The Flowery War [Invite Only]

[MoxexPenNama]

[I would actually agree with this. There are probably enough shady people here that somebody would be able to provide you with the raw ingredients you need for your venom point.]

[souldoubt]

After he's finished eating the food provided, Itzcuintli sets about cleaning his weapons and getting his equipment in order, keeping a wary eye out as he does.

[BDEYE]

After eating, Mizton wanders around the camp and does what he can to find alternate sources of ingredients.

[MoxexPenNama]

Mizton returns with a sachel of dried odds and ends, and you all pass the night rather uneasily among the shouts and strange languages of the camp. In the morning several guards approach the hut and call out to you.
"Revered sirs, Tecuanitzin would like to speak to you."
The light of sunrise is just barely visible, and the morning is cold. What do you do?

[BDEYE]

Mizton approaches Tecuani's tent.

[MoxexPenNama]

You walk towards Tecuani's throne, past the skullracks, the huts and the crumbling, stepped temple whose steps are now stained with new blood. Approaching under the palm-leaf eves of his throne room, you see Tecuani sitting on his dais with a low table in front of him. Three bowls of chocolatl sit on the polished wood, along with warm tortillas and freshly-cooked meat.
"Good morning," he says. "I trust you slept well. Please, take your repast as you listen. I have need of your skills."
He beckons you to sit down on the cushions positioned around the table.

[BDEYE]

Mizton sits but waits before he eats.

[souldoubt]

Itzcuintli seats himself, but doesn't let his guard down.

[MoxexPenNama]

Tecuani notes your guardedness and laughs.
"Eat and drink," he says. "If I'd wanted to kill you, don't you think I would have done it last night while you slept? Or the moment you stepped into my encampment?"
His face suddenly becomes serious.
"I understand your doubts, your distrust," Tecuani says. "One isn't normally welcomed into the camp of one's enemy. Most of the bumblers Three Vulture has sent this way I have killed--those that got beyond the ruins, at least, of which there were very few. The ones who did reach me usually did so as cowards: betraying companions, fleeing from battles, ignoring the mysteries of the place. But you three embraced those mysteries, investigated deeper than almost any other man in the thousand years since the Ancestors fell. Almost any other man. . ."
He becomes reflective for a moment, but continues.
"I have need of your skills," he says. "I have soldiers and strategists, but no generals. I put the point before you as baldly as I can. If I am to become Speaker, to remake the Land Between the Waters as an Empire, I need men of your talents not as soldiers, but as advisors. So there is something I need you to do.
"South of this camp by five days' travel, I have deployed a captain of mine, Angry Turkey, awaiting orders to strike at a garrison of Three Vulture's soldiers on the border of the lands of the Cloud People. Your task is to supply him my orders--"
Here he snaps his fingers, and a guard brings a folded scroll forward and lays it on the table.
"Seemingly simple, I realize--a messenger boy's errand, not a warrior's. But those five days of travel will take you through thick jungle haunted by bandits and spirits. Angry Turkey spent weeks detouring around them through the north, but my message to him is urgent, and must reach him in no more than a week's time. Have you any questions?"

[BDEYE]

Mixton listens. He has had time to think by now. He eats the food in front of him slowly and deliberately, completely cleaning his plate before he pushes it silently to the side.

"At the risk of becoming tiresome, it would make me more comfortable if I could read the message that I would be delivering."

[souldoubt]

Itzcuintli eats silently as he takes in all that Tecuani says.

"I don't trust orders picked out on animal hides or whatever. Better tell me the full of your orders for this Angry Turkey. That way they're in my head where I know they're safe."

[S.K.U.M.M.]

"Yes, I will find this man," says Xicotencatl. "And if he doesn't follow these orders, I can..." He makes a motion of slitting somebody's throat. "I'm rather good at that."

[MoxexPenNama]

Tecuani shrugs.
"The orders are simply a map--a plan of attack on the garrison. The garrison is a fortified town, Tilantongo, and it controls a key pass, the Serpent's Tunnel, leading through the mountains into the lands of the Cloud People. The map shows where I wish Angry Turkey to position his forces, and orders him to attack under cover of darkness, for the garrison's commander, Nine Reed, is a superstitious man, and will be hesitant in his counterattacks. And as to your question, Xicotencatl, Angry Turkey is a faithful commander. If I give an order, he will follow it, though there may be others in need of your skills. Does that answer your questions?"

[S.K.U.M.M.]

"I'm ready now," says Xicotencatl.

[BDEYE]

"As am I," says Mizton.

[souldoubt]

"Then we will make for the camp of this captain."

