warhorse and were charging down towards to jail. Logically working out that this would be Gisborne and his Knights, Arianwen conjured an illusion of a group of boars to scare the horses of Gisbornes armed retinue and by the team enough time to complete their mission. This gambit paid off and caused the retinue to be cautious, however the illusion was broken where a knight attempted lance a boar and it went straight though revealing it was an illusion to the cry of  ‘Witchcraft!’ , Gisborne shouted at his men their distraction and stupidity and charged back towards the jail, however Arianwen had been successful in keep them distracted.

The Prisoners followed Evelyn and Essel back towards to the treeline and started to run off into the woods to hide before the guards at the jail managed to get their act together and deal with the boars. Not long afterwards Gisborne arrived, furious. As he immediately spotted the hole and rode over to the sergeant in-charge of the jail and berated him for his incompetence, before his discovered a note left on wall pinned by an arrow with a small pouch attached to it. The note stated the following; '' “Here is a payment for crimes these men have committed. Yours, Robin of Loxley – Loyal Servant of the King” '', within the pouch was a single silver piece. Gisborne's enraged shouting could be heard quite far away by Rian who watched the ordeal and managed to overhear what was happening with an amused look.

Deeper into the woods, the group stopped and the ex-prisoners wanted to know about who they were going to serve and would this endanger their immortal souls. Silk and Essel explained that they would serve the “Good” and christian mages of the Order of Hermes, who abided by laws and didn't consort with demons and that magic wasn't inherently evil, much like a hand wielding a sword, the sword itself is not evil if the hand is good. Moderately convinced they came to an agreement with the Magi that they would see how serving them was like after one year and those that wanted to leave and try and make a new life in somewhere else like Lancashire could. The ex-prisoners agreed to these terms. The leader of the prisoners called himself Eddie and revealed he was a good brawler if they need of him, which was accepted. The Magi promised that the prisoners could keep the profession they had previously if they wanted to, if not they could easily find something they wanted to assist them with and look at training them.

Realizing that heading back though the villages they initially came though with individuals like Evelyn and Little John was foolish, as they were both extremely easy to remember, especially after the jail break and people would be looking for odd occurances, they instead decided to head back ignoring the villages, thanks to Silk and Islwyn they made it back to the covenant before Gisborne's men could organize a proper search due to the boars.

Once they returned, the Magi decided to deal with several other issues pertaining to Sagehollow. The first of this was the Council of Magi; it was decided that council would have three offices that would be filled. The first was Consul; which would run the administration of the Covenant and deal with its hermetic landscape and what issues would arrive from this. The Second was Praetor, who would organize the defense of the covenant, meet with its spymaster and making sure the grogs and other individuals were able to keep the magi and its interests safe. Finally the office of Tribune would not be held by any Magi and would instead he held by an elected Grog and would possess the power of Veto on any legislation put forward by the magi, on the grounds they explain their Veto while using it. This would improve the overall loyalty the grogs had to the mages as their voices would be heard by magi and held some real weight to it. Each of these offices would last for 1 year and would initially be un-elected, with each mage take the roll of of Praetor then immediately taking the role of Consul afterwards, before being allow a four year gap before needing to take over as Praetor once again. Once the initial infancy of the Covenant has been overcome the positions would then become elected by the Magi.

The second issue was that the covenant needed registering with the Mercere house in Coventry; Essel decided that this was a task for her and would take Silk (who was eyed as being the covenants eventual Spymaster, as he would soon be making ageing rolls) due to his unique set of skills and various disguises. This adventure will be told soon….

(Spring) 1190 - Trip to Coventry
About a week after the Magi had enacted the prison break, Sagehollow heard the rumor though Robins men who learnt that in order to save face on the prisoners escaping, Gisborne spread the rumor prisoners were executed in secret at the jail instead of publicly by Gisborne. This meant that the prisoners were legally dead and as such could no longer return to their previous lives in Nottingham.

However while Gisborne and Giscard had been foiled for the moment, there were more pressing issues which required attention. The most pressing issue was the need for the covenant to be registered with the Red Caps at the Mercere House in Coventry. Essel decided to take this issue upon herself, and along with Silk, Little John, Old Giles, Alfred and Theopania began their preparations to head towards Coventry. Silk realizing that they were would need a legal fiction for travel, so that they would not be suspected as bandits or the-like, decided they should disguise themselves as a merchant party, with Silk acting as the merchant and Essel acting as his apprentice.

Heading into Nottingham on Market Day, Essel, in order to foster a good relationship with the grogs, allowed Giles and Alfred to head towards to the pub to have a couple of drinks, after which Essel and Silk would have sorted out what type of cargo they would be transporting in their disguise. Before heading to the pub, Silk and Theopania disguised Little John as a great gruesome hunchback, so that he would not be recognized from his previous escapades in the local area (One of which involved a group of prisoners disappearing). Heading into the pub to garner some information, they discovered that Robin Hood had not managed to garner a great amount of reputation among the people of Nottingham and Sherwood, as unlike with the great legend he is not providing his money to the poor. The party realized that in order to keep the peasants on side, they would need to assist Robin with rectifying this issue.

After gathering this information, the party decided to start collecting their trading goods and complete a few jobs in the city. Silk deciding the easiest form of commerce in this part of England was wool, decided to take on the persona of Malcolm of Manchester and collected the wool for their travels. While going to complete other tasks, Essel and Silk left Old Giles as a guard for the wagon.

Silk decided to go look for contacts for lab equipment on behalf of the Mages, knowing that several of them were utilizing either missing ingredients or had lacklustre ones, While Theopania would looked for bookmakers or binders to assist with Sagehollows very modest library. Essel meanwhile looked for generic contacts for Sagehollow hoping to find individuals who would be good allies in the future once Sagehollow has more resources, and also started looking for more covenfolk, such as finding individuals like whores who wanted a different line of employment.

Both Essel and Theopania discovered that all the parchment comes from the local abbeys and as such a trade agreement would need to be reached with them. However during this investigation, Giles got distracted from guarding the wagon and decided to go have a few beers in the pub. When Silk passed the area where the wagon should be, he discovered that it had been stolen, cursing and swearing, Silk managed to gather the rest of the party in record time. Deciding to bollock Giles later once they had reclaimed their belongings, they started the pursuit of the thieves. Managing to locate which direction they headed off in thanks to some bribes given to a couple of beggars, they realized that the thieves had left Nottingham and were headed outside of the eastern gate towards Newark.

Quickly following the trail, they eventually located the thieves up ahead on the road between Nottingham and Newark. They were a group of six men, the group was armed with small clubs, five of the group walked around the wagon, with the six driving it towards Newark. The party also noticed a Merchant and his party passing the thieves and heading towards Nottingham, deciding that they didn't want the merchant to assist the thieves encase it looked like the Party were the actual robbers, they decided to hide and allow the merchant to pass before reclaiming their stock.

Unfortunately the Merchant and his guards had noticed this and believed the party were planning and ambush and waited. The merchants guards step to the foreground. Silk realizing that the Merchant likely thought they were going to attack them, stepped out and called over to the merchant, after an initial suspicious conversation, Silk informed the merchant they only wanted them to pass, because they were in pursuit of thieves who had stolen a wagon of his merchandise and didn't want to involve the merchant or others on the road (meanwhile Theopania snuck off and continued following the thieves), with Silk still in disguise and the merchant knowing his reputation, he managed to convince the merchant and his guards of their good intentions and allowed them to pass, they merchant also introduced himself as David.

After allowing David to pass, the party quickly caught back up-to the thieves and after observing them, came to the conclusion that the men were drunk and this was simply a drunken scheme they had come up with in the heat of the moment. Not wanting to kill the men if they had to, Essel decided that she would attempt to intimidate them, with Little John (who was armed with a small tree as his gear was on the wagon) and Silk as back up. Calling out to the thieves who stopped and confronted them, Essel put forth a threat. The combination of Essel own frightful demure (a combination of “Aura of Ennobled Presence” and her Piercing Gaze), along with the clearly armed Little John and Silk caused the five thieves to surrender. The sixth thief who was driving the Wagon only had a moment to act before Theopania was beside him, a knife to his throat. Deciding to teach the thieves a lesson, Silk stated they should take all of their clothes and make them walk back into Nottingham naked, Essel disagreed and decided they would only steal a single boot (a suggestion put forth by Alfred), this would make their journey uncomfortable and they would learn their lesson. They also quickly frisked the thieves and reclaimed the items which they had individually stolen from their possessions.

Afterwards, Essel decided the best course of action with Giles was clemency, noting his remorse for his actions. With this brief bit of action sorted, the party decided to continue of their journey towards the town of Newark. To reach Newark they took the ferry over the River Trent; the ferry was a simple raft with a pulley system. Heading into the town proper, Silk and Essel informed the other to be on their best behaviour, as Newark and its Hospital were the headquarters of the Knights Templar in England and they were practically on the doorstep of Sagehollow, this was not an enemy that the covenant could handle, so they needed to keep a very low profile.

For the evening the party stayed at the “Inn of the Red Cross” with their wagon safely secured in a the inn’s barn. Essel decided to keep with her policy of allowing the grogs to enjoy themselves and have another evening of rest and relaxation. Little John and Alfred decided to head towards to bar looking for drinks, Meanwhile Silk and Theopania decided to flirt with each other and play a game of who could steal a single coin from the other while in keeping with the conversation. Giles meanwhile nursed a few beers, deciding to keep on his best behavior after the incident earlier.

The following morning, Essel headed towards to town Church in order to attend Mass. After attending Mass, she noticed Bob the Bookseller (the same Bob she had met a week previous, while Silk was in a different disguise), Bob was speaking with several Templars, who had not only conducted the Mass, but were also present afterwards to speak with others and the local community. One of the Templars Essel spotted was a young, half-arab looking man, this was the individual that was speaking with Bob.

Allowing Bob to finish his conversation, She heartily greeted the young clerk and spoke shop with him, informing him that “his” master was currently at the Inn. Essel, knowing which books the covenant wanted to trade for with the abbey, provided the list of tomes to Bob. Bob stated that he would have the tomes available next season, and that they could meet where they first met in Lenton to trade and any future ones they want to complete could also be done there.

Continuing on their way to Grantham, the party realized they could relax somewhat, as the road was regularly patrolled by Templar recruits, who took a very dim view of banditry in the area, many of the bandits having been impaled on spikes and notes left praying for their immortal souls. Otherwise the journey was rather dull and allowed the party to continue uninterrupted, and by nightfall they had reached the village of Grantham. Once again finding a secure inn to stay at and securing the wagon they headed inside, this particular inn was called “The Weathered Spoon”.

Essel once again decided to reward the grogs with another night off to enjoy themselves. Once again Silk and Theopania decided to amuse themselves by continuing to steal the coin from each other. Eventually growing bored, they decided to stage a fight and pretend to break up and find other individuals to steal from, the person with the highest gains being the winner (this specific round was won by Silk). The party also decided to sell the Wool here in Grantham, so that they might be able to get new merchandise for Coventry, however after speaking with several merchants they discovered they wouldn't even cover the costs of travel and decided to keep the wool for selling at Coventry.

The following morning the party headed on their way to Leicester, knowing that they would not be able to stay at an inn for that evening, they decided to take precautions; They would camp off the road, have watches and Essel would created a ring of darkness around them to disguise any fires needed. Unfortunately on the way to Leicester, the weather turned for the worse and rain started. Even though Silk was skilled at driving the wagon, it eventually became stuck in the mud on the road, causing Little John, Alfred and Giles to push the wagon free. While it took some time, swearing and sweat, they eventually managed to get the wagon free and continue on their route to Leicester. That evening, the party made camp. Alfred cooked the food needed for the evening, Essel created magical defenses, Little John and Giles set up the camp and Silk tended to the animals. Theopania however putting her acting talent to work managed to disguise the fact she was doing any work and managed to get a rather easy evening.

The night passed uneventfully, and with the weather still being foul the following morning, Essel decided to cast “Cloak of the Ducks Feathers” as a spontaneous group spell; succeeding on this, her standing among the grogs improved as they were now dry for the day as the rain continued to pour downwards. By Lunchtime the weather had started to improve and rain stopped, however even with the rain stopping, the road was still a quagmire and difficult to pass though. Luckily, Silk once again came though and managed to keep the wagon on the better drained parts of the road going slightly off the road entirely when necessary. Because of the awful conditions the party decided not to stop of lunch and continued on their way to Leicester. Eventually they came upon a wooded area, in the middle of the road where there was two wagons pulled across it blocking the path, in-front and around the wagon approximately twenty men were position, all armed with small arms and the occasional crossbow. Realizing a possible fight, Essel cast “Wizards Sidestep” and Little John located his pole-axe, the other also prepared for combat.

Deciding to be sporting, the party continued forward like there was no problem to let the bandits make their “Your Money or Your Life!” threat. Alfred also spotted that there were no further bandits in the wood nearby, as Essel, Little John and Giles step forward to greet the Bandits. Meanwhile Silk, Theopania and Alfred would hold back and guard the wagon and also prepare for an engagement if required. Essel cast “Aura of Ennobled Presence” upon herself and begins to banter with the Bandits who requested that they would have to handover half of their good and all the change they had on them in return of passing, Essel made a counter offer that they surrender and give us everything they owned. The Bandits scoffed at this, so with Little John stepping forth to protect Essel from Archer fire, Essel cast “Topple the Brutish Band” and threw half of them on the right hand side into the wagons, this also knocked the crossbowman down. Essel once again made her threat, and terrified the group ran, leaving some of their friends behind.

