critical role campaign 4, episode 27 ‘complicated questions’ - in which the gang meets with a king, a demon, and the most heinous bitch in aramán.
the thumbnail has luis pulling a very weepy face… I CAN’T DEAL WITH MORE AZUNE TEARS, PLEEEEASE. my poor boy.
we are at the hallowed round and SOMEONE HAS ALREADY MOVED THE COFFIN OF OLBALAD OUT OF THE ‘LICE WIGS’ BOX. god fucking dammit agakshaksh. bolaire and murray are just like CAN’T HAVE THAT! and take the coffin 😂 they also collect up the bits of pariah blade they have hidden here () and ask olgud to bring the rest of them STRAIGHT to hal’s house when the barking crew returns with them. jesus…. it seemed like such a good hiding place at the time! 😂
olgud says hi to thimble and warns her that the crow keepers are looking for her 💀 which, i mean, we Knew, but what does that even mean at this point agskshsjs. olgud also says he is saving seats for all of them, for the show. 🥹
as they leave the theatre, murray tells thimble she’s pretty sure there are no crow keepers left to hunt her down, and brennan confirms she’s right GAMAHSKAH the schemers and soldiers single-handedly took down the crow keepers in less than a week 😂 slay.
olgud tells them thaisha is back, and thimble is like ‘WAS OCCTIS WITH HER??’ ohhhhhh i am so excited for this next reuniting of the groups! they head to hal’s house, where (hopefully) the seekers are!
sam and liam are inventing new ways to rpf in the ad again… some things never change. 💜
THE CHAOS! LOOK AT THIS SHIT! I'VE DREAMED OF EPISODES LIKE THIS.
everyone greeting each other in a very subdued and chill manner, then WICK AND TYRANNY COME IN. wick is in an insane disguise (long blond wig and a dragon hat) and tyranny immediately sniffs occtis closely 😂 she’s like “you’re dead!” and says he smells great to her 😂😭 thimble is HORRIFIED avskahskahskshshs.
murray tells everyone the theatre troupe has been using the pariah blades and thaisha is like SAY THAT AGAIN? WHAT? WE WERE GONE NINE DAYS. 😭
ohhh shit fuck. julien (NAT 20 ROLL) notices teor is wearing the royce arm bracers. AND I OOP- this is gonna be an awkward conversation lmao. 💀 thankfully julien realises they took the bracers from the knight who killed the royce guy (sorry to that man, i can't remember his name agakagsj), so at least there’s that.
azune notices aranessa is not with them 🥹 and julien breaks the news about the golden orchard. POOR THIMBLE.
the schemers tell everyone that the halovars and the tachonii are about to try to do SOMETHING SINISTER AND MYSTERIOUS, and they need to work out how to stop it.
murray insinuates that thjazi might have been in cahoots with the sundered houses and thimble is Not having it. bolaire backs murray up, saying thjazi lied to everyone, so why not thimble too? 💀 thaisha is like uhhhh watch your fucking mouth when you’re in his brother’s house. OOOOH THE TENSION. I LOVE IT.
they explain the paint, and how it is clearly important, and how it appears to have primed the theatre for whatever ritual is meant to happen? maybe? murray tells the others that the paint is rendered from celestial blood, and wick is like ‘oh yeah, probably from the angel monster my grandma has chained in our basement’ GAKAHSAKHS. everyone who hasn’t heard this whips around like EXCUSE ME????
occtis explains a bit about why his family killed him - that they wanted a horrible death-celestial of their own. everyone confirms that the tachonii seem to think occtis is DEAD dead at least, so that can be an element of surprise, i suppose.
murray points out that a BUNCH of the people in this room are wanted, dead or alive, by the most powerful people in the city and uhh YEAH i think they need to find a secure place to meet/hide that is NOT halandil fang’s actual home agakshakhs.
hal, after sitting in pensive silence for a bit: “wicander, how long have you known that there’s a monster in your basement???” 😂
brennan clarifies that the blood paint isn’t specifically celestial, and reminds everyone that it was like a photo-negative vibe of the stone of nightsong, which is made of celestial bones. so?? what the fuck. i don’t fucking know. demon blood, then??
oh god, the information is flooding out from all the groups now… i am not writing all that. 😂 there is a big info dump.
occtis pulls tertia’s head out of his fucking bag wgskshakshsk BUDDY, NO.
okay so! current working theory - the sundered houses, led by tachonis, are trying to open a door to the underworld in the hallowed round AND trying to destroy the druidic path to prevent spirits from leaving.
