Deathly Visage - 30/12/2021 - A Kavel Perspective

Sorrel’s Party

It was good!

Sorrel is no longer cursed, and she has devoted herself to Selune, and best of all, now she is no longer afraid of hurting her friends involuntarily, which means; she can get back into heavy club training with me again!

We had some drinks at the Dragon, since it’s close to the Temple of Selune. Sorrel ate cooked meat, which was a pleasant change for her since her time under the curse, and everyone had stories to tell someone who they hadn’t caught up with in a while. I caught Sorrel up on adventuring with the only two artificers in Kantas. Sorrel had things to chat about with Seraphina, and Silvia stayed for a while, before she had to leave for Fort Ettin.

Whilst it was good seeing comrade Sorrel refreshed, I was equally pleased to make a new acquaintance, comrade Toothy! Toothy is much like me. Although, no one would say we look the same; he is Drow, I am Goliath. And, our personalities are quite different; he is a sweet young man, I am courteous, but not sweet. However, Toothy does favour a polearm like me, and equally; is impressively strong! I insisted he train at Kavel’s Corner with me, next time he’s at the Fort.

Apart from Seraphina, and now Sorrel, there was another cleric of Selune with us; Nessa. Nessa was the more senior cleric. I told them about how I am now technically devoted to the sea-goddess Umberlee. And that Umberlee had coins called, ‘Umberlee’s Mercy’, which could force allegiance. I asked my new cleric friends if Selune had cursed coins of her own. They reassured me that their lady did not give out cursed coins to faltering adherents, and nor would she have the cheek to call such coins, ‘Selune’s Mercy’, if they weren’t offering any mercy.


Screaming In The Streets of Daring Heights

As I was the only one staying at the Dragon, it was not surprising to find I was the last one left at the party. It was late, eleven at night. Outside would be pitch black, if not for the street lamps. I had drunk a lot, and wanted some fresh air, so I went outside for a walk.

The crisp winter air was just the ticket. Everyone else leaving taverns and heading home were wrapped up warm. I wore only my vest for warmth. It seems only goliaths appreciate the cold.

I walked a distance past the Dragon, when I heard a frightening scream from an alleyway nearby. If the cold air didn’t sober me up, the chilling scream did. I ran towards it. My running towards the scream seemed to be everyone else’s cue to run away from it. All but one other that is. I saw a pair of wings at the entrance to the alleyway, and then those wings disappeared into the alley.

The light of the street lamps did not penetrate into the narrow alley well. My own large frame reduced what little light was being shone into it further. I could just about make out two shapes; a bird person approaching someone sat against the wall who was twitching uncontrollably. One of them was the one screaming.

“... comrade Tayz?! Is that you? … is it you screaming?” I said, addressing the aarakocra silhouette.

“I don’t scream Kavel! I caw. You should know the difference,” my friend responded, rather sassily. The voice and manner of speaking made it clear to me that this was indeed my cleric ally, even though I still couldn’t see him well.

I had my gear with me, so I got out a torch to get a better view of the person screaming. Tayz asked me to stay by the alleyway’s mouth as a lookout while he inspected the body.

As I was finding my lighting equipment, Kelne, another cleric friend of mine turned up.

“This way is it Kavel?” They said in passing, as they shot past me to join Tayz in the alley, making it through a gap only a halfling could.

I got the torch lit, and threw it to Kelne, so the pair of clerics could get a better view of their new patient.

The screams from the seated person wouldn’t stop.

“What’s the problem? Are they drunk?” I asked my cleric friends as they investigated. They exchanged a look with each other, and then both stepped back a bit, so I could see the light of the torch shine on the person’s face from where I was at the entrance. And it was not good. I could see the person’s face had… gone. I could see bone, muscle and tendons. No wonder why this person was screaming. They were in pain, and horribly so. Mercifully, perhaps for all of us, the screaming had stopped. The person was dead. By the corner of their mouth, where their lips should be, was a pink liquid.

“Kavel. Do you know what that is by the mouth?” Asked Tayz.

“I don’t know. Maybe that substance is responsible for their face?” I replied. Kelne thanked me for my contribution to their investigation.

I thought a couple of clerics would be able to solve this medical problem, but it seemed like we needed someone with more academic intelligence.

