The Faith of a Few - The Crimson Throne Journal of Chazon h'Besorah

15 Desnus, 4715 – Night continued

We exited the lift into a demented art gallery, where murals of skeletal undead—all obviously having succumbed to bloodveil—cavorted with one another throughout. These murals were fashioned with great care, indicative that whomever created them desired an ending to our current plague-ridden city to match. How very Urgathoan of them. To anyone with taste and a conscience, this scenery evoked disgust at the depravity of a grotesque mind.

Merethyl examined the artwork and deduced its origins somewhere around one-to-four months ago. As bloodveil just appeared in the city roughly a week ago, give or take a day, this little display proved this whole epidemic had been planned out some time ago. We knew the secrets of the plague doctors’ purpose here, but this evidence showed it all to be contrived months in advance, at the very least. This evil has been lying in wait beneath the city for some time. Syrical wondered aloud whether this may clear the Queen of any intentional involvement in the plot, as she probably had no desire to rule the city of death that these murals depicted. Or, perhaps she knew of the plague, had devised plans of her own concerning it, but never intended for it to get this far? There are other possible scenarios, and many would seek to heap this upon her head, regardless. We’ll need to remain vigilant to truly determine the reality and be very mindful about how much we lay blame without actual proof. What evidence we have feels damning, but there no clearcut link for us to drive home the nail completely. Her Grey Maidens work with these Urgathoan physicians, but do they absolutely know the truth of these physicians? Do they know of this place? We can’t say for sure just yet.

Not desiring for any here to escape our ability to interrogate them, Merethyl studied the controls of the lift for a few moments, then effectively disabled them. None can flee this place that way now without some work to fix all he has broken . . . which includes us, of course. It would appear we’re committed fully.

Our party moved to the north door, decorated as it was with more skeletons holding the favored weapon of Urgathoa—the scythe—in their bony grasp. Merethyl and Calcedon led the way and triggered a trap set in the door . . . A green, noxious gas breathed out through the nostrils of the skeletons, and, at the same time, the arms animated outward and swiped the scythes in a decapitating arc. Calcedon ducked beneath his, but Merethyl reacted slower. The blade’s point raked the skin from beneath his chin, missing his throat by the narrowest of margins, and only because of the natural fleeing motion that occurs whenever the eye catches something speedily approaching it. As quickly as the situation started, all went back to normal. The gas, which appeared to do very little, evaporated from sight, and the scythes retracted back into the images on the door. Calcedon threw it open immediately, as if to not allow the wicked trap another opportunity at their heads.

Beyond that first obstacle resided a storage room. A score of plague doctor outfits and tools at least filled the chamber, though only a couple of their frightening masks rested upon a table at its opposite side. Merethyl voiced a strong desire to disguise ourselves as plague doctors to more easily move through the sublevel, but Calcedon disapproved. Lest we all desired to switch out our weaponry for the physicians’ masterful clubs, he stated, our individuality would certainly be noted swiftly by all we stumbled across. Lord Fordyce has a strong-willed appreciation for forthrightness when dealing with enemies. Though rather adept at the use of disguise himself—both magical and mundane, he much prefers the brutally straight-forward approach of handling problems. I’m not one for disguises myself, I’ll admit, and I know Glannin prefers a straight up fight over sneaking and subterfuge, but I’m somewhat shocked to hear Calcedon continually shoot down clandestine ideas. I’d have thought him a man more concerned with the details, being one of great artistic talents. People will surprise you from time-to-time. Of course, he also trained to be a hellknight, and subtlety has never been high on their list of problem-solving techniques either.

Having scrapped the disguise notion entirely, we passed through the eastern door into one of their sleeping chambers—obviously Urgathoan, because the beds were covered in funeral trappings rather than the common cover. Seven lively folk awaited us within, as well. Three of them wore the attire of the plague doctors, but the other four donned breastplates and scythes—the calling card of an Urgathoan cleric or a redcap, but these appeared nothing like the latter.

Afraid that if we allowed such a large number allotted against us time to maneuver, they may well block us off and bottleneck us in the doorway, I requested a shielding of faith from the Last Azlanti, then charged in among the physicians. They quickly surrounded me as Merethyl ran by to engage the first of the clerics. I successfully parried the first club, but the second and third struck me hard on the shoulder and head. The last certainly would have dropped me babbling to the ground had I not been afforded the protection of Aroden, which softened the otherwise lethal blow. A small thundercloud enveloped a second of the clerics, obscuring him from sight, while Calcedon and Glannin attacked the physician I’d defended against. The nobleman’s fauchard landed solidly on the enemy’s back, directly between the shoulder blades, but he’d turned the blade downward at just the last moment so that it jarred the man powerfully, but nonlethally.

Aroden infused my blade with holy power against the physician, which enabled me to butt him atop the head with my pommel and knock him out cold. Merethyl stepped over from the cleric he had attacked and skewered a plague doctor through the small of his back. Undeniably masochistic, the man willfully slid off the impaling rapier while moving to my left and swung his club at me! I batted the weak swing away with my gauntleted forearm, which provided an opening for his friend to bash me on the back of my head. A flood of white light filled my vision for a split second, then parted to my peripheral. Glannin slapped me on the back with encouraging words akin to, “Hang in there, Chaz!” and the stars cleared from my vision immediately.

Behind me, Syrical cried out that Grey Maidens were behind us, then swept into the room, deftly dodging the attacks of both plague doctors.

Grey Maidens here in the sublevel. So, that’s no longer a question, I suppose.

I heard more than saw Calcedon enter the room, then the door slammed shut. My attention focused more on the four Urgathoan clerics that encircled Merethyl and swiped lethally with their scythes at the same time! The elf’s limberness helped him dodge or block two of the slashing blades, but the other two penetrated armor, flesh, and possibly bone. Though he fought hard to conceal it, the investigator’s step carried a hitch for the rest of the fight after those two blows.

Calcedon’s voice bellowed over the din of combat at that moment, his strong vocals singing about the founding of Korvosa, specifically a battle waged against the Shoanti. I can’t tell you how, but I found the words most inspiring, as did the rest of my companions, judging by how we straightened up with a renewed vigor even after the crippling wounds a couple of us had taken.

With the amount of damage I had sustained, even after Glannin’s healing, I struggled to find clarity. This promised to be a long and hard engagement, so I deemed to pass judgment on this situation, which I channeled through divine healing. Slowly, I recognized my body’s injuries mending, but the first thing it succeeded in doing was dissipating the murkiness in my head and vision. The wounded plague doctor pounced in to club me again, but I stepped inside the blow and delivered one of my own with the flat of my crossguard. A second club cracked me at the base of the neck, almost driving me to my knees. I glanced over my shoulder at the enemy, who appeared ready to cave in my head, and saw Syrical raising his crossbow at the physician. Crossbows failed to be small or silent, and the plague doctor whirled about and hurried a glancing blow off the elf’s forearm. The crossbow clicked, and the bolt wedged itself deep beneath the enemy’s left clavicle. Then, behind the wizard, a scythe of pure force materialized and sliced into his shoulder.

I heard Merethyl cry out in wicked pain and realized that I still had a threat before me. I hated to leave Syrical with the other, but it would do neither of us any good if I died looking behind me. The smell of charred flesh suddenly wafted into the air, followed by the thud of a breastplate slamming the ground beneath the force of a body. I brought my sword up for a blind parry just in case, only to watch as Calcedon garnered the attention of the physician I’d been concerned about with a chop of his fauchard. The plague doctor skipped away just in time to avoid injury.

The western door flew open again to reveal a Grey Maiden, who swiftly ducked out of the way as an arrow flew past Glannin’s head. He immediately slammed the door shut, then stepped away from our little fight against the physicians to do battle against a Urgathoan cleric.

I saw Merethyl stab an Urgathoan dangerously close to the groin, effectively sapping all the strength had boy had to swing that scythe effectively. In the foreground of that exchange, Calcedon attempted to scuttle away from an Urgathoan scythe, but they proved notoriously difficult to dodge away from, and its dulled blade severed into his left hip. The nobleman pinned the scythe there with his fauchard, then delivered a lethal backhand with his thorned bracer that punctured the cleric’s temple, ending the Urgathoan’s existence. I turned on the last plague doctor left standing, but he looked ready for me. I sought to give him the flat of my blade upside the head, but he hastily ducked beneath the attack and bludgeoned me to the gut. Just after, one of the Urgathoan clerics that had been hanging back availed himself of my sudden defenselessness and raked down my back with his scythe. My magical chain mesh absorbed most of it, but what got through felt as though it raked across my vertebrae like a filleting knife. Thank Aroden it only felt like that, because had it actually occurred, I wouldn’t have walked away . . . though I knew myself to be close to not walking away from this anyway!

For the umpteenth time, the western door flung open, and an arrow aimed to do damage on Glannin soared by. Unimpressed, the dwarf filled the doorway and leveled a hack with his waraxe at the Grey Maiden there. She danced backward, quite agile in her masterwork plate armor. Her desire to dance away from that decapitating cut left the door unguarded, however . . . the dwarf nodded at her, reached forward and casually closed the door in her face for the umpteenth-plus-one time.

Once more, I charged my sword with Aroden’s power to make it a bane to mine enemies, and the weapon performed its task perfectly, as its pommel smashed down into the plague doctor’s face. Despite having the maske there for protection, the power behind the blow toppled the last of the physicians into unconsciousness. I spun about to face the Urgathoan and managed to interfere with his scythe’s arc by interposing the vertical blade of my sword between it and my body. I felt the bludgeoning impact of my own weapon, but it saved me a great deal more hurt by the edge of that scythe!

Beside me, Calcedon traded blows with another cleric, and while our bardic nobleman displayed bloody wounds to make Zon-Kuthon proud ( . . . my apologies, Calcedon; that was in poor taste . . . ), it proved the Urgathoan who received the worst of that exchange, as the unconscious body that flopped to the ground would profess.

I’ll not rehash the events at the revolving door. It takes little imagination to know what happened there.

Even with Aroden’s judgment healing me slowly, the damage I’d endured to this point crippled me terribly. I launched a half-hearted attempt at the cleric with my sword, but it missed wildly. Thus, I stepped away from him and drew out the healing wand given me as a gift from Tiora, the young woman I’ve been helping steer away from her criminal past. Another arrow skipped off the entryway stone, as Glannin recognized how dangerous my wounds had become and healed me a second time. Unfortunately, this time it cost him a little lifeblood of his own. The Grey Maiden he’d been playing musical door with took advantage of his distraction and skewered him with her sword. Sadly, that would prove her undoing at the hands of the dwarf, who would slaughter her mercilessly with two hefty swings of his waraxe in the moments that followed.

Merethyl had worked his way into a door cubby on the other side of the chamber via a fighting retreat. The elf looked far the worse for wear, and things got worse when the Urgathoan I had stepped away from chose to go and heal his companion rather than pursue me—the companion combating Merethyl. When that cleric—who’d strode away a short distance from the investigator to get healed—decided to throw a spell at Merethyl to no effect, it seemed the opening he needed to escape that cornered position. Just as he tensed to make his move, however, the door behind him hurled open, and a Grey Maiden pushed through it with sword leading. He contorted his body with the full measure of elven gracefulness to avoid that attack, and it all but shattered his plan at that point. Battered and bleeding profusely from at least a half-dozen wounds, Merethyl had nowhere to hide from the Grey Maiden newcomer.

Syrical had been slinging crossbow bolts rather ineffectually since his clavicle moment a while ago, but seeing his elven companion in dire straits, he moved his thundercloud over one of the Urgathoans, where its internal lightning added a mixture of blue flashes to the orange torch light. Soon after, the thundercloud dissipated, but that failed to be of use to the Urgathoan, as Calcedon moved in and cracked the man into unconsciousness with the haft of his fauchard.

I tapped myself a second time with the wand, then moved forward to do my part for the investigator by trying to steal the attention of at least one of the clerics. I triumphed in doing so until Merethyl rammed his rapier through the left side of the man’s neck. Blood spurted from the wound, but rather than eliminate the threat, a sudden rage entered the Urgathoan’s eyes, and he swept his scythe in a deadly horizontal arc that gouged the investigator deep into his thigh. The stabbing of the cleric kept Merethyl too close to the Grey Maiden, and he paid for that mistake by taking a slashing sword across the back that felled him.

I dropped the last of the Urgathoans into blessed sleep—an endeavor made easier by his having turned his back to me to inflict pain on Merethyl. I then rushed into the Grey Maiden’s path, refusing to grant her a free shot at our fallen companion—whom I assessed to still be drawing breath. She tried her best to have me join the elf on the ground with a quick maneuver that batted my defensively-positioned sword aside, then slashed me across the front of my torso. The chain mesh warded off the attack but neglected to prevent the pain of the blow. Summoning Aroden’s power to my blade once again, I returned the favor of her sword slash with one of my own, though my aim bit through the chain mesh at the back of her knee.

A gold coin whipped through the air and penetrated the Grey Maiden’s armor, really causing her to have a bad day. I suddenly had my hands full with the second Grey Maiden on this side of the room, though I spied Calcedon lending aid to Merethyl while desperately fending off her sword swings.

The bloody battle continued in the room between the lot of us and two Grey Maidens. Glannin had fought his Grey Maiden back into the storage room, where I heard him proclaim the presence of skeletons milling about in the small room by the lift. I feared for the life of that woman, having witnessed what the dwarf had done to her compatriot in the doorway. However, the two Grey Maidens fighting us offered a fine showing that saw me hitting nothing but getting hit by something. Calcedon tripped the first Maiden—she that had dropped Merethyl. For his part, the elf had feigned death until he recognized the Grey Maiden on the floor. Ever the vengeance-seeker, he grabbed his rapier and thrust it straight through the eye hole in the Grey Maiden’s helm, while I simultaneously dent the side of the other’s helm to knock her out.

Syrical moved back into the storage room to help Glannin with his signature frost rays. Seeing the last of this chamber’s threats unconscious or dead on the floor, I hurried across its length to join the fight against the last of the Grey Maidens, being sure to instruct the dwarf to withdraw from this fight and destroy those skeletons in the other room. He was reluctant at first, but I’m pleased to say he listened to reason and departed. Calcedon arrived immediately after, and between the three of us—Syrical being the third, we quickly dropped the Grey Maiden into the painful slumber of a good, nonlethal beating.

The skeletons in the other room had no chance against Glannin, though Calcedon also joined in to help destroy them. In the aftermath of this amazingly difficult confrontation, I used my want to heal myself and Calcedon, while Glannin cured the wounds sustained by Syrical. We stripped the enemy of their valuables, including armor and weapons, then tied them up for future imprisonment. The room they’d come from held nothing of value or interest, so we swung back around to the barracks and entered the central chamber through the door opened by the Grey Maiden. There the dead lined the walls in a grotesque display of death and undeath known as “Princess’s Bacchanal,” an unholy piece of Urgathoan art meant to convey the message, “In the end, may you be undead.” Other than this sickening piece of meaningful art, nothing else resided in this small hall, so we took a chance at opening the westernmost door on the south side of the wall. It revealed eight beds with iron straps holding down unconscious or unwilling occupants. Cutting implements for torturous surgeries were situated near a couple of the beds, and a huge brown stain was splattered against the wall near one of the beds. Whatever experimentation happened here was obviously no joke.

Two plague doctors and two Urgathoan clerics stood toward the other side of the chamber. Having heard us coming, they had just released a trio of zombies strapped to the beds on the far end. Behind them all, in a short hallway that led to another door, dwelled a fifth man in the accoutrements of a necromancy. He was a pale and blotchy fellow, and he failed to find our arrival comforting or joyous.

15 Desnus, 4715 – Night continued

The physicians decided it wise not to close on our position too quickly and hung back. After all our searching, looting, and binding of prisoners in the last chamber, Aroden’s protections had ceased, so I beckoned them back before going in this time. Glannin refused to wait and charged in. One of the plague doctors swiped at him with a club, but it deflected harmlessly off his armor. The dwarf’s axe suffered no such problem against the man’s flesh, and blood splattered the ground.

Syrical must have recognized the blotchy one as a mage, because he slid up behind Merethyl and never took his eyes off the man. I could tell he readied something in his mind—arcane words, perhaps.

The three zombies ambled off their beds sluggishly, but methodically. At the foot of those beds, one of the Urgathoans silently cast a spell, while the other moved out of sight towards the other door into the room. The wizard near the back barked at us, “You are interrupting very important work here!” The next words from his mouth were an incantation that caused Glannin to halt his assault for a brief moment, then shake his head, as if warding off some compulsion. I’ve not yet grown knowledgeable enough to recognize all the spells that wizards cast, but I’m certain Syrical identified it. Despite his intense concentration on the man, the elf made no effort against him, so whatever it was that the enemy had conjured musn’t have been so bad. Calcedon entered the room and tripped the wounded physician with very little trouble.

All the while, Merethyl stood in the doorway, unmoving, his eyes locked on the enemy magic-user as if he’d seen the man that had murdered his family . . . and that should have been a clue to me as to the enemy wizard’s identity. As it was, it only dawned on me after the investigator broke into a mad dash that appeared to startle everyone with its boldness. Not a single weapon leveled at Merethyl as he darted between and around the plague doctors, Urgathoan clerics, and zombies alike . . . his destination the man he’d not yet taken his eyes from.

Rolth Lamm.

The necromancer shouted that Merethyl had dogged him all his life, that he would kill the elf slowly and animate him afterward. His hands suddenly burst into intricate gestures, and arcane words spewed from his lips as he stepped away from Merethyl. Syrical’s body tensed ever-so-slightly, then immediately began to mimic the gestures of Rolth, but reversed. A surge of transparent power—more recognizable in its intensity, being heavier than the air and rippling it disturbingly—released from Syrical’s open palm but a brief second after the Keylock Killer completed his own spell. Unfortunately, a pair of flame rays that erupted from our enemy’s open palm sliced right through the elf’s released energy to blast Merethyl and Glannin hard in their chests. It seemed to bypass their armor entirely, scorching dark marks of ebony soot where the magical power had connected and eliciting sharp hisses from both companions. Syrical looked none-too-pleased by the result.

A sudden fury lit in the dwarf’s eyes. Without bothering to even look at the physician lying at his feet, Glannin dropped his shoulder enough to undercut his axe in a broad, underhanded arc that clobbered the plague doctor beneath the chin with the flat of the blade. I don’t believe he intended to use the blunt part of the axe, but he hardly cared in that moment! He plowed over and through the beds in his way to the necromancer, pressing a healing hand against his wound as he went, murder in his eyes. The dazed physician on the floor never bothered to club Glannin as the dwarf barreled by, then failed to get the chance for future harm when Calcedon smashed him upside the head and knocked him into blissful unconsciousness.

The second plague doctor maneuvered into the space beside Calcedon and beat him hard on the shoulder. I prayed for Aroden’s divine favor during this battle, then leapt into the fray, seeking to cut off the physician’s position before Lord Fordyce. The Urgathoan near the second door quickly moved to me, but I parried his scythe before it could touch flesh.

