Moonday, Desnus 30 (early morning)

We’ve kept a low profile in town over the past few days. Given how dangerous the pursuit of these worms and those responsible for them have become, we used that time to better both ourselves and our equipment. We can’t do those things if we are constantly looking over our shoulders.

We’ve also kept an eye and ear out, discreetly, for signs of Smenk taking the initiative. Like, revisiting our families and friends to kick things into gear. So far, all has been quiet on that front, too, though my visits to see mom and dad are not doing their anxieties any favors.

We all know this can’t last, especially with us departing for Korvosa tomorrow. That means dealing with it now or never, and no one is keen on leaving family behind to fend for themselves. Which leaves “now”.

(afternoon)

I spent the rest of the morning arranging for repairs at the house. The first step there is to fix the roof, since there’s no point in doing the rest of it if we can’t keep the rain out. The hardest part of that was explaining how to get out there since there aren’t roads and the landmarks all look the same (“go to this grove of trees, and turn right towards this other grove of trees,” and so on). I just had to trust that they could follow a cadastral map.

When I got back, everyone was ready to put the gears in motion. So we brazenly walked into town as a group at close to noon to have lunch at Kullen’s. We picked up a tail on the way there, but Dasi used some spell to spook him and he took off towards the observatory. Pretty much what we expected if Kullen’s info was good.

None of his henchmen were in the bar. It seems he wasn’t so anxious to cause trouble that way, either because it was too public or he didn’t want to tangle with Kullen at the same time.

After lunch, we decided to poke at the hornet’s nest by checking out the abandoned mine and that got a quick response. One of Smenk’s thugs was there and he moved to block the road that led to the ruined building, lead pipe in hand. The message he was sending was obviously “keep moving”.

Viore approached him and called out in a decidedly friendly tone. “Good day, sir! How are you doing?”

The guy just glowered at us. “You ain’t got no business here.”

“You don’t even know who I am,” Viore answered. “Maybe I do.”

“You aren’t too bright, are you, boy?” He swatted his pipe into his open hand and said, “It’s not your business. You get on to wherever you’re goin’ but stay outta here if you value your skull.”

And that was my cue. I stepped up. “Are you saying we can’t walk on a public street?”

He looked at me, then said, “T’aint no public down this road.”

“I believe that’s ‘obstruction of the public right-of-way’. And that,” I said, pointing at his lead pipe, “is ‘menacing’.”

There are rules to this, you see.

For a moment he looked like he was going to have a go at us, but Zhog spoke up. “If you swing with your pipe, we’ll kill you. If you hit with your fists, you get to live. Be smart.”

He looked at Zhog, taking him in for the first time. “Aren’t you Kullen’s kid?”

Zhog smiled wide. “Yup.”

Smenk’s man seemed to get the feeling he was in trouble here, so he made a shrill whistle. Zhog swung into action, hitting him hard with his fists. Then the thug tried to swing his pipe at me. His problem, though, was that we were faster. Much faster. I punched him in the jaw, then Viore knocked him down and out.

From the ruined building, we heard a crashing sound and looked over to see two enormous apes on long chains rush towards us. That’s right: apes. Where did Smenk get apes?

“And that,” I said to no one, “is a public safety hazard.”

Varin hit them with a spell to blind them, and the rest of us took them down mostly with saps and the flat of our blades to knock them out. We just didn’t have an appetite for killing animals.

We found another of Smenk’s goons back there, likely the one that set the apes on us, and he surrendered so fast we barely had time to threaten him.

“So. Where is he? You know who I mean,” Zhog asked.

“Mr. Smenk?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh. I know you. You’re Kullen’s kid.”

I was very annoyed at this exchange. “You know what? I’m getting really offended by how no one recognizes us. But, Zhog? Him, they know!”

The goon ignored me. “I don’t know what kind of business you all have with Mr. Smenk, but now is not the time,” he said to Zhog. “Maybe you don’t know but your dad, uncle, whatever he is, he’s no longer in good favor.”

Zhog said, “Uh huh. Remember that group he’s really angry about?”

It took a while for this to register, but register it did. He pointed us to the Observatory, because it was only fitting, I guess, that this both began and ended there.

We knocked on the door because we’re very polite people. It opened and another of Smenk’s henchmen tried to shoo us off. “The observatory is closed. Go away!”

But at the same time, we heard Smenk’s irritating voice echoing from somewhere deeper inside: “…go and grab the girls’ families. You, lure those kids…”

“We’re done here,” I said to no one in particular. And just as the guy was shutting the door, Sera and I shoved it hard, sending him stumbling back behind it. Then we converged on Smenk and his henchman and quite thoroughly kicked their assess. When it was all over, one of his goons was dead and the rest had been tied up.

Not gonna lie here. I found this all extremely satisfying.

I went to get what passes for the authorities in town—none of them were inclined towards Smenk as it was, and given recent history, they weren’t likely to try and turn this back on us—while the rest of the group mopped up.

I don’t know how it happened, exactly, but sometime between when I left and when the Sheriff and his goons arrived, Smenk had developed a fatal case of being stabbed.

(evening)

We met up with Kullen after things had calmed down. And I am really looking forward to the day when I no longer have to write things like “we met up with Kullen”.

Kullen wasn’t exactly thrilled about being summoned. As I wasn’t exactly thrilled about being here, I figured that made us even.

Zhog started us off by dropping a set of keys on the table. “I understand you and Smenk were partners,” he said. I didn’t know what keys those were for, but I could guess that their owner no longer needed them.

Kullen caught on real quick, especially the part about him being a partner. I tuned out most of a conversation that I didn’t want to hear. When they were done with their scheming, he said, “I see you have someone among you that knows about legalities, right? Someone who can draw up papers for claimin’ ownership?”

This is the sort of thing that gives me heartburn. But, when you are hired as an advocate, your job is to give legal advice and answer questions, and what the client does with all that is on them. I explained about partnerships, wills, what sort of paperwork to look for, and what he’d need to do to make a transfer of ownership once that’s found.

And, yeah, I knew what he was planning to do. Here’s the thing. Smenk doesn’t have any heirs, which should surprise no one, and that means that his mine and bar are at risk of falling into probate. Which would put them under the control of the esteemed Governor-Mayor Lanod Neff.

Given that these were my options, I went with the one that didn’t make me physically ill.

Starday, Sarenith 4 (evening)

This is the farthest I’ve been from Diamond Lake. Actually, just about every day since we left has been the farthest I’ve been from Diamond Lake. And, previously, that record was held by Blackwall Keep. This should tell you something about how much traveling I did as a kid.

We passed through Melfesh, Baslwief, and Palin’s Cove before arriving here in Veldraine. I honestly believed the closest I would ever come to these places in my life was seeing them on a map.

Melfesh is the largest of Korvosa’s inland holdings, and it controls access to the Runtash River. There’s a huge drawbridge there (which we didn’t get to cross since we aren’t headed in that direction) and if you want to go up the river, or down into the lake, you have to pay a toll for the privilege. Charging a toll and blocking a river like that requires some military muscle, and that makes Melfesh a pretty heavily garrisoned town for its size.

Rumor is they charge more for ships sailing out of Magnimar’s holdings than they do for ones flagged internationally because people in power basically suck, and tend to abuse it when they have the opportunity.

Baslwief is a mining town. I almost wrote “a mining town, like Diamond Lake”, but on reflection, that’d be a misleading statement. The only thing they have in common as far as I can see is that they are both mining towns. But Baslwief seems to be blessed with such amenities as “drinkable water” and “an atmosphere that doesn’t smother your soul and drain you of hope”.

I got my first sight of the ocean at Palin’s Cove.

The city started life as a military outpost long ago, and then kind of grew into this industrialized complex. With all the forges and smelters and refineries belting out smoke so thick you can taste the air, it kinda feels like what Diamond Lake will become once it grows up. Only with more siege engines. I’d say something trite like, “I’ve never seen so many siege engines in one place”, but until recently I’d never seen any, so that kind of rings hollow.

As for the ocean…I don’t even know how to begin to describe it. It’s majestic. It makes me feel small and inconsequential. It’s also terrifyingly large. There’s just…nothing there but water as far as you can see.

I could watch it for hours.

We’re currently in Veldraine. It’s an old and beautiful city, and the second-largest city in this part of Varisia. It’s a navy town to its core and the military here is responsible for the defense of Conqueror’s Bay, which means they are the naval defense for Korvosa. We stayed here a full day to stock up on supplies and do some research in their libraries, among other activities.

I specifically used the time to connect with my Aunt Esma. It took a while to find her home—you try finding your way in a city this size when it’s your first time in a city this size—and it was a bit awkward at first because I was showing up unannounced (well, that and she’d not seen me since I was a toddler, and I had to give her a letter from dad to get that whole “Who are you?” thing out of the way) but she graciously invited me in and even offered to let me stay with her that night instead of at the inn we had chosen.

