Zoom 2024-06-18 21:00

Final preparations for the smash-&-grab raid on Hasandra's temple in the imperial palace in Stormhaven
Rasten is going to send a priest with us to take the party up to the door of the temple complex.
The Shanah armour and the leathers are repaired and ready.
We buy 1 Watchful Eye and 2 lots of the lock dissolver off the special list at the Hall of Rogues, plus some sparkle bombs from the regular list.
Also we pick up 2 scrolls of Suggestion to say "this is not your problem, someone is taking care of it" in Elvish.
Garaf refreshes our supply of Continual Light rocks and hands out 3 to each character, with the spares in the bag.
We have just 4 teleport scrolls, 2 to get us all to a teleport sink and 2 to get us from there to a chosen teleport sink (presumably Willston, but I don't remember discussing it?)
The seal (which only Brokev, Wun, Bazin & RiffRaff know about) is actually the metal seal for sealing documents, saying something equivalent to "from the office of the Empress". It's intricate and difficult to forge.
We ask Rasten's chancellor to make us up some sample documents. We know they won't pass close inspection and we will need to somehow forge a seal on them, but we will have the Suggestion scrolls to help convince anyone checking them and we're off to talk to the Hall of Rogues next. We have 3 documents in mind:
#Deliver the witness to Lady Sorlor, so that she may hear his information about the demise of Eliezure. This information is not to be shared with anyone below the rank of City Governor.
#What the bearer has done was for the good of the Empire and on the orders of the Empress
#The Empress requires that you provide any material aid requested by the bearer, who is carrying out Her instructions
Documents 2 & 3 are a backup in case things go badly and we need a get-out-of-jail card.
The 4 characters in the know intend to use the real seal on the documents, even if they have to pretend to admire what a great forgery we got from the Hall of Rogues.
Our plan is to enter the temple by the back door, using the first document if needed to pass through the vestry & other service preparation rooms to the presence of Sorlor. Joshua will be the witness mentioned in the document.
We expect to find Sorlor in her quarters upstairs, by going up at the red carpet. Alternatively she may be in the priests' chapel or Her garden, but we hope to avoid those locations by our choice of timing.
We have to bring the witness to Sorlor because she hasn't visited the Empress to hear the news like all the other city governors.
Hentron will probably be with Sorlor, and we will have to point out that he does not have clearance to hear Joshua's information, thus getting them apart.
Joshua will tell some nearly-true story about Eliezure, implying that the Five are in league with the Lizardmen and are even now attacking the palace. Rasten will arrange an attack by the lizardmen for us, which should also draw away some guards from the temple.
Joshua will suggest that the Five may already be here in the temple, and that Sorlor should use the goblet to check for them. There will then be some improvisation to get her to hand over the goblet so that we can check why it isn't hot. Our goblet will be very hot, because we've filled it with phosphorus ready to have it burst into flame when it comes out.
Meanwhile Hentron will be offered refreshment, in the form of the Wyldwood apple pie. We have packed a regular apple pie as well, so that anyone else can be given a slice of that one.
With a cast-iron plan ready to be implemented, we synchronise our hourglasses and set off to the Hasandra temple.
We arrive in the outer gardens at dusk, just as the light is fading. The main service of the evening finished about half an hour ago. We march up to the back door as though we are here on official business.
Do we try the door and hope to slip inside unnoticed? Do we check for traps? Do we knock?