Letter to Ileas 1

Dear Ileas,
 
Hope you are faring well with your family. The last few months have been quite busy so sorry for not writing as much. There are also not many stories I could relegate to you that happened in that time, and I do know you like stories and hope you enjoyed the stories I sent in the past of how I got to meet Carnwen, Petra and Krysander.
 
Anyhow, a few days ago I finally saw Liliana again. I waited on her at the fey gate I had to leave her those years ago. You should have seen her, now adorned with silver white hair and blue eyes, marks of her stay at Vivienne's realm, besides that she didn't look too different, even younger since she told me only two years passed for her. Guess I'll be calling her little sister now.
 
But the story of this letter really starts on the 1st of Nuan, don't know if you care for dates and all that, but as you probably know the old group was getting back together. Feyris sent the invites out, you remember him right? The amnesia ridden traveller we picked up? He inhereted a tavern from the nice owner he worked for, she had no remaining relatives and he got that inn. After all Feyris went through it's the least he deserves.
 
So we agreed to meet at his tavern, Erna's will, at 11 am on the 1st of Nuan. Now we were not the first to arrive, as Luke already stayed at the tavern, his apprenticeship at Caern Fussil did put him half a day's journey. Feyris had closed the bar for the day and put a nice long table out for all of us to sit at, and he was working up a storm in the kitchen as Luke used a magic servant to serve up drinks. Last time I saw him he was married to this girl Lyra, I must have told you about her in a previous letter. But Luke seems to walk from tragedy to tragedy as he's both broken up with her, and gotten involved with another named Seraphine and had a terrible break up with her. The man has a horrid taste in women, which honestly speaks volumes about my sister that he isn't interested in her, besides some unneeded apologies about not being able to stop her from going into the Feywild.
 
Next up was Dadroz, who explained he mostly kept busy with odd jobs to look to join the Moon Blossom Circle, he described it more as information brokering but I have a mild suspision there's more to that work.
 
Following him was Gael, though he did not get much time to explain what he's been up to. Though I've heard he's been looking to join the Rose garden so he's been doing jobs for them I reckon.
 
As the bells rang for the 11th hour Hayley came in, either having impeccable timing or having waited a few minutes to make a dramatic entrance. But what surprised me was how she was now dressed in all black, making me suspect she was mourning someone? Not much to be said about it however as Feyris came in with the first round of food and asked us to get seated.
 
I was trying to pry some of the story of Luke's travels as the door opened and two guards marched in, wearing green capes and helmets. For half a second I was worried a scene would unfold as Elsa Colline walked in, dressed in gowns that must have cost more than what the rest of us were wearing combined. Almost like Luke talking about his past romances called her through the door. And it immediately became clear the last five years have transformed her into the perfect image of a noble lady. She moved with a grace and confidence that you'd think money can't buy, but she did go to a high class courtier school that definitely helped. She moved around and complimented us and sat down and started making conversation, leading it even. She now holds quite an influential position at court, petitioning for whatever party needed help.
 
She insinuated Luke's name was used quite a bit at court over the years, but not in a good way. She complimented Liliana's new style and then asked me about the battle of the Northern Plains, you must have heard of the battle that took place against the forces of Fenhunter, or Velora Morenthene as she's properly called. And you probably know I was there as well, helping to stop the army before it could ransack and plunder the countryside too much, or God forbid loot the city. Now usually these battles are the catalyst for great deeds, but I mostly remember many clashing of steel, scales and bone, and much death. It wouldn't make for a good story as the battle itself was rather futile of course, ending in a stalemate. It mostly lead to a treaty with the dragon. Hayley said she was there too, after the battle mostly, to take care of wounded. It's a shame I didn't run into her then, but before she arrived I probably took whatever bodies and belongings I could on a cart to Keralon, so their families could bury them.
 
Anyhow, around this time Dorr joined us as well, making his entry in a way only he could, by making a row with Elsa's guards outside. He was also at the battle as a mercenary, claimed he made a pretty penny that day. Elsa also showed off her skills in silent commanding as she could dismiss her guards with the simplest of waves now.
 
We were settling in nicely, catching up on an eventful five years as we suddenly heard bells ringing over the city, more specifically the alarm bells. We saw soldiers move to the gate and we followed, making note of signs of massive movement outside the city and people from their windows pointing to something up North. But at the gate we were met by a sergeant asking us to go back home, we were neither guards or knights so we would just get in the way. So we decided to go back to the tavern and wait for news, but Feyris and Dorr had made their way to the roof to have a look at the disturbance from outside the city that was causing the alarms, an army of Velora Morenthene had somehow made it to just outside the city gates and was setting up camp. It felt a bit surreal to watch this threat to the city unfold as we ate some snacks out of a picnic basket Feyris had taken up on the roof. Elsa apparently was ushered away by her guards in her carriage.
 
It did strike me as weird that such a host could just walk up to the city gates without anyone knowing. But there was no real way to know how they did this so after taking in the sight for an hour or so we went back inside to continue our feast, though now with one less guest. I did know Robert Talespinner was invited but he didn't show up, and I doubt he would show up now with the alarms in the city. But after a few hours there was a knock on the door though when Feyris opened up the door no one was there, yet immediately I heard rummaging in the kitchens to find Vern Skald there, one of the heralds of the Outer City. He was looking for us, specifically Dadroz, Hayley and myself. As we were all looking to join one of the outer city circles. He said he finally had a pledge for us that would convince him to recommend us to the circles, and it was an urgent one.
 