While most who were knocked down by Essel escaped; the Crossbowman was still slightly in shock and was unable to pull himself together before the party was upon him, and another man had taken a nasty head wound and was unconscious. Little John quickly confiscated the Crossbow, and they pulled the guy who had taken the nasty head injury out of the mud so he wouldn't drown. The party quickly moved the wagons out of the path and to prevent similar issues from arising in the future, they removed the wheels from the wagons to use as firewood (and to greatly annoy the bandits) with Little Johns pole-axe. As Silk passed, he decided to have one final piece of fun and put the hand of the guy who had taken the head injury and put it on the mans crotch, as to place him in a compromising position, chuckling to himself as they continued to Leicester.

The journey towards Leicester continued fairly uneventfully, until Silk spotted a small group of figures in the woods off to the side. The group seemingly consisted of two people in heavy cloaks, deciding to be friendly Silk called out to them. Discovering that the two were Women, and that they were heading towards Leicester they decided to tag along encase of further problems like the Bandits further up the road (Silk realized that they only stated they were going to Leicester due to the fact the Party was). Theopania meanwhile also noticed that the pair were wearing Nuns habits, after a bit of word play from Silk and Theopania, they decided to disguise the two young women who we’re called Arianne (the talkative and smaller of the two) and Caitlyn (the silent and larger of the two).

Having arrived at Leicester unimpeded (minus a few times the wagon needed to be removed from the mud), they headed towards a local inn to spend the evening. Once at the inn the party had another night off, Silk spotted an old acquaintance of one of his other disguises (Edward of London) a money broker called Joseph the Jew. Joseph almost spotted Silk though his disguise, however due to being a master spy, Silk managed to get away with his current disguise. Essel meanwhile managed to speak with both Arianne and Caitlyn and listened to their backstory; they were on the run from their Nunnery as both were not suited to the lifestyle of a Nun. Seeing an opportunity for more covenfolk (especially female covenfolk) offered them employment at the covenant, something the young women said they would consider.

Elsewhere in the pub, Silk and Theopania decided to organize a huge pub fight, so that they could either make money or steal it. Going into separate disguises, organized a fight between Old Giles and Little John. A combination of Leadership and Guile won out and they attracted a huge crowd for the event, and swayed the crowd to put a large bet on Little John, as due to his monstrous size, he would likely win the fight. Meanwhile Silk and Theopania placed all their money on Old Giles (a veteran brawler), Old Giles, wiped the floor with the Ex-Varangian and the evil minded pair managed to make a good amount of winnings from the fight. During this time Alfred spent the evening chatting up the local Barmaid, he was successful in this endeavour and retreated away to spend the evening ploughing the young women

The following morning the party arrived at Coventry, decided to deal with all of their business in one go, they sent Theopania over to the Mercere House to announce that Essel of Bonisagus would be arriving shortly. And the others would deal with the wool which they had purchased in Nottingham, Sadly the wool didn't turn a great profit, but it didn't lose any money either, so managed to accomplish its task of being a good disguise for Essel’s travel.

After selling the wool, the party headed for the Mercere House, the Mercere House took the form of a lovely farming estate and a manor house. Outside of the estate by the stables were several very fine horses, clearly bearing the distinction of the Templars, meaning that they were currently visiting the Mercere House. Arriving at the door they are met by Percy the Red Cap, along with his bodyguard another giants blooded individual. While dealing with the issue of the covenants registry, Essel asked that as Sagehollow was built on the ruins of another Covenant could they please have the report which showed what Vis Sources and other resources were utilised by the previous covenant. Percy quickly realized and informed Essel that the only Covenants which were lost previously were Diedne covenants during the Schism War. This documentation would also be difficult to locate as the Mercere House in England was torched by the Diedne during the War, however copies of the previous covenants holdings might be found at Durenmar and Harco. Essel being from Durenmar decided she would send a message to her Parens asking for this information to be sent over to her.

Percy also revealed that about sixty-five to seventy years ago there was a Tytalus Magus who who lived in Sherwood, and had even registered his Sanctum in the woods nearby the covenant. However no-one has heard from him in a very long time, and his mail was being re-directed to a magna at Cad Gadu, unfortunately this magna died a short while ago in a laboratory accident. The name of the Magus was Regulus, and Percy recommended they have a look into his whereabouts, he also recommended that they head towards Cad Gadu and look to see what mail was collected by his deceased friend Mara.

Essel also utilised this moment to advise the Percy to send out a message to all the other Covenants in England, that Essel would be taking on the Position of the Spring Tenens in the tribunal and would be regularly visiting the other covenants. Percy agreed, and he would send out messengers to advise the tribunal of this. He also stated he would be sending a Red Cap back to Sagehollow to get information on its location and gather other important information about the site and its occupants.

After the conversation with Percy, Percy advised Essel that there was a guest at the House who wanted to speak to her personally. Leading Essel into another room, they met with a young women in her early twenties. She introduced herself as Fredegisa of Guernicus, one of the Junior Quaesitors of the Tribunal. Fredegisa advised Essel that if they were going to break prisoners out of a jail with a hole in a wall, it might be a good idea to close the wall up afterwards, she also refused to provide how she came about this information. Another fact she kept to herself was her questioning of Theopania on the subject an hour or so earlier, who being formerly associated with Fredegisa's covenant was honest in what rumours she had heard while not providing any actual confirmation or proof. Theopania too kept this to herself, though she never had the chance to warn Essel in any case.

Essel saw no reason to lie to the Quasetor's face, especially as one of the most recognizable participants (little John) and one of the freed prisoners (Old Giles) were in the same room! Essel also hoped to prevent further investigation which could have revealed the covenant's links with Robin hood and the source of the covenant's income. Fredegisa was also a mage Essel hopes to help in the rebuilding of the tribunal (being a reformist) and didn't want to start the relationship with a lie. Fredegisa then went on to explain that she would expect more discretion from the covenant in the future and that she might have a suitable way for the Covenant to deal with another issue in recompense, the issue however was highly delicate.

Fredegisa explained to Essel that a group of Templar's had arrived at the Mercere house looking to purchase magic items, she also explained that it looked the Templar's were window shopping and probably didn't know what kind of items they wanted, this was likely part of a greater scheme or plan, but the order didn't want the Templar's as potential foes, and as Sagehollow has a Verditius Mage, it would be in their interests to create a deal with the Templar's. Her reasoning for this was because Sagehollow’s Verditius magi was young and freshly gauntleted, the items that the Templar's would request could not be exceedingly powerful, as might be the case with an older Verditius magi.

Fredegisa suggests that Essel convince her fellow covenant magna to be on side for this task, and it would not only be useful for the Tribunal, with the Templar's on side, but could also be beneficial for Sagehollow and the Verditius magna personally. Essel agreed, certain she could convince the quirky Evelyn to take on the task.

Leading Essel to another room, Fredegisa introduced Essel and her group to the Templar's, before promptly leaving, although likely keeping an ear on the conversation by mundane means. The Templar's were lead by a half-arab man called Ser Balian; The same man who was talking to Bob back in Newark, he also had a scholarly looking individual of Mediterranean decent alongside him, who was advising the Templar in Greek. Little John managed to catch a portion of the conversation, before the Scholar recognized him as a Varangian previously in service to the Roman Emperor.

Ser Balian greeted Essel and began discussions over the magic items that he wanted to commission. Ser Balian was surprised when Essel explained that the item would be created by a female Armour-smith, however kept his thoughts to himself. Essel only knowing moderately what Evelyn could accomplish at her currently skill level, explained what kind of items the Templars could order, and informed them that these items by the laws of the Order of Hermes would be quite expensive and would have to be staggered to keep within laws of the Order. Ser Balian agreed to these terms and stated price would not be an issue, nor would the cost of the materials to make the item. Eventually the two came to the conclusion that two items were to be created, the first a helmet that would allow the person wearing it to breath underwater. The second a suit of chain-mail that would allow the wearer to be fireproof.

Essel, unsure on the necessary timescales that Evelyn would require to make these items, stated that the first item would be created by Winter this year the second by Autumn the next year. Ser Balian agreed to these terms. Essel however would now need to buy several pawns of Vis in order to allow Evelyn to create these items; the vis needed would be one pawn of Auram Vis (that Evelyn could study), five pawns of either Creo or Auram vis and five pawns of either Rego or Ignem, along with specific supplies necessary to create the item via shape and material bonuses.

Before leaving the Mercer house, Essel wrote 3 letters, one to be left for Fabian the redcap when he returns, written in cipher asking for books on Area lore Stonehenge tribunal (politics) and/or Order of Hermes Lore (one every year)as per the Blackmail story hook. The second in Trianoma cipher to the Shadow tower (Trianoma tower) at Durenmar asking for information about the former Diedne covenent. And the third to the same place naming Ser Balian and his associate 'a person of interest' in her capacity as the Spring tenens.

With these issues accomplished, the party headed back towards Sagehollow with Rufus the Red Cap as a companion.

(Spring) 1190 - Hunting Down the Vis
About ten days after Essel left for the Mercere House in Coventry, the young Maga returned with a Red Cap named Rufus in tow. Upon his return, Little John was provided a letter bearing the seal of the Roman Emperors court, upon reading the letter, the giant man, packed his belonging and informed the magi, that he had been summoned by the Roman Emperor for an important undertaking, it might be several years before they see him again; however if they required assistance while in Constantinopolis, he would gladly help them. Knowing that the Magi needed to be informed of what she had learned in Coventry, Essel summoned the remaining magi to a tent at Sagehollow and began a Council meeting. The individuals in attendance were; Arianwen, Edric, Essel, Evelyn, Rian and Tribune Ellie.

The first order of business decided upon by Essel was to inform the covenant that they were now registered with Mercere House and future letters and mail would be delivered accordingly, She then went on to explain her meeting with the Quaesitor Fredegisa, and how Sagehollows had been caught meddling with the Mundanes, while this wasn't an official reprimand, it was a simple conversation about if they intended to meddle with the local Mundanes, at-least have the common sense to remove any evidence (such as holes in walls) from the scene of the crime. This immediately was capitalised on by Edric, who raised the issue of how she knew of the Covenants activities; suggestions of possible scrying, a spy among the new grogs or possibly even Theopania being a spy (as Fredegisa is from Schola Pythag, as was the young grog).

Essel then mentioned that in exchange for this issue being dropped, the covenant would have to deal with another issue that Fredegisa had; namely the Templars looking for magic items. Essel immediately volunteered Evelyn for this job, much to the young maga surprise and protest. In the end however Evelyn agreed to make the items for the Templars and would even generously give all of the funds made from their creation to help Sagehollows problematic funding issues. However she would need someone to act as a Venditor for her, and she would also like to meet the individuals who had requested the items from her (much to Essel’s horror).

With that immediate issue resolved, the mages turned to some of the other pending issues that needed resolving; Firstly Essel brought forth an idea she had formulated while on her journey to Coventry; She mentioned that several working ladies of somewhat ill employment had expressed an interest in leaving their pimps and would very much like alternative employment, the other mages agreed with this sentiment and agreed that in this issue, leaving none of the future covenfolks employers alive would be the best possible avenue as this would prevent witnesses and would also prevent any future retaliation from the pimps.

Edric brought forth the second agenda; Sagehollow required more income sources, the run in with Fredegisa had made it apparent that Sagehollow had gotten very lucky with the Quaesitor not learning about their primary income source, it was universally agreed upon by the magi, that removing the bandits as an income source was a very high priority and would require a serious look at in the next few seasons. Edric suggested that the covenant look into Usury as a possible income source, this idea however was pushed back on by both Essel and Evelyn, both of whom didn't want to endanger their immortal souls by committing Usury. Edric did however suggest that rather than interest being charged (which was the sin), that they instead lend the money with resources and services to be charged instead in-case of late payments. This still hadn't garnered great support, however it was an avenue of pursuit that the mages agreed to look into.

The next item brought forth was by Evelyn, who advised that Sagehollow desperately required Vis sources. Not only for the covenants ‘’Aegis of the Hearth’’ which would expire in Winter, but also for Evelyn to create magic items for Sagehollow. Evelyn suggested that Edric look into this matter, as he possessed the greatest skill in Intellego of any of the magi present. Edric reluctantly agreed, and stated that once the council was over, he would gather a team of grogs and start trying to locate some Vis sources. To assist Edric, Evelyn stated that Robin had previously mentioned of an old Roman temple located in a glade to the south west.

Following on from this conversation, Essel mentioned that the Red Caps in Coventry, informed her that there was another Hermetic Mage located very close by. A Tytalus Magus by the name of Regulus, had registered his sanctum in a patch of Forrest to the north of the Covenant approximately sixty-five to seventy years ago. While he hadn't registered any Vis Sources, it would be a good idea to locate him (or what remains of him) and possibly negotiate deals for Vis with him. The Red Caps also mentioned that he has having all of his mail re-directed to Cad Gadu; to a maga named Mara, who had recently perished in a laboratory accident. Rian was volunteered to head this investigation into the Tytalus mage, and would be locating the woods that the mage at set his sanctum within shortly.

Edric building upon what Evelyn had been told by Robin, stated that the covenant should possibly look to investigate Newstead Abbey, Evelyn suggested that because Sagehollow was collecting the books procured by Bob in Lenton during the summer, it would be a very easy detour to investigate the Abbey while on that journey to collect the books, the other magi agreed and would advise the grog team sent to collect the books to also investigate the Abbey on the way.

