Season 5: Ghilanain and the Mother of Monsters

## Synopsis

*She ghilan on my nain until I mother in her monster*

##### *Session 2*

1. Sarah broke into and entered Antonio's old estate to get free lodging in Antiva City

##### *Session 5*

1. Adriana broke into the office of La Matriarcha Fortunada to look for her sales ledger

##### Session 7

1. Mercè broke into a room of a chronomancy researcher looking for clues on how to keep her Helionbrain from dying

##### Session 8

1. The party broke into Magister Zara Renata's mansion.

#### **Murder: 6 counts**

##### *Session 2:*

1. Sarah, Adriana & Mercè murdered Ducato De Borgona in the Promisers' lair after taking Helion out of his brain. They cut his head open and left it open after taking Helion, then they threw him in a vat of water.
2. Mercè murdered a Promiser cult member while sneaking inside of their hideout
3. Adriana murdered a Promiser cult member at the same time as Mercè

##### *Session 6:*

1. Sarah executed an unconscious slaver leader during a sandstorm with an arrow

##### *Session 8*

1. Adrianna, Mercè and Sarah murder a crow from house Aranai as a part of a conspiracy to murder all hostile crows and a magister

##### *Session 9*

Adriana, Sarah and Merce collectively killed 1 guard (the other guards were killed by other people) while attacking? freeing? Archon Zara

#### **Medical Malpractice: 2 count**

##### *Session 2:*

1. Sarah cut Ducato De Borgona's head open without his consent to take out Mercè's grafted piece of brain out of there. She did this while he was unconscious (not via anesthetic) and left his head cut wide open.

##### *Session 9:*

1. Adriana assisted suicided Katarina, the Leader of the Crows caught in the Crows Civil war

##### *Session 2:*

1. Sarah squatted in Antonio's old estate in Antiva City after breaking into and entering it.

#### **Graverobbing: 2 counts**

##### *Session 2:*

1. Sarah & Mercè chipped frost runes from Helion's tomb in the ruins near Costa Luna

##### *Session 12:*

1. Sarah & Mercè took ancient Andrastian coins from the temple of Dumat, a historical monument. Real British museum behaviour

#### **Assault: 2 counts**

##### *Session 2:*

1. Sarah, Adriana & Mercè knocked Ducato De Borgona out, tied him up and physically attacked him after finding him in the Promisers' hideout

##### *Session 4:*

1. Mercè assaults the slaver agent in order to get information out of them, to locate Fairweather.

#### **Robbery: 6 counts**

##### *Session 2:*

1. Mercè robbed a jewellery store in Antiva City heist-style. Her loot consisted of 4 lockboxes (unopened), a fancy pincushion and 3 gold.

##### *Session 3:*

1. Mercè stole a dragon egg from Yavana's dragon cave (and she got caught?)

##### Session 4:

1. Sarah took Fairweathers medical books from his house without his permission

##### *Session 6:*

1. Mercè stole weapons from various merchants in the bazar while Adrianna and Sarah acted as accomplices to the robbery by distracting the merchants.

#### **Impersonating a Government official: 2 counts**

##### *Session 5:*

1. Sarah and Adriana pretended to be Tevinter Magisters to enter a slave market.

##### *Session 9:*

1. Sarah, Adriana and Merce pretended to be Archon Anais' agents to sneak into Magister Zara's estate

## Not-So OST

"Season 5" - David's Theme, Mass Effect 2 Overlord DLC OST

"Broken Promise" - Main Menu, Dark Souls 2 OST

"Broken Memory" - Intro, Disco Elysium OST

"Broken Egg" - Debriefing, Metal Gear Solid 3 OST

"A Day at Court" - A Game of Passage, Book of Travels OST

"Broken Silence" -

"Travelling Time" - Seven Serpents, Sorcery! 3 OST

## Sessions

### Session 1: Broken Silence/Memory/Egg/Promise.

We start with an interlude as Anais has an important meeting with the celebrity appearance Magister Meavaris (\*Wild live studio audience cheers\*) regarding betrothal options for her children. The list was long as Mae brought the entire family tree with her, which included every character under the sun even if they didnt make any sense (I mean... Cassandra Goth? Really?). The most interesting options were Sellwyne and Mercé's son Linda. Two Orlesian fish children of Axelle Poisson Comtesse of Jader who's likely to succeed Gaspard if he dies without heirs. And the wild card Alice, with the idea that Anais pushes Sarah's claim to the throne, Vicky inherits it becomes empress and Alice goes to tevinter and marries Atrius (I see only a dozen flaws with this plan, but its chaotic nature has an allure).

After the interlude we move to Caer Oswin on Alice and Victoria's birthday party. Everything is going great, kids are having fun so you know something bad's going to happen. Before all that Leliana sends Sarah a note to talk with Maryden which she puts off for a bit wanting to spend some time with family. Sarah's aunt shows up with a Rivaini "companion" who doesnt get the vibe of the party trying to sell Sellwynne's crappy clothes to everyone, even Kingston who's looking wistfully out a window barely responding to anyone. As punishment Sarah and Alice trip him and make him fall into a cake. Unfortunately the one time Sarah tries to be a cool parent on her kid's birthday karma decides that this show of bad influence should be punished with a child dying, and Alice tries to trip her friend as a joke, and the friend flies down a staircase and died. To make things even worse, before all this Maryden told Sarah that Leliana asked for her to travel to Val Royeoux immediately. So of course for the fate of the world traumatised Alice was left with only her loving father, twin sister, 6 dogs, 2 aunts also Kingston but hes a bit out of of it all.

In Val Royeaux, Leliana reveals that the reason she called for Sarah was because someone scary offed the egg, while inquisition agents are dying all over the place from cancer and an agent named Tulip deserted and works with the people who offed the egg. Sarah is tasked with hunting down Tulip who was last spotted in Rivain in a stronghold held by The Order of Fiery Promise.

