Aurora at Evermore Park: Part 3 – Girl’s Night Out

Even though I went to Evermore Park the day before our girl’s night out, I had a vastly different experience despite the events in the park being largely the same. That’s the beauty of Evermore Park – it will be unique to you every time you visit. If you would like to read the other parts in this series, Part 1 is about going before Christmas, Part 2 is about their New Year’s Eve Party and the new coded messages quest.

I’ve been looking forward to this girls night ever since our girls night that we had during Lore. Some of the quests on the Aurora scavenger hunt were a continuation of story lines from Lore.

I was so excited to find out with my friends about the hunters that we had joined last time. After we got some yummy food, we went to the tavern and asked Sephtis the executioner about the hunters, also known as the Blackhearts, because we were one of them.

Sephtis said, “You must have been very brave then.”

We said, “Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. She got a bulls-eye with the bow and arrow. Oh. Wait. That was my other friend. Pretty brave though. Yeah.” Lol.

Sephtis said that after Wickham had closed the Lore portal, the Blackhearts stopped coming. Something about they had the cure for the curse of darkness?? (my notes don’t make sense about that part). And the hunters ran out of things to hunt at Evermore so they were fighting wild beasts in Scotland. But rumor has it that they are coming back in 2 weeks. He also told us that the druids were thrown in jail and some made deals to get out if they promised not to touch gold. Agramire was one druid that made that deal. We asked if he needed help and he said no, but the dragon trainers down by the ruins did.

At the ruins, we met Kaida the dragon trainer. She told us that the dragon eggs were dormant and they needed some blue salt to help them hatch but she didn’t know who had it. And since she was having a disagreement with her father, she wanted us to give it to him and say it was from her to help make amends. The fight between her and her father started because her father can be hard on her and he said she had reached her full potential which made her mad so they aren’t speaking. My friend asked where we could find out about the salt. Kaida said the townsfolk know a lot of gossip and would probably know about the salt. She also thanked us for sticking around the whole time. People tend to take off before she’s done talking and they have a hard time of it. Oh we learned that real fast in Lore. You wander around enough even if you know exactly who to talk to let alone just wandering around with some vague goal of finding salt.

We went to town and met Boris the farmer. He said Sephtis will give you the salt if you give him a coin which you can get from the dwarves if you tell them a certain phrase. Boris couldn’t really remember the phrase but it was something like “Allpheano Beano.”

My friend, Linda, wanted to know about some gossip he knew. Oh boy did he know some juicy gossip! He said that Jakull used to be the town drunk and used to go by the name of Badger. Now he seems to think he’s some sort of god king. He was here during Lore as the gravedigger and now he wants to be Aurorean. There’s been some bickering among the Auroreans about the position of General and they are threatening war if they don’t get their way. He thought the Auroreans were causing trouble. He also said that Wickham has been disappearing in the forest and no one knows why. If we wanted to help anyone, Humbug needed help because he wasn’t getting along with Foldo.

Linda asked if he needed any help. He said he wanted us to explain something to him. His wife is a writer and she can’t describe the word “irony.” I saw my other friend, Calista, perk up. She had just been teaching her kids about irony and she explained it very well to him. He gave us some gold for our explanation. I liked that the people in the town square seemed to know a lot. When I first came during Lore, they actually knew the least which I thought was strange. As a visitor, you would assume the most helpful people would be right near the entrance to help all the new comers. I’m glad they are very helpful and informative now (and they gossip too! How fun!!).

We went to the burrows to tell the dwarves our phrase but they seemed confused. The phrase we were supposed to say was “Abrailleoga” which means “I love you.” The phrase we said proposed marriage. Awkward! (And I have a sneaking suspicion that Boris gave us the wrong phrase on purpose so we would have an interesting conversation with the dwarves. Bless you Boris. It was one of the highlights of the night!). Since all three of us had said it, he said he would have to think about which one of us to marry.

