Session 8 (10/22/2021)

## Day Four, Late Morning

**Dove** staggers across the floor, clutching a bloody abominabunny tooth in one paw and a dripping arrow in the other. She flops down on the stone next to Swage and Topka. She drops the tooth into her cloak pocket, stows the arrow in her quiver, and takes out her unicorn snugglebeast, Pygmalion. The tabaxi breathes deeply, presses her nose into Pygmalion’s yarn mane, and closes her eyes.

Pele pulls one last leaf out of her hair and cautiously wanders around the room. She doesn’t find any more rabbits, but she sees remains of mice and rats that were most likely the rabbits’ snack of choice before they arrived. The cells are small and cramped and have rudimentary sleeping and toilet areas that are not that far apart. Tally marks are scratched into the stone walls, likely from a previous occupant counting the days.

Gary searches through the remains of the rabbits. He’s surprised to find that such awful creatures could have such thick and silky plush fur. He picks up a few coins out of the remains as Esha casts Circle of Spores on the bodies. Mist sprinkles down on the fluffy remains, and mushrooms begin to sprout out of what’s left of the rabbits. Gary watches with fascination as the rabbits disappear beneath dense clusters of mushrooms. He asks Esha if these mushrooms would be safe to eat, but the druid isn’t sure. Gary decides to collect a few and is amazed at how sturdy and fresh these mushrooms are. The individual mushrooms snap off the cluster almost the same way a stalk of broccoli would snap.

Kaz scrapes his vicious maul against the rough stone wall–these bunny guts are just impossible to get out of the rivets and engravings. He walks over to the diminutive cleric. Gary looks up at Kaz and raises the handful of mushrooms towards him. Kaz picks up a mushroom and looks at it closely. He rubs his large fingers across the cap, flips it over to inspect the gills, and gives it a deep sniff. Kaz has seen many mushrooms like this in his travels. He hands it back to Gary and tells him that it’s a common forest mushroom. This variety isn’t poisonous at all and can be used to make satisfying and hearty soups. “Oh, so they’re not poisonous?” Gary asks, disappointed. “Thanks for checking though, Kaz.”

Kaz turns away from Gary and walks towards the next group of cells in an adjoining room. Pele carefully follows a few steps behind him and peeks into the room. Swage and Dove give their stuffies one last hug before stowing them and joining Pele. The room seems empty and desolate, and the adventurers can’t hear anyone or anything moving. Pele produces balls of flames and lobs them into the room, illuminating the cells and revealing broken metal chains and ominous drag marks across the floor.

Holly approaches the center-left cell. The door of metal bars is open, and the dwarf steps inside. The wall of this cell also has tally marks scraped roughly into the stone wall, and Holly sees that one stone brick is just barely sticking out from the wall. He digs his nails into the edges of the brick and manages to shimmy it out of the wall. A single key sits in the vacant space behind the brick. Holly grabs the key and tries it in the lock on the cell door. The key effortlessly locks and unlocks the door. Curious, he tries the key on the door to another cell. The key opens this door just as easily as the first. Holly takes a quick circuit around the room, and he finds that this key opens all the cell doors. He drops the key into his pocket.

Swage steps forward to investigate the chain segments spread across the floor. The metal is oxidized, and some of the links have been bent and bowed to the point of fatigue. “Inferior materials,” Swage grumbles to himself as he collects three two-foot sections of the chain to add to his scrap collection.

Nearby, Dove crouches down near the drag marks on the floor. She can smell the ferrous twinge of blood. The floor is caked with thick, crusted splatters of dried human blood. Smeared handprints mixed in amongst the drag marks indicate the desperation in the doomed victim’s last moments of life. The marks on the floor leave the cells and go into the darkened room ahead of the adventurers. Swage looks down at the floor and up into the darkness. “Looks like a whole lot of NOPE in there,” he says.

