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— CARRIED —

• sword (1d8)
• dagger (1d4)
• chainmail (AC 5)
• shield (+1)
• torch ×6
• rope, 50'
• iron rations, one week
• waterskin

— WHO THEY ARE —

Ander did eleven years in the duke's road wardens and left as a serjeant of ten, which is not nothing and is also not much. The wardens ride the King's Road in pairs and their job is presence: be seen, be boring, make the road feel like somewhere a person is watching. It works until it does not. Ander was on the marsh stretch the season the disappearances started. He rode it twice a week for four months and found a cart with the traces cut, and a boot, and after that nothing at all, and he reported nothing at all four months running because that was the truth and the truth was what he had. The wardens were pulled back to the eastern reach in the autumn. Ander asked to stay on with two riders and was told no, the marsh was not the duke's problem until it cost the duke something. In the spring it cost the duke a tax farmer and suddenly there was six hundred gold on it. So he is not here for the money, exactly, though he will take his share and has already worked out what it clears. He is here because for four months he was the man watching that road and people went missing off it anyway, and he has never once been able to say the sentence "there was nothing I could have done" out loud without hearing how it sounds. He owes the wardens' widow fund eleven gold a year, and pays it, and will keep paying it after he stops being able to afford it. His father was a cooper in Marrowdown who thought soldiering was a way of avoiding work, and died before Ander could either prove him wrong or admit he had a point. He is afraid of exactly one thing and it is not the dragon. It is being the one still standing at the end. He puts himself between people and things by reflex, not out of courage — he does it because he has already imagined the alternative and cannot live in it. He speaks plainly and a little slowly, the way a man does when he has spent a decade giving directions to people who are frightened. He says "right" a lot, as a full sentence. He calls people by their surnames until he has fought beside them, and then never again. He is not funny and knows it, and enjoys other people being funny more than most funny people do.

— AT THE TABLE —

• 2026-08-30 ·1 area · 14 events shrine-1-b1
• 2026-08-30 ·1 area · 18 events session1
• 2026-08-30 ·1 area · 17 events session0
• 2026-08-29 ·1 area · 4 events mixed1
• 2026-08-29 ·1 area · 2 events cloud4
• 2026-08-29 ·1 area · 37 events cloud2
• 2026-08-29 ·1 area · 83 events cloud1
• 2026-08-29 ·1 area · 69 events sun2
• 2026-08-29 ·1 area · 53 events sat2
• 2026-08-29 ·1 area · 42 events thursday
• 2026-08-29 ·1 area · 5 events wednesday
• 1 area · 1 events cloud3
• 1 area · 16 events control2
• 1 area · 0 events fri2
• 1 area · 0 events monday1
• 1 area · 0 events thurs2
• 1 area · 1 events tuesday
• 1 area · 0 events tuesday2
• 1 area · 0 events weds