Meanwhile, the second Urgathoan and all three zombies poured over to Merethyl—a strategy that should have cut the investigator off completely from the rest of us but didn’t due to the rampaging dwarf breaking beds to get there—and attacked with unholy fury. I’ve never witnessed the elf perform such a remarkable feat of simultaneous dodging and parrying as I did at that moment. Not a single weapon—natural or otherwise—even knicked a portion of his armor. At the completion of his defensive work, Merethyl lunged forward and buried his rapier hilt-deep into Rolth’s gut. His nemesis stepped back, sliding off the blade now thickly wetted with his own blood and threw out a finger pointed . . . Glannin’s way? It shocked me that the necromancer paid little heed to the serious stomach wound, and even more so that he ignored the deadly threat of the elf beside him for that of the dwarf! I suppose that a charging dwarf bashing aside beds in plate armor and with bloodied axe could be a sight worthy of intimidating anyone! Luckily, the black ray that shot from his extended finger struck a bed that the lumbering dwarf had shouldered before him, converting it into a brief, improvised shield that absorbed the attack without consequences to Glannin.

I sought to pommel the physician beside me, but the display of Rolth’s arcane might and the sheer rage of elf and dwarf concerned me enough to distract. The plague doctor parried my blow rather easily, I’m ashamed to admit, while both Urgathoans turned their scythes on me, with neither of them missing! Too close to the fight now for the fauchard, Calcedon backhanded the physician with his thorn bracer and punctured a series of small holes into the man’s head, cheek, and neck. The doctor gave as good as he got, however, whacking the nobleman with his club in an incapacitating attempt against the hip. Calcedon ignored the painful shot and refused to go down, though the physician certainly did when my pommel bashed the back of his head. That left only the pair of Urgathoans to combat Calcedon, Syrical (whose crossbow had launched a couple bolts, but had yet to hit anything), and myself. With the odds in our favor now, I hoped we might incapacitate the two men swiftly so I might interpose myself into the fight with Rolth, as I feared the blind rage of my companions currently facing the necromancer would surely kill the man rather than capture him for the rightful justice of the courts.

Glannin had reached the necromancer now and delivered a vicious chop meant to decapitate him (my point made), but the wizard ducked beneath it, quickly rattled off a spell, then touched the dwarf with a bare hand. At first, Glannin’s muscles seemed to constrict, as if locking solidly into a rigid position, but then he regained control of them through sheer force of will and hacked at the wizard again! Though obviously surprised his spell failed to afflict the dwarven warrior, the necromancer dodged the arching waraxe, then deftly twisted his body to miss the rapier’s point that plunged for his exposed side. The investigator’s strike proved nothing more than a feint, however, intended to reveal the next enemy’s next move. With lightning speed, the tip of that rapier angled up and to the right, where it plunged in an upward advance beneath the necromancer’s sternum.

Necromancers have a rare knowledge for undeath, certainly, but they are as mortal as you or I . . . and that assault should have killed the man. How it missed his heart made no sense, but it must have, because Rolth only grinned sadistically, stepped away from the weapon that provided the devastating wound, and unleashed a crackling bolt of lightning straight down a line that encompassed the zombies, an Urgathoan cleric, Calcedon, Syrical, and myself! The four living beings convulsed uncontrollably for a split second as the electricity coursed through our bodies, while the mindless undead merely shuddered once . . . then exploded! The concussive force of all three rotted bodies detonating battered Glannin around mercilessly and covered him in a horrific load of gore.

Our fight against the Urgathoans had gone poorly until that painful intercession. I recovered quicker than the Urgathoan and smacked him upside the head. In agony, and still halting in my movements thanks to the lightning, I willed Aroden’s judgment against these evil clerics to heal me, that I might outlast their damage to me and continue his just cause. He tried to retaliate, but I swatted the haft of his scythe that stopped its momentum and stole any lethal power from the attack. I rolled my sword over his weapon and backhanded his jaw with it, spinning the cleric about, and toppling him to the floor, now silent, motionless, but still breathing. With a clear path to Rolth now open before me, I charged forward to join the fray.

Calcedon felt the reaping blade of the other’s scythe, unfortunately, but he weathered the cut with grim determination, despite his countenance growing pale. He landed a strong punch to the enemy’s chin with his thorn bracer, but then cried out in pain as the Urgathoan tilted his weapon’s blade and slid it across the open wound to lengthen and deepen it. Hobbled and weakened, Calcedon used his fauchard haft to push the biting scythe away from his body, then retreated a step and tripped the Urgathoan with a sudden thrust and pull.

As I arrived into the midst of the Rolth fight, I implored my inflamed companions not to kill him, as he could have information we required about whatever this plot might be, as well as who was behind it, and that he could be unsusceptible to divine spells that make the dead talk. I witnessed a keen understanding within Glannin’s eyes after hearing me, and I must say that I’m proud of my dwarven friend for realizing it before his next attack. Rather than cleave the necromancer, he bashed the man with the flat of his axe blade in an attempt to subdue rather than destroy. Yet somehow, though bleeding from half-a-dozen wounds—two of which should easily have been mortal, Rolth staggered between Merethyl and Glannin, spoke a simple command in the arcane tongue, and disappeared.

Having seen it all, Syrical cries out that the necromancer stepped through a dimensional portal that would not have taken him so far away—a few hundred feet, at most. Merethyl immediately bolted from the room.

With his master no longer to be seen, and after being surrounded by Glannin, Calcedon, Syrical, and I, the last Urgathoan cast down his weapon and surrendered.
We gathered the unconscious enemy and placed them with the conscious one after searching them for anything valuable they would no longer need. Calcedon and I used a key we discovered to open the double doors near the back of the room and discovered half-a-dozen holding cells within. Lord Fordyce called out for his Varisian ward, but none shouted in reply. Instead, five arms extended outward from the cell doors. All of these people proved to be Varisians that Rolth had intended to operate on, but Calcedon’s ward was not among them. We released them from their imprisonment.

Of Rolth himself, however, we discovered no sign. Merethyl had not found him in the already explored portions of the complex, and Syrical had requested his House Drake to fly above ground again to see if the necromancer had retreated there. No such luck. Or, as Syrical pointed out, it’s possible that Rolth’s spell could have deposited him either outside the hospice above, or deeper inside this complex. We all hoped for the latter.

We held a conversation with the most physically imposing of the Varisians, a man named Ophraim. He thanked us for the rescue and clarified for all to hear that he’d told his other prisoners that they weren’t destined to die here. I’m certainly glad Arodin listened to his words and permitted us victory to free them. He explained to us that they were brought down here because of their immunity to bloodveil. Outside of Rolth, two others stood out amidst the Urgathoan followers here: a priestess that repeatedly spoke of undeath as a great gift, and a bald man who repeatedly berated the physicians. He described them briefly, but none of us could put a name with the descriptions.

We thanked them for the information disclosed, and Calcedon requested that they explain to the other Varisians above to flee from the hospice, each to their homes or safest place they can find. With Rolth having escaped, and our uncertainty as to his whereabouts, we feared he may bring reinforcements back, and the Varisians would not be safe milling about the place. I asked Ophraim to visit the temple of Aroden after a day or two, that we might ask questions of him should any linger after our investigation here finishes. He agreed gladly. Merethyl fixed the lift during our conversation, so the five Varisians rode it back to the surface.

The cells proved the perfect location to store the Urgathoans without the need of rope or manacles any longer, so we put all the unconscious ones (and the one that wasn’t) in there. Being spellcasters, I broke one of their fingers to prevent them from using magic to manipulate the locks. It seems harsh, I know, but better to cause them a small amount of discomfort than to have them escape and destroy the lives of others . . . including my companions, whose very hearts and minds grow threatened with each life they desire to snuff out in the name of vengeance.

Merethyl checked the doors leading deeper into the complex for traps and found none. We opened them to a large chamber with three vats that spewed noxious green chemical vapor into the air. The smell was awful, and it stung our eyes so much of it had escaped into the room. A walkway with stairs at either end of the chamber rose ten feet above the floor, where the vats could be tended to easier. A single door resided to our left on the walkway, but many doors were set into the walls on the ground level. An elaborate mosaic of Urgathoa herself decorated the ceiling. I’ll not describe it. The wretched goddess deserves no such treatment. Six Urgathoans spread about the room, all ready for us, having heard the battle and conversations in the other room, undoubtedly.

Yet another prayer of shielding uttered from my lips, and I set course for the nearest Urgathoan to engage in battle. Glannin charged through right behind me, though to the right rather than left, the blunt haft between the axe heads thumping the enemy square upon the forehead. Merethyl rushed into the chamber behind the dwarf and ascended the stair onto the catwalk, while Syrical launched a bolt against the enemy upon the catwalk on my side and punctured a hole in his breastplate. All the clerics save two called upon their unholy goddess for battle preparations. The two that didn’t instead moved to doors—one on the walk, the other at the back of the chamber—and banged on them to provide warning of our arrival. Calcedon played advantage during their casting, tripping the opponent opposite me to the floor.

The Urgathoan rolled away from my attack, but failed to get out of Calcedon’s reach, though I appreciated that the nobleman bludgeoned the man rather than sliced a line through him. Glannin disengaged from his opponent to scramble up onto the walkway on the far side from the elf, giving us a presence there on both sides of the room. He bellowed a nasty promise to the cleric there that clearly rattled the man. These misguided fools hid nothing from their faces! The next bolt fired by Syrical at the intimidated cleric flew wide, and the man must have found some ounce of courage from it, because despite the uncertainty of combat with the dwarf, he shuffled in and connected with a wicked chop of his scythe against our companion. On the other side, Merethyl charged at the enemy with a sap, but his swing proved too low, and it deflected off the enemy’s armor. A second swung in from the the perpendicular crosswalk that connected the two sides of the chamber and flanked the elf, finding purchase for his scythe blade high on Merethyl’s right arm. Luckily, it hardly crippled him, and he had closed enough on the other to get inside the scythe’s swing radius, making it easy for him to parry the blow before ever it got underway.

I kicked the enemy at my feet hard in the chin, just as I noticed a shimmering scythe of force materialize before Syrical. It sliced down through the air to cut along the wizard’s left shoulder. Having not suffered a great deal of damage in our fights thus far, I was impressed at how casually the elf absorbed the pain of that wound as he loaded his crossbow, then flung a bolt into the upper thigh of the cleric that cast the divine spell against him!

The enemy at floor level failed to cause any damage to us, though Calcedon smashed the prone one at my feet comatose with his fauchard. He motioned for me to go help Glannin, whose shaken opponent had somehow managed to harness that panic into repeatedly dangerous blows against the dwarf. As I took his advice to heart and started up the stair, Lord Fordyce ran forward to where an Urgathoan had reappeared through a door where he’d been assuring someone knew of our presence and tripped him! I rushed the Urgathoan that seemed to have my companion a bit on his heels and clobbered him just hard enough to try and gain his attention. Admittedly, I tried to hit him much harder, but he mostly ducked away from the worst of it.

On the other side, Merethyl held his own against the two clerics confronting him. Even from so far away, I noted a bloodied welt on the side of the man’s head where the investigator’s sap had struck unusually hard. Merethyl bled from a couple injuries himself, but he looked to be going strong still, which I believed encouraging.

Syrical had shifted his attention to the clerics doubling up on his elfkin, and the cleric in the center of the crosswalk that had been his target decided to join the fray on our side, seeing his companion facing both Glannin and myself. His scythe bludgeoned the dwarf as he approached, though no indication existed that the strike had penetrated the steel plate anywhere. I recognized that the numerous hits he’d taken had started to wear on Glannin, so I removed the healing wand from my belt and returned some of his vitality. It worked wonders, and the dwarf’s next swing pummeled the original enemy into unwanted restfulness.

As I peered across at the investigator, things had taken a bit of a turn. A pair of new wounds had slowed his steps a bit, and I saw how he labored to stay inside the killing range of both scythes. Help arrived from below, as the cleric Calcedon had been tussling with made the mistake of trying to climb to his feet, and the nobleman had beat him back down with a final blow of his fauchard. Reaching up with the long-hafted weapon, he caught the ankle of an unsuspecting Urgathoan and tugged back. The victim cracked his head against a metal railing as he fell and laid unmoving upon the catwalk. Merethyl attempted to use the opening to quaff a potion, which he just succeeded in doing when the second cleric sheered through his armor with a terrible, hacking swing that felled the investigator atop the unconscious man Calcedon had just outmaneuvered.

Afraid that the cleric of undeath would attempt to finish him off, I tapped Glannin with the healing wand one more time, then rushed along the crosswalk, yelling the name of Aroden the whole way to gain the Urgathoan’s attention. I’m happy to say it worked, though less enthused at my inability to parry the scythes blade before him struck me just below the left armpit. My chain mesh warded off the worst of it, but I could feel links dig into the skin underneath. Calcedon rammed the point of his fauchard through the small openings in the catwalk from below and stuck the unholy cleric through the bottom of the foot. From the way the man howled, it must have chipped away a portion of his foot bone. We traded swings—again, his connected with me, with mine failing off his breastplate, when Calcedon played a healing tune from below that helped Merethyl just enough to cause his eyes to flutter open. Feeling a little rejuvenated, I deeked a forehand chop with my sword, which resulted in the Urgathoan opening up to that side in an attempt to more easily ward off my blow. Rather than carry through with it, however, I thrust forward with my pommel to land a blow on the bridge of his nose, though more of my gauntlet impacted there than my sword. It still proved enough to flatten him out and put him out of the fight.

With the enemy here now defeated and Merethyl safe, I glimpsed back across to see how Glannin fared. The cleric appeared in bad shape—a long, bloodied gash opened in his breastplate vertically along the right breast, and two points of frost had formed on the right side of his face. Glannin also looked worst-for-wear, however, with blood trickling down his forehead from where the Urgathoan must have smashed him with the haft of his scythe.

Back over the crosswalk I charged to provide aid for Glannin and received another vicious wound from the Urgathoan for my trouble. With Glannin’s help, I managed to knock out this one, as well, and the hard-fought battle had finally concluded.

We stripped the unconscious of their breastplates, weapons, and other gear that might help them when they recovered, then locked them in the cells with the others. Then we concentrated on healing up a bit. Syrical sent his house drake above again to check on the situation there. Still no new arrivals, which was good, and all the Varisians had successfully cleared out of the hospice. Merethyl informed us that he heard noises coming from behind the door on the catwalk—things like the clinking of glass instruments going on in there, and we agreed that it would be our next destination when the healing work was completed.

Book-marked.

16th of Desnus

With the papers we liberated from the Urgathoan "Doctor's" office identifying Bloodveil as a mutation of Voral's Phage, Merithyl and I set out to make the cure.  His skill with alchemy is highly impressive, and his dedication to this city was beyond what I believed possible.  He worked like a man possessed.  I split my days into helping his efforts (measuring reagents, recording what went right and what went wrong, while he focused on the fundamental problem of the cure), and helping Lord Calcedon prepare us implements of battle for the struggles that we would face post-cure.  I had very little sleep.  I'm not sure Merithyl slept at all.  We spent a fevered week working on the cure for that damnable disease...it felt like months.  On the morning of the seventh day, with knowledge of where we were in the process, a feeling of immense relief came across me as I heard Merithyl's triumphant cry shake the foundations of his safe house.

It was fortunate it came when it did, because the situation outside could scarcely be more dire.  Korvosa was dying-both as a functioning city and in actual population.  Panic had given way to a funereal silence as the streets were quiet- staying inside made one's chances of survival a bit better.  The pyres burned day and night, coating the city in a fine layer of ash of those who had succumbed.  I hoped the disease could not withstand the fires, else we would all be breathing in concentrated Bloodveil.  The HellKnights had abandoned the city, possibly to avoid the disease, probably because they were no longer being paid by the Crown.  As bad as the HellKnights were, I think they would have been a considerable problem for the Queen had they known the truth of BloodVeil- the plague was planned by the Queen herself to purge the city of those she deemed undesirable.  All doubt had been eliminated when we found the Gray Maidens working alongside the Cult of Urgathoa, who had been trying to improve the lethality of Bloodveil,  and the memories I extracted from the head doctor that showed the Queen giving the orders.  

During my time with Calcedon, I could tell he had been greatly affected by the events that occurred at the finale of our liberation of the "Death Bed Hospice" (a term I had heard circulating after we had deliberately publicized what had been occurring there).   He also was getting little to no sleep, and he tore open parts of his manor that had been sealed for some purpose.  I overheard a conversation between him and Glannon that gave me further concern.   Counseling is unfortunately beyond me and in any event, there was no time.  I only hoped that the human expression "Time Heals All Wounds" would prove true for him, even though, as elves knew, that is often not the case.  

23rd of Desnus

We had determined that Bloodveil, although not a supernatural disease, originated from one.  Merithyl speculated that a spirit that was tied to the creation of Voral's Phage was what provided some measure of protection to Varisians from being infected- the very protection that the Doctor had been seeking to override.  Rumor was that Doctor Davelos had been imprisoned in Castle Korvosa for "deceiving the Queen" and the Gray Maidens found there did not know what was going one.  It remains to be seen how effective those lies will be.

Merithyl's recipe for the cure was fairly complicated, and while he had total mastery of it, I was not sure I could replicate it with certainty every time (timing of the mixture of reagants and temperature spoiled more than a few batches).  We were able to produce eight doses of the cure, and Merithyl had infused it with a wondrous quality which made the salvation of the city not just possible but likely!  The cure could be transmitted the same way the disease was!  Someone "infected" with the cure could pass it on to those they encountered! We spent a brief period debating whether to keep our involvement secret and disseminate the cure through third parties, but given that our role would be hard to suppress, we decided to lean into it and have House Fordyce take full credit for the cure.  Lord Calcedon personally distributed a vial of the cure to the Korvosan Guard (our closest allies), Theumanaxis College (I vouched for their ability to replicate it and their good intentions), the temple of Pharasma (extremely high motivation for them given the machinations of the Cult of Urgathoa), the Temple of Shelyn (naturally given Lord Calcedon's allegiances), the Temple to Abador, (they had been instrumental in keeping the city functional despite their insistence on payment).  Of the three remaining doses we developed on the first day, one was taken by Lord Calcedon so the cure could be passed as he trekked through the city, one was taken by Glannon to distribute as to the lower class as he frequented the bars that remained open, and the final one was to Chazon, so he could introduced the cure to Old Korvosa.  He left that morning and we knew it would be some time before we saw him again, given the barricades that had sealed off Old Korvosa from the rest of the city.  We wore his Order of the Phoenix regalia proudly during this quest.  

In addition to distributing the cure itself, Calcedon gave copies of the recipe (also emblazoned with the Phoenix) to the Temples to Asmoedues and Sarenrae.  A copy was also provided to the Academae despite my misgivings.  They had sealed themselves away from the city and provided no help in the most dire situation, and thus they should get no credit for its salvation.  And if the Bloodveil had made it beyond its high walls....they should have to live, or not live, with the consequences of that decision and their support of the monarch who had made it all possible.  

24th of Desnus
We were summoned by the Guard to assemble at the Tower this morning. All of us save for Chazon, who was no doubt hugging some beggars up in Old Korvosa, proceeded there.  Kroft offered to deputize us- the ranks of the guard had been decimated by the disease.  She asked us to investigate a situation in Old Korvosa.  She had sent a contingent of guards to investigate a problem and had not heard back.  Apparently the Master of Civic order had also been trapped on the wrong side of the river when the bridges were destroyed to enforce the quarantine.  With no Gray Maidens north of the river, and no Hellknights, she needed to have law and order restored in Old Korvosa- and we were the only way to provide it.

In addition to bringing order back, she had been getting reports of a NEW PLAGUE hitting areas of Old Korvosa.  I wondered if this was failsafe from the queen or something that she had always intended.  The victims were turning up gray and drained of life (though importantly, not drained of blood).  It had been dubbed "The Nightmare Plague".  It was hitting Bridgefront, and we had to investigate for the guard.  We were provided an account at the Armory as befitting our new status as deputies.  I got a new wand and some healing potions, and the others equipped useful items.  We spent the rest of the day brewing more doses of Bloodveil cure to take with us.

