Mineas Well Revisited

[lord_wizard]

Who: Felix and anyone on the expedition
What: Exploring Mineas Well
When: November 17th-18th
Where: Mineas Well
Rating: PG

After days of walking in the dense woods, the group eventually came across a slightly grown over but clear path leading through the trees, courtesy of marked circles on the towering trees all around them. Many of the trees seems filled with some kind of strange fruit, though they seem rather grey and unappetizing to look at, and the wizard leading the group only stares at them with an frown. Those who have been here may before may recall these were once glowing tubular creatures that came alive at night. But now they seem dead, or at least dormant. Early after setting out this day, they come across a large hand-made gate, absent of any fence to connect to it, sitting just slightly ajar in the middle of the path. A sign to one side reads "PRIVATE PROPERTY: To all uninvited guests:
please ring the bell to speak to a messenger. Thank you." A cord extending from the branches above seems to indicate it leads to such a bell. After a moment of consideration, Felix pulls it, and it rings softly in the quiet. After a few long beats, nothing at all happens. Sighing, Felix pushed past the gate with a slight shove, and towards the clearing on the other side...

...and the enormous tree on the other side, many hundreds of feet tall, with several levels of tree house built into the different sections of it's branches. Unlike last time, it seems a bit to dim here. Too quiet.

EXPLORING | STAYING THE NIGHT | THE MORNING

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EXPLORING

[lord_wizard]

At the base of the tree are many bowl-shaped pools. Once warm and fragrant, the waters are no more than lukewarm and half covered with a blanket of algae. Nearby is a wooden platform connected to a pulley system to take one up way way up into the tree. It takes a bit of work to get it going, but eases up the higher you go. Inside the treehouse there's lots to see. One end has nothing but fairly comfortable looking room - though their spidersilk sheets have gone a bit musty, and the remnants of the fruit in the bowls on the furniture have long decayed. A strange purple bulb in the ceiling seems to have once been a light, but no amount of poking will make it flare to life now. A large kitchen and dining hall seems to show similar signs of neglect and decay. There are other rooms on the other side, mostly empty, and many grown over with vines that make it impossible to pass. A few are clear enough to reveal they lead to platforms where swings are suspended over the dizzying drop to the forest floor below. The central platform may be of the most import, however. This is where Flora's office was, and still is, though the former mistress seems to be long gone. There is a large desk with many drawers, an empty loom against the wall, and a door behind leading to a master bedroom of sorts. The walls there are covered with old maps, most of which are different depictions of Nostos, each with a different purpose. There is a large bed, much like the smaller ones in the rooms on the other levels, a wardrobe, a chest, and table filled with dead houseplants, jewelry, and a few random shards of pink crystal.

Feel free to explore.

[lord_wizard]

Perhaps naturally, Felix is contenting himself with ransacking Flora's former room and office, digging through the desk and later on, pouring over the maps on the walls, making notes in his journal before he tries to take them down, muttering softly to himself as he works. There are several of note. One with several crisscrossing lines in different colors. Another with a pink diamond in several spots on the continent. And another with six large stars in a few rather recognizable locations. Cair Paradisa. In the Cindbreach mountains, where Cair Libet once dwelled. Another in the far northeast, where the mysterious Cair Ivera sits. Cair Draconis, on continent to the north. And two more, never seen before to his eyes - nearly in the center of area called the Candlespine mountains, and another on an island in the middle of a circular bay on the continent to the south.

[radiantwingedone]

Ah, Felix is after the maps. Duke waits until Felix is done inspecting one before looking over it himself.

The joys of not having been able to see here.

"The stars are castles, have previous expeditions passed through diamonds before?"

[lord_wizard]

Felix wanders over to peer at the other map, humming to himself.

"There," he says, after a moment, and points to an area on the eastern coast. "Terre Haute."

[inafadingcrown]

Galadriel has had much the same the thought. Her journal is out and she is making notations on an older map, updating it with the these new additions.

"I wonder where she has gone- and under what circumstances."

[lord_wizard]

Felix is silent a moment. The room around them is eerie in it's peacefulness, and he's afraid to say what he believes, but it seems the only thing logical to his mind.

"She was old. I don't think she would simply pack up and go. This tree gave her power, and power isn't easily surrendered. The fact that the tree is in this state tells me she's no longer in this world. There's really only two options, in that case. Either she was killed somehow, or the castle finally sent her back home."

[inafadingcrown]

It's a concise and, to her mind, reasonable assessment. She had, in all honesty, been thinking along much the same lines.

"For her sake, I shall hope it is the latter." She's silent for a moment more, not wanting to be morbid, but feeling the need to continue. "There seems to be no sign of conflict here, at the least."

