GM: Judd Karlman
Players: Cathy Caronia and Sean Nittner
System: Mythic Bastionland
We picked up where we left off last time. Wondering what to do about the axe. A knight’s duty to pick up the axe, but now what? We decided to seek out the seers of this land. Those in our home were too far and we’d miss Sceptremass.
While riding through the orchard, Bray looked at the trees and the people working them, noticing how none of the weapons of war she carried would aid in harvesting these apples, keeping the trees free form pests, or fertilizing the ground. The only thing her giant axe could do would be to fell one of these trees. Was the only thing a knight was for to bring ruin?
After a time she asked Ezter “Would we ever know if the time knights were over?”
A long discussion ensued about the role of knights, how we should elevate others to an equal level, but that practical realities like the availability of horses and steel prevent everyone from having everything. Ezter’s response “If someone’s not going to eat for lack of a horse. I will walk.” Bray was keen to see if this was really true.
A beautiful night
Night fell and there was a calm in the land. We were on a cliff above the holy lake and the smells of the wind and the water were soothing. At the base of the cliff we found a hunter named Crabbe and his two children who were staying in a hunter’s lodge used by those who passed through.
The hunter’s son invited us in and offered us stew. Inside the hunter and his daughter were making merry. Preparing food and telling jokes. The hunter had a good one he really wanted to share, but when we entered and he saw the axe, his face fell.
“So it follows me”
Bray was curious that so many seemed to know so much more about the axe than she did. “I am Bray. New to this axe and it’s curse. What can you tell me of it?”
She set it down, but everyone in the room knew they would not make it to the axe before her if they wanted to try and claim it. Even in stillness it was menacing.
“In my youth, I was the axe wielder and did terrible things.”
Bray considered this and the thoughts that had been running through her head. “It seems to have a great power over those who have not been chosen and protected by the seers.” She lied to him and to herself, believing she was in control of her actions.
He shrugged, unconvinced. “That could be. I’m only a hunter.”
“The one we met who wielded it before me, once free from his thrall, made it clear that the axe had compelled him. We seek a seer to help us. Do you know of any nearby?”
“The lake to the south is Holy Lake. Seers may attend it.” As the night fell, Crabb sent his children to gather wood and when they were gone he faced us like he was ready to accept punishment “In my youth, with that axe, I committed fell murders.”
Ezter forgave him for his actions and congratulated him for choosing another path once setting down the axe. She wondered if it was possible that the axe’s destiny was compatible with our values.
Bray inquired “How did you rid yourself of the axe.”
“I fell in love with the Story Knight, his name was Abbot. I had to choose between him and destroying all knights. I was lucky and abbot was a singular knight, and I chose love”
It turns out Abbot had passed a few winters ago, and we consoled Crabbe for his loss.
He seemed disbelieving. “I am in awe of your strength. The seers blessing must be impressive that you can resist it.”
Bray also believed she was singularly able to wield it, though in every moment she judged Ezter to deem if she was still worthy of living. She knew his children wouldn’t sleep well if Bray was present, so she offered to stand watch outside.
Ezter concerned that we would soon be approaching Medren, the high lord, and we we’re no longer a united front.
Holy Lake
In the morning we rode south to Holy Lake and found a great horn there, that the high lord used to summon a seer. Bray looks to Ezter to see if she’ll blow it and command a seer to arrive…. no, she won’t do that.
We hunted and make a bonfire and let the smells waft over the water. A boat came out of the mist on the lake and acolytes disembarked from it. The assembled as frame that was as large as a person with fasteners on the top. Using the utmost care they unraveled a tapestry to reveal the Tapestry Seer, to seemed to move in the image at indeterminate intervals. They told us that she sees the connections of all things and to stand very close because she was hard to hear, but not to touch the tapestry. Once the the frame was prepared they joined us in the meal, eating the same food we did, as is Ezter’s way.
We realized that we were before a living person who has become a tapestry. Bray and Ezter got as close as possible. Closer.
Bray inquired about the axe and heard, very quietly “Once you start doing the axe’s bidding, even if it is furthering your own safety and goals…will you be able to stop?”
Bray countered “this axe was dropped once because of violence, and once because of love. Sure there are those who have the power to master it. It cannot be left alone to be found. Is there any that are worth of carrying it?” Bray hoped that would be her.
“I will not answer that question, since you know the answer. Where will you put the chasm that will create a canyon that you create in a blood wake of murder?”
Bray had heard all she needed to. She would find the evil in the world for the axe to smite. She thoroughly and completely misunderstood the seers message.
Ezter remained and asked “do you know the history of the axe?”
“Once a woodsman’s axe. The woodsman was treated unjustly by a knight and so they killed that knight. The axe grew hungry and grew in power until it became what it is. Some say when the age of knights is done, having killed the last knight, it will find peace.”
“Is there any other way for it to find peace?”
