The circle was heading east in their tiny boat (with tiny crew) from last time. They saw a flotilla northeast of them, damaged and heading north, and a ship peeled off from it, heading west (perpendicular to them, but further north). They intercepted and hailed that ship, were told that the flotilla had sank the pirates and freed the captives, and was now on it's way north to Coral. The circle sent their tiny boat north to Coral, and hitched a ride with the ship, which was faster, but had to stop elsewhere first, for “an errand”.
While aboard ship, they discover many things, most of them not useful. There are three characters who matter, all Dragon-blooded: Iron Paradise, the fire aspect, Soaring Mantis, the wood aspect, and Iselsi Kuwini, the water aspect captain. The crew is mostly not very nice people (but also people who nominally fight pirates for a living, so that's par for the course either way). The circle thoroughly investigates various sailors' homes, families and love for their homeland.
Eventually, they decided that there was no more blood in that particular stone, and fast forwarded to arrival, three days later. Along the way, they passed a pirate ship going the opposite direction, but didn't interact with it. They arrived at a small island with what looked like a burned down town on one side of it, but haven't checked it out yet. It's stereotypically volcano shaped, and has a caldera in the middle with a collapsed wall. That leaves the monastery inside surrounded on three sides, but with a nice level hike up to it. The characters bluster their way ashore with the landing party, and all together head towards the monastery. When they get there, it has also been burned trashed. All the monks are dead, and the statues are smashed. The dragon blooded and the marines they brought with them spread out purposefully; the PCs wander around. Eventually, one of them notices that the monastery is a manse, and they start looking for its hearthstone room. discovering that it's going to be in the chapel, Hammer heads there, and finds Mantis keeping watch, and some of the pedestals from the statues moved. Hammer tries to move the next pedestal, and is unsuccessful. Then Mantis asks him to stop messing with stuff. Hammer gathers the rest of the circle, then they try to move the pedestal all at once. Mantis grabs for Hammer to stop them; Hammer attacks Mantis with a grab; Mantis uses Safety Among Enemies to redirect his attack at Rabbit; and it's pretty much all downhill from there. Mantis exited out the south door. The circle immediately returns to molesting the architecture, levering up the pedestal. Underneath, they find a passage with an irate Iselsi, who shoots Hammer with an elemental blast through an essence lens, but Hammer has a perfect soak available. Iselsi uses Safety Among Enemies a few more times, and bolts out the east door. Throughout, there has been no talking.
After that, it turns into a solar vs. dragon-blood brawl: Mantis dies, and the other two flee. Iselsi gets captured fast and dragged back to the chapel, where Hammer and Third Monsoon barricade themselves in. The rest all chase Iron Paradise down to the ship, and catch him on the beach, where, in full view of the crew, Rabbit knocks him out. In an effort to improve the situation, all three row out to the ship, hem and haw, then tell a story remarkably similar to “a crazy demon did it”. They are not very convincing. Their follow-up attempt (“your officers are all fine, and have decided that everyone should come ashore for a barbecue”) is also not very convincing. However, they are willing to send people to get Iron paradise, who is in plain sight, unconscious and burning on the beach. Ranger Brad goes with them, and convinces them not to move him until he wakes up. Orchid also goes with them, and starts back toward the monastery. Rabbit remains on the ship. At this point, the five members of the circle are in four different locations, and the session ends.
Everyone earned 12 XP and ayone who put up a bio gets a bonus point.