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Your name is John Nicholas Cagebert, aspiring bard of the Prospitian realm, and things could not have possibly gone worse than they are going right now.
“John! Get your ass over here!” Vriska’s strained hiss cuts through the noise of battle, and you look over to see the tiefling rogue clutching her side as she staggers behind a wooden crate. One of the goblins that ambushed your party lies dead at her feet on the rough stone of the cavern floor. You gulp.
Across the cavern, you can see Sir Jeffery using his longsword to great effect against the goblins. Beside him, Sister Pyralspite lands a wicked slash from her shortsword on the biggest one, who shrieks in pain. Hearing the cry of their leader, the goblins start to swarm the two members of your party dealing the most damage.
Glancing back to Vriska, you can see blood dripping through the fingers holding her side, so you gather your courage and dart from your own hiding place through the shadows to reach her. “That looks pretty bad,” you mumble, unsure if you should place your hands upon the wound or your accordion to kickstart the healing spell.
She growls. “Just start singing or something! I need to get back out there.”
“Fine! Be careful though,” you whisper, and—
“Wait, so, Cure Wounds is one d-eight, right?” you ask Victoria.
Next to you, your girlfriend nods and moves to get a closer look at your character sheet. “One d-eight plus your spellcasting ability modifier. Which is Charisma, so…”
You flip through your sheet. “Uh… my Charisma is sixteen, that means it’s plus three?”
Victoria gives you an excited grin. “Yeah! Okay, now roll for how much you heal me!”
“This is so cool.” You grab the eight-sided die from your swirly blue set that Victoria gave you for your birthday, and roll it into her dice tray at your elbow. “I got a six! That’s nine points of healing to Vriska!”
“Hell yeah,” Dave holds his hand up for a fist bump, which you oblige. On the other side of the table, next to Victoria, her best friend Theresa cheers.
Behind the Dungeon Master’s screen, Dirk nods and marks something down in his notebook. “Describe how you heal Vriska,” he directs, gesturing to the grid where your minis are scattered.
You take a deep breath. “I—
“—need you to hold still,” you ask Vriska, and settle your hands around the gash in her side. She grunts, but stills.
You pucker your lips and start to whistle, concentrating on the slowly building feeling of arcane power gathering at your fingertips. When you finish the first verse of the jaunty melody, you can see her cobalt-blue flesh already starting to knit together. By the time you finish the second verse, there isn’t even a scar.
“Thanks, John,” she says, and gives you an evil little smile before she jumps up and dashes across the cavern. You watch as Sister Pyralspite unleashes a cone of icy wind from her mouth, covering three goblins in frost, before Vriska grabs one of them from behind and slits his throat.
You notice the slowly dropping numbers of the goblin horde, and decide you can probably jump in at this point without taking too many hits. Drawing your light hammer, you shout a nasty insult at the closest goblin, imbuing your words with just enough magic to make him flinch in pain.
“Nice one,” Sir Jeffery calls over to you, his deadpan face betraying nothing behind his dark quartz spectacles. Sister Pyralspite just laughs and hacks the arm off of another goblin.
The fight is over all too soon, with the combined efforts of Vriska’s fluid sneak attacks, the blades of Sir Jeffery and Sister Pyralspite, and your arcane support. Now that all of the goblins are dead, Vriska is already rummaging through the crates in their hideout for loot. Sir Jeffery joins her.
The silver scales of Sister Pyralspite are hard to miss even in the low light of the cavern, the flames from the various torches glinting off of the exposed arms of the dragonborn monk as she approaches you. “Yo, Cagebert. Got any healing left?”
Her knuckles are bruised and bleeding slightly in a few places. You pick her hands up and study them closely as you try and concentrate on the magic required to heal them, but it’s like your power has fizzled out for the time being. “Sorry, Sister. I’ll need to rest before I can give it a shot.”
“Worth a shot,” she mutters, and shrugs. “We’ll probably be able to find something back in the town. I’ll be fine.”
It’s hard to judge her expression behind the red blindfold she always wears, but you can tell the bruised knuckles hurt more than she’s letting on. You’re about to look around and see if the goblins had any bandages lying around when you hear Vriska gasp in delight.
“John! Pyralspite! Look what we found!” she calls over, gesturing for them to come see. There’s a glint in her eyes as she shoves her hand into a crate, and a second later, she pulls out a hefty canvas bag. When she drops it on the floor of the cavern, your eyes bug out of your skull when you see the sheer amount of silver coins inside. “It’s the money from the townsfolk!”
Sister Pyralspite crosses her arms and manages to give Vriska a Look, even through her blindfold. “Money that we will return to the town, right?”
Vriska pouts. “All of it?”
You give Pyralspite an approving nod. “Yeah, we should give this back to Mayor Valentine. Maybe he’ll give us a reward!”
Sir Jeffery pokes the bag of coins with his toe. “I mean, this could be our reward,” he points out.
“I mean like something cool! Like a magic item, or a weapon, or something!” you try.
That gives Vriska pause. “It would be nice to get something magical,” she muses to herself.
The paladin next to her does a double take. “Wait, for real? But the money.” He gestures to the bag again weakly.
“Come on, Jeffery,” you plead. “We want the Mayor to like us!”
He sighs. “That’s true. Fine, we’ll give it back.”
