Meanwhile, Noph escaped from his dungeon cell. Khelben was disabled by powerful ancient magic while Piergeiron fought desperately without sight. After a spell-slinging battle in which Blackstaff look-alikes vaporized each other, the real Khelben uncovered the shapeshifters as doppelgangersīarely had Khelben restored peace and commanded the ceremony to resume, mysterious warriors materialized from the heightened flame of candles and descended into the crowd alongside a cloud of preternatural darkness. As Noph was thrown into the dungeons beneath the palace, Khelben uncovered yet more shapeshifters, who had replaced the bridesmaids. While the bolt only hit one of the wedding guests non-fatally, the automated contraption self-destructed, destroying all evidence at the scene and framing Noph as the assassin. Noph caught sight of a bolt aimed at Eidola from on high, but his efforts to disable the contraption that was rigged to fire automatically were only partially successful. However, despite the formidable assembly, its members were unable to prevent chaos from erupting in the ceremony. The team was comprised of the Blackstaff Khelben Arunsun, Madeiron Sunderstone, second-in-command of the city watch Captain Rulathorn, and Noph, who had proven his worth to stand alongside the others with the information that he'd bravely gathered. With circumstances becoming direr, Piergeiron assembled a small force of his most trusted confidants to aid in keeping watch in the upcoming wedding ceremony. Piergeiron broke his disguise to save Noph, managing to slay one of the conspirators while the others fled, and unmasked the dead man to reveal a prominent member of the Master Mariner's Guild. Piergeiron's attempt to draw out their plan was cut short when the conspirators presented Noph, whom they'd caught eavesdropping, and revealed that they planned to kill the young noble. "Eidola" wasn't Eidola after all, but one of the conspirators against the union, and they, in turn, mistook the disguised Piergeiron for one of their own. Finally, when she seemed to have found him, "Eidola" took the masked Piergeiron to a clandestine meeting with seven others. The Open Lord's anxiety reached fever-pitch during the masquerade ball, so utterly befuddling him that the entire scene seemed a nightmare, and he could no longer identify his bride. Only Noph witnessed the shapeshifters take on their true forms to dispose of their kin by eating it in entirety.Īs the celebration progressed, Piergeiron's misgivings mounted. He tasked his bodyguard, Madeiron Sunderstone to guard the shapeshifter's corpse, but Madeiron was deceived by two more shapeshifters who had taken on the guise of palace guards, to leave the scene. Piergeiron made quick work of the creature and guessed it to be a Malaugrym. Hardly before the festivities had begun, the bride was set upon by a mysterious shapeshifter, who had taken on the guise of one of her maids. While greedy nobles and crooked guild representatives conspired, young Kastonoph "Noph" Nesher, son of Laskar Nesher, an unscrupulous capitalist, sought excitement and truths amidst the dangerous environment that the plotting of his elders created. Nonetheless, many took interest in the union, both good and bad, for it would finalize the proposal for a new trade route to Kara-Tur. Few knew much of Eidola, including seemingly Piergeiron himself, whose greatest attraction to his bride appeared to be based on his lingering attachment to his previous and now lost love, Shaleen. Nobles and other persons of consequence gathered in the Palace of Waterdeep to celebrate the wedding of Piergeiron Paladinson, the Open Lord of Waterdeep, and Eidola of Neverwinter, of the Boareskyr clan.
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