Twilight's Children

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Tuesday, October 23rd, 121st Year of the New Kingdom (BC 736)
Theospine Mountains, Nidala

Having found the false dragon machine that Elena had been using to terrorize her people, Leif, Ludovic, Kerri, Duffy, Joel, Taige, and Kukri set out in the mid-afternoon to find the lost repository of knowledge at Forenoon Abbey. Leif's mother Sharon once sought answers there, according to her friend, the priestess Corinne, but only the flesh-eating undead Ahltrian can find the Abbey, deep in the Phantasmal Forest. Ludovic expects that the Ahltrian are some form of ghoul, an intelligent form of undead whose bite leads to ghoul fever, and whose attacks cause paralysis.

They retrieve their horses from the other side of the river and debate between destroying the dragon projector or taking it with them. Hooking their horses to the wagon, they intend to haul it down the mountain, though it will be difficult.

And, knowing that it probably won't fit through the dense forest, they plan to abandon it just inside the trackless woods, where it will be lost forever.

Along the way, they worry once again about Suriana's students and Gavin, having seen nothing but mist on Ludovic's amulet since their last note over ten days ago.

Ludovic's only guesses are that either the wagon’s been destroyed, they've been taken by the Mists, or they rearranged their furniture. Kerri remarks that their plan of staying in the wagon out of fear of the Mists is "sort of like pulling the covers over your head in bed." It won't stop whatever's out there, but it makes you feel a little safer.

Along the bumpy mountain pass, Duffy rides in the wagon studying the projector. The magical parts seem to be confined to the tiny illusion generator itself, with all the projection parts being mechanical. He attempts to extract the magical component but the trail is too rough for delicate work.

Leif stays behind the group to cover their tracks with a leafy tree branch.

After a while, they hear a clattering of stones up ahead and see a man [green 1] running down another path that converges with theirs. He slides on the loose rubble, seemingly running for his life. They all ready themselves, with Ludovic (in bear form) and Kukri leading the procession, Leif taking the high ground with his bow at the ready, and the others staying close to the wagon.

Seeing a bear and a wolf blocking the path, the man, dressed in peasant’s garb, is momentarily shocked, but looking backward, he apparently decides that whatever's chasing him is scarier and skirts around them. Approaching the human part of the party, he pleads, "I am the butcher. Help, they are chasing me!" When Leif asks, "Who’s chasing you?" he says "Them!" and points up the mountain at a knight in full armor [red 1] and three more lightly armored men, [red 2-4] charging down behind him.

The leader of the knights, upon seeing Ludovic the bear and Kukri, shouts, "It has called the beasts of the wild to protect it!" He directs his followers to handle "the beasts" while he goes after "it," then rides toward the party and tells them, "You can stand down strangers, we'll handle this." Seeing that the knights are all wearing insignias of Belenus, the party moves to protect the butcher, attacking his pursuers. Duffy's pistols blast through their armor, and Joel lands a tremendous blow to the leader's back with his sword,

while Ludovic and Kukri bite and claw at his young squires. The butcher cheers on his rescuers, saying in broken Nidalan, "Yes, I am the butcher! Beef! I will give you beef!"

Suspicious, Leif tries to grab the butcher and calls out, "Hold on, let's talk about this!" But as he holds the man in place, he notices an odd wound along his neck, filled with shaggy black fur instead of blood. Then the knight tells them, "You don't know what you're doing! That thing killed the butcher!" and then slices at his prey with a mighty swing.

As his sword slams down, it bursts the thin skin the creature was wearing, revealing a hideous beast underneath. .

Duffy finishes off the creature with a bullet to the head. But then they hear several moist, snuffling roars from all around. One of the squires fighting Ludovic and Kukri shouts, "Great Belenus, there are more of them!" And indeed, several more [green 2-5] crawl out of the cracks and fissures of the mountains. While the knight pauses to drink something from a flask that seems to close his wounds,

the party turns on the other creatures and quickly slays them.

However, the squires continue to battle with the bear, because no one has bothered to tell them Ludovic is on the party's side.

Ludovic reaches out to the spirits constantly swirling in his head and bids them to telepathically pass a message on to his friends, "Tell them to stop!"

Eventually, someone tells the knight to call off his men, and they stand down. Upon inspecting the bodies, Ludovic mentally tells the others that they are skin thieves, a monstrous form of humanoid shapeshifter that wears the skin of its prey as a disguise. Their eight fingered claws contain a paralytic poison.

The knight introduces himself as Sir Eoin Silvertree,

and informs them that attacking members of the Guardians of Morals is usually punishable by death, but since they also saved their lives from the monsters, he'll call it even, and forget the misunderstanding. For a brief moment, over Ludovic's spirit bond, the party mentally debates whether to kill the knights anyway, but ultimately decides that not everyone serving Elena is necessarily evil themselves.

Sir Eoin then turns his attention to the party and their wagon. Thinking quickly, Kerri convinces him she is a traveling juggler, the others are her bodyguards, and the wagon is full of props.

The Knight offers to help them turn their wagon to head toward civilization, but they decline. He reminds them to be sure to report for inspection once they reach a town, and heads off with his squires in tow.

Wednesday, October 24th, 121st Year of the New Kingdom (BC 736)
Theospine Mountains, Nidala

Kerri wakes up with a painful, insatiable hunger. Leif is concerned, and asks if she's alright. She opens her pack to look for Gondegal's magic bowl and mug, but her bag is inexplicably full of food: nuts, berries, jerky, bread, and more.

She doesn't even notice that Leif has faded away, and unable to help herself, she begins to devour the food.

She looks up from her meal and sees the pack is too large, almost the size of a person. The inside of the bag holds not food, but gory torn flesh. Joel lies before her, eviscerated. He looks up feebly, sword falling from weakened fingers as he lifts it, and weakly croaks, "Look out Kerri, there’s a monster!" She sees her hands covered with soft brown fur; membranous wings connect her arms to her body. She finally realizes it's a dream, and spreading her bat wings, flies up toward consciousness, wind whipping through her hair, feeling absolute freedom. She shares the bad dream with her friends, and Ludovic theorizes that with no new moon in Nidala, her werebat side is trying to break free in her dreams.

Soon, they reach the base of the mountains and set off on the day-long journey across the plains to the edge of the forest. That evening, they set camp just outside the forest.

While Ludovic and Duffy are on watch that night, they both see a flicker of light off in the woods, coming closer. Ludovic wakes Leif and the others up.

They see a white light, silhouetting what appears to be an old man stooped over a walking stick, carrying a sack. The light is perhaps from a lantern they can't see. Ludovic shouts, "Halt!" and the man shouts back, "Is that any way your mother taught you to talk to your elders!" They are relieved to see that it’s Ludovic’s father, the Seer! He continues, "Took a while to find you, son... This blasted forest taxes even my divinations." As he emerges from the forest, they see the light source is actually "William," the Seer's ball of floating light. Ludovic asks suspiciously, "What brings you from the forest?" and he replies, "I have something to show you!" From his sack, he pulls out a small door carved out of ivory, a small piece of polished marble, and a tiny silver spoon.

