(Run by Ledaal Catala Eavos (3xp) for Still Waters, Cathak Nerus, and Mnemon Koal.  Koal had to drop out in the middle)

A giant green malfean lens is not an easy thing to keep secret. So Still Waters hasn't bothered. The lens is in a more remote part of the temple grounds, and a hasty pavillion with wards painted on the cloth has been erected around it. Inside, the lens sits balefully, swathed carefully in yet more cloth. Still Waters is shakily distributing tea to himself and Nerus, and trying to coherently explain the situation.

Brother Nerus has not been back in town long, as is apparant by the bundle slung across his back. His prayer mat wrapped around his massive stone Tetsubo and thus, constituing the sum of his worldly possessions He sits crosslegged, shrugging the bundle and huge club in his lap while accepting the tea from Still Waters with a free hand. His monastic brother has his attention, but it is divided as he occasionally looks at the baleful green lens. As if trying to make his mind up about it.

Unfortunately, Greyfalls' least composed monk is not at his best. Apparently there was a blasphemous tapestry, and a man was bisected, and Nuri Ibnahid is behind on his taxes. The relationship between these facts, and their relatio to the pile of charred and green-eyed bodies is not totally clear.

Mnemon Koal meditations simply don't work today. Sitting crosslegged in the main temple unbidden shivers race down his spine as if Pasiap is reaching out and shaking him to get his attention. It's almost like the feeling before a bombardment hits in battle. Eventually, even Koal's patience gives out as all his instincts tell him something wrong is in the direction of the far courtyard.

Mnemon Koal footsteps echo hollowly on the cobblestones like bricks slamming into stone in a marching gate. The monks are aware of his coming long before he arrives.

Still Waters abruptly sits down, only narrowly avoiding splashing tea all over himself. "I'm going to interview the Ibnahid household tomorrow. I'd appreciate a second opinion," he says to Nerus. At the crunching, he very gingerly sets down the tea, and picks up a chakram. "Enter..." his reedy voice requests from inside the pavilion.

Cathak Nerus is utterly lost, but out of very reheresed politeness, Nerus offers a discerning, sympathetic look to brother Still Waters, complete with a furrowed brow that might feign understanding to a less perceptive man. "I see Brother Still Waters. I am slow and ponderous like the earth, perhaps you could start again at the begining so I might absord the details more readily.... I do not understand how Nuri Ibnahid was able to cleave a man in twain with his back taxes....." With a smooth motion he rises to bow towards Mnemon Koal, "Good day my lord." he says calmly. Still balancing a tea cup in one large hand.

Mnemon Koal unhesitantly throws open the flap of the pavilion and enters. He is a prince of the earth and a dragonlord, he doesn't even acknowlege the possible readyness to attack that the monk displays as he himself didn't even bother to bring his goremaul...it's meditation day. His uniform and demeaner are easily recognizable to Still Waters. To Cathak Nerus and Still Waters, a stiff and formal acknowledgement in the proper formal order, "Good day." Clearly is staring at the lens in the background.

Still Waters sets the chakram down like there's nothing unusual about it. "Mnemon Koal," he says, standing to bow. "I- I assume you have concerns about the -" he looks at the lens with a twitch of his neck "- recent incidents? Brother Nerus and I will strive to address them."

Bowing again to Mnemon Koal, Nerus says, "I have heard of your deeds, but I have not had the pleasure of meeting you in person. I am Brother Nerus of the Immaculate Order, at your service. I am afraid I am still trying to get a handle on what has happened, but i will assist how I can."

Mnemon Koal is clearly completely focussed on the lens in the background and the monk may have the odd feeling that he is spending essence...especially if one is earth aspected. "I had heard rumors Brother..." he hesitates "however my concerns are more immediate and drawn from my instincts, I can't explain it other than that. I realize that this is a matter for the Order, but would you please explain this thing to me."

Still Waters gulps in a breath of air. "A Nuri house was holding a celebration in honor of Greyfalls. This device -" he points sharply at the lens "- was unveiled there, and promptly began wreaking havoc." He turns now to point at the unfortunate pair of corpses laid out in the pavillion. "The other casualties are being put to rest by the Vartabed - these are being retained for study only until we can identify the root of this heresy."

Mnemon Koal goes over to study the bodies. He isn't a medic, but the lady Mnemon insists that all her progeny receive some occult training and maybe that will aide him here.

"Have we learned where they got it from? Or did none of them survive the unveiling?" Nerus asks as his gaze floats from the deceased the to evil lens....

