An Uneasy Alliance

“I told you I was going to take my time with you the next time we met!”, Rolth Lamm snarled. His eyes were fixed on Tomas with a stare of hatred so intense that the ranger involuntarily took a half step back. They’d found the son of their nemesis hiding out in the Red Mantis headquarters deep beneath Korvosa. His last hideout had been with the derros in the Dead Warrens, and they’d found grotesque evidence of the necromancer’s obsession with creating undead constructs there – bits and pieces of half-constructed or failed experiments in building new creatures from the remains of the dead. He’d obviously continued his work here, to greater success. Two huge creatures blocked the corridor between the party and Rolth: one looked like it had been sewn together from fragments of half a dozen or more different corpses, while the other was an amalgam of bones from a dozen mismatched skeletons.

Inner Sanctum of the Mantis

Jax was invisibly flitting about the pillars supporting the cave roof; he had his wand out and his eyes open for the sniper who’d been harrying the party as they fought. The sniper was in one of the small caves near the ceiling and would only poke his head out long enough to fire his bow. Just then, he saw movement at the farthest end of the cave, and heard the twang of a bowstring and the whistle of arrows. Jax started to raise his wand, but before he could, three more arrows flew from Tomas’s bow. The two archers' arrows passed in mid-air, and there was a scream from the distant cave; two seconds later there was a thud as the sniper’s lifeless body hit the ground.

Kicking the Mantis Nest

“AIEEEE!” Wren’s scream echoed throughout the cavern. She’d been climbing up to the top of one of the ledges flanking the entrance, hoping for a better vantage point to look for potential dangers, but she’d apparently found one instead. Now she came hurtling back down the rock face. She landed hard, apparently unhurt, but flat on her back. The cause of her fright followed right behind her: a horrid creature came flying down the cliff after her. It looked like a naked woman from the waist up (save for the vulture wings growing from its back); from the waist down … well, there was no waist down – just dangling entrails where it looked as if she had been ripped in half.

The Avengers

With a slightly disorienting jolt, the party appeared in the seldom-visited region of the Gray District that hid the secret headquarters of Korvosa’s budding rebellion. After communing with his ancestors to reveal the secret history of the warlord/dragon Kazavon, whose fangs now adorned Queen Ileosa’s crown, the Shoanti shaman, One-Life, had agreed to travel to Korvosa with the party, to consult with Thousand Bones and Field Marshall Kroft on how the Shoanti might be able to aid the rebellion.

The party descended into the mausoleum that housed the secret entrance, and spoke the password – ‘Blackjack’ – that allowed them to enter. As they came into the headquarters’ meeting room they saw Cressida Kroft sitting at the table, her head down and cradled in her hands. Bishop d’Bear stood behind her, her hand on her shoulder, while Thousand Bones and Boule stood off in a corner, eyes averted. As the group entered, Kroft raised her head, and her eyes were red from crying. “Vencarlo Orsini is dead!” she sobbed.

The Saga of Kazavon

One-Life, the Shoanti Sun-Shaman, marched in silence with the party as they made their way away from Citadel Vraid. The party stayed well away from the village of Colmar, remembering their anti-Shoanti bias. Several of them tried to make small talk with the Shoanti, but their efforts earned nothing, not even a grunt.

Jailbreak!

 “We obviously need to report back to the Lictor,” Wren insisted. They’d gone to Hell and back (literally) in order to get Lictor DiViri to agree to release the Shoanti shaman, One-Life, into their custody only to discover that the Hellknight jailer who’d been guarding him had apparently traded him to some devil in exchange for a Hell Hound. At least that’s what the other prisoners had told them. Either way, One-Life was nowhere to be found, and to Wren’s mind, that was DiViri’s problem, not theirs. “We had a deal with him, and he hasn’t held up his end of it. He seems like an honorable man – or at least someone who believes in rules. Once we tell him his man cheated us out of our prisoner, I’m sure he’ll send his people in to get him back.”