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The city of Draslyis was bustling with activity as the group made their way through its crowded streets. Merchants of all kinds were peddling their wares to those on the streets while others conducted business within the shops and restaurants that lined them. It made it easy for them to blend into the crowd, but as they maneuvered their way into the heart of the city they also saw the town guards posted everywhere in order to make sure nothing got out of hand. While they weren't sure if the missive that King Pandez had sent made it this far yet they treated the situation like it had, which meant a lot of side streets and keeping their heads down.

Eventually they did reach an inn that was nice enough they didn't have to watch over their shoulders the entire time, yet out of the main streets to avoid being seen. "You know this would be a lot easier if we didn't have a seven foot tall necromancer ferret in our group," the barbarian fox stated as he sat down on one of the beds. "I swore we almost got lost more than once."

"Well now that we're here we have a chance to plan," Alkali stated.

"I don't know, not having a plan seems to be working for us so far," Draggor retorted while he sat down at the small table in the corner of the room with the map. "Unless you count the hoard of goblins that we had to cut through because we accidentally invaded their territory."

"Or the two griffins that tried to use Xander as a chewtoy," Serathin added.

The others laughed as Xander scowled slightly and crossed his arms. "Don't forget the howlers that infested that cave jumped into to get off the main road!" Zen continued on once they settled down. "My ears are still ringing!"

"Alright!" Alkali shouted, which caused the others to hush him and he lowered his voice. "So maybe running into the wilderness without a set plan wasn't the greatest idea I ever had, but it did get us to the city faster, even if that was because we were running for our lives. Now that we are here we have to get the king off our trail by any means necessary."

"Well I've been thinking about that actually," Draggor spoke up. "There are a few mages that washed out from the arcana university here that I know of, if I go and speak to them I think I can persuade them to help us out."

"That's what I'm talking about!" Alkali said loudly, once more prompting the others to shush him. "Anyone else?"

"I can go see if I can find some fellow criminals," Serathin stated. "City this big is bound to have at least one bandit gang, perhaps we can get them to cause trouble for our fine monarch. Nothing big, mostly distractionary since most would not want to get on the wrong side of the king for anything major."

"I suppose I could do something similar and find if there are any spies operating in this area," Xander chimed in. "Most are still going to be on the king's side, but if I can find anyone that I know might help, I'll tap them to spread a few rumors and other disinformation."

"Great, great," Alkali stated before he looked at Zen. "How about you?"

There was a moment of silence as the fox continued to drink from the glass of wine he had poured himself, staring off into space as he did until his head finally turned and looked at the ferret intensely while he set the glass down. "I'm a barbarian," he stated simply, "I go where I want."

"So we have our goals it seems," the ferret continued on unabated. "If anyone gets in trouble use our new... huscoon totem and at the very least inform the rest of us." As everyone started to get up and leave Alkali raised his voice once more, prompting another round of hushing before they looked at him expectantly. "Before you all go, I don't suppose one of you wants to drop by the tavern and get me a bottle of something?"

Everyone gave various degrees of snickers and eye rolls before they left, though in the end all four of them returned with a bottle of liquor that the blackguard was soon surrounded by. Once they had left again the grin on the ferret's face turned dower and, after making sure to refill the flasks he had on him, poured himself a single glass and dumped the rest of the contents out save for a small amount in each. He placed the mostly empty bottles back on the table and waited, sipping on his drink as he slowly watched the sun drop below the horizon. Even as day turned to night the streets remained busy, though not nearly as much as the daytime as Alkali idly watched the crowds while he waited.

Just as the moon was about to peek over the horizon and he had just finished his first glass a tiny red ball of light appeared a few feet away of him. As it grew in size Alkali quickly put a hand on his sword and readied himself to unleash any number of magics when the light morphed into a visage that caused him to relax somewhat. "The demonspawn wants to talk to you," one of the huscoons said as he stood there with his hands behind his back. "Says it's important."

"Must be if he wants me to go outside, even at night," Alkali commented as he stood up, only to have the ethereal creature wave his hands at him.

"You will not be traveling there physically," the huscoon stated. "Under strict orders by him you are to remain here, but through your totem we can transport you there through the astral plane for a short time."

"Well you guys just keep getting better and better," Alkali replied. "Thanks... uh... you."

"I'm Exile," Exile corrected with a slight sigh and held out his hand. "C'mon, we haven't got all day."