SO. million dollar question (or at least one of them) - do the paints HELP the ritual attempt or do they HINDER it? what the fuck was thjazi’s goal in getting those paints sent to hal? he literally made it one of his dying wishes, so it was IMPORTANT.
also important, azune reminds hal that the photarch is desperate to meet with him - what does she want with hal? azune’s theory is that she has one final card to play, relevant to whatever is going down in the theatre, and she obviously needs hal for it. GULP.
poor hal - he’s now grappling with the very real possibility that his play is too dangerous to go on. FUCK. murray points out that he could cancel it and see how the sundered houses react.
OOH brennan reminds the schemers that the freaky little halfling they found when they were investigating the paint said that his ‘mistress’ (the one who rendered the paint from WHATEVER the fuck) wanted to talk to wick! THAT’S RIGHT! thank god he mentioned that ahakshakhs. (or so i thought, but then luis quietly goes: “it’s on my list” SGAKSHKSH HE DIDN’T FORGET!! sorry to have doubted you, luis 💜)
poor kattigan is digging holes in hal’s doorframe with his knife because he NEEDS SOMETHING TO DO OR HE’S GONNA LOSE IT. agashak kattigan and azune are two peas in a neurotic pod, i swear (said with SO much love and also a decent amount of projection wgakshahsh).
murray: “lady cormoray had great interest in the blades. also, she’s sucked into that casket right now.” occtis: “what?” thaisha: “what!?” thimble, unfazed: “great! then she’s no problem.” brennan: *losing his shit*
occtis realises that the only solid connection between thjazi and the sundered houses is that they both went after the stone of nightsong - maybe they wanted it for different reasons?
HOLY SHIT. occtis casually pulls out the gems he took from tannesar to show murray. SHE ROLLS A NAT 20 ARCANA. she stares at the gems as the gems in her teeth vibrate. she KNOWS that these gems were used to communicate a dark and terrible ritual, connecting two places in a way that hasn’t been done since the shaper’s war. and brennan asks - what could SHE do with these? AND LEVELS HER UP TO LEVEL 5. AND THE CROWD GOES WILD.
occtis also gives her that druid book that lets you talk to stones, and brennan goes (ever so casually) “gems are stones”. AVAKSHAKSB. i am so excited but this campaign is so humbling so far ahskshaksh i feel like i only understand like 50% of what is going on. i’m like a dog that sees people getting excited and also starts running around. 😂
hal, with deep feeling, is like FUCK THE SUNDERED HOUSES. IF WE PUT THIS PLAY ON, I WANT OUR 350 SOLDIERS READY TO SLIT THEIR THROATS IF ANY FUCKERY HAPPENS. ooooh, my boy is NOT playing anymore.
