- We Dock and Ascend So far there’s nothing to say. We arrive at the island, and tie up to an iron mooring. We disembark and start up the stairs. As we ascend, the steps continue up as we begin to see a path heading up; mostly turf and grass, the rock is steep on either side of the path (at the start).
Storr, Silas, Rambler, Branwen and Balz (in that order) ascend the steps, and see a path that leads up into the mountain. Storr trips on a rock and falls on her left knee, got a little bit of a limp as she makes it up to the call with the rest of the party.
Strong winds. We smell the ocean everywhere. So windy. We get to a fork in the path. We go west. It’s pretty steep, and somewhat treacherous. About halfway up we all basically need to sit down because we’re exhausted. Krambler slips and bangs up his right shin pretty badly, got a limp to match Storr. After a little break we continue on up to a flat spot, where we hear the wind whistling in the cracks. There’s a 3 foot wall around the edges, we notice a large stone in the center of the flat spot.
The center flagstone has the same three lobed symbol that we saw at the Island of Voices. The space feels ceremonial.
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Silas’ Jaunt Eastward Silas and Arthen take the east side of the island, intending to skirt along the coast. He gets down to the junction and goes around the small hillock to the east. Path is laid stone, not soil. Steep, water flowing down would fall far. Trail splits again, one goes along the across the larger hill, the other is created by stone pillars that goes along the backside of the hill, three feet apart, vary in height depending on the terrain. Arthen and S choose the backside pillar path. Arthen has a couple close calls, but he’s okay. After 100 yards, we;re back on a flat ledge, then a very steep stone staircase up to another terrace. We hear low singing as we approach, slow, gregorian chant like, long, drawn out notes, not unlike Eric Whitacre’s “Alleluia”. We pause and retreat, noting the location to share with the group, back across the pillars and return the group,
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Storr’s Jaunt Westward
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Back at Camp In the late afternoon, Silas goes foraging for some pipable heath, and/or brush. There’s a lot of diverse plant life. He grabs some to burn, as well as some wintergreen and blueberries.
Sunset. We have a magnificent view. Stars to the east appear even as the color ignites.
Constellations. It’s dark AF. We see the dragon, not the bear. We also see a raven shaped hole.
Balz, Bran, and K drop 1 exhaustion level.
- The Chorus We wake, and head to the singing dias. We get to the branch and take the eastern edge, not the pillar path that Silas traveled previously. Switchbacks, we gain some height. We come to the edge, and we start hearing maybe the same singing as previously. We pek around the corner and we think we see above us what we thing is the terrace. We see a marsh harrier hanging out on a stone. It sees us, jumps up into the wind and starts flying back toward the terrace Silas saw yesterday. ‘Was that thing looking for us?”
We continue. Our cover might be blown.
We come across a few flat surfaces and some bee enclosures. We definitely hear Whitacre on the wind. Storr, Silas, K, Bran, Balz is our marching order. We come to the backside of one of these bee hives. People humming and chanting just on the other side. We would need to weave our way through the hives to get there.
We come around the corner and we see a group of people, 9, 5 men, 4 women, sitting in a circle. All wearing versions of blue gray brown cloth, all worn, billowy, same cloth but different among them, multiple pieces, not robes. They span a variety of ages. Rushes on the ground. They’re on a flagged terrace, similar to ours. Bee hive style huts surrounding them on three sides. Splints in front to them, some rushes, some wood splints. They do have woven bee skips as well. They’re all making baskets of various shapes of sizes. The harrier has landed in front of one of them. He’s weaving, but also paying attention to the bird.
They look up and see us and go back to what they’re doing. The man in from of the harrier looks up, looks back to the harrier, nods and the harrier flies off.
We approach the birdman, Kanstal.
Kanstal - more like CanStall, AMMIRITE? He isn’t super forthcoming with information and is rather indifferent to our presence. He’s focused on weaving - because that’s what he does. ALL DAY. They certainly aren’t hostile with us, and don’t really react to our…oddities (we have a bear, a horned human, and a Mother Night look alike, so we usually get some looks).
Branwen is thinking that spending some time with these craftsfolk could be fruitful - learn a new skill, make something with our hands, and maybe even sneak another short rest in to clear our exhaustion. Furthermore, the voices on the wind are loud here. She’d like to craft, and listen. And learn to sing with them.