Pele casts dancing lights and sends four glowing orbs into the darkness. A long rectangular room stands before them, with an additional room to the right and the left. A tattered carpet runner at their feet leads up a short staircase. The high ceiling is supported by stone pillars, and two stone statues of humanoids loom silently. One statue stands intact, while the other is merely hips, legs, and a base. Pele bravely steps into the room and approaches the intact statue. The carved figure depicts a knight wearing full armor and brandishing a fine shield. She investigates the face of the statue and gasps. Its face shows pain, anguish, and fear – not what Pele would expect to see on the face of such a towering figure. She is taken by the realism of the statue. It is perfectly proportioned and even the most minute details are flawless. Pele thinks that the statue looks so real that it might as well spring to life right in front of her. She runs her hands over the statue and gives it a light push. The solid stone does not move.

The statue has a strange pose. In addition to its fearful face, the statue is posed defensively as well. Its raised arm and balled fist are empty, as if it held a weapon that’s no longer there. Kaz looks at the base of the staircase and sees a wooden spear. It’s bent and splintered in the middle. The pointed end hangs limply in Kaz’s hand.

Holly approaches the destroyed statue. Even though only half of the statue still stands, Holly can see that it was just as magnificently carved as its counterpart. The dwarf is nearly rendered speechless. This stonework is practically without equal. The actual material is curious, too. This variety of stone is not from the earth. Dwarves can create stone aggregates and blends from a variety of materials, and it looks like a superior craftsperson was behind this creation.

While Holly marvels at the statue, Swage cautiously walks past him and enters the left room. In the center of the room rests the remains of a wooden coffin. The bottom of the coffin is splintered, and pieces are missing. Swage thinks that it looks like an enormous hand just reached down, snatched up the coffin, gave it a few shakes, and slammed it back to the ground.

Pele takes in the grand scale of the room, the destruction, and the bloody drag marks. She wonders if this is where Ocelot von Draun would come to…. change. Gary creeps along the stone wall and enters the right room. This room also contains a wooden coffin, but this one looks as if giant claws have raked it into shreds. Gary peers in through the long gash in the wood. There is nobody inside, but the interior of the coffin is lined with elegant, tufted velvet. “Wouldn’t be a bad spot to live!” Gary thinks to himself. Dove enters the room behind him and approaches the coffin. She examines the claw marks on the coffin and runs her paws over the wood. She flinches as her paw snags on a splinter. She pulls her paw back and looks it over for damage, but there’s no blood. She looks again and sees a shimmering scale sticking out from a knot in the wood.

Dove plucks the scale out of the wood and turns it over in her paws. The smooth surface catches the gleam of Pele’s dancing light, and Dove can see a beautiful swirl of turquoise and yellow colors. The scale is surprisingly large. It covers almost all of her paw pad. Dove knows that snakes have scales, but a scale of this size…. could it possibly be a dragon scale? Gary sees the scale and takes a few surreptitious glances over his shoulders. He digs through his burlap sack until he reaches his jar and pops the lid open. The shaman’s rehydrated head floats in the grain alcohol. One of its eyeballs has dislodged and bobs on the surface of the liquid. Gary takes another swift glance at the scale, glances at the head, and quickly replaces the lid. Holly stares at Gary, his nose scrunched up in disgust.

“Wow, that must have been a big fish!” says Gary.

“Or maybe a small dragon!” replies Dove.

Both Kaz and Swage jump up at the mention of the word “dragon” and rush over to Dove. The tabaxi hands the scale over to Swage, as his knowledge of red dragons runs deep. Swage turns the scale over in his hands. It’s not a red dragon scale, and he thinks it’s most likely not even a dragon scale at all. He hands the scale back to Dove, who puts it in her cloak pocket. Kaz and Swage are unable to hide their disappointment.

Holly slowly creeps up the short staircase, humming a suspenseful theme song to himself. He gets to the top of the stairs, drops to his belly, and begins to crawl across the stone. Suddenly, the dwarf finds himself nose-to-nose with a massive, dark mound of a creature. Holly’s eyes widen in fear as he gazes upon the monster’s eight massively thick legs, its deep under-bite with sharp fangs jutting upwards, two sets of eyes, and a row of deadly spines running down its back to the end of its tail. The hulking creature is curled up and noisily snoozing. It releases a deep snore from its nostrils, blasting Holly in the face with a putrid cloud of death and decay.

