The breathes a bit after the fight with Rolth, the necromancer, before moving onward. They find a room having vats with blood in them. All can feel that there is magic in the air but Cress realizes that it's necrotic in nature. Listening at the doors, the group hears someone moving around behind one. They open the door to find a vampire, a nosferatu, doing an autopsy on a body. Niko spoke a bit but was ready to leave when Grohlyn jumped in and attacked him! The fight is on and the group is wondering if they are going to pull it off. The nosferatu keeps dominating Grohlyn and it's only his steely nerves and veins of ice that allow him to break out of it and attack. Sveinn appears to be unnerved by the nosferatu because he can't hit shit. Cress deals a massive blow to the nosferatu, and himself, by using up all the charges in a wand of scorching ray. Of the nine charges, eight hit the nosferatu! One charge did explode in his hand and sent him reeling away but he managed to recover. A few more hits and the nosferatu, who introduced himself but no one paid attention to it, turns to gas and disappears under the operating table into some openings. The group looks around and Rock is the one who sees the outline of the secret door. After a trap is disarmed, they burst into the nosferatu's lair and managed to give him the final death. Cress is happy to take his spell book and they find many magic items as well.
They take the time to spread the items out and then head back to the room with the blood vats in it. Opening some double doors reveals tall tubes, with some sort of viscous liquid in them along with some creature. Cress isn't even sure what the hell it is. They all avoid the tubes, not wanting to awaken them. Another set of doubles doors takes them to the inner sanctum of Urgathoa, where the high priestess is doing another summoning into a tube. The group won't have that and attack.
The group's moral is almost shaken when, after two devastating blows, one from Grohlyn and one from Sveinn, that the priestess heals herself almost back to full health. They start all over and eventually bring her down. Cress went down from a blast of energy she gave off, as does Lazarus, but both were helped back to their feet and they continued to help. Lazarus pounded on the priestess using the wand he was given, Niko kept trying to flank attack, and Grohlyn did what he could to charge but didn't manage to do so. When the high priestess goes down, they are happy!
Until the pool pulls her body into it, transforms her to a Daughter of Urgathoa, and she is back fighting! Again, spewing curses at them for ruining her and her mistress' plans! Lazarus has no idea how they are going to do this. His throat is so dry, it's scratchy. He can barely speak, much less intone a cantrip he has. Saying the wand's command word is almost too much! Cress uses the wand he has and has Rock healing others as they need it. However, as scary as she looked, she doesn't hit often in this form and isn't able to cast spells without invoking quite a bit of wrath from the group. Soon, this enemy is vanquished as well.
The group collapses.
They forget about someone they have tied up. They are battered, bloody, and beaten. They barely manage to work the elevator and bring the platform to the main floor, walk into the treatment area, and collapse. Some of the queen's physicians help them but they can't do much other than bandage them. Niko is well enough that he goes and gets a carriage to take them to the temple of Pharisma, where they explain everything that happened. The high priestess heals all of them and while the worst of it is gone, they are still quite exhausted. Eating some of the bland refreshments also helps but all of them, as they tell her what happened, long for their beds. Soon, they have the carriage take them away. Trinia understands their exhaustion and only asks for the barest of details before getting them to bed.
They rest the next day, exhausted. Cress isn't sure if the ring of sustenance is good or bad since he sleeps his two hours and then is sore when he gets up. But get up he does and keeps working in his lab. They found out from the priestess that no one is sure if the queen is behind this or not but something, or someone, called a Fallen is. Lazarus has heard of them but doesn't know many details and the stories he does know seem exaggerated. They hope to hear more tales of these Fallen to understand what it is they may face.
Again, two hours of sleep that night still doesn't see Cress back to feeling his full self. There are places that ache that he didn't know he had but he again gets up and gets going. Very early, there is a knock on the door. Confused, Cress goes to find out what is happening. Someone is saying they got the call and have arrived and what did the place want? Confused, and more than a little wary, Cress talks more with them before he opens the door to see the copper dragon. Not sure what to make of that, he does invite the dragon, who names himself Clink, inside. The dragon transforms himself into a Shoanti barbarian, although with coppery skin and blue hair, and then proceeds to make breakfast. Whatever he doesn't have, he sends someone to get or pulls out of a bag at his side. Soon, a good breakfast is prepared. Again, the dragon explains that he heard a call bringing him here. Not to the tavern itself, he says, but the city. He was wondering if they knew about it or heard about it from patrons. The group is unsure of this and still pondering it when another comes in and joins them.
The elf, who introduces herself as Laori, is wearing spiked chain mail and carries a spiked chain for a weapon. She blatantly says that she is a member of the Brotherhood of Bones, a group dedicated to bringing about the return of Kozavon! The group isn't sure what to think of that. Indeed, they are taken off guard by her pleasant demeanor and how frank she is about things. Hopefully, they don't get distracted.
GM Notes