The ferret looked down at the semi-transparent hand before he shrugged and made the motion of grabbing it. As soon as he touched the red energy of the other creature it felt like he had just been suddenly pulled forward and the room around him went dark for a few seconds before he once more felt the sensation of movement. While he wasn't a stranger to such arcane techniques such as teleportation, dimensional shunting, and astral travel it was the first time he had done so without the preparation or use of magical energy. He could still see the glowing red totem figure in front of him as he felt the sensation of sudden movement once more until it once again stopped abruptly.

Even though it only lasted a few seconds Alkali found himself extremely disoriented when he found himself able to see again, only to find that the pale wooden walls of his room were replaced with shelves upon shelves of scrolls that occupied most of the room. The only other piece of furniture in the room was a desk and several chairs that surrounded it, one of them occupied by the red-scaled male that summoned him there in the first place. As the ferret was just about to call to him he noticed that the mage wasn't alone in the room, a black-furred wolf with red markings stood in one corner of the room as he looked over several scrolls.

"He can't hear you," Exile said as he appeared once more next to Alkali, which caused him to jump slightly at the sudden apparition. "Only those connected through the totem can see or hear you, so in this case Draggor. You also won't be able to interact physically with any of the objects here unless they also have a tether to something in the astral plane, which would be very unlikely."

Alkali nodded and decided to have a seat in one of the unoccupied chairs, though he couldn't feel the cushion underneath him as he did. While he still made the motions of trying to get comfortable Draggor had begun to lean in to whisper to him, but before he could get anything of substance out the wolf had already started to walk back towards him with a number of papers in his hands. "So this is your standard illusion magic right here," the canine mage explained. "Now as per your request these are modified with a scry component so that you can cause them to appear anywhere in the kingdom almost, no extra charge of course."

"You are a lifesaver, Poker," Draggor replied as he gathered up the scrolls.

"Anything I can do to help frustrate and humiliate Serina is my pleasure," Poker replied as he leaned back in the chair and began to shuffle a deck of cards. "Anything else you need?"

Draggor glanced over in Alkali's direction for a split second before he leaned forward and placed his hand on the desk. "I know you had mentioned before about a potential problem in your city," the demonspawn prompted. "Now that our immediate business has concluded I was wondering if you could go a little more in-depth into it? Any information we have to evade the king and his housepet magi would be of great value."

"Well you didn't hear this from me," Poker said as he leaned in. "But there's been whispers in the city that there's an infestation in the city right now. Now it's nothing more than rumor and speculation at this point, but from the sounds of it we've got werewolves."

"Werewolves?" Both Draggor and Alkali asked, though the wolf's muzzle turned towards the only voice he heard. "I would think a city this size could handle something as minor as a lycanthropy outbreak, even if they somehow missed several in their initial infection stages there's no way the guards would allow a threat to fester like that even if they are trying to handle it in a humane fashion."

"That's why most people think it just a rumor," Poker replied. "But between you and me... I think it's true. I've been seeing a lot of strange stuff going on and even more strangely enough it's been mostly positive, especially the decrease in crime. Not only that but those who were criminals at one point are now part of the city guard, and even those that had been soldiers for a while seem to have changed as well. Which can only mean one thing..."

"It's an alpha werewolf," another voice said at the exact same time Poker did, both of them turning their heads to see Xander appear along with a blue ball of light that turned into another huscoon. "Sorry I'm late Draggor, but I wanted to get somewhere private so I wasn't just sprawled out on a chair somewhere while my astral form traveled here."

Draggor was about to respond to the bard when out of the corner of his eye he saw that Poker had given him a slightly confused look. "Sorry, demon stuff," Draggor dismissed with a wave of his hand. "You know how it is."

"Sure..." Poker responded with a curious look. "Anyway, I think that our Lord knows about it but is working with the alpha werewolf, letting him handpick various citizens to join the pack in exchange for his aid in keep control in the city. Now if that and what you told me is true you better watch out, because if Lord Dryskale finds out about it they're going to make sure you never leave this city."

As Draggor and Poker continued to talk Alkali motioned for Xander to move away from the demon to not bother him as they conversed. The dragon quickly informed Alkali what he needed to know about alpha werewolves, how unlike their lesser brethren they were able to not only control their own instincts, but also those of anyone created by them. Unlike normal lycanthropy that caused a normal person to become a bloodthirsty beast by any number of triggers that killed and infected indiscriminately, the alpha strain would make that infected person become enthralled to them. The werewolf thralls could control their forms, and though it was still possible to provoke a change, they were completely devoted to their alpha and could even hear mental communications from it. That made a werewolf pack controlled by an alpha exceptionally dangerous, since it could do exactly what the canine mage feared and infiltrate a city.