25th of Desnus
The city started lifting the quarantine in areas of the city other than Old Korvosa.  Glannon found out his family left the city.  He seems somewhat unaffected, but it is hard to tell.  That night, under the cover of darkness, we made our way across the river in a small skiff.  There was no restriction of entering Old Korvosa- we could have done so openly, at least going into- but we wanted no records or knowledge of our activities reaching the Throne.

We found a place to sleep in a very overcrowded section of the city.  Calcedon kept watch and Manjenko kept him company.  Merithyl, Glannon and I had a strange dream- which was later determined may not have been a dream at all.  We were in this part of the city, but the color had been washed out of the surroundings.  Clouds of sickly green miasma permeated the streets.  The buildings seemed to lean as if collapsing.  I witnessed Merithyl calmly walking down the side of a bulding- something I was fairly sure was not among his many talents.  Our senses slowly came into focus although still somewhat muted, as though we were underwater.  The few people in the street looked cautious and scared.  As we grouped up, we heard a shreiking in the skies.  Three dark faceless shapes plucked a man out of the streets and flew into the air with him.  After ascending 50-60 feet in the air, they dropped him, drinking in his fear.  We then "woke up" and Merithyl and I met eyes and simultaneously confirmed what we had seen:  "Night Gaunts!"

Having had the same vivid vision/nightmare, we surmised that we would be facing down Night Gaunts sooner rather than later. We compared notes about what we knew about them: They are creatures from the Dream Dimension, fond of swooping down, picking their prey up into the air, and then dropping them from great heights, all the while feasting on their fear. After everyone had made their preparations for the day, we ventured from our hidden sanctuary into the dreary, desperate scene that was Bridgefront.

The streets were thick with people, surprising given the barren scene in the rest of the city. It seems as though these destitute had given up hope of avoiding Bloodveil- or perhaps no longer cared if they pcontracted it. We passed by several vendors, some selling coffee, other trinkets. Cal made a “purchase” from an woman who was selling some sort of fungus. As he talked to her she said her children were sick with Bloodveil. Hearing that, we insisted that we make haste back to her abode, so that our newly found cure could be delivered. We followed her hastily back to her dwelling.

I had not thought it possible for a hate to burn brighter than that of the hate I felt for the arrogant lying schemers in the Academy. Today I learned that I was wrong. We were far too late. All of the children had succumbed to Bloodveil already, probably before we had even produced the cure. As she pleaded for Cal and Glannin to help them, I stepped outside. The memories I had extracted from Dr. Davelos slashed through my head as I revisited the Queen gleefully ordering that this atrocity take place.

The Academy could wait.


Silence reigned among us as we proceeded next to the Apothecary. An alchemist lived there, quite well known. We reasoned that the sick would probably congregate there and give us the chance to help the greatest number of citizens.

Enroute, we suddenly heard screams echoing off the Shingles above our heads. Macabre shapes emerged from the fog, corpses that seemed to be animated by a sentient fog. I had heard of these…only known as “Malnourished Dream Things”. We engaged it and its puppets and were able to deal it severe damage. During the fight, four City Guards- of the contingent that the Watch had landed as sort of an Expeditionary Force before the bridges were destroyed- came up and valiantly tried to attack it as well.

After we destroyed it, the corpses collapsed. They looked like they had been partially eaten, and the guards referred to it as “Hog Slop”. Apparently these corpses were now a common sight in Bridgefront, though the fog was not. Their captain arrived, a woman who had survived a bout with Bloodveil. We told them of our efforts to spread the cure, and took us to the Magistrate. Glannin asked her if she knew of Chazon, but she was not familiar with Old Korvosa.
The guards escorted us to Old City Hall. We met the Magistrate- Stanton Driune. We passed the cure onto him, and asked what he knew about the mist and the corpses. He made remark that each such death “fuels a terrible blasphemy”. He also told us of the “Brotherhood of the Spider” (no relation to my adversary-apparently it is a very desired appellation). It is a cult that seized control of the shiver trade, and he believes they poisoned the wells in this area with shiver in order to gain more addicts. We also found out the corpse we fought was “Frel Tan”, nephew of Korvosa’s Magistrate of Commerce and Taxation. Perhaps we can use his passing to gain some kind of leverage against the Brotherhood?

The Magistrate offered us a reward of 8,000 GP if we could accomplish several things. 1)Provide proof the Frel died under the effects of shiver, 2)find the dealer or source of the shiver he took, 3)find proof of the dealer working with the Brotherhood, and 4)help combat the Nightmare Plague. He suggested if we could find the den where Frel died, we could perhaps find the dealer.

I asked the Magistrate how many men he had remaining under his command. Only seven guards remained. Our initial investigation uncovered the following:
-Six shiver users have hung themselves in Fever Dream Alley, and some grey victims were found by the piers.

-Found some victims that gnawed on themselves, possibly to death. Some esoteric book dealers had their throats slit-apparently the denizens of Bridgefront have turned to the occult as a solution for the many, many problems they are beset with. Local theaters have also taken more of an occult turn.
-Drug dens keep pigs to dispose of bodies.

-Selling shiver to patrons in a shiver den is illegal. (Blink.)

First, we decided to try to figure out what den Frel had been at. We proceeded with an autopsy of Frel. It is very likely he was on shiver at the time of his death. Appeared he was gnawed on by a shiver den pig before getting possessed by the Fog.

We then went back to the scene of our combat to try to backtrack where Frel’s corpse had come from. That did not yield results.

We asked around about the Brotherhood.and how to become a member. We heard that “Madame Carrington predicted the deaths. She has a spirit guide that tells her of all the murders that are about to occur.” I am quite skeptical.

Our investigation started around noon and lasted 5 hours. We made efforts to distribute the cure as we made our way around.

We eventually found out the names of two dens that Frel frequented. The “Soiled Sow” and “Rook’s Roost”. We again heard the rumor about shiver in the water. Glannin attempted to trace the source of the fog, but found conflicting reports. Someone told him it came up Baker Street.

We broke for dinner at a local inn. Even our waitress had a theory- she attributed the nightmare plague to “Sally Scrabblebones” with her propensity for bone-shucking.

Cal made sure to visit House Arkona that evening to drop off the cure and recipe. Though they would not let him inside, he made sure they knew exactly who it was that was delivering it to them.

We next decided to pick up on our lead regarding Madame Carrington, and made our way there.

Around 7 in the evening we headed to visit Madame Carrington. As darkness fell through Bridgefront, we lost even the small amount of sun that penetrated through the urban canopy overhead. We reached her place of business, and were greeted by a tiny man who told us she was with a client but could see us soon. Only one voice was audible from the other room.
We were escorted in past several domesticated xtbay plants, and found the reason for the one-sided conversation. Madame Carringon had been paralyzed. Her body was severely atrophied, and the left side of her face was frozen in a grim rictus. She enabled her communication by using a cantrip to write our her responses to our questions, making the communication possible if significantly slowed. We waited with baited breath on every response, and carefully considered most of our questions, as the planchette slowly recorded her thoughts.

Merithel started the questioning by asking about Frel Tan. Her response: “HIS SOUL WAS STOLEN BY THE CULT’S CROOKED WITCH, WHO SEEKS THE KEY. HE TRIED TO SELL ME A LARGE JOURNAL OF THE DESNAN FAITH. (I DO BUY BOOKS OF ESOTERICA). HE (also) TRIED TO SELL ME A KEY OF PRECIOUS METAL, BUT THE PRICE WAS TOO HIGH.” She did not know what the key was for, but indicated the witch could be found in our dreams.
“YOU DREAM WHAT WE ALL DREAM. THE SPIDER IS INVOLVED- THEIR POISONS HAVE ENSLAVED THE MINDS OF THE LUCID.”

She then asked us how he died, and we gave the details, speculating the he probably died in a shiver den. “THE NIGHT MARKET’S FOUND DREAMING DRUG IS TO BLAME”. She then returned to warning us of the witch. “SHE TAKES SOULS. YOU CAN FIGHT IN DREAMS IF YOU KNOW HOW. “ She offered to fight for us, and asked us if we had skills in lucid dreaming. Merithel actually thought he could make that possible if we decided we had to go that route. She continued her warning: “MANY UNSKILLED DREAMERS ARE NOW DREAMING LUCIDLY. IF YOU DIE IN DREAMS, YOU DIE IN REALITY. “ She stated she had a friend that could protect us from nightmares. His name is Baka- a floating creature with long black fur, as well as a phantom companion named Guinsera that… eats nightmares? We asked why she was willing to offer this help, and she gave us a Chazonic answer- “THESE ARE MY PEOPLE AND THIS IS MY HOME.”

Her final advice to us before we left to digest these warnings was that the dream realm we would be facing would be much more stable than we were accustomed dreams to be.
We departed about 8 pm and headed for the Soiled Sow, the first of two shiver dens that we were going to check for evidence of Frel’s death within. Enroute, we heard strange sounds from an alley. We encountered Rook, of the infamous Rook’s roost. The man believed himself to be part bird, and wore a plague doctor’s mask. He purported to be able to “cure our sick”. His behavior was very reminiscent of a psychopomp, but he appeared to simply be deranged. Calcedon made contact with him to pass on the cure, but I wonder what other diseases he left himself exposed to . I kept my distance, barely entering the alley. Calcedon played his violin for the manic proprietor and managed to calm him down.

Realizing we were already at the Rook’s roost, we decided to investigate this den first. We decided to go in separately so that we could question the clientele discretely, rather than trying to force our way in. Merithel went in first by himself. I went in next, partially disguised in my armor. They charged a rather extravagant 5 gp. I made no pretense of being a habitual shiver user, and told the guards this was always something I wanted to do, and had decided to try it before falling to the plague. I was granted entry and the host asked if I wished to fall asleep on a cot out in the open, or in a semi-private room. I chose the cot and sat down, and was able to pick out Merithel as I had seen his disguise.

Glannon and Calcedon came in next, and true to the plan, they created quite a distraction, pulling not just the guards on the main floor, but guards from the back and other floors. Glannon could not be moved out the door as he shouted for Frel. Merithel and I made our move to the back while Glannon and Calcedon kept them busy…Calcedon even broke out his violin and began playing. I’m sure that was quite a confusing scene for the guards.

Merithel and I began checking the upstairs rooms, hoping to find some kind of office or safe room where the precious key that Frel was said to have possessed might be stored. Unfortunately, it appeared that every room was devoted to the use of the shiver addicts. When we heard the guards returning upstairs, apparently after they had finally succeeded in bouncing Glannin, we posed as sleeping shiver users in one of the rooms. After they left we made our way downstairs. I got a guard to escort me to the basement level and was able to examine all the rooms there under the pretense of dissatisfaction with the quality-these rooms also were all used by the clientele unfortunately. On the plus side, I was able to obtain a large refund when I proclaimed the lodgings were not up to my standards.

We all met up and outside on the street and compared notes. The proprietor had flatly denied that Frel used this den, and we could not find anything to dispute his assertions. Merithel suggested we check the sow pit before we leave. Ever the consummate investigator, he climbed in the slop and got right to work. Even Calcedon got in to carefully search. They turned up a scrap of clothing similar to what we found him in, which pushed them to further efforts- which paid up. We found a finger with a signet ring still on it-with the Frel family crest.

With hard evidence in hand, we confronted the host of the shiver den again. This time he admitted that Frel had been here, but denied that he had the key or knew anything about it. He seemed to persuade the others, and we departed, though I pointed out that the host had first lied about knowing who Frel was, then lied saying that Frel was never there, and then lied that he did not die there- but we are now taking him at his word that he did not steal the key? Nevertheless, we pondered our next move, perhaps to try the lucid dreaming or investigate Fever Dream alley the next day.

As our rest the prior night had been fitful and interrupted (and some had no sleep at all), we decided to attempt to rest- a normally benign activity that was newly hazardous in Bridgefront. We doubled up in rooms at the inn for safety and I had Manjenko watching the hall. Our physical bodies were not in jeopardy, but our dreams reflected the new reality of Bridgefront.

I myself woke to find myself several stories above the city, standing near the edge of a tall precipice. The sky above a roiling green, though no light source was visible. After a few long moments I saw Calcedone and Merithel on the street below, motioning for me to be careful. I quickly descended to meet up with them, mindful of being in such a hazardous predicament with no other Phoenix member to rely upon.

After reaching street level we started to look for Glannin. Suddenly, a wide crack opened in the street and Calcedon and Merithel fell in, along with a number of other exhausted looking civilians. They tumbled about forty feet to the bottom, landing quite heavily. They began their climb up and while Merithel nimbly made his way up, Calcedon was much slower and not making progress- when the fissure began to seal itself! My assistance in yelling helpful encouragement to him proved not nearly as useful as the rope that a now regal and athletic Madame Carrington threw down to him. Apparently her situation in this realm is far different than her plight in the real world.

After Calcedon was rescued, we were fully reunited as she had brought Glannin with her, along with a gift- a new third eye planted squarely in his forehead. After being told we would need this…alteration….in order to find the place of sanctuary , we all allowed her to open this new eye for us. Indeed, upon receiving it were we able to immediately pinpoint her sanctuary- a fairly non-descript storefront. Her friend Baku was there- a slow speaking being that ate the nightmares of everyone under the roof, allowing those under his protection to experience normal sleep.

We talked to Madame Carrington at length and found communication to be far easier here than having to riddle out her oblique, terse written communications. We found that the “witch” she had mentioned was a Night Hag- a creature from this realm that rides a dreamer’s back as he sleeps, depriving him of rest until he expires. They would trap the souls of their victims in gems, to an unknown end. They could only be fought by an opponent who was also ethereal- as we currently were.

She also told us the Witch was not the cause of the problem plaguing Bridgefront, (though her presence was certainly making it worse) and that the Night Gaunts should not eve be here. The Brotherhood of the Spider was likely behind the dream plague. We were also warned of other shadow creatures- the Hounds. She explained to us that she was dreaming lucidly, allowing her to perform actions she would normarlly not be capable of (obviously) but even citing that before walking up to the fissure to save Calcedon, she did not have a rope…but decided she would. Apparently that it how lucid dreaming works, and it sounds it is something we are going to have to become proficient in, rapidly. She said the sanctuary would be available to us as we explore the dream realm, when we are ready.

We woke up fully rested. Our first move was to attempt to track down the Brotherhood, so we headed to Fever Dream Alley. We arrived at about 10:30 am. The alley was nothing special- trash was strewn about and three individuals were within. One was a sleeping man, the other two were an intoxicated couple.
Calcedon asked the conscious pair about Frel, and they denied knowing him. Glannin noted that they appeared to be in rough shape, and he provided them a simple meal of bread and honey, infusing it (unknowingly?) with his healing energies. They gladly accepted the charity. They claimed the alley was not safe and we encouraged them to leave. As the female complained of phantom spiders, Merithel and I noted a spider crawl out of the sleeping man's mouth. He then spasmed, and webs shot out of his body encompassing most of the alley- or at least it appeared to to Merithel and I. Glannon and Calcedon only saw vague shadows approximating a web. This difference in perception explained why we reacted quite differently to this threat from the alley.

Merithel, realizing what was going on, loudly proclaimed " Fear not the shadows my friends; they cannot hold you!" The a swarm of spiders erupted from the mouth of the comatose man, covering the alley with multiple swarms. The spiders began attack the couple and Merithel. Glannin tried to help the couple, but against a foe he was barely aware of, he could do little. I asked Majenko to take to the air to see if the architect of this assault was looking down at us in the alley from some elevation, but he reported he saw nothing. Cal blasted the area with a musical explosion which seemed to both harm and heal Glannin and the couple. I could see nothing and could only hear screaming coming from the mass of webs in the alley. I tried to Dispel the webs twice, both efforts failed. (More study is needed.)

All three swarms then collapsed on Merithel and the couple, and the resulting damage made one of the pair fall due to injury. Glannin never stopped slashing at the shadow swarms and it appears he was able to dispatch them, though too late to save the male of the couple who was covered in bites. The victim turned completely gray and died, the first time we saw this in someone who had not been dead for some time. The woman he was with was quite distraught and this time the truth came pouring out. She admitted that Frel gave them drugs. He used to lie here in Fever Dream Alley, but he had joined a gang that aimed to loot an old temple. He bartered in the Night Market with some of the things he found. They think he bought the shiver from Greely's crew, a dealer, possibly belonging to the Brotherhood of the Spider. Items he found from the temple included: a Silver Key, an engraved silverware set, Butterfly Gold Brooch, a mummified imp corpse, a blue parakeet in a Bronze cage, and a Desnan book (likely sold to Carrington).

After urging the occupants to leave the accursed alley, we headed to the Night Market to ask about Greeley and look at the fountain. We spent a few hours asking around but could find no leads about the gang or its hideout. We went to the fountain and found that people were giving it a wide berth because of the rumors now associated with it. Merithel drew up some water from it to test. Calcedon and Glannin looked to purchase some cold iron weapons for use against our anticipated ethereal opponents, but could find none for sale.

About 4pm after the crowd had turned over, we made a second effort at searching for the gang. We heard some rumors about the well, a few rumors about
"Salley Scrabblebones", and a few slim leads about a gang. a man named Barvas- A member of the Brotherhood of the Spider, and a brother of the cretinous Devargo) There was however no evidence Greely was associated with them.

27th of Desnus

6 PM- We took stock of some of the facts and assumptions we had made in our investigation thus far. We thought it possible the Nightmare Plague may have been caused by something Frel unleashed in his temple raid. Merithel had not heard of Greely being associated with a gang, and had only heard of the Barvassi band in passing. We did know a Barvassi was in charge of a gang that could be working with the Brotherhood of the Spider. Merithel did find that water in the Night Market well was untainted- no shiver in it.

We decided to explore the Market more in the few hours it would remain open. We went to check with some book dealers to see if Frel had managed to sell off the book he looted from the temple. Along the way Calcedon and Glannin looked to purchase some cold iron weapons, with no success

We found an exotic book dealer who had some news to share. Two other book dealers in the market had been found dead a few days ago, killed in their stalls with the bloody daggers still in hand. Their bodies were found as gray corpses..These dealers had been visited by members of Barvassi’s band looking to sell something. We asked about investigating the area but were told they were just empty stalls now. We described Frel to our book dealer informant and found that he had been trying to sell his book them them. However, the deceased dealers did not purchase it as they feared it had dark powers and wanted no part of it.

7 PM -Our survey of the weapons dealers, many of whom were already closed, finally turned up a cold iron Greataxe, which Glannin purchased.

8 PM- All the stalls in the market had closed by 8. We decided to stake out an area by the Night Fountain to attempt to find a shiver deal in progress. We set up shop outside a seedy tavern near the Well, called the Wet Hag.

10 PM- Our stake out proved fruitless, but the information came to us. Calcedon was approached by a young boy who promised us information about Greely, for the princely sum of 50 gold! Glannin called him over in a fairly imposing way. I’ll give they tyke credit- he held his ground for almost 10 second before outright bolting. Not wishing to see our only lead vanish into the night, the four of us set off in pursuit of boy barely out of toddlerhood. It was not the Order of the Phoenix’s finest moment. Thankfully for the sake of our own dignity we were able to catch up and stop him fairly quickly, and reopened negotiations. Glannin played hardball and Merithel started out as the “good constable” but they also implied that it was possible that the tyke’s name could leak to Greely if he did not reveal what he knew. I myself questioned whether we had to resort to the hammer and anvil method of negotiation to obtain the information from a boy fresh out of diapers, but I held my tongue.

