Eddie x Original Female Character Pt 2 of Eldath's Priestess 2406 words
No warnings.
Tags: Dungeons and Dragons, table top gameplay, flashback usage marked by =, slight angst, Jewish oc, family dynamics.
Now on ao3
No beta this time. We ride like the Rohirrim in the Battle of the Pelennor.
Summary: Judy gets reacquainted with her favorite troupe of misfits, and the newest members.
Notes: Not canon compliant, alternate history of Hellfire, semi-accurate portrayal of Dungeons and Dragons. hint of Eddie the Simp.
Judy was buzzing with excitement, tossing her dice bag into her purse. She had gotten the call from Fred Emerson, the Dungeon Master of Hawkins legend, immediately asking her if she would “join in the newest crusade against the Shadow Lord”. She had never accepted an offer to quickly in her life.
The handmade drawstring bag kept her pencil case company as she went to her suitcase and pulled out her binder, cracking it open. From the corner pocket, she saw her old character sheet.
Feyanim Hellarad Half-Elf Cleric Lvl- 14- High Priestess Lawful Good
From banished princess to priestess of Eldath, yearning for adventure far from the cloister and the crown.
Her memory played vignettes of her times as Nim, starting with her older brother, introducing her to the game on her twelfth birthday.
“A princess? Are you sure?” he had asked.
Little Judy nodded at her desk, “yeah! But she has a heart of gold. Forced into the cloister by her mother, the queen, and her jealous stepfather, the king.”
“Is she illegitimate?”
“I think so. That would add…” She paused, searching for the word.
“Angst.”
“Yeah…angst.”
Judy’s eyes shot to her bedside clock. 3:45. Fifteen minutes to get to Scott’s place, pick him up, and drive to Fred Emmerson’s place for the game. After a year without playing, in Pittsburgh where her brother’s body lay buried, she was itching for the game to continue. Her old group, her old comrades. She finally exited her front door.
=
Her brother, the dungeon master, introduced her to the group the first Friday of freshman year, Eddie in tow. His hair was longer than when she had last seen him. She had hoped he would grow it out.
The newest members of Hellfire club, the trailer park metalhead and the nepo-baby.
Her stomach was in knots. Where were the other girls?
Before she could open her mouth, Eddie took a step forward, his voice booming throughout the stage. “I am Edward the Stalwart, half-orc fighter, prepared to cast off the bonds of the past through my unquenchable thirst of adventure.”
“And how do we know you, young Edward, have the grit to join the band of fearless warriors who sit before you?” Joey asked, theatrically gesturing to the other men at the table.
To be honest, she had tuned out Eddie’s answer, too paranoid about her own.
Their gazes turned to her now. “I…am Feyanim Hellarad, half-elf cleric.” She cleared her throat, feeling a push of energy, “from banished princess to priestess of Eldath, I yearn for adventure beyond the cloister and the crown.”
The table was quiet. She looked at Eddie, whose sweet brown eyes gave her the encouragement she needed.
“And what makes you, dear princess, fit for adventure as a priestess of the most peaceful of Gods?” Her brother asked, no longer the Joey she was used to, but the DM, omniscient voice of the world she wished to join.
The question stumped her. It was a good question. Why would she venture from Eldath’s still waters to join this rowdy band of fools?
She heard two of the older boys make a comment, leading to a chuckle, which turned into a laugh. A ginger boy, bespectacled and haughty, called over to Joey. “Listen, man. We get that she’s your sister and all, but is she really ready for advanced Dungeons and Dragons?”
Judy’s lips pursed in irritation. Staring down the table, she took a step further, placing her foot on what she planned to be her chair, puffing her chest out. “I am already a priestess, skilled in the healing arts. And by all that is holy, I will ensure your survival. Something tells me you lack a healer in this party. If I may be frank, this party lacks any sense at all.”
“Then welcome, Princess Hellarad, to Hellfire.” Joey placed a hand on her shoulder, whispering with pride, “good job.”
She sat down, beside the boy who had talked down to her, and across from the boy she had known for years. Judy and Eddie’s eyes met, excited to be joining the first campaign of the year. They reached across and grasped each other’s hands, uncertain of why. Was it a shake of mutual friendship? Or did she just want to touch him, like she always had, and he finally wanted the same?