“Kavel Can I get past, please?” A voice from my right hand side, and some flickering light. I turned to my right to find a fire genasi standing there with his flickering flame-like hair. He was waiting for me to let him into the alleyway. I let him get by. It was comrade Glint

Glint joined the clerics. “I think I recognise that pink substance,” Glint began to say, “it comes in philters. You can actually buy this stuff in the market. I saw some being sold earlier today. Philters of Love they are called.”

“Are Philter’s of Love supposed to destroy faces?” I asked.

“No Kavel. It’s not supposed to be acid,” my learned comrade explained.

Tayz and Kelne were discussing their options, and Tayz concluded, despite the cost, to cast the Revivify spell, and bring the person back to life, and then with Kelne, they would both cast Cure Wounds. I have seen them do this before, it’s very impressive, restorative magic.

Tayz performed all the components of the Revivify spell, and then with Kelne cast Cure Wounds for good measure. But, while the person came back to life, and the clerics could confirm a pulse, the person’s face was featureless. No eyes, no nose, no mouth. Just smooth skin. Glint tried the Message spell, but could only hear gibberish from the person.

Kelne tried a last resort. Something to do with divine intervention straight from their deity, but it didn’t work.

It appeared to me that divine magic hadn’t helped at all here, which I intimated, “Comrades! What have you done? You’ve taken that person’s face!”

Tayz appeared perturbed by my observation of his work. He voiced his thoughts, “I would like you to bear your comments in mind next time you’re screaming in pain and require my healing magic. You know what? Why don’t you go back to being lookout? How about that?”

It would seem Tayz had reached peak sassiness. Perhaps like me, he had been drinking through the evening.

I agreed that I should go back to look out duty though, because there might be other people who have consumed a Philter of Love, in need of our help. However, everyone else had scattered when the screaming started. So, there was no one around. So I rejoined my comrades.

“I don’t understand how this person is breathing”, Kelne stated. It was very odd. The person had no mouth or nose.

None of this was my area of specialty. “You’re the cleric,” I pointed out to my halfing comrade.

“Sassy today Kavel!” It appeared I had hit a nerve in comrade Tayz. Maybe I get sassy when I’m drunk? I would have to monitor this. But, does this mean Tayz is routinely tipsy?

All my magic user comrades had more spells they wished to exhaust on the problem. So, I had to stand there while at least one of them did a ten minute ritual. Tayz detected transmutation magic on the person, and enchantment magic nearby. Glint found the source of the enchantment magic, having found an empty philter for a Philter of Love. Kelne casted a spell called, Commune. Though they’re deity didn’t respond to a divine intervention request, Kelne did get some direct help. Through Kelne’s deity, we discovered that the deity had no magic to help the person, and we were definitely dealing with a murder. Drops of blood nearby and holes in the person’s clothing confirmed this.

Glint thought we needed to take the faceless person to the Academy, since it seemed more of an arcane matter than clerical one. However, the Academy was closed at these hours. So we had to find a temple. As it happened, I was at a temple earlier today and it was very close to the Dragon.


Back To The Temple of Selune

We were greeted at the front doors by minor clerics, “how can we help as the moon shines down upon us?”

The faceless person weighed around 175lbs, a fairly average humanoid. Of course I was the one carrying him, which I did with one arm only, outstretched as far away from me as possible. I wanted no risk of my own features disappearing. I was instructed to put the person down on a seat, while the junior clerics fetched someone more senior.

After much discussion, a senior cleric informed us that Tayz’s Revivify spell brought back a husk. There was no soul present. According to the senior cleric this was more a job for the Academy, if only the academy weren’t up themselves, and would take the time to look into cases like these. It seemed everyone was a little sassy today. Maybe the cleric had drunk a little?

I asked my Academy comrade, “Glint. Is he right about the Daring Academy?”

It was the first time I had heard sassiness from comrade Glint. He answered my question, but it seemed like he was talking to the senior cleric instead. The sassiness was understated, but present. Glint was much more skilled at talking than I.


Magical Halfing Face/Philter Detector

The senior cleric allowed us to leave the faceless person at the temple and pick them up later to take to the Academy.

Before we left the temple, Kelne had the idea that the murderer must have stolen the person’s face. Kelne had one more spell up their sleeve to help get to the bottom of things, and locate the murderer. As I remember now, I had seen them cast it before when we were trying to find Levuka’s special dinosaur hide. This was the spell, Locate Objects. Kelne suggested it would work better if they sat on my shoulders, when we roamed around. But Tayz suggested he could carry them in flight. I agreed this would be better and suggested I could throw Kelne up into the sky for Tayz to catch. But, Tayz said this was unnecessary. Although, in retrospect, seeing Tayz struggle to take flight and keep Kelne perched on his shoulders suggested to me that it would have helped had I thrown Kelne to him.