Ludovic recognizes them as the components for a magnificent mansion spell, which causes Ludovic to wonder, "If he can cast that, why does he live in a hut?"

The Seer casts a spell and his items disappear, leaving a shimmering glow. He asks Ludovic only to come inside with him. Ludovic skeptically follows him, through the opulent rooms of the magical mansion hidden beyond the portal. Finally, the seer reaches a door and asks Ludovic to close his eyes. He leads him into the next room and sits him into a chair before bidding him to open his eyes. At first, he thinks he’s looking into a mirror, but seeing the garish clothing the "reflection" is wearing, he realizes it’s his brother, Dmitri, seated across from him, at a table laden with gourmet food. Dmitri smiles and says, "good to meet you, brother." Ludovic asks, "What brings you here?" and he replies simply, "Father." Ludovic complains to Dmitri that his behavior in Darkon brought Ludovic a lot of trouble, which Dmitri starts to laugh off, when a voice off to Ludovic's right interrupts, "Boys, boys, stop squabbling! Would you care for some pheasant in gravy, Ludovishka?" Ludovic knows its his mother's voice even before turning and seeing her. He angrily pushes back from the table and jumps to his feet saying, "What is this trickery!?" She beams back at him, unfazed, "The whole family, together at last!" He demands, "I don't know who you are but you'd better answer quickly." The Seer attempts to calm him, saying, "You should know by now that all things are possible through magic." "Not bringing back the dead!" counters Ludovic.

The Seer keeps his calm, saying "That’s a very limited view." Madame Natasha says, "You wound me with your words. I've come so far, please sit down and eat." Ludovic retorts, "I will wound you with more than words if you don't explain how you got back." She gestures to the Seer and Dmitri, replying, "You assume they are responsible for it, but they had help. Isn't that right, my lord?"

With that, she looks off to the side, toward a giant bat-winged creature hunched over the table.

It seems unbelievable that Ludovic could have not noticed it before. The thing cackles to itself, and says "I am the Lord of Dreams.

Where is the stone?" Ludovic, completely confused, says "what stone?" The monster grabs Ludovic's mother by the neck with one of its four claws and, threatening to cut her throat with another, says, "Where is the netherstone?" Ludovic bravely says, "I have no idea what you’re talking about. And I'm not convinced this is my mother. So first, convince me that this is my family." The Lord of Dreams lashes out at him with all four claws, and he feels thoughts being leeched from his head.

The dreamspawn throws Ludovic down with disgust, exclaiming, "ugh, the stone is not here!"

As Ludovic wakes up from this nightmare, he yells in pain, but finds his wounds healed, though his mind is still fogged.

He realizes it’s actually Kerri and Joel’s watch, and he's been sleeping. He mutters, "Someone is going to pay!" When Kerri asks what’s wrong, he replies "There’s someone here who’s haunting dreams. They’re looking for a stone." "What stone," she asks? "The netherstone." They wake everyone up to warn them. Kerri tells everyone the story she heard once called "The Shaman and the Stone," in which a shaman uses something called a netherstone to travel to the world of dreams.

Leif thinks how nice it was for Ludovic to see his mother, even if she wasn't real. He thinks to himself, "Now that I'm prepared for it, I'd almost welcome that kind of nightmare every night."

Instead, Leif has pleasant dream about hunting with Kukri and other everyday things.

Thursday, October 25th, 121st Year of the New Kingdom (BC 736)
The Western Plains, Nidala
The party awakes in the morning, at the edge of the forest. After Duffy finally removes the magical component that creates the miniature dragon illusion,

they shove the projector just inside the woods, depending on the eerie amorphous nature of the Forest to ensure that it will never be found again. Duffy also keeps some of the more interesting looking mechanical parts.

Then they follow the treeline north to the River Finn, and using the river as a guide to hopefully prevent getting lost,

they head into the gloomy and sunless woods.

Friday, October 26th, 121st Year of the New Kingdom (BC 736)
The Phantasmal Forest, Nidala

After camping for the night in a clearing along the river, they set out again, and after a few more hours of fruitless hiking, reach the fork that they expected, based on the map in Suriana's Book. Hoping that this lost Abbey might be in the ruins of Avonleigh, they cross to the northern shore at the fork, intending to set off toward the road labelled King's Highway. But soon after crossing, Kukri smells "death," in a clearing up ahead. When they reach the clearing, the reason is obvious, as a pair of rotting, nearly skeletal corpses are lying in the center. While searching the remains, Ludovic's Ethereal Empathy picks up a vision of a lady and a man getting suddenly attacked by ghouls.

Having seen no other sign of the Ahltrian, they contemplate setting a trap here, but are worried that they could be ambushed as easily as this couple was. Regardless, they are resolved to give the victims a proper burial, and they delegate the task of digging to Joel, while figuring out what to do next. But they are interrupted when Joel finds more bones buried just under the surface.

After finding a relatively unused area of the clearing, they bury the victims, and lunch on some rations while talking over what to do next. Only Ludovic is comfortable enough around the dead to sit in the clearing, while the others eat in the nearby woods.

Setting camp, Leif notices a ghoul creeping up on the clearing, and mentally alerts Ludovic.

Ludovic mentally replies, "Try to take it alive... relatively speaking." The decayed undead ghoul leaps at Ludovic with inhuman speed and bites him in the shoulder. The wound burns intensely. A deathly stiffness creeps through his body, spreading outward from the wound. Toxin spreads through his body, making even the slightest movement almost impossible. Breathing becomes unthinkably difficult and the beating of his heart is a taxing burden. Lurking beneath it all is an oily wrongness, the touch of something perverse and wholly inhuman.

The ghoul leans into his frozen face and says "Shouldn't go in the Forest alone, Now you’re alone with me!" But the creature is sadly mistaken as Duffy blasts a hole in its chest with his pistol, and Leif tackles the ghoul and ties him up.

After some awkward negotiations, the ghoul agrees to lead them to the library, in return for not burying him deep underground where he'll "starve" for an indeterminate number of years.

The Ahltrian's requests for just a small taste of human flesh fall on deaf ears. Securely tied up, and tethered to Leif, the ghoul leads them back along the river that they'd been following.

But oddly, when they come to what seems to be the same fork in the river, they arrive from along the opposite branch than what they thought they'd been following.

After crossing to the southern bank, they reach a clearing, which Leif's keen eyes confirm as the same clearing where they set camp the night before. They camp for the night, and take up the usual watch schedule. The ghoul says he's stronger than the flesh, and doesn't need to sleep, so Leif tries get some more information from him during his watch. He learns that many humans have reached Forenoon Abbey, but only one escaped, presumably Sharon, by shining a bright light from her hands and a metal circle.