Holly’s eyes water and he manages to suppress a gag. He slowly crawls backward and cautiously rises to his feet when he reaches the stairs. He takes one tentative step backward, then another, and another. Holly is nearly out of the monster’s range when his heel kicks a loose rock on the stairs. It bounces down the remaining stairs and clatters across the stone floor. The noise echoes throughout the cavernous hall. Holly stops dead in his tracks and holds his breath.

The creature growls and rises to its feet. It lifts its head, shakes off the last vestiges of sleep, and lets out a deafening roar.

Kaz sees a shadowy figure rise above Holly’s head. A rush of joy flows through the goliath. He raises his maul above his head and gleefully shouts to the creature in challenge.

Dove runs for cover behind a stone pillar, sets her hunter’s mark upon the monster, and pierces it with two quick arrows. The beast lumbers down the stairs and leaps at Holly, who manages to roll out of the way just in time. Frustrated, the beast lashes out at Kaz and Pele. Kaz calls on his stone’s endurance to resist the devastating bite. Gary quickly mutters a few obscenities before striking the beast with a chill touch spell and calling forth his spiritual weapon. Undaunted, Kaz releases his rage and his frenzy to attack the monster, but the vile creature dodges his maul. Pele squares up the beast. “Not today,” she says as she uses a mind spike to delve into the mind of the beast and deliver psychic damage.

Swage, barely recovered from the onslaught of the past few days, takes cover behind a pile of stone rubble. He quickly whispers, “Gond will provide” and blesses Kaz, Holly, and Dove before he ducks back behind the rubble. Holly pulls off a successful sneak attack, sinking his dagger into the monster’s rough hide and causing it to roar out in pain. Esha has an inkling of the true nature of this beast and hits it with a blind spell. She calls down her Healing Spirit, which appears next to her in the form of a large fire beetle. The beetle scuttles across the floor towards Pele, who yelps in fear. She manages to suppress her entomophobia long enough for the beetle to heal her.

Dove steps out from her cover and sends another arrow into the hide of the monster. Blinded and enraged, the creature exhales a vile cloud of putrid air, which settles on Pele and Dove. Gary swings his spiritual weapon at the monster and adds a Touch of Death. The spectral scythe slices down the monster’s back, bisecting it into two mirrored halves. Each side of the beast falls outward, exposing its rotting entrails to the air.

The adventurer's cough and retch as the smell fills the room. The fire beetle leaves Pele and scurries across the floor to Kaz. The goliath drops heavily to the floor and sits with his chin on his hand. His maul rests on the floor next to him. The broods while the fire beetle scampers up his arms and across his shoulders. Holly notices Kaz’s dismay at not being able to defeat the creature. “You may not have hit that thing, but it did hit you,” Holly offers. “Scars are stories!” Gary sneaks over to the monster’s corpse and gives it a covert shake. “Look, Kaz! It’s still alive! Come kill it!” he shouts, but Kaz just sighs heavily.

Dove walks over to Pele. The two of them don’t necessarily feel any different now, but they know they breathed in the wretched cloud the monster expelled. Dove checks her body and gives Pele a look over, and her stomach drops. Tears well up in her eyes and she tells Pele that the monster infected them with Marrow Ooze. She explains that their immune systems are under attack, and they will feel more and more tired each day. When they are finally brought to exhaustion, the disease will take over their bodies and turn their arms and legs (and Dove’s tail) into more marrow oozes. They will survive, but possibly without their limbs.

