Two things of note for this trip. We found a wondrous sanctuary in the middle of a terrible city tainted with undeath, and we came closer than we ever have to losing a party member.

The garden was petty nice. The water indeed was healthful, increasing the vitality of all of us, and healing all of our wounds. But more to the point, it's inhabited by a Belar, doomed to watch over the damned city forever.

She was kind of ornery, too. Didn't want to talk to us. But eventually she came around, and we learned that she was in our last dream! Something very odd is going on here.

We learned a little about the history of the city. The internal strife came about because some in the city feared an external threat (the lizardmen?), and created evil artifact weapons that sucked the life out of people. The clerics and paladins objected, and fighting ensued. Somehow, the whole place became tainted with the undeath of the weapons, and the leader of the mages became a lich.

At this point Kamila (the belar in the fountain) stepped in, and sacrificed herself to put a shield over the city to contain the evil. I can't imagine spending millenia in one place, always on guard, never relieved.

I take away two things: first, actions even by humans can have enormous consequences. Second, good intentions can be perverted into evil. Neither of these is a surprise, but the visceral impact was tremendous.

And on the way there, we almost lost Errol. The problem was that we were'nt thinking strategically at all in the fight. Every move was what seemed to be the best way to do damage right then, and we didn't plan for problems. We need to be better about that.