Skip to Nevarra, Adriana has a dinner with the family of Fredric Pentaghast, the guy she's courting, who are also the king and queen of Nevarra. The first impressions did not go too well as the king's first words acknowledging her existence included calling her a "whore". The dinner was very awkward after that, Adriana did try to impress the queen with some de-aging solution and promised to send her samples. After dinner Adriana gets a visit from Gerart who thanks her for introducing him to a doctor in Dendric who cured him of a tumour and informed her that the beast of Dendric was spotted in Rivain.

Finally, in an unspecified cell, we discover what happened to Mercé. She wakes up all bloody and on the verge of death with a hole in her head and markings on her arms. She bonds with a rat who brings, a spoiled chicken to her, a bone of which she used to open her cell. The prison Mercé woke up in was filthy and empty except for a single cell with some creepy crawly inside which kills the rat [NOOOOOOO >:( ]. She finds her stuff and a sigil that looks like a wierd mix between templars and seekers before going outside where its revealed that this is in fact *the future*. And she comes across Sarah and Adrianna who approach from different entrances on their own quests.

### Session 2: Half a Mind

Our party members meet for the first time, all - rightfully- weary of the others. Hackles and weapons raised, the 3 introduce themselves as Blossom(Sarah), Ria(Adriana) and Logan(Merce). Mentally, Merce calls sus on Sarah. Then "blossom" proceeds to bandage and heal Merce's head wound as much as possible, and the three venture into the dungeons to investigate. There, Adriana finds signs of the Hound, takes blood and hair samples, and goes to help Sarah investigate the dark cell they'd passed by earlier. Inside, they find a hideous serpent monster devouring what looks to be a pile of meat of (thankfully) unknown origins.

Back out the dungeons, the party delves into the rest of the hideout to find clues, at which point Merce tells on herself about knowing the Rivaini King which makes Adriana question her. They find multiple vats inside the facility, containing water and a black goop-like substance. Adriana and Sarah dispose of the cultist-templars guarding the goop vat, and disconnect the panel controlling it after turning it off. Meanwhile, Merce observes that the black goop seems to actively avoid the blood from her wound. In a study further down the hall, the party finds an experiment diary about how the cultists put the black goop into people. The goop corrupts them and turns them into monsters, it being impossible to predict what monster they become. People with white hair are unaffected, but there is no known cause for this. In the diary there are also the following liquid maintenance instructions:

- must be kept pumping

- it doesn't ignite or evaporate

- if it becomes stale, it loses potency

- it isn't fond of lyrium, so keep away

In a room north of the office, the party finds Adriana's distant cousin, Ducato De Borgona, who turns out to be some nihilistic dickhead, and a part of a cult that wants to destroy the world or something. They try to interrogate him but cant get much out of him aside from the fact that he put a piece of Mercè's brain that contained Helion inside his head and apparently that works and let him get all the knowledge contained in Elgar'nan's well, including meme lore. (I dont think thats how brain science works). So anyway, Mercè wants the piece of her brain back and asks Sarah to cut it out and they put it in a jar. Except they have no means of reattaching it so they plan a trip to Nevarra to find a doctor with the correct expertise.

Seeking a boat and some ice cubes for the brain, the party visit Mercè's home town, after some investigating they find Helios's old pad had ice runes that could be used to preserve the brain for longer so they do some minor grave robbing. After that they find a ship captained by Quintus, who's working for Emily's company now. He immediately ruins Sarah's and Mercè's covers calling them by their names, making everything very awkward, but at least now everyone was on equal footing cause Adriana's name got revealed almost immediately back during the Ducato interrogation.

Quintus agrees to take them to Dendrick which is slightly out of the way of his destination of Starkhaven, and even gives them a discount. Some uneventful boating later, during which Mercè spent most of the time speaking to her brain jar, they arrive in Antiva City for the night. The boat is small and has no sleeping quarters so Quintus tells the party that they'd need to find a place for themselves.

Antiva City is a place of many opportunities, casinos, bars shops as far as the eye can see. So Mercè takes the initiative to practice her craft and breaks into the jewellery shop. She doesnt manage to break the safe but steals away with a couple of lootboxes and some loose gold. Meanwhile Sarah has committed crimes of her own locating her family's old Mansion, last owned by Antonio Hecate, which was now abandoned and repossessed by the Bank of ~~America~~ Antiva. Not caring about pesky things like the Antivan property laws, Sarah decides to stay the night there. She also finds a locket with a picture of Mercè, Dario and their mother, thought she does not recognise them. Finally Adriana visits the blacksmith to ask if Ronja is around, but she wasnt. Then she went to the noble quarter to see Firentia, the head of one of the 3 merchant families that control Antiva. Firentia tells her how the Crows left and everyone is on high alert, as now if you want someone dead you have to \*gasp\* stab them yourself. Unthinkable. So Mercè and Adriana find the same tavern and Adriana decides its best not to ask about the new loot Mercè has acquired.

### Session 3: Unsated

After the stop in Antiva, Mercè busts open some of the loot on the ship, getting only some rather cheap junk, a nice silky sash and a wierd ram skull with wood on the bottom. Next stop Ansburg, a place unsuccessfully attempting to compete with Kirkwall for the gloomiest place in Thedas. Granted, 24/7 rain, shoddy architecture and plain food do paint a very miserable picture but, its still not Kirkwall. While looking for an inn to stay the party finds a very creepy fork. Adrianna bravely picked up the fork to study later. Once in the inn they got a bedroom, Mercè bought herself an exotic delicacy of bland brown bread soup, straight from Fereldan cookbooks. After Mercè finished her meal something compelled Adrianna to lick the empty bowl which creeped both of them out. They went upstairs to consult with Sarah who remembered reading something about it in a book she had on her. And indeed the fork was a cursed fork owned by Nicholas "the cannibal" Ansburg. A Gluttonous Viscount who's nickname speaks for himself. It contained a hunger demon that forced the holder to want to eat whatever is nearest, people and live animals included.

