Wednesday, January 24, 653 AU, continued

• Aetheris speaks with William, Bill’s rabbit, who claims he had the same dream about the tower that Bill did, and that his “employer” will not permit him to explain why he is accompanying Bill, but that Bill is “very dear to us”.
• The Dawnbringers reconvene in the square in front of the creepy church in mid-afternoon. They decide it’s best to explore at night, when cultists could be around for questioning.
• In the meantime, they decide to ask Talesse if she can get them an audience with Duke Adorin Sarlana. Talesse says she will try, but makes no promises and says it will probably take two or three weeks.
• Aetheris searches for someone who can teach her infernal. She finds an old diabolist named Gerard Onyx, who convinces her to make a deal with the devil Tror’gel, losing her ability to speak druidic in exchange, plus certain pieces of druidic lore. To give the deal a time limit of six months, Aetheris gives up something else: infernal is now her mother tongue and she needs to focus to speak common.
• After the deal, Gerard informs Aetheris that there’s a shop in the Shining Citadel called Mortar and Amaranth that sells displacer beast fangs.
• At dusk, the Dawnbringers buy magic weapons and potions from a black market arms dealer named Passiflora Bubblegem—a tough-talking, cigar-smoking pixie who smuggles stolen goods from the Feywild. Potions are expensive right now, due to the recent requisitions by the town guard. Passiflora also informs them that she’s trying to start a thieves guild in direct competition with Avex Ochrescale, head of the assassin’s guild, while she lays low—she’s wanted in the Feywild.

⁂

• They get dinner at The Green Griffin, then they head back to the church. The butcher is, disturbingly, still chopping up meat in total darkness—they only realize this because they can hear the thud of his cleaver from the lightless window.
• Aetheris sneaks in as a spider, and sees strange hunks of meat hanging from hooks all over the room. There’s a grate in the floor into which blood constantly drips. She sneaks past the butcher and under a door to a back room, where she finds a trapdoor.
• After some deliberation, they decide to confront the butcher. When the butcher realizes they don’t intend to leave, he shrieks, and a mass of tentacles burst forth, displacing his mask. The butcher is horrifying but not that tough—he collapses into a pile of flesh with a squelch. Valya inspects the mask he was wearing, and discovers it is a tanned human face.
• A middle-aged woman, having heard the fighting, approaches the butcher’s shop and, seeing the carnage, is horrified and suggests they inform the guard. The Dawnbringers convince her to return to her home and let them handle it.
• Beneath the trapdoor, they find a short tunnel that leads to a horrifying pool of misshapen flesh. A tentacled statue stands to the side of the pool, clearly magic. The ceiling has celestial motifs, with a comet in the center of the ceiling.
• Most of the party teleport to the other side, but Aetheris tries to wade through it as a velociraptor, and discovers a face whispering “help… me…” at her. Aurelia puts it out of its misery with a fire bolt, but more appear. “They… make us grow…” says one. Aetheris also discovers that most of the flesh in this pit is connected.
• Thoroughly disturbed, they continue on and hear chanting. Beyond a door, they discover several cultists chanting around an unconscious body in the middle of a magic circle. In the back of the room is a raised lounge area with several bookcases.
• Bill shoots one of the cultists while the party is still hidden, and a big fight breaks out. The cultists are extremely tough, and when they realize they’re about to lose they try to destroy the books, but the party stops them.
• The horrible aura of this place takes its toll, and Valya and Bill are most affected. Valya temporarily loses her memories, and Bill becomes paranoid. While arguing with the rest of the party, who Valya doesn’t trust, she probes everyone’s thoughts and tentatively trusts them, but during the process she sees Aurelia’s thoughts about Valya.
• Aetheris casts divination and asks what’s wrong with Valya, receiving the response: “Her soul is resting for a time.”
• They investigate the bookshelf and find three books that are much older and more worn than the others. They’re part of a set—one is green, one is indigo, and one is violet. Aetheris feels queasy when she touches one. She doesn’t recognize it, but Qhask does—aside from the colors, these are identical to the blank book they found in Uxovaharis’s tomb! They also discover a heavy disk of crystal on a velvet cushion next to the books on the shelf.
• Valya notes that when she looks at her hand through the crystal, it appears alien and wrinkled. Aurelia tries to look at the book through the crystal (casting protection from evil on herself first), and discovers that these books are The Maw in the Sky volumes four, six, and seven—they take the red book they found in Uxovaharis’s tomb from Torba, and discover it is volume one.
• Aurelia looks inside the red book, and resists the psychic assault that bypasses her protection spell. She can’t read the alien text inside, but she sees an etching on the inner cover: an angelic figure with membranous wings shining light from its face onto a crowd of humanoids. They decide to investigate the books later in a more controlled environment, and put them all in Torba.
• On a desk, they discover notes—it looks like someone was trying to translate passages from The Maw in the Sky. Aetheris tries to read the notes, but not even comprehend languages helps. They take those too.
• They return to the room with the flesh pit and look around with the aid of the crystal disk. They can see strong conjuration runes around the statue, and the comet in the sky is pulsating with life. All along the walls are murals of ghouls feasting on humanoid flesh, and writing: “Behold the bountiful harvest of our masters.”
• One of the faces in the pit begs them to save him, and as they watch a limb starts sprouting from the nearest shoulder. Bill shoots the face with an arrow.
• They return to the ritual chamber and try another door, finding the cultists’ dormitory. Valya tries to open the chest in the corner, but triggers a poison needle trap, taking massive damage. The chest contains 140 gp and a letter. Bill reads the letter:

Marcus,

The diviner does not appear to understand our ways or his own best interest. Perform the ceremony tonight, then feed the poor soul to the pit.

Renard

• Aurelia checks on the unconscious victim again, who has woken up. He’s disoriented, but manages to inform them that he was in a cell and that there are other prisoners, but that the prison guard is a floating sphere that makes thinking clearly almost impossible. The prisoner is Terryn Wheathand, who was accompanying Anladar Morgen of the Hammer to Telmir to investigate a string of recent disappearances, which he now realizes was the work of this cult. Anladar had to return to the Citadel, leaving Terryn behind to continue the investigation. Terryn then began having dreams about a comet, and went to a dream interpreter for advice—an old woman named Genevra—who Terryn thinks sold him out to the cultists. He was kidnapped from his room that night, which was about a week ago.
• The only other prisoner Terryn is aware of is a dragonborn, though he saw dead inhuman bodies with gaping holes in their faces in other cells.
• They continue on, and notice they’re being spied on by someone listening at a door. Aetheris crawls under the door and sees the woman who had come to investigate the battle with the butcher. Aurelia assumes she must be Genevra. While they debate what to do, Bill kicks open the door and shoots her with a crossbow. The woman, turns out not to be Genevra, but an infiltrator named Vanessa Barlow. She hasn’t learned much, but knows where the jail is. Valya chastises Vanessa for allowing the ritual to happen, but Vanessa claims it was more important not to blow her cover.
• Vanessa claims that the cultists don’t actually know much—all their instructions come from dreams. Vanessa’s “employer” has some ideas about who is pulling the strings, but she’s not at liberty to discuss her employer. She knows that anyone who has dreams about a comet is marked by dream interpreters throughout the city, and then kidnapped and brought here. Anyone who refuses to join the cult is thrown into the pit, which is enchanted to cause flesh to proliferate. Worse, the cultists have been putting the flesh on the market—the citizens of Telmir have been eating it unknowingly. She doesn’t know what the purpose of feeding people the flesh is, or the purpose of the ritual.
• Valya casts detect thoughts, and determines that Vanessa’s employer is Uxovaharis.
• Vanessa offers to lead them to the prison, but warns them that the halls in that part of the catacombs is trapped. She also says there is an alchemy lab, and the party immediately surmise nothic eyes are involved. Vanessa is surprised, and notes that sometimes the prisoners “dream a little too hard” and transform into nothics.
• They go to the alchemy lab first. They find a bubbling cauldron and a single nothic eye on a shelf. Based on some notes, they determine that this potion is almost finished and only requires displacer beast fangs. Vanessa is surprised they’re cursed too, and notes that her employer has a “source” of nothic eyes.
• Aetheris suggests using the flesh pit to harvest nothic eyes, but everyone is pretty sure turing the flesh pit into a nothic monstrosity could turn out… very bad.
• Vanessa notes that they probably don’t have much time. There are never too many cultists in the church at once, and others may soon arrive. “They have a funny habit of showing up at the right time,” she says, “and I’ll note that it’s night—they could be dreaming right now.”
• They decide to risk it and finish the potion, which takes half an hour, giving them one extra dose of the potion plus one more nothic eye.
• Terryn, who has been confused this whole time, tells the party that Lord Peyton Cloudfang, in the Shining Citadel, has been acting erratically and moving money between accounts to amass a stockpile of displacer beast fangs and other magical supplies. The diviner’s guild has explicitly been told to keep an eye on him by the Queen.
• They make it to the prison (with only a slight mishap when Aurelia triggers a trap) and get into a fight with the warden—a tangle of ribbons of pure energy that emits powerful psychic waves. They defeat it, though they take a lot of damage in the process and have to keep their distance to avoid incapacitation.
• They find the dragonborn in one of the cells, and though Aurelia heals her, she doesn’t wake up. She mumbles something about “the conjunction” and “they’re coming”. The nothic corpses in the other cells have already had their eyes removed.
• They return the way they came, stopping to destroy the flesh pit. Aurelia casts wall of fire over the whole room, and the room erupts into echoing screams. A few seconds later the statue cracks with an echoing explosion. The skin of the writhing flesh in the pit suddenly pops like a soap bubble, and beneath it is only blood, which sloshes and sprays everywhere, covering Aurelia in gore. The sight is too much for them—Bill is temporarily deafened, and Qhask is blinded.
• When they get to the butcher’s, they notice several cultists sneaking into the church. Aurelia, who is on a hair trigger at this point, immediately immolates them with a fireball.
• The town guard will probably have a lot of… questions, soon, so they leave the city as fast as possible and make camp in the forest.
• Terryn confides in them that he’s discovered that Leander is a vampire, and is surprised that the party already knows. He also knows that the highest members of the diviner’s guild… tend to end up missing quite often. Maybe they’re being lost to the curse? Vanessa guesses that they also have the potion, so they could be dying to something else. Maybe the Queen herself is cursed? If Lord Cloudfang is also producing the potion… just how many people are in on this secret?
• Disturbingly, out of all the events of the day, the one that sticks in Aurelia’s mind and trouble’s her sleep is the image of the angel etched into the cover of the green book.
• Aetheris questions Professor Niku about The Maw in the Sky, but he doesn’t know anything. He does, however, identify the “warden” they fought as an intellect snare, which is native to the Far Realms. He also hypothesizes that if comprehend languages didn’t work to decipher the language in the book, then either it’s a cipher or it’s a language from outside reality.

