A Dire Call

A Diary by Sister Mara von Witten

Bringing Us Up to Date…

In the three years since we left the Runechildren, Aliya and Zophas spent some time clearing out the Dark Reliquary. Gaerioth took off on a quest for the Word That Began Creation. Serai led a team down to the Banewarrens to recover and raise the Company of the Black Lantern. Later, he and the recovered Sercian went off on a voyage in their new ship. The restored Tellian went off looking for the birthplace of Navashtrom but recently returned to protect Urlenius. Canabulum remained in the city researching more arcane secrets in his underground laboratory. Sister Mara spent a good deal of time in Dreta Phantas helping repair the Dreaming City and studying its magical nature. Now restored to its proper place in the world, north of Ptolus, it has become home to elder elves and modern elves alike. Shurrin is married to Tellith, hostess at the Ghostly Minstrel; today the happily domesticated former adventurer lives a quiet family life in Ptolus.

Now it is the end of the month of Moons….

— Monte

Warning! Contains spoilers for Ptolus Chapter 25: Jabel Shammar!

Session #1

After almost three years of experiencing none of my “sending dreams,” blessed Lothian suddenly grants me one: I dream of Calista, Aliya’s cousin, reaching out to all of us in urgent need. Symbols in the dream suggest to me that Serai’s presence is particularly vital. I manage to get in touch with the rest of my old adventuring companions and pass along the urgent call. We gather at our old haunt, the Ghostly Minstrel in Ptolus, and catch up with each other a bit after being apart for so long.

It’s wonderful to see everyone again, despite the looming threat of the circumstances that brought us to the city. We head over to the Pale Tower, where Calista still lives, to find what has been going on. She recounts for us a tale of a curious Dragonscales game in which an ancient elf spelled out “Something stirs once again in Jabel Shammar” with the playing pieces, then died.

Jabel Shammar, the fortress atop the Spire, was built by the Dread One, Eslathagos Malkith, some twenty thousand years ago. He wanted to corrupt the world and created countless evil creatures and aberrations in pursuit of this goal. After his defeat (an effort that took the combined work of the gods and powerful heroes), the elder gods sealed Jabel Shammar for good. No one has been there in untold millennia. And now something stirs there?

Ghul, thousands of years later, claimed to be the son of Malkith. Whether or not that was true, he was very powerful and built his own evil fortress, Goth Gulgamel, halfway up the Spire. Ghul conquered much of the world and created the Utterdark, which covered Palastan and other realms in darkness. But the dwarves, elves, and humans all joined together for the first time ever and defeated Ghul, slaying him in the Jewels of Parnaith.

We ask Falstef, the legendary angel rescued from the Dark Reliquary, for more details about the history of this wretched place. He tells us that after the good priest Danar built his citadel called Mosul Pearl, three envoys of the elder elves went there to treat with him; along the way, they received a gift to give to him. That gift was The Book of Inverted Darkness, and it was disguised agents of the Vested of the Galchutt who presented it to the envoys. The book corrupted Danar and caused him to fall. Falstef points out that this evil tome is still there atop the Spire. That could be what is causing the unrest in that wicked place – perhaps it seeks someone new to corrupt.

We adjourn to House Lorenci to discuss matters further. A divination implies that the Galchutt are involved in what is stirring in Jabel Shammar but only tangentially – their reach is not infinite, and they are far away from us now, thank Lothian.

Communing with a holy agent of Lothian tells me that The Book of Inverted Darkness appears to be in Jabel Shammar – at least, it appears to be nowhere else. I’m warned that touching the tome brings corruption and reminded that Serai has a magical key that will let us inside the foul fortress. The place is still sealed, I learn. But when I ask whether the Dread One is truly dead, the response is, “I don’t know.” That last is troubling, to say the least.

The next day, the elves in our group visit Iridithyl’s Home and meet with Doraedian Mythlord, hoping to speak with the spirit of the deceased elf, Naelyn Blueflight. Doraedian says the old elf died of natural causes during the Dragonscales game, but that he was poisoned too – he just died before this virulent (dark elven?) toxin could take effect.

