9 September 2017

23 Berrum 3275

Al and Matty emerge from swimming and meet Sivin (half-Dorgenian, half-Elf)
on her ship, with her crew pulling weeds off the boat -- a large storm
blew them into the Huulmarsh. She mentions she will be heading to
Blackberry Bar's later.

At Blackberry Bar's, next to Milena, Ronnie is trying to get Rickie to
tell him the story of a haunted house he stumbled into recently.
Dettie is trying to distract Gnik from his conversation with Curt.
Matty and Al enter, and Biray and Vidal enter and tell rest of Blue
Gauntlet (Curt, Dettie, Daryl) that horses are saddled and it is
time to go; Larry and Wend depart for work.

Sivin enters, asks Milena if she has read any omens. She mentions
overhearing the gentlemen beside her discussing a haunted house.

Kynmeh bursts in (from Cylandic lands). He received a package from a
mage who sends him oddities, but it turned out to be alive; knocked
him down and ran away before he even got a good look at it. Milena
walks outside and whistles to try to call one of her dogs. 

Crate Kynmeh opened includes rats drained of blood and small amounts
of spider webbing. Examining the mud near the crate, clearly the tracks
are a giant spider -- Milena has a good sense of the trail, Matty and
Al also following. Kat is scouting ahead from the rooftops, Gnik has
called his familiar to keep an eye on things from above.

As group reaches shipyards, Bradford (runs shipyards, part-orc) says
he saw monster; the group says they are tracking giant spider. Bradford
asks, "Are you going to kill it?" Matty says to Al, "We're not going to
kill it, are we?" Al goes around a building to try to head it off and
trap it in an alleyway. Matty enters from the other side, and Milena
goes to the south side of the building in case the spider climbs over.

Al and Matty sees the spider hanging under the eaves of the building;
spider lunges for Al, and Al tosses a net at it to try to catch it.
Kat hits it with a sling stone, and Gnik targets it with a sleep spell
that succeeds in putting it to sleep. Milena heals it as they take it
back to its crate, and then heals Al from the bite he sustained on
his leg. Kynmeh promises to release it in the Dreadwood.

Group returns to Blackberry Bar's and Kynmeh buys everyone breakfast.
(Ronnie has eaten all the food they left behind.) Kat tells Ronnie that
they will tell him about the adventure they just had if he tells them
about the haunted house.

("That's north? Then why is that called the West Gate? ...Oh, because
that's how West works." -Andy)

Haunted house is about 4 mi east of town, once owned by Megan Crabb,
reputation for being a witch, who disappeared 18 years ago. Ronnie went 
there looking for food, or to see if any wine might be in the cellar. He 
heard horrible ghastly shrieks and piercing wails coming from downstairs, 
swirl of ghosts coming up the stairs, so he fled and slammed the door 
behind him.  Gnik knew Megan, who would sometimes come to him in search 
of books on magical/alchemical properties, history of magic, history of
places (e.g. Bargal Valley, Tyreln -- capital of Rantokc's Realm). She
was a well-known and well-connected alchemist, worked with Exotics to
procure needed materials, sometimes had visitors.

Gnik and Kat suggest spending the day researching the house, and Megan
Crabb, and what to do about ghosts. Allard goes to ask his mom about
Tillian stories about ghosts, and she tells him that the stories say
you should tie twigs in a certain shape to ward them off. Kat goes to
the market, Milena makes the rounds to check on her clients, Matty subs
at Blackberry Bar's.

Gnik does some research on ghosts at the library and then goes to
the Temple of Maria to see if they can provide more information.
Assistant priest Callas greets him, Gnik says he and some companions
will be investigating a haunted house and want to know how to protect
themselves from ghosts and how to draw them out to verify they are
there. Callas brings him in to consult the literature (which Gnik
is very interested in), which suggests that how to put the ghost
to rest depends on how the ghost was created in the first place.

While doing more research at the Town Hall, Gnik is greeted by
Juliana Forrest, the Lord Mayor of Saltmarsh, who says she heard
from the Temple of Maria about his planned quest and encourages
him to pursue it. The house has been an eyesore and a hazard for
years, and the city does not have the deed to the house to do
anything about it. She implies that the city might reward anyone
who might be able to do something about it.


24 Barrum 3275

The group gathers at Blackberry Bar's. Kat brings Mouse, who she thinks
can see ghosts. Milena brings Boris so that Gnik can ride him on the
four-mile walk. Gnik relates what he learned in his research.

As they approach the house, a 6 ft stone wall surrounds the property,
but it is crumbling and the gate is ajar. Garden is completely overgrown.
(Milena notes that many plants are useful.)
House is 35 ft high, roof is peaked and gabled but missing shingles and
with some holes; two stories with attic, most likely.

(Russ notes that he didn't use the front-view version of the house
because it didn't match the floor-plan. Carl asks if he got it from
a module.

Russ: "Yeah, but it's from like 1984."
Karen A:  "Which is before they had discovered 'matching'. I grew up
in the '70's, so I know.")

Wall around house goes all the way to cliff edge (about 70 ft high)
overlooking the sea; house is about 80 ft from cliff edge. 

Gnik casts Light on a pebble and gives it to Al, and the group
enters the house through the door from the patio. Inside of house
is dilapidated, damp with patches of mold, full of cobwebs, with
visible rot in woodwork, plaster falling from walls/ceiling, warped
and sometimes missing floorboards, evidence of rodent infestation.

Al pokes around in a pile of garbage in the corner and finds a gold
earring. Matty sees a well-worn trail running from the door to the
hall into the opposite corner from where Al is investigating. She
goes to the corner and they all hear a sinister laugh coming from
somewhere below the floor. Allard tries looking under the floor
where it is pulled away and sees there is cellar underneath. He
pokes at the floor in the corner and finds that the floor rotates
up, revealing a set of stairs to the cellar. Allard goes into the
cellar.

There are lit torches around the walls, it appears to be living
quarters for about 10 people with cots with their heads along the
south wall and a wooden locker at the foot; floor is flagstone, there
is a long wooden trestle table with crockery and tableware around it,
jug of cheap beer, a dozen wooden stools, two large casks (possibly
water and beer), a wooden bin next to the casks, ham and sausages
hanging from hooks, stove, logs, and cookware. Near foot of stairs
are two unbroached casks and a bolt of shimmering cloth. Two doors
out of the room.



23 September 2017


Allard checks the doors and finds one is heavily bolted and has
the word "DANGER" carved into it. Mouse sniffs around and sits
and stares at that door. Kat notes that there is no scent of smoke
and the torches on the wall generate no heat. Gnik comments that
that is consistent with a Continual Flame spell, which is expensive
to cast (50 gp per spell); but for a group trying not to be found,
probably worth the expense.

Al listens at the doors, but doesn't hear anything; no light coming
from under the doors. He checks the non-danger door, and Kat moves
to lift the bar off the danger door; Al suggests maybe they should
warn everyone else before opening the door that says "Danger". Kat
tries anyway, but the bar is too heavy; she asks Al to help, but
he's going to try the other door first.

From tracking, Matty notices that the room has probably been lived
in for at least a few years, and one of the stools at the table has
been tipped over and is still warm. She notes that there is not much
traffic to the corner with the two doors, but lots of traffic to the
other two corners. She goes to investigate the corner south of the
stairs.

Al opens the left door; it is unlit. Kat peers around him and sees it
is a small sleeping quarters, tidier than the main room, with a neat
bed, leather chair, three-branch brass candlestick, table with small
wooden box beneath with bullseye lanter, shelf above table with three
books, wooden cupboard.

Milena pokes around in the chests at the foot of each bed; contain
clothes and a few personal effects; some have small non-valuable
whittled items, like a little rowboat.

Matty finds the mechanism to open a secret door, just as Kat succeeds
in removing the bar from the danger door. Milena sends Boris to that
door.

Kat sees that the room on the other side has a large pile of bones,
some with armor. She moves to slip inside, but Mouse makes sounds
of concern. Milena brings a torch to the door, and she and Kat
notice that the skeletons are standing up, armed with swords. Kat
says, "Awesome!" and then "Oh, crap!"

She scrambles back out of the door and Milena moves to close it.
Boris suddenly makes a run at Matty, who is putting on her armor
near the secret door; when she leans down, he leaps over her and
attacks the three people who just came out the secret tunnel.
Milena gets the danger door closed, she and Kat hear thumping
from the other side, and Milena suggests they should bar the
door again.

Gnik casts a sleep spell at the attackers (since it won't affect
Matty) and all three of them hit the ground. Two more enter, a 
man and a woman, and the man runs for Al, who has jumped onto
the table. Apparently he is not tactically wise, because he
stays on the ground and lets Al have the high ground. The 
attacker trips on a stool, falls backward into his partner, and
onto her cutlass. Al makes a rope attack and then tries to kick 
a piece of crockery at her weapon; he succeeds in disarming her.

Milena and Kat try to close the door, but a skeletal arm comes out.
Matty runs across the room and slams into the door, breaking off the
skeletal arm, and Milena and Kat re-bar it with Matty's help.

Boris grabs the fallen attacker by the leg as he is getting up again;
he stumbles and knocks himself out cold.

Al's attacker is still caught in the rope, but trying to cut her way
out with a dagger; Al asks if she wants to surrender, or if he is
going to have to try to hit her. She looks around at her fallen
comrades and drops her dagger.

Gnik runs across the room to close the secret door. Al works on tying
up the sleeping attackers, and then the rest of the group joins to
help, using sheets from the bed.

Al introduces himself to their only conscious captive; she responds
(in a deep voice) that her name is Fib. Kat asks if she knew there
were skeletons behind the door and where did they come from; Fib
replies that they've always been there, since she's been here -- a
couple of years. She is reacting badly to Al -- she is Dorginian,
and from a women-only culture, so Kat takes over the interrogation.
Fib asks to be untied and says she will tell everything. Kat is
amenable, but Matty protests -- "How do we know you won't attack
us again?" "Because I have no blades...?" "Well, you could GET them
again...."  So Milena begins collecting all the scattered weapons.

Kat tries to intimidate Fib into talking, but it doesn't work very
well. Milena suggests perhaps now they should try the untying plan.
The other attackers are beginning to wake up and suggest they should
definitely be untied. Kat tries to throw the skeleton bone at him,
but Mouse runs after it, catches it in midair, and brings it back
happily.

Fib reveals that there are five other brigands (Cora and Joanna
and somebody and the "two Uglies", and Bryon, who is in charge).
Bryon sent them to kill the adventurers while they were distracted
by the skeletons. Bryon facilitates smuggling goods into Saltmarsh
without being inspected by the authorities; Fib thinks the goods
are probably stolen.

Al and Kat have been exploring Bryon's room; Al brings out a spellbook
for Gnik to inspect. Kat calls for her mother; she has tried to open
a box and been stuck with a needle, and her finger is turning blue.
Milena does not detect any poison; she intuits that it is a dye that
lasts a few days but does not cause any lasting damage -- Bryon just
wanted to know if any of his people tried to open the box.

Milena sees the lantern and two flasks of oil and takes them with
her back out of the room. Gnik comes in to inspect the other three
books in the room -- a nautical almanac of tides, an illustrated
book of erotic poetry, and a volume concerning mesmerism and its
effects -- just as Kat gets the box open. She finds
two vials packed in wood shavings.  Gnik identifies one as a potion
of speed, the other is probably the dye that is turning her finger
blue. He sniffs it, and then says to Kat, "Don't take this the wrong
way, but can I smell your finger?" It mostly smells like Kat, but
he's still 99% sure that it is the same dye.

Matty keeps interrogating the brigands and learns that the "uglies"
are fiendhounds -- also called gnolls.

Gnik opens the mesmerism book and a piece of paper falls out with
a list of words in trade along with words written in a script he
does not understand.

Kat hatches a plan to open the trapdoor to the underground pier
where Bryon and the others may be trying to make an escape, then
open the skeleton door, run upstairs and bar the way out so that
the skeletons will go downstairs. Gnik will use Az, his hyacinth
macaw, make a fuss and then fly down the stairs to attract them.



11 November 2017

All prisoners get cleared out to a side room, away from the 
path of the skeletons. Once Matty releases the skeletons,
she and Al go to the cliff face and down ropes to block the exit
of the brigands; Milena covers with bow and arrows from shore. Kat
and the dogs stay behind to keep watch on the tied-up prisoners
and Gnik, who is staring off into space as he is mentally connected
to Az. 

Bryon, the leader of the brigands, is behind a barrier with three
brigands (Carinha, Janha, and Jeanette) and two fiendhounds. Through
Az, Gnik sees Bryon about to cast a spell and makes Az disappear, then
reappear a short distance away where she can't be seen. When she comes
back, she sees the released skeletons enter the area and the fiendhounds
jump the barrier to engage them. Bryon casts a series of firebolts
(cantrips) at them until they are defeated.

Al slips from the rope, manages to correct into a perfect dive, but
bonks his head on rocks under the surface. Matty climbs far enough
that she can safely push off from the cave face and shallow dive. She
can see a small masted boat inside the cave at the cliff base with
three people around it, bickering. Suddenly they all turn to look
further into the cave and then run in that direction. Matty pulls Al
into the cave and up onto shore so he doesn't drown.

Gnik, through Az, sees three people charging into the cave carrying
oars. Then Bryon casts a spell at Az, who disappears.

Matty pulls Al into the boat and begins pushing it out to sea, but
unfortunately there are no oars. Behind her, she hears someone yell,
"Bitch!" and then some words she doesn't understand -- and a blast
of fire hits her in the shoulder. She says the most unpleasant-sounding
thing she can think of in Elvish, and gets the boat pushed into the
water. When she looks back again, she can't see Bryon; she jumps in
the boat and attempts to sail it back toward the ropes. She manages
to get it there and tie it off and start climbing up the cliff face
back toward the ropes.

Gnik and Kat close the trapdoor into the room where they're hiding 
and get both dogs and two brigands, Angel and Conrad, to sit in front
of the door to block it. There is banging at the door. Gnik casts
Mend to fix all the damage they do. Angel shouts, "Fib is getting
away!" and Gnik and Kat decide to let her go in favor of saving
resources for the fight to come.

As a hole opens in the door and Gnik closes it, a voice from below
says, "You can't keep that up forever -- we'll get through eventually."
Gnik says, "We just have to keep it up until our backup arrives." The
voice says, "And we just have to keep it up until OUR backup arrives."
When a second hole opens up, Gnik pours his bag of ball bearings into
it and down the stairs and makes an Illusionary sound of other people
running into the room.

Matty and Milena run back to the house when Matty reaches the top of
the rope. They see the rest of their party in the side room where
they entered, clearly blocking the trap door.  They decide to enter 
by the front door and flank the attackers from behind. When they open
the front door, they see the two fiendhounds in the hall. Milena casts
Sacred Flame at the first one, Matty throws a net to trip the second
one. While it's down, Milena casts Sacred Flame at the second one, and
then Matty pulls out her axe and knocks him cold by conking him on the
head.

The brigands trying to break through the trapdoor, bantering with
Gnik, Kat, and Matty, learn that the fiendhounds are dead and ask
about Bryon.  When they learn he is not also dead, they get quiet
and move back down the stairs. Milena, in the front room, investigates
where the fiendhounds came from and notices there are three sets of
tracks -- theirs and a pair of boot-prints that move into the front
room, avoid the hounds, and exit the front door. She hears voices
coming up the back stairs and ducks around the corner. She hears
them complain that Bryon probably ran away, because he's an asshole
like that -- and then they see the dead fiendhounds. After arguing
that it's too dangerous to go into the front room, even though that's
the nearest exit, they decide to flee by breaking a window. Milena
yells to her companions (who clearly heard the glass breaking), "They
are going through window." The brigands panic that they've been found
and scramble out.

Milena inspects the knolls and finds they have belt pouches with
coins: 15 gp, 16 sp.

Matty, Kat, and Gnik escort their prisoners to the boat. Kat takes
a detour to look into the room where the skeletons were. She doesn't
immediately see anything, so she moves around the room knocking on
walls and looking for any inconsistencies that might indicate secret
hiding places.

Milena descends the back staircase to meet the others, into a wine
cellar with a horrible stench. Almost all the bottles are broken,
and there is a bloated corpse, perhaps dead a week, in the middle
of the floor. She pushes past and finds the back side of the secret
door they had seen in the barracks room. 

Kat hears the door open and comes back into the barracks room to
see her mom emerging from the door. "Ludmilla, where would you
hide deed to house?" They discuss where such a thing might be
hidden, and whether it's important to do it right then, and then
Kat goes back to searching the skeleton room. Matty and Milena
join them. Just as Kat finds the outline of a door in the stone,
Matty finds the stone that moves to open it. Kat pushes the door
open to find a room of similar size. Kat thinks it looks like an
abandoned wizard's lab. Kat sees someone sitting at a desk at the
far wall with their back to her, hunched over a book. Milena brings
a torch, which shows that many things on the table are gold: a skull,
an apple, a rose, five discs. The person at the table turns out to
be a skeleton -- possibly the missing former owner of the estate.
Kat sneaks one of the discs into her pocket.

Matty asks Milena if she can determine how the body died. No wounds,
no other damage -- could have been old age or natural causes, or
magic. Matty goes back to guard the prisoners and send Gnik in to
see if he can identify the body. Kat blows the dust off the book
and realizes it is a text called "Secrets of Ye Old Philosopher's 
Stone" -- and she knows such a stone is meant to be able to transmute 
anything into gold. The page she sees has warnings about the dangerousness
of this part of the process. When she picks up the book to examine
it, she slightly jostles the table, and a large, untarnished silver
coin with a male halfling's face on one side and a female halfling's
face on the other falls out of the body's hand. Kat pockets it.

Gnik thinks the body looks like Megan, the former owner, based on 
the robes and the hair. He has heard of the book, and has heard that
is is a convincing but useless knock-off. He thumbs through it and
finds Megan's notes on the problems with the methodology. Her notes
suggest she was reviewing the book and whether the items claimed to
have been made with it were legitimate.

Gnik grabs the book and he, Milena, and Kat collect the gold objects.
They decide to barricade the prisoners in the skeleton room while they
investigate the rest of the house in search of the house deed -- but
then realize that they should go check on Al, unconscious in the
boat with the tide coming in. Kat and Matty swim out to the boat
and bring it back in.

Once they are sure Al is safe and the boat is pulled up far enough
not to float back out at high tide, they explore the rest of the
house. The first room they open looks like a study or writing
room with a locked desk. After trying to check for traps, Kat
picks the lock.  In the central drawer, there is a secret
compartment holding a glass vial with a watery rose-colored
liquid that Gnik can't immediately identify, but he holds onto
the vial.



23 November 2017

Allard wakes up in a boat in a cave. He can see the light of
some flickering flames further into the cave, but it is eerily
quiet. His head is bandaged. He stands, makes sure his head injury
isn't too bad, and makes his way further into the cave. The cavern
is mostly natural, but with some carving to smooth and level the
floor. He comes to a Y, and sees a mess: bones and blood spatter,
scorch marks on the wall and ceiling to the left of the Y, and
a barrier of broken casks across that branch. He takes the right
branch, which opens into a large room. He turns back and goes
down the left branch until he comes to another Y. The path to
the right is lit and slopes up; the path to the left is unlit
and slopes down.  He takes a lantern and moves down the left
path; he comes to a natural cavern (uncarved) with a small path
leading out to the right; nothing obvious here. He goes to the
entrance to the path out to see if there's fresh air coming out;
he sees the walls taper and then open back up ahead into another
room. He sees stalactites and stalagmites, and a green ooze on
the ceiling, moving a little -- but it holds still again as he
shines his light on it. He yells, "Is anyone there?" and hears
a faint dog bark that seems to come from far ahead in the direction
he's heading. He tries to move through the room skirting around the
edge and shining his light on the ooze to avoid it; it splats itself
against the wall to try to catch him, but he moves past it too quickly.
He comes to a set of stairs going up and another path to the right
that he intuits is how he would have come if he had taken the right fork.
He climbs the stairs and comes to what looks like the back side of a
secret door. He pulls on the lever, the door opens, and he is tackled
by a dog -- Mouse. Kat is behind Mouse; she links her arm through his
and leads him up to where the rest of the group is.

The rest of the group catches Al up on what has happened since he
was knocked unconscious. He goes out to the cliff to retrieve his
shirt (Kat comes with him) and then comes back. The group continues
their search of the house.

Across from the office they find a library; the shelves are empty
(and many broken), but a pile of books in the southwest corner.
Al goes to investigate the fireplace, Gnik goes to investigate the
books. Only about a dozen intact books many more torn to pieces.
Rat droppings everywhere. Gnik recovers (and cleans and restores,
with prestidigitation and mend) three books of interest: magical
properties of gemstones, magical properties of herbs/flowers, and 
metaphysics of mathematics (the first and third of which he had
originally acquired for Megan). A piece of paper falls out of one: 
a receipt for "skeletons to protect your research", signed "Mallan". 
Gnik ends up with a total of 14 salvageable books, which he moves back 
to the trapdoor room.

Kat moves further down the hall, thinking she has heard faint moaning
and perhaps a scrabbling sound on floorboards. She sees the two 
fiendhound corpses in the front entryway. Matty follows a little
distance behind to keep an eye on her; both hear some kind of a
breathing or moaning sound. Mouse sits down. Angel does not think
Bryon put any magic mouth enchantments on that section of the hall,
only on the entryway. Kat peeks into the first room after the
entryway and hears another moaning sound coming from upstairs. She
sees a ring of red-capped mushrooms on the floor. Kat remembers
reading about them and they are edible but taste terrible. Al 
checks the fireplace of this room and finds a stone that is
much looser than he would expect. He pulls it out and finds a
leather pouch with a small blue-green stone, which Al puts into
his pack.

Kat opens the door to the last room on that hall. It holds a
couple of piles of rubbish that used to be furniture and piles
of plaster fallen in from the ceiling. Al checks out the fireplace
again -- it is in very bad shape. They find nothing, so move to
the room between the entryway and kitchen. They find what's left
of two armchairs -- wooden frames are mostly intact but chairs
have been cut open and much of the stuffing removed. As Kat and
Matty move to the next room, Al screams as a large spider falls 
on him from above. Milena pulls out a javelin and stabs at it
to keep it at bay. Gnik hits it with a sling bolt and it retreats
far up the chimney. Al notes that a number of chimney rocks seem
very loose. He finds a cavity with a small locked box in it. Kat
checks it for traps; it does not appear trapped but is rusted
shut. Gnik cleans and mends it. Inside Kat finds a small round vial
with a metal screw-cap stopper, filled with liquid, and 15 very old
gold coins. (One goes into Kat's pocket.) The liquid in the vial
is grey-colored.

In the next room is a long table, rotted and termite-eaten broken
chairs, remains of china cabinet (all china shattered). While Al
investigates, Milena and Boris drag one of the fiendhounds into
the room with the spider to give it some food and keep it from
coming after them again. Al peeks into the kitchen. Al, Matty, 
Gnik, both dogs, and Angel hear a sound from under the sink -- a 
skittering sound. Matty thinks it sounds like a very large centipede. 
Al tries to open a cabinet and it falls off the wall and shatters.
He opens the larger cabinet that they think might hold the centipede;
they open the side door to the stairs that lead down to the basement.
Four centipedes immediately swarm out -- three on Kat and one on Al.
Kat tries to hit one with her quarterstaff, hits herself in the 
foot instead and passes out. Milena casts Sacred Flame and one of
the centipedes on Kat explodes. Al punches the one on him and squashes
it. Boris attacks and kills one, and Angel pokes one with a flaming
torch. Matty drags Kat out of the room to Milena, who cures her.

The party moves to the second floor, with Kat going first to
check the safety of the path. They hear thumping and strange moaning
to the right, so they move to the left first, being careful of the
dilapidated floor. Kat tests sections with her quarterstaff as she
goes. She comes to a section that will clearly collapse if they
step on it. They decide to use a door as a bridge, so Kat goes to
listen at each of the doors to the right. The sounds get louder as
she moves further down the hall, and begin to sound like perhaps
someone tied up, gagged, and crying for help. She tries the door,
it's locked, so she quickly picks it; it is well-oiled as though
it has been frequently used, and Matty sees tracks that indicate
two people came up and only one left -- not the one who worked
the lock. Tracks are fresh, probably from this morning before we
arrived.  Kat opens the door anyway, sees a dirty decayed room
with a tied-up man in the corner wearing only undergarments. Angel
does not recognize him. Matty takes his gag off; he identifies
himself as Ned, said he was passing by the old house, thought he
would check it out, got conked over the head and woke up here,
tied up. Matty and Al are pretty sure he's lying (though he's
very good at it). After some back and forth, and Milena yelling
from the hall, "Did you tell him we killed fiendhounds?" he 
admits he was hired in Saltmarsh to keep the group from discovering
the bandits. He can't reveal precisely who hired him because he will
be killed, but tells where they can find the information: The person
framed for participating in the sacking of Seaton -- the head of the 
leathermaking guild -- was framed; there is documentation in the 
abandoned guildhall proving his innocence; and the person who framed 
him is the one who hired Ned. That person is also Bryon's contact in 
town.

There is some arguing in the group regarding whether to let Ned go;
Matty assumes he was going to kill them, but since Kat implied they
would untie them in exchange for information -- and he hadn't actually
done anything illegal -- the rest of the group is inclined to let him
go. He tells them where to find his dagger (in the fireplace) and 
his clothes. Al finds the dagger and discovers that it has a white
powder on it, asks if it is poison. Ned says it is just a paralytic.

Matty grabs the first door in that hallway off the hinges to use as
a bridge over the rotted section of floor. The room is a bedroom,
rotted, with all furniture in horrible shape. She lays the door over
the rotted spot. Kat decides to climb along the outside of the
building and opens a window, which falls out of the frame. Parts of
siding fall off as she climbs. When she gets to the other window,
she tries to jimmy it, and realizes that just pulling the other
window out of its frame would be easier.

Al cuts Ned free and goes to find his clothes. 

Kat finds a moldy bedroom with a chest under the window, still
closed but with some timbers split. Al comes into the room and
takes a timid peek into the fireplace with a continual light
torch while Kat looks in the chest. She finds a chewed, moldy
leather-wrapped bundle of documents, which she puts in her backpack.
Al finds nothing in the fireplace, so he and Kat move to the next
room, which looks like storage: oak chest, busted wooden buckets,
broken chairs, and a bundle of fresh clothes by the door. Al
rifles through the clothes, finds a belt pouch with gold and silver
coins, considers using a sock to wipe the paralytic off the dagger
and then throws sock in the corner. Kat opens the chest, which is
empty. Al returns the clothes to Ned (and tells him the missing
sock has poison on it), who puts them on and climbs out the 
window.

Kat takes the documents to Gnik, who cleans them and then starts
looking through them. They are Megan's: many are old letters,
some about the house, including the deed. The last page, very
mildewed, says something about a gift, and the page above seems
to be some kind of ritual that emanates magic -- Milena looks at
it and determines it is a Bless spell, which she holds onto.

Al peeks around the far back corner and sees it is the landing for
the back staircase, and there is also a set of stairs up to the
attic, which is so rotted it is no longer climbable. 

Kat opens up the first door down the remaining hallway, another
trashed bedroom. She looks in the cupboard, it smells so bad
she starts coughing and closes the door again. Final door is
also a bedroom with worm-ridden wood, looks like many rodents
have lived there. Milena looks into the room next to where Ned
was held, which Angel says is the room they used to signal ships
in their smuggling operation. It is empty, and Milena can see
the trail skirting the rotted section of floor where they walked
regularly to the window.

Al and Kat check out the entry to the attic; Al boosts her up
to avoid the rotted stair. The roof is so rotted that daylight
is coming in through many holes, making it easy to see. It is
a full attic, very damp, wood coming apart, thick with cobwebs,
liberal evidence of rodents. Ceiling height is 1 ft at edges,
15 ft in middle; she sticks to stepping on floor joists to keep
from falling through. She finds a couple of large sacks, rather
mildewed, and rolls them through the hole to the floor below.
Toward the other end of the attic, there is broken furniture,
old clothes, some other sacks. As she moves toward the front
of the house, she sees something moving -- flying at her very
fast. She runs back toward the exit when a couple of them catch
up to her: they have four wings and claws. She tries to jump
down through the hole to escape, but misjudges the distance and
slams into the far wall. Al tries to jump up and pull himself
into the attic.

Milena hears the sounds of Kat's footsteps running through the
attic, and then a thump, and runs to see what is going on. Al
tries to parkour up, but doesn't quite make it. Meanwhile, Kat
manages to bounce off the wall, up, and down the hole while
the creatures miss her. The sacks she threw down only have
old clothes, and the group decides it is time to go.

*Gnik uses prestidigitation to clean a very smelly parcel*
Al: Wow, you're really handy! I'm glad I got to know you better!
Gnik: Well, as long as I don't have to fight anything.
Milena: Fight dirt, fight smell...
Gnik: I'm tough on grime!


2 December 2017

Kat and Milena walk back to town. Kat shows Milena the items
she lifted. Milena recognizes the silver disc as probably a
holy symbol of Ag; she feels some power radiating from it. Kat
also hands over the gold disc ("This is strawberries for the
next year") and the stack of moldy documents, including the
deed to the house.

They reach the gates and head to the Mayor's office.

On the boat, Matty, Allard, and Gnik sail back with Angel. Gnik
explains that legally, the goods they are bringing in will be
logged by a company called Whitecap, and they will need to pay 
fees on these imports if they keep or sell them. If they turn
them over to the city, it will be up to the City Council what
happens next. They decide to go ahead and pay the fees out of
the group loot, keep the goods, and sort out later what to do
with them.

Angel explains that some of the papers Gnik found are notes
on their communications/signaling with ships bringing goods.
Bryon worked for Michel of the Raging Hammer smuggling
organization in Freeport; Polis was his contact. Angel thinks
there was a dock Bryon could access to unload his cargo and
meet his contact; according to one of the documents they found,
today (25 Barrum 3275) should be the next meeting.

The group asks Angel about her background, she says her father
was an assassin, her mother a healer, tried to convince her church
that sometimes people need to be hurt to protect those that can't
protect themselves, but they were booted from the church. She was
raised with that idea -- that sometimes people need to be hurt or
killed to protect others.

As they're coming into port, they see brothers Larry and Wend who
work on the docks and take inventory of the goods they're bringing
in. They recommend telling Klav at the Whitecap office that the
goods are recovered contraband, because they would be treated a
bit easier.

They pull up to the dock outside Whitecap and go in to declare
their goods. Al and Gnik go in; Al knows Koi, the boy working
the desk. He calls out Krav, who looks at the letter between
Bryon and his contact, tells them to take it to town hall, and
then comes down to the boat. He tells them that if they can't
get a good price on the goods, he'll offer 25 for the silk and
18 for the casks (slightly more than the prices stated in the
letter).

Al, Matty, and Gnik decide to keep two casks but sell the rest
of the goods to Krav.

They arrive at the town hall just a few minutes after Kat and 
Milena. They see mayor Juliana approaching, along with three
other town council members (Janet Hector, high priestess of
Maria, along with Rolland Ruge and Belto Tunnelly). They go
into a conference room, ask how their adventure went; Al shows
off his centipede-bitten leg and asks if they have a healer;
Janet checks his leg for poison and then heals him. Matty says,
"Well, if you're healing...." and shows her injuries from Bryon,
then fills in as many details as she can about the smuggling
ring and what happened. Juliana asks if they found the deed,
and Milena turns it over (and gives rest of the documents
to Gnik; Kat asks if there is a reward, and Juliana offers 20 gp 
each. Kat tries to persuade her for more due to the hazardous nature 
of their adventure. Instead, Juliana offers that the next time there 
is such an adventure, she will offer the opportunity to them at a 
higher pay rate.

Angel will be kept for further questioning and to help with the
investigation. Matty takes Juliana aside and asks for leniency
for her; that Angel got mixed up in a bad crowd but seems to have
a good heart.

The group heads to the Temple of Byorn (also an inn) to have a
private conversation (and perhaps also some food). Someone is
doing poetry on stage when they walk in. Britteny, the high
priestess, is also there. She provides a private room and says
she will send up a free meal in honor of their first adventure.
She also agrees to buy the gold items (skull, apple, rose, etc.)

They determine that the two potions they picked up are a healing
potion and a potion of climbing, the latter of which they let Kat
keep. They discuss what to name the boat and decide on "Lucky Me".
(Next morning, after she attunes to it, Kat discovers that the
silver coin she picked up is a lucky charm.) Also discuss whether 
to paint it. (Currently it is black.)

Kat: Isn't it traditional to have a woman baring her breasts on the
front of a ship?
Milena: Yes, sometimes I will do that.

Al keeps potion of healing.

The group guesses that Bryon was probably planning to meet his
contact at low tide (about 10:20 pm), so they decide to stake 
out the docks around 10 pm.


13 January 2018

Al and Kat (with Az) plan to bring the boat that the contact is
expecting to meet, and see who comes out to meet it. Matty, Gnik,
and Milena will stroll up the shore to see who they see on the
docks to try to figure out who the contact is.

Kat and Al talk as they sail toward the northernmost dock. Kat
expresses that she is interested in going into the Dreadwood
to meet elves and fairies.

Milena, Gnik, and Matty start about halfway down the docks and
walk northward. As they walk under the second-to-northernmost
pier, they see two people sitting on the end of the northernmost
pier. They pause in the shadow of the pier to watch and listen.

As Kat and Al sail down to the northernmost pier, they see a
couple of people sitting on the end of it. They sail up; one of
the two stands up, puts hands on hips, and walks back down pier
and into town. Matty and Milena emerge with Boris and see that
the person moving down the pier is Francis Widener, the owner
of the pier. He asks what they are doing; Milena says she is
walking her dog, and then throws a stick for Boris to chase.
Widener heads home. The other person on the dock stands up; it
is a very tall woman, definitely human, that we don't recognize.
She comes down the pier, says, "I'm afraid you ruined my romantic
evening," with a sly look, and continues into town. Mattie perceives
that she is being deceptive.

Kat and Al see the two people on the northernmost pier stand up
and depart, so they continue southward, somewhat stealthily through
the fog. They see a kid fishing on one of the docks, and also notice
a ship coming in. Al recognizes that the ship is the Sea Wyvern, owned
by the Lassiters.  It is coming in much faster than it should be -- and
will crash if it isn't stopped.

Matty, Milena, and Boris track the woman; Boris gets her scent, and
they follow behind too far away for Milena to see her, but just in
the limits of Matty's dark vision. They hear a huge crash from down
the shore, and Matty sees the woman look that way in surprise as well.

Kat and Al row to the crashed ship; Al leaps onto the ship to see if
anyone needs help. He finds two people on the deck laughing and acting
drunk -- one of them is Al's friend Beyolin, who does not normally
drink or get into trouble. When Al gets closer, he can see that Beyolin
has been crying; he leans in, and Beyolin shouts, "It took Jim Su!" 
and then falls over backwards and passes out. He has a crumpled piece
of paper clutched in his hand. Al heads belowdecks to make sure no
one is trapped down there as the ship takes on water.

Kat sails their boat up beside the pier and beaches it. Az senses
that Gnik is approaching and flies to the ship to show him what
she can see.

As Al hits the deck below, he suddenly feels good... like he's
drunk. But he's still aware that people might be in danger, so
he continues on his quest to see if anyone is in danger. He wobbles
forward to where the crash took out part of the wall and deck, and
sees a person in a bed with the covers pulled up over their head,
giggling slightly. Az lands on the lower deck and staggers a little
-- and communicates to Gnik, "Hey... this is cool...."

Kat sees Gnik on the beach; he doesn't notice her at first, but then
shakes his head and says, "Don't go onto the lower deck; there's
something there causing people to get drunk." She asks if it would
be ok if she held her breath; but he doesn't know. She climbs up to
the upper decks.

Al carefully makes his way around the broken wall... and throws himself
out of the ship and onto a bed that landed on the pier. Kat sees him
and comes to talk to him; he is still drunk. Az flaps her way over to
Gnik. Al runs up and parkours his way back onto the lower deck of the
ship. He can see into the lowest level, which is filling with water.

People come running up, including members of the militia; Gnik tells
them about the spell of intoxication. A militia member sends for the
Lassiters, since it is their ship.

Kat tries to climb the ship and looks for block and tackle to rig up 
a rope system to help get people off the ship without sending more 
people belowdecks. However, she slips on her first attempt and falls
back to the pier, hitting her elbow.

Gnik retrieves Al's continual light torch, which he'd dropped when
he fell, and tosses it into the water near the lowest deck. Al makes
his way down to the lowest deck and sees doors open up and something
emerge, about Gnik's size.  Gnik recognizes a fae dialect and tells
everyone, "There's a rum gremlin on the ship!" Meanwhile, the gremlin
sees Al and jumps at him. He bites at and claws him; the wound burns,
but it makes Al giggle.

Mouse jumps into the hole in the ship, and Kat follows, landing in
the water. Gnik fires a sling bullet at it, hits it, and yells
into the hole, "Haha, take that, asshole!" in Gnome. Al grapples
the gremlin to keep it on him while throwing himself off the
ship, doing damage to both of them in the process. They miss the
dock and land in the water. The gremlin tries to get away, but can't
immediately. Kat can see them, and tries to hit the gremlin with a
sling stone. She is not affected by the drunkenness spell, but is
not able to hit thie gremlin on her first try.

Al swims to the surface while still grappling; and Az, still drunk,
flies down and bites the gremlin in the back of the neck. "Az, don't
kill him!" yells Al. "Okay!" sayz Az.

The gremlin squirms away from Al; Kat throws a dagger and hits it in
the thigh, and Gnik casts Sleep on it. Al climbs up onto the shore,
very hurt, and just lies there with his eyes glazed over. Kat brings
over rope to tie up the gremlin, and takes its rum bottle away from
it. Gnik is now close enough to the gremlin to feel the drunkenness
effects. He calls out, "Stay away from the imp. Gremlin. Grim...limp.
Limp imp."

Gnik realizes that this variety of gremlin eats people, and that
infestations have resulted in whole towns being wiped out... so he
pulls out his dagger and kills it. "Public health hazard," he says
to Kat. Kat pulls out the cork from the rum bottle and takes a sniff;
it smells very potent.

Matty and Milena track the unknown woman to the Tailor's Guild; the
guildmaster is known to be a tall, older woman named Jackie. They
decide to return to the shore to see what that crash was all about.

Milena sees Al seriously injured and heals him. He drunkenly expresses
his appreciation. Kat gives her the summary of what happened and then
slips off into the night to take advantage of the fog and the distraction
of the giant crash to make some mischief in town. She decides to check
out the Lassiter house while so much of their household is distracted
by the crash.

Two men show up, point to the gremlin and ask if that is what's responsible
for the crash, and then haul its body away. Gnik recognizes them as 
Lassiter family servants. More Lassiter representatives show up to clear
everyone out so they can salvage what they're able from the boat. Milena
and Boris help the still-drunk Gnik, and Matty helps Al, who has scooted 
on his back partway up the beach and tried to go to sleep. They head to
the nearest friendly place, which is Blackberry Bars; Milena asks for
hot water to make tea for Gnik and Al.


27 January 2018

Gnik briefly talks with one of the proprietors about how useful it would
be to keep a rum gremlin in a cage in the bar; then they could sell drinks
because of how they taste rather than how much alcohol they have in them.
Milena tells them this is bad idea; they say they are talking only
theoretically. Gnik and Az drink the tea Milena offers them; Al walks 
into the back to play with throwing hatchets. Despite his drunkenness,
he hits the target on the first try, so he tries it again with his
eyes closed -- and flings it over the protective wall. He goes to climb
the wall to see where the hatchet went -- even though the wall is only
ten feet wide and easy to walk arond. Matty keeps an eye on him.

Meanwhile, Kat uses the distraction of the ship crash to explore up
the hill in the Crowns. She goes to check out the Exotics estate. She
tries to avoid the streets to keep from standing out -- keeping to 
rooftops as she is able.

The place is surrounded by a wall of perfectly smooth polished stone.
She walks closer to observe and hears a voice from above: "Whatcha
doin'?" She looks up and doesn't see anything but some kind of wolf-
humanoid hybrid. "I'm not doing anything -- just taking a walk." She
reaches out and touches the wall, which is extremely smooth. The voice
tells her it's magic. She pulls out a little chisel to try to take a 
piece, and it makes a "Don't do that!" sound. They go back and forth
like that for a moment, and then she hits the wall with her chisel. It
is extremely hard, and she can tell it will take a long time to remove
a piece -- and more voices erupt from the roof: "She's breaking the
wall!" and she hears a door open behind the wall.  She hurries back 
across the street and finds a rooftop vantage point to see what happens.
A small window opens in the wall, a little taller than halfling height.

While she's watching, she hears an old woman's voice behind asking what
she's doing here. Kat tells a sob story about being a poor child from
the Ass End, just coming up the hill to see how the other half lives.
The woman comes closer, and Kat asks what she's doing there. She points
across the street. "I work for Exotics," she says. She identifies herself
as Misty and says she works in Records, but that coming over here and
climbing the roof is more fun. She says they have no problem if Kat
wants to mess around in the Crown, but she probably shouldn't mess
with Exotics. Kat asks if they have any job openings. Misty asks what
she does, and she describes a typical day -- leaving out anything
about her family, or the mansion they explored that day. Misty says
they sometimes hire people like herself for certain jobs, and they
buy interesting historical or magical artifacts. "Like this?" Kat
says, and pulls out her weightless cube. Misty looks at it. "That
would make an awesome dagger," she says, "if you had the right magics
to be able to shape it." She invites Kat to come back sometime -- but
during normal business hours when the gate is open. Then Misty slides
down the roof with a "Wheee!" and goes back across the street.

Gnik and Al sober up, and Al goes to check on the boat. They decide
that the next morning, Matty and Gnik will go to talk to the City
Council about who might be the smuggler contacts in town, and Milena
will go with Al to talk with his friend Beolin to talk about what
happened before the boat crash. Al and Matty drop Milena off across
the river, take the boat back to their slip, then Al goes to stay 
with his parents and Matty swims back to the island.

As Gnik is walking home he sees Kat with Mouse and says hello. She
mentions she took the jug from the rum imp and asks if he can tell
if it's magical. He says yes, but it will take about 10, 11 minutes
-- but afterwards he can check whether other things in the vicinity
are also magical. "Would it work long enough to check out the
leatherworker's guild?" ... which she is conveniently standing almost
in front of. Gnik suggests maybe they should just go there and then
he can start the spell.

They see a small person -- probably a child -- sleeping against the
building; Kat goes to wake him up. Kat recognizes him as a local
street kid named Roger. He tells Kat that tomorrow at midnight
the Slaughter siblings -- known troublemakers -- will give them five 
shells each to lure Bradford out between the shipyards and old Gunther's 
house. Kat gives Roger a couple of coins and tells him to go get something
to eat. "Okay, and I won't tell anyone you were here! Thanks Kat!" He
takes the coins and runs off.

Kat and Gnik push their way through the broken door; the whole place
is broken down and many floorboards rotted. Gnik sits to cast his 
spell; while Kat is waiting, she explores, looking for evidence.
In the back room on the ground floor she finds a desk that has fallen
through the floor onto the ground below; she uses a crowbar to reach
down and poke through it, but everything in it was either taken or
has rotted away.

Gnik finishes his spell; the bottle is not magical, and the only
things he detects that are magical are the things Kat brought with
her -- coin, floating cube, light source. Gnik joins her as she
opens another door and finds a small bedroom. They find a loose
brick with a locked case behind it. Kat picks the lock and finds
inside a notebook, some rolled-up papers, and some folded papers.
Gnik takes the box of papers back to the library to read, where
there is better light and less chance of accidentally falling
through the floor. Kat asks to borrow a book. "You may read a
book here, but you may not take it out," he says. She decides
to take off; Gnik tells her about the plan for him and Matty to
go to the town hall in the morning. She gets home to find breakfast
waiting for her, kept warm on the hearth. She eats it and climbs up
to sleep in her hammock.


26 Barrum 3275

Kat wakes up hearing Al's voice in the main room of the house; Milena
is up and dressed to visit someone who might need medical attention.
She akss Al how he's feeling; he says he's much better today. When she
learns where they are going, she asks if she can join; Al and Milena
agree.

They walk to the Lassiter house and are asked who they are. Al introduces
himself and asks to see Beolin.  The servant tells them to wait and
disappears inside. After a few minutes another servant comes out and
greets Al. "Allard, it has been a long time; you have grown." It is
one of the servants higher in the hierarchy. He invites them in, but
says the dogs will have to stay outside. He says that their friend
Jinsu has been found; he is not well, but will be fine.

Beolin's mother Callie comes to greet them and takes them to see Beolin,
who clearly has a hangover. Milena asks if there is hot water so she
can make tea. Beolin had not yet heard about the rum gremlin, so they
explain what they think happened; Callie guesses that they must have
picked up the gremlin on their last stop, which was Freeport. She says
that Jimsu is next door -- he has lost half his hand, and is still
recovering -- so they go in to talk to him.

Milena inspects his hand; it is healing with no sign of infection. He
was found far below decks; he remembers the gremlin chewing his hand,
and remembers hearing Al yelling from somewhere above him. From what
he is describing, that could only be possible if there were more than
one rum gremlin. Milena asks if Kat took anything from the gremlin;
she says she has its rum bottle. She takes it to let the dogs get
the scent. Callie tells them that Jack is heading up the investigation
to what happened.

Back at his home, Gnik goes through the papers he and Kat found. One
of them is Kiorn's diary; he was researching what happened and believed
it must be a merchant in Saltmarsh working with the smugglers, but since
smugglers were never caught, no way of knowing what type of cargo might
be involved and thus what merchant might be involved. Soon after, he
expresses surprise that "J" expresses romantic interest in him, since
she is one who he suspects might be involved. It is clear he does not
suspect he himself is under investigation; the entries stop soon after.
It is clear that Jackie must have set him up.

He and Mattie go to the town hall and tell the clerk that they have
more information about the smugglers they found at the house, and want
to know if Juliana is free. They are led to a room with Juliana, Roland
Ruge, and Egan Lassiter from the town council. Gnik shows them the note
they found setting up a meeting time and Matty describes what they saw
on their investigations lasat night. Gnik goes on to show the papers
he found at the leathermaker's guild with strong evidence to exonerate
Kiorn. Roland says, "Well, that explains some things, doesn't it?" and
Juliana explains that Jackie requested an emergency meeting with them
again. Gnik then raises the concern that rum gremlins rarely travel
alone; Egan responds that they do if they are placed there -- he
suspects sabotage and says they are monitoring the docks. He gives
Gnik a bag with three small green stones to thank him, Al, and Kat
for helping protect their people after the crash.

At the Lassiter mansion, Mouse and Boris get the scent of the bottle
and Mouse immediately runs into the gates. Jack sees her coming and slams
a door shut. Milena says they expect an infestation of rum goblins and
Mouse has caught the scent. Jack says they brought the corpse back to
the house, so that is probably what she smells. He believes that Jimsu
is confused about the timing of events and that the physical evidence
suggests there was one gramlin in a lead-lined box that clawed its way
out. The group decides to head to Blackberry Bar's for lunch and then
take the dogs to the beach near the wreck to see if they pick up
another scent going in another direction.

Gnik writes a note to Bradford letting him know the Slaughters' plans 
to distract him at midnight. He goes to see Bradford, gives him the 
note, and tells him to read it before midnight. Bradford tells
someone else to take over for him a minute, reads the note, and 
invites Gnik and Matty in to talk. He says the Slaughters have been
asking a lot of questions about his mother (the former guildmaster
of shipwrights, who died some time ago, and from whom he inherited
the role). Gnik says alerting him seemed like a good way for a bunch
of little kids to get paid without causing Bradford any real trouble.
Bradford says he will be on his guard.

Milena, Al, and Kat take the dogs to the beach. They follow a scent
to the next pier over. Workers there say the Lassiters used it to
load evidence from the wreck; that could have been where they loaded
the corpse of the gremlin. They go to meet the rest of the group at
Blackberry Bar's for lunch. Matty and Gnik tell them that the Town
Council wants to meet with them the next morning at 10 am because they
may want to hire them for another job. Gnik hands out the green stones;
Kat offers hers to Milena, then asks if she should find someplace to
cash it in. "We could buy a bigger house!" says Kat. "We do not need
bigger house," says Milena. Al plans to give most of his money to
his parents, some to his sister, and some to the temple of Nolan.


10 February 2018

Kat goes to market to try to sell the rum goblin's bottle. She gets a
good price for it considering it is a disgusting flask of low-quality
rum. Then she picks up a nice set of cards and goes to practice her
three-dragon ante skills on Al. She also buys a nice lute. 

Kat easily bests Al with her sleight-of-hand skills and then asks if
he knows anyone who plays lute. He suggests his friend Rachel, if she
is still in town, or going to Byorn's temple or to find Britney the
high priestess at the inn. Since Kat is looking more for random pointers
rather than regular lessons at specific times, they decide the inn is
a better option. Mattie decides to go with them.

Britney is performing when they arrive. They buy drinks and the waitress
mentions the relic that was recently found -- a trader bought it off
someone down south at Black Cove -- and is now at Vain Robert's Gibbet.

Kat asks Al if he finds that he gets hit on a lot from walking around
shirtless, and is it a problem? He says it probably happens from time
to time, but he doesn't think it's a problem. She asks if he ever takes
anyone up in it, and he says, "Well, I certainly have a lot of friends."
Kat tells him he didn't answer the question, and he says, "Some questions
are better left unanswered." Kat takes her drink and finds an empty table.
The waitress says to Al, "I'm interested in the answer to that question,
too -- my name is Dan, by the way." She proceeds to flirt with him for
a while.

Britney finishes performing and comes to sit between Matty and Kat. Kat
fangirls at her about the music, and she calls over the lutist, Jewel.
Kat sees he is a half-elf and nonchalantly tucks her hair behind one
ear -- which she never does. He sits with her a while to talk about
music -- she mentions she's looking for someone to teach her lute, teach
her about music, and teach her how to sing. He tells her to stop back in
the next day, or the day after -- no pressure.

Al comes to join them. They discuss the fiends from Jaeleth that appeared
after it moved. Kat asks how they got to Maerson and Jewel speculates
that maybe they teleported. Kat opines that it would be great to find
one of those fiends and convince it to take her back to Jaeleth. Britney
says she wouldn't trust it to actually make good on any promises. They
talk about Jaeleth vs Maerson and the fountain at the center of Maerson,
which Britney says she's heard is really impressive, with an amazing
rainbow, but Exotics would know more. Kat asks what she knows about
Exotics. Britney says the ones in town are good people... but you 
probably wouldn't want to case the joint or anything. Jewel laughs and
so does Kat, nervously. Britney says Blake and Misti don't get out
much, but they don't seem much like Byorn kind of folk, so they don't
show up in the inn. Kat asks what one might do to impress them -- show
up with a cool artifact? Britney says spending a lot of money in their
shop might do it... or agreeing to work for them, since they are always
looking for adventurers.

Al asks Jewel where he's from and gets the impression he doesn't like
talking about himself -- he's good at evading and turning the questions
around, so Al ends up talking about himself. Jewel is very good at
keeping the conversation going and keeping everyone engaged; Kat gets
the feeling that he's good at being social and wants to make sure everyone
is having a good time, rather than trying to be manipulative. Kat notices
that when topics approach things she doesn't want to talk about, he 
senses that and deftly steers the conversation away.

Kat gets home and tells her mother she bought a lute that she is going
to learn to play. "How will you learn to play?" "There's a handsome
half-elf at Byorn's temple who is going to teach me." "Handsome is not
good at music." "Oh, he's also good at music." "That is better."


27 Barrum 3275

Gnik researches how adventuring parties get their names, figuring if
they are going to be hired as an adventuring party perhaps they need
a name.

Milena sees a strange sign while stirring the eggs this morning; one of
the yolks is black, but only on the outside. On the third turn of the
whisk, usually the best time to see signs, she sees a dark line
merging with the dark bowl, with bulges and branches. Tatiana looks
at it over her shoulder and says, "Ooh, pretty," then runs off to
play.

The group goes to the town hall for their 10 am meeting with the
council. While they are waiting, Al asks if anyone heard about
the relic. Virgas, the dwarf guard, direct them to a door down
the hall. There is a woman waiting by the door; Kat and Milena
recognize her as a girl they know as Jaime who came to Milena
as a young teenager for help with birth control and women's
health -- but she looks much better and more well-off than they
had previously seen her. It turns out she is a Lasseter, there
to thank them for their help with the Sea Wyvern. Al had not
recognized her since he hadn't seen her in so long. She says
Jack said the necropsy found proof that the goblin they caught
was the one that bit off Jimsu's fingers. Al asks if the fingers
might be re-attached or healed by magic; Jaime says it's very
expensive, and their father probably won't pay for it.

They enter the council's chambers. Roland has his feet up on
the table. Juliana invites them in. She tells them that Jackie
has been arrested -- she was surprised to walk into their meeting
to find a roomful of guards. Juliana then expresses concern that
Bryon's contact is still out there and will just find somewhere
else to set up camp if they can't make contact with Bryon's people.
She is interested to hire them at 100 gold each to catch the contact
ship, and they also can keep the spoils, including the ship, which
is a three-mast ship probably with a crew of about six. The mission
is to stop the operations of whoever is running the ship; if they
can do that without destroying everything, they can keep the spoils
(minus the usual 25% excise tax on goods coming into town.)

As they are signing the contract, Milena sketches what she saw in
the egg bowl that morning to see if it looks familiar to anyone.
There is some discussion, but no conclusions.

The group discusses possibly asking if Angel could be released
from jail into our custody. In the meantime, Gnik gets a note to 
allow him to at least talk to her.

Jaime invites them to lunch; Milena is going to join them, but
Kat, who has perceived from her actions that Jaime is prejudiced
against non-humans, gives her a dirty look, so she declines.

Kat heads to the inn for a music lesson with Jewel. Milena gives
her a head start and then slips in to observe. She hears a voice
behind her: "Don't worry, I'm keeping an eye on them." Britney
says Jewel is a good guy, and also about 70 years old, so much
too old for Kat. Milena says she also wants to know if he's a
good musician, since she will have to listen to the practicing.

Gnik heads to the jail to talk with Angel about the other ship.
She says it is called the Sea Ghost, one of them is really short,
and there are fewer than a dozen people on board. The Sea Ghost
arrives and signals, the house signals back and then sends someone
out to meet them. The Sea Ghost typically is dropping off goods to
be smuggled into town, or perhaps a new person getting dropped off
to help at the house.

As he leaves, Gnik writes a note to the town council letting them
know that Angel has been very cooperative in their investigations
and he hopes they will take that into consideration at her trial;
and that she might be useful to their upcoming plans and it might
be good to have her released into their custody to help.

Al has lunch with Jaime and they have fun catching up; she's not
flirting but is clearly enjoying the conversation.


24 February 2018

In the evening, the group heads to Vain Robert's Gibbet: Gnik is telling
stories with Matty backing him up, Al is visiting his mom, Milena is
tending to the working girls. 

There are people clustered around a table; Eleanora tells them that
Ellis, who has the relic, is charging a silver piece to see it. Gnik
says he will go look, and then everyone else will be able to see what
it looks like. Kat decides to try to sneak behind Ellis and take a
silver piece off him that she can pass to Gnik to pay for his peek
-- but she is unsuccessful.

Relic is a smooth dark grey, almost black matte metallic-ish stone 
-- polished smooth, but not glossy -- with straight lines of different 
colored jewels embedded in it, like veining. Where the lines cross,
the materials seem to merge. Ellis says conspiratorially to Gnik, "I
think it's Kanassian." Milena has heard of them as a group of humans
who used to live in this region but were wiped out.

Bradford, the half-orc harbormaster, walks in and tells Perytar, the
bouncer, that he's there to talk to Gnik. He asks Gnik what else he
knows about the Slaughter siblings' reasons for trying to break
into his house; he thinks they might be trying to steal from him.
He asks if Gnik might be willing to stop by the next day to talk
more about the situation and help him figure out what the Slaughters
are after. Gnik agrees.

While Milena is tending to the working girls, they mention that someone
-- the dueling guy -- was looking for her earlier. Other than that,
they want to know about the group's trip to the haunted house -- there
are lots of rumors and stories blown way out of proportion.

As she is finishing up with the girls, Eleanora tells her that
Daryn Larsken, the duelist, is there and wants to talk to her. She
comes downstairs to talk to him. Gnik and Matty have finished their
storytelling and are having dinner.

Daryn says he wants to talk in private. Eleanora is leading them to
a room when Matty comes up, asking if Milena feels ok about his.
Milena tells Daryn her friend has concerns, so he says she can
join them if she wants. Before leading them upstairs, Eleanora
tells them not to touch anything, to holler when they are ready
to come back down, and if Daryn stares at her ass on the way up
she will take his eyes out. Daryn is indignant.

Upstairs, three people are playing poker and seem annoyed to have
been interrupted. Eleanora leads them into a different room and
tells the poker players to let them out when they are done.

The room is opulent, with nice furniture, a spyglass, a locked
chest, and bookshelves, with a globe in the corner. Daryn thanks
Milena for being willing to speak with him. He asks if she knows
anything about the Playhouse. He says he is in love with Jae Moyer,
who he saw in a play and whose swordwork was the most beautiful he
has ever seen. He has written her many times but never hears back;
she declines invitations, and he is concerned it might not be of
her own will. He is willing to leave her alone if that is what
she desires, but his intuition says something sinister might be
going on; at the play he saw, as she walked out through the 
respectfully cheering crowd, she seemed scared. He asks about the
cost; Milena says she usually has a price based on time spent, but
in this case, since he undoubtedly knows people she does not, she
suggests that he can owe her a future favor when she needs similar
information. They return downstairs, Daryn departs, and Matty and
Milena have dinner with Gnik.

After midnight, Kat makes her rounds -- she decides to steal a few
eggs for blind Anna and for Bob who sells pencils on the corner. At
one of her regular stops, she is coming out of the henhouse when
through the window of the house she sees a silver plate on a shelf
in the kitchen -- and it calls to her. She breaks in; there's a
cat bathing itself, and it rubs against her legs for petting. She
finds the plate, which has a nice etching on it of a house, and
something written on the bottom. She takes it, and hears voices
down the hall -- "Is it cold? Why is there a breeze in here?" She
slips out the window, closes it behind her, and slips into the
shadows.

On her way along her rounds, she stops by the Lillybrook Orphanage
and leaves a gold piece for them (in the room of the trustworthy
person who runs the orphanage). Then she heads home and hides the
plate, because she feels conflicted about having taken it.


28 Barrum 3275

Gnik, with Matty, Milena, and Al goes to talk to Bradford. As they approach,
they see a couple of shipwrights outside the building, and one of them
hides something behind his back -- the bottle they were sharing. Gnik
tells them he's come to talk to Bradford, and they go to find him. He
comes out and thanks them for coming. He asks if they know Rue -- one
of the other dockworkers. She says she overheard the Slaughter siblings
say they got the map they were looking for from the black market and
Stockton's stash of coin -- his mother's -- would be theirs. He knows
of no such thing, but it is not out of the realm of possibility. They
ask him if he would rather they try to find the treasure themselves
before the Slaughters get it, or investigate the Slaughters to try
to stop them. He doesn't care one way or the other. Milena suggests
that her daughter might be very good with finding the hidden treasure.

Gnik goes below the building, holds up a silver coin and a piece of
food, and tells them that he will give anyone who can tell him where
to find a pile of silver some of the food. They have not seen such
a thing; he gives them the food anyway, and tells them that if any of
them come to him and tell them where a stash of silver is, he will give
them more food.

The group goes back into the house to look around. Gnik suggests that
the most likely places his mother might have hidden something were the
places no one would stumble upon it accidentally -- her quarters or
the offices. The group spends a couple of hours looking around. Milena
walks around carefully tapping the toe of her boot on the floorboards
-- until Matty hears something that sounds different. Two of the 
floorboards swing up to reveal a solidly built wooden box with no
obvious way to open it. They take it to Bradford, who says his mom
used to make things like this all the time. He taps it in a couple
of places and the lid pops off. He peers into it in shock -- it is
stacked full of platinum coins. He thanks them and says he will take
them to the merchants, and make it clear they have been found... right
now. Milena asks if he wants bodyguards, and grins. They accompany
him to at least warn him if danger is coming.

In the evening, Milena, Matty, Gnik, and Kat go to the latest play
Jae is starring in. Milena and Matty decide to go early. Kat also
goes early, but goes around the back and tries to climb up into a
second floor window. She falls and breaks her arm instead; a stagehand
comes out and finds her, brings her inside, and asks what happened. She
spins a tale of being a big fan of Jae, but her mother decided to bring
her younger sister instead..... Jae comes out to talk to her for a few
minutes, and Kat says she is considering becoming an actress, too. Jae
tells her she should come by early some day for tryouts, then tells
the crew to get Janet... who turns out to be Janet Hector, the priestess
of Maria. She gives Kat a Look and asks what she was doing. Kat sticks
with her story; Janet heals her -- Kat cries out as when she touches
her arm, and then hears, faintly, her mother's voice calling, "Ludmilla?"
-- then invites her to her box to watch the play. It turns out that Jewel 
is also in the play, playing Reginald, and Jae is Glee, in the story 
of Maerson getting moved.

After the play, there is a tradition that the cast comes out to the
upper audience decks to mingle with the higher-class crowds. Gnik
and Matty make their way to the upper lobby; Milena (with Gavriila
in tow) stays in the lower lobby with good sight lines to observe. In
Janet's box, Rosalie invites Kat out with them; Janet rolls her eyes
as Kat accepts, still playing the fangirl. Rosalie asks Kat what she
enjoys doing, and Janet asks if she heard about the haunted house --
because Kat was one of the ones who cleared it out. Kat tells parts
of the story, emphasizing the heroic bits that she was involved in.

The actors come out, but Jae is not one of them. Gnik asks Jewel why
not, and Jewel says she usually doesn't -- she doesn't like being 
around that many people. Gnik asks if she gets much fanmail; the other
actors say Nub, who manages tickets and front of house, would know more.

Janet is no longer paying attention to her, so Kat tries to head back
into the backstage area by going through the side doors that the actors
came through. She sees Jae coordinating things; Kat grabs a prop -- a
big potted plant -- like she is helping clean up, and slips past Jae to
look into the back rooms backstage. She goes up a spiral staircase and
finds offices and storerooms. One of the offices is locked; the other
has a table and chairs, bookshelves, a bunch of manuscripts, as well
as a stand with a mirror and a makeup stand. The locked office has 
a desk, file cabinet, and big locked chest, and is very spartan. Kat
quickly looks through the unlocked office, looking for anything that
might suggest Jae is being coerced or threatened.

As Kat is popping the lock on the bottom drawer, she looks up to see
Jae standing in the doorway, arms crossed. She asks what Kat is doing,
so Kat comes clean. Jae chuckles, tells her she does not have any
interest in a relationship, and writes a note for Kat to deliver to
Daryn. As they are talking, Kat slides open the locked drawer and
sees a box with a crystal mounted on it, and a note saying "For a
fabulous performance -- Fanny Reiner".

Jae escorts Kat out, where she meets back up with Gnik, Matty, and
Milena (who has sent Gavriila home already). Once they are a little
way away from the theater, Gnik pops open the seal on the note; Jae
kindly tells Daryn that she is sorry she hadn't had time to write
before, but she really isn't looking for a relationship, and is fine.
Gnik uses Mend to re-seal the note.


24 February 2018

29 Barrum 3275 - 5 Klook 3275 

The 150th anniversary of the founding of Saltmarsh is coming up
soon. When Kat next visits Jae, Jae tells her she has a small part 
for her in their next play which will take place at the festival -- 
a play about the founding of Saltmarsh.

Kat spends some of her free time before the festival trying out
her three card monte skills on the visitors to Byorn's temple/inn
and Vain Robert's Gibbet.

Milena spends the next few days preparing medicinals for both her
own clients and the large number of travelers expected in the city
for the festivities. Svetlana tells her she will be in the park
for the whole festival with the followers of Alexander, becuase
some big names in the church, including Lisa Byron, are expected
to be there, and then runs off excitedly.

Eleanor's daughters find each party member and tell them that Eleanor
wants to have dinner with her on the 2nd, as there is someone she
wants them to meet.

On the 30th, Kat comes to the playhouse and sees a group of people
fawning over someone.  Kat asks Jae, "Who's the schmo?" Jae says
he is Reggie Ortlun, from Teriola, who has been acting since he
was very young and is rather well-known. He also will be in the
play. Jae knows him from her younger days. Reggie comes over to
introduce himself -- he is very charismatic and flirtatious. As
they are talking, it comes out that Reggie's mother is Bargallian;
she and her sister left as children and mostly grew up on ships.
He also is half-elf but does not know who his father is. His mother
and her sister tended to choose mates based on what the sky said,
or chicken bones, or whatever, and that sometimes his mother and
her sister were amorous with the same person... at the same time.
Kat tells him he really has to meet her mother.

Gnik writes to Juliana asking if they could arrange to have Angel
released to their custody for their upcoming boat trip to try to
catch the smugglers.

Kat brings Reggie by the house to meet Milena. They converse briefly
in Bargallian -- he gives a standard semi-formal greeting to respected
elders, she responds with a formal reply boiling down essentially to
"Who are your ancestors and where are you from?" and he says his
background is not well-known, but he gives the town where his 
grandmother lived and his mother was orphaned. She looks at him a
long time, dishes up a bowl of fish soup, and says, "You should eat."
They chat for a while -- Milena asks about how he got into this
pretending job, and he tells the story of seeing a play when he was
a small child, running up onto the stage to join in, and everyone
enjoying it so much that the company invited him to join them, and
he's been doing it ever since. "Yes, some of my daughters are also
impulsive," Milena says. As they finish up and are leaving, Kat
says, "Oh, by the way, there is an event in a few days, and Reggie
is taking me as his date, okay bye." Milena holds up a contraceptive,
asks, "Do you need this?" but Kat is already out the door.

Reg is spending the time leading up to the festival helping out at
the Temple of Nolan, god of sailing and saltwater.

Milena and Gnik go to deliver the note from Jae for Dylon. He reads the
note and says he will respect her wishes. Milena mentions that her 
daughter has befriended Jae, so if there turns out to be reasons to
be concerned for her safety, they will look out for her.

On the 2nd, everyone arrives at the Gibbet and discovers the whole
group has been invited. They are taken upstairs, up the ladder to
the private quarters upstairs, to a table where a group was playing
poker last time they were there. There is another group having dinner
at the next table -- Sivin, Ronna, Haldo, and Drew, all captains of
local ships. A man at the table Eleanora leads them to stands and
introduces himself as captain Marcus Roberts. He says he heard about
what they had done messing with the smugglers and wanted to buy them
dinner to thank them. He is based out of Freeport. He is gregarious,
loves telling stories. Gnik and Milena notice that although he is
drinking a lot, he is not as tipsy as he pretends to be. Mattie
notices that he is carefully paying attention to everything and
everyone, even the captains at the next table, though he is pretending
not to. He asks who is going to the big social event on the 4th, and
he is particularly looking at Milena. Milena says Kat is going and
has a date. Al is also going with his friend Jaime Lasseter. Marus
asks if Milena would like to go, and she looks at Kat. He says, "Oh,
hey, awkward -- but what if I promise to keep her on the other side
of the room?" They discuss what would happen at this shindig; he
says everyone will have to dress up, and there will be socializing,
and dinner, and then probably music and dancing. Milena subtly checks
in with Kat to see if she would be utterly mortified if she went, and
Kat grudgingly says it would be okay. 

By the end of the evening, Marcus has drawn the next table into their 
conversation. Gnik takes the opportunity to talk with the group of
captains about their plans for taking the smuggling ship. 

Afterwards, Kat draws Gnik aside and asks if he knows any diviners.
He says he does, she would not be willing to be hired, but he might
be able to ask a favor of her if she made a big donation to the
temple. Kat wants to ask a diviner who her father is. 


21 April 2018

4 Klook 3275 

In the morning there is a buzz around town: Ellis, the sailor who
had the relic at Vain Robert's Gibbet, has been murdered. No one
knows where the artifact has gone. His body washed up on shore with
the throat cut. Gnik does some investigation and learns that he had
come into the Gibbet without the relic but with a lot of money saying
that he was going away to somewhere he would be appreciated, and then
left. Someone else says he saw Ellis meet with a dark-skinned woman
and hand her a bag, receive something in return and then do a little
dance of happiness.

In the evening the group makes its way to the party, which starts
at 4 pm and food is served at 5 pm. Jamee Lasseter will pick Al up
at his mother's house so he doesn't have to swim from the island
right before the ball. Marcus does not want to arrive until food
is being served, but Milena tells him he can meet her at the 
dressmaker's a bit ahead of that. Gnik goes to the temple of Tyolus
to pick up high priestess Fran, and Kat goes to the temple of Byorn
to meet Reggie. Mattie goes herself from the island of the druids,
in Lido's stead representing the druids.

Al and Gnik arrive first with their dates. The town council chambers
have been set up with food, places to sit, and musicians. Al chats
with three representatives of Exotics -- Lisa Byron, Janelle, and 
Korvina -- and mentions that he and his friends seem to work well
together and might be interested if they could help with any adventuring
work with Exotics. Janelle mentions someone at Exotics may already have
talked to one of their group about it.

Marcus arrives to pick up Milena. In the coach on the way to the
party, they chitchat.  He tells her his home of Freeport is run by the
Council of Captains, the Sealord is the ruler of the city. He wants to
talk to Lucas, Bollak and Yam about harbor-related issues and asks that
if they get separated and anyone asks her about him, see if she can
get anything from them about their perceptions of Freeport. When they
arrive they are introduced as Lord Marcus Roberts of Freeport and
guest, and he complains under his breath that he hates that "Lord"
stuff, it should be "Captain".

They first talk to Duke Lucas Ledford about ship business. Apparently
ships are vanishing or being sunk outright -- forces coming out of the
water and attacking -- and they are trying to figure out how to work
together diplomatically to find out what's going on and fix the problem.
Then he talks to Mon and Bollak about the same topic; Mon is sympathetic,
Bollak responds, "Yeah, sounds like that's a big problem you need to
fix."

Kat meets Reggie, and on their way to the party she asks how long it
took him to get to Saltmarsh all the way from Terriola. He said it
took him about 15 minutes to walk to the nearest Exotics location,
and then he teleported, and the 15 minutes to walk to his friend Jaye's
place -- he was glad Jaye was willing to pay for it, because
teleporting is expensive. Kat is fascinated by the thought of teleporting.

When Reggie and Kat arrive, Jamee tells Al that they need to go talk to
that guy at some point -- he is a very popular actor in Terriola, it's
amazing they were able to bring him here for their play. Al mentions
he knows Reggie's date. Jamee looks at her and says, "Is that... Kat?
She looks different." She mentions she has one ticket for the play Reggie
is performing in, but she could perhaps ask her father if he could finagle
another ticket if Al is interested in joining her.

Mattie arrives with Brittney, and they are both announced. Mattie
complains quietly to Brittney that they never can quite pronounce
her last name correctly.

Kat goes to get food for Reggie, and while there a woman comes over and
asks if she is Kat. She introduces herself as Tricia, a performer at
the Dancing Dryad, and she's heard Kat has some impressive skills.
"...In what?" Kat asks. Tricia says that she ever wants a more interesting
challenge in her career, she should stop by. "In... my acting career?"
"Sure, that," Tricia says. "Okay, sure, perhaps I'll stop by sometime."
Kat knows very little about the Dancing Dryad, but knows that the street
kids avoid it because the proprietors are pretty aggressive about not
wanting them around.

During an up-tempo and percussive number, Milena asks Marcus to dance:
"I will show you. You seem like you will catch on quickly." Then she
leads him through a dance from her homeland with a lot of stomping and
clapping that looks like it could break out into a fight at any moment.
Many others jump up to join, including Al -- who gets many others up --
Gnik, Jewel, and Brittney.

Kat retrieves Reggie from the crowd of female admirers around him and
pulls him over to a small table to eat food. Mattie stops by to chat
for a moment, then Kat asks if he wants to dance. As they make their
way to the dance floor, Kat says, "I have a confession to make. I don't
know how to dance." "That's okay," he says, "just relax and let me lead."
They glide around the dance floor and look good doing it.

Milena makes a circuit without Marcus to see who might talk to her. She
talks briefly with Tricia, who is one of her clients, then she is stopped
by Mon, whom she had previously met when Marcus talked to her. She asks
if Milena also is from Freeport and how long they have known each other
-- "No, we only met a few days ago" -- and then if he can be trusted.
Milena says he does not seem malicious, but is very good at "talking
between the lines -- saying without saying, and hearing without hearing."
Mon then asks if he has mentioned anything about the lighthouse -- it
is a place in Freeport. Apparently some unusual situation is related
to it.

Gnik makes his way over to Korvina and mentions he is part of an 
adventuring party that might be interested in doing business with Exotics.
He points out the rest of the group and she says that the group must have
caught someone's attention for them all to be at the gala -- but on the
other hand, it is unusual for there to be so few adventurers in Saltmarch.
They talk about the Blue Gauntlet, and adventuring party that has gone
missing; they had borrowed resources from Exotics before setting out.

A man comes to each member of the group telling them the Duke wants
to speak with them. He leads them to a room across the hall from
the central chamber with a tall window made of frosted, cut glass
that lets a lot of good light and patterns into the room. The duke
is sitting there with a servant just inside the door and his assistant
Eveline. He says he just wanted to thank us for helping the Town Council
out, and also to have the opportunity to get more drinks -- he sends
the guards out for drinks for each of them... two each... and he takes
one of each for himself. He proposes a toast, and then asks what we
call ourselves. Gnik opens his mouth to answer... Matty glares at
him... and Gnik says four out of five of them have been calling themselves
the Liberators, and maybe if he starts doing it, too, the fifth one
will accept it.  "You're not supposed to name yourself!" Matty says.

Suddenly, there is an extremely loud thud against the door to the room.
The duke notes there are supposed to be guards... but he does not
hear them respond. Milena immediately has a knife in her hand, and Kat
has a... fork, that she accidentally pickpocketed from the buffet line.

Gnik has Az materialize outside the room, so he can see the front desk
clerk, Mon and her bodyguard Admaw, and a Dorginian sorceress with a
dagger floating in the air in front of her. The two guards are down.
Gnik reports what he sees and the duke hides behind a desk, taking a
drink with him. Kat throws a chair at the window to break it and give
them another way out. Matty complains that she didn't even bring a
weapon... and the duke holds up a dagger from under the desk. Al
goes into the hall to try to help the guards, but they are already
dead, with their throats cut.

The duke scrambles out the broken window as Mon's bodyguard Admaw
says this is none of their concern, Mon just has something they want,
and slams the door to the hall shut again. Milena has gone to the 
door to listen, and tells everyone to stand back... she calls down 
a Thunderwave that knocks everyone in the hall down, blows the door
off its hinges, and pushes Admaw through the door across the hall
and into the council chamber. Gnik casts a Grease spell at the
sorceress, who falls down.

Guards come running toward them from the council chamber. Admaw
puts down his weapon and drops to his knees with his hands behind
his head. Mattie jumps on the sorceress to keep her from running
away; but not before she casts a spell at Al that freezes him.
The clerk says, "Well, it was a good gig, but..." and runs down
the hall; Kat chases her, slams into her as she comes around 
the corner and she had been trying to open a door. Kat punches
her in the nose; the clerk says, "This has been fun...." and
two knives drop into her hands from nowhere. She stabs at Kat
with both of them; one just grazes but the other cuts deep into
her side. Kat punches her again, harder this time.

The guards arrive and begin securing Admaw and the sorceress; Milena
points down the hall and says "One more went that way." Gnik has already
taken off that way, followed by Al, who is fast enough to get past him.
Al attacks the clerk as Gnik gets there; he casts Sleep and gets both
the clerk and Al. Kat stabs her with the fork out of spite.

Milena talks briefly with Mon, who says they were after something she
acquired. Milena puts together that they must have been the ones who
killed Ellis, and says so. Mon had not heard he had been murdered. 
Milena asks if she knows why they want the artifact; "I don't know
why THEY want it," she says. She thanks Milena for her help and
goes to explain to the guards that Admaw was not at fault here.


23 May 2018

Post-gathering conversations and interactions; Kat and her date Reggie
go to Blackberry Bar's for talk and other recreations; Milena and her
date Marcus return her borrowed dress and then go to the Gibbet for 
drinking and cards with the gang of Not Pirates.


2 June 2018

5 Klook 3275 


Councilman Rolland stops by Milena's place to ask how well she knows
Tricia, with whom he saw Milena talking at the party. He has been
dating her for some time and wants to marry her, quit his position
on the council and move far away, but is not sure she would be willing
to leave her job at the Dancing Dryad. Milena asks why he doesn't just
quit his job but let her keep hers. He says he will think on it.

Gnik spends some time doing research and discovers that the puzzle-like
fragments they discovered are almost certainly Captain Needam's Chest;
it is told that he secreted his most valued treasure (although there is
no record of what it was) in a clear chest so he could admire it -- but
because an enemy of his was always coming for it, he increased the
protections on it by putting an extradimensional pocket inside the
chest and then magically breaking the chest apart so it must be
reassembled in order to open and access the pocket. Gnik tries doing a
bit more research on who the "Michel" might be who is looking for it,
beyond an associate of Bryon's. It occurs to him that Angel, who was
with that group for some time, might know.

The group convenes at Blackberry Bar's for lunch. He has a sign on
the door asking for help with a simple job. He has heard there is
a baker, Tandy Poe, from New Tyreln who has come up with a new sort 
of food involving fried dough, and he wants to get the recipe. Gnik
is asking what Barul is willing to give her for the recipe, when a
young messenger boy runs in to let the group know that the Council
wants to meet with them that afternoon at 3 pm.

They head to the market to look for Tandy Poe. Gnik asks someone he
knows who is in the Baker's Guild, who suggests Gnik could buy something
from him instead. Gnik tells him a friend of his is looking for a specific
recipe, so he begrudgingly points her out. Gnik buys a few pastries
from him and they go to talk to Tandy; her booth is very busy, but she
is almost sold out of food, so they wait for her to sell out and become
less busy. Kat explains who they are and why they are here and invite
her to come back to Blackberry Bar's to meet Barul and negotiate for
her recipe. She pays a passing child a gold piece to watch her stall,
and promises another when she returns.

When they get to Blackberry Bar's, Barul uncharacteristically comes
out from behind the bar and formally introduces himself, and she
responds with a formal introduction of her own. They talk for a
while, clearly hit it off, and she spends some time tasting his 
baked goods and they exchange tips and techniques. Milena notices 
while they are talking that Barul does not share the secrets of how he 
makes his jellies. Tandy says she is willing to let him make her recipe 
for a share of the profits; he says he just does this for fun and she
can keep the profits. She looks down the hall at his severed-head
trophies and giant battleaxe from his adventuring days, and nods. Barul
then gives Gnik, Matty, Kat, Milena, and Al each a small bag with his
standard finders fee for good recipes -- 5 platinum pieces each. Matty
asks if instead she can have a few of those pastries every day for as
long as she's in Saltmarsh. Barul and Tandy agree, and Barul copies
down her recipe and shares some of his own. 

They head to the town hall. They notice on the way into the building
that the window they broke has been removed and the damaged wall is
being worked on by masons. There is a new desk clerk -- Marjorie, who
grew up in town and many of them know. She seems nervous; Gnik tells
her not to be, but she says, "But we're going to the BIG meeting
room." She leads them to a room they haven't seen. Mon is sitting
on a dais; when they enter, she comes down and presents each of them
with a Scroll of Merit stating that each may make a request of her
individually at some point in the future, that she will do her best
to fulfill, along with a few coins. Then the duke arrives, late,
thanks them for trying to protect him, and drops a bag of coins
on the table in front of them, and then gives them each a token that
he explains grants knighthood, in thanks for trying to protect his
life when they thought he was in danger. The knighthood is for the
Order of the Star. He winks at Kat on his way out.

The Lassiters' servant Jack is present because Egan Lassiter is on
the Council. He is waiting outside for the group when they exit the
chamber. Kat had previously told the group that the Lassiters were
interested in hiring them to retrieve an object stolen from the family;
he tells them it is a journal from one of the ancestral members of the
family. He says they don't know who took it, but they are fairly certain
it is on the Ruge estate -- Rolland's family. Kat asks why he hasn't just
asked Rolland about it; he says the Ruge family has been unwilling to
admit they have it.

Kat and Gnik ask more about the book and he shows them a picture -- a
thick leather-bound book with metal clasps. He claims it's not especially
valuable except that it is a family heirloom and an old book, a couple
hundred years old. Milena senses that he is not lying, but there is
more to the story than he is saying. He offers them each 100 gp up 
front plus another 500 each if they recover and return the book. They
say they will think about it and let him know if they decide to pursue
it.

Gnik and Matty go to the jail to talk with Angel and see if she knows
who Michel is. She tells them he is in charge of the Raging Hammers, and
his last name is Berry. She says he liked her pretty well and trusted
her more and more over time, but she got shipped off to work with Bryon
after they had a disagreement. She doesn't know about the puzzle pieces
he's been collecting. She says Polis is in Seaton (the town that was sacked)
and is in charge of the Raging Hammer there. Gnik asks where Bryon might
have gone, and Angel says he might have run for the hills, or possibly
to Seaton, because Michel does not take failure well so Bryon is probably
trying to avoid him.


Saturday, 16 June

6 Klook 3275 

The group meets for breakfast at Blackberry Bar's. There's a new sweet
fried dough thing on the menu. Mmmm, doughnuts. 

Gnik has done some research on the book Jack wants to hire them 
to retrieve. He learns it probably belonged to one of the founding 
families, of which the Lassiters were one -- but so were the Ruges.
Gnik thinks retrieving the book and giving it to the Lassiters is
shady and probably a bad idea, but he's intrigued anyway because...
book. Kat also thinks it's a bad idea, but is interested in the
challenge of trying to do it. Since Jack did not seem to have any
particular time frame, they may just keep an eye on the situation
to see if an opportunity presents itself.

Mattie reveals that Juliana had approached her to tell her that the
job is a set-up to see how the group would respond, since there is
some mistrust on the council of the group. She suspects Egan has
some ulterior motive for having proposed this particular test -- he
probably really wants the book. Milena suggests to Gnik that perhaps
he should ask the Lassiter daughter Dona, whom he knows and who has
recently graduated from the wizarding school at the Temple of Tyollus, 
if he can read the book. Mattie says Juliana said the book appears to 
be blank -- even with attempt to read it magically. Gnik is even more 
intrigued, and sends a message via Az to Dona asking if they can chat 
when she has some free time.

Az returns about 15 minutes later and lets Gnik know that because Dona
is bored -- everyone is off celebrating the holiday -- she is on her
way now. She arrives about 30 minutes later -- getting through town
is slow due to all the revelers -- and tells Gnik that the book is
blank, like a journal the original owner never got around to writing
in. They discuss ways that it might appear blank without actually
being so, and her interest is piqued; she invites them back to the
family estate to check out the book. Mattie stays behind to wait 
tables at the increasingly busy bar.

Dona calls her horse, and offers to Gnik that he can ride to make
it easier for him to keep up. He is concerned that that would be
a long way to fall, so Milena offers to ride with him to keep him
steady (and because it is a very nice horse). He agrees only 
because it is a novel experience. The horse looks at them appraisingly,
but does not complain at their presence.

Matty catches up with them and they make their way up the hill through
throngs of revelers. The Ruge estate has no wall around it, although
it appears there may once have been. They go first to the stables,
where a young boy comes out to wait while they dismount, then walks
toward the stables and the horse follows. The group follows Dona up
to the front door; she touches the front door with her palm and then
turns the knob. A halfling greets Dona and she introduces him as
Meko. He tells her her brother is home -- she says, "By his tone,
he means Clarence; let's be quiet."

The entry hall is bigger than Milena's entire house, three stories
high and with a grand staircase and balconies overlooking it. She
leads them to a room, tells them to wait a minute, goes in and closes
the door; a few minutes later, she comes back holding a large box
and pulls the book out of it. Gnik asks to hold it, and it is so big
and heavy he almost topples over. They are on the way to a reading
room when a door opens up and Clarence comes out, lost in thought.
"Hey, Dona," he says, and then sees the rest of the group. "Uh, what's
going on?" "Friends," she says, "go away." He shrugs and leaves; she
says he must have a lot on his mind to have let it go so easily.

They go into the reading room, put the book on the table, and Gnik
starts a ritual to detect magic on it. The pages are old and yellowed,
but apparently blank. Milena begins describing techniques for making
invisible inks and then revealing them again using a solution made
from a combination of herbs. Gnik finishes his spell, and before he
begins looking around the room Dona whispers in his ear, "Don't look
too closely at me, okay?" and winks. He detects something very
bright in Kat's pocket, something faint in Milena's pack, and some
items on Dona but he doesn't look too closely. He looks more closely
at Kat and gets a sense of chaos but not fae, and enchantment. He
does not detect any magic on the book.

Kat takes a look at the book and notices that the hinge mechanism
is strangely hard to open, and other portions are weirdly loose.
When sections of the binding are pulled, the back comes off to
reveal a small book in the inside cover and another in the outside
cover. Each book is about 16 pages long and has writing in an
alphabet none of them recognize. Gnik asks if he minds if he
copies the books, and Dona says, "Sure," and provides paper and
ink. The text appears to run top-to-bottom rather than across.
She makes her own copy, and asks that none of them share what
they found. Kat puts the book back together again, Dona takes
it back upstairs to put it away, and then comes back to lead
them out again before Clarence comes back again; she says he is
a good guy, but is very focused on the family business and thinks
magic is a waste of time and those who practice it are lazy.

Gnik goes back to the library to investigate the strange script. He
concludes it is not an alphabet; the patterns look sort of like
Jhoynian turned on its side and coded. He works through the night
on likely patterns to break the code.

Kat wanders the market and finds a silver merchant; she haggles
for a silver chain. She is performing in the play in the evenings; 
she does a pretty good job, but Reggie is so good those of the group 
who see him forget they know him, and are actually a bit concerned 
when his character dies at the end of the play.

Milena does her usual rounds; at the Gibbet, Eleanora tells her
there is a woman upstairs who has been roughed up by a man; she
says pointedly that the man won't do it again, but if Milena can
tend to the woman's injuries, Eleanora will pay for it.

Gnik deciphers enough of the code to understand the writing; it
speaks of dissention in the ranks, and says that the diseases were
not an accident, they were murders, and he needs to get this information
to the others. There is no indication of who wrote the passages, however.
The author writes, "I fear Lumaka is here" -- a reference to Lume, god
of disease, suffering, torture, destruction, evil secrets. Gnik guesses 
the writing is from about 100-150 years ago. The book also documents
the writer's perceptions of four different deaths that appeared to be
in assaults, but upon closer inspection magic or disease might have
been the true culprit.


7 Klook 3275 

The morning is quiet because so many of the town revelers are still
hung over. Mattie goes to the library to check on Gnik but runs into
the high priestess Fran, who tells her to go talk some sense into Gnik,
who has been completely absorbed in his project all night and is
neglecting his other duties. She finds him still absorbed, but at
least partially rested and absent-mindedly eating food that Az brought
him. Matty tells him that Fran needs help with her research that afternoon.
"What about my research?" he asks grumpily. He tells her what he's figured
out so far, and tells her to let Fran know he'll help her this afternoon.
"And one of those doughnut things would be nice," he adds.

Milena goes for a morning stroll and overhears one of the guards mention
that at the gate at the Mouth, they repelled stone cultists trying to
get into town. Her morning divinations gave the impression of finding 
secrets, much more and much bigger than what she can see. Matty stops
by the house to find her and Tatiana points her in the right direction;
Milena asks her if she knows anything about "stone cultists" but Matty
hasn't heard of them either. Matty fills Milena in on what Gnik has
found out so far.

Kat attended the cast afterparty with Reggie and then spent the night.
After breakfast she heads to the library to see Gnik. When she opens
the door, Az is there fluttering menacingly, trying to keep people
away. Kat asks if he has found things out; Az says, "Yes! Find Matty!
Leave Gnik alone!" She then leads Kat to Matty, who is still with Milena
being peppered with questions about the specifics of the symptoms of
those who might have been murdered, to see if she could connect it to
any specific disease or poison or other effect.

Matty goes back to Gnik to ask if he knows anything about stone cultists.
There was a group who lived around a stone that emanated magic, and
they were able themselves to perform some magic just from absorbing
those emanations. It turned out that the magic came from a demon
trapped inside, and when it broke out some carried around the
broken shards and worshipped the rock. In the last few years there
has been talk that some groups of these followers have been wandering
around occasionally ransacking towns looking for something.


14 July 2018

Milena has been feeling a stronger pull toward the god or spiritual
entity that grants her her power. In acknowledgement, one evening in
the dark of the night she goes to shore and wades out naked into
the water with a candle -- for connection to earth, water, fire, and
air -- and meditates on the presence as a ritual way of saying, "I'm
here and I'm listening."

The Cathedral of Alydia organizes non-lethal fights during the 
festival: 1-on-1 bouts, combats of monsters vs people, and battles
with multiple participants on each side. Mattie is concerned about
the practice of holding monsters captive and then sending them into
the ring against their will to fight, so she wants to figure out
where they're being held so she can try to free them. Britteny has
warned her not to go down that road, as followers of Alydia are
very into combat, so she is just asking for trouble.

Kat decides to participate in a bout for fun. She tells Mattie
and Al (and Reggie), but not her family. She goes up against
a big Dorgenian guy, introduced as Sei, about 5'8" and 190 lbs. He
comments as they are entering the ring that he probably won't be
too much of a challenge for her. Because the fight is non-lethal,
they fight with padded staves and daggers. Although he is obviously
very strong, Kat is faster and gets several good blows in -- including
to the kidneys and the groin -- before he concedes.

Al also participates in a bout, against a Jhoynian woman named Mabel
who grew up down the coast. Al starts out by dodging her blows, but
after a couple of dodges she slips and he gets several very solid
body blows in. She rolls to her feet, breathing heavily, and says,
"Yeah, that was good...." and Al asks if she's had enough for the
day. She drops and spins her leg out, slams him hard in the leg,
and he drops in a controlled fall, grabbing at her ankle, and
kicks her in the head; she falls over unconscious. Al stands up,
bows to his opponent (although she is on the ground unconscious),
bows to the crowd, and then throws his hands above his head 
and gives a triumphant shout -- he's still working on his
humility.

Mattie transforms into a rat to try to sniff out the location of
the beasts being used for battles in the Cathedral of Alydia. She
smells something big cat-like... and finds a displacer beast that
was brought in today by someone from Trihorn for a fight later 
today. Mattie decides to follow the Trihorn representative to
try to figure out where the beasts are being kept. He gets into
a wagon and she manages to hop on board, still in rat form. They
go to a building near the edge of town on the forest side. He
knocks on the wall at the back of the building and it slides open;
the building has been mostly gutted to make room for cages. There
is a small bear, a dog-ish thing that seems to shift in space as
she looks at it (a blink dog, which Mattie knows is a fey creation,
like the displacer beast), and a strange feathered lizard thing,
about 4'6" tall, that is clearly intelligent (a velociraptor, but
Mattie has never seen or heard of such a thing before). Mattie
hears the person she followed talking to someone else, saying he
will bring the wagon by again tomorrow, just make sure the illusion
is in place; Mattie guesses it is an illusion on the wagon to make
sure the beast on it is not visible. Mattie departs, still in rat
form, and as she is leaving, the person she followed re-enters
the wagon and it suddenly disappears, and the back of the building
looks completely different. Knowing it is an illusion, she tries
to disbelieve it; she can see the illusion as an overlay but also
the reality behind it. The man reaches up, rings a bell that makes
no sound, and the wagon vanishes -- Mattie can't hear it or smell
the horses, either.

Mattie thinks the best course of action is to find someone who can
dispel the illusion that hides the wagon; then, those who protest
against the animal fights will be able to see the animals, and could
work to stop the wagon. She talks to Al about her plan, and Al suggests 
she should talk to his sister Himaya, who has been leading some of 
the protests with other followers of Sayd, who are pacifists. Mattie 
is hoping Al's sister might have befriended some of the high priests 
who might be able to dispel the illusion on the wagon. Himaya points 
them to Brendan, the high priest of Sayd in Saltmarsh. Mattie tells 
him that she has found the house where the Alydia temple is keeping
the animals for fighting. She says she would like to free the
animals, but it is not something she can do herself and she thinks
it should be a bigger town effort anyway. Brendan tells her that if
she can tell him everything she knows about where they are being held,
he can see to it that they are freed and returned to the Dreadwood,
or kept in safety until they can be returned to their home (in the
case of the animal she couldn't identify). He thanks her and offers
her and Al a hug. 

They find out later that a group of people arrived at the house, opened
doors that had never been there before, and loaded three caged animals
onto three wagons, drove the wagons through town chanting, "Save the
animals, stop the killing!" and then drove out of town and into the
Dreadwood. Himaya tells Al later that Brendan went by himself to get
the doors open and told everyone else to follow a half-hour later
with the wagons.



28 July 2018

10 Klook 3275


Group sets out with Laur, Wend, and Angel to try to take out the
smuggler ship. They approach in their small ship and see flashes
coming from the "haunted" house on the shore. From Az's vantage
point soaring above the ship, she sees several people on the
starboard (houseward) side of the ship, including a smaller
person standing on a box -- probably the mage. Mattie transforms
herself into a giant spider and skitters up the side of the ship,
while Kat tosses up a padded grappling hook onto the top deck
railing and begins climbing. Gnik reduces himself to small size
and Az comes to pick him up and carry him to the top.  Milena
climbs up the rope after Kat and waits at the railing. Kat climbs
most of the way to the crow's nest and casts a Sleep spell. Matty
waits to watch the lookout in the crow's nest slump down, and then
shoots webbing at the cluster of three people that they think includes
the mage. Milena and Angel perch on the railing for a moment, Angel
with a sling and club, Milena with a bow and arrow.

Matty entangles the mage, and the nearby person holding a lantern
falls to the deck thanks to a Sleep spell from Gnik. The third person
standing between them turns around to see what is happening and is
hit by an arrow from Milena while someone standing farther forward
is knocked overboard by a sling bullet from Angel.

Al climbs the rope and attemts to grapple two guards simultaneously
and knock them over the edge of the railing; he also goes over the
edge, but drops into a graceful dive and then swims to the rear 
anchor chain to climb onto the boat again. The man with an arrow
in his gut yells, "Cary! Bell!" and pulls out a sword and dagger
and runs to attack the spider. He gets a couple of slashes in, but
then Mattie-the-spider bites him with a poisonous bite.

Gnik casts Grease at the person on the wheel, who falls. She tries
to get up again to ring the bell, but slips and falls again. Kat
clocks the Sleep-spelled sailor with the hilt of a dagger to keep
him down and then ties him up. Milena casts Sacred Flame on the
spellcaster. The sailor fighting the spider dashes to one of the 
doors to belowdecks and throws it open to alert the others; Mattie 
tries to trap the wizard in more web, since she has started to break 
free. The spellcaster yells, "Cary, kill the spider!"

Gnik tries to cast Sleep on the sailor who went running to alert
others. He throws open the door, and then falls forward, unconscious.
The mage curses, mutters a word, disappears from the webs and reappears
next to the hole to belowdecks. She begins climbing down and Kat casts
Sleep on her. She sees her drop.

Al sees one of the guys he knocked overboard has reached the top of
the fore anchor chain; the guy looks around, frowns, and dives overboard.
Milena motions to Matty to come for some healing; Matty doesn't understand
the gesture and chitters at her. Milena says, "Fluids are supposed to be
inside body. Come here, I fix." Matty transforms back into elf form
and comes over for healing while Al talks with the sailor still struggling
with the grease, and asks in a friendly manner if he can restrain her.
Gnik sees someone else coming up the ladder from below, a woman with a
crossbow, and casts Grease on the ladder she is climbing. She does not
fall, but is struggling. Kat, still in the crow's nest, shoots a 
crossbow bolt into her shoulder. She comes up, surveys the situation,
Angel yells and pulls out her sling, and the woman runs and dives over
the side of the boat. Gnik sends Az to follow and see where she goes.
As the few other sailors try to emerge from belowdecks, they either 
slide on the greased ladder or make it to the top and surrender.

Matty concentrates and senses that there are three other non-human
humanoids on the boat who have not come abovedecks. Meanwhile, Al
checks the room that the sailor tried to duck into, and discovers
it is a small toilet, but with a panel that swivels into another
bathroom. Milena and Kat check out the other aftward door to see
if they can figure out where those other humanoids are. They find
a room with two doors, one padlocked, and stairs going down. Kat
checks out the padlock and picks it.

Al, Angel, and Gnik go through the other bathroom and rush into the
room behind it to surprise anyone who might be there. It appears to
be captain's quarters, unoccupied. Milena and Kat can hear movement
behind the wall behind them, and a moment later Al, Angel, and Gnik
burst into their room. Milena lets them know that Kat has just picked
a lock, and she listens but hears no sound. Al returns abovedecks to
keep an eye on things with Matty. They open the room and it appears
to be a small, tidy storeroom. Two cabinets are empty except for a
small locked box, and there is a large barrel, full or mostly full,
with Dorgenian script that they cannot read, but they guess it might
be some kind of liquor. Milena hands the small box to Kat, who finds
that it is trapped. She springs the trap on purpose -- a blade pops
out where normally it would slice off fingers trying to work the
lock. Once the trap is sprung, she works to pick the lock.

Gnik senses something trying to communicate with him. He looks over
at the steps downward and sees a small, rainbow-colored flying
chameleon-like thing. It flies up and peeks around the door at
Milena and Kat, who get a mental sense of, "Whatcha doin'?" Milena
says they are exploring, and then asks if it is hungry and offers it
a piece of jerky. It excitedly takes it and licks and nibbles at it,
and they get a sense in their minds of "Zazzen," which they think
is its name. As it flips around, they see a coin they don't recognize
clutched in its back claw. Al and Matty think it is a pseudodragon,
a type of fae. Matty gets a sense from it that it has been hanging
out with a scaled humanoid, a lizardman, who has been feeding it.

The box Kat opens is full of gold pieces, maybe a couple hundred in
all. Kat reflexively pockets some of it.

Zazzen leads them downstairs to the room where the lizardman who
has been feeding it resides. There are three lizardmen asleep in
the room, but they wake up when Al and Matty open the door. Matty
tries to convince them that they are not a threat, but the lizardmen
seem to be getting aggressive -- the first one is rushing toward
the door, the other two are moving that way.


Saturday, 11 August 2018

The front lizardman lunges at Al and tries to grapple him; Al drops
to the floor in a full split to dodge him. The next one yells, "You'll
just take us as skins!" as Matty grabs him, throws him into the closet,
and Matty yells, "I would never!" Kat says, "We don't want to hurt
you, we just want to help you get where you're going---" ... and then
immediately throws a dagger at the third one coming forward. Gnik tries
to use Suggestion on the leader to get him to get the others to talk,
but he shakes it off and growls; Milena stands blocking the door with
her staff and the charging lizardperson clotheslines herself on it,
knocking the spear out of Milena's hands and knocking her into Kat in 
the process. Milena feels something on her leg, and sees the faint 
outline of Zassen, who has changed color and pattern to blend in.

The one fighting Al says, "Your people are weak; you hide rather than
fighting." Kat takes advantage of the fallen lizardwoman trying to 
scramble back to her feet to throw another dagger, and hits her in
the back of the head; she falls flat. Kat says, "We are stronger than
you, and we're going to beat you." The other two back off, grab their
fallen friend and pull her into the room. Al approaches cautiously,
does a quick medicine check, and says she is barely breathing. Milena
leans in and lays on hands to heal her. Al says, "We're going to let
you go eventually, but we want to understand why you're here and where
you're trying to go." Several get the feeling that the leader, the
only one who speaks their language, is actively trying to avoid telling
them anything. He says it is another sign of their weakness that they
do not know what is going on.

Al asks if anyone knows how to read lizard minds. Zazzen appears and
raises a hand. He gives them the impression that the lizardmen don't
want to ally with weak softskins. The group steps back and the lizardmen
move past and out into the hall, where they begin walking much more 
quickly. The group follows them up the stairs and hear stunned yelling
from above -- Laur, who had come up from the smaller boat to help
guard the tied-up people on the deck. He mentions that Angel jumped
off the ship and swam away, so he figured he should come up to help
keep an eye on things.

Al checks in with the prisoners and Matty reminds him there is still
one more person belowdecks. The captain says it is someone they are
keeping secure -- giving the impression she is a prisoner. Al asks
if there is anything else he needs to know, and he says she is kind
of weird-looking. Milena stays above-decks to keep an eye on the
prisoners and see if anyone else is coming up from the water (or
needs to) while the others go below to find this last person.

Kat goes to try to open the chest in the room the lizardfolk were
inhabiting. It appears to be trapped with a discolored needle, but she
removes it with pliers, wraps it, and sets it aside. The chest is full
of different kinds of coinage, mostly gold, about 30 lbs. She checks
out the bottle next to the chest, uncorks it and snifs; it seems to be
poor-quality alcohol, so she re-corks it.

Al, Matty, and Gnik go to find the remaining person. They come to
a locked room; Gnik asks Az to ask Milena to see if the captain
has any keys. Milena pats the captain down without preamble; he
says, smiling, "My dear, I don't even know your name." In the
meantime, Al tries to pick the lock; he asks if anyone has a
nail, and Gnik offers him one. Al tries, and hears something
break inside the lock. Gnik makes the nail disappear, but the
lock might still be broken. Az brings the keys from Milena, and
Al tries them in the other door. It works.

They find a chest. Al knocks on it and hears a muffled response. They
find another key that opens the chest. A woman with green skin and
purple eyes emerges; she says, "You were not on the ship... thank
you." Then she sees Matty and says something in elvish. She mentions
she is hungry for real food -- fish -- and would like some fresh
air. She gives her name, which is a long elven name, but says they
can call her Anny. They head abovedecks.

In the meantime, Kat talks with Milena about the fact that she found
another chest of gold, and suddenly they have a much different
socioeconomic status than they did before, and should anything change
because of it? Milena says she already has much more than she did as
a girl, and does not have immediate plans for the money. Kat says she
would like her own room, and maybe they should get a bigger house;
Milena says she likes her garden, and how close she is to her clients,
but maybe Kat would want her own small house nearby? Kat asks about
her older sisters; Milena says they are women grown and can do as they
will -- continue to live with her, or live elsewhere. Kat asks if they
would get dibs on the money since they are older. Milena says she might
need money for a dowry someday -- she does not know how these things work
here -- but that will come from her own funds; Kat's money is her own.

Matty, Al, Gnik, and Anny come abovedecks. Matty says Anny has been locked
in a box for at least three days; the captain says it hasn't been three
days, he just found her having snuck onto the ship and locked her up
until they could figure out what to do with her. Anny says she is a scout
and noticed that the ship was stopping in water in strange places. Al
explains it is a smuggling ring and they were stopping to make pick-ups
-- but if she is aware of other places they've been stopping, that
information might be useful to them. Gnik makes a map appear, and she
indicates other places she has seen the ship make stops. She knows
nothing about the lizardmen on the ship, or why they were there, but
says it is strange to see such folk on the sea. She turns to the 
captain and asks, "Where is fish?" Al says to the prisoners, "Yeah,
who needs food? You all are basically under arrest, but there's no
reason we can't be friendly." Laur says, "No, they ARE under arrest."
Gnik says, "Yeah, you have the authority to say that; we don't."

They decide that things are stable enough that they can begin sailing
the ship back to Saltmarsh. Laur and Wend come aboard and haul up
the smaller boat for the sail back. Al helps with the sailing, and
Gnik helps by staying out of the way. Anny plans to sail back with
them; she is interested in interacting with the people of Saltmarsh.
Matty tells her, somewhat privately, that most of the people of
Saltmarsh have never seen a sea-elf and know them only as legends,
and then explains a bit about the administrative structure of the
town; Anny is surprised that the town is not run by elders. Matty
says that there are some she has come to trust and respect, but
some she does not.

As they sail, they explore the rest of the ship. Matty finds the
galley, including a barrel of fish. Gnik returns to the captain's
cabin to look for papers. He gets Az to retrieve the keys for Az
and opens the desk; he finds three potions with notes crudely
scratched on them (and misspelled): for healing, for healing, for
poison. He finds three very intimate letters from three different
women in three different ports, each of whom thinks she is Mrs.
(Captain).

Matty and Milena explore the galley and find spices and other
food; there is a strange resealable ceramic container under
a table in the corner. Milena pops it open, and finds it is
filled to the brim with meat... which appears to be growing. She
slams it shut and reseals it.

Kat investigates downstairs rooms and find a very small pair of
boots, a nice goblet, a decanter of wine, and a small chest. She
tries to open the chest after checking it for traps, and gas starts
pouring out the back of it. She beats a hasty retreat, closing the
door behind her. A bit of gas leaks under the door but doesn't go
further than that.

Matty and Milena go downstairs and Matty hears a door slam. They
go to investigate and find Kat, and see faint smoke coming from 
under the door beside her. "Ludmilla, why is there smoke?" "It's
not smoke. I think it's poisoned gas." "Ludmilla, why is there
poisoned gas?" She explains that she tried to open a chest that
was trapped, and she's waiting for the gas to dissipate to finish
her investigation. Milena stares at her clinically to make sure she
is not poisoned, and they decide they will all go into the room 
next door.

They enter the other room and hear, "Bwah! Pieces of eight!" There
is a bright red macaw in a cage, pacing back and forth. Matty tries
to tell if it is in distress, but it just seems excited to see people.
It starts singing a sea shanty. Kat checks the room, finds two books
in Jhoynian -- "Principles of Navigation" and "Legal Distinctions in
Licenses for Arms" -- and a flagon that smells like cider. She opens
a chest and finds a strange spear and iron box among clothes. The other
chest contains more clothes and a brass box, a bit bigger than the
iron box. The iron box contains a pouch full of shells etched with a
language she doesn't recognize; a crossbow and quiver with eight bolts.
Matty recognizes the lettering on the shells as elven, and they wonder
if these items were taken from Anny. The brass box contains a pouch of
coins, eleven illustrated pamphlets -- Jhoynian pornography. Kat looks
at one, turns it sideways, hands it to her mother, and says, "Is this
even physically possible?" "Yes, but usually requires small step."
"...And how do you know that?" "...I am educated." Kat goes to take
some of the coins from the bag, realizes Matty is there, and puts
all the coins carefully back.

They return to the first room as Gnik comes back. The gas has 
dissipated, so they open the chest. It contains some coins, a
book in Jhoynian called "A Mage Life at Sea" which Gnik immediately
starts reading. He realizes that if the spellcaster is a mage, she
must have a spellbook -- and finds it hidden in the lid of the box. 
It is both a spellbook and notebook, and the owner seems to be largely
self-taught.

They continue exploring, and find a chest with gauntlets, pieces
of stone that look like turquoise, more pieces of the mystery box, 
more coins, along with a set of dice. Kat rolls the dice; they seem 
to be true. Gnik casts Detect Magic; the pieces of the mystery box
have a faint magical aura, and the gloves are also magical. With some 
study, he finds that they help with climbing and swimming. He looks
up toward the mage's room but does not see anything magical there,
but does detect something on the top deck -- possibly where the
mage is tied up.

They also find weapons (including a shield with a lizard design
on it), a mermaid statue, and a nice vase.

Milena makes snacks, and then asks the captain about the ceramic
jar of growing meat. He says it is troll -- and grows because it
is regenerating. Matty and Anny are horrified, most others think
it sounds pretty terrible, and Milena gives the captain advice
about using vinegar to tenderize it.

Gnik detects a magic dagger that is obviously Dorgenian; he realizes
in looking at it that it is a named weapon he has heard of. He learns
that it was specifically forged to fight Sea Devils and will pull
toward enemy sea devils if any are close by, and it floats.

Gnik persuades the captain that it may be some time before he can 
return home, and if he cooperates with them Gnik might feel better
disposed to alert his wives about his absence without telling them
about each other. With that motivation, the captain reveals that
the lizardmen were looking to acquire weapons for some armed
conflict -- which surprises Matty, who has fought lizardmen who
were unarmed.

Gnik finds a bundle that contains wood that is faintly magical, blue,
and glows faintly. He asks the captain about it, who says it is a
shipment he was taking to Freeport. Gnik realizes it is from a rare
type of innately magical tree that produces extremely durable wood,
used frequently for weaponry. The tree seems to pop up in random
places, and a culture that finds one tends to nurture it until it
must be cut down when it is about to die of old age. 


Saturday, 25 August 2018

The group sails the Sea Ghost back to Saltmarsh, securing the prisoners
and taking inventory of what is on the ship. Milena makes snacks to make
sure everyone is well-fed, including the parrot. Zassin sticks with Milena
and is happy to be her taster.

As they near the port a couple of ships come out to escort them in.
Eleanora hops on board. She says she was readying a ship to leave
soon herself, saw them coming in, and was curious to see what had
happened. "We found parrot, do you want parrot?" says Milena.

When they dock there are armed guards ready to take the
prisoners. Nelson, the captain of the jail, is looking over them
when Gnik asks to speak with him privately. Nelson smiles. Gnik
apologizes for accidentally letting Angel go, and Nelson guffaws.
"Yes, I noticed she's not here." Gnik says they hadn't intended
to let her go, and she was very helpful and stuck around until 
everything was secure before making a break for it. Nelson says it
is his boss who will be upset; he knows Angel was tricksy and is
unsurprised she fled.

Juliana Rolland and Lyto are on the docks when they exit the ship. They
offer to post guards to keep people off the ship, and they can deal with
customs and tariffs in the morning. Al and Matty plan to sleep on the
ship, but think guards would be a good idea anyway. Gnik debriefs the
council members about what happened, who they captured, and who got
away, including a summary of their strange encounter with the lizardfolk
and that they claimed to be preparinig for war. Rolland begins laughing.
"We need to send them out more often, they bring back the best news."
Juliana requests that the group join the council the next evening for
a meeting.

Matty introduces the council members to Anny and tells them a bit about
her background. Juliana has someone show her a place she can stay. Al
lets Anny know where he'll be in case she wants to find him later.

Zassin watches the group break up, and follows Milena. Milena holds
up her arm and he comes to perch. When they get home all the dogs
but Boris look suddenly confused at the pseudodragon voice in their
head, and Boris just gives a calm hruff. 

Svetlana comes in a few minutes after Kat and Milena arrive home. She
had volunteered to be one of the people at the house to work the lights,
and wants to know how things went on the ship. "We have a ship," Kat
says. "And we did not burn or make holes," says Milena. 



11 Klook 3275


They return to the ship the next morning to figure out what they are
keeping, selling, and giving away. They decide to give the mermaid
statue to Britney, and Al wants to give two planks of the Trallop
wood to his father, and Kat is interested in the rest. Milena brings
herbs and other supplies to freshen up the bed linens and other fabrics;
Al helps her sort things and wash what needs to be washed (and burn
what needs to be burned.)

They learn that the cask of Dorgenian whiskey is probably worth 300
gold, but Matty wants to keep it.

They discuss whether to keep the ship. Matty is interested in leaving
Saltmarsh for adventures, Gnik is interested in having that option,
and Milena says, "Maybe this is what shark was trying to tell me." She
explains her recent encounter with the shark that swam around her once
she figured she didn't need to punch it in the nose, and maybe it was
telling her that she needs to spend some time in the water. "Does this
involve another daughter?" Kat asks. "I do not know yet. ...But not with
shark, if that is what you mean. I do not think that is possible."

They decide that they will be on the lookout for a mission that will
take them away for a short time to get used to life on a ship and the
ins and outs of sailing. They discuss how they might go about hiring
a crew -- ask the non-pirates for recommendations, perhaps hire Laur
as the captain and Wend for muscle, perhaps bring on some of Al's
sailor friends.

Kat and Matty discuss the Ag coin she found and Matty tells her she
needs to offer a sacrifice to Ag of the silver she has stolen since
she got the coin to take away the negative effects and dreams (but she
will still keep the luck). Kat is annoyed; if she did this immediately
after she found the coin she wouldn't have to burn as much silver.
Matty points out that she wasn't having the dreams yet then. She asks
when Kat wants to do this. "Full moon... no, dark of the moon. When's
that?" "Tonight... so, after the council meeting?"

Kat decides to use the money from their adventures to buy a rapier.
Al suggests that maybe she could go to Exotics and try to find a
magic rapier. Milena suggests that if they like her and think she
might be advancing their agenda, they might give her a good deal.
She wanted to check in anyway and let them know that the group might
be available to do jobs for them, particularly now that they have
a ship. They recall that Heidi's Curio Shop deals in magical
weapons, because it was part of Exotics contract for being in town
is that they would not sell magic items in town. Kat, Al, Matty,
Milena, and Anny head to the curio shop.

As they approach, Zassin gives Milena a very curious look. Milena
says, "Ah. Perhaps it is the dog that is not a dog. You will see."
The door opens and the not-dog, Taaliax, is looking curiously at
them. Kat gives him a scritch on the head, and Mouse sniffs him
and then cautiously slinks by. Zassin hides behind Milena; Matty
thinks, "Zassin! What is that?" and gets mental images of mirrors
and confusion. "Yeah, I know that feeling," she thinks.

Heidi comes out and welcomes them, looks at Anny and says, "Welcome...
oh, hi, you're new!" Matty introduces Anny and gives her tribe of
origin. As they look around, Kat says she's looking for a rapier.
After some discussion, she says, "Hmm, maybe Torchlight would work."
She digs around a chest and pulls out a rapier; she flicks it around
and it erupts in a bright glow. Kat says, "I can see in the dark."
Heidi says it also is a magical weapon even when it is not glowing.
Kat does not have the 600 gp that it is worth, but mentions that she
has magic wood that she can trade. "Trallop wood," Matty adds. After
some negotiation they agree that the wood plus 100 gp (to cover the
excise fees, which they haven't paid yet since Kat thought she was
going to keep the wood) would be a fair price.

As Al is wandering around he bumps into a glass case that has several
rings in it, including one in the shape of a dolphin that catches his
eye. Heidi says that she hasn't tried it, but it's supposed to let you
swim really well. Al finds that Anny is suddenly standing next to him
to hear more. Heidi says Exotics brought it in just a couple of days
ago. Anny says that these are given to guests of her people who can
already breathe, to help them swim faster (and they have other gifts
for those who cannot breathe).

Al seeks out his friends Harangi and Jimsu at the Gibbet. They have
dinner and he catches them up on his recent stories and adventures.
During the course of the evening, Jimsu tells him that if he's 
looking for a pilot let him know. Al asks if he's not working for
the Lassiters right now, and he says they're just paying him to
make up for "...this!" and holds up his injured hand. "Aargh, don't
show me that!" says Harangi. They are all a little drunk, so it
will remain to be seen if Jimsu has the same feelings about the
opportunity once he has sobered up.

As he is stepping out of the Gibbet, still drunk, realizing he is
late for the council meeting, he hears a bark -- Mouse. "What is
it? Does someone need help, girl?" He pets her a couple of times
and she runs down the stairs, looks back at him, and barks again.
"Well, they're going to be mad that I missed the meeting, but I
guess somebody needs help!" Mouse proceeds to lead him to the
council meeting.

Everyone else has already arrived, including Anny. Kat says she
has sent Mouse to retrieve Al. They ask a number of questions
about how things went and what they found; they share most of
what happened, but don't mention the puzzlebox. They are almost
done when Mouse and Al walk in. "Oh, this is fantastic!" says Al.
"I thought I was going to miss this because Mouse needed me to go
help someone." He goes to greet each member of the council, a bit
drunkenly, and Egan tells him to sit down. The council is alarmed
that there is a colony of lizardfolk near Saltmarsh that are
arming themselves. Gnik points out that the lizardfolk implied that
they were getting weapons because they were being threatened somehow.
After reviewing the details of the story, it seemed clear that the
lizardfolk don't think Saltmarsh is the threat -- they did not attack
when they learned the group was from Saltmarsh, only when they learned
the group was trying to stop the smuggling, which they feel they need
to arm themselves. The council notes, however, that the lizardfolk
might be a threat to Saltmarsh and should be investigated. Egan is
for taking them out, and has communicated with some people he knows
at Snyder Keep about getting some people out there to wipe them out;
but the rest of the group thinks they should investigate instead.
Egan says those he contacted will be here in a week, and the council
should decide what to do before then.

The council asks the group if they would be willing to go reconnoiter
the lizardfolk settlement, figure out how many they are and what they
are doing, and offer to provide a crew for their ship and pay 1000 gold
for determining their strength, size of colony, and intentions. As the
meeting is breaking up, Lyto and Juliana come up to talk with them
saying that they feel the group is on the same page they are about
the lizardfolk: find out what they're doing rather than just wholesale
slaughtering them. They say to let them know if they need anything.
Matty says she has talked with Laur and he and Wend are in, and they'll
look for at least six people at a time to run the ship, but the group 
will make their own inquiries. The council will pay, so Gnik suggests
they should try to get twelve crew members -- in case they have to
do more sailing than they are expecting, they can have six on while
the other six rest.

Gnik strikes up a conversation with the rats on the ship about anything
interesting they noticed. They say that sometimes it was very scary, like
when the glowy things came out. "What glowy things? Describe them." They
say that they came out of the ground, and when they touch you, you die.
Gnik decides perhaps they need to talk with the former ship's crew about
this.

Matty and Kat go to the beach with all the silver Kat has stolen and
start a fire. Kat throws in a piece -- one that is kind of ugly compared
to the rest of it. Nothing happens. She takes the tub of silver and
dumps it in; there is a wave of energy that hits both of them, and the
fire goes out -- and the silver is gone. She feels that the compulsion
to steal silver is gone, and they hear a high-pitched little giggle out
of nowhere.


8 September 2018

The group plans to reconvene at the Gibbet. Al returns a bit early 
with Anny to visit more with Harangi and Jimsu. As Kat and Matty are
on the way, they encounter Larae, the master of the Stonemason's
guild. She has a piece of paper in her hand, is muttering to herself,
and almost bowls them over, obviously very angry about something. They
ask her about it, and she complains about Milton's Folly and that
bastard Klav. Kat asks, "What is Milton's Folly?" and Larae throws
the piece of paper at her, says "Read for yourself," and storms off.
It is a broadsheet talking about how the construction of the Lighthouse
of Drac by Milton, the Sea Lord of Freeport, on the nearest of the 
Serpent's Teeth islands is bankrupting Freeport, using up all local 
resources of stone and driving up prices.

When they all reach the Gibbet, the waitress Sivin greets them and
offers them drinks on the house. Perytar the bouncer growls, and she
says, "Okay, drinks are on me."  "Top shelf, then?" Perytar says.
Sivin offer that they should go up and take the seats in the Crow's
Nest. They discuss whom they should hire on as crew for their upcoming
trip down the coast, and Gnik suggests Ember, a friend of his with years of
sailing experience who now teaches swordfighting. Kat pipes up excitedly
that she needs to learn to use a rapier, so that sounds like a great
idea. Al finds a couple of poles, tosses one to her, and says "En
garde!" The two of them play-fight, with Al treating the pole like a
short sword and Kat trying out rapier moves. Perytar pulls out a bullhorn
and yells up, "If you break anything you're paying double!"  A moment
later they hear three loud thumps coming from the floor above -- where
Sivin went to talk with Drew and Haldo. Milena yells down to Perytar,
"Maybe trouble upstairs -- we will let you know." Al tosses Kat up to
the top of the ladder; she knocks but there is no answer, and the door
trapdoor feels like it is barred. Al leaps out the window and tries
swinging himself up to the window above, and Gnik sends Az outside to
get a view of what is happening. Through her eyes he sees wet spots
going up the tower, as if someone climbed up from the window while
wet.

Az flies in and Al pulls himself up so he can see in the window.
Sivin is lying on the ground, Drew and Haldo are both standing;
Drew is holding a big bag and is pushing something into it; Haldo
is holding a small bag that appears to be full of something bulky.
A hooded figure stands between them holding a globe and making a
cawing chanting sound; it seems to have a beaklike face and talonlike
hands and feet. Al hears a voice beside him; Anny is beside him and
says, "That's strange."

Kat drops off the ladder and Matty climbs up to try to break the
trapdoor open. Gnik sees that as Az flies in, Haldo and Drew look
at her, but the bird-man keeps doing what he is doing. Gnik directs
Az to fly low enough that he can see underneath one of the tables,
since he can teleport to anyplace within 30 feet that he can see.
He disappears without warning anyone what he is doing.

Zassen send thoughts to Milena that there are minds upstairs like
the dog -- they are mirrors.

Kat climbs out the window and tries to work her way around below the 
window. She notices part of the wall is wet, which makes it slow
going.

Gnik blinks into the room above and Haldo says, "Oh, hi, Gnik! It's
all good -- there were two thugs, but we took care of them, and now
this guy is helping Sivin." Al tries to open the window, but it is
latched from the inside. He considers how to break the window; Anny
pulls out her crossbow, slams it into the window, shattering it
inward, and then pulls it away. She looks at the result and says,
"Oh! That's interesting." Al borrows the crossbow to knock the
rest of the jagged glass out of the hole so he can climb through.
Matty has no luck smashing the trapdoor, so she touches it and
suddenly shrinks toward her hand -- turning herself into an ant to
crawl through the crack between the door and the floor.

The bird thing stops chanting and Haldo says, "That was pretty
cool -- how did you get here?" Gnik disappears -- having turned
invisible. He scrambles out from under the table and goes to
see what is down the hall behind them. Zassen goes to the door
and tries to reach around to figure out how to unbar the door.
He thinks thoughts of helping to Matty; she asks whether the
bird man is friend or foe. He says that it doesn't like him.
Matty asks if it doesn't like the rest of them, and how is it
like the dog? Zassen says no, it is not like the dog -- the other
two are.

Milena asks Zassen to send thoughts to Perytar so he knows what is
happening above. Perytar, who was standing on the bar trying to see
what was happening upstairs, gasps and falls backwards with a crash.
Zassen looks sheepish, and Milena says, "Thank you for helping." She
asks where Matty and Gnik are, and Zassen says they are upstairs.
Milena climbs to the top of the ladder and waits for the door to unbar.

Kat climbs into the window, followed by Anny, who swings her way in
with her dagger in her hand, and then Al. Kat slides the bar off the 
trapdoor, and Al moves to keep anyone from going out the large open
window. He says to Kat and Anny, "I don't know what is happening
here, but I don't think we should let anyone leave."

Matty asks Zassen to share with the others that Drew and Haldo are
fakes, and the real ones might be in the bags. Gnik directs Az to go
tell Perytar what is happening. Gnik, still invisible, moves behind
the three foes to try to be ready to do something when something
needs doing.

Kat moves slowly toward the three foes, rapier drawn, and asks them
to show her who's in the bags. Haldo says it wouldn't be a good idea;
they are ruffians that they have to deal with sometimes. The bird guy
screeches and Drew and Haldo nod as the bird guy rushes as Kat while
throwing out a hand at Al; three bolts of energy shoot out at Al and
follow him even as he dodges, burning into his flesh. He stumbles
backward, trying not to fall out the window. Anny says a couple of
words that nobody understands -- squeaky bubbly words -- then slaps
a bolt into her crossbow and hits the bird man with it. Al pulls out
a net and tries to use it to restrain the bird creature, but his
throw goes wide.

Matty reverts to her normal form and attacks Haldo with her hand
axes. As she grows, she rips open the bag holding real-Haldo's 
desiccated corpse. She hits him a couple of times, he spins around
and suddenly has a dagger in his hand. He swipes at her and stabs
into her thigh.

Drew has a short sword in his hand and stabs at Sivin, who is just
waking up, but she rolls and he misses. Gnik casts Sleep and the
bird guy falls to the ground. Zassen jumps on Milena's shoulder
and she casts Sacred Flame at not-Drew, who is farther out of range
of others who might attack him. He moves unexpectedly quickly to
dodge, but not quickly enough: bright light hits him.

Kat steps toward Haldo and swings with her rapier, but he dodges.
She uses her off hand to attack with her dagger, and hits, running
him through. Anny shoots another crossbow bolt at Drew, hitting the
hand holding his sword; it appears to go through the sword and his
hand, and the sword shrinks into his hand and comes out of his other
hand.

Al runs over to the bird guy to tie him up; when Milena sees what he
is doing, she says, "Also bind the beak."

Matty stabs at Haldo again, hitting him in the shoulder. He grows a
second dagger from his other hand and stabs into Matty's foot with
one and tries to do the same to Kat's foot but he dances back. Drew
rushes forward and takes a dive out the window Al is no longer 
guarding. Gnik gets a message from Az that Perytar knows and she's
coming back; Gnik tells her to follow the thing that looks like Drew
that just jumped out the window. Gnik then casts Sleep again, and Haldo
goes down. Az says, "Drew is not going anywhere, so I am not following."
Gnik says, "Where is he?" "Falling off Perytar's swords."

Matty punches Haldo and he wakes up, so she punches him again, and he
falls unconscious.

Az says, "By the way, you gotta see this!" She shows him an image of
something silver, with pointy stiltlike things where its feet should be.
Al has heard of things like this called Replacers, which do the bidding
of their masters and are used to replace others. Kat and Matty think the
bird guy is called a Kinku, very talented at magic and working for the
same race as the Replacers.

Kat asks Sivin what happened; she says she was talking with Drew and
Haldo, something fell on the floor and the room filled with some sort
of smoke and everything went dark until she woke up to see the not-Drew
and not-Haldo fighting. She asks them not to tell anybody this happened;
Matty says the council needs to know; Sivin says she will tell Eleanora
when she gets back that she needs to talk to the group. They press her
further, and Sivin says that what she can say is that their group is
not smugglers or pirates, but they have been waging a secret war against
these creatures that they thought were not aware that they were involved.

Milena heals Al and Matty; Al feels mostly better, Matty is still a
bit sore, especially in her stabbed foot.

Gnik identifies the neckpiece worn by the kinku, which they believe might
be some kind of spell focus; the dangly bits at the ends generate a
bubble of air so they can always breathe -- including in the presence
of gas and underwater, which is why the bird man is wet. Al is interested
in it, since he swims so much.

Perytar comes up, says, "You all are assholes... but thank you." He
departs and comes back with a tray full of drinks, including elven
wine from Eleanora's stash. Al asks Sivin, "So, this happened once,
is it likely to happen again?" She says they are usually more subtle
than this; maybe these three were the only ones who knew Eleanora's
people were involved, maybe others knew and will try to hit them again,
maybe since this group failed others will back off. They will learn
more when they talk to Eleanora.  They all toast to Drew and Haldo.


12 Klook 3275

In the morning, Al checks in with Jimsu to see if he is still interested
in sailing with them now that he is sober. For this short gig, he is
definitely interesting -- the Lassiters can be scary, since you never
know what's really going on with them.

The group goes to the jail to talk to the prisoners from
the Sea Ghost to ask about the glowing entities Gnik learned about from
the ship's rats. Nelson is working, and says, "A ten for one exchange
seems all right, but Malcolm wants to talk with you before you talk with
them." Malcolm, the head of the jail, says Janet is down now with the
prisoners interviewing them about their smuggling involvement. Behind
them, they hear the sound of someone in chains being dragged; they
see two guards they know, Fenric and Keren, dragging the escaped
ship's mate behind them. They toss Gnik his magic rope.

Janet comes up and says most of the prisoners knew the nature of the
work of the ship, but two of them, a brother and sister, Lanny and
Carie Colman, just hired on as sailors -- their previous ship was
sunk and they were left without possessions or work -- and didn't 
know until they were under sail. They had planned to get off at the next 
port, and had only been on the ship a week.



22 September 2018

The group goes to talk to the twins first. They describe being stuck
in Seaton after their own ship was sunk, and the Sea Ghost was the
first ship that came along looking for crew. Carie is the more
talkative, and does not speak like a sailor -- she is eloquent, as if
well educated.  Lanny clearly is a sailor and talks knowledgeably of
his work on the ship. They were unaware of the white lights coming out
of the walls; Lanny wonders aloud if there is some kind of ritual to
Nolan that might help protect the ship from such a thing. Matty asks,
"Do you worship Nolan?" and Lanny and Al both say, "Yes!" and then
high-five each other. Matty asks if Lanny is a priest of Nolan, and
he says no (but Carie adds under her breath, "But he could be.") They
share that he has been taking care of Carie since they were young,
but Carie is good at defending him. Milena asks what kind of defending;
they say they met a woman who taught her some weapons techniques -- 
mostly blades -- to keep people from hurting her. The group mentions
that they will be putting a crew together for a small job and may come
back to talk to them.

They next talk with Brenton Wolfheart, the sailor in the crow's nest
that Kat knocked out, who has been on the ship several months. Matty
asks if he ever encountered anything strange on the ship. He says the
mage is weird, and then says, "Oh, you mean the ghost?" He says it
comes out every month or two but Crysik takes care of it. He hasn't
seen it himself, but he saw the guy that didn't get out of the way
in time, who looked like he had died of old age despite being Brenton's
age, and he sometimes hears screams. 

They talk with Crysik, but he decides not to tell them anything about
the ghost because he thinks it will be funny when they have to encounter
it themselves. Al asks Zassen if he can read Crysik's mind to find out
about the ghost, but he can only read thoughts that are intentionally
sent to him. Kat asks about the lizardfolk; he says they paid for
weapons and the ship was going to deliver them.

When they are done, Matty asks Janet if there is anyone in town who
can detect ghosts. She suggests that other than the priesthood of
Maria, the most anti-undead priest in town will be Brendan, the priest
of Sayd.

They head to the Lizard's Boat tavern for breakfast and to talk to the
proprietress Relanna (and say hello to her monitor lizard Sticktongue).
Milena introduces Zassen to Sticktongue; Zassen flies over, lands on
Sticktongue, and proceeds to knead his neck affectionately. Matty
introduces Relanna to Anny and they chat politely. Then Matty fills
Relanna in on their task to gather information on the lizardfolk 
settlement and asks about her own experience with lizardfolk. She
infers that the type of lizardfolk they encountered were the sort
that can make friends or allies with others; and that they probably
are amassing weapons because they feel threatened. She mentions that
Krushar, the lizardman who saved her life that she would usually ask 
about this sort of thing, vanished recently -- she goes to see him
regularly, but has not been there the last two or three weeks. They
ask how best to approach and investigate the lizardfolk to the south;
she says they probably won't be watching toward the ocean because most
threats come from the marsh, and they can probably find waterways
into their lairs for fresh water. She recommends making a show of
strength immediately by beating up on a couple of them. They show
her the map of where they're going; she identifies it as a very old
lair in the Dunwater abandoned more than a decade ago because it was 
too close to humans in Saltmarsh. Al asks about other nearby lairs
in case this is only a drop-off point and still uninhabited; she
says the nearby ones are also abandoned as far as she knows.

She mentions that if they want to help her find Krushar once they're
back -- she doesn't expect it, but she would appreciate the help.

They go to the House of Shrines to find Brendan (since there is no
temple to Sayd here), and ask if he can help them determine if there
is a ghost on the Sea Ghost. They explain what they've learned so
far about the alleged ghost; he says they would need to find out
who died, who they were attached to, so that they can get laid
to rest. Brendan wanders through the ship and suggests they might
have two ghosts -- something in the hold, and something coming from
the aft direction of the captain's quarters. Kat investigates the
spot, finds boards that move, and finds a small box in the hole.
She looks for traps, does not find any, and removes the box from
the wall. There is a latch holding the box closed, loosely; there
are two rings in the box that look like they could be wedding rings.
The emanation feels like it is coming from beneath the box, but there
does not seem to be any way to open into that area, so they try prying
the board loose over it and a form comes out of the wall. 

It says, "Crysik, what do you want now?" then sees that they are not
Crysik, and changes from a decayed ghost form into a less decayed
form. He says his name is Bud Wilder. They ask if he knows about the
other ghost and he says yes, it is his wife. He says that six years
ago his ship was taken, he killed several before he was killed, then
he woke up and tried killing his foes again until he was killed again,
until eventually he woke up being controlled by Crysik, who took his
ring and his wife Sal's wedding ring. When Sal wakes up, about once
a month, she is nothing but rage; Crysik controls Bud to go meet
her with his knife and kill her, which he can do because she is
calmer when she sees him. When she wakes up the next time, she does
not remember anything. Milena suggests perhaps they should re-marry
the two of them and give them their rings back. He figures it's worth
a try.

They go down to the hold and Brendan finds the place in the forehold
where her essence is strongest. Bud calls to her, but nothing happens.
They try giving him his ring; almost immediately, a bright glow
coalesces before them. Milena takes the other ring from Kat, holds
it to Brendan, and says, "Do you want to do honors, or shall I?"
He suggests he should stand back in case something happens, so she
holds out the ring on her open palm to the coalescing ghost, which
stares at her. Bud says, "Take it, woman!" She reaches out, the ring
leaps onto her finger, and she dissipates, the ring disappearing with
her. Bud nods, thanks them, and then disappears himself.

Bud referred to the ship as previously having been called Wilder Seed,
and then Mighty Redemption. The group talks about renaming it to Mighty
Redemption (although Milena suggests maybe "Wedding Reception").

Later in the day, Lanny and Carie are let out of jail and the group
invites them to join the crew for their recon job. They mention the
name of the ship has changed, and Lanny looks concerned until they
tell him it has gone back to its original name. He is relieved because
he says it is bad luck to change a ship's name, but changing it back
should be good luck.


6 October 2018

Gnik, Kat, and Al go to the duelist school (School of Blades) to talk
to Ember. Gnik tells her that they have acquired a ship and are going
on an adventure for a couple of weeks and wonder if she would like to
come along. She asks, "Why do you want me along?" Kat says, "Because
you're awesome...." and Gnik says, "Because I thought it would be
fun and you'd be fun to have along." He fills in more of the details
about where they are going and why. She asks where the ship will be,
and says she'll see them there in the morning.

She asks if there's anything else she can do for them, and Al says,
"You wanna spar? I mean, I won't have any weapons, but I usually
don't have weapons." Ember says, "That seems very disadvantageous
for you," but invites him out into the courtyard. She selects a
blunted rapier and dagger from the weapons on the wall. They circle 
one another for a while and then Ember dives in like lightning and
goes at Al's stomach with the rapier. She gets a hit in, he grabs
at her arm, and she tries to hit him again with the dagger and then
the rapier, but he staggers backward just in time. "You're very quick,"
she says. "You're very deadly," he says, and then talks about his 
philosophy of trying to keep harm from happening rather than necessarily
trying to hurt his enemies. He then goes in with a fist attack and
manages to hit her chest, staggering her back, and then her arm and
leg. They continue for a while, but as Al's tendency is mostly to
dodge rather than attack, Ember stops and says, "This is not dueling,"
so they end.

As they depart, Al asks Gnik and Kat, "Why are we inviting her, again?"
Gnik says, "She's cute... also, I thought Kat might appreciate having
someone skilled with a rapier on board while she has time to learn on
the way down."


13 Klook 3275

The crew arrives at the ship in the morning and sets sail, aiming to
arrive near the lizardfolk encampment at about sunset. Gnik has Az
turn into an owl on the way down for better stealth and night recon.
Kat asks Ember for some instruction on the finer points of using a
rapier. After about 20 minutes of sparring, Ember says that Kat's
style is already very effective for her strengths; with more training
they could shave off some of the rough edges, but Ember doesn't think
she could make Kat more effective -- but Daryn might be able to help.
Kat says she doesn't want to go through the school, which requires
full-time commitment, but wonders if Daryn might do private lessons.
Ember says Daryn really only wants students who are very committed
to the craft. "I can be very committed," Kat says, "for maybe two
days a week."

They drop anchor a mile from their destination, where they think
the ship won't be casually visible to lizardfolk who look that way,
and Matty, Al, and Anny, Az and Zassin scout ahead, with Matty in 
the form of a dolphin. The lair is a mound near the mouth of the
Dunwater; there is a landing near the mouth that seems to have
been used regularly, or recently, and trails leading into two 
entrances in the mound. There is a sea cave leading into the
mound; Anny suggests Matty go in as a dolphin, because in that
form she would not seem too unusual. Anny and Al stay outside
near the entrance, and underwater, since he has a ring that lets
him breathe underwater.

She goes into the cave perhaps 70 feet into a chamber in which
there are stairs leading right out of the water; the cave looks
natural except for the hewn sections such as the stairs. There is
seaweed in the water; and as she is looking at the chamber a young
male lizardman rises from the seaweed and shakes a spear at her
in a "go away, dolphin!" kind of way, so she swims out and reports
(in dolphin) to Anny that someone is in the cavern. They return to
the ship and make their report. Zassin stays behind to observe the
mound, and eventually Milena sees through his eyes a group of six
lizardfolk armed with morningstars returning to the mound along the
path.

The group discusses trying to take out the guard in the cave and
sneak in that way, possibly bringing in the beat-up guard as a
show of strength. Milena suggests they should spend a full day
observing to get a sense of comings and goings, how many lizardfolk
are in the vicinity, whether others come to the camp, and wait to
engage until after a day. Gnik suddenly says, "I can sneak in! I've
seen it!" -- because he has seen a portent about a great success.

Milena gets a mental prod from Zassin, who shows her four lizardfolk
exiting the northernmost mound entrance with ropes and leashes 
attached to four large lizards striding ahead with their tongues
flicking out as though sniffing or testing the air.

The group takes a small boat to shore; Matty plans to turn into
a spider and sneak into the cave, with Anny as backup; Kat and
Gnik and Ember plan to scout outside the mound, and Milena will find 
a place to conceal herself and keep an eye on the paths and the
rowboat; Al goes with Milena so she won't be left alone.

Matty is on her way into the cave, underwater, and sees a being
with a human head and torso, but with gills along the ribs, and
the tentacles of an octopus in place of human legs. In the next
section of the cavern she sees two eels, about 20 feet long,
being pet by a fishman. After that the water ends, but the path
continues up out of the water and further into the mound; in the
water in that chamber there are three merfolk, two sparring and
one watching.

Kat tries walking through the marsh, but it is very slow going,
so she returns to the road. Gnik and Ember follow about 100 miles
behind.

Milena and Al see a group of six lizardfolk of a variety of sizes
and shapes coming down the path, moving toward the mound. Milena
asks Zassin to warn Kat, Gnik, and Ember that six lizardfolk are
coming from their rear, so he sends an image of a menacing group
of lizardfolk striding with angry purpose; Az goes back to check
and reports that it is a patrol. Kat heads toward the northernmost
cave entrance, which is quite large -- about 12 feet wide. She
climbs up the cliff face above it, realizes she can see the lizardman
patrol from there... and flattens herself down so they can't see
her. Gnik suggests to Ember that they should get off the trail so
the lizardfolk won't see them as they go by. They scoot off the trail
and Gnik covers their tracks with prestidigitation. Kat can see from
her vantage point that the lizardfolk take the other fork, toward
the more southerly entrance.

Kat, Gnik, and Ember hear splashing in the cave entrance but can't
see anything, so Az flies in and reports back that it is one of the
large lizards, rolling in the muck, and behind it two entrances
into the cave to the right and to the left. Kat climbs over the
mound toward the more southerly entrance.

Gnik suggests to Ember that he will turn them both invisible and
use prestidigitation to make them smell like lizardfolk, and then
they will sneak into the large cave entrance. They pass the watch-lizard
and take the left entrance into the mound and explore by always 
turning and looking to the left. They find an opening to a
room on the left where they see two lizardmen sitting quietly on a 
bench and another who looks like a guard, standing. They go further 
and find a wooden, but not very well-made door to the left; Gnik finds 
a chink to peek through and sees bustling activity: many lizardfolk 
without crests with tiny lizardfolk playing or sleeping on straw 
mattresses among tables and pottery; there are some wooden pillars 
and a door at the far end, and occasional torches lighting the room. 

They come to an iron gate that looks like it may have been recently
added by wedging it into place. There are three guards in the room
it enters into -- one looking in Gnik's direction and the other two
sitting quietly on a bench. They turn around -- they are not strong
enough to move the gate -- and come to another door on the left. They
see a lizardman in nicer attire than the others yelling at a small
group, and one wearing a robe standing off to the side. As they
continue, they begin to smell cooking meat. They come to a closed
door that doesn't have any good gaps to peek through, so they keep
going; they come to a fork that leads to the source of the cooking
meat smell, but they are nearing the limits of their invisibility
spells so they head back out again.

The group returns to the rowboat and then to the ship. Gnik uses
an illusion to show the group what he saw, and Matty describes
the strange creatures she saw. Anny is clearly angry at what she
hears, and says some things to Matty in elvish.


3 November 2018

Zassin alerts Milena that a group of lizardfolk are returning to the
lair from the north, and they are hurt; two are limping along, dragging
a third between them. Kat also sees them from her position on top of
the mound; she says one is carrying a spear.

The group returns to the ship to regroup and compare notes. They decide
to scout toward the north to see if they can figure out what injured the
lizardfolk and whether that is the threat they are preparing to war with.

They take the rowboat up the river and as they are getting ready to
pull the boat onto shore and track on foot, Matty notices wide tracks
along the shore consistent with alligators. She is just pointing this
out to the group when Anny suddenly is dragged under the water.

Matty manages to stab into the water with a javelin and Gnik hits the
alligator with a Sleep spell; it floats up to the top. Kat pulls out
her crossbow and finishes it off with a shot to the eye. As it stops
thrashing, they hear an inhuman (and also non-gator) angry growling
coming from one of the small nearby islands in the river.

Az flies up to investigate and communicates, "Big and ugly... not
right... can I go back?" They decide to drift down the river a bit,
pull the boat up on the other side and then walk up so they can see
that island from across the river. Milena heals Anny, and as she is
getting ready to pick up her oar again, the brush on the island parts
to reveal a winged, scorpion-tailed demon with shackles and chains
on his wrists and ankles that seem to trail off behind him into
nothingness. He leaps -- cannot fly because his wings are tattered --
but lands on the island nearest them. His skin appears to be burning
where the manacles touch, and he is holding a flaming blade of some
kind.

Matty tries to row away, but Kat aims her crossbow and hits it in
the chest with a bolt, which it pulls out and tosses aside. Gnik
casts an illusion of a water elemental that only it can see, and
Milena casts Bane to lower its resistances. They feel a sensation
in their minds wishing death upon them, but see the demon swinging
its sword angrily at the air. They row away quickly, but can see
the glow of the creature coming toward them along the side of the
river.

They send Az to let Al, Ember and the others on the ship that
they are fighting a demon and ask them to help; and Zassin to
the lizard mound to let the lizardfolk know a demon is coming.
He is reluctant to leave Milena alone unprotected, but she
reassures him. They pull the boat onto shore across from the
demon and wait for it to come into range; as it leaps at them,
Milena casts Sacred Flame (since they are no longer keeping
their presence secret from the lizardfolk), Matty throws a 
javelin, and Anny shoots with a crossbow. It lands and staggers
when it hits the ground -- at which point Gnik casts Grease at
its feet. It slips, falls to the ground, and the flames on its
ankles catch the grease on fire. He rights himself and leaps
into the boat, punching holes in it and setting it on fire.
Milena hits it again with Sacred Flame and it shrieks. Kat
pulls out Torchlight, her rapier, and Kat steps forward just
as Anny hits him with another crossbow bolt. He staggers
backward, bursts into an explosion of flame, and disappears
back to its home plane.

The group discusses what to do next, since the lizardfolk
might be coming and the group does not have any evidence
of having just killed a demon. Kat suggests they should
look at the islands to see if there is any treasure or
(as Milena adds) evidence of the demon or other threats.

They find a nest made of branches and brush where the demon
had been bedding down. They see a rotting corpse of a humanoid,
probably not a lizardperson, with human-sized leather armor and
helmet and the hilt of a sword with a shattered blade nearby.
There is a rusting and rotting chest with metal straps and a busted 
latch. Kat uses Mage Hand to open it and sees a pile of coins, two
pieces of leather rolled up, and something pink-purplish glittering
in the moonlight. She digs out the purplish thing with Mage Hand and
holds it up to the light; it is an amethyst. She replaces it and
pulls out one of the leather things; it is rolled around a piece
of paper, which she floats over to Gnik. She pulls out the second
leather-wrapped scroll and also gives it to Gnik. The first is a
protection scroll that appears to be Protection from Undead. The other 
is a spell scroll of Knock.

They notice that the armor is embossed with shells, and recognize it
as magic mariner's armor that allows the wearer to swim in it. Gnik 
recognizes the helmet as the Helm of Disla, made in the 600's, which 
allows the wearer to function underwater as on land.

The lizardfolk arrive at the shore across from the island and one asks 
in Trade what happened;
Zassin says they saw the explosion. Gnik shows an
illusion of the demon they fought, and there is much excited muttering
among the lizardfolk. The lizardfolk ask about the alligator, and Gnik
responds that we killed it and shows an illusion of the alligator with
a crossbow bolt in its eye. The head lizardperson responds, "Come with
us; we will take you to our leader." Matty says, "Because we did a 
good thing or a bad thing?" He gives the lizardperson approximation of
a smile and says, "Good thing." Az gets back in range, and Gnik tells
her that they have defeated the demon and it is up to Ember and Al
whether they want to join the rest of the group to go into the mound;
Az says, "Don't want," and Ember and Al return to the ship to let them
know they can bring it closer now that the lizardfolk know they're there.

They enter the mound and are led to a room with several lizardfolk, one
with a huge crest and one very old one with scales falling off. The
old one, without a crest, welcomes them in trade. She thanks them for
killing the alligator, and explains that alligators are holy to them --
they cannot hurt them but can influence them so that the alligators
don't hurt them. However, recently this alligator began hurting them
-- possibly because of the demon. She thanks them for removing the
threat to their tribe. 

Matty asks why they have amassed here in this very old mound; she says
they were run out of their home by Sahaugin. She introduces herself as the 
minister of the tribe, Lashash. She says there is an island just off the
coast of the Hool Marshes, further south from where they are now, which
was their original home taken by the Sahaugin. The lizardfolk have been
working with other water races (merfolk, cecaelia, and others) to form
an alliance to try to fight the Sahaugin and take their land back. She
explains that they did not reach out to Anny's people due to their historic
animosity with the cecaelia. The chief says a couple of things in 
lizardfolk that Matty is able to understand thanks to the translator 
pearl: Do the softskins have any interest in joining to help fight 
the Sahaugin? The minister mentions to Anny that the cecaelia have
chosen not to join the fight because they think there is a low chance
of success, and so wonders if her people might be interested to join --
Anny says yes.

Milena says there is already a warlike group planning to move in this
direction because they detected a threat, and perhaps that group could
be redirected to fight the sahaugin. They decide to return to town
with a couple of lizardfolk who can serve as emissaries. A lizardperson
offers two books to Gnik and says they might be useful: a lizardfolk-to=
trade translation dictionary, and a book called The Nature of the Sahaugin.
The minister then asks if they might have their weapons back that they
were attempting to smuggle, since they were already paid for; most of
them are on the ship in case the crew needed them, and the group is
happy to give those back as a show of good faith.

Milena asks if due to their beliefs there is any special way they
should dispose of the alligator body, and Matty adds, "We were going
to eat it." The minister says they would eat it too, because it is
meat. Milena decides that if they are able to reclaim their home mound,
she will give them a pot of troll meat started from the pot on their
ship as a housewarming gift.

Gnik mentions that they have a friend in Saltmarsh who is looking for
a lizardfolk friend of hers named Krishar, who has gone missing; the
minister knows of him, but has not heard from him in some time. Gnik
notices that Lashash seems to know Zassin, and asks if she knows
anything about his coin; she says not to ask about the coin, he has
had it for as long as she has known him, which has been perhaps 50 
years now, and he is very protective of it.

14 Klook 3275

They sail back to town with a fighter and a shaman. Milena uses the
time to skin and begin butchering the alligator. Kat decides to make
herself scarce so she doesn't get roped into helping and look through
the other items in the rotted chest. She finds a very nice necklace
with rubies and diamonds and a pink-black stone among the coins --
not magical, but perhaps valuable.

They come into port; the lizardfolk will be staying on the ship, and
Milena offers to stay with them to run errands as needed, and figure
out how they like their alligator prepared. The ship coming into
port with a 15-foot alligator suspended from the boom attracts a
lot of attention on the shore; Laur tells the crew that if anyone
tells anyone that there are lizardfolk on the ship, none of them
will get paid.

Gnik and Matty send word to Juliana and Lyto to meet them on the
ship; Rolland arrives, and they invite him as well but tell them
they will wait for the others to explain why they have a giant
alligator suspended from their ship's boom. When Juliana and Lyto
arrive, Gnik and Matty explain that the sahaugin invaded the
lizardfolk home about a year ago and may be planning to use it
as a base for attacks against other races. Rolland says, "See?
this is why we shouldn't send them -- they just keep coming
back with better and better news--" and rolls his eyes. Gnik
shows an image of the demon and explains it was bonded to the
alligator they killed. Juliana says, "Oh, that's where it went,"
and explains that they were aware of the demon but hadn't seen
it for some time. Matty says that their defeat of the demon and
alligator impressed the lizardfolk so they were willing to talk
to the group, and two have returned with them to seek an alliance
against the Sahaugin. They make plans for the whole council to
come to the ship to meet them, and Juliana hands Matty their 
payment -- a sack of platinum coins.

