Either there was a lot of information this week or else my notes are not typed up as concise as usual. I suspect both. With apologies, I present you with a wall of text.... .....
Thursday 14th April 1204 continued…
A Secret Mission
We are ushered into the presence of Count Baldwin and his brother, Henry of Flanders. No others are permitted to enter the chamber. The Count bears a grim countenance and the atmosphere of our meeting is decidedly clandestine in nature. Baldwin gets straight to the point: Crusaders are engaged in chaotic plundering in Constantinople and are committing atrocities against the Byzantine Greek citizenry. Their oaths to God are forgotten. The army is sinking into anarchy. Baldwin accuses our Venetian allies, or at the least a faction amongst them, of falling into heresy and weaving dark magic. This soul-possessing, unnatural and ungodly subversion is the cause of the crusader debauchery.
Our liege tasks us with investigating the rumours of a Venetian cult in the city. He informs us that his own occultist, a monk named Merovic, can be consulted on such matters. Brother Merovic is a leper and is confined aboard the leper ship moored in the harbour.
Of primary importance is that we visit the northern basilica of the Forum of Theodosius without delay. Some of our men guard a priest that they took into their care overnight. We must hear his story. Our liege warns us that there is rumour of a monster unleashed in the city, killing Greeks and Franks alike. Venetian heretics are suspected to be behind the appearance of this beast.
We are not to draw attention to ourselves. Secrecy is paramount. As reward, Baldwin offers us a share of any spoils we take while investigating this matter in his service. We are given permission to kill any heretics that oppose us – God wills it!
To assist us, Baldwin bids his bard to enter the chamber. The bard, a feckless man named Bledich, is familiar with the city and will act as our guide.
The Varangian Trap
Three miles of chaotic city streets lie between the Blachernae Palace and the Forum of Theodosius. Bledich leads us there through a maze of back alleys. Along the way we witness a Frankish soldier being dragged down the stairs of a cistern. We intervene in the kidnap of one of our Frankish brothers. Chasing the helpless man and his assailants down the steps into the darkness of the vast underground chamber. It’s a trap. The man is not a victim. He is a lure. The man and his assailants are revealed as Varangians intent on doing us harm. The fight is bloody and without mercy. While Reynaud and Gilles prove their martial prowess, Andre and David receive bloody wounds. But God be praised, the Varangians are vanquished.
Evidence of the Beast
Later, we are confronted with the scene of a broken house and Frankish soldiers murdering a Greek woman in their state of drunkenness and distress. They shout at each other: “Did you see it?”, “It was a beast”, “It killed three men!”, “It destroyed the house, there!” “It vanished into thin air” exclaims one soldier, “No, it flew away” replies another. They’re in no fit state to answer our questions. Reynaud runs one through with his sword for being annoying.
At the Forum of Theodosius
The Forum is flanked by four churches. It is the northern basilica that we head towards. Within, four Franks, in the service of our liege, guard the nave and the steps to the crypt. Bledich provides our introduction; we are here to see the priest. One of the guards warns us that the priest is a cursed man. We are permitted to descend the steps into the crypt where the priest is being kept.
Padre Agostinos
The priest, Agostinos by name, looks terrible. He rocks back and forth and mutters to himself. He wears an eye patch which obviously covers a recent injury. Between bursts of incoherent ramblings we manage a mostly lucid conversation. Agostinos is aware of a Venetian cabal that has entered the city under cover of the crusade. They call themselves The Unburdened Flesh. Agostinos doesn’t know to what extent the cult has infiltrated Venetian ranks. Perhaps their influence reaches all the way to the Doge himself? Agostinos knows why they have come. He knows what they seek. They seek a relic named the Devil’s Similare. A Venetian knight named Ramardi leads the cult’s investigations. The Devil’s Similare allows its wearer to assume any living form, as long as the wearer possesses the skin of the form he wishes to assume.
