Session Forty-Four: The Prioress’ Tale

The one-eyed beggar continues his flight around the shrine, only to bump into Jules, who was coming from the other way. Jules duel with the beggar is cut very short by Sabina, who uses her other pistol to shoot the beggar in the back.

Meanwhile, inside the shrine, Sir Henri picks up Hugo’s riddled corpse and hurls him out the door.

With their two foes down and dead, the company searches the bodies. Sabina is warned by Jules that the beggar, “has a nasty rash, or something.” Sabina confirms that the beggar does have some kind of reddish, pustule-laden illness on his trunk, as well as a brand that marks him as one of the faithful of Nurgle. She finds Hugo’s keys and an unpleasant medallion with a Chaos symbol on the beggar, while Sir Henri finds a crumpled letter on Hugo.

In the midst of this, Sir Henri is accosted by the washerwoman, Agatha, who is standing outside the gate to the shrine’s yard. She asks if everything is all right, and Sir Henri asks her to fetch some of the guards. She goes to do so, clutching her bucket in her arms.

The One-Eyed Beggar's Medallion

Two Unpleasant Bits of News

Pierre reads the letter to the company. It appears to be addressed to Hugo from the enigmatic Q. It warns that the Cult of the Stranger (the company) is on the move, and that Hugo is to continue to prepare his part of the plan and not to engage them. Q remarks that the high priest of the Stranger’s cult (presumably the wandering monk), has gone ahead of the group to Noyon, for unknown reasons. Q says that he will ambush the high priest, decapitate the cult, and end the threat.

At about this point, Prioress Simone, having heard the sounds of battle die down, comes down into the main shrine area. She is glad to find that the company is well, but bursts into tears when Sir Henri, rather too matter-of-factly, tells her that Hugo has been killed. He attempts to comfort the prioress and tell her that Hugo was actually a servant of Chaos. This does little to soften the blow.

Meanwhile, Agatha returns with two members of the night’s watch, who take in the scene, learn that a Chaos cult is responsible, and immediately call for reinforcements. Minutes later, the whole shrine is covered by watchmembers, who take great pains to secure the site. Garnier takes pains to ensure that the head remains “safe” in its undercroft hiding spot, and that neither Simone nor the watch go down to retrieve it.

The company inspects the medallion, and find that it is unusually heavy, slimy, and seems to draw light out of its immediate vicinity and into itself. Sir Jean-Marc brings the awful thing outside, places it on a rock, and shatters it with a single blow of his war hammer.  The medallion’s shards dissolve into dust and baleful energies, leaving the world a little brighter.

The company gathers in the main worshiping area of the shrine, where the fill the watch in on what they know and make plans for what to do next. In the midst of all of this, Sir Henri feels like he and his friends have stopped a great evil with minimal harm to the people of Saint-Ouen.

His good feelings, however, do not last very long…

Hugo's Letter

The Final Test

A strained noise causes Sir Henri to look up toward the ceiling, where he sees that one of the room’s heavy chandeliers, its iron chain damaged by Hugo’s last magical attack, looks like it is about to fall. Looking down, Sir Henri sees that Agatha is standing right beneath it, unaware of the danger.

Sir Henri lets out a cry of warning before running fill tilt toward the washerwoman. Far above him, the chain breaks. The chandelier falls. At the last possible moment, Sir Henri scoops up Agatha and throws her clear, just as the chandelier comes crashing down on him.

The chandelier lands on Sir Henri’s lower body, pulverizing his legs. As he goes into shock, his companions rush to his aid, struggling to lift the weighty chandelier off of him and move it to one side. Pierre kneels down to tend to the knight, only to realize that Sir Henri’s shattered legs are far beyond his skill to heal.

Garnier, wondering at the impossible timing of this disaster, approaches Agatha, who is clutching her bucket and standing off to one side.

“So…test?” he asks.

In response, Agatha smiles at him enigmatically and glides over to the grievously injured knight.

