The Hag Hassling Mantzur

The next morning, Terrance, Tuala, Fine Branch, and Dryali were feeling a need to get out of Cliffshadow.  The Planting Holiday was fun, but they were from elsewhere, and had felt it was weird.  They rose to go ask Arnari if there were any missions, and realized some folks in the front part of the tavern, at the foot of the stairs, were watching, sizing them up.  Fine Branch noticed one person in particular in the corner who was pretty antsy.

They looked at each other, and went upstairs to Arnari's office.  She seemed pretty normal, sipping her morning tea.  It occurred to Dryali he didn't know whether she was from Cliffshadow.

Arnari had four missions elsewhere on Duquesne:

• Look for hippogryph eggs between Haven and Stormhaven, for House Aldous
• Look for gryphon eggs in Northridge, for House Lyona.  This could be dangerous
• Go past Mantzur into Haven Hills, a Hag needs dealing with
• North of Lakeview, near the top of Mossey Lake, find out what is polluting the lake.

Egg hunting did not sound interesting.  "Hag seems most straightforward," Dryali declared.  Tuala agreed, "like Hag."  Fine Branch also said, "Hag."

Terrance hesitated.  "I want straightforward, but going to the lake might result in climbing."

Tuala told her, "I know Hags either come from, or cause, bad nature bits!"  He included the others in his proclamation.  "Hags know some spells, and thrive on making others miserable."

That was nice, but everyone considered Mossey Lake, and whether there would be gryphon eggs to be found, and whether maybe that kobold den with the eggs had anything to do with anything.  Then Arnari told them Korfel was paying 150gp each and they decided to go after the Hag.

The four of them got their gear together, and departed for Mantzur, getting there in the evening.  It was much as Dryali and Tuala remembered it, except there were a couple of new fruit trees freshly planted.  Fine Branch looked around at the trees in disparate seasons.

They spent the night in Mantzur, as guests of Korfel, and then Terrance and Tuala led the others to the glade where they'd tangled with the mean Dryads, almost 3 primes earlier.  It was late when they arrived, but they started looking around.

Tuala didn't really see anything, but the others quickly found the remains of the dryads and needleblights from before.  The needleblights were not decaying normally, and Dryali looked at them more closely.  Mushrooms were growing on them, with vivid yellow and red colours.

"These are weird mushrooms," he told the others.  "Normal mushrooms like this are poisonous…. But not this colourful!"  He pulled out his tools again, to begin a detect magic.

The mushrooms did have an aura of magic transmutation, but they weren't magic themselves.  Curiouser and curiouser!  Fine Branch carefully harvested some, and put them in their bag.  But by this time it was getting dark, and the Freelancers decided to camp in the glade.

Fine Branch was insistent: "Everybody, write down a good idea and a bad idea.  If the ideas still seem good and bad, okay; if they reverse, get worried!"  Fine Branch also took the first watch.

The others followed: Terrance, Dryali, Tuala.  Everyone but Terrance saw, while on watch, a wolf come bay, look at the camped Freelancers, and then melt back into the bushes.

It looked like a normal wolf, but this was not normal behaviour!  In the morning, they examined the ground where they'd seen it.  It was observing from a different direction each time.  The wolf was nowhere in sight.  A stellars jay screamed down at them from the trees.

They tracked the wolf SxSW to a stream.  Cautious, Dryali pulled out his tools and cast detect magic again.  The 10 minutes the ritual took was sure getting old.  He detected no magic the Freelancers weren't carrying, so they started looking for where the paw prints went.

Dryali, distracted by his peevishness about detect magic ritual, saw nothing, and neither did Fine Branch, who didn't admit it but was daydreaming of all the various sex positions they'd tried during the Planting Festival.

Terrance and Tuala were more methodical, checking up and down the stream until they found, 50' upstream, the paw prints wandering away.  They followed the prints easily, for hours.  Around midday, they came to a valley between some hills.

