Session 45 - Homecoming

From Kleeck's Journal
  Our ship made good time, and it was a little over a week after we departed from Port Exera that I woke to see the distant docks of the Beak ahead of us. Were it not for my landbound companions I would have leaped from the side of the ship and winged straight for the Eyrie, but I settled for pacing the foredeck as we skimmed through the waters of the Sundered Sea towards port.

As soon as the ship was docked we disembarked, and immediately hired the first available flight of eagles to take us to the Eyrie. Mkali's visible relief at leaving the boat quickly gave way to nervous apprehension when he realized he was expected to climb on the back of a giant bird of prey, one that under other circumstance might try to snatch him up in its talons for a quick meal. How Laura managed to coax him aboard I shall never know.   As the eagles took flight, I could not help but feel a sense of joy rise up in me at all the familiar sights, sounds, and smells of the Aerium. The foliage, the rocky coastline, everything I could see around me felt like home, even though we were still a good ways away from the Eyrie proper. As Mount Etna loomed closer, however, my joy quickly gave way to dread and apprehension. Even at a distance I could see the black plume of smoke rising up from the newly active volcanic fissure. The position of the eruption was clearly problematic, threatening one of the major roadways to the Eyrie, as well as the water supply on which many farmsteads (including the Accepter vineyards) depended.   As we approached the vineyards from the air, my heart fell further. I could see workers busy along the riverbank near our farmstead, digging a long trench and building up a barricade between the river and our farm. It was as Uncle Heehk had said; the volcanic eruption had poisoned the water. The crops were dying, and the only hope for saving the soil from permanent damage was to dam off the farm entirely.   Not even waiting for the eagle to land, I leaped from its back and flew towards the vineyard.   I spotted uncle Heehk, directing a group of workers beginning to dig yet another trench. Despite the dire situation he was as upbeat and cheerful as always, greeting me boisterously and asking about my recent exploits. As much as I wanted to chat with him, I cut the pleasantries short and asked about the rest of my family. He quickly brought me up to speed; my mother Aial was in our villa, my sister Ikki and cousin Aur were helping to direct the workers, and my father Urreek was in town conferring with other patricians about the eruption.   My companions were beginning to make their way up from where the eagles had landed. Remembering my manners, I quickly ushered them inside the family villa, snapping a one of the servants to bring us wine and food. Hassan was looking around laughingly, making snide comments about my family's wealth that I found amusing and annoying in equal parts. Tertia wanted help with the trench digging, insisting that the exertion would be good for her after our travels. While a part of my mind was worried enough about the vineyard to take her up on her offer, I balked at the idea of an elderly guest doing manual labour under the hot sun beside the servants. In the end everyone settled into one of the suites of the villa, taking time to refresh themselves after our flight here.   My friends taken care of for the moment, I headed over to my mother's room.   Even under the strange circumstances of my return, it was a relief to see her again. She greeted me warmly, asking about where I had been and what I have been doing. I had intended to keep the details of my recent activities vague, but in my relief on seeing her I could not help myself, and I told her about some of the adventures I had been on. I also presented her with the Kuo-Toa scroll I had found and promised to make a translation of its text to add to her library.   Returning to my companions, we plotted our next course of action. We were determined to investigate the strange volcanic activity, and after pouring over some maps of the mountain decided that the best approach would be to descend from the south road where it drew closest to the eruption. We also needed to enter the temple of Juno in the city and find the inscription we knew would be hidden there. We made a plan to obtain rooms for the night in the Eyrie, break into the temple in the dead of night, and then head for the fissure in the morning, fully rested and ready for anything.   As we were preparing to depart Uncle Heeck approached me, pressing a scroll into my talons and saying that the information within could be of use to us. As I skimmed the contents, I felt a mix of fear and hope. If Maagog was a Revenant like the ones described in the scroll then he was literally un-killable, a terrifying prospect to consider. And yet the scroll did hint that there were ways to end his unnatural undead existence. I thanked Heeck for the information, tucking the scroll away for future reference.   We quickly returned to the eagles we had hired and flew straight to the city.   As we crested the summit of Mount Etna and beheld the Eyrie from our vantage point in the air, I felt a sense of pride swelling up in me. Before my journey to Nemasus I had lived my whole life in the Eyrie. Now, having seen so much, I looked at my home with new eyes. It did not have the grandeur of Rome, the bustle of Ostia, or the elven beauty of Turris; but it was in its own ways magnificent and marvelous, undeniably Roman but also distinctly Aarakocra. I took a deep breath of the crisp clean mountain air and squinted at the sunlight glinting off of the twin lakes around which the city was built. As our eagles began their descent, I reveled in the sight of hundreds of my kin flying above and about the city, filling the air with the ever-present sound of beating wings - a sound I had not known I was missing until this moment.   On arrival at the city proper, we split up. Laura and Tertia headed over to the library to see if there was any useful information to be found there. Hassan and Bandua went to secure us lodgings, and to do a preliminary scout of the temple. I headed to the forum to find my father, to get the latest news from him and let him know of our plans.   