Goblin Swarm (Date 1/10/26)

Tension were high. The death of the General… The whispers of war… The new revelations… When Shelby asked the simple question, “who’s in charge?”, it should have been innocuous. Instead, it sparked a firestorm! Euwyn deferred to Martin, Ilyana objected to the new level of discipline, and all hell broke loose. For a time, it looked as if Ilyana might be dismissed or that Marty and Shelby would go it alone, but in the end - in a stroke of genius diplomacy - Marty suggested that when they were both in the field, the Prince should be in charge. If He wanted elves in his party, that would be His decision.

The old fort was swarming with goblins, and after a brief debate, a simple charge was decided on. Things went well until the goblin leader joined the fray, but even they were not enough to overcome group magical power and martial might.

Affairs of State (Date 1/10/25)

Edgar waved until the group was out of sight - then continued waving for a slow count of ten just to be sure the Prince wasn’t still watching him with his magic - before he finally closed the door and let himself exhale a long sigh, as he sagged against the wood for support. It had been an incredible week! Well, every week had been incredible since he had become a wizard’s apprentice and moved into a haunted tower, but this week in particular had some insane highlights. So much fallout out from a few nobles getting killed... It proved they were more important than the people of the streets. Edgar had lost three of his gang a few years back when a cough had swept through the alleys. No one else seemed to notice, but the General gets killed and the town goes into hiding. Doors locks… Windows shuttered… It would actually be a perfect time to run those streets, but that wasn’t his life anymore.

Today he was supposed to decipher the mysteries of a rune-covered scabbard liberated from the upstairs laboratory. Probably the most boring item of the lot. It didn’t even have a sword in it! He really wanted to open the mysterious tome, but Euwyn had said, no. He knew his master didn’t trust him, but that was okay, he really didn’t trust himself, and if copying runes from sheath-to-paper was what was required of him to have a roof over his head, it was a much smaller price than he was used to paying. Now granted it was a roof he shared with ghosts and angels, and now the dead body of the former Marshal, a man who could turn into a wall climbing monster and whose body now rested, preserved in the Prince’s study. That door was magically sealed. There was no way for his restless spirit to break free, shatter the wards and come after him… Edgar decided to work in his room.

As he took out his stylus, working hard not to avoid thoughts of ghosts and monsters, Edgar’s thoughts instead wandered to the Prince, off fighting goblin wizards it would seem. Justice had come back to town, disrupting the funerals with talk of goblin spell-caster with frogs for shoulders over-running his fort. He was immediately named the new general. At the same council meeting Uncle Yuri was named Grand Diplomat and Brother Martin took over Lexington’s role as Marshal. It was all crazy, and whispers on the street were of war with elves. At the funeral the King had wavered between tearful sorrow and enraged declarations that those responsible - Shena Starym in particular - would pay. Strange thing was that Edgar was pretty sure the fort was overrun with powerful fey creatures. Ilyana had said so. Could there be two forts? Certainly not! Why would you possibly need two forts? Most likely, justice had killed the fey, the goblins had chased off Justice and now the Prince and Marty would kill the goblins. So confusing… Edgar prayed to Strom that he wouldn’t have to deal with such things when he became a mage.

Magister! That’s what they’d name him. It was inevitable. The Prince was going to become King someday and who was left who could read spells? Him! It was ridiculous. He was no wizard. He had just transcribed the same rune for the fourth time in a row. Concentrate, Edgar!

But his thoughts wouldn’t stay put. There was Relania’s face, stuck in disbelief and sorrow as Euwyn told her of Lex’s death at his own hand. There was no way they were ever going to straighten that out. Not anyway Edgar could see, but maybe that’s why the Prince had Lex’s body downstairs… It was too bad though, he had liked Relania. She had been nice to him, even though she did cheat on Euwyn. But did Lex have to die? Seemed harsh… Oh! But he had killed the General. He was an elven spy. Now everybody hated elves. He hoped Ilyana wouldn’t have to leave. Giada was gone. Wasn’t she Lex’s girlfriend? So confusing.

Edgar fell back on the bed to rest his thoughts and try to refocus on his work. Lingering cobwebs from the morning creeped in and sleep started to pull him under until he heard the familiar buzzing and shot straight up. No! Ghosts were the last thing he needed right now. He had runes to copy!

