Alastor Crossclaw – blogpost 5

We walk back to the inn, shrouded in a fog cloud, and with an invisible Farryn and Grond near us. I can still hear the metal grinding from Grond, and people shouting in commotion near the fire we caused. We try to walk stealthily back to Guts & Garters. Then, with a pop, Patience appears again. 

Before he can say anything, I cover my mouth with my paw, shake my head at Patience, and whisper: “Please be silent.”

Back at the inn, without being seen, I exhale in relief. 

“Hey, where is Mohan?” asks the White Mage. No one has any idea where he went. We decide to wait for him and make ourselves comfortable near the fire. 

I start playing my lyre, and setting the mood: “When we kiss…. oooeeeehhhhh… firee…”

Farryn asks: “So, am I going to get paid, or do I have to join you voluntarily?”

“Well, we think we can use your help, but first, I have to ask something of the bar lady.” the White Mage walks off. I have the idea that the bar lady likes him, so I play a little bit louder than I usually would do, trying to help the White Mage to persuade her if necessary.

After a short while, the White Mage gestures to the party near the fire, we need to come closer. The bar lady brings us to the cellar beneath the bar. 

“What have you done?!” she whispers with a low, raspy hushed voice. 

“We freed a Gnome from the Zhentarim.” 

“Gnome? What Gnome?”

“A Gnome with a metal dog.”

“Yeah. Ho! HO! Wait. I am NOT a Gnome with a metal dog. This is Farryn Flamel from the Never Evers.” says Farryn pompously, stepping forward. I facepalm myself with my paw: why is this Gnome so STUPID to immediately reveal his identity?! If this bar lady is aligned with the Zhentarim, we will have a huge problem on our hands. 

“Oh. Sorry, I didn’t stand up for you,” she says. “They have too much power here, and they come for people more often than I’d like.”

I exhale under my breath and take my paw off my mace. Crisis averted. 

“Have you been seen?” she continues.

“No. We have to make sure the Zhentarim has less power here. We have a small starting group, and we can try to arrange that. Are you with us?” asks Farryn.

Then, Farryn sees Patience and turns around. “Stop. Stop. We first need to do some introductions.” he says with an outstretched hand. 

“Who are you, actually?” 

“You’ve NEVER heard of me?!” says Farryn, his voice cracking with disbelief.

I start to play the Never Ever song silently on my lyre. 

After a minute, I stop abruptly, because we hear someone knocking at the door of the cellar. 

“Can someone go up and check?”

I stand up and walk the stairs up to the door. “Who is this?” I ask in a low voice. 

“It. Is. POES.”

I let POES in, and it immediately walks to the White Mage. 

“One of the reasons, Farryn, you’re here with us, is that you can perhaps help us with POES.” says the White Mage, showing POES to Farryn. “You have invented stuff, and maybe you can help us?”

“An AUTOGNOME. I haven’t seen one in AGES,” says Farryn in awe. “Can someone help me to investigate him?”

I approach POES and grab it. I turn it over so Farryn can read the inscriptions on the bottom of the metal. After Farryn is done, I put POES down again. I don’t really understand what it all means, but hey, as long as they know, I’m happy. 

After a while, we need to go. However, Farryn wants to sell items in the Yawning Portal first. Turbulence and Violence first give the purple bag of holding to Farryn, where they stashed all the Zhentarim loot in. 

“We need a place to rest in peace. Where can we do that?” asks Farryn.

“Yeah, no. I dunno..” say the two sisters. 

“Could you arrange the resistance to the Zhentarim here, then we can go to the Yawning Portal. If you need extra help, we can help you.”

“That’s a nice plan.” says the bar lady. 

“I’ll contact Mohan.” says Patience. That’s a good idea, I’m getting worried as well. 

Patience tells us Mohan is near, so we decide to wait a couple of minutes more. When after 10 minutes Mohan is not in the cellar yet, Patience sends a new message to him. 

“Seems like Mohan has some problems with the Zhentarim…” he says when he received Mohans’ answer. 

Farryn says we have to get to the Yawning Portal to sell the stuff to Obaya because she’s leaving tomorrow. He describes a place Mohan can meet us tomorrow to Patience, so he can send that to our troubled friend. As a last action in the cellar, he puts all the money in front of us and tells us we can take our share. Before I can get my part of the loot, he asks me: “What are your specialties?”

I answer briefly that I am a heavy hitter, and that I can play music. I shrug and take my share of the money. 

We sleep one last night in Guts and Garters, and before bed, Farryn plays a song about himself. I’m secretly not impressed: the content of the song is not one of heroes. 

“Let’s create a new song, you’ll get the royaltiesss!” he says to me before I head upstairs. 

The following day, we woke early and go to the place we’d meet him. To take the shortest route to the Yawning Portal, we need to pass Hobgoblins, and need an identification paper, an ID, as Farryn explains it. We already start the process while we wait for Mohan to join us.

