Chapter 4 - Session 8

Heretics on the Run

Events and Actions

The session begins with the party grappling with the shocking revelation that approximately three years have passed while they were on the mist-shrouded island. Werner uses his navigation and astronomy skills to read the shifted position of the sun and moon against what he remembers, confirming it is the same season they entered the mist in, but roughly three years later. The physical evidence bears this out: their clothes have gone tight and short, faint stubble has appeared, and their voices have begun to change. Looking at their own reflections in the water, and at each other, makes it plain — they have grown into their late teens. Leela, Batu Batu, and Salter have visibly aged as well, and even Noddy's familiar, the seagull Pocket, shows the years, though otherwise seems fine. Oddly, the aging is not complete: none of them carry anywhere near three years' worth of unshaven growth, nor any sign of having gone hungry, and a check of the gear left in the boat turns up nothing unusually worn either — as if the years had been imposed on their bodies without the wear that should have come with them.

Looking down from the cliffs, they observe the massive Northern settlement that has replaced the Islander village, complete with a quarry worked by enslaved Islanders and Stone Men. Before approaching, the party agrees on a cover story: they are northern sailors who were separated from their ship in the Maelstrom while pursuing a Southern vessel, and have been lost in the interior ever since, for a length of time they prefer to keep vague. They agree not to volunteer the Amada's name unless pressed, and to hold Werner's De Rendal name and letter of introduction in reserve. They hide their ship's boat along with its swivel gun, keg of gunpowder, firewood, and a crate of grenades, and split up their remaining store of harvested root to carry on their persons, since they doubt they will ever make it back to retrieve it. Taking stock of what's left to them, they accept that whatever they'd left in their sea chests aboard the missing Amada is gone for good — but each of them had kept a personal store of gold rather than trust it to the crew, so between that and Leela's jewelry they still carry a considerable hoard, their only real resource now. Leela is persuaded, not without difficulty, to conceal that gold jewelry, and both she and Batu Batu are told to present themselves as slaves to avoid drawing suspicion. It stings Batu Batu, a slave of the Navy himself, who struggles to reconcile the request with Leela's status as a free woman among her own people; Leela herself, unfamiliar with slavery as the Northern Empire practices it, only grasps what is being asked of her after a halting, painful conversation, finally summing it up herself as "me slave, me animal, good."

While still on the cliffs, the party pulls out the map taken from the raiders and studies it properly for the first time, matching its markings against what little the raiders had told them. They confirm the Stone Man home is the mountain marked at its centre, and that a nearby pyramid is the "staircase to God" — the tower to the Stone Men's sky god. The map also shows a long-ruined "Old Wall," a caravan route, a possible trading post, a stretch of desert marked with scorpions large enough to be worth avoiding, and an unlabelled body of water where, according to the raiders, "there are no more ships." Both the Old Wall and the Stone Man home appear to lie a couple of weeks' walk away — useful landmarks, though the map answers few of their immediate questions.

They approach the quarry, where islander and Stone Man labourers haul cut stone toward the river under the crack of overseers' whips, and encounter Sergeant Perkins, a Northern NCO. Wary of him at first — and careful to give Werner's family name only as the shortened, noncommittal "Dendle" rather than the full De Rendal — they learn that a Commander Odo is in charge of the settlement before Noddy magically charms the sergeant. Perkins's newfound devotion fixes on Noddy himself — he recalls seeing him in action three years earlier in Zylos, the night a Southern wind witch's fire ship was boarded and stopped in the harbor, and even claims, bafflingly, to have heard that Cosimo died "terribly," a rumor no one in the party can account for. Loosened by the charm, Perkins reveals that Major Hubert is now considered a traitor who was secretly working for the South all along and vanished with the Amada amid the ensuing confusion, that the North has held this settlement for two years by way of a difficult, bitterly cold "Northern Passage" that bypasses the Maelstrom entirely, that construction of the settlement's temple is running months ahead of schedule though the new clergy meant to staff it have not yet arrived, and that most of the Stone Men have been rounded up and brought here as slave labor, with only a handful of holdouts left in their original home to the north. He adds that the truce with the South holds only in the east; out here in the west the two sides remain locked in an unofficial, low-grade fight, and as far as he knows the South still has no way through but the Maelstrom itself, crossed only by their wind witches.