The Council wants to put together a scouting force to find out
the status of the sahaugin and when they are likely to strike. They
offer 500 gp for anyone willing to go.


15 Klook 3275

After a day of talking and negotiating between the lizardfolk and the
council and a night of rest, they begin making plans for the scouting
force. The council is sending a group of six fighters called the
Stern Raiders (Gnik asks, "Do they have to hang out at the back of
the ship?"). Nelson volunteers to join. Egan says he will direct his
force to the fight against the sahaugin, and sends word to bring as
many men as they can. The lizardfolk will send two officers and
twelve fighters. Milena sends a message to Eleanora (or Sivin, if
Eleanora is not back yet) to let the not-pirates know about the
sahaugin, and the scouting expedition, and the possible coming threat.


17 November 2018

Gnik talks with Fran, high priest of Tyollas, about a safe place to
store the pieces of the puzzle-box while he is travelling.

Gavriila contacts Kat to let her know that the street urchin Rodger has
gone missing and no one has seen or heard from him for several days --
much longer than is usual for him.

News comes that the Raging Hammer has taken the Lassiter ship Stingray,
which the Wyvern's crew (including Bayolin) had transferred to while
the Wyvern is in dry-dock. Laur recommends that the group may want
to fortify their ship since it mostly hid from trouble as the Sea
Ghost, but now is less likely to be so subtle.

Kat goes to talk with the street urchins about Rodger. They have not
seen him and do not know where he went, but one is able to point out
where he was sleeping a couple of nights ago.  She sees if Mouse can
get a scent and do any tracking from there.  However, it has been a
drizzly few days so there is not much scent left to find.

The group heads to the curio shop. Heide shows Gnik a book, the Wonderous
Book of Arcane Oddities, that sometimes just knows what you're looking
for and flips to it. Though he has other expenses coming up, he decides
to get it. Matty asks about magical javelins; Heide has one in the shop
that has an energy loop you can wrap around your wrist that turns into
a magical chain when thrown, that can be used to reel the javelin back
if it misses or try to knock the enemy down and drag them if it hits.
Heide also mentions that she has a magical suit of armor from one of
the halfling founders of town that will change size/shape with the
wearer.

Eleanora gets back into town and sends a note that she wants to talk
to the group. They converge at the Gibbet for dinner, and Eleanora
sends for them to come upstairs when they are done. Gnik and Matty
talk with some of the children there about whether they have seen
Rodger; they haven't, but someone else mentions that she thought
she might have seen him with Audry Lilybrook who runs the orphanage.

Eleanora says she is part of something called the Sea's Watch. There
is a legend of the Witch Queen of Hell's Deep: several centuries ago
a powerful force rose from the ocean claiming dominion over surface
lands, and the Sea's Watch believes this entity has returned. When it
happened before, the seabed shook, creating tsunamis, the seas turned
black, and nothing could come near the thousand square miles in the
area without attracting giant sea creatures that capsized boats. It
is thought that the captain Jeremiah Blake led a group into the eye
of the disturbance and defeated the queen, after which the seas
calmed. About eight years ago, when Anlin defeated Serim, the queen
of Serim escaped and, led by divinations suggesting that the threat
would return, formed the Sea's Watch from those still loyal to her
to try to counter the threat. They know that the replacers they
encountered have been infiltrating governments and influencing
leaders to avoid investigating ships that go missing or other
things that would expose them; instead of taking over by force, the
Sea's Watch thinks they are trying to take over slowly by stealth.
Eleanora also mentions that she cultivates her image as a black
marketeer to cover up the activities of the Sea's Watch, but she
does occasionally fence items to cover their operating costs; she
finds it distasteful, but it is necessary to sustain their work.

After leaving the Gibbet, Kat swings by the orphanage. She peeks in
a window and sees an older woman working in the kitchen, then makes
the rounds through the grounds just to get an idea of layout and see
if she notices anything strange. She breaks into the small shed in
the back but finds only tools and a symbol scratched in one corner.


16 Klook 3275

Matty goes to the curio shop again first thing in the morning. She
asks Heide if Taaliax knows anything about his people, where they
come from or what his purpose is; and if Heide is able to detect
them. Heide says she has heard of a spell attributed to a fire
lich who called himself "the demon" that could locate such
creatures -- which Taaliax calls "assumers".

The group meets for breakfast at Blackberry Bar's; Laur joins them to
discuss the details of what it would take to outfit the ship defensively.
Zassin reports that he checked all the Council members to make sure they
weren't replacers, and they were all fine; but then Matty gets a mental
image of Lassiter with an X over him, and Matty says, "Because you don't
like him?" and Zassin says it's because he couldn't find him. "I told
you!" says Matty, and tells him he has until 4 pm when they depart --
that is his challenge for the day. He looks indignant and stalks out
of the restaurant.

After breakfast Kat returns to the orphanage with Gnik (who can show
the other kids what Rodger looks like) and Matty (who will ask Audry
if she has seen Rodger while Kat is talking to the kids. Audry is
at the door talking with a member of the baker's guild who is dropping
off some goods, and there are two kids in the yard. Audry greets Matty
as she approaches, and Matty asks if she has seen the street kid Rodger.
Audry says yes, he is here, upstairs, and Matty asks if she can talk
with him. Audry says she doesn't see why not and calls for him. 

Kat and Gnik talk to the two kids, who are cutting wood in the yard
(one holding it while the other chops). One of the two is a street
kid named Maddie who says they came of their own choice as the weather
is getting cooler, to stay out of the rain, and to get food... and kind
of trails off. She introduces the other boy as Elsworth, who says he
has been here most of his life and is now 13. He says Miss Audry has
been teaching him lots of things -- like reading and numbers and 
history -- and in a couple of years he will pick a profession. Gnik
uses an illusion to show proper methods of chopping wood, because it
would be harder to get a profession with missing limbs. Kat asks if
it is so great at the orphanage, why aren't all the street kids coming
-- wouldn't they be better off? Maddie looks toward the house, and
Kat gets the impression that she might speak more freely if Elsworth
weren't there. Gnik asks Elsworth if he has considered magic as an
option, and beckons him a little ways away to talk. Then Maddie says
to Kat, under her breath, that she thinks there are demons in the 
basement so other kids definitely shouldn't come there... but the
food is good. Kat asks why she thinks there are demons; Maddie
says there are sounds in the basement, and sometimes kids disappear
and don't come back, and Miss Audry says they've run away but Maddie
doesn't believe it. Then she says she has to go because Miss Audry
will know she's been talking.

Rodger comes down to talk to Matty. She says some people noticed he'd
gone missing and were worried. He says the food is good and asks if
she's come for breakfast because if so, she's late, and then rattles
off the things he's eaten. Matty notices that he's really good at
lying but there is a hint of worry in his eyes and posture. She gets
the sense that he is not comfortable but is not outright lying. Matty
tells Audry that she is going to take Rodger outside to talk with him
alone; Audry says to be careful because kids tell stories all the time,
but good luck. Matty asks why he has suddenly changed his mind about
the orphanage after evading it his whole life. He asks can't he change
his mind -- and mentions the food again. Matty moves around to the
side of the house to try to find Kat; Rodger follows, and runs up
to talk with Kat when he sees her. She mentions that she just talked
to Maddie who said there is something scary in the basement and did
he know anything about it? And how did he get enticed to come there?
He glances at the house and casually shifts so that she is between
him and the house and mumbles, "I just woke up and I was in the
house." Kat asks if he wants to leave with her right now, but he
says they will find him and people disappear. Elsworth runs over
and says, "Hey Rodger, what are you doing?" Kat throws her arm
across his shoulders and say, "C'mon, Rodger, I think you're about
to get adopted!" Elsworth follows, but at a little distance. Kat
takes him to Audry who says that someone who wants to adopt needs
a stable profession and to pay the fees. "My mother is the town
healer," Kat says, and Audry replies that her mother should come
sign the papers then. Gnik sends Az to go get Milena, who brings
Gavriila and Tatiana with her.

Kat makes a big show of "reminding" Milena of the conversation
about adopting this child. Milena asks Rodger several questions
about if he is ready to join the family, and uses her usual
strange way with the local language to imply that he will be
coming under their protection. Rodger is nervous; Audry tells
him to go upstairs and get his things, and Kat offers to come
with him. He gathers up his things, Gnik makes a floating disk
for the kids and their things to ride on, and they go to Milena's
house.

Rodger says that the other kids say that anyone who tries to 
escape ends up vanishing, but he guesses that getting adopted is
different from escaping. He didn't know any of the kids who disappeared
because he didn't grow up in the orphanage. Milena does a physical to
see if she sees any sign of head trauma or anything else amiss, but
there is nothing obvious. After some discussion, they decide he will
come with them on the ship but will stay on the ship (although his
best skill is sneaking into and out of places).

Gnik goes to find some rats and ask if they ever go to the basement
of the orphanage. They say yes because sometimes there is food there
-- meat and grain. He asks if it is ever scary there and they say
yes, people are there. They aren't aware of other scary things there.


22 November 2018

17 Klook 3275

The group sets sail on the scouting expedition. As they arrive, the 
lizardfolk begin hissing; they mention that the island was the "high
island", but is smaller now; the rope bridge to it is in the same
place. The top of the island looks the same, but lower, as if the
island sank. There was not previously an opening at the top, but now
there is, and the rope bridge goes to it instead of the opening that
used to be into the bottom floor of the lair. The bottom two floors
must now be underwater.

Matty gets the sense of 340 humanoids in the vicinity of the mound,
and no other humanoids (except the ship's crew) within five miles.
The group decides she will swim around the base of the mound in the
shape of an inocuous fish to get a sense of what is happening below
the water. She sees a gated entryway with two sahaugin approaching,
and the gate raises to admit them as they approach. On the side near
the shore, she sees the opening that the bridge used ot lead to, but
it is now underwater and covered with seaweed and debris. The area 
around the island looks unnatural, like the entire island has fallen 
into a sinkhole.

She returns to the entrance the sahaugin are using to keep an eye on
their comings and goings. They seem to be armed with crossbows and
spears. After some time observing she returns to the ship to share
what she has seen.

Matty returns with Anny and Al to keep an eye on the two underwater
entrances. Sahaugin come through the gated entrance at regular
intervals, sometimes with sharks. Each group includes one sahaugin
wearing a gold-colored band on one arm. Once the sun sets, the 
frequency of entrances and exits approximately doubles; some are
bringing food (such as dolphins on spears), some are probably going
out on general patrol. The other entrance seems completely disused.

Gnik, Kat, Milena, Ember, the squad of lizardfolk, and the Stern Rally
squad scout on land. The Stern Rally and most of the lizardfolk go one
way to scout, one of the lizardfolk and Gnik, Kat, Milena, and Ember
examine paths the lizardfolk used to take to see how much use they 
have seen recently. They see signs that clawed feet have come this
way, carrying spears that they use as walking sticks. It appears they
come through frequently and are not deviating from the trail -- and
nothing else has come through here.  It appears they are coming out
in groups of six at a time. The trail goes along the coast, heads up
to the landing of the rope bridge, and then continues along the 
coast, branching toward the interior occasionally. The last group
to head back to the mound appears to have been dragging two sets
of booted feet with them -- large boots.

They track in the direction the boots have come from; after about
an hour, they see that two people dragged themselves out of the
water -- both large-ish people, 200-250 pounds -- sat for a while,
and then most likely were attacked and brawled -- there is a lot
of blood -- and then were dragged back to the mound. From the
freshness of the blood, it probably happened last night. They return
toward the mound and hide to observe comings and goings through the
night. At intervals of a little more than an hour, sahaugin come out
in groups of 12 and then split up into groups of six to patrol in
different directions, mostly along the shore but sometimes inland.
Cinna says they are watching for lizardfolk. They appear to be 
patrolling rather than hunting.


18 Klook 3275

As the sun comes up, Matty goes back to being an inocuous fish and
scouts into the disused entrance. It smells like rotting meat, and
the smell seems to be coming from just past the first small room.
The hallway winds a ways and then is blocked by a big stone slab
that appears to have been knocked out of place, and something pushed
up against the entrance on the other side. The stench is strongest
here. The thing blocking the entrance appears to be the larges eel
she has ever seen, more than 20 feet long -- dead and rotting. It
looks like it may have been trapped here and thrashed until it died.

The group reconvenes and decides Kat will disguise herself as a sahaugin
and carry the translation pearl, and Gnik, Al, and Anny will go in with
her, invisible, to scout as much as they can inside the mound, entering
via the rope bridge. Their goal is to see what they can see and rescue
the recent prisoners if they are still alive. Milena, Matty, Ember,
the Stern Rally Squad and the lizardfolk will wait on shore as backup 
if necessary.

Kat knocks on the door and attunes the pearl to the sahaugin language
as one pulls back a bone shutter to look out a small window in the
door. "Who you?" it asks. She blusters intimidatingly about being
from another tribe, and it lets her in -- with Gnik, Al, and Anny
slipping in behind. There are several sahaugin inside, some with
crossbows, and a gong that the guards can use to alert the rest of
the mound. Gnik tells Az to tell the group at shore to come to the
doors and wait; if the group inside runs into trouble, they may need
help getting out.

Kat encounters a sahaugin lieutenant with a gold band around his arm who
begins escorting her. She takes the opportunity to ask about the plans
of the sahaugin in the mound, under the guise of wanting to hear his
take before talking to the person in charge. He does not know all the
details and says she would need to talk to one of the two senior 
chiefs. She asks if all the defenses are at full readiness, and he
indicates that they are pretty close, with a net trap at the gateway,
and would probably be ready for a first attack within a month.

Outside the door, two of Fenric's people with the Stern Rally Squad
pull out small battering rams and hold them at the ready. Gnik relays
through Az that there is a gong just inside the entrance and if they need
to come in, that should be their first target -- keep it from getting
rung. He also mentions the net trap in the room just after the gate.

Kat tells the lieutenant that she has gotten the information she needs
and is ready to go back and tell her people. One of the other sahaugin
activates the lever to raise the gate, but the lieutenant is suddenly
suspicious. He is raising his hand to say something when Anny suddenly
appears in front of him with her spear and runs her through. Kat casts
sleep into the room with the alarm gong and puts one of the sahaugin
to sleep. Al attacks a sahaugin near him, becoming visible again in
the process. Gnik runs to the door and unbars it and lets Az know to
let the others know that they can come in. The lizardfolk and Stern
Rally Squad pile in and take out the rest of the sahaugin in these
rooms. Milena unhooks the gong and puts it into her pack as Gnik
chucks the mallet out the open door.

The group of lizardfolk agree to guard the stairs from below to make
sure no sahaugin come up and catch them unawares, and Fenric's squad
stay at the gate to keep the way out clear. The rest scout the top
level looking for prisoners. They pass an armory of spears, nets, and
other weapons. They come to a room with stone columns; the lizardfolk
with them gape, because it is so much changed from when they were here
a year ago. There is a sledgehammer propped against the wall which
Milena takes just in case it is a magical hammer they have been using
to re-shape the stone.

Kat, still disguised as a sahaugin, is in front and hears a sahaugin
voice ask, "What're ya doin'?" She claims to be going back to the
barracks. She sees three sahaugin guarding a bone gate similar to
the one near the entrance. One of them sees the dim glow of Al's
torch in the distance and says, "What's that?" The three move forward
to peer down the corridor and Kat hits them with color spray, blinding
them. The group quickly finishes them off and Milena and Al look behind
the gate and find one person, emaciated, chained in the far corner. Gnik
recognizes him as Curt, one of the members of the Blue Gauntlet that
went missing some time ago. He looks up and says, "Great, now I'm
hallucinating."


15 December 2018

Kat removes the chains binding Curt. Curt tells us that he's pretty
sure the rest of the crew is dead.

Curt tells us that when he was captured, the crew had some stuff on
them and the sahaughin have been trying to make him tell them what the
stuff is. The stuff is being kept in a secret room off a store
room. We go there.

While opening the secret door, Kat sets off a trap that blasts cold
into the room. 6 of us were hurt -- Matty and Milena take full
damage. After a round of healing from Milena, everyone but Matty and
Milena are fully healed. Milena needs a potion of healing. Al has one
he gives her. Matty and Milena are still slightly injured. Everyone
else is fully healed.

We go into the secret room and find the stuff taken off the crew: 

- A skirt that when the wearer goes into water turns them into a
merperson. Kat takes for now. Milena ends up wearing this when we go
underwater. 

- A cloak that when the wearer pulls the hood up has super swim
abilities. Gnik takes for now. Al ends up wearing this when we go
underwater.

- An "arrogant" sword -- will force (try to force) someone to kneel to
them. Nelson takes for now

- A spear -- Slayer Spear -- anyone it stabs has no sign of injury. Spear
can change its appearance in minor ways, ex. can look like a
staff. Matty takes for now

- Mithral armor that Curt calls, "Dark Flames Umbre". Matty takes for now

- A "shiny" shield -- will blind their attacker with a bright
light. Nelson takes for now.

- Breast plate -- Nelson takes for now

- A stone coffer with: 
-- a wand - Nolan's Touch -- allows ppl to function underwater for 1 
    hour -- Milena takes for now

-- some scrolls - silence, continual flame, water breathing, murk (makes
   water murkey), thunder step - Gnik takes for now.

-- 2 potions of water breathing -- Nelson and Ember take one each for now

-- a bag of allies - reach in and pull out a shell, throw shell on the
   ground and it turns into a critter -- Al for now.

Come to a room with 10 slaves and 8 sahaugin watching them. All slaves
are in chains around the hands and neck. They are all digging. We
decide to rush the 8. We win, killing them all and only sustaining
minor injuries (Al and a few lizardfolk). We free the slaves (2 of
which were the 2 who were recently brought in). Some lizardfolk take
the slaves back to the front then all the lizardfolk guard the stairs.

We finish scouting the rest of the 1st floor. Don't find anyone. We do
find a cold room that has the dead bodies of Dettie and Vidal (among a
few others). While we go to the 2nd floor, we have a few lizardfolk
take Dettie, Vidal, and a dwarf's body up to the front entrance so we
can take them back to Saltmarsh.

At this point we've found, or know for sure what happened to, everyone
but Daryl and Rickie from the Blue Gauntlet.

We figure out how all the PC's plus Anny can go underwater -- seeing
and breathing -- and go down to the 2nd floor.

Al has the cloak
Gnik has Al's water stuff
Milena has the skirt
Kat has Milena's water armor and the wand of water breathing
Matty and Anny go with their normal stuff

Anny and Kat in front, Gnik and Milena in the middle, Matty and Al in
rear. Az stays with the lizardfolk and Zasan stays with the team at
the 1st floor entrance.

We find a door and Kat opens it enough to take a peak. She sees at the
far end of the room a white marble table with 4 Priestesses sitting on
it each holding a baby sahaugin in one hand and a knife in the
other. There's also a GIANT shark circling above them. The Priestesses
appear to be chanting. We decide to leave them be for now and continue
on.


29 December 2018

The group hears a sound of cackling laughter coming toward them, so 
Kat cautiously opens the doors beside the door into the chamber with
the priestesses. The group slips through and closes the door behind
them to hide; they just make out the shapes of a couple of smaller
sahaugin swimming along the hall to the south -- not coming into
their hall. The room has gilt engravings, a table with elaborately
carved benches, and seaweed growing in the corner. (The floor is
not tiled in that corner -- the seaweed is just growing out of
the floor.)

Gnik inspects the table -- and sees carvings on the underside. It
appears to be a seam that can be opened.

Al pokes around the seaweed, which is about 7 feet tall. He does not
find anything in it.

Gnik investigates the grooves in the table more closely and can see
smudges similar to the warding that blasted them with cold. Gnik sees
enough differences that he thinks it will have a different effect, but
they decide not to risk setting it off. They make note to come back
later.

They move on to the next room down the hall. It has a smaller,
undecorated stone table, a bed of seaweed in the corner, and
a small coffer against the opposite wall. Kat checks the coffer
for traps and does not even see a lock on it, so she opens it.
It holds three sets of harness like the sahaugin wear, and two
strands of alternating black and white beads -- prayer beads for
religious ceremonies -- and a gold collar with coral beads. The
latter finds its way into Kat's backpack.

They move on to the next room, and Kat feels the pull of the 
sahaugin-sensing dagger as she nears the door, so they decide
to pass it by. 

They move to the hall that the two smaller sahaugin swam down
earlier. They find a parallel hallway on the other side of the
temple chamber, but continue on to try to make their way north,
to the area where they will expect to find the most sahaugin while
Kat's disguise still holds. They find two archways; as Kat approaches
the first, the dagger pulls toward it. It is a plain room with the
back wall covered in seaweed probably 10 feet deep -- possibly a
barracks. Kat can hear some quiet conversation, gossiping about
other sahaugin, but they are around the corner where she can't
see them. She stands in the archway and motions the others past
her while she blocks the view in case they glance her way.

They move on to the next archway, which opens to a long room with
black floor tiles and columns, coral walls, white ceiling, with
long tables and benches. About halfway down the room is the head
of a lizardfolk statue, about 4 feet high, on its side -- badly
damaged and with rubbish piled up on it, including fecal matter.
On the north wall across from the head is an archway; Kat can hear
voices behind it and feels a strong tug. Peeking in, she sees a
really, really big sahaugin with four arms, sitting on an ornately
carved throne. There is an adult female sahaugin on his right side,
about the size of the priestesses with a simple gold armband, and
on his other side is a rather large male sahaugin with a spear. In
front of the throne are three adult guard-sized sahaugin with their
backs to the door, and there may be others between them and the
throne. The group decides to move on -- but now they know they've
found a baron.

Kat goes to the arch on the other side of the room. They find a
symmetric hallway with another barracks, with no sahaugin but
with four coffers and a table with two benches -- probably quarters
for four sahaugin guards.

They continue on to other areas on this level they haven't yet
explored. First, a large room of plain dressed stone, untiled,
full of sahaugin -- one larger one with an armband is barking
orders at a group of ten, and another group of ten is in a circle
around a couple of crabs that are fighting as those in the circle
goad them on. The whole back of the room is full of seaweed, and
there are 20 coffers along the wall. They guess there will be
another identical barracks on the other side.

They continue to the south and find an archway. Kat feels the
dagger tug a bit, and can hear a munching sound, as if perhaps
someone is eating. She sees a sahaugin looking in her general
direction so she pulls back; she is staying near the ground and
hopes he didn't notice her. He is wearing an armband with stones
in it, and the room contains a table and a bed of seaweed. They
swim past over the archway so the chieftain can't see and move
on to the next archway which includes a seaweed bed, closed coffer,
table and bench -- probably the room of another chieftain.

They hear voices ahead, and as they approach the next archway
Kat feels a tug on the dagger. It opens onto what looks like a
sahaugin nursery with several adult females and a lot of young
sahaugin running and swimming through the room. Kat retreats from
the room. They return to the empty chieftain's room to see if there
is any additional information there. In the coffer they find harnesses 
with gold buckles and a leather bag holding three bags -- two emeralds
and a clear stone that may be a diamond.

They explore the other side and find a single archway opening onto a
quarters with one coffer and a large crossbow propped against it. Kat
opens the coffer and Al, Gnik and Matty look through the seaweed for
secret doors, since they expected to find another room here symmetric
to the first chieftain room on the other side.

As they head to the last area of the level they haven't explored yet,
symmetric to the first large barracks, they have to duck into a corner
as a large squad walks by down the hall. In the barracks there is a
large number of sahaugin and another 20 coffers.

They return toward the temple and explore the remaining quarters that
they believe belong to the priestesses. They no longer hear the wailing
of the sahaugin babies, but they do still hear chanting coming from 
the temple. In a side room through an arch next to the temple, they
find a larger coffer with a glyph of warding. They realize any attempt
to disturb the table will set off the glyph, so they move out of the
side room and distribute themselves at the doors around the temple
room to attack the priestesses -- Anny with the heavy crossbow they
found in the guard's quarters, Matty with javelins, Al with hand-to-hand
combat, Kat with a crossbow, and Milena with Spiritual Weapon. Gnik
makes an illusion that the doors on the south end of the chamber are
open, closes the actual doors and hides behind them while letting Az
know to let their allies on the top floor that they are about to attack.

The group quickly takes out the priestesses before they even have a chance
to respond, and because the Spiritual Weapon has a long range and a duration
of a minute, Milena uses it to dispel the glyphs on both the coffer
(warded with electricity) and the table (warded with blindness).

Gnik finds a necklace of beads in the table of alternating coral, 
amber, and pearl. When he touches it he feels a strong magical aura
from it. 

Al returns to look more closely at a carved spon on the wall behind
a seaweed bed, and nearly sets off a trap. He realizes that it is
some kind of a puzzle with tiles that must be slid around in the
right way or a blade comes out. Gnik comes to join him and recognizes
that the style of the carving looks dwarven. Gnik tries to solve the
puzzle using mage hand so that even if the blade stabs out again he
will be safely away. He solves it and the middle piece pops out -- it
turns out to be a small coffer holding harnesses with gold buckles,
sahaugin prayer beads, a nice gold bracelet with pearls in it, and
trinkets including a collection of teeth in a small bag. They also
find a conch shell and when they hold it up they hear a voice inside
saying, "As agreed, you will no longer attack the Raging Hammer ships 
and we will provide you with the materials you requested." Gnik is
aware that if they whisper into it, it will record their message of
up to 25 words and start repeating it instead.

In the coffer in the priestess room, Kat sees gold -- four masks shaped
like shark heads, four golden gongs with a golden striker, four golden
necklaces set with coral beads and a fifth set with pearls.

They return to the priestess quarters where they detected a sleeping
sahaugin and barge in; they don't see anyone, but Kat detects the inhabitant
in the seaweed using the pull of the dagger. Matty throws a javelin,
catches her in the shoulder, and drags her far enough out that her head
and shoulder are visible. Milena hits her with Sacred Flame and Anny
shoots her in the stomach with a crossbow boat, taking her out.

They consider taking out the chieftain they left in one of the rooms
near the stairs back up to the top level, but when they return he is
gone. They look in his coffer and find harnesses, a folded leather
pouch with lockpicks that Kat recognizes as having belonged to Daryl
in the Blue Gauntlet, and a gold ring set with a pearl.

They head back up the stairs and find seven sahaugin bodies piled up,
taken out by the lizardfolk. They gather their people together and
discover that Rickie, of the Blue Gauntlet, has joined them; he was
outside watching the place and trying to figure out how to infiltrate
it whe he saw the group come in. They all return to the ship, taking
the bodies they recovered with them. Milena makes chicken soup with
plenty of aromatic herbs for Curt, telling him that cave air is bad
for the breathing and this will help.

Because they want to get a glimpse of the lowest level where they
believe most of the soldiers are quartered, when they return to
the ship Gnik takes an hour to transform Az into an octopus. He
borrows the manta cloak and Matty and Anny join him to swim back
to the cave. 

Az slips into the cave and sees a large area with five or six dozen
sahaugin, and a similar number of bags along the wall. She looks through
two archways, which lead to guard posts with gates and net traps. She
tries to go further but gets taken out by a guard.

The group returns to the ship and they immediately set sail back to
Saltmarsh, knowing that the sahaugin will discover their mayhem and
come out in force at nightfall.



19 Klook 3275

As they sail, with Jimsu at the wheel, they notice through his shirt
a tattoo on his back that matches the symbol scratched into the floor
of the shed at the orphanage that took Rodger. Kat asks him if that's
a new tattoo. He says yes and seems a little embarrassed about it,
says he's not supposed to talk about it because it is a group that
doesn't want to be known about. He says it is the symbol of Jedai,
the god of luck. Kat has heard shoremen mutter "Praise Jedai" after
strokes of luck, for example for casks of brandy that fall off a wagon
without shattering, or crates that fall without landing on the people
below.

Milena suggests that Gnik take a closer look to see if it might be
magical; he casts Detect Magic and sees that it is, of the Divination
school. They ask who gave it to her, and he says Audry Lilybrook who
runs Lilybrook Orphanage. 

He also takes a look at the other items they've acquired. The prayer
necklace includes three different types of bead that can be used once
a day by a cleric or paladin to cast three types of spells. Milena
gets that.

Next, he tries an Identify on the tattoo. As he is looking at it, he
remembers Al saying something about a six-fingered hand and sees a
sudden flash of a black, six-fingered demonic hand; he screams in pain
and immediately passes out. At the same time, Az screams and pops out
of existence.  Milena and Matty look him over and Milena detects a
magical poison effect on him. She uses Lesser Restoration to try to
remove the effect, and then cures him. He wakes up, hurting all over.

Milena calls Rodger over and asks if he has seen this symbol. He says
he saw one of the kids at the orphanage scratch it out, but doesn't
know what it means. She tells him it is bad.

Keren, of the Stern Rally Squad, asks Milena how well she knows Al.
It comes out as they talk that Fenric dislikes Al not because of
the prank Al pulled years ago, but because some of his things went
missing in the process and he assumes Al and his friends stole them.
Milena says she should ask Al about it; he will be happy to talk about
the prank because he thinks it is very funny (though she does not
understand why), but she does not think stealing sounds like him.


12 January 2019

The group sails into the harbor at Saltmarsh; members of the Town
Council come onto the ship to greet them, and Gnik presents them
with the report of the excursion he prepared on the way back. Juliana
asks for the executive summary. They provide a brief summary, and Gnik
hands over the message shell from Raging Hammer. She lets Roland listen
as well and tells Gnik she will return it to him later. Juliana says
they will review the written report and get payment to them tomorrow.

The group decides that their next priority will be investigating the
orphanage and getting the tattoo off Jimsu's back.

Gnik and Matty talk with Janet about the tattoo and their concerns
about the orphanage. Al, Anny, and Jimsu go to the temple of Nolan
and talk with the high priestess Myra. Al asks to speak privately
with Myra and tells her he would like to make a donation since he
just came into some money, and pledges 250 gold pieces. Myra is
stunned and thanks him profusely. Al asks if Nolan has a take on
sahaugin, and Myra says, "Kill them?" Al says Nolan is probably 
very happy with him, then.

Milena goes home to talk with her daughters and asks Svetlana
and Jelena if they have any interest in the sorts of jewelry she
finds on her adventures. They both find it not very useful; Jelena
says it might be useful if she wanted to attract attention, but she
does not usually want to attract that sort of attention. Kat 
expressed that she didn't feel comfortable taking things that may
have been looted from people the sahaugin killed; but might take
an armband or something the sahaugin made themselves.

Gnik and Matty research the demon connected to the tattoo
on Jimsu's back. They suspect that if no contract was signed,
the tattoo should be able to be removed with a sufficiently
powerful Dispel Magic spell. If there were a contract, it would
depend on the specific stipulations and clauses in the contract.

Al goes with Jimsu and Anny to the temple of Sayd to talk with Brendan 
about the tattoo of the demon Zratz. Brendan asks to see it, so Jimsu 
lifts his shirt up. Brendan says, "Yes, that's Zratz." Jimsu shares the
story of how he ended up with the tattoo. Brendan asks, "Are you 
going to follow up on that?" Al asks, "About the orphanage? Yes."
Brendan says, "Then we will consider this payment for that." His hand
glows white, and at the same time the tattoo glows red and they all
hear a sound like something breaking loudly nearby. Brendan says
that should do it, and Al asks if they should bring others to him
if they also have the tattoo. He suggests they need to talk to Janet.

Al then asks to talk with Brendan alone. He also makes a donation
to the Sayd temple, and then confesses that he just killed a bunch
of sahaugin because he couldn't see any way around it; Al says he
doesn't expect Brendan to forgive him for it, he doesn't want to
lie about it. Brendan says that then telling him is what he needed,
and even though he wished it didn't have to happen, he trusts that
Al did it for the right reasons.

When he comes out, Anny says Jimsu said he had to go back to the
ship, but thinks he was just feeling embarrassed. She says she will
be meeting Kat later to investigate the orphanage, so should also go
back to the ship and sleep. Al says, "Don't you want to go to the
Gibbet and have a bunch of people buy us drinks?" and she says, "Hmm...
yes."

Al and Anny come out of the temple of Sayd just as Gnik and Matty
exit the temple of Maria next door. They compare notes; Gnik and
Matty say they learned Zratz is a demon of hedonism, and the only
thing he abhors is restriction. There is some thought that he used
to be a devil but could not abhor the structure and rules, so he
became a demon -- which is worse because they are not predictable
as devils are.

The group meets up at the Gibbet, where Al tells the tale of their
recent adventure while Gnik projects images and Matty plays music.
Milena listens to crowd chatter and hears someone suggest the town
should ditch the Darkscales mourning and celebrate this victory
instead. 


20 Klook 3275

A couple hours after midnight Kat and Anny meet to scout out the
orphanage. Kat suggests they should try to get into the basement
to see what they can find. Anny asks whether they should do this
with the whole group. Kat says it is a stealth mission, so the
fewer people the better. Anny suggests that going into a den of
demon worshipers might end up with them dead, and shares everything
the group learned in their research that afternoon. Kat says they
just made it through a whole den of sahaugin. Anny says, "Yes... with
all of us," but agrees to go in and look around, and they'll just plan
to bail if things look to dangerous.

Kat finds a window into a kitchen and sees that it is trapped with
some kind of wire trap. She uses mage hand to hold the wire in place
while she clips it, and then opens the window... which squeaks loudly.
She hears someone inside yell, "What are you kids doing down there?"
and footsteps coming down the stairs. She decides to try another window
and sees someone enter the kitchen with a lantern as she walks away. She
decides to try a 2nd floor window instead. She and Anny climb up the
building and find a room with a desk with one chair behind it and
three in front of it -- an office of some kind. The window here does
not appear to be trapped; it is latched, but she can see the mechanism
through the window and unlocks it with Mage Hand. She slips inside,
followed by Anny.

While Anny listens at the door, Kat tries looking through the desk,
carefully checking for traps as she goes. The desk is locked and
she doesn't see any traps, but as she's checking she notices an
extra panel under one of the drawers with a mechanism that looks
like a sliding number puzzle, but with symbols she doesn't recognize.
Anny takes a look as well, and tries sliding some numbers around,
but has no luck. Kat tries picking it mechanically by feeling for
the resistance; when everything falls into place, she hears a click
and the panel slides open to reveal a bundle of letters tied with
a string. She suggests to Anny that maybe they should leave now, and
Anny says, "Someone's in the hall talking." Kat says, "Let's get out
of here!" Anny goes out first and Kat is just dropping out of sight
and closing the window behind her when two people come into the
room. She overhears one of them saying, "I heard someone come into
the window downstairs, but it doesn't look like they've come in here.
Let's check the rest of the house." 

Kat and Anny carefully climb down, slip away, and look at the letters,
which appear to be gibberish. They go to Gnik's house -- the temple of
Tyollas -- which even at 3 am is abuzz with activity because tomorrow
is the Day of Remembrance. Kat gets paper and pen to work on trying
to decipher the message, but decides to go wake Gnik up first, figuring
that he would want to see it too. He is asleep, and a bit grumpy at
first, but when she says she and Anny just broke into the orphanage
and found coded letters -- just as two temple servants walk down the
hall past Gnik's door -- he motions them in. 

He also doesn't recognize the symbols, but notices that there are no
spaces -- which suggests to him that it is probably a cipher of some
sort (although it could be a coded message or a message in a foreign
language that then was run through the cipher.) Kat recognizes that
the paper is very high-end -- she has only ever seen it in the two
noble houses she has been in. She also notices that the symbols look
like those on the lock she just picked. She tells Gnik the final 
pattern that opened the lock, which helps inform his investigation
into decrypting the cipher. It takes him a good couple of hours to
work it out, but he gets the gist: comments about "Need to step up
our activities," "Glad to hear rituals are successful," "Collect
more to do the final ritual sooner than originally planned."


26 January 2019

Everyone gets together at Blackberry Bar's for breakfast. They discuss
the orphanage and what Kat found there. They decide that they should
try to sneak in that night, when those performing the rituals are most
likely to be active.

Milena shares some of the rumors she overheard at the bar the previous
night: Zaru, the proprietor of the Wicker Goat (oldest bar in town)
believes someone is trying to kill him, and is willing to pay someone
to look into it; someone believes that the army coming to town is there
to take over; and someone saw lights at the house of Logtaru, a wizard
who has been missing for a couple of months -- that person and their
companion wondered whether he'd returned and was laying low, or was
dead and his ghost returned to haunt them. 

Al goes to the curio shop looking for magic items to help him speak
with animals and see in the dark. Heide is talking with a man with
facial tattoos whom Al does not recognize. She excuses herself and
comes to help him. She asks about what specific animals he wishes
to speak with, and he shows her the box of shells that turn into
animals. She says she has just what he needs, and shows him a
small shell, Dama's Conch Shell, that when placed in the mouth 
allows the user to speak with anything that swims. The downside 
is that the user has more trouble talking with things that don't 
swim on account of having a shell in their mouth. Heide says she 
doesn't have anything to help with seeing in the dark, but the man 
she was talking with steps up and introduces himself as Mallon and 
asks if he can help. After hearing what Al is looking for, he offers
to make Al a headband that incorporates a Continual Flame that
only Al can see.  He says he can do it for 250 gold, plus Al
would owe him a favor, but he would make sure not to ask anything
that would cause him a moral quandary. Al asks Heide if he should
owe this guy a favor, and Heide says he has been good about asking
things that are reasonable. Mallon says he will have it ready in
about six days.

Milena plans to go to the market to get a second sturdy container
for troll meat, because she plans to give some to the lizardfolk
as thanks for their assistance. She finds a pot with ease, and
walks by Logtaru's house on the way there and back to see if she
notices anything amiss. There are weeds in the garden consistent
with his absence for a couple of months, but she is surprised to
see no obvious vandalism, which would normally be common on 
abandoned houses. She asks Zassen if he notices anything unusual
about the house compared to the others, and he gives an image
of a rat peering out the window in a very un-ratlike way. Milena
looks at the window and the rat immediately ducks down to hide.
She pulls a scrap and a wax crayon out of her pocket to write
a small note to slip under the door: "Logtaru, if you need help,
let us know."

Kat goes to the orphanage to spend the day scoping it out. It is
conveniently across from the abandoned leatherworker's guild, so
she packs some food and takes Mouse with her and plans to make a
day of it. She sees adults go out and in, some running errands
and bringing back sacks of supplies of some sort. She sees someone
bringing in a ragged-looking child whom she doesn't recognize but
who doesn't seem to be coming against their will.

Matty and Gnik decide to go talk to Jimsu to find out more about
the ritual that surrounded his tattoo. They go to the place where
he and his family live, but the person they meet there says he's
not there and hasn't seen him in a couple of weeks, so they head
to the shipyard to look for him there, stopping by the Gibbet on
the way. Nobody there has seen him either, so they go to the
shipyard and into their ship to his bunk. Matty decides to transform
into a dog, get his scent, and see if she can track him. She picks
up the scent and follows it along the docks, through a cemetery,
to a row of poorhouses, and up to a door where the scent stops.
Gnik shrinks himself to half-size to ride on her back because he
can't keep up with her on foot. They knock on the door and Jimsu
answers, sees Gnik at half-size, and says, "Are you ok?" Gnik
reassures him, Matty turns back into herself -- which startles
him -- and then Gnik proceeds to ask about where he was when he
got the tattoo. He thought it was at Lors's place, the Dorgenian
who works with Audrey; Lors applied the tattoo while Audrey talked
to him. Gnik asked if there was any sort of incantation, and he
said that's what Lors was doing.

Anny and Ember are dispached to the docks to find out more about
the rumor of a red-skinned female fiend who has been trying to
sneak onto a ship for passage, and who had previously been seen
in Seaton up the coast. Gnik points out that it might not be strictly
a fiend; it could be a tiefling, which is part-fiend, part-human.

Al stops by to talk with Beyolin, who is waiting on a ship of
his father's that is late; Al asks if it is likely the fault
of the Raging Hammer, and Beyolin says it's coming in from
Freeport so it could be. Al says he thinks Fenric is mad at him
because of something Beyolin does, and asks if Beyolin knows what
it was. He says yes, probably, and suggests they go somewhere
else to talk about it. They go to a private room at the Silver
Raven, and Beyolin tells Al to ask Gnik to look up Dorgenian
binding ink. He pulls up his sleeve to show a tattoo of a rope
around his arm, and says that might explain some things. He
then says that Jaime told him to take the book. Al asks if
others in the family can also tell him what to do; Egan is
in charge, but Jaime has his ear. Al asks about the pecking
order -- Beyolin says he's not very high up, so lots of the
family can tell him what to do. He's not sure whether Jack is
part of the binding, he just knows a lot of things. Al asks if
he would like to be free of the binding, and Beyolin suggests
Al ask him about that after he's talked to Gnik.

To change the subject, Al asks him what he knows about demons,
and Beyolin tells him the same rumor they've heard about a
demon trying to kill people and take over a ship. Al offers
that since he has a ship now, perhaps they could ship some
things for the Lasseters -- but Beyolin says that the Lasseters
only want to deal with ships they own so they can keep their
business and their secrets in the family.

Milena takes the pot of trollmeat to the lizardfolk and explains
to them what it is. She says she is not sure if it will suit
their palate, but it is abundant. One of them tries it and
declares it good.

Gnik and Matty catch up with Anny and Ember, realizing that
perhaps sending the two party members with colorful skin to
search for a fiend with colorful skin might not have been
the wisest choice. Anny says that when they talked to people
who had seen the fiend, she really just was trying to book
passage on a ship, not threatening anyone; she is looking
for passage to Freeport. They think she has moved to the
docks further toward the south of town, so they go that
way to look for her.

They realize the best place to hide would be near the abandoned
leatherworker's guild, so they head that way, not realizing
Kat is up on the roof keeping an eye on the orphanage. Kat
comes downstairs to follow them and see what they're doing;
she leave Mouse upstairs. Gnik and Matty see a trail leaning
down under the dock and follow it, along with Anny and
Ember, with Kat trailing stealthily behind. When they go under 
the dock, they see a pair of glowing blue eyes. They call out
and a shy tiefling steps forward. She is obviously scared to
death and just wants to get away to Freeport, where she says
they even let orcs in, so it should be safer to her. She says
she was a prisoner somewhere near Seaton but escaped and made
her way down here from there. The man who held her had other
slaves and prisoners as well.

Gnik and Matty discuss more comfortable places that she might
stay -- at a room at Brittney's inn, on the druid's island
with Matty, or at Milena's. They are describing each location
and Kat steps out and says, "I'm sure mom would be fine with
having her stay at her place," startling everyone there. Matty
introduces Kat, and the tiefling says her name is Nora. Gnik
offers to make Nora invisible as they walk through town, and
they make their way to Milena's. Matty warns Nora that Milena's
youngest daughter can be a bit... disconcerting, and may not
be surprised at her arrival. When they near the house, Tatiana
runs out, hugs Nora (though she cannot actually see her), takes
her hand and leads her inside. Gnik warns Gavriila that their
guest's appearance was a bit startling, and Gavriila says, "How
bad can it be? I live with her," and points at Kat. Gnik drops
the invisibility, and Gavriila immediately admires Nora's tail.
The group knows that Milena would want their guest fed and looked
after, so Gnik offers her tea and Gavriila sets about getting
food together.

Gnik and Matty go to talk to Eleanora about whether any ships
are going to Freeport, and she says not for at least a week.
They say that Nora has no particular plans in Freeport, she
just thinks she will be more accepted there. Eleanora offers
that she should come stay at the Gibbet with her girls, and
says she will send Perytar with a potion of invisibility so
she can get there safely.

Kat stays at Milena's house to ask Rodger questions; she is
considering disguising herself as him to infiltrate the orphanage.
She gets a basic idea of the layout and what he did on a daily
basis. Then she heads back to the orphanage, disguises herself
magically, and finds the stairwell at the back that leads all the
way up to the attic and down to the basement. The attic appears
to take up only about 2/3 of the length of the house, and only
three out of the five dormer windows on each side that are
visible on the outside of the house. The attic is mostly storage
with shelves and chests. She looks at the wall for hidden doors,
and listens to see if she can get any idea of what's on the other
side of the wall. She does not hear or see anything unusual in
her quick check. Then she heads down to the basement; the stairs
go down without any door, and the basement also seems to take up
about 2/3 of the length of the house. The brick foundation has
been repaired in spots, and needs repair in others, and also
appears to be mostly storage: barrels and foodstuffs that might
benefit from cool storage. She looks and listens at the opposite
wall and doesn't see or hear anything unusual. She is heading out
the door when Audrey's second-in-command catches her at the door
and asks, "Roger, what are you doing here?" Kat says, "I was just
visiting some of my friends." "Well, you are welcome anytime."
Kat heads to the Gibbet.

Milena returns home and offers to examine Nora to help improve
her health, if Nora is comfortable with it. Perytar arrives
with Matty, Gnik, Anny, and Ember. They discuss whether Nora
should stay with Eleanora or with Milena. They decide she should
at least go talk to Eleanora, who can talk with Nora about longer
term solutions either in Saltmarsh or elsewhere, or can get a
ship to Freeport -- and there is more room there. Milena assures
her that she is welcome to return if she decides she would rather
stay with her.

They all return to the Gibbet. Al and Kat are already there, and
Al is showing off his new purchase. Perytar, Gnik, and Matty go 
upstairs with Nora to show her around and introduce her to the girls 
and make sure she's settled. Gnik asks her if the name Polist means
anything to her, and she says that is who she escaped from. Gnik
says that the group has been following and trying to oppose the
actions of the group he is associated with, so Gnik will want to
ask her questions later about what she has seen or heard, but that
can wait until after she's settled.

The group reconvenes and Kat shares what she saw at the orphanage.
Then they discuss Nora's situation and whether and how much to
tell the council. Since Gnik asked for a list of fiends from the
council, it was provided by Janet, and that is how they learned
of Nora, they decide that they should at least mention that that
fiend is no longer a problem. 

Az, still in octopus form in a bowl on Gnik's back, reaches up two
tentacles to make tiefling horns behind Gnik's head. Al gets excited,
puts the shell in his mouth, and tests his ability to talk with swimming
animals. Az asks, "What's happening?" and the two excitedly gurgle at
each other for a while.

Nelson comes in and tells them that the mage they captured on the
boat is now free; someone came in claiming to be her master -- she
did say she was an escaped slave who had been experimented on --
and paid a huge pile of fees to get her back. Gnik asks who the
man was, and he said he did not hear a name but the papers are on
file at city hall.

Al expresses that he is a bit overwhelmed by all the things they 
are keeping track of -- the orphanage, the raging hammer, the black
market, the sahaugin, the thing we're not supposed to talk about --
and Milena tells him to put his fingers in his ears. She tells the
group, especially Gnik, that she walked by Logtaru's house, saw the
rat, and left the note offering help.

They discuss their plan for infiltrating the orphanage.


9 February 2019

Al asks the group if he can trust them to keep a secret, and then asks
Gnik if he has heard of Dorgenian Binding Ink. Al says he has learned
that the Lasseters have been using it on each other. Gnik says it
shrinks when a promise is broken, and it is often used as tattoos
around body parts -- which would be removed if the ink shrinks. Al
says Beyolin has a tattoo on his upper arm and is under control by
Egan. It is not clear to Al whether the whole family is beholden to
Egan, but if someone else became head of the family the control would
shift to them; or if some family members have control over some others.
Al does think older members of the family are bullying younger members
into entering into these contracts, and asks Gnik if anything could be
done to remove it. Gnik first guesses that the same process that removed
Jimsu's tattoo might have some effectiveness, but because there is a
contract involved that may have been willingly signed it might add
oomplexity to the magic and its breaking.

Al asks if Zassen can read a face from someone's mind and project it
to someone else. They try getting him to read an image from Al's mind
of Al's mother and projecting it to Gnik, and it works reasonably well
-- so Gnik takes Zassen upstairs to talk to Nora. He asks her to 
visualize Polist, and then gets an image from Zassen. Gnik makes an
illusion to show Nora, to make sure he saw correctly, and she confirms.

The group heads to the orphanage. Kat climbs up to the roof and then
drops a rope down for everyone else. Ember joins them but will stay
on the roof to keep watch. Kat climbs onto one of the dormer windows,
uses Mage Hand to pull aside the heavy curtain inside the window, and
sees shelves and a chest. It appears that it could be storage. She
checks the window for traps or anything unusual, applies a little oil
to make sure it doesn't squeak, and then tries to open the window.
There is a quiet pop as it opens, and she climbs in. She sees a small
bed to her left, with someone under the covers; they stir a bit but
don't get up. It is someone about Kat's size, and there are a lot of
books piled about. In the direction of the part of the attic she
explored before there is a mechanism connected to something that looks
like a door -- most likely the back part of a secret door. In the other
direction is a very secure barred and padlocked door, past the last set
of dormers -- meaning there is very little space between it and the 
end of the house. There is a small slot beside that door, which could
possibly be used to slide food in. Kat casts Sleep on the already-sleeping
person and then goes to bind her up -- definitely human, and young. She
carefully binds her hands, feet, and mouth in case she is a mage.

The rest of the group climbs into the room. Al knocks a book off the
shelf, which wakes up the sleeping woman. She gives them a glare that
is a level more intense than a death stare... and her eyes begin
glowing. Al and Gnik feel some kind of effect, and Kat goes to knock
her out with the pommel of her sword. It doesn't work, so Matty holds
a sword to her throat and Milena binds a piece of cloth around her
eyes; Gnik and Al feel better.

Matty thinks the girl looks familiar; Milena says she is the sister
of Al's friend -- she recognizes the girl as Deanna, Beyolin's younger
sister, who was lost at sea with her father ten years ago when she 
was five years old. Gnik recognizes the magic she's using as coming
from a cult in Ponallian lands who study death. Al asks her if she
is Deanna, if her father is still alive, and if she remembers Beyolin,
but she does not react; it's not obvious she even knows he's talking
to her.

Kat tries to peer into the food flap using a small mirror from her
thieves' tools she inherited from Daryl. She hears something moving,
and sees that the space just on the other side of the door is a
trap door in the floor with a handle on the other side, and beyond
that a gear with a rope that is very slowly moving. Kat describes
what she sees, and Deanna stops struggling and begins listening
intently. Matty gets the sense she is confused. She moves like she
is trying to pull off her gag; they discuss whether she would be
able to cast any spells verbally, but Gnik says her books are not
spellbooks -- her training is that of a monk. Matty puts her sword
to the girl's throat again and pulls off the gag.

Deanna asks if Kat is telling the truth; she herself has never looked,
she is only there to watch the Chosen, the ones needed for the final
ritual. She says she has been here as long as she remembers; she does
not remember her name, or her brother, but she knows she is at the
orphanage in Saltmarsh. She says the ritual is needed to save Saltmarsh
from the Cleansing; Milena asks, "By...?" but Deanna does not know.
She says she was trained by Elvara, Audrey's assistant. She says no
one calls her by a name, she is only the Defender. They try to remind
her of her father by having Al think of what he looked like, and then
having Zassen project it to her. She says she does not recognize him,
so Al tries sending an image of herself at age 5. She lies quietly,
trying to process.

Matty asks when the ritual will take place, and Deanna says, "Soon".
Milena asks if the Chosen is what is behind the door, or the children
who are brought for rituals. She says the Chosen is supposed to be
a girl.

Matty decides to transform into something small that can fit through
the food flap and see in the dark -- a small centipede. She sees a
contraption that has knots and fabric designed to make noise to make
it seem that someone is behind the door. Zassen looks through the
flap and sends what he sees to Deanna. Gnik tells her that we would
like to be able to untie her so she can see for herself what is 
behind the door. He says they are just there to investigate what
has been hurting the children at the orphanage, and that she is
wrapped up in that somehow.

Kat opens the locks, which are not complicated, and goes into the
small room to inspect the mechanism of the noise-maker. The trap
door would open into the office that Kat broke into the previous
night.

They ask Deanna if she is willing to leave with them to someplace
with safety. She says that if anyone comes up they will notice
she is missing, so she will stay in the attic for now; she is
processing what she has heard.

The group decide to go to the kitchen window nearest the back stairs
to try to sneak into the basement. Kat and Anny go first to make
sure the coast is clear. They hear voices through the door to the
dining room (even though it is about 1 am). The first one asks, "So,
we have to patrol?" The second is Elvara's, and she says, "Yes, in
case there is another break-in. If that happens, make noise and don't
worry about who you wake up." Kat discusses what she heard with the
group and they decide the time for action is now; they will try to
sneak, but if they are caught, they will engage.

They slip onto the back stairs and hear voices from below. Kat slips
ahead to scout. She sees six people in a circle, chatting, including
Audry, Lors, and Lonellia from the orphanage; Norris, a candlemaker; 
Beth, a half-orc gardener; and Terrance, a herder who lives outside 
town. Terrance, Norris, and Beth are making small-talk and asking
about patrol schedules; apparently, this is a shift change time.

Kat drops in and throws a Color Spray at Audry, Lonellia, and Lors,
blinding Lonellia; Gnik throws a Sleep spell into the room, knocking
out Norris, Beth, and Terrance; and Milena casts Hold Person at
Lors, who stops moving. Al and Matty try to trap Audry with a net;
Matty catches her and Anny tries to knock her over, but she dodges.

Lonellia, still blinded, mutters a prayer and throws a seething black
energy at Anny, whom she heard moving; the skin of Anny's hand blackens
and cracks. Anny throws her spear at Lonellia, and she goes down.

When Lors gets free of the Hold Person, Milena hits him with a Sacred
Flame and Gnik casts Grease at his feet, causing him to fall; he tries
unsuccessfully to Hold Gnik, and Anny hits him in the head, knocking
him out. Kat faces off against Audry with her rapier and dagger, taking
her down as Elvara reaches the bottom of the stairs. Matty stabs her
with a javelin and Gnik casts Grease at the bottom of the stairs,
causing the people descending the stairs behind her to slip and
fall. Elvara casts something at Matty that makes unnatural cracking
sounds in her leg, and it hurts to stand on. Kat shoots a crossbow
bolt at Elvara, but she snatches it out of the air and flings it
back, hitting her in the stomach.

Gnik casts Sleep at the pile on the stairs; the one person still
standing falls, and the person on top of the pile falls asleep.
Milena casts Spiritual Weapon at Elvara; the scimitar strikes,
but she dodges.

Matty transforms into a giant toad and tries to swallow Elvara. She
bites, and as her jaws close, Elvara punches her in the roof of her
mouth. At her next bite, Elvara goes limp... but then shakes it off.

Kat shoots at one of the two of Elvara's group still standing, and
Milena moves her Spiritual Weapon to the other. One of them throws
a hand out toward Matty and she feels a burning sensation, but is
still standing. The other casts a spell that makes a wavy kris blade
appear and move toward Kat, but it misses.

Kat hears someone coming down the stairs, a couple of thumps, and
Deanna appears, eyes glowing. Kat stabs at Elvara -- the parts
hanging out of Matty-toad's mouth -- and Elvara goes limp... and
then shakes it off again. They ask Deanna how many times she can
do that, and she says three.

Deanna comes over and grabs Elvara's head; black energy flows out
of her, Elvara goes limp and does not come back. Matty drops her;
the ceiling is too low for her to jump as a giant toad, but she
wriggles quickly toward the two remaining fighters, who fall over
at the impact. Kat hits one with her rapier and the other with
her dagger, and they go unconscious.

Ember rushes in, sees the scene, and says, sarcastically, "We
need help!"

While Milena spends time praying for healing for the group,
several others look for secret doors. They find a concave brick
that has clearly been pressed many times. Al moves to press it
but asks Ember to come stand near him in case it is an incredibly
stupid idea. Anny stops him, listens carefully at the wall, and
says, "Don't -- that's growling." Al goes back to sitting against
the wall waiting for healing.


23 February 2019

21 Klook 3275

Gnik asks a rat in the basement what is behind the wall where
they heard the growling, and the rat says, "Nothing". Gnik
investigates the wall more closely and finds a series of sigils 
in the line of bricks near the floor; Gnik recognizes this as 
the sort of warding that might keep vermin out -- which could
be why the rat detected nothing.

They search the orphanage workers, now tied up, and relieve
them of their weapons and belt pouches. Only Audrey has
anything of particular interest: a long strip of leather
with silver markings on it that seem to resolve into symbols
if wrapped around a bar of the correct diameter.

They decide that they should evacuate the orphans in case anything
goes awry. Kat, who knows many of the orphans, will help wake them
up and Gnik will escort them to the Temple of Tyollas for safekeeping.
Matty goes to the garrison to alert Nelson for help guarding and
retrieving the prisoners. Al, Anny, and Deanna stay in the basement
to guard the prisoners while they are waiting.

Milena and Ember search the orphanage, starting with the office, for
whatever pole or device is used to wrap the leather strap and reveal
the secret message. They find a staff shaped like a snake along the
bottom shelf of the bookshelf; Milena carefully pulls it off but
leaves the head, which is curved, on the shelf behind some of the
books in case it comes to life. She wraps the cord and finds that
it is a series of letters, each with a few symbols after it, separated
by spaces -- a key to decode a cipher with more than one symbol for 
each letter.

As Gnik and Kat return from the temple, Matty returns with Stern
Rally. Matty pulls down the back collar of the shirt of one of
the prisoners to show Fenric the tattoo they have (but they see
Audrey does not have it.) Keren tells Matty that Malcolm, the 
captain of the guard is not happy about the fact that they broke 
into the orphanage.

Kat takes Audrey's ring of keys and does a more thorough search of
the orphanage, starting with the study. She tells Milena, "Don't
open the door in the basement without me." She quickly manages to 
find the locks that go with all but one of the keys on the ring. 
Milena, meanwhile, finds stew in the kitchen being prepared for 
tomorrow's lunch, and offers some to Deanna, who takes it.

As Kat returns into the house from the shed she sees a wagon with
the Lasseter crest on it. Matty asks Fenric if they sent for the
Lasseters; he says no, but he told Malcolm where they were going.
She asks Deanna if she is ready to face the family she doesn't
remember; Deanna decides to wait upstairs. Al and Ember go out
to meet them. Juliana and Egan alight from the wagon, and Al
tries to persuade them to go interview the prisoners who are
being taken to the garrison. Egan states that what happens at
the orphanage is his business -- it is the old family estate
that they donated, and his family still supports the activities
there -- so Al asks him if he knew about the demon-worshipping
cult operating there, and describes their tattoos. Juliana says
maybe they should go question the prisoners, but Egan insists
that they go inside. Al narrates a blow-by-blow of everything
that happened in the battle -- but leaving out the parts about
Deanna -- and Anny joins in once she realizes he's trying to
keep Egan from being able to get a word in edgewise to ask 
questions.

When Egan sees the basement, and hears the growling, he seems
genuinely surprised. He is angry that the group broke into
the orphanage without alerting anyone, but with some conversation
he understands their motivations. He acknowledges that they should
go ahead and try to take care of the monster, whatever it is, now
that the children are evacuated.

Gnik rounds up some cots and brings them to the basement so that
those who need rest can do so. Kat has a bowl of stew and curls
up with Mouse. Deanna is already curled up on one of the cots
upstairs sleeping, her empty bowl of stew beside her.

Milena holds onto the snake staff; after about an hour, she has
the sense that the head can be animated and used for a poison attack,
then turned back into a staff, by someone with a strong sense of
devotion.

They rest and prepare to face the monster. Matty transforms into a
dog with a good sense of smell (Milena looks at Boris, looks at her,
and asks, "Are you in estrus?" But they determine that will not be
a problem) and tries to sniff along the brick wall. She also is 
unable to smell anything at the line of warded bricks -- it is as 
though there is some kind of fog of perception there. She returns
to her regular form.

They position the Stern Rally guards near the top of the stairs
so that they can defend if the monster gets past them. Deanna
stands at the bottom of the stairs so that she can help them
defend or provide another line of protection, as needed.

Kat presses on the loose brick they found and the section of wall
that looks like a secret door moves aside. Al, who cannot see in
the dark, throws his continual light torch into the room. There is
a section of three steps leading down; there is some kind of altar,
some beds line the wall, and there is a cage with no obvious door
in the corner. In the middle of the room is a beast with flesh that
seems to float away from it in mist and then reappears. It stands
behind the altar and looks at them with what looks like a creepy
smile.

Al runs into the room, jumps onto the altar, and throws his net
onto the beast, then dodges. He hears more growling behind him,
and shouts, "There's more than one!" Anny joins Al on the altar
and stabs at the beast with her spear, obviously hurting it badly. 
Kat draws Torchlight and attacks the second creature, scoring a 
hit, but fails to connect with her dagger.

The creature in the net seems to phase its shape, and the net falls
through it. It gathers up its mass and lets out a massive roar that
sprays out some kind of cloud, but Al and the others manage to
dodge; however, Al feels pain as the air touches him.

The one Kat is fighting attempts to bite her, and manages to grab
her right leg; everything in her leg is now excruciatingly painful,
down to the bone. It turns to run to the altar and she gets another
blow in.

Gnik asks Az, back in bird form, to fly to the third creature and 
try to distract it so it doesn't try to flank their companions.

Milena casts a Guiding Bolt at the creature that bit her daughter,
hitting it with glittering energy. The third creature runs to the
door and blasts out energy at Milena, Gnik, Matty, and Deanna. Deanna
dives onto the creature in response and begins pummeling it; it seems
to be breaking apart where her fitst hit, and her fists are black. Matty
throws her javelin and hits it.

Gnik throws a flaming phantasmal net at the creature in the door, hoping
it will at least need to stop and investigate or be distracted; it sniffs
the air, looks at him, and growls. Gnik believes these creatures might
be demon hounds, with attacks that are necrotic energy.

Al jumps down between Anny and the creature at the altar so that she
can use him as a shield if she wishes, and punches at it. It feels
like his fist is sinking into it, which clearly hurts the creature,
but not as much as he would expect or that other weapons seem to be
doing to it. Anny jumps back onto the altar and stabs deep into its
flank again, making it roar.

Kat casts a Sleep spell at the creature by the door; it glares in 
her direction and then falls over. Gnik and Matty quickly tell Deanna
to stop attacking it, because she might wake it up, and go for the other
two instead.

Ember hits one of the creatures with a dagger, but it does not seem to
have much effect. Al looks at the creatures and call out, "Do you things
talk?" The one in front of the altar responds by making another breath
attack. Anny staggers backward and looks around like she can't see;
her eyes look like small black dots. The other creature jumps at Al,
but he dodges. It turns toward Milena as she hits it with a second
Guiding Bolt, disintegrating it.

Deanna runs to the remaining creature in front of the altar, hits it,
and it goes down, disintegrating. Matty pulls out her longsword, takes
the head from the shoulders of the sleeping creature, and there is a
burst of trumpet sounds as the sword bellows, "GROVEL BEFORE ME." From
up the stairs behind them, Keren yells, "What was that?" Matty says,
"...It was Gnik!"

They examine the room more closely. The walls are covered with tapestries
depicting celebrations and orgies. There is a glass cabinet holding a
collection of potions of some sort, and a large wardrobe. The altar is
stained with something dark, and shows a bas relief image of debauchery
surrounding a demon-like horned figure with six fingers on each hand.
Based on the imagery, they are not sure they want to touch any of the
beds, which they guess were not used for sleeping. There is a chest
in the room, which Kat checks for traps. She doesn't see any traps,
but also can't get the lock open. Al suggests maybe she should use
one of the keys from the ring; she tries the remaining key, which works.

Inside the chest are about a dozen masks in various materials showing
expressions of joy and rapture; a variety of revealing outfits that would
fit a wide range of human body sizes and shapes; strongly-scented candles;
one wooden and one metal box, and several jars. The metal box is locked,
so Kat checks it for traps and then tries to open it with the same key
that opened the chest, which works. She sees that if she hadn't used
the key, a trap would have shot a three-inch needle out the side of the
box into her hand.

On top of the box is an opal necklace, a couple of inches across; a gold
and phallic idol of a man with six fingers on each hand; a sheer silk
robe with gold embroidery; a tattooing kit; and a very old book. Gnik
opens it with mage hand and sees that it is full of symbols, that look
like those encoded on the strap they found.

In the wooden box Kat finds small pamphlets that depict someone who
is down on their luck, who spends a day and night with someone very
attractive in acts of debauchery, who then reveals that they have
been recognized by Jeddai to get what they deserve.

Gnik detects that one of the candles in the chest, wrapped in silk, is
magical; as well as some of the flasks in the glass cabinet. The flasks
contain unholy water, and the candle will enthrall anyone within a
10-foot radius who looks at it for one minute; it has six uses left
in it.

Milena performs a ritual to consecrate the altar. When she is done,
there is a deafening boom as the altar cracks and falls into four
pieces.

They talk with Deanna about her options of where she might stay. She
does not like the idea of going to another religious institution, but
does like the idea of spending her time outside, so they plan that she
will go to the druid island with Matty (where Al also sleeps most nights.)



Saturday, 23 March 2019

(Some in-character and out-of-character discussion prioritizing dangling
plot hooks.)

Al: Wants to find out more about the tattoos the Lassiters use to control
one another, particularly figuring out how to remove them.

Matty: Wants to figure out what the Zratz cult is doing, and particularly
what they want with Deanna Lassiter (the Defender).

Gnik (and others): Interested in closing down the Black Market (partly
for self-interested reasons); figure out what happened to Logtaru; keep
an eye on the activities of Raging Hammer; and working on the details
of the writings in the books he's found

Juliana will be convening a meeting of the Council and asks them to
plan to have lunch someplace that they are easily findable, so they
regroup at Blackberry Bar's. Deanna is staying on the island, happy
to stare at the sky and walk barefoot; Milena sends some clothing in
her size.

Milena and Kat meet up with Gnik to walk by Logtaru's place on the
way to Blackberry Bar's. After discussing that Gnik also aspires to
be eccentric when he grows up, Gnik checks the door for glyphs and finds
one that he thinks will summon lesser demons if it is disturbed. "What a
dick," Kat says, and checks the area for traps; she finds a couple of
suspicious-looking gaps in the boards.  A couple of passers-by ask what
they are doing, and Gnik says they are checking on Logtaru, since he has
been missing; they say it is dangerous, that a little street tramp was
killed a couple of years ago trying to mess with the door.

Gnik and Kat decide to tap on the glass of one of the windows; Kat finds
a second glyph, different from the first, which Gnik thinks is some kind
of harmful divination magic; but he doesn't think it will be set off just
from knocking on the glass. Gnik knocks and then calls out, in rat, "Hello,
is anyone there?" and a rat pops up inside the house. "You can understand
me?" it says. Gnik asks if he is Logtaru, and if everything is alright.
"No, and no!" it says: there is a devil in the house, in a circle, and
Logtaru left through a door in the stairs and told the rat to stay and 
keep an eye on it, but that was 53 sunsets ago. The rat introduces himself 
as Calrik, and verifies when Gnik asks that he is Logtaru's familiar. He
doesn't have any particular way to let them in, but says that when Logtaru
came home he always says, "Ma says hi". Gnik tells him they have a couple
of other things to attend to, but will be back soon.

They arrive at Blackberry Bar's, and soon after Jamee Lassiter also arrives
and walks over to Al, asking if he has a minute to talk. They move to the
bar to chat, a few moments later there is a loud banging sound as someone
breaks down the door -- and someone comes in with glowing red eyes and
rotting skin. Al moves in front of Jamee, and realizes she is frozen with
fear. The being says in a surprisingly feminine voice, "Now you will get
what you deserve, princess" -- while staring at Jamee. Kat recognizes
its accent -- Reggie had the same one, which would place it from Tarriolla.

It snarls at Al, "Out of the way," and Al says, "Hi, I don't think we've
met!" It swings at him, hits the bar behind him, and Al sees the bones
in its hand crunch. It is hit with several attacks but does not seem to
notice them (although it is clearly taking damage); it is singlemindedly
focused on Jamee. Al tries asking Jamee what she knows about it; she
mutters a bit, but her response is incoherent. Gnik identifies it as a
revenant, a soul seeking revenge that will inhabit a corpse to come after
the object of its ire; and if that body is killed it will seek out another
to inhabit until it achieves its revenge.

Matty grabs Jamee and pulls her behind the bar. Gnik and Milena recognize
Mel Hallum's body, who was killed in an attack at the Wicker Goat a couple
of days ago, but the voice is obviously female; Milena thinks, based on
what she knows about revenants, that it is someone who died within the
last few months, no more than a year ago. Milena realizes that such a
creature cannot be turned, but when she hits it with Sacred Flame it burns
and is stopped from regenerating as it was doing.

It swings at Al, misses as Al steps aside, and shatters a stool instead.
Gnik shoots a sling bullet at it and takes off the rest of its fingers
on one hand. Al manages to bind it in a rope, and yells out, "I need someone
strong here to help me!" Ember yells, "Help how?" Al wants to try to pull
it off its feet, so Ember -- all three feet of her -- runs up, slams into
it... and bounces off. It glances at her, and she says, "Worth a try!"

Matty tells Jamee to stay behind the bar and leaps back over to try to
shove the creature down. Milena burns it again with radiant damage. Al
asks if they should try just restraining rather than killing this creature
so it doesn't just occupy another body and come at it again. Gnik pulls
out a silk rope; Jamee bolts for the back door, and Kat runs to keep
her from leaving -- which will just make the creature try to chase her
out into the street. Ember tackles her, and Kat pulls her back into the
room and closes the door to the street. Milena suggests throwing the
ropes holding the creature over the rafters to haul it up so that its
struggles don't kill it. Gnik mage hands the end of the rope over a 
rafter and Ember hauls it up.

While the others stay in the main room to keep an eye on the creature,
Matty, Al, and Kat take Jamee into a back room to ask her why this thing
is after her. She says it is Polly Dire, who was a student with her in
Tarriolla but who was killed in a mugging. She says she doesn't know why
Polly would blame her or seek revenge. 

Out in the main room, the creature asks why they are protecting Jamee,
and Gnik asks why it wants to kill her. It says she and her friends
poisoned her, slit her throat, and drained her blood over days to summon
a demon: Jamee, Richard Dorman, Alice Hendrill, and Kala were involved. 
Milena asks why it addressed her as Princess, and it says it is what it 
called her at school because she was arrogant and believed she deserved 
things she did not. 

Al mentally asks Zassin to ask the creature what it saw leading up to
its death, and show them what it saw. Zassin sits on the rafter above
the creature, concentrates on it, and then shows them all darkness, a
covering being removed from its head, it is staring at the ceiling and
there are two women and a man they don't recognize; and they seem to
hear Jamee's voice from its feet; they are all chanting something, and
the man brings a knife down to the being's throat. Zassin sends these
images to Jamee as well, who says she doesn't know who that was, but
it could have been someone taking her form. Gnik notices from the
chanting that the name of the demon they were trying to summon was
Segorid, and that they were asking for three years of service and
three specific requests from each of them.

Kat runs to the temple of Seyd to find Brendan, who might be able to
help with the creature; but his assistant says he is missing: he didn't
show up yesterday, they went to his house and he appears to have packed
up and left, although they don't know why. Kat comes back and reports
this, and Gnik sends Az to the Council letting them know that they should
come to Blackberry Bar's when they are done because there is a situation
that they need to see.

Al goes to talk to Gnik, and asks Jamee not to leave. "So am I a prisoner
now?" she asks, and Matty says, "Not if you don't try to leave!" Al
convinces her that there is a situation that needs to be resolved and
it would be best for her to stay while they do that.

Al offers to go outside and try to squash any rumors that must be arising
from those who fled when the battle started; there are a few dozen people
outside, and they have many questions (including "When are we going to
get our bar back?" from Crissy and Rosnor). Meanwhile, Kat disguises
herself, slips out into the crowd, and spreads a few of her own rumors
about Lassiters, and demons, and summoning.

Az reports that the Council is coming -- that they weren't going to, but
then she told them what had happened. A carriage pulls up with Juliana,
Egan, Bellto, Rolland, and Lyto -- but Janet, the other person besides
Brendan who might be able to deal with the revenant and detect lies,
is not there. Egan asks where his daughter is; Al says, "She's in the
back; we've been keeping her safe." He walks in and asks, "What's going
on?" She says, "I don't know!" and Matty says, "Yes she does." Egan asks
to talk with his daughter; Matty says, "Sure, so you can get your lies
straight."

Zassin offers to show Juliana and the others what he saw from the 
creature's mind. Guards come in to shackle the creature and take it
away for safekeeping. (They return the party's ropes, but note that
they might need cleaning.) The group agrees to return with the Council
for their original meeting at the Town Hall; Rolland walks with them
and the rest of the Council rides back in their carriage. They discuss
the strange coincidence that Brendan disappeared after removing a Zratz
tattoo from Beyolin; and apparently many people are having strange dreams
and having tattoos disappear since they consecrated the altar the night
before. (This is why Janet was unavailable; she's dealing with a bunch
of people who suddenly want to get right with Maria.)

Egan asks if they found anyone in the attic; Matty replies, without
actually lying, that they found that strange, but just found the
mechanism behind the wall. Lyto and Rolland don't ask any questions;
Bellto just seems upset by the idea that the group decided for themselves
that they would take care of this place themselves.

Gnik then brings up the situation with Logtaru, mentioning that they have
not yet broken in anyplace new yet, and technically they have permission
to enter and help Logtaru's familiar -- but he explains about the devil.
Juliana shakes her head and Rolland starts laughing. Al asks if the Council
wants to deputize them. Juliana agrees that the devil must be dealt with to 
keep peace in the town, but with constraints.

As they break up, Milena pulls Egan aside, puts a thumb over the spot where
she saw his tattoo, and asks, "What does this ink mean?" He says it was a
youthful indiscretion: he was young, and drunk, and got a tattoo but chose
poorly. She asks why poorly, and he says apparently it has some religious
significance. She asks what religion, and he says apparently it is some
kind of wolf-god who is worshipped in the form of a wolf-shark by those
on the seas. He asks why she wants to know, and she says that she felt
drawn to it -- probably because where she is from, the wolf has a special
significance. As she is touching the spot on his chest, she can feel power
of the sort that flows through her with her magic, but Egan does not seem
to be aware of it. She mentions that they have been researching the
removal of tattoos because of the incident with the Zratz tattoos, so if
he really does not like it perhaps Gnik who reads a lot will have some
advice for him. He nods noncommittally and continues on his way.


20 April 2019

As they head out, in the lobby of the town hall Jae (who runs the
Saltmarsh playhouse) is talking with the receptionist. She lights
up when she sees the group, says hello, and says to Kat, "Hey, don't
you have a birthday coming up?" She invites Kat to meet in the market
in the morning for a birthday shopping trip.

The group decides to go to the temple of Sayd to see if they can find
clues to where Brendan has gone. They find Al's older sister Himaya who
works there, and asks if there is anything they can do to help. Matty
asks when was the last time she saw Brendan and did he seem okay. She
says they went to bed as usual last night, and then this morning his
door was still closed (he is usually up before her) and the door and
windows were all still latched from the inside. Milena asks Himaya
about any special skills granted by his god; she is listening for
anything that might have let him walk through a wall without using
a door, or offering suggestions to someone who might let him out
and bar the door behind him without remembering it.  She describes
many things, including a lot of healing, but nothing like that. Gnik
suggests Mage Hand might work to re-bar something, but you would have
to be able to see it, and the bar across the door would be too heavy
-- but a window latch might work.

They investigate Brendan's room. The bed is bare, there is nothing
in the dressers or chest. Kat points out some patterns on the floor
that look like divots on the ground that look like they might have
been made by a large set of talons -- four in the front and one
behind. The dogs sniff at them and shake their heads as if the
smell is strange or unpleasant. Gnik wonders if it might be consistent
with the Kenku, but they have three toes in front and one behind.

Gnik tries to take a sniff, finds it unpleasant but does not recognize
it. Al tries and faintly smells something revolting, like a very bad
cologne. Matty turns into a dog and has a sniff; it is distinctive and
horrible, but nothing like she has smelled before. She cannot smell
any entry or exit, as though it teleported in and out. Milena posits
that the creature gathered Brendan and all his possessions up in
the bedsheet and disappeared; Al suggests perhaps it was following
some orders that were either very simple or that instructed it to
remove anything that might be used to scry for Brendan.

Gnik and Kat look for secret compartments in the furniture while
Matty in dog form tries to track places Brendan has been. She finds
that one of the far bedposts smells strongly of Brendan; and it
has a hollow compartment with a carved holy symbol of Sayd -- plants
grown together in the shape of a shield. It is not a symbol they
have seen him use regularly, though -- his is hand-woven from
actual vines. The group asks permission to hold onto the carved
symbol.

They decide that their best bet is to try a Sending to Brendan; none
of them have that skill, but they know Britteny (high priestess of
Byorn) or Fran (head of Gnik's order) both can do it. Since it is
dinnertime, they go to the inn to talk to Britteny (and get food).
She agrees to do the sending and tells them to meet her in a side
room after they eat.

When they join her, she says there was no response. She thinks it
would probably wake him up if he were just asleep, so he is either
intentionally ignoring her or unable to respond. They discuss whether
scrying is an option, but they don't think anyone in town would be
able to cast the spell; but Heide might have access to a magic item
that could do something similar.

Gnik considers that the back-facing claw makes it more likely to be
a demon than a devil; but it is not Zratz, who has hooves rather than
claws.

They go to talk with Janet. The doors are open; the guard, Callas, is
slumped tiredly against the door but comes to attention when they walk
up. They ask to speak to Janet, and he goes to find her... and bars
the door, since all the priests are so busy.

They wait... and wait. Kat gets bored and scales the very tall walls
to look in a window. She sees ten lines of people waiting to talk
to priests.

After about half an hour the door opens again and Janet walks out,
looking exhausted.  Al and Matty warn her that they believe Brendan
has been taken by a demon and they are afraid it might be someone
targeting the high priests for some reason. Matty says it is a bit
strange they would have chosen to go after Brendan first, unless he
was just the easiest.  Janet says, straight-faced, "Yes, that makes
sense." She thanks them for the warning, and for consecrating the
altar -- and clarifies that she is not being sarcastic about that
last, despite the exhausting repercussions.

Kat, still on the roof, decides to climb one of the spires, leap off,
and use her Featherfall ring to stop herself. She screams most of the
way down in freefall before triggering the ring; Mouse whines, then
looks surprised, then leaps on her when she reaches the bottom.

Milena acquires a fish and examines its entrails with the question of
what has happened to Brendan. She sees harmony and balance in the past,
probably attributes of Brendan; then in the present a down-to-earth 
female presence concerned with practical security and the welfare of
those she cares for; then, in the future, loss and regret. Kat asks
her how this casting works -- is it something anyone could read if
they knew the symbols? Milena says it is a mix of knowing the signs,
such as finding the organs in the wrong place or seeing the shapes
the entrails make, and sometimes just touching and knowing; and this
time it was just touching and knowing.

(http://tarot.fortunetellingfun.com/nornspread/riderwaite/15-0/49-0/55-0)

They decide to go to Exotics to see if there is something or someone
who might help them scry. One of the gargoyles on the wall looks down
at her and says, "You again?" but only Kat can see and hear it. Matty
accuses her of making it up. Kat points, but the gargoyle has gone
back to its regular pose. Kat tries climbing the wall and it says,
"That's not a good idea," and sticks out its claws -- but still nobody
else sees it. Kat tells Matty to try climbing the wall to see if the
gargoyle will talk to her; she gets almost to the top and is suddenly
overcome with fear, so much that she falls off the wall -- but does
not see or hear the gargoyle move. Kat apologizes to the gargoyle
and says that they really didn't intend to break in but there is a
matter of urgency because they think there might be a demon attack
coming to Saltmarsh. It says, "Why didn't you say so?" and the front
gate opens. As they walk in, Al looks up at the gargoyle and says,
"Thank you." It says, "You're welcome!" ...but Kat doesn't see or
hear it, and thinks Al might be having her on.

The front door of the building opens and Korvina welcomes them in.
They fill her in on what they saw at Brendan's, and that they think
he was kidnapped by a demon via teleportation. She looks in a book
and says, "This would match those claw marks, wouldn't it?" and
shows them a picture that could be consistent. She says they'd had
some suspicion that it might be in the area. It is exceptionally
intelligent and is the kind that makes deals with people for
significant cost. Gnik recognizes its name, Segorid, as the demon
being summoned by the people in the Revenant's memory. They discuss
whether Jamee might be involved in some way.

Korvina goes to gather other mages to try to scry for Brendan. She
comes back some time later and says that the bad news is that they
found Brendan: he is underwater, strapped to the support post of a
pier, dead. The good news... she hands them a Locate scroll and
says that the Council had already offered to pay to help find Brendan.

The group takes the scroll and finds him in the shipyards. Near him
is a sack weighted by a rock holding his belongings. Kat goes to
alert Juliana. Gnik performs a ritual to create a floating disc to
carry the body and his things in a more dignified way. Matty turns
into a shark to see if she can smell the same demon scent on the
chain wrapped around Brendan. She does, faintly; anything else has
been washed away by the saltwater.

The town guard escorts them, with Brendan's body, to the garrison
to find out what happened. Juliana arrives and they share what
they know (although not their speculations), including that the
demon is the same one mentioned by the Revenant.

Gnik does some research and finds a reference to a group of demons that
includes Segorid who are based out of Tarriolla.


11 May 2019

22 Klook 3275

The group meets at breakfast; Al decides to stake out the Lasseter estate
for a couple of hours to see if he can figure out what's going on with Jamee,
and Gnik goes to do more research, specifically on the Defender. He finds
reference to a conversation overheard by the servant of one of the founders
of Saltmarsh (the source does not say which one) about putting some things
into place including suckering someone in their youth to make sure they
grow up ignorant of reality.  The second person asks how they would
communicate this to a future generation, and the founder says they will
leave notes explaining the situation. The conversation happened just
prior to the founding, meaning that the servants were henchmen rather
than household servants.

Al goes to the estate, walks around outside for a few minutes, and
realizes just hanging out there -- where there's not really a great
place to hide -- is maybe kind of a dumb idea, and maybe he should
go talk with the neighborhood gossip instead -- Tobias's uncle Reuben, 
who might have heard something interesting and is very talkative. He
asks a vague question about Jamee that might imply that Al is
interested in her, to prompt him to say what he knows; he mentions
she and Jack often leave the estate at the same time but then go
their separate ways -- and in fact, usually she goes left, he
goes right, usually in the morning.

A call had come out via the town crier suggesting that in Brendan's
memory all should engage in quiet reflection on Godsday for the next
several weeks, either at their home temples or at the temple of Seyd.
As today is Godsday, Milena and Kat go to the temple of Seyd; Milena
brings a casserole, and Kat tells the story of that time Brendan helped
two ghosts reunite so they could move on to the afterlife.

Milena goes afterward to the Temple of Shrines to meditate at the
shrine of Daln.  Garu, a Tillian who tends the Temple of Shrines,
greets her and invites her in. They speak for a while and then she
goes to Daln's shrine she sees Rickie sitting there, smoking. He
taps out his pipe, she tells him he does not have to, but he does
not want to bother her. She makes clear that he is welcome to stay,
then settles into her own meditative contemplation; he decides
to stay and watch.

Kat stops by the Temple to Byorn with her lute; Jewel is there,
invites her to join in playing with a little coaching from him.
She uses her performance skills to weave together audience ideas
into a ballad honoring Brendan.

The group gets together at lunch. Learning what Gnik found in
researching the Defender, Al wonders if perhaps someone who can
control Deanna is trying to manipulate her into inheriting Egan's
estate -- or perhaps more importantly, his power and influence in
town -- by taking out his other heirs (Beyolin, who was attacked
by a rum demon; and Jamee, who was attacked by the Revenant).

They go to Logtaru's house; they use the password ("Ma says hi")
to get past the magical trap on the front door, but there is still
a mechanical trap to disarm and a lock to pick. Kat and Anny successfully
get past the trap but have trouble with the complex lock, so Gnik calls
out and asks the rat Calrik if it can unlock it from the inside. They hear
a scrabbling sound, a click and a thunk, and the door swings open.

The inside is one large room, one story, but with a set of crudely
constructed spiral stairs going up about five feet to an ornate
doorframe around a shimmering portal to elsewhere, where there is
a carefully-constructed stone staircase. There are several
books evident at various places around the room.  There is also
a circle of faintly glowing symbols around a large creature, which
stands up and smiles at them when they enter.  He introduces
himself as Zagrimil. Al asks what he is, and he identifies himself
as a pact demon. ("Packed like in a crate, or pact like make a
pact?" Al asks for clarification.) He says Logtaru wanted to go
to Jaeleth and was willing to make a deal to do it. He was looking
for specific information and Zagrimil heard where it might be
located. 

Kat goes to look at a book lying open on a table; it has ornate
writing in a language she can't read. There are two books she
sees with titles in Jhoynian, one on portals and one on summoning
and interacting with demons; another is untitled but bound in
leather, probably Dorgenian. She begins thumbing through it and
realizes it is a spellbook. She calls out to Gnik, who is already
right beside her because... book.

Al tries throwing a small clod of dirt through the portal; he sees
it land on the steps, but does not make any sound. Al says, "So
we're going through the portal, right?" The demon says it's just
a portal. When they question whether they can trust him, he says
that he won't lie to them, but upon further questions admits he
wouldn't necessarily give them all the relevant information. Al
ties a rope around a shoe, throws it through the portal and
successfully pulls it back; and Kat successfully mage-hands the
clod of dirt back into the room.

Kat calls out to Calrik and says they would like to know if the
portal is visible from the other side, and offers to mage hand
him through and let him look; he shakes his head vehemently and
squeaks, which Gnik understands to be "I made a promise to stay
here and watch the demon!" As she discusses trying to find another
rat, Zassin just runs through the portal, turns around, looks at
them and blows a raspberry, and comes back. They ask what he saw
and they get an image of themselves caricatured staring at him
with dorky looks on their faces, and then he visibly shivers to
show it is cold. Milena covers him with her hand to warm him
up, and Al runs through the portal. He finds it cold -- as cold
as he has ever been, when he traveled over mountains. He can
see but not hear his companions on the other side of the portal.
Kat steps through to join Al. They walk up -- the stone staircase
continues to spiral -- and can see light and hear wind above.

They find a small hallway with four doorways -- no doors, but the
stone frames have been scratched up and damaged -- and a barred
window with a narrow arrow-slit window that shows steep rocky
snow-covered mountains, blue sky, and clouds, and tattered
curtains. Teeth chattering, Al says, "Shall we go back down?"
and then races back down.

The others chat with Zagrimil, who says that he knows they wouldn't
want to make any deals with him because there is not particularly
anything he could offer them. They ask him if he knows of Segorid
(he doesn't) or Zratz ("Of course! Who doesn't?") and becomes worried
when they ask why he's here. "Here? He's in this area?" They say his
worshippers are, and he says they're everywhere. Al asks if he knows
about binding tattoos and he says yes, of course, it's pact magic.
"Do you know how to remove them?" "Yes...." "...without hurting
the wearer?" "Oh, that's harder."

They argue about what to do next -- whether to borrow some of Logtaru's
robes and go explore immediately, go for supplies, leave a note, let
others know in person, etc. They decide to go for supplies, tell Fran
and Brittney (but not the Council), and come explore tomorrow, on
Kat's birthday ("Best birthday ever!")

Since Kat is shopping, she contacts Jae to say perhaps they could
use today for their shopping trip after all. In the process, Jae
says she heard Trish had approached Kat about a job offer. Kat
said she hadn't followed up because she assumed it was a prostitution
gig at the Dancing Dryad, where Trish works. They talk as they wander
through the market with the group; and suddenly Kat feels like everything
is going too slowly and someone pushes her in the back; and everyone is
looking at her strangely; and suddenly she realizes there is a crossbow
bolt sticking out of her chest with something black streaked on the
tip. Al notices there is something tied to the back of the bolt.


8 June 2019

Kat turns to throw a dagger in the direction the bolt came from, but
instead she falls woozily to her knees. She and Gnik catch sight of
a silhouetted figure standing up and then jumping down from a rooftop
about 200 feet away; the figure is tall, but not obviously identifiable
against the sun.

Al, having a rough idea of where the bolt came from, stands between
Kat and that direction in case another bolt comes that way. He points
out to Matty the note attached to the end of the bolt. Gnik sends up
a magical flare and says, "The shooter was there!" and tells Az to
follow. 

Milena, looking at Kat's wound, suspects the poison is Lie of Hell,
something meant to knock the recipient out for about an hour. She
removes the bolt and magically heals most of the damage. In the
process, she notices the note and hands it to Kat: "Ludmilla, I
believe this is for you."

Matty transforms into a direwolf, sniffs the bolt to try to get
a scent different from Kat's -- it is human, and musky -- and 
takes off into the crowd in the direction of the shooter, whose
scent is obvious.

Kat reads the note and hands it to Milena.  The note says:

"Happy birthday! You really should have killed me. -Ned"

Kat, now feeling much better, says, "Thanks, mom!" and takes off
running in the direction of the shooter. Milena makes a hand
signal for Boris to stay with Kat, and also follows.

Zassen flies ahead and projects into their minds a view of them
as cartoon characters on a map of the streets below, with a blinking 
dot where the shooter is. Ember grabs Gnik and leaps onto Matty's back --
as a direwolf there is plenty of space on her back for them.

By scent, Matty thinks the shooter is converging on a path he has taken
first, and has a sense where it would take him. She decides to
move to intercept, assuming he doesn't divert from that path.

Kat, knowing the city as she does, thinks he may be heading to
a block of derelict houses in the Ash Pit. She thinks it would
be a great place to lure someone into a trap, and asks Zassen
to relay that to everyone. He flashes, "TRAP! TRAP! TRAP!" across
their mental map.

Kat stops and Milena catches up to them. Kat says that maybe they
shouldn't all go barreling in because it's probably a trap, but
Milena is pretty sure she intends to go sneaking in on her own
anyway. Al sees that they are stopped and runs back to join them.

Gnik, watching through Az's eyes, sees something following the shooter,
maybe like a very large cat, black and yellow striped. He lets
Matty know; she smells it, and then sees it between two buildings
-- a tiger.

Az and Zassen continue to follow, and a couple of crossbow bolts
come flying up toward Az -- the bright blue bird that is obviously
following the shooter. Zassen sends an image to everyone showing a cartoon
bird exploding in a bunch of feathers, with sadness. Gnik, who was
sensing through Az's senses, screams and briefly falls unconscious.

Kat decides a frontal assault is a bad idea, but she wants to use
her disguise ability to disguise herself as an urchin and slip in
to learn what she can. Al suggests to Milena that he can skirt the
area and try to keep the attention of their foes to keep their
attention away from whatever Kat is doing. Milena tells him not
to get shot by any crossbow bolts, and he suggests she should
be nearby in case he does.

Gnik makes Matty invisible, which makes her a little bolder as
they approach the block where the shooter is going.

Kat wanders in, more acting than sneaking, and a young warrior
woman hiding behind a barrel sees her and whispers, "Kid, get
out of here!" Kat starts to protest she's just passing through,
and the warrior points a rapier at her and whispers, "Get. Out."

Matty sneaks in and sees several people hiding behind various
buildings... and also smells two people where she sees nothing.
They all seem to be clustered around a central clearing. She
slinks out again to move around the block and come in from a
different direction; as she comes out, she sees the big cat
sniff the air in her direction.

Al tells Milena he's going to go create a distraction. Milena cautions
that they are trying to be stealthy. He says, "Yeah, I know, I'm keeping
them from getting noticed. It's gonna work, you'll see!" He strolls out
from between two buildings and calls out, "Hey! People with crossbows!
Are you all having a good day?" Across the block, Matty stops in her
tracks -- and so does the tiger. Kat tries not to laugh.

Kat sneaks into the back of one of the buildings and sees a big guy
with a crossbow aiming out a window, his back to her. She pulls out
her crossbow and shoots at him, hitting him in the left buttock. He
roars in pain and spins around.

Al hears the yell, but no other response. He asks, "Are you all on
a contract job, or something else?" and moves forward... slowly.

Gnik and Ember climb onto a nearby rooftop. Zassen flies over to
the side, both to give himself a better view and to keep from
getting shot.

Matty lets everyone know via Zassen that there are two invisible
people among the warriors around the clearing, and gives them a
visual of where they are. Knowing where they are, Milena sends
a Guiding Bolt toward one of them, a Dorgenian woman who falls
to the ground, glittering.

Matty tracks the scent of the shooter to one of the buildings, 
finds him standing in the doorway, and bites him; he falls over
just as she becomes visible, and she sits on him.  Ember 
jumps down from the roof at the crossbow warrior behind the barrel.

From the far alley there is a growling sound and the sound of
possibly another shooter being attacked by the tiger.

Anny comes running up beind Milena and asks what is happening; she
says it is time to hit the shooters. Anny says she can do that,
and runs to join the melee.

Matty senses a spell being cast and sees a demonic creature coming
through the far wall -- but realizes as she sees it pass through Kat
that it is only an illusion.

Al hears someone mutter, "Well, I'm outta here," and senses them
trying to sneak off. Al makes an attack of opportunity to attack
them and calls out, "So, is anybody else going to try to run 
away? Because we could still talk...."

Kat uses Mage Hand to throw a rat from the corner of the room
at the shooter Matty sat on; and while he's distracted, she
runs at him with her rapier.

Gnik takes a Misty Step off the roof, sees a woman hiding in
the shadow of a building who looks like a spellcaster, and
fires a sling bolt at her, disrupting her spell.

Milena sends Mouse and Boris in opposite directions around the
edge of the perimeter to round up any foes that try to flee. She
moves into the shadow of one of the buildings at the edge of the
block, where she can see into the window the fight between Kat
and the original shooter.

Matty moves to the spellcaster and tramples her to try to keep
her from casting spells. In doing so, Matty finds that she is
not nearly as small as she appears to be; she is a much larger
and older woman.

Inside the building, the original shooter slashes at Kat with
a dagger, jumps nimbly up -- unexpectedly given his great size --
and crashes out the window, next to where Matty is grappling
the spellcaster. He curses and takes off running.

Boris runs up and bites into the wrist of the spellcaster. She
chants an incantation and five glowing darts hit Matty in the
chest.

Kat pulls out her hand crossbow and takes another shot at the
shooter. He crumples to the ground. Milena hits the spellcaster
with a Guiding Bolt, and although she is still conscious, she
seems to lose her fight.

Milena debates letting the shooter die, but Kat suggests they
might be able to get good information out of him, so Milena
stablizes him as they tie him up. They subdue the remaining
combatants.

Matty tracks the tiger and finds it goes into an abandoned building
in town and then transforms into a human whose scent is familiar.
Jae emerges from the building; Matty lets her go, knowing she can
find her again later.

City guards, having gotten wind of the commotion, come running to
the site of the scuffle and ask what happened. Several make an
attempt to give partial answers, and then Milena points at the 
shooter on the ground and says, "This man shot my daughter,"
dark and intense, as if everything else that happened is a
foregone conclusion.  The guards, intimidated, promise to get them
all taken into custody immediately.

Kat shows the note from Ned around to the group. She recognizes the
bow-and-mask symbol on it from having seen someone at the Dancing
Dryad flash it and be let into a back room when she was there with
her mom. Matty once saw it on the wax seal of a scroll being put
into a bag at Brittney's place. Matty says she thinks it might be
a symbol of the thieves' guild. Gnik says he thinks it is an
assassin's mark, because it has also been seen on at least one
weapon found at the scene of an assassination. They see it is etched 
onto the shooter's dagger as well, and the etching looks new.

They notice that all the combatants except for the young female
warrior who tried to shoo Kat off all had the distinctive accent
of Tarriola, although they were a mix of Jhoynians and Dorgenians.
They recall Ned also was from Tarriola.

Gnik pulls the shooter aside and uses Suggestion to
ask him what he knows about this assassination attempt. He says he
was hired to travel here from Tarriola and was given that note by
his guild -- he does not know who did the hiring. He was told to
shoot one of the group's members with the note tied to the bolt,
to lure the rest into a trap and kill as many as possible, and to 
leave the dagger with the mask and bow symbol at the scene. He was
told Kat and Anny were the top priorities to kill. He says they
were teleported to Saltmarsh to get there so quickly from Tarriola.

As the group discusses the situation, Anny says, "Maybe now would be
a good time to mention why I was late to join the group." When everyone
ran, someone tripped her -- impressive, because she is hard to trip --
and when she got up again her spear was gone and she didn't know who
took it. The spear, which she got in the sehaugan lair, can look like
any long skinny thing and doesn't leave a mark -- a perfect weapon
for an assassin.

Matty suggests that she could try, in dog form, tracking the scent 
of the spear to get it back. When they investigate, she finds that
the path goes straight into the water. Al pulls a sea creature out
of his bag of friends to see if it can track it in the water --
and a giant octopus emerges. Al asks it if it can track, but it
has been too long; any trace has dissipated.


22 June 2019

The group decides to have dinner at the Temple of Byorn and then
give their statement about the attack at the town hall. When they
arrive at Byorn's temple, Matty goes to talk to Britt privately
to try to get a contact with the local assassin's guild (the 
Nightblades) to see if they can get any leads on the individuals
who attacked them or hired the attack. She also mentions that they
plan to go through a portal to Jaelith tomorrow. 

After dinner they go to the town hall to give their statement; they
show the note that was on the bolt that hit Kat, and Al, Gnik, and
Matty describe the large striped orange cat they saw near the fight.

They return to their homes; Gnik tells Fran about their plan for
tomorrow. When Kat and Milena arrive home, Tatiana gives Milena 
a scarf she knitted, and a hat for Kat, because "scarf gets caught".



23 Klook 3275

When Kat comes down in the morning, Milena has ritually sharpened
one of Kat's knives, presents it to her, and anoints a spot between
her brows with a drop of oil. "Normally on seventeenth birthday we
would put you in linen dress and send you into wilderness with knife
to make your way, but maybe this counts."

They meet at Blackberry Bar's for breakfast, then head to Logtaru's.
The devil Zagrimil is still in its circle. He greets them and asks
if there is anything he can help them with. Al says he knows 
better, because Zagrimil is very clever and might talk them into
something they regret. The group bundles up in warm clothes;
Milena has the coat and boots she brought from home, and she
and Kat bring Boris and Mouse.

As they make their way up the spiral staircase, Al moves into
the first hallway off the stair and hears something off to
the side. Al calls out and a small creature with dusty wings
comes out and looks at him. Al asks its name and it makes some
sounds that that seem like they might be language, but he can
make no sense of it. He asks Zassen if he knows what they are or
can make any sense of them; he has no idea what they are and gets
the sense that they are just trying to have fun. Al decides to stay
at the end of this corridor to keep an eye on them while others
see what other rooms or passages might be along this main hallway.

Kat advances to the next passage where she sees something very
bright. She notes that and moves on. In the next room it looks
like everything has been trashed -- shredded tapestries and smashed
furniture -- and there is a glowing dome of translucent crystal set into
the ceiling as a light, with curtains to cover it that have been
pulled down. The furniture was mostly metal and stone but is now 
mostly rubble. The fabrics don't appear rotted, but the cold here
would have slowed that process. Kat sees another of the small 
winged creatures in the corner; when he turns toward her he's 
holding a vial of some swirling greyish liquid that he holds out
to her with a grin. She takes it and he removes his thumb from the
opening; some kind of sand explodes from the vial and goes everywhere
as he laughs. Some goes into her eyes and stings, but she gets the
sense it could have been a lot worse if she hadn't been quick to
dodge.

Kat recalls that she has read about mephits in the library; they
are elemental creatures that can be vicious if they are upset. She
believes these are dust mephits, which tend to find death morbidly
fascinating. Gnik notices that one of the fallen tapestries is
fluttering, as if it is covering a hole that lets a draft through.
As he gets closer, he can feel the breeze is warm. He tries to
mage-hand the tapestry out of the way but feels as though the magic
he's trying to use is squirming away from him. He tries again and
feels the magic twist... and suddenly eggs are falling from the
sky. He comes running out of the room, sliding on yolks. The
mephit is knocked down, looks at the ceiling, and opens his
mouth.

Matty moves into the next room which looks like another ruined
bedroom with another mephit that has wrapped himself in a 
tapestry and is rolling around laughing with glee. She can see
out the window out the end of the hall to see mountains with
some snow and rubbly ground cover that Milena would recognize
as glacial deposits.

They regroup and move toward the bright light with Al going
first. It looks like the other bedrooms but the crystal on
the ceiling has been broken open and the light behind it
is blinding.

Gnik warns everyone that he is going to try to clean himself;
this time it works, but he says he has to concentrate a lot
to make the magic work.

Kat mentions that it might be interesting to take the bright light
source with them. Al and Kat pile up rubble for Kat to climb up;
she feels carefully into the broken crystal and feels only smooth
stone. Kat takes one of the pitons from their climbing supplies
and tries to chip away the portion of the stone. It is a very
slow process; they decide perhaps now is not the best time to
try it.

They return to the first corridor which had two nephits in it; it
appears like the other rooms and there are two more nephits in 
the corner.

Anny stays behind to guard the way down to the portal to make sure
the mephits don't find and cross it; Az (now in snowy owl form)
stays with her.

Al investigates the window at the end of the hallway; he steps
into the window well, which is about five feet deep, and sees 
if he can put his arm out the window. About halfway in, he can
feel a force stopping his hand but he does not sense any wind
or temperature change. 

They move further up the central spiral stairs. There are marks all
along the stairs as if something very wide and hard was shoved through
the passageway -- like a boulder or a large armadillo.

At the next level up, there is a similar main hallway, perpendicular
to the main hallway below, with snowy mountains still visible through
the window at the end of the hall. In the first room there is a large
boulder embedded with green crystals -- which could have made the
scrape marks in the corridor. There is also an indentation in the 
floor with about four inches of liquid in it.

Gnik looks at the boulder from a safe distance and identifies it
as an earth elemental just as it starts moving. Al yells, "Hi
how are you we mean you no harm my name is Al what's your name?"
Anny yells from below, "Guys...? What's going on?"

Matty tries throwing her javelin of returning at it, and it seems
to hit. Al takes out his net and tries to restrain the elemental,
but the net snags on one of the crystals on its back. Gnik lets
everyone know that the elemental is most likely resistant to
non-magical weapons. Kat pulls out her rapier, runs forward to
take a swipe, and then disengages before it can get a blow in
at her.

Ember runs in and engages, stabbing at its lower legs while 
dodging away from its angry swipes at her. Gnik successfully
casts Grease and the elemental loses its footing and falls.

Milena attempts to summon a spiritual weapon but also feels the
magic squirming in an unexpected way. Rather than try to force
it into the spell she wants, she just directs it toward the
creature and lets it take whatever form it will. An orangey
substance covers the creature and then solidifies, trapping
it and keeping it motionless.


13 July 2019

Al asks Zassin if the creature is having thoughts. Zassin nods. Al
asks if they are good thoughts. Zassin shakes his head vigorously
'no'. Kat finds some tattered curtains to cover it up so it's not
looking at them.

Milena goes to the window at the end of the hall and looks out.
There are still tall snow-covered mountains, but also -- at a
height that looks like it was carved out of a mountain itself --
a massive statue in slatted armor of a type Milena has never
seen, gazing off to Milena's right.

Matty finds a pretty purple and white crystal; Kat takes a look
and thinks it is a sort known for its ability to store magic. Matty
asks if Kat knows how to store a spell in it, and Kat says she can,
assuming it has already been prepared to hold a spell.

There is a puddle on the floor; Kat investigates and thinks it is
water, but it seems to be self-cleaning. They hypothesize it could
have been set up as a source of water for a mage in the tower who
did not want to go all the way downstairs to carry water up -- 
but it is not clear why it is in the floor and not on a table
or something.

They move into the room across the hall, which appears to have
been a library. The shelves are stone, carved straight out of
the stone of the wall, but many are smashed and books are strewn
on the floor.  Also, there is a Dorgenian man on the floor, dead
and desiccated as if he'd been dead for about a month, and a 
translucent figure near him facing away from them. Kat calls out,
"Logtaru?" and he turns to face them.

He clearly is not aware that he is dead, and gets angry when they
suggest it; his face goes monstrous. Al takes over talking to him
and learns that he is here to find information that he thinks might
be in the spectral book he's holding, but he can't read ancient
Dorgenian. Al offers to help, and Logtaru asks skeptically if he
reads ancient Dorgenian. Al says no, but Milena mentions that if
Logtaru knows how to make the sounds from the symbols in the book
they may have a device that can translate.  Matty uses the pearl
of translation; the book is a slow and wordy, but it becomes clear
that it is the story of Dorg. Logtaru says he is trying to prove
that Dorg was here on Jaeleth; but in the first part of the story
he is still a mortal and is on some completely different world.

Kat has noticed that while the two rooms on this level seem to
be the only two, there is a significant gap between the two of
them. While Matty translates for Logtaru, Kat inspects the shelves
at the far wall, pulls at a couple that are not connected the way
the others are, and they swing away revealing a space behind
them. Several of the rock shelves fall and shatter, and at the
same time there is a clattering sound from the other room.

Al and Anny go to investigate and discover the mephits are on
the earth elemental with rocks trying to break it out of the
amber -- and are making progress. Al decides to try to distract
them by singing, dancing, and doing acrobatics; he attracts the
attention of most of them and leads them down the stairs.

Logtaru finishes reading the book aloud; Dorg's people had lost
faith in their god, and when Dorg leads them to a new world they
declare him their god. They eventually meet others who say that
this new world is called Jaeleth.

Logtaru is thrilled that he has proved his people did come from
Jaeleth, and not only the Jhoynians as some claim. He says he
needs to return to prove it to his peers. He does not fade,
however, and Matty gives Milena a Look. Milena asks Logtaru if
she knows who is the dead man on the floor. Logtaru looks surprised
and embarrassed and says he was so excited about the books that
he hadn't even noticed, and assumes it is the owner of the
library. Milena asks permission to tend to the body; Logtaru
grants it, and when she turns over the body to show its face
he stares in recognition, apologizes to Matty, and fades from
view. Matty says they should honor his memory by taking the book
back and sharing the story with others, and Milena agrees.

Kat investigates the secret room, finds a chest and opens it. She
finds several items, including a strange puzzle box, a small casket,
and a crystal like what Matty found except that it is glowing. Matty
comes over to join her as she goes to grab the glowing crystal;
there is a flash, and Matty sees Kat disappear -- but Kat can still
see herself. Her clothing and possessions are still visible, however.

There is a yell from Anny below: Al has led the mephits to the
egg-filled room, tried to bowl with them, and failed horribly,
and now he has fallen, they piled on him, and one of them blew
dust in his face to temporarily blind them. The others rush down
to help, but the room is slippery with egg. Unfortunately, the
mephits can fly.

Anny manages to get her daggers into a mephit and tears it apart;
it dissolves into dust. The others slip and slide as they move into
the eggy room. Kat tries to mage hand one of the mephits into the
wall, but the magic seems to be slipping away from her; she guides
it, and the room seems to turn blue for a moment -- and at the same
time, her eyes (in her invisible head) flash blue.

Matty turns herself into a spider and webs one of the mephits, but
it breaks free. She webs it again and points at it with one of her
legs. Milena tries to move to it and attack, but slips. They hear
a crash from upstairs, and she decides that she should let the
others deal with the fight here while she goes upstairs to retrieve
Logtaru's body, the book, and his staff before the earth elemental
gets to him.

She runs upstairs and sees the mephit that stayed upstairs breaking
at the amber with a rock. She hurls a javelin at it and it goes
through its arm. It screams, sticks out its tongue, and grabs a
smaller rock with its good arm to keep pounding. The group finishes
off the mephits downstairs, and Kat comes running up, shooting an
arrow at the mephit. She sticks it in the leg, but it continues
pounding with the rock. 

The amber shatters and the elemental emerges; Boris tries to attack
it and it slams him, flinging him out the door. Kat catches him,
but he is close to death; since magic is not reliable here, Milena
asks for a potion of healing for him and Matty hands her one. She
applies it, and Boris wakes up and licks her face. "Good boy," she
says. "Stay." 

Kat tells Mouse to stay with Boris, and pulls out her magic sword
to attack the elemental. She stabs it through the arm and rocks
fly out. Anny and Ember also attack, and then the elemental swings
at them both; Ember hits the far wall and goes down, but Anny is
able to roll with it and just gets ain injury in her leg. Matty
throws her javelin at it and sticks it in the neck, while Anny
swings with a dagger and it breaks off.

Milena runs to Ember and tries to heal her, since there are no other
potions readily available; she is unable to control the magic, and
she suddenly feels a warm glow. The others see glowing light emanating
from her, filling the room, and Milena feels that she could channel 
the power into a healing touch. She touches Ember, who gasps, wakes 
up, and says, "You're so pretty...." Milena kisses her forehead.

Kat suddenly becomes visible again as Al makes his way upstairs. He
is covered in egg yolks, so he runs and slides between the creature's
legs, punching up into its groin as he goes. A tiny chip of rock
falls off onto his face as he slides by.

The creature rears up and then sits, trying to crush Al, who flips
out of the way. It swings at Kat and clobbers her, breaking her arm
and throwing her back. Milena channels healing energy toward her,
and while she's still injured, her arm feels more functional.

Al uses his insight to determine that the creature is not very
bright and will attack at the most obvious and flashy thing.
Kat casts a minor illusion to make the creature think its head is
enclosed in darkness; because it is not very bright, it stops attacking
for a moment, confused. Ember hits it with a dagger. Al is making noise
to keep its attention on him and it swings blindly at him and manages
to connect. It also tries to hit at Ember but she dodges.

Anny and Matty attack at the same time, both hit, and the elemental
breaks apart into bits.

Milena uses the rest of her wild magic healing on Ember, Anny, and
Kat; they are still injured, but not as badly. Matty finds a huge
book -- two feet tall, one foot wide, one foot thick -- that appears
to be about magic but is not a spellbook.

The group takes the green crystals that were embedded in the elemental.
Al roots around in the rubble to see if anything else came out of
it.

The group decides to return Logtaru's body and all the readable books
that are in the library to Logtaru's place, get some healing, and
then return to the upstairs of the tower to see if there are any more
threats that might come through the portal. 

Al comes through the portal first and tells the devil that they talked
to Logtaru; he says, "So he's ok then?" and Al says, "Oh, no, he's
dead." Calrik makes a sad sound and curls up in a ball.

Milena uses her magic to heal the party up. Matty finds books in his
library on using rituals to open and close portals, and on summoning
devils. Milena lays Logtaru's body in state as best she knows how
according to Dorgenian customs, and says a few soothing words to Calrik.

Kat pulls out the small chest she found and picks the lock. It feels very
heavy, although nothing makes sound when she tilts it around. When she
opens it, she has to peer down four feet -- deeper than the height of
the chest -- to see into the bottom. There is a bag of coins and
a bag of three clear gems in the bottom. The coins are iron with
symbols that do not look familiar to them; one side is a complex
symbol and the other is an image of a mountain. There is a square hole
cut off-center in each coin. There is also a star-shaped puzzle lock
of some sort.

Kat is aware that some magic chests like this one have the ability
that one can call for a specific item and it will come up without
having to reach in for it; she throws the pouch back in, calls
"Pouch," and it appears at the top.

They come back through the portal and up the stairs. When they get
to the level with the disintegrated elemental, they hear a voice
call out, "Hey... guys?"

They suddenly realize that all their memories of Gnik had been erased
from their minds from the last several hours, but they come flooding
back.


17 September 2019

They realize that the spell-trap crystal Gnik touched created a
wild surge that temporarily removed him from existence. He takes
the crystal, still in his hand, and puts it into his pack.

They climb the stairs to the next level; as they go up, there is
an increase in rubble on the stairs that they must scramble over,
and it becomes bitterly cold. They come into an open room that looks
completely destroyed -- rather like a wizard's lab that an earth
elemental has crashed through, with bits of brass and glass smashed
on the floor. There is another glowing translucent dome of crystal
on the ceiling. There is a tattered set of armor that is of the
same style as on the statue outside, and several broken single-edged,
slightly curved swords.

The stairs continue up, and there is a loud, cold wind coming from
above. Al scampers quickly up to the top to see if it's worth
further exploring, and Anny and Milena (who is well-bundled)
follow in case he needs back-up. It becomes obvious that the tower
used to be taller, but the top has been torn off. The last few steps
up are covered with rubble. There are gouge marks on the ground and
in the rubble, like claw marks the size of longswords. Al thinks
he sees a glint of gold buried in the rubble.

Al quickly, trying not to lose his footing, tries to see what the
gold glinting is. It seems to be a gold coin, and he sees another
silver coin glinting on his way. He leaves them where they are
and returns to the group. Milena makes her way to the top, pulls
her scarf off her face, inhales a deep breath of frigid mountain
air, and nods.

The rest of the group continues exploring the shattered lab. They
find more suits of armor with a sword standing beside each, and a
stone table with several items on it that look like they could
be a mage's lab equipment. There is a statue behind the stairs, 
very lifelike, that looks like a kimono-clad woman.

The group who went upstairs comes back down, and while Gnik is
discussing what they found in the lab, Kat sneaks up the stairs
to try to retrieve some of the coins. She gets only a few before
she is so cold that there is frost on her hair and her limbs are
starting to go numb.

Al walks over to the statue and asks, "Are you alive?" He hears
a whooshing sound as the two swords whip out of their stands and
the suits of armor start moving.

Al tries to grab one of the swords out of the air, but he misses
and it slices deep into his hand. Ember slams her dagger into
one of them and breaks the sword's tip. It comes at her and slices
into her arm.

Kat tries to use Mage Hand to grab one of the swords.  The magic
twists away from her; she feels that she has grabbed a sword,
but it is difficult to control. Matty hits the other sword with 
her own longsword, and the floating sword shatters.

Al grabs again at the remaining sword; his hands close around
it without touching -- and realizes it is the Mage Hand. They
work together to hold it steady so someone else can smash it.
Ember attacks one of the suits of armor and knocks pieces from it.
Gnik flings a sling bullet at the remaining sword and the sword
shatters.

Kat realizes that her Mage Hand is persisting even though she
stopped concentrating on it. She pulls out her rapier and starts
attacking one of the suits of armor. She uses her Mage Hand to
try to untie one of the straps on the armor; the armor tries to
swat at it and knocks its own helmet around.

Milena uses her staff to swipe the legs out from under the other
suit of armor; Matty hits it with her longsword and it shatters.
Al and Anny take out the other.

With the foes defeated, they take a closer look at the statue.
Gnik notices that it has clearly been placed there; it was not
created there, and if it were a person who was turned to stone
or a magically created statue it was moved here from elsewhere.

The group discusses what to do with the statue. They discuss
whether it is worth bringing it back through the portal to
Maerson to see if it is a person who can be revived. On the
downside, if they close the portal while she is on the Maerson
side she will be trapped there; and they do not know if she
might be evil. They decide it is better to bring her through
rather than leave her to an unknown fate, and discuss how to
bring a heavy stone statue down the stairs. Gnik suggests using
his disc of carrying, but realizes the magic might be dangerous.
Milena suggests he go down the stairs back through the portal
to cast the spell safely, and then bring it back up. He complains
that is a lot of stairs he is not tall enough to climb easily,
so she sends him with Boris.

Kat examines the coins she retrieved from the roof. The copper
coin has a bridge with buildings on top on one side, and a sad
woman looking down on the other. On the silver coin there is
a hemispherical pit with a tower built in the middle on one
side, and the face of a halfling on the other. There is a
brownish coin with a square cut out of it, with an artistic
arrangement of shapes on one side and symbols she does not
recognize on the other. Two of the gold coins have a massive
tower on one side with architecture that does not seem possible,
and a wolf's head on the other side. Another gold coin has a
massive wall with a golem built into it on one side, and a well
with a bucket on the other. The final gold coin has three coins
in a triangular arrangement with a gem at the center, the other
side has a sword crossed with a dagger and mace on the other.

Milena recognizes that the three crossed weapons are the Maerson
trinity of Ceonaire, Maria, and Byorn; and on the other side the
symbol of the Merchant god, Etlath.

As they bring the statue down, Milena glances up the stairs toward
the roof and says to Kat, "Now you know one of the many reasons we
no longer live in my homeland." "Yes. Thank you," Kat says.

Gnik casts a Detect Magic once they are back through the portal
and finds the statue is magical, but does not appear to be a
magically transformed person. The star-shaped lock is also 
faintly magical.

While they were gone, Calrick has pulled out several items that
he knows Logtaru will not need anymore but the group might have
use for -- ink that he used to write in his spellbooks. He also
mentions that Logtaru had a bag of useful items in the bottom of
his wardrobe. Kat goes to investigate, pulls out a drawer, hears
a click, and eight shapes appear around the room -- they have a
strange and putrid smell associated with them. Gnik recognizes
them as minor demons called dretch, which can expel a cloud of
noxious gas that can make those in the area sick.

Ember leaps on Boris and charges across the room at one of them,
stabbing it in the leg. Gnik, realizing that the thing demons
hate the most is devils, creates the illusion for one demon that
its neighbor is the devil the group encountered in the swamp.
The effected demon turns in fear and runs to the nearest window,
trying to break through to flee.

Kat casts Sleep and the two demons nearest her fall to the
ground. Milena casts Guiding Bolt at the demon running to
the window and hits it. Al moves to defend the circle around
the devil Zagrimil and nets one of the demons. Mouse takes a
bite at one, and then spits at the bad taste.

The two standing dretch nearest Kat charge her; one belches
out a horrible gas cloud, but she manages to hold her breath
to avoid the worst of the effects. The dretch running to the
window attacks it, trying to get out; the group sees a protective
glyph on the other side suddenly glow, and the dretch's brain
suddenly glows and it falls over and explodes in a way that defies
the laws of physics, collapses back on itself in a pile of disgusting
goo on the floor, and disappears.

One of the remaining dretch charges toward Zagrimil's circle and
Matty tries to shove it back. She spins it around and shoves it,
and it stumbles away. Anny runs into the fray to help Kat with
the two attacking her. Matty changes into a giant spider to
defend the circle, as Ember and Boris finish of one of the dretch.

Gnik points at Al, who suddenly doubles in size. Behind him, Zagrimil
says, "Well. That's cool." Matty sprays web on the dretch nearest
the circle.  Kat casts Sleep again at the two dretch that charged
her, and one of them falls. Al, enlarged, feels extra-strong and
takes a swipe at the dretch in front of him, which is pushed back.

The dretch in Matty's web pulls itself free. The one Al grappled
with tries to get past him, and manages to dive between his legs
and cross into the circle. Zagrimil reaches out and grabs the
dretch, putting his claws into its head, and it dissolves in a
pile of maggots.  Al yells, "Zagrimil's free...!" However, Zagrimil
returns to sitting where he was.

Anny takes out the remaining dretch next to Kat, and Ember skewers
another one. Matty, still in spider form, bites at the one that
broke out of her web, and it dissolves in ichor. Kat kills the 
three sleeping dretch.

Matty asks Zagrimil what he plans to do next. He says he at least
will stick around in case they need help closing the portal. He
mentions that if it is closed incorrectly it could explode, leveling
the equivalent of a city block. And in fact, it will explode even
if it is closed correctly, but he thinks he can contain the explosion
in that case. He names his price, which is that the group does not
kill him today -- but they are free to do so later if he does something
else to piss them off. Gnik checks the book on portals, which they note 
is called "Creating and Maintaining Portals" -- not closing them --
and it confirms that the portal creates a channel of energy that
is not meant to be broken, and so is difficult to do. Gnik also
realizes that Zagrimil is the source of the power to the portal, and
so if he is killed before the portal is closed -- whether now or
later -- it will explode. Gnik says, "We accept your offer" -- but
Matty says, "No, you can't answer for the whole group!" Gnik 
explains what he has learned.  They ask what Zagrimil's price would
be to close the portal and leave Maerson forever; he asks for Kat's
lucky Ag coin and Gnik's spellbook of chaos magic.

As the group discusses what to do, Kat tries to use prestidigitation
to whisper something to Zagrimil, but she hears his voice in her
head saying, "Why don't you just tell me?" Mentally, she negotiates
to give him her lucky Ag coin and her small cube of weightless metal
in exchange for closing the portal and leaving the area of Saltmarsh
for the lifespan of everyone in the party. He promises to close the
portal within three hours of being asked, and to keep the explosion
within the confines of Logtaru's house. Zagrimil hands her a
contract and a pen; Matty steps in front of her to ask what she is
doing, but lets her sign when she explains what she is doing.

Kat looks in the backpack she retrieved from the cabinet; it has
a necklace with a blue jewel, an antler-hilted knife with a
strange pattern in the blade, and an odd chunk of rock that Kat
recognizes as a chunk of raw, uncut blue topaz that would be worth
close to 1000 gold pieces if cut. There is a backup spellbook and
a roll of leather with four sheets of parchment with spells on
them: Skywrite, Suggestion, Whisper Wind, Banishment.

The group works to remove the valuables out of Logtaru's house; Zagrimil
helps, carrying stacks of books that they would never be able to lift
themselves. Milena tends to Logtaru's body to keep it properly shrouded
and treated with respect.

When they go outside, there is a kid sitting across the street to tell
the group that Britt has invited them to breakfast, her treat, to meet
with some people they need to meet with.  Matty leaves the group to
go about her own business.

Al asks Zagrimil why he wanted Kat's coin. Zagrimil said it is an
abomination, and must be destroyed.

City guards show up, size up the situation, and help round up carts
to take books and other items to the library, and to let Milena take
Logtaru's body to the temple of Dorg. Calrick goes with Gnik, who
says he could use Calrick's help at the library. Before they leave,
Kat gives Zagrimil the go-ahead to close the portal; he leaves the
door open so they can see, touches places around the portal, which
start glowing, and then moves inhumanly quickly as the glow gets
bigger. He vanishes, and the room bursts into flame.


24 August 2019

Milena arrives at the temple of Dorg and meets Lales, the assistant to
the priest. He says they will see to Logtaru's remains and thanks her
for bringing him. She shares that Logtaru died on a quest to find
evidence of the history of their god, and what he learned; she tells
him the book is with the librarian Gnikobol.

Lales pays a visit to Gnik to inquire about the books, and suggests
they should come back to the temple of Dorg. Gnik asks for time to
catalog them, so Liles draws up a contract saying that the books
belong to the temple of Dorg, but Gnik has one week to catalog them
and may have free access to them after that.

Al goes to the Gibbet, and then to the island, looking for Matty,
but does not find her. The druids tell her that there are pockets
of illness in the Flotsam and she may have gone there to help. Al
asks Anny, who has come with him, if she is interested in spending
the night with him and she says yes.

Gnik talks with Fran about the books they found, and the statue.
After an Identify, they discover the statue was created by a wild
surge that teleported the caster away and left an identical statue
in their place. Fran notes that Curt has been helping Gnik with his
duties quite a bit while he's been away and asks pointedly if Curt
is being paid. Gnik makes a note.

Gnik takes Ember to dinner at the Silver Raven, and stays the
night with her.

Milena returns home to have a family birthday celebration with Kat,
but Svetlana is called away almost immediately; her supervisor Janelle
sent a note saying she was called away suddenly to Byorn's Estate by
the High Priestess and asks Svetlana to look after things in her absence. 
Kat mentions that they have learned someone may be targeting priests in 
town. Svetlana looks nervous and says that the handwriting was Janelle's,
but she usually refers to the high priestess by name, not by title. She
jumps on her horse and rides away. Jelena also excuses herself to go
to the Flotsam, where an illness has broken out. Gavriila is staring
at the cake, so the rest of the family enjoys it in celebration, and
them Milena and Kat go outside to talk about Kat's history and her
deal with the devil. After that, they go to the Flotsam to help with
the sick. Most of the sick have been treated throughout the day, but
there are several who still need help. Milena offers to use her prayer
beads on the very sickest. Jelena mentions that usually something would
be contained by the combined efforts of Britt, Janet, Brendan, and the
other high priests. Milena notes that these are the very people they
think are being targeted, and wonders if this illness were placed here
on purpose. They begin making inquiries to see if they can gather
information about who might have been Patient Zero.


24 Klook 3275

The group gathers at Britt's in the morning, but Matty has not
arrived yet. Britt takes them to a private room; a man arrives
with a package wrapped in linen for Al, and when Al asks who
sent it he says it was given to him by one of the servants at
the Lasseter estate. 

After Gnik checks it for magic and Kat checks it for traps, they
carefully open it and discover there is a book, and a note that
says it is from Beyolin. It is the book Al was accused of stealing
that Beyolin actually stole; Beyolin says that Egan has instructed
him to return it to Al, because Jaime no longer needed it. It is 
full of characters Al does not recognize; but when Gnik looks at 
it he thinks it is another version of the book of Zratz they got 
from the orphanage. After some investigation, he concludes that 
it is encoded.

Matty has still not arrived, so Milena sends Boris with one of
Brit's people to look for her.

Kai, a sailor they know, arrives and hands Brit a scroll case before
joining them in the room. She says she has gotten in touch with the
Night Blades, who were made to look like the perpetrators of the attack
on Kat, but there is suspicion that the attackers were not actually
part of the group. The scroll she brought will allow them to 
communicate with the Night Blades, who are elsewhere with another
scroll and will be ready in a few minutes.

Al takes the scroll and asks if they know why the group was targeted.
The response is no -- that the attackers weren't Night Blade's people.
Al asks why they pretended to be; response is no, but a lot of their
people are angry about it and think the Thieves' Guild might be
behind it. Al asks if they know who hired the assassins; they say
no, but finding out would help, because folks seem ready to start
a war over it -- probably with the Thieves' Guild. Al asks why
Kat and Anny particularly were attacked; they say no idea about
Anny, but they know the Thieves' Guild wants to recruit Kat -- which
is the argument of the writer of why the Thieves' Guild was NOT
responsible. Al asks why Anny's spear was stolen; the response is
"Didn't know about a spear. Was it useful? Magical?" Rather than
answer, Al asks whether there are any other out-of-town assassins
in Saltmarsh other than the ones they caught; the response is only
one, but they weren't involved, because the Night Blades have had
them locked up for over a month. Al asks if the Thieves' Guild runs
the Black Market -- and where is it, and do they want the group to
bust it; answer is Ha! "No" to all three, neither they nor Thieves'
Guild has any involvement, but if the group busts it the assassins
will bust them, as that's where they get many of their resources.
They also say they don't know anything about Brendan's murder or
who's spreading disease and why, but that they're being hit by
the disease too. Al asks if they know what Zratz's followers are
doing; they say nothing good, but the group knows more about that
than the Night Blades. Al asks if they have any questions, and 
they ask if Kat is going to join the Thieves' Guild; Al draws
a shrug. They ask if the group killed Ned; Al says they didn't
kill Ned, but that the attackers were instructed to leave a
note to make it look like Ned had hired them. Al tells them
that the attackers claimed to be from Tarriolla. They say
thank you; good to know who to go after; and that they haven't
heard from Ned since he went to the old spooky house.

The search party who looked for Matty comes back and says they
found her and Lyto the head druid... dead. They are on the
island near the tower. Kai asks to go with them, as she also
knew Matty. As they are discussing how to get there, Britt pulls
out a rolled-up carpet and unfurls it, and it hovers in midair.
They all pile on.



When they arrive, there are many people there who offer their
condolences. Juliana is there and invites them in; she looks
worn out. She says it looks like someone beat Lyto and Matty
to death with a small mace or fists. They go into the room
(except for Kat) and see that Matty is sitting in the corner
with her head lolled to the side; she has no weapons, though
she has the rest of her equipment. Gnik finds a claw mark
that appears to have been made by a flying creature that
touched down from above; both appear to have been beaten after
they were killed, and Lyto appears to have been killed in his
bed and then dragged partially out. The cause of death is not
immediately obvious. Gnik and Milena send Az and Zassin to try
to find Deanna to make sure she is okay and not involved in
this.

Milena stays with the bodies to cast the funeral rite that will
protect them from becoming undead for seven days, and to be where
Zassin can easily find her. Kat and Anny have shut down to process
what has happened. The rest pile onto the carpet to go to the
library so Gnik can learn the "Last Image" spell from Logtaru's
spellbook, which will allow him to see the last thing these two
saw. Gnik tells Kai that they also found claw marks when Brendan
was murdered, from the demon Segorid. They pass the obelisks
where Deanna usually hangs out, but she is not there; Kai and
Al jump off the carpet to try to track her.

Al finds Deanna's barefoot tracks, left after the recent rainfall
-- widely spaced and only on the toes, as if she were running very
quickly. The footsteps go to the entry of the house connected to
the lighthouse tower, but as she was standing at the door it 
appears something dragged her backwards.

Kat hears them talking and recalls that Deanna told her that she
had been taught to sense and master death; and perhaps she sensed
the deaths at the tower and came to see what had happened.

The rest of the group returns; Gnik casts his spell and touches Matty,
and he sees Deanna in the main room with a look on her face like she's
yelling "No!", and between her and Matty's vantage point is Segorid
holding the handle of a long weapon that appears to be going into
her chest. They are certain it is Anny's stolen spear, which does
not leave a wound.

Gnik shows the image to the group. Kai asks, "Is that Deanna?"
Juliana says, "Who's Deanna?" They clear everyone else out so
no one else can overhear and Al shares the story.

Kai asks if the prisoners who kept Deanna had been questioned,
and Juliana says the leader has the ability to resist magical
detection of lies. They discuss their suspicions that whoever is
doing this is targeting magical healers and someone mentions Milena
can do this now, too. Juliana expresses surprise and asks some
questions. Milena and Al suspect she is just a little too interested
in this information, and in the story of Deanna. Milena asks Zassin
to follow Juliana and see where she goes, and to report back immediately
if he sees Deanna.

Kat asks Milena if their house is hallowed ground; Milena says no,
and that she herself does not have the skill to hallow it effectively.
Kat suggests perhaps they and her sisters should sleep at Britt's
for the near future to be on the safe side. She gives Milena the
uncut topaz as a future payment for someone else to cast the spell
to hallow their property.


28 September 2019

While Gnik works on decoding the book they got from Bayolin, Al plans to 
go to the curio shop. Gnik asks him to ask Heidi when and how she got
the pipes -- she'll know what he's talking about -- and also asks him
to pick up a small lead-lined box -- he gives Al a string indicating
the appropriate inner dimensions.  Anny plans to go with Al.

Zassen comes back and shares that Juliana went to talk to Egan, who
referred to her as Drarnemas, though she still addresses him as Egan.
She tells him never to address him as that name again or he will
understand how complete her control can be. Al is aware that certain 
kinds of demons and devils can possess others, which seems to be
what is going on here.

Al goes to the curio shop and tries to remember the question Gnik
asked... something about pipes? Anny remembers -- where did Heidi
get the pipes from originally -- and Heidi says she had them for
so long that she will have to consult her records. Al asks if she
has any magical weapons such as brass rings that he can put on
his hands to do damage against magical foes. She says she can
have something for him for the next day, and she also has a
lead-lined box she can sell him.

Al goes next to Exotics to see if they have magical weapons that
might be of interest to him.  When he arrives he sees two of the
people who work there talking, and they beckon him over -- but
he cannot hear anything they say even though they are obviously
talking.  He runs through the gates but slams into some kind of
invisible force field. The two Exotics employees look annoyed,
walk around feeling the force field, and then one of them pulls
out paper and writes, "This is blocking all our communication,
including our teleportation." Al writes on the dirt to ask if
they have anti-magic, and they write back that that's something
they would usually go elsewhere to get if they needed it.

Kai, Ember, and Milena go across the street from the Byorn temple to
the temple of Maria to warn Janet what they have learned. Milena
dresses in clothing other than she would normally wear to be less
obvious to those who might wish to harm her. They knock, are admitted,
and are taken back to the library. They eventually are admitted to talk
to Janet, who seems exhausted. They tell her what they have learned
about Juliana and Egan, and name the demon who possesses Juliana.
She has not heard of him, but suggests her assistant Porter might
know something.

Porter finds an entry on Drarnemas, who has been around a couple 
hundred years ago; reality around him ripples so he is hard to 
look at when he manifests; can take someone over completely. Immune 
to poison, resistant to fire and lightning, can knock observers 
unconscious if they just look at him; resistant to magic but can 
be killed by weapons; very arrogant. Must manifest before taking
possession of someone; can allow them some control but also take
complete control so they are just along for the ride. Possession
can happen purely by force, without consent or in some case even
awareness of the possession.

Al and Anny continue their errands, which takes them past the Lassiters.
Al notices that both main guards are out, with extra guards posted at
the entrance, including Keren who is a member of Fenric's guard...
along with other members of that team, and Pattie, the assassin who
is supposed to be locked up after working with the assassin team that
tried to kill Kat and Anny, and who had fun fighting Ember when they
walked into the trap of abandoned buildings. Al also notices that the
foliage around the estate looks like it has died back a bit.

Al decides to go chat with the group, catching up with Keren and then
introducing himself properly to Pattie. She says she is from Freeport
and came to Saltmarsh where there is less competition for the kind
of work she does, and now she's working off her sentence -- with Keren
keeping an eye on her. Al gets the sense she's trying to make a name
for herself as a great duelist.

On the way back to the tavern Milena stops by the Houses of Healing
to learn the latest on efforts to find Patient Zero in the outbreak
in the Flotsam.

They return to the tavern and Al shares the information about the
blocking field around Exotics. The rest, including Britt, are not
pleased.

Kat asks to spar with Kai and they ask Britt where they should do
that. She gestures to the stage and smiles. Kat shows off a bit,
doing flips and being very acrobatic in her moves, but notices
that when Kai hits anything with her sword, she hits HARD -- she
is very strong.

Milena tells Britt that she would like to talk to a god who is
not Britt's god, and asks if it is ok to do it here or if she
should go to a more appropriate place. She says it should be
ok... as long as it's not Maria, and she smiles. Milena says
it is the Explorer, and Britt says she thinks he and Byorn
play poker... and both cheat.

Someone comes to tell Kat that someone is here to talk to
her. It turns out to be Tricia; the two of them talk around
the fact that Tricia is inviting her to go through tests to
join the Thieves' Guild, and explaining the benefits of
being a part of the Guild. Tricia asks if it was really
the Assassin's Guild that tried to kill Kat, and Kat says
it seems that it was someone else pretending to be the Assassin's
Guild. Kat says that if the Thieves' Guild were to look into
that incident and find out the truth, Kat would consider that
an act of good faith by which she would more seriously consider
their offer.

Milena finds a private room, strips down, lightly cuts her arms
to make an offering of blood, and tells the Explorer that she
did not understand years ago that he was calling to her, but
she sees more clearly now. She dedicates herself to his service
and asks his guidance and wisdom. 

She hears the window to the room open, and a man falls in --
Ver Stowell, whom she had met five years before when he came
to seek the Compass of Daln, which he now carries. Milena says
she thinks she needs that. He walks around her and finds the
compass keeps pointing to her, so he hands it over. He looks
very beat up and says he could use a drink. She gets dressed
again and they go downstairs, where he shares that he got
beat up and his companion Ruby killed by a demon on the way in, and
that they passed many demons and fiends quite close to Saltmarsh
on the way in.

The group decides to go ahead and try to use the Banish scroll
Gnik has to banish the demon Drarnemas from Juliana. Milena looks
at the compass and finds it points to the Lassiter estate, the last
place Juliana was seen; but to keep up appearances that they don't
know she's possessed and in league with Egan, they go first to
the Town Hall, where they're told she's gone home, and then to
her house, where they're told she's at the Lassiters meeting
with Egan. The group heads to the estate.

The guards say that Juliana is in a meeting with Egan and has
asked not to be disturbed; Al asks if Beyolin or Jamee are in,
and a servant is dispatched to look. As the door opens, Milena
asks Zassin to slip in camouflaged and scout around, and Gnik
sends Az, carrying Calrik, to fly around to scout the grounds
and try to find a way for Calrik to get in. Beyolin is there and 
invites them into a receiving room while they wait. Gnik asks
if he may ask Beyolin a somewhat uncomfortable question, and
Beyolin hesitantly says yes. Gnik asks why he stole Fenric's
book all those years ago, and Beyolin says it is because Jamee
told him to, and he was a kid, and she's scary. Then Kat asks
if she may ask a kind of uncomfortable question; Beyolin at first
says no, but then says yes; she asks if she could use his bathroom
because she has never used indoor plumbing before. Beyolin says
Al asked the same question the first time he came over, and directs
her across the hall.

Kat leaves the water running to make it sound like she is still in
the washroom, disguises herself as the servant Jack, and slips out
to explore. Al and Milena both notice her walk by the open door
and realize it is Kat; and they also notice Beyolin noticing and
obviously ignoring it.

Down the hall, Kat finds a library and Egan's office; as she looks
into the office, she realizes it is not as big as the surrounding
rooms would suggest, and goes looking for secret doors. She finds
a well-constructed and well-hidden door hiding a backpack, a lever
that looks like it would open a section of the wall to the outside
of the house for a quick escape, and a trap door in the floor. Kat
checks the traps, oils the hinges to make sure they don't squeak,
and carefully peeks under the trapdoor.

Zassin communicates that there are very few people around. He saw
Egan and Juliana talking upstairs, several servants sleeping in
their quarters, and a few servants wandering around the house.

Kat lifts the ring and sees a ladder going down. It is pitch black,
so she is relying on her darkvision. Al asks Zassin to relay to Kat
that she can take her time because Beyolin knows what she's doing
and doesn't care. 

The group in the receiving room hear two pairs of footsteps coming
down the stairs. Al stands up as Egan and Juliana come into the
room and asks why they have come. Milena shares that an ally of
theirs has arrived in town and reported that several demons and
assorted fiends seem to be closing in on Saltmarsh. Juliana looks
shocked and asks if the military force has arrived yet. Milena
says she does not know if the whole force is there, but some are,
because their ally was injured by one of the demons and received
aid from some soldiers. Juliana turns to Egan and suggests that
they should send the military to deal with the demons, but Al
says that it sounded like it sounded like the demons were the
biggest and most powerful in existence -- hoping to irritate
the arrogant Drarnemas. Juliana stammers that that seems
unlikely; meanwhile, Gnik begins reading the scroll, and Egan,
who sees the movement out of the corner of his eye, takes a
step back. Gnik finishes casting the spell; the writing dissolves
from the scroll, they see for a brief moment the huge and
disturbing shape of the demon, which seems to explode into
nothingness and Juliana falls backward. Egan says, "She seems
to be ill, perhaps I should take her home. You are welcome to
join, but there may be things here you still want to do -- and
I believe one of your friends might need help soon." Bayolin
takes a carafe of wine and joins Egan.

Kat continues her explorations. She finds supplies, including
several unlatched chests. One is about half-full of red and
brown robes; mostly red with brown symbols embroidered on them.
She takes one and sticks it in her pack. She finds candles, a
box with a tinder in it, a box of small glass vials with clear
liquid with a bit of fogginess to it.

Milena checks the compass, which is pointing in the direction 
Kat went. The group catches up with her as she finishes looking
through the boxes and is ready to go through another door she
found opened by a lever. Daln's compass points through the door.

Al recognizes that the symbols on the robes and the candles are
the symbols of Lume, the god of plague -- also known as Lumaka.


5 October 2019

Kat picks the lock and opens the door to find a small room filled
with shelves, many of which are empty, but some of which contain
chains with spikes on the end, a metal bell with a striker, and
several several other doors including the back side of another
secret door. Kat pulls out a dagger and flings it.  A small creature
appears as the dagger hits it and then falls to the ground. Kat
tries to use her Mage Hand to bring the dead creature toward her,
but it is already bubbling and dissolving.

As they move into the room and explore it more closely, they see
that one of the doors has not only a bolt but also three dials
with letters on them. Gnik uses Mage Hand to retrieve the striker
from above the bell and stashes it in one of the boxes of robes.

The compass is spinning, pointing to all the doors. Milena tries
tilting it up and down, but it seems to be telling her that everything
here needs to be dealt with.

Kat begins playing with the dials and spins them until the letters
on them spell OPEN ME. She pushes the dials in and they click into
place. Nearby, there is a section of wall that looks like it used
to be a doorway but has been bricked in. Al inspects it to see if
it is an illusion, or if there is a loose brick that might open
a secret door, but it seems like a regular wall.

Gnik uses prestidigitation to create a small cork and shove it
into a small tube that looks as though it could release something.
Kat finishes picking the bolt lock and opens the door into a room
full of tables.  About halfway through the room there is an arc
painted on the floor; on a nearby table there are rocks, sticks,
and some sort of lizard creature in a cage. Gnik recognizes it
as a tuatara. There are jars, a piece of paper wrapped in a ribbon,
and papers in a box. On another table are papers, a reddish square
of some rock-like material that seems to be glowing from the other
side, and two small objects that look like a cube cut in half and
the sections put on opposite ends of the table, and three greenish
swirly stones. On the back table are two tall cages, each with a
small pot-bellied, green-haired creatures about a foot tall -- rum
gremlins. One is standing, the other is lying in the bottom of the
cage. The one standing has the wound dealt to the rum gremlin on
the ship, and its eyes are white.

Al tries to talk to the standing gremlin to asks who it is, to see
if perhaps it is being inhabited by a lesser demon and that's why
its eyes are white.  It stares at him a moment, then snarls and
lunges at the bars of the cage.

As the group discusses whether there is a mage in the Lassiter
family, a voice says, "Define Lassiter." Gnik looks around and
realizes the tuatara is speaking to them. He tells them he was
a childhood plaything of Jack's, but was given the gift of speech
by Lir -- the last mage Al was aware of being in the Lassiter
family. They ask the tuatara's name, and he says it is Ojen.
They ask what Jack has been up to, and he says Jack and Jamee
have been bringing people here and doing bad things. They ask
if Deanna has been here, and Gnik shows an image. Ojen says yes,
briefly, but then she was taken for a ritual by Jack, Jamee, and
the beast.  Gnik shows a picture of Segorid and asks if that is
the beast, and Ojen says yes. They learn Ojen has never been
outside and would like to be freed, as long as he will still be
able to get food. They asks what he eats, and he lunges forward
and eats a cricket. They assure him that will be easy to come by
outside, and tell him that they will come back and free him after 
they finish exploring the basement

Al, Kai, and Kat listen at the three remaining doors. Al hears
grunting behind one door, like two non-human beings wrestling.
The group suspects these might be the creatures that would be
summoned by the bell on the shelf. Kai hears no noise behind the
next door. Kat comes to examine the lock on it, and two of the 
screws on it suddenly turn into eyes and says -- with the keyhole 
as a mouth -- "Get lost, kid -- you don't have a key." Kat goes 
back into the storage room and re-disguises herself, this time 
as Jamee so that she has a better chance of imitating her voice.

She says to the others, "Let's just go into the other room and I'll
explain everything... oh, I don't have the key, OH HY GOD." The door
complains that she doesn't have a key, and she says, "Just open the
damn door!" The lock relents and pops open, but they still hear it
complaining as they walk through. It is a small room full of shelves
with jars, neatly labeled, with things like diseased heads.

Gnik borrows a couple of spikes from Kat and quietly wedges them
under the door to the wrestling creatures. It probably won't stop
them but will at least slow them down a bit.

Kat finishes her exploration of the back side of the secret door.
It is a small door, only a couple of feet high and a couple of
feet off the floor. Kat opens it and is hit with a blast of dead
air; there are cobwebs and a skeleton, and it appears to open
into the family catacombs. They listen quietly but don't hear
anything. They wonder if this perhaps was a former entrance to
this secret area. Al tries crawling through the small door and
discovers the skeleton is stone and the cobwebs are illusory.
He searches the wall near the secret door to see if there is
another secret passage in an empty space between the storage room
and the basement. While he is searching, he hears a noise to his
left... and realizes a fresher body is moving, and so are several
other skeletons. He scrambles back through the door and shouts,
"Close the door! Close the door!" They do so as at least a dozen
shapes move through it. They hear the talking lock chuckle and
say, "You all deserved that."

Gnik recognizes the workmanship of the bricked-up section of wall,
and realizes it's about 30 years old and done by someone who is
more likely to have put something in place that is meant to stay
in place rather than as a mechanized secret door.

They decide to go through the remaining door with the grunting;
Milena pulls out the compass and it is now pointing to that door.
Kat quietly picks the lock, opens the door a tiny bit, and peeps
through. There are four creatures, each unique. Two look like
they used to be people. One of those is being stomped into the
ground by a more grotesque creature with one tree-trunk-like
leg and a mouth for a hand. A second grotesque creature is
leaning against the wall in the corner. Kat sees that the
stomping creature has its back to her, so she enters the room
and stabs it in the back with her sword Torchlight. It yells
and she stabs it a second time with her dagger.

Milena tries to hit the slouching creature with Sacred Flame,
but it dodges; she hits it instead with Spiritual Weapon in
the form of a scimitar, and Ember stabs at its legs.

Kai runs into the room, slashes at the stompy-legged creature and
takes out its smaller leg. It falls to the floor moaning. Zassin
takes off from Milena's shoulder and flies into the darkness at the
back of the room, where there are stairs going down. The group notices
that there are nine torches missing from the sconces on the wall.

The other creature charges at Ember and accidentally impales itself
on her rapier. They notice it does not use the staff in its hand
to attack, it only bites at her. Gnik hits it in the leg with a
sling bullet and then tells Az to fly around and distract it.

The first more human-looking creature pulls itself up from the
floor and tries to bite at Kai, but trips over its own feet and
hits its head on the floor; the other one comes at Al and tries
to bite at him, but he dodges.

The creature with the now-missing leg starts bubbling like tar 
and dissolving, producing an unpleasant stench; clearly it is a
true demon. Kat takes out the foot of the one that stunned itself 
and it dissolves and then blows outward into dust.

Al attacks the other one that looks more human, hits it in the neck,
and it seems to fold in on itself and disappears. Al and Kat realize
that the two more demon-looking creatures were ruddikin and the other
two were their victims, who are affected with their diseases and turn
into abyssal wretches after they die.

Zassin sends Milena a message that there is a door down the stairs
and he can hear people talking; he sends out a sense of the words,
and it sounds like someone is giving a motivational speech in Jhoynian.

They move to the stairs; Kai activates the dim light of her sword, and
Kat, still disguised as Jamee, grabs a torch. They reach the bottom of
the stairs and there is a door that doesn't even have a lock on it. Kat
listens and hears someone talking; it sounds like a male voice, but
not Jack.

Kat pulls open the door and stomps through the door like she owns
the place and surveys the scene disdainfully down her nose. The
space is definitely some kind of temple. There is a rectangular
pool near the door with pews on either side of it; the room slopes 
downward toward a dais with a man standing and talking, flanked by
two others. There are others in the room who turn to face them as
they enter.  One of them is Robbie from the Stern Rally, and they
recognize others from around town: a member of the guard, a dancer
at the Dancing Dryad, a chef, a secretary at one of the other estates,
a scribe, and others -- a total of nine people. Jack and Jamee are
not there. Seven torches are set among the pews. The walls are covered
with tapestries depicting scenes they don't particularly want to look
at.

Kat stares witheringly at the group and says, "Well?" The man
speaking, Clevel, asks, "How are you here? You went in the ritual
room."  "Well, obviously it circles back around and there's another
door!" She walks toward the door indicated, and Kai moves to
follow. Gnik says, "DON'T LOOK AT ME," lights a candle, and moves
toward the assembled group of cultists. The majority of them stare
fascinatedly at the candle, but Clevel and Robbie shake it off. Clevel
yells, "Kill him!" and points at Gnik.

Al runs at Robbie and tries to snare him in a rope and tie him up; he
hits, but Robbie dodges from being wrapped and grabs hold of the rope.
Kai also runs at Robbie and tries to take him out without killing him.
She slices his left leg and he staggers back a bit.

Gnik sends Az to fly around Clevel and keep him from reaching for the
javelin on his back, which the group recognizes as Matty's. Zassin
flies to the wall and pulls back a section of curtain. Milena moves to
it and sees the outline of the door, and a section of slightly rotated
stone that is probably the latch. She also re-casts her Spiritual
Weapon and hits Clevel with it.

Ember runs along the tops of the pews, hits Robbie in the neck with
her dagger, and he goes down bleeding. Ember says, "Oops," and puts
her hands over the hole to try to stop the bleeding.

Kat uses Mage Hand to open the door to the ritual room; the section
of wall slides inward and to the side. 

Clevel charges at Gnik to try to take out the candle; Kai strikes at
him as he goes, and he falls flat on the ground in front of Gnik, not
moving, without putting out the candle.

Inside the ritual room is a hallway, walled with stucco instead of
stonework, molded with demonic visages, disease, and pustulence.
Gnik suggests to Kai that she takes the javelin from Clevel, which
returns automatically.

