"Can we push the wall in?" queried Erevel, "That should be easy with no mortar."
"It doesn't seem to move," answered Ciprian, "Can we use some of these barrels to try and bash the wall?"
Gavril and Erevel grabbed a barrel and ran at the wall breaking in down to reveal an area filled with bales of hay. Beyond the hay there appeared to be a door.
Clearing the bales out of the way revealed what appeared to be another cell door, with a lock and a grate that could be opened from this side. Ursina stated that there was a faint aura of magic shining through the door.
Ciprian moved up and slid the grate revealing a cell with cot and a desiccated corpse lying on the floor.
Looking into the room Ciprian could see that the magic was coming from the body, or from under the body. Taking the keys out of his pouch he unlocked the door and entered to search around the corpse. The corpse was dressed only in a ragged loincloth and had undergone a process of natural mummification. The most recognizable feature of the corpse were several large tattoos on the torso and thighs, mostly depicting abstract, swirling monstrosities with too many eyes and too many mouths. The monstrosities were not recognizable from any creature the party had fought, nor were they reminiscent of anything in Zandalus' drawings. Trying to find the magic source Ciprian flipped over the corpse with his staff. The magic moved with the body as if it were contained inside.
While the rest of the party discussed how to get to the magic source Gavril moved up and slit the body down from the sternum. Since the corpse was desiccated there was no liquid gore or slimy substance as Gavril reached in felt around sniffing for the magic and pulled out a Scarlet and Blue Sphere. Gavril pocketed the sphere.
Looking closer before removing the head Ciprian determined that this body looked very much like the ghost they party had fought in the outer room.
"How do we keep the ghost from reappearing?" he asked.
"Probably removing the head worked," answered Ursina.
Erevel, bored by these developments walked leisurely over to the one remaining door the party had not opened beyond the pantry. Listening she heard no noises beyond. Trying the latch she found the door locked.
"Ciprian, when you're done in there bring the keys here we have another locked door," she hollered.
After finishing the work on the corpse and making sure there was no magic the party had missed, Ciprian and the rest of the party moved closer to Erevel. Paullus and Ciprian entered the room and Ciprian used one of the keys to unlock the door. As he did so a spray of freezing liquid was released from the door and hit Erevel, Paullus and Ciprian with ice cold liquid inflicting cold damage.
"Well that was unnecessary, we used the key," grumbled Ciprian.
Erevel opened the door which led to a short hall that opened into a circular room that was lit with dim light from above. Moving in she found that the room was build around a water well, which opened to the sky above at the apex of the ceiling. A bucket tied to a rope was visible 50 feet above. The well shaft extended down from the floor, at ten feet below the floor water was visible. From the north a small shaft was visible at the water line apparently letting water into the well.
A search of the room revealed no other doors, hidden, secret or otherwise. Gavril recalled that there was a well in the middle of the courtyard, of course the hounds did not allow any inspection of the well. After finding no magic in the room the party set out to look for any hidden, secret or concealed doors in the basement. Finding none they then climbed the stairs back to the main level.
"I would like to study the court records for a while," Ciprian indicated.
"I will show Sholn to the door so that he can go home," Armania said leading Sholn to the main doors.
Ciprian, Paullus, and Ursina went to the record room and started searching the files. After three hours of searching the group found the following interesting information.
One cabinet contained records of a lawsuit presented against Count Lowls, two years ago, by a bookseller from Thornstep, who lamented not being paid for an occult book titled The Revelations of Hali. Lowls lost the case, and was ordered to pay the price of the book. A later note indicates that months passed before the payment was actually issued.
A memo documented an official interrogation of Count Haserton Lowls IV about the unexplained death of his mother, Nemira, made at the request of her elder brother in Kerse. The response from the count was that his mother died suddenly of the same strange disease that claimed his father, and was buried privately in the family crypt under Iris Hill. Despite a strong protest from her family in Kerse (and the offer of a substantial bribe), the magistrate was unable to gain legal access to Iris Hill to investigate further.
A document showed the record of arrest of one Gavril Yonescu after starting a brawl at the Silver Wagon in the past year. The arrest resulted in the offender spending the night in a cell below Fort Hailcourse and Lowls had to pay a fine of 50 gp to avoid any further inconvenience.
A memory summarized the proceedings of the trial for high treason against a certain Dr. Clymes Prett,
accused of having poisoned Count Haserton III, and sentenced to “die in his cell."
The records indicated that Count Haserton Lowls III died in 4694, twenty-one years ago. His wife died a year later. Haserton Lowls IV was away at school at the time of the trial of Clymes Prett.
Armed with this additional information the party returned to the Sleepless Detective Agency to report to Cesadia. They brought with the head of the ghost man, hands of the Skum and stories of undead zombies inhabiting the Fort. They also indicated no evidence of the Magistrate or the Constable in fact Ciprian was convinced that the Constable he talked to was the creature they killed that took on the visage of Armania and Gavril as they were fighting it. This creature had some skill at using mirrors and in fact took on mirror images and when it died it exploded in shards of glass.
Cesadia did not know anything about the Dr. Clymes Prett but she only came to Thrushmoor 15 years ago. She had always known Count Haserton Lowls III but he has seemed to change over the last 10 years. He was a poor student who seemed to want desperately to redeem his shattered reputation in academic circles.