The Freelancers stopped as wolf prints led to a path, and faded out.  The sides of the valley were steep, and the trees were tall, but droopy.  The effect was, it was not as well lit as the more airy forest they'd been moving through.  Fine Branch looked ahead, and saw a little light, about a mile away.  Perhaps someone's fire?  Perhaps a lit window.  Terrance tried talking to the droopy trees.  They seemed… unfriendly to her.

The group decided to follow the path, but stay about 50' to the left of it.  As they proceeded, the darkness under the trees was ominous and felt unfriendly to everyone, not just Terrance.

The trees ended to reveal a cottage with a garden.  The light Fine Branch had seen came from two windows.

The garden was well-tended, and full of herbs and vegetables, and surrounded by a hedgerow about 4' tall, roughly 60' from the cottage.  A stone path led from a corner to the cottage door.  The Freelancers hung back in the trees, studying what they could see — except Terrance, who was too intimidated by the unfriendly trees to really observe anything.

Dryali saw that the herb garden had poisonous herbs… deathly poisonous.  Perhaps some of the berries were too.  He saw leaves for the "cold potato", and also plants from his native Nadhezda.  Despite this, birds and bees were buzzing about.   He pointed all this out to the others.

Fine Branch came to a decision, and announced  "I'll use my doppelgänger to knock on the door, and proselytize Daystar worship."  After a moment of being utterly taken aback, the others agreed.

Everyone hid in the trees behind the hedgerow, whereupon doppel-Fine Branch knocked on the cottage door.  After a moment or two, someone opened the door.  They heard the kindly voice of an older female human.

Cottage person:  Oh my dear, a nekomata!  You are very far from home, what are you doing here?
doppel-Fine Branch: Have you heard about the Daystar?
Cottage person:  The… Daystar?  <points up>
doppel-Fine Branch: The Daystar loves you!  It wants you to be happy, and
Cottage person:  <cuts off the cat> Oh, hon.  Let me help you, and you can help me!
doppel-Fine Branch: We who work for the Daystar are happy to help others!

The person at the door was confused, and so was Fine Branch.  Fine Branch checked their insight for how genuine her reaction was, with Dryali helping with guidance; she seemed to be wanting a trade.

doppel-Fine Branch: What do you need?
Cottage person: I just want some of what you value!  I want to share your happiness.
doppel-Fine Branch: Come outside with us!
Cottage person: <eyes narrowing> there're more than one of you?
doppel-Fine Branch:  Lots worship the Daystar!
Cottage person: <audibly makes a decision> Come to the garden with me!
doppel-Fine Branch: Sure!
Cottage person: What can the Daystar do for my garden?
doppel-Fine Branch: the Daystar helps everything grow!

They came to the garden, where the hidden Freelancers could see her.  She looked like she was about 60 years old, and fairly attractive.  Fine Branch was not fooled, though!  They easily detected the illusion, and Fine Branch saw a hooked green nose, a hump back, teeth far too sharp to be human, and stringy grey hair.

The Freelancers all checked again that they were well hidden, as Fine Branch sighed softly.  "Hag!  This is a hag!" they declared.  Dryali immediately made a force ballista eldritch cannon.

Meanwhile, as the hag and the doppelgänger entered the garden, her eyes scanned the hedgerow out of pure habit, and stopped on both Terrance and Dryali.  They both moved to improve their hiding places, as doppel-Fine Branch continued to pitch the virtues of the Daystar, ending it with asking if she wanted to buy some of the lotion.

The hag, however, was watching Dryali.

Terrance had actually climbed a tree.  From her hidden position, she used her shortbow to crit the hag with a perfect shot.  The result was a very weird sight: the hag was bleeding heavily, and that was visible, but her illusion did not account for it.

