Llanmhael's Story

Llanmhael adventures in the Forgotten Realms world. He allows humans, with their phonetically deficient tongue, to say his name "Lawn-Vale" but it is properly pronounced (click to hear pronunciation). He hails from the elven city of Evereska, but has been wandering for many years. He happened to be in the town of Scornubel as several adventure-seekers were banding together to answer a summons by King Corvin Deepwound. Upon enlisting, Llanmhael was introduced to Hodor Brightblade, a dwarf; Kronk, a gnome sorcerer; Lelenia, a human cleric; Ghondrue, a human wizard; Hawken Goldthumb, a dwarf cleric; and Sephara, a gnelf sorceress. King Deepwound lived in Kelwar Keep, a small fortress several days journey away. In the inn that night Llanmhael met a merchant prince named Mendel. He warned the young elf against taking the direct route to Kelwar Keep through the Forest of Wyrms, as it would pass a mysterious dome of thorns guarded by vicious beasts known as Growlers. Instead Mendel offered to hire the party as guards, for he was leading a caravan around the Forest toward the Keep. Llanmhael conferred with his companions and they agreed. After a nighttime fight with a band of hobgoblins, they reached their destination and the caravan continued east toward the Anauroch Desert.

King Deepwound hired the adventurers to seek news of a previous group of heroes who had disappeared while ridding the nearby Caves of Chaos of evil creatures. The new party succeeded in finding the one survivor, a female half-orc barbarian named Aagraa. She declined to return with them, having found a baby dragon which she was now raising. The younger party gave the troll that had killed her companions a wide berth, but cleared out the remaining monsters from the other caves. Llanmhael came into the possession of a handy magical item, a portable hole, and everyone returned to the fortress local heroes in their own right.

The party members went their seperate ways, but a short time later Hawken and Sephara approached Llanmhael with a new quest. They had got their hands on a map to the tomb of an ancient dwarven king. The king had been buried with a powerful magical axe known as Skysplitter, and Hawken and Sephara recruited a new group of adventurers to loot the tomb. Llanmhael, a ranger, was unenthusiastic about another foray underground. He accompanied the group only grudgingly. He led them across the Plains of Pelinor to the Hill of Bones, site of an apocalyptic battle many generations before. The map indicated that the hidden entrance to the tomb was revealed by a shadow cast by a particular stone on a particular day of the year. That day was months past, but Llanmhael used his wilderness lore to extrapolate the approximate position of the shadow and a search quickly turned up the entrance. It was too narrow to squeeze through, but Llanmhael set his portable hole in the passage, effectively widening it so everyone could enter.

The party looted the tomb with little difficulty, acquiring Skysplitter and a suit of magical dwarven armour. However Hawken, being a dwarven cleric, had just desecrated the tomb of a true believer of his faith. For this unholy act his god cursed him, taking away many of his powers, and sent a powerful monster after the party. It caught up with them near Kelwar Keep. It was a Reaver, a creature which enforces divine vendettas, sucking lifeforce from its victims, and has a penchant for collecting magical items. The party, though fairly strong by this point, was no match for the Reaver. Weapons weren't even having any effect on the creature, so Llanmhael, in a fit of desperation, tried to toss his portable hole over the Reaver. Luck was not with him; he fumbled and the hole dropped over himself instead! The creature paused in its demolition of the party to gather up the hole and tuck it inside itself.

Llanmhael thought he was a goner, but the Reaver realised that the elf was a grudging participant in the tomb raiding and not a follower of the dwarven god anyway. It let him go after extracting a promise not to defend the cursed dwarven cleric (and it kept the magic item). Llanmhael readily agreed, and the party fled back to Kelwar Keep. Viet, another dwarf in the party, naively befriended a dwarven assassin at the inn. The assassin, hearing that they had to flee the area, suggested that they accompany him east into the Anauroch Desert. The rest of the party didn't trust the killer for a minute, especially considering his name was Poison. However they had few other options and left the next morning.

They were not far into the vast desert before they were seized by the Bedine, the region's nomadic tribesmen. Llanmhael and most of the party members realised they were outnumbered and had nowhere to run anyway, but Hawken, Sephara, and Poison resisted. They succeeded in killing several Bedine before fleeing into the desert, where they most likely perished.

The Bedine brought the rest of the party before their sheik, who convicted them of trumped up charges and "sentenced" them to clear out some troublesome bandits in the Desert of Desolation to the south. The party had no choice but to obey. While tracking the bandits, they unwittingly released an evil efreet from a magic lamp. Fortunately for them it flew off, intent on destroying the Bedine, but Llanmhael had a startling flashback to a previous encounter with the efreet. Many generations ago his soul had been in the body of another elf, guarding an envoy from Evereska to Amun-Re, ruler of a desert kingdom that once flourished in the Anauroch Desert. Llanmhael remembered the efreet soaring above him, sending pillars of flame down onto the kingdom and the envoy.

