(Finally, I manage to stay awake long enough to attend one of the sessions. Here's how Ritha gets involved in the action, give or take a few details.)

Ritha is puttering around her home village of Truce, thoroughly bored of staring at trees all the time. Suddenly, salvation arrives in the form of a magic carpet. The flying rug parks itself in the middle of the town and announces that it has been sent by the Great Illusionist Agachock (whoever THAT is); he wants to meet with a citizen of this town, and has thoughtfully provided transportation to achieve this end. Ritha volunteers (she'd do anything to get out of Truce), sits on the carpet, and off she goes. The trip takes days; food and water appear by magic at regular intervals, and she rides in comfort and style. Until, while flying over a vast plain, she spots a large group of... something or other... flying in the distance. Straight towards her.

Meanwhile, Latke, Agace, and Sine look up and see a group of flying things off in the distance, which seems to be heading towards our heroes. Agace disguises himself as a boulder on the off chance that they'll ignore him.

Ritha can't change the course of the magic carpet, so she ends up smacking right into the pack of flying monkeys. (And your little dog, too!) She's knocked off of the carpet and falls quite a distance, landing with a thud on the grasslands. Ouch. Pain.

The flying monkeys are in an aggressive mood. Plus they have our plucky little band of Adepts both surrounded and outnumbered. Though the Adepts manage to take out a few monkeys (a surprise attack from the "boulder" helps), things look pretty bad. However, in the nick of time, Latke recognizes the critters (Ice Howlers, in case you were curious), and suggests a strategy.

Carrying out the hasty plan, Sine approaches the Howlers. As a Sky Raider, she possesses the ability to strike fear into the hearts of her enemies with the sound of her voice alone. She lets out a powerful Battle Shout; the alpha male Ice Howler, always up for a challenge, howls back at her, caught up in a little contest of superiority. It doesn't take long for Sine to shout the monkeys into submission, and they fly away in defeat.

The few dead monkeys yield up some valuable prizes: chilly elemental-ice feathers in their wings. These are bound to be valuable. Plus they're great to have around on hot days.

The other prize is a little more puzzling to our heroes. Where did this unconscious elf chick come from, anyway?

Ritha eventually wakes up. The magic carpet is long gone, not having noticed that it lost its passenger. And now she's surrounded by three Adepts who are highly suspicious of her. To make sure she's not Horror-Marked, they make her practice her lone creative skill, wood-carving. She botches it royally. Luckily, Agace (mistakenly) sees a spark of creativity in the butchered piece of wood, and gives her a second chance. Finally they accept that Ritha's mind is free of a Horror's taint, and not a moment too soon.

However, none of them have ever heard of the Great Illusionist Agachock, or of the little elvish village of Truce. Ritha has nothing better to do, and nowhere else to go, so she tags along with our heroes. They accept her presence grudgingly, at least until she digs up a bunch of water-bearing tubers. Once it's generally understood that she won't be cutting into the limited water supply, that she might even help them survive out here, they're a lot friendlier towards her.

(Let me take a few minutes off from the narrative to expound upon the wonder and glory that is known as Edible Plant Lore. In Earthdawn, every character is allowed to start off with a couple of Knowledge skills, based on the idea that even though the player won't necessarily be familiar with the gameworld, their character has been living in it all their life and should damn well know a thing or two about the creatures and situations they run into. A broad, vague knowledge skill, like World History Lore, can be applied in many situations, but you have to be really lucky with the dice to get any useful information from it. A highly specific skill, like Canoe Creation Lore, will be a big help to you, on the off chance that you ever have a pressing need to make canoes. Now, Edible Plant Lore is a pretty specific kind of knowledge... you're not trying to find out the medicinal uses of the plants, or their optimal growing conditions, or their monetary value; all you want to know is whether you can safely eat 'em or not. However, you can use Edible Plant Lore pretty much anywhere you find some vegetation. It's specific AND generally useful! You won't believe how much cash it's saved me and my party members on rations.)

Another bonus: Ritha is now available to share nighttime guard duty. The need for such is amply demonstrated a short while later. In the night, a group of five-foot-tall chickens silently approach the camp. The four Adepts find themselves paralyzed when the birds spray them with some kind of special goo. Ritha is nearly pecked to death. Eventually the paralysis wears off, the birds get chopped to bits, and Ritha gets bandaged. Damn useless elf chick. It is discovered that Ritha's player really sucks at healing rolls, too, even when Latke helps out with that most useful of elemental spells, Heat Food.

An interesting result of fighting the chickens: for some reason, everything looks orange. The sky. The grass. The Adepts themselves. No one knows why, and everyone just hopes it'll wear off.

Next: The Horror!
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© Megan Jones 2002. This story wouldn't be possible if not for my endlessly entertaining friends, and the Earthdawn RPG originally by FASA.