Looking for people to dispose of the fork Mercè asks a guard for any spots in town. She finds out about a chantry and a swamp that contained witches. After some discussion the party figures the more reliable solution for dealing with a demon would probably be those swamp witches, so they stuff the fork inside one of the lockboxes Mercè stole and they store that lockbox inside a bigger lockbox just to be safe. Unfortunately this doesnt seem to work as once in the swamp the fork exerts its influence on Sarah who grabs a squirrel and the other two had to hold her down to save the poor squirrel, which got compensated by Sarah once she regained her senses with all the animal treats she had on her.

In the swamp they find an eluvian, and with some struggle -because all human party-, they come through on the other side which is back in Antiva. The three find themselves in an ancient temple with dragons all over the walls with ancient Tevene writing which no one understands. Sarah deduces they're in antiva through some botany knowledge and they head deeper in to find a whole bunch of dragon eggs and a skeleton. The skeleton had a stick which looked kinda like its staff with a head missing. And Sarah wondered if the Ram head Mercè found is the same one. Lo and behold it actually was and the staff automatically fixed itself. To everyones shock the repair magic extended to the staff's user as the skeleton, turned back into a person. A witch named Yvanna. She thanks the three of them and offers one boon each. Mercè asks first if she would be able to fix her brain but I guess brain surgery isnt on the resume of a witch who reconstructed her entire body from a staff and some bones, all she can do is preserve it, which isnt that much of an issue so instead Mercè's boon is used to destroy the fork. Sarah and Adrianna both ask if they can have a dragon each and Yvanna agrees and gives instructions on how to hatch the eggs they choose. But if you thought Mercè was going to come out of this encounter without an egg of your own you dont know Mercè. After saying their farewells she snuck back and yoinked a one for herself. Though I guess the witch didnt mind that as much telling her in her mind that "that too is fate". Being cryptic runs in the family I guess.

Having returned its daytime and Ansburg immediately sees improvement with the fork gone. The party does some tourism and shopping for materials to keep the egg warm, food and mech from the museum of agriculture. The ship ride to starkhaven consists mostly of them all taking care of their eggs in their own ways. Then in Starkhaven they are stopped by the rudest guards in the Free Marches, who say no one can go past Starkhaven because of some slavers and try to do shake down offering to let them past for 50 gold or if they clear out the slaver camp. Being on the clock as Mercè's Helionbrain doesnt have that much longer to live, the party doesnt want to do either so they try to persuade the guards to let them past and after some stubbornness Sarah pretends to pretend to be an agent of the divine flashing an old inquisition symbol (that was given to every scout and footsoldeir in the inquisition) as proof. Which shuts the guards down and they let Mercè climb up and pull the bridge lever herself letting the boat past to Dendrick.

Because the river is rather thin in these parts Quintus drops them off near the woods where they witness a Qunari digging an unmarked grave. Adrianna recognises her. It is "Ataashi" who in the Hound of Dendrick DLC joined the town guard after the whole hound incident. She doesnt notice them and buries and elf before leaving. The party uncover the elf and are stumped by who it might be. They recognise that he might be in disguise as all of his stuff looks very new, and that the cover up was skilled. They decide to put the elf back in the grave and keep it hidden.

### Session 4: Fairweather Friends

The party finally enters the town of Dendrick in search of Doctor Fairweather. The town is quiet, feeling deserted. After trying to find the good doctor at their house and getting no response, the three head to the town's tavern. There they find Garret still running the place and looking pretty startled to see Adriana.

A quick run-down from Garret lets the party know that the town's population had drastically decreased: Rat had left after the Hound incident with no knowledge of her whereabouts; Dessinta had been found hung in her house without any letter explaining why - both Adriana and Garret being weary of calling it guilt for her actions against her sister, Leonor -; Ulf, now chief, was in a rough state and barely left his old home, unwilling to move into the chief's house. As for Fairweather, they had left town a while back with no words spoken to anyone.

The trio then visits Ulf - the current chief and Adriana's cousin - who opens the door only after recognizing Adriana's voice and seems to be barely holding himself together. Trying to get him out of his misery, Adriana encourages Ulf to visit his sister and nephew for a change of pace. He hands the party the key to Fairweather's home and wishes them luck. Once inside, they find the place deserted and a few haphazardly thrown letters that indicate the destination of the Dr's trip: the Anderfels , from where news of a case of curing of the taint had reached their ears via Gerart. Now with knowledge of their target's destination, Sarah takes a crash course into brain surgery from the doctor's books as a *just in case* and they rush to catch up with the doctor. Before their departure they stop by Ataashi's house in order to interrogate her about the last time she'd seen the doctor, without mentioning her little elf in the "basement"/grave. Ataashi seems in a hurry and unhappy to see Adriana, but responds quickly and shuts the door in the party's faces. After leaving Ulf a note of Lyanna's location and the security password, they rush to catch up to the doctor's carriage.

Alas, they find the carriage on the side of the road so they did catch it... with everyone dead except for a missing Fairweather. With help from Sarah's animal friend spider, the trio tracks down a slaver den where supposedly Fairweather is. But alas, after infiltrating(read as : crashing into) the Lacusta slavers' den and interrogating their scape goat agent it is revealed that the doctor had already been taken to the Bazaar. After a bit of a roughing up and intimidation courtesy of Merce, the party follows the instructions to finally reach the Bazaar.

After days of grueling heat to get to this place, the party is in for quite the rescue mission. Will they finally find the doctor? You will find out soon... *TO BE CONTINUED*

### Session 5: Fettered Fate

*NOW*...

Standing in front of the gates to the Bazar the three get their fake stories straight so that they can fit in amongst slavers. They decide on Adrianna (going by 'Riana') and Sarah (choosing to be 'lady Amladaris') pretending to be Tevinter Magisters and Mercè (going with her trusty Logan) posed as their bodyguard. The guards refused to let them in, saying that the bazar only opens during a set date the party were late for. That was until Sarah literally channelled Anais down to the voice, convincing the guards of their Tevinterness and they called some bigshot from one of the slaver family's who we're going to call "sweaty guy" for very obvious reasons. He lets them in but purely oozes of ulterior motives that concerns the party.