okay! we are getting some plans going. murray is gonna meet with king gus, and take some people with her. hal is gonna meet the photarch, and likely has to be alone but wants someone nearby in case he needs them. wick is gonna (try to) meet the mistress of the knife and palette pigments, clearly has to take some people with him. oooh are we about to split the group into some new configurations????? 😍
sgakshsksj everyone starts talking about wick like he’s not in the room again 😂😭 my poor boy. i am with tyranny here, he is DOING HIS BEST UNDER THE CIRCUMSTANCES. bolaire is like ‘we need to keep this fucker alive, and he cannot stay alive by himself’ 😂 awww hal smiles at wick. 🥰
HAL ASKS IF THIMBLE CAN COME SEE THE PHOTARCH WITH HIM, HIDDEN IN HIS POCKET, BECAUSE SHE’S “A BAD BITCH”. 😂 amazing. she really is a bad bitch, i don’t think hal even KNOWS how bad a bitch she is. thaisha is going with hal too, of course. aww but thimble wants to stick with occtis. 🥹
kattigan offers to go with hal instead, and murray is like 😒 aww man i wanted the sexy forest man to come with me…. 😂😂😂
bolaire wants to inspect the stone of nightsong. vaelus is not keen on bolaire looking at the stone, but seems willing to allow it if some of the others are there. talesin asks if he can whisper something just to ashley??? oho??? and brennan allows it? ooooh i LOVE that.
julien is gonna go with wick and tyranny….. oh my GOD this combination is going to be fucking insane, i can’t wait to see how that shakes out. 😂 tyranny is going to ask julien SO many inappropriate questions, i can already tell. and teor is going too? oh BOY. if someone sees wick and teor together??? that’s like the halovar jackpot… i am SO WORRIED.
okay so! thimble, murray, and occtis are gonna hit up king gus. bolaire, wick, teor, tyranny, and julien are going back to knife and palette. hal, thaisha, and kattigan are going to see what the fuck the photarch wants. vaelus and azune are still working out what they want to do.
UGHHHHH julien goes: “thimble, was it?” AS IF HE DOESN’T REMEMBER HER NAME. BASTARD MAN. oh but he actually passes on the message from the other fey creatures that twig is okay. GOD he is such a dickhead (with a heart of gold - or maybe just copper idk if he's all that).
kattigan elbows teor in the ribs and asks if he’s okay with splitting up. teor: “you might be a little exposed without me, but absence makes the heart grow fonder.” murray, to thimble, immediately:
teor and kattigan: these smart people don’t know SHIT. good luck out there, homie who means everything to me. *fist bump* godddd they are soooooo….
vaelus decides she is sticking close to occtis - she makes the very good point that they have NO idea what happens if occtis gets too far away from the stone of nightsong. OH. well! that is something i hadn't even thought to be worried about agskshskhsk. brennan, the devious bastard, puts the thought in her head that she could just take this precious artifact of her goddess and return it to her abbey. DAMN, BRENNAN. OKAY. you can see as ashley realizes in real time that vaelus may very well choose to do that. ohhhh boy. but for now, she trails behind occtis at a fair distance.
SGSKSHSKSH kattigan is going with thaisha and hal, partially because he is one of the only people in this whole party who isn’t wanted for some reason or another, but MAINLY because he wants some time away from wicander. 😂😭
wick casts aid on them and tells them to NOT try to kill his grandma because she will easily fuck them up lmao. REAL AND TRUE.
awwww occtis gives teor one of the anti-petrification potions in case his fuckass family comes after him again, and apologises for his family turning cyd into a statue. 🥺 teor hands off the seremai blade to occtis. interesting! makes sense i guess, but occtis takes it like it’s a dead snake agskahskah.
brennan points out that everyone in the knife and palette group are basically being hunted down by the noble houses agakshsk except bolaire i guess. well that seems fine… 😂
azune pulls murray and thimble aside and tells them he has been asked to testify against house tachonis, and he is SHAKING. einfasen basically told him his physical evidence won’t prove shit, and so he asks if he can take demodus with him. OOOOOH FUCK. murray is not keen on this idea, but it might be their best bet. as long as they can keep him SAFE, for fuck’s sake.
azune reckons that the sundered houses have been conspiring for ages, but that house tachonis has deviated from the plan and gone off on their own weird necro tangent, and azune thinks the more he can turn einfasen and the other houses against them, the better. YES.