Sir Henri is now somehow feverish and cold at the same time. He cannot feel his legs. His throat is parched. Just as he is about to call out for water, Agatha squats down next to him, thanks him profusely for saving her, and offers him her bucket. Sir Henri, in his delirium, takes a long sip of the filthy, soapy water…only to find it as fresh and cold as the water issuing from a mountain spring.

Pierre reels in shock as, beneath his dented greaves, Sir Henri’s legs knit themselves back together. Everyone marvels at the miraculous healing as Agatha says, in a voice lyrical and sweet, “Sir Henri Plitt of Aquitaine, my good, my loyal servant. Rise.”

As he does, his armor repairs itself and he begins shining with light from somewhere deep within. He lifts his head to see that Agatha is gone. Standing in her place is a beautiful woman clad in robes of blue silks. In her hands, she holds something that had once been a battered, wooden bucket, but which is now a cup of simple gold, decorated with sapphires.

As one, Simone, watch, and the company all take a knee, awed to find themselves standing before Bretonnia’s divine patron, the Lady of the Lake.

The Lady of the Lake, Patron of Bretonnia

The Audience

The Lady first speaks to Prioress Simone alone. This conversation seems to be stern, but kindly, and leaves the prioress in tears once again.

The Lady then asks the company to kneel before her one at a time. She speaks to each one before granting them a boon. These are as follows.

Renee: She commends her on merely holding her foes instead of harming them, and for looking out for her companions’ best interests. Renee asks that her wounded arm, which bears the scars Pierre left behind cutting out her strange mark, be restored. It is granted.

Magnus: TBD.

Pierre: She commends him on his great wisdom, pragmatism, and healing arts. Pierre, somewhat flippantly, looks at Sir Henri and says that he would like, “whatever’s in that cup!” The Lady smiles and draws forth a sapphire on a silver chain from the Grail. She presents this to Pierre.

Maurice: She commends him on his keen eye and steady hand, but remarks that she has seen him walk a crooked path. She says that he must strive to walk the path of righteousness, or else he will experience a fall like none other. One of the company mutters, “you mean, like, from that window?” He asks for aid against their supernatural foes, and the lady awards him with a shining arrow, which she draws from the Grail.

Sabina: She commends Sabina’s dedication to protecting the roads of Bretonnia, and says that her foul words do little to mask her noble heart. Sabina asks for good luck as she continues her travels, which the Lady grants.

Garnier: To Garnier, she says that his japes, sharp words, and antics hide the soul of one who deeply cares for Bretonnia, and that she is pleased with him. Garnier, usually never at a loss for words, cannot think of anything to ask for. The Lady suggests removing the Chaos curse from the magic ring he acquired so long ago, so that it will serve its true purpose without causing harm. Garnier agrees.

Sir Jean-Marc: To Jean-Marc, whom the Lady calls Ambrose, she says that the lords of Bretonnia claim that only those of noble birth and good standing can be true knights. The Lady says that this is not truly so. She says that even a poor thief, who found comfort in a dead knight’s tent, and who, the next morning, clad himself in the dead knight’s vestments and continued his work, even he can be a knight. She goes on to say that, in her eyes, Sir Jean-Marc is a knight o Bretonnia, no matter what name he chooses to go by, and that any who gainsay her judgment so at their peril.

This prompts Renee to exclaim, “Wait, does that mean that, until now, neither you nor Henri were knights?!”

The Lady smiles at this and, at last, addresses Sir Henri. To him, she says, she can grant no greater boon than the one that she has already given, which is a sip from the Holy Grail. She tells him to stand before her, and announces to all and sundry that, from this day forth, Sir Henri is a Paladin of the Holy Grail, one of the chosen champions of the Lady of the Lake.

As applause from friends and onlookers washes over Sir Henri, the Lady vanishes.

Simone’s Admission

After the Lady departs, Prioress Simone approaches the company, shamefaced, but no longer crying. She admits to them that they were right to suspect her, and hands over a crumpled slip of yellow paper. It contains her wish, which she wrote in the monk’s magic book. She goes on to say that she meant no harm, and only wanted to do good works in the Lady’s name.

Sabina advises her to burn the parchment. Simone immediately does, using one of the shrine’s many candles as a source of flame. She then withdraws to bed.