Meanwhile, Ludovic wakes up, his eyes snapping open, but he finds himself unable to move.

After trying unsuccessfully for a few moments to move or call for help, Ludovic sees his own hand move in front of his face and flex of its own accord. Despite his growing horror, he feels a grin spread across his face, and his body begins to stand up. Realizing the truth, Ludovic calls out mentally, "Taige, is that you?" and his body replies, "Yes, it's me, Ludovic." Unfortunately for Ludovic, his telepathy spell has worn off, and the only one who hears his psychic cries for help is the surly ghost who's finally succeeded in taking over his body. Leif asks Ludovic if he's alright, and Taige says he's fine, but he just wanted to study some spells. Leif seems to think this is odd behavior on Ludovic's part and starts questioning him, but Taige brushes off the interruption and pulls out his spellbook.

After studying for a short time, he begins scribing strange symbols on a piece of blank paper. Ludovic quickly recognizes what he's doing and tries to stop him, but is as powerless as Taige usually is.

Taige holds up the finished magic runes and says nonchalantly, "Hey Leif, take a look at this!" As Leif reads the page, a smoky brown snake lashes out from the page and encases him in a crystal prison.

Meanwhile, Duffy is working in his workshop, tinkering with Vir's head. It does not occur to him at the moment that he doesn't have a workshop of his own.

The nonexistent setting seems perfectly normal, as one of his recent inventions scratches out a playful tune to fill the silence.

But as Duffy reaches deep inside the head to set a gear in place, tiny spring-loaded clamps pop out from the neck's inner surface and grab tightly onto his hand.

Then two tiny gear-driven buzzsaws orbit his wrist, slicing his hand cleanly off! Duffy screams in horror

and reflexively grabs for the head with his other hand, hoping to free his severed hand from within. But a thin, razor-sharp loop of wire ejects from Vir's ear and loops around Duffy's wrist, constricting tighter and tighter until his other hand is severed as well. With a deep chuckle, the head rolls over to a pile of spare parts and the heap of machinery starts to stand up, in a lumbering, roughly humanoid shape, [BIG green 1] with Vir's head on top, and Duffy's lifeless hands dangling mockingly from the ends of its arms. Faced with this preposterous monstrosity, Duffy's mind finally registers that he's dreaming, a nightmare of incredible magnitude.

Ludovic, however, has not yet discovered the same truth. In his dream, he once again tries to reign in Taige through diplomacy, but Taige simply points his fingers to his hijacked head, and blasts Ludovic with a ray of spirit-wracking energy.

The force of the blow knocks Ludovic's spirit free from his own head, [green 1] and he floats in the air, watching helplessly from the outside as Taige pulls out a dagger and slices the sleeping Joel's throat.

Kerri, meanwhile, is in the midst of her own bad dream. She finds herself trapped in an apparently abandoned building, with the distinct sense that she's being chased. Determined to turn the tables on her pursuers, she sprouts leathery bat wings and flies up to the ceiling where she hangs on and lurks in wait...

Determined to take control of his dream, Duffy wills himself to sprout a pair of pistols from the ruined stumps at the end of his arms, and ducks behind a workbench, ready to spring out and blast the mechanical monstrosity.

But behind the bench is something even more unexpected:

A tall, dark haired man, dressed in bizarre fashion, he wears a surreal outfit stitched together from hides of impossible looking creatures. [red 6] He complements Duffy on his realization that "permanence is an illusion," and Duffy deduces from his primitive clothing that he might be the Shaman of Kerri's story.

Duffy asks him if he knows anything about the netherstone. Indeed, he is looking for the stone as well. He says, "We must find it before the dreamspawn do. Your friends are in danger. We must go." "Agreed," replies Duffy. The shaman tells Duffy to concentrate, and step out of the dream, but Duffy can't quite do it.

As the machine bears down on them, the Shaman touches Duffy's shoulder and shows him how. They are suddenly in a vast field of shimmering bubbles, each one apparently holding another person's dream. Far in the distance, beyond the bubbles, Duffy can make out a forest, and in the other direction, cliffs dropping to a raging sea. The Shaman calls this place The Terrain Between, and then introduces himself, saying that he calls himself "Walks Alone."

Walks Alone leads Duffy into one of the bubbles, and they emerge in Kerri's dream, where the door of the dilapidated room slams open, revealing her mysterious pursuers.

Dr. Van Richten [red 2] stands in the doorway, armed with a crossbow loaded with a gleaming silver-headed bolt. Three of his companions [red 3-5] are close behind, also armed with silver weapons. The Doctor shouts, "Get those monsters," pointing to Duffy and Walks Alone. But before they can attack, Kerri shrieks a magically enhanced scream that blasts the four men.

As the three companions die, they shift into a gooey, liquid silver humanoid shape momentarily and then disappear. They look exactly the same as the creature Duffy saw leap from Ludovic's head, which Leif saw jump into Kerri’s head, back in Darkon.

Though damaged, "Van Richten" remains standing, and Duffy quickly wills the door to shut and sturdy locks to appear, holding it shut.

Temporarily safe, Walks Alone explains to them that the netherstone is a portal between the waking world and the Nightmare Lands. He pulls a cloth from the air, colorful on one side, plain on the other, and also a needle and thread, with a pebble tied to the end of the thread. He explains that one of these creatures, a Morph, found a weakness in the barrier between the waking world and the Nightmare Lands, known as a Nether Portal. The dreamspawn slipped through, taking the key to shut the portal with it, which allowed it to punch back through into the dreamtime, creating a second weakening of the barriers. To illustrate, he pushes the needle through cloth from the decorated side and pulls until the pebble breaks through, then repeats the process from the plain side.

Now other dreamspawn have learned of this and are searching for the way out. They feed on fear, guilt, and despair and they seek to sow those dark emotions in the waking world. The barrier must be resealed. The morph with the key must be found, and the key must be returned to seal the breaches. The dream spawn know that the breaches are in this area of the Web of Dreams, among the dreams of the party or their close friends or enemies. "But the morph is somewhere in your dreams and it must be found to seal the breaches." Suddenly, the shaman is distracted for a moment, then tells them he cannot stay, "Someone is bothering my body. I must return to it. I will see you again." Then he disappears abruptly.

Duffy and Kerri concentrate and are able to step out of Kerri's dream and into Ludovic’s, where his spirit is engaged in a wizard's battle with his body, still controlled by Taige. Ludovic flies up into the air, raining magic on Taige's bear form.

But Taige takes the form of Skeever the Imp, and flies up to meet him, moonblade in hand.

Ludovic plunges into the ground, his incorporeal spirit form passing down through the earth.

Eventually, he hits a pocket of air within the ground, and within it is the dining room of his father's magic mansion from his previous dream.

