The Tree

The Tree

This is a history of one of my characters and his adventures, as seen through his eyes. Glad to have you visiting.

ALL MATERIAL IN THIS FILE IS UNDER COPYRIGHT BY ARIEL GOLD

Not long ago, I was going to bed . . . the bed not to be empty . . . when suddenly there was a blinding flash of light. When I could see again, I found myself in a forest clearing with a number of other people who looked just as confused as I felt. Bolten was nowhere to be seen, and I had little doubt I was far from where I had been. The next thing I knew, a halfling had tied something to an arrow and shot it away from us, and we were being attacked by a gang of orcs at the direction of a Red Wizard of Thay. We defeated them, but a small human woman was badly injured in the fight. She was the protector of a small child who appeared elven when I finally got a good look at her. Something in me snapped when I saw the child in need of protection, and I found myself involuntarily drawn into that cause.

We collected the object the halfling--Turen Salleck--had shot away from us. It turned out to be a root of pure black. Then we took the child Laurianna to a woman named Layrel in Waterdeep. She was in the castle of Kelvin Blackstaff. But the root we had caused both Kelvin and Layrel severe facial burns whenever they were in the same room with it. After getting the root out of the room, we learned something of what it was. The root, it seemed, was the physical manifestation of a the lawful evil god Bane, who was supposedly killed by Mystra and Cyric during the Time of Troubles. A similar object had been found previously, and Elminster of Shadowdale destroyed it. Unfortunately, Elminster was now on another plane and could not be consulted on its destruction. Also, the root would cause serious burns to any Harper.

It seemed we were stuck with the root, since neither Layrel nor Elminster could come in close contact with us (it inhibited their magic as well) and they could not think of another group who would not be tempted to use its power in ways which would ultimately be harmful, by intent or otherwise. Our enemies--those who would use the root for evil--were likely to be the Red Wizards of Thay, the Zhentarim, the Cult of the Dragon, and generally anyone powerful who wanted it.

As to the girl the small human woman--a young ranger named Chantelle--had been protecting, she turned out to be very important. Layrel told us the she was a demigoddess, as was Layrel herself. Layrel was also sister to the Lady Alustrial. However, Layrel didn't know what god was mother or father to Laurianna. We decided it was safe to leave Laurianna in Layrel's keeping. Also, Layrel's sister, the Simbul, had been intimate with Elminster. Layrel agreed to call her to see if she could aid us any in the matter of this god-root we'd been saddled with.

The Simbul was a silvery-looking older woman. She told us that Elminster talked to many of the gods, and finally found one who would destroy it. In the process, though, the destroying god was destroyed and Elminster was transported to another plane. Evidently, there was another way to destroy the root, but it was "too dreadful."

We were told that if we needed to contact either Layrel or the Simbul at any time in the future, either hears anything said anywhere in the realms in connection with their names. We planned to go to Shadowdale to attempt to find answers in Elminster's dwelling, and in preparation, Kelvin Blackstaff outfitted us with supplies and the best horses, those meant for light war.

At some point, in our experiences with the god-root, a magic-user in what had suddenly become our party tried to cast a "detect magic" spell on it, and it changed the had that had held the root into the hand of a beast, furred and clawed. We realized that using magic around the root was probably not the best of ideas. What we didn't realize was that, with the odd effects the root had on magic, Kelvin's usually strong wards around his dwelling were not effective. I and one other, a strange human woman named Zola who turned out to be a druid, were captured from our rooms in Kelvin's dwelling. I was asleep, and they had used sleeping poison on her. We woke to find ourselves tied and locked in a dungeon. More of our party joined us there at every turn, prisoners of a halfling--or what had once been a halfling, as it had obviously been using magic on the root Zola had had possession of and was now considerable transformed--and his drow accomplice.

The remaining members of our party somehow found out what had happened to us and came in to rescue us, including Turen in full plate armor. It would have been hilarious to see a halfling in full plate armor, if not for the fact that he had obviously gone all but battle-mad in the rescue attempt. He and Thelamdaae--a merchant with an unusual choice of weapons--and an elf in our party whose name I do not remember (for he wasn't with us long) and Kelvin had slain the halfling--Cuddlemuff Furwinkle--and the drow--Malagar. I asked Turen and the others if the drow, being about my height, had worn any armor. He had chainmail, it turned out, and it fit me nicely. I foresaw much more fighting in our future, so it seemed sensible to wear the stuff. I doubt it was elven chainmail, but it made almost no noise when I walked--I suppose a drow would not have put up with such--so I suppose it's in that same class.

