Cards Reshuffled

Have you ever suddenly got the feeling that something’s wrong, without knowing exactly what? That can be very creepy, not to mention annoying. Of course, sometimes you don’t feel better even after you figure out what’s wrong, for example if it’s somebody trying to kill you, or your mother-in-law stopping by for an unexpected visit when you thought you’d get to spend the morning in bed with your loved one.

Excerpt from ‘Ruminations Of A Master Bard’

“And so it was that I conquered the foul beast, defeating the evil Rakshasa that would have preyed upon you, my lady! Ah, what a glorious battle it was and…”

“What? You didn’t defeat that Rakshasa, Helmite! It was my magnificent magic that summoned and controlled the creature that struck the actual killing blow. (Trying to steal my thunder, will he? If it’s thunder he wants, then lightning he’ll get…a lightning bolt should work wonders on that armor.)”

“Aye, ‘tis true, but…but without my strong arm to keep the beast at bay, you would have been dead within seconds, wizard. And I am certain I could have killed it myself.”

“You? Ha! You couldn’t kill a blind donkey! (I doubt he would want to harm one of his closest relatives either.)”

“I could so kill a blind donkey! And but for my True Sight spell, you would never have been able to see through that illusion. Ha! What do you say to that, villain? You owe me your life, and may Helm forgive me for it!”

“Only that if I hadn’t prodded your sluggish self into action you never would have known to cast the spell in the first place, and you would currently be in the process of being slowly digested. You owe me your life, and if anybody spreads that shameful tale about I will turn them into a slug and pour salt on it. And furthermore…”

Jaheira clutched her head with both hands. “SHUT UP!” she shouted, glaring furiously at Anomen and Edwina. They had been going on like this for about an hour or so now, ever since the battle with the Rakshasa Ihtafeer. Now she couldn’t take it anymore. “Unless both of you drop this subject right now, I will make you both intimately acquainted with my staff, by administering it to your thick skulls. The Rakshasa is dead, so let the creature rest in peace and spare us the tedium of your exaggerated boasting that is likely to attract a swarm of enemies at any moment. Do you both understand me?”

The two infuriating humans gave her two comically identical looks of affronted innocence. They actually were pouting like two children who had been deprived of their favorite toy.

“Lady Jaheira, I must protest…”

“Listen, druid, don’t attempt to order me about or…”

Jaheira bared her teeth in something that resembled a smile, but wasn’t really. She raised her staff. “You wanted to file a formal complaint?” she asked. That finally shut them up, though they both kept muttering quietly to themselves, no doubt fussing about the unfairness of it all. Children… She turned her head to notice Zaerini giving her a grateful smile.

“Thanks,” the younger half-elf whispered. “I tried to get them to calm down, but I guess they were too eager, and I didn’t have the heart to tell them off.”

“Well, I do. They could easily attract dangerous attention to us. That we have seen no druids yet does not mean they are not here. Actually, I would be very surprised if we did not run across them soon.”

The bard nodded, a concerned look in her golden eyes. “I know,” she said. “Jaheira, can you get any impression of what we’re up against? What’s causing all those animals to attack? I mean, it would take a lot of druids to control that many animals, wouldn’t it?”

Jaheira paused for a moment. “Yes,” she said. “It worries me. Even if every druid here has become corrupted, their powers should not be enough for this. I do not understand it. But I will see what I can find out, we should be close enough to the grove now that I can get a proper impression of what is happening.” Jaheira walked over to a tall cypress growing with its roots deeply sunk into the dark swamp water, resting her hand against the gnarled bark. Closing her eyes, she opened her mind, reaching out to the tree, and through the tree, to the swamp itself and the Druid Grove within it.

Cypresses, silent sentinels by the water. The water, dark and motionless, shining black like obsidian, with white water lilies floating on top and mosquitoes darting here and there above the surfaces. Fat leeches in the water, eager for blood, and frogs and toads singing their endless songs from the wet shores and the thick lily pads. Enormous ferns grew along the shores, almost resembling trees themselves, with spiders spinning silky webs between their wide leaves. Cattails bobbing here and there like their namesakes whenever a small wind stirred them, their leaves rustling. Fish, and snakes, and much, much more. It was a complicated web of life, and it spread out before her, shimmering and beautiful, open to her eyes. But…something was wrong.

The proper plants were here, and the proper animals. But there was also something else, a dark influence, like a poison permeating everything, twisting and corrupting. Whatever it was it was drawing power from the earth, from the land itself, without giving anything in return, without respect. It was brutalizing the land, harshly commanding, not requesting. And it was somehow familiar, though she couldn’t place the presence. “This land is dying,” Jaheira said in a toneless voice as her eyes snapped open. “We do not have much time.”

“Dying?” Zaerini asked. “What do you mean? How?”

The druid gripped her staff more firmly, her eyes narrowed angrily. “Something is draining this place of the lifeforce generated by the living plants and creatures here, using it ruthlessly to gain power. If the process is not halted soon, this will be a desolate wasteland. I will not allow that. I am a druid, and my duty here is clear. This evil must be stopped.”

“Minsc agrees!” the large ranger chimed in. “Minsc and Boo don’t like it when people hurt the pretty flowers and the cuddly little animals, or even the large and not-so-cuddly ones. Look at the menacing way in which his whiskers tremble! Ooooh, just let the Evil Forest Wreckers come here and try throwing trash on the ground or setting fire to things, or feeding the poor animals fatty food! Minsc and Boo will shove their feet down their throats to turn them all into Hamster Wheels!”