Also, she called me “Bel”. I’ve made a mental note to visit her more often.

I got to see the old letters and diaries of my great-great-grandmother Galeriana, which was pretty amazing just on its own. I’m not known for being book-smart, but I can take notes and do research when I’m motivated, and I was motivated. Aunt Esma was surprisingly supportive of the idea of trying to find the dragon Galeriana had, um, been intimate with. Her logic was, if he spent a lot of time among humans, as a human, and spent enough time with my grandmother to, uh, have this romance, then that says something about his temperament. “Just don’t ask him for money when you find him.”

I couldn’t tell if that was a joke or not. I still can’t. So I’m just going to assume it’s not.

Speaking of dragons, we asked about Ilthane at every stop. No one seemed to know her by name, but there were plenty of stories about a black dragon with encounters and sightings going back several years, and ranging all the way from here to the Storval Plateau. Not directly helpful, but interesting.

In Veldraine, we also learned about an upcoming event in Korvosa called the Champion Games. It’s some sort of pseudo-friendly gladitorial thing that attracts competitors from Varisia and beyond. It was all the locals could talk about, really, which I guess isn’t surprising given the military influence here. What was surprising, and this took us a bit to piece together, was that those adventurer types we saw back in Diamond Lake (the ones that mistakenly thought the Stirgenest Cairn held anything of value) have actually been in the Games, themselves.

Odds are good, I suppose, that we’ll be seeing more of them.

Starday, Desnus 21 (night)

After dealing with a knot of aggressive boggards mid-day, we reached the fort this evening. It was not the celebratory welcome of our triumphant return that we were expecting.

From the top of the tower, one of the soldiers called out, “Quarantine! Quarantine! Keep your distance!”

The Captain answered back, “This is your commanding officer, soldier! What is your status?”

The status was, the worm-infested, undead monstrosity that was their previous battlemage had broken out of its makeshift prison. Several soldiers were unaccounted for. They had blocked off the stairwell to the bottom level, and at least two were known to be down there with it.

Zhog turned to us and asked, “So do we just take care of this problem?”

It was clear the soldiers weren’t able to manage it. Zhog suggested that Marzen and Captain Alezar stay outside as a last line of defense in case we fail. The Captain agreed, and so we shut the door behind us, prepared defensive spells and some magical enhancements, and descended into the keep.

There were four soldiers down there with it and all had been turned into similar worm-infested zombies. Two ascended the stairs when we removed the makeshift blockade, and we engaged them on the main level. Each projected a sort of aura of panic-inducing fear (both Varin and Sera fell victim to this and fled upstairs), and if that wasn’t enough, they were literally throwing their worms at us, presumably to infect us, as well. All of these distractions made it difficult to truly gang on up on them. And if that wasn’t enough of a challenge, their wounds were healing as we fought, albeit slowly.

We destroyed those, but had to descend to the lower level of the keep to deal with the remaining three, as they didn’t want to cooperate by coming to us. This was more of the same, just in much tighter quarters.

Once all of them were destroyed, I headed outside to give them the update on the immediate crisis. Zhog called out after me, “Tell Marzena I’m okay! I don’t want her to worry about me.” Um. What?

I headed outside and spoke to the captain and Marzena. “All five of them are dead…again.”

The conversation turned to their long-term prospects, which were honestly not good. Down more than half their numbers, they were worried about another lizardfolk attack.

To say they were skeptical of this cease-fire we had negotiated would be an understatement. There was even less faith in the proposal for a long-term treaty. “And what if they break their agreement and attack?” someone asked. I wanted to say, “They were thinking the same thing about us,” but wisely didn’t. Instead, I took a different approach to help them understand the machinations at work here.

“This is the basic problem. These worms are popping up everywhere, and everyone is blaming anyone they can find. The lizardfolk saw them and blamed us, and then we got attacked and blamed them, but what we’ve learned is that neither side is responsible. There seems to be a black dragon named Ilthane that started all of it.”

Captain Alezar didn’t know Ilthane by name, but he’d heard rumors of a black dragon terrorizing this region for quite some time. Which sounded too much like a coincidence to be a coincidence.

“We’re still cleaning up down there,” I said. “We’ll let you know when it’s safe to come back in.” We agreed we should scan the tower, one level at a time, to make sure there were no more surprises.

I headed back downstairs. When I saw Zhog I said, “She didn’t ask about you.”

Um. I am not sure why I did that. I mean, I feel kind of bad about it now? But, Marzena is, uh, quite a bit older than him—again, old enough to be my mom, and I’m four or five years older than Zhog—and I don’t want to see him get hurt, I guess. I don’t know. Maybe I’m reading this all wrong.

It’s late, so we’re spending the night here before heading back to Diamond Lake. Marzena is coming with us to speak with Allustan, and she’s agreed to accompany us to Korvosa as well so she can advocate for a long-term peace treaty with the lizardfolk.

I’m keeping my eye on you, lady.

Moonday, Desnus 23 (morning)

We spent the night at the farmhouse again, which to our surprise was holding a group of soldiers that had fled from the keep when the worm-infested zombie broke free. Marzena scolded them gently last night, and convinced them to return to the Keep. “I am sure the Captain will understand given the unusual circumstances.”

Hopefully, she’s not sleeping with all of them, too.

When I saw Zhog I could tell that something was very wrong. He looked off and was having trouble concentrating. I used a spell and determined that, yes, there was some illness running through him that was fogging his mind and draining his stamina. It didn’t feel like worms, so it was probably something he picked up in the marsh. Given our timing, it might have come from the boggards or the giant toad they had with them. Viore use a spell to end the illness and keep it from getting worse, but it would still take time for him to recover.

(evening)

Our return to Diamond Lake was not the triumphant return we were expecting, either.

We headed straight for Allustan’s, and after he and Marzena geeked out in the lab for an hour or so, he sat down with us.

“Balabar got released pending trial. It pays to have money and power in a town like this.” He looked at Zhog and said, “I don’t know how welcome your uncle would be to see you again. Word on the street is that he declared himself the owner of that bar he managed for Smenk.

“I think Balabar’s days in this town are numbered, but I don’t know what he might be capable of. All of you should keep a low profile.”

Damn it! This problem just will not go away.

Zhog was, very reasonably, concerned about his relationship with Kullen. “Why would my uncle be mad at me?”

“I don’t know how he feels about this after this shake-up,” Allustan said. “I think he’s broken with Smenk. And I know Smenk blames all of you. I don’t know how feels about it. Maybe he’s fine with you, maybe he’s not. I’m just warning you is all.”

Basically it came down to this: we didn’t know where we stood with Kullen, and Smenk’s people (and those loyal to him) might not be above jumping us if we made it convenient for them to do so. Allustan offered for us to spend the night at his home while we work out what to do.

In the meantime, he has suggested we travel to Korvosa—which we were going to do anyway—to meet with a colleague of his named Eligos. There were two reasons for that. The first is that Eligos was talking about some event happening soon in Korvosa and a need for exotic animals, and it turns out he is very interested in an owlbear chick. So that’s at least one less problem on our hands. The second was that Eligos is also a scholar and wants to look at all the notes we’ve gathered on the Ebon Triad and these worms. Allustan is going to write everything up nice for him and we’d just take the bundle with us. That sounds like a good plan to me.

Marzena had some ideas as well. She says she can make an oil from the crushed worms we have which can be used to coat a weapon and make it particularly harmful to worm-based undead. The potency will fade after an hour. The other option is to make a foul-smelling paste that can protect an individual’s skin from the worms, themselves. This is less interesting to us as a whole because of our collective abilities, but it’s still an entry on the “good to know” list.

Toilday, Desnus 24, 4722 (afternoon)

This business with Smenk has us concerned, so we decided to assess the situation. As discreetly as we could, we slipped out into town to learn what we could. I stopped by mom and dad’s.

“Belessandralena!” mom said when she answered the door. Ugh. Why does she do this? “I am glad you made it back OK.”

She let me in. Dad was at work so it was just the two of us. And I could tell something was wrong right away.

“Mom. Did something happen while I was gone?”

“Someone came to the house trying to find you. They wanted to ask you about some investigation they were pursuing.”

“Was it one of the deputies?”

“No, it wasn’t. And they didn’t say where they were from when I asked. They just repeated that it was important that they talk to you. I told them you don’t live here, and that I didn’t know where to find you. Then they got pretty belligerent, and your father got involved and asked them to leave.

“What’s going on Belessandralena? Does this have to do with this business with Smenk?”

Fuck!

I stopped by my flat—the lease is good until the end of the month—and, sure enough, someone had broken in. Nothing was missing (not that there was a lot to take) but it had been searched.

When we met back up later, it was the same story everywhere. Someone was looking for Sera at her parents’ inn. And while we were out, someone showed up at Allustan’s, trying to find “his old apprentice”. Which is pretty damned gutsy, if you ask me.