OH MY BOY IS HAVING A PANIC ATTACK 😭😭😭😭 PROTECT AZUNE AT ALL COSTS.
ooooh fuck! azune wants OCCTIS TO GO WITH HIM. now that would throw the cat amongst the pigeons agakahsk can you imagine???? occtis gently tells him it would be a really bad idea (correct) but poor azune is just grasping at straws now. murray talks him down, much more softly than i expected, and tells him he is a good person. ohhhh my heart.
brennan stabs the knife in harder by reminding luis that, this morning, azune was thinking about his sister, how broken she looked. marisha, staring at brennan: “..... not helping!” i feel like murray just stared into the face of azune's neuroses and told them to SHUDDUP. 😂
murray tells azune she will buy him all the ice cream in the city, and he (quietly and slightly perplexed, face still wet with tears) asks her which flavour. 😭😭😭😭😭 oh my GOD.
everyone rolls some insight checks, and oh man. it becomes apparent that murray actually agrees with azune - she doesn’t want him to do this, and is GUILTY for trying to force him to carry on - but she knows that the only way through is forward, and azune is instrumental in this forward movement. ughhhh fuck that is painful.
vaelus seems touched by azune’s pain, and tells him she understands - she can feel the grief on him, a grief she feels too.
murray agrees to talk to demodus, but says, IF he agrees, she wants to be in the room - physically, magically, whatever - in case anything goes wrong.
murray to azune: “hey! i love you.” azune: “i JUST stopped crying.” murray: “okay, get the fuck outta here!” azune: “that’s better.” 😭😭😭 MY THEMMMM. 💜 oh but he’s gonna go with her anyway, to king gus! YAY.
hal, thaisha, and kattigan are trying to work out their plan - thaisha suggests being a dog companion lmao. but ultimately, since everyone knows thaisha and hal are family, they are just gonna go in together, with kattigan presented as a guest of hal’s. no lies, no potential issues. good fucking call.
AWWWW hal asks thaisha to tell him she loves him and that everything will be fine, and she DOES, while touching his face tenderly. 😭💜 i adore them. (i couldn’t get a screenshot bc i was watching on my tv lmao WAAH but it was gorgeous.) hal uses this to cast ‘enhance ability’ on himself for charisma. A BARD WITH A PLAN.
ohhh my god. they bump into cruelty, one of tyranny’s demon sisters, who the seekers fought back in riesingürtle (sorry if i fucked up the spelling shakshaj) 💀 holy shit. aabria also reminds everyone that she has STILL NOT LEVELED UP AND THUS IS “A LIABILITY”. 😂
thaisha and cruelty have a little bitchy back and forth, because cruelty is worried thaisha is here for revenge 😂 hal is standing there like WHY DO YOU HAVE BEEF WITH A DEMON??? lmaooooo.
cruelty lets slip that she is ‘in trouble’ lmaooooo. clearly for failing to find tyranny and wick. getting pissy, she tries to read thaisha’s thoughts to find something to hurt her, fails miserably, and kinda just… falls to the ground and rolls under a parked carriage? SGANSGAKSHKS. thaisha is so tickled, like ‘i love this fucking demon…’ while hal and kat are like ??? what the actual fuck is happening??? 😂 incredible.
filoneus, who apparently has seen this whole thing go down, scolds cruelty and tells her to go do her afternoon prayers. 💀 he apologises to the three guests for her behaviour LMAOOOO. i love this. filoneus is WAY too excited to see hal, which makes me NERVOUS.
