"Hunh," Rhydd grunted when Sheriff Markham told of the trail of death and destruction writ wide and long, seemingly by the Red Wizard who was held captive only a few feet away from them. "He was not exactly subtle, was he? Or she. If that is an illusion that we see shackled there in that cell, we scarce know anything about him -- or her -- do we? Well . . . except that Lady Mallory has observed that very powerful magicks were required in order to bind the likes of a Wight to his or her service."

The archer thought for a moment. "I believe that I heard the . . . the paladin, I suppose she must be, though I know very little about the likes of them . . . any way, I heard the female warrior say that she had captured the Red Wizard. What a battle that must have been!"

"And she struck the blow that laid the Wight low . . . I hesitate to say that it is killed, for I have little understanding of such creatures. Any way, you should have seen how her blade glowed with a dazzling, radiant light, the likes of which I have ne'er seen afore."

"Of course," Rhydd was quick to add, smiling pridefully, "Lady Mallory, here, was instrumental in besting the formidable Wight. She used her magicks to lift the evil creature into the air, up above the floorboards. And there it  hung, unable to strike at us, whereupon it was quickly struck down by the paladin."

Rhydd fell silent for a moment, then added "The paladin told us in the aftermath of the battle that she was a squire of the Radiant Heart Auxiliary. None of that means anything to me. Do you know what a squire is? And have you ever heard tell of this . . . this Radiant Heart Auxiliary?"
This message was last edited by the player at 20:29, Sun 13 Feb 2022.

"I've heard of them, but never seen one in person," Markham replied. Rhydd's tale of the Wight's downfall brought out a slight smirk in him, despite him seeming the type not too generous with expressions. "They're a respected order, so it's no surprise Squire Kumalo impressed. And, hmm . . . perhaps their battle," he nodded to the Red Wizard, "would have been one to behold. Or perhaps it was a one-sided tromp. When she arrived, she bore not a scratch on her. The Radiant Heart Auxiliary are nothing to scoff at, and I cannot even begin to comprehend the power the main branch — The Holy Order — holds. For a junior Squire to join their ranks, they have to both serve in the junior branch for a long time and distinguish themselves from their peers. And there are no more than twenty-five senior members at any given time. So as you can imagine, most never ascend."

---

Markham's History Check on the Radiant Heart Auxiliary [18]: Yeah, that'll do it.
This message was last edited by the GM at 21:59, Sun 13 Feb 2022.

"That is interesting," Rhydd remarked, seemingly quite impressed to hear about the Radiant Heart Order. Certainly, their squire had impressed him.

He took a moment to glance over at Lady Mallory, and satisfied himself that nothing untoward seemed to be going on, at least insofar as was evident to one  who was quite uneducated when it came to all things magickal.

"Just out of curiosity, did Squire Khulekani say whether she had trailed the mage, or whether they had met here by happenstance?"

"She arranged a meeting with him," Markham explained. "Somehow. He had fled to Hundelstone, a trade town just over the mountain pass, and was attempting to negotiate his way out his own mess. He agreed to meet with Squire Kumalo if and only if she fully disarmed herself. I suspect he thought he would have the upper hand. When she still demanded his unconditional surrender things turned sour fairly quickly."

---

I will reveal the results of Mallory's Identify once the conversation dies down. Just so we're all on the same page.
This message was last edited by the GM at 12:36, Mon 14 Feb 2022.

"It seems unlikely that her Order's vows would have allowed Squire Khulekani to be untruthful regarding whether or not she had disarmed herself. When time allows, I shall have to question her as to how she managed to best a powerful Red Wizard in such circumstances. I admit to being curious."

Rhydd glanced over at Lady Mallory, then at the Wight.

"Unless you have something else to add," he remarked to Sheriff Markham, "I suppose that we have little else to do other than await the results of Lady Mallory's investigation."

Instead of saying anything, Markham let the silence between them that followed speak for him.

The Red Wizard had somewhat calmed throughout Mallory’s ritual, but he still appeared tense under her touch. At various points he had mumbled through his gag, threatening to tear away her attention. Blood had begun streaking from his nose.

---

Mallory’s Identify results: The Red Wizard is affected by the spell Simulacrum.
This message was last edited by the GM at 07:17, Tue 15 Feb 2022.

