Just as Andrew runs off, Lokilia calls after him. "Do come visit us at the Lilac."  She watches until he disappears into the distance. "Should we go over to Glinnicks and check on this Bavvrik? I hope we aren't messing up your plans for the morning Normont."  She looks over at the gnome for his response.

Normont considers Lokila's question for a moment, feeling the weight of the oversized to him broken rifle on his back and having the other items he picked up at the far gate portal.

"I don't know. I would really like to deal with all this stuff I am carrying around before we head off on another task. Especially one that could turn dangerous. Would you all mind if we go to the Eastern Ruins first? I don't think I would be very discreet right now, if we want to surveil Glinnick's store".

Dev nods his assent to Normont.

”That makes sense,” he agrees.

Lokilia nod as well. "Sure, we can go to those Eastern Ruins first."

With a consensus reached, Normont is happy to move on towards the Eastern Ruins, looking briefly to Quinn in case he disagrees.

"We can ask about these strangers to the city whilst we are there. If anyone has noticed a criminal element arrive in the city, it will be them", he says, talking of the Grey Hunt but not wanting to advertise their purpose in public.

Quinn will nod in agreement. 

Moving on to the east just past Forlington Square there was a small single passage gate in the city wall, a rather aged member of the Pale Guard ( Gilbe Ocampo, a bald and heavily wrinkled old human man with tanned skin and slight traces of orcish ancestry some generations back was snoozing quietly up against the wall on the inside of the gate). 

Normont knew they could either pass through here or follow the wall south around the eastern boundary of the city until they got to the Temple Gate which led to the Grey Field and The Zenith.

Normont approaches the gate, but seeing Gilbe snoozing he holds a finger to his lips and motions for the others to follow the wall around to the south.

"There is another way in, Old Gilbe will just get embarrassed if we wake him, and seeing as though I am not on duty it doesn't seem right to do that", he explains. "Maybe you can play something to help him wake up as we walk away, Dev? That way he won't know we spotted him".

Lokilia follows along after Normont, trusting in him to get them where they are going. She keeps thinking about Andrew and wondering how this situation will turn out for him. And she can't help but steal glances over at Dev now and then. He'd done such a nice thing for the boy, thinking he was hungry and stealing for himself and his family. He'd seen himself in his plight. And then it all turns out to just be a 'prank' - with perhaps something more nefarious behind it.  She just felt bad for Dev - he deserved better. 

As the companions proceed, Dev’s mind holds in place, at first. I know I read what Andrew was… not thinking, but feeling. His reluctance and also wish to succeed. And that he was trying to cover up things, at first. But he wasn’t like the mean kids back in Drynna. He never turned my questions around, or got angry, or put up, like, walls?... to keep me out. I think he heard me. I hope he is smart enough to take my advice.

But Dev also knew that kids don’t always do the smart thing – including himself when he was that age. 

He notices Lokilia’s searching glance. “I’m okay,” he smiles, wanly. “I just hope the kid, Andrew?, doesn’t get involved with that Bavvrik, whoever he is.”

But Lokilia’s attention pulls him out of his thoughts, and he decides to leave his glum mood behind. As the group reaches the sleeping guard, he is willing and able to acquiesce to Normont’s plan. Dev follows Normont away along the wall and, playing a few bars of a jaunty jig on his pan pipes, creates an illusion of many pan pipes playing louder and louder until the elderly guard awakens. Then, the sound instantly ceases.

He glances somewhat guiltily at Normont. This was a lot like a prank. “Maybe that will keep him from getting into trouble or letting something by that should remain outside the city?,” he says in a whisper to the others, only half-convinced, though feeling at any rate that they’d done no harm and might indeed have done some good.

Gilbe awakened with a loud cough and the four of them saw his balding head poke out from the alcove warily before smiling and moving out to lean against the inner wall.

They passed through the open Temple Gate guarded by two very young members of the Pale Guard that Normont did not recognise, passing through it a wide road led almost directly east towards The Zenith, Temple of the Dawnfather, about halfway down the road their was a road leading off to the left blocked off by large chunks of masonry that could be easily walked between, Normont indicated that was where they were headed.

Looking to the end of the road the companions could see the Zenith surrounded by the iron gated cemetery outside of which stood two more Pale Guard, there was also a smaller temple like building at the left and rear of The Zenith.

The exterior of the Zenith temple is built from stone and features stained glass windows representing sunlight. The temple has a wooden, double door with carvings depicting a flaming wreath similar to the outer ring of classical depictions of the sun, going across the sky waving flames you could see waving flame licking the sides of the doors. 

There are slight signs of disrepair, and its roof is a little damaged. However, despite its relatively modest appearance it looks welcoming.