Swage overhears Dove’s grim discovery and suggests they could harvest organs from the beast and use them to create an antidote. Dove is willing to try anything to cure this nightmare of a disease, so she hops right into the fetid body of the deceased monster. She rummages around a bit before pulling out a huge, sickly waterskin-like organ full of sloshing fluid. She carries it with both arms back to the Firbolg. No one was expecting it to be so large, and now the adventurers are confused about what to do with it. Should they puncture it and drain the fluid? Or talk an apothecary into coming down into the Crow’s Nest to help brew an antidote? Dove’s enthusiasm fades and she sets the disgusting sac down at the foot of the frightened-looking statue.

She joins Kaz as he glumly walks up the short staircase. Pele sends her dancing lights ahead of the group to light their way. On the center of the floor is the image of a creature with many long tentacle-like arms surrounded by a circle of runes. Holly notices another coffin tucked away in a secluded room on this level, and he lightly steps into the room. This coffin is undamaged, and as he pulls away from the lid, Holly sees that it’s filled with an assortment of scrolls, documents, and books. He scoops some papers out of the pile. He peers at the symbols scrawled across the pages. There’s a pattern and flow to the writing, and Holly can almost pick out a bit of Thieves' cant here and there, but overall, the meaning of the symbols is a mystery. He flips through a few of the bound journals. The pages list numbers and monetary amounts, almost like a shady croupier's ledger. Holly collects and an assortment of books and documents and asks Kaz to carry them in his pack.

Pele slowly circles the strange symbol on the floor. She can't decipher the runes, but she can feel a strong magic presence. It's not an evil presence, but it's strong. Pele thinks that this spot must serve as one end of a magical doorway, but she has no idea where it might connect. Esha passes the circle on her way to investigate a small room off to the left. Inside, she sees another wooden coffin. She flips open the lid and is instantly struck by a handful of darts. She yelps and steadies herself on the rim of the coffin. When she opens her eyes, she sees the coffin contains ten cloth pouches. She flinches as she pulls the darts out of her shoulder and reaches into the coffin to touch the bags. Small bits of metal slide and clink inside the bags, and Esha thinks they must contain money. She grabs one bag in each hand and shuttles all ten bags over to Pele. The Genasi peeks in each bag and does a quick tally of the contents before stowing each one in her handy haversack. Kaz looks over at the two and jokingly asks Pele when she became the entire Department of the Treasury.

At the far end of the hall, there is a raised platform accessible by another small set of stairs. On the back wall stands another imposing statue. The figure wears a hooded cloak that completely obscures its face, except for a long, curved beak. It holds a wooden staff in its hands. The staff is elegantly carved to resemble a tree, with shining gems inlaid on its head.

Swage can detect a powerful, but not negative, magical energy coming from the area. Gary looks up at the statue in awe and reaches out a hand to touch it. Holly smacks his hand out of the way and gives Gary a serious look. The dwarf asks him to just give him a second, as he searches high and low (especially low) around the statue for any traps. He pauses for a moment to smack Gary's hand away again before knocking on the floor near the statue. A strange echo from the floor suggests a hollow area underneath. Holly feels around the dusty floor until he finds a hatch and pries it open. He tells Gary that the statue has the "Holly Seal of Approval" before he disappears below the floor.

"Finally!" Gary exclaims as he reaches out to touch the alluring staff. He is surprised at how easily he can remove the staff from the statue's hand. Suddenly, the statue opens its hand and spreads its arms wide. Swage watches wide-eyed as a magical aura flows out of the statue and overtakes Gary.

Gary feels as if his mind has detached from his body. He can see his arms and legs moving, but he has completely lost control and is unable to stop himself. Both hands grip the staff, and he turns to face the magic symbol on the floor. He watches, terrified, as some unknown force compels him to walk steadily towards the circle. His panic rises with each step, but he uses all his willpower to call out to his friends. "Help me! I can't control my body!"

Kaz steps in to grab Gary, but the unstoppable force piloting Gary breaks free from Kaz's grip. As the cleric gets closer and closer to the circle, Pele quickly casts Mage Hand. The spectral hand can wrest the staff out of Gary's grip, instantly freeing Gary from the magical force. Swage sees the aura lift, and Gary exhales in relief. Turning the staff with her mage hand, Pele gives it a close inspection. There's powerful magic attached to this staff, and the conjunction of the wood and gems amplifies its power. She sets the staff down on the ground and steps back. Swage looks at the staff, then back to the beaked statue. The magical aura he saw around the statue was gone. The staff's magical properties must have been so strong that it made the area and the surrounding statue look magical. Swage centers himself and prepares to cast his Identify Magic ritual.