[lord_wizard]

"I'm inclined to agree. This whole place speaks of abandonment rather than a battle. And I'm sure she would have been difficult to kill here. I am more than certain she used it to protect people inside of the Dead Zone. She should have been just as capable of defending herself."

At least, from physical attack. Which only leaves him to wonder why and how the castle sent her back after so much time.

"And with her gone, the bond to the tree seems to have broken. It seems to have been a kind of partnership. Without a bond, the magic in this place seems to have withered."

[wishmadeinfire]

Ashura followed him, trying to handle some of the storm he left in his wake as he took his own note of things. His eyes fell on the maps as he leaned against her desk, noting the other castles, and that sparking a conversation he had with a particular dragon not all that long ago.

"I wonder... if those are the Castles the dragon spoke of, the ones she and her companions made," he said aloud, more to himself than Felix or anyone else in the room, glancing down at the papers in his hand as if they might hold some hidden clue the maps would not give up alone.

[lord_wizard]

Felix wasn't one to let a question go unanswered, as averse to silence as he often was. The tree in this state unsettled him, though he was one of the few here who remembered what Mineas Well looked like alive and full of light.

"Undoubtedly. All but these two are marked on the maps we have," he said, pointing to the two in the south with light fingers. "And if her story was true, then those and Cair Ivera are the three remaining of the five."

[wishmadeinfire]

Ashura watched his fingers, looking to their relation to Cair Paradisa.

"Do you think when winter passes we should seek them out?" He asked him. It would be a tough journey, he did not doubt, but maybe there was something there that could explain not only this but their own predicament.

[lord_wizard]

Felix frowned, though the expression was more thoughtful than anything else.

"Winter is a poor time for walking around in the Dead Zone. However...I do still have that key..."

[schrodingersghost]

Danny pokes around in the empty rooms a little, but he really had no idea what he was looking for. And this kind of careful investigation wasn't really his thing. Give him an enemy to stop or a villainous plot to unravel, and he knew exactly what to do.

This?

He eventually makes his way up to the highest part of the tree and perches there, looking down on everything.

[lord_wizard]

Felix takes to wandering the paths after he's scoured the main room long enough. His eyes are mostly on the ground, but every once in awhile he glances up at the boughs, and eventually spots Danny there.

"What are you doing up there?"

[schrodingersghost]

"What does it look like I'm doing?" He may have been a little grumpy.

[lord_wizard]

"Putting yourself in unnecessary danger?" Felix ventured, his tone dry. The last thing he needed was to have a mostly uneventful journey marred by a kid falling out a tree and breaking his neck.

[schrodingersghost]

"Getting a better view," Danny corrects irritably. "I know what I'm doing, okay?"

[inlifesname]

This entire place is stunning. Nita can only imagine what it looked like when people where here. She spends a decent amount of time just exploring, wandering up and down the pathways, poking at the pools of water, and foraging through the desk drawers.

But she seems particularly interested in the crystal, picking it up and turning it over in her hands.

"I wonder what it would tell me, if wizardry worked out here."

[lord_wizard]

Felix looks away from where he'd been poking at a dead plant and angles his gaze over her shoulder. It's not hard to do, for one of his height.

"It's another one of those shards, like the ones she gave us years ago. The ones that power things in the Dead Zone."

[inlifesname]

Well. That is useful information. "You mean they work like batteries? How come we didn't bring a bunch of them with us?"

[lord_wizard]

"Because I don't have any great need for them. They don't power very much, and in any case, there's very little remaining. Most of them disappeared along with all the people she gave them to," he said, a bit unhappily, and picks up the shard.

"I'm not even certain they work anymore."

[inlifesname]

"It's worth a look, at least." She glances down at the remaining shards on the table before looking back up at Felix. "Do you think it'd be alright if I took one? It feels wrong, like we're looting or something, but-"

But it's practical.

[wizard_redfive]

Dairine is not far away, looking at the long-unused bed with a strangely intense, quiet stare. Something heavy is on her mind, but as usual, the young wizard is keeping such troubles to herself.

However, her big sister's voice is enough to shake her out of it. She starts slightly, but tries to act nonchalant.

"It might not say much. They don't near the castle."

[inlifesname]

"Nothing says much around here." It's a complaint, but there's not much bite to it. She sees where her sister is looking and it doesn't take a genius to guess what she's thinking.

"You met her, didn't you? The woman who lived here."

[wizard_redfive]

"That's for sure." Dairine found it annoying too, how little anything said around here. What good was her wizardry if no one would tell her how to use it? Even if she didn't have a Senior to guide her, at least the local life should be able to give her a hint.

Dairine shakes her head, still staring at the bed. "I was planning to, but..." Dairine turns away from Nita, not wanting any potential emotions to be obvious. It doesn't help much though, as a layer of guilt seeps into her voice. "But then the person who wanted to go with me left the castle and... Well, it never happened."