They make their way down the hall, which curves back and forth, although
it doesn't appear to be a natural passage; it looks as if it were carved
or built this way on purpose. They get to a set of doors, thick enough
that it is difficult to hear through them. Kat opens the door into a
50 ft diameter circular room with a 30 foot ceiling. There is a pattern 
of continual flame on the ceiling in some sort of demonic symbol. There 
are stairs down into the room on either side of where they came in. 
Around the room about halfway up the wall are men and women suspended
on chains by their arms and waists; they recognize some as townsfolk
they have seen. Deanna is chained in the middle of the room, between
Jamee and Segorid; there is another robed figure with his back to
them who turns to face them as they enter. It is Nathan Borrel, who
was seeking the Pipe of Plague five years ago.

Kai enters the room and flings her handaxes at Segorid. They hit
him and she hears a voice in her head saying, "That is going to
cost you." Jamee tells Nathan to finish the ritual; he replies
that she should kill the others quickly because if she doesn't,
he will want to. Her boots sprount wings, she rises into the
air and she casts a spell that makes a spiked chain appear, glowing
a sickly orange, right in front of Kat -- who still looks like Jamee.
It slashes and stabs her.

Al takes a running leap off the landing, over the head of Nathan,
and lands next to Deanna, ready to defend. Segorid takes a couple
of steps backwards, claps his hands, and their brains are filled
with a horrible blackboard-scraping screech, stunning Kat. Milena
yells out, "Deanna, hold on. We are coming to help you," and sends
her spiritual scimitar at Nathan, slashing his leg.

Ember makes a run, trying to swing off Jamee in place of a chandelier
and take her down.

Nathan glares at Milena, waves his hand to his left, and another
ghostly spiked chain appears, slashing the throat of the first
suspended prisoner.

Al pulls off Deanna's hood and gag; while trying to figure out how
to get her chains off, Zassin sends an image of Gnik coming in and
waving his hands and making her chains come off.

Kai falls into a berserker rage and runs down the stairs, charging
Nathan. She slices into his arm and he snarls, "Who the fuck are you?"
She snarls back, wolf-like.

A black beam of energy comes from Jamee's hand and slams into Ember.
Her grip slips just a bit, and she falls, hitting the ground hard.
However, she still manages to hit Segorid in the leg.

Segorid appears next to Al and attacks with his claws, but Al manages
to parry and dodge.

Milena slashes Nathan across the chest with her spiritual scimitar;
he responds by killing another of the prisoners. Kat becomes un-stunned
and fires her crossbow at Jamee, hitting her in the stomach, and then
runs down the stairs to join the fray.

Kai swings at Nathan again, hitting his foot; he looks like he is
barely standing. Jamee drops to the ground brandishing a longsword;
it bellows "GROVEL" and the group recognizes it as Matty's old
longsword. Kai falls to her knees.

Az flies in with a miniaturized Gnik on her back brandishing a Knock
scroll. The chains fall from Deanna. Segorid yells, "SHE WILL BE
SACRIFICED!" and tries to charge around Al to get to Deanna. Al
and Ember swing at him as he goes, and Al hits, but Segorid still
takes a swing at her, slicing her back. 

Milena hits Nathan with her last blow with the spiritual scimitar,
hitting him in the leg and tearing up into his gut. He goes down.
She casts Sacred Flame at Segorid, hitting him.

Zassin sends a mental warning to everyone of light shooting out
of Kat's eyeballs and making those in its path distracted. The
rest of the party averts their eyes as Kat casts Color Spray
in the direction of Segorid and Jamee. Segorid covers his eyes,
but Jamee is temporarily blinded. Gnik casts Phantasmal Force
at her to cause her to perceive an angel busting into the room
and coming at her. She turns to flee, using her boots to try to
fly to the door, but she is blinded and Kai is able to swing at
her as she goes. She squeals in pain but keeps going. Milena hits
her with a Guiding Bolt, which hits her so hard that she goes limp
and falls heavily to the ground just before reaching the landing.

Deanna shakes off her chains and takes a swing at Segorid, but
misses. Kat takes a swing and cuts his arm deeply at the elbow.
Deanna stands up and slams him in the chest with her fist; Milena
actually sees him tramble a bit as her eyes flare up and the 
necrotic effect appears on his chest.  Kai slams him in the shoulder
and shatters the antlers protruding from the side of his head and
shoulder.

Gnik flies out on Az to tend to Anny, whom Zassin has shared is
unconscious. Milena hands off a healing potion to him as he
goes. He drops the potion to Zassin to give to Anny, and then
continues up the stairs in pursuit of Candace, the cultist member
of the guard who was the only one not affected by sleep spells
from Gnik.

Segorid tries to teleport away; but as he crouches down to initiate
the teleport, Kat skewers him in the back and he erupts and disappears
into nothingness.

Kat takes the flying boots from Jamee and slips them on.

Gnik and Az get to the top of the stairs and see the door to the
catacombs open and a zombie crawling out. He closes it using Mage Hand.


26 October 2019

In the ritual room, the light appears to be getting slowly brighter.
Kat says, "Mom... you're glowing...." Milena takes a moment to meditate
to figure out what is going on, while the rest work on helping the
suspended prisoners.

Zassin sends word that Anny has taken a healing potion and is doing 
better.

Gnik continues up the stairs into Egan's office, and Al runs the
same way a bit later. They hear a loud clanking noise like all the
metal in the house slams into stone. Gnik sees that a portcullis has
slammed down over the windows. Al catches up to him, and they decide
to try to chase the fleeing cultist Candace through the front door.

One of the freed prisoners stalks up to Milena and asks what she
did with Ver. "I healed him," she says. The woman points to the
compass and says, "How did you get that, then?" "Ah, he found that
it pointed to me, and gave it to me. Are you Ruby? He thought you
were dead. We will take you to him when we get out of here."

Upstairs, Al and Gnik encounter a servant and start to talk, and
then Al yells, "I've been stabbed!" Gnik realizes someone was
standing behind Al, either invisible or incredibly stealthy, stabbed
him and then quickly fled. They both catch enough of a glimpse to
be almost positive it was Jack. Al is hurt badly and decides to
drink his healing potion. The servant they encountered has vanished
-- probably an illusion.

They move to a hallway intersection so they have good sightlines, and
Al asks, "What was your plan, Jack? Take over the city all for yourself?"
He hears a crossbow twang, they see Jack for a brief instant, and a
bolt embeds itself in a wall near Al. Gnik makes an illusion of himself
and then hides behind a chair.

At Al's request, Zassin sends a message that Gnik and Al need help.
Deanna and Ruby say they can stay and help the rest of the prisoners
while Kai, Kat, Milena, and Ember head upstairs. But as they are running 
out,the doors to the chamber slam shut in front of them. Kai tries pushing
it open and it slams shut again, so she slams into it, knocking it off
its hinges. As they run past the door, it flies at Kat; it slams into
the far wall and breaks into three pieces.

Al says, "Gnik, I heard Jamee somewhere else in the estate; I'm going
to go find her, you stay here and keep watch."  Al then moves to hide
behind the door he thinks Jack is most likely to come through.

They hear a voice from further down the hall: "Hello? It sounds like
a fight going on? Can I join?" It sounds like Keren, from the city
guard. Gnik says there is a fight and asks if she's okay. She says
fine except for the skeleton they just dispatched. Gnik warns them
that more may be coming from the crypt.

Keren, Pattie, and Cyril proceed down the hall, see Al, and he puts
a finger to his lips for silence. He gestures down the hall to Gnik.
Keren says Candance had come through and said that people needed
help, so they came in to help, but then everything slammed shut.
Gnik tells them Candace was part of a group that was getting ready
to perform a human sacrifice in the basement, that they stopped them,
but there are still cultists around.

Kai and Al both look in the library where Al thought Jack was hiding,
but don't see him. Al tells the guards that Jack is a necromancer --
they know because they found his lab -- and that he can probably
make illusions. They hear heavy footsteps near an entrance and a
skeleton comes into view. 

Milena and Kat make it into the hallway and Gnik sees that she is
glowing; he suggests she go stand near the skeleton, for science.
She moves that way and it charges him, so she pulls out her holy
symbol and tries to turn it. The glow becomes very bright and floods
the house; they hear voices cursing with surprise around the estate.

Al asks why that happened and Milena holds up the compass, as though
that explains everything. As she holds it up, open, it points very
clearly to the floor above them.

Gnik finds that the front door is barred, but yells to the guards
on the other side to go next door to get Egan, and tell them they
stopped the ritual. Kat, Milena, and Al move up the stairs. As they
do, Kat feels something grab at her -- surprisingly, since she thinks
she should be able to see invisible things --  and Al gets slammed by
something. Al tries to kick at it, but doesn't seem to make contact
with anything.

They reach the landing and Milena holds out the compass. She feels
something try to slam it out of her hand, but she keeps hold of it
and points down the hall to where it is pointing.  As they move
down the hallway, a crossbow bolt comes from behind and hits Milena
in the back. Kai sprints off to find who did it, and Gnik sends Az
to look as well.

Milena channels energy to heal those nearest her; they are flooded
with a divine white energy. Kat and Pattie join Kai in opening doors.
Gnik yells out, in rat, "Calrik, watch out for a man with a crossbow!"
Calrik reports that weird things are happening: there were all these
zombies and skeletons, but then there was a bright light and they
exploded. Gnik says that's good -- not the zombies and skeletons, but
the exploding. He tells Calrik to stick with them.

Pattie opens up a door, searching for foes, and three crossbow bolts
come whizzing toward her. Two hit her, and she dodges the third. Kat
throws a Sleep spell into the room; she hears two thumps, gets down
on the ground, and peeks around the corner.

Al stays back with Milena, and suddenly a bunch of paint brushes
come flying out of the art room at them, hard end first. They
dodge any major damage, but still get some bruises. 

Az lands on Kai's shoulder, and Kai turns invisible; Kat can still
see her with a blue glow around her. Pattie plunges into the room,
and Kai follows.

Another crossbow bolt comes flying at Milena from in front of 
her and Al; Al jumps in front of it and tries to catch the bolt,
but it goes through his hand and shallowly into his shoulder.
He briefly sees that the shooter is Jack, and yells, "It's Jack!
....Ow."

Kai, still invisible, comes running up, followed by Kat. A violin
comes flying out of the music room and hits Kat. Zassin flies off
Milena's neck, flies down the hall toward where Jack is, and 
fades into invisibility. He projects an image to them of Jack,
and behind him Jamee, floating and translucent with a black
aura -- a banshee. Milena casts Bless on herself, Al, and Kai.

Gnik runs up to join them, reading a scroll. When he's done, the
text disappears from the scroll and a glittering shell appears
briefly around him. He tells them it is a Protection From Undead
spell, but it's not clear whether it will work against Jamee.

Down the hall, in the room where Pattie and Ember are fighting
an antagonistic servant, they hear a thump, and Ember says,
"Nice shot!" "Thanks," says Pattie.

Al whimpers at Milena and holds up his injured hand, so she casts
a healing spell at him. Kai, still invisible, peeks around the corner
where Jack and Jamee were, but doesn't see them. She moves down the
hall planning to peek into rooms to see if she can find them, and
sees that a bedroom door is open. As she investigates, she sees
Jack crouching in a storage room with the door open only a crack,
pointing a crossbow.

Gnik suggests to Milena that they move to the intersection of
the hall ahead to try to keep Jack and Jamee from escaping. Milena
checks the compass, sees it is pointing that way, and they begin
moving -- toward the storage room. Kai hears them coming and yells
out, "Jack's in the storage room!" He shoots the crossbow, badly,
turns to see who yelled, and tries to flee from the room -- but is
hit by the invisible Kai. Al runs in and attacks, hitting him several
times. Jack drops his crossbow and draws his short sword.

Kai, having attacked, is no longer invisible -- so Gnik casts
invisibility on Milena and Kat. He sends Az to help attack Jack.

Milena moves to where she has line of sight on Jack and casts
Guiding Bolt; she then gets out of the way so Kat can get around
her and into the room. She runs in and attacks, skewering him
in the hand as he raises his sword, and then stabs him in the 
chest with her dagger. He falls backwards, and Jaime appears in
the room, hovering over the bed.

The sight of her is terrifying; she smiles, opens her mouth much
farther than it should go, and lets out a wail that shakes them
to their bones; they feel life being drained from their bodies.
Jack falls backwards and his head hits the ground.

Al and Kai attack with daggers and swords, and Milena hits with 
a Sacred Flame. Kat runs up and skewers Jamee, and she explodes;
however, Al sees that the black energy around her seems to flow
down the hall, and Milena sees that the compass is pointing in
that direction. 

They follow to a room Al knows is Jamee's bedroom. When they open
it there is a stench in the room like decaying human flesh, and a
sickly sound of movement that almost makes them nauseous. It otherwise
looks like a typical young woman's room, except that there is a sheet
covering something that looks like a birdcage, and black energy is
emanating from it. In it is a dome with two fingers, one desiccated
and one fresh, with black energy swirling around it. The fresh finger
is wearing the same color of nail polish that Jamee was wearing, and
they recall seeing her hand was bandaged.

They discuss what to do and Milena is planning a ritual sanctification
when they hear the house shudder as the bars open up again. Most of
the town is there, including Egan and Janet, the latter of whom says
she also would do a sanctification, so Milena continues while Janet
heals the rest of the party.

Egan tells them that whatever Jamee was involved in, he wants no
relationship to it, so they are free to take any of her things;
Kat has claimed her boots and her bag of holding. They tell Egan
that Jamee actually died, twice, and he seems genuinely shook,
but says she brought it on herself. "Still," Milena says, "I am
sorry for your loss."

While Milena completes her ritual, the rest of the group goes
downstairs to investigate Jack's lab. Egan claims not to have
any knowledge of what is downstairs except for a secret path
to the outside; he seems sincere, but then so did Jamee.

In their explorations, Kai picks up a piece of paper and starts
reading it -- and stops again after she gets a paragraph in.
She says, "I don't want to keep reading this because I think
something bad will happen!" She feels a tingling, and a painful
sensation like her blood is slowing down. Gnik takes the paper
with Mage Hand and reads it, learning that it is a recipe for
the poison that coats the paper. Kai did not hold the paper
long enough to absorb a fatal dose, though.


2 November 2019


25 Klook 3275 - 3 Agram 3275

The group spends time dealing with the aftermath of the battle. They
find Jamee's diary and learn that she, often at Jack's instigation,
was behind most of the schemes they have faced, including the hit
on Kat and Anny, which was meant to spark a war between the thieves'
guild (looking to recruit Kat) and the assassins' guild (falsely
accused of the hit). She only included Anny in the hit because she'd
been spending so much time with Al.

Deanna stays with Al's mother for a while, but over time gets to know 
her brother Bayolin and their mother and moves back in with them. Mallon
comes back through town and presents Al with his headband of dark-seeing
and pays a visit to Gnik to retrieve the spellbook of his servant the
halfling mage they battled.

Heide contacts Al to let him know she has found something that will
help his hands act as magical weapons -- an ancient item with no known
history that looks like a rock with some holes in it; it appears too
small for him, but when he puts his hand in the holes it morphs to
conform to his hand.

On the 29th, a messenger boy finds Kat and delivers a message to her
from Saltmarsh Sendings. The rest of the group eventually gets their
own notes.  It is from Zagrimil, containing a coin each can use to
contact him by whispering his name over it. Kai learns from Britt that
it can be destroyed in the hot fires of a forge and she takes hers to
be destroyed. Kat and Milena decide to keep theirs; Milena makes sure
not to keep it on her person since it's possible Zagrimil could use
it to spy on them.

Britt reveals to them that she is a member of a secret organization
called the Hopeful. She lets them know that when their ship is ready
to go, there is someone stuck in a Fortek prison (a city in Dorgenian
lands). In order to get to the prison they would have to find a contact
of Britt's in the Twin Cities who knows where the prison is, and needs 
to be convinced to help them. The prisoner is a friend of Britt's, and 
also has information about what happened when Anlim invaded Sarim -- an 
act in which many people, including the queen of Sarim, vanished.

Svetlana returns home with the body of the leader of her order. Milena
spends much of the week working with other priests and priestesses on
funeral rites and ceremonies of public mourning for the many dead.

The army returns on 2 Agrum. The raid on the sahaugin lair was very
successful, thanks to the intel from the group.

Milena checks in with Juliana, who hasn't been making any public
appearances after her ordeal. She confesses that she is planning
to step down from the mayorship and retire.

Milena checks in with Ver and returns Daln's Compass -- which is
now pointing to Ver.


16 November 2019


4 Agram 3275

Eleanora has information about the Black Market, which Gnik asked
her to investigate. They go in the evening to talk with her, and
the place is packed with the returned military and others celebrating
their victories. Perytar ushers them upstairs. Al asks if Perytar has
seen his brother among the soldiers, but Perytar says he hasn't been
by. When they get upstairs, Nora is tending to Eleanora, who has
been injured and poisoned by someone trying to kill her. Milena
uses her necklace to remove the effects of the poison and then
heals her; Gnik and Kat tell her to change out of her tattered
and bloody clothes so they can Clean and Mend them.

Eleanora asks if they really want to try to shut down the Black
Market, and Gnik says that so far they want more information to
help make the decision: on the one hand, they have been incentivized
to find proof of its existence and location; but on the other, they
might make enemies of the assassin's guild, who use it heavily.
Eleanora thunks a dagger on the table with the symbol of the Night
Blades on the hilt -- the dagger used to try to kill her. She says
the only way she knows to the black market is through a contact of
hers that she finds at the assassin's guild. She says she can get 
them a time, place, and location to meet her black market contact.

Milena learns that she has gained the power of Sending and sends
a message to Kat's father letting him know that his daughter made
a deal with the devil Zagrimil to learn his identity and advising
him to be cautious if Zagrimil comes to him. He replies that Bogdan
sent people to Saltmarsh last week, and says that he will send help
and come soon after.


5 Agram 3275

Kat receives a note from Zagrimil that verifies what Milena learned
from the Sending and adding details: Her father's name is Ron, he
is the son of a Thialli elf and half-elf, and he followed the one
surviving thug from the encounter with Milena back to Bargal Valley,
where he has been slowly ingratiating himself with the locals in
order to spy on Bogdan; the thug died soon after returning to 
the Valley and before he could tell anyone else about what happened.

Having been warned by Kat and Al that Calrik seemed to be acting
strangely, Gnik realizes there is a good chance he is actually
a summoned low-powered devil spirit in rat form. He tries asking 
Calrik what he observed about the devils and demons Logtaru 
summoned, and what he knows about the thinking and motivations of 
such beings. He says demons just want to destroy reality so they
can be reborn in a new form. Devils have a specific purpose;
Zagrimil's specific purpose is to collect souls to power an 
aspect of the hells. Gnik asks who specifically Zagrimil might
be trying to help; Calrik starts to answer, but then gets very
nervous and asks for some cheese.

Milena calls a family meeting to tell her other daughters about
the coming threat; Lana is the only priest at her temple right now
and will come to the house to defend if needed, but may be more
needed at the temple. Jelena will stay home to defend her youngest
sisters; Milena gives Rodger a dagger (he asked for a sword) and
sends him to patrol the streets for signs of Bogdan's men and let
her know when and where he sees them.

Milena and Kat share the news with the rest of the group. They do
not have a good way to know how these men are traveling -- magically
via Exotics, over land by horse, or some other way -- which would
make a big difference in how long the journey might take. They discuss
asking Exotics to see if they can learn whether these men used those
services, and looking for jobs in town because they don't want to
abandon town -- and particularly Milena's younger daughters -- if
the men show up soon. They agree to share the news with Britt,
Eleanora, Rodger's network, and Fenrik.

Gnik decides Calrik is too dangerous to keep around; he traps Calrik
and explains the situation, says there are no hard feelings, and
then dispatches his mortal form, sending him back to the hells.

The group decides to investigate claims that bad things keep happening
in the cemetery. They meet at Britt's and Milena tells her about the
coming enemies from Bargal. They go to the cemetery; Al and Gnik 
decide to talk to the cemetery keeper, Sally, with Anny and Ember
joining them. They find her hiding behind a statue with a crossbow,
guarding her property; she asks what they're doing there... at
midnight. Al says they hadn't planned to, they were just going to
investigate the rumors of strange happenings, but decided to ask
them about it. She says no one has ever bothered to come talk to
her about what happens in the cemetery.

Kat, Kai, and
Milena stroll the graveyard within line of sight of each other.
They come around a hill and see a huge glowing mastiff. Kat says,
"Good boy!" and he sits; Milena asks if they may come, and his
body language says its okay. Kat and Milena find that even though
they can see through him, they can touch him while he's looking
at them, and Kat can pet him with her Mage Hand. They give him
lots of belly rubs while Kai performs a ritual to speak with animals.

Back at the keeper's house, Al asks Sally about a hellhound that has
been spotted there; she says, "Yes, I summoned it; it was a gift from
Vlondrel to help guard against those seeking to steal bodies, and it
is actually a celestial. Al mentions their companions are wandering
the cemetery and maybe he should go catch up with them, and invites
Sally to come along if he wants.

Kai finishes her spell, and the dog comes to his feet and starts
talking to her -- but they all can hear it. He tells her the
spell was not necessary, but humor is important. He says he has
been helping stop graverobbers, and caught a couple just a few
weeks ago; mostly he just scares people off. He says he is also
here during the day, but can't be seen in daylight.


6 Agram 3275

The group reconvenes for breakfast at Blackberry Bar's. Rodger
comes in, runs up to Milena, and whispers, "I found a Bargallian,"
just as a tall man walks in, removing his upper armor and sweating.
Kai stands up in a defensive stance, but doesn't draw a weapon.
Milena stands, faces him, and the two begin conversing in Bargallian.
Kai asks, "Friend?" and Milena nods; he introduces himself as Nikolai
and says he came through the magic doorway, which Ron paid for. He
says in broken trade that Bogdan is trying to enact some kind of
ritual that requires an inexperienced girl of Milena's line. Kai
says, "Inexperienced?" and Milena replies, "...means what you think
it means, yes." Gnik says this sounds similar to something he read
in Fenrik's book about the Lume ritual requiring someone who carries
no secrets. Milena says that is no one in her family, and the other
meaning is much more likely. Outside they hear barking that Milena
recognizes as Gavriila's dog; she runs outside to find Gavriila,
dripping wet and bleeding slightly from the back of her head. She
says masked men came to the house, knocked out Jelena and took
Tatiana, who hit her in the head with a frying pan. Milena, Kat,
and Nikolai take off through the streets to try to intercept the
men, while the others head to Milena's house.

As Milena and Kat cross the bridge, they see Bellto coming the
other way; he asks why Tatiana was walking with three masked men
who are staying at the Raven. Milena tells him they have taken
her, and takes off running toward the Raven. Bellto calls out,
"Don't hurt my inn!" as they disappear.

As they round a bend, they see a chaotic mob of people with traffic
stopped by an overturned cart and horse. Two masked men are trying
to figure out how to get around it while a third stands to the side
lightly holding Tatiana's arm. At that moment they get a message from
Zassin that he's found Tatiana, and that there is another masked man
still in Milena's house. Milena asks him to warn those coming to her
house, and then asks him to ask Tatiana why she is going with these
men. She replies it is so fewer people will be hurt.

Kat runs onto the rooftops and tries to shoot the man holding Tatiana,
but misses; Milena signals to Nikolai that they should run up opposite
sides of the street under cover of the crowd. As she runs she casts
Spiritual Weapon and takes off the man's arm at the elbow, as Tatiana
steps aside with perfect timing; he falls to the ground screaming and
clutching his bloody stump. A spear flies through the crowd and pins a
second masked man to the overturned cart.

The third man grabs Tatiana and starts to run, but Kat drops down
with her rapier and slices him in the leg. He falls, and she finishes
him off.

While Nikolai retrieves his spear, Milena stands over the man with
the missing arm and says, "I warned him." He growls, "You cut my
arm off, bitch!" She says, "You took my daughter." He passes out.

The others reach Milena's house and find a man with a scarred face
and eyes that look dead or missing; he stands, turns to face them,
and says, "Where is Milena? She must die." Al asks who he is, and
he gives his name as Manin. He tries to attack Al, but Al dodges
and then attacks with a flurry of punches that stuns him. Ember and
Kai attack with swords, and then Gnik casts Silence. Al continues
to pound on him, and he falls to the ground; dark energy flows from
his mouth and he falls to the ground.

Kai finds Jelena bound and gagged, but conscious, and with a serious
contusion on the side of her head. They discuss the undead man they
fought; Gnik checks his book and believes it is an advanced form of
sword wraith, which could be created to a specific purpose or create
itself if it died without achieving its objective.

Kat, Milena, and Nikolai discuss that they have not yet encountered
the powerful warlock or the woman in the group sent from Bogdan; they
wonder if they might still be at the Raven. Milena thinks if these
are the most powerful members of that party, they will want the rest
of the group as back-up. Kat offers to do reconnaisance on the Raven,
and promises not to do anything foolish; Milena gives her a look,
and Nikolai says, "I think there is history here."

Gavriila and Tatiana head back to the house; before she goes, Tatiana
looks at Milena and declares, "I had an adventure!"

Kat decides to disguise herself as Juliana so she can ask questions
with some level of authority. She asks to see the registry, and
between her acting ability and her persuasion, convinces Sami,
the man at the front desk, to show her the guest registry. He asks
if there is anything he can help with, or anyone specific she's
looking for. She asks about foreigners, and he describes a group
that is clearly the people they're looking for; the two remaining
are in the largest suite, and the other four have gone out.


28 November 2019

Kat reports back about her scouting, and mentions that Duke Ledford
is also in residence in one of the suites. Nikolai does not know
much about the warlock Havel Brabec and the warrior Marika Jandova
except that the warlock is very powerful and the warrior has some 
renown.

Kai and Al want to talk to these foes to find out if they did
indeed send the others after Tatiana rather than just attacking
them outright. Gnik makes Anny and Kat invisible. As they walk
in, Kai whispers for Kat and points out the Duke and Juliana
are both in the main room.

Al and Kai proceed upstairs to the room where the Bargallians
are staying. Milena and Nikolai go up but hang back out of sight.
Al knocks on the door and when a woman opens the door slightly Al
says there is a mouse infestation and they need to check it out.
The woman looks skeptical. Kai asks if the woman is Marika and if
the man calling out from the back room is Havel. The man asks why
she hasn't invited them in yet, so she does and then walks into
the back room.

They talk with Havel, who claims they were just here to learn of
the situation with others from Bargal Valley whom they believed
to be in town. They learned that information and now will return
home. Kai and Al ask if they meant to kidnap a girl, and reveal
that their companions tried to and did not survive the encounter.
After some discussion, Havel says they should ask their librarian
friend to look up the Ritual of Reclamation, which is the reason
Bogdan needed an innocent of Milena's line -- but that the fact
that Tatiana was involved in an adventure by being kidnapped
means that she no longer meets the criteria of being innocent,
so they will go back and report to Bogdan on Daln's descendant.
Kat, who was really hoping for a fight, uses Mage Hand to grab
a random object and fling it across the room as she exits. Al
says that there are sometimes problems with poltergeists; Havel
nods and says they have this also in his home, and maybe they
accidentally brought it with them.

Al and Kai leave the room and report back to Milena and Nikolai,
just down the hall. They hear a whooshing sound and Al goes back
into the room; it is empty. The window opens; Al calls out, "Anny?"
She says the warlock opened up a portal to someplace filled with
flame, and they left.

They regroup with Gnik, who looks up the Ritual of Reclamation.
It is a ritual to take the descendant of a god who has not yet
done anything to fit the archetype of that god (for example,
the descendant of a god of adventure who has never adventured)
and use them as a vessel for the god's enemy (in this case, Tamoth).

Milena suggests Nikolai should meet his daughter, since they may not
get another chance. She also says she has some questions for him
about the situation at home. They stop by first at Milena's house
to check on her other daughters. Gnik tags along to ask Nikolai
questions about Bargal Valley, while Milena heals Jelena and makes
sure she has no lasting trauma.

Milena and Nikolai go to meet Svetlana, and on the way Milena
asks about the current power structure in Bargal Valley. She
says she is a woman of her word, so if Bogdan tried to come
for her daughter she needs to respond; and sometimes taking out
a beast means an even worse one arises in its place. Nikolai
says Bogdan understands his power comes from the people, and
though he will take out anyone he sees as a threat to his power
-- thus Nikolai and others work to appear nonthreatening -- he
is not overly harsh to those who pay proper tribute (which by
Saltmarsh standards is excessive, but seems normal to Bargallians).
She tells Nikolai that Ron may be coming soon, and asks if he
would be willing to stay until then so the three of them can talk,
although she knows he will be anxious to return to his family.
He agrees, if it is not too long, and asks why Ron would be
coming here. "Because he has learned he also has a daughter."
It takes Nikolai a moment, but then he says, "This makes many
things make sense." Milena says, "You can probably guess which
one."

Nikolai and Milena go to talk to Svetlana, who has heard there
was some excitement at the house. Milena tells her what happened,
and then introduces Nikolai as her father. Svetlana says, "Okay,
can you tell me what happened? Because what she tells me makes
no sense." Nikolai thinks a moment, figures out what she is 
asking, and says, "We killed a beast, she cut out its heart, we
ate it and then had sex." Milena says, "It is just as I said."
Svetlana says, "Yeah, okay, that matches...." She and Nikolai
talk, and after a bit of initial awkwardness find they have a
lot in common. He tells her of his sons, and is glad to see she
is good with a bow, which is as it should be.

Kat decides she wants to buy a small sailboat and learns there is
a widow trying to get rid of her husband's old boat for not very
much money. She purchases it and takes Mouse out sailing -- like
she has done many times, but usually she "borrows" a boat. While
she is out, she sees a large ship coming in and learns that the
Duke is going on some kind of a trip.



7 Agram 3275

The group decides to go talk with Zaru, the proprietor of the Wicker
Goat, a tavern that has been in town since the town was founded; he
thinks someone is trying to kill him. He brings them to a table in the
far corner to talk with them. He says he is originally from Thainga,
where he left in a hurry; he has seen a lot more Thaingan coin in the
area and is worried that someone has come looking for him. He says the
money changers mentioned they started noticing the coin a couple of
weeks ago, and that it has been a variety of folks coming in with
these coins.

Milena asks who he has upset, to give them clues about who might be
coming for him. She is aware that Gavriila's father is from that area,
which is a mageocracy ruled by a council of seven mages. Zaru found
out that one of the mages sacrificed her own nephew to the devil
Mephistopheles, the ruler of one of the nine hells and is known to be
the wizard devil, who experiments with everything and everyone; he 
was not supposed to know that, so he left town quickly.

Gnik, Milena, and Kat head to the merchants' guild to talk with the
money changers. They meet Myron, who says they are getting the coins
from a variety of shops, mostly from the Planks and mostly taverns,
food vendors and supply shops -- he names the Drunken Urchin and the
Griffon and Harpy (a tiny tavern with four tables) as two places he
remembers specifically.

Al, Kai, and Anny go to Whitecap to talk to Klaav. He says a few weeks
ago there was a group who bought a warehouse and are bringing stuff
from Till to sell upriver. He says he's been trying to investigate
them because he's not sure they are paying their fair share of duties.
Al offers to act as his agent in this, and reminds Klaav that he is
half-Tillian. Kai asks if there is any chance they might be smuggling
humans; Klaav says they wouldn't be so stupid, but Kai reminds him
they're Thaingans. He says he's only spoken to two of them -- Bine
and Gatto.

Milena walks by the warehouse to get a sense of it, and then goes
somewhere quiet to cast Clairvoyance. She starts by casting at a
spot in the back of the warehouse. She cannot see anything, but
when she switches to hearing, she hears movement and a faint cough.
Kai loans her a helm that lets her see in the dark; and she can see
she is in a narrow hallway with many people chained up against the
wall, along with other crates.  Most are Tillian, but some are
halflings.

Slavery is not illegal as long as those brought into town are already
slaves when they come in. It is not clear whether these people were
bought legitimately; so Kat decides to sneak in using the language
pearl and ask one if them if they were already slaves. The group
discusses the possibility of setting them all free and destroying
any evidence of their purchase, if any exists. Al can also speak
Tillian, so he plans to go in with Kat, while Anny stands guard
outside.

Al acrobatics his way onto the roof and Kat climbs up after him. There
are two small smokestacks on the roof. They hear chattering through
the windows in a language they don't understand -- probably Dorgenian.
In one corner of the building they see a small room with two chairs
and a bookcase, and two people talking. The door to the room is open to
the rest of the warehouse. In the other corner there is a similar room 
with a table and chairs, with the door closed. They decide Al will
go into the room with the door closed so he won't be heard, and Kat
will go into the room with the two people and wait until the coast is
clear to open the door to Al's room. She activates the pearl of
translation so she can hear what the people are saying, after Al assures
her that he should be able to understand the Tillian slaves since he
speaks Tillian.

The man and woman are talking about logistics -- the arrival of a
ship, hopefully after the caravan leaves because they have contracts
to meet. The woman behind the desk is wearing some kind of medallion
with a triangle and a lightning bolt; Kat doesn't recognize the symbol.

The man exits and goes through another set of double doors into the
back of the warehouse. Kat takes the opportunity to let Al out: she
opens the door and quietly taps Al on the shoulder using Mage Hand.
Al hesitates, and mentally sends Zassin a question asking for a map.
However, Zassin has never seen the inside of the warehouse, and so
asks Milena if he should go. She gives permission but tells him to
be safe.

Al and Kat move through the double doors into the back. They hear
someone talking to at least one other person; Kat hears that the
man they followed is indicating chambers that will be emptied in
the morning. They get a mental map from Zassin showing the two
of them, and him between him, and a bunch of Dorgenians near the
front of the room; they move toward the back, but don't see any
slaves. They realize the walls they are looking at aren't the
external walls; there is a narrow corridor down each end of the
building, well-disguised.

She and Al each start looking for hidden doors. In each corner there
are sections of wall that will pop out if pushed just right. Al is
in sight of the Dorgenians, so Kat uses her Mage Hand to tug on his
hand to bring him to her end where they are less visible. They open
up the panel and see six Tillians and two Rel; the Tillians are
cowering and covering their faces, the Rel are glaring in their
direction. One of the Rel says they paid passage on a ship and
next thing they know they were captives; and that their captors
told them they would be killed if they made too much noise. One
of the Tillians says he was in a hunting party and was poisoned,
and woke up on a ship. After some discussion and whispered arguing,
Kat and Al decide to slip out and find the rest of the group to
plan what to do next.

Before they go, Kat notices the woman they first saw is going over
contracts, and she goes to catch a glimpse of them; the first one
says it is for Jeremy Teal and asks for 12 human slaves. Kat uses
Mage Hand to distract the woman and then takes the contract.



11 January 2020

The team re-groups and decides, concerned that the guard might assume
the slaves are legally obtained and take them into custody, that
rather than calling the guard immediately they should break the slaves
out first. Gnik casts a Silence spell in the middle of the outside
wall adjacent to the slave compartment they found, and Nikolai and Kai
use crowbars to remove several boards.  Kat slips in and unlocks their
chains. While they work, some passers-by notice what they are doing
and pause to watch; in a few minutes some city guards come by, notice
them, and tell the spectators to move along. The group breaks out the
six slaves and Kai and Al takes them down the street to his mother's house
for temporary safekeeping; his sister is home and looks after them.

Kat looks into the two boxes in the compartment where the slaves were
kept. In the larger box, which she has to pry open, she finds a dozen
sealed clay jars; she pulls one out and it is labeled "snake weed".
Others are labeled "dream dust". Kat recognizes the second as a
fungus that causes any in the area who inhale it to have a shared
hallucinatory experience. Later Al and Kai identify the "snake weed"
as a mild relaxative that can induce dreams; it is illegal because
it can be addictive. Kat takes one jar of each. She opens the
second box and finds two books: "The Gods are Insane" and
"Divine Failures". Kat asks Zassin to send an image of the books
to Gnik to see if he wants them. He recognizes that such heretical
books are illegal in Anlim, and his having them would make Fran
mad, but he wants them anyway.

When Kai and Al return, they collect the group and move to the other
side of the building to repeat the process. As Kai and Nikolai get the
first board off, a Tillian face appears in the hole; Al motions to
them for silence. Kat slips in once enough boards are free; there 
are five Tillians, a covered cage, and some boxes. Milena recognizes
the creature as a juvenile Varrultar, a fey creature that loves
watching living things decompose and has deadly poisonous claws to
make sure that happens. There's a padlocked box that Kat can tell
has something moving inside. She lets the group know, but curiosity
gets the best of her and she picks the lock and uses Mage Hand to
open it up a crack. A hand with rotted fingers grabs the lip of
the chest; and then another hand; and then another. Kat slams the
lid shut and puts the padlock back on. When Kai hears the description
she recognizes it as Crawling Claws, disembodied hands that attack.

Al and Kai take the rest of the Tillians to Al's mom's house. Al's
sister offers to take the Tillians to the temple for passage back
to their homeland. The two Rel want to depart now.

Nikolai and Ember station themselves at the back door of the warehouse
to keep the smugglers from escaping, and Milena goes to fill the
guards in on the situation. The captain identifies himself as Spencer
and sends six guards to the back and the rest to the front. There are
sounds like thunder; through the open doors, those in the back see
someone run into the back room, throw down a box, and some kind of
glowing creatures emerge from it -- four hippogriffs pulling a
wagon. The two leaders of the smugglers jump into the wagon; the woman
seems to have dark energy swirling around her, full of skulls and
demonic faces, and when two of the guards try to catch her their flesh
is burned. Milena runs in through the front doors and tries to hit the
woman with Spiritual Weapon, but misses. Al runs in through the back
door, somersaults onto the wagon, and tries to knock the man off the
wagon. Al stays on the wagon as the man stumbles and falls off the
back.

Az flies to the back, shows Gnik an image of the wagon, and Gnik has
her yell, "Shut the doors!" Kat runs in and shoots her crossbow at
the woman in the wagon, hitting her left hand. Kai runs up to try to
shut one of the doors, and the woman points at her; Kai ducks as a
bright energy hits the door and burns a hole in it. Ember grabs the
other door and pulls it shut, slipping in as it closes. Anny runs
a spear through the hole in the door and then asks Nikolai for something
bigger. He runs up with his big two-handed sword and wedges it in.

The other Dorgenian man on the wagon pulls out a two-handed bladed
weapon and swings at Al, but he fends it off. 

Gnik, who has been watching from the roof, runs to the back and jumps
off; Ember and Nikolai catch him.

Boris runs in and jumps onto the wagon. He dodges the necrotic tendrils
and trips the Dorgenian man, who falls into the wagon. Milena tries
her Spiritual Weapon followed by Guiding Bolt, hitting the woman
with both. Al tries to attack her but feels the dark energy around
her tearing into his flesh. Al jumps off the wagon. Kat shoots her
crossbow again, this time hitting the woman in the left wrist. The
swirling energy crashes away -- the woman seems finally to have
lost concentration -- and the wagon is no longer moving, though
the hippogriffs are still there. Kai works to make sure the man
on the wagon can't regain control of the reins; she hits with her
greatsword in his shoulder and calf.

The woman hits Milena in the left leg with a Guiding Bolt, then
throws out a Spiritual Weapon of her own at Kat; it appears as
one of those big Dorgenian two-handed weapons and makes a slice
in her cheek. Ember runs up to the other side of the wagon, hops
up, and attacks the man who fell off the back. He tries to run
away, but Al hits as he runs and he falls unconscious.

The other man tries to grab the reins and the hippogriffs tear
free and begin attacking. Gnik suddenly appears between Milena
and Kat and casts Grease on the wagon. Kai jumps out of the
way. Gnik makes an illusion of a loud lion's roar which startles
the man enough to let go of the reins; the hippogriffs immediately
go still. Boris runs up and grabs the reins; the hippogriffs look
at him and he barks. Milena runs up and grabs the reins, pulling
them away from where the two foes in the wagon can reach them. She
gets the feeling she could command them to collapse and they would
go away entirely because they are a one-use item.

Kat jumps on the wagon and hits the woman with her rapier; she
feels a wave of thunder rolling back at her, but she dodges it.
The same thing happens when she hits with her dagger. The woman
falls over and her spiritual weapon disappears. The man drops
his weapon and surrenders. Milena gathers the surviving guards
and others who were injured and heals them.

Kat finds that the woman has a holy symbol of Dorg that emphasized
his lightning aspect; she was a tempest priest.

Several of the group decide to ride the hippogriffs while they are
still activated; they land and dissipate after about an hour. The
guards go through the remaining contraband and find other drugs,
illegal books, and other illicit goods. The guards show Gnik a
book called "Queen Arndt's Escape" about the former queen of Serin.
When he expresses interest, the guard inventorying the contraband
quietly removes it from his list.

They discover the Duke's assistant's name, Eveline Bradbury, is on
one of the contracts, for narcotics and "Queen Arndt's Escape".

Roland comes riding up and says Juliana sent him to ask what happened.
Al tells him that they were tipped off about a possible smuggling ring
and found this warehouse.



25 January 2020

In the evening, the group gathers at Milena's house. Kat disguises herself
as a child and goes to the Flounder Pounder (just a couple blocks from the
house) to try to trail the Black Market contact Eleanora told them about.
Az or Zassin will contact the rest of the group if backup is needed. Al
and Ember hide nearby so they'll be easily in range.


8 Agram 3275

Kat slips into the restaurant by sneaking in through the bathroom hole
and then hiding under the nearest booth. Anny stays outside watching
the patio tables. Kat notices that the server looks familiar, and
asks Zassin to send his image to the others to see if they recognize
him -- it's Ned.

As midnight approaches, a woman walks in with a tiny bat on her
shoulder that she scratches affectionately under the chin. She
gets a table, orders a drink, and talks to the bat. The bartender,
Bollis, also seems to be talking to himself, but alternating with
the woman -- probably a communication cantrip to talk to someone
within eyesight. Kat recalls that Milena now has the ability to
see or hear at a distance, and asks her via Zassin to listen in
at the bar. She hears Bollis whisper, "That's a little on the
high side. We might be able to do $400 for the poisons. Okay, that
sounds like a deal." The woman picks up her bat and makes her way
to the exit. Kat asks Anny to trail them and she'll catch up. She
acrobats herself back out the bathroom hole and onto the beach.

The woman gets to the Temple of Glaw, the river god, and throws a
couple of coins into the offering box. She takes a left onto a side
street. Kat gets up onto the roof to get a better look at where she's
going. She has something next to her that is man-sized and translucent
and glowing blue; it has massive arms that would drag the ground if
the creature stood upright.  She notices that the bat is no longer
with her, and asks Anny if she saw it fly off, but she did not. Kat
recognizes the creature as a fey creature called a domovoi that likes
to beat up on things to see what happens, that can become invisible or
change their shape to look like other things of a similar size.

Kat sees that the bat is flying around above them, invisible. The 
creature turns around and heads back toward the group tailing it.
Kat goes back toward Anny but stays up on the rooftops. Gnik instructs
Az to continue to follow the woman.

Kat trains a crossbow bolt on the creature, but holds off firing
until it looks like it is going to attack. It looks up, not in her
direction but nearby, crouches down, and leaps up two stories,
grabbing the side of the building. Anny lets out a quiet squeak;
she can't see the creature, but she can see the eaves of the
building crushed by an invisible weight.

Al and Ember catch up to Anny. Through Az's eyes, Gnik sees the
woman they're trailing suddenly change direction and bolt between
two buildings right under where Kat is perched. Az flies around to
watch for her to come out the other side of the alley.

Kat realizes Anny is on the building the creature jumped onto and
shoots at it. It turns and glares. She uses Mage Hand to pick up
a stick to point to the creature so others know where the creature
is; the bolts now sticking out of its leg also helps. Anny runs
toward where Kat is, taking a swipe at the creature on her way,
but misses. It leaps onto the building where Anny now is.

Al tries to acrobat his way up the side of a building, but the
windowsill he leaps for gives way and he falls, without hurting
himself.

Kat hears a voice behind her: "What're you doing here, kid?" Kat
whirls to face him; it is an elf. He asks why she's making trouble,
she says a creature attacked her friends, and he says, "Only because
you were following. Why not just mind your own business?" Kat says,
"Can we put this conversation on hold?" He starts casting a spell.

A small creature appears and jumps at Az, causing her to decorporialize.
Gnik feels an instant of horrible pain and then is back to his own
senses. 

Kai climbs the building she thinks the creature is on; she sees Anny
and a couple of floating bolts and a stick on the building, and Kat
on the next building.

Gnik looks up and sees the small creature that attacked Az turn
back into a bat. He casts Sleep on it. It falls 30 feet, crunches
on the ground, bubbles and dissolves.

Kat says, "We'll talk again later," somersaults off the building to get 
away from the elf, uses Featherfall to slow her fall, and shoots at
the creature on her way down. Anny yells, "There's another one!" and
throws her spear at the creature, scratching its arm. It runs at
Kai and smashes her foot into the roof.

Al finds a rock and throws it at the Elf's head. The elf curses and
says, "Dude! That's gonna leave a scar!" Al says, "Hey! Who are you?"
The elf says, "I'll get back to you," and casts a spell. Al feels
that his movement is off for a moment, but he shakes it off; however,
Ember is not moving.

Kai attacks the creature and slices it across the forehead. Gnik
casts Silence onto the roof where the elf is.

Kat looks into the alley where the woman went and doesn't see
her; she knows Az was watching for her to come out the other side,
and she didn't. Kat slips into the alley and tries to climb up
behind the elf like he did to her; she parkours her way up the
building. Thanks to the Silence spell, he won't be able to hear.

Milena and Nikolai arrive; Milena casts Hold Person at the elf
from the cover of a nearby alley.

Anny starts attacking Kai and yells, "I need help -- there's too
many of them!" Several of the group recognize that she's probably
under a spell that makes her see everyone as foes, even allies,
that can only be broken by doing some damage to the subject of
the spell. The creature takes another couple of shots at Kai.

Al tries to wake Ember up; he realizes his best options are Dispel
Magic, and to break the concentration of the person who cast the
spell, so he throws a couple more rocks at the elf. The first sails
by but he notices the elf's eyes don't follow it, so he tries again
and hits. Ember suddenly takes a gasping breath and starts moving
again. The elf suddenly shoots into the air; he clearly had Fly
going already. Kat has snuck up behind him, grabs him, and tries to
knock him out.

Milena hits the creature with Guiding Bolt; it begins glittering.
Kai takes another swing at the creature and skewers him in the
stomach. A spear comes flying up and skewers the creature.
Gnik casts Suggestion on Anny to get her to believe only the
creature is her enemy, and then Milena casts Dispel Magic on
her. The creature uses Dimension Door to escape.

Kat keeps hitting the elf in the head trying to get him to pass out.
They're heading back to the Flounder Pounder and Kat sees a couple
of people on the roof with crossbows. Zassin lets the rest of the
group know where they've gone since they've disappeared into the fog.
Kat manages to knock him out and casts Featherfall; she uses him as
a human shield against the crossbowmen. Two of their bolts hit Kat,
one thumps into the elf. She realizes the bolts are poisoned.

Al and Kai come running up to where Kat lands, and see about a dozen
people running in her direction, although they don't immediately
see Kat. The foes turn and go the other way when they see Al and Kai;
when they're gone, the illusion of an overturned boat disappears to
reveal Kat and the elf. The rest of the group arrives and Milena
dispels the poison effect on Kat.

They decide to interrogate the elf and then turn him over to the
city guard.  Gnik casts Suggestion to give the elf the impression
they are potential black market clients, and asks questions about
it.  The elf identifies himself as Vlistur. He says people don't
usually find the black market by attacking their contacts for
the black market; Kat points out that they didn't technically
start attacking, they were just following and defended themselves
when they were attacked. He says the black market is still the
same place it has always been, where he put it when the city was
founded. They ask if he'd been disguised as a woman in the Flounder
Pounder, and he says maaaaybe. Gnik asks if they can go look at the
list of magic items kept by the Black Market; Vlistur says they'll
have to wait at the entrance, but he can bring them the lists. They
walk two houses past Milena's house and he tells them they have to
wait outside. Kai argues that she's not letting him out of her
sight, and Gnik says, "I know someone who would be interested in
investing in the Black Market -- let's go there!" and they take
him to the garrison to turn him in to the City Guard. Milena stays
at her house to keep an eye on things, and Kat, Kai, Al, Anny,
and Nikolai return there after dropping Vlistur off. Ember goes 
with Gnik to make sure no one attacks him at the temple. Gnik
resummons Az as a hawk when they get back home.



22 February 2020

The group meets for breakfast; many ask, "Did you really go up against
the Black Market last night?" and the group denies it. A woman walks in,
glares at them, throws a note on the table, and stalks off. It is a
warning from Vlister (who should be still in jail) that the Black
Market will go underground for a time and if the group tries to come
after them they will make them regret it.  

The group decides they've fulfilled what Heide asked for, so they head
to the curio shop to talk to her. The door is locked, so they knock;
it takes a moment, but the door opens; Heide says she was working in
the back. Kat shows her the note, and they discuss whether that is
enough to meet their bargain. Al suggests they could get the discount
for as long the Black Market remains inactive.


Milena goes home to do a sending to Kat's father:

Thanks for sending Nikolai. He
helped much against Bogdan's people.
My group may have brief
business nearby in Seaton. When
will you arrive here?

She receives the reply:

"Will be there tomorrow morning. Have some things to wrap up. Looking
forward to it! Do not have ten more words to say right now."

In the meantime, the rest of the group goes to the jail to see if
Vlister is still there. He is gone; three guards are dead, one is
missing. Al suggests that this could be a chance for them to take
a stand against the Black Market, but the rest of the group do not
want to start a war. They decide their next move is to brief Juliana
on what happened.

When they arrive, she is in a meeting with someone else. When that
is done, she invites them in and already has chairs set up for them,
as if she expected them. They share the story of what happened and
that they were planning on letting it go, for now. Juliana agrees
that is probably a good idea, but the guard will still investigate
the location they provided. They share that the bartender at the
Flounder Pounder was buying poison from Vlister, and that the
assassin Ned works as a waiter there -- suggesting that it is
probably a front for the assassin's guild. Kat says, "Yeah, so
if you need help with anything else, let us know." Juliana laughs.

Kat and Al wonder if perhaps there might be a bounty available to
hunt those demons outside town, and decide to ask the Duke, who
is currently in town staying at the Silver Raven. They go there
for lunch; Bellto offers them a private room -- most likely to
keep them from breaking anything in the main room.

They make smalltalk; Al asks why there are so many forks. Gnik
explains them all, and Nikolai says it is a waste; the metal could
be used for many more weapons. Al asks Kat how her performance career
is going, so she pulls out her lute from her magic box and sings
a ribald song. When she gets done, Milena says with a straight face,
"This reminds me, your father will arrive tomorrow."  Kat falls into
stunned silence, then asks her mother how she found out. Milena
describes her sending, and that she originally learned Nikolai was
coming to deal with Bogdan's people when she made a sending a couple
days ago to warn Kat's father to be wary of Zagrimil, which also meant
mentioning that he has a daughter. Kat asks Nikolai if he has anything
to add, and he says, "No. Should I?" He tells her that her father's
name is Ronchevia (which Kat knows translates in elvish to "lucky
traveller"), but he goes by Ron, and he is mostly elven; his
father was part elf.

There is a knock at the door; when they open it there is a burly
armored man there, and a voice behind him saying, "Could you get
out of the way?" The Duke appears and enters. He asks if they have
anything to drink, and after some small talk they mention Juliana
told them that if anyone were aware of bounties for the demons
around town, it would be the Duke. He opens the door, leans out
and whispers something that sounds like, "Hey, are there any....
Really?! Huh..." He comes back into the room and asks where
they are going, and which demons are there. They say Seaton, and
describe the three demons in that direction. He is particularly
interested in having the demon (The Indescribable One) blocking 
traffic on the road to Seaton and the one attacking the neighboring 
farms (The Marazon). He offers 1000 gold to take out each. Al and 
Milena get the strong sense that his show of confusion was just 
an act, that he knew exactly what he was going to say before 
opening the door to ask about bounties.

They recall that because they are knights of the Duke, they can
ask for horses. Al asks whom they should ask about it, and the
Duke says, "Me!" He says they can use the horses he brought with
him, just don't get them killed. He mentioned he will be in Freeport
for a few weeks on diplomatic bullshit, and they are welcome to look
him up if they're there. Then he says, "See ya -- I have to go hire
a new assistant...." As he leaves, he pauses and says, "Oh, Evelyn --
my old assistant -- said there was something missing in the illegal
stuff, but she wouldn't say what. Well, she heard the list and said
'What about the b---? ...Never mind.' Just thought you should know."

The group decides to spend some time getting to know the horses, since
none of them have much experience riding. Kai uses her ability to talk
with animals to talk with the horses to get to know them. She learns
that one of the two pulling the cart would rather not, but another
shy one would like to do it. The one who wants off the cart seems
particularly intelligent. When Kai asks if there is anything they
need that they don't normally have, he says, "Apples." He also
understands more than the others when Kai warns them about danger;
when the others mention snakes and fire, he mentions magic.


9 Agram 3275

Rather than their usual meeting at Blackberry Bar's for breakfast,
the group decides to meet for lunch to give Milena and Kat a chance
to catch up with Ron in private when he arrives. Kat, dealing with
the awkwardness of the unexpected meeting, decides to leave the
house early and come back sometime after Ron arrives to let her
mother talk to him first.

He arrives and talks with Nikolai and Milena, while Tatiana watches
in rapt attention. They discuss what is going on with Bogdan; Milena
says she promised that if he ever came after her or her family she
would kill them, but knowing the work Ron and Nikolai are doing
subtly against him she is willing to play the long game. They plan
that she will use her Sending power from time to time to share news,
and sometime later when the time is right she may come to help them.

Kat arrives and talks with her father, awkwardly at first, but she
warms up when he reacts positively and with interest to her stories
about what she has been doing lately, including choosing to work with
a devil to try to find him. She mentions she has been learning to play
lute and he says his mother, a Thiali elf, was a performer but also
part of a spy network. He tells her he is originally from Cath'home
but now lives in Bargal Valley, having infiltrated the household of
Milena's enemy, the Tamoth worshipper who tried to have Tatiana
kidnapped, to keep an eye on him and work subtly against him. He
points out that Milena's house in Saltmarsh is very much like Bargal
Valley, with basically no privacy.



21 March 2020

10 Agram 3275

The group prepares to set out for Seaton.  Rumors are that there are
more than 500 people still there; the castle is run by Raging Hammer,
but with competition -- at times violent -- with merchants who were
there before the invasion, the Workman's Association. The town is 
largely in a state of anarchy, but with the Raging Hammer running 
things to the extent that anyone is. The Workman's Association also
has had some shady dealings, so the goal is not to take out Raging
Hammer and create a power vacuum for them to fill. The main goal
is to try to take out some fiends on the road, and do some recon
on Raging Hammer in Seaton.

The group sets out; they pass the haunted house a couple hours out,
and it looks even worse than the last time they saw it. At about
the halfway point, they see a line of carts and horses, probably a
caravan bringing goods to Saltmarsh, and a couple of guards bearing
Seaton flags approach them and ask what they are doing. The group
says they are investigating news of fiends in the area. The guards
tell them they are going in the right direction then -- and not to
stay at the Seaway Inn, where a fiend has killed several people.
They say the fiend is surrounded by inky darkness. Al feigns
interest in doing business with the merchants in the caravan as
a pretext to get an introduction to them, but the guard he's
talking to says the caravan has asked not to be disturbed. Al
senses the guard dislikes one of the merchants, and says, "Are
you sure there's no one we could talk to?" He points Al to a
particular cart and says, "Why don't you talk to those two over
there?" and says the merchant's name is Sydney.

Al goes to talk to her and asks about what the Raging Hammer is
up to in Seaton. She cautions him not to say that too loudly --
she suspects some of the merchant guild members are moles for
Raging Hammer. She says Polist is mostly running things, but
she suspects Polist's agenda is not precisely Raging Hammer's,
and he's using the situation for his own ends. This fits with
a letter the group had seen previously suggesting that Polist
and Michel, the overall head of Raging Hammer, did not see
eye to eye. She suggests they check in with Christopher Buckley 
when they get to Seaton, and say Sydney Ware sent them. She
suggests the Emerald Dolphin is the only inn worth staying 
in Seaton.

The group continues on. They come over a rise and see a cluster of 
trees with some buildings scattered among them and farmland
surrounding. They guess it is the small town of Seaway. They
see a Dorgenian man walk out of the nearest building and come
to stand in the middle of the road, facing them. He's armored
and holding a crossbow, not aimed at them but at the ready. Kai
moves forward to talk to him. He asks who she is, and when she
introduces herself he says he is Filux, the guard. He tells her
not to piss off the locals, because he'll have to come deal with
them. He warns them about the fiend in the inn, but when they ask
if it has attacked others in the area -- including those camping
outside -- and he says no.

Al stays behind to talk to the guard while the others move on
to question people at the inn. Filux says the fiend killed two
of his partners a couple of days ago, and three of the merchants
last night -- he says it has been here for six days.

As they approach the inn, three young girls come running out.
The oldest says, "Are you looking for a place to stay for the
night? It might not be a good idea!" The group asks if the girls
have been able to stay there ok, and they say their daddy has a
magic lamp. Ember takes the carriage around back to store for
the night -- the stables are across the street. 

They are greeted at the stables by a part-elven woman named Suzie,
and then joined by the smith Vlon from the smithy next door. The
group mentions they're going to try to deal with the fiend. Vlon
says that would be great, but seems skeptical they can pull it off.

The group goes into the inn, which is quite nice, with ornate wood
and windows looking into a nice courtyard in the back. A woman comes
from behind the bar and introduces herself as Caren Ackers, and asks
if they are looking for a place to stay. They say yes, and they also
want to try to take out the demon. They ask if anything in particular
happened the night the demon first attacked, but there is nothing
obvious in the answer they get. However, they learn the Ackers's 
magic lamp is an eternal flame, and that the creature enters the
inn by passing through the walls -- even if the room is well lit,
a dark spot appears that absorbs all the natural light in the
room. Caren mentions that it usually seems to come from the
courtyard and then comes to the bar and stays all night at the
edge of the light, trying to find a way in -- throwing things at
the light, trying to put it out. Everyone who died has
been at the bar, but outside the range of the magic lamp.
The creature is bigger than a man, but not by much, and tears
its victims apart with huge claws.

Gnik checks his book for an entry on Rorsalon, the shadowy demon
they had learned about in Saltmarsh who meets the description of
this one. It is particularly susceptible to radiant damage. Gnik
notes that it is unusual for a demon like this to come back over
and over again like this unless it is being compelled somehow.
Gnik starts a ritual casting to Detect Magic, and the others start
clearing the tables out of the room and into the corners to give
cover from which to attack the fiend. They hope to lure the demon
into the room and then block it in with their own continual light
torches. The Ackers will stay with the innkeeper's brother at the
emporium next door to stay safe. They leave, but there's still
one person left in the bar -- a woman named Valery Madder who has
been sitting there writing in a book. She says she is from a small
town near Tarriola and has been traveling, but her ship crashed and
she has been traveling down the coast ever since. She sounds like
she is very excited to sit and watch the battle they're planning.

Gnik finishes his Detect Magic spell. He senses a couple of things
on Valery, and something incredibly powerful in or on the other side
of the wall between the bar and the courtyard. There are no obvious
entries into the courtyard, but through the windows into the courtyard
Kai and Milena notice a couple of panels through the windows that look
like they might be hidden entrances. Kai and Al move through to
the next room in the inn to try to work their way around to one
of the panels. They move into the kitchen and Kai finds the panel
that she thinks corresponds to the one in the courtyard. They pop
it open and through the windows Gnik directs them to the spot with
the magic. The plants have been pulled back and a small hole dug,
with a bit of metal sticking out. Kai digs into the lose dirt
with her hands and pulls out a reddish metal rod, about 18 inches
long, carved with horrific faces and scenes; touching it makes her 
feel a bit nauseous. She picks it up with a cloth bag, which eliminates
the queasy feeling.

They bring the rod into the bar and put it between Al and Milena each
holding continual light torch so it stays in the light.

Darkness in the courtyard, demon appears and jumps straight up through
the ceiling and then appears in the bar area, floating about 15 feet
up. It says "You found it," looking at the rod. 


Ember shoots, but her bolts pass through it. Kat shoots with her
new magical crossbow and hits; it lets out a scream. Gnik, next
to Milena, casts Protection from Fiends on her. Milena hits
it with a Guiding Bolt, which explodes in its face and seems to
melt some of the darkness around it.  It screams so loudly it
almost bursts their eardrums and says, "Give me the rod!"
Milena asks, "What is it to you?" It says, "An end to torment."
It flies at the floor and disappears into the floor. Realizing
that it could reach up through the floor and grab the rod, Kai
puts the rod on a stool and then Kat lifts it with Mage Hand
so it is suspended in midair.

The ground below Ember grows dark and the demon bursts up through
the floor again. Milena sees it coming and hits it with Guiding
Bolt again. The demon lashes at Ember with its claws and hits
her leg -- the wounds bleed a lot but also have a darkness around
them that seems to seep into her skin.

Al manages to hit it with an attack that stuns it; it hangs in
midair. Al pummels it, Kat shoots it again with a force bolt
from her crossbow, and Milena hits again with Guiding Bolt. Anny
and Kai both stab it and it explodes in inky blackness that tears
into everyone within a 5-foot radius. Once it dissipates, the
entire room visibly brightens.

Gnik begins the Identify ritual to find out about the rod. He
casts Protection from Evil on himself first to try to protect
against the nausea; Milena makes tea as a back-up. She goes into
the kitchen, and Al goes with her. Ember also follows so Milena
can hit her with some healing magic while the tea is brewing.

Gnik learns that the rod automatically attracts the nearest demon,
who will try to take the rod and return to its home plane. They
discuss whether to keep the rod to attract the nearby demons one
at a time, or destroy the rod -- perhaps by melting it down at
the smithy. Milena intuits that it is not a religious artifact,
so Sanctify won't work on it. They don't want an endless stream
of demons coming at them without their being able to rest, so Gnik
starts creating a magical hut that magical effects cannot pass 
through to put the rod in while they rest.

Al goes to tell the Ackers that the demon is gone but there may
be others coming, so they should stay where they are -- but when
he goes outside he sees a woman floating about four feet in the
air, with spider legs extending from her -- another demon, who
is able to teleport. Anny sees it and just starts yelling
"Demondemondemondemondemon!" Al feels strange -- Kai jumps out,
pulls him back inside, and yells for Anny to come in too.

Milena grabs the rod and runs out the back door toward the smithy
to try to get the rod melted down. Kai goes with her, running
ahead. Gnik stops trying to cast the tiny hut and instead casts 
Invisibility on Az to transfer to Milena by touch.

Kat runs out to try to shoot the demon, and hits it on one of its
legs. Ember comes out, sees it, says, "What... is... that...?"
and starts quivering. Valery runs out with her eyes closed, grabs
Ember, and brings her back inside. Kat stays outside and continues
to shoot it. Anny runs out and throws a javelin, and had been planning
to run back inside again but stays when she sees Kat is staying. They
see the demon change direction and move toward where Milena is running,
but it is stalking along rather than moving rapidly. Kat notices it
is virtually silent.

Gnik casts Phantasmal Force at the demon, trying to convince it that
the rod is moving off in a different direction. Kat tries to cast Sleep
on it, but it does not seem to have any effect. Ember and Al discuss
whether to run out and try to get behind it -- Ember tries, and looks
at it, and grimaces, but does not seem to be stunned again by seeing
the demon. Al runs out and feels the pushing on his mind but is able
to hold it back. He runs up to it and attempts to hit it with a
stunning blow, but it is still moving. Its two rear legs reach back
at Al; he tries to slap them away, but they tear into his shoulder;
he feels something off and weird emanating from the wound, and feels
a bit woozy and off-balance. It keeps walking, but seems to be going
straight forward, in the direction of Gnik's Phantasmal Force -- it
perceives Ned running down the road to Seaton carrying the rod. Kat 
tries shooting at the demon again, but misses.

Kai barrels into the smithy and tells Vlon to take Susie and go to
the guardhouse or the emporium. She asks if the smithy is up and
running because she wants to destroy an evil rod. He points and
says, "You put it on that anvil and hit it with that hammer."
Milena runs in, invisible, and drops the rod onto the anvil,
where it clanks and reappears.

Kat follows the demon, staying about 30 or 40 feet back, and shoots
it again, slamming it in the backside.

Kai goes into rage mode and hits the rod as hard as she can. It
splits in two and a black cloud comes out from it. Milena feels
her skin crack and break where it hits her.

Outside, those watching the demon see it raise up, look in the 
direction of the smithy, and then shrink to nothing in some kind
of teleport effect.

NEXT TIME: Find out who planted the rod in the courtyard (and why).



4 April 2020


After some healing from Milena, the group talks with the Ackers about
who might have planted the rod. Kat and Anny go to the roof to keep
watch. Al, Milena, and Gnik investigate the courtyard where it was
found to see if they can find footprints or other clues. Milena finds
a smudge on the side of the door as if someone were holding it as they
walked through, a mix of soot and horsehair, at about the right height
for someone a little over 5' tall.

The guards arrive as the team regroups. Gnik uses Illusion to give an
illustrated story of what happened; Al watches Suzie, the most likely
culprit in town to have left the handprint, to see her reactions and
whether she seems to be sincere in her emotions. She is hard to read,
but when she starts seeing the story he detects panic and anger behind
her eyes and in her body language. Milena notices that Keren and Jerry
are glancing in Suzie's direction like they are a bit suspicious. Keren
whispers something to Alvin, Jerry's brother who runs the emporium, and
he begins looking suspiciously at Suzie as well.

Wilco, the captain of the guard, asks the group what they believe
happened. Al says they have found some evidence, but will give
whoever it might have been a chance to confess. Nobody does, and
Milena shares what they have found. Vlon asks how that narrows it
down -- it could be any traveller who came into the forge and then
to the inn, and acknowledges that it could be Suzie, but why would
she do that?  Keren says, "Because she's been trying to convince 
me to sell this place to her."

Gnik casts Suggestion on Suzie and asks what she knows about the
rod. She says "Polist just told me it would help scare them," then
looks at Gnik and says, "What did you do to me?" She adds that she
doesn't know where it came from, she knew it would summon a demon
and he told her that she needed to return the rod to him as soon
as she could so he could put it back into its protective casing.
She mentions he also gave her something that would protect her
from the demon.

Everyone starts yelling at everyone at once; Suzie tries to bolt, but
Kai stands intimidatingly at the door, Al throws the net on her, and
Alvin puts manacles on her. Mouse runs in and sits on her. Wilco
thanks them and invites the group to sit in on her interrogation. Vlon
is going back to his place to pack up Suzie's things and bring them to
the guardhouse, since the protective item must be among them. Gnik and
Ember go with Vlon.

At the smithy, Gnik detects magic and sees something powerful in
a backpack wedged behind the bed. Vlon did not know it was there
-- it is obviously a go bag, with food, clothes, and a scroll
emanating magical power, as well as a smooth stone about three
inches across that is also magical.

At the guardhouse, Suzie caves pretty quickly. She was to let Polist
know who was coming to Seaton and who was asking about him. Her goal
was to get the inn because not everyone comes to the stables, but
everyone stays at the inn. She has been working for the organization
he heads, the Warren, for most of her life. She says Polist has always 
taken good care of her, and treats the group better than did the
founder he replaced. She thinks Raging Hammer are assholes who came
to Seaton and hurt a lot of people, but Polist was able to work a
deal with them that kept them out of Seaton.

Gnik arrives and asks her about the rock. It is a sending stone
that lets her communicate with Polist once per day. The scroll,
when she activated it, would summon an angel-thing to smite the
demon and then return the rod to Polist. Gnik looks at the scroll;
it is like someone took the Planar Ally scroll and altered it so
that anyone could summon the being Tabris who will perform any
task if convinced of its worthiness before returning to its own
realm. Milena takes the scroll for safekeeping. They give Kat
the stone so she can pretend to be Suzie in the morning to keep 
from tipping off Polist that they've been captured.

Kat notices that the rod seems to have been made of abyssal
steel; it is not inherently evil, but it can be imbued with
the energies of the spell it takes on. It could be forged
into a magical sword that would be very receptive to magical
enchantments. Vlon volunteers to make daggers for them as a
thank-you for revealing Suzie's treachery.


11 Agram 3275

Kat sends a message to Polist, disguising her voice as Suzie's, so
he is not suspicious. They set off.

A couple miles outside of Seaton, the re-summoned Az hears a cry for
help coming from a nearby farm that has several armored but unattended
horses milling around outside. Kai, Al, Kat, and Milena ride ahead.
The unattended horses shy away from them a bit; one has heavier armor,
and they have weapons strapped to their saddles. Kat rides around to
the back, joined by Valery (who is sharing a horse with her) and Az,
while the others dismount and walk cautiously to the front door.
A gruff voice inside is saying, "You might as well tell us; just
spit it out." Al rushes in and Kai yells, "Hey, what's going on
in there?"

There are five people, armored and armed, standing around one older
woman on her knees. Al says, "Hey! How are you guys doing?" One of
the women in the group says, "This is none of your business." Kai
steps in with her sword out, and the other group immediately pull
weapons and come at her. She says, "I don't want to fight you, I
just want to know what's happening." They say that the woman they're
subduing is a witch who comes into town with a whole wagon of food
every day to feed people. In a small voice, she says, "It isn't my
fault, it keeps growing back!"

The other group is itching for a fight, so all but the woman who
appears to be leading them rush forward at Al and Kai. Through
Zassin, Milena sees the leader move to put on her helmet and casts
Hold Person on them. The other foes swing without much luck, and Kai
says, "I think your leader is done with this fight, so let's just
try talking calmly." They back down and say the other farmers are
mad that they can't make money any more because this woman is bringing
too much food. The thugs were sent from a farmer's group in Seaton to
find out how she's doing it so they can do it too.

Milena enters when the melee calms down and heals the prisoner,
named Mercy, who has been kicked in the knee. She explains that
a couple weeks ago, for some reason, everything became ripe at
once, so she took it all into town; and when she came home that 
night, everything had fruited again, so she took it all in the
next day, and that has been going on since then. The group decides
to take a look at the fields; the mercenaries follow them.

Kat remembers Gnik telling a story of a specific kind of fae with 
climate affinity, a grungif, that enjoys watching people farm.
Several of them notice in the brush behind the field a small fey
creature that looks like it's trying to hide. Kai asks Gnik if
it's dangerous. Under his breath he says, "It's fey, of course
it's dangerous!" and then smiles and waves at it and starts walking
toward it. Kat reminds Gnik that its spines are dangerous, so not
to get too close.

Gnik stops about 50 feet away and it says, "What do you want?" in
gnomish. Gnik says they were just trying to figure out what was
going on here. The creature says it is happy and they should go
away now. Gnik comes back and tells the rest of the group that
they should go and leave it alone. Al tells him he should suggest
to the creature that it move around to other farms. Gnik says, "You
don't have much experience with fae, do you? The best thing to do
is leave it alone."

They discuss whether an arrangement could be worked out for Mercy
to share some of her bounty with the other farmers on a rotating
basis, when the leader of the mercenaries suggests that her group
could stay, work the farm, and provide protection. She says her
team just wants work, and that those who sent them would not be
in a negotiating kind of mood. Mercy asks if the fae could be
related to what killed her husband two years ago, and the group
suggests it was probably a fiend instead.

Al shares that the group is hunting fiends and asks if the others
have any information. The leader, Susanna, shares that there is
a mound of stones that marks the place that one should go fast,
and another mound marks where to stop, due to attacks in the
area.

Al takes Susanna aside to ask about the Raging Hammer, and as
soon as she mentions them her head snaps around with anger in
her eyes. He mentions that in addition to hunting fiends, they
are doing recon on the Raging Hammer. She pulls out maps to
show the layout of the town, and Gnik comes over to look as
well. Al says they might be looking for another legitimate
group to fill the power vacuum, and he senses that she probably
had some position in the castle and might be able to suggest
alternatives. She says if he wants to find her again she'll
be working at this farm. She says the castle is called Palden
Castle, but these days everyone just calls it the Pall.

A couple hours later they come upon the first stone mound. Kai
explains to the horses what they are likely to encounter. The
group does not know what it will be susceptible to, but they
do know it's not a demon, or it would have been drawn to the
farm instead of the spider creature.

They send Az and Zassin to scout above and ahead. Az is in hawk
form, and catches a glimpse of something about 150 feet off the
road within the treeline away from the shore. Gnik looks through
her senses and lets Ember know Az as seen something. Ember shares
that with the rest of the group, and Valery begins chanting a poem
at Kat that Kat can feel making her stronger.

Gnik, through Az, sees a creature moving through space as though it
is non-Euclidean. It lets out a shriek and space seems to fold in
around it. Milena immediately casts Beacon of Hope on everyone within
range.

The creature reappears on the beach side of the road, about 15
feet from the road, and roars again. It is at least 9 feet tall.
Kai goes into a rage and attacks, cracking into its chitinous
arm. Al punches it in the leg and attempts to stun it, but he
almost feels the energy reverberate back out at him. However,
it bends down at the attack on its leg and Al is able to make
a second hit on its head. Anny makes a sneak attack on its other
leg and her sword calls out "Grovel!" but the creature ignores it.

Gnik pulls out his book to try to figure out what this creature
is or what it is doing. He finds an entry that says, "Does it look
like a bug that doesn't fit in reality? It doesn't matter what it
is -- kill it. It crawled through a crack in the world and wants
to kill anything that doesn't fit with its own world."

Kat attacks with Torchlight and hits into the cuts Kai made in
its arm. Milena casts Spiritual Weapon, but it is not able to
hit on its first try. 

The creature roars and ripples; everything in the area seems to
twist, including everyone within 15 feet of it so that they feel
like they are half in and half out of reality. Anny runs screaming
away, but the rest maintain their ground. The creature bites at Al,
but he dodges. It claws at him and hits him in the thigh. It swings
at Kai and hits her arm.

Ember jumps from the carriage and stabs the creature in the foot
and leg. Kai swings and cuts it across the stomach. Al pummels
it in the chest. Kat stabs Torchlight into its right foot and
takes off one of its toes -- if those are toes. Milena swings
again with her Spiritual Weapon which hits this time in the back
of its head and then hits it with Sacred Flame.

The creature swings its arms out wide, but this time they feel
it physically. Kat is not able to resist the effect, and feels
bent extradimensionally; the others within 15 feet still take
damage. It bites at Al and tears into his shoulder; he hits
the ground. It hits at Kai and Ember as well. 

Anny shakes off her fear and runs back to rejoin the group.

Gnik casts Phantasmal Force at the creature to make it think
a fire elemental is rising up and attacking; because it perceives
that actual damage is being done, it screams and falls to the
ground dead.

Milena rushes to Al and casts Spare the Dying, followed by a
Mass Healing Word on all her injured companions.


18 April 2020

After another half-hour the road bends to the left and goes over
a rise. At the top of the rise on the right is a small shack with
two people sitting at a table outside. Several more come out of
the house and approach the group. Some are carrying crossbows,
one has a book. The one with the book asks where they are coming
from and their business in Seaton. Al says, "Demon-killing!" The
man looks taken aback and asks how long they plan to be in town.
The group says a few days at most. The man with the book asks
their names; he looks as though he's trying not to look impressed
as he recognizes their names. He tells them to wait for the Sorter,
who will help them with directions to an inn and other instructions.

A woman comes over the rise and introduces herself as Clair. 
They ask about possible lodgings, and which are controlled
by which faction. Archer and Goat, Dancing Harpy on this side 
of river; on the other is Emerald Dolphin. She says this side 
is Raging Hammer, the other side is Anlim Merchant's Guild.
The market and temple districts are shared by everyone.

As they come over the hill, they see that much of the town still
looks destroyed from the Sack of Seaton seven years ago; there
are holes in some roofs, some buildings are knocked down to the
lower third of their walls. There are very few ships coming and
going.

Clair says that if they run into any problems they can holler
for a constable; some have been appointed, some decide to take
on the role. When they ask if it's safe to roam the streets at
night she says no-no-no, on account of the unresolved trauma
from the sack. They ask for details and she shares that there
are undead of many types that come out at night. Kat asks if
the town is lawful, and Clair says it is more like anarchy.

Clair gives directions to the three inns so they can walk by 
and check them out, but the group privately concludes that they
don't want to spend the night in territory controlled by Raging
Hammer, and head toward the Emerald Dolphin. Along the way they
encounter a raven that calls out "Blood, blood everywhere!" next
to a wagon. Gnik greets the raven in its own language and asks
how it is doing. He says he is bored. The door of the wagon opens
up and a woman steps out to ask if the raven is giving things
away. She says that the Raven can see things that have not 
happened yet -- but then she sees Milena and says, "...but
perhaps you do not need this." She wishes the group luck.

Milena recognizes the woman as Vasani, a traveling people said
to have mystical powers. It is said they are from another place
outside this world and were brought here when the other world
was closed off, or ended -- the stories are very odd.  The
raven croaks at Gnik that if he brings food, the raven will
tell more secrets.

As they cross the bridge, they see several people fishing; most
are packing up for the night to try to get inside by dark, but
a girl starts yelling, "Help! I can't lose my pole!" Something
is on her line and is on the verge of pulling her toward the
edge. Al leaps off his horse and dives into the water; Kai
jumps down and grabs the pole, and tells the girl she might
need to cut the line to save the pole.

Al sees that on the end of the line is a huge shark... skeleton.
The hook is hung on one of its ribs. It sees him and comes at
him. Al tries to dodge and cuts the line. Anny dives in as
well and tries to stab with her spear -- not the most effective
weapon against a skeleton, but she gets a couple of hits in.
Milena tries to Turn Undead, and the shark turns to swim away.
Al punches at it with both fists, and destroys it. Al and Anny
come out of the water, and Milena requests that one of them 
bring up a piece of bone; Anny shows that she already has a
piece on the end of her spear.

The bystanders seem indifferent to their defeat of the shark.
Valery tells them that she learned from the bystanders that
undead sea life coming down the river from the dreadwood to
the ocean is pretty common, because of a hag in the dreadwood
named Auntie Treeshadow. Gnik has heard the name as a rumor,
but knows there is a hag in that part of the wood that others
actively avoid because she is always interfering in the affairs
of mortals and they are not sure what her motives are. The stories
of her are older than Gnik; she is part of the reason the dreadwood
is so scary.

The group proceeds to the Emerald Dolphin. A man comes out from
behind the bar and introduces himself as Brian. They negotiate
for rooms and get dinner. The cook, Marty, comes out to talk to
them -- he is friendly and charming. Kai asks about the undead
in town; he doesn't know what type they are, but mentioned they
weren't a problem until the Sack. Kai says, "And no one has done
anything about it? The Merchant's Guild can't afford to hire
someone to take care of the problem?" He says, quietly, that they
are more interested in taking care of themselves.

The group decides to do some scouting about a half hour after
sunset, mostly to look for undead, but Kat to look for the
seedy underbelly of town -- possible locations of Raging
Hammer or Polist's group the Warren. Gnik and Ember go to
the roof (and Gnik casts Leomund's Tiny Hut to give them a
comfortable place to sit while they watch), and Milena sends
Zassin out to scout overhead and watches out the window.

Kai, Al, and Anny walk around town. There is almost nobody
out, but after about 20 minutes they hear a scream down an
alley behind them; it sounds like it might be an older woman.
At a spot between two buildings, they see her cowering between
two barrels looking up at two glowing floating things that
turn, look at them, and snarl. They look insubstantial. The
bottom of one of them appears to be in the barrel. Al asks
Zassin to tell Milena they need help taking down some undead
things; Zassin projects an image of a shark skeleton exploding
and Al's location, and includes Gnik and Ember in the message
as well. Milena starts heading their way.

Kai goes into rage mode and attacks with her sword. Al rushes
forward to attack the other one. He hits it with a stunning
strike and it hangs in the air. He hits the other one and it
is stunned as well. They hear the sound of another screech
from the main road, then Anny exclaiming and fighting at least
one more of these creatures.

Milena goes to join them. Brian has to unbolt a number of bars
and locks, opens up the door only wide enough to let her and
Boris out, then slams it behind them and rebolts it.

Kai and Al finish off the two stunned creatures and join Anny,
who is fighting two more. As the group continues fighting, one 
of the creatures hits Kai; her shirt where it touches seems to fall into
tatters, and her flesh goes black and necrotic. Anny also gets hit,
tumbles in between Al and Kai to strike at one of the creatures, then
tumbles away. Kai hits at it again and it falls apart.

Gnik climbs into his bag and asks Az to fly him to join the others;
as they arrive, Gnik asks Az to fly by Kai to brush her with a
wing to cast Protection from Evil. Milena arrives and casts
Guiding Bolt, but misses. Al hits it again, and it dissolves
into nothingness. Milena is unable to heal Anny, even magically;
Anny says she has heard of undead effects like this, where the
only recourse is to let the body push out the necrotic poisons.

Kai goes to talk to the old woman who was being menaced by the
creatures. The woman is disoriented, so Kai says she will escort
her home. The group gets her to a part of town she recognizes
and she thanks them profusely and goes into her house. She says
the creatures came out and surrounded her, and she ran.

On the other side of town, Kat tries to find street kids or orphans
she can talk to about the seedy goings-on in town, but there is
nobody around; she gets a bad feeling and realizes she should head
back after about an hour. She is coming back to the Merchang Guild
side of town by the main bridge, stealthily, when she hears something
on the bridge. It is dark, but she sees a hunched male figure behind
her with a walking stick. His voice reaches her and he says, "Go 
ahead, keep going." She turns and keeps going, more quickly, but
when she looks behind her again he is goine. She returns to the
inn, and the group crashes for the night, after Milena makes Anny
a tea to help her sweat the necrotic toxins out.


12 Agram 3275

The group reconvenes downstairs as the sun comes up. Marty yells
that he will be out in a minute, and Clair peeks out and says, "Oh,
you did come here!"  They describe what they fought last night,
and ask if she knows what they are. "Bad?" she says. When Gnik
comes down, he identifies it as a specter; it is someone who was
slain, but their hatred for their fate is so strong that they want
to destroy the living to get back at those who killed them, and
they have been cut off from the afterlife. Milena asks Clair whether
the undead sea creatures from Auntie Treeshadow also started at the
time of the Sack, and she says that has only been happening for the
last few months.

There is a knock at the front door; a kid is there with a scroll
that he hands to Marty, who looks at it and says, "Uh, I think 
this is for you." It is an invitation from Polist to the new
adventurers in town ("The Usuals") to dine with him at the castle
at 5 pm. 

The group heads out to the market to see what they can find out.  The
market looks only about half full compared to what they would
expect. The colorful wagon is there; lots of things to see, but
nothing really impressive or special. Gnik brings scraps of meat and
fruit to the raven Jardani, and asks if he gets to hear any
secrets. He looks back at the woman in the wagon, Madam Tsura Lockie,
who shrugs at him, and he asks, "What secrets you want?" Gnik asks
what he can tell about the castle. Jardani says, "Many deaths." Gnik
asks if that was recently or long ago. Jardani says, "Yes. One got
away," and hops away to say cryptic things to people to see if they
will give him things. Gnik tosses a silver piece to the Madam, who
says, "If you find yourself feeling strange, stop eating."

Three people wander by proclaiming the wonder of Gosh, singing,
dancing, and holding out a bucket for donations to the temple
of Gosh. Kat throws a couple of coins in, and Milena throws one
in as well. Al asks if there is a shrine to Gosh; they say it's
in the temple, and they should bring drinks. Al throws in a coin
and they hug him and thank him for his generous donation. He asks
for their names, and the woman who hugged him identifies herself
as Elios Roeder.

They head to the temple, which is at one end of the market and
flanked by 20-foot columns depicting the gods. Al excitedly talks
about Sayd, the god who doesn't fight. When they get into the
building, they see there are doors on two levels leading to rooms
with altars for individual gods -- most of which don't actually
have priests, just shrines. Al suggests they go to the Nolan shrine,
accompanied by Milena, Gnik, and Anny. There is an old Rel woman
seated at the back corner of the altar who arises and greets them
when they enter. Al chats with her and then drops a donation in
their offering shell.

Kai and Kat wander around looking for a priest to talk with,
preferably one associated with a god that is against undead.
At the altar to Arkon (god of Desire, Foresight, Greed,
Possibility) there is a man holding a book, hunched
over and with a walking stick. Kat asks him if he had a nice
walk last night. He says yes and asks if she did as well. She
says it was a little foggy. Kai asks if this is them man she
saw last night and she whispers she thinks it is. He says he
saw her wandering around and wanted to make sure she was okay,
and that she was not out to create any trouble or vandalize
the temple. Kai argues with him about why he is not trying to
solve the town's problem with undead. He says he takes up the
fights he needs to fight, and they take up their fights, including
the fight against the undead. Kai says they're only passing through,
and Kat adds they're really more demon hunters, and puffs up a bit
as she says it. He says, "But your first was a devil, yes?" and
reveals that word of their misadventures has traveled this far.
He introduces himself as Justin Cloud, and at their questions talks
more about the history of the town and the current unrest.

They move on and peek in at the temple of Gosh, but decide that
group won't be interested in talking about the undead problem.
Kat goes looking for street kids again now that it's daylight.
She pulls out a silver coin and starts twirling it around her
fingers to try to get their attention. Two kids come running
over, Trev and Sal. Kat says she's new in town and is wondering
who's in charge. They say nobody. She asks what happens if ships
come in to trade, and they indicate several guilds that fight all
the time with everyone else stuck in between. She asks about
the the undead, and they say there is a rumor that a witch came
with the Raging Hammer who did something to keep the dead from 
departing, for some purpose they don't know.

Kai finds the shrine for Sasha (god of Emotional Love, Purity,
Women, Family, Protection) and asks the priest why there are
no priests here for Maria, Sayd, or Vlondrel. She says there
was someone here for Maria and Vlondrel before the Sack, but
the Vlondrel priest vanished -- as did the Ceonarre priest --
and Sayd is not so much worshipped here.

Milena goes to the shrine of Daln for contemplation and
meditation. It has a stark altar with two statues of wolves
and carvings on the wall of maps. She notices one of the wolf
statues is looking toward the wall behind the altar at a
map with a circle etched into it that looks like it might
be more than just part of the etching. It looks like it
might be a button, so she presses it. There is a flickering
light behind her, a small passageway opens up in the wall
behind the castle, and Milena sees that behind her is an
illusion of the shrine without the doors open and without
Milena there -- so that it is no longer obvious anything is
happening in the room. She looks into the room; it looks
like a small dormitory, with torches on the wall and beds
lining either side. At the far wall, there is another large
wolf statue with a small golden statue at its feet. After
making sure she could get out of this room if she climbs
in and the door closes behind her and seeing the latch
just behind the door, Milena climbs in, goes to the far
wall, and leaves an offering of two gold coins in front
of the tiny statue, which is also a wolf. It looks up,
comes to her and puts its paws on her knees, then goes
back to standing still in its original position. She holds
her hand out to it and it climbs into her hand and sits
still again. She decides it is asking her to take it
with her, so she does so and departs ths shrine.


2 May 2020

Gnik casts Invisibility on Kat and she sneaks down to scope
out the castle where they'll be having dinner. The rest of
the group grabs lunch in the market and heads to the docks.

The entrance through the wall around the castle is guarded by
a large fanged woman, probably part-orc, with a sword on her back 
and an axe nearby. Kat, invisible, tries to slip past; the woman's
head snaps around as if she heard or smelled something, but since
she can't see Kat she seems to decide it was nothing. As Kat nears
the castle she hears someone ask, "Hey, Bess, is he in?" and the
guard grunts a yes. Kat turns and sees Doreen, the woman who dived 
off the Sea Ghost as the battle started. Kat follows her. She goes 
up a set of external stairs that look hastily rebuilt, perhaps 
after the sack seven years ago, to a door on the 2nd floor that 
she enters and closes behind her. Kat waits 30 seconds and then 
slowly opens the door a crack. She sees that the hall before
her is empty, so she slips in and closes the door behind her.
She hears voices off to the right along the hall that the entry
hall T's into -- the woman addressing Polist, and him greeting
her by name.

The rest of the group goes to the docks. Nothing looks very 
out-of-the-ordinary, except for the green-skinned woman -- a
sea elf -- working on a boat. Anny doesn't recognize her. She
doesn't want to approach alone, not knowing why the woman is on
the boat -- not a normal situation for a sea elf -- so Al goes
with her. As they approach, Al senses confusion and fear in the
woman. When they get close enough, Al calls out in greeting and
introduces himself. The woman asks if they are looking for her.
Al says no, and Anny starts speaking in elvish; the woman looks
panicked and says she doesn't understand that language. She
shares that she was found as a baby at sea and raised on land,
and introduces herself as Lossy. Al invites her to come have a 
bite to eat and talk. He notices that her boat is the best-maintained 
in the dock, and Al asks if it would be safe if they left it 
alone. She says yes, there are people watching it, she paid 
the right people. Gnik and Ember join them and go to a nearby
restaurant, The Sailor and the Duck. 

Kai joins Milena to walk the docks looking for working girls.
She sees two women talking who are dressed to show their assets,
and approaches them, telling them she is visiting and that she
usually provides medical services. They say if she wants to
do that here, she'd have to talk to the Warren; they manage
the girls and their care. Kai notices that the docks are very
well-guarded and there is less chaos than she might expect:
no dock-rat children, for instance.

In the castle, Kat follows the voices and finds a large room
with a desk and a pile of framed portraits, and another door 
on the far side. Windows open onto the courtyard to the south. 
Doreen and Polist are discussing business: ship loaded with cargo,
will depart tomorrow afternoon. There is also a dwarf asking
about cost and the overall business side of things. They don't
mention the cargo, but they are headed to Freeport. Kat looks
through the door on the far side, which opens into a hall
with other rooms opening off it. Kat decides to try to find 
the kitchens to see if she can pick up any gossip about the 
evening's dinner.

At the restaurant, Lossy says she has been fishing her whole
life; she was found floating in the ocean by fisherfolk, who
brought her back to Seaton, where she was raised. Al asks about
the town generally, and shares that they killed four spectres
last night. She say that's about half of them, but that there
are other things around: the spectres leave bodies behind, but
other people just vanish, and one woman reported being attacked
by a monstrous man who didn't pursue her when she fell in the
water trying to get away. She says the vanishing has been happening
since before the sack, most of her life. She speaks with respect
of the Warren, who arose from nowhere to protect the town when
Raging Hammer attacked. She says the Warren cares more about Seaton
than the Guild does, which only cares about making money and letting
the wealth flow back inland to Tyreln and other places. They ask
if she has an opinion about Polist; she says not really, she never
met him, but it seems like he tries to keep money flowing back into
town so he seems like an okay guy.

Kai and Milena see an older couple cleaning their catch for the
day. Kai points out the guards and that there is no one at the
docks -- except them -- who are there for anything other than 
work.

Kat finds the kitchens and sees a halfling woman preparing food.
She does a quick search for anything suspicious -- such as poisons
-- that might be slipped into their food, but finds nothing. She
goes looking for a study to rummage through, but sees that the
castle is pretty bare. She does find two bedrooms with attached
offices, and in one of the offices there is a large ornate chest.
Based on what is in the wardrobe, it is probably the dwarf woman's
rooms. Kat takes a look at the chest and finds that the lock is
internal, there may be multiple traps including a barely visible
rune, and a hidden second keyhole. She tries to open it with Mage
Hand, but has no luck. Knowing that her invisibility is about
to go away, she slips out of the castle and keep. When she gets
about ten feet away, she uses Mage Hand to gently tug one of the
guard's braids. Her axe is in her hand immediately.

Life is harder since the sack: it's harder to buy things, not
as many people around to do things, and can't stay out after
dark, so their time to fish is significantly reduced. Kids in
town don't want to stay here, and many end up vanishing -- not
clear if they've left on purpose or were taken or killed. Milena
asks about Auntie Treeshadow and whether her influence has been
constant over the years, or has changed. They say she has always
been there in their time. Milena asks about the undead creatures
and if they as fisherfolk knew what the aim of those creatures
are. They did not, but said they ignore -- but frighten -- the
fish, and head out to sea. Kai asks about the guards -- their
purpose and how the couple feels about them -- and gets the
sense they are very nervous about this turn in the conversation,
as if the guards are basically a protection racket. They ask
if Kai and Milena are part of the group that went to the restaurant
and express annoyance at having to compete againts a sea elf
who can go places they can't and fish in ways they can't.

When Kat gets back to the inn, Marty is reading a book and
asks if he can get her anything to eat. Gnik returns and goes
to his room to rest. Milena goes to her room to meditate and
see what she can intuit about the wolf statue, which she
senses is trying to communicate with her. Milena gets the 
sense that it is friendly and curious and wants to share its
story and learn hers. She learns that it is a large female
wolf named Nash who has adopted this form to help people,
and can take her true form for up to an hour each day.

The group, along with Valery, heads to the castle for dinner.
The guard at the gate lets them in and tells them to go up
the stairs and to the right, Herna will show them where to
go. It turns out to be the halfling woman Kat saw in the
kitchen, leading them to the office room where the desk has
been replaced by a large table. Doreen and Polist are at
the table talking; when the group enters, Doreen glances
up, does a double-take, and reaches for her weapon but
Polist puts a hand on her arm to stop her from drawing. He
says there's no need for that, as the group is their guests.
She glares at him like he needs to die. As soon as Al sees her, 
he looks around to check where the exits are, asks the rest of
the group to remind him what they were told her name was, and
greets her by name. Polist introduces the rest of them to her
and tells them that there is no need for formality.

Polist expressed some surprise that anyone from Saltmarsh
would come to check on them, as no one has seemed to care
about Seaton since the sack. Al mentioned they were surprised
to see so many undead, as this was not widely known of in Saltmarsh.
Polist shares that originally there were at least 8 spectres
and thanks them for taking care of four of them.

They discuss the current state of Seaton. Polist says it would
be better if Raging Hammer were gotten rid of; since Michel
took over, he is wiping out governments in small towns all over
the place, and between them and the Guild there is no free trade.
Al asks if he would be happy if the duke rode in, got rid of Raging
Hammer, and installed a new baron, and Polist says the Guild has
so much political sway that they would just take over and nothing
would really improve. Al notices that Doreen does not seem to be
reacting negatively to the idea of Raging Hammer being taken out,
although she does view Al and the rest of the group with a bit
of spite. Polist mentions the problem that Freeport is scavenging
all building materials in the area, driving prices up. Kai asks
about the protection racket by the guards on the docks, and implies
that he is causing the problems that require the need for the guards
in the first place. He says that the Guild has been the ones making
trouble.

Al asks how Polist plans to take out Michel. Polist pulls out
a bag and shakes it; it jingles with a sound like glass. He says
Michel has been trying to get it, so he has been doing everything
he can to keep him from getting it, and will give it to them if
they express willingness to take out Michel. They decide it is
in the interest of both their towns.

Kai asks Doreen about Michel. She says he is a psychopath -- he
thinks he's fighting the good fight against oppression despite being
a slaver. His ship is the Laughing Sin, and it flies the regular Raging
Hammer flag when it goes out. It is well-armored and armed but fast, 
and there are rumors he's had it magically enhanced. Polist says there
are hundreds of people working on many ships for Raging Hammer, and
he is rumored to have an island where he hides out. The thought from
Doreen and Polist is that if Michel is taken out, the other captains
will squabble and take each other out for dominance.

Gnik asks what Polist thinks would happen if the undead were taken
out. He says it would be good for everyone. He also mentions the
story of the girl who was attacked but the attacker did not pursue
when she fell in the water. Gnik pulls out his book of arcana for
clues, and it falls open to two pages listing the various types
of vampires.

The group asks whether it would help the situation if someone
formerly associated with the baron's family or in a position of
power came back as at least a figurehead. Polist expresses extreme
skepticism that anyone survived, and Al shares that he may have met
someone who was formerly in a position of power, but he's not sure.
Milena suggests they could look through the stack of portraits, which
Polist indicated he was waiting to appraise to see if they were worth
anything. Milena suggests they could look through the portraits to 
see if anyone looks familiar. They see several portraits that include
a teenage girl that looks like it could be Susannah -- and Polist, in
identifying everyone in the portraits, identifies her as the baron's
daughter Susannah. Gnik suggests that he should hold onto the portraits
in case anyone comes back and he needs to prove their identity to the
townsfolk.

The group decides that they will wait until near sunset to return
to their inn so that they can attempt to take out more undead on
their walk back. Doreen departs before sunset so she can make it
to her ship, and wishes the group luck.

They get to the entrance of the temple and Julian, the priest of
Arkon, is standing there. He asks what they're doing there and
asks if they're coming to kill more spectres. Kat says, "We're
coming to vandalize your temple!" and he chuckles. They say they
might also be looking for a vampire and asks which kind is afraid
of water. He says none are afraid of it, but both Jhoynian and
Dorgenian vampires are harmed by it. They ask what else he knows
about killing vampires, and he says the Sayd temple has some books
-- they can take a look if they come back tomorrow.

They head toward the smaller bridge across the river. As they approach,
about a block away, they see a glow coming from an alleyway. Kat scales
a nearby building so she can try to flank it. As she walks across the
top, she feels a beam give way beneath her, but rolls away before
she falls through.


16 May 2020

Kat rights herself; the glow from the alley disappears and reappears
behind her. Four more rise out of the ground below, surrounding the
group entering the alley. Kat stabs at the one on the roof with Torchlight,
tearing bits of it away. 

Milena hits a ghoul with Guiding Bolt; it strikes out at Valery, cutting
into her leg. She falls to her knees as an inky blackness spreads from
the wound. Another hits Kai in the hip, and a third hits Al in the
wrist, but he is able to fight off the necrotic effect. The fourth
hits Ember.

Al yells to Kai, "Hold your action -- I might be able to stun it!"
He takes four attacks and manages to stun three of them, but not the
one by Kai -- however, she swings twice at it and does significant
damage. Anny stabs the one next to Valery, which is stunned, with 
her spear. Gnik casts Protection from Evil on Ember, who is next to
him.

Kat stabs the spectre she's facing again, and then tries bludgeoning
it with her magical crossbow. Milena casts Beacon of Hope, and Boris
runs over to protect Valery. The spectre attacking Kai hits her again.
The one Kat is fighting attacks her; she dodges, but it still does some
damage.

Valery mutters something, and the spectre fighting Kai suddenly looks
at her and covers its ears. Kai slashes at it and it falls apart. She
runs to the one Ember has been fighting. Al also closes with that one,
punches it, and it falls apart. He runs to the one that attacked Valery,
punches it, and obliterates it as well.

A section of roof disintegrates under Kat, but she's able to jump
away to a stable section of rafter. Gnik uses Mage Hand to send his
magical dagger to her. Ember attacks the remaining spectre on the ground,
stabs it twice, and it dissolves into ichor.

Kat slashes the remaining spectre with Torchlight through the head,
then stabs with the Gnik's dagger; it is obliterated into nothingness.
Milena casts a Mass Healing Word to give a bit of healing to all those
who were injured. Valery and Ember, who took necrotic damage, will need
to rest before healing will be effective. The group returns to the inn
to rest.

The innkeeper, Brian, mentions that he has heard strange rumors
about Lossy when he learns Gnik is planning to have lunch with
her -- he mentions that she is extremely tough, and has retractable
claws... and Gnik realizes she is probably not just a sea elf, but
sahaugin. He decides he should hold his special dagger when he
meets with her to see if it detects her as an enemy sahaugin.



13 Agram 3275

The group decides to set watches, with Milena taking the last watch.
During that watch, all of the group suddenly perceive themselves
to be in a wood surrounded on three sides by mountains, on a path
of metallic bricks, silvery-colored, that give a bit with each step
and that lead to a circular paved area. In the path is a stump that
seems to have a chessboard on it, a Rel sitting by it on a very large
chair, and a Jhoynian sitting on the other side of the table. There 
is another small table covered with a variety of objects. When the
Rel sees them he gets a big smile on his face, hops off the chair,
moves a chess piece, and comes over to greet them. Al asks who he
is, and he says, "Hi, I'm Ag, this is just where I'm hanging out...."
In the distance, they see what looks like an enormous dog disappearing
into the trees. Kat says, "Hey! Ag! It's your day today!" He says that
because of that, he has the power to make things happen. He invites
them to sit down, and suddenly it's dark and they're sitting around
a pleasant fire.

Kat asks why they're there, and he says he wanted to talk to them.
He says he gave them some things, cool things, and they do cool things
for him, and what happened? Kat doesn't know what he's specifically
asking about until Milena says, "Do you know what he's asking?" and
Ag asks, "What happened to the coin?" She tells the story of giving
away the coin to learn something she desperately wanted, and then
regretted it because she learned the information less than twelve
hours later from her mother, who had been planning to tell her.

Ag asks her what she learned, and she says she learned that gifts from
the gods are more important than her own wants and needs.  He says,
"Naaah, that's the wrong lesson." But then he tells her there is no
right answer, and that she has free choice.

Al asks if Ag knows why the hag near Seaton is doing what she's doing,
and what she's up to. Ag responds there are a lot of hags in that
area -- which Gnik is surprised to hear.  They don't generally hang 
around together, but might form covens, and there is a heirarchy in
which the most powerful are granted the title Grandmother, and the
next tier are called Auntie -- like Auntie Treeshadow. They enjoy
seeing people in misery.

Kai asks Ag who he was playing chess with earlier. He says it was
his high priest. They look over and there's now a woman in that
seat -- he says he gets a new high priest every month, and they
learn by playing chess with him. Kat says, "You're the coolest
god -- is there any way I can get my coin back again?" Ag laughs
and says, "Now THAT'S the answer I was looking for---" and the
group suddenly finds themselves back at the inn, waking up for
those who were asleep.

They go downstairs; Valery comes down looking much better, having
healed herself that morning. Ember still looks pretty beat up,
so Valery gives her some healing as well. 

They begin discussing their strange "dream" and Milena says it
was not a dream, as she was not asleep -- it was a summoning.
Al mentioned that he saw the group was not the only one there --
he seemed to be meeting with many people at once, perhaps other
of his followers or chosen. Al got the sense that he was doing
this because he could on that day, and he thought it would be
fun. As they talk, they realize there was no sun when they got
there and no stars when it got dark, so it may have been another
plane or extradimensional space. Valery is hastily taking notes
on everything they're talking about, when Al says, "Did we ever
tell you about the time we went to Jaeleth?" and Gnik begins
telling the story.

As they talk, a man walks in and starts talking quietly to Marty,
then comes over to ask them if they were the Salties who came into
town yesterday, and asks if they've seen Clair, the Sorter who
brought them into town.  He introduces himself as Ponba, one of
the other Sorters who works with her, and says she hasn't been
seen since yesterday morning when they came in with her. Al asks
what her normal day is like, and listens closely to try to tell
if Ponba is telling the truth. Al gets the impression as he talks
that he's not only telling the truth, he's worried. Marty goes into 
the back room, and Ponba asks how much they've talked to him -- he
says he doesn't trust Marty and thinks he may have done something.

Al decides to go into the kitchen to chat with Marty to see if he
seems trustworthy by asking him if he thinks Ponba is trustworthy.
He gets the sense that Marty is very uncomfortable with this line
of questioning and thinks Al is sticking his nose in where it
doesn't belong.

The group decides to send Az and Zassin to fly around the city to
see if they find any clue of Clair. They discuss their plans for
the day, and when they mention lunch with Lossy, Gnik shares what
he learned about her. Anny has an immediate negative and prejudiced
reaction to the fact that she is probably sahaugin; Gnik talks her
down my mentioning that they can use the dagger to see if she is
a foe.

Al and Marty carry breakfast out to the group and they start eating.
Al shares with Marty that Gnik has a spell that could let him
track someone if they are close enough to him, and if he knows
of an object that is on them. Al recalls that Clair was wearing
a long chain both times they saw her, and Milena recalls she was
wearing a cute anklet. Marty heads back into the kitchen. Al begins
asking the rest of the group if they see the creature flying around, 
and the black stuff coming out of the ground. Gnik tries dispelling
magic on him, but nothing happens. A moment later, he vomits across
the table, poisoned. Kai runs into the kitchen to see Marty trying
to bolt out the back door, and grabs him. Gnik casts Suggestion
on him, with the suggestion that he helps them find Clair. Milena
cures Al's poisoning.

Marty says he left Clair at the waterfront. Kai asks if she's
alive; he says he thinks she was when he left her. He leads them
to the north of town and to the rocky shore out of the edge of
town. He says he left her on the rocks because they had an argument.
Gnik asks what they were arguing about, since that might help them
find her. Before he can ask, something comes rising out of the water
-- it looks like Clair, but she is pale and red-eyed and her hair
is long instead of cropped. Her hair begins reaching toward Marty,
and Al grabs him. Kai and Kat seem to think this is justice, but
Al says they don't know what happened -- maybe something else 
attacked her. Clair says, "He bashed my head in with a rock."
Al tries to argue that maybe she only thinks that, and someone
else killed her... and then looks at Marty and says, "...but you
did try to poison me." Kai recognizes Clair as a drowned maiden,
who won't be appeased until it kills its murderer. Al lets go
and the hair pulls him under. As soon as he drowns, her body
dissolves into seafoam. Marty's body floats to the surface, and
they find Clair's corpse on the shore a short distance away.
Gnik conjures a floating disc to bring the bodies back to town
to try to find the nearest constable. When they do, they tell
her what happened and ask her to let Ponba know.

Al decides to go back to the inn to rest, and Anny goes with
him. Valery goes back to write up the story of some of the
things that happened last night. The rest of the group heads
to the temple area to meet Julian to review information on
vampires. He has found one good book from the Sayd temple,
which he says got trashed -- the book looks like it has been
thrown around and beaten up. Gnik offers to take the remaining
books from that temple back to the temple in Saltmarsh if Julian
is willing to part with them, and he agrees. Gnik mends the book
and starts reading. It is verbose, written fairly recently --
perhaps within the last ten years -- but includes descriptions
of all the types of vampires the author was aware of. Gnik asks
Julian if he knows where he could buy some holy water and parchment,
and Julian says he has some.

As Julian helps them, Kat notices there is something odd about
the way he moves and how he picks things up. Then, for a brief
moment, the edge of his cloak seems to pass through another object.
Kat gets the sense this might be what it would look like if someone
were using a Disguise Self spell. She whispers this to Gnik and
asks if they should dispell magic on him, but Gnik responds that
he's being helpful and friendly, and that seems like a hostile
thing to do. Julian says he has three vials of holy water he can
part with, and though they are 25 gp each, Gnik gives him 100;
Julian thanks him profusely.

After they leave, Kat shares her suspicions. Kai opines that
she can't think of any examples of someone disguising themselves
for non-nefarious purposes. Milena suggests he could have been
disfigured in the sack, or could be of a race that is not well
regarded here. They discuss the fact that they have only seen
him at night or indoors, never in broad daylight.



30 May 2020

The group (minus Al and Anny) heads to the Sailor and Duck to 
meet Lossy for lunch. She asks where Anny is; Gnik says she's
not feeling well, that they have fought many spectres over the 
last couple of days and Anny still has some healing to do. He
asks after Lossy's day and she says she had a good day on the
boat, but the guy who was supposed to go with her never showed.
Gnik asks if she's worried about him, and she says this sort of
thing happens all the time. Under the table, Gnik pulls out his
hostile sahaugin-sensing dagger and feels a pull... behind him,
rather than toward Lossy. He jumps up, dagger in hand, and turns
behind him. Kai jumps up reflexively, and Kat, who'd been reading
the menu, asks, "What's going on?" Gnik says, "Sahaugin!" and
goes invisible.

The five people at the table behind Gnik stand up and draw
weapons; none of them is obviously sahaugin. Kai says, "Can we just
pause and take this outside?" -- but simultaneously Kat pulls out
Torchlight and charges the other table. Kai calls out to her to
stop, that the other group may just have pulled weapons before
they did, and she pulls up short, staring at the other group. One
of them says, "You backed the wrong side... and took the wrong 
ship." Gnik, invisible, begins moving toward the door and triangulating
with his dagger; it seems to be pulling toward the half-elf in the
group. Kat uses Mage Hand to lift a mug over the head of the nearest
foe, pour it out, and then drop it. He looks up at the unexpected
shower and so the mug hits him in the face.

Kai tosses the barkeep a platinum piece and says, "Sorry, I tried,"
and runs at the largest foe. He steps forward as she runs and she
slices into his thigh and wrist with her sword. Gnik moves out the
door, peeks back through the doorway, and casts Grease under the group
of foes. The half-elf and the Jhoyniah slip and fall, but the others
remain standing. Boris runs at the Dorghenian, trying to knock him 
down, and Mouse runs at the Rel, but both keep their footing. Az
flies at the big Jhoynian to distract as he and the half-elf regain
their footing. The half-elf and two Jhoynians go after Kai but she
is able to dodge and parry all three, the Rel goes after Ember but
misses, and the Dorghenian goes after Kat but misses.

Lossy leaps up onto the table and dives off it straight at the
smaller Jhoynian; she grabs at his clavicle and chest and he screams
as he falls backward. Milena, still sitting at the table sipping
her tea, casts Hold Person at the Dorghenian and Jhoynian who are
still standing; the Dorghenian is frozen but the Jhoynian manages
to shake it off. Valery calls out to Kai, "You've got this!" and
she looks at the one foe still standing and in motion and growls,
"Are you sure?" trying to intimidate.

Kat aims a kick at the head of the fallen Jhoynian who is trying
to get up again. He flips all the way over and lands on his belly
again. The guy Kai roared at steps backward, slips on the grease
and falls on his chair, which shatters. He tries to scramble to
his feet and run away. Zassin flies to the frozen Dhorgenian, gets
up in his face, and tries to make his scariest face.

A couple of the group notice that the Jhoynian struggling to stand
has a Raging Hammer tattoo on his forearm. Gnik attempts to cast
Suggestion at the half-elf, whom he suspects to be sahaugin, and
says, "Why don't you stop fighting and talk about what's going
on?" The half-elf, wipes at his head, mutters, "Spellcasters!"
and keeps fighting. Boris jumps at him and knocks him over, while
Mouse knocks the Rel down, but he leaps up and skewers Mouse in
the stomach. The half-elf attacks Kai and hits her across the temple
with a scimitar and in the forearm with a dagger. Lossy snarls and
jumps at the half-elf, scratching down both legs with her nails.
Kai notices she has serrated claws under each nail.

Milena leans forward to touch Mouse and casts Cure Wounds. He
perks up and gives a little woof. Valery calls out, "Kat, take
'em out!" She lunges at the Rel, Torchlight in one hand and a
dagger in the other, and hits with both -- the sword in the arm
and then, when he pulls it back, the dagger in the stomach. "That's
for Mouse!" she growls. "There's a mouse?" he asks, befuddled. Kai
gouges the half-elf across the chest. Gnik casts Sleep at the
nearest fleeing Jhoynian, but he doesn't stop. The Rel and half-elf
disengage and make a run for it; Lossy lets them go. Milena moves
to the window and casts Hold Person on the half-elf, which releases
the Dhorgenian. Valery stands, pulls out her short sword, which none
of the group has ever seen, and holds the sword point at his throat
and says politely, "You're not going anywhere, are you?" The 
Dorghenian sits. Milena lets the group know that there is a held
half-elf down the block, and Kai goes to collect and tie up
the prisoner.

The Dorghenian looks around and calmly asks, "Where'd my mug go?" Kat
asks Gnik why he instigated this fight, and he says, "You've used my
dagger." She says there are no sahaugin here, and he points to the
half-elf. She looks confused and says her mom is just around the 
corner... but she never knew her dad. Gnik takes a few minutes to
cast Identify on the dagger to figure out if the lore about it is
wrong, or if the half-elf is unknowingly a sahaugin.

They ask the attackers why they attacked. They say they took it upon
themselves to hunt the group down, given that they were staying on the
wrong side of town and then went to the castle to threaten Polist. Kai
asks what made them think they threatened Polist. They say they just
figured it out from knowing they went to the castle, and that it was
the idea of the little Jhoynian who fled. Kai rolls her eyes and says
they just went to have dinner, at his invitation.

Gnik finishes casting and learns that it will sense anyone of elven
blood, orcs, sahaugin, or cecaeliae who are hostile. The group discusses
letting their captives go, and the barkeep suggests they should clean
up their mess first.

Kai mentions to Lossy that she noticed the extra spurs under her nails,
but they're gone now. She says she knows that's not normal, and she's
been told her blood is darker than it should be. They ask if she knows
what a Milenti is, but she has not heard of it. She has heard of
sehaugin, though, calls them sea devils, and says they have killed
many people in town. The group explains that sometimes sahaugin are
born that look like sea elves, and that sahaugin raised with their
own kind are vicious and evil but not necessarily if they have been
raised apart. She asks if anyone else knows. Gnik tells her that
only their group knows, but they thought she should know -- and that
Anny, who fought sahaugin, was not sure what to think so she stayed
away from the lunch.

Al arrives and approaches the group. Valery says, "You missed a
lot of fun!" and proceeds to tell a well-told tale of an epic
battle. Kai lets him know that they've told Lossy about her
likely heritage. Al tries to get a sense whether she would be
comforted by a friendly hug, and decides probably not -- so 
instead he says, "No matter what you learned today, I am still
your friend." She thanks him.

Gnik mends the broken chair and then moves to the front to mend the
windows. A man who was boarding up the broken windows and getting
ready to put up a third board sighs, pulls out a crowbar and starts
taking the boards down again.

The group discusses whether they want to stay in town and try to deal
with the alleged vampire situation. Gnik declares that he would like
to find a mirror, and suggests each of the group should probably carry 
a wooden stake. Milena says, "It is too bad you mended the chair."

They discuss whether Julian could secretly be a vampire. Gnik mentions
that he sold them holy water, and Kai says, "Yeah, if it's really holy
water...." He sighs and takes time to cast Identify, which confirms
they are indeed holy water.

Al approaches a table of locals; they are immediately nervous and
intimidated, but he tries to reassure them: "No, no, I just want to
ask you a little bit about the town, nothing weird, just we heard
there might be vampires and we thought we might try to take them
out as a public service, and can you tell us anything?" The group
stands up and scurries away. Behind the bar, the barkeep throws
up his hands. Al finishes their drinks.

Kai asks Valery not to reveal Lossy's background in any of her tales,
and Valery agrees. She then asks Valery if she could write something
that would help the town feel more comfortable about Lossy. Valery
slides her chair over by Lossy and starts asking about her life.

The group goes to the market to look for a mirror and wooden stakes.
They realize the seer is their best bet for a mirror, and when they
approach she holds up a bucket full of wooden stakes and offers them
to the group for free (but not the bucket). Gnik goes to talk to Jardani
the raven and offers a small piece of meat. "If I remember correctly,
you told me that if I brought you food you would tell me more secrets."
He says, "Yes yes!" Gnik asks if he could tell secrets about vampires.
"Food first?" Jardani asks. Gnik tosses him the food. He says, "You
seek but you won't find... but you will find." Madame Tsura says
something to Jardani in a language they don't know, but she seems to
be telling him off. He skulks off into the wagon. They ask her if
there are any particularly creeply places in town with features that
might suggest a vampire lair. She says she is new to town, but that
does not sound like a place that would be in town.

Gnik asks if she has any small mirrors, and explains that he would
like to build a small monocle that would allow him to check for
vampires. She says she has such a thing, but it was difficult to
make, so she asks 30 gold pieces for it. Al pays it and gives the
device to Gnik. Milena buys a small steel mirror.

Al asks around of other townspeople if there is a graveyard in or
near town, but they say it is too close to sea, so they do all their
burials at sea.

The group goes back to the inn to rest and eat dinner, with the plan
of returning to the market at night to see if any vampires attack
or they get any other clues. When they arrive, the constable is there,
and they learn that Marty had three other girlfriends who had gone
missing -- but it didn't seem too suspicious because lots of people
here go missing.

Gnik consults the wondrous book for tips on how to track a vampire;
the page he flips to says, "If someone were going to look for a vampire,
which I don't know why you would because there isn't one in the
area, you should look for their shadow to find what you're actually
supposed to find."

They discuss options to get things to cast shadows. Gnik mentions
he could light the streetlights, which they have not seen lit at
night. They ask Ponba why the lights aren't lit, and he says there
has been no one to do so since the sack, and they have not been
maintained with oil. They decide perhaps they could light them and 
see if anyone or anything comes to stop them.

After a rest, they set out to the marketplace, with Az landing on
each streetlight so Gnik can cast a Light spell on each. As they
reach the market they see Madame Tsura's wagon is gone, though
there are three other wagons there; and the doors of the temple are 
open. Al puts on his headband that allows him to see in all conditions,
and goes to the door of the temple to look in. He hears a voice down
the hall call out, "Who's there?" He responds, "It is I, the seafaring
monk!" Julian comes walking around the corner and asks what they're
doing. Al says they're looking for the vampire.  "In a holy place?"
he asks. Al says it's the only place open, so he thought he would
look to see what was there. As Julian approaches, Al sees his
shadow: it is much taller than Julian, the hands appear to be
upside down with the fingers curving the wrong way, with claws,
and he has some kind of snout, along with either ears or horns. Al 
asks if Julian knows about any creepy places with bats or rats around 
that could be a lair, while backing away nervously. Julian wishes him 
luck. Al tries to mentally contact Zassin and visualize what he saw. 
Zassin passes along an exaggerated image, as usual.

Kat decides to go up onto a nearby warehouse roof to get a better look
at the marketplace. Al rejoins the group and gives them a better
description of the shadow. Gnik recognizes the backward hands as
belonging to a type of horrible fiend that loves feeding on human
flesh and comes to this plane specifically to do so. They are often
feline in appearance; they are not actually devils, but they are
from the hells and will return there if killed, and will then do
everything in its power to return to the plane where it died to
seek revenge against everyone associated with those who killed it.
The only way to kill it permanently is to kill it in the hells. The
panther-like ones will avoid water, can disguise themselves at will,
become invisible, and read thoughts. Kai says, "I'm out." The group
decides to return to the inn. Gnik scribbles a message, "Julian is
a fiend, we're retreating to the inn," and sends Az to take it to 
Kat.


13 June 2020

On the way back to the inn, the group discusses what to do about Julian.
Kat suggests they could talk to Zagrimil, who might want to take Julian
out. Milena says they could mention it to Polist, who can then decide
what actions to take to protect his people. Kat says maybe they could
offer to take it out, for sufficient reward, but the others think
there's too much risk. Milena recalls that she has a scroll that can 
summon an angelic being to perform a worthy task. They decide they 
should wait until they return to Saltmarsh before using it so it will 
be less likely Julian will know who acted against him. 


14 Agram 3275

At breakfast, Gnik looks up the angelic being Tabris in his book.
The entry suggests that if you let him know about an evil being
that is killing others, he will deal with it. Kai says she is
willing to be the one to read the scroll just in case there are
repercussions -- she has the least family who might be a target
of Julian's wrath. Milena gives her the scroll.

As the group is getting ready to leave, Ponba walks in, points to
the group, and says, "Here they are." Angel, formerly one of the
brigands at the haunted house with Bryon, follows him in and says, 
"Oh, hi, guys!" She tells them she came to Seaton because she knew
Polist didn't like Michel, but when she found out Raging Hammer
was still active on the other side of the river she came to the
merchant's side because it seemed better for her. They fill her
in briefly on what happened to Matty. Al mentions they might be
going to Freeport, since she used to live there when she was
working with Mtchel. She warns them that there are a lot of
scary people, and a lot of pirates, so they should be careful.
Gnik recalls that she previously mentioned a friend in Freeport,
and she shares her name is Cristina Loggins, an old contact of
her father's who works as a broker, helping bring things into
town and get them bought and sold. Al asks if she knows about
a place called Gonagibria; she has just heard that it is a rock
rising far in the air that can be a good place to make port because
most people leave each other alone, and it is often shrouded in fog.
They also ask if she knows about Auntie Treeshadow, and she mentions
Demmer Reece, a former adventurer who was one of only two of his
group who came back from an encounter in the Dreadwood, and who
is still in town.

They find Demmer at a scrivener's shop and ask about his experience
in the Dreadwood. He says they didn't even make it to Auntie Treeshadow;
after fighting through swarms of creatures -- spiders and wolves and
others -- they were turned back by a huge guy that looked like he was 
stitched together, whose hide could not be pierced by any weapons, 
including silvered weapons -- but they had no magic weapons to try.
They had gone because the town lord at the time had offered a
reward, a little less than a year before the sack. Gnik asks if
the undead were already coming down the river then, and he says
there is supposed to be a ruined village on the river in the
Dreadwood where they think Auntie Treeshadow is, but their
sorcerer could not find anything about it through divination --
it seems too well protected.

Al and Kat go to talk to Polist to see if he might be interested
in offering them a reward for the work they've done killing spectres.
Bess is reluctant to let them in, but relents. As they're walking
away, Kat taps her shoulder with Mage Hand. Immediately there is
a huge booming sound of metal on stone; Al looks over his shoulder
and sees that she has buried her axe into the stone wall.

Al and Kat walk in; Polist asks what brings them back so soon. Kat
says, "We notice you have a fiend problem, and we think we can help
you." He says, "From what I hear, you already have." She says, "We
think we can help you more -- we have new intel," and tells him
about Julian. Al does a double-take. Kat says she knows Auntie
Treeshadow has also been a problem, and they might be able to help,
but that they need some extra compensation to cover scrolls and
components and other things. Polist says he's used to people asking
for compensation, and asks how much she's talking about. They haggle
a bit and come up with a price; then Al and Kat rejoin the group
to have lunch with Lossy. Lossy is somewhat subdued, as she is
still processing what she has learned about her background.

They decide to go to the beach out of sight of the town to use
the scroll. Milena notices Al is reading a piece of parchment
and has a coral-colored rock in his hand; Kat notices that Gnik
has a piece of parchment tucked into an empty scabbard where
the sahaugin dagger used to be. They are notes from Anny, who
says the dagger belongs to her people, needs to be returned, and
that it would be dangerous to say more than that. She has left
a small pouch with three diamonds that she says she hopes will
make up for it.

They go to the beach, and Milena (after disrobing, as do Ember
and Al) summons the celestial being Tabris. She explains that
Julian is a fiend that can only be ended by being killed in
its hell. At Al's prompting, she also mentions the hags, but
says that is a more complex problem with no clear solution. Tabris
says, "One task," so Milena chooses Julian. The creature vanishes,
returns a moment later with a small pile of clothing and other
personal items, drops them on the ground, and says, "I will end
him now," and disappears again. A moment later they hear screaming
and commotion coming from town -- probably people reacting to the
sudden appearance of this being and the death of Julian. Gnik
says, "Hey, I was supposed to pick up some books from Julian
before we left town -- we should go do that!"

They go to investigate, and in the temple of Arcon they learn
that a being appeared and engulfed the temple in a very localized
area. There is also a pile of pulverized skeletons -- it appears
they were in the wall, tried to come out when Julian was attacked,
but now lie dead and still. Gnik looks through the books and takes
anything that looks like it might be a good addition to the library
in Saltmarsh.

Kat and Al go to talk to Polist again, and the rest of the group
returns to the inn. They decide they might as well stay one more
night since it is now so late in the day. Gnik examines the items
that used to belong to Julian; it includes thunderstones which can
be thrown to create a loud booming, a dagger that feels magical,
a mirror, and two bags of "powder of peace" which will glow when 
lit and everything touched by its light is encapsulated in silence. 
The chainmail armor feels like mithril.

As soon as Al and Kat approach, Bess steps aside to let them in.
As soon as they enter, he sees them, greets them, and hands them
a bag full of jewels. Kat says that they'll return at some later
time to try to take care of Treeshadow, but they would need to
gain more skills first, and maybe take care of Michel. He says
that even if he is no longer in charge, he will pay the promised
fee. Kat offers her hand to shake on it.

When the rest of the group arrives at the inn, Tabris appears just
long enough to say, "It is done." Around the dining room, patrons
drop their drinks and fall out of their chairs in shock. 

Gnik casts Identify on Julian's items. The dagger, which has a
dragon on the hilt, is called Dracomist; it is critically sharp,
can do Thunderwave on a critical hit once per day, and there is a 
chamber in the hilt that can hold a potion that can be sprayed by 
pushing on the dragon's head. The mirror is a dazzle glass,
a single-use item that can reflect a beam of light at a creature 
that will dazzle them and knock them prone; the light must be direct 
(so e.g. not filtered through tree branches) and the mirror will
crack when used.



27 June 2020

15 Agram 3275

As the group prepares to leave town the next day, Kat receives a
message from Polist via the sending stones that he is sending a
message for them to carry to their contact the heir, for the heir's
eyes only. As they are at breakfast -- taking well-wishes from a
number of townsfolk who stop by to give their regards, a messenger
arrives with a sealed scroll, which he gives to Kat. The group
discusses whether and how to open it -- "Because, really, Polist
has to assume we'll open it and read it" -- but Milena suggests
instead they should bring it to Susanna, share their concerns with
her, and offer to open it on her behalf if she prefers. Gnik points
out that the scroll itself could contain or be used as a tracker of
some kind to locate the heir, so Milena suggests two people ride
ahead to talk to Susannah while the rest continue on the road with
the scroll.

Kat and Milena ride ahead. Kat is glad of the time alone, because
she says she has something she's interested in asking Milena --
namely, if she might be interested in joining the Town Council,
particularly because it might be a way to set up a clinic or guild
of healers rather than just the small individual services provided
by Milena and her daughters. Milena confesses she has actually
considered it, given that some good people are no longer on the
council, or about to step down, but she is not sure how it would
intersect with her other interests. She mentions feeling a call
to the service of Daln and does not know yet whether she should
establish a temple and take up priestess duties, or if her service
will take another form.

Kat catches a glimpse of some kind of glint in the treeline,
but it is quickly gone.

They arrive at the farm and turn off the road toward the house. As
they move toward the house they see Susanna come walking out of
the house, a crossbow in one hand and battleaxe in the other. Kat
lets her know that Polist has sent a message for her because he
believes they could be of mutual benefit to one another. Susanna
asks why he would think so, and Milena fills her in on some of
their conversation with Polist at dinner: the current balance
of power in Seaton, who holds it, and who should -- including his
own people, Raging Hammer, the guild across the river, and the
former ruling family -- and his expressing that he would be open
to the return of one who could prove their connection to that
family. Kat notices Susanna's grip tightening on her battle axe,
as she asks, "And why would you think this has anything to do
with me?" Milena says, "When we were here before, some in our
group felt that your bearing marked you as being of less humble
origin than your companions. And then at dinner, Polist showed
us portraits from the castle of members of the royal family, and...
some of them had a very familiar look."

They explain their concerns about the message -- various ways
that it could be tracked or trapped -- so Susanna rides back
to the rest of the group. While they're still riding, Kat uses
mage hand to open the scroll and hold the pages up for Susanna
to read. Once she has read it, she asks if Polist can be trusted.
They say not really, but it is possible to work with him if their
goals align.

Susanna asks about what happened in Seaway, and they tell her
about the rod that attracts demons. Gnik shows her an image. She
says the morning before the attack on Seaton, a woman showed up 
and gave the rod to Susanna's father saying that Seaton would
prosper for as long as he reigned; her mother, a priestess, did 
a divination and concluded that the woman meant what she said. 
However, that night when the sun set the screaming started, and 
ships appeared in the harbor; when she and others ran to ask 
them for help, the bombardment started. 

Susanna asks if Polist mentioned a weapon being developed that
could help against Auntie Treeshadow. She said her father had
commissioned it from the mage at Roburn Tower, and it was to
have been delivered a week after the sack happened. They speculate
that the mage, Mallan, might still have it. Al offers that if
Susanna has any sort of royal seal, it might allow them to talk
to Mallan on her behalf at some point in the future.

As they arrive back at the farm, they offer Susanna the sending
stone to talk to Polist and let her know he's listening in the
morning, and they don't think he can use it to track her.

As they continue on their way, the group discusses whether to take 
a detour to talk to Mallan on their way home. His tower is between
Seaway and Saltmarsh, so they make their way on to Seaway.

As they approach the town, they see someone step onto the road --
Wilco, the head of security. They greet him, and ask if there are
openings at the inn. He says word hasn't gotten out yet that it's
safe to come back to the inn. Al says they'll spread the word,
and already let folks in Seaton know.

They arrive at the inn and the three young girls -- Ruby, Pearl,
and Jade -- come out to greet them and take care of the horses. Al
walks around to the back with them to see the horses settled, while
the rest go to the inn. Caren comes out to greet them and says their
daggers were finished up today. Vlon comes over with a leather wrap
and rolls it out on the table, revealing a row of weapons. He,
Gerry, and Alvin all look beat -- apparently they've been working
on these almost nonstop. Most are daggers, but others have modifications
appropriate to the wielder, including a bladeless hilt for Al that can
be used for punching, and a thin stiletto for Gnik that can be used
as a dagger or a wand. The weapons glow faintly red, and when
they each pick them up they sense magic, and know that if no one
else is touching it and they are within 50 feet, they can call the
weapon to them. There is a coral-handled dagger for Anny; Milena
agrees to do a Sending to let her know it is ready, and to let
her know there are no hard feelings from the group for her departure.
They discuss whether to leave it in Seaway for her, but Gnik expresses
that he would rather she had to come to them for it.

Gnik infers that the magic in the blades was unknowingly imbued from
the life-force of the three men working on them, who thought of the
recipients as they worked, and the power and magic of the material
shaped their energy into special magic for each of them. He doesn't
want to tell them that's what they did, though; Milena decides to
thank them by casting a Lesser Restoration, couched in the language
of a blessing of thanks, to relieve their exhaustion.


16 Agram 3275

The group leaves Seaway and journeys to the tower. It is old and imposing --
and it is unknown who built it, but it has been occupied by many over time.
Mallan has been here 14 years, from what Al has heard.

There is not obviously anyone about -- by appearance, it could easily
be abandoned. Kai dismounts and knocks on the door. A rectangle of wood
seems to fade out, and eyes look out. "What is it?" a female voice asks. 
"We're here to see Mallan," Kai says. "And who are you?" the voice asks.
From his horse, Al says, "Oh, you know, the usuals." The voice utters
a loud expletive and the opening disappears.

Kai, confused, asks how the woman inside knows Al. The group pieces 
together, and explains, that she was the mage on the Sea Ghost, that
her master came to claim her when she was in jail, and that master
is Mallan -- which is something Gnik knew but the rest of the group
did not. He'd been carefully not bringing up the slavery thing because
he wanted a chance to talk to Mallan without other members of the group
attacking him. Kai asks if the woman Cyrrald is a good person, and Gnik
says, "No, she's a bitch" -- and explains that having read her spellbooks
and some of her exploits, he's just as glad that she's not roaming free.
He and Kai argue a bit about whether slavery is a reasonable alternative
to being locked in a cell indefinitely; Kai decides to walk away.

The door opens and Mallan is there. He welcomes them and asks what
brings them so far out of their way to see him. Gnik says they were
actually passing by on the way back from Seaton, where they learned
about Auntie Treeshadow and that he might be able to make something
that would help. He describes that he had made something that could
help, but it was used for something else -- they realize he is talking
about the scroll that called Tabris. He says he could make it again,
but it would take 6000 gold pieces and about four weeks. Gnik says
that if they can scrape that kind of money together they may be
back to ask them to make one. Gnik asks about her defenses -- they
know about her flesh golem, but Mallan tells them she also has
a flying device that looks like a great cauldron that she rides
in. He warns not to trust what they see around her, that hags are
skilled in dececption. Al asks if taking her out would just cause
another hag to step up to take her place; Mallan says he does not
know the politics of the situation, but although she is rumored
to be part of a coven, he could not see that in his divinations --
in fact he could not see her at all in his divinations. It
occurs to Milena that that is evidence that Auntie Treeshadow
is the one who took the demon-rod to Susanna's parents, which is
why her mother was not able to divine ill intent.

As they are leaving, Gnik asks Mallan how Cyrrald is doing. Mallan
describes her as strongly motivated, but he was channeling her
energies into more productive pursuits, keeping her from causing
trouble. Kai shouts out from her horese, "But does she want to
be here?" Mallan calls to her, "Do you want to leave?" and she
says, "Why, are you gonna take me somewhere? No." Mallan calls
Cyrrald to come talk to the group so he doesn't have to act as
a go-between. Gnik asks how she's doing, since she didn't seem
too happy to be there before, and she says it is better than
being shackled and muzzled. He says he read her journal, and it
sounded pretty horrific when she was in the tower before, and
asks how she's doing now.  "Fine...?" she says, and asks if
she can go back now. Gnik wishes her well.


1 August 2020

In the light of a coming lightning storm, Al sees something 
glittering in the treeline at the edge of the dreadwood, and
tells Gnik. "Don't follow it," Gnik says. "Well," Al says, 
"maybe I should see if someone is following us." Gnik sends 
Az to look, and she says it is a very ugly looking corpse -- 
about a week old -- with a gold necklace with some sort of 
stone or orb in it -- unexpected for a peasant. Upon closer 
inspection, the orb is in the form of an eyeball -- but it 
looks like ceramics rather than an actual eye. There are footsteps 
leading to and away from the body that disappear into the brush. 
They discuss whether to take the necklace, and whether it might 
be used to spy on them or track them. Kat suggests stashing it 
in her box of holding and using Mage Hand to retrieve it. Gnik 
retrieves it as well as a belt pouch and scroll case. Still using 
Mage Hand, he puts the necklace into the belt pouch. Kat thinks
it looks creepy, so she suggests putting it in a lead-lined box
instead to keep divination from passing through. Gnik has to
first remove the spell crystal he has left there as a booby
trap to anyone going through his stuff, loaded with the Suggestion
"Gnik is your good and trusted friend, do what you can to help
him."

The group returns to Seaway for the night. Al chats with Filux
the guard and mentions that the group is planning to try to
take Michel out. He looks surprised and says he has information
to share with the group if they promise never to tell anyone
in Seaway. He says when he was younger and looking for any
work he could, he spent several years on a ship that turned
out to be affiliated with Raging Hammer. He says they have
their own group of assassins, they want to tear down
governments -- Michel is against anyone having control over
others, unless he's the one with the control. Before Michel,
the previous leader was more of a typical pirate -- and
Raging Hammer not nearly as bad as what it has become under
Michel. His trust in people is low, and his assistants don't
tend to last long.

Gnik carefully pulls out the necklace and casts Detect Magic.
The eye is infused with divination magic, as expected; the
scroll case does not appear to be magical. He then casts
Identify -- he can tell it is magical as soon as he touches
it. He gets the feeling that as long as it is on and visible
it allows the wearer to manipulate fate, and to telepathically
bond with someone. As he keeps working with it, he realizes there
is a hidden piece that connects the device to someone else; that
while in possession of it and attuned to it, the wearer is cursed 
and the owner can see what the wearer is doing; and the owner
can also read the mind of anyone connected telepathically by
the device.

Gnik carefully opens the scroll case and finds a note written in
very poor handwriting:

My sweet Leon,
Do be a dearie and find my boys. They've gone and wandered off
again. Their auntie misses them terribly, and it would be a
shame for them to hurt someone you know in their wanderings. 
Be careful if you look for them at night -- you know how much
of a scaredy poo they are around torch fire. Remember, your
family is counting on you!
-Auntie Treeshadow

He puts the necklace back into the lead-lined box; the group
decides they'll take it to Heidy, who might have use or 
interest in it. Gnik plans to take the note to the library,
and keep the scroll-case, which is made of scrimshaw and
is waterproof.


17 Agram 3275

As they set off down the road, they see something flying toward them.
At first they think it is a bird, but it keeps getting bigger. Az looks
at it and says, "Oh, that's horrible." Gnik looks through her eyes and
sees a fiend coming toward them. It is huge, winged, horned, and covered
with mouths. Milena's dagger glows as it approaches. It lands near them, 
bows, and says, "We wish to form an alliance with you." The group asks 
who it is. It introduces itself as Kueta, and gestures into the bushes, 
where two more emerge. The group asks what kind of alliance. "We want 
what you want -- to kill the demons." Gnik says the group's objective
is to keep the area safe from all threats and asks what these devils
would do if the demons were gone. Kueta says they might move on, or
they might stay to continue the alliance. Kat points out that devils
always want something in return in their bargains and asks whether
they want something, or are just helping out of the goodness of their
hearts. (Gnik points out that for devils, "good" is a four-letter word.)
Kueta asks that they would be allowed to take something from the demons
they kill. Kai says, "But no. The answer is no. We're not considering
negotiating with them, are we?" Gnik says to Kueta, "We'll need some
time to consider. How should we contact you with our answer?" He asks
how long it will take to decide, and Gnik says perhaps a few days.
Kueta says they will meet at dawn the day after tomorrow on the road
outside Saltmarsh. 



8 August 2020

The group returns to Saltmarsh, discussing their opinions on what
to do about the devils' offer. Gnik wants to consult the book on
summoning and controling demons before making a decision; and they
decide as a group that they will at least honor the meeting even
if the answer is they are not ready yet to pursue taking out the
demons.


Al goes to check in with his sister. She tells him that crops have not
been growing the way they should in neighborhood farms, which would be
very bad for the area following a bad harvest last year. The group
realizes that the concentration of fiends in the area could be causing
the problem -- they noticed dead vegetation around the Lassiter house
when they were there. She expresses frustration that the order has
not sent another priest with the capabilities Brendan had. Al gives 
her books on Sayd he retrieved from Seaton and tells her there is no 
priest of Sayd there.

The group goes to the Silver Raven to return the horses, then on to
Byorn's temple for dinner and to catch up on what has happened in
Saltmarsh while they were away. The lizardfolk have taken over the
slaughterhouse since the Slaughter Siblings have been locked up,
and it is working out well (when they can keep from eating the food).
They are thinking of setting up a consulate so there will be a safe
space for their people, in the Ash Pit (which the residents in that
area are not so happy with).  Laur stops by and lets them know that
their ship is now ready, and Jarvis is adamant that because the ship 
has been renovated they must leave harbor before sunrise on the day
they next sail to keep bad spirits from getting on the ship.

They go to Heidy's curio shop. Al tells her about their recent 
adventures, including what they've learned about Auntie Treeshadow.
Heidy says some think she is the reason things are coming out of
the Dreadwood. Gnik shows her the letter and the orb, letting her
know that if she is not interested in it their plan is to destroy
it. He asks if she wants to see it, warning that it could be
dangerous. She says sure, but as soon as he opens the box she
slaps it shut again. "That's an Eye of Fate," she says. "You
don't even have to be attuned to it for someone to look through
it." She says if she did take it she'd just put a hammer through
it. She also says the "my boys" referenced in the letter is the
flesh golem she made, stitched together from several boys. They
take the eye outside, find a flat stone surface, and Kai whaps
it with the flat of her sword; the outer shell shatters and
the insides squish. Gnik uses Prestidigitation to clean up
the mess and Mage Hand to put his spell trap crystal back into
the box. They go back in and Al shows off his new Abyssal Steel
dagger and tells her about the demon-attracting rod, which they
think Auntie Treeshadow gave to the lord of Seaton.

The group discusses their upcoming plans and decides on a sailing
trip to several islands to the south.


18 Agram 3275

Milena talks to her other daughters about Kat's suggestion of
buying Logtaru's house to use as a base of operations for their
healing. Jelena thinks this would make things easier, although
there are still clients they would have to visit at home. Milena
says she might be going away for a while; Jelena says she can
cover their usual clients with the help of several folks who
have stepped up since the death of Brendan.

Milena and Kat go to talk to the town council. Egan is talking to
the receptionist, sees the two of them, and his face falls. Milena
promises they have not blown anything up, and tells him her daughter
Ludmilla suggested they ask about using Logtaru's house as a base
of operations for their healing. They may not be able to buy it
outright now, but might consider it in future. They ask how much
it is, and he says he will have to talk to the council; Milena
gets the impression he doesn't know because he's trying to figure
out how much he can get for it. Kat asks to see the records from
when Logtaru bought the place; he asks the clerk to take them,
and they see Logtaru paid 2200 gp for the land, house, and
furnishings. It has been a while ago, so the value could have
increased, but the house did take some damage in the explosion
and most of the furnishings are gone.  Egan says he will take 
Milena's proposal to Juliana and the others, if she trusts him
to do it; she says she does, and to send for her if there are
questions or need for discussion. Since they are leaving town
soon, he says he'll try to send word one way or the other by
tomorrow.

Gnik researches the three devils they will be meeting tomorrow.
He learns that none of them can teleport, but the flying devil
could pick up a smaller being (gnome, halfling, small human,
etc.) and fly with it -- however, it can't use its paralyzing
howl attack while flying. They are all lesser devils with no
spell-like abilities; they are more combat-oriented. They are
resistant to magic spells but not to magical weapons or psychological
attacks.

Gnik then does some research on the demons in the area. He finds a
history that talked about the opening of the portals that brought
many demons. It talks of a celestial being who arrived through a
portal carrying a shield which absorbed a pit fiend, one of the
most powerful devils in existence, and was immediately swarmed
by demons and destroyed, dropping the shield. One of the two
demons still in the area took the shield, which is probably what
the devils want to take. The pit fiend, even trapped in the
shield, is powerful enough that it alone would be enough to 
affect the harvest as is happening now. The demon is unique,
horned, surrounded with a sickening fog with lights inside that
lure the curious, who then are killed by the demon in the fog.

The group concludes that they should not take the deal with the
devils, as they almost certainly want the shield and shouldn't
have it. Kai suggests that they should just go early to the
meeting spot and try to ambush the devils, but Ember points out
that if devils don't sleep, they most likely already are there
and on watch. 

The group prepares for the possibility of fighting the devils.
Heidy is willing to loan them a couple of items: a net that
could help against the flying devil, and a wand that improves
spell attacks.



19 Agram 3275

Valery tells the group that she will be departing in the morning
for New Tireln. Al asks if she would like a letter of introduction
to the Duke; she gratefully accepts.

The group goes to the designated spot outside town to meet the
devils. They see Kueta, and assume the other two are hiding in
the brush nearby as they were at their prior meeting. Al asks
Zassin where the other two devils are, and Zassin says he 
cannot sense other beings like that, only communicate with
those he already knows are there.

Gnik tells Kueta that they have decided to reject the offer to
join forces, and asks the devils to leave the area. Kueta says,
"Why would we do that?" Kai says, "Milena... it's time..." and
Milena begins casting Beacon of Hope. As soon as she starts
casting, Kueta braces himself and opens his mouth for a scream
attack. Kai throws two javelins and hits him in the foot and
the forearm. Al runs forward and throws his special net, and
speaks the command word to turn it into a cage around Kueta.
Kat shoots at him with her crossbow that can create its own
bolts that do force damage rather than projectile damage, which
the devil might be resistant to.

Gnik casts a Silence spell; Kueta grabs the cage and tears it
apart; the cage crumples into its component parts that will
reform back into a net, but not for another 24 hours. Az, in
hawk form, lets Gnik know that the other two devils are hiding
in the brush.

Milena feels a mental tug asking, "Would you like assistance?"
Milena says yes, and the wolf statue in her belt pouch emerges
as a horse-sized wolf, trots easily the 50 feet to Kueta, grabs
him by the arm with her teeth, and throws him to the ground.

The Merregon emerges from the brush with a crossbow that looks
like a small ballista, which it aims at Kai; it hits. Jolgroma,
the soul cage devil, emerges as well and they move about 30 feet
toward Kueta. Jolgroma holds up his soul cage, and Ember jolts
as light flows from her toward the cage.

Kai attacks the prone Kueta, hitting twice, cutting his leg and
taking a piece off his horn as he rolls to avoid getting hit in
the head.

The light streaming from Ember breaks off as she shakes off the
effect. Milena tries to cast a Guiding Bolt at Jolgroma, but the
devil ducks. Al strikes at Kueta with Crusher, then tries for a
stunning strike, but Kueta shakes it off; Al tries to hit with
Obviator, but misses. He manages to hit again with Crusher, and
succeeds on another stunning strike.

Kat shoots at Jolgroma, but the Merregon steps forward and takes
the shot in the gut. Gnik casts Mirror Image on himself, and all
four of them run at the two devils near the brush. Az flies 
around the Jolgroma acting as a distraction; it swings at her
and Gnik yells "Az!", keeping her from flying into the space
its sword slices through. It points its soul cage at Gnik --
it doesn't need to know which one is Gnik to collect his soul
-- but he is able to shake it off. The Jolgroma and Merregon
move up to join the fray, and the Merregon swings at Kai three
times, hitting twice in her calf and arm. Kai strikes at the
still-stunned Kuata, doing significant damage.

Ember charges at the Jolgroma, trying to stab at it, but the
Merregon jumps in between them, taking the damage of both
her attacks. Milena casts Guiding Bolt at Jolgroma, but the
Merragon jumps up and takes that hit as well; it is staggered.
Kueta tries staggering to his feet, but Nash grabs his leg and
jerks it out from under him, sending him back to the ground.

Al attacks the Jolgroma, but the Merregon takes the hit; it is
clearly on its last legs, but still standing. Kat runs in with
Torchlight and tries to hit Jolgroma, Mouse at her side. Mouse
jumps at Jolgroma, and as the Merragon jumps in front she 
bites it in the hip, and it dissolves into a pile of maggots.
Mouse whimpers and backs away. Kat stabs at the Jolgroma and
puts the blade right through its stomach; as she rips it out
there is a glowing red-black ooze that comes out of the wound.
She hits again with her dagger in its forearm, but it does not
do the effect she would normally expect, because it is not
magical.

Ghik and his doubles run up and try to stab the Jolgroma with
his dagger. As he hits, he releases the holy water in the
dagger's compartment, causing the flesh to boil around the
wound. The devil does not have a mouth, but in their minds
everyone hears a migraine-inducing scream of pain.

Kueta staggers to its feet and swings at Nash with both of
its claws and misses, but spins around and slams her with
its tail. She staggers back and lets out a menacing growl.
The Jolgroma swings at Az again, and hits this time, cutting
her in half. She blips out. It then attacks at one of the 
Gniks and manages to choose the correct one; he casts Shield
as a defense, but the attack still gets through and slashes
across his stomach. The wound flames. He nearly loses his
concentration on the Silence spell, but manages to hold it.

Kai pummels Kueta, who is clearly starting to stagger. Ember
stabs at the Jolgroma, getting several shots in. From a 
distance, Milena casts Healing Word on Gnik, almost completely
closing his wound, but it is still on fire.

Nash grabs Kueta again, but this time Kueta manages to stay
standing. Al attacks Kueta, hitting twice; his second hit
goes through his chest, which dissolves into a sticky mass
of flies that stick to his arm and leave sticky goo as they 
fade away.

Mouse tries to bite at the Jolgroma and pull it down the
way Nash did with Kueta, but it doesn't work, although it
does do some damage. Kat hits with Torchlight as well as
her dagger. Torchlight tears through its neck, pulling out
the same red-black ooze. Gnik manages to get the fire on
his wound out, and casts Mindspike on the Jolgroma; it 
tenses up and explodes in flaming, disgusting goo.

Al collects the tattered, reforming net to return to Heidy.
Nash comes over to nuzzle Milena and thinks to her, "Thank you
for the fun." Milena says, "I'm glad you enjoyed," and scratches
her ruff. Nash goes to sniff and nuzzle Boris, who licks at her
wounds.

Today is the Holy Day of Glaw -- god of rivers, fresh water, and
life -- so there is a big party going on in town, particularly
around the river. They run into Valery, who asks if they have
full names for Mallan and Cyrrald; they are at Britt's, and she
knows Mallan's full name is Mallan Barjas'Koe, while Gnik knows 
Cyrrald's is Cyrrald "Sly Bones" Milliciny (although it is not
clear whether "Sly Bones" is what she calls herself or a name
others have given her.)

They recall that the duke told them he would give them 1000
gold for each fiend they took out; they discuss asking Valery
to stop by his keep on her way to New Tireln, but then recall
that the Duke set sail somewhere out to sea when last they
saw him.

The group discusses what to do next, and whether they should
get rid of the remaining demons -- particularly the one with
the demon-entrapping shield, which may be the reason for the
crop failures.

At dinner, Juliana comes to talk to them and tells them that
there was some controversy about selling Logtaru's property
to non-nobles. She and Rolland wanted to give the group a
break, and were eventually able to convince Janet that because
Logtaru left no will, and the group was instrumental in helping
Logtaru's ghost and dealing with the aftermath of his actions,
allowing them the chance to buy the house for what Logtaru paid
for it is fair. Milena says she is interested, and Juliana says
they will hold the property for a few weeks while they gather
the funds.

The group decides to go after the demon the next day, on the
high holy day of Byorn and Ceonnaire. They learn that a ceremony
with six clerics will destroy the shield, and the pit fiend trapped
inside. They plan for Gnik to cast a summoning circle to call the
demon, attack via ranged weapons from a protective circle of their
own with Kat's exploding star as a back-up in case the demon is
able to teleport out, and then to bring together all the clerics
in town (Milena, Svetlana, Britt, Janet, the priest of Nolan, and
the priest of Khela who will be in town for the celebrations)
to deal with the shield. The clerics gladly agree.