I approached the forum filled with apprehension. In my time away I had not written to my father since arriving at Nemasus. I was afraid to see him now, and to have to explain my actions over the past few months. I already felt that I was a disappointment to him for not having joined the legions like Zeed, or not staying to manage the vineyard like Ikki. What would he think when he heard that I had not only left the temple at Nemasus in shame, but had also thrown in with a random bunch of plebians and provincials to form an adventuring troupe?   My father was standing with a well-dressed group of fellow patricians, holding court as he often did with his peers. I stood at the periphery and watched him, waiting for the right moment to make my approach. When I finally made eye contact, he greeted me with the disciplined restraint that I had always known him to carry himself in public - not the warm acknowledgement of my mother, but a formal (though not unkind) nod of recognition.   I quickly drew him aside, and despite my intentions to match his every-professional demeanor, the words started to pour out of me - about my having left Nemasus , about having joined an adventuring troupe, and about our travels and adventures. He took it all in with surprising calm, and from his response I gather that Uncle Heehk had already shared much with him about my exploits. I had thought...I don't know what I had thought; that he would admonish me for leaving Nemasus, chide me for the company I kept, belittle me having ended up on the strange path I was now on. Instead, he seemed to take my tales in stride, wanting for the moment only to know what I had told my mother, and what I intended to do now that I was home.   I let him know of our plans for scouting out the fissure (though not of our intention to breach the Temple of Juno), and that we would continue in our own way to pursue information that could aid in Rome's struggle against her enemies. He nodded (in approval?) and wished me luck in my endeavors, and we made plans to stay in touch, and to work from our respective positions to bolster the Empire against the threats that encircled it. He gave me one final nod, and then he was off, winging his way towards home, or more likely another meeting with his peers.   I took a minute to gather myself. I was relieved to have finally faced my father, and let him know about what I was doing now. I was surprised that he did not disapprove of my choices, but seemed (tacitly at least) to support them. And I had to admit that I was perplexed as well - despite having known him my whole life, my father continued to remain something of a mystery to me. With too much to think on and too little time I put thoughts of father aside for the moment, and sought out my companions.   I found my friends in good spirits. Hassan had used his magic to transform Tertia into a giant eagle, and the group was taking turns flying about the city on her back. Watching my friends laugh and play and fly around together in the heart of my hometown, I was struck by how much my life had grown and changed since I departed from here. I would never have sought out the life I was now living, never sought out the company I now kept, yet now I could not imagine what life would have been like otherwise. I silently offered a prayer of thanks to Apollo for setting me on this path, grateful for the challenges and experiences that had allowed me to grow and change so much from that naïve acolyte that left the Eyrie so many months ago.   We eventually retired to the inn to eat and rest before our nocturnal activities.   We had breached so many temples by now that it almost felt almost commonplace when Hassan's spell transported us into the dark confines of the building that night. We found the hidden statue, the secret buried chamber, and the inscription as always. And as always, I could not help but feel a chill run down my spine as I read the secret, heretical words of a long dead historian, words that as always undid and unmade my entire worldview. The idea that Romans learned civics, engineering, and the arcane arts from this long dead lizard empire made me suddenly and unreasonably angry. I could not tell if I was angry at the person who wrote the inscription, the people who had hidden this truth from me, or (most irrationally) the Lizardfolk who had apparently given us the foundations of our civilization.   Before we left the hidden chamber, I called on Apollo's magic to reshape the letter on the stela from an O to a U. If, Gods forbid, the enemy ever took the Eyrie and discovered this inscription, we hoped that this misdirection would prevent them from learning the true name of Rome and completing the Ritus Religati to bring down her defenses.   In the morning, we headed out along the South road from the Eyrie. We could see smoke rising from the site of the eruption on the side of the mountain, and at the bend where the road grew closest to the fissure we left the ease of the well paved path and made our way down the rocky slopes towards the fissure. We were not long into our descent when we began to see places where magma was bubbling up from cracks in the side of the mountain.   It was as we were passing one such pool of lava that the magma creatures attacked us.   A pair of hulking, vaguely humanoid monsters made of rock and fire rose up from the lava pools ahead of us, charging towards us with alarming speed. Bandua and Tertia were at the front to meet them, weapons quickly drawn and readied. As Tertia swung with her spatha, I saw fury rise up in her face, and (as had happened in the battle with the giants a few weeks ago) the creatures seemed to recoil back in pain and fear. Laura and Hassan picked at them from afar with arrow and spell, and soon the creatures were reduced to piles of unmoving stone and ash.   Somehow, a group of random rag-tag strangers had become a formidable fighting force. With barely a moment needed to catch our breath after the battle, we continued our descent.