The Lodge of the Eclipse
Lady Drita sits up slightly from her reclined state and reaches for a slice of cheese from the tray her father, Nargis Ruba has left. “So, my father says you are investigating these attacks.” Her voice is low and smooth, but her exhaustion is obvious. Bandages wrap her arms and several cuts and bruises are evident on Drita’s face.
“Yes, can you tell us about what happened? Where were you?” Blythe gets started with questions, hoping not to push Drita too hard, but keen on getting answers quickly.
Recalling the attack
Lady Drita Xhaferi closes her eyes softly and recounts the attack. She was walking through town with several of her servants when suddenly a cloud of green mist was in the air. She started coughing violently, the mist clouding her eyes for a moment. Her servants started turning on her and each other. It was chaos as the fighting crossed paths with a local tavern. The mix of bodies allowed Drita to slip by her handmaidens and limp back to the Lodge of the Eclipse. Some of her servants had paid the price with their lives, the others had been taken into questioning by Drita’s father.
“Did you see anyone suspicious before the attacks started?” Merrick pushes.
Scrunching up her face in thought, Drita recalls. “There was a woman… yellow shirt and green pants. Average height. Short dark hair…” She matches the description of the woman Merrick saw in the market, fleeing after young Lord Yiver had been attacked.
“Was she familiar?” Merrick asks.
Drita opens her eyes and shakes her head. The party asks more questions about the Weavers, the Trades Guild and their heirs. They learn that the Guild only gained power about five years ago when they cultivated the Jeli Flower and invented Jeli Wine.
“If the heirs to these powerful houses are all being targetted.” Drita starts. “Then you may want to find Eryndall Sylvaranth. His father is the Grand Messer Amos Nir Sylvaranth, and he controls the Jeli Flower trade. Each Highsummer one us, heirs of the Guildmasters, takes a turn playing the ‘Prince of Vice’ in the festival March. Tonight at midnight the March begins, and Eryndall is to play the part of the prince.”
Drita is fading and doesn’t know the answers to the party’s further questions. “My father will know more about the other lords and their children.”
Nargis Ruba’s Secret
Leaving the lady to rest, her guards adjust their positioning, and the four investigators find Nargis back serving behind the bar. They wave him over to discuss, divulging what they’ve learned and impressing on him the seriousness of these attacks.
“It seems like someone is intentionally hunting your heirs.” Luxara explains.
“Can you tell us more about how the Jeli Flower came to be? How is it cultivated? Where did you find it?” Merrick asks, the nature of the flower intriguing him.
But with those words, a flicker of doubt crosses Nargis Ruba’s face. Both Merrick and Luxara pick up on it. Fear. Regret, maybe.
“Look, if you really care about your daughter, you’ll tell us everything you know.” Merrick leans on the bar as he conveys the seriousness of this situation to the Head of the Xhaferi family. “Do any of the Lords have something to gain by threatening you and the others?”
Nargis shakes his head, disbelieving the other Lords would issue a murdering spree. Finally cracking under the insightful gaze of Merrick, Nargis comes clean. They divulge of a bargain he and the other Guildmasters struck with a witch. Proud Edun. How they agreed to relinquish their firstborn children to Edun as apprentices, in exchange for the Jeli Flower and all the riches and power that would come with it. But once the magical flower was secured, Nargis led the charge to go back on the deal, killing the unsuspecting Proud Edun.
“Did this Proud Edun have any kin? Anyone who might seek out… revenge?” Warryn asks quietly.
Merrick describes the woman in yellow and green he saw fleeing the attack earlier this evening.
Nargis pales. “She had a daughter. But no one had seen her in years, even years before this deal was struck.”
Splitting the Party
Nargis provides a wax-sealed letter, vouching for the party and their activities to investigate these attacks on the Lord’s heirs. He provides them with what information he knows about this biza creature. With a suspect and motive identified, the party determines they need to hurry and deliver the intelligence to Madame Samira, Head of Security. It’s late, however, and the March of Vice will be starting in an hour on the opposite side of the city. Outside the Lodge of the Eclipse, Merrick transforms into a majestic war horse and allows Luxara to hop on his back. Gracefully, the eldritch knight of the Luxon rides the steed bareback. They gallop off into the night towards the Hall of Erudition.
Blythe and Warryn set out towards the city gates, where the March of Vice is set to begin soon.
Luxara and Merrick find Madame Samira glued to her desk, tirelessly pouring over her notes. She listens intently as Luxara describes the last several hours and the information they’ve been able to uncover about the case.
“Up security. Warn the Lords.” Luxara commands.
Samira agrees but notes that her forces are all but deployed. Grateful for all of the intelligence, including Nargis’ admission, and for their work saving Yiver Lhethiner from a brutal beating, Zadash’s Head of Security hands over a hefty coin purse. 300 gold pieces, each, for the four adventurers. Merrick neighs in excited thank you, before Luxara climbs back on and they gallop out of the Hall.
Meanwhile…
Blythe and Warryn have a harder time locating the Prince of Vice tent. But eventually make their way through the crowd to see a white float and a throne being hauled out and attached to two oxen. At this time, the spectacle of Luxara and Merrick the war horse make an appearance. Blythe calls them over and the four begin to discuss the next course of action. Before they can agree on how to warn Eryndall in his Prince of Vice costume, the parade is off to a start.