First thing the party does as they enter is get some food and water. Adrianna and Mercè then browse the regular market a bit while Sarah refuses to participate in unethical consumption under capitalism. To find Fairweather they ask some creep where the slavers keep their slaves, Mercè engraving the image of the creep's face and the face of the elven boy he bought in her mind hoping that she may save that boy in the future. They find that theres 3 tents where the slaves are kept by each of the 3 families, after some more investigating, it appeared Fairweather was kept in the Rivaini Fortunada tent. Their tent had a hole in the ground with a ladder that went down to an underground complex. Mercè climbed down and witnessed an argument between Sweaty guy and the leader of the Fortunada family we'll call "kissy slaver lady" for very obvious reasons. Sweaty tells Mercè how the stock of these Fortunada people totally sucks and his is definitely better even though the Fortunadas are the only ones with a proper map for their tent while the other two we had to use our imaginations for. After he's gone Sarah and Adrianna go down the hole too and greet Kissy slaver lady who tells them that she sold Fairweather to a magister a week back, but refuses to say who. She then takes interest in Mercè and gives her, her signature disturbing hand kisses from which he gets her name. She tells Mercè to follow her into a secluded room. Mercè obliges and Sarah shadows them and eavesdrops, while Adrianna breaks into Kissy's room to look for a ledger or any letters of which she finds none, except one from someone from Sellwynne Industries mentioning working together to take out a rival slaver family and warning her to never "do buisness" in Rivain. Kissy slaver lady was interested in Mercè because of Dario's sword on her hilt, she assumed shes from a rival slaver family out to kill her but Mercè has no clue whats that about so Kissy instead offers to buy the sword which Mercè is not interested in.

To look for the magister who bought Fairweather the party asks the slaves in the Fortunada tent, they speak to a, elven mage who's a former agent of Fen'Harel whos all sad cause her daddy has been killed. She reveals that Ghilan'nain killed him and that she sees no point in breaking out. While she doesnt know anything about who bought Fairweather she says that a qunari mage who also might have a plan of escape had a look at the ledger before she caused a scene and ended up in the fighting pit. So the party head there to see the qunari fist fighting a bear (with help of some magic). She gets hit by a bear on purpose so that Sarah has an opportunity to offer healing to talk to her. The Qunari called herself a sage, a less common name for a Seer it seems, and she said she foresaw a red haired healer showing up in the future where she gets out. She reveals the fate she saw in her visions, after 3 slaves were sold, as the 4th was getting auctioned the party's to make a distraction, and then run to a place North called 100 pillars... or 1000 pillars she was iffy on it. Sarah went with it trusting fate to do its job relaying the qunari's words to the party and they planned on how to cause a distraction.

The plan is of course slave revolt, theres weapons sold by the traders in the markets that could easily be given to some angry slaves. The elf mage agreed to join the plot and said she'll lead the slaves who cant fight away if they guards move out or are eliminated by Mercè. Sarah will be in charge of burning down the ship the head honcho will be on board of and Adrianna will be handing out weapons and rousing those who can fight. A well put together plan I cant wait to see it go off flawlessly as all plans of course do. But before that the party will need to steal those weapons.

### Session 6: Freedom Dances on Twilit Sands

With a few hours until the plan goes into action, the party makes their way through the weapons merchants and pull a good old distraction and (stealing) action, preparing the necessities in order to arm the rebelling slaves. Adriana takes this moment to get her little cousin a knife - classic royal family gift -. The trio ends up with: 5 swords, 5 bows, 40 arrows(20 courtesy of Sarah), 10 staves and 40 daggers; and get into their positions.

Spoiler alert: None of these ended up being useful. After 3 slaves were sold (which included a very hot Qunari) and Sarah threw a bomb at the boat with the head honcho in it a huge sandstorm enveloped everyone. Whats worse is that inside the sandstorm there seemed to have been a giant monster. So everyone ran and que in a fade to black but not in a sexy sort of way. The party got separated. Mercè found Kissy in the midst of the sandstorm and watched her fall off comedically. Though for obvious reasons she didnt want to deal with her. Adrianna found Sweaty who grabbed her, saying he wanted to make her a slave cause of her hair. After a bit of a scuffle he got eaten by a smaller monster that was wondering the sandstorm. And Sarah found the boss man of the whole operation and quickly put an arrow in his eye. Then the huge monster which she recognised as being the tarrasque showed up controlled by Devola and Popola who were slightly disappointed to find the body of the bossman saying "someone got to him first".

After the sandstorm subsided the party reunited and found Zettria, the qunari sage who foresaw the whole situation and explained that what she needed a distraction for. She shared that all the remaining slaves were led to safety (including the very hot Qunari who was sold during the auction), and then offered to read the fortunes of all party members individually. Sarah and Mercè were cool with theirs being heard out while Adrianna wanted hers to be private but there is no privacy in this party so Mercè eavesdropped anyway.

You dont need to read the prophecies for the recap I just wanted to put them somewhere so they're saved as they've already been burried on Discord:

Sarah

"You are walking along path that you yourself created. But at the end of the road you will spill your own blood to break it. Along the road you will find a flower, evade its thorns but do not break them for they will serve you come the end."

Mercè

"You are a thief searching for something that was stolen. But only when you retrieve it will you realize the true extent of the theft. The carrier of your sin will knock. Be ready and lay your past to rest."

Adrianna

"At the end without end you will stand frozen. The voyeur of destruction, the bride of false betrayal, the daughter of monster foul."

Finally they found out that Fairweather was kept by a magister in Vyrantium so they start heading there next. First taking a hike through the mountains to the nearest city where they buy horses and ask some mage to cast a cooling spell on the Helion jar. Then they reach some river town where they get a boat to Vyrantium though they had to sadly sell or release their horses. After a speedy journey they reach Vyrantium.