For the price of 20 gold and an assurance his name would not be mentioned as an informant, he told us he was a member of the Guttersnipes- apparently a juvenile gang around here. He heard from a shiver dealer that Greely’ hideout is small building on the pier, and that Greely is resupplying his dealers from there. The boy had quite a jaded look on his plight. Calcedon tried to reassure him about Hope, but the boy went on a pessimistic political rant about the value of lives in Old Korvosa. Glannin and Merithel complimented him on his acting, which was quite good (I was certainly willing to start the revolution after listening to him, though much of that was probably covered by the discoveries of the past days.)

We proceeded to the pier based on the tyke's tip.  There was enough moonlight to see the hideout- a small building at the end of a pier.  A single watchmen stood the building.  We boldly marched down the pier without subterfuge, hailing the man standing outside.  He immediately went inside.  Glannin approached the door and knocked...after which we heard it lock from the inside.  Merithel slipped to the back of the shed to make sure no one was escaping out the back, with an aim to look under the pier next, as Glannin broke the door down along with Calcedon.  I stayed midway down the pier and watched our flank to make sure no reinforcements were enroute.

Glannin quickly gained entry and knocked out one of the men inside.  Suddenly a large water elemental appeared and engaged Calcedon.  The elemental was entirely too close to me, so I carefully retreated while launching a few scorching rays at the summoned creature.  I was on extreme alert, because while the elemental was the most dangerous creature visible to us, there was surely a powerful caster nearby capable of causing much more dire problems.  My fears proved true as suddenly the water level instantly rose eight feet, putting us all underwater.  Glannin and Merithel attempted to save the lives of the men that had been rendered unconscious and drowning withing the shack, while Calcedon quaffed a water breathing potion (as did I) as he was now left alone to face the water elemental in its preferred terrain.  

I recognized the effect as Control Water- a spelll significantly more powerful than I was capble of casting.  I told Manjenko to gain altitude and find our foe so we could retaliate against this onslaught.  Next, I tried to Dispel this effect.  Having failed on all my prior attempts, I had some doubts as I knew that effect I was trying to destroy was cast by someone at a minimum significantly more adept than I.  Apparently the adrenaline inspired me to new heights, as I got hold of the magic and was able to rip it apart, and the water instantly receded.  Merithel and Glannin had rescued the drowning men. Calcedon was in rough shape but had damaged the elemental, and I finished it off with some more fire,   In a fit of enthusiasm, I cried out: "Friends!  Let me deal with all your water based attackers!".  Rarely does the world issue a more rapid rebuke than the one I was about to undergo.  

Manjenko then was flying back to me with haste, to tell me that our arcane foe was not on the shore where I suspected, but was in fact behind me out in the water.  I turned to catch a glimpse a a large, boggard like creature with clear otherwordly features, before it leaped next to me and pummeled me into unconsciousness.  As I understand, my comrades quickly came to my aid, with Merithel and Glannin going into water to fight this beast.  Glannin actually cut the beast in half, and it sunk beneath the water. 

After the Daemon was destroyed, we questioned the "gang members" that we had captured. It turned out they were unwitting agents to a trap laid out for us- a supply of shiver to pretend to hang out at the end of this dock (conveniently leaving assailants with nowhere to retreat) and wait for us (three days at this point). We asked about the man who hired him and I requested that he share the memory of the man who hired him, which I subsequently shared with Merithel. Merithel had a recognition of the man. His name was Kelvin and he was a member of the Barnassis Gang.

As we finished up the questioning of the "bait" we heard a rumbling of many voices coming from the end of the dock. A large group of some of the most disreputable, scarred, drug addled, pockmarked scum that Bridgefront had to offer had amassed at the end of the dock, and they were calling for our heads. They began advancing on us while we were at the end of the dock, and the mob began assaulting us with a fusillade of rocks and broken glass. After taking a rock to the jaw, I decided that whatever lay in the water was preferable to taking the mob head on, and I jumped off the dock. I did my best to support my comrades who held their ground on the dock by casting spells while treading water. Glannon and Calcedon met the mob head on, and forcibly readjusted enough of their attitudes to break it up and send many of them fleeing.

We then questioned some members of the mob we detained, and found that they had been promised a lifetime supply of shiver if they brought our heads to Greely's den. They easily gave up its location- the Red Olypant in the Night Market. We let the members of the mob who had survived leave to reflect on their poor choices, and we went to deliver our heads to Greely- still firmly attached.

With businesses closed for hours at the Market by this point, it was quite deserted. We found the defunct Red Olyphant and located a door to the building off an alley. I had Manjenko look at the nearby roofs for lookouts or snipers, but there were noon. We then entered the building, and were immediately greeted by a hail of crossbow bolts. Glannin and Merithel charged through the door, and spotted the man who had set up our ambushes, confirming we were in the right place (bursting through any door in Bridgefront has a chance to provoke a crossbow bolt assault, after all) As the battle turned against the gang members, the presumed mastermind, retreated up an open staircase, firing bolts at us. Glannin charged up the stairs after him, with the rather intimidating if long winded battle cry: "HELLO! We are looking for Moses Greely. Which of you should we interrogate and which should we kill?" We knocked out several of the gang members and the last one surrendered, as Greely appeared on the staircase above us and cast a spell and turned invisible. I sent Manjenko back out the door and told him to track the man if he escaped us. Merithel managed to trip him, and Greely channeled energy from the Negative Plane, which was an unpleasant experience. Merithel was able to knock him out and tie him up. We inventoried the gang's loot and found a nice cache of treasure, including several items that had clearly been looted from the Temple. We also found a haunting passage- "The souls of those we have sacrificed have risen up for their revenge."

We found a hidden passageway in the gang's hideout and followed it out. Glannon charged ahead in his haste and triggered a trap- a 30 foot fall onto spikes below. Thankfully his armor bore deflected the spikes so his injuries were limited. After we pulled him up, Merithel pointed out that it was obviously a trap as there was a 2 inch channel on the rafter on the ceiling above that had been smoothed by years of using it to swing across. Merithel and I were aghast that Glannin had missed such an obvious red flag. We demonstrated by swing across ourselves, and then continued on.

We decided to spend the night in their lair and pick up our investigation in the morning with no delay. While we were waiting, one of the captured gang members signalled a desire to talk and did so with Glannin and Calcedon. He offered to reveal to us to their "hideout" if we released him. Glannin countered that we would agree after confirmation of the information, and the gang member agreed. He showed us a secret panel behind the latrine, and we released him. We slept in shifts and experienced the familiar nightmares- but we made it to the sanctuary, and our slow speaking friend feasted on them, and all was well for the night.

We finished our preparations for the day at noon and set out. Calcedon and I took our remaining prisoners to the Magistrate, while Merithel and Glannin stayed to guard the latrine. We told the Maigstirate what we had found out about the threat to Bridgefront, and he was very interested and asked for frequent updates. We returned to the Olyphant and met up with our comrades, whose watch had been uneventful.

We started down the latrine-passage. I believe the tunnel was actually within the huge seawall that formed the border of the city. There was no natural light- we relied Calcedon's light. Glannin and Calcedon spotted some tracks and determined the direction they came from (the group's elves were unsure- having spent so much time in the urban city, tracking footprints is a skill of limited utility. 200 feet down the tunnel, we were attacked by huge spider both in front of and behind us. Calcedon and I dealt with one, while Merithel and Glannin engaged the other one. I used my new haste spell for the first time, greatly increasing our speed. Our spider entangled Calcedon in webs, hampering his combat efforts. Merithel was bitten and badly poisoned. We did manage to dispatch the spiders. I gave Glannin one of the scrolls we had found in the bandits lair that would reverse the poison damage that was done to Merithel, and told him how to read it, knowing that his divine energy would do the rest whether he was aware of it or not.

We continued on and came to a stairway leading up to a torch lit porcullis. Beyond it was a set of tied back curtains and some mannequins dressed as cultists. We used Merithel's multi purpose tool as a block and tackle to raise the portcullis enough for Merithel to slip under it, hoping to raise it more easily using a switch from within. He was only able to lock it in place before he was attacked by 3 Kytons, evil outsiders from Hell. He was trapped on the wrong side of the portcullis with the enemy and was brutlized by the chains before Glannin and Calcedon were able to reach him. They waded on and took some punishment themselves. I was able to stun one Kyton for a short time using my new Greater THundercloud spell. Glannin split one Kyton in half with a might shot, and Calcedon was able to kill another. Merithel had used some potions and magic to heal and augment his combat abilities and raced back into the fray, only to have the collapse around his body and resulting a cascade of cracking up and down his spine and ribcage. He fell to the ground very nearly, but not quite, dead. Cal was able to dispatch the final Kyton while Glanning attended to Merithel, bringing him back before we lost him.

The Kyton's bodies started to faded away, showing that they had been summoned by a powerful wizard or sorceror. We continued on and found a few doors- one was barred, the other led to a to an ornate room. We encountered a group of cultists. One of them was able to create duplicates of himself, but we were able dispatch all of them but one. THe final cultist fled , with Glannin in hot pursuit, followed by Merithel and Calcedon. As we pursued the cultist into a new room, he revealed that his intention was to lead us headlong into an ambush, as other enemies suddenly appeared.

As the ambush unfolded an eerie laugh rang thoughout the room. It sounded like a hag and I had Manjenko look with his all-seeing eyes to see if one was present invisibly in the room, but he found nothing. The laughing voice’s disembodied nature and peculiar effect marked it as most likely a haunt, and Glannin fell victim…fortunately the only lasting effect appeared to be a bout of uncontrollable laughing. Some of our cultists ambushers also fell over laughing, so it appears they had not been counting on the haunt to help them. With their ambush disrupted, they were quickly dispatched.

The room consisted of rotted furniture and paintings, and had a cage in the corner. We managed to take one of the cultists alive for questioning. He offered to trade information for his freedom. He said he and his fellows (4 of them on the daytime shift) were guard/enforcers hired to watch this house. He hated the house and hated the job, and wants to leave. Regarding they hag’s voice, he said they heard if from time to time, but never saw one. The front door to the building is blocked, and they came and went from a secret passage. They do not leave this area, and their only job was to protect the cultists when they were sleeping. They talk about this place as though it were the Temple, and they also make Shiver here. He took us into the next room, a lab with a glass mosaic of a butterfly on the floor and a torn up stage.

Merithel followed close behind him, and barely noticed him make some kind of gesture when he got in the room…then he bolted! His machinations however had brought forth an invisible stalker, an amorphous permanently invisible creature from the Plane of Air. We had a difficult time fighting it, as pinpointing where it was was highly difficult. Manjenko called out its location until it brutally attacked him. I directed him to flee the room to a place of safety. We lost the ability to see where it was and our group had to become far more crafty in our attacks. With the right timing and strategy we were able to kill it even though we could not see it.

We then heard echoes of childlike giggling echoing throughout the room, and saw small children’s footprints in the floor. We tried to see where the fleeing man went, and entered a room with a shiver still and webs on the ceiling. Merithel attempted to examine the equipment when abruptly several couches fell on his head, and we were ambushed by giant spiders. A spider tried to web Merithel but missed. Calcedon created a fiery effect to try to burn the webs, but as the burned a by-product was created, an intense dose of concentrated Shiver in gaseous form. The gas has a very obvious impact on the minds of those that inhaled it. I realized these were Dream spiders, the same kind that had attacked me that night in Fordyce manor. Trying to rally my comrades I shouted “Get them lads! I stomped these beasts in my slippers and night shirt!” I believe Glannin may have had a comment about that, but he was currently inhaling large quantities of Shiver gas.

The situation rapidly got worse as a door opened behind me and I was accosted by more assailants. I did get a Burning Hands off, but I was hit by a scythe and fell victim to a magical sleep effect, as did Merithel. One of the opponents coming down from the webs was an Ettercap, and it started attacking Merithel. More webs were burned, putting Calcedon and Merithel in another cloud of gas. I was told the Ettercap mentioned Devargo, and I believe based upon the description it was a “Nightmare Ettercap”. We dispatched the cultists who streamed in through the door behind us, and the Ettercap retreated back up to the ceiling, hiding amongst the huge quantity of webs. We decided not to pursue it in such a hazardous place and continued on after looting the cultists.

The room was smoky, another kind of lab perhaps, filled with vials and satchels. Smoke was pouring fairly steadily out of the fireplace, and Merithel saw the flue was jammed. Much of the Shiver equipment was destroyed during our fight.

The next room contained what could best be described as a “Corpse Closet” Dozens of corpses in a small room filled with quicklime. As we looked upon the ghastly scene, a bloody script started to scratch itself into the each of the corpses. Some of the corpses had written onto them a profession, or time of death. Others had descriptions of how they died. On top of the necrotic pile was a white haired half elf. The bloody script on it said “ I’m not supposed to be here. Can you hear me?” I would wager all the corpses shared that sentiment. The magical effect looked like some variation of Blood Biography, though I have no idea who cast it or how it was triggered. All but Calcedon were nauseated by the sight, leading me to wonder what in his past had so ably steeled him to confront this scene…

After we had recovered, we moved on. Calcedon found several musical instruments in the next room which captivated his attention, while the rest of us examined five corpses that had been laid out morgue-style. While we were investigating, a few of us heard faint music- telltale signs of a haunt becoming active. Suddenly a blaring discordant noise sounded, and once again Glannin and I were nauseated, while Calcedon endured the cacophonous tones with impunity. As the noise blared, only Merithel noticed that a portrait of a man hanging in the room had changed expressions- from neutral to seemingly sneering at us. He pointed it out, but neither Merithel nor Calcedon recongized the man. Merithel destroyed the painting in a Glanninesque fashion, Calcedon's disapproval. I believe that art that seems to actively despise you deserves what it gets.

After we recovered we found our initial conclusions were wrong- the corpses were not corpses after all, but instead living people who were in some sort of paralysis. Apparently they had been poisoned into helplessness. Notably, such an effect is NOT a feature of Ettercap poison. All of the victims appeared to be average laborers. We decided we had to take a break in our Temple exploration to bring these victims to a safe location. We broke open a boarded up window and extricated them, and then carted them to our in to recover.

We had a bit of drama when it appeared that our inkeeper had potentially been murdered and replaced by a look-alike. Merithel had noticed some subtle differences in appearance. As it turned out, she claimed she had a twin and was mistaken all the time. The others seemed to accept this explanation but I remain wary. Will have to set up some tests and and precautions...we already had experienced a double ambush and coming after us while sleeping is the next logical step. I already had foregone all food and drink from this place in favor of Glannin's gruel spoon, and that was before I had any reason to suspect the innkeeper's murderous intentions. Sleep seems unlikely in the near future. Nevertheless, the others were content to leave the paralyzed victims in our room while we returned to the Temple. It is good there is no viable law enforcement currently in Bridgefront as this would be....hard to explain.

We returned the temple and were ambushed by a giant wasp like creature called a Spider Eater. It was able to sting and paralyze Merithel, but I dispatched it with a hurled coin. I believe it is possible the others also may have hit it.

Seeing Merithel paralyzed in such a fashion by the Spider Eater led me to the realization that the victims we had just transported may in fact be suffering an unfortunate side effect of the Spider Eater's attack- being the host for its spawn. I announced this possiblity and Calcedon was particularly horrified. However the gestation period was a number of days, not hours, so we resolved to finish exploring the Temple before the gang responded, then we would move to help the victims.

We re-entered the building where we had left it and continued on. The next room we cam to had a huge animated hustk of a spider, filled with spiders falling out of its body like drops of blood. I created a thundercloud as this foe looked particularly dangerous- a Death Web. It did actually smash Glannin so heard he flew back 10 feet onto his back- a fearsome feat of strength. Merithel hit with Holy Water at the end of a fierce fight and it finally crumpled up. Upon searching, nothing else of interest was in the room.

We came to a stuck door, and Glannin and Calcedon were able to pop it open. Beyond that was a room with a large hole in the floor, covered with webbing. Glannin determined it was a recent floor collapse. Merithel entered the room after and saw images of arcance inscriptions floating through the air. He felt the need to repeat was he was seeing...some of was incomprehensible.

We found some bedding in the webs- likely the sleeping place of the Ettercap. We raided his stash in retaliation for his attacks upon us.

We next search the library and found some minor religious artifacts and a book I was unable to identify- most intriguing! We also found some other useful magical equipment. We were then attacked by a group of Areanas- spider like creatures. Merithel was again paralyzed, though this time I was able to dispel the Ghoul Touch spell he was under. They tried to take me out of the fight with Hideous Laughter, but they failed. Again I finished off one of our foes, with a simple Ray of Frost. Another went invisible, but was killed by Glannin when she tried to attack.

In the next room we found carcasses- of the porcine variety, thankfully. There was a trap door in the ceiling with a ladder. Identifying it as a larder, Merithel suggested we distribute this meat to the citizens of Bridgefront. Searching the room, he also found a hiddden switch that activated a poison blade trap. He was able to deactivate the trap.

We headed up the ladder to the trapdoor. Merithel went up and as soon as he stepped into the room above he saw a woman hung up in the webs, barely breathing. Before we could even move to help her, a Spider Eater burst forth from her, fully ready to attack at the moment of its "birth". Merithel managed to finish it off, and it was a gruesome scene. We deduced the adult Spider Eater we killed early was kept here, and had been released by someone.

Thenext room was a bedroom with a fine bed and desk. There was a gaping hole in the Northeast Wall. As we searched, we saw a barely discernable shadow flitting throughout the room. Calcedon was hit by a Deep Slumber effect. In his state, he was able to see a form pacing about the room, with a quasit on his shoulder. The figure sneered at Cal and he realised the figure was a much younger version of the man in the portrait we had destroyed earlier. Merithel woke him up before he could see more. We searched the room and realized someone had been residing here the past few weeks. We found several useful items but most importantly we found a thick tome with hundreds of names- a complete record of the Cult's membership rolls! Additionally it had a note near the end: "Withhold Joseph Barvssos' payment until Book of Dreaming is returned." Merithel surmised that this was Devargo's son! With the Lamms, now the Devargos...crime is a family business in Korvosa.

After we digested this revelation, we continued.  We took the stairs several levels down to complete our exploration of the Temple, back to the room with the damaged stage.  It was easy to see that planks of the stage had been recently torn up, revealing a staircase heading down- the last area that remained unexplored.  We proceeded down, to areas of the city that were evidently very old, (Merithel thought up to 400 years old) as we passed numerous alcoves filled with dessicated corpses.  We exited the stairs into a cavern filled with wine casks.

In the cavern was a 10 foot diameter well capped with a  cover.  Glannin and Calcedon managed to lift the cover off, and it unleashed another haunt.  This time we saw nightmarish images of faces in pain swirling around us, and heard faint echoes of a conjuring call, and then something fell to earth and leveled whole cities.  After a few moments, the haunt subsided.  Calcedon threw a light pebble into the well so we could see what lay in it before we descended into something potentially hazardous.  At the bottom was a lead coffer.  Glannin suggested that perhaps we should just leave it, but Merithel had already started his descent.  He experienced the visions once again, but shrugged them off and continued.

