Of Wisdom's Light
Eighteenth Day of the First Month 293 AC
It is no easy thing for a dragon to surrender gold, but then for all that you have worn a dragon's skin and wielded its power you are not yet a dragon in truth, but a mortal man, and you would not fight these wretched ones, not for gold and baubles, not when there is a better way. Some day Sallosh by the Silver Shore may be more than scattered stones among the long grasses, perhaps with a measure of the lore and the beauty of the City of Scholars returned from dead lips to the ears of their long sundered kin. What is mere gold besides that, the hope of light of life and thought rekindled in dark and forgotten places?
"I accept," you say simply. "I would ask only that you tell me if there is aught else the servants of Tiamat forgot in these lands that I might make en end of it."
"Only that which you carry with you..." comes the almost pained answer beneath the dead voice. "Take the defilers far and wide where we can not reach them."
"You bear them no ill will?" you ask, startled. Perhaps Lya's curiosity is catching after all.
"Hate is the death of reason. It is the fire that devoured the great libraries. It is the mindless savagery of the Horselords and the spiteful denial of those who should have come to out aid but did not. Though it sustains us, it burns all that it is not. Hate makes of us hollow things, unworthy to even linger amidst wreck and ruin," the words come haltingly, as if from some deep well of thought rarely plumbed. "Enough blood has been spilled here. Let us be remembered for better things than deathly horrors."
In the blink of an eye the shadows lengthen and twist and the tattered figure stands not two steps before you, the smell of stale air and bitter mildew almost overwhelming. Then to your surprise it takes off the heavy golden chain about its shoulders and hands it to you. "Let this gift willingly offered be the seal of our pact, the last of old Sallosh, perhaps the first of the new should hope blossom even here."
Lost 3780 Gold
Gained Greater Star of Wisdom
As the figure fades from view a faint silver light suffuses the crates and chests the sellswords were bearing, making them suddenly lighter. None of them dare say a word.
"I'm glad that ended... like that," Waymar says with a wide smile. Not for a moment would you suspect him of fearing the restless dead, but your friend is nothing if not honorable.
Malarys for his part shakes his head in surprise. "Only in Sallosh would the Lingering Dead resort to philosophy. Strange is this city's spirit in death as in life." Though he would never fully say it, you suspect he too approves, if from much different reasons.
***
You suspect that had they had anything besides a haunted city at their backs the sellswords might have balked or at least hesitated in allowing themselves to fall through the tower's shadow. As is they content themselves with suspicious looks and the odd muttering. Thus you pass back into your realms, surrounded by enemies made subjects, content in your deeds.
What do you do next?
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OOC: I made a conscious effort to make Viserys' reasoning for agreeing more lawful than good, given his alignment and most of the arguments used. I hope this worked.
