Chapter Sixteen

## Watch and Quern

**Bathjertdag 24th Biriskjur 1770 to Zwatandag 25th Biriskur 1770**

The Fellowship awoke a little the worse for wear but otherwise in good spirits following the previous night’s revelry. As Brandyr took on his usual role of oat soaker, Plymouth, in an uncharacteristic fashion perhaps inspired by their recent stay at the Ranger’s station, set out to forage for some food to accompany that morning’s breakfast and returned with a wealth of mulberries for his efforts.

As they were preparing to set out for the day, a yelp emerged from a nearby tree followed presently by Delg, who emerged pulling up his britches and is scarpering hurriedly away from a hare. “Stop it! Don’t let it get near the girls” he says, hurriedly buckling his belt, a plea that was promptly answered by an arrow and a crossbow bolt from Nixe and Fitz respectively.

"Poor little blighter. Didn’t realise they had the blight this far south. Oh well, nothing we can do about it now. Shall we?” said Delg, gesturing to leave. The party would not be dissuaded, however, tracking the hare back to its form, where they discovered the mutilated remains of another adult hare and four newborns. Having seen enough, Booker cremated the remains and the party left.

The rest of the day passed uneventfully until, as the sun began to dip in the sky, The Fellowship saw an enormous white monolith emerging into view on the horizon before them. It was the unmistakable sight of The Agolith and even from this distance, the similarities between the white stone of the monument and the artefact they had discovered in the mines of Russet were undeniable. Sensing their chance for some much-needed answers, the party made the decision to investigate.

The shear enormity of the five-hundred-foot monolith grew ever present as they approached until, as night fell, they stood on the hills before it. Beneath they could make out two distinct camps; a ramshackle spread of tents and temporary structures of varying styles, teeming with life and a smaller, more uniform military encampment, surrounded by fences from which, even at this late hour, people appeared to be making preparations to leave.

Deciding that they should announce their presence, the party left Delg, Wilf and the taxi-wagon on the hill and made their way over to the military installation, a group of soldiers in the back of a cart exiting as they approached. A single dwarf called Captain Vondal Portcullis, had been left behind to man the AMAR (Agolith Monitoring And Response) encampment and, after The Fellowship flashed him their Freedom of the Empire documents, he gladly welcomed them in for the night.

When quizzed about where the other men had gone, the captain responded that they had “been called back to Bezmad. From there it’ll probably be the front lines”, a statement that raised more questions that it answered. “War’s not been declared just yet” Vondal followed “but it’s only a matter of time now. They’ll need all the men they can get if we’re gonna be fighting dragons”.

He answered their questions about the potential war with Kivanduil, fuelled by the dragon attack on Russet, before the party's line of questioning turned to the other camp nearby. “The followers?” asked the old guard, “Buncha fruitcakes, but they dinnae cause no harm. Mostly I just let ‘em get on with it and no one else much seems to care”. After a few more questions, Captain Portcullis directed them towards a barracks in which they could spend the night and he and Nixe played a few rounds of cards before bedding down for the night.

Booker, being an inquisitive young gnome, had other ideas however, and set about investigating the other barracks, which had housed the artificers who investigated The Agolith a couple of years earlier. Finding nothing, he then tried to convince Plymouth to head down to the site with him that night whilst the others slept. Rebuffed by the scholar, he turned his attention to Nixe, who eventually persuaded him to rest for tonight, so that they could head out together at first light the following morning.

Morning came and the party made for the larger encampment. Even at this early hour there was a general bustle of activity which, combined with the multi-coloured tents, the various flags, the gathered throngs of people playing music and games and the smell of a dozen different breakfast cuisines filling the air, created an overall feeling of vibrancy.

Feeding on the energy of the camp, Booker and Plymouth followed the hullabaloo to its source, a young woman with a tambourine called Moonbeam. “Come on everybody” she shouted to the gathering crowd, “y’all know this one, it’s the song of the prophetess”. A heavy drumbeat reverberated around the camp as the men on either side of her began to beat on bongos and a tall freestanding drum, the crowd stamping their feet and clapping their hands in a rhythmic fashion. “I’m gonna need y’all help with this one” she continued “when I point, I need y’all to give me a real big Quern! Can you do that for me? Let’s give it a test!” and this is what she sang.

**"Song of the Prophetess"**

The power of five realms, (Quern!)

The people of one. (Quern!)

Unite the nations, (Quern!)

and stay the setting sun. (Quern!)

Balance the scales, (Quern!)

As they start to tip. (Quern!)

Stop the hunger, (Quern!)

As a fellowship! (Quern!)

As a fellowship! (Quern!)

As a fellowship! (Quern!)

