"Does anyone have any paper or parchment? I'd rather not rip a page from my book, but I'd like to send a note with Aleesa if we send her to Harbin"

She then thinks a bit "Well if you can get me some of the Mushrooms I may be able to make something to counteract it, it could be we don't need the preist, otherwise we should get to the Barracks"

Dumasz pauses considering all this. “I think we should keep everyone together until each is secured. No one should go alone, especially Aleesa. These cultists may be locals, in which case we don’t know if there are sympathizers in town. A pessimistic view, I understand. Better to be cautious as it costs us little.”

"None of them are locals," Noell says to Dumasz with some confidence.  "But Aleesa herself might not want to go alone anyway.  Let's just get to the barracks first.  One problem at a time," she agrees, hefting Joe up under her shoulder uncomfortably.

"Good point, although I could send Fay to get someone, she can mimic voices so can carry a message" Hayeth says smiling and relaxing a little now they are back in town ready to leave with the party

As you enter the outskirts of town, a young elven girl sees you returning and shouts, then runs off towards the center of town. By the time you reach the main part of town, you are greeted by Undermayor Harbin and four town guards. Aleesa gives a shout and tearfully runs to her father who embraces her. After a few moments, he looks up at you and says, "You've brought my daughter back to me.  I am truly in your debt.  These guards will take your prisoners to our jail for now, let us enter the inn for some discussion and feasting!"

Noell is put off immediately by Harbin's joy, which seems displaced to her.  As wonderful as it is to see the happy family reunited, the vision of Aleesa being forced to nearly slaughter Ol' Joe, whom she's still dragging along, has her too unsettled to feel true happiness despite their good fortune.  Her roiling stomach tells her that feasting is probably not going to happen for her, at least, tonight.  Uncomfortably, she clears her throat.  "I'll get a room for Joe here first," she requests.  "I think he needs a bit of rest.  I'll join the rest of you once I've settled him down in a bed at the inn.  You guys can start on telling the Mayor what we found while I do that."

Hayeth looks at Noell and tilts her head to the side a bit "Take Fay with you at least? Dumasz is right none of us should go alone after that, not just for safety but also, that was really tough in there and we're the only people who actually went through those tunnells like we did"

She then will look back to Harbin, does anything look disingenuous about his joy? Or is there anything fishy about him right now? Insight: 21

"We will certainly take you up on that Harbin, I think we can recount the tale of what occured in those tunnels quite easily, plus I have notes to support"
She smiles pleasantly indicating the undermayor should lead on, as Fay flies from Vahorn to Noell but doesn't land on her until Noell is ready.

Dumasz looks longingly down the street towards the candy shop but shakes his head with a laugh. 

“We’ve done it, folks. A success. I wish we could’ve found poor Derek, still. Alas... perhaps a dirge.” Dumasz begins to hum and his feet shuffle to make the occasional dancing stomp as he walks to the inn after the undermayor. 

"I mean, we don't know for sure what happened to him," Lia suggests hopefully as she follows along with the group. "Maybe they took him somewhere else. Or maybe they never got to him at all and he's still out in the woods somewhere." And then she leans in to Hayeth and whispers, "Which one was Derek again?"

Hayeth leans back shaking her head a little and whispering back "I only know his name, I'm not from this town... I'm just playing along"

She will then follow the rest of the group into the inn

Noell nods at Fay thankfully.  She trudges after the others with Joe, and takes her leave to find the innkeepess.

"Oleira... we found Joe.  Could you give us the key to a room so I could put him down and let him rest?"  Once Oleira grants her access to a room - something Noell is certain will happen, considering that Harbin and the others are preparing to eat, drink, and be merry right behind her - she takes Joe up to his room, Fay in tow on her shoulder.  Settling the old man in bed, she carefully covers him with a sheet, and claps him on the shoulder once.

"Sleep, old man.  You earned this bit of peace."  Looking to the bedstand, she scribbles a short, concise note about what happened and leaves it next to him, with instructions to find the Undermayor and explain what happened as soon as he feels ready. She also pours a tall mug of water from the pitcher and uses it to anchor the note.

Once she's finished, she returns to the taproom of the inn, taking a seat next to the others.  "I left a note for Joe," she says absently, digging through her pack to inspect the goods she collected from the cultists and sharing the find with the others, as well as passing out the coins.

