March 3, 118
This day, the party split up to pursue different tasks, while they wait for the Grand Tourney to take place in a few days. While Dark Star stays behind at the Eminent Cathedral to study the book he got from Demon's Gift, everyone else heads out. Elvish goes to inform Zorlac of their plan, while Calanon heads for the Undercity to keep Ellyanna up to date. Ash-Daughter, following Ellyanna's wishes, heads into the city to learn if there's any local enchanters who can help Corsica.
While Elvish is on the way to Zorlac's home, he suddenly realizes that he's being followed by a group of a dozen or so cloaked figures. However, he only notices this once several of them start approaching him from the front, while several more close in from behind, as he makes his way along a street. Thinking quickly, he makes a run for it and ducks into a nearby tenement.
Unable to see if the men are chasing him, Elvish sprints through the cramped corridors of the three-story building and makes his way to the roof. When he gets there, he sees several of the men are waiting on the streets below, but most are somewhere out of sight - most likely searching for him in the building. With a running jump, he leaps across to the building behind the one he's on, a shorter, two-story building, then lowers himself down and drops onto a different street. Taking a look around, he doesn't see any of the men, so he takes off down this new street.
Eventually he makes it to Zorlac's home with no further incidents. He informs the wizard of their plan, and Zorlac agrees to release the two Kaplans to them for that day. Of course, if he isn't finished the process of removing the transferred memories by then, he'll need the fake back afterwards. But then, their deal is that he gets the fake once they're done with him anyway, so he'll have to go back in any case.
Being careful to disguise himself and stick to wide-open, public streets, Elvish makes it back to the Eminent Cathedral. There, he finds that Calanon has returned, having told Ellyanna what's going on. Based on what happened to Elvish, they ask Severn to send some of his men out to retrieve Ash-Daughter. They consider going down to get Ellyanna as well, but decide that she's safe where she is.
Shortly thereafter, Ash-Daughter returns along with Severn's men; unfortunately, she was not able to find a suitable enchanter. The group decide that they'd best lay low until the Grand Tourney. They consider going to retrieve Ellyanna, but decide that she should be safe down in the Undercity with Leravith.
Meanwhile, down at Leravith's, Ellyanna continues her research. While she doesn't discover anything exactly like the effect Corsica is under, she does learn a bit about how similar enchantments function. Most permanent enchantments of such strength tend to have a built-in way to break the enchantment. This built-in weakness is what allows the spell to otherwise be so powerful. But, without knowing anything about the specific magic that Zorlac used, there's no way to tell exactly what weakness it has.
March 4, 118
The rest of the party continue to lay low, but Ellyanna doesn't know about what happened to Elvish, and decides to head up to the city to look for an enchanter who can help her. Asking around, she eventually learns about a man who is known to provide enchantment for the various rich citizens of Vornheim, and goes to meet him. She explain her situation, and the enchanter tells her that, without further information, he cannot help her. Furthermore, when she mentions that the person she is trying to help is one of Zorlac's librarians, his fear of the wizard makes him demand a large amount of money in exchange for his services - he will not cross Zorlac for a pittance.
Eventually, Ellyanna agrees to trade him the spellbook they found in the crypts of Frosthaven in exchange for his services. She'll need to actually get Corsica and bring her to the enchanter in order for him to study the enchantment and try to determine its weakness.
Ellyanna returns to the cathedral to update the party on her progress. When she arrives, they tell her about what happened to Elvish - luckily, she somehow managed to avoid getting followed. They convince her to lay low with them. She can't go forward with her plan to free Corsica anyway, because they still need Zorlac and can't risk doing anything that would upset him.
March 5, 118
This is the day of the grand tourney, and most of it is spent in preparation. The party retrieve both Kaplans from Zorlac, who is not yet finished the process of removing the memories from the fake. Afterwards, they head to the colosseum and finalize their preparations for the speech that Elvish will help Severn and Sahril deliver.
Finally, in the evening, the second-to-last round of the tournament completes, and they begin their announcement. Everything goes off without a hitch and, together with Elvish, the two prelates deliver a masterfully executed speech, exactly as planned.
Afterwards, Sahril, who hasn't really had a chance to talk to the party before now, thanks them for their involvement in saving her son from Gorith. She presents them with a reward of 1000 gold pieces, as well a minor relic of Vorn, the Hammer of Saint Alessia, a warhammer that was wielded by a famed witch-hunter a few centuries ago.
The party return to the Eminent Cathedral along with Severn, where they plan their next move. Severn explains that, although they have definitely just won the public's support in the upcoming election, it will probably still take a few weeks for the whole process to finish. However, once everything is done, the presence of a new Arch-Prelate means that the city will be in much better shape in the spring when the mountain passes thaw and the war against the Second Empire continues.
They discuss the undead threat, but Severn is still more concerned about the known threat, that of the Second Empire. There simply isn't enough information for him to commit valuable soldiers against the undead when the Second Empire will already require their full attention. However, he agrees to remain open to any new information the party might discover regarding the undead.
Finally, he advises the party to leave Vornheim as soon as possible. While one of Sahril's first acts as Arch-Prelate will be to remove Gorith from his position, until then, he remains a threat. Of course, the party can't leave the city until Zorlac is done with Kaplan.
March 6, 118
Although the rest of the party heed Severn's warning and stay in the cathedral, Ellyanna doesn't want to waste the day, and heads to the College of Celestial Thaumaturgy in order to continue her studies. This turns out to be a good idea, as during the day she makes a breakthrough and finally puts together some information that seems to relate to the situation they're now facing, as related here.
March 7, 118
On this day, the party receive a message from Zorlac, informing them that his work on Kaplan's double is done. When they arrive at his workshop, they find that the other Kaplan is indeed no longer able to answer questions that only Kaplan would know. Finally satisfied that this Kaplan is the fake, they release the real Kaplan and he rejoins the group.
They decide to pay a visit to Leravith and see if she's made any progress. Using the new route that she showed them, they are able to make it to her home quickly and without incident. Leravith explains that she's continued studying the remains, but still cannot discover any particular reason why they were created in the strange way that they were.
However, she has made progress in one area. Since the energy powering the creatures was external, she's created a sort of magical compass using a bone from one of the corpses that points in the direction of the source of their necromantic power. It points to the north, although beyond that she cannot say much.
The party thank Leravith, take the compass, and return to the surface. They quickly realize that the source of the necromantic energy must be very far to the north indeed, as the direction of the compass doesn't measurably change as they walk from one end of the city to the other. Thus, if they wish to find the source of the undead's power, they must prepare for a long journey into the frozen north.
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