Obviously, this could not stand. I couldn’t move against Smenk on my own, but if he took a shot at us? If he tried something? Then I sure as hell was going to hit back. Abadar may forbid vigilantism, but there’s no rule against making yourself into bait.

It was time to meet with Kullen.

(late night)

Viktor, Sera, Zhog and I found Kullen at his home after nightfall. He grunted at Zhog, then let us in.

“You caused a heap of trouble in this town, boy.”

Zhog beamed. “And you’re now a bar owner, unc!”

“Didn’t say I didn’t profit from it.”

“He’s gonna want his bar back.”

“He can try.”

“Or we can take him off the board. Me and my friends don’t take kindly to being threatened. We’re ready to jump, but she,” he said, pointing at me, “has to wait until we get hit. It’s a code. And I respect her code. But when he hits, we’re hitting back. We just need to know what we’re up against.”

“His life in town has changed a bit, but in the long run he may pull through, may even keep control of his mine. But I’m not inclined to be in his employ anymore. I can…maybe divulge where he’s hidin’ out. And what you do with that info is not my business.”

“To those folks you know, that are ‘in the loop’. You tell them, all my friends’ families? If they mess with them, it’s a death sentence.”

Kullen stared at Zhog for a while. This wasn’t the same Zhog that he knew from just a couple of weeks ago.

“Where you stayin’ so I can get word to you?”

“We’re not staying anywhere,” Zhog answered. “I’ll come to you.”

Wealday, Desnus 25 (evening)

We made the trek out to the house and back. Someone had been there while we were gone, though nothing was damaged more than it already was.

Zhog dropped by to see Kullen, and learned that Smenk and the remainder of his crew are hanging out at the abandoned mine near the observatory. Next to the entrance is the ruin of an old building, and that’s where we’ll find them.

Starday, 21 Desnus (small hours)

There is a saying among soldiers that goes, “no battle plan survives contact with the enemy”. What it means is that you can’t account for every contingency, and once the fighting starts something will happen that you did not expect which will necessitate a change in tactics or strategy. A good battle plan, then, must allow for flexibility and adaptability when circumstances change.

That being said, as far as battle plans go, ours unfolded pretty well.

We ran in under cover of invisibility and silence, but were detected (vibrations, air movement, odor, and who knows what else) much more quickly than we had expected. But that was fine, because we were not expecting to go undetected, and the precise timing of it did not really matter. We made it to the chief’s chamber with lizardfolk mobilizing behind us—how many, I don’t know as we couldn’t hear anything outside our magical bubble, but likely dozens—and set up our rear defense.

Zhog dropped the arrow that was the source of our silence spell at the base of the steps before entering the chamber, and our spell casters spun into action. We only had two passages to defend: one’s surface was coated in grease thanks to Viktor, and the other was obstructed when Snagsby reshaped the stone to form a solid wall. The rest of us engaged Shukak and his guards.

One of those guards dropped quickly under Sera’s attacks. Zhog and I tore into two of the others. Then Shukak joined the fray, throwing his trident at Zhog, which then magically returned to his hands. Nice trick.

Sera felled a second of the guards. Viore disabled a third. I dropped the last. And then we all converged on Shukak.

Behind us, lizardfolk were carefully stepping their way through the grease, which was not at all part of the plan. Varin summoned a wolverine to distract the one that made it through while Viktor obstructed the greased passage with dense layers of sticky strands, much like spider webs. We heard the bellowing of one very pissed-off lizardfolk as he tried to pick his way through it. That, we reasoned, was Shukak’s lieutenant.

Viktor used a spell to enlarge me, and we concentrated our efforts on taking Shukak down. I called on Abadar’s power to strike him, then stepped back to help cover the rear.

Then we noticed something odd. As one of Shukak’s guards lay dying, three green worms emerged from its ears and mouth. He didn’t look like he was a zombie, so whatever we were seeing here? It must have been some new variety.

Several of us called out, “Worms!” Viktor responded by targeting each with bolts of force, killing them instantly.

Sera delivered the final blow to Shukak. As he fell, I called out in Draconic, “We are only here for the chief and his lieutenant! They were the ones who took our people as prisoners!”

From behind us, we heard Hishka’s voice call out. “It was Shukak’s misguided policies that brought the soft skins down on us!”

More arguments and discord followed. “Now is not the time to question our leaders! Our enemies are here!” someone yelled.

The lieutenant reinforced this. “It doesn’t matter what the soft skins’ intentions are. They are invading, and we will hold our territory and our prisoners!”

I answered, “We don’t intend any harm to the rest of your tribe! We have acted to block your access or impede your progress, not harm you who are not the chief’s guard and officers.”

“And what of the chief?” the lieutenant demanded.

“The chief had to go.”

More cries out from behind us. “So the chief is dead?” and “What did they mean by what they said?”

Hishka spoke again. “Now you see the fruits of Shukak’s leadership. This is the future of our tribe if we don’t change our ways!”

His lieutenant scolded Hishka loudly, then asked me, “Where is the chief?”

“Which pieces of him?”

So he tried to take power right then and there. “The chief is dead! Long live the chief! Rally to me, everyone!”

I don’t normally like to trade barbs during battle, but he had earned it. “You’re next.”

And he was. With two strikes from my horsechopper, he fell to the ground, dead. And then it was over.

I called out to the lizardfolk. “We have no quarrel with your tribe. We’re here to free our prisoners, and help you with your worm infestation.”

That got a response. More of a panic, as the news of worms spread. Hishka spoke up quickly before it swelled.

“Soft skins! You are our enemy and have invaded our domain. However, I understand your desire to save your people. Will you agree to a parley to discuss a peaceful resolution?”

“Absolutely,” I said. And that seemed to ease the growing tension.

We negotiated an immediate truce between us. In exchange for releasing the prisoners, we would return their lair to its previous condition, and assist them in removing the threat of worms from their egg chamber. We had already stabilized and begun to heal their wounded (all except Shukak and his lieutenant, that is) which helped establish our sincerity to the rest of the tribe. Long term, we would build a preliminary treaty to take to Korvosa, and propose negotiations for a lasting agreement.

But the immediate problem was the worms.

First, there was the matter of the dying (and now stabilized) lizardfolk which had leaked worms onto the ground. According to Hishka, Ilthane had gifted the tribe several potions, and this lizardfolk had been administered one. And if that wasn’t the very definition of “suspicious”, I don’t know what is.

We had Ilthane’s potions brought out and they were fairly cloudy and opaque, which we found even more suspicious. We used a sieve to filter their contents; each, and every one contained a small, segmented worm. And that took care of any lingering doubt among the tribe that their worm problem had returned, not to mention who was behind it. Fortunately, only one of the potions had been consumed.

Next, was the egg chamber itself. As I said, if Ilthane later confronted the tribe we wanted them to be able to say truthfully that humans invaded it, so we went in alone. It was, as we were told, guarded by eight kobolds, and while they were not much of a match for us, the big surprise was that several of the eggs appeared to be moving. On closer examination, these were lizardfolk young that had been infested and turned into undead in their shells. We destroyed the ones that were infested, then scanned the chamber to ensure no more eggs were tainted.

That left only Ilthane’s egg, which sat among the Lizardfolk eggs. We wrapped it for safe transport and brought it out of the egg chamber into the space where we had been negotiating with Hishka. A close examination of it showed small holes as though numerous worms had bored their way out from the inside. Hishka sent for a cauldron with a sealing lid that would contain any further worms until we had recovered the spells to deal with it.

We revived Captain Alezar and Marzena and brought them up to speed. Marzena was skeptical that we had negotiated peace with the tribe.

“How?!” she asked.

“They had an aggressive, outsider leader. And we solved the problem with a change in leadership.”

Varin got us focused on the important part. “They have a problem where worms are infesting and killing their young.”

And that got Marzena’s attention. She’d been trying to get ahold of one, herself, for study—her now-undead predecessor back at the Keep was way too dangerous to approach—so we showed her one we had filtered out from Ilthane’s potions. “This would be easier back at the Keep,” she said. We agreed, but that would have to wait because we all needed some sleep.

Hishka graciously allowed us to rest in the abandoned village.

(morning)

When I woke this morning, I saw Zhog and Marzena—who I swear is old enough to be my mom—cuddled together. At first, I thought I was still asleep or seeing things, but nope. This was a thing that was actually happening.

That image is going to linger.

We examined the egg once we were all awake and had eaten some breakfast. I cast a spell and confirmed that it was riddled with disease. Viore followed that with a spell to cure disease, and when I cast my spell a second time, it came back clean. So we opened the egg and looked inside.

It was completely full of dead worms.

Fireday, Desnus 20 (dawn)

We followed Gathok over 15 miles into the Mushfens overnight, stopping in the pre-dawn light just a couple of miles outside his village’s patrol perimeter.