kat asks if dogs are allowed in (lol) and filoneus is like WELL YES, and his freaky celestial hounds (called wrath and judgement, by the fucking way) step forward and CAST ‘DETECT MAGIC’ WITH THEIR EYES. they see hal’s ‘enhance ability’. 💀 hal, quick talker as he is, convinces filoneus he has just come from the theatre, and that the magic is just a bit of enhancement to prevent performance anxiety. 😬
thaisha asks if she can cast ‘speak animals’ to talk to the ‘cute’ doggies 😂 filoneus goes “ah. a druid of the circle of ancients. you are welcome here.” but his face is TERRIFYING agajshjahss. his mouth said ‘welcome’ but his eyes said ‘i will crush your bones to dust’. ultimately he does NOT let her speak with his doggies. 😡
they are led in, and yanessa is on her fucking throne. ugh. she asks if thaisha is hal’s ‘love’, and he says “she is family, yes”. 🥹 yanessa pretends to be chill about druids as well, but she is slightly more convincing than filoneus was lmao. hal immediately goes on the charm offensive, like soooo glad to see you healthy after that SPOT OF DEATH LAST NIGHT. 😂
oooh yanessa tries some shit with kattigan, saying he has a ‘weight to his spirit’ and assuring him that ‘nothing is ever truly lost’. oh, BROTHER, she’s already trying to convert him??? she met him two seconds ago! poor kat seems very uncomfortable with this level of scrutiny.
yanessa asks if hal can be invited into a circle of trust. here we go… she tells hal that she has been lying about wick - he’s not on a mission, and she believes he has been abducted BY TEOR. 🙃 lmao. she thinks teor kidnapped wick in retaliation for the death of thjazi. i can see why she would think that, i guess lmao, but i wonder if she believes it? the last time she saw wick was the revelation of the angel in the basement that is actually his grandfather, after learning his whole life and religion is a lie. SURELY she has an inkling that he could have run off because of that 😂
oh godddd ROBBIE NOOOO! kattigan asks if she will ‘forgive wick’ if he comes home, and of course yanessa is like ‘forgive him? for what? have you seen wick?’ and kattigan is like “😳 no.” THEN ROBBIE ROLLS A NAT 1 DECEPTION. BUDDY, NO. aabria mimes lining up a shot to take him out sgakahskshskhs. he tries to wriggle out of it by essentially victim-blaming wick shskshsksh, like ‘yeah, are you gonna forgive him for letting himself be taken?’ 😂 liam takes pity, having hal confess that wick did seem attracted to danger despite his innocence. GULP. yanessa is so fucking smart, this is RISKY. hal rolls a good deception, but BOY that was bad. i still don’t think hal fully covered their asses there, given the nat 1. 💀 kattigan is in danger.
thaisha, wanting to quickly change the subject, spots emnity, and is like “oh hey! i saw you in riesingürtle!” and enmity says in her head: “the less said about our failure, the better - i’ll make it worth your while, BE COOL.” 😂😂😂
oh fuck. yanessa has A COPY OF THE SCRIPT. OF HAL’S PLAY. THAT SHE TOOK FROM WICK’S STUFF. AND SHE WANTS HIM TO MAKE SOME CHANGES. THE DAY BEFORE. THE FUCKING AUDACITY. liam’s face is like 😧 and aabria grabs his arm shakshakshs.
THIS BITCH. she wants them to make it blatantly clear that the hero (who dies at the end, fucking SPOILERS) should have his soul redeemed. ughhhh more propaganda…. of course. hal is like “uhm. love this idea. but that is already, like… implied?” she’s like ‘make it explicit’. FUCKING HELL. she also gives notes on the comedy in act i??? bitch. shut your mouthhhhh oh my GOD. and hal has to go with it, because the halovars have funded so much of the fucking thing. oughhhhhhhhh.
WOW. she is like ‘here are the notes’ (gives him a huge stack of paper) ‘if there’s anything you creatively disagree with, let us know, and we can DELAY OPENING NIGHT UNTIL WE REACH MIDDLE GROUND’. oh my fucking god. what. what. this is insane.
she almost seems to be encouraging hal to push the opening night, and using this as a reason to force it. HMMMMMMM. interesting… she’s really pushing for it.
yanessa insists on seeing the revised version before opening night, and hal is like ‘well, that’s tomorrow, but we can show you with book-in-hand tonight?’ and she’s like ‘oh, it won’t be ME personally, i can’t be seen in a theatre’. and aabria’s face does something SO fucking complex and hilarious. she gets SO angry and then immediately smothers it sgskshshs. meanwhile hal is just pleasantly smiling, agreeing to all her terms (outwardly). ughhhhh this SUCKS. this bitch couldn’t care less about the arts. it’s all a means to an end.
