The Watch on Candle Lane — guard confrontation
They were barely out the warehouse door when Captain Hyustus Staget came around the corner — broad-shouldered, green-and-gold tabard over chainmail, a dozen veterans at his back. The kind of arrival that meant someone had reported a disturbance and the Watch had decided to do something about it.
"Hold there. Captain Hyustus Staget, City Watch. You mind telling me what business you have coming out of that warehouse?"
Caelith Morn stepped forward. He had been a soldier. He knew what Watch captains wanted and how to give it to them, and he gave it plainly: that the party had come here the previous night to find a missing man named Floon Blagmaar, that they had found him here alongside Renaer Neverember, that they had freed both men, and that they had returned this morning to understand what they had walked into. In the basement, he told Staget, there were two bodies. There were stolen paintings. There was evidence of serious criminal activity. All of it left in place.
Staget listened without interrupting. Something in his shoulders eased.
"Renaer Neverember."
He said the name the way a man confirms something he already suspected.
"We had a report of a disturbance here last night. Didn't know it was him."
He waved two veterans toward the building and pulled out a ledger.
"I'll need your names for the report."
"Caelith Morn."
"Jack Blue."
"Fienderck."
Staget wrote them down without looking up — and if the halfling's name or the halfling's manner gave him pause, he didn't show it. He tore a small paper from his ledger and held it out.
"If you find anything else connected to this safehouse, bring it to the Dock Ward watch post on Pressur Street. Ask for me."
Caelith stopped him before he could turn away. There was one more thing: in the basement, they had found a paper bird — a sending, addressed to someone named Urstul Floxin. The same name had appeared on a note found on one of the bodies.
Staget stopped. He turned back slowly, and the easy cooperative manner became something more careful.
"Urstul Floxin."
Full name. Said like he knew it.
"Where exactly did you find that note?"
He waited for Caelith to answer, then:
"Floxin is a known Zhentarim enforcer. Senior. If his name is on a note in that basement, this just became a different kind of investigation."
A pause.
"The sending bird. You said you found it. Where is it now?"
"I have it on me."
Staget held out his hand. Caelith handed it over without hesitation.
"Smart. And honest. I appreciate that."
He added a note to the ledger.
"You've been cooperative. If Floxin's name comes up again in connection with whatever you're investigating, come to me before you do anything with it. Understood?"
He looked at each of them in turn, landing last on Caelith.
"Waterdeep has enough people playing hero without telling the Watch. Don't be one of them."
He turned toward the building. He almost got through the door.
Caelith called after him with one more question: the names Kolat Towers and Manshoon — found in coded papers in the basement. Did either of those mean anything?
Staget stepped back toward them and lowered his voice.
"Where did you get those names?"
He didn't wait for the full answer.
"Kolat Towers is a derelict wizard's tower complex in the South Ward. Nobody's supposed to be in there. If the Zhentarim are using it—"
He stopped himself.
"That's Watch business. Not yours."
A beat.
"Manshoon is a name we don't say loudly in the Dock Ward. Leave it at that."
He straightened up, held Caelith's eye for a moment, and headed inside. The twelve veterans filed in after him.
While Caelith and Lylnyler made their way north toward Trollskull Alley, Corrin told them he had some personal business to attend to and would catch up later. It was a vague excuse, delivered with the particular smoothness of a man who had been giving vague excuses for sixty years and had nothing to prove about it.
Jack Blue's Business — the transaction
The Dock Ward's grey market was not difficult to find if you knew what you were looking for, and Corrin knew exactly what he was looking for. He worked his way through the waterfront streets until he found it: a cluttered curiosity shop wedged between a sailmaker and a cooper, the kind of place that bought things without asking where they came from. The proprietor, a wiry older man with appraising eyes, looked at the fifteen silver bars Corrin laid on the counter and made a face.
"Traceable. I'll give you half value — twenty-five gold per bar. Take it or find someone else."