At the table are Duffy, Kerri, and the creature that called itself the Lord of Dreams.

With Duffy and Kerri's help, Ludovic dispatches the dream creature, and all three of them wake up.

They brief Leif on their dreams, and Kerri mentions that Walks Alone's mention of "The Nightmare Lands" rings a bell to her.

Before the Great Upheaval, where the Nocturnal Sea is now, there once was a place called the Nightmare Lands. But it disappeared when the mists rolled in over it during the Upheaval. A few years later, when the mists rolled out again, the Nightmare Lands were gone, and the Nocturnal Sea was revealed.

Eventually, they let Leif get some rest, still tethered to the ghoul, but he has a strange dream as well...

Tendrils of mist creep up around him, emerging from the grass and surrounding trees. The misty fingers dance across his chest and through his hair, like the caress of lover. The mist coalesces into a figure in the darkness... into the shape of Suriana! [red 1] But she's clad all in black, form-fitting silk, and her hair is darkened to a deep auburn; it cascades wildly down her shoulders. But, having been prepared, Leif quickly realizes that it's a dream. He fights showing any emotion, though he doesn't even know what to feel. She says that the Mists have shown her the way. "The Mists aren't evil, they're everything," she says, as a wisp of mist dances across her hands like a spider. She thanks him for showing her to her true path, tells him that the Guardians didn't understand her destiny, and asks him to join her. He demands, "What do you want? What is your purpose here?" "All I want is you," she replies, pressing uncomfortably close. Leif fights himself again, not knowing how to feel but the knowledge that this is a dream overpowers his emotions. He asks, "Are you really who you appear to be? Or are you the Lord of Dreams?" She frowns for a moment and says "Of course I'm not her. She’s never coming back, and it's all your fault," as dark bolts of energy fly from her hands and Leif feels their foul energy coursing through him.

Leif demands, "What is the netherstone?"

but when she doesn't answer, he strikes her down with his staff and she disappears.

Leif attempts to hold onto the dream and not wake up, and manages to dream a bit longer.

He concentrates and thinks of his mother until she appears before him.

He knows she's not real, but he asks her to tell him something new, hoping she might show him something useful in his subconscious that he'd forgotten. She lays a hand on his shoulder and the world changes around him. He's back in Krezk, Barovia, sitting with Conrad in the ashes of their family home, grieving the sudden loss of his mother, Sharon. The crowd of villagers is gathered around, their sad, piteous faces all showing genuine concern... except for one old, balding man, with a long white beard. Unlike the others, his unfamiliar face shows only a slight smug smile of satisfaction.

Leif catches only a glimpse of him before he fades into the crowd, and Leif returns to the dream-clearing in the forest with the apparition of his mother, and then finally wakes.

Saturday, October 27th, 121st Year of the New Kingdom (BC 736)
The Phantasmal Forest, Nidala
Thankfully, the ghoul is still there in the morning. As far as they can tell, everything is real now. The ghoul seems to sense their unease and mockingly asks, "So, are you all well rested?" Leif's only response is to re-spritz the ghoul with perfume.

The ghoul continues to lead them along the river, toward where they entered the forest. When questioned, he says it will take a half day, and as promised, half a day later, he giggles, "We’re here."

Up ahead, the river leads to a clearing, inexplicably sitting along the path they'd followed into the forest. It's now midday, and they see a walled complex in the clearing, built along the river. It looks like they would have practically walked through it on the way in, it if it was really there. Leif asks, "Does the library move?" The ghoul laughs and says, "No, but the forest does." Approaching closer, they can see the decrepit main building of the Abbey.

The windows were once stained glass, but have all have been shattered. Shards of glass, like rows of fangs, lining the inside of stone maws, glitter in the faint light.

Sunk into the ground in front of the building is a huge golden disc with the symbol of Belenus engraved on it. Kerri sprouts some wings

and takes a quick flight around the abbey to reconnoiter.

She reports back to the others that there are several outbuildings in addition to the main building, which has some sort of domed chamber at the rear.
The whole compound is surrounded by a wall, and the river runs straight through the grounds, passing through culverts in each wall.

Also, it looks like the wooden supports at the top of the bell tower were cut with an axe, causing the disc to fall.

Leif tells their ghoulish guide to take them to the library, but the monster refuses to go any further. When reminded of his deal, he simply smiles confidently and sits down, apparently unafraid of retribution now that he's "home."

They leave him and head into the complex, but Kukri senses something not right in the bushes flanking the entrance, so Leif thwacks them.

Up close, it's clear that they’re Bloodroses, [green 1-4] and the party makes short work of them.

Duffy finds some sort of magical trap engraved onto the step, and scratches out a few key runes to disarm it.

Exploring the main abbey, they are confronted with a giant globe of glowing hands blocking the main hall. [pale blue circle] Ludovic recognizes the spell from an ancient text, a barrier that can only be crossed by those who worship the same deity as the caster.

Trying to determine who cast the spell, Leif attempts to push forward through, and he can, albeit slowly and with much effort. Ludovic and Kerri guess that perhaps his connection to Belenus through his mother is enough to work.

Not wanting to risk being separated from the group, Leif rejoins them as they enter a side room to skirt the barrier.

In this next small room,

Duffy and Ludovic pass by a wash basin and shelf of rotted towels. But just as they call for the others to follow, dozens of severed, animated hands [little red dots]

spring from the basin and the shelf, trying to bear them down to the ground.

While the macabre critters have trouble hurting the battle-hardened party, they prove tricky to destroy, hiding within clothing and taking cover by darting between their legs. Duffy struggles to keep focused, as the severed hands bring memories of his recent nightmare to the surface.

Eventually Kerri has had enough and fills the room with a shriek that shatters the hands and leaves her friends' ears ringing and heads pounding.

As they catch their breath for moment, Duffy hears a muffled cry from the next room, as well as some garbled chanting. They burst in the door and face a foul stench and a horrifying sight: four Ahltrian ghouls [green 1-4] sharing the meal of a paralyzed man [blue dot] laid out across a banquet table, as a fifth [green 5] Ahltrian stands at a pulpit, reading from a book in a harsh, guttural language.

Duffy, wearing Azalin's crown

under his hat, can understand the chanting clearly. The four feasting ghouls break off their meal, one to try to escape with the victim, and the others to attack Leif, who is first through the door.

The other continues to read his unholy liturgy...

"Long ago the Great Kingdom was a shining beacon of hope. Thirteen provinces bound together, protected by the Knights of the Circle, an order of paladins dedicated to Belenus, the sun god. Beyond the borders of the Kingdom lay the Southern Empire, under its just and noble ruler, the Grand Caliph Mudhar ab Sang. The peaceful and naïve folk of these lands were ill prepared for the arrival of a greater power. The Ebonbane." After this, and each other time he mentions the name of The Ebonbane, the other ghouls pause in their attack to call out responsively, "Long may he reign!"

