Nyneve and Valaria take it upon themselves to re-settle the humans who are freed from the jade mines after Lord Ash defeats Tongueater in one-on-one combat. Lord Ash is a dwarf, albeit a tall one, but the ‘skins’ speak of him as though he were their own. They worship him. They speak his name with reverence. They look down with humility when they speak of his grace in forgiving Tongueater and sending him to live as a hermit in the mountains.
All this is difficult for Nyneve and Valaria to understand as it was Tongueater who oppressed the humans and forced them to live as slaves. However, regardless of how it came to be, Lord Ash can do no wrong in the skins’ minds.
The freed humans are naturally attracted to Valaria as someone who will assist them in finding stability in a time of instability, and Valaria cannot resist the call to duty. Nyneve is less interested in doing good deeds, but is ultimately swept up in Valaria’s enthusiasm.
In the course of their work, Nyneve and Valaria encounter a lizardfolk scouting party descended from the nearby hills. They spy the scouts and dispatch them quickly with their powerful magics, but the experience leaves them concerned. They send a runner back to the monastery of the monks of the order of the flying sandal to inform Lord Ash. Until then, they continue to assist the displaced humans in building houses, irrigating land and redirecting water.
So far three Lanterns of Light have been recovered. One from the Troglodyte avatar’s throne room, a second from the Citadel of Shadows below Bale Keep, and a third in living form from Tongueater to Lord Ash. A fourth living lantern is known to exist inside the Lizard King, whoever that is, but the recent encounter with the lizardfolk scouting party impresses upon Nyneve and Valaria how close they are to meeting the Lizard King.
One day a sudden conundrum strikes Nyneve as an epiphany. “Fuck!” she declares.
“Who?” Valaria asks.
Nyneve smiles. “No, the lanterns,” she says, waving her hand. “I’ve been thinking.”
“Tell me,” Valaria inquires, genuinely interested. “Thinking about what?”
“My mother’s lanterns,” Nyneve responds. “Only ‘worthy’ people may carry them. Among us, that appears to include Ryparin, Janaar, Kildrak, Proxen and Ash.”
Valaria nods, agreeing. “Yeah, so?”
“Unworthy people, according to my mom, would appear to include you, me, Grim and Zymaan.”
“Uh-huh,” Valaria continues to nod, still not entirely catching on.
“Well,” Nyneve continues to explain. “Ash is now Lord Ash, a living Lantern of Light. I doubt he can be two lanterns at once, so he’s out from any further lanterning.”
“Okay.”
“Ryparin has not woken up in 40 days, so it looks like he’s out…”
“Yeah…” Valaria nods sadly.
“Which has left Janaar and Kildrak carrying the other two lanterns.”
“Yeah, so?” Valaria asks.
“That leaves only Proxen to defeat the Lizard King to become the next living Lantern of Light,” Nyneve concludes.
“Fuck,” Valaria declares.
“Yeah,” Nyneve agrees.
“Janaar and Proxen are totally gone on some tree quest,” Valaria laments. “Janaar took one of the lanterns with him.”
“I know,” Nyneve says. “That means that it’s actually Kildrak who needs to defeat the Lizard King and become a next living Lantern of Light.”
“Without killing him. Like Ash did to Tongueater,” Valaria adds.
“Exactly,” Nyneve concludes. “And then give the lantern he is carrying to Proxen.”
“That gives us four,” Valaria calculates. “We need six.”
The two ladies look at each other with hard stares as they realize there are not enough lantern bearers among them.
——-
Unbeknownst to Valaria, Finn cannot stand another day aboard the Sea Ghost without his love Valaria to gaze upon and lay beside. Over the objections of his crew mates, Finn jumps overboard the Sea Ghost and abandons ship on his quest to find Valaria.
He swims to shore and comes upon the Lucky Monkey. There he narrowly avoids being selected by Tongueater and his goons for decapitation and tongue removal. Surviving that, he forges on into the jungle, blind with lust and need for the woman who has infected his mind with poison more dangerous than the many other venoms contained within the plants and insects within the jungle.
Still he forges on until he finds her. When he does, he and Valaria race across a field of exotic flowers and embrace. Reunited again, they will not be separated again so easily.
[Valaria gains Finn as a henchman. He is a 3rd level Ranger. He is her’s to command on the battlefield (and otherwise). David should make a character sheet for him.]
——-
Deep down inside, especially at night when she lies in her bedroll alone, Nyneve knows that a storm is coming. She also knows in her heart of hearts that Grimald Nightleaf is at the centre of it. He saved her life once when they first spied the black dragon that the lizardfolk in the Hool Marshes summoned through ritual magic. Grim fled as any wise man would but then came back to get her as she was mesmerized by the beauty of the black dragon, still at that time unaware of her own true nature.
But now she knew that Grim was dangerous to her. She could feel it. He had disappeared with Benedict, whoever that was, but she knew that nothing good would come of it.
She had a fever dream where the shaman she had met before with Ryparin told her to leave this place and give up her quest. He told her she could not win. The odds were too great. The deck too heavily stacked against her.
When she refused to give up, the shaman told her that Grim was coming with forces of darkness to snuff out her light; to end everything Alandra de Winter had worked for, and that he was coming now.
“How do I live?” she found herself asking the shaman in her dream.
The shaman looked sad, like there was no cure for her condition, like the story was already told.
“How do I live?” Nyneve asked again, poking a hole in the story through sheer force of will.
“You must convert him back to your side,” the shaman tells her. “If he dies, so do you.”
Nyneve awakens to the sound of dogs barking and the sudden sense that she is being hunted. Valaria darts up from her bedroll in the night with the exact same feeling.
[One more story post before Saturday, folks. Then game on.]