"Zinda’s spirit shepherds are called 'daturas' - they walk the jungles, and they're protectors of the spirits of our land," she says. "Zinda welcomes all religions, but our one common faith involves the daturas, the spirit shepherds. They speak for and protect the spirits of the jungle. They spend their lives escorting caravans, performing exorcisms, guarding the sacred parts of the forest, things like this. Sometimes we hire them to escort mourners to the silk cotton trees, where we hang tokens for the dead. In the old legends, spirits of the jungle and ocean worked together to create Zinda. They raised stone buildings from the earth, shifting rivers and trees. But recently, the daturas warn us that these spirits are agitated and seek appeasement from Zinda for its greed." She shrugs and smiles, as if to consider this information with a grain of salt. "As to Arel, well..."

Suddenly, you hear raucous voices at the door. Performers in bright feathers and shimmering silk flood into the tavern, laughing bombastically. The crowd, including Zenia, responds with great enthusiasm. “That’s Diva Luma and the Elucidarium Divas!” Zenia cries, nodding to the dark-skinned woman leading the group, whose outfit is all sequins and bright feathers. The divas wave and proceed to the stage. There, Diva Luma pulls a small silk bag from her belt and hurls its contents upward, standing amid a rain of colorful glitter as the performance begins. A moment later, the diva’s expression changes. Diva Luma grins cruelly, slips off her heeled shoes, and leaps toward Zenia.

Roll initiative!
Zenia: 4
Diva Luma: 22
The Elucidarium Divas: 15
The Silent Verse guards: 12

Zartan Init 13

Walt’s initiative: 17

Initiative:
The Elucidarium Divas: 18
Walt: 17
Zartan: 13
Diva Luma: 12
The Silent Verse guards: 4
Zenia: 2
Aranor: 5

The two divas flanking Diva Luma grab bottles of wine and, smashing the bottoms off with a spray of jeli wine, lunge for Walt and Zartan (leaving Zenia for Diva Luma to strike):

Diva 1 vs Walt:
Broken Bottle Attack #1 vs. Walt: 14. Hit: 3 piercing damage.
Broken Bottle Attack #1 vs. Walt: 15. Hit: 6 piercing damage.

Diva 2 vs. Zartan:
Broken Bottle Attack #1 vs. Zartan: 22. Hit: 4 piercing damage.
Broken Bottle Attack #1 vs. Zartan: 8. Hit: 7 piercing damage.

The crowd gasps and pulls away from the stage in a panic.
Walt and Zartan, both now covered in wine spray, may act next!

Zartan casts sleep at 3rd level centered on the Divas who are attacking (presuming he can center on them and not catch any of the team). He shouts to the team and other guards "They are not in their right mind. I'm going to try and put them to sleep"

HP Worth - 40

Both Elucidarium Divas crumple onto the stage, dropping their broken bottles. Only Diva Luma still stands.

Walt is up next!

Walt parries the attacks with his bleached wooden shield and watches as the Elucidarium Divas collapse around him. He scrambles towards Diva Luma, reaches for their shoulder and casts lesser restoration on them in an attempt to end their crazed condition.

At Walt's touch, the diva collapses onto her hands and knees and begins to cough. The crazed look drops from her face, and she drops her wicked, high-heeled shoe onto the stage with a clatter. She looks around in confusion at her unconscious stagemates. "What happened?"

Two guards scramble to yank Zenia away from the table, and the other two race to protect Nargis. But Nargis shoves them away, and hustles over to Zenia, protectively. The distraught Nargis embraces Zenia and wails, "It's all my fault! Our greed and arrogance have doomed the firstborn children of the Kings of Coin!"

Walt slowly lets down his guard after the threat fades. He walks over to Zartan and checkes on his wellbeing. "Are you okay, friend?"

He then scrambles over to Nargis. 

"Nargis, we must talk. What do you know of the circumstances behind these attacks?" Walt digs out the his coin and discretely flashes it to Nargis. "Please be truthful with us. Clearly, we are here to help. What do you know of these attacks? We cannot be sure, but some evidence points to datura's being involved in some manner. What could this mean?"

Nargis, highly upset, makes an emotional confession to Walt:

"It's all my fault... The jeli flower is a magical creation, you must understand. The creation of a witch named 'Proud Edun'. The Kings of Coin, we negotiated with the witch... we promised our firstborn children would be her apprentices in exchange for the jeli flower and the wealth it would bring. Then I talked the other Kings of Coin into murdering Proud Edun to break the bargain. After calling the witch to a secret meeting, we murdered her. But now she's exacting her price from beyond the grave!" Nargis begins to wail.