Tuala, who was also in a tree, crit the hag with a firebolt from his own hiding place.  The hag's illusion did not play well with the resulting burnination, either.

doppel-Fine Branch reached out and touched the hag's shoulder, feigning concern.  "O my dear, is everything alright?"  Fine Branch sent a guiding bolt through their doppelgänger, to no effect; perhaps The Cat was displeased at Fine Branch's Daystar proselytization.  An orangey-gold flash of light surrounded the both of them for a second, but otherwise nothing happened.

Nothing, that is, but a very angry hag.  "What the shit is this?!" she exclaimed.  Fine Branch looked around for the wolf they'd all tracked to this cottage, but saw nothing.  The hag moved further into the garden, spotting Tuala, and concentrated on him.  Nothing happened, and she followed up with a stream of invective quite at odds with the nice female human demeanor of the illusion.

Dryali set his force ballista to hide in the hedgerow, and it shot the hag.

At this point, the Freelancers were feeling pretty good about the entire affair.  But then Tuala heard her exclaim, "Attack them, my pretties!"

Five of the hedgerow shrubberies came alive.  One moved towards Fine Branch; another attacked Dryali, wrapping him up in its viney bits, causing him to exclaim "What the shit?!"  A third one did the same to Tuala; a fourth one started climbing the tree towards Terrance, who was not down with this, and leapt out of the tree.

Terrance's leap was less graceful than she'd imagined in her head, and she landed on her butt in the hedgerow.  However she got up, shot at the hag with her shortbow, missed, and promptly hid behind the nightshade in the garden.

Tuala was not enjoying himself and tried to break out of the vine, but failed.  Fine Branch tried guiding bolt through their doppelgänger again, and failed again.  They grabbed a dagger off of restrained Dryali's belt.  This got the hag's attention, and she moved towards Fine Branch and Dryali.  She concentrated on Fine Branch, but nothing happened then either.

Dryali flailed ineffectually against the restraining vine, his attempts to wiggle out failing critically.  So the vines around Dryali and Tuala stayed in place.

Two of the viney shrubberies moved towards Fine Branch and Terrance, but they didn't move very fast.  Terrance drew her rapier and attacked the hag from her hiding place, piercing her.  Then Terrance disengaged and moved towards the cottage, away from the shrubbery.

The force ballista missed, but Tuala, who again failed to break out of the restraining shrubbery, sent magic missile at the hag.  Fine Branch tried sacred flame, but that was as effective as the previous two guiding bolts.  Fine Branch moved away from the vines.

The hag was much angrier now, and looking pretty weird, with wounded bits poking through the illusion.  She turned and slashed at Terrance viciously with her claws.  Terrance dropped like a sack of potatoes, bleeding profusely.

The force ballista missed again, but Dryali got out of the vines finally, and he moved back, to get away from them.  The shrubberies chased him and Fine Branch.  Tuala, still in his vines, sent more magic missile at the hag, who was not looking too great.

Fine Branch sent the doppelgänger to touch Terrance and cure wounds, then they moved next to Dryali.  As a result, Dryali was in an excellent position to bring on the booms, so he cast thunderwave on three of these annoying shrubberies, including the one who was restraining Tuala.  He also had the force ballista shoot at the hag again, and it critically missed; good thing Terrance was still prone!

The three plants came back at Dryali, but one missed and the others had been pushed too far away by thunderwave to come back and attack.  Then, Terrance rose up behind the unsuspecting hag, drawing her shortbow; and the other Freelancers watched as the illusion dropped and a hunched-back green creature pitched forward on her face, an arrow in her back.

Terrance broke into a dance… but kept away from the shrubberies, who were still on the attack!

Tuala just could not get out of the vines that restrained him.  He flailed, frustrated.  Fine Branch called down the bane of The Cat on them all, and Dryali cast thunderwave again, pushing two away.  Then he trained the force ballista on the vine holding Tuala, killing it.