I'd had a lot of time to think in the dungeons, and what time I wasn't dwelling on being locked up again (and this time, having not even done anything to merit it), I was brooding about trying to find information in Elminster's dwelling without getting ourselves killed in the process. The two persistent trains of thought came together in an odd way. Since Elminster was somewhere in the planes, we might be able to find out where and bring him back, or at least speak to him . . . if we had someone who could speak across the plains. And the only person who came to mind was the Lady Alustrial, who had helped me not once, but twice, before. So very much against my well, I suggested we go to Silverymoon instead of Shadowdale. The rest of our party pounced on the idea with enough eagerness I almost wished I hadn't suggested it--the last thing I wanted to do was go back to Silverymoon and risk running into my former "friends" and family. Some of them would be dead of course, being shorter-lived than elves, as would my record with the thieves' guild (I hoped), but others would be very much alive, and I did not want to see them. Still, it did seem like our best option, so we set out for Silverymoon disguised as a merchant caravan. Along the way, I asked Zola if she would teach me to read, rather than just guessing at words. She agreed, and she taught me as we went on our way.

We found out from a man along the trail that one of the towns we must pass, Red Lark, had been taken over by the Zhentarim. We considered our options--to go through or to go around--and decided that with such a dangerous object as the root in our hands, it was more important to keep the root safe for the safety of the Realms than it was to risk it for the sake of perhaps being able to help one small town. We went around. On our way around, we ran into Seabreeze Moonglory, a Harper (we could tell because she started burning) who had been send to free Red Lark from the Zhentarim. Alone. We thought she was crazy, but had decided already that me must keep the root safe, and so we wished her well and went on our way.

A few days later, on the trail, a Cult of the Dragon member, along with her immense and armored bodyguard and a dracolich accosted us, looking for the root, which we claimed to know nothing about. Her name was PoisondBlade, and she said that if she could not get us to give this "powerful object" to her, she would at least like to travel with our group, to prevent its falling into "the wrong hands." After some discussion, we decided to let her and her bodyguard--who was not allowed to speak and whom she called simply "Joe"--travel with us, on the condition that they ride point and that she not use magic unless given specific permission. She also swore a halfling blood-oath with Turen, at his request.

Not too long after that, we ran into Seabreeze again. She had defeated the Zhentarim at Red Lark. It turns out that she and PoisonedBlade are sisters, and try to kill each other once a month since one is a Harper and the other a Cult of the Dragon member. They said they wouldn't fight again for another three weeks or so. We made them promise to take the ensuing battle at least three hundred yards from us.

The next obstacle we ran across was a naga with two goblin accomplices who wanted the root. We defeated it in battle, but in that battle I shot an arrow and hit three of my own allies. We could never decide afterwards what had happened, if the wind had caught it wrong and bounced it off the rocks, or if (as Turen thinks) Turen bumped my arm as I was firing it. None of those in my group really understand quite how devastating that was for me, though. I've been hurt so often by people I called friends, that to hurt someone I called friends . . . it was shattering. I shot practice arrows many times after that, trying to improve my aim, but I don't think I will ever use my bow in battle again.

We passed through the town of Yartar, staying the night there. It was there that we found out more of the story on PoisonedBlade. While she was gone for some reason, her bodyguard, whose name was actually Bob, explained to us that this tea she was always offering us was actually the antidote to a sleep spell, but that she took it all the time because she didn't like sleeping. That's why she was always so . . . energetic. At the time, she was in the common room of the inn doing backflips with the Thelamdaae, who kept up with her due to some incredible tumbling skills. Later, Thelamdaae gave her a small drink from his flask of saki, which he claimed to give even more energy than her tea. In actuality, saki turned out to be an extremely potent rice liquor. She was out for the better part of the day, and while she was unconscious, someone (I no longer remember who) replaced the herbs for her sleep antidote with those for regular tea, giving us a brief respite from her antics--until she gathered more herbs, at least.

