Prologue – unwilling cellmates

Morning in the coast city of Neverwinter was not proving to be kind to Nala Fennorae. Having spent the previous evening – and the entire night - in the Shamrock tavern, drinking whatever she could get her paws on, the gold-skinned Dragonborn Paladin awoke to a pounding headache coursing through her skull. She found herself on the same table that she had collapsed on earlier. Not a good idea. Her neck hurt, and as Nala slowly got up from the table and stretched her limbs, she could feel herself getting woozy.

'Air. Need fresh air.'

Clumsily, the Dragonborn stood up and waddled to the front door. As she opened it, a bright ray of light pierced her eyes and Nala quickly brought up her hand to shield herself. Right. The light was hurting. That meant that she had drank at least... too much.

As the gold-skinned Paladin grabbed hold of the tavern wall for support, her thoughts dwelled back to the previous night. Her intention had been to gather intel. As much as she could, about a shady figure that had been spotted around town lately. Gathering intel had turned into drinking ale in order to blend in. That had quickly turned into drinking ale for real. And that... well, that ended as usual. With the street shifting under Nala's unsteady feet, and a pounding headache.

'Come on. Walk it off. You're a Paladin, for crying out loud.'

Slowly, the Dragonborn started to walk. The fresh air did help. She was still waddling across the street, mind you, but she was moving. Her head started to clear up a little bit. Enough to become vaguely aware of her surroundings- including a dark, cloaked figure in the alley next to her, disappearing around the corner. Nala's mind instantly sprang back to the reason that she was there in the first place. Was that him? That could very well be him. The Paladin was in doubt only for a split second, after which she decided to follow the figure.

Nala ducked into the alleyway, trying very hard (and failing) not to bump her head on the low roofs around here. The figure was already on the other end, turning right at another corner. She had to speed up, or Nala would lose her. Sluggishly, dragging her still hungover feet, the Dragonborn fell into a jog, closing more distance, turning the corner-

'Why are you following me?!'

She heard the voice before she saw its owner. As Nala blinked furiously to gain sharper vision, the outlines of the person that she had been tailing became clear. She was standing inches away from the Dragonborn, right up in her face. A thick, hairless tail with spikes on the end swished through the air. Two large horns protruded from her forehead, curving back slightly over hair so dark it gave off a blue shine. One horn had a silvery ring wedged around it. It was a Tiefling, and she seemed to be rather pissed off. As she stared the Dragonborn down, Nala noticed that there were no pupils or irises in her eyes. They were grey all over.

'Let me repeat the question,' the Tiefling said, as Nala remained silent. 'Why. Are. You. Following. Me?'

Not who Nala was looking for, then.

'I'm not,' the Dragonborn quickly said, attempting to improvise. 'I, uh, need to ask you some questions.'

A momentary silence fell, and Nala could see the Tiefling sizing her up suspiciously. She realized why – Tieflings were generally a very mistrusted race, and Nala was a Paladin. She probably expected the Dragonborn to try and arrest her.

'What kind of questions?'

'I'm just gathering some information. Have you seen a shady figure skulking around lately?'

For a second, the Tiefling just looked at her, frowning. Then the frown disappeared and was instantly replaced by a broad, if somewhat strange-looking, smile.

'No, darling. To tell you the truth, I'm a newcomer in this city. I haven't been here long enough to notice anything. I have been looking for a good tavern, however. You seem like you know a few good ones. Mind sharing them with me?'

From the corner of her eye, Nala could see another person standing at the end of the alleyway. He was cloaked, and seemed to be chanting something. A priest? The Tiefling was still right up in her face, though, so she ignored the figure and replied to the Tiefling instead.

'Oh, yeah. The Shamrock is great. It's right over there, actually. You must have passed it on your way through. They have excellent ale.'

'I don't doubt that,' the Tiefling said, looking at Nala with a slight smirk on her face. 'Well then, if you don't mind, I'll be back on my-'

At that moment, the world around them went up in flames. A huge explosion sounded to their left, after which both Nala and the Tiefling were knocked off their feet. Pieces of stone and rubble were blown everywhere, hitting Nala in the face as she smashed into the nearest wall. She could feel blood trickling down her neck. If Nala had not been a fire dragon, she would have taken huge damage from the blast. Screams resounded in her ears as she slowly got back up, gazing upon the burning wreckage.

The scene in front of her was nothing less than an inferno. The building on their left had exploded from the inside, blasting the top straight off and sending a huge cloud of black smoke across the streets. Huge, orange flames engulfed what little was left of the structure. It looked like something taken straight out of a disaster painting.

What... had just happened?