Though Llanmhael was deeply troubled by this vision, the party continued, and met a wandering spirit who was none other than Amun-Re. The spirit woefully described how he had been cursed for squandering the wealth of his kingdom on monuments to his afterlife. "As I looked only to my death in my life, so shall I look only to my life in death." The only way to lay his wandering spirit to rest was for someone to break into his unbreakable tomb and remove two magical items that had been interred with him. The party might very well have blown him off, but one of the items was a Stargem, one of three given to Amun-Re's kingdom by the elves of Evereska. After Amun-Re's death the kingdom collapsed and all three gems were lost. Llanmhael knew that returning the gems to his people would be a heroic act that might even appease the offended dwarven god. The party agreed to help the cursed spirit, and Amun-Re pointed them in the direction of his pyramid.

Simplifying matters, yet making them many times more dangerous, the bandits sought by the party were camped out near the pyramid. They seemed to be under the leadership of a powerful wizard, who was attempting to break into the tomb himself. The adventurers spent so long debating whether and how to attack the bandits that they were discovered. A fierce battle broke out, and the bandits were joined by five deadly ninjas with poisoned weapons. Llanmhael and the rest of the party, badly outnumbered, fled into the pyramid. Unfortunately they were cornered, for there seemed to be only a few rooms inside. The wizard leader and dozens of his bandits amassed outside. At the last moment a party member named Trebor, a human paladin of Helm, found a secret door and the adventurers slipped away from certain death.

They skulked around in the hidden passages for some time, finding little of interest. That night they emerged and sneaked toward the one room in the pyramid they hadn't yet dared to enter. This was a temple with a dozen bandits worshipping in front of an altar. The party attacked from behind but found themselves nearly outmatched. Llanmhael, by now the group's strongest member, was twice reduced almost to unconsciousness. Miraculously they overcame the bandits and discovered a secret portal deeper into the pyramid.

They were now safe from the bandits, but the pyramid harboured myriad more perils. One by one party members succumbed to the dangers of the unbreakable tomb, until only Llanmhael and Trebor were left alive. The paladin acquired a cursed sword inscribed with the name Enduval. Together the two adventurers shouldered past the last obstacles and reached an antechamber at the apex of the pyramid. Here there was a decaying wooden boat, and on the wall a frieze of the same boat floating among clouds... with the Stargem set in its prow! However there was no gem on the actual boat, mystifying the surviving adventurers, until Llanmhael found that his hand passed right through the painting. Cautiously sticking his head through, he saw the boat thirty feet away, floating in clouds just as depicted, with the Stargem in its prow. Looking down the elf saw the Desert of Desolation stretched out in all directions, and the pyramid nearly 5,000 feet directly below him.

He called over Trebor and they tossed a grappling hook over to the boat. The cleric secured their end with a piton, and Llanmhael looped his belt round the rope and nervously shimmied out to the boat. The scene played out as follows:
Trebor: When you get in the boat, tie the rope around your waist.
Me: (Distracted) Sure. Do I make it to the boat?
Jeb, the DM: Roll "use rope".
Me: (Rolling) I succeed. Okay, I unhook my belt and climb into the boat. I search the boat (Rolls a successful search)
Jeb: There's nothing of interest except the Stargem. To get it you'll have to reach over the side of the boat.
Me: Okay, I pull out my dagger and pry out the Stargem.
Jeb: (Knowing full well I have a dexterity of 19) Okay, just do a Dex check.
Me: (Rolls a 1, automatic failure) Oh, gods, I botch!.
Jeb: (With mock sympathy) Oh, you don't quite have a grip on it! You juggle the Stargem from hand to hand, oh! It slips away and plummets toward the ground. You have five seconds to decide what to do.
Me: (Immediately) I jump after it. (Abruptly realise that I unhooked myself from the rope as soon as I reached the boat. Moreover, the way Jeb plays, once you state an action, it happens and you can't take it back. I'm committed to jumping out of the boat.) Oh, I'm dead, I'm dead!
Trebor: No you're not.
Me: (Mournfully) I'm dead, I'm dead!
Trebor: No you're not. You agreed to tie the rope around your waist when you got in the boat.
Me: (Abruptly brightening) Oh yeah.
Jeb: (Shaking his head in pity) Okay, do another Dex check.
Me: (Rolls a 20, automatic resounding success) Natural 20!
Jeb: (Amazed) Okay, you dive after the Stargem and miraculously catch it in midair. You fall 50 feet until the rope jerks you to a stop. Take, uh, 2D6 damage. (Rolls) You're swinging back and forth 5,000 feet above the desert. Looking up you see the rope disappears into thin air and Trebor's face appears to be floating slightly above it.
Me: (Desperately) Pull me up!