Hayeth looks around as they drink as though directing the question to the group but more projecting it towards Harbin "Does anybody happen to have a Pearl? I'd like to know what this scroll and potion do."

She then turns back to Noell putting the coin in her pack with her other coin "Thank you Noell, I'm sure Joe will be fine he just needs some time"

"Okay, as glad as I am you've returned my daughter, she doesn't seem to be volunteering what happened out there.  So what did you find?"

Hayeth thinks for a moment "Where to begin... well the first thing I must say is your daughters mental faculties were not her own, she was under the grasp of a Yuan-Ti which we found and killed down there"

She looks over the notes in her book "Feel free to interupt me if I miss something friends... We believe we have found the beginings of a cult in the tunnels, the people we led back into town were all members willingly, as well as a few Yuan-Ti which they reffered to as 'The Masters', through the tunnels there are a few rooms and in the final room we found the majority of the cult preparing to sacrifice Joe"

She indicates the room where Old Joe is now resting "This was being done on top of some sort of magical seal, I don't know what exactly it seals but it was powerfull and old, I believe their plan was to break this seal via blood sacrifice, however once again I do not know what the purpose of the seal was. The Yuan-Ti themselves we slew, but most of the Cultists are still alive and we brought them back with them"

Noell clears her throat and gestures to Harbin, eying Aleesa and making sure the girl isn't within earshot as she passes along the information.

"I'm sorry to say this, sir... but they were going to force Aleesa herself to be the one to sacrifice Ol' Joe.  I'm sure it was some sort of bewitchment she suffered under, for when we broke her of the compulsion she was panicked and scared, and not at all willing.  So it's no wonder that she doesn't wish to talk about it.  That poor girl nearly killed a man with her own two hands, and would have, had we not stopped her in the nick of time.  She'll likely need some time and support to recover from that traumatic experience."

She pauses.  "... And, I'm afraid there was no sign of Derrik whatsoever.  I fear the worst for him, and for our Hearth."

While Noell is talking Hayeth looks over the scroll and takes a sip of the potion she then with a note of dissapointment in her eyes carefully rolls the scroll back up and wait and waits for a moment to speak. "This" she says holding up the rolled up scroll "Is not in my wheelhouse, it's more of a Divine or Druidic spell"

Then she pushes the potion onto the table "And this will allow you to walk like a spider for some time, again probably not so useful for me but one of you could make good use of it I'm sure" she pauses "I'm sorry neither helps us find Derrick but they could be usefull in retrieving him if we do"

Vahorn had stood at the back of the group with his arms folded, shifting uncomfortably. As the feast is laid out, he glares over the arrogant display of oppulence, growling “This is no time for feasting Undermayor! What the Wizard says is true, a great seal, snake-men, and blood sacrifice..... if that seal is opened, the time of men and elves is over, as the once vanquished Serpent Empire will return for revenge and conquest. You can celebrate your daughters return once we are certain that she... and every other living thing in this forest is safe.” Vahorn leans over the table, glancing at his companions for courage. “Undermayor.... send a force to keep watch on the cave. They still have a hostage, and their blood could be being spilled as we speak.”

Hayeth nods along with Vahorn "I don't know anything about this ancient empire, but the seal is definitely worrysome and warrants watching... by people you trust we don't know how deep this cult goes"

Hayeth looks around at her companions pausing briefly on each "I am at least fairly certain it's not among us"

She snaps her fingers and the slightly glowing quill appears in her hands and she pulls out her book writing a note in Sylvan on it "Be careful what we tell him, we don't know where his allegiance lies" in flowing slightly glowing violet script she slides it over to Vahorn as she knows he can read it and as soon as she is sure he has she waves the feather of the quill over the script and it vanishes in a small flurry of violet embers

The Undermayor is taken aback a bit. Glaring at Vahorn, he says, "I'll celebrate when and how I wish. If the worst of what you say is true, it may be the last time for a while.  I'll send some guards out to watch tonight, and we'll have a meeting with the Mayor tomorrow, where we will deal with the issue in full.  I'll give you your reward then, and we'll make sure this is being dealt with. You may interrogate the prisoners if you want.  I'll allow you to talk more with Aleesa is you promise to be kind, and I'm sure Old Joe will have his bit to say when he comes to."

[[I rolled Intimidation for Vahorn, he got a 4.  His words were still listened to, as far as you can tell.]]

Ooc: By the way did Hayeth get anything from her insight check earlier?