Meanwhile, Diva Luma tentatively stands and brushes herself off. She apologizes profusely. "I wasn't in control of my body!" she explains. "I don't know what happened!" Her companions continue to sleep. She puts her shoe back on.

Much of the terrified patrons have cleared the tavern, although a few remain near the doorway.

"Walt" Zartan whispers "Can you remove the effects on these two?" 

As he waits for an answer, he asks for help in restraining them if they wake up. (If none appear he will tie they up.

The sleeping divas continue to doze for a full minute, while Nargis makes his confessions. Zartan restrains them, but when they awake, they seem to be of sound mind, if somewhat confused and disoriented.

"I should have known better than to trick a witch. I was greedy!" blubbers Nargis.

"It must have been the glitter!" interjects Diva Luma. "Just before we entered the tavern, some datura introduced herself and offered me that sachet of glitter as 'thanks for many inspiring performances' she said. It looked like quality glitter!"  You can see that the glitter left a film of pink ash on the divas and the floor around them.

“More evidence linking the Datura with some sort of involvement in this. Nargis, do you know of any connection between the Datura and Proud Edun?”

Walt sits in silence, drinking his now warm mug of ale while he strains to make any sense of this. He leans forward and poses another question for Nargis.

“Though we’re starting to connect some dots here, I can’t seem to draw any clear conclusions. You say each King of Coin promised their first born as an apprentice—do all of the current Kings of Coin have children? Do they all have skin in the game? What about Samira Arah, head of the Jewlers Trade? I’ve been focusing on her involvement with the Silent Verse and lost sight of the fact that she too is a King of Coin.”

"Samira's new – she wasn't part of the original bargain," replied Nargis. "I don't think she has any children."

"That datura who gave me the glitter told me her name," interjects Diva Luma, rubbing her temples. "She made a point of introducing herself. Her name was 'Kala,' she said"

"Kala Mabarin," adds one of the other divas, still sitting on the floor of the stage. She points outside, evidently where the exchange took place.

Nargis begins to weep again at the sound of this name. "Proud Edun had a daughter by that name, but she was lost in the jungle years before the Kings of Coin bargained with Proud Edun. I beg you – go find Kala and put an end to whatever she’s scheming."

As the others awaken and are out of their fit, he joins Walt. "Great work there" he says to Walt. "Any further along on who that lady is with the glitter/powder?"

"Aye, good work to you, friend. This person involved with the glitter and the powder appears to be a datura that goes by the name of Kala Mabarin. She may be the daughter of the witch, Proud Edun. Whether or not that is true remains to be seen." 

Walt wraps his arm around Zartan, leans in close and whispers "You know the ritual to detect magic, do you not? Please humor me and perform the ritual on the coin Samira gave you. Let me know if you find anything."

"Nargis, might we speak with you in private?"

IF Nargis obliges, Walt will pose some more questions regarding Samira. IF Nargis will not speak in private, Walt will share his line of questioning aloud. 

Walt says to Nargis "We will get to the bottom of this mystery and we will leave no stone unturned. With that in mind, I ask you, what do you know of Samira? I find her place in all this mess...quite curious. Head of the Jeweler trade, running the guard detail and seemingly doing a piss poor job at it, mind you. She is the only King of Coin without children while all the others have children dropping like flies. As you said, she was not part of the original bargain. Again, I ask what do you know of Samira's background? Is there any chance she could be tangled up or even orchestrating this?" 

Nargis, still weepy and emotional, cooperates, waving away the guards. "Madame Samira is not satisfied to be one among equals. She wants to be Grande Madame and take over the position from Grand Messer Amos Nir. I think she wants to find evidence to implicate him, but I doubt she'd be so bold as to become mixed up in something like this. She is ambitious, maybe ruthless." Nargis shrugs, unjudgmentally. "I'm sure she won’t hesitate to capitalize on any evidence that could bring down Nir. But she wasn't around when we made the pact, or broke it. No, this is something more sinister, I'm sure of it.". 

One of the remaining patrons by the door, listening in to the divas' conversation, speaks up. "A datura? Yellow tunic? I just saw her. She was just here. She's heading toward the pier!"

Does the person at the door sound honest? 

Insight 8

“Very well, Nargis. I appreciate your wisdom and honesty. Whoever’s behind these attacks, they appear  quite dedicated and very resourceful. Perhaps consider sequestering you daughter in someplace more secure. Perhaps…”

Walt stops mid thought when he hears the patron mention seeing the datura heading to the pier. Walt chugs the rest of his ale. He rushes over the the patron and says “please, lead us to the pier!”

(OOC: I assume the insight check won’t reveal much. If that’s the case, Walt would like to head towards the pier to investigate. )