"You can always re-melt them to get rid of the stamp. How about thirty-two gold, five silver for each?"
The proprietor gave him a flat look.
"I know I can re-melt them, son. That's why I offered half. The work still costs me."
Corrin took the deal.
The proprietor swept the bars off the counter without ceremony. Corrin walked out considerably wealthier than he had arrived — and when he caught up with Caelith and Lylnyler, he explained that he had been selling a dagger for roughly ten gold.
"You should've gotten more for it."
Corrin, who had just pocketed three hundred and seventy-five gold from a fence, nodded solemnly and agreed that was probably true.
North Ward mornings had a different pace than the Dock Ward — less urgency, more settled commerce. Trollskull Alley was a quiet cut of cobblestone with a handful of working shops along its length and Trollskull Manor at the end of it, still shuttered, still waiting. Caelith and Lylnyler had arrived first, and they went neighbor to neighbor the way you do when you've just signed a deed and want people to know it.
Trollskull Alley in Daylight — the neighbors
Outside the steam baths, a woman with blue-tinted skin and hair that moved with a faint current was sweeping her step. Her name was Avi — a water genasi, calm and warm in the way of someone who had been here a long time and had no reason to be otherwise.
"Hello, good morning! I'm Caelith Morn, and this is my savior Lylnyler. Together with a third companion, we've acquired the deed to Trollskull Manor. We're going to have it renovated starting this week and wanted to make our acquaintance."
"About time someone did something with that place."
She stuck out a calloused hand.
"Avi. My husband Embric and I run the steam baths and forge two doors down. We've been watching that manor rot for years."
She glanced at the building, then back at them.
"Lif was a good neighbor. Quiet, kept his step clean, decent ale. Whatever's in there now—"
She lowered her voice.
"—knocked a city inspector clean out the door a few years back. You've met it?"
Caelith explained that they had entered the manor already, that the exchange had been friendly, and that they'd promised to clean and reopen the place. He asked if she had encountered it herself.
"Friendly exchange. That's more than most got. The inspector who came round didn't look friendly when he left."
A pause.
"I've not met it directly. But I've heard it — banging, mostly, late at night. And once, about two years ago, I saw every shutter on the ground floor swing open at once on a still day. No wind."
She looked at the manor with something more like fondness than unease.
"Lif was good people. If it's him in there — I'm glad he's got someone looking after the place again."
She glanced at Lylnyler, who had been largely quiet throughout.
"I'm kind of an introvert."
"Fair enough. My husband's the same — you'll get more words out of his forge than out of him before noon."
"If you need anything during the renovation — hot water, somewhere to clean up — the bath house is open. First visit is on us. Neighbor's discount."
Down the alley, Tally Fellbranch ran a repair shop out of a bright-lit front room, half-obscured by shelves of odds and ends. She was a middle-aged halfling woman with sharp eyes and ink-stained fingers, and she looked up when they came in with the expression of someone receiving genuinely interesting news.
"Don't get many paladins in here. Looking for something, or just browsing?"
"Actually, I would say hello, neighbour!"
He gave her the same introduction.
"Trollskull Manor. Finally."
She leaned forward and extended her hand.
"Tally Fellbranch. I run repairs and odd jobs out of here — woodwork, mostly, but I turn my hand to most things. I've been watching that place since before Lif disappeared. Used to send work his way, he'd send customers mine. Good arrangement."
A beat.
"You're renovating the whole thing?"
She pulled a small card from under the counter and slid it across.
"Carpenters' Guild will handle the big structural work, but for the fittings, the bar furniture, the interior finishing — come to me. I'm cheaper and I know the building already."
Caelith thanked her for the offer. Tally picked her quill back up — conversation over, back to business.
By the time they reached the forge at the far end, Corrin had caught up. The coal smoke was already going, and a stocky dwarf man with a short grey beard looked up at them from behind his hammer — Embric, Avi's husband, exactly as economical with his words as she had suggested.
