Sir Eric

I find myself facing a dozen men in armor of various types. At the low end they're wearing breastplates with caps, chain coifs, and gauntlets. At the high end, full plate. They are all wearing blue tabards with a fancy compass embroidered on the front in yellow thread, and all visibly carry a bow, sword, spear, and shield… although the styles vary: Swords can be shortswords, longswords, broadswords, greatswords, rapiers, etc; bows can be short, long, light or heavy crossbows, and so on; the spears can be pikes, shorts spears, longspears, and so on; the shields vary in size from a buckle to a tower shield… but all have all four.

The man in the shiniest armor, a big beefy guy who went whole hog on his weapons, approaches the altar, puzzled, “No sacrifice or hero? What was the madman doing?”

Considering, and feeling surprisingly good after that release, I answer him as I cast the Toolkit cantrip for some thieves' tools and start in on my chains, "Activities that earned him that arrow through his chest.” Ugh, am I high? My voice certainly is.

The man (knight?) jumps when he hears that, looking around warily.

I wave the chains as I work, “I'm right here. The dead guy was babbling something about sabotaging summoning a hero. Give me a minute, I can probably unlock these…”

The man nods, “The heroes are known to have strange powers… although an invisibility spell fresh out of a summoning is unheard of.”

If I am my character… “It's not a spell. I'm just invisible. I can suppress it, kind of, for a little while, but…” I finish one manacle and move on to the next, “...not easily or often.” Yet. Ugh, this voice.

“Strange powers indeed…” the man nods.

I continue working, getting the manacles first, fetters second, and watch as they fade into sight quickly after they're off. When I'm done, still feeling a little floaty, I get a little serious about things, “So… hi, I'm Dan, mind filling me in on what's going on?”

“It is my honor to meet you, Hero Dan,” my shining knight replies formally, bowing to what is certainly empty air for him, “I am Sir Eric, squad captain in the Knights of the Compass. More than that… the King should explain. This way, if you would, Hero Dan.” He actually bows, holding his arms to indicate a direction.

Well… he killed the guy who had me in chains, hard to get more ‘no harm intended’ than that. And for practical reasons… “Please lead the way, Sir Eric.”

We leave the slaughter behind, a few of Eric's men staying and wrapping them in sackcloth, treating the old woman with much more care and reverence than the black robed cultists(?) and their red-robed leader.

When we get outside the temple, I can see the structure properly: It has to be a good three or four stories tall, and is functionally a castle itself: Stone curtain wall, enclosed courtyard including a few buildings, a stairway to the main door for the keep that curls around the building, barbican with **** holes, towers with arrow slits, crenulations, the works. The squad captain keeps moving like it's nothing new to be in such a land.

Which I suppose makes sense: He fits right in.

We walk past a few wagons to several horses, tied lightly to a wooden rail. The knight unties and hops on one, points at another, and I follow suit. I have no ranks in ride, but I don't need them for basic riding: There’s no check for mounting normally or guiding a horse through regular streets... at least u til a foght breaks out. We leave the temple-castle and onto a cobblestone street... which is busy with farmers with their produce on horse-drawn carts, people walking to and fro, wooden farm stands up against the buildings, and humans as far as the eye can see.

Sadly, I don't see a single member of a fantasy race for the first half of the trip: No elves, dwarves, hobbits with the serial numbers filed off, orcs, catfolk, kitsune, or others. It makes me sad; I was looking forward to seeing such in a world that very obviously has magic. It's not until we get close to the actual palace that I see a few… all with some weird tattoos on their chests, each of which looks essentially the same. I don't exactly know what it is… (I hearsome dice, but don't get any messages like with the spells) but not seeing it on any humans, and seeing it on ALL the non humans, has me worried… especially because every nonhuman is taking orders.

And if I'm my character, I'm only half human.

I reach up to my ears, and feel the partial pointing… yep, I'm a half elf. So… first guess is that I'm going to be at the bottom of the social ladder if anyone can see me. Hmm. I can ask, though, “I'm not familiar with that tattoo I keep seeing. What is it?”

“**** brand,” my rescuer answers easily like it's the most obvious thing in the world.

Great… “What exactly is it for?”

“Enforcement,” he shrugs, “It flares up painfully when the **** lies to, fails to follow an order from, or harms the bonded master. The master can also just tell it to flare up if desired, and once started it keeps going until the bonded master tells it not to do so,” he looks at my seemingly empty saddle, raising an eyebrow, “What did you expect it to be?”

I hear dice in my head as I give a non-answer, “I just wondered what it was, is all.”

“I suppose other realms have different ways of dealing with the lesser races,” he seems to buy it, shrugging and continuing on. Yay for Bluff.

The Palace itself is visibly bigger than the temple. Walls twice as high, guards visibly armed with bows and pikes every fifteen feet, and the same defensive gates, currently standing open. We ride through without more than a nod from the gatekeepers to Sir Eric….