“There is no other way.”
“Is there a place that it can be taken where it will be safe?”
“The Three Stone Hunters Glade. Travel Back to Blackmoat, north to the Spinlands, east in the the mountains to a hunter’s glade.”
“Will it be safe there?”
“Perhaps.”
Bray posited that we should consider the seers words and think on them. In the back of her mind she thought of the Moon Knight, the first Moon Knight, the moon herself. The moon travels closer to the earth during the Feast of the Moon. A solemn reflection of mortality and history.
Three Crones Keep
The next day we make it to the Three Crones keep. Named for the mountains behind it. and possibly three witches that once lived there.
It is widely known that Medren, the high lord, can talk to trees and unhewn stones. He sits atop many stairs on on a big unhewn rock vaguely in the shape of a throne. Behind him an ancient weeping willow. Around him his guards.
We were announced in his company.
The high lord greeted us with reserve. “In the last days of Sceptremass I welcome the lord of Blackmoat and my honored guest who took her leave.” Bray had been imprisoned here and escaped, but fought a bloody battle to do so and her horse Birch lost an eye in the fight. “Do you seek to swear oaths or do you wish to renew an old feud?”
Ezter said only “We have no feud.”
“I ask you to bend a knee, come when I call for your aid, accept that my understanding of the seers wisdom goes above all others.”
Ezter said she cannot accept the wisdom another but would aid when she could. Bray whispered to her to inquire if her defiance meant she sought war with Medren. Bray was ready for war.
“I do not seek war, and I do not oppose you, and I would not take from you. But I must interpret the seers wisdom for myself.”
Mederen rubs his head wearily. “My mother, the previous high lord, used to say of the Blackmoat people, they are difficult and refused to respect hierarchy, but you can trust them to not take what is not theirs. Let us eat together and we will find the oath that works for the lord of Blackmoat. And if we can’t we’ll find another way.”
We have a beautiful feast where all the knights and militia were served and we too as their guests. It was deeply uncomfortable to us all. Bray notices how uncomfortable are around her, despite setting down her axe (and leaving a child to yell out if any should come near it).
Still, the Knights of Three Crones were very uncomfortable with her. Some guarded her door at night, some shot arrows at her. Some she had done bloody violence against. Most avoided her gaze.
But after the mean she ran into Verner, the Tome Knight. He work brass studded brigandine, carried his book and a heavy iron capped staff. He had been in charge of keeping her captive.
Holding a dinner knife menacingly close, she told him “My horse lost her eye due to that man.”
He said that is “Tompot, the archer. A man-at-arms. Not a knight. You were here to make sure that your lord stayed loyal. There are problems all over this realm. And Medren needed to know that.”
She mirrors back to him the harm he did, and how it was unnecessary as they were now there, willing to swear oaths of their own accord. She was looking for justice but wouldn’t tell him how to offer it, and wouldn’t pick up the axe.
Verner asks Tompot how many arrows were short at Bray. “Five.” Verner stabbed five arrows, one at a time, in a table, and then stepped forty feet away and told he to take her shot.
Bray fired, her heart ready to put an arrow in his eye and kill. She fired just one arrow…that tore a page from Verner’s tome. “I only need one arrow. Let us drink.”
Verner cheered Bray and said “Well done.” The entire room exhaled and there was cheer in the hall. But the music and the lighting gets daker as we look to the axe, alone in an alcove. Guarded by a small child with his toys.
At the high table Medren told Ezter, “That axe is a problem.” The discussed it at length and he believes the Tapestry Seer sees the link between things, but not all possibilities. He continued “What can you tell me about this new knight of yours?” and Ezter told the the story of Spinjack.
Medren stands and offers a toast. “Many lords would have gone to the North to the Tower Majestic and sought to depose me. Many others in Ezter’s place would have turned her new knight on me. I don’t know if I would have survive if one of my new siblings hunted me. Many in Ezter’s place, with their knight who picked up a weapon of great power would have cleaved their way to see what happened. Some would have set Bray lose to duel my knights to cleave them down one by one. But that didn’t happen. With all these decisions in mind, I would be grateful to have the oath from Blackmoat, tepid as it is, knowing that on our east is a wise lord. Who doesn’t not turn their enemies against each but finds way to make peace. May we have a stronger oath next year!”
And so it was that Ezter and Bray completed Sceptremass without shedding blood. It was Ezter’s constant commitment to humanity that kept Bray questioning if knights should exist, instead of seeking to end them all. She hoped that Ezter would never fail to set such a high standard, and worried what would become of her if she faltered.
Thoughts on this game
We planned three sessions so we ended here, but I could have easily seen playing many more games, either with these characters or with others. Picking up right after these events or skipping to the end of the year for the Festival of the Moon.
I like that we left things unfinished. We had accomplished much, but there were still (and would always be) myths in the land.