Perkins has a camel-drawn cart brought round and rides the party into the settlement, which they find utterly transformed: a town raised on stone pillars above the water, threaded with causeways, bridges, and small boats, and ringed by fields of rice and grain. At a tavern, the party plies Perkins with a fierce local liquor, and once he is well into his cups he begins talking loudly about a pirate problem — someone, somewhere close by, "hiding in plain sight," preying on shipping in a way no one can explain. Pressed further, he also lets slip that the port at the river delta remains small and poorly organized, with ships simply anchoring wherever the unpredictable depths allow, and that no one has established any shipbuilding on this side of the Maelstrom — nothing like the infrastructure he remembers from Zylos. As his voice rises, Noddy hurriedly casts a spell of silence around the table to keep him from being overheard, but Perkins keeps talking and shouting names and directions within the silenced bubble, so Noddy puts him to sleep with a spell to shut him up. The party carries him out, loads him back onto his cart, and sends him off with his driver, claiming he simply overindulged.

Meanwhile, Knick Nab slips away on his own to gather intelligence. In front of the half-built church, whose plaza is lined with pillars bearing routine notices — hymn schedules, requests for blessings, lost dogs — one posting stops him cold: a declaration of heresy from the Divinity of Two. It names a long list of individuals as heretics: Major Hubert, Captain De Guzman, his lieutenant Blaque, Lieutenant Dardell, the priest Nicolas, and the party members Cosimo, Knick Nab, Mani, Riu, and Werner. Noddy's name is conspicuously absent. Knick Nab tears the notice down and tucks it away before rejoining the others, who by then understand the gravity of their situation: they are fugitives.

They decide their only option is to escape the island. Werner changes out of his midshipman's uniform and back into ordinary sailor's clothes, and the party moves east along the riverbank under cover of night, heading for the river delta to find a ship. Passing through the settlement, they see no cannon, gun slits, or other sign the town is braced for an attack — only routine patrols, as though the surrounding desert is considered defense enough. Their path is blocked by a new and formidable gatehouse and wall spanning the entire river valley — a stone tower complete on the north bank, one under construction on the south, and a barrier running from the gate out to the desert on both sides. Sentries pace the wall's top, visible against the night sky, and a single small boat, its mast unstepped and sail down, sits moored just inside the closed gate. Before they turn to scramble up out of the river valley, someone points out the dark silver lining in it all: since the Navy that owns Batu Batu has just declared the whole party heretics and enemies, its claim on him is worth exactly as much as its goodwill toward them now — which is to say, none. Batu Batu, they agree, has effectively just won his freedom. The session concludes with the party planning a dangerous trek through the desert to come around the wall unseen.

NPCs & Creatures

Sergeant Perkins: A Northern NCO overseeing the quarry. Charmed by Noddy, he becomes instantly and utterly devoted to him, recognizing him from a night three years earlier in Zylos and providing key intelligence — about Hubert's disgrace, the temple's construction, the fate of the Stone Men, the state of the war, and rumors of a hidden pirate problem — before the party plies him with drink until he passes out and sends him back to the quarry with his own driver, none the wiser.
Commander Odo: Named by Perkins as the officer in command of the settlement. The party does not meet him directly.
Northern Soldiers: Seen overseeing the slave labor at the quarry and patrolling the new fortification downriver.

Locations

Isle of Sands: The desert landmass and river valley beyond the Maelstrom where the party is now stranded.
The new Northern settlement built where the Islander village once stood — stone buildings and pillars raised above the water, linked by causeways, bridges, and small boats, and surrounded by fields of rice and grain. Islanders move through it visibly deferential, though uncollared, alongside ordinary shops going about their business. It encompasses the quarry, a half-built temple to the Divinity of Two, and the tavern where the party interrogated Sergeant Perkins.
The fortified river gate and wall: a stone tower complete on the north bank, one under construction on the south, and a patrolled barrier running from the gate to the edge of the desert on both sides, now blocking the river valley entirely. A single small boat sits moored just inside the closed gate.