Warryn casts invisibility on Blythe, and she sneaks onto the back of the float just as it begins to pull into the middle of the street. Luxara is still sitting on Merrick as he trots into the succession. He puts on his most convincing parade horse dance. Warryn follows the lead float from the side of the street, ducking around excited festival onlookers and keeping his eyes peeled for disruption.
Pulling out all the stops
The march continues along the wide street in between vendors set up for the Highsummer Festival. Warryn and Luxara catch a glimpse of magic being woven under the Prince of Vice’s float mere seconds before vines burst out of the cobblestone. The earth quakes and the carriage is thrown off course, spooked oxen stampede away, and a sinister green dust is cast over Eryndall’s guards.
Warryn and Luxara act first, positioning themselves to aid the young noble. “Sister, by the Beacon, aid me.” Luxara whispers as she hops down to the ground. An echo of a woman appears out of nowhere. Avi, a white outline shining with raw magic the same colour as the magic that pours out of Luxara.
Painted on the two guards’ faces is the familiar stupor they saw on the merchant earlier and then on Warryn himself. The guards draw their swords and step towards their charge. At the same time, a familiar woman is spotted at the edge of the crowd as she aims a magical attack towards Eryndall.
Combat ensues
Blythe takes advantage of her invisibility and rocks the first guard as he deftly attacks Eryndall. Raging, the barbarian’s orcish tusks enlarge and her veins start to pop out of her muscular neck.
As the assailant hits Eryndall with a magical flame, Merrick rears up on his hind legs and charges. She resists him knocking her back, but his front hooves clobber her and hold her in place while Blythe and Luxara attack the poisoned guards.
A few quick slashes cut the noble down, but Luxara is able to dash over and dispense a healing potion before his life force wanes. Helping him up, Luxara speaks zealously. “Your father sold you out for the Jeli Wine, and you owe your life to the Beacon.”
Shocked but grateful for his rescuers, Eryndall takes the opportunity to try and escape. Blythe runs over to flank the attacking caster, just as Warryn rains spiderwebbing down. Spells are traded, as Warryn counterspells a dangerous Thunderwave and retaliates with his own barrage of Magic Missiles. Blythe and Merrick alternate blows on the caster, as Luxara joins the fight from the other side. In a last attempt, she tosses a pouch full of green dust into the air. The poison leaves a series of bystanders coughing and then chaotically attacking each other. But she is no match for the party, who handily knock her unconscious.
Some ghost stories are real
Before the win can be acknowledged, a dark energy begins swirling out of the woman’s chest. Ghostly tendrils extend and a wraithlike shadow-being extends up and outwards. It rakes its spectral claws towards them. This must be a biza, the party registers. The recall the advice Nargis could provide, that it’s resistant to most types of damage, and poison and necrotic do nothing at all.
Steeling themselves for its attacks, the party beats on the creature, but it barely seems phased. Merrick narrowly dodges the wraith’s claw as a cold life-sucking force avoids collision with his war horse form.
In a split decision, he drops out of his beast shape and calls on the natural powers that course through his body. Conflicted, he feels sympathy for the creature and its connection to nature but also sees this thing as a perversion of the nature he has dedicated his life to. Merrick mutters a quick prayer to the Wildmother and unleashes Moonbeam on top of the biza. A green beam of light swirls around the creature, wrapping it in a tight embrace. Merrick holds his hand out, concentrating on the spell. Then he closes his hand as the light pulses around the biza. Its shadows fade and the creature dissipates into the air and is no more.
The panic in the street quiets down as the threat is quelled. The parade has stopped, but many people mull around, as Luxara shouts. “Let it be known that it was the moon, and not the sun that came to your aid today!” Warryn shoots her a warning glare and reminds Luxara to be careful about shouting, what is considered, blasphemy within the Empire. “It is a celebration of the Dawnfather, after all.” But the fighter doesn’t seem phased by it.
In the days that follow
Her coin purse happily weighed down, Blythe smiles to herself at a job well done. They learn the name of Proud Edun’s daughter. Kala, is the druid who has been releasing biza poison on innocents. She is the same who attacked Eryndall and subsequently the party in the street.
Merrick stays nearby as she awaits judgement. He does not want her to be wrongly harmed or punished more than she deserves. One noble and a handful of servants have been killed because of her, but she has been wronged in this too.
Luxara meets with Starosta Wyatt Fedar, the halfing who presides over the city of Zadash. Her motivation goes beyond a fair trial for Kala. She wishes to see justice brought down on each of the five heads of families who make up the Guild.
Warryn is less invested in the particular justice of these figures. But he follows the events closely, observing. How does the machine of justice work in Zadash, in the Empire? How does he feel about it? and he still needs to check in with Headmaster Oremid Hass. Why did the Archmage call him here, to begin with?
Game Master’s Notes
This game was played over 5 hours and followed Wages of Vice, a Journeys through the Radiant Citadel adventure for fifth-level characters. A variety of non-player characters were inspired by Eren Angiolini‘s Arcane Compendium.
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