Session 9

Thomas Aberrich and Piper Aves return to Salt Landing. The party is soon to be departing for Northgate with Catherine Lynn in tow, to deliver her safely to the Vyckeros Seekers Academy, along with the creature Ekk. Lissie stops and buys a medicine kit before they depart while Thomas purchases a carriage to get them all back to Northgate. The trip takes five days. During one of the evening stops Catherine Lynn asks Marallis "Lissie" Ophiuc if she would be interested in doing an experiment with the Orb of Echlune. The goal of the experiment is to see if anything will come through the from another plane of existence, much like Ekk. Lissie asks Rhea Aves to accompany them, and together they travel a ways into the woods where they will not be seen by onlookers. Caelestus Nishant notices the women leaving, but does not make an attempt to follow them.

After Rhea, Lissie, and Catherine find a suitable spot Lissie opens the orb by slightly unscrewing the two halves from each other along an undetectable hinge, as the party had seen Styrmir do with a different orb. They look inside the orb to see a deep purple light and what looks like the perfect miniature version of a pathway tunneled out of stone. The walls appear to be shimmering and pulsating, as if they are moving. A soft chittering can be heard from inside of the orb. None of them have an idea of what this means. Catherine tries to read the stars, but finds nothing out of the ordinary. Rhea takes Catherine's spyglass and tries look into the orb, but still cannot see anything of note. A soft purple wisp of smoke begins to emanate from the orb and a deep purple hue begins to escape the orb and cover the surrounding grass, bushes, and trees. Lissie notices a commons house spider on the back of her hand holding the orb. She brushes if off and finds another spider on the other side of her hand. With the orb opened the spiders begin to appear faster and faster, with larger and more exotic spiders appearing, and Lissie remains hesitant to close the orb. It is not until Lissie's hand is no longer visible under the "second skin" of spiders that she quickly closes the sphere. The remaining spiders scatter into the forest while the purple hue dissipates.  Lissie asks Catherine and Rhea if they saw this, and they confirm that they did. Lissie tells Rhea that she does not want anyone to know about this little experiment or that she has told Catherine about the orb. The women return to the sleeping quarters, with Cael noting their return, but saying nothing.

Once in Salt Landing, Rhea is taken aback by the shear size of the city and the mass amount of people traveling the roadways. The party is dropped off at one of the main plazas and start to walk towards the Vyckeros Seekers Academy. Rhea finds it difficult to make her way amongst the crowds as the others weave their way around the throngs of people. She bumps into several groups of people by accident, who have no issue telling her to watch herself and to mind her business.

Catherine abruptly motions for Lissie to follow her in an alleyway while the others continue traveling to the academy. Catherine tells Lissie that she must first head to her private laboratory in small estate that she has in Northgate prior to going to the Seekers Academy. She wants to speak with her assistants about the theory of the orb promises Lissie she won't tell them about Lissie herself. She tells Lissie that she should be careful of people within the academy and that she can keep the orb safe for Lissie at her estate. Lissie balks at giving up the orb and tells Catherine that she is going to keep it, but lets Catherine see it again so that she can properly draw it.

Meanwhile Thomas is bumped into while he is leading the party through the streets, and notices that his coin purse has been cut and stolen. He turns around and sees a young woman who smiles and tells him that he should be more careful. Thomas knows this woman to be Eveleth. Eveleth tosses Thomas back his coin purse along with his "take" and passes him a bag holding 150 gold coins. Thomas gives the bag a jingle, smiles, and hands Eveleth a note. Eveleth wants to carry on conversation but Thomas cuts her off, promising they will talk later. Eveleth tells him to go about his "seeker" business as Thomas continues to try to get her to leave. Rhea says she likes Eveleth. Piper thinks Eveleth must be one of Thomas's lady friends, to which Thomas gets defensive about, denying any non-business relationship.

