The Danger Gang Meets The Guards Of The Forbidden Valley
The Danger Gang wakes up bright and early, ready to start their adventures away from Chrysopolis. Before they can rush out, however, Helena approaches Arben with a note she found in a litterbox. It reads:
"Did you guys send this circus here? Troilus went to jail, and all he was doing was picking a few pockets. We actually had to bail him out. Anyway, if you didn't, watch out for a circus of jerks.
Arben pens a quick response and then asks Beau to track down a bird to carry it over there. Beau, having heard that the plover is the smartest bird, finds one of those and starts tries to ask it for a favor. The plover (named Rover) asks him if he could kill Eorl. Although everyone should have seen this coming by now, Beau's a bit surprised. He says that he won't, but Rover agrees to bring the note anyway.
Meanwhile, Gershom has been thinking about that magic jar. He casts a Detect Magic and tries reading the Final Letter of Rabbi Tarphon to it. When he gets to the part that says "For who in Jerusalem was richer than he, save I?" a Magic Mouth appears and says, "No". The number on the front of the jar reduces to 19. It seems this is a twenty questions jar. They decide that now is not the time to puzzle through the jar, so they leave it with Leo, who is ordered to not any questions near it. Leo will try to research Rabbi Tarphon to see if there are any clues as to how to open the jar.
They head over to the governors mansion to bug Halcyon to ferry them around. Unfortunately, Halcyon can't do much, ever since Eorl and his friends burned down his boat. Eorl mutters in his office that Halcyon has The Swordfish, but no one notices. Halcyon reccomends they track down Kolya. That is exactly what they do.
They decide to hug the coast in the Kivot and set sail. There's Arben, Can, Gershom, Xenon, Beau, and Zahrah. Unfortunately, Zahrah is a little under the weather. They leave insturctions for Martialis to come track them down at Samothrace when he's done in the Hagia Sofia. Arben hangs a big "Visit Chrysopolis" sign on the back of the boat. Everyone enjoys the day, fishing, taking in the sea air. It would be such a serene scene if not for a sudden feeling Gershom has, a feeling that they're being Scryed upon. Arben climbs up to the crows nest to see what's what, and that's when he spies a pair of Gryphons flying down.
He shouts a warning and everyone gets ready. There are riders on both of the Gryphons. Gershom casts Suggestion on one of them, suggesting "Swim". The man bails off his Gryphon and falls into the ocean. His armor causes him to sink like a stone. He feels a little guilty. They start scrapping with the two gryphons and the remaining rider, a Cyclops-kin. A Gryphon quickly bites Beau, knocking him unconscious. Xenon leads the fray, sword swinging. Can knocks out the Cyclops-kin with his trademark fan-shaped spray of clashing colors. A wounded Arben crawls off and plays his Pipes of Panic and scares off one of the Gryphons. The other one goes down after biting and clawing it's way through most of Can's Mirror Images. When it dies, it turns in to a large token, then disintegrates. Gershom heals up the wounded and they sail on to Samothrace. They try to interview the Cyclops-kin, but he only speaks Bulgar.
When they arrive off the rocky shores of Samothrace, they take the tied up Cyclops-kin and row ashore. Xenon starts explaining that they're just interested in provisions to the assorted yokels on the beach, but Arben will have none of it, yelling that they are the famous Danger Gang here from Chrysopolis. They tie their boat up and soon run in to three people clearly in the adventuring business. They are Ferminus, Ulampius, and Sergia. They introduce themselves and the adventurers ask the Gang to join them to see if they know some guys. They lead them to three heads on pikes. No one recognizes them. Ferminus explains that they've been hired by Basil II to guard the island's Forbidden Valley, which is filled with a huge pagan temple complex. Any one who goes in there is looking to get murdered by this bunch. The Danger Gang all laugh nervously. They head towards a clumping of houses to buy some food and drinks off the natives and chat. Ferminus introduces the rest of the Samothrace Party, Gabriel, Anderoctonia, Melissa, and Chow-Han. Ferminus asks what these guys are doing here, and Arben explains that they're on a fact finding mission from Chrysopolis and that they are the world famous D.G. Xenon keeps nashing his teeth, wishing that Arben would shut up.
In any case, it turns out that Anderoctonia speaks Bulgar, so they set about interviewing the captured Cyclops-kin. It seems that Zar-Simmian has put out a contract on our heroes. This guy claims he was just out on a routine patrol when he saw a Greek ship. It just happened to have the Danger Gang on it. It seems they had nothing to do with the scrying. The bounty might have something to do with an adviser to Simmian and Etl, a former bandit. The Danger Gang leaves the one-eyed ruffian, then retires to the Kivot for the evening.
