Hello, Everyone!
How are you? Are you ready for Mary’s adventures?
Last time she gathered her courage and finally confessed to her friends that she was a ‘found child’ and that her adoptive parents were a couple of gnomes from Frinkeltong. To her surprise, the others didn’t mind the revelation and now the trio is going to her home town to meet her family.
But we have some time until we get there, so…
Before they started their new journey, Mary went through her belongings. She wanted everything to be in order but she also remembered something falling off when she hung upside down during the passing of the rope bridge.
Nothing was missing.
"Your bag smells of a human man again," said Paulina, who was just passing by.
"Aurum has probably…" Mary began.
"It's not him," the dwarf girl said. "I know his smell. This is a stranger’s scent."
That was bizarre. The smell was just a few days old, Paulina said, and it was from after they came out of the tunnels. Someone had rummaged through Mary's bags somewhere between their arrival and the ceremony for naming them 'The Heroes of Belfast'.
But how did that happen? Mary and Aurum were the only humans currently staying in Bruno's home and nobody had seen any others come in. Had that human man been invisible?
During the next few days Mary would summon her familiars at random times, just to be able to look through Aingels' eyes. The tressym was famous for being able to see invisible things but her senses didn’t register anyone.
There was one more thing Mary wanted to do before she left Belfast. On the last evening, when the four of them were once again gathered in Bruno's room, she went and asked Paulina for a makeover.
"I love your hair and I've been meaning to do something interesting with mine for a while," she said. “Ever since I made my pact with Gillean, it’s been growing like crazy.” She picked up a strand. It had gotten ridiculously long in the tunnels under Belfast. "And, well, you did say your friends from the druid circle helped with your hair, so…"
Paulina was down for that. She went out--her grounding had already ended a few days ago--and came back with a tall muscular woman named Asya. Asya didn't talk much but she spent the whole evening braiding Mary's hair with thin strings of blue yarn until every strand was wrapped up and capped with a small bead. Mary felt her head a lot heavier than usual but the braids were so pretty! And now they were a lot easier to tie up and out of her face.
Mary sent a letter to Frinkeltong telling her family to expect them in two weeks' time. They were going to make a few stops along the way.
Paulina wasn't joining them. After her grounding had ended, she wanted to dedicate herself to the druid circle.
"I'm a Birch tree now but I'm really close to becoming an Ash," she said eagerly. “So, that’s what I’m going to do.”
They said their 'goodbyes' and set off towards Frinkeltong.
On the first night on the road--it was so good to be in the open again!--Mary decided to try out her wand's special properties. She already knew that it made her magic more potent and that it didn’t listen to her when she used it to do just random tricks, but Bruno had Identified it and told her that something else would happen if she planted it in the ground.
So, she did. It immediately sprouted leaves and started to grow.
“Oh, no, no, no!” she cried out as it was forming into a tree. What if that was its last use and it would now stay a tree forever?
Fortunately, it turned out that the growth was temporary. It lasted up to about eight hours but it could also end whenever Mary wished it to.
The next days she made some experiments to find out the spell's parameters and reached the conclusion that this might have been the best of her Patron’s gifts so far.
Every night, when she planted the wand in the ground, it sprouted a tree with a crown spanning ten feet in every direction, and the branches touching the ground to form a dome. It produced oranges which were so tasty and filling that you could spend the whole day without needing to eat anything else. It was warm and cozy beneath the tree, and the earth there would mould under their bodies just like it did for Roko in the tunnels. Her friends could move in and out of the tree but if she did, the magic ended. But while it was active, they were safe inside. No spells or throwing weapons could pass through the dome and they were invisible from the outside, while at the same time they could see everything around.
In the tree’s crown there were dozens of small fireflies and pixies, zipping around and chatting excitedly.
“Oh! Look!” Mary pointed and pulled at Bruno’s cloak. “There’s the one we summoned to guard you when we went to Sylvanas’!”
The pixie with the pointy hair made a rude gesture at them and flew deeper in the crown.
“And this one was going to prevent an attack on me?” Bruno raised his eyebrows.
“Well… I mean, he could’ve at least woken you up…” Mary said.
The dwarf shook his head.
I adore Mary’s wand and its properties! ❤️ Mechanically, it gives her an additional spell slot once per long rest, which is super important for a warlock, plus did you see that tree?!? It’s awesome!
And the best thing is that, last Christmas our DM gave me an actual, real wand as a present and now I can use it in-game when I cast my magic! ❤️❤️❤️
I hope that you’ve had such a nice occurrence on your D&D table at least once! It’s really, really great!
See you next time!
Take care and be well!
(Also, here's a link to the Chapter Guide and the Glossary for the series. You're welcome!)