11. Sole's eventful visit at Aaron's

T.M.O.L.: Campaign Notes: Chapter 5

After drinking copious amount of tea with multitudes of astral spirits Sole feels that it is time to begin his training to next circle. Looking out the window the human sees that it is late afternoon. Packing up his things quickly Sole sling his pack over his shoulder and walks to the bar. Paying the barkeep his outstanding bill Sole quickly walks through the town, heading towards Aaron's. Quickly hiking up the hill he walks along the path to the front door.

Sole hears a creaking on the wind and heads over to investigate. The front door of Aaron's home swings back and forth in the wind, creaking eerily. There is not a soul in sight, and no sounds coming from inside. Feeling sick inside Sole pulls open the creeking door and continues inside. Slidng his pack to the ground and drawing his sword as he does so.

The main room of the house looks like a tornado has gone through. Furniture is broken and scattered around the room, and the bookshelves are toppled over, spewing their books on the ground. Ornaments, bowls, candlesticks, and lamps are smashed, and almost nothing is left intact. In the centre of the destruction, the body of Aaron lies immobile in a bone circle. The side of his face has been horribly mutated, like the skin was ripped away. Blood from several deep wounds soaks into his robes and into the earthen floor.

Sole, sickened by the sight, steels himslef against the bile rising in his throat. Grimly he walks foward, face like stone to study the body and its surroundsings. He feels for Aarons pulse, holding to a small spark of hope that his mentor may still be alive.

As be hends over the body of the dwarf, a ghost-like form materializes before him, and reaches out cold tendrils. Sole jerks away from it, and it follows.

Thinking quickly Sole strengthens himself mentally and backs away from the ghost, ready to run if need be. The ghost continues following, but Sole backs out of range. Once Sole gets out the door, the vague misty manifestation stops and drifts back towards the bone circle.

Puzzled by this strange response Sole pauses and considers what is happening. Aaron is lying in the middle of a bone circle, apparently dead with the room totally destroyed around him. His face looks like it has been torn apart, obviously by something that didn't like him. When Sole entered the bone circle to look at his mentor a spirit, or something like it, emerged and approached him. Sole decides on two possibilities. One, the spirit is that of his mentor, trapped in this realm somehow, possibly by the bone circle. Two, the spirit is what killed his mentor and is temporarily inhabiting his dead body. The nethermancer shakes his head, not liking the options. Cursing the fact that he hadn't paid more attention when Aaron talked about summoning and bone circles, Sole re-enters the room, studying the bone circle. Walking slowly around it being careful not to disturb anything, Sole looks for any obvious discrepencies or breaks in the circle. Anything that may have allowed a spirit to escape his mentor's control.

As Sole re-enters the room, the ghost comes out again from the circle and rushes at the intruder. Reaching out a cold tendril it strikes Sole on the arm, making him flinch away from the cold. Sole hurriedly backs away from the spirit again, and it withdraws to the bone circle when Sole leaves.

"Alright." Sole thinks to himself, "It looks like there is something nasty living in the bone circle now. It certainly doesn't seem like the ghost of Aaron."

Sole skirts around the house and looking for the window to Aaron's study. Finding the wooden paned window latched from the inside Sole bashes it in and looks through. Sole passes his sword through and follows quickly. The study doubles as a workroom, and has the apparatus needed to make most blood charms, as well as shards of crystal, herbs, powders, and various solutions. It also contains a collection of books, tomes, and scrolls, which Aaron used for research, reference, and study. Around the room on the shelves and table are many strange items, such as bones, skulls, candles, dead rodents, preserved pieces of creatures, rocks, and plants.

There are no signs of damage in the room, other than the broken shutter through which Sole entered. Looking over the book and scrolls on the shelf, Sole sees that several of them are missing. Scanning for books and scrolls on the table, Sole sees a scroll titled 'Blood Charm Solutions Made Easy' pinned down by several rocks, as well as two other rolled scrolls and a tall blue book. Sole thinks over the warnings that Aaron gave him about meddling with another's books.

Sole considers, "Hmm. . . meddling with others' books. What did he say again? Oh yea, that's right. Some magicians leave traps and the like to discourage any theives." Sole quickly scans the open scroll for any reference to bone circles and flicks through the other books on the tables, looking for the same reference.