Gary shakes off the last creepy feeling of being controlled and returns to the statue. With clearer eyes, he sees the figure's robe feature a symbol of a mask with a billowing cape. He recognizes it as the mark of the Lord of the Shadows - a trickster god and patron of thieves and spies. His followers have the gift of duplicity and cloaks of shadows. The Lord of the Shadows is the sworn enemy of Cyric and Waukeen. He hears some knocking and scraping below his feet, and he steps aside just as Holly pops back up from the hatch in the floor. He dusts off his clothes and pulls a few spider webs out of his beard. He looks at the group and tells them that he's found a door.

Swage's ritual completes, and he identifies the wooden staff as a Staff of Charming. This magical quarterstaff can resist and reflect Enchantment spells and also allows the wielder to comprehend languages. Holly and Gary rejoin the group standing near the circle, and they all begin to discuss what to do with the staff. Holly suggests they could put the staff in the circle and see what happens since the staff was using Gary to get there anyway. Pele grabs the staff with her Mage Hand and tosses it into the circle. The runes illuminate and the circle glows brightly for a few seconds before the lights fade away. The circle is empty, and the staff is gone. Swage looks in annoyed disbelief that the item he just spent ten minutes meticulously analyzing was yeeted into the ether in under ten seconds.

He sighs heavily as he steps forward to investigate the circle of runes. The magic they just witnessed was powerful indeed. This spell is firmly anchored, and anyone wishing to use this doorway must know the exact spell to use and the precise destination location. The ships Swage sailed upon the Astral Sea could access these types of doorways by using runes engraved into their metal hulls. This doorway leads somewhere, but Swage has no way of knowing where.

Holly suggests that they all follow him through the hatch he discovered. The group walks up to the base of the statue and peers into the dusty hole in the floor. Pele, Esha, Gary, and Holly all hop in with ease. Dove, Kaz, and Swage look at each other. Dove isn't sure she can fit, and she wonders how on earth the massive goliath and the towering Firbolg will make it work. With a lot of crouching, squeezing, cursing, and pushing, everyone makes it through the tunnels to a barred iron door. Holly swings the door open, and says, "Look! It's snow!"

Dove steps one paw through the doorway, pauses a minute, and steps fully out into the snow. They are on the side of the mountain, and they can see the town below. Kaz takes out his magical compass and holds it high while it calibrates. Holly taps Kaz's elbow and tells him the compass isn't needed - Seidan is right below them. Pele speculates that this must be a secret way to access the town, without having to pass through the gates. She looks at the door, which has been cleverly disguised within a tree. The door has been covered with bark, so it's virtually undetectable from the outside. Holly asks Swage if he could craft a lock so that they can control access through the door. He pulls the cell door key from his pocket and smiles. Holly crawls back through the tunnel, and within a few minutes returns with a lock and a metal bar from the cell doors, and a small section of chain. Swage can create a locking bar that fits the door and discreetly blends in with the door's camouflage. With the door secured, the adventurers look down the mountain at the town of Seidan. With no easily discernable path down the mountain, Dove suggests that maybe they should go back the way they came. Swage sighs at another effort wasted, and mentally prepares himself to squeeze back through that miserable tunnel.

Once back in the cavernous hall, the group takes one last look at the magical circle on the floor. Holly notices that some of the symbols in the ledger book match the symbols on the floor. "hmmm...if only there was something we could use to comprehend languages," Swage muses sarcastically. He takes out his notebook and begins to sketch the runes, taking care to split each symbol over two pages as to not accidentally activate the magic. He can’t capture them as well as he would like, and he hopes he can understand this drawing later.