“Yes,” Zaerini said, smiling. “That would sort of make them pause, I think.”

The party slowly progressed through the swamp, and Jaheira’s sense of unease grow, as did the impression of corruption around here. The same plants grew here, but they were…odd, their shapes tormented and twisted, and with far too many rotting leaves. The mosquitoes had gone completely silent, as had the frogs. She hadn’t heard a single birdcall for several minutes now. And she could swear there were eyes watching her from a distance. Evil, malicious eyes. Eyes belonging to somebody who wanted her dead. All the others too, but her specifically.

“Hm, this place sort of reminds me of my second cousin, Alec Jansen,” Jan said with an annoying gleam in his eyes that Jaheira recognized all too well. “See, he was doing research on the rare Swamp Turnip in a secret laboratory way out in the swamp, a turnip that would completely eliminate starvation for gnomes all over Faerun, when suddenly – KABOOM!”

“’Kaboom’?” Edwina asked in a weary voice.

“Yep, it was Alec’s Archnemesis, the fiendishly Evil Dr Anton Urbane, out to steal the secret recipe and turn the entire swamp into an amusement park. Why do villains always cook up such silly schemes, Red? I’d like your input on this in order to improve the story.”

“Personally,” the Red Wizard said between clenched teeth, “I think that the painful and drawn-out death of a prattling gnome sounds like an excellent plan that any sane and intelligent person would approve of.”

“Funny, that’s what Dr Urbane said too, before he blew up my relative’s laboratory with a fireball. He wasn’t related to you, by any chance? I have to warn you, Red, that would mean a blood feud between the two of us, and the wrath of the Jansens isn’t a pretty thing.”

Edwina sighed and shot the grinning gnome a dark look. “I am not related to some half-baked lunatic with a turnip obsession and a ridiculous name.”

“Oh come on, Anton’s not that bad. No worse than ‘Edwin’, is it?” Jan swiftly dodged the wizard’s staff as Edwina took a swing for his head, and then went on without drawing breath, balancing along a fallen log. “Where was I? Oh yes, poor Alec. He survived, you see.”

“Why was that bad?” Jaheira asked, before she could stop herself.

“Why, because the turnip formula had leaked into the swamp water when the lab blew up, and when poor Alec’s bloody and mutilated body fell into the swamp the secret formula reacted with his body and turned him into…SWAMP TURNIP!” Jan hummed a few bars of a eerie and somehow…wet…tune. “Half gnome, half mutated slimy swamp turnip. It’s funny, his wife Linda Jansen always did say that he was a bit of a vegetable after he’d had his dinner.”

“And then what?” Zaerini asked.

“Well, he wanted revenge on Dr Urbane, of course.” Jan’s voice took on a sorrowful note. “So he crept into his garden and…er…got intimate with the good Anton’s favorite rose bush that was meant to win the prize at the big gardening fair that week, spread his seeds, so to speak. I’m afraid that rose bush wasn’t too popular with the judges once cousin Alec had worked his swamp magic on it, but they were popular with it. It ate them all, and then it screamed ‘Feed me, Feeeeed me!” at Anton, very aggressively if you ask me. The last anybody saw of Anton he was legging it away over the hills, bleeding and screaming like a baby, with the rose bush crawling after him, or so cousin Alec said.”

Edwina shook her head. “What a load of bollocks!” she sneered.

Jan nodded. “Yep,” he said, “that’s what the rose bush said too…don’t tell me you’ve heard this story before? You should have stopped me!”

Edwina moaned quietly.

Jaheira suddenly stopped, raising her hand to warn the others. That sense of creeping unease was growing even stronger now, and she didn’t think it had anything to do with Jan’s atrocious story. The air was growing denser by the second, it was almost like trying to breathe water now, and she could feel sweat trickling down her back, itching furiously. The mud seemed to suck even harder at her boots than before.

They came silently, people dressed in green, gray or brown, colors mean to blend in with nature, and they almost seemed to rise from the swamp itself as they stepped out of their hiding places. Most of them seemed young, mere striplings to Jaheira’s eyes. Some looked frightened, some determined. Most had that glazed and unquestioning look in their eyes that is common to all true fanatics. They wielded spears and staffs, or wicked scimitars, and there were at least twenty of them she thought. Her fellow druids, but not her fellows anymore, not judging from the hostile looks on the faces surrounding her. Still, she had to at least try to observe the forms of courtesy.

“Greetings, brothers and sisters in nature,” Jaheira stiffly said. “I am Jaheira, a druid as you, and I seek passage to the Grove.”

One of the druids, a young brown-haired man with freckles and a pug-nose, glared at her, cold hatred in his eyes. “We know who you are, filth. You are no true druid, and your very presence pollutes this place, as does that of these…city-dwellers.” He spat the last word out like a curse. “But we know how to deal with your kind.” He raised his voice, and his scimitar along with it. “In Faldorn’s name! KILL THEM ALL!”

Faldorn! Jaheira instantly recognized the name, and from the startled looks on Zaerini’s and Edwina’s faces, she thought that they did too. She certainly remembered the Shadow Druid they had encountered in the Cloakwood Forest, bent on the destruction of all that she considered a threat to nature. The hatred that poisons everything, the malign presence…now I see. Faldorn. A Shadow Druid, here, twisting the Grove, making druids hated everywhere. She must be stopped. She will be stopped. Jaheira snarled like a wolf, gripping her quarterstaff firmly as she prepared to battle.

“Come then,” she whispered. “Fall, and feed the earth.”