Entry 48: Trouble at the Cathedral

Dear Diary,
 
 
A week had passed since the festival, and I had barely stopped to catch my breath.
 
The morning after, Fiachna returned with news—the mercenaries who had attacked our keep were on the move, heading north. They had spent the night at a tavern, likely thinking they were safe.
 
They were wrong.
 
Alistan, Dadroz, and I wasted no time. We saddled our horses and gave chase, while the rest of our companions found excuses—no horses, important sword-related conversations, books that apparently needed reading. Typical.
 
The pursuit stretched over days, but we didn’t let up. When we finally caught them, they tried to resist—briefly. The fight ended almost as soon as it began, and faced with the reality of their situation, the mercenaries were suddenly very eager to talk.
 
They had been hired by a man in fine clothes and a fox mask. That was all they knew. The elves who had joined them? Unfamiliar. Unplanned. Their orders had been simple: attack the keep.
 
For their trouble, we relieved them of the gold they had been paid—recompense for the damage they’d done. Then Alistan delivered them to the guards in Keralon, ensuring they wouldn’t be causing trouble again anytime soon.
 
While we were hunting mercenaries, Khiria—my ever-diligent research apprentice—had been digging into something far more interesting. She had uncovered leads on an amulet that could block divination magic, something I had a keen interest in acquiring.
 
Two promising options had emerged.
 
The first: Darkmouth, a city far to the south, home to a thriving black market that specialized in the kind of magic most respectable people pretended didn’t exist.
 
The second: a traveling fey market, whispered about in legend, moving along the edges of the Lorewood. A place where bargains were struck with more than just coin, and where one could find items both wondrous and dangerous.
 
When time allowed, I would look into both.
 
For now, there was still work to be done.
 
The day started before the sun had even risen.
 
I was jolted awake by the deep, resonant toll of the cathedral bells—half an hour before sunrise. That sound only meant one thing. Trouble.
 
Still groggy, I stumbled to the window and pushed open the shutters. A sickly orange glow flickered in the distance, illuminating the early morning haze. Smoke curled into the sky. The cathedral district was on fire.
 
By the time I threw on my robes and sprinted downstairs, the others were already up and getting ready. There was no need for discussion. Within minutes, we were on horseback, tearing through the quiet streets toward Keralon as fast as our mounts would carry us.
 
When we reached the Solemn District, the cathedral itself was untouched. But fires burned in scattered spots around it—trees, shrines, gardens. Not homes. Not businesses. The pattern was too deliberate to be an accident. Someone had set these fires intentionally, but not to spread destruction.
 
People were already fighting the flames, dousing them with water and stamping out embers. As we scanned the area for ways to help, our attention caught on a small group of guards slumped against a stone wall. They looked battered, bloodied. Some cradled minor wounds, while others simply sat there, dazed.
 
We hurried over. "What happened?"
 
One of the guards, a man with a bruised jaw and torn sleeve, exhaled sharply. "We thought we were dealing with drunks."
 
I frowned. "Drunks?"
 
He nodded. "Caught a few of them smearing oil on a wall. We confronted them, and that's when we realized—" He hesitated, swallowing. "They weren't drunk. They were already dead."
 
"Zombies?" Alistan asked.
 
The guard gave a grim nod. "Aye. Soon as we took them down, fires started popping up all over the place. Small explosions, just enough to ignite things."
 
I glanced at the scattered blazes again, heart pounding. This wasn’t random. Someone had orchestrated this.
 
While we spoke with the guards, Luke’s sharp eyes caught something—flickering lights dancing inside the cathedral. His gaze darkened with suspicion. "The fires are a distraction," he said, already moving. "Something’s happening inside."
He was right.
 
The moment we pushed open the heavy doors, a cold dread washed over me.
 
Galiene lay crumpled at the foot of the altar, motionless.
 
And standing over her was a nightmare given form—a Lich Troll. Its hulking body was that of a troll, thick with muscle and sinew, but its head was bare bone, a skeletal grin twisting in the eerie green glow seeping from its hollow eyes and gaping mouth.
 
The creature scoffed as it spotted us, then, without hesitation, kicked Galiene’s limp form down the stairs like she was nothing more than discarded rags. She tumbled to a stop as the monster turned and stalked deeper into the cathedral’s shadows.
We surged forward—only to be met with an ambush.
 
A skeletal minotaur barreled straight into Liliana, its massive, decayed frame slamming into her like a battering ram. At the same time, a ghast lunged at Gael, its twisted claws raking through the air with deadly intent.
The fight was over in moments.
 
Liliana and Dadroz tore through the minotaur with brutal efficiency, sending shards of bone scattering across the marble floor. Alistan made quick work of the ghast.
 
But there was no time to celebrate.
 
Galiene wasn’t moving.
 