The pledge would entail that we approach the host that was camped outside the city and see what they wanted, and also figure out how they got here without any guard towers spotting them. And if they're here for war, try to grab as much information on their siege plans as possible. Made a bit more difficult since he couldn't get us out of the gates or back in. So we'd have to find a way to get back out and in. But we accepted the pledge, and set to make plans on how to do this. Luckily Liliana, Luke and Gael who would not gain any mettle from this were happy to help, and to be fair, it helped out the city so why wouldn't they want to.
 
Luckily Dadroz knew of some ways we could get out of the city that didn't involve gates. One involved the catacombs, for there were rumors of tunnels that went in and out of the city, another would be to convince someone to ferry us along the Lorerun River and make our way up North from there. I personally would love to search for secret tunnels, maybe fight some monsters that are plaguing the tunnels with our gang, for old times sake, but we landed on using the boats. But first I wanted to get my plate armor I inherited from Gideon, I was wearing a chain mail but for a quest like this you need to bring out your best armor. Though any magic items would stay. But sadly enough the Inner City was now closed off as well by the guards, and it didn't seem to worth the hassle to talk ourselves in to then talk ourselves back out. And I wasn't the only one disadvantaged by this, Gael was hoping to get one of his bows for the task.
 
Anyhow, we set out to the Fishtown district to get more information on getting a boat. But quickly we saw that the district was in chaos, as the people didn't know what was going on and thought the inner city was leaving them to be overrun. While Dadroz went and got more information on a boat out we all spent some time bringing some peace and calm back and make sure things didn't escalate from chaos to a full blown panic.
 
When Dadroz came back he let us know the boats were all in lockdown, except for a few in the repair dock, and that he knew of an inn called the Noxis' Tap where he could learn more.
In the end Dadroz managed to learn from the Inn's owner, a tiefling called Noxis, that the owners of the ferry dock left themselves a few hours ago, leaving no one there. But he did arrange for a bugbear by the name of Teflon to help us sail down the river, if we could procure a boat.
 
Now I'm not really proud of the next bit, since it involved a lot of attempted stealing of a boat by Dadroz, who got caught twice, and Luke and Hayley using magic to confund some guards, though not before one could shoot a bolt into her shoulder. But eventually we managed to get a boat from the dock onto the river and our boatman dropped us off a few kilometers down the river, and we made sure to pay him and make arrangements for picking us back up. And with that we decided to set camp for the night.
 
The next day started off with us making some plans for what approach we should take. First there were plans about pretending to be mercenaries, or sneak in somehow, but Hayley managed to find out the army was entirely kobolds and dragonborn, so since we are quite fleshy by comparison we really stand out. She also saw they were not making any moves to lay siege, and the camp was divided up into a few smaller camps. So we decided on a mostly honest approach. Since people were adamant on not saying anything stupid I made sure to refrain from the conversation too much, I'm many things but subtle and careful in speech is not of them.
 
It didn't take long as we approached the camp for a group of Kobolds and a dragonborn to ride out. We would later learn this dragonborn is called Rachnar Ergoll. They seemed to understand we were not looking for trouble but also extremely confused at our intent, they didn't think much of us since we're no delegation of Keralon. They seem to have a different view on proceedings and ranks than us, but seemed very interested once Gael and Hayley propped me up as a noble. Apparently they see Nobles as 'leaders of men' and thus see us as a worthy delegation. I wonder if I should've brought up my history in the battle of the northern plains, but the warnings of herald skald rang in my ear that we're not here to increase tensions. And we did somehow get a way in.
 
Once inside Rachnar introduced himself and made the intention of the host clear, he was a representative of Queen Velora (the dragon) and brought a host of his most powerful warriors to start talks on forming closer ties to Keralon. And wished for us to take him into the city so he could speak to the King. Of course we couldn't really promise him that we could take him into the city but we could transfer a message. This confused him and he asked if he could discuss something with his underlings. While he was gone we made some note of some locked chests that might contain valuable information but decided to wait this out. Eventually Rachnar came back with a new proposal: we would be emissaries of their horde to go talk to the king, but for that we needed to be initiated into the horde. Which involved a ritual combat with their champion. This sounded like a duel so I asked if this was one-on-one which got quite a laugh from Rachnar, since Dran would be our opponent.
 
Dran was one of the few names I heard in the aftermatch of the Battle of the Northern Plains who left an impact. A giant dragonborn who would wield a sword the size of Cornu's in one hand. He took down a few dozen knights before the battle was over. Luckily we would all stand in the arena together against him. And the combat would be non lethal.
 
So this is where I'll leave you for now, Ileas, preparing for a fight against this walking storm of steel. But reunited with those we long lost sight of, those with whom we overcame impossible odds. So we'll do it again.
 
Hope to send the rest soon, but for now I hear that the fight's about to begin.
 
Sincerely yours,
 
Alistan
 
P.S.: How did you ever get convinced to call Liliana and I by our names? My staff has the tendency to call me 'sir' or 'master', though I suspect they might do it in jest, since they know it annoys me.