The escape from Lusteris began in blood and fire.
In the twisting alleys, cult scouts struck first—swift and coordinated. Lyrian ascended the rooftops with practiced grace, taking out a scout before Velara joined him in the fray. But the cultists focused their assault on her, nearly bringing her down. Ferinthria responded with a fireball that scorched two of them to ash, and Lirielle tried to dislodge the last with a firebolt. Meanwhile, Momeline slipped into the shadows with the hammer, unseen. Dravencoles ended the fight with sacred flame, and Lirielle rushed to Velara’s side with a healing potion.
With the immediate threat cleared, Momeline quietly returned the hammer to Dravencoles.
Pressing onward, they came upon a ritual in progress—cultists preparing to sacrifice a halfling bound in chains of shadow. Momeline struck first, vanishing after her blade landed. Lirielle and Ferinthria unleashed volleys of magic missiles, disrupting the ritual. One cultist tried to ensnare Lirielle with magic, but a portent vision she’d seen earlier warned her—she twisted fate to her advantage and resisted the spell. When the last cultist fell, they freed the terrified halfling, Dessie Pindlehop, who chose to join them rather than be left behind again.
Soon after, they encountered Lieutenant Marvos, bloodied and wavering. Though duty demanded he arrest them, the chaos unfolding around him—the dead rising, magic corrupting the sky—led him to let them pass. But the city was not done unraveling. A sandstorm surged on the horizon, and with it, sandwalkers and a dark figure watching from the rooftops. Marvos remained behind. The group fled into the smugglers’ well—Lyrian staying behind to hold the line.
At the bones in the desert, tempers frayed. Tensions between Velara and Tilly boiled over as the party revealed the truth: they possessed the crown. An argument followed, torn between choosing Southaven or the westward path to Balandel. Tilly insisted that knowledge was their only hope; Velara believed they were abandoning those who needed them. Finn brokered an uneasy truce: understanding before action.
Momeline, taking a risk, placed the crown upon her head. What followed was a psychic onslaught—a vision of the crown’s last bearer in their final moments. It nearly killed her.
After resting, the group pressed into the forest. There, they were ambushed by elven wardens. Tilly gave a secret codephrase—“The blue bird chirps softly”—and the elves led them deeper into the woods.
In the heart of Vel Enweir, beneath the branches of a starlit tree, they met Queen Sylanthiel. Suspicious, cold, but not without purpose, she offered a chance to prove themselves. The forest is rotting. Spirits have gone silent. Scouts sent east to Vael’telor never returned. If the party truly carries the weight of prophecy, the Queen said, let the forest be the judge.
The vow was made. The forest now watches.