Harpers Quest Two- Beyond the Mists

Chapter Fifty-One

Athkatla- Amn- Toril- Nightal 1374

A few hours later he and Narache stood outside a House in Athkatla, Narache wearing his new Harper Pin visibly on his tunic as Varharland had done.
"I can't believe I have earnt this!" Narache said quietly " and should we be showing it like this".
Varharland nodded " this will mean more and will officiate and be more believable coming from both of us as Harpers and visibly so, thanks for coming with me Narache".
Narache nodded "it's ok, you asked me, too" he indicated Varharland's scales still visible on his arms " why are your scales showing though?"
Var said " you noticed that too did you? I'm stressed out; also the Plane was sapping me too, I'm not quite as well....good as the rest of my kind, I'm too Chaotic or Neutral I think, so my dragon blood is trying to protect me, although I suspect there may be something more involved...we have been through a lot though it will fade soon though now that we are home.
Still, they are kind of hard to explain, so I am glad they are not on my face, so I can hide them with sleeves. It does that sometimes if I'm stressed or wounded or something, my blood it is trying to protect me".
"You shouldn't be ashamed to be a Silver dragon Varharland...your beautiful! And the Realms it has too few dragons!" Narache said " remember Talafran? The dragons flying through the skies?"
Varharland said, "I remember, and no, I'm not ashamed to be a Silver Dragon, Narache, I just prefer to be an Eladrin!"
"You and Josalyn, save us all there at the end," Narache said, " especially me and Jack....you came so close to losing us both there at the end to the Darkness and you probably would have lost K'hari too, due to her link with Jack, it was not a failure Varharland do not think it as such".
"Then why do I still feel that it was," Varharland asked "I didn't expect this to be so hard!...I've done this so many times! But this is harder because I knew them both, I trained them!" he sighed and covering his scales knocked on the door of the house.

The door opened, and a man and a woman stood there, their eyes went to their visible Harper Pins and Var said, "Mr and Mrs Teren?" the man nodded and Var continued "I'm Master Harper Varharland Silverflash and this is my companion, Harper Narache Nightwalker, I'm afraid we come here as bearers of sad news, it concerns your daughter....Josalyn".
The man said then " she's dead, isn't she?"
"Um, yes...I'm so sorry we're here to inform you of her death and we are sorry to be the bearers of such sad news" Varharland started off.
The man waved that off " come in, both of you" he sighed " we knew this day would come, we just hoped it wouldn't, or when it did, it wouldn't be so soon...." The woman started to cry and he held her "the Curse. Strahd...Strahd got to her, didn't he? He finally found her".
Varharland was stunned and said, " you knew, ...how?"
"Come in and I'll explain," he said, he looked at Narache "you too, Dhampir".
"What....?" Narache asked.
He opened the door and let them into the house and led them into the lounge room and turned to his wife "put the kettle on for us will you, my love? And then come and join us".
She nodded and did so, wiping her tears and she walked out silently.
"How did she die?" he asked them softly "I hope it wasn't painfully?"
"How did you know?" Varharland asked.
He nodded " I'll explain my name is Roderic Teranovich, and my wife is Maria, and I'm a merchant and although we have long lived here in Amn and even changed our name, we weren't originally from here, we were originally from...."
"You're from Barovia!" said Varharland with sudden insight.
He nodded "Barovia, aye, and we know all about Strahd's curse and....Ana's" his wife returned then and poured all of them tea and offered them biscuits looking a little surprised when Narache took one.
"Anna....she was our daughter," Maria said softly "our one daughter. Our one child...I was only ever to have one child and that was Anna, Tatyana".
"But she was called Josalyn!" said Var.
Roderic said " she was a mere babe when we ended up here in Amn....her name was Tatyana, we knew she was Tatyana, so we called her Josalyn hoping that seeing she was here and that we live in Amn that she'd be safe and it seemed to work, she joined the Harpers, became a Bard, fell in love with Jondalar, whom I'm assuming is also dead as well, Strahd would not have let him live. We hoped that she be safe from the curse of Strahd and of Barovia. We hoped she'd would have a chance to live and to be happy!", he smiled sadly then "Marie and I had given up hope of ever having a baby, we'd lost too many, we were used to nothing but death crawling from her womb and when she fell pregnant again with Anna, and Anna was born healthy, perfect and alive, she was perfect and beautiful in every regard! And we hoped until a visiting Vistana told us that she was Strahd's curse" he sighed "how did she die?"
 Varharland said, " she sacrificed herself, so we could come home, I tried to stop her but in the end, it was ultimately her choice" he sighed " She died in the service of the Harpers, Maria, Roderic, the Harpers they meant everything to her, that and off course Jondalar, who is also indeed dead, his last request to us was to find Josalyn, and her last request was to come and tell you, neither of which I in good conscience could refuse! It is my duty to do so and I feel it is so. I trained both of them, her and Jondalar. It was I who took them for their first training mission. So I can share with you some in your grief. I told my superior that both she and he both died in the service of the Harpers, It does happen more than we all like to admit. She will be remembered and honoured for that, her and Jondalar both" he handed Maria, Josalyn's journals and her Harper pin.