Still Waters says, frowning, "The mortals wisely fled the scene. We suspect that the lens was... altered before the presentation, and was not initially manufactured like this." He twitches aside a bit of swathing, and indicates some baleful runes gashed into the surface. "I intend to interview the Nuri household responsible, and proceed from there."

There's some dried blood on the edge of the lens, which looks quite sharp. The bisection mystery is a little less mysterious.

Waters feels a faint stirring of essence as light strikes the lens. Candlelight and sunlight transmute into something else even in the dim pavilion when they flicker off the tiny exposed edge. Indeed, it is almost as if the lens is giving off essence of its own. It is oddly remniscent of a demesne, though not nearly as strong.

Still Waters hastily recovers the lens.

"Do we have the Nuri family in custody..." Nerus words trail off as the two men go to examine the bodies. He looks at the lens for just a moment before asking, "Perhaps we need something more secure to store that lens in. I could create some white jade bands for a trunk or something similar that could hopefully keep it contained better than a tarp might."

Mnemon Koal eyes flicker from the bodies to the lens in alarm. "Something's wrong here, it's been knawing at me all morning. Can't you two feel it there and there." Koal is clearly pointing at the bodies and the lens.

Still Waters nods, and only a little irritation is in his voice. "I think the wrongness of the situation is patently obvious. And yet, I am loath to destroy the lens until we've extracted what information we can from it - or we'll fail to uproot all the corruption responsible for this atrocity, and it will bloom again."

Mnemon Koal pauses and closes his eyes, perfectly still as if listening to something only he can hear. "This is more than it may seem, the presence of this thing is growing stronger over time....what happened to the other bodies?

Still Waters sips at his tea, recovered from the floor of the pavillion. "The Vartabed is overseeing their funeral rites, as I said. And, I've presupposed that the insidious corruption of the lens will only intensify. The temple is best suited to withstand this sort of corruption without imperiling the

"Brother Still Waters... precisely what information do you think can be extricated from such a thing?" Nerus asks calmly. He is not ignorant of the occult but it's knowledge he has always applied towards his craft, and not critical supposition. "I'm all for learning all that we can, but is this thing too dangerous? Should we not consider destroying it?"

Still Waters nods. "I'm rather certain it should be destroyed - however, not learning all we can could prove equally dangerous. But you're right, we should proceed with haste." That said, he centers his Essence and activates the Immaculate Order's technique for percieving spirits.

Nerus reconizes the meditation that is inspired by the humility of the earth dragon. Nerus bows his head, "A wise idea Brother Still Waters." And he bows his head and focuses himself so that he might see the spirits of the temple and those that perhaps crowd around the lens. "I'm afraid that my occult knowledge is not particularly assute when it comes to 'infernal' influence. Reliable information on them is so hard to come by..."

The Dragonblooded's meditations reveal no spirits surrounding the lens. In fact, the area around it is strangely empty of them: The little gods of the grass and the tent and the tea are nowhere to be seen.

Still Waters frowns, the creeping sense of doom prompting a little shiver as he scurries up and starts tracing runes by touch onto the wrapping (with systematic unfaithfulness to avoid inadvertently abetting the malfean cause), occasionally checking a aged sheaf of papers he pulls from a sleeve. To Nerus, he explains, "Remember that Akuma you seized that manse from? I think that contrasting his methods to these symbols may provide some insight into the nature of this blasphemy's creator."

Cathak Nerus eyes get big, obviously Nerus had not thought of that, and despite, his appearance as that of a big lumox, he's usually very perceptive, "That's a very good idea.... I'm afraid I don't know completely if I can remember those markings.... Most of hte texts there Sister Cloud Hands declared heretical and she sent them to a monastery back on the Blessed Isle for study and then destruction...." Nerus draws in a deep breath, "A sorceror had corrupted the manse and used it to study demons.... Most of the spirits there were perversions of the element of wood though..."

The lens is a font of information for your cause. Indeed, you notice two sets of runes carved into it. Eerily, all of the runes in the first set appear to have been carved at the exact same time. No mortal could have done this without the aid of magic or an incredible number of mutant appendages. The second set of runes is more normal, but not entirely. These runes are the ones which praise the Green Sun and Malfeas himself to a lesser extent. Essence enhanced fingers feel the chisel marks, but something about them is not quite right. A flash of insight: Whoever chiseled the second set of runes had six fingers on one hand.

Still Waters nods. "I recall an array of beams, as well, though they seemed to be of no apparent effect." He rustles the sheaf of papers with a sheepish grin. "Cloud Hands didn't, um, get all of the Akuma's documents."

As the runes from the papers are placed upon the wrapping, the lens begins to vibrate. Essence is building within it, a feedback loop that may end poorly if you continue. The tainted manse runes are, in many ways, very similar to the runes around the edge of the lens--they both evoke the essence of the infernal prison, begging some demon or another to tear a hole in Creation through which to shunt said essence.

