6 Eleasias, 1372

Dear Master Zorthaster,

Finally some progress here in the ruins. We have restored the mythal, recovered the Easterling Moonblade and found Dravis's sword. Not all my news is good however, but perhaps I'll cover the high points first before touching on darker matters.

During our explorations through the elven ruins we heard the sound of a thunderous boom even above the sound of the howling wind. A huge explosion shook the ground and drew our attention toward a very chaotic battle taking place between a giff-filled spelljammer shaped like a gold dragon and a dozen or so sarcrith.

It was difficult to figure out just who to target with spells as first. One of the sarcrith popped through a rather unexpected gate right in front of me but fortunately Xan was nearby and ready to put a number of arrow-shaped holes in the unfriendly beast. The whole encounter became even more crazy as the magelord and his crew of adventurers appeared and started throwing meteor storms and blade barriers everywhere. Xan went down and Oskar, though still vertical, looked like he had just climbed out of a forge.

In a matter of a few breaths we saw more spell power than most mage fairs see in a ride. The magelord, escaped via a contingent teleport when Liadan hit his party with reverse gravity. I targeted those left behind with a few spells before they got off a successful dispel magic against Liadan's art. They hit the ground and instantly raised a prismatic sphere.

During the confusion of the battle, the sarcrith were attacking us just as much as the giff and magelord's party. Fortunately I was able to successfully dominate one of the leaders of the sarcrith. Even more fortunately, he turned out to be the overall commander of the entire force. It was a struggle to finesse my way through the domination without pushing the spell-eater beyond his limits. Despite their hatred for magic, I was able to work the leader into a position where he called off the others and they stopped attacking us. I wasn't able to accomplish much more than that and suggesting that they guard the area around the prismatic sphere until the end of the spell's duration. One sarcrith, testing the limits of his spell resistance, tried entering the sphere. He failed and it was not pretty.

Meanwhile, in the center of the battlefield we discovered the ruins of a spelljamming ship and a pulsing sphere of violet light made of brass and crystal. The giff ship had crashed to the ground during the battle, all the crew had been killed in the brief and confusing fight. On board the ship we easily found orders from the Elven Imperial Fleet, commissioning the ship and its crew to find the "Vondoni Stone" and remove it from Realmspace.

Mr. Tuskgrin and Xan had also died in battle. Xan was back up thanks once again to the spell revenance. Pellinistra next brought Mr. Tuskgrin back with a resurrection. The spell restored him to his animate "life" again, but he came back dripping blood and screaming. When he finally got calmed down he remained a deep, blood-red color.

We also raised the most highly decorated giff we could find amongst the crew. He was a bit taken aback by the fact that his entire crew, the elven advisors, and the ship's helmsman were all dead, but was willing to explain his mission once he saw Pellinistra. His manner seems to indicate that he was used to working for the elven fleet and our companion's drow heritage didn't seem to matter. He was pleased that we had recovered the Vondoni Stone and began strapping it into a cradle designed to accommodate it in the cargo hold.

As this was happening, Xan had time to tell us that he had seen a pair of Shadar Hadouk enter the battlefield and disappear into the ground below one of the blade barriers that had been spinning across the combat zone. We decided to take the Vondoni Stone and our Giff commander along as we followed the two servants of the shades. We discovered them in a short underground passage and listened silently as they discussed a book they had come to find. They discovered it a few minutes before we had arrived and had just deciphered it. Their conversation led us to believe that the Easterlings had discovered the Plane of Shadow and had constructed a portal to it here. It was used to hide things far away in the Shinatra mountains. The portal key was the blood of an Easterling. As soon as the Shadar Hadouk had learned all they needed to from the book, they teleported away.

We entered the room cautiously but as soon as Pellinistra approached, the portal activated and a purple shimmering veil appeared in the gate. We jumped through the gate to find the room we arrived in inverted. All the contents of the room were strewn about what was once the ceiling. We had arrived in a secret chamber that had become a part of an enclave of the Shade Empire; a chopped off and inverted mountain top. Amongst the debris we did discover Dravis's sword. Seeing it, together with the amulet, Kerith was able to dredge up a name -- Pathfinder. He also recalled that there was a third item, a ring that was part of the set. As I had suspected, the sneaky bedine had arrived in the inverted room sometime either just before us or just after while we were distracted. He revealed himself to us, I think because he wanted more information than he was getting just by listening in to our conversation. We explained a little of what we knew about where we were and how the sword Pathfinder came to be here. It still didn't make a lot of sense just then, but when the drow used Pathfinder to locate the missing sapphires it led us through the deserted ancient hideaway where we discovered a few bits of treasure, a shrine to Illistreae, some long-dead elves, and finally three more of the sapphires. At this point we needed only one more.