It’s been a long time since I have done this sort of thing. In my days (and nights) with the Night Walkers, we would be out a couple of nights per week, occasionally well into the early morning. The only rule was that we would always be back before what Sergiu called “civil twilight” because that was when you could no longer navigate by the stars, and the point of the Night Walkers was, obviously, to be out there in the dark. Supposedly this term comes from sailors, though how he got to know sailors in a land-locked mining town in the middle of the Fenwall Mountains is beyond me.

We made camp while Gathok continued ahead, and waited for his return.

We didn’t have to wait long. Just as the sun was rising above the horizon, we saw Gathok walking up the path towards our campsite. His expression was grim, which told us what we ultimately needed to know. The rest was just details.

“I have good news and bad news,” he began. “Our worst nightmares are confirmed. This batch of eggs are full of corruption. However, our alliance with Ilthane is not ill-informed. Her own egg is deeply infected as well, so she’s but a victim of the same ill fortune as our tribe.”

I hate being the one to deliver bad news. Really. I do. Gathok was holding on to a spark of hope, that there would be something salvageable in this mess, and I was about to smother it.

“Gathok…when we spoke with Hishka yesterday, she said to us quite clearly and directly that Ilthane was protecting your eggs, and leaving one of hers with you as a show of faith. That she was your ally, protecting you from this corruption.

“Either she hasn’t protected your tribe as she promised, or she is the source of this corruption and has been lying to you. Regardless of which of those statements you believe, your alliance with her has ultimately failed.”

However bad I felt about doing this to him—and I felt plenty bad, you try it sometime—he was feeling far worse. Losing another generation of eggs like this would be disastrous. Ilthane was their one great hope, that she had the power to stop it. With her alliance revealed as a fraud, and no understanding of why and how this was happening (much less how to stop it), they were facing the extinction of their whole tribe. And that thought was terrifying.

It took some gentle cajoling to get Hiska’s actual message from him, and not just his interpretation of it. She said she snuck into the egg chamber long enough to use the wand without being seen and saw that both Ilthan’e eggs and the ones closest to her were corrupted. “We are in over our heads,” she told him. “let the soft skins know!”

So here we are.

There were three problems to be solved: separate the good eggs from the bad ones to save as many of the new generation of hatchlings as possible, remove chief Shukak from power, and free the prisoners. Just the first one, alone, required that we meet with Hishka: we needed to get a better understanding of the egg chamber, and what could and couldn’t be done with the eggs. So we needed a place to meet.

Gathok said that their current lair is underground, next to their old village (now abandoned since their numbers have dwindled). He suggested that we sneak into one of the huts of the old village after dark, and meet with Hishka there. We’d have to hide everything about our presence, including our scent, but it would put us in a position to meet quickly and do so face-to-face without raising suspicion from their tribe. As I’ve said, time was not on our side, and multiple, long treks through the swamp would compound the problem. We agreed to the “abandoned village” plan, and sent Gathok back to deliver the message.

Hiding our scent would be a challenge, of course. Varin has a cantrip that is good for cleaning, and certainly a clean animal smells a lot less than a dirty one, but that can only take us so far. We could, however, use natural scents to mask our odor, and make the natural smell of the Mushfen on our bodies stronger than that of our own. This was another throwback to Sera’s and my time with the Night Walkers. She’s kept her skills sharper than mine, so I deferred to her.

We’re resting here for the day. We’ve been up nearly 24 hours with no sleep and we’re starting to feel it. And, the spell casters need to refresh their spells for what comes next.

(late night)

Gathok said that Ilthane has stationed kobolds in the egg chamber (ostensibly to guard the eggs, but we suspect their real purpose is to prevent interference with Ilthan’s plans, no matter the source), and they are loyal only to her. As soon as we enter, there will be a fight. That told us right away that dealing with the eggs would have to come last, lest we find ourselves trapped inside with angry kobolds in front of us and angrier lizardfolk behind us.

That meant dealing with Shukak first.

As an added complication, we cannot put Hishka or Gathok in danger from their tribe, or the lizardfolk tribe in danger from Ilthane. Which means they need what’s known as “plausible deniability”. Everything we do has to have the appearance of us acting alone.

As such, we formed our plan around a prisoner rescue, using a lightning raid. Zhog actually had the best idea on how to do that.

“Why don’t we just run straight through?” he said.

It sounded crazy at first, but…we have a map, courtesy of Gathok, and we know exactly where to go. With cover provided by invisibility and magical silence, we could get quite a ways before we were detected by other means, and even then it would take time for them to figure out what was happening. That would be enough for us to get into position and block off key passages, so we could limit the scope of the engagement by making it more difficult and time-consuming for the rest of the tribe to enter the fray. If we take Shukak down quickly enough, Hishka can assume the role of acting chief before we put other members of the tribe at risk.

At that point, we can legitimately negotiate a cessation of hostilities with Hishka. From the lizardfolk tribe’s perspective, humans will have staged a raid into their lair to rescue their prisoners, and Hishka will have acted in the best interest of her people since, after all, it was Shukak that led them to attack the human lands.

Then, Hishka arranges for us to enter the egg chamber and deal with the corruption in the eggs. Once again, plausible deniability would come into play here: no lizardfolk would enter the egg chamber with us, just in case one of the kobolds escaped. It had to look as though we were raiding the lizardfolk lair on our own, and specifically going after Ilthane’s egg. We wanted Ilthane retaliating against us, not the lizardfolk. (Actually, we don’t want Ilthane coming after us, either, but she may not give us that option.)

The biggest unknown was the safety of the prisoners. What would stop Shukak from simply executing them once he learned we were inside? Fortunately, Hishka had a solution for this. “I will have them brought to my chamber. Shukak’s lieutenant knows I’ve been healing them, and tending to their wounds. I’ll simply find another excuse to do that.”

Good enough, and probably as good as we were going to get.

We launch the raid at midnight.

Wealday, Desnus 18 (night)

We smelled the smoke from campfires long before Blackwall Keep came into view, and we made first sight of the tower as we emerged from the forest just as the sun was setting. It sat atop a hill dotted with fraises made from large, sharpened stakes, and from a quarter-mile away we could see it was under siege by scores of lizardfolk. They were organized into several squads of about a half dozen or more that surrounded it, with one squad equipped with a crude battering ram that they used to hammer the door. We watched as the lizardfolk exchanged salvos with the soldiers on the walls. Every time one of the latter took aim, javelins were sent in response.

We couldn’t take on an entire army, but there had to be a way we could help. To do that, though, we needed to make contact with them. Since I had the best understanding of military matters, I volunteered to go. We wrote up a message explaining who we were, and attached it to a weight so it could be dropped from the air. Under the effect of spells for flight and invisibility, I flew out above the tower and dropped it down.

“I only have a few minutes,” I said, landing next to them once they read the message. “What is your situation? How did this start?”

“The situation is dire! I don’t know that we can hold off for more than another day at this rate. As to why? I don’t know, they attacked us out of nowhere, without provocation. We are down to half our numbers, that are still able to put up a fight.”

“How many soldiers is that?”

“Fourteen.”

“Is there a leadership company among your attackers? Are they organized?”

“They seem disciplined. I don’t know who the leader is, but there’s an order to their attacks and they are keeping us pinned down. And…they…they have some of our people, including our commander and our battle mage! They took them captive and dragged them off to the south into the swamp.”

Not good.

Our best bet was to get the soldiers out, but that meant giving up the fort and they refused to abandon it. That left plan the second: find a way to break the siege.

I returned to the group before both spells wore off and we discussed what I had learned, and what our options were, and a plan started to form. We would go for the battering ram, which the lizardfolk had fashioned from the trunk of a large, sturdy tree. Without it, the threat to the Keep was greatly diminished, and it would take the attackers time to find, fell, and work a suitable replacement.

We needed a couple of hours for Varin to prepare some spells, but that worked to our advantage as it meant we’d be coming in under cover of darkness. While he prepared, we studied the attackers to learn their movements. Squads rotated in and out of ram duty, which was smart, but other than that there was no interaction between individual squads, and no active patrol of the perimeter. That meant we could attempt to sneak up on their positions.

When Varin was ready, we came at them from the southeast, making our way carefully up the hill. It mostly worked. We got close, but not as close as we would have liked before some of us were spotted, and two squads converged on us.

We needed to provide a distraction for Snagsby, who was still advancing stealthily toward the battering ram crew. Viore summoned a wolverine while the rest of us loosed a volley of arrows. One of the lizardfolk spotted Snagsby and threw a javelin his way. Recognizing this jeopardized the raid, Sera, Viore, and Viktor took them down at range.

With the wolverine occupying several of the attackers—making a great deal of noise in the process—and me closing for melee, Snagsby was able to sneak up on the ram and hit it with a spell. In an instant, the trunk has transformed into a tangle of thin branches and twigs, rendering it useless.

This took care of the immediate threat to the Keep, but presented a new problem: the lizardfolk formerly ramming the door were now inclined to engage us, and Snagsby was a visible and convenient target. Fortunately, we were able to identify their commander. Viore summoned a second wolverine to boost our numbers, and it, Zhog and Sera took the leadership down quickly while I kept some of the soldiers at bay with my horsechopper.