We passed the mausoleum on the way to the tavern because Foldo and Humbug were supposed to be there. The dwarves had given us silver to give to Foldo. That’s two people now who had mentioned that quest but we never did find him no matter how many times we passed the mausoleum. Every time I asked someone where Foldo was, they always said by the mausoleum. By the end of the night, since we were tired of trying to hunt him down, I started asking if they had seen Foldo there recently. That was much more helpful. No need to go trekking down there if no one else had seen him, either. And no one else had seen him recently.

At the tavern, we traded our coin to Sephtis for the blue salt. Then the postman came into the tavern saying he wanted to help cheer up Suds so they were going to the Burrows to do that. I ran into the Syndicate Guild at the burrows and I said hi to them. My son and I had met them last night when we were solving codes. I asked them about the tarot card that we were trying to find with our questing but they had gotten theirs before Christmas so they didn’t know where it was now. Pit Plum, who was an Evermore Champion during the Lore season, asked if I was Jessica. I said yes, flattered that he recognized me. He introduced himself and shook my hand. I said, “I know who you are!” with a big dorky grin. I guess I know now how I would act if I met a celebrity – like a dork. Haha!!

The postman had us all write postcards to Suds to help cheer him up. My friends and I wrote a quote from Princess Bride: “Death cannot stop true love. It can only delay it for a while.” Suds is sad because the girl he loves got trapped on the other side of the portal.

After we checked in with Turno the dwarf to see if he had decided on his bride yet (“I’m still thinking!”), we left the burrows and found Humbug by the mausoleum. He said that Foldo, the lantern bearer, was “mad and I didn’t do anything he can prove.” I asked if he knew where Foldo was and he said, “Foldo hasn’t been here since the day nothing happened.” Oh my heck. He’s hilarious!

Since we were getting stuck on that quest, we went to town to see if the dragon trainer was there so we could give him the blue salt. I saw him handing out tarot cards and we got excited. We worked really hard during Lore to find where all the tarot cards were hidden. But he ended up giving us a card we already had. That’s too bad. But we will keep looking for the one we don’t have.

We ran into the town crier. I liked him. He went around letting people know of events happening around town at certain times. We showed him our tarot card and asked if there was another quest for a different card and if he could point us in the right direction. He mentioned the dragon quest, which we had already done, and the lantern bearer quest with Foldo, which we were stuck on. He had the idea to talk to the dragon trainer again and see if he had any other cards to trade for. I thought that was a good idea.

While we were wandering around trying to find out where to go next, we ran into Drifa and Rainer. They were having a conversation with someone else about the blue salt. The world-walkers (the Evermore Park term for someone who doesn’t work there) asked if they were the ones to talk to about the blue salt. I blurted out “No.” The conversation came to a halt and everyone turned to looked at me. That’s when it occurred to me that maybe I shouldn’t have said that out loud. If only things like that occurred to me sooner. I immediately apologized and told them to continue but Rainer gestured to me and said, “No please. You seem to know what they are talking about.” So I started fumbling through my notes trying to remember what we did and in what order until I finally found my note about talking to the people in town who will tell you where to go next. They were still looking at me so I said, “You have to talk to someone else. It’s the dwarves. But you have to know what to say to them!” Everyone laughed. I asked Linda later why everyone had laughed, and she said it was because I seemed so excited that I just blurted out the answer. Haha! I guess I did.

We are officially stuck now. We can’t find the lantern bearers, the dragon trainer, or the historian who is very helpful when you are stuck because she knows pretty much everything. In the tavern, we were asking around about the tarot card. Jardini, the fortune teller, saw me asking about it and he whispered to me to come and see him if we didn’t have any luck.

In all my Evermore visits, there has always been a time where I have gotten stuck for one reason or another. This has always been the perfect time to get a cookie, so that’s what we decided to do. After we ate our treats, we met Greebly the goblin who has a sleigh and presents on his back. Some of the presents have cute little mice sticking out of them. We tried to teach him how to say “smuggling” because he kept saying “snuggling.” I explained that snuggling meant hugging someone and smuggling was being sneaky.

“It’s smmmmmmuggling.”