The next agenda to be discussed by the magi, was covenant duties to be undertaken by the Mages. The mages all agreed that they would spend the summer writing books for the covenant; Edric would write a tractatus on Magic Theory, Essel a tractatus on Rego, Rian a tractatus on Creo and Arianwen a tractatus on Parma Magica. These would also be written in the Summer, this would allow Haeddi (a failed apprentice from Durenmar) who was gifted with the art of figurine magic to create some wax figures to boost some of those writing books so that they are of a higher quality, Haeddi would also be writing a tractatus on magic theory in the summer. This would mean that each mages had spend a season on Covenant Duties. Evelyn however would be creating the magic items for the Templars as her duties to the covenant and would be spending three seasons on this as opposed to the single season the other mages were doing.

The final agenda was who would be voted into the two covenant offices; Praetor and Consul. Deciding that Essel had already fulfilled part of the Consul role in dealing with the Red Caps at Coventry, the Magi decided that Essel would make the most compelling candidate for the role. This would also benefit Sagehollow as Essel would be continuing to undertake her role as the Spring Tenens and as such would be visiting the other covenants within the tribunal and could also complete any necessary work that might be required as Consul of Sagehollow.

For the position of Praetor however, it initially didn't garner much enthusiasm from the Magi present, as none of them wanted to spend a year dealing with the defense and security of the covenant. Evelyn however deciding that making the magic items for the Templars did technically constitute as assisting to the defense of Sagehollow, as it would be making the Templars located in Newark more friendly to their presence, decided to take the position of Praetor for this year. While this did cause the magi some concerns, as the young maga was rather naive and excitable, it was confirmed that she would have to preform this office eventually and it would probably be best if she did so before Sagehollow made too many enemies.

With the Council of Mages concluded, Edric decided to complete his promise to the other mages and locate some Vis Sources nearby the covenant. To this end, he gathered the grogs; Thorfinn, Byrne and Osanna to protect him as he journeyed into the wilderness. With the grogs gathered, Edric decided to capitalize on the advice that Robin had provided Evelyn and head towards the south west looking for the a possible vis site. Edric easily cast a spontaneous spell to allow him to sense nearby vis, and was able to hear three possible sites nearby while at Sagehollow, with the closest to the south west (as Robin had suggested). Heading south west, the party took one of the many hidden paths known by the covenant towards Newstead Abbey. Edric could hear the humming of the Vis from towards a large section of woods.

The woods before them was rather dense and overgrown, huge walls of brambles, nettles and fallen trees marred their route. Deciding to try and find an easier way though the woods, Edric ordered that they travel around the woods looking for a good entrance that was easier to traverse. Spending a few hours looking around the edge woods (during this time the spell was dropped, as Edric noticed the sound was coming from towards the centre of the woods) they managed to locate a possible path; an old animal track on the southern edge of the woods which was heavily overgrown, but somewhat more traversable than the other parts of the woods.

Entering the woods, their initial approached was easy for most of the part. Edric however has some issues with traversing the path (mostly due to his size and girth), this lead to him almost headbutting a tree due to slipping on some mud. While his walking stick was broken, he managed to escape from this without injury. Continuing though the woods, and having several more troublesome paths, they managed to make good progress without too many issues. On the journey the party located several tracks of what seems to be a huge dog or wolf, the creature was far larger than it should have been and caused the group to be on guard in-case the creature was nearby, however Osanna had determined that the tracks were at least several days old, so there should be no immediate threat. This continued until Bryne deciding to take an alternative route from the others over an obstacles managed to fall though a floor of brambles and nettles into a Brooke running though the woods. The brambles and nettles scratched delicate areas of his anatomy and caused some discomfort, unfortunately the brambles also locked into the straps on Byrne’s armour and caused him to get stuck in the bramble floor.

Thorfinn, anchoring himself down managed; with Byrne’s assistance, to pull Byrne out of the bramble floor and Osanna got to work with making poultice out of Doc Leaves to alleviate Byrne’s injuries. Meanwhile Edric kept watch on the situation alongside Thorfinn once he had extracted Byrne from the brambles. While the poultice was being applied to Bryne, Thorfinn noticed movement in the trees about twenty metres away from where Thorfinn stood. In the woods was a huge black dog, its fur as black as night and eyes as crimson as blood. Evidently cautious, he alerted Edric and the others subtly. It became apparent on a short inspection that the hound was clearly intelligent and watched the party curiously for a few moments before heading further into the woods towards the south east.

Breathing a sigh of relief, the party continued on their journey though the thick overgrown path, spending the next several houses making slow progress. Finally the party reached a glade within the centre of the woods, the glade had a deep green colour too it and several large boulders were staggered around glade. The thickness of the canopy was so intense it was almost impossible to see the sky, and the green light shining though the trees was intensified by the vast volumes of wet slippery moss covering the floor.

Working into the glade following the noise that Edric could hear after recasting the spell. They discovered two upright columns. The columns clearly of Roman design were followed by further columns which had collapsed, several small walls could be seen alongside the reminiscence of a roof, two large boulders also blocked an area which lead into an underground section. The area was clearly the Roman ruins which Robin had mentioned, quickly searching around the area before looking into the underground section, they discovered a collection of partial damaged inscriptions, which read; VE//US //ENET//IX. Studying the inscriptions Edric came to the conclusion that the temple was dedicated to the Roman Goddess; Venus Genetrix, also known as Venus the Mother.

After re-casting the spell, Edric realized that the sound he was hearing, was in the underground section of the temple. Knowing that they would be without light sources, the party created several torches and proceeded into the bowls of the earth. Inside the temple they saw that the place was completely overgrown with moss and other vegetation, a small amount of light was at the far end of the temple, however vines and other flora made it almost impossible to see the other side. Taking their time, the party headed towards the southern wall of the temple (which was easier to traverse, due to two collapsed columns – the roof being held up thanks to pressure and plant-life), seeing that on the walls there were several torch sconces, Thorfinn light one of the spare torches and placed it within one, so that if the party did fall over, they would still have a light source. By this point they could see what the light at the other end of the temple was illuminating. Upon a raised Altar was a skeletal body, both of the skeletons hand was grasped around an iron dagger which had been plunged into their ribcage. Edrics spell (which had been re-cast) showed that the vis source was on the body; specifically the dagger.

Heading over to the skeleton to investigate further, Thorfinns leg was grabbed by a skeletal hand. Several other skeletons began to reveal themselves from the moss around the temple, all armed with Pilums and Gladius’s. The Skeletons having the jump on the party managed to inflict some minor injuries to Thorfinn, however, other than causing Osanna to drop her shield (due to a pilum sticking inside it), the group managed to deal with the attackers with a combination of heavy handed violence and magic. With there foes defeated and minor medical treatment applied to Thorfinn, Edric and the others approached the Skeleton upon the Altar. While this Skeleton had not moved, the party decided to be cautious in case it did, while Edric examined the body. Using magic, Edric discovered that a crystal coating the dagger inside the ribcage of the skeleton was the vis from the Vis Source. Edric also realised that from how the body was position and the unusually strong aura present in the temple, that the body was likely that of the temples High Priestess, who had committed ritual suicide to strengthen the temples power during the heathen purges of the Roman Empire (this story was very similar to the sacrifice of Trianoma at the founding of the Order).

After carefully collecting the Vis from the dagger, Edric cast Sense the Nature of Vis to determine what Vis Source the Covenant now had, and discovered from its Silvery glow, that they now had a Vim Vis Source, Edric also released that he had foolishly forgotten to bring a known quantity of Vis to see how much the Vis source provided. Meanwhile the rest of the party gathered up the Pilums and Gladius’s from the skeletons and searched the rest of the temple, during their searched they located several stone tablets inscribed onto a clay-like substance. Edric quickly looking over the tablets realized that they were magical in nature, however were also encrypted and would need to be decoded before they could be utilized. He did however realize that they were likely rituals, however they were not like those utilized by the Mercurians (which made sense, as the temple was too Venus). Realizing that they would need to return to the Covenant, the group packed up what resources they managed to collect and headed back though the woods returning to Sagehollow.

Once out of the woodland hiding the Temple of Venus, Edric realized that the spells he had cast towards to skeletons within the temple, had needed to penetrate their magic resistance, meaning the bodies contained vis!. Cursing his error, Edric and his party marched back though the woodland towards the Temple of Venus, spending several more hours trekking though the woods, they eventually managed to reach the temple again. Thorfinn, who had been injuried by the skeletons, decided that crossing the glade before them, would be difficult in his present condition, and would stand back and allow the others to travel towards the temple again.

While it took some time and effort to get back into the temple, the party finally reached the corpses that they slew only a few hours earlier. Edric castSense the Nature of Vis and discovered that the one of the hands of each Skeleton contained a pawn of Corpus vis. Pocketing these vis, the party once again started traveling back towards the covenant to re-supply. Heading back towards Thorfinn however proved more difficult that initially thought, and both Edric and Byrne got trapped within the maze of rocks and moss that the temple was hidden within. Luckily for the pair of them, Osanna managed to free both men and allowing them to continue back towards Sagehollow, now knowing the route more thoroughly due to their journeys managed to make it out of the woods with no further issue (with each of them keeping an eye out for the large black dog they had spotted earlier during their travels).

Heading North East back to the Covenant, the party re-supplied and told Thorfinn to head to the infirmary so that his injuries could be looked at. Edric realizing that the journey could still be dangerous for the remaining Vis Sources, decided to gather more grogs before setting out. Edric grabbed the welsh rebel Islwyn and also grabbed Eddie and Cuthbert (encase they ran into the nobility), Edric also quickly stopped by Evelyns Sanctum to borrow a pawn of vis, so that he could determine how many Vis the temple of Venus produced. With these grogs in hand, he set out from the covenant again and re-cast his spell. Hearing a sound of vis coming from the South East, the party started heading cross country though the various hidden paths known to Sagehollow following the sound. The journey was moderately simple, with the party making sure they knew their bearings while traveling, while on the trail of the Vis, the group spotted ahead of them the figure of a huge White Stag, upon its head however was two bloody stumps where its horns where once located (the hunters within the group confirmed that Stags lose their horns in the spring and regrow them back before the summer for the rutting season). Believing that the stag could possibly be magical, the party decided to follow the trail from where it came from. Traveling down several animal tracks was hard work, but they managed to keep sight of the trail and eventually came onto the remains of an old pathway leading though the forest.

Taking a moment to get their bearing and re-locate the Stags tracks, several members of the party heard the sound of riders coming from towards the south. Knowing that Edrics’ gift could very well cause a fight, they decided to hide from the riders, with Edric casting a spontaneous spell to shield them via plant life around them. Galloping up the path, three men rode past the group at some speed and all bearing the insignia’s minor noble houses from the south of England, these men passed the party without any issue and headed northward upon the trail. A final rider however lagging behind his peers, was going slower and clocked something in the woods where the party was located. Slowing his steed down, he looked around the area the party was located somewhat confused, his shield bore the insignia of “A red cross with two small lions on either side”. Cuthbert was not familiar with this insignia and the plant life hiding them made it difficult to see the man's features.

Noticing that their companion had dropped off behind them, the remaining riders turned their horses around and headed back towards their lagging companion. Calling out to him as “Ser Aymeric”, now with a name as point of reference; Cuthbert remembered hearing about the nobleman from the south of England (towards Leicester and Coventry); his full name was Ser Aymeric de Borel, he was a moderately mysterious man, who from what Cuthbert did know from his reputation was a Just, Kind and Fair man. Cuthbert also remember that Ser Aymeric was famous for his martial prowess as well.

Unfortunately for the party, their attempts at hiding didn't last too long, as Ser Aymeric managed to spot Edric and called out for the party to step forward. Unsure on how to gage the nobleman's reaction, the party baring Edric all stepped forward and Cuthbert introduced himself and his companions. Suspicious on why a group of heavily armed individuals were travelling though the kings Forrest, Ser Aymeric demanded why they were dressed the way they were?. Thinking on his feet Eddie lied that they were looking to cash in on the bounty for Robin Hood as their lord stated there was a bounty on his head. Ser Aymeric seemed to buy their story, but still asked why Edric had not stepped out of the bush before them? Again lying to prevent the blatantly gifted magus from meeting the nobleman, they lied stating that he was currently releaving himself behind the hedge and that he didn't want to offend the nobleman. Meanwhile Ser Aymeric’s companions where listening to this conversation and were readying their weapons, believing that the party could well be either bandits or poachers (as there equipment clearly showed that they were not hunting rabbits).

Before hostilities could break out among the group, Ser Aymeric laughed and stated that it was a good thing that he had found them instead of another nobleman, as they might have simply attacked them, as their actions could very well be suspicious. Taking the name of each of the group in front of his, he asked why they were trying to find Robin Hood, as it was the duty of their liege lord of deal with the bandit, not the job of serfs or freeman. Ser Aymeric stated that he would converse with Robert Giscard on this, and that he was not pleased on this action, As Ser Aymeric had the permission of the king to be in these lands, and Giscard could not utilise his authority to simply bush the nobleman off. Bidding the party a good day, he and his companions continued up the old road northward.

Breathing a sigh of relief, the party decided to continue following the deer tracks and once again stepped into the wilds. After about an hour of travelling though the dense woodland, the party came upon a grove, in the centre was a large pool of water about ten metres across, with a large boulder going part way into the pool. A large oak tree also stood by the edge of the clearing with clear scratch marks upon it. To the parties surprise, they were not the first individuals at the grove, a young woman with dark hair and a ragged dress was at the pool side by the tree holding what looked to be a pair of antlers.

