While Lirielle and Ferinthria headed to bed, Momeline convinced Dravencoles to wait up for her. Ferinthria cast invisibility on the halfling, and Momeline slipped down to the cellar of the Gilded Dragon Tavern to investigate a secret door she’d noticed earlier—its surface etched with strange symbols.
She’d barely found it when Jorin descended the stairs. As he stepped through the hidden passage and began closing it behind him, Momeline slipped between his legs in a heart-stopping near-miss, then Misty Stepped past him through a second door. She followed him through tunnels that opened into an underground common area that led also to a fighting pit. There she watched Brynn Rooke quickly dispatch a massive beast while the crowd roared. At the front sat Jorin, a woman with a glass eye, and an old man whose face she couldn’t see. When Brynn won, the old man stormed out in barely-contained fury.
Momeline followed Jorin back. When he opened the cellar door, he found the rest of the party waiting, they’d come looking for Momeline. Recovering quickly, he offered them wine to celebrate their stay. Momeline and Dravencoles noticed something off and only pretended to drink. Lirielle, Ferinthria, and Landor drank freely. By morning, the three remembered nothing.
The next day, the party split up. Lirielle and Ferinthria went to the library to research the symbols but hit a dead end. Everything on Vaelith worship was locked in a restricted section they couldn’t access without permission from the Master of Letters. Meanwhile, Dravencoles and Momeline met Castellan Verin at the church. He asked about the Hammer of Elandria; Dravencoles admitted having it but said it wasn’t with him. Castellan accepted this, then apologized for their cold reception the day before. King Aldric was very ill, acting rashly, and letting them stay at the Gilded Dragon had been a hard-won compromise. He had a mission for them: he suspected someone was poisoning the King and wanted them to investigate Master Thandril Greymoor, the Master of Coin (and interim Master of Letters). When Momeline asked for resources to help them understand the underground and Vaelith worship, the Castellan provided her with a copy of The Awakening - How the Gods Shaped Our World and a Vaelaen dictionary.
Back at the tavern, Lirielle and Ferinthria were approached by an old man fascinated by Ferinthria’s pink hair and Lirielle’s blue skin. He introduced himself as the Master of Coin and asked them to investigate Brynn Rooke as a suspected Vaelith worshiper. When Momeline returned and heard this, she recognized him instantly. He was the angry old man from The Pit. She suspected his concern for religious purity had everything to do with gambling debts and nothing to do with actual worship. The party agreed to look into it but made no promises.
That afternoon, Ferinthria and Momeline baited Jorin at the bar, loudly discussing Vaelith worshipers until he bit. They mentioned Greymoor’s request, and Jorin warned them off, but Momeline pushed just a bit too far and made it obvious that she remembered the previous night. His expression shifted. He told them to meet him in the cellar at two in the morning.
With time to kill, the party explored Solaris’s shopping district. At the blacksmith, they met Darius Kael (Lord Kael’s cousin) and Ferinthria avoided his gaze when he asked about home, knowing Lord Kael lay comatose back in Southaven. At Velthorn’s Curiosities, Momeline got two magical tattoos from Brynn (Slow and Comprehend Languages), Lirielle got an Illuminator Tattoo, and sold her potion of flying to Corvinus Glasswright for ten thousand gold. They noticed Cassira Velthorn never touched her wares directly. They met the arrogant high-elf owner of the spell shop, Meliora Sunveil, and the friendly elf owner of the textile store, Selvanna Treelace. Selvanna revealed that she is third cousin to Lyrian Brightwind and asked anxiously about Lusteris. The news they shared left her shaken. They finished at Taniel Merris’s bakery, whose warmth stood in contrast to the tense city.
As evening fell, the party returned to wait. Lirielle studied the Vaelaen dictionary and worked out the meaning of the symbols on the cellar door: Ela, Elatar, Vala, Valatar: Life, Death, Freedom, Submission. At two in the morning, Jorin had promised answers.