At the bottom he examined the coffer and found it ajar and empty.  He moved the cover back on, but the visions did not stop.  We surmised something had recently been removed from the coffer.  Whatever it was contained was in the shape of a sphere.  The room also contained an elevator.  Glannin examined it and pronounced it safe and we boarded and used the hand driven pulley to go down.  It descended about 40 feet to a very long worked tunnel.  It was deep enough to go under the Old Wall, certainly below the shoreline.

As we started walking down the tunnel, we were ambushed in the front and rear of our group by Phase Spiders- giant vermin that shifted to our plane to attack, then back to the Ethereal before we could retaliate.  I took a grievous wound on their first assault and was forced to vanish in order to stay alive.  We quickly picked up the same trick we used fighting the invisible stalker to hold our blow until the moment the creatures phased back to attack us.  Merithel and I were subject to poisonous bites and it appeared as though we both might succumb, but Glannin urgently moved back and forth between us applying his home “remedies” and keeping us on the brink of life until the poison ran its course.  We were so weakened by the poison we had to turn back, as Merithel and I could barely walk under our own power.

We went back up the elevator and exited the Temple.  We stopped in briefly to see Driune (Magister of Civic Order) and update him on our progress.  He was very, very excited to see the list of the cult members- it was a large list and had many still active members to bring to justice.  We received a portion of the reward at this point.   We quickly spent most of it at the Night Market on healing the damage the poison had done to use, and some antitoxins and other healing for our hopefully final excursion to the Temple.  I also picked up a new spell that will let me use a burst of air to toss an opponent into the air and then let them fall.  I have high hopes.

After we had recovered somewhat and resupplied, we returned to hopefully finish exploring the Temple.  We headed to the depths again, this time through a long corridor that terminated in what could be described as an underwater glass dome.  This remarkable room was occupied by about 2 dozen members of the cult.  As we approached the entrance of the room, many of them seemed listless and preoccupied, though they appeared to be preparing sacrifices of six hapless victims hanging from webs thoughout the room.  A gigantic fossilized spider hung from the ceiling.  We had the luxury to prepare for the upcoming conflict as we were not spotted.

After we moved in and confronted the cultists, their Priestess addressed us and tried to cut a deal.  She offered to give us the avenue to deal with the perpetrators of the plague if we would leave them alone to complete their sacrifices.  She told us how they had excommunicated a subsect of their cult, a group who had obtained a sphere that could alter the dreamscape.  When their leader opened a portal to it, they pushed him in and sealed it.  He is now hunting them in their dreams.  He is seeking a book he needs to increase his power (the book Barvasso stole).  

Merithel and Calcedon feigned agreeing to her terms but she was able to see through at least one of their bluffs.  She roused her cultists to action and their barrage of thrown weapons proved impossible for us to dodge- it became a race to kill/incapacitate enough of them before they were able to overwhelm us with their numbers.  I was able to keep the Priestess from tipping the scales in their favor by tearing her spells apart before they left her lips.  I deliberately chose to taunt her to provoke a mistake, but she saw through my bravado- I could not in fact counterspell her all day.  

We were able to dispatch the rampaging groups of cultists.  She again made us an offer, a better offer this time:  "Take the Key, Find the Book, Make the Door, Use the Key!"  Merithel reiterated that she was still under arrest, and that was a deal-breaker for her.  Calcedon tripped her, and Glannin knocked her out Merithel tied her up.  Then, just as it looked like we had the situation under control, everything went to hell.

The fossilized "statue" that was hanging above suddenly animated and dropped to the ground.  It was so large it could reach most of the room we stood in.  To make matters worse, when it fell it weakened the structural integrity of the room, and water started pouring in from broken seals in the windows.  In an instant the water was up to our ankles.    The creature, a effigy of a Leng spider, we absolutely ferocious.  I was separated from Glannin and my last memory was being knocked down and seeing stars.  I wish that were the worst that happened to me.  After the spider literally trampled over me, I believe my body was best described as an "empty sausage casing".  Thankfully my friends were able to destroy that abomination, and I will be forever grateful that they hoisted my remains despite the water rising rapidly around them and brought it all the way back with them.  

When they updated the Magistrate on our progress, he was elated enough to foot the cost of bringing me back.  I repay my favors and this will not be forgotten.  I will strive to make sure that this honorable and dedicated public servant both survives the reign of the Queen and is in a position to lead the city after we deal with her.  As to what I experienced in the handful of hours in between my death and return...that is for another time.  Suffice to say I will be both more cautious in the future- I have been wounded far too much in our Temple explorations and this cannot continue!

I was able to examine the Key we obtained from the Priestess.  It felt heavy- psychologically heavy as if it had a story to tell.  We have to find a way to listen.

Desnus the 29th- My return to the living was delayed one day, as the priest of Abador who had been stranded in Bridgefront was eager to take the Magistrate's coin but did not have the necessary spell in his arsenal. I came back in a weakened state, but was able to use a scroll we had found to repair some of the permanent damage. Repairing the rest will be costly. After trying my best to repress the events that led to my death as well as as what happened after, I threw myself back into the task ahead of us. One unfinished task in my mind was to retrieve the victims in the "corpse closet" in order to identify who they were and provide closure for their relation. The story of the half elf ("I'm not supposed to be here.") also needed investigating. We carted the bodies out and brought them to Drune. He was less than enthused about the task but considering the successes we had been bringing him, he was willing to delegate someone to the identification task. We spent the rest of the day selling the equipment and lootage in order to re-equip for our next push.

Desnus 30th-Lacking the expertise to examine the key, we went to see what Madame Carrington could tell us about it. We got past her annoying manservant and presented it to her. She was quite intrigued after examining it and rather than painstakingly write our her thoughts using her stylus and board, she decided to show us what she had gleaned using a variation of my Share Memory spell (note to self- have to try to replicate that, her version was more useful). She revealed to use these visions, going in chronological order from the most recent to the most distant:
1- Myre Lembroski (the High Priestess) is handed the Key by Moses Greely, and offers an apology to her and Mog-Lathar (the fossilized Leng Spider)
2- Frel Tan (the nephew of the Magistrate ((the other Magistrate))) pillaging a ruined chamber and snatching up the Book and Key.
3- Nakum and others in the ritual chamber before its destruction, then during its destruction as they tried to crawl away from the portal as it warped their bodies. As he is pulled in, he drops the Key.
4- Nakum uncapping the seal in the catacombs, while the same haunt energy affects him as id did us, and
5- Nakum deep in contemplation in the Cult library, poring over the same tome with a gleeful look in his eye, (the same tome Frel Tan stole)

The interpretation was that the idol of Mog Lathar did not want Nakum to awaken the Dreamstone, so Myra banished him and his followers into the Dreamscape.

The visions stopped after the Key dropped from Carrington's hand, as she was drained by her efforts to reveal the visions. Merithel told her we believe Josef Barvasso has the book. She asked if we can find him, and stressing that time was precious "More come to me every night seeking sanctuary. Going into the Dreamscape is dangerous but you must fight them there. The Book may have a way to get you safely into the Dreamscape." Lucid dreaming is an option, but it is dangerous because we would be using someone else's dreams, and thus it becomes much harder to alter the dream reality. Glannin posed a question to us "Regarding the condition of Nakum- lethal or non-lethal?" Given that Chazon was not with us currently and given the reality warping nature of our situation, Merithel's response was apt: "What happens in the Dreamscape stays in the Dreamscape. Technically I think he's already dead." Carrington is exhausted so we take our leave to seek out Josef. We decided to start by questioning some of the Barvasso band in custody.

Glannin and Merithel took turns interrogating one of the captives, he was completely cowed and seemed to be forthright when he professed no knowledge of Barvasso's current whereabouts. He was in it solely for the pay, with no interest in the cult or loyalty to Josef. Accordingly, Josef had kept him at arm's length from useful information. He did tell us Josef had been trying to sell the book but had not gotten the offer he was looking for. After telling the jailer's of his cooperation, we moved on to a two part plan to track Josef down.

Merithel disguised himself as a freelancer trapped in Bridgefront who was eager to work with a competent band like the Barvasso gang. He managed to hook a contact and get the word of his interest out. Separately, we also put out the word that we were looking to buy the book, by using the occult community. We found someone willing to this searching for us for just 10 gold. With these plans in motion, we decided to attempt lucid dreaming to see what we were dealing with.

Merithel used his cantrip to induce lucid dreaming in Merithel, Glannin, and myself. Glannin and I ended up together and we experimented with running, jumping, and throwing-nothing differed from our real world experiences. As actual danger threatened when we heard the baying of hounds closing in on us, Glanning achieved sufficient motion to bend this reality to his will, he grew three sizes that day and his towering strides enabled us to easily outpace our pursuers. Merithel on the other hand took to the new reality much easier, as he was able to quickly bend the Dreamscape to increase his speed and completely avoid jeopardy. I believe success is in at least due in part to force of personality. We both made it to the Dreamscape sanctuary at Carrington's.

It was standing room only. The building was much more crowded and our friend the Baku looked completely sated yet still hungry. Under his watch we were able to sleep our way out of lucid dreaming and back to the normal reality. We were heartened by being able to alter the Dreamscape under the most adverse conditions- now we had to find a way to turn the odds more in our favor so that it would not be such a struggle.

The next day Merithel met with his informant. He verified Barvasso has the book, and he knew someone who may be able to mediate the purchase, by the name of Weatherly. It is good that that effort bore fruit, as Merithel's efforts to join the gang came to halt when a contact told him that Barvasso was not interested in recruiting. We also got information on other parts of the city through that source- apparently someone on the east side of Korvosa had sent themselves up as Emperor. Since we can only depose one Monarch/Emperor at a time, we decided to let that situation resolve itself.

We also heard that people across the river had no problem sleeping. This gave us an idea that perhaps the nightmare effect was centered around the Book. We investigated the boundaries of the nightmare effect through Bridgefront and found that our theory was not accurate- the effect did not seem to be limited to a radius around the book. While that did not pan out, we did discover something else- the radius was simply expanding. More area was covered now than when the nightmare plague first started. Whether there is a natural limit to the effect or whether this threatens all of Korvosa, there is no way to tell yet.

2nd of Sarenith-
Merithel met Weatherly at the tavern at noon along with Glannin and I. His disguise might have sufficed, except that Glannin and I made no effort to hide our identities and we were immediately made. Apparently we are more notorious than I thought- that is not good. Still, she was willing to act as a go between to broker the purchase of the book , for a fee of 120 gold. The efforts will take another day.

While we waited, we checked in with Driune to see what progress had been made in identifying the corpses. He had released several bodies to family members, but made no progress in identifying the half elf. We then visited Carrington to update her on our efforts. We were dismayed to find she had been physically wounded. Glannin smeared some kind of grease over her face to "heal her"- her face was suddenly suprisingly expressive. Communicating through the stylus and board, she told Glannin that "You are blessed. You have gifts given to you by the Lady of Valor". Merithel interpreted this and we resolved a mystery- it was obvious Glannin had a powerful patron of which he was completely unaware and who had asked nothing of him, but it was very surprising to learn that the power was from Iomedae! When one things of dieties who bestow gifts without duty attached, she is far from the top of the list. Glannin, as always, was quite skeptical.

Calcedon meanwhile had embarked on his own independent search, using his connections and natural charm to sift through the social echelons of Bridgefront.  In pursuit of this he performed multiple shows celebrating the Day of Destiny festival, which still went on despite the twin plagues of Bloodveil and the Gray Nightmare.  The widsom of cancelling large social events in the face of an epidemic was apparently outweighed by the need to celebrate something.  Calcedon's inspired performance did much to lift the spirits of those who heard it, managing to put aside the existential dread the had to confront daily, at least for a time.

3rd of Sarenith-  After Calcedon provided another virtuoso performance for the masses, we turned in for the night.  As we fell into slumber, we again made beelines for the sanctuary of Carrington's.  The building was even more crowded than in previous nights.  The next morning a note was delivered to Merithel. It ready only: "Get to the Rook's Roost immediately."  Myself, Merithel and Glannin set out immediately while we sent a runner to Calcedon.  

When we made it to the Roost, we were greeted by the propietor and his bodyguards.  He led us to a room in the back hall that was accessible only by a secret door (that I had missed on my first hurried scouting of the building done under pressure).  Inside was a most gruesome scene.  The remnants of the Barvasso gang, along with Josef Barvasso himself, lay strewn about this room.  Apparently they had been trying to take the fight to the Dreamworld, as they had an apparatus set up to harvest the secretions of the hydrodaemon we had killed earlier.  Its secretions apparently allowed for lucid dreaming, and they had pipes set up to deliver doses to each of them to ingest.  Their corpses were gray and torn to shreds.  Shadow hands did not do this- it appears as though they were ripped to shreds from something in this world.  

While the three of us were investigating the scene, a threat was building.  The gruesome scene, intersecting with the Dream World, had spawned a blood golem.  We heard a gruesome shrieking in our minds, identical to when we encountered Frel Tan upon our first arrival to Bridgefront.  It immediately attacked me, only missing due to my new defensive philosophy pursuant to ensuring my own survival.  In an abundance of caution, I may have called out that our weapons could not hurt the creature.  Merithel corrected this, noting that it could be technically be hurt.   Given its durability, I may have been more correct in the end then him, though they were eventually able to kill it (its immunity to magic relegated me to a support role only). The fight ended with blood and viscera thrown everywhere, leaving all the combatants drenched in it.

Adnon was grateful to us after he and his bodyguards reappeared after fleeing, and was much more amenable to answering our questions.  Much of what he told us we already knew. "Frel Tan found a book and key in some wreckage.  He bartered away the key, and sold the book to Josef.  When the Cult withheld is payment, he tried to leverage the book  for more influence over the cult.  Then dangerous entities started appearing in their dreams.  They used this device to defend themselves.  Josef was spooked by our inquiries and sold the book to a merchant on Winding Way."  That was the extent of what he could tell us, and as we departed he set his minions to dismembering the corpses for disposal.  

We proceeded with haste to the Winding Way bookstore. As we approached, we saw a crowd gathered nearby, an ominous sign on these sparsely traveled streets. Cora Kranden (the Guard sergeant) initially drew her sword as she saw Merithel running at her still drenched in drying blood. Only when she recognized who he was did she lower her weapon. She put her efforts into maintaining order with the restive crowd. Cora told us that she was securing the scene of a suicide, but the crowd was restive and hostile. Calcedon managed to convince the crowd to stand down and rejoin the festival. The crowd clearly did not believe her claims of suicide, but Calcedon's soothing words did convince the crowd to disperse, which lowered Cora's tension level.

She told us the proprietor of the Winding Way bookstore, a man named Digorgio, had been discovered on an alley an hour ago. He bore much the same wounds as the members of the Barvasso gang did- many ripping and slashing wounds. It also looked like he fell out from some height onto the alley. He had been wearing night clothes, probably having been pulled or fled from his place of slumber. As we examined the scene I felt a tug at my sleeve. A teenage human girl told me she had something to tell me regarding the scene in front of us, but it was obvious she did not want to speak in front of Cora, or was scared of her. When I realized she had useful information about what transpired, I called over Calcedon to speak to her, which proved very effective.

We found out that Abigail was the daughter of Digorgio. She had been awaked by the sound of snuffling at her door, and had peeked through the keyhole to see what she described as "a big dog with no skin on it". She thought it was just a dream, until she awoke to find her father gone. We went into the Winding Way bookstore to see if we could find the book in it's inventory. A lengthy search ensued and Calcedon found a book that caught his attention in the new inventory pile- it appeared to be just another book, but he was able to see through the magical disguise. The crafty book dealer had inserted a magical bookmark into the Book to conceal its true nature! It had been protected from the midnight assassins, leaving it for us to find. We took possession of the Book, thanked Abigail for her help, and left to secure it.

An examination of the Tome showed it contained what we were looking for- the Ritual of the Breach. It would allow a much safer foray into the Dreamscape than we had with our lucid dreaming experiment. However, the ritual was extremely complicated, there were chaotic and nonsensical elements to the Ritual much unlike the straightfoward logic utilized for arcane magic. I estimate it will take us about a week of solid studying before we can attempt it. Given the assaults on the prior owners of the Book, we decided not to conduct these studies in our room at the Inn, but instead inside the "library" at the Temple we had cleared. It seems defensible and it also is quite hidden. We will see if our choice of sanctuary proves wise.

3rd of Sarenith
Our week of intense study commenced. Merithel and I shared a table, pouring over the tome, consulting other sources, and developing a mutual interpretation of this Ritual that was unlike any we had ever seen before. Glannin, though clearly bored, stood watch as we knew what had happened to the previous two owners of the Tome. Calcedon left during the day to attend to the spirits of the Bridgefront residents and retrieve supplies. We set up a watch with Glanning, Manjenko, and Calcedon, while Merithel and I got desperately needed sleep. The first attack came during Manjenko's watch, and caught it unawares. The assault opened with our shadowy attacker filling the room with Negative energy, a cloying, draining feeling. I awoke under assault and began casting Haste before I even opened my eyes. Our assailant brought with her a Hound of Tindalos, which tried to slice me to pieces (as we had seen happen to it's earlier victims) with its "Ripping Gaze". I was able to steel myself against it, but the assault continued until Merithel scored a vicious hit against the assassin, at which point they teleported/plane shifted away, leaving both sides bloodied but with no casualties.

Realizing that they could possibly keep these hit and run tactics going indefinitely while they sought to whittle us down, I asked Calcedon to procure a scroll of Conjuration Foil ( to give those trying to leave an unpleasant and perhaps fatal blow as they fled) or Dimensional Anchor, (to lock them down in the room with us for a final settling). He found a Dimensional Anchor scroll, but it will take time to get it transcribed into my spellbook. He also got me a scroll of Alarm, which I can implement immediately.

4th of Sarenith
The marathon of studying continued. Knowing that the Hound would not be able to attempt its gaze attack until full day had passed, we prepared at night for an encore, and we were not disappointed. The attack came much as before, though this time Manjenko spotted them appear and gave warning. This time, we focused on the assassin and not the end. Freed from the need to conserve my magical talents, I unleashed the might of the storm upon her twice, stunning her witless while Glannin and Merithel made certain she would never teleport anywhere again. The Hound got away after doing some damage, but we may have just cut the threat in half.

5th of Sarenith
Another full day of study and revelation, another night plagued by nerves and fear as we tried to sleep knowing the Hound could appear any moment. It did indeed, but we had our playbook down. Once it was stunned, the other managed to dispatch it before it could leave again, perhaps ensuring us an uninterrupted night's rest going forward.

6th of Sarenith
On the evening of this day, after Merithel and I had studied as much as we could, Calcedon returned to our lair to tell us that Maynard, Madame Carrington's servant, was looking for us. We packed up the book to take with us- hiding it here had its merits, but was just too risky. We were greeted at the door by a distressed Maynard, who took us in immediately to witness a comatose Carrington, bearing signs of injury. Glannin healed her, but she did not come to. On her planchette was a warning: "The Spider's silk is strong. They are coming for me." Manjenko leaned over and asked me who the old woman was that was leaning over Carringon- a clue that I repeated so we all understood a bit more of what was going on. Maynard told us that the enemy "Just walked into the sanctuary and attacked." We debated about how to proceed- under Calcedon's urging several of us were about to take Merithel's potion to undergo lucid dreaming to confront the hag in the DreamScape- when Maynard pulled out a potion and the color drained from the room. He disappeared and his hostile intent was made clear.