Increasingly obsessed with secrecy during his burgeoning occult research, he grew a tall hedge around his residence overnight to prevent the curious from getting too close, leaving a gatehouse as the only point of entry. Lowls seemed to intensify his efforts to gain as much esoteric knowledge as possible. The count hoarded more and more occult evidence in the form of books and artifacts, even hiring couriers to gather information in distant lands. Heedless of the consequences, Lowls began to allow his already questionable expenses for this expedition to siphon funds intended for the governance of Versex County. This burst of lavishness exacerbated Lowls’s long-lasting conflicts with his dependent civic leaders. Though the mayors thought keeping the count happy was a sure way to maintain their position, Lowls’s wastefulness began to worry them, and they feared direct intervention from the capital in their affairs. The count’s odd behavior had caused problems with the principality in the past, but his scrupulous magistrate, Tillus Padgett, had always assured a steady flow of cash into the count’s coffers, keeping things under control. As Lowls spent more and more coin, however, he began to embezzle tax money due to the crown. In response to this highly suspicious incident, and after a secret request by Padgett, the authorities sent a state inspector, Royal Accuser Omari, to investigate the count’s administration.
When Royal Accuser Omari finally arrived in town, she came with a small group of investigators having sent Winter Klaczka to Briarstone, she intended to keep a low profile until she had a clearer picture of the situation. Instead of visiting New Chapel, the Pharasmin church in town, Omari met with Cesadia at the Sleepless Agency and requested that the office be the rally point for her and her investigators. Omari asked for an audience with Melisenn Kororo, a request that received no answer. Omari and her investigators went to the Iris Hill, however, her group had not been seen since.
Cesadia now requests that the heroes investigate Iris Hill and try and find evidence of Omari, Magistrate Padgett and Count Lowls. The party is willing but needs to rest and recover, identify a few items they found at the Fort and prepare for assailing the manor.
As the group left the Agency headed to the Silver Wagon, they were met by Sholn and Holissa who were both so grateful for the recovery of Sholn. Holissa thanked the party over and over and then offered them their grandfather's mithral heavy shield as a reward.
"Wouldn't you like to keep the family shield?" asked Ciprian, "Surely your mother would want it to stay in the family."
"She told us to offer it to you, as we hope you can improve the situation here in Thrushmoor," Holissa replied.
The party took them up on the offer and suggested they return home before it became too late and darker outside.
"You surely want to avoid the kidnappers if they are out again," insisted Armania.
As the group neared the Silver Wagon they spied the phantom woman that they had fought once before. Her left eye was missing and a tentacles grew out of her abdomen, great open mouths decorated her arms and bulbous growths were everywhere on her body.
Giggling in a high pitched voice she said "Where is my son, where is he. Where has he gone. Where is my son."
She wandered down an alley and the party let her go as they didn't want to fight another incorporeal creature.
In their rooms at the Silver Wagon the party identified the Scarlet and Blue Sphere as an Ioun Stone. Ursina found that the Bookmark in the Pharasmin Hymnal was a Bookmark of Deception. She removed the Bookmark and the book became a description of the Dreamlands, a realm created
and sustained by the collective dreams of sleeping mortals, the
Dreamlands (also called the Dimension of Dreams) overlays the Ethereal
Plane. When a creature dreams, regardless of the location of their
physical body, they interact directly with the Dreamlands. Sleeping
creatures cast themselves into the plane in idealized avatars known as
lucid bodies, and their dreamscapes are immune to outside entry by
standard magic such as plane shift,
requiring obscure, more specialized spells to access. The dreamers of
each mortal world generate a cluster of dreamscapes, like drifting
bubbles atop a deeper ocean of permanent dreams formed from the
collective mass of slumbering desires, dreams of especially powerful
dreamers, and the dreams of ancient, obscure entities—including the gods
of the Elder Mythos. While most dreamscapes are safe, travelers in the
deep, permanent Dreamlands face living, animate dreams, Denizens of Leng, Leng spiders and the predation
of night hags from the Ethereal Plane, as well as stranger beings
spawned within the core itself.
Some scholars postulate a
distinct region within the dimension for nightmares, much as the more
stable inner portions of the dimension exist separately from the
transient, ever-forming and evaporating mortal dreamscapes at its edges.
Others conflate this nightmare region with the demiplane of Leng, while
still others dismiss this notion but speculate that Leng is somehow
accessible to dreamers who intentionally seek it out.
With this new information the party warily went to sleep and woke refreshed at 6th level. At breakfast the party discussed methods of entering Iris Hill, the thorny hedge seemed to be an impassible barrier. Paullus suggested that he would circle the hedge looking for animal tracks that breached the hedge. Erevel was interested in either crawling under the hedge or hacking her way through it. Ciprian asked about methods of flying or levitation to enter over the hedge. Armania replied that she had one fly and one levitate but that wouldn't get the party over the hedge.
As the party approached the manor the gatehouse looked the same, a squat structure with double doors and a sliding door. There was no knocker or bell. The hedge grew together over the top of the gatehouse. Paullus began his transiting around the hedge while Erevel and Ciprian moved to the west looking under, and through the hedge which had finger long needle sharp thorns growing throughout it. Ursina, Armania and Gavril stayed near the gatehouse watching for any activity.
DM's Notes: Having finished clearing out Fort Hailcourse and reuniting Sholn with his family the party is now at 6th level.
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