Trebor successfully reeled in the jubilant elf, and after catching their breath they passed into the next room. Here was Amun-Re's sarcophagus. They levered it open to find the second magic item they must remove from the tomb, a staff, clutched in the mummy's hand. However Amun-Re's mummy proved less grateful than might have been anticipated, and attacked the two weary adventurers. Llanmhael was paralysed with fear, but not before tossing Trebor his magical weapon, a +2 scythe given to him by Aagraa. The paladin succeeded in cutting down the mummy, and they took the staff and escaped from the pyramid through a magic portal.

They found several new adventurers who had been separated from a trade caravan in a sandstorm. They were also joined by Zoron, a human barbarian of the local Dune Clan. Together they tracked the bandits, who appeared to have fled south. The tracks peeled off in twos and threes into the desert, but the party eventually found a Bedine settlement at an oasis. Unfortunately it has been burned to a crisp; the efreet had been avenging himself on those who imprisoned him in a magic lamp. Farther on were the charred remains of camels and humans, one of the latter just barely clinging to life. In a cracked voice he explained that they were despatched by Mendel, sheik of the Oasis of the White Palm, to attack the efreet, who had been burning oases throughout the Desert of Desolation. Unfortunately they were no match for the vengeful demon. The party vowed to bring news of the defeat to Mendel, whom Llanmhael recognised as the leader of a caraven he joined when he first started adventuring. The Bedine soldier nodded and died, and so the party backtracked the nomad warriors to the Oasis of the White Palm.

They presented themselves to the sheik, who greeted them warmly and offered them a mission. He was dealing with the efreet situation, but this left him unable to attend to an equally vital problem. Shadalah, the bride of his son and heir Hassan had been kidnapped; he would pay the party handsomely for her recovery. The party agreed and commenced an investigation. Despite Mendel's assurances that the Bedine would handle the efreet, Llanmhael was quite worried about the situation (not to mention guilty). His worries doubled when they discovered vitrified footprints in the sand outside the sheik's tent, as if a fiery creature had melted the sand beneath it into glass.

The party split up to investigate. Llanmhael and Trebor spoke to Korus, Prince Hassan's twin brother, younger by mere minutes. He described the three political factions at the Oasis. First were those loyal to his father the sheik. Second was the Sand Voyagers Guild, an organisation of merchants, smugglers, and slavers. Third was the Thune Dervish Cult, who were none other than the bandits the party had been hired to vanquish. In another part of the oasis, a Tiefling rogue named Black overheard a Guildsman and a Cultist accusing each other of having the kidnapped Shadalah. The party reconvened at the oasis's inn, and Black volunteered to infiltrate the Sand Voyagers Guild. Apparently he fared poorly for he tore back into the inn within minutes. The guild was right behind him, and an enormous bar fight broke out. The adventurers took cover behind an upended table as they were beset by six Guild archers, six dwarves, and the five ninjas. They recognised one of the dwarves: the assassin Poison! The fierce battle raged for some time, and the party managed to kill one ninja and most of their other assailants. Poison, true to his name, poisoned Black, and bargained his escape for the antidote.

After this debacle the party decided to strike at the Thune Dervish Cult. They had an underground temple in a canyon not far away, so the party staked it out and crept close at dawn. The entrance was simply a set of stairs descending into the ground. Rather than rush in, Llanmhael suggested they take positions around the lip of the stairwell and call for the doors to open and close until the Cultists investigated. The ruse worked and the party picked them off from above. Inside they found that the temple was a maze of rooms and hallways, guarded by the bandit Cultists and their undead minions. Black and Viet were investigating a hidden shaft when they chanced upon two mummies. The fright destroyed Viet's tenuous grip on his corrupt heart and he caused Black to fall to his death. The dwarf then fled farther into the temple.

The party continued exploring the temple. They encountered a wizard, who turned himself into a cloud, then cast the same spell on Zoron. The wizard fled down a pipe and the now gaseous barbarian gave chase, but did not reappear. In a cell the remaining adventurers found a Bedine prisoner named Tolnus Granicus, who named himself former leader of the Sand Voyagers Guild. He described how dwarven assassins had corrupted the guild and Poison himself had taken it over outright. The party armed the grateful Tolnus, who joined them as they continued fighting the Cultists. Unfortunately they were beaten back by two drow and their six-armed bone golem. Several party members fell, and Llanmhael himself was wounded to within inches of his life. Adding insult, literally, to injury, he also lost his +2 magical scythe to the drow.

