Session 11 Recap:

* Lord Quint Sephone - Younger brother of Baroness Sephone, scholar, suspicious?
* Bliz - Steampunky entertainer and lieutenant of the travelling show.

### Locations:

* Vylenvale - Center of the Kellos Church.
* Willow's Hill - Small unimportant village, where the Turtle King has appeared.

**Previously...**

### Downtime

*(To resolve or advance some of the ongoing story, players were allowed to narrate some threads. These are detailed here. Unless noted otherwise, these events are known to the characters)*

**Dragon’s Heart** - *(Not known to the characters, except as seen via the vision below)* Has been trying to prevent the PCs making it to Vynelvale, without it becoming known that they are acting against them. This task was seemingly left to Aelrindel (Elven Cleric) and the Dwarven rogue. Now that the characters have left the city, DH is focusing its efforts on something else *(the PC’s will probably not directly encounter them again for a little while. See also Dandy’s flame vision).*

**Justicar Benifold the 5th** - Goldie found an opportunity to talk to Benifold and convince him that Giana's report needs to be seen by the inner circle and he has changed his position and recommended it to them. As a result, Giana is now officially in charge of investigating the prophet’s predictions and has deputised the characters (offering 250 silver per person as an initial payment).

The church of Kellos is still skeptical of the prophet’s words, but is taking it as worth investigation.

**Flame**- Dandy has visited her miracle flame and it offered up an ember of itself, which Dandy now carries around inside a little box. She also had the following vision during her visit:

*‘There is a meeting at a crossroad. Three await under a sign pointing to the city of Vynelvale - a huge orc woman, a human man, a gnome in spellcaster's robes. Two more figures, travelling seemingly away from the city reach the group - Aelrindel and a female dwarf. The dwarf is carrying a large box under her arm.*

*'The elf tells the orc leader that the egg has been captured, and no-one knows they have it (others are suspected). The leader enquires if they have dealt with "The meddlers". The elf says, ‘we had to choose the egg over them'. The orc smashes the road sign in rage with her double-bladed battleaxe.’*

**The lovers** - have made it to the sanctuary of the ‘love church’ and had their marriage more officially ratified. They remain there, safe from any retribution from the Earl.

## And Now...

There is a discussion (between the PCs, but also Giana) about where to go next. Giana plans to go to the Applewood Forest where she plans on calling on a favour from a druid friend. This allows the group to travel to Willow Hill, where the Turtle King is. Their paths align up until then, but Giana has stated she will continue ahead if they choose to spend much time at the village. However, to ensure that she can find them later, Giana has taken a token from Goldie and turned it into a magical ‘beacon’ that will allow her to track them if they become separated.

Arik spends some time, before leaving the city, bonding with his new holy item/weapon - the Censer. He only manages to form a weak bond to it so far. At an unspecified point, the curse on Arik’s Tooth is removed by Benifold.

Dandy does some research onto turtles, even visiting someone in the city who owns some, in a small private zoological garden.

The church has provided a new (basic) riding mount for all of them.

Leaving the city at dawn, the trip to Willow Hill will take them a full day of travel, from dusk till dawn. Midway through the travel, they see what looks like an approaching army on the road. Once they get closer they identify it is actually The Great Travelling Show. They talk to one of the shows' leaders, a friendly Gnome named ‘Bliz’. She explains that the Show is usually on time to participate in the Festival of Cleansing, but missed it this year because they got sidetracked at Willow's Hill. The characters express an interest at seeing the Show, and find it will spend some time in Riverwatch before continuing north.

Along the travel between the show and the village, the characters discuss all the visions and collected prophecies, and begin to form theories about the meanings. The theories are:

* The boar seen in several visions might be the symbol of the Sephone noble family (lead by Baroness Katrin Sephone, of Allerfeldt)
* The River seen in one of the visions maybe ‘The Flametail River’ which boarders Allerfeldt and is close to Goldhall, the Sephone ancestoral home.
* The noblewoman seen in some visions may be the wife of Baroness Katrin Sephone.

They arrive at Willow's Hill and find the village is overfull with visitors. The inn is full and people are either staying with locals in their homes, or pitching tents. They have their horses stabled at a seasonal warehouse being temporarily used as a stable (which Dandy will later use as a workshop and bed).

They meet the Turtle King. He is a huge tortoise (bigger than any of the towns residences) and sits in the small town square, with no visible way for it to come or go. It has a pearlescent shell, overly large eyes (compared to usual body/eye ratios) and white-grey skin. Locals tell that it appeared 10 days ago and it only speaks the word ‘Tribute’ (in whatever native tongue of it’s audience is). Tributes are given daily, and at dawn, magically vanish. No one understands why it is here, how it got here, or what Tribute it wants.

The square is busy with people queuing to offer tribute, with stalls selling food and souvenirs (including shirts and cloaks) at a huge mark-up, and intellectuals in ongoing debate.  Goldie and Arik get in line to meet it *(while Dandy is crafting, see below)* and both have the same experience as others. Arik casts a spell using his Censer, and catches the attention of Lord Quint Sephone (who is accompanied by two guards with the red boar livery). He invites them to have a meal with them and takes them to a local home who is hosting several visitors.

While they eat, the Lord talks to them, sharing a lot of information about the Turtle (largely explaining that they know very little, but also recounting the story of someone who tried to remove a part of the turtles shell in the night and got crushed under it’s foot non-lethally) and asking them a lot of questions about themselves. After some time, Arik found the lord's questions too personal (too interested in him?) and Goldie found him to be racist (Describing her race in very broad strokes). They left him after dinner feeling suspicious of his motives.

While this was happening, others were interacting with with the Turtle. Dandy was inspired to create a high-quality souvenir cloak. One made of leather, lightly-armored, and designed to look like an actual turtle shell. After consulting a local leatherworker and getting some materials Dandy spends 10 hours on the crafting, foregoing sleep.  The cloak is a success, although it came out smaller than expected, more of a prototype/gnome size. She shows it off to the leather-worker and a merchant who are impressed and interested in buying many. Dandy offers to show how they are made, after getting some sleep.

On her way back to the stable, she passes the turtle who takes an interest in her. She detours slightly to cut in line and meet with it. It speaks, saying the only word other than ‘tribute’ anyone has heard it utter ‘Chance’. This is significant to Dandy, as it is her father’s name. She hugs the turtle’s head and falls asleep, waking later on its shell.

She gets up and returns to the stable/workshop to finish her sleep in a softer bed and has a dream of a forgotten memory. She recalls her dad telling her a story when she was particularly young. She doesn’t remember all the story details, but does recall it was about Chance helping a giant turtle mother giving birth to a litter# in Blackthorn Grove (Northern part of Elfland).

Arik successfully casts a divine spell (While Dandy sleeps on the turtle), looking at the turtle through the magical smoke of the censer. He learns the creature is focused on a quest and that it considered Dandy to be family.

### Continued in Session 12....

*10xp*

*(165 xp Total)*

*('# - the apparent contradiction is that Turtles lay eggs, but this is how Dandy remembers the story being told.)*
 **Quote of the day:** *“What happens at The Pink Dragon, stays at The Pink Dragon.”*