After leaving the hall, the companions visited the stables of Elverandil's tower to check on their animals. The horses and Billy were being well cared for, and Billy had even been brushed; he seemed rather pleased about it.
After that, the three decided on an evening stroll, and wandered out into the city. A sense of overwhelming peace and security pervaded the place, and sounds of merriment and music could be heard in many places. One of these appeared to be a tavern, and Surya and Hildraft decided to enter and have a drink. Sack declined, and carried on walking. As he did so, he realized that the three had been followed, and that the follower had altered course to follow him.
Entering the ale-hall, the two were greeted in a friendly fashion by the elves present; word had got around that the Dragonslayers were in Belamir. Drinks were pressed on them, and the elves made them welcome.
Bards and minstrels performed, and the mortals were moved to contribute. Surya stood, and recounted the tale of the Dragonslaying, placing events in their true context vis a vis which warriors had done the actual slaying. This went down rather well, as he made a reasonable job of telling it.
Once the applause had died dowm, Hildraft stood up, and narrated some of the Kingmaker Quest, including the group's travels through the city of the Fae Mhor. He could see that the mention of the Dark Kindred was shocking to the Elves, but they seemed to be enjoying the story enough to continue listening. Towards then end, though, an obscure impulse moved him, and he announced he was going to share a piece of poetry he'd picked up on his travels.
The expectant faces slowly crumbled through shock to fear, horror and anger as the dwarf proceeded to recite, in its' original language, the dreadful Service to Lolth. As he spoke the strangely accented words, it seemed to Hildraft that almost visible waves of darkness were rolling out from him and spreading around the room. As he spoke, he could feel a sense of leashed power being built out of the words, and hints of calling, summoning among the invocation and prayers. Belatedly, he concluded that this might not be a good thing he was doing, and that he should stop. To his horror, he found that he could not stop - not without enormous effort. Finally, he managed to gasp to a halt, slightly less than half-way through the ritual. Dead silence fell.
Once the shock had faded, the elves in the ale-hall requested the mortals - in fairly strong terms - to leave at once. Surya pointed out that the dark powers they despised had been essential in both the Slaying and the Kingmaker Quest; the response was that that was no reason to bring the pollution of such darkness back here to Belamir.
Leaving, the pair wandered on until they found another drinking-hall. This time, Hildraft played it safe, and told the tale of the three-way battle at the ruins of Vorsand between the companions, the Githyanki and the forces of Gozan, and Surya retold the same story he'd told in the first inn.
At their third tavern, however, the two were met at the door by a ten-strong patrol of mailed elves and four mysterious-looking elves dressed in form-fitting black leathers that blended into the night. The patrol leader made it quite clear that, for them, the evening was over, and they should go back to their lodgings.
They complied, after some verbal sparring. Hildraft contented himself with Stone Shaping his windowsill into an obscene shape, and spending some time hammering metal in one of Elvernadil's forges, but Surya started making preparations to descend from his window and resume his stroll. As he did so, one of the leather-armoured elves briefly showed himself between the trees, indicating that the Tellaran was being watched. Giving up, Surya turned in.
While all this was going on, Sack was moving through the trees with all the woodcraft and stealth he could muster. Casting Pass without Trace, he concentrated on trying to shake his pursuer off his trail and reverse their positions so that he was trailing them. This proved harder than he expected. His opponent was every bit his equal in the arts of shadowing and concealment, and for a long time, the two barely-seen figures flitted in and out of the trees, dodging, weaving and backtracking. Finally, Sack managed to twist around a tree to a position where he was behind his pursuer. He flicked an coin towards her, which pinged off a stone in the grass, and she whirled around.
What he saw was a slender but muscular-looking elfwoman, dressed in form-fitting black leathers, and with an array of small knived and odder weapons strapped close to her body. No part of her outfit or equipment twinkled or chinked as she moved. She grinned at him as they faced each other - and then stepped swiftly sideways into the shadow of a tree.
Although the shadow she entered was not deep enough to anything like obscure her from view, she vanished instantly, leaving Sack gazing at an empty glade.
From just behind his right shoulder, a voice spoke. "Nice night." Somehow, she was behind him. Sack grunted and carried on. The elfwoman followed him for a bit, unprotesting as he chose the dirtiest and most awkward route he could, and in the end she put on some speed and came up beside him. "As I appear to have failed in my assigned task of watching you unobtrusively, we might as well walk together," she said. Sack conveyed with signs a query as to who had hired her to follow him. Her answer was that she was not hired, but a sworn member of the Shadow Guard, a traditional Elven force mainly used for defence and security of the cities, trained to use a mixture of stealth and the lore of light and shadows. It occurred to Sack that there were striking similarities between the techniques of the Shadow Guard and some of those used by the Fae Mhor, but unlike his comrades held his peace.
Finding a comfortable place, Sack settled with his back to a tree. The Shadow Guard chose a tree facing him and sat to watch him. Sack humphed, and went to sleep.
