We mark our time in the astral. Kenari spends her time smoking. Squick has a ballpark time for Corbus’ arrival, so we just have to be patient. Kenari watches the portal from the other side and as the caravan approaches she sees it in double vision. Lenata thinks Kenari is seeing parallel universes. We stand patiently at a distance from the gate and try to appear non-threatening.

The caravan is 7 wagons. The harnesses are empty – so what exactly is pulling these wagons along? The guards draw a bead on us, but we continue to stand still. One of the carriages opens and a large, bearded man emerges. He’s wearing expensive clothing. He walks over to us with his hands out and empty. The Captain mirrors the gesture and greets him. She asks if can join his caravan. Corbus (for that’s who this is) seems surprised that we are so familiar with his route. The Captain tells him where we want to go and Fyn chimes in.

Kenari is sneaking around the caravan and notices that there is a high percentage of tieflings making up the guard and she catches a whiff of some rancid/highly combustible drugs. The caravan doors are marked with protective runes. Ef Utan mentions later that we probalby could have taken the guards, but there more of them than us so it would have been rough.

Corbus makes it clear that he does not want us to travel with him. He asks us what we want to know and how much the information is worth. Eventually they settle on a price of 2,000 GP and he gives us the details on how and where to access the lattice in the plane of shadows. He draws us a map with all of the details. The caravan pulls off and when they are a good distance away, we head through the portal to the Plane of Shadows with Fyn using the map.

We quickly gain a following of living shadows. The Captain says they are filled with thirst, hunger and rage. Lenata casts a spell which kills a bunch of them and sends the rest fleeing. Fyn sees a spelljammer like shadow off in the distance – but we keep pressing onward.

After about 2 hours of travel – up ahead of us on the path – 2 Illithid appear holding flails. Kenari grabs Fyn and teleports him to the back of the group. One of the Illithid hits Ef Utan three times with his flail. Melchior shoots that one and is immediately mentally attacked. I run ahead and attack – hitting one of them four times and cutting his hamstring. Lenata draws her pistol and shoots one. Kenari shoots the one who was hitting Ef Utan again. Fyn takes Violet from the Captain who then manifests her mind daggers and starts throwing them. One goes down and then does a channel energy before planeshifting away. Melchior shoots the remaining Illithid twice, hitting it once in the eye. It throws a dagger back at Melchior – missing – then planeshifts away. Kenari and Ef Utan look a the dagger on the ground, then each other, then both dive for it! Kenari comes up with it. We start forward again while talking about what kind of deity a mindflayer would worship with a flail.

After some time has passed we finally come to a road laid with glassy, onyx bricks. Lenata decides to talk to the plane. The plane tells her to go left to find the center of the lattice. The bricks will not glow, it will take a fortnight to get to the center – and the City of 7 Seraphs is in the center. Once we hit the road, it seems like our traveling is going faster. Finally.