All the normal suspects have shown up: Chris (Pawnbroker), Tim (Laerynthe) and Nick (Mungo). Everybody else is apparently MIA.
The session starts on the 275th day of Abbatine Year 856, near the beginning of the Low Hot Season. The characters are currently hiding in an abandoned Faiai Family plantation they and about 75 Holy City refugees led by Fesh (a Living Weapon of Pellwen's Plaza) have converted into a camp.
The characters talk about killing Liggin, the Abanga's Plaza Tale-Teller who accompanied them back from the Abanga's Plaza refugees' camp. They fear that Liggin may either be a Spyral Devotee, or simply in league with others back among the other refugees, and want to ensure that he cannot bring back the location of their camp. They bring Fesh into the conversation. Fesh points out that Tale-Tellers are traditionally inviolate, though in recent times Living Weapons have occasionally been called upon to slay them. The characters finally decide to sent Liggin back, and send out Fesh's Living Weapons to find a new camp to ensure that Liggin cannot tell the other Abanga's Plaza refugees where they are.
Pawnbroker ensures that Living Weapons are sent out regularly to maintain contact with the other groups of resistors in the area (particularly Taotach Cassand and his group).
The characters consult with the Dellemoi Speaker Ebenei to determine if she knows of any good locations for a camp. They tell her that they would like to avoid buildings that will be obvious to Prince Tonnalk's people. She offers two possibilities: an abandoned deyrey mound overrun about a century ago, and the ruins of a village depopulated by the Dellemoi maybe fifty years ago. The deyrey mound is about a day and a half away, and Ebenei says she does not know if there is anything dangerous left inside. The old village is about two days travel away, and had been seeded with poisonous vines and nettles which are probably still thriving. Both sites are closer to the Abanga's Plaza refugees than the characters' current refuge.
The characters debate on the relative defensive merits of village and mound city, finally deciding that Prince Tonnalk's people have more than enough fire mages to incinerate a wooded village, no matter how many poisonous plants they have around them. If nothing else, earth and stone mound cities are not particularly troubled by fire.
Ebenei says that it will take the healer another two days to finish healing everyone of the chills, so the characters gather up most of the healthy Holy City folk and head off, leaving only a few Living Weapons to watch the remaining diseased Holy City humans. The whole procession travels cautiously, with Mungo and three Dellemoi adapoi serving as a forward guard, several Living Weapons on the flanks, and Laerynthe, Pawnbroker and more Living Weapons bringing up the rear. Pawnbroker makes a point of teaching the Living Weapons simple techniques for covering the group's trail. All of those in the rearguard use them to make the procession's passing as inobvious as possible.
The characters arrive at the mound to find that it has been almost completely overgrown by the forest. Of the five visible mounds, two have collapsed, obviously because their foundations were undermined by tree root systems. Two of the mounds still have recognizable entry ways, and are in fairly good condition considering that the Dellemoi have been urging the forest to destroy them for the last several decades. The hive's central plaza is also in fairly good shape: the red clay bricks are still visible in most places, though small plants and vines creep from between them.
Immediately after they arrive in the area, the characters establish some rules for the Holy City Folk: no eating local plants, no converting mounds into food, no exploring below ground level, and everyone who can helps repair the tunnel structures. The characters take advantage of Kuchok's and Pakak's experience in the Veka Family copper mines, and give the two turgosk the task of supervising the Folk while they dig. The turgosk appear to be quite satisfied with this arrangement, in spite of their normal dislike of mining.
Initially, the three Dellemoi guides simply sit and watch the characters' activities, until Mungo asks them to look for poisonous plants. The adapoi tell him that it will take them a tenth of the day to explore all around the hive. When they finally return, they report that there are no more poisonous plants in the area than you would normally expect in the Yodai forest.
Once the Folk have established a temporary camp and the Dellemoi adapoi have confirmed that poisonous plants are not to be found in every shadow, the characters detail ten Living Weapons to watch the Folk, then take fifteen more into the central mound to explore. They quickly find that the interior, though damaged, is in reasonable repair. The chambers and corridors are walled in fused stone, probably done through earth magics.
Within ten minutes of venturing into the mound, the characters find the Main Hall, a large circular chamber easily large enough to hold their entire group. Random rubbish and deyrey bones are scattered about the floor. While the Living Weapons skirt the edges of the chamber, the characters search the place for valuables. Laerynthe finds an intact (and balanced) stone club (swing+1 crushing damage, 3 pounds), while Mungo locates the Queen's skull. Inspired, he spends several minutes locating intact deyrey skulls to use as shoulder pads and other adornments.
After convincing themselves that the Main Hall is safe enough, the characters spend two hours outside making torches, so they can explore the depths of the mound. Returning to the Main Hall, they divide the Living Weapons up into groups of three. Four groups are sent off into the mound proper. The remaining group and the characters head down into the underground tunnels.
Some distance beneath the Main Hall, the characters encounter a passage blocked by a deep wash of dead vines. An adapoi skeleton is visible in the midst of the vines, and a collection of deyrey bones lie in the distance. Pawnbroker recognizes the vines as a variety that secretes a toxic sap upon it's leaves. The adapoi have often used it in warfare. He also remembers that the live plants are dangerous to burn, especially in enclosed spaces.
The characters retreat back to the Main Hall briefly and recall all the Living Weapons. They spend a few moments to warn them about dead vines, then all the groups head back down into the mound. Lacking any other obvious way to get through the vines, the characters simply wade through, taking their chances.
