26 Kythorn 1491

Session 19, 4/02/2021

When we met in the common room of the Roc’s nest the next morning we were overjoyed to see The Professor had made it. As we thought, he had been swept out of the underground cavern by a strong current, but once he surfaced he was able to swim to shore.

We introduced The Professor to our new companion Ankeli and told him how she had helped us in the cavern and the agreement we had come to. I made sure to stress the difference of opinion on saving Ravenna versus just destroying her, but that she had agreed to give it an attempt if a cure could be found.

After a long discussion it was decided we would head out to Windmeer keep to meet Jensen Windmeer for dinner and hear what he had to say. We would travel using the Wind Walk spell cast from the Necklace of Prayer Beads we received from Lorian Yost. That would let use travel to and back from the keep in 1 evening. And if things went bad, the ability to transform would be a decided advantage.

When we arrived at the keep we did a fly by of the area in cloud form. From the air we could see that the wall were manned by what appeared to be cultists and the inner yard of the keep had a number of wights and willow wisps inside it. We landed some way back up the rode where we could not be seen and took corporeal form so we could talk through our options.

We did not like what we had seen, but we were unsure if Jensen was a prisoner or if this might be a trap, so we decided to proceed with caution. Ankeli brought up the point that she had not been part of the group invited, so she was an unexpected factor and perhaps we could use that too our benefit. It was decided that she would enter the keep in cloud form and find a place in the keep yard where she could materialize and stay hidden. We would give her 20 minutes to do so and then approach the keep and ask to speak with Jensen. If it was a trap, or anything went wrong, she would be able to use surprise to her advantage to aid us.

As agreed, Ankeli flew off and we waited our 20 minutes. While we could not observe it, she did a quick fly though to get her bearings and then materialized as agreed. She cast a minor illusion to help keep herself hidden while she waited.

After our wait, we then approached the keep and called out that we were there by invitation to attend dinner with Jensen. The gates opened and we entered, pretending to be surprised by all of the undead creatures. Jensen introduced himself and assured us the creatures were under his control and would not attack us. None of them had made a hostile move, so we assumed it must be a similar arrangement as Ravenna had in the vampire keep.

Jensen invited us to the top floor of the keep to have dinner and hold our discussion. He said it would take some time, but his servant Jurisa would prepare something and then his wife Kira would join us. On the way up, we passed a quite notable painting. It appeared to show Jensen and his companions in all of their glory before they destroyed the vampire. It was quite prominently displayed and, as we learned later, hid a secret.

In the dinning hall the group members all took seats at a table, while Jensen sat at a separate table on a raised dais. This almost gave the impression that we were attending an audience of some sort and kicked off the dinner on the wrong foot indeed. But the atmosphere only got worse when Jensen’s wife appeared and it turned out she was actually a wight!

Needless to say, our conversation had quite the acidic tone. I, and the others, held our tongues while The Professor did his best to diplomatically converse with Jensen and find out why he invited us. Their conversation went back and forth a bit and it was obvious that Jensen did not actually want to tell us anything that we might not already know. Eventually, The Professor was able to get him to corroborate the story that Lorien Yost had told us.

The difference was that Lorien Yost came off as someone you could almost pity, He seemed to truly regret what was done but was felt powerless to correct it.

Jensen, on the other hand, appeared to have taken the change to heart. He appeared to see what was done to Ravenna as a fair trade. He had gone so far as to take an undead wife and gave the impression that he may have even joined the Cult of the Grey Master in some fashion.

The Professor did wean a few bits of new information out of Jensen. He said the Marrik Fordham had discovered a listing of the members of the Council of Bones inside the library of the vampire castle. Also Marrik had tracked the cultist that cursed Ravenna and so he knew the location of their secret temple as well as the keys to undoing what had been done to Ravenna.

At this point The Professor, who could sense my increasing discomfort with the situation, made a point of declaring that his questions had all been answered and asking if anyone else had anything to add. At this point, I will admit that I let loose my temper a bit, but purposely.

At no point had Jensen openly declared his allegiance to the cult and we could not get a solid read on whether he had joined the cult or if maybe he was a prisoner here and the undead had been set to watch over him. So I let loose on him with some of my anger on what they had done to Ravenna as a group and showed him my true disgust as the undead abomination he called his wife.

It got pretty loud and Evelios joined in as well. Jensen got angry but never completely lost his cool and in the end I was still not certain. Was he a member of the cult trying to dissuade us from our path? Or just a glorified prisoner who was too prideful to admit it or ask for help?

I gave serious thought to starting a physical confrontation, but since we had been invited under the guise of friendship, it seemed inappropriate to attack the man. That, combined with a fear for the safety of his human servants and a lingering uncertainty about the situation led me to decide that it would be better to leave for now. We could always return in the future if we wanted.

On the way out, we passed Jurissa in the kitchen. The Professor warned her that we thought she would be in mortal danger if she continued to stay on at the castle. She protested and said the Jensen was a hero and she had served him since he had helped to defeat the vampire and she felt safe. The Professor then used a spell to magically implant the suggestion that she would pack a bag and leave at first light to return to town. This idea apparently took hold, but caused her great distress and she clearly did not want to leave.

This really upset myself and we had a quick whispered conversation with The Professor on the morality of using mind control magic on people. Not only does it violate the person by causing an undesired outcome (for the person), but it robs them of their agency and ability to make their own decisions. I believe his heart was in the right place, he was truly concerned with her welfare, but to remove her free will was not a good thing.

In the end, he remove the enchantment from the cook. We urged her to leave, but she was adamant about staying. She did let slip that she had spoken to Professor Mirakle and he had told her the seeds had been planted to return him to his old ways.

We finally exited the keep at this point. Making sure to exclaim loudly on our way out that we were leaving without a fight so that Ankeli would hopefully hear us and head out as well. Apparently it worked because she met us outside at the prearranged spot. We then all transformed to mist and flew back to town. Once there The Professor headed up stairs and Ankeli decided she would roam the town a bit.

Sylrel, Evelios and myself sat in the common room a bit until we noticed Professor Mirakle coming in for the day to head up to his room. We pulled him aside to have a quick conversation about what the cook had said, It turns out the cook had spoken to him in confidence and he had done his best to help.

In his travels he had a come across a ring that would change the wearers behavior to the opposite of what he normally displayed. He had the stunning painting we had previously seen commissioned and hidden the ring in a secret compartment hidden in the picture.

After the day we had, I was most unimpressed. His “help” had been to take an obviously cursed ring, hide it in a painting, tell no one about it and then give the painting to Jensen. So many things wrong with this. Giving out cursed items … wrong! Hiding the item meant to help someone in a place no one could find it … wrong! Hiding a cursed item somewhere any one could find it and put in on … just plain dumbassery.
Hopefully tomorrow will be a more productive, and calming, day.