The adventurers wisely retreated into the desert. While recovering, Llanmhael found that he'd advanced enough as a druid to shapeshift into animal forms. However he was confounded to discover he could only turn into a female hawk, nothing else. This was deeply troubling until he recalled vague rumours of druid incarnates, a rare few whose souls had been reincarnated time upon time, and could with experience shapeshift into the forms of previous lives. Llanmhael now suspected that his soul had once been born into the body of a female hawk, and must once have dwelt in the body of another elf, who had guarded the envoy to Amun-Re. This would explain his mysterious vision of dying at the hands of the efreet. Llanmhael had become an adventurer because he had been wracked with feelings of an importance larger than himself. Now he was beginning to find answers.

The party escorted Tolnus back to the Oasis of the White Palm. On the way, however, they spied Poison and a band of dwarves facing off against a battalion of lizardmen. The adventurers hunkered down to watch the fight, but instead both sides approached and began to parley. They were too far away to overhear, so Llanmhael morphed into his hawk form and circled overhead to eavesdrop. Poison and his Gold Dwarves seemed to be hiring the lizardmen as mercenaries in an upcoming battle against King Hodor Brightblade and his Shield Dwarves. Llanmhael had fought alongside a Hodor Brightblade in the Caves of Chaos, though he knew nothing of the dwarf being a king. Llanmhael reported back to the party and they all agreed that King Hodor ought to be warned. Any enemy of the dwarf Poison was likely a friend to them, and Llanmhael felt there was a good chance this was the same Hodor who had been a valiant companion at the start of his adventuring career.

At the oasis Sheik Mendel claimed all his men were needed in the fight against the efreet and he could spare no messengers. However if the party could rescue his kidnapped daughter-in-law, he promised three lines of pegasus-mounted lancers to escort them and their warning to King Hodor. With no choice but to continue, the party returned to the Thune Dervish temple. Miraculously the two drow and their minions seemed to have departed. Llanmhael's keen ears picked up noises at the bottom of the shaft Black had fallen down. Lowering a rope, he found the barbarian Zoron, trapped when the gas-cloud wizard he'd been chasing had fiendishly discharged the transformation spell on him. Proceeding more attentively, the party discovered a secret chamber. It appeared to have been the scroll library of a wizard, but it had been torched, and there was little doubt by whom. Sifting through the ashes they found a few unburnt scraps indicating that the long-dead wizard, one Martek, was the very person who had originally imprisoned the efreet in the lamp. Moreover Martek had made provisions for a possible escape. If brought to his crypt, the three Stargems would release a good Djinni to battle the efreet! And beneath a pile of ash they found the second Stargem!

This left but one room unexplored, a room they could not see into because the doorway was cloaked in Darkness. Fortunately Llanmhael had extracted some lore about the Stargems from Tolnus. Supposedly by looking through the first Stargem one could "see things as they really were". Holding the gem up to his eye, the elf indeed saw through the magical barrier into the next room. A statue of the Cultists' god loomed up before a deep well in the floor. Its eyes were huge gems. Unfortunately the room also contained a shadow demon, a wraith, a ghast, and a cloud of smoke.

Llanmhael cast a flaming sphere into the room, which the shadow demon immediately dispelled, but all four creatures then rushed into the antechamber where the party lay in wait for them. Trebor turned the two undead creatures, which fled back into the room and leaped down the hundred foot well. Valence, a human sorcerer, pounded the cloud with magic missiles. Most of the remaining fighters surrounded the shadow demon. An Earth Genasi barbarian named Adept, seeing that both remaining enemies were thus distracted, dashed into the chamber and began prying out the statue's gems. The cloud, fleeing from Valence, chased after him, so Trebor and the party's other paladin pursued it into the chamber. Adept freed one gem, but the cloud cast a cylindrical wall of wind pushing everyone toward the pit. Trebor was knocked in but managed to grab the ledge for a moment. The howling wind tore him loose, but in that second Adept leaped forward and caught hold of him. However Adept began sliding into the hole and the other paladin grabbed him.

With him was the gem he'd pried off the statue. The party took the remaining one, but alas it proved to be an ordinary ruby. The final Stargem was nowhere to be found in the temple. However the party did find a map the to Crypt of Badaad ad Masak, where the efreet had gathered his undead army. The adventurers were quite reluctant about going there, but they had no other obvious leads. Sure enough they had a nearly devastating encounter with the efreet's minions. After escaping the army, they found a perilous passage to another level of the crypt. There a booby-trapped room stymied them for quite some time. When Llanmhael, Trebor, the dwarf cleric Kreagor, and Valence finally made it through, they found themselves face to face with Shadalah... and the efreet! For Llanmhael it was deja vu in the worst way, especially as the efreet dropped a flame strike directly on him. Barely surviving, the elf staggered to Shadalah and freed her. The efreet cursed him, vowing "We will meet again, Incarnate!" and disappeared in a wall of flame.