Taking a moment to gather themselves, they approached the young woman as greeted her, ignoring the grogs, the young women approached Edric and kept looking at one of his bags, Edric suspicious that she was after the pie that was in the bag, placed it behind himself. However the young women pounced on him and managed to get into the bag and removed the Skeletal hand which contained the Corpus Vis. The grogs attempted to get the young women off their boss and were surprised when the saw that she was simply looking at the hand. The strange young women introduced herself as Chimi and explained that the hand was similar to the antlers. Edric came to the conclusion that Chimi must have some form of supernatural powers, and believed that she might be a magician of some kind, with Edric demonstrating his magic when requested by Chimi in return, by casting ‘’Rise of the Feathery Body’’. When questioned on her origin, she mentioned that she came from a snowy placed located between two trees (Edric concluded that this was likely a regio).

With introductions made, Edric realised that the White Stag which they had seen earlier was likely the Vis Source, and that every year the stag would shed its horns which would produce the vis. Casting ‘’Sense the Nature of Vis’’ Edric saw a deep purple glow, meaning that the horns (which were crown like in their shape) produced Rego Vis. This was excellent news, as it means that the covenant would have the vis required to cast the Aegis in the winter. Deciding that Chimi had useful skills, they invited her along to join them at the covenant, as she was clearly a fish out of water in the mundane world.

Heading back though the forest, the party managed to get back to the covenant in record time, their journey back was not nearly so problematic, as they retraced their steps. Once at Sagehollow, Chimi proved to be able to sense where the Aegis was cast and could even sense the Aura around covenant. Concluding that she must possess some kind of supernatural ability like second sight or magical sensitivity, the party dropped off the vis they had collected from the grove, and started heading towards the North West, where they had heard the final buzzing from the Vis Source.

After casting his spell once again, the party started heading onto the Moors towards the north, while they had some incidents of getting stuck in rabbit holes or gaps between rocks, they managed to travel though the area mostly unmolested. Eventually the party came to an extremely dense collection of trees, after walking around it (as Edrics spell detected the vis source from somewhere within), the party concluded that the trees formation was unnatural, as the treeline was an almost perfect circle, furthermore new trees seems to be sprouting as the woodland spread in this unnatural fashion.

Spending several hours travelling though the woodland, the party eventually came into a small clearing, two brook's flowing in opposite directions came from a small hill, upon the hill lay the stump of an old silver tree. Edrics spell detected that the area around the tree contained the vis, but seemingly couldn't see where, with Chimi confirming that they were in some kind of aura, the party approaching the stump, both Chimi and Edric discovered a regio boundary that lead towards the vis source. After making sure it was safe, the party entered the regio.

The regio was stuck in perpetual twilight, a huge blood red oak tree grew upon the hill, with the face of a primeval entity formed upon its surface. Approaching the tree, Chimi called out to the face, but received no response, once at the tree, Chimi realised that she could feel breath emanating from the tree. Futher attempts to awaken the tree failed until Chimi knocked upon its forehead, opening its eyes in a tired fashion, the tree briefly looked around before crying tears of blood (the vis source) and returning to its slumber. Edric quickly gather the vis with a cloth and a vial. The party also noticed that he two brook's in the regio flowed with blood rather than water, as it did in the mundane realm. They also spotted the body of a giant individual buried in the hill that the tree was upon, deciding the investigate this later on, the party gather their things and stepped back though the regio boundary.

Once back into the mundane world again, the group quickly decided to investigate the mound the silvery tree stump was upon, closer inspection to the stump revealed a piece of iron or steel, that looked like half of a sword blade stuck within the tree stump. With a bit of Rego Herbam magic, Edric was able to move the wood in the stump and allow one of the grogs to remove the metal. The item was indeed part of a sword blade, seemingly severed perfectly in half. Along the fuller of the blade was a collection of strange markings. Pocketing this item, the party, with their mission completed decided to head back towards Sagehollow.

(Summer) 1190 - Journey to Cad Gadu
Deciding to kill two birds with one stone, Sagehollow elected to send both Rian and Essel to Cad Gadu; for Rian it would be looking for any information that Mara left behind before her death in regard to the magus Regulus of Tytalus. Meanwhile Essel would continue in her duties as the Spring Tenens and introduce herself to the magi of Cad Gadu. For their journey to Cad Gadu, the mages decided to take a larger contingent of grogs than usual, as Rian didn't possess the gentle gift and this could cause complications with the superstitious and uneducated masses. Will Scarlet elected to accompany the mages and lead the grogs in his capacity as Turb Captain in journey, taking with them; Alfred (Cook), Alistair (Sargent), Lohse (Bard/Diplomat?) and Gillian (Stalker) to cover all the eventualities that the journey might consist of.

Taking a day to travel to Derby, which was relatively uneventful. The party decided not to say within the town boundaries due to Rians gift. Instead they decided they would camp a short way into the woods nearby and would set up guards to prevent any issues. Deciding to kill time, Lohse entered Derby and using her enchanting music managed to get a fever of generosity to spawn within the townsfolk that heard her. While this didn't prove as useful as planned, it did give her a modicum of spare change, before she left to re-join the others at the camp site.

That evening however a full moon appeared in the sky and began the transformation to turn Will into a werewolf. Rian, knowing about his friends predicament, made sure that he was tied to a tree with some rope, before summoning a collection of rabbits to feed the wolf. Leaving Will as a guard-dog for the camp, the party went to sleep and discovered that during the night, the Wolf had managed to chew through his bonds and escaped into the wilds to hunt.

In the morning, the party discovered that the Werewolf had managed to escape in the night. cursing, Alistair and Alfred managed to located the wolf's tracks and started tracking the wolf-man into the forest. The tracks headed towards the southern Pennines, and after several hours of tracking due to problematic footing and weather, they located the corpse of a sheep, that had clearly been attacked by a wolf. Deducing that the wolf attack was likely Will, Essel decided to make sure they were heading in the correct direction, and used one of Will’s Shirts as an Arcane Connection to momentarily locate him, the spell was successful, Essel's confidence in her own abilities boosting her success. Locating his general direction, and also having located further tracks, they party continued in their journey further into the Pennines to locate their way-would friend.

Heading uphill, they eventually came to a large stream (bordering on becoming a river), with enormous boulders scattered around in its bed and along the sides, the burns of the river had also both collapsed. Crossing the river without too much issue, the party managed to once again locate Will's tracks leading into a deep patch of wilderness, this wilderness was like an enormous wall of plant-life that needed hacking and brushing aside to traverse. Several hours of following the trail, Essel decided to try and utilize the arcane connection again, while doing so, she discovered that they were located in a magic aura of indeterminate power. The spell however was successful and they learned that they were still on track for locating Will.

Heading further into the wilds, the party was making good progress in finding Will, however through the trees Alistair spotted something large lying in ambush and managed to only just throw himself out of the way before an enormous net captured the rest of the party. Hiding in the undergrowth, Alistair spotted that a sixty foot tall giant had managed to captured the party, using a huge net tied to a single piece of wood; likely a tree, that was possibly a Pine that had the branches cleared away. While the rest of the party struggled against the Giants net, Essel utilized this commotion to free herself using teleportation magic.

The Giant with his prey captured, headed off further into the wilds with the party, Meanwhile Essel and Alistair picked themselves out of their hiding spots and started to follow the Giant's path though the forest.

The Party was taken to an almond shaped lake, on the eastern side of the lake, they could clearly see a huge collection of boulders being utilized as a Dam blocking a river leading from the lake. On the Western side, there was a huge river poring down from a mountain side feeding the lake. In the center of the lake was what looked like a small mountain poking out of it, around the beach at the bottom the mountain was what looked like a small shanty town. The Giant, waded easily though the water, with the water reaching his upper chest as he did so, after placing the net towards shanty town, he deposited the party there, before leaving with a smile and wave and headed up the mountain side on the western side of the lake.

As they arrived, they spotted Will watching them laughing. Alongside Will was a man with an overgrowing tonsure who said “Welcome to Hell!”, Will asked what took those bastards so long in locating him, afterwards he explained the parts of the tale that they didn't already know, the giant had managed to capture him in wolf form, and he was deposited on the Island like the rest of them, however while still as a wolf, he attempted to escape briefly, before transforming back into a Man at day-break. Upon his return to human form, the friar who was nearby watching him (The same man who welcomed the party), spotted him naked and provided him with a pair of trousers before saying “Welcome to Hell!”.

The Friar introduced himself as Father Christopher, and explained that everyone on the island were prisoners and playthings of the Giant, while he did keep them prisoners, the Giant did feed them and make sure they were looked after, and people only died on accident if the giant stepped on them for example. When question by Rian on why they didn't just swim to the shore to escape? Christopher pointed at the lake, just as a fish the size of two barns rose up from out of the water for a brief moment, the question it seemed had a good answer. Father Christopher then invited the party to share in some fish stew before the sun went down for the evening.

The following morning, deciding to see what they could do to try and escape from the island, Rian attempted to communicate with one of the giant fish with his magic. Climbing up a ladder on a section of a pier on the shanty town, Rian utilized his abilities to try and get the fishes attention. Coming up from the depths was a giant Pike, the fish however showed no interest in communicating simply attempted to attack Rian smashing its body against the side of the Pier causing the villages of the shanty town to view Rian with suspicion and contempt for endangering their lives, luckily Lohse managed to convince the villages, that Rian was attempting to help them, and that they should be patient.

Retiring to the beach-side, the party discussed their options with Father Christopher. Eating fish stew, which is some of the food that the Giant provides the shanty town. The party concluded that options like creating a raft were out of the question, as it would be destroyed by the Fish, furthermore, the gap was too large for Rian to create a bridge or even a large boat due to the limitations of his magic. While eating the food, Alfred noted that the ingredients there very strange, catching the attention of Rian, they decided to look at the food supplies given by the Giant. Discovering that they had been supplied with gigantic vegetables and plants. Rian suspecting (almost obviously) that the veg were magical in some format, casting “Sense the nature of Vis” to see if Vis was present, he was met with a bright green glow indicating Herbam Vis, Rian then cast “Gather the Essence of the Beast” to gather the Vis into a more easily transportable piece of the plant, this also caught the attention of the Shanty villages, who were now deeply suspicious of Rian and the party. Lohse step forward and introduced Rian as a mighty and powerful Sorcerer who would save them, however they were going to have to be patient and assist Rian when he asked for aid.

While sceptical as to how a “Great and powerful Sorcerer” was captured, they agreed to Lohse’s logic and the party along with the villagers, started coming up with ideas on how to escape the island, without the Giant realizing. Questioning the villages, they discovered that the Giant only goes part way into the lake each time (as Rian realized that from the size of the fish, and how many there were, it wasn't big enough to support them, meaning it was likely very deep), meaning the giant had created an underwater causeway or platform for him to stand on. They also learned the Giants routine; being that in the morning he descends from the mountainside and walks across the beach to check on the Dam on the eastern portion of the lake, before visiting the Shanty town; either for entertainment or to headcount them. He then travels into the woods, before returning in the evening with food and possibly more people (depending when he as caught them) before returning up the mountain for the evening, where smoke could clearly be seen.

With this information, Rian realized with the help of the grogs, that the vines used as rope around the village could all be joined together (either with magic, or by mundane means), then Rian could create a zip-line going from the top of the mountain to the other-side of the lake, however this would need to be done at night-time to prevent the Giant from stopping them from leaving. As they were discussing this, the Giant made its way down from the mountain side, upon its back was the large tree and net, after checking the Dam, it waded onto its underwater pier and deposited the net on the island, very quickly the Giant did a double-take as he realized the net was empty and roared in rage before collecting the net again and quickly returning up the mountain.

The confused villagers turned to Rian, who explained that it was likely his associates who had done this, realizing that Essel and Alistair were likely investigating the Giants lair to see how they could rescue them.

Meanwhile, just after the party was captured and taken to the Island, both Essel and Alistair managed to follow the giants rather obvious tracks though the woods, and discovered the shore around the lake and seeing the giant deposit the party on the island, they patiently waited for the giant to leave and head up the mountainside. Alistair voiced his opinion, as to why the group didn't just escape the island by swimming, as Essel pointed towards an enormous skull of a fish, that was slightly down the shore from them. Knowing where the party was located, they decided to do a bit of reconnaissance first, before attempting to enact a rescue (hoping that Rian, and maybe Will and the others would be trying to formulate an escape plan on the other-side).

Heading towards the Dam on the eastern side, they saw it was a huge piece of construction, enormous boulders put in place and held together by mud, clay and other agents. However its construction was not perfect, as moderate amounts of water were escaping though the cracks, however it was keeping the vast majority of the water back. Alistair suggested that they could break the Dam, and with the lower water flow the fish wouldn't be a threat and they could escape.

Essel, however explained, that while the plan did have some merit, it would also likely create a massive flood in the area and cause other issues. Furthermore she didn't have the magical capability to destroy earth, as it was outside her field of specialty. They decided to head back towards the Forrest to camp for the evening, using magic to disguise their sight and scent, the following morning they agreed to investigate the mountainside where the Giant made it lair and to possibly look at taking the approach of negotiating with the creature rather than trying to fight it. The pair easily made there way though the Forrest, and were able to follow the giants tracks up the mountainside.

