74. Peace and War

* The day is Harvestide 39. The party have left the peaceful island of Oleantis behind and temporarily joined the Laupepa Fleet, a convoy of thousands of reefbeard outrigger ships, bringing in *the Drunken Dragon* a few dozen ships behind the very front of the fleet.
	+ The fleet kahuna, an old, squat, ever-smiling woman named Arihi, agrees to take them to the far side of Lake Makuahine, as close to the Rumidian Southern Margraviate as the reefbeard fleet can get them. When asked why they were so ready to help, Arihi mused about the nature of connectedness, playing a hand through the ocean waters as she spoke. That island druid, Qing Shan, had felt the need to ask Arihi to help the party on their journey, and so Arihi intended to do so. It really was as simple as that in her mind.
	+ The group then get shown about the fleet by three of the kahuna's children, Fui'fui, the dark-skinned, blonde haired man who had first met them on their approach to the fleet, and his twin sisters, Kaime, the elder, and Toroa, the younger - both of which sported long chestnut hair unlike their mother or brother. The party ride in twos at the back of each of the siblings' outrigger canoes as they cut through the waves, weaving about other boats and reefs alike, shouting and pointing at various vessels and people of interest. All eyes about the fleet are very much on the exciting newcomers.
	+ That evening the reefbeard twins have a fun time giving Wilfred his first ear piercing, so that he could wear the dangling grey-and-white feather earring Qing Shan had given him. Cill had them add another piercing to his handsome collection so that he might wear the matching earring he'd also received from the island druid. Pyt gets his mane-like hair braided and has them shave some off the side for fun.
	+ Cill has a bit of fun practising his new on-the-run persona, a mad inventor named Jacamo, with Lockjaw, playing the role of Wesley, Jacamo's ever-suffering assistant. Cill turns out to be quite bad at the whole fake identity thing.
* When the night is fully on them and the activities about the fleet have quietened down significantly -- all the vessels shifting to a skeleton, some choosing to anchor, others drifting along ever so slowly, such that the fleet would be shuffled around quite a bit by morning -- the party and their crew sat at the table in *the Drunken Dragon's* deck cabin and talked about their new witch problem.
	+ A sea fury was coming for them, that much they knew. But they didn't know a great deal else.
	+ Most of the group felt they needed to tell Arihi and the reefbeards the situation, and that they should probably leave the convoy before they got all these people killed.
	+ Clwyd was adamant that leaving would be akin to suicide, while staying offered them more opportunities to take down the sea fury while she was distracted with other targets.
	+ If leaving is suicide, argued Lockjaw and Cill, then staying would be mass murder on top of that.
	+ When given the choice between suicide and murder, the goblin said she vastly preferred the latter.
	+ Most of the group were pretty sickened by that sentiment, so Clwyd shifted focus over to Aerendyl. The elf still dodged most of their enquiries with misdirection and sylvan double-speak, though he did betray that the sea fury now somehow had a lock of his hair.
	+ The discussion starts going around in circles, so Wilfred and Pyt say they're going to talk to the kahuna, explain the danger, and then likely take their leave in the morning - since the leave sentiment was the majority, much to Clwyd's chagrin.
* As Wilfred and Pyt hop from deck to outrigger platform to deck again, making their way along the close-nested house-vessels in the heart of the convoy, the light of the full moon shone down on them. Taking note of it, Wilfred mentioned to Pyt that they should consider approaching Mab or Titania if the River King continues to ignore them. And seconds later, they see him, the River King, sat on the edge of a vessel some 20 feet away from them, feet dipping into the water, moonlight across his almost-elven face.
	+ The River King told them there was no need for ultimatums. The duo disagreed, since he hadn't answered Wilfred's calls the night before. In return, the fey said simply that Wilfred hadn't offered anything interesting yet.
	+ Pyt and Wilfred were understandably angry with the River King, but the fey remained calm and even-tempered throughout the talk.
	+ They asked him why he'd done what he did, and the River King responded that Aerendyl had spent near 5 centuries in idleness, and that his kind were well known for progressing at little more than a plodding speed. In the short time Aerendyl had been in the River King's care, the depths of his strength had grown by fathoms. But the River King said he knew the dangers of sloth better than most, and so he had to continue to push Aerendyl, so that he might achieve everything he can and become something great.