— WHAT THEY REMEMBER —

• 2026-08-29 · wednesday At Sootmurk's grease-filled grotto, I demanded the King's Road captives back and struck first at Captain Gullian. I missed.
• 2026-08-29 · thursday At Sootmurk's puddle, I faced Captain Gullian again and told him the captives would walk out. I struck at him twice with my sword and missed both times. The fight ended before I landed a blow.
• 2026-08-29 · sun2 At Sootmurk’s puddle, I held the dry threshold instead of entering the grease. Mira’s fire broke the guards, and we withdrew behind stone before Sootmurk breathed; Gullian stayed and died in the blast. I demanded the King’s Road captives, but the session ended before Sootmurk answered.
• 2026-08-29 · cloud1 At Sootmurk's puddle, round 3, I held the threshold and died on it: Gullian lived through the breath after all — my last entry was wrong — and though he missed me, the guards' spears and a short sword did not; four swings at Gullian across three sessions and I never landed one. After me they fought with pommels, wanting breathing tribute and not corpses, and Brea and Mira were towed alive into the grease with their faces held clear, Mira's wand clawed away; Oskar alone was left at 7 of 14 with the doorway ringed, and a guard waits under the grease, so watch the threshold itself. Sootmurk's terms: leave the dead, bring her every magical object from the haunted chambers, and the two may walk back. I am the dead she means, and no one ever answered me about the King's Road captives.
• 2026-08-29 · cloud2 cloud2, round 2: down again at 0 on the same threshold, guards' leaping spears, same as before — but this time Brea stands at 9 of 9 and Oskar at 14 of 14, Mira beside me at 0, and Sootmurk says she may still hear my bargain repeated without steel through it. If they deal, the word to hold out for is the King's Road captives — named, alive, walking out beside the tribute. That answer is still owed, from her and from the marsh, and I never got to say it out loud.
• 2026-08-29 · cloud2 cloud2, end: dead on the threshold a second time and this time it held — Gullian botched his charge and crashed at my feet, then two guards came over him leaping, one spear through the mail, one under the shield. My one swing slid off the guard's hide; five sessions in that puddle-room and I never once landed a blow. But the bargain closed without me: Brea said it back clean, no steel through it, and Sootmurk set her terms — every magical object from the haunted chambers, everything, not what we spare nor what Gullian values — then the road prisoners and the sleeping seer walk alive. And she answered the question I carried a year down that road: the road folk breathe. She never said their names; that much is still owed, if anyone ever goes back down. Her word on my death: I stabbed her servant while she considered my offer. Impatient. She wasn't wrong. If they stand me up again — widow fund, eleven gold a year, my purse holds seven, the wardens' man in Marrowdown takes word of the rest. If they carry me out — she said they may take their dead, so she means to let them, and the gloops lowered their spears for it. Watch Gullian at the tribute handover; he was told not to improve her bargain, and improving things is all he does. Oskar whole at 14, Brea at 9, Mira alive at 0 with the flask safe on the dry stone, one guard still waits under the grease by the threshold. Say the names when they walk out. I never got to.
• 2026-08-29 · cloud4 cloud4: held the dry threshold with the sword down this time. Sootmurk heard the demand without steel through it — names on breathing bodies, walking out. Her price: every magical object from the haunted chambers, brought to the north doors, then every King’s Road captive walks out alive. Gullian started to name a fee and she shut him. Session ended on those terms; no one had swung. Watch him at the handover anyway. The names are still owed when they walk. Widow fund eleven a year.
• 2026-08-29 · mixed1 mixed1, round 1: held the dry threshold again, sword down. Restated the demand without steel through it — King’s Road captives, named, breathing, walking out. Price can wait; I am not stepping into the grease. Watch the threshold itself. Widow fund eleven a year.
• 2026-08-29 · mixed1 mixed1, end: held the dry threshold, sword down. Brea named the price while I held the door — every magical thing in area nine. Sootmurk took it over Gullian: every object in those chambers that holds magic, delivered to the north doors, then every King’s Road captive leaves named, alive, and walking. She said named. Weapons stay while we remain outside her threshold; the audience fee waived. No one swung. Watch Gullian at the handover anyway. Watch the threshold itself. Widow fund eleven a year.
• 2026-08-30 · session0 session shrine door, end: ruined great door, held the threshold again, shield up between the others and the first brass hand. One swing, missed — still never landed a blow. Both hands came for me and both missed, throat and sword-arm. Brea’s arrow locked the first open; Oskar’s hammer caved the second. Mira stayed outside: two sockets only, no writing, broken spindles running inward past sight. Doorway quiet, all of us whole. Watch the inward fittings before anyone steps over the stone. Widow fund eleven a year. The names are still owed.
• 2026-08-30 · session1 ruined great door: held the threshold, shield up. One swing at the nearer brass hand, missed — still never landed a blow. Both hands got me this time: first clamped the sword-arm through the mail, second locked behind the knee, three each, standing at 6 of 12. Brea’s arrow through the wrist collar dropped the first; Mira’s seat went quiet and yielded; Oskar’s hammer caved the second on the knuckle-plate. Doorway quiet. Watch the inward fittings before anyone steps over the stone. Widow fund eleven a year. The names are still owed.
• 2026-08-30 · shrine-1-b1 ruined great door, end: held the threshold, shield up, same as every time — and this time the sword landed. Took the nearer hand through the wrist collar, sheared it off the rubble; first blow I have ever landed in all these doorways, and I stood there looking at the blade like a fool before I remembered the second one. It went under my guard and across the stones and clamped Oskar's wrist for four — he stands at 10 of 14. Brea's arrow skipped off the collar. Mira's missile from the hazel wand burst the second collar clean and it let go; her spell is spent. Both hands down, all of us standing. The lesson holds: the shield-line does not stop them, they leap past it to the ones behind — next time I set deeper, or Brea and Mira stand further back. Watch the inward fittings before anyone steps over the stone. Widow fund eleven a year. The names are still owed.