The dull glow that shone through the leather of Mallory's glove took on a more defined form as, bit by bit, shimmering bands of light coalesced together into odd arcane shapes.  Like beams of a rainbow projected from a prism's facets.  The symbols came together into a complex and multi-layered glyph seven tiers deep that hovered in place over the back of Mallory's hand, all encircled within a sigil ring.  The same symbol reflected in the young noble's eyes before she blinked and, in that instant, it vanished away.

For a long moment she didn't say anything.  Her hand continued to rest on the Red Wizard's shoulder where it had come to lay in the first place.  Until she shifted down from her seat to instead kneel before the bound man and brush his matted hair off his brow.  A handkerchief was quickly drawn to blot away both sweat from his face and blood that had seeped down along his chin as she cradled the man's jaw in a gentle hold.  "You poor thing... I'm so, so sorry.  He had no right to do this." Her voice was soft but heavy with pity.

With a deep sigh she stood once more and retrieved her lantern rod from where it hung in mid-air, then turned her attention back toward the other men present.  She spared Rhydd a worried expression - clearly whatever she'd uncovered didn't settle well on her in the slightest.  Markham, however, would find her gaze steeled as she braced to give him some unpleasant news.  "I'm afraid your Red Wizard is still at large, sir.  This isn't him.  What you have here is a Simulacrum." she gestured to the bound captive and promptly continued since she figured nobody would understand what that meant on its face.  "It's a sort of... doppelganger.  A magically created duplicate.  It's a facsimile of the mage himself - all his memories, behaviors, and skills, but without the capacity to become its own person."
This message was last edited by the player at 08:21, Tue 15 Feb 2022.

On inspection, it was clear his nose was broken. And not only slightly so — it was completely shattered, the bone as rigid as a wet dishrag.

Markham stepped up beside Mallory. Contrary to the female mage, his expression did not convey sympathy or any of the like. "I see," he said. "That is unfortunate. Thank you — now the timeline of events make more sense. We were curious how he managed to move so quickly from town to town and assumed some form of teleportation." He paused as he further processed this new information. "When you say 'without the capacity to become his own person', what does that entail?"
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:46, Fri 25 Feb 2022.

"Given the nature of this spell, it's not as though he could have cast it in a reactionary manner to avoid capture.  But it's not at all unusual for powerful mages to use a Simulacrum as a sort of assistant.  Who better to aid you in your endeavors than another of yourself?" Mallory shook her head.

"When you say 'without the capacity to become his own person', what does that entail?"

That brought another pitying gaze on the poor wretch bound before them as Mallory mulled on how to phrase the matter.  "Please understand that I'm speaking from a theoretical perspective rather than practical experience; I've been tutored in many spells, but this one is quite unique." she prefaced.  "A Simulacrum is, in effect, a perfect copy of its creator.  But it bears a hollow, static existence; it can't grow, or learn, or better itself.  It has a will of its own but is beholden to the commands of its creator above all else.  And even if the Red Wizard were to die, the Simulacrum would not gain independence.

It can only weaken and degrade from this point on.  Its injuries will never heal, nor will it ever regain any arcane power already spent.  If you strike it down, or if the Red Wizard decides to create another to replace it, then it will simply crumble away into nothing more than slush and ice."  It was, in a way, perhaps cruel to speak of the Simulacrum's fate in front of him that way... but, as far as Mallory knew, a Simulacrum was aware of its own nature to begin with.  It wasn't as if illusory duplicates believed themselves to be the genuine article, especially if he had already been working alongside the real Red Wizard in the first place.

"It's an act of utmost cruelty by my measure.  To create a sentience, only for it to be used in so callous a manner." she hugged herself at the very thought.  "The Red Wizards of Thay are infamous for their abominable ways, though it says much of how craven they can truly be if they're even willing to inflict a version of themselves with such a fate."
This message had punctuation tweaked by the player at 09:24, Tue 15 Feb 2022.

“So it is sentient,” Markham remarked. “It experiences pain? It’s more than a simple mirage?”

That sort of question earned Markham a rather wary look at first, but Mallory relented all the same.  "Yes, he does.  Despite the manner of its creation and existence a Simulacrum is, for all intents and purposes, the same being as its creator at the moment of its creation.  Until the moment the enchantment expires, this fellow is effectively the same as this Dzaan; they share all the same memories, mannerisms, and so forth."  She reached out once more to offer the bound entity a reassuring touch yet hesitated, then withdrew the gesture before it could land.