Still Waters stops copying.

As the lens shakes, the runes on the wrapping twist and howl, glowing green as essence is expended. They are vibrated off the wrapping completely and the shaking subsides.

Cathak Nerus does a double take. "She didn't?" He cannot help but grin and says, "Well.... in this case good... that might serve us very well" He makes his way towards the lense and looks it over carefully. Where Still waters studies the runes and the mystical energies, Nerus starts to look at something.... far more mundane. "Glass is crafted by heating sand and blowin it into a shape. Apparantly there's a sandy bank not far from the Falls that makes some great smokey colored glass. I've a young glass blower that practices at the manse often." Nerus steps back then as lens shake, "Hrm... well that's not good."

Still Waters makes a noise that is best rendered as 'meep', and does a pretty good job of nonchalantly pretending that the dash to hide behind Nerus was an urgent need for more tea once the vibration stops. "I think I'm satisfied. If you could deduce what you could about the manner of its construction, I'd then be happy to destroy it," he says in a shaken voice.

Examing the lens, Nerus notices that it is composed of mundane glass. The glass is known as Dragonfly Soul for it's vibrant green colors. Dragonfly Soul is a rare, expensive type of glass produced in Greyfalls. Coincidentally, the Fadr produce almost all of it.

There is certainly some evil magic about it, but the infernal runes and essence appears to have been layered on after the crafting, not during.

Cathak Nerus rubs his chin and says, "I thought the color looked familar... this Lens is Dragonfly Soul glass. The Fadr are probably the biggest producers of it...." Nerus points out, "So one of hteir craftsman likely made the Lens before it was enchanted.... You did say it was the Fadr who's party this was unvieled at yes?"

Still Waters nods. "I think the most likely scenario is the Fadr thought to make a magnificent lens as their monument - though their exact thought process on that escapes me - and it was then enchanted by malign parties, possibly ones trusted by the Fadr household or manufacturers. What are your thoughts?"

Cathak Nerus hrms, "Well if we consider basic greed as motivation..... is there anyone that stands to gain from the fall of Fadr? Seeing them in trouble with the order might give them the opportunity to take the trade t hey have lost?" Nerus taps his chin slightly, "The infernals often appeal to people's greed and avarice to trick people into making pacts with them, just so they can get free to cause some havok."

Still Waters frowns, and downs the last of the tea in a gulp. "That's another possibility, though the runes suggest it would have taken quite some time to gain the necessary knowledge - if this was revenge, it was certainly long in the planning."

The monk Still Waters remembers his contacts mentioning that the lens has been under construction for two years--It was intended to be finished in three, but Ibnahid ordered more workers and stepped up work in three eight hour shifts a day, rushing it to have it complete by the day it was unveiled.

Still Waters turns to Nerus. "Can you dispose of this safely here, or should we transport it outside the city grounds first?"

You paged Cathak Nerus with 'You don't think it would be safe. With all of the essence leaking out of the lens, you suspect an incorrect move while destroying it could have catastrophic side effects.'.

Cathak Nerus warms his own tea while pouring Still Water's another. Tea helps the thinkin' after all. Palming his own cup he looks to the Lens and studies it intently for a few moments, "I don't think it would be safe to destroy it here no. It would only take the slightest mistake to cause catastrophic side effects. Rather than just one concentrated beam, It might explode and send one in every direction and take a very long while to dissipate.... I would not risk anyone else being close to that thing when it's destroyed if I did not half to, but I think I will need help to destroy. Had Megara not left us I could have used her help. What do you know of this woman named Tsure... I hear she is a craftswoman."

Still Waters frowns. "I met her briefly once. She is in Zuriel's employ, apparently. I could find out more," the spymaster offers, "but I don't know if we have the time. If you trust her, I'll take your word."

Cathak Nerus shakes his head and says, "I really don't know her, but if she is in Zuriel's employ, I should be able to talk him into letting her assist us. Perhaps his wifes medical an occult knowledge might aid us as well." He looks at the lens and sighs, "I'll handle disposing of this thing for you Brother, and Keep it safely at the Blackstone Tower manse until we can do so. That way you can stay focused on tracking whoever built this cursed thing."

Still Waters sighs as well, and looks at the lens, resigned. "We still don't have a good solution for moving it, do we?" So much for keeping sorcerous ability a secret.

Cathak Nerus sighs as he looks it over, "I'm going to have to get some help to contain this thing so we can move it... If Tsure is in Cathak Zuriel's employ she might have access to laborers we can use to help us...."