It seems Naelyn was an expert in ancient history. His summoned spirit says the ghosts of three elves (the Dread One’s ancient envoys?) visited him to tell him the tale of The Book of Inverted Darkness – a last attempt at goodness reaching out through a shroud of evil. The spirit says this evil could get out if left unchecked. It doesn’t think it’s a trap for us. The elf couldn’t reveal the threat openly during his life because the knowledge was a danger. The spirit thinks that when the fortress was sealed, Jabel Shammar still held a very few relatively minor servants of the Dread One. But it has long been speculated that the Dread One may have had long-term magical contingencies in the event of his death. There also may be remnants of Mosul Pearl (the name of the place when it was good Danar’s home) and its inhabitants still hidden somehow within Jabel Shammar.

Two Company of the Black Lantern members, Tellian and Gaerioth, recall that Shayla (our old intelligent dagger) used to be part of the staff of shards, which was wielded by a hero named Maethra Moonrise and sundered to finally kill the Dread One. The Company was defeated near Jabel Shammar three years ago by dark elves, so it stands to reason that the staff of shards (including Shayla) is now in the hands of the dark elves. (Tellian tells us that Shayla had been under a compulsion to do the will of the Pactlords of the Quann, a group of aberrations out for the death of all humanoids.) Zophas notes that the poison given to Naelyn Blueflight might have been dark elven in origin. Hmmm…

So Tellian communicates with Shayla via a sending spell and Canabulum’s scrying determines that she is in a niche in a dark hallway among dark elves. I am able to learn that the dagger currently lies beneath Palastan in a city called Nluguran in the Grand Hall of Dark Victories. We decide to go there immediately.

When we teleport into the hallway, we set off an alarm and horrify passersby. At first the dark elves think we’re mind flayers attacking “again.” We battle a number of dark elves as well as a drider before we teleport out again with Shayla (and a magical belt on display next to her).

Session #2

That evening, Canabulum receives a visit from emissaries of the four great dwarven gods. These dwarves know from longstanding spells cast by their ancestors that we intend to visit Jabel Shammar. One explains that long ago the Dread One captured Queen Doral the Elder, mistress of all the Earthsinger overclan. (Earthsingers formed an overclan just as the Stonelost and Grailwarden dwarves do now.) Their spell was designed to alert them in the hopes that visitors could find out whether she still lived in that magical place. Legends speak of a secret prison in the dungeons beneath Jabel Shammar. He offers Canabulum a magical chisel to inscribe a wish on natural stone, and the inscription shall become reality.

When I relate our mission to Fr. Rol Heinren, my old mentor, he is eager to inform the Church Elders and the Prince of the Church. I try to dissuade him, at least until we return with more information about the situation. Shayla, meanwhile, gives us some information about Jabel Shammar: its towers, main levels, and so forth. We prepare to leave on the morrow.

The next morning, we fortify ourselves with a hero’s feast at the Ghostly Minstrel. Then we activate Serai’s key – really an intelligent spell, it seems – and appear in the fortress. A massive central tower rises up before us, flanked by several smaller towers. Two of the towers have bridges that extend to the central Tower of Malice. We find ourselves upon one of them.

We advance toward one of the smaller towers and come up against a wraithlike gigantic serpent. It seems to recoil from the sunlight of the Eye of Ardaen, but a combination of spellpower and monkpower ultimately lays it low.

In a room above, beyond a barrier of impenetrable darkness, lies an obelisk flanked by two iron cauldrons filled with darkness. The writing on the obelisk seems to be inscribed in shadow. This inscription is a curse against light and nature – we must be in the Tower of Blasphemy. We continue up the stairs to a room with black and white chequered flooring and a table holding a lance. It appears to be another sunslayer (like the one we encountered in a confrontation with dark elves years ago), not entirely finished. Zophas gleefully destroys it.

In the next room up we observe a well rendered mural depicting all manner of depravity and horrible, sacrilegious bestial activities. Fonts here are labeled “lies,” injustice,” and “immorality.” We continue on our way up, unfortunately, through six symbols of pain. The next room contains six reliefs of large faces, each with a shaft of blue light emitted from the faces. Ten niches each hold mummylike creatures, with six more on the balcony above: They are undead creatures in armor and jewels. Death knights? Whatever they are, they cast a silence effect across the whole room. With a quiet cry, I realize that I am no longer in contact with Lothian in this unholy place.