"This explains why there is no grimoire to be found; no Wizard would ever part with theirs.  Though I cannot be certain what spells are at their disposal without having the book to review, I can at least assure you that there are precious few of any danger that he might cast through nothing but a word alone." she continued. "I'll have to examine the captured items as well to make sure there's no magic among them but, that aside, you should be relatively safe in removing the gag if you wish to question him.  Just keep a few feet of distance or be prepared to gag him again if he begins to invoke anything."
This message was last edited by the player at 10:27, Tue 15 Feb 2022.

Markham let out a deep sigh, turning away from both Wizards. A few seconds passed, and it was clear he had no immediate intention to ungag the Red Wizard for questioning, despite Mallory's request. "I'm afraid this raises more questions than it answers. He may or may not be capable of magic. He may or may not be in communication with the real Dzaan. And, most importantly, he may or may not be innocent. In which case our current treatment of him would be indefensible." He thought for a few more seconds, standing straight and staring out the cell with his hands behind his back. "Would it be possible to erect an antimagic field of some kind?"

Rhydd shook his head as he listened to all that Lady Mallory had to say. "Clever bastard," he muttered under his breath. Given who was present, it seemed obvious enough whom he was talking about.

"I daresay that Squire Khulekani will not be pleased to learn of this."

Turning to Lady Mallory, he asked, "Is it possible that the Red Wizard might have more than one of these simul . . . whatevers active at the same time? Or is this one the only one whom we need to be concerned about?"

After pausing for a moment, the outdoorsman added another query directed to Lady Mallory. "So, then . . . do you have any idea how we should go about locating the real Red Wizard?"

"Regarding that," he added, tapping his chin-whiskers thoughtfully with a forefinger, "it seems to me that we would want our foe to continue to believe that we are unaware of his ruse. If that is the case, it seems to me that we should be very careful as to whom we tell about this . . . situation."
This message was last edited by the player at 21:42, Tue 15 Feb 2022.

"Would it be possible to erect an antimagic field of some kind?"

Before she could do anything about it, Mallory let out a barking laugh at such a suggestion.  Her hand immediately clapped across her mouth as a dark blush spread across her face, but a reflexive guffaw at such an apparently ludicrous request had gotten out all the same.  "I... ah... I apologize, that was terribly inappropriate of me." she cleared her throat primly.  "No, an antimagic field is quite out of the question, nor would it perform as you'd hope.  That would simply render a Simulacrum inert or possibly even destroy it."

Thankfully Rhydd spoke in and spared Mallory further focus from her faux pas, which she gratefully latched onto as quickly as she could.  "Only one Simulacrum may exist at a time; were another to be created, this one would harmlessly self-destruct.  The process of creating a Simulacrum is expensive and exhaustive, to the degree that very few mages could even successfully perform the ritual in the first place." she switched readily to an academic's tone to cover her butt.  "It requires rare, extremely expensive materials and an entire day of uninterrupted focus, through which the caster cannot eat, drink, or rest.  No, if the Wight was here in Bryn Shander attacking guards, I would imagine that Dzaan is unable to simply create a new Simulacrum and intended to have the Undead retrieve this one."

"It seems to me that we would want our foe to continue to believe that we are unaware of his ruse. If that is the case, it seems to me that we should be very careful as to whom we tell about this... situation."

"I would certainly agree about keeping the matter hush from the general public so as not to raise a panic, but it's safe to assume the real Red Wizard is already aware of the situation to some degree.  For a mage who can create Simulacrums and summon Wights, monitoring his copy with scrying or telepathy is mere child's play."  It did raise a troublesome matter to have on hand.  Whatever had drawn the Red Wizard so far east and urged such costly conjurations to aid him had to be very important, so it was unlikely he'd just cut and run.  But if he was backed into a proverbial corner and low on resources, he'd be especially dangerous.

