Shortly after Ezrin joins the group, Alexis finds himself alone with Gustav and Ethelred.
“Just so we’re clear, we’re not saying anything about Telosh and his penchant for magic meddling. If you have any questions, say nothing and send them to me.”
Alexis makes it clear with body language that he’s talking about not talking to any member of the Collegium about Telosh’s use of magic.
Alexis looks between the two of them and then settles his eyes on Ethelred. “Is that clear?”
Upon arriving at The Tree Fortress, Ezrin is rather wide-eyed, but takes it in stride and unrolls his bedroll in a spot on the second floor.
After things settle down and a bit and the Aegirian ranger and… apprentice are busy, Ezrin approaches Alexis.
“I have so many questions Colleague… perhaps though, I should start here… what is this place?”
The Sutheroni mage gestures expansively at the massive trees around them.
After asking Telosh about his theories on the forced bird connection, Gustav privately goes to Alexis for his opinion:
“What happened there. Why do you think Telosh forced a connection between me and the bird against my will? I didn’t want that troublemaking bird to follow me or rely on me for anything. Telosh already knew my feelings of the crow, Do you think he was possessed by a demon who cast spells against his will? Or did he let in the demon?”
Gustav seems to be seething thinking about it again.
“It seems like it might not have been his choice, but he wanted a connection between me and the bird before the possession. Maybe the demon stole his desires and spilled them all over the veiled world.”
Gustav looks at the crow which is cawing nearby and kicks a rock near it.
After Telosh’s Possession, Gustav furrows his brow and asks:
“What happened there. Why did you force a connection between me and the bird against my will? I didn’t want that troublemaking bird to follow me or rely on me for anything. You already knew my feelings of the crow, were you possessed by a demon who cast spells against your will?”
Gustav tries to calm down and his shoulders crumple a bit.
“It seems like it might not have been your choice, but you wanted a connection between me and the bird before the possession. Maybe the demon stole your desires and spilled them all over the veiled world.”
Gustav looks at the crow which is cawing nearby and hisses at it.
During one of the meals after the group has retreated from the “chaos river of rage and eternal hunger”. The group is discussing the significance of the white owl, while it is not around. This discussion is some time after Alexis has studied the owl with Avv’s sight.
“There is a strong possibility the owl is tied to Hood. And given the weird alliance between Hood and Ty-Lin, if your near-death dreams can be believed Telosh,” Alexis says with obvious good-natured humor in his voice “then perhaps this owl is also connected to Ty-Lin, although hard to imagine how.”
“The dreams I had seemed to have little to do with what scholars and priests call ‘Hood’ and ‘Ty-Lin’.”
In camp, well after leaving the area of the chaos magic storms, and after his conversations with Gus and Alexis, Telosh approaches Ethelred while the others are busy elsewhere.
“The ballista is coming along well eh, Red? Looks wicked!”
He looks truly excited about the project, his Westlander accent is showing..
“Do ya think it’ll take the giant out in one shot or should we prepper some follow up measures? More traps maybe?”
“I’ve been tryna figure out how to.. embiggen the deadfall traps that the Gus uses to catch small animals like squirrels, maybe have it set up for a tree or two to fall on the giant?”
“Digging a deep pit might be tough, but a shallow pit with spikes in it could trip the giant up pretty bad… Based on it’s behavior before, I bet it will want to charge at the ballista if it survives the hit…”
“Oh, I should let you talk… I’m getting excited about taking on the giant!”
In a moment with Gustav:
“If you had to take down a really big animal, like an elk or a bear, say to feed a big hungry group right as fast as possible, and your bow was broken, and you didn’t have any bow-making tools, how would you do it Gus? What kind of traps would you use?”
In a moment with Alexis, when Ethelred is busy elsewhere.
“Alexis, we need more than just the ballista. We were successful with both the dragon and The… Pit because we worked together and because we used more than one…tool.
“we need need to do more that just one thing. Immobilizing it, or at least slowing it down would be good. Spike traps, deadfall, and giant-sized snares too, I bet there are other things we could to do too that I’m not thinking of, but
I’m getting ahead of us though, what do we already know about the giant?
It ignores us if we play dead? At least as long as there are other things for it to worry about. It stinks. It has three arms. It has a lair. What else do we need to know? It’s movement pattern? Where along it’s path is best to set our ambush?
“Alexis, what do you know about sleeping gods? I overheard mention at the Five Winds that TyLin is sleeping? The Hungry Voice said She had abandoned me… She’s certainly more distant than… Others, but…”
In camp, some days after leaving the valley of chaos and cold.
“I’ve a thought… what if we don’t have to kill the giant to get the sword? Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for killing the giant, but it seems like there is a lot of other things going on, and the longer this takes, the more… strange things get. Maybe we should try to deal with the swords first.
“The giant is our goal because of the Twice Broken Sword, be believe it is in the fort, right?
He looks at all his companions.
“Raff is… concerned about the Twice Broken Sword, but the Chaos Blade is not, correct?
He looks at Alexis.
“We know Earycka has more access to the inner workings of the fort that we do…”
He looks around at every one and pauses to see see if at least Alexis and Red are following his line of thinking…
“We are deal-makers after all…”