Many thanks to everyone for the birthday wishes!
It should be known, by the way, that P'Cat never missed a chance to cause Arcade misery when it came to identifying Wild Magic items.
Somewhere I have amusing e-mail descriptions of the results after attempting to identify a Deck of Many Things, the Bracers of Wild Defense, a Wand of Losing, and a Wand of Wonder. Oh, the opportunities! Too much for a peg-legged furball to pass up, you may be sure.
Sito is correct. "Toadhead" (we never knew his real name) was a wild mage in a group of mercenaries that we faced back in Gaunt, a group that included the mage Clith, sister to Peggus. The mercenaries had been hired by Skiltor Rune to kill us (see the Early Years Thread for details). As you may recall, Rune was imprisoned and had his tongue removed for his crimes at Legerdemain. Alix (of course) decided to taunt him by having a false portrait painted of Arcade and Tivity looking deliriously happy at their wedding. He then bribed the guards to have the painting placed across from and in full view of Rune's cell!
This, I should point out, was Alix's idea of a really funny joke.
Rune was understandably enraged. He hired the mercs and then sent us a misleading note to lead us on the road to Candledin, right into the ambush. They were well informed and well armed, and gave us a good bit of trouble. The evil druid added 10 years to Arcade's age with a Staff of Withering. The anti-ranger nearly carved Tao into kibble. Also, the wild mage (I believe) tried to Sovereign Glue a metal pot over Tom-Tom's head to stop him from using psionics. I seem to recall that it nearly worked.
[By the way, high up on my list of really ooky and horrible near insta-deaths: submerging someone's head entirely in a Sovereign Glue filled pot. Breathing not an option, and boy is it hard stuff to get out of the lungs. Makes Raise Dead/Ressurection very tricky.]
Clith drowned in a small creek after being badly wounded and then having Insatiable Thirst cast on her. Sadly, her spellbook was ruined by the water and Arcade was unable to mooch any of her spells.
We had no idea who she was until Peggus clued us in (while we tried to keep the rising tide out of our mouths)!