Across the table, Dave shrugs. “If we don’t get any kind of reward for this whole deal, I have dibs on smiting you both,” he addresses you and Theresa.
“If we get something really cool, then I think I should keep it for myself,” Theresa fires back, grinning.
“Hey! What about me?” you ask, leaning past Victoria to glare at Theresa, even though you know she won’t see it. “I’m glaring at you, by the way.”
She sticks her tongue out in your general direction.
Dirk clears his throat. “So, are you all heading back to the town, then?”
“Wait, what else did I find in the crates?” Victoria asks, picking up her pencil and flipping her character sheet to the inventory page.
You can hear Dirk click something on his laptop behind the DM screen and roll a handful of dice. “You find a potion of healing, a vial of acid, three day’s worth of rations, and the Mayor’s signet ring in a small pouch.”
“Awesome!” You turn to your girlfriend in excitement. “The Mayor’s gonna love us now!”
“Ooh, can I have the potion of healing?” Dave turns to Victoria as well.
Victoria narrows her eyes. “We’ll see.”
The sun has set at last, and the four of you are enjoying a celebration in the town’s largest tavern. The Mayor had been delighted to receive his signet ring back, as well as the stolen wealth of the townsfolk, and had rewarded you all with five gold apiece and a bag of holding. Sir Jeffery had been mildly disappointed at the meager treasure, but Vriska assured you all that the small, brown bag of holding was worth more than it seemed.
Now, the four of you sat at a table in the tavern, enjoying a night of free drinks and free lodging for the rest of the week. Naturally, the conversation turned to politics.
“Do you really think Derse is going to war with Prospit?” you ask Sir Hellacious Jeffery, bonafide paladin of the Order of Clockwork. You know only that he hails from the Dersite city of Ebonpyre, as he is the only Dersite among your party— a fact he’s having to hide from the town of Prospitians around you.
He shrugs. “Things are looking pretty dicey. Ebonpyre cut off trade with Port Scorpio just a month ago… aren’t you from Port Scorpio, Vriska?”
“I’ve been lots of places,” she answers shiftily. “But it’s not like Port Scorpio is super close to the border. I’m more worried about bandits in the countryside.”
You frown. “Like in the north?”
To your left, Sister Pyralspite seems to recognize your concern. “You’re from Windyshade, aren’t you, John? That’s pretty close to the border.”
“Yeah, I’m from Windyshade,” you mumble. “Your monastery isn’t all that far.”
Vriska perks up. “The Monastery of the Mindful Thought, right? I’ve been there before.”
“You have?” Sister Pyralspite’s surprise is clear. “When? Why?”
Immediately, the rogue glances side to side and rubs the base of a cobalt blue horn. “I might have tried to steal from you guys before I realized there were easier targets,” she admits.
The monk laughs and takes a swig from her flagon. “Good luck with that,” she snickers.
Her good mood is infectious, and even the impending threat of war between Derse and Prospit fades into a worry for another night. You decide to order another round, and end up playing some drinking songs on your accordion for the whole tavern, much to the delight of the townsfolk. When you catch Vriska’s eye across the tavern, she waggles her eyebrows until you blush.
This could be the start of something great.
“Good session, guys!” you announce, gathering your things from the table with everyone else. “That was super fun. When’s the next one?” You look to Dirk.
He shuts his laptop and starts to pack up as he speaks. “Can you guys do every other Thursday at five? Next session would be not this next Thursday, but the one after that.”
Dave nods. “You know I’m free.”
Victoria pipes up as she helps Theresa put away her sheet and dice. “Works for me.”
“Thanks, Vickie,” Theresa mumbles, grabbing her cane from where it’s propped against the table. “Yeah, I can do Thursdays.”
You smile. “Same here! I’m so excited for the next session already.” After making sure you have all of your stuff, you turn to Victoria and Theresa. “You guys ready to go?”
Behind you, Dave grabs his house key from his pocket. “I’ll walk y’all to the door.”
“Yeah, we’re ready,” Theresa says, giving you a thumbs up and a grin.
At the front door to the Strider apartment, Dave pats you on the shoulder. “He won’t say it, but Dirk’s been planning this shit like it’s part of his college classes. I’m glad y’all were willing to play.”
“Of course! Victoria’s been wanting to play D&D with me for ages. Because she’s a nerd,” you stage-whisper, and your girlfriend smacks your arm lightly.
“Whatever, Egbert!” She rolls her eyes flippantly, but the tips of her ears are red. Gotcha.
You pull the door open and wave goodbye to Dave. “Bye, Dave! See you tomorrow in class!”
He gives you a lazy salute and shuts the door behind you.
“That was really fun,” Theresa offers quietly, the sound of her cane clicking against the floor of the apartment hallway familiar to you and Victoria both. “Thanks for being willing to help me with all of this.”
Victoria takes Theresa’s free arm in her own and tosses her hair back. “You’re my best friend,” she states, as though it’s the most obvious fact in the world. “Besides, someone has to be there to make fun of John’s bad dice rolls besides me.”
Theresa laughs that jagged, abrasive laugh of hers that warms your heart. “That’s true!”
You can’t keep the happy, goofy smile off of your face, and you kiss Victoria on the cheek. She kisses your cheek back, and it’s obvious she’s trying to be nonchalant, but her whole face has gone pink. “Tonight was very fun,” she belatedly agrees.
Yeah, you could get used to this kind of thing.