	+ Wilfred was angry. Really angry. He said they had been progressing fine, and the River King simply smiled at that. Pyt snapped that they were caught in the middle of all this for no good reason. The River King responded that should they benefit from his endeavours to improve Aerendyl then so much the better. The power of mortal friendships is ever a remarkable thing, after all. And if he started talking to Aerendyl? asked Wilfred. What if the gnome started trying to steer the elf the way the party wanted. To that, the River King simply said that he'd had a lot more practice than Wilfred had. Pyt said that he thinks the River King isn't nearly as strong as he thinks he is. And the fey's response was simply to say 'perhaps you are right.'
	+ The River King told them that he did care for them, despite their wounding accusations to the contrary. And he said that should they be afeared right now, then it was simply due to their lack of information. Questions three was an old offering between his kind and there's, and the River King would trade it here should they offer something of equal weight to that of their fears. 'Fuck you,' was the response.
	+ The River King inclined his head, pushed himself off the edge of the ship, and fell to someplace else as he passed into the water, disappearing.
* As Wilfred and Pyt spoke to the River King, Aerendyl had sequestered himself alone in his room. He cast a strong spell and summoned Anemone the former island witch into a watery simulacra manifestation, much in the same way as he did for his quicklings.
	+ The elf told her that she'd agreed to help them from time to time and that it would be a great help if she could tell him the name of the remaining witch in the Coven of Covens, once the youngest of the seven sunken sisters.
	+ Anemone replied that she would help within the limits of their arrangement, but that this manifested form had its limitations, especially while he held the yoke of control.
	+ Aerendyl thought for a moment, but didn't intend to drop his concentration on the spell, which would give the witch free reign until the spell had ran its full course.
	+ He cut his losses and dismissed Anemone, her form returning to simple water and splashing down to the floor.
* Wilfred and Pyt arrive at the Nau'natia, the kahuna's house-vessel they'd been on that morning. They're invited inside her home. The door opens into a sitting room outfitted with furniture woven from the husks of drag fruit -- the yam-like staple most of the larger vessels in the convey farmed in the wake of their ships. Burning incense filled the room with the aroma of spices, and a draping curtain separated this living room from the only other room on the house-vessel, a bedroom half again as large as this room.
	+ Arihi sat with them, nursing a drink, while they told her that a sea fury, a powerful witch, was hunting them and that they think it's best for them to leave. They stressed that it was in no way a mark against her or the reefbeards' hospitality, and how, in fact, they wished they could stay more than anything really, but they just think it's too dangerous for them to do so.
	+ The old woman regards them silently for a time. Then eventually says that she has mothered five children, that they as men would never understand the strength of purpose that gives a woman, and how perhaps they didn't understand that people are never safer than when they are held in the arms of their mothers. 'Do you know what "Makuahine Loko" means in our tongue,' she asks them. Naturally, they do not, as so Arihi tells them it means 'the Lake of the Great Mother.' The reefbeards sail in their mother's embrace, and there is no place in the world where they could be safer.
	+ Whether it be witch or anything else coming for them, let them come, the kahuna says. Arihi and the reefbeards had agreed to help the party in the simple way they can, by showing them the way onwards, and they intended to see that through. And if this witch intended to get in the way of that, she will quickly learn that the Laupepa fleet are not such easy prey.
	+ Still Pyt is worried. He says that even if the reefbeards aren't easy prey, the party had dealt with a number of witches up to this point, and still they didn't know anything about this one other than her likely being stronger than even those they'd fought before.
	+ And so to alleviate Pyt's fears somewhat, and to show a piece of her people's strength, she says they should see if her ancestors might know some more of what was coming for them.
	+ Arihi tells them to gather on the flat deck in front of her home, then she starts out with a complex series of whistles and shouts, and she sends runners off to pass on the word: though it was short notice, the reefbeards would sail with their ancestors this night!

