After we’d gotten the mugshot and an advance on our pay, I found myself at a table with Vakka, the other half-elf Zuffy and two strangers. Well, more strangers than these people I’ve fallen in with. I had not and have not forgotten the cruel words that Zuffy spoke against Ehlonna. What sort of creature is she to mock the goddess so? Suddenly Vakka threw an arm over me and said, “Us clerics – we gotta stick together, right? Right?” I was shocked by her words — I had no idea she was a cleric — but glad to have an excuse to ignore the woman across from me. I deliberately turned a shoulder to Zuffy. Yes, I know! I was deliberately rude. No doubt my actions were clear enough to her. Oh Diary, how ever shall I heal her in battle? I pray that Ehlonna guides my hands to do their duty when the time comes.

Vakka was talking: “Did I ever tell you how I became a cleric? I was in a bar.” She glanced around. “I don’t think it was this bar. But hell, they all look alike, eh? Especially come last call, eh? Eh?!” She laughed.

“I think I stepped on this orc’s foot, yeah. And he was out of his chair so fast, a broken bottle in his hand. And I thought, ‘Well, Vakka, that’s life. At least you go to your god good and drunk.’ And then I thought (she leaned into me) or did Olidammara speak to me? Anyway, the thought came to my mind, as they say, You don’t have to die. Why not live and drink again tomorrow? Well, that was enough for me! True words, eh little lady? If I’m dead, I can’t drink! And that would be a gods damned shame.” She went to slam her glass on the table, for emphasis, and missed, sloshing liquid on my leg and hers.

She leaned back and grinned, showing long fangs. “It’s a living. Showing folks how wine (she gestured with her glass), women (she patted my leg) and song (her free hand waved vaguely towards the piano) do honor to Olidammara, and to all the old gods.” She seemed to lose her thought. “Live! Live and drink and honor god…..  And that’s how I became a cleric.”

To be polite, I thought to share my own tale of how the Maiden of the Forest chose me. “My tale is more simple, I fear. But my calling as true. (I was being polite, Diary — as you well know! A drunken bar fight is a call to god? I think not!) My mother had sent me to the groves to look for fallen limbs of the Mahdrone tree — it is our sacred tree and the lifeblood of my village (I explained helpfully). They had to be of a certain length and width since she was going –”

From across the table a voice broke in. “It’s late. We should turn in.” Zuffy stood up and drained her glass. “Good little girls should be in bed.”
“Aye? Is it as late as all that?” Vakka stretched her arms over her head. “Very well. Sleep peacefully, little Ari. Our last fluffy beds for a while, yes?”

It was a great plan — a quick disguise to fool the two half-orcs out front of the temple and then, bam! we’re inside. The first part was fine; we just hadn’t planned on six more guards and the giants.

I’ll begin at the beginning.

Ever since we heard about the Jasidian expansion of the temple, I have been praying for guidance. The Temple of Wee Jas, the new, expanded temple, will block the morning sun from reaching the Temple of Pelor. This is a problem. And I am the solution.
Add to this the fact that one Jasidian cleric hired assassins to remove us and another one swapped spell components to remove the head Pelorian clerics and we have just cause to be inside the temple after hours.

If you were Acgar you’d be saying that it’s one thing to be inside the temple, it’s another thing entirely to be planning on blowing the roof off it. I didn’t have an easy time convincing my fellow adventurers to blow up the temple. I laid out my arguments and waited for their questions.

Acgar was the first to speak. “This is evil. You are talking about willful destruction of property, not to mention whatever innocents get caught in the rubble. I want no part of it.” She looked at me for a long moment. “You’ve changed. We were too long on that evil plane, perhaps.”

Her words hit home, so I hurriedly called out to Sadi.
“Sadi! Please be the voice of reason, OK? What more proof do we need that Wee Jas is tied up in all of this?”
Sadi shrugged. “I’m in. How do we do it?” Myntilly rubbed her chin. “We really just need to take off the top of the temple. That’s not so bad.”
Inside I was cheering. Outwardly I said, “Exactly. This will be surgical.” I turned to Ian. “You know about stuff like this, right?” He looked startled. “Me? What?” I felt a little sheepish. “You’re a gnome. So you kind know about engineering and stuff, right?” He cocked his head. “I can do some simple carpentry, I guess. Is the temple made of wood?”

I stopped, because I realized I had no idea what it was made of. “I….” Various interrupted: “I have made a study, hurried though it is, of Cauldron’s architecture. It’s a small sideline of mine. A few journals publish my monographs on architecture and design. The Jasidian temple is made of stone. The facade is quite clever actually. You see they’ve added stone and then shaped it to appear as a single rock, hewn if you will, from the ground in one act. Quite breathtaking, actually.”