Without hesitation, I reached out and warped the space around Alistan, bending reality itself to hurl him to her side in an instant. He knelt beside her, pressing one of Gael’s goodberries to her lips.
 
She gasped, eyes flying open.
 
But instead of relief, panic flared across her face.
 
"He’s after the lance!" she shouted—then, before any of us could react, she grabbed hold of Alistan and vanished in a flash of light.
 
They were gone.
 
And the Lich Troll was still out there.
 
Our path to the cathedral’s inner chambers—the place where the lance was kept—was blocked. A thick, poisonous cloud churned through the air, its noxious fumes curling like grasping fingers, and looming within it were hulking zombie ogres, their rotting forms shuddering as they lurched toward us.
 
Luke stepped forward, his expression set in grim determination. With a sharp gesture, he dispelled the toxic fog, unraveling it like threads in the wind. The path cleared in an instant.
 
"Go!" he barked.
 
I wasted no time. With a flick of my wrist, I twisted space around Liliana, propelling her straight into the heart of the fight. She hit the ground running—blade flashing, eyes burning with fury.
 
The rest of us followed, though the vastness of the cathedral slowed our approach. Dadroz surged ahead, Gael moved with quiet precision, and Luke kept close to me as we closed the distance.
 
By the time we reached the thick of it, the battle was nearly over. The zombie ogres fell one by one, their bodies collapsing into dust and decay. But victory came at a cost.
 
The Lich Troll was gone.
 
And worse—so was the lance.
 
When we turned to Galiene for answers, her face was pale, her breath unsteady.
 
"The lance—it’s no ordinary weapon," she explained. "It was forged to kill dragons."
 
Silence stretched between us.
 
Whoever had orchestrated this attack didn’t just want power. They had a target.
 
And the first name that came to mind was Velora.
 
Galiene wasted no time—she turned on her heel and rushed off to inform the clerics and summon Sir Donovan and the knights. Liliana took off toward the embassy to warn Rachnar, her urgency clear in the set of her shoulders.
 
I turned to Luke. "Go to the Academy," I said. "Find out everything you can about the Lich Troll. If it’s come back, we need to know what we’re dealing with."
 
He nodded, already thinking ahead.
 
As for me, I had my own path to follow. I would head to the Long Table, the city’s vast repository of knowledge, to dig into the truth myself.
 
The others, their hands still bloodied from battle, turned back to help fight the fires.
 
The city still burned.
 
And somewhere out there, the Lich Troll had a weapon meant to bring down a dragon.
 
That evening, we gathered once more within the walls of our keep, piecing together what we had learned. To my surprise, Liliana arrived with Rachnar in tow. His presence alone was enough to tell me that something serious was about to be asked of us.
But first, we discussed our findings.
 
Between my research at the Long Table and Luke’s studies at the Academy, we had uncovered a troubling truth: the transformation into a Troll Lich wasn’t permanent. It was a grotesque but temporary state—a Lich sacrificing some of its magic in exchange for raw, brutal strength. A barbaric act, one so vile that no known cases had been documented. Worse still, the creature had no inherent weaknesses. No silver stake, no divine smiting would easily bring it down. Its regeneration could only be stalled by one thing—acid.
 
Troublesome news indeed.
 
Then came the reason for Rachnar’s visit. He started by thanking us for alerting him to the stolen lance, assuring us that the resources and influence of his embassy were at our disposal should we need them. A generous offer. But it was clear there was more.
 
The true reason for his visit was far more unsettling.
 
“A knight,” Rachnar said, his voice heavy with the weight of his words, “dressed in black, has been sighted near Latebra Velora. He challenges warriors to duels—” he hesitated, then exhaled, “—and kills them.”
 
A silence fell over the room.
 
The moment Alistan processed the words, he looked like he’d been struck by a Stone Elemental.
 
The Black Knight.
 
The Nemesis Knight.
 
The same being that had taken his brother’s life.
 
For the Black Knight to be so close to Latebra Velora was unheard of. He was a myth, a living legend of death and inevitability, said to never leave the Black Keep. And yet, here he was—challenging and cutting down warriors at the border of Rachnar’s homeland.
 
I could already see it in Alistan’s face. The decision had been made the second the words left Rachnar’s lips.
 
“We need to go,” he said, his voice low, controlled—but barely.
 
Revenge? Justice? I wasn’t sure which fueled him more.
 
Not that it mattered. Because the Black Knight wasn’t a foe you simply defeated.
 
According to legend, any warrior who bested him would die within a year. No exceptions. No mercy.
 
We couldn’t let Alistan charge into that fate without another way.
 
So, we agreed. We would travel to Latebra Velora. Investigate. Find answers.
 
But not just yet.
 
The next full moon was only two days away, and we had long been waiting for an opportunity to visit the local fey court. The timing was too perfect to ignore.
 
We would deal with the fey first.
 
And then, we would face the Black Knight.