*The party, their guests, and all their crew save Garret and Taylor -- both left behind to man* the Drunken Dragon *in the night -- sat cross-legged alongside a gaggle of excited children on the Nau'natia. Eight torches burned at the sides of the ship in from of them, and on each of the ships that sailed around the Nau'natia. An old male reefbeard stepped with purpose, muttering in his people's musical language, brandishing a long staff with a burning censor hanging at its end. The incense coming off it was thick and sleet-grey, but it smelt pleasant.*

*Without warning, people began banging on large standing drums. The beat from the different ships seemed discordant, out of sync with each other, each riding their own rhythm.* Du-dum-dum *went the drum on the Nau'natia, loud in their ears. Arihi stood before her seated crowd, and 18 reefbeards stood behind her, alternating in lines of five and four, all shirtless, revealing intricate tattoos that told the story of their lives as they snaked across torsos and arms. Each of the torch-lit ships around theirs also had lines of shirtless, ready reefbeards, all looking towards Arihi and the Nau'natia. They shook their hands, pumped their legs in place, and worked their tongues in frenetic anticipation.*

*And when at last Arihi called out fiercely in their language, hundreds of voices answered her, and each line of reefbeards sank into a mighty* haka*. Their synchronised stomps shook the whole ship, the slapping of thighs and forearms echoed out to the unseen horizon like thunderclaps, and their chanting, 300 voices shouting as one, echoed even further. The drum beats had risen, more harmonious now. And as the* haka *progressed, the drums came further into line, until at last they were all beating as one.*

*The incense burned thickly around the onlookers now, swirling amidst the rise and fall of the dancers' feet. And when the* haka *reached its crescendo, the thick smoke seemed to blot out all sight for a moment, save the burning of the eight torches on deck. Arihi called out the final line, the drums stopped, and a single bell rang a loud, clear, punctuating tone. The smoke cleared slowly, and when it did the black canvas of the Terca Mahres sky stretched above them, seamlessly fusing with the ink-black waters of the Lake somewhere out in the distance, and the Nau'natia seemed to be sailing alone.*

*'We are in another place now,' said Arihi into that sudden, deafening silence.*

*And as if to back up their descendant's claim, an ethereal, blue-white outrigger chose that moment to sail past the Nau'natia. It was followed by another from the other side, and then more, and more besides, until the Nau'natia soon sailed in the midst of hundreds of spectral outriggers, each of them twinned in the mirror-like water, all crewed by ghostly reefbeard figures who clutched hands to heart and nodded in respect to the kahuna that had called them.*

* Arihi bids the party to ask their questions. She would handle the translations for them. The group opt for the Laupepa ancestors to provide them with the equivalent of a *legend lore* spell on 'sea furies.' Arihi's ancestors with relevant knowledge sail up near her ship and call out their answers, which she then translates for the party. In all, they learn the following:
	+ Sea furies were most common in the Third Time of Madness, when sea witches had been deployed in great numbers. Comparatively weak as they are, these sea witches would form large covens consisting of seven, nine, eleven, or sometimes even more members. These large covens would come to collapse under their own weight, and in a manner that should have been unsurprising for the unseely fey, individual members would try to claim the power of their coven siblings. When one witch one out in these civil wars, they emerged as a fury.
	+ Furies were ruled by extreme emotions, even more than the average fey. They were violent, capricious, wrathful, and hungry to taste yet more power after having grown so much from what they were.
	+ Alongside their own might, a sea fury keeps the spectral remains of their slain siblings bound to them. Each is warped and twisted with purpose, turning them into tools for the fury's own use. And each represents a store of Weird Magical power, such that the sea fury can use them for Legendary Resistances should the sea fury fail a save, each counted as a *death ward* spell should the sea fury be reduced to 0 hit points, and should the fury choose, each could be sacrificed in order to bring forth potent magical effects. And so long as the sea fury remained, they would invariably reform near her when slain, if given enough time.
* When their questions had been answered, Arihi thanked the spirits of her ancestors and gave a short, sharp series of whistles. The torch light was snuffed out in response, and in the darkness, the party again heard the sounds of the hundreds of reefbeard ships cutting through the waves of Lake Makuahine. The party returned to their party, Garret was distraught at having missed such an amazing spectacle, and, their worried somewhat alleviated by at least some knowledge of their enemy and the kahuna's conviction that they stay, the group took to rest.
* The group settled into fleet life as best they could, though an air of tension and alertness hung over them all the while, and they never stopped keeping watch at night. The weeks began to pass as they moved through Lake Makuahine and learned about the reefbeard lifestyle.
	+ The highlights of the first week included someone catching a massive oarfish and all of the nearby ships coming together to eat it communally, as well as the reefbeard women taking great delight in the array of reactions they got from the outsiders when they showed off their provocative, hip-swaying dances. Clwyd enjoyed the nostalgia of eating drag fruit, the misnomered vegetable also a common staple among migratory goblins. Cill was super popular with the local children, since he enjoyed showing off his many magical trinkets. The deep gnome also got one of the kids to weave him a wide brim hat to help alleviate the sheer sun.
	+ After checking it was ok with the kahuna, some of the group sat in on a creche history lesson, where the reefbeard children were being taught about their past.
		- They learned that Lake Makuahine was incorporated into the Rumidian Empire and the reefbeards were vassals of the crown, but that they'd never been conquered. Instead, a great kahuna named Kame'ha had united many of the disparate fleets of the Lake into a mighty force, and so had been able to negotiate terms with the Rumidians when they came and tried to conquer. Kame'ha Kahuna had been aided by the Rumidian galleons fairing poorly in the coral waters where the reefbeard outriggers did not, but mostly he was successful because the Rumidians expected to be dealing with a primitive, but Kame'ha Kahuna was as shrewd at politicking as he was fearsome in warfare.
