7th Sea - Chapter Two - The Fury of the Northmen
Being an account of the several continued adventures of sundry retainers of the University of Kirk's Archaeology Department.
A record of Chapter One: Rocks and Hard Places is available.
Captain Ausgisilse Fiddvinmunddottir - Vendel wine merchant and captain of the brig Sommelier. A most practical woman, loyal to her crew and much beloved by them.
Dona Catalina Rodriguez de Torres del Castillo - disenfranchised Castillian noblewoman. Confident, pious and unwilling to compromise her values, she is an adept swordswoman.
Professor Sophia Jannike - Vendel professor of history at the University of Kirk. Well connected within the Explorer's Society, she walks a line between her modern profession and her Vestenmannavenyar heritage.
Lady Sandrine Dubois d'Arrent - the niece of Duc Samuel d'Arrent, Sandrine combines the manners of a well raised young noblewoman with an incongruous set of more lethal talents.
23/11/10 - Session The First - Gifts and Visits
The Sommelier returns to Kirk after some ambiguously vague adventures. Burning warehouses are passed. The Captain gets a grilling. Von Henner gets some blood. Sophia is given a painting. Sandrine fails to find a suitably awesome swordsmith. The Captain is invited to dinner. The Captain makes an awkward parental visit. Sophia visits a cairn. The Captain has an awkward dinner, and is persuaded to take on a job delivering free beer to the Vestenmannavanyr.
11/1/11 - Session The Second - Long Ships and Long Houses
Skardaal himself delivers beer. Catalina forgets her shoes and runs into an old 'friend'. The Sommelier sails. Vesten raiders use sorcery to overhaul the ship. Sophia uses sorcery to persuade them to go away. Beer is delivered. A longship of angry young Jarls picks a fight on the beach. Ulfar puts his foot down. Kleppjarn lends boots. Beer is drunk; conversations are eavesdropped, and much glaring is had. Kleppjarn tells the Lay of the Worst Days.
18/1/11 - Session The Third - Hearts and Minds
A vision is had. A drinking challenge is offered. Ilse falls off her chair. A fistfight is ended by breaking a bench on heads. One of Kothran's Band gets lairy. Ilse does not like being called a housewife. Ilse delivers a beating. Favour is won. The gangly Skjaeren tells an unsubtle tale. Sophia reworks the Grumfather Cycle. Kothran will not stand for this insult. Catalina answers Kothran. Kothran breaks her sword. Kothran is shot! Ilse did not do it! Dark-clad men running into the village, torching thatch. Gunshots. Lightning. Catalina leads the charge.
25/01/11 - Session The Fourth - Igni Ferroque
Catalina breaks the line. Sophia clubs with a musket. Sandrine fights three men alone in the dark. Ilse takes two, then spots the kidnappers. Catalina damns the leader for a coward, and is shot for her troubles. Ilse frees the children, and holds off two armed men with nothing but a handful of burning thatch. Catalina, surrounded, takes a panzerhand to the temple and falls. Sophia fights through and drags her out. Sophia throws the Captain a musket, who shoots one man and scares the second away. Sandrine reappears covered in blood - only partly her own. The attackers withdraw. Sandrine rends the universe to fetch Haagman (and Cobb with six other armed men) and help is given where it can be. Kleppjarn gives a confidence. Worries are shared. The night is spent, and the morning sees departure. The Captain is VERY hung over.
01/02/11 - Session The Fifth - Badge and Gun
The weather worsens through the day, and the night at sea is rather stormy. Dawn sees another Vendel cog, caught afire, with survivors in a boat. The Captain changes course to assist, rescues Captain Olfant and a dozen of his crew, some bruised. Offers to help are met with the statement that he fired the ship himself, can't say where he was going or what he was carrying. There is much quiet speculation, but the Sommelier puts on to Kirk without further ado. The ladies answer Master Skardaal's invitation to the Brewers' Guildhouse. He is very concerned about the events in the village, imposes upon Ilse to investigate, and inducts her as an Agent of the Vendel League.
