The group remains near the open gate. Beyond the walls, the fort commander and soldiers hold their positions as a wounded elf messenger staggers up the road, clutching a broken violet-black sigil.
the wounded elf messenger
Jessica... Oath-Shadow... the vow has found you.
The fragment convulses in the messenger’s hand. Violet-black light lashes across the stones, then leaps toward Reggie’s bleeding palm as though drawn by the dragon-marked blood.
Reggie Vonland
Keep that fragment away from me. It is answering the blood, not the sigil.
Jessica
No one has called me that since Larry’s first oath. He must have sent this message through the old covenant.
The messenger collapses beside the gate, still conscious for one shallow breath. The fragment drops free, scorching a black crescent into the earth before its light gutters.
Far beyond the walls, the smoldering village answers. A dragon-shaped glow rises among the ruins, bends toward the fort, and fades, leaving the road trembling beneath everyone’s feet.
✓ Quest Accepted
Reveal what Larry’s old covenant demands of Jessica
“I ask Jessica what Larry’s old covenant demands of her.”
SUCCESS (Good Diplomacy, rolled +2)
Roku Luaghly
Jessica, what does Larry’s old covenant demand of you?
Jessica looks from the wounded messenger to the scorched crescent in the earth. Her fingers settle over one dagger, not drawing it, while the gate stones still tremble.
Jessica
It demands obedience when Larry invokes the first oath. I must answer his summons, guard his chosen gate, and never strike him beneath its sign.
Jessica
But the covenant does not command what I do before he calls. It does not bind my judgment, my secrets, or the moment I turn his own passage against him.
The broken sigil gives a faint pulse beside the messenger’s hand. Jessica watches it with open contempt, as though recognizing an old chain laid across the road.
Jessica
Larry believes the oath makes me his weapon. It makes me his witness instead. I know every vow he twisted, and I know where this one can be severed.
Reggie Vonland
Then tell us the price of severing it. If that covenant reaches through Reggie’s blood, silence will serve Larry better than any blade.
Quest Complete
Reveal what Larry’s old covenant demands of Jessica