"Good morning! I'm Caelith Morn — I believe we've just had the pleasure of meeting your wife."
"Avi mentioned you."
He set his hammer down and wiped his hands on his apron.
"Good. That place has been an eyesore long enough."
He looked Caelith's armor over with a professional eye.
"Smith work, if you need it. Repairs, modifications, custom fittings. I don't do weapons — that's not my trade — but armor and ironwork, I'm your man."
"Good to know! I'm certain I'll be back here for some armor work."
Embric nodded once — deal noted, conversation complete — and picked his hammer back up.
The manor was unchanged from the morning before — shutters open, the same grey light through the same grimy windows. Caelith called out to Lif as they let themselves in, explaining that they were going to look around the whole building, that they weren't here to disturb anything, just to understand what they had.
From behind the bar came a single slow knock. One deliberate rap on the wood, like a barkeep calling last orders. Permission granted.
They went through it room by room: the cellar first, dry stone walls and old barrels long since empty, iron hooks and a bottle rack still sound enough to use. Four guest rooms on the second floor, bed frames and washstands and solid floors under the dust. Two rooms habitable as they stood; two that needed new flooring. Corrin immediately claimed the best room on the third floor, which had its own small suite and a view over the alley, and Caelith took the second floor.
"Lif — the three of us are going to be staying here while the renovations are underway. We'll use the second and third floor rooms. Hope that's alright."
From downstairs, faint and deliberate: the sound of three cups being set out on the bar.
Lif's Three Cups — turret view
They went all the way to the top — garret rooms with sloped ceilings, broken roof tiles letting in the cold, a narrow hatch up to the turret peak with a view over the whole North Ward. Nothing of value up there. Just the city, grey and wide, going about its business without them.
They ate from their rations and bedded down. It was the first night at Trollskull Manor.
Morning brought Gwynda Hammerstone, her two guild workers, and their toolboxes. She arrived brisk and professional, barely inside the door before Corrin mentioned that Tally Fellbranch said hello.
Gwynda paused mid-stride. She turned back with a look working very hard to be neutral.
"Tally. Of course she did."
She waved a worker toward the stairs.
"Structure and building envelope only — noted. Saves us an hour."
She glanced at Corrin.
"Tell Tally she still owes me for that job on Salabar Street."
She headed outside to assess the exterior and roof.
Twenty minutes later, a second knock: Renaer Neverember, with a leather satchel that clinked with satisfying weight. He had the easy confidence of someone who had grown up moving through rooms like this and had made his peace with the state of them. He looked at the common room, took in the shutters, the bar, the three cups lined up in a row.
"So this is it."
He set the satchel on the bar.
"I can see why it needs work."
He looked at the cups again.
"Is that...?"
"That's Lif indeed."
Caelith introduced Renaer formally to Lif as the fourth owner of the place. Renaer addressed the room with the easy manner of a man who had grown up in Waterdeep.
"Lif. I'm Renaer Neverember. I'm told you ran a good tavern here. I'm looking forward to seeing it open again."
What Renaer Knew — the fourth cup
A pause. Then a fourth cup slid along the bar and stopped in front of him. Renaer picked it up, looked at it, and set it down with a small smile.
"Right then. You said you had things to tell me. Kolat Towers was one of them."
Caelith laid out everything: the return to the Candle Lane safehouse, the decoded papers, the two names that had made Staget step back and lower his voice. Renaer listened without interrupting.
"Staget took the bird. That's probably for the best — if Floxin traced it back to you, that would be a problem."
He leaned against the bar.
"Kolat Towers. Two derelict wizard's towers in the South Ward — officially abandoned for decades. The Zhentarim have been using them as a base of operations in Waterdeep for years. It's an open secret among anyone who pays attention to faction politics."
He paused on the next name.
"Manshoon."
Quietly. The same way Staget had said it.
