Fifty-Second Session - Just a Quick Errand to the Treasury

Following a festival intermission at which magical gifts were exchanged, this session began with the Keepers holding their midnight meeting with Celus, the Palace Guard who had emerged as their ally/minder in Azkaresh. Celus showed his trust by leading the party to his own home to talk.

It emerged that the Governor had been acting strangely for the past few years: more distant, less communicative, not performing his duties reliably. In particular, he responded poorly to a pair of severe droughts, which is a bad thing in a desert city. Celus also discussed the 'Heart of Azkaresh', the spring of water that fuels the city's water reservoir, and also revealed that Governor Rashid and his wife, Hepatian's mother, got quietly separated without approval from Raith for a formal divorce.

After thanking Celus for his assistance, the Keepers discussed next plans. They speculated that Lord Roe's mate might be held captive in the city's secretive vault, or that Governor Rashid could have been possessed by an artifact or creature or even replaced by a Changeling to explain his behaviour. The party also planned to visit the city Treasury to search for incriminating information on Azkaresh's likely corrupted finances, which was expected to be a fairly simple and unexciting errand.

Celia then Communed with the Lady of the Lasting Embrace, which once again revealed striking information. Celia then speculated that Roe's mate left him and started dating the Raith Governors. This led to Ishaq realizing that Hepatian had survived the Dream Devourers awfully well for a defenseless teenager. There was a chance the youth might have draconic blood like Ishaq himself, implying an innate magical talent.
 * 1) The Lady indicated the party was being spied upon once per moon, and Ishaq deduced this indicated a nightly observation.
 * 2) She also shared that Rashid was not being influenced by anything from the vault except grief.
 * 3) Roe's mate was neither living nor dead, leading Ishaq to suggest this may be why Roe is fixated on the Negative Zone.

With the discussion concluded, the Keepers rested for the night. In the morning, they purchased a mystic item nicknamed a 'sneak-o-scope' to conceal them from the nightly spying, which had ten uses. The party then dropped by the palace to ask Celus if Hepatian could come for ice cream while the Keepers did some errands.

Alana turned into a rhino to give Hepatian a ride, and on the way to the Treasury Ishaq tested Hepatian for draconic heritage. He verified that the boy had an innate grasp of the draconic language as well as an inherent gift for the arcane- one that he was dangerously ignorant and untrained in. Meanwhile, Raul, Markoris and Max made plans to recover the needed records from the Treasurer’s Office behind the counter. Celia cast Guidance on Max and Ishaq while Alana, Hepatian and Celus stayed outside. The plan was for the sneaky characters to get into the Office while the rest of the party caused a distraction.

Celia acted distracting by having her magic rapier appraised, then tried to stab an office plan to test it, to the consternation of the tellers. Ishaq meanwhile discreetly planted a magic bean that resulted in the growth of a tree in the Treasury lobby laden with magic fruits. And then he Suggested one of the tellers try a fruit, at which point the chaos was high enough to merit ROLLING INITIATIVE.

ROUND ONE
 * 1) Raul - moves into position
 * 2) Treasurer - exits office
 * 3) Markoris - moves into position
 * 4) Max - rolls Intimidation to get the Treasurer moving
 * 5) Celia - yells like a lunatic
 * 6) Ishaq - turns Max invisible
 * 7) Tellers - eats forbidden fruit of Gaseous Form, evolves into Ghost Leonard -other guy tries to Grapple Celia
 * 8) Alana - tries to take H to a minimum safe distance

ROUND TWO
 * 1) Raul - repositions
 * 2) Treasurer - takes bait
 * 3) Markoris - moves
 * 4) Max - gets in the office
 * 5) Celia - acts like a lunatic
 * 6) Ishaq - casts Mage Hand to pick a fruit
 * 7) Tellers - a guy goes to call the Starred Guard, almost catches Markoris - Ghost Leonard keeps trying to eat fruit
 * 8) Alana - keeps taking H away from the chaos

ROUND THREE
 * 1) Raul - bullshits the Treasurer
 * 2) Treasurer - distracted by Raul
 * 3) Markoris - can't move, suspicious teller watching him
 * 4) Max - rifles through Treasurer's desk, uses Action Surge to rifle faster
 * 5) Celia - acts like a lunatic
 * 6) Ishaq - messages Alana for help, continues picking fruit with Mage Hand
 * 7) Tellers - goes to summon Starred Guard
 * 8) Alana - pushes into the lobby doors with H on his back, Celus in tow

ROUND FOUR
 * 1) Raul - More distractions
 * 2) Treasurer - Is distracted
 * 3) Markoris - Stealth check, turns out door closed and locked behind Max after he picked it, distracts alarm guy
 * 4) Max - fucks up investigation check goddammit
 * 5) Celia - implores Celus to handle the chaos
 * 6) Ishaq - tries to get Hepatian in on the distraction, but gets him to practice Message instead. Also has 3 magic fruits now from Mage Hand.
 * 7) Tellers - fails to escape Markoris' grapple
 * 8) Alana - breaks into bank and horn-attacks the tree with Hepatian in tow
 * 9) Hepatian eats a fruit and gets potion of Growth, immediately growing to a giant size.

END OF SESSION