**(Repeat)**

Brandyr, feeling his overtly religious apparel may cause him to stand out amongst the fervently religious followers, excused himself, while Nixe and Fitz scanned the crowd. Among the eclectic members of The Followers of Quern were the affable but slightly boring, sausage-loving farmer Jon Cheeseman and the travelling dragonborn Restless Norixius Balasar, with whom Nixe enjoyed some hallucinogenic edibles in an attempt to establish whether he was complicit in the dragon attack on Russet.

Fitz, meanwhile, had spotted the familiar face of Bertram Clyde among the followers, handing out flyers extolling the virtues of Quern. After some gentle persuasion, Bertram, who already looked favourably on Fitz for saving his life, agreed to gain the party an audience with The Voice, the spokesman for the Quern.

After meeting beneath The Agolith and affixing an ear of wheat to each of their lapels, The Fellowship took a step, felt a lurching sensation in their stomachs, and found themselves surrounded by well-lit, white stone walls. They recognised the location as where they had witnessed the conversation between the halfling and the blue skinned elf, only instead of a window, there was an open door, through which beside the war-table and chairs, stood the halfling.

“Well, come in if you’re coming in” he said, gesturing towards the chairs as he walked around the table and sat behind it. As the rest of the party took their seats, Nixe spotted the blue skinned elven woman at the end of the corridor. Seeing the change for answers of his own, he left the others to their meeting with The Voice.

They quizzed the halfling before them and he explained that he had once been a miller, from a family of millers, but that he always had a mind for invention. By the time he was a teenager he was tinkering with things that his family couldn’t understand. So, he kept them to himself.

As a young man, he discovered, how to communicate with other planes, and later how to travel between them. In communicating with these realms however, he was discovered by a malicious entity. An evil, all-consuming evil, driven by nothing but their appetite for destruction. They came for him and his realm, infecting all that they touched with their black bile. The halfling fled as they devoured his realm and he had been running ever since.

He went on to explain that The Agolith had started as his family’s windmill, the quern-stones making up a large part of the central mechanism. Over time it had grown, but the mill was still there, at the centre of it all.

Over time he learnt how to predict the entity’s path, and he began travelling between the realms that were in danger. At first, trying to stop them, but after realising the futility of this, they began to just save who and what they could.

When asked about the changelings, he explained that they were a peculiar race of people, able to adopt the look of anyone they wished, that they had saved from another plane, along with their brood mother. They use the changelings to spread the word of Quern, to summon people to the monolith, or to gather what relics they can, so that they can preserve at least a little history from these fallen realms.

The party, having listened to his tale, accused him of giving up, of cowardice and of not doing enough to save those in need. He threw them an olde dwarfish dictionary and told them to look up the word Ungermoth. Finding it to mean “agreement”, he began to explain the secret history of the Ungermoth Empire.

Years ago, back when they were still trying to stop those who consume, they travelled to The Fellowship’s realm. They had calculated that they had plenty of time before they arrived so  thought they could prepare the people for their coming. Reaching out to the local leaders, those with the resources and the means to do what was needed, they made an agreement.

The Dwarves said they needed an army, to unite the land under one rule so they could prepare to fight the enemy rather than each other. So, The Voice gave them the secrets of warforged technology and, in return, the Dwarves would make an army and prepare their people, so that when the enemy came, they would be ready for them.

The Agolith left, going on to other planes that needed their help, until the time was right. Over time they exhausted a dozen other plans and, over time, gave up on fighting the enemy. When they returned, seven hundred years later, they found the people of Ungermoth unaware, their leaders in disarray, the warforged production had stalled and, once more, they were on the brink of war.

“Your leaders have reneged on the agreement” said The Voice “You are in no fit shape to fight the coming hunger, so we will do what we always do. Once it is clear this realm is lost, we will save those we can and flee to the next plane that needs our help”, and with a few last cryptic remarks, he returned The Fellowship to beneath The Agolith.

Meanwhile, Nixe had tracked down the blue-skinned elf, asking her who she was and what their connection was. She explained that she was not his mother, but that she did know her. Nixe’s mother had come to her prior to their home realm being destroyed and asked her to take Nixe aboard The Agolith. Nixe’s mother had become separated from her husband and infected with the blight, a precursor to the interdimensional consumers.

Not prepared to be a mother, The Voice suggested they leave Nixe in this realm, knowing that it was safe from incursion for enough time for him to grow old. The elf then fetched a bow from her room, and handed it to Nixe, telling him that I had belonged to his father, Firn, and that it was called Neve, after Nixe’s mother. With that, the meeting with The Voice had concluded and Nixe too was returned to The Ungermoth Empire.

Next: Chapter Seventeen. Derailed