"As for how to deal with this Simulacrum and how to find the real Dzaan?  Well..." Mallory sighed as she offered the bound prisoner a more critical gaze "I would say the Simulacrum is our best option.  This fellow here is, to every reasonable measure, Dzaan.  If he murdered people then it's either because he chose to do so or because the real Red Wizard commanded him.  Such a creature is not an innocent, blank slate being manipulated against its will by its creator.  It cannot defy commands, but a Simulacrum is of one mind with its creator to begin with; any conclusion one makes is the same the other would have.  Especially since the Simulacrum cannot change its perspective.  Both the creator and creation bear equal responsibility for any wrongdoing."  Her half-hidden gaze lifted instead to Markham.  "I understand it may be a difficult moral quandary, but I pity this fellow's state of being, not him.  He is every bit the wretch that the real Dzaan is, by definition, and deserves any justice meted against him for his crimes.  But one thing is certain of the Red Wizards; they are obsessed with their own self-interest.  I daresay this fellow here might be inclined to sell out his creator to spare his own hide.

I believe Squire Kumalo may be of service; I recall those of the divine order can magically induce truthfulness to gain confessions.  She would be instrumental in an interrogation come morning."
This message was last edited by the player at 22:13, Tue 15 Feb 2022.

Rhydd listened to Lady Mallory's explanation, and he prided himself that he actually understood most of it. Well, some of it, any way.

Looking back and forth between the Wizardess and the Sheriff, he remarked "Well, then. It sounds to me like bringing the Squire up to date on what is going on might well be our next step."

Turning to address Mallory, he added "Farwalker and Torgrim too, I would think -- as long as they are going to continue traveling with us. But I am inclined to draw the line there, and keep this knowledge limited to a rather small circle."

"Does that sound satisfactory?"

"Let's not get too ahead of ourselves, Rhydd." Mallory raised a gentle word of caution on the topic.  "This is the Sheriff's investigation, after all, and we're strangers to Bryn Shander.  Let's best not assume we're welcome to muddy about in matters simply because we've been permitted this far.

Besides, while I'm happy to volunteer my expertise in this sort of examination purely out of good will, contending with a murderous Red Wizard on the loose is a very different affair." she spared a sidelong look Markham's way along with a shrug.  "One that would demand not only careful preparation but suitable compensation."

Their little gaggle of cohorts had become rather in the habit of getting involved in local affairs of late, Mallory realized.  Some by request, others by their own wherewithal.  But she was already tasked with tracking down one murderer with a considerable bounty attached... goodness, if she wasn't careful, people might start to think she was some sort of adventuring vagabond hedge wizard!  "In my opinion, we should perhaps allow things to settle for the night.  Give Squire Kumalo a chance to recuperate, as well as both the good Sheriff and Simulacrum time to mull over their options.  Then reconvene in the morning?"
This message was last edited by the player at 00:23, Wed 16 Feb 2022.

Rhydd shrugged his shoulders. "As you wish," he replied.

"I admit to being out of my depth when it comes to matters pertaining to magicks of any stripe, so you must take the lead."

"Thank you for your aid," Markham nodded. He'd been facing away when Mallory laughed at his doltish question and given her no visible reaction, but had now turned his attention back to the Simulacrum. "You've given me a great deal to think on. Let me know where you are staying, and I will send someone to fetch you come morning. I hope Squire Kumalo may lend us her powers once more — any willing priests capable of truth zones have been driven from the town. Though if we can get him to answer our questions is another matter."

Markham, with his hands kept at his back in statuesque composure, stepped out of the cell and waited for Rhydd and Mallory before locking the door. Within, the Simulacrum remained chained, gagged, and blindfolded.

"We've yet to square away our quarters for the night, but once we figure it out among our companions I'll send word here to inform you." Mallory followed along quickly when they were ushered along.  Astre had likewise scampered up to rejoin the group since they'd finished and gave a sour yowl at his partner's idea of 'sending word'.

"Yes, that means you.  I don't want to hear you complain about it; you can fly and have fur to keep the snow off."

"Rrrwl!" the Tressym countered.

"Fine, I promise." she assured him in return as he gave a hop to land himself across her shoulders once more.  The young noble gave a sort of 'what can you do?' expression to the men about her.  "In any case, I can either take the Simulacrum's possessions with me to review overnight, or do it here if you'd rather not let them go.  I doubt there's any magic among them given this discovery but there's no harm in being cautious."