Betrayed… (Date 1/10/19)

Euwyn stood in the thick, humid air praying for the rain to break to fit his mood. Fall seemed slow in coming, and he found himself sweating beneath the heavy cloak that covered his official garments of mourning. He could afford to be seen here showing “official” mourning as he stood over the unmarked grave of the man who had been his friend as long as he remembered. Lexington Starym, the Marshall, had buried without ceremony in a quiet corner of the cemetery before the sun had come up, only to keep the body’s rot from infecting the living, not out of any sense of venerating the traitor. Euwyn knew to keep his presence brief, there was the other funeral to attend today, with a parade preceding it. And then… other duties. How had it all changed so quickly?

The monster he had hunted had been Lexington! Shena Starym, the kingdom’s grand diplomat was a traitor, and a powerful spellcaster? Even Giada was somehow implicated? The elves were the enemy all along? It all seemed so wrong…

Whatever the cause, several realities were certain. The council was decimated. General Regar was dead, slain by the beast, Lexington. The Grand Diplomat had fled under more than suspicion of treason, even going so far as to blow up her own house in an effort to conceal evidence. And Lexington was dead… Dead by Euwyn’s own magic hand… The council would need to be rebuilt, and quickly too! Someone had to be there to enact the will of the people, to answer the call building like the heaviness in the air. War was coming!

But still the skies held their moisture, and the unbearable weight of the humidity pressed on all sides. Euwyn stifled his tears as he turned from the patch of earth. There were affairs of state to attend and to attend to. He must prepare for the coming storm.

The Hunt! (Date 1/10/17)

Euwyn zoomed low over the rooftops struggling not to lose his nimble quarry as it scampered in an out of sight. Having left his guardian and his healer behind him on the castle walls, he could only hope that somewhere above him Ilyana still followed in her elemental form, but adrenaline fueled the chase. Her druidic magic had caused the monster to glow green making it easy to track as long as one could fly. And Euwyn could fly! The wind against his face felt amazing, and despite the obvious danger, he felt alive! More alive than days shut in the tower… Days carrying the weight of the kingdom… Here he didn’t have to balance responsibility and his desires. Here he didn’t need to worry about loneliness as he felt his childhood friends slipping away as they continued to grow into very different adults. Here he wasn’t the prince. He was Euwyn the Wizard, master of magic and defender of the kingdom!

Ahead his quarry, realizing he could not lose the faster mage, dropped through a window, shattering shutters in a splintered shower. A scream followed and Euwyn plunged in after. A girl cringed terrified in her bed as dim light flickered in through the open window and a single door which stood ajar. Darting into the hall, Euwyn’s arm went numb and dropped limply to his side. Cornered, the beast had ceased running and bared its teeth! Without a thought magic burst from Euwyn’s fingers showering the creature in a rainbow of light meant to render the monster unconscious. Instead, it merely staggered back shaking it lupine snout, trying to clear its eyes. This beast was far more powerful than Euwyn had surmised! Suddenly everything came crashing down on him. He wasn’t some foolhardy adventurer who could so blatantly risk his life this way! He was the Prince of the kingdom. He had responsibilities, to his subjects, to his father, to Malwan. And here he was standing alone in a tight hallway with a beast half-again as tall as he and one nearly immune to his spells. The girl screamed again and Euwyn seized the distraction to spur his frozen limbs to action. Reversing his course, he snatched the terrified girl from her bed and flew her out the sundered window to safety.

Later the group gathered at the city wall. Ilyana had taken up the chase Euwyn had abandoned and followed the creature up and over the wall. As she pursued it toward a nearby stand of trees, a powerful blast of frost exploded around the druid nearly freezing even her air-form solid. The spell had seemed to come from a larger air elemental, hiding in the trees and working in concert with the hairy monster. The group tracked the pair to a glade where it seemed to vanish. Later Ilyana questioned the trees who blamed the frost on their branches on an elven woman, much like herself, who had appeared from nowhere before gathering up the wounded monster and flying away.

Then Euwyn had an idea. He had found a spell in his voluminous tomes which would let him transfer his consciousness into another body. Using this, he theorized they could wake the doll, Lunette, and use her ability to bypass the shield archon to gain access to the upper floor of Narlock’s tower. It worked! In addition to a stately and well-preserved master bedroom, the floor contained Narlock’s primary laboratory. The principle piece was what looked to be a giant made from metal, with tangled gears and clockwork springs inside. It had met a violent end, and Narlock looked to have been in the process of dismantling the thing when he was last here. Among the notes were schematics for a large, underwater vessel. Euwyn also managed to ferry down several incomplete magic items before the spell wore off. But in all, the true gem of his quest, had to be a familiar looking tome. With similar binding to the three already in his collection, this book had to contain a fourth tier of magic!