SCENE: Orst and Pettiaen

After finding the kitchens and partaking of a substantial breakfast, Orst sets out to locate First Alchemist Maelor's office. He leads Pettilaen on a circuitous route through the Inner Sanctum's labyrinthine halls, chambers, and passages. Pettilaen attempts to remind Orst several times that they were told they could ask directions from anyone in Candlekeep, but Orst simply hrumphs, waves him off, and continues plodding on. Finally, when Orst is red in the face, sweating liberally, and the two of you come around to a recognizable intersection that you've definitely been to before, Orst stares at Pettilaen with an arched eyebrow.

"Pretty sure it's that way," Pettilaen says, pointing down a hall that they've passed no less than three times.

Orst pulls up his trousers, adjusts his girth, and strides forward down the suggested hall with a deep sigh.

-----

It takes another half hour, winding through the halls of the Alchemist's wing, but eventually Pettilaen spots a fancy marble door above which is a bronze plaque etched with the words First Alchemist Rinn Maelor. Orst, blinded by sweat and fatigue, almost walks past the door, but Pettilaen's exasperated sigh draws his attention.

"Oh yes," Orst says with a weak grin. "Here we are."

Orst opens the door to the office, an impressive two-story room of cherry wood and brass, lined with books, interesting baubles, and a wide oval skylight.

"First Alchemist Maelor," Orst bellows, his hand extended. He pauses a moment to catch his breath, then steps in. "Good to finally meet you in person. I've sent a good many tomes and artifacts your way over the years, but never have I put a face with the name."

Orst's obese dwarven body blocks the doorway so that Pettilaen cannot see who he's addressing until Orst steps to one side. Then Pettilaen's breath catches in his throat. Crossing from the far side of the room to meet Orst's greeting is a tall woman of no less than seven feet with hair so lustrous and golden that, even pulled back in a snood and bound by silk strands, it glitters in the room's natural light. Her eyes are a piercing silver, her skin pale as the winter moon. Under her robes of silver, gold, and red she wears polished plate armor and a golden scroll-medallion marking her as a ranking priestess of Oghma.

"Orst Shieldstone," she says in reply. "Indeed some of my finest pieces were obtained by way of your services. Well met. May I offer you a seat and a drink?"

Orst plops down on a gilded cherry wood bench. "Both, yes, thank you. You know, Old Orst has never met a member of the heaven-touched before..."

She retrieves a crystal decanter filled with a pinkish liquid, pours some into a tiny, faceted cordial glass, and offers it to the dwarf.

"Elfwine," she explains. "From the royal cellars of Myth Drannor. No doubt you know it."

Orst nods and smiles.

"I do. No one's been able to get 'hold of that vintage for some years."

"Well," she says with a teasing grin. "Not 'no one'... Just not you."

Orst hrumphs, then laughs.

"But shall we get to business?" She says a few arcane words, then takes a seat on an invisible floating object of some sort, her legs folded to one side and her cloaks draping to the floor. "I've heard you have some urgent messages to send."

Orst takes a long draught of the Elfwine and smacks his lips approvingly. For a brief moment after, his eyes sparkle in the light streaming from above.

-----

Orst and Rinn Maelor engage in a lengthy discussion about plans and potential allies. Orst details his plans to liquidate all of his family's assets and contract the best dwarven engineers from Baldur's Gate to build a stronghold south of Beregost. They discuss which mercenary companies are the most reliable and where and how an army could be raised as quickly as possible. Rinn Maelor warns him against intruding on Flaming Fist territory, to which Orst waves a hand by way of dismissal.

"They lost that right when they allowed Beregost to be sacked," he says, drinking the last of his wine.

The conversation continues, covering political alliances and risks as well as what role Candlekeep might play, then concludes with Rinn Maelor leading Orst to a bronze door. Pettilaen catches a brief glimpse of a dark-colored sphere of crystal on a bronze stand as Orst enters the room, but then the First Alchemist closes the door behind him.

She turns her attention to Pettilaen. "How about you, Master Gnome? Are you familiar with Elfwine?"

