We begin as the party prepares to descend into the sewers. They spend a solid chunk of brain power trying to figure out if there was a way to magically keep the sewer filth away. They end mostly just changing clothes (or taking most of them off in Mohr and Tal's case).
Reading the thieves' cant scrawled on the sewer walls, Verity shares that there will be a heist happening tomorrow during the masquerade. He is unclear whether it's happening
at the masquerade or simply
during the masquerade. Jack insists their plate is too full to worry about this heist.
To their disappointment, after hours of wandering through the sewers, all they discover is a little hidden room that doesn't seem particularly connected to any of their issues. They take a bunch of stuff from the hidey hole, including a nice cloak and some jewelry. The group decides they won't find what they're looking for without knowing where to look. Zenith, Tal, and Verity split off to go do their own heist at Mildred's Menagerie, while the rest of the group goes to post up at the Clavells' place to keep watch on Clara.
Tal insists on a quick sea break to wash off the sewer vibes.
Zenith, Tal, Verity go invisible, Zenith keeps watch, and Tal goes in with Verity. Tal disarms Alarm spell, going visible. Go through to back room. Tal lights invisibility lamp and sees invisible illustrations and text on a few boxes. Turning off the lamp, Verity moves some boxes out of the way and opens the false panel that was spotted before. It folds out into a desk, showing a recess with a little lantern, a very nice quill and some ink, a small locked chest, a locked journal, and stacks upon stacks of additional ledgers going further back into the wall. Unlock chest and journal. Chest contains vial of shimmery golden liquid, several stacks of platinum, and an intricate obsidian ring. Journal contains pages and pages of completely nonsensical text with illustrations in the margins corresponding to the invisible illustrations. They take the contents of the chest and the journal. They do their best to put everything back as it was. Zenith warns them on their way out that Mildred is on his way back, laughing with a dragonborn companion. Tal uses Dimension Door to get them out.
The three eventually join up with the group back at the Clavells' house. Talasea sets about decoding the journal while the rest of the party takes watch in shifts, more stealthily this time. Around 4 am, they notice that a note has appeared on the Clavells' door: "Thank you for the evening's company."
Glancing in on Clara, she is alive, asleep, and well.
Tal spends the night decoding the journal (gaining a point of exhaustion which he'll totally just sleep off in the morning) and uncovers Mildred's account of the last twenty years of his time as a Seamstress. He writes of his growing jadedness towards criminals at first, saying that the brotherhood of criminals is a fairytale and that each will do what benefits them in time. Then his writing veers towards jadedness towards Joyce in particular as he recounts her vicious acts as Chief Seamstress as well as the complicity of the rest of the Seamstresses. Eventually, Mildred writes of his decision to depose Joyce and his collaboration with the Raywalkers to make it happen.
The party is left conflicted between Joyce's savage methods, Mildred's deliberate suggestion of targeting the children of the council members, and the Raywalkers moving into town. They float the idea of blackmailing Joyce, blackmailing Mildred to get to the Red Hand, telling the Queen the situation and getting her to take care of it. They start discussing the Springish justice system - they will in extreme cases execute people, they have investigation clerics who require a certain amount of "mundane evidence" before they will cast Zone of Truth, and a person may decline to answer questions under Zone of Truth but it will be counted as evidence against them.
We leave off with this most serious dilemma unresolved...
