"Daga"

1621, Storm Season 50, Truth Week, Freezeday

The party has dragged several crates of stuff to the Zola Fel river bank where the boat is moored, and is preparing to load their flatbottom.  Since it is evening, they decide to set up camp where they are, and leave for Corflu the next day.  They set up three watches, and everything remains quite during the first watch, but as Herculon and Raiko keep second watch, a gang of thugs approaches as sneakily as they can.  Not without being noticed though.  Our friends pretend to not have noticed the attackers, and Raiko moves out of sight and sneaks back.  When the thugs attack, Herculon is ready, he takes out the first thugh with one blow to the head, then finished the second by almost decapitating him.  The thugs realize they have bitten off more than they can chew, and the headman starts planning an escape only seconds after starting the fight.  He casts a darkwall, in an attempt to disorganize the party and retreat, but Jaya runs forward, luckily ends up straight next to the thug leader, and compels him to surrender.  Morik, as he is called, decides to give up, rather than die for the cause.  On the thug leader they find a note from Gimgim The Grim, and a purse with 250 Lunars.

With the weather getting more and more ugly, the party has no choice but to get out of the sandstorm, but just at this moment their boat begins to slip free.  The pilot tries to jump on board, but fails, and if not for Herculon to grab the line at the last moment, the boat would definitely have been gone.  However, for all his brute strength, Herculon is unable to keep the boat from drifting off.  Daerius and Giomanach try to catch the line and assist him, but to no avail.  When, after several shameful attempts, Giomanach manages to grab hold of the rope, Herculon, exhausted, must let go.  The boat crashes into the marshy shore brush.

The next morning, the weather is better.  The boat has suffered some damage, and the party starts repair.  Morik is taken captive, the henchmen are stripped and sent off.  Morik tells them about the crown he is supposed to find, and his award he received in advance.  During repairs a hooded figure appears from the north, with an ox wagon.  As the orlanthi in the party come forward, the visitor reveals his true identity: He is Ademin, the Storm Voice.  He is willing to consecrate a shrine and hold a service for the Orlanthi, permitting Herculon to recuperate his theist spells.  For several days our party remains busy finding wood and reed to repair their boat as well as possible.  Meanwhile Jaya and Raiko head back to the Rabbit Hat Farm, and after some searching, discover the Pumpkinhead's treasure trove.  They find several trinkets, as well as the crown of Yamsur.  They only tell their comrades about the crown.

The repairs finished, the party head south again.  The boat has lost a lot of his speed, though, and Ademin manages to keep up with them in his ox cart.  The first morning of the Sacred Time, our heroes wake up in a different environment.  The Zola Fel gone, no more boat, and some of the party members have taken on mysterious identities.  Ademin now seems to play the role of the Orlanth, Raiko has become Hadrath Ingilli, and Daerius is toiling in the field as Barntar, bringing water to the scorched fields forom his well.  Giomanach seems to have become an incarnation of Pavis, and Herculon is chained to a rock, berserking away, like The Storm Bull on a good day.  Amina Ingilli, priest of Zola Fel, appears and convinces Raiko to become initiate to Zola Fel, and mend his ways.  Raiko accepts, without going into detail exactly what ways would need mending.  Daga, the wraith of drought appears.  He has taken Heler, the rain god, captive, and is disappearing into Daga's desert with him.  The party tries to stop Daga with violence, always an option, but The Storm Bull cannot bear to be this close to Daga for more than a few seconds, and collapsed from teh drought.  Barntar seems to be more enduring, but must give up as well.  Jaya, who is playing the part of Ernalda, intends to bring water from Barntars well using her cooking pots, but Hadrath summons the biggest undine he can, and drives it to Daga, who vanishes upon contact with the water entity, releasing Heler.  The party escapes through the well.

They do not return to the boat, however:  Ademin has vanished, but the party wake up on some beach, with a gang of baboons trying to steal their possessions.  It takes them some convincing and some rolling of muscle to get their gear back from the Baboons, and the limited communication is not helping. In the end, however, they recuperate everything, and discover they are only minutes from the town of Corflu.  In Corflu they meet up with the local Zola Fel priest, and he tells them about a series of runes that have appeared on their wrists.  These runes are the Zola Fel runes, and the characters are the river voices, selected by Zola Fel himself to help the Corflu people in their struggle.  The townsfolk are very enthusiast about the new visitors, and they receive a heroes welcome during their stay.  The priest arranges a fast vessel for them to return to Pavis, but requests a service in return: the locals being exploited as workers in the river, often get attacked by mudsharks, and the party will have to kill these ferocious beings.  They accept, and after a short recon mission decide on a plan.