### Session 7: Vyrantium, Twice Murdered

As the party steps foot on the docks of Vyrantium they debate their escape plans for the rescue of Dr Fairweather. They settle on taking a boat to Asariel with the rescuee.

Well this plan immediately goes down the drain. While they are being checked in and questioned by the old elf working at the docks, he promptly explodes. A quick investigation by Sarah determines that the explosion was not magical in nature. The port guard questions the party and they explain everything - the strange hooded figure that seemed to pass something to the elf on his way to them, Merce losing track of the hooded figure, and the unexpected explosion post check-in questions -. The guards say they will investigate, and instruct the trio to not leave the city until the matter is solved.

But their rescue must go on, so the party heads to the library. They find out that outsiders need a pass to enter from an Enchanter. In the next building over? 3 Enchanters. Divide and conquer, as they say.

Merce talks to the dwarven Enchanter - Delvin - in whom she sees a kindred spirit, and goes to get some pants for him... and ends up with a book full of permits for her trouble.

Sarah charms the Enchanter with an Orlesian hairstyle and receives a daily pass and an invitation to come back for more, should she need it.

Adriana confronts the traditionalist Enchanter... as much as you can confront a sleeping person in the middle of a hallway. With no questions asked, he scribbles Adriana a pass.

Now in the library, the party researches ways into the citadel, and find 2 options: the aqueducts, and tunnels centered in the Price of Decadence zone of the city. With Sarah and Adriana as lookouts, Merce sneaks into the room previously assigned to Magister Klister where she finds his diary.

In a streak of good decisions (which, in a party of 3 rogues is as rare as good politicians) they scout out the estate, where Adriana spots something shiny on the rooftop. Thinking it might be a bomb, they stay around for a while to see if it will explode soon, but no luck.

Explosion hopes dashed, they head to a tavern to get some food and rooms where Adriana promptly gets (Merce-seen) whiplash from the tavern keeper who is one of her friends within the antivan Crows. The two exchange "veiled" messages updating each other upon the situation and the tavern keeper offers Adriana "amusement" which she decides to *share* with her party members.

That "amusement" came in the form of crawling through a tiny corridor at the base of a tree to reach underground tunnels. There, underground, the trio is met with quite the surprise: the 5 Talons of the Crows and a blond mage, Bevin.

What has this trio gotten themselves into? We will find out soon. **TO BE CONTINUED...**

### Session 8: "Crows of a Feather"

What they got themselves into is a party with no booze or strippers which really disappointed Mercè. The Talons introduced themselves and went over the state of things happening in Virantium. Apparently the Crows are having a Civil WarTM because of a disagreement on which ruling party to back in preparation for a qunari invasion. 5 Talons want to put Bevin in charge (terrible idea) and 4 of them are backing the current Venetori ruler (somehow an even worse idea). The elf guy at the docks who got exploded was actually one of the bad crows scouting new arrivals and the device was actually made by Ronja. Anyway, the talons want to hit each enemy leader at the same time and then attack the mansion through a back exit Bevin is aware of, so the party are assigned a target of their own. The best house Aranai has to offer: "The Bug Guy" (Zevran really did a number on them, this was the best they had).

After the brief, the three went upstairs to prepare and Adrianna got to reunite with Ronja and Gerart, chatting about explosives and Dendric, catching themselves up on recent events. Sarah overhears the explosives part and asks if Ronja had any stink bombs thinking that if the bug guy uses pheromones or something it might confused the bugs. She also provides Adrianna with some extra fire bombs just in case. Mercè meanwhile spent this entire encounter in her room wrapping her face around with a scarf.

Finally the party moves to assault the lair of the Bug Man. He has set up his alley with buried and disguised giant bugs, which while gross is probably a better alternative to swarms of tiny ones. All those traps are foiled however by the strategy of throwing pebbles at the floor to see which bounce and which sink. Further up they meet with the crow and he reveals to be even more disgusting than already assumed. He had this scorpion with no stinger that likes to play catch. But Sarah with her knowledge of Biology deduces that this scorpion only plays catch for its mates meaning the bugman somehow mated with this scorpion. Ew. The scorpion catches all arrows and bombs thrown at the crow but it can only catch 2 things at once so all 3 of them aim at the bomb that was thrown earlier and Mercè manages to Kaboom the scorpion and its \*eugh\* mate, to pieces. Then they ran away cause the rest of the bugs in the area went into a frenzy.

They met up with Bevin next to the mansion just like planned but were the only ones. He leads them to the back entrance in a garden that is activated by (brace yourself) Tyra: **"BLOOD MAGIC!!!???"**. Bevin asks if we can keep the magister alive so that she could be tortured for a confession that would be given to the Archon, which would solidify Bevin's chances of getting Virantium. The party figures "why not", but then a crow shows up and its not one of the friendly ones so the party runs through the portal and Bevin stays behind. So he's probably dead now anyway. The party are in the mansion in some basement area.

### Session 9: The Man who Sold the World

The party begins investigating the basement/dungeon they find themselves in, finding multiple hidden doors and pathways, and a few slaves they manage to dodge. In the dungeons, there are multiple prison cells and torture rooms, with blood slowly trickling away to the sewers, but they find that the blood is not of a human or elf like you'd expect, but it is pig's blood, which confuses the party. This is supposed to be a Venatori's dungeons. The trio meets an elf slave who is apparently the ledger-woman of the mansion - Miranda - who, startled, pulls a knife on the party.