24/02/11 - Session The Sixth - Requests and Replies
Sandrine prevails upon Les Freres Emprenne to travel to Vasteras and visit Maitre Detruire, running into a musketeer officer there, but failing to notice being tailed through the streets. Sophia discovers her office door marked with Utivithet and kicked in, with the painting missing. Sophia and Ilse lean on one of her students. Catalina manages to acquire a place at Maitre del Pasiega's salon to learn the Gallegos style.
01/03/11 - Session The Seventh - Watch and Learn
Catalina runs into Capitan Ramon, drunk out of his head and manages not to fight him very much. He gives her his sword to kill Ochoa with. Late to her lesson, Catalina takes a whupping from del Pasiega. The others visit Eskiltuna and check out the site of Vel's burned warehouse. Ilse notices some wounded mercenaries and draws conclusions. Conversation is had with Val Mokk's men Ash and Karl, and cards are laid on the table. The Ghostlight is visited, and students are recognised. An impromptu visit to the theatre is planned.
07/03/11 - Session The Eighth - Stage and Scream
Hromund's students are spooked and a bar brawl starts. Sandrine jumps the fight and gives chase. Ilse and Catalina find a plank. The theatre is entered, and Vesten found. Catalina fights a berserker in the prop room. Sandrine fights a knife thrower on the stage, while Sophia trades lightning bolts with a Skjaeren in the stalls. Hromund is knocked unconscious by a falling cloud and falls down the stairs. The knife thrower has a castle dropped on him, and Ilse ends the fight with a gun in the Skjaeren's ear. Ash and Karl burst in with guards; decide that Ilse has the situation in hand and depart, leaving her a free piece of advice.
24/03/11 - Session The Ninth - Wealth and Wisdom
The Skjaeren is questioned and rants at length about the shortsighted foolishness of the Vendel and how the Worst Times are upon us again. Sophia has a vision of a great leader withering away into an old man cursed to turn all he touches to gold. Ilse sends the casualties on a dray to the Brewer's Guild, and returns Hromund to his father. Ilse and Catalina drink; Sophia walks up the hill to visit the Soldier. Invoking Velstand, she receives another vision, and determines that the painting was meant for her as a gift from Fornuft. Skardaal is visited and requests Ilse investigate Klorbulg; Joseph Volker will send a detachment of soldiers with her. In the morning, a merchant by the name of Peter Vel visited the ship and offered Ilse a retainer to work for him. Sophia seemed to recognise him; he appeared unable to see her. Ilse promised nothing beyond to consider it. Catalina went to her fencing lesson; paired against a Valroux, she took a hit but disarmed him. Del Pasiega told her that she had failed because she had allowed herself to be hit, but had started to learn the Gallegos philosophy because she had turned the Valroux's next against back against him.
28/03/11 - Session The Tenth - Duels and Jewels
Ilse paces the deck, trying to figure out a way to take the Sommelier to Klorbulg, while the others turn to discussing the strange red crystals that have cropped up. Sophia resolves to pry the stones out of the berserker's torc once they're in deep ocean. Sandrine expresses an interest. Sophia checks the university library, picks up her stipend and receives a message from the Explorers. Checking the Explorers' library reveals a few mentions from digs, Kailean's report (see Chapter 1, Session 1) and a veiled reference to "the Charouse Dig". Sandrine remembers that her brother Remy may have mentioned something along those lines and writes to her great aunt with questions. It transpires that von Henner had been asking about similar things at the Explorers; Sophia confronts him, and he admits that their "mysterious mutual friend" has asked him to find out what he could. Catalina attends her lesson, gets asked nasty questions and made to do a lot of parrying. On her exit, she is approached by a Voddace swordsman, who delivers a challenge from Ochoa. To the death! Fighting in the Ambroggia style, he starts a convincing beatdown, before Sophia knocks his sword across the street, places the point of her sword on his neck and offers him the choice of yielding or dying. He yields, and slinks away a broken man.