[MoxexPenNama]

You spend most of the morning readying yourselves. Just before midday, one of his advisors, an elderly man of the Eagle People, approaches you with a densely scribbled map.
"Tecuanitzin sends me with directions. Your path is due south through the Great Bowl, a flooded lowland swamp. Much of the Great Bowl is shallow enough to be navigable by foot, but Tecuani has ordered that you be given a canoe for the sake of speed. It will be half a day's portage, but worth the trouble once you reach the swamps.
"The area between here and the Great Bowl used to be inhabited by gangs of brigands and Heart Eaters, but by the efforts of Tecuanitzin, they have been pacified. To cross the Great Bowl at its narrowest point is a four-day journey, mostly across choked backwaters with a few more open spaces where the water becomes deep and there are small islands to camp on, although the country is wild and dangerous, and you would do well to be vigilant. Beyond the Great Bowl is a highland region, and past that, Angry Turkey's encampment. Have you any questions?"

[S.K.U.M.M.]

"Heart Eaters," says Xicotencatl, visibly concerned. "I'm surprised Tecuani didn't simply exterminate them. You never said anything about Heart Eaters before."

[souldoubt]

Itzcuintli tenses at the mention of Heart Eaters, though his face remains stoic, and he waits for the elderly adviser to respond.

[MoxexPenNama]

"Ah, but he did," says the advisor, giving a brutal smile. "There was one in particular who called himself Owl Lord. Tecuani had him slaughtered like the coward he was, along with his entire crew. Only his daughter was spared. The rest were strangled like the cowards they were and thrown to the coyotes still choking on their last breaths."

[BDEYE]

Mizton shakes his head disapprovingly. If you're going to wipe out a community, don't spare the women and children. The women are just as dangerous as the men, and the children will grow up eventually.

Nothing to be done now. Except sleep with one eye open.

"I see now reason not to depart as soon as possible," Mizton says. "As the sun rises."

[MoxexPenNama]

You depart slightly after midday, lowered down the weedy face of the plateau in the canoe. Plunging through the treeline into the gloomy forest below, the boat falls in soft leaf litter, and the three of you heft your equipment and begin to trek southward, following the lead of a magnetite compass.
The land here is harsh and wild, filled with thick bush that requires clearing with machetes. Occasionally you find a few scattered bones, fragments of skulls or splintered femurs. The rustling of skinks among the loam and the forlorn cries of howler monkeys are the only interruptions to the quiet of the deep rainforest.
In the late afternoon, a light rain washes over the heavy tree cover, filtering down to you in pebble-sized droplets. Using your machetes, you cut a quick shelter of sticks and palm leaves and wait wet and close-mouthed for the rain to end. The showers bring a hot mist out of the black soil of the jungle floor, and you sweat as you walk, the land beginning to slope down and grow soggier.
At points you pass raised mounds of earth covered in ferns. In some places the dirt falls away to reveal old masonry, the remains of Artisan temples and palaces. Once you come across a giant stone head half-buried in the muck, pitted and grown over with lichens and moss.
Finally, the ground levels out and becomes boggy. Large stands of reeds poke out of pools of stagnant water, and after a time you come to a muddy peninsula beyond which walking is no longer possible. Setting the canoe down as dusk falls, you find yourself surrounded by the vast, overgrown expanse of the Great Bowl. Wearily, you light your torches and set about preparing camp. A small fire has been started before you notice something floating in the black water of the swamp--something pale and aimless bumping against a canebrake.
What do you do?

[BDEYE]

Mizton watches the shape silently, focused, relaxed but ready.

[souldoubt]

Hefting his machete, Itzcuintli cautiously moves a bit closer, trying to make out what it is.

Spot check - (1d20)[18]

[S.K.U.M.M.]

Xicotencatl takes out his dagger and stands next to Itzcuintli. He tries to make out what the thing is too.

(d20+8)[5](13)

[BDEYE]

Mizton looks a little more closely:

(1d20+9)[2](11)

[MoxexPenNama]

Itzcuintli notices it first, scowling. The thing is a body, already stiff with rigor mortis and bloated with gases, floating face down in the swamp. The corpse was a young man, and its black hair floats free in the water among the shreds of his cloak. One hand is curled slightly, and you can see where each of his fingernails has been torn out.
Using his machete, Itzcuintli flips the body over, and a scent of decay arises that almost sickens you. Both the long man's hands and both his feet have had their nails torn out, leaving only billowing, bloodless flesh. Worse, both his eyes are empty sockets and his open mouth shows gums torn free of all teeth.
What do you do?

[S.K.U.M.M.]

I step back up to higher ground, close to the campfire. I yell to the others, "Forget it, guys. Let's get to higher ground. We don't want to be stuck in the swamp if something goes down."

I spot or listen for anything amiss:

Spot: (d20+8)[2](10)
Listen: (d20+8)[3](11)

[BDEYE]

Mizton stays where he is and takes a closer look at the body:

((In this order, stopping if attacked obviously-

Search: (1d20+9)[14](23)
Heal: (1d20+13)[17](30)
Knowledge: (1d20+9)[4](13)
))

[MoxexPenNama]

Itzcuintli tilts his head, but hears nothing aside from the croaking of frogs and the occasional flop of fish. As Mizton crowds closer to the body, the stench hits him, and he grimaces, but keeps looking and nods. What do you all do?

[Check your mailbox, BDEYE.]