Through some messy deception rounds, Sarah tells the woman the trio are Venatori, which panics her even more and she insists her mistress is not a Venatori - 2nd "wait what" moment for the party" - and then Adriana convinces Miranda that they are actually investigators for the Archon, and they were following up on the rumors of Zara Renata being a Venatori and keeping illegal slaves at the order of the Archon, and that the "we are Venatori" thing was just a test. This calms the ledger-woman down enough to explain the internal situation in the mansion: Zara Renata is buying slaves and freeing them, which is why she goes through illegal markets, and those who choose to stay help her with that mission. Thinking the woman might have been lied to, and that the "freeing of slaves" might be a coverup, they request proof of those claims. Miranda presents the party with the ledger containing information on all the slaves that have come through, and explains the existence of the escape docks down the stairs from her room. While Sarah and Mercè check the existence of the docks, Adriana goes over the ledgers with Miranda in an effort to keep her from telling her mistress about the party just yet. Noting down some names to double check later, Adriana inquires about Fairweather, which she finds out has stayed in the mansion in order to help take care of "an ill Crow". With Sarah and Mercè back with confirmation of the dock's existence, and with Sarah confirming that the amount of blood recorded in the ledgers(taken from the remaining slaves) is nowhere near enough to use for blood magic rituals or enough to harm the donors, the trio agree to meet with the Magister after meeting Fairweather.

Miranda leads the party up in the mansion to the room Fairweather and the Crow are in, and leaves to inform the Magister about them. Inside the room, reunited with Fairweather, the trio question them about the mansion and slave situation, and put them up to speed on the *brain situation*. Fairweather agrees to operate on Merce if Renata allows the use of the facilities. They also explain that the old Crow leader sleeping on the bed, Catharina, is near her death.

The party finally meets the supposedly Venatori Magister, Zara Renata, who doesn't really seem like a Venatori. She at first mistrusts their purpose of "investigation", but Adriana manages to convince her they are the Archon's agents. As the party starts explaining contrary evidence to Zara being a Venatori, the guards stir and she looks panicked. She refutes all the party's counter-evidence, ignored Adriana's request for a private audience, and orders them taken to the dungeons with their weapons as she "will deal with them later" - signaling them that the purpose is to avoid being overheard -.

At that (worst possible) moment, Bevin and Darinius drop in and Bevin, believing the party had failed, immediately attacks the guards. The party manages to convince him to not attack Renata yet, as she was not Venatori, which confuses the hell out of the blond. Deciding to trust them for now, they make quick work of the guards. Except, Renata panics and attacks Bevin with blood magic lightning, and to protect himself Bevin reciprocates, and sends Darinius to attack Renata. Thankfully, Sarah manages to redirect Darinius to attack the guards rather than the Magister, but shit hits the fan when Adriana snaps and screams at the two would-be Magisters to stop, which sends their combined magic out of control, taking down one of the support pillars of the throne room. In a mad scramble to get out the way (with STR rolls failing all around), Sarah and Mercè get Renata on Darinius and out the way of the pillar, while Adriana fails to get Miranda to jump out the window to avoid the falling stone.

The fallen pillar breaks the gigantic dragon glass sword that sat behind the throne, from which dark fumes began to rise. Those dark fumes gain the shape of a darkspawn, that silently watches the party, glances towards the room Fairweather was in, smiles and vanishes.

Now properly scared out of their minds, the party heads to the recovery room where Fairweather and a now awake Catharina Dellamorte await them. With permission from Renata, Fairweather leaves with Mercè and Sarah - as an assistant - to perform the operation. Meanwhile in the recovery room, with two grumpy would-be Magisters and an old Crow leader, Adriana seeks to put the story straight with everyone. Catharina explains of the tragedy that happened within the Crows, following the infiltration of a quinari agent in the Talons, which left them divided. Catharina, realizing how easily corruptible the Crows have become, decided to purge her organization of filth: she faked deciding to side with the Venatori, thought Renata to be one through rumors, not knwing her - Renata's - truth, and took the corruptible Crows with her while slowly killing them off. She apologises to Zara Renata, who is rightly furious about being used as such, and entrusts the truth of the matter, and what to do with it, to Adriana, and asks her to kill her. To go out with a fight.

Adriana accepts, requests a duel with Bevin and Renata as witnesses, and kills Catharina in one strike to the heart for a quick death. Catharina falls onto Adriana, taking her last breath.

Back in the operating room, Fairweather asks Mercè one last time if she is sure she wants the brain piece back. She is healthy without it, is she truly wishing for it back? But Mercè is sure, she wants her memories back, and so the operation goes ahead. Fairweather compliments Sarah's treatment of the wound, gives Mercè a sedative, and the operation begins. In her recovery sleep, Mercè gets a dream: heavy bars above her head with a strong light. And behind those bars, a face shows: that of Sellwynne, King of Rivain.

**ACT 1 : STOLEN MEMORIES - END**

**ACT 2 : SANCTIONED SINS - START**

### Session 10: Homebound

This was one of those sessions where no crimes were committed. Lets not make a habit of that.

We start with the interlude telling us what the Courier is up to. They did courier stuff in Antiva, until one day where the info guild guys told them some of Sellwynne's people are looking for them. So they headed to Rivain in hopes of learning more about who the previous Courier. In Sellwynne's palace the custom made spear was immediately stolen by Mercè's child (We're very proud). Before meeting the Courier, Sellwynne had a meeting with kissy slaver lady, remember her? Honestly, a perfect match for Sellwynne I cant wait to see the wedding. During the meeting with the shadiest man in Riviain the Courier decided to claim that they got amnesia from being shot in the head instead of admitting their spirit nature. Seeing this "amnesia" as an opportunity Sellwynne offered the Courier work in exchange for answers about their identity and the courier agreed. Nothing bad could possibly come of that.

Back to the main party, Mercè is mid brain surgery and is not doing very well. Trapped in a sarcophagus with visions of Sellwynne and then Nasa shows up and tells her to kill or embrace a chicken. The chicken is Helion, or as Andra put it: Chick-lion. Nasa revealed that she was there during the expedition to the new continent and that shes a dreamer. Then gives her the choice with the chicken. She claimed to have an opinion on Mercè's choice but didnt stop her from going against her opinion to kill the chicken in spite of having unlimited power in the dream. After making the choice Mercè wakes up with her memories to Sarah and Fairweather watching over her.