		- What emerged was the Silk-Tied Agreement, wherein the reefbeards have their relative autonomy, and perhaps most surprisingly for those in the know, seem to have most of their religious freedoms still in place -- their chief doctrine being that the islands of Lake Makuahine are sacred, hence them not stepping on them often -- and in return, the children of the kahunas would be sent to the capital islands of the Compass Isles to study. To the politically savvy, this was clearly a hostage arrangement, should the reefbeards ever rebel, and it also served to indoctrinate the next generation of reefbeard leaders in Rumidian thinking. But the reefbeards weren't stupid; they understood these things well. From their perspective, it was harder and harder to justify a leader who didn't have any understanding of the world beyond the lake, so the arrangement suited them too.
	+ The party learned that the three children of Arihi that they'd met, Fui'fui and the twins Kaime and Toroa, had all studied in at least some of the four great islands of the Compass Isles. Of them all, Kaime is the most inquisitive about the outside world and seemed to have enjoyed her time in Rumidia the most. She hounds Wilfred for stories of his youth. Arihi herself, it turns out, had also studied in Rumidia when she was younger.
	+ In the next week of sailing, the biggest highlight came when the fleet had inadvertently sailed over the nesting territory of a coral drake brood mother. The creatures were more bestial than most drakes and fiercely territorial at the best of times, let alone when they've got a clutch of young. Numerous reefbeards sprang into action to protect the fleet, zipping out on their one-man outriggers, large war spears in hand. They fought fiercely, even as they never intended to kill the drake. As they fought, some of the reefbeards hummed and sang, calling forth the spirits of the ancestors to protect the nearby non-combatants and the others that fought in kind. Others, Fui'fui included, employed oath magic in their fighting, and were capable of whipping up the wind to buffet the drake about - wave knights, they were called. They were able to beat back the drake long enough for the fleet to bow itself and get out of the creature's territory. In the end, only minimal injuries were incurred.
	+ By this time, the party had learned another fascinating fact about the reefbeards: they could all drink seawater and suffer no adverse effects. This was just another part of their being 'Children of the Lake,' or 'Keki-oka-Loko,' which was their own name for their people.
	+ While they're shucking oysters one day -- the reefbeards farm them for pearls -- Wilfred asks Fui'fui about the Compass Isles fifty-ish years ago, which should have been around the time the wave knight was there studying. Wilfred wanted to know if Fui'fui knew anything about the death of an archmage that happened at the time. Fui'fui said he knew about it alright! He'd been studying on the island of Bernesia when that attack happened. The death of the Archmage of Abjuration and the theft of her robes, themselves a sacred treasure of Rumidia, had started the last war between Rumidia and the Sultanates. Even to this day, the Archmage of Abjuration is the only seat that doesn't have the robes because of this, and they're still thought to be somewhere out there in the Sultanates.
* In all, the party sailed with the Laupepa fleet for 33 days. On the morning of Fallingleaf 27, Fui'fui saw to it that the Drunken Dragon was loaded up with food stores, and then he and his sisters guided the party away from the fleet and to the edge of Lake Makuahine.
	+ They sail until mid-afternoon, at which point the end of the great reef system is obvious on the horizon, where the waves picked up. Fui'fui and his sisters bring their canoes in close to the party's ship and bid them farewell.
	+ Cill gives the the two women coloured braids that he's made to weave into their hair and they accept them gratefully.
	+ Fui'fui tells the group the bearing they need to hold on a couple of their log pins, and that if they do so and sail straight through that gap up ahead, they should reach the Southern Margraviate in two days.
	+ And as the reefbeards made to go, Wilfred said he hoped they'd meet again some day. Fui'fui smiled and nodded, saying it was more up to them than him. He'd be here, somewhere in the Lake, though for the time being he was going to check out life towards the back of the Laupepa fleet for a bit so they might not see him if they go back to the Nau'natia at the front.
	+ And with that, they were off and *the Drunken Dragon* was alone again for the first time in what seemed like a long time.
	+ Wilfred said to Pyt that when all of this was over, debts paid and missions finished, this might be a nice place to come back to if he decides he doesn't want to sail off the end of the world.
* They sail the Drunken Dragon til it's almost sunset, then opt to drop anchor at the edge of the reef shallows since they won't have the chance to do it again for a little bit.