"He's the reason the Zhentarim are here in force. A clone of the original Manshoon — a powerful wizard, very dangerous, very patient. He wants Waterdeep and he wants the vault gold to fund it."
Corrin asked about the Stone of Golorr, and about the Xanathar Guild sewer hideout.
"The Stone of Golorr is what everyone's actually fighting over. It's not just a stone — it's a transformed aboleth, an ancient creature forced into that form. It holds the location of my father's vault and the three keys needed to open it. Whoever has the Stone can find the gold."
He paused.
"Last I heard, the Xanathar Guild had it — or were close to getting it. Which is why they hit the Candle Lane safehouse. They weren't after Floon or me specifically — they were looking for anything that pointed to the Stone."
On the sewers:
"The Xanathar Guild operates out of a hideout beneath the city — somewhere under the Dock Ward, near the harbor. I don't have an exact location. But I know who might — Yagra Stonefist. She knows the Dock Ward better than most."
He opened the satchel and counted out the gold in neat stacks — a thousand pieces.
"For Gwynda. Don't let her talk you into anything that isn't structural."
He picked up his fourth cup, looked at it one more time, and set it back carefully on the bar.
"I'll be back this evening. If you need me before then, leave word at the Yawning Portal."
He headed out.
The others had gone ahead. Caelith stayed behind.
Lif's Keeping — the strongbox entrusted
He set the strongbox on the bar — a plain wooden box with iron fittings, nothing special about it except what was inside. He put both hands on the bar on either side of it and looked out at the empty taproom. Dusty tables. Cobwebs in the rafters. The hearth cold and dark, afternoon light coming through the warped shutters in pale streaks across the stone floor.
"Lif. This is a thousand gold. It's for the renovation — for fixing up your tavern. We need to leave it here safely while we take care of some business. Guard it well."
He waited.
A pause — the particular silence of a room that is not quite empty. Then one of the cups on the bar slid forward, slow and deliberate, and stopped squarely in front of the strongbox.
Like a hand placed over it.
Caelith stood there a moment longer, then straightened and left.
Urstul Floxin's Good Name — Yagra at the Muleskull
The Muleskull Tavern was a Dock Ward establishment — rougher than the Yawning Portal, smelling of salt and cheap ale, the kind of place that had a history and was comfortable with it. Yagra Stonefist was at the bar exactly where she had said she would be. She raised her mug slightly when they came in.
"Didn't expect to see you this soon."
"We need your help."
"That's what the favour's for."
She waited.
Corrin explained what they needed: the Xanathar Guild sewer hideout. A way in.
Something shifted behind Yagra's eyes. She took a long drink and set her mug down.
"The Xanathar Guild. You're not thinking small, are you."
She told them what she knew: a sewer entrance the Guild used, in the Dock Ward near the harbor. Selnorm's Alley, behind the fishmongers. A grate with two crossed scratches cut into the left post — how their runners found it in the dark. She also mentioned a backup, an unwatched maintenance hatch on Fillet Lane with an iron ring handle at street level, unused by the Guild.
"I can tell you where the entrance is. I'm not going in with you. That's not what I owe you."
A pause.
"You go in there, you're going into Xanathar's territory. His people, his traps, his rules. Whatever you're looking for, it's in there."
They thanked her for it. Before they left, Caelith bought a round — four beers, one for each of them. He paid.
The party made their way to Selnorm's Alley in the dark.
It was a narrow cut between two warehouse walls, half in shadow. The iron grates ran along the left side, and the third post in had two crossed scratches cut into the iron — faint, deliberate, exactly where Yagra had said. Corrin, Caelith, and Lylnyler scanned the alley. Two potential hides: a broken crate against the far wall with a good sightline to the grate, and a first-floor warehouse window open just a crack, covering the same angle.
Lylnyler went still. He said, quietly, that he had a feeling — that something might go wrong soon. He didn't explain the feeling. He didn't need to.
