1149

Scribed by Theodosius

Spring 1149 AD

As I sit here at the Council table writing these lines, I find it hard to reflect on all that has happened to Severn Temple. In just over a single season our council has been halved and the covenant has most definitely been sent spinning back into Spring. I still do not understand fully what happened to bring about the end of Madoc, Turold and Ruaridh - one small, petty argument over a simple lie and the three of them are now dead. That makes Aelfwin the longest serving member of Council at six years, and myself the oldest member! If the entire thing was not so lamentable and disastrous I think I would be laughing. Of the previous season I will add nothing to Astrius' words, except to say that although I am shocked and dismayed at what happened I still trust that Turold and Ruaridh worked for the best interests of this covenant.

The season itself started on a crisp, sunny day, much at odds with our mood at Council. We talked of little other than our seasons work, other than that Clifford (Turold's ex-apprentice) had abided by our request not to leave the covenant and that Aelfwin would use his help in the laboratory. Astrius reported that he had successfully developed the light spell we talked of last season. We also discussed the possibility of going to Blackthorn to register the Heart of the Forest as a Vis site, but it was decided that with bandits upon the road it would not be safe to do so. As for our season's work, Astrius would study the Aquam texts, Aelfwin would extract vim vis and I would seek out the Heart of the Forest as there was no longer any within the covenant that knew of it's location. At the same time we said that during the year, Astrius and myself would work upon our Parma Magica and Aelfwin would practise his affinity with potions.

Cormoran, although not yet a member of this covenant and therefore not at Council decided that he would spend this season about the covenant being trained in how to use the sword, a weapon he has never been able to afford before. Nor, I would have thought, would he have been able to find a sword for someone his size to wield. It was shortly after this that Cormoran was sparing with the Castellan, when the Castellan decided to show off his magical protections. Much to his surprise and our eventual dismay, Cormoran's blow landed full upon his person, although the Castellan was unharmed it appears that the enchantments in the sword and tabard had faded. Upon discovering this we thought to check the rest of the covenant's magical items, it turns out that all of the items made by Turold had ceased to function. Both Aelfwin and Astrius had heard of this sort of thing happening before, it seems that with some magi their magic is so strongly bound to them that it 'dies' when they do. This has bereft the covenant of many powerful and useful magical items. Yet another strike of bad luck against us all. Still on the plus side, at least we discovered this now, rather than when using the items would have been critical. Cormoran has only just arrived and he has already helped us - although inadvertently.

Later on in the season whilst I was about in the forest, Dialectica paid us a visit; she had come to return Madoc's belongings to us. A decent gesture on her part as Blackthorn knew that Madoc was no longer a part of this or any covenant and I would have thought could quite fairly have claimed his belongings for themselves. Anyhow, within his packs there were apparently three large sacks of Vis, to be exact 31 pawns of vim Vis! When I consider Madoc's arguments and stalling over paying the covenant the vim Vis he owed I am amazed at this seemingly blatant act of duplicity. There was worse to come however, Aelfwin tried to determine where the Vis had come from and randomly chose a pawn of Vis from each bag - he discovered that the original form for this Vis was acorns! Madoc had been going to the Heart and taking its Vis from it without informing us. So not only did he lie to us, but he stole from us as well - we do not know for how long, but I would imagine for the previous four or so years. I hope that we never see the likes of him within this Council again - we have enough problems without one of our own working against us. I wonder did this theft have anything to do with Idris' warning to him? Well I'll never know now.

As for my travels, well I set off and headed towards Blackney, as I do like to start my season's travels by going and relaxing with the good folk there. From there we headed towards the southern part of the wood, we knew only that the Heart was in this area of the forest, but so is the Dell - I made very sure not to go anywhere near this area. I talked initially to an old Chestnut tree, it informed me of the direction the Heart lay in but that the path was hidden - if I was meant to find it I would. Talking with trees is an interesting and rewarding experience I have found, but time does seem to fly by when I am immersed in conversation. When I came round from the spell it was already night, so we set up camp and I told some stories to keep us all entertained. During the evening Ferret (one of our scouts and heavily fae touched) and Dylan spotted a Cor hiding in the trees. I thought little of it as I vaguely remember that these creatures wander the woods when the fae season of Winter is ascendant. However not long after, Ferret and the others spotted many more of them in the trees, along with many wolves moving through the shadows. What this presaged I had no idea, but as they made no move upon us I bade the guard to remain still. Then a small figure wearing a dark mask approached the edge of the shadows; she said (she seemed to have a young girls voice) that she had a message for me and that I should approach her. Obviously I was a little concerned by this and I was not going to go into the darkness with the wolves and Cors about the place, so I approached to near the edge of the firelight and said that she could give me the message there. Unfortunately, she was either not affected by the weak light this far from the fire, or I had stepped to close to the shadows, she reached forward and touched me. The next thing I knew the woods were whistling past me at an incredible speed and the land about got even darker and colder - as if the world spun about me and I moved not a single step. Then I stopped and found myself on a dark hill with a single stone atop it. There I was given a message about a vision of my future - a warning if you will. Once I had received this I was sent straight back to the covenant only to discover that they had been warned of my disappearance and Aelfwin had left for Blackthorn to get help from Sylvania. Sylvania had herself arrived and left in the time I was gone, it seems she has little sway over the Unseelie folk and was going to fetch the Merinitan Quaesitor from Loch Leglean, Lynaris.

