New party formed

Sir Ivan, an Exorcist of the Silver Flame from Breland or Thrane, received orders from his superiors that took him to Graywall. The retired cleric Ellemar had received a vision of a giant mind flayer setting himself up as a god of Graywall. Sir Ivan's superior, the Archbishop of Wroat, decided that this would be a Bad Thing, and sent Sir Ivan to deal with the problem. Travelling with him was Horgar Horgar, a bugbear fighter employed by the church.

Ellemar had said that she believed a wizard was living in Graywall who had encountered this particular mind flayer. Sir Ivan and Horgar found the house of Tharrad Katarn and after a tense stand-off decided not to kill him for being part devil when he introduced them to Verschoyle. Horgar enjoyed Tharrad Katarn's wine and appeared to be warming to him, but Sir Ivan did not let his guard down.

Verschoyle agreed to help defeat the mind flayer, and suggested that they go to Castle Granis and recruit the help of Grim as well. Verschoyle, Horgar, Sir Ivan, Zurga and Primrose the Flesh Golem all travelled on horseback to Castle Granis.

Sir Ivan has received a very cool reception throughout Droaam due to his insistence of wearing the symbols of the hated Church of the Silver Flame. However, his charisma has managed to convince some of the goblins of Castle Granis that the Church may not be all that bad. Zurga, in particular, now has a much more open mind regarding religion.

Rather than travelling to the Temple of Zilkloog straight away, the party decided to go to the Val'druusk observatory in order to scry on their enemy first. There they found Zumm next to the scrying orb, apparently in some kind of suspended animation. The party defeated a random spirit naga that had made its lair in the observatory, and scried on Zilkloog's temple. They found it to be inhabited by a band of gnolls: ten in total, including the captain. There was also a young goblin who seemed to be training and Zilkloog's new priest. Verschoyle scried on every temple room that he had seen previously, but did not see Zilkloog himself.

At the end of the session, Verschoyle teleported the party to a safe area near the Temple of Zilkloog where they can rest. Because of the limits to his teleportation, he has brought only himself, Grim, Horgar and Sir Ivan. Hurgadar, Zurga and Primrose are all still at Castle Granis.