The black-robed bailiff closes the iron tablet and leads the the gargoyle vampire from the court. The red lattice holds as they pass beyond the castle gate under Leebes’s authority.
The Gargoyle Vampire
My custody is recorded. I will not resist the Queen’s keeping, provided the castle and its people remain outside my reach.
The court clears, leaving the Devil free to depart. Before he reaches the outer road, a thread of blue-white magic gathers in the air and carries Elaris’s voice across the coast.
Elaris
The riders’ territory is being cursed from deep below. We sense an old hermit hag beneath the mountains, frog-like and hidden in caves.
The Devil follows the summons to the fortified coastal mountain base. Elaris waits beside a broad-shouldered senior rider, a middle-aged woman in slate armor and a weathered blue cloak.
The Senior Rider
The ground cracks without collapsing, and the wells taste bitter. The curse rises from below our foundations, but no passage has opened.
Elaris
Her presence feels old, solitary, and deliberate. She is a witch, a hermit hag shaped like a giant frog, concealed somewhere beneath these caves.
✓ Quest Accepted
Find the hermit hag
✓ Quest Accepted
Protect the dragonriders’ territory from the underground curse