While Tayz and Kelne were up in the night sky, they stayed within 120 feet of me and Glint on the ground, because this was the range of Glint’s Message spell.

Kelne had to cast Locate Object twice. On their first try, they made the spell focus on the faceless person’s skin, but this just pointed us back to the temple of Selune, where most of the skin was. When Kelne cast the spell again, they focused on Philters of Love, which took us somewhere promising.


Strike Team Go!

Kelne’s Locate Object spell took us to a two-storey home that didn’t have much in the way of neighbouring homes.

Tayz was confident the home was abandoned from his aerial reconnaissance with Kelne.

Glint informed me from speaking to Tayz through the Message spell that Tayz wanted to breach the home from above and below. Him and Kelne through an upstairs window. Me and Glint through the door.

“He’s referring to us now as, ‘Strike Team’”, Glint looked up at me to say. Hmmmm. Will this be breaking and entering? Where is Derthaad when you need him?

Anyway, Tayz was confident the home looked abandoned, and Kelne by use of their spell felt we had located where the murderer must be. So, this was good enough. Whether it was breaking and entering or not, we agreed to it. Tayz flew him and Kelne around to get a ‘run up’, and counted us down for a synchronised aerial and ground breach. I stood by the door ready to barge my shoulder into it. Glint was behind me, messaging Tayz’s flying count.

“3-2-1. Go!”

I took a couple steps forward and planted my shoulder into the door. The door split where my shoulder made an impact. It then came off the hinges. At the same time there was a crash from the top floor, as a window broke. It was followed immediately by a heavy thud. Glint received a message that the upstairs team were fine though.

I cleared the bottom rooms. No hostiles. Glint went into the living room. There was dust everywhere. Glint said he would cast Detect Magic. He looked busy doing this. I guess it was another ritual spell? Do my magic-user friends cast ritual spells, because they don’t have the conditioning to cast them instantaneously?

I went into the kitchen space and decided to be a detective and make myself useful. I found three full Philters of Love in a cupboard, and I found a basement door. I went to inform Glint who was still waving his hands about and drawing symbols in the air.

“Glint, I found more of the philters and a basement door,” I helpfully updated my comrade as he paused from waving his arms in the air.

“Okay Kavel. Inform the others upstairs, “ Glint said in response, as he began re-doing these air symbols with his hands.

“You could just use your Message spell, right?” I enquired.

Glint stopped his air symbols again to respond to me. “... you go upstairs and update them please, Kavel. Please?”

I guess Glint was busy with his ritual spell. So I went upstairs.

I had noticed I had some door powder on my shoulder where I blasted through the front door. I wiped it off. When I saw Tayz and Kelne, I saw some scrapes on their bodies from where they crashed through a window. When I looked at the window they crashed through, I noticed some marks on the nearby wall, which I presumed they crashed into after breaking through the glass. I decided to keep my comments to myself, in case they betrayed any unintended sass.

They came down stairs with me and informed me that upstairs was dusty and empty except for a glass of half drunk water by a bed that looked like it was slept in..

We hung around the basement door as Glint’s ritual spell still wasn’t ready yet. As is usually the case, there was discussion about me opening up doors and entering first. I am fine with this. It makes sense, but Glint wasn’t ready yet. While still casting his Detect Magic spell, he did manage to remind us we should check for traps first, or wait for him to do it.

Kelne had a wand that detected traps, and they discovered no traps. Tayz was insisting I open the door, so I did. When I opened the door there was light coming from below, as was some muttering. But the muttering stopped.

…

The three of us near the door exchanged looks.

…

I broke the silence, and yelled down to the basement, “Hello!”

There came a response, “Hello! Are you here for the wedding?”

I was hoping for something obvious we could react to like, ‘they are onto us. We’ve been caught!’ But, no such luck. In fact, we were really taken off guard.

“Who’s down there?” Asked Glint who joined us finally - Detect Magic was active.

