A few days had passed since the group had captured the Displacer Beast for Zardoz Zord of the Sea Maidens Faire. The team had gone about some separate business during their downtime to various endeavours. Ray had visited with some of his Trollskull Alley friends for a bit of time on the town. In particular, he got together with Tally, the half-elf owner of the Bent Nail, and took him out around the city for a good time. They also visited the temple of Sune to have him visit one of the mourner's rites that Sigurd had mentioned and get some counseling for his grief. Feeling much better and satisfied he can start putting the past behind him, Tally thanked Ray by lending his support through contacts with the Carpenters, Roofers and Plaisterers' Guild to help rebuild the tavern at a discounted rate, shaving some of the costs off. He also remarked that the guild has been seething after Emmek Frewn recently spurned them by attempting to do the repairs himself on Frewn's Brews, and are looking to get back at him in some way. Fixing up Trollskull Manor and potentially spiteing a rival is right up their alley, it seems. Enigma managed to finish his Warpick training, and is now fully proficient with the weapon and able to mix it in with his monk training. He was able to secure a brand new warpick courtesy of Embric at the Steam and Steel at a great price. Unfortunately, for the other two, things got a bit... complicated. Sigurd entered a local fighting tournament held at the temple of Tempus, the Hall of Heroes, to try and earn some money for the tavern. While he did exceedingly well and won the tournament, the problem with that is that he ended up pissing off a local champion, a female minotaur with the name "Rushing Raisha" - known for her brashness and recklessness, as minotaurs tend to be. Knowing she'd likely charge into him, Sigurd, an intellectual, used this against her and sent her flying out of the ring, disqualifying her by ringout. This angered her so much that she threw an epic tantrum and swore revenge on him and everything he cares about while being forced off the tournament grounds by officials. Sigurd walked away two hundred dragons richer, but has made a potentially dangerous rival! Meanwhile, Yuan and Tally had spent some time together at the Bent Nail, as Yuan approached his shop to obtain supplies, Tally asked him what he was making and the wolfman explained he was making an oversized longbow. Curious, Tally learned more and he actually found out that Yuan was making something only elven masters knew how to do - the making of elven warbows was a lost art and he happened to know it as it was passed down his family and business. He was happy to share some time with the barbarian to make this unique weapon and lend his aid, cutting down the crafting time by half. However, it appears that their movements caught the notice of the owner of the nearby noble villa, the Gralhunds. Yalah Gralhund, lady of the house, sent Tally a letter 'asking' for a deal to be made to acquire the recipe and weapon for five hundred gold, as the Gralhunds specialize in mercenaries and weapon manufacture and this knowledge would be quite valuable to them. While Tally finds it hard to turn down the money, he's not so keen on sharing the lost art with someone he doesn't think has earned the right, which has put the party in quite a quandary. No set date was given, but it's known Yalah is a fast-moving woman and sharp to boot - Tally is concerned that spurning the offer might spell trouble for his business. With those thoughts lingering, the team - minus Yuan, who was spending time helping Tally at the shop today - reconvened at the tavern to look over the construction efforts. Things were going well until one of the carpenters noticed that he had sent one of his buddies up to the turret tower to fix some holes in the roof, and he hadn't returned. He asked Enigma to go check on him since he was busy with other repairs, and the drackal agreed, climbing up to the turret. What he found much to his surprise was one of the carpenters frozen against the wall, and soon enough Enigma was about to become the next victim of a gazer who had been lurking in the tower! Fortunately, Enigma was able to see the lurking gazer before it got the drop on him, and chaos quickly ensued as the two came to blows. During the struggle, Enigma was struck by a fear ray and almost launched out of the window but managed to resist being pushed, retaliating by throwing a javelin, but due to his panicked state he accidentally launched it out of the window and into the street. Fortunately, nobody was hurt. As Ray and Sigurd came rushing to Enigma's aid, the gazer managed to strike him with a frost ray. Having had enough, Enigma put on his wings once more and flew up to strike down the gazer up close and personal, giving his new warpick a try and dealing it a grievous blow. Ray managed to show up in time to finish it off with a Dissonant Whispers spell, and took out the gazer. While he was unfortunately too late to save the frozen carpenter, Sigurd was able to pry him off the wall safely and take him back downstairs. When the other two members had vacated the tower, Enigma took his frustration out on the gazer's corpse by punting it against the wall, causing it to be launched out of the broken window into the street, where a man pushing a cart carrying some produce was almost hit by it and ran off down the street in a panic. After that, Enigma casually collected his javelin and flew back into the tower to rejoin the others. Sigurd and Ray were in the process of telling the carpenters what had happened and looking over the place to make sure nobody else was in danger (they weren't), and Sigurd thought it best to summon the Watch to file a report and explain what had happened. Indeed, a watchman was summoned and took a statement from the team but didn't suspect them of any wrongdoing - after all, this incident wouldn't spell good news for the tavern and they know they don't have any associations with the Xanathar's Guild, who likely sent the gazer to spy on the party's movements, and more importantly, someone had died on their property. The watchman believed their story and understood that outside malefactors had caused this incident but warned them to be more vigilant in the future as he took the body of the unfortunate carpenter