Manjenko pointed out his positioned and I brought down the thunder, but Maynard was surprisingly agile and dodged it. At that point the plants in the room- Xtbays of course, realized a pollen of sorts that filled the confined space, and put Glannin slumbering into the Dreamscape. I extermined a plant with my Cloud, while Merithel engaged the deceptively dangerous Maynard, and Calcedon turned into raptor (making me question whether I too was in the Dreamscape) and attacked a plant. It quickly became clear Maynard was not acting of his own volition- weeping as he attacked- it seemed he was under some kind of domination. We destroyed the plants and incapacitated Maynard.

It became apparent Glannin was being injured in the Dreamscape, as wounds opened up on him. Determined to help him and rescue Carrington, the three of us (leaving Manjenko alone to do his best to protect our sleeping forms) took Merithel's extract and merged into the Dreamscape. Each of us faced a peril before we could reunite- I had to disappear and flee from Night Guants, a mud elemental attacked Calcedon, and shadow hounds were after Merithel.

We did reunite at the Dreamscape Sanctuary. Entering together, we saw a scene of complete carnage. All the souls who had sought refuge there had been slaughtered. Carrington and the Baku were not present here, and we could find no trace of the Hag. Frustratingly we realized we could do nothing here, the damage had been done and we could not find the hag in the short time we had. After running through our options, we exited the Dreamscape.

Maynard, tied up, apologized profusely for his actions, saying that he was controlled by a shadow in his mind. He was however no longer under the domination effect. An examination of Carrington revealed she could survive perhaps 8 days before the Hag completely drained her. With absolutely no other options available to us, we determined, much to Calcedon's utter frustration, that returning to study the ritual was the only course left open to us.

Merithel and I returned and finished up our studies the night of the 8th. Calcedon had heard rumors of many more deaths at night- sanctuary was no longer available to anyone in the Dreamscape. Glannin, having taken to sleeping during the day, realized he was lucid dreaming. I was reasonably sure he had not indulged in shiver, so that was a very bad sign.

Wasting no time, as soon as Merithel and I had completed our understanding of the ritual, we undertook it that night. The easy parts involved chanting and drinking- the hard parts were reciting dozens of pages of intricate chants and incantations from memory. With Merithel's help, (mouthing certain phrases to me when I came to a pause), we were able to pull it off on our first try. I drew a keyhole and Merithel inserted the key, and we entered the Dreamscape, together, and finally on OUR terms.

We appeared in front of the Dreamscape version of the very Temple we had been residing in. This version appears much more intact than the version in the real world. Strange shapes appeared to leer down on us from the windows. It appears Nakum dreamed this house back to its former glory.

We are now physically in the Dream World, unable to "do the impossible", but with the ability to track down the Hag and rescue Carrington.  The mansion loomed ahead of us.  Thick ivy covered the house, restored to its previous glory.  In an 80 ft radius around the house lay the remains of dozens of splintered and broken hovels.  Knowing that we had to face the perisl within, Merithel stepped up to the door and checked for traps.  Before we even walked through the door, 2 vines on each side of the door animated and tried to move to attack us.  Trying to save my spells, I used my acid cantrip, and was the only one to do damage initially.  The others quickly rallied, and destroyed one of the vines.  Apparently that triggered a response, because a huge tree-creature behind us animated and moved to attack us.  The aura around it caused Calcedon to temporarily flee.  Merithel was grabbed by the tree, and Glannin moved to intercept it.  

Merithel called out the tree-creature was immune to electricity and fire, rendering my most potent spells useless.  I chose to began chucking Alchemist's fire at the assassin vine instead and burned it up.  We took quite a beating before Glannin chopped it down, and once again, we tried to enter the house.

The first room was a foyer (ruined it the real world equivalent).  A large rug covered the center of the room, with two stained glass windows depicting a butterfly/spider creature.  A stained glass window shattered and formed some creature made out of stained glass.  I knew cold damage would slow the creature so I hit it with a Ray of Frost, to great effect.  However the second time I attempted it, the Ray was reflected back at me, a mildly unpleasant experience.  It created gaping bleeding wounds with its agack. Attacks by Merithel and Calcedon managed to shatter the golem.  

After the fight, we realized that one of the doors in the room disappeared.  Merithel thought it was an illusion but could not prove it.  Then a small number of rats ran out from a table, and the last one stopped, looked at Glannin, and spoke "Turn Back!  You want no part of this hell!"  A most unexpected turn of events, but we chose not to heed the warning.  We exited through the door that that rats fled through.

We entered into a Billiards room, richly furnished.  Several instruments were in the room, in perfect condition this time.  The painting, which Merithel destroyed in the real world, now began to move and speak.
Painting: (A young Nahum) "So, you've come to return my book. "  
Calcedon "We have something of a different plan."
Painting:  "You know in this place, there are forces you don't understand.  Only I can control it.  Only I can control the the Dreamstone and restore the stability to the worlds."
Painting: "My house does not like you.  I offer you a trade.  I will give you the cripple Carrington in return for the book and the key."
Calcedon:  "I give you a counter offer.  If you want any bargaining chips left after we destroy all your minions in this house, you won't touch her."
Painting: "I wonder what Sally Scrabblebones and her girls are up to."  and he leaves.
Merithel:  "I truly hate that man."

We take the valuable instruments, knowing that they may disappear as dream figments when we return to the real world.  

We move onto the next room, a smoke den ( the shiver manufacture room in the real world).  Two inhabitants sit in chairs.  The smoke of incense/shiver hangs heavy in the air, the floor is covered by luxurious pillows and blankets.  The men are dressed as cultists and seem to be deep in the throes of the drugs they are using, and look malnourished to the point of being disabled.  
Addict: "Uggg...did you bring the book?"
Merithel:  "No"
We leave temporarily, wary of the shiver cloud, but found alternate exits barred.  We return to the addicts, who offer us a hit.  Someone begins to call for help, and Glannin demands to know who is behind the door calling for help.  The addicts are unhelpful, only saying "He just wouldn't shut up."  Glannin offered to let them leave, but the addict doubted he could stand up.  He again offers his pipe, and Merithel declines.  Glannin and Merithel enter, and attempt to open the door that was being pounded on "This wasn't supposed to happen!"  Merithel picks the lock and we finally see who we had been hearing calling for help so many times.  From the rear of the closet we hear a whimper "Something went wrong...you've got to kill me please!"  Something lurches forward, all the corpses have merged together into a pile of fused bodies, including the emaciated form of the half-elf, melted like a candle into each other.  While the half elf begs us to kill him rest of him demands we not kill the blob.  It moves to attack us.  Merithel recognized it had become a Gibbering Mouther.  There was no way to save the elf.  [Blood Drain, Engulf, Spittle, Immune Crits and Precision. ].  

Calcedon was affect by the Mouther's confusion ability, and jabbered.  It grabbed Merithel and bit him multiple times.  I directed Manjenko to heal Merithel while I dropped a lesser thundercloud on the Mouther.  Glannin brought forth a Wall of Fire on top of the creature, burning it every round.  I moved the cloud an second time after it tried to swallow Merithel, and electrocuted it to death.
The addict spoke alound "Why are the guards looking through the House?"  We surmised that their shiver addiction may be letting them see  into the real world, and the Guard was exploring the Temple there.  

We moved on to the next room.  A large alchemists lab, of the highest quality.  Merithel started collecting some of the best and most valuable equipment to take with him.  Recognized this lab was to create homunculi, and a Philospher's stone. (Representing only abandoned ambition now.)  Rare and expensive equipment.  An admixture vial  being among the most valuable, but several other valuable alchemical items were also confiscated.

Moving on, we found the Butterfly Room, where the butterfly mosaic was inlaid in the floor. The altar area in the room had scattered and bloody remains of a strange tusked creature, strung up across the altar, torn and shred across the room, was our friend the gentle Baku. We heard the sounds of giggles, and I vowed to bring the same fate to those who eviscerated our peaceful friend. Merithel used his scent ability to try to track down these invisible vermin. Wanting to destroy these as fast as possible, I used a precious Haste to speed up my companions, knowing that the invisibility would make it hard for our blows to land. Two then moved to attack Merithel with short swords, 2 attacked Glannin. The fight was going well, and then the remains of our friend the Baku animated and began attacking Merithel. When one of them is dispatched, we hear an echoing, piercing shriek that we recognize as Sally Scrabblebones. When the second "child" fell, we heard another shriek from elsewhere in the house. One of them starts shuddering through its throat-mouth, an Aura of Doom, which affected most of us. What remained of our friend the Baku was incredibly resilient, and took a long time to get through his defenses to finally put him to rest. I hoped to see Sally make an appearance, but the Hag was too cowardly to appear even as we killed her "children".

We moved on to the next room. An ornate wooden staircase ascends to the 2nd floor. Fine art and tapestries adorned the room, but it was also partially filled with fetid water, likely from the reliquary where we killed the idol (which subsequently flooded). Most sculptures depicted malformed creatures and deformed nobles. We then heard finally heard the cackling of Sally Scrabblebones as she descends from the top of the stairs, as she drags Carrington's body behind her. As we move to attack her, she puts her teeth to Carrington's throat, saying that she wanted the Key and Book in exchange for her life. Calcedon and Sally had a lengthy interchange wherein Calcedon offered her passage if she gave us Carrington and left the city. She had absolutely no interest. We then so the most surprising thing- Carrington, crippled and damaged as she was, was very subtly moving her hand toward a gem at Sally's waist. With a quick twist, she grabbed it and threw is to the bottom of the stairs, Sally shrieked, dropped Carrington, and ran down the stairs to it. Carrington had given us our chance...

Glannin reacted first and went for the stone. He picked it up within the shadow of Sally Scrabblebones. I was grateful I did not have to send Manjenko to retrieve it. I decided to Haste first, then try to prevent her from teleporting away. Calcedon tripped her on the stairs. She attempted to put him to sleep, but he shrugged it off, and buried his voidglass fauchard deep into her side as she regained her footing. Merithel vaulted past Sally to stand over and defend Carrington. Glannin stepped forward and finished her, ending her century-long existence in seconds.

I asked Glannon to make check the stone, knowing that she wanted to get to it at all costs. He produced and it seemed to be stable- it did not seem to be a threat. Merithel attended to Carrington, realizing that she had been greatly weakened by her ordeal. She said she could leave this realm on her own without our help, and she faded away back to the Material Plane.

Then a huge elemental rose up in the shape of the Mog-Lathar idol out of the shaft, with reach to attack everyone in the room. Merithel opined that this was a fight we did not need to have, but the creature was so large that we had no choice. We were able to disperse it back to watery droplets in short order. We found a valuable healing wand in a sculpture.

In the next room we found a crystal projecting horrific images of a multilimbed fiends up on w screen, in front of an array of chairs. An excommunicate kept cycling through the images, but greeted us in a panic when we entered. He asked if we would like to watch the show. When we declined, he moved to attack, but on the other side of the room a Adjucate, an Asura appeared, a pair of fiends conjoined at the waist. Confident it could not see me if I turned invisible, I vanished and moved away. Calcedon managed to trip this foe and once it was on the ground, we were able to dispatch this extraplanar foe as well.

Merithel and I looked at the slides. The slides function like the cards from a Deck of Illusion, all types of Asuras, (all different kinds, lawful evil). It would create a Major Image of the creature. Calcedon told us he had a new song that would make casting difficult- useful, but I have to be careful to avoid.

Next room-Magnificent bar stocked with an assortment of expensive liquors, with an ornate staircase leading up. In the bar area, so many different kinds of alcohol from all over Golarion, including Wormwood wine (needed for the Ritual). A door from this room leads to a balcony, with a view of the city badly damaged.

We entered a bedroom that seemed to house a pig, and reeked of brine. A quick search found nothing of value. In the real world, this room had been blown apart. In the next room beyond that, arcane script was drawn in chalk and blood, the remnants of an attempt at the Ritual. This was where it went awry in our world. We quickly became aware that Calcedon was acting strangely when he attempted to trip Merithel and did trip me. I realized he was under the effects of a Paranoia spell, but quite dangerous as he could view us as enemies. We managed to keep him talking long enough for the spell to wear off and before anyone hurt anyone else.

We moved on to the library, in the reality the shelfs were laden with occult relics. In the room was a quasit made of copper, folded into a origami-like shape. It was immediately hostile and attacked Merithel. It was an origami animal that came from the tome of construct origami animals. As we fought it, trying to damage the construct, we had a most pleasant unexpected surprise- The absent member of the Order of the Phoenix made his return! Chazon immediately stepped in as if he had never left, and he moved forward to engage. I saw that he had upgraded his weaponry- from his impressive longsword to an even more imposing bastard sword. Glannin was able to break the thing into shards, and with the threat dealt with, I asked Chazon how he managed to make it here. He told me he was lucid dreaming, using the demon spittle from the roost. He moved past me due to a warning from Merithel that there was another threat. Chazon moved into a dining room off the hall to engage more constructs that had been unleashed, a badger and hedgehog construct, much larger than the normal varieties of such creatures.

Merithel had gotten into trouble with a mimic while trying to flank through the secret passage, and was being constricted. At the same time, Manjenko shot off my shoulder like a rocket to engage something invisible in the corner. The invisible creature attacked him, and I was horrified to find it was NOT an imp, but a quasit. I shouted to Manjenko that his Amulet would not help him here and to flee if he got into trouble, while I exited to help Calcedon save Merithel, who was now in dire straits. I used a Greater Aggressive Thundercloud to try to stun the Mimic, but the chest of drawers dodged the lightning attack. It took a beating from Calcedon and failed to dodge the next lightning bolt, killing it and freeing Merithel. The others aided Manjenko in dispatching the Quasit, and we were finally able to turn our attention to our reunited ally.

He explained he always had his new sword, and promised to give us the full story at a later date. For now he had an urgent message for Merithel that he had to decode. He said the Queen survived an assassination attempt, and so did he. That brought up many questions, but we had to first deal with the situation at hand before we were able fully digest the implications of what he told us. I told Chazon that since he got here through lucid dreaming, he might be able to do some thing that would otherwise be impossible.

We searched the library and found several interesting and valuable magical items. We moved to search the room where Merithel was attacked by the Mimic…and encountered another Mimic. To make matters worse, while Merithel was searching, he was affected by an Enemy Hammer, sending him careening around the room like a billiard ball. Truly this room was most unkind to him, his blood now coating the floor from two separate encounters.

I tried to Dispel the effect throwing Merithel around however the chaos in the room threw off my casting. Merithel managed to fight off the effects by holding onto the table, and we left the room and closed the door, confident he could fight it off. We heard a few more crashes, with one final massive crash into the door, and then he finally called us back into the room.

We left Merithel’s room of horrors and headed down a hallway filled with animal heads- they turned to us and animated, and an antelope spoke to us: “The dead dream of broken circles!” They did not appear to take hostile action, so we continued on with past the strange hallway.

Our next room explored was a bedroom with a sigil on the floor, with some kind of spectral mist within the circle. It looked at first like a skeleton, then a tentacled beast..shifting forms. A body lay outside the circle. We identified the thing inside the circle as an Animate Dream, a native to the plane of Dreams. It was both incorporeal and possesses some very dangerous spell like abilities, such as Phantasmal Killer. Thankfully it appeared combined to the circle, unable to pierce the walls of the circle holding it.

Merithel and Calcedon went in to examine the body, while Chazon went to look at the closet in the room. The body was a female cultist, she appeared to be contorted in a rictus of fear. They found that she was not in fact dead. Merithel saw her move draw a line across the circle imprisoning the thing, and thus freeing it...she had been faking! We were not aware of that fact immediately however, as he succumbed to a Confusion effect and was unable to warn us. We ourselves were confused (small c) as he began acting strangely but we initially saw no assailants.

The situation became much clearer when the Dream appeared outside the circle and moved to attack. Chazon tried to get it with a Searing Light spell but missed. I tried to launch a Thundercloud at it, but I felt something sapping my energy and it failed to get through his spell resistance. The creature was hard to bring down as weapons were not particularly effective at damaging it. The creature fled after taking damage, and when we looked down the body was gone. Manjenko said that she cast some kind of spell and disappeared. Merithel in a moment of lucidity realized what was happening to him and moved to the corner of the room while we waited outside for his Confusion to dissipate. We found some interesting and useful magical items in the room that will serve to help our future investigations.

We finished exploring the last room on this floor. The only contents of this room were sigils on the floor and wall. It appeared to be a room where the Ritual was performed by the Cultists- at least a representation of this room in this reality. As we went into the room, it darkened and chanting was heard...in the center of the room flashes appeared that showed the dreamstone hovering. We felt a sense of betrayal. It seems like this vision was from Nahum's perspective when he was betrayed. From Chazon's perspective the floor turned into a pit, but he was able to dodge and stay out of it. We left the room, not wishing to fall prey to the perils of this haunt.

As we moved to ascend to the last floor, Chazon cast some protective magic upon himself. I never inquired into the source of his power, but I assume some other diety is fueling his power either in tribute to Aroden or because Chazon's efforts are in line with it desires. Either way, the power is quite real.

We ascended into a room covered with overlapping glyphs and sigils. We finally came to Nahum, holding a human femur and adorned with talismans hanging off every square inch of scream. It appears his time in this realm has turned him into a Nightmare Lord, using shadow spells and similar as spell like abilities. Animate nightmares seemed to stream from every one of his pores. He threw open the door behind him, plunging the room into a fiery hellscape. The walls and ceiling catch fire and are reduced to ash. We now see the entire city of Korvosa in flames, people leaping to their deaths to avoid fiery death. "This misery is what your lack of cooperation will cause. If it is what you desire, it is what you will have." He grins widens and his head shatters, but his teeth remain hovering there. He cast a spell at Glannin (I was not in position to see what it was.) An emaciated, agile devilish looking creature darted into the room through a door Nahum opened.

It sliced into Glannin first. He counterattacked, and then a shadowy image of Nahum appeared where Glannin had just vacated, and hit him with a sickle. As the battle wages, we hear the citizens of Korvosa screaming out. We see Nahum's teeth shatter again, and we have a wave of fear wash over us. He then shoots was ray of purple ectoplasm, bursting out amidst us. The acid that wash over us was searing as patches of our flesh sloughed off. Chazon was able to kill off the Babau, and I dropped an Aggressive Thundercloud on Nahum, which he dodged.

He then hovered 5 feet in the air, and he flexed and the ceiling seemed to shatter. Beneath our feet, the building shuddered, and the fixtures around us began to crumble. Glannin endured several attacks moving to me to heal me from the massive acid burns, and he did not look to well himself. He tried to fly another 15 feet higher and endured a few of our attacks on the way up. He shot a ray of acid at Calcedon and missed.

Glannin ran over to heal Merithel. Chazon called out that dispelling Nahum's Stoneskin would be very helpful, so I dispelled it and was met with a most unpleasant surprise: Nahum had a Contingency spell active and the shards of stone that were stripped from his body assembled into a large fist and rammed into me, crushing many bones while I remained conscious. Merithel was knocked unconscious by a attack from Nahum, and quickly healed by Glannin, exhausting his god-given healing talents. I began emitting a prescience aura to my allies so they could more readily anticipate his attacks. Glannin went down to an acid attack, then we heard a central wall that the house was built upon crack and split.

Chazon was apparently able to warp reality due to his lucid dreaming, and lept up to fly next to Nahum! Calcedon summoned his healing songbird. We then saw fissures erupt in the streets of Korvosa. Chazon landed a very solid blow on Nahum, which triggered a second contingency on Nahum. The chalk from the symbols swirled around and attempted to Daze us all, but we were far too focused at that point. Merithel finally got position on him and stabbed him through the heart, ending Nahum's reign as a Nightmare Lord. The cityscape continued to detoriate, getting even worse than before.