Suddenly Nala could feel a hand on her arm. She turned to see the Tiefling, once again very close to her, but this time without the strange smirk on her face. Her sharp ears were folded back on her head, like a cat's, and she had a nervous look in her eyes.

'We need to leave. Now.'
'Wait, what?' Nala reacted.
'I said we need to get out of here!'
'We can't leave! What if there's people in there? We need to help!'

'Think about how this looks, Paladin!' The Tiefling hissed. 'You're a fire-breathing dragon. I'm a Tiefling. And the building next to us just exploded. If guards come running, and they will, who do you think they are going to blame?'

'We'll explain that it wasn't us!' Nala protested, taking a couple of steps towards the burning building. 'I'm a Paladin, they'll understand! We need to check for survivors!'

She could hear the Tiefling let out a curse, in a language that Nala did not understand. She moved away from the Dragonborn, attempting to vanish into the shadows, but it was already too late. As Nala moved towards the burning front door, a dozen city guards came running out of the surrounding smoke. They were all armed to the teeth and in full armour. The men took one look at the burning building, noticed Nala and the Tiefling, and instantly drew their weapons.

'HALT! Do not move, fiends!'

They did not wait for a response. In unison, the guards gathered around the two in a circle and aimed their swords at their throats. The Tiefling hissed. Any escape path had been cut off.

'It wasn't us!' Nala said, turning towards what seemed to be the guard in charge.

'And I'm supposed to believe that, Dragonborn?' The man said in a low voice. He had a small beard and his eyes were furious. 'Do you see anyone else here that could have blown up a building?!'

For a second, Nala was stunned into silence. Then she remembered- there had been someone else! She turned around to point at the other figure that she'd seen, but the street behind her was empty. There was no-one there.

'Bloody animals,' one of the guard growled. 'You're both under arrest!'

'How dare you!' The Tiefling suddenly sneered full of malice. 'Where is your evidence?!'
'There's a building on fire right next to you, you bloody Tiefling! That's all the evidence we need!'

'Oh, because I'm a Tiefling, is that it? That explains everything, doesn't it?! This is one Tiefling that happens to know her rights and I demand that you show me more evidence before taking us in like some rabid beasts!'

Her voice was so venomous and full of hate that some of the guards actually stepped back. But they also raised their swords even higher, and seemed to be seconds away from attacking outright. Nala quickly stepped in front of the Tiefling, digging in her pockets ('HANDS IN THE AIR!') and pulling out her seal for the Order of the Gauntlet – her proof of being a Paladin.

'She speaks the truth. I'm a Paladin, and I give you my word that we had nothing to do with this.'

The leader of the guards squinted his eyes, bending forward a little to take a better look at the seal. He frowned.

'You could have gotten that anywhere. What do you see us for, a bunch of imbeciles?'

'Oh come on, why would we blow up a building?' The Tiefling spoke to him. 'You're smarter than this, Think about it for a second. Why would we make city property explode and then just stand around for the guards to find us? If I really wanted to blow something up, I would frame somebody else for it. Make sure that it could not be traced back to me. I would not just wait right next to the crime until I got arrested!'

Mistrusted or not, the Tiefling had a point. The guards seemed to realize that, too, as some of them looked at their leader in confusion.

'Sir?'

'Look, I get that,' the guard leader responded, lowering his weapon a little. 'But we cannot rule you out as suspects, either. The best thing that you can do now to prove your innocence, is to go with us willingly. If you are innocent, you have nothing to fear, after all.'

'Tell that to the other "innocent" prisoners,' the Tiefling grumbled softly. Nala quickly gave her a elbow-poke to make her shut up. Then she threw her hands in the air, surrendering.

'All right. I am innocent of this crime, but I will yield myself to your authority. My Tiefling friend here will do the same.'

'I most definitely will n-'

'Will that be enough to show our cooperation?,' Nala asked, staring the Tiefling down. She huffed, then followed Nala's lead.

'Fine.'

'Good,' the guard nodded, seemingly relieved. 'I will let the warden know that you cooperated. Take them into custody, men.'

Their weapons were confiscated, and the Tiefling got her hands bound behind her back. They tried to do the same to Nala, but her wrists were too large to fit in the bindings. So they used a rope, like she was a piece of cattle. It was humiliating. Nala clenched her teeth and went along with it. The two were taken away, headed for the Neverwinter prison.

-About 30 minutes later-

'Name?'
'Nala Fennorae. Paladin,' Nala spoke.
'Just your name is enough, dragon. Next.'