We finally reached Silverymoon, by which time I was not the happiest of elves. We were granted audience with the Lady Alustrial very quickly, and on our way in passed a drow with violet eyes exiting from an audience, and a huge panther with him. I nearly stopped breathing. I had heard tales of the drow ranger Drizzt Do'Urden, but I had never in my life expected to actually see him. Oddly, as we passed, Thelamdaae greeted him in a language I can only assume was drow. He looked startled, replied in the same language, and went on his way.

When we entered the chamber with Lady Alustrial, PoisonedBlade, Joe, and Thelamdaae were all struck down by an alignment detector before Lady Alustrial remembered to turn it off. To my intense embarrassment, Lady Alustrial remembered me, and greeted me with a hug and a question as to how I was doing. I think I mumbled something incoherent. When we asked Lady Alustrial for aid in at least attempting to find out where Elminster was, she agreed readily. Suddenly she paled, and I could have sworn the symbol of Cyric flashed in her eyes. I think she lost consciousness, then, and when she awoke she began hastily writing letters as she explained. Elminster was indeed in Cyric's keeping, so she could not contact him without risking Cyric's intervention.

She also gave us some suggestions on how to destroy the god-root--or rather, tree, since its encounter with Cuddlemuff Furwinkle. We could: overload it with spells and deal with the ensuing problems, place it in a pocket dimension for safekeeping, expose it to a good god on the plates, plant it in a dead magic area, cast a spell on it in a wild magic area, plant it in the Beastlands in the outer plains, cat numerous protections from evil on it, or cut it with a vorpal weapon. None of these were guaranteed to work and all had serious drawbacks. She told us that Elminster had destroyed the similar object which had been in his possession by getting the most neutral god he could find, Narfondel, to destroy it. This was no longer an option for us, since as we already knew, Narfondel was destroyed in the process.

The tree was already beginning to show signs of intelligence--it seemed distinctly amused when we moved to protect it. We were told that at some point, it might grow sentient enough to talk to us, and that we must not listen at any cost. It might charm us if it got too large. We also learned that there was a large dead magic area in Myth du Nor, but going there was a bad idea. There was also an area in northern Silverymoon which was now sometimes a dead magic zone--and sometimes not. To find a wild magic zone, if we went about five miles to the north in the forest north of Silverymoon, we would find an area about a hundred miles in diameter. However, this also seemed to be a bad idea. When asked, Alustrial said that if she had to chose, she would try to plant it in a dead magic zone.

A wizard, one of Lady Alustrial's friends, had an apprentice he wanted seasoned, and she suggested that the girl come with us. Her name is Kayna, and she's a half-elven fighter-mage . . . and she doesn't seem to know who her parents are. But we were low on magic in our group, and she seemed to be able to do exactly what she said, so we agreed to take her with us--though why anyone would willingly throw in her lot with a party guarding the physical manifestation of a lawful evil god is beyond me.

We stayed in Silverymoon for several days. During that time, Turen told us that a cleric named Mularic had tried to bribe Turen into delivering the tree to him. Later, most of our party left for a rather fancy ball in the home of one of the wealthier citizens of Silverymoon. I stayed far away, of course, not wanting to run into anyone who might remember me. PoisonedBlade was among those who went to the ball--carefully covered so her Cult of the Dragon robes didn't show. What happened next, I didn't find out till later. Evidently, at some point in the party PoisonedBlade's robes slipped and everyone saw that she was exposed as a Cult of the Dragon member--and for this I feel a small bit of kinship for her, that she also was one of the few in Silverymoon who could not be accepted. But when the guards came for her, instead of going with them and explaining the situation, she threw a fireball at them. The first I learned of this is when PoisonedBlade showed up after teleporting out of the situation. I gathered that Lady Alustrial went after her, and when I saw the signs of a magical battle just out of town, I went to see if I could be of aid.

Some type of skeletons were trying to attack Lady Alustrial, who was in a magical duel with PoisonedBlade. Soon the rest of our party showed up, as did Drizzt Do'Urden, and we all did our best to help Lady Alustrial. But PoisonedBlade made an attack that knocked her from where she levitated and sent her sprawling to the ground. Chantelle and I ran to break her fall. Then I drew on my strength, shouldering her unconscious or dead body, and ran into town looking for help. Mularic found us and healed the Lady Alustrial, whose first words on opening her eyes were, "I've never been dead before."