19 September 2020

20 Agram 3275

The group hikes out about an hour out of town and finds a livestock trail
crossing the road. They choose that spot to cast their summoning circle,
as crossroads are thematically appropriate for summoning and defeating
fiends. Gnik casts a protective circle and a tiny hut that could be used
as a fallback position. Gnik casts another magic circle tuned to entrap
fiends, and casts Snare inside it. Milena casts Beacon of Hope on the
group.

Gnik casts the summoning -- it takes about 10 minutes, and he feels
the energy snap away... and nothing happens. He's thumbing through his
notes to make sure he didn't miss anything, when there is a whoosh and
a huge column of dust that seems to fall from the sky. The dust settles
and the demon is there. It growls, "This is interesting," as the snare
goes off and suspends it upside down.

Gnik casts Phantasmal Force to send an illusion of a small celestial 
orb flying around the demon's head to distract it. Kat shoots it from
behind with her crossbow and hits it in the arm. Kai throws her javelin
and hits it, followed by her dagger. Gnik sends Az to fly up and make
sure the group is not about to get ambushed by something else while
they're fighting the demon.

Suddenly, the group can't see... except for Milena, who sees that
the area is suddenly enclosed in inky blackness. Al, with his personal
light source, can see things dimly, and can see the edge of the 
darkness. He sees the demon reach up to the rope snare holding it. It
tears the rope in half and its lower body lowers while its upper body
stays in place. Its movements are all very slow and deliberate. Al
steps forward and hits it, attempting a stunning strike. It doubles
over, and in Al's mind he gets the sense of disappointment from the
creature. He hits it again with Crusher.

Milena hears a whooshing sound behind her, and turns to see the spider
demon has appeared behind her. She feels a mind-numbing coldness wash
over her but is able to shake it off -- but she sees Az freeze in the
air above, and she stops talking to Gnik.

Kai jumps over the circle edge and draws her sword, which has a light
effect. She attacks and jumps back out of the circle again.

Kat pulls out Torchlight, which glows blue, allowing her to see
dimly, and attacks at the same time as Kai, stabbing it through
the midsection. Kai retreats toward where Gnik and Ember are, as
Ember moves toward the spider demon. Az starts flying toward the
spider demon.

The demon in the circle, Zoniuth, doesn't move -- it seems to
continue to be stunned. Al jumps into the circle to hit it again
with Crusher and Obviator, twice each.

The spider demon Sillotha walks up to the protective circle, pushes
against the edge, and can't get it; the space around it warps, shrinks,
and expands out again, as if it had tried to teleport in but failed,
and skitters back a bit.  Its front two limbs start stabbing through
the air, trying to hit Milena, and manages to hit her right thigh,
going straight through, and to graze her left arm. Milena casts Cure
Wounds on herself; the wounds close up but still hurt. Nash senses
that Milena is hurt and appears in her wolf form, leaping out and
grabbing one of Sillotha's front limbs, trying to pull her down or
pull the limb off.

Gnik hopes that Sillotha is not very bright and casts Phantasmal
Force to make her see the being they summoned in Seaward to take
out the demon there. Then he runs into the protection circle as
far from the Sillotha as he can.

Kat jumps into the circle with Zoniuth again and hits with Torchlight,
stabbing into its backside and jumping out of the circle again. Kai
runs to the Sillotha and attacks with her sword. Az flies down and reaches
the spider demon. Ember runs up and attacks, nicking at the Sillotha's
legs and taking chunks out. 

Kat can see dimly into the circle with Zoniuth; there is a cloud of
dust, and then she cannot see its legs anymore -- as if it had teleported
out.

Al attacks the spider demon with Crusher and attempts a stunning strike,
but it does not appear to work. The Sillotha extends a spike from a
tentacle-like appendage on its abdomen, and strikes at Az, who seems
to shrivel and get sucked into the limb. With its forelimbs it stabs
at the air -- probably the Phantasmal Force -- as well as at Kai and
Ember, hitting Ember through her shoulder.

Milena sees that the darkness around the other circle has dissipated
and the demon is gone, so she tries a Guiding Bolt at the Sillotha
instead, but misses; Nash continues to bite at the spider's legs.
Kai attacks Sillotha again, and Kat runs toward her, sending Mouse
into the protective circle with Milena.

A pillar of dust appears inside the protective circle, and Zoniuth
is right next to Milena. Gnik immediately casts Mindspike at him,
which dispels the Phantasmal Force on the Sillotha. The Zoniuth's
arms go out to its sides, and blur as they turn into a multitude
of arms, whirling around and hitting everything within ten feet
-- including everyone in the circle and Kat. They hold their ground,
but Milena, Gnik, and especially Boris and Mouse are badly hurt.

Al hits the Sillotha and manages a stunning strike this time. Then
he steps into the protective circle to make himself another target
and tries to hurl an insult at it: "You... you're not even alive,
really!" He hears the response in his head, "But what is life, really,
when you extinguish so easily?" Boris barks and bites at the thing's
legs. Nash bites at the spider demon again as Milena casts a Mass
Healing on the injured members of the party. She instructs Mouse
and Boris to jump out of the circle and then she leaves herself to
give Kat a chance to throw the Star of Jaeleth.

Gnik steps out of the circle and hits the Zoniuth with a dazzle
glass. It falls over, stunned and prone. Kat throws the star
at Zoniuth and it explodes, taking him out. At the same time,
Kai hits the stunned Sillotha, and she dissolves.


3 October 2020

As the group is recovering, they all hear a voice in their heads,
like a bell, saying, "Help...? I'm trapped in here with a devil...."
Al asks who the being is, and the voice answers that it is a planetar
-- a lesser angelic being -- named Yadashe. Gnik consults his wondrous
book and learns that Yadashe was good at taking the form of physical
objects. Gnik also recalls that Yadashe was said to be on the
battlefield in the battle in which the pit fiend was captured, but
that he was not seen after the battle. Gnik asks if he would return
to his own realm if the shield were destroyed; the being says yes,
but it would keep him from completing his mission on this plain.

Milena asks what this mission was; he says he was sent to keep
fiends from swarming across the continent, and some who had escaped
are still roaming free. Al senses that the voice is inauthentic, and
Gnik thinks the method the planetar is describing would protect the
shield from the fiend and letting the fiend escape, rather than letting
a non-fiend escape. Milena offers to the voice that it should tell them
the names of those other fiends, so that if they were unable to free it
they could at least seek to destroy the other fiends in the angel's name.

The dogs and Nash look uncomfortable, and Zassin is clinging tightly to
Milena in fear. The voice changes to something deeper, almost vibrating,
and says, "This doesn't seem to be going well.... I suppose I need to
act quickly...." and several of the group feel a deep sense of dread
and fright that keeps them from approaching the shield. It has fallen
in one of the protective circles, but the one that keeps things out
rather than in; Gnik and Milena discuss whether Mage Hand could be
used to move it to the other circle. Gnik tries, and the weight of
the shield is just at the limit of what Mage Hand can handle, so
Milena pulls out a couple of javelins to slide under it to help lift.
they move it toward the other circle. Nash keeps pace with Milena to
offer assistance if needed.

In their minds, they hear the horrible voice again saying, "This
won't do," and there is an explosion of fire from the shield
engulfing everything within 20 feet. Milena sees the sparks and
dives down, but is partially protected by Nash. When the fireball
subsides, Milena is badly burned and Nash has reverted to statue
form.

Gnik gets the shield inside the circle and then creates a minor
illusion of a shrub to keep those who have been frightened from
being able to see it. They can still sense it and cannot move
toward it, but it removes the disadvantage of fright. Milena
picks up the Nash statue and tucks it into her belt pouch, casts
healing on herself, and retreats. Al approaches but does not
enter the circle, to serve as a distraction if needed. Kat draws
her crossbow with the magic bolts and waits.

There is a ring of flickers of flame around the shield that
burst forth and rise up into a wall of flame 20 feet high.
Al leaps back as fast as he can and gets away from the wall,
but the heat is intense enough to burn, even without flame.
The heat affects Gnik as well, and he falls over. Ember runs
up to pull him out, getting singed in the process, and dumps
a healing potion down his throat, followed by more healing 
from Milena. Milena casts a Sending to Brit: "Shield is feisty.
Magic circle will not last. Please come faster." Brit responds,
"On carpet. Be there soon." A few minutes later, the other
priests arrive on Brit's flying carpet, and the group explains
what has happened so far.

As the priests, including Milena, approach, they feel a wave
of dread coming from the shield, but it is blunted by the
magic circle. They begin performing the series of rituals,
blessings, and other spells that Gnik shares with them. A
tiny localized thunderstorm rolls through, putting out the
fires still smouldering in the grass. As the spells conclude,
a bolt of lightning comes from the sky, shattering the shield
in an explosion that knocks the priests back onto the ground.
When they look, the shield has completely vanished.

The group goes back into town and convenes at Brit's, while
Gnik re-summons Az as a macaw so she can talk... and she 
uses that ability to give Gnik crap about letting her die
again. Much of the town knows they will be sailing away
and have gathered at Brit's for well-wishes. Much of the
council is there... but not Egan.  Al makes a point of
spending some time with Fenric, who is there briefly with
his patrol, to try to rebuild that relationship. He lets
Fenric know he's prepaid a few drinks for him, so he can
drop in at Brit's when he wants for a drink on Al.

Gnik lets Fran know that he is hoping to find out what happened
to Lyle on his trip, and will let her know what he finds out. He
also talks to Kurt about some of the items they found at Egan's
while investigating.

Late in the evening, Al and Milena notice that Tricia has slipped
in looking very inconspicuous, and floats through the crowd until
she is right next to Kat, and says, "Hey, I heard you were leaving
town" -- and startles the heck out of Kat, who says, "Hey, I wanted
to talk to you about that opportunity we talked about earlier. I
think I would be interested in pursuing that." Tricia says if they
are leaving in the morning maybe they can talk when they get back,
and Kat says, "Well, what are you doing tonight?" -- because Tricia
has hit on her in the past. Kat gets the sense that she is attracted
to Kat, but occasionally her demeanor slightly changes -- when Rolland
walks by, and she is trying not to be seen. They get a room at Brit's
for the night.


21 Agram 3275

The crew wants to set out before dawn for good luck, so the group
makes their way to the ship before sunup. The winds are strong,
slowing them down, with a heavy storm blowing through in the
afternoon. The roll of the ship is enough to make Milena a bit
queasy, so she makes a pot of mint tea and sits quietly.

The ship approaches Abbey Isle and sees the stone abbey at the
base of a massive spire of rock over 400 feet tall. They are
pulling up and dropping anchor just as the sun is setting. The abbey
looks a bit dilapidated; one window in the tower appears to have
caved in.

They need to drop anchor and take a rowboat to the small wooden dock.
Al decides he would rather just swim in. The sea has calmed significantly.
The rest of the group goes by rowboat.

The group knows that the island was originally known as Firewatch
Island for the fire lit at the top of the tower to warn ships of
the rocks; Gnik's friend Lyle came there about 15 years ago in
search of an artifact, but he never returned; about 10 years ago everyone 
on the island vanished, and then about 5 years ago a group of Nolan 
worshippers took over the abbey as a refuge for those looking for peace.

Al reaches the shore before the rowboat reaches the dock. As he 
comes onto land, he hears a woman's voice demanding to know who
he is and why he is invading the island; he looks up to see an
armored woman, over six feet tall. Al says, "We're here to see if
anyone knows anything about my friend's friend who visited here
about 15 years ago." A male voice gently chastises the woman,
Childa, for giving Al a hard time; he comes out and introduces 
himself as Sorrill. He is disheveled, but his voice has a noble 
cadence. He is under 4 feet tall and barefoot -- a Rel. Al makes 
small talk with him until the rest of the group arrives.

As the boat pulls up, Childa points her spear at them and growls,
"Who are you and what are you doing here?" Kai jumps off the boat
and says, "Childa. It's Kai." "Oh, Kai, what are you doing here?"
Kai says they are on the path of the Raging Hammer. The group makes
introductions all around. 

A man walks up with a flourish of cape, welcomes them to the island,
and introduces himself as Brad. Kai greets him; she has been to the
island several times before on her previous ship. Brad asks what their
purpose is in coming to the island, and Gnik steps forward, explaining
that he is in search of information about a friend who is thought to
have been here 15 years ago, but then vanished. Brad asks them if they
have had dinner, and invites them in.

They get on the trail toward the island, and a woman comes running up,
causing Brad to give an exasperated sigh. "Jenore, you're not supposed
to be here." She says, "Is the ghost here?" Al says, "Not anymore...."
and Milena adds, "Yes, we took care of it already." Jenore says, "I
dreamed a ghost was coming---" and Brad says, rolling his eyes "Yes, 
she dreams things and they 'come true'..." at which point Al mentions
that their ship used to be called the Sea Ghost. She grins and Brad
facepalms. Milena says, "Perhaps someday when my youngest daughter
is older I will bring her here to talk to you. I think you would 
have much to discuss."

They go to the abbey. Outside the wall everything is dry and desolate,
but well-maintained inside, with lots of plants and people tending to
them. There is also a woman doing repair work on the stones of the
wall, although she does not look like someone one would expect to do
masonry. At the door are two men, one of whom has an ear missing and
doesn't make eye contact. Milena thinks he looks familiar; Al recognizes
him as a vagrant who used to live in Saltmarsh. "Clie!" Al says, "you
look like you're doing well!" Clie nods, a bit embarrassed, and excuses
himself to take care of some things.

Al asks what aim they are trying to achieve here, and before Brad can
reply, Janore says Dannara had a vision of a place of peace where those
who were lost can find themselves. They are followers of Nolan, and
Brad is a priest.

As they sit down to dinner, after pulling up some extra chairs for
the group, the abbey inhabitants excitedly ask for news of the outside
world -- they've heard that there has been some business with demons
and devils. Kai starts to share facts, and Kat complains that she's
being much too boring in the telling. Kat pulls out her lute and
starts embellishing the stories, with Gnik providing illustrations
with minor illusions.

Dannara comes in and introduces herself quietly in a calm, friendly
way. She asks what she can do for them. Gnik tells the story of
tracking his friend Lyle, who was searching for an artifact that
had also been sought by someone from this isle, who disappeared
into the Hool Marshes. Janore speaks up and says, "Ooh, it has to
be in one of two places!" Dannara asks her what she is thinking.
Janore says, "The broken room at the top of the tower, or the
hidden room underneath!" Dannara sighs and explains that the first
acolyte to enter the room under the tower was killed by a bolt of
lighting, so they sealed it up and no one has gone in since. The
top of the tower is merely dangerous because it is in such bad
shape and could collapse further. She does say that because the
group is not of the island, though, there is no prohibition that
would keep them from exploring, although they should use caution.

Al asks Jennell, the mason, what brought her to the island. She says
she was a sailor and had some good runs, some not so good runs, and
decided to hang it up. She asks where Al is going, and he describes
several destinations and goals. She says if he ever encounters a
ship called Empress of the Waves, she'd like to hear about it --
it was her ship that she had sent out, and it disappeared after
picking up its cargo.

The group decides to explore the hidden room that night -- as
since it is underground, they will need light whether they
go in the day or night. Dannara takes them to the kitchen,
pulls out a stone behind the hearth, and there is a ladder
leaning down. The group asks how far the acolytes got; Dannara
says they are not sure, they went down the ladder and some
time later there was a boom, and a few people went down to
retrieve them from the middle of the room. Gnik asks if anyone
has tried to detect magic on the room; they have not, so he
casts the spell and climbs down.

There is no magic on the ladder; it is rickety, but he makes
it down without any problems. He sees a big chest with a lock
against the far wall, and a horizontal crevice in the wall,
like a viewpoint to the outside. He immediately senses magic
on the chest that feels like it is probably a rune or glyph;
he also senses that there are a couple of magic things inside
the chest. Concentrating, Gnik senses the glyph that most
likely caused the lightning, and targets it with a Dispel
Magic spell. Once that is cast, he no longer senses the magic
of the glyph but still senses the magic on the items inside
the chest. 

Milena casts a Bless on Kat, Gnik, and herself before Kat approaches
the chest to check for traps. It is very solid; as Kat gets closer
she begins to make out text etched into the top of it: "The possessions 
of Luidoria Bana Kenbuli. Any who steal them will not live to regret it."
Kat recognizes that it is a Dorghenian name. Al responds that this
person is dangerous and they should take care: he is a trader and
swinder who comes through this region a couple times a year and
is not to be trusted.

Kat takes a closer look at the chest and notices a wire that runs low
in the lock structure that would be hit if it were being picked; there
is also a fine slit in the slats below the lock, most likely where
something would come out. She moves to the side so that she is not
directly in front of the chest, and tries to use Mage Hand to disable
the trap. When she feels that the trap has been disabled, she tries
to pick the lock. "Everyone back up!" she says, and there is a quiet
pop as the lock opens. She flips open the chest and notices a 
spring-loaded blade that would have swung out in an arc almost two
feet out from the chest; if it hadn't been disabled, it probably
would have taken off at least one of Kat's hands. The chest 
contains books, scrolls, and a small box that Gnik detects is
the location of the two magical objects. He senses that one is
Abjuration and the other is Transmutation. Kat uses Mage Hand to
open the box, revealing two metal flasks, one on each end, with
a bunch of folded up papers in between, many with broken wax seals
that look like they could be letters. One of the flasks is labeled
"For Poison" -- a protection or antidote -- and the other labeled "To Fly".

He loads up the books and scrolls onto a floating disc; they are focused
on dead gods and those who research them; a search for something called
the Ebon Tablet through the ages; and followers of Tyorl. Gnik mentions
that Lyle had asked for help to research something called the Ebon Order,
and hypothesizes they might be trying to find a way to resurrect the
dead god Tyorl, which would cause problems since Tyorl bequeathed his
role and pantheon to Tyollus.

All of the letters are dated from 3260 or earlier. The most recent set
of letters is comprised of responses from various adventuring groups
negotiating a potential job to escort Luidoria Bana Kenbuli (often
abbreviated "Ken") to and from the border between Garma and the Hool
Marshes and to assist him in finding an artifact that is not described
in the letters. One group of letters are from someone named Gabriela
Gould and addressed to Ken. There are references to a group called the
Ebon Order, saying that the divinations of the Order show Ken may be
correct in their suspicions that the Memento Mori fled to somewhere on
the border of Garma and the Hool Marsh in trying to avoid followers of
Tyorl. Gabriela instructs Ken to travel to find it, saying she would
ensure Kenbuli was well rewarded with all the arcane secrets the Ebon
Order has to offer, in addition to a significant promotion within the
order. Kenbuli just had to bring the Ebon Tablet to the Redoubt Arcana
to obtain their reward. The last set of letters are older, going back
to 3255. They are made up of both letters from and notes about
communications and research into some events that followed the death
of Tyorl. This information was used to establish a timeline of events
and a trail that leads to where Ken believed the Ebon Tablet ended up.

The events are laid out as: 
-Tyorl died (somehow) in a great battle with Sgult somewhere in the abyss
-A group of people arrived to claim his corpse soon after, including members 
of Memento Mori
-A member of Memento Mori named Surithailan recovered an artifact called 
The Ebon Tablet 
-Surithailan and his companions fled followers of Tyorl who wanted to 
recover the Tablet, as they believe Tyorl could be revived using it
-The followers of Tyorl were able to determine their quarry had escaped to 
Maerson, and pursued them there
-Lots of accounts of people interviewed who met or spoke with members of 
the Memento Mori or their pursuers in the Gellan Sea area, the most 
recent being in the area of Garma near the Hool Marshes 

Kai returns to the ship, but the others decide to stay on the island
for various reasons. Milena talks to some of the residents comparing
beliefs, as her god is not incompatible with theirs but is different.
Gnik nods off at the table reading the books and letters, and wakes to
find Clie standing over him draping a blanket around his shoulders.
Ember is snoozing at the other end of the table with a blanket on her.

Some of the group notice that Janore has a black spot on the back of
her hand that looks like a square sail and mast, but upon closer view
appears to be a birthmark that happens to be in that shape.


22 Agram 3275

The group reconvenes for a breakfast of sweet gruel. Kai returns from
the ship with a donation of rice and beans equal to the meals they
have eaten, to repay the abbey's hospitality.

Al asks Janore about the mark on her hand. She says she has always
had it, but it really solidified when she got older and started
having dreams. Al asks who is sending the dreams, and she says,
"Nolan, of course!"

She leads the group up to the tower. They get to the second floor
and need to go through a trapdoor to get to the collapsed third
floor; looking at the ceiling, the floorboards above appear rotted
through in many places. Al starts going up the stairs, relying on
his acrobatics to keep him safe. Kat goes up behind him. Al pushes
on the trapdoor; it is stuck at first but then swings open, loudly
and with some effort. On the north end of the tower there is a
very corroded potbellied stove. There is a spiral stair against
the wall leading up to another trapdoor, where the fire was lit
above. On the southwest the wall is collapsed inward; rubble
covers the smashed remains of a chair and other things. There
is a desk, a rotted bed, and several arrow slits that have
hinges beside them as though they once had shutters, but those
are gone now.

Al goes to check out the desk, and Kat inspects the stairs to the
next level, which are more rotted than the previous set of stairs.
Kat tries them to see if they hold her weight and finds they are
safer if she stays closer to the wall.

The desk is more like a table with just a single side drawer; whatever
was in there before is now trashed, stained in a mess of rotting goop,
with possibly a rat carcass. He looks closer to try to find hidden
drawers or other items of interest. As he climbs around looking at it
at odd angles, he notices that in the section of wall that collapsed,
there is an area at the edge that looks like somebody carved an 
intentional squared-off section of rock, as though there were a
compartment that the rest of the wall collapsed around. The rest of
the damage appears to be normal wearing away and breaking of rubble.
Al begins trying to clear away rubble.

Kat uses Mage Hand to push the trapdoor open to the level above. The
wall only goes up about three feet, and then there are four pillars
supporting a conical roof. There is a big bronze bell with sigils
engraved on it, and a gorgeous view in every direction. Below the
bell is a brazier, about 8 feet in diameter, with poles that hold
up a convex cover to keep the smoke from going into the bell. Kat
climbs up to take a closer look at the symbols on the bell, making
an acrobatic leap to do so; she looks down and sees some islanders
in the garden below gaping up at her. Kat recognizes the runes as
references to peace and serenity, but in some cases they are used
in a deceptive way to mean peace and serenity in death -- used by
some cults to disguise their true intentions. Kat sees there is
a clapper, so she rings the bell. It gongs nicely -- and very
loudly. She hears some shouting of obscenities in Tillian from
the floor below.

Al finds a metal box, about two and a half feet long, and a foot
tall and wide. Al doesn't want to touch the box without waiting
for Gnik. Kat reaches out and pretends to touch the box, but then
draws her hand back; Al laughs. Gnik finishes his spell and comes
up to the third floor; he detects all kinds of magic in the box:
transmutation, evocation, and others. He goes up to the fourth
floor to look around quickly, but doesn't detect any magic there.

Kat checks the box for traps and doesn't find any, so she opens
the box. It contains a very nice ring; a nice bowl with a cork
cap with a handle in the same ceramic material as the bowl, almost
like an inkwell with a magic substance inside; a rod of black metal
with a number of silvery runes carved into it; a box with lines that
make it seem that it might fold or collapse in on itself, also with
runes on it; a leather bag that doesn't weigh very much; and a leather
backpack. Kat opens up the leather bag and sees that it is bigger on
the inside than the outside, and there is a fire burning -- a metal
rod with continual flame on it -- as well as fishing nets, hundreds
of feet of hemp rope, and a small metal container with six capsules that
look like fish oil pills. The backpack contains a waterproof bag that
holds a journal. Gnik takes the journal and sits down to read it --
the journal relates the numerous assignments and duty stations of a wizard 
named Archais while a member of the Serin military. lt also includes notes 
about the different sunken ships he explored in the surrounding bay and 
its tributary rivers. The final entry on this list gives the location of 
a ship named Tammeraut. Most of the journal is moldy and illegible. The 
last few pages are intact, and they relate the events surrounding the 
coming of Tammeraut.

From the last pages: 
Our worst fears are confirmed. Virgil has brought word of disaster. A war 
galley fully loaded with pirates approaches from the southwest. It flies 
the flag of the raiders and bears the name of the cursed ship Tammeraut. 
We must prepare what feeble defense we can muster. Woe to the folk of 
the coast at the approach of this bloody tide. 
-
Miracle of miracles! The Maelstrom has answered the prayers of our 
illustrious chaplain. A furious storm blew in from the open sea and swept 
the war galley to its doom. But I believe that the vessel went down near 
the Pit of Hatred, an ill-starred undersea chasm two miles south of here. 
This does not bode well, for the rift is said to be a passage to a source 
of interminable evil that was long ago sealed away. If the wreckage should 
rupture the wards, terrible darkness might be unleashed. I must mount an 
expedition to the sunken hulk and make sure all is well. 
-
A fell wind blows this evening. I fear the wards on the rift have been 
broken. I must set out first thing in the morning to inspect the wreckage.

The journal's reference to "raiders'' is likely the pirate captain Syrgaul, 
a notorious sorcerer who forged an unholy pact with a demon lord. He and his 
crew never left survivors of their attacks, and his ship, Tammeraut, was 
the scourge of the seas.
. 

Kat tells Gnik to focus, and he says he is focusing, but returns to looking 
at the contents of the box. "Gnik, what does this rod do?" she asks. "It
distracts me from things I want to read," he says, "but sure, I'll
take the eleven minutes out of my life to satisfy your curiosity."
The group decides that perhaps they should leave the floor that might
collapse under them before casting Identify.

The ring is a Ring of Free Action, which would keep the wearer from 
being impeded in an area that might otherwise be hard to move through.
The substance in the bowl is called sovreign glue which will hold almost
anything, and the rod is an immovable rod -- if it is placed somewhere
and the wielder wills it, it cannot be moved. The box is a folding boat;
with three command words it can open to boats of two different sizes,
and then return to its original size. It can also be physically unfolded
to hold items; if one of the boats is holding more items than could
fit in the box, they will be kicked out when the boat folds up. The six
pills will let anyone who takes a pill breathe underwater and avoid the
effects of deep diving for an hour.


21 November 2020

They decide to check out the top of the rock spire behind the abbey.
Kat wants to try to climb it, while Gnik levitates the rest of the
group to the top in their small boat. He considers using his new immovable
rod, attaching and reattaching it to the rock as they go up, to keep them
close enough to see the top well, but is worried that he doesn't have the
strength if the winds are high. They also consider looping rope around
the spire and pull it in as they go to keep themselves close to the rock.

Kat climbs up without too much problem, and sits on the top with her
feet dangling over the edge. She notices a piece of rock coming off
the top of the spire near the edge that tapers to a small circle an 
inch or so across that is white in color, and doesn't look quite natural. 
Below it starts blending into the rock. She takes a closer look and
notices something that looks like a seam about half an inch from the top,
as if it could be removed. She carefully checks it and finds an area
that feels like it could be a hinge. She yells down to Gnik, "There's
a really cool thing up here that you're missing!" and flips the circle
up at its hinge. It reveals a green button, which she immediately
presses without a second thought.

The top of the spire begins to vibrate, and a nine-foot ring seems to
be rising up from the top of the tower as the stone around it seems to
be sinking down. The stone turns a light grey color and becomes completely
flat and smooth, and then it vanishes; there is a hole with a platform,
and sloped sides, leading down into the darkness.

Kat yells again, "You really need to come up here!" She calls for Zassin,
who flies up and sends the rest of them an image of an ominous black hole
with Kat pointing to it. Gnik does the calculations on how much weight
he could carry with Levitate, and realizes he can't carry them all along
with the boat; so instead he casts a floating disc and levitates them
on that instead, using the rod to pull them along.

They reach the top and see the ramp leading down. Al thinks the grey
material looks like the material in the Ancient artifact that someone
was showing off at the Gibbet, with jewel-like lines embedded in it.
Al peers down and can see a couple hundred feet; he can see the ramp
spiraling down and down into darkness. He can also make out some kind
of spikes on the walkway that start after the first revolution of the
ramp.

Kat pulls out her new continual light torch and starts walking down
the ramp, followed by Al, Gnik, Ember, Milena, and Kai. They reach
the first of the spikes, which are not sharp at all. As they begin
walking past them, green glowing images light up the walls all the way
down: some kind of runes or symbols, an abstract image of a person
being pulled apart, and some kind of flowing writing in a script
they have not seen before. It goes down farther than sea level.
There seem to be seven collections of symbols and images that
repeat over and over again.

The group walks down to the bottom, where the opening has gone from
about 9-foot to 40-foot diameter. As they are a couple of revolutios
from the bottom, they see some bones scattered in the area, and a
circle in the middle -- possibly etched, possibly a separate piece
of stone. Around the wall are 12 oblong raised sections, about four
feet high, two and a half feet wide, ovals coming out like bumps from
the wall. Milena thinks the bones are probably humanoid; there are
two skulls that look human or human-like.

Kat reaches the bottom of the ramp and steps onto the floor at the
base. As she steps off the ramp, there are creaking sounds as the
twelve raised sections come popping out of the wall. A couple of
them just crash down, but a couple more move out more purposely;
those that are more functional have blinking lights and move on
leg-like appendages. "Hello!" Al says; "Who are you? Also, what
are you?"

All of them respond with some kind of sound; they all seem to
be saying the same thing, but it doesn't make sense. Al uses his
pearl of speech to understand them: "You are not authorized; you
will leave." Kat recalls hearing about adventures in the area --
the Borderlands -- where adventurers fought similar entities in
Gellan ruins. They are not alive, but are some kind of autonomous
guardians. Milena casts Word of Radiance at the three that are
moving and look like they could be a threat; two of them seem
affected, but it seems to bounce of the other one as if it was
reflected.

Kat tries shooting one of them with her crossbow and magical 
bolts; she aims for one that is leaking fluid. The bolt cracks
its armor, but it keeps coming. She backs up behind one of the
spikes so they have more trouble seeing her.

The one that appears to be in the best shape begins smoking,
and stops moving. The other two are not moving very quickly.

Ember leaps off the ramp, tumbling over to the one in the middle 
of the room, and attacks it. She's stabbing with her rapier and
dagger at its weak points, and parts are coming off as she does.

Al runs over to the sputtering one and gives it a whack with his
hand in what he perceives to be the noggin, where most of the
blinky lights are. Kai jumps down to the one at the bottom of
the ramp and hits with her sword. Milena calls up her Spiritual
Weapon, but fails to hit with it.

Kat aims at the guardian in the middle of the room and hits
it in what might be considered the face area, generating sparks.
She hides again.

The one that had stopped moving starts moving again with a
whirring sound. The one Al and Ember are fighting begins swinging
its appendages wildly, but Al dodges. The one that is still moving
moves up next to Ember and stabs her through the shoulder with a
pointy forelimb. The one at the base of the ramp steps around Kai
and blasts dust out of its mouth-ish area, hitting Gnik, Kat, Kai,
and Milena. Kai coughs it out, but the others fall to the ground
paralyzed.

Ember, mad about being skewered, takes time to line up her attack
and gets a bunch of shots on it. Kai hits again as well. Al attempts
a stunning strike on one, and it shudders and stops moving; he runs
to the one attacking Kai and hits again, managing another stunning
strike.

Milena controls the spiritual weapon with her mind and hits the
one that spewed dust. Kat manages to shake off the paralysis. Ember
hits one of the stunned guardians, doing a lot of damage; it shuts
itself down. Kai hits one of them very hard, but it doesn't fall;
Al hits it, and it falls apart. He runs to the other one that is
stunned, and it falls apart. He tries hitting the one that shut
itself down. Milena sends her Spiritual Weapon at the shut down
guardian. Kat shoots a bolt at it and hits; it falls over and a 
couple of its legs fall off as it stops moving.

As they examine the remains of the guardians, they see lines of
gem-like stone under the armor, as well as liquids. Al asks if
they are magic; Gnik says they must be, but he can check if
they want to make sure. Instead of that, Gnik casts Comprehend
Languages to try to read the writing on the wall, while Kat
steps down onto the floor to scope out the area.

Kat goes to inspect the circular area in the floor. She presses
a button and there is a lid that opens into a tube fit with concentric
rings that would make a perfect climbing surface. Kat is eager to
climb down; the rest of the group tries to distract her while Gnik
is finishing his spell, but she just wants to go down and take a peek
at what's down there, so she heads down the tube.

The room below is almost the same size as the room above, but the
walls are covered with razor-sharp spikes pointing into the room.
Kat hangs from the opening, being careful not to touch the floor;
she head back up, but not before noticing another ring in the
floor below.

Gnik finishes his spell; the words running around the rooms
say, "Danger -- flee -- monsters -- poisons -- evil -- corruption 
-- flee -- danger -- flee."

They discuss whether to go further, and decide they would like to
at least see what is below, if they can figure out a way to get
to the next hatch without touching the ground. Kat hangs from the
bottom of the ladder tube and uses Mage Hand to first touch the
floor -- which releases an obvious electrical discharge -- and 
the to open the hatch below. Az flies in, makes a quick circle 
around the level below, and flies back. Through her eyes, Gnik 
sees a room with four passages leading from it, but three are 
caved in (and there are bones under the rubble in at least one of 
them).

To get the whole group through the next hatch without touching the
floor on the level below, they loop a rope around the hatch lid on
their current level and have Az and Zassin take the rod of immobility
with the other end of the rope to the next hatch.

Kat slides across it first, climbs down the next hatch, and touches
the floor below with Mage Hand, to no obvious effect. The rest of
the group follows.

As soon as Kat drops to the floor, the ceiling begins to glow faintly
with ambient light. As soon as they get into the room, Gnik starts
casting his floating disc again to use as their escape plan: everyone
piles on the disc and Gnik casts Levitate on himself and uses the rope
to guide them back out of the hatch.

As they walk into the hallway, it lights up. It is about 8 feet wide
and opens into a room about 20 feet wide and 30 feet long. There are
shelves on either side of the entry, and sloped counters on the right
and left, a little higher than waist-high on a human. There are 
jewel-lines on them, recessed areas that look like three-fingered
handprints, and some holes that look like they would perfectly fit
the stones that they found at the Lasseters' that had strange magic
effects -- and there are a couple of those stones on the shelf. There
is also a strange glowing thing on one of the shelves, a sphere a
couple feet in diameter.


26 November 2020

On the shelf on the other side of the door are three small
crystals that were not obvious at first. On one of the counters
on the right side is a small hole that one of the crystals would
fit into.

Gnik still has Comprehend Languages running and notices that there
are words on the wall that seem to be in the same language as on
the walls on the way down the spiral. Over the handprint it says
something like "access logging"; over the circle for the round
stones is a sequence that might say "power/soul stone"; and over
the small hole that would fit the crystal it says "storage".

Kat takes one of the crystals and tries sticking it into the
crystal-sized hole. When she pushes a bit, it clicks into place,
but nothing obvious happens. Milena suggests she needs to put
a four-fingered hand in the handprint, and Gnik suggests she use
Mage Hand to press it. Still nothing happens, so Gnik grabs one
of the stones with Mage Hand to put into the stone-sized indentation.
The gem-like lines of color immediately light up; the crystal in the
slot glows, and an illusion appears with circles and writing, hovering
in midair over the middle of the counter. Gnik gets the impression from
the writing that one circle represents information on the facility; one
is about the information on that crystal; and there are two others that
just look mutilated, like they are warped, with pieces missing, and so
they don't make a lot of sense.

Gnik reaches up and puts his hand into the indentation; he sees text
pop up that says "Unidentified individual number 327 -- logged", and 
then blinks out. Gnik says, "Do you understand me?" but nothing happens.
Al, who still has the Pearl of Speech, says, "Do you understand me?" 
but there is no response. Gnik suggests he should try putting his own
hand in the indentation and talking, but nothing happens; so Al tries
walking over to the illusion and trying to touch it. It zooms into the
part he touches, and it seems to be a map of the facility. There are
little icons next to some rooms labeled "view". Two rooms are labeled
"prison" and "storage", one with a deep floor is labeled "retirement",
and one with many rooms off a central room is labeled "quarters". Al
tries touching the white "view" icon over the retirement section; the
picture zooms and morphs and changes to show complete blackness in a
square of green with writing behind that translates as "next room", so
Al touches it. The illusion seems to warp and bend into a green and
orange color of mangled flickering light, and an icon that says "previous
room".

He hits a "return" button to go back to the original view. Gnik suggests
looking at the information for the room they're in. Al suggests he should
interact with it instead, but Gnik is too short to reach, so he attaches
his immovable rod to the counter to make a bench at the level that he
wants to sit.

Gnik tries looking at the "storage" room, and just sees blackness, so
he tries "prison" and sees himself sitting on the bar at the counter. He
waves, and the image waves back in real time -- it is labeled 327, and
Al is labeled 328.

Gnik tries reaching out to touch the back wall of the illusion, and
the view zooms in onto the wall. After some playing with it, he figures
out that he can zoom in and out and rotate the view.

Gnik pulls back out to the original view and tries to interact with
the illusion corresponding with the crystal. It brings up a list of
numbers that his Comprehend Languages interprets as dates, but that
he has no frame of reference for; they appear in reverse chronological
order. He touches the most recent one; it appears to be a log of things
brought to the facility to be stored for either protection or preventing
future interactions. There are six things in the list, some of which
appear to be proper nouns since there is no direct translation:

-Pain Servant Crassak
-The Shadow Horde
-Dark Witness Talsatlon 
-Dark Witness Sreen
-Sil's Gift
-Serpent of Sil 

Overall it looks like a log of the facility, including food consumed and
other daily activities. It appears to be a combination prision and storage
facility for dangerous items, such as corrupted power/soul stones. At the
end there seemed to have been a small group protecting the facility from
being broken into during some kind of war.

Gnik pops the first crystal out and puts the next one in, but the illusion
it makes is warped and indecipherable. The third one makes an illusion
that implies it has nothing on it, like an empty book.

Meanwhile, Al picks up the sphere to look at it. When he lifts it, he
immediately has a sense of how it is used. It has nodes at each end
that swivel to be between his hands, and he has a sense that if another
creature puts their hands into the sphere they will be stuck and unable
to travel -- including fly, teleport, etc -- until he deems otherwise.
They stash the sphere in their bag of holding.

Gnik goes to look at the other counter, which does not have a hole for
a crystal but does have an indentation for a stone, so he puts one
in. The console lights up and an illusion of text appears, like a
cylinder of text. There are 20 lines of text in total; 15 of them seem
identical and seem to imply "empty". Two of the remaining five lines
are unreadable, but the other three match the names in the list he
found in the logs. He inspects those and sees icons that imply "talk"
and "record". He touches the one for Pain Servant Crassak, and gets
information implying that he was exceptionally dangerous, a devout
servant of The Enemy, who worked against those at the facility. He
is listed as never to be released for concern of what else he might
do. He touches the "memory" and sees a corrupted image on which details
are difficult to see -- a still image, but it appears humanoid.

He repeats the process for Dark Witness Taslon and the information
describes him as "touched too deeply in the darkness and allowed The Enemy
too much access -- we are preserving for future study". Gnik looks at the
"memory" and sees a picture of a blob of flesh with four faces coming
off from a central maw full of teeth.

He then looks up Dark Witness Sreen; it looks humanoid, but with bubbly
skin that looks warty and cancerous, purple-green tentacles with eyeballs
staring out from the ends. The text talks about another corrupted by The
Enemy but this one is no longer even alive. Apparently there were hordes
of these that were destroyed, but a couple were kept for future study to
protect against such things in the future.

He looks at one of the records that had a warped label; the text says,
"The Shadow Horde will be imprisoned and remain here forever". The image
just looks like a pretty glowing crystal. The other entry with the warped
label also has incomprehensible text.

Gnik goes back up to the main map and tries navigating to the level
above where they are. There is an icon that says "off", and he touches
it. The floor on the map changes from orange to green, and the label
now reads "on". He thinks he has turned off the spinning floor, but
says they should test it first before they step on it. He then touches
the hatch above on the map, and it shows the room and the start of
the spiral going up. The room has outlines of the guardians, lying
on the floor. The outlines are white, the insides are the orange
color. He touches one, and a huge amount of status information comes
up, most of it makes little sense to him. There are two selectable
icons: "heal", and "on". He leaves them alone, but gets the sense that
they are not currently able to repair themselves.

The group puts the crystals and stones in the bag of holding and walks
out to the opposite hallway, which would lead to Storage if it weren't
caved in. They examine the stones to see if they could be moved, but
it would require actual excavation equipment, or a Disintegrate spell.

Milena mentions that she could look into the Storage area if she
had Clairvoyance prepared, and if there were a light source in the
room. Kai offers to loan her the helm that imparts darkvision. They
decide they will take a long rest for Milena and Gnik to renew their
spells, and then try this plan that evening.

They return to the bottom of the spire and Janore asks if they found
the last soul sucker. She says it takes life out of things like 
livestock by eating their hearts. Gnik shows her the image of
Dark Witness Talsatlon, and she says, "Eww, not that!" After some
discussion, Gnik recognizes the description: a peryton, a monstrous 
creature with antlers and the shadow of a human. Its feathers are said
to be tough as iron, its antlers razor-sharp.

The group take a rest and then return into the spire. Milena borrows
the darkvision helm and casts Clairvoyance a little past where the
map showed the center of the Storage area. She sees the room dimly
lit by a glowing crystal -- the Shadow Horde, floating in midair
near the collapsed entrance. Gnik decides to go back to the prison
room to use the interface to look at the map of the storage room,
which now shows what Milena sees. He goes back to the prison interface
and looks for the Shadow Horde entry; it now shows as Empty.

Kai looks down to the other end of the prison room and sees a series
of symbols scratched into the floor and ceiling. Kat gets the impression
that they are meant to create extradimensional spaces tapped into the
ethereal plane. Al and Milena think the Horde may have already gotten
out of their cells and were waiting into the ethereal plane, looking
into the physical plane, waiting for something interesting to happen.

Gnik finds some of the bones under the rubble and casts Last Image on
them. He sees the view as if someone were lying on the floor looking
at the far wall, as if they died at their post.

Milena is still watching into the room, and sees the crystal fade into
darkness, as if all of its facets bent into themselves. She lets the
group know, and Gnik tries navigating around on the map to see if he
can see where it went. He finds it... in the prison room, as it appears
in the room behind him.

Al asks Milena for the manacles, and takes them to the prison room.
Shadowy tendrils reach out and touch each one of the group, and then
disappear; six shadowy figures then flow out and coalesce. The crystal
is still floating there but has gone dark. The figures look like the
group, but with the colors muted, and with a blurring effect as they
move. 

Gnik casts Detect Thoughts at his shadow, and has a disorienting
impression of detecting himself detecting his thoughts detecting
his thoughts....

Al attempts to gain insight on what his doppelganger is going to do,
and his impression is that it is not sure because he is still trying
to figure out the situation. Gnik gets the idea his shadow is sorting
through his memory trying to figure out what he knows about Gellans.

Kai looks at her shadow and asks, "What is your purpose?" "To survive 
and thrive," it says. "At any cost?" Kai asks, and it smiles.

Kat pulls out Torchlight and attacks her shadow; she hits, and clearly
does damage, but the shadow has her dodging ability and avoids some of
the damage. Kai steps up to attack and Al tells her to attack his
doppelganger before it can do a Stunning Strike. She finds it difficult
to hit, so she jumps in recklessly to lay into him. He parries her
first attack but connects with the second. Milena tries casting Hold
Person on Al's doppelganger, and it works.

Al drops the manacles globe and attemts a Stunning Strike on Milena's
shadow. He hits twice and manages to stun on the second attempt. He
moves to Gnik's shadow and attacks, but is not able to stun.

Gnik moves his concentration to the shadow Kat and asks, "How do we
defeat you?" He gets the impression that each entity includes a copy
of their minds, combined with an alien intelligence, the purpose of
which was to take over others. He senses that they are undead, and
shares that with the group, then runs for the exit of the room, dropping
Az on the floor in snake form as he runs.

Ember dives into the shadow Milena and tears her apart until she
dissolves screaming into an inky blackness.

Shadow Kai goes into a rage, wails into Kat and knocks her out.
Shadow Kat goes after Kai and hits, but Kai does not take much damage
in her rage. Shadow Ember also goes after Kai and does a bit more damage.
Shadow Gnik says, "This is entertaining, but not worth sticking around
for," and blinks out as the crystal had, presumably into the ethereal
plane.

Milena casts a Word of Healing at Kat and a Word of Radiance on the
held Shadow Al, who disintegrates with a scream.

Kat pulls out her bow and shoots at the shadow Kai, doing significant
damage. Kai also goes after shadow Kai. Al attacks the shadow Kat and
stuns her, and moves to the shadow Kai, hitting again.

Gnik casts Levitate on the shadow Ember. The real Ember gives him
a grin and a thumbs-up, and attacks the shadow Kai, who dissolves
with a scream. The shadow Ember crosses her daggers and fades into
the ethereal. Milena hits the shadow Kat with Sacred Flame; the
shadow disintegrates.

Az in snake-form tries to find a path through the rubble to the
storage room. The entire hallway is collapsed, as is the first
part of the room; when she enters, the room lights up. Al climbs
into a Bag of Holding so that Gnik can bring him along on a Misty
Step into the storage room. The air is stale. They try to power
up the consoles; on the map side, the console sparks, smokes, and
goes silent when they try to power it up. There are markings on 
the floor and ceiling involving the ethereal, but they are not 
identical to the ones in the prison room. 

In the meantime, Kat examines the crystal that is still floating
in the prison room. She gets the sense that it is pretty useless
without knowing the specific command word, but it is a pretty nice
jewel that would go back to being a regular jewel if Dispel Magic
were cast on it. She thinks as a jewel it would be worth at least 
1000 gp, but an Identify might reveal the command word.


12 December 2020

Gnik and Al try to power up the other console in the storage room.
It lights up and does not spark. When Al puts his hand into the
handprint indentation, an illusion of lines of text arranged in
a drum-like shape come up. There are about 64 lines of text; seven
are green and legible, another 40 are green but smeared to the
point of being illegible, and the others are greyed out, as if
it might be an empty slot. Gnik interacts with the image, and
finds an entry labeled "logs". He tries tapping it, and gets
more information: that they are captain's logs, personal logs,
and others, and another line indicating that it includes backup
copies of something that seems to translate as "algorithms". 

Gnik presses the "View" button and sees an image of a sphere with
hundreds of holes in it, many with crystals stuck in them, with
glowing text around each of them, although it is too small to
read. Gnik then presses the "Review" button and there is a tearing
sound off to the left -- and a moment later the sphere appears
in the room. The "Review" button now says "Store".

Al walks over to the sphere to see if it has any sound or odor,
but detects none. He pulls out his abyssal weapon to try to see
if he can move it without touching it. He finds that it will spin
easily around its axis but does not move off its axis. He puts
the weapon away and tries to pull one of the crystals out. He
moves to try to put it into the console with the hole for it,
but Gnik reminds him that the console doesn't work. Al tries it
anyway, thinking that maybe it needs the crystal in it to work.

Meanwhile, Kat tries to tap the floating crystal to see if it
will move. As soon as she taps it, it falls to the ground. She
picks it up and puts it into her backpack. She pulls out her
knife and tries to find a surface to scratch "Kat was here". She
can't make a mark with her regular dagger, but the abyssal steel
dagger works. Then she draws pictures of Gnik and Ember with a
little plus sign between them. Ember watches over her shoulder
and gives pointers.

Al puts the crystal in and tries to turn on the machine, but a surge
of energy comes out and knocks him back. The crystal shatters. Gnik
goes over to look at the words written on the sphere: many of them
say "Control Log" or "Maintenance Log" with numbers that probably
translate as dates but that he doesn't have context to interpret.
Others are logs with words that don't translate -- probably names,
representing personal logs. One is labeled something about an
algorithm -- Shisayl's backup of algorithm details; he takes that one, 
and three of the facility management logs, and three of the command
logs that seem to have the highest number associated with them.

Gnik returns to the console and hits "Store" on the sphere, and
pulls up the next legible entry. It seems to be some kind of
utility equipment. He hits "Review" and a bar appears, hovering
in midair with arms coming out of it, with cloth draped over
each arm with a hole cut out of the center of each one, and an emblem
on what would be the shoulder if they were worn as ponchos. There are
also four concave, octagonal pieces of glass or crystal with the same
emblem on it. The glass is very clear. There is also a ball of grey
steel, flat on the top and bottom with what looks like a seam running
around the equator, about 8 inches in diameter.

Al goes over to inspect the sphere, tries to check it for traps --
he doesn't detect any -- and then tries unscrewing it. The top half
is empty, but the bottom half includes some kind of foam with little
balls sticking up out of it. Gnik brings over the bag of holding and
Al tries putting the items into it. The top glass crumbles apart into
a weird dust that is still easy to see through; the other three hold,
though. He holds one up and looks through it and notices a smear going
across it on the inside, but it is otherwise clear. When he takes the
cloth, he finds them very light but not very thin.

Gnik stores the rack and goes to the next entry: Offensive Equipment.
Gnik hits the view button and sees the illusion of a wall that has
been sloped with divots in it and multiple items: eight balls with handprint
indentations and sticks coming out the end, and 24 faintly glowing red
crystals, about fist-sized. Gnik ask Al if they should take those, and
Al says, "Why not? Hey, why don't you give me the bag and I'll put
things in---"

As he's walking toward Gnik, Gnik hits the Review button and there
is an enormous roar and a ball of fire. Al manages to dodge the worst
of it, but his backside is pretty singed, even after Gnik uses his
dagger to extinguish the fire on his back. When the fire subsides,
there is nothing salvageable. Gnik hits "Store" again.

The next entry just says "Jewel of Joy". "View" shows a jewel floating
in the air; it looks pretty small and oddly faceted, with orange and
purple sections. He hits "Review" and the jewel appears. Al takes his
healing potion, takes the bag, and goes to retrieve the jewel, but
Gnik offers to use Mage Hand. There is a moment's resistance, but
then it comes free and he puts it in the bag. Instead of "Store",
the interface now has a "Clear" option, so Gnik hits it.

The next item indicates it is Phayshas's personal effects, left in
storage when Phayshas went elsewhere. When he hits "View", it shows
another storage sphere, a strange helm-looking item, and something 
with a rod and two spheres attached to it. Gnik uses Mage Hand to
retrieve the items and put them into the bag.

The next entry says "Sil's Gift" -- which Gnik recalls having been
mentioned in the prison logs. Gnik views it and it appears to be
an egg or egg-shaped rock, mottled green, about 2 feet tall, on a
wooden stand. He retrieves it, and it appears to be a bit translucent.
He tries to grab it with Mage Hand, but it is too heavy. He and Al
carefully fit it into the bag. The last entry says "Serpent of Sil"
-- one of the other entries from the prison log. It looks like a
swirling medallion on a cord, perhaps of some kind of jade-like
material. He puts it into the bag with Mage Hand, and then also
takes the life nodes in that room.

They wait for Az to get back through the rubble, and Al gets into
the bag again -- which is much more crowded now. Gnik Misty Steps
back out into the main area. At Al's urging, he goes into the
prison room to look at what is on the Algorithm crystal -- and
determines they are spells, thirteen in total.

lets them know that if they wait
an hour he can cast Levitate -- he's out of spell slots, but can
cast it as a ritual -- but Kai decides that since the walk would
only take 45 minutes she's walking. For security, they re-engage
the defensive spinning floor in the level above them. They return 
to the top of the spire and use Kat's Featherfall and a floating
disc to get down.

When they return to the bottom, Janore greets them and asks what
they found. They have only told the leader of the island, Dannara,
what they found, so Kai says there's nothing there.

The group decides to stay on the island one more night to rest
and recover before continuing their voyage.

Gnik begins identifying the items they found:
The Jewel of Joy just makes the holder feel good by holding it,
and will help with healing.

Sil's Gift is warm to the touch and very smooth and clean; Gnik
gets the impression it is waiting for its purpose. Al asks it
what it thinks its purpose is, but gets no response.

The Serpent of Sil is about 3 inches long and has power in it
that allows the wearer to cast Sanctuary for 1 charge, Calm
Emotions for 2 charges, and Aura of Purity for 3 charges. It
regains 3 charges per day.

The cloth, if one throws it over one's head and touches the 
emblem, will form itself into a lightweight protective suit
of armor under the clothes. One of them disintegrates, but
the other seven seem to work just fine.

Kat tries putting one on Mouse, who is a little wigged out by
it -- it goes under her fur, and she scratches at it a bit.
It would keep her from relieving herself, so Kat takes it off
her for now.

The glass things are shields, and if one puts one's arm into
the smudgy spot, a display comes up showing areas of weakness
in one's foe's defenses -- a tactical display.

The eight things inside the metal sphere are two balls attached
to each other, one squishy, that will allow the users to put
the squishy end into an ear and talk to each other up to a
mile away. Seven of them have survived.

The balls and rod has teethmarks in it that, if bitten, will
go into the lungs and create an artificial lung structure that
guards against bad air, and will allow the user to breathe
underwater and to perform a breath attack once per day.

The helm produces a mental energy field that will allow the
wearer to send a blast of energy at a target they point at,
doing psychic damage.

The storage ball that was stored with the helm is hollow and
contains a collection of oddities, including a miniature evergreen
tree with a hook on the side of it of some kind of soft material;
a fragment that looks like the same material as the consoles, with
colored lines of jewel; and three small 8-sided objects that Gnik
can see is labeled 0-7 on the sides. The jeweled material seems to
be a trigger for a specific object that it would slide into. The
evergreen tree is not magical.

The crystal that used to contain the Shadow Horde is no longer
magical.


23 Agram 3275

Gnik takes the day to go back into the ruins and copy down all
the spells in the Algorithms crystal.


24 Agram 3275

The group sets sail, but there is sickness among the crew. When
Milena is brewing tea to help combat it, she notices her Abyssal
dagger is glowing through the hole in the scabbard. Milena shouts
"Fiend!" and goes to the deck to see if something is flying by
overhead -- perhaps one of the soul eaters that Janell talked
about showing up on the island occasionally.

She sees nothing above, and a minute later the dagger stops
glowing. She runs to the back of the boat to see if there
is anything in the water, but she doesn't see anything. Al
borrows the dagger, dives into the water, and swims back
to where they were when the dagger was glowing, but it
does not glow again, so he returns to the ship.


25 Agram 3275

By the next day almost all the crew has gotten sick, and Milena is
trying to tend to them while sick herself. Kai and Kat have spent most
of her time in the Crow's Nest and Gnik has been in his room so they
have avoided illness, so when the ship comes across a battered ship,
dead in the water, they take a boat across to rescue the survivors --
who turn out to be a young woman named Annie with her ghost brother
Alex and two undead cats. The rest of the crew had been killed when
one of the crew opened a portal to try to bring an evil entity through.
In their trip to the ship, Gnik, Kai, and Kat found a chest with a
golden lens, 3 feet in diameter, that causes Gnik horrific visions
when he touches it, so badly that he passes out. When he wakes up,
he can't remember what he saw, only that it was the most horrific
thing he had ever seen. The ship's manifest did not say who it was
for, only that it would be retrieved upon arrival at Freeport.

Laur wants to send some crew over to get the other ship moving again
in the hopes that they can salvage it when they arrive at
Gonajibria. The crew grumbles, as they are already stretched thin due
to illness, but comply. Al goes over and also tries touching the lens,
and is also overcome with horrific visions that cause him to pass out,
as Gnik had done.


26 Agram 3275

Another day at sea, with storms.


27 Agram 3275

The day is overcast with storms expected later. Laur tells everyone to
keep an eye out as they should be getting close to Gonajigar. It is too
cloudy to see the legendary spire that is supposed to stretch high into
the sky, but they do see an island with a mountain stretching
upward. Laur slows to avoid reefs in the area. When they are about
a quarter-mile from the island, a form rises up from the water, about
10 feet tall. Al walks to the front of the ship and says, "Hello, my
name is Al! What is your name?" The being answers, "I am Aiglase; why
are you here?" Gnik answers that he is looking for Duane Hatchett,
who has something that belongs to a friend of his. They see a man
frantically rowing a small boat toward them. Aiglase says he does
not want them to damage the coral in the reef, which he enjoys.
Milena asks if he can show them the way to avoid the coral, and he
says yes, but it's the job of the man in the rowboat.

The man in the rowboat pulls alongside and comes aboard. He is the
harbormaster, Greemus. Gnik tells him their business on the island
is to find Duane Hatchett. "The guy in the tower?" Greemus asks,
and Gnik confirms it. They get directions to the inn, where Gnik
is to meet someone who can direct them to Duane.

Greemus directs the Mighty Redemption to pull in alongside the
inn and the derelict ship, the Pride, to go to the shipyards. He
points out other businesses that might be of use to them. He says
the tower is not really visible right now, but he can get directions
to the path at the inn. He recommends not going up unless they really
have to, because it can be dangerous -- there is a gap in the trail
at one point, and it is hard to see on a cloudy day like this. He
says the weather up the spire itself is freezing if you go high
enough, but the tower they seek is not that high.

Al asks if anyone in town might have a healing potion to sell, and
he directs them to Agnes's shop, next to the boatyard. Milena goes
with him, while everyone else goes to the inn.

The inn seems well-kept, with a meal and drink list on the board.
A friendly woman introduces herself as Rayba, the innkeeper. Gnik
introduces himself and says he is looking for Kladdo, who he was
told can help him find Duane Hatchett. Klaado is her husband, and
he is behind the bar, so Gnik goes to talk to him. He is skinnier
than most Dorghenians, and as he moves Gnik occasionally catches
sight of pointed ears. There is a girl, about 16, playing with a 
set of ceramic plates with writing on one side, sliding them around
the table. "Klaado, strangers!" she announces as they come in, and
introduces herself as Danae. The group introduces themselves, and
Gnik explains that Duane sent a letter saying that Klaado could
help them get in touch with him. Danae says, "When you see him,
could you ask if he has more of these?" and holds up one of the
discs. Gnik asks if he can see one; they are of a strange material
that gives a bit without actually bending, and has slits in it.
Klaado says they've been here for decades, and the story is that
someone brought them down from the spire. Danae says her aunt thinks
there are more of them around and they'll do something when put
together.

At Agnes's shop, the sign says "Agnes's Herbs", old but well-painted,
and in smaller, less careful letters below that get smaller as they
go, "and healing, and crystals, and fortune telling". Al knocks
and a voice says, "Come in, sweetie!" The shop is cluttered with
piles of materials, jars, pots of leaves and nuts, mortars and pestles
-- some clean, some not -- and a stove on which several mixtures
are boiling. A small woman who is hunched even though she does not
look that old comes from the back and greets them excitedly, telling
them they look interesting. As Al begins explaining what he wants,
she says, "You want healing!" and offers to let him taste several
to see which he likes best... but hands him one and says, "You will
like this one!" It tastes like the cookies his mother used to bake
when he was a child. Al asks what he can give her for it. She says
he may have it as a gift, as she senses they will take care of things
that need to be taken care of. Milena asks if there are things she
thinks need to be taken care of on the island, and she says, "You
are going to see Duane. He could use your help."

At the inn, Danae offers to take them up the path, but Klaado says
her aunt would kill him. She has magic, but has not learned to
control it yet; Kat recently read one of the new books in the
library that mentioned some people have recently started manifesting
magic that they can't always control well; they are called
sorcerers, and some of them eventually learn to control it. Kat
asks Danae if she's an orphan and learns that the story is that
she showed up alone on a badly damaged ship -- only the keep was
left -- when she was an infant, and Agnes found her and brought
her in. Kat asks if she wants to go up to the spire with them,
and offers to go with her to help convince her aunt to let her
go.

Gnik asks Klaado about Duane, and learns that they have never
interacted; Duane has been in the tower longer than Klaado has
been alive, and he is almost 60. Only Anges has been in town
longer. They decide they would like to start up to the tower
immediately, so they go to Agnes's shop to pick up Al and
Milena.

On the walk over, Danae asks Kat what the group has been doing,
and Kat tells her about their recent adventures with the sahaugin,
and other stories. When they reach Agnes's shop, Al is showing
off some of his stuff. Kat introduces herself and reaches out
her hand to shake Agnes's; Agnes takes her hand, holds it 
between hers, looks at it, and says, "Oh, you're very impressive!"
To Danae, she says, "She might be able to help you -- she taps
into her magic as well, but knows what she is doing with it."
Kat asks if Danae can come to the tower with them; Agnes looks
skeptical, so Kat tries to persuade her. Agnes chuckles and says,
"Oh, sweetie, I'm to old for that kind of buttering up, but you
can go. Just be careful. And don't let Klaado bully you too much."

Milena asks Agnes if there is anything they should take with them
to prepare. Danae says, "We brought the plates!" Agnes says, "Ah,
then you should be fine." They set out.

Klaado leads the group through the first part of the path, up
a path past a waterfall. They encounter two guards who are
protecting the water from outsiders; they let them pass when
Klaado vouches for them. A short time later, Klaado says, "This
is as far as I go, and as far as Danae goes." Kat and Danae both
protest that Agnes said she could go, and he asks the group if
they're really sure they want Danae along, and relents when
they say yes. Klaado points out the series of switchbacks above
that form the trail, disappearing into the clouds six or seven
hundred feet up.

The group makes their way up to the tower.
They reach the ruins and hear a voice bellowing out: "Get outta
here or I'll kill ya!"


2 January 2021

The top of the tower area is partially ruined; the bottom part is
intact but with some upper walls destroyed. In response to the
voice, Kai says, "Gnik, you're up..." and the voice replies, "Gnik?
Oh, come on in!" A man emerges and introduces himself as Duane, and
Gnik introduces the group and says he's interested to hear what
Duane has found. Duane invites them in and leads them into a spiral
stair leading down into the tower. He says he used to work at the
Treasure Trove of Time, a library in Freeport, and fell in love with
books there, but has been here for a while. Danae whispers to Kat that
he's been here for longer than she's been alive. Duane says he's
interested in their help with something he's working on.

They reach the downstairs and he asks them how much they know about
Dorghenian vampires, and specifically about half-vampires. He leads
them down a hallway lit with continual flame spells on the ceiling.
They pass a door with a board nailed across it with Dorghenian writing:
"This holy space is protected" written neatly, and then scrawling above
and below in some other language. Duane says the top line says "Big,
ugly, leave it" in Goblin. Duane says it has a big ugly statue that
spits fire. They reach a door at the end of the hall. Duane pulls out
an ornate stick, opens a door to a pitch-dark room, says, "By Maria's
Truth..." and the room lights up brightly.

He shares that the way to become a Dorghenian vampire is by drinking
the blood of a vampire, and he accidentally drank what he thought was
wine, and now he's trying to figure out how not to turn fully. Gnik
looks at Duane through his vampire-detecting eyepiece, and Duane appears
translucent.

Duane opens a trunk that includes two books and more of the plates Danae
was playing with. Danae gets excited and says, "You have plates, too!"
He says they were here when he got here, and one of the books talks about
them a little bit.

Milena says where she is from she never had to deal with saving someone
from turning into a vampire, only saving people from vampires. She wonders
aloud whether garlic would help remove the poison or just make him sick. He
says he actually likes garlic, so it probably wouldn't do it. After some
discussion, and with Gnik consulting his book of knowledge, they realize
that any resurrection magic will cure it, so Milena prepares to cast
Revivify.

Kat and Al notice a strange-looking amulet, like a truncated pyramid,
in the open chest. Kat asks Duane about it, and he says he found it
in the rubble here. Kat reaches to pick up the amulet.

Milena casts the spell; Duane staggers a bit, and then his color
returns. He gets a big smile on his face and begins thanking Milena
profusely. Gnik re-inspects him through the eyepiece and sees he has
returned to normal.

Kat inspects the amulet, and decides to see if it will protect her
from the fire-shooting statue. Gnik asks which of the books is Lyle's
journal, and Kai suggests Danae take a look at the other book to find
out more about the plates, to keep her from following Kat into danger.

Kat pries the board off and pushes the door open a little bit, but it
seems kind of stuck, like the hinges are rusted. She tries to kick it,
but her leg bounces off. She tries again, and the door bursts open,
tearing off and falling to the ground. There are a few bricks that 
have fallen from the walls and ceiling, and three other doors leading
out of the room, as well as a huge statue that turns to look at her.
Kai and Al start to follow her in and the statue turns and starts to
raise its arm. Kat raises her hands and says, "No, they're with me!"
and it stands down. They notice a design at the top of its shield
matches the amulet.

Kat approaches the guardian to see if it will speak or respond, but
it just stands there. Kat goes to the far door and opens it, then
calls out into the hall to see if Milena is coming. She asks Kat
to tell the golem not to set her on fire; as she enters the golem
raises its arm but Kat tells it to stand down.

The first door looks like it may have been a storeroom of some sort,
but the contents looks rotted. She quickly looks for secret doors in
the room, but finds nothing.

Kat moves to the next door and looks for traps, but finds none. She
opens the door to a dark room, and pulls out her Continual Light rod.
There is a small room with a statue with its head broken off. It looks
ornately crafted to a specific purpose. Kai and Kat both recognize that
it looks like a statue to Dorg, the Dorghenian god. The decorations
invoke Dorg's facet of protection. There is a door on the other side,
so Kat checks it for traps and opens the door to a big room. This one
contains four Dorg statues, all in bad shape but with their heads
intact. They represent Nature, Life, Love -- standing in a row -- and
Wealth in an alcove to the side. Kat, Al, and Kai notice that the Wealth
statue is on a pivot that can be activated by pulling on one of the feet.
As the statue rotates to the 90-degree point, the wall behind it moves
back a half-inch. When pushed, it goes back further and then slides
upward on rails, with counterweights. Inside is a casket.

Al and Kai see a translucent sword hovering over the casket. Kat,
however, sees a woman lying on the casket with the sword sitting
on her, with the blue glow of Kat's invisibility sight. The woman
is Dorghenian, ornately dressed. She turns and looks at them,
annoyed and quizzical, and sits up. When she does, Kai and Al
see the sword disappears. Kat explains what she sees.

The woman asks, in Dorgeninan who they are and what they are
doing there. Kai says they were there to help a friend, and
were exploring. Kat suggests adding that they mean no disrespect.

Al activates the Pearl of Speech, introduces himself, and she says her 
name is Neekut Sidu Cliene. She says she has been waiting. Al asks what
for, and she says, "Maybe you. Someone worthy," and holds up her
sword. "Worthy of the knowledge and experience I wield." She explains
that she and her two brothers established this place as a shrine and
to protect her family's valuables. She died, and since then has been
aware of things outside the room but has not been able to leave. She
does not know how she died, but she remembers being up on top of the
tower, hearing something behind her and her brothers yelling, and she
woke up there.

Milena asks if she was dedicated to Dorg, and she says she honored
the aspects of Protection and Skill. She asks to see Kai's sword.
Kai lets her know she can't see her, so she'll have to approach and
touch the blade herself. Kat sees the woman walk up, overlay her
own ethereal blade on Kai's, and then dissolve from the feet up.
Kai feels her blade become warm, and then very comfortable.

There are jars and boxes in the room that contain old coins, jewels,
and jewelry. Kat decides she doesn't want the sword knowing that she
took anything, so she plans to leave it all alone, but Al still looks
through the items to make sure they aren't missing anything important.

Meanwhile, Gnik reads Lyle's journal, and Danae looks up information
about the plates in the other book. When Gnik asks her what she's
found, she hands over the book.

The notebook is a thin volume bound in simple leather cover with a
stiched binding and is about 9 inches tall, 6 inches wide and half an
inch thick. The only identifying mark a small (less than 2 inches
tall) embossed image of a trident crossed by a dagger and a mace in
the lower, right corner of the front. The contents are short,
seemingly just some kind of explanation.  Apparently, the information
was written and purposefully left behind by an adventuring group
calling itself the Trident of the Trinity. They came here hunting a
group of Sgult worshippers. After their success, they left behind
tools in a secret and protected cache for people to use to deal with
Sgult worshippers, again, should they reappear (as they often do). The
note says the 12 plates they've hidden hold the clues to lead people
to the cache.

The other group goes to the final door in the golem room. After finding
no traps, Kat opens the door. There are a couple more statues, aspects
of Skill and Magic, and three constructs: an armored bipedal form
with two giant shields flanked by two crossbow devices on wheels where
the bolt fires from what looks like a dragon head. As the door opens,
the crossbow devices appear to be arming themselves. Kat draws back
and tells them to stop, but they keep arming. Kat suggests Kai tell
her sword to tell them to stop, but the sword knows nothing about
them. Kat closes the door but arms her own crossbow. Ember has come
to join them.


9 January 2021

The group sets up to try to ambush the golems if they come through
the door, and Milena offers to jump quickly through the door with
her new tactical shield to try casting Thunderwave at them. She
ducks to try to get below their line of fire, but both ballistas
fire, and one of the bolts slams into the shield but is diverted
upward. She casts Thunderwave, and all three golems are shoved
backward into the wall behind them. Milena jumps back out of
the room. Kat catches a brief glance of what looks like a skull
flying through the room as other items are bounced around by
the spell.

Back in the room where Gnik is reading, Duane asks, "Is that
normal?" Gnik replies, "With this group? Yeah...." Kat activates
the Gellen far-speaker to tell her they're in battle. He asks if
he needs to stop reading, and she says not yet, but she'll let
him know.

Kai jumps in and attacks, hitting one of the bolter golems, and jumps
out. Kat throws a thunderstone, which makes a lot of noise and
light rather than damage -- but it appears to have blinded and
deafened the shield golem and one of the ballistas.

Ember jumps in and goes after the ballista that Kai attacked. The
shield golem is shaking its head, trying to see what's going on,
but clearly doesn't perceive her. She hacks it to pieces.

The other bolter selects another, smaller bolt, which flames as
it sets, and fires it out into the hall, where it explodes; the
group gets a bit singed, but it could have been worse.

Al throws a rope at the bolter, trying to disrupt the mechanism
to pull back its bolts. Milena casts Sacred Flame and then attacks
with her Spiritual Weapon, trying to destroy the arms it uses to
reload. The shield golem steps forward, still blinded and swinging
wildly.

Kat jumps in and and shoots the bolter with her magical crossbow;
it falls apart. She dives under the table in the corner for cover.
Kai goes after the shield golem, the only remaining opponent, getting
two good hits on it; Ember jumps in and finishes it off.

As the battle ends, Danae runs in, trying to cast a spell -- and
vanishes. Kat can see her glowing blue as she says, "Oh, you got
them!" Kai lets her know she has accidentally turned herself
invisible.

They look around the room, finding a chest, blocks of metal, a
small box and jug... and a curved sword with a dragon head at
the hilt. A beam of energy appears between the sword and Kai's
sword, and Cliene's voice says, "That's my sword!" It seems to
disintegrate, disappearing into the energy beam, and afterward
Cliene indicates she feels better -- more complete.

Kat explores the contents of the chest; sitting on top is a 
silver chess-piece, a rook. Milena recalls that the god Ag
was playing chess when they had a vision of him, and she asks
Kat if she thinks it is a sign from her god. She doesn't know
whether it is meant to be, but she takes the chess piece.

There are papers and a book, but they are not in great shape; 
they appear to be notes on smithing, written by one of Cliene's 
brothers. There is a leather pouch that feels about 15 pounds,
but there doesn't seem to be anything in it. She puts her arm
in, and it goes farther than it should, but she does not find
anything in it -- but it seems to be a bag of holding, probably
empty.  There's a small set of gems on the table.

Milena moves to the side room, slightly lower than the main
room, where the sword was sitting. She looks to see where
the skull came from, and sees that there are other bones in
the fireplace. Kat asks Milena if the remains should be given
a proper burial, and Milena says they would need to figure out
who it might have been first. Kai asks Cliene, who says it is
most likely one of her brothers, but she is very practical and
nonsentimental so doesn't think anything more needs to be done
for him unless he's a ghost.

Milena takes a look at the bowls and jars in the space to try
to determine what they were used for; she sees a bit of powdery
debris in the bowls on the table, but it is not clear what it
is.

Ember examines the small selection of items in the corner and
finds a box full of Dorghenian-style smith's tools, and several
sealed jars and jugs, which she sets to the side. Cliene indicates
to Kai that the room has not changed since she was alive.

The group hears a whooshing sound: Gnik as come to check if
any of the jars are magical, and the golem in the first room
fires two flaming balls at him. Kat says, "No, no! He's with 
us!" as Gnik dives out of the room. She escorts him through
to the room with the jars.

Gnik casts Detect Magic, and clearly sees the chess piece,
Kat's amulet, the Bag of Holding, and Kai's sword, which
is now more magical. Cliene mentions the year she died, which
was 121 years ago, so it is surprising that the seals on the
jars have lasted so long. She says the jars are various things
her brother Dolist would use in his smithing, and the jug is
her other brother Figor the cleric's wine, which is very good.
Gnik carefully mends the book on smithing before attempting to
move it.

The group moves to the last of the three doors from the first
room with the protective golem. Cliene indicates it was a side
chamber that was not much used in her time -- they were expecting
it to be for future expansion. Kat checks the door for traps just
in case.

The only thing in the room is a large wooden shield that has a
pair of leather boots sticking out from under it. Al goes to
inspect and finds a corpse under the shield -- Cliene's other
brother.

They discuss what to do about the guardian golem. Al suggests
that she try to dismiss it, so she says, "You're done. You
don't need to guard anymore." It stares at her a moment with
its faceless face, and then it and the amulet vanish.

They discuss having Gnik cast Last Image on the corpse to try
to find out what happened to him. He doesn't have it prepared,
so they discuss going up the mountain. They realize to go all
the way up they will need cold-weather gear, but decide they
might as well go up as far as they can.

Duane is packing up to leave, and asks the group to take a
book to the Temple of Knowledge in Freeport, which offered to buy it 
from him. Gnik gives him a note and tells him that if he is ever in
Saltmarsh, to stop by the library there -- and if Gnik is not
there, to give the note to his friend Curt Albrecht.

Duane hands over the book: 
Legends of the Caller of Nolan's Pets: The Stories and Details of 
the Artifact Left Behind For Us to Use and How It Has Been Abused.
Gnik asks if he would be okay if Gnik kept it instead, or if he
promised it to the temple. Duane says it was not a promise, and Gnik
should consider the book as having been given to him by Duane and
can deliver it to the temple if he wishes; they'd offered 200 gp
for the book.

They exit the tower and see that it is slightly shorter than it
was when they entered, thanks to the three explosions in the
battle with the golems. They begin hiking the trail, with Danae
still with them. The wind picks up, and they reach a section of
the trail that has a bit of wall built up to help people stay on
the trail -- they are about 600 feet up at that point. At about
900 feet, there is a section where the trail does not have any
support below it -- it is like a curving bridge around the spire.
There are spurs of rock sticking out, with many dead bodies
visible -- they are directly below Sasha's Leap. There are
holes below, and several of the group think there is movement
among them. They ask Danae whether anything lives up here; Danae
says there are rumors of griffins, wyverns, and some things that
only come out and attack at night -- the group assumes they must
be undead, but they don't have a good enough view or a good way 
to get down to the crevices, so they decide to leave them alone
for the nonce.

They keep going and come to a tower-like spur that may previously
have had a bridge connecting it to the main spire, but no longer.
There is a rope hanging from it, 100 feet long. Gnik sends Az over
to see if anything is tied to the end, but if there once was, it
is long gone from being battered against the rock face for years.
They keep going.

Around the next turn, they can make out a cavelike entrance that
can be reached by a branch from the path, and a tunnel ahead
that has a small shrine on the other side -- Sasha's Leap. Danae
says the cave is probably where the pirates with the skeleton
crew are holing up while their ship is being repaired, because
no one in town wanted to take in skeletons, and the living crew
wanted to be able to get drunk in peace.

The group decides to look into the cave. The entrance is only
about 6 feet high, but it opens up inside. It is a rough tunnel
that does not appear to have been worked. They hear faint echoes
of laughter off in the distance. They decide to continue up the
trail, and perhaps investigate the cave on the way back down;
Milena suggests that they could ask the pirates if they are
willing to share their cave for the night if it gets dark, but
the rest of the group seems skeptical of hanging out with actual
skeletons.

After another turn, they see another branch from the path that
leads to a small hut on stilts. Cliene says that was Figor's
hut that they helped him build. The group decides to check it
out, but Milena suggests that someone who can fly -- namely Kat,
who has flying boots -- should check it out first, in case it
is no longer structurally sound. Cliene observes that it has
had work done -- the roof and walls have been patched.

Kat starts up the ladder, and a name comes from the window above,
"Come on up! The name's Kevak!" Gnik sends Az up to look in the
window; she (and Gnik through her eyes) sees a guy standing there
who smiles at her and says, "My! You're pretty!" He is at the
stove heating a pot of something.

He says he works for the Sisters. Kat asks how much further it
is to get to them, and he says they would have to go the distance
they have already gone twice again. A couple of the group notice
that when he steps up to the window he looks like he is standing
in a shadow that isn't there. He asks why they are climbing the
mountain, and Kat says they are looking for more pieces of a
puzzle, and that Gnik can explain more. Gnik creates an illusion
of one of the plates in front of the window where he can see it.

Al tries to detect Kevak's motive, and gets the sense that he's
hiding something. He says he has a couple more of the plates that
he found in one of the wisdom caves years ago, and they're welcome
to have them. Kat says they will take them, and if they are the
pieces they need, they won't have any more reason to climb up to
visit the sisters. "All the more reason to give them to you,
then," Kevak says.

Gnik assembles the plates together into a dodecahedron. It carries
a message: "We created the Wand of the Divine Blaze to reveal the
secret that you seek."

Gnik has inferred from his reading that the secret is a cache of
weapons to fight Sgult, and the wand is the one Duane was using,
which he gave to Gnik. Gnik tries inspecting the dodecahedron with
the wand set to candle mode, and it reveals a hidden message:

The Trident of the Trinity 
left you weapons against pain and madness. 
Above the clouds, enter the wailing path. 
Continue to the second.
Cross the great wound. 
Follow the roar.
Climb to the cascade's source.
Align the sun to find where to dig.
To access the gifts, 
remember Maria's truth.
With Maria's wrath, 
the wand will grant dawn's light.

The group heard the sound of the wailing caves far above, perhaps
twice as far as they have come so far, per Kevak. They decide to
return to town to sleep and come back up in the morning. As they
walk back down, they discuss Kevak. Kat describes a ring he was
wearing, and Milena recognizing it as something that would allow
a vampire to walk in daylight by cloaking it in a shadow that
protects it from the light. They hypothesize that he is a Sgult-type
vampire, and discuss how to kill them, in case it is necessary:
cutting off the head, or piercing or cutting out the heart.


23 January 3275

As the group goes down the trail, they realize the sun has shifted
to the other side of the spire, so the caves with possibly undead
creatures that were previously in sunlight are now in shadow. Kat
gets out her Continual Flame, hoping the light might scare them
away. Milena offers to Turn them if they get in the group's way,
but Kai says she'd rather try to kill them than make them flee.
The glimpses they had on the way up suggest they are probably
wraiths or spectres.

Gnik sends Az to fly up and keep an eye on the caves to let them
know if she sees anything. In a few minutes Az tells Gnik, "Um, there
are ugly things coming up toward you very fast...." and they can see
dark shapes moving through rock toward them. They disappear into the
rock for several moments, and then two of them pop up through the
stone bridge, one in front of Milena and the other in front of Ember.
Gnik casts "Psychedelic", and one of the two begins flickering in
multiple colors and looks disoriented; the other flickers briefly
but then goes back to its normal color. Kat fires her crossbow with
magic bolts at the one in front of her mother and hits.

Danae gestures wildly and a ripple appears to go out from her, but
nothing apparently happens. "Dammit!" she says. One of the wraiths
swipes at Milena, but she jumps back; its red eyes look like a glow from
an endless abyss. The other jumps back from Ember's attack and Milena
swipes at it with her Abyssal dagger. Six more pop out from the rock;
five of them are flickering with the psychedelic effect. These look
like spectres, unlike the first two that look like wraiths. Milena
casts Word of Radiance at them, tearing pieces from several of them.

The spectres fly through the group, slashing at them, and one of them
tears through Milena. Kai tries to take a swing but misses; Al throws
a punch and hits with Crusher. Gnik has put on his helmet and uses it
to blast one of them with psionic damage. Kai takes a shot at the one
spectre that is not flickering (and therefore not at a disadvantage to
attack).

The creatures fly up about 30 feet and turn around, preparing to fly
down and attack again. Gnik blasts the non-flickering wraith with
the helm. Kat triggers her boots of flying to meet the creatures
halfway and casts Color Spray at them, then drops to the ground
and hides in shadow. Three of the spectres start flying strangely,
as if they have been blinded.

Danae, impressed, says, "That was cool! ...hey, where'd she go?" Then
she points up in the air toward the creatures; a piece of rock pops
of the spire above them and a stream of water starts shooting out.
Danae looks perplexed.

Milena casts healing on herself and then Word of Radiance at the
creatures again. One of the spectres is obliterated. As the creatures
come streaming down again, Kai strikes twice with her sword. Another
comes at Milena; Ember jumps up to hit at it, but misses. One comes
at Al but misses as he dodges, and another comes at Kai but misses.
One tears into Ember, and another goes after Danae but misses as
she throws herself to the ground; she tries swiping with her dagger
but misses. Kai shoots with her crossbow and hits it in the face;
it explodes. 

Danae gets an intense, focused look on her face; at first nothing
happens, but Kat says, "I believe in you, Danae" -- inspiring her
to try again -- and a flaming chicken flies up and hits one of
the blinded spectres, tearing the spectre apart.

Milena casts Spiritual Weapon and Sacred Flame at one of the wraiths,
and tears it apart. The other one flies up under Al, and Gnik triggers
his Psychedelics spell again. The three remainings spectres are affected,
but the wraith is not. Al takes a swipe at it as it passes, attempting
to stun it; it stops in midair and slowly drifts. Kai attacks it, hitting
twice, tearing it appart.

The three remaining spectres fly up at Al, Kai, and Milena, but all
miss. Kai and Milena take attacks of opportunity and hit their foes,
which fly up and turn to attack again. Gnik blasts another with his
helm, and it dissipates to nothingness. Kat shoots at one of the
others, tearing it apart. Milena hits the last one with Guiding
Bolt, and it explodes into sparkles.

They make their way down the hill, and Milena casts Prayer of Healing
as they go, healing up the rest of the party.

The group reaches the bottom and goes to Agnes's shop to drop off Danae.
Kai hears a voice in her head -- Cliene -- asking if there's still an
Agnes's Shop, and if Agnes is still in charge, as the store has been
there since before she died over 100 years ago. When they come in,
Danae runs in looking for her aunt, and Kai feels a hand on her shoulder
and Agnes says, "Don't worry, sweetie, I'll explain it all," and Cliene
in Kai's head says, "What the fuck, it's the same woman...." Danae
starts talking about her adventures, Agnes asks how high she went, and
Danae looks embarrassed; Agnes tells her to go on up to bed and they'll
talk about it later.

Gnik asks Agnes how she cane to meet Danae. Agnes says the story she
tells everyone is that Danae came in on a ship where all the rest
of the crew were dead, so Agnes took her in.
The truth is that there is a powerful hag that has been causing the
town problems; undead sea creatures had been coming from the
Dreadwood and destroying the fish, impacting the townsfolks' 
livelihoods and ability to feed themselves. It turns out that Agnes
had come to meet up with two other hags to form a coven, but the
other two did not share her views: she wanted to help people, but
the other two took delight in harming people. Auntie Treeshadow felt
the coven might be a threat and sought to break them up by destroying
all the people. Agnes parted ways with her sisters and came down to
the town to try to help the people. She says Danae is a Forgotten: When 
a hag is born but not allowed to become a hag until after she has gained
enough power, she becomes much more powerful. Agnes hoped she might be
a means to defeat Auntie Treeshadow once she came into her power; now
she thinks the group might also be able to defeat Auntie Treeshadow.

Gnik asks if Agnes knows where they could get 6000 gold pieces to pay
the wizard Mallan for a scroll that could take her out; she says she
thinks Mallan is probably working with Auntie Treeshadow so wouldn't
actually help them if he knew what they were doing.

The group shares some of the information they learned in the tower,
about the Sgult worshippers and those who fought them. 

Agnes asks Milena if she knows the origins of the Bargallian religion.
Milena says, "It is always presented that this is how things are and so
how things have always been." Agnes says that is not far off, but because
the Bargallians don't ever fully trust any one being, they draw from 
many gods, and so that is Milena's right as a Bargallian. She says
she sees connections from Milena to the Time-Keeper (Cynthia), the 
Explorer (Daln), the Archer (Alex), and the Historian (Alsaya).


She says Gnik steals his power from something outside himself, while
Kat and Al draw it from inside themselves. Gnik says he always assumed
it came from the fae.

They tell Agnes that they are looking for the Wailing Path, and she
says that is likely to be at the Chimney Caverns, near the top. Milena
asks if they should provision themselves for cold, and Agnes says yes
-- and also be prepared for griffins, wyverns, and other creatures
high up the mountain that may want to eat them. She warns them about
a tower on the way up that was once a base of the Sgult worshippers.
Gnik asks if they should take out her sister hags if they are able,
and she says she won't tell them to do so because she has an agreement
with the other hags that they won't attack each other, but they may
decide to do it of their own volition.

After leaving Agnes's, the group provisions themselves with cold-weather
gear.

That evening, Gnik sets out a Tiny Hut for the group and they go inside
to talk. Gnik tells the group that he is interested in finishing
the mission that Lyle started -- which means destroying the Ebon Tablet.
At least he wants to continue following the path that Lyle was on to
figure out what happened to his friend -- and rescue him on the very
slim chance he's still alive.



28 Agram 3275

The group heads out the next morning and climbs past the hut on stilts,
reaching a very steep section of the spire where the path is only 7 or 8
feet wide. Kai takes the lead, with Kat and Al close behind, Milena in
the middle, and Gnik and Ember bringing up the rear. Danae does not come
with them. Gnik ties a rope around his immovable rod and around his waist,
and then around Milena's waist, just in case -- although Kat can cast
Featherfall if anyone falls. Milena thinks the rope might help pull Gnik
up the steep stairs.

As they climb, several in the group see three things flying toward
them. Gnik sends Az to try to see what they are; they appear to be
wyverns. The group takes a moment to retreat to a small tunnel the
path ran through a short way back. They peek out and see one of
them coming straight at them to the front entrance, and the other
two veer off and go to the other side. The wyverns are unable to
reach them, and give up after several minutes and fly off. Gnik
sends Az to follow them at a safe distance; they fly up the spire
and snag a few birds out of nests, but eventually give up and fly
off. The group emerges and continues upward. 

The path narrows to only 5 or 6 feet wide, and reaches a crevice
that leads to a landing and a hole with stairs cut into it -- the
Sacrosanct Stair that Agnes mentioned that she thought were put
there by the Sgult worshipers. Inside the crevice is mortared
stone, and Kai notices that the mortar in some places is missing,
in a way that suggests a door. She calls Kat's attention to it,
and Kat inspects it for traps and an opening mechanism. They can't
find a handle, but they put Kat's crowbar in and manage to pry it
open far enough to see that the metal workings are heavily rusted.
Kat casts Prestidigitation to clean them, and then gets the door
open far enough to see that there is a very steep stair -- essentially
a ladder -- going about 100 feet down into the dark. Kat uses her boots
to fly down and pulls down her perpetual light baton; Kai climbs down
as well, and Gnik sends Az down so he can see through her eyes. They
use the Farspeakers to describe what they are seeing: The stair ends
at a hall that goes forward for several feet and turns right into
the main part of the spire, ending at a door that looks like the
back part of a secret door, also rusted. Kat uses Prestidigitation
again as the rest of the group comes down to join them, and then
she and Kai push the door until it pops open.

It opens into a room with two doors in the far corner, two
statues, an altar, and skeletons strewn about the floor. It looks
as though there was once a third statue but it is shattered in
the corner. There are scorch marks near the altar, and what
looks like the remains of a book on top of it with what looks like
mold growing on it. The eyes of one of the statues is set with
red jewels, the left one of which is glowing.


6 February 2021

Kat closes the door. Bringing up the rear, Ember pokes Gnik and
whispers, "I hear something behind us -- I'm gonna go check it
out." Gnik lets Milena know, and joins Ember. He casts a minor
illusion so she can hide near the bottom of the steep staircase
and blend in.

They hear someone come down the stairs and a familiar voice
says, "Wow, how long has this been here?" It's Danae. Kat
goes to give her a hug. Danae excitedly tells her about being
able to access magic she has never been able to do before, and
thanks her for helping her.

Al asks Danae if she's supposed to be there, and Kai tells her
she needs to go home. Danae says it won't be a big deal, Agnes
might get mad, but it won't be that big a deal, and anyway, now
that she can control her magic she wants to help! Milena tells
her that they do not know if the things they do here might affect
the town below, and it would be good to have someone below who
knew the town well to keep an eye on things for anything unusual.
Danae brightens, pulls out a few strands of hair, ties them in
a knot, and hands them to Kat, saying it will let Danae get a
message to Kat. Gnik is aware that hags can give a piece of
themselves -- a tooth, a nail, a lock of hair -- for this purpose,
but it is not clear Danae knows she is a hag.

Kat describes what she saw; the group decides to proceed. Al
cautiously enters the room; Kat, looking into the room from
the doorway, reaches out with Mage Hand and tweaks the nose
of the gargoyle with the glowing eyes, but it does not react.
She then picks up one of the skulls with Mage Hand and makes
it float around, but still nothing happens. Al moves in to
look more closely at the statue. Milena takes off her head-scarf
and asks Kat to use Mage Hand to drape it over the gargoyle's
head, but before she can do so, Al sees that the glow is coming
from behind the eye -- and then there is a wave of red energy
that fills the room. Everything feels strange and a little
disorienting -- and for Az, Al, and Milena, that feeling
intensifies. They see beings moving around them that they
think could hurt them. Milena swings at one of them with her
walking-stick. Gnik can see Az's view of the strangeness.

At the same time, the skeletons get up. Kat shoots one with
her crossbow, managing to hit it in the spine and explode it.
Kai attacks with handaxes, taking out another. Gnik, recognizing
the confusion effect on his comrades, manages to dispel it just
as Al and Milena begin looking like they might attack their
allies.

The skeletons attack; they are not very skilled, and being hit
with bones hurts a bit, but they are not doing tremendous damage.
One hits at Al, and as he parries, its arm comes off in his hand.

Gnik has Az fly near Kat to cause a distraction to give Kat
advantage on her attacks. Ember runs in and attacks, and Al
smashes the two nearest him, disintegrating them both. Milena
smashes the skull of one with her staff.

Kat and Kai take out a few more, and Gnik pulls out his sling
and bullet. "Let's see if I remember how to use this thing...."
He misses.

After the skeletons attack again, Al punches one so hard that
its skull comes off and also takes out the one behind it. Milena
casts Word of Radiance and takes out all the skeletons around
her, leaving Ember and Kai to take out the last two.

The skeletons dispatched, Al looks more closely at the altar,
which is deeply stained with blood. Gnik takes a look at the
book; it is too moldy to do much with at the moment, so he
uses Mage Hand to move it by the door so he will remember to
take it with him later if they come back by this way.

Kat decides to try removing the gems in the eyes of the gargoyle.
She drapes Milena's scarf over its head first and then carefully
fiddles around with her lockpicks, disabling any traps. It takes
her about five minutes on each side to pop them out; in the
meantime, Gnik, realizing it will take a while, goes ahead on
mending the book, and Milena inspects the other statue. Al says
the statues look like pictures he saw once of demons that were
created by and directly serve Sgult.

Gnik finishes with the book, and sees that it is a manual on
expectations and opportunities in the worship of Sgult. Not
so much an organized religion as recommendations on the kinds
of actions and schemes that might draw Sgult's attention to
grant boons. As Sgult is the god of pain and insanity, most
of the schemes are extremely hurtful.

Milena looks at the other statue to make sure it is not dangerous,
and then moves to the altar to cleanse it. Kat knows that it will
take a while -- about an hour -- for the ritual. Kai asks Kat
under her breath, "Does she get naked for this?" Kat says, "80%
no, 20% yes." Kat, having seen this ritual before, decides to
move on through the next door on the other side of the room. Al
at first blocks her way, but when Kai sees Al is staying behind
and can watch Milena, Kai goes with Kat.

They open the door and see another steep stairwell leading up
from the room. From their angle, it is obvious that every fourth
step is trapped to collapse if stepped on, and the last five or
six steps are actually a fused stone that would drop if anyone
stepped on it. Since they came in the back door, this would
clearly be a trap for anyone trying to come in the front door.

They look through the other door and see a sarcophagus covered with
random symbols. They don't have much desire to enter, but Gnik
does a Detect Magic and detects at least three magic things inside
the sarcophagus, one of which is immensely powerful. He senses
the schools of magic are necromantic and enchantment. The group
decides to wait until Milena is done sanctifying the altar to
explore the sarcophagus further.

Gnik uses the immovable rod to brace the trick stairs so they
won't drop; Kat flies up with her flying boots, accompanied by
Az, while Kai waits below ready to climb up if needed. Kat checks
the door for traps and opens it; there is a short hall to the
right that ends in another door. Kat realizes there is a stone
in the middle of the hall that appears not to be attached to
anything, so she flies to it to keep to touching anything. She
tells not to touch anything, as the whole thing could be trapped;
Az lands on Kat's shoulder, since she can't really hover.

Milena finishes her ritual by pouring the rest of her holy water
over the alter; there is a loud cracking sound, and although the
alter did not break, the feeling of oppressiveness in the space
dissipates.

Kat examines the next door and sees that although the lock mechanism
is on this side, thus easy to manipulate, but it has been etched
with what looks like a glyph of warding that has been altered to
use necromantic magic, and will affect everyone within 20 feet if
triggered. After talking with Kai, they decide to leave that door
until after they deal with the sarcophagus.

Kat looks carefully at the door and then the sarcophagus; Al and
Milena also help look for physical traps, but don't see anything.
Kai moves in to try to lift the lid from the sarcophagus.

The lid comes off; it is dark inside, and then the darkness starts
writhing. It looks like a gelatinous writhing mass with a blackened
skull in the middle. The sense of oppressiveness immediately returns
in waves of blackness. Most of the group is able to duck away, but
Kat is overcome with fright, and pieces of her flesh blacken and
tear away as if rotting. Two undulating tentacles reach out at
Kai and Al, but miss.

Kai strikes with her handaxes and hits twice. Gnik realizes that
the skull has to be able to see its targets to make the flesh-corrupting
gaze attack, so he creates an illusion of a bag over its head. Al punches
at it, but it moves and he misses in a way that allows it to engulf his
hand, burning the flesh. He pulls his hand out and punches again, hitting
effectively this time, and stuns it.

Milena casts Bless on herself, Kai, Kat, and Al to improve their
attacks and saving throws. Ember attacks and hits. Kat is quivering
in fear, unsure what to do, and Milena says in a commanding voice,
"Go to the door." Gnik sends Az to help Kat out of the room.

Kai hits again with her hand-axes, and Gnik blasts it with his
psychic helm. Al takes a swing and hits the skull, which he feels
shatter through the bag illusion.

Milena realizes that only a Greater Restoration will allow Kat to
be healed, so she uses her necklace to cast it, and then heals her.

The rest of the group looks into the sarcophagus and sees that there
is stuff in the ooze: a breastplate covered in magical runes and with
a screaming skull shape over the collarbone area, radiating enchantment
and necromatic magic; a drawstring bag stuffed full of something; and
a pendant with a horned skull and green gems in the eyes and mouth,
radiating powerful necromantic magic.

Gnik takes time to Identify all the items. The bag has to be attuned
to, but must be fed a sentient being once every 30 days to maintain
it; if attuned, the user can pull out an unlimited number of sharpened
femurs that can be used like magical hand-axes. Gnik decides he will
cast Air Forge to destroy these items, and goes ahead and casts it 
so the others can throw the items in if his touching it does something
bad to him.

The breastplate also must be attuned by feeding it a bit of blood
each day, at which point the ghost bound within it will grant a
number of advantages to the wearer. Gnik doesn't want to destroy
it immediately, as he may want to offer it to the necromancer they
helped into town. Kai is concerned about the spirit that is bound
to it, so after some discussion he decides to go ahead and destroy
it. And upon reflection, he decides to go ahead and chuck the amulet
into the forge without even identifying it because he is afraid of
what it might do to him. When it hits the forge, it just sits there
for a moment -- and then it lets out a horrible scream and explodes
rather than melting, taking out the air forge with it. (It turns out
it was an Amulet of Pure Evil, which would have done so much damage
that it would immediately have destroyed any of them that touched it,
and that if one of is four charges were used could open up a chasm 
under a good-aligned being and destroy it immediately.) 

They notice that the symbols on the sarcophagus include writing in a
language they don't recognize, so Gnik takes time to decipher it. It
tells of the horrible deeds of someone called Treezkar. The sarcophagus
is too big to fit in the air forge, so Gnik levitates the lid and drops
it on top of the rest of it, several times, to destroy it.

The group decides to rest up and heal up before proceeding. Gnik sets
up the Immovable Rod in front of the door they entered, and a Tiny Hut
near the other two doors so that it and the gargoyle will block them.
Gnik notices that the glyph that triggered the energy blast from the
gargoyle is still active, meaning that the effect could also be
triggered by moving or touching it. Gnik uses an Erase to remove the
glyph, and then returns Milena's scarf to her.

While they are resting, Kat gets a message from Danae saying that
she made it back down the spire but had to kill a wyvern on the
way.


13 February 2021

After resting, Gnik sends Az ahead so he can cast Erase on the glyph 
on the door using her touch. Kat, Kai, and Milena proceed carefully 
up the stairs, while Gnik continues to watch through Az's eyes, and
Ember and Al sit with him to make sure he stays safe. Kat carefully
picks the lock, which isn't easy but would be even harder from the
other side.

Kat opens the door into a 15-foot square room with six zombies that
immediately turn and move quickly toward the door. Kat slams the
door shut again and tells the group what she saw. Milena offers to
turn them, and the group decides that is a good idea since they
aren't sure what they are.

Kat opens the door, Milena channels divine energy at them, and three
of them immediately turn and run while the others keep coming. Kat
slams the door closed again. Gnik identifies them as Sgult zombies,
which have pustules that explode into dust that will infect their
attacker, and those killed by them will turn into zombies.

Kai and Kat come to the door and each receive some mild scratches
from the advancing zombies. Kat tries casting Color Spray at them,
but it doesn't seem to affect them. Kai shoves them back and slams
the door again.

They discuss what to do and realize they can see enough through the
slot on the door to cast ranged spells at them. Milena tries Guiding
Bolt, but mis-aims and ends up covered in sparkles herself. Gnik
takes a Misty Step up and blasts at them using his psychic helm. The
zombies beat on the door.

There is a loud sound and through the slot they see the three turned
zombies come sliding back down the stairs, each with one leg badly
injured. They scramble up the stairs again.

Milena casts her Spiritual Weapon through the door and hits one
of them, then casts Word of Radiance and hits two of them. Gnik
blasts again with his helm. The three fleeing zombies thump down
the stairs again and go running up again. The other three bang on
the door and the hinges creak.

Gnik suggests they all retreat back down the stairs and remove
the piton that is keeping the trap door latched, and let the
zombies chase them and fall into the trap. Kat uses Mage Hand
to unlatch the door before flying down using her boots -- but
the zombies break through before she is done, just in time for
her to see the other three zombies fall down the stairs again
and dissolve into dust.

From behind the door they hear a commotion; then they can hear
zombie yells from some distance away, and nothing is pounding
at the door. Al carefully opens the trapdoor; they see one zombie
has crumbled to dust, and the other two are not smart enough to
climb. Among them, the group uses ranged attacks to dust the other
two.

On the way back up the stairs, they notice a red powder on the 
floor. Al and Milena inspect it; Milena recognizes it as something
that causes a burning sensation in eyes and on skin, especially if
it gets into an open wound.

The door on the other side of the room with the zombies appears to
be similar to the one that had the necromantic glyph -- but now it
will be on the side of the door they can't reach. Kat decides to
try opening it from the farthest distance she can manage, with
everyone else farther away. A globe of dark energy surges toward
her, but dissipates just before it reaches her. She tries jiggling
it again and a second wave comes at them. They conclude that it
is probably an ongoing effect.

Gnik uses Maria's wand to cast Continual Flame through the slot.
The floor appears to be covered in bones, with the far wall about
10 feet away. He dismisses Az into her pocket dimension and has
her reappear on the other side of the door. As soon as she pops
into existence the bones rise up in a wave and crush her; he
hears a squawk as she dissipates.

Kai opines that she wishes they had a way to know what was in
the other room to see if it would be worth going in, so Milena
casts Clairvoyance. She sees no other obvious exits, although
the floor is not visible under the pile of bones.

They look up the next set of stairs and see bits of zombie goo
on the third-from top steps, with a gap in the step behind it,
as if a blade might come out when it is stepped on. Kat flies
up to inspect the door at the top of the stairs and sees it is
again the rear of the door, with the locking mechanism visible.
There appears to be a wire connected to the back side of the
latch going into a hole in the wall. She uses wire cutters with
her Mage Hand to disable the trap from a distance, then opens
the door. It opens into a very short hallway with another door
on the other side. There is a corpse on the ground right in
front of her and another about halfway to the other door. They
look as though they were smashed, and she sees that some of
the stones on the right wall are not connected. She realizes
the wire she cut would have triggered those rocks to fly out
and smash things against the opposite wall.

She proceeds forward to inspect the next door, which also has
a lock on her side. She stands back and uses her two Mage Hands
to pick the lock with her tools and push the door open. No traps
are obviously sprung.

Ahead looks like a short hallway, with a hole in the ceiling that
goes straight up. Above is a large, solid slab of stone with no
obvious mechanisms to move it. Kat tries to push it, but it doesn't
budge. Gnik tries to levitate it; it moves slightly and slowly, and
Kat pushes it back, but hits the wall. She pushes it forward, and
it reveals a 4 foot-square opening to the outside.

At the top there is a stone that looks crypt-like, although more
of a memorial than an actual coffin, with horrible imagery -- this
is what the slab hit when she tried to move it backward. Nearby
are pillars that look almost exactly like the pillars on the Oak Isle
in Saltmarsh, except the lines on these pillars line up rather than
being disconnected. The top section of one has been knocked off and
is sitting nearby.

Gnik decides that perhaps he should Dispel Magic on the door with
the glyph before they leave. Al and Milena stay with him; they
hear a soft fizzly sound and Milena, with her Clairvoyance still
active, sees the rune spark and disappear.

Gnik peeks through the slot and casts Psychedelics at the pile
of bones. Milena casts Bless on Kai, Kat, Al, and Ember, and
then casts Thunderwave into the room. There is a deafening
explosion as the door blows in and all the bones fly against the
far wall.

Kat shoots a crossbow bolt, and Kai charges in with her sword,
shattering bits of bone all over the place. Milena casts Sacred
Flame, tearing apart more of them. Gnik blasts with his psychic
helmet. Al runs in and tries to break some bones.

The bones seem to pull apart into two. The half on Kai's side of
the room pulls it up on three legs and brings a smashing mass down
toward her. The other half coalesces into a wave, tries to smash
into Al -- he somersaults away -- and flows into the room with
the rest of the group. Ember hacks at the bit nearest her. Milena
casts Spiritual Weapon and Sacred Flame to try to keep it at bay.
Gnik considers casting Phantasmal Force at it, but realizes it
won't work on undead. He blasts with his helm from a safe distance.

Al runs into the hall and hits the pile of bones with Crusher as it
tries to coalesce into another shape. It shatters into a bunch of
bone splinters and stops moving. The bones in the small room attack
Kai again.

Al and Milena notice a small collection of long bones pushed into the
far corner of the room and not moving. Ember switches to her bow and
takes potshots into the room. Gnik switches to his sling, but fails
to hit. Kat shoots it again and it falls apart and stops moving.

Milena goes to inspect the bones in the corner. She lifts one and
they all come up, even though they are not obviously attached. It
appears to be a ladder made of bones. It feels to be magical. Gnik
casts Identify and discovers that it can be rearranged into any
shape that could be made by this set of bones, but it requires a
couple of drops of blood. When shaped, it is as rigid as steel,
and has a maximum length of 20 feet.

They use the bone pole to climb up to the surface (pulling Gnik up when
they pull the pole out of the hole) to examine the area before camping
below for the night. At the top, Kat catches a glimpse of something
peering around one of the columns with a blue glow around it, as if
it might be invisible. It's hard to make out, but appears to be about
8 feet tall. She tells the group, then sneaks over and peeks around
the other side of the pillar. She sees a gap in the rock face and
peeks in to see a statue that looks like a horned fiend holding
actual fire in its hands. The statue sets aside the bowl of flame
and starts moving.

Milena suggests going back down the hole. Even if it moves the stone
to try to trap them in, they can just come up the other way. It comes
around the corner, and Al tries talking to it. It asks, "Why are you
here?" The voice comes from the statue, though it does not seem to
be speaking. Al asks if it is the protector of the area. "That is
one title, yes." Al asks what other titles it holds and it says
"Slayer of Mortal-kind". Kat remembers reading of an undead entity
that can animate a statue, an Eidolon, but must be killed separately 
after the statue is destroyed.

The group decides to go down the hole in hopes of resting up before
dealing with the statue. Ember decides to test her new Gellen lung
to try to blow the statue back; it slides back 15 feet. It gets to
the hole after everyone is down, and a horrific-looking entity pulls
out of the rock with a roar. Al and Gnik are so shaken by how horrific
it is that all they can do is run away from it.


3 March 2021

Milena and Kat also run down the stairs, but stop partway down to
make sure the entity does not try to pursue them. Al, with Kai, reaches 
the big room at the bottom of the stairs, and Gnik and Ember reach the
smaller room halfway down before they shake off the fear. Gnik decides
to set up camp in the big room and work on re-summoning Az. Kat and
Milena just hear the sound of wind above, and can feel the chill from
the air. The dim sunset light from above seems to be being blocked by
something -- probably the statue.

The group decides that even if the entity can move through the walls,
they would be better situated to be all together. They set up camp
in the big room with a Tiny Hut for protection. To give the spellcasters
plenty of time to rest, they decide Gnik will take the first watch with
Kai, Milena and Kat will take the third shift, and Al and Ember will
get the middle shift.

While they are getting set up, but before the Tiny Hut is in place,
a voice roars out of the winged statue: "You have defiled the rest 
of the holy one! You have defiled the holy one! YOU MUST DIE!" It 
stands up as much as it can with the low ceiling and swings its 
stone tail across the room at them.

Al jumps forward and tries to stun it; he hits, but is unable to
stun it. He turns to run, as he is out of energy for the day, and
the thing slashes at him; the claws are not sharp, but they emanate
a dark energy. It hits, but he's able to roll with it. He feels it
hit, but it doesn't hurt; however, everyone else sees that the
skin on his back has broken open and he is bleeding a lot.

Kai throws a couple of javelins at it; they do some damage, with
bits of stone chipping off. "Everybody out!" she yells. Kat takes
a couple of potshots and runs out, with Milena behind her, toward
the set of stairs they first came down. Gnik casts Psychedelics at
it; it swirls with color and looks a bit disoriented. He runs to
follow Milena. The statue swings at Ember and misses, then at Kai
and hits; she hears something crack but doesn't feel any pain. Ember
leaps around it and reduces the statue to rubble, leaving the undead
entity floating there. She stabs at it with her dagger and it winces,
even though from her perspective the dagger just passed right through
it; it clearly felt that.

Kai yells "Statue's down!" and Al runs back into the room to attack
it. He gets a couple of good punches in. Kat shoots with her crossbow,
hits it in the forehead, and the creature tears apart into shreds with
a long, reveberating scream.

Milena gathers the group together and casts Prayer of Healing on
Kat, Kai, and Al. Gnik resummons Az as a snowy owl since they are
going someplace cold and then sets up a Tiny Hut. When Az pops
back into existence he hears her in his head saying, "Aargh! What
was that?!" "Tide of bones," Gnik says. "It's gone now."



29 Agram 3275

In the morning, the group goes up the stairs they came down initially.
At the trapdoor opening, they see that the huge statue is leaning over
it, but there is enough space that someone could squeeze through if
they wanted to.

Al takes a closer look at the top of the stone pillar that has been
knocked off. He notices that there appears to be a fine etching of
symbols inside the obvious knotwork symbols that decorate it. The
broken surface is covered with sigils that are not easy to see. It's
not clear how old they are, but they are significantly less worn looking
than the sarcophagus at the top of the stairs.

He calls Gnik over to take a look. He gets the impression it is ancient,
and the sigils are related to communications, perhaps telepathy, and he
gets a feeling of magic from them. He makes a sketch to compare to the
ones back home on the Isle. Al tries to lift it and finds it significantly
lighter than he would have expected, though still too heavy for him to
lift himself. He asks Kat to help him replace the broken stone on top
of his pillar. As soon as it is close to being aligned, it snaps into
place. There is a crackling as a sheet of crystal starts growing up
between the pillars. It is opaque at first, but then it clears a bit
and glowing eyes appear. A voice asks, "Who?" and everyone hears it
in their native language. Al responds in Tillian: "I'm Al! Are you
a dragon?" "No," it says. Al says to the rest of the group, "Hey, it
speaks Tillian!" "No, Bargallian," says Milena. "No, Ponallian," says
Kai. Al switches to trade and asks who they are. The being calls itself
Moriesha, and says it is above them, trapped; that it came to cleanse
the darkness on the spire and is being held captive. Al gets the sense
the being is confused, almost as though it thinks it is dreaming in
talking to them. Milena asks what darkness it was trying to cleanse,
and it replies that it was sensed from far away. Al asks what it is,
and it says a word they don't understand but that gives them a similar
feeling to some of the things the celestial being they summoned with
the scroll said. Gnik asks how it was trapped, and it says, "A bell
was rung." Gnik asks if there is anything else it would like to tell
them, and it says, "Be cautious." 

Gnik gets the sense that the device can be turned off by touching a
panel and thinking about turning it off, so he does so. Al decides to
test if he can communicate with someone else by thinking of them, so
he tries thinking of his mom and turning it on again. The glowing eyes
reappear. "Again?" "Sorry," Al says, "we were trying to communicate with
someone else's dream." He turns it off again.

As they move higher it gets noticeably colder. They enter the clouds
and get to a point where the stairs turn and go straight into the
spire. They can hear a wailing sound from inside that could be wind,
or could be something else.

They enter, and Gnik reminds them of the instructions from the plates:

The Trident of the Trinity
left you weapons against pain and madness.
Above the clouds, enter the wailing path.
Continue to the second.
Cross the great wound.
Follow the roar.
Climb to the cascade's source.
Align the sun to find where to dig.
To access the gifts,
remember Maria's truth.
With Maria's wrath,
the wand will grant dawn's light.

He activates the wand of Maria with "By Maria's Truth", which reveals
secret writing, including a sigil above the door of a crossed mace
and sword. 

The tunnel opens up into a cavern; there is a trickle of water flowing
out down the path they came through. There is an opening in the far
wall that they continue toward. Gnik sends Az to fly around the cavern
to see if she sees anything of note, but she doesn't in this cavern.
The opening leads to a much bigger cavern with a large fissure, seven
feet wide at the widest, and an opening nearer to them. They assume
it is the "great wound" they are supposed to cross, and do so at
the narrow gap near the side. The drop in the fissure is about 30 feet
deep, so Gnik sends Az to fly down; she sees a lot of bones down below.
Above, there is a ledge, and an opening past the ledge. Milena and Kai 
notice a consistent but faint roaring sound coming from the opening
above; Kai uses her boots to fly up, and she can hear it much more
clearly there.

The rest of the group climbs up and continues up a wide, natural-looking,
curving passage. The roaring sound gets louder as they continue, until
the passage opens into a cavern with a ceiling covered in stalactites,
and a cascade from a ledge above, about 20 feet up. Al starts climbing
the wall; it takes him several tries. Meanwhile, Gnik sends Kat up with
the immovable rod with a rope tied to it for Kai to climb. She makes it
to the top and activates the bone rod for the rest of them to climb,
except for Gnik, who ties the rope around himself and gets pulled up.

Kat notices that most of the stalactites are live -- still growing --
and several appear to have been carved into them. She flies up to
look more closely, but can't quite tell what's going on. Gnik walks
around to see if he can find a vantage point from which the cuts
will align; he sees that he will have to jump the stream, so he
sends Az to fly over there to make sure nothing will pounce on him.
Two rock creatures, about 13 feet tall, flow out of the stone but
just stand there with their backs against the wall. They have sigils
on them and glowing rock around their face and chest areas. Gnik
proceeds across and realizes it would line up for anyone between
three and seven feet tall -- which is still a little tall for him.
However, it seems to align into a starburst. The ground under the
spot to see the alignment feels like pulverized rather than solid
stone.

Milena leans down and begins digging; it only takes a couple of
inches to hit something solid, including a gem with writing around
it that lights up when the light from the wand hits it: "Open with
dawn's light or all will be lost."

Gnik warns them to back up, as the wand will cast a 30-foot radius
beam of radiant energy. He tells the rest of the group to back
up, and uses the words to activate Maria's wrath from the wand.

The gemstone absorbs the energy from the light and dissolves the
stone lid of the compartment in the floor. It contains a bag filled with 
a number of items -- a wand, a gem, arrows, knives, horn, a couple of 
scrolls, a small bag of coins and gems.


3 April 2021

As the group discusses what to do with the items, and whether to
continue up the spire, Kat nods toward the ledge and indicates there 
is a lady floating there. The rest of the group can't see her. Kat
says, "Hello, I'm Kat, is there something I can help you with?" The
woman crystalizes into visibility and says, "Hi, I'm Tracy, who are
you?" Al and Milena also introduce themselves, but Gnik and Kai do
not. She says, "Sorry, it was hard to hear you from the ethereal.
What are you doing here?"

Kat knows that most hags are fae and present as female, but some have
converted into devils and can pass into the ethereal. She whispers into
the farspeaker at Al, "Areful-Cay of the Ag-Hay." The magic mouth that
Gnik set up on Milena's abyssal dagger starts screaming "Fiend! Fiend!
Fiend!" Gnik makes it stop. She drifts over, and Al maintains a position
between her and the cache of items.

Kat asks her intentions, and Tracy says she's just curious what they're
doing. Kat says they are explorers, and asks if they should not continue
further up the spire. Tracy says they can continue up, looks at Kat, and
says, "I see you've dealt with my kind before." Kat says that's why they're
a little twitchy. Tracy says they are willing to help if the group needs
it. "But for a price?" Kat asks. "Well, everything has a price," Tracy
says.

Al says, "I think we may have a common interest -- getting rid of a being
called Auntie Treeshadow." Tracy says they don't have any specific ways
to defeat her, they mostly focus on defending themselves from her.

Tracy asks if they have met anyone else interesting on the island, so Al
tells stories of the undead, the bone wave, and the Eidolon that all, per
Al, they defeated easily with no trouble at all. She says it is good that
those things will not trouble future travelers. Al says he looks forward
to exploring further up the spire, and she says she looks forward to talking
to them later, and dissipates to nothing.

Gnik consults his wondrous book for information on hags and learns that
those who have become fiends are generally out to collect souls, and can
invade nightmares. There are some tales saying that sprinkling silver dust
over them will interfere with some of their magic.

The group explores another passage in the cavern that branches; there are
griffin tracks, and one branch leads outside, where it is cold and snowing.
They guess the other branch might lead to a griffin den. Al tries to 
listen, but can't hear anything over the roar of the wind. Gnik sends Az
to look, but tells her to come back immediately if she sees griffins so
they don't eat her. 

She sees a high ledge with two griffins that start squawking at her
as soon as they see her; she gets a glimpse of two large eggs in the
nest behind them before she flees. The group agrees that they should
leave the griffins alone.

From the exit tunnel, they can see the rest of the spire above them,
which splits in two: there are stairs up the shorter spire, and a
hanging bridge from its peak to a tunnel in the upper part of the
other spire. They estimate that if they go straight up, they would
be getting to the tunnel at about sunset. They decide to go back into
the cavern near where they found the cache to camp for the night.

30 Agram 3275

In the night, Kat has horrible nightmares that she has trouble waking
up from. When she awakes she feels that she hasn't slept at all, and
appears ill. Milena uses her necklace to cast Greater Restoration on
her, and she immediately feels better. The group realizes that one of
the Hags must have come to touch her in the night, which could have been
prevented with the circle of protection. Kai and Milena realize they saw
a couple of people in the village who looked as Kat did, as if the Hags
are regularly tormenting some of the townspeople. They decide to go up
and try to deal with the hags.

When the group reaches the rope bridge, they can see thunder and lightning
off in the distance over the ocean, but it isn't clear it will come this
way. Az lets Gnik know she can see a couple of wyverns on the spires
above. Milena and Kai can make out a humanoid figure standing in the 
tunnel on the other side of the bridge.

Gnik begins generating a floating disc. Kai takes a potion of flying
and she and Kat in her flying boots fly toward the tunnel to see who
is there. The others tie themselves together, planning to ride over
on the disc.

A large man steps out, greets them, and asks what they are doing.
Kat says they are going up to see Tracy and Tammy, who are expecting
them. The man says he knows, and they asked him to stop them. Milena
and Az notice the wyverns diving, as the man says, "...They asked me
to stop you in style," and his flesh burns away to reveal a red-skinned
winged form.

Al starts running, with Milena and Ember coming behind him, as they
are all tied together. The fiend picks up a bow and fires three
arrows with some kind of dark energy flowing behind. One of them
hits Kai in the side; she has taken her potion of necrotic resistance,
so it hurts, but not as badly as it might have. Zassin flies down to
Milena's hand, puts his lucky coin into her hand, and takes off flying
ahead of her.

Kai goes into rage mode and swings at the fiend with her sword, hitting
twice. Milena casts Spiritual Weapon to prepare it for when the wyverns
come into range. Az flies up to distract the wyverns, and Gnik casts
Levitate on Ember to make it easier for her to be pulled along. Kat
shoots at the fiend with her crossbow, hitting his foot. She then drops
down below the bridge, out of his line of sight.

Zassin tries to distract the fiend to give Kai advantage on her shot.
She swings again and hits as he swings his sword at her and misses,
though he is fast and strong.

Milena and Al run forward and stop, letting the levitated Ember's
momentum carry her forward to attack with her sword and dagger. The
wyverns keep diving; they don't seem distracted at all by Az and
continue to dive at the rest of the group. Milena attacks one with
her Spiritual Weapon and Gnik casts Levitate on the other one. Kat
pops up from under the bridge, shoots with her crossbow again, and
hides below the bridge again.

Al runs forward and hits the fiend twice, but is not able to stun him.
He tries a third time, and the stun works. Zassin jumps on his back
and attacks, biting his neck; the creature roars and collapses in a
pile of black goo. Zassin makes a face and spits, then flies back to
Milena, who offers him his coin back as well as a snack to get the
taste out of his mouth.

Kai flies up and attacks the non-levitated wyvern. Milena hits it
again critically with her Spiritual Weapon and hits it with Sacred
Flame. Ember pokes at the black goo to make sure the fiend is not
coming back, while Az flies to the wyvern to distract it and give
others advantage. Gnik blasts it with his psychic helm.

The wyvern bites at Kai and hits her with the poison stinger on 
its tail. Kat takes a shot at it from under the bridge and hits.
Al doesn't have any good ranged weapons, so he prepares to dodge
if needed. Kat thinks she sees something moving beneath her; she
looks down and sees what looks like Tracy standing sideways on
the cliff face getting ready to cast a spell. For a second there
is a faint glow on Kat, and then she hears Tracy say, "I'm sorry
dear, we can't have you seeing these things," and disappears.

Zassin curls up around Milena's neck while Kai takes another swing
at the wyvern, opening up a big gash in its neck. It screams, and
she hits again. Milena misses with her Spiritual Weapon, but her
Sacred Flame hits it in the forehead and falls spinning through
the clouds. Gnik sees that the other wyvern seems to be trying to
fly up rather than attack, so he releases the Levitate and it
flies up and disappears into the keep.

Gnik makes it to the other side of the bridge and regroups with
the others. Kat tells them that Tracy seems to have cast a spell
to take away her ability to see invisible things. Both she and Gnik
are aware that magical effects from wild magic -- as her invisibility
detection was -- can be dispelled. She notices that when she glanced
up at the top two spires before, she could see some kind of energy
line between them, and now she cannot. The group wonders if that is
where the celestial being is trapped.

Gnik ties himself to the end of the rope after noting that the
approaching storm could make any stairs very slippery, and they
proceed into the tunnel. Kai takes a potion of healing to keep
Milena from having to cast any spells.


17 April 2021

The storm blows through and the group takes an hour to rest so Al
can recover his monk abilities. As they proceed into the tunnel,
they hear the clack of something hitting the stone, and sees a
small winged being, smaller than Gnik, perhaps an imp, throwing 
bones. "Took you long enough!" he says as they approach. Gnik
asks what he is doing with the bones, and he says he is scrying.
He says his ladies are waiting for them, and leads the way through
an opening to the right; the way ahead goes into a spiral path up
the leftmost spire, and the opening takes them back into the open
air, toward the two spires between which Kat saw an invisible
being, probably the imprisoned angelic being.

The group follows the imp and sees two women, the hags Traci and
Tami. Milena catches a glimpse of three blackened skulls looking
over a railing high above; it is unclear whether they are just
skulls sitting on the railing, or the heads of three skeletons
crouched behind.

Traci congratulates them on proving that they might actually be
worthy to take on Treeshadow. She asks if they are still interested,
and Milena says it is still on their minds. Kai says, "Taking out
Treeshadow, yes; allying with you, no." Al asks if they have a
creature trapped between their spires, and they say it is a horrible
creature from another realm that doesn't belong here, and that they
are drawing energy from it. Al senses that they are telling the truth,
from their perspective.

Gnik suggests they go somewhere warmer to talk about their common
interest of stopping Treeshadow, but Kai says she is more interested
in taking care of these hags who are hurting the people below, and
who hurt Kat twice. The hags claim they are not hurting people...
right now... and anyway, where is Kat?

At that moment, Kat -- who has carefully snuck around behind the
hags, jumps out at Traci, striking with both weapons. There is a
green glow faintly on Traci as she staggers back shouting "What
have you done?" and transforms into a hideous hag. A blast of
black fire flashes out of her toward Kat.

Az relates to Gnik that she sees monsters on the balcony: three
blackened skeletons with bows and swords, and two massive flame-headed
demons. One of the skeletons leaps down, pulls out its sword, and charges.
The other two fire from above, hitting Milena and Kai; it burns abnormally
and blackness oozes from the wound.

Kai goes into a rage and runs at Traci, hitting with her sword. Al also
attacks her and hits twice, but is unable to stun her. Kat attacks with
her sword again, sticking it through her right elbow. Gnik borrows Milena's
wand of Detect Magic, ducks behind a rock, calls Az to him, pulls out his 
bag of holding, and jumps inside.

Ember rushes in, going full-bore and stabbing Traci twice with her
rapier and once with her dagger. The two flaming fiends leap to the
ground; their tails end in serpent-heads.

Milena calls forth Nash, who is eager to emerge; she grabs Traci,
throws her in the air, shakes her around, and throws her to the
ground, where she dissolves in a puddle of goo. Milena also casts
Bless on the party, except Gnik.

Tami transforms instantly into her hag form, over seven feet tall. 
She throws down a small pouch and a sphere emerges from it; all
within the sphere feel an overwhelming sense of nausea; Ember 
immediately vomits her guts out, and Kai, Kat, and Al are also 
affected, but shake off the worst of the effects.

Az grabs the bag of holding and flies up toward the top of the spire,
where Gnik will try to detect and dispel the magic trapping the
celestial being.

Al attacks Tami, but is unable to stun her; Kai and Kat also try to
attack Tami, hitting her a couple of times; Kat stabs her through her
right thigh and she staggers back and falls to the ground.

As he flies up with Az, Gnik senses an immense magical effect coming
from the tip of the sphere he is closest to.

Seeing that both hags are down, the two fiends immediately flee. The
door into the spire, which was open a crack, opens and the vampire
Kevak emerges, says, "See ya!" and jumps off the spire. Gnik directs
Az to dive after him and sees him hit a rock outcropping and jackknife
himself around it, clearly having made the choice to protect his head.
Gnik casts Levitate on him and Kat tows him back up with Mage Hand,
holding him just above where he can touch the ground, and Kai decapitates
him as he observes, "Big sword!" "Greatsword," the voice in her head
corrects. He explodes into dust.


1 May 2021

Gnik flies back up to the nearest spire to cast Dispel Magic while
the rest of the group destroys the skeleton that had jumped down.
The group sees a flash of light at the tops of both spires, and they
suddenly see a celestial being sitting in midair, cross-legged, that
starts to fall; it converts to a somewhat more human-looking form, 
winged, with a jewel in a chasm in its chest. It lands, and the wind
around it blows the unnatural cold away. It says it had come to kill
something wrong. "One of these?" Milena asks. He leans over the remains
of Tracy, sniffs, and says, "It is gone." Al points out there is another
one out there that could use killing, and it says, "Not my concern,"
folds in on itself, and vanishes.

Kat uses Mage Hand to pick up Tami's belt pouch from the goo of her
remains. It is heavy, almost at the limit of the Mage Hand, but contains
only two small keys. Gnik sees that the bag is magical, but the keys
are not. It is a bag of holding, which is always the same weight no
matter what it holds. Gnik detects more layers to the magic than the
bags they already have.

Kai notices that Tracy's remains are still glowing faintly green, which
started when Kat attacked her. She asks Kat what it was; Kat says maybe
she doesn't want to know, and says they should talk about it later. Kai
asks if it will hurt anything and will it go away. Kat says it won't 
hurt and will go away, even though she's not actually sure.

The group decides to go into the door Kevak came out of, into the taller
of the two towers, so Gnik can use the rest of the time on the Detect
Magic, while Kai and Milena wait outside to take care of the two
skeletons in the shorter tower if they come out the door.

The first level of the tower is a nice entryway, with a leather cloak
that glows with magic hanging on the coatrack. There are couches,
and windows that appear to be open, although no wind blows through
them due to a magic field on them, and the room is a bit warmer than
they would expect.

They climb the ladder to the second level, with a big table in the
middle of the floor and a set of manacles attached to each leg. There
are bits of flesh and spatters of blood all over the room; some of
it looks old, but most of it seems recent. There is a wardrobe in
the corner that glows with magic; opening it with Mage Hand, it
has cheese and crackers, sausages, cold cuts, and other foods, 
tableware, and dishes. The cabinet likely has a preservative
effect on the food.

The next level is some kind of laboratory or storage area, full
of bookshelves, precariously stacked, and countertops with
equipment for making potions, jars of oddities, including three
mummified heads under a glass dome with their mouths moving as
though they are talking. Gnik sees a title about the flora and
fauna of the Hoole Marshes, and puts it in his bag.

The top room, very tall, is storage. There is a cable that runs
from a hole in the ceiling down to about 9 feet above the floor.
Gnik does not detect anything magical. Al tries to jump up and
grab the cable; when he does, there is a loud "CLANG". He tries
to lean out the window to let his companions know that it's
okay, it was just him -- but he can't push past the force field.
He opens the door to a balcony and yells down, "Sorry about the
bell!" He sees that the clouds that have already shrouded this
spire have blown away and the view is fantastic.

Gnik convinces Kat to fly him up to the area at the top of the
tower; as they near the hole that the cable comes out of, Gnik
senses extremely powerful magic. "Did Moriesha say something
about being trapped by a bell?" he asks the group through the
far-speakers. "Yup," Kai says. "Let's go back down," he says
to Kat.

They fly back down and Gnik sends Az up so he can see what she
sees there. Se sees a bell, 5 feet tall; the top of the tower
is otherwise empty. He casts Identify on the bell through Az,
and immediately senses that there is another bell, and the two
work together to trap or release an entity, or to attract or
repel those who hear the bell, or cast a geas, depending on
how they are cast. They discuss whether to destroy the bells,
which can't be moved, and decide to finish exploring first.

They head to the smaller spire and Gnik casts a second Detect Magic
from Milena's wand. The ceiling of the lowest level glows with a
strange shade of purple that they can only see in their periphery,
and the floor is an earthy, loamy dirt. There are plants and fungi
growing all over the room, and there is a winding path through the
plants to the stairs. There are a number of plants that are useful
medicinally, and a couple that are hallucinogenic, and others that
could be made into tea. Milena and Gnik notice an infestation of
bloodsquash vines against the far wall, purple cabbage-like
vegetables that will create communicable disease, and fungi that
will spew spores that grow in any host that inhales it until it
kills them.

Milena also notices two bloodthorns, which are carnivorous and can lash 
out at anything they can reach. She notes to the group that the only way
to avoid it is to avoid the path and pick their way through the plants
along the wall. They discuss whether to suggest Agnes come take over
this place and deal with the bad plants, or whether they should take
the time to kill the bad things. They decide to go kill the skeletons
first and discuss it more later.

As Al comes up the stairs into the next room, an arrow comes flying
at him, which he catches out of midair as a second arrow goes flying
past him. Kai sees him catch it and runs to where it must have come
from, Kat fast on her heels. Kai goes into rage and hits with her
sword, while Kat fires force bolts with her crossbow. The two skeletons
drop their bows, pull out their swords, and swing at Kai, hitting a
couple of times, although she manages to avoid the necromantic
effects.

Al throws a rope at the undamaged skeleton, attempting to bind it. Ember
rushes up next to Kai and hits the damaged skeleton three times. Gnik
clambers up the stairs just far enough to look into the room and hits
both skeletons with Mind Whip.

Kat hits the more-damaged skeleton with a force bolt, shattering its
foot, and as it falls over it falls into Kai's swinging sword, which
cuts it in half. Al keeps the other skeleton grappled with the rope,
and Gnik levitates it; it cannot reach its bow, so the group is able
to take it out with missile attacks. There is nothing else in the
room. Kat is concerned about the necromantic magic on the skeletons'
blades and arrows. They decide that when Gnik identifies things,
Milena can try consecrating them.

They move up the stairs to the next level, which is another laboratory,
but much less well-kept than the other tower's: jars are open, there
is a horrible stench from rotting items, and everything is disorganized.
The group moves through quickly. They realize that the other tower was
Tracy's, who worked with devils and was thus Lawful, and this chaotic
mess must be Tami's.

The next level up contains piles of hides, but nothing else obvious
except a trapdoor in the middle of the ceiling 12 or 15 feet up.
Kat flies up and finds a sequence of rooms, each with a trap door
and no stairs except for a ladder carved into the wall of one of
the rooms. She finds nothing else except the bell at the top.

They return to the sitting room in the larger tower, and Gnik
begins identifying items while Milena makes lunch. Tracy's belt
pouch is a Bag of Holding with eight separate pouches inside,
each to a different extradimensional space that except for the
first one cannot be accessed except by the wearer of the belt.
He finds a number of stoppered vials, as well as a pair of
spectacles, divided among the spaces. Some of the potions he
recognizes as potions of healing, growth, and flying. The glasses
will allow the wearer to read any language if touching the surface
it is written on, and can be used to detect magic, but only focus
on nearby things; anything more than 30 feet away is hazy, and more
than 60 feet away cannot be perceived.

Gnik identifies the cloak next. Anyone wearing it exudes a strong
stench of vinegar and mustard, and can be easily tracked by scent.
If the wearer goes into combat while wearing it, it pierces the
wearer with poisoned thorns; but anyone who hits takes poison
and acid damage, and the cloak can slash at foes within 10 feet.
The group decides it should go into the airforge.

Kevak's ring protected him from sunlight with a faint shadow-like
effect; Gnik decides to hold onto it. The dust is Dust of Dryness,
which will turn a cube of water into a marble which can be released
by an action to break the marble.

Gnik looks through the books in the laboratory. The book on the Hoole
marshes was written by three of the founders of Saltmarsh. There is
a book on an expedition to the Cyrillian wastes, and another that is
an introduction to botany. There is a book on the history of the blood
war between devils and demons. The Ashmodae Codex is written in Infernal
and is about Asmodius worshippers and their dealings, and seems to be
written as a warning text.

He uses Mage Hand to lift the glass dome off one of the mummified heads.
They don't recognize the language, so Al uses his pearl of speech.
It seems to be in the middle of telling a story that may be the length
of the novel. The second head speaks the same language, and is reciting
poetry: the plight of slaves and the poor, and is beautifully emotional.
The third makes Al feel that he walked into a conversation with a mage
describing a complicated and boring magical algorithm. Gnik identifies
the one speaking poetry and gets the sense that it is a knowledge
storage device with no soul bound to it.

On one of the high shelves they find a box of letters as well as notes
about communication with various people. Gnik finds some letters from
the mage Mallan asking about summoning powerful celestial beings and
promising to help with Tracy's endeavors in exchange. They also find
a lockbox with two padlocks and two other keyholes . The box itself
is not magical, but Gnik detects five faintly magical things inside.
Kat inspects it carefully for traps and detects something that might
jut out through a small space in the front, but it won't activate if
the two non-padlock keys are turned at the same time. She removes the
padlocks and then uses Mage Hand to try to turn the other two keys.
She had them backward, so two spikes come jabbing out -- but she is
too far away to be affected. She swaps the keys and opens the box.
Inside is a small flat wooden box and a collection of coins and crystals.

The box contains five sheets of paper that are magical but do not appear
to have anything on them. Gnik identifies them and learns that one can
write 50 words or fewer on one, and when a recipient is named, it will
fold itself into a tiny bird and fly by the most direct method to find
them if they are on the same plane of existence; otherwise it crumbles
to ash.

The crystals are somewhat rounded and have sigils etched inside; Al
recognizes it as a currency used as a very reclusive variety of elf.


15 May 2021

In the evening, after they spend the rest of the day clearing out the
towers, Kai asks Kat more about what she did to take out Tracy so quickly,
and with that weird glowing effect. Kat makes sure nobody else is listening,
and then shares that she made a deal with Zagrimil to give her a sword to
defeat hags, in exchange for something she will do for him later. She can
do necrotic damage with it and also, once a day, can use it to dimensionally
anchor a foe. She thought it would be the only way to defeat the hags
without getting killed.

Gnik and Ember take first watch; Kat will take third watch with Milena,
but she is not sleeping, as she doesn't trust this place. She's sitting
quietly in the corner with her back to the wall.

They hear a high-pitched call, and then a second overlapping one. Several
of them recognize it as the cry of young wyverns, probably coming from the
tower they haven't explored yet.


31 Agram 3275

Early the next morning Kat and Milena catch a glimpse of the surviving
adult wyvern diving off one of the towers, but the night is otherwise
quiet.

The group makes their way carefully to the door in the other spire: as
the path approaches the door, the way is only about three feet wide and
the stones are well-worn. The way leads to a solid stone door with no
obvious hinges. Kat inspects it and doesn't see any traps; it looks
like it would just push open. Gnik detects magic on it. It is too
heavy to open with a Mage Hand, but Kat can use both of hers together
to push it open. It opens with a grinding sound into a round room with
an earthen fireplace with one burning log with golden letters in the
side which Gnik recognizes as elven script: he and Kat recognize it
as the elvish word for "blessed by fire". There are stairs to the right
spiraling up along the wall, and a comfortable chair in front of the
fire with a small stack of books. The books are not magical; the log
definitely is. He puts on his new glasses of translation and looks
at the book titles, which all appear to be horror-romances with
horrific endings. They guess this tower was the domain of the
ugly devil who met them at the bridge. After pondering whether to
destroy the books, Gnik puts them in his bag.

At the next level, Gnik detects a magical effect in the middle of
the room: a six-foot spire of rock in the middle of the room that
looks like an exact replica of the spire they're on, about 1/500
scale. Going up the trail just before Kevak's cabin they make out
tiny people, and higher up they see a lone figure -- probably Danae. 
Kat pulls out the magnifying glass from her thieves' kit and sees 
that it is a very lifelike representation of Danae. She looks at 
the group farther below and sees it is a group of skeletons and 
humans -- the pirates and their skeleton crew -- who turn toward
Kevak's cabin rather than coming further up the spire. Gnik notices 
that there are more guards at the water, and a cluster of about a dozen
people heading in that direction.

They decide to use the farspeaker to talk to Laur and find out what's
going on in town. He says the town is all up in arms and worried that
the world might be ending because a bell rang. Kai says the group rang
it by accident and understands why the townsfolk would be concerned but
now that they know what it does they won't ring it again. Laur says he
will let the townsfolk know.

As Kat looks closer at the figure of Danae, she sees that it is in
black and white, though everything else they see is in color. They
guess it is some kind of wild magic effect. They think she will reach
them that evening, if she comes straight up. The only other thing in
the room is a pentagram etched into a piece of clay hanging on the
wall. It isn't magical. It looks like it might be wearable. Knowing
there are wyverns above, and with their previous experience with the
talisman that kept a golem from attacking, Kat takes it and wears it.

When they reach the top, the tower is open to the sky and it is in
ruins, full of rubble, with a nest against one wall. Just outside
the nest are two little wyverns, who look at them curiously but
go back to playing when they see the pentagram. Milena says the
devil was probably training the wyverns, and that's why the adults
staged a coordinated attack against them -- they were trained, or
the devil was controlling them.

They return downstairs and Gnik investigates the log. He discovers
he can turn it on and off by saying the word written on it. He
turns it off and Al puts it in his new pouch of holding.

The group discusses trying to destroy or at least deactivate the
bells. Gnik notes that the magic is imbued into both the bells and
the tops of the towers, so if they can find a way to remove the bells
from the towers or destroy the mechanisms holding them up, the bells
will become normal bells. However, if it falls, it might take the
whole tower down with it.

Kai decides to ask Cliene about who first built or lived in these
spires. She says that from what she knew, the first time anyone found
or lived on this island, the bells were already here -- and that was
thousands of years ago. Gnik is aware that there are rumors that the
spire was originally the trident of a god.

They decide to leave the bells and return down the spire. They see
on the model spire that Danae has somehow almost reached the top. Kat
decides to fly down and meet Danae since she's so close. Danae says she
heard the bell and was worried so she came up. Kat asks why she's all
black and white; Danae says she was trying to get up faster and it
didn't quite work, until her last try. She also is wearing a pentagram
amulet; she say Agnes told her to grab it from Kevak's hut, where he
has a whole barrelful, to protect her from the wyverns. Kat shows her
around -- she thinks it is mostly pretty cool -- and then they head
back down.


29 May 2021

The wind is picking up as they come down, so they take shelter in
the cave of winds to wait it out; one of the griffins peeks around
at them but does not bother them. The winds pick up to almost 30 mph
and there is lightning but very little rain.

They proceed down from the caves using the inside tunnels.
They reach the level of the standing stones as the pirates come up.
Their leader is wearing a capelet of bright feathers. He asks if
they rang the bell. Kai says yes, sort of. He asks if anything is
left there or did they clear everything out. Kai says there's nothing
left, and he asks if they would mind if someone double-checks that.
She says she minds if he does; they want to talk to the townsfolk
about it first. He says, "That's unfortunate," and flames come out
from the cape and envelop his whole body as he rises into the air.

Al drops down from the stairs they were descending and runs forward
to throw a thunderstone into the midst of the pirates. It bounces
off the forehead of one of them and explodes, knocking several of
them back.

Kai goes into a rage and charges through the skeletons to try to
reach the chief in the feathered cape. She hits him and feels a
burn coming from his cape. He kicks away, floats back, and
fires at her with his crossbow. When the bolt hits, it explodes
in a black cloud and is extremely painful. The skeletons come 
charging up the stairs and one of them grabs Ember and tries to 
drop her over the edge; she manages to fight her way through. 
Another grabs at Kat, but she ducks away.

The captain is casting a spell, but Gnik tries to cast a counterspell
to disrupt it. He can tell the attempt fizzled, and that it was
an attempt at Circle of Death, which would have raised necromantic
energies that could have killed most of the party.

Milena casts Thunderwave, carefully aiming it at the skeletons
coming up the stairs and avoiding the rest of the party. Six of
them shatter, their bones scattering back and tumbling below.
Kat runs up next to Al and throws the Star of Jaeleth into the
cluster of pirates; it hits another one in the forehead and
explodes with energy.

Danae yells from behind the group, "LEAVE MY FRIENDS ALONE!" and
throws her hands forward; tendrils of purple energy rise up from
the ground, grab the flying, flaming chief, and pull him to the
ground. Milena recognizes his cape as a Bargallian artifact, made
from the feathers of the now-extinct firebird that was hunted to
extinction, that grants flight and fire and protection from the
flames. These capes used to be gifted to the village protectors.
Gnik tries to temporarily suppress its magic with a Dispel Magic
and the flames flicker and go out. He sends Az to fly around and
distract skeletons, and he runs forward to get off the stairs and
get cover from the pirate spellcaster.

Three pirates charge at Al, the nearest foe they can see. They
swing at him with their cutlasses, but only one successfully hits,
slicing across his chest. Ember runs to the mountain side of the
remaining skeletons and lets loose with a blast of wind from her
Gellen lung, knocking four more off the mountain. Al attacks one
of the pirates, crushing his knee and causing him to fall to the
ground; he hits another in the shoulder and stuns him. He hits the
third and stuns him as well.

The chief says, "Captain?" and the captain says, "Well, I hoped
facing the hags would have at least weakened you. Parley?" Kat
says into the farspeakers, "They didn't respond well when we tried
to parley before, so fuck that noise." Kai, though, says, "Gnik, I
think it's time to bring out the manacles," and asks the chief to
remove the cape. He says it won't work again anyway, and she says
he won't get a chance. He asks if she's going to take it, and she
says, "I'm just going to keep you from using it now." He accepts
that, takes it off, and drops it behind him. She retrieves it.

The captain says, "I'm not interested in any parley that involves
manacles." He steps toward the edge, opens a portal through reality,
steps into it, and disappears. "Well, shit," says the chief. The
skeletons stop moving; it is clear that the captain was the necromancer.
Milena casts Thunderwave to knock the rest of them off the stairs.

Gnik lets Kat know that Dimension Door has a relatively short range,
and the mage probably didn't move up the spire. She flies out and
goes to look for him a little farther down the spire. She spies him
on the stairs about 400 feet down. She flies down toward him, but she
sees another dimensional door and he disappears again, possibly into
the cave where they've been staying; she cannot see him. She decides
to sit and watch to see if he comes out of the cave while she waits
for the rest of the group to catch up.

Al ties up the stunned and injured pirates. The chief asks if they'd
be willing to let him go in exchange for information. Milena is at
least interested in hearing his story. He introduces himself as Clinton
Clancy, or at least that's what they told him at the orphanage. He's said to
be Bargallian but grew up in a Jhoynian orphanage. He got the fire cape
from the captain. Kai asks if the captain works with the Hammer, but
Clinton says the captain thinks Mitchell is an ass. They asks Danae
whether the town leaders would be willing to take these pirates
into custody. Danae says Captain Pickett was too powerful to deal with,
but the rest could be put into jail. After some questioning, it becomes
clear that they are not good candidates for rehabilitation and should
be locked up. They rig the bone ladder into a stretcher so that two
of the pirates can take the one with the broken leg down the mountain.

They use the farspeaker to tell Laur about the pirates, and that
Captain Pickett is a powerful necromancer who might try to come to
town or escape. Milena tells him to tell Agnes. "Who's Agnes?" he
asks. They direct him to the herbalist's shop.

Kat hears something moving down at the opening of the cave, but
does not see anything. She keeps waiting, but with her rapier
out. She asks over the farspeaker if Gnik could cast Invisibility
on her so she could just sneak in and take care of the guy. He
says he doesn't have it prepared, but he will come down to watch
with her, and asks Az to fly him down in a bag of holding. He gets
close and says, "Um... where are you?" and then sees a hand waving
from a rock. They don't hear anything else coming from the cave.
After some discussion, they realize the captain may have cast
Invisibility on himself to get away. At about that time, they
get a communication from Laur thanking them for telling him about
Agnes, because when the asshole came down and tried to steal their
ship she was able to defend against him, although he then ran off
again. The villagers are spreading the word to steer clear of him.

Milena checks in with Nash about whether she could track the captain.
She has an excellent sense of smell, and suggests Milena could drop
her over the edge. Kat offers to take her down instead. Milena says
to Nash, "My daughter is bored she will take you. You know what to
do with bad man." Al says, "Does she? I mean, she won't kill him,
right?" Milena smiles.

Danae decides she wants to join Kat, tries to cast a spell, starts
floating, and throws herself over the edge excitedly. A moment later,
they hear her scream -- the wild surge is actually a series of five
surges, and the second was Dispel Magic, which got rid of the floating
effect. Milena calls below on the farspeaker to let Kat know to look
for her on the way down. A minute later the whole spire shakes as she 
casts Earthquake with a 2-mile radius. The last surge happens just as
she gets in range for Kat to cast Featherfall; she drifts, motionless.
Gnik sends Az to retrieve her and bring her back; she is sound asleep.

Az flies Gnik down and Kat carries Danae down slung over her shoulder
and drops her off with Agnes. Agnes asks Kat if she is all right, because
she doesn't look right. Kat says fighting the hags was... eventful, but
anyway, they have to go now. Kat pulls out Nash, who springs to life
before she can even put her down. She sniffs around to get the scent,
bows to Agnes, who scratches her head, and takes off toward the pirate's
ship. Kat and Gnik follow behind, and realize Agnes has followed as well,
carrying Danae over her shoulder. Kat hears in her mind, "Climb on my
back," and Kat does so, then pulls Gnik up as well. Gnik has the Holding
Sphere and is ready to cast Suggestion. They get the impression Nash
is not being quiet, trying to draw the foe out. Once they're on the
ship, Kat slides off Nash's back with her rapier out.

Nash indicates one of the two doors as the way Pickett went. Since Gnik
can't see the opponent yet, he casts Mage Armor on himself. The other
door opens and six skeletons come rushing out. It is followed by a large
translucent hand that pushes Nash off the ship, with Gnik on her back.
Gnik rolls off clumsily before she goes over the edge and into the water.
Az flies quickly into the doorway the hand came from and says he is just
inside. Gnik rolls the sphere into the door and says, "Kindly put your
hands into this sphere," and a voice comes back, "Gladly!" followed
by a stream of curses. They hear the sound of crunching wood as Nash
tries to climb back up the side of the ship. Gnik considers casting
Levitate, but she is too heavy -- especially wet.

Agnes taps a skeleton on the shoulder and it crumbles to pieces.
They attack, and one hits Kat; Agnes appears to have tossed a 
glittery handful of herbs that create a shield effect. They hear
Pickett try to cast a spell, but he can't even get the words to
come out since the sphere prevents any attempt to move. He curses
more. Kat hits one of the skeletons and it falls apart, and Agnes
taps another one and makes it fall apart. Gnik casts Psychedelics
on the skeletons; one makes its save but the other two miss and
have disadvantage on their attacks.

They hear another crunching-wood sound and then a long scraping
sound as she slides down the side again. Kat hears her say in her
mind, "I hate boats." Kat lets her know that Pickett has been 
captured, and takes out another skeleton, and then she and Agnes
take out the last two.

Gnik, Kat, and Agnes take Pickett, still in the manacles, to find a
place to hold him overnight. They meet the governor, and discuss what
to do with Pickett. Gnik mentions that they are traveling next to Freeport,
where they have learned from one of his crew that Pickett is wanted and
will be executed, and if the crew is willing they may take him with them.

Gnik lets Agnes know that the stronghold at the top of the spire is now
vacant, if she is looking for another place. Agnes asks Kat to ask her
mother to come visit her when she gets to the bottom of the spire; she
doesn't think Danae is waking up from her sleep anytime soon.

The rest of the group reaches Kevak's hut and they stop to rest for
the night; Milena casts healing, including on the badly injured
pirate.


1 Sinta 3275

The rest of the group stops in to explore the cave the pirates had
been using. They find items that might be useful for the ship, six
skeletons -- which they dispatch easily -- and a well-done painting
of the town from above, painted by the ship's captain, along with an
easel and a nice set of paints.

The rest of the group reaches the bottom of the spire. The other
pirates tell them that Pickett has a bracelet that lets him breathe
underwater that they may want to take from him. They learn a ship
that came in yesterday dropped off the Freeport newspaper, so they
pick up a copy.

Agnes asks Milena if she has the ability to remove curses; Milena
does have that spell, so she casts it on Danae and that wakes her
from her enchanted sleep. She is covered in scales, but those fall
off after a couple of days. Agnes also warns Milena that she is
worried about Kat. Milena asks about what specifically, and Agnes
mentions a diabolical influence. Milena says she knows the one.
Agnes says the sword has never been wielded by a mortal.