With the commander dead along with several of their kin, the siege slowly broke. We managed to take one of them prisoner as the rest withdrew. When the last of the lizardfolk had disappeared into the woods, we signaled to the garrison and they opened the battered door to let us in, with our prisoner in tow.

We took some time to assess the situation in the Keep, perform some basic repairs on the main door using magic, and locate a suitable room to detain our prisoner so we could talk to him.

“Our people have been in conflict for a long time,” I said in Draconic. “What has changed? Why this attack here, and why now?”

The lizardfolk stared at me contemptuously for a while before replying. “Our chief told us it is finally time to avenge your wrongs, and Ilthane agrees, so your doom is already sealed!” He started working himself up into a fervor. “You’ve encroached into our lands, decimated our people, slaughtered us at your whim and for your pleasures—”

We needed him calm, so I adopted a conciliatory tone. “Look,” I said, “I understand. I really do. Humans in general can be…invasive, even imperialistic. I don’t want to rehash all of our history. If ‘now’ is the time for this, then what has changed? What have we done recently that led to this?”

“We’ve found allies and strength to finally take action in retaliation for what you’ve done in the past!” His expression softened to sadness briefly, but then he found his rage and indignation again. “Almost an entire generation, young, old, hatchlings! What kind of barbaric race are you to resort to genocide?”

We were at a loss on this. To our knowledge, Korvosa hadn’t ordered any invasion of the Mushfens. If we had, the garrison at Diamond Lake surely would have been involved, or at least aware. And this would be significant news; people would have heard about it.

As for their ally, Ilthane? I didn’t know who that was, but Viktor did. In Varisian, he said she was a black dragon known to periodically terrorize the region. So that was not good. Was she somehow manipulating events?

I asked what the soldiers had done to their people, and he confirmed it wasn’t an invasion. According to him, humans had somehow corrupted their young, causing them to wither and die. This pestilence wiped out nearly an entire generation of their tribe.

The very thought of it was sickening, and it was hard to imagine anyone in Korvosa’s military ordering an attack on children. But it could easily be forces working towards their own goals, independent of the government. The letters we found from the Triad suggested worms would be found here, among the lizardfolk tribes. Could that be what was happening here?

“Look,” I said after some heated back-and-forth, “I know we’ve had our conflicts. But what you describe…this would be considered a reprehensible crime by our people. Who would we speak to in your tribe to get at the truth of this?”

He considered us in silence. “You should talk with Hishka. But you’d need to bring something to the table, to prove you are sincere. And that you have something of substance to talk about.”

So we showed our cards. We told him we were pursuing rumors of unkillable, green worms. “These are stories we’ve been hearing. I’m trying to figure out if what we have heard connects to what has happened to your people.”

We released his bindings as a show of faith (I still had my spiked armor on; I am not a fool), and we found our way to an agreement: we let him go, he takes a message back to this Hishka, and we meet her at a designated spot the following day. We procured a map of the region from the soldiers in the Keep, and together we identified a location that provided no cover for an ambush. We even exchanged names; he was called Gathok.

The soldiers of the garrison were not happy with us. Not in the least. And I get it, but I also didn’t care. “You want to get the hostages back?” I said, “This is how you do it.”

And then there was the matter of a suspicious door in the lower level of the building. It had a heavy padlock that had been smashed open by the lizardfolk when they managed to break into the Keep and capture their prisoners earlier in the siege. After the soldiers drove the raiders off, they hastily nailed the door shut. We had asked about it before, but their Acting Captain Bosh had only said that it was “off limits and may not be opened by anyone, under any circumstances”. We had asked what was behind it. His answer: “It’s not any of your concern.”

Sorry, but bullshit. The man was clearly terrified of what was behind that door, and after our little chat with Gathok? We all wanted a closer look. Viktor and Varin used a spell, and said a single, intelligent mind was on the other side. I walked up to it and opened my senses, and felt a moderately strong, foul aura behind it. We decided to confront Bosh with this. Not our concern, my ass.

He was hesitant at first, but quickly realized he was not the one in charge anymore. Not while we were there, anyway. “That was…You see, Battle Mage Marzena is here for a reason. She came to replace Aldis, our previous Battle Mage. And…that’s him behind that door. Or…what’s left of him.

“He came back two years ago from a mission to those savages, but wasn’t quite himself. After a day or two, they say—I wasn’t stationed here then—he transformed into some kind of monster! His skin was desiccated, like a zombie or something. So they locked him in, and he’s been there ever since.”

In other news, we also checked out Marzena’s room and personal effects. Zhog was particularly interested in her desk, which had several loose papers, quills, and ink. I asked him what was so fascinating, and was rewarded with a series of drawings, many of which were, um, rather risqué.

Some things, once seen, cannot be unseen.

Oathday, Desnus 19 (early morning)

Snagsby used a spell to confirm that the thing behind the door was undead. This more or less confirms Marzena’s (non-pictorial) notes, which we read through last night. She wrote down what the soldiers described to her: a zombie with worms crawling under its skin and dripping from its nose and mouth. One of these worms landed on another soldier’s arm and it started burrowing into his flesh. They killed it with an enchanted weapon before it got completely under the skin.

So, yeah, this all seems connected. We meet with Hishka at noon, assuming she even agreed to do so, and hopefully we’ll be able to convince her that our problems are also her problems.

The big question is, “Who is doing this?”

(afternoon)

We entered the clearing and saw the lizardfolk party approach. We both halted at a cautious distance apart, and then two of them stepped forward. One of them was an elderly woman (for lack of a better term), somewhat stooped and walking with some difficulty. A snake was coiled around her arm.

We decided to mirror their actions, so Snagsby and I approached the two while the others stayed back.

We nodded to each other, and the woman, Hishka, spoke in draconic.

“I understand your people actually want to talk to my people. I am curious why.”

“It sounds like both of our people have been taken advantage of,” I said, “and we are acting against one another when we shouldn’t be.”

“But we haven’t done anything to you—not first.”

“And I acknowledge that our people have not been kind to your people in history. But, something has happened to you in the last couple of years, and something has happened to us in the last couple of years, and they appear to be connected.”

Adopting a condescending tone, she asked, “What do you know of such things?”

I let the tone pass. We needed to talk, not argue. “We know that two years ago, one of the human men stationed at our Keep came into the Mushfens. We don’t know what his mission was, we don’t know what his purpose was, and we don’t care. We just know that when he returned he was infested with something, and it was a rotting disease. When it had run its course, he was infested with green worms that could only be slain by enchanted weapons.”

“And do you know why? Do you suspect we were behind this?”

“No, we don’t think you’re behind it. We think you may be victims of it. We uncovered among our own people a conspiracy of men who worship the worst gods in existence, and they are working to bring about what they call the Age of Worms. Part of that is bringing a monster into our world, and apparently the harbinger of that is these worms, infecting and corrupting the living.”

“We have allies that made us aware that the scourge my people suffered was due to the actions of your people. That you admit it is…interesting.”

“Again, I can’t say we’ve always been good to one another—”

“You are all blind! Soft skins! You don’t. Even. See us.”

“We are all young, this group you are talking to. So, I would say ‘yes’, but…we’re learning. So enlighten us. Something has happened to you in the last generation and it has caused disease and sickness, correct?”

“The hatchlings, mostly.”

“It seems related. This plot goes back more than a couple of years.”

“Ten years to be precise. We learned it was caused by you humans, from Korvosa specifically.”

Zhog stepped forward at this and objected. “Will you stop with the ‘you humans’ thing? Are you responsible for lizardfolk on the other side of the world? Stop talking to us like we’re all the same group. We have clans, we have tribes, we have kingdoms.”

Oy, Zhog. But it was a valid point. “What he’s saying is, we are not a monoculture. There are factions among our people, and whatever people are behind this? What they’re doing would be considered a crime. And more importantly, they need to be stopped.”

“But my information is that this is a conspiracy out of Korvosa.”

“And that may be true! Some of the information we are getting is pointing to that, but that doesn’t mean Korvsa, the government, the city, is behind it. Just that the plot originated from people who are there.”

“Fair enough.”

“But what matters to us is that it’s happening, and we need to stop it.”

“We already have the capability to stop it! We’re doing fine, thank you. It took us 10 years to get here after all of our hatchlings were decimated by worms and decay! But we have strong, new allies with the ability to prevent this from happening again! And a strong new clutch of hatchlings that are coming of age as warriors. She is even protecting our egg chamber now, personally!”

And who is their protector? “Ilthane,” I said.

Her eyes widen. “So. Her reputation has reached the Soft Skins, I see.”

“I know she’s a black dragon. One question I have for you is, how do you know your current batch of eggs is healthy?”

“This corruption was ten years ago. Since our alliance with Ilthane, there has been no harm to our clutches of eggs.”

