The group presses on. Azaka leads, followed by Sickle, Sir Darak, Sedrik, Boris, Badger, Silas, Ham and finally Mandra taking up the rear.   The party of nine, smaller than a few days ago continues what seems like a year long trudge through the forest, leaving behind the scene of carnage. 

It's been about 8 days since you left Mezro and figure you must be 2/3rds of the way to Kir Sabal. Sweating, greasy from the repellant, but feeling good after your magical sanctuary, you press along bravely.  In the evening you come across the charred, rotted remains of what seems to be an elf, wrapped in the rotting corpse of a dead boa constrictor. They, and the area around them seem charred and burnt.  It's been here a few days you figure. As you set camp the sky opens up and under hastily setup shelters you adjust your spots as rivulets of water sluice down the ground around you.  Dry spots acquired, shelter setup, you eat a moist dinner, using the rain water to rinse mess kits. Eventually, with the steady thrum of the downpour, you head off to sleep. 

The following day passes uneventfully with a spot of rain but nothing else interesting to speak of. The miles of jungle passing by beneath your feet. Large spiders, snakes, birds, monkeys, rodents, and small dinosaurs, have lost their novelty and are simply things you see as you march. 

That night you head to sleep as any other night. 

Silas, you wake from a restful sleep. The jungle is dark around you. The only light emanating from the small fire that has mostly gone out. You turn over in your cot to continue sleeping, but something nags at your mind. Your sleepy brain seeps information. The fire sure is low. It's your watch at some point, when will Sir Darak touch you on the shoulder to wake you. It's very quiet. Sir Darak needs the fire, why would he let it get so low?  You turn over, keeping one eye shut so that you don't wake when you could be sleeping, you lazily scan the camp. Mandra sits, her eye lids shut, in meditation. Sir Darak should be on watch, but you don't see him.  You open your eyes and look around, alertness flooding to you.  You scan the sleeping forms.  Boris, Sedrik, Azaka, Badger, Ham, Sickle....Mandra is there....where is Sir Darak.  You sit up.  Mandra doesn't move.  He may have just gone to relieve himself, no need to shout alarm just yet.  

"Mandra? Where's Sir Darak?" 

Mandra's undead eyes open. She looks at you.  She shrugs.  "He went to relieve himself."   

"When?"

Mandra's face looks a bit confused, "I...not long...I think."  She looks around.  "I find time...in this body...sometimes hard to judge.  It can't have been more than....thirty minutes?" 

The alarm is risen as the group begins looking around.  You find him just around a tree from camp perhaps 15 feet away. He lays on the ground, eyes staring lifelessly up. He has strange symbols drawn on his face and skin, in blood....and his mid section has been peeled apart, organs missing.  Sickle gags. 

Mandra, "I...I'm sorry, I really didn't think he'd been gone long...."

Silas examines the markings. Witch craft of the darkest kind. He recognizes some of the work.  Boris and Sedrik come over.  Sedrik vomits, but Boris looks on, unflinching. 

Azaka examines the ground around the area.  "Tracks.  They're subtle, but here, a woman's tread, she is short, perhaps 5 feet tall, and walks with a limp. Too short to be Mandra in case you guys are wondering. The feet are too small as well, and...a bit odd. The tracks lead to.... no...they simply vanish. Nothing has disturbed the bushes past them, water pellets sit undisturbed....it's as if whoever walked this way.....just never went any further." 

Sedrik wipes his face off and heads back to the camp. Boris goes with him, a hand on his shoulder.  Sir Darak's cloak lays, pinned underneath him, still strangely clean, bright and red under his body.  Boris returns a few moments later with a short shovel and begins to dig silently.  The dark dangers of the jungle seem suddenly much more ominous than before. Snakes, spiders, and rats were looking for food. This was something else, insidious. 

Badger's rod whispers to him, "oooh oooh ooh, eight days....then safe, eight days..."

After a few moments, Boris removes Sir Darak's cape, handing it to Badger who is closest, and then with help from Azaka, they lift Sir Darak into the hole.  Finally he takes the black blade Onyx, still sheathed.  He looks at it, and his once master, and then places it on his chest.  He clears his throat, "Though your path has taken you from light to darkness, I believe you had again found the path back to the light. We will destroy the Soul Monger, so that you're soul can continue it's journey to the right place."  Nodding, he begins shoveling the dirt over Sir Darak's body. 