"Ebonbane, god among fiends, ruler of dark places, corrupter of mortals and lord among demons. The Ebonbane..." "Long may he reign!" "...fixed its sight on these lands, dominated ab Sang, and turned the ancient empire to evil and demon-worship. With the Southern Empire befouled, the shadow fell next on the Great Kingdom.

"The Grand Caliph’s elite servants, the Ahltrian, were reforged into an army of assassins, who clashed with the holy warriors of the Circle in a bloody conflict known as the Heretical Wars. During the war, the Ahltrian Lysander Greylocks led a strike on the city of Hammerlin, and captured a Knight of the Circle, a young paladin named Kateri Shadowborn, defender of the Province of Avonleigh. Lysander subjected her to unspeakable torments, but shockingly, her will could not be broken. And during her ordeal, Lady Kateri learned of the true nature of her foe."

Leif grabs for the victim and gets into a tug of war with the ghoul, eventually pulling the poor fellow onto the floor at his feet. Leif is then struck by two big blows

and falls unconscious, thinking death has finally caught up to him.

As usual, he hadn't let anyone know how terrible he felt after the fights with the shrubbery and claws. Adding insult to injury, the ghoul climbs on top of the fallen Leif to fight the others through the doorway, and when they finally slay it, its body sprawls on top of both Leif and the hapless victim. By the time all the ghouls are slain, there is a huge pile of bodies blocking the door, and Ludovic the bear digs through them to free the two humans at the bottom.

After healing Leif, they wait for the paralysis to wear off and cautiously question the man they saved. (Experience has taught them that needing a rescue is one thing, but earning trust is another.) The grateful man's name is Holger Boyd. He was camping in the plains with Kip, his companion. They had been hunting, and Kip was on watch, while Holger slept. "Next thing I knew, I was getting dragged into this building." Ludovic asks, "What town do you hail from?" and Holger replies, "Well, I grew up in Skorrlag." Leif wonders privately, assuming that the guy is telling the truth, if he knows Leif's newfound family. Holger asks if they've seen Kip, "a young boy... my height, brown hair, that kid always had his head in a book. I should have known better to let him keep watch. I hope he survived."

Holger recovers his longspear from under the table

and says "There’s one more thing I need to know. Where do you stand on Elena Stranglehold?" When Leif asks who Elena "Stranglehold" is, he relents, "Fine then, Elena Faith-hold if you must." Kerri says, "Yeah, we don't like her." Holger smiles and says, "Then you’re good in my book." Kerri shows him the dragon projector. In awe, he says, "Got to show The Wolf this." Confused, they ask about The Wolf, and he explains, "The Red Wolf. He’s the leader of what we call The Pack.

The Stranglehold calls us bandits... We live here beyond the mountains where she can't reach. But to have proof that the dragon is only trickery, that’s something we can use against her."

Badly beaten, they decide to barricade the doors, and stay here for a day to rest up and heal. Holger agrees to stay with them until they leave the Forest.

Sunday, October 28th, 121st Year of the New Kingdom (BC 736)
Forenoon Abbey, Nidala
They try to read the book the chanter was reading from, but only Duffy, wearing the crown, can translate. Picking up where the ghoul left off, he reads "... she dedicated herself to ridding her world of the evil of The Ebonbane.

"And she succeeded. Lady Kateri's forces gradually drove back the Ahltrian. At the battle of Sined Pass, she took captive her former tormentor, Lysander. But rather than exact revenge, the paladin repaid hatred and malice with compassion and sympathy. With the divine aid of her god, she purged him of the influence of Ebonbane and then brought him to join the monks of Forenoon Abbey. There, he embraced a life of penitence, in the service of the Moon Goddess, Brigit, and became Kateri's trusted advisor. Finally, after four years of war, Lady Kateri faced the Grand Caliph himself and expelled the dark force within him from her world. Mudhar ab Sang was restored to his true self, but he could not bear the weight of the atrocities committed through him and soon took his own life. Both the Great Kingdom and the Southern Empire started to rebuild, and Lady Kateri put down her sword..."

That night, Kerri is the only one who has a dream. She is in the labyrinthine building again with Van Richten stalking her. She sees the shaman, Walks Alone, who shows her a wicker hoop, decorated with feathers, string, and beads: a dreamcatcher. He says she must make one herself, in the waking world.

He also tells her that her friend (Duffy) has "great potential." As the dreamspawn-Van Richten thumps at the door, about to break through, Walks Alone says, "Perhaps you should wake up now. Until you exist again..."

Upon waking, and tending to the wounded, Kerri scrounges up some beads from her entertainer's outfit, feathers from Leif's arrows, and some wicker from the basket holding her healer's kit, and sets to work on her assigned project. Eight hours later, she's close, but can't quite get everything to line up and stay stable like the shaman's dreamcatcher.

Some thumping and snarling from outside disturbs their sleep, but the barricades hold, and none of the Abbey's residents manage to break in. Having rested up some, the group packs up and keeps exploring, into the next room, apparently an empty kitchen. As they are about to pass through to the door on the far side, Holger warns them to be cautious. He has noticed that the chimney of the fireplace doesn't quite connect to the ceiling.

Leif, at least, isn't surprised; he remembered that there was no chimney outside, and was suspicious of the fireplace as well. Duffy takes some shots at it, and rather than ricochet off the bricks, they plunge into them, leaving bizarre, gooey wounds. As Holger charges the "fireplace" [red rectangle] with his spear, he is surprised to be grabbed from the side by the legs of a table [brown rectangle] he was running past.

A fierce battle ensues between the party and the sticky, mushy table and fireplace. Joel and Duffy both lose their swords to the creatures' adhesive coating and get grappled by the table, while Leif manages to pull his staff free from the fireplace, only to get squeezed by a faux-brick pseudopod. Duffy keeps pulling weapon after weapon from his sheathes as each gets stuck to the creature after one hit. Wanting to avoid a repeat of the ghoul fight in the dining room, Leif sheepishly admits over the mental connection that that he probably won't be able to take another squeeze. His remaining friends that are still mobile manage to assist him in killing the creature before he has to find out. Holger also takes quite a beating from the creatures, nearly dieing, but once again they manage to save him. Retrieving their weapons from the bodies of the aberrations, they proceed to the next room.

They find themselves back in the foyer, on the other side of the ghostly barrier. Leif searches the area and find some faint women’s footsteps in the dust.

Evening approaches, but they resolve to spend a few more hours in exploration, heading first into the golden dome at the rear of the building. It appears to be a chapel, with a central altar surrounded by circular pews. The altar is a flat stone table carved in the shape of Belenus's symbol, but a vile-looking black sword is plunged into it, cracking the stone. Ludovic sees an armored lady kneeling at the altar that no one else can see. [red 12] Her armor is covered by a red tabard with a black hawk symbol, and her black hair is short, save for a coil of long hair over her shoulder.