Thursday, January 25, 653 AU

• They debate whether or not to cast greater restoration on Valya—what if in her current state she’s no longer under the effect of the curse? They should determine that. Aetheris casts divination, asking if Valya is still subject to the curse, and gets the response: “Ignorance is bliss.” They decide to hold off for now.
• Aurelia describes the creature she saw in the book to the rest of the party. They decide to ask Professor Niku, but he doesn’t recognize it. He does however, recognize the writing! It’s Deep Speech, the language of the Far Realms, and the only people he knows who ever spoke it were the highest wizards of Ghelroth Far, who had dealings with the Far Realms.
• They ask Terryn about Anladar Morgen of the Hammer. According to Terryn, Anladar is an eldritch knight, very good with a blade, and proficient in forbidden combat magic. He knows dominate person. Of all the Hammer, he is the best fighter.
• They debate how to get an audience with the duke and duchess, and consider just sneaking into the manor or posing as a courier with important information. Then they decide to contact Prince Calvin. Aurelia casts sending: Apologies for intrusion. Dawnbringers need to speak with Talia as soon as possible. Would appreciate your help. Already in Telmir. Prince Calvin responds: So nice to hear from you, Aurelia! Telmir? So close! You simply must come to our wedding in one month. Sure, can tell my sister—. Aurelia sighs and casts another sending: Congratulations! When and where? We will owe you a fabulous gift. Prince Calvin responds: In the Shining Citadel! It’s very annoying that Leander cannot be here. Lythienne warned us. Leander is in Telmir. Have you met him yet? He— Aurelia sighs and uses her last third-level spell slot for the day: Brief only! Where is Leander? When can we see Talia? Prince Calvin responds: Okay, I’ll try to be brief! Leander is at Sarlana Estate. I’m sure I could get you in tonight—let me pull some strings and—
• Aurelia informs the rest of the party of their conversation.