Editing Journal 2: Elven Emissaries (section)

== 25 Lowsummer 807 ==
As we were riding through the forest near Diomed, we heard a scream off of what passes for a trail in these thick woods. We stopped the cart and got out. Glendower ran ahead to scout it out, but the rest of us were not far behind. We found a clearing where an elf woman was surrounded by zombies. Zombies! I’ve never actually seen an undead before, but they were super gross. Two of the zombies were ogres, and there was something Lendallinn called a Beholder. It was a floating orb with a giant eye in the middle and a bunch of little eyes on stalks. It was monstrous. Glendower wasted no time attacking, but when the Beholder turned one of its eyes to her, she got frozen in place. It did the same to me. I couldn’t move, I could barely breathe, all I could do was watch. Lendalan ran in and destroyed most of the regular zombies with holy light like I have never seen. I managed to shake off the paralyzation and Aalari and I fought off one of the big ogre zombies. Bula managed to slay the Beholder with her maul while Llandalynn called down fire and more holy light to finish off the ogres and the rest of the zombies. Her strength is incredible. I know she’s a cleric and her magic is different from mine, but I hope I can learn something from her. Once the zombies were gone, we talked to the elf. She was a ranger from Diomed scouting the area. She said that there were more undead in the area since Dovar’s Emissaries arrived, though she didn’t have any proof that they were behind the increase. She said things in the world have been getting worse since Dovar “came from the sky”. Those were her words. When we asked her what she meant, she said that he actually floated down from above to the door of the Temple of the Gods. After that, we searched the zombies. We found a few curiosities that might fetch some coin, and I got a very nice rabbit-skin belt. We parted ways with the ranger and we returned to our carriage to go on to Diomed, which we reached in the evening. This city is incredible. Most of it is built into one massive tree, bigger than I could have ever imagined. The tree is hollowed out and divided into levels where people live, shopkeepers work, and politicians talk, all inside this one tree. There are a few buildings outside the tree, but not many. When we went in, there was a small group of guards to welcome us, but they didn’t want to let us non-elfs to the upper levels where our lodgings were. Llendalyn just pushed past them and led us to a stone circle in the middle of the tree. This was some sort of magic lifting device that floated us up to the next level where our lodgings were. Before turning in for the night, we did a little shopping, then Aalari retired and the rest of us spent some time in a tavern. I ate a delightful dish of a meat they called “fezzant”. They told me it was some kind of bird. While we were in the pub, we ran into Tonya, one of the diplomats from our last mission to [[Lilingbroke|Lilly-Brooke]]. She had a companion, a beardless dwarf man named Metzer, who had a very pretty attendant named Sara. While Glendower and I talked to them, Bula, who was dancing in the middle of the room, ran into a halfling named [[Jenny Bluefang]], who seems to have some sort of rivalry with the Redfangs. I got a chance to to tell the first story of Brother, Sister, and Mother the Earth to the tavern, which was received well. When we left the tavern, we found Llendallin, who was talking to a priest from the Temple of the Gods named Lawrence. He told us that Dovar appeared out of nowhere at the temple and forcefully evicted everyone there with the help of his Emissaries, which he apparently had a couple dozen of. Landallenn asked Glendower to fetch Aalari and go scout out the Emissary’s camp. When they came back, they reported that they found the camp in a clearing near the town. They wore all white, perfectly clean robes, and they wore strange white masks. They spoke to each other in a strange musical drone, and they were sitting next to an illusory campfire. We went to bed to ponder this news.