Turen disappeared for awhile after that. When the others came back they told us that PoisonedBlade had said that Joe was her only love, and now he was dead, and that we were her friends. She decided that maybe it wasn't worth being a Cult of the Dragon member if it lost her her friends. And then she left. I remember feeling a knife in my heart when she said that, but I couldn't argue with her. At least she had a choice. When Turen came back, he was very subdued. He had some rather deep cuts on his arm, and he claimed PoisonedBlade's teapot and kept it in case she should come back.

I don't remember when during our trip PoisonedBlade and Seabreeze fought, but fight they did, and PoisonedBlade killed her sister. Somehow, though, she seemed just sure that Seabreeze would be back to fight her next month. Some of our party basically looted the body, and Zola gave me her longsword. I had wondered if it might be magical, and had asked Lady Alustrial if she could tell. Sometime in the day or two after PoisonedBlade left, Lady Alustrial showed up at the inn where we were staying and told me that the sword did have a minor magical enchantment, but more than that--it held Seabreeze Moonglory's soul. Seabreeze spoke to us then, explaining that both she and her sister had such an object--PoisonedBlade's was her Cult of the Dragon outfit--so that if either was killed by the other's hand, that object would hold her soul, and sometime in the next month that object would be taken by someone--usually someone unscrupulous. Supposedly, that someone was fated to die within the next month, and when it happened, at the moment of death that soul took over the flesh, remolding it and fighting off whatever threat had killed the previous soul. Seabreeze suggested that I leave the sword for someone else to find, and promised that if PoisonedBlade really had mended her ways, she wouldn't need the sword anymore and would give it to me. I wasn't so sure I wanted it, but I did have a very good idea of where I could leave the sword.

Lady Alustrial left and I after her. I stopped to tell Chantelle that I was getting rid of the sword, though not all of the why behind it, and she decided to come with me. I left the sword in front of the house where the priestesses of Loviatar had tortured me so many years ago, for it had the same disreputable look and knowing what I did of the group, I had little doubt it was still used for clandestine "worship" of their goddess. On our way back to the inn, we bumped into a dwarf named Halfthere, who was missing his left eye, hand, and leg.

He told us of strange happenings in Sundabar--of a massive man in the armor of a priest of Bane wreaking havoc on the city. (He also told me to grow a beard--I looked like a girl. This did not exactly inspire my goodwill.) We were leaving when he began humming a little tune that began "Elminster and Halister were once very much the same . . . " With our interest in Elminster, we stopped him and asked him to explain. He told us that he was not native to our planet (planet?) and that he had a boat in which he went plane-hopping and had learned the song off-plane. It seems that before Waterdeep was Waterdeep, Halister was gifted by the gods with magic much like Elminster's. However, he got strange and reclusive, and was said to kill his apprentices by trapping them in tunnels underneath his castle. He ran into drow down there, and I don't remember the outcome of that battle. I do know that that's the site where Waterdeep now stands. There is a tunnel that still leads to those tunnels (called Undermountain) which begins in a tavern in town. Halister is said to be there still, perhaps undead by now.

Not too long after that the priest of Bane showed up . . . and it turned out to be not Bane, but Bane's soulless body. We knew we had to get Bane's soul in tree form out of there before it was reunited with the body. The only way we could see to get out of there quickly was to ask Halfthere to take us out of there on his plane-hopping boat. He agreed, but told us he couldn't guide the boat, it just drifted. We decided we had to take the chance. Right before we left, PoisonedBlade showed up, deciding she had to help defend Silverymoon to put things right. Then the boat left, and we ran aground in the middle of a dry tunnel in the Outlands. Halfthere said it was an area run by naga's.