The party heads into the Seekers Academy and meets with Leo Suvalis. Rhea's first meeting with a member of Seeker authority is cold. Thomas and Cael debrief Suvalis on their accomplished mission, with Thomas mentioning that Catherine Lynn went to her estate to get her affairs in order prior to meeting with the Seekers. Suvalis's face grows pale, and he stares at the party wide eyed. He claims that Catherine Lynn has been at the Seekers Academy for the previous three days, and she is staying at her designated quarters in the compound. Lissie starts to hyperventilate. Suvalis quickly makes his way out of the room and begins calling for guards to blockade exits. The party follows as Suvalis begins to run down the hallway, unsheathing his sword. Suvalis barges into Catherine Lynn's quarters, and the party sees that the person working at a small desk is not the same person that traveled with the party from Waddlestork. Suvalis confirms that the person in front of them in the real Catherine Lynn. Lissie begins to panic even more. Suvalis asks the party if anyone told the imposter anything. Thomas responds with an immediate denial, but Rhea is quiet and Lissie is in near hysterics. She admits that the imposter knows about the orb and what they believe it can do. She also knows Suvalis's involvement. The only piece of information she doesn't know is Lissie's true identity.

The party and Suvalis meet with Ollesin Eresh in the Seeker library. Cael produces an image of the Lynn imposter for Eresh to attempt a divining spell to, but Eresh explains that it isn't enough for him to locate. Rhea says what about the spyglass she used to look at the stars. Cael creates an image of the spyglass and Eresh casts a spell to try to locate it. Unfortunately, the spyglass is not within range. Suvalis sends out guards to look for the imposter with a description derived from the image Cael made, saying it is a matter of national security. As it appears the party has run out of immediate avenues to pursue the imposter, Rhea starts to berate Suvalis. She asks why the young Seekers were sent to the observatory, and why they weren't notified that Lynn had arrived in Northgate three days prior. Suvalis states that he figured the young seekers must have missed her and were soon on their way back to Northgate. Leo admits that he wanted them to oversee the interaction between Styrmir and Lynn. Upon hearing this, Rhea is enraged, telling Suvalis that the Seekers are way out of line, and they negligently are risky their lives. Suvalis counters that while they are young, they are talented and trained, and he has the utmost confidence in them. Stymir would not outwardly attack fellow Seekers and this interaction may give them insight on what Ogonek is looking for. They are the only ones who know about these spheres except for Tybalt, whom his hasn't had contact with in years. Rhea will not let up and continues to berate Suvalis, until Cael snaps and starts screaming at Rhea. All the bad blood between the two boils over and the two party members have at each other again.

Afterwards Cael leaves the library. Suvalis tells Rhea that he is appreciative of her concern, but this is seeker business, and as such the manner they go about their operations have no bearing on her. She may do and go as she wishes. He states that it appears this imposter has successfully eluded them for now, but there are other matters he wants them to attend to. There is a young squire from Alvland that has arrived at the academy only a day's past claiming that his knight-errant has gone missing in the Grand Wild. Perhaps this will give the group time to clear their heads. He also says he has heard reports of a group of bandits in the Council Kingdoms that are specifically targeting Ogonek Trading Company caravans. He will look into this and have more information he suspects when they return. He leaves with saying to not think that their mission was a failure. They saved the town of Waddlestork, restored order to Iresia, met with and extracted information from Styrmir, found Ekk, and returned safely. The party should not diminish their successes just because of a singular deception.

Rhea is left with a cold smoldering rage, while Lissie is slumped to the floor clutching her knees. A worried Thomas goes to find Cael, and locates him praying to the The Father in a small chapel in the Seeker compound. Thomas speaks with Cael, but fails to connect with him. Cael asks Thomas what drives him, and why he does any of this, and Thomas stumbles, not certain how to answer. Cael asks if Thomas feels any sense of duty. Thomas scoffs and says of course he doesn't. Thomas makes a half hearted answer that he wishes to become a higher ranking Seeker, but Cael asks why. Thomas doesn't have an answer and takes him leave - telling Cael he hopes that Cael finds what he's looking for.

Piper, meanwhile, wants to find the Ogonek Trading Company Marshall Alicia, to show her how strong he now is. He travels out of the Seeker academy toward the Ogonek Trading Company compound near the main plaza. As Piper approaches he sees a crowd of people listening to the speech of a man standing small elevated platform. The man is telling crowd of the wonders of Dyssia and the new life and riches they could have. Ogonek is offering free safe passage for anyone willing to go. After he gives this oration the crowd disperses and he starts up again, giving the same speech to a new crowd. Piper speaks with the man, named Nylemar, in between these speeches and asks about Alicia, telling Nylemar Piper's entire life history. Nylemar can barely get a word in over Piper's monologuing. He mentions that there is an Aves that works for the company, but he is more regularly known as the "Carrion"