They had been escorted to the city prison, a dreary place with hardly any windows. The warden, an elderly-looking man with a bushy moustache, had insisted on placing restraints on the Tiefling's feet, too. She was looking all sorts of venomous now. Then he had taken them to another room, whipped out a piece of paper on a wooden board with a candle stuck to the top, and proceeded to write down their names.

'I said: next.'

'Why should I give you my name?' The Tiefling said defiantly.

'You give me no name, you get no trial assigned to you. You get no trial, you're never getting out of here.'

He looked at her over his wooden board for a moment, then spoke again.
'Name.'
'Ugh, fine. Angelica Dodecahedron.'

That was such a jumble of syllables that Nala was certain that the Tiefling had made it up on the spot. The warden seemed to be thinking the same thing, but did not comment.

'You two, line up there. You move somewhere else, you get the sword. You try to leave the room, you get the sword. You start a fight-'

'Let me guess. We get the sword?' Angelica said sarcastically. It earned her a cranky stare from the warden. They did as he ordered, and moved to the back of the room. Not long after, a door on their right opened and another guard came in, escorting three more prisoners. He was looking rather damaged, and very, very cranky.

'Where's Edward?' the warden asked him. The guard merely shook his head. With his free right hand, he shoved one of the prisoners to move along- a bound, rather scrawny-looking human male.

'Line up.'

The other three joined Nala and Angelica on the other side of the room. As soon as they were all lined up, the warden began to read from his sheet again.

'All right. Let's get on with it, then. Those two – charged with malefic destruction of city property using fire magic.'

A scoff from Angelica, as Nala glanced at the other prisoners that were lined up next to her. She seemed to be the tallest person there.

'That one –poaching on city property and resisting arrest. The deer has been confiscated as evidence.'

An elf with brown hair and green eyes scoffed and rolled with her eyes.

'Stupid humans.'

'Next one- unauthorized trafficking of illegal goods within the city. Confiscated goods include multiple dubious potions-'

'I told you, I was just trading!' The male wizard protested. 'There's nothing harmful about my goods, I swear! I demand to see your captain!'

'You'll see the captain at your trial,' the warden said, ignoring his pleas and moving on to the last person in lineup.

'This one- withholding information, resisting arrest, assault, battery and seriously injuring members of the city guard.'

Nala raised a single eyebrow as she looked down on the tiny, pale half-elf. She did not seem at all capable of the things that the guard just described. In fact, she was not paying attention at all, merely staring at the ceiling.
'That all of them, boss?' the nearest guard asked the warden.
'I believe so. Quiet day, today. Put them all back in the cells. We'll start the trials after that mess in town is taken care of.'
'Yes, sir!'

Once again, a sword was pointed at Nala. It was starting to get old. The guard approached the row of people, gesturing with his head towards the nearest cell.
'Come on, in! All o ye!'
They did not have a choice. Like cattle, the group was herded into the cell, after which the guard locked the door behind them with a loud click. He left them there, and the room grew dark.

As the group of strangers looked at each other, an awkward silence fell. Nala had no idea what kind of people she was dealing with. They were prisoners- half of them could be real criminals. And to make matters worse, she was currently locked in a cell with them. With no place to go if one of them decided to attack.
Then again, she was innocent of any crimes. Maybe that was the case with these people, too.

Carefully, she glanced at the newcomers. The green-eyed elf from before had moved all the way back to the wall, clearly separating herself from the rest of the crowd. An elegant, golden head ornament rested on her brown hair and forehead. If she'd been caught poaching, that probably meant that she was a ranger. She seemed to be your stereotypical elf – a loner, not keen on the company of other races.

Her gaze wandered. In the other corner, Angelica seemed to be looking for cracks in the wall. This one was definitely suspicious. If nothing else, she was at least not the one responsible for blowing up that particular building. Nala had encountered Tieflings before, but still she couldn't help but feel wary of this one. She just seemed… suspicious, and way too smooth of a talker.

Nala turned to look at the only male in the cell. He had auburn coloured hair and eyes, and a pale skin that indicated him probably being a scholarly type. He, too, seemed to be not too interested in interacting with the rest of the prison. Nala wasn't sure what to think of him. The Dragonborn made a mental shrug, and focused on the last prisoner in the cell.

And blinked a couple of times in confusion. The cell was dark, with no windows to shine light inside from- but for a second Nala was sure that the tiny half-elf was glowing. She shook her head – must still be hungover from all that ale. That had to be it. Too much ale and it was messing with her brain. Nala opened her eyes again, focusing a second time. She was the smallest one of the bunch, smaller even than the elf. Her skin was so pale it was almost snowy, and the grey hair made her almost completely colourless. Contradictive to the others, she was looking around the dreary cell with great interest.

