Valdris Jasildane

Who he is (one-glance)

• Name/Style: “The Ruby Mortarch,” last high priest of the temple’s funerary order of Wee Jas (Law, Magic, Death).
• Old role: Magistrate of rites over stone, craft, and guardianship cults housed here (Jascar & Fortubo chapels stood under Wee Jas’s funerary authority).
• Present state: An intellect‐intact undead hierophant bound to the temple’s law-wards, re-consecrating the complex by pressing the dead into service and punishing desecrators.

Appearance & voice

A tall Suel priest in lacquered funerary black with thin ruby fillets, face preserved to waxen perfection; rubies burn at the brow and sternum. His voice is measured—six beats to a sentence—and slips easily into Old Suloise legalisms.

Sigil: Ruby skull circled by a glyph-star, painted with a calligrapher’s brush on doors he claims. (Wee Jas’s iconography.)

Ancient history (in brief)

• The temple began as a Suel pantheon house: Wee Jas oversaw spells and the dead; Jascar patroned guardianship of the halls; Fortubo sanctioned craft, stone, and metals.
• In the late days of the old Suel diaspora, the Mortarch codified funerary regulation here—“Ruby Law”—and mediated disputes between stone-orders (Jascar) and the craft-orders (Fortubo). (Jascar is mountains/guardianship; Fortubo is stone/metals/craft.)
• His congregation dwindled after the cataclysms; the complex was sealed under measure wards keyed to Lendor’s cadence—the Suel habit of doing sacred acts on a six-count.

How he woke

Centuries later, Howling Moon orcs battered the upper halls and desecrated seals; their Pyremian rites scorched the chapel and fed bodies to the pits. (You’ve already shown this in Level-1.) The repeated breaches of funerary law tripped the Ruby Witness—a deep ward that reanimates the chief magistrate if the temple’s dead are abused under hostile fire (a pointed reaction to Pyremius, assassin-fire of the Suel).

He rose—not as a mindless revenant—but as a law-bound undead with his memories and docket intact, and began mustering: ordaining Ruby Custodians (wights), setting ghoul attendants, and conscripting zombies from fresh orc dead.

Goals (what he wants now)

Short term (the level):

1. Reassert funerary order: restore sealed lanes, silence pits, and return stolen relics to the Ruby Stacks.
2. Expel or leash the orcs: their bodies are fuel; their shaman of Pyremius is to be judged and immolated. (Pyremius is destructive flame and murder among the Suel; heresy to the Ruby order.)
3. Bring the Wing of Stone to heel: use Jascar/Fortubo logic—weight, brace, alignment—to secure a mustering ground. (Jascar: guardianship of hills/mountains; Fortubo: stone/metals/craft.)

Mid term (the complex):

• Reconsecrate the main temple under Wee Jas and re-open processional rites.
• Bind the Beltar breach: pits and spite-earth are antithetical to his order; Jascar counts Beltar among sworn enemies—he’ll seal or weaponize that hall.

Long term (ideological):

• Raise a Ruby polity—“Suloise ruled by law”—that can rival other cults in the region; align with deities of order/industry when useful (e.g., Bralm often sides with Wee Jas in lawful conflicts).

How he views the gods (quick DM grid)

• Wee Jas (patron): Absolute magistrate of magic & funerary law; her emblem seals judgments. He quotes her norms and expects compliance.
• Lendor: The cadence and ledger; he treats the six-count and records as sacred.
• Jascar: Proper guardian of halls and approaches—he borrows Jascar’s idiom (oaths, bracing, ward-studs) to keep lanes just.
• Fortubo: Legitimate craft authority; the Mortarch tolerates dwarves and craftsmen who respect the ledger; he cites Fortubo when ordering repairs.
• Bralm: Useful ally when labor must be organized; “the hive serves law.”
• Beltar: Spite-pits and monstrous births—enemy by statute; he wants the Pit quieted and sealed.
• Pyremius: Murderous flame and poison; a standing writ of condemnation (see Temple of Pyremius upstairs).

Relationships in the dungeon

• Howling Moon orcs (Urzhag Grey-Howl): Fodder and trespassers. He’d enslave their dead, frighten their living off, then use their pits as refuse chutes.
• Vhakra the Blood-Singer (Pyremius shaman): Prime heretic; the Mortarch would try to humble and sacrifice her to extinguish the Pyremian stain.
• Derro/under-things: He hates them—Fortubo stands against derro; he orders ghouls to trap and purge whenever they breach.

What he’s doing (clock & tactics)

• Quiet muster: Ruby ghouls drill in the Wing of Stone; zombies work sleds; a Custodian patrol inspects noise within a few beats (your Attention clock).
• Law first, then force: He parleys if a party keeps cadence, uses Old Suloise, or shows a Jascar/Wee Jas blessing from the Great Hall; once they lie, desecrate, or consort with Pyremius, he escalates to binding and conscription.
• Battle style: He avoids messy melee; prefers separation—closing screens, Stone-Bite lanes, and Strength-drain allies (via wraith lieutenants) before he steps in with cold, precise magic.

Boons, bargains, and banes

• Boon (lawful respect): Return a stolen ledger tablet or reconsecrate a seal → one Ruby token that grants advantage vs. Ruby undead for one scene (they read you “in good order”).
• Bargain (Fortubo/Jascar): If the party restores a brace or resets a counter-mass door, he marks them Stone-bonded (resist forced movement in L2-11).
• Bane (Pyremius/Beltar): Use fire on the dead or shove someone into the Pit → the Mortarch declares High Contempt; all Ruby undead gain advantage to resist Turn/Channel within the complex for the next hour.

Confronting Valdris Jasildane

The ruby vigil light gutters; frost creeps along the lintel as a tall, wax-pale priest in lacquered black gathers from the shadow—rubies burning at brow and sternum, robes edged in strict geometry. His voice lands like a judge’s gavel on a steady six-beat.

“Intruders in a consecrated house… hear the writ of Valdris Jasildane, Arch-Verger of the Ruby Law. By Wee Jas who owns the quiet, by Lendor’s Measure that counts your trespass, by Jascar’s Oath that braces these halls, and by Fortubo’s hammer that seals their stone, you stand arraigned. Speak your names and oaths or be entered as unclaimed remains. Lay down stolen relics; quench the assassin-fire of Pyremius you carry in your hearts; kneel, palms open, and the ledger may yet show mercy—measured passage, one corridor only, under my eye. Refuse, and I take you by statute: one—your tongues stilled; two—your limbs bound; three—your breath weighed; four—your warmth forfeit; five—your names struck; six—your bodies enrolled to lawful service, ruby-sealed and obedient. Look upon these halls and understand: the dead are my court, the chains my choir, and your lives a brief interruption. Choose now—obedience and tithe, or contempt and conscription—and let the Law witness.”

The air tightens; unseen chains give a slow metallic sigh. In the alcoves, something dry shifts, and the ruby sigils along the walls kindle—waiting for your answer.