Lokilia takes in the sights as the group walks.  She is intrigued by the stained-glass windows and studies the designs depicting the sun. Seeing the path between the chunks of masonry where they're headed, she turns to Normont. "Where is it that we're going exactly anyhow? I don't mean the name, but... what is it?" 

"That's the Zenith, the temple to the Dawnfather here in Whitestone", Normont explains as the group come across the visage of the large temple with its much smaller neighbour. "And that beside it is the Altar of the Raven, the temple her to the Raven Queen".

Before he makes his way through the masonry, he turns to answer Lokilia, making sure there was no-one around to overhear.

"You remember the person we found at the far gate portal, the one that had been corrupted and transformed into a kind of monster? Well, he was a member of the Grey Hunt, which is a bit like a secret organisation of peacekeepers in Whitestone. Not many know of their existence, and those that have heard of them aren't sure if their existence is even real or a myth. Anyway, members of the Grey Hunt, I wanted to return their belongings and let their leader know what happened to him. And I wanted to know who he was, I guess. He died trying to protect folk from that portal, I think people need to know", he explains, hoping Lokilia would understand.

He didn't say that he thought it was an opportunity to get on their radar himself, which would give him far more freedom to travel than he would as a Pale Guard or Whitestone Rifle.

"The Commissioner, my boss, told me to come here and the Grey Hunt would find me. I am hoping to see the Grand Mistress herself, but she may not be here. I guess they are using the abandoned buildings in this disused portion of the city as a base or something. Or it could just be a meeting point", he finishes with a shrug.

Dev listened to Lokilia and Normont, remembering the horror of that day on the mountain.

“Ugh, the Gray Hunter…,” he recalls. “I, like, shiver, just thinking about him. What a lonely, terrible way to die. Completely by himself, and losing everything that made him… him. Transforming into a… a monster. A terrifying monster.”

Nearing the Zenith and the cemetery, the young bard falls into moribund silence. As his glance takes in the artful details, bordered like an old love letter by the degradations of time, the tableaux infused by thoughts of fleeting mortality – the cemetery and their purpose here, dark counterpoints and dirges float through his mind.

"The Grey Hunter was rather horrible to see. And sad," Lokilia says, nodding in agreement with Dev. She then turns to Normont. "Are we expecting these people to just appear then?" she asks, not quite understanding. "Why would this part of the city be empty?

"I was only about 14 years old when this was built, a child refugee from Emon. It was just after Lord de Rolo and Vox Machina ousted the Briarwood's and the Chroma Conclave were defeated, so not a good time. To house us refugees they built this new area to the East, outside the main city wall, which meant it wasn't as protected from the monsters of the forest. Between the number incursions from those monsters and the social unrest of the time, it was abandoned. They eventually built to the South, which is where mine and my Gandfather's home is", Norman explains.

He also remembers the Grey Hunter, and terrible thought it was, he died in the course of his duty. His fate needed to be documented. Needed to be known. However grim.

Dev had known Normont for months by now but had never, until this moment, not once, considered what the older gnome’s life would have been like as a young person. He’d never even imagined Normont as ever having been anything — any age — other than the brave, brilliant adult he knew so well.

The sudden awareness of his own utter lack of curiosity halts him in his tracks, and it takes a moment to filter out his emotional reaction and actually digest the words.

“So…, should I try to call them?,” the teen tiefling asks, playing a few exploratory notes on his pan pipes, testing the acoustic, one might surmise.

The group moved into the ruins, though they were only tens of metres from the walls of Whitestone the wilds had begun to reclaim the buildings here in earnest and most of the distinctive Whitestone roofs had collapsed within their stone walls.   Hundreds of small trees grew around and on the buildings and the empty spaces between them and the woodland surrounding the area was no different than the Parchwood they had passed through to reach Whitestone.

As Dev pondered his question to Normont both he and the gnome spotted a thin copper wire strung along the ground at ankle height up ahead...

"This is amazing," Lokilia comments as they enter this area filled with more trees. "A shame we couldn't have stayed here. It just feels so much less...  oppressive than the city just a few steps away!"  She starts to look about but doesn't really see much of anything. "How do we find someone out here? Maybe you should try and call them Dev?"  She then glances to Normont. "Or is there some specific signal you have?" 

Normont produces the green bound pass he was given by the Commissioner, "This should grant us an audience".

Seeing the copper wire, he adds, "And I assume they usually get notified when people step on that wire over there". He points to the trip wire. "Perhaps we can avoid the usual, and you can play something to attract their attention instead, Dev. I think that would give a better first impression of us".

He finds somewhere to perch whilst they wait, and ensures the pass is clearly visible.