Pathfinder however, seemed to want to find the ring to complete the magical set. We followed it onward a bit further until I was starting to get concerned that we might run into some shades and our secret way into the enclave might be discovered. Before this happened though, we found the ring. It was set into some strangely marked stones that were arranged near the top of a large chamber. I thought I'd have a bit of fun with everyone by warning them all to close their eyes, hinting that something bad might happen when I removed the ring from its setting. Really I just wanted to examine the markings a bit more without everyone staring at me. Thesmiteed drow spoiled my fun by refusing to close her eyes. I felt a little bit bad that Oskar and the cat both immediately followed my request even though I was just teasing. Oh well, they will get over it. The whole incident really leads me to be a bit suspicious of Pellinistra though. She doesn't trust me even though I've helped her out a lot. I'm going to keep a closer eye on her behavior from now on.

The thing that was truly interesting was that the arrangement of the ancient stones and their markings were clearly the work of Peraus Wands. I know that he had been working on the shade problem for a long time, and that as a traveler in time he had a lot of time with which to work, but this was a rather complex conundrum. It was clear that the whole situation with Dravis leaving his sword here was a way to get us, still his agents, his "Wandsmen," here to discover the sword and the ring, but it wasn't immediately clear why. I examined the arrangement of the the shadowstone more carefully and it struck me that the whole arrangement was very similar to the way we had set up the keystones that allow us to shift Shadowhold back and forth, to and from the plane of shadow. Not only that, but if some of the speculative notes in Master Wands' writings were accurate, it might be possible to rearrange the stones and symbols here and in the other enclaves, at least all of them except Shade Enclave, so as to weave them directly into the Shadowhold trigger. If that were possible, by shifting Shadowhold, we could shift all the new enclaves back to the plane of shadow! Then if we could prevent them from returning, they would no longer be a threat to us.

The trick would be to get under each of the enclaves. However, if I understand how these shadowstones work, we could very easily travel to the plane of shadow ourselves and make all the necessary adjustments there. That way we wouldn't have to fight the wards guarding the enclaves here and the shades wouldn't even know about our efforts.

The second realization that came to me as I looked at Master Wands' handiwork is that if we were able to make an apparatus to hold the Vondoni Stone in just the right way near an enclave's mythal and if heavy magic was introduced to the Vondoni Stone in just the right way, we could cause a massive disruption to the mythal, perhaps even destroying it and bringing down the enclave. There is a construct in Master Wands' workshop that I recall seeing but that he never talked about. It would be just about the right size and shape for such a device. I do wonder what that would do relative to the signal to the Vondoni though. It might be best to also try that little experiment on the Plane of Shadow to better protect our home.

All these thoughts took a lot less time to conjure up than to write down. I held my tongue for fear of revealing too much to the Bedine and any other untrustworthy dark pointy ears. In silence I removed the ring and tossed it down to the drow who seemed all too possessive of it and the other treasures of ours that she carries. Following that we had a short trip back to the gate room and then a long argument about getting the last sapphire. The Bedine had it. Pellinistra discovered this using Pathfinder and shared the information with us before we rejoined him in the gate room. He was busy reassembling scraps of a journal and thinking about how the Shadar Hadouk can teleport in and out of enclaves when no one else can. We argued a bit about how and when he would give us the last sapphire. Pellinistra seemed even more mistrustful than usual. It seems that the closer we got to recovering the moonblade the more she resisted. I began then to really wonder if she was trying to prevent us from getting the sword. We were able to brow beat her into going along with us and eventually we did get the Easterling Moonblade from its protective wards and got the Vondoni Stone away from the mythal so it settled down. But she seemed to be trying to block us from accomplishing these things by fighting with the Bedine at every turn. I wonder if her real aim is to prevent us from bringing Primula back. I don't think any divine power she wields would have been able to prevent my wish from taking effect, but the drow was there during my casting and she might have done something I did not notice as I focused on weaving the spell.

After removing the Vondoni Stone from the vicinity, I tried to commune with the restored mythal. It was difficult and my new methods for weaving the art do not mesh well with the flavor of the mythal. Even so, I had a brief glimpse of Primula as I tried to read the threads of her disappearance. In this vision I saw her in a magical cell, held captive by the Shadar Hadouk. I saw two of the mysterious people approach, intent on filling a bowl with her blood. No doubt to activate the Shinatra Gate and explore the other end. My vision faded with little more information with which to act. I am confidant though that Primula is alive and that she is no longer in the Spiderhaunt Woods. I also know that whatever Pellinistra intends, I will get my friend back and that she will one day wield the Easterling Moonblade as the rightful heir.

We were able to pilot the spelljamming ship out of Spiderhaunt without much further difficulty and we returned to Shadowhold with much to do. When we arrived, we discovered two unpleasant things. First I learned that Dwalimer Omen had kidnapped Larissa. When I contacted him with a sending and demanded to know where she was, he just said "safe." He made no further explanation and did not attempt to contact me in return. I no longer consider him to be trustworthy and I worry that he has turned actively against our cause.

The other distressing bit of news is that all of Anauroch appears to be enclosed in a huge wall of shadows. I don't know what the effect of this will be, but it does not bode well for the future.

Sincerely,

Cedar