“There’s a possibility that Ilthane is using your eggs as a breeding ground for worms. That she’s gaining your trust by giving you protection and using you at the same time.”

There was a very long pause after I said this. “I admit it’s an outlandish claim,” I added. “But you can’t deny the possibility. The timing is convenient.”

“That would be the worst thing to happen to our people.”

“She’s a black dragon. They are known for corruption.”

She called me out on this. We had specifically objected to having humans painted with a broad brush, and here I had done the same thing with black dragons. What can I say? I am new to this, and I make mistakes. But, thankfully, she was still willing to listen.

Zhog asked, “How did she get rid of the worms?”

“She has laired in our lair. And ever since she did this, there have been no worms.”

Zhog says, “But you have no proof that she’s done anything. You don’t know how it works. You only have her word that she is the one that made it stop.”

It’s no surprise Zhog would be the first to see the angle here. This had Kullen and his protection rackets written all over it. We had to step Hishka through it, and we kept hammering the point that Hishka has no proof that Ilthane has done anything at all to make the corruption stop. It is literally all on Ilthane’s word.

“Let me ask you, blind Soft Skins. I see that it’s in your interest to find a way for your people not to suffer this plight. What does it mean to you that our people suffer or don’t suffer from this?”

“The world is connected”, I said. “Whether or not we get along, we are sharing this space. What happens to one of us, happens to the other in some fashion. This thing is bigger than all of us.”

“But the actual plight of my people doesn’t concern you.”

“I can’t overcome hundreds of years of human and lizardfolk conflict and prejudice. The only thing I have to bring to you is, we want to stop this thing.”

“Perhaps…you’re not completely blind. And you let one of our people go to broker this meeting between us.”

“And you came, which we are grateful for.”

Zhog said, “This is what I meant about tribes and clans. We are not beholden to a king or a city. We are not wearing guard uniforms. There are seven of us here. What can we do for you?”

“I came here not sure what to expect, but…curious…thinking it would go nowhere. And now, I’m going to leave here full of dread. You’re right. I don’t know what Ilthane’s motives are.”

I said, “Let me ask you this. Do you have a way of verifying the health of your eggs? Do you have a way to detect undead? Can you detect disease?”

In short, she did not. But, we weren’t going to let that stop us. Over the next half hour, we talked out ideas both amongst ourselves and with Hishka, and we came up with a tentative agreement.

Viktor would craft a wand that Hishka could use to detect undead^†. She was capable of identifying it so she could trust what it does. Gathok would stay with us until it was done, then take it to her, and we would follow him to a point just a few miles from their lair so they wouldn’t have to hike another 20 miles to get a message to us (time was not on our side here). Hishka would use the wand to examine the egg chamber at her first opportunity, and then meet with us afterwards. If our fears were confirmed, we would discuss what to do and how to do it, because they were going to need help.

There was more. Hishka explained that there is a schism within the lizardfolk tribe, with some aligned with her and others aligned with their chief, Shukak.

“In truth,” she said, “this was one of my motivations to come and talk to you here. Shukak is not from our tribe. He arrived and assumed power when we were weak. We needed a leader and he filled that role. But I don’t think he has our best interests at heart. And I didn’t think these raids against the Soft Skins was the best way to avenge our people even before we met here. Now? I am more convinced of that.

“I want to counter the hold he has over the younger warriors of our tribe. If you could arrange in writing some treaty between your government and our tribe, I could probably arrange for a cessation of hostilities, at least for a time.”

It was an intriguing idea and we discussed this at length. Fundamentally she was asking for more than just a right to exist. “They give us the right to live here, but the guards in those towers hold us at a knife point, and we are seen as monsters. We are fighting perception. The perception of things often matters the most, and our people perceive that Korvosa is at war against us.” She wanted lizardfolk to be recognized as a society of people with laws, traditions, and families.

The best shot at accomplishing that? We free Marzena and the captain, and convince them that a treaty is the right thing to do. That both sides have been duped here, and we are not each others’ enemy.

This all had to happen soon. As I said, time is not on our side. Hishka believes she can keep the prisoners alive for another day, maybe two. If they die, any hope for a treaty dies with them.

---

_{†I believe this was our GM invoking Rule 0. Technically she did not have access to this spell, but the plan was good, as was the narrative that was forming around it.}

Moonday, Desnus 16 (late afternoon)

We spent the rest of the morning at the Observatory, and I do mean that literally. I slept in almost to noon. You know, like a normal person.

The irony of squatting at the Observatory is not lost on me, but it was too late to hike out to the house and too early to barge in on Allustan, which I guess was the plan for the morning. If you’re going to squat in Diamond Lake you may as well follow tradition.

Why Allustan? Well, aside from being Viktor’s mentor, he’s also willing to do research into pretty much everything we stumble upon, including this business with the worms, and do it all for free. I don’t really understand the “for free” part, but he can charge or not charge as he sees fit, I guess.

Allustan said he had heard from a friend named Marzena who serves as a battle mage at Blackwall Keep, and she, too, has come across or heard rumors of the same worms that we have. Given that her story and our story seem to be overlapping, and that Smenk’s and Dourstone’s organizations might not look too kindly on us as of later today, maybe it would be a good idea to go visit Marzena and compare notes. And maybe, perhaps, we should set out sooner rather than later. Hence we are spending the night at the house and heading out in the morning.

Allustan also requested that we escort her back to Diamond Lake to meet with him in person, and also share notes. Why does a battle made need an escort? I don’t have an answer to that. But we do need to get a message to her regardless, and we need to come back afterward, so maybe it’s just a figure of speech.

Blackwall Keep is a small fortress on the edge of the Mushfens, the largest swamp in Varisia and quite possibly in all of Avistan, sitting at the base of the mountain pass that climbs up to Diamond Lake and eventually across the Fenwall Mountains. It and Marsh Keep (also constructed on the edge of the Mushfens, only farther south) were built to more or less discourage the lizardfolk from expanding to the east because colonialism is only for us.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve heard stories about clashes between the lizardfolk and the holdings of Korvosa. The two sides used to butt heads constantly, with the lizardfolk gradually growing more and more aggressive because who wants to live in a swamp?  Anyway, the stories say that, once the keeps were constructed—and manned with heavily armed soldiers—the lizardfolk raids more or less fizzled out, and there’s been an unspoken truce since. The soldiers at the garrison in Diamond Lake do rotations among the Keeps, since ignoring the corruption and violence in Korvosa’s favorite money-making hellhole doesn’t take a lot of their time.

Are the lizardfolk really violent, aggressive, expansionist savages? I don’t know. I mean, I’d be inclined to say “probably not” but then we found that group in the house, and they were way outside their designated territory (though I am inclined to believe that they were not consulted on that matter) and pretty belligerent about it. So, maybe there’s some truth to all of that. Or, maybe it’s just the winning side writing history. I’ve certainly seen firsthand what happens when a select few who are in power get to write the rules for everyone else.

For references on that, see Balabar Smenk and Ragnolin Dourstone.

(night)

I stopped at mom and dad’s before we headed back to the house for the night, as I wasn’t sure how long I’d be gone, or when I would have a chance to see them next. Also, they were going to find out soon enough that I quit my job today, and maybe it was best to hear that from me, first. And, I had an ulterior motive on top of all that.

After selling much of what we found down in the temples under Dourstone’s mine, I am sitting on a sum of gold that would take me four years to earn working for Osgood. Back when I lived at home, I used my income as a server to supplement my family’s, which was fairly meager. Dad has worked in Gansworth’s mine for as long as I can remember, and though Gansworth is one of the least objectionable mine owners in town, no one is getting rich in his employ. Mom does odd jobs for Tidwoad, but it’s never been what I’d call steady work.

A couple of gold per week waiting tables doesn’t sound like a lot, and it wasn’t, but it always felt like we were living on the financial edge once I was old enough to understand finances, so every coin I brought in helped. My parents stretched to keep us out of the warehouses, which is where most miners and their families live, and how much stretching was required depended a great deal on how much work mom was able to get. Kids are expensive.

Once I moved out, they went to a smaller flat and that made things a bit easier on them. Easier is not the same as easy, though.

I knocked on the door, and braced myself.

“Belessandralena!” mom exclaimed enthusiastically. She turned her head to yell back into the flat. “Henric! Belessandralena is here!”

I cringe inside every time they use my name. Especially at full volume like this.

Mom led me to the kitchen, where they were eating dinner because I have great timing, I guess. I greeted dad (and suffered another “Belessandralena!”) and sat down at the table, dropping a coin purse with 50 gold on top. I’d have given them more, but it turns out this new life I’ve started for myself? It’s expensive if you want to survive it.

“What’s this about?” dad asked.

“I haven’t contributed since I moved out. I still want to contribute.”

He opened it up and his eyes went wide. This was easily two weeks of income for him.

“Where did you get this kind of money?”