SCENE: Visit to the Lower Candles

Most of the group follows Elder Reader Dhoro down the many sets of stairs, far away from the Inner Sanctum, toward the outer curtain wall of Candlekeep. Down, down, they go until the majestic estates and buildings of stone have turned to modest wood-framed dwellings and open-air artisan and merchant stalls. Dhoro glances back to make sure everyone is following before he makes a right turn, heading down one of the streets. The common folk scramble out of his way and give peculiar looks to the lot of you. Several hundred feet down the street, on the right, the endless rows of wooden buildings gives way to a gap in which a stone stair has been built, flanked by gardens of manicured grass and beautiful flowers in crimson and gold.

"This way," Dhoro says flatly as he ascends the stairs toward a squat, stone building, cylindrical in shape, with a tall magical flame burning at its domed roof's apex.

Two heavily armed guards, one of them wearing a monocle of some sort, inspect Elder Reader Dhoro before opening the door for him. He beckons for each of you to follow, waiting to follow you in and give the order for the door to be closed. Inside, a stone cylinder glowing with ambient light descends as far as the eye can see. A wide staircase spirals along the outside of the cylinder, which appears to be lines with aged and valuable tomes beyond reckoning.

"The magic can be found in the lower sections." Dhoro takes the lead again, descending the stairs.

He passes many landings populated with hand-carved wooden tables and comfortable chairs, many of which are occupied by scholars and lower ranking representatives of the keep who bow their heads to acknowledge the passing of a superior.

-----

Your legs are beginning to wobble by the time you reach the landing, no less than a quarter mile beneath the surface, where Dhoro directs you to sit.

"Make yourselves comfortable," he says. "You will find the incantations dealing with illusion a little further down. Most of the lore is well above us." He gestures up the stairs, then toward one of the larger chairs. "I will be seated here, reviewing works that I have brought with me. You will need my assistance if you wish to exit the Candle, otherwise, if you are looking for a volume in specific, any of the Readers you saw above, I'm certain, would be pleased to help."

The sheer volume of knowledge housed in Candlekeep left the gnome breathless. Despite her scoffing at Kanon's library in the past, she was incredibly impressed now.

Not too proud to ask for help, at least in this instance, Zina was pointed in the direction of the specific spells she was looking for. "I'll just be here for an hour," she called out to Kanon before making herself comfortable on the ground. 

She took out her own spell book, a worn leather-bound tome that her father had given to her as a gift when she had first been recruited for Blackstaff. The illusionist flipped through the book until she found a satisfactory spell. It took her an hour to copy the spell, although the minutes flew by for Zina.

With that task complete, Zina moved to the next thing on her mental checklist. Luckily, the bard hadn't traveled from her side, so she didn't need to go far to find him  

"Hey," she nudged Kanon. "I need your help with something. See, I'm a big enough person to admit that sometimes my specific skill set isn't very helpful in some situations. You're good with people, and these guys know you right?" Zina bit her lip nervously before continuing onward. "Can you ask about books on the Red Wizards of Thay for me? I know if I do it, they'll just say no immediately. But you talk good, and they like you. So will you please help?"

Kanon spends the majority of the time by Zina's side. She is so enamored in her work that she barely even notices him. As she discards a book, he picks it up and begins reading. This is how he spent the majority of his two years in the Keep. When a reader was done with something or felt it didn't contribute to their study, he'd pick it up and begin parsing through the tome for any tidbits he felt were interesting. Even though Zina found no value in a particular book, every single book had a value to Kanon.

He acted startled when she asked him to see about getting some tomes on the Red Wizards, but he knew it would eventually come to that. He was more interested in deciphering her tome than he was in any of the spellbooks she had sitting next to her. "Of course, Zina," Kanon responds, "Lets see what we can dig up."

He moved past Dhoro, eyeing the book he had open, and headed above to bother a younger reader. He finds a young reader who seems engaged in his studies. Typically those that are on a roll in their research will be most eager to get you what you need so they can get back to their research.

Kanon coughs slightly to alert the reader of his presence. When he looks up, Kanon says, "We're..." he indicates the beaming gnome next to him. At least he thought she was beaming... either that or growling. He couldn't tell. "Looking for tomes on the Red Wizards."