Ludovic approaches and asks if she can hear him. She looks up at him with anger, and hisses "Be gone, do not disturb me." Undaunted, he asks, "To whom are you praying?" She begins to sob, clutching at the altar, "He won't answer. Why won't he answer me?"

He asks, "Can you see the sword on the symbol?" and she grunts, "Yes." But then starts to wail again, "I have failed! I have failed. I wasn't strong enough!"

Ludovic asks, "Are you a knight of the Circle?" She replies, "I hope that I am, but Belenus won't answer me!" She seems to be getting very agitated, and then abruptly sinks into ground.

Meanwhile, Kerri senses that the sword in the altar is vaguely magical. Duffy attempts to pull out the sword, and much to everyone's surprise, out it comes. But suddenly it shatters in a hail of shards, screaming in a guttural, inhuman cackle of evil. Once the sword is gone, the feeling of uneasiness that once pervaded the chapel is gone as well.

The lady ghost rises back up from the floor to declare forlornly, "Master will be furious," before sinking back underground. Apparently her "master" is no longer Belenus.

Kerri looks at one of the books in the chapel; it's written in Abyssal. Borrowing the crown, she sees that it's a copy of the Libram of Ebonbane, but slightly more complete than the last one.

"...Lady Kateri put down her sword... One year later, the last three remaining Ahltrian met in secret to summon their master back into their world to seek its vengeance. They created a magic blade to house the fiend’s abyssal spirit, and once sealed in the sword, Ebonbane’s first act was to draw the very life-force from its servants, remaking them as powerful undead slaves. Then, The Ebonbane began the grand quest that would come to define its existence: The complete and utter destruction of the woman who had defeated it, and the absolute corruption of all she held dear.

"The Dark Triad, as the last of the Ahltrian called themselves, brought the unholy sword to Forenoon Abbey, killed all who dwelled there, and shared with them the curse of undeath and the domination of Ebonbane. Then, wielded by the traitor Lysander, the sword-bound demon sought out its nemesis at her manor. Kateri greeted her old friend at the door, but immediately sensed the truth. Kateri and the dominated monk fought a long and exhausting duel, but eventually Ebonbane shattered the blade of Kateri’s holy avenger and struck down the paladin."

She summarizes to the others, "The Great Kingdom was good. Ebonbane, lord of evil, made a neighboring kingdom corrupt. The Great Kingdom's Knights of The Circle, led by Kateri Shadowborn fought back. She was captured, tortured, and escaped, then captured Lysander, the minion of Ebonbane that tortured her. She forgave him, and brought him to Forenoon Abbey to worship Brigit the Moongoddess. Then Kateri defeated Ebonbane, but the last three Ahltrians got together and trapped Ebonbane in sword. Ebonbane swore to defeat Kateri Shadowborn. The Dark Triad brought the sword to Forenoon Abbey, where Ebonbane dominated the traitor Lysander, then used his body to kill Kateri Shadowborn."

The group concludes that all the traps and guardians seem to be placed to protect the upstairs, where they can just make out the shape of some bookshelves -- the library they seek!

Duffy and Leif creep upstairs stealthily and hide among the shelves. They see a man in a red cloak [red 1] seated at the far end, scribing something in a book.

Leif carefully removes a book from the shelf, and is surprised to see a leering ghoulish face peering through from the other side. The ghoul lashes out through the gap and rakes Leif across the face with his toxic claws.

Seeing Leif in danger, Duffy shoots the red-robed figure and shouts, "call off your monster!" The man in red replies calmly, "Is that any way to enter a library? Show yourself if you seek knowledge." Most of the party cautiously enters the center of the Library, with Joel and Holger guarding the rear downstairs, and Ludovic in imp form on Leif's shoulder. The ghoul, [green 1] and several others like it, [green 2-4 and 9] spread out in the darkened corners of the library to watch their leader speak with the outsiders, and hope for a meal to soon follow.

The party first asks, "Who was the lady in the chapel?" The Abbot answers, "That was Dasmaria, one of Ebonbane's triumphs." The ghoulish choir responds in unison, "Great is the Ebonbane! Great are His works!" Ludovic asks mentally through Leif, "How long have you been the Abbey?" and the reply is, "Oh, for a few centuries," as the Abbot stands, revealing more fully his decayed form. Someone asks what he's doing here, and he explains, with awe, "Kateri’s death was only part of Ebonbane’s revenge. The next was the destruction of her legacy. Even now, at the heart of the Phantasmal Forest, the god-fiend lies plotting, sending his minions forth to corrupt those people and places Kateri loved -- each one drawn into a prison of torment, floating through the Forest, like bubbles on an oily pool."

"I am but one of many," he concludes with sadness. "Ebonbane's will is strong, stronger than me. My name is Lysander." As they'd surmised, he is the member of the Ahltrian, who captured Kateri and tortured her, but was forgiven and rehabilitated by her, before Ebonbane used him to destroy her.

Leif says, "Many come here to seek knowledge. Tell me of the one who survived." Lysander tells him "The other was a woman alone. She sought the knowledge of the true path of Belenus." "Is that book still here?" Leif asks. "Yes," says the monk. Leif continues, "I would like to take a look." The Abbot asks him, "Why do you seek this knowledge?" and Leif answers, "I don't know yet. Perhaps the answer will be in the book." The Abbot presses him, "What brings you here?"

But Leif replies literally, "The ghoul outside the window behind you."

Lysander walks over to the shelf and pulls out one book, and places it on a reading table, saying "That is what you seek, the truth of Belenus before his worship was corrupted by the Knight-Protector."

Ludovic asks, "How long ago was it corrupted?" He replies, "It is the 121st year of her New Kingdom." Ludovic presses further, "How does she live so long? Our kind don't live that long." Lysander replies, "Elena Faith-hold is one of the trinkets collected by Ebonbane. But perhaps the greatest of all since she corrupted herself." It is clear that the undead monk says Elena's name with love.

Kerri asks, "What happened to Ebonbane’s sword... the one that you wielded?" "Ebonbane still lurks in the forest," Lysander's expression reverts to awe as he proclaims, "Ebonbane is the forest."

While they talk, Leif is furiously flipping through the book; it is The Libram of Belenus, like the one he read before in the temple in Nidala. It starts out the same, but is a lot longer, with many more details. Unlike Elena's censored version, it describes how Belenus led the pantheon of gods: Brigit, the goddess of the moon; Diancecht, the god of healing; and others, and how they worked together to create the world in their image.

Lysander recalls that Sharon asked about Elena and how Nidala had come to this, and most importantly, how she might be defeated. He told Sharon then, "To defeat her, you must know why she is here."

Leif asks, "Why did Elena go around burning villages?"