	+ That evening, Clwyd and Aerendyl stay out on the ship's deck, nervous now that the party's escort is gone.
	+ Mennick talks to Pyt in their room, telling the bard that he's made some significant progress on the Sawtooth Basin transcript. Working around various distinctive idiolects, using his own conversations where possible as markers of time and place, Mennick had documented a couple interesting things. Firstly, he had a full transcript of the meeting of the Council of Nine that Aerendyl had scried on before. But secondly, and perhaps more interesting to Pyt since it was new information, Mennick had made good progress around the conversations the goblins had had - since a number of them had useful speech markers and vocal ticks, apparently. He hands Pyt the relevant sheets of copied out conversation.
	+ Pyt reads what Mennick gave him:
		- Now that their technology, the advantage Madog and his close council had worked so hard to earn for goblin-kin, was protected and secured, they could move ahead with their plans. There were a few loose ends around the world, but he'd sent the Four and Forty after them, and even if complications arise, those creatures can't be slain in truth on Terca Mahres any more.
		- Their next step then was to approach Mother Shandy and form an alliance, to accelerate her war efforts, for goblin engines would do well in the Calm Blue where the ironoar rowers were said to be unbeatable until now. They would kill Svavil the Iron King, and then claim his windless waters as the new home of goblin-kind, and at last their long quest would be complete.
	+ Pyt tells Mennick he should stop working for the day and then takes the pages he'd just read to Wilfred. They both share a 'holy shit' sort of sentiment, and debate whether they should tell Clwyd or not.
	+ And around that time, the ship is rocked by an underwater explosion.
* Everyone inside the extra-dimensional deck cabin scrambles to get to the deck, Clwyd bellows that they're under attack, using thaumaturgy to aid her, and she and Aerendyl ready themselves on the deck. When another explosion happens, again at the back of the ship and below the water line, the goblin jumps into the ocean for a look their assailant. And there she sees the sea fury, hurling *shatter* spells at the ship's hull and steering oar, surrounded by the wretched, screaming, spectral forms of her former sisters.
	+ The fight was pure chaos.
	+ Aerendyl summoned first his quicklings, but their swords did nothing to either the fury or her spectres, and so the elf sent them away. Next he summoned Anemone, the former naiad a master in the water.
	+ Pyt used a new spell, Circle of Power, to conjure a great many floaty spectral Pyts around them all to guide them away from harm.
	+ Still the fury and her ghosts were not to be reckoned with. Clwyd ended up surrounded in the waters twice, saved the first time by her good armour and a *thunderstep* and the second time by Pyt jumping into the water and *dimension dooring* her unconscious form away from the relentless attacks of the sea fury.
	+ The steering oar was destroyed and the ship's hull badly damaged, though Wilfred prevented that from getting worse by protecting it with a *wall of force*.
	+ Anemone, under Aerendyl's command, trapped several of the spirits in the vortex of a *control water* whirlpool from which they barely had a chance to escape.
	+ As such, the sea fury started sacrificing them for more power, first regaining tonnes of health and adding fierceness to her attacks for a short while, and then to cast *chain lightning*. The latter could have been devastating, had it not been for Pyt's *circle of power* shielding them all from harm.
	+ Clwyd's *hallow* spell long ago cast on *the Drunken Dragon* prevented the fury or her ghostly sisters from climbing onto the deck, and limited what they could do to Clwyd or her allies while they stood on there.
	+ With her spirits dwindling in number, the fury made to beat a retreat. She let out one last chain lightning as she did, sacrificing her last spirit for it, but Wilfred was able to *counter* the tricky Weird Magic thanks to a bit of help from Cill.
	+ The sea fury was incredibly fast in the water and the night was dark, but the party smelled her blood now and they weren't keen to let her go. Cill collapsed to the deck, exhausted after the harrowing fight and his own near-death experience in it, while the rest of them took to teleporting after the fury by their various means.
	+ Wilfred trapped her in a *wall of force* and they all readied attacks, but the fury had refilled her health from one of the spirits before she started fleeing and so withstood their onslaught. Clwyd tapped the fox skull's power, levelling an Evil Eye at the fury that would help to make her fail where she might have otherwise succeeded, and then Aerendyl tried to trap her in the iron flask, but still she resisted.
	+ She managed to fill Wilfred with fright and almost killed him with her *death glare* but the gnome resisted it at the last.
	+ And then she beat her retreat again, and this time, with the party split up, with them lacking the *telepathic bond* they were at this point so used to, and with the nighttime waters so dark, they miscommunicated their final pursuit and the fury managed to slip away into the reef and then the waters beyond.