26 June 2021

The group explores the pirates' ship and finds more paintings, which
Al peruses to see where they might have been. It includes the Freeport
docks, along with paintings of the crew (including the skeletons).

Al takes a little time to play with his sea friends from his bag in
the harbor and the nereid comes to play with them. He plays a little
rough, but is well-intentioned.

They catch up on news that has come in while they were up the spire.
The necromancer Annie they were going to give a lift to Freeport has
left a note saying she got bored and caught a ride with another ship,
and will see them there.

Kat wants to give Danae something to remember her by, and offers her
the sea-elf shell she found in the Sahaugin lair. Danae says she doesn't
have anything to give her in return, but maybe she could cast a spell on
her? "Sure!" says Kat. They go outside, and Kai tells them to stay well
away from their ship, just in case. Danae does the spell, and they are
completely surrounded by a wall of fire, but they don't feel any heat.
Danae apologizes and says maybe she should try again. "Yeah, why don't
you try again?" Danae concentrates, and Kat feels a weird rippling 
sensation all over, and feels that she has a new ability to walk on
water once per day. Danae looks disappointed, but Kat tells her what
happened and Danae does a little dance. They realize the fire around
them is hot on the outside and is starting to singe the stone around
them. Kat asks if she can dispel it, and she says, "...I could try?"
She points at the fire, and the stone breaks and a geyser of water
shoots up to the sky.

They see Agnes coming up the stairs. She says, "You went somewhere I
had to climb, sweetie. Stand back." She dispels the fire, but leaves
the geyser, and then uses magic to shape the stone to make a trough
to feed the lake. "This will be good in times of drought," Agnes says.


2 Sinta 3275

The group sails out the next morning, escorted out of the bay by the
harbormaster. Al, Gnik, and Kai notice a ship off to port coming around
the island that is going way too fast to be coming into port; it looks
like they are trying to cut off the Mighty Redemption. It has a notched
shark fin on its sail -- Al recognizes it as the Crimson Shark, a pirate
ship captained by the Stormdaughter. It is raising a signal flag: Surrender
or be boarded. There appears to be a stormcloud rising over it. Laur starts
hollering orders.

Al and Gnik think the stormcloud is someone preparing a Call Lightning
spell. They discuss options for taking out the other ship. Kat asks Gnik
to cast invisibility on her so she can fly over and shoot a bolt of
Demolition near the ship's waterline, but Gnik hasn't memorized Invisibility
for the day. She remembers that she has a skirt that will transform her
into a merfolk, and they realize that if she can hit the keel it will
be extremely hard to repair. Al, Kai, and Gnik go with her.

There are significant waves, so they dive as deep as they can to avoid
the churn. They guess it would be safest to be at least 100 feet away
to avoid the thunder damage, but Kat wants to be closer to give herself
a better shot of hitting her target.

As they approach, Kai sees a flash of lightning above her and tries to
evade, although she does get a bit of a shock from it. Kat takes her
shot; the ship is flying toward her, and she manages to hit the keel
just where it bends upward. The ship comes to a screeching halt and
the ship immediately begins going down. The others see Kat spinning
in its wake, and her crossbow floating away from her. Gnik and Kai
get to her just in time to pull her away so she doesn't get hit by
the ship, while Al retrieves her crossbow. Gnik swims to the surface
and dispels the Lightning spell. Kai swims up to survey the crew
members to see if she can see the Stormdaughter, who is said to be
a beautiful elf. She sees a woman clinging to the boom, yelling to
her people sternly and barking orders in her beautiful elven voice.
Kai discusses with Gnik whether they want to try to take her out.
Gnik says if she wants to try it, he'll support her, so she takes
her potion of flying and goes to tackle her off the ship. As she
does so, Gnik casts Phantasmal Force to make her think she is being
attacked by seagulls.

Kai grabs her, she calls out in surprise, and black flames shoot
out and engulf them both. Kai dodges some of the effect and they
hit the water; the Stormdaughter takes a deep breath just before
they go under. Kai does not want to kill her, but wants to try to
knock her out and then bring her to the surface. She punches her
in the diaphragm and holds her under the water until she passes
out, while dodging the crossbow bolts and spears coming into the
water. She catches a glimpse of a tattoo on her wrist, identifying
her as a follower of Zratz.

Al swims back to the Redemption with Kat, who comes to on the
way; Kai and Gnik swim away from the pirate ship and try to subdue
the captain in all the ways they can think of to keep them from 
doing magic. Gnik recognizes the black fire Kai describes as Hellish
Retribution, a spell used as a reaction. They gag her and bring her
back to the ship. Kat wags a finger at her and says, "Don't fuck with
the Mighty Redemption."

They discuss what spells she might be able to use purely verbally,
and Gnik points out she could possibly use Misty Step or similar
teleportation. Kat offers that she could anchor her by poking her
with her sword, as long as she does some damage. Kat cuts a little
slice in her cheek, and sees a faint green glow. Kai tries to
intimidate her into telling why she was following their ship; 
she says she heard they have a book on controlling Nolan's
pets -- that is, all sea creatures -- and she needs it for
vengeance for her people. Kai asks if she means the Thiali, and
she says, "Maybe you should let me go...." and Kai says, "Yeah,
maybe I should do that." Gnik recognizes she's trying to use
suggestion and tries to dispel it; Ember tries to tackle Kai,
but it doesn't work. The Stormdaughter waves her hands, sees
that nothing has happened: "What the...?" Gnik looks at her
and says, "You should surrender." She chuckles. Al throws his
rope at her as she tries to sprint for the edge, and catches
her legs. "Al, what are you doing?" Kai asks.

Ember drops behind Kai and yells, "Kat!" trying to give her
advantage to take down Kai. Kat jumps up and manages to wrap
herself around Kai's torso while Ember anchors her legs. Gnik
casts Slumber on both the Stormdaughter, who immediately falls
asleep, and Kai, who yells "What the hell?!" as the Suggestion
dissipates as she stops concentrating. 

Kai recognizes the word the Stormdaughter tried to say, and
realizes it is the same thing the demon who killed her father
said when he escaped into another dimension -- a spell effect
that lets her travel between dimensions.

They get her tied up and gagged again, and Al -- who is a
worshipper of Nolan -- asks if he can see the book. Gnik had
already been planning to read it that afternoon, but lets him
take a look: "Legends of the Collar of Nolan's Pets". Based on
the drawing, it is a conch shell that has been inlaid with 
precious metals and jewels. Some stories are from the time of
darkness thousands of years ago. It is said it was last seen in
the Gellen Sea area by someone using the collar to bring up krakens
to sink an armada, but his ship was sunk with the conch still aboard.
Al gives the book back to Gnik, who begins looking through the book
for clues about where the collar may have ended up.

The group discusses whether to continue on to the island indicated on
the treasure map, or continuing on to Freeport to drop off the prisoners.
Since the island is on the way, they decide to stop, but to make sure the
prisoners are carefully restrained while they explore -- with Kat stabbing
the Stormdaughter once a day to keep her anchored.


10 July 2021

Milena takes Kat aside to share with her the warning Agnes gave, that
the sword had never before been wielded by a mortal. Kat brings the
sword to Gnik to Identify it, and learns that it will begin draining
energy from her if she does not use it to deal necrotic damage at least
once per week, it will drain energy from her and it will become more and
more difficult to resist its pull. They decide she needs to make sure
she uses this effect when they get into combat.

They reach the island and sail around, discovering that there is only
one really approachable area to the south; the rest of the island is
has sheer cliff faces. There is a large, partially hidden cave a little
more than halfway up the cliff face on the northern side. The group
decides to approach from the south and walk across the island, past
ruins in the middle that they saw from the crow's nest, and toward the
cave.

The group takes a rowboat, except for Al, who pulls a friend out of
his bag to go with him -- and pulls out Gina, the giant octopus. He
warns her about the eels in the seaweed.

They reach the shore and see there is a corpse in one of the rowboats
that is at least several months old and has been picked clean by animals
and birds, with a rusty cutlass beside it. There are also a lot of other
bones sticking out of the sand all over the beach, and places near the
water's edge that look churned, as if a large crew of people had tried
to come ashore. After some investigation, it appears there are paths
where groups tried to cross the dunes but then the sand churned and
there are no tracks out of that area. They do find a path that crosses
the dunes without hitting churn. 

They are about to head that way when Kat, curious about what caused
the churn, tosses a rock that way. The sand roils, and seven skeletons
emerge and run toward them. Al suggests pushing the rowboat back into
the water and climbing in to see if they follow, so they try that.


3 Sinta 3275


In the morning, they approach the island to the only approachable area
at the south, where there are not sheer cliff faces. They can see a
couple of smashed rowboats on the shore, above the waterline.

Ember tries slamming one with an arrow and Gnik follows by blasting
it with his helm. Kat flies up with her crossbow and nails another
one. Al swims out into the water and warns the octopus they might
have company, as Milena hits one with Sacred Flame. Kat hits it again,
and it collapses. The other six walk onto the beach and start walking
into the water.

The group decides to try rowing around them back to the beach to try
to get advantage. As Ember and Kat row, Gnik and Milena blast another
one to dust. 

Kat lands on the beach, luring two skeletons back toward her as the
other three continue into and under the water toward the rowboat.
Al and Gina move toward the underwater skeletons. Gina grabs at one
with her tentacle and hits, getting a good grip on it. Gnik blasts
one moving toward Kat, and Milena blasts one moving under the water.
Kat sees the two coming to shore are about to reach her so she flies
up again to shoot from above.

The group in the boat lands again, and Kai leaps out of the boat
and runs at them in rage mode. She slams through one of them,
exploding it, and the momentum carries her into the other one; she
gets its skull stuck on her sword, who complains at her about it.

Al attacks the skeleton Gina has grappled, shattering it as she
finishes crushing it. "Wanna go get another one?" he asks her,
and she swims off to the other one. 

Ember jumps out of the boat and charges into the water at the one
remaining ungrappled one. Gnik and Milena blast it, but it continues
toward the beach. Kat nails it with a bolt and it shatters. 

The skeleton Gina is grappling breaks free and attacks her; it hits but
does not do much damage. Al attacks it and punches through it; it falls
apart.

Milena and Kai notice that the bones that have fallen apart seem to
sprout little crab legs and skitter back toward their original location
in the churn. They debate whether it's safe to leave the boat here if
they stick to the safe path, but decide it will be ok.

They head up the safe path and onto the island. They see and hear no
animals, but they see evidence: feces of a carnivore that is larger
than a wolf, claw prints of something digging for a burrowing animal,
a splatter of gore. They reach the ruins: it appears to have been a
defensible position built up with walls of stone, probably brought in
from elsewhere, that are now smashed and surrounded by corpses that
look several months old. As they look around, they see a set of stairs
going down; and at that moment, Milena's dagger starts shouting, "Fiend!
Fiend! Fiend!" They don't see anything nearby, and conclude it might
be underground.

Kat has her Mage Hand carry a continual light torch down the stairs;
it stops at a door that has been pretty seriously singed and looks like
its hinges are damaged, so Kai rips it off. It opens into a large room;
it has not been burned, but there is evidence that the level above must
have been completely ablaze. It reeks of rotted food -- it appears to
have been a dining hall, and there are scraps of food scattered around.
Gnik notices that the area above has already been investigated.

There are several doors around the perimeter of the room. Kat picks one
and begins investigating it for traps, as Gnik checks it for magic. There
doesn't seem to be anything unusual about the door, so she opens it. There
is a faint stench of rot permeating the room and heavy black curtains hung
around three sides. There is a small table with a brazier on it, and on
the fourth wall there is a hideous mural. It appears to have gotten
very hot, hot enough to melt a silver statue in the brazier. Al finds
another door behind one of the curtains -- it is a section of stone
with strange abstract etchings and indentations in it. They notice
that the indentations match the size and shape of the gemstones they
found in the box with the map. Kat checks the door for traps and Gnik
checks it for magics -- and it is definitely magical. Gnik uses Mage
Hand to place the gems into the indentations; a set of etchings begins
glowing orange and the door slides outward and swivels. Milena has heard
rumors of this: the Saffron Sigil, which is expensive to see because it
could cost you your life; it is associated to Sgult, the god of insanity
and death. 

As they move through the door, Kat uses her serpent necklace to cast
an Aura of Purity around them. As she and Kai step forward, they hear
a sound behind them, between them and the door they just walked through,
and something throws them forward. They are both able to catch themselves
before being thrown into the larger room at the end of the short hall,
which is lined with pustule-covered Sgult zombies, six on each side
of the room. They recall that if the pustules explode they can spread
disease. Kai tosses a thunderstone into the center of the room, and all
but two of the zombies are blinded and deafened for a minute.

Al flails around with Obviator trying to find the invisible creature,
and feels that he may have grazed it; he says, "I think it's around
here, guys!" Something slams Kai and Kat again, and it seems to be
two separate attacks; one flings Kat across the room, but she is able
to roll with it against the wall and down to the ground to avoid taking
the full damage. Kai is sure she heard a giggle.

Ember appears to be attacking the air, but her sword seems to stick
into something; there is a horrible shriek, and Al feels something
blow past him. He takes a punch, and feels whatever-it-is disintegrate
around his fist with a fading scream.


24 July 2021

Five of the zombies swarm Kat while the others throng toward the
hall and the rest of the group. Gnik casts Psychedelics at the
ones around Kat, affecting all but one; she slices its hand off
and runs toward the rest of the group. When she gets in range,
Milena casts Bless on all of the group but Gnik. She tries 
throwing a fistful of dust to see if it reveals another invisible
creature, but she just gets dust all over Kai's backside.

Kai goes into rage mode and attacks the zombie in front of her,
which is no longer blinded, taking off its arm and slashing
across its abdomen. Gnik sends Az to distract the nearest
zombie to help give Ember and Al advantage on attacks. Al yells,
"Back!" and uses Kai's back to vault over the cluster of zombies.
He punches the nearest zombie twice, doing significant damage
but not taking it down. Gnik uses his psychic helm to blast one
of the zombies.

One of the zombies comes flying through the air, as if thrown, at
Milena; she ducks and it slams against the wall behind her. Ember
slices through the nearest zombie, and it explodes. The one behind
it steps up and slices at her throat. The group of zombies that
originally went after Kat shambles across the room and one tries
to attack Al, but he parries. Kat hits the zombie nearest her;
it staggers and explodes.

Milena calls forth Nash, suggesting she grab zombies and fling
them against the far wall, and then casts Sacred Flame on the
zombie that hit the wall behind her. Kai dusts the zombie in
front of her and manages to avoid the worst of the effects
from the dust. Az distracts another zombie. Al lands several
body blows on another zombie.

Gnik moves forward, preparing to blow dust to the far wall if
another zombie dusts, when another zombie comes flying at
Milena, but she ducks. Nash senses where the creature was
that threw the zombie, and leaps for it. Milena gets the sense
she got a bite in, but only barely.

Ember attacks the most recently thrown zombie and stabs it a
couple of times. The zombies try to attack, but none manage
to hit anyone. Kat takes out another zombie, and Gnik blows
a gust of wind, pushing it back so it explodes away from
the group. The wind continues, pushing two more zombies back
toward the far wall.

Milena casts Word of Radiance at the two zombies next to her;
one of them explodes into spores, but Milena and Ember shake
off most of the damage. Kai explodes another zombie, and all
within range save against the worst of the damage.

Al hits another zombie and dusts it. Nash senses something
moving near her, grabs at it, and slams it to the ground
while keeping a bite on it. Gnik tries to hit it with a
Psychic Blast; based on Nash's reaction, the blow disintegrated
it. Gnik moves the wind to try to push another zombie back.
Zassin flies forward, hoping to help with the invisible thing,
and stomps indignantly at the spot where it was when he finds
it was gone.

Nash grabs the nearest zombie, but doesn't succeed in flinging
it away. Ember moves back to take out the other zombie next to
Milena, then moves forward to help with the other zombies
remaining in the room. Kat dusts another zombie. Milena targets
a zombie on the other side of the room with Sacred Flame, and
it explodes.

Kai runs forward at one of the remaining two zombies and hits.
Gnik tries using the helm on the same zombie, and it explodes.
Nash runs at the remaining zombie and bites it, but is unable
to get a good enough grip to throw it. Ember shoots it with
an arrow. The zombie attacks Nash and hits. Kat shoots it with
a crossbow and Milena hits it with Sacred Flame, and it explodes.
Milena takes a few minutes to cast Prayer of Healing to help
the group recover from the damage from exploding zombies.

The group checks the next door for traps. It is sturdy, but doesn't
appear trapped; it isn't even locked. They don't hear anything on
the other side.

They move forward to an intersection; Kai peeks around one corner
to the left, Kat looks ahead in the corridor. When Al reaches the
intersection, he notices a tripwire to the right, which Kat disables.
It appears it would have dropped a massive block from the ceiling onto
whoever tripped it. Gnik puts on his arcanis glasses; he detects an
illusion in the hall Kai looked down that makes a floor appear where
there is not one, and a magical effect in the hallway ahead. Al
notices another trap beyond the tripwire, which appears to be a 
wooden door in the floor painted to look like stone -- probably a
trapdoor that would fall when stepped on.

Gnik moves forward to look more closely at the magical effect and
determines that there is an undead creature entrapped in the wall 
that can move its essence around and attack from the walls anywhere
in the area, but can be destroyed by destroying the section of wall
where it is entombed.

The group discusses whether to continue exploring when they have a
prisoner they need to get to Freeport. They decide they need to find
whatever the item is that was brought to Jack's attention.

Gnik decides to try taking out the undead creature by using the Wand
of Maria to cast sunlight at that section of the wall; and if they
stand in the middle of the large room they just left, it would not
be able to reach them. They move into the room and Gnik throws
the spell; horrific arms reach out of the walls, ten feet long,
and move toward them, but can't reach them; they hear a shrieking
sound, the arms desiccate and fall apart, and the section of wall
down the hall explodes.


14 August 2021

The group decides to check the other doors that branched off the first
large underground room they encountered, to see if any others lead to
chambers where the jewels could be used for entry, and/or to heavily
trapped areas (or more zombies). Al wants to take an hour to rest in
order to get his qi back, but Kat knows she will get bored. They
leave Al to rest in the small curtained room and the rest check
out the other doors clockwise around the room.

The next door is not latched -- it is just a swinging door that
swings out. Kat tries to use Mage Hand to open it, but finds the
doors are warped from the fire that had burned above. It takes her
a couple of tries to get it open. There are empty wine casks -- the
heat melted the seals and spilled the contents. Poking around with
Mage Hand, she and Gnik find a nice dagger with a whalebone handle
along with a small bag of coins. There do not appear to be any other
exits from the room.

The next door is broken apart, and untrapped -- or if there were once
a trap, it is long sprung. It is a kitchen, with a large cauldron in
the middle and shelves (some broken) of cookware. There is a tub of
standing water, now stagnant and slimy, that was once used for
dirty dishes. There is one carved scroll case on the shelf which
they bring back with Mage Hand. It holds several loose papers that
turn out to be recipes -- including flatbread, fish stew, and seagull
loaf.

The next door has a latch, but it is not in good shape -- the wood
is partially crumbling, and the door is warped. It opens onto a small
rooms full of bookshelves, a chair and scribe's desk. The books and
scrolls are in very bad shape, and there are four bedrolls stacked
in the corner. Gnik detects four faintly magical things in the desk,
so he steps into the room to take a closer look. Kat uses Mage Hand
to shake out the bedrolls to see if there's anything in them, but
they are just dusty, scratchy blankets. Gnik finds that the desk is
locked from the inside and there is no obvious key, so he asks Kat
to take a look. They do not find any traps, so she picks the lock
with her tools and Mage Hands. It pops open in just a few seconds.
Inside there is a glass vial of ink that seems to have survived,
and four other glass vials, faintly magical, labeled "Bliss". There
are several blank pages, slightly charred, that Gnik takes -- he
notes that he could fold them into small animals. Gnik looks through
the books to see if any are salvageable. One small set of books appears
to be about some hideous rituals -- he decides it is not worth wasting
a Greater Restoration on, even if he could get a lot of money for them
from the right buyer -- and another is about maintaining the
finances of a small religious organization.

Kat gets bored waiting for Gnik and opens the next door. There are
statues at the far end of the room: a skeleton holding a cat o' nine
tails and a woman with snakes for hair, as well as many small figurines
scattered around the floor. Kat borrows Gnik's glasses of magic detection,
and sees that the small figurines are not magical but there is something
magical in the base of the gorgon statue. Kai steps toward the door for
a closer look, and notes that there are small scuff marks on the base,
as if there is a section that pulls out lining up with where Kat saw
the magical effect. Kat takes a closer look; it appears seamless, and
would not have been noticeable without the scuffs. She opens it up
to find scrolls bound with a ribbon, a large tome, and a medallion
showing a skull with a spiked chain coming out of its eye sockets 
surrounded by random shapes. Kat recognizes the image as being related
to a cult of Sgult. The medallion is not magical, but is made of 
platinum. The scrolls, however, are magical: the first is a spell
that looks as though it might command someone to do something, but
she doesn't fully understand it, and the other looks like it could 
be Hold Person. Kat takes a look at the book, opening to random pages;
she's still wearing the glasses, so she can read it even though it is
in Infernal: it is a book of ritual enchantments for horrible things -- 
ritual rape, child sacrifice. She considers just putting the book back, 
but Kai suggests they just burn it. They debate whether Gnik will be okay 
to burn it; he is okay with it and sets up his airforge to burn it and
melt down the platinum. Kat decides to fashion it into a thin bracelet.

The next room is a weapon room with some bedrolls and racks but no
weapons. The one after that is full of kegs, bags, boxes, clutter,
and a cot in one corner, a storage room that someone also lived in
on the side. They do not detect anything magical; there is food that
is long-spoiled; everything is coated with a thin film of charred 
flour where a bag exploded. There are carpentry tools and lanterns,
and charred coils of rope that were next to the now-burned oil.

The final room has three pallets on the floor, an iron kettle in
the center of the room, and a pile of lumber in one corner. Waiting
for Al to finish his short rest, Kat searches several walls to see
if there might be secret doors, but finds none. Al finishes his
rest, goes to glance in all the rooms, but doesn't notice anything
they haven't already found.

They return to the hallways with all the traps. Kat and Al walk in
front to search as they go. They go to the first north segment,
carefully stepping around the hidden pit trap, to get to the door.
Al notices a thin wire, which Kat is able to disarm despite almost
slipping as she tries to clip it, as if there is a heavy weight
behind it. She tries to open the door, but it does not budge; with
some investigation, she finds that it is a fake door but rigged so
that the stone above it would fall if the wire were tripped.

They head east to the next intersection, with Gnik moving behind them
watching with his glasses. They move to the north, carefully avoiding
a trip wire; it tees into another long hallway with several more traps:
trip wires, illusory floors over pits, and trapdoors opening into
spiked, slimy floors below.

They realize there are some empty spaces surrounded by doorless walls,
so Al and Kat investigate for hidden doors, but don't find anything.

Kat and Al decide to disarm the tripwires, spike the trapdoors so
they won't fall open, and lay boards over the illusion-hidden pits
-- when they go back to the bunk room to grab pieces of lumber, 
they discover several weapons, but nothing of value.

They return to their search with the door on the southwest of the
maze, which is unlocked and doesn't appear to be trapped. Kat and
Al step back ten feet and use Mage Hand to open the door. A
ballista bolt comes flying out into the wall behind them; if
they hadn't stood back, it would have hit whoever opened the door.
There is nothing else in the room besides the ballista. They discuss
possibly taking it back to the ship to use for spare parts for their
mounted ballistas, although it would be very heavy to carry.

As they come back down the hall, they can see into a room to the
south, the walls of which have bas relief patterns of bones with
the occasional hideous demon-face peeking out. They move slowly
down the hall toward it, checking for traps as they go, to investigate
more closely.

There are several chests in the center of the room, several open
and showing jewels, some urns and a strongbox -- all surrounded
by piles of bones. Kai notices a gap in the bones near the far
wall. Kat uses Mage Hand to bring a necklace from one of the
chests; no traps are sprung, and they quickly see the necklace
is just glass. They decide to ignore all the things in the middle
of the room and instead make their way to the only obvious door in 
the room.

Kat moves toward the door, searching along the north wall and then
the east wall as she goes. On the east wall, she finds that one
of the demon faces has a tongue that is not attached to the
stonework, just above where Kai noticed the gap in the bones. Kat
pushes it with Mage Hand, and an entire section of wall moves
away, opening into a hallway that ends with two stone doors. They are
much nicer than any of the other doors they've seen in this place.
They do not hear anything or detect any traps; the doors are not
even locked. They stand back 10 feet again and Kat tries to open
the door on the right, which opens to a hallway that has a door
and a bend ahead. They try opening the other door, which opens
into a huge room with massive ceilings; from their position down
the hall they also make out a pillar etched with geometric shapes,
and the walls seem to be made of a shiny black iron, also etched
with geometric shapes, and there is an urn on the far wall. Gnik,
Ember, and Milena approach and Gnik immediately senses magic in
the room.

As they enter the room, they see a few chests and urns scattered
around the room, a pile of leather, and two pillars that Gnik
senses are the source of the magic. He detects that it is related
to a summoning power, suggesting that triggering it could bring
something into being. Kat tries to repeat her Mage Hand trick to
grab something from the chest to see if it's real; the minute the
hand touches something, there is a shimmer between the pillars and
a huge winged fiend with a bird-skull head appears, about nine feet
tall. Kat recognizes that it lets of fumes that will poison anyone
that comes within the fumes. Kat shuts the door. "What are you doing?!"
Kai asks. "I finally have something to do!" Kat offers her a potion
of protection from poison; Al has his necklace of Clean Breath that
will protect him from the fumes. Kai takes the potion and charges,
hitting twice. Milena casts Bless on everyone but Gnik, and Al
runs forward to attack and hits twice, but is unable to stun it.

Ember slips into the room and takes potshots at the creature from
the corner to try to avoid the poison fumes, but she does not hit.
Gnik attempts to use Suggestion to suggest that it go to its home
plane and not return; it chuckles and says, "How about I do something
more fun?" A moment later, the piles of leather begin moving and
shamble toward them; Gnik realizes it could be the flayed skins
left over from making skeletons. One hits Al, although he is able 
to knock the blow aside. A second one hits Kai and tries to envelop
her, sliding over her head and making it hard to breathe. She grabs
it and rips it off her as the other one attacks. It also hits and
covers her. Gnik sends Az to try to pull it off, but she is not 
quite strong enough to pull it off.

The creature chuckles again and says, "You all are so cute. Since
you two are busy..." It folds in on itself and appears behind
Gnik and Milena. They smell the caustic gas, but both manage to
shake off the effect; they've smelled worse before. Kat tosses
the Star of Jaeleth at it, and hits. It is engulfed in flame,
but laughs. She drops her crossbow and pulls out her rapier and
abyssal dagger.

Al tries pulling the boneless off Kai, and gets her free. Milena
tries turning undead; white energy passes through the room and
sparks as it hits the boneless, all but one of which begin moving
toward the wall. Kai pulls out her chained javelin and throws it
at the fiend to try to pull it back into range; she drags it back
easily, and as it nears it attacks with its claws, one of which
gets through her defenses, tearing deeply into her forearm. Ember
shoots and hits it. Gnik stabs at it with his dagger with holy
water, but is not able to hit. The last unturned boneless tries
to hit Ember, but misses. The creature attacks Kai again with its
teeth and claws; one claw and a bite hit. 

Kai attacks and hits once, and then Kat runs forward to hit with
her rapier, triggering the dimensional anchor and the necrotic
damage effect; it jerks its leg away. She slashes with her dagger
and hits again.

Milena casts Spiritual Weapon, hitting it, followed by Sacred
Flame, hitting it again. Al attacks the last boneless to try
to free up Ember to attack the fiend. He hits twice and his
second punch goes entirely through it as it falls to the ground
in tatters.

The fiend snaps a bite at Kat, but she jumps away, avoiding much
of the damage. Ember attacks and hits twice with her rapier and
once with her dagger. Gnik tries stabbing with his dagger again,
but does not hit. Zassin whips out from under Milena's collar,
bites the fiend in the wing, and then flies back to hide in Milena's
shirt.

The fiend attacks Ember, hitting twice with its claws, almost taking
one of her hands off and slicing across her face. Kai attacks again,
taking its head off; the body dissolves in gelatinous ooze, with
tentacles that reach out and briefly touch them all with a stinging
sensation, leaving numbness as they dissolve away. The giant bird
skull flies through the air and lands at Milena's feet. She smiles
and puts it on her head.

The group finishes off the rest of the boneless and Milena casts a
Prayer of Healing on the group. They decide to use the iron room for
a long rest, and Gnik bars the door with his immovable rod.


21 August 2021

Milena uses the rest of her spells to heal up the group, especially
Ember, before the group settles down to sleep. Kai checks in with Laur
on the farspeaker, and he reports that there is some kind of great
beast, a "manny-core", that keeps flying around the ship; they are
hunkering down and fighting it off as best they can. The group discusses
whether to head back but realizes they are pretty much out of spells.
Kai let them know that manticores particularly like human flesh, so
if the humans stay belowdecks and the non-human crew stay above, they
may convince it to move on.

Al knows manticores are not the smartest, but can negotiate; he
suggests they might want to offer it the remains of the boneless
they defeated to eat instead of their crew, but they decide against
it for now. They settle for the night.


4 Sinta 3275

When they wake, they check in with the ship again; they're still fine,
and the manticore hasn't come back in a while. They begin taking a look
at the urns, which are open and contain coins, gems, and jewelry; likewise
the bags and the smaller chests. The big chest does not have a lock on
it; it contains bolts of silk, glass flasks with a red liquid that
glimmers, that Gnik recognizes as potions of healing, but that glisten
more than the potions they've usually used. There is a small hinged
container of wood with a handle, a glowing gem, and a tattered jacket
lying along the inside front of the chest. There is a small orb with
an eyeball imbedded in it in the bottom of the chest, and an amulet of
bone covered in runes and shards of ruby, and a leather book that
Gnik sees is not magical (although the amulet is). The eyeball does
not appear to be moving, unless it is not being looked at; and then
it seems to blink.

Kat looks at the lock on the small container, and finds it to be
very complex, made with fine work on the inside. Milena offers to
assist, and reminds Kat to look for magical as well as physical
traps -- which prompts Kat to peer inside and see a tiny, finely
etched glyph. Gnik offers to erase it once he's done with his
Identify. Meanwhile, Al tries to talk to the eyeball, but it doesn't
respond.

Gnik finds that the orb can be pressed to the forehead, which will
cause it to embed; it incurs resistance to psychic damage, and
proficiency (or expertise, if already proficient) in perception, but
also some form of madness that may be different for each user, or for
each use. It can be willed out, or will fall out if the user dies.
After some discussion, Al decides to try it to get a sense of how
bad the side effects are. He doesn't seem obviously different to
the others, but to him everything seems brighter and clearer, like
he's seeing things he'd always been missing.

Gnik works on removing the glyph; the rest of the group stands behind
one of the columns while he does, just in case something goes wrong.
However, it seems to fizzle out just fine. Kat works at the lock for
a while, and eventually gets it open. The box appears to be lead-lined
and contains a glass orb enclosing an ever-changing ball of liquid.
Gnik identifies the substance as obyrith ichor, taken from an ancient
eldritch race that predated both mortals and gods and believed to have
created the first demons. The ichor has only vile or destructive uses.
Kat hears Zagrimil in her mind indicating that he wants it -- and when 
questioned, he says he has been watching her for the last day once he 
realized where she was going, because he thought there might be opportunities
to fulfill part of the bargain they made.

The amulet provides wisdom saving throws against enchantment.
The cloak has some sort of necromantic aspect, and the jewel has
some kind of unstable magic in it. The book is written in haphazard
handwriting, describing rituals to bring aspects of Sgult into the
world, or channel power to Sgult. Only about a fifth of the pages
are written on, but Gnik immediately concludes it should go into
the air forge.

He goes to identify the jewel; as soon as he does, there is a flash
and he flings it across the room. "Don't touch that!" he says. He
doesn't know what it was, but it had some kind of curse on it. He
says he thinks it will get better by tomorrow, but he won't be able
to attack things as well until then. Milena looks him over and thinks
a Greater Restoration would fix it, but Gnik suggests they wait until
the end of the day in case she needs to use her spells for other things.

The cloak can be placed on a corpse within ten days and it will
come back in undead form, but mentally unstable and aware that they
have died. If they take the cloak off, their soul is destroyed. So
they decide to chuck it in the air forge as well. The potions are of
Greater Healing, and they keep those.

They distribute the items they are keeping and continue their explorations;
now that they are familiar with all the types of traps, they easily avoid
them. They return to the room with the bones, and decide that Milena
will try to ceremonially sanctify and give them funeral rites. As she 
does the first sprinkling of holy water, the bone that it lands on starts
to sizzle, and the bones move as one mass into a massive tower -- but
then a dazzlingly bright shaft of light comes through the ceiling and
they see the bones begin to crack and shrivel before the light becomes
too bright; when their vision clears again, the bones are gone without
a trace -- the gods (possibly Maria) have intervened. They search the 
room and find nothing of value, only a note that says, "Ha ha, was it
worth it?"

They return to the surface and check in with the ship. Lanny answers
and says the manticore is not currently bothering the ship. As they 
return to the boat they see a shadow pass overhead... and then another...
and another -- they look like winged lions with human-like maned heads.
They roar, and they hear answering roars from the other end of the
island. Ember says, "So, are we fighting them off?" and gets out
her bow. Al yells up, "What do you want?" The lead manticore yells,
"You look tasty!" Kat says, "But we're very pointy!" He answers,
"So are we!" Al says, "We'll give you indigestion!" "What's that?"
he asks. Al says, "We're covered in an oil that will make you 
sick?"  "Ugh, why you do that?" he asks. "It was an accident!" Al
says. "We fell in a pit!" "You stupid," says the manticore, and
he and the others fly away. The group hurries on to the ship before
they come back.

Gnik settles down to read Kat's contract with Zagrimil. It includes
a telepathic bond until both sides are honored: she must give back
the sword within two years and also owes him a favor that does not
compromise her morals or beliefs and will not harm those she cares
about, and for the term of the contract he can see through her eyes
and hear through her ears so that he knows what opportunities might
be available. There are clauses preventing him from spying when she
is doing personal things. If he breaks his end of it his essence will
be consumed and he will be demoted in the hierarchy; if Kat breaks
hers he keeps Torchlight. If he doesn't ask for a favor by the end
of the contract, she is free of it. Since Zagrimil has asked for
the ichor, Gnik concludes that they really can't do anything else with
it or risk breaking the contract.

Kat decides to go ahead and give it to him; he shows up immediately
to claim it, and then vanishes again. 



5 Sinta 3275

On the second day out, Kat is playing her lute for the crew, 
and as she finishes a bunch of dolphins come splashing up about
a hundred feet off the ship. Al grabs his conch shell and dives
off the side of the ship to go talk to him, as a massive surge
of water comes up and an enormous dragon-like creature bursts
out of the water. Al says, "Hello...?" while Laur is on the deck
yelling, "Get back on the ship!" Milena has heard many stories
of the unique and powerful (and scary) dragons of the world; they
feel a sense of power and wonder that washes over them. Gnik and
Kat are so in awe that they feel fright; a reverberating sensation
of thought washes over them with a sense of frivolity and interest
in having fun, and then dives under the water again. Al dives again
and tries to talk to the dragon -- he says hello and asks its name,
and gets a jumble of thoughts in his mind that he can't make sense
of. Al asks if it is a young dragon or an ancient dragon. It swims
up to him and surfaces right in front of him. Al senses that it
heard interesting sounds that were very beautiful. Al tries to
hum what Kat was playing, and the dragon's response is that it
is close but not as good. Al offers to introduce the dragon to Kat,
and the dragon indicates it would like that. "Kat, the dragon likes
your music and wants to meet you!" Al says. She pulls out her flute
to play something else for it. The dragon surfaces right next to
the ship and peers onto the deck. This time Kat and Gnik are not
so surprised and avoid the sense of fright. Dolphins leap up and
bounce off its neck, trying to entice it to play some more. Al asks
if it thinks it would be fun if he climbed up on its head and then
dived off. It replies that it thinks Al would find it fun, and that
might be amusing. It lowers its head for him to climb on, and as he
is getting ready to make an acrobatic dive, it launches into the
air so that he's now falling about a hundred feet, which will really
hurt when he hits the water; Kat hits him with a Featherfall and
he makes a slow series of fancy acrobatic dives. The dragon seems
very amused and splashes back into the water.

4 September 2021

Kai notices that Al is no longer wearing the extra eye. He says
he took it out because he was trying to figure out where a magical
effect was coming from; and when he took it out he realized it was
making him paranoid, believing things that were not true -- in
particular, that someone was spying on him and an enemy imminently
planning to attack, which seemed very plausible on account of the
devil that was actually spying on them. He says he talked to a lot
of the crew to make sure they weren't spying, and still isn't sure
about one of them even now that the eye is out.

He then shares that he took the eye out because he saw the statue
Anny gave him looked slightly different, and he talked to it, and
found out he can talk to Anny through it. They all hear the statue
say in Anny's voice, "Hi everyone." She's on patrol, and says before
Al tried talking to her she would occasionally hear things and just
thought she was going a little crazy. Gnik studies the statue and
concludes that when Anny created it, she inadvertently put some of her 
essence into it, which allows her to communicate through it. They
catch her up on what they've been doing, and she shares that she's
back working as a scout for her people, some of which she's not
allowed to talk about, but she invites them to come visit at some
point.

That afternoon, Kat is sitting in a chair and suddenly shrinks to
half her height. She runs out to find the rest of the group. Milena
asks if they need to read the contract again. Gnik says, "Were you
being short with your mother?" Kai says, "Now is not the time, Gnik,"
to which Ember replies, "Oh, no, it's always the time -- nice one,
Gnik." Kat says she was thinking about things Danae told her about 
wild magic, and she thought she would try it, and she heard voices
arguing in her head that sounded like Ag and Zagrimil, and then there
was a flash and all of a sudden she was smaller. She looks at her mother,
who examines her and declares she does not think it's a curse, so they
should wait a while and see if it goes away on its own. Gnik says if
it hasn't by the end of the day he'll try to dispel it.

At the end of the day, she is still small, and so he tells her to
take off all her magic items and dispels the spell. She thanks him
and says she likes being able to look down on him. He glares at
her and casts Reduce on her, sending her back to half her height.
(But it only lasts a minute.)

Al tells the group that in interviewing the crew he felt Corey was
hiding something, and Kat volunteers to see if she can find out
more. She sneaks into Corey's quarters and finds a small gold ring with
a five-loop knotwork design on it, hidden in a secret compartment. She
meets with Al up in the crow's nest to tell what she found, and decides
to try a wild surge to do Prestidigitation to show him a picture of it
-- and instead, ball bearings start falling from the sky all over the
ship, doing damage and hurting some of the crew. Kat dives off the crow's
nest into the water and the ball bearings stay with her as the ship
keeps going. Once the spell dissipates she catches up with the ship and
helps clean up. Milena is running around healing people and she hears
Laur telling the crew that it was probably just some kind of magical
vortex, but she sees both of them shoot her a look. She mouths "sorry"
to Laur. 

When they get done, she tries just drawing the ring for Al. He calls
the group together, but none of them are familiar with the symbol. It
is a signet ring, but a very simple one, not at all fancy.

They discuss what to do with the lens they got from the derelict ship,
that they now suspect might be used (or at least usable) for one of
the Sgult rituals they read about on the island. Al tries touching it
again, and is struck again by chaotic, nauseating visions, with a core
of pure nothingness that is mindblowingly fearful -- but he manages 
not to pass out this time. They wonder if someone chaotic might be able
to interact with it, so she tries touching it with her Mage Hand -- and
suddenly she can't sense the Mage Hand anymore; it is gone. Gnik suspects
the magical protections on it might be so strong it dispels any magical
effect that touches it.

Milena and Gnik discuss using Augury to divine whether putting the lens
in the airforge would result in a good or bad outcome -- and both of
them got a strong sense of Woe. They are keeping the chest in their
secure vault area, but Kat considers also adding a trap for extra
security.


6 Sinta 3275

Al suggests that to keep the ship and the city safe, perhaps Kat should
practice her wild magic on a dinghy off the side off the ship. They
decide she and Al can swim so well that they don't even really need
a boat.

She decides to create a Mage Hand; there is a subtle flash of light,
and they both feel really good afterwards but don't otherwise notice
anything different.  It kind of feels like life energy; Kat thinks it
might be an Aura of Life spell that will protect nearby allies from
necrotic damage. Al suggests that if they're protected, maybe she
should try again. Kat suddenly finds it hard to stay up in the water;
Al sees her turn to a silvery color; she is made of living steel. The 
boat is now getting away from them. They still feel the Aura of Life
around them, so Al encourages Kat to try one more time. Kat becomes
aware that she can cast the Tongues spell once per day for an hour
as a permanent effect. The steel spell, though, wears off after a 
short time.

They arrive at Freeport in the afternoon; Laur tells them that as
they arrive they will slow down to wait for someone to lead them
through the reefs that are used as part of their defenses. They
recall Angel suggested they stay at the Last Resort.

Most of the crew and the group is on deck as they come in; Milena is
below decks near where the prisoners are being kept, just in case.

A small boat comes toward them piloted by a Dorghenian man and a
Tillian female. As the boat gets closer, Jimsu looks down and says,
"Oh, sh-sh-sh-crap." He recognizes the woman, and characterizes her
as "not nice". Al watches the boat, and as it hears, he recognizes
the man as Alen, whom he'd sailed with before. He greets Al warmly
and say he's pleased to see him alive, as they'd heard all sorts of
interesting stories. The woman boards, sees the dogs, greets them
happily, and then turns and starts barking orders at Jimsu, who
was taken aback by her warm reaction to the dogs but jumps to
attention immediately.

Al says maybe Alen can give them the lay of the land in Freeport
as they sail in, and he warns them that Mitchell has a large number
of people at the dock to meet them, although he thinks Mitchell is
likely to play it safe rather than try to kill them. Al tells him
about the two prisoners, both of whom are magic users who will need
special handling. Alen thanks him for the heads-up and tells him
they will get someone on the ship quickly to take care of them.
Alen says his boss is connected to the Sea Lord, so there's only
so much he can do to help them, particularly if they try to go up
against the Raging Hammer, as Mitchell is also an ally of the Sea
Lord.

Al asks if Captain Roberts is in town, and Alen says his boss is
meeting with him tomorrow. He also mentions the library will be
easy to access, as it's a library of Alsaya and their holy day
is tomorrow. The group notices he's mostly focused on Al, but
glances at Kai occasionally, and gives her a wink as he leaves
the ship.

As they come in to port, there is a crowd of around 30 people on
the dock; most don't have weapons, and even those that do don't
have them drawn. From the crow's nest, Kat sees a small winged
creature at the front of the crowd that she thinks is a homunculus,
an avatar that is an extension of someone -- possibly Mitchell.
Behind the crowd and back a bit is another gaggle of people who
seem to be waiting to see what will happen.

Kat is bored and doesn't want to wait for the prisoners to be
collected, as everyone else is doing, so she stealthily drops
off the edge of the ship and into the water to shore. As she's
swimming she sees two other merfolk working on the bottom of
a nearby ship. She waves.

Guards approach and make their way through the gaggle. The homunculus
makes his way back, talks to them, and they make their way to the
front. "Mighty Redemption!" the head guard calls, "We hear you have
prisoners to turn over to the Sea Lord's Guard!" Al asks if they
want to come aboard; they do, bearing rune-covered manacles for
use on magic users. The guards mention there was a bounty on these
prisoners and asks where they are staying so they can bring it.
They say that if they haven't heard in a couple of days the group
can check in with the city center. As the Stormdaughter is led
off, she says, "Be seeing you," and smiles. Gnik reminds her that
they didn't kill her. "Maybe you should have," she replies. "We
still could," he says. She smiles and says, "You wouldn't."

Gnik sends Az to follow from a distance; the guards to not seem
to be treating them particularly gently, and marches them to a
building where they presumably are put into a cell.

The homunculus says, "So are we going to talk or what?" Al asks
who he is, and he says, "Sorry... Mitchell. Well, not actually
Mitchell, but... you know." He says the group of people with him
were just to make sure they didn't kill his homunculus immediately.
He says he knows them, the "Saviors of Saltmarsh", and just wanted
to say hi to the people who stole his boat and make sure they 
weren't coming to start a war in the middle of his town.

As they chat with him, they get the sense that he sees himself as
an anarchist helping people get out from under the yoke of their
oppressors. Al asks if that means he's against slavery, and he
says no, because some people deserve to be punished. Al gets the
sense that Mitchell earnestly believes everything he's saying and
is not just bullshitting.

They hear a thunk and suddenly there is an arrow sticking out of
Gnik. He feels that it stings in a way that feels wrong. A second
arrow flies out and slams into Ember; Gnik sees writing etched
into the shaft of his arrow saying, "It's fun doing this with all 
your memories." Ember falls, choking. Mitchell yells, "It's not me!" 
and immediately starts shooing his people out of the way so they can 
chase the perpetrators. Kai looks up and catches sight of the archer 
-- Candace, the lone escapee of the Lune cult, a skilled archer who 
was formerly in the town guard. Milena sends Zassin to follow while 
she tries to heal Ember. She can tell the poison is a caustic, 
necrotic poison that will keep her from healing well if it isn't 
removed. She hits her with a Lesser Restoration and a Cure, and sees 
that Ember's arrow also has writing on it: "I am the real Ember."
They hear a voice from the ship yelling, "The vault door's open!
The vault door's open!" and Kai runs back to the ship. She sees
small wet footprints and a faint blackness vanish as they get
to the door. Jarvis and Chastity are both down and bleeding,
apparently dead. Lanny prays over Jarvis and he revives, but
he can't revive Chastity.


18 September 2021

Milena carries the still-unconscious Ember back onto the ship, and
Al takes off to try to catch up to Candance; Zassin is flying above
her with his bottom half changed to the same shade of blue as the
sky so that whoever is directly below him can't see him, and his
upper half a scintillating kaleidoscope of color so that those
farther away can keep track of where he is.

Milena assesses the injured, sees that Chastity is dead, and
casts Revivify; the color comes back into her face and she sits
up, gasping. She looks at Gnik suspiciously, and he says, "It was
my double."

Kai also takes off to follow Candace (and Kat, and Al), using the
boots of flying. Soon after, the group hears Kat on the farspeakers
saying, "I found her; I'm going in!" Milena gets an image in her mind
from Zassin showing Kat diving of a 5-story building, slamming into
Candace and sending her sprawling, and landing with her weapons out.

Al parkours his way onto a nearby rooftop after his path is blocked
by crowds. He makes his way across the rooftops and sees a roof with
a hole in it; he realizes the whole section of roof is rotted out
and manages to avoid falling through.

Kat attacks the prone Candace and sticks her in the stomach with
the enhanced Torchlight; she hears Kai say into the farspeaker,
"Don't kill her, we need to ask her questions!" Kat activates the
Booming Blade effect, which will do extra damage if Candace moves
more than 5 feet away voluntarily. She then takes a step back,
hoping Candace will be tempted to move -- which she does, and is
staggered by booming energy. She has a short-sword in her hand and
jumps at Kat, but doesn't manage to penetrate Kat's Gellen cloth
armor. Kat attacks again and then steps away again; Candace switches
her sword to her other hand and starts throwing daggers, but Kat
reacts by casting Shield, and the daggers bounce off. Kat takes one
more swing, but Candace avoids her without moving enough to trigger
the booming effect. Then Kat sees Kai land in the alley behind
Candace. Candace throws another couple of daggers but Kat's shield
blocks them. Candace turns around to run, and sees Kai standing
behind her. She jumps up and starts parkouring her way up to
the roof.

As she reaches the roof, she sees Al running toward her and turns
and tries to flee the other way. Kat follows her up and Kai launches
herself with the flying boots. Kat catches up to her and hits her
again with her sword. Kai again positions herself behind Candace,
and Al throws a rope in an attempt to snare her. Candace says, "Well,
that went better than it could have," and drops her sword. Kai asks
who hired her and she says, "The gnomes." "Who hired them?" Kai asks,
and she says she doesn't know, but Al gets the sense that she is
lying about that and seems concerned about revealing it. Al relays
this to the group and says, "Do you like your chances better with
them or with us?" "You," Candace says without hesitation. Kai flies
into a rage, shatters Candace's rapier with her dagger, holds the
dagger to her throat, and growls, "Are you sure?" 'No, no, fair
point," Candace says. Al says, "You don't know what we've seen
since last we saw you." Candace says one of the Captain's Council
members, Verlaine, who is an advisor to the Sea Lord, set it up,
but she doesn't know if the Sea Lord himself is involved. Al asks
if she knows where the gnomes are, and she says no -- they found
her, and they had no plans to meet up afterward. The group divests
her of her belongings, ties her up, and plans to bring her back to
Gnik for questioning. They find two vials of a sticky substance,
probably the poison she used, which Kat takes. She also finds blades
hidden in the back of her belt, the top of her boot, and worked into
her belt buckle.

Back on the ship, Milena apprentices Lanny to help her remove the
arrow from Gnik and otherwise help heal the injured; when he figures
out what she's doing, he jumps to action. Ember wakes up groggily
and asks, "Who was it? Did we catch them? Can I kill them?" Gnik
says it was Candace from the orphanage, and she can't kill her.
Ember says, "Okay, I'm going to take a nap for a week," and lies
down again.

Kat, Kai, and Al bring Candace back to the ship and fill Gnik in
on what they have learned. Gnik asks what else they want to know;
they say mostly whether she's telling the truth and what else she
might know. Gnik puts the Gellen shackles on her and puts her in
the brig, as he doesn't have the spells to interrogate her until
tomorrow.

Laur comes in and tells the group there is a woman there to see
them. It is a woman they had caught a glimpse of on the dock,
sitting in a chair that moves on spider legs, who says she is
hoping to get their help. Milena, on instinct, greets her in
Bargallian with, "Interesting chair," and the woman responds
"Thank you" in casual Bargallian, then "It was a gift" in trade.
She introduces herself as Elene, a priestess of Alsaya. She says
their friend Annie came by the temple to find a way to resurrect
her brother, and said they would be coming, and her friend Lucius
said he knew them. Gnik recalls him as a Freeport librarian who came through
Saltmarsh asking for books about other planes of existence -- a strange
quirky guy who stayed for a couple weeks and then left. Elene says he
disappeared a couple days ago and she is worried and would like them
to try to find them.

She explains that about six years ago he had a gap in his memory,
was kicked out of the temple and had started acting very weird
-- looking into obscure and forbidden texts. He then suddenly seemed
to become more lucid -- as though he had temporarily been taken
over by someone else and was now more himself -- but disappeared two
days ago. 

They learn where Lucius lives; Milena provides more healing to Gnik
and Ember, and they set out for his house. It is a small ground floor
place with just a couple of rooms in the poor part of town. Al tries
the front door and it's open. The main room is cluttered with 
scrivener's tools: quills, pots, and parchment; a small desk, a small
cot shoved in the corner. The other room is a kitchen, and there are
steps going down into a basement. Milena takes a look at the parchments
that have writing on them to see if there is any clue what he might have
been working on that could have been related to his disappearance. She
finds a to-do list that includes "update diary" and "examine travel logs".
It also refers to a "Captain Scarbelly," whom Al and Kai know is the
captain of the orc-crewed "Bloody Vengeance". He is a known pirate who
tries not to get in trouble in town; Gnik has heard stories that he
has killed 29 people in hand-to-hand combat. Kai asks Elene why her
friend might want to talk to him, and she says she doesn't know. The
ship came into town eleven days ago.

Al sits at the desk, pulls out a drawer, and finds Lucius's diary on
a small hidden shelf beneath it. Gnik reads it and finds the gap of
five years in it and indications that Lucius had strange dreams and
no memory of it. He mentions that he will be taking his dagger with
him for his meeting with the captain, which Gnik has seen and so
could use to track him once he renews his spells. 

Excerpt of the diary from six years ago:
I awoke this morning frightfully fatigued. I feel like the I spent the
night in combat, not sleeping. My head hurts, and I feel weak. I can't miss
work at the temple, but I think I'll confine myself to light tasks today.

The next entry is dated five years later:
The gods help me! What happened? I awoke from some strange dream to find
that five years have passed! Egil told me I was kicked out of the temple
four years ago for violating the sanctum.

Surely this is madness!

Entry from six months ago:
Life has resumed a kind of normalcy. I have won admittance back into the
temple. My reception was strange, but everyone seems relieved that I am
"back to my old self". I have so many questions about these missing years
but it seems best to simply move on with my life now. If the god wills it,
knowledge will come to me.

Entry from four months ago:
Egil says that Milos was asking after me again, that he was worried about
another "episode". Maybe he's simply concerned for the temple, but surely I
have sufficiently proven myself by now. My life is mine again, and I'm not
giving it up!

From two months ago:
The dreams came again last night. I don't know that I'll ever get a good
night's sleep! I dreamt of cities as tall as the clouds and creatures so
alien in form that I can't describe them. Does this have something to do
with my lost years or is this some fresh torment?

From one month ago:
It's clear to me now that I must find some answer if I'm ever to make the
dreams stop. Thuron and Milos tried to discourage me... I think they fear
what might happen to their temple. A pity their compassion does not extend
to a living being.

From one week ago:
I have begun to feel like I'm being watched. I pray this is not a further
milestone on the road to madness. I think I'll take my dagger with me in
the morning. In a city like Freeport, I suppose one can't be too careful.
Especially with pirates in port.



Kai and Al go in search of the Bloody Vengeance and learn that Captain
Scarbelly is at a bar, the Rusty Hook. They find him sitting at a table
in the corner reading a book titled "The Ecology of the Sahaugin". He
puts the book down as they approach, and he asks if they have business.
Al explains that they are looking for a missing man who had meeting
with Scarbelly on his to-do list. Scarbelly says he came by the ship
two days ago and gave his first mate a note, which he hands to Al,
saying Lucius was on his crew four years ago and asking to be let
aboard when next he calls. Kai asks where Scarbelly took Lucius when
last he was aboard, and he says they dropped him in Saltmarsh. Al
buys him a drink and Scarbelly invites them to sit and chat. Kai tells
him he is very different from his reputation, and he smiles and says,
"Don't let it get out." Al asks his opinions on the leadership of
Freeport and he says he's against the Captain's Council, who never
did anything for the city. He warns them to avoid Fortek ships, who
have too many spellcasters and are the last slavers left in the area.
They share some tips about dealing with sahaugin, and have a few
drinks.

Gnik, Kat, and Milena head to the library. There is a young man in 
his late teens sitting out front who perks up when he sees them and
asks how he can help them, introducing himself as Norton. Gnik 
says he has a book he would like to sell to the temple. He gestures
them inside and asks them to wait; a few minutes later he brings
back someone he introduces as Milos, the priest. Gnik says he has
a book from Duane Hatchett that Duane had an agreement to sell to
him. He warns Gnik that they were attacked as they were leaving
Gonagibria by the Stormdaughter, who specifically was looking for
that book. Milos is surprised, wondering why she would want a book
of fairy tales. Gnik then shares a couple of topics he would like
to research -- the symbol they found on the ring, and the lens of
Sgult. Milos says he will have to check with another priest about
access to the more esoteric books that might help with the lens
research, but directs him to books that might help with the symbol.
He is not able to find anything in the couple of hours he is there.
They say hello to Annie, who also hasn't been able to find what
she needs yet, but is waiting for access to more restricted books
from the high priest Thuron.


2 October 2021

Milena notices that Milos seems a bit subtly put out by their
group, as if he does not like them for some reason -- it seemed to
start when Gnik asked about the lens. Gnik and Kat don't seem to notice.
Gnik finds old ship's logs for the Golden Grace, his missing friend Lyle's
ship, which was last seen in Freeport 15 years ago, per the logs. The
Blessed Chaser, carrying a load of mithril meant for a friend in Saltmarsh
but that never arrived, left earlier in the year and hasn't returned.

Milena, having been told by Agnes that Alsaya is one of the gods who
grants Milena power, heads to the Religion section. There is an old
man there who greets her and observes she does not come there frequently.
She says she has come to pay respects to the Goddess in her way, by
perusing some of the books. He directs her to the books on Alsaya. She
tries to ask him a bit about himself, but he moves along on his way.

Kat is wandering the stacks and an old man looks down at her curiously,
comes to join her, and looks at her ear. "What is that?" he asks. "Where
did you find it?" She tells a story of an island they visited where
people wore them instead of earring. He doesn't seem to believe her,
but apologizes, saying he shouldn't have pried, and goes on his way,
letting Kat know his name is Thuron.

Milena skims several texts on Alsaya, learning about how she is
worshipped in different places, including a place called Darkhaven
where her Death aspect is honored. The section on Daln includes the
logs of many adventuring parties that would take a long time to read
through. Milena skims titles to see if anything jumps out at her, and
the librarian helping her asks if there is something specific she is
looking for. Without specifically mentioning the lens, she says she
has seen cults in her area try to control crowds with magics from
dark gods, and she is interested in learning of things that might
disrupt such rituals.

Al, Kai, and Ember wander the city a bit on their way to the Last Resort.
They arrive and the innkeeper, Jakin, greets them by name, saying Laur
already checked them in, and lets them know dinner is being served and
will be for several more hours. A door opens, and a tall woman is holding
it open for a short woman -- a purple gnome -- with her face in a book.
The tall woman looks at Al and does a double-take; he thinks she looks
a bit familiar, but doesn't remember from where. She asks his name, and
he says Allard, from Freeport. She excitedly re-introduces herself as
Mabel, reminds him they fought at a festival in Saltmarsh, and asks
if he'll be around for a while; the gnome looks impatient to be going.
He says yes, and she says they'll catch up later.

Kai and Ember get a table, while Al goes to chat up another woman
sitting by herself. She introduces herself as Cheryl and says she
is just waiting for some friends, but there should be plenty of
seats, as they'll be playing cards with a buy-in of 100 gold. He
says that's too rich for his blood, but he's happy to chat for a
bit. He gets the impression she's playing a game herself, trying 
to feel him out and get information from him. She's charming and
pretty, but he's not into that kind of politicking, although he's
happy to be forthright about things that aren't secret. She says
she doesn't pay attention to politics, except to say that the
attention just goes to the biggest pile of coin.

Gnik, Kat, and Milena arrive at the Last Resort, are also greeted by
Jakin, and join the others for dinner. Kat mentions having told some
guy named Thuron that her farspeaker was jewelry, in case it comes
up again, and Gnik facepalms. Al tells Kat there will be a game of
Three Dragon Ante starting up, and she also balks at the 100 gold
buy-in but says she'd be interested to watch, so Al introduces her
to Cheryl, who says she and her friends will be heading up to their
rooms to play after dinner, and would be happy to bring Kat along.

They share their news of the day over dinner. Mabel and her gnome
charge arrive at a nearby table and Mabel waves to Al. The gnome
still has a book, and Gnik peers curiously at it. Al asks Gnik
if they should invite the two to join them. Al goes over and
Mabel introduces the gnome as Jenoffin, and Al asks if they would
be interested in joining them; Jenoffin shakes her head 'no'. Al
mentions one of their party is a gnome librarian, and Jenoffin
says, "Yes, Gnikobol," and briefly mentions several of their
exploits. Mabel tells Al they can catch up later, after Jenoffin
goes to bed.

As they are finishing up their dinner, a woman comes to their
table, plops down in an empty chair, introduces herself as Jenny,
and says she wants to talk to them about something. She flips up
a piece of the puzzlebox Gnik has been trying to assemble, and it
disappears just as quickly as it appears. She says she has been
paid to retrieve several pieces, but she's heard they don't like
the person who paid her, so maybe they'd be willing to pay her
more to get them themselves. The other person offered her 500 gold,
so she asks 1000 gold from them. Al says they don't generally have
that kind of money; she seems skeptical, and Al asks if she's ever
travelled with a spellcaster. She says she's not going to answer
that, but she knows what he means. Gnik asks how they might get
hold of her if they were to come up with the money, or if it would
be too late. She says she's supposed to hand of the pieces tomorrow
night, but she'll come by the inn for lunch tomorrow in case they
want to bargain.

Gnik takes Ember and Al to check in on Candace; he has an idea
that she might be susceptible to another attempt at Suggestion
to find out more of what she knows about who hired her. They
learn that Candace was just told to say Verlaine had set it
up, but in fact he had no connection and was probably being
set up by someone who doesn't like him or has a beef with him.


7 Sinta 3275

They decide that Kai will use her boots of flying to carry Gnik
across the center of the city to see if they see the chest with
the lens in it. If they don't find it in the city they will try
to look near the tower. They are not able to find it using Locate
Object, then try again looking for Lucius's dagger; as they return
to town from the tower they detect it almost immediately in a tavern
near the docks. They let the rest of the group know on the farspeakers,
and go in; as they look in the direction they sense the dagger, the
person holding it and says, "Well, fuck," then turns to an elf mage 
and says, "Don't burn the place down. Kill 'em." Twelve more stand up
and draw red-painted scimitars while the rest of the patrons scatter
and try to leave. Kai recognizes the group must be the mercenary band
the Redblades.

Kai drinks a potion of Inner Fire and begins breathing smoke, then goes 
into a rage but stands her ground. The mage steps forward to cast a spell,
but Gnik counterspells; he's pretty sure it would have obliterated the
tavern with hailstorms. Gnik tries to web the tables, but she
counterspells him. The dozen other fighters rush forward toward Kai,
positioned in the doorway, most with swords and a couple with crossbows.
A couple hit Kai, and one bolt gets past her and hits Gnik.

One fighter takes a step back so the boss can run at Kai; she slashes
at him and hits his arm. The boss says, "I don't know how you found
us, but you're going to die. When we get paid to do something, we
do it right." He manages to hit her six times, but the effect of her
potion burns him each time. She slashes and hits him twice.

The spellcaster yells to the boss that the rest are probably coming,
and he yells back, "Yeah, good call," and tells the rest of the
group to dogpile Kai. She gestures at Kai and Gnik, trying to use
a cantrip, but Gnik counterspells; and then she casts Misty Step
and vanishes. Gnik casts Slow at the leader and five other nearby
mercenaries; four of the minions successfully shake it off, but the
leader does not.

The minions start trying to grab Kai and grapple her down -- each
getting burned in the process. She manages to shake them all off.
Another volley of crossbow bolts comes at them, and four more hit
Kai. The leader takes a step back to disengage and move to the
back of the room with the crossbow archers behind him.

Kat comes running up, sees Kai in the doorway -- which has caught
on fire from her potion -- and considers the open windows. Al
asks Zassin if there is a back door, and Zassin says there are two.
Al and Kat see a cloaked figure at the side door that they identify
as the mage who used Misty Step. Kat tries to throw a Chaos Bolt
at the mage, but it doesn't seem to have an effect. The mage says,
"He didn't say I couldn't burn down other buildings," and casts
a Fireball at them. Kat attempts a wild surge to counterspell, and
she realizes that her See Invisibility ability has returned -- but
the fireball explodes. Al dives through a nearby window and Kat
dives into a water barrel, but they are not able to escape all the
effects of the fireball.

Gnik casts Grease at the feet of the boss, but he is dextrous and
slides his way through it. The six crossbow wielders run out the
back door, see the results of the fireball, and one laughs; then
they follow the direction the mage ran, down an alley. The leader
follows out the back door and begins berating the rest of his team.
He sees Al and mutters "Well, fuck" again. The other six mercenaries
come out.

Milena arrives at the door behind Kai and tosses Nash in statue form
over Kai with instructions to grab the leader. Nash gently grabs the
enraged Kai, throws her onto her back, and charges into the alley,
bowling over four mercenaries in the process -- another has thrown
himself against the wall to get out of the way.

Al parkours over the remaining standing mercenary to reach the leader
and attacks with Obviator, stunning him, and then hits him a couple
more times for good measure. Gnik sends Az to keep an eye on the leader
to make sure he doesn't get away. Kat climbs up onto a nearby rooftop
to keep an eye on the rest of the foes; she can see the six crossbow
archers and the faint blue glow of the now-invisible mage getting
ready to cast a spell. Kat tries Chaos Bolt again, and hits. She
staggers back, yells, "...the FUCK?!" and looks up. Kat flips her
off, and then hides. She lets everyone else know over the farspeaker
that the mage is invisible, but is slightly on fire now.

Kai dismounts from Nash, goes to the leader, and attempts to knock
him out; he goes down at the first blow. She sprints to the place
where she can see smoke rising and attempts to attack the invisible
mage. The mage attempts to cast Firebolt at Kai, but it doesn't
work; she Misty Steps away.

Gnik takes a moment to Control Flames to try to keep the building
from burning down, and then heads toward the back door; Ember is
jogging up as quickly as she can. The mercenaries in the street
get up, realize their choices for retreat are down a burning street
or into an alley with a flaming barbarian. They head back into the
building, where Gnik and Milena are, with their weapons in defensive
positions. Milena asks what their business is with them, and the one
in front says their boss just told them someone paid them to kill
them, but the mercenaries don't know who hired them. Milena lets
them flee.

Kat doesn't have eyes on the mage, but they realize she only could
have gone somewhere she could see. Al goes into the nearest doorway,
which opens into a storage area in the back of a shop. He thinks he
might smell something burning, and as he moves toward the front of
the shop he sees a trail of smoke. He dashes around the room to
block the door and says into the farspeaker, "I think she's in the
room with me," and hears a voice mutter, "...the fuck?"

Ember finally makes it to the tavern and asks Milena what's happening.
Milena points to the back door and says the leader is that way, not
knowing he's been knocked out already.

Kat drops into the room and shoots at the mage with her crossbow,
hitting her in the shoulder, and then hides again. Kai comes in
and attempts to hit as well, with some guidance from Kat, and
manages to connect; she goes down and goes visible as soon as
she hits the ground. Kat searches the magic user and finds an
orb she was using every time she was casting spells, but nothing
else. Kai goes to tie up the leader, and Gnik goes to put out the
fire in the alleyway.


30 October 2021

Once the fires are out, Gnik works with Al to get the mage's hands
into the shackle orb. They bring her back into the alley with the
tied-up mercenary leader. A couple of city guard approach from the
other side of the alley, peer at them, and say, "Looks like you've
got it all under control," and keep walking. Al says, "We have people
who need to be taken to jail...." but they keep walking. 

Milena casts Prayer of Healing on the injured party members; while
she's doing that, Al questions the tied-up mercenary, Arha. Al asks who
paid them, and he says a kid named Enzo brought them the dagger
and the money. Kat asks how much they got paid, as she's curious
how much they're thought to be worth. He says they were given 50 gold
for the whole gang. Al says that seems like a pretty low price and asks
if he thinks the person expected him to succeed. Arha says, "I don't think
I like how this conversation is going...." but he's willing to tell them
the little he knows. They ask if he's going to come after them again,
and he says no. 

Al pulls Kai aside and asks if they're supposed to take some of the
mercenary's stuff since they defeated them -- "I mean, how does it
work in Freeport?" Kai says there wouldn't be a problem with it, so
he comes back and tells Kat she can search him. He has a coin purse
with a few coins, and four letters from four different women, which
Kat reads, aloud. They are pretty bawdy. "Do I have to listen to
this?!" Al asks, but Ember listens with amused interest.

They bring the mage over; she has an expression of angry frustration.
Al says, "I hope you realize we've restrained you out of concern over
what you might do; we respect your power." She just glares. Gnik tells
her she can speak to answer questions but not to answer spells. She
says her name is Mona, and she didn't even know who had hired them. Arha
confirms that she's just someone he hires sometimes for jobs; she doesn't
seem to have any particular grudge against them. Kat searches her and
finds a crystal orb, which she takes from her. After some discussion,
the group concludes that the authorities would do nothing if they took
the mercenaries in, so they just let them go. Mona asks Kat if she
can have the orb back. "Sure, for 50 gold...." She's already taken Mona's
coin purse, so Mona says she'll have to go collect the money and send it
to her, and asks where they're staying. Arha elbows her and says, "You
already know that, idiot!" She sighs and says, "I'll send it to you."
"Okay," Kat says, "when I get it I'll give the orb back."

Arha asks how the group knew they were planning to attack them. "You
told us when we walked in," he said. "We weren't looking for you, we
were looking for Lucius's dagger. Where did you get it?" Enzo gave it
to them as part of the payment, and they were just hired last night.
They were planning to attack tonight, and meet up again with Enzo
afterwards.

Milena borrows Kat's dagger that allows Sending once per day to send
a message to Agnes:

Gnik unwisely told blue gnome
chick Jennifin that your island
has artefacts of Casadega. Be
warned of unwanted visitors snooping 
around. Kat says "Hi, Danae!"

The group heads to Enzo's house/tailor shop to confront him. Al and
Ember walk around back in case there's a back door where he might
flee. The rest of the group walks in, and a man behind the counter
greets them. Kai says they're looking for Enzo. He says, "Can I tell
him who's asking?" "Just go get him," says Kai.

At the back door, Al and Ember see a head poke out, look around, and
startle. He claims he needs to run an errand to get more needles, but
Al marches him back inside. It is the same guy, and it is clear it's
Enzo. He says the Master told him to pay to have the group taken out,
but he doesn't know why.

Kat searches his desk and sees that someone has tried to disguise the
bottom drawer to make it appear like it is not really a drawer, but it
is easy to pull out. It is full of miscellaneous occult books and
writings. Al finds a black hooded robe. Al asks, "Who's the Master,
and where do we find him?" Enzo says there's a bricked-up building
where they've met a few times, and that's the only place he's ever
seen him. He also mentions that the Master asked him to bring food
there the last few days. Gnik asked how he got involved with the
Brotherhood, and Enzo says someone approached him at the occult shop
and invited him to a meeting. Gnik has reviewed the occult writings,
and all of it is crap -- legends and lore with no real basis in
reality. They get the impression that while the writings are slanted
toward "dark arts", he really just wants to get control of his own
life. Gnik tells him he should go to the library to get real knowledge
-- and perhaps ask for the Philosophy section. They get the address 
of the bricked-up building, and decide perhaps they should tie up Enzo 
so that he can't warn anyone before they get to the building. Milena 
says they can check on him later in case no one else has come in to 
free him.

They go to about a block away from the building and let Kat go ahead
to scout. She and Mouse walk around the block to scope it out. The
building is bland and nondescript, even for Freeport. It is a wooden
building but with the windows bricked up, and a single door. It is
a detached building in a surprisingly low-traffic area. The buildings 
nearby are warehouses, or abandoned. Kat sneaks into a building next
door, which is a bookbinder's, looking for possible underground
connections to the building. She makes small-talk with him while
walking through the building, but sees no trap doors or connections.
She asks about the building next door; he says it is abandoned, but
there are squatters there sometimes. She goes to check out the abandoned
building on the other side; it is in bad shape and there are signs of
squatters. There is a path from the front door to a bedding area,
perhaps used by a homeless person, but no other obvious paths that
would connect to the building next door. She returns to the group
to report her findings. Since there is only one door, they figure
they will all just barge in.

Kat finds that there is a built-in lock on the door, and it is latched.
The whole door appears newer than the rest of the building. She does
not find any traps, and pulls out her lockpick tools to pick the lock.
Al keeps an eye out to see if anyone else is watching the building, and
Milena looks around to see if anyone might be using Clairvoyance. The
lock is very complicated and Kat is not immediately able to open; she is
excited at how complicated it is. 

She and Al search the perimeter for secret entrances, and find none.
Milena listens at the crack under the door, but hears nothing. Gnik
slides his small mirror and a glowing blade under the door so he
can see the back side of the lock and the door handle, and uses Mage
Hand to unlock the lock and open the door.

The place is a wreck on the inside, with rubbish and refuse on the 
inside. It was probably once many rooms, but no more. In the back there
is a trapdoor in the floor. Kat checks the trapdoor for traps and finds
none; she uses Mage Hand to open it. Milena is fairly certain that path
has been regularly used, but it seems to be always the same pair of
boots with a rock stuck in the heel based on the scratch patterns.

Beneath the trapdoor are steep, narrow stairs leading down. They leave
Boris and Mouse to guard the room and warn of intruders. They close
and re-lock the door, and Gnik puts a chip of wood on top of the
locking mechanism so they can see if someone unlocked it while they
are down.

They descend into a room with nine huge winecasks. There are tracks
in the dirt floor, that Milena and Kai can see lead to one of the casks
in the back corner. Kat investigates and suspects that the front piece
is hinged inside the cask. She finds a piece of false wood that hides
a lever to open the secret door. There are more stairs going down
steeply a few feet. The area seems dimmer than they would expect, and
there is a faint orange glow that Gnik recognizes as possibly from
cojuration magic -- an abjuration effect on the floor, which he
points out, covering the stairs and at least part of the floor
beyond. Gnik uses Mage Hand to put something on the floor where the
effect ends, and the group discusses having Kai fly each of them
over the effect. Az and Zassin look at each other, fly forward, hang
off the wall past the effect, and look back at the group. Gnik says
to Az, "Okay, smartass, what do you see?" "Dark!" says Az. Zassin looks
and sees a hallway ending in a door, and a smear of blood nearby. Gnik
notices that the orange glow disappears as they fly through the area.
They suspect the spell has warned someone they're coming.

Milena, Gnik, and Al see that there has been a lot of foot traffic
ahead; but there is a spot in the middle that all of the foot traffic
avoids. They warn the others to avoid it in case it is a trap. Al
sidles down the left side of it. Kat expresses concern about the dogs,
and Gnik decides perhaps he should plant the immovable rod inside
the front door to the building and bring the dogs downstairs with
them. Boris and Mouse don't take the stairs very gracefully, but
they make it down (and up will be easier).

The group decides to let the dogs sniff the hilt of Lucius's dagger
to see if perhaps Lucius is down here; Boris sniffs and goes down
the hall to the door at the end and scratches at it; Mouse takes
longer to sniff, then sits down at the same door and looks proud
of herself. Kat examines the door and doesn't find a trap or lock,
so she uses Mage Hand to open it. It creaks a bit, and the air inside
seems strangely colored; and it sometimes feels as if something might
be moving just at the periphery of their vision. As they look more
closely at the tracks, some of them appear to come from four-toed
clawed feet, probably from something two-legged and just smaller than
human, based upon stride length, and possibly with a tail that sweeps
across the ground behind them occasionally.

They continue following Boris's lead, passing two closed doors along
the hall they are following. The hallway bends 45 degrees, and there
is an old spatter of dried blood on the floor. The hallway ends in
massive double doors, and Boris stops in front of them. Gnik examines
them with his glasses but doesn't see any magical effects on the doors
themselves. Kat finds no locks or traps, but sees light coming through
the cracks around the doors; it looks like flickering firelight. Gnik
pulls out the Wand of Maria and activates its candlelight; it seems to
blaze even more brightly than usual. They listen at the door; Kai thinks
she hears a voice or voices, faintly; one seems to be barking orders,
and she hears a faint creak as of a door closing, then more orders.
Kat oils the hinges to try to keep them from creaking, and stealthily
opens the door to peek in with the mirror. Milena steps back a few steps 
with the dogs, and Gnik joins them.

In the room there are six pillars, each with a giant carved stone
snake curled around it, and each flaming, probably from a Continual
Flame spell. At the other end of the room is a basalt altar carved
with a sigil they had previously seen in the Sgult dungeon on the
island. There are hooded figures with crossbows glancing around toward
the door, and there is a man on the dais, also in robes, pacing back
and forth, possibly casting a spell. She gets a glance at his face, 
and it is Milos, the second-in-charge at the Library of Alsaya.

Kat activates the Serpent of Sil's Aura of Purity, and the sickly
orange glow vanishes out to a radius of 30 feet -- and the necklace
glows brightly, as it has not done before. Kat hides it inside her
shirt, then Ember throws open the door for her so she can throw the 
Star of Jaeleth into the midst of the crossbow wielders. The explosion
is enough to hit all four of them, but not quite enough to reach Milos.
Al goes running in, straight up the dais to punch Milos. As he swings
he encounters a force around him that seems to absorb the blow in a
shimmering light. Milos smirks, and does not appear to interrupt his
spellcasting. Al throws his rope, and it seems to be resisted by
another effect that Al recognizes as Mage Armor.

Kai runs forward in rage mode and hits Milos, breaking through his
defensive barrier; but he finishes casting his spell, and tentacles
of sickly orange flail out from the palms of his hands with searing
cold that hits Al, Kai, Ember, and Kat. Zassin turns on his camouflage,
peels off from Milena's neck and slips into the room. Kat sends Mouse
into the room to bite one of the crossbowmen, and knocks him down.
Milena casts Sacred Flame at Milos, and then a quick Healing Word at
Ember, who seems to have taken the most damage from Milos's spell.
Boris goes running in at another of the crossbowmen.

Kai swings at Milos again with her greatsword, and hits twice. He looks
annoyed and says, "What are you even doing here? What do you care?"
Al asks, "What are you doing here?" "Making the world a better place,"
Milos says. "Yeah, that's why," Kai says. "Also, someone tried to kill
us this morning." "And you're blocking my access to the library!" Gnik
calls from the hall.

Ember runs in and stabs at the man Mouse knocked down. Gnik casts Slumber
on the remaining two archers that the dogs haven't knocked down; they
slump to the ground. Kat charges the opponent Boris is facing and strikes
with her blade, engaging its necromantic effect -- which the blade is
happy to allow. There is a loud booming sound as the blade hits, and
Kat steps back to prevent an attack of opportunity.

Milena and Gnik hear heavy footfalls behind them, and a hissing sound,
but don't see anything yet. Milos says to Al, "You should pay more
attention to your friends," and casts a Fireball into the back of
the room; Milena and Gnik are partially protected by the door, but
Ember and Kat go down. Al hits Milos and stuns him. A blob that appears
to be the color of the wall appears on Milos's shoulder and bites him
in the neck, then goes and hides again; in their mind's eyes, the group
sees an image of a bound man bleeding from many wounds.

Gnik sends Az down the hall to see what might be coming; she lets him
know there are a dozen snake-people coming, wearing armor and carrying
spears, and with really big teeth.

The man facing Mouse tries to get up, and she yanks his arm out from
under him; he curses and tries to train his crossbow on her, but only
scrapes her foreleg. Milena casts Mass Healing Word, and Ember and
Kat regain consciousness; the others also feel significantly better.

Kai hits the stunned Milos, who tries to stammer out a sarcastic
comment but fails miserably. She hits him twice and he stumbles
forward, barely conscious. One of the crossbowmen wakes up and
takes a shot at Kai, but Al grabs the bolt out of the air; the guy
curses, throws his crossbow down, and pulls out his sword to charge
Kai. Ember shakes off her recent unconsciousness, looks at the guard
in front of her, and takes him out with her sword and dagger.

Gnik moves down the hall just far enough to see the approaching
snake-men. Once he can see them, he pulls out the Wand of Maria
and says, "By Maria's wrath" to cast Dawn. Even those in the
room behind him and down the hall can see the glow. The snakemen
yell out in pain. Gnik notices one of them is wearing a snake 
skull-shaped helmet, and it occurs to him that his own oddly-shaped
helm would fit a snake-man.

Kat shoots a chaos-bolt at the man running at Kai; the effect
spawns a second bolt, which she sends against the foe Boris
is attacking. The one facing Boris is thrown against the wall
and goes down. The one coming at Kai is still standing, but
is not in great shape.

Al hits Milos, taking him down with a punch to the sternum; he coughs,
and his whole shape transforms into a snake-priest. He says, "You can't 
stop us. We will win." Al turns and hits the guard who charged Kai, and
a moment later Mouse piles on. He attacks Al, who manages to smack the
blade away.

Milena moves up to join Gnik and casts Thunderwave at the approaching
snakefolk. Three continue moving forward, but the others are pushed
back 10 feet.

Boris charges the remaining crossbowman, who goes down hard. Boris
wipes his hind-legs at the guy, chuffs, and heads back toward the
hallway and Milena.

Kai grabs Milos and marches his snake-man corpse out to the approaching
snake-folk army. She holds him up and says, "Your leader is dead. Leave
before you are, too," in full intimidation mode. Many of them do seem
pretty shaken. Gnik casts Grease in front of the front ranks of the
snakefolk, pulls the Dawn effect forward so they are still in it,
and retreats into the room. After that effect, there are only three
still alive, and two are prone in the grease. The third turns and
flees.

Kat and Al see Ember stalk over to the remaining guard who is still
affected by Slumber and stab him repeatedly and angrily with her sword.
Kat pulls out her Wand of Secrets and activates it to try to find any
secret doors; an outline appears near one of the columns nearest the
altar.

Al goes behind the altar, where Az and Zassin have pulled the burlap
sack off the prisoner's head, and Az is biting through his bonds. Al
sees that he is pretty beat up, his right eye swollen shut, but is
in no immediate danger of dying. Al says, "Who are you? What's your
name?" He identifies himself as Lucius, and asks who they are. Al
tells him Alane sent them, and reassures him that she's ok.

Milena asks one of the snakefolk why they are doing this. He says,
"He will come and bring wonder." Milena asks if he means the Hater.
He replies, "The Unspeakable One." "The one these people call Sgult?"
"The Unspeakable One," he replies again. Milena casts Hold Person on
him. The other tries to get up again, but Kai clubs him over the
head with the flat of her blade and knocks him out. They tie up
the two incapacitated snakefolk, and Gnik sends Az up to retrieve
the immovable rod before the fleeing snakefolk gets it; however,
she sees that he turns down through another door rather than
going to the surface.

They move Lucius out of the way and Gnik moves the Dawn effect over
the altar; when it hits the stone statue on top of the altar, it
starts melting, and the altar starts smoking and chipping. Once it
is bathed in light, the altar explodes and the sickening orange light
effect is dispelled.


13 November 2021

The group settles down for a short rest. Milena looks over Lucius
and asks how he is. He is quite beat up, but conscious. She casts
a Prayer of Healing for him and all the injured members of their
party (everyone but Al). Gnik casts Gentle Repose on Milos's corpse
to keep it from rotting away or being turned undead. Gnik asks if
Lucius remembers him from Saltmarsh, and he apologizes and says it
was during his missing time. Al asks if he knew what the snake people
were up to, and he answers, "What snake people?" They show him Milos's
corpse, and he says, "Why is it wearing Milos's clothes?" They explain
it's Milos's true form. He says Milos kept asking him what happened
in his dreams because he seemed to think it was a key to contacting
other realms. He doesn't remember anything about his missing time,
but what he remembers of his dreams are all horrific. Gnik asks if
he wants to know what happened to him, and Lucius says yes. Gnik
suggests that the next time Lucius sleeps, Gnik could cast Detect
Thoughts on him; Lucius agrees to this plan.

While they rests, Gnik uses Augury to ask, "What will happen if we
find out what happened to Lucius?" and the answer is Woe. Gnik relays
to Lucius that he may not want to know what happened to him -- and that
while he is normally not a fan of willful ignorance, in this case the
signs suggest that is the best choice. Lucius asks if Gnik knows who
his Augury contacts for answers, and if it could be biased. Gnik agrees,
although he does not know the source.

After they have rested, they direct Lucius out of the warehouse so
he can return to the temple for the Holy Day, and then they explore 
the tunnel behind the trap door. Leading Lucius back to the warehouse
entrance, they see another section of wall open a crack -- another
trap door, probably where the snake people came from. Behind the
trap door in the altar room, the tunnel is rough-hewn and partially
natural. It is not lit. They reach a narrow opening; squeezing through,
Kat finds an enormous cavern with a ceiling up to 20 feet high in places,
and a large lake that is mostly invisible in the darkness. The ground
is very worn in a lot of places, and the ground is very sandy. There are
bones and refuse scattered around, and to the right is a mound that looks
like a kiln with a red glow coming from it, with two open crates to one
side and three barrels on the other -- two lidless and one nicer, with
a lid. Gnik checks for magic with his Arcana glasses; he detects multiple
magical items in the kiln, one in the nicer barrel, and one in one of
the crates. Al inspects the open barrels, which appear to contain things
used to create bricks. The barrels have a symbol branded on them that
looks like a fancy V; it is marked on the crates as well. In the kiln, 
Milena sees a grate at the bottom and a brightly glowing, hot plate at
the top, with six yellow-white bricks in it.

Al looks in the nicer barrel and sees that it has a few inches of dark
red liquid remaining in the bottom; it smells like it could have been
blood. Gnik detects that the barrel itself is magic, not the contents.
Al discerns that the blood seems fresh, although clearly much of it
has already been used; most likely the magic of the barrel keeps it
fresh.

Al looks in one of the crates and sees three finished bricks, which
Gnik detects are magical. He sees that there is a very fine seam that
runs along it. Gnik suggests it could be a mold rather than a brick.
Milena uses tongs to pull one of the bricks from the kiln; it gives
a bit, as if it is not yet fully cured. The seam is more evident on
it. Al suggests they regroup and examine the bricks. He asks if Kat
and Gnik could use their Mage Hands to pull one of the uncured ones
apart, but they are not strong enough alone; but having someone strong
on one side and both Mage Hands on the other allows it to pop apart.
They see that inside the bricks the Saffron Sigil of Sgult is etched
and filled in with dried blood.

They see marks in the sand where other crates have been dragged down
another passage, and follow the tracks. They lead a long way down another
rough passageway; there is a hallway that continues, and a branch to
the left that leads to the back side of a secret door. Kat opens it;
it opens into a room with garish purple curtains on all the wall, four
chests scattered haphazardly around, and a pile of skeletal but still
somewhat gooey bodies that appear human; they have no skin or meat,
but the bones and internal organs remain. Al walks into the room to
examine the bodies and Kat walks in to look at the chests. Boris
makes a growl in the direction of the bodies, and Milena says to Al,
"Watch the intestines, they are coming for you." A segment of intestines
is squirming across the floor toward him. The bodies begin standing up.
He disengages, dodging the reaching arms and intestines, but they move
to follow and to try to engage Kat, but she dances away.

Milena pulls out her holy symbol to try to turn them. Six of them begin
crawling to the far corner; three more stagger to their feet and move
toward the door. Mouse barks at them.

Gnik casts Web; sticky silvery webs come from his hands and cover the
far side of the room. They smell like old books. From the three unturned
creatures, twelve tendrils of entrails come shooting out at Al, but he
manages to dodge all of them. Boris lets out a threatening woof. Al
throws his abyssal weapon into the hip of one of them, and then calls
it back.

Milena casts Thunderwave at the three unturned zombies, plus the three
stuck in Gnik's web. One is completely destroyed; two of the webbed
ones are pushed against the far wall and stick. Kai jumps into the 
room with her sword and slices through the nearest unturned, unstuck 
zombie; it oozes to the ground. Gnik blasts the other with his helm
and it staggers.

One of the zombies sends its entrails to grapple Kai and drag her
ten feet towards it. A second tendril hits her from another zombie.
She is pulled between the two of them. A third zombie reaches a
tendril toward Al, but he parries it. Kai hits the webbed zombie
grappling her, and cleaves through its skull; its tendril lets
her go. She swings toward the next nearest one and slices through
the ribcage, but it is still standing. Al moves forward to attack
it, and punches through the rest of its ribcage. He moves forward
to get the next one, which is webbed, and destroys it. He moves to
the back of the room and one of the turned zombies, but he is
unable to hit it; he hits the wall instead. Milena casts Sacred
Flame at it, and its entrails bubble under the radiant damage.
Gnik blasts the one still holding Kat with his helm, and it
disintegrates.

Kat, who has been keeping Ember company while she keeps watch down
the passageway, wanders back to see how the battle is going, and
whether she can look in the chests yet.

The zombie facing Al reaches out a claw at his face, but he parries
it. Kai charges one of the remaining two; her first swing misses, but
the second connects. Al takes down the one he is facing, and then 
moves to hit the last turned zombie; the one facing Kai swings a 
claw at him, but he dodges it. Milena hits it with another Sacred
Flame, and Gnik blasts it with his helm, and it goes down. 

With only one foe remaining, Kat wanders back into the room, and
four tendrils come at her from the last zombie. She knocks one
away, but one goes around her leg, one around her torso, and one
around her neck. She throws up her Shield, knocking away the ones
coming for her leg and torso, but the other one is still coming
at her neck. Mouse runs forward, jumps up and bites at it, and 
stops the attack. Kai hits it twice and it falls apart.

Gnik informs them all that there is magic on top of all four
chests in the room, and that the chest in the far corner also
has something magical inside it. Kat can't tell what's magical
about the tops of the chests; she asks Gnik if he can use his
glasses, and he says no. He can tell it is Abjuration magic;
and if it is writing, it is on the inside of the lid. He recommends
opening them from a distance with Mage Hand. Kat tries carefully
picking the lock and upon looking at it more closely she recalls
a spell she read about called Symbol which can affect everything
within 60 feet. Kat thinks she could probably slide a wire saw
under the lid and take off a corner of the chest without taking
off the lid, which might allow her to get into the chest without
setting off the glyph. They decide to wait until they are better
rested to return to the room.

Al returns to the hallway and keeps following the tracks. They go
to the back of the secret door they noticed on the way to showing
Lucius out. They go through and look for signs of crates being
dragged across the room; they appear to go toward the entry room
with the barrels, where they had not previously detected any
magic.

Kat crosses the room to the other door, and when it doesn't seem
to be trapped, she opens it up. Milena is oerwhelmed with a
sensation of some kind of horrible ritual of jusgment -- a man
being held by tentacles coming up from a pit surrounded by hooded
figures, and a ceiling shimmering with stars; there is a gong,
incense burners, and candelabras on the far table. Kat feels a
strange spiritual energy in the room, and turns to look at her
mother, who is staring with concern. She describes the vision
she saw, and says she hopes it is something that happened in the
past and not one that is going to happen. Al suggests that she
should consecrate it, but she doesn't think she has the power
to overcome the energies there by herself.

They go to the next door and verify that it is the back way
into the room with the zombies. They come to another door on
the right that opens onto a small octagonal room with a teakwood
desk and low shelves crammed with books and scrolls, and a hanging
lamp with magical flame. There is a large bound book on top of the
desk, bound in black leather and silver. It is labeled "The Book
of the Unspeakable One". There are letters on the desk; two are
progress reports on "the structure" that are very vague. The third
is signed N'Tal and says the preparations are almost complete and
that they will be arriving in Freeport soon, and "the Brotherhood
is counting on you".

The titles on the shelves suggest mostly horrific subjects. Kat
sizes up the beautiful desk, wondering if she could get it out
the door. Gnik finds a needle in the desk that is magical, and
has runes along its flat portion that say something about granting
ink for ink -- it turns into a tattoo that will allow the wearer to
permanently write with their finger, as long as the tattoo is in
place. It can be popped out again and turned back into the needle.
Gnik takes it and the books and places them in his bag.

While he is doing that, Milena briefly looks at the Book of the
Unspeakable One to see if it contains any clues for how to stop
the ritual to come. It is so horrific that she immediately feels
psychically damaged, and feels that she could have lost wisdom
if not bolstered by her companions. She slams the book shut,
hands it to Gnik, and says, "Burn it."


26 November 2021

(Unknown Future Day)

Gnik comes to the group suggesting that they search for the Left-Bonded
Blade of Alyssa, the companion to the Right-Bonded Blade he already has,
which can sense the bonded blade, its direction and approximate distance.
He has detected that the other blade is in Freeport. The blade he has
can put out fires and is probably the Blade of Smoke, so the other (by
legend) must be the Blade of Fire.

The blade is somewhere off the main island, so they take the ship to
the south and east, about three miles. They can see a collection of
tiny islands in the direction they're headed; Kat and Al see someone
on one of the rocks, waving, sunburned and in tattered clothing. Kat
calls from the crow's nest, "Man ahoy, or whatever...." and they head
that way. Al dives into the water and swims that way, with Az and Zassin
flying after him. Kat and Kai help the crew lower the sailboat.

The man looks at the approaching macaw and faerie dragon with confusion
and then annoyance. Zassin and Az see behind him a number of other
creatures -- harpies -- and the man on the rock transforms into a harpy
as well, and starts singing. Kai, Al, and Milena are aware that they
are foul creatures that lure people in; Al and Kai have heard of another
type that can create illusions in people's minds. 

Al sees a shipwreck below as he swims; as he surfaces, he hears the harpies'
song and swims toward it. Milena recognizes that Kat is preparing to try
a wild magic surge to try a Silence spell, and says, "Stop. I have Silence
scroll." She puts on the Firebird cloak to get within range of the harpy.

Zassin sees Al still swimming toward the harpy and nips at him to try
to snap him out of it, but Al keeps going. Zassin dives under the water
to hide.

The other eight harpies leap up into the air; two of them and the
singing Matriarch circle in the air above Al, while the other six
head toward the ship. Al senses that the harpies want him to reach
them, so he throws up a rope, which the Matriarch catches on a claw.

Kai sees that Jimsu, at the wheel, is trying to get the sails situated
to keep going, but Kat is on her way to try to stuff candlewax in his
ears. Jerry is trying to raise the anchor, so she goes to try to punch
him to snap him out of it (or knock him out). She connects and he goes
down. Rodger, who has been trying to fight him, slides down and says,
"Thanks, he's big!" He lowers the anchor again.

Ember dives into the water, followed by Gnik. Milena activates the cloak
and since the harpies have now left the rock, casts Silence on the helm
of the ship where Jimsu is trying to steer, and then moves toward Gnik
to try to pull him out of the water. The unaffected crew start hauling
the affected crew into the sphere of the Silence spell. Kat stuffs the
wax in her own ears and uses her mermaid skirt to dive in and rush toward
Al.

Az dives into the water and slams into Gnik, knocking him out of the
effect. Zassin also dives into the water around Al, flashing colors
at him and nipping at him to try to distract him. The Matriarch lets
go of the rope and the other two with her grab the rope and carry him
back to the rock, landing next to him. Al is suddenly aware of his
predicament, but is incapacitated thanks to the proximity to the harpies.
Gnik looks up and sees six harpies flying overhead, and casts Web at
them, pulling four down into the water. He grabs Az and continues toward
Al.

Milena shoves wax into her own ears and catches up to Ember, making a
grab at her to try to pull her out of the water and singeing her in
the process due to the Firebird cloak, but Ember does not snap out of
it. She tries flying Ember back to the ship to drop her in the sphere
of Silence. Ember pulls out a couple of daggers and stabs at Milena, 
hitting her in the side.

The Matriarch leaps at Al and swipes with her claws, but he is able to
parry most of the attack, getting a scratch across his chest. Another
one jumps at him; he ducks under the first attack and blocks the second, 
attempting to pin it. Its claw sticks into the rock. The third swipes
at him, giving him another scrape. Al kicks the Matriarch with his
free foot, stunning it; the song stops. Back on the ship, the affected
crew members all shake it off and run for the Silence sphere. He attacks
the pinned harpy and stuns it as well, then attacks the third harpy and
stuns it.

Kai sees the crew is recovering and uses her boots to fly to one of
the two approaching harpies; she slashes it multiple times with her
sword and it falls dead into the water. She glares menacingly at the
other one.

Gnik flips over on his back to toss the waterlogged and unable-to-fly
Az into the air, and casts Prestidigitation to dry her out; she flies
away and Gnik continues on to the rock.

Milena drops ths singed Ember onto the deck of the ship and shouts,
"Get into the Silence zone or put wax in ears!" Ember pulls her bow
out and yells at the approaching harpy, "You're now in range, bitch!"
Milena moves toward the four harpies in the water.

Kat reaches the rock and acrobats onto it beside Al. "What needs to
happen here?" she asks. "They need to stop being able to sing," Al
says. Kat attempts a wild surge to create a damaging ray that will
hit all three harpies. Instead, she notices that the light gets
very dim. And also, the sun appears to be about an eighth its normal
size. Al suddenly feels less good about egging Kat on to try a wild
surge.

Zassin flies up and attacks the Matriarch to give advantage to 
whoever attacks her next. Al hits the other non-pinned one and
it slides off the rock, dead. 

The four webbed harpies surface; they are unable to fly, so they
are trying to swim back to the island. The remaining harpy near
the ship, having been hit twice by Ember's arrows, turns to
fly back to the little rock.

Kai flies out to chase down the one fleeing the ship. As she nears it,
she throws her javelin at it, hitting; it falls into the water and Kai
drags it toward her on the magical line attached to the javelin.

Gnik reaches the rock and leaps out of the water, attempting a Mind Spike
on the Matriarch. She is staggered.

Milena flies into the midst of the waterlogged harpies and casts Word
of Radiance, hitting three of them while also singeing them with the
fire effect from the cape, then flies up out of their reach.

Kat attacks the Matriarch and uses the Booming Blade effect and necromantic
energy draw; the flesh goes black around the rapier as she rips it out. With
her off hand she swipes again with her dagger, hitting it in the shoulder;
it staggers back and falls over. Zassin flies at the remaining harpy on
the rock, nipping at it. Gnik sends Az to see if there's anything hidden
in the rocks; she finds a nest with things in it, and he tells her to 
investigate it.

The harpies in the water squawk up, "Leave us alone! Leave us alone!" at
Milena, and one of them starts singing; she is not as powerful as the
Matriarch, though, so none of the group is affected.

Al hits the pinned harpy and it goes down, unconscious; he hits it again
to finish it off. The group converges on the remaining waterlogged harpies
to finish them off.

Zassin returns to Milena and projects an image in her mind of the battle
on the rock, with Zassin taking out the three harpies while Al cowers in
fear and Az flies up to high-five him. Zassin then asks for treats.

Gnik consults the book to figure out what to do about the sun, and finds
that it is probably a curse effect that can be removed. It seems to affect
a seven-mile radius around the target area -- which is mostly in the middle
of the ocean, but includes Freeport.

They take a closer look at the shipwreck; it is in horrible shape, covered
in barnacles, except for the ram at the front. Az inspects the nest and
finds humanoid bones, some coins and tiny gems, a locket, and a symbol
on a medallion that looks like a wolf; Milena recognizes it as Rafael, a
major god in the Bargallian culture -- a god of obedience, hard work
loyalty, and fatherhood. Milena claims it.

Gnik finds that his bonded dagger pulls toward the shipwreck. Milena casts
Cure Wounds on Al, who has taken the most damage, and they go to inspect
the shipwreck more closely. Az stays above to keep watch, as she can't
swim in her bird form. Gnik sees that the ram in the front is magical,
and he detects other magic below the main deck. Looking into the hold,
he sees a marble statue of a man in furs holding a sword; it has an aura
of enchantment and necromancy. Zassin slips down, camouflaged, to take
a closer look.

The group notices that it is eerily silent -- not to the level of a
Silence spell, but muffled. Al pulls out a friend from his bag and
gets a seahorse; he sends it to swim around looking for interesting
things. "What's interesting?" it asks. Al says shiny things, and 
creatures that shouldn't normally be there. "OK!" it says, and swims
away slowly. Al pulls a second friend... and gets the giant seahorse.
He tasks it to watch out for danger. He pulls a third friend and gets
Cuddy the Octopus, and asks her to search for anything unusual.

As she wanders around, Kai notices a gapinig hole at the back of the
ship, and some smaller ones near the rocks it rests on. She also sees
writing on the side of the ship that is not Jhoynian; she can't read
it through the barnacles.

Zassin peers through the darkness in the hold. He sees the statue, a lot
of debris, and a hole in side of the ship that opens onto the rocks --
and a hole in the rock that seems to lead into a cavern. He sends a mental
image to the group of the statue, which Milena recognizes as Rafael. She
lets the group know through the farspeakers. "Bored now," Zassin thinks
to the group, and tries opening the door to the front of the hold. It
is so rotted that it falls to the floor.

Gnik goes into the hold, and Milena follows to get a closer look at
the statue. The rest of the group follows. Al hears Cuddy call out,
"Hey, the little guy got eaten by a giant crab... gotta go gotta go!"

The rest of the group sees a translucent man in armor Milena recognizes
as Bargallian emerging from the cavern, followed by a beautiful woman.
The man asks in broken trade, "Why are you here?" Kat responds, in
Bargallian, "We like dogs." The woman starts laughing. 

Cuddy and the giant seahorse swim frantically in with a huge shape,
seven feet in diameter, chasing them. The woman says, "Brigida, wait!"
and it stops. "But it looked so tasty!" it says. 

Gnik says they came looking for the bonded companion to his dagger,
and the woman gestures to the crab, who is holding it in one of her
claws. The two ghosts introduce themselves as Dalibor and Hanka, who
were traveling from town to town with the statue spreading word of
Rafael. At his name, the crab begins gleefully singing a hymn to 
Rafael. Hanka says she wanted a sea companion and awakened the crab
and gave her sentience. Their ship was beset by harpies, and they
were locked in the hold while it sank and the rest of the crew were
eaten by the harpies. They ask if someone can say last rites over
their corpses and those of their crew. Milena says she is happy to
do so, and asks questions about their preferences. She asks if Dalibor
wishes to be buried with his amulet, but he says not if it can be of
use elsewhere. They share that the high priest had an altar with something
magical in it, although they don't know what, as well as a waterproof
crate of books about Rafael. Milena asks what to do about the crab, who
might get lonely without her companions, and they consider taking her
with them. Brigida asks if they have food, and Milena says they have
plenty of troll meat.

Hanka stays with the crab while Dalibor takes the rest of the group to
the brig where their bodies are. They have been in seawater for more
than three years, so they are reduced mostly to bone with tattered
clothing. The group retrieves the bones. Zassin notices one of the
hands has something glittering on it, so he swims in to retrieve it.
Kai hears a muffled sound of something else nearby, but she is not
sure what it is. She thinks she sees movement through the hole at
the side of the ship, and swims to the hole to take a closer look.

Everyone hears a voice in their minds and aloud say, "Dalibor is
staying here." He does not seem to have heard anything. Kai sees
four things coming down the rock toward the ship, somewhat humanoid,
that Kai, Kat, and Al recognize as Skum, powerful telepathic beings
that serve the ancient race of the Aboleth and that will take a ship's 
crew to their master to be enslaved. Kai slices with her sword; the 
creature oozes slime rather than bleeding. Milena and Zassin see another
creature moving toward the hole at the back of the ship -- a Deep
Scion. Zassin tries to distract one of them with shiny flashing
lights, and then hides. Kat throws a Chaos Bolt through the hole in
the brig to try to hit the distracted Deep Scion.

One of the Skum hits Ember, stunning her; another hits Kai, and
her brain feels muddled. Three Skum come up to Milena and Zassin,
and each gets hit once, feeling the brain-muddling sensation. Kai
attacks one of the Skum again, lopping off a tentacle, but it 
doesn't seem to care. The other Scion screams with that brain-muddling
effect and slashes with its claws at Milena across her chest, where
she has just stashed the stunned Zassin. She steps back and casts
Bless, and Kat casts a Sanctuary spell on Milena, who is now very
injured.

Ember comes to, pushes off toward one of the Scions, and slices it
into bits. One of the others tries to slip past Kai; she takes a
swing, but misses. The other two swipe at her, and one of them
hits, muddling her mind again. Two of the Scions swing at Ember,
and one hits; a third moves toward the door and tries to hit Milena,
but she is protected. Two Skum swing at Al, but he dodges. Kai swings
at one and takes its head off at the shoulders, then attacks a second
one and hits. The remaining Deep Scion, which is slowed by a spell
from Gnik, goes past Ember and heads to the door to try to attack
Milena, but is unable to.

Al sends Bounder the Giant Seahorse to try to distract his foes;
it swims back and then comes charging forward to slam into the one
next to Al. "Is that distracting?" it asks. "Yes, good job!" Al says.
Cuddy also goes to the one facing Kai and pulls on its feet, trying
to mess with it.

Gnik Mind Spikes the remaining Scion, then ducks back behind the door
to the brig. Milena casts Mass Healing Word on her injured party member,
and then moves toward the front of the ship to try praying to the
statue of Rafael. She sees the two ghosts back at the entrance of
the cave held rigid and staring upward with a look of torment; Brigida
is waving a claw at them, saying, "Hanka? Are you okay?" Milena asks if
she has seen this before, and she says no. Milena kneels and says a
Bargallian prayer, and a blue light emanates from the statue, imbuing
all of the party as it passes them with extra confidence, and an 
increased Bless.

Kat ducks out from her hiding spot and hits the remaining Scion with
her Booming Blade and then hides again. Ember goes after two slowed
Skum, and they pile onto her. Gnik yells, "Ember, disengage! Back up!"
The two Skum near Al swing at him, but he parries their only decent
attack. Kai, with the help of Cuddy's distraction, parries the blows
from the Skum near her. The Deep Scion looks around for Kat but
can't see her, so goes through the door and sees Gnik. It slices
twice, and Gnik tries Mind Spiking it again; it staggers and goes down.

From her spot near the ghosts, Milena casts another Mass Healing Word
and asks the remaining Skum, "Why do you want Dalibor?" They reply
telepathically, "Zallmimin orders it."

Zassin flies in to distract the Skum attacking Ember, and then pulls
away again. Kat sneak attacks the Skum nearest her, and engages both
Booming Blade and the necromantic draw, then hides again. Ember stabs
the Skum in front of her that is already hurt, and takes it down, then
hacks the other one with several effective blows. It attacks and hits;
she does not go down, but is very injured. The one Kat attacked turns
and manages to see her, and attacks, taking damage in the process from
the Booming Blade; Kat reacts with a Shield spell, which blocks one
of the two hits. The one facing Kai hits her twice; she slices at it
and takes it out. The two facing Al try hitting, but only one gets 
through. Kai slides down the rock to join Al. Al blasts the one just
inside the door near Kat with another Mind Spike.

Milena moves through the melee to hit Ember with a Cure Wounds; she
walks past Kat on the way, who could also use healing, but doesn't
see her because Kat is hidden. Zassin does see Kat and goes over to
distract the Skum on her with a coordinated strike. Kat hits it again
with the Booming Blade and necrotic effect, then disengages and moves
out of range. Ember attacks the Skum next to her, and doesn't quite
take it down, but it is very hurt. The Skum that was attacking Kat
starts searching the rocks for her, but can't find her since she has
moved. Each of the two Skum facing Al gets a hit through at him.

Al hits the first one and takes it out. Both he and Kai hit the other
one, and then Al hits it a second time with his off hand. Gnik tries
to Mind Spike the one going after Kat. Milena casts Sacred Flame at
the one facing Ember, and it goes down; since Milena is now in the
cell with the bodies, she starts last rites.

Zassin distracts both the remaining Skum; Kat pulls out her crossbow
to send a force bolt at the one that was chasing her, hits it in the
face, and takes it out. Ember runs after the one remaining foe and
slices it up; it turns on Kai but doesn't manage to hit her, and she
and Al take it out.

Once the foes are dispatched, the ghosts return to their normal
selves. Milena ceases her Last Rites long enough to talk to them.
Delibor explains that he spent the last couple years of his life
fighting Zallmimin and his minions, so he is not surprised Zallmimin
would try to keep him from the afterlife. He says he took many notes,
but they are probably no longer legible after so long underwater.
Gnik asks to see them; one is a book called Aboleth -- the Horror
Beneath the Waves, and the second is an accompanying notebook. They
are trashed, but Gnik carefully collects them to Restore them later.
He asks Delibor where Zallmimin operated, wondering if the book would
be more useful in Freeport than Saltmarsh, and decides it probably 
would.

Gnik sees that the ring Zassin found is magical, and asks Delibor about
it, who says it belonged to their High Priest. Gnik asks what it did,
and he says, "I just thought it was his holy symbol." Gnik, trying to
decide whether to go ahead and cast Identify now or wait until later,
asks Delibor if he wants to know what it did. "It does not matter
now," he says, but Hanka says, "Yes we want to know!" While he casts
Identify, Milena casts Prayer of Healing on the group.

Gnik deduces that the ring has some kind of divination magic, but
only works if paired with another item. They determine that the other
item is the altar, which is in the priest's former quarters, and can
be used to cast a Scry spell. Zassin and Milena see that the top of 
the alter has latches on the side, and if both are hit at the same 
time the top swings up; there is a mirror and an indentation that the 
ring can go into. Coiled around the indentation is a mechanical cobra 
that rises up, looks at Milena, sees that she has the Amulet of Rafael 
around her wrist, and coils up again.

They determine the ship was called "Leader" in Bargallian, and had
been there a bit over three years. When the ghosts are ready, Milena
performs last rites, and the ghosts spark out; Milena gives a Bargallian
gesture of "safe travels", which they return.


1 January 2022

(7 Sinta 3275, continued)

The group decides to set up camp in a Tiny Hut in or near the underground
lake. Al dives in to see what it is like; it is freshwater, about eight
feet deep, and is clean and sanitary. Gnik uses a pinch of his Dust of
Dryness to create a marble storing 15 cubic feet of water for later
use. The surrounding water comes crashing into the sudden void, making
a big splash.

Gnik places the Book of the Unspeakable One into the kiln at the
beach, and although it takes a little longer to burn than one might
expect, it does incinerate, releasing black smoke that floats up to
the ceiling.

Gnik places the Tiny Hut underwater, and those who need to rest
(Milena, Kat, Gnik) settle in. Kai patrols about once an hour,
and takes some time to smash the bricks beside the kiln. The group
awakens a couple hours before midnight.

The group returns to the room with the chests. Gnik hypothesizes that
although some are probably magically trapped, it is possible using the
keys they found on Milos will keep the traps from being sprung. He
suggests using the key with Mage Hand from a safe distance... except
one of the effects he thinks it might be would have an effect twice
the radius of the range of Mage Hand.

They decide to try using a Tiny Hut as a shield, although Kat would
have to have her hand and head out of the hut to manipulate her Mage
Hand. Milena offers her tactical shield as additional protection. She
finds a key to unlock the first chest; as it begins to open, she sees
the beginning of an explosion of orange light and pulls back -- but
begins babbling. Al pulls out his Pearl of Speech to see if he can
understand her... and he begins babbling as well. They both start
wandering aimlessly... but as Milena considers using Restorations from
her necklace on each of them, they both snap out of it. Kat goes over
to the chest; on top of a pile of silver coins is an ornate gold-plated
shield with a snake motif on it. It is not magical.

Having seen the protection spell in action, Gnik recognizes that it is
a Symbol spell, which can be tweaked in many different ways, meaning
that the traps on the other chests could be significantly more deadly.
However, Kat decides to try the others anyway, with Milena casting a
Bless spell to give her a better chance of shrugging off the effects.

The next chest releases green light which makes Kat feel a bit like
she is about to pass out, but she shrugs it off as she pulls back
into the tent. In the hall, they see bugs fall off the wall as the
light hits them and they pass out. She moves quickly onto the next
chest so she can still have the effect of the Bless. The next chest
releases grey energy, and as she pulls back she feels the beginnings
of burning pain, worse than she has ever felt, but she shakes it off
and moves to the third chest. 

As she opens it, inky black energy rolls through the room; where it
hits her as she is trying to pull back, she sees her flesh beginning
to burn off, and then she can't see as her eyes explode. Al, standing
by her, pulls out a potion of Greater Healing and pours it over her;
she comes to in excruciating pain. Milena casts a high-level Cure
Wounds and her flesh re-knits.

The chests contain a large number of coins and four onyx gems. Milena
states that they will be converting some of the coins into diamonds
for her to hold onto.

They move on to the room where Milena saw the sickening vision of
a ritual. Kat looks in, planning to bring the items from the altar
out with Mage Hand. The candelabras, of silver, are exquisitely
shaped like coiling snakes; the candles are black but don't seem
remarkable. The gong has a serpent motif and is made of bronze.
There is something on the altar behind the gong, an oval piece
of smooth grey material etched with text that looks like Gellen
text. It is not magical; Gnik sees that it is a description of
a ritual used to judge those who want to join the order by summoning
their god. "Something else to chuck in the kiln," he says.

They move to the remaining secret door they've found, and Al investigates
to see how it opens and whether it is trapped, but it looks like all the
others. Al opens the door, and immediately notices the stench: it is
definitely the sewers. It is a mess, and although there is a small
area where they could walk along beside the flow, it would not be
easy. They decide not to try it -- some of them emphatically.

Kat, having been recently dead, does not feel up to checking out the
lighthouse, which was next on their list. Celebrations will be ongoing
at the library, so they decide to take Milos's body back to the head
librarian and explain what happened. They put it into the barrel of
preservation which formerly held the blood for the bricks, and carry
it on one of Gnik's discs.

Kat shares that while she was mostly dead, she had a vision of Ag
telling her that it wasn't her time yet, and "Good job"! She plans
to take her share of silver and offer it to Ag as she had done before.
They make their way back to the surface and out of the building, where
there are two guards wearing Verlaine's symbol on their livery, saying
they're there to pick up a crate for Verlaine. Al gets the impression
that one of them is blissfully ignorant, the other is worried and
trying to figure out how to get out of a bad situation. Al approaches
him, trying to convince him that they are just trying to keep the
peace. The guards suggest they should take the group to Verlaine; 
Al says they need to take something to the library first, but then
will go talk to Verlaine. Al hands him a coin, pretending it is a
Shapeshifting Detector, after telling the guards about the Sgult
worshippers and snake people underground -- hoping Gnik could track
it, and therefore the guard, if he is reporting to someone other
than Verlaine.

As they head to the library, Milena and Al notice that there are not
a lot of folks milling around near the back alley, but there is a woman
standing off to the side looking like she's trying to look inocuous, and
occasionally glancing in the group's general direction. Al calls Kat's
attention to her, and Kat waits for the rest of the group to walk past
before talking to the girl -- but the girl walks up to them and says,
"The Mighty Redeemers." She is tall, almost 6 feet tall, and says
she just wants to chat -- they can walk and talk.

She introduces herself as Bernace, and asks if they would be insterested 
in doing something for them; she is from the Fallstar region, and she wants
to protect her home. She says she has a little place near the Dreadwood,
and that she is a witch and potioner. She wants the group to have a
conversation with Brigit, who is also staying at the Last Resort, to
understand the problem she's dealing with and to try to find a more
direct way to deal with it. She offers them a bag of potions just to
have the conversation. She says she can't tell them more about Brigit
because Brigit wouldn't want her to, and it would be a disadvantage
going into the conversation; Milena asks if they should tell Brigit that
Bernace sent them, but she says Brigit wouldn't know who she is. Milena
takes the bag of potions, and they continue on toward the library.

When they arrive, Elene is there on her her chair and comes up to thank
them effusively for finding Lucius. Gnik says they also found Milos, and
need to talk to Thuron. She says Lucius is talking with him, and invites
them up. When they enter Thuron's tower, they see Lucius on one side of
the desk and Thuron rises from the other to greet them. He thanks them,
says they have done more good than they know, and shares what Lucius
has told him. Gnik says they have brought Milos's body back, and opens
the barrel. Thuron looks surprised, but reveals that he himself is
also of the Gellen people, although they do not call themselves that.
He had met Lucius when he was wandering and followed him back to Freeport,
where he found the original Thuron dead, and used his abilities to take
his appearance and take his place to figure out what was going on. He
shares that his real name is K'stallo. The Brotherhood is another sect
worshipping the Unspeakable One; the remaining Gellens stay hidden because
the different sects are still trying to kill one another. Milena asks if
he has kept up Thuron's original priestly duties; he says he has, to the
extent he was able. She lets him know there is an altar in the underground
place that she does not think she has the power to consecrate herself, and
he says he will help gather others to help, although probably not until
tomorrow afternoon to give them time to recover from the night's festivities.
He also says his actual god is Sil, and Gnik asks, "...who has this symbol?"
showing an image of the Serpent of Sil. He smiles and says, "I take it
you have found one of our hoards?" Gnik says, "Why would you think that?"
and he taps his ear, indicating the Farspeakers. They share some of
the things they found, including that they released a Shadow Horde.
Thuron says it is good that they were such a small group, as a released
Horde takes the form of whatever is near, and having a smaller group
makes a weaker Horde. 

Al asks K'stallo if Sil is known by another name here, and he says
Sayd -- a pacifist -- is the equivalent god. "Oh, Sayd is great!"
says Al. "He's okay," says Kai. K'stallo and Gnik discuss some of
the information Gnik was looking for in the restricted section, and
he says he will allow him access. He tells Milena to come back after
the midday meal so they can take care of the altar.

They head to Verlaine's. On the way, Al asks Gnik who he thinks
Brigit is that Bernace asked them to talk with; he says it is probably
the deposed Queen Brigit of Serin.

They arrive at Verlaine's a little after 10 pm. Alen is standing outside,
wearing the "V" symbol on his tabbard. He says Verlaine is waiting for
them, and leads them in. As they are walking, Al asks Alen, "So you aren't
a Sgult worshipper, are you?" He snorts and says, "No way, man." Al warns
him that there may be some among Verlaine's staff. Alen says he doesn't
see it, but Al has a good sense of people and he trusts Al.

There is a large granite entry hall with a fountain and circular stairs
leading up. There are chairs arranged by the stairs; a man sitting there
stands up, looking a bit put out. Kai positions herself at the edge
of the group, in a guard-like stance, as Al says, "We want to make you
aware that there may be more going on with the bricks you have ordered
than you were aware of." Gnik shows a series of images of what they
saw at the kiln, including the barrel of blood -- "Now you're getting
creepy," says Verlaine -- and the sigil inside. Verlaine seems like he
is annoyed to be bothered by this; Al offers to help him root out the
problem, and Verlaine says no, but that he will look into it.

Alen escorts them out and apologizes for Verlaine being an ass. Kai
asks who was the guard to Verlaine's right, who she noticed sweating
as Al described the Sgult activity. Alen says that guy is an idiot,
but Al and Kai suggest he should be watched, in case he has been
told to share information with someone else. Alen also says he will
share the names of the business managers of Verlaine's multiple brick
manufacturers.

Gnik is glad to be done so he can go back to the library, and Milena
plans to go with him. The rest want to go to a bar, although Milena
reminds Kat that she was recently dead and won't have Gnik to give her
a ride back to the inn on a floating disk. She decides the bar is still
more her speed than the library. They head to one of Kai's favorite bars
on the rough side of town which has competitive fighting.

Gnik and Milena head back to the library. Elene comes to greet them;
she is re-shelving books that had ended up in the Divination section
where they didn't belong. Gnik notices that one of them is magical
and asks to look at it; it has an ink signature on the front, Lindsay
Cade, but no other title. Gnik steps away before opening it, just in
case; he gets the impression of having an opportunity, and casts Mage
Armor. Inside it is labeled as the spellbook of Lindsay Cade, and
beneath it says that in the event of their death or disappearance it
should be delivered to someone with an obviously Dorghenian name whose
locale was wiped out in an earthquake 30 years ago. Gnik asks to borrow
it.

Milena takes a look at the other two books, one of which is about Daln,
written in Bargallian, documenting his life from his departure from the
Bargal Valley to his ascent to godhood; and the other of which turns out 
to be about the followers of Tyorl and their tactics for fighting Sgult,
written by Julee Adkins. The first appears to be a very old tome, the
second seems much newer.


5 February 2022

Gnik and Milena return from the library to the Last Resort late, as a storm
is blowing in. The person at the bar addresses Milena as "Lady Milena" and
says he has a note for her. It is from Marcus, inviting her to dinner in
two days' time, with the rest of her companions welcome to join as well.
The man addresses Gnik as "Lord Gnik" and says there is a woman waiting to
see him. Milena joins him when she has read the note.

The woman is Naringer, from whom Gnik had been tasked to collect mithril 
for Leo, the master smith in Saltmarsh, who had sunk all his savings into
purchacing it. She shares that the Council of Captains had taken the
shipment from her without compensation, claiming it was for an urgent
need related to the lighthouse. She expresses her apologies.

Gnik returns to her suite to cast Augury, asking whether Bernace would
harm Bridget if he reached out to her; he gets an immediate 'no'. Milena
writes a reply note to Marcus saying she would be delighted to meet him
for dinner on the 9th, and she expects at least some of her companions
would also join. As she is getting ready for bed, the storm blows
through for about 15 minutes before blowing through.

At the bar, Kat sets up a game of Three Dragon Ante with Ember acting
as her plant. She's able to fleece a couple of people, who are getting
in on it just for the fun of it, for low stakes -- but makes enough to
cover the group's drinks. They return to the Last Resort and head to
their rooms. Al decides to experiment with meditating instead of
actually sleeping... but he falls asleep during the attempt.

 

8 Sinta 3275

Before breakfast, a street urchin comes to Kat with a packet of five
platinum pieces and a note asking for the crystal orb; she decides to
go ahead and return it as promised.

At breakfast, Milena reveals that her divinations that morning showed
an ominous future, possibly related to what is happening with the 
lighthouse and the Sgult worshippers. As they talk, two people walk
in and head for their table. One is a woman with armor that Al identifies
as being a paladin of Vlondrel. The man with her seems to be in a cheery
mood, while the paladin appears stone-faced. The guy introduces himself
as Royn, in Trade, with an accent they don't immediately place, although
Gnik thinks they might be Shoynian. The woman states her name, tersely,
as Saskie. Royn asks if they have a moment, and Milena gestures for
them to take a seat. Royn does, Saskie does not. Kai keeps a close eye
on the woman. 

Royn holds up his hand and shows an image of a woman they recognize
from yesterday -- Ginny, who tried to sell them the pieces of the
puzzlebox she'd been hired to bring to Michel. Al says they have
seen her, and Kai asks why they want to know. Royn says she is
a follower of Shaddick who had escaped and they are trying to take
her back. The group tells them that she tried to sell them a magic
item, but they declined. Royn asks why she had tried, and Milena
says the woman thought she could get a better price from them than
from the one who had hired her. Royn asks who hired her, and Al
explains about Michel and the Raging Hammer. He also mentions that
they've got someone in custody that they want to take back to Saltmarsh,
and asks if Royn and Saskie would be willing to take her as well. Royn
asks her crimes, and Al mentions her trying to kill them and also take
over Saltmarsh as part of a Lune cult, which gets Saskie's attention.
She says they will take her, and Al says they should just capture her,
not kill her -- but Milena, Kat, and Kai shrug at Saskie in an "either
way" sort of way, while she and Royn seem to be having the same 
argument in a glance. The group also lets them know about the Sgult
cult they fought against yesterday, and that they suspect will be
unleashing some kind of evil plan in the near future. Saskie sighs;
she and Royn indicate they weren't planning to stay in town after
finding Ginny, but they will send word of where they are staying
when they have settled in.  Al, Gnik, and Kat recognize Saskie's armor
and sword as artifacts of Vlondrel called Death Warder and Death Scouger.

Milena heads to market to restock her supply of diamonds for Revivify
spells (and also to pick up a new dress. Kat recommends lots of cleavage.
"You do not have to tell me this," Milena says.) Al goes with her to
make sure she's not getting ripped off, and Ember joins because Gnik
is being boring today -- copying new spells into her book.

Kat finds a beach on the outskirts of town to make an offering of her
silver to Ag for looking out for her while she was briefly dead. She
builds a fire, throws the silver in, starts trying to figure out what
to say, gets as far as "Ag..." and the fire rises up and consumes
the silver.

In the evening, when the group has returned to the Last Resort, a woman
walks in, right past Jakin at the bar, and comes to their table projecting
confidence, although Al thinks she seems a little nervous. She greets
them as the Mighty Redeemers and introduces herself as Christina Loggins.
She says she heard someone had been asking about her, and she had some
things to ask them. Gnik says he believes they have an acquaintance in
common -- Angel. Christina brightens and asks how she is doing; Gnik
shares that she has settled in Seaton. Christina is glad she had gotten
settled safely away from Michel. Christina identifies herself as
a broker, connecting people with what they need; Kai asks if she works
with Michel and she says no, but she had originally directed Angel toward
Michel hoping she would be a good influence.

She says she deals with a group who wanted her to talk to Kat, saying
that they will respect her territory in Saltmarsh if she respects theirs
here in Freeport. The group calls themselves the Canting Crew. Kat 
acknowledges that she will respect it. Al asks if she knows where Michel
is, but she does not -- however, Angel had been to his hideout. Al asks 
if she thinks Sea Lord Drak is under someone else's influence who is making
him act questionably, and she says no, he's just a psychopath who took
power when the previous Drak was killed by a mysterious poison, and city
rules state that the Sea Lord can only be a Drak -- and no other relatives
are known to still be alive. However, she says, if something were to happen
to this Drak, the Sea Captains Council would work it out -- and they are
already trying to change the rules, but it is hard to do when Drak has
so much influence. They ask if she has been involved in brokering items
for the tower, and she has not, but many have noticed that some have
become questionably rich working on it.


9 Sinta 3275

The group is at breakfast discussing whether to talk to Bridget -- Milena
mentions the omens are much better today -- when Angel appears at their
table. They ask her opinion of what would happen to Raging Hammer if they
took out Michel, and she shrugs, saying she doesn't know politics. They
ask if she'd like to take it over and she says no way. Most likely the
other pirates would continue to operate, but perhaps more loosely 
organized. They chat with her a little more, and she goes to get herself
a room.

The group decides they should go ahead and talk to Bridget, although they
don't have any strong feelings about their goals in talking to her -- they
are not looking to get her back onto the throne. They head up to Suite 1,
where there are always two guards in insignia. Kai recognizes one of
them as a Ponallian she spoke to briefly in the bar the day before; he's
not very talkative, just working a job as a guard.

Al greets them and asks if Bridget is willing to talk with them; they
say it is unlikely, but he knocks on the door to check. A section of
the door slides in and flips away, and eyes look out and a woman's
voice says, "Whaddaya want?" Al says he thinks they may have similar
interests, and wanted to talk with her about it. She pauses, and says,
"One hour. Downstairs."

Kai and Al pass the time by sparring, with Al trying to dodge while
Kai tries to hit him.

An hour later, Nathan and the other guard come down with an elf woman
who cautiously looks around. She says Eleanora says good things about
them, but she hasn't heard from her recently. Gnik describes the
encounter with Bernace who said Bridget was trying to accomplish
her goals too indirectly. The elf pulls out an item like an egg and
starts twisting it; a zone of silence expands around them so they
can speak in private. She asks what they think Bernace might have
meant, and Milena says among them they probably have several guesses.
Gnik says they know a little something of her work with Eleanora,
and shows the book Gnik found about the fiends that belong but do
not. She shares that her court was infiltrated by shapeshifters,
and Gnik tells her about the Gellan Sgult worshippers they found
who can disguize themselves as humans. She says the Witch Queen is
backing the takeover of Anlin and ousting of the former queen. Gnik
reveals that he just learned a "Find Shapechanger" spell yesterday
at the library in a book that revealed itself to him by being misfiled
on his previous trip. Bridget says that to be direct about the Witch
Queen they would need to go down to the bottom of the sea and get
through the merfolk and others who live in that area who don't react
kindly to strangers, and then make it to the Witch Queen and her
people and fight them.

Kai asks what the Sea Witch actually is, and Bridget points to Gnik's
book, saying that her servants are the "vile fiends" in the book, so
she is most likely one as well. Gnik tries out his "Find Shapechanger"
spell and looks around; he sees a table at the far side of the room
where one of the two people sitting there is definitely a shapeshifter
not in their normal form -- and he sees it is a Replacer. It stands up
and starts walking away -- perhaps because it read his mind and knew
he recognized it. He casts Mind Spike on it, and at the same time
Bridget's personal guard Rachel throws a dagger at it without looking.


19 February 2022

Al runs forward to entangle the shapechanger in a rope, Kat throws
a Chaos Bolt of acid at it, and Kai tries to punch it with the hilt
of her sword to knock it out. Gnik sends Az out to keep an eye on
it in case it runs out. As the Mind Spike goes off, the creature
shudders. Mouse follows Kat and tries to knock the thing down,
without success. Bridget's escort and her guards get up and hustle
her back toward her rooms for safety.

Ember comes running up to hit the Replacer with her rapier hilt and
it dodges, but she manages to clock it with her dagger hilt and knocks
it out. It reverts to its native form, and the crowd in the dining room
let out a gasp. Jakin the owner says, "What are you guys doi--- what is
THAT?" As Al is trying to figure out how to tie it up so it can't escape
even if it changes shape, Gnik pulls out the restraint sphere and puts
its hands in it.

Kat wonders aloud what they are going to do with this thing now that
they have caught it and Jakin says, "Take it out of the front door,
as soon as possible?!" They decide to take it up to their rooms. Al
tells the crowd they have everything under control, and Kat adds, "Just
the Mighty Redeemers taking care of business." They decide to let Bridget
know what they are doing in case she wants to talk to it, but she might
not since it can read minds.

They take it upstairs and when they open the door to send someone to
tell Bridget, her bodyguard is about to knock on the door. "Oh, you
got it," she says. She shares that such creatures rarely share anything
unless one has a way to pry into their minds. The group wonders if perhaps
the paladin and wizard they met that morning might be of help, but the
escort suggests they might not want to let too many people know about
it. 

Gnik reveals that he has Detect Thoughts, but that anyone who will have
trouble controlling their surface thoughts should go farther away so
it can't read their mind. Ember and Kat head downstairs, and Az and
Zassin accompany them.

The creature wakes up and Gnik tries to read its mind; he feels the
sensation of it trying to read his mind simultaneously. He manages to
resist, but the creature is stunned by it. He senses it is trying to
figure out how to salvage the op, hopes the others were able to get
away or keep their cover; and that its mission is more important than
its life. Gnik asks, "How many others?" and he gets the impression of
"Five" before the creature squelches it. Gnik asks, "What was the
objective of the operation?" and the response he got was "Kill Michel."
Gnik asks, "Why do you want to kill Michel?!" He gets the impression
Michel is interfering with their objective to take over the societies
in the area. "Was Michel in the room?" Gnik asks, and then "What does
Michel look like?" He gets the mental image of a dark-haired man. Gnik
asks, "Where's your hideout?" but the creature manages to shake him
off.

Al asks out loud, "Why were you in the room downstairs?" and he hears
the reply in his head, "You already have that answer." "We do?" Al
asks, and Gnik tells him. "Why are you following us?" Al asks, and
it just stares at him. It also stares at him when he asks its name,
and tilts its head when he asks if it likes to swim. "How do you
eat if you don't have a mouth?" It stares up at the ceiling.

Gnik asks Al to go get Kai, and Al says he should just use the
Farspeaker. Gnik stares at him a moment, and then tells Kai to
come back in. "Am I coming to knock it out or kill it?" she asks.
"It's too dangerous to leave it alive." She comes in with her sword
drawn. "But you're going to make a... mess," Al says as its head comes
off. He takes a moment to fill in the rest of the party via Farspeaker,
and then he and Kai and Gnik go to tell Bridget what happened. Milena
stays to pull samples of its blood and brain and other body parts that
could be used for potions: shapechanging, mind-reading, and so forth.

The guards let the group in and Rachel says, "Well there's more than
one of you, so I guess you're not the doppelganger...." Al and Gnik
discuss whether to go looking for the person the Replacer was sitting
with; Gnik shows Az and Zassin an image and sends them to go look
downstairs. Then they tell Bridget what they learned, and she asks
who Michel is. They explain he's the leader of the Raging Hammer,
and Gnik shows her an image. Gnik offers to share his spells both
for finding shapechangers and for detecting thoughts, but warns her
that trying to read someone who is reading back could result in
getting stunned.

Gnik then says, "So should we pick up where we left off with
our conversation about the Witch Queen?" Kai asks what she'll do
if the Witch Queen is taken out, and she says she will go back to
trying to retake her throne, hoping that removing the Witch Queen
will also root out her followers. Gnik shows Bridget the "Vile Fiends"
book, and she confirms that the creatures in it match the Witch Queen's
followers, but the Witch Queen herself is not represented. They see
that the Replacers are the "Embedded" and the kenku are the "Feathered",
but they have not yet encountered the "Hidden". Rachel says they've
run into another kind of "Embedded" that can stretch their limbs to
make them very fast and give them very long reach in combat, but that
otherwise look similar in their native forms to the Replacers. She tells
them not to let their guard down around the Hidden, who flash colors
that will make them lose track of reality.

The group discusses that it suddenly seems strange that Angel just
appeared to give them information about Michel when they had been
wondering how to find him, and wonder if it could have been a Replacer.
Kai says, "Huh... But we should worry about that later." The group 
mentions that if they take out Michel it will leave a power vacuum that
the Sea Witch wants to exploit, and asks if Bridget would like to take
over Raging Hammer? She says she doesn't think they would follow her
lead, but they have others who could possibly take over similar roles....

Milena uses Sending to tell Marcus they have encountered Replacers
and is checking that he is really the one who invited them to dinner.
He responds that dinner is on, reservations are made, and what's a
Replacer? and he looks forward to seeing her.

Milena decides to check in with Theron and the other priests about
consecrating the Sgult ritual room; Kai decides she should come
as back-up. Al, Kat, Gnik, and Ember head to the pawnshop, a 
small shop with a narrow doorway on an alley. It is quite dark
inside; Gnik puts on his arcanus glasses, and sees that the windows
have some kind of alteration magic on them. The proprietor invites
them in; he has a very crooked nose and seems to make a point not to
look directly at any of them. Al glances around to see if there is
another non-obvious door. Al doesn't think there is enough room
in the building for there to be a hidden door or space. Gnik looks
around for other magical effects but doesn't find anything obvious.

The proprietor asks what they want; if they want to sell something
or buy something, let them know what it is, because he likes getting
to the point. Al says someone told them they might find her here, but
the proprietor says she is not there. Al shows him the Potion of
Blissful Pain to see if he wants to buy it. He says it sounds
interesting, but how does he know if that's really what it
does? He takes a look, consults a book, takes a sniff, and says
it looks legit. He offers 30 gold for it, and Gnik expresses that
it seems like a pretty good price.

Al says he would like something that would keep someone else from 
reading his mind. The proprietor laughts, then looks at him and
says, "Oh, you were serious." He says that may take a couple
days, and wants to know if he's looking for something short-term
or long-term. Al lets him know where they're staying so he can
contact them once he's found something. Al sells him the potion
and gives the money to Gnik for his spellbook fund.

Milena goes to Theron; they gather up several other priests and their
supporters and go to the underground lair, but it has been completely
cleared out -- the hole is still there, but the kiln, the altar, and
the blood are all gone and it appears someone went out of their way
to make this look like a completely disused space. Theron is disappointed
they were not able to disrupt the Sgult worshippers.

The group gathers back at the Last Resort, and Kat and Al practice
hand-to-hand sparring, then they head to the restaurant.

It turns out to be a good-sized place, and a dwarf greets them as
part of Captain Roberts's party and ushers them to a side room
where Marcus greets them; he kisses Milena's hand and Kat rolls
her eyes. They join him and he asks what they are working on.
Milena says, "You asked what is a Replacer? It is a follower of
the one we don't talk about that can change its shape and read
minds." Roberts nods, though he calls it by a different name.

Al fills Marcus in on the plot to use the lens in the lighthouse
to create a mass insanity, and about Verlaine and the bricks. Marcus
says one of the council members went to the continent recently and
came back with candles that could be used ritually. He suggests they
should check on Verlaine after the dinner, who may be a target, and that
their group may be being set up to be framed for it. Kat asks if there
is a finish date for the lighthouse, and Marcus says the following week
on the 15th, the day after the big celebration. 

Kat asks Marcus if they should head out now to check on Verlaine,
but he says they should talk first. Al asks Milena if she can send
a Sending to Alen: Be wary: we have credible evidence of contract
on Verlaine's life. Keep him safe, and make sure we are not framed
if you can't. (He responds, "Thanks. Source of information?")

The group asks about what would happen if Drax were removed. "Are you
suggesting assassination?" Marcus asks. "'Suggest' is too strong a
word," Gnik says, and Milena nods. They note that if Drak is at the
lighthouse, or is framing them, he could be caught up in their efforts
to fix it. He says the city would be in upheaval, but his continued
rule is perhaps just as bad if not worse -- so they should do what they
need to do, and the city will take care of itself. 

There is a large buffet of delicious food, and Kat asks if she can
take a doggy bag -- she wants to avoid eating and drinking too much
immediately in case they get into a fight later.

Gnik asks Marcus if he can ask a bunch of random questions, and Marcus
says, "I would expect nothing less." Gnik asks if he knows Bernace,
and shows an image, and he says no, and that's concerning -- since he
knows a lot of people. He does recognize Ginny, and knows what Michel
looks like, as Michel is quite cozied up with Drak. Gnik asks if he
knows what Drak is doing with all the mithril, and he says he assumes
it has to do with the lighthouse. Gnik shows him the note from the
puzzlebox signed by MM and asks if he knows who that is. Marcus says
yes, and he even recognizes the handwriting -- Melkior Maeorgan, one
of Drak's lackeys. Gnik says the note led them to an island with a
temple to Sgult where they found ichor that could be used to make a
focus lens. 

Milena and Marcus discuss the fact that perhaps she should stick with
the group to go check on Verlaine, and they can get together again
later. "Yes," she says, "if we survive."

As they approach Verlaine's, they see that there is a guard leaning
up against a column in an unnatural way, and appears to be wearing
a tight necklace. Gnik sends Az up to look; the guard's throat has
been slit and he is tied to the column. Al, Kai, and Ember vault over
the wall and Al runs to the door. He sees it is ajar and shouts "The
door is open," trying to raise the alarm and rouse the house. Kat stays
outside the building and Kai circumnavigates it to see what else is
going on around the house. Milena moves to follow Al so that if they
find Verlaine in need of healing, or recently dead, she can do 
something about it. Gnik sends Az to stay with Milena.

Zassin sends the group an image of himself pressed against a window
where there is an ornate bed with two figures on the floor, one
on the bed, and a figure in shadow with two short-swords hiding
behind the door. Al sees a door cracked in the direction where Zassin
is, and slides into the room to be under the immediate reach of the
swordsperson. Kai finds a servants' entrance at the back; she and Ember
go in, and find that the servants, slumped at a table, are halflings,
and the servants' stairs are sized for them.

Kai suggests they find servants who are still
alive so that someone will know they are not the killers; so Gnik
decides to cast Detect Thoughts to find those still alive.


26 March 2022

Kat climbs the building to keep an eye out from the roof, and tells
Mouse to guard the front door and alert them of anyone approaching.

Kai runs up the servant stairs. When she gets to the top, she sees
three ladders leading up, and a small head with pointed ears --
probably a halfling -- looking down from the top. Kai whispers,
"We're trying to save Verlaine -- where is he?" The halfling points
at the door next to her and says, "Last door on the right." Kai
quietly slips through the door, leaving it ajar for Gnik and Ember
behind her.

A crossbow bolt comes flying at Kai; it misses and shatters on the
stone wall behind her.

Al kicks and slides his way into the room, while Zassin sends cartoon
imagery of the fight. The person hiding behind the door slashes at
him with a short sword, but he parries; he tries to pin the blade
but she manages to pull it away. From behind him, he hears a crossbow
go off, but Al spins, grabs it from midair, and throws it at the
archer. The opponent throws aside the crossbow and draws shortswords.
Al hits the woman and stuns her, then kicks through the door into the
second opponent, but is not able to stun them.

Milena makes it to the door; she sees that Verlaine is lying motionless
on the bed, and Alen and two more guards are on the floor. She sees the
stunned foe and casts Guiding Bolt at her.

Gnik and Ember make it to the top of the servant stairs; Gnik sees the
hiding servant and whispers, "You may already know this, but the house
is under attack -- stay hidden." The servant nods.

Kat runs along the peak of the roof, keeping an eye on the back while
Mouse keeps an eye on the front. She asks Zassin to help keep an eye
on the side for anyone entering or exiting.

Boris charges into the bedroom, grabs the stunned foe's leg and pulls
her to the ground, then sinks his teeth into her shoulder. Kai runs
down the hall and into the room, sees Boris attacking the assassin
on the floor, and tries to take her out. She hits twice, but the
woman still seems to be breathing. The foe in front of Al disengages,
throws one of their swords at the window to break it, and runs to try
to dive out.

Ember steps into the hall and a crossbow bolt comes out and hits her.
Gnik sees a second one flying at her, but it misses as she doubles
over. She rushes the door and busts through it to take on the two
foes.

Zassin sends an image to Kat of a black goopy thing flying out the
window and landing on the ground. She looks down in time to see
the assassin starting to head away.

Al attacks the remaining foe in the room, still stunned on the ground.
They visibly pass out, and Boris lets go, but keeps growling at them.
Al goes to check Verlaine and sees that he, and others in the room,
have the group's weapons sticking in them -- cleearly meant to frame
them.

Milena asks into the farspeakers, "I can only Revivify one -- Verlaine
or Alen?" Both Gnik and Kai immediately answer, "Alen." Al has found
that Verlaine is clearly dead, and not very recently. Milena goes to
Alen and sees that he is still alive, barely, as is another guard, so
she casts a Prayer of Healing on both of them. They come to, confused.

Gnik has Detected Thoughts on the two crossbow foes, and casts a Mind
Spike on one of them.

Kat runs to the edge of the roof and sees Az come flying out the
window after the fleeing assassin. She leaps off the roof, trying
to land on the foe. She slams them in the back and then leaps off
them. They fall on their face as she lands next to them.

Boris looks at Milena, and she sends him to help with the fight
against the two crossbow wielders Ember is facing. Kai also heads
that way and busts through the door. They are a man and a woman,
and Gnik lets her know through the farspeaker that the woman is
Mind Spiked and might lead them back to the assassin's lair if
she gets away, so Kai attacks the man. Ember is engaging with the
woman, bouncing all over the place to avoid the woman's blows. Kai
sees Ember glance back at Gnik like, "Are we really gonna let her
go?" Gnik responds, "We don't HAVE to...." but she attacks the
man, a halfling, and just attacks the woman with her off hand.

Al sees that everyone in the room is fully dead or recently healed,
so he goes diving out the window after the fleeing assassin. He
sees the man get up, run, and make it up to the top of the wall
around the property. Al considers throwing a net or rope, but
the range is too far -- so he just tries to run and catch up.

Gnik tries casting Telekinetic Trip on the halfling -- the only
spell he can cast that doesn't break his concentration on the Mind
Spike -- and the halfling falls over. Ember, Kai, and Boris all look
at each other, bemused. Then Boris, sensing the others want this one
down, jumps in to bite at him and then steps back so others have room
to attack. Kai brings her sword down, crushing his left knee, and he
passes out. Kai turns and swings at the woman, trying to at least give
the impression they're not just letting her go.

Kat tries throwing a Chaos Bolt at the fleeing assassin; it transforms
into a lightning bolt and slams into him. She sees that Al has caught
up with the assassin and figures he has the situation well in hand,
so she climbs back up the wall to check on her mother. She tells Mouse
to help Al, and Mouse goes running back to the entrance to go to the
outside of the wall and get him as he comes down.

The assassin fighting Kai throws her sword at the window and leaps;
Kat hears the shattering glass just as she is climbing into the
next window. The assassin on the wall leaps off and runs at full
speed. Ember runs to the window, flings a dagger at the fleeing woman,
and sinks it into her shoulder. The woman sees what's happening on
the wall and heads in a different direction.

Al speeds to get in front of the fleeing man, and has they try to
disengage, Az divebombs them to give Al advantage. Al hits, and is
able to parry two return blows. Mouse comes running up and knocks
the foe prone. Al says, "Maybe you should surrender now," but the
assassin doesn't respond, so he tries again, more hesitantly, in
Tillian. Al hits again, and the man looks like he is barely holding
on, but he does a flip to get up on his feet. Al tries again: "There's
no honor in dying," he says. "Like your dog?" the man replies, and
stabs Mouse in the shoulder. Mouse growls, grabs his ankle, throws him
on the ground, and he passes out. Mouse growls, and then looks at Al
and whimpers, obviously very hurt. Al lets Milena know in the farspeaker
that there is a dog that needs help. Milena asks if the dog is still
alive, and he says yes. She and Kat make their way down to Mouse. They
gather up everyone who needs healing -- Mouse, Ember, Alen, and the
other guard -- and casts another Prayer of Healing.

Kat searches the body of the now-dead assassin who attacked Mouse,
and find daggers, a fourth sword, a thieves' kit, and empty loops
that probably held other daggers and an axe, but nothing identifying.

Al has noticed a freshly-written note on Verlaine's desk, signed by
Verlaine, declaring their group deputies to investigate the Temple
of Alsaya for their role with the Sgult cult, and mentioning that
the Sea Lord's Guard has been given authority for an assault on the
Temple once sufficient evidence has been found. Alen looks at the
note and declares it bullshit, in that Verlaine would never have paid
attention to such things. The group suspects this might have been
meant to cast suspicion on the library at the exclusion of other
organizations.

Ember and Kai search the rest of the estate and in the basement
find a crate with items from the underground Sgult lair. Kai looks
and see that some bricks look less worn than others. Kai looks at
Ember and says, "What would Kat do?" so they look for loose bricks.
They find one, with a lever behind it. "Hey, that worked! Kai says,
and pulls it -- and feels a needle behind it, sticking into her
finger. "Ow... ow...." ... and then a section of the wall pops out.
"Should we...?" she asks Ember. "Maybe we should wait for the others?"
So they alert the rest of them on the farspeakers. Al asks Alen if
he wants to come. He frowns and says, "YES."

Gnik concentrates on tracking the remaining assassin and finds that
she has holed up in a safehouse -- a tiny room with a cot. They decide
to send Zassin to watch the house and let them know if she leaves, or
anyone else arrives.

The group goes to investigate the secret tunnel and finds that it
looks very recent, and not like it has been carved. Al has heard of
creatures that could reshape stone by touch, and this seems consistent
with that. Gnik notices human-like teeth-marks, but other places without
such marks, and thinks it might have come from a Gibbering Mouth, which
can warp reality to change the properties of the earth around them,
sometimes getting people stuck in it.

The tunnel slopes downward into a storage room, and further on they
see the back side of another secret door, which leads into the sewers
-- which is likely how the serpent-folk are getting around. Gnik puts
on the Arcanus glasses but doesn't find anything of note.

Alen notes the whole thing feels like a set-up, including the crates
in the basement with a single brick and items from the Sgult temple
-- not even in the secret room. The group wonders if originally the
plan was to throw Verlaine under suspicion, but when they started
interfering they hatched a new plan to implicate the Temple of
Alsaya. Milena suggests they could just be trying to create so much
confusion that no one is sure where to look until it is too late.

They decide to heal one of the unconscious and dying assassins to
interrogate. Gnik casts Detect Thoughts, Al uses his Insight, and
Kat and Kai play good cop/bad cop. Kai starts by asking, in her
most intimidating voice, with her dagger out, who hired them to
kill Verlaine. Gnik senses top-level thoughts of rain on the
street, a squeaking wagon wheel, and other images from around
town -- clearly they are well-trained to resist. It is clear that
he is scared, but more afraid of his boss than of them. Kat tells
him that if he tells them what they want to know, they will let him
go. Al says, "That may not be what he wants," and Kat says, "Well,
there may be more than one way to let him go...." The man says,
"Promise to burn my body," and Milena immediately and emphatically
answers, "Yes."

They ask who hired him, and he answers:
"The Unspeakable One. The order hired me. I don't know a name --
our organization was hired." He describes receiving his orders in
a sealed scroll case, and that he only knows his group of four. Milena
asks if one of them left the letter on the desk, and he says he did,
but was given the wording to use. Gnik infers that the assassins belong
to a cult that worships an aspect of death.

When they are done speaking with him, Kai slits his throat -- he
maintains eye contact the whole time -- and then they burn the
body, with Milena using the Sacred Flame cantrip until it is nothing
but bones, which Gnik puts into the airforge.

Since she did not have to Revivify anyone, she has enough spell energy
to cast another Sending to Marcus: "Verlaine's dead. Alen's alive. We
are fine. Continue date?" He sends back, "Fuck. Who's Alen? Yes,
definitely, meet me at...." and gives her an address.

Gnik sends a note to Thuron with Az letting him know about what
happened, and the letter. Thuron sends back a note thanking him and
saying that through research in the library they have learned that if
the Sgult ritual is started, the only way it can be stopped is with
an artifact of similar mass from another god, like Sil. Kat recalls
that they have a large Egg of Sil in the hold of the ship that she
only barely resisted breaking open out of curiosity, and mentions
maybe they should bring it with them just in case.



9 April 2022

10 Sinta 3275

In the morning, the whole group gets a message in the Farspeaker from
Laur asking if they know a couple of people named Saske and Royne --
and Al answers yes, we met them yesterday, and they're going to escort
Candace back to the mainland for justice. He responds that they have
come to the ship, and he'll turn Candace over, as soon as he can convince
Chastity.

The group meets for breakfast; before Milena has arrived, a man and
woman arrive and head their way; Kat recognizes their attire as looking
very Bargallian. The woman introduces herself and the man with her
as Norina and Ilkun Klavdiy, and ask if Milena is with them. Kat says
she is indisposed at the moment, and Norina says they are from a village
near Milena's and have a small colony nearby -- in a rough part of town,
the Bloodsalts -- who are ready to help if needed. The group discusses
whether to visit today, but decides that perhaps they shouldn't go looking
for trouble before making a visit to the lighthouse. Al asks how they
might find them tomorrow, and Norina gives a place where they might
ask for them. Kat says they will let her mother know they stopped by
and will plan to call on them within the next day or so.