Lysander explains, "As I said, she is the most prized of Ebonbane's collection. A paladin, trusted friend of Kateri Shadowborn and fellow Knight of the Circle, Knight-Protector of the Province of Nidala. After the Heretical Wars, Elena returned to Nidala a hero. Although she knew herself to be merely a vessel of Belenus’s power, she still basked in the adoration of the masses. After a time, her people’s praise filled her head and she began to see a purpose beyond simply protecting Nidala from evil. She set forth on a crusade to crush evil utterly, followed by thousands of fanatics as devoted to her as to Belenus himself. The forces of evil rose as one to oppose her, and the War of Evil lasted many months, but Elena and the forces of good emerged victorious.

"In the wake of her victory, many Nidalans forsook the other gods of their pantheon, turning from Brigit, Diancecht, and the others to worship only Belenus, as their hero did. As Belenus’s following spread, the few holdouts began to be seen by the people as outcasts, stubbornly refusing to join the 'One True Religion.' The zealots among the clergy came to Elena with vicious lies about the nonbelievers, and eager to please her god, Elena leapt into another holy war against the heathens. It was then that her paladin’s gifts deserted her, as did her unicorn mount; Belenus had withdrawn his approval. But Elena was convinced of her own righteousness, and was certain these tests of faith would only make her stronger. After extinguishing those who would not worship Belenus, she turned among her followers and sought to annihilate those who were not firm allies, and those who were not human. With each purge, she found some new target, some faction not as holy as she, against which to continue her crusade.

"When her divine powers didn't return, she began to doubt, and prayed to Belenus for guidance. Belenus was silent. But something else answered. A swirling fog arose, and when it receded, she found herself in a strange land. As she wandered this new place, she found in each village she encountered, something of the evil she'd eradicated from her own lands. Resolved to cleanse this area of its vile inhabitants, she devised a test. Disguised, she would enter a town and sit quietly in a public place to observe. If she saw more evil than good in one day, she would destroy the village and all its inhabitants. But as fate would have it, her chosen spot was often the center of ill-repute in each town, where evil among the townsfolk was most likely to be seen. Her harsh judgment fell on ten towns before she was once again whisked away by the Mists. She emerged before the Faith-hold Castle, as a wizened old servant welcomed her home to Nidala.

"Now, she is one of us, though she doesn't know it. We love her, and she hates us because we love her."

The party is shocked to learn that she’s an Ahltrian too!

The Abbot continues, "You may wonder why I tell you these things. This is information that all the Ahltrian know, so it is important that you learn it if you are to join us."

With that, the surrounding ghouls begin to close in and attack, and Holger and Joel rush in to assist, and they aren't the only ones. The Abbot calls out, "Dasmaria, why don't you tell them of your fate?" and Dasmaria rises up from below, [red 2] filling the room with a sense of crushing despair.

Lysander prays to Brigit for sanctuary

and Leif finds himself unable to defy the goddess's protection, so he joins Holger, Kerri and Duffy, fighting the ghost and the other ghouls instead, while Ludovic, Kukri, and Joel fight Lysander.

As they approach the monk, there is a sudden huge crash, and a giant bell comes careening down from the belltower above, bashing into Ludovic and Leif before crashing through the floor.

Kukri takes cover under the stairs and is unharmed. The bell is soon followed by a hail of arrows, from archer ghouls [green 5-8] perched in the belltower. Duffy's magic bullets, and Kerri's holy water infused whipvine make short work of the ghostly paladin, Dasmaria, as dozens of heavy books leap off the shelves at them at her mental command.

Leif strikes the final blow, and she whispers an earnest "Thank you," to him, as her spirit disperses.

Meanwhile, the undead monk starts draining the life force from the room to heal himself

and Duffy sees more ghouls approaching outside, pouring from the outbuildings. Especially concerning is a giant, two-headed ghoul [big green 1] that climbs easily up the Abbey walls and crashes into the library through the window.

Duffy takes a few shots at the massive creature, then takes cover behind a behind a bookshelf, where he and Leif see a swirl of mists begin to gather, and much to their surprise, Suriana emerges from within the cloud, seeming to claw her way into reality, struggling against some force that's holding her back. Unlike the Suriana in Leif's dream, her hair is its normal vibrant red, and she wears her usual modest white travelling dress. She reaches out and touches the bookshelf with one hand, her eyes closed in concentration. Then she grabs a single specific book and throws it on the floor before being yanked forcefully back into the bank of mist, which instantly collapses in on itself and disappears.

As Leif rushes to help Joel with the giant ghoul, Duffy tumbles behind the shelf to scoop up the book. The enraged monster shoves the heavy shelf over. Duffy narrowly leaps out of the way, as the shelf smashes into the next one, and the next, and the next, toppling the whole row like dominoes.

Duffy quickly notes that the title of the book is "Ceremonies and Rites of the Church of Belenus," as he stashes it in his pack. Finally able to attack Lysander, Leif once again deals a final blow, destroying the monk. After a string of bad luck, Leif is relieved to be proving himself effective, once again.

He was starting to feel replaced by Joel who was admittedly doing great for their pack in prior battles. Eventually, all the ghouls in the room are dead, but more are approaching from all sides, the party is badly wounded, and Holger lies unconscious, but stable, on the floor. Not wanting to find out whether the supply of ghouls is limitless or not, they run, leaping through the window, and levitating down to the ground on the back of bear-form Ludovic, carefully avoiding a giant shrub of the white bloodroses.

They flee the shambling horde, reaching the forest edge, and the horses, which are miraculously still there.

They head north along river to get out of the forest as soon as possible; as afternoon becomes night, they still haven't reached the edge. They set up camp to rest up and heal. Most are badly injured. Leif observes, while traveling with Holger, that he seems to be quite the woodsman, able to find his way quickly and quietly through the dark forest, which earns him a bit of respect in Leif's eyes.

That night, Leif has a dream about "Dark Suriana" again. Embarrassingly, he finds himself in an opulent bed, beneath silk sheets, with "Suriana" curled up next to him. She stares at him with the eyes of a temptress and demands to know where the stone is. With effort, Leif forces himself awake.

Meanwhile, Duffy refuses to take Kerri's sedative, wanting to try working his way through the nightmares, practicing to gain control of his dreams. Despite his efforts, every twenty minutes of so, Duffy wakes up screaming. On his watch, Leif talks to Holger and reads the book Suriana found. The well-kept book includes ceremonies and prayers for nearly every occasion, including the marriage of a priest or priestess. Since part of the reason that Sharon fled was because she couldn't marry Leif's father, this was clearly one of Elena's corruptions of the Belenite faith.

Monday, October 29th, 121st Year of the New Kingdom (BC 736)
The Phantasmal Forest, Nidala

By mid-morning, they reach the forest's edge, but not where they expected; with some consultation of the map and Holger, they figure out they’re on the north end of Nidala, east of mountains. The Forest must have grown around the northern edge of Nidala as well. After some discussion, they unanimously decide they want to help the resistance, if they can, and ask Holger to lead them to Red Wolf's stronghold. During the two day journey through the mountains, Kerri succeeds in making her dreamcatcher, Ludovic starts to look ill,

and Leif shares with Holger the books’ contents and they agree that Elena must be stopped.