They helped the rest of the party past the booby-traps and surveyed the efreet's lair. In the next room they were elated to see the third Stargem resting on a chest-high pillar. Looking through the first Stargem, Llanmhael could see that it was doubly protected. First a column of deadly burning light streamed down from the ceiling over the pillar. Second the pillar itself appeared to have some sort of pressure plate. Kreagor cleverly jury-rigged a scale and filled a pouch with silver pieces until it was the same weight as a Stargem. However they couldn't figure out how to disable or bypass the magic light trap. Hoping there might be a clue elsewhere, they decided to investigate the doorway at the other end of the room. Unfortunately it led to a dead end, a small, badly scorched chamber filled with bones and weapons. A search turned up nothing. Then Llanmhael had a bright idea. He tried holding a metal shield in the column of light. It got very hot, but it blocked the light underneath it, enabling someone to safely switch the pouch of coins and the Stargem.

Trebor pointed out that once the shield was removed, the pouch would burn up and the coins start to melt, surely triggering the pressure plate's trap. Whatever it was, it wouldn't be pleasant. Kreagor then realised they could leave the shield in place if he built four legs out of swords and spears from the other room. The shield would melt eventually, but by then they would be long gone. The dwarf outdid himself, constructing a platform several shields thick, and large enough to block the entire light column. They slid it into place; Llanmhael, ever cautious, motioned everyone else out of the room. He stepped under the shields and swapped the pouch for the Stargem. Alas, the weight must have been slightly off, for the pressure plate triggered anyway! The magic light trap reversed so that it flooded down on the entire room except for the column around the pillar. Llanmhael was safe under the platform, but if he hadn't sent the others out they'd have been burned to crisps. He had no trouble devising a way out for himself. He simply lifted the platform and carried it above him back to the doorway.

With Shadalah and the three Stargems the party raced back to the Oasis of the White Palm. She was reunited with her fiancé Prince Hassan, and her future father-in-law made good on his pledge of an escort to King Hodor.

Llanmhael left the rest of the party and flew south with 36 Bedine lancers mounted on pegasi. They reached the Stonelands, a blasted wasteland of stone towers and outcroppings, just as the Gold Dwarf army was approaching Hodor's ragtag forces. Signaling from a distance, Llanmhael alerted them to the lizardman army ambushing them from the north. As vanguard units came clashing together, the elf spotted several old companions: the gnome sorcerer Kronk, the human cleric Lelenia, and the human wizard Ghondrue. He did not know Jahara, the elf druid, but she managed to cast soften earth and stone at the base of a nearby stone tower. In less than a minute it collapsed... directly on top of several enemy units! Llanmhael circled his lancers over the lizardmen, taking heavy fire but causing even greater destruction below. Kronk took to the air and pummeled the Gold Dwarves with fireballs, then turned his attention on their army's deadliest unit. He couldn't see what it was because the entire unit was cloaked with shadow. However Llanmhael held the Stargem of True Seeing to his eye and saw the evil dwarf Viet commanding soldiers and three Tyrannosaurus rexes! The elf manoeuvred his winged mount up to Kronk and handed off the Stargem. The gnome was able to target Viet and disintegrate him.

Meanwhile King Hodor's ground troops were fighting bravely and succeeded in routing the enemy armies. The Shield Dwarves took the field, and the self-proclaimed King Hodor was victorious.

Llanmhael returned to the Oasis of the White Palm with the three surviving Bedine. He and the party were immediately called before Sheik Mendel. Llanmhael expressed his regret over the dead lancers, but hoped that the gratitude of King Hodor for their service would mitigate the Sheik's loss. In Llanmhael's absence Hassan and Shadalah had been married and the party had gained a few new members. The wedding had further cemented Hassan as heir to the sheikdom, causing his dark-hearted younger twin, Korus, to storm out of the Oasis. Sheik Mendel reported more brightly that the corrupt Sand Voyagers Guild had been thrown out of town, including the dwarf Poison and a drow. The efreet had not reappeared, but dark magical attacks had occurred outside the Oasis. Sheik Mendel feared that Korus was behind them, and bade the party to investigate and defend against these attacks. Bedine soldiers had been turned to stone, others had had their flesh melted from their bones. The party agreed these were dark tidings, perhaps more than they could handle, so they opted to head first west. There a field of cacti had merely been seen topped with skulls.