Corrin looked at the crate for a moment, then called toward it.
"Hey, you behind the crate — I have a question!"
The alley was silent for a moment. Then the crate shifted. A figure stood up slowly: a teenage boy, maybe fifteen years old, with a Xanathar Guild tattoo on his wrist. He looked caught and calculating in the same breath. Corrin signaled him over, and the boy glanced instinctively upward — at the warehouse window — before stepping out from behind the crate.
"When is your window buddy coming down to join?"
Something close to a smile crossed the boy's face. He turned his head and gave a short, sharp whistle. A door opened somewhere in the warehouse and a woman appeared — late twenties, heavyset, a short club at her belt and a Guild tattoo on her wrist.
"You're not Guild."
Not a question. She said it while she was still reading them.
Then Lylnyler stepped forward — unhurried, calm, with the particular quality of stillness that comes from a man who has spent fifty years learning what it costs to be the wrong kind of person in the wrong kind of company.
"We were sent by Urstul Floxin. He wants a progress report on finding the stone."
The woman's posture shifted. The name Urstul Floxin carried weight in this part of the city — weight enough that her skepticism gave way to something more careful.
"Progress report."
She was deciding how much to give up.
"Stone's not here. Guild's been tracking a lead through the sewers — something moved through three nights ago, heading toward the Austabar cistern. Xanathar's got people down there now."
She crossed her arms.
"Floxin want that in writing, or are you carrying it back yourself?"
"We'll need a written report."
She stared at him for a moment, then jerked her head at the boy. He disappeared and came back with a folded paper. She scrawled four lines, folded it, and held it out.
"Austabar cistern. Three nights ago. Six operatives, one kenku handler. No Stone yet."
She didn't let go immediately.
"Tell Floxin his watchers here are doing their job. We've had no interference."
She released it.
The party thanked her and left the alley. They were carrying a Xanathar Guild intelligence report, extracted using a Zhentarim enemy's name, and no one had raised a weapon.
They brought it back to Yagra at the Muleskull.
Corrin and Lylnyler explained the alley encounter — the boy behind the crate, the woman in the window, the Guild tattoos, the bluff with Floxin's name, the report they had walked out with. Austabar cistern. Three nights ago. Six operatives, one kenku handler. No Stone yet.
Yagra listened all the way through. When they got to the Floxin bluff, something shifted in her expression.
"Urstul Floxin is Zhentarim. Those watchers knew that."
She looked at Lylnyler.
"They gave you what you asked for because they wanted you to have it. That report points you toward the Austabar cistern — right where the Guild has six operatives and a kenku handler."
A pause.
"You didn't bluff them. They played you. Someone up that chain made a decision in about thirty seconds — easier to send three strangers into the cistern than deal with them in the alley. If you go in through Selnorm's Alley, they'll know you're coming."
She picked up her drink.
"And whoever that woman reports to now knows there are people asking questions using Zhentarim names in the Dock Ward. That'll get back to Floxin eventually. Maybe fast, maybe slow — but it will."
She looked at all three of them.
"What do you actually want with whatever's in those sewers?"
"We're looking for the Stone of Golorr."
Yagra went still. Then she exhaled slowly.
"Of course you are."
She looked around the tavern out of habit, then leaned forward.
"The Stone of Golorr is not a thing you stumble into and walk away with. Half the Guild is looking for it. The Zhentarim want it. And Xanathar — Xanathar really wants it. That's why there's a kenku handler in the sewers. That's not a search party. That's a retrieval operation."
She sat back.
"Use Fillet Lane. The maintenance hatch I told you about — the Guild watchers don't know it. If the Selnorm's Alley watchers reported you, they don't know about Fillet Lane. That's your way in. And whatever you find in there — don't bring it back to this tavern."
They walked back through the Dock Ward with a better route, a worse situation, and a clear picture of what they were walking into.