“Let’s find out,” I responded as I took my first step downstairs, and Kelne cast a spell of protection on me. Glint announced he’d drink a potion of Mind Reading, which he did, and Tayz cast a spell that summoned a giant snake to accompany me at the front. All of this seemed a bit much for a wedding.


Kavel’s Second Basement Ceremony In Less Than 24 Hours

I was just in a basement observing a ceremony several hours ago. Now it seems I am drawn to them.

I walked down the stairs cautiously. This was not like the temple of Selune’s underground ceremonial area, which had amazing stonework, a wonderful shallow pool, and simply put; was divine. The contents of this basement, on the other hand, was very creepy.

Down in the cellar, I could see two rows of pews lined up facing an altar. There were sewing dummies on the pews. Twelve in total, two per pew. All of them had humanoid faces pinned onto their heads, held by pins inserted into the cranium and neck. At the altar stood a metallic statue, dressed in formal clothes, and standing six feet tall. The metal face looked to be a rendering of a male elf. The eyes were hollow. On the sculpture's shoulder there was a large Philter of Love affixed in a way to run into the insides of the metal sculpture.

Beside the metal sculpture was the person who had asked if we were here for the wedding. This guy seemed very happy to have more guests. He was a moon-elf from the looks of it. He looked youngish for an elf, too.

“Welcome to the wedding! Please take a seat. The ceremony is about to start,” said the jubilant elf.

This was such a peculiar scene to take in. There didn’t appear to be any threats here. Nor did the elf and his imaginary party feel threatened by an unexpected goliath accompanied by Tayz’s summoned giant snake. But, I felt on guard nevertheless. The elf’s politeness and joy was eerie to receive when contrasted to the constructed, creepy, basement wedding venue.

I was standing by the bottom of the stairs. Glint joined me. There was just enough room for another body to stand by the stairs at the bottom of the cellar. He took in the surrounding view, and then moved to position himself behind me.

“Kavel, using the potion of Mind Reading, I’m picking up no trace of lying from him, just happy thoughts. I’m also, curiously picking up thoughts of pure love from the sculpture,” whispered my Academy friend from the semi-concealed position behind my back. I was slouching to fit in the cellar. It had a low ceiling. But to be fair, almost every building has a low ceiling for me.

Kelne, with their halfling frame, managed to find space to stand between me and Glint, and they took in the surroundings and asked, “excuse me. Did you take all these faces?”

“Yes. They couldn’t be here otherwise,” the delighted elf replied.

I moved away from the bottom of the stairs to allow Tayz to come down too. He had been listening up the stairs. He too could now absorb the bizarre surroundings. His summoned giant snake exchanged a quizzical look with him.

“I don’t know what’s going on. But, I have no idea how powerful his magic over there is. I suggest we act agreeable for the moment,” Tayz whispered behind a polite smile. I took his advice.

“I’ll take a seat,” I said to the non-sculpted groom.

“Yes, please do. Come and have a seat next to Beatrix up front,” the elf said as he pointed out where I should sit, which was the right hand, closest pew to the altar.

I ‘asked’ Beatrix if she minded, and then moved her nearer to the other sewing dummy, to make room for myself. Beatrix and her friend did not look like their skin had been taken recently. Despite being stretched, their skin looked like it was decaying.

I looked back at my comrades, all squashed up by the entrance to the cellar. Tayz looked back at me with astonishment. He doesn’t understand how low the ceiling is for me.

Glint engaged in conversation with the groom, and we learnt that the family of his groom were not happy with the marriage, on account of the groom being dead, he was very ill before he passed. But, the living groom, our host, said he saved him.

“Oh that’s good you brought your groom back to live. Yes. But, what is the Philter of Love for?” Glint continued to amicably enquire.

“Oh that’s medicine to keep him alive,” the elf responded. But, from what I understood about those philters, they contain enchantment magic, not the divine necrotic magic of my cleric friends. This, Tayz confirmed, when he made the following observation and request:

“Er, no. That’s enchantment magic pouring into a sculpture. I’m not sure why. Kavel, would you help my snake restrain this mad man?”


Things Guests Shouldn’t Do At Weddings

And with that the giant snake slithered fast down the aisle between the pews and up to the altar to wrap itself around the elf. The snake launched itself up at the moon elf, but was intercepted by the metal sculpture, as it’s right arm stretched out with unexpected speed and its hand grabbed the snake by its throat and held it in place. Woah. The sculpture can move, and it’s not only fast, it’s very strong. The giant snake is pretty big after all.

