Act IV - Session XVII
Come the morn we are all sick. Time slips by in our fevered state.

2nd day, 1st rule, State of Depravity, 157 FHR
I awake in Nabod's room feeling much better. Acolyte Media has looked after us these past few days. Prioress Ismine drops by and gives us leave to depart our sickbeds.

Chryseis brings the note she found in the rat room to Priestess Sophia, and sure enough Priestess Sophia recognizes the writings upon it. She says it reads:

Our king demands a tribute of 3 ratlings to be delivered before the end of constraint. Those who do not deliver the ratlings will be considered parahia.

Track.

Hynrik has a new client; a green-skinned gargoyle. They seem to be setting a price.
Back at home I learn that Da's doing guard duty while an estate is surveyed. In the temple Tripicas is teaching a class about the Prime material plane today. I visit the temple then Hynrik's place. Once the group is gathered we head off to visit the Friendly Fiend.

The Friendly Fiend has a shop in the Lady's ward. It's in the strata just below the street, and so you have to go down a sharp set of stairs to get to it. The shop has a simple front. Inside the shop smells like a berry-herbal tee. Wind chimes sound as we enter. It's a 20' square room piled high with shelves and wooden bins. All of it is trinkets, wooden toys, paperweights, carved statuettes, whistles, and so on. There's a cabinet of decorative swords and knivs. It's a cluttered curio ship with strange paraphernalia. Seems he sells magic components, portal keys and probably magic items too.

A tan-brown jackal-headed fiend comes out to greet us. He's got pointy ears with tuffs of fur sticking out of each. He wears a lot of bangles, crystals, rings and beads. His name is Akin, and he is the friendly fiend. He's very ... friendly. He recognizes that we're cross-guardians by our accent.

After the pleasantries, wherein he proves he knows most of our families) he tests the black powder we found in Nabod's treasure. It's a imaging powder - a powdered form of creation. With it you could create anything non-magical. He creates an arrow head from it, using only a tiny amount.

In his very friendly way he inquires after us. Chryseis asks about her helmet and bracers. He says that the gems in them are waiting to be set with magic. We depart after telling some tales to apease his curiosity. Ludivik is very cold to him and Eki not very talkative. He seems to collect information along with curios. He tries to feed us, offering us tea and cakes (to Chryseis he offers mercury, but realizes quickly that he can't offer it to her warmed as he intended because mercury fumes are fatal to mortals). And when we leave he gives us a marvelous gift - a spinning top that never stops spinning. As it spins you see a "galaxy" float above it - pinpricks of light of various sizes and colors across a dark expanse. It's beautiful.

We then walk to the end of gear run to the Hands of Time. It's a 3-story metal building. Sadam Hasan ibid Arvalos bids us welcome. The Gnomes are quite taken with Chryseis. We follow as she is taken aside and offered a membership to their guild; Gnomes seem quite eager to fix her, work with her and even work on her. One happily fixes the compass box for her. She offers to consider membership and we depart. When we do we see a gnoman woman come out and activate a portal in front of the building and then step through.

Back in Crossguard we learn that Manioc (the fated who evaluated Nabod's room) is making an offer on the wardrobe. Ludvik agrees to act as courier and negotiator on the deal.

Linni tells us that Eliath works the main shift at hte foundry; stoking the main furnace. He comes off shift six hours past peak. Most folk coming off shift stop along ale house row for a time.