Before the winter break, Joey had planned first boss fight, a paladin oathbreaker and his undead horde was prepared to slaughter the party. He took his job as DM very seriously, carefully considering all player’s strengths and weaknesses, deciding what path he wanted them to go down. He was more narrative focused, though his battles were just as intense.
“What is your action, princess?”
“There is still time we can make it.” Shouted Marty.
Eddie sucked in a breath, “I’m already down. We can’t last much longer.”
“Your action princess.” Joey insisted.
Judy looked at Eddie, who gave her a nod. He was on board. The others were either prone, dying, or occupied by the undead horde. She looked at the rogue, Andreas the Swift, who had yet to reveal himself. He gave her a nod.
“Does he see me?”
“In his fury he has paid no mind to you.”
“Then I get advantage.” Judy gritted her teeth, “I cast command,” rattling her first d20 and sending it to the table, 14, with her modifier it still wouldn’t hit. The next d20 followed with her call, 19, with her wisdom modifier that would be a twenty-three.
Her brother cracked a smile, an evil smile. She felt her heart sink before her brother froze, as if struck by lightning. “What is your command?” He bellowed.
From the far end of the table, her finger extended, and she cried out, “grovel!”
“Yes…” Her brother slammed his hands on the table along with his face, to make it seem as though he threw himself down, “my la..dy…”
Knowing it was his turn, the halfling assassin played his held action and backstabbed the prone paladin oathbreaker, with advantage, and all his proficiencies, doing heavy damage. Judy’s command turned the tide. That and her brother’s two very unfortunate rolls.
=
Summer rains were Judy’s least favorite. The droplets themselves, warmed by the atmosphere, felt like stones against her skin. Fat rain, heavy rain. Also, the humidity made her hair both expand an extra half an inch in width and cling to any piece of skin it touched. A hot, wet, sweaty mess.
She slid quickly into her 1970 Volkswagen beetle, closing the door behind her. There was her cleric figurine, mounted with a rolled slip of duct tape, and sitting beside her was an armor-clad half-orc, her lover’s paladin. Gifted to her before she left for Pittsburgh by Eddie Munson, the presiding Dungeon Master of the Hawkins High School Hellfire Club.
“I won’t need him anymore. Besides, I don’t think I could bring myself to separate the princess from her paladin.” He took her hand and enfolded his figurine in her palm, “as sadistic of a DM I might be, I would never.”
Judy’s lips fought back a frown, “I’m sorry. I just can’t stay here and wait…”
“I know,” he released her hand to caress her face, bringing her lips to his in a gentle kiss. “You’re still my girl, however far you go.” Another kiss, this time on the bridge of her nose. A journey up to her face that he had taken many times before, a path he adored. “And when I graduate this year,” his lips rested on her forehead, his nose nestling in her hair, “I will get in my van and come to you.”
“Class of eighty-six.” She smiled.
She started her trusty steed, twisting the key in the ignition and listening to the turnover. Knocking it into reverse, flicking on the windshield wipers, she looked over her shoulder to pull out smoothly from the driveway.
“Eighty-six, baby.” Eddie’s voice echoed once again though Judy’s ears, as the phantom kiss still warmed her skin. She never should have left, never should have watched him shrink away as she drove further from her home. Her eyes graced back as if he was still standing there. Nothing.
The citizens and military personnel had entered a regular routine, the belching crags that divided the town into fourths became as normal as creeks and cliffs. Judy’s practice of Pittsburgh navigation took a backseat to the slow and cautious pace of post-earthquake Hawkins. None of her destinations were severed by a crack. First, five minutes away, was Scott Clark, another teacher. He had started the year after Judy entered high school, taking over for Emma Magil for 8th grade science.
Their journey went off without any conflict. Judy had asked him about his fiancée. Scott had asked her how her mother was doing. Neither really dug into the unspoken sorrow in the air. She parked her beetle in the street, as the driveway was already full of cars. The two got out and joined in the festivities within.
The kitchen and the dining room were separated by a countertop, upon which was a lineup of various snacks. A veggie tray, some cheese and crackers, tiny sausages on toothpicks, mini ham and cheese sandwiches.