Milena chats with Marcus; he asks for news of Saltmarsh, and she shares
the recent changes on the Council, including a lizardfolk representative
and one appointed by Anlim. He opines that Anlim is most likely trying
to consolidate control, and lets her know that if there are problems
he may have agents who can help. She asks if he knows anyone who might
be interested in stepping up to lead Raging Hammer; he looks surprised
and asks if this is something that is likely to happen soon. She says
it might; the group was concerned about his role in the slave trade,
but also are aware that agents of the Sea Witch seem to want him
removed as well, and leaving a power vacuum doesn't always work out
the way one prefers. He says he will see what he can figure out.

Al buys a drink and starts chatting up Norina. She explains that
her village was under the same rule as Milena's, and was wiped out
when the ruler claimed he needed to flush out a traitor. She makes
reference to her family not being as important or powerful as Milena's,
and Kat gives her a bemused look, which Norina doesn't notice. Ilkun
looks toward the entrance just as a hush settles over the room,
and Captain Roberts and Milena come walking in. Kai and Al hear
Ilkun mutter a word, and ask Kat what it means -- "the cape", which
Milena is wearing.

Norina excitedly introduces herself to Milena like she's greeting
a famous person. They chat a bit, and Ilkun asks where she got the
Firebird cloak. She tells the story of taking it from someone who
had stolen it from a refugee on a ship, but that when she visits
their colony they can discuss the best use for it. He says she found
it and so has a right to it, but they can discuss.

Kat wonders aloud if the colony of Bargallians might be moved to
a slightly better part of town -- or, Al adds, Seaton. "If only
you knew someone with a whole fleet of pirate ships," Marcus says,
and winks at Milena. They wonder about moving the group into the
range of Auntie Treeshadow, but Milena notes that if there is
anyone who could thrive as a neighbor to Auntie Treeshadow, it
is a bunch of Bargallians.

Gnik shows Marcus the symbol from the ring they haven't been
able to identify, and Marcus smacks Gnik's hand so hard it
does damage, then says, "Jakin, I need a drink." He says it is
the symbol of a group called the "Crossed Five" -- five families
who secretly control Anlim, and who will assasinate anyone who
finds out about them. As Marcus leaves, they see him stop to speak
with Jakin and pass him a small bag.

Angel -- or at least the person claiming to be Angel -- comes down
the stairs to chat with them about the map to the Raging Hammer
headquarters. Since they are aware that a shapeshifter like her
would be able to read their thoughts, they plan to focus on
trying to catch her in a lie without thinking too hard about
the correct answer. She talks them through the details of a map
she claims to have drawn, but those who have seen her handwriting
before know that this was written by someone else. They also,
however, get the impression that she knows they're aware she
is not who she claims to be, but doesn't care as long as she can
still get them to do what she wants.

Milena gets a message from Zassin about seeing the assassin leave
the safehouse and head to a bakery where she is serving people --
her day job. The group considers going to pay her a visit, but
decides at least to wait until they have visited the lighthouse.

After sunset, they set out to swim to the lighthouse -- except for Kai,
who uses the boots to fly -- about a half-mile from shore. The tower
is covered with bamboo scaffolding so it is hard to get a good view of
it, but it is made of white marble and is about 200 feet tall. There
are open archways to the interior starting about 20 feet up, with a
ledge sticking out beneath them to make it hard to climb from the
outside. At the top is something that looks like a giant crystal,
which is probably where the light comes out. They walk around and
see that the four sides are identical, with a large door in the
center of each. Kat approaches the door facing away from Freeport
and checks it for locks and traps. It is covered with canvas,
perhaps to protect it until the unveiling. Al peeks behind the
tarp and sees that the door is well-polished smooth stone. Kat
tries the door, and it starts swinging easily. Gnik has Az fly
up to look into the arches above; there is faint flickering light
reflecting off them from some light source inside. She sees four
fire pits with a couple of people around them. The group decides
perhaps they should climb the scaffolding instead. Gnik agrees,
as long as someone carries him; "I'll do it," says Ember with
a twinkle in her eye. Kat offers to slip in the door stealthily,
since she has confidence she can do it without being seen.

Kai uses her boots to fly up to look through the archway on
the western side of the building, and sees a total of four
people around the fires. She comes back down and picks up
Gnik, who can't climb safely. Kat slips forward to listen
to the guards; they wear Verlaine's symbol on their armor
and are speculating whether they will still be paid now that
he's dead. Kat decides to try to slip up the central spiral
staircase without them noticing. She makes it up easily; Kai,
with Gnik, flies up silently in the darkness to the ceiling,
where the guards won't be able to see them through the smoke
from the fires, and joins Kat. The others climb up the
scaffolding on the outside to the next level.

Ember and Milena look into a room on the southwest side that
holds four pillars around a 20-foot statue of the goddess Alyddia
holding a spear; the walls are decorated with symbols of combat.
Al looks into a room on the southeast side holding a statue of Nolan
with a trident, and a basin of water. Those on the staircase have
arrived at a door; Gnik offers to try to Detect Thoughts to see
if anyone is nearby, but Kat tells him not to waste the spell.

Milena decides to circumnavigate the building to look in the
other windows on this level using the convenient ledge under
the windows. There are still areas of construction where the
exterior is not yet fully smoothed. They see Kat entering a
large room on the north (Freeport-facing) side where there is
a golden alter, behind which two people are talking. There are
statues of Nolan in the corners, with people working on the
bases of the statues. Kat slips in and hides behind a pillar,
and once she is settled, Kai and Gnik plan to fly in and up to
the ceiling, figuring the people in the room are unlikely to look
up. Kat slips into the room with the Alyddia statue, while Kai
and Gnik try to listen to conversations in the room. When they
realize they will almost certainly be seen if they actually try
to slip in, they fly back out to come in through one of the
windows of the other two rooms.

Milena, with Ember, climbs up about halfway to the top and Milena
tries casting Clairvoyance inside the tower. It is pitch black.

Al explores the room with the basin and finds a perfect crack
on the wall closest to the Alyddia statue. Kat sees a similar
crack on her side, and begins trying to figure out how to open
it. Al tries checking for traps, but doesn't see anything but a
smooth wall. Al suggests to Kat that maybe they should try pushing
at the same time; Kat is skeptical, but tries it. Nothing happens.
Al goes to look at the statue of Nolan and sees a weird crack in
the wrist. He prays to Nolan for guidance, then tries to shake the
statue's hand. The whole wrist rotates, and he hears a click, then
a faint grinding sound in the wall where the door was; he finds he
can now push it open. "Hey, I'm inside," he says; it's too dark
for Az, who unlike Al does not have a personal light source, so
Gnik sends her to keep an eye on the people in the larger room.

Kat examines the Alyddia statue and finds she also can rotate the
wrist; the secret door in her room also opens, and inside the
secret space between the rooms a wall opens up to reveal a hidden
staircase going up.


16 April 2022

Kat and Al close the hidden panels and go up the stairs; they
find a trap door from the spiral stairs into a large room with
nine columns supporting the 20-foot ceiling. Kat holds the trap
door open so that Kai and Gnik can join them, and Kai lights her
sword dimly so she can see. They hear a cacophany of voices in
their minds, most clearly saying "YOU DO NOT BELONG HERE," but
also nonsensical phrases; and see scenes from their dreams and
their lives. The light flickers, and a hole appears in the wall
below where Milena is. Near one of the columns a figure appears
wearing an orange robe with the hood pulled down over its face
and its arms folded inside the sleeves.

Kat charges the figure and attacks with her rapier using the
Booming Blade effect and the necrotic drain. She gets the impression
the blade is unimpressed with this foe and wants more to feed on. It
feels insubstantial, and when she pulls out the blade an orange-yellow
goop comes pouring out of the wound. She triggers the interdimensional
lock so it cannot move away into another dimension and steps away and
hides behind a nearby pillar.

Al hears a glooping sound in the corner; as he moves toward it, he
sees something amorphous pouring from the base of the pillar; as he
gets closer he sees that it is full of eyes and mouths -- the creature
that can chew through and shape stone. He runs forward to try to punch
it, as it pulls itself back preparing to attack.

The robed creature pulls its hand out of its sleeve -- it appears to
be made of worms -- and gestures at Gnik, saying in their minds, "YOU
ARE BOTHERSOME." A wave of energy mixed with rain and snow rushes toward
him and he disappears.

Milena switches from looking through her Clarivoyance spell to listening,
but also hears nothing. She climbs down to the opening below her, sees
the blob Al is fighting, and casts Spiritual Weapon. Ember also climbs
down and runs in to join the fray. The robed worm creature waves at
the the ground and black tentacles spring up, grabbing at Kat and Kai,
but they avoid its grasp.

Kai goes into a rage and runs at the worm creature. As her strikes
tear through the robe, she sees that its body is made completely of
worms and goop. It pulls its arms in, and there is a green flicker
around it; it looks around -- it tried to teleport, but was held by
Kat's anchoring effect. Al asks Az, "Where's Gnik?" She responds, "Don't
know, and don't want to think about it!" which suggests he is no longer
on this plane.

The gibbering mouther splats out from the pillar onto the ground, and
the stone around Al starts to feel weirdly ripply and soft. Its mouths
start gibbering and it bites at Al with a pseudopod filled with eyes
and mouths, but he is able to parry. One of the mouths spits out a
glob of something that lands next to Al and explodes in green light;
he's able to avert his gaze before he is blinded.

Kat throws a cantrip at the worm creature, and its sleeve catches on
fire; it takes a moment to beat out the flames. Al punches the blob
again and manages to stun it.

The worm creature moves to put itself in line with Kai, Kat, and
Ember, and throws a spell that looks like a tear in reality rushing
toward them. They all manage to jump (or in Kat's case, parkour)
away from it, but still take some force damage as it passes; they
can feel pieces of their flesh burning off or just disappearing.

Milena wields her spiritual weapon against the blob and then hits
the worm creature with Guiding Bolt. Ember runs at the worm creature
and does a lot of damage, but looks worried at the damage it has been
doing in return. It claps its hands soundlessly and Kat, Kai, and Ember
are enclosed in a globe of darkness, in which they can hear strange
slurping sounds. Al yells out, "Kai, Kat, Ember, are you in that darkness
in the corner?" In response, he hears Ember cursing. The air around them
gets very cold, to the point that they begin getting frostbite.

Kai flails out at it in the darkness with a reckless attack, and feels
her weapon connect with something. Kat uses the pillar she's hiding
behind to orient herself and move out of the blob of darkness; she
staggers as she comes out. She tries throwing a chaos bolt at the
worm creature, and hits it with acid damage, then hides behind another
pillar.

Al hits the blob again and re-stuns it, then punches it twice more;
gore splatters all over the area. Kai feels something brush up against
the back of her legs, but jumps forward before it does anything. Then
she feels something rip into her in seven places. Milena steps into
the room to cast Bless on her teammates, then hits the blob again with
her spiritual weapon.

Inside the darkness, the group hears Ember attack, and then scream.
Al asks, "Ember, are you ok?" and she yells back through gritted
teeth, "Define ok. I'm still here." Another line of reality-tearing
energy comes surging out of the darkness toward Kat and Al, but they
both dodge; however, Kat falls to the ground unconscious; but the
wave also hits the gibbering mouther, which falls apart into a pile
of goop.

Kai hits the worm creature, and it falls apart. The darkness
vanishes, and the hole in the wall closes up behind Milena. Gnik
reappears, with his clothes torn in a few places and covered in
goop. He blinks, steps forward, and vomits up everything he has
eaten all day.

Al runs to Kat and pours his healing potion from Agnes down her throat.
She regains consciousness, sputtering and coughing, with a taste in her
mouth of wet dog. "Thank you, I think?" she says to Al. "Thank Agnes,
who saw the eventuality of this need," says Al. "Why am I not surprised?"
says Kat.

Milena gathers the group and spends ten minutes on a prayer of healing;
Kai and Ember are not completely healed, but feel much better. Kat
checks the pillars to see if they hide a way up; after some inspection,
the group finds that the pillar next to the gibbering mouther had an
opening with a hinge that allowed the creature to hide inside it. In
the opposite corner the pillar has a hidden door and an eyehole covered
with scrim disguised to look like stone. Kat opens the secret door, and
there is a ladder going up. After a brief discussion, the group decides
to climb up rather than waiting to take a rest.

Kat examines the trapdoor at the top and stealthily opens it. With her
darkvision she sees a nearby pillar, and stairs leading up. She holds
the door open for the others. When they get a light source going,
they see that the stairs spiral up around the four sides of the
tower, with each set going up about nine feet.

Kai decides to use the boots of flying to go up to the top, and Kat
hangs onto her to hitch a ride. At the top there is another trap door
in the ceiling. Al starts walking up the stairs, with the others
following behind, but Gnik moving very slowly. Kai drops Kat off to
start checking for traps, and then comes back to collect Gnik.

The trapdoor has a locking mechanism; Kat checks it for traps, and Gnik
uses a Detect Magic. He says that it looks a lot like what was on the
chests that caused Kat to die temporarily. After some discussion, they
ask Gnik if he could cast a Dispel Magic on it; he tries it, and it
seems to work, so Kat works on the lock. It is a very complex lock,
close to the most complicated she has ever seen; it takes her several
minutes, but then it pops open.

Kat peeks in and sees several living things, only one of which is
not translucent and glowing blue -- ethereal and invisible. There is
a large, pure hollowed-out crystal at the top of the chamber with
a diagonal mirror beneath it on gears so that it can be moved around.
There is a space the right shape and size for the stolen lens, but they
cannot see whether it is actually there. Kat sees the doubles of Gnik
and Ember, a human man standing with them, and three dark ghostly shapes
flying around. There is a table and chairs that also appears to be in the
ethereal plane.

Kat quietly lowers the trapdoor and relays the situation to the rest.
They realize that they cannot actually hit ethereal beings. Kat sees
a vision of a coin and a chess piece clicking together -- she gets the
sense that both Ag and Zagrimil want to talk to her. While the rest of
the group talks, she pulls out her chess piece and Ag shows her a vision
of a grey-skinned grotesque creature attempting to teleport, and its
foe, a purple-skinned elf, saying, "Oh, hell no," and then casting a
spell that anchors it back to reality. Having seen it, she thinks she
could repeat it -- although she might not be able to control it. She
shares with the group what she has learned, and that she thinks Zagrimil
also wants to talk with her. They seem skeptical, but she wants to see
what he has to say. He asks how things are going, and she says, "Oh,
unicorns and rainbows. You know how things are going." He offers that
he could help anchor those ethereal beings, or destroy the lens. Kat
says they would probably need more help destroying the lens, and he
says he could do that, but he would need to touch it. She asks if that
is something he would want to do anyway, or would he want some sort of
payment. He says she would owe him a week of service, doing nothing she
would not ordinarily do, after her 30th birthday. She tells him she'll
get back to him.

Kat takes Al's potion of Heroism ("That's two potions I've given you
today," says Al) and Milena casts Bless on the others. They plan that
Kat will try to anchor them and then Al will run in and try to stun
as many foes as possible, starting with Gnik and then Ember.

Kat holds onto the chesspiece, says a prayer to Ag: "Yeah... here
we go... hope this actually works...." and throws open the trapdoor
as she pictures the spell she wants to cast. She feels the energy
flow through her and blast out of her, as the chesspiece in her hand
turns to dust. Their foes fall into solidity and look around with
surprise -- all excecpt the human -- and then the enemy-Gnik begins
screaming and glowing as he channels positive energy from Ag, doing
damage to himself and the other undead in the room -- everyone but
the human guy.

Ember runs in and throws a Thunderstone, which blinds and deafens the
enemy-Gnik, then moves next to enemy-Ember. Kai takes a potion of
firebreath and targets the enemy-Ember, then runs up into the midst
of the enemy gnomes to attack. The human guy holds his hands up and
says, "Whoa, I'm just here for a conversation," disengages, and
takes a couple steps back. Kai notices that the chest that held
the lens is on the other side of the pedestal in the center of the
room.

Al leaps over the pedestal acrobatically, lands between Kai and
Ember, and throws an attack at enemy-Ember, but is not able to
stun her. Milena moves to the top of the ladder and tosses Nash
into the room, then casts Sacred Flame. Nash bounds into the
room, grabs enemy-Ember by the head, and slams her onto the ground,
where she crumbles to dust. Milena aims her cantrip at enemy-Gnik,
who is still blinded and so takes it straight to the face.

Zassin asks if he can go bother cutie-guy. "I don't trust him,"
says Zassin, and goes to hang on the wall next to the guy, where
they have a little conversation to distract each other.

Kat uses a firebolt cantrip against one of the wraiths, then
hides again; enemy-Gnik continues to do damage against them
and himself from the positive energy of Ag's spell. Ember attacks
the same wraith. They wonder whether to attack enemy-Gnik next,
and through the farspeaker Gnik says, "YES," so Kai attacks
enemy-Gnik. She pushes him back and then brings her sword straight
down on his head, cleaving it in half, and then breathes fire on
the injured wraith. It does not seem to take as much damage as she
would have expected, but the fire does hurt it.

Al attacks the injured wraith; it doesn't quite fall, so he hits
it again with his off hand, and it shatters and dissipates into
nothingness. The two remaining wraiths look at each other, take
off in different directions, and flee through the walls.

The guy says, "Well, that was pretty entertaining. You all are
impressive!" Kai turns to him with her sword up, eagle-eyed and
with smoke coming out of her mouth, and says, "WHO ARE YOU?" and
Al attempts to sense his motive. He introduces himself as Korrin,
says he was roaming the ethereal and saw them somewhere he wasn't
expecting, so he went to check them out. Milena asks what gods he
reveres, if any, and he says none, although he generally was not
in favor of killing people. Al asks where he is from, and he says
Nexus, and has the ability to go into and out of the ethereal at
will, which he proceeds to demonstrate. He had gone to Jaeleth
from Nexus, then come to Maerson through the ethereal. Kai says
they were working to stop Sgult's followers from causing death and
madness of a lot of people, and Al asks if he could help destroy
the artifact. Korrin asks what it is and what he would get out of
it, and Kai says, "We're done bargaining if your response to helping
keep innocent people from dying is 'What's in it for me?'" He nods,
says, "Well, it was nice to meet you," and then pops back into the
ethereal.


4 June 2022

The group discusses how to use Sil's Gift to destroy the lens. It is
made of crystal, and Gnik's Identify on it just revealed that it was
an ancient relic and a source of power -- but no information on how
to activate it.

Kat sees a spot in the air start glowing, with the same blue glow
she sees when detecting invisibility. Gnik suggests that someone
is probably spying on them. Kai asks if someone can dispel it, and
Gnik suggests that whoever is spying would just re-cast it.

The trapdoor into the room rattles, so Kai asks Nash to sit on
it. They consider having one of them try to sit on it to attempt
to hatch it. Milena observes that she is the only one who has
ever gestated anything, so if they are going to try that maybe
she should be the one. She tries shining a light from her continual
light torch through it to see if it makes any interesting patterns;
it does seem to amplify the light as it goes through. It does not
seem to make any interesting resonances when struck with a fingernail.

A part of the wall seems to ripple and tear open into a 10-foot wide
circle they can see through to one level below with the spiral staircase.
Gnik tells Kai to stay by the trapdoor, as no one is coming through the
portal. A voice they don't recognize says, "I just wanted to talk, but
now I can tell you I'm not inviting you to the ball." They suspect it
is the Sea-Lord Drak.

The two wraiths that fled the previous battle come back through the walls;
one flies at Gnik and the other at Kai but don't manage to make contact.
Milena casts Sacred Flame at the one coming at Gnik, and tells Nash to
stay on the trapdoor but grab any that come by. Zassin distracts the
other one to help give Kai and Ember advantage.

A bunch of priests come running toward the portal, so Gnik attempts
to Dispel Magic as the first ones come through. It ripples shut and
they see the first two get thrown backward into the room below.

Kat shoots a force bolt through the wraith near Kai, and then Al closes
with it and attacks, hitting it three times. Kai suggests Ember go help Gnik,
and she is on the way to do so when there is a huge explosion... under
Nash's butt. She is not happy about it -- it knocks her up and over,
and the door beneath her is shattered.

Ember takes a running leap from the platform she was on, and flies over
Gnik's head as she slashes the wraith. Kai goes into rage mode and cleaves
through the wraith, obliterating it into nothingness. She moves toward the
trapdoor and Gnik tells her not to get too close. He asks Az to look down
through the trapdoor; she sees a ship's sail hovering in midair, with three
people standing on it rising toward the hatch, but about 50 feet below it.
One of them calls up, "It would be nice to just have a pleasant conversation
with you...." while another just looks pissed off and the third, a serpent-like
being in robes, appears to be casting a spell. Below are guards and cultists
on the stairs, running back up. Gnik watches through Az's eyes, waiting for
the "sail" to get within 20 feet of the trapdoor so he can cover the bottom
part of the hatch, the top of the cloth, and anchor the cloth to a wall,
if possible.

While he is concentrating, the remaining wraith attacks him. He keeps
his concentration, but his flesh near the wound goes black with necrotic
damage. Zassin flies over to help Ember with the wraith and gets a bite
in on the way, and Nash lumbers up, bites into it, and tears it to pieces,
spitting out the final wisps.

As the flying carpet reaches the target area, two of the riders try to
hop off onto the staircase just as Gnik's spell goes off. The hatch fills
with web, and Drak says, "Really? You came all this way to talk to us
and now all you want to do is violence?" Kai says they didn't come to
talk, they came to save the city. "Freeport?" Drak says, "have you seen
that city? Why do you think it's worth saving?" "I'm not engaging in
this conversation," Kai says.

Kai throws the Star of Jaeleth at one of the guys in the web -- the one
who looks pissed off. It slams into his right wrist and explodes, setting
the web on fire. The guards and cultists on the stairs look at Drak, who
says, "Hold up...." He appears to be casting some kind of spell, which
Gnik successfully counterspells; he recognizes it as Dimension Door. He
sees Drak reach for a huge maul on his back that appears to be covered
with eyeballs.

Al whips a rope through the hatch to entangle Drak, then tries to hand
off the rope to Kai. Ember runs to the hatch and gets off two quick shots
at him, which seem to be tearing at a protective shield around him; she
sees the arrows tear at areas of blackness around him. Kai throws her
chain javelin and then helps Al hold the rope. The javelin completely
pierces and dissipates the black shield, and sticks into Drak, drawing
blood. The second javelin sinks into his shoulder; he looks disappointed.
Gnik casts a Telekinetic Trip at one of the guards at the top of the stairs,
who suddenly falls a long, long way.

Knowing now how the egg amplifies energy, Milena picks it up, with her
holy symbol in one hand pressed against it, and attempts to channel
divinity through it, focused on the lens. Colored lights sream in from
the walls through her, and a green light comes from the egg and through
Milena, and all the energy is directed through the egg to the lens in
a beam that starts disintegrating it. A sickly orange light comes from
it, and then there is a huge explosion. When the dust settles there is
a 10-foot wide crater; the lens, case, and egg are gone without a trace;
and Milena is standing there unharmed. A ring of light continues spreading
out, passing through the others, who feel strangely calmed by it, except
for Nash, who perks up and says, "Where'd he go?"

...And then the light moves down the hatch, and the people below disintegrate
as it passes through them... and keeps going... all the way to the bottom of
the tower, and perhaps beyond. The "sail" begins fluttering to the ground,
so Al jumps down through the hatch onto it. Milena continues praying, as
she feels she has some thank yous to share.

Gnik shares with the group where he went when he disappeared, which seems
to be some sort of hell dimension.

The group agrees they all need a rest, and realize that the tower now
feels cleansed and much safer than it did before. Milena casts Prayer
of Healing, and Nash responds by licking her face. The group takes a
long rest.


11 Sinta 3275

The sunrise looks quite beautiful through the crystal at the top of
the tower. Al experiments with the sailcloth and while flying down
the stairs finds that though the people on the stairs below were
destroyed, their things were left behind. Mostly this includes
coins; they did have at least a couple of things that were
soul-bonded, including Drak's mace, which exploded when he died.

Kat mentally maps out the space to see if there are more hidden
rooms, stairs, or compartments, but they have already found them.

The group heads back toward the inn for breakfast, but on the way Gnik
uses Detect Object on Marcus's sword to locate him on his ship, the Black
Dragon. They go to his ship, with Al, Kat, Milena, and Ember on the flying
sail, and Kai carrying Gnik with her flying boots. The crew look surprised
and prepare for an attack until one of them recognizes "the Saltmarsh
folks". Marcus comes out to greet them and says, "This seems ominous,"
and invites them into a private room to talk, where he mentions their
flying sail looks familiar, which also seems ominous, and does it mean
what he thinks it means? "We asked the gods for help--" Milena begins,
and everyone gives her a significant look. "-- *I* asked the gods for
help to destroy the Lens of Evil, and they did, but they had additional
agenda." He asks if that's what all those lights were that came from the
tower and spread through the town, and says there have been reports of
disappearances and people disintegrating, mostly known cultists. He says
he now has a lot of people to talk to; the group tells him to reach out
if he needs them.

They return to the inn for breakfast. Jakin gives them all free breakfast
-- he seems to be in a very good mood -- and copies of today's Shipping
News, and tells Kat that Marcus sent something for her -- and points
outside to a pony. "I said I wanted a pony and he got me a pony," she says,
amused and maybe a little chagrined. "Am I going to be able to take it
on the ship?"

The group goes to touch base with Bridget again, who shares that Marcus
is the spymaster for the faction of the Freeport government that actually
cares about the people, which is why he has so many contacts.


11 June 2022

Al asks Milena to send a message to his mother via Sending:

Message from Al: 
Defeated hags and Sgult worshippers.
Opposing slavers. Helping refugees.
Found treasure. Played with a dragon!
Hope you are well. How are you? 

She responds, Good to hear... This is weird... We are well.... How are you?

The group discusses how to spend their day, including whether to engage
with Michel and whether to call out the Replacer pretending to be Angel
so they can all be straight with one another about their goals. They
decide to talk to her, and head over to chat with her in the inn dining
room. They let her know that they know she's a Replacer -- "Yeah, I know,"
she replies -- and ask what she's hoping to gain from Michel's death. She
says he is being controlled by a hag -- Auntie Treeshadow -- whom they
also oppose. They tell her that they would prefer she didn't come along
with them, and after some discussion she finally sighs, "Fine -- just go
kill him already."

Gnik opines as they take their leave, "I'm not sure how I feel about
all this killing," and Kat replies, "Remember, some people just need
killin'. I'm going to put that on a cross-stitch to hang in the
Tiny Hut."

After some discussion, the group decides against sailing up the coast,
as it would be too easy to see them coming, so plans instead to use
their flying sail to go into the woods near the Raging Hammer camp and
spy from there, as Kai has eagle eyes that can see up to a mile away.

After watching the camp for a while, and discussing whether they want
to go in through the top of the large central tree -- where Al thinks
Michel is probably holed up -- or through the caves in the cliff face
at the beach that lead to their prison, they decide to wait until
nightfall and sneak in through the caves at high tide.

They swim into the cave under a bright moon; they can see where a
ship would dock on the right, and a platform on the left where someone
might stand to keep watch. They send Kat and Zassin to sneak ahead out
of the water to get the lay of the land. She sees someone standing on
the observation platform staring toward the cave opening, and hears
voices from further into the cave. She sneaks into a passage behind
where a ship would unload and finds what looks like a storage area
with no obvious exits.

She hears a voice muttering up ahead of her, griping about something.
He is sitting on a crate whittling on a piece of wood, across from
a door. She suggests the rest of the group come up and join her. After
some advice from Kai, and with Gnik making a distracting sound in the
opposite direction, she sneaks up behind the guard and tries to knock
him out with a blow to the head. The blade suggests to her that it could
draw some life energy from him to help knock him out, and she agrees;
dark energy flows from him, and the man falls over. Kai ties him up and
gags him, and hides him in the storage room.

They sneak ahead and listen at the door across from where the guard was
sitting, and hear snoring. Kat opens the door, and there is immediately
the stench of people who have been in one place for far too long. There
are two cells, each holding one person. The one at the far end is chained
in manacles attached to a chain pounded into the ground, and a muzzle
clasped around her mouth and wrapped around her horns. The person in the
other cell looks like a human female.

Kai walks toward the far cell and the tiefling wakes up and looks at
her. Kai tells her they aren't with the pirates, and asks if she is,
or if she's a slave. She shrugs. Kai says, "They're trying to make you
a slave?" She bobs her head in a "sort of..." gesture. Kai asks, "If
we free you, will you make trouble?" She nods. "For them, though, not
for us," Kai says. They use the key to open the bars, the shackles, and
the muzzle. The tiefling says she doesn't know how long she has been
there, as she doesn't see the sun very often. She is covered with scars.

Kat goes to free the human woman and asks if she can cast Fireball. She
says no, she is better with a blade. The tiefling volunteers that she
can cast Fireball, and introduces herself as Mercy. The woman is Dorgenian
and introduces herself as Londa. Mercy says she knows her way around the
camp, as they take her out from time to time to help destroy things. "What
things?" Kai asks. "Oh, ships, people... it's fun," she says. She doesn't
know where Michel sleeps. Al has trouble getting a read on Mercy, but can
tell Londa just wants to get out of here and seems to be exactly as she
presents herself. They give her the unconscious guard's sword and dagger,
and then lock the guard into one of the cells. Mercy doesn't know of a
way up into the tree from the caves, because she was never taken into
the tree; they just put her on ships or pulled her up to the ground
above the cave on the lift.

Kat continues to scout down the hall beyond the brig. She finds wide
stairs that lead up to the viewing platform, and a small hallway that
opens into a room where a Jhoynian woman and Dorgenian man are sharpening
weapons and chatting. She slips up the stairs to make sure there are no
other passages leading from them.

At the top of the stairs she sees there are camp-like living quarters
behind the platform, and the shape of the room moves away from the
tree. The group decides they should try using the sail to fly up through
the shaft of the people-lift.

While they wait for Kat to come back, Al asks Londa her story. She has
trouble keeping her voice down without being reminded, but shares that
she joined Raging Hammer because she had no other options; made some
negative comments about the group that got back to Michel, who told her
she needed to spend the night in a cell; and it's now been several days
and she doesn't know what will happen now.

Londa shares information about the other members of the camp, which includes
Bernace -- the woman who approached them to ask them to help Bridget do
what she needs to do. They infer that Bernace is an agent of Auntie
Treeshadow, since "what Bridget needs to do" is take out the Sea Witch.

Milena asks Londa if the others in the camp are loyal to Michel, or just
loyal to the group. Londa says Rich is loyal to the land -- he seems to
be a druid or similar -- and has concerns that Bernace may have been a
harmful influence on Michel, who he thinks has changed in the last few
years. 

Kat, Kai, and Gnik hear a sound -- Mercy has moved to the door and says,
"I'm getting bored." The group decides to sneak over to the people-lift,
and Kai flies up with her boots to try to see where it comes out. The
sail would have trouble fitting due to the rope hanging down the middle.
However, Kat could just climb the rope, and Kai could probably carry each
of the others up. Kai asks Mercy if she could get herself quietly up the
lift. The walls have enough hand-holds that the humans can climb up
easily; the tiefling is not very strong, but they get a rope around
her and help her up; and Kai carries Gnik up.

The building at the top of the lift is not inhabited; they peek out and
hear soft snoring coming from the directon of the tree. Mercy asks if
she can wreak havoc now; the group tells her she can take out Malsar,
whom she doesn't like, and then Bernace, but she should try not to
hurt the tree. The rest of the group moves toward the door into the
tree. They hear a large explosion from the direction of Malsar's quarters.

They consider crossing over to a neighboring treehouse to talk to Rick,
but decide to continue upward toward Michel's quarters. Kat is the
first to reach the top of the stair; she sees a shape moving ahead
of her that appears to be seven or eight feet tall. She immediately
hides in the shadows; it looked like a massive human-like being
created out of stitched-together flesh. She recalls that the group
researched flesh golems and learn they are very susceptible to fire,
but lightning makes them stronger. Kat hears another massive creature
and a third, human-sized person moving around the tree. She asks Zassin
to tell Mercy that lightning is bad against these things, but fire is
good.

The group infers that Michel was the third person moving around the top
of the tree; they see two women running toward Malsar's place, which
looks like it has been struck by lightning and then hit with a fireball.
Kat and Al move around the tree toward the man they think is Michel.


25 June 2022

As Milena and Gnik make their way up the tree bringing up the rear,
they hear a female voice ask in a whisper, "So what's the plan?" Gnik
turns around and asks if they've been introduced, and she says she is
Kath -- who Angel had told them was the bartender. Gnik says, "We're
trying not to burn down the tree, or hurt anyone too much who is not
working for a hag." "Hmm, good plan," she says, and goes back down
the tree.

Kat closes half the distance to Michel and tries to hit him with a
crossbow bolt, but as she does the dark-haired woman with him yells
a warning. Michel makes a gesture and one of his flesh golems leans
in and takes the hit. Al sprints forward between the two golems and
attempts to entangle Michel in a rope, but is unsuccessful.

Ember runs up next to Kat, points and says, "Michel, right?" and
then sticks him with two arrows. Al, Ember, and Kat see the dark-haired
woman fall off the tree, and Kat immediately forgets that she had been
there. Al feels a tickle in his brain that wanted to erase her from his
memory; he knows she was there but can't remember what she looked like.
He lets everyone know over the farspeaker. Malsar roars and runs at Al
with a rapier in her hand that seems to have appeared out of nowhere;
it is covered with burrs and a serrated edge. He sees a green glow in
her eyes and gets the idea that she can sense where he is dodging. She
strikes at him but he parries, blocking the blow and pinning the blade.
She lets go of it and takes a step back, glaring with a little bit of a
sneer. A number of vines come up to the platform Michel is on and grab
onto it; there is shouting and yelling from below.

Londa turns and yells, "Hey, Tony, you're gonna take a fall!",
clotheslines him against the tree, and drops him onto the roof below.
She looks at the next foe with a "come and get it" gesture.

Kai flies over and lands next to Michel. He smirks; "Kai, right?"
She says, "Michel, right?" She notices he has a pendant that has
fallen out of his collar: an eyeball in gold filligree that they
recognize as identical to the pendant that would let Auntie Treeshadow
see through the eye and telepathically bond with the wearer. She hits
him several times with her sword; he smirks and says, "Yep, that's about
what I expected...." He pulls out two daggers, one of which looks like
a bloodstained straight razor. He swings and she parries the first blow,
but the second gets through her defenses, cutting deep into her stomach;
it feels wrong, like it's tearing into her soul. He looks like he's
thinking of striking again with his off hand but disengages and runs
over to the vines to slide down them. Milena peeks around the tree,
sees him descending, and hits him with Guiding Bolt. She sees a Ponallian
man with long dark hair climbing the vines, looking very angry. "There's
a fire. In the tree. We had an agreement, man!" Michel slams into him
as he slides past.

A couple of flaming bolts come up from the ground, and one hits Malsar.
Gnik crosses through the inside of the tree and peeks out the door in
that direction. The golems swing at Al multiple times, but he dodges
them all. One of them takes two steps and jumps off the edge, and Al
punches it as it goes. The second one follows.

Kat dives onto the vines with Dark Kiss in her hand; she manages to
catch the vines with one hand and stabs at Michel and skewers him
as the impact of her fall bounces him off. He falls to the ground,
and the faint glow on him vanishes. From above her a voice says,
"Damn. That was pretty cool. Let me help you up," and the Ponallian
man offers her a hand up.

Al strikes again at Malsar; he misses with his first blow but connects
with the second and third, although he is unable to stun her. His fourth
blow does stun her.

Ember runs down the limb and drops onto one of the golems, tearing into
it with her rapier. Someone lands next to Kat on the vines, but she
doesn't register her as being important. Rich, the Ponallian, says, "It
probably doesn't matter now," and the woman says, "You're probably right,"
and drops off the vines. A bunch of pirates run over to where Michel landed;
he is not moving.

Kai looks at the stunned Malsar and calls down, "Hey, Mercy, do you want
her?" Mercy claps with glee, and Kai grabs her and flings her off the
platform. She runs to the edge of the platform and looks down the vines,
and flies down toward where the pirates are converging on Michel. She
sees the dark-haired woman take the pendant from Michel, put it on a
rock, and smash it with the hilt of her dagger; as had happened to Al,
the memory of her features immediately goes out of her head. The woman
looks up at Kai and Kai gives her a thumbs-up gesture; the woman does
not seem happy and says, "I don't think you understand what we're all
dealing with," and then turns and walks away. Kai calls after her, "You
could stay and explain it -- nobody ever talks about anything." She
keeps walking. Kai asks, "Is he dead?" just as Kath gets there, checks,
and nods. The ground nearby bubbles up with black goo, and Bernace
materializes. She surveys the situation, says, "I like both sides,"
and disappears again.

Milena sends Zassin to help Ember with the golems, and Milena moves
around the tree to put out the fire. Rich comes climbing up, introduces
himself, and says, "You're Al, right? Gotta go put out a fire." Gnik
sees what Milena is going to do and hands him the the marble of water,
which she flings against the roof of the burning building. Water cascades
over it, putting out the fire. "Nice!" calls Rich from below.

There's an explosive sound below as Mercy casts Thunderwave straight
down into the ground where Malsar landed. Gnik pulls out an Enthrall
candle, lights it, and yells, "Hey, look up here!" The golems swipe
at Ember but all four of their attacks miss. Kat can see them above
and knows that they have an aversion to fire, so she considers a
fireblot cantrip, but decides on a chaos bolt instead; she doesn't
hit with it, so she tries Reckless Dweomer. A dagger appears and
suddenly splits into dozens of spinning, whirling daggers where Ember
and the golems are and filling the space below, including where Michel
landed; if Michel weren't dead before, he is very dead now.

Al runs over to stand next to Ember and try to fight the golems. He
hits one of them several times, but it doesn't seem to care. Ember
jumps back out of the whirling daggers, pretty cut up but not lethally
so, and then dodges the blades to hit the other golem. Rich runs out
and uses some kind of spell effect on the fire; what little is still
burning collapses into a small ball and disappears.

The dark-haired woman comes walking back again, says something to Kath,
and the dark-haired woman says, "Raging Hammer, stand down -- time to
negotiate," in a booming voice that no one can miss... except the ones
who are enthralled. Their comrades shake them out of it so they can
gather to talk. Kai flies up to the platform with the golems and
slams one of them into the blades.

Rich asks Milena what her people want, and she says they were concerned
about Auntie Treeshadow's influence; he says they also had the same
concern. He looks below to where Mercy has just destroyed Malsar, and
says, "We don't feel too bad about Malsar, either...." Mercy looks up,
sees Az, says "Pretty!" and takes off running toward the northwest. Both
of the golems get quite shredded by the blades, and one of them roars
as if in rage and strikes at Al, hitting once, but he parries the second
blow; he considers pinning its arm but doesn't want to get pulled into
the wall of spinning blades. The other one strikes out at Kai and hits.

Kat runs across a rope bridge from the platform she's on to attack the
golem Al is facing. Al sees Kat run up in a blur behind it, the tip of
her blade comes through its neck, and it falls over. She strikes at the
other one with her dagger and hits. It roars and goes into a berserk rage,
and Al attacks it, hitting three times. Ember stabs it a couple more times
and it falls over in pieces. Gnik yells, "Kat, if the monsters are down,
STOP CONCENTRATING." Kat says, "What?" and the wall of blades disappears.

Kath and the dark-haired woman, who suddenly everyone can see and remember
just fine, are talking together on the ground, and invite the group back
to the bar to talk.

Gnik sends Az to track Mercy and sees her go to another hut and yell up,
"Bernace! Bernace, are you up there?" then shrugs, and hits it with
lightning bolts before running off farther onto the island. Rich hears
the sound and sends some people to cut the bridge to keep fire spreading
from there to the tree.

Kat decides to go check out Michel's house and invites Al to join her.
Gnik returns to his body and casts Locate Object to find the missing
pieces of the chest, which he sees immediately are in Michel's quarters.
He starts to head that way but thinks maybe someone should check for traps
first, so waits for Kat. When she gets there, Gnik asks her to check for
traps and a woman's voice says, "Oh, just come on in." It is the
dark-haired woman, who has no problems letting them look around. She
was Michel's bodyguard, but did not like how things had been going with
him over the last few years as he fell under Auntie Treeshadow's influence.
She introduces herself as Shirley. Kat asks what will happen with Raging
Hammer, and Shirley says the captains would need to talk about it; if
no one steps up with the skill to lead the whole group, they might just
go their separate ways. Al says they might know people who know people
who would be interested.

Gnik puts on his arcana glasses and sees an interesting magical item on
the shelf that looks like a dinghy in a bottle. He also notices Shirley
has a small amulet on her necklace that glows strongly with magic, and
her dagger glows weakly as well. Al asks how she does the thing that
makes people forget you, and she ignores the question and says, "Who
wants drinks?"

Kai and Milena walk with Kath toward the bar, and she offers them the
straight razor. They head on to the bar.

Gnik Identifies several items they find; the razor has a once per day
effect of necrotic damage that causes the victim and anyone who sees
it to be frightened. Malsar's sword causes an extra point of damage
at the start of each turn until the victim makes a save. The bottle,
when broken, releases the contents, which become full-sized: a rowboat,
rope, cask of water. Bernace's quarters contain six nesting hens with
eyes, beaks, and legs removed (although Milena immediately declares her
intentions to heal them) and several black eggs which Gnik identifies
as causing advantage on dexterity saves if it is cracked over someone,
or creating magical darkness if thrown.

Gnik asks Milena to Send a message to Fran: "Hello Fran, it's Gnik.
Can you send the puzzle pieces I gave you? Thanks." She immediately
gets a response: "Yes."


23 July 2022

The group talks with the remaining leaders of the Raging Hammer about
what happens next now that Michel is gone, and Gnik suggests, without
giving her name, that they should talk with Bridget, who has some shared
interests with them and a common foe.

Al asks if anyone there actually liked Bernace, as she's aligned with
someone we have concerns about. Shirly tosses him a note and says "This
should answer your question." It is a note from the druid Rich expressing
his concerns about Bernace based on his consultation with the spirits,
even though Michel had brought her in as a potential ally, and brings up
that she seems to have an aversion to seawater, which is why she never goes
anywhere by boat. Rich shares his notes that suggest that Bernace is not
human -- she is a centuries-old shapeshifting fae spirit from the Dreadwood
-- and the Ponallian spirits fear her. The group hypothesizes that Bernace
could herself be Auntie Treeshadow, if not her agent.

They discuss trying to find out more about the ultimate goals of Auntie
Treeshadow and the Sea Witch, and realize that that Bridget is the founder
and leader of the Sea's Watch and could probably tell them more. They
also discuss talking with the Bargallian refugees in Freeport to see if
they would like to try relocating to Seaton where there is more land.
They mention it to the Raging Hammer folks to see if they'd be willing
to provide ships to help the relocation, and Anch asks, "Are we getting
paid?" Shirly says, "We can work something out," and offers to go with
them to talk with the Bargallians.

Milena tries some magical healing on Bernace's chickens to see if it
will help at least remove some of the magical taint on them so they
could at least be used as stew chickens. It would take extraordinary
magic to heal them fully, as they are missing their eyes, beaks, and
legs.

Gnik sets up a Tiny Hut for them to sleep, and they discuss whether
an ethereal creature such as a hag might be able to get in -- and they
think one probably could.

Gnik assembles the puzzle pieces, which turn out to be a tiny chest
and a key. As soon as the key turns in the lock, it pops out to much
larger size, six feet wide, and when open it extends down farther
than its outside height, with a ladder going down. In its larger size
it weights exactly 100 pounds no matter what is in it. Turning the key
to the right again makes it small again, and turning to the left makes
it fall into its individual pieces again. The chest contains many things
including an anchor, a thin net made of something like thick spider's
webbing, a stone with mystic runes, a ship's figurehead leaning against
the wall, a large book, a large compass, a ship's wheel that Gnik believes
is part of a teleporting ship; a figurine of an albatross in flight; and
a nicely folded pile of red silk cloth that upon inspection appears to be
ship's sails.

Al has seen one of the mystic stones before -- it is a cleansing stone
which can remove all dirt and grime by touching it and speaking a word.
The anchor is an Anchor of Seafaring with a rope that will magically
lengthen with a word to go to the bottom of the ocean or its maximum
length of one mile, and will raise again with a word. If one is
attuned to the figurehead and says the command word "disaggregate
enigmatically", the ship will shrink, turn into a puzzle, and fall
into its component pieces in the hands of the person who commanded
it, with everyone on board safely deposited nearby. The net is only
usable underwater and can be commanded to shoot forward 30 feet; Al
claims it.


12 Sinta 3275

In the morning before the group heads out, Londa loudly thanks them
for their help and says she will be taking over leading the groups
formerly led by Malsar. Shirly comes to them looking very different,
telling them she never goes to Freeport in her usual persona. Milena
humanely kills the chickens after healing them to the point that they
would be safe to eat, planning to take them to the Bargallians. They
return to the ship and hand over many of the ship's items to Laur to
install on the ship, with notes about what they do.

They return to the inn to talk to Bridget. As they approach the inn,
everyone except Al notices two men talking, who glance at each other,
turn, and walk away as soon as they approach, as if they were waiting
for the group and then going to tell someone they'd arrived. When they
go into the inn, there is a special edition of the Shipping News
describing the results of the actions of the "Sea's Saviors" at the
lighthouse and the shakeup on the Captain's Council in the wake of
Drac's disappearance and that of others in the cult of the Unspeakable
One, as well as a note waiting for Al, from a pawn broker he spoke
with about an item to protect the mind, letting him know of an
archaeologist in the Twin Cities who had found a ring that might
do the trick.

Milena and Al go to talk to Bridget, letting her know about what happened
with Michel and that she might want to talk with the remaining Raging
Hammer captains about their common interests. She says to tell their
contact she will come down and have lunch with her. Al says the group
also wants to know more about what the Witch Queen is doing, but perhaps
they should wait until all the group is together to discuss that, so she
asks if they have plans for dinner. Milena says they will be going to talk
to the Bargallians, perhaps seeing if they are interested in relocating to
Seaton, where there might be more land as well as a need for hardy settlers.
She tells them that some of the Bargallians, a few dozen, follow someone
they call the Oracle in a cult-like fashion, and there has been some talk
in political circles wondering what she is trying to do.

Bridget comes down with Rachelle and the group introduces them to Shirly
(in the persona of "Dana"), then head to the Bloodsalts to visit the
Bargallians. They notice everyone is staring at them but also staying
out of their way. Norina and Ilkun are at the gate, and Norina says
brightly, "You did come!" Kai asks if they'd been waiting, and Ilkun
says "The Oracle said you would arrive." Al asks if they are followers,
and Norina says Ilkun is; the rest respect her for what she has done for
the community.

As they move through the area they see only 10% to 20% are human, with
many orcs, hobgoblins, and goblins, among others. There is a walled-off
area with orcs on the walls, and farther down a makeshift tent city
with an emblem on some flags like a bright red setting sun. Al asks
Norina about her background, including how long she has been here --
it has been a few years -- and that she handles animals and is a
beekeeper, and paints for fun. Ilkun says under his breath, "At least
you weren't a bricklayer" -- and Norina notes to the group that many
died in the building of the lighthouse over the last ten years.

Al asks what they should know about the Oracle before they meet
her. They share that she arrived in Freeport nine years ago with no
knowledge of where she came from. The commune of her followers is
called the Burning Horizon.

They ask her about a possible move to Seaton -- she sees that
it could be good for the people and for Seaton, but she would not go
with them because she cannot see anything past Freeport for herself.
Gnik shows an image of his friend Lyle and asks if she could see his
fate; her eyes roll back in her head for a moment, she mutters and
spits something out, and says, "He is dead, but you will talk to him."
Milena speaks with her in Bargallian, and her dialect is similar to
Milena's but she says she speaks many languages -- including Tillian,
when Al speaks to her. She does not revere any particular gods. Milena
gives her the chickens, and asks if there are any of her group who
need healing, and they see some are already gathered, as the Oracle
told them ahead of time to come, as well as those bearing broken things
because Gnik offers to fix them.


20 August 2022

Al asks Norina out and she is hesitant, but asks what he is thinking
of. He suggests a sunset stroll on the beach, and she arranges to meet
him at the Last Resort. She gives him a peck on the cheek and slips
a small piece of paper into his hand. As the group heads back to the
Last Resort, he looks at it and it asks if there is room on their ship
for her to come with them when they leave. He does not immediately share
this information with the group.

Dana/Shirley is no longer at the inn, so the group heads up to talk to
Bridget. Bridget thanks them for bringing Dana to talk with her, as it
will be useful, although she is not sure how yet. Milena mentions that
they suggested to the Bargallian refugees in the Bloodsalts that there
might be a better place for them in Seton, and their Oracle said she
would encourage them to go, though she cannot see her own future beyond
Freeport. Bridget asks if she should talk with this Oracle, and Kai
says it might be useful to Bridget just to understand more about her
and the Bargallians. Kai overhears the guard Rachel asking the other
guards just outside the door to find out about this Oracle and whether
there would be a way to have a secure conversation with her.

Al asks Bridget about how to defeat the Sea Witch. She says Eleanora
would know more, but she tells them the history she knows of the
situation: A sea hag found a source of power that is not mobile --
which is where she put her Hells Deep. A group of adventurers made it
their mission to take it out, but they never came back and she vanished.
The assumption is that they defeated her but were not able to make it out
-- and that was hundreds of years ago. Her m.o. was summoning hordes of
creatures and taking out a port town. The newer activities include
divinations that point back to that same location, and that the subtlety
and deception being seen now comes from the same location. So they are
calling it the "Sea Witch" though it's not clear if it is the same entity.
There was a legend that the adventuring group found items from the area
before they left -- Eleanora might know more. The new activity out of
Hell's Deep only became evident when Seton was overrun. 

Al asks Bridget what she knows about the Crossed Five. She asks what
it is, and he explains it is a secret organization that may seek to
control Anlin, but he was wondering if the group would be aligned with
or against the Sea Witch, as he's trying to figure out if they might
be allies against the Sea Witch, or Auntie Treeshadow.

Gnik shares the description of the Vile Fiends he found in one of his
books, and she says they have encountered several of them -- the Replacers
and the Feathered. She also says they know the approximate location of
Hell's Deep, which is on the other side of Till. Al mentions having seen
something in the Shipping News about the ruler of Fortek, "The Voice",
losing the faith of his people, and he wonders if that could be another
leader under the sway of the Sea Witch or Auntie Treeshadow -- but Bridget
shares that probably not, because The Voice is a lich. It is not a
well-known fact, but is known among local leaders.

Gnik offers to copy the book with the information about the Fiends;
Bridget takes a look and sees that it is not in a language she knows
-- because it is in Gellen. Gnik says it would take longer to translate,
as unlike copying, he can't do that magically. Kai notes that the librarian
could translate it.

Bridget gives them a rather cryptic note for them to give to Eleanora,
and explains that it will let Eleanora know that Bridget trusts them
completely and she should tell them everything.

As evening approaches, Al and Norina go to the beach; Al shares his
magic items with her that allow her to swim well and breathe underwater,
since he is already very comfortable in the water, and she has never been
in a large body of water. He brings out some of his water friends to play
with, which she very much enjoys. Then he asks her about her note, and
why she wants to leave. She shares that she wants to get out of Freeport
and is afraid Ilkun will not go to Seton. Al says he could still go with
the rest of the group, but she says she's ready to go now and could catch
up with the rest of her people in Seton later. Al asks about her skills
and ability to defend herself; she is an animal handler and trainer, and
though she isn't particularly skilled with a sword she is much better at
throwing things from a distance. Al says he will talk with the rest of
the crew.

Kai goes to a bar; the locals greet her and jokingly ask if she wants
to get arrested. She gets the impression that they don't want her to
get arrested, and certainly none of them want to do the arresting. She
goes to get a drink and Ilkun is at the bar. He asks when they are
leaving, and she asks if he's eager to have them gone. He says not
exactly, but he's afraid they are a bad influence who will break up
their clan. He is also worried about the Oracle without their
protection. Kai tells him a bit about Seton, that it is a place that
could use them, and may have opportunity for them, after being sacked.
He thinks about it, finishes his drink in a gulp, says something to
her in Bargallian, and departs.

Kat goes into town to shop for nice clothes, accompanied by Ember.
Milena sends a Sending to Marcus letting him know this will likely
be their last evening in Freeport, and he invites her to a late dinner.

Gnik goes to the library to find information; he asks Lucius and Elene if
they could find books with information about the Blood Tower, Martyr's
Rest -- including what it is named for -- and any books by someone named
Crystal. Thuron makes himself available to answer questions, and Gnik
tells him -- using an illusion to make an image of writing on a page so
he doesn't have to say anything out loud -- some of the information he
got from the book on the Vile Fiends. Thuron asks to borrow the book to
copy down the information. He gives sincere thanks to Gnik and his
group for everything they have done for Freeport. On the way out of
the library, Gnik runs into Annie and her ghostly little brother,
and thanks him for rescuing her and bringing her to Freeport. She
will be leaving Freeport in the morning for some opportunities, and
when he asks where, she says she probably shouldn't say. He tells
her not to do anything that would disrupt time and space, and she
says, "Oh, no, I looked at some books on Chronomancy, and that's
scary -- I wouldn't do any of THAT." She cheerfully bids him
farewell.

Al finds Kat on his way back to the inn and asks if she has any
objections to Norina coming with them, and she says it sounds fine
to her. He finds Kai back at the inn, who asks a few questions about
her motivations, asks if she's ever worked on a boat, and concludes,
"Eh, she's Bargallian, she'll figure it out." Gnik returns, and Al
asks if he has any concerns about it. "Is she going to cook?" he
asks with some concern, but doesn't have any concerns beyond that.


13 Sinta 3275

When Milena returns to the inn in the morning, Al asks if she has
any objections to Norina joining them. She asks if her people know,
because she does not want them to think the group has kidnapped her
or otherwise done harm that would bring a vendetta on them -- she
does not want bad blood. She wants to talk with Norina first to
make sure she knows what she is getting into, and to understand what
she thinks she is getting into -- and away from.

Kai returns early to the ship to look things over and help get ready
for departure and to check with Laur about bringing on a new hand.
When Milena arrives at the ship, Norina is there with a backpack and
a duffel that is squirming. Milena has a conversaton with her in Bargallian,
first asking what's in the bag -- it is a puppy and two chickens. The puppy
was a gift from a wealthy family whose dog she helped train, and then the
dog had puppies. Milena asks what she is hoping for, and what she is
leaving -- particularly trying to tell if she is escaping abuse. That is
not the case, she is just impatient to get away from her life in Freeport.
She interacts with Milena with a certain amount of reverence as befits
her status as an elder and the holder of the Firebird Cloak. Milena asks
if she told anyone she was leaving, as Milena would not want to bring
vendetta on them if they think Norina was kidnapped. Norina says she
left a note with the Oracle. Milena says they should introduce the
puppy to Boris and Mouse, so Norina pulls it out -- it has a few small
scrapes on it from being pecked by the chickens.



[Trip to the island to find the other dagger happens here]


Kat recalls Dany mentioning Agnes removing curses when her wild magic
goes awry, so asks if anyone can cast Remove Curse. Milena can, but
Gnik suggests they wait until they are back in Freeport to enhance
their reputation. Milena thinks this is wise, so waits until they
are in port, where the people seem very nervous about the change in
the sun. There is much exclaiming when she gestures and murmurs at
the sky and the sun comes back.

They warn the crew that a giant crab will be joining them. When Brigita
comes aboard, Jerry says, "Oh, look, now we have an armored spider,"
and Chastity is disappointed that it's not dinner. Norina is very familiar
with Raphael as head of the Bargallian pantheon, and enjoys Brigita's
hymns.

They put the figurehead on the ship holding the Raphael statue to shrink it
down and bring it with them. They decide to attach the figurehead to
it so that it will shrink down with everything on it into a miniature
puzzle ship, which they take back to Freeport. They sell the ship for
salvage and donate the statue of Raphael to the temple; Brigita goes
with it to be with her "people", who are only a little freaked out by
her. There are Raphael worshippers among the Bargallians, so Milena
suggests giving the altar of scrying (and the ring that goes with it)
to those who will be going to Seaton, because they will probably have
use of it -- particularly since the Oracle will not be with them.

The group decides to stop by Gonajibria to say hello to Agnes and Dany
on the way to Casadega.


15 Sinta 3275

About a day and a half into their trip, the wind has died down, but Kat
sees an area ahead in the water that is churning in a strange way with
a mix of colors -- greys and browns. When Kai sees it with her eagle
eyes, it looks like colored bubbles of many different sizes churning
in the water. Kat calls down to tell the rest about it. Al asks, "Kat,
did you do some spell around here when we were sailing by before?" Kat
makes a rude gesture at him.

As they approach, the churn seems to move to intercept them, and they
can make out rocks -- not bubbles -- of different sizes rolling on top
of each other. Gnik consults his book, but the only reference he finds
is that in some realms elements have intelligence, only they're not
intelligent. Kai is reminded that natural things where she is from
have spirits. Al thinks it looks like many individual entities all
trying to get on top of each other so they can get higher. He suspects
they want to climb onto the ship.

They decide Laur should use the wheel to jump ahead beyond the rock
mass, while the rest of them stay behind and then swim to catch up.
He says, "You mean I don't just get to leave you behind? Aw, man...."
They jump out and see the ship disappear; the water rushes into the
vacuum and shoots up, then they see the ship reappear in the distance
and a wide swath of water sprays out to get out of its way.

Kat uses her Tonges ability and Al uses the Pearl of Speech to try
to talk to the rock creatures. They hear many voices speaking a
guttural tongue mostly yelling "Float! Float! Float!" along with some
one-word phrases and curses as they slam into each other. Kat says,
"HELLO THE ROCKS!" in their tongue. They stop for an instant, and then
a pile of voices yells "WHAT? WHAT? WHAT?" Kat asks what they're doing,
and there is a cacophany of voices -- Kat and Al can make out some of
them saying that they were warm in the dry dark and then suddenly they
were wet and they want to get back to being dry. The group checks with Laur
on the farspeaker to find out where the nearest landmass is, and points
them in that direction. The rocks don't have a concept of "thank you"
but they seem happier to be moving in the right direction. Gnik gets
the impression after looking at them from the arcana glasses that they
are tiny rock elementals. Milena asks if Gnik would like to adopt one
of them -- and he thinks about it, but decides not to. They don't have
books.

After lunch, Gnik gathers the group in the ship's meeting room. He shares
information he got from Thuron, and reminds the group about the book they
found under the warehouse, which he has investigated further and has found
a coded message that the Gellans (Velosans) wanted to keep hidden: the
fiends called the Hagral can hear their names from any distance when they
are called by the names they call themselves: Koth (which he does not
say but creates an illusion in the air to spell out). He says he will
only be referring to the as Hagral or Vile Fiends. They believe they
were created by a being called K-Ooth who wanted to create more beings
like themselves, so created D'She and D'Lie; and no longer being the
same person after pouring out part of himself, renamed himself K'Jat.
Then they all wanted to make more beings like themselves so they created
the Koth. They used a powerful artefact to pull a portion of Jaelith off
to make a place for themselves to live, which is what we now call
Maerson. After that happened, D'She had a falling-out with the other
two and killed D'Lie. K'Jat, though immortal, was imprisoned and hidden
away from his people. Then a group came from Jaelith to imprison D'She,
and made a deal with the Vile Fiends to stay out of each other's business.
It is possible that K'Jat is the martyr for whom Martyr's Rest was named,
and is still imprisoned there. Al recalls that there was news of a stone
of power that disappeared, and he wonders if that could have been the
prison of the other one who may have gotten freed.

Kai says she had a conversation with Corey that morning, and he says
he was sent by the Crossed Five to find out whether they were working
with the Fiends or not. He has concluded they are not so he's willing
to talk to them. He believes it was the beings from Martyr's Rest who
were responsible for the invasion of Serin, and she got the impression
from him that they would be ok with things going back to the way they
were. The group decides to call him in to chat with him.

Corey refers to the Vile Fiends as the Newcomers, but mostly knows about
their actions back in Anlim rather than in this region, trying to influence
or replace various individuals in positions of power. He shares that the
goal of the Crossed Five is to get Anlim out of its current state of being
out of control -- both politically and economically. The Crossed Five have
been managing Anlim behind the scenes for centuries. He says that when
they get to Casadega he can try to get in touch with others of his
organization to exchange information. Gnik shares the information they've
learned about the Vile Fiends and Martyr's Rest, without sharing the
unspeakable names.

Kat asks if they're done, because she wants to go play with Norina's puppy.



16 Sinta 3275

As they come up on Gonajibria in the late afternoon, they can see,
first, that the clouds are cleared and they can see the whole spire;
and second, that there is an enormous gout of flame coming out of the
tower over halfway up. As they approach the town, they see two buildings
that look completely burned out, and a few others appear to have fire
damage. Laur is concerned that no ship is coming out to meet them and
guide them through the reefs.

When they drop anchor, they hear a bell tolling from the top of the
tower.


3 September 2022

They see someone coming out from the harbor in a rowboat; and with the
spyglass they see it is the harbormaster Greemus, and they hail him.
They see his leg is in a splint and he asks for some help up onto the
ship, so Kai flies down to retrieve him -- he is not a very big guy.

Kat asks what happened, and he says a bunch of pirates and knights
swarmed all over the town, and broke out the pirates they had previously
captured. Kat asks about the flame coming from the tower, and he says
he assumes Danae did it; she is the one who rang the bell to let him
know a ship was coming in. Milena asks where Agnes is; Greemus says she
is dead, killed by one of the pirates from the Stormdaughter's ship,
who attacked the night the group ambushed it and captured the Stormdaughter.

They bring the ship into port; Laur has the magic compass and is comparing
the information from it against the path they are shown.

The group flies up (on the sail and using their other flying items) to
visit Danae at the top of the tower. They see the flame on the way up --
it doesn't block the trail and seems to be coming straight out of the
stone. As they fly by Kevak's cabin they see what looks like the massive
corpse of some enormous, whale-sized creature that hit so hard when it
fell that it is unidentifiable. Some chunks have been cut out of it,
but it is now starting to stink. Higher up, there is a silvery pillar
of liquid just oscillating around. Gnik wonders what would happen if
he threw a pinch of the Dust of Dryness at it.

At the top, they see some work has been done to shore up some of the
structures. As they land, Danae comes running out of the taller tower,
smiling and clapping. Kat jumps off the sail and goes to give her a
big hug, but sees that her hair has gone black and there are black veins
at her hairline. Kat hesitates, Danae says, "Yeah, I know... it's fine!"
and then Kat hugs her anyway. They notice there is an area of brightness
around her, as if the colors are more intense within five feet of her.
Al asks what happened to her, and she says she doesn't know, she just
tried some things. Milena asks if she needs any curses removed, and she
says she doesn't think so...? She says that she accidentally saw the whole
history of the tower, but it was a lot so she could only really focus on
one thing, so she focused on the bells and now she knows how they work. She
rattles off the information to Gnik, and it matches what he knows. Milena
asks permission to look over her to make sure she's okay, and she agrees.
Milena finds no obvious damage.

They ask about the strange things they saw on the way up the tower. The
flame happened when she was trying to stop a wyvern coming at her, and
it worked... sort of. "It turns out wyvern meat is kind of tough, but
at least it was already cooked!" Milena offers advice on how to prepare
tough meat, while Kat stands behind her gesturing "noooo" at Danae. The
creature came from the sky when she was trying to pull something down
to stop a griffon, which did fly away -- but the stink is getting pretty
bad. They discuss some ways to get rid of the corpse.

Kat shares with Danae the information Agnes had told them about Danae
being a young hag, as well as about the two previous hags on the island
and Auntie Treeshadow. She has trouble processing the information, but
thanks them for telling her. Kat asks about Agnes's workshop, and Danae
says they went through it looking for all the healing to help after
the attack. She says they are welcome to go through what's left, since
the apothecary is now a public repository.

Milena and Al notice that something has shifted in the way Danae is
acting at the point Kat told her she was a hag. Al tries to draw her
out by asking how it is making her feel. She says, "I don't know...
something is wrong." Al wonders if maybe the knowledge that one is
a hag makes a change in them. Gnik consults Glee's book, which has
a line that says "Forgotten are forgotten because if they remember
then they remember that they were forgotten." Forgotten are those
who don't learn they are hags until after the normal age of
transformation, and in the meantime they continue to gain power
-- which if it is delayed long enough could cause them to become
the most powerful beings in existence, and if another hag finds
out about a Forgotten they would try to kill them immediately.

Kat draws Danae aside for a private conversation, telling her about
the hags Tami and Tracy, and that Kat eventually wants to kill Auntie
Treeshadow; Kat tells Danae that she would be an ally if Danae wants
to do that. Right now Danae is more concerned with protecting her
people and helping them rebuild.

The rest of the group heads back down the spire to try to help
with rebuilding and healing in the town. Gnik stops at the pillar
of liquid to try to identify it. His spell tells him it is an
alternate reality liquid mithril. When Az touches it and pulls
back, she has a thin layer of mithril on her talon which immediately
starts drying. Az scrapes most of it off, but then thinks, "Mithril
claws!" and sticks all her claws in to coat them. They realize one
could put a vessel in and pour out liquid to pour into molds before
it hardens, for example to make weapons or armor. They get word to
Danae that she has just created a mithril mine, and this will be
another way to bring resources to the island.

Kat and Danae compare notes about their wild magic. Danae shows a
few of the spells she's learned since they saw each other last. Kat
tells Danae that if she ever needs help and can get word to her,
she will come. Danae thinks, pulls out a lock of her own hair, ties
it in a little knot, and hands it to Kat. "Keep this -- I think
it will work longer this time." It allows Danae to talk to Kat
telepathically, although Kat can't talk back.

In town, they learn the innkeeper Klaado was killed and rather than
reopen the inn, his partner Rayba is planning to leave. They offer
her passage to Casadega if she wants it. They decide to stay a couple
of days to help with things the townspeople would have trouble doing
themselves, such as Gnik's help with Mending and Milena's healing.


17 Sinta 3275

In the evening, another ship arrives, badly damaged, carrying five
Tillians. They tell of massive tentacles attacking ships just north
of the island, perhaps 30 or 40 miles, and of seeing a ship adrift
with just one of its three masts still intact. The group realizes
that since it is on the main route to Gonajibria from the north,
it will keep the island for getting help and supplies. Al speaks
to the crew in Tillian and learns that they are trading, seeking
supplies and opportunities to help their people, who are refugees.
Al gives them names of a broker in Freeport as well as contacts
in Saltmarsh.


18 Sinta 3275

The group decides to go deal with the big tentacles. Laur and Jimsu
figure out where the wreckage of the three-masted ship would be based
on currents, so they head that way as a starting point. Kai flies
ahead to scout with her far vision, and Al gives her the conch shell
that will let her speak with swimming creatures underwater.

They find the ship, and from a distance they identify the Empress
of the Waves -- the ship that was stolen from Jennell with all
her fortune on it. Kai heads in the direction the boat drifted
from, and Al pulls out a sea friend from his bag of shells to
scout underwater. He pulls out Bounder, the giant seahorse, so Al
decides to go with him. The rest go to the ship. Looking at the
ship from a distance, it appears the damage is from many sources:
the hull appears to have gone onto a reef or run aground, and it
appears something came down hard on top of it. She also recognizes
a lot of storm damage. It is already riding low, and she guesses it
will go down within the next week or two.

Al swims up from below to see if there's anything on the underside
of it, but doesn't see anything that stands out. Gnik also swims
under to see where it is damaged, to see the extent of the damage
and to see if there are obvious places that could be repaired. He
puts on his glasses to see if there is a magic effect keeping it
afloat, and can detect a couple of sources of magic inside the
ship itself, but no effect on the ship itself. On the other side
of the hull there are a couple of large suckers stuck to the hull.
Al stays in the water to keep watch while the others explore the
derelict ship.

On the upper deck there is a significant tilt toward the port, and
there is a lot of creaking and grinding. There are two doors leading
to crew quarters and a grate that is rusted shut. Kat and Milena see
things moving in the shadows that look like spiders with fist-sized
bodies. Kat decides to go check out the aft door, and Gnik follows.
They notice bits of blood splattered on the deck here and there,
not especially fresh, but Kat draws her rapier just in case.

Milena drops a dog treat through the grate to see what happens. It
appears to bounce off something invisible, then something else,
then sticks in midair -- as if stuck in a filament of web that
she can't see. Five spiders -- by far not the only ones in the
space -- skitter up to check it out, but leave when they see it
is not live prey.

Kat opens the door and sees a large stone altar surrounded by human
skulls. There is an acrid smell in the air, and stairs descending
into the hold -- where she doesn't want to go, because of the
spiders. She and Gnik recognize the symbol in the center of the
altar as that of the goddess Leolth -- "The Spider" in Bargallian
lands.

They decide to go get the figurehead, which will both let them
salvage the ship and will immediately dispel the spiders. Kat plans
to be the one who activates the figurehead so that the spiders will
land near but not on her. They use the sail to bring it from the
Mighty Redemption, and Gnik uses a floating disc to hoist the front
up into position while Kai gets it mounted to the ship.

Kat goes to inspect the front door and sees some web around the
jamb. She bends down to try to slip a mirror under the door, and
the whole gap is filled with web. She is still very tempted to
look inside, but Milena reminds her they can inspect it after
they have gotten rid of the spiders.

They bring Laur over on the sail to give the command word, as he
is the one attuned to the figurehead. Milena activates the Cloak
of the Fire Bird to fly about 100 feet up but well away from the
sail. Kai and Az are flying a couple hundred feet up. Kat and Al
are in the water, but at a safe distance.

When the ship disappears, they see five giant spiders, four
giant wolf spiders, swarms of the fist-sized spiders, and two
three-armed, three-legged, three-eyed creatures with a huge mouth
full of teeth that takes up most of its face -- Al recognizes it
by description as a maw demon. They also see for a brief moment
something that looks like a huge blue and white spider that vanishes
as it hits the water -- Gnik recognizes it as a phase spider, which
just went into the ethereal, which means Kat can see it standing
there on the water. They also see a woman who looks human, as well
as four other humanoids with long fingers and tongues that Gnik
recognizes as ghasts.

The swarms of spiders try to climb on one another but are quickly
sinking. Al sees the demons, human, and ghasts start swimming. Milena
sees that while the woman's attire is tattered, she is definitely
a Bargallian.


1 October 2022

The Bargallian woman attempts to cast a couple of spells, but Gnik casts
Counterspell and they don't go off. The woman looks put out. Kat runs
on the water near where the phase spider is, so that she can hit it
with her rapier as soon as it pops out of the ethereal. Gnik casts Dawn
at the area where all the foes are; the Bargallian woman sees that he
is about to cast something, and ducks below the water. The blast hits
Kat as well, since she is near the spider, although she resists some
of the damage. Many of the already-drowning spiders are taken out, as
well as the giant wolf spider, but the other giant spiders are still
standing.

Milena asks the woman why she was in their friend's ship, and she answers
that she was stranded on an island and it washed up after hitting rocks.
Kai asks what she is doing with all those demons and ghasts, and she says
she needed something to hunt for her, and Leolth provided.

The phase spider tries to move behind Kat, but she turns to follow it. It
leans this way and that, surprised she can see it, then moves straight
over her, leaves the ethereal, and drops on her. She attacks with her
rapier, which suggests she pull some of the spider's essence to feed it,
which she does. She also activates the Booming Blade effect. It is still
falling toward her, but she ducks and rolls away as it bites at her. It
tries to flicker into the ethereal, but it is held by the blade's effects.
It sinks into the water and begins getting torched by the Dawn spell. It
tries to move away, which triggers the Booming effect, and it explodes.

Milena casts Guiding Bolt at one of the ghasts, which is underwater. She
can see it glittering as the spell hits. Al pulls another friend out of
his bag and gets Gina the giant octopus, whom he sends to attack one of
the maw demons. She pulls one out of the cylinder of light, bites it with
her beak, and cuts one of its arms off.

Laur asks over the farspeaker, "So are we killing this woman or not?"
Kai answers that she is inclined not to, yet; Milena just says, "No."
Laur has a crossbow and takes a shot at the glittering ghast, after Al
suggests that if the weapon is not magical it probably won't affect the
maw demons. He gets two shots off, hitting both times, with the second
one in the back of the skull, and it stops moving. Several more spiders
succumb to the continuing Dawn effect.

The three remaining ghasts swim toward the group, although they don't move
very quickly; one moves toward Bounder, one toward Ember, and one toward Al. 
However, two of them succumb to the Dawn effect before they can escape it.
The remaining one moves toward Ember, but Bounder swims toward it, slams
into it, and caves its skull in.

Kat surveys her possible opponents, decides not to kill the Bargallian
because her mom said not to, and releases her Waterwalk effect so she
can go after one of the maw demons. Her sword, which was created by a
devil -- and therefore hates demons -- is in favor of this plan. She
goes for the one Gina hurt, and again activates Booming Blade when she
hits it. She hits it between the eyes and draws the blade down through
its mouth. She sees a dark swirl as the blade steals its life energy;
the demon seems to fade in color and then begins sinking. Kat is surprised,
because usually when a demon is defeated it returns to its own plane.

The Bargallian woman yells, "I just want to get out of here!" There is
a loud crack, and a line comes out of the sky and hits her between the
shoulderblades -- web-like -- and pulls her up and out of sight probably
faster than is strictly healthy.

Gnik moves the Dawn effect to follow the one remaining maw demon, and
then attacks it with his psychic helm, but only does a small amount of
damage. Kai moves to it and slices it in half; the body immediately
starts boiling away. She moves out of the Dawn effect.

They consider what to do about the remaining drowning spiders and giant
spiders, which some of the group would prefer not to just let drown. Gnik
uses Shape Water to make two five-foot cubes of solid water to see if the
spiders will crawl on them. One of the wolf spiders gets on top of one,
and one of the giant spiders gets on top of the other, and many of the
small spiders swarm on top of them. Laur checks his compass and is surprised
to see something demarcated with a dashed line; he doesn't know what that
means, since there are other line styles for ports and reefs. Al and Milena
go that way to scout, while Kai, Kat, and Gina push the ice cubes. Gnik adds
a web between them to help scoop up more of the small spiders, which latch
onto the web and then climb to the cubes.

From the air, Milena sees a very small oval-ish land mass, rocky with
shrubs and a few trees on top. Underwater, Al sees that it is floating,
and there are tentacles and a large beak on one end of the oval, kind
of like Gina's. Over the farspeaker, Al says "Stop stop STOP STOPSTOPSTOP!
This is the thing that has been attacking ships!" The group realizes that
the reports of ships being attacked did not include any mention of a small
island nearby. Al realizes he can talk with it using his conch shell, so
he swims up to it, starting just out of what he thinks is its tentacle
range. Kai stops pushing ice and flies up to monitor the situation from
a mile away with her hawk eyes.

"Hello amazing sea creature!" Al says nervously. An enormous eye opens
up, and its head emerges around its beak. Al hears a voice conveying,
"Whut?" Al says, "We're trying to save some creatures and we were wondering
if they could live on your back, or if you could take them to another place."
"Yes," it says slowly. "My name is Al," Al says, "what's your name?" He
answers, "Coloss." Al asks where it's from, and it says it doesn't remember.
It asks what kind of creatures, and Al says spiders. "I will try to find them
a home quickly, then." Milena suggests he ask about what has been attacking
ships. "Ah. The dull one," it says, with a tone that sounds like a sigh.
Al asks if Coloss would mind if they hurt the dull one, or at least stop
it from hurting ships. Coloss offers to send them there now -- which Kai
is in favor of, as she took a strength potion she hasn't really had a
chance to use yet. He asks if they can breathe underwater and says he
will have to bring them into his tentacles. Milena quenches the Fire Bird
cloak, and the other gather to Coloss. He takes each of them gently into
a tentacle; there is a slight glow and a sensation of comfort. Then there
is a loud crack and they are suddenly in cold, dark water with a lot of
pressure -- they are deep underwater. Coloss is not with them.


15 October 2022

As their eyes adjust to the murk, they see that they are near a crevasse,
about 60 feet wide, filled with ruined ships of all descriptions, including
a circular ship, all well-scavenged and with barnacles attached. A slight
sheen is visible between a couple of ships.

They hear a rumble and some of the sheen seems to slide as if something
moved. In their minds they hear a sense of annoyance and frustration,
not so much language as feelings, followed by a loud "Why?" Al says,
"We seek to stop the attacking of ships."  "Why?" "To save the people
on board." "Did the senile one send you?" Kat says, "Maybe...?" and Al
asks if he is also an island. The being says it feels like an island,
as the world is much smaller now, since this rock was ripped from his
world and made its own land. They ask why it has started attacking
ships, and it says that it was asleep, and sometimes it gets bored.
The group quietly discusses whether to try to fight it, with Kai
expressing that someone needs to take it out, Kat thinking they
can't defeat it, and Gnik and Milena expressing that there is not
enough information.

Kat hears it ask, "I wonder what that metal does," and she asks, mentally,
"What metal?" "The long thin strip at your side." She says "I'm not sure
you want to find out."

Al senses that the mental voice is getting more annoyed, grumpy that it
has been woken up. Milena suggests they swim for the nearby ridge, that
might be an island, and starts swimming -- until Kat says she thinks
she saw something move along the wall.

Al pulls out his statue of Anny and tells her where they are. "Why
are you there?!" she asks, and he says that an intelligent island
sent them there. She says they will soon be running into her people,
and they should tell them that Zynesua will want to talk to them. Al
and Kat suggest they should head straight across to the ridge rather
than at an angle. Kai plans to go to the surface and get the lay of
the land -- if there is any land.

The group hears a voice call out in elvish, which Kat and Gnik understand,
saying, "What are you doing here and why are you disturbing it?" Al
replies, "We didn't mean to... Zy... Zy... Milena, what was that name?
...Zynesua will want to see us." A couple of sea-elves emerge from the
murk; one is male and tattooed, the other female, both well-muscled. They
ask their names, which the group shares, and how they came to be there.
"An intelligent island sent us," Al says, and the woman starts laughing.
Her crossbow stops pointing at them. The man still regards them sternly
and asks why he should believe them. Al repeats that Zynesua will want
to see them, and he asks how they know that name. He shares that his
friend Anny told him to say that. The guards relax a bit, introduce
themselves as Luana and Angmar, and share that
they are part of a group that watches the sleeping beast, which has
been slumbering for at least the last decade, and it is bad that it
has awakened. Gnik shares that they were sent here because of tentacles
attacking ships, but the guards say it could not be this beast. Milena
suggests that if the beast communicates with its mind, perhaps it could
do other things with its mind and perhaps the tentacles were the living
dream of a bored creature.

Kai reaches the surface, sees no land but two huge dolphins, one of
which heads toward her. She breaks the surface and continues flying
upward thanks to her boots; the dolphin also breaks the surface,
leaps, and chitters at her, but she can't understand. She sees a
couple of small islands, but nothing distinctive.

The dolphins go to the group below and the guards tell them to grab
on to their fins. Al asks if they can be brought back to the same
spot, since their ship knows where to find them. Luana says she will
be staying and will be on the lookout for any ship, and they can be
brought back there. Angmar grabs a dorsal fin, Al collects Bounder
and Gina, and the rest also grab on.

They find it is surprisingly easy to hold on, and that the dolphins
are sending you wordless thoughts of greeting and pleasure at being
able to help.

They approach an area where the rock face has crumbled, and sand is
pouring down; the piles of rocks below include well-hidden openings.
The dolphins slow down to release their passengers and a dozen more
elves come out wielding crossbows. Angmar tells a couple of them to
go catch up with Luana, and they grab the dolphins and disappear. He
enters one of the stone buildings and returns with a small, slim-looking
elf; he is graceful and flawless-looking. "Angmar says you just showed
up, and something sent you?" Al explains what happens. The elf invites
them in and introduces himself as Kirsh. Milena shares that the creature
in the crevasse expressed a desire to return to where it came from so
it wouldn't be as bored, and asks if he knows where it is from. Gnik
says it is from Jaeleth, and talks about what he knows of that story.

He offers them food -- mostly raw fish wrapped in seaweed -- and as
they chat they notice he is friendly but easily distracted. They discuss
sea elf culture -- Al has a lot of questions -- as well as what they
know of the creature they have been guarding. They learn that when it
last awoke it attacked their village, physically rather than telepathically,
and its motivations seem consistent with being bored. Al asks if they
have a way to communicate with other settlements of sea elves, to find
out more about what has been attacking the ships -- Kirsh and Angmar
speculate that some large octopodes could do it, and say they will
look into it. Al asks about Zynesua, and learns that she is Anny's
mother, who is over 1000 years old.

Milena asks some general questions about happenings in the area to see
if they intersect with things they've been following up on. She shares
a bit about Auntie Treeshadow, and they say they have not dealt with
land hags, but occasionally have to deal with sea hags." Kai takes the
opportunity to say they recently heard a story of sea hags at a place
called Martyr's Rest, and asks if he knows about it.

"Ah, yes, the Imprisoned Tower. I don't know much about it myself,
but I understand there has been activity there recently and some have
been sent there to investigate." Kai asks how a tower could be imprisoned,
and Kirsh says he doesn't know; another elf speaks up and says he heard it
was imprisoned in crystal. Kat starts up a game of three dragon ante, just
for fun. She also flirts with Kirsh, who is very receptive to flirting.

Before settling down for a night's rest, Milena sends a Sending to the
Bargallian Leolth worshipper:

Apologies - my friends get twitchy around fiends. We saved all
the spiders we could. If we meet in person again, I buy you a drink.

She responds with a traditional Bargallian greeting along the lines of
greetings and we will talk later, sister -- Maryna.


29 October 2022

19 Sinta 3275

In the night each of the group has strange dreams that seem to come from
the tentacled being Coloss called "the dull one". Milena wakes to find Gnik
already awake and looking to take notes about his dream. She asks, "Did you
also have a dream sending from the ancient one?" "Oh. OH! Is that why it
had more than two arms?" The others wake up and Al says, "Guys, we're in
trouble!"

Kat wakes up with Kirsh, and Angmar comes by and says she should get back
to her friends -- some of their patrols have gone missing. He offers her
a kit that they send with their patrols, with a weapon made of sharpened
shells joined by a cord, and a set of chews that last for a minute each
and grant a particular attribute (speed, reason, agility, might, wisdom).
As she moves through the protected village, she sees a huge school of
fish off to her left that suddenly scatters in all directions -- and
behind them, something that looks like a four-legged creature with
multiple joints in its long legs. Kat moves toward it and realizes it
is an elf woman whose limbs and neck have been broken. It is Luanna,
who she first met with Angmar. She shows Angmar, and they both freak
out -- Kat says, "No. No, no. We have to go find my friends." She
manages to persuade him to move away, dragging him if she has to, so
Luanna is no longer in their line of sight. She calls out on the
farspeakers to ask if anyone else is awake. Ember and Kai also had
dreams of varying levels of threat from the ancient creature; Gnik's
dream was less threatening, but involved a forest gnome with multiple
arms offering him a puppy and books.

Kai exits the rock hut where they've been sleeping. She can see Kat
and Angmar approaching, and can see a crystal pillar at the other
side of the settlement. She does not see any other ocean life, unlike
before they went to bed.

There is a flash of light near the crystal, and it goes out as a deafening
crash emanates through the water. Gnik looks up and sees that the sandfall
is no longer blocked by the bubble shield -- the crystal provided the
shield.

Gnik says, "I need you to protect me for ten minutes," and swims toward
the broken stone. Milena, Al, and Kat -- with Angmar -- go with him,
while Kai swims for the surface. Al pulls out a friend from his bag
and gets a male reef shark, whom he asks to protect Gnik.

Kai looks out from her higher vantage point and sees that the crystal
is completely crushed -- at the largest, she can see a couple of shards
less than a couple feet long. She also sees five sea-elves on the ground,
and three very large mast-sized logs on the ground next to each other
near where the crystal was. She relates this through the farspeaker.

The group is about halfway to the crystal when they hear in their
minds a cacophany of words and emotions asking "Why to flee to
danger?" Gnik replies they are trying to fix the problem. Al asks
why he broke the sanctuary stone, and who he thinks is going to
oppress him. The response is "If there is the slightest chance that
you can free the Jailer, I will end you now."

Kat moves forward to check on the sea elves to see if any of them
are still alive. Angmar expresses concern that the sanctuary stone
is what kept enough oxygen flowing through the settlement to allow
breathing in the buildings. Al starts peeking into the stones as
they go by; he sees an elf sitting at one of the openings, so he
says hello - but there is no response. As he gets closer, he realizes
there's nothing there from the waist down. Gnik joins them and casts
Detect Thoughts to help find anyone still living. Milena casts Bless
on herself, Kat, Al, and Ember as they go. Angmar asks for a Speed
chew, and Al takes one as well. Kai requests a Might one, Ember takes
an Agility one, Gnik a Reason, and Milena a Wisdom. Angmar goes quickly
to check on his people, and Al is helping. Kat, Milena, and Ember continue
moving toward the downed elves at the crystal.

When Kat and Milena reach the crystal, Milena can tell it was shattered
by something hitting it coming from the cliff. She wonders if one of
the masts could have hit it, and notices that one of them is missing.
Al suggests that perhaps the bottom logs are launching the top one.

Gnik asks Angmar if the masts have been lying by the crystal for a
reason. Angmar doesn't know the word "mast", and once Gnik explains,
he says, "No, why would we have dead trees down here?"

Al stops searching himself and pulls a second friend to help -- getting
a male dolphin. It and the reef shark eye one another and then look to
Al for guidance. He sends Ralph the Reef Shark to continue the search
and Donny the Dolphin to patrol the perimeter, and he and Gnik rejoin
Kat and Milena. Al notices as he passes some of the rock structures that
the openings appear to have been crushed.

At the crystal they find Kirsh -- who appears to have been squeezed
almost in half. Milena looks more closely and sees a massive sucker
marking. Some of the other bodies were clearly killed by the exploding
crystal. Al senses that the creature is toying with them, and the group
suddenly realizes that it can camouflage itself.

Gnik suddenly senses overwhelming thoughts, as if the universe suddenly
opened up in his brain, but with feedback since he is running Detect
Thoughts. He screams through the farspeakers and breaks concentration.
Al goes to him to ask what's wrong, and Gnik says, "It's here."

Kat takes a Reason chew, and looks around to investigate where the
creature is and what its next move might be. Al takes the Speed chew
and looks around to try to find the creature. He can't perceive where
it is, but realizes many places it could be. He runs to the cliff face
to see if it is on that side, but it is not there. He keeps going, and
when he gets between a couple of rocks he sees a mask sticking out. Al
tries to hide, but Gnik tells him that the creature can read his mind.
Gnik swims to where Al is, sees the log, and casts Mindspike. Everyone
sees the ground ripple for a moment, starting near the crystal and
curving between two rocks. Gnik goes to Kat and Milena.

Ember takes the Agility chew and pulls out her bow to fire a couple
of arrows where the log goes into the rocks. It goes into the stone,
which jerks, and bluish ichor comes out.

The rock changes shape, rises, and suddenly the mast comes hurling at
Gnik like a spear, but he dodges as it flies by in a blur inches from
his nose. Kai swims toward the sanctuary stone, taking her potions of
Dire Cleansing and Ebbing Strength on the way down.

Kat notices something coming at her -- a section of stone changes texture
and hurls something at her, but she dodges. She sees Angmar's body bounce
off the ground and scuttle away.

Milena takes a Wisdom chew and casts Guiding Bolt at an area where she
knows part of the creature is; a secton of rock suddenly appears more
flesh-like and the area begins to glitter. A tentacle slams into Milena
and tries to wrap around her, but she spins away and pushes off before it
is able.

Kat decides to shoot her remaining Demolition Bolt at the base of the
glittering tentacle. There is a massive explosion with a sound wave
made visible by all the sand in the area. The tentacle is completely
severed, and they hear a roar of anger and a cacophany of hateful
thoughts in their minds.

Al attempts to hit the beast; he tries twice for a stunning strike, but
its hide is so thick that it doesn't seem to make a difference. He hits
a third time and manages to split it open, but still doesn't manage to
stun it.

Zassin goes into camouflage mode himself and goes running around to
keep track of the creature and get bites in at it. Gnik swims near
and tries a second Mindspike; it manages to shrug off some, but not
all, of the damage. Gnik swims out of its reach. Ember manages to
stick another arrow into it, and Az in octopus form goes to slap at
it in octopus form to help provide advantage. 

A tentacle swings at Al and Ember, but Al dodges away to avoid being
wrapped and parries as a reaction, then tries to pin the tentacle. It
pulls away as he tries, but manages to grab Ember and pin her to the
ground. Kai charges in and cleaves into it with her sword; in her mind,
her sword is singing a battle hymn from her history. She hits again and
cleaves through the tentacle. The reef shark comes to attack as Kai goes
into rage mode. Kat and Milena see a tentacle reach out to grab a mast
and hurl it straight at Kai, but she dodges.

Milena moves out of range of the tentacles and then casts Guiding Bolt
again. The tentacle holding Ember pulls up and hurls Ember at Kai. She
leaps up and grabs Ember, rolling to absorb part of the damage Ember
would have taken. Ember mutters, "Ugh... thank you...."

Kat charges and attacks with Dark Kiss, and activates the Booming Blade
and necrotic damage effects; the sword is pleased with these choices. She
also triggers the dimensional anchor effect, although it is not clear
whether the creature can move between dimensions. She uses Fancy Footwork
to skitter away. The group notices that in many places it is no longer
attempting to camouflage.

Al attacks and hits four times; the creature's whole body is twitching
and jerking. Gnik tries a Mindspike again, but it shrugs off part of
the damage. The creature is done hiding; it comes up from the seabed
and roars at the group. In their minds they get thoughts of "I will
kill you. Whatever happens, I will kill you." They almost get the
sense that it is promising to come back from the dead to get them.

Ember swims back and takes more shots with her bow, hitting twice with
Zassin's help while Az tries to assist Kai with her next attack. A
tentacle comes at each of Kai, Kat, and Al. Kai and Al are hit but dodge
away, but Kat is grabbed in a tentacle. The reef shark attacks the tentacle
near Al while Kai attacks the tentacle holding Kat, severing it before it
can throw Kat into its mouth. Another tentacle slams into Kai, messing up
her elbow, but she keeps from being grabbed.

Milena asks Nash if she would like to come out, and Nash says, "Sure, I
can hold my breath for a little while...." Milena tells her to stay out
no more than five attacks, but Nash asks, "What's the worst that'll
happen?" She snaps at the creature a couple of times but is not able
to get through its skin; Milena casts Spiritual Weapon but is also not
able to hit.

The creature grabs for Al, Kai, and Nash. It manages to wrap around Al's
lower body, but misses the other two. Kat thinks that in her increased-
Reason state she could emulate the magic of the demolition bolt -- and
the creature's head is visible now. She reaches out and there's a crackling
around her fingers, followed by a crackling around its face; a hole opens
up in reality at its head, and the water near it starts pouring through.
Al manages to wriggle free from the tentacle and then attacks it, hitting
once, but his second hit gets stuck in the creature's hide. His third
attack hits, and his Ring of Free Action allows him to pull his stuck
weapon free. Gnik casts Mindspike on it one more time; it works, but
almost immediately he can't sense where it is as it as its head goes
through the hole. Ember takes a couple of shots at it and moves away.

The creature flails blindly and hits Milena with a tentacle, slamming her
in the back. Another hits Nash; Milena asks Gnik to ask Az to get Nash
if she turns into her statue form. The shark also gets hit, but the
dolphin flips away. Kai moves away from it. Milena uses Wand of the Sea
to cast Touch of the Sea on Nash so she can move and breathe underwater
and get away from the portal. Kat pulls out a Dispel Magic scroll --
since Gnik has run out of the spell points to cast it -- and casts
it at the portal as the creature is going through; the portal closes,
cutting the thing in two. The part remaining begins to bubble and
boil, as if it were a fiend -- although it didn't cause Milena's
dagger to sound the alarm. Al pulls out his statue of Anny to let
her know what happened.



12 November 2022

Milena heals everyone who needs it: Kat and Gnik are unscathed. The group
struggles to deal with the trauma of the sea elves they just befriended
being all wiped out. They gather the remains of 42 people and search
thoroughly for survivors, finding none. Anny confirms that someone from her
group will teleport there soon.

Eventually five beings approach on dolphins like the ones we rode earlier.
Four sea elves and a merfolk. When they get closer the dolphins swim away
and they approach in formation, spears and crossbows ready. They yell "Who
are you? What happened here?"

Al tells them that we've been communicating with Anny and expecting a group
from there. He says the creature from the chasm killed these people, but
then we fought and banished it. They seem to accept this. They ask how we
are communicating with Anny, and Al explains it is through some accidental
magic and a figurine.

Their leader introduces himself as Zurael and we introduce ourselves. The
merfolk is male and has a horrible scar. He keeps looking curiously at Kat.
There's an androgynous magic user named Calia.

We go to check the teleportation circle to see if it's still intact for
someone to arrive. Quigley goes and confirms that it's dark. Az takes
Milena's torch and we can see that the area is clear, it will just be hard
for people to come up from that room when they arrive, because there are
lots of fallen rocks in the way.

The merfolk asks Kat, "What are you? You're not one of my people." Kat
explains that it's just magic. He accepts this and swims away.

Shortly after the opening is cleared, we hear a sound from below and see a
glow of light. More sea elves, led by one named Zyaodar (Zy), come up and
ask for an explanation.

We theorize that the creature from the chasm was some kind of fiend native
to this plane, and when it was killed while partially on another plane, it
was banished back to its own native place: Jaeleth.

We explain that the creature was leaving the chasm by camouflaging itself.
Az starts demonstrating camouflage, and Zassin joins her, and then they
start copying each other.

We tell them that the creature said "If there is the slightest chance that
you can free the Jailer, I will end you now." Zy tells us it's a reference
to the battle at Martyr's Rest, probably K'Jat ("Thing Zero"). It was
called The Jailer because it watched over many beings that were threats to
their people or their interests.

Zy reminds us of the story that D'She ("Thing One") and many of their
followers became free years ago, and when Maerson was moved they agreed to
be left behind.

Zy tells us that Zenesua wants to meet with us at some point. We tell them
that we'll stop by there on our way back north, after Cassadega, the Blood
Tower, and stuff.

We're told that the remains will be taken out away from the settlement,
where they will let nature take its course. Ralph and Quigley look at Al
expectantly.

We go to look at the chasm and see if The Dull One had left anything
valuable behind. But when we arrive it seems to be getting unnaturally
dark. We go up to the surface to find out what's happening. Kai flies up
and there's a storm raging above.

It is a natural storm, so Kai returns below to join the group in searching
the chasm. The ships have already been looted, so they find nothing of value,
but do note that there are ships of many different ages -- obviously this
has been going on for some time.

The group returns to the settlement. They discuss what they know and
recall about the K'oth: K'Jat is the jailer in Martyr's Rest, and is
K'oth, and made D'She and D'Lie from parts of itself; and then D'She
killed D'Lie and imprisoned K'Jat, and was in turn imprisoned by the gods.

The group returns to the surface because they decide not to sleep underwater
again.


20 Sinta 3275

Kat, Al, Gnik, and Milena return to the settlement so that Kat can watch
the teleportation spell (so that she might get an idea how to do it herself).
Afterwards they return to the surface, and hear over the farspeakers: "Hello,
are you there?"


24 November 2022 -- Crew Adventure!

The Mighty Redemption encounters a ship full of spiders, and teleports
away while the adventurers and Laur go to investigate. Laur returns
about an hour later, looking a bit annoyed, saying that the bosses
have been teleported away to check something out and will return later.
Laur pulls out the charts to figure out where they are. They are near
Alliance Isle, a place where people go to retire, where it is rumored
that ages ago some alliance between gods happened; and Stormwreck Isle,
with a retreat called Dragon's Rest. "What kind of weather are we expecting
there, boss?" Rodger asks, pointedly.

Jarvis asks Laur, "So... dragons have feathers, right?" Laur points out
that they've only seen one dragon and it didn't have feathers, so....
Wend says they do have scales, which Jarvis says is like feathers. He
shares a dream he had, of a shadow creeping across the sea and swallowing
an island in darkness. The small group of people there were threatened
by an unseen evil -- although Jarvis couldn't see the people. He did see
a wrecked ship, though -- "Stormwreck Isle, huh? See?" he points out to
his crewmates -- and feathers, "--which could be dragons, right?" He also
heard a voice calling him to "stand against death's endless hunger," and
he thinks the Sea God has sent this dream, possibly to tell him to check
out this island. Wend seems to think this is a great idea, and Rodger
and Chastity are interested as well.

Laur asks Carie to go with the others to keep an eye on them, and see
if they can get a sense of whether the bosses have been there, as well
as trying to establish trade with the people living on the island.

A dark storm blows through in the evening as they approach. "Wow, Jarvis,"
says Wend, "you are really good with the visions!" Rodger rolls his eyes.
"It's Nolan who provides," Jarvis says. They drop anchor off the coast,
to avoid bringing the ship through the dangerous approach. Laur outfits
them with a boat with supplies, and Corey lets them know there is a
lift system so they don't have to haul the supplies up themselves.

Carie pulls Laur aside and asks for more guidance on what she's trying
to achieve on the island, and also asks if he can officially put her
in charge so Chastity doesn't try to go off on her own. Laur agrees
he'll pull Chastity aside to let her know Carie is in charge of the
negotiations. Chastity accepts this.

The group takes a small sailboat and rows into the cove. As they approach,
they see a statue, about 20 feet tall, of a man holding a tankard aloft.
There is a winding path up to a temple of Ceonnare. Rodger says, "Maybe
someone should stay with the stuff. And ride the lift up."

Carie starts walking up the stairs and turns to see if anyone is following,
and sees three people wearing sailor's outfits shambling out of the water.
"Weapons out, people!" she says as she returns to the boat. Rodger hits one
with a sling rock and then hides, and Chastity hits the same one with a
crossbow bolt. The crossbow bolt tears through the zombie's gut, and the
rock tears off its arm... which continues to pull its way toward the shore.

Wend runs up to them and hits the closest one with his maul. He hits it
in the side of the neck, and its head flies off and bounces off the
zombie next to it, falls into the water, and tries to bite at things
while the decapitated body feels around for something to attack. Jarvis
uses his sling against the damaged one in the middle, blowing through
its left knee; its leg continues flopping around, while the now one-legged
zombie continues trying to hop forward. Jarvis yells to Wend, "Any idea
how they got like this? Because we don't want to." "I don't know," Wend
yells back, "you think it's contagious?" "Maybe don't let it bite you
or bleed on you," Jarvis suggests.

Carie runs forward to attack the now-headless zombie with her rapier,
stabbing into its thigh; then punches with her shield, popping its
arm off. The arm on the ground tries to grab her ankle, but she kicks
it back, and distracts the next zombie from hitting Wend. The third,
uninjured zombie lumbers up the dock toward Jarvis, who has stepped
back but is still visible. As it passes Wend, he takes a swing at
it and tears its arm off at the shoulder.

Rodger slings at the one going toward Jarvis and then runs out to try
to distract the zombie to help Jarvis. Chastity also hits, piercing its
ribcage. Wend swings at the one-legged zombie and manages to take off
its other leg. It flounders on the ground, trying to pull itself up to
get at him.

Jarvis pulls his scimitar against the zombie that has closed with him
and takes its other arm off just above the elbow; there is very little
resistance, like slicing through a soft cheese. It continues to stagger
forward trying to bite at him. Jarvis tries an off-hand attack with his
dagger, but misses.

Carie hits the headless zombie in front of her, and it stops moving --
as do all its fallen limbs. She runs up to help Jarvis. The torso zombie
flails at Wend but can't hit him. One of the fallen arms of the zombie
coming at Jarvis and gets a claw sunk into his good leg, then the rest
of the zombie lunges and gets a bite in. Rodger stabs at it with his
daggers but the zombie flails away; he tries once more and manages to
get a hit in.

Chastity shoots at the zombie on Jarvis, hitting the base of its
skull. It falls back and stops moving as Wend hits the zombie in
front of him; and it also stops moving.

Carie sees some people watching from above, who appear to be
masked. Jarvis pulls out his medical kit to tend to his own wounds,
and makes a small fire to cauterize the wounds, in case this is a
contagion. Some of the observers start down the path from the
temple. Wend, Rodger, and Jarvis recognize the zombies as being from
another crew they saw in Freeport, sailing on the Black Boar; the ship
left Freeport a couple of days before the Mighty Redemption. "What turns
people into zombies?" Chastity asks. "Necromancers," Carie says. The group
concludes that it probably is not contagious; someone creates them on
purpose.  Chastity is aware that zombies can be manifested by divine
or fiendish power, but there are multiple ways to create them; these
seem to have been caused by fiendish power, which causes the body to
stay animated even when it falls apart, until all the energy is gone.

"How do you know so much about zombies?" Wend asks. "Dated a
necromancer once," Chastity answers.

Five people approach from above; while Rodger helps Jarvis, Carie
and Wend step off the path a bit ahead to meet the group descending.
Chastity hides.

The approaching group seems to be about 3 to 5 feet tall, and above
there are some who are taller. The approaching group have feathered
bird heads. Jarvis hisses, "Feathers! FEATHERS!" under his breath.
One of them says, "Who are you?" and the others chitter, "Yeah,
who are you? Who are they?" and they squawk in a cacophany until
the leader says, "Why are you here?" Carie says they killed zombies
and now need a healer. "Yes, says the leader. "Been a problem lately."

From above, a white-haired woman gestures a greeting and thanks them
for dealing with... "Those." She gestures toward the remains of the
zombies. She sends a man with her down to tend to Jarvis, Tarek,
who offers him a potion and checks him out. He is covered in tattoos,
in which Jarvis and Rodger recognize an abstract symbol representing
the Gilded Gallows, an assassin's guild. At Carie's suggestion, he
takes some himself to prove it is not poison. Jarvis gets an okay
feeling about the whole situation and accepts the healing. The
wound fully closes up and there is an almost immediate cessation of
pain; and there is no scar, and the wound is knit together with something
that looks like filaments of fungus. The medicine also has a very fungal
scent to it.

Wend asks the leader, Runara, about the bird-people. She says they have
been enslaved and so the group has given them a place to live and a purpose.
She refers to them as kenku, and says there are nine of them on the island.

Jarvis asks about the source of the zombies, and Runara says it's been
happening for about thirty years, since the wreck of the Compass Rose
at the small chain of islands off the edge of Dragon's Rest.

Carie talks with Runara about trading, who implies they would be a
better trading partner if they didn't have to deal with the zombies.
Tarek offers to give each of them a potion if they work to find and
eliminate the source of the zombies.

One of the kenku seems particularly bold and curious, having walked
up to Wend and tried to peer into his belt pouch. "Friend kenku," Jarvis
says, "you seem bold and curious, would you like to come with us?" The
kenku introduces himself as Mumpo, and says he would like that. One of
the other kenku gives him a look, and Runara looks like she is trying
not to laugh. She suggests Mumpo would be a good addition to the team.
Mumpo says he doesn't have any weapons, so Rodger offers him a dagger,
and Wend offers an axe, but asks if he will give it back when they're
done. Mumpo looks at Runara, who says "Yes." Mumpo says "Yes." Runara
says they don't have weapons here, because they don't need them --
although the zombies have been a problem. Jarvis leaves a message with
Runara in case the Mighty Redemption comes for them before they are
back: "Nolan has called us to stand against death's endless hunger."

On the way to the shipwreck site, Chastity asks Mumpo where he's from,
and he says, "The Broken Isles," stands up and points off to the horizon.
She asks about the kenkus' enslavers, and he says they are bad people...
not people... very bad, not talk about it.... Let's go this way....  He
also shares that Runara thinks something happened a few months ago to
cause shipwrecks here to become much more common.

There is a faint odor of rot in the air as they approach the wreck
of the Compass Rose. There is a gaping hole in the hull beneath the
water line. There are other shipwrecks visible in the vicinity. They
tie off, discuss preparations, and Jarvis pulls out his lucky seagull
wing as he turns three times deosil and utters a blessing to Nolan.

Carie climbs up onto the rigging, followed by Rodger and Chastity.
Jarvis finds a railing to lie along so he can stick his Continual
Flame torch below the waterline. He sees that the rear starboard
corner of the hull appears to have been torn off, as if the ship had
hit something head-on and then been dragged along rocks on that side.
He takes a moment to look for movement. Wend stays near him. They don't
see obvious movement, although it is difficult to tell with the movement
of the waves.

Chastity moves toward the bow, finds nothing particularly unusual, and
moves to the stern. Rodger notices the crow's nest is filled with debris,
and climbs up the ladder to take a closer look. Carie sends Mumpo to look
into the grating while Jarvis and Wend climb up to join the others.

Rodger reaches the crow's nest and tries to climb into it. The area is
full of wood shavings, shiny baubles, tufts of grass... and it is big
enough for several human-sized beings to bed down -- a very big nest.
Rodger explains what he sees, and Jarvis asks to look out for feathers
and describe what color they are so they have an idea what they're looking
out for. Mumpo asks if he can help, and Rodger says he can help by keeping
a look out to make sure nothing comes to attack him. There is a crunching
sound as Mumpo climbs the mast with his claws, goes past Rodger to the
tip of the mast, and keeps a look out. Rodger finds downy white feathers,
and some larger feathers that are brown with black stripes. He pulls out
a sack to collect some feathers and any baubles that look particularly
valuable -- such as a gold bracelet he sees lying to one side.

Wend finds four doors and begins peering in. The first has a table and
chairs and broken crockery. Chastity looks down through the grating and
sees three faces staring up from below; the nose is missing from one of
them. Jarvis is walking past, on his way to plant himself at the railing
to keep an eye across the deck, sniffing as he goes to try to find where
the scent of decay is the strongest. He passes the grating, makes a face,
looks at Chastity, and she points down. He alerts Wend and Carie, who
calls up to Rodger to suggest he come down because they found zombies.
Rodger says he can shoot from up there, and can keep watch. However, they
need someone to check for traps, so he trades his sling to Mumpo for his
dagger so Mumpo can keep watch and have a ranged weapon.

Wend opens up the second door to find six double bunks with personal effects
strewn about. There is a portrait of a young couple on the far wall. Jarvis
brings his torch to get a closer look. The words "Aletha and Brastos Together
Forever" are written across the bottom; the black-haired woman wears tattered 
sailor uniform similar to what the zombies wore, while the man wears merchant's
garb. Rodger notices a loose board under the bunk nearest the portrait, and
takes a closer look. There is a fine wire connected to it. "It's a trap!"
he says, excitedly. "I'll try to take care of it!" He carefully disarms
the trap and then lifts the board to find a sack. It is very heavy -- about
twenty pounds -- and clinks with coins as he tries to lift it.

Meanwhile, Wend tries to open the next door, but it catches on something
as he pushes -- so he forces it and the door comes off its hinges. At one
point this was a luxurious cabin, with an ornate compass in the center of
the desk, a bookshelf with waterlogged books and scrolls, a sagging bed,
a hole in the floor where a nightstand may have been torn away... and
three zombies. "Hey, I found more zombies!" he says excitedly, and swings
at the first one with his maul, tearing its arm off as it reaches for him.
Mumpo yells out, "What should I be doing?" Carie tells him to stay up on
the mast keeping watch.

Jarvis leaves his torch for Rodger and runs to help Wend, but doesn't
enter the room. Chastity moves to higher ground and yells to Wend to
come out of the room. "Little busy fighting zombies," he yells back.
"Come out to lure them out," Jarvis adds. "Oh, yeah, okay," Wend says.
Carie comes into the room and stands next to Wend to help him respond
to attacks.

Rodger pulls out the sack and peers into the hole to see what the
other end of the trap was connected to. There is a spring-loaded
dart with a green powder on the end of it. He carefully steps away
and triggers it so it hits the bottom of the bed. Then he crawls out
and assesses the situation... from behind the bed.

The zombies attack, and one gets a claw through Wend's armor, while
another gets a bite in on his arm as he swings. Carie dodges the one
attacking her as it gnaws on the top of her shield.

Wend attacks and then backs up, trying to lure them out. He brings the
mace down through its ankle and punches a hole in the floor, removing
its right foot, which continues to twitch in its shoe -- but can't make
any headway. It tries to slash at him but is off-balance and accidentally
sticks its claw into its neighbor's gut. The other one scratches Wend
across his hand as he backs up.

Jarvis dashes in, hits the nearest zombie with his scimitar, and dashes
back, trying to be distracting to help the next attacker. He takes the
hand off the zombie already missing an arm and a foot. Carie disengages
and backs out to help lure them.

Rodger peeks out the door and then runs up to the poop deck in case he
needs to jump on any zombies from above. The zombies emerge from the
room, and Mumpo yells, "Ugly zombies on the stairs! Ugly zombies on the
stairs!" and takes a shot. Chastity also takes a shot. Between the two
shots it tears one arm off the leading zombie.

The armless zombie tries to bite at Jarvis and manages to bite his pec
as it falls. The second zombie bites Carie's thigh as she is pushing it
down with her shield. The third one gets a bite and a claw into Wend. Wend
slams it hard. Mumpo critically hits the first zombie on the stair and takes
off its other arm. Jarvis swings at the zombie in front of him and takes it
down, then tries to distract the one facing Carie. Chastity hits the first
zombie on the stairs through the spine and it falls apart, no longer moving.

Carie attacks with her rapier and shield, and gets a couple of hits in.
Rodger runs in with his daggers and jumps from above onto the zombie in
front of Wend; his right dagger sticks in and the left scrapes across it,
but the force of his jump knocks its head off. The zombie in front of Carie
runs at her, but manages to impale itself on her blade. Another one runs
up behind her from the stairs and sinks its claws into the back of her
neck and then bites the back of her head. She goes down.

Wend looks at Carie and looks conflicted; Jarvis says, "Keep 'em off her;
I've got this." He hits, and Mumpo takes a shot from above and also hits
the one in front of Carie.

Jarvis runs in and pulls Carie away from the zombies, stabilizes her,
and pours his potion down her throat. The wounds on the back of her
head begin to stitch together, and she regains consciousness.

Chastity shoots through the zombie nearest Carie, and Carie stands up and
hits the zombie on her other side, then uses her special ability to heal
some additional damage. Rodger also attacks the one Carie just attacked,
sticks his daggers into its kidneys, and it disintegrates. He is hit with
an overwhelming stench, and suddenly has the urge to vomit up a week's worth
of food, but is able to hold it off. He catches movement out of the corner
of his eye as something lunges out of the doorway at him, with a claw
tearing at the side of his head. He feels a numbing sensation creeping
through the side of his head. There is a woman who looks as if she used
to be human, with long black hair -- very like the woman in the portrait
-- who sticks out a long tongue as she snarls.

Wend attacks the zombie by Carie, taking the left arm off, and then uses
Second Wind to regain some hit points. Mumpo slings at the woman. Rodger
is pretty sure the woman is a ghast. Jarvis sees her and says, "Oh, Aletha,
child, what have you done?" She stares at him and glares; he slings at her
and hits, then disengages to get to a place where he has some distance to
likely targets. Chastity shoots at the ghast and then hides. Carie stabs
a zombie and bashes with her shield, taking it out.

Rodger activates his tattoo, allowing him to change his appearance to
become larger or smaller, and disguises himself to look like Brastos. He
calls out, "Aletha, my love, why are you attacking me?" She stares at
him, stunned.

A fallen zombie arm finally makes its way out of the cabin... and finds
the ghast, which it attacks. Wend runs past the headless zombie to try
to attack the ghast. The zombie swings as she runs past, but doesn't
hit. Wend smells the stench, but is not sickened by it. He brings his
maul down on her head and crushes her; she falls to the ground. Between
Wend and Carie, they take care of the other two zombies.

They search the well-appointed cabin; the hole in the floor has gotten
bigger where the ghast crawled her way up. Rodger checks the desk for
traps and removes the compass, which still seems functional. He finds
a pouch with gold coins.

Rodger returns Jarvis's torch, and he looks down into the hole. There is
wet, chilly air coming up from below; the floor is obscured by water,
and there are crates, some floating. Immediately below, there is a
hole in the floor opening to a hold below.

Rodger checks the door to the final room on the deck. He finds no traps,
and the door opens easily. There is a skeleton leaning against one wall
in the galley, and... did it move? No, those are just crabs. They move
down below, into the hold. They find a few still-sealed barrels of fine
wine, a pair of candlestick holders. Carie takes the continual flame
torch and dives into the hold, which is completely submerged. The most
interesting thing she sees is a massive iron chest, padlocked. She goes
back up and asks Wend if he could bring it up. It's about 125 pounds, so
it takes him a few tries to move it all the way, but he gets it up and
the group helps remove it from the water and take it another floor up,
completely out of the water. Rodger notes there must be a key around there
somewhere, and when he goes to look for it, Chastity tries picking it.
She doesn't quite make it, but Rodger comes back with the key.

Inside there is a packet wrapped with waxed fabric and a pair of nice
boots that look like something an elf would wear, and that aren't
damaged by the water in the chest. They open the packet, which includes
a captain's log and a weird braid of hair stuck in the book like a
bookmark at the log's last entry. The log ends with the captain's
description of Aletha breathing a horrible prayer as she died to be
reunited with her love on the island, whatever it took, and that she
would bring this talisman there.

They return to Dragon's Rest and explain what happened. Runata brings
them to Brastos's grave; they leave the talisman of hair there, and
it bursts into flame. As it burns away, a fog rolls in over the islands.
The group discusses whether they've made things worse, as the fog obscures
the rocks. However, the next morning, the fog is gone -- and so is the
wreck of the Compass Rose. The ship returns and shares that they were
attacked by harpies -- which is what had been nesting in the crow's nest.

That night, Jarvis has a dream that the darkness leaves the island, and
he feels Nolan's approval.



28 January 2023

The group hears about the crew's adventure and decides to visit the
retreat themselves to talk with the kenku. Runara comes out when she
sees the boat but slows when she sees new people. The kenku introduce
themselves... all at the same time, except for Aga, who waits for the
cacophany of the others to die down, and then says, "Aga." Al asks,
"Which one of you is Mumpo?" His hand is up even before Al finishes
speaking," and Al thanks him for helping their crewmates. "They needed
it," says Mumpo. Runara invites them up to speak together in more
comfort in the dining room. Mumpo and Aga sit with them.

Al says, "Runara, you seem to be the leader here," and all the kenku
nod, but she shrugs. "As close as we have here," she says.

"We call ourselves
matal, but your people call us many things -- Observers, Assumers...."
"So you can read our minds," Al says. "I could, but I choose not to,"
she says.

She notes she can tell some of what they know because they don't
use the name Koth. She says there once was one of the klorta -- the
largest, most powerful Koth -- who could hear all things in the
world and would confront those who said that name -- but he was left
behind when the world moved. Schongar are the middle-sized koth, much
larger than normal humans, and hagrahl are about the size of normal humans.

After discussing whether to let her just read one of their minds, Gnik
decides just to tell her what he knows, showing her some of his books
as well. She shares some additional history:

K'Jat created Klorta, D'She created Schongar, D'Lie created hagrahl. 
Klorta did their own thing, schongar took over and seemed to be bent on
eliminating all humans as they think that was the original objective. In
order for any of them to reproduce, they need one of each kind: making an
egg, coating it in energy, nurturing it to life, which could be of any
of the three kinds.  The klorta are bound to the world -- wherever K'Jat
is -- and will return to that world if slain. But they don't have a
body until an egg is nurtured to produce a new klorta body. Sometimes
a klorta essence will go into an unborn child instead, and the child
is born with some innate magical power -- but this does not happen
anymore because all the klorta have been slain or were left behind
when the planet moved. She is aware of a dozen or two schongar in
the mortal lands just doing their own thing; the rest dwell in the
Shattered Isles, which Kat has heard of, having seen it in a log of
a trip across the world by someone from Exotics -- Tyolus, the recently
ascended god of magic. He described it as very dangerous (but not as
dangerous as another region on the opposite side of Maerson, apparently,
which he just labeled "DON'T GO HERE".)

She describes how klorta create more orbs than they need to manage
their numbers, and they eventually devised a device to turn those
eggs into a different kind of egg from which hatched something called
a kren, which they transformed into krana -- she points to the kenku --
which they then transform into us, matal, or natak -- lesser shapeshifters.
Matath are created by another device. Very few kren exist now -- they look
like smaller kenku, are less intelligent, and they are currently all on
the Shattered Isles.

Gnik describes their encounter with the Dull One, and its comment that
"If there is any chance you can free the Jailer I will end you now." He
says they thought it might be a reference to K'Jat, and he wonders why
this thing would have cared. She did not know K'Jat's objective for
certain, but she thinks it may have involved making sure entities like
that did not get out of control. All Runara's history is post-K'Jat;
D'She wanted to eliminate all lesser races and control all that remain.
She concludes that the Dull One thought they were competition. The Klorta
seemed more interested in working with humans, which Runara thinks is
within K'Jat's objectives.

Kai and Milena have heard of the Ponallian throne, which was found already
in existence, and the Ponallians chief use it to change into different
animals (if they survive). Kai asks if one of the transforming devices
might be on Ponal; Runara doesn't know, but Aga says yes, the Throne
would make the matal -- the type of powerful shapeshifter that Runara is.
Runara says she has heard of schongar who have taken over a society on
a neighboring continent and have been running people through an arch
to turn them into minor matak -- they can't read minds, but they can
shapeshift to a certain extent. Al asks if Runara thinks they should
try to free K'Jat; she says she thinks their choices are their own,
and K'Jat is an exceptionally powerful entity. Kai asks who Runara
served; she served one of the klorta until about 30 years ago -- she
gives a name, but it just sounds like an odd noise to them. Kai asks
if all of her kind want to be free; she says there are some true
believers, some who are slaves, and some who seek their own way. They
ask if they should send others to her if they find those who are looking
for freedom; she said she would need to talk to them, and Milena says
she could Send a message if they meet such individuals.

The group returns to the boat to head toward Cassadega.


20 Sinta 3275

Kat pulls Gnik aside and shows him a fine golden length of chain,
asking him to take a look at it and identify it. Gnik looks through
his glasses and immediately sees it is magic. He casts Identify: if it
is touched to a thrown weapon and a melee weapon and is attuned, there
is a magical link between the two, creating a link between the wielder
of the melee weapon and whoever, within 30 feet, is hit by the thrown
weapon, keeping the target from teleporting and allowing the two to
read each other's surface thoughts. He shares this with Kat -- who,
when she learns about the surface thoughts, says, "Well, he didn't
tell me THAT part...."  She shares that she has Torchlight back, and
the chain is to help them when they face Auntie Treeshadow to make
sure she can't dimension-travel away.



21 Sinta 3275

In the morning, as they are sailing, a creature appears in midair
above the ship and flies straight toward Kat; it has little wings
and horns, scaly grey skin and claws -- perhaps some kind of imp.
It yells down, "I have delivery from Zagramil!" She says, "O...kay...."
It lands before her, bows, and says, "Here you go, your highness --
I am glad to meet you and I have done as I was bid." He hands her
a note and flies away again.

The group arrives at Cassadega in the afternoon. They're aware that
there is a magical effect in place that causes any violent act to
rebound on the aggressor -- which makes for a very passive-aggressive
society. There are also a lot of archaeologists, but they have trouble
coming to agreement on what to do next.

Laur's intention is to park in the deep docks, which are cheaper; there
are shuttles to the shallow docks, which are closer to the mainland. Gnik
wants to find people to request humanitarian aid to Gonajibria; possibly
checking in with the most powerful families or the town council. The
archives are run by Tauch, who is on the council and whom Al wanted to
visit in search of a ring of mind shielding.

The docks are not exceptionally busy -- certainly not compared to
Freeport. There are folks trying to make contacts and deals to get
goods, or get things shipped off the island. The ship's crew gets
right to work unloading the items they brought for Cassadega. No one
seems to be specifically waiting for the group, although several seem
to recognize them.

They head to the Ankeshel Archives, where Al thinks Tauch is. They
take a shuttle to the mainland -- except for Al, who swims -- where
there is a gaggle of people who seem to be waiting for them. Two
of them look familiar -- the merchant Landa and her bodyguard Bea that
they freed from the sahaugin lair, who thank them again. Others just
seem to be trying to make connections with those who are wealthy
or famous. Al asks directions to the Archives, and for advice
about lodgings. Many people stay on their ships, but Sounds of
the Sea is recommended, or the Archives might be willing to put
them up. Kat learns that she can also get healing potions in
the Archive complex.

The bodyguard leads them to the complex. Gnik has had correspondence
with the librarian there, known to him as Ama.


11 February 2023

As they head toward the complex, a small girl comes running up
enthusiastically to greet them and offer to show them around town.
They notice she has a strange bauble at her neck. The crowd seems
to shy away from her as she runs through. Al looks at Bea, who
says Yaa is a known tour guide, and offers to get them set up
at the Golden Eel Inn while they take a tour. Gnik puts on his
glasses and sees that the bauble may be bonded with Yaa in some
way with possibly necromantic energy. Kat tells Yaa she's interested
in riding a hippogriff, and Yaa says yeah, they can probably find a
way to make that happen. Al asks Bea if he wants to join them, but
Bea demurs; Al gets the feeling that it's not that he thinks there's
anything wrong with the tour or Yaa, she's just a bit much and he
doesn't want to deal with that kind of chaos today. Kai pulls him
aside and asks about Yaa, who shares that she has an invisible "friend"
put in place by her parents that protects her from threats, which can
be problematic for anyone who looks like they would be a threat to
her.

Yaa sets off leading the group through the town, pointing out buildings
with a constant stream of patter, some of which the group thinks couldn't
possibly be right; Al thinks it is more that she is an imaginative kid
than that she is actively lying. She points out a number of ruins,
and to Pritia's Protectives, for preventive medicine. She points to
the remains of a wall and says that's where they found a vril battery,
an old Ankeshel artifact, but they found out those are very delicate...
and that's why the wall fell down. They notice that all the walls seem
to have a metallic sheen, and not just on the surface of the stones.

They reach the Archives, which Yaa says they've never let her into...
although she has been inside, and suggests that she could come in
with them. Al says maybe they could find someone and ask if she could
come in, and Yaa says, "Or I could just come in with you, that would
be easier!" Milena asks why they won't let her in, and Yaa says, "I
don't know!" -- blatantly lying.

They walk up to the entrance where there is a young boy sitting at the
base of the steps. The construction is of an old style, with knotted
metallic threads hanging down. The boy asks if they want to come in --
and says, "No dogs... and Yaa, I hear you, you still can't come in --
Dash said no, they're still fixing that wall." Yaa explains that she
tripped on something in the floor -- it was dark -- and the wall came
down. Kat pulls out a piece of silver and says, "Are you SURE the dogs
and Yaa can't come in?" The boy looks at the dogs, looks at the silver
piece, and says, "Ididn'tseeyou," grabs the silver, and runs.

They enter, and Al asks Yaa where Tauch is likely to be. She points to
doors on the right, which open onto a huge space with display cabinets,
shelves, and some lumber leaning up against the far wall where there
appears to be a hole in the more recently-constructed wall built on
top of the original Ankeshel wall. There is a man and woman working
at a table; they nod when they notice the group and introduce themselves
as Tauch and Gurow. When they see the dogs -- and Yaa -- Tauch asks, "Was
the boy not there?" Kat says, "What boy?" and Milena says, "Children are
so easily distractable," deadpan. Gurow steps slightly away from the group
and away from the table and surrounding shelves -- as though to get away
from anything that might explode. 

Tauch says to Al that he learned from his Freeport contacts that he
was interested in his family's ring. Al apologizes and says he didn't
realize it was a family heirloom. Tauch says he doesn't have a particular
sentimental attachment to it, but it is useful against certain individuals.
He consults Gurow, then asks if they are adventuring types. When Al says
yes, he says, "I was originally going to ask 4000 gold, but you may be
able to help us with a problem instead." They have been having issues
with ghost-like things called "ropers" that babble in some ancient
language, and when they go away the ropes are all tied up in knots. More
recently, dark ghost-like entities have been showing up with them and
attacking and killing people. Normal weapons don't affect them. Gnik
asks whether the protective magic would keep them from hurting the ghosts,
but Tauch says no since they're not alive. He says when the ghosts show
up in Lower Cassadega, they show up with a ghost ship that has been
identified as Geerskahmen -- the records of which would be in Lower
Cassadega. He suggests Gurow could take them below to try to find
out more about the ship. The ghosts have been showing up more
frequently recently -- every week or two -- and Gurow says there
was a sighting at the docks just that morning. Tauch looks surprised
and says, "That's two days in a row!" Kai asks if they only show up
in areas with ropes, and if the ropes are untied again. Gnik would
like to see the ghost-tied ropes more closely. They hypothesize it
could be a form of "writing" and perhaps the good ropers were trying to
send a message or warning.

They realize Yaa is no longer with them, and look around; she is in an
open area near the entrance, and Boris is playing with her -- actually
corraling her, as he has much experience doing, at Milena's request.

Tauch says he will give Al the ring if the group takes this on; there
has been some disagreement about who should investigate -- folk from
the upper or lower city -- but since the group are outside third parties
they might be ideal investigators. Tauch offers them the ring and 2000
gold if they investigate the wrecked ship and the ghosts and figure out
what's going on. Gurow offers to meet them in the morning at their inn,
at dawn.

They look around at some of the artifacts, including something Tauch
presses against Gnik's back that gives him a quick and very effective
massage. Al asks what a vril battery is; Tauch says it seems to power
some of the artifacts, and "vril" is what they call the material it's
made of. Some artifacts they thought were broken or nonfunctioning would
start doing things when it came even within the vicinity of one of these
batteries; their assumption is that an Ankeshel home might have one in
the center to power their devices.

They depart and Kai and Al head to a tavern, Sin on the Water, while
the rest of the group goes to the alchemy shop. There is a note on the
door that says, "For help see Ama in the library". An older woman comes
shuffling out of the library, apologizes, and comes to open the shop;
apparently the usual proprietor is out sick. She sees Yaa and says, "You
stay out here." Yaa protests, so she adds, "I love you, girl, but no."
She asks the group what they are looking for, and Kat asks for healing
spells. Ama says "Potions?" Kat says yes, that would be easier. She
offers Dorg's Kiss for general healing, or Dorg's Love for greater
healing. She has other potions available as well. Gnik jokingly asks
for Dorg's Humility; Ama says the usual proprietor sells it to people
like him, but she wouldn't do that. Kat is comparison shopping, so
doesn't buy anything immediately, but Milena picks up a couple of
potions. Ama and Gnik catch up a bit, and then they and Milena go
to the library; Gnik finds reference to the ship Margaret's Grace
sinking, and verifying more information about his friend Lyle.

Kat tells Yaa it will probably be a while, and Yaa says maybe they
could go try to ride a hippogriff while they wait, and runs off
excitedly. On the way, she tells Kat that she won't try it, but Kat
can; Yaa tried it once, but the hippogriff didn't like her, and her
friend Mr. Stick hit it, and then it tried to claw him, and she ran
away because she was afraid of what would happen. Kat procures a
snack along the way by nicking a piece of fruit from a cart. When
they get to the stable, Kat asks Yaa to distract Mouse; she says
she's good at providing a distraction, and Mr. Stick is REALLY good
at it. Kat sees that the only hippogriff with tack on is being ridden
into the stable. She stealths her way in and tries to make friends
with a friendly-looking hippogriff. There are two people working there
-- one about Kat's age and one about her mother's age, riding the
hippogriff in. She sees six hippogriffs in the stables and slips
into the pen of one that looks promising. It gives her a side-eye,
and she offers it the treat, which it happily takes. She tries
approaching it as she would a horse, since she has no hippogriff
experience; it rubs its head across the top of her shoulder in
greeting as she pets it. She realizes she doesn't really know
how to ride or steer a hippogriff, but she did see the rider
with her legs in front of rather than behind the wings. She slips
out to try to find some tack without being seen. She tries putting
it on, and it takes a while to figure out, as it's quite different
from a horse saddle, but she eventually figures out the extra bits
are a harness for the rider to keep them from falling off. The
hippogriff keeps pulling away -- not violently, but like it doesn't
really like it. She tries to climb up, slowly, and just as she's
getting up, the hippogriff tears out of the gate and takes off.
She sees Yaa peering over the fence yelling, "Yeaaah!" and hears
the two workers screaming -- that's a new hippogriff that hasn't
been broken yet....

Kai and Al are at Sin on the Water, an open-sided hut with a pile
of kegs that are tapped whenever they're needed. There are holes
in the deck through which they can see colorful fish, and every
now and then a merfolk pops up, tosses a coin, and gets a quick
beer before descending below again. They both hear a voice they
recognize that says, "Al and Kai? What are you doing in Cassadega?"
It is Bimisi, Al's mentor with whom he went to Ponallian lands. Al
gives him a big hug and tells him they're on their way to the Blood
Tower to help their friend Gnik find out what happened to his dead
friend, but first they're looking in to the ropers. Bimisi says
the ropers are haints, ancestors who try to warn of bad things
coming, and that the dark shadows are described as translucent
with glowing eyes, who come from the walls and claw through their
victims. Al thinks it sounds like wraiths. Bimisi, who is also a
monk of the Way of the Asp, asks Al how he is progressing in his
practice, and Al talks excitedly while trying not to forget that
there are actual other people in the conversation who might get
bored. Bimisi says someone in his order had a vision that they
should find out more about what's going on in this area, so he
came to spend a little time. Then they hear a commotion outside,
someone yelling about a wild hippogriff on the loose. Al and Kai
go to look -- and Kai, with her eagle eyes, can see Kat is riding,
looking like she is having a great time as the creature bobs and
weaves all over the place. She asks on the farspeaker if Kat is
okay, and she says she's fine. "Well, let us know if that changes,"
Kai says.

Milena wanders into the religion section of the library just to see
what looks interesting or jumps out at her. She finds a book that
looks different to her from the rest, looking relatively new, and Ama
says, "I'm questioning the veracity of that, I think someone wrote it
as a joke... and I think someone said they found it in that boat you
were looking for...." The title is "Tyorl's Secrets and Plans:
Millenia of Manipulation to Expose the Great Foe". No author is given,
nor any date, though it looks very new. The gist is that Tyorl, who is
clearly revered by the authors, thought that Sgult was not actually a
god, but rather something that came before the gods -- but the only
way to prove that was to try to kill it and fail. It describes a lot
of long-term schemes and manipulations: to get evil gods to move
Maerson away from Jaeleth to give the mortals there a chance to build
up their own power to defeat the evil on Jaeleth when the time came;
to sequester many evil people away until such time Tyorl needed to use
them for fodder when he went to the hells to fight Sgult.  At the end,
the book goes through preparations to go to war, the effort taken to
bring the weapon they needed, and all pieces for moving the world
being in place, and they have the man who knows the word that can slay
gods. The book ends at the point of them heading off to war.
Gnik has heard stories of a legend of a pair of mortals who
discovered forbidden knowledge of a powerful spell that, when
activated, would destroy anything and everything around them --
including them; ancient magic from very old times that it was said
they got form a chronomancer. One tried to use the word on a group of
gods, who foresaw it and stopped it; the other wanted other power, and
was vanished in some way. 

Gnik offers to buy the book from Ama; she says that since he's adventuring,
maybe he'll find something to trade. He asks if she wants a book on Rafael,
but she says no -- she's seen those many times.

Kat begins to get the feel of steering the hippogriff, who is beginning
to chill out and enjoy flying. Kat steers it over to buzz the Mighty
Redemption; it lets out a cry as she waves at Rodger. She then steers
it back toward the stables.

As Gnik and Milena are finishing up at the library, a woman slips in with
a message for them: Jenehba of the Night Revelers invites them to the
Ancestors Dance House tonight to speak to them and have them join the
reverie. Gnik asks Ama about who the Night Revelers are; Ama says they
are troublemakers who like to party all night, although they do have
some interesting intellectual discussions.

Al asks Bimisi to spar, and Kai and Ember (who has joined them) make a bunch
of money when they realize everyone is betting on the young guy, but Kai
knows Bimisi is much more experienced. She and Ember make a lot of money.

Gnik asks Ama about a scroll of Dispel Magic to replace one that Kat had,
and she directs him back to Tauch.

Kat arrives back at the stables; the owner sternly says she will have to
pay for that gate, while the boy asks how she did that since the hippogriff
hadn't been broken yet. "So I broke it -- does that mean I should get paid?"
Kat asks. The man says gruffly, "We'll call it even."

A man named Brerinch approaches Kat, saying he is from the True Path, and
tells her that she should not do what Tauch has asked her to do, because
there will be bad consequences. Kat tells him he should tell the group
himself, because she's the wrong person to convince them. He says he
will meet them back at the inn. He departs and she lets the rest of the
group know over the farspeakers. Al asks Bimisi about the True Path;
he says they think the things the Ankesher were right, but there was
a traitor among them who made them fall, and they want to return to
the old ways.

The group go to the boathouse to inspect the ropes from a recent haint
appearance. Yaa joins them, excitedly, to talk to Kat about her ride.
Gnik, with his glasses, is able to translate some of the words, including
"The seal must be protected".


25 February 2023

The group is heading back to the Golden Eel when a tattooed man approaches
-- the wizard Mallan, asking Al for the favor he promised as part of his
payment for his headband. He shares that there is an individual in Saltmarsh
whom he would like to leave the area for at least a few weeks -- so if he
is still there when they return, he would appreciate if Al would convince
him to leave. He says that if the man has already left before they return,
he will consider the debt repaid. The man is Royn, whom they met in Freeport.
Mallan says at the time they began hunting him, he accepted the role of
outcast because he disagreed with his government; he followed all the rules
of his people, but Royn and his companions continued to hunt him due to
differences of worldview. Al decides to return the headband. 

Milena notices Mallan has a number of plants and herbs in his pockets;
a couple could be poisonous in large quantities, but could also be
medicinal. She does not ask about it. Yaa hides behind her while Mallan
is there.

They arrive at the inn and they are greeted by a woman who gives them
each a key; they've each been given their own individual room. Kat notes
to herself that she doesn't think she has ever had a room all to herself.

Brerich is waiting for them, so they sit together at a table. Al asks
why the True Path don't want them to do anything about the haints. He
says it is none of their business. Al asks what their plan is; he says
they will be taking care of it tomorrow, and if they show up they will
just get in the way. Al says they have been asked by someone who lives
there to help, and so why shouldn't they? Brerich says Tauch is a fool
and it isn't their affair. Al tells him that if he isn't going to be
forthcoming, he can leave -- so Brerich gets up and walks out.

Milena suggests to Gnik that this might be a good circumstance for an
Augury, asking the result of not interfering and just letting the True
Path handle the haints and wraiths their way. Gnik takes his tools and
goes to cast, and as soon as the sticks are no longer being held, they
slam onto the table on WOE.

Al shares that his mentor Bimisi told him the haints in general have
been helpful harbingers of warning. He would like to try to talk to
one of them since he has a pearl of speech. He asks Milena how quickly
she could fashion a replacement headband for him using a Continual
Flame spell, and she says she would have to prepare the spell, so she
wouldn't be able to do it until morning. So instead, he gets a harness
fashioned for one of the continual flame torches from the ship.

They ask around about the Night Revelers and hear mixed opinions --
some think they get into interesting, deep conversations (sometimes
enhanced with mind-altering substances), others think they are wasting
their time partying. 

Kai uses her paper bird to send a message to Royn about what Mallen
asked them to do.

The group enjoys dinner at the inn, which is quite good, and they invite
Yaa in to join them. She says she has been there before, but they notice
she stands on the other side of them when one of the employees walks by.
Gnik asks her what her parents do; she says her father mostly manages the
family estate, and her mother likes to give people money to make more
money -- she doesn't really know, she doesn't understand business. Kat
asks if they won't be worried about her, or if she will get in trouble,
but she says no. Al looks around to try to discern the locals' attitudes
about Yaa being there: one group seems worried about her being there
due to her reputation; someone near the bar seems to be wondering why
this local girl, whom he doesn't seem to know, is hanging out with a
bunch of out-of-town adventurers; and a third group seems to be worried
about her safety. Al approaches the last group and says Yaa has said her
parents wouldn't be concerned, and she has been good company, but he is
looking for guidance on how to proceed. They seem to think her parents
would be looking for her about now, so they send someone to let them
know where she is.

Soon, a man shows up and calls out to Yaa -- her father, Bida. He
introduces himself and thanks them for befriending Yaa, saying he
has heard good things about them. Yaa asks if she can come back tomorrow
to head out with them again, but Gnik says they will be going underwater.
She looks up hopefully at her father, who says, "No, you can't borrow it
-- I'll be using it." But the group tells her they could see her after
that. Al asks him a bit about his business, and then Kat asks him his
thoughts on the True Path. He sighs and says, "They're... extremists,
is the only word I can think of." He says it is a take on a Dorgenian
word that Kai has never heard -- Tropad -- which translates to a sort
of horror, describing what is believed to have been what inspired Dorg
to become a god to fight that original horror. Kat asks how dangerous
they are, and he says they're pretty dangerous, so hopefully the group
won't cross paths with them. Kai says they probably will, since they
are going to the same place tomorrow -- underwater, to try to deal
with the wraiths. He says perhaps he should change his own plans for
the morning, and thanks them for helping deal with the wraiths.

The group heads out to meet up with the Night Revelers. Ember and Kai
state that they will be avoiding any mind-altering substances and keeping
an eye on the rest of the group. They let Laur know through the farspeaker
that others on the crew could join if they wanted. As they approach the
dancehall, they hear rhythmic sounds. Most of the building seems to be
original construction, with a couple of new levels above. Kai tells the
woman at the door, who invited them, that they invited some of their
crew, but they didn't bring anyone from the True Path. She introduces
them to Jenehba, in a large ballroom with hovering crystal lights.
There are people talking quietly and intently to each other, small
groups of musicians, people dancing. Jenehba is clothed head to toe
in a loose garment, with no face or gender obvious. They express
interest in hearing about the group's conversations with Tauch
and Brerich.

Kat and Milena go to dance, and Kai and Ember notice a very
good-looking man dancing who makes flirtatious eye contact with them;
Kai does not have the willpower to stop herself from joining him.
Kat falls in with a group jamming rhythmically together, jumping and
spinning and feeding off each other's energies. Milena dances more
of a meditative, spiritual dance, for which others give her space
but also join with that energy. Soon that group begins removing
their clothes. Chastity joins Milena's circle, while Carey joins
Kat's.

Gnik falls into listening to a conversation about theories of magic,
including about elven magic. Jenehba approaches him at some point and
asks if he has enjoyed his evening -- and that his friends have made
an impression. She offers 4000 gold if he brings whatever the group
learns to them instead of to Tauch, because they may be able to
forge the knowledge into something new. 

Kat tries the mind-altering substances, and while she is dancing,
she sees the roof of the building rise into the night sky, and
clouds whip by in the night sky, as if time is speeding backwards.
She sees arches over the roof forming a dome about 40 feet up, with
a surface like a single sheet of mother of pearl -- and the glowing
crystal lights are there the entire time, with more popping into
existence as she moves earlier in time. She stops and stares up
at the ceiling gleaming with color. The people around her seem
to disappear and others appear -- until two thirds have the traditional
tall sloping head that has been popular here. There is always a lot
of talking -- not a lot of partying or other activities. And then she
passes out.

Al also tries the mind-altering substances, but whatever he takes
doesn't agree with him, and he starts feeling a bit sick before
anything kicks in. Milena tries something mellowing, but it does
not have much of an effect -- although it tastes good.

Gnik casts Detect Shapechanger and looks around the room, but doesn't
see anyone who registers.

The group returns to the inn and Milena tends to Al and Kat; Kat has
vague memories of Ember arguing with someone, and then she wakes up
in her bed at the inn.



22 Sinta 3275

The group wakes up and comes down to breakfast; Kat is feeling the
aftereffects of her trip the night before, and heads back to bed
as soon as breakfast is over. Milena just feels extra hungry and
asks for an extra serving of potatoes. Al also feels a bit grumpy
and out-of-sorts. Kai arrives at breakfast with Corey. Gurow arrives
and asks if they are ready, and Kai asks if she can get potions to
help with the recovery of the two who are still feeling ill. She
returns and says not to worry about the charge, they would just
take it out of their reward. Al drinks one, and Milena takes the
other upstairs for Kat.

Gurow leads them to the water. As she goes into the water, the shells
in her necklace seem to sink into her skin, and she dives in. The
group follows down a fairly steep incline, past beds of cultivated
seaweed and clams tended by merfolk. Gurow seems to be breathing through
holes where her necklace used to be, and her fingers have become webbed.

She says she is taking them to one of the local council members, who
may be able to help with records of the lost ship. They are a couple
hundred feet below, and can see the sharp dropoff of the shelf ahead.
The area darkens, and they realize there is a translucent ship just
above them, with a red-eyed shadow and a trail of glowing red balls
coming toward them.


1 April 2023

The group have heard that the red balls are some kind of undead creature
that can shoot out necrotic energy of the same sort the wraith can impart
with its claws. About a dozen more are descending into the town around
them.

Kai flies/swims up to attack the wraith, hitting it in the head; Milena
casts Guiding Bolt, also hitting and tearing a hole in its shoulder with
radiant energy. Kat casts a chaos bolt in the form of lightning and hits
it, catching a couple of the red balls in the area effect; Kai, hearing
the crackling of energy behind her, dodges out of the way but is still
singed. Kat is also singed. Gnik blasts the wraith with the psychic
helm. Al asks over the farspeakers, "Do wraiths require magic to damage
them?" Gnik anwers yes.

Zassin sees that these undead are not attacking with magic, so he
doesn't need to stick too close to Milena; he flies up to interfere
with one of the little red balls and distract it. Gurow swims straight
down to protect the merfolk below.

The wraith attacks Kai, but she parries with her sword. She feels a
painful energy coming off it as she knocks it aside. The red dots
spread out a bit, with one firing at Ember, one at Kai, and one at
Al. The one Zassin attacked attacks him back, and hits; he squawks
loudly. Another one fires at Kai and hits.

Kai slashes through the wraith and it fades to shreds; she swings
at one of the balls near her. Milena casts another Guiding Bolt
at one of them; it dims a bit, and Al swims up to attack it. Kai
attacks with Torchlight and uses the Booming Blade effect, with
Fancy Footwork to retreat. Ember takes a couple of shots at the
one she's facing, and tears into it.

Gnik swims up near the one Ember is fighting, using Shape Water
to interfere with its movement. Zassin flies back down to Milena
and crawls back into her shirt to hide. Az flies up to help Kai.
The dot that Milena hit tries to attack her, but she dodges. Kai
swings at it, and it poofs. Milena casts Sacred Flame on the dimmest
dot that Ember is up against, but it doesn't have an effect. She
swims down to try to stay out of their range. Kat throws up a Shield
spell to counter an attack.

Al attacks the ball nearest him and hits it three times; it is very
dim. Kat sneak-attacks with Torchlight and uses Booming Blade; the
dot dissipates into nothingness. Ember attacks the one next to her
and tears it apart. Gnik blasts the last one, next to Al, with his
helm and it blasts apart.

The townsfolk below are fending off the rest of the red dots, so
the group goes to help clean up. They realize that when the wraith
was taken out the ship began fading, and is now almost invisible.

Milena gathers the injured together, including three townsfolk who
were seriously injured in the fight, and casts Prayer of Healing. Then
they regroup with Gurow and continue on. They notice storms above, with
flashes of lightning, but it doesn't seem to be affecting the water below.
It is the feast day of Nolan, who has domain over weather as well as the
sea, and Kai opines that it's just Nolan enjoying being worshipped.

Gurow takes them to see Zeesata, a member of the high court of Lower
Cassadega, handling defense and the tracking of sunken ships, among
other things. They get to the lip at the edge of the deep and Gurow
pops into a bar, the Deep Dive, and says they need to go to the
arena below. She steps off the lip and starts swimming down the
cliff face. They see caves dug into the cliff that look like shops,
and there are people swimming up and down. The magic protecting the
city keeps them from being affected by the pressures of the deep.

They hear a deeply resonating music coming from somewhere below,
and as they get deeper they see lights emanating from an chasm
-- it probably started as a natural shape but has been carved
into an arena. All along the cliff face are randomly scattered
openings, like balcony boxes in a concert hall. At what would have
been the midpoint of the sphere if it continued above is a group
of musicians playing percussive instruments. Gurow says, "Follow
me -- I'll make introductions and we will try not to offend her."
Al says, "What else should we know?" Gurow says, "She's a little
bit arrogant." "Great, why are we dealing with her?" Kai asks. "Is
there anyone else?" "She is the only one who knows," Gurow says.

They swim into a box holding a female merperson, talking, and a
male merperson holding a shell and running his finger along it;
he stops when he sees the group approach. There is a human man
standing beside the merwoman -- Jak, whom Kai met at the party.
He is standing in an at-ease position until he sees Kai, and then
swims up to greet her. Gurow has started an introduction, but then
says, "Jak, what are you---" "No, go ahead," he says, as he says
hello to Kai. Gurow begins explaining the group's purpose, but she
interrupts: "Should we let you speak for yourselves, or are you
going to let your servant do all the talking?" Kai bristles and
says, "Why do you call her a servant?" Jak steps in and explains
that they are outsiders, are knighted in their own land, and hold
the favor of one of their leaders -- whom they saved at a party
in Saltmarsh.

Gurow formally introduces Jak to the group; although it is not said in
those terms, they get the impression he is a Paladin of Dorg, with a
commitment to the protection of Dorgenian society and Cassadega in
particular; Gurow is also a protector of the people.  Al explains
their purpose to Zeesata. As she asks, "What is the name of the ship?",
another male merperson swims in and casually leans against the
wall. Jak gives a little smile and Gurow looks at the floor. Zeesata,
looking annoyed, says, "I ask again, what is the name of the ship?"
Al gets the impression the newcomer wants to interrupt and to be
part of whatever is going on. Al asks if Zeesata wanted to introduce
him, and he swoops in and introduces himself as Broomahnay, another
member of the council. Gurow names the ship, and the merman who was
working with the shell goes to look through a pile of similar shells.
Zeesata asks why they want to know, and the group asks if they have
seen the ghost ship -- which just appeared above, and they just fought,
and killed a wraith. "You're welcome," Kat interjects. Gurow adds that
the group also saw that the townsfolk who were badly injured in the
fight were healed. Zeesata thanks them earnestly.

Broomahnay asks if they were at the Night Revelers party the night
before, and Kai says, "Some of us, yes." He smiles at Milena and says,
"Ah, yes, I recognize you!" Kat asks her how naked she got. "Very,"
she replies. "It was a very spiritual experience." "It often is,"
Broomahnay says.

The merman comes back with a shell showing the location of a wreck, and
he shares that two groups have gone to investigate but did not return.
It is an ancient wreck, thousands of years old, that only survives because
there is nothing in the area to mess with it. Kai asks if they may have
permission to investigate, and Zeesata asks their objective; Kai and Al
say they want to stop the undead attacks, and ask if they should fill
Zeesata in when they return. Broomahnay says, "Yes, definitely," and
Gurow -- who hates politics -- rolls her eyes. She says she will go
with them; Jak demurs, as he has other things to attend to. He tells Kai
she should stop by when she gets back, as he'd like to spend more time
with her; Kat stands behind him making kissy faces at Kai. Gurow notices
and whispers something in Kat's ear.

Al pulls out three friends from his bag to accompany them: Gina the
giant octopus, Quigley the quipper, and Ralph the reef shark.

Jak asks Kai how long they will be in the area. "We never really
know," Kai replies, and Kat adds, "We usually stay until we destroy
something." Jak laughs, and they share a couple of brief stories:
destroying the tower, fighting the sahaughin in a lizardfolk lair,
going up against a pair of hags.  He says he has heard many of the
stories, and Kai asks if he had heard them when he approached her
at the party. He says he had, and she seemed an interesting individual
he would like to know more. He invites her to breakfast the next
morning, if she's available.

As they depart, Kat lets Kai know that Gurow told her that Jak doesn't
have sex. "Well, then I'm glad I made the decision I did last night,"
she replies. "And that takes some of the pressure out of our
conversations.

It takes the group about three hours to get to the site. Al chats with
his animal friends on the way there telling them to keep an eye on the
surroundings as they go, and that he'll have more instructions for them
when they get to the wreck.

It is very deep when they get to the site, so much so that they can
hardly see light from the surface above. It is in a chasm at a point
where it is about 150 ft wide. Gnik asks how the name of the ship is
known if it is over a thousand years old; Gurow says it was named
when it was first viewed from above, and it is clearly of an ancient
design. From their view of the ghostly version, it was built to resemble
a fish but with a sail in place of the dorsal fin, shimmering and in a hoop.