Wednesday, October 31st, 121st Year of the New Kingdom (BC 736)
Theospine Mountains, Nidala
Late in the morning, they reach a cave, deep in the mountains. Holger makes a bird noise, and waits for the proper response before bringing them into the cave complex, a group of connected natural caverns, bustling with a small group of people. As they near, an elf springs to his feet, pointing a nocked arrow and demands, "who are they?" Holger says, "Don't worry Rupert, they're friends. They saved my life." Rupert lowers his bow, grumbling, "Well, I don't like the looks of them." They learn that Red Wolf isn't there, he’s "on his pilgrimage." Holger is surprised, exclaiming, "Already? What day is it?" It’s the last of October.

A lady comes out to greet them and Leif notices the emblem on her brooch is the same as Davvyd and Gavin’s, the symbol of the Morninglord of Barovia. Her name is Nadia, and when they ask if The Red Wolf went to meet Gondegal, she is shocked. "How do you know Gondegal?" she asks, and she is even more surprised to learn that they came across the Mists with him. "But you are not fellow knights," she says, "You would be with him now... Well if you are friends with Gondegal, you are friends of my husband, Irvyne, who is one of the Order." And despite Rupert's glowers, she invites them in. Unfortunately, she won't tell them where the pilgrimage is only that they’ll be back in a few days. Then she suddenly has to leave because she’s not feeling well. While Holger shows the rest around, Kerri and Ludovic follow Nadia discreetly, and find her vomiting by the river in a grotto outside the caves. Kerri wants to help. She sends Ludovic back and tells Nadia she's a healer. Nadia reveals that she's not sick, she’s pregnant. She asks Kerri not to say anything; even Irvyne doesn't know yet. She gives her some anti-nausea herbs and herbs that are good for growing babies.

Back in the caves, the others are meeting the other Pack members and asking questions like, "How long has this uprising been going on?", "How do they get recruits?", and "How do they know to trust the recruits?" But most of the people Holger introduces them to are too concerned about Kip to make much conversation.

Holger introduces Leif and Duffy to the only other woman there; her name is Maureve Spellweaver.

Aside from being a woman, she really stands out from the crowd because unlike the other members of the ill-kempt, ragtag band she’s wearing a beautifully maintained pink silk dress with blue highlights. Like the others, she first asks about Kip, but then agrees to answer some questions, though her demeanor is very aloof, as though they're bothering her. She’s one of the ones who’s been here the longest. She and Irvyne escaped together from the dungeons of Faith-hold castle, with six or seven others. "We’re all that’s left from the first batch, almost ten years ago now." Attempting to sway her to a more friendly disposition, Leif asks, "Where did you get your dress? It’s beautiful." She replies, "It's one of the last things I have from home." "Where’s home?" asks Leif, and with a wistful look, she replies, "very far away." Finally, he asks her, "How do you know Nadia?" and learns that Irvyne rescued Nadia from Elena’s clutches in the past year, fell in love with her, and soon married her.

Ludovic arrives, and Leif introduces them. Testing the waters, Ludovic says, "what is your name?" in Draconic. She’s pleasantly surprised and is interested in getting to know more about Ludovic. They leave together to discuss wizardry and swap spells.

After getting to know the pack, the party settles in to wait for Red Wolf.

On the first night, Kerri tries out the dreamcatcher that she was told to make by "Mr. Walks with Himself," as she calls him. She clasps the dreamcatcher tightly, and she and Duffy sleep while Joel and Leif watch over. In her dreams, Kerri finds herself on a stage and all around are people watching expectantly; she’s standing there with a harp and a stand with music in front of her. She quickly realizes she’s in a dream and tries to will Duffy to come to her dream. Duffy doesn't arrive but Walks Alone does, and, true to his name, he is alone. As the audience grows restless, he tells her that dreamcatcher must be hung over the sleeper. As long as sleepers are near it, it will work. She asks him, if she can wake up, hang it up, then meet him back here. But he tells her that the dreamcatcher will prevent all intrusions, even him. Just then, LeMot Sediam Juste emerges from the wings and walks toward her, his hands extending into creepy claws. She tries to will his hands to fall off, but fails. Walks Alone tells her to run away and wake up, and with some effort, she does. In the waking world, she relays the shaman's instructions and hangs the dreamcatcher. She goes back to sleep and this time, tries to look for the stone. She concentrates on trying to make a happy, pleasant jail for the evil thing in her head. But it seems she needs to practice more, since nothing happens.

Joel watches over her all night. Despite the dreamcatcher, Duffy still has nightmare echoes of his horrifying first contact with the dream creatures.

But at least he seems to have no further unnatural intrusions. While they sleep, Joel and Leif notice that one of the five beads in the middle of the dreamcatcher shatters.

When Kerri wakes and hears about this, she is disappointed to know that the protection isn't permanent, but sets out to create more dreamcatchers, with the help of one of the members of the Pack, who is a craftsman.

During the downtime, Leif tries to teach Kukri a trick,

and probes the Pack members for their history with Elena. They've confronted her forces but never her directly because they’re too scared. Red Wolf is trying to figure out a way to strike against her soon because he’s losing patience, and wants to see his people free. Elena has sent her forces across the mountains to look for them, and they've moved their stronghold several times to avoid being caught. They have to be careful, because Elena has great powers. Her knights are just knights for the most part; none of the other knights claim to be a paladin like Elena does. But at her right hand is an old man named Theokos who is often by her side in inspections. He’s rumored to have magic powers.

Ludovic succumbs to the Moon Madness and runs wild on the third night. After he gets back, Kukri approaches Leif. Kukri tells him

"something really weird happened..." Apparently, Ludovic met up with about a dozen other vistani, and they went off and chanted and "howled" together. Kukri couldn't get close enough to tell more because the other vistani glared at him, and for some reason he couldn't approach any further.

Saturday, November 3rd, 121st Year of the New Kingdom (BC 736)
The Pack's Stronghold, Nidala
Red Wolf and the rest of his men come back, but one wiry man is injured. Maureve gasps and runs to him, furious, "Garik, you fool, what happened? Get yourself to Nadia for some healing!" He complies and Nadia shines her Morninglord symbol and heals Garik with a prayer. Irvyne, the Red Wolf, seems to be so named for the red lacquered wolf-styled armor he wears, under his black and gold Knight of the Shadows cloak.

His wild brown hair and stubbled face give him a look that makes it easy to believe Elena's accusation of banditry. But though he is wary of the party at first, he is grateful to have their help. Once he and his men settle in from their journey, together they will make plans to bring Elena Faith-hold down.

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