She gestured over to where the Wight's remains were bound up in another cell.  "I'd also like to remove whatever lingering necrotic essence is still within the Wight.  It's thankfully a quick process and one that doesn't require magic; I could even teach you both how to do it, just in case you ever have to contend with Undead disposal again."
This message was last edited by the player at 08:40, Wed 16 Feb 2022.

"Yes. If you wait here, I'll send in a guard," Markham replied to Mallory's offer to tutor them in ways of getting rid of any lasting necrotic magic within the Wight, "if you could show him. In the meantime, I'll lay out the Wizard's . . . Simulacrum's," he corrected himself, "possessions, though I have to insist they don't leave this building. Especially the wand. You may join me in my office for an inspection once you finish here." He then headed for the door, and a guard — the one who had been keeping watch in Markham's office and outside the cell area — soon entered with his own set of keys to unlock the Wight's cell.

The dead body laid motionless, constricted tightly by chains. No rattling or faint twitching of the fingers indicated any remaining motor functions, nor did it reek. Had it not been for its sickly complexion and the dull, grey flesh exposed at its neck, it could easily have been mistaken for any other freshly decapitated body. The guard, a tall middle-aged man, surveyed Mallory, prepared to follow instructions or replicate the steps she laid out. Markham had clearly already briefed him.

"As you wish, sir."  Mallory wasn't surprised that Markham wouldn't want the items removed from his control but, at the same time, she was rather inwardly annoyed.  It was going to take her some time to finish checking everything thoroughly and she'd rather have done it in the comfort of somewhere with good companions, warm hearth, and strong drink.

In the meantime, she moved along to examine the Wight's corpse.  Thankfully it seemed the guards had shed her blanket and rope into a pile nearby when they'd chained it up, so she quickly recovered those with a quick flourish of cleaning magic to ensure they had no lingering Undead musk, then bundled them back to her satchel.  When the guard arrived she offered him a polite nod of her head and gestured to the laid out remains.  "Good evening, sir, come this way please.  You too, Rhydd; one never knows when this sort of thing will come in handy.  I'll spare you the extended lecture on the topic of Undead but, in short, their bodies are animated by necrotic energy.  For lesser Undead like Skeletons and Zombies, the energy is spread throughout the entire form very thinly - just hit them hard enough and it disperses like a popped soap bubble.  Greater Undead like Ghouls, Wights, Vampires, and the sort?  They're trickier.  The necrotic energy condenses into a single point somewhere within their body and must be removed lest it contaminate the area after their demise."

The young noble shook her hand about briskly to work away any stiffness from the cold then, with her fingers splayed out limp and totally relaxed, slowly began to sweep her hand up and down the length of the Wight's form from head to toe.  "Necrotic energy is antithetical to living beings, so we sense it reflexively.  Animals are especially keen at it.  If you simply relax your hand and sweep across where the necrotic crystallization is, you'll feel your fingers begin to cramp."  She swept across the body several times before, just as her palm crossed over its left bicep, her fingers slowly curled inward in an echo of rigor mortis.  "Ah!  There it is.  Here, each of you try and see what it feels like yourselves." she invited the men to mimic her motions and feel the blood-chilling sensation of being so near to raw necrotic energy.

Once they had their turn at it one way or another, Mallory drew her field knife and made a careful incision over where she'd detected the welling of lingering energy.  To cut into a withered Undead's flesh was both easier and more difficult than fresh in different ways - it was dry and brittle without any splash of blood, but toughened by exposure and cold like leather.  But with enough wiggling of her knife she leveraged the gap open and reached in with gloved fingers to carefully tug free a tiny, matte black mass that looked akin to a naturally-formed mineral crystal.  Barely any bigger than a coin.  "There we are.  Quite diminished; it seems as though Squire Kumalo's attack destroyed much of the necrotic essence in the body to begin with.  All the better, really." she appraised the nasty little crystal in the light before she wrapped it in a spare bit of cloth for safe-keeping.  "If you don't remove the necrotic essence from an Undead, it increases their chance of reanimation.  Bury their corpse and the necrotic energy will seep into the surrounding earth, poisoning the plants and animals in short order, while also drawing more Undead to it.  If you burn it?  Half of Bryn Shander would come down with a heaving case of Crypt Lung before the week was out.