The party journeyed to this field, which was nestled between two dunes, but it was a trap set by a giant Wolf Spider and a Lamia disguised as a female Bedine. Llanmhael gave orders to retreat, but the Lamia charmed Trebor into following her "into her garden". Tantalis, the party's new half-elf rogue, hid in the cactus field but got snared by densely tangled spiderwebs. The spinners, four Dire Spiders, set to eating Trebor's camel. As the Lamia and her captive approached, the rogue lit the webs on fire. The Lamia beckoned Trebor farther in, but the obvious harm to himself from the flames broke the charm and they were able to flee. Llanmhael circled back and pulled the paladin onto his camel.

Zoron examined the skulls on the cacti and was aggrieved to discover they had been members of his barbarian clan, magically transformed. Llanmhael looked up to see a small object flying through the air. As it grew closer he recognised it as a gnome, in fact Kronk come to see what he was up to. They invited the sorcerer to join them in searching the Lamia's cave. Inside they were attacked by the Wolf Spider's mate and several Shadow Demons. The sorcerer Valence slipped away from the combat and probed the last chamber of the cave. He found a black helmet encrusted with gems resting on a pedestal, and in an uncharacteristic display of stupidity, reached up to take it. He was transformed into a Shadow Demon himself and attacked his comrades. They were forced to slay him. Proceeding with greater caution, they found a black onyx longsword and a slot at the base of the pedestal that its blade fit into. Inserting it, however, caused the pedestal and helmet to retract into the floor and emit a seething column of shadow directly through the cavern roof. Zoron glanced outside and reported that a giant black city was floating above the desert. The Anauroch Desert native knew that once the region had been the kingdom of Netheril, populated by powerful wizards. They dwelt in floating cities and grew so mighty they sought to destroy the gods. For an instant they succeeded, but in that instant magic ceased to exist, and their floating cities crashed to the earth. Netherilese civilisation was destroyed but for one city, which managed to teleport to the Elemental Plane of Shadow in the nick of time. Now the party had managed to call this City of Shade back to their plane.

Llanmhael managed to wrest the onyx sword out of the slot, but the city remained. Fortunately the Netherilese took no notice of them, and the city eventually floated away. The party admitted there was nothing for it and trekked to the next problem area. On the plus side, Llanmhael was able to keep the +4 keen ghosttouch longsword.

Their destination was a grove of trees all turned to stone, interspersed with stone statues of animals and adventurers. The party approached expecting a Medusa, and was surprised instead by a Beholder. From one of its eyestalks it shot a beam that caught Llanmhael in the back and turned him to stone. Another beam unfroze a statue of a lizardman, which attacked the party. Barely avoiding its poisoned blade, Zoron managed to kill it. A young sorcerer named Zahrdahl miraculously cast a blindness spell on the Beholder. Unable to cast spells from its many eyestalks, the monster was nearly helpless as Trebor approached and slew it with his longsword.

In the centre of the grove grew a still-living tree in the shape of a woman. Water trickled from its branches, feeding a shining pool. The adventurers rubbed some of this water on Llanmhael and he was restored to life. They rubbed it on a few other statues that seemed friendly, including a Bedine girl and a paladin of Helm. Llanmhael smashed the remaining lizardmen statues and identified the tree as a shrine to the elf goddess Aerdric Faenya. Some of the younger party members sought to arm themselves with the shattered lizardmen's weapons, but by touching the stone swords to the sacred tree they restored the metal and the poison, and the shrine began to die. Llanmhael and Trebor knew they must save the holy shrine, but could discern no solution. The elf remembered from his previous life's visit to the Anauroch Desert that there was a Sphynx three days' journey away. If they managed to answer its riddle, they might ask her how to save the shrine.

A desperate march across the desert brought them to the wise creature. A correct answer informed them that marigolds growing in the Forest of Wyrms should counteract the lizardmen's poison. Of course the Forest was thousands of leagues away, but Kronk was able to teleport himself, Llanmhael, and Trebor instantaneously. The other paladin of Helm went too, for he was anxious to return home after having been petrified for 50 years. Concentrating on the familiar, the gnome sorcerer brought them directly to Aagraa's cave. In true fashion of old friends, the half-orc barbarian hit them up for money to help feed the baby dragon she was raising. Llanmhael ducked outside and easily collected several marigolds. The next morning they bade farewell to Aagraa and the paladin and teleported back to the petrified grove. They succeeded in curing the shrine, and furthermore restored all the trees by rubbing the holy spring water on them. The rest of the party joined them after trekking back from the Sphynx's lair.

