Day of the Parrot (11th), Seed Moon, Year of the Burning Mountain

Shivering Shore-leave for the Shark

Christian of the High Passes and Cunelas stepped off the Shark to an unexpectedly chilly, desolate Lankhmar oppressed by a sorcerous winter. The first thing they saw was white-robed Aranduil chatting to skittish seagulls.

Drinks at the Double-Dome

Aranduil invited the seafarers to the nearby Double Dome, in the Street of the Thinkers. At least it was warm. Cunelas was impressed with Aranduil’s past performance on the stage. Ockasiola and Yucta arrived and they discussed the situation. Christian and Cunelas agreed to help out with the city’s persistent ice-sorcerer problem.

The Astrologer’s Agonizing Arboreation

They walked down empty Silver Street towards the Park of Pleasure, seeking the astrologer Droov. When they arrived at his third-floor tenement they found it ransacked. On the roof was Droov’s corpse, grotesquely pierced by a five-foot pine-like tree of unknown origin. It looked like the tree had grown up through the astrologer’s body. The tree was growing in an oily, ill-smelling dirt.

Droov’s neighbour had seen two hooded figures and pulsating colours, and heard sounds of struggle.

Gardener’s Guidance to Gallows Ground

The strange pine seemed vaguely familiar to Yucta, but Aranduil knew of a retired gardener of the Overlord who might know more. Kalla Green-Tresses was mournfully tending her roof garden when they arrived. She identified the tree as an avak pine, which grows only in darkness in the frozen north. She thought the ill-smelling soil was gallows ground, a sorcerous fertiliser, and suggested Borlu of the Plaza of Dark Delights as the merchant.

Borlu wasn’t hard to find. He sold expensive night-flowers to Yucta and told them he had sold a cartload of gallows ground to a number of small pale-eyed fellows — Ice Gnomes! — who took it away in a gaudy cart. Cunelas recognised the cart description as like those used in Lankhmar’s festivals, and stored away at the end of Festival Street.

Furtive Fight at the Frigid Festival Facade

Aranduil squatted in an alleyway, talking to the rats. They told him of a building nearby with pulsating colours. As they approached the warehouse, a snowstorm engulfed the city.

The warehouse was an ugly clump of three buildings with a water tower on top. They opened up a set of barn doors to reveal the gaudy wagon and a couple of ponies. Ockasiola found traces of gallows ground in the cart. This was the place! Christian thought flame might cure Lankhmar of this problem, but his torches spluttered and went out. Sorcery!

They proceeded upstairs cautiously. Ockasiola kicked open a door to reveal four Ice Gnomes trying on bits of actors’ costumes. Those gnomes were not long for the world. The adventurers continued upstairs to a dilapidated room with an old statue. They found a few bags of gallows ground and 12 avak pine seeds in a box. Aranduil carefully separated the seeds from the gallows ground. He climbed the next set of stairs, which ended at a door. Pulsing red green and yellow light was visible through the cracks, and he heard soft whispers.