Vigilante Game Twenty Nine: Minor Intrigue and Fey Favors or The Boots, The Boar, and The Blessing

At first, you could mistake the Feywilds for a paradise. It is beautiful, truly, and drenched in magic, but once you’re there for any length of time you realize the tragedy of the place. These creatures have not been elevated by their pristine and wondrous home. Despite all the splendor, despite all their power, they are just as petty as we are. Maybe it’s worse. Maybe they’re bored.

We were soon ushered into the hall of Rhiannon, Edna’s patron, who sprawled casually on her glamorous throne. She told us exactly how much trouble we were in, and how little anyone here cared to help us. To heal the mother’s heart and protect our world from potential destruction, we would have to gain three favors, and we would have to work for them.

We would obtain our first favor in the middle of an epic hedge maze. Every minute that we stumbled through the tangled trail fell heavy on us. We didn’t know how much time we did or didn’t have. Even one wrong turn could mean that we had failed and that there was no home to save. Frustrated, after hours, we finally emerged into a small town. There, we met the creature who could determine our fates. Byakku, the man who could bestow the blessing of fire, was a cobbler, and he was missing a pair of boots.

We investigated the crime scene, his shop, quickly. The theft hadn’t been subtle, and we would take its lead. We found a necklace inscribed with a name by a melted back door, and we started asking after it in town. At the local inn, we spooked a man who tried to dodge us in the back allies. We followed him to a lead, and that lead to another until we were face to face with the culprit’s boyfriend, Eric. Luckily, even creatures in the Feywild can be charmed, and a wink and a smile from Edna made him cooperate. His girlfriend, Lydia El’Ranatoth, had stolen the boots which, were intended for Princess Daneliean Dandelion, so that she could curse them. She hated the Princess, and in the way of the of the Fey, things couldn’t end at that. He let us use a teleportation rune which transported us to a warehouse. Inside, we found her.

It was a garish and tragic site, surely, but with all the hoops we would jump through, later on, it’s almost funny looking back. Lydia was wearing those beautiful boots and dancing like a mad thing. Her feet bled, and she looked starved. It wasn’t hard to discern that her curse had gone awry. Far from surprised, we helped her out of the dancing boots, patched her up and hoofed it back to town, but things weren’t settled yet. The cobbler asked, or, really, ordered us to deliver the cursed boots to the Princess. After all, their arrival was overdue. Maybe he expected that we would be blamed for the curse, maybe he didn’t care either way. No matter his plan, the hedges waited for us.

The Princess lived in the center of the maze, and we talked Lydia into leading us there. We sprinted through, doing our best to ignore our magical surroundings. Then, in a splendid castle guarded my mean looking Fey, we asked for counsel with the princess.

After some strong-armed coaching, Lydia delivered Princess Dandelion’s boots and explained, sullenly, what she had done to them. The squabbling that ensued (and a small bribe) let us sneak out of the castle without much hassle, at least that’s what we thought at the time.

After finally obtaining our blessing from Byakku, we were given our next target. The wind blessing which could be found in the Plains of Rolling Thunder. We hadn’t gotten far from the hedge, however, before hitting a snag. In the thick woods surrounding the maze, something appeared in our pockets. Notes from Princess Dandelion, asking, repeatedly, for a suckling hog for dinner.

Maybe this only proved our place in things. Our planet was chosen as a home for the world breaker out of disinterest. The monster that waited under us for our entire lives was only there because the rest of existence felt that we were insignificant. Boring. And here we were, being used as casual playthings by fantastical and beautiful creatures who, I’m sure, never even tried to learn our names.

At least hunting was something we were good at.

The Wild Hunt descended, actively pursuing our new target. The way things were, of course, a deal was struck up between us. If we killed the boar, we could deliver it to the princess, if not, our barbarian, Uluthrek, would become a member of the hunt, and an impish but staggeringly power Fey royal would be on our bad side. We didn’t waste time shaking hands. Instead, we ran.

The Wild Hunt on their fierce mounts were outpacing us, but we could outwit them. Berthok created a false set of tracks, and while the hunt veered away, we sprinted through the thick brush. Finally, just beyond some trees, we heard it.

I was the first one to see the gigantic boar, its eyes black and it’s massive tusks cruel and curling. Even its smell threatened, thick and rank. Finally, something on this plane of existence made sense.

My friends tore through the brush behind me, and we went straight to work.

Grass and roots shot around the creature as our bard and warlock tied him where he stood. Blinded and immobile, our party assaulted the boar while the distant sound of hooves grew louder. The tusks of the creature began to glow, but as the creature bellowed Edna cut a tusk away. Desperate and in pain, the boar tore through the foliage that kept him in place and began to charge just as the wild hunt found us. Without pause, Uluthrek clung to the belly of the beast as Ereden toppled the hunt with a wall of force. The boar barreled panicked through the woods before Uluthrek ended the thing. With a crash, the creature fell, and we knew that our gamble had worked.

As Uluthrek tore through the carcass of the gigantic boar, I felt, for the first time in a long time, a sense of relief. If we, small mortals from a small city in the dark corner of existence, could outwit some of this plain’s best hunters, maybe we weren’t nothing. Maybe we mattered, even in the smallest way. Maybe we had what it took to hold our own against an existence that didn’t care for us one way or the other.

Maybe we could win.

End of game Twenty Nine.

-- Arlyn LaBelle is a poet, flash fiction writer and legal assistant living in Austin, Texas. Her work has appeared multiple times in the Badgerdog summer anthologies as well as The Blue Hour, LAROLA, JONAH Magazine, The Oddville Press, Songs of Eretz, Grey Sparrow Press, Cease, Cows and The Southern Poetry Review.

Thoughts on the game: Since I am DMing for MED now, Arlyn (June Shin) has started writing the recaps of the games and sharing them with the other players. If you couldn’t tell she is a much better writer than I am. Haha. I want to add to the certain things of the game, but since most of us read this I will refrain from spoiling anything for them. Running the game has been awesome so far and I can’t wait for the party to figure out what is happening in the Feywild and to their old party leader Martin. Next week I will be out of town so my Brother Ezra (Edna) will be running the game in my place. His plans for next week sound like a lot of fun so I will update you once that happens!

As always I shall explain the game! Vigilante is a group cooperative world gaming experience. A combination of several D&D groups, all established as different guilds, are all active in the world influencing the events of the town of Bastion and surrounding area. The guilds allow everyone to exchange items and it also allows players to switch parties to pursue different quests and be part of events. The story continues to progress in cool and inventive ways and I am so grateful to the collaborative Dungeon Masters for putting it all together, but there are still a ton of things to do and uncover and I look forward to more interesting and exciting adventures.

I know I haven’t been posting my weekly games weekly, but I will have all of them typed up soon. I’ll keep posting updates on my weekly games going forward! Hopefully!