Of course I did not wish to waste the Quaesitor's time but neither Astrius nor myself could think of a way to get message to her to stop her coming. As it happened Lynaris could obviously travel exceptionally quickly, she arrived shortly after I had returned. She was kind enough to ask how I fared and then took her leave.

I went back out into the forest to continue searching, but other than many more conversations with the trees of the Dean nothing exciting or informative happened and as the season drew to a close I returned to Severn Temple.

Theo's additional notes (1)

Summer

The first, happy order of business at the Council meeting was to accept Cormoran as a member of this covenant. One of his first acts was to offer to the covenant an exceptionally large pearl, with the magical property of being able to purify a liquid! This has been put to good use by being placed in the covenant's well - thereby giving us safe drinking water, and the happy additional benefit that the beer we brew has never tasted sweeter. A most generous gift indeed. It was also decided that Cormoran's lab would be at the top of the tower next to Astrius.

I reported over my lack of success to find the Heart, which was hardly unexpected, in truth I expect to have to work to gain the Dean's acceptance and this may take some time.

For our seasons work Astrius will once more study the Aquam texts, it seems he has some plans for working in the element that few within his House study. Aelfwin would study the Corporem texts and Cormoran would read the journal as a covenant's service (oh, he would also be joining Astrius and myself in working on our Parmas). Whilst I would try to get to know the lay of the land within the forest with a hope of working to gain it's trust.

Whilst I was journeying the covenant had two visitors. The first was Quaesitor Yania, she came to finish her investigations and to release the sancti of Turold and Ruaridh - the pair of them have been declared dead, with no proof that they were involved in the attack on the Redcap or the death of Ianeous. Madoc has also been declared dead but what happened to him is unknown. Their cases, along with that against Venius, will be heard at the next Tribunal.

Later in the season the second visitor was the Redcap Loretius. He delivered the following news. Of mundane interest the King has begun to buy land from the church at a paltry price, apparently some dissent within the church is allowing him to do this. The abbey at Tintern has been re-consecrated, the Dean of the abbey has heard of rumours of an evil in the forest and an expedition is being mounted. There is some suspicion that Yvonne of Micheldean may be involved in this. Considering her past, her significant influence over mundane matters is very suspect. Finally the English King has won a significant victory over the Scots, so it seems the English prosper in both Scotland and France. Of Hermetic interest, there were two letters, one for Astrius an invitation to explore the old Vis sites of Moorstow, the second for the council from Jordael. My Pater was informing us of a possible new member to the Council, a young Quaesitor called Medius. Jordael encouraged us to accept his application as this may help stave off an investigation or even dissolution of the covenant at the Tribunal. Finally Clifford sent message to Shaun of Merinita, an old friend of Turold's - I assume over the issue of who will continue Clifford's apprenticeship.

What of my season out in the woods of the Dean? Well it was eventually successful; I gained the support of a guide who would show me the way into the Heart on the condition that we planted the acorns instead of using the Vis. At Council it was decided that as we were not going to get access to the vis anyhow and that this may in the long run help strengthen the magic of the forest I should accept the guides help. I do hope in the future, when our goodwill has been seen to see if this Council can reap somewhat of the rewards of the forest - after all not all acorns become oaks.

Theo's additional notes (2)

During this season, when I was within the covenant Cormoran approached me and reminded me that we were to go and capture the Vis from the Boar tide. This we did and subsequently gained three pawns of Aquam Vis. I must add here that I am most impressed with Cormoran's proficiency with magic - although he is only newly graduated he is able to enact spontaneous spell effects that the rest of us certainly could not manage, so once again we are able to harvest vis from the Severn.

