Company Log, 7th Heat, 802

We were summoned to Sir Janos' offices in the stronghold, but Raven and Stephen were nowhere to be found. I sent Jeck, but impatient as always, Blackhawk decided to go looking for them as well. Once they were located in Rosewater Park, they returned to the stronghold and the company made their way to the meeting.

Sir Janos was polishing the great sword he always has with him, but he looked up when we came into the room and offered us a seat and a drink. (I should know better than to drink anything with alcohol in it with my track record, but I tried the liquor, which turned out to be Sylvan Whiskey. It didn't even make it down my throat before it sprayed out of my mouth...) The others fared better, although a sniff of it made BlackHawk's eyes water and the others said it burned like fire in the gullet.

Janos offered his condolences as well, saying that Max was a fine guildsman and the kindest man he had ever known. He went on to say that he felt that the bounty hunter was in fact a highly trained assassin, which would explain why he had so much money with him. He feels strongly that the Blackcloaks are unaware that anyone besides Elensul survived the shipwreck, so they believed a single operative would be enough to finish him off. The Blackcloaks would probably have no gruge against him beyond the fact that he could tell others of the cause of the shipwrecks and their involvement in them. We seem to have the advantage since none of the assassin's fellows know where he is, or that he is dead.

He told us that he thought the creature that was enchanted into the talisman was an evil outsider.We had pretty much figured that out. The Guild's stand on Lawrence Crawford's news was hopeful, they will not be neutral;the Blackcloak's have done harm and the Guild will exact retribution.There is to be a service for Uncle Max in SeaGate at sunset on Solstice, the Guild bells will ring for him. It brings us great sorrow that we cannot be there to honor him, but we will have our own services at some point in the future, I'm sure. The Guild is trying to recover his body, which would usually be hung on the city walls for scavengers to feed on, but I pray that will not happen. The filthy Blackcloaks may also try to destroy his body to prevent us from having remains to bury. The Blackcloaks have used magic, sunk ships, and done great damage to Guild members.The guild is looking for red sailed ships, and I pity those on board if they are found.Sir Janos wondered if the Blackcloak's purpose in destroying amulets is to disable us. That made us think about the battle with the Dark Circle, who seemed connected by the destruction of healing potions, scrolls and the attempted destruction of the cauldron. We also started to wonder if they are eliminating the Companions because of something they know, or can do to thwart their plans.

As we had Sir Janos in a talkative mood, (made more so by his consumption of the Sylvan whiskey...) We determined to ask about some of the things that had been puzzling us. We are, of course very curious about the remaining Companions, the Gryphon's records, and Uncle Max's last will and testament. The latter is of great import if we are to carry out his last requests. Apparently, Sir Janos believes Firel, Alisande and Tomas could still be alive. He seemed less certain of Gelmir, even though we had a note of sympathy from the elves, signed with a letter G. Any records that might be available to us are kept by the chief archiveist Mr. Wickwier, but a companion would have to release them to us.

We asked about the Taoiseach and the Ard Righ, and were told that the Taoiseach chose prospective candidates for Ard Righ, scions of royal and noble houses, and put them through challenges that would determine who best fit the position. He administered final tests and then if the candidate was found worthy, the kings were summoned, and in a mystical ceremony that joined him to the land, and it's people, the new Ard Righ was raised.The last Ard Righ was a crazy weak degenerate, as were his father and grandfather before him.

BlackHawk asked about the problems with the sewers, and was told that there are always rats and even RUS's in them, but a rust monster was killed there 2 weeks ago. We were led to believe that that was unusual.

I asked if Janos had known Alfred.He said by reputation only.He said they were members of the same order, but that his exploits had been confined to Alyusia.

At this point, Sir Janos was relatively drunk and sent us off. He was genuinely distraught at the loss of Max.