The party are told they have at least two to three weeks to spend in
Zothay before they will be needed again but this is cut short
when the sages in Damkina request additional help. In the end it
is agreed that Magar and Irina will throw the full weight of their resources against whatever
problems exist in that city as well as bumping up the number of sages that are doing research
there. The party that goes north therefore consists of the adventurers, Magar and Irina plus
her personal assistants, two female sages, Carembur and Ardil, and three of Irina's rangers.
This extended party is divided into several groups which will pretend not to know each
other. Eluriel and the rangers are experts paid to set up a ranger service for the
Temple of Glor'Diadel. Irina and her cohorts
will quite reasonably be a trade mission from Zothay. Solomon, Narin and Foddlewick are
wandering adventurers who form a small adventuring party after meeting on the boat. Midge
has his own trading mission for Stomper Trading. Magar and the two sages will supplement
the team already looking at Damkina's ancient records. Lastly Hanna is transformed into a tiefling
and pretends to be the head of the Thieves' Guild of Zothay come to avenge the murder of a
friend.
The whole party teleport to a boat off the coast of
Kalastar in the north. They put into Kalastar and hire a boat
to take them up the Greyflood River. As the boat crosses the Glazed lake it comes under
attack from a group of 20 gargoyles. Magar and the sages go below (as they are pretending to
be harmless sages) and leave the rangers and adventures to take down the attackers. Magar,
however, leaves instructions to obtain a sample of at least one of the gargoyles. There
follows a bit of a massacre (as the gargoyles were hoping) but not of the boat passengers.
All the gargoyles are destroyed and even one captured for questioning explodes shortly
afterwards but not before Midge sees an image of an evil magic-user in its mind (who is no
doubt going to be very annoyed as the gargoyles had been expensively enhanced by magic).
In
Damkina all the party quickly settle in to their undercover roles.
Hanna ingratiates herself into the local Thieves' Guild. Eluriel and her colleagues take
apprentice rangers into the wild for training and Midge finds willing employees
for Stomper Trading. Midge also searches the sewers without discovering much of note.
After a few days those pretending to be adventurers attract the attention of
Lady Moonmist who has a delicate
and dangerous task for them. Her steward explains she wishes
Baron Drampinhill to be apprehended and
brought to Damkina to face the Nobles' Court. A cunning plan is hatched which is run past
both the steward and also Magar and Irena.
With a few tweaks the plan is approved. Solomon and Narin are seconded to the employ of the
Overlord and given the task of securing venison for a forthcoming feast (and power of arrest
over any who would thwart them). They decide to look in a glade in the
Quinden area. Eluriel is sent by the temple to train their new
rangers with the help of
Irina's more experienced rangers. Apprarently the training will
involve stalking a man called Krillan through a forest in the vicinity of Quinden. Foddlewick decides he would like a
day out near Quinden polymorphed into a deer. By a (genuine) coincidence Hanna is also going to
Quinden having tracked down the lover of the thief whose murder she is avenging. Hanna and Midge
break into the Baron's Castle to ascertain the composition of the hunting party he is taking
out that afternoon and feed the information to Krillan, noted bard and steward to the Baron's
neighbour
Lady Starlight. Krillan then
appears in the local tavern to suggest to the Baron's men his excesses mean that his days are
numbered (without actually telling them the number is less than one).
That afternoon the Baron's party follow a deer in the forest and ignore the fact that they
are straying on to Lady Starlight's land. They burst into a clearing where a number of
halflings carrying bows appear to have already killed the deer. Solomon and Narin are in the
process of negotiating a fair price for the deer. For some reason Krillan also appears
to be in the clearing. The Baron tells everyone to move away from the deer. Krillan who has
a long history of irking the Baron politely declines. The Baron's main henchman whispers
that this is an ideal opportunity to get rid of Krillan (and any witnesses). The Baron gives
the order to attack. For many of his men, however, the murder of innocent civilians is a step
too far and more than half hang back. His chief lieutenants target Krillan, Solomon and Narin
but underestimate their foes. Eluriel appears from the undergrowth and shoots the baron off
his horse and the appearance of the other rangers encourages the remaining men to surrender.
Midge and Foddlewick who had been firing off helpful spells during the conflict watch with
some satisfaction from the undergrowth. The Baron's chief lieutenant, however, after severely
wounding Krillan makes a break for it on what, it shortly becomes clear, is a nightmare. The
nightmare sadly fails to notice a wall of force and the lieutenant is killed when Narin and Solomon catch up
with him. The Baron is arrested by Solomon and Narin and taken back to Damkina.
Meanwhile Hanna fails to turn up for a meeting with Midge in the local tavern so Midge
and Foddlewick investigate. They talk to the thief's
lover, Lamorna, who explains
that Hanna went through a portal in her cottage which leads back to Damkina. Midge, however,
can't sense that Hanna is on the Material Plane. They return to Damkina and get the
whole party to investigate the empty house where the other end of the portal is situated.