The group reaches the edge of the ravine and look down, with continual
flame torches, to see a smashed wreck that looks like it came down the
side of the chasm, shearing some of the rock as it went, before coming
to rest against the side. There is an opening in the cliff face
about 15 feet above the wreck that looks like worked stone, possibly
with ornamentation that was sheared off by the ship. They see three
wraiths and several glowing balls rising up toward them from the ship.

Al sends Quigley to Kat, Ralph to Ember, and Gina to Kai, telling them
to help distract the foes and give their team advantage. Then he swims
forward to close with the wraiths; Gnik sends Az, in octopus form, to
go with him. The red orbs swim up about 20 feet and take shots at Al
and Az; Al dodges most of them, but two energy blasts hit him, burning
away a bunch of his flesh. He goes unconscious. Kat swims to him,
grabs him, and pulls him back, and pours a potion of healing down
his throat. He wakes up, but everything hurts.

Ember asks if there will be any blast effects, and Gnik says yes.
She holds to wait for him. He pulls Maria's wand and uses Maria's
Wrath at the wraiths. A blast of bright sunlight hits them in a
cylinder that surrounds them. As he thinks to himself, "Hmm, I
wasn't sure that would work in this domain," he hears a female
voice in his head, indignant: "Please." The three wraiths are
all still there, but two of them are in very bad shape. Three of
the glowing balls survived. Gnik reminds them that the sunlight
will hurt the party as well, but only if they stay in the cylinder
of light.

Ember throws her dagger at one of the two badly-hurt wraiths, and
Kai throws her chain javelin, critically hitting the other hurt
one through the left shoulder. She follows up by throwing her abyssal
dagger, which takes it out. Milena approaches the one Ember hit and
casts Word of Radiance, which takes it out, and then retreats out
of the light toward Kai.

Al feels terrible, but swims up to hit the remaining wraith, trying
but failing to stun it, and then disengages, returning to where Kai
is. Az flashes colors and patterns, trying to distract the foe, while
Gurow hits the wraith with two crossbow bolts. The three glowing balls
move out of the cylinder and shoot at the people below. One attacks
Gnik, one fires at Kat, and one at Gurow. Gnik gets hit in his hip
and Gurow in her knee. Kat throws a Chaos Bolt at the remaining
wraith, but triggers a wild surge. A tentacle shoots out of her
hand and wraps around the wraith, then solidifies, holding it in
place in the cylinder of sunlight.

Ember does a double-take and then swims with Ralph to one of the
balls, taking it out. The wraith disintegrates, but the tentacle
is still coming out of Kat's hand. Gnik starts swimming toward
the ship, taking the cylinder with him. When the light hits the
ship, there is bubbling in the water like there is something
bubbling and writhing within the ship.

Kai swims to the two remaining spheres with Gina, goes into a
rage, and attacks, obliterating them both. Milena moves toward
Gnik and beckons the rest of the group toward her, casting a
Prayer of Healing when everyone is in range. Al still feels like
he has a hangover, but everyone else is completely healed.

They see the ghost of the ship pulling out of the wreck below. Al
yells out, "Who are you? What are you?" Kai notices that there
might have been just a faint flicker of light coming from the cave,
as if there is an air bubble inside. Al tries to swim in to see
what he can see and then come out without getting caught inside
the cylinder. Milena holds, waiting to Channel Divinity if it
looks like it might be useful.

Al sees amazingly ornate stairs with a mosaic of mother of pearl;
shattered, but still beautiful. It opens into a chamber that has
water in it to a depth of about 15 feet, but an air pocket above.
There are ornate pillars, and the room is lit. There are glass
orbs with glowing fish inside at the top of the pillars. Al sees
shadows of things moving in there. There are stairs coming out
of the water on the other side of the room; Al goes to the base
of the stairs and listens. He hears chanting.

The ghost ship cannot move and is stuck in the cylinder; it
disintegrates as all the undead inside it are destroyed.

Kat swims up to join Al and then up the stairs. The room above
has four pillars with glowing fish at the top. There are openings
to the right and left, and one straight ahead that is collapsed.
To the left there is rubble, so might be collapsed ahead. To the
right is a faint white glow with the shadow of someone in the
opening. She sees two slimy tentacled creatures and three clawed
creatures, but none of them are the source of the chanting. She
has gone as far as she can, so she hides. It is not a language
she knows, but the syllables sound Dorgenian. Kat also notices
in the mosaics that it seems like a story charting the growth
of a great city, followed by its collapse and sinking into
the sea. Kat sees the flicker of something translucent coming
out of the rocks. She recognizes the tentacled creatures as
Skum; the Chuul were created to sniff out and bring back to their
masters powerful magical artifacts. Some of the Chuul seem to be
coming toward her.

Ember, Gurow, Kai, and Milena enter the cave as well.


15 April 2023

Al moves forward next to Kat as all six of the Chuul and both Skum turn
to look at Kat. The chanting -- which seems to be a single, male voice
-- stops for a moment before resuming. She gets the impression it is
a ritual Dispel Magic that the caster is pouring a lot of energy into.

The Chuul shuffle forward to create a line blocking the way to the
chanter, and the two Skum step forward. The group hears a voice in
their heads asking, "Why have you come?" Kat says, "We're just looking
for good take-out," and Al says, "To find out what evil nefarious
things you're doing!" Kat pulls out her crossbow and shoots a force
bolt at one of the Skum.

Through the opening on the other side of the chamber, two translucent
figures pass through fallen stone. They seem to flicker in ways that
make it hard to focus on them, although they do seem to be wearing
cloaks that move in ways that seem to defy physics. They come up behind
two of the Chuul and start attacking them.

In their minds they hear a voice speaking in a strange accent asking,
"Please help -- the flickering ones have trapped me. I only want to
help Ankeshel. I have the knowledge of the gods."

Gnik still has the Dawn spell going, so Kai asks him to bring it up
partway into the room so that it covers the Skum and Chuul but leaves
room above them so she can fly in and investigate. The room is suddenly
bright with daylight. Zassin lets Milena know he is sneaking up to the
ceiling to peek in and see what's going on.

Kai flies up and sees that there is a glowing door with knotted strings
carved into the door. There is a person chanting who turns to look at
her; she recognizes Brerinch. Kai goes into a rage and flies at him;
as she comes toward him she slams into something that feels like stone,
but she feels it dissipate as she hits it. She swings again and connects,
slicing into the side of his face. He shrieks; his concentration breaks.

Milena casts Bless on the group, except for Kai (who is out of range)
and Gnik (who has other protections and is not going to be attacking
directly while he is keeping the Dawn spell going). The three Chuul in
the front step together to form a triangle, and there is a glow in their
pincers as they tap them together. The Dawn spell shatters and Gnik
screams as some of the energy they have put into it channels into
him. He seems really confused and drops the wand into the water. Another
Chuul runs at Kai. It just misses with its first pincer, but the second
connects and slams her against the wall and tries to close it around
her neck. Tentacles come out of its mouth at her, but she manages to
break free.

The Skum sprint forward toward Kat and Al. They manifest energy that
becomes tridents in their hands. The first attacks Al, but he parries.
The second attacks Kat, but she throws up a shield and it bounces
off. It swings again and grabs at her with a tentacle, but misses with
both.

Kai recognizes that the shield spell Brerinch was using is specific to
mages with Abjuration -- protection and banishment.

Kat pulls out Torchlight and attacks with the Booming Blade effect. She
stabs it through the elbow, almost taking its arm off. A couple of arrows
splat through it, from Ember's bow. The translucent beings continue
attacking the Chuul.

Kai says to Brerinch, "Stand down. I don't want to kill you." He says,
"Well, I do want to kill you." She notices the blood coming from his
wound seems diluted, almost watery. He throws up his hand and three
tentacle-like things come at her. The first two hit her with a lot
of force but she manages to stand her ground, although it hurts. She
ducks the third, and it hits the Chuul behind her. Kai sees a section
of wall behind Brerinch move, and Zassin appears, attacking him in
the back of the neck. Kai takes a swing at him and hits twice.

Milena casts a Lesser Restoration on Gnik; he comes back to himself
quickly, although he still seems to have a bit of a headache, and
thanks her. She retrieves the wand and gives it back to him, and tells
him to sit and rest.

Al hits the Skum in front of him and stuns it, then hits it twice
more. Two of the Chuul who broke the Dawn spell walk up behind
the Skum, and are tall enough to reach over them. One reaches its
pincers at Al's chest, but he smacks it away and flips over it,
only taking minor damage. The second one reaches for Kat but the
Skum in front of her moves and the Chuul hits it in the head instead.
Another Chuul moves up to face Kai. The first grabs for her leg but she
kicks it away, the newcomer grabs at her arm but misses. The Skum in
front of Kat reaches for her, but it bounces off her shield effect.
Kat attacks it again with the Booming Blade effect. It looks like it
is not in great shape. Ember takes a couple of shots at the stunned Skum
in front of Al. 

Brerinch mutters, "I have better things to do with my time than waste
it with one such as you," and says a couple of words. For a moment the
reality around her seems to flicker; she's not underground, but the
sky above her is land, and there are stalactites and stalagmites,
with armies fighting on the land above... but then she is back. "Well,
shit," says Brerinch, as Zassin flutters around his head trying to
distract him. Kai swings at him and he tries to jump back but she
still catches him across the stomach. She swings again through his
left arm and he shrieks. He says, "Is it too late to talk about maybe
not killimg me?" as he drops to a knee.

Milena hits the Skum in front of Kat with a Sacred Flame, and it
bursts into white glistening fire. Al attacks the Skum in front
of him. He hits it twice and it goes down, then attempts an off-hand
attack at the Chuul behind it, and stuns it.

Brerinch asks if the offer to spare his life is still on the table.
She looms over him intimidatingly and says, "Only if you call off
your minions." He says, "Unfortunately, they are Zallmimin's to
command." Zassin reminds them all that Zallmimin is an Abelith
which can dominate mental capacity with a touch and that live
underwater. One of the Chuul behind her reaches for her leg and
hits but does not grab it; its other attack grazes her head as it hits
her. The other Chuul scrapes her arm, and she is beginning to feel
pretty hurt.

Kat attacks the Chuul in front of her using Booming Blade and hits
it in the left pincer. Ember and Gurow coordinate their attack and
aim for the stunned Chuul. Kai yells at Brerinch as she turns to
attack the Chuul behind her, "Are you also working for Zall...
wossname?" and she hears the rest of the group say "Zallmimin!"
into the farspeaker. He says he is working for Zallmimin's
freedom. She also hears another voice in her head saying, "I work
for the glory of Ankeshel, which all should wish for." Kai takes
a potion of Greater Healing. Milena throws another Sacred Flame
at the stunned Chuul.

Al hits the Chuul in front of him and stuns it, and Gurow shoots
the one in front of Kat and hits it twice. It turns to attack Al
and grabs at his ankle, but he is able to leap and flip over the
pincer. One of the two facing Kai grabs at her head and at her
arm, and they hit but can't grapple. Kai hears a booming sound
and one of them falls flat on its face in front of her to reveal
Kat standing there with her rapier. Ember runs up into the space
Kat left behind to fight the Chuul that was facing her. The
ghostly figures finish off the two Chuul in front of them; one
goes to help Kai and the other to help Al and Ember.

Kai turns to look behind her at the mage, and doesn't see him.
Kat, though, sees him -- transparent and glowing blue, sneaking
along the wall -- and says, "He's right there!" Kai swings at
the point Kat indicated; he falls to the ground and reappears
in a heap. She slashes at the remaining Chuul and cleaves into
its leg. Gnik blasts one of the Chuul with his helmet.

Milena goes tumbling past the Chuul in front of Al to a space where
she can see all the injured party members and casts Mass Healing
Word on all of them -- including the fallen mage. Kai and Gnik
feel somewhat better, and Al feels much better. Al swings at one
of the Chuul in front of it and takes it down, then spins around and
takes the other one out. Gurow steps forward into the space Al left
behind and shoots the remaining one in front of Kai with two bolts.
The two haints swarm it but don't take it down. It grabs at Kat and
gets her around the waist, and grabs at Kai's head with its other
claw, hits, but doesn't get a firm grasp. It pulls Kat toward it
and whacks her with its tentacles; she feels a stinging goop and
brings up her rapier to stab it in the face. The blade goes through
its head and it collapses.

The haints babble at them and Kat triggers her ability to speak Tongues.
"Thank you for helping us!" they say, and Kat says, "We were happy to
help." "You speak our language!" they say excitedly, and she explains
that it is a temporary magic. They explain that they were once part
of a faction of people to stop the leadership of Ankeshel from sinking
the whole city below the waves so it would be under the power of the
Abelith. They say they don't know how to kill an Abelith, so it must
stay imprisoned below. There were once more haints to help defend,
but many have lost their grip on this realm. The ghost ship was full
of servants of the Abelith, so now that it is destroyed they won't be
able to seek out other followers. Gurow has many questions -- such as
whether the innovations of Ankeshel at that time was all due to the
Abelith. They respond that the Abelith was tempting the people with
power that was slowly corrupting them. She says Taush will know of
a way to seal the entrance so others cannot find it. Kai asks if
there are others in Brerich's faction, and Gurow asks if he will give
up names. He is now bound and gagged, but nods weakly. The haints also
share that when Ankeshel started to fall, the faction began a ritual
to transform the people who fell into the water to save their lives.

Gnik points out that the mage is wearing a magical amulet, so they
take it from him. Al asks if the fish have been trapped in the columns for
thousands of years, and the haints say they are not alive, they are
magic, and were originally part of the government complex that slid
into the ocean.

They discuss possibly looking into the no-longer-undead shipwreck; they
quickly discover there is nothing there of interest that has survived over
the thousands of years.


29 April 2023

Gnik looks in Glee's book to see what it has to say about Zalmimin. He finds
a side-note that says "Abileths are yoyos". There are theories that each one
is just one tendril of a single creature. There is also a note about an area
where the servants of Zalmimin swarm.

The group discusses ways to fill in and hide the cave. Gnik does not have
a Stone to Mud spell -- he is not that powerful yet. Kai is aware of using
black powder to blow things up, but it is not safe and would not work
under water. Milena suggests using Al's animal friends, or Gnik's disc,
to bring rubble up from the ocean floor and fill in the room. They ask
Gurow what Tauch might do, and she says he would most likely bring a
device that would cave in and hide the entrance. They know others in
Brerinch's group are aware of its existence, though.

They decide someone should go back to get Tauch while others stand
guard. The haints offer to go with whoever goes back to protect them.
Kai goes; Gnik sets up a tiny hut blocking the entrance to the underground
lair, with Al outside on the water side with his animal friends to keep
watch, and Milena keeping watch on the dry chamber side, wearing Gnik's
ring of psychic shielding, to keep an eye and prepare snacks. Gnik
takes time to identify Brerinch's amulet. He finds it is an Amulet of
Hidden and Safety, preventing various sorts of divination magics and
scrying against the wearer, including Read Thoughts (but not Telepathy).
After some discussion, they decide Milena will wear it temporarily.

Kai heads up to the cliff face at the edge of the underwater city and
sees a dozen or so people coming out of the arena and toward
her. There is a ring of armored and armed people around them. She sees
Zeesatta, and then Broomahnay casually swims over. Zeesatta asks Kai
what happened, and Kai says they found a wrecked pirate ship and the
others were looting it.  She asks again, and Kai adds that there was
some kind of ghost ship attached to it, which is where the wraiths
were coming from, and they destroyed it. Zeesatta asks why the group
couldn't have sent someone up who was good at communicating. Kai
pushes her way past and flies up and out of the water. When she bursts
out of the water, there are people gathered on the shore, and she
hears Yaa yell, "Woo-hoo!"  She sees Tauch in the crowd, and her crew
over to the side.  She goes to talk to Laur and let him know everyone
else is fine. She asks why everyone is gathered on shore. Apparently
merfolk scouts spotted her when she first came within visual distance
of the city. He gently scolds her for not having kept in touch, and
she lets him know they were more than a mile away -- it took her over
two hours to return.

She sees Tauch approach, and lets him know she needs to talk with him.
She asks Laur to keep others away to give them privacy. Tauch asks what
she found, and she asks if he has heard of an aboleth named Zalmimin. He
is aware of aboleths and the name sounds vaguely familiar. She tells Tauch
he's locked up below. He asks why, she thinks a moment, and says Gurow
will be giving him a long history lesson when she gets back, but they
need his help burying and hiding the entrance so no one can find it. He
asks if she can sketch out the space -- not exactly, but he needs to know
roughly what he's working with so he knows what to bring. "No," she says,
and asks if he can swim. He can't, so she asks if there's someone else he
trusts besides Gurow. He mutters a few words of magic and poofs away. Jak
approaches her from the crowd and offers her some healing. "Oh, you're
even prettier now," she says.

A kid comes running up with a bag in each hand and says, panting, "Tauch
says put these together down there." "Put the bags together?" Kai asks.
"I think he means put what's in the bags together," he says, and runs off
to get paid for his errand. She calls after him, "...and then get away
from the contents?" "Oh, yeah, then go away really fast!" he says. She
returns below; some of the merfolk cheer as she goes by, but Zeesatta
glares.

Gnik and Kat discuss how best to set up an explosion to fill the entrance
without letting the rubble fall out. They decide Gnik will set up another
tiny hut for safety, so Kat can use Mage Hand to finish putting the device
together and then jump into the hut for safety from the explosion. She
opens up the bag and sees that it is a vrill battery, with half of it
in a conch shell. She sticks that half to the ceiling, steps back 30
feet, then uses Mage Hand to stick the battery into it. It immediately
starts vibrating violently -- she jumps into the hut as it explodes.
They see rubble and soundwaves stream past all the way to the shipwreck,
knocking out fish in the area. When the rubble settles, they see two
glowing fish float out of the rubble. Al goes to retrieve them. When he
goes to grab it, it feels gelatinous; he lets go and it circles around
his head. He grabs the other one and it also begins circling around his
head. They persist even when he goes into the air-filled hut.

They ask Gurow what her people would do with Brerinch. She says it will
be a matter for the Council, but Tauch is on the Council and can work
with the other members. They leave Brerinch to her custody when they
part ways.

They return to the upper city and talk with Laur. The group is heading
upriver, which is too small for the Mighty Redemption. They discuss
the possibility of having him head back to Saltmarsh for news and then
come back to get them in a few days, but decide they'll make final
decisions in the morning.

Al's friend Bimisi greets him and points out his ship, which has come
to pick him up -- it is quite conspicuous, as its mast is an actual,
huge, living tree. Al goes with Bimisi to talk to it; it vibrates to
make speech sounds, and is very curious about where Al has been and
what he knows. It wants to see everything, but its crew keeps taking
it places it has already been. Al suggests they might want to take
Norina's people to settle in Seaton.


23 Sinta 3275

Kai has breakfast with Jak, and when she returns she shares that
she has learned Cassadega residents have been going to the Blood
Tower and only one has returned, thinking he was only gone three
days but it was actually two months. She did not tell him about
the relic that Lyle went to find -- the Ebon Tablet, which is
rumored to be able to bring Tyorl back, as well as to alter
reality in general -- but he says there is a rumor that some
relic is causing the temporal effect. 

Al asks why they think they want to destroy the tablet. Gnik is
conflicted, but wants to follow through on his friend Lyle's plans.
Milena says it is a power not meant for mortals; even well-meaning
changes will have negative repercussions. Kai says bringing Tyorl
back would be bad, and those who want to do it hate his successor
Tyolus, and who knows what they might do if they are unable to
bring Tyorl back -- for example, if he does not want to come back?
Milena suggests an Augury; Gnik asks what will happen if we decide
now that we will destroy the artifact when we find it. He gets back
an answer of Weal.

Gnik and Al decide that Al will take the Ventilating Lungs and let
Gnik take his Necklace of Clean Breath so Al can have the Amulet
of Hidden.

They have the Mighty Redemption drop them off at the river mouth
in the rowboat and then go on to Saltmarsh while they explore --
with Mouse and Boris, so there is room on the 6-person rowboat
in case Lyle is still alive. Gnik suggests sending a message to
the dealer in Saltmarsh who might be able to provide economic
assistance selling the mithril in Gonajibria so they can improve
their defenses -- since it could be months before the group is
able to return, if they are caught in a time effect. The group
will meet the crew in Saltmarsh when they are done. They provision
with 40 days' worth of provisions, expecting that it may take two
weeks to get upriver.


25 Sinta 3275 an beyond

Milena tries her own Augury as they sail up the coast, asking the
same question as Gnik. Her result is both Weal and a sense of concern
regarding the path to get there.

It is an easy sail up the coast to get to the mouth of the river.
They set out, and despite Milena's skill at maps and navigating, it
becomes quickly confusing, as it seems in a matter of hours that they
have gone a distance that should have taken days. Further in, the water
sometimes flows in a figure 8 before resuming normal flow; or water
going upward and then falling. After five days they see a fish swimming
above the water, and a beaver with a tortoise shell walking sideways
along the shore, crab-like, but overall less and less fauna. Near the
end of the sixth day, around a bend they see a battered pier. Kai can
see two people standing on the end of it.  As they get closer they see
a male and female human; the man is looking at them; the woman, wearing
chainmail, is looking around puzzled. They navigate nearer and the
man yells out to a welcome. "Come, throw the... thing...." "Rope?"
Milena asks. "Yes... it is hard to concentrate...." She throws out
the rope to him and he pulls them in. He introduces himself as Estem,
and the woman as Silen. He says he will try to make things safe for them,
but they will have to hurry; if she has enough time, she will eliminate
them. Kai asks who, and he glances at Silen. The group gets the impression
he may somehow be simultaneously interacting with multiple points in
time, which is what requires so much concentration.

They set out over land in the direction they expect the tower to be.
The foliage is up to eye level on Al and Kai, so they take the lead.
There is a faint trail; there is a point where it opens up to an
area where all the plants are dessicated; some look like stone, the
ground looks scorched, and there is a ball of flame and another ball
of water hanging in the air. There are bones, some with packs --
something went down here a long time ago. With his glasses, Gnik sees
a wave of magic coming off the area. There are hills in the distance;
Kai can see a tower on one of them, and a shaft of darkness near it
going all the way up into the sky, as if it is night in that spot. Kai
suggests that everything that has ever happened here is happening now.

They see four people stumble out of a door that wasn't there before;
Gnik recognizes them as four members of the Exiles looking exactly
like they did when they left Saltmarsh 15 years ago. He greets them
and Gala the halfling greets him excitedly and runs forward to give
him a hug. She asks what he's doing there and he says looking for them,
since they didn't come back. She says they just got there, and Gnik
says, "It's been 15 years." They start trying to relate what happened
to them; they got off the boat and were jumped, and are confused about
what happened next. Gnik asks about Lyle; they say he was with them,
and aren't sure what happened. Al notices that the weapon Ruben is
holding is also on the ground near some of the bones. Al whispers
over the farspeakers, "I don't think we should tell them yet, but I
think they died here. I think we should just head to the tower." Gala
chats excitedly with him as they go -- but as soon as they get 10 feet
from the clearing, the four of them disappear. The group decides they
need to hurry on to the tower, but will stop on the way back to do
something with the remains.

They go on about two hours; though it was dusk when they reach the pier,
there is still light, but they are getting near the shaft of night. They
hear two Dorgenian voices arguing, and decide to sneak past and perhaps
try to help them on the way back. They see movement in the brush, but
the trail moves in an impossible way in order to avoid it.

They get to the point that they can see the tower very clearly. The
door just looks like a glowing light. There are two people talking
to each other, a man and a woman who turn to look at them when they
get closer: Angel and Brendan. Angel waves, and Brendan gestures them
forward. Al suggests Gnik puts on his glasses, but Gnik casts Detect
Shapechanger instead. Angel says this is the strangest dream she's
ever had, and she doesn't even remember going to sleep. Milena asks
her what she does remember, and she says she was shopping for groceries
in Seaton. She fills them in on what has been happening: The rightful
ruler of Seaton came back to claim the throne, and Polis stepped aside
for her. Several people disappeared about the time they left, and Gnik
infers that the shapechanger they killed was all of them, playing all
sides against each other. Brendan approaches, and Al gives him a hug
before he can say anything. Brendan says, "It is good to see you,
boy." Al asks, "Do you know---" "Yes, I know what happened, and I
know what you did. Thank you." The group asks how they got here, and
they don't know, but think they just arrived. Brendan tells them they
must rest and prepare for what comes next. Al asks him if there is
anything undone that he wants to see done, or any messages to pass
on, and he tells Al to tell his sister she is doing a good job. Al
asks Brendan's opinion of what should be done with the Ebon Tablet.
"Well, what do you want to do with it?" "Destroy it," says Kai, but
Al says, "I'm not so sure." Brendan suggests that the tablet itself
is not evil, but they can only hope that someone with good heart finds
it; and after that, someone else with a good heart finds it, and so on.
He tells them to rest and get ready, because once they go inside, it's
a race, with one person there to help them and one person to stop them.

Al peers through the shutters and sees a ruin on the inside, with no
roof even though they can see a roof from the outside. As they approach
the door, through the glow they see what looks like a massive room with
20 foot tall bookshelves lining the walls. They look around an realize
Angel and Brendan are no longer there. Al walks through the light
and it dissipates off him as he disappears. He feels a warm
tingle, and then he is somewhere else.


13 May 2023

The group steps through and finds themselves in a room that is not
shaped consistent with the outside of the tower. There is an ambient
light that seems to emanate from everywhere at once. There is a spiral
staircase on the other end of the room, visible through the maze of
bookshelves. There is a pedestal in the front part of the room with
some sort of diorama on it, with a sheet of paper on it, as well as a
wadded up piece of paper on the floor near them.

A metallic creature with two legs, a round body, and a single eye on
a long neck, waddles over to them and says hello. Kat asks its name
and it says it has no name, it is the library automaton. It asks if they
are with Luther and Naila, who have been here for a while -- Gnik and Milena
recognize their names as adventurers from the Union of the Cube who were
in Saltmarsh for a few weeks, about a decade ago. They were interested
in religious and other arcana.

Al has heard of library automata -- they don't have arms but can
telekinetically move written materials; Kat knows the eye is usually
from someone who used to work at the library and gifted the eye for
the automaton. Its inside is an infinite space for storing books,
which can be accessed by a handle, and it can be used as a familiar.

Al asks whose library it is, and the automaton says it is Tyorl's.
Al asks if it has the Ebon Tablet, and it says no. He asks if it
has ever been here or if there is anyone who knows where it is. It
says no, and asks what it is. Al says it can change reality, and it
blinks and says, "Sounds scary."

Gnik sends a Mage Hand to pick up the crumpled piece of paper. Milena
goes to inspect the diorama, and Al picks up the piece of paper on
top of it. The diorama is a 10-foot wide crater with a tiny figure in
the center sitting on its heels with a piece of paper in its lap, a
much larger figure leaning against the edge of the crater, and corpses
strewn about the edge of the crater. There is a glowing cocoon off-center
that seems to hold a figure, but it is difficult to make out clearly.

Gnik reads the crumpled piece of paper and announces, "We need to go."
It is a note written by Silen saying she is pledged to protect the library
and send all threats to oblivion. Al takes a moment to ask the tiny diorama
figures if they are real, and hears a voice talking about all the knowledge
and power in this place. A shadowy, smoky spirit appears and babbles at
all of them as they try to move toward the staircase. The words seem to
seep into their brains, making it hard to think straight. Az quivers and
poofs away. Al is stunned and out of it; the others are a bit confused
but shake it off. Ember asks if they are running or fighting, and Gnik
and Milena say run. She takes off toward the stairs, and Kai grabs Al
and follows. Kat jumps up on top of the bookshelves and calls out
directions to everyone else. Kai rounds a corner and sees another of
the shadowy beings blocking the way that was not in Kat's line of
sight. She calls out to let Kat know. Kat moves forward and casts
a Chaos Bolt at it, hitting it with a blast of thunder.

Kai yells, "Gnik, what are these?!" She realizes her sword might also
be albe to answer that question and asks her telepathically. Milena casts
a Sacred Flame at the shadowy being as she keeps running. Al calls out,
"They're immune to cold, necrotic, and poison!" Gnik adds, "Don't talk
to them -- the crazy rubs off!" It whispers something -- and just as Al
feels himself coming back into himself, a wave of paranoia comes over him,
but he shakes it off. Milena briefly feels that the two people near her
are going to hurt her, and then realizes that's Al and he wouldn't hurt
her. Kai realizes Al has come back to his senses and drops him, he
tumbles away and to his feet. As Kat comes to the end of the bookshelves
she flips off with a double flip and lands in a hero pose. They all make
it past the shadow and to the staircase, and Al takes a healing potion.

At the foot of the stairs there are two people -- Esten, looking older,
and Matty. Esten says, haltingly, "She's fighting... sorry..." and then
seems to stop existing. Matty turns to the group and greets them
warmly. Kat asks what she has been doing, because they haven't seen
her for a while, and she says, "Well, I'm dead." She says Selim brought
her here as a distraction. Gnik says, "That means we probably shouldn't
stop and talk to you," and she says, "No, probably not...." Kat can't
resist, though, and asks her what it's like to be dead. She says she
thinks she is at peace. Kat gives her a big hug and says she's glad
to see her, but they have to go. Matty says it's great to see them.
Al asks if there are any messages he can share, and she says to tell
Anny the secret is not worth her hiding away. Al says he'll tell her.
Kat says she's sorry she was not there when Matty died; Matty says, "I'm
not -- you would have died too." Kat says she's sorry she never had a
chance to apologize from their falling-out over her deal with Zagrimil.
Matty tells her, "It's fine! We're fine. You don't have to carry it
anymore." Pause. "But you should probably stop working with Zagrimil."
They notice colors shifting and dimming randomly, and shimmers that
are becoming longer and more frequent. They occasionally smell things
they don't recognize.

As they go up the stairs, Al shares what he read on the paper on the
diorama, which describes the battle. The large body slumped against
the wall was apparently Tyorl, the being in the cocoon was Sgult, and
there is mention of a strange young girl (although this doesn't seem
to be related to the battle).

At the top of the stairs is a trapdoor in the ceiling. Kat looks for
traps, finds none, and flips it open. They are in a long hall with
another set of stairs at the far end. The place is weirdly lit by
a starscape on the ceiling -- it is only 15 feet up, but looks
infinite if they're not scrutinizing it too closely. There are two
rows of pillars running down the length of the hall, with 12-foot tall
figures carved into them -- the two nearest them are a warrior and a
roguish figure. The far wall looks like a mural of beasts and monsters
that looks different whenever they look away and look back -- but there
is always a red glow of eyes along the wall. Several of them notice a
split at the head and feet of the statues, as if the statues can move.
They decide to run down the left wall. Kai picks up Gnik and Ember and
flies behind. Kat goes first, and as soon as she gets past the first
row of columns, two of the eyes on the far wall flare up and a blast
of energy comes at her. She dodges to the side; and then Milena,
behind her, dodges, as does Al behind her, and then Kai. The blast
hits the wall behind, blowing chunks off it.

They discuss having one person run, dodge the attack, and then have
the others run out after the blast goes by. Al runs out as fast as
he can and it shoots at him. He kicks off the wall to dodge it and
keeps going, and the rest of the group runs out afterward; it
doesn't immediately shoot again. Al runs out again and dodges another
blast; as soon as he gets past the last set of columns the far wall
becomes featureless, although the others still see the shapes on it
until they clear the last columns. They make it to the stairs; the
world seems muted and things vibrate in off-putting ways, with others
seeming to flicker out of reality for a moment.

At the top of the stairs they come into an even longer room -- about
200 feet long -- with two rows of columns, but just abstract patterns
rather than figures. Kai senses that the floor is actually lava outside
the two rows of columns. The air is hot and dry.

Al takes a couple of cautious steps down the middle of the hall,
followed by Kat, Milena, and Gnik, Ember, and Kai at the back,
ready to catch the gnomes if needed. Sections of the floor ahead
of them... and behind them... and near them... start forming
humanoid shapes. The one under Milena reaches around her and tries
to grab her. She is able to avoid being crushed, but it injures
her wrist in the process. Another one grabs for Al, gets a good
grip, and starts moving toward the lava. Gnik pulls out his immovable
rod in case he needs it. Another of the tile things grabs at Kai, but
does not get a full grip. She yells to Al, "I'm coming!"

Kai and Kat know that shapechanging magic won't work on golems,
and neither will normal weapons. They are immune to a range of
damage types, and if they are hit by something they are immune
to, they repair damage.

Kat tries a wild surge to create grease that will make the golems
slide off the path. The one holding Al starts glowing red,
and gouts of flame come out of it. Kat goes past the one in
front of Al, and Kai moves forward to it to try to pull its
arms off him. He slides free; her hands are a bit singed. It
tries to attack Kai, but misses; it gets off-balance and she
knocks it into the lava, spashing the far wall. 

One in the floor near Milena grabs her and squeezes; she feels
a popping in her hip. Another attacks Ember, but she dodges. She
looks at Gnik and says, "Get out of here!"

Milena ignites the Firebird cloak and casts some healing on herself.
The cloak does damage to the golem but it it still grappling her. Al
pulls out his rope to try tripping it; he gets the rope around its
legs. He moves to the golem near Ember and tries to punches it, but doesn't
make contact.

Ember asks if they're just going to run through or stay and fight, and
Gnik says "Run". She takes off; a golem grazes her, and Gnik hears
something pop, but she flips over and does not get grabbed. Gnik uses
a telekinetic trip to try to trip the golem behind it, but it clumsily
keeps itself standing. Then he runs.

Everything appears to be shaking, fracturing, and reforming around
them; they begin feeling somewhat disconnected from their bodies, and
feel as if they are smelling sounds and hearing aromas....

Kat activates the Serpent of Sil and sprints for the far wall. Kai tries
to release Milena from the golem holding her; she is slightly singed from
the Firebird cloak, but breaks Milena free. She flies up and toward the
far end of the room. Zassin also flies down the hall. Kai grabs Al and
flies toward the ceiling; the one that held Milena grabs for her legs
and crushes her ankles but can't get a grip.

Zassin hits the portal at the end and vanishes, and a bunch of other
sections of ground start moving. One grabs Ember and she goes limp
in its arms. One grabs at Kat, but misses. Milena sees that the one
that fell into the lava tries to climb back up but slides back into
the lava. Milena moves to make sure everyone is within 60 feet of
her and then casts Mass Healing Word before flying farther down the
hallway.

Kai drops Al, and he parkours his way down the double row of columns.
The golems try to jump for him; one gets a hand on him, but he parries
the blow. Ember tries to break free, and wriggles free, but it grabs
her again when she tries to run off. Gnik tries to trip it, and it falls
to the floor. He yells to Milena to come back and get him; he will take
the damage from the cloak to let Kai work on getting Ember. Kat makes it
to the end of the hall, but pauses before going through the portal.

Kai pries the golem off Ember, grabs her and flies; it hits her but doesn't
grab her. She drops Ember off next to the portal and then turns to make
sure everyone can get out. The one in front of Gnik turns to attack him,
and hits, but does not manage to grab him. Two come at Al but miss.

Milena flies back to Gnik with the bone ladder and waits for him to
disengage and grab hold of it, then flies back toward the end of the
room over the lava so they are out of range of the golems. Al dodges
past the remaining golems and makes his way to the end of the room.
They go through the portal.

The room on the other side is not the library.


10 June 2023

The group finds itself in a room that looks like a study, with several
bookcases, but not as many as the library they saw through the windows
on the first floor of the tower; it is larger than it looks like it
should be based on the view from outside, and warm and cozy, instead
of looking partially destroyed as it did through the windows. They
remember the conversation with Brendan and Angel, but not their previous
trip through the tower. There are divider screens between the bookcases
that look like they would route someone in a particular path.

Sounds come from before them and to the right and left, like someone getting
up from an old leather chair. They hear Mattie's voice say, "Oh, you're
here!" and then Brendan's voice say "Finally." Then a voice Al recognizes
as Lyto the druid from the island in Saltmars say "It's all your fault."
A voice Gnik recognizes as Lyle says, "You could've stopped me." Jaime's
voice says, "You killed us all." They see movement -- corpses of each
of the voices, dessicated but with the flicker of an image of them in
their living forms. They see a spiral staircase on the other side of
the room.

Ember tries to run through one of the fragile-looking screens, but
bounces off it, grunting in pain. Az, now in weasel form, runs through
a gap in one of the screens to scout ahead. Milena tries to climb up
to the top of a bookshelf for a view of the room; she can't quite pull
herself to the top, but gets enough of a view to see that not all of them
would be able to run along the tops of the shelves and screens, even if
they were very stable.

Kat climbs up as well, more successfully, and attacks a ghost gnome that
Ember recognized with her crossbow. Milena tries to Turn them; Lyto and
Lyle stop, but the others keep coming.

Al runs to the right wall and tries to parkour straight down the wall. He
sees Jaime stare at him with hate in her eyes, and other of them, which
they recognize as Revenants, stare at others. Al and Kat feel too
frightened to move; Kat crouches next to her mom, and Al freezes on
top of a bookshelf.

Kai decides perhaps she should just carry the rest of the party across
with her boots of flying one at a time. They decide Al should go first
while Ember defends Gnik and Milena defends Kat. Gnik moves to try to
get a sight-line to Jaime and the gnome, and casts Web on the area
they're in. He glances at the books and sees poetry, stories of adventurers,
and more. Gnik randomly grabs a book off the shelf and puts it in his
bag. Ember takes a dodge, and Milena casts Word of Radiance at the
two nearest Revenants while staying on the bookshelf to keep an eye
on her frightened daughter.

Al comes to out of his frightened state and tells Kai she can put
him down. She drops him on a bookshelf and heads back as he continues
to parkour down the wall. One of the Revenants comes after Gnik and
Ember, and another tries to climb the bookshelf after Kat, but she
also recovers from her fright and dodges both its attacks. One of
the Revenants hits Ember with its fists, and it hurts. Kai tries to
do a flying tackle as she reaches the Revenant on Ember, which is in
the form of Matty, and grapples her. Gnik casts a Telekinetic Trip
on Brendan, and he falls off the bookshelf. He runs through the
non-webbed path. Ember attacks the grappled Matty with her rapier
and tears her up pretty badly.

Milena sees that Kat is back to normal, so scrambles up onto the bookcase
and hits the fallen Brendan with a Sacred Flame. Kat uses the Serpent of
Sil to cast Calm Emotions, suppressing fear effects for the rest of the
party, and and causing the foes who fail their saves -- in this case,
Matty -- to be indifferent to them. Matty's real face flickers into
view and she says, "Oh. You should get out of here." Kat then takes
off running toward the other end of the room.

Al reaches the stairs, sees movement, and hears Anny's voice. They
each ask whether the other is real; she's soaking wet, and says she
was out on patrol, a weird woman pointed at her, and suddenly she
was here. Az appears, runs around Anny's leg a bunch of times, and
then shakes the water off -- she didn't know Anny was wet.

Brendan starts trying to climb the bookcase again to get at Milena.
The gnome makes it out of the web and comes at Kat, but she evades
and keeps running. Kai grabs Gnik and Ember, and starts flying to
the other side of the room. Milena warns Zassin that she's about to
ignite her cloak, and he takes off flying, trying to match the patterns
on the ceiling as he goes. Gnik casts another Trip at Brendan, and he
falls off the bookshelf again. Milena ignites her cloak and takes off
down the room.

When they reach the stairs, Anny fills them all in on how she got there,
and Gnik shows an image of the woman at the dock, who she recognizes as
the woman who pointed at her. Gnik says she was probably brought here to
slow them down, and hopefully she's still alive; she should come with
them, but they need to go. Milena invites her to come a little closer
to her cloak to warm up and dry off, but she says, warily, "No thank
you...." Kat is probably the only one who recognizes Milena's invitation
was mostly tongue-in-cheek. Kat gives her her dagger that she's been
carrying around for ages, and Anny happily thanks her, but disappears
as soon as she steps onto the stairs.

At the top of the stairs they enter a long, thin room, 20 feet in width
and about 200 feet in length, covered in dirt and plant life -- a colorful
jungle-like garden full of flowers. There are no obvious paths through
the flowers; the plants are between 2 and 5 feet high, and the ceiling
is an indeterminate distance above, painted with a daytime sky scene with
a glowing sun in the center. Gnik casts Mage Armor on himself, and Milena
casts Bless on everyone but Kai and Gnik. Kai attempts to fly over part
of the room to see what happens, about 20 feet out and back, to see
what happens. She smells something sickeningly sweet that makes her
feel sick to her stomach. She returns and lets everyone know. Kat
activates an Aura of Purity from the Serpent of Sil, which will extend
to everyone within 30 feet of her.

Al begins walking forward into the plants; vines reach out to grab him,
but his Ring of Free Action makes them slide right off. He goes farther
and encounter the noxious gas, which makes him feel a bit queasy, but
does not stop him.

Gnik suggests a low way to go, which would be to have Milena set the
plants on fire with her cloak, at which point he could control the flame
to burn them all. Kai rolls her eyes and says, "Or I could carry the
gnomes across and then come back to get Kat." Ember says, "I probably
shouldn't stab the plants, should I?"

Kai picks up Ember and Gnik and flies in to see if the vapor has an
effect again. It does, but everyone resists the effect. Milena notices
that one of the plants is Alluring Horror; those that smell it succumb
to a sickening sensation, and if they are near it too long they will
be lured to it and want to protect it until they die and fertilize it
with their corpses. She shares this with everyone over the farspeaker.
Kai sets the gnomes on the stairs; Gnik offers her his Necklace of
Clean Breath for the trip back across, and Al hands over his Ring
of Free Action. Gnik puts on his Arcanus Glasses and examines the
plants. There are all kinds of magical effects of different power
levels and schools of magic.

Kai picks up Kat and they head back across; Kat almost succumbs to
queasiness but shakes it off. Milena follows, staying within the
effect of the Serpent of Sil. Milena also almost succumbs to the
noxious gas, but shakes it off. They reach the other side and Kai
returns Al's ring and Gnik's necklace. They continue up the stairs.

The room above is also long and narrow, about 200 feet long and 
about 30 feet wide, lined on both sides with grooved pillars, not too
ornate, about 10 feet apart. Outside the columns there is no floor,
just a bubbling liquid with an acrid smell. The floor between the
columns is paved with colorful tiles. Gnik does not see any illusions
through his glasses, but some of the columns have magical effects as
though they are magical constructs with transmutation properties.
He points those out to the group. The pillars go all the way up to
the ceiling.

Gnik conjures a rock and uses Mage Hand to lower it into the liquid
and then pick it up again; the rock is falling apart as the liquid
drips off it. He conjures another rock and uses Mage Hand to press
it against a column, but nothing happens.  Al walks up between the
second pair of columns; he moves closer to inspect the one Gnik told
him it was magical but it just looks like a column. He takes another
step past it, and it bends around trying to wrap itself around him,
but can't do it because of his Ring of Free Action. It tries to
attack but he manages to parry a lot of the damage. He wants to attack,
but Gnik and Kai ask him to keep going so they can see if it will follow,
so he dodges it and keeps going. The next one on the left tries to
grab him but fails. He keeps going, and the next one on the right
activates; they seem to be alternating diagonally on the right and
left. The third one hits him but he parries all the damage.

Gnik recommends they all run after Al, to move past the columns that
have already reacted to Al. Kat offers to cast the last effect of
Serpent of Sil, a Sanctuary spell, on one person. Gnik suggests
Milena since she's least evasive. "Oh, she can be pretty evasive,"
Kat says. Milena casts Beacon of Hope on the group, and Kat casts
Sanctuary on Milena. The rest of the group advances to catch up
with Al. 

The columns attack. One comes after Kat, but she's able to roll
away from it and throw up a Shield spell to deflect the damage.
The next one tries to come after Milena, is deflected by the
Sanctuary spell, and goes after Gnik instead. It doesn't grapple
him but does crush his arm, almost pulling it out of the socket.
The next two attack Ember, but miss.

Al advances another 30 feet so the rest of the group can keep up,
and attacks the next column, attempting to stun it. He hits it
and succeeds in stunning it. He moves up and attacks the
next one, and stuns it as well. The rest of the group moves
forward, and Milena casts Mass Healing Word on the group. Zassin
has flown a little bit ahead but is camouflaged, so the columns
don't detect them. 

Al runs forward, passing one without attacking but going to attack
the next one. It hits him hard and he hits back trying to stun it;
his second attempt works. Milena moves forward, and one of the
previously stunned columns slams into her, grappling her. Kat runs,
trying to run up to Al. Kai sets Gnik and Ember down and tries to
free Milena from the column grappling her. She manages to pull it
open enough for her to slip out. She flies Milena forward to Al
while Ember grabs Gnik and runs forward. 

The group decides they are close enough to the end of the room that
they should just let Al go first and then flat out run to the
end. The next column tries to attack Al but misses, then bites
him. He lets Kai run the rest of the way before him, but Zassin
is out in front, not as well camouflaged as he had hoped. He is
hit pretty hard, though he avoids being grappled. He keeps going
and triggers other attacks of opportunity, eventually getting
constricted by a column about 40 feet from the end of the room.
Gnik casts Web on the tops of the columns closest to the room.

Kat moves forward and throws the Star of Jaeleth at the column
holding Zassin. The explosion engulfs the base of the column
but doesn't touch the webs. Milena moves forward and casts
Thunderwave at the base of the column. It breaks off at the
base and Zassin falls out. Kai grabs Ember and Gnik, and Gnik
grabs Zassin with Mage Hand as they go by. The two they pass
try to attack but are stuck in the web.

Only Kat and Milena are left within range, and two columns try to
attack Kat but all their attacks fail. Gnik webs the last two
columns they need to pass through. Milena moves the rest of the
way to the portal, and Kat catches up. They all go through.


24 June 2023

They come into what they expect to be the library; the walls are
at least 40 feet away, the ceiling 30 feet up, and there are racks
of armor and weapons along the walls. The room is sectioned into
a fighting ring, target practice, a practice dummy -- it is clearly
an armory and weapons-training space. There is a wall with hooks
and racks in the middle of the room, and a spiral staircase on
the other end of the room. There is an ambient light emanating from
everywhere.

Al turns to look at the weapons, and Milena reminds everyone that they
were warned to go quickly through this place, so try not to get distracted.
Al sees that all the weapons look very interesting -- some with writing
that seems to move. Gnik puts on his arcanus glasses and sees all the
weapons glow with various kinds of magic.

They hear growling sounds from the sides and ahead with otherworldly
sounds mixed in. Six glowing, flaming hound-like creatures appear. Kai,
Kat, and Al hear sounds of people they know crying in pain, see visions
of Saltmarsh being washed away, and are too frightened to move toward
the hounds.

Kat cowers behind Kai for cover and casts Chaos Bolt at one of the
hounds, but it misses its mark. Gnik, Milena, and Al recognize the
creatures as undead, and Gnik realizes they are lichhounds, most
susceptible to nonmagical slashing weapons or magical weapons. Milena
heard rumors that some necromancer found a way to summon celestial hounds,
murder them, and transform them into horrific beings that gut whatever they
trip. Ember is moving forward; Gnik sends Az to distract one of the
hounds in front of them. Zassin flies forward and bites at one of the
hounds. The group gets an image in their heads of Zassin knawing on
a bone that is just smoking, not flaming -- so it won't burn them.

Kai throws her magical javelin at one of the hounds in front of them;
she pulls it back but does not engage the effect that would pull the
hound toward her. She then throws her magical dagger and hits, then
calls it back. She looks at the wall of weapons behind her, having been
told by Gnik that they are all magical, and grabs a hand-axe: it is all
a single piece of metal and very well-balanced. She flings it at the
hound, and as it flies through the air it glows. It misses.

Ember fires two arrows and hits the one Zassin attacked. Gnik casts an
illusion of a fluffy bunny in front of the hounds to the left side; one
of them definitely notices -- it dives at it and gets very confused when
it goes right through it.

Al takes out the Orb of the Mind's Eye and puts it into his forehead.
He turns to the weapons rack behind him looking for hand-axes. He finds
a pair with strangely curved handle and blade, both very well-balanced.
He flings one, but it hits the ground about five feet in front of him,
and shatters. He flings the second one, and hits. 

The hound that Az was attacking looks like it will be running toward
them, but leaps in the air and flies at them, reaching them. The other
in front of them attacks Zassin, who is thrown to the ground; it chews
into him. The other from the left not distracted by the fluffy bunny
runs at Al; the two on the right run at Milena and Kat.

A hound bites at Al and he gets a sensation of dark and cold rather
than heat, but he somersaults away from it and it seems to fade out
and disappear. Kat sees that it went into the ethereal plane, and
lets Al know. The one attacking Milena hits and throws her to the
ground, dives onto her, and starts tearing into her stomach. The one
coming at Kat jumps, but she throws up a shield and deflects it. The
one coming at Kai attacks but she is able to defend with her sword.

Milena pulls out her holy symbol and attempts to Turn the undead hounds.
The ones attacking Kai and Milena turn and run. Milena tosses out Nash
and tells her to go retrieve Zassin. Nash takes two leaps, grabs the
hound's leg, and flips it over on its back, then leans between Zassin
and the hound. She casts Healing Word at Zassin, stands up, and moves
away from the turned hound.

Kat uses the Calm Emotions effect of the Serpent of Sil on herself
and Al, the two who haven't shaken off their fright. Az goes to
distract the hound Nash is facing. Zassin flies back to Milena,
curls up on her shoulder, and gives her a mental image giving her
the impression that Zassin thinks the hounds were out to get the
two of them. Kai attacks the hound in front of Kat with her
greatsword and Ember jumps at the same one with her rapier and
dagger. Gnik casts a Mind Spike at it, and it cringes.

Al runs toward the staircase, 200 feet away, at a full run, and
takes a dash, getting 3/4 of the way down the room.

The hound in front of Milena takes a step back and disappears into
the ethereal; the one that was in front of Al reappears, flies after
him, realizes he is going to fast, and tries to attack Nash, who gives
it a look like, "Really?" The injured hound attacks Kai, biting into
her knee. The hound that had attacked the illusory bunny comes at Milena
and bites into her thigh, but is not able to fling her down. She tries
Turning Undead again, and the one in front of her goes into the
ethereal. Nash tears into one of the hounds in front of her and it
disintegrates. Kat asks Milena if she needs a Sanctuary spell, and
Milena says she's had worse. Kat makes a run for it, trying to join
Al, and gets about halfway down the room.

Kai and Ember attack the hound in front of them. It disintegrates.
Over the earpieces, Al says, "Can you get away from them? We should
run!" He reaches the staircase. Two people turn to look at them; the
man steps in front of the woman and says, "Who are you?" Al ignores
them and walks past them up the stairs. Nash comes back and kneels
in front of Milena, who climbs on with Ember; Nash picks up Gnik
in her mouth and carries them all to the stairs.

Kat reaches the stairs, sees the two people and says hello; the man
introduces himself as Lyle, and Kat says, "Gnik is coming." Kat asks
if he's dead, and he says, "Oh, yes." She asks if he's here to slow
them down, and he says yes, but he also has information for them.

Nash deposits Gnik in front of Lyle. He tells them they should
convince Silen to let Esten destroy the artifact.
Silen has to obey Tyorl -- she made a promise to protect what Tyorl
left behind -- which she seems to be interpreting as the Ebon
Tablet. They should not touch the tablet.

They come through the portal into a plain, square, smooth stone room,
about 25 feet on a side,
with a stone block in the middle, about five feet square and three
feet tall, with a large set of scales, unbalanced, on one end of
the stone, and three buckets. Gnik examines the room through his
arcanus glasses and sees some kind of effect tying the door to
the scales. Al moves to the door and finds that it is locked, but
not in a pick-able way. Kai moves to the door and considers breaking
through, but as Gnik and Al consider figuring out how to balance the
scale, she figres she'll give them a couple of minutes to try. Water
is coming out the top at about the rate of a gallon a minute. Milena
considers whether they have a faster way to get water. Al slides the
largest vessel under the water source in case they need it. While they
wait, he and Gnik try balancing the scale just with the force of their
hands. A grinding sound comes from the door, as the stone slowly comes
away from the wall. Gnik goes to place his immovable rod to hold the scale
figuring he can pull it back with the attached rope once he gets through
the door -- and Milena points out he could set it to hold the door instead.

Somewhere in the tower, Silen says, "Well, fuck."

The next room is a 100-foot hallway with a set of stairs at the far end,
and a word scrawled in brown liquid on the right: "OVERTHINKING". Gnik
goes to look more closely at the writing as everyone else moves straight
to the staircase. Ember pulls Gnik along behind her, and he says, "...Yeah,
you're right...." They reach the far stairwell with no resistance. As they
walk, Kai tells Al he should take the Eye out of his forehead. He argues
that it is helping make things clear, and he should keep it in.

They reach a long, narrow room with columns on each side, a misty
portal at the other end, and a smell of hot tar in the end. Gnik uses
his arcanus glasses and suggests the stench is coming from under
illusory sections of floor on the other side of the columns. Kai tries
walking down the middle of the room where the floor seems solid. She
reaches the second column and pseudopods come out of the floor; one
sticks into her stomach, and it is hard to pull her foot back. She
wrestles with it and manages to pull herself back, but notices that
the whole floor is starting to feel sticky. She flies back to the group
and asks Gnik to clean it off, as her foot is sticking to anything it
touches. He uses prestidigitation to clean it. Nash asks if she should
go back to statue form or try to run others down as far as she can through
the room. Milena says statue form is probably best; Nash transforms and
Milena tucks her back into a safe pocket.

Kat decides to use her special gloves to navigate the room by jumping
from column to column high above the floor. Nothing attacks her, so
Milena warns Zassin, engages her Firebird cape, and flies down the center. 
Al jumps up and parkours down the columns on the opposite side to Kat,
making it 2/3 of the way down the room.

They hear a crack behind them and the ceiling begins coming apart near
the entrance. Kai grabs Gnik and Ember and begins flying as fast as she
can. The ceiling completely caves in as she departs the area; sections
of the floor reach up to pummel the falling debris, and tar splashes
up. As Kat and Milena continue down the roll, more debris falls at
Milena, but Gnik shoots up a Web to catch it, and she manages to dodge
it. Al continues to parkour, slips, and Gnik yells, "Hit the button!"
He hits the button on the immovable rod, catches himself, and dashes
the rest of the way to the end of the room. Zassin catches up to him
and he sees in his mind an image of a human-like Zassin clapping wildly.
The ceiling is now fully collapsed in the first half of the room and
full of debris -- strange debris, such as a chair, and things that don't
seem they should exist in this reality, such as a car. Kai reaches the
end of the room and stops before going through the portal. Kat and Milena
catch up, and they all go through the portal. 

On the other side, all the memories of all three trips through the tower
flood into their heads, along with two other trips that went much worse
-- each of them died at least once, and it was horrible. However, they
are all now fully healed and back up to full strength.

They are in a large room, ornate and beautiful. There are five portals;
Kat and Milena come out of one, Kai and Al come out of one, Gnik comes
out of one, and Zassin comes out of one, dragging himself out and then
flopping over as if he is the only one who survived. No one comes out
of the fifth portal, and Ember is not with them.

On two thrones sit Esten and a woman who may be Silen, but aged. Esten
is holding something that looks like a large black finger, covered with
markings. Silen stands, says, "Congratulations, I suppose," introduces
herself as Julie Atkins, and adds, "We know who you are." Kai asks where
Ember is, she gestures to the fifth portal, and says she did not make
it.

Esten says that when Tyorl fought Sgult and his forces, Tyorl told her
to leave, and when it was done, to protect all that he left behind. She
came back after the battle and tried to protect all his remains that
she could. She met others who were there to salvage power from his
remains; she later learned that one of those who took the pinkie
transformed it into a device that could warp reality.

Gnik asks what exactly he asked her to promise. She says, "To protect
what he left behind." Gnik, grumpily, says, "He left the world behind
-- protect that!"

She steps back, surprised, and Esten nods. They sense that Esten is
able to do this. Silen explains that the energy must be directed
somewhere, so they must choose some piece of reality to adjust,
keeping in mind that any change will come with all implications.
They ask for Ember back, but Silen says she can do that herself; it
needs to be something bigger.



Once they decide, the energy is released and they are all flung
back. They are outside the tower, which appears decrepit, and they
hear a voice in their heads thanking them for dealing with that,
and that he was not able to interfere directly due to the
desecration of his predecessor's flesh. In thanks, he is giving
each of them a boon.
(Add 2 to an ability score, 1 to two ability scores, or pick a
new feat)


1 July 2023

The group discusses what to do with the energy. Kat mentions wanting
a portal to Jaeleth, and Silen says, "Another one?" When Kat asks if
there already is one, Silen says, "I only know of... six?" Estem nods.
They promise to get that information to Kat.

Kat mentions wanting to make sure Danae gets a beneficial mentor, as
she feels somewhat responsible for Agnes's death and Danae being stuck
up the mountain protecting the town. The group realizes they might be
able to take care of that on their own (and Milena considers that she
might want to spend some time with Danae).

Gnik asks about the books that they saw on some of the trips through
the tower; Esten shares they are manifestations of books in the Valley
of the Gods.

Kat asks Gnik about the door he was worried about opening... and did
it have something to do with the Koth?  He reminds them all it is
called the Pit of Hatred, near Abbey Isle, that might have had its seal
broken by a sunken ship and evil undead are coming out -- but they should
be able to check on that on their own, and it would probably be pretty good
training for the Koth thing, come to think of it....

Gnik asks if they could have access to Lyle's remains to bring back to
Fran. Silen says they can have both Lyle and Shelley's remains.

Al asks if the people who they encountered to slow them down were all
dead, or a mix of dead and alive. Silen says it was a mix; she was
reaching into their minds, but sometimes Estem nudged to a particular
result. She says all the living ones will be returned to where they
came from. They have all been living in a single moment since they
started exploring the tower.

Silen shares that she is from the Valley of the Gods -- that's where
Tyorl created her.

The group decides they would like to use the energy to end the war and
slavery -- with the Tillians winning through a peaceful, diplomatic
solution.

The time-bubble pops, and each in the party receives an urgent Sending
from Milena's daughter Svetlana, saying things are bad in Saltmarsh.
They respond:


Al: We are all fine. Had a big battle. Stopped some strange stuff. Don't
worry about us. See you soon.

Kai: Milena will respond soon... what do you mean, things are bad? Ok,
thanks.

Kat: We're fine. Saved the world again. Should be in Saltmarsh soon.
Love, Kat.

Gnik: We're fine. Coming soon. Please clarify "Things here are bad."

Milena receives three sendings; it seems Svetlana tried her first, then
everyone else when she didn't hear back, and then a third time:

"I hope you are all well. Saltmarsh is in chaos. Anlim military taken
over island. Gibbet burned. Council is in upheaval. Miss and love you!"

"None of you are answering me. If I don't hear from you soon, I am coming
to find you."

"Talked to your crew. Jarvis has seen your return. Then Alexander spoke
to me, saying I should be patient. I'll wait. But not long."

Milena: Coming soon, probably within a day. Tell me what you can about
military takeover. What can we do to prepare? We have much to discuss.

We have been briefly unstuck in time. Be patient, and continue to heed
the wisdom of the gods. Love to you and your sisters.

Let me know if you have become impatient and moved. If so, I will update
you soon about where we are.

Silen approaches Milena with Ember's body. "Speaker?" she says, a term
of respect for a Speaker for the Gods, as Milena's mother was, in Bargallian
lands. She holds out a handful of jewels and says, "I assume one of these
is a diamond?" Milena picks out what she needs and casts Revivify on Ember,
then casts a Cure Wounds on him; her body appears to have been badly burned,
and begins to heal. Kat offers Ember a flask.

Gnik asks Milena for a ceremony of last rites for Lyle and Shelley. Silen
says they can land at their remains on their way back toward Saltmarsh.

Kai has received another sending, from Royne, saying Malin and his little
friend have been taken care of, and his tower is now under control of
the Mayor, Juliana. 

Silen says, "Alright, everybody on--" and she's not there anymore, there's
just a massive dragon. Estem looks at them, amused and a bit smug. They
climb aboard, with Gnik thanking Estem before he mounts. Estem smiles
and says, "Now I need to take care of some guys in the swamp." Milena
recalls stories of Tyorl having created a race of servants who are
shapeshifting constructs in the form of a dragon. 

She takes them to Lyle's and Shelley's bodies. Milena performs last
rites for the group. As she finishes, Milena hears voices on the wind 
that she can't quite make out. They return to their small sailboat,
which she carefully lifts out of the water to take with them.

Milena casts a Sending to Janet, figuring that of all the members of
the Council she would be best practiced at responding efficiently:
"We're returning today, sailing from the south. Know about army. What
else should we know and how should we prepare?" Janet responds, "We
will meet you there. Usual port patrol will meet you first. Been a
long couple of months. Talk then."


8 Kella 3275

Silen drops them on a beach a couple hours' sail from Saltmarsh.
Gnik thanks her for being willing to change her mind. Milena offers
that if she ever faces anything their skills could help with, feel
free to ask. Al asks how this war is going to play out, and she
begins going into exquisite detail about all the tweaks that have
been made to put the right people in the right place.

They sail up the coast and when they get within a mile Laur, over
the farspeakers, welcomes them back to a normal reality. He tells them
it is the 8th of Kella. The sun is just rising. He says the buzz of
their return has rippled through town -- someone heard one of Milena's
kids talking about it, and Janet talked to some people. Also, Oak Island
has been taken over by the military, and they have good lookouts. Something
happened at the Gibbet -- it was burned to a hollow cylinder, and he knows
Nora and the twins are ok, but no one has seen Eleanora, Perytar, or Sivin
for a while. Al's mother took over the orphanage a couple weeks ago -- she
knows how to cook, so that worked out well -- so she wasn't there when
it burned. Sivin's ship "The Breath" had left port soon before, and she
was probably on it. He reports the military has put up tents and cut
down most of the trees, fortifying the old fort. He says the ship is
just fine, they're just working on repairing some damage from a sea
serpent attack, no big deal....

From a little way out the tents and the loss of tree growth are
obvious, and a couple tents cover the obelisks. Al asks if the
duke is in town, but Laur doesn't know. There are a couple of
craft heading around the island in their direction. They recognize
Keren, a guard who helped them against the Sahaugin. They come up
alongside and congratulate the group for surviving. She tells them
they have a lot of nicknames now. (Gnik says he only has one
Gnik-name.) They escort the boat into port.

Mighty Redemption is in port and they pull in behind it. On the pier
they see all Milena's children, Blackberry Bar and Rosnor; the former
half-vampire Dwayne, whom Gnik had suggested come to Saltmarsh; Curt
and Rickie, the survivors from the Blue Gauntlet addventuring group;
Tricia and Valery, Jae and Jewel, who taught lute to Kat; Heide and Brit;
Nelson and Bradford....


12 August 2023

Gnik shares with Fran what happened with Lyle and Sheila. He offers Kevick's
ring to Dwayne -- who doesn't technically need it, but who has been getting
used to being outdoors and around people again -- and Dwayne accepts it for
the comedy of it.

Juliana and Rolland approach them. Juliana is limping with a cane.
Rolland asks if they sank any ships or brought any curses back. Milena
says, drily, that they left the curse in Freeport, but they fixed it
before they left. Rolland shares that the 7000 gold reward from the duke
for eliminating seven demons has come in, minus the 20% tax taken by
Saltmarsh. Kai immediately protests that the town didn't do anything,
maybe next time they would just let the demons do their thing. Someone
explains that the taxes on the huge wealth of adventuring saves the
poor townsfolk from having to pay taxes, and she feels better about
it. Juliana tells Milena that she was able to get Logtaru's house for
2200 gold and has let her family take possession, figuring Milena was
probably good for it.

Juliana pulls Kat aside and asks her if she arranged with someone else
to continue her nightly escapades, as small things have gone missing.
She says no, but it is something to look into.

Juliana and Rolland tell them a bit about Zak Burz, the new councilman
sent by Anlim, as well as the new lizardfolk ambassador Krara. The
former ashpit has been given over to the lizardfolk; Krara and his
assistant were among those they rescued from the sahaugin lair, and
so would probably be happy to see them. Gnik asks about the tents over
the monoliths on the island, but they don't know, and Zak doesn't know
either. Al asks if his brother is in town with the military; Rolland
says he was there, but his unit was sent to sea on a secret mission.
Al asks how they feel about the soldiers; they look around to make
sure they won't be overheard, and mention that Zak is taking information
back to the government. They are doing what they can within the bounds
placed on them.

Rolland and Juliana depart, and with them the guards who have been
holding back the crowds. Al's sister Himaya comes to talk with him,
sharing the news about their mother taking over the orphanage. His
father has had some bad luck but is optimistic as usual. She says
Pellum couldn't visit but did leave a note, which she shares with
him.

Milena's daughters run up to greet her and Kat. Jelena hugs
Kat, and Gavriila says, "Well, looks like you're not dead." "Not
anymore," Tatiana adds, and the other girls give her a look. Jelena
has been running the business out of the new house, and Gavriila is
excited they have walls now; townspeople they have helped have been
helping with repairs. Kat asks if everyone has their own rooms, and
Gavriila says "No," grumpily, while Tatiana grins. They have put in
four sleeping lofts, with Jelena in one and Gavriila and Tatiana
sharing the other, with the other two left for Milena and Kat.

Al shares the contents of the note, which is that the secret mission
is led by the Trihorn group, and the rumor is that they are looking
for treasure or magical items and that other groups have gone but
have not come back. After some brief discussion of who is really
behind the request -- Anlim, the koth, etc. -- they decide to meet
up that evening at Brit's to discuss further.

They take a few minutes to catch up with Valery, who they'd met on
the way to Seaton and who had taken the news of their defeating the
demons to the duke. Al describes having swum with a dragon, and Gnik
provides a slide show. Kat says they can share stories as fodder for
her songs, and she says she'll be performing at Brit's that night.
She says she has traveled up to New Tyreln, where the politics were
a bit weird, so she came back down to see what was happening in Saltmarsh
and has only been back for a week. They agree they will talk more at
Brit's. Ember says she is going to go check in with the folks at the dueling
school and will meet them at Brit's.

Milena and Kat go to see their new home, and Milena and Jelena start on
a blessing for the space with prayers and incense. While they are doing
it Svetlana arrives and talks with Kat about how she has been, saying
she looks older. Kat says she has almost died multiple times, and it
has only been a couple months. As the ritual ends, there are red sparks
on the ground and a mist rises up from the ground and dissipates. Milena
nods; she expected there might have been residual energies from his
work with devils and demons. Jelena shares that the couple next door
don't have any children and have decided to will their house to the
clinic. Milena gets herself cleaned up and dressed a little more
intentionally than usual, in a way that Kat perceives is to project
a bit of power and "don't mess with me" energy to any strangers
they might encounter.

Kat goes to change some of her gold to silver for a sacrifice of thanks
to Ag, who has been very good to her.
Gnik goes to the library, opens Captain Needham's chest, climbs inside,
and says, "Someone help me get these books out of here!" Curt casts
Unseen Servant a couple times to help.

Kai goes to the Crowns to visit Eleanora's parents, who came from
nothing but Eleanora bought them the house; to the annoyance of the
other Crown residents, they have a full staff but they all live in the
main house, commune-like, and use the servants' quarters for storage.
As Kai arrives, the twins Pearlie and Sherry run out to greet her; she
notices their teeth are more prominent. Nora comes out and invites
them in. She says Eleanora told her to tell them that they torched the
Gibbet because there had been too many close calls and they needed to
hide the trail; they're all fine and on Sivin's ship, and will check
in periodically so if they need to get word to her to let Nora know.
Eleanora made sure everyone was financially okay. Kai asks where they
are sailing to, and Nora says for now they are just making sure they
are not being followed. She hands Kai a small octagonal device and
says Eleanora told her to give it to the group.

Al goes to catch up with the druids on the island and fill them in on
what they've been doing. Then he pulls out the statue of Anny to let
her know they're ok. She is relieved to see him, since the last time
she saw them she was unexpectedly in the tower. He shares what happened
after they parted ways.

A man appears at the library asking if Gnikobol is in. Curt calls out,
"Gnik, are you in?" Gnik recognizes the man from around town as Fibam
-- the local head of Trihorn. Fibam says he has heard about the amazing
work his group has done, and would they be interested in an opportunity
to do some significant good? He has been working with a team of
archaeologists in the sea on the other side of Tillia. Gnik says they
would be interested in hearing more, but the group has much to catch
up on since they've been gone, so it might be a few days.

Kai arrives first at Brit's. Heide is there, and Jewel is on the stage
playing. The place is pretty full, mostly with travelers. Brit comes
over to say hello, and Heide nods a greeting but stays with her group.
Kai tells Brit of having met the Serin queen Bridget in Freeport. Brit
says that is wonderful news and asks if she knows where she was staying.
Kai says yes, but doesn't immediately share the information; she says
Milena has a way to get in touch with her if needed. Brit says she could
also do a Sending but didn't want to cause problems. Kai says she doesn't
want to say too much because of the shapeshifters. "...What?" says Brit,
and Kai explains about the infiltration of Anlim. She also says, tentatively,
"I think we also set into motion the end of slavery on Maerson...?" She
shares a little about their having been granted a boon. She says she'll
believe it when she sees it, though. Brit says the announcement of the
treaty with Fortek arrived two days ago. "So I guess it worked," Kai
says.

The rest of the group arrives and they adjourn to a separate room with
more protections. Brit says she got a lot of information from Laur and
the crew. She says Kai let her know about the shapeshifters, and that
she herself had recently had someone come to her concerned that they
were a shapeshifter and they were afraid their kind were involved in
concerning things. Gnik uses his Detect Shapeshifter spell to look
around; he sees Heide is definitely a shapeshifter, and then he sends
Az out to survey the room for the duration of the spell. He detects
a druid, but that is not unexpected. Brit says the shapeshifter expressed
concern that the work Trihorn was doing with the government has something
to do with it. She asks if it it ok to bring in the shapeshifter to talk
with them, and they say yes. She opens the door and gestures Heide in;
Heide enters, and says, "Heide is at home; I'm Taaliax -- I'm normally
her dog." She briefly shifts into the dog, woofs at them, and then turns
back into Heide. She shares that different Mitocs have different
capabilities, but that they can read people's minds. While going out
running errands for Heide, Taaliax overheard Fibam talking to a
shapeshifter; Fibam has just been hired by the government without
knowing the whole story and is not aware of the shapeshifters. Taaliax
also shares that Heide saved them and so they pledged their existence
to her. The group shares that there is now an island of shapeshifter
and kenku refugees, and tell Taaliax where it is. Gnik asks what's
going on with the monoliths on Oak Isle; Taaliax doesn't, but says
the druids might. Gnik asks if Taaliax needs anything from them; they
say that Heide trusts the group so it might be worth the risk of revealing
themself to the group. Kai offers that if they ever want to go to the
island the group can find a way to get them there.

As they break up, Gnik invites the druid over; Al recognizes her as Beula,
who was second in command to Leto. He says, "We have some questions for
you." She says, "Okay, who are you?" He introduces himself and says he
is a friend of Al. He asks about the monoliths, and shows an illusion
of the ones they saw while traveling. She says the ones on the isle
were there before the druids came but they know little about them. Gnik
asks if they have magic on them; she says it seems like residual magic
rather than active magic. Over the farspeaker, Kat asks Gnik to ask Beula
if they could have permission to try to rearrange the pillars, but Kai
says, "We don't want to do the army's job for them!" Gnik hisses back
through the farspeaker that he's having a conversation, and then apologizes
to Beula that his companions are talking to him. "I noticed," she says. "Shall
we join them?" She gracefully rises to go with him to the side room.

Kat asks why the military has covered the monoliths with fabric. Beula
says she doesn't know for sure, but Nothfus was able to slip in -- before
she was grabbed -- and it looked like they were experimenting on them.
The druid Nalthus, a dwarf, tried climbing up the cliff and peeking
under the sheets, but was caught and banished from the island. Nalthus
said there were arcanists there examining them; one froze her in place,
called for the guards, and then calmly walked past her to look at the
columns. They ask about the removal of trees, and she says with barely
suppressed rage that the army said something about needing the sightlines.

Valery replaces Jewel on the stage and says, "In honor of the Saltmarsh
Saviors returning to town, here are a few songs about their adventures!"
Kat slips up onto stage to join her on her lute. Both of them do an
amazing job -- Jewel, just off stage, bursts into excited applause,
proud of his student.

The group plans to do some quiet recon on the obelisks at about 2 am,
with Az in weasel form, Zassin, and Kat flying to the island with Kai's
boots.


26 August 2023

Gnik plays with the little device Nora handed Kai. He spins it on the
table, and part of it rises up. As he lifts it, a dark disk shooting
sparks from its edge appears between the pieces. In one direction they
see a hallway -- bookshelves in one direction, desk and other work
surfaces in the other, set into a cylindrical tube, about 12 feet in
diameter and 20 feet long. Black stones have been stacked along the
bottom to provide a flat surface to walk on, with stairs up to the
work area. There is a piece of paper on the third step, which Gnik
grabs with Mage Hand. It is a note from Eleanora saying her group had
been compromised, so they are leaving their materials to their care,
if they choose to take up the cause. Gnik sends in Az in weasel form
to take a closer look. There are a couple of flat-ish crystals,
like rose quartz, with a faint glow to them. Kat goes to another set
of stairs leading down toward the far wall -- and finds a note that
seems to be addressed to another group that has access to the space,
letting them know that another trustworthy group has been given access.

Al goes to the alcoves with the work surfaces to look around. He finds
a note on top of a small box that looks like a clam shell, and a
crystalline blade with a note on it as well. The note near the
crystals speaks of the large crystal that they believe imprisons the
ancient koth K'Jat at Martyr's Rest, and holds energies that others
who have been tapping into for ill ends -- including the hags who
serve the witch queen of Hell's Deep. The small crystals could be
attached to weapons giving them interesting properties, so that they
could be used to penetrate the barrier used by their enemy. The note on
the clam shell shares that it is a puzzle that will help, that they
could not solve but someone of sufficient intelligence might be able
to.

The books are written in Elvish and are primarily documentation around
the events that were fictionalized in another book Gnik has about the
sea hags, confirming many of the details in the other book.

Kat tries putting one of the crystals on her dagger. It seems to sink
into the dagger and little spiky crystals start popping out of the
dagger -- and out of her hand. She drops the dagger, but the crystals
remain -- she feels a small sparking of energy. She picks the dagger
up with her other hand, but there are no other changes. Kat suggests
Gnik should cast Identify, so he recalls his consciousness from Az
and collects the dagger from Kat.

He finds that the crystal is now making the abyssal steel as hard
as adamantine. They discuss who might use the other crystal, and
discuss having Al put it in his fist or in one of his weapons. Kat
mentions that she'd thought of having her weapon become hard like
a diamond, so possibly his intent might affect what happens. He
tries putting it into his abyssal not-dagger while thinking about
effects at a distance.

Gnik identifies the other crystal before Al takes it, which he finds
to be a little overwhelming: raw power that has no purpose or direction.
He also identifies the crystals in Kat's arm, and finds that she
has an increased chance of wild-surging -- so she's also more
dangerous.

Al adds the crystal to his dagger, and when Gnik identifies it he
finds there is now an effect at a 60-foot distance. 

Milena uses the paper and quill Eleanora used for her notes and
adds another note to place with the one for the other, presumably
sea-elf, group: "We take up the challenge. We will check this
site daily for messages. Do you believe the source of power should
be released?"

She then does a sending to Eleanora:
Found workspace. Accept challenge. Left note for allies. Should crystal's
power source be released? Other advice for next steps? (25 words.)
Hope you are well. 

Eleanora responds with her thanks and indicates she doesn't know about
the crystal's power source and asks for more information. She says they
are at sea and doing well.

The group realizes they only learned about K'Jat and the koth from an
ancient Gellen text that had to be decoded -- so perhaps it is not
very common knowledge.

Evening falls and Kat, Gnik, and Milena enact their plan to inspect
the obelisk. Kat flies over to the island and waits until a patrol
passes before going to inspect the tent structure covering the
obelisks. She's able to lift up an edge to let in Zassin and Az in
weasel form, and then slips in behind them once Gnik gives her the
all-clear. She's aware there are lanterns that could cast shadows
against the tent, so she is careful to stay low to the ground. She
sees the obelisks, appearing as they always have, but also tripods
with a blue-tinted crystal on top, pointed at the obelisks, three
around each obelisk. There are also four lanterns at the corners
of the tent, on stands, to provide light.

Az walks around the obelisks so Gnik can observe through her eyes.
Zassin sends cartoonish visuals to Milena. She warns Kat through
the farspeakers that the crystals might be some sort of security
measure. Kat takes a closer look at them and catches an aura of
divination around them. Gnik considers sending Az to climb up one
of the obelisk. Through their connections to Az and Zassin, Gnik
and Milena hear someone entering the tent. They warn Kat and she
sees an elven man enter with his face in a book. He looks up at
Kat, looks back at the book, realizes what he just saw -- but when
he looks up again she's not there (as she is now hiding behind the
pillar from him). He touches each crystal, thinks, writes something
in his book, and then adjusts the crystal down to point from the
second-to-bottom block down to the bottom block on each pillar. Then
he leaves.

Kat considers her options. After some discussion, she tries rotating
one of the blocks, third from the bottom. It is surprisingly easy
to rotate -- she gets the feeling it knew she wanted to turn it. When
it snaps into place a surge of glowing energy shoots up through the
first three blocks. She utters an expletive and puts the block back.
It is harder to turn the other way, but goes back.

Kat decides to try stealing the book from the elf, but finds that
he is sitting at a desk with the book on it. Meanwhile, Gnik asks
Az to see if she could turn the second-to-lowest block on the other
obelisk, and it turns easily. Energy surges up into it. He directs
her to arrange the rest of the blocks except the top. After some
conversation over the farspeaker, Kat decides to sneak up and knock
out the elf before they turn the last block. She bonks him with her
dagger and he slumps onto the desk. She grabs the books from his
desk and shoves them into her backpack, then grabs the circlet from
his head as well.

Az turns the last block on one of the columns and the energy glow
goes to the top and stays lit. She turns the last one, the sparks
fly up, and there is an explosion of energy across the island.

In the warehouse where Al, Gnik, Kai, and Milena are, Gnik sees
the energy wave hit Az, and then the others see Gnik glow, and then
they are all engulfed in a white light. They feel that they are all
together in a mental space, and they see a pair of glowing red
eyes. The feeling they get is first confusion, then satisfaction
and interest; but certainly not malice. Kai asks, in her mind, "Who
or what are you?" The creature responds that such labels are
insufficient. Milena, who can't quite stop herself thinking it,
asks, "K'Jat?" The answer is close to an affirmative, but with a sense
of slight difference -- perhaps it is more, or not what it was. Kai
asks if they just released it, but gets the impression this is just
communication. They discuss whether to release it, and the being
is unsure -- along multiple possible meanings of "release". It is
most certain that what they should do is stop its offspring. It gives
the impression that humans -- and mortal beings in general -- are
better than it, at least in the sense of accomplishing its mandate.
Al intuits that the three releases are complete destruction, release
from its prison to aid humanity, and perhaps becoming more of a guiding
spirit.

Kai asks why it was imprisoned; it feels hurt that in its attempts
to recreate the success of humanity, it created its own downfall.
Al asks how they would destroy it, and gets the impression it is
physically vulnerable in its current state. He asks what is its
mandate; it gives the impression of a role of containment of past
mistakes. Kai asks whose mistakes, and gets the impression of "The
ones before." She asks, "Sgult? The Unspeakable One?" It responds
that is one of the original ones, but there are others. Gnik asks
where to find it, and it responds, "You know where I am." They are
beginning to get a headache, so Kat asks if it can send them back.

They are back where they were, but their heads still hurt. Kat is
hanging from the column where she just turned the top block. She finds
that she can push the top block off the top of the column, and then
resets all the other blocks how she found them. In the meantime, Az
removes all the crystals in case they were recording devices. Kat would
like to bring the top block with her, and she's seen Gnik cast a floating
disc, so she tries that. A glowing disc appears, and out of it hops five
one-legged creatures. They hop around happily chattering, "We can help!
What do you need? What do you need?" She asks if they can carry the
block, and two of them grab it and bounce around with it. She sends the
other three to bounce around the camp and create chaos.

She and the two monopods jump off the cliff and Kat casts Featherfall
on them. Zassin grabs one of them and pushes, and Kat realizes she
can steer their fall -- and continues to push when they hit the
water. They meet up with the rest of the group and load the block into
their portable tunnel (the "pocket office") -- and the monopods pop out
of existance a few minutes later.

Gnik Identifies the blue crystals and finds they are recording information
about changes of magic in the area. He also identifies the elf's circlet.


30 September 2023

The group goes to turn in for the night -- Kat and Milena to their new
house, Gnik to the library, Kai to Britt's, and Al to Oak Isle. Everyone
is awake, having seen the wave of light coming from the sea and wondering
what it was. Tatiana observes, "The talking happened!" and Milena nods.

Al swims over to the island and climbs the cliff face, as he often does,
since other paths to the island are guarded by the army. He notices that
near the top, roots he would normally have grabbed onto have been burned
back to make the island more defensible. He makes some effort to evade
patrols as he finds an out-of-the-way place to camp for the night. He
notices a lot of activity on the island. As he makes his way along, he
hears a shout: "You there, stop! What are you doing here?" It is a small
group of soldiers, one of them still strapping on armor. Al says he's
come here to sleep, because it's where he always sleeps when he's in town.
A deep voice behind him says, "Let him be, boys, I'll take it from here."
He introduces himself to Al as Commander Lally and says it's nice to
finally meet him. He says there is an event on the island so he won't
be able to sleep outdoors, but he'd be happy to put Al up in the keep
for the night. He shares that one of their men was attacked, so it might
not be safe. As they walk, Al says he's sorry to see what they'd done to
the island, as he liked the trees. Al asks Lally about his background,
and he says he grew up in New Tyreln. He seems like a friendly,
easygoing guy; Al gets the impression he might be flirting with him,
so makes it clear his own tastes don't go that way. Al asks some general
questions about the troops, and Lally seems to be thinking carefully about
his answers so as not to give too much away.

Al is led to a room in a tower of the keep. He considers going down to
chat with the soldiers of the garrison, but when he opens the door there
are two guards there telling him he should stay here until morning -- so
Al starts chatting with them instead. They've been stationed here only a
couple of weeks, so they talk about life in town, the best place to get
a fish sandwich, who Lally is dating....


9 Kella 3275

Soon after sunrise -- about 5:07 am -- there is a knock on Milena's
door; she throws on a robe and goes to answer. Rolland is looking a
bit mussed, with his shirt buttoned askew. There is a small child
with him, holding a letter, who asks, "Is Lud...milla... Ekat--"
Milena yells, "Ludmilla!" After a long moment's hesitation deciding
whether to answer to that name, Kat calls back, "...What?" "Small
child here to see you for some reason." Kat comes downstairs to
collect the letter. The child runs off, Kat goes back upstairs, and
Rolland leans on the doorframe and asks Milena, "So I suppose you
had nothing to do with what happened last night?" "You mean the light
from the sea? Did anything bad happen?" He mentions the elf being
attacked and having personal property stolen, a couple of people
stumbling "...but you shouldn't let that weigh on your conscience,"
and that the elf was able to determine by triangulation that the
light came from the obelisks. With an exasperated look, he bids
her a good day and departs.

Kat comes back down and shows Milena a letter -- a notice that
she owes the stables in Casadega money for the stable and gate
she damaged, as well as for the hippogriff she "spoiled" so that
it will no longer let its trainers near it. She is given the choice
to purchase it or pay for it to be euthanized. Milena asks, "You
want to own hippogriff?" and Tatiana begins running around with her
arms outstretched singing, "Kat flies! Kat flies!"

Kai and Ember, who slept at Britt's, get up in the morning and do
weapons exercises in the courtyard. They clean up and then head
to breakfast.

Al, Kai, and Ember converge on Blackberry Bar's for breakfast. Rosnor
has a table already set up for them in the corner. After they eat, Kai
reaches out to Milena on the farspeaker to see if she might be headed
that way. Kat chimes in sleepily to suggest the group come to their
house instead, and Milena asks that they bring doughnuts for the girls.

Al and Kai go to spar near the Ashpits, to allow Al to practice with
the distance effect from the crystal he placed in his weapon. Kat
comes too. At some point when Al and Kai are sparring, Kai suddenly
moves very close to Al, very quickly -- a new ability she has just
attained. Al spars with Kat, and at some point he makes contact and
a green sparkly glow covers her that dissipates after about a minute.
Kai notices that it would be difficult for her to hide with that glow
on her.

When they all reconvene, Kat shares that she has been fined for her
joyride on the hippogriff. Gnik suggests she could have the little
girl Yaa who was with her at the time deliver the fine. They decide
asking for advice at the Temple of Dorg might be a good next step.

Gnik invites Tatiana to join him, Kat, and Al, and comments that he
thinks she would make a fine divination wizard. She says she can make
glowy friends who are pretty dancers. Kat asks her to show them, and
glowing balls of light come out of her ands and dance around as she
waves her hands; and then coalesces into a humanlike shape to dance
with her; and breaks apart and disappears. Al and Gnik recognize the
Dancing Lights cantrip.  "That was very pretty, Tatiana," Kat says,
and Tatiana replies happily, "I know" and keeps walking. Gnik talks to
her about prestidigitation, which might be a useful spell she could
learn; she shakes her head "no" -- she doesn't "learn" spells, they
just come to her.

They arrive at the Temple of Dorg to talk to the priestess Satto, who
welcomes them in -- a storm is starting to brew outside -- and asks
what she can do for the Saviors of Saltmarsh. Kat shares that she has
a small problem with someone in Casadega, and offers to let her see
the letter. Satto reads it and asks whether she actually did the
things in the letter. Kat says she did, but she doesn't think the
damages ran to the charges laid out in the letter; and moreover the
group averted a disaster and were not compensated for it, which would
have been worth more than the charges here. Satto nods and pulls out
paper to take notes, asking what Kat would like to happen to the
hippogriff; she doesn't want it to be euthanized, and Al says if it is
set free it will be able to live in the wild, reverting to its
original behaviors. Satto agrees that there is no good reason to
euthanize it, and that was only thrown in there to force her to pay
for it. Satto writes up a counterproposal and gives it to Kat. She
tells Kat she could go to Paniloor and ask for Zehis, the high priest
to the temple to Dorg there, but after some discussion Satto says she
will take care of it for her. Kat asks what they owe her and she says
she is happy to help, although a donation to the temple is always
appreciated. Kat seems unsure about how much to give, and Al says,
loudly enough for Satto to overhear, that a gold is probably
appropriate -- they have the money, but not as much as most people
probably think they have, since it costs so much to maintain their
gear. Satto understands -- Dorgenians are often also expected to
be wealthy due to their reputation as businesspeople.


14 October 2023

In the Ashpit, the lizardfolk and druids are working together to
build a home for the lizardfolk. One of the lizardfolk is directing
a water elemental to scoop out and move sections of earth.

After getting finished at the Temple, Kat takes Tatiana to go sailing,
and Al heads over to visit his mother at the orphanage. Not too much
later, Britt comes running up to Kai asking where they are; Kai says
she's not sure but could call them. She relays Britt's message that
they should cover up the crystals -- there are those who look for
those stones and are willing to kill for them. A group stopped into
Saltmarsh a few weeks ago and made a bit of trouble before heading
north, but they could come back. Al responds that he doesn't really
have anything to cover it with, and anyway everyone has already seen
him walking around with it. 

Milena, who is at home but heard the conversation over the farspeakers,
heads to the market with Gavriila in search of metal bracers that Kat
and Al might be able to wear to cover the crystals. She asks Gavriila
about what they might need for the household, as long as they are at
the market. Gavriila enthusiastically makes suggestions, inculding a
few things Gavriila eyes eagerly that "Tatiana would like". 

Al arrives at the orphanage at about lunchtime. He helps his mother
serve lunch, tells the children some stories from his adventures --
such as that time he met a water dragon -- and tries to get them
interested in meditation. He doesn't tell any stories about the time
he fought cultists in that very orphanage.

In the evening Al heads back to Oak Isle, figuring the "danger" was
last night so he should be fine to go back there tonight. He manages
to get onto the island and get settled into the brush to sleep for
the night. No one finds him.

Kat goes to the beach to build a bonfire and make a sacrifice to Ag.

Rolland shows up at Britt's to tell Kai that the Lassiters will be
showing up at Milena's in the morning with a squad.  Kai shares this
information with the group and says they should all have breakfast
at Milena's. They make sure everything they took from the site of the
columns is safely in the pocket office.


10 Kella 3275

Al wakes up in the morning, drops off the food he'd promised to bring
the guards at the front door of the keep, and then heads toward the
edge to swim back to the city. On the way he runs into one of the guards
he had talked to, who is stunned to see him there, and stammers something
about his boss... and then says, "I didn't see you here...."

Kai stops by Blackberry Bar's for a couple dozen doughnuts and lets Rosner
know they'll be having breakfast at Milena's.

When they arrive they see Milena has made a lot more food than usual. Kat
isn't up yet. There is a knock at the door and Milena answers; it is Egan
and twelve members of the militia. Alton Barry, a member of the militia
and a good guy, is knocking. Milena says, "I do not have enough seats,
but there is plenty of breakfast. The entrails do not lie. Would you
like to come in?" Alton seems ready to do so when Egan grabs him by the
shoulder and drags him back. Egan says, "We are not going in. I know we
owe you, so I will be nice. Did you or your friends have anything to do
with the island?" Milena frowns and says, "I did not, and I do not believe
they did." He looks to his left, and Milena sees Janet standing there;
Janet says, "I didn't detect any lies." Egan scowls and leads the militia
men away, while Janet asks what she has for breakfast. Milena invites
her in and takes the opportunity to ask Janet her perspective on what has
happened in town while they've been away.

Janet feels that she's not sure how to deal with Zak, who seems like
he is a nice guy who wants to do what's right, but is also directly
involved in working with the Anlim government to hire Trihorn to help
with the archaelogical expedition.

Janet asks if they know anything about why someone walked into town
and deeded a tower to Juliana. Kai says she met someone in Freeport
who offered to take care of the former occupant of the tower after
Kai shared stories about how problematic he was. She received communication
later that it "was taken care of" but she doesn't know any details. Janet
says, "See, you're helping Saltmarsh even when you're not here." Kat says,
"Maybe you should name a day after us -- like a holiday," and Janet says
it has already been proposed. "By who?" Al asks, and Janet rattles off a
long list of names.

Kai asks what's going on on Oak Isle, and Janet says they are trying to
return it to its original purpose as a defensive post. She thinks it was
a mistake to kick the druids off, but no one consulted her about it.

Gnik asks how crime has been in Saltmarsh. Janet says it has been a
bit weird with the black market having gone underground. "Oof. That
seems like a bad idea," Gnik says. Janet shares that there was a
direct assault on the curio shop; witnesses saw explosions and balls
of fire in the area.

Al asks Janet how she would feel if Serin were to regain its
independence; she says as long as it was done with a minimum
of bloodshed and suffering she would not have a problem with
it. Al senses she is very guarded on the topic; she supports
law and order and structure, and a transition like that could
be utter chaos, but what Anlim did was wrong and she would
prefer it returned to Serin. She does share that she was angry
at how Zak was appointed to the Town Council by Anlim without
a vote to take Lyle's spot, and Anlim forced them to change
their charter.

Before she leaves, Janet pulls Milena aside and says, "I have not
always agreed with how you handle your affairs, but I understand
now, and wanted to thank you." Milena replies, "I confess I also have
found your ways strange, but have come to appreciate them." They
exchange a nod and Janet takes her leave.

Jelena takes the younger girls out so the group can plan with more
privacy. Al asks about what their goal is with K'Jat; they agree they
should release it, and probably not destroy it, but have less clarity
on whether it should continue to exist in its current form versus go
through a transformation to become a guiding spirit. They think they
have enough information to get in their ship and head that way; they
discuss whether they would also like to get paid, but think they want
to involve as few others as possible. They discuss how to get there
faster, knowing an expedition from Anlim has already set out; they
consider reaching out to Anni about a faster means of transport,
and then consider that her people might instead be able to slow down
the other ship.

Al takes out the figurine and begins talking to it. It takes a few
moments, but then it animates and responds in Anni's voice. Al asks
what Anni knows about the crystal, and she is well aware of it: her
mother was at the crystal to fight the sea witches trying to take
its power. Al shares that a ship is on the way there, that his
brother is on the ship, and he would love to see the ship slowed
down or not get there at all so no harm comes to them. Al recalls
that Anni's mother had extended an invitation to the group to come
visit, so they decide that if the other ship can be slowed down or
stopped, they can take the time to do that -- and let the sea elves
know they plan to go themselves to the crystal. Kat takes a moment
to catch up and tell Anni she misses her, and shows her the new
crystals in her arm. "Wow, my mom has those too," she says, "but
I've never seen anyone else with them. She always keeps them
hidden under a sling." Kat shares that Al has them too, and Al
says, "We were warned not to let anyone know we had them, so we're
showing everyone." They decide they will set out for the sea elf
settlement within the day. They contact Laur, who says they can be
ready by tomorrow morning.

Gnik says he is going to the Town Council meeting just to get a
sense of what they talk about now that Zak is there, and to get
a sense of Zak himself. They arrive and find that it is a closed
session. Gnik asks the dwarf receptionist how long it is likely
to be and learns that meetings have been running long and there
have been many more closed meetings lately. Milena heads back
home to spend time with her family before leaving town again,
and Gnik sends Az to try to listen in to the meeting; Zassin
goes too, and broadcasts his own cartoonish view of the proceedings.
Gnik has a full view through Az's eyes, and at some point sees
Rolland roll his eyes, look toward the fireplace, squint, and
then facepalm.

Gnik hears Egan saying that there is no evidence that the Saviors
were responsible for what happened on the island, and they did not
lie -- he gestures to Janet, who shrugs -- and that the elf's circlet
has been undetectable by divination, so whoever took it must have
left. (Someone else throws in, "...or stored it in an extradimensional
space.") Egan says he is looking into sending to New Tyreln for someone
who can look back in time to see what happened. The talk moves on to
concerns about the child streetcleaners in town possibly being a front
for thieves' activity and perhaps they should import automated street
cleaning technology from New Tyreln. Egan seems neutral, Rolland is
against it because he doesn't want to take jobs away from the kids
doing it now.

The meeting breaks up and Gnik casts Detect Shapeshifter. Kai comes
to join, and Milena joins soon after. The council meeting ends
and everyone comes out except for Zak, whom Rolland says is
waiting inside for them. Juliana checks in with them briefly before
they head up.

Zak stands and greets them as the "infamous Saviors". He is dressed
simply, with no adornment. Gnik sees immediately that he is a
shapeshifter; he looks like a replacer. Gnik begins making conversation
while Al tries to use his insight to get a sense of Zak. Zak stands and
introduces himself as Zak Burz; he invites them to have a seat.

Zak says there has been increased interest in Saltmarsh particularly
after the chaos in Seaton. Gnik says Seaton could probably use Anlim's
help more than Saltmarsh, but Zak says they wouldn't take it; and
anyway they are now on better footing with new leadership.

Zak says that someone higher up the chain than himself wanted to
secure Seaton; they are aware of a source of power several hundred
miles out that they want to secure for Anlim. He says he doesn't
know anything more about it, but Al can tell he is lying -- although
he is a very good liar. Gnik asks if that's what he had been talking
to Fibam about, and he says yes. Zak asks what they plan to do now
that they are back in town; they mention the Stormdaughter and Auntie
Treeshadow, and that they may be leaving town soon.

They take their leave, and as soon as they get out of earshot, Al
says, "He was lying." "And he's also a shapeshifter," Gnik says.
"What?! And we didn't kill him?" Kai says, before adding, "Oh, I
guess we'd need witnesses." Gnik recommends going to the magic
shop and scans the crowds as he goes by; he sees one member of
a group of six military men entering a shop appears to be a
replacer.

They go to the curio shop; Taliax, who is on a pillow, hops up
to greet them with a bark. Heidy also greets them. Kai says,
"We have news," and Gnik says, "We've come to play with your dog!"
Heidy says, "Ah, ok, I'll close up," and begins closing shades.
Gnik asks Taliax what he picked up from Fibam's conversation with
Zak, and Taliax says only that he was being misled. Gnik lets Taliax
know that there are other shapeshifters in town.

The group discusses what to do about Zak. Kai wants to take him out
because she sees him as an immediate threat to the town; Al reminds
them they have reason to believe releasing K'Jat might cut the problem
off at the source. Milena suggests that the most immediate threat is
that he can read thoughts, and perhaps they should warn Janet, who
may be the most likely on the council to avoid being read.

They find Janet at the temple and ask to speak to her in private.
Milena asks if she has a way to keep others from reading her thoughts;
Janet says no, and asks why. Milena shares they have reason to believe
Zak has a native ability to read thoughts. She says that explains a
lot. Al offers her his amulet to resist having thoughts read, to borrow
temporarily. Kai asks about telling her the other thing; they decide
since her thoughts will be blocked, they can share more. Gnik shows an
image of a shapeshifter and asks if she's familiar with them; she is,
and shares what she knows. They tell her that Zak is one, and there is
at least one other in town -- Gnik shows her his current form. They
ask if they should expose Zak before they leave town, and she opines
that perhaps it would be better done by someone else while they are
elsewhere. She asks what they are going to do, and after discussing
amongst themselves they let her know they are going to keep Anlim
from the source of power they are trying to attain at the "archaeological
dig". They tell her it is related to the source of power the sea witches
tried to take for themselves. They also share their concerns that
replacers have infiltrated, and perhaps are controlling, the Anlim
government.

Gnik then goes to the Temple of Tyollus to share the Detect Shapechanger
spell with Fran, and also shares why -- including that Zak is a
replacer and that Janet also knows. She says no one will be able to
read her thoughts, and that she will go talk with Janet. As he exits
her office, he hears the tearing sound of her using her dagger to
step into the ethereal.


11 Kella 3275

In the morning, Kai and Ember arrive at the Mighty Redemption. Laur is
leaning on the railing to the gangplank, which is unusual for him. He
nods at them and as they approach says, "We've been told we can't leave."
"By who?!" Kai asks. "Council, apparently -- they want to send someone
to talk to us." They hear an argument at the next berth over, at a
ship flying the Anlim flag with the Trihorn flag below it. Kai asks Laur
who is keeping them from sailing, and he says Karen -- a friendly member
of the town guard. Kai goes on board and Karen waves and says, "Hi, sorry!"
She shares that she was told to tell them the Council was delaying them,
but it was actually Zak, who is planning to come later. Kai and Ember
share this over the Farspeaker and Kai says that they need to get there
soon if they don't want her to take care of this her way.

When Gnik nears the ship, Fibam accosts him saying he wants to share
some information -- he hands over a pamphlet and says his team has
discovered an arcane barrier; he also shares six pins with the Trihorn
insignia and says that if they would like to take on a job helping them
he can activate them to allow them to pass through the Trihorn security
at the site. Gnik says he'll have to talk with the rest of the team and
would be able to send word if they decide to take it.

Al, knowing that Zak is coming, decides to find a vantage point from
which he can see Zak approach.

As Milena is about to leave the house, Tatiana says cheerfully, "Good
luck! Don't die too!" Milena asks who will die and gets the impression
someone has already died.

As she and Kat approach the ship, one of Milena's clients, Ingad, who
made her dress for the ball, greets her and when Milena asks how she
is shares that Trihorn asked her to make a ridiculous suit for a 10-foot
tall statue and then paid less than they promised in the contract. Milena
and Kat recommend she could get help with the contract at the Temple of
Dorg. Milena offers her a gold piece in case she needs it to cover the
cost of that service, but she says she can take care of it.

Much of the town seems to have gathered to see them off, as if many
people know they're planning to leave today. Milena and Kat go ahead
and board the ship; Milena greets the crew as she normally does,
paying special attention to whether everyone seems themselves.
She notices that Carie seems a little off and shares that someone
with a completely covered face attacked her last night; she protected
herself and the stranger ran off limping. Milena offers to check her
out to make sure she has no lingering injuries, but she says her brother
healed her up.

Laur calls the crew together to talk about the mission. While he's doing
that, Gnik casts his Detect Shapeshifter spell and doesn't see any among
the crew. He goes back down the gangplank to observe the crowd; he sees
Jai, but she looks like herself, which means that is her true form and
so she's not a Replacer. He concludes she is probably a druid with a
shapeshifting ability.

Zak arrives with the elf who was studying the columns on Oak Isle, and
one of the guards Al met. Zak greets Gnik and says they are searching
all the ships before they depart to make sure none of the contraband
stolen from the site is being smuggled out. Gnik calls up to Laur
and they send the guard up. Gnik stays below to engage the elf Arlasaith
and Zak in conversation. Gnik asks what they were able to find out about
the columns, and what else Arlasaith has researched. The elf is happy
to talk about his work.

Eight soldiers come up to do the inspection and Laur assigns a crew
member to escort each one. After the inspection, seven soldiers leave.
Kai and several others notice, and Kai asks the eight crew who escorted
a soldier to step forward. They do, and all say their soldier got off.
Just as she realizes Garelle is acting suspicious, she turns and bolts
toward the side of the ship away from the pier. Kai runs after her and
Ember dives at her legs. Zassin jumps on her head and starts whapping
her. Milena runs below decks with Rodger on her heels to try to find
the actual Garelle. Boris runs after them to help sniff her out.

The faux Garelle begins shifting in unnatural ways to try to get free.
Some of the crew gather around to help, and Kai yells down for Karen
to come back onto the ship. Gnik takes the opportunity to cast Charm
Monster on Zak. Gnik asks what his plan is here today, and Zak replies
he just wants to make sure there's someone on board to keep tabs on
them since it's pretty obvious they were the ones who messed with
the pillars. Gnik asks if it was only one Mitoth, and Zak corrects
him that it was a Mittal. Gnik asks what the difference is, and
Zak says that Mittal are far more powerful and versatile. Gnik asks
which he is, and he says a Mittal, of course. The elf, hearing this
conversation, looks extremely confused. Gnik amplifies his voice to
tell the crowd that Zak has something important to day. Zak asks what
he is sharing, and Gnik says his plans -- why he is here in Saltmarsh.
Zak says that is too big to share even for their friendship.

On deck, Kai tries to knock out the faux Garelle with a choke-hold. She
shifts, her head turning into a pipe, and slips out but Kai grabs her
again as she turns into a large rat.

Milena runs downstairs and when Rodger sees where she is going, throws
open the hatch to the bilge. They see Garelle lying motionless. Milena
goes down the hole and casts Revivify. Garelle gasps back to life and
asks what happened; she says the person she was with had a mirror, but
Milena tells her it was a shapeshifter. Garelle seems to blame herself
but Milena reassures her that these foes are quite powerful. Garelle
asks for training so this won't happen again and Milena says there
will be many discussions on this voyage, as they themselves are still
learning.

Gnik tells Zak not to go anywhere and checks through the Farspeaker
how it's going on the ship. Milena reports that Garelle is alive
again, and Laur thanks her. Gnik asks that they bring Garelle and
her doppelganger down the gangplank. Kai asks for a barrel or a
gunny sack or something to help contain the shapeshifter. Wend
and Jerry bring over a barrel.

A mage-in-training comes running up with Juliana on a floating
disk.

Gnik tells Zak they seem to be at an impasse; he doesn't want to
hurt Zak, but he can't let his plan succeed because it would be
bad for his people. Zak says that is one way of looking at it;
another way is that the world would be better off without his
people. Gnik asks how extensive the replacement has been, and
Zak says not everyone, but everyone who matters. Gnik asks about
the duke, and Zak says yes, he's been replaced for years. Juliana
looks increasingly horrified as she listens. Gnik asks how long
he's been in Anlim and Zak says he has had this role from childhood;
he has not replaced another person, but has just taken this form
for himself. Kai pulls the Replacer out of the barrel and a rumble
of concern goes through the crowd.  Milena reminds Gnik that it
would be useful for Juliana to know about the mindreading, so Gnik
asks Zak how far his innate ability to read minds extends, and Zak
says about 50 or 60 feet, but it can be blocked by certain materials. 
Gnik asks how many of his people are in Saltmarsh and he says three:
himself, the one who boarded the ship, and one more in the military.

Gnik says they seem to be at an impasse -- that once the spell wears
off they won't be friends anymore. Zak says it won't change the way
he interacts with Gnik -- he's still the same person with the same
goals. Gnik points out that now the people know his true plans, but
Zak says he's still the appointed representative.

After some discussion with Juliana, they decide it would be better
to imprison Zak than to kill him, and Gnik pulls out the manacles
and asks him to put his hands in. Al suggests going to Oak Isle
to talk to the main commander about what's going on. Juliana takes
Zak to lock him up while Kai, Gnik, and Al take the other shapeshifter
to the captain of the guard on the isle to explain the problem with
all the shapeshifters. Kai picks up Al so he can detect shapeshifters
among the soldiers on the island. Kat follows along with the
shapeshifter in the barrel explaining the situation to the crowd
following along behind. As they fly along the coast, Gnik notices
that one of the soldiers manning an armed catapult is a Replacer
and casts Mind Spike at it. Kai suggests to Gnik that he should
drop off so she can grapple the replacer and barrel-roll at
speed. He pulls out the immovable rod, jumps, and re-activates
it against a tree, then lets himself down a bit at a time after
Kai flies on.

Kai sees the replacer grab a flaming stick and light and launch
the catapult just as she tackles him. The flaming ball is aimed
straight at Mighty Redemption.

Kat attempts to cast Levitate, triggering a wild surge; there is
an explosion in the water under it and a blast of lava comes up,
hardening as it goes, and clips the stone, knocking it off-target
-- but toward the empty pier. Milena has jumped up with her Cloak
of the Firebird and hits it with Thunderwave, putting it out and
dropping it harmlessly into the water. Gnik had called for Laur
to get to the helm and teleport or shrink the ship, but when Laur
sees the stone is diverted he holds off.

Kai flies at the Replacer with the intent to kill him. The other guard
at the catapult yells "You can't attack him!"  After two hits the Replacer
goes down, reverting to his original form. As the other guard gapes, Kai
says, "Yes I can."

Gnik, knowing soldiers will be coming, lights a Candle of
Enthrallment. As the captain Lally arrives, Gnik magnifies his voice
and explains that they have been deceived. After the enchantment wears
off, Gnik talks more with Lally and they decide the guards should stay
in groups of three to protect against being attacked and replaced by
shapeshifters. Over the farspeakers, Milena suggests that perhaps the
other shapeshifter, if it is no longer needed as a visual aid, should
be dispatched. Gnik suggests to Lally that perhaps they should go
meet the other group. Lally looks up and sees Kat and Al with most
of the town parading along behind them and says, "Oh my gods."

After some discussion with Juliana, who suggests she has ideas of how
to keep the shapeshifters imprisoned, Gnik pulls Kai aside and reminds
her that they encountered an island of shapeshifters who had exercised
their own free will and defied their masters.

After Juliana takes the shapeshifter away, Fibam catches up with Gnik
and asks what is the "worse threat than the military" that he referenced
in his conversation with Zak, so Gnik fills him in about the shapechangers
taking over the government and trying to unleash the power under the sea
for themselves. Fibam shares that that matches with stories that came
out about the negotiations with Fortek. Fibam asks if they can stop
those foes if they get to the site, and Kai says yes. Gnik asks with a
smile how much they'll get paid for it. Fibam offers 500 gold each unless
they want to negotiate higher. Kai suggests a favor from Trihorn. "In
addition?" Fibam asks. Kai shrugs and says, "Either way." Fibam offers
them each 700 gold or a favor, and they accept -- given that they would
do the job anyway.

Gnik asks what's going on with the 10-foot-tall statue and was that related
to this dig? Fibam said that some of the folks on the ship were given the
order from their leadership, and perhaps they can ask them. Fibam does say
that he found out the person who negotiated for the clothing was trying to
skim some off the top, and he's taken care of it.

They find Ingad to learn more about the specifications of what was made
-- it was three outfits for (allegedly) three identical statues with very
long and skinny limbs. They asked for extravagent materials -- very high
quality silks. They ask the crew of the Trihorn ship where these are
being delivered; it is going to the dig site.

Al and Gnik talk with Lally about his thoughts now that he knows about
the subterfuge within the Anlim government. He still believes in his
orders to protect Saltmarsh and will continue to do so but will carefully
consider any new orders to see whether they are still in the best interest
of the realm. He asks how to detect shapeshifters as new troops come in,
and Gnik recommends he talk to Fran.

Kat uses her new Waterwalk ability to go inspect the lava pillar. There
is a troop of soldiers on shore trying to figure out how to get rid of
it, and gape at her as she walks out onto the water. She casts one of
her new spells, Shatter, a couple of times. The first time, she sees
the pillar shake and vibrate. The second time, it teeters and falls into
the water; she rides the wave back to shore. The soldiers and divers
cheer her on as she comes back to the dock. "I saw there was a problem
here," she says, "so I thought I would see if I could help." They are
very appreciative; she eats it up.


12 Kella 3275

They head out the next morning toward Abbey Isle. Far out to sea, they
see a rowboat drifting; from a distance it looks like there is someone
in it, slumped over. Kai can detect it is a tall, dark-skinned man with
blue spots on his skin. As they get closer they realize it is Clie, from
Abbey Isle, with blue boils all over his body. Al recognizes it as blue
rot, a disease primarily carried by undead -- specifically Drowned Ones.
It does not make someone undead, but will kill them. It appears that Clie
was beaten to death instead. Al and Kat know that some Sgult worshippers
make Drowned Ones intentionally. They decide it is best to burn the body
in the small rowboat to keep the disease from spreading.


11 November 2023

Milena does a Sending to Dannara, the high priestess of the Isle: "Found
Clie in rowboat with blue rot. Arriving at Isle in morning. What is
status there?" She gets no response.


13 Kella 3275

As they approach the Isle in the morning, there is a boat at the dock
with a tree for a mast -- they'd seen a similar one in Casadega, that
Bimisi was on -- sitting low in the water as if it had been scuttled. 
Kai tells Al that she thinks she sees the ship Bimisi was on, and takes
off to fly toward the island. Al dives in to swim over. Kai sees something
flying from the island toward her -- something big -- with colorful
wings, a wolf-like face, and antlers. She pulls out her sword. As it
nears she sees that it is over nine feet long with a massive wingspan.
She asks over the Farspeaker if anyone knows what it is. Gnik recognizes
it as a peryton, but more than twice the size of normal; they were aware
of Soul Gougers occasionally terrorizing the surrounding area, but they
had chosen not to deal with them since they had not seemed to be an
immediate threat. Gnik warns her that it could mess with her shadow
in ways that would distract her. Milena engages the Cloak of the Firebird
and flies up to be in range to provide back-up, if needed.

The creature is very dexterous, managing to fly by and take a couple
of swings with antlers and a talon at Kai before she can react, but
misses. Kai catches up to it and hits it twice with her sword; it
responds by striking her in the leg with a talon. Al uses a Dash
through the water to get in range to use Obviator; with the new
crystal effect, space briefly appears to warp so he is in front
of the creature. He attempts to stun it, but is not quite successful,
so he tries a flurry of blows, hitting it once. It folds its wings
and dives at Al, trying to hit him with its antlers, but misses.

Milena and Kai hear the island bell ringing -- which they have not
heard ringing before. They recall the symbols on the bell translated
to peace and serenity as well as death -- as in, all will be peaceful
once everything is dead. The Soul Gouger wheels around and flies quickly
back toward the island. Kai catches up to it and attacks, and it slashes
at her, hitting her shoulder. Al swims after them, and Kat and Ember
jump in the water to follow.

Kai flies up within 30 feet of it and uses her chained javelin on it
to stop it from getting away. She hits, but it manages to pull away
and dive toward the water again before heading toward the island,
rapidly. Kai tries to throw another javelin at it but it dives away
again. Kai tries a couple more times, each time with the creature
having pulled farther ahead of her, and manages to hit twice more.
It is beginning to look wobbly in the air as it finally gets out
of range. Kai sees it head to the bell tower and then fly out the
other side and off the island.

Kai does not see anyone on the island as she approaches, so she
heads toward the bell tower.

Al reaches the pier and examines the ship. Beneath it are places
where holes have been punched into it, and there are 20 or so
people standing in the shadow of the ship, staring at him, all
in various states of decomposition. It is obvious they are avoiding
the sun. He reports this to the rest of the group over the Farspeakers.

One of the openings in the bell tower has been torn open to make it
larger, perhaps by the peryton. Kai sees Brad, recently dead, with
a message scrawled in chalk, apparently by him: "Beware the Sea
Killers".

On the tree-ship, Al sees blood spatter and hears crying toward
the mast. He lays his hand on the bark and asks, "Is that you
crying?" The ship says yes -- the damage hurts. All but one of
his crew was pulled off into the water, all but Bimisi, who leapt
onto the pier. The tree asks Al's name and then introduces himself
as Awakened. Al thinks he recognizes one of the zombies as Childa,
one of the guards on Abbey Isle. Awakened tells Al he arrived on
the Isle two days ago and the attack happened that evening.

Kai works her way down the tower to see if she can find anyone
still alive. 

Gnik and Milena reach the pier. Gnik warns Al that he is going to
use Shape Water to try to move the ship away from the pier to try
to expose the zombies to sunlight. However, the sunk ship is too
big to move that way, so he tries to use the whirlpool effect to
pull the zombies out from under it. It pulls them out from under
the ship and they begin to fight their way back toward the ship.
Five of the newer zombies break free and head toward Al, who is the
nearest non-zombie they can see. One of the older zombies also
breaks free, carrying a rusty longsword and a crossbow, which it
fires at Al. He deflects it.

Kai makes it to the scriptorum, throws open the door, and calls out,
"Is anyone here?" She hears the sound of a giant coral snake from
behind the wall. She knows they are huge and venomous in a way that
infects a person's psyche. She shares this with the rest of the
group through the Farspeaker. She quickly moves on, down the stairs
toward the kitchen. She can tell violence has happened in the entryway:
she sees blood and destroyed items, and that the door into the sleeping
quarters has been barricaded from the outside.

Al moves around the edge of the whirlpool to make sure the path toward
him comes back into the whirlpool. Zassin dives in and comes up next
to Al. Gnik swims around to see if he can see whether there are more
zombies under the pier. Three more of the newer zombies and two more
crossbow wielders break free and try to reach or attack Al and Gnik.
Gnik reacts to a crossbow coming at him with a Shield, which deflects
it. Milena moves to position the freed zombies between herself and
the whirlpool and Turns them, hoping they would flee back into the
whirlpool. All the newer zombies are immediately destroyed, and one
of the crossbow wielders flees back into the whirlpool.

Kai moves through the kitchen and throws open the door to the larder.
She sees a large box of potatoes has been moved over the trapdoor to
the cellar. She hears Janore call out, "Who's there?" Kai identifies
herself, and Janore says Brad blocked them in the cellar. Kai lets
them out and sees that Janore is uninjured, but Jennell, Sorril,
Bimisi, and Dannara have all been infected with the blue rot; Dannara
is unconscious. Janore asks if Kai found Brad, but before responding
she calls out to Milena on the Farspeaker saying she needs her in
the kitchen, now.

One of the older zombies breaks free and heads out into the ocean,
rapidly, ignoring the group, as Ember and Kat near the pier. Kat
asks what they should be doing. Al says he is going to go after
the fleeing zombie, so she should stay and help Gnik with the
others. Al comes within 40 feet of the fleeing zombine and makes
a ranged attack, hitting and stunning it. He hits it again. Kat
uses her crossbow to shoot force bolts at one of the crossbow
zombies, hitting it, and then hides. Zassin flies down to harass
one of the zombies, until Al says, "Don't turn into a zombie!" and
he remembers he would have to bite them to do that, and maybe that's
not the best idea. He sends an image of himself biting and all his
teeth turning blue. Gnik comes within 60 feet of the stunned zombie
and casts Mind Spike at it. It shudders. Gnik sends Az to look under
the pier; she sees 10 more zombies, five of which are older, three
of those with crossbows. One of the turned zombies walks back into
the whirlpool as several others are destroyed by the force of the
water.

Kai fills in Milena on the situation in the abbey as Milena flies
that way. Kai helps helps Dannara get out of the cellar, tells
them Brad is dead, and asks what happened. Jennell says three
nights ago Janore had a vision, thought she should tell Dannara
about it, and while she was doing that the undead attacked,
taking out most of the inhabitants while they were sleeping. The
ship arrived the next day and barricaded themselves in to try
to help, but the wave of undead that arrived the next night were
far worse than what they'd anticipated. The undead come up every
night, kill people, and then take the bodies away; the recently
dead show up the next night as zombies, so someone is raising
them.

Ember takes a shot at the zombie Zassin is giving advantage on.
She hits twice with her short bow. Kat uses her crossbow again
and hits the one Ember just hit; its head falls off as it falls
to the ground.

Al approaches the stunned zombie and throws his magical underwater
net on it, then hits with an unarmed strike. After several rounds, the
group takes out the rest of the zombies.

Jennell brings a crowbar to the front door, looks at it, then hands it
to Kai, so they can get out of the house faster.

As they discuss where the necromancer might be who is raising the
undead, Milena realizes that the fleeing zombie was headed directly
toward the sunk ship Gnik keeps talking about.

Milena uses healing on the five injured Abbey Isle residents and
then a Restoration on Dannara so she can help with the healing.
They also begin to heal Awakened. They discuss sending to Saltmarsh
for a crew to take Awakened back there for repairs, and realize
they will need to take out the necromancer to keep more undead from
being raised. They realize Bimisi and the other Abbey Isle survivors
are all ship-savvy enough to limp back to Saltmarsh with the healed
Awakened, once Gnik uses Dust of Dryness to get water out of the
hold.

They discuss whether they have time to take care of the necromancer
on their way to talk to the Sea Elves. Al tries to contact Anny via
her figurine to ask if she was able to get others onboard with slowing
down the Anlim army, but she is not able to answer. They decide to
anchor out to sea while they take a long rest and then try to take
out the necromancer that evening. Kat spends some time speaking
with Awakened -- hoping to get a twig to grow into another ship, but
Awakened explains sadly that it doesn't work that way: someone must
awaken the tree with magics.


24 November 2023

The group tells Jennell that her rescued ship is in a berth in Saltmarsh,
and they give her her chest that they recovered for her. She gives them
a reward of jewels and potions worth 1000 gold each.

Al talks with Bimisi, specifically about whether he still believes the
prophecy that led him to sail out. "Awakened and I are exactly where we
are supposed to be," he says. "It's a shame the others did not make it."

Milena expresses concerns and cautions to the group over her divination
for the next day, which shows death, destruction, and betrayal in the future
and cautions toward meditation rather than action in the present. 

The group discusses whether to invite Bimisi to go with them to the Pit
of Hatred, or to Hell's Deep. Gnik expresses concerns because of the
premonition of betrayal in the future, so he casts Augury about whether
to invite Bimisi. He gets an immediate response of Weal. They discuss
how much to tell him about where they are going next and decide to
go ahead and fill him in. Al invites him to join the group for a
discussion and tells him about the Koth, about the Anlim plan to take
power from K'Jat, and about the shapeshifters that have infiltrated
the government and want to eventually eliminate all humans. He thanks
them for sharing this with him and says it sounds like exactly what
they were warned about -- a group stealing power and creating danger
even in Ponallian lands. He will return to Saltmars with Awakened and
join them when they return to reprovision before going to Hell's Deep.


14 Kella 3275

After sleeping in the ship overnight well away from shore, they head
in the morning to where Gnik thinks the Pit of Hatred is. It is a
beautiful day; Zassin does a tiny belly-flop off the ship, Az in
octopus form joins him, and Al pulls three friends from the bag:
Cuddy the octopus, Bounder the giant sea horse, and Ralph the reef shark.
The rest of the group gets into the water and heads down.

Gnik and Kai catch sight of what looks like half a ship with its prow
pointed down into the ground, some distance away. The area around it
is strangely flat; the ship is not quite in the exact center, but is
only a bit off-center. The surface is smooth, like some kind of
stone. Al sends his octopus forward to check it out and asks his other
two friends to stay behind with the group to keep an eye on them. Al
also pulls out one of his glowing fish to serve as a light source. Gnik
sends Az to swim around to see if she can see where the other half of
the ship went, and if she sees any zombies.

Cuddy is swimming along; about 300 feet from the ship, he shudders,
stops moving, begins floating to the surface, and then disappears.
Kat didn't see any invisible foes. Gnik puts on his arcanus glasses
and immediately sees a force field of sickly green-grey energy that
peters out about where Cuddy stopped. Gnik uses Minor Illusion to show
the group what he sees. Kat has seen documentation of something similar:
the effect will keep any celestial being from entering, and will infuse
necrotic energies into any living beings, causing damage to be worse
inside the barrier -- and crossing the barrier itself will cause damage
that may be enough to kill a person or creature. The thing Kat read
about was caused by an ancient being of great power. Gnik's reading
about this location expressed concern that a seal may have been
broken -- perhaps that is the flat area they are seeing, and the
broken ship damaged it somehow. They notice there are no sea creatures
in the area. They are aware that the ship sank 11 years ago, but don't
know whether the field was there before that. Gnik thinks that perhaps
the ship's captain, Sirgalt, may have been corrupted by the energy
to become a necromancer creating zombies.

They discuss possibly throwing Nash in -- since she would be in stone
form going in, the cold damage of the barrier would not affect her,
but she would still be in danger from extra damage if she were attacked
while inside the area.

Milena uses Clairvoyance to look below the ship; she sees through a
hole in the stone cap down into the pit where there is a tendril of
sickly green-grey energy emerging from one end of the pit to a barnacle-
covered creature with split legs -- similar to the older zombies they
fought -- talking to two others. It says:

"They were a little bit late. The other versions said they would be here
a long time ago. Make sure you're all ready." Then to the other he says,
"Why don't you hang here for a bit? I'm going to go commune for a bit."
"Okay," the other says, "but why are you telling me this out loud? We
can hear each other's thoughts." "I did not want everyone to hear what
we are talking about." Milena relates this to the others, and suggests
that perhaps the "other versions" were King Gnik and Burnt Ember. 

Kai has read about sealing powerful entities, and Kat and Gnik believe
that either multiple clerics of the same god or the Trinity completing
a ritual would be needed, although a motivated god might allow one of
their artifacts to be used for a similar purpose. 

After some discussion, they decide Al should have the Wand of Maria, as
it can only be used by someone who has not sinned in the past year,
according to Maria (and Milena has killed at least one person in cold
blood in that time). Gnik will try to Dispel the magical effect and
then Mend the broken seal while Kat uses the magic of the Serpent
of Sil.

They reach the barrier and Gnik attempts to Dispel it while Milena
casts Beacon of Hope. Gnik strains for a moment, and then the
shield sparks away. Al sends the reef shark in ahead of them and
they swim behind. Kai is pretty sure she can see something moving
at the top of the ship. She lets everyone know over the Farspeaker
that something is hiding there, possibly with a crossbow. She keeps
an eye on that area as they continue to swim. As they near, crossbow
bolts come at them and someone yells, "Too bad you all took so long.
Could have been interesting -- maybe even saved some lives!"
A bolt comes at Kat and she casts Shield; it bounces off. She pulls
out Bolter and tries to shoot force bolts at one of the foes, and
hits the one that hit her.  She continues taking pot-shots as she
advances. Ralph the Reef Shark flies up and dives down into the
interior of the ship.

When Gnik gets within 60 feet of the ship, he casts Web toward
the zombies shooting at them. One of the zombies shoots at him,
but Al snatches the bolt out of the water before it hits his
shoulder, as well as a second bolt coming at Gnik. A third
bolt comes at Al before he can react and clips his side. Milena
casts Spiritual Weapon as she gets within range. She hits the
already-damaged zombie.

Kat fires her crossbow again and uses Tides of Chaos to give
herself advantage. She hits one of the zombies through the
neck; it drops its crossbow as its head slowly slides off and
floats away. She reaches the opening to the ship.

Kai swims over the zombies on the wall and attacks the leftmost
one. She slams into its spine and then clips its skull with
her blade; it twitches but is still moving. Ember shoots with
her bow at the same one and hits it twice, taking it out.

Kat and Kai see that there are stones sticking up behind the
ship that very clearly have writing on them. In addition to
the two other zombies on the wall, they see two others climbing
very quickly up the inside of the ship toward them. They nimbly
pull themselves up through the web and launch themselves at Kai
and Kat, punching and kicking. One punches at Kat's hand. She
can see strange blue tendrils growing on the zombie -- the right
color for the blue rot. The other kicks Kai in the left leg. Both
resist the effects of the rot.

Al uses his distance attack ability to hit one of the fast zombies,
but is not able to stun it. When he fails, a chaos effect is triggered
from his crystals: a charge ripples through his arm and the zombie in
front of him glows for a moment. "What the hell was that, man?" the
zombie asks. Al hits it again, and again fails to stun it. This time,
there is a throbbing in the crystals as steam and then flame erupts
out of his hand, screaming "Aaah, huuuurts!" -- a fire elemental,
swimming straight for the surface. Kat calls Laur over the Farspeaker:
"Um, incoming, and it's not my fault this time!" A few moments later,
Laur responds, "No, nothing on our end but some steam."

Zassin asks Milena if he should assist the others or peek inside to
see what is happening. She suggests he look inside but don't be
seen. He scoffs and vanishes against the side of the ship. Gnik
attacks the non-restrained zombie with Mind Sliver and it is
unable to save, then slides into the web. 

Two other zombies poke up from below the web with small crossbows
and fire at Kat and Kai. One of the bolts coming at Kat hits her
thigh and burns with a pain like poison. Kai is also hit, and does
not manage to save against the poison effect. One of the zombies
at the top of the wall fires at Al, but he deflects it out of
the water, and the attack on Ember misses.

Milena hangs back and hits the fast zombie attacking Kat with a Sacred
Flame and with her Spiritual Weapon. Kat switches to her rapier and
strikes with the Booming Blade effect. She hits, and he triggers the
effect because he is already falling and thus moving away. She scoots
away with Fancy Footwork. Kai swings at the zombie in front of her, the
one Al made glow. She slices a chunk off its arm. Ember closes with the
same zombie and strikes with her blades, hitting it three times. There
is very little left holding it together.

As the two fast zombies fall, the Booming Blade effect goes off -- extremely
loudly, underwater. The one attacking Kai punches her and hits her in the
stomach. As it falls past her, she swings at it and hits, cleaving through
its ribs; as he falls apart there is a massive burst of light from him,
and there is a living sailor swimming in front of her, desperately trying
to swim for air. "What the hell?!" Kai yells, and tries to help him.
Milena says, "I have wand," and Gnik says, "He can have my necklace."

Al goes after the other fast zombie that was attacking Kat. He hits and
attempts to stun it, but doesn't succeed. Zassin sends an image to Milena
of the tentacled guy standing at the base of the opening. Gnik swims to
the drowning sailor, pops the necklace over his head, and says in his
ear, "You owe me." Gnik figures he is one of the Tammarat sailors -- and
just because he is no longer undead does not mean he is suddenly good or
on their side. Gnik then Mind Slivers one of the slow zombies again, and
tells Az to keep an eye on the sailor who has his necklace. Then he tells
Laur over the Farspeaker, "There's a sailor coming up. Rescue him but
don't trust him. And get my necklace back from him." Al sends
the seahorse to head-butt one of the slow zombies. It charges and hits
it hard.

Zassin sends and image of two crossbow zombies crawling into the hole
in the cap and holding themselves on the ceiling. Milena uses her
Spiritual Weapon and Sacred Flame again at the same fast zombie. Kat
uses Tides of Chaos and a Chaos Bolt to attack it as well. The spell
starts going as she plans, but then reality bends and twists and
suddenly she can see herself where Al is, gesturing at one of the
crossbow zombies. Then Al is there again, and glows brightly for
a moment -- the chaos gives him the ability to regenerate a hit
point every round.

Kai swims down to attack the last fast zombie and drives her blade
through its skull, which comes off as she pulls the blade away. Its
body slumps to the side. She then hits the webbed zombie that Gnik
has been Mind Slivering. The skull on her blade shatters, causing
blunt damage to the zombie, breaking ribs. Ember dives at the zombie
that has not been damaged yet, hitting three times. Al hits it and it
seems to go down, but shakes it off. Al hits again, critically, and
takes it out. He then hits the other one -- which also seems to go
down and then shake it off. Al ducks around to the outside of the
ship.

Zassin sends an image of a couple of sneaking zombies hanging
underneath the cap, and their locations. The tentacled captain
reaches up a tentacle and sticks himself to the other side of
the cap.

Gnik casts another Mind Sliver on the remaining zombie, but it continues
to hang on. Milena hits it with a Sacred Flame, and it is immediately
torched. She repositions her Spiritual Weapon toward the hole in the
cap. A voice calls up, "Can we at least parlay?" Gnik yells back, "I
don't speak with dead." "Shame," the captain says, "we have so many
interesting thoughts." Al asks what the thing is in the corner. The
captain says it is why they came there and sank -- Kelvuroz willed it.
"You're welcome to come down and see what he's like," he adds.

Gnik tells Az to come back since it is going to take a while for him to
get to the surface. Al doesn't see the reef shark anywhere -- it was
destroyed immediately when it went into the hole below.

Gnik sends Az to sneak into the hole so he can see the captain and
then casts Banish. The captain sees Az and moves to do something, but
blips out of existence. When he does, the two sneaky zombies fall from
the ceiling, and the green tendril of energy that had been connecting
to the captain is now sparking and flailing. The group goes in and
dispatches the two fallen zombies. Gnik says the Banish will only
last a minute, and then he will return to the same spot. Milena
casts a Guardian of Faith that will hit him with radiant damage as
soon as he returns, and Al and Kai stand by hoping to stun and hit
him. Gnik casts Silence at the spot where the captain will return,
right before he pops in.

The Guardian smashes him with radiant energy. Kai slashes at him,
hitting a couple of his tentacles, and Al hits and attempts to stun
him, but surges again; sparks leap across the crystals and the captain
begins to move more quickly -- he now has a Haste effect. Al hits
again and attempts another stun, but isn't successful. The captain
says, "You are all kinds of fun" -- although they can't hear him --
as Al directs a flurry of blows at him, but still fails to stun him.
Ember jumps in and skewers him several times. Kat zips in and hits
him with her rapier and the Booming Blade effect. Milena attempts
Guiding Bolt, but misses. The giant seahorse swims in and hits
him.

The captain is looking very ragged -- but the sparking tendril of
energy reconnects to him and some of his wounds seem to stitch
together. He lashes out with two tentacles at Kai and Ember,
hitting them both and wrapping around them. The skin goes grey
in the area where it hits. It is the most excruciating thing Kai
has ever experienced, and the captain stitches together even
more. He pulls his head back and vomits out this inky blackness
at Kat, Gnik, and Milena. Very feebly, Ember says, "I can't see."

Gnik casts a Dispel Magic at the Haste spell on the captain, and he
immediately slows. Kai hits him twice, and Al hits him three times.
Ember mutters, "Fuck you," and sticks her sword into his eye before
hitting him a few more times. Kat hits him with a Chaos Bolt, and
avoids a surge. It smacks him in the face with a bolt of acid and
he sags backwards, but the tendril does not detach.

Milena steps forward and attempts to channel Divinity at the tendril.
There is a deafening scream -- so much that they can see the water
vibrate, and the captain's body writhes -- and then the tendril
fizzles out. Kai suggests Kat use her Sovereign Glue to fix the
hole, which is faster than using Mend, to fill the hole. Then Kat
hands her Serpent of Sil to Gnik, who hands it to Milena. She tries
channeling Divinity through the necklace and into the stone. As
she works, she sees a vision of two of the most powerful beings
in the universe -- one pounding against a barrier and the other
smacking it down. When she is done, the necklace has melted into
the glue and is glowing a beautiful, emerald-like green.

They make a note to tell the sea elves about the hole in the stone
cap.


6 January 2024

There is a chest next to the now-repaired hole. Kat and Gnik open it
with Mage Hand from a safe distance; the lid crumbles. This clearly
was the Captain's chest that fell from the ship. It is filled mostly
with coins: a lot of corroded silver, some gold and platinum, and
a set of ten jade animals, all sea creatures. Kat picks out a couple
of the animals -- a dolphin and an octopus -- for her younger sisters
and asks to be paid all in silver for her remaining share.

They return to the ship, and as they take a long rest, symptoms of
the Blue Rot begin to manifest in Ember, she fails a save, and Milena
hits her with a Greater Restoration.

They continue on toward the elf village of Mana'an. Al activates Anny's
statue to let her know they're coming.

As they approach, they see elves sitting above the water -- sitting on
giant dolphins -- and approaching the ship. Kat recognizes them as the
three elves who taught her the teleport spell. Zyalar, their leader,
greets them cheerfully: "Much better situation! Nice to see you again!"
They lead the group down while Laur keeps the ship in the general area.

Under the surface there is a raised section of seafloor covered with
seaweed. They swim through until the kelp forest opens up into a
huge clearing where there settlement is. They are being taken to
the Deep Drink, a place where they can spend the night. The structures
all appear to be made with cultivated coral with many arches and open
areas; seaweed serves as screens to provide privacy or separate spaces.
The lowest point in the settlement is about 400 feet down. There is a
rock face with caves carved into it, some shielded by seaweed and others
by coral. There are elves working in some of the fields tending seaweed
and other things.

In a section of a rock face is an area that has been carved into a
bar, and behind it a mirror that was probably salvaged from a shipwreck
-- clearly in humorous imitation of a human bar. The cave also contains
some rooms with air, generated by plants. Anny is waiting for them at
one of the tables, waving and grinning. They greet her warmly. She shares
that her mother's right-hand person, Kaladrim, will be coming to provide
more information about when they can meet with her mother. They share
with her Matty's message that "the secret is not worth hiding away,"
and ask if that's why she left. She says, "Sorry about the dagger --
I had to give it to my mom. It doesn't just detect Sahaugin, it detects
everything related to Sahaugin." It turns out that includes goblins,
who were created by the sea elves as part of a war against their foes,
and the elves are afraid humans will find out they created them and
want to come kill them for it. So she stole the dagger to keep anyone
from discovering that history.

The waiters bring them plates of interesting foods -- some of which
are delicious, some less to their tastes. 

Anny indicates an elf swimming toward them and says, "That's Kaladrim."
They notice him glancing at his own reflection as he passes mirror.
He greets them and they introduce themselves. He says the Queen cannot
meet them this evening but will see them in the morning; they are
welcome to stay in the caves or on the ship. Kai wants to return to
the ship; Gnik and Ember decide to stay, as do Kat and Milena. Several
of them get a sense of tension between Anny and Kaladrim, although it
doesn't seem to be entirely animosity. Kaladrim says, "I'll meet you here
in the morning," and Anny says "WE'LL meet you here in the morning." As
Kaladrim leaves, Al asks her about it. She shares that they used to be
a couple, and Kaladrim has been weird toward her since she came back
-- wanting to exclude her from things. She doesn't know if it's due
to her having been among humans, or something else.

Al asks about where Anny lives; he wouldn't mind seeing it. She shares
that she lives in a barracks -- she is effectively in their military
after all. She's happy to show them around. Al asks if they have
ships or other vessels to move elves or objects, but she says they
don't need them; they have the dolphins, and underwater can generally
lift and move anything they need to move. Kat asks if they gamble, but
because they live on a barter system, they play games for fun rather
than for any monetary value. Anny does share that there are some plants
that create psychedelic effects, which gets Kat's attention, and prompts
Milena to ask about other interesting medicinal or other plants. Anny
introduces her to Pylam, who is an expert with medicinal herbs -- with
300 years of experience. Kai asks about someone who could spar with
her to give her practice with underwater tactics, so Anny introduces
her to Seldeth, who is excited to spar because she's never seen anyone
try to use such a large weapon underwater. Anny, Kat, and Ember try
the psychedelics, while Gnik supervises and makes sure they get back
safely to their rooms.

Anny sends a dolphin with Kai to get her back to her ship, which is more
than a mile away. Kai chats with the dolphin along the way; it seems
happy with its life and the exchange of its service for delicious food
and a comfortable place to live.

After Anny departs, Al relates the story of her relationship with Kaladrim
and then suggests perhaps Gnik should use the spell that allows him to
detect shapechangers, just in case.


15 Kella 3275

In the morning Kaladrim collects them and takes them to Zynesua. She
has obvious facial scars and her left arm is bandaged -- the group
recalls that she also has crystals in her arm and keeps them covered.
After introductions are made, Zynesua says she would like to speak
to the group alone and dismisses Kaladrim and Anny. As they swim
away, Kai looks at Gnik, trying to get him to cast the spell.
Zynesua asks if something is wrong. Gnik thanks her for agreeing
to see them and then says that they have sensitive things to discuss
and they are concerned about beings that are able to take other forms--
"Yes, Kaladrim is one," Zynesua says. Gnik is taken aback, and she says
she would rather work to control the information he is getting than reveal
that she knows what he is. Gnik asks if she would permit him to cast a
spell that would let him detect if she's a shapeshifter, and she agrees;
she watches as he begins the spell and nods. Gnik does not detect any
shapeshifters among the group.

They start by telling her about the Pit of Hatred and that the cap
is damaged. She says they will fix it; she was there when the original
stone was laid, and helped seal the hole below. She does not know much
more about the entity below than its name. She concludes they need to
hide or patrol the area better.

She asks them to share the story of what happened at the other
settlement. Whereas Gnik normally illustrates his stories with
minor illusions, for this story he only shows Coloss, the being
that brought them to that place. She says she knew it was there
and had been monitoring it for some time, but had never seen it
herself. Kai shares that they think it is now on Jaeleth. Al asks
if she has communication with others on Jaeleth and she says they
had established communication once they arrived. She says she will
let her contacts on Jaeleth know about Coloss.

Gnik then says they've been in contact with a group called the Sea's
Watch. She reaches into her pocket and pulls out the letter they left,
sealed in wax to waterproof it. She is the one who has been coming
through the other side -- the only survivor. She has not met those
on the other side, as she did not want them to know her identity. They
promise they won't share.

Zynesua says that Anny asked them to intercept a Trihorn ship on its
way to Hell's Deep. They share that Anlim has been overrun by Koth
agents who are now running the government and trying to harness the
power of the being there. She says she knew Kaladrim was related to
the Koth, but not that there was a connection to Hell's Deep. They
share that K'Jat is there, they had communicated with it, and the
three choices they were given. They tell her that they have not yet
told anyone else about that conversation; she thanks them for their
trust.

She knows very little about K'Jat beyond knowing that it is the entity
imprisoned at the Tower; she says the tower appears that it was once
upright on land but is now fallen over. As they discuss the appearance
of the tower Gnik realizes it is very similar to the Tower of Time
in Terriola. Zynesua shares what she saw and learned when she was
there battling the hags: there were creatures she'd never seen before
that the hags were sending against them. The hags weren't trying to
get through the barrier but were drawing some power through the
barrier. They ask if she has an opinion of which of the three options
for K'Jat would be the best, but she says she doesn't have enough
information to make an informed decision. The group discusses perhaps
making a tentative decision but possibly revising once they get there
and have more information.

Al says, "So, I think you've seen these...." and opens his bracer
to show the crystals in his arm. "I'm glad you're covering those,"
she says. She has had hers since a couple of days after her interaction
with the hags. She also experiences her magic being corrupted when she
tries to cast spells. She thinks the only way to remove the crystals
is to destroy the source crystal that imprisons K'Jat.

Gnik shows her the octopus puzzle and asks if she knows anything
about it. "Yes, I put it there," she says. The man who created
it managed to make it into the base of the tower with a group,
and while they weren't entirely of right mind when they came out
he said the map would help those who came after. They ask if she
would like to come with them. "No," she says, immediately and
definitively. "I cannot take that again. But I will send some
others to assist." She asks their plan -- dive straight for the
tower, or something else? Gnik thanks her for the additional
information about the layout, and says they have been invited to
join the Trihorn expedition, which could allow them to get down
there without having to fight their way through the Trihorn folks.


20 January 2024

Zynesua asks the group why they are interested in this. Kat and Kai
say they want to stop evil beings from getting more power, and Gnik
adds that these beings have taken over the government that conquered
their country. She asks what they would do afterwards, and Gnik says,
"Probably set up some form of representational government, but that
will have to be developed over time." "No," she says, "I mean Hell's
Deep. It is a source of great power." They see they will have to see
what's there first; and they wondered if perhaps the power would still
be there once the being trapped inside is free. Kat says they do things
off the cuff since they can't really make a plan until they know what
the situation is. "That's what worries me," Zynesua says, but she has
some trust of the group and their motives based on what Anny has told
her. Milena shares that they have the power and the plan to look ahead
to certain possible choices to determine whether they would be favorable
or harmful, and that though the answer is not always clear they should
at least get an idea if the action might break the universe, or them.

Zynesua says she will send some of her people in that direction to help.
Al asks about sending others to slow down the Anlim ship, and she says
they have already been sent, by Anny -- implying Anny made the decision
on her own without consulting her. The group decides they should leave
straight from the meeting so Kaladrim will not know they know he is
a shapeshifter. She looks off to the side and a half-dozen dolphins
swim up to escort them back to their ship. Al asks her to give Anny
their best wishes. Al and Kai talk with a couple of the dolphins on
the way back; Al uses the Shell of Speech. The dolphin Al is talking
with is called Tidewinder by the elves; it is obviously not the
smartest dolphin, and just knows it is supposed to follow the other
dolphins and do what they do, but is excited to do flips and things
with Al's encouragement.


16 Kella 3275

They head toward Saltmarsh to resupply before heading on toward Hell's
Deep. The crew has settled into a regular routine of taking breakfast
and dinner all together, with the day crew sleeping after dinner
and the night crew sleeping after breakfast. After dinner, as the
day crew are settling in to their quarters for the evening, Kat is
up on deck with Roger and Mouse, Klaab, and Corey, and Milena is in
the kitchen doing a bit of pre-breakfast prep, with Zassin "helping"
by tasting everything. Mouse lets out a little bit of a whine, and
Kat sees someone translucent rising out of the hatch. Realizing that
he's invisible and probably doesn't realize she knows, she says
something comforting to Mouse and keeps an eye on the guy, while
quietly saying "There's an invisible guy walking up the stairs
from the crew quarters" into the Farspeakers. She recalls seeing
him before... oh, wait, he helped kidnap her sister. He smiles
at her and she fires a Chaos Bolt at him. 

There is a surge of chaos magic; a thin filament flies out of her
hand and hits him in the forehead and suddenly she can hear all his
surface thoughts: "Why did she do that? Is she going to talk to me?
She seemed pretty pissed when she stormed out before...." Kat asks,
out loud, "Why are you here?" Rodger says, "You said we could hang
out..." and she tells him there is an invisible man in the room and
places herself between Rodger and him. She names him as Havel. Rodger
asks, "Should I be doing something? Should I be hiding?" She tells him
to go hide. He tries to sneak up the stairs, but trips on the way up.
From Havel she gets two streams of thought: One hoping that he could
warn her and her mother because shit is about to hit the fan and they
don't deserve it, the other thinking that he will destroy her and
everyone she cares about because She commands it.

Klaab notices something odd is happening and calls out, "Is everything
ok?" Kat calls out that there is an invisible undead man and everyone
should either arm themselves or clear the area. Milena pops out the
door from the kitchen and throws a pan of flour on him so his position
is obvious. She calls out in Bargallian, "Havel, what are you doing
here?" He reports that Bogdan is dead, and he was killed as well,
but Tamoth decided that it was not payment enough, so he has been
instructed to kill everyone on the ship except for Milena and Kat,
then return to the mainland to kill everyone they know, and then
wait for them to return to finish them off. He sounds remorseful,
and the first thought-train agrees with this, while the second is
yelling at the first, "Shut up! What are you doing?"

Kat sees him start to cast a spell while obviously fighting against
it. She sees a glowing blue circle at the edge of the ship, and lets
everyone know over the Farspeaker. Zassin sends Milena a mental image
of him slapping the other members of the party with his tail to wake
them up, and she gives him a thumbs-up. He projects the image of his
own face yelling, followed by a flour-covered monster on the deck.
Gnik and Al wake up, and Kai is already on her way up the stairs.

Kat runs forward to hit with her rapier, with Booming Blade; the
weapon itself does not seem to do much damage, but the booming
effect does. Mouse runs forward to help.

A crossbow bolt thunks into the wall next to Havel, from Corie.
Chastity comes running up the stairs, having also been awakened
by Zassin. Kai flies into the room and attacks him. Magical plates
appear where she hits, but she is hitting hard enough to break
through every one. His body is not reacting the way most bodies
do -- taking damage but not nearly as much as would be expected.
Kat reports this to the group. Boris bites at Havel's feet to
try to trip him, but he moves away... appearing to float before
taking a step.

Al asks what's happening and did anyone else have a weird dream?
Garelle mutters, "Did EVERYONE else have a weird dream?" Milena
says over the farspeaker, "That was Zassin. You have been summoned,"
and Zassin projects another image of what's happening. Al runs up
the stairs and attacks Havel. He notices that Havel's flesh doesn't
give the same way he expects; he tries a stunning strike and feels
the energy being pulled out of him and knows intuitively that this
is not right -- he can't be stunned.

Milena pulls out Nash and says, "Friend and friend of the Explorer,
Tamoth has sent forces against us. Be aware there may be more invisible
foes." She tosses Nash onto the deck behind Kat, where she comes into
being and wobbles a bit -- she has never been in wolf form on the
ship and needs to get her sea legs. Milena casts Sacred Flame at Havel
and asks Kat if it worked better than the weapons. Kat says it melted
the flesh from his skull.

Klaab calls out, "Are you sure they're going to be invisible? Because
these are pretty visible." Corie looks over the edge of the ship and
says, "Holy shit!"

Gnik hands Ember the bucket with octopus-Az in it and casts Haste
on her. She runs up the stairs, leaves Az at the top, crosses the
room, hops on the railing of the stairs to the next level, and gets
ready to attack Havel.

Havel throws his head back and roars; a wave of energy bubbles out
from him with a crackling black and orange effect. Al manages to
avoid most of the damage, but it does stun him, and his flesh cracks
without bleeding. Ember, Boris, and Mouse are also stunned, and Az
disappears. Havel rises into the air and the Booming Blade goes off;
pieces of his flesh fly off but he doesn't seem to care. The first
train of thought seems to want to get this over quickly.

Zassin goes to peek over the side of the ship and reports back what
he sees: there are ten creatures, one of whom is an undead Marika,
whose form looks a bit out of focus, and the rest of whom appear to
be undead Bargallian warriors. 

Kat throws her dagger at Havel and sees that it does the damage
she would expect -- possibly because it is now adamantium, and so
counts as a silvered weapon. Nash communicates to Kat to hold her
next attack and hop on her back. Nash jumps up to the next level
and Kat stabs up into Havel's back with her dagger.

Carie comes up the stairs by Milena and asks if she should go out
there. "Undead warlock above, undead warriors coming up side of
ship," Milena says. "Oh, okay!" Carie says brightly, and goes to
the nearest portal to shoot down at the ascending warriors.

Rodger peeks out and takes a shot at Havel with his sling, then
hides again.

Kai asks Cline what she knows about this kind of undead warlock;
Cline reports the resistances they've been observing -- regular
and magical weapons -- but they're particularly susceptible to
radiant damage. She says Marika is most likely a Swordwraith,
which are extremely powerful but corporeal and can be harmed
normally by magical weapons. The rest of the warriors appear
to be wights. Kai flies to the edge of the deck where Marika is
emerging and attacks, hitting a couple of times. Kai notices that
she already has a crossbow bolt sticking out of her shoulder that
she doesn't seem to care too much about. It occurs to her that
most of the crew don't have magical weapons, so she tosses her
javelin on the deck next to Corey and says, "Magical weapon."
He grins and says, "You're awesome."

The wights come over the railing and begin attacking. The first
one slips as it tries to attack Klaab and falls into the ocean.
The second manages to tear into her with its claws, but she fights
it off before it can throw her overboard. One grabs at Kai's arm
and another digs into her side, but neither are able to throw
her overboard. Milena attempts to cast Guiding Bolt, but misses.
Ember shakes off the Stun effect and Milena hands her a dagger
treated with alchemical silver.

Marika jumps over the railing and attacks, hitting Kai but not
inflicting much damage. 

Kat hears the first stream of Havel's thoughts expressing remorse
for what is about to happen, and tendrils come from him and grab
into Klaab, Ilris, and Corey. Klaab and Ilris go over the side.

Zassin flies over to assist Kat, who attacks Havel with the
Booming Blade effect on her dagger. She punches several holes
into him and he crumbles into pieces; the last thought Kat
can hear is his first stream of thought saying "Thank you."

Marika snarls something at Kai in Bargallian; Kai shrugs and
swings at her, hitting a couple of times, but it's difficult
to see how badly she might be hurt.