They discovered the Beholder's treasure horde at the bottom of the pool. To bring it to the surface Kronk tossed it all in his portable hole, but then cast invisibility on himself and pretended to fly away. Llanmhael cast a wind wall in the vicinity of the flying gnome, forcing him down into the trees. The gnome proceeded to chuck gold coins at the heads of his companions until he'd had enough of a laugh and reappeared to let them divide the treasure. Llanmhael then earned everyone's ire by tossing his share back into the pool as an offering to the grove's goddess. He also got into an argument with them over a magic weapon in the loot. This Elfbane spear would instantly kill any elf it hit, and naturally Llanmhael wanted to destroy it. The others wanted to keep it in case they ran into drow again, and finally Trebor gave him his honourable word that only he would carry the spear and use it against their enemies.

The party then made for the third and final problem area, where a Bedine caravan had been discovered with the flesh melted from their bones. Among the carts and other remains, the adventurers were set upon by acid-spitting Ankhegs and venemous giant lizards. They were already taking a beating when the creatures' master appeared, a Dracosphynx. With one blast of freezing air the monster killed Zahrdahl and the unlucky Bedine girl and badly wounded the rogue Tantalis. Llanmhael saw the battle was hopeless and called a retreat. Everyone barely managed to disengage, but Kronk held his ground and managed to cast a disintegrate spell on the Dracosphynx.

Disgusted with his cowardly companions, the gnome flew off. The others gathered and returned to the Oasis of the White Palm. At the inn they found a wizard who sold magical tattoos. He talked the two rogues, Tantalis and Nalio, into getting tattoos of a scorpion and a serpent, respectively. The barbarian Zoron opted for a Shadow Dragon, while the ever-practical Trebor got a warhorse. Unamused by the shenanigans in the inn, Llanmhael reported to Sheik Mendel. With the three threats to the sheikdom removed, the elf was anxious to go after the efreet. He questioned the sheik about the Tomb of Martek, where the three Stargems would release a good Djinni to aid them. "Its location is lost to us," Mendel admitted, "but it is rumoured to be south of here, in the Sea of Glass."

Llanmhael rounded up his companions and they rode their camels south until they reached a broad plain of vitrified sand. Under the burning desert sun, this Sea of Glass got so hot bubbles grew and exploded into razorlike shards. The adventurers opted to cross it at night, and while waiting they discovered a unique sailboat hidden nearby. It ran on two knife-like keels, and Nalio was able to pilot the vessel across the smooth glass that evening. They reached an island of sand, upon which stood a giant obelisk surrounded by clusters of crystal pillars. Runes on the pillars read in part: "But once per day when the crystals sound/ the way will be made clear/ You have but to knock to enter."

The party waited for 24 hours, but the crystals never sounded. One pillar had a slot into which a Stargem would fit. Having exhausted all other ideas, Llanmhael decided to try leaving one gem in place for a day. Perhaps that would trigger the crystals to sound. During the daylight hours they had to shelter in the shade of the obelisk, but that evening they spied men milling about the pillar with the unguarded Stargem. Beyond them were four more knife-keeled boats, and additional men. Lost without the Stargem, the party charged the intruders. As they got closer, they recognised them as members of the Sand Voyagers Guild! Moreover the group at the pillar included a drow and a ninja. Ignoring the archers, Trebor and Llanmhael engaged the drow. Holding the Stargem of True Seeing to one eye, the elf saw through the drow's shadow sphere and called to the paladin where to strike. Meanwhile Zoron attacked the ninja, but lost his grip on his weapon. It sailed behind his head and struck one of the crystal pillars, producing a resonant clang. The crystal had been sounded, just as the inscription had instructed. A piercing light bloomed in the sky, blinding the drow and sending the six surviving Guildsmen running for their ships. Llanmhael slew his foe and retrieved the pilfered Stargem. Zoron vanquished the ninja, and the other party members picked off three of the fleeing Guildsmen. The ships were too far away to give chase, and their leader taunted them in dwarven. It was Poison! The adventurers cursed him back, but the assassin got the last laugh as his men sailed off in the party's boat too.

They all returned to the obelisk, over which floated a giant glowing sphere. They were teleported up to it and discovered inside a small jungle realm populated by other adventurers who had sought the Tomb of Martek but could proceed no farther without the Stargems. Tantalis made contact with the natives, questioning them loudly and feeding information to the others, eavesdropping from the undergrowth. The rogue got the people to lead him directly to the tomb's entrance. The rest of the party popped out of the jungle and used the Stargems to open the doors before the stunned spectators could react.