Heading up the mountainside using the undergrowth as cover, they eventually came up to a huge cave, smoke was clearly coming from around the entrance, deciding to be stealthy, they headed towards the mouth of the cave, however didn't go as planned, as Alistair failed at being stealthy, this led to the pair being heard by the Giant within, deciding to hide as the Giant came outside, they remained still until it started heading towards them. Realizing that she could escape if captured again, Essel made her presence know and lead the giant away from Alistair before turning around and attempting to frighten to giant into leaving her alone. This ploy almost worked as the Giant was even taken aback by the ferocity of the glare the small women produced. Before capturing her once again in the net and started heading back down the mountainside with the net over his back. This led to Essel once again using her magic to teleport herself down behind the giant, before meeting up with Alistair again.

Re-united with Alistair, the pair reached the entrance of the cave, and discovered a garden of veg, that was supernaturally large. Alistair asked Essel if magic was at work here and received confirmation. Essel also decided much like Rian to check if Vis was present in the veg. Being able to achieve both spells Rian did earlier (although for Essel, she once again relied upon her own self confidence to try and complete this task), After collecting the Vis from the plants, and giving the smaller plants to Alistair to carry, they entered the cave. The cave itself was a huge cavern filled with the smell of Giant’s shit and cooking veg (which Essel also 'harvested'). Suspended above the remains of a large fire (long since turned into cinders) was a bronze cauldron, likely from a castle due to its size, the cauldron was were the smell of cooking veg was emanating from. Further into the cave, was a large depression in the floor covered in undergrowth which had been flatten (Both Essel and Alistair concluded that this was likely the giants bed). The walls however were the most interesting; as rather crude cave painting covered them, the paintings told the story of a giant, who fought Men, Dragons and other legendary beasts. It terrorized towns and villages and eat men and livestock. Judging from the paintings, they only looked a few years old and looked to be of self flattery rather than telling a concluding story however.

Before further examination would be undertaken, the pair heard a roar of anger from the giant and concluded that Essel trick had been discovered. Leaving the cave the pair sneaked away separately and met back up on the shoreline on the northern side of the lake. Essel decided now that they knew more about the Giant, it was time to rescue their companions and using the smallest gap on the northern side utilized her Teleportation magic and arrived on the shore by a group of villagers, who alerted Rian of her presence.

Rian explained his plan to Essel, that they would create a Zip-line from the top of the mountain and travel down it at night; this would avoid the Giant and the fish. The the real trouble would be taking a group of about forty five people though the wilds in the dark before the giant could locate them. Rian and Essel knowing the limits of Hermetic Magic, decided to spontaneous the Spell “Moonbeam” to illuminate the beach (as it was about a hundred metres away) with a gentle light, so as to not arouse the giant and then cast the spell to create the Zip-line, with Alistair on the other side to secure it the line if necessary and to also catch the people coming down, so they would not injured before the real escape attempt into the wilds.

Deciding to enact their plan to escape from the island that evening after the giant had done its headcount of the villagers and retired to his cave for the evening, the party began to prepare for what they needed to do in order to accomplish it. On the mainland side of the shore, Alistair began to clear a section of the undergrowth to allow the party and the villagers to escape with greater ease in the dark, while at the same time also creating a false trail which the giant could follow to buy the party more time to escape.

While Alistair was doing this task, Essel decided to return to the giants cave while he was away to get a further look at the giant veg that was being grown as Vis by the giant. Upon arriving at the giants garden, Essel noticed that due to it being summer, several of the plants such as the parsnip were gestating and their seed-pods could be harvested. This could mean that the covenant could grow the giant plants as a vis source if the time was taken properly grow them, deciding that this was a worthwhile endeavour she scouted out the plants for an appropriate seed-pod and decided upon going after the giant parsnip as there would be several seeds within the giant pod.

Teleporting up to the top of the plant, Essel managed to hang onto the side of the plant and utilise a bit of spontaneous magic to knock the seed-pod to the ground without falling down herself. Once teleporting back to the ground, Essel discovered that while the seed-pod was large (about the size of a good sized plank of wood), it wasn't nearly as heavy as it looked and while awkward, could easily be dragged by a strong man such as Alistair.

Meanwhile on the Island, the Giant had briefly returned during the day, and demanded that during the evening the villagers must entertain him or there would be trouble. The party decided after a great deal of debate that the best course of action would be to preform a talent show, with Lohse using her musical talent to provide a soundtrack to everyone's performances; the various villages did either individual or group acts of various types, meanwhile Will and Gillian did a mock battle and the party made sure that Rian was hidden encase the giant attack him due to his gift. With his need for entertainment satisfied, the giant retreated to his cave for the evening.

Essel after spending most of the afternoon dragging the seed-pod back, had returned to where Alistair was, Alistair watched with a modicum of amusement, which quickly vanished when she informed him that he would be carrying the seed-pod back to the covenant. Alistair decided he would make this as easy as possible for himself and create a figure of eight in some rope from their supplies and carried the pod across his back and shoulders.

After the sun had gone down, the party enacted their plan. Essel on the mainland side of the shore, waited for a bit of time, before casting a spontaneous version of the “Moonbeam” spell to allow Rian to view the other side of the shore and create his zip-line. As the spell Rian was attempting to cast was quite complex, it took him several attempted to cast it, meanwhile Essel and Alistair were on the other shore waiting for zip-line to arrive and not being privy to what was taking Rian so long to cast the spell.

After about twenty-five minutes of waiting, the zip-line finally arrived on the opposite shore and the escape plan was enacted. With Alistair present to catch people as they arrived, the group managed to get everyone off the island, although there was a near-miss with Gillian nearly falling into the lake. However, by the end, the party had managed to rescue all of their companions and villagers of the shanty town. Deciding to waste no time and get as much distance between them and giant as possible before morning, they set off into the wilds. Not long before setting off, with the island still in sight, the group began to hear drumming coming from towards the island, almost immediately the villagers, grogs and Will started to dance their way back towards the island. Luckily the mages were protected from the effect by their Parma Magica. Lohse was also likewise spared as she didn't notice the drumming and as such was not effected by its magic.

Deciding to fight Magic with Magic, Lohse used her enchanting music to enthrall the villages, grogs and Will to her music and get them to follow her instead. Lohse managed to overpower the giants drumming and help lead the group away from the island and the Giant. Travelling further into the wilds during the night with Alistair leading the way, they eventually returned to the river with the large boulders. Deciding to cross as quickly as possible Alistair jumped the various rocks, using the seed-pod as a balance aid and made it to the other-side with a rope. Angling the rope in such as way as to allow the villagers to use it as a guide while crossing the river as to prevent injuries. While Alistair and Will were setting up this rope and preparing the villagers to cross. Rian managed to hear something large was travelling up the river towards them, alerting everyone that something was coming, the party decided they needed to get everyone across the river as quickly as possible.

Will took immediate charge of the situation with a full force of personality and immediately fell into mercenary captain mode. Barking orders and getting the villagers to cross the river in an orderly fashion. Meanwhile Gillian and Alfred prepared for a fight and got themselves ready to defend the villagers and the mages. On the other-side of the river Alistair once informing the villagers where to stand, drew his weapon and shield and prepared to fight. Essel and Rian got themselves across the river alongside Lohse and Alfred, leaving only Will and Gillian on the other side. Keeping and eye out on what was coming up the river, the party spotted two giant crayfish dragging themselves up the river and towards the party seemingly in the search for food. Rian capitalising on his innate ability to communicate with animals decided call out to them and discovered that they were hungry and were in search for food. Realising that he was unable to dissuade them to find food elsewhere as this food would fight back, he informed the party of the situation. Meanwhile Will being the ever reckless man that he was, decided to jump across the river and re-join the rest of him men before a possible combat started, Gillian being infatuated with her commander quickly followed suit.

Lohse knowing that her enchanting music ability could also effect animals with emotions, decided to en-still a feeling of “content” within the giant crayfish and managed to get them to retreat without a fight. With the “battle” over the party continued to travel though the wilds and eventually reached the sheep which Will has devoured while as a werewolf. Realising they were now outside of a Regio (as all of the giant plant-life had shrunk in size), the party took a well earned breather from escaping the giant. Several of the villagers who had only been recent arrivals to the Island informed the party that they would be heading off together back towards their villages. Essel attempted to get them to say nothing about the Giant or Island for fear of encouraging others to visit the island, however both the villagers and the grogs informed her, that everyone gets drunk and eventually the story could come out. As they were defending themselves and their assets the magi were safe from interfering with the mundanes.

The rest of the villagers however (many of whom were severly warped due to the aura) were unable to return to their previous lives and decided to travel to the covenant with the mages. Knowing where they were; from tracking Will previously. They decided to return to the covenant to deliver the new covenfolk there before once again attempting to reach Cad Gadu and accomplish their original mission.

Upon returning to the covenant, Essel and Rian decided to re-evaluate which grogs they were going to be taking with them on their journey to Cad Gadu, after escaping from the Giants regio. Deciding that travelling via towns and villages might be safer than simply going cross country, they decided to bring Silk with them, in order to disguise themselves as travelling merchants, alongside the spy, they bought Silks apprentice; Oskar. Will and Gillian also elected to continue travelling with the mages, as the Grog captain and second in command.

Silk decided the best course of action was to head towards Nottingham to the south and collect a wagon of sheep pelts, before taking the road towards Derby and then heading north in the direction of Bakewell and then onto Chester; where they could sell the pelts and then head on into Wales. The journey into Nottingham was mostly uneventful, good weather and general talk managed to pass the time uneventfully and they arrived at the town with Silk leading the way. Once into the Town, Silk and Oskar began looking at the various Pelts that were on sale, Oskar’s natural eye for wool, allowed him to find a good collection of pelts, and after discreetly notifying Silk, Silk began to bargain with the merchant for the goods. In the end Silk came out on top and managed to get a very good deal for the pelts.

With the pelts now on the Wagon, the party set off towards Derby. The journey to Derby was much like the one towards Nottingham, overall very uneventful. Upon arriving in Derby, the party decided to spend the night there and Silk organised a room in a local tavern that he knew, with his masters now safely within the confines of the tavern, Silk decided to continue with what he always did, play dice and steal from everyone he could. While playing dice with several of the patrons, he noticed that while he himself was cheating there was another individuals who was just as good at dice as he was. While being unable to see if the man was cheating and seemingly vise-versa, Silk decided after clearing the men out of their money to buy them all a round of drinks, so that there was no hard feelings. Silk also learned that the man who was apparently his equal with the dice was known as “Honest John”, before he quickly vanished without speaking much more to Silk.

Meanwhile at the table containing the magi and the rest of the party, Essel had come under the effects of Will’s curse of Venus and was flirting with him, Rian meanwhile decided to stay silent in case he was blamed for any activities going on inside the tavern due to his gift. The flirting between Will and Essel was noticed by Gillian, whose unhealthy infatuation with her commander was causing her to grind teeth when it came to the attention that Essel was giving Will and vise-versa. Noticing this after completing his goal of robbing the patrons blind in a dice game, Silk decided it would be very entertaining (mostly to himself) if he stirred the pot a little, and proceeded to manipulate Gillian to cause a scene, before leaving for the bar. While under the pretense of getting everyone drinks, Gillian slipped to the side and drugged both Essel and Will's drinks with a mild poison so that they would spend the evening on the john, rather than together. While Gillian had managed to hide this rather effectively, Silk had noticed and started chuckling to himself.

The following day, the party started on their route northward towards Bakewell. Both Will and Essel were still feeling rather fragile, however they were well enough to travel without much discomfort. With Silk leading the way and directing the wagon, they made good time northward. While heading up the main road, they eventually came across Honest John; after striking up a conversation with him, the party invited him to travel with them, as they were both heading to Chester. With John regaling them with taller than life tales, that he had participated within, and with little else to do, they happily listened to the man's adventures, before eventually making camp about a days south of Bakewell. That evening, the group learned a little more about Honest John, and Silk discovered a kind of kindred spirit in guile and both enjoyed playing dice with each other.

The following morning, the weather had turned slightly worst and it had started raining, however other than that slight problem with the weather, the party was not slowed down on their journey to Bakewell and was making good time. Just before sunset, the party had reached the small town of Bakewell and quickly made it to a Tavern to spend the night. At the Tavern, there were several ladies of the night called “Bakewell Tarts”, Silk deciding to wet his appetite early, so that he could enjoy the festivities later on, decided to go first and managed to get the prettiest girl first, Will joined him not long afterwards and got another girl.

Meanwhile Essel and Gillian got to talking and managed to put their differences aside as Essel realised the true depth of Gillian's feelings towards Will, promising to help her realise her desire they spent the evening together becoming allies and friends. Rian briefly decided to assist with this endeavour and informed the girls, that Will had stepped out with one of the Tarts, the pair of them then started to plot on how to inconvenience him upon his return. On the other end of the tavern, once finished with his tart, Silk had decided to continue with robbing people while cheating at dice, he was quickly warned by the barman, to only go for one specific game, as the other table had individuals who would cause a fight if they started to lose. Under a combination of not caring and wanting to cause a scene, Silk started to plot how to rob them, and went to Rian to warn them that a fight could start when trying to get information out of the men, while Rian was suspicious of Silks intent, Silks silver tongue had once again served him well, and the other were warned of what might happen.

