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[Jon Potter]

They rested, despite Saelus' protests. "I still say we should press our advantage," he asserted. "A ship without most of its crew won't go far." Neither Grandfather Plaque nor Morier had much inclination to seek further battle, however and so they rested.

There was no convenient ground nearby so they were forced to lash the umber hulks together into a rough approximation of terra firma. The amalgamation was bizarre and more than a little grisly considering that Noxin's remains were part of their improvised island, but pragmatism won out over sentiment.



Morier used his newfound powers to heal the worst of the colonel's injuries and then Saelus settled in with the spellbook he'd gotten from Huzair's Haversack. After a while, he paused long enough to scratch out a rough magical formula onto the back of a nearby umber hulk.

"By the way, Morier, I have an idea that could use Noxin as the host for a spell of creation," he observed, tapping out the ritual he'd outlined on the hulk's carapace. "So that we might have a companion of sorts that is able to fight for us. But it does probably then need that hammer to wield." He then pointed at the Valiant Vessel bag into which Morier had placed Noxin's magical gear. Morier looked over at the wizard's writing and, while he couldn't understand all of it, he saw that it was far from complete, having just the barest suggestion of how such a thing might be accomplished in theoretical terms.

"I'm laying no claim to the weapon, Saelus," the albino said. "It's just too big to carry any other way." The war mage nodded and went back to flipping through his new spellbook to see if he could find an Identify spell in its pages.

Morier began examining the potions.



A few minutes later, Saelus closed the book with a frustrated sigh and said, "I think the other spellbook contains an Identify spell, and unless you're capable of casting such an incantation, I need access to that spell." Morier looked up at him and put the stopper back into the potion vial he was examining.

"I'll get it," he said, getting to his feet. He handed the mage a clutch of potion bottles. "Take a look at these three and see if you can tell what they are. I deduced that the other one's a Potion of Invisibility."

"That will come in handy," Colonel Saelus said, accepting the other three vials.

Morier soon had recovered the second spellbook from the Handy Haversack and he waited for Saelus to examine the potions. The mage was only able to identify one with any certainty: a Potion of Cure Moderate Wounds. The other two vials were quite similar, but there were enough differences that he wasn't comfortable saying they were all Cure potions.

Saelus took the second book, black-bound and adorned with shiny metal studs, and settled in with it while Morier brooded with his thoughts and Grandfather Plaque circled their "island" on watch duty but growing more and more enamored with his freedom on the astral plane.



"Gah!" Colonel Saelus growled snapping the spellbook shut some time later. "I can't make heads or tails of this encoding matrix! I can barely make sense of the handwriting! The formula is idiosyncratic and needlessly grandiose!"

"That sounds like Huzair," Morier said, smiling wistfully at the thought that the wizard was managing to annoy folks even after his death. Huzair would be proud of himself if he only knew.

"I can't learn this spell," Saelus muttered bitterly. "Not now anyway." Morier stood up and walked over to the mage, extending his hand for the spellbook.

"Well, the items aren't going anywhere," he said, patting the Haversack at his side. "And neither are we unless we get moving."



They unlashed their "island" and repackaged the corpses so that Saelus and Morier could each tow some of the bodies; Saelus had an idea of making suits of hide armor from the umber hulks and since the bodies did not decay on the astral plane there was no hurry in shelling them.

With no indication of a direction to head, they followed the path of the fleeing spider ship. Contrary to Grandfather Plaque's very vocal protests.

Saelus quietly suggested to Morier that they return the construct to the Handy Haversack in order to have some peace and quiet.



This time when the ship approached, they did not see it until they heard the cry of "Ahoy!"

They turned to see what looked like a narrow longboat approaching from behind them at an oblique angle. It was close enough for them to see that a bearded human dressed in robes stood at the fore, his hands hovering over a massive crystal embedded in the bow. Light from the crystal washed over him and his companions, four tall, skeletally-thin humanoids with jaundiced flesh bearing a variety of large, bladed weapons stowed about their person.

Morier recognized them from Huzair's description of his brief time on the astral plane. "Githyanki," he said to Saelus.

"Ahoy!" the human shouted again. "Do you require assistance?"