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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Isida Kep'Tukari" data-source="post: 3064553" data-attributes="member: 4441">Aftermath of Arden's FallFebratari smiles at the little group and returns a squeeze to Shenystari's hands.  Then her and the two men leave the little group alone.  Following the still-shaken Opal along a different route, they arrive in the garden of another large and elegant home that's scarcely a stone's throw away.  Pushing open the front door, Opal leads the group past marble-floored halls, mirrored studios, and into a sitting room paneled in golden-violet wood, carpeted in something woven to look like a garden full of flowers, and filled with carved furniture of obvious quality and some taste.  An older woman, hair going to gray, but her face still mostly unlined, sits with her back to the door, drinking tea and looking out the windows at a small but colorful garden.  "Mother..." Opal gets out, before bursting into tears.  The woman hurries over to her daughter, tugging her over to a couch and setting her down, hugging her and letting her cry onto her silk-clad shoulder.  After a few minutes, Opal finally sits back, and wipes her tears with a handkerchief.  The woman rings for a servant, and cold juice is brought for Opal and the rest of you.  She waves for you to seat yourselves as Opal begins to talk.She talks about her philosophy classes, her meetings with the Illuminated Minds, her infatuation with Arden Fair, and how Shenystari had been helping her with her studies.  Tearfully she recounts the events of this afternoon's meeting, telling how Arden picked her for a demonstration, then tried to get something to possess her body.  "They saved me, Shenystari and her friends.  They stopped Arden before he could finish, and then they took me away from there.  I guess I fainted after they knocked out Arden, and a riot broke out.  They were just trying to help me, and I know all kinds of wild rumors will be going around.  I wanted to tell you what happened before you heard something awful,” she finishes, waving at Shenystari, Rayni, Mel, and Bail.Shenystari had met Lady Ir’Daga in passing, so she wasn’t entirely a stranger, but right now the Lady looked as if she wanted answers and wanted them now.  “Shenystari, what exactly happened to make you think Opal was in danger from Arden?” she asked, her voice cool but tightly controlled.  Opal clutches her mother’s hand in an attempt to comfort.~~~~~~~~~~~~~At the Drunk Duck  “Well, I was with a group out of Morgrave University.  They wanted us to bring back some giant artifacts, and I’m a sucker for an adventure.  I was a student there at the time, just picking up some useful information in between my fencing lessons, and that was something I couldn’t resist.  “The trip itself was somewhat expensive, nearly a hundred, and it took us a half-month to get there.  Course, you can go cheaper and get there in a month, or spring for a wind galleon, Lyrandar ship, or airship and get there in about a week, if you want to pay anywhere from five hundred to fifteen hundred gold.  Expensive, but safer and more comfortable.  Some of the dedicated teams out of Morgrave can get the university to spring for that, but they’re going after things that can turn you to goo if you aren’t careful.  And the university took care of our letter of marque too, which was a plus; those bloody things are expensive.  Necessary, but expensive.  Some poor sods tried to sell their stuff from the ruins without one back here in Sharn and had to hand over everything and pay fines to boot!  But getting there’s half the fun, eh?” she says with a bright laugh.The group can continue to chat as they finish their meal and take a stroll down the dock to take a look at the various ships.  There are several merchant ships docked, being loaded or unloaded with cargo.  Some is being loaded into wagons, others onto platforms that are hoisted by magical cables to the Stores district far above.  Other ships are a bit less ordinary, some bearing the elegant lines of a House Lyrander ship, some soarwood vessels scarcely skimming the surface of the water, even at rest.  A couple of the rare elemental galleons, with their airy rings of captive elementals, are berthed in separate areas, giving the magnificent ships plenty of their own space.  Far above you can just make out the airship docking tower, with one pulling into dock as you watch.Hxaptos does notice [sblock]something a little odd as his group is walking.  Tondrek might have noticed it too, if he hadn’t been extremely busy commenting on “elemental binding apparatuses” and “potential for fire-propelled vessels” or plying Querzana about the warforged she saw in Xen’drik.  A halfling and half-elf in scuffed leather armor, knives in their belts, with shifty eyes wouldn’t normally garner any attention down here.  Except you know these two.  It’s Harven and Felis, the two bodyguards you hired for your trips down to Fallen last month.  They’re following you, you’re sure of it.  Hadn’t they been at the Drunk Duck?  Weren’t they at at least three of the docks you had been strolling on?  Didn’t you see one of them eye you with a third eye from somewhere within his cloak? 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