yanessa talks to kat in his head as they leave, saying she’s ‘there if he wants to talk’. oh, RUN. run so very far away. kattigan can never be in this woman’s presence again agskahskahsjsh. she is WATCHING him as they go out the door. and with a nat 20 insight, brennan says kat has been ‘marked by the most powerful woman in the world’ and she wants him ‘in her jaws’. FUCK. RUN. RUN. RUN.
holy fuck - before they leave the building, aabria drops her snake familiar and tells it to FIND THE ANGEL BASEMENT. OH WE ARE GETTING INTO SOME DEEP FUCKERY NOW!
hal, as soon as they are a little down the street, doubles over with laughter, and goes “i have so much work to do. that old dried out husk can choke on filament.” YESSSS sgskshskshjshs i was waiting for the polite mask to drop lmao. thaisha: “i have never loved you more.” SO REAL.
ooooh hal tells thaisha and kat that his actors are putting on this SHAM of a play tonight, just for the halovars, and tomorrow? THE PLAY GOES ON AS ORIGINALLY PLANNED! yessssssss bitch!
okay, we move over to the knife and palette. bolaire tells wick that he has no idea why this mistress wants to speak with him, and that there is a non-zero chance they could just get turned in. wick and tyranny decide to stay in disguise to begin with (tyranny, i assume, is going to be magically disguised, but is wick still just relying on a long blonde wig???)
teor uses his ‘divine sense’, and the place has intense fiendish energy. travis chooses to have teor tell the others in THEE funniest fucking way:
GSSKSHAKSHAKSJ. ‘it’s radiating bitches in here’ has immediately been added to my lexicon, thank you. teor can feel fiends in the house to the front (where the schemers met the halfling last time) BUT also through the bricked up door on the opposite side of the road, including one intense presence that MUST be the mistress. OOOH i didn’t expect that! they inspected that bricked up door last time and found nothing. maybe there is a secret entrance?
ohhh my fucking god. the halfling comes out and reveals he has been standing there behind the door, listening to their conversation about wick being in disguise, because WATCHING THE STREET IS LITERALLY HIS ENTIRE JOB. 😂 incredible. 10/10. no notes.
he asks wick to pick him up, and says “you need not fear” while caressing his face. bro, WHAT is happening. he is also very excited to see tyranny, and knows she’s an aspirant. this feels weeeeeeird. he is chuffed that bolaire has brought both of them here and also that they had absolutely no subtlety to speak of, and leads them across the street where a DOOR OF FLAME appears in the apparently bricked over entryway.
they enter into a workshop of some kind, with pots of bubbling, boiling paints. there are a bunch of people working, and a woman, who teor can tell is a fiend in disguise. she has pointed teeth. when she sees them, she STARTS CRYING AND RUNS OUT. i feel more and more perplexed with every second of this campaign that passes agakshahshags.
okay! we meet the mistress - an elderly figure in rags, holding what seems to be a MASSIVE paintbrush. teor immediately matches the SUPER strong fiendish energy he felt earlier to her. teor (very un-subtly, as is the trend with this group lmao) points her out as a fiend, and she seems almost relieved, dropping her disguise to reveal she is actually a 12 foot tall, spined, tiger/wasp/ram combination, hooved, bat-winged THING. wow. okay!
