BEAU'S DOWNTIME Side Action #1 : Voril and Arielle are happy to see you. They invite you inside and dine with you. Voril pours you an ale while Arielle whips up a fresh loaf of bread with butter in a small bowl. You are all dipping bread into thick oil sprinkled with garlic and drinking and laughing. The night is good. Special Items : Voril scratches his bald head. “Special items? What are you looking for exactly, my friend?” Gethrame : “Gethrame?” Arielle thinks for a moment. Then her eyes light up. “Ah! You mean the witch? Why didn’t you say that to begin with? Well, I can only tell you what you already seem to know, except for this new bit: supposedly there is an old ranger named Herl who patrols these lands. He knows more about the witch’s tale than anyone else. Not sure why, though. He sometimes visits Fairhill and stops at the Drunken Cockatrice for a night. Drinks a few ales. Eats a big supper. Sleeps. Then vanishes in the morning for weeks or even months at a time. That’s all I know, friend.” She does not know anyone named Tavik, Vortigern, Balgruuf, or Auris Veng. “Fathilir is a legendary (11th level+) bard who lives in Bard’s Gate, but he travels the world often. He is an incredibly talented harp player and singer. Foreign kings request him personally in their courts just to hear him perform for a night. Can you believe it?” “Last I heard,” Arielle says, “he was on a long journey west to another continent. He’s apparently seeking out an ancient treasure or something or other. When the bard was passing through Fairhill on the way to Reme, he heard me singing in the Drunken Cockatrice one night, and he was so enchanted with my voice, he said, that he gifted me with one of his exquisite harps. Amazing, isn’t it?” “Fathilir told me I shouldn’t be in a one-horse town like this. But it took me several months of the man’s words gnawing on me before I finally decided to pack my bags and leave for a better life in Bard’s Gate.” Side Action #2 : The magistrate grants your party a newly written letter of introduction that he stamps closed with his private seal of office. “My library? Of course. You are free to use it whenever you please…though I must admit that it isn’t too impressive.” Research : After perusing Arlen’s small library, you realize that there is nothing you will be able to learn here no matter how many hours you spend trying to research the way stations in the region. (You do not need to make a check, nor do you spend any gold, and you have seven extra days of free time.) Searching for Gethrame : Your journey begins. 8 Hexes to Keep (No Difficult Terrain; Paths Known to You) The elf’s skeleton is still impaled on the tree. It has already been stripped of valuables. You bury the elf’s corpse in the ground in the nearby woods. 9 Hexes to Cave (Difficult Terrain = 3 Hexes x2) As you approach the cave using the writings of Eralion for directions, you find yourself standing near several trees, and you can see that the cave itself lies ahead in the cleft of a large rocky hill. A woman’s voice can be heard wailing from within the cave. She is crying out, as if in great despair. Entering the cave, you see an older woman, perhaps in her 80’s or 90’s, dressed in gray robes and stumbling about in the dark. At one point, this cave was probably a comfortable home, but right now it is in a state of disrepair, as if the woman has stopped taking care of it entirely. In fact, several pieces of furniture look smashed, something this old lady could not have done herself, given her likely age. But at the sound of your footsteps, the old woman’s ears perk up and she stops crying. “You…you miserable creatures! Have you come back to finish me off? Give it back! How else can an old woman see?” You ask permission to enter and identify yourself. She responds, “Well, you’re already in here, aren’t you? So you might as well sit down. I am afraid there is little I can do to properly serve you, Beau of Bard’s Gate.” You give her Eralion’s robe and tell her your full tale. She listens intently, occasionally asking you questions, or to clarify some point or another that seems slightly unrelated to the narrative. At the end, you ask her why this all happened, but she only sits in silence for a long time. “He is finally laid to rest then. Long have I waited to hear of news related to either his true death, or to experience my own, at last. Our tale is a tragedy, I’m afraid. I do not wish to share it.” She turns and looks at you, though her eyes are clearly milky white with cataracts and she is unable to see through them anymore. “But…maybe I will tell you more about Eralion and his amulet, if you help me with something. A small tribe of wretched grung broke into my cave and stole my walking staff from me. I know they lair under the old twisted tree to the northeast. If you return this item to me, I will tell you anything that you wish to know.” (Party Quest sheet updated.) 16 Hexes to the Ruined Waystation. (33 Hexes total. With exploration here, this ends your first day of downtime during your private expedition. You camp inside.) (Tell me what you want to do while you are there at the way station.) 9 Hexes to Crimmor along the Tradeway. (No Difficult Terrain.) Crimmor is a small village, slightly smaller than Fairhill. It was once a rather prosperous fishing village and a gathering place for merchants on their way from Bard's Gate to Reme in the West. It is run by a merchant's guild. Originally, Lake Crimmormere was a source of a rare type of fresh water fish, a type of large-mouth bass famed for its flavor and its ability to be dried and preserved. In the last decade, however, the species' population has greatly waned, and this has devastated Crimmor's economy because most villagers are fishermen. Many have left the village to find work and fortune elsewhere, so the population has dwindled. Now, with the ascendancy of Fairhill, the lack of fish and the corruption in the guilds, Crimmor has declined, and is rarely visited, except by the traveling merchants who know of Stipish’s prowess in repairing wagons. There are several shops of note in Crimmor. The Merchant’s Wagon is a local tavern and inn that has seen better days. Linrog’s Tent is a hut on the outskirts of town where the adept sells trinkets of local witchcraft, most having to do with charms to increase a fisherman’s prowess. The Blessed Net is a tavern for local fisherman that is now a rather depressing and dilapidated watering hole. The Guildhall is a large open hall where the guildsmen meet. The Crimmor Market is an open market where merchants can trade their wares, though at the moment, that is a sad place to peer around. The Docks , from which fishermen still put out their small boats and cast their nets in the lake only to return empty handed. And finally, Stipish’s Shop . Though the town may be run down, Stipish is still the best at making and repairing wheels for carts and wagons and his shop is usually busy. (What specifically do you want to spend time inquiring about while in town? Post these along with your Charisma checks.) 20 Hexes back to Fairhill along the Tradeway. (No Difficult Terrain. Your time asking around town, along with the 29 hexes you already traveled, ends day 2 of your trip.) Craft Healing Potions : You craft 5 healing potions over 5 days of downtime. Spend 125 gp total. When you combine the potions, nothing explodes. But the first combined potion turns strawberry red in color. The second combined potion turns the color of tarpaulin grey. And the third combined potion changes into a red-violet color. There is no way to use Arcana to identify a potion’s effect once they have been mixed; drinking one is a total shot in the dark. Technically, you have spent 7 days of downtime total. What do you want to do with the remaining 7 days?