No one knew quite what to say to all of that. Sadi stood up. “We need alchemy. If we’re going to do this, let’s go see Weer.”

Imagine that Cauldron is a clock. The Jasidian temple is at four o’clock; the Pelorian temple is at five o’clock and Weer’s Elixirs is at eight o’clock. We walked up to Weer’s shop. He greeted us heartily. “Divas! Buying or selling? Always welcome!”

“We need to clear away a quantity of stone.” (I spoke the literal truth.) “Ha ha! Easy to do. Easy. To. Do.” His eyes glowed with pleasure. “The best method will be a lovely little concoction called thermite. You take powdered aluminum, rust, some potassium chlorate and a pinch of sugar. Give it a spark and there goes the rock. Molten iron. That’s the ticket.”

Myntilly smiled. “That’s perfect. Can the spark be, say, a lightning spell?” Weer drew in his breath. “I don’t know! Let’s do a little experiment, shall we?”

He took us out back and set up a small clay pot. He filled it with a pinch of several powders, put a lid on it and shook it gently. Myntilly put a fist-sized rock beside the pot. We all stood back about 30 feet. Myntilly cast lightning at the clay pot. There was a flash of light and lots of heat and when it died down, Myntilly’s rock was half melted.

“Well,” said Weer, “I guess lightning will work just fine. Thank you, young lady. I never would have thought of it! Now, how much do you need?”
I turned to Various. “How big is the temple, would you say?”
“What temple? You said you needed to move rock! What are you planning here?” Weer’s face got serious. Myntilly jumped in to cover my mistake. “She’s just trying to figure it out based on the Pelorian temple as a comparable size. You know? How people do that…..” He was silent for a moment. “Yes, yes. Of course! You’re a Pelorian. Why would you blow up your own temple? Ha ha!”

Various scribbled some figures on a piece of paper. “I’d say we’re talking about 3,000 square feet. Give or take since it’s really the top we’re concerned with.” Ian looked over her shoulder. “Are you sure? As we place the thermite around the temple –”
“Cave!” Myntilly yelled.
“Yes, the cave,” agreed Ian. “As we do it, we’ll need to account for the Bezoni effect.” Various nodded vigorously. “Yes! True. If we take the square of the area divided by the hypotenuse of the ceiling to floor angle……” She bent over the paper.

“I don’t know from Baroni or his effects, but I can tell you that you’ll need a powerful sum of aluminum. And she ain’t cheap.” Weer did some of his own calculations. “We’re talking somewhere in the neighborhood of 35,000 gp. Give or take.” There was a moment of silence as we all thought about the money.
I cleared my throat and smiled. “How’s our credit?” Weer did not return my smile.

Various looked up again. “I can make aluminum. Get the rest.”
Weer raised his eyebrow at this, but he quickly did his sums. “1,750 gp. Rust is cheap. Potassium isn’t.” He moved around the shop, quickly filling casks with the materials. “You be careful with this. You could blow up a block of Cauldron if you’re not careful!”

As we left the shop I couldn’t help but grin. “I love it when a plan comes together!”

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Orak is a true friend. He let us stay the night in the bathhouse. I didn’t trust the streets and we wanted to question the two assassins. We filled Myntilly in on the night’s events and took a long hot soak. Dyskko and Ian sat on the short people side of the big tub. The enfeeblement spell was still in effect for me, but the hot water and talk of my friends did much to calm my nerves.

As the others talked and planned, I mused over the idea of writing to my father. True resurrection for Buzz would cost about 5,000gp for materials. I didn’t have that much to spare. I might be able to scrape together the 1,000gp needed for reincarnation, but there’s the chance then that the person comes back a different race. I mulled over the opening lines of my letter: Dear Father, I know we haven’t spoken since the engagement party but….. Dear Father, I hope this letter finds you well. I need money….. Father, I am doing my best to fight evil and I ask for your help..…. Nothing sounded right.
Why not the truth? Dear Father, You are probably as shocked to read this letter as I am to write it. Although you disowned me and I swore I would never utter your name again, I need your help now….. Each attempt sounded more feeble than the previous. Pelor would give me guidance; I had to trust.

