Hello, Everyone!
Last time, Mary went snooping in Reina's room and managed to escape without being caught. Reina technically didn’t see her, but she followed and confronted her nonetheless. It wasn’t pretty.
Afterwards, Mary had a little chat with Gillean. He’d been missing for the majority of Arc 5 and had to be caught up. Also, it turned out that the reason he hadn’t been available was because he’d been running from being forced to fight in Oberon’s war.
Also, Mary asked Bruno to prepare the Zone of Truth spell for the next day. I wonder why :)
It was at breakfast, when Mary was thrown out of her bad mood by the most pleasant surprise. A Bearer came to the house, asking for her. He was carrying a large parcel and delivered it, nodding politely. Mary’s heart fluttered when she saw the sender: ‘Miirym’s Library’.
Someone was sending her books!
Barely having touched her boiled eggs, she excused herself and almost ran to their room to check out the package. There were four books wrapped neatly with brown paper: "Draconomicon", "Dark Artefacts", "Netheril, Karsus' Folly" and "Powerful Necromancers Through the Ages". Along with the books, there was a note from Francesca Findabair.
“Sorry to interrupt your breakfast, Mary,” it said. “These should help understand the challenges you’re facing. I'm glad your group has an erudite."
‘An erudite’, Mary read again and her chest puffed like a pigeon’s. The Francesca Findabair thought of her as an ‘erudite’!
The others found her on her bed, deep into ‘Powerful Necromancers Through the Ages’. As she’d expected, Francesca Findebair was, indeed, there, along with a few guesses of how the Devoted were created. Nobody knew for sure – the Mage hadn’t revealed her secrets.
“Hey,” Aurum said. “We were never able to get together after the Swamp and figure out what we're going to do next.”
“Well, some people were busy,” Mary spat out, barely looking up from her book. “I'm honestly surprised that Reina let you see us at all.”
"What? Why?"
"She's been holding on to you like а baby blanket."
There was a moment of silence. Mary glanced at Aurum gingerly. Had she come on too strong? He seemed… uncomfortable.
"Well, I'm here now," the bard said eventually.
"Did you find out anything about Reina’s secrets?"
"She said there were no secrets."
“Of course she did.”
“She was under the impression that you've been snooping around into her room.”
“That's ‘cause I was,” Mary said. “How do you think I knew about the illusion and the empty diary?"
She looked up from her book for longer this time, and glared at Aurum defiantly. If he thought that she was going to apologise for sneaking into Reina's room, he was sadly mistaken. After Tesaya, she was not going to trust someone just like that.
“Reina just seems too suspicious,” she said, finally.
"Yeah," Agatha said. "She looks like she's hiding something. Could she have a Patron like Mary? That would be a good reason to be so suspicious."
Aurum turned to her.
"Speaking of suspicious," he said. "Why were you in such a hurry to unlock the dragon's prison back then?"
Agatha raised her brows.
"Because we were all in a hurry," she said. "I thought that was the point. You seemed…"
"Wait!" Mary stood between them. “We must have some assurance that nobody is lying. Bruno, did you get that spell?”
“The one you woke me up for?” the cleric grumbled. “Yeah.”
“Then let's use it. That way we are all going to know that we're being honest with each other.”
She explained the spell to Agatha and she agreed to take part in it. When Bruno was ready, they all stood up in a circle and watched as his holy symbol flashed and surrounded them with a faint grey aura.
"So, Agatha, why rush ahead to unlock that final door?” Aurum repeated. “Were you in cahoots with Tesaya and her dragon friend?"
Mary held her breath, waiting for the answer. She’d felt Bruno’s spell take effect, like a wave washing over her, filling her with desire to tell the truth.
“No, I wasn’t. And I’m not,” Agatha answered simply.
“Then why?”
"Because that's what I was supposed to do. I am the rogue. I was doing my part.”
“But why?” Mary said. “Why help us?”
“Because the world is burning?” Agatha said, making a wide gesture with both her hands, “And you lot, despite all your bickering and interpersonal problems, seem like you can do something about it.”
“You can't be in it 'for the world'," Mary insisted. "There must be something more personal!"
She felt a guilty prick at her heart. Up until recently, she'd believed she was ‘in it for the world’. But when it had come down to it, she'd preferred saving the few people she knew--the Dwendel family, her parents, Aurum and Bruno--instead of ‘the world’.
“I don’t have a personal beef with any dragon,” Agatha said. “It’s true that I’d love to help my siblings get away from Mustro but it’s not why I do what I do.”
A short silence followed. Then Bruno coughed, as if he'd thought of something.
“We’ve had dealings with people who believed things that weren’t real,” he said, “because they were controlled by someone. All of them had strange scars on their bodies. Can we see the back of your neck? Or your chest?”
Agatha rolled her eyes and, to Mary’s bewilderment, straight-up disrobed herself. She slowly turned around, showing them her thin agile figure. There were several small scars on her body, but none of them looked like what they’d seen in Maquiel or Dorina.
So, she was telling the truth. Mary felt like she could finally breathe again. She looked at her friends while Agatha was putting her clothes back on. Bruno seemed calm and reassured, as if he’d never doubted Agatha. Aurum looked… pensive. He was absendmindedly playing with Granny Grettel’s amulet and that made Mary think of something she’d heard from Lady Findabair.
“Aurum?” she said. “While we are in the truth zone, where is your amulet? The purple one,” she clarified quickly. “From the fairies?”
She’d caught him off guard. For a second, his usual confidence gave way to something else--confusion, guilt?--and his eyes darted to the ground between his feet and Mary’s. However, a moment later, he was shrugging with the most happy-go-lucky of smiles.
“I don’t have it,” he said. “It’s with someone else.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know. I... have no idea where the person who has it might be.”
He was dodging the question! Mary frowned. Why didn't he want to tell the truth?
“Who has it?” she insisted.
Aurum looked her in the eyes but remained silent. Then, after an intense pause where Mary was trying to decipher what he was thinking, he cocked his head and narrowed his eyes.
“Why don’t you like Reina?”
Oh, crap!
Zone of Truth is so much fun :) So many things can be revealed with it! Well, this time it wasn’t Reina’s Deep Dark Secret, but I think we’ll get our money’s worth anyway.
See you next time when Mary will have to tell the truth. She isn't as experienced as Aurum about technically not lying, so it'll be fun.
Take care and be well!
(Also, here's a link to the Chapter Guide, the Glossaries (Part 1 and Part 2)
and the Map for the series. You're welcome!)
An important disclaimer: Mary Windfiddle's story is my notes from a D&D game turned into a narrative. All the worldbuilding and NPC encounters belong to our DM, and all the actions of the other main characters (Aurum, Bruno and Agatha) belong to my co-players. My contribution to the story is only everything Mary-related (actions, reactions, inner thoughts), as well as the writing itself.