Autumn

This was a quiet Council meeting we discussed our seasons work and nothing more. Astrius is to create a lantern enchanted with the light spell he invented, this can then be placed in the pit from which the shadows come. So hopefully we will be warded from them for good now. Aelfwin will be studying the Terram texts; obviously he is expanding his knowledge of the Arts other than Creo and Corporem. Cormoran as a second covenant service will go and extract the Ignem vis from the cave, this may take time as none of us know the way there, although I'm sure the description in the journal will be accurate enough. Whilst I will spend time amongst the locals, expanding my knowledge of the local area and trying to counter these rumours of evil in the Dean. If possible I will see what else I can learn of Yvonne and the missing children.

About two days into the season we have a visitor, Medius finally joined us. The Council immediately voted to allow him to stay. Several issues arose from this. Medius signed the Charter but declined to sign the codicil of the Charter allowing the other members of the Council to enter his sanctum if we judged he was in trouble. After which we discussed his seasons activity, Medius requested that he be allowed to read the Journal, which the Council agreed to as his first covenant service. It seems that the consortis that came with Medius, called Giovanni, is an educated man (to be expected coming from the Rome Tribunal I suppose), and would also like to read our mundane library, to which the Council acceded. As a final item of discussion, Medius said that he would be using Ruaridh's old laboratory and would use one of the decent sets of equipment. Cormoran very kindly allowed me to have the fourth set of this old but precious equipment.

Following this meeting we had a feast to formally welcome Medius to the covenant, I told a few stories and played some music, although I'm not certain our new sodalis appreciated some of the bawdier songs.

The next day, suffering from a mild hangover I met up with Cormoran and we both set off for Blackney and then Chepstow, where we would part and go about our seasons work. I write about Cormoran's adventure first as he told me off it when he returned.

At Chepstow Cormoran hired a barge to take them up river to Monmouth from there they would walk to Raglan, thence to Abergavenny and just beyond that to the vis site. The journey to Monmouth and then Raglan was easy with no problems arising. However at Raglan they started hearing rumours of bandits and armed caravans being sacked. Therefore as a precaution they decided to see if they could travel with some merchants travelling that way, assuming that there would be safety in numbers. To explain away what they were doing travelling to Abergavenny, they said that they were just mercenaries looking for work, as Cormoran has no sense of the Gift about him, this seemed to work fine.

On route they came across a recently burnt caravan and some expertly shot guards - after discussing this they decide to head on back to Raglan rather than risk pushing on. Once back there the merchant tells the local Knight, whose name escapes me, what has occurred, and the Knight decides to do something about these local pests and hires the merchant guards to go with him. Unfortunately Cormoran and crew having mentioned that they were mercenaries could not get out of this. So a large armed party head on to the site of the burnt caravan looking for the bandits.

After a few days of searching, in which they found a few traces of the bandits, the night watch reported hearing several wolf howls in the forest. Now it was a full moon and Cormoran has read this Journal and wondered how close to the hunting grounds of the werewolves they were, however his knowledge of local geography was not up to the task. However he kept a close watch on events just to be on the safe side, luckily nothing happened that night.

The next night was a different story. Following some tracks the party plans on attacking the bandits the next morning, and set up camp. The Knight orders a double watch, which was just as well as later into the night, with the full moon beaming down upon them, they hear wolves and see shadows move in the trees. The way Cormoran tells it, it was a short ugly fight with the wolves eventually been driven off, but from what I can gather from the grogs it was Cormoran himself who slew two of them. Having seen this creatures from behind a powerful magical ward I can only say that I am most impressed with the bravery of both Cormoran and the grogs that stood with him.

With the fight over there were several dead and two wounded, unfortunately for them Cormoran did not remember in time to purge their wounds with fire to ensure that the curse did not take a hold of them. One of these poor souls was Rumbold, a member of our covenant.

So the badly beaten party returned to Raglan, as soon as they got there Rumbold and the Knights man were taken to the church and held there. Where they fasted and prayed in the small hope that the curse could be removed. The priest obviously could not manage this and after one month they were both burnt alive. This is a terrible way for a brave man like Rumbold to die, especially when Aelfwin could have helped control the curse somewhat. Still there was nothing Cormoran could do to rescue Rumbold, in fact he and the grogs had to go and attend the priest so that he could hear their confessions. A pointless exercise, still it did get them out of the village and at last they could head back to the covenant, where they reported that the road to Abergavenny and the vis site is closed to us for now.