The scroll, titled 'Blood Charm Solutions Made Easy' discusses herbs and requirements needed to make the special solutions in which to soak Blood Charms. Sole unrolls the other two scrolls and scans over them, seeing that they discuss the production of particular types of charms, and the special requirements and ingredients. Flicking through the tall book on the table the Nethermancer sees that looks like diary entries of several Nethermancers writing about their experiences with death, and some theories about the passage of the spirits of dead Namegivers.

Sole searches the shelves looking for books on summoning and bone circles. He finds a book aptly labled 'A Discourse on Bone Circles.' It looks like a thorough treatment of bone circles, ascribed to a Nethermancer who calls himself Soulseeker.

"Wait a minute," Sole thinks. "Wasn't Aaron's mentor called the Soleseeker? This could be what I'm looking for." He tucks the book under his arm and searches the rest of the room.

Studying the blood charm apparatus Sole remembers his conversation that he had with Aaron just after arriving. His mentor had mentioned something about "lost souls" and his quest to "free the lost souls". He had also mentioned someething about a companion that would be going with him. Sole takes another look around the room for anything in reference to this, but cannot find any obvious letters or anything like that.

The next room Sole searches is Aaron's bedroom. He is especially hopeful of finding some notes or a journal here. The room has the usual furnishings of a bedroom, with none of the weird trappings or adornments of the other rooms in the house. In fact, there is very little furnishings at all, other than a single bed, two chests, and a set of drawers.

Sole thoroughly searches the bedroom, especially checking for any secret compartments in the furniture, walls or floor. Knowing how secretive Nethermancers are in general he wouldn't be surprised if he found something. None of the chests reveals anything out of the ordinary, just plenty of changes of clothes and personal effects.

Looking through the drawers, Sole finds one of them full of notes, loose paper, and scrolls. Scanning through them, he sees that most of them are written in Aaron's handwriting. Just a few of them are notes about Astral Space, ritual spells, inscriptions and runes, and enhancing True Patterns through physical patterns. To find what they are all about could take hours, or even days, Sole decides.

Sole curses, "How in the Passions can I find out what went on here!?" He then thinks, "I think I need some help. There is that wizard Juurnkal or something in the village. Maybe he can help me." Sole climbs back out the window with the Soulseeker's book, closing it as much as he can behind him. Heading back around the front, Sole gets a sudden idea. "Maybe I can use astral sight to find out something."

Successfully shifting his vision to the astral plane he looks through the door into the main room. Filling most of the floor is a hazy crisscross of lines, forming an intricate circle around the circle of bones in the middle of the room. Sole looks towards the centre of the circle, and sees the pattern of whatever ghost or spirit it is that attacked him earlier. The pattern of the spirit is strong and flowing with magic. Lying on the ground is the pattern of Aaron, filling his astral imprint. Aaron's pattern looks masked by a shadow, but appears strong underneath. A few of the strands of his pattern are broken and tattered, but the broken strands are covered in a different type of pattern, which looks like a big mess of knots, loose ends, and frays. Sole also notes that a few of the items around the room contain true patterns, rather than just the plain astral imprints of mundane items -- a candle, a bowl, and a small carving of a goat.

Studying the patterns Sole ponders what he is seeing. "Apparently Aaron isn't dead, at least not totally. He has some broken threads but they are covered by something. Some other pattern. Obviously the spirit in the bone circle is there for a reason. Maybe to protect Aaron? If it's there to protect him, protect him from what? And what is that other frayed and knotted." Sole sighs, "I think I'm way out of my depth here. I'm going to have to ask for help."

Sole carefully closes the door behind him, making sure he memorises what items had patterns, scoops up his belongings and hurries into town to find Juurnkal.

After asking for directions, Sole arrives at the Wizard's house and knocks on the door. Juurnkal opens it, and behind him Sole sees the other elf, Betrian, sitting in a chair in the living room. "What can I do for you," asks Juurnkal.

"I have a serious problem, it's about Aaron," Sole says with an ashen face. "I think Aaron is dead or very close to it. Can you come straight away? There are some things there that I don't know how to deal with."

Without a word the Wizard runs inside and through a door, and returns seconds later with a cloak, staff, and a small bag. "Sorry Betrian, I'll be back in an hour or two," he says as he hurries out the door after Sole, leaving his guest with a confused look on his face.

