Session 15-A: The Soulless Shield

## Key Plot Developments

Trix watches, stunned, as Ichabod is crushed in Suortin's powerful maw. A moment later, he is shocked to see his family disappear in a puff of red and black smoke. He quickly realizes what happened: by summoning Ichabod to Annarei's grove, an openly hostile environment, he has behaved negligently. This negligence directly violated the terms of the Ichabond. Therefore, his boons were reversed.

The dazed party-goers ask him what happened; he cannot speak. Shuushar and Lemon remain. Shuushar was previously dazed by the Umber Hulk's confusing eyes, but has regained control of his senses. He tries to comfort Trix, who is inconsolable. His family is gone and he feels like it's his fault. He sold his soul for nothing.

Before he has time to recover, Annarei flies out of the deeper grave, radiating an aura of malice and rage. Her bat-wings outstretched, she rushes at him. Shuushar moves to defend him, though he makes no attempt to evade her onslaught. She stops short of attacking, and says that the Dark Prince has forbade her from striking him down. She spits out a fragment of a prophecy she says she is meant to convey to him: **"The maze. The machine. The madness."** Then, she demands that she leave her grove and never return.

Trix, stumbling away with Shuushar and Lemon, cries out in the darkness for Pelor to save him. He hears nothing. He prays to the Sea Mother. Nothing. He asks for anyone to hear him. Nothing. He considers suicide. Shuushar intervenes, praising him for his selflessness in surrendering his soul to save Pyrite. As Trix helped defend him and bring him back from despondency after his hometown was destroyed, the kuo-toan will care for the goblin. With or without that devil, they will reunite his clan and cure Glyn of his madness. Trix, barely lucid, gloomily agrees.

After a sleepless night, Lemon attempts to cheer Trix up. He offers his advice about the benefits of traveling and expanding one's outlook on life. His simple-minded enthusiasm propels Trix forward.

They travel, seeking goblin tracks. Instead, they see a pack of gnolls--both skeletal witherlings and a cruel-looking flesh crawler--transporting badly beaten shield dwarves in chains. Trix acts on autopilot, blasting them with his cleric magic; instead of blinding them with the magic of light and life, he subdues them with the power of twilight. Lemon, too, springs into action; his words now spread the power of healing. Trix is surprised; Shuushar is impressed.

The group is able to save three dwarves (Thizzorlig Nightforge, Gorthorli Nightbreaker, and Hekkar Barreljaw). They claim to be from Gauntlgrym, a surface dwarven city. They were dwarven scouts, seeking a missing member of their expedition: Eldeth Feldrun, the now-deceased prisoner of the drow. Trix informs them about her fate. They thank him for the intelligence and his willingness to safe their lives; while they are happy to die in a noble battle, being slaughtered in chains holds no glory for them.

The dwarves ask if the goblin would like to join them back on the surface; he declines, since he wants to bring his family back together first. When he explains his circumstances, mentioning the Sunless Citadel, they are surprised. They mention that a surface gnome has recently bragged to their king (Bruenor Stormbringer) about his goblin-slaying expertise, describing how successfully he killed goblins in the Sunless Citadel. Trix recognizes the gnome: Grampus, the wizard of the Knitting-Club Heroes. Furious, he resolves to eventually kill Grampus.

After he declines their offer to join them on the surface, the dwarves ask if he would like to have a drink with them. He agrees. They travel to the Long Salt Tavern, a surprisingly warm and inviting establishment built into the hollowed-out core of a massive cluster of clear quartz crystal nearly 100 feet long and over 30 feet high at the tallest spire.

Outside the tavern, they meet a queue of floating flumphs. These pleasant tentacled creatures fascinate Trix and amuse Lemon. The dwarves explain that this location seems to draw the appealing monsters; it's a safe place for many Underdark travelers to revel and relax.

Inside the crystalline tavern, Trix sees a hospitable haven. Small tables and booths sit scattered among the tavern, each one busy with deep gnomes, duergar, and flumphs playing cards, dice, or a keen game of insight and knowledge called “Liar's Gauntlet.” To the left, a small back room glows brightly with the pink shimmer of joyous flumphs.

Overhead, a wrought iron mobile spins slowly as polished steel mirrors orbit a single brazier that burns with a soft pink flame. Five flumphs undulate wildly at various heights to a strange mathematical music being played by a gnomish woman at the room's center, beating on an arrangement of moving pipes with two wooden dowels. A bright pink flumph tirelessly makes adjustments to each pipe's height and length, altering their sound and tone into a hypnotic melody.

Trix meets the inn's proprietor, a deep dwarf named Odarin Deepshackle. Odarin, who also serves as the bartender, has surgically implanted mechanical augmentations into his body. Odarin offers him various drinks and introduces him to a flumph named Lolmulmit, a thoughtful and conscientious creature who telepathically observes Trix's mood and describes his views on philosophy, alignment, and the nature of the afterlife. Finally, the creature offers to give Trix something he's lacked since the first moment he set foot in the Underdark: a map!

## New NPCs

1. Thizzorlig Nightforge, pleasant shield dwarf scout
2. Gorthorli Barrelbreaker, gruff shield dwarf scout
3. Hekkar Dragonjaw, aggressive shield dwarf scout
4. Odarin Deepshackle, duergar proprietor of the Long Salt Tavern
5. Lolmulmit, flumph patron of the Long Salt Tavern