“Dear Hobgoblins, this is the ID for Grond and Farryn. These three,” Farryn points to the White Mage, Patience, and me, “need to register.”

We walk to the desks in the back of the cave and answer questions. The first part of the ID process takes an hour. Next to me, I see the White Mage wait irritably. “This would be FAST Farryn…” he mumbles. 

“I think I’m dead by the time they’re done…” whispers Patience. 

“WRITE DOWN. 1282. Please hurry up.” says the White Mage. 

“No. no. This cannot be your birth year.” says the Hobgoblin behind the desk. 

“Then write down what YOU think, I don’t care.” 

After the tedious questions, we need to create a portrait. It takes a long time, but the devil is in the details: I want them to get my manes and nose JUST right. Finally, when my portrait is almost finished, Mohan arrives. He tells us he helped put out the fire as an alibi, but he got a card from a Zhentarim-guy, that turned out to be a tracker. He didn’t want to lure the Zhentarim to us, so he flew almost the whole night, dropped the card somewhere on the street, and slept near the place we’d meet the following morning. When all the IDs are created, we can go upstairs, one level closer to the surface. 

Along the route, we find some dead Hobgoblins. They are poisoned, and already looted from any valuables. We leave them. We also find a Chimera statue, and when we break the statue, it is rebuilt quickly. “This is a place where stuff is enchanted: it just rebuilds like that.” the White Mage explains. 

We walk through a hallway, hear a ‘click’, and jump aside. An arrow misses Farryn’s head by an inch! 

Floors 2 and 1 are empty, we can safely pass through them, and not much later, Farryn is talking to Obaya in the Yawning Portal. 

“Found new recruits?” Obaya asks Farryn.

I’m a bit insulted: WE found Farryn and took him with us, not the other way around… I start to look around the Yawning Portal and see applications hanging on the wall. All of them are made by Farryn. 

“Tomorrow, I’m leaving Waterdeep, so is this your last sale?” asks Obaya to Farryn. “I’m going back to Chult, so you can come by if you’d like. Asks for Wakanga, the merchant prince.” 

“Yes, this will be my last sale, but first, I have to check what could come in handy for the party,” replies Farryn.

He starts handing out stuff. A shield for the White Mage, a Headband of Intellect for Mohan, a Clockwork Amulet for Patience, and a sword for me. The sword’s name is Tearulai and the hilt is covered in rhinestones. “This is the base of a good friendship,” says Farryn. 

He continues with the stuff he wants to sell, and it takes a while. I sit at a table and try to attune with the sword. I don’t pay attention, but I overhear mostly: “Um… No. I want to keep… that… and that… oh, this might be convenient…”

“Who am I talking to?” I hear inside my head.

“Hello, Alastor Crossclaw speaking,” I say out loud. 

“DID YOU SAY HALLASTER?” Farryn immediately turns around.

“NO! I said Alastor, but in short, CROSS.” I snarl. 

“Okay, okay,” says Farryn. “You know you can answer mentally, right?” 

“I’m going to have some fun.” says the voice.

I think this is the sword talking to me. Interesting. “Yeah, let’s have fun,” I reply.

“I see you love beauty as well. Your own exterior isn’t bad at all…” says Tearulai. I puff up my chest, fulfilled with pride. I want to buy a new rhinestone or jewel for the hilt of the sword, to put my stamp on the weapon as well. 

During shopping in Waterdeep, I see multiple stones, but most of them are already imbued in the hilt, or I don’t like them as much. I see a diamond, but that is a bit too expensive for me. 

When we’re done with shopping, we head over to the bar that is owned by the Never Evers, Trollskull Manor. There, the White Mage tries to investigate POES once more. He and Farryn notice a protection layer on POES, and they try to break it by dispelling the magic.

“What the hell is happening?!” POES yells in panic. “O my god, o my god… O, MY GOD!” 

“Calm down POES.” says the White Mage.

“How are you calling me? POES? What a shitty name!” says the Autognome.

Then, POES calms down. “POES reports,” it says.

“The protection is active again.” says the White Mage. 

“Maybe we have to calm his emotions when we’re trying to remove the protection.” suggests Patience.

“Hold on, why would we remove the protection…? We see it’s totally freaking out without it. Why not leave it alone?” says Mohan.

We leave POES in Trollskull Manor to help Smokey, the bartender. 

We all sleep in separate rooms in the Manor, and the next morning we’ll leave for Undermountain again. 

We gather in the bar early in the morning. The fastest route is via Skullport, or via the Gith in Stardock. 

We decide to plane shift with the amulet Patience has with him. He has to study it first, but after breakfast, we go to Stardock to get to Undermountain via the Astral Plane.

On the outside, where we crashed the ship, we are recognized by the Gith. Arakek is among them, and he gestures us inside. We haven’t had the time to oblige to the quest they gave us, so hopefully, they won’t be too annoyed with us and let us through.