February 22, 2026
The eastern road into Waycross has been quiet for most of the morning. You've been traveling together for a few days now, each of you headed toward the town for your own reasons. Coincidence at first, then convenience. The road is safer in numbers, and easy company makes the miles pass faster.
By the time the low rooftops and scattered chimneys of Waycross come into view, it feels natural that you're still walking side by side.
That calm shatters. A sharp crack splits the air as a second-story window of a roadside tavern bursts outward. Glass and splintered wood rain down as a small goblin figure tumbles through, slams into an awning, and hits the dirt hard, rolling once before scrambling to his feet. He's already running.
A broad-shouldered orc woman in a militia coat steps into the street, sword drawn. "You're armed," she says, locking eyes with you. "Good. Are you going to help, or are you going to get out of the way?"
What Happened
The party arrived in Waycross chasing a goblin named Skrit through the streets, and then stopped chasing him, because the crowd around him was uglier than he was. Vexira had words with Captain Mara Venn. Those words escalated. Mara mentioned there was another Tiefling in town, Lysa Zyros, to redirect the brewing confrontation, and escorted the party to the town hall to meet her and the local scholar Anna Reed.
Town hall revealed the actual shape of things: Mayor Eldric Hale was using goblin raids as justification for increasingly bad policy, Anna Reed was trying to study the Moss-Eyed clan rather than fight them, and Nimma Vetch, the goblin raid leader, was being held in the Muster Hall. The party asked Hale to leave his own office so they could talk. He did.
They found Mara mistreating Nimma. Yssala confronted her. Mara pushed Yssala down. The fight that followed went exactly as you'd expect when a party has surprise and a sorcerer. Mara ended up in a cell. Nimma walked out into the forest with the party.
Maena healed Nimma on the move and they made it to the Moss-Eyed Grove by evening, avoiding wolves and arriving in time to meet Grakka Bonewise, Rukhar Moss-Eyes, and the rest of the clan. They learned about the Thornfather, a sacred tree the goblins believed held deep power, and spent the night.
The night went sideways. Wolves attacked the camp. Lysa went down. Yssala used Speak with Animals to talk one of the wolves into standing down, turns out without the cairns along the road singing their ward-song, the wolves thought the whole area was open hunting ground. The goblins took the bodies. The last wolf ran. Then Corvus detected something and flew off toward town.
The party split. Maena, Anna, and Lysa followed Corvus back to Waycross, and walked straight into Eldric Hale waiting with soldiers. Anna and Lysa escaped. Maena was arrested. Corvus flew back to warn the others.
The rescue was everything it needed to be. Corvus swept through the Muster Hall and knocked Maena's bow off a weapons rack into her hands mid-cell. The party plus a band of goblin archers cleaned out the guards and Hale. When Mara arrived to the noise, she found herself outnumbered, and the party, despite their earlier history with her, made the argument that Hale had been the real problem all along. Mara, reluctantly, agreed to run the town.
Session 2: The Faire →