(he didn't have any other magical items did he?) 

 Sickle helps sullenly to bury Sir Darak. He wasn’t sure of his struggles, but he knew that something had been pressing on him, driving him off the righteous path he was on when they first met. Shaken he was too, by the thought of the last real conversation they had had, when Sickle had yelled at Sir Darak.That would stick with him for a while.

When Dark’s retainers finished burying their master, he spoke lowly to them for a bit, about Darak’s courage, his commitment to a holy purpose, and his commitment to them as his charges.  He encouraged them to live his example, and invited them to stay on their quest, or, at first chance, to head back to Nyanzeru, and to their home beyond.

He is kept awake that night with the thought of what could have claimed their friend, this small woman who disappears into nothingness.

Thr next day he would take a moment and cast Plant Growth and watch as the jungle grew in tangled vines and tree trunks over the area Darak was laid to rest.

The next day after the burial, Silas will sigh as he turns to the party, "I do not find it pleasant but I find myself become accustom to losing friends," He will grab the Ioun Stone of the air, looking it before throw back up, "Let us at least find something that resemble civilization,"

Upon hearing the news, Mandra nervously holds the hilt of a newly pilfered short sword which rests sheathed at her side. She checks the corpse, inspecting the markings to determine if she recognizes any arcane purpose (6). She will also murmur hoarsely to herself for some time and cast Detect Magic to see if she can discern any more information about the threat that faces the group.

She turns to Sickle, "I don't mean to be insensitive about your friend, but maybe those Zhents sent an assassin to get their revenge?"

While Mandra herself seemingly ignores the burial proceedings, just standing nearby in meditation while methodically wrapping a piece of string around some wood, an unseen force begins to assist Sickle with digging the grave and prepares the body for burial. She nods in agreement at Silas's comment of seeking civilization, but harbors some trepidation about how her she will conceal her undeath from the living, especially those owning torches and pitchforks. 

Badger watches quietly as Sir Darak is buried. In his mind he recalls words he heard the paladin say on first arriving in this godforsaken land: Sedrik, we are the first of our family to visit the Chult. Let us not become the first to die here, yes?  Of course, Badger knew at the time that such words would be prophetic, but it would have been insensitive to have said so. He also thought back to his Vistani card reading for Sir Darak - The Hooded one and the Priest and recalled how he had predicted that Darak's doom would come by a concealed hand. Oh, how the burden of seership weighed heavily on Badger at times like this...

The burial completed, Badger looked around for Darak's ever-present shield, and lay it against the grave. Then as an afterthought, he flipped it over and with his small knife, etched the following familiar words inside before placing it back: Sir Darak Darkhall, Son of Dartleth Darkhall, Champion of Tyr, Warden of the Deep and Knight of the Realm

Sickle nods at Mandra. “It’s not without reason. Though I suspect the Zhentarim will be looking to finish all of us. Perhaps this is just the beginning, and they will start picking us off, one by one.” Sickle will look around for any idea of where this attacker might have gone after. Perception: 13

Without any further idea of who this woman was, spotting no further clues to her identity, the group goes back camp, though precious little sleep is had by anyone.  The group wakes up the following morning, groggy and somber.  Leaving the engraved shield upon the plants that have grown across his grave, the group heads away, unsure what other horrors this jungle holds for them.  

Azaka, stalwart as ever, leads on into the jungle, the group slowly shrinking in size behind her. 

That day brings rain, drinking water, and good berry's for everyone, along with some other jungle fruit scavenged by Sickle near camp. People take care to stay close to camp, everyone extra vigilant, thinking that the Zhentarim could be stalking them. But the evening comes and goes without harm, though a Boa constrictor does enter camp and get wrapped around Sedrik's leg, the group deals with it. The next day passes as well, then another, where you see a group of Stegosaurus wandering through the jungle. The next day you spot a webbed region and make your way around it, seeing looming shapes in the jungle that don't come out of hiding to attack.  That day you also spot a large number of ghouls, but Azaka spots them before they see you and you make a wide birth around what looked like possibly a half-hundred zombies wandering through the jungle.  