On the way to Aaron's Sole explains everything he has seen, both physically and astrally and shows him the book on bone circles that he took from the study. He also tells Juurnkal what he knows about the Soulseeker and how Aaron was planning to complete his quest with a friend. Last of all Sole shows the wizard the wound he received from the spirit.

The Nethermancer asks in a worried voice, "Do you think you can do anything?"

"I don't know anything about bone circles, unfortunately. I always left that up to Aaron. I would have thought that you would know something about them, since he trained you and all. You say that his pattern looked frayed and tattered, with strange maskings or something on it? I'm not sure what that could be, but I'll have a look for myself. The whole thing does remind me of what he did one time over in the Servos when those lizards were after us. . ." Juurnkal's voice dies away, and they continue hurrying towards the house.

Arrivng at Aaron's for the second time in that day Sole hurries up to the front door, preparing himself mentally and shifting his view to the astral plane. Opening the door carefully he looks inside. The room appears to be the same as he left it. Shocked again at the sight of his mentor lying on the ground Sole feels a surge of rage. Both at whatever did this to Aaron and at his own impotence in the situation. Making way for Juurnkal he steps back.

"When I first came in the spirit didn't attack me until I went into the bone circle to see if Aaron was dead." Sole shakes his head, "I never did find out because I was attacked straight away. Then, when I retreated the spirit followed until I left the room. Then it went back into the bone circle. I thought stepping into the bonecircle might be its trigger so I stepped into the room again but it attacked me straight away. I wasn't even anywhere near the bone circle."

Juurnkal pauses at the door and stares intently into the room, scanning back and forth for quite a while. Finally he turns back to Sole, and says, "He was supposed to be training you today, wasn't he?" Sole nods, and Juurnkal smiles ruefully. "I think I know a way to save him, since he is definitely still alive. That spirit or ghost doesn't appear to have harmed him on the ground, even though you say that it attacked you when you entered. So maybe it doesn't recognise him as living because he is not moving. I'm not sure but that could be it."

Sole shrugs, "I don't know either."

"Anyway, I can try to help him, but I have got to be able to touch him. Did Aaron get around to telling you how to deal with spirits? No matter. What I need you to do is to get in there and distract or defeat it, while I try to get around to Aaron. I need about a minute. Can you do that?"

"I certainly can." Sole says with a steely voice, "Can you help me prepare for combat at all?"

Juurnkal thinks for a moment and then says, "I'm not sure how it will be attacking you, but I can help out some. The spirit seems to be operating under the Idea of Guarding." He makes some arcane movements, and Sole feels his grip on his sword tighten. Again Juurnkal mutters some words, and a pale shimmer surrounds Sole. "Now is the time for attack," says Juurnkal, and begins weaving another spell.

Sole makes sure he has the Spirit Grip spell in his matrix and prepares to combat the spirit. Stepping near the doorway he concentrates on the spirit's pattern, trying to unravel it. Through force of will, Sole tries to send the spirit back from whence it came. The spirit appears to weaken, and almost succumbs, but then shakes off Sole's mental attack.

Having failed to banish the spirit Sole nods to Juurnkal and runs inside, casting spirit grip as he does so. The spirit is distracted by the attack of one of its own, and misses Sole as he ducks past towards the other side of the room. It follows Sole, ignoring Juurnkal as he slips in through the door.

The Nethermancer takes up a defensive stance against the far wall stepping all over the broken furniture and items on the ground. Sole tries to dodge and defend himself with his ferndask shield, but the spirit touches him, unleashing a powerful surge of energy. Even shielded by his mental protections, Sole is thrown backwards from the force of the attack, and crumples against the wall. He rolls to the side and stands up shivering, while Juurnkal bends over the prostrate form of Sole's mentor.

The spirit follows Sole, brushing him again and sending the cold energy through his system. Unfazed the Nethermancer swings his weapon at the spirit, but it passes straight through without seeming to affect it. Continuing to defend himself, Sole swings through the air again, dodging back to the side to avoid the spirit's attacks. Finding himself backed into a corner, Sole takes another hit as he tries to dart past into the open. The repeated chilled energy attacks overcome his senses, and he falls into unconsciousness.

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