14 Lamashan 4709 AR
Absalom

We elected to fight on. First, we needed to get through the thick wooden door in front of us. I was unable to kick it down, so Zandu torched it, and I used my claymore to break up the burning wood so we could enter more quickly. Our nemesis was already gone, but his means of departure was obvious: I pulled up a “hidden” trap door and we filed down and through some winding tunnels and caverns. Zandu’s dog and I split tracking duty, and when we came to a ladder, I slung the dog over my shoulder so we could ascend easily. We all came up in a storage building in the Coins district and then headed to the Puddles as far as Gill’s house. He was not home, and Nessiam was nowhere to be seen, so we took the tunnel back to the pyramid and did a proper search of the main tower. We were quite lucky— we found several lanterns with glass of different colors and an iron box— once Tythe got the lock open, we found the book Nessiam had stolen (as well as a large sum of gold and gems). Before heading back to the Pathfinder Society, we opted to memorize the “abort” code just in case we managed to lose the book.

I am happy to say that we did not lose the book, or get attacked, or witness armies of dead marching through the streets. We got the book to its destination and handed it over, then used the lanterns to render any further use of the codes ineffective. We were rewarded with seeing the unnatural fogbank along the harbor’s edge dissipate.

One would think we would go and take a well-deserved rest at this point, but Zandu had other ideas. After getting the Society’s cartographer Elias to look at his “map” (which is a big tattoo on his back), we all ended up nodding off in various corners while his map was meticulously copied by Elias.

Afterwards, we went to the Golden Griffin, where there was a big “bath” waiting. The bath turned out to just be a big tub of water that everyone used— I am not sure how this is supposedly cleaner than a river, where the water rinses away whatever needs washed, but it was warm, which was a pleasant surprise. It was quite late, well after the kitchen had closed, so I pleaded our case with the innkeeper, who kindly found us some fruit and bread to tide us over till breakfast. We shared a room— I do not remember too much after that, as I was quite worn out from two days of non-stop adventure.

Morning started out with a proper breakfast. I had planned to take it easy for the day, but shortly after we sat down in the common room a local woman burst in and exclaimed to the innkeeper (and anyone else within earshot) that her basement had demons in it. Curiosity piqued, we asked the innkeeper about her and learned that Goodwife Thestra was of sound mind. We wandered next door and offered to look around for her, and found a tunnel behind some barrels in her basement, and a shadow of… something. Before we could check that out, the town watch arrived and took over, insisting that this was now a crime scene and needed to be handled in an official capacity (never mind that we had rescued the town several times without their help over the past few days).

We started to feel a bit aimless. Salma decided she should drop in at her school and give them her portion of the gold we found. I guess that is her family. Later still, we returned to the Golden Griffin to find a letter waiting, addressed to Zandu. It said simply:

“I’m in need of your services— meet me at the Salty Dog. — TR”

I was actually relieved that we might have something to do, as I was getting restless, and I think Tythe was hitting the rum bottle a bit earlier than normal.

We headed straight to the Coins and to the aforementioned tavern. Upon entering, everyone in the place turned to look at us, and I thought we might have to fight our way through, but a man at the back of the room motioned to us and ushered us through a door to a private room. There we met Torin Radu, one of the two families we encountered upon our arrival in Absalom. He told us how his sister had been kidnapped by the filthy Torescos and somehow charmed into believing she was in love with one of them. Our “mission” will be to attend a fancy ball hosted at the Torescos with the hopes that we can get the Radu woman away from her captors. Dress clothes will be provided by the Radus.