The company withdraws from the shrine, traveling back to their inn to get a good night’s rest. In the darkness, they realize that Sir Henri is still glowing with a faint blue light. As this is one of the signs that one has been recently elevated to Grail Knight, it draws many curious onlookers, even at this late hour. By the time the company reaches their inn, a crowd of overawed citizens is following in their wake.

News of Sir Henri’s knighting has also, somehow, reached the inn ahead of them. The pilgrims turn this news into a reason for a celebration. Many of them offer toasts and cheers to Sir Henri, and congratulate him on his exalted rank. Henri the innkeeper is especially overjoyed, and says, “well, that couldn’t have happened to a finer fellow!”

Meanwhile, Rauchamp the pardoner asks Sir Henri to add his signature to several new purity seals he’s constructing, which he plans to sell for 2 Crown a pop. Sir Henri agrees, but only if Rauchamp destroys the seals bearing “the bishop’s signature.” With a smile, Rauchamp tosses the old seals into the inn’s roaring fireplace, shouting, “ah, only too happy to do so. Did you know he was excommunicated? Terrible thing! These are worthless now.”

In the midst of this hullabaloo, no one notices Garnier slip out of the inn. He runs over to the ship, speaks to Antonella, and recovers the Head of the Grail Virgin (still in its bag), which Antonella was keeping in the ship’s boiler. He returns to the inn with it. Sabina, the only other member of the company who knew the true location of the head, is relieved to see that Garnier was able to recover it.

Prioress Simone's Wish

The Next Morning

Sir Henri, still glowing, awakes to find the common room of the inn completely full. He eats a quick breakfast while being stared at by a hundred people, and agrees that the company should get ready to depart Saint-Ouen as soon as possible. Gariner insists that they “stop by the shrine” first, just to see if everything is all right, and also suggests that Sir Henri go shopping for “new clothes befitting his rank.”

Buying Sir Henri new clothes is, apparently, just a pretext for Garnier to get his hands on the knight’s old cloak, which he chops into many hand-sized scraps using his beard trimming scissors. Inspired by Rauchamp the pardoner, Garnier makes a tidy sum selling the scraps as relics to the crowd of people following Sir Henri, and the company, around Saint-Ouen.

At the shrine,  Garnier slips away to return the head, with no one being the wiser. Upon his return, he is pleased to hear that Prioress Simone has canceled the pilgrimage to Turin, and that the head will remain in Saint-Ouen for the foreseeable future.

Noyon

Once again, the pilgrims and the company set forth in their landship, rattling down the road that leads to the town of Noyon. They reach the gates at dusk and find it guarded by two dozen watch members holding pikes. The company makes introductions and, once the watch realizes that a) Noyon isn’t being invaded and b) they are in the presence of a still-glowing Grail Knight, their moods swiftly improve.

The company leaves their landship outside the gates and prepares to head into Noyon to find lodging for the pilgrimage. Before they can get very far, they are interrupted by an elderly man, who tells them that he has a message for them from their friend, a monk who carried a very heavy book.

The man explains that he met the monk at the local shrine, and that he was told to deliver a message to people who arrived in a ship. “Seemed odd to me, since Noyon is landlocked, but turns out he was right.” He says that the monk is very tired, that he has left off of his journey, and that he waits for them nearby in Summersfall Fort. “A strange place to wait for anyone, as the Lady knows, since it’s supposed to be terribly haunted.”

The company ask if the monk had granted any wishes when he was in Noyon. The man says that, “he told me all about his wishing book and then asked me if I wanted anything. Before I could say a word, he shouted at me, ‘no no! Don’t! You can’t! I won’t!’”

The company thanks the man, tips him, and finds an inn in short order. While they are getting settled, a small party, led by Maurice, ventures out into the night to scout out Summersfall Fort. The ruined fort are only a few miles outside of Noyon, and the scouting party easily reaches it under the light of the moon. An investigation on the muddy heath around the ruins reveals a relatively fresh set of sandaled footprints, which seem to lead into the fort.

Satisfied that the person they have long sought now lies relatively close at hand, the scouting party returns to Noyon to rest.