This pissed off the living elf.

“Please leave! You are disrupting my beautiful day!” Angrily and frustrated, the elf said this to comrade Tayz.

Comrade Tayz took a different action and instead I could see a magical light emanate from his hands as he prepared a spell.

I began to interject with my own question for the living groom, “excuse me. We brought someone back to life earlier, who was missing a face…”

But he wasn’t listening. He was quite fixated on comrade Tayz.

As I looked towards the elf, I saw comrade Kelne had snuck up behind the sculpted groom made of metal. This was sneaky. I looked back to the cellar entrance, as if to confirm Kelne was no longer there, but they were still there by the stairs! And they were over by the metal man, too!

Glint applied his diplomacy skills, “I’m sorry. It’s probably not clear, but the snake actually has restorative venom. This is what the snake was trying to give your groom. Here, look one of the two Kelnes is beside your groom with a replacement philter full of the restorative venom. Look, it's a bolder colour of pink.”

The elf was as surprised as me to see two Kelnes, and indeed Kelne by the altar was assisting Glint who was using mage hand to install a new philter into the metal sculpture. Where did Glint get this other, more potent philter? Was it one of the three upstairs in the cupboard? But they were regular size philters…

“My groom will be better with this philter?” The elf enquired with optimism in his voice.

“Yes, that’s the plan,” confirmed Glint as his mage hand fixed in the new philter.

I took some time to look over the other guests. While most of the sewing dummies had very old skin stretched out over their heads, one of them in the middle left pew had fresher skin that matched the skin tone of the faceless humanoid from the alleyway.

The elf asked us all to sit down again. I hadn’t moved from where I was already sitting in the front row. I looked back at my comrades, Tayz still charging up some magic. With a disinclination Kelne and Glint took a seat each on the back row. Tayz looked at them incredulously.

“So. That’s it?! We’re just going along with it? No repercussions for this murderer?! I can’t. No. Oh,” Tayz said whilst gesturing profusely.

“Glint has a plan, “Kelne said back to the standing Tayz, from their rear pew. It took some time, but Tayz with reluctance eventually made some space for himself on one of the middle pews, and sat down, arms folded.

“This is very weird,” were the last words on the matter from Tayz.

The Strike Team were all sitting down now. The elf was fortunately ignoring all of us, but Glint, who continued to chat with him.

“We’re about to start!” Announced the elf, happy again, “are we expecting another arrival?”

“No. Everything is fine. We’re looking forward to the ceremony,” Glint responded. Glint is very good at diplomacy. I almost started looking forward to it, until I turned round to Beatrix to nod my approval that the ceremony was about to continue, only to be met with a reminder that Beatrix wasn’t really here, only her decaying face was.

Tayz’s snake was wriggling around still, trying to escape the metal elf sculpture’s clasp. Tayz brought one hand up from the folded position they were in. He waved his hand, and released the summoned snake. The last act of acceptance. I heard him mutter, “I can’t believe we’re doing this.”

The elf began to speak in elvish. I turned to face the rest of the team in our spread out pews. Yep. I got acknowledgement back that not a single one of us understood elvish.

I turned back to face the altar. The weirdness got a little weirder. The metal elf sculpture’s hollow eyes began crying blood.

Groom one, the living elf looked concerned and began wiping the blood tears away. Then something unexpected happened. The crying metal sculpture moved one of his arms faster than I could see. There was no hostile snake to grab this time. There was no grabbing. The statue had struck its fingers into the living groom, plunging its hand in the living groom’s chest.


Things Grooms Shouldn’t Do At Their Wedding

Stunned as we all were, though I suspect the elf was more alarmed than the rest of us, he strained one final word in elvish, before the lights in his eyes went out. The metallic elf withdrew its hand, and the formerly living elf collapsed dead on the altar.

The statue elf knelt down astride the now dead elf, who was sprawled on the ground, and began digging its fingers into the dead elf’s body. This was another unexpected turn in this evening of unexpected turns. Not at all what I expected to see from my front pew seat.

I pushed my back as far into the pew as I could. With a slightly wider view of the altar now, I noticed something. A little bit left and up of the evisceration directly in front of me. The Philter of Love that Glint provided wasn’t connected to the metal elf’s shoulder. It was floating in midair, where it would be if the elf sculpture was still standing up. The philter was dripping too, but not spilling any content out. This was probably the least weird thing all night, but weird all the same.