The night was uneventful. In the morning we separated the two half-orc assassins. I cast discern lies and we began. The first assassin said he was named Tolrock the Mighty. He’d been hired by an “average looking” human to kill all of the Divas. Payment was half up front and half after the job. We left him to sit for awhile and talked to the other. As we left Tolrock, he called out to his companion, “Don’t tell them anything!” The second assassin was sitting in one of the changing rooms of the bathhouse. He was called Haruk. “Now, why would your friend think that you’d spill your guts?” Acgar fixed him with a fierce stare. He met her gaze. “I don’t know. He’s not my friend.” As I handed him a bowl of gruel, I asked “Where’s the meeting place?” His eyes got wide. “You know about it?” Acgar and I both nodded. “I’m not above hurting you to find out more.” Acgar grabbed my arm. “That would be evil.” I waved her away and turned back to the half-orc. “So you got half of your money. But you obviously didn’t finish the job.” Haruk spit on the floor. “I’ll kill you later. Solstice is still two days off.”
“Solstice?” Acgar leaned in. “Why is that important?” The half-orc winced, realizing that he’d made a slip. He pursed his lips and shook his head.

We went back to Tolrock. I had a picture of Wee Jas that I wanted to show him. “Does this symbol look familiar?” He shifted in his seat but didn’t speak. I sat down. “Look, the morning is getting away from us. We have things to do; you have things to do. Things you are supposed to do before Solstice. So let’s just make this a business transaction, OK?” I plopped a small bag of gold at his feet.

He said, “How do you know about Solstice?” I smiled. “The same way I know that the man who hired you was wearing this symbol.”
Slowly we got the whole story from them. Hired, along with two others, to kill us before Solstice. Rendezvous spot was the Jasidian temple.

After the half-orcs took off for their regular jobs as town guards, we went in search of Oakenfoot, the druid. He had reincarnated Sadi, so we went to him for help with Buzz. I was glad that it did not take long. We have a lot of work to do in the next two days, not least destroying the Jasidian temple. Who’s with me?

A few days ago, when we were still in Cauldron, Kiriyana got very quiet after dinner one night. Then she started talking about how much she missed the open sky and the quiet of a mountain pass. How she needed a lot of alone time. It sounded so like the speech I’d given to my fiance that I blurted out “You’re breaking up with us?” She laughed but nodded her head.

“But…..” She said slowly, “I did meet someone who could be a great replacement. Her name is Ragnara. I think you’ll like her. I told her to stop by sometime tomorrow. Is that OK?”

When the knock on the door came, I’d almost forgotten about the mysterious replacement. I opened the door to a thin, elvish-looking woman. She was wearing an elaborate hat and I thought, “Another bard? Really?” She seemed a bit odd to me, but I figured she was some sort of half-elf or something. I was doubting Kiriyana’s judgment. This was a good fit for our group?

I don’t remember what I said, but I made her laugh and she slapped me on the back. The hand that hit me was no elven hand, I’ll tell you that. I almost fell over, she hit me with such force. And it was like a curtain going up, suddenly I saw a half-orc female in front of me. She had a frightened look on her face and so I said, “Green is my favorite color.”
She laughed even harder and took off her hat. Then everyone could see that she was a half-orc.

The affection and respect I felt for Ohme and Ohboi made it easy for me to look at Ragnara as a person and not a beast. She’s a fine companion. I am proud to walk beside her.

We only brought the half-orcs to help with the hydra. Well, with what we thought would be a hydra. My dream was indeed a true Dreaming: a hydra waited at the bottom of that staircase. The half-orcs showed mettle and helped to defeat the hydra.

When the frog man approached with his boat, we didn’t know what to think. We did not have a common language. I did not prepare tongues today. I did cast detect magic and Acgar cast detect evil and we felt no immediate threats.
All the way across the fetid lake, he jabbered in his gargling language. Whether it was advice, taunts or prayers I could not say. We made quite a picture, I’m sure. The six of us in the boat and the half-orcs trailing out behind, thanks to a levitate spell from Myntilly.

We landed at the base of a huge stone fish temple. These frog people are not with piety, it would seem. The entrance to the temple looke dlike a huge fish mouth. As Dyskko stepped from the boat, the frog man paddled away quickly. And in the next instant an arrow pierced the armor of one of our orcs.

Another arrow flew past Acgar. As it clattered to the mossy stone, she took off running into the maw of the temple. I had just a moment to cast ray of hope upon her. I knew that Pelor would shine his face on her.

Sadi took the steps two at a time to join Acgar and as her foot hit the landing, two frog men slid from second story windows down the slick buttresses and tackled Sadie and Acgar. It was the coolest move I’ve ever seen. More arrows landed at our feet. Cinder waved to the half-orcs and the three of them ran past Sadie, Acgar and the frogs and entered the temple proper.

What’s a healer to do? My friends are in combat or running away from me and into harm’s way. Who do I follow? Who do I help? As I paused in confusion, Pelor showed the way. The frog men were no match for Acgar, Sadie and Myntilly. I ran past and up inside the temple, following our headstrong rogue.