11/04/11 - Session The Eleventh - Back and Forward
Ilse visits her parents for advice and is warned by her father that Vel is far too lucky in business not to have something sinister going on. Ilse asks Von Henner to find a priest for Catalina; he "jogs his memory" and "remembers" Monseigneur Andrade, who is known to Sandrine. Catalina, Sandrine and Ilse visit him, and Catalina gets a great many things off her chest. Sophia hits the library. Sandrine meets Von Verschneitenblud and doesn't hit it off with him. Ilse and Catalina warm to him rather more, as they share the objective of not getting everybody killed on Klorbulg. All but Sophia visit Bolli Kolsson's shop, overhear a customer complaining about a rune not working, and enquite about Utivithet. Some conclusions are drawn.
21/04/11 - Session The Twelfth - Eyes and Vision
Sophia realised she had lost all her money. Sandrine located the single Sol in an alleyway; the Guilders were lost. On the way, Ilse stopped off at the Brewers' guild to deliver her supply list and tell Skardaal of her plans. Sophia had an unexpected vision. Ilse went on to visit Peter Vel's secretary, with a crowd of lurking women in tow, to tell him she was refusing his employer's offer of work. On returning to the ship, she found Cobb nervously pacing. having been visited by Vel in her absence and offered a "perfect cargo" of a pair of Eisen weapons called Sturmwerfen - a curious sort of short barelled cannon firing explosive shells. Ilse thought this was a terrible plan, even if she had had the thousand Guilders to buy them. Retiring to her cabin, Ilse found Alvaro Arciniega in her chair enjoying a glass of wine. He was curious about the red crystals; very surprised to hear they were being forged into items. He took the torc, and cautioned strongly against going near more crystals, for fear of damage from continued exposure. He gave Sophia a "device" which they could use to contact him. Sophia attempted to inscribe a Guilder with Velstand, calling it "Self". Upon inscription, she fell unconscious and had a potent vision, and the Guilder vanished. A large quantity of gold appeared in the Captain's desk drawer though. Everybody slept; Sophia had troubled dreams. Catalina went to her fencing lesson, failed to have a conversation in the Gallegos style, and proved herself against a Valroux apprentice; waiting for his attack to turn it back on him, annoying him to the point he made a mistake with his follow-up attack allowing her to take his sword from him, all without moving her feet. Del Pasiega was impressed, and agreed she was ready to be tested. Von Verschneitenblut's mercenaries embarked. The Sommelier sailed!
24/05/11 - Session The Thirteenth - Fire and Axe
The first day out was spent drilling Erik's gun crews and demonstrating to Konrad's men the dangers of recoiling guns. As night fell, Ilse and Sophia remained on the quarterdeck discussing Sophia's strange visions, when Ilse noticed that a star vehind them was moving. As time passed, it became clear that this was no star, but a great bird of fire, ridden by a flaming rider. Crew were called to quarters and the ship doused down. Konrad's men assembled with muskets as Ilse ordered the sails reefed to protect them. The bird swooped in close, as the rider discharged a cloud of fireflies and two serpents of fire onto the deck. As he passed over the ship, Sophia struck the flaming man twice with bolts of lightning, knocking him clear of his mount and into the forward rigging. As he hurled fire at the crew below, his firebird dropped onto the quarterdeck and exploded, blowing Sophia clear over the railing onto the gig below. Ilse swung herself up into the ratlines, doused the man down, then chopped through he line he was holding, leaving him to plunge forty feet to his death. Fires were fought. The body had some odd features - he looked Avalonian and was dressed like a scholar; with a series of neat puncture wounds on his forearms, and a bloodied pouch of smashed glass vials at his belt. He was unceremoniously dumped overboard. The morning held a funeral for the sailor killed in the battle, and the Sommelier sailed on to Bjartavath. Met at the beach by a scowling mob, the new chief declares they are unwelcome, before being shamed by Kleppjarn into offering hospitality while they remain. Kleppjarn's hut turns out to contain the wounded Ulfar, and Kleppjarn has bad news from the North - the Skalds say that the Living Runes which fell during the Worst Days walk again, and that the Bearsarks at Klorbulg are led by Villskap and unnamed others, and that they have been visited by foreigners. Conclusions are surmised...