Tether

Lord Skirvin was treating donors to a dinner party in his home when Ludra returned, anxious to see her former lover. Pregnant and unemployed, she was desperate. Before she could make a scene, Skirvin intercepted her outside and tried to calm her down. Ludra threatened that she would spoil his political career if he didn't do something to help her. She grabbed at Skirvin's breast coat, tearing at the man's ascot; Oaken, defending his lord, pulled Ludra away. But Ludra slipped on the snow and hit her head against the side of the manor well. Ludra's eyes rolled back into her head and she started to convulse.   Panicking, Skirvin backed away. "No worries, m'lord," Oaken assured his shocked master. "I'll take care of this. Please, return to the festivities." Skirvin stumbled away while Oaken handled Ludra—he pulled open the seal to the well and dragged her inside. One hundred feet Ludra Vale fell, down into the frigid water below. Oaken sealed the well.

Marren Skirvin was the first person Esme/Ludra killed. She slashed her mother's wrists as she bathed, then framed it as suicide. Phineas shrieked in agony as he held his dead wife in his arms. Esme watched in silence.   Next, Petro fell, tumbling over the balustrade railing onto the foyer below. The poor boy broke his neck, dying instantly. "An accident", Esme told her father Oaken died next, slaughtered by Esme with a woodchopping axe. Kerrin helped hide the body. "Evil, Lord Skirvin," said the priest Skirvin had hired to watch Esme. 'It permeates the entire estate. Three accidents in as little as a week. One wonders: is there a reason an angry spirit would target your family like this?" Weeping, Phineas told the priest everything—his affair with Ludra, the murder, the cover-up, even the ghost he saw at the bottom of the well. Finally, he looked into the priest's eyes, begging, "Can you revive Marren and Petro?"   "Yes," assured the priest. "But only after I remove the curse on the manor." Of course, the priest had no intention of removing the evil. The priest's true name was Eflor Vale, wife to Istha, father to Ludra. "To perform the ritual, you will need to invite all who were here the same night the servant girl died." Phineas understood and reached out to his colleagues.

Arvan was found and approached by the Horizon Walker enclave known as the Unchained and he soon joined them with the promise of adventure.

Stefan finally came to his senses and found his old flame Ardan. He then began travelling with him from plane to plane, eventually becoming a warlock of Morwel. Their relationship blossomed as they travelled.