Journal Twenty-one
The Vodacce swamp.
I had thought that Frieburg had the worst kind of weather. Where it was wet nearly all year long and the sun was slow to come out. Well, it was wet AND the sun was out. And all other sorts of things. Bugs and snakes. And things that were a cross between both. Leeches. Bugs didn't get though my coat often, but I had to wear it to keep them that way. I sweated a lot, and the air practically dripped in and of itself. But we had tracked the Explorer's last reported location there, and we asked the locals if they had seen anyone about. Turns out they had, but it wasn't the Explorers, unfortunately for us. It could have only been Calagari's men. The trail was hard to find but my sharp eyes and Volker's woodland sense put us on it almost immediately. Cutting through the brush was easy enough for Volker and William, but Enrique, Sabine, and Reynaldo were having no such luck with their foils. Trying to make any speed in the swamp was nearly impossible, not only did the very swamp dog our footsteps, but when were able to put some speed on we nearly lost the trail. And because of the leeches we stopped often. While the others pulled them off, I found that they didn't like the intoxicating liquor too much. While the leeches were a pain to everyone else, William had an encounter with something much more deadly. Some of the snakes that we were trying avoid dropped into his lap during his night watch. He wasn't able to escape without a bite. Thanks to some quick thinking on my part, he wasn't killed. It occurred to me that the leeches could be used to suck out the poisoned blood, luckily for William, I was right. It killed several of the leeches that we used. But he was weakened. It took a few days, but eventually we did find the Explorer's camp. And we had made it there first. Not a sign of Calagaris or anyone else. But for that matter, there wasn't any sign of Colesun either. But his aide was there, and she was taking notes on some artifacts that were there. Actually the entirety of the Explorer's camp was sitting on a ruin that was springing from the swamp. A few Explorers were hacking away at its edges, trying to reveal more of the ruins. The aide was very helpful, when she wasn't pointing a gun at you. Yes, the simple hello seems to have gone out of style, replaced by something a little more brusque. But after a little diplomacy, the Explorers were fair deal more cordial. The knowledge that the group had of the artifacts, the compasses, was probably what won them over. Colesun was down one of the ruins passageways, underground, Enrique and Reynaldo took a torch and proceeded to try to warn him as we had warned the others. The aide was concerned about the news, and began to have the others try to pack up what they could. As they did I had a look at some of her notes. Unfortunately, I didn't know Thean, so I didn't get the best idea of what they were discovering, but she explained a bit of it. And then the Calagaris arrived.Return to Uncommon Valor