So, they know me. They know I won’t do anything illegal or unsavory, but they worry anyway. And I suppose they were right to, even if they didn’t know it, since the circumstances behind this were something of a grey area. (How grey? Think charcoal.) I explained it the best I could. And let me tell you, it was more than a little uncomfortable. I left out a few of the uglier details, too, because I didn’t want to scare them.

To say they weren’t thrilled about me revisiting the cairn would be an understatement; they remember Masildi, too. Dad was pretty excited about Dourstone and Smenk, though. “Serves the bastards right,” he said. “Never did like those two. And I can’t wait for them to get what’s coming to them!”

Mom took a more practical approach.

“Does this put you in danger?” she asked.

“A little. But we’ll be away for the next few days, delivering that message to the Keep. Things should cool down by the time we’re back.”

Mom didn’t seem convinced. And to be honest, I didn’t feel so convincing.

Toilday, Desnus 17, 4722 (evening)

Allustan said there was an abandoned farmhouse about halfway to Blackwall Keep, and we reached it just before nightfall. We’ll spend the night here (that sounds so much better than “squatting”) and head out for the keep in the morning. It seems the house serves as a communal rest stop, and there are signs that people have done some maintenance on it here and there, just enough to keep it from falling into disrepair.

It was not an uneventful journey. About noon we came upon a clearing along the trail that looked like a good spot to have lunch, but I’ve spent a lot of time in the brush (albeit mostly at night) and this one looked an awful lot like someone was trying to hide the fact that they recently camped out. There’s no reason to do that unless you 1) don’t want someone to know you came through here, or 2) you don’t want someone to know you’re still here.

I was more concerned about the second one, so I brought the group to a stop and concentrated, trying to find tainted auras in the tree line.

I don’t do this sort of thing very often because I grew up in Diamond Lake, and the few times I have used this power I’ve found the results to be depressing. Sometimes you are better off just not knowing. But this was the wilderness, and we needed to know if we were walking into an ambush. Not that this was a perfect solution—not everything hostile would have a dark heart—but we could still learn something from it. And in this case, the precautions paid off as I sensed several foul auras, just out of sight.

Sensing that their little setup wasn’t going to improve with time, an orc stepped out of the trees near Zhog.

Zhog stared at him and asked, “Are we talking, or are we fighting?”

The orc advanced on him, answering, “It’s a good day for fighting!”  And then a dozen more stepped into the clearing at various points along its length, We had stopped short of being completely surrounded, but it was still not a great tactical position and since I was in front, I was voted most popular target.

Zhog pounded his dance partner, sending them to the ground, bleeding out, as two more took its place.

For some reason, Viore thought that exploding a ball of fire in the middle of them was a good idea. I mean, this worked as a demonstration of force, but here’s the thing about trees: they’re flammable, especially when the wet season has passed. Fortunately, Snagsby had a spell to create water, which he could repeat over and over, and got to work putting out the flames before we had a firestorm on our hands.

Though I had orcs on all sides, I also had my horsechopper. I used that to pin them down as the others picked them off, one by one. I cut a couple down, myself, then barked at the last one still standing: “Sit!”

He sat. And we had a nice little conversation.

“How many of you are there?” I asked.

“This is all of us.”

“What brings you this far northeast?”

“Nothin’ personal, y’know, just figured there’d be spoils to be taken, y’know, when the war comes.”

“When the war comes.? Tell me about that.”

“Y’know… it’s inev’table. The Twisted Branch have been on the path to war for…well, the past month.’

The Twisted Branch is one of the larger lizardfolk tribes in the Mushfens.

“Why? What’s going on with them?” I asked

“They’re just…I don’t know! But they’re hoppin’ mad, obviously gearing up, soldierin’, marching through the swamps…”

“They’re displacing your people?”

“No, it’s just an opportunity we sees up here. Figure if they take on the soft skins, eh, we’ll get a piece of it, maybe, y’know, it’s just how it is.”

We tied him up along with a couple of the other orcs that were still alive, then ate our lunch. They weren’t tied so tight that they couldn’t eventually work themselves free, but they were tight enough that it wouldn’t happen soon.

When we left, Zhog said, “You are at the mercy of the road. May Desna protect you.”

Wealday, Desnus 18, 4722 (morning)

We woke up to the sound of roosters crowing, only the roosters sounded like they’d been breathing gravel and had woken up from the grave. Then it got louder and louder and we realized they weren’t just screechy roosters. We threw open the windows and saw three large, emaciated birds with bat-like wings converging on the house.

Cockatrices. Just great.

Sera, Viore, Viktor, and Zhog took shots at them from the windows, which was a great plan right until they flew up onto the roof. I took a position in the middle of the house in case one of them made it inside, but what we really needed was to get them onto the ground so my defensive position wouldn’t even be necessary.

Varin used a spell to conjure a wolf as bait, they fell for it, and then they were easy pickings.

Maybe if the inn doesn’t work out we can get a job as monster hunters for hire.

 

Sunday, Desnus 15 (night)

We exited the maze into a bizarre, L-shaped hall with walls made from grey marble and a white, stone-tiled floor. Marble pillars ran down the center, each with veins of green that writhed and shifted as though they were alive. The walls had circular bulges at irregular intervals, and as we studied them with magic they opened up, revealing human eyes that followed our progress through the room. There was very little doubt that we were being spied on. Like, zero doubt. Zero is little.

We didn’t want to be spied on, and the whole effect was rather creepy anyway, so we returned to the maze and found another passage out, this one leading into a storeroom. Much like the Zon-Kuthon wing, there were barrels of water and boxes of rations stacked neatly inside. There was also little doubt that these, too, came from Balabar Smenk. Like, zero doubt. See above.

From there we found what appeared to be living quarters, and they were adjacent to an even more bizarre hall with walls made from a strange, green rock that had purple veins writing inside them. Sort of an inverse of the creepy hall with the eye, only it had six pillars along the walls, black this time, with a tar-like appearance.

It also had three fanatical acolytes and a strange shadow creature that babbled constantly, and incoherently, to the point where Viore, Sera, and Snagsby were overcome. It was a bad start. Sera was hit by a spell that left her further debilitated, and was in danger of being overwhelmed, so I grabbed her and literally pulled her back and out of the way. The whole fight just seemed terribly lopsided at this point, so I asked Viktor to enlarge me with the wand. And then Zhog and I entered the fray. The shadow fell first, and the acolytes shortly after.

We actually captured the third instead of killing them and tried to get information from them, but they were so deep into raving lunatic territory that it ultimately wasn’t worth the effort. All we got from them is what we already knew: the last room contained the Faceless One.

Remember how I said I don’t like to chat during a fight? Well, the Faceless One did. He literally would not shut up, even while we were laying the smackdown. It was all “Every action you take is advancing my plans!”, “You only hasten his arrival!” and “My victory is inevitable!” Stars, man, just accept defeat in peace. Please.

I ended up knocking him unconscious with my sap because we’re going to need better proof of what had gone on down here than a bunch of dead bodies. A fanatical true believer with a propensity for running off at the mouth solves that problem nicely.

Distressingly, the various bits about the so-called “Ebon Aspect” did turn out to be true (including, I suppose, the Faceless One’s prognostications, such as, “Your fate will be sealed by your own actions!”). A large humanoid grotesquerie with six arms and a nasty disposition had risen from the pool, and was busy smashing the elevator in anger as we were preparing to leave.

It was a difficult fight. I was the first one to engage it so I bore the brunt of its attacks, and got beaten severely—to within inches of my life!—before the others could engage. That bought me time to heal. Viktor used the wand to enlarge Zhog and Sera, and once they had it flanked (and once I was not on death’s door) he enlarged me too. With the three of us working in tandem, and Abadar imbuing my blows with divine power, we were able to bring it down.

I took the liberty of cutting off its head, thinking, If the Faceless One’s insufferable ramblings don’t do enough to sway people, maybe this thing will.

As for the Faceless one, I don’t know what to make of him. Albino, with a featureless face save for a small, sharp nose, he seems more like something from Lamashtu’s playground but for whatever reason he threw in with Urgathoa. I am sure there’s a story there but I honestly don’t care enough to ask.

We decided to spend one more night down here, or at least stay until midnight when Snagsby can pray for spells. A little magic is all that was needed to repair the elevator, so we’ll be able to use it to get back up top.

The Faceless One came to not long ago. Of course, we can’t have that, so I knocked him unconscious again. But not before showing him the head of the Ebon Aspect so he could see just how thoroughly he’d failed. I didn’t say anything. Just showed it to him, and let the image sink in.

Moonday, Desnus 16 (small hours)

We left the mine just after the shift change at midnight. We knew we wouldn’t be able to make it all the way out without being stopped by the guards, so we were ready when six of them hurried to block our exit with swords drawn.

“Who are you?” one of them demanded. “You’re not miners!”

I dropped the sacks I was carrying, and pulled out the head of the Ebon Aspect. Next to me, Sera unceremoniously dumped the body of the Faceless One on the ground.