They find some notes hidden in a draw which belonged to the thief that died but not Hanna
although they are fairly sure she was in the house when she disappeared. Magar agrees to
detect Hanna across the planes and finds her travelling through the first plane of Hell and
magically communicates with her. Somewhat sheepishly she confirms she needs rescuing and is
duly rescued.
Hanna explains that she has found a network of tunnels which she assumes have connections
all over the city. The network forms its own pocket dimension. As a trap some of its openings
lead to evil planes. The party explore the network and discover that someone is scrying them
which probably explains why they have to share the tunnels with two purple worms and two
mariliths as well as experiencing a sudden trip to another plane. The assumption is that these
tunnels are used by the cult of Arthranax and
may lead to the Closed Temple.
Meanwhile Lady Moonmist who is obviously impressed by the party's actions so far invites them
all to dinner. Over some excellent food and drink she gently probes their motivations and
tries to find out what it would take to get them to settle in Damkina. As encouragement she
turns the Baron's valuable equipment over to the party and offers to make Eluriel Baroness
of Quinden. When Eluriel reaches her new castle she finds that there are considerable riches
stored in its treasure vaults and although she turns some of this over to the villagers
and the Overlord she concludes the majority of the wealth must have come with the Baron (or
been given to him for some purpose). She also finds the body of the previous owner and the
Baron now has a murder charge to face.
Meanwhile the sages have discovered a match for the shard of gargoyle that they obtained on
their boat trip to Damkina. They have narrowed it down to a strip of the foothills in the
Guarding Range and a party immediately sets out to investigate. The party consists of Eluriel,
Foddlewick and Solomon ably assisted by Coran, Irina's Chief Ranger. After a few miles they
are joined by the fey, Sir Isfahan, which makes Eluriel very happy for the rest of the trip.
With at least three party members who can cast Pass without Trace the party do just
that. It transpires, however, that they are intermittingly being scryed upon and the party
have a number of encounters. After a while their progress can be viewed from space as
several large areas of devastation held together by an invisible thread. The first encounter
is with a group of dire triceratops on day one. On days four and five they meet Greater
Shadows and on day six a new type of more powerful undead which have poison dripping from
their claws. After the last encounter the party decide to 'die' to avoid further harrassment:
Foddlewick Mindblanks them and leaves an illusion of their bodies.
The party are now in full stealth mode and carry out the rest of their mission without being
detected. They discover a hobgolin village with a smattering of men in it. The chief's hut
has a descending ladder in one corner that seems to be used by the men. Past some hobgoblin
guards and a portcullis at the bottom of the ladder is a long corridor with huge brass
doors at the end. The party also note a path from the village leading towards the mountains.
After a stakeout they see two men waiting in a clearing at the end of the path
being picked up by a dragon (literally) and taken to an evil mage's lair high in the
mountains. They manage to overhear the men talking to the mage who they address as 'Lord'.
Someone under the village 'the Dark One' wants the mage to fly to where the parties 'bodies'
were left. The mage declines saying it is not his problem: the 'Dark One' should send out
a hobgoblin patrol. The mage stresses that above all else their base must remain
undiscovered. When the party return later they find that the magician's cave has disappeared
although the cave of his dragon is still visible.
Meanwhile back in Damkina Hanna and Midge are working on a plot to identify other members of
the cult of Arthranax. Hanna suspects one of the members of the Thieves' Guild is involved so
she starts a rumour that members of the cult are being arrested. Midge and Hanna then follow a
thief who leaves a hidden message behind a drainpipe which is later picked up a cloaked figure.
The cloaked figure turns out to live in the wealthy Merchants' District in a house protected by
many magical traps and alarms. Unfortunately these are temporarily turned off as he enters the
door which is when Hanna and Midge enter his house. After a few minutes the 'merchant'
teleports away leaving his house vulnerable to a quick search which turns up a secret magic
library containing many books of evil spells. Hanna and Midge also find a secret underground
lair which is largely deserted apart from quite a few zombies and golems. The zombies are
unintelligent and appear to serve as programmed housekeepers for the complex but the golems
seem (in various degrees) to have acquired independent intelligence. It would appear that
they once served the magic user who lives above (and who may be hundreds if not thousands of
years old). He is, however, no longer interested in them and now only visits a single room in
the complex which is guarded by a fearsome many-tentacled aberration. Hanna and Midge make
friends with the golems and retreat leaving (they hope) no trace of their penetration of the
magic user's house.
Hanna and Midge return with the whole party who resolve to kill the many-tentacled
aberration and find what is beyond the door it is guarding. The beast is resistant to both
blows and magic but the party are by now tough enough to kill it. They open the door to the
room it was guarding hoping to find a pile of treasure but instead find a large disembodied
head
floating in the middle of the room. The head belongs to
The Seer a god who was 'killed' in the
War of Magicks and whose head has been sustained on the Material Plane ever since.
The Seer can see further and deeper into the future than any other
God. He feels he was let
down in the War of Magicks by the other Gods because they felt he was giving away too much
information about them to mortals. If the other Gods knew of his presence here they would
surely insist that he withdrew to the Celestial Plane so he gets the party to swear to keep
his
location secret. In return he will make predictions for them starting with they next mission.