Esha remembers that there might be someone she could ask. She pulls out her sentient scimitar and asks it to awaken. She tells it that she has decided on its name - Erinaceus, the Lion's Mane. She hears the now-familiar voice in her head. "hmmmmm... Erinaceus. I like it. That "lion's mane" part though, not so much."

Esha agrees to just use the first part of the name. She sets her scimitar down near the circle and asks it if it can decipher any of the symbols around the circle.

"Let's just say this language....is for the birds," the voice chuckles.

When it doesn't hear Esha laugh in return, the voice coolly adds, "It's Auran. It's a difficult language to learn, but I did have one master who.... tweeted a lot."

The scimitar admits that it only recognizes one word: "Meding," or possibly "Midang." It isn't sure what the word means exactly, but it does recognize the context. It was a word often used about a place. A kingdom.

The scimitar also has a question for Esha. "Why didn't you use me in the battle against the basilisk? I am hungry!" it demands accusingly.

Esha balks at this omission and tells the scimitar that Gary killed the beast too quickly for her to be able to draw the weapon.

"Haters gonna hate!" Gary interjects.

Esha tells the adventures about the word in the circle... Meding. Midang? Pele recognizes the word - she's seen it on a map. It's a place. She asks the group if it could be the Kingdom of Midan?

As they mull over this new information, the adventurers retrace their steps through the Crow's Nest. They close the access to the stairwell and ensure the firepit is in its rightful place. As they step out into the streets of Seidan, the group parts. Esha heads back to the herbalist to pick up a few dried yew leaves. Kaz follows his nose and finds a street vendor selling grilled meat on a stick. The vendor looks up from his grill as a broad shadow blocks the sun. A stony face stares down at him, and requests all the meat sticks he has. The vendor shakily gathers all the skewers off the grill and presents the goliath with a meat bouquet. "Ten....ten copper, please," he asks meekly. Kaz hands the vendor a gold coin, turns, and walks away. Kaz doesn't do math.

Swage returns to the general store. Timmy looks up as the shop's doorbell jingles and smiles joyfully when he sees Swage. "Welcome back!"

The Firbolg wearily places his hand on the counter. "You got any smokes, kid?"

Timmy apologizes, since the store doesn't stock anything like that, but he does suggest a trip to the herbalist. Swage starts to open up about his family, seeing if he can get Timmy to open up too. Swage asks Timmy if his mother does anything special for him if he's feeling scared. Timmy replies that his mother would sing to him. Swage asks Timmy to sing his mother's songs, and he takes out his dulcimer to accompany the boy's voice. He uses his artisan's blessing to craft a music box, capturing their song. Swage hands it to Timmy, who opens it up to hear the song they just performed together. The boy's chin quivers, and he sniffs and quickly turns away from Swage. He shakily thanks the Firbolg for such a wonderful gift and insists that Swage take payment in return. When Swage refuses, Timmy ducks into the back room and returns with a beautiful lute. Swage is touched by the gesture and knowing that Timmy won't let him leave without accepting some sort of payment, he graciously accepts the lute and says goodbye to Timmy. He turns the lute over in his hands as he walks down the street. His eyes catch a small engraving on the back of the lute. "To Harnold, from Timmy."

Dove is exhausted and distressed. She's been suppressing her panic over the marrow ooze disease all morning, and her spirit is starting to break. Gary assures her it will be okay. He and Swage will work together to heal her and Pele just as soon as they can. Dove thanks him, and listlessly returns to Shasta's house, climbs the stairs, and falls into bed.

Holly beelines to Shasta's house, ready to spread out all his found documents and give them a close look. As he enters the manor, he sees Shasta in the front room. Holly tells him that he has additional questions about the Crow's Nest and Shasta's involvement in it. What would his father think? Shasta scoffs at the dwarf's attempt at intimidation and assures Holly that the Leonid king knows all about the portal. Besides, Shasta had put an end to that secret organization anyway.

Holly stoically stares at Shasta. His ear of deceit tells him that Shasta is lying.