Inside doorway after doorway opened in front of them, down an unending hall. Striding forward, they were only stopped when a group of elves appeared before them. Llanmhael recognised them as Royal Elves, a nearly legendary people who dwelled in immortality in the Forest of Wyrms. For millenia they had been at war with the Poison Elves, an equally powerful race born from the union of the serpent god Seth and the goddess Elexia. The other products of this evil union had been the drow, who followed Elexia underground when she was banished from the land, and the various clans of lizardmen. Strae, the Royal Elf captain, stepped forward and addressed Llanmhael by name. "We have been waiting a long time for you. We are locked in a desperate struggle, and there are fewer than 20 of us left. We created the Stargems millenia ago for this purpose, to gather a band of brave and true warriors to aid us in our fight against evil. I'm afraid this silliness with the efreet has been a ruse."

The party was rather astonished, but everyone agreed that this war against evil outstripped any of their own priorities. Strae led them through a portal into a vast dome of vegetation, filled with grass, trees, and flowers of every description. The Royal Elves, she explained, had created this dome in the Forest of Wyrms as their holdout. However the Poison Elves had corrupted the magic, covering the outside of the dome with giant twisted thorns. Not only were the Royal Elves trapped inside, but any creature which touched the thorns became a vicious beast called a Growler and a minion of the Poison Elves.

There was no time to lose, The final battle was approaching, and this time the party was stationed at the portal through which they'd entered the dome. They were first attacked by a wyvern. Then they were set upon by a pack of Growlers. Llanmhael and Trebor had booby-trapped the eastern approach, and as three juvenile Growlers tried to leap away from the elf's spike growth spell they were impaled on the paladin's sharpened stakes. The younger party members were set upon by their enraged mother while Llanmhael, Kronk, Trebor, and Zoron faced the main pack of Growlers to the south. The elf and the gnome raked them with a flame strike and a fireball before the beasts set upon Trebor and Zoron. Llanmhael spun to the west and intercepted two Poison Elf Golems, despatching the first with two critical blows. The barbarian and the paladin were surrounded by Growlers, but managed to cut several down with help from Tantalis, who would sneak around and shoot them from behind. Kronk cast flesh to stone on their chief. Nalio, who hadn't shut up about acquiring a winged mount since seeing the Bedines' pegasi, pestered Kronk into casting fly on him. Sure enough the foolish rogue flew into the air, drew fire from two Poison Elf archers hidden to the east, lost consciousness to their venom, and fell 90 feet to his death.

Just as the first wave of Growlers was slain, another appeared, led by a Poison Elf riding a giant snake. Kronk blasted them with another fireball before three Growlers fell on the party's front line and the others engaged the younger adventurers in the rear. Two more Poison Elves appeared on the west: their general, who waded right into the fight, and a sorceress. The general swung at Zoron with his viron battle-axe, but fumbled it. Tantalis kicked it through the portal. However the party was in dire straits by this point. Most of the younger adventurers were dead, everyone else was badly wounded, and the enemies were ganging up on those still standing. In desperation Kronk cast a spell creating an illusory feast which enchanted enemies and allies alike. The surviving Growlers turned and began gobbling nonexistant food, as did the Poison Elf general and snake-rider. However so did all the party members except Llanmhael, Zoron, and the sorcerer Olim. The sorceress cast flesh to stone on the gnome, and Kronk clunked to the ground. It was now 3 against 3. Zoron raged and charged the Poison Elf archers, who could only swing their crossbows against him. Llanmhael reached among the enchanted feasters and grabbed the Elfbane spear from Trebor. He hurled it at the sorceress... and missed by inches! Amazingly it landed near Olim, who tried to throw it but dropped it. The sorceress blasted Llanmhael with lightning but he staggered through it and ran to the spear. He turned, hurled it again, and caught her directly in the chest! She shrieked horribly and dropped dead.

Zoron was in terrible shape but continued to hack at one of the archers. The other drew a bead on Olim and shot him with a poisoned arrow. Olim lost consciousness, but not before yanking the Elfbane spear from the sorceress's body and tossing it at the archer. Unfortunately it landed a foot short and stuck in the ground at his feet. Llanmhael ran to help Zoron and together they slew the first archer. However the other picked up the magical spear. Llanmhael thought he was a goner, but Zoron, inches from death, feinted toward the Poison Elf and intimidated him into fleeing.

Llanmhael gave chase, casting a spell on the grass around the Poison Elf. Thorny vines sprang up and entangled him. It was urgent that Llanmhael get back before the illusory feast spell wore off and the remaining enemies fell upon his weakened party. There was no time to finish off the immobilised Poison Elf with spear after spear, so Llanmhael cast summon nature's ally. From over the hill appeared Rava's coatl. Zoron and Llanmhael revived Olim, and the three of them wrested their companions away from the illusory feast. The coatl swooped in and hissed at them to run through the portal. They fled, dragging the petrified Kronk with them, while the coatl incinerated the enemies with fireballs.