IWoS 1: In the Shadow of the Mountain
General Summary
Following the revelation that Stalks in Shadow is the long-lost sister of Blood on the Dawnflower, Shadow challenges their mother Sun Smiles Upon the Dunes to a Kha'itan. She is easily defeated, having severely underestimated her mother's capabilities. As her mother had once, long ago, given her up to the judgment of the spirits of the desert, according to vearhokt, the desert khatharin tradition of tripartite justice, Shadow is to be given unto the spirits of the mountains. The party seizes upon this opportunity to have one of their opponents at their mercy and decide to accompany the small procession that carries Shadow up the side of the nearby mountain. At the same time, they dispatch Dawn to fetch Issad Windrider from Khabrel, as they felt that they might require his expertise and his advice in their questioning of Shadow. Complications arise almost immediately as the party is assaulted on the way up the side of the mountain by a tussari stormcaller who declares that "failure cannot be tolerated." After a brief battle, during which Heather kills the stormcaller and uses their corpse as a bludgeoning weapon to destroy the storm spirits that had been summoned, the party proceeds up the side of the mountain, pursuing the procession that had gotten away while the party distracted the stormcaller. On the way up the mountain, the party sees that there is a Stormrider keeping watch over a narrow path bordered on either side by stone. Two of the group, Izha and Heather, attempt to approach the bird, which they find to be outfitted for battle. It does not let them get too close, taking to the skies and flying away, angling due west when they try to walk up to it. The group happens eventually upon a fork in the road, with the left-hand path seemingly far more treacherous than the right-hand path. Due to Shadow being incapacitated the group decides that it may be prudent to take the safer road. However, after a short time, Hadrea notices that there is a plume of smoke rising in the distance. Izha departs to investigate and finds that there is a camp located up ahead, further up the slope of the mountain, which she presumes is reached by taking the left-hand path. After Izha informs the group of what she has found and takes to the air once more to keep a close eye on the camp, she notices that one of the tents has been painted with what appears to be the word "parley." Quickly deciding that it might be worth their time to talk rather than immediately resort to violence, Izha and Heather enter the camp and meet Meriq ar'Qardim, the de-facto leader of the group. He is a grizzled old veteran who emphasizes that he is old-fashioned, but also says that he doesn't agree with the direction that the Hooded Eye has been taking recently. Meriq states that he is contracted to retrieve Shadow, but hints that should he attempt to attack and seize Shadow, but be thwarted and captured, that his honor would allow him to consider that a defeat and a failure at the contract, rather than the violation of it. It is also at this time that the party meets Lykares, an a'drekh mercenary, who they recognize from the khathari camp, who had been paid to keep an eye on the events and ensure that the Kha'itan proceeded as intended. Armed with this new knowledge, Izha departs the camp with a confused Heather, who did not "get" the hint that Meriq had just given them. The two return to the group and help them a good place to create a camp of their own. Once Shadow begins to stir from her unconsciousness, the khathari depart to leave her to the judgment of the mountains. The party remains and talks to her, and yet, despite her obvious disadvantage in this situation, Shadow is confident and cocky. She taunts the party with the information that she has, declaring that at the end of the day they will let her walk away and will guarantee her safety until she recovers. Heather, so incensed by the statement, knocks Shadow out once again. Shadow comes to a few hours later, after she has been tied down and chained to a rock. Heather comes over to talk to her and asks her if she wants to get punched again. Shadow invites her to do so and is promptly knocked out once more. As the hours wear on, Shadow eventually wakes up once again, and Izha eats in front of Shadow as if to taunt her, but it does not have the desired effect.
The next day, Dawn returns to the party with Issad and Taaka in tow. Once Shadow regains consciousness, the party interrogates her, and she uses a blood oath to show that she is being truthful. She claims that she has vital information, information that would otherwise take the party forever to find, leading to more innocent lives being taken. As a show of good faith she discloses to them the location of Serpent's Cove, the hidden base of operations where Haqo'ob ar'Sabbin was training his army. The party finds that Shadow will not tell them anything, but has instead guaranteed her survival by hiding the information far away from their current location and tying the information to her own life force, rendering it useless to the party if they do not find a way to ensure her survival. Although Heather wants to kill her, regardless of the information that she has, Izha manages to convince Heather that it is for the greater good that they let her live. After the interrogation, Meriq and his men arrive, half-heartedly attacking the party and surrendering as soon as Izha throws a net over them. After the sun sets, the party gives Shadow her equipment and gives her the time she asked for to rest. Early the next morning, she is ready to depart, and instead of heading back out of the mountains, in the direction that they had come in, Shadows heads deeper into the range. Izha takes to the skies and follows her for a short while, witnessing the brutal fashion in which Shadow dispatches a craglion with her own two hands with clean, merciless efficiency. When she returns to the party, she makes the observation that Shadow might well be a devil. Following these events, Izha and the rest of the party take off to find the information that Shadow left them, at the Spinster's Jewels in the city of Rasaak. It is here that they meet a new companion, the boisterous Plays for the Stars, who immediately strikes up camaraderie with the party, and who shares somewhat of an intimate moment with Izha. It is also here that they discover that Heather should be kept away, at all costs, from alcoholic drinks lest they end up paying even more for damages. The journey is not without reward. They find out three important things:
- The Stormcaller is masquerading as a high-level government official
- The Stormcaller's headquarters is not Serpent's Cove, but rather the Font of Life at the heart of the Pāll-tanír
- The Stormcaller's true army is one made of tussari and storm spirits. The Hooded Eye will serve merely as cannon fodder.