Honest John, had managed to hear of what Silk was planning and decided to join him in this endeavour, in return for half of the winnings. Silk agreed and the pair of them went over to the thugs table and started to play dice. After several extremely good rounds of dice from both John and Silk (thanks to weighted dice), the leader of the thugs became angry and started getting aggressive at both Silk and John, knowing a fight was going to start very quickly, Silk threw his beer at the faces of the men and a bar fight then broke out. Luckily for Silk, the first thug who attempted to attack him, slipped on the beer just thrown and Silk managed to get a solid punch to his face, before Silk was in turn hit lightly in the ribs. Meanwhile Rian had headed up stairs incase he was blamed for the fight, only to return once his raven; Morvan started to warn him that Silk faced his “Doom!” in the fight.

Will seeing that one of his companions was now in a fight rushed over to assist him, Essel and Gillian decided not to intervene as Silk was likely guilty of whatever grievance the man was angry about, Will upon reaching one of the other thugs, quickly took him out without much problem. The leader getting more infuriated that his men had been so easily taken out, drew his sword to attack Silk with, however Silk knowing that when the guards eventually arrived (as a bell was now being rung by the bar steward) and he was seen to only have been defending himself, he would get off scot-free while the other man would likely be arrested, so Silk didn't draw his weapon.

Almost immediately the brawl stopped as an older gentlemen with a large walking stick entered the tavern, drumming his stick along the way. Even the thug decided to not escalate things further when the man arrived and everything returned to normal. Once this had happened Silk looked at the table and noticed that his Dice and the money were gone, visibly double taking at the theft (and also noticing that Honest John had vanished) this made the thug suspicious but he could not call him out further. The party decided to make there way out of Bakewell and camp in the woods that evening, so as to not cause further problems. The following morning the party continued on their way towards Chester, and quickly located Honest John on the road when they briefly stopped, he explained that he ran away with the money and then divided it up into two piles and allowed Silk to pick first.

The journey to Chester much like the rest of the journey was uneventful, eventually they reached the town walls, they decided to sell the wool that Silk had bought in Nottingham here, and get a different cargo before heading into Wales and then on to Cad Gadu. Thanks to the help they gave Honest John, John had set them up with a friend of his who would sell them at a highly discounted mate-rate a collection of very good tools and implements which they could sell while in Wales, he simply advised them not to sell them near the boarder. Deciding that the quickest way to Cad Gadu was to take a ship to Bangor, then travel overland towards Cad Gadu, they quickly managed to find a ship captain, after being advised not to rob him or capture the ship (to which Silk, sarcastically replied that they were planning to use him to get back to Chester, so that would likely have caused travel issues) they made it to Bangor, and with assistance of Essel began to travel towards Cad Gadu.

The journey thought Wales, was uneventful. The few times that the party was approached by armed men, they were able to give them a few coins and some of the trade goods as a “Tax” before leaving and being able to continue on with their journey. This happened a couple of times, before they eventually managed to reach a small island in the middle of a lake, on the island was a small cottage and Essel announced that this was Cad Gadu. Silk was elected to go and announced the presence of his Masters, and headed down towards to dock. Seeing a bell on the end of the dock, Silk rung it and heard no sound, using the back of his knife he then slightly hit it to the same effect. A few moments later, a man came out of the house and shouted across the lake, asking who he was, Silk sarcastically responded that he was here to announce the appearance of his masters, Magi from Sagehollow and that they had sent a letter in advance. The man accepted the response and informed Silk, that he would let the Covenant know and they might as well get comfortable as it might take some time.

Returning to the camp, Silk advised the mages of the situation and they set up camp. About a day and a half later, the boat from the island returned with the man and a rather young looking women, who introduced herself as Maewen of Ex Miscellanea and greeted them as fellow mages of the Order and invited them officially into the Covenant of Cad Gadu. Making sure that there camp was taken down, and that Maewen knew where there wagon was hidden so that her grogs could guard and collect it. The Party headed across the lake and went around to the other side of the cottage, Located there was two large white stones which Maewen explained was the Regio boundary before entering with the rest of the party.

Upon entering the Regio, the party discovered what looked like the ruins of a Greek or Roman temple complex which had been built upon further ruins. Most of the Covenant looked to be in a state of decay, baring certain sections which looked moderately less decayed. Leading the grogs towards the main hall for breakfast, Maewen introduced them to Branwen who was in-charge of the kitchen and thanks to the highly warped and inbred nature of the covenfolk also ran most of the day to day activities of the covenant alongside Rhodri and Gwydion, who manned the cottage and the library respectfully. Talking with Branwen, Silk discussed that they had travelled as merchants and that they had a collection of good quality tools and implements they were looking to sell, Branwen was interested at the possible trade and after looking at the tools alongside Silk, agreed to buy them from him, this would assist with paying for the return journey and allow them to make a bit of profit on the side.

Meanwhile the mages were taken to the waiting hall of the covenant library and introduced to Gwydion the Librarian, Maewen then excused herself and returned to her other duties. Rian explained to the librarian that they were after the correspondence that Mara had from her friend Regulus of Tytalus, and that Essel was here to introduce herself as the Spring Tennes of House Bonisagus in Stonehenge. Gwydion explained that it might take some time to locate these items and left to start searching the Library, as for the role of the Spring Tennes, that would likely be what Maewen was dealing with, as meeting Immanola depended on how cognizant she was due to her advanced age and warping.

While they waited, a child entered the room and introduced herself as Cirice of Ex Miscellanea and the three mages began to converse with each other. Cirice expressed as desire to leave Cad Gadu and asked Rian and Essel what there new covenant was like. Rian and Essels answers were rather honest with what state the new covenant was in, however Cirice did still seem interested in joining and informed the mages, that she was unable to leave quite yet as she still needed to learn the Parma Magica, however once that was accomplished she should be able to travel down with several guards and meet the other mages of the Covenant before making her decision, Essel mentioned that she would advise the other Mages of her interest to join and give her support to the notion. She also expressed a hope that the Covenants Praetor hadn't lead the grogs and other mages astray. When asking for an explanation on that from Cirice, Essel explained that the Covenant has a rather peculiar collection of mages, and that the Verditius maga (who was also the Praetor) was rather “quirky” to put it lightly. After meeting with Cirice, Both Rian and Essel decided to call it an evening and returned to where there grogs and companions were located, while there Essel mentioned that it would be a good idea to have a party and allow to the two covenants covernfolk to interact and meet with each other, Branwen agreed to this and organised a party between the two covenants. The grogs spent that time getting to know some of the less warped and inbred grogs of Cad Gadu, leading in some circumstances such as Will and Silk to hopefully increasing the gene-puddle which has accumulated over the years in Cad Gadu. Meanwhile Essel and Rian spent the time chatting with Cirice and Maewen about Cad Gadu and the political climate of Stonehenge, while also conversing over smaller matters and enjoying each other's company.

The Following morning, Essel and Rian decided to see if Immanola; the primus of house Ex Misc was together enough to converse with, especially as they needed permission from one of the mages to take Mara's letters from Regulus and also convince the mages of Cad Gadu to attend tribunal. Branwen said that she would speak to Immanola’s servant to see if their mistress was together enough for the meeting, this would likely happen after they had eaten breakfast.

After breakfast, both Essel and Rian were lead to Immanola’s waiting room, the room was very warm and had a large table inside of it, on their end was two smaller chairs, where-as on the opposite end of the table was a large comfortable looking chair. After about twenty mins of waiting the door opened and an ancient looking woman entered, she has thin pure white hair and was extremely frail, after spending a few moments slowing entering the room and getting into her chair, she silently looked at both Magi softly smiling before Essel started the conversation. In the corner of the room a servant brought the ancient maga a mug of steaming hot milk before sitting in a chair to the side and began making notes of the meeting.

Essel started the conversation by introducing herself and Rian and stating that it was a pleasure to meet her, it was clear after several minutes of conversation, Immanola was suffering from immense twilight episodes and senility, and that the firebrand women who was celebrated early in the order was now a shadow of her former self. With these facts (potential vis raiding from the Normandy tribunal), Immanola agreed to attend tribunal with the rest of her covenant and would also allow copies of Mara's communications with Regulus to be passed onto the magi before they left, however this conversation was difficult and took time as Immanola would forget who the pair in front of her were and why they were present.

During the negotiations, Immanola suddenly went rigid and straightened herself, her once meeker posture was replaced by a stronger look, her eyes went fully black and her voice gain a strength and authority that was more like the firebrand women of her past, when she spoke it was as if another feminine voice spoke though her and she uttered the following words to Essel and Rian.

“My warnings of destruction and salvation; ignored and squandered. He shall return, though blood and betrayal. Making friends out of slain foes. Chaos approaches, the song has been sung. Ice, blood and darkness shall reign across Hermes children. Yet, Hope remains; sundered across ten and three. Harken to me, The Final Days are Nigh!”

After speaking these words, the previous Immanola returned and stared at the pair of them, before once again asking who they were. The two magi quickly shared a look and carried on as if nothing had happened. With their business with Immanola concluded they requested a copy of the minutes of their meeting from Immanola's servant, the young man, stated that a copy of the minutes would be presented to them alongside there requested documentation, and that another copy would be sent to Durenmar as all of Immanola prophecies were.

With their business at Cad Gadu concluded they gather Silk and the others, and reclaimed their wagon before setting off back through the welsh countryside and reaching Bangor after about two days of travel. During the travels, they were once again met by various men at arms from various welsh lords all requesting money to allow them to travel though the land which Silk begrudgingly allowed. Upon reaching Bangor the party got onto the ship which was previously used to get them into Wales, the captain having stayed as part of the agreement with Silk on the initial journey. Once again after reaching Chester, the party decided to get some more goods in order to travel with greater ease though the English countryside, under Silks suggestion, they decided to buy a collection of dried Peat, which could be used in the creation of charcoal and could fetch a good price in Nottingham.

With this completed, the journey back to Sagehollow was otherwise uneventful, with the various groups of bandits which were looking for weaker prey, deciding to not interfere with such a well armed group and after a weeks worth of travel, they reached Sagehollow. Essel decided to call a meeting of the Magi to discuss what was going on at Cad Gadu and to discuss Immanola’s prophecy and to advise the others that Cirice of Cad Gadu was hoping to join Sagehollow, the news of Cirice joining the covenant was well met, with Evelyn excited to meet someone new, and the others happy for another collogue to discuss covenant issues with. On the other hand while Immanola’s prophecy was intriguing, the magi concluded that there was nothing immediate that could be done to counteract it, and that Immanola had also warned of an apocalypse facing the order thirty years previous and nothing came of it, was also a good sign that her prophecy likely would not come though as could be a result of her highly warped state.

It was at this point at Arianwen interjected into the meeting to discuss what she had found at the covenant during Rian and Essel journey to Cad Gadu.

(Summer) 1190 - Exploring Sagehollow
Participants: Arianwen, Tancred, Tessora, Chimi, Falko

(Autumn) 1190 - Trials at Normanston
Participants: Arianwen, Rian, Tancred, Alfred, Alison, Gillian, Old Giles, Osanna, Theopania

(Autumn) 1190 - Shopping for Iron
Participants: Evelyn, Tessora, Will, Alison, Bryne, Cuthbert, Haeddi, Richard

(Autumn) 1190 - The Cambridge Fayre
Participants: Essel, Cass, Falko, Islwyn, Oskar, Silk

Essel decided that the next venue on her little tour of covenants was Schola Pythagoranis in Cambridge. Bringing a handful of adventurous covenfolk with her, their first stop was at the Red Boar before truly setting off.

There, she came across Iudicium (a mage from Blackthorn, of House Geurnicus), accompanied by his bodyguard, Dane and the speaker, Petrus. They were also heading towards Cambridge, so they decided to accompany the group.

Dane was utterly silent, and Cass and Silk decided to make it their mission to make him say something. On their first night, at a pub, they hatched a plan with the support of Petrus to steal his underwear off him as he slept. Unfortunately he woke up in the process, and after a pregnant silence, the duo retreated out of the room and neither party spoke of it the following day.

The group were then accosted by bandits on the road, who had suspiciously avoided far easier prey just ahead. After a fracas broke out, in which Falko was badly injured and Cass took one hostage, who wet himself (and, by proxy, her) in fear. After handing him over to Iudicium to (apparently) interrogate, she went off to the cart to change her trousers.

The bandit relayed that they had been offered a bounty by a man called Gar Lawrence for a man fitting Silk’s description, but with a different name. Silk had a vague memory of the man, but had no idea why he would want to harm him.

Meanwhile, Cass used the opportunity of being unobserved to steal all of Dane’s spare underwear and plant them in the bottom of Silk’s pack.

That night as the group made camp, Silk discovered the underwear and went to Cass with them, with the suggestion of this time trying to put all the spare pairs on him as he slept.

As the group ate stew, Islwyn noticed that there seemed to be a person within the reflection of the sword who wasn’t around the campfire, and quietly told Essel about it. She chose not to confront him about it until she had seen it for herself.

Cass and Silk, not knowing this, snuck into Dane’s tent and also spotted the reflection, but continued anyway and were, again, caught by him. This time he leapt out of bed with his sword drawn, but Cass and Silk scampered out before he could untangle himself from all the underwear around his calves, swiftly climbing a tree and observing him as he strode out of the tent, saw they were gone, grunted in frustration, and returned inside.

Cass and Silk chalked that up as a victory – he may not have spoken, but he vocalised.

The following morning, Iudicium had a quiet word with Essel to say that Dane had told him of Cass and Silk’s shenanigans. She apologized and promised to have them punished.

Cass was called over and grilled about her role in the antics, and after some back-and-forth in which she claimed as much innocence as she could feasibly get away with, she essentially apologised for getting caught and promised not to fuck with Iudicium or his companions again. Especially after Essel explained that Iudicium was testing her and the party, and potentially dangerous.