The dreamstone hovered there waiting for us. We found a safe room in the House and started the ritual, Calcedon standing ground. Chazon "woke up" from his lucid dream and left us. We performed the ceremony flawlessly this time, and as intended, we deposited the Dreamstone within the new portal we created and forever ended its threat. As the Dreamscape fell apart around us, we had to will ourselves awake. After a few false starts, we managed to find ourselves back in our own, proper reality, with the Nightmare Plague hopefully ended.

After arriving back, we decided to reunite with Chazon in the real world.  Enroute, we stopped at Magistrate Drune's office to inform him of our success and collect our reward.  He was not present, but Sergeant Kroft of the watch told us he left us our reward.  Calcedon noted that among the papers scattered on his desk, it appeared that he contracted to take a boat out.  On another paper, we saw his name fully spelled out-  Stanton Wilhelm Drune.   Which was most curious as the name Wilhelm was mentioned in the Paginarum Lethargica, which mentioned the betrayal of a man name Wilhem in their quest to find the Dreamstone (and instead found the idol).  This was most suspicious, although I would certainly give him the benefit of every doubt given that he had braved the dangers of Bridgefront trying to solve this Nightmare Plague, (and brought me back to life, for free).  We decided we would check in later to ask about this coincidence.

We continued on to retrieve Chazon from the Roost.  He was fine after using his alternate method for entering the Dreamworld. He told us there was an attempted assassination of the Queen.  Chazon had heard that she managed to make it out alive despite being in a bad situation.  She was apparently wounded from it.   He also told us he had survived an assassination atttempt in the Temple on the night of the 5th that targeted him.  Only the intervention of one of the priests managed to wake Chazon to prevent his demise, trading his own life for Chazon (leaving only two brothers at the Temple of Aroden).  He was not able to take the assassin alive, but self-induced poison ended his life (turning him into a mist?)  He believes it was a member of a gang called Red Mantis- a organization of assassins.  The nosferatu had mentioned them when we encountered him, and this confirms their presence.  Chazon had an intuition that he was being watched and followed in the week preceding the attempt on his life.  

Chazon also told us that Kroft had given him an encrypted message which Merithel decoded-  "Knights we must meet.  Messages are not safe it must be in person.  Come in disguise, for your names are known by our mutual enemy."  Something e

We arrived at Carrington's.  Maynard was extremely grateful that we rescued Carrington and heaped accolades upon his.  Carrington was resting but willing to speak with us.  She asked us if Nahum was gone, and we relayed our success in dispatching him and destroying the Dreamstone.  She expressed regret at what happened to Baku, and we told her Scrabblebones had paid with all she had  for what she did to Baku and the sanctuary.  Calcedon told her to contact us at his manor if she needed anything, and we took our leave.

Calcedon told Chazon about some rumors he had heard regarding one  of Chazon's nemesis', the one who had proclaimed himself Emperor of Old Korvosa.  The theater that was housing him apparently burned down, and thus we did not know his current location.  With Chazon's new status as a deputy of the Guard, he thought he might now have the tools to deal with the problem.  

When we arrived at the Temple of Aroden, Merithel said that his Harrow deck from Zalara was acting up.  We found a vacant room and set up the deck.  Zalara appeared (half formed) and greeted us.  She wanted to give us each a reading:
Calcedon- The Foreign Trader- Chance for an unlikely alliance leading to growth
Chazon- Snakebite- You are not the first to feel the assassin's blade. You are still hunted.
Glannin- The Wanderer- The child of two worlds, you have often felt out of place.  Your present wanderings will lead you to where you want to be:
Merithel- The Hidden Truth- A truth will be revealed that you may act upon- your decision will forever alter yourself and other's perception of you.
Syrical- The Vision- You will find yourself face to face with madness brought on by genius. Two things that are very closely related. Guard your mind carefully.  

Her reading continued
The Past- The winged Serpent, the Juggler.    You have shown wisdom in your actions.  Your union will change Korvosa forever
The Present-The Cycolne (misaligned), the Fiend, and the Brass Dwarf.  We have suffered at the hands of the fiend, and others close to us have suffered.
The Future- The Hidden Truth, The Twin, and the Foreign Trader- There are two truths to be revealed, one hidden for good, one for evil.  The Foreign trader will provide us what we need and influence the actions of the Phoenix.  

She wished us luck and departed back into the deck.  

Now that we in a secure area, Chazon showed us the mask his assassin was wearing- in the form of a Red Mantis.  He also described the exotic swords that the assassin was using.  The wearer of the helm can see in the dark, see invisibility, and can use Deathwatch.  It also enhances their senses.  It works on daily charges, as is typical with magic items.  It was estimated it could be sold for 3,000.    We decided to rest and recover (also so I could memorize Water Breathing for our anticipated night Crossing).  Merithel used this time to visit Vencarlo.   He found Vencarlo's Academy was burned down (a fate met by other buildings in Old Korvosa lately).  He deduced it burned over a week ago.  He smelled the unmistakeable remnants of Alchemist's Fire.  Other burned buildings did not have evidence of being set alight by Alchemist's Fire.

We made the night crossing near Lamm's old place.  Bothered by a few sharks, but nothing we could not handle.  Once we made it in, we assumed our various disguises.  I chose to take the form of a halfling, as no one in the Phoenix is of shorter stature.  We noted that the streets were deserted except for an occasional Grey Maiden patrol, leading us to think the area may be under curfew.
We made our way to Citadel Volshanek without issue, dodging patrols easily. Only one guard stood at the door, and Calcedon told him we were invited.   The yard and halls are empty, with trash scattered along the hallway.  We made our way to Cressida's office.  She said we could not speak here, and she led us down a hallway.  She appeared haggard and tired as we made our way to a small room in the depths of the keep, to a room filled with fog.  Merithel and I quickly scanned for scrying sensors.  She told us that she had a permanent Private Sanctum spell on this room.  She said she believed all of us were being spied upon, and we should be very careful what we say in public.

She said the Guard had not yet been disbanded, but that is not far off.  The assassination attempt took place on Sarenith the 4th, the anniversary of Korvosa's founding.  She announced a surprise public address and a large crowd had gathered. (She had used Dr. Davalos as a scapegoat for the plague).  She had a new Seneschal with her as well as her bodyguard, even though the old Seneschal had not been found, and the leader of the Sable Company, Markus.  She said she should have realized something was wrong.   As she relayed it:

She addressed the crowd that the Plague had been defeated, and Dr. Davelos executed.  She called the Order of the Nail cowards, and the Korvosan Guard and Sable Company, having suffered losses, named the Grey Maidens the official new protectors of Korvosa, with her bodyguard Sabina appointed the new General.  She dressed down the Sable Company and alleged that the old Seneschal fled the city.  She disbanded the Sable Company and seized its holdings.  Commandant Endrin trembles, but instead of handing it over, throws it at the Queen striking her cheek.  He shouted "Your shameful reign ends now!"  Grabbing his bow and sinking the arrow deep into her Temple.  She rips it out, seizes him by the throat, and stabs him with the arrow through the head.  "This shall be the fate of all enemies of Korvosa!"  Torgemar steps forward taking Illeosa's hand, and they vanished.

This resulted in a riot that was quelled brutally by the Grey Maidens.  That is not all.  We are now under Martial Law.  A curfew is in effect 6pm to to 6am.  The streets are patrolled by Grey Maidens.  Korvosa is being murdered by her own Queen.  The Guard reallocated most of its resources to the Grey Maidens.  She feared Endrin would take matters into his own hands, but wish he had taken a better route.  Vencarlo had been feeding her information about information, and had told her he had information about the Queen, something about dark magic and a pact with a devil.  He also said he might have a lead as to the whereabouts of the old Seneschal.  

For our part, Chazon told her about the Red Mantis attempt on his life, which surprised her.  We told her about the Grey Plague and she questioned whether it was connected to the Queen.  We told her we found no such evidence.  For now it may actually be for the best that Old Korvosa is sectioned off and of no interest to the Queen.

She asked us to find Vencarlo, as finding the Seneschal would be immensely helpful.  He return may give those who oppose her, or at least reduce her power.  She didn't think there was much time as the Korvosan Guard will probably be disbanded soon.  The fact that she was willing to hire the Mantis (probably) to go after Chazon.  She is organizing her own resistance of some like-minded people in the city.  Calcedon asked who we should contact if something happened to her.  She said she was not sure of any guards she could trust with certainty, but she did cite someone known to Merithel (AVG, the person who fed him information for years), and the Editor of the Korvosan Chronicle.  It has now gone underground.  She would be a good contact if Cressida disappeared.  

Korvosan Martial Law-Buying things -4,400 GP  Selling Limit-25,000.  Spellcasting only up to 3rd level, thought the government has some access to higher level casting.  Calcedon wrote a letter for Manjenko to deliver to one of his friends at the manor.  I made him memorize the Red Mantis mask to describe to the other dragons, so they would know what to look for.  We decided to spend the night in the Citadel before heading back to Old Korvosa to look for Vencarlo.

Calcedon visited his manor and was told there were rumors of Grey Maiden strike forces breaking into homes. He told his man that if that happened, everyone should flee the manor- don't attempt to fight. Merithel discerned that Vencarlo was poviding reports about Old Korvosa, the first clue to tracking him down.

We made our way back to Old Korvosa with ease, no attempt was made to stop those heading in that direction. We made first for the Temple of Aroden. Our options were to check Vencarlo's mansion, ask around and check for rumors, check burned buildings for evidence, or deal with the Emperor of Old Korvosa. We decided to head for Vencarlo's house first.

Vencarlo's house stood undamaged even though his school across the street was a fiery wreck.   Calcedon's note was under the door, right where he had left it.  There was no response to our knock, so Merithel moved to pick the lock- but the door was not locked.  We moved inside.  The Vudrani decorating motif was evident.  Glannin announced Chazon's presence, but there was no reaction, other than eye rolls from some of us.  We checked the nearest door, it appeared to be a workshop for repairing weapons.  The next room was the main living room.  Everything seemed to be in order, and not in disarray. A fire was burning in the hearth, even though so far the place appeared to be empty.  The next first floor room seemed to be his study, filled with books about swordfighting, philosophy, and ledgers for his academy.  The privy was also empty.  His pantry had nothing of interest except for some spoiling food.  We were perplexed about the fire, but it was exactly as it appeared.

We moved on to the second floor.  The stairs opened into a practice room with training dummies.  Merithel paged Vencarlo again, again with no response.  His bedroom was also empty.  Merithel searched the bedroom but did not find anything of interest.  Chazon casually examined the hearth in this room and happened to look up, and found himself directly staring at a Red Mantis assassin hiding in the rafters.  As he realized he had been spotted, the armor clad assailant dropped some powder into the fire, (Merithel knew it was residual alchemist fire) and the room exploded.  

I moved into the room hearing the commotion and seeing our foe up in the rafters, revealed his weaknesses to my allies in glowing light.  Chazon attempted to Peacebond the Mantis's weapons.  He then jumped down from the rafters and jumped into the flames, then stood up with flames burning all around him.  The room caught on fire around him.  Merithel then recognized that the room had been coated in residual alchemist's fire.   Calcedon threw some liquid ice to put out the fire. Knowing that if there was one thing that could rouse the denizens of Old Korvosa to action, it was the threat of a burning building, I made haste back downstairs to put out the call for the fire brigade.  My efforts came to a quick halt as I ran into a second Red Mantis coming up the stairs.   Behind me in the training room the fight continued and the fire spread, catching Chazon on fire.  I had to open the window to call for the brigade instead.  My aggressive Thundercloud left the Mantis on the stairs unfazed.

As the fire raged on the second floor, we were able to knock out the Mantis on the second floor.  As the fire engulfed the second floor, we tried to push down to the first floor.  Chazon sounded out that the Mantis that had been knocked out seemed to be healing, and also to "look for a fake tooth".  My Thundercloud finally caught the Mantis off balance, giving him a severe shock.  Shortly after, I realized the flames were crawling up my back.  

Glannin attempted to tie up the unconscious Red Mantis before he realized he had healed.  He took a swipe at Glannin and then crunched down on a suicide pill.  Glannin ripped off his helm and saw that some kind of acid/poison was melting his jaw away.  With no other options and me blocking others from attacking the remaining Mantis, I decided to improve our tactical situation by diving out the window.  I managed to roll with the fall so I only had light bruising.  Once I stood up, I moved to the street and continued calling for the brigade.  Chazon asked me to dismiss the Thundercloud, and regretfully told him that particular spell cannot be dismissed.  I then made for the street and the front of the building.

In the building, Chazon leapt over Merithel's head down the stairs, into the Thundercloud, to instill a delay poison in the Red Mantis.  Against all odds he succeeded, though he took a nasty shock before rolling down the stairs.  I saw someone throw a comatose body of a Mantis out the same window I went through.  It landed with a satisfying thud.  As I rounded the corner I heard Calcedon come out the window and began beseeching the citizenry to help fight the fire.  I made it back in and ran into Glannin, who hair was standing on end.  It appeared as though we triumpheso I exited Brigade assembled.  They managed to put the fire out, with some of us participating, in about 20 minutes.  We were able to save about half of the building.  Calcedon found himself shoulder to shoulder with a noble friend who was pitching it, who asked to talk to us after the task at hand was completed.  Merithel also removed a false tooth from the Mantis who had not yet used it ( the one subject to Chazon's Delay Poison).  

We went to speak to Calcedon's friend in private.  He said he had been attending classes at Vencarlo's Academy when the city went into lockdown. Vencarlo let him stay there before it burned down, but he did not stay long as several of the Red Mantis came in and invaded the building.  Vencarlo took one of the threee down, but both he and Calcedon's friend then had to flee.  He assumed the Academy had been burned down as a warning.  He did not know where Vencarlo was, but he had noticed Vencarlo had been leaving his house at odd hours.  He once returned with his clothes bloody.  A few days before the assasins attacked, he had a strange guest visit a few times, a man with paint-stained hands, wild hair, and a gittery demeanor.  Calcedon's friend recognized him as Salvador Screin,  an notorious artist who produced gruesome and scandalous art.  He displayed his work in Exemplary Execrables, a place held in very low repute by Chazon.  He was not a public figure, but his work was infamous.  He said they met behind closed doors 3 times in all, the last meeting he heard Vencarlo's voice raise in anger.  He considred tracking down Salvador himself, but the presence the self-proclaimed Emperor gave him pause.  No one in the Old Dock really comes out anymore, apparently if you are not affiliated with the gang, it is a very dangerous place. The Emperor surrounded himself with a large number of thugs.  He provided us with Salvador's address on Wave Street.

We decided to rest for a bit in Merithel's safe house and made arrangements to meet Jalento at the Temple to Aroden before we proceeded to Old Dock. Glannin and Calcedon interrogated our prisoner, and through magic and intimidation they managed to get him talking. Obviously, he was out to get Vencarlo. As he was questioned about the Red Mantis, he suddenly siezed up in pain. I suspected magic at play- but there was none present. Calcedon clued us in that this was actual some kind of non-magical conditioning that prevented him from talking. Unable to get anything else out of him except that he needed to get Vencarlo, Calcedon played along and said he was game for that. We had him tied up in a chair with his arms up. He thwarted my attempt to pull memories from my mind. Glannin was rightly concerned that they might be able to find the Mantis with magic, and I said it could be- but there was little we could do to stop it at this time. After Calcedon fed our captive some honeycakes, we made ready to storm the Old Docks.

We proceeded to the Old Docks to find the eccentric artist Salvador.  Gelento accompanied us, and he seemed quite nervous about interfering with the dealings of the Emperor, rumored to be a cannibal and with a casualty count hire than Bloodveil.  Calcedon gave him an accounting of our feats to date, and this bolstered his resolve.  As we got to the narrows, we found many more burned out buildings in this part of the city than in any others.  

As we made our way, Merithel spotted a figure perched in the shell of a burned out building- some creature with a birdlike shape, something that seemed to be covering itself in large bat wings, a beast he recognized as an eriynes.  It realized we had spotted, and its first move was to summon a creature from the Pit to attack us.  Unfortunately it came straight for me right off with a fiery weapon that could reach behind our front lines. The Bearded Devil attacked Glannin, while Merithel moved to engage the Erinynes, who told him "You have meddled in our affairs long enough."  Apparently this was not a chance encounter, as it appeared to have a grudge against Merithel.  Glannin dispatched the Bearded Devile while Merithel took some heavy damage, and Calcedon, once again lamenting our weakness in ranged combat, threw a tanglefoot bag.  As I had Manjenko revealing her weaknesses to the group, she was bound by it and crashed to the ground.  

It tried to teleport away when it was grounded, but it failed when it was distracted, and Merithel was able to dispatch his heretefore unknown enemy.  We passed her bow off to Glannin- it should help our ranged combat going forward.  We then continued on, Gelentoo had a failure of nerve and said he would wait for us at the Temple.

We arrived at the decrepit building at the address we were given.  It was adjacent to a house that appeared to have sank into mire.  Merithel checked the door for traps, found none, and we entered. Much mud had been tracked through the room, as if a small army had traipsed through.  A row of empty shelves stood against the wall.  The next room had a bad with a splash of blood on the pillow,.  There were

The next room had shuttered windows with 6 burning candles, each attached to a glistening skull.  A chair sits before the desk and in it sits a female elf clad in barbed armor, who greeted Merithel enthusiastically.  She asked Merithel of his parentage, and identified herself as Loreli .  She said she was interested in Salvatore's whereabouts as well.  She said she was a native of Riddleport and Nidal.    She said she had come to Korvosa hunting a wanted criminal named  Lady Andasan.  (who we had met earlier when she turned into a daughter of Urgathoa.)  She thanked us for dispatching her.  She said she was curious to see what Salvatore's motivations were of his interest to followers of Zon Kuthon, and conversed with Calcedon primarily, bantering about his hand.

She proposed we work together to find Salvatore as she wished to speak to him.  She thought she knew what happened to him, and also offered us.  The others agreed to work with her to this end, a prospect I found quite distasteful.  I put up the visor on my armor, determined to protect my identity as best as I could, as I had listened to the proceedings from outside the door.  

After a handshake with Calcedon sealing the agreement, she handed over a bloodstained piece of fabric.  She recognized it came from a government official's uniform, and Merithel recognized it from a high-ranking Korvosan official- specifically the uniform of the Seneschal of Castle Korvosa!  She also believed Salvatore was being held by the "Emperor" of old Korvosa.  She referenced the skulls and said they were also artists- who had recently committed suicide.  She said she polished and "took care of" the skulls, and named some of the former owners.  She said they did not speak to her as they should.  (Genoa- was a really good costumer, Boathar, a toymaker, Veloca, a writer, Maxell, a sculptor, Yevos, a tatooist, and Iman, a poet)  Calcedon, apparently recognizing some of the names, excused himself to another room, and presently a melody of such sorrow came forth that it brought Lorali to tears as she packed up her skulls.

Merithel investigated the rest of the house as she packed, and found a patch of yellow mold.  Glannin brought to me a Magic Jar to identify, and I motioned him to follow me outside, as I had no wish for our new "friend" to know of my abilities.  Suprisingly the object's capabilities eluded me for the moment- it will take more careful inspection.  As we left I gave Merithel a salute and followed dutifully behind.