away to be processed. The rest of the carpenter team decided to call it a day to process what had happened and inform Tally, who would no doubt be displeased by this outcome. Sigurd explained the nature of gazers - they are dreamed into existence by beholders, which are a kind of powerful aberration, and he began to suspect that the Xanathar's Guild likely had some kind of tie to such a creature - he pointed out that the ten spokes on the symbol of Xanathar was similar to that of of a beholder, which also featured ten eye stalks. He concludes that after the group had taken out one of their hideouts and then claimed much fame after rescuing Renaer, it likely attracted the attention of the Xanathar's Guild and a gazer spy was planted at the manor in an attempt to spy on them. Ray had mentioned he had investigated the rooftop and concluded that it had likely been there for at least several days, having gotten by on eating rodents and critters, and somehow managed to evade the notice of Lif, though considering a gazer is only eight inches across, it makes the perfect spy for an eye tyrant to 'gaze' on the party, and likely flew in through one of the holes in the roof at night to avoid arousing suspicion. Melancholy had taken Ray, who was very sad now, and the other tavern members tried to console him, unfortunately to not much avail. Enigma didn't seem too bothered outside of the fact that he felt like he didn't need the help and totally had that thing on his own. Sigurd was understandably disturbed, and talked with the party about what they might be able to do to try and defend the tavern. They considered turning toward magic, and headed down the street to get Rishaal's advice on the matter. On the way, Sigurd had noticed something peculiar about Ray, and asked him if his eyes always had a bronze-ish tint to them, which he said no - they had usually been gray. He thought this peculiar and wondered if being out of the water for so long was hurting him in some way... At Rishaal's place, he was a bit more welcoming this time since the party had helped him with his paper problem, and allowed them to ask what they wished. They asked about some potential spells that might help in defending the tavern, and his recommendations were Glyphs of Warding and Arcane Locks. However, these spells are pricey to cast as they have costly material components and purchasing them from other wizards was likely going to be even more expensive since casters often sold such services. Not satisfied, the party asked for something grander and he informed them of a spell called Guards and Wards, which would protect a huge chunk of the building but it is a sixth circle of magic spell, and out of the party's reach - and out of Rishaal's grasp as well. He was an accomplished wizard, but such esoteric magics were out of his reach. With that option out the window, the party decided to focus on Ray's peculiar eye issue, heading to the Steam and Steel, and he talked to Avi, a fellow water-borne gentleman. Curiously, Avi was proficient in the medical arts and offered to take a look at Ray. He concluded that the eye issue wasn't medical in nature and that, physically, he was just fine. When they were questioning what it could mean, Avi remarked that Sigurd's eyes were silver, befitting his silver dragonborn heritage. Sigurd made the comment that it is entirely possible Ray might bear a draconic bloodline as well, although a simple changing of eye color wasn't really enough to prove that much. It would be pretty cool, though! Soon, Embric showed up and asked how Enigma's warpick was working out. Just great! He even got to use it! Embric decided not to push the issue and joined the conversation; he bragged about his heritage from efreeti from the deserts of Calimshan, which he seemed particularly proud of. When Ray questioned why this was important, Avi sort of rolled his eyes a bit, likely having heard this story many times, and explained that efreeti were a kind of powerful genie from the elemental plane of Fire. Embric simply waved the pair off and went back to work. Sigurd mentioned that Ray's friend, Marcellus, also claimed draconic heritage, so he might possibly know if something like this was indeed what was happening. He also explained that bronze dragons are amphibious, and with Ray being an underwater-borne being, it made the situation much more likely. Ray wasn't sure what to make of this and decided to note to himself to pay a visit to the draconic-blooded sorcerer later... When the team returned to the tavern, they found Jalester Silvermane taking a report from the local City Watchman, who saluted him and walked off after finishing the report. He had heard about what had happened with the gazer and offered his condolences, and cursed the gang war for bringing things to such a state. He was in the area because he had heard the team was fixing up the tavern and wanted to see how it was progressing. Enigma took him aside and asked him about the the Gralhunds, and Jalester informed him that they're political firebrands, though he hasn't had any experience with them outside of Waterdeep personally. He says while he can't recommend the party take one action or another, he mentioned that they should do what's in the group's best interest. In addition, he thought it unlikely that the Gralhunds would take any direct action against the party if they refused the offer, because doing so would easily implicate them in potential crimes. However, badmouthing people subtly and behind closed doors wasn't exactly against the law, either. He had also mentioned that a while back, right after the Death Masks incident, Yalah Gralhund had apparently been trying to seize influence by ascending to the ranks of the Lords' Council, to fill in one of the many vacancies that had been left due to the incident. When she was passed over, she was obviously irked, but it was her husband, Orond, who became insanely angry and temperamental at this perceived slight. It looks like the party and the Gralhunds - whom the party is aware of due to Maxeene's surveillance previously - might end up coming to blows sooner rather than later... What other machinations did the Xanathar's Guild have in store? How will Sigurd deal with his latest 'fan'? What will Yuan do about the Gralhunds? Find out this and more next time, on Waterdeep: Dragon Heist!!