her name is tsul’rekshi, and YES i did have to pause to spell that, because WOW. she seems very excited to meet bolaire! she gives him a MASSIVE coin that she spits on, saying it is a symbol of being in his debt for bringing wick here. OKAY!? she asks tyranny who she is, and seems very interested to know she is the daughter of ksha’aravi. she asks if tyranny was conscious in the pit, which gives us the most INCREDIBLE interaction. tyranny: “that’s a really personal question, but because i feel like we are having a moment? i would say i was in an observant stasis. i didn’t have this rockin’ bod that you see before you.” tsul’rekshi: “yes… we all have bods that rock differently." tyranny: “so true. so true, queen.” (you can hear liam laughing SUPER hard in the background btw 😂)
tyranny notices (in the reflection of her weird magic knife lol) that the person who ran out weeping earlier is now lurking in the shadows and watching her. HUH? it turns into a spined, simian creature with a beautiful, fanged face, and asks tyranny if ‘it hurts’. wick realises that this poor fiend girl truly believes in the candescent creed and that tyranny has been saved. OUGH.
tsul’rekshi turns on teor and julien, like ‘and why are YOU here?’ and she is distinctly less friendly to these two agakaha. they both try to say some candescent creed shit, and she basically tells them both to shut the fuck up 😂 (this time you can hear laura laughing in the background lmao).
tyranny asks what she wants with wick - she says she has noticed the changes in the city, and wick going missing felt like it didn’t fit in with everything else. she’s curious! in a very interesting conversation about old laws with bolaire, they decide to do a little information transfer - she asks wick some questions, and they get to ask her questions in return. she promises to not harm them or keep them against their will, which is… reassuring?
tsul’rekshi asks wick how his family has kept their sorcery without the shapers, and hooooooo boy. getting right down to the biggest halovar secret, straight away! wick tells her, because they decide lying to this being is probably a BAD idea - she is ASTONISHED to learn about the basement angel lmao.
tyranny gets WAY too excited and asks the question “what’s up with the paint?” which is NOT SPECIFIC ENOUGH, and tsul’rekshi takes great joy in this fuckup. she says she will allow them to re-word the question, but only if wick gives her a drop of his blood. OH BOY, THIS GOT OUT OF HAND SO QUICKLY. 😂
wick agrees, and teor pricks his palm with a claw (😏😏😏). she takes the blood, and an image of a tree made of runes and feathers appears. she tells wick that his power is from his angel blood, and not from the filament he has in his skin. (i think we knew this?? wick’s grandma used angel blood to make a magic baby, right? hence the sorcery? perhaps wick didn’t realise this.) she calls him an aasimar! WOO race name drop! only bolaire has heard this word, but only in legend - incredibly rare.
okay, finally we might get the paint answer! she says a client delivered a profane artifact of the shapers, that ‘deserved to be unravelled and that which it captured to be liberated’. ARE WE TALKING ABOUT THE COFFIN?? oh, nope lol. the paint is from something called ‘the blood of the river gavzidra’, which is a river of azgra’s blood that passes through the underworld. it seems that azgra cursed his people, the rungjani, so their blood would forever run through this river, and tsul’rekshi says ‘the souls of the rungjani deserve freedom’. HMMMMMMMMMM.
okay so! thjazi brought her the blood from this river, and she transformed it into the paint. god. why.
for her next question, tsul’rekshi asks where the luxes of the creed get their power from - she says there is no way one angel is producing enough blood to use for the magic of all of them, and she doesn’t believe the creed is a real thing (astute lmao). wick seems confused by this, and says it’s from the filament. (OHHH because he doesn’t know about the demon contracts… 😬)
thjazi and mara apparently found this blood simply by watching the tachonii very closely - the font they had been looking for was in the barrowdell where the tachonii were performing their horrible little experiments, which thaisha also found after they killed poor tertia.
ahh. so thjazi and mara’s intention was to break the curse on the river of blood to free the souls of the rungjani. and tsul’rekshi actually DID IT. and… put it into the paints? i’m gonna be so real, i do Not understand what the paints actually are, or how they are part of this. is it just that she used the paint-making process to break down the blood, breaking the curse? are the paints a byproduct or are they the point?