Laur throws open the door long enough for Wend to lean out,
smash one of the wights with his shield, and then close the
door again.

One of the wights hits Kai with both of its attacks and tries
to throw her overboard, but she breaks free. Al shakes off
the stun effect as Havel disintegrates and throws a couple
of friends from his bag over the edge of the ship and tells
them to help the crew: he pulls the small and giant seahorses
and giant octopus. Al hits the wights on either side of Kai
and stuns them both. Milena steps to where she can see as many
of the wights as she can, as well as Marika, and Turns Undead. 
Every one of the wights are affected, but Marika is not. Ember
sprints over to her and slashes at her. Marika roars out in
anger and flies into a rage, going at Kai. She hits hard,
twice, then slips and falls off the side of the ship. Kai
and Ember each manage to hit her again as she goes over the
edge, and she dissipates into dust. Kai flies down to help
their crewmates back onto the ship; Klaab is unconscious
and being held above the water by the giant octopus. 


3 February 2024

17 Kella 3275

In the evening, the crew sails into the Saltmarsh harbor. Keren and Rourke
come out in a rowboat to meet them. They learn that the city is on lockdown
with a force massing at Snyder Keep to take Saltmarsh for Anlim. Laur tells
the crew that they will all stay on the ship except the owners, and they will
leave in the morning. No one questions the orders.

As they dock, Rolland approaches with Krara the lizardfolk council member
-- as well as Kat's father Ron, who is animatedly talking to Krara. Gnik
detects that Krara is a shapechanger but is in his natural form -- he
is a druid. Rolland greets them and says he heard they ran into some
trouble while they were away, so maybe they wouldn't be bringing any
trouble to Saltmarsh this time? "We are only here a short time and do
not plan for any trouble," Milena says. "You never do," Rolland says with
a smirk.

Ron greets them cheerfully. Kat gives him a hug and Milena greets him in
Bargallian with a traditional greeting for family long-separated. He returns
a greeting in kind. He shares that he and Nikolai returned to Bargal Valley
after their last meeting to share what Bogdan had done in trying to kidnap
Tatiana. They were able to inspire enough of a resistance to take out Bogdan.
Milena shares that Havel and Marika came after them on the ship the day
before with a force of wights. Ron looks shocked; Milena says they
were both re-animated and Havel had made a pact with The Ruler, who sent
him for vengeance against Milena's family for keeping Tatiana from her.
Ron says last time he saw Havel he had Ron's axe sticking out of his
face. Milena says hopefully this will be the last time he rises. She
shares that some part of him was still remorseful, fought against
the compulsion, and thanked her when she ended him.

Milena offers her bird fiend skull -- "It has no powers except terrifying
one's enemies" -- and Klara's eyes grow wide. "It is wondrous!" he says.
"Do you know what it is?" Kat asks. "No -- but it is wondrous!" he says
as he accepts it.

Kat asks Ron if he has time to catch up and invites him to the beach
later while she burns her sacrifice of silver to Ag.

The group discusses preparations they might make against the foes they
are likely to face at Hell's Deep. They go to Heidy's to pick up four
potions of Bad Taste and one of Resistance to Psychic Damage, as well
as a scroll of Fortune's Favor and a Float scroll for Gnik. Al looks at
the Jewel of Zutar, which looks similar to the crystals in his arm, and
floats around one's head to increase armor class. He shows Heidy his
arm and asks her if she's ever seen anything like it before; she says
it looks like he messed around with one of the stones the Cult of
the Stone was looking for. He asks her not to tell anyone else about it.
She offers to let him borrow the Jewel of Zutar for his trip; he offers
to rent it instead, just in case something happens.

Al goes with Milena and Ember to visit Bimisi in the shipyards. He asks
how their trip back was, and Al tells him about the fight with the
undead. Al asks if he's ready to head out and he says no, but there is
another ship that will be following in a few days that he will be on
-- another group is coming to provide support. He said he was talking
to someone at the Winking Bard named Britt who told him of this other
group. Al shows off his new regeneration ability by giving himself a
small cut and then watching it heal. 

They go to the Temple of Byorn to talk with Britt. They see Gnik and
Kai who are just finishing up dinner. Al tells them about the conversation
with Bimisi and then seeks out Britt. She says Sivin will be bringing
the Breath to follow them and be helpful, with Eleanora as well. Milena
is relieved; better competent fighters than cannon fodder. "Or enemies,"
Al says. Britt says, "Speaking of enemies...." She shares that Dragon
Spectre, Captain Pickett's old ship that the Stormdaughter's people
took, have been raiding ships going to the Tillian Islands.

Milena stops by the house to say hello to her girls and share the
little jade figurines Kat picked out for Gavriila and Tatiana.


22 Kella 3275

Several days out toward Tillia, Kat, in the crow's nest, sees a ship
in the distance flying a shark fin flag and with a figurehead she
can't quite make out. Kat calls Kai to fly up to check it out. Kai
lets everyone know it is the Dragon Spectre -- and heavy stormclouds
start gathering over it. Laur has the crew pick up speed and then
they teleport to ram the other ship using the Great Cleaver. As
the Great Cleaver hits the ship, a cone of energy surrounds them
to absorb the shock -- as well as the force of the other ship's
speed and spell effects. The Cleaver tears a hole along the side
of the Dragon Spectre and then pushes the ship over as zombies
and skeletons fall over the side, buffeted by gale-force winds.
A body lands on the deck of Dragon Spectre; it was not a zombie
when it hit the deck but arises as one. Gnik and Kai recognize
this as the resultof Bones of Endless Toil: Anyone who dies on
the Dragon Spectre will rise again to serve it. 

The figurehead appears to be an air elemental; Gnik recognizes
that it is creating the storm effect, which can be dispelled.

Milena sends Boris and Mouse belowdecks to get out of the storm.

Al uses his ranged strike attack to attempt to hit the Stormdaughter. He
hits and manages to stun her. He then hits the other woman who is floating
above the ship and sparking, but does not stun her. Kat and Kai's sword
Cline realize that the woman -- who they learned had been hit by a spell
from Danae that gave her some special skills -- is now tied to the
elemental plane of air. Wend angles the ship to give their ballistas
more room to maneuver, while Milena Blesses herself, Al, Kai, Kat and
Ember, and casts Spiritual Weapon at the stunned Stormdaughter, hitting
her.

Kat pops out from her hiding place and casts Chaos Bolt at the
Stormdaughter, hitting her with a blast of cold damage that nails her
in the chest tattoo. Kai uses her sword to dispel the storm attack
from the figurehead; a beam of light slams into the figurehead and
there is a whoosh as the storm suddenly stops. The roar is replaced
by the previously-masked sound of screams and splintering wood form
the other ship. Kai then leaps to the other ship, hits the Stormdaughter
twice, and leaps back while the crew readies the ballistas. Laur yells,
"Fire!" and the ballistas go off; three hit, tearing into the hull of
the Dragon Spectre. Ember shoots twice at Stormdaughter, who falls to
the deck.

Gnik attempts to banish Baedvin, the woman connected to the air elemental
plane; she vanishes.

Mikule shouts over, "I'll flee to Tyreln if you let us go," and Clin
looks at him and nods. The group notices that the zombies on the other
ship are moving as the regular crew would, just slower; part of the
magic of the bones is that they retain their knowledge of ship
operations.

Al leaps over to the other ship to strike Mikule, stunning him. Milena
suggests bringing Stormdaughter back to their ship so they can kill
her without having her be raised again by the bone effect. Al hits Clin
instead, but his attempt at a stunning strike triggers a chaos effect.
The crew of the Mighty Redemption see his shape shift oddly; he has
taken on a second form that he can switch back and forth into at will.
He picks up the Stormdaughter but feels bad about killing her outright,
so he drops her in the water where she will definitely drown since she
is stunned and unconscious. Milena hits her with her Spiritual Weapon,
decapitating her, and then hits Mikule with a Sacred Flame.

Kat stares gloatingly at Stormdaughter for a moment, then shoots a
Chaos Bolt at Mikule, sending force damage at him. Kai flies over
and attacks him, taking his head off. She looks at Clin and says, "Do
nothing," then jumps down to attack the zombie on the deck below. Her
sword goes straight through him and he falls; even though he just died
from a fall, he is already rotting.

Gnik drops Az (in octopus form) in the water and tells her to track
the Stormdaughter's body and search it.

There are cracks in the Mighty Redemption's hull as the Dragon Spectre's
ballistas hit it. The Mighty Redemption returns fire; the group tells
the crew to hold further attacks while they clear the zombies from the
other ship and search it.

Ember attempts to jump to the other ship to begin taking out zombies,
but stumbles and sprains her ankle. Gnik casts Web at the other ship's
ballistas and then leaps to the other ship to help Ember. Zassin goes
to harass the zombies operating the last ballistas that Gnik's web
couldn't reach. Al ties Clin to the mast.

Wend yells, "Crossbows!" Milena moves her Spiritual Weapon to attack
through one of the people behind the webbed portals, and casts Spiritual
Flame at one of the zombies through the unwebbed portal; its head explodes
and it slumps over.

Kat jumps to the other ship and hides, waiting for Baedvin to return from
temporary banishment. The others join her to get set up. Kai asks Clin if
Baedvin is an air elemental now; he says he doesn't know what she is, but
she ain't human. Sparks come off her and she's constantly burning things,
including her own clothes, which she has to replace every few days.

Milena casts Bless again. Gnik casts Haste on Kai, which removes
his concentration on the Banish. Baedvin pops back into their plane,
looking pissed off, with her eyes glowing white. Al makes a ranged fist
attack and attempts a stunning strike, but doesn't manage to stun her.
She shoots a blast of wind at him, which throws him back 10 feet. He
moves back into position and attacks again, but still is unable to
stun her.

Baedvin calls out, "Where is the Stormdaughter?" Kai says, "Oh,
she's dead," and attacks, hitting her. Kat peeks out and shoots
a Chaos Bolt at her, hitting her with cold damage before hiding
again.

Baedvin roars and the wind whirls around her with a crackle of lightning.
Al, Gnik, Ember, and Milena are thrown to the ground and slide back
5 feet. Milena hits her head and Gnik lands on her. She points at Kai
and a bolt of lightning arcs from her hand, hitting her.

Milena staggers to her feet and back up the stairs to cast Guiding Bolt
at Baedvin, hitting her. Gnik casts Mind Sliver at her and Ember hits
her several times with her rapier.

Al runs up and throws a net over her, then punches her. She uses a magic
effect to throw him back with a blast of wind, but he only is blown to
the railing rather than overboard. Kai hits her and she falls to the
deck. Kai hits her again to kill her. Gnik casts Detect Thoughts to
make sure there is no one else living on the ship.


17 February 2024

25 Kella 3275

After weathering a storm the day before, the Mighty Redemption gets to
Tillia. As they approach they see a Dorgenian-style fortress; the jungle
around it has been burned away to improve sightlines. An outrigger
approaches. A wave approaches the outrigger, lifts her toward the ship,
and drops her onto the deck. In halting Trade, she introduces herself
as Zedal and welcomes them to Sohotin. Suddenly the ship starts moving
very quickly. Al shares with the group that she's working with a nature
spirit.

As they approach the pier, they see a row of people standing between
the pier and a throng of people, and two more people standing even
closer to the pier. One of those two is a Tillian woman and the other
a large Dorgenian man wearing a mask. Zedal names
them as Babaylan Siginagala and Neem Daiphatia (in the mask). Kai
shares that "Neem Daiphatia" means "one who walks between worlds". Milena
and Al notice that Kai has swapped out her usual simple armband to wear as
a headband instead. Al asks her about it and she says, "There's
someone I know here who would expect it."

Gnik ducks out of site to cast "Detect Shapeshifter" and then returns
to survey the crowd as they arrive at the pier. He doesn't sense any
shapeshifters.

Neem thanks them for their presence, nods at Kai, and says they are
welcome. Al steps forward and thanks them in Trade, then says in Tillian
how amazing it is to be in his family's homeland for the first time.
The group shares that the other ship is for them, loaded with supplies
originally meant for Tillia. The Tillians recognize the ship and ask
if any of their crew were harmed in the fighting. They share that they
are all right but have captured two prisoners. They bring forth the
prisoners and two guards step forward with what look like small wooden
rings. Some of the group recognize Dorgenian slave control rings, and
apparently it shows on their faces, because Babaylan assures them that
they will only be used until the prisoners get to prison; they believe
the criminals should pay for their crimes but no one deserves to be
enslaved as their people once were. Out of Clin's earshot, Milena
shares that if there is an opportunity that he believes is in his
best interests that could also benefit others, he could be of use.
Babaylan nods.

While the ship is being restocked, the group disembarks for food. Neem
removes his mask, asks Kai, "Do you have a few minutes?" and she nods.
They wander off together and Kat follows stealthily until she realizes
they are just talking and catching up. She gathers that Neem -- whom
Kai addresses as Galeddara) was, like Kai, also involved in smuggling
slaves to safety and freedom.

Kat returns for lunch and mentions that the clothing of the locals
is beautiful, and that if there is a market she would love to pick
up something for herself and her sisters. Babaylan sends for necklaces
for them; the Tillian culture is very giving and open. She also picks
up some dried fruit sweets for Rodger.

Gnik asks about what they should be aware of in the seas beyond Tillia.
Their hosts mention a kelp eel -- a creature that looks like kelp but will
coalesce and chase ships, thinking they might be food. They also mention
it is molting season for serpents, who may bang against ships thinking
it will help abrade the old skin away.

They gather with the locals for an impromptu feast. Milena expresses
appreciation for the food and asks about preparation techniques and
local plants, both food and medicinal. She is introduced to Doher, a
younger man who is very excited to talk about local foods.

Everyone is very accepting of Al even though he is only half Tillian.
They ask him about his family and where they are from. He asks what
are their plans now that the slave trade is no more. They are still
working that out; the Dorgenian outposts here, like this one, could
be useful, but others want to tear it down.

After a couple of hours the crew is ready, so they head out. It takes
them a couple of days to reach the last island in the Tillian chain;
they expect another 12 days at sea before they reach their destination.


28 Kella 3275

As the sun rises, they see a wall of fog in the distance with lights
and shapes moving in it. Kai, who can see the farthest, says they
are images, like they are being projected -- one looks like a ship,
another like a dragon. Al and Gnik decide to swim out to investigate,
with Zassin flying along with them. Al pulls a friend from his bag
and gets Bounder the giant seahorse, who precedes them.

They swim out until they get beneath the fog wall. As they look up
they can see images in the fog, some at weird angles. Kat has heard
stories of strange magical storms where a magician has screwed something
up -- it is called a Divination Fog, and those who pass through it may
see scenes from their pasts and futures. It is disorienting and could
be incapacitating for a few days, but those who are able to concentrate
effectively may be able to retain some aspects of their futures in a
way they could act upon. She relays this to the group. Since they would
be hard pressed to avoid the fog, they bring the ship through.

Each person feels that they are in a moment that has happened, or that
will happen, rather than viewing it from outside. Gnik and Kat both
have glimpses of the future that they retain glimmers of. Al and Milena
don't retain anything but aren't incapacitated. Boris is a bit shaken,
as are Jarvis, Jerry, and Lonnie) and Kai and Ember, along with several
members of the crew (Carie, Corey, Chastity) are incapacitated for a couple
of days. 

Later that evening as dinner is winding down and some of the crew is
playing music -- and Milena is practicing her embroidery for the first
time in ages -- Gnik and Al notice two tentacles of kelp snake over the
side of the ship and toward Milena and Klaab. Al yells, "Look out --
tentacle!" and leaps up. Klaab jumps out of the way, but it manages
to get a tendril on Milena, slam her onto the deck, and then drag her
through the railing, shattering it. Gnik sends Az in after her and
Zassin flies down to try to distract it. Al spits out his ventilating
lungs and jumps into the water in case Milena needs a way to breathe.
Gnik jumps in with the Necklace of Adaptation.

As they go under the water, they see the kelp has formed into a huge
serpent about half the length of the ship. Gnik sees that the creature
is reeling Milena in to eat her, wrapping her in kelp as she goes.
Milena gets her hand on the Wand of the Sea to cast on herself so she
can breathe. Gnik casts Shatter at the kelp eel -- far enough away
from himself and his teammates to avoid them -- and blasts off a
section of its tail. Milena shares over the Farspeaker that the best
way to kill the creature would be to raise it out of the water and
let it dry -- otherwise any incapacitation will be temporary and it
will reconstitute in about an hour; she learned this from talking
with Doher, who shared that kelp eels cook up well. She casts Spiritual
Weapon and manages to sever the tentacle holding her. She swims for the
surface and calls for the troll meat while a crew member lowers a rope
for her.

Kat tells Rodger to go get the troll meat and then leaps in the water.
She shoots a Chaos Bolt at the kelp eel, but the magic shifts into a
ring around it, whirling, with dozens of phantom-like figures swirling
around it. It isn't clear that the figures are doing anything to them,
but there is a slight moaning sound coming from below the water.

It tries to grab Al and Kat, but they both manage to dodge. It tries to
hit them instead, but misses. Gnik sends Az to help Milena; Az wraps two
tentacles around her waist and waves her other eight arms around to
try to distract the creature. Al puts his lungs back in while Zassin
helps distract it.

Gnik casts Haste on Kat. She darts forward with her Booming Blade;
since the creature is moving along with the ship, it explodes outward
where the swirling phantom shapes are. It tears apart a bunch of kelp and
the phantoms disappear. Milena hits with her Spiritual Weapon and then
climbs up the rope being lowered down to her.

Al hits the kelp eel and stuns it, then Gnik hits it with another
Shatter spell. Milena hits it again with her Spiritual Weapon and
also with Sacred Flame. She works with the crew on a plan to scoop
up as much of the kelp as they can to dry out so it can't reconstitute
(and Milena can put it into soup later).

Kat tries another Chaos Bolt, and once again the magic twists as it
leaves her fingers. She glows red and explodes in a fireball, taking
the rest of the creature out. She also singes Al, who is just within
range. What's left of the creature stops moving -- and Kat is nowhere
to be seen. As they are figuring out what to do with all that kelp,
there is a surge in the water and Kat reappears. "Did I do something?"
she asks. "I was going to do a spell, and then... I'm not sure what
happened." "It's okay," Al says, "the only one who got injured is
already healed." Zassin shows her a cartoon mental image of her
exploding and then coming back into existence. Gnik uses Shape Water
to help gather up the bits of remaining kelp.


30 March 2024

29 Kella 3275

They awaken to a thunderstorm. Milena prepares teabags of anti-nausea
tea for those who need it. Kai, Chastity, Ember, Corey, and Carie are
still recovering from the divination fog.


31 Kella 3275

Gnik's divination says the weather will improve, but the wind will
completely disappear on the 2nd.


1 Mara 3275

Off starboard they see a massive pod of dolphins swimming together in
the same direction. Al dives in to ask them what they're fleeing from
using his conch shell: "What are you getting away from? Something
dangerous?" Many of them chirp back "Yes!" "Yes!" "Yes!" They say a
word that seems to be a name -- and then say, "It translates as
sea... snake?" At that moment, a huge head rises out of the water,
shoots forward, and swallows a dolphin whole.

Al swims for the ship, saying into the Farspeaker, "I need an
extraction now... please...." Kai is already flying that way
and scoops him up as soon as he reaches the surface of the
water. Gnik and Kat know these serpents are known to ram ships 
to help them shed skin. They are very territorial and need a
large area. They are not dragons; they need to eat, and dragons
do not, as they are magical beings. They are more intelligent
than the dogs -- perhaps comparable to dolphins. This serpent
is about 1.5 times the length of the ship. It continues to
follow the dolphins it is hunting, ignoring the ship.


2-4 Mara 3275

The sea is calm on the 2nd, with an average wind speed of 4 miles an hour.
This continues for the next several days.

Kai lets everyone know that she has found a way -- through Britt -- to
heal Garelle's sight. Whoever will be doing it should be in Saltmarsh
when we return. She asks the group to help chip in, as Kai can't
cover the full amount herself.


5 Mara 3275

At about midday, Kai sees something in the distance that appears to be
a flying ship. The hull appears wooden but is shaped like a whale;
it has trees growing on the deck as though they are masts holding what
appears to be a glowing crystal or glass bottle with something writhing
inside it. Kai recognizes it as a Caylatra airship -- from a variety
of elf they have not previously met. They sail the air and sometimes
stop on land, but not on water -- and never stop in non-elven ports.
The airship heads toward them.

Kai alerts the rest of the crew and suggests they should wait and
see what the other ship does; it begins slowing down and maneuvering
as though it wants to draw alongside the Mighty Redemption. Two
jump off and onto the deck of the Mighty Redemption; a faint glowing line
connecting them to the other ship seem to slow them down. The man looks
very serious; the woman looks cheerful. She says, "Hi, I'm May, this is
Captain Delye." The group notices that although Caylatra are known to
have the off-putting air of the elves, these two do not. Al and Milena
introduce themselves, Kai says, "You already know who we are, I'm not
playing politics, what do you want? You're not Caylatra." May says the
ship was not crewed when the captain took it on, and that they were
sent to make sure no trouble comes to the Trihorn dig site. Gnik says
they were asked to come help with the operation and that they have a
token from Fibam. May asks to see it, whispers some words into it,
and it briefly glows. She shrugs, hands it back, and says, "Ok! Good
luck!" As they ascend back to their ship, Kai flies up to get a closer
look at their ship. May says hi, cheerfully. Kai can see that the
entity in the bottle is some kind of lightning creature; May says it
is a lightning elemental that flies the ship; it was there when they
got the ship. They fly off a good mile away, but continue to shadow
them.

After some discussion, the group decides they would like to talk more
with May about what to expect, so Kai flies over and asks if they would
join them again. The ship comes back. Gnik casts Detect Shapeshifter, and
finds that May and the Captain are not.

Al asks if they could give them more information about what they're sailing
into and what to expect. The Captain asks, "What did Fibam tell you?" The
group shares that they know it's an archaeological dig to get through some
kind of barrier that Anlim hired Trihorn to help with. They ask how May
and the Captain are connected with Trihorn; they say they've been contracted
for security, and there have been some weird creatures in the area. She
describes the sea serpent and says there are rumors that some of the other
sea life in the area can jump through the tube to the dig site and grab
people. Al asks for a moment to talk with Kai, about possibly asking May
and the Captain to go ahead and contact Trihorn without contacting Anlim
that they are coming.

After some discussion, the group decides to tell May and the Captain
that they will be stopping some distance from the site, as Fibam shared
that he's not sure he trusts everyone on the Anlim side and so hired the
group to check up on some things independently -- therefore they will not
be checking in with the Anlim folks. They decide Kat should be the one to
tell them, and ask them to pretend they didn't see them. May says they
weren't going to go back all the way with them anyway, they'll be circling
back on their patrol route, but thanks her for letting them know. The
captain and Laur touch base to get exact coordinates for where they're
heading to go straight to the air shaft to the dig. The captain and May
depart, and they send Kai to fly up and keep an eye out for other ships,
creatures, or hazards.


11 Mara 3275

The morning dawns clear. Kai flies up and can see about 30 ships in
the distance, including a couple of very strange ships; one is a hovering
octagonal platform that Fibam told them about, and there are two others
also hovering. They are close enough that they need to stop the ship to
keep it from being seen.

Al uses his figurine to try to reach Anny, but there is no response.

Laur slows the ship, and the group dives in. They head down to about
4000 feet -- twilight without being total midnight. They can clearly
see a glowing pillar in the distance. It will take more than a day to
get there, so Gnik will conjure an immobile tiny hut when they need to
rest. They see some movement in the distance as they go, but nothing
bothers them.

As they settle in for the night, Milena casts a Divination:
"Would facilitating K'Jat's transformation to a new form be more good
than bad according to the gods that grant me my power?"

A voice comes out of her mouth that is not her own: "A tiny portion of
K'Jat's power was once gifted to the peoples of the world. This would
benefit the world again."

Gnik remembers a vague reference in a book by Exotics folks that talked
about people in the world that seemed to have unusual powers and abilities
without a known or understood source: a butler who could heal by instinctively
regrowing injured body parts; an archer who could hit things at extremely
long distances, but not up close, because he was instinctively pushing the
arrows. The book went on to note that the source of the power eventually
came back to collect those powers, and those people are no longer on
Maerson.

While they sleep, they all have really weird dreams, although they don't
remember specifics when they wake up -- fanciful worlds far away,
strange creatures, elf-like and stone dwarf-like creatures, and others.
They compare notes and find that there are many similarities; including
dreaming of the Koth. Nobody has particularly restful sleep, although
not poor enough to be a detriment.


13 April 2024

12 Mara 3275

When they wake up the next morning, Milena does another Divination:
"How can we best enable K'Jat's transformation?" Everything for Milena
and Kat goes dark and a man's voice says, "Seriously? Just talk to the
freak, they'll do it." Kat bursts out laughing. Milena says, "Thank
you, Ag, for your help," at the same time Gnik says, "So what did Ag
tell you?"

They resume their travel and as they near the pillar of light they see
that it appears to be glowing with a blue-green cast, which also emanates
from some areas on the ground and from the openings of structures. There
is a 14-foot tall rectangular structure, a 30-foot cylindrical structure,
and a 20-foot tall building, all of which seem ancient. Between them,
columns surround a 20-foot tall globe. People -- or beings of some sort --
walk along the ground in the glowing areas, which seem not to have water
in them based on how their hair and clothes move.

Milena finds it interesting that the building complex matches maps they
have seen -- but behind it, the continental shelf is farther away and
steeper: the nearer parts have slid down, and are covering the fallen
tower. 

Milena warns the group that based on today's portents, they may be
best served from a combination of stealth and diplomacy rather than
a frontal assault. Kai is grumpy and promises to stay in the back.
They discuss whether to go in and say Fibam invited them vs sneaking
up; they are unsure whether the group below will be just Trihorn
people or whether there will be Anlim representatives as well, so they
decide to sneak nearer, swimming about 100 feet up in the twilight.

Al pulls a couple of his friends from his bag and gets Hopper the small
seahorse, Cuddy the octopus, and Ralphie the reef shark. Gnik is in the
form of a manta ray and Kat looks like a merfolk, so the two of them
scout ahead with Az in octopus form since they would be least conspicuous.

They get closer to the sea floor to peer into a chasm that leads into
the camp. They don't immediately notice any threats. The rest of the
group follows about 120 feet behind, with Kai using her vision to keep
watch. Kai, Milena, Al, and Ember drop into the chasm, with Milena
staying close to the edge to try to blend in. Al lets the group know
something is coming up out of the chasm at them -- two bloodfish, 12
and 15 feet long. Kai warns them that it will explode in toxic goo
when it dies, and also they shouldn't let it bite them.

Zassin bites one and Milena casts Sacred Flame at it, followed by
Spiritual Weapon. Ember attacks the other one. Kat asks if they
should come back, but Al says they should keep going and they'll
let them know if they need help. Kai hits one with her sword and Al
stuns the other one; Kai takes a swing at it as well while Al
attempts a flurry of blows -- but triggers a chaos effect which
sends his attack to Ember instead of the serpent. He swims down
next to her as the un-stunned serpent flees into the depths. The
stunned serpent follows as soon as it comes back to its senses.

As Kat advances, she sees an area covered in a tightly woven seaweed
net covering something glowing, and four merfolk nearby -- they are
still about a quarter mile from the settlement. She and Gnik let the
others know and shift their position to swim on the other side of
the chasm, about 30 feet away. Kat takes a closer look at the net
and thinks it is a crystal golem made of pink crystal; right next
to it she barely makes out someone clamouflaged hunkered down on
the ground and lets the group know about that, too, reminding them
that it could be one of the servant races that could read minds --
the mittath.

As they swim in the chasm, Al sees a sea elf come out of nowhere
and make a hand motion at him, beckoning them forward. He lets
them know and they follow it down; two more follow and one whispers,
"Our queen sent us and said you would be coming. We will remain
here but if something happens we will assess and help in any way
we can." Al asks about the barrier that the others are having trouble
getting through. They say the glowing barriers can be pushed through,
but the insides have no water -- they say this with a shiver of
disgust. They describe few people coming out of the largest building
-- only tall beings with horns and bird people. The shortest building
is barracks, and the small tower also houses people that others go to
consult -- perhaps wizards. The merfolk-looking folk on guard are one
of several guard posts at the boundary; they can read minds and are
shapeshifters.

Kai and Gnik reach the edges of the camp and see three stone statues
of merfolk about twice the size of regular merfolk, carrying things
from land and wearing actual metal armor. They see long-eared Koth
and a kenku near the large building, and a group of four humans at
a table playing cards near the tower. There is a stone arch across
the chasm that Gnik and Kat recognize was made recently with some
kind of transmute stone spell, as it is obviously a single piece
of stone. The roof structures of all three buildings seem to have
been rebuilt and then patched -- as if they have been attacked,
perhaps by sea creatures. The buildings themselves are not that
ancient -- probably built after the landslide, meaning the tower
they seek is under them.

They recognize one of the humans -- Al's brother Pellumb. Gnik
asks over the farspeaker if Pellumb would be likely to help them,
and Al says probably not, so Gnik decides not to detect shapeshifters
yet.

They scout around the perimeter toward the largest building, which
has a sign on the door saying "No entry without permission". It appears
there may have been a second structure built inside the original stone
walls to keep there from being any gaps or openings. He summons an
Arcane Eye inside the building about 30 feet away. He sees that they
have spackled the walls to cover every opening. There is a large hole
in the floor with a winch and pulley over it. There are four pillars
with a large pink crystal, over 8 feet long and over a foot in diameter,
leaning against each one. By the hole are a kenku and a hagral, one of
the smaller of the Koth, with pink crystals sticking out of its right
leg and a little shorter and of a little heavier build than others
they have seen. There are two other kenkus and kren -- short krana,
that look like kenku but are only about three feet tall. They are
working at various tasks: cleaning, polishing crystals. Sitting on
a dais at one end of the room is a cube glowing the same color as
all the glowing spaces; Gnik realizes they have seen similar ones
at other spots around the encampment. Gnik notices the hagral look
up and dismisses the eye before the hagral can react.

Al, Kai, Milena, and Ember position themselves in the chasm just at
the edge of camp, with a coral reef between them and the plaster
covering the former entrance at one end of the building. Gnik moves
around the building to cast Shatter on the glowing cube, and Kat
goes to target the cube in the passage leading from the building
past the large globe.

Gnik casts Shatter; there is no sound, and he realizes that if the
effect were like a Tiny Hut, no sound would make it out. He does not
see that anything has changed with the barrier. He lets Kat know through
the farspeaker that Shatter may not affect it. Kat tries it on the cube
they can see, and she sees it hop and everything around it vibrate. Two
kenku and a hagral guarding the door to the building look toward it and
the kenku cover their ears. She sees cracks and the light shines brighter
through them. She and Gnik each cast a second Shatter, with Gnik casting
between the cube and the wall to try to take out some of the stone wall
as well. They still do not hear anything, but bits of plaster come flying
out and the glow vanishes from around the building. The Hagral pushes its
way out and there is a bright pink flash inside the building.

A few moments later the second cube explodes; one of the two humans
collapses, but the other -- Pellumb -- grabs his buddy and drags him
to the next air bubble. The hagral grab the kenku and pull it into
the building.

Al goes to help his brother, and Kai hands him a second pressure pill
sprints forward to push her way
into the building. It is filled with water that is murky and churning;
in the middle are the two hagral and a kenku desperately trying to hold
its breath. She goes into rage mode as taller kenku pulls the kenku
behind it. The other, with crystals in its legs, holds out its arms;
the crystals flash blindingly bright, and all three of them disappear,
along with the water in the space between the pillars. Ember, Gnik, and
Kat swim to the building.

Al swims up to his brother, hands him the pill, and motions, "Eat this!"
Pellumb takes it and shoves it into his mouth. Milena swims in their
direction and casts a Healing Word at Pellumb's unconscious comrade,
who wakes up in time to swallow the pressure pill Pellumb is shoving
in his mouth. Pellumb looks at Al and says, "What are you doing here?"
Al says, "Saving the world, you've been lied to, try to get your buddies
out of here." Pellumb says, "Yeah, we figured." Al says, "Oh... I should
give you more credit." "Yeah," Pellumb says. "But thanks."

Inside the room, the crystals flash again, and the two hagral, four
merfolk, and a much taller Koth wearing a very nice, now soaked silk
suit are standing in the center of the room. The big one looks around,
tilting his head. The taller hagral holds its hands out a little but
does not make any other obvious move.

Gnik tries casting one more Shatter in the midst of the four crystal
pillars and then dives down the shaft in the corner. Two of the four
pillars shatter. The merfolk are in bad shape and move around the
hole. The big Koth points at the remaining crystals, and everything
freezes. In their minds they hear a voice saying, "Well, this is
unexpected."


27 April 2024

Out of the corner of his eye, Al notices more ships approaching the
30 or so floating above.

The voice continues, "I believe it is your custom to tell labels...
I am Doynatrich." Kat replies, in her head, "So what happens next?"
"I thought you were supposed to share your names." Al says, "I'm Al,"
and the voice responds, "Thanks." Milena also shares her name.

Al asks, "Where are you?" "Some of us are here with you. It is wet...
why is it wet?" Another voice says, "They destroyed the block." "Ahh.
I liked this outfit." Al asks why they are here, and the voice says,
"Because you are breaking things and hurting our people, as your
kind always do." Al asks what he is, and the voice responds "Schongar."

Gnik asks what he wants; Doyantrich says they are trying to get their
purpose and their leaders back, and says D'She was a better leader than
K'Jat because they killed D'Lai and imprisoned K'Jat. Gnik and Al challenge
the idea that having more power and violence, rather than compassion, makes
a better leader. Doyantrich says they do not know the whole story.

Al offers that they could talk to K'Jat to ask for his help. "You really
think that will work?" Doyantrich asks. "Well, we've talked to him before,"
Al says. "Several times," Kat puts in.

Gnik says all they would need to get the Klorta back is to prepare an
egg in the proper way so that when one dies in its current place it
would return here. "The old ways still work?" Doyantrich asks, while
the rest of the group says, "...Huh?" Gnik adds, "And, if we can end
this peacefully, I can restore your outfit." "Certainly," Doyantrich
says. "I will wait."

Suddenly time is moving again, and Doyantrich says, "Go on. This should
be interesting." The rest of the group catches up, and they all head
down the well, with Kai coming last. The material they're moving through
is compressed stone, with a pink glow beneath them. There are crystals
toward the bottom, and the floor is smooth stone. Kat goes first in case
they descend into another air shaft, trusting her reflexes that she won't
just fall.

As she nears the bottom she sees there is a bubble of air, a chamber has
been dug out and she can see a surface sloping away from her, through the
crystal. They descend to the bottom and see there is some kind of force
field. Al throws a rock at the field; it speeds at the crystal, bounces
off, and comes flying at Gnik's shoulder, hard enough to do damage, although
Al reaches out to snatch it from the air before it hits. Gnik
recalls they were told that a bubble of chaotic energy surrounding the
crystal. He suggests to Kai that perhaps she should touch the crystal
with her crystal knife. It occurs to Gnik and Kat that perhaps the
energy was previously chaotic because the (chaotic) hags were previously
messing with it, but it has since stablized.

Kai touches her knife to the crystal. It goes right through the crystal;
it feels like it is in water. Al tries walking to it and dipping a toe
in; his foot also goes right through. Gnik, who does not have crystal
embedded in him, feels like someone tied a rope to his hand and tried
jerking his arm off. Gnik, recalling that Az collected a number of crystals,
has her hand them out to the group. They pass through the force field
and onto the fallen tower. There are large gold-colored doors -- too large
to be made of solid gold, which would be too heavy to have lasted in
place. Kat inspects them and thinks they may be sliding doors; Kai and
Ember each take a door and try to slide it. When she touches it but
before she even tries to push, there is a whooshing sound and the doors
slide open. There is a faint glow of pink crystal all around the chamber.
Al puts up his floating, glowing fish for a little extra light. They
see a hole in the ceiling with a pink glow showing through it. The group
moves to the hole, with Kai going first to look through with her superior
eyesight, but Kat also near the front.

Through the hole is another chamber, filled with crystal through much of
the room. There are two pathways; they realize they are now on the path
from the map Anny's mother gave them, so they begin following the map. Gnik
suggests they should first look at the other path to make sure it really
is the dead end they think it will be. Milena says, "And let us hope that
it is a dead end and not a... dead end." As Kai peers in she sees that the
crystals on one side appear to be moving toward her and on the other side
moving away from her. They decide not to enter and go the way they think
the map leads.

The next room has a glow to the left and the right, but no obvious crystal.
They go right... and there is a flicker, and they are in another place,
with three bright scintillating suns above. The area around them is covered
with plants moving... in non-plant-like ways, as if the movement and blooming
of regular plants were sped up. There is a group of individuals of mostly
humanoid creatures of all different configurations. They appear to be in
some sort of settlement, each in their own depression in the ground. They
see the group and there is a mental cry that comes from them. A thought
comes to them, in K'Jat's voice: "I failed these amazing beings. I battled
the threat, but I could not save them." In the sky they see a massive dark
shape in the far distance coming toward them. The beings run toward them
pointing at the sky: "You're K'Oth! Save us! It's what you do!" As the
being gets closer, the words "Celestial dragon" come to mind. There is
a portal behind them, and they intuit that it doesn't go back where they
came from, but rather to where K'Jat/K'Oth was at that time -- Maerson
where it was at the time. Al tells the group to go through the portal
to safety; some of them point to the ridge and say there is another
community there -- save them, too! They realize they can create portals
and set about finding all the communities, getting them to safety; when
all are saved, they are back in the room they were in previously.

K'Jat's voice comes to them.... "You have shown me another way... how
it could have been...." They intuit that K'Jat is extremely powerful
but lacks imagination, responding to threats instinctively without
pondering alternatives or consequences. Gnik recalls legends of the fae
homeworld, a beautiful land with three suns that was consumed by a
celestial dragon.

The group continues following the map; in a couple of rooms there is
another shift and they are in a massive forest with trees they have
never seen before. In their minds they hear K'Jat again: "Ah. My first
encounter with other entities with different mindsets. I was at a loss."
Four beings pop out of nowhere, look at them and cock their heads. They
look somewhat like very tall elves radiating a powerful aura. "What are
you?" one asks, and Gnik says, "We are still discovering that. I believe
we currently call ourselves K'Oth." One says, "I am Isar, these are Tras,
Itryn, and Tithar." The accent is a bit odd, but elvish doesn't change
much: Seeker, Trees, History, and Victory. Gnik recalls stories of the
first elves all others are descended from. The elves say this is the
first place they have been. "How long have you been?" Milena asks. They
say they are not sure they know. "I believe we have much to learn from
each other," Milena says, and Kai says, "How can we help?"

They are back in the room, and K'Jat's voice says, "Of course. Not
everything has to be a fight."

As they move further along the path, they see flickers in the crystal
-- almost as if there are images deep within the crystal.

Farther along the path, they see a vision -- like memories manifested
in front of them but that they are not part of. They hear an echo of
thought about the impact of K'Jat's actions: There is a massive fight
in a community about the size of Saltmarsh. K'Oth is fighting a creature,
and there is lots of collateral damage. The creature keeps tearing itself
into two creatures, and then recombines, and then tears itself into two
different creatures, over and over again. K'Oth does beat the creature
eventually; and when it is slammed to the ground there is an immense
release of energy that tears all the people in two. There are now twice
as many; half of them are humans and half are orcs, and the group gets
a sensation of guilt. 

A bit farther along there is another shift and they are in an underground
chamber with people who seem to be made of stone and metal, about 5 feet
tall -- like proto-dwarves -- and they seem to be begging for assistance
with a threat they cannot stop and they are told it is what K'Oth does.
Al asks if they can show them, and Gnik asks if they came to it or it
came to them. They say they went into the stone and there was a hole,
and it followed them back. The dwarves lead the way, and they can hear
the destruction as they approach. The creature is about 35 feet tall
and the stone below it is being pulverized by its tentacles. Al calls
out, "Who are you? Why are you here?" They notice there are rings of
energy around their wrists -- and Milena's dagger begins yelling, "Fiend
fiend fiend fiend fiend!" The creature lets out a blast of fiery energy
from its mouth; instinctively, everyone throws up their arms, crossed,
in front of them, and an immense force shield is thrown up in front of
them; the beam is deflected and the stone it strikes in the ceiling
turns to dust. There are other dwarves trying to fight it but getting
thrashed. Kai points to the first dwarf and says, "Get them out of
here -- they're no match!"

Kai pulls her sword, goes into a rage, and -- drawing on K'Oth's powers --
blurs over to the creature and hits with an energy sword that extends
from her arm.

Kat flies by the creature and hurls the Star of Jaeleth down its throat,
using Tides of Chaos to help with the attack. When she flings it, one of
the wrist halos wraps around it and goes with it. One of its horns and
a bunch of its tentacles are blown off. Ember steps up, swinging with her
rapier.

The creature swings at Kai and Ember; Kai dodges one claw and parries
another; it hits Ember but she's able to roll away before it closes
its fist around her. It sends another blast toward Gnik, Al, and Milena,
but the latter two are not quite able to dodge it.

Al uses his teleporting distance attack to try to hit the creature in
just the right spot to stun it; he hits twice, but is not able to stun
it either time. He tries a flurry of blows and triggers a chaos effect.
He feels power surge inside him, but nothing obvious happens.

The creature thrashes its tentacles at Kai but she is able to dodge. Gnik
casts Mind Sliver at the creature; energy flares from his head and hits
the creature's head -- which rocks back in anguish. Milena casts Sacred
Flame and a blast of flaming energy tears through the hole Kat's Star
of Jaeleth had made in its head. It staggers and falls to the ground...
and they are back in the room. They get a sense from K'Jat: "This is
why I wanted to create more. More of you can do more than I."

The group continues on, and the next room is full of plant life (in
reality, not in a memory). There is a creature in the middle of the
room -- a Koth, sitting on a mass of plant life with its arms crossed
over its chest and its knees pulled up in front of it. They hear a
voice -- not K'Jat's -- say, "Oh, visitors! Real visitors! This is
different...." It unfolds itself and the plant life moves with it as
it floats up in the water. It is about 16 feet tall. Al asks, "Are
you D'Lai?" They get a sense of comedy. "No, no. I am called Urgreth.
You would know me as a Klorta." Al says, "It is interesting you are
here, since there are no others here." Urgreth says it has come here
seeking guidance. Al asks if he can tell him how to get to K'Jat,
and Urgreth asks why. Al says, "He asked us to come here to help him
decide what to do next," and when Urgreth says, "You spoke to them?
How?" Gnik shows him an image of the columns they used to communicate.
They learn Urgreth came to the tower after it had fallen, using a
crystal to get through the barrier. Gnik shares that some of its
kin have been trying to get in, seeking Klorta and seeking guidance.
"Shongar," Kai says. "They've been causing us a lot of trouble." "Yes,
that makes sense," Urgreth says. "They need firm guidance." Milena
asks if he knows the proper way to prepare the eggs for other Klorta.
"Yes," he says, "perhaps that is a good idea." He observes that they
look like they could use some rest -- Al, Ember, Gnik, and Milena are
rather beat up -- and then the plants grow into a protective bubble
around all of them, pushing the water out. Urgreth folds himself up
again and floats in midair.



11 May 2024

The group rests, and each dreams -- a dream that is more like a
memory, of a being -- K'oth -- seeing its Creator face off against
an Enemy, encasing it in stone at the expense of being encased itself
in a ball of fiery energy. There were two other beings, equal with K'oth,
who were destroyed by the fire. The group awakens and concludes that the
enemy Creator is imprisoned within Jaeleth or another planet and
K'oth's creator is imprisoned in the sun. The two other destroyed
beings were meant to be part of a triad, and perhaps this is why K'oth
was inspired to create D'She and D'Lai and become K'Jat.

Gnik recalls a reference in Glee's book about passing stars with writhing
forms inside them against a black background of nothingness when they
passed into the plane of Jaeleth with the cat castle. 

Kat and Gnik realize that the stars perhaps needed energy around them
because they were beings that could teleport, and beings that could
not teleport would just be brought to the surface of the planet.

Al asks whether the beings in the sky were created before or after
K'Oth became K'Jat. Urgreth says it was all before; afterwards was
more maintaining and managing what was already here.

Gnik addresses Urgreth in his thoughts and thanks him for the
hospitality. Gniks asks him about the tower; it was one of
three strongholds against dragons, that came when the world
was pulled off Jaeleth. Kat asks Urgreth what she will do next;
Urgreth replies that she will leave the tower to find others of
her people now that she knows they are out there.

Kat says they are having trouble with the medium-sized Koth made
by D'She, and asks if Urgreth will help, since currently they are
subjugating the peoples of this realm.

Gnik asks Urgreth if some of the stars are oberinths -- the beings
that created fiends -- and she says yes. Kat asks which ones, and Urgreth
says you shouldn't mess with any of them -- they all include dangerous
beings that are impossible to destroy, some of which were created to
destroy all of reality. Gnik asks why S'gult is still here and not
imprisoned; Urgreth says S'gult is like the Creator -- a Primordial.
Some are lost, some are hiding, some are active.

Kat asks: "Why are you here, in this tower, when you could be out there
doing a lot of good?" "Or bad," Kai says under her breath. "Shush," Kat says.
Urgreth says she came here to seek guidance from K'Jat and stayed because
she felt comfortable and felt that he needed to be here, but now she feels
she should leave the tower. They learn that Urgreth has been in the tower
since before the mortal beings were were in existence.

Urgreth asks if they are ready and then tears open the protective bubble
of plants around them, then heads back the way they came in, dragging
the plants along with her.

As they continue, they all sense K'Jat in their minds. They get a direct
thought of, "Oh.... You're here. I've been seeing things strangely --
dreaming -- was that you? You are very close -- I have not been back
to myself in quite some time."

They squeeze their way through a passageway; ahead they hear a
crashing sound in the water and see a large chamber covered with
crystals, some of which have been smashed. In the middle is a massive
entity -- about 24 feet tall -- smashing the crystals. They figure out
it it K'Jat's body but K'Jat hasn't inhabited it for some time; it is
mindlessly flailing and runs toward them. They ask K'Jat what will
happen to him if they kill the body. "Oh, I will heal," he says. Kai
draws her sword, goes into a rage, and charges forward to attack. She
encounters an energy barrier around it, but her sword punches through
it. It throws out an arm and energy tears through her shoulder, although
she resists much of the damage. She swings again and hits. When she slashes
into its abdomen, it feels like flesh but there is crystal beneath, glowing
through its skin.

Al steps into the room and uses his ability to melee attack at a distance.
After a couple of swings he manages to hit, and he can feel immediately
from its energy that it will not be able to be stunned. Gnik casts Haste
on Kat and stays hidden in the tunnel. Ember slips into the room and

Kat uses Tides of Chaos, attacks it with a chaos bolt, and channels
a wild surge. She feels the energy being pulled through the crystals
in her arm... and amplified by all the crystals in the room. She shapes
it into a Disintegrate spell and throws it at the creature; energy arcs
into her arm from the surrounding crystal and out at K'Jat, tearing its
flesh apart in multiple places. She swims forward and hits it with Booming
Blade.

In their minds, they hear K'Jat say, "It's blocked off. I don't know
how to get back in." The wounds to his body begin healing and it sends
energy bolts at Kai and Kat, hitting them both. A second wave of
energy comes from him, and Al suddenly feels frightened, wondering how
he could ever defeat this thing -- and Ember apparently feels the
same.

Milena swims forward, approaching the creature in the same way she would
a frightened dog acting on instinct. She swims nonthreateningly toward it
and gets in place to help soothe it as K'Jat tries to reinhabit his body.
Gnik asks Az to help give advantage to Kai. He mentally asks K'Jat if
creating a mental link to the body that K'Jat could use might help; K'Jat
says it could help.

Kai swallows a potion of Dire Cleansing to resist poison and then attacks
again, hitting. The creature throws energy at her but misses as she hits
it again. It throws back its arms and shards of energy flash back in a
cone in front of it, toward Kai, Kat, Al, and Ember. Al manages to dodge
entirely, but the others each take some damage.

Gnik swims out within 30 feet of K'Jat, activates his circlet and casts
Detect Thoughts. The thoughts he gets back are pain, torment, and other
horrible sensations. He swims back to the tunnel.

Al takes an action to calm his own mind from his fright, and gets himself
set up to dodge -- but triggers a wild surge instead. He suddenly turns
to stone and sinks to the ground. Ember takes two bow attacks, hitting, and
manages to shake off her fright. Kat again casts Tides of Chaos again and
allows a wild surge; her skin grows scales mottled with dark red and green.
She can tell that she is more resistant to damage. She attacks with Booming
Blade again, and hits. 

The creature throws more energy at Kat and Kai, but fumbles; Kat sees an
opening and stabs into its neck. Gnik feels something in his mind, passing
through him as he concentrates frantically on maintaining the mental link
to the creature; it suddenly pulls back, it puts its arms to the side and
crystals pour out of it. In their minds they hear it say, "Sorry about
that."

Over the Farspeakers they hear Al say, "I'm coming back, guys...."
"...You're a statue," Kai says. "What? No, I'm back in the hallway,
but I'm coming back!" He swims into the room and sees a marble statue
of himself on the ground.

K'Jat folds itself up as Urgreth had done, making itself smaller and
less threatening. Al asks him if he can heal them, and he says, "No,
that is not something I can do." Milena calls the injured to her and
casts Prayer of Healing.

Al asks K'Jat why it was trapped here. He says he was not willing to
leave knowing the damage he had done in the past, so he allowed D'She
to imprison him.  Al says, "But you could leave any time you wanted?"
"Yes." They get the impression that he was waiting to be judged.

Although Kai has serious reservations, the group tells K'Jat he should
transcend. He tells them they should not be there when he does. Al asks
if he could give an order to the Koth not to kill all the mortals, which
is what those made by D'She have been doing. He says he will try, but
his ability to communicate has been hindered while in the tower.

They ask K'Jat some history questions, and then Kai asks how far his
powers will go on Maerson; he is not sure. They thank K'Jat and then
move back toward the base of the tower.


8 June 2024

As they approach the base, they see the color fade out of the crystals
around them; and Al and Kat feel the crystals in their arms start tugging
their way out. Kat appears to go a bit aqueous, and Al is suddenly covered
in bruises, although they don't hurt. He tries shape-changing into his
other form, but it also is bruised, so he changes back. His healing
effect seems not to be affecting them. Gnik asks Kat if she's okay, and
she says she thinks so... she's still figuring it out. She mentions that
she felt a chaos surge as the crystals fell out of her. Everything on her
including her clothes and weapons are also water, although she finds that
if she tries to use her rapier it can still take a chip off a crystal.

They continue out and up the shaft; the force field is gone and the
shaft is now full of water, making it much easier to go up. They see
an aqua glow above, suggesting there is still an air pocket there. Kat
goes first, trying to be stealthy. There are no koth or kenku in the
room, but there are people: three in Anlim military garb, with one telling
the other two what to do, and two more are holding pieces of crystal, with
one talking excitedly to the other. Kat reaches up to pull herself out
of the hole and just floats up, a blob of water on water; Kai flies out 
immediately to make sure no one attacks her. They step out of the way and
to the side as the five people stare at them. 

One says, "I'm Della, and this is Melony" -- indicating the bubbly one
-- and asks if everything is okay. "Do we have anything to worry about?"
The group says they don't think so. Melony says they're researchers who
just got in. Gnik shows images of the Koth and asks if they have seen
them; they saw Doyantrich, but not the larger Koth.

The commander introduces himself as Lt. Stase Peace and asks if the group
knows what is going on above. He says Pellum is fine and is nursing his
wounds in the supply area. He says the smaller bird people all vanished
and Gnik asks if anyone else did; Stase says now that he mentions it,
some of his people seem to have taken off. Gnik explains that they were
shapeshifters who had infiltrated all levels of the government and military.

Kai tries reaching out to Laur, who is close enough to answer. He says
they've been gone a day and a half, which is longer than it has been
in their own experience of time. Laur says the ships above are in some
chaos, but things seem more or less under control.

Stase asks how they will get back up, and Gnik says they will swim up,
same way as they got down. Stase warns them that there are two enormous
man-sized crystals against each of the two doors. They can see out of
the portals that they are still pink -- but no longer glowing. Al moves
to one of the portals and sticks his face into the water from the air
pocket; as soon as he does, the crystal golem turns toward him and raises
an arm as if to attack. Al pulls his face back into the air pocket and it
relaxes again. They realize they could walk past staying in the air passage
with no problems -- that's how the soldiers and researchers got there --
but might have problems if they went into the water.

Gnik, Kat, and Milena notice there are several crabs around the feet of
the golems that have been stomped to death -- as if the golems were
programmed to protect from all creatures that approach. Gnik asks the
soldiers and researchers if they want to be able to return to that
place. Stase says he doesn't care, but Della and Melony both say yes
-- particularly once they learn that what is below is a lived-in tower
fallen on its side, although everything in it is encased in crystal.

Kat goes to inspect one of the golems and throws a Shatter spell at it.
Small chunks of crystal blow off it as the water ripples around it, and
it staggers back. It raises its arms and charges into the air. Gnik sends
Az (in octopus form) toward Stase, Della, and Melony to distract the golem
if it heads their way.

Kat slashes at the golem with the Booming Blade effect, then moves away
to hide behind a pillar. Zassin goes to distract the golem, giving Ember
an advantage as she rushed up to stab it, taking significant chunks off
it and prying one of its arms off. Al swings at it a couple times but
is not able to hit effectively. Gnik casts Hydraulic Push at it, knocking
it to the ground and setting off the Booming Blade effect. Kai goes into
a rage and hits it twice. It pulls itself up and takes a swing at Ember
and Kai. It slams Kai in the face and hits Ember in the shoulder, spinning
her around.

Milena runs up and casts Thunderwave at it, aiming it to hit it but not
her companions. It shatters into tiny pieces that are flung back out of
the room into the water. Melony claps excitedly.

They discuss taking the other one out so it doesn't hurt anyone else who
comes by. Milena hits Kai with a Cure Wounds spell.

Al pulls one of his friends out of the bag and gets Gina the Giant
Octopus. He sends her to crush the other golem... and then says, "No,
pick up big rocks and drop them on it!" until he sees that she doesn't
have a lot of lift strength, and goes back to the original plan. She
goes almost invisible with camouflage, then suddenly reappears wrapped
around the golem. It tries to fight her but its arms are pinned. Kat
aims another Shatter spell at its head so she won't hit anyone else.

Ember climbs to the top of the golem and hits it several times, knocking
chunks off it. Zassin distracts it, giving Kai advantage as she hits
it with her sword. Milena casts Spiritual Weapon, but misses, then casts
Sacred Flame straight into its maw; its crystalline structure concentrates
the radiance and blows chunks off it.

Al runs forward to attack and manages to stun it so that the rest of them
can pummel it into small pieces. Melony applauds again and Della thanks
them.

Stase asks about the things that were in the room before -- the bird
things and the others. They explain the kranna/kenku and the koth, but Stase
didn't see Doyantrich. He lets them know the mittacks and mittath are both
shapeshifters and mind-readers. Stase mumbles that that explains some
things. Melony is very excited to learn of a whole society they didn't
even know about. She and Della ask many questions, and Gnik answers as
many as he can to the best of his knowledge. While he's doing that, Milena
casts Prayer of Healing on Kai, Ember, and Al, although she is doubtful
his bruises will actually respond to healing -- and they don't.

Kat experiments with her aqueous form, finding that she can pour herself
into a nearby barrel and conform to its shape; Zassin dives in. She can
also move about in the water without her merskirt with no ill effects.

They swim back up to the surface; Kai checks in with Laur, who says he
is on the platform directly above them, so they head that way. They
see no one on the intermediate platforms by the shaft on the way up.
There is a ring of ships around the platform, which is floating about
five feet above the water's surface -- definitely magical. It has
crenellations and a couple of ballistas on it, visible as they surface
about 20 feet away. Someone throws a rope ladder over the side. Kai
flies up to survey the area, and Gnik tries to leap out of the water
in his manta ray form; he succeeds and shoots up onto the platform
with octopus-Az riding his back. Kat walks on the surface of the water;
Laur sighs and shakes his head as he sees her. When they get to the
platform, there are Anlim military, Trihorn, several members of their
crew, and Eleanora and Britt. Eleanora and Britt explain that they
brought every ship they could find -- except the ones Bridget took
to take back Serin -- to serve as a distraction against those who
might try to follow the group below and cause trouble. Gnik lets
them know that there are a few below who will need help coming
back up -- and possibly encouragement, because two of them want to
keep going down into the ruins below the ruins. One of the Anlim
soldiers says, "Yeah, we know who you're talking about."

A woman steps up and introduces herself as Arbam, the Trihorn rep at
the site. She says they were contractors for the Anlim government but
those agents all vanished a couple days ago. Gnik explains they were
actually shapeshifters who probably won't be bothering them anymore.
Arbam says, "Okay, we'll pack up and head out." Al says they might
not want to do that, and she counters, "We're not getting paid
anymore." He explains that the tower below could be filled with
historical artifacts that might be worth their while. Kai glares at
him for possibly giving a powerful organization more power as Arbam
says, "We'll consider it." Al mentions they're agents of Trihorn,
and Kat says that they put their butts on the line and so would
deserve a share of the profits. Arbam agrees and says she'll see
what she can do. Kat says, "Can we get that in... writing?" Arbam
gives her a note laying out the details, including first pick of
any artifacts and 10% of any finds. Kat thanks her and shakes her
hand; as she pulls her hand back, she turns back to flesh -- an hour
after the crystal effect ended. Kat plays it up like it's something
Arbam did. Al, however, still has his bruises.

Bimisi is also there, so Gnik asks how Awakened is doing. Bimisi says
they're still a little mopey. Al says, "Look at this new trick I learned!"
and transforms into his other form. Bimisi says, "I don't think you learned
that. Why that form?" "I... think I had a crush on her?" "Well, who didn't
-- of your age, anyway," Bimisi answers.

The group discusses where to go next; there will be things to do relative
to the retaking of Serin, but they don't think they want to be directly
involved in that. They are near Terriola, and they discuss perhaps visiting
the Tower of Time there -- they figure they deserve a little bit of a break
before figuring out how to take out Auntie Treeshadow.

Before going to sleep that evening, Gnik tries a Dispel Magic on Al's
bruises, but nothing happens. Milena suggests Remove Curse but doesn't
have it prepared, so she tries a Greater Restoration from her elven
prayer bead necklace; his bruises fade and disappear.


22 June 2024

The 'E' island is referred to as Phrolla, but is often referred to as
the Phrollan frontier. Rantock's Realm has settled and unsettled it
numerous times over the last thousand years.

There is a small portion off a peninsula that Rantock's Realm has been
able to maintain control over thanks to a small mountain range
protecting the peninsual from the rest of the isalnd.

As we discuss what we know about this, Gnik starts convulsing and
having fits, then stops. His mind was a couple of other
somewhere-elses, in many other minds. He was able to see their
information about Phrollan. When he comes back to himself his brain
hurts, but he remembers experiencing a zombie invasion, and explored a
castle and found a mystical artifact. It was a beautiful, crystaline
sphere that could be used to imprison someone.

There was some discussion on whether or not we would want to explore
the Keldan. Gnik expressed interest. Kai expressed concern.

We asked Britt and Eleanora for someone who could be our agent in
Saltmarsh. They recommend Perytar. We ask him to do so and he
agrees. We negotiate terms.

We go back to our ship.

Al describes the pressures he's feeling from everything. Ember, Gnik,
Zazzin, and Az are kind of similar. Kat isn't much like
others. Everyone else is similar.

Milena is being overwhelmed by some sort of sensations she's
experiencing. She says, "This is a lot. I am going to make tea."

Kai isn't experiencing anything new. Ember is expriencing something
new, but hasn't figured it out. Once in a while she feels deja vu,
and like she may be able to make that thing 'not be'.

Kat describes that she is 3/8ths Elf.

Kai pulls out her haunted sword. Al gets multiple auras off of
it. It's confusing.

Laur tells us it will be a week to get to Tariolla. "It's over open
ocean, so it will be just as uneventful as the trip here," he says,
smiling.

On the trip Gnik spends time with Ember trying to help her figure out
what's going on with her new ability. Al spends time trying to
understand his new ability.

Al contacts Anny via the statuette to fill her in. The statuette feels
somewhat similar to the dogs.

Gnik casts Identify on Anny's statuette. It has two abilities. One is
a telepathic connection between whoever has the statuette and
Anny. The second is a conduit to Anny. One could cast spells on her
through it. If it is destroyed, it would hurt her badly, though she
would recover.

Gnik has another fit and learns about the statuette. He sees a
ceremony where two people are handing each other statues of each
other. They are surrounded by elves. It is an elven marriage
ceremony. He gets an idea of a researcher standing in front of a six
foot tall silver statue of Ag. He's cast 'Identify' on the statue and
learns that it's connected to Ag.

Al tells Anny what he learned about the statuette. Anny is fine with
Al having it, is not going to tell her mom about it, and is going to
try to learn more about it. Anny tells Al that the shapeshifter we'd
met at the Sea Elves' place disappeared.

On the morning of the 14th they bring up anchor and head out. Gnik is
doing Read Weather, so is not surprised when on the 16th a bit of a
storm blows through. It's not too much rain, more wind.

Kat is hanging out in the crow's nest when the storm hits. She's not
loving the motion, but it's not the worst. A talon drives into her
unexpectedly. It's late afternoon, before dinner.

Kai is on deck helping people keep things locked down. Al is in his
bunk, meditating.

Gnik had by this time used his ability to help figure out Ember's
ability. He saw a blond person in a mirror doing some experiment
related to time. He sees some folks standing in front of the Tower of
Time who are practicing techniques to see different paths in time to
choose which one to go down. Gnik and Ember are in their cabin
discussing her ability.

Al hears Kat screaming. Gnik and Ember don't notice.

Laur is on the wheel. Ilris is out with Kai.

Mouse is below decks because no one wants to smell a wet dog.

Kai looks up and sees a wyvern lifting Kat out of the crow's
nest. Because of the challenging wind, she uses instinctive pounce and
then climbs. She gets to 60 feet, but the crow's nest is at 80
feet. Kai rages and throws her javelin with a chain. The javelin hits
and sticks.

Al jumps up, tells his bunkmates there's a problem. Kai says it's a
Wyvern into the Farspeakers and Al relays that to the nearby crew. Al
heads up to the top deck. Al pulled out a net, but sees what is going
on and climbs up the mast.

Al notices that the rain has a texture that looks like the ocean and a
bit like Kat. The Wyvern has some sort of texture, and Al gets a sense
that there are two more hidden by the rain. Al lets the others know.

Ilris attacke with a crossbow and hits the wyvern in the left side.

Kat turns to water. The wyvern immediately loses its hold. Kat jumps
out and is coming down feet first. Al puts out an arm to let Kat catch
it, if she wants.

The wyvern dives towards Kai and stings her in the shoulder. The
stinger is very large, so it's a heavy impact. The wound burns. Two
more wyverns come diving down, one towards Laur and one towards
Ilris. Laur is able to hide behind the wheel. Ilris is hit with a
stinger, and staggers pretty hard. The wynverns, having failed to
grapple, fly on. Laur lashes down the wheel. Laur goes to Ilris and
does something to help him.

Ember and Gnik run out to the deck.

Kai flies off the mast, releases the chain, dropping the javelin to
the deck, pulls out her great sword, and attacks. She slices its left
wing off. Kai then shoves it as it starts to fall so it falls in the
water rather than to the deck. The wyvern bites her arm in the
process. The wing hits the deck right in front of Gnik and Ember. Kai
flies back to the mast and takes a defensive posture.

Carrie comes running out, slips, and slams her head on the deck,
knocking herself out.

Kat ignores Al's outstretched hand, so Al jumps down, using his Slow
Fall, goes over to Carrie to give her a Greater Healing potion, and
gets her moved over into the mess.

Az stays with Gnik. Laur helps Ilris up to his feet. Ilris goes in to
the mess hall. Corey comes out and fires a crossbow at one of the
wyverns. The crossbow breaks and Corey throws it off the side. He
pulls out blades and runs over to Laur. Chastity comes out and shoots
a crossbow. She hits one of the wyverns.

Jarvis comes up to Al and says 'I got this'. Lanny comes to help
Carrie, too. Jerry ran out and took a shot with the crossbow, but
misses.

Kat hits the ground hard. It really hurts. Kat casts Chaos Bolt at the
wyvern off the starboard side. A bolt hits, and then surges towards
the other wyvern, hitting it, too. Ice forms at each place the bolt
hits. Kat then hides.

One of the wyverns attacks Kai and grabs her with a claw. The stinger
comes around, but Kai blocks it. The other wyvern attacks Chastity,
and grabs her. Laur jumps on that wyvern's claw and pulls it off of
Chastity, freeing her. Ember runs over and stabs that wyvern a few
times. Wend runs over to the wyvern and hits it pretty hard with his
maul.

Gnik casts Slumber against both Wyverns. The wyvern that has Kai falls
asleep. From Kai's perspective, everything flickers gray for a moment
and its claws pass through Kai as it starts to fall. Kat sees Kai glow
blue for a moment, then turn transluscent. That wyvern falls into the
water. Gnik goes up to the top deck and heads toward the stern.

Kai divebombs the remaining wyvern and attacks it, sinking her sword
into the base of the skull, pinning its head to the deck while Kai
lands on its neck.

Kai is not poisoned in the sense that she needs to be cured.

Jarvis and Milena decide that every part of the Wyvern can be used.

When Kat turns back to corporeal form, she is still injured, though
she doesn't have broken bones.

The storm starts clearing up a bit later and behind us we see a
floating island. It's about 150 feet up. Laur slows the ship. Kai
heads up towards the floating island.

Gnik uses Control Water to dry himself and then others off. Kai heads
up to take a look, but stays a mile away. There's a partial ring of
water with an outcropping in the center with a castle on top. There's
water bubbling up in the horseshoe of water, and then water flows out
and off the side. Kai sees something moving in one of the windows of
the castle. Kai sees some things moving down on the main flat part of
the floating island, outside the horseshoe of water. There are three
air mephits, three ice mephits, and three mud mephits.

Kat borrows Milena's firebird cape. Ember and Gnik get in Kat's bag of
holding. Kai carries Al. The group aims to land on the other side of
the outcropping from the mephits. Flying underneath we see a cave
underneath it. The group flies up past the path to the castle and to
the front door, then knocks. Kat turns off the cape and lets Gnik and
Ember out. From up above we hear a heavily accented trade shouted at
us.

Kat says, "We're here for a cup of sugar." Kat says, "We saw you and
were curious."

A genie made in part of a pillar of water comes floating down. Kat
says they look beautiful. The genie says Kat looks familiar.

G: "What do you want?"
Kai: "Why is this here?"
G: "I don't know"
Kai: "Why are you here?"
...
G: "There is a connection to my home." (probably elemental plane of water)

(the mephits are also from a plane of water -- a demi-plane?)

Kat: "Do you mind if we look around?"
G: "I'd rather you didn't enter my home."
...
Al: "Would you be willing to show us your home?"
G: "I suppose I could ...

He forms legs and shows us around the castle. He has done a lot to spruce
the place up. He says he's gone home a few times to bring things here.

He is named Huhaso.

Kat notices that there are a couple of areas that make it look like
this was a wizard's residence.

Huhaso takes us up to the Gazebo at the top. We don't feel the wind up
there. All the windows are open in the castle, but the wind is not
coming inside. It feels climate controlled inside.

H: "There was nothing on the walls. Quite drab and boring."

There are now very pretty, abstract art on the walls.

Kat: "I love what you've done with the place."

There is a room covered in bookshelves, but there are no books.

Kat: "Was this place empty when you came here?"

H: "There was garbage. I just threw it in the water, and it washed off"

The water on top of the island is no deeper than six or seven feet.

Kai: "Do you stay up here or go down?"
H: "If there is someone to grace with my presence I may go down."

Al can see that Huhaso's aura is similar to Kat. Al can see that
there's something different about the land and something different
about the plants.

We go to the cave entrance and find a brood of two baby
wyverns. Wyverns can be trained. It's a challenge, but they can be
impressive as mounts or guards. Kai spends ten minutes to attune to
them and then speaks to them. Meanwhile Gnik starts summoning a
floating disc.

Ws: "Food?"
Kai: "If you come with us we can get you food."
Ws: "Are you food?"
Kai: "We are friends, not food."

The baby wyverns get on the floating disc. We warn Laur that we're coming.

Someone in Milena's village has actually trained a wyvern.


6 July 2024

From Zassin, Milena has an image in her mind of Laur saying, "Ask
Milena when she's going to get up here!" She rouses herself from her
bunk and goes to the deck, where Laur points over the edge. "I figured
this was more your thing than ours," he says.

Over the edge, there are two sparkly pink dolphins. They chitter, and
Milena hears in her mind, "Hello! I am Lovely, and this is Daring. Can
you help us?" They explain that an evil being named Huaso came to
their world, manipulated people and they started vanishing; it turns out
he was eating them. They fought him off and he escaped here; they followed
to make sure he wasn't causing more harm, and he killed four of them --
the remaining two fell off the floating island and need to get back to it
to return to their home.

Milena explains the situation and asks if they have met a being called
Huaso. They say yes, and hatch a plan to bring the wyverns down and the
dolphins up using the portable office. Klaab is ready on deck to take
charge of the wyverns. The dolphins teleport into the office -- they
can only go a short distance -- and Gnik pulls in a cube of water to
help provide buoyancy to keep them comfortable. Kai flies them back up
to the island.

Gnik realizes he has seen drawings of these creatures in books. At
home. Because they are fey-descended. They are called Delighters,
and they really are friendly and not at all deceptive.

The Delighters tell the group they are welcome to come visit, but
humankind usually don't like to spend that much time in the water.
The group says they have ways of being comfortable in the water.

As they reach the surface of the island, Kai notices that the water
is not moving the way she would expect. She can see where water is
coming out of the underwater portal, and the water behind it seems
not to flow with the currents.

Kai gets about 30 feet above the portal and opens the portable
office far enough to let the dolphins out. They both go "Wheee!"
and disappear in a poof of sparkle, then reappear in the water
near the portal. Milena and Ember prepare to distract any creature
that might hurt the dolphins; Milena preparing to cast Sacred Flame,
Ember with her crossbow, and Kat with Chaos Bolt. A huge watery form
rises up 30 feet, to the level where Kai is holding open the office,
and tries to hit her, but instead lops off part of itself by sticking
it into the office. Fresh water pours out of the office; Kai manages
to keep hold of it, but her arm has been bludgeoned pretty hard.

The Sacred Flame and Ember's crossbow bolt both hit the water creature
as Kat's Chaos Bolt goes off, dealing Lightning damage; there's a
flash of lightning through it.

Al dives acrobatically out of the office portal, hitting the creature
on the way down and managing to stun it; it hangs quivering in midair.
Al twists and dives perfectly into the water. Kai yells, "Everybody
get out!" Gnik dives out with his hood pulled up, hits the shallows,
and skates along the surface, downstream.

The dolphins swim against the flow of water toward the portal; Daring
makes it out, but Lovely is having trouble fighting the strength of
the current.

Kat yells, "Go to land!" and Kai sets the office on the land. She flies
up again to hit it with her sword. She's not sure how much effect it will
have; her sword says, "Let's find out!" Milena waits for everyone to get
out of the office, then closes it and puts it away for safekeeping, while
casting another Sacred Flame. Kat hits it with a firebolt, and then hides.

Al attacks the creature again and stuns it a second time. Gnik realizes
Lovely is still having trouble getting to the portal, so he redirects
the Hydraulic Push he was planning to use against the water creature
and uses it to redirect water out of Lovely's way. She pops through the
portal in a spray of sparkles, chirping "Thank you!" on her way out.

Kai hits the creature again, and it falls apart and splashes into the
pool below. Milena asks the group, "Is this Huaso?" and they say no --
he is more of a djinn. Milena looks around and for a moment thinks she
perceives something between them and the castle; she alerts the others
and prepares to cast Banishment if needed. Knowing he seems to like to
eat all manner of things just for enjoyment -- he doesn't need to eat --
she prepares a small fire as a material component that is distasteful
to him.

Kat looks up and sees him, invisible, coming toward them. She uses
Mage Hand to hold a stick pointing at him, then casts Firebolt. "How
dare you come into my home and attack me unprovoked?" he bellows,
suddenly appears, and splays his hands out in front of him. Jets of
water spray out and hit them with firehose force; Milena is pushed
back 20 feet to the edge of the island but manages to teeter on the
edge without going over.

Al swims forward and attacks, attempting a stunning strike, but fails
to stun him. He hits again and does some damage.

Gnik casts Mind Sliver at Huaso, and hits, then dives below again. Kai
flies up to attack his upper half, which seems more solid. She slashes
deep into his left shoulder and chest.

Milena pulls out a Continual Flame and casts Banishment. Huaso yells
in rage and pops out of existence. Milena holds up a finger and keeps
concentrating to make sure he doesn't immediately return.

Six mephits peek around a rock, wide-eyed, and slink away.

Al calls down to Laur on the Farspeaker, "We may be here a while,
we just got rid of all the creatures here and need to explore. Well,
except for the mephits." "How many mephits are there?" Laur asks.
"Six..." "...because we just saw six creatures fly off the island,"
Laur says.

The group begins exploring; they immediately notice all the ice
sculptures have melted. They look more closely at the tapestries
and see they are made entirely of metallic threads. Milena finds
a secret door behind a bookshelf -- more obvious because there are
no books -- that opens onto what looks like an extension of the
lab, but with all the equipment removed. There are benches, and
marks where objects used to be, but the objects are gone.

Kai finds a section of inlaid tile floor with circular patterns
on it. She finds a stone that is recessed and steps on it; a
spiral staircase drops down from the floor leading to a secret
exit below.

Gnik finds a similarly ornate floor in an enclosed porch space with
a lovely view; he also presses a stone to reveal a stairway down
into a room below. There is no opening, but there is a view of
the island from behind the island. There is a ball of glowing
blue energy with two smaller ones beside it, and a cone below
the big sphere, with its flat surface on top, all floating in
midair. He puts on the arcanus glasses to examine them more
closely, then touches the side of the cone. The view flips,
showing the bottom side of the island. He touches a little bit
to the side and the view shifts to the side. He can't reach the
spheres, but when Kai gets there she touches the top of the cone
they get a top-down view; it appears to be in real time, since they
can see the splashy mess they left after their flight.

Gnik asks Kai to lift him up so he can touch the sphere; he feels
resistance that he didn't feel with the cone. He asks Kai if she
can hold him up for 11 minutes; she sighs and says, "Milena, can
we get him a ladder?" Milena pulls out the bone ladder and shapes
it into a stepstool.

Gnik finds that the middle sphere can be used to reorient the
island: turning it by rotating the sphere or moving it forward
and backward by pushing and pulling it. The two spheres on the
sides are connected to energy sources -- one at the bottom of
the island and one at the top of the tallest turret, each of
which can fire energy bolts. Only one can be fired at a time,
but it can be fired while the island is moving. It can sit on
the surface of the water but can't go underwater, and it also
has a limit on how high it can go. It can only go 20 miles per
day -- their ship can go 120 miles in that time.

Milena sees that everything here has been here for a long time.

Gnik has a vision of a memory of a smaller island, the entire
top of which is a keep, flying through the sky. A humanoid but
stocky woman is sitting in front of four gems, manipulating them;
he hears a voice say, "What are you doing in here?" and he immediately
passes out, but comes to quickly. He says he thinks someone realized
he was visiting their memories. The person he saw did not speak, but
he believes that is the person who spoke to him.

They decide to move the island up as high as it can go so it will be
less obvious to those below. They move it up two miles, and Al proposes
they go through the portal to the water world before they leave. Kai
says, "I am NOT going." Al, Kat, Ember, and Gnik dive in; Milena casts
an Augury and gets "Weal," so she joins them.

When they are all gone, Kai says into the Farspeaker, "Laur, everyone
else went through a portal to the elemental plane of water." "Of course
they did," he says.

Those that went through the portal feel the gravity switch partway
through and they come out into an area caged off with a seaweed net.
Six dolphins are outside it. "Well, hello!" they say. Milena says,
"Lovely and Daring invited us." The dolphins say they went home
to their families because they haven't been home for quite a while,
and the rest of them were just about to repair the defense -- there
is a hole in the net. Milena says they wanted to take the opportunity
to see this place since they might not have another chance, but then
they could help with the repairs. Milena shares with them that although
the dangers have been cleared off for now, it may not be safe later.
Gnik adds that the island is now much further up in the sky, so falling
off the edge will hurt much more. Al shares that they banished the
water elemental that was eating their people to its home plane, but it
might be able to find its way back. They ask how they might come back
and visit if the defense is put back up, and the dolphins say they
will know.

Kai lowers the island all the way to the sea surface so the crew can
explore it. When it hits the surface, a pier comes out. A few minutes
later, the rest of the group re-emerges from the portal; they spent
a couple hours in the other realm, but it has only been 15 minutes on
Maerson.


17 Mara 3275

The next day, Kai and Kat spot a huge whirlpool in their path; Laur
triggers the teleport effect to go past it. He says it's not on the
charts, although other whirlpools are.

They near Cloud's Edge, a port city in Tarriolla. Before they arrive,
Laur tells Kat that there are some laws in Tarriolla about what gods
people can worship, so she might not want to say too much about who
her friends are.


23 Mara 3275

As they come into Cloud's Edge, it is a foggy morning. They notice
crystal pillars sticking out of the water, about 8 feet in diameter
-- part of the city's defenses. As they approach, they see two pillars
glowing; according to the story, they indicate the safe way to go in
times of safety, and nothing is lit up in times of strife. As Jimsu
steers towards them, an old lady pops up beside him to ask the ship's
name, their purpose, and how long they will stay. Laur answers, and
Jimsu reaches out to poke her; it is an illusion, and as they near
the shore they can see her on a balcony on shore with an illusion of
the deck of their ship. Al notices that he can't see the source of
the illusion image, which lets him know it's an illusion.

In the city, different religious orders run different aspects of the
city: defense, medicine, commerce, etc. They see a tower, almost 200
feet tall, covered with scaffolding as though it is being worked on.
There is a platform on the top with a balloon ship moored on it.

They discuss how to get to the capital city of Terriolla; Ember and
Jarvis say there are many ways: sailing up the river, or land-train,
or airship.... Kai asks what would be the fastest, and the answer
is airship, but it might be expensive. The rest of the crew will stay
in Cloud's Edge to make deals -- selling the tapestries, and the
wyverns.... "We're selling the wyverns?" Al asks wistfully. They
discuss terms with Laur and suggest selling to someone who would
let them come visit the wyverns.

They disembark and a large man with a loud voice greets them and
says they're here to make their stay pleasant; he's wearing a tabard
of Arcon, the god of arcane knowledge, prophesy and greed. He introduces
himself as Monroe. Behind him is an old woman they didn't see at first,
a gnome taking notes, and wearing a tabard showing the holy symbol
of Etlath, the god of business and contracts. He seems in his element;
she seems over it.

They all notice that Ember is hiding in the back of the group. 
Al asks her over the farspeaker why she is hiding. "Because I don't
like Petin. She's a smug bitch."


20 July 2024

Monroe suggests the best inn is Cloak and Dagger, run by a former
spymaster, but don't tell anyone -- he winks. Kat banters with him,
asking if he gets a kickback if they go there. "No, no, that's not
allowed," he laughs. Petin, the gnome, shoots him an exasperated look.

They notice that there are no street urchins, rats, garbage... there
are vendors, and a sign nearby that says "tours". Kai is aware that
there are slums around Cloud's Edge, but they are well away from the
docks and the center of town. Kat observes to Monroe that it's the
cleanest dock she's ever seen; he says they pride themselves on it.

Kai knows a little about the Cloak and Dagger; there are rumors about
the owner that include that he's a former spy, a former assassin, a
fiend disguised as a half-orc... and that perhaps he's the one spreading
those rumors. It's a private space with good food.

Several of the crew will be joining them, so they send Al and Jimsu
ahead to make sure the inn knows they are coming and make reservations.
They go to sign up for one of the tours, and Kat asks if it's a walking
tour; she learns that it is, but there are transports around the city
that they walk into that takes them immediately to another part of the
city so they don't have to walk all the way across. Kat recalls hearing
about such things being ancient technology, many of which no longer
work, but a few places -- including Cloud's Edge and Tarriolla -- have
been able to keep some of them operational.

They sign up for a food and drink tour that will start in an hour.
Gnik takes Ember into a weapons shop so she can explain to him why
all the weapons in it are inferior and really just cosmetic, because
he thinks she will enjoy that. Kat and Rodger take the dogs and wander
the dock, discussing how weird it is that there are no urchins or trash
or anything. Milena wanders into a couple of shops looking to replenish
small supplies: herbs, thread for mending and embroidering -- particularly
if there are interesting colors or fiber types. Kai has a drink.

They see that the city is surrounded by a wall, 40-50 feet high, due
to a history of conflict with Rantock's Realm from which the city
broke off.

Al and Jimsu come back in time for the tour, saying they will really
like Mel and Mik. The tour guide, an older man, sports the symbol
of Gosh. He introduces himself as Padto and asks if they just want
the normal tour or if they want to see something special. Kat says
they want to see the out-of-the way place. The tour takes six hours
and includes thought to be from before the third stonefall, based on
a translated old Jhoynian cookbook. They go to an authentic Dorgenian
restaurant that caters to Dorgenian travelers, founded over a hundred
years ago.

They experience the transporters. They learn that it would cost about a
gold piece for a map, and they can get a day pass to the transports. Kat
buys a map and Gnik asks if he can look at it. "Sure, for a gold," she
says. Ember chuckles.

After the tour they tip their guide -- who has been doing this 40 years
and always made sure the dogs had things to eat, too -- and make their
way to Cloak and Dagger. The door has a little ledge sticking out of
it in front of a tiny door within the door. Two little mice come out.
"Hello! Hi, Al! Hi, Jimsu!" One says, "I'm Mel," and the other says,
"I'm Mik!" As Milena gets closer, her dagger begins yelling, "Fiend!
Fiend! Fiend!" One of the mice squeaks and runs inside to hide.
Milena moves back, and side-to-side, and quickly figures out it is
being triggered by something or someone inside.

The door opens inward; a half-orc man is standing there with Mel on his
shoulder. "What's this about a fiend?" he asks. Voices inside voices jokingly
yell, "They got ya, Lavane!" while Gnik explains they have an item that alerts
them when a fiend is nearby. The man shrugs and invites them inside.

There are table and chairs of various sizes to accommodate all sizes of
beings. A server in a short, tight dress walks over to one of the short
tables and as she approaches she shrinks down, so that the dress is
full-length and loose. She chats with the folks at that table and takes
their orders, then gets larger again as she walks away.

Kat offers to pay the bar tab for their group for the evening. Corey
excitedly goes to the bar, then they hear him yell, "What?!" as he
learns they don't sell hard alcohol, only beer and wine. The shapechanging
girl, Syble, becomes 8 feet tall and very strong, and moves a
couple of tables together for their group. Kai says to her, "This is
going to sound rude, but I'm going to ask it anyway.... What ARE you?"
"I get that a lot," the girl says. She says her people call themselves
Changers, they used to be human but were made into Changers by a being
called Prosaleeza who then enslaved them and tried to use them to
infiltrate societies, but some of them have escaped, and she works
here now because Lavane is awesome. Lavane adds that ships showed up
many years ago with Changer spies who turned out to not be as obedient
to Prosaleeza as he had hoped, then says, "Can I interest you in roc
eggs and a tarask steak?" "Where do you have a tarask?!" Gnik asks.
"Oh, it's buried under the city, so it can't move, but we can go take
pieces and it grows back, so it doesn't really hurt it. Expensive, but
worth it." What comes out is steak and eggs; they're pretty sure it's
just regular steak and eggs, and Lavane is a very good storyteller/liar.

Al peruses the room with his new power; nothing appears to be other than
it is supposed to be until a few minutes later, a couple comes down the
stairs and Al says, "Okay, SHE'S different...." It is a clearly wealthy
couple; the man, who appears wealthy, departs and Lavane scampers over
to the woman and asks how she is doing and if she needs anything, then
escorts her to a private room. Milena's dagger is still glowing.

When Lavane comes back, Kai asks him what the city rules are about
fiends. He responds that there are no rules against them as long as
they're following the rules. Kai asks if there's another exit from
that private room and he says no, then asks if there's going to be
trouble. He hopes not, because she's been there for years -- a
regular renter who receives gentleman callers and who always pays
her bills on time.

The group debates whether to do anything; most don't want to, but
Kai does, so she goes over to the door to knock. Before she does,
Lavane sees her and comes to ask what she's doing, pointing out that
the servants can go in if they knock and are invited, but no one else,
because it's a *private* room. He offers to ask if she wants visitors,
then knocks and identifies himself. He asks the woman if she'd like a
visitor and she asks, "Is it an interesting visitor?" "Oh, I think so...."
The woman invites Kai in.

Kai confronts her, asking what she is. "Oh, so you know I'm different
but not what I am?" Kai says they know there's a fiend nearby. She
looks confused for a moment, then says, "Technically there's a fiend
in me, because that's how it works.... How much do you know about
vampires?" "Quite a lot, actually," Kai says, and recalls the book
they have describing the differnt types of vampires. "You're a Sgult
vampire," Kai says. "Yes, I think that's what it's called," the woman
says; "Do you know how to cure them?"

Kai uses the Farspeaker to call Al in.

The woman is completely open about her situation, seeing that Kai and Al
already have an idea what she is. As they talk, Kai perceives that she is
enslaved by the demon inside her and feels drawn to help her. She leans
forward and unconsciously touches the woman's hand. She notices it is
room temperature, and then...

The door blows off its hinges and Kai calls out, "That wasn't me!"
Then, "Sgult demon!" The woman is slumped over, as is Al, and there
is a huge demon, about 12 feet tall, crouched in the room and covered
in flames.

Kat leaps up and makes a beeline for the doorway with Torchlight in
her hand. It flicks the blade to the side but she sinks her dagger
into its shoulder. It doesn't show pain although she knows it was a
solid hit -- then she recalls followers of Sgult like pain. She scampers
out of the room again.

The demon roars and the wound in its shoulder immediately closes up.
It brings its hands together, throws them apart, and fire erupts within
the inside of the tavern. Gnik notes that none of the items in the tavern
catch fire, but the people do. The fire seems to hit a barrier that keeps
it in only half the room.

Ember leaps at the demon and gets a few good hits in. Boris looks at
Milena, then goes to one of the downed locals to pull them to safety;
Wend grabs another to drag away. Lavane grabs something from under the
counter and yells, "What the hell are you doing? Who's going to pay for
that door?" "THAT'S your concern?" asks Kai. "No, but I had to say
something!" Lavane begins dragging patrons to safety. "I can fix the
door," Gnik says. "Well, then, THAT makes it all better," Lavane says.

Carie runs at the demon and hits it several times, but none of her
weapons have an effect... because none are magical. Mouse grabs one
of the smaller fallen patrons to pull them to safety, and the rest of
the crew follow suit.

Kai attacks with her sword; her first attack misses but the second
hits. Gnik hands the Wand of Maria to Milena as an item distasteful
to a demon, and casts Mind Spike at the demon.

Milena holds out the wand and casts Banishment. The demon roars and
collapses in on itself in a sickening crunch of cracking limbs, then
disappears. For a moment, there is total silence, then Gnik says, "Nobody
distract Milena." "Why?" Lavane asks. "Because that thing might come
back," Gnik says. Lavane steps between Milena and where the demon was
with a hand-crossbow in each hand, to stand guard.

Kai sees that there are three dead civilians and asks Lavane, "I can only
save one -- which one?" He points and says, "What are you going to do?"
"I have Spare the Dying in my dagger," Kai says, and uses it on the person
he indicated. Milena is able to Revivify the other two without breaking her
concentration on the Banishment. Then she sets about healing as many
people as she can.

The woman, Arlean, thanks them and says they have done plenty already
-- they gave her her life back -- and she can get healing from the
local temples. Gnik warns her she will probably start aging again.

Kai says to Gnik, "So... I don't know what actually happened in there."
After talking Al, they realize that her new gift from K'Jat allowed her
to push Arlean briefly into the ethereal without also pushing the demon,
which separated them -- which was only possible because Arlean was
imprisoned by the demon.

After everything has calmed down, Gnik seeks out Mel and Mik and asks
their story. "We were pets of a wizard who decided he wanted to know
what they were thinking. He wasn't impressed. But we got better!"

Lavane breaks out alcohol just for their table that he keeps for special
occasions.

Arlean comes back downstairs with a coffer, pulls out a small bag and
puts it on the bar. Lavane looks into it, his eyes widen, and he stuffs
it into his pocket.

Kat complains that she's the only one who doesn't know what her gift
from K'Jat is yet. Al tells her he can see the Koth energy on her, so
there is definitely something.

They talk with Lavane about what to see in Tarriolla. He mentions the Tower
of Time, which is a temple of Cynthia and seems to be getting newer. He tells
them of an inn, probably the most expensive they will ever see in their lives,
with amazing spas and other services, but they release floating lanters with
tickets attached that anyone can find and bring for a free night; and if one
of the six owners decide to retire, there is a random lottery for anyone in
town to have a chance to join in ownership and share in the profits.



17 August 2024

The group spends the evening playing music, drinking, and having fun in
the bar. Gnik uses a ritual to mend the door, then asks Syble what she
knows about Prosalisa. She thinks he just wanted to infiltrate and
control societies to get rid of them. She says she last saw him on a ship
that went to Tyreln after dropping her and other of his creations off
here. They were originally from another continent to the west.


24 Mara 3275

The group, including Rodger and Jimsu, leave in the morning to take the
airship to Terriolla. It will take two days. Byron Pare, the manager of
Terriolla Transports, gets them all set up. Rodger is very proud to have
enough money to pay the 50 gold for his own passage. There is another
passenger on the transport, Melonie. Gnik and Kat remember seeing her
before, but she was dressed much differently and went by a different
name -- she was one of the archaeologists. They bring this up with
her, and she says, "Ah. I see you've met my sister." She clearly
doesn't like her sister very much. She's wearing a crown-like
headpiece; when asked about it, she says it's been in the family
a long time. She's not a queen, but she is nobility.

They make small talk with her about their stay at the Cloak and
Dagger, and mention this will be their first time in Terriolla.
She mentions a museum holding a collection of books called
"The Chronicles of Life" in which text just shows up; it's
rumored the goddess Alsaya is writing it. She shares that her
family trades in spices and similar goods.

There's someone on the deck serving as a guide: "There's the
Free Forest -- it doesn't always look like that, it walks around...."
Milena is aware of a grove back home that would move when there was
a threat to it; her people told stories that it was the gods moving
them to protect them. Kat has read of a group of druids who sacrificed
themselves to give the woods their spirit, turning it into a living
forest. Gnik get the impression of a memory of someone walking through
a forest talking to someone dressed simply in leather armor; they talk
about what they are about to do will take all they have. One of them
takes off flying, and the other one looks up, as if at Gnik, and the
memory ends.

The tour guide is a halfling; Al asks her about how the ship is flying
and gets the impression she doesn't want to give away the secrets
to how it's done.

Flying and sleeping on the ship is really nice compared to being at sea --
it is very smooth. Occasionally they see the land ships go by below, which
are a little faster than the airship.



25 Mara 3275

As they approach Terriolla from above, they see the Tower of Time at the
mouth of a river that cuts through a ravine with three natural black
stone bridges across it, with roads in the middle of the bridges and
buildings on either side. The river ends in a waterfall over a cliff
about 600 feet tall. On the other side of the river from the tower is
the coliseum, with a switchback road coming up the cliff near it. There
appear to be some kind of stone structures that have been build into
the river.

The ship flies straight to the Tower of Time. Nearby they can see four
huge statues on top of the coliseum, which holds about 60,000 people.
The statues represent Alyddia, Ceonair, Gosh, and Vlandrel. The ship
docks at a platform about 50 feet up; the tower itself is about 300
feet tall. They see no seams in the stone of the tower, and a massive
cut crystal a little over halfway up on each of the four faces, a pale
pink-purple color. Al sees an aura of violet and yellow-green on it.
Near the base he also sees a blue-green glow he hasn't seen before.
To Milena, it appears to have always been there.

As they exit, there's a wall of painted images and someone inspecting
the passengers as they exit the ship, comparing them to the pictures.
Kat recognizes one of the images, labeled Karissa Caddell -- but it's
Jae, whom she recalls is from Terriolla.

Al asks Melonie if she has recommendations of where to stay; she asks
how much tey want to spend, and Kai suggests "middle of the road". Melonie
has only stayed in the very expensive inn Lavane told them about. She tells
them about a few other places she's aware of, and the group decides the
place with the best food -- the Jaded Spoon -- sounds like the best pick.

They enter the tower on the fourth floor and take the spiral ramp to the
bottom. The inside of the tower is the same solid stone, with rugs and
tapestries to help dampen the sound. They notice the entries to the
rooms they pass have very tall doors. The spiral is in the middle of
the tower, wrapped around a pillar; the way up is chained off. At the
bottom, it is a hive of activity, much like a city market: booths line
the edge of the walls with people in each one. One vendor is selling
little statues of the tower.

Melonie is talking with someone whose garb marks her as part of the
Temple of Cynthia, who is loudly saying, "Sorry, we can't help you."
They get the impression Melonie was trying to ask quietly for something.
When she sees the rest of the group, she nods and turns to leave, but
Al hurries to catch up to see if there's something the group can help
with. She says, "No, you can't," and turns around and starts walking;
she seems embarrassed to reveal what she was talking about.

As the rest of the group reaches the bottom of the ramp, the woman
in Cynthia garb asks if she can help with anything. They share that
most of them have never been to Terriolla and she asks what they're
interested in. "Fighting," says Kai. "Oh, then you'll want to visit
the Coliseum." "Can *I* fight?" "If you sign up...." Kai is very
excited.

"Books," says Gnik, in answer to his interests, "and secrets of the
universe."

There are posters around the room of shows in town, and Kat sees that
one of them includes Reggie in the cast; Kat points it out and says
maybe they could go see Reggie in a show. Kat explains to Kai how they
know Reggie and keeps making Gnik show her image: "Hey Gnik, show Reggie!"
"Hey, Gnik, show the dress I was wearing when we went to that ball and
Reggie was my date!" Gnik obliges, long-sufferingly.


31 August 2024

24 Mara 3275

Crew Adventure!

After a day of exploring the city, the crew regroups and Laur shares
possible opportunities. He asks Wend, Carie, Garelle, Chastity, and
Jarvis to meet with someone who has an opportunity offshore. Garelle
says, "Better than staying here and seeing the sights." "Good one,"
Wend says; and a couple beats later Jarvis says, "Ah. Funny!"

Laur tells them the name of the man they are to meet, Karmus Yelgun,
for breakfast at the Mysterious Paladin tavern. He's a merchant dealing
in antiquities. "A brand new adventure," Carie says. "Hopefully nothing
too exciting," Laur says.


25 Mara 3275

In the morning they head to the Mysterious Paladin, in a seedier area
near the docks. The bar is raucous for the hour of the morning; there
is a rowdy ship's crew having a good time, but the person they are to
meet is obvious -- sitting by himself in the back corner of the tavern.
They head to his table -- except for Chastity, who hangs back in case
there is trouble, until Wend gestures her over. They introduce themselves
and Carie says, "We hear you might have a job for us." He explains he has
had something stolen from one of his ships, an ancient flask that is not
magical but is historically important. He posted a bounty and someone
came to him with a tip that smugglers going under the cover of a company
called Horizon Shipping stole it. They have a hideout on a nearby island
and he thinks the flask might be there. He thinks there won't be more
than a dozen people on the island. He offers 100 gold each, and then
describes the flask in extreme detail. He says he bought it from an
archaeologist in the capital area, who found it in a wizard's tomb,
and it was very expensive. Chastity can tell that he really did pay
for it -- but she also noticed that he paused when they asked if he
was Karmis, as if that is not the name he has normally gone by. Garelle
gets the sense that he described the flask in such detail to distract
from the parts of the tale that aren't true.

Chastity pulls out a dagger and plays with it, and in a lull in the
conversation she says, "Now you're going to tell us who you actually
are, and why you want this flask." He blinks, blinks again, and admits
that he did buy the flask, but he didn't have enough money for all of
it so he used collateral from the smuggling group to cover it. They
didn't like it, so they kicked him out of the group but kept the
flask. He confesses his name is actually Denis. Jarvis asks some
questions to determine what else the smuggling group has been into --
to determine if taking them out might be a useful bonus to taking
the job -- and asks about the archaeologist who sold him the flask
to make sure he was trustworthy. Denis says he has worked with the
archaeologist before and has not felt he has been led astray before.

Denis says the name of the leader is Urdo Mugwort -- and describes
him as a spoiled dandy. Garelle asks if there's anyone in the
smuggling group with special abilities they should know about,
or animals like guard dogs. Denis says he thinks there are a few
dogs used for hunting.

The group discusses amongst themselves: Jarvis is concerned that the
flask might be something that shouldn't be in the hands of the smugglers
or Denis. Garelle thinks they might have other interesting things to
take -- such as rare spices -- and Chastity and Wend think that taking
the job sounds like a good time. Carie thinks maybe they don't have a
real reason to go up against smugglers -- although the description of
the markings on the flask make it sound like it is either magical or
has something magical inside it. They discuss renegotiating the terms
to say that they hang on to the flask until he's able to sell it, and
then take half the profits in place of the 50 gp afterwards. Garelle
suggests they do it after aquiring the item; Jarvis says, "That's
shady, but I see your point." They tell Denis that they'll take the
job, and he begins describing the island. Because of the location of
the watchtower on the northeast edge, at the top of a cliff, and where
they'll be landing on the southwest corner, he recommends they land just
before sunrise to give them the maximum amount of daylight while letting
them get across the beach in the dark. He says the flask is most
likely in the tower or in the cove, but he's not sure exactly where
the cove is. Carie suggests they go at sunset instead so the sun won't
be in their eyes as they cross the island. "Just so you know," Garelle
says, "I'm good with going at night." They agree on a time to meet up
in the afternoon to get them to the island by sundown. Chastity asks
where the island is and he's reluctant to tell them -- they might go
themselves and take the flask for themselves. Chastity says they could
do that anyway, and he says that at least he would be there.

He goes ahead and give them their 50 gold up front so they can get
supplies. Garelle and Jarvis suggest they may need mountaineering gear
in case they need to scale the cliff. They also need rope and gags in
case they have to tie up any smugglers (as Carie would rather not kill
them, even though Chastity and Garelle point out that would be more
efficient). And boat snacks.

Jarvis goes with Garelle to ask his new Nolan-worshipping friends at
the boatyard about charts and maps, since they've now had the island
described to them and know how far away it is. Chastity decides to
join them -- and Carie briefly thinks she should go keep an eye on
them, but doesn't want to leave Wend to do the shopping alone. Jarvis
describes the island to two folks and one says, unconvincingly, "Oh,
no, I've never heard of that...." while the other shows them where
it is. When Chastity presses the first one, she says, "Oh, I think...
sometimes people camp there... and hunt."

They discuss ditching Denis and just going to the island themselves, but
decide that they might need him to take the boat away so it's not obviously
sitting on shore. They are all competent sailors, so they help without
being asked. It's an overcast day, and he hits the beach dead on just
through dead reckoning. They jump out and pull the boat up enough so
it's not easily visible from the tower, and he plans to sit and wait for
them.

They head toward the cliff upward to the tower. They perceive a path,
not very well-worn and a bit overgrown, heading that direction. Chastity
and Carie scout ahead about 30 feet, and Wend brings up the rear.

Garelle detects the faintest hint of wood smoke and something acrid.
"Does anyone else smell that?" she asks quietly. "Not yet," Jarvis
says, "but I probably will in another... hundred feet or so." They
stop, and Carie and Chastity come back to join them. Garelle points
toward where she thinks the campfire is, and Chastity says she will
go check it out (without Carie, who is not being very quiet). "I
noticed," Garelle says.

She finds the camp; there's someone tanning hides, someone tending the
fire, and someone whittling on a stick that might be used as part of a
trap. There are also two large hunting dogs, and the woman whittling
has a wolfskin rug at her feet. She can see a bear trap.

She returns to the group and reports that it seems to be just a
hunting party, and perhaps they should just go around them. Carie
says perhaps they should ask them for information about a switchback
trail or if they know anything about where the cove is, but the rest
all think it will be better to leave them out of it.

Jarvis discerns that there is a path from that camp to the rise
where it gets rocky, and sees a series of switchbacks. As Jarvis
points it out, Carie sees the top of a ladder and a well-camouflaged
archery stand and a small guard tower. They decide to break out their
climbing gear and go a different way to avoid having these guards
signal the folks in the big tower. They make it up the cliff face
without incident and head toward the big tower.

The tower is ancient and falling apart. There is a hole in the side
with poles stuck in it to block it off. There are other poles blocking
a hole in the walkway to it. As most of the crew hide behind a wall,
Chastity sneaks forward to look into the hole in the side. She can
see the entire ground level, and hears something a bit higher up.
She climbs up to peek into the second floor and sees a dapper-looking
halfling carrying a way too large sword strapped to his back. He's
pacing back and forth, fretting: "I don't know if we should wait. I'm
getting worried." The Jhoynian woman with him says, "I understand, I'd
write them off at this point. I don't think they would have survived.
I'm pretty sure it's some sort of demon." "But we don't have anything
that can take it out. It vanishes!" "...And I think it ate their souls."
She gleans that the next ship coming in won't be there for another two
days, and that they think they have the demon trapped in the cove.

Chastity quietly goes back to the group and says, "I think it's time
to leave. There's a demon. They're not paying me enough to fight the
demon." Wend, though, thinks they should fight the demon, because it's
the right thing to do. "Since when did doing the right thing become the
right thing to do?" Garelle asks. "It would be greatly appreciated if
you did try to take it out," the halfling says, looking down on them
from above. "How greatly appreciated?" Wend asks. He says they have a
lot of stuff they can't get to right now, so if they take out the demon
he's happy to give them something they want. He describes the demon,
which is huge, and Chastity says, "Nope, I'm going back to the boat."
Everyone else is at least interested in checking it out. Jarvis recalls
hearing about demon-traps that can contain a demon by speaking the
command word -- most likely written on it -- and guesses that's what
the horn is.

After some discussion, the halfling, Urdo, invites them in to talk
more. He sketches out what the cove looks like and where he thinks
the flask might have landed. Jarvis asks what the gate is made of;
Urdo says it's iron. Jarvis says the bosses sometimes talk about
some of the things they fight not liking certain materials, so maybe
this one doesn't like iron. He wonders alout if maybe the bear trap
Chastity saw might be made of iron. Carie suggests someone really
fast who could also read the inscription could run in, grab the flask,
jump in the water where the demon doesn't want to go, and read the
word on the flask.

They make their way down to peek into the cove, along with the woman,
Alisha. They see six dead smugglers but do not see the demon or the
flask. Garelle can smell the stench of the blood and the sea, which
blocks out most everything else. They divide into a group to fight
the demon and a group to look for the flask and read the word.
Chastity loans Alisha her magical dagger so she has a better chance
of hurting the demon.

Urdo opens the gate and he, Alisha, Garelle, and Wend run in. Alisha
says, "I saw something in the dirt down there!" She heads that way.
Carie hands Wend a bag of flour and says, "Throw this on the demon
so you can see it!" He brings it to Alisha.

Jarvis, Chastity, and Carie move to where they think the flask is.
Jarvis sees it and picks it up.

They hear a horrendous roar as the demon appears in front of Wend
and Garelle and attacks them. It hits Wend, slamming his left shoulder,
and tries to grapple, but he's able to break away. It swipes at Garelle
and grabs her left leg, but she also is able to pull free. Everything
around it appears to twist and fold, and it vanishes; Garelle perceives
it pulling away and takes a swing at it, hitting it with cold damage
from her mace. There is a strange cry coming from the multiple mouths
of the demon. Urdo grabs the flour out of Alisha's hands and hurls
it; it slams into the invisible demon and multiple eyes blink open
and closed through the sheen of flour.

Garelle steps forward five feet, just enough to put it in her blind
sight, flings her dagger at it, and hits. She points to it and says
to Wend, "It's there!" not realizing it's covered in flour. Wend
skirts around it to hit it from behind and leave space from his
allies to hit from the front. He hits with his mace, releasing a
massive explosion of thunder damage. Alisha runs up and stabs it
in the head as it reaches down to try to grab her.

Chastity takes a look at the flask Jarvis is holding to figure out
where the command word might be written on it. She sees it is written
in Bargallian -- which she is the only person in the group who can
read: "Imperium". As she says the word, "Goranda" in Bargallian,
magic tendrils shoot out about ten feet, passing through them without
doing anything to them. "Now we know how close to get to use it!"
Jarvis says, and Chastity replies, "Um, yeah, I meant to do that!"
He runs forward within ten feet of the creature and repeats the
word; the tendrils writhe out and grab the demon, sucking it into
the flask, which closes on it.

Urdo goes to look on his injured folks; all but one are dead, and
the other is seriously injured, but Jarvis is able to get him
stabilized. Urdo asks how they got there, and Chastity tells him
Denis hired them to get the flask back. "He's on the island?" "Yes,"
Chastity says. "Mind if I go back with you?" Urdo asks.


5 October 2024

The smugglers go back and confront Dennis, telling them they plan
to tie him up and drop him off to the authorities onshore with evidence
of his prior crimes.

Urdo gives the crew a contact in port, figuring he still owes them for
the help with the demon. He says to drop his name if they ever need
anything. He gives them Dennis's rowboat to get back to shore.

Meanwhile, back in Terriolla....


Kat notices two glowing blue, short whirlwinds hovering in the air above
the lobby -- invisible air circulation. All the stalls around the edge of
the lobby have clearly displayed badges showing they are licensed to sell
there. More people than usual have companion animals -- crows, monkeys --
that retrieve things for them; Al notices that their aura looks similar to
Az, although a few others appear to be fiends rather than fey. There are
also floating discs to carry goods and magic hands to retrieve them. Clearly
there is a lot of casual magic in use here. 

Gnik peruses the stalls looking for books; Milena purchases a few interesting
fruits to try; Kat just wanders around taking it all in and thinking about
how easy it might be to lift trinkets.

Al wanders with Kai looking for anything that might be Tillian or from
Saltmarsh, but also things he's never seen before. There is a stall
with models of the colosseum and toy weapons for kids. Kai looks at
one of the cheap Tower of Time souvenirs, then puts it back on the
shelf. There is a larger, nicer model with glass around the pinnacle,
with a giant chair visible in the top. Kai asks what the chair is for,
and the merchant says the priests sit in it; it is guarded to make
sure no one climbs or flies up, and mentions that it is illegal to fly
in town. Kai asks indignantly why that is, and he says it's dangerous;
"No it's not, I do it all the time!" "Dangerous for other people,
maybe," Gnik suggests. The merchant nods.

The booth also has small cubes, black with some kind of pink marble.
Kai asks what it is, and the merchant says it's terriol -- a material
that is native to Terriolla but can't be exported because it turns
to dust. The merchant says it's not real terriol -- it's just a
souvenir representing it. Kat and Gnik have heard other things about
terriol -- that it is poisonous if ingested, and that mages have set
up portals for it to flow into so that it doesn't contaminate the
water supply as it comes out of the mountain. It is used as building
material. Kat asks if there are samples of actual terriol that they
can see up close; the merchant says she could go to the manufacturing
area, as they make a lot of things with it. Kat buys one of the
souvenir cubes.

Gnik asks around about stalls selling scrolls, but learns that there's
a permanent shop in town for that sort of thing, since most people in
town wouldn't be able to use a scroll. Gnik says he's looking for a
very low-level scroll, so most people should be able to use them. He
learns that in fact most people in town have bought their familiars;
there's a mage who has figured out how to summon familiars for non-mages.
The unseen servants, floating discs, and mage hands mostly come from a
device also invented by the mages. Realizing that the main magic here is
conjuration, Kai goes looking for a mug that conjures beer.

They get tickets for Reggie's show the next night. Kat springs for the
box, which seats six. Ember gives the vendor a sharp look, and he says,
"Ah, yes, we have seats for smaller people."

They exit the tower to another market. They see a couple of booths
selling the devices one of the merchants told them about that conjures
floating discs, unseen servants, and mage hands; it works like a wand
with charges that recharge at dawn, but is very expensive. There is an
area on the edge of several priests handing out bags of food to those
who present a certain badge. Al inquires about it and learns that it
is a charity operation for those registered as being in need, run by
priests of Sayd, Maria, and Vlondrel.

They secure rooms at the Jaded Spoon, which looks like a large mansion.
The board outside lists the daily menu: rhubarb pecan cakes, hazelnut
venison stew, honey cakes. The proprietress greets them and asks if
they came for the food or if they need a room. When she seems a little
surprised they want to check in, a young woman with horns and a tail
pops into the room and says, "Mom, you're underselling it again. The
rooms are great!" One of the small rooms in the attic is already
rented for the next two weeks; they rent the other four rooms for
the next week.

26 Mara 3275

They sit down for breakfast and are directed to Florence and to Grory,
a gnome who arranges the drinks. She has two axes strapped to her back
that she is not hiding at all. Krista's father, Nuihar, is elven and
the cook. 

They head to the colosseum before Kai gets too bored. As they approach
they see a stone statue, eyes closed, until a weasel climbs up onto
its shoulder and sticks its nose in the statues ear; the statue
laughs, and they can feel the tremors in the earth. Kai asks one of
the fighters, Arden, about her; she is Mashga, one of the colosseum
warriors. Al introduces the group and says they're interested to learn
more -- and some of them might be interested to compete.

Kai asks Mashga what she is; Mashga says, "I am Kiron!" She points
to the sky. "You're from Jaeleth?" Mashga says she was conjured
out of the heart of Jaeleth and doesn't want to go back; "Why
would I go back to that waking when I could stay in this dreaming?"
She likes her colosseum life.

Mashka takes them into the colosseum and gives them some of the
history of the structure, pointing out the statues above of
Ceonarre, Alyddia, Vlondrel, and Gosh. They learn Cayron -- Tyollus's
partner and Alyddia's daughter -- is also revered here.

Mashga introduces them to Hollie Welty, who manages the colosseum.
She sizes them up and asks if they want to participate in any fights.
The weasel, Slayer -- who it turns out is the size of a panther -- has
accompanied them; he agrees with a nod and a squeak when Hollie
says the animals are well cared for, and paid, if they are intelligent
enough. Slayer's aura reads to Al like a normal animal. Mashka's aura
is the same color as the Koth -- perhaps because she is from Jaeleth.

Gnik asks Slayer for permission to read her mind; she looks suspicious
at first, but Gnik reassures her he's not going to probe, he just wants
to ask some questions and understand Slayer's answers. Slayer makes a
squeak that Mashga says is "yes", so Gnik casts Detect Thoughts. He
immediately detects a barrage of curious questions that he attempts
to answer as quickly as possible while asking a few questions himself.
Slayer came here as a kit and has been taken in by Mashga.

Al and Kai discuss the how to get a bout scheduled, and how they would
be classified according to their abilities and their magic items. Hollie
asks if they would like to fight each other, and Kai says no, they have
that chance all the time. After some discussion, Hollie asks if anyone
else wants to be involved; Ember nods enthusiastically. Rodger looks
like he might be thinking about it until Kat says she's not interested.
Milena says quietly to Rodger that he might have more fun making wagers.

Once they get that arranged, Kat goes wandering the markets looking for
new clothes. One merchant is very excited to design for her and incorporate
her tail into the design. Kai goes looking to find the shadier parts of
town and learns that while there is a lower-income part of town, there is
no shantytown; when someone comes into town without a home, or loses their
home, one is found or made for them, and there is a lot of assistance in
finding jobs for those who need and can hold one, and supporting those
who cannot work. She also hears a strange rumor that the altar of Maria
sometimes spontaneously gets replaced by sticky buns, and has to be
replaced; they've stopped replacing it because they got tired of doing
it every two weeks or so. Kai gets the sense that they are generally
happy and feel they have opportunities to move up into other jobs if
they want, rather than being repressed or exploited. 


26 October 2024

In the evening, the group attends the play, which is impressively done
with excellent use of magic for the special effects. They have an excellent
view from the box they purchased. During intermission, a male halfling comes
to their box and says, "Mr. Ortlan says he would like to see you -- I'd
be happy to come back after the show and take you to him, if you'd like."
They agree, and as they depart, Kat says, "We didn't even tell him we
were around." Kai says, "People tend to know when we show up."

Kat is amazed by the production. Kai says she wonders how true-to-life
it was, so they asks Gnik. He gets an entranced look on his face; he
recalls a book he read called "The Guileful" that includes the facts
that are known and much that is unknown, such as where she came from
before arriving as a young girl in Tyriln. The inspector in the play
was actually multiple investigators in real life, many of whom didn't
know they were tracking the same perpetrator because she was smart
enough not to use the same tactics every time; the romance, and her
leaving with the inspector, were a romanticization. In reality, she
departed to unknown whereabouts. In his trance, Gnik also gets memories
of someone digging into archives, paying a divination mage to find out
where she went, but she was not findable on this plane -- as if she
cloaked herself in a way to make herself unfindable, or left for
somewhere else entirely.

The halfling page, Seredo, returns after the show and invites them
to follow him. They go backstage through the hectic post-show cleanup
and arrive at Reggie's dressing room just as he emerges. He greets
Kat enthusiastically. She compliments his performance and says, "How
did you know we were here?" He replies, somewhat sheepishly, "I may
have told the people at the desk that if anyone showed up here that
looked exactly like you to let me know...?" Gnik says, "Not *exactly*
-- she didn't have a tail before." "No, that's new," Reggie says, as
Kat's tail swishes in agitation at Gnik's comment. Kat tells him they
are in town purely for tourism.

The actress who played Layla, Paige, emerges from her dressing room
and Reggie invites her over. She comes over, suddenly bashful, and
Reggie introduces her to everyone -- even members of the group he
has never met before. Paige says he has mentioned them before. Reggie
asks Kat if she'd like to have breakfast in the morning, and she says
yes; she asks what else the group should do in town and he defers to
Paige, who is from Tyriln. Paige mentions several things they've
already heard about, and when she gets to the amphitheater, Kai
says, "Oh, yeah, we're fighting there tomorrow. Well, just me,
Al, and Ember. Individually tomorrow, and as a group the next day."
Reggie perks up and says, "We should go!" Paige seems dubious. They
chat a bit more -- Paige slinks off to do her own thing -- and then
Reggie hugs Kat again and heads off to take care of a few things
himself.

Back at the Jaded Spoon, Gnik chats a bit with Grory, the bartender.
She says she is a bit worried about Nuihar, the cook, who has had
a rough life. Gnik asks if Krista, the tiefling girl, is adopted,
and Grory says no, she's Nuihar's... but maybe he should ask them.
He has flashes of memories of a woman doing research to find every
tiefling she can find to figure out why they are born -- he infers
that she had a child and is trying to figure out where it came from.
She concludes the child must be born of someone who is at least
part-human or part-orc, or who had some kind of relationship with
a demon.


27 Mara 3275

In the morning, Reggie is less energetic than he was last night --
the cast was out late -- but he's still happy to see her. They chat
a bit about his work -- he says he will do plays in several cities
until he has money to take some time off, so he's not completely tied
to the grind of play after play. Recalling that Jae was the one who
had invited him to Saltmarsh, she mentions they saw her on a Wanted
poster when they got to town and asks what happened; he characterizes
it as "a misunderstanding" but says she should ask Jae when she's back
in town... "and tell her I didn't tell you." Reggie suggests they shoud
eat there at the Jaded Spoon, since he doesn't get to that part of town
often. Krista comes over to serve them and is totally starstruck,
stammering to put together sentences. Reggie asks Kat what she's been
up to, and she takes the opportunity to spin stories of their adventures,
with voices and gestures. He eats it up, and they chat for quite a while.
He has to check back in at the theater, but says he will find her at
the colosseum and gives her the name of someone there that she should
check in with so he will know where they are sitting.

When the group arrives at the colosseum, Kat and Milena go to
find seats while Gnik accompanies Ember, Kai, and Al while they
prepare for their fights. They find that the people running
the fights have found out in the last two days who they are.
"Dammit," says Gnik under his breath. Kai will face someone named
Souvar, a chimera; Al will face Yelkan, a trent; and Ember will
face Jinath, an Awakened owlbear. The fighters are advised that
because this fight is for entertainment purposes, they shouldn't
try to end the fight as quickly as possible or incapacitate their
opponents -- Kai gives a significant look at Al, who sags a bit
-- but not let it drag on so long that it gets boring, either.

Souvar comes out to meet Kai. He sees the sword on her back and
the snow leopard-head asks, "You fight with sword?" "Yes," she says.
"Any ranged weapons?" She opens her mouth to answer, looks at
Gnik, and says, "Should I tell him all my tricks?" "He's trying
to plan the entertainment," Gnik says, so she replies, "I can,
but it's not my favorite." "Ice breath," says the dragon head.
She asks if the stinger at the end of his long tail will
paralyze her, and the leopard-head says, "Make sick." "Much
throw-up," adds the goat-head enthusiastically. The dragon-head
looks at the goat-head and makes a disgusted sound.

Yelkan emerges, sees Al, and expresses gratitude that he's not
going up against a blade-user this time. Jinath sees Ember and
says in a growly voice, "Oh, you're adorable! This will be fun!"

Kai asks how the fight starts. Souvar tells her that since she's
the guest she will be announced first. When Souvar's name is
announced, he flies out a tunnel partway up the stands and roars;
the match starts as soon as they meet, so she could fly up to
meet him -- "The crowd would love that," he adds. He tells her
there are magics in place that will keep them from dying even
though they will go down at the same pace they would normally;
but when the fight ends they will be reset to their health state
when the match started. Hollie, the colosseum manager, also notes
that you don't have to win for the crowd to like you and want to
see you again -- as long as they are entertained. She points out
that if you want to roar while you're fighting, you'll have to do
it extra-loud to be heard over the crowd. "I... don't really roar,"
Kai says. "Heh. Leave that to me," says the leopard-head.

As Gnik wanders around among the fighters, he finds that they are
all happy and well-looked after.

Ember is introduced for her fight as she comes up through a trapdoor.
"They were just passing through and decided to visit the best place
in Terriolla!" the announcer says. The crowd laughs and coos at how
cute she is until she whips out her blades and glares, and they start
cheering. Jinath is introduced, and he comes roaring out of a nearby
trapdoor, pouncing 30 feet into the air to try to land on her. She
leaps up and manages to climb on his back and ride him around for
a bit, pricking him with her blade. He eventually throws her off but
she dances around between his legs, pricking him from below. She
wears him down while making clear that she could take him out at
any time. When finally he falls from exhaustion, she jumps up on
his back, does a little tapdance, and throws her arms up in a "ta-da!"
gesture; the crowd goes wild.

Kai is announced, and as Souvar comes out she flies up to meet him
so aggressively that he pulls back a bit. The three heads bite at
her and the leopard-head sinks its teeth in and tries to throw her,
but finds that it has passes right through her. "That's it, we're
breathing," the dragon-head says, but she manages to dodge the
ice. They are reasonably well-matched through much of the fight,
but eventually Kai manages to get a hand on its wings to grapple.
"We taking to ground?" the dragon-head asks. "I don't know...
what would be fun here?" Kai asks. Souvar decides to tuck its
wings in response to her grapple and falls to the ground. Kai
lands nearby and the ram-head slams her and knocks her down.
The dragon-head breathes ice at her again, doing some damage.
As the fight nears its end, Souvar tries hitting her with his
tail but she keeps dodging out of the way; eventually she manages
to grab the tail and brings up her sword, and Souvar holds up a
paw, conceding.

Al talks with Yelken about how they might make their fight more fun
and Al decides perhaps he should use his quicker movement to jump
around Yelken's branches and between his legs. He also pulls out his
extra floating fish. When he's announced, Yelkin runs down from the
platform at the top of the stadium through crowds waving his flag;
Al runs toward him to tumble between his legs, and Yelkin's ribcage
opens up releasing a pile of squirrels. Al is surprised, but manages
to hop on his back, dodging the vines coming from his hands. He pulls
out a bag from his belt pouch and pulls it down over Yelken's head,
then trips him, knocking him down completely as squirres run up and
try to pull the bag off. Al nets several of the squirrels and flings
them to another part of the arena, taking care to keep them inside
the area of protection so they don't get hurt. In the meantime, Yelken
gets the bag off his head and stands up again, chittering at the
squirrels as he does so. Al grabs Yelken's tendrils and attempts to
tie them together under his feet, but the tendrils just come off. Yelken
grabs Al in a bear hug -- very tightly; Al hears some things
cracking -- and roars, while winking at Al. Al hits his face with
a flurry of blows, and Yelken falls backward -- still holding Al.
The crowd roars and applauds, and Al takes a bow.

A fourth fight is between a dwarf and a Starrier named Uradu, a
reptilian with a lower jaw that can elongate to sweep toward the
dwarf and who can teleport short distances; Uradu is the victor.

Afterward, Kat goes to check on the status of the new outfit she
commissioned and Milena goes with Gnik and Kai to see more of the
Tower of Time. There are a couple of priestesses of Cynthia on the
stairs into the tower and Gnik inquires about a tour; a young woman
named Beth comes down to be their guide. She is fun and a little
sarcastic; she asks what they'd like to see, and Kai says, "That big
chair at the top of the tower would be interesting...." When Beth
seems amenable, Kai suggests maybe they could go where other tours
don't go. Kat joins them and Beth seems a bit taken with her, so
they engage in some friendly flirting as they make their way to
the chairs at the top. "Everyone knows that the tower has been
here since the beginning of time," Beth says; "No one knows where
it came from and it seems like it was being refurbished as time
goes on." She says it's not known the purpose of the chairs at
the top, but there is an amazing view from the top of the 300-foot
tower... on top of a high cliff. Kai says, "I thought there were
guards up here," and Beth answers, "There's not much to guard
unless there's an event happening." They see that the spire above
the protective bubble at the top does indeed look like a chair
sized for one of the largest of the Koth. Beth notes that even
though it is outside the bubble of protection it is still protected
from the fierce wind outside the tower.

As they discuss where else in the tower they might want to see, Gnik
says, "I mostly wanted to see how it compared to the other one we saw.
Beth looks surprised: "Other one? Where was it?" "Martyr's Rest," Gnik
says, just as Kat says, "Hell's Deep." "In the Broken Isles? I thought
no one went there," Beth says. "Well, there are reasons we needed a
vacation," Gnik says. Kat adds, tantalizingly, "We know what's supposed
to sit in the chair." "What?" Beth asks. "Have you ever heard of the
Koth?" Kat asks, and when Beth says no, Gnik brings up images and
gives her a basic overview -- without mentioning K'Jat. "That will give
you a place to start researching," Kat says. "Think of that as our
thank-you to you for showing us around." Gnik also gives her the name
of the archaeologists studying the tower under the sea.

Milena asks a bit about the worship of Cynthia from the priests'
point of view: Cynthia is goddess of time, change, continuity, non-combat
survival, and the lost. The tower was once considered a gift from Cynthia,
and while it is no longer assumed as such, it is considered a sacred place
to her because it is moving backward in time.

After leaving the tower Gnik, Milena, and Al go to the Treasury, which is
actually a museum. There are exhibits of the Books of Life that write
themselves -- or, as legend has it, that Alsaya is writing -- an exhibit
that suggests that Gonajibria is built on the body of a dead god, the
precious stones room that includes a diamond said to have been made by
Alyddia with her bare hands, a bit about Terriolla and its history
including the effects of various stonefalls, and other bits of history.
The most recent section is on local hero Reginald who is ascending to
godhood.

Kat and Rodger decide that despite the pretty rocks the museum will
probably be more boring than they're looking for, so they follow Kai
and Ember. 

The Treasury is a massive building with a lot of security. By the time
they make their way to the divine history section a woman comes rushing up
and introduces herself as Eliya, head of the divine history section, and
says she is very pleased to meet them. Gnik says he's pleased to meet her
too, as she has the books that write themselves. "Yes, and you have shown
up in them," she says. Gnik blinks, and she offers to take them back to
see it. The guards look uneasy as they pass, but let them go.

The books are under glass, but the pages can be turned back with Mage
Hand. Gnik and Eliya start talking nerd librarian mage talk, and then
she turns back the pages to show a passage saying "The Saviors arrive
at Martyr's Rest and end the threat there," and a few pages later notes
their arrival at Cloud's Edge and then in Terriolla. Gnik expresses
curiosity about when they started appearing in the book, but Eliya has
not read back that far.

Gnik and Milena peruse the rest of the divine history section; there
is information about the Cleansing saying that details have been omitted
to prevent future threats (and of course it almost happened in Saltmarsh).
Gnik looks for information about which gods were involved in the God
Wars: at least per the evidence here, good-aligned gods were mostly fighting
the agents of the evil gods. The god of mountains, a bit of a troublemaker,
had some involvement, as did Tamoth, against the trinity and others.


9 November 2024

When they arrive back at the inn Milena talks with Nuihar. As a chef he
is very interested to know about her native cuisine, as he has never met
a Bargallian. She tries to draw him out about his own past, starting with
how he became interested in cooking as he seems very comfortable talking
about that. He is from Kyntar, which is not far south of the Bargal
Valley but with no pass connecting the two. Some time ago -- in 3231,
about 40 years ago -- a plague passed through, wiping almost everyone out.
He was in Rantokc's realm at the time; he had a run-in with a fiend that
resulted in his injury, but says he can't complain because he got the
two women in his life from it. She mentions her group has had a run-in
with fiends in the past and asks the name of this one; he says he only
knew her as Liara and thought she was human. He asks more about how
they keep the crew fed on the ship; she shares that they have a range
of ways and tells the story of establishing friendship with the new
lizardfolk colony with a jar of "troll starter". He is curious how
one would make that palatable and Milena says it is a food of last
resort, but is always there. She offers to find an appropriate vessel
and give him some, and he excitedly agrees -- he almost smiles. He's
definitely interested in a challenge -- she perceives that he is
probably more than 200 years old.

That evening, Bernace shows up with an extremely large man she
introduces as Nightson. With her new time perception, Milena sees that
Bernace is probably 500 or 600 years old, the oldest human Milena
has ever seen; Nightson is more confusing, as different parts of him
seem to have different ages. When she sees the group, she smiles like
she was expecting to see them and slides a chair over to their table.
She sits and Nightson stands behind her; Gnik can see that he is masked
by a glamor and beneath it he is actually a flesh golem.

Bernace says, "I wanted to personally thank you for your help---"
Kai says, "We weren't doing it for you." Bernace says, "I know, but
since we worked together -- and you tied up the loose ends with Raging
Hammer -- I wanted to say thank you, and to offer you a gift." Kai says,
"I could use more of those potions -- but both this time, not just the
one that poisons but also the one that counteracts the poison." Bernace
nods and digs through her bag, pulling out a couple potions each of
Ebbing Strength and Dire Cleansing. She then offers them Nightson. "No
thank you," Gnik says, "but thank you for the offer." She says he is a
loyal servant, but Kai says they don't need that, even after Bernace
points out they have a whole ship full of servants." "That we PAY
VERY WELL," Kai says.

Kat asks what she is doing in Terriolla and Bernace says she just
came to find them and say thank you. "You must have much more convenient 
means of transportation than we have," Gnik says. Bernace smiles and says
yes. She asks if the group needs any more potions, or perhaps some shadow
eggs. They decline, so she puts her potions away and prepares to leave.
Gnik asks her if there are things they should know about, and she says
that in Seton the town has rallied behind Susanna, the daughter and heir
of the previous ruler. Gnik asks what Auntie Treeshadow wants and Bernace
says she wants to see civilization survive and the Koth were a threat to
that. Gnik says, "We don't have a problem with that," but Kat interjects,
"But she wants to kill Danae!" Al gets the impression of a flicker of
anger from Bernace that she can't control; Kat also sees it and gets
the impression it is anger at the situation, followed by trying to
process something; Kai and Milena get the impression Bernace feels 
anger at all of them as well for their part in the situation. Kat stares
intently at Bernace in challenge, who says, "I think on that I'm going to
go. Good to see you all." She departs.

After she's gone, Al says, "I think she's Auntie Treeshadow." "Based on
what?" Kai asks. Al sensed that she saw Danae as a personal threat rather
than a threat to an ally. Milena shares that that explains why she seems
to be the oldest person Milena has ever seen.

As they settle in for the evening, Grory offers them all drinks. She
says to Milena she heard she had a good talk with Nuihar. "We talked
food," Milena says, "and I will be giving him a small token of friendship
you may or may not appreciate." "You won't," Kai says. "I trust his skill,"
Milena counters.

Gnik asks Grory about the other guest in the upstairs suite; she is Postia,
who came to enjoy the food. Grory continues making them drinks until they
all get a bit silly; Milena asks for a cocktail that tastes like Bargallian
winter, with berries -- and Grory delivers. ("So, bitter..." Gnik says.)


28 Mara 3275

In the morning Milena goes in search of a suitable crock for troll
starter. Kat and Rodger go exploring. Those who are fighting in the
group match head to the colosseum to strategize about the fight. They
learn that they will be fighting someone called Boil, who seems to be
some kind of wide, spiky blue ice creature that can reshape
itself. "So, how do you fight?" Kai asks.  "Oh," Boil says, "I can--"
"DON'T!" the colosseum managers interject; "Tell them, don't show
them!" He says, "I can make it really, really, really cold, and I can
do this!" He drives one of his nine spiky legs into the ground and the
floor ices over near him. Al says, "So maybe we could flood the
arena?" "It wouldn't be a very entertaining fight," the managers say.
They discuss a few other options.

Gnik returns to the Treasury to learn if anything else appeared about
them in the book since the day before. It hasn't, so Gnik shares that
they were visited by someone who might be noteworthy and wanted to see
if anything made it in about that. Eliya asks who that was, and Gnik
shares that they think it was a powerful hag.

Kat and Rodger go down to the area where terriole is being processed:
sending it through and retrieving it from a portal. They see Boil
there at his day job freezing the liquid terriole into solid and
mention it over the Farspeakers. Kat decides to try to take a piece
of the solid terriole. Rodger serves as a decoy and Kat cracks one
of the shadow eggs over herself. Rodger looks at her and says, "Oh,
that's weird -- you are kind of droopy and weird looking and your
outline is fuzzy." He takes Mouse and goes to run around and knock
things over. Kat sneaks over to a pile of bricks; someone comes around
the pile and is about to see her but someone else rolls a cart of
black terriole behind her right at that moment and she completely
blends in. She grabs a brick and sneaks away.

The fight begins; as the group is announced the crowd cheers and they
notice that some people now have flags for them -- with a red donut
on them. Boil comes out of the floor and makes an ear-piercing screechy
sound, like he is trying to roar but doesn't really get roaring. He
runs forward on his janky legs. Kai runs forward with Ember on her
back while Al runs around the other side. Ember jumps off and tries
to get under him, while Al attempts to tie Boil's legs together. Boil
sits just as Ember gets under him. "Argh, cold!" Ember yells as she
stabs at him. Al finds that as he grabs Boil's legs, they break off,
and new ones grow back in their place. Suddenly it is so cold that
it hurts to blink, for just a moment. Boil stands just a bit so Ember
can get away. Kai scoops up Al, flies up, and drops him. Ember tries
to stab Boil from beneath again but he pins her with ice spikes; her
teammates hear lots of fey cursewords. Al lands on Boil, taking out
some of the spikes and then gracefully flipping off. Through the
farspeakers, Al says, "Let's take him from three sides." "Great,"
Ember replies through gritted teeth, "you take the bottom."

Kai throws her chain javelin at Boil while Al and Ember distract
him. Kai pulls him up and says, "I'm going to fling you!" "Wheee!"
says Boil as he flies across the arena. Several spikes break off
but he regrows new ones. Kai, Al, and Ember all throw their abyssal
daggers. Ember's and Kai's hit, but Al's skitters away -- it was
not designed to be thrown. They call their daggers back and Al and
Ember dive over Boil to take out the spikes and limbs. Kai skewers
through Boil, who shatters -- and Kai gasps. A couple of people come
out with a giant broom and dustpan. Kai asks under her breath, "He's
okay, right?" "Yeah, he does this every time." As soon as they are
back through the door Boil pops back into form and Kai cheers.

That evening Grory sits next to Milena and says, "Nuihar told you
about the devil Liana?" Milena says yes, and she says he usually
doesn't mention that to anyone. Milena says she'd asked a few
questions because the group has encountered fiends before and was
wondering if it was one they knew about. Grory sets a slip of paper
on the table and says, "No expectations." The paper says: Nesiza Mentz.
Milena shares this with the group and Gnik realizes there may be a
reference in the book at the Treasury. Kat also checks Glee's book,
finding an entry that refers to a succubus of that name who did
some impressive corruption and is no longer a succubus -- meaning
she has probably taken a more powerful form.


28 November 2024

Al, Gnik, and Kat ask around to see if they can find anyone who tried
going up the mountain to the source of the Terriole. Kat gets connected
to an adventurer named Lendara, who says they encountered some kind
of stone spirit that took out some of her party; afterward the rest of
them made it to the top but can't remember anything about it. Kat
asks about the stone creature, and Lendara says it was wearing very
pretty jeweled armor and had a blue stone circling around its head.
Gnik finds information about Rebecca Zuck, who made it up the hill, saw
a creature in the distance, and came back down; she's retired and
living a quiet life in the nice part of town. Gnik invites Kat and Al
to come with her to visit her.

She has a well-maintained, 3-story house with a nice yard in the back
with a garden. They pull the bell and hear a voice upstairs: "Just a
minute!" After a few minutes, a Jhoynian woman in her 80s, silver-haired,
hunched over a bit but still over 6 feet tall, opens the door, breathing
a bit heavily. She says hello and adds, "Sorry, I don't get many visitors."
Kat introduces the group and says they are writing a travelogue and are
interested in including her story about investigating where the terriole
comes from. She says she and her friends went up -- that was before she
ran into a ghost, which is why she's old now and in somewhat forced
retirement -- and dealt with some wyverns, then when they got near the
top she saw a creature whose head she could see through, which she
didn't like, so she came back down. She describes a fountain of terriole
-- clearly not water -- coming up out of a lake. Kat remembers that when
they read the scroll that summoned an angel, it first had a form with a
difficult-to-comprehend head before taking on a form more acceptable to
them; and the celestial they freed from the hags' trap also had that
kind of appearance, though somewhat corrupted, when they first saw it.
Gnik sees a memory of a woman leaning on a mace and with a beaten-up
shield and busted armor -- perhaps 30 feet tall -- surrounded by two others
and saying, "This is your job now, for the rest of existence, to prevent
anyone from ever leaving." The area is stone and there is dust settling
as if something big just happened here. As Gnik gets a better sense of
the surroundings, he realizes his perspective was wrong and the woman
speaking was closer to 50 feet tall. 

Gnik falls over; and when he comes to, Rebecca asks if he's okay and
if he needs anything; Kat says maybe a glass of water, which will give
them time to talk when he's out of the room. He relates what he saw,
and says he thinks the speaking woman may have been Maria, talking to
an angel, although not necessarily the same one Rebecca saw -- he didn't
see any terriole in the area. 



29 Mara 3275

Kat is interested in increasing her notoriety by publicly announcing
that they're going to find the source of the terriole. She asks about
if there is a town newspaper, and Al asks the staff at the hotel who
in town is the town gossip who people go to for stories. Ruthe, Grory,
and Florance all look at Krista, who says, "Yeah, I can do that! What
do you want to share?" Al says they're going up the mountain to find
the source of the terriole, and his friend Kat is really the instigator
and is very brave and he thought people would want to know about it
because it would make a good story. 

As they are leaving the inn, there are children playing outside dressed
as Al, Kai, and Ember and playing at fighting in the arena.

Kat goes to the newspaper to share her story. "Oh, Saltmarsh Saviors,
right? Some of you fought in the arena?" "Yes, some of my crew fought,"
she says. He asks for stories  about other adventures they've had, and Kat 
happily obliges.

Al goes to the arena to let one of the bookies know what they're doing:
"We're going to do something with a low chance of success and wondered
what kind of odds you'd give us." He explains what they're doing, and
the bookie, Kirk, tells him he'll consult with the other bookies and
they should have some odds ready in the morning.

Jimsu will not be coming with them. Rodger is interested, but Kat is
worried about him, so Milena asks him to stay in town and report their
progress each day to the paper, which she will relate to him via Sending.

They decide that Kai will fly most of the way up the mountain
carrying Kat, and take one door of the Pocket Office with them.
The other half of the group will stay in town in a private room
with the other Pocket Office door open, and come through when Kai
opens her side.

As Kai and Kat ascend, they see lots of plant and animal life except
near the flow of terriole -- which doesn't seem to be cutting a riverbed
into the rock, it just flows right over. They pass a woman with red hair
stooped over doing something they can't quite make out, but they don't
stop to talk to her. 

The flow of terriole is weirdly cohesive. Kat experiments with throwing
a stick into it; it churns along for a bit and then gets spit out from
the flow.

Kai can see the footpath peek out from time to time on the left side
of the flow. On the right are strange jagged mountains -- more a giant
mass of rock than typical mountains. There is a spiraling pillar of
stone that looks like it has been shaped from the stone; there are
windows in it, and it is perhaps 200-300 feet tall with a diameter of
about 40 feet -- not as big as the Tower of Time, but impressively
large. They make a mental note to investigate it on the way back down.

They fly for about 5 hours, guessing it would take another 3 hours of
hiking to get to the end of the path. It is cold and windy out of the
protection of the valley around Terriolla.

They land and open the portal. Gnik is sitting in the office reading
and lets the others know it's time to go through. They leave Jimsu
in charge of the other office door. Kat and Kai tell them about the
corkscrew tower and the girl they saw on the path, but that they're
saving that to investigate on the way back down.

They make their way up the rock; there is very little plant life,
just some lichen and a few small plants growing out of cracks.
Eventually they see what looks like a pillar of terriole rising
up 8 or 9 feet tall and then falling into a lake that flows out
through a gap. Floating over the lake is a being, perhaps 12 feet
tall, white and helmeted although with no discernible head. Al asks
if they should greet it to let it know they're here, and they get a
sense of agreement in their heads -- it knows they are here.

If Milena thought Auntie Treeshadow was the oldest thing she had
ever seen, this is even older, by far, and unchanging through time.
Al sees its aura as blue, suggesting perhaps an air elemental -- the
same as the air-refreshers in the Temple of Time. They get the sense
of its name -- Jabrile.

Kai says, "The source of this came up as demon, and we did not like
it." There is no disagreement. Kai asks where the Terriolla comes
from, and they get an image of a woman with a shield and mace, a
slightly smaller guy with two short swords teleporting around the
battlefield, and another man on the other side of the fight with a longsword,
fighting a demonic horror-show that does not fit in reality.

Kai says, "You trapped a demon in the mountain? Is this its blood
or... ichor?" They get a sense of an affirmative -- "but you can
never tell anyone." Kai asks when the flow started, and the being
thinks, "...recently?" They know it has been happening for as long
as people were aware of this place, so probably since Maerson was
still a part of Jaeleth.

Kat asks why they can't tell anyone, and the being responds that
they cannot risk that someone would try to free the demon -- and
someone would. Milena asks if it can be destroyed, or if it can
be banished: "No. No." She asks what the demon was trying to do
when it was trapped: "Consume the world."

Gnik tries to activate his Illuminator Tattoo and write "Yes" on his
wrist. When he looks at it again, it says, "I do not remember."

They ask what the being will do to make them forget, and it
responds that it has already done what it will do. They discuss 
and ask if they will remember but just not be able to say anything,
and the being affirms.

Milena asks, "Besides going and telling no one, is there any boon
we small beings can offer you for the good work you do here?" The
being wants to know how to stop the flow, but has no idea how to
do it. 

They ask if they can look more closely at the source of the flow
and the being says yes. There is a fissure in the ground that the
flow comes out of. They ask Jabrile if the fissure was already there
when the mountain was first put here and its says no -- there was a
shake. Kai asks questions to determine if the quake was natural or
the demon trying to escape, and it sounds as though it was natural.
They discuss ways to close or block the fissure; Gnik has a spell
that might work, but he does not have it memorized, so it will need
to wait for the next day. It also occurs to him that if he were
able to freeze it, the frozen terriole would plug the crevice --
which Boil could do, but it would be hard to get him up the mountain.
It occurs to Milena she could sacrifice the Wand of Maria into a
powerful effect that might block the hole.

They decide Milena will do a Sending to Boil to go to Al and Jimsu's
room now for an important task. He sends back, "At work. Pay good?" 
She replies, "Worth your while if you come now, no questions asked."
She gets back, "Weird. Ok."

They let Jabrile know what they're doing, and they also open up
the office to warn Jimsu and Rodger that Boil is coming.  When he
gets there and asks, "Pay good?" Gnik asks how much he would consider
good. "Gold? Gold is good," he says. "10 gold?" Gnik offers. "Sounds
good," he says, and skitters out of the office. They get an impression
from Jabrile that it thinks Boil is an abomination, and Kai says,
"He is here to help you STOP A THING that YOU DON'T WANT HERE."
Jabrile seems like he would allow it. Kai directs him to freeze
everything around the fissure, and Boil tells them, "Stand back...
no, more... more... okay that's good." He directs his cold at the
lake and the whole thing freezes... and the flow at the end seems
to accellerate as if all along its length it is in tension and pulling
together.

Milena says to Jabrile, "We may be back." They tell Boil that he will
remember what he saw but won't be able to tell anyone. "Ok," he says,
and goes back into the office. Jabrile stares after Boil with
skepticism, while Kai stares at Jabrile. They get a sense from the
being of "Perhaps all things have purpose."

They fly quickly to where the terriole is being mined and warn the
workers that the flow is about to increase dangerously. The workers
on the waterwheel side decide to pull it out; on the other side
they shunt as much as they can into barrels.

Milena makes some inquiries and learns that cost of living is about
a gold per day for a modest living.





Daln: exploration, revealing the unknown, daring, courage, wolves
("the explorer" to Bargallians)

Time-Keeper (Cynthia), the 
Explorer (Daln), the Archer (Alex), and the Historian (Alsaya).


http://www.luzetski.net/saltmarsh/saltmarsh.xhtml

https://iu.zoom.us/my/luzetski

http://tarot.fortunetellingfun.com/
https://www.ifate.com/tarot-reading.html
https://www.ifate.com/tarot-shuffle.html?spread=ppf


Reading for 29 Mara 3275

Past: Eight of Swords (Inverted)

Isolation. Self-imposed restriction. Imprisonment.

Inverted Meaning:

To free oneself of restrictive thoughts. To get out of a mental rut. To
begin thinking differently. To become empowered.


Present: Justice (Inverted)

Justice. Fairness. Truth. Law. Consequences.

Inverted Meaning:

Legal problems. A failure to take responsibility for choices made. A crime
goes unchecked. Or, to be overly critical of oneself.


Future: Ace of Pentacles (Inverted)

Manifestation. New financial opportunity. Prosperity.

Inverted Meaning:

A missed opportunity, or an opportunity with possible pitfalls. Success may
come at a high price -- financial, physical, or spiritual.




Reading for 24 Mara 3275

https://www.ifate.com/tarot-reading.html?&spread=ppf&sdata=26,1,53,0,42,0&p=1

Past: Knight of Pentacles (inverted)

Routine, Conservatism, Methodical Approach, Diligence.

A hard worker. Unwavering dedication to detail and to getting the job done.
Delayed gratification. A diligent person who works consistently toward a goal.
Responsibility.

Inverted meaning:

To be stuck in the daily grind. To feel trapped by a routine or a restrictive
approach. A sense of impatience. A rigid person or perfactionist.

The reversed Knight of Pentacles has several possible meanings.

In many cases, it's a sign that distractions have clouded one's
ability to focus on an important task. Something is interfering with a
core responsibility. That "something" may be something minor like a
mobile-phone, or it may be something major like a non-work activity
which is eating up too much time.

In other cases, the inverted Knight of Pentacles may reference a job
or a task which has become dull and boring. The daily grind of
monotonous tasks has become unfulfilling and a breaking point may be
near.

Lastly, the reversed Knight of Pentacles card may serve as a reminder
that "all work and no play" is making someone a "dull boy". While
diligence, responsibility and unwavering focus are all positive traits
- life is short, and important opportunities may be passing by.


Present: Page of Wands

Enthusiasm, exploration, discovery, free spirit.

An enthusiasm for new ideas and a desire to empark upon adventures of
discovery. Creative solutions are born. A yearning for freedom and travel.

Page of Wands may represent an actual person when the card appears in a reading.

The Page of Wands is someone with enormous enthusiasm for new ideas and new ventures. He sees possibility and potential in places where others may not. His optimism and his vision are infectious and inspirational.

Such optimism however, is not necessarily a sign of future success. The man pictured on the Page of Wands card clearly believes that the sprouts at the end of the wand show great promise, but one must notice that he stands in a desert. He is either a visionary or a fool. Fate will decide.

When the Page of Wands does not represent an actual individual in a reading, it represents optimism and enthusiasm for new things and new ideas. It may also represent travel — particularly to less-developed countries and places.

The Page of Wands is a moderately positive card. It heralds new beginnings, new adventures and a boundless sense of optimism — even when such optimism may not appear warranted to others. However, the card may at times indicate a naivete towards risk or too much optimism given the circumstances.

The card carries overtones of exotic travel, plants and farming, and visionary leadership — but also possibly: malinvestment or excessive risk.


Future: King of Swords

Clear thinking, intellectual power, authority, truth.

A person of authority who is evenly judgmental. A decision without prejudice,
not swayed by petty disputes or favoritism. A clear-thinking, just leader.

The King of Swords' power comes from his intellect, and his courage to stand by his insight against intellectual opposition. He is a symbol of expert status and may represent any type of knowledgable professional or industry expert in a reading.

Common references include doctors, financial advisors, consultants or any other expert-level knowledge worker.

The King is not swayed by the opinions of others or by political expedience. His ideas are selected because he sees them as logically valid and proven by experience — even if they are at times unpopular.

He is a seeker of the truth.

When the King of Swords does not represent an actual peron in a tarot reading, the card typically represents a fair decision or an equitable resolution.

The card may also suggest that emotion and personal feelings have no place in the issue at hand. Logic and sound reasoning are what's needed.

The appearance of the King of Swords may also carry a warning in some readings: Ambition and logic can sometimes leave behind a trail of tears if special efforts aren't made to consider the feelings of others.

Generally speaking the King of Swords is a very positive card, although the card's emphasis on cold logic may be somewhat neutral or even negative in some relationship reaings, depending on the positioning.


Reading for 23 Mara 3275

Past: Knight of Cups (Reversed)

Charm. Imagination. Artistic refinement.

Creativity and passion meet action. A quest either physical, romantic or
spiritual begins. A benevolent or heartfelt journey. Creativity and yearning
combine to form motion.

Reversed meaning:

Movement is blocked somehow. A goal that is so far away may feel unattainable
at present. A premature start creates problems. Physical or emotional
restraints.


Present: King of Swords

Clear thinking. Intellectual power. Authority. Truth.

A person of authority who is evenly judgmental. A decision without
prejudice. A clear-thinking, just leader, not swayed by petty disputes
or favoritism.


Future: The Chariot (Reversed)

Willpower. Transformation. Assertion. Mind over matter.

Willpower can accomplish anything. Speed and mental focus accomplish the
impossible. Inner transformations as a result of success. A warning to
control ego.

Reversed meaning:

Confidence is a double-edged sword. While it can make great things happen,
it can also lead to poor decisions. A rushed decision or a lack of conviction.



Reading for 12 Mara 3275

Past: Page of Wands (Reversed)

Enthusiasm. Exploration. Discovery. Free spirit. Adventurous. Ambitious.
Energetic. Active. New beginnings. Skilled.

Reversed Meaning: Setbacks to new ideas. Pessimism. Lack of direction.

Your energy is unfocussed and directionless. Your confusion may be
making you unhappy. Take time to consider your many options, but do
not hold back for too long. Commit to one plan and take a single,
carefully focussed direction.


Present: Seven of Swords

Betrayal. Deception. Getting away with something. Stealth.

The Seven of Swords means to use your wits for diplomacy and not to
use aggression. It can be viewed as secret planning or hidden
dishonour. The questioner's acts may be legitimate, however, they may
prefer to use their mind and intellect rather than use force. It may
also indicate a betrayal by a companion.


Future: Six of Wands

Public recognition. Victory. Progress. Self-confidence. Completion. Good news.
Reward. Recognition. Success. Triumph.

Achieving organization and leadership. Galvanisation or mobilisation,
of forces. This can be metaphorical, such as the forces
within. Looking forward. Success, confidence and competency.