God bless you, Sheryl. Judy thought.
Fred had married Sheryl Kaufmann when Gareth was in middle school. Joey would drag Judy to these grownup games at the Emerson house. She’d sit with Gareth as he kicked rocks in the driveway. Sheryl would come out with snacks, and he’d grumble a forced ‘thank you’.
That woman tried so hard. She didn’t make him call her mom. No pushing boundaries, forcing herself to be liked by her stepson. But she still tried. And even when Gareth warmed up to her, called her ‘Cher-bear’ when she called him ‘Gare-bear’, told her he loved her too, she still felt the need to prove herself. She wanted him to have a good home, a place to feel safe and happy.
In the end, they all loved Sheryl.
“Celery’s gross.” Gareth said, staring blankly at the veggie.
“You don’t have to eat it.” Said Sheryl as she floated through the kitchen.
“Not to everyone,” Dustin reached his hand past the upper classman’s gaze, fishing out three sticks of green and placing them on his plate.
“I don’t know, Henderson.” Judy rattled her d20s in her hand, releasing them on the table. “Celery is just bitter and stringy.” She sighed at her results, “Guess purple and red are going to dice jail.” The dice clattered in her brother’s old ashtray. “Bummer, these were his.”
“Whose?” Will asked, sliding next to her at the table.
“My late brother, he was the DM of Hellfire before Eddie.” She answered, rolling the final two dice, “nine-teen and twelve, guess I’m using these.”
Will sat awkwardly, taking a moment to salvage the situation. “I didn’t realize Hellfire was so old.”
“Oh yeah, it started as an offshoot of the chess club.” Judy popped a tiny sausage into her mouth, half her mouth chewing as the other half continued, “My brother was a sophomore. Fred was the teacher who signed off on it. Seventy-eight, I think. I came in two years later and somehow these guys had already set up their boys’ club.”
Andrew dropped his bag on the table, sitting on the opposite side of Judy. “And how is our beloved nepo-baby? Still squeezing into places she might not be wanted?” Setting his cane down between them, he slumped into the hardwood chair.
“God, you are such a dick. I saved your lives how many times in my four years as your resident cleric?”
“None of that matters now, your eminence.” A voice bellowed.
Dressed in his Renaissance best, Fred Emrerson slowly made his way down the stairs to the dining room, the wood creaking below his weight. His graying auburn hair tucked under his feathered flat cap. “Such a high ranking Eldathyn priestess should do well not to dwell on lives owed.”
“Wait…Eldath?” Dustin slid beside Will, “what’s your name again?”
“Uh..Nim Hellara-”
“No, your actual name.”
“It’s Judy.”
“No. Actually, Hebrew name.” He insisted.
“Who says I have a Hebrew name?”
“You’re a Jew, of course you have one.” The table let out a chorus of sniffs in amusement. Dustin was always frank, seeing no point in sugarcoating and beating around any proverbial bushes.
Judy nodded; lips pressed in a thin line. “Yehudit-Miriam after my great-grandmother.”
The young teenager smiled, as if the pieces of an ongoing puzzle fit into place. “Huh.”
Once Fred reached his chair at the end of the dining room table, the game began.
The tavern was busier than usual, the cloud giants had occupied a nearby summer palace. And with unusual activity and monsters to be slain, comes many an adventurer hoping to increase their renown, or their coffers.
Judy worried Nim would struggle to fit in, but with Andreas the Swift by her side, she was quickly welcomed into the party.
“Nimmy,” he asked, “what’s that thing you used to do? That poem?”
“The limericks?” She clarified. They nodded and Judy took a sip of her lemon-lime pop. She began.
“There was once a woman from Wheeling, who had a particular feeling. She laid on her back, tickled her crack, and pissed all over the ceiling.”
It got a laugh. But her eyes fell once more to Dustin as his gaze burned into the side of her head.
The younger players were at a lower level compared to the others, and Fred had planned accordingly. But Andrew, Scott, and Judy pulled most of the weight, Gareth and Jeff were auxiliary. But Fred was a kinder DM compared to Eddie. He never liked to punish his players, and only wished for a good story and plenty of laughs. The younger players: Dustin, Will, Mike, Lucas, and Erica, were uneasy and borderline paranoid. No doubt traumatized by Eddie or the tales of him.