The next little while is a blur for me--so much happened so fast. We helped the ruler of the nagas to defeat a rouge naga-creature. We took a brief trip through the Third Hell. We ran into the deity of cats, and Bane's body showed up and killed that deity. We spent a brief time in the Beastlands and planted the tree in a dead magic zone there, but when we got back it had grown another couple feet. We finally wound up in the Seven Heavens, where an angelic being tried to destroy the tree with a vorpal weapon. The tree grew another half-foot when the magic weapon hit it, making it six feet tall. We gained two party members in the heavens: a dwarf in a silly red hat named Grumpy, who was too evil for the Heavens to want him around; and a magic-user named Stargazer (with her familiar, a cat named Sam). Stargazer wanted to some revenge for her cat, whose deity had been killed by Bane's body. Grumpy just wanted out of the Heavens, and left us as soon as he could.

We had no idea hat to do or where to go next, so Chantelle asked to see Mielikki for advice. Mielikki was unreachable, however, we were sent to visit Mielikki's counterpart for some other planet (planet?). She gave us some more options for further advice: Elminster, Cyric, Halister, and someone named Raistlin Majeree. Cyric would have to be fooled into helping us. Elminster, of course, was bound by Cyric. Halister's story was much as Halfthere had told us. Raistlin was actually from the planet Krynn. (No one has been able to really explain to me what a planet is. Maybe Zola knows--she has a lot of very odd information and knows words I've never heard before). He defeated bane himself once while bane inhabited a human body on his planet. However, Raistlin was currently a captive of Takesis, the Dragon Goddess, on the six hundred sixty-eighth plane of the Abyss. Additionally, he is a very evil man, who led the Order of the Black Robes, the most evil magicians on his planet.

We chose Raistlin and the Abyss as the lesser of all evils. The goddess we were speaking to was able to send us to the appropriate plane of the Abyss, but we had to abandon Halfthere's boat and had no idea how we were going to get back. The plane of the Abyss where we arrived was a sandy wasteland. Raistlin was chained to a wall there, evidently to be killed by the Dragon Goddess everyday and brought back again. We were able to break Raistlin's chains, but guardians showed up to battle us as soon as the chains were gone. We battled the guardians, and for the first time, I was a spell called power word kill. After the first guardian was dead, Raistlin had a chance to pitch into the battle. He pointed a finger at the heart of the second guardian and said, "Die." And that's exactly what the guardian did. Very frightening. Kayna took an obviously magical battle axe from one guardian, and I took the longsword from another. Then Takesis showed up in dragon form as Raistlin tried to construct a gateway to his own tower on his own planet. I was one of those who fell prey to a fear spell and fled the dragon, but Raistlin finished the gate and we were able to run though in time.

In Raistlin's tower, he was able to analyze our situation a bit more and give us some advice. He said that another way to destroy the tree would be to have a creature connected with a negative energy place (such as an undead) touch the tree. That would free the soul from its tree form. Then it would take the body of a powerful evil person. We would either have to destroy Bane's soul before it took a body or after killing that body.

Raistlin tried to send us back to our own plane of Toril. However, it was a spell in which a coin was flipped, giving us a fifty-fifty chance of getting to where we were going. If not, we would wind up . . . "somewhere else." We called the coin and it fell tails. We wound up on the Plains of the Dead on what certainly appeared to be Toril. However, after a battle with evil priests of Sylvanus in which Chesintra Thilofar, the Red Wizard of Thay whom we had seen just as we gained possession of the root back at the beginning of our hellish adventure, fought on our side, we came to realize that this was not our Toril. It was a reverse Toril, with all alignments equal but opposite. Evidently, we all had our evil counterparts in this Toril--only now they were in our Toril--who were trying to destroy Bane, the god of Love. Chesintra finally caught on when Kayna pulled out her battle axe and watched the reflections of our counterparts back in our Toril.

Chesintra said she had to send us back to our own Toril. She suggested that we might destroy the tree by having our Cyric break it over his knee. Then we had to gain an old text, guarded by skeletal ghosts, to find a spell to go home. Chesintra flipped the coin again, and we called a place as it was in the air. However, the tree, talking since it reached the Plains of the Dead, called out "Momaster" at the same time.