Silk didn’t even bother to protest or show remorse, and instead insisted that it was in Essel’s interest (coming across as incompetent to lower Blackthorn’s guard, and testing Dane’s alertness – and therefore fitness to serve as a bodyguard). Essel didn't agree it was in her best interest, she warned Silk of the consequences.

The pair individually apologised to Iudicium and Dane, and Essel gave Cass her punishment – to play nursemaid to Falko in whatever way he felt he required for the duration of their journey. She decided to give out Silk’s punishment later, and to let him stew for a while first. Essel had calculated (correctly) That the ambush on the road was arranged by Iudicium, both to show he knew a lot about her associates (Gar Lawrence, very obscure) also that he could arrange misfortune on her if he chose. Also to test how she would deal with a threat, without breaking the code. Part of a series of terse questioning and testing that had began from their first meeting in the inn.

The group then moved on and eventually reached Cambridge, where Iudicium said he would leave them and continue on. Essel asked him about the image in the sword, advising him that it may be misconstrued as scrying. Iudicium explained that it was an awakened sword, and asked if she wanted to make an official complaint. Deciding it was wise not to antagonise him, she merely congratulated him on recovering a magical marvel and bade farewell.

Essel made her introductions with the mages at Schola Pythagoranis, giving Cass, Islwyn, Oskar and Silk permission to take the day off to join the fayre that was being held in celebration of the Lord’s child’s nameday. The mages listened to Essel's request to attend the tribunal attentively, but wouldn't agree unless Julia of Voluntus was supportive.

At the fayre, Oskar took special interest in a competition to guess the weight of a pig in horseshoes, in which he aimed high - and then took great pains in advising everyone to lowball, whilst taking every opportunity to feed it on the sly.

Silk set up a betting pool for a melee tournament that was going on, in which a ten year old named Thomas had inexplicably defeated two grown men in bouts. Silk recognised some magical fuckery was afoot, and persuaded many of the crowd that it was beginner’s luck and to bet against him, with Cass putting forward a chunk of the party’s expenses fund in his favour.

Islwyn, as he made his way through the crowd to seek the comfort he can find only in sitting in a tree, noticed an old woman sipping a tankard, who made eye contact and raised it in salute. He noticed that she hadn’t gotten up to refill it, and that it was magical. With his fascination for such things, he was lured towards her and they shared an awkward and stilted conversation.

She introduced herself as Mathilda, and told him that she was Thomas’ faerie godmother, and she’d like our help in saving his life – due to his pride, some kind of demonic imp (she thought) named Bomburkhan had bestowed upon him the ability to win duels against grown men to boost his pride, before removing it all and causing his death in the final.

Islwyn fetched Cass and Silk, and after the next fight they tailed Thomas as he left the fayre. They followed him to a clearing, where they watched him eat from a cornucopia and then retrieve a sword, giving it a few swings before heading off back to the tournament.

They surmised that the sword was clearly magical, and decided that the best way to prevent him from competing any more was to essentially jump him when he went down the path and tie him up.

This all fell apart when he spotted Islwyn hiding up in the tree and demanded to know if he was a goblin. Islwyn froze up, and realising the jig was up, Cass swung into view upside-down from the canopy too. Silk strolled out from behind a bush and convinced the kid that we were indeed goblins, and bullshitting on the spot, claimed that we were seeking his aid to thwart “the Dark Lord… Morgana” – which over the course of the bullshitting also changed names to Morganneth, Morgoth and Morgar – who sought to defeat the “Winter Queen”, preventing the rebirth of Spring.

After much back-and-forth, Thomas refused to help because his responsibility was to protect Cambridge. Silk told him that essentially a substitute hero had been called in to cover for him, the mighty Oskar.

Thomas insisted on going to the tournament, and while he was busy, Silk rushed off to enlist the help of Essel and Oskar. He produced a convoluted plan involving disguising himself, Cass and Islwyn as “goblins”, Essel as “Morgana”, and Oskar as a mighty hero, putting on a performance in which Essel used her magic to throw Thomas away while Cass and Silk pretended to be magically paralysed.

Islwyn then grabbed Thomas by the arm and led him away on a roundabout route winding back to the same clearing, buying time for Silk and Cass to change into more fine clothes, and Essel to change into “the Winter Queen”.

She instructed Thomas to seek out a magical crystal in Nottingham, which was the only way to defeat Morgana, sending him off with all due haste.

When Thomas failed to show up to the tournament, Silk was forced to step forward to face the other finalist, and through a stroke of misfortune on his opponent’s behalf, Silk won. The prize was a longsword and being named the Champion of Cambridge, which he accepted graciously, before handing the sword to Essel to make up for fucking with Dane earlier.

Islwyn was taught by Mathilda to make charms, Cass entered and then absolutely crushed the obstacle course, and Oskar eventually won his pig, which he was absolutely delighted with.

(Spring) 1191 - Red Moon Rising
Participants: Cirice, Rian, Tancred, Adelaide, Arobaite, Bryne, Falko

After a year at the covenant, Rian began to receive vivid night terrors, wherein he stood before a ruined castle in a field of red flowers, and was later killed by a three-pronged object impaling him through the back.

When these terrors refused to subside and continued to ruin his sleep, he sought the advice of Cirice and some of the more well-travelled English covenfolk. After discerning its location as Boristrum Castle and producing no other ideas as to how to bring an end to the night terrors, he decided to investigate it.

Cirice and Tancred chose to accompany him, along with several grogs. After reaching the castle, they saw that it was inhabited by around fifty travellers. They tolerated the group’s presence, but were clearly on edge and less than welcoming.

After poking around and growing increasingly suspicious of the travellers, the group spotted a small contingent heading into the neighbouring Boristrum Forest. Cirice (in fox form) and Bryne shadowed them to a clearing, where they talked with a shadowy and hooded figure, referred to as Fandaniel, a type of being known as an Ascian.

The travellers told Fandaniel of the group’s presence and were subsequently dismissed, and the Ascian was then joined by another, called Lahabrea. The two spoke ominously of their plans going ahead regardless, involving a ritual at the rising of the Red Moon, which was that night.

After reporting back to the group, and some more poking around the various areas of the castle that the travellers had firmly steered them away from, they decided to make a show of leaving and double back before nightfall.

They noticed they were being followed at a distance by some of the travellers, and decided to turn back and attack them to eliminate at least some of their overall numbers and maybe gather some information.

Cirice darted around behind them to slow them if need be, and Tancred mounted on his warhorse and began to ride for them. The travellers, satisfied that the group were indeed leaving, had turned back to return to the castle, and went to force their way past Cirice. She threw up a wall of wind, keeping all but one at bay, who was slowly stepping through the wind to kill her with an axe.

Fandaniel appeared beside her to taunt her, while she was unable to do anything but concentrate on her spell. As he finished and turned to leave, as an afterthought he impaled her through the leg with a three-pronged dagger, almost breaking her concentration.

Luckily Tancred arrived on the scene at this point, charged past the travellers who had been blown over, and decapitated the axeman nearing Cirice in spectacular fashion. After subduing and failing to gather any vital information from the others, the group ran towards the tower to stop whatever ritual was going to be conducted.

Upon arriving all of the travellers were scattered around, dead, and Fandaniel and Lehabrea were stood on the roof of the keep of Boristrum Castle. They delivered a monologue and then disappeared, as the corpses of the travellers rose to their feet to attack the group.

Tancred bade Tiffanius protect Adelaide and ordered her to flee, Cirice created a stone staircase running up to the roof of the castle, and the rest of the group moved to run up it.

They were mobbed by the undead, with Rian being seriously injured. Cirice took on the form of a bear to charge through, and when she then fell through the stairs halfway up, instead cleared a path to the keep’s doors. Bryne was badly wounded defending Rian as Falko dragged him up onto the stairs, as Arrobaite fought his way to join Cirice and Tancred merrily rode in a circle, his sword taking limbs and his horse crushing bones, with undead hanging off him.

Cirice tossed the helpless Bryne into the castle and, after Arobaite darted behind her, backed into the doorway herself, holding them off despite many bleeding wounds. Falko pushed Rian towards the top of the stairs as he held the pursuing undead at bay.

Rian crawled to the roof, only to be met by Fandaniel, who appeared behind him, rammed another three-pronged dagger through his back just like in Rian’s nightmares, and then cut off his head. This was witnessed only by Morvan, who then flew to Falko to vociferously attempt to prevent him from going onto the roof.

Soon after, the duration of whatever ritual had reanimated the corpses ended and they collapsed. Falko reached the top of the stairs, looked over the parapet, and saw Rian’s corpse. He had just enough time to process it, before the duration of the stairs vanished too, and he fell several dozen feet onto the ground, somehow only gaining a broken leg.

Tancred chased down Adelaide and brought her back, and the members of the group who were able to travel went to the nearest village to try and find a healer to help Bryne, Cirice and Falko. Luckily the village had a very skilled, if cantankerous woman referred to only as “Granny”, who went and healed them.

As she waited to see how they fared through the night, she revealed to Tancred that she knew they were members of the Order of Hermes and had dealt with them before, but that she and the small group of witches she had gathered weren’t powerful enough to be “asked the question”, despite their magical capabilities.

She probed him for details of Fandaniel, and the groups’ purpose in going to Boristrum Castle. She then promised to ask her associates to investigate these Ascians and perhaps unearth their schemes, and Tancred told her that if her efforts bore fruit, to go to the Red Boar Inn to contact the covenant.

(Spring) 1191 - Visions at Wishborne
Participants: Evelyn, Tessora, Alison, Islwyn, Theopania

(Spring) 1191 - The Lidby Leet
Participants: Arianwen, Cuthbert, Gillian, Old Giles, Richard

It was decided at the covenant meeting that assart rights needed to be acquired from the nearby Forester-in-Fee, the eccentric Ser William Peveral at Lidby. The castle’s drawbridge was lowered, and any were welcome to enter and gain audience with him.

Arianwen and her retinue entered, with Cuthbert introducing her. Peveral seemed a bookish sort, and was only accompanied by one knight, who wore a close-faced helmet and armour that was deliberately tarnished. From speaking to the locals, the group knew this to be his “pet”, known as “The Black Knight”.

Arianwen explained that she wanted the land in order to attract a good husband, which Peveral seemed receptive to. He then said that the group were free to roam the castle and village as they wish, except for the third floor of the castle and a strange stone and glass building next to it.

Cuthbert, Giles and Gillian went to chat to the locals. Cuthbert discussed the crop yield with a farmer who’d come to petition Peveral for aid – apparently the crop should have sprouted, and despite the fact that there was no blight or anything affecting it, the crops just seemed (in his words) “scared” to emerge.

Looking for any rumours, they also learned of a strange group of people seen travelling in Sherwood Forest, whose descriptions matched several members of the Covenant, including Evelyn and Lady Tessora. Cuthbert noted that they’d have to have a word at the next covenant meeting about perhaps keeping a lower profile where possible.

That evening, invitations were individually extended to the members of the group – even the low-born Giles and Gillian. After Cuthbert and Richard gave them a crash-course in the basics of noble etiquette, and Arianwen and Cuthbert loaned them some more formal clothes, the group attended the dinner.

The Black Knight, who was named Yeshua, was also in attendance, and after being told that he could partake he removed his helmet. He was an Ethiopian, though definitely still a Christian.

In conversation with Peveral, he revealed that he cared little for status, politics or war, and was instead a keen horticulturalist, and enquired as to whether anyone in the group had seen any unusual plants. Giles told him of the “scared” crops that the local farmer had mentioned, but besides that the group kept quiet about things like the giant vegetables of herbam vis that Essel was growing.

After the meal, Peveral took the group to the strange glass building, which functioned as a greenhouse (not that any of the group knew it). Inside was a large collection of strange and exotic plants, the centrepiece of which being a cinnamon tree.

In the tree was a white fox, which hopped down and let itself be petted. Peveral told the group of his story; he had met Yeshua whilst imprisoned, having been captured on his way to the holy land. One night they saw a white fox outside their cell, and shortly thereafter noticed that the gate had been worn away. Taking the opportunity, the pair escaped with Yeshua fighting their way out, and they then followed the white fox to safety and then to a sapling.

Feeling that they should take it, Peveral dug it up and they returned back to England. The sapling grew into the tree the group saw before them, and the fox and Yeshua had both been with him ever since.

The following day, Peveral held the leet. Amongst the attendees was Guy of Gisborne and his retinue, who definitely recognised Arianwen and Old Giles from the trial at Normanston.

Arianwen stayed silent and didn’t engage him, and he stayed throughout the leet until her turn came to formally petition Peveral for the assart rights. She laid out her proposal as before, which Peveral began to accept until Guy interrupted.

He politely inquired as to which house she belonged, which she answered was “Falcone”. With exaggerated confusion, he said that he’d never heard of it, following up by explaining in an overly saccharine manner that although he was of course certain that Arianwen was truly a noble, the good Ser Peveral surely had an obligation to verify such things, as fake claims were not unheard of.

He gave Arianwen six months to travel to Wales, collect her writ of noble birth, and bring it back. This would then be verified by the completely unbiased Francois Giscard, Robert’s brother. After throwing that particular spanner in the covenant’s works, he and his retinue departed, making it clear that he had lingered purely to do that.

That evening after the leet concluded, Arianwen sought out Ser Peveral in private for his thoughts. He told her that he actually got on quite well with Guy, and was surprised by his interruption – he’d never done such a thing before, and Peveral guessed that he’d been acting on orders from Robert Giscard.

