The concealed passage descends beneath hazel roots to a rough gate wedged between wooded slopes. Its braces are fresh, pale timber against older, weather-darkened posts.
Beyond the gate, a narrow track bends toward the old quarry and open country. Fresh boot prints cross the mud beside an inspection cairn of stacked stones.
Elian
The quarry road is exposed, but it is direct. Anyone inspecting the circuit will see travelers there before they reach open ground.
Elian kneels beside the cairn and points past it, where small cuts in the lower branches mark a thinner path descending through the trees.
Elian
The footpath is less certain. It may bypass the watchers, or end in ground too steep for a loaded traveler. The cut twigs are recent.
Tomas
I know the quarry road, but not this woodland path. If the wardens restored the cairn, their inspection may already have reached the gate.
Mara
Then we should choose with the evidence we have. Renee, the road offers certainty and exposure; the path offers concealment and unknown ground.
“I ask Elian to guide us past watchers”
SUCCESS (Superb Diplomacy, rolled -1)
Renee
Elian, guide us past the watchers.
Elian
Stay close, step where I step, and leave the quarry road to those who expect it.
Elian slips through the lower branches, following faint cuts in the bark. The path descends beneath dense cover, leaving the inspection cairn and open road behind.
Tomas
The watchers will search the road first. This route keeps us beyond their usual sightlines.
Mara follows with the wrapped tablet secured beneath her cloak. Renee moves behind Elian, crossing soft leaf mold while the wooded slopes conceal their passage.
Elian
There. The path joins the quarry stream below the next rise. From there, the old boundary posts end, and open country begins.
The trees thin around a stony streambed. Beyond it, the land opens toward distant fields, with no wardens visible on the road or ridge.
“I ask Elian for a concealed route onward”
SUCCESS (Superb Diplomacy, rolled +2)
Renee
Elian, is there a concealed route onward from here, one that avoids the quarry road and its watchers?
Elian
There is. Follow the streambed north until the split boulder, then climb through the alder hollow. It leads to an abandoned charcoal-burner’s track beyond the boundary posts.
Elian leaves the stream and guides them beneath overhanging roots. She parts a curtain of alder branches, revealing flat stones set deliberately through the mud.
Elian
Step on the stones. They cross the soft ground without leaving clear prints, and the hollow hides anyone traveling below the ridge.
Renee follows the concealed crossing with Mara and Tomas close behind. The route rises through dense alder, then emerges beside a collapsed charcoal hut and a narrow track beyond it.
Elian
This track runs north to the mill village. No circuit marker reaches it, and the quarry watchers cannot see this approach. You are beyond the wardens’ boundary.
Open fields appear between the trees, silvered with morning mist. Behind them, the boundary country disappears into the wooded ridge, while the hidden track offers clear passage onward.
✓ Quest Accepted
Reach the mill village
“I follow Elian’s track north toward the mill village.”
SUCCESS (Great Agility, rolled +2)