Once removed, the corpse can be disposed of by normal means safely, and the crystal itself can be destroyed by submerging it in a two-to-one ratio of holy water and high-proof alcohol, which will destroy the liquids and crystal alike.  I'll see to it this is done away with myself."

Rhydd pursed his lips thoughtfully and listened to Lady Mallory as the wizardess explained about Undead and something called "Necrotic Energy." The archer had never heard about any such thing, but then he would be the first to admit that there was much that he didn't know about magicks and the like. In fact, there was much more on the "Don't Know" side of the Ledger than on the "Know" side when it came to magicks.

He tentatively lowered his own hand when Lady Mallory invited him to experience the effects of the Wight's little concentration of Necrotic Energy for himself. The first thought that he had was that his hand felt somewhat paralyzed, the same way his arm did whenever he bumped the so-called "funny bone" in his elbow too hard.

The next thing that happened was that unlike the manner in which he had seen Lady Mallory's hand react to the dark Necrotic Energy, the fingers of his own had began to twitch and dance about, as if his hand were a spider that had landed on a hot stove.

"Ugh!" he exclaimed, yanking his hand away and cradling it with the unaffected hand.

"That's . . . I don't like it, not one little bit," he muttered.

He turned to Lady Mallory. "Can the Red Wizard re . . ." here he fumbled for the right word. "Can he put more of that Necrotic Energy into the Wight from afar? Or is he too far away for those sort of magicks to work?"

Mallory likewise gave a rather surprised exclamation to Rhydd's response, which in turn made Astre fluff up and bristle in a quick chain reaction of flinches.  "Goodness!  I'm sorry, Rhydd; I wasn't expecting such a strong reflex.  Some people are especially sensitive to Planar energies though... you aren't allergic, are you?" she immediately abandoned her scholarly air for one of prompt concern and reached out to take Rhydd's hand, only for it to be cradled away himself.

As for matters of the Undead's revival, she shook her head.  "No, the process of raising even the most basic of Undead servants requires various components beyond the Simulacrum's reach." she assured.  "And if the Simulacrum has been casting any spells prior, that arcane power will never return to him, so he can't repeat powerful magics."

The guard, along with Rhydd, followed the steps Mallory had laid out. Seek. Curl. Cut. Simple enough for even the dullest of guards to recall. "Good thing you're here," the tall guard spoke, "we might have buried him if not. Figure he won't be kept in a cell for all eternity . . ."

---

Once accompanied, Markham laid out the items belonging to the Simulacrum on his desk. "As I said, not much," he spoke, surveying the various coins and wand in front of him, "I know not the first thing about magic, so you'll have to inform me on the significance of the wand. If need be, it can be destroyed." Three copper, twenty silver, and five gold, as Markham had specified earlier, were all neatly arranged and sorted. "We'll concern ourselves with matters of the investigation tomorrow morning. For now, only the security of the prisoner and the citizens are of importance."

Once things were settled in the jail and they'd reunited with Markham, Mallory took a moment to glimpse over the varied items laid out.  Nothing leaped out immediately to her senses as bearing a magical aura, though she was well-aware a cautious mage could mask simple dweomers if they cared to.  Though if the Red Wizard was going around conjuring Wights, Simulacrums, and murdering people while seeming to appear in two places at once, she wondered if he was really all that concerned about being inconspicuous.

"Wands serve multiple purposes for a spellcaster; sometimes they contain spells of their own, though they are most often a medium through which our magic might be channeled.  Without a foci or a suitable material to serve as a conduit, it's difficult to shape magical energies into any sort of useful form.  The real trouble people run into is that it's hard to tell what items are dangerous in the hands of a mage when even the most innocuous of items are potent tools in our arsenal."  Mallory explained as she took up the wand in hand and began her concentration.  "A twig, a drink of water, one of their own eyelashes.  It's possible to read minds with nothing more than a single copper coin.  Summon a blade of searing flame with spices from your dinner.  I'm not at all a combative sort yet even I can tear a hole into another dimension with some rope or overwhelm an entire crowd with a bit of dust."

---

Mallory ritually casts "Identify", first on the Wand and again on the coins.  Hopefully the coins can all just be scanned together rather than one at a time, else we're going to be here for the next several hours watching Mallory chant.  ^^;
This message was last edited by the player at 23:14, Fri 18 Feb 2022.