Meanwhile Adrianna and the new Crow leader were trying to negotiate a peace between Zara and Bevin. The crow offered terrible suggestions like locking them up on purpose so that Adrianna's offers sounded like reasonable compromises. In the end they just decided to kick the can to Anais and keep the two locked up under house arrest till the Archon arrives. They will also organise a festival as a show of strength.

### Session 11: In high places

The next day, Adriana and Miranda are planning the festival, with the main focus being local produce and businesses. With the help of Sarah, they send an invitation to the archon, and Sarah sends out letters of her own to Anais, Fenriel and Leliana. While checking in with Zara while her people try to remove the fallen column, she asks Adriana for some blood in order to "speed up the process". Zara uses the blood to amplify her magic, and Adriana in silent panic says they should compare notes on these effects.

Adriana leaves to check in on Ronja and Gerart at the tavern, but only finds Ronja and Gerart's cousin, and 3 masked people at the far end of the tavern. Ronja is delighted to get feedback on her *very* efficient bombs.

Mercè wakes up to a chicken at the foot of her bed. The chicken feels CORPOREAL, and is a bit worse for the wear. Mercè immediately threatens Helion to turn him into roast chicken. Darinius, from under the bed, frightens the both of them, and proceeds to bark at Chicklion who flails around trying to get away.

In the meantime Mercè realizes she has become **sweaty** and that only she can see Helion, among the non-spirits in the victinity.

In new shocking news in the family tree chart, Fairweather and Bevin are cousins.

Sarah goes to meet the new Crow leader, and inquiries about if they happened to murder her relative Antonio who disappeared, and gets the Crows to accept traveling with the team on the way to Antiva.

In the meantime, Camera de Resoli arrives at the Tevene court and introduces herself to the Archon. They set to meet for brunch the next day. After this, Anais reads Sarah's letter and instantly opens up her wine stash.

### Session 12: Dirge from a Dream

We return to Anais as she's having cofee with the Rivaini ambassador Camera, they discuss foreign relation and alliances and political marriges. All the fun stuff. After the illuminating chat which I totally paid attention to she makes her way to Virantium to settle the whole magister thing.

Meanwhile Sarah is visited in the fade by Feynriel. Well not so much visited as she sees him bound by chains. He explains it was done by Nasa the dreamer, who came out of nowhere, bound him and got Valywen. Thankfully Bella took Alice and ran, and the powerful dreamer magic chains could still be undone with a lockpick. Worst of all Feynriel reveals that Nasa has an elven foci. The bad news makes Sarah wake up and warn the girls of the threat Nasa and Sellwynne pose.

Still, they have to wait until the festival to solve the whole succession crisis and go with the Crows to Antiva so the three spend some time preparing for the festival. Adranna and Sarah go to the library to maybe find out what the thing that hopped out of the sword in the throne room was. They didnt find much other than it being taken from thousand pillars and it made one magister crazy. Then Adrianna's bag got set on fire by an enchanted electric dagger. This made her go shopping for a sheath that would hopefully not catch on fire or zap her when touched. Sarah meanwhile goes to hang out with Mercè who's having the tastiest chicken in the city to spite Chicklion. They visit the temple of Dumat wondering what its like there, being the only landmark they havent visited. It was empty and eeary with a telescope upstairs through which Sarah thought she saw a 3 headed dragon. And downstairs the duo commit the first crime of this arc finding some ancient coins and keeping them. They belong in the local museum (not the british kind). Adrianna meanwhile goes back to the villa and has a chat with Zara about white haired individual where the magister asks her about Mercè's deal and if she could find out, for professional curiousity Im sure.

At the end of the day the party reunites in the fake tavern at the Price of Decadance to discuss how they spent their day. Ronja blows up some stuff cause shes bored so Sarah lets her know of the telescope at the temple that looked to be dwarven. Adrianna brings up the chat with Zara and Mercè claims to not remember how she got them, her lost memories are still in the chicken after all. There are also some books from the temple in Zara's chambers which Mercè suggest to steal.

Will we ever make it out of this city? Only time will tell. But for now at least we wait until the festival and Archons arrival.

### Session 13: Unexpected company

As the day draws closer Mercè figures that this festival severly lacks a fun party to get things started and with Sarah's help she organises a proper rave in the old temple of Dumat. Unfortunately for her it seems whatever Helion has done she cant get fully wasted, same cant be said for Sarah who tried to be helpful with the organisation front but then had a few much more to drink and discovered she can be an actual bard and not just an honorary one.

To get the proper rave lighting the party needed a mage and they only knew two, from which Bevin seemed like a more fun one to bring to a rave. This caused an issue later as midway through the party Bevin disappeared and so did Zara according to her crow body guard. So both them and the crows started running around the city in the panic while (spoilers) Bevin and Zara were out making out somewhere hidden. Not knowing that the three girls came across very suspicious individuals. Qunari spies? Venetori? Local neighbourhood association gathering to complain about the noise and drug use at the temple of Dumat? Whichever they were, they surely were enemie of the state. They tried eavesdropping but a bad stealth roll and a random twig on the ground alerted the shady bunch and they scattered. Instead of splitting up the girls started chasing the tallest one. In spite of being stabbed, shot at and poisoned the tall spy took seemingly barely any damage. And as the sun rose, they made like a vampire and chose to throw themselves down to the rocks and the cold sea than stay on the rooftop they were fighting on.

Finally the next day Anais arrives with that classic sitcom applause where the celebrity appearance shows up for a special episode. Sarah and Adrianna met her alongside the crow leader while Mercè hid in the background. A very good idea for a reason she did not realise yet. They spent some time catching up walking through the longest hallway in the mansion until reaching the meeting room where Zara and Bevin were supposed to be. But instead there stood Sellwynne.