tyranny asks (in demonic!) how she is to walk her path, as a demon who is devoted to protecting an angel. 😭😭😭 in response, tsul’rekshi casts ‘identify’ on her knife! she tells tyranny that she is here to hurt people, which tyranny pushes back against, until tsul’rekshi clarifies that there are people worth hurting. 🙃 the knife is a tool to ‘give insight into people’s hearts’ and to ‘punish those who have hurt those who love them’. hmmmmm. TYRANNY ATTUNES TO THE KNIFE AND LEVELS UP TO 5! WOOOOOO!
bolaire tries to warn tsul’rekshi of what is to come, but she actually seems excited because she hates when things are boring 😂 okay, so she probably won’t be much help, but at least she is a tentative ally!
the spined demon has one last desperate interaction with tyranny, who accidentally says the light 'comes within’ instead of FROM within, sending everyone into giggles. AMAZING.
we jump to the group going to meet good king gus! they arrive at bowsprit manor, and are welcomed in. murray introduces her little squad, and thimble is SO CUTE. she’s like ‘i met some of your hounds’ and he says it’s an honor to meet with the fair folk. 🥹 king gus, no wonder they want you dead. your vibe is simply too fucking powerful.
occtis is disguised as a guard of azune’s, which seems risky! but i guess they need to gently lead into this conversation without the undead tachonis boy standing there agakshakhss.
AHDKSHSK FUCK. brennan forgets occtis has the walker’s ward, which protects him from being detected as undead, and it seems like things are fucked for a sec, but NOPE his disguise is working. for now lmao.
king gus tells them he is planning to leave that night, and thanks murray again for saving his life. murray jumps straight into it, telling him he can consider them - and their 350 soldiers - allies of his. OOP. just putting that straight on the table, huh? she also tells him yanessa is a fucking LIAR and that the miracle was faked - she rolls a pretty good persuasion. he trusts her! fuck yes.
he introduces his sister and nephew to them, and says his nephew is his heir, since he’s ‘not the wife-taking sort’. ?? hmm. i wanna know more about that. gay or ace king gus reveal??
gus tells them he came here to ask the revolutionary council ‘who the fuck is at the wheel’ - SO REAL.
gus tells them he never wanted to be a king, he just led the rebellion and it kinda happened. 😂 oh my god, he is the fucking best. murray wants to jump his bones so fucking bad.
azune, wanting to be helpful sooooo bad: “do you wanna know who tried to kill you?” *pulls out his notebook* 😂 BABYYY I LOVE YOU SO MUCH. they tell him everything they discovered, and how halovar is likely behind it all, with tachonis involved. they (with occtis’s permission) hand gus the letter that has the tachonii discussing his assassination. FUCK YES, WE LOVE SOLID PROOF.
he sees in the letter that they planned to target the golden orchard, and seems genuinely heartbroken when thimble tells him that the orchard and house royce have both fallen.
azune rips the letter in half and gives gus the part that references his death (he needs the rest for his tachonis take-down).
gus gives thimble a seed that will open a path onto the miller’s road (the secret path that the hounds of the king took the soldiers down). only fey, hounds, and some druids can find the road, but they can lead others onto it.
gus agrees to accept refugees if everything turns to shit the next day, which is SO good to have on the back burner. theoretically, thimble can open the path of the miller’s road and show people the way, giving them safe passage.
azune rolls a persuasion check, basically to convince king gus to help them. he rolls SHIT. brennan tells them that gus helped with the falconer’s rebellion, which failed and got him in hot water. he almost got killed YESTERDAY - the man is weighing up how much more he can risk. BUT! murray uses her portent to fix azune’s bad roll! DAMN that is powerful.
to change this fate, murray accidentally (purposefully? idk man, portent stuff is weird) says something that reminds gus of something one of his knights said, long ago. HIS KNIGHT WHO MURRAY SEES KISSING HIM AND KNOWS HAS SINCE DIED. 🥹 ohhhh, king gus has a tragic gay backstory! STOP IT. when i think i can’t love him any more than i already do…
YESSSS! KING GUS IS IN! FUCKING AMAZING. I LOVE YOU FOREVER, KING GUS.