'Is this the normal welcoming procedure in human territories?' she asked, still looking at the cell's bars. Angelica stopped searching for weak spots in the wall and snickered.
'Of course not. We're prisoners, awaiting execution now.'
'Trial,' Nala corrected the Tiefling.
'For a Paladin, maybe. I'm not sure if the rest of us will be as fortunate. How long have you all been in here?' she asked, directing the question at the elf and the wizard. The elf looked up, her green eyes gleaming in the torchlight.
'Two weeks.'
'Two weeks?!' Nala replied, startled.
'Yeah. I'm sure that that deer they "confiscated for evidence" has long been eaten by now. I wasn't even on their territory when I started hunting. It's not my fault that the deer decided to run here.'
'Shouldn't have poached so close to the city boundaries, then,' the wizard shrugged. The elf threw him a dirty look. She was clearly not happy with his presence.
That caught the attention of the tiny half-elf in the room. She glanced back and forth between them and then, to everyone's surprise, walked right over to the Tiefling and asked:
'Do those two not like each other?'
'You don't get out much, do you?' Angelica snickered. When the half-elf did not answer, she started to explain, in a loud voice and much to the chagrin of the two people in question.
'You see, elves don't really like anyone that is not their own race. They're stuffy like that.'
Listening to the conversation, Nala once again raised her eyebrows, wondering what kind of strange crew she had gotten herself involved with. The Dragonborn was seriously starting to regret her decision to go out for some fresh air. Add to that her failed information lead, the exploded building and their current predicament...

Yeah. She officially needed a drink.

'Can we leave now?' the pale half-elf suddenly asked, looking at the room behind the iron bars of the cell.
'Good luck with that,' Angelica answered. 'The door is locked, there are no windows, and no weaknesses in the wall that we can exploit to blow the place up. For now, we're stuck here.'
Ignoring Angelica, the half-elf strolled over to the door and inspected the lock. She turned to the wizard.
'We could pour water into the keyhole and freeze it.'
Nala honestly couldn't tell if the half-elf was being serious or sarcastic. At that point, the human wizard walked up to the door as well, shaking his head.
'No. I will freeze the bars. Dragonborn- Nala. When I freeze them, use your paws to break them off.'
'Freeze… the bars?'
'Can you do it, or not?' the wizard spoke to Nala, ignoring the girl standing next to him. The gold-skinned dragonborn looked at him warily.
'Maybe we should stay put, wizard. Breaking out of prison will not improve our chances of being proven innocent.'

He seemed to be in a terrible rush to get out. She wondered why. Nala found herself getting slightly more suspicious of the man. What had his crime been, again? Trafficking illegal goods?
'What is your name?'
'I am Alatar Vermillion, if you must know,' the wizard replied, freeing his hands from the wide sleeves of the cloak that he was wearing. 'And I am leaving this cell, with or without you.'
Without warning, he suddenly raised his arms and targeted the cell bars. A blue ray of frost sprouted forth from his palms. They shot forward and made impact with the bars, freezing parts of them solid. A good chunk of it missed, though, slipping through the bars and spreading all over the far wall instead.
'Help me out here, Dragonborn! It's too late to back out now!'
Cursing under her breath, Nala trudged up to the frozen bars. She did not remember properly agreeing to help Alatar in the first place. In fact, her Paladin honour usually forbade blatant rebellion against the law such as this. But seeing how half the room was frozen over already, she might as well. Nala braced herself and grabbed hold of one of the frozen bars. Her hands started hurting almost immediately. Being a fireblood, she did not have much cold resistance and the icy bars felt very uncomfortable on her scales. She growled, gripped the bar tight and pulled. An awful metallic groan sounded. The bar she was holding bent back, stopped and then broke loose with a loud clang. Nala dropped it on the floor, eager to let go of the frozen bar.

At that very moment, the far door opened and one of the guards walked back in.
'Good news! You'll be happy to know that someone paid… your…'
He just fell silent, gazing at the scene in front of him. The ice smudges on the wall. The frozen bars. The broken piece that was lying on the ground and Nala's guilty face as she quickly tried to scuttle backwards. Alatar's look of complete indifference.

A short silence fell.

After which he shot the group a very, very dirty look.