The coin landed tails and we wound up in Momaster. There we found out that Bane's High Impreceptor, presumed dead, was probably coming for the tree. We didn't know what to do, but Eric Malaya, a man who claimed to be a former Zhentarim/Thay double-agent, helped us out. Eric turned out to be Cyric in mortal form. We asked him to break the tree over his knee just as he was preparing to ascend a celestial stairway. However, it didn't work, and the tree wrapped its roots around Cyric's arm and couldn't be untangled. Cyric tried to lose his mortal form and loose himself that way, but the tree was tangled in his primal essence. Over the protests of both gods, we shoved them into a bag of holding that Cyric himself had thoughtfully provided for the tree, and Zola stitched them in with a stitch she said would hold anything. We were at a loss for what to do next, though, until the door on the celestial stairway opened and Elminster himself walked out through it, since Cyric could no longer hold him. He agreed to help us, and transported us all to Shadowdale.

Elminster told us that, eventually the gods would break out of the sack. We probably had a couple of weeks till all the Hells broke loose, he thought. Eventually, though, either the gods' fighting with each other would cause the stitching to tear, or the gods would ally with each other and burst out of the sack. Elminster thought that the best thing we could do was to try and make sure the gods escaped in a relatively safe place. They would both consider us mortal enemies by this point, and would have to defeat us before they could regain all the prerequisites of their godhood. If we didn't succeed in killing their souls then, they would take avatars and we would have to kill the avatars as well. Elminster also was able to outfit Kayna, Stargazer, and Zola with a spell which must be cast simultaneously, but which would kill the gods' souls.

During the interim, we had the option of doing whatever we wanted. Dove Falconhand showed up at Elminster's dwelling, and offered to give any of us who wanted some training in weapons. I have been a ranger too long to need much training in any of my chosen weapons--the only thing that will make me better is experience. So I declined politely. I had my own business in Shadowdale. Unsavory it may be, but some things must be done for sanity. I went "hunting" every night, and slept during the days.

I was returned from a "hunt" about a week after our arrival in Shadowdale to find Elminster's front door a splintered, smoking shambles and a fight just ending. A pair of glowing eyes, associated with Chesintra Thilofar was fleeing rapidly, and I was later told that the wizard herself had been there, only to wind up in a battle with Elminster. When I arrived, however, the most obviously wrong thing was that two glowing, blob-like masses were floating free in the air. One spoke with the voice of Bane; I did not have to guess who the other was. The souls of the gods, set loose in the fray, sped off to take avatars in the Realms.

Elminster found out for us that Bane was in Silverymoon, in the body of his High Impreceptor, while Cyric had gone to (of all places) Momaster. Elminster explained that the difficulty was, the gods now both considered us their mortal enemies--and neither could regain true godhood until he had killed all our party. We had to go after them. Bane was busily ravaging Silverymoon, trying to get our attention. The longer we left him alone, the more damage he would do. However Cyric was absolutely insane; he might show up at any given moment for the sheer pleasure of distressing us. We had to choose where to go first.

For me, at least, it was no choice. The others agreed with me. We would go first to Silverymoon, to try to help the innocents there. Elminster teleported us to a spot just in front the Lady Alustrial's castle.

We stepped inside the dark main room, and I briefly made out a large man's form holding a Lady Alustrial, unconscious, by the throat. He made some mocking threats. Then suddenly, he let go his hostage--Zola's doing, I found out later. I made to run for Lady Alustrial and get her out of there . . . only to find myself suddenly in the midst of a fireball that caught most of our party. (StarGazer's familiar died in the flames). I kept running, though, on memory and sound alone as someone lit a lantern, further destroying my infravision. I grabbed Lady Alustrial and dragged her outside the palace, then went back in to see Kayna struck down by--the fireball? I wasn't sure. I pulled her out, too, then shouldered the unconscious Alustrial and cried out for clerical help. Mularic and a few others of his order were there, and helped us. I rushed back into the fray. We battled Bane's avatar, and of all the ridiculous things, the blow that finally destroyed the body was from my dagger.

Immediately, we saw the glowing blueness that was Bane's essence. The fighters in our group flung off our cloaks and threw them over the essence, trapping it, then throwing our own weight on top to hold it where it was. The next thing I knew, we were lying on the floor, the essence gone. The spell Elminster had provided had worked.