Seemingly on Arianwen’s side and believing that she was a noblewoman being unnecessarily obstructed from receiving fair assart rights, he suggested that she contact the low-born Giles of Vennes and his protector and friend, Baron Richard of Blyde. Both men are close friends of King Richard, beyond Giscard’s ability to overrule, and are certainly no fans of his.

(Summer) 1191 - The Miracle of Summerbridge
Participants: Tancred, Tessora, Adelaide, Alfred, Alison, Chimi, Haeddi

As the sun rose on Sagehollow, Lady Tessora was finishing her morning prayers when a near-blinding light appeared in her tent. From it emerged the angel Midael, who told her that she must “go to summer’s bridge, and there find the way to paradise.” He advised that she bring companions capable of communicating and fighting if need be, and that he may be called upon for aid during this quest, though of course he cannot stray from God’s ineffable plan.

Asking around the covenfolk, Richard told her that a village named Summerbridge lay a few days’ travel to the north, within the domain of William of Hartwith. The headsman is called Alwin, and the priest is Father Edward, a young man in his twenties.

After gathering Tancred, their respective squires, and Alfred, Chimi and Cuthbert, they set off, stopping at The Red Boar and Normanston – in which Adelaide enthusiastically told an exaggerated account of Tancred’s part in the battle at Boristrum Castle, enlarging Tancred’s existing reputation. The group stayed the night in the town of Danecastle. Bored and interpreting a rivalry between the two knights, Adelaide challenged Alison to a duel. Alison explained that she had no weapons, and was then mocked by Adelaide because she had been entrusted with a long knife by her knight.

Alison scampered off to ask Tessora for a dagger, to which she asked why on earth she would require such a weapon. The squire explained the proposed duel, and Tessora promptly sought Tancred out for a conversation. She explained that it would be far more responsible to have the squires first fight without weaponry. Tancred agreed, and the two established “battlefield conditions” by renting out the mud- and horseshit-covered stables.

After much ineffectual flailing and slipping, the two squires ran headlong into each other, bloodying their noses and falling over. Tancred called an end to the bout, declaring a draw, and Tessora tentatively congratulated them on fighting bravely (if not skilfully).

Setting off the next day, the group reached Summerbridge. The inhabitants clearly saw the group as outsiders, and unanimously wore strange amulets. Tancred and Tessora stabled their horses and the group crossed the stone bridge that the village derived its name from to visit the church.

It was occupied by the young Father Edward, who was surprised to see anyone enter, let alone the ragtag group before him. After initial pleasantries, and Tessora explaining broadly that she was on a holy mission, he told her Summerbridge’s recent history;

A plague had hit the village (and curiously, only the village, with other nearby settlements being completely unaffected), killing hundreds. One of the villagers, Jonathan, claimed to receive a vision from an angel named Castanel, telling him how to cure it.

He did so, saving the village, and they heralded him as the village’s new holy leader. Edward’s congregation dwindled to none, instead attending sermons held by Jonathan where he “reinterpreted” the words of The Bible to relay its “true meaning”.

His followers referred to themselves as the Children of Eden, and had essentially shunned Edward, ignoring him except to provide him with food to live. He said that he still believed Jonathan to be a good man, but wasn’t sure whether he completely believed what he’d been preaching or if he was manipulating the people of Summerbridge.

Edward then told Tessora of how when he was a mercenary in the Holy Land, he bore personal witness to an act of God whilst dying of thirst in the desert – an angel with six faces and six wings appeared, telling him to repent, and then created an oasis to save his life.

After repenting, he went on to meet and befriend the “Keepers of Fire”, who are often (incorrectly in Edward’s view) labelled as heretics, but were in actuality Magi of the Order of Hermes. Tancred stepped aside to pray to Tiffanius, who told him that the Keepers of Fire were old Persian priests and therefore (in a fashion) divine. He also told him that the amulets the Children of Eden wore symbolised a wolf, and whether that was good or bad was unclear.

Tessora promised Edward that they would do everything they could to resolve matters peacefully, but Tancred advised him to pack a bag in case the situation spiralled out of control. Tessora and Edward gave each other heartfelt farewells and best wishes, and then the group set off to see what Jonathan was preaching.

The entire rest of the village were gathered before him as he preached his version of The Bible, impressing upon them the role of women in absolving men of their sins and generally of obeying the commands of all men at all times. Alwin, the former headsman, was front and centre, apparently fully content with relinquishing his role and becoming a loyal follower of Jonathan’s.

As the group quietly joined the back of the congregation to listen, Chimi clearly wasn’t a fan of being near it, sticking her tongue out and shaking her head like a child who’d tasted something she didn’t like – meaning the aura around the congregation was either divine or infernal in nature.

Speaker Jonathan continued espousing the woman’s place in obeying all men, and how if the village continued operating according to the words of Castanel, conveyed through him, then men will gain their wings and ascend to paradise. He also claimed that once humanity was all to adopt this “true” version of The Bible, they all would ascend to Paradise. After Tancred continued to keep a twitchy hand on his sword’s pommel, Tessora pulled him aside. She told him that she would not countenance the killing of the village while repentance is still a possibility. He reluctantly accepted, in a “it’s your funeral” kind of way. With that established, they went to talk to Jonathan, and they engaged in a theological debate. Although remaining perfectly calm, Jonathan refused to realise his specious reasoning – such as that the fact that Castanel was a legitimate angel being proven by the fact that he was told… by Castanel, or that if all of humanity were to ascend to Paradise, then humans would be unable to sin, or repent, or do good, thus meaning that none would be able to prove themselves worthy of being in heaven in the first place. Giving up on this approach, the group returned to the church to pray. Tessora’s prayers to Midael went unanswered, but Tancred gleaned some information from Tiffanius; all but confirming that the infernal was behind it, and saying that we should focus our efforts on this Castanel’s “true” servants, instead of Speaker Jonathan. Though we had no idea who those might be or how we could find them. After some further theological discussion with Edward, he and Tessora together explained to Tancred that killing people for committing a major sin is exactly what the devil wants, as it means he gets their souls. It’s far better to offer them the chance to repent and earn forgiveness in the eyes of God, to save their souls. This led to something of an epiphany for the crusader. He and Tessora then turned to Edward and reinforced his shaken faith by reminding him that God tests the faith of his followers, and he never puts a burden too heavy for us to carry (though it would be nice if he didn’t have such high opinions of us at times). The trio planned to hold their own sermon outside the church the following morning to peacefully attempt to steer them back onto the right path – not threatening or accusing them, but simply by preaching God’s virtues and the actual teachings of the bible, and by explaining each of our respective experiences with the divine – Edward in the desert, Tancred with Tiffanius, and Tessora with Midael. With renewed faith, Edward advised they camp outside the village just in case Jonathan incited his speakers to violence, saying that if they attempted to attack the church, he would lock the doors and ring the bell. The group bade him farewell and camped up several hundred metres outside in a forest clearing. The group set up camp outside the village, and during the night, Chimi heard the church bells ringing. Grabbing their horses and going as fast they dared, Tessora, Tancred and the squires arrived outside the gates of Summerbridge, followed by those on foot. Tessora stood up from her horse and clambered over the palisade wall, catching her chainmail on the spiked top.

She tipped over the wall, snapping a chunk of wall off in the process, before slamming inelegantly onto the ground on the far side and rolling down the small earthworks. After recovering the breath that was driven out of her, she lifted the two drop bars holding the gate shut and let the others in.

As the group entered the village, they saw that the entire village was in the square, where they had lit a pyre and burned someone. Given the bells had stopped ringing a while ago, it didn’t take a genius to figure out that they had dragged Father Edward out of the church and burned him, and were now attending a speech held by Jonathan.

Tessora strode forward into the square to confront him despite Chimi’s efforts to pull her back. Jonathan explained that they had to purge the nonbeliever in, lest he steer others “away from the word of God” as told to them by Castanel with his “lies”.

Tessora exclaimed that he was a peaceful and holy man, and they had committed a mortal sin in murdering him. Chimi, overwhelmed by the aura around her, shouted that they were all bad. At this, a deep voice emanated from the fire, saying “oh yes, they are”.

The fire took a humanoid form and stepped off of the platform, carrying a wicked-looking sword. He revealed that he was Zodiacus, a fallen angel, and he had so easily lured the village into committing great evil. Speaker Jonathan stared at him, horrified, as the villagers either scattered in terror or dropped to their knees in prayer, presumably begging forgiveness.

As Tessora drew her sword and readied her shield, hoofbeats were heard beyond the gate on the far side of the village. Zodiacus raised his hand and the gate exploded inwards, and in rode four knights. Tancred rode off to engage them, assuming that they would otherwise begin slaughtering the villagers to send their souls to hell before they had a chance to repent.

Tessora charged into Zodiacus with an opening swing that would have seriously wounded a normal person, but he shrugged it off with a scratch, before his answering swing went clean through her chainmail and cut a deep gouge in her side. Chimi hurled stones at him to absolutely no effect, before Haeddi took her to run off to the church.

Alfred bravely charged in to assist, but his attack was easily parried, and he was then thrown back with a heavy wound to the chest. Alison and Adelaide gathered the children of the village together. Adelaide lied that she knew where the daemon wouldn’t be able to hurt them – which Alison added was the church. Haeddi was looking through the reliquary for any potentially useful items, assisted by Chimi’s magical sensitivity, eventually finding a broken sword hilt.

Tancred raced over to the bridge before the knights could cross, reigning his horse up to stand side-on to block their passage. The knights wore full-face masked visors and lacked any heraldry or insignia. They could only fight him one at a time, and he wasn’t particularly hard-pressed by the first knight.

Tessora dealt another blow to Zodiacus, but his counterattack battered her sword out of her hand. Alfred staggered back to the church, while Chimi scampered past him on all fours coming the other way, sword hilt in her mouth. Adelaide told Alison to take the children to the church while she split off, slipping round a corner.

She donned the mask that the group had discovered during the Trials at Normanston, which she had secretly stolen for unknown reasons. After doing so, she was visited by the spirit of Father Edward, who guided her in rousing the skeletal remains of knights buried nearby. They clawed out of their graves and she commanded them to run to the aid of Tancred.

Tancred continued his duel with the first knight, whittling his strength down without much issue. Chimi arrived beside Tessora, handing her the broken sword and then scurrying off, but before she could bring it to bear, Zodiacus dealt a colossal downward blow.

Tessora raised her shield to block it, but his sword cleaved straight through her shield and into her shoulder, hacking a chunk out of it. Tessora’s vision faded to black, and then she awoke in a pure white landscape.

Edward was there, casually commenting that they both seem to have fallen. He then explained that God had chosen her to be his sword upon the earth, to protect the good and punish the evil. Tessora responded that she did not consider herself worthy of such a blessing, to which he answered that it was exactly why she was given the role.

He said that Midael will continue to offer guidance when needed, and advised that going on Crusade does not absolve people of their sins – one cannot wash away the blood on their hands with more blood.

With that, they bid each other a fond farewell and Tessora awoke in a corona of holy light. Her wounds had healed and the broken sword in her hand had the missing length formed as a translucent golden blade.

Dealing a truly awesome blow to Zodiacus, he was cast down and as he looked up at the blessed form of Tessora, she planted the point of her sword, dropped to her knees and prayed. A gateway to hell formed and opened behind her, and chains stretched past to wrap around Zodiacus and drag him inexorably in. He begged for Tessora to grant mercy, and that he was sorry for his actions, but she responded that there was no word from a daemon that she could trust. He was pulled in screaming, the gates then clanging shut behind him and disappearing.

Seeing this behind Tancred, two of the three remaining knights at the bridge turned and fled. Before Tancred could close in on the last, the five skeletons that had been summoned by Adelaide leapt over him onto the knight and tore him limb from limb.

Tancred looted the knight’s intact gear and took his cavalry horse, Adelaide ran to his side and excitedly wondered at the “miracle” of the skeletons. The pair returned to the village square, where they saw that Tessora’s skin had become very pale and almost luminous, with a faint halo around her head.

They then filed into the church, while Tessora stopped to talk to Jonathan, still stood where he had been speaking from with a thousand-yard stare full of horror and disbelief. He was appalled at himself for being so easily lured into sin, and sought Tessora to administer whatever justice and punishment that she saw fit. She told him that forgiveness is always possible for the earnest, and bade him to go forth and seek to find it.

He slowly nodded, and told her that he would travel to the Holy Land to repent, before perhaps settling down in France and find some Good to do. She wished that he would find peace, and advised that he avoid fighting in the crusade – instead focusing on helping others. With a farewell, he left the village.

Tessora then retrieved the remains of Father Edward, laying him down in the church before kneeling over the badly injured form of Alfred, laying her hand on his chest and reciting a prayer. Though his wound didn’t heal itself, it stopped bleeding.

Tessora and Tancred told the assembled villagers their experiences with the divine, and shared those of Father Edward in his absence, and the following morning held a funeral service for Father Edward. They knew that his spirit was in heaven, absolved of his sins and stripped of his doubt and pain.

The villagers as a whole seemed distraught at their actions, and prepared to set off – they had committed much sin in Summerbridge, and they too resolved to undertake a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Before they left, Alwin told Tancred and Tessora to take whatever supplies from the village that they wished.

After that, the group returned to Sagehollow, with a few of the inhabitants giving Tessora strange looks due to her brighter visage, broken sword, cloven shield and ripped chainmail – but absolutely no damage to herself.