The Satanic Relic
Agostinos doesn’t know where the Devil’s Similare is hidden, but he did know of a chest deposited at the Church of St. Mocius many years ago by Byzantine monks in which, reputedly, is kept a ritual. Performing the ritual would, it is said, reveal the location of the Similare. Prior to Venetians arriving at the church yesterday, Agostinos removed the ritual from the chest and hid it in the Statue of the Virgin – one of several statues in the church. Disappointed to find an empty chest, the Venetians took Agostinos captive. The priest remembers distinctly that one of his captors had an unusual tattoo of a five-tailed whip on his left bicep. Agostinos was beaten but revealed nothing to those who tortured him. They took his eye. We speculate that perhaps the cultists took the priest’s eye for use in witchcraft.
The Spectacular Demise of Agostinos
Agostinos tears away his eye patch. Behind the empty socket is a pulsing red ball of flesh – like a false eye. The ball of flesh explodes and with it Agostinos’ whole head in a shower of blood and ichors. Bledich is covered in Agostinos’ oozing flesh. He stands unmoving and no longer reacts to any stimuli. The experience of the exploding priest has rendered Bledich catatonic. Our liege only loaned him to us less than four hours ago, and we’ve broken his favourite bard already. God has abandoned poor Bledich.
Excuse me sir, would you be so kind as to direct us to the Church of St. Mocius?
We need to find the Church of St. Mocius to recover the ritual that Agostinos told us about, but our guide is in a stupor. We pull a Greek citizen from his home and threaten violence against him unless he tells us how to find the church. We don’t speak Greek. The Greek doesn’t speak anything else. So, we shout at him in French, loud and slow – S-A-I-N-T M-O-C-I-U-S!! – and Reynaud roughs him up for good measure. Fearful for his life, the terrified Greek seems to understand. He points the way. Of course it was only later that Reynuad remembered he knew where the church was all along – in fact he’d been there before.*
*After trekking across the city towards the church, Doug realises he has Knowledge (Constantinople) as a skill on his character sheet and rolled a critical 01% success to see if he (retrospectively) knew how to find the church all along without the need to terrorize Greek citizens.
Greek Powered Cart
We contemplate leaving Bledich behind, but decide it would be rude of us not to return our liege lord’s property. We find a cart outside, but unfortunately no horse to pull it. In trying to manoeuvre Bedlich up the crypt stairs Andre accidently touches the blood and ichor that covers him. Andre feels an immediate itch and burn and so rushes up the steps to plunge his hand into the holy water of the font. The water fizzes.
Bledich is placed in the commandeered cart. We then commandeer some locals to pull it. The team of Greeks huff and puff through two miles of city streets, hauling the cart on our journey to the seventh hill of Constantinople upon which the church of St. Mocius is situated, between the Forum of Arcadius and the outer west wall.
Local Hospitality
We draw ever nearer to the seventh hill, but it’s getting dark and it’s tiring work watching Greeks struggle up the street pulling our cart. We decide to impose ourselves on a local Greek household and billet for the night. We can gather a new team of Greeks to pull the cart in the morning. The Greek family have no choice but to admit us to their home. No doubt their best hope is that we won’t murder them all and steal their belongings. Actually, with foresight, considering what is to come later, murder and pillage might have proved the more merciful option.
We realise we are becoming ever more contemptuous towards our fellow human beings; more cynical and less Godly one might say; except for Reynaud of course, who remains true-to-form. Are the warnings of our liege true? Is there truly an evil atmosphere in the city promoted by witchery that affects the disposition of us all?
We bring Bledich indoors and lay him on a bed. He’s still unresponsive. His skin is terrible, all red with burn-like scars and one of his eyes is beginning to swell and close up. Andre’s hand burns too – the skin of his right hand is red and the redness is spreading. Andre says nothing and keeps his hand hidden from his companions.
Friday 15th April 1204
Before the morning dawns we are already preparing to leave. To our horror poor Bledich has melted away in the night. There is nothing but a sickening heap of seeping ooze in the place where he lay. Reynaud, convinced the house is tainted by evil, burns it down as we depart. The Greek family, now homeless and destitute, weep in the street, but at least we’re not going to make them pull our cart.
We set out on foot up the hill. Andre scratches at his arm, the affliction having now spread to his elbow. Still he keeps it hidden.
