OOC: I am still not getting notifications for this thread, despite having it Watched. This may become a problem.
After hearing the 25th word spoken between Ana and Ashur, the raven takes off and flies back in the direction from which it originally came. Analiese senses Roo's desire to pursue the target, but it's just a momentary twitch before the raptor's magically-constructed sentience overcomes its innate predator instinct. The artificial bird never sees Bannor, nor vice versa (though he might hear the whistling of its flight overhead, past a thickness of canopy sufficient to block his view, shortly before he arrives in the clearing).
Meanwhile
Dumos and Robyn have met on the road, both independently en route to Waterdeep. The tiefling has gotten a letter from some mid-ranking noble, who mentions that he was recommended to her by a lower-ranking noble whose holdings Dumos recently protected (not that this was really the reason why he was there; killing the monster was his priority, and he just managed not to inflict any real degree of collateral damage in the process, so the locals remember him more fondly than they otherwise might have done). The missive was quite vague on the details, but Dumos can likely assume that the intended mission will involve both coin and trouble, so he's certainly inclined to go check it out, having no other immediate priorities. The cleric of course has a more personal and hard-to-ignore summons motivating his travels; Selune's whispered voice is often hard to clearly make out, but one particular moonlit evening's prayers, he was quite specifically pointed in the direction of Waterdeep, with a highly unusual degree of urgency, as if the fate of many innocents depends on his making his way there as soon as reasonably possible. As tends to be the way of things in Faerun, the two traveling adventurers crossed paths coincidentally, shared a campfire meal or three and traded stories, and have established at least the beginnings of an acquaintanceship, so they now approach the local trading hub of Westwater together.
As the holy man and the somewhat-less-holy spellsword approach within a mile or so of the city, they notice that the air smells worrisomely of ash and smoke. They are relived when they finally spy the walls, but somewhat less so when they see the closed iron gates on a settlement which usually has nonstop trading caravans passing through in both ways, with spear-carrying guards walking the battlements only 15 or 20 yards apart, and a distinct haze of pollution in the air overhead which the summer breezes have yet to dissipate. Clearly, something unpleasant has happened here, or perhaps it's still happening....