The reader responds quickly, indicating that all tomes on the Red Wizards had been taken for study elsewhere. "How about ciphers?" Kanon asks, thinking about the complexity of cracking the book's code.

"Oh, sure, they have hundreds of tomes on cryptography," the young reader responds.

"Any that pertain to the Red Wizards in particular?" Kanon's question is met with a raised eyebrow.

"Any that were specific to a Red Wizard methodology," he says, "would have been collected. However, as I understands it, the Red Wizards used a hybrid of 3 different advanced encryption methods, though they obfuscated the script as well for an additional layer of security." He shrugs and adds, "You might want to check the White room. Cryptography is one of their most highly specialized sciences and no one knows more about it than those that work in the White Room... so I've heard." 

Kanon thanks the young reader, and with Zina on his tail makes his way back to Elder Reader Dhoro.

"I believe we're finished here, Elder Reader Dhoro." Kanon smiles before adding, "We'd like to go to the white room now."

Elder Reader Dhoro never raises his eyes from the pages of his book.

"The White Room is a phantom," he says, turning a page. "A myth. It's fodder for fools."

He pauses for a long moment.

"There are other candles on the lower ring if the books in this wing do not suit you, but the First Reader made access rights fairly clear. Lower candles only."

"I see..." Kanon says, turning to Zina. "It appears as though Neiklot were correct in his assumption that Candlekeep couldn't help us in decryption." He frowns, waiting to see if the Elder Reader takes the bait.

A few seconds pass before he adds, "We might have to actually travel to Athkatla and see if Aerie can help us."

"Yes," he says, still not raising his eyes, "your logic is sound. If we had expert cryptologists in Candlekeep, why would we overpay so badly for the services of an expert such as Neiklot? And Aerie may well be a valuable ally for you in this crusade. We have purchased many tomes from her in the past, though she, too, is wildly overpriced. Be sure to take a fat purse - or perhaps a fat dwarf." 

"Well how about the tomes that have been taken to the inner sanctum. May we have access to them?" Kanon asks. He knew it was a longshot, but the whole reason the group was here was to help fight off the invading force. Knowledge of the invading force was a good way of doing it. 

"We'd be sure to stay out of the way..." He adds with a hopeful grin.

Dhoro looks up from his book to meet Kanon's eyes.

"I am sure the Keeper of Tomes had very good reason for removing and securing those volumes. As they are no longer in the lower candles, the Keeper has not granted you access to them. In all honesty, as an Elder Reader, not even I know exactly where they've been taken..."

He sighs.

"But I understand and appreciate your urgency. I am sorry if I have been difficult. If there is some way I can help you find information that would assist you, let me know. I will guide you personally."

"We appreciate your apology," Zina nodded, slightly in awe of how much information Kanon had managed to get from people. Her father had always told her she could get more flies with honey than with vinegar, but she had always been of the opinion that a ray of frost would be superior to both. But seeing the bard in action had garnered a new level of respect from the gnome. "Dhoro, do you know of any other books that may have been left behind that could help us? Books not about the Red Wizards of Thay exactly, but books that may have information that could be helpful. Or books on cryptography or obfuscation. D'arvit Kanon, we've got a lot of stuff to research."

"They've got hundreds of books on cryptography... we could start there. I'll get them!"

Kanon nods at the gnome before heading back upstairs to bother his newfound, young reader friend. Moments later he returns to Zina's side. "I've asked for all of them," he says, "We'll find something that'll help." 

"Or every single useful thing is gone to that White Room," ZIna grumbled. "How much do you care about what these guys think of you? Because Pettilaen does have a certain set of skills..."

Despite her misgivings, she had already pulled out her notebook and begun to take notes on the closest book she could find. Perhaps they wouldn't find anything useful, but at least it promised to be interesting. 

SCENE: Portia Searches for Malark

After searching most of the grounds of lower Candlekeep, Portia finds a group of Beregost refugees setting up large tents to serve as temporary shelter. From there, she's able to determine that the priests from Song of the Morning, as well as much of the remaining government and militia from Beregost, are taking shelter in the Temple of Deneir, hidden away among the population of scholars and learners who were never able to achieve, or who quit from, official service in Candlekeep.