Tuala was free, but not for long!  The two shrubberies in range hit Tuala and Fine Branch, restraining them both.  Tuala's ears went flat with rage, but Terrance shot the vine that had him in its grasp, killing it.  Tuala climbed higher in the tree.  Then he shot a firebolt at the vine grappling Fine Branch, lighting it on fire.  Fine Branch moved a little, and the sonorous tone of toll the dead rang out, withering the burning vine.  They moved out of it, brushing the dead bits out of their fur.

The force ballista moved 15' towards Dryali, and then crit the shrubbery coming at him, killing it.  Dryali drew his crossbow, and shot the remaining shrubbery, but it kept coming.  Terrance, who had been hidden, rose up again and crit with her shortbow, killing it.

Nothing else moved, other than the birds and the bees.

In the quiet, it seemed like there was a lightening of the trees, but the Freelancers weren't sure.  Everything still felt creepy.  Tuala suggested maybe it was "spiritually" better.

Terrance and Tuala wanted to check out the cottage.  Fine Branch decided to let others go first; they cut off the hag's head, and put it in the bag with the mushrooms from the glade.

Terrance and Dryali went to the door, checking the cottage for traps; but they found none.  Tuala did too, but had a critical fail in his attempts.  Inside, they found the walls lined with shelves.  On the shelves were jars of herbs, and lots of tchotchkes.  They saw a … carved bone thing, and an empty birdcage.

Of the tchotchkes, some looked like the hag had made them herself, but others appeared to be items of sentimental value to people.  These, Fine Branch started gathering, telling the others, somewhat grimly, maybe these could be returned to their owners.

Tuala looked around for hag tokens.  He found lots of things that looked like they were, or were in process of becoming such.  Dryali pulled out his tools, and cast a ritual detect magic.  He even managed not to sigh.  He was rewarded by finding

• On the table next to the bed, a plain gold ring
• Up behind the door, an unremarkable-looking broom
• On a shelf in the kitchen, a metal rod with ornate finials

While he was doing that the others discovered 235gp worth of coins in various denominations.  Dryali decided to check the garden too.  He found broken pottery shards with the detect magic, and realized they were from pot of awakening.  So, that's where all the awakened shrubberies came from!

Fine Branch came outside.  "Dryali, do you know how to make fire extra hot?"  Dryali startled at this non-sequitur.  "Alchemist fire?"  Fine Branch looked meaningfully at the hut, and Dryali rummaged in his backpack to get it out.

After everyone was done and the magic items and sentimental tchotchkes and gold removed, they burned the cottage to the ground with the alchemist fire.  The flames had weird colours; maybe those were from the burning hag foci.

By mutual consent, the Freelancers removed to the mouth of the valley for their camp.  The night passed uneventfully; they didn't even see a wolf.  Then they headed back to Mantzur.

They arrived in Mantzur mid-afternoon on the second day, and talked to Korfel about what they'd found.  Fine Branch brought out the hag's head, and the mushrooms they'd found.  Korfel is a gentle soul; he was disgusted by the head, but examined the mushrooms with interest.  He told the Freelancers they were extra-poisonous, and he was a bit concerned they were growing about the forest.

Nonetheless, with the hag dead and her cottage burned, the threat was removed from Mantzur, and he paid the Freelancers 150gp each for removing the threat, and invited them to stay in Mantzur, even Terrance.

That evening everyone was lighter of heart and there was music and dancing around a big fire.  Or maybe not, but it sounded cool so I added it.

The next morning, Dryali took an extra half-hour or so to identify the items they'd taken from the cottage.  The items were a ring of swimming, and a broom of flying; Terrance claimed these, and the others were happy for her to have them, since they all had flying mounts, albeit untrained.  The last item was an Immovable Rod, and Fine Branch was fascinated by it, and so it was theirs.

Then they bade farewell to Korfel and headed back up to Cliffshadow.

• Dryali → lvl 5!
• Terrance → lvl 4!
• Tuala → lvl 4!