When we last left the party we were trying to figure out what to do with the human cultists. We decided that, even though Travar was closer, Newtowne was the better place to take them.

We passed the Mad Wizard in the Tower, who sent down an emmissary to talk to us. He asked us what we were doing with the people, we explained what had happened, waved and went on our way. Wonder what he thinks of us...

We went all night through the forest, and just as we were emerging from the clearing one of the people in the wagon shouted "NOW!" They started running off, but Thwak jumped on them, Tristian knocked the side of the wagon over onto them to keep them together, Steven electrocuted them, and I did an explosive ephemeral bolt (for knockout only, of course). Keleios rooted the last one to the ground, and Thwak shot a flamearrow into the sky as a signal.

Shortly afterward, a party of scouts showed up. We asked them to help us get the people back to town, and they began hitting the prisoners on the head (presumably to make sure they stayed unconscious). I was about to explain that it wasn't necessary when Kelios jumped on one of them. He, barefoot, knocked her out in a single kick to her head, and continued loading the people into the van. We explained that we had no idea why she did that, and they seemed to take that for an answer, though they were much more wary of us.

We asked the bartender about what we ought to do with our prisoners. He said that some of the mages are still being taken care of by some folks across town, so Tristain and I went to talk to them, and they said, according to their books, these people should have recovered if the horror is gone, unless it's in their minds. This may be a problem. They didn't seem terribly happy about us leaving the humans, but I gave them 500 silver pieces, which changed their minds. First Truth I ever learned: Money makes a lot of people a lot nicer. That taken care of, I went to go take a nap.

In the morning, Tristian and I set off to find the Nethermancer. Keleios tagged along. I explained the situation with the letters to the Nethermancer and he tried to figure out what the letters might do. "The letters aren't *inherently* cursed..." He had a conversation with the letter, animated off the page, threw it into the fire, and then shook some spices into the fire.
"What's that for?", I asked.
"That's to calm me down" He answered.
He continued, "The language is old. Old enough to want to be spoken, and named. It's not something a horror wrote... it won't have you cursed, but it might drive you mad..."
"Okay. What have you figured out from the stones?", I asked
"Not much yet. Still working on it. If I can make bodies for them, I might be able to put the souls into new bodies, or put the stones in in place of a heart, but... If you happen to find a giant cauldron, I'd love to have it. Otherwise I'll have to have the smiths build one, and it'll take them six months to figure out how"

We took our leave of him, and all went to meditate. I learned the language of the "Val-Heru"--the language that had been on the slate. "Val-heru" does have a sort of translation: "Lords over Dragonkind" It has no words for thinking about other languages, and it calls itself "Writing". And this language is, in fact, sentient. You suspect if you talk to it, it could talk to others who speak it. Oh, and their word for themselves was "Val-Heru" It has no words for Trolls or Orks. Its word for Dwarf is a combination word "Scholarly High-ranked House Servant". Its word for Elf is "Woodsy Low-ranked Outside Servant". Humans are "Reproduction Project Attempt J", T'Skrang are "Underwater elves" and Windlings are "artistic elves". The page is a page of instructions, apparently for tending dragon eggs and training baby dragons.

Tristain was there when I finished meditating, and I explained some of what I'd learned. We decided to try to track the egg-stealer down, and since we've upset the people on both sides of the river, we decided to ride our "boat" (wagon) to sail downriver.

As we passed the former caer, we noticed the tentacles with sharp hairs have moved out and are all around this area. Tristian tried poking one, it reacted, and several of the party members jumped back (and stepped on other tenticles) Keleios and Thwak got wrapped up in the tentacles they stepped on. The party tried to rescue them, but it demonstrated that it has DamageShift. We knocked out Thwak, but managed to cut off the tentacles and make a strategic retreat.

Keleios made herself a shower and then stepped into a fire. Kenisha flew up to scout. She came down barely avoiding the tentacles flying at her--I think they noticed her--and fell unconscious into my arms. We bandaged her eyes, which were bleeding from the sockets, revived her, and she started babbling: "There's too many of them. Tens of thousands of them."
"What did you do", I asked
"I looked at them", she answered
"Did you look ... astrally at them?" asked Steven
"Yeah" she answered, somewhat guiltily
"There's many of them. They took the caer and are using it as a... backpack", she added.
"Like a spider?" -Me
"Or a turtle?" -Steven
"Yeah" -Kenisha

She healed remarkably quickly, and we tried to come up with a Plan to deal with the Caer. Riding lawnmowers, catapults from across the river, and the calculated merits of sharp vs. magical vs. impaling damage on this horror. Tristian started building a catapult for razordisks. Thwak asked for pitch, and I asked Steven how to make it. I went to collect some tree sap, then spent the rest of my time taking care of Thwak, meditating, and teaching/learning from Steven.