There, she is able to track down Malark. After saying their hellos, determining each other is well, and catching up, Malark introduces Portia to a soldier named Mara Windrunner, formerly a sergeant in the Beregost city watch. The two have struck up a friendship since leaving Beregost and Malark has hoped the two could meet. He believes Mara could help Portia in her "adventures".

"She's quite fierce with the sword-and-board," Malark explains. "She made short work of no less than three hobgoblins when they raided the Song of the Morning."

SCENE: ...back in the lower candle...

Dhoro cringes hard at the reference to an apology, then even harder at the concept of theft from Candlekeep, but he says nothing in response. He only chimes in when the concept of cryptography is brought up.

"Significant knowledge in cryptography will require that you focus your every waking moment for years - even decades. Perhaps, if you have a specific question, or need information, we could work together to find the expertise you need to solve your problem. 'Stand on the shoulders of giants,' as they say."

Kanon is reluctant to even mention Zina's tome. It's a secret, something that he's learned she holds dear. If the revelation that she held something like this came to the ears of Candlekeep, it'd be gone forever.

He whispers to Zina, "Don't even think about it... thoughts are read as easily as the books we're reading. Unless you truly want to risk ever seeing it again, shield your thoughts and purse your lips." 

Kanon continues reading the tome he has in front of him. The repetitive nature of every encryption technique is surprisingly boring, but he's always been the type to adapt to what he's reading. Something in the book will be useful, and when it is he's sure to pass the passage on to Zina.

Listening to Kanon's advice, Zina began to fill her thoughts with lullabies, singing them in her mind. If anyone attempted to read her surface thoughts, hopefully that would be what they saw first. Bits of song absentmindedly snuck out of her brain as she hummed a few bars here and there.

Her notebook filled with more barely legible scrawls as she poured over the books. Despite her disappointment in not being able to find what she was looking for, knowledge of any kind was exhilarating. Candlekeep was a treasure trove.

Despite herself, Zina began to yawn. She had planned on barely sleeping so that she could make the most of every single second in this library, but the all nighter had begun to take its toll. After about an hour of research, the gnome curled up into a ball and fell asleep using her own notebook as a pillow. 

Kanon raises his head from the book he's reading when he hears a slight snore nearby. Both of them had been up all night, but he thought that Zina would have been able to last longer once the real research began. He looks around them, noting the piles of books that surround them. The young reader he had recruited to help them was very thorough in bringing every tome available. The research area they took over looked more like a fort with stacks of books as palisades. 

"Elder Reader Dhoro," Kanon says, "I think we're ready to retire for the night. Can we keep these books available for when we wake?" Kanon doesn't even seem to notice that it's merely noon right now. It doesn't matter to him though. He yawns and stretches, his bones cracking as he stands from his position next to Zina. He gathers their things, making sure to take Zina's notebook with them, and gently lifts Zina up like a child cradled in his arms. A deadly child... but she looked peaceful in her slumber. Finally, he nods to Dhoro to indicate he's ready to make his way back to their quarters.

SCENE: ...back with the Beregost refugees...

Portia brightens upon finding the refugees in the maze of the place having had to climb down around so many stairs she is not sure she could get back to where she had slept the night before. To be honest, she did not even know where any of the party were at by this point of the day. She had no doubt someone in this place would reunite her with them soon enough. They could have fun doing their arcana research while she quieted her soul finding her family. She smiles at the woman she is introduced to by Malark.

"Please to meet you, Mara." She smiles. "I'm not sure where my adventures are going next, but there has been some interesting things going on and who knows how much is related or not. I met a great deal of refugees and the main contingent from the temple heading to the Gate when I was on my way south from there. Most of my party are elsewhere in the candles and probably digging through arcana stuff above my head. However, we could use a hearty warrior in our crew. Once we are regrouped we'll know if we go on as planned or have to change plans again. I'm hoping whatever we do, it helps find more information about what caused the attack on Beregost and what we need to overcome it before it takes out other places." She slaps a fist into her hand. "May Lathander's light shine on them and reveal all."