Date: Twenty Fifth of Febuary, year 810 Post Seminal War (810 PSW)

… --- ...

Job yawned, “somehow I think the Guild Hall might be the best place to check first. Even if we don’t find the Library of Mevada it should have things like bedrooms that we could use. I’ve lost track of the time ever since we went underground but it must be betting close to nightfall.”

Enra bobbed her head in agreement, “it might even have an old Teleport Circle. I’ve no idea how to activate such a thing but it could serve as a way to get back here safely.”

Baar’Miin squinted into the darkness beyond the illumination of the Light cantrips, “light makes us easy to find. Should stay together. Post guards while sleeping.”

Index rolled her shoulders, “even while I rest, I can keep watch. Lead on Enra, let’s at least search the Guild Hall before we bed down.”

It took almost an hour to traverse the unfamiliar streets of Mevada, even with Job finding all kinds of shortcuts and without any traffic to get in the party’s path. The Guild Hall itself was a five-story stone marble block structure. The one story tall emblem was picked out in basalt, as were window frames, arrow slits, and the two-foot tall gargoyles perched on the gutters. A pile of rusted iron straps wrapped around rotted timbers served as the front door. Baar’Miin and Sly were able to lever them open with a resounding crash. The party froze for a long moment, straining their senses, searching for anything threatening. Finding nothing but dust and silence, they headed inside to start their search.

Bein’Doc watched the lights bob in the darkness. This underground city was old, life long fled from its streets. The buildings were too big to be of kobold construction, and the elf-bone in his belt gave Bein’Doc a good idea of who has built the city. Lights meant other living things, other intruders into the city. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to approach them just yet, not when he didn’t know who or what they were. The twisted spires of the mage-homes seemed a good place to scout first; they would be a good place to hide and sleep, and a good place to ambush anyone else looting the city. Bein’Doc had no inclination to go searching for loot himself; the prospect of traps or guard-spells interfering with his objective of capturing the one traitor to trade for the Black Egg was too high.

One of Bein’Doc’s trappers led the way up the stairs into the mage-house. The place was empty of people, its owner long fled with all of his valuables. Scraps of furniture and dust filled the corners, things too heavy and of too little value to take. Bein’Doc nodded, and his trappers started gathering up cloth scraps for nests, happy to be able to sleep in comfort. They would lay traps all the way up the tower as a matter of course, to give them time to flee if the other party came to loot.

Job’s fingers twitched uneasily as he looked about the large common room that the group had selected to camp out in. Something was poking the back of his brain, clawing at the dragon-blooded side of him, demanding that he collect. That he hoard. Job’s nostrils

flared, his scales itched, the hair at the back of his neck stood on end.

Sly was the first to spot the signs, “Job? What’s going on with you?”

“Not sure. ”

“What? I don’t speak dragon dummy.”

Baar’Miin perked up, “I do. Have seen this before. Dragon-blood senses large treasures, unclaimed. Desires to add it to its Hoard.”

Enra frowned, “what, like gold? I thought that was just an adventurer's story about dragons and collecting things.”

Baar’Miin shook her head, “No, is dragon instinct to hoard things. They get itchy, irritated if they don’t. Not sure what Job will Hoard though. Is different for every dragon. Black Drake Hoards power over others, Silver Mother keeps her family bonds.”

Sly slapped her hands together, “then let’s get to collecting! I don’t know about you all, but having a bit of coin to retire on sounds like a good idea. The stipend from the Mage Academy is good, and I can’t argue with the room or board, but…”

Index nodded, “It is not enough to live on. Even one who needs as little as I runs out of coin on occasion.”

Enra cleared her throat, “artefacts should go in a museum, not be sold on the flea market.”

Job shook like a dog shaking off water, “I don’t think we’ll be able to find much in the way of artifacts. This place is open to the sea, I can smell the salt on the air, and that’ll have chewed up a lot of things. The bones were already picked clean too and there wasn’t much in the way of usable furniture in here either.”

Enra sighed, “I can’t argue with that. And since the wedding, I’ve stopped using my family accounts, and the money has been getting short. It’s not pinching, but its not endless either. What do you propose?”

Sly nodded, “Adventurer’s cut, as it’s called on the street. We can only carry small and portable things anyway, so most of the things we’ll wind will be either too large or too not-valuable to take. We look for coins, gems, jewelry, and magic items. Not all of that is useable of course, and I expect the jewelry and some of the magic items to be of historical significance. We can’t justify keeping those, but I expect the Mage Academy has some sort of finder program we can turn them in to for some sort of reward. Gems are a little harder to move, but I think I can find a jeweler or two who’s willing to buy them.”

Enra nodded reluctantly, “let’s limit our search to the Guild Hall alone though. The things in here are less likely to belong to the residents of the city and more likely to belong to adventurers. No desecration of bodies. Agreed?”

There were nods all around.