Just as Alkali began to ask how they could potentially tell if someone was an alpha werewolf when it felt as though someone had grabbed him by the spine and pulled him backwards. The entire world stretched away from him into darkness and in the next second the chair he was under tipped backwards slightly before the ferret reached out and grabbed the table to steady himself. Exile appeared a second later in front of him once again and before the blackguard could yell at him, the huscoon informed him that he had ended the projection because someone approached the door. The ferret looked at the door before he turned back to Exile, only to find an empty space that the totem creature had once occupied.

After a few seconds of silence there was a knock at the door, and when Alkali asked who it was a voice answered that it was a member of the Draslyis guard that needed to speak with him. The ferret carefully took his sword and leaned it against the wall next to the window, then got up and carefully opened the door to peek outside. "I'm sorry to be a bother sir," the snow leopard dressed in a guard's uniform said as he stood there. "But there's been reports of some suspicious activity around the area and we're doing a full sweep of this and the surrounding buildings. Do you mind if I step inside for second to look around?"

"Of course not," Alkali replied as politely as he could as he opened the door enough to let the feline enter. He could feel himself on edge as the guard walked in and took a cursory look around the area while he moved over to the window. "I've not personally seen anything suspicious myself, but perhaps if you told me what you were looking for I could be of some help."

"Well the things is the information we have one what we're looking for is rather spotty," the guard replied, grinning slightly to Alkali at the pun before he moved over to the beds. "As much as I would like to divulge information to you that might help us apprehend them I'm afraid I can't do so, just that they're potentially smuggling in a dangerous artifact that they intend to sell here. Doesn't make our job very easy as I'm sure you could have guessed."

"I'm sure," Alkali replied as he turned to face the window, feeling slightly relieved though still on guard. "Haven't seen anything like that as of late, of course I do rather keep to myself. Could I offer you a drink, perhaps?"

The guard nodded and moved over to the table, picking up one of the liquor bottles and swirling the contents around. "I'd say you had enough for the both of us from the looks of it," he said as he set it back down and moved away. "I'm rather surprised you could even get up to answer the door. In any case I don't see any mystical or dangerous artifacts, so I'll let you get back to it." Alkali turned and gave the guard a brief nod as he walked over to the door, the snow leopard's hand on the doorknob before he stopped and paused. "You know... there might be one more thing that I would want to go over with you before I leave..."

Alkali watched from the reflection in the mirror he had palmed as behind him he could see the hand of the guard shake slightly while it gripped the knob, thick claws pushing out from the tips of his fingers that scratched against the metal. As the snow leopard turned towards the ferret his eyes went from a bright green to amber as his lengthening muzzle turned up into a sneer, revealing growing fangs as the leather of his boots began to groan from the feet expanding within. Having seen enough the blackguard grabbed his sword just as the transforming guard tried to pounce on him and whirled his entire body around. The sound of glasses shattering filled the air as his metal blade smashed against them, showering the feline in a rain of razor sharp shards that cut into him.

"How's that for a full sweep?" Alkali said triumphantly, only to have his gloating cut short as the wounds caused by the shrapnel quickly healed as the growing werewolf growled lowly at him. The leather armor the snow leopard had worn ripped and fell off the growing muscles of the already large creature as it quickly got back onto its feet, only to be rocketed backwards by a bolt of green energy that game out of Alkali's sword. Despite being one of his more powerful spells the necromancer could see the hold spell he placed on the creature quickly begin to deteriorate as the former feline was now almost bestial and canine, his rounded ears growing pointed and the thin, ropy tail behind him fluffed out and expanded as it snarled and snapped at him...

A few seconds later the window exploded outwards and Alkali flew out of the opening to the roof awning below, hitting the wood with a loud thud before he rolled off and hit the ground hard enough to knock the wind out of him. As he struggled to catch his breath he looked up to see the former guard, now completely transformed into a werewolf save for the coloration of his fur that remained its former pattern, peek out from above with a snarl on its face before it disappeared. Once he was fairly certain the creature wasn't going to jump out the window and chase him he got up and began to limp his way through the crowd of onlookers that stared at him in a mixture of surprise and confusion.

