The Path to the Centenarchy

Carlagnios knew how to get to the Centenarchy. "I can write down the ritual for you," he told Kale.

Kale replied, "Wait, you know how to write?" Carlagnios glared at him. "OK, OK," Kale stuttered, digging into his bag for a magic quill from the Old War. "Why don't you just explain it to me, and I can write it down.

Carlagnios proceeded to explain the details of the ritual. As he explained more, we began to realize that we could not perform the ritual immediately. First of all, Carlagnios was still far too weak to take part in the ritual. And then, we were lacking the components required for the ritual.

"Maybe we could we sell Carl to get the components needed?" suggested Tiny. Carlagnios growled back at him.

"Perhaps it's best if we head back to the Siege City, the city of the dwarves," said Kale.

We flew back to the city with our vulture drakes. As we approached, we could see the tops of the towers that protected Siege City. And the ballistae on top of the towers began to fire at us.

"Hey!" roared Carlagnios. It was fortunate that he was still weakened, or the testy Dragonborn fighter would have attacked the dwarves manning the towers.

Tiny wisely suggested that we land and that he should approach the towers. "Hello!" he called to the dwarves at the top of the towers.

"Who goes there?" one of the guards asked.

"We are looking for some components to complete a ritual. Could we find the components here?"

The guard shook his head. "I feel that you've come to the wrong place."

Tiny raised his hammer, Loom, into the air. "Do you see this hammer?"

The guard squinted for a moment and recoiled in surprise. "Are you the one who wields Loom? Why didn't you say so? Come in."

They took care of our Vulture Drakes and led us to Ionel Brownstone. "Yes, we can get you the components," answered Ionel. "We'll need to go back to the House of Mages."

We returned there, where we exchange 5 of our gems for the components needed for the ritual. "We would also like you to rest here tonight," suggested Ionel. "From what I understand, you had a difficult journey, and one of you had to be raised from the dead."

"I was, but I am not weak!" snarled Carlagnios before his drooping eyes sagged shut and fiery snores blew out from his nostrils.

"I've prepared quarters for you," said Ionel. "We will see you in the morning."

The next morning, Ionel and Pesker the Younger came to greet us.

"While you were gone, the council convened. The signs are right. We are ready for The Return when you are ready."

"The ... Return?" asked Tiny.

Ionel recited, "And Po said: 'When these eleven portents come, cast this hammer, Loom, from thy hand. Cast it into the moat of thy exile. The hammer shall return in hand of a mighty warrior. And he shall cast you from your exile and you will return to the rich hills of your birth. Heed his call.'”

He paused and looked over Tiny.

"We were ... thrown off by the 'mighty warrior' part ..." He paused to gesture at Tiny. "But," he sighed, "on the whole, this seems like it fits, and our auguries are not overwhelmingly negative." He shrugged.

"So," he continued, "how do we go back?"

"Well," said Tiny, "we could help with The Return, but we're on a quest somewhere else."

Ionel smiled. "No need to worry. We need to get our people ready for The Return." He handed Tiny a horn. "Just blow this when you are done with your quest and are ready to help us."

Kale noted that this was a Horn of the Highway, an arcane item.

Tiny eagerly took the horn and began to fiddle with it.

"Can I try it out? What happens when I blow? Can I try blowing softly? Would that be OK?"

Ionel shook his head. "You must not blow the horn until you are ready. Otherwise, you might call us too early." Tiny looked sorely disappointed.

"Now," Ionel continued, "we must make ourselves ready. We will have stout hearts of stone ..."

"Ah," interjected Tiny with a gleam of recognition in his eye. "Have you met the stone men before?"

"The ones we sent with Loom saw the stone men from a distance. Now you must go and complete your quest."

With that, we left the city. We left the Vulture Drakes behind us -- the ritual was a walking ritual, and we had no use for the Drakes.

Beneath the open sky, we began to perform the ritual. Kale and Garg assisted with the ritual. When it was done, we could see a path in another world -- a path that now appeared in our world.

Carlagnios told us to follow the path and led the way. He said it would take a day to get to the Centenarchy.

As we followed the path, we could feel the eyes of other creatures upon us -- creatures that we could not see. We could see the path in our own world, but we could not see anything else from the other world.

We finally reached the entry to a valley. Bran decided to try riding the Ebony Fly to the sky to see if we could see more of the area. But as he flew farther from Carlagnios, he felt as though he was not following the same path. He returned to the ground.

Then, somewhere in the distance, we heard a party approaching us.