Conflicts

The primary conflict is the revelation that the party has been declared heretics by the Divinity of Two, making them fugitives within the very Kingdom they serve.
A social encounter with Sergeant Perkins is successfully navigated using magic, though plying him with drink until he talks nearly backfires when his voice rises within earshot of the rest of the tavern, forcing Noddy to cast a hasty spell of silence to contain him.
Passing Leela and Batu Batu off as slaves for the sake of the cover story causes real strain: Leela only reluctantly accepts, unfamiliar with slavery as her own people practice it, while Batu Batu is asked to perform a role he already lives every day, standing beside a woman he knows to be free.
The party's escape is physically blocked by a large, patrolled wall and gatehouse spanning the river valley.

Learnings and Discussions

Approximately three years have passed while the party was in the mist.
All party members (Cosimo, Knick Nab, Mani, Riu, and Werner), with the notable exception of Noddy, have been officially declared heretics along with key associates including Major Hubert, Captain De Guzman, Lieutenant Blaque, Lieutenant Dardell, and the priest Nicolas — now defrocked, and named on the notice only by his given name, without the title "Brother" he once held.
The official Northern narrative is that Major Hubert was secretly working for the South all along, and that the Amada disappeared with him amid the confusion once this came to light.
The North has had a presence on the island for at least two years, though the temple under construction is running months ahead of schedule and its incoming clergy have not yet arrived.
The Stone Men have been largely subjugated and forced into slave labor alongside the local Islanders; only a small number remain free in their original home to the north, too few to be worth the trouble of retrieving.
The North has established a difficult but functional "Northern Passage" to this region, bypassing the Maelstrom — Perkins describes it as bitterly cold and thoroughly unpleasant, though passable.
The war with the South is in a state of official truce in the east (the Mainlands), but the conflict continues unofficially in the west; as far as Perkins knows, the South still has no way through but the Maelstrom itself, crossed only with the aid of their wind witches.
Studying the raiders' map properly for the first time, the party identified the "Stone Man home" (the mountain marked at its centre) and their "staircase to God" (a pyramid, the tower to their sky god), along with a long-ruined "Old Wall," a caravan route, a possible trading post, and a body of water the raiders described only as a place where "there are no more ships." Both the Stone Man home and the Old Wall lie a couple of weeks' walk across the desert, alongside a stretch marked with scorpions worth avoiding.
The party discussed how to manage the perception of their Islander companions, deciding that both Batu Batu and Leela would need to pretend to be slaves to avoid suspicion — a fiction that visibly troubled Batu Batu, given his own status as a Navy slave beside Leela's freedom.
Pressing the question of how a slave might be freed, the party learns that only an owner can grant freedom, that the freed slave customarily takes the former owner's name — as with Freeman Knowles, the freed Islander they met on Zylos — and that it requires formal paperwork and is rarely granted, typically only for truly exceptional service. Since the Navy owns Batu Batu, not the party, they have no power to free him themselves.
The party learned of a Southern port in the region — Perkins, deep in his cups, slurred the name almost past recognition ("Port Lisker," "Liz Gurr," "New Lisgar") — and let slip rumors of a significant pirate problem — some group operating "hiding in plain sight," close enough to strike at shipping yet impossible to locate.
Perkins also revealed that the port at the river delta remains small and poorly organized, with ships simply anchoring wherever the unpredictable depths allow, and that no shipbuilding of any kind has been established on this side of the Maelstrom.
Despite the years lost, the party's medallions show no sign of change, looking and feeling exactly as they did before the mist.
Passing through the settlement, the party sees no fortifications, cannon, or gun slits on any building, and nothing to suggest the town is braced for attack — only routine patrols, as though the surrounding desert is considered defense enough.
A massive, patrolled wall now blocks the river valley, preventing easy access to the coast.

Items Gained

The official notice from the Divinity of Two declaring the party as heretics, which Knick Nab took from a public pillar.

Items Lost

Approximately three years of time.
Whatever gear remained in their sea chests aboard the missing Amada, now presumed unrecoverable.