“That’s what I said! Snnnnnnuggling.”

And then every time we said smuggling afterwards, he asked if it was the huggy kind or the sneaky kind. We sang songs with him and he really liked the one about the ducks that don’t come back because he likes to eat ducks but not cooked.

We ran into Elinore and asked her about an item on our scavenger hunt which was finding out the name of the mill. She said it was called Nettleton Mill. We noticed she had a bag with clear rocks so we asked her about them. She said it was Everfrost and she was collecting it for the lantern bearers. That sounded like the end of the quest we were trying to do! But where’s the beginning? Where do you get the Everfrost from? She didn’t know but she said she would find out for us after we explained how we couldn’t find the lantern bearer Foldo all night.

While we waited for Elinore to come back, we saw Sephtis the executioner by the fire pit. We were going to ask him about the tarot card but he seemed sad. He said he was disappointed that Suds didn’t like his dating game in the tavern. I said I thought it was nice and Calista added that Suds probably appreciated the effort even if he wasn’t interested in a date. We asked if we could help him and he said there was nothing he needed help with. Some world-walkers came up to him with a message from Suds. Suds said that he was sorry for what he said. We didn’t hear the rest because that’s when Elinore came back with a clue. She said to talk to the light elves about it. I hope that Sephtis and Suds made up. Sephtis had left by the time we were done talking to Elinore.

We found one of the light elves in the burrows. She couldn’t stand still as she told us that Humbug has been spending time in the forest because he doesn’t like people so he gets grumpy and chops trees and the Fae King doesn’t like it. Her version of the story had a lot of sound effects. And when the Fae King is upset, so is Foldo the lantern bearer. For more information, we should talk to Jakull.

Jakull said that he thinks Foldo is upset for another reason and it has to do with trying to help the Fae King. If we wanted to help, we should get some Everfrost from his brother Rainer. I asked Rainer what Everfrost was. He said, “This is a good question. It is embodiment of elemental powers and it comes from Aurora.” He told us to give it to Elinore. Sure, now everyone is saying to talk to Elinore because she is helping Foldo tonight. That would have been helpful earlier.

When we gave the Everfrost to Elinore, she gave me a coupon. Which I already have. And we had already gotten all the food we wanted that night. She saw my hesitation and asked if I wanted to trade for an Aurorean pearl instead. Heck yes I did. They are a status symbol apparently. My friends gave me their beads which I thought was nice.

There was only one item left on our scavenger hunt paper. It was to talk to the Skare brothers about what they liked about Evermore. “Who are the Skare brothers?”

“Their names are Rainer and Jakull.” Seriously?! We just spoke to Rainer and Jakull!

We walked allllll the way back to the mausoleum. On the way there, I overheard someone say, “This place should be called Exercise-More.” I agree! We found Rainer and I asked what he liked about Evermore. He said, “You.” And then he winked at me. I said, “Awww” and blushed and hid my face in my notebook that I may or may not have filled with hearts next to his name. Then he said in a charming accent that reminded me of Russian, “Let me explain better.” His favorite thing about Evermore is the people. He thinks of us as kittens because of the fragile beauty of our mortality.

On our way back to talk to Elinore, we ran into the dragon trainer! Yay! When it was our turn to talk to him, Sedric the executioner’s apprentice came up to the dragon trainer and said he had some private business with him and we should wait a moment. Linda leaned closer to eavesdrop and whipsered, “They are trading the blue salt.”

“What?! NO!!” Sedric said as he whipped his head around. I expected him to give me a scowl or frown but he looked scandalized and he was trying not to smile. I got a big laugh out of the look on his face. My friend Calista chimed in and said, “Ignore the man behind the green curtain.”

“What green curtain?” the dragon trainer said.

We all giggled and said “Nothing!” That was an excellent Wizard of Oz reference, I might add.

After Sedric left, we asked the dragon trainer about the tarot card. He said he only had the one. Oh darn. It was worth asking. While we were walking away, Linda scurried back and asked the dragon trainer a question. I couldn’t hear what she said but I definitely heard the dragon trainer say, “Of course not!! We use the blue salt to hatch the dragon eggs!!!”

