"Hrmph," Lym grunts. "Fine. We can try. Limmeric?"
Lym's bat comes crawling out of her sleeve, and she mutters an incantation over him, stroking his fur the whole time.
"Let out one," she cautions. "Only one. We need raw meat to settle the rest down, however."
Suddenly, the wizard snaps her fingers. "Before you release the selected bird, grab it and hold it before me. I have an idea for something useful..."
Sounds like a plan.
Praxim takes care of the birds' needs, including the one they'll be releasing.
Rhianni watches the release, in case she can aid the procedure.
Outside, the raven zips northwest and the bat follows.
The spellbook contains: ball lightning, blink, cat's grace, chill touch, enlarge person, fox's cunning, grease, haste, lightning bolt, mage armor, magic missile, scorching ray, shocking grasp, shrink item, spider climb, and web.
"I know now where the raven has gone," Lym reports after communing with her bat. She strokes her familiar's furry back and feeds him a few snippets of raw meat, left over from the ravens' repast, before the weary little creature crawls back into its usual hiding-place.
"This spellbook is... very good," she continues. "There are many spells in here that I did not yet know. Useful spells. Rhianni, shall we consult a bit? With sufficient funds, I can scribe scrolls of some of these spells for your use and mine."
"But in any case -- now that we know where those cultists' contacts are, we need to make an important decision. Do we go there right now, or do we take the day to prepare ourselves appropriately?"
"Let's take the time."
"Either way, they're going to know somebody is coming. That bird showing up with no message will tip them off."
"It could not be helped," Lym says, shrugging. "We still haven't mastered their cipher, so we could hardly send a message they would have accepted."
The Wizard frowns. "Which brings us back to this blasted journal. Who do we get to help us with it?"
"Then let us prepare, they may get bored waiting for us to arrive." she says with wry smile. "Hmm, and Lym, you can read all that stuff in that book, I guess I was lucky to discover the powers without having to study like that."
Yep.
Lym never actually told us where the cultists are, so it's her decision. Otherwise, I'd like to wait until we can be rested and ready before going after them.
"Get me a map, if you would be so kind," Lym says. "I shall mark the location so our more martial constituents can make a proper plan of attack. Personally, I will continue to study these encrypted documents and try to make some more headway."
Praxim will rustle her up a map of Underbridge.
Tomaru continues to help decipher the journal.
Make a Linguistics check and roll 2d4 days.
Aid other Linguistics
You fail to decode the journal and learn nothing from it.
Lym utters a rather vile series of Orcish swearwords and slams the book shut.
"Failure!" she snarls, clearly angry at herself. "Bah, and we do not have the time to work on it more. We need to prepare for the next confrontation."
The Wizard turns away from her books to regard the party's warriors.
"Have you a plan ready for the battle?"
"Depends on whether we have some means of flight for everybody. The best approach would be at the top from the air. Climbing through an old clock tower taken over by cultists could be messy."
Rhianni will take a few days and will try and discover what she can about their destination and who is there currently. She will go off to find some more scrolls, looking for a few scrolls of knock and 6 scrolls of fly.
"I can scribe some scrolls of flight, if we have the time," Lym says. "Rhianni and I can use those to ferry us all in and out."
"Desna sees fit to grant the ability to fly to her priests. You need only pen spells for Praxim and Rhianni."
Underbridge is the most derelict and seediest of the city's districts, and the Magnimarian government by and large takes an "out of sight, out of mind" philosophy to this district's problems. The clock tower was a rare attempt to bring order to the area, but was ordered closed by the city after ten different deaths resulted from attempts to climb the stairs inside.
No one seems to know more about it and finding more information probably requires going to the Shadow to find out more.
Returning to her friends, Rhianni relays the what she has found out, "To find out more of the Clock Tower, we shall have to go to Underbridge, though its is rough and ready. Even the government has given up any control in the area, it's likely lawless and dangerous. As for the Tower, at least 10 have died climbing it's stairs, before it was closed. I will journey there and read the cards or tell tales of the ancient, if you give me a couple of days, I might be able to get some more information. Have any of you heard the names of inns and taverns in the area? Its where I would start."
"Should we move closer to our destination? It would help to keep it under surveillance and, if we have been found out by our foes, the move may throw them off for a bit."
"On the other hand, it would make it easier for them to attack us in the dead of night," Lym counters, "and down in that district, no one would turn a hair, or so it sounds."
"The ale probably isn't as good there, either. It probably wouldn't hurt to change inns in the morning, and from there, Tomaru and I can scoot the Tower while you two stay here where it's safe...r."
"Just send us a message where you are get to in Underbridge boys." says Rhianni smiling at the two men about to go to the Shadow.
"How bad can it be in that other part of the city?" asks Rhianni, unafraid through her own naivety. "We could follow Praxin and Tomaru down there don't you think Lym."
"It can be very bad," Lym says, her voice stern. "I vote we stay here until we are ready to move; keep our base of operations as far from those blackguards' hideout as we can until we are ready to move."
Tomaru will split his time between deciphering the journal and scouting the area around the clock tower.
Lym assists Tomaru with the translation and starts scribing a scroll.
Praxim goes with Tomaru to scout the tower. Otherwise, he finds a tree somewhere near their inn to sit under and try to calm his roiled spirit.
Rhianni goes out looking for magical supplies, taking in the sights and sounds of the city, enjoying being in the street markets and in the various highly colored merchants shops. As she wanders she keeps her ear to the ground for rumors or any inspiration for her stories. She will sketch a map of her travels as she goes and searches for the shops, to get a good idea of the layout of the city.
Praxim and Tomaru:
You find your way to the coastal district of Underbridge, where the crumbling Irespan leaves the area in dim light. Due to its height, clock tower is easy to spot, despite being deep into the Shadow district.
Making your way past run-down taverns, brothels, and gambling dens, as well as salt-blasted tenements and cheap flophouses, the suddenly hear the sound of feet scraping agsins the ground behind you, followed by a low curse. When you turn and look, you see what seems at first a group of three common beggars, but looking more closely, you see that they are in fact wererats, and they're weilding swords.
...
Lym:
What spells are you scribing?
...
Rhianni:
Make a Diplomacy check
"Resplendant Goddess of Fortune, be a boon to me and my companion and a bane to our enemies." Tomaru prays for Desna's aid as he moves to put Praxim in between himself and the rat-men.
Cast Prayer.
Lym starts by scribing a scroll of Fly.
Rhianni takes refreshments in the square and listens and watches the world go by...
"We want no trouble," Praxim growls, knocking an arrow and waiting. "Run off."
He readies an arrow at the lead wererat. If the wererats move towards them, he fires.
Attack:
Damage:
Praxim: Make an Intimidate check.
Lym: No, it's not okay.
Rhianni: I'll give your results later.