The first floor of the Guild Hall proved to contain many services for adventurers or paying members of the public. The back of the building was actually a set of semi-public shopfronts where apothecaries, smiths, and the like hawked their wares. Most of the stock was either gone, decayed beyond usefulness, or of dubious value, but three shops proved slightly better preserved than the others. The first was a jeweler’s shop. Most of the displays had been smashed in, looted by the unscrupulous as Mevada was hastily evacuated, but the safe at the back of the store was untouched. Sly set to work with her lockpicks as the others spread out.

The apothecary's stock proved to be only partially looted, and a quick Detect Magic cantrip was enough to parse out which of the dozens of vials were unspoiled. Job and Index picked them over, eventually finding two healing potions, and one each of animal friendship, diminution, stone giant strength, climbing, water breathing, and resistance.

Baar’miin picked through the weapons and armor on display at the smithy. She was dismayed at just how much of it was rusted or tarnished to uselessness by time and the salt air. They did manage to find a single quiver with four enchanted arrows left. Enra gave them an examination, finding no particular magic on them besides a generic enchantment for a little bit of extra penetration and damage.

After fighting with the rusted lock of the jeweler's safe for some time, Sly was rewarded with a click and the door grinding open on rusted hinges. Inside was a gleaming pile of small valuables; twenty small gems including turquoise, bloodstones, and moonstones, and neatly stacked gold coins: five hundred and eighty one in total. She started to sort and evaluate the gems, estimating how much they might fetch when sold.

Job prowled about behind her back, poking through the jeweler's tools, searching for something. He wasn't sure what he was looking for, but his scales istched less and les as he walked amongst the engraving tools. A tingle raced up Job’s arms as he brushed over a set of scrimshawing tools and a trio of ivory blanks. He felt the urge to create, to encapsulate, to preserve memories in art. A quarter of dragonwings cradling an egg, an elf head topped with a crooked tiara and an unrepentant smile, and one more. Job wasn’t sure what it would be other than it would be about Mevada.

Bein’Doc strained his eyes at the lights moving around in the darkness. It has to be that other party again, there wasn’t anyone else down here carelessly giving away their location. But was that… it was! It was an urd flapping about! And there was a golem in the same group, he could see its wooden limbs. It had to be the betrayer and her group. Bein’Doc pondered this development. It was risky to go chasing after them, six on four and a golem seems like poor odds to him. Traps would help even the odds, but Bein’Doc’s plan was complicated by the fact that he needed the betrayer alive, at least for a little while. He decided to wait, to see if the betrayer would try to loot the mage-houses. Bein’Doc and his trappers already had them littered with little surprises.

With the first floor searched and Job happily carving away at ivory in their chosen resting place on the ground floor of the Guild hall, Sly led the rest of the party up to the second floor. The stairs were rickety and rotted, but they held up so long as the party took their time. The second floor landing only had two doorways; one back to the stairs and one into a shopfront of some sort. The shopfront was too decayed to make out what it once sold, so the party moved passed it and into the ‘shop’ beyond. Decayed bookshelves dotted with the rotted leather spines of once-books fastened in place by lengths of short chain formed neat rows. Scroll cases fronted by shattered glass and lined with the dusty remains of disintegrated parchment lined the exterior walls. Behind the front desk sat a single tome; its vellum pages yellowed, cracked, and crumbling; its leather cover faded and frayed. Enra used a gentle Prestidigitation to sweep the dust and cobwebs off of the desk and peered at the tome.

“ ‘The Library of Mevada, Adventurer’s Guild Branch.’ Well, it looks like we’ve found at least part of what we came to find. Some of it might even still be salvageable. Spread out and look for any books or scrolls that are reasonably intact. I’m going to ritual-cast Detect Magic to find any lingering preservation enchantments.”

It took just over ten minutes to ritual-cast Detect Magic, and another twenty to sort through the haze of lingering failed preservation enchantments. But the effort was worthwhile, as it helped the party to pinpoint a single intact book, a cluster of three sealed scroll tube, and a clump of other enchantments in a room on the floor above.

Index scrunched her nose and ran her fingers across the scroll tubes, “it’s an old dialect, but fragments of it show up here and there in the Trebor Library. Not enough that I’m fluent in the language, or proficient in it really, but spell names have stayed rather constant doen the years. The one on the left is a Scroll of Message, the one in the middle is an Ensnaring Strike Scroll, and the last is a Scroll of Control Water.”

Enra perked up at that announcement, “I can add Control Water to my spellbook, though it would consume the magic of the scroll. I couldn’t cast that spell yet either, it’s a level four spell and I only have level two spell slots available.”

Baar’Miin flexed her wings, “save scroll for now, in case we exit out flooded seaside cave? Easier to go down shaft then climb up it when carrying many things.”

Sly tossed her head, “the seaside cave floods with the tide. All we’d have to do is wait for it to go back out. If we started out when the water started to go out, we’d have a little over six hours before it started to rise again. Plenty of time to get to dry ground if we weren't out of the cave yet.”

