Every time we woke up without getting attacked I started feeling extremely paranoid. Melissa might be the group’s gamemaster; but I’ve played enough dnd and pathfinder to know that the game is balanced around daily encounters.

The holdfasters were all very nice and loaded us up with piles of supplies to get us to the river. I was half expecting them to be doppelgangers or hags or something. But we left without incident and headed towards the next holdfast on our journey. The forest was magical. Golden brown leaves bedecking massive oaks and maples. According to Gorn the elementals we had seen which were made of wood and snow were called spirites. Though the translation spell he used called them sprites. Whatever they were called the forest was crawling with them. Mossy furred squirrels, maple leaf hummingbirds and dragonflies made out of the wind itself.

I was so tempted to pull out my guitar; but I couldn’t shake the crawling feeling behind my spine, I kept myself busy by asking Gorn the names of the various critters in Low Imperial. To be quite honest he was useless with anything but the most common names. But every so often Eris came to report on her scouting and filled in the gaps. Rachel joined the conversation and seemed to pick it up a lost faster than me. But I guess you must have a knack for them if you already speak five languages.

After that the conversation turned towards the Pantheon. According to Gorn most bards in human lands worshipped the nine Muses. Which, despite having the same title as the Greek deities, weren’t all female. “Of course you know Vael. Who is called Valdric or Valerus in human lands. I’ll avoid talking about the dwarvish names for the rest. No need to get too confusing. There’s Biblos; god of knowledge. His priesthood runs libraries across civilisation. Though the Great Library in the Dweornbergen is obviously the best of the lot. Then there’s Erosis. God of love and passion. And the Many Masked One, who is patron on actors, spies and anyone hiding their true selves. He or she, depending on the situation, is very popular among all number of people. And has as many names as masks.”

In my head I decided to assume the Many Masked One was genderfluid or non binary and I’d use the pronouns ‘them’ and ‘they.’ It felt a bit rude making assumptions; but when I asked Gorn he said while Low Imperial didn’t make the distinction; High imperial used a neuter gender for deities like the Many Masked One and Nixos. Though he did laugh when I tried to explain how we viewed gender. I think he agreed with some of the more backwards members of British society. Apparently gender varied wildly by culture; and dwarves were particularly strict about gender roles.

Souring on the conversation I barely paid attention to the other five. Melody, goddess of music, Taalus, god of language, literature and poetry. Simplisis, god of fools, clowns and protector of idiots. And the Lord and Lady. Gods of luck and fate respectively. Apparently calling on either of their real names brings their attention on you. And as Gorn said, “the only thing stupider than fucking with Fate is expecting all Luck to be good luck.” Call me superstitious; but I crossed my fingers behind my back at that statement.

It took the rest of the day to get to the next Holdfast. This one was a mix of humans and satysr. There was another dance that night and I found myself drunk and snogging a satyr boy. I’ve never been a furry; but it made a lot more sense in the moment than it did the next day. Both Rachel and Meacham were watching us like hawks; so I was lucky it didn’t go any further.

“I can’t believe you made out with a goat,” Sara said. “How bad was his breath?”

“It was pretty minty you racist shit. I think they use some sort of herbal mouthwash. “

“It’s common in rural regions for witches to make various soaps and washes. Only monsters and savages don’t bother keeping clean,” Gorn interrupted. “Though I do miss a good sauna. As much as I love seeing the world nothing beat the comforts of home.”

It took the rest of the day to get to the river. The open wilderness developed into a rough dirt path that must have seen more common traffic. We did see some combat that day. but they were trash mobs. A trio of juvenile forest trolls barely five feet tall and a massive bear foraging for food. I don’t know what it says about me that I felt more guilty about the bear than the trolls.

The holdfast by the river was a mix of humans, satyrs and halflings. Gorn called them gnomes but they were stereotypical one meter tall men and women with bare furry feet and a love of food that bordered on gluttony. The feast that night was glorious. Five courses; each more delicious than the last.

The next morning it was time to go upriver. The barge stunk to high heaven. It was filled with goa’ts cheese, raw wool and green timber. The fresh pine smell did not mix well with the pungent cheese and musky wool.

I was trying to keep myself from gagging when the gnome captain said, “You lot best behave yourselves. I can only make two or three more trips before the river freezes over. And I won’t tolerate any delays.” Unlike the gnomes at the holdfast he was wearing shoes and was strict about eating three square meals a day. When I enquired as to the reason he said he wanted nothing to do with those rural ‘savages.’

The barge was pulled against the current by a pair of goats the size of plough horses. They were extremely shaggy and from the smell I suspected they were the breed that produced the wool. I kept busy by trying to compose a song about our journey. Rachel worked on her language skills with the captain while Gen and Simon did their best to communicate magical theory. The rest of the party sparred with their various weapons.

The river itself wasn’t very wide. And the current was quite fast. “I’m surprised the goats can pull such a heavy load,” Simon remarked to Gorn during supper.

“There are probably runes of lightness underneath the boat. I wouldn’t trust any rune carved by a human to last more than a few centuries; but every little bit helps.

“Runes of lightness? I wonder how they work? I assume they somehow mitigate forces applied to an object in a specific direction; since they’d need to counteract the force applied by the river and not the tension in the ropes pulling the boat.” Simon’s technobabble went way over my head. But I thought it was interesting.

“Boy; you’re over thinking things. Lightness has nothing to do with force. It just makes things easier to move. Otherwise a sword with a rune of lightness would do less damage than one without one. But that I definitely not the case.” Gorn was grinning as he spoke.

“So magic doesn’t use the same laws as physics. This is amazing. Can you know how to draw the rune? I’ve got to do some experiments.” Simon was shouting in his excitement.

Gorn’s tone turned sour. “I’m no runemaster. And even if I was my clanmothers would kill me if I gave away clan secrets.”

“But the runes are being used in the boat.” Simon looked confused.

“Boy, you don’t understand dwarves. Just because humans stole the runes seven thousand years ago doesn’t change the fact that dwarven runes are sacred to the clans. Don’t press me on this.”Gorn had his hand on his warhammer. Simon looked like he wanted to argue; but Sara dragged him away before anything else could happen.

I left the galley and stared out at the stars. All three moons were small crescents and the stars in the sky were breathtaking. I pulled out my guitar and started singing. “Somewhere over the rainbow. Way up high….”