We ran into the dwarves in the town square again and we talked to them while we warmed up by the fire. It was getting late and Turno the dwarf still hadn’t decided which of us he was going to marry. Calista asked what he was looking for because she’s very good at knitting. Turno scratched his chin and considered that. Linda said that she was good at cooking. Turno was impressed by that, too.

Turno looked at me and said, “What about you?”

Linda answered for me and said, “She’s a writer.” That took me by surprise. Most people say I’m a piano teacher or a mom. No one has ever described me as a writer. I don’t even describe myself that way. I was touched that she said that about me.

Turno seemed very impressed by that. “Oooooh. I’m partial to artists. Can you cook, too?”

“Yeah,” I replied. “I’m pretty good, too.” I cook a lot from scratch for me and my families’ food sensitivities and I’m proud of how much I’ve learned. I wasn’t about to lie about it.

He said he would still have to think about it. He had a lot to consider now. We never did talk to him again that night. We’ll never know who he would have chosen (*loud whisper* but I bet it would have been me).

After we met up with Elinore and got another Aurorean pearl for finishing all the scavenger hunt items, there was only one thing left to do before the night was over. Follow the very last lead we had to get the only tarot card that I hadn’t collected yet by asking Jardini the fortune teller about it.

As we waited in line to talk to him, I realized that was the first time all night that there had even been a line to talk to someone. Yes, we had to wait our turn when we had talked to other characters that night but it was usually only one other person in front of us. At Lore, the lines were often 20 minutes or more to talk to each character. I’m not sure how they fixed that problem. Probably magic.

I showed Jardini my tarot card and he went behind the bar and said, “Which tarot cards do you have?”

I replied, “The hunter, the maiden, the auctioneer, and one other one…I can’t remember what it’s called…”

He looked at me, stunned.

“The only one I don’t have is the sentry.”

Jardini was still looking at me with his mouth open.

Fintan, who was a townsfolk, was watching us at the bar. He reached into his pocket and said he had one sentry tarot card left. He apologized for it being rumpled but it was his very last one and I could have it if I wanted. I was speechless with how very kind that was. I’m very fond of my wrinkled sentry tarot card. In fact, when I got home I noticed that it was made of different paper from my other cards. It has a shiny finish like a playing card while my other cards have a matte finish. It’s very special indeed. The cards to me aren’t just about collecting them. It’s about the adventure and the memory that goes with finding them. Thank you so much, Fintan. That card will remind me of you and your kindness whenever I see it.

Jardini asked if he could help us with anything else so I asked him if I could get a tarot reading. He told me to think of a question and explained I could share it after the reading if I wanted to but most people didn’t. I had every intention of telling him my question. My cards were the maiden, the serpent, and one other card that I can’t remember. The maiden was about love, the serpent meant I had to be clever (he even pointed to my Gryffindor hat and said “Less of this and more Slytherin”), and the last card meant I needed to ask for help. After his earnest and thoughtful advice, my question suddenly felt personal and when he asked if I wanted to share it, I said no, to my surprise.

It was another great night at Evermore. We had talked to so many great people that night. I ran into the people that I had spoiled the quest for and apologized to them. They said they were glad I had helped and hadn’t been spoiled at all. They had even ran up to me when they saw me later to ask for advice on the ciphers. I also saw my friend from Instagram, Rachel (@evermore_adventuress). I had never met her at the park before and it was so nice to finally meet her in person. At the door, I said goodbye to the greeter, Micki, and she went out of her way to say goodbye and that it was nice to see me again. I recognized her from my other visits and the Facebook group. I agree with Rainer. The best part of Evermore is the people.

If you want to read more recap posts about my Evermore Park visits, here’s a list of all my posts so far in chronological order:

• Lore Part 1
• Lore Part 2
• Aurora Part 1
• Aurora Part 2
• *This post: Aurora Part 3

Featured Image credit: Evermore.com

All other photos taken by me.