Location: Star's End Monastery, Takanal, Kashin

Date: Fall, 1332 Avard

Characters: Shauny, Halkad, Morion, Riya

The Star's End payed small rewards for information on rare manuscripts and books that move over the docks in various cities. A harbor agent in Kashin had seen a particularly rare book leave one of the boats, and it was given over to the master tailor Kauvil. The book, as near as the agent and the monks could determine from the brief description, was the only known copy of the holy book of Argunas, the demon god.

The Procurators were sent through sleeting rain and autumn winds to obtain the book. The team was also to pick up supplies and a shipment from the Libranum, the temple of Lul in Kashin. The temple had also sent a priestess of Lul to act as a liaison between the temple and the monastery, and to act as a healer. The priestess, known as Riya, went with the Procurators to Kashin.

The journey to Kashin took almost five days on account of foul weather. The team stopped briefly in Takanal to visit the Temple of the Trees there, where they worked out a deal for additional healing supplies. They also stopped to overnight in Boulderdash at the Procurators Adventuring Guild, where Halkad, Morion, and Halkad met Master Walker for the first time. Master Walker maintained the taxable, on paper entity that was the Procurators, and did so as a front for the Star's End's team.

In Kashin, the team endured light sleeting rain again to canvas the largest city in Rakore for information about Kauvil, before going to the shop itself. One of Kauvil's competitors had experienced a fire in her warehouse, gutting her supplies of cloth. Another of Kauvil's competitors was wanted on murder charges. Twenty fingers from twenty different people had been hidden in various bolts of cloth. Kashin's coroner, a lady associated with the God of Death, Curiss, had confirmed that the owners of those fingers were dead.

It was decided that the sword-mage Morion would go into Kauvil's shop and ask for a cloak similar to the one he owned. Morion had a powerful mage patron at Lok Magius who had given such a cloak to the sword-mage. Morion pretended to be looking to have a similar cloak made for his patron, while Shauny infiltrated the second story of the shop where Kauvil actually lived. Halkad and Riya acted as scouts to assist Shauny should she get caught.

Morion's sly questions were turned back on himself as the intelligent tailor began assessing the sword-mage. When Shauny began to take far too dangerously long inside the second floor of the shop, Riya moved to extricate Morion. Riya's porcelain skin with purplish tint marked her as unique, but apparently Kauvil recognized her as a deva and detailed one of his apprentices to follow her.

Kauvil was a tyrant with his people, even as he turned a smile and charisma on his customers. His apprentices were all terrified of him, and apparently with good reason. Shauny had become trapped in a small room full of mirrors. A small pair of fiery eyes had looked at her briefly, but before she could flee, she seemed to lose all track of time.

Halkad, more cautious of the potential for demonic trouble, used his powers to follow Shauny in and break the enchantment holding her. Acting quickly, he shattered one of the mirrors with his mace, but the act was not enough. The demon poured forth from the other mirrors.

Riya and Morion had shaken their tail and made it to the back of the shop by then. The ice-slicked walls and shutters slowed them briefly, but they were soon able to join Shauny and Halkad upstairs in Kauvil's bedroom as the demon attacked their minds and attempted to draw them into its pink, undulating mass.

Riya's animal companion, a strange bird with ash-colored feathers, aided the battle as teleports interrupted pink blundgeonings, damned souls tore at their minds, arcane powers attacked the demon, and arrows found what solid parts were there and seemed to go unerringly to damage. Kauvil rushed upstairs, but was quickly knocked unconscious in the room of mirrors, even as the demon was blinded by shadow magics and assaulted by chill arcane powers.

The demon was pushed back into the room of mirrors, where it found its summoner unconscious and an easy target. The demon took the easy out, and dissolved Kauvil into a pink mist, before retreating back through the mirrors. The team's magic shattered what mirrors remained, as they quickly found the tome with the holy symbol of Argunas, the Demon God. They fled quickly, the Guard already on its way, and they disappeared into the cloudy, sleety white afternoon of Kashin leaving behind only broken mirrors and a mystery.

Date: THU30JAN2014

DM's Notes: Ross had to cancel at the last moment, so that let Paul bring in a character he hasn't used in awhile. Sommer rolled up a new character that she's been itching to play. Sam and Tab brought a King's Cake, which we attempted to devour in its entirety. And we stayed up way too late trying to finish the fight. Part of that is my fault for dragging out the trip to Kashin and the initial meeting. I may move towards a, “You start this time near…” and leave out all the travel details. Ironically, though, they seemed to have enjoyed last week's icy rain so much that they kept rolling for it at the table. Towards the end of the evening, though, I had to tweak the encounter a bit so that we weren't playing until midnight. DM's prerogative, there, to alter monster stats when no one's looking. Hope everyone had a good time, and Tab sure seemed freaked out by her first demon encounter in D&D. Morion's ability to make the demon vulnerable to cold damage came in handy, as Halkad could do cold damage, as well. It made for a nice one-two punch that did quite a bit more damage. I don't think Morion or Shauny will ever look at mirrors in the campaign world the same way, again.

Reference: Campaign IX

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This was a fun, new adventure for Halkad. It was his first one with the procurators that dealt with an enemy that primarily targeted willpower. I'm glad we had Sommer's character, Riya. Without her, Halkad may have been reduced to a pink mist as well, since the demon monster was drawn to him as a result of Halkad's pact with Sheverash (God of Vengeance). Joe- nice attempt to kill Halkad, but you should know that the Water Shadow won't go down without a fight! Be careful, he may just turn his vengeance upon you!!!

Mwaaa ha haaaaaa….

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