The next day you're greeted with a tropical storm.  The area is getting more mountainous and you left the river canyon behind a couple days past.  You find yourself high up on a hill and as you find a spot through the canopy to look down into the valley, you're greeted with a wonderous site.  The cliffs across the valley from you, perhaps two miles away, are covered in buildings built against the very cliff walls.  You see Aarakorka like small dots flying about the area.  An ancient monastery overlooks the jungle from its perch on the cliff. Stone steps and rickety walkways connect the various buildings, the lowest of which is 500 feet above the ground.  Azaka says, "Kir Sabal."  

As you cross the valley and get closer to the cliffs, you can see the main building has a circular maze like symbol carved into its crumbling facade. 

You look up from the base of the cliff, and are suddenly reminded of the climb up firefinger.  This cliff look easy, but the climb to the lowest structures will probably take at least an hour.  Everyone silently thinks about Yroc and a few smiles pop up on people's faces. 

The rod of security whispers to Badger, "Four more days to safety, only four.....safe safe safe..."

(Book keeping:  who gets the red cape?)

Badger is prepared to climb, but he figures his 6-day-old zombie will have to stay behind, not only because it probably can't climb the cliffs very well, but bringing a stinking zombie into a city of strangers is probably not the way to make friends. He looks then to Mandra, wondering how the Aarokocra will respond to her, before commanding his mindless zombie to walk away into the forest.

New portent rolls: 20, 15

"I hope this is a safe haven for us," Silas states before he moves down the path to the city.

Mandra silently follows Silas's lead, prepared to cast Disguise Self, and again every hour as needed, to appear as her former living self when they come within sight of any inhabitants. 

(To be clear, it's a collection of buildings, 500 feet up the cliff, stuck to the side of a cliff.  There is no "path".  You must scale a cliff, fly, or teleport to get to it.) 

Sickle looks around at the others, then at the cliff. “Alright, best plan that comes to mind for me... Badger and I gnider up, and I can cast a spell to help someone else climb like a spider, perhaps Mandra. Silas and another can teleport up with the cape.  The other two can wait here until we can send assistance back, or climb by hand, which seems a bit daunting. Of course, the locals may find a gnome riding a spider toward their city a bit odd...”

Silas will then look around for a way up then before asking for climbing gear from the party.

Silas spends a bit of time looking around but finds no obvious way up the cliff. 

Mandra walks forward, staring up the cliff while she pulls out a feather from one of the pockets in her robe. She opens her mouth to begin casting, but then looks to the others in the group. "I can get two others and myself up there, but can only do so one person at a time. Maybe someone who knows how to install climbing equipment for others? Who wants to go first?"

After the burial Boris sleep is anything but restful. Without Gregory he seems to be having more and more escalating nightmares. If anyone attempts to shake him from them he awakens groggy and covered in sweat, but cannot remember his dreams.

The following day when everyone is trying to figure out a means to scale the cliff he offers to climb it if anyone has any tools. Azaka offers to lend hers.

If not one has a better means I then proceed to use the piton's, hammer, and rope to climb the cliff. I use the excess rope to carry up anyone who wants me to assist them. "I have been trekking through these mountains long enough that these heights won't stop me." 

To climb: 
Athletics 11

If you think it is important for a climb of that distance:
Constitution 16

Another idea occurred to Sickle, and he curses himself for not asking Azaka what they would find when they got her so he could prepare.  He turns to Mandra in surprise, impressed. “Alright, Silas and Azaka, why don’t you two use the cape and go ahead.  Mandra can send up Ham, then go herself.  I will assist Boris with his climb, and Badger can ride on my back as I climb as a spider.”

if this works, Sickle will cast Spider Climb on Boris, then Wild Shape into a Giant Wolf Spider with the seal of his house on it.

The cliff looks so much bigger to Badger now that he is standing at the base. He looks hopefully over at Sickle just as the druid starts to speak, and then hops up and down excitedly at the chance to be a spider-rider again.

"This will make my travel much easier." Boris called out while testing his newly provided abilities. Climbing the wall he marvels at the tiny hooks and adhesive that have appeared on the end of his appendages. Sweat has broken out on him, but he still has a curious yet bland expression on his face.

"Well let's start ascending before it begins to pour down on us again."

The feather floats in front of Mandra while she mutters quietly to herself, her fingers tracing symbols in the air until the the feather glows with a blue arcane light. She suddenly grabs the feather and taps Ham's shoulder with it, who rises above the ground a few inches and hovers from the effects of the Fly spell. Mandra watches him thoughtfully, a similar blue light flickering in her eyes as she concentrates on the spell. "Well, go on then. Just think high thoughts"