Dum dum dum

### Session 14: All that is promised shall delight thee purely

Back to Mercè: we find her, as usual, up to no good. On the mission of sneaking into the magister's personal library, she steps in something *squishy* and smelling of sea water. Mercè gets the Crow guard to investigate with her and they discover a cloak of the 3 individuals who the party had chased. The Crow goes to report and Mercè takes the golden opportunity to get into the library.

In her search in the library - who, by the way, is sorted by **year**(WHY??) - a book on the lineages of magisters surfaces. This book references Asha Campana - a white haired woman born in a side branch of the Thestamaras ages ago -. Another book that catches our shadow extraordinaire' eye is one on elvish tribes, which mentions multiple elves with white hair, in multiple clans, with no apparent connection.

Back in the shock and horror meeting room, Sellwynne - the absolute wanker - directs the people entering as if he owns the place, which truly displeases the Archon - which she expreses to Adrianna later in a 1 on 1 meeting. Sellwynne treats the Crow leader as if he's a servant, and teases the people around him with his too detailed knowledge of the situation. Sellwynne, point made and Archon thoroughly annoyed, saunters off.

With that unfortunate meeting out the way, Anais proceeds to get to the true point of the meeting: the choosing of the magister of Virantium. Zara claims Bevin's claim is a hostile takeover and 'reminds' the Archon of her father's execution. Bevin claims Zara is a venatori, and that he has ancestral claim over the region. Sarah and Adriana get questioned on the events up until then, and Dellamorte recommends wedding the 2 magister claimants. In her individual meeting with Adriana, Anais questions her on her closeness to the king and on the idea of wedding his son into her family. Adriana, as a Rivaini Royal used to the machinations of her family, responds neutrally but slides a note to the Archon - bidding her to be weary of Sellwynne and advising against the bethrotal.

All this said and done, there are more issues in the mansion. Sarah, during her patrol, finds blood splatters that lead to Bevin's bed which prompt the blond would-be magister to start researching counter spells to blood magic. Darinius, having picked up a trail, leads the team - Sarah, Mercè and Adriana - back to the tunnels under the tavern where they find a strange mirror. The mirror burns to Mercè's and Adriana's blood, and repels the Hound's. The trio bring the mirror back to the mansion, when Adriana remembers the Archon's meeting request for Mercè.

Well, those 2 get along like a house on fire. Fave subject: plotting a certain king's death. What a way to form a friendship.

Finally, Anais declares she has made her decision and calls for her court to gather. She declares:

- Zara is not guilty of venatori conspiracy

- Bevin's family is to be reinstated, but only he and his descendants may take up the role

- Bevin and Zara are to marry and co-rule

Zara seems a bit miffed for not having gotten her twink in a dungeon fantasy ending, but everyone pleased overall.

With the 2 contenders reconciled, and passage guaranteed by the Archon, the party's adventure in Virantium seems to be at an end. Let's see what other mess they'll get into next! **TO BE CONTINUED...**

### Session 15: Ojos

We finally leave Virantium. Truly the fade of Tevinter cities... except before we leave we ought to of course wrap up everything with the characters left behind, get forged documents for Merce and Adrianna and discuss future plans and all the hints we've collected so far hinting at the fact that Sellwynne is in with Ghilan'nain who likely controls the eluvian network. Unfortuantely we couldnt postpone the inevitable forever and the party had to have gotten onto a boat... Hold on. A boat? In these waters filled with hostile Qunari? That sure is going to end well.

Intermission: Aenea is in Orlais (Im so sorry) dealing with a mage serial killer (a serial killer targeting mages not a serial killer who is a mage). She goes to see Gaspard and meets Brialla who appeared to walked back to Val Royeoux all the way from qunari lands cause "someone" nicked her eluvian keys. Aenea is asked to deliver the message about that to Gaspard.

Finally we return to the very not safe waters patrolled by qunari drreadnaughts. The elf captain ensures the party that its completely safe and you have nothing to worry about unless youre a mage or a spy. Sarah is safe cause while yes she is a spy she's a spy for the divine not tevinter. And theres no mages aboard... Except Helion. Yes, we will blame everything that happens on Helion.

As they reach a checkpoint set up by the qunari and go past the Papers Please guy the huge statue with its boobs out starts glowing and it makes Mercè pass out. This being some anti-mage system qunari assume she is a mage and arrest everyone on board. The "non-mages" are thrown to the dungeons and a magic non mage to an interrigation room. In the cell Sarah and Adrianna talk to someone who appears to be a prisoner claiming to have been there since before qunari took over. In hindsight that should've been the first clue that something was off. The prisoner suggests escaping and tells the party that theres a demon trapped in a book that could cause a distraction if freed. Not seeing the red flags waving in the distance the two agree and the prisoner casually walks out of her cell like she owns the place. They also check on the ships captain and find out he already gave up and took a cyanide pill. Meanwhile downstairs Mercè was being interrogated by a Qunari dommy mommy, but she wasnt into that so she kept dodging her attacks while insisting shes not a mage. The qunari gave up briefly on their interrogation and left. Leaving Mercè to experiment with the wierd magic marks that were the cause of this mess. Apparently they let her to phase through objects partly and characteristically the first use of this power for Mercè is to reach inside a door lock and unlock it.

The party reunites in the middle of their escape plan as the prisoner leads Adrianna to where the book is held, behind magical bindings made by tevinters a long time ago. If there was a need for a 3rd red flag on why that prisoner was wierd, she saw Chicklion. But by then it was too late to back out and Mercè used her new ability to grab the book past the field keeping it and Adrianna set up explosives to destroy it while the party is far away so the demon will awaken away from them. Shock of shocks, the prisoner was the demon tricking the party into getting itself released. The party hid waiting for the explosion and waited until the sounds of brutal fighting faded. The demon won and continued to rampage across the checkpoint as the party took this opportunity to run away to the boat and escape. As they sailed away the smoke from the city didnt paint a good picture. Mercè was reminded of the time she released an old evil and said how its probably going to come back and bite them. Sara meanwhile remembered Jader and figured Velhkost probably is looking down at them very dissapointed right now.