Enra folded her hands around the scroll tubes and tucked them into her pack. “I can wait until we are back on the surface before adding anything to my spellbook. That way, we’ll have the scroll if we need to use it. And if we don’t need it, I can still add Control Water to my spellbook later.”

Index nodded, “logical. You did mention ‘a cluster of mingled enchantments’ on the floor above. Should we check that out?”

Enra flicked a dismissive hand, “Sly and Baar’Miin can check that over, I need your unique talent with the book we found. It looks like elvish script on the cover, but there’s also dwarven runes and a spiky-curly script I’ve never seen before.”

Index bobbed her head, “Old elvish, Old dwarvish, and Old undercommon. A full translation will take at least a week, but we can at least work out the subject matter while we wait. Might I suggest we check on Job?”

Job Arseoth stared at the third and final ivory blank with a furrowed brow. The imagery for the first two had come so easily, so naturally to him. Job’s scrimshawing work left much to be desired, the quality far below anything sold at obscene markup to tourists on the Trebor wharf, but that didn't matter. The memories contained in the little art-pieces were what mattered. They soothed the dragon in him, sent it back to slumber contentedly atop the two new pieces in his Hoard. Job sighed and set the third blank aside. The memory for it was not yet complete. He nestled the wing-cradled egg and the elf with the smile and crooked tiara in a pouch with the glazed mosaic tile and the empty perfume bottle. Job’s little Hoard of Memories was growing; just today it had doubled in size.

Sly Malon and Baar’miin stared at the iron trunk. It was right where Enra had said the cluster of enchantments was. The problem was the elven skeleton sprawled across the top of the trunk, and of course the fact that the wooden trunk did not appear damaged or degraded at all.

Sly rubbed her nose, “This stinks of a trap.”

Baar’Miin nodded, “might be a mimic. Bones haven't fallen to the floor.”

“How do we check if it is a mimic?”

“Hit it. Wood doesn’t bleed, mimics do.”

“After you then.”

Barr’Miin nodded, “be ready. Don’t let it grab you. Guiding Bolt!”

The ‘chest’ howled in agony as the searing ray of light struck it. The mimic was outlined in faint, flickering flames as it sprouted eyes atop its lid and teeth about its hinged jaws.

“Fuck! No way I’m going to try and stab that, it’d bite my arm off!” Sly pulled out her shortbow and one of the enchanted arrows, took aim, and let fly. The arrow buried itself in one of the mimic’s eyes with a decidedly un-wooden squelch and spray of purple ichor.

The mimic thrashed itself free of the floor sprouted stubby spider legs, and lunged towards Baar’Miin. It crossed the floor quickly, but not quickly enough to catch the evading urd.

“Guiding Bolt!” the searing ray of light charred a tight circle into the floor, but missed the mimic. “Dragon shit!” Baar’Miin quickly took to the air, flinging herself away from the Mimic and back out into the hallway.

Sly followed quickly, snapping another shot at the mimic as she backpedalled. It missed the skittering creature. “We can out run it, keep moving!”

The mimic skittered after the retreating duo, but couldn’t keep pace. It Skreeed in frustration at their retreating forms, its meal denied.

Baar’Miin turned to fight, “Skirmish instead, hit and move. Guiding Bolt!” The ray of blessed light struck the mimic right in the eyes. The mimic skreeed and howled as its top boiled away, leaving only half a jaw ringed by cauterized bubbling flesh. The mimic sagged in on itself, slumping over and losing its trunk-shape.

Sly panted, knocking another arrow, “is it dead?”

Baar’Miin spat on the mimic, “its dead.”

“You want to give last rites to whatever is left of that skeleton then? I’ll see if this thing ate what we were searching for.”

Baar’Miin nodded and started gathering up the bones.

Sly knelt down and poked the mimic’s corpse with the end of a hand scrap of wood. The lower half of the mimic’s jaws flopped open, revealing two throats. Upon investigation, one throat led to an acid-filled stomach, while the other led to a storage pouch of some sort. Cutting the storage pouch free proved to be a messy task, and slicing it open was not easy, but as Sly behelt the items inside she decided it was a worthwhile endeavor. Doubly so if Job or Enra could salvage her stained clothes with magic. The cluster of items inside were all neat and pristine, saved from the ravages of time by their resting place.

A neatly folded leaf green hooded cloak, adorned with a subtle leaf pattern sat at the bottom of the bag, providing a resting-place for the other items. A pair of near-black gloves with a subtle ebony spider web design are arrayed palm up and wrists crossed, holding the last two items. In the left-hand glove sits a long, slender wand of obsidian tipped with a silver spider and a purple gem. In the right-hand glove rests a small leather box with a mithril clasp. Opening it reveals a deck of fifty-six cards, edge on, with neither the faces not the backs visible.

Sly stares at the items for a long moment, unable to tell what any of them do. Bringing them to Job and Enra to determine their properties seems like a good idea, but that deck of cards is calling out to her. Surely drawing one couldn’t hurt?