Three days after Session 2

Varatas lay in the uncomfortable bedding of his private quarters at Fiona’s lodge. Ugh, I don’t get how people sleep on these things. A combination of sheer exhaustion plus his mind racing from what he witnessed the past weeks left him unable to meditate, forcing him to sleep as humans do. Mostly his thoughts were a clumsy mess of magic implications. The weight of knowing there was someone else looking into his family’s past was still weighing on him as well.

Varatas had not left his room for the last few days, only exiting to relieve himself and for the occasional meal. Moonsea cults, undead, dragons, magic, and other possibilities as endless as the Weave raced through his mind.

Sitting up Varatas looked across the room at the writing table, 2 innocent looking chunks of jade lying upon it next to a wand of magic detection. Both were from that accursed Dagon shrine. Now standing over the table his thoughts turned to more practical matters. The chunks of jade had faint traces of residual magic left on them. This observation was based on the assumption¹⁾ Varatas properly knew how to use the Wand of Magic Detection next to the jade, which he only attuned to a few days earlier. Of course, mastering a simple wand like this was no challenge for a sorcerer of his skill…

Varatas picked up a rough sketch he had made based on an item he saw back in Silverymoon. A surprisingly gifted wizard had on her person a set of four amulets made out of blood red rubies that she used to amplify not only her magical power but increase her magical reserves. She claimed each talisman contained a small piece of a demon lord. Such a claim was likely nothing more than a boast.

While he didn’t get the chance to study them closely Varatas presumed the talismans worked by storing a small amount of magic in the gem and focusing a spell’s energy through it briefly, amplifying the spell like a voice through a horn. Likely a set would be able to give a modest increase in magical output. That presumed enough of the magic was left in the jade to perform such a task.

Creating the amplifiers would require skills he admittedly lacked. But Lothar once boasted during a drunken rant how he was a jewel crafter…perhaps he could help. Quickly dressing Varatas left his room, the light of the morning disturbing his eyes. He walked past Logan’s room, not bothering to knock because at best Logan was hungover in his room, at worst still out on some coked out misadventure that would end up annoying Lothar and himself to no ends.

Varatas knocked on Lothar's door, hoping the dwarf wasnt hungover or already off for his tedious mediations and prayers. “Lothar, you in there?”

Lothar's Response

Lothar groggily stumbles out of bed upon hearing the knocking. “Damn elves keep all sorts of unseemly hours” he mumbles seeing that it is shortly passed dawn from the light coming in through the shutters.

“What do you want elf?” Lothar belts as he opens the door. He sees the jade stones in Varatas' hands and motions him to come in. “Aye, wondered when you'd come to me about that” as he points to the stones. “Set them on the table and have a seat.”

Varatas notices that Lothar's jewelcrafting kit is already spread out and he appears to have made a few small test cuts to his stones as he places his stones on the table.

“So, what can I get for ye” Lothar asks?

Making an assumption that the room has a couple of chairs, table, and bed similar to a modern day hotel room²⁾

Varatas

Varatas released a small smirk, apparently the dwarf was smarter than he looked at times. “I see I was expected,” Varatas walked towards the table, pulling out the roll of paper containing his rough stech of his talismans. He laid it out on the table as he continued to speak, “I know from analyzing the jade that it still contains a level of magic. Now, I think we can use a few pieces to create a pair or two of talismans to act as a amplifiers for our magic.” He paused for a second turning to his dwarven companion, “Now as Artificing was never my strong suit, I need some help creating and setting the gems to act as the amplifiers.”

He casually leaned back on the table, “ of course, the magic from these could be from the spells I was weaving at the time, or the magic you used to break the idol, or they could be from Dagon himself. The former, and likely the jade would fade sooner than later, the latter two would mean we would be tapping into a portion of an infinite being’s magical reserves.”

This time his smirk was nearly a grin, “Still game even though it could easily blow us both up?”

Lothar

Lothar spends a few minutes looking over the designs Varatas brought to him. “Yes, I can do this. Though it will take some time. At least a week, 2 if you want them perfect, and knowing you, I have a feeling you want the best quality possible. I don't see a particular cut in your designs, so I assume that I can be creative” he asks with a twinkle in his eye?

Lothar looks up from the designs to address Varatas directly. “I also have a theory about these stones, similar to yours. If the gems do still possess the power of Helm in some way, do you think attaching them to my holy symbol would further amplify that power? I'm thinking of replacing the emerald in the eye, and adding the second piece to the base of the hammer”.(See Holy symbol description on character page) “What are you're thoughts?”