Merithel wished to inspect the sunken part of the house before we left, and quickly discovered why the house had sunk- starvign otugyhs had burst through and wrecked it, and moved to consume us as well. Loralei fought alongside us quite effectively with her spiked chain- too effectively, perhaps. The hapless otuyghs fell quickly, and I even hit with my crossbow enough to credibly maintain the ruse.

We departed Salvatore's house to the Temple of Aroden to collect Chazon, before heading to confront the Emperor.  She explained to Chazon that her purpose with us was to speak to Salvatore, and said her sect had religious interest in his works.  Chazon seemed skeptical but accepted the (hopefully temporary) aid of our new ally.    She said she had another purpose- to bring back Lady Andosa (the one we slew who turned into a daughter of Urgathoa), and would have to explain her failure when she returned home.

As we moved into the neighborhood, it looked even worse than Bridgefront.  Rampant vandalism, smoldering fires, few people on the streets, many low level predators around.  We reached Eel's End.  Some of the boats appeared scuttled.  The most intact one appeared to be the one the Spider resided in.  Several children played on the docks and in the water, singing a little rhyme.  They played a game wherein the chopped off the heads of dolls...more than slightly disconcerting.  Calcedon questioned them and gave them some bread in return for information about the Emperor's location.  They also gave him a headless doll.  He played them a song with impressed them so greatly that it replaced their creepy rhymes about beheading.

We continued on to the main boat docked at Eel's End.  The main doors were barred.  Calcedon reasoned that if children were playing here, it was very likely deserted, so we decided to move on to the Emperor's place of power.  The city's condition worsened even more, if possible.  Rubble from ruined buildings, feral dogs, rampant vermin, drain spiders....all threats out in the open.  They gave us a wide berth.  We also saw bodies hanged out on display- easily recognizable as a warning to outsiders.  Then, rounding the bend in front of us, we saw six thugs armed with battle axes on their belts.  "What is the meaning of this intrusion upon the Emperor's domain?"  Calcedon responded  "We are not pleased with the the Emperor's actions and wish to voice our objections."  Addressing Calcedon as "lordling" they told us we were not welcome in this domain, and we should turn around and go back where we came from.
Calcedon's response:  "Why don't you head to the river- its the only way you will escape death if you order us around."  

Battle ensued when Calcedon tripped the leader as they squared up against us.  I prepped my crossbow very carefully with a spell, only to have Chazon give me instructions to "shoot for the knees"  Since shooting anything but center mass is quite hopeless for me, I internally sighed and moved up to attack with my club, wielding my crossbow in the other hand. Suprisingly my first swing in a LONG TIME cracked him squarely on the skull.... Will have to apologize to Chazon later.  The fight continued on as we continued to fight carefully in order to spare their lives.  Our new ally was quite dismayed about our rules for refraining from killing, but she abided.

We left them unconscious and relieved them of their valuables.  As we healed, we heard shutters open above us and an old man shouted down his displeasure to us about the commotion we caused.  He appeared fully ready for bed, and asked when the Queen was going to restore order and fix the bridges.  He also asked about the quarantine, and again asked when we were going to repair the bridges and the mobs.  He then chucked a loaf of bread at us, which Calcedon gratefully accepted.  We continued north, only to run into a group of eight thugs this time.  We did cow them, but they proclaimed that were were not as scary as their Emperor, and we engaged in our second brawl. It was a repeat of our first fight, except this group was a bit savvier and several of them surrendered before they were beaten into unconsciousness. We continued on to the Old Docks- seventeen minute laters, twelve of his guards approached, signalling no offensive intent, and offered to escort us to the Emperor's palace. Calcedon graciously accepted the offer for us, and we proceeded without further conflict to the "Palace".

It consisted of six buildings. The lower floors were gutted, the upper floors intact. They were formerly a series of tenements and storefronts. The "palace" resided in the upper floors. Our escort called out our presence as we entered the courtyard of a hovel. Four guards remained with us at the others dispersed. We went up a set of rickety stairs, ascending to a rope bridge that connected to another building. We then proceeded across another rope bridge. We arrived on a balcony with spectators on the roofs of nearby bridges. A parody of the Crimson throne was on the balcony, was well as a highly decorated guillotine that appeared as the face of a fiend. Other scenes and artwork depicted violent scenes of the guillotine in use. The "Emperor" was here as well, in full regalia with a mockery of fine clothes and crown. He appears to have survived a bout of bloodveil.

"No one may wear capes in the presence of the Emperor!" was his initial greeting to us. He ordered a guard to light a brazier. "All those in the presence of the Emperor must burn their cape in deference to his majesty!" He challenged Chazon, the "one who has always insulted my performances!" Chazon dressed him down mightily in front of his audience. The Emperor snapped his fingers and a guard blew a horn. Chazon called him pathetic, and Merithel insulted his rulership abilities. Chazon told him that he was fighting for the rights of the people of Old Korvosa, and the Emperor claimed that he represented the people, which elicited a small cheer from the dozen spectators on the other roofs.

Chazon moved up the stairs to attack the Emperor, and called out for his people to defend him, which seemed to inspire them. The gnomish executioner was the first to answer his call, striking Chazon with a greataxe. Merithel went to aid him. I shot a guard with my crossbow and ended up back to back with Layori...the exact opposite of what I had hoped to happen. When large numbers of reinforcements arrived I was forced to caste Haste, trying to obscure my casting from witnesses. The Emperor hilariously activated a Rod of Wonder and shrunk himself, which Calcedon then made great fun of. His second attempt at pointing the Rod at Chazon resulted in him being surrounded by Faerie Fire. I attempted to shoot one of the guards into the air, but he nimbly dodged the whirlwind. Getting concerned about us being outnumbered so, I had to throw caution to the wind and reveal my magical prowess by shooting scorching rays at the guards engaging Layli. The rest of the guards were dispatched, leaving only the emperor and his nigh-useless Rod of Wonders.

Despite Chazon offering the Emperor the chance to surrender twice, the Emperor absolultely refused and instead hit Chazon with a lightning bolt. Chazon retaliated with a series of mighty blows, rendering the Emperor unconscious.

We relieved the "Emperor"'s followers of their valuables as well as the Emperor himself, who had some valuable items himself.  We took a solid half hour to bind our captives, and Chazon quite surprisingly branded the word "False" across the Emperor's head.  I recognized it as a temporary brand, but still a useful insight into his "brand of justice".  Loreli had a number of questions of Chazon regarding his notions of justice and he held forth at length, providing a soothing background monotone as we secured the captives.

We moved on to search for any captives.  Our first explored room found supplies from Exemplary Execrables, including a jewelry box with costume jewelry

Next room had a most grisly sight- 14 heads from bodies of various races, all mounted to the wall.  They were partically decomposing, only to have been soaked in perfumes.  In this room was was also a child-sized bed, likely for the gnome executioner.  Merithel thought some of them might have been merchants from Old Korvosa, but no one he definitively recognized.  Chazon searched the room but only found a silverware set on the table.  

The next bedroom had the trappings of a luxurious air- but a careful examination showed that it was a decorative illusion.  The elaborate curtains were moth eaten, the bookcase filled with cheap books and mold furnishings.  The pictures were gruesome as well.  A door off the room was barred from this side.  Loreli seemed taken aback by the paintings- she said they were Salvatore originals.   The first depicted a thin humanoid wearign shadows, standing beside a fearsome figure.  The other was a desert scape with camels.  The final depicted a man peeling off the flesh from his arms, apparently delighted at this, in the background stood a forest of humans impaled. (Merithel 1st painting - Zon Kuthon stepping into Nidal, 3rd one, Scales appeared to be a blue dragon.) She was quite gleeful when we gave her the Ok to take the paintings.

We moved onto the barred room.  In this room we found the artist- working on his next macabre work.  This one seemed to be lacking something though.  Upon seeing us he fell to his knees and begged for rescue.  It appeared he had been physically mistreated, beaten about the face.  He asked if the Emperor was gone and seemed quite relieved when Chazon assured him the Emperor was permanently dethroned.  He said he had to get out of Old Korvosa.  He said he had information he would share with us on two conditions- that he be able to leave Old Korvosa, and that he see the Emperor's blood corpse.  He was quite insistent, but Chazon of course could not be swayed on this issue.  We gave him a bit more hope on getting out of Old Korvosa, although Merithel stated it would be hard given the condition of the bridges.  He replied we could either try and execute the Emperor here, or escort Salvatore out of the city.  Loreli offered to escort him out the city, but we needed to do so that he would then give us the information he claimed to have.  

We said we would proceed as soon as we finished searching for other prisoners. The ceiling and floor of the next room had partially collapsed, opening up to Old Korvosa. The most prominent sight in the room was a man in a cage, working on a loom. He was malnourished and dirty. Calcedon recognized him as Andrew Marrou, a tailor from New Korvosa. Calcedon greeted him, and Andrew pointed to the ceiling. As our heads swiveled up, we saw a slew of Chokers up in the rafters. The lashed out seeking to grapple, constrict, and strangle us. We were able to grapple with these creatures quite well, and when the tide turned against them, one of them reached into the cage and began to strangle Andrew. We moved quickly to make sure Andrew maintained his ability to breathe.

Andrew said the Chokers had some kind of deal with the Emperor, but did not know much beyond that. Chazon asked him if he knew where the Seneschal or Vencarlo were. He said the Emperor had him in caged and sewing costumes for him. He said he was deliberately producing his worst work in spite. We had Andrew wait with Loreli and Salvatore in the safe room.

We moved on, next was a supply room for the artists, with the materials they would need for their creations. More finished paintings were here as well, newish paintings, all somewhat macabre but only of lower quality. Chazon suggested we give them to Loreli. The stairway to the basement was filled with rubble and impassable, ending our exploration of the building without finding the rest of our targets. We had a short debate about what to do with the Guillotine- as a near work of art Calcedon was reluctant to let it be sundered, but eventually we let Glannin have at it with his axe. We departed with our captives. Salvatore said he would wait at the Temple until we had turned in the Emperor to the jailors. We had a lot of resistance from the prisoners, it took about 90 minutes to corral the group to the Magistrate's jail. Cora was the only one there at the time. She was dismayed at the number she had to take in, but was heartened by the presence of the "Emperor".

Chazon offered the minor thugs the chance to "volunteer" to serve Old Korvosa with the Temple of Aroden (after they gave their true statements), which after some encouragement they appeared to accept. They did not appear to have any loyalty to the Emperor. We headed back the Temple where Loreli, Salvatore, and Andrew waited for us. Salvatore appeared relieved that we had delivered the Emperor to prison. Salvatore revealed what he knew: He had frequent converstations with the Seneschal. That night of the death of the King, he came to Salvatore's door bloodied and said he needed a place to hide. He said the Queen was behind it, in League with the Red Mantis, and they tried to kill him. The Seneshcal said there was something about the Queen that was not right- she had changed somehow. He needed time to think about his next course of action. Salvatore's hosue was not safe, so he suggested he hide with the Arkonas, and he did. They said they would keep the Seneschal safe. He trusted them to hide them, as he suspected they were not supportive of the Queen.

He told Vencarlo about the Seneshcal and Vencarlo was not happy- he thought the Arkonas were crimiinal -minded. He suspected Vencarlo went to infiltrate the Arkona's estate, but he was taken captive shortly after that and knew no more. He believes the Seneschal was the key to taking down the Queen. He advised us all the leave the city, a prospect that was entertained by us for exactly no amount of time.

Loreli while listening to the tale seemed rather bored and unimpressed. She did say she needed to report to her superiors and would escort him out of the city.
Andrew offered to stay safe at the Temple and craft the priests wardrobe until the path to the south reopened.

We debated our next course of action as to the Arkonas. On the table were using Calcedon's noble connections as a pretext, perhaps talking about a plan to help the city by restoring the guard through volunteers. Chazon knew of about half a dozen candidates who might be interested in being a "volunteer deputy", and perhaps raising some money to pay them. Also on the table were more covert methods of infiltration- either through disguise or acting, or magic. We broke into 2 teams- Merithel and I sought to obtain information about the Arkonas using our particular set of skills, while Chazon, Calcedon, and Glannon started assembling a volunteer guard.

Manjenko was dispatched to mingle with the house drakes residing in the Arkona compound. I hoped to leverage his burgeoning reputation as Korvosa's premier imp slayer. Manjenko reported back that the resident drakes did not see anyone matching the descriptions of the Seneschal or Vencarlo. They saw the gates were closed during the plague, and likely described Calcedon's visit to said gates. There was some commotion about a week ago when some buildings started burning in the Arkona bubble, and the guards dealt swiftly with those responsible.

Merithel donned a disguise to ask around about the Arkona's and their staffing levels. He found they had low turnover in the servant staff as servants were treated well, but the staff may be large enough for his plan to blend in, though he would have to be careful of the majordomo. He was able to obtain several names that he might be able to leverage. He also asked about new employees- was not able to find that any existed.

11th of Sarenith
In the morning the team assembling the watch began their recruitment of the six likely candidates they had for the volunteer guard. They found there was not a lot of trust of the guards due to the perception Old Korvosa was abandoned by the guard, and due to past incidents of corruption. They were able to get their six initial recruits on board, though.

I had Manjenko infilitrate the Guard House in the Fort so I could view it through his eyes. At shift change, I was then able to plant a listening sensor so I could overhear the guards. Their main topic of their conversation was about the fall of the Emperor of Old Korvosa. They complained mightily about the quarantine. Karno-Chan was named as the majordomo. A portion of the guards were Vudrani. Finally I overheard some talk about their conflict with the Red Mantis- they apparently "squashed a bug". It's good to know they are not in league with each other.

We reconvened to discuss our findings in the evening. I shielded our room with Private Sanctum so our conversation would remain between us only. The recruitment successes were discussed. I relayed the lack of information my efforts produced (except for the encouraging news about the conflict with the Red Mantis). We discussed the merits of a formal visit versus infiltration and decided to attempt to go into the front door first.

I was greatly surprised when Calcedon presented me with a very unique and powerful gift- A crossbow designed specifically for capable mages. Not only is it substantially more accurate than my current weapon, it helps me slice through the spell resistance that certain powerful foes naturally possess. I find myself again in debt to my noble patron!

Calcedon penned a letter of introduction announcing his wish to visit the Arkonas. It talked about several things we did to help the city, (the cure, exposing the doctor, ending the dream plague) and hinted at other things. It mentioned he did not have ability to end the quarantine, and he needed to talk to them about efforts to reunify the city. He wished to meet with them at their convenience. It was delivered the evening of the 11th. I spent the evening creating a scroll. I had Manjenko spend the night at the Arkona estate, but he did not have anything useful to report the next morning.

12th of Sarenith
Merithel spent the day consorting with the denizens of Old Korvosa trying to learn more about the recent activities of the Arkonas. He heard about how the Arkonas were trying to get things under control but their hands were full, and they could use help. Most encouraging. He also heard a rumor about the Hanging Judge. It was thought she was lost to Bloodveil, but she resurfaced and renounced her faith in Abador. The Arch-Banker declared her a lost soul. Finally he confirmed the Arkonas are beloved in Old Korvosa, and there is much hate for the Queen. Glannon and Chazon cavorted around the city performing good deeds and charitable actions. We convened that night in our private room to discuss the events of the day, and the progress/lack of it.

13th of Sarenith
Manjenkos efforts during the night again failed to yield results. Chazon and Glannon again went out into Old Korvosa again. A pair of Arkona house guards delivered a letter to the Temple at noon.
It was the desired invitation, signed by Gloria Arkona. We gathered together and proceeded to make the visit we had spent the past few days engineering.
We proceeded over after lunch to their compound and were greeted by six house guards. Calcedon presented his invitation and we were escorted in. The ground were open with some landscaping and decorations. The palace was breathtaking with its Vudrani architecture. We were led to the Palace entrance and inside.

Waiting for us was Karna-chan, who welcomed us to the Palace. He then took us to a small lounge while he checked to see if the host was ready for us. After not too long a wait, a extroardinarly well-dressed man entered and cheerfully greeted us, and chastised his servant for not providing us refreshments. He introduced himself as Glorio Arkona, and said he was aware of our activities in Old Korvosa, and recited almost all of them. Calcedon humbly accepted the credit. He expressed his thanks on behalf of the citizens of Old Korvosa, and expressed that the Arkonas were doing what they could to stave off anarchy.

The quarantine was discussed, and Merithel and Chazon got the sense that he strongly disapproved of the Queen's choices. He used careful phrasing to get across his contempt. He said the quarantine hurt his House both economically and in other ways- stating his city was spending time with a suitor in the city. I questioned why he was passing along family gossip, but Chazon said he was actually very concerned about his sister's strange behavior. Calcedon volunteered to put on a concert to improve morale in partnership with the Arkonas. Gloriel was unsure if he wanted Old Korvosa thinking they were having parties or galas while people were starving in the streets, but he would support a performance for the people. Calcedon suggested it might help break the quarantine if people on the other side of the river heard the celebration.

He dismissed his servant when Calcedon began talking about the need for judge in Old Korvosa. He said without the Queen and Council, he was unable to appoint judges. "I get the sense that you are not just here for niceties. Am I incorrect?" Calcedon paused, looked at us, and said while he may have desires to revive his house, he wanted to make the situation at hand better. After a little more verbal dancing, he stated: " I suspect, perhaps you may be here for someone in particular." He moved to shut the door to the room. Calcedon stated he was looking for both Vencarlo and the Seneschal. "Handing over our two guests may be a bit complicated. My sister insists he will be safe from those who wish them harm, as the insect infestation in Old Korvosa make it hazardous for them, though we are trying to stomp it out." We recognized the name of his labrinyth as a notorious dungeon controlled by the Arkonas.

It was known as Melia's labrinyth. Apparently his sister was the force behind their imprisonment. He has some doubts-the last couple of the weeks, she has been replacing a few of my staff here and there. She doesn't do anything about the guards outside the house, but has been replacing some inside the house. He has had to be more careful of late. He is also mindful that the Queen has means of spying, and that his sister may have fallen to that. He has no evidence she is in contact with the Queen or even sympathetic. Most of the "improvements" she made was over the last week. He apologizes for the difficulty this put us in to retrieve these "guests", and he will not put himself in the position to retrieve them from his sister. He will however, tell us how to access the labrinyth. It can be accessed via the jade elephant statue in the garden with the phrase "Chamedu is blind". Otherwise, the elephant will attack. There is a circular trap door underneath the elephant. Below that is another secret door, and various rope bridges. Another secret door is on a platform on the lower level.

He does not believe she wishes them any harm, but she has been acting strangely of late. He gave us a ring off his finger and suggested it may help us. He warned us to be careful in the caverns- his sister and her servants could be a threat in the labrinyth. He would prefer if his involvement did not come to light. He then had a servant give us passage to the garden. Calcedon very credibly expressed his intense interest in the gardens to the servant.

We were quickly escorted by the servant to the garden, remnisicent of a vast jungle with exotic birds and unfamiliar flora. The center of the garden was a large fountain, and on the other side of the garden was the promised elephant. Calcedon listened in rapture to the servant hold forth on the garden, and Calcedon eventually convinced him that we could be trusted to examine the gardens at our leisure. We looked around and spotted a balcony above us, where we were indeed being observed by the servant. Merithel asked me to see if the fountain was magical- I checked
and confirmed it was. Merithel was able to see a cleverly hidden pressure plate at the center of the platform under the elephant. We took our chances and Merithel uttered the password and hit the pressure plate. A curved opening appeared revealing a set of spiral stairs, and we moved to descend.