5 Alturiak, 1372

Dear Master Zorthaster,

We've cleared the Beholder Corps lair and released Bithra, but our victory has been tempered by news from the surface that the Kiaransaleeans, led by Irae T'sarran, just assaulted the Dales with a huge force of undead. After a brief contact with Lord Morn, our mission has gained a sudden urgency and we have raced to Maerimydra to try to kill the T'sarran before she can amass more undead troops.

As I wrapped up my last letter, Kerith was being raised and I had just found myself on the front line in a battle with beholders. Following that battle, my friends quickly healed my wounds as Primula finished bringing Kerith back to us. It wasn't long before we were ready to move on to the next room. There we found another beholder and an ocular adept, a powerful human warrior who shared some of the powers of the beholders. He put up a fierce fight, using a nasty combination of spells including forbiddance and blade barrier. He was also protected by a powerful resistance to spells that prevented much of my art from being effective. Shane suffered as a result. A ray from the third eye in the forehead of the ocular adept hit the halfling and he was consumed in unholy fire.

The adept was eventually killed, but our enemy had a death pact spell in effect and was soon healed and back in the battle. Fortunately my friends were more effective than me. They took the guy down a second time and this time he stayed dead. We made a quick assessment of the other rooms and failed to find Bithra. Using the crystal skull, I scryed on the strange being. I saw him in a cage, but could not tell where he was. It was Oskar who discovered him. The paladin was going to the other side of the room to search the body of the ocular adept for clues to Bithra's whereabouts when he disappeared. I was able to learn that the cause of this was a portal between the room where we fought the adept and the room where Bithra was caged. The portal, I learned after some investigation, was always active and unkeyed.

We released Bithra as soon as we assured ourselves that he was not going to be a danger to us. Bithra is extremely intelligent. He determined, from the accent of my undercommon, that I was a native speaker of Chondathan. From Bithra, we learned that a Houthocha known as Bawur the Loquacious of Jungentown knows of a portal from that city to Maerimydra. We also learned that Bawur traded his normal life span for the ability to pursue his studies. I feared that we were going to have to deal with another lich. This did not make me happy.

Before leaving the area, we made a rapid survey of the room where Bithra was held captive. The place was connected to the surface by a short stair. At the surface we found that the beholder corps stronghold above had been recently raided. It appeared that the ones we fought had been hiding out and keeping a low profile. We speculated that this was the hide out of the beholder corps hit a short time ago by the adventurers known as the Celestial Fury.

Much of this we learned later, after we had gotten our group back together. We collected what we could of Shane's remains and sought refuge in the magnificent mansion. In the morning, Primula brought Shane back to life and we went up to the surface to make a report to Lord Morn. With a sending by Primula and some scrying using the crystal skull, we learned that the Dales had been attacked by a powerful force of undead. Lord Morn was in the process of leaving Missile Dale, leading a train of wounded. Along side him were the Rangers Three, a contingent of Bladebright Dwarves, and several Far Rangers. He seemed very upset with us and directed us to kill T'sarran. I don't know if he had been tying to reach us to alert us to a new urgency to our mission, or he was simply stressed because of the recent conflict, but I was surprised by his reaction to our contact. It concerned me that the situation could have changed so fast on the surface while we were engaged with making our way to Maerimydra. But, more about that later.

We made our way hastily back to Jungentown after I used a gate seal on the portal. Bawur was easy to find, but not easy to deal with. He was not a lich, but some other unusual underdark race. Stone tablets circled his head as if they were ioun stones. He required books in payment for his information. He was uninterested in spell books. This was fortunate, for I was reluctant to consider parting with any at the moment. I could have kicked myself for not grabbing some of the books I examined briefly in Manzassine's library. Some of the other Wandsmen suggested leaving Mr. Tusgrin in exchange for information about the location and key to the portal to Maerimydra. I'm not sure if they were jesting or if they were serious. I think that some of the group is still not entirely happy with the talkative floating skull. I happen to like him, but he does get a bit annoying at times. I suppose that could be said about all of us from time to time though.

Dalis was able to come to our assistance. When we discussed the problem, he told us that books from the illithid prison had been looted and had already made their way to Jungentown. He was willing to find us a couple in thanks for our assistance to him. He did this quickly as he could tell that we were now in a hurry to get to the drow city. We discussed, before we left him, something else that Bawur had told us. The strange houthocha said that disruptions in the weave have been spreading and that yesterday it crossed the borders of Jungentown. Dalis knew nothing that could explain the meaning of this, but I hope that some investigation on his part might turn up clues to its meaning.

We hurriedly left Jungentown for the portal to Maerimydra. This is a one way portal (key = a thrown stone) that was located just out of the city. It brought us to the borders of the deserted drow city of Maerimydra We found the city in ruins. There were, however, no bodies and no undead. I have since come to believe that Irae T'sarran somehow created her undead army from the former residents of this entire city. It is a frightening thought.

We finally found someone as we made our way through a huge castle in the eerily quiet city. He was Ambassador Wyrruth of Shade Enclave. Wyrruth was in the process of packing his belongings and preparing to leave the city when we discovered him. He was cordial, as all the official emissaries of that dread city seem to be. He confirmed that Irae had returned to the city and was now in the Undying Temple preparing to generate yet another great army of undead to launch at the surface world. He called her first effort a "great revenance" and said that it killed every living thing in the city. She then led this army of undead to the surface. Wyrruth saw little point in staying in Maerimydra as it was. He calmly informed us that he had told Irae of our arrival and then he faded into the shadows.

We are about to launch ourselves into an assault on the T'sarrans, hoping to prevent a second wave of attacks on the sunlit realm above. Wish us well.

Should we survive the coming battle, I hope to implement some strategies that would better enable us to stay in touch with what is happening when we are off adventuring. I know that you have little patience for adventurers, but I know that the path I have chosen is important and that it is the right one for me. If you happen to know of any other troublesome apprentices that, like me, refuse to listen to your wisdom and need to charge off to distant lands looking for adventure, perhaps you might send them my way. Especially if they happen to be interested in gathering information and are good at observing clues and putting odd bits of information together to form answers to puzzles. I need to establish a network of such people that I can trust.

Along those lines, I hope to being to establish more regular two-way communications with you as well Master Zorthaster. I intend to learn sending as soon as I am able, and hope to speak with you via that spell in the near future. To facilitate these communications, I wonder if you might have Korl, your clerk wear something special whenever you wish me to contact you via a sending. If, for example, he wore that pin of the lizard, the one with the one garnet eye, on his vest when you had something to tell me, I could scry on him regularly to see if we needed to speak. In the meanwhile, I will use the crystal skull of scrying to keep an eye on things there. I have been doing so the past few days and have been reassured to see that things seem to be returning to normal as much as might be expected after the terrible events there recently.

Again, wish us luck in our assault on the Undying Temple. I know that what we go to do now is worth whatever sacrifice is demanded of us. I just hope we are up to the task.

Your faithful student,

Cedar