Tayz stood up and cast Guiding Bolt at the statue man and hit him full on. The right side of the abdomen was dented. But, this didn’t impede the metal elf from tearing the face-stealing elf apart. It looked like the metal elf had finished what it wished to accomplish. Its head turned to face us. Then its body. It held its arms outstretched, and palms turned upwards. It opened its fists to reveal some jewelry.

“Oh of course!” Glint began to explain, “it looks like the Philter of Love was making the statue love the other elf. But when I,” he did air quotes, “‘attached’ my illusion Philter of Love, I cut the supply of enchantment magic, so now the metal elf was free to act un-charmed by magic.”

“Message him we mean no harm,” Tayz suggested, which Glint obliged.

“He says the same,” Glint informed us, “and the jewelry is his way of saying , ‘thank you’.”

Something in the statue had worn out, and the metal construct collapsed off of the altar.

Glint had a theory that the metal elf did not appreciate being brought back to life, and was angry at the elf that did this. He was probably angry about the ‘guest’ sewing dummies, too. The faces probably belonged to people he knew.

With the way it collapsed, the metal man’s back was facing the ceiling, and Tayz was first to notice a back panel. When opened up there was a full male elf skeleton inhabiting the statue. He determined the spirit of this man must have been inhabiting it, but it’s gone now.


Did We Solve The Murder?

We were left with a few questions, but everyone that could answer them was dead. We were lost Until, Kelne mentioned they knew a divine spell for speaking with the dead.

Kelne cast the spell, and a spectral image of an ill-looking male elf appeared before us, whose facial features the metal sculpture appeared to be based on.

Kelne informed us that we would only have five questions we could ask, and the spirit would be limited to giving yes or no answers. We agreed on some questions and proceeded.

“Who are you?” The spirit seemed to shrug and shake its head. To be fair, that was our mistake.

“Did you know the person trying to marry you?” The spectral figure nodded, with an irritated look on its face. At least our question was phrased better that time.

“Do you know anyone in the city?” Unfortunately the spirit shook its head.

“Do you know the faces of the guests?” The spirit pointed at eleven of the guests. It ignored the fresher skinned sewing dummy. I went to retrieve the head off of that dummy. If the Academy could do anything for the faceless person, that person might as well have their face preserved.

“And, will you be at peace now?” Our final question, to which the spirit gave a small smile and nodded, and then faded away.

“I bet I can lift that metal statue easily?” I claimed to my comrades. I had other thoughts too, “well, now that it seems over, we should inform the City Watch. There must be a report of a grave robbery somewhere to which this elf man’s bones belong, and maybe the faces of the other eleven guests.” There was no disagreement with my suggestion.

Glint was using his Mage Hand spell to poke around the eviscerated elf’s body and found a very important part of our case - a dagger, which was soon identified as the Dagger of the Stolen Face. The person from the beginning of the night had ingested a Philter of Love, but it was this dagger that killed them - and in addition stole their face and their soul. So, fair is fair, my comrade clerics did not mess up their reviving and healing magic; this dagger messed up the effectiveness of their spells.

“I’m sorry comrades, I thought you messed up your spells earlier,” I said to my cleric friends. What is fair is fair - Goliath teaching taught me that. We goliaths are tough and strong, but we are also fair. Strength first. Fairness second. They accepted my apology - without any sass, too.


Getting Things in Order

There wasn’t much we could do now, but we felt obliged to inform the Temple of Selune that we closed the case and would pick up the faceless person in the morning and take him and the dagger to the Academy to see what they could do.

We also went to the City Watch to inform them of why there was a house with a broken window and front door, and what happened there. They went and boarded the place up, and took our statements. Eventually we were thanked for our help and told we could go.

We split the jewellry between us equally. There was around 450 gold pieces of jewelry between us.

There was one other thing we did. It happened just before we left the scene of the crime - the second one - the house. There was the matter of the three remaining Philters of Love in the kitchen. Despite the many odd magical items we had all acquired on our adventures, we all felt that being caught with Philter of Love on our persons would be a little compromising, even if we had innocent intentions for the potions. So, we tipped them into the gutter.

And so ended my time as an unintended city detective. If this is what comrade Derthaad deals with regularly, I do not envy him. It’s back to regular adventuring for me! Next time an ‘adventure’ finds me in the street, I’ll call the City Watch.