Alas, we had little rest after that battle. We were quickly sent to Momaster to deal with Cyric. We found him there in his temple. Zola spoke reasonably with him--or as reasonably as possible with an insane evil god. He said that he had a small difficulty: he either had to kill us to regain his godhood, or we could procure for him the Book of Vile Evil, which would allow him the same option. We chose the latter--though I almost wished we hadn't. When Zola asked, Cyric told us the Book of Vile Evil was right there in Momaster. In the Temple of Loviatar.

The rest of our group decided to get the book while I stood there, trying not to go blind with rage or be sick to my stomach. Zola gave Cyric a token of our good will so he would let us leave peacefully to get the book. It was a metal object, like the weakest spring I had ever seen, and it came out of her pack. She let it spring back and forth in her hands a moment, then gave it to Cyric. She called it a "sling-key," and as we turned and left she called back, "And Cyric: It walks down stairs . . . all by itself."

We heard Cyric mumbling over the sling-key, and as we got outside, one of his priests grumbling, "No, I do not want to try it."

We went to the temple of Loviatar. The others made a plan for how to get the book out. I just leaned against the wall of a building across the street, hands on the hilts of my longswords--for Chantelle had taught me to fight with two-weapons of equal length, as she did with scimitars. I do not remember much of what was said, for I was too busy trying to retain control of myself. Chantelle looked at me worriedly, but I could not answer her questions. Why, in the names of all the gods, did it have to be Loviatar? Eventually, Kayna went into the temple, dressed in the garb (or lack of same) of a priestess of Loviatar--where it came from, I do now know--and leading Halfthere as a "prisoner."

The next thing I remember clearly are the sounds of something going direly wrong. That was all I needed. I entered the temple at a dead run, swords drawn, and began hacking at priestesses wildly. At some point in the battle, I noticed a sudden flash of light as a stream of fire shot at some of our party. Chantelle was among those caught in the flame. This enraged me even further, if possible, and I attacked the high priestess, the only one powerful enough to have thrown such a spell.

Everything after that is a blank, until the point Chantelle caught my arm and told me it was over. I put my swords back in their sheaths--without cleaning them, I later realized, and we moved a platform in the center of the room. The Book of Vile Evil was under that, as was some amount of treasure. Turen wanted to stop and gather it. I tucked him up under one arm and ran out with him as someone else grabbed the book and the others joined us.

I am told I accounted for three of the six or seven priestesses in that battle. One fainted from the pain with my first attack; I beheaded her later. I practically flayed the flesh from the bones of another. And the high priestess . . . all they found left of her was her chain mail and a few adornments. I do not remember doing any of it.

We gave the Book of Vile Evil to Cyric, and he tucked it happily under his arm, saying he was off to find a Celestial Staircase.

When we were returned to Shadowdale, there was a party going on in our honor. Statues of us had been erected, with plaques beneath calling us the Heroes of Happenstance, and stating our heroic deeds. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. We all received healing. I had a wound from a flail on my forehead, right above the old scar Habyln's group left above my eyebrow. I don't remember getting it. I just touched it gingerly, wondering aloud, "What's one more?" before it was healed. Chantelle and Zola looked at me oddly, but neither asked. I think that's for the best.

Elminster returned Halfthere to the Seven Heavens so he could get his boat back. Then we saw PoisonedBlade again--but she no longer wore her Cult of the Dragon robes. Instead, she wore similar robes, but with real dragons on them, in metallic colors. She was the founder of the Order of Metallic Dragons, she told us, and considered us to be members. She also was the first evil Harper, having saved Lady Alustrial's life several times as Bane's body ravaged Silverymoon in our absence.

Then she said she had another surprise for us.

She made us Harpers.

Well, she didn't actually make us Harpers, but she gave us our Harper pins and described the basic code to us.

No sooner was that done, then an ominous hush fell. A company of priests of Yaktu Zvim, Bane's son, approached. We had no idea what they wanted, but my hand went to my dagger reflexively.

They congratulated us. They didn't want Bane back any more than anyone else did.

When they left, the party resumed. Elminster told us we had also been invited to parties in our honor at Silverymoon, Thay, and Zhentil Keep. Even I was not so much fool as to choose either of the latter, so we were off to Silverymoon once again. Before we left, though, I bought new scabbards for my swords--the old ones being beyond help--and polished the sorely abused blades.

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