In the meantime I had been travelling about the Dean. I had heard in Chepstow of the re-consecration of the Abbey at Tintern, whilst I fear that this will just be another source of trouble for the covenant, it is also possible that we may gain from them. We might be able to sell them glass, and I established a contact to talk to about this after I raised it with the Council. Then I got about my work. I discovered that after the first investigation into the 'wizard' and his death, Yvonne of Mitcheldean, petitioned the Baron to keep tracking the Wizard - the Baron refused. So she then petitioned the Earl, whom she convinced, the Earl then ordered the Baron to continue the hunt for the Wizard. However with the Baron of Monmouth still searching for Cadfallen and believing that the Wizard is dead, it's unlikely to be a problem from that quarter. As for the rumour of evil within the woods, these seem to be coming from Gloucester, with Monmouth mainly ignoring them and them not taken too seriously in Chepstow. As the main trade and travel route to Tintern is through Chepstow I decide to spend most of my season there quashing these rumours and starting a few of my own. His seemed to go really well, so I moved onto Monmouth to continue my activities there. By the end of season I had made a good start on stopping the circulation of these rumours, but it would take a bit longer to make sure. Then I will need to move onto Gloucester.

I also heard news that Geoffrey Plantagenate refused the King and therefore the English may face war with both the Scots and the French. Of course the Welsh are going to take advantage of this as well I would suspect.

After this I returned to the covenant.

Winter

At the last Council meeting of the year, Cormoran and myself told the Council of last seasons activities. Due to the problems with the werewolves Astrius suggests that we commission the making of another "Ward Against Fantastical Beasts" to replace the one that was destroyed when Turold died. With the ward he would then go and deal with the wolfs. As they are now threatening our safe passage to Blackthorn this is an important issue, in fact a joint venture with Blackthorn may be appropriate.

During my own report it is suggested that the rumours from Gloucester may be connected to the Fells, however I need to keep countering the current rumours and investigating where they are coming from. During this Cormoran comes up with the idea of establishing our own merchant in Chepstow, as a more direct way to sell our glass and other items and at the same time create a safe house in that town.

Then we discussed our seasons activities. It turns out that we were all studying within the covenant this seasons, with Astrius studying some Ignem vis, Cormoran the Rego texts, Aelfwin the Terram texts, Medius the Intellego texts and I was to study the mundane books on pagan lore.

With that the Council ended and a quiet season commenced. For the first time since I have been living at this covenant everybody had a peaceful and prosperous season.

At the very end of the season we had three magi visit us: Magus Shawn of Merinita, the Redcap Mathus and the Magus Tiarnan of Merinita. Shawn had come partly to escort Tiarnan but mainly to come and collect Clifford, as he knows of a maga of his House who is both looking for an apprentice and quite an expert on the fae of the stone court. So Clifford seemed quite pleased by this and has left us, I do hope he finds happiness in his future, he was an odd sort and his voice was rather annoying but seemed to have a fair heart. Tiarnan was here to petition the Council for membership, he had newly been accepted into the Order at his House meeting and had heard of us there. As his interest is in the magical and fae properties of bodies of water he was most interested in the nature of the spring and river here. Considering we have barely studied these powerful magical sources at all, the Council was very interested in having him join us. However we thought it best to be honest with Tiarnan concerning the current problems of this covenant and this definitely made him re-consider his application. In the end it was decided that he be allowed to read the journal to familiarise himself with the history of this place, then he could make an informed decision next season.

Then we had the dreadful news from Mathus that Garius was dead. He was at Bori -Tor, fighting the renegade magi of McGraine, who are still rousing the mundane forces of Scotland to attack the covenant. The enemy set a trap, and Garius knowing it was a trap decided to risk spring it in the hope that he could strike at his elusive enemy. So Magus Garius went and triggered the trap, in doing so he killed three of the eight magi there, including McGraine's right hand man - however in doing this his lost his own life. This is a terrible loss to the Tribunal and that night we toasted his memory and wished his brave spirit a safe journey.

The rest of Mathus' news was tame in comparison. Of the mundanes, he told us of the problems that the English are having with the Scots and French and that the 2nd Crusade to the Holy Lands had failed. So I would have thought we can expect some angry, scarred men returning soon. Of hermetic news: the Tribunal has been called for next midsummer at Blackthorn; Serenia has been re-appointed as Senior Quaesitor for Stonehenge. Of the current investigations it is going to be recommended that the Tribunal rules that Ruaridh murdered Madoc, that Turold is dead (but can not be connected to any crime), that Venius was a diabolist and finally that Ianeous was killed by a powerful spirit (suspected to be the Morrigan). Finally that Narwold covenant is requesting help from someone who can deal with spirits, in return they would be paid in vis.

The final event of note this season was Astrius going to Cad Gadu for Garius' funeral, he returned just as the season ended. On that sad note I end my year's service to this Journal and will let Medius continue.