“We’re here,” I began, “because we uncovered a death cult operating under your mine. We are taking these to the garrison, and we need you to get out of our way.”

All but one of the guards looked uncertain about how to handle this. That sixth one, though, gave me a look that suggested he knew what was going on. So I walked over to him, and said, “So you’re aware that there was an elevator built in your mine that leads down to the death cult. And you’re aware that people have been coming and going. And you know what we’re doing. So get out of our way, or you’re going to become an accessory.”

“You’ve been down there?” he asked.

“Do you think that we took these things down into the mine, and then brought them back up again, all to make an elaborate show?”

“What of the Citadel of Zon-Kuthon?”

Oh, dear.

“There is nobody left in the Citadel of Zon Kuthon, just as there’s nobody left in the Caverns of Lamashtu, or the Maze of Urgathoa.” I was careful to pronounce the capitalization.

“And…Theldrick?”

“There. Is. Nobody. Left.”

And he bolted. I ran after him and tried to grab him but missed. He stopped abruptly, pulled out a dagger, and stabbed me with it. Viore responded by casting a spell that held him where he stood, unable to move. Crisis averted. We tied him up before the spell wore off, and dragged the whole lot off to the Garrison (there was just no way I was going to trust Sheriff Cubbins with this). The guards at the mine just kinda watched us go. I guess they lost their appetite for a confrontation.

It took a little explaining, and more than a little fast-talking, to convince the duty sergeant that this wasn’t just some religious dispute, but actual necromantic activities taking place under the town. Once we got the whole story out, he promised a full investigation…including Smenk’s and Dourtsone’s roles as conspirators. In just three days, we managed to take down the two most powerful and corrupt mine owners in Diamond Lake.

I’ve been dreaming of doing something like this for several years.

 

Sunday, Desnus 15 (morning)

Did I say that the last of the tengu had fallen? If so, I would like to revise my earlier statement. Now the last of the tengu has fallen.

This group of four ambushed us when we moved to explore the far end of the maze. They were a lot tougher than the ones we tangled with earlier, too. There was a spell caster of some sort, and one that was obviously the head of the snake. I faced off against the latter while my friends dealt with the rest. Before long he was the last of them still standing.

I don’t like to chat during a fight (I’ve never understood those who do) but I like senseless killing less, so I broke with protocol.

“Look. You’re the only one still alive. Why? Why keep fighting?”

He said, “Because I have a cause worth fighting for.”

“Is it a cause worth dying for?”

“It wouldn’t be a cause if it wasn’t.”

Which, I can almost respect since I feel the same way about mine. But there’s a key difference here that makes me stop short: My cause creates. His destroys.

Sunday, Desnus 15 (morning)

Our tengu friend did not try to return, and his friends didn’t come looking for him. This was smart, in my opinion. Odds are they knew we were here (even if they didn’t know who we are) and that we’d have to come to them, eventually. Better to bolster their defenses than risk a battle on our terms.

Our biggest obstacle in the “take the fight to them” plan was the lock on their door, but the tengu gave us what we needed for getting around that, and Sera had it popped in just a few seconds. The door opened to a long hallway with numerous side passages branching off in the distance.

“It’s a maze,” I said, shaking my head.

There are all sorts of strategies for solving a maze according to everyone but me. I only knew of one, myself: crumple up the parchment on which they are drawn and throw them away. Sadly, this approach was impractical in our particular situation.

As we explored and bickered—I think someone suggested that we always turn right at every intersection for some reason—Sera found a secret door, and then we heard a loud squealing sound echoing from up ahead. That was followed shortly by the source: the first of three giant weasels, which seemed much more at home squeezing through the corridors of a maze than we were. And then things got worse.

There were secret passages everywhere. Tengu popped out of them left and right, dividing us up as we contended with them and the weasels. It was a chaotic, claustrophobic, and extremely musty fight. Stars, but those weasels stunk. Two of them spent considerable time in my face.

My tactics typically center around defending a very large area (and when Viktor uses that enlargement spell on me, a very, very large area) to slow our opponents and prevent them from ganging up on us. Needless to say, this doesn’t work so well in narrow hallways where the best we can do is line up in a single file. That being said, a horsechopper stabs as well as it slices, and does so quite well from several feet away, which put the weasels and myself on somewhat equal footing.

Once the last of the tengu and weasels had fallen, and it took a while to figure that out because we got scattered all over the place, we regrouped in a room that was in a fairly secluded corner to rest and heal.

And to get away from that blasted smell.

Starday, Desnus 14 (late morning)

Well, I asked for different and we got different.

Lamashtu is the goddess of, among other things, the monstrous and misshapen. If you’ve been thinking to yourself, as I have, that grimlocks aren’t really all that monstrous, and might be unfairly labeled as such, then you can set your mind at ease as we’ve gotten to the root of this mystery. We met the grimlock’s high priest today. And he had eyes. In true Lamashtu fashion, he had taken the eyes from some unidentified creature and sewn them to his face. And if that wasn’t enough, he had carved her holy symbol into his chest (their chieftain had done the same, so it was a whole thing). But that is the sort of dedication to abnormality that Lamashtu appreciates. Unlike Zon-Kuthon, it’s self-mutilation with, I dunno, a purpose.

The priest (Theldrick’s journals imply his name was Grallak) had some scrolls—I have no idea what someone who can’t see is doing with scrolls, so don’t ask—that were written in Common, but they were faded and nearly illegible. All we could make out was some reference to a power growing “in the pool of the dark cathedral” that would serve as a champion for the Triad, and more references to Kyuss bringing forth the Age of Worms.

The letter in Theldrick’s chambers also spoke of something called “The Ebon Aspect” stirring in the pool, and even suggested that heretics (that would be us) raiding the temple might awaken it.

Three guesses which pool they are referring to.

(early afternoon)

We’re resting back in the Zon-Kuthon wing because it’s nicer than a cave. And the beast, which Zhog has named “Bubbles”, needs to eat.

While we were waiting, there was a knock at the door in a deliberate pattern. It repeated after a short pause.

We were not expecting company. Not polite company, at any rate.

Snagsby did what any reasonable person would do, which is knock back with the same pattern. Then he said he heard footsteps retreating, and we decided to do something about that. He opened the door and there was a tengu backing away down the hall. Sera walked out after it and said, “Come in!’ with Snagsby following right behind her.

He froze and looked at Sera, then looked over at us through the door and said, “You’re not Theldrick’s…” leaving that thought hanging in the air.

Sera circled behind him somewhat threateningly, and it snapped at her with its beak. “Where is Theldrick?!” he demanded.

Viktor answered, “We’ve replaced Theldrick.”

“Prove it!”

I stepped into the hall with my horsechopper in hand, gave him my most charming smile, and said, “Honestly, we were not expecting visitors today! Come on in and we’ll show you around!”

“I see, I see…I didn’t mean to stay. It was just a simple errand…I’ll be back later.”

“What kind of errand do you have?” I asked. “Maybe you don’t have to leave!”

“I just want to talk to Theldrick. And I see he’s not here…”

“He is here! You can talk to Theldrick all you want! He just…won’t…answer.”

He was alarmed, and not sure what to do, so Sera decided for him. She gave the Tengu a shove, pushing him towards the doors. I swept my horsechopper low, catching his feet, and he tripped and fell forward into the room. He tried to stand up, so Zhog punched him and he went down again, this time unconscious.

We tied him up and decided to pump him for information. I checked his aura while he was out and it wasn’t tainted, which suggests…he just fell in with the wrong crowd. When he came to, I went with “nice”.

“Look, we get it. You wandered in here; you weren’t expecting all of this. You’ve got a message for Theldrick. Just tell us what it is, and maybe we can find a way for all this,” I said, gesturing around the room, “to end.”

“What’s your relationship to Theldrick?”

Honesty is important when you’re trying to build trust. “We’re alive and he isn’t.”

“The message was to simply ask him where his guards went.”

I smiled in response. “Oh! I can help you with that! They’re with Theldrick.”

The short of it was: he works for The Faceless One, which is the name mentioned in Theldrick’s journal, and the head of the Urgathoa contigant. Those journals have suggested that there is more than a little strife between the groups and something of a power struggle. He had written, “Grallak is the key. Thank the Midnight Lord that he trusts me and not the faceless One.” Well, good for you, Theldrick!

Of course, we couldn’t just kill him because I wasn’t going to allow another summary execution of a prisoner, but we couldn’t keep him with us, and we couldn’t let him go back to his cohorts. In the end, we made an appeal to logic and his sense of self-preservation: if he goes back to his master he’ll be seen as a snitch and most likely killed. But if he takes a chance on us, worst case is he has a lengthy head start running away. Best case? He’s the only surviving member of his little cult. He accepted the deal.

We aren’t naive. We sent him up the elevator, but there was nothing to stop him from coming back down so we set up a watch, just to make sure there were no surprises.