The tunnel shudders above you, ash trickling through hairline cracks. Ahead, the pilgrim knot on the wall gives off a faint, unnatural glow, bright enough to paint the damp stone silver.
Bram stops dead. His hand twitches toward the knot, then away. The color drains from his face.
Bram
No. That knot should be dead.
The Paladin turns sharply, one boot already set for the climb upward, but he catches Bram's look and slows instead. Slaan stands between the glow and the dark behind them, the passage still groaning.
Bram
That is not a hunter's mark. It is ours.
The admission lands hard. Bram's jaw tightens as he studies the knot like a wound reopened after years.
Bram
A pilgrim knot means safe passage. A hidden door. A warning to my people.
The Paladin
Your people? What sect is this, Bram?
Bram does not answer at once. The glow on the wall pulses, and somewhere above, stone gives another sick crack.
Bram
The Sun-Eaters. I was branded for them, long before the chapel called me useful.
✓ Quest Accepted
Learn what the Sun-Eaters were to Bram
“To the paladin " aren't you a sun eater also?"”
SUCCESS (Good Persuasion, rolled +0)
Slaan
Aren't you a Sun-Eater too?
The question hangs in the damp air. Bram flinches as if the knot itself has struck him, and the Paladin looks from Slaan to Bram, waiting.
Bram
No. I was marked by them, not one of them. They took me in after my house fell, then used me to carry their signs.
Bram
The Sun-Eaters were pilgrims who hid routes, names, and doors from the chapel. Safe passage for the hunted. Safe passage for the guilty, too, if they paid for it.
The Paladin
And the chapel branded you for that?
Bram
I wore their knot under my cloak and called it shelter. When the chapel came, they called it treason.
Bram swallows hard. One hand presses against the wall beneath the glowing mark, and ash sifts down from the cracked ceiling.
Bram
Now you know why I kept it buried.
Quest Complete
Learn what the Sun-Eaters were to Bram
“"well we need to clear rusty here, we're do we take the papers I found to?" I ask the three planly”
SUCCESS (Good Persuasion, rolled +1)
Slaan
We need to clear Rusty, and decide where these papers go. To the chapel, or away from them?
Slaan lowers the recovered papers between them like a blade laid flat. Bram’s eyes flick to the bundle, then to the glowing knot, then away from both.
Bram
Not to the chapel. If they reach those hands, they become another chain.
The Paladin
Then they come with us. We keep them from both sides until we know what they prove.
Bram lets out a slow breath and shifts his palm from the wall. Ash drifts from the crack above, dusting the soot-marked passage while the tunnel stays quiet behind them.
Bram
There is a dead drop farther along the pilgrim routes, a hollow beneath a stone saint. The Sun-Eaters used it when the roads were watched.
The Paladin
Then that is where we carry them. Bram, if you are finished hiding from your own mark, walk with us.
Bram
I walk with you.
✓ Quest Accepted
Bring the chapel papers to the Sun-Eater dead drop
“" could we return it to town, isn't that where king Steven of Dragon scale lives?" I ask referring to the market. " The market is just outside of the city of Dragon scale proper"”
SUCCESS (Fair Reasoning, rolled +1)
Slaan turns the question toward the papers, and the tunnel seems to listen. Bram stills, while the Paladin angles his helm toward her in the dim glow.
Slaan
Could we return it to town? Isn't that where King Steven of Dragon scale lives? The market is just outside Dragon scale proper.
Bram
No. The chapel would intercept it there. The market is watched, and the roads out are worse.
The Paladin
Then we do not hand it to a market clerk and hope for mercy. If Dragon scale is the nearest gate to safer eyes, we go by a route the chapel will not expect.
Bram
The dead drop is still the safer place. I know the stones under it. If we leave the papers in town, they vanish into somebody else's hands.
A thin crack ticks overhead, shedding grit onto the soot-marked passage. Bram lifts a hand toward the wall, then lowers it again, choosing the group over the dark.
The Paladin
Then we take the market route, keep the papers hidden, and move before this tunnel gives us another reason not to.
“" ok bram, to the dead drop." I say planly”
SUCCESS (Fair Willpower, rolled +3)
Slaan
Okay, Bram, to the dead drop.
Bram gives a short, relieved nod and folds the route into his memory like a prayer. The Paladin lowers his hand, accepting the plan without another fight.
Bram
Good. I know the stones beneath it. Stay close, and keep that bundle hidden.
Slaan tucks the chapel papers in tight and turns with them toward the soot-marked passage. Ash drifts from the cracked ceiling as the tunnel takes their footsteps and gives back a faint, distant scrape from the brush above.
The Paladin
Then we move now. Bram, lead us.
Bram steps into the dark ahead, no longer evasive. The paladin falls in behind Slaan, and the group commits to the dead drop route as the shrine walls groan around them.
Slaan leaves ash shrine tunnel behind and arrives at the dead drop.
“I follow Bram to the dead drop”
SUCCESS (Good Agility, rolled +0)
The dead drop sits under a cracked saint of black stone, half-swallowed by roots and old snowmelt. Bram stops at the base of it, crouches, and brushes frost from a narrow seam cut into the pedestal.
Slaan slips in behind him, papers tight to her chest, and the Paladin halts at her shoulder, watching the dark around the shrine rather than the saint itself.
Bram
Here. Hidden since the Sun-Eaters walked these roads.
His fingers find a concealed notch. Stone clicks once, then grinds aside to show a shallow cavity lined with dry cloth and ash.
Inside lies a pilgrim knot carved in bone white, a second knot scored beside it, and a fold of old wax sealed against the damp.
Bram
No chapel seal. Good. Still waiting for me to prove I belong.
Bram looks to Slaan, then takes the papers from her hands and settles them into the cavity with careful precision. The bundle fits as if the hollow was made for it.
The Paladin exhales through his nose, his guard easing by a fraction as the stone saint seals again, hiding the papers from the world.
Quest Complete
Bring the chapel papers to the Sun-Eater dead drop
Attribute Upgrade: Reasoning Fair→Good