“Perception check on the door.” Erica rattled the dice, “not gonna let you take me out because of some trap.”
Fred was ready to tell her it was ‘just a door’, but he let her roll anyway. And even with her nat16 and the modifier, she still refused to believe it wasn’t rigged with a trap.
Judy’s character stepped forward, holding her shield up in front of Erica. “Okay, if something happens, you won’t get hit.” The lock was picked, door opened to the next room. No bomb, no spikes, no danger, just a door.
“A valid fear, my lady.” Scott’s druid reassured Erica, “the Gods can be cruel.”
Judy leaned in and whispered to her, “Fred doesn’t run games like Eddie. The worst thing he tried to do was the Tomb of Horrors. A tenth of the way through, he scrapped it. The only time I heard him use the ‘just a dream’ cliché.”
“I read that module after that session, and it is so asinine. And the captured nymph thing was so creepy.” Andrew Grumbled.
They continued through the maze of corridors, an entire world inside the walls of the small palace, occupied by a very uncomfortable cloud giant.
Through a spell of marching teapots and a well-placed howl from a dark corner, the group managed to rid the small castle of the cloud giant squatter. The fact of the matter is, not all D&D sessions are climactic battles or salacious dramas. Sometimes, it’s just pretending to be ghosts to scare away a cloud giant because he’s too high level and no one wants to die.
Once the session was over, Fred offered to give Scott a ride if he agreed to stay for a few more beers. Judy had her own belongings packed. While she had enjoyed herself for the first time in recent memory, the ache in her chest refused to abate. It wasn’t the same without her paladin.
The air draped over the trees, the smoke from the cracks caught beneath the thick layer of moisture. It stuck to her skin, her hands becoming clammy with each swipe across her shorts. She just wanted to get home.
Dustin stopped her before she got to her car.
“You’re Yudit Mountain Song.”
“Yudit Mountain Song?”
“Yeah,” Dustin opened Eddie’s binder of character sheets, messily flipping through the pages. Judy watched the many NPCs fly by, familiar faces and strangers alike, until she finally saw it. Her face. “She’s a reoccurring character, a half-elf bard who gave us some excellent quests and much needed rescues. Even gave my character her harp, lets me have an extra bardic inspiration slot after a long rest.” He excitedly handed the binder off to Judy.
She gazed at her own face, her own body. He had given her some additions, fantasy length hair and a lyre. Her lips parted in song. Eddie had made her a singer.
“I knew you looked familiar.” Dustin continued. “At first, I thought it was a coincidence, but then you said that dirty limerick and I remembered Eddie saying that exact joke when introducing her before the Vecna storyline.”
Judy flipped through the character sheets until reaching the back. Eddie had made one for Kas, altering little traits to mirror himself.
“Pretty sure Yudit and Kas used to connect, before his sword made him all…evil.”
“Maybe I was the blade and not the bard, slowly pulling him to the darkness, seducing him with power.” She smiled, “or maybeeee I was both.” Judy closed the binder, handing it back to Dustin. “I’m sure we’ll never know.”
Thank you for reading! This is a passion project of mine, and it means a lot that you are taking time out of your life to read this. Next chapter very soon...like tomorrow maybe.
tag list: @voyeurmunson
Why has no one made the D&D/Pathfinder conditioner markers into like…keychains or window stickers? I, too, would like other players (everyone) to know I am stunned and exhausted.
we’re taking this weekend out while nova is busy to play a lil futureverse game, ft some returning characters from our main game, and also their children. the plot for now is under wraps, but it does take place some years ahead of our main campaign, and may extend into multiple sessions.
the party:
bat as aaliyah. our favourite fish returns this time wearing the mom jeans of the party.
page as ocha. aal and umong’s (part orc, part undine, slightly human) daughter, who is pretty good at flooding rooms.
sydri as onion. a tiny treant whose origins are a mystery, even to himself.
crystal as goldie. giles’ adopted dryad daughter, who was the last surviving spawn of the deceased Willow. this will also be my debut as your friendly neighbourhood DM (dungeon mom).
we will be recording and eventually cobbling it together for posting, so watch this space ;)