Beyond the vinefall, the characters encounter a deyrey magical construct. The thing is a long, sinuous length of stone that attempts to wrap around it's victims, crushing them to death. Several of them are injured badly in the fight, particularly Pawnbroker. During the combat, Laerynthe attempts to incapacitate the creature by hurling the coma blanket over both it and Pawnbroker. To his horror, he finds that while Pawnbroker is instantly incapacitated, the construct is not. He rapidly whips the blanket away, barely in time to save Pawnbroker from a sticky fate. In the end, Pawnbroker cuts the creature in half with an axe after Mungo repeatedly fractured it with the stone club Laerynthe found up in the Main Hall.
The characters quickly determine that the stone construct had been protecting a nursery chamber. It is laid out in the same fashion as the nursery in the old deyrey hive the characters took refuge in the Tadooban Forest, so Laerynthe tries knocking the walls to locate hidden chambers. He manages to find a secret compartment in almost the same place as the one in the old hive. Unable to easily break through the stone wall, Laerynthe marks the place with three bones then accompanies the rest of the group back up to the Main Hall to regroup.
The characters return to the Main Hall to find that all but one Living Weapon have returned. In addition to the missing man, another Living Weapon is badly wounded. The wounded Living Weapon and the other survivor of his group report that their third companion was killed by a stone snake very similar to the one the characters recently dispatched. They report that while their (bare-handed) blows had little effect upon it, magical Stun spells slowed it. The characters organize a hunting party composed of themselves and five Living Weapons, all of whom know the Stun spell at level 15. The hunting expedition is fairly successful: the characters locate the creature and Mungo smashes it to death while the Living Weapons keep it Stunned.
After the second construct has been destroyed, Laerynthe travels further down the path and falls through a section paper-thin shaped stone floor concealing an apparently bottomless pit. Laerynthe manages to grasp the side of the pit before he plunges to his doom. The other characters throw him a rope and successfully pull him back to safety.
Once the Main Hall has been deemed secure, the characters head back to their old encampment to get the remaining Holy City folk and some wall-breaking tools. The round trip takes them four days. By the time they return, the Holy City Folk have established themselves fairly well in the Main Hall, and Fesh has organized sentries and patrols.
On his return, Pawnbroker talks with Fesh and his lieutenants, arranging long range patrols and couriers to the other known resistor groups. In particular, a courier is sent to Taotach Cassand and the Dellemoi adapoi to warn them of the characters' impending plan to finish off the Abanga's Plaza refugees.
Pawnbroker takes the two turgosk and several Living Weapons some distance from the deyrey hive and lays out a big stone arrow with a spiral beneath it, pointing straight to the Abanga's Plaza refugees. He writes instructions and information about the Abanga's Plaza refugees in Tharrish nearby. The whole display takes about a day to set up.
Mungo sets up a camouflage observation post nearby, and the characters take turns watching the sign, along with Shokek. After three days, three bat-folk finally show up on Laerynthe's watch (at the time, he was trying to play fish with Shokek in total darkness, losing badly and cursing the Low Season). The bat-folk land and spend some time looking at the message. Shokek promptly dashes off into the night to tell the other characters about the visit. On hearing the news, Pawnbroker sends runners off to the Dellemoi and Taotach Cassand's people, warning them of impending motion on the part of Prince Tonnalk's men, and urging them to send warning when they see troops moving. He also asks them to send troops to ambush the soldiers.
Now that he knows Prince Tonnalk is likely to send troops to attack the Abanga's Plaza refugees, Pawnbroker places Living Weapon sentries in the higher trees, to look for the bat-folk escorts that will surely accompany them. He tells them to look for large numbers of bat-folk, moving slowly as if they are escorting a large group. Four days pass, during which time the characters dig through the secret compartment wall in the Nursery.
During the time the characters are waiting for Prince Tonnalk's men to appear, they use the tools they brought from the Faiai Family plantation to break through the wall of the nursery. After two days of incessant hammering, they break through to find a chamber dominated by a large stone statue of deyrey queen. They also find two stone men with the power to walk through stone. A running fight ensues. The characters swiftly destroy one stone man, while the second travels up into the Main Hall and kills two Holy City Folk by dragging them through walls. Mungo orders the Holy City people to leave the mound, for their safety, and Fesh details five Living Weapons expert in the Stun spell to accompany the characters. They finally manage to spot the second stone man walking inside one of the walls of the nursery, immobilize it with Stun spells, and then bludgeon it to death with mattocks.
Once they are able to investigate the chamber more closely, the characters fin that the queen statue wears a silver necklace studded with poorly-cut semiprecious stones (index 67), a pair of simply-worked gold bracelets (index 68), and an obsidian dagger obviously shaped through magic that proves to have fertility powers: according to Brakan, if the dagger is used to draw a magical sigil upon any female creature, she will conceive if given the opportunity in the next three days, and safely bear at least two healthy children (or, for creatures that normally produce litters, a litter one larger than normal) (index 69).
After the stone men, the characters (and most of the Holy City people) are unconvinced that the Main Hall is safe, so they establish a temporary camp in the forest nearby. Thinking of fat grandchildren, Pawnbroker attempts to seduce one of the female Living Weapons. He is not completely unsuccessful: while she does not immediately accede, neither does she Stun him with magic and beat him up.
The session ends on the 286th day of Abbatine Year 856, in the middle of the Low Hot Season. The characters are camped outside an abandoned deyrey hive in the Yodai Forest, waiting for signs that Prince Tonnalk's men are moving on the Abanga's Plaza refugees a half-day's walk away. Mungo, Laerynthe and Pawnbroker each gain four experience points. Brakan (upon whom the characters prevailed several times for magical healing) gains one experience point. Laerynthe buys Combat Reflexes for fifteen points.