"Exile..." Alkali whispered as he tried to get as far from the inciting incident and its witnesses as possible, the huscoon once more appearing next to him. "Contact the others and tell them the hotel has been compromised and I'll tell them where to meet me next."

"I certainly can do that," Exile replied. "Once they're no longer being attacked, of course."

The ferret stopped dead in his tracks at the causal announcement, turning to face him despite doing so in public. "What's going on?" he asked angrily. "Who's being attacked?!"

"From the sounds of it from my brothers..." Exile replied, scratching his chin for a second as he appeared to be in deep thought before he looked back at the angry ferret. "Draggor has been ambushed on the way out of his friend's magic shop, Xander was attacked coming out of the building he holed up in to astral project, Serathin is currently on the run from several werewolves in a dilapidated section of down, and Zen had just finished a bar fight where two of the patrons were werewolves as well."

Alkali cursed under his breath but knew there was nothing he could do about it at the moment. He told his totem to still deliver the message when he could and began to shift his way through several side streets. Already he could feel the presence of any guard he saw as they were constantly aware of his presence, and with his knowledge being limited he wasn't sure how well the pack could communicate telepathically with one another, if at all. At several points he felt like he was being followed as well but when he managed to find a spot to hide in he saw no one looking for him. Despite his paranoia he felt confident after about an hour he managed to shake off anything that might have followed him, as well as gotten far enough away from the inn to be comfortable enough to start to look for a new place to crash...

Several hours later the five sat in angry silence in one of the tunnels that funneled storm water out of the city, the cramped locale seemed even moreso as Zen bandaged up a set of claw marks on his arm and Xander wrapped gauze around a wound in his leg. "Anyone care to explain what in all twelve hells just happened here?" Draggor asked, a thin tongue of magical fire flaring out from his nostrils as he spoke. "One second I'm talking to you two about the possibility of an alpha werewolf in the city and the next second I'm alone and I suddenly get jumped on my way back to the inn room."

"At least you got to have your meeting!" Serathin shouted. "I'm talking to a few guys from a group of bandits that I've been in contact with before when they suddenly go completely feral and start chasing me through half the city! I should have known when they agreed to meet me at their old hangout, they haven't used that place since the city guard raided it a few years ago..."

The group continued to bicker at one another until finally Alkali raised his voice enough that everyone stopped and looked at him. "This isn't solving anything," he started to say once everything had calmed down enough. "Why don't we take a few minutes to breathe and once we've gotten to a better place try to figure out how the hell we're going to leave this place."

The rest of the party agreed and as they separated themselves somewhat to talk Alkali and Xander moved off to an adjacent section of storm drain that would hopefully be out of the others' earshots. "You're thinking what I'm thinking, aren't you," Alkali said with a sigh.

"I highly doubt even if the werewolves were looking for us that they would have been able to not only follow us all from the inn, but have enough time to set us up for these ambushes as well. They knew where Draggor and Serathin were going and would have at least had an idea of my meetings if they knew I was going to see other spies. Zen's not exactly hard to follow and then there's the fact they knew you were still in the room. If that doesn't scream that someone in our group is leaking information to this alpha werewolf, I don't know what does."

"But who?" Alkali asked. "We've all been in the city the same amount of time, only just breaking off to find a means to throw King Pandez off our scent. How could someone have known about, gotten in contact with, and given information to this alpha werewolf in the few hours we've been here?"

The dragon looked off down the tunnel to where the others went, a look of deep contemplation his muzzle before he sighed. "The thief mentioned he had contacts with the bandit party of this city before," he mused. "Draggor also knew of people inside the city before we got here that could have told him this, though the hybrid has more reason to betray us than the demon. Of course if knowing people is the only prerequisite for blaming people I would have to be on the chopping block too, and Zen... I really can't read Zen."

Alkali sighed and scratched his head, both of them in silent contemplation as they listened to the echos of conversation the other three were having. The minutes passed and once it was clear that neither of them were going to have any sudden bursts of inspiration they decided to rejoin with the rest of the group once again. When the five were back together once again they looked around the drainage pipes until they found a flood vault that would not only be private, but also very secure. Even with such an advantageous position they decided to keep a guard posted during the night which upon Xander's recommendation they split into two groups; the dragon sticking with the fox barbarian while the ferret took the second watch with the other two. Eventually the night continued on, though everyone remained ill at ease as they were surrounded by complete darkness...