We dropped into Beiydark’s estate through the front gates with Tittlin’s Pass Without Trace running — me, Momen, Ignis, and a flying carpet that passes for an elf. Given the state of the streets, flying in was the right call. Fighting through the infected on foot would have taken the rest of the day.
The garden was the first problem. Tittlin peeked over the hedge and came back down with the kind of face that means bad news. Several large vats filled with a silvery-purple liquid, tentacles wrapped around them, mercurial elves positioned throughout the space, and sitting in the middle of it all: an elder brain. Momen’s working theory was that the mind flayers were combining their psionics with whatever Hydrargyrum had put into the vats — not just spreading the Minamata Malady through bites, but manufacturing something more efficient.
I didn’t have a better theory.
Tittlin dealt with the closest mercurial elf quietly and draped him into the tree line. I pointed out that this would result in silver blood dripping from the branches, which Tittlin reasonably noted was better than a pool in the road. We moved on.
The gatehouse building had multiple locked doors, nearly all of which either had something braced behind them or someone tensed to swing. The clear locked door on the right side of the manor opened into a mud room. The next was more interesting: a large inert skeleton, a conjuration circle painted on a grey carpet in red, and a dead man lying in a pool of blood behind. That turned out to be the butler. He’d been interrupted mid-entry in his log — writing about a morning shipment with boxes that didn’t match the manifest. He was going to send someone to investigate the suspicious boxes. He didn’t get the chance.
Momen identified the symbols on the floor a destination conjuration circle. The distinction became relevant when it activated while we were still standing there. Zipping out of the room and hiding, Tittlin watched as a mind flayer stepped through carrying a tank of whatever was in the vats outside. We got out.
Further in we found another mercurial elf, a hallway with scorch marks outside of a door and a dead guard. Then I tried the next door and took a rolling pin to the head for my trouble — caught it, barely — because three human cooks had been locked in the kitchen since six thirty that morning when the screaming started. Beiydark had her breakfast at six as usual. The cooks couldn’t confirm whether she’d already left for the ceremony by the time things went sideways, but her normal schedule had her leaving between seven and seven thirty, just after the second produce shipment. The second produce shipment arrived around seven.
They drew us a rough map of the estate. Second floor had Beiydark’s quarters, her office, and a laboratory. A locked room the servants weren’t permitted to enter. We took the map.
After evacuating the cooks, we decided to give the servants’ quarters a try outside. Tittlin unlocked the door and one of the two guards inside swung at me with a greatsword before I got the words “Cedar Combe Monster Bashers” out. They confirmed the same timeline as the cooks — normal morning until the produce carriage arrived and someone attacked the driver.
Tittlin flew everyone to the temple while Momen and I waited. By the time he came back, Pass Without Trace had dropped.
Transcendentalist Elidyr was still in the square managing the cordon, slowly pushing the mercurial elves back. We found him and gave him the summary: elder brain, vats, mind flayers apparently cooperating with the spread of the Minamata Malady. He winced at the right parts and we all made our way towards the temple to escalate this further. At the temple gate, the moon guardians wouldn’t let us in. Lockdown.
Then Momen mentioned — out loud, to the air, with some reluctance — that we’d been communicating telepathically the entire time we were inside, within range of an elder brain. Which means everything we said to each other through the bond could have been intercepted. Our position, our plan, what we’d found, what we intended to do next. The mind flayers may have known exactly what we were doing while we were doing it and simply chosen not to act, because acting would have told us they were listening.
We’ve been assuming a private channel. We didn’t have one.
Elidyr tried to relay a message into the temple through one of the moon guardians. It went inside, stopped, and came back. Something was preventing it from reaching Drusilia. Beiydark was the obvious candidate, unless Drusilia had locked down inbound messages herself as a precaution against psionic interference.
Then one of the moon guardians hit Momen. Specifically Momen — not Tittlin at the same distance, not me. Elidyr’s read was that the guardian had reacted to the Moonblade, which Lathaeril had presented to Drusilia at that morning’s ceremony. One guardian controlled by the sword, the rest controlled by something else. Drusilia. Beiydark. Whoever currently has the blade.
We don’t know which.
What we know: the mind flayers have an operational base in Beiydark’s estate, the estate’s own staff was caught unawares, the temple is sealed from the inside, at least one moon guardian is answering to the Moonblade, and our telepathic communications have been open to the elder brain for the entire investigation. What we don’t know is whether Beiydark is running this or is herself a victim of it, whether Drusilia locked the temple down as a precaution or was made to, and who currently has the sword.
Thankfully, after some intense concentration, Elidyr commandeered one of the Moon Guardians to move aside. Time to finish this.