'You lot are lucky that someone paid your bail. If it were me, I'd leave you in here with the spiders and throw away the key.'
'Did you just say that someone paid our bail?' Angelica asked, suddenly very interested. With the chains rattling around her ankles, she strolled up to the front of the cage. 'Who is it?'
The guard took out a key, turned it in the lock of the cell and swung the door open.
'Go see for yourselves. Out, all of you.'
'Not so fast,' Alatar suddenly said, moving up to the front. 'I want my stuff back.'
'All personal items, safe for your illegal goods, will be returned upon exiting the prison,' the guard frowned. Apparently that was not the answer that Alatar wanted to hear. He walked up even further, getting right up in the guard's face. In a low voice, he growled:
'That's not good enough. I want all of my stuff back, you hear? All. Of. It."
As Nala was standing behind the wizard, she could not see what he was doing. But the guard did. He reflexively took a step backwards and started to stammer:
'E-e-easy now! I'll s-see what I can do. Now leave, please!'
'That's more like it,' Alatar said, seemingly content. He stepped outside, not waiting for the rest of the group to follow suit. They scrambled out after him.

As soon as the group reached the main prison hall, they saw two people: a densely built dwarf with a bushy beard and a tall human with ash-coloured hair. Both were in full armour, and were looking at the group of ragtag prisoners with great interest.

'Ah! You lot look like you'll do nicely,' the human spoke in a content voice. His dwarven companion nodded. The human continued:
'Nice to meet you, adventurers! My name is Sildar Hallwinter. And this is my companion, Gundrin Rockseeker.'
'Why did you pay our bail, human?' the brown-haired elf asked immediately, skipping any pleasantries. 'I don't know either of you.'
The dwarf laughed. He had small dimples on his cheeks, and his eyes were lively and alert.
'Cutting right to the chase, I see! That's rare for an elf. I like this one, Sildar.'
'We'll cut right to the chase, too, then,' Sildar nodded. He sized the group up and down, visibly stopping on Nala and Angelica for a moment. Then he spoke again, picking up where he left off.
'We have a job for you. And we think it's in your best interest to take it, prisoners.'

He put a heavy emphasis on that last word. Nala stiffened at the unspoken threat behind it.

'What kind of job?' Angelica asked. Her tail was swishing back and forth behind her body and she was looking at the pair with interest.
'It's quite simple. We have a wagon full of supplies that needs to be escorted to Phandalin. The roads are not entirely safe lately, so we need a group of capable adventurers like yourselves to guard our goods. Nothing too dangerous, mind you - just a couple of bandits and the like. Nothing that your numbers can't handle.'
'And in return?' Angelica asked with gleaming eyes.
'In return for yer services,' Gundrin added, 'we will assure yer freedom. All charges against ye will be dropped and ye will be free to go. We'll even add in a reward! Ten gold pieces and yer freedom in return for a wagon safely delivered to Phandalin.
What do y'all say?'

Nala looked at the rest of the group. The elf and half-elf seemed to be slightly wary, but Alatar and Angelica were not. Especially the wizard- as he spoke up, Nala could see the unmistakable greed in his eyes.
'I think you could raise that price a little bit,' he spoke confidently.
'I agree,' Angelica nodded. 'It sounds like we'll be placing our necks on the line for you. My neck happens to be worth a little more than a measly ten gold pieces.'
That might have worked, if not for Alatar adding:
'Who says I have to do this job for you, anyway? You already paid my bail. I'm home free. What's stopping me from simply walking out of here?'

At that point, the eyes of the dwarf grew dark. From behind his beard he growled, in a much lower tone than before:
'Either ye deliver those supplies for us and earn yer freedom, or those guards behind ye take ye right back to yer cell and erase yer name from the trial board. And trust me. Ye do not want to have yer name erased from the trial board.'

As he said that, the guards flanking them once again reached for their weapons. As the group was still unarmed and without armour protection, getting into a fight here would be a bad idea. It appeared that they had little choice in the matter.

'All right. We will help you,' the brown-haired elf suddenly said. Alatar turned to her in disbelief, to which she simply shrugged.
'They have paid for our release. We are in their debt. We shall escort that wagon to Phandalin, after which we can all be on our way.'
'With ten extra gold coins,' Angelica added. The elf nodded once.
'With ten extra gold coins.'
'What's yer name, lass?' the dwarf asked, sizing the elf up and down with interest.
'Mialee. Mialee Naïlo.'
'Can we call you Mia?' the pale half-elf asked with a smile. Mialee shot her a single, venomous look.
'No.'
Alatar and Angelica let out a snicker. The dwarf ignored both of them and kept looking at Mialee.
'That's settled, then! Now we'll be ridin' ahead of ye to Phandalin. It should only take a couple o' days to get there. Ye'll get the money upon safely arriving in Phandalin with the wagon.'

That seemed to be the